In the session of 1829 a select committee of assembly, for preparing a
specific plan on which a bill might be founded for promoting classical
education, presented their report, recommending the establishment of a
classical academy in Charlottetown, to be designated the “Central
Academy,” vesting the management in a patron and nine trustees. Two
masters were to be employed, each to receive a salary of one hundred and
fifty pounds a year; and no religious test was to be permitted. A bill
in conformity with these recommendations was accordingly introduced and
sanctioned.
The most important act passed in the session of 1830 was one “for the
relief of His Majesty’s Roman catholic subjects.” The agitation for the
removal of the disabilities under which the Roman catholics suffered in
the old country resulted in catholic emancipation; and the British
government recommended the adoption of similar measures in the colonies,
which recommendation weakened unreasonable opposition to the change. The
act now passed provided that all statutes which imposed on Roman
catholics civil or political disabilities should be repealed, and that
all civil and military offices and places of trust or profit should be
as open to them as to other portions of the King’s subjects.
The agricultural society, which had been for some time in operation in
the island, was active in accomplishing the beneficent purposes for
which it was established: it encouraged improved stock by an annual
exhibition and premiums, and imported seeds. District societies were
formed at Saint Eleanor’s and Princetown. The governor took a practical
interest in the operations of the society, of which the Honorable George
Wright was president; the Honorable T. H. Haviland, vice-president; and
Mr. Peter MacGowan, secretary and treasurer.
In August, 1830, intelligence of the death of King George the Fourth,
which had occurred on the twenty-sixth of June, reached the island. The
reign of His Majesty lasted about ten years and a half; but, including
his regency, he was at the head of the government more than nineteen
years. He was succeeded by William the Fourth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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