161 



troi.* That report, and former documents of the like nature, 

 if perused with even a slight degree of care, would also have 

 prevented him from aspersing the character of our literary in- 

 stitutions and public officers, by the assertion, that in order " to 

 make a parade and draw more money from the state than ought 

 to be drawn," many are returned as students in the academies, 

 " who neither know nor understand any thing beyond read- 

 ing, some writing and arithmetic ;" and that the regents of 



they u inclined" to do so.f 



But if the deficiencies and mistakes already pointed out, ex- 

 cite surprize, what shall we sav of Mr. Macauley's account of 

 the common schools ? His work was published in 1829, and yet 

 he informs us that he is unable to state " with certainty, the 

 number of common schools in the state," for any year later 

 than 1823, and he then gives the aggregate from u Spafford's 

 gazetteer" !J It is almost incredible that any man in this 

 state, with any pretensions to intelligence, could be ignorant, 

 that minute and accurate returns are annually made to the su- 

 perintendent of common schools ; that the results of these re- 

 turns are uniformly stated in the annual messages of the ex- 

 ecutive ; and that copious abstracts are annually reported by 

 the superintendent to the legislature, which are printed in the 

 newspapers and in pamphlets ; and yet it is obvious from the 

 meagreness and the simplicity of Mr. Macauley's statement, 

 that he is such a man. 



Mr. Macauley's work is also defaced, by numerous mis- 

 takes in dates, and in the names of individuals. Many of 

 these are probably to be set down as errors of the press ; but 

 there are others which must have proceeded from the careless- 

 ness of the writer. Thus we are informed, in the list of per- 

 sons who have administered the government of the colony and 

 state of New-York, that Governor Clinton died on the ninth 

 instead of the eleventh of February, 1828 ; and that the go- 

 vernment then devolved on Joshua Pitcher, lieutenant-gov- 

 ernor of the state. In the same list, there are several impor- 

 tant errors in dates, and six instances in which the names of 

 persons who have administered the government are misspelt. 



