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To the Honourable the General Assembly of Nova Scotia now convened at Halifax.

      The Petition of the Reverend Robert Willis, D.D., Rector of St. Paul's Church in behalf of the Coloured People of Halifax.

      That your Petitioner in presenting this his fifth Petition on behalf of the African School respectfully tenders the expression of his gratitude for the kind notice and support which the Institution has received from your Honorable Assembly.

      That although the School has laboured under many and great disadvantages from the want of a proper school — house (which would have been erected in the course of last Autumn if carpenter's labour had not been monopolized by the building of the Hotel:) the benefits of a sound, religious, moral and intellectual education are abundantly manifest in the children and have been by them indirectly conveyed to their parents.

      That this amelioration of the general condition of the people of colour in this town must be evident to any one conversant with their history.

      That the advancement which the children have made in every branch of knowledge in which they have been instructed, and their great improvement in the whole tenor of their conduct and deportment refute the opinion which was too commonly entertained, that there prevailed amongst them a peculiar want of moral principle, and a natural deficiency of mental power.

      That from the opening of the school (every system of education tending to produce emulation having been rejected) no bad or unkind feelings have been generated in the children; and that consequently their acquirements will not disqualify them for the performance of their duty in any state of life in which it may please God to place them.

      That the master has voluntarily taken upon himself to instruct the most proficient amongst the boys (who were well acquainted with the common rules of arithmetic) in Geometry