874 HISTORY OF BROOKLYN.

special acts relating to Brooklyn; the board to present annually to the common council an estimate of money required for the support, purchase of sites, and for the building of schools, etc., during the ensuing year; and the common council determines what sums shall be raised for such purposes, in addition to the amount already required by law, in order to entitle the city to its distributive share of the state school money.

In February, 1862, an act was passed by the legislature, amendatory of that of 1850, by which the appointments necessary for the filling of vacancies occurring in the board, were given to the mayor of the city, subject to the approval of the common council.

The Town of Bushwick and Village of Williamsburg.

The educational advantages of Bushwick in the olden time were probably, from its peculiarly isolated position and the smaller admixture of the Yankee element in its population, even more limited than those of Brooklyn and Flatbush. There was, indeed, the old school, at Bushwick Corners, present junction of Bushwick avenue and North Second street, where Governor Stuyvesant, in 1661, established the original town plot, and where Boudwyn Manout, from Crimpen op Lock, was installed teacher, chorister, and handy Jack-of-all-work, very much as old DeBevoise was in Brooklyn, as previously narrated. There was also, the Wallabout school, which we mentioned in our previous article; and some of the children in the Wallabout district availed themselves of the tuition furnished at the Bedford school, in Brooklyn. Then, too, Bushwick, although farther removed from New York city, was not altogether overlooked by the traveling Yankee pedagogues, who went roaming around in Dutchland, and who manifested a wonderfully keen appreciation of the home comforts of the quiet old Dutch farm houses, an appreciation which not infrequently took the shape of a permanent attachment to the daughter of the household, and a consequent retirement from the ranks of instructors into the more pleasant walks of domestic life. Of such, perhaps, was Peter Witherspoon, who “notifies the public,” through the columns of Rivington’s Gazette, in 1778, “that he intends to teach a small number of Greek and Latin scholars, not exceeding six or eight, at Bushwick, with due attention to education and morals.” From Gaine’s newspaper, in 1779, we learn that an equally adventurous teacher, the “Rev. Mr. Foley, has opened an academy at Aram, in Bushwick, for the reception of young gentlemen, to be instructed in Greek, Latin, and the English tongue, grammatically. Would be willing to accommodate a few young gentlemen with board.”