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��EDUCATION IN HOPKINTON.
��classics, " Liber Primus," containing the first chapters of the Book of Genesis for translation from Latin into English; "Se- lecta Profanis," and Virgil : and perhaps others.
For illustration in geography, there were globes and atlasses, but there were no further means of illustration except a slate, pencil and ruler. The reading books were classical and choice in their selections. Geography was sometimes taught as reading lessons. Most of the English text books had many good fea- tures, but inferior in numerous respects to some of recent times. A curious fea- ture was sometimes introduced into arith- metics, in the form of riddles or uniquely stated questions. We once saw an an- cient arithmetic which offered in all grav- ity this problem:
As I was going to St. Ives
I met seven wives ;
Each wjl'e had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cats had seven kits ;
Kits, cats, sacks and wives,
How many were going to St. Ives ?
We have no doubt many boys and girls may have ciphered long and hard over this problem, trying to develop the sum of a series of a geometrical progression, without once noticing the main point, that there could possibly be but one indi- vidual going to St. Ives, since the long array of kits, cats, sacks and wives were coming from St. Ives, and of course go- ing the other way.
In a somewhat ancient arithmetic is found the following mathematically con- sistent problem :
If one pound ten and forty groats,
Will buy a load of hay, How many pounds with nineteen crowns,
For twenty loads will pay?
Also this, more stately in its diction :
After an old man's death, in gold was found, Left to his family, eight thousand pounds ; To be bestowed as his last will directed, Which did provide that none should be neglected; For to each son, there being in number five, Three times each daughter's portion he did give ; The daughters each were also to receive Double the sum he to their mother gave ; His daughters, all in number, were just four, Their gold in weight eight times their mother's
store : Now, that this will may justly be fulfilled, What must the widow have and what each child?
HOPKINTON ACADEMY.
This institution, which attained to a widely extended and honorable celebrity, was principally founded by Dr. Ebenezer
��Lerned, a native of Medford, Mass., a graduate of the academical department of Harvard College and of the medical department of Dartmouth, who came to this town in 1793 or 1794, from Leomin- ster, Mass., where he had been teaching school about a year. Through his dom- inant exertions a preliminary meeting was held on September 11, 1826. of which gathering James Stark was made Moder- ator, and Philip Brown, Clerk. After de- liberation. Rev. Roger C. Hatch, Rev. Michael Carlton and Horace Chase were chosen a committee to secure subscrip- tions to the enterprise. To this commit- tee Abram Brown, Parker Pearson and Philip Brown were added. A contribu- tion of five dollars was to make one qual- ified to vote for officers. On the 24th of February, 1827, the movement had at- tained such proportions as to warrant the selection of a committee to report a plan of organization. Ebenezer Lerned, James Stark, Stephen Darling, Stephen Sibley and Abram Brown were chosen. They reported on the 3d of the following March. Their plan was accepted, and Ebenezer Lerned, Philip Brown and Stephen Sibley were selected to procure a preceptor. Permanent organization was effected two weeks later, as follows : Trustees — Ebenezer Lerned, President: Abram Brown, Stephen Sibley, Mat- thew Harvey, Phineas Clough, Roger C. Hatch, Michael Carlton. On the 23d of March it was determined to fit up the Court House with the consent of the Se- lectmen.
School began the spring of the same year, under an arrangement admitting of four terms of twelve weeks each per year. The hours of study for the first term, opening the first Wednesday in May, were prescribed to be from 8 A. M. to 12 M., and from 1 to 5p.m.: other terms were left to the discretion of the trustees. There were to be reviews once a week.
The act of incorporation was approved June 26 of the same year. In due time improvements were made in the upper story of the Court House. This building had practically ceased to be the property of either Hillsborough or Merrimack Counties; especially as the courts of the
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