FOR COMMON SCHOOLS AND ACADEMIES. THE following testimonials relating to the merits of the "ELEMENTS OF RHETORIC AND LITERARY CRITICISM," by J. R. Boyd, A.M., Principal of Black River L. and R. Institute, are from gentlemen long engaged in the business of instruction, or occupied in superintending the management of schools, and may therefore be relied upon as worthy of confidence. The following notice is from T. ROMEYN BECK, LL.D., Principal of the Albany Academy, and from Prof. P. BULLIONS, D.D., connected with the same institution. Albany, July 31, 1844. The Rev. James R. Boyd, Principal of the Literary and Scientific Institute at Watertown, Jefferson county, has now for several years conducted that institution with ability and success. He has necessarily become acquainted with the numerous text-books in use, and it has occurred to him that an improvement might be made on those in common use for instructing in English Composition and Rhetoric. He has prepared a work from those of Reid and Connel, with numerous emendations and additions from his own pen, and we have no doubt, from a general examination of its contents, that it is deserving of publication, and that its introduction will prove useful both in academies and common schools. (Signed) T. ROMEYN BECK, Communication from S. S. RANDALL, Esq., Deputy Superintendent of Common Schools of the State of New-York. Secretary's Office, Department of Common Schools, Albany, August 2, 1844. Having examined the manuscript sheets of the Rev. Mr. Boyd's proposed publication on the "Elements of Rhetoric and Literary Criticism," I am free to express the high gratification it has afforded me, not only as a work admirably adapted to the purpose for which it seems specially to have been designed, a text-book in rhetoric for the use of our common schools, but also as a valuable and tasteful compilation of specimens of the great masters both in prose and poetry, at home and abroad. As a text-book in our elementary as well as higher institutions of public instruction, it is, in my judgment, unsurpassed by any of its predecessors; indeed, I am not aware of the existence of any elementary work upon the same plan; and I shall regard its publication at this time as a valuable contribution to the cause popular education, no less than to the interests of a sound literary taste S. S. RANDALL, Dept. Supt. Com. Schools (Signed) |