Schools. Scholars. 2 Wolmer’s, 527 3 National, 1136 3 Mico, 590 1 Baptist, 250 1 Jamaica Union, 120 31 Gentlemen’s private, 1137 59 Ladies’ do. 1339 9 Sunday, 1108 By itinerant teachers and children. 1500 —— —— 109 Total, 7707
1837. Schools. Scholars. 2 Wolmer’s, 502 3 National, 1238 4 Mico, 611 1 Baptist 260 1 Jamaica Union, 200 34 Gentlemen’s private, 1476 63 Ladies’ do. 1525 10 Sunday, 1316 By itinerant teachers and children, 1625 —— —— 118 Total, 8753
We also visited the Union school, which has been established for some years in Kingston. All the children connected with it, about one hundred and fifty, are, with two exceptions, black or colored. The school is conducted generally on the Lancasterian plan. We examined several of the boys in arithmetic. We put a variety of questions to them, to be worked out on the slate, and the reasons of the process to be explained as they went along; all which they executed with great expertness. There was a jet black boy, whom we selected for a special trial. We commenced with the simple rules, and went through them one by one, together with the compound rules and Reduction, to Practice, propounding questions and examples in each of them, which were entirely new to him, and to all of them he gave prompt and correct replies. He was only thirteen years old, and we can aver we never saw a boy of that age in any of our common schools, that exhibited a fuller and clearer knowledge of the science of numbers.
In general, our opinion of this school was similar to that already expressed concerning the others. It is supported by the pupils, aided by six hundred dollars granted by the assembly.
In connection with this subject, there is one fact of much interest. However strong and exclusive was the prejudice of color a few years since in the schools of Jamaica, we could not, during our stay in that island, learn of more than two or three places of education, and those private ones, from which colored children were excluded, and among the numerous schools in Kingston, there is not one of this kind.