and even in villages with a population of three or four thousand, it is
desirable to establish at least three grades of schools, viz., first,
the primary, for the smallest children; second, the intermediate, for
those more advanced; and, third, a central high school, for scholars
that have passed through the primary and intermediate schools. While
this arrangement is favorable to the better classification of the
scholars of a village or city, and holds out an inducement to those of
the lowest and middle grade of schools to perfect themselves in the
various branches of study that are pursued in them respectively as the
condition upon which they are permitted to enter a higher grade, it
also allows a more perfect adjustment of the seats and desks to the
various requirements of the children in their passage through the grade
of schools.

NEW YORK FREE ACADEMY.--In the public schools of the city of New York,
two hundred in number, six hundred teachers are employed, and one
hundred thousand children annually receive instruction. The Free
Academy, which is a public school of the highest grade, and which is
represented in our frontispiece, was established by the Board of
Education in 1847. The expense of the building, without the furniture,
was $46,000, and the annual expense for the salaries of professors and
teachers is about $10,000. Out of twenty-four thousand votes cast,
twenty thousand were for the establishment of this institution, in which
essentially a complete collegiate education may be obtained. No students
are admitted to it who have not attended the public schools of the city
for at least one full year, nor these until they have undergone a
thorough examination and proved themselves worthy. Its influence is not
confined to the one hundred or one hundred and fifty scholars who may
graduate from it annually, but leaches and stimulates the six hundred
teachers, and the hundred thousand children whom they instruct, and thus
elevates the common schools of the city _in reality_ not only, but
places them much more favorably before the public than they otherwise
could be.

Smaller cities, and especially villages with a population of but a few
thousand, can not, of course, maintain so extended a system of public
schools; but they can accomplish essentially the same thing more
perfectly, though on a smaller scale. For the benefit of districts in
the country and in villages, I will here insert a few plans of
school-houses