Εικόνες σελίδας
PDF
Ηλεκτρ. έκδοση

"How was it, how was it?" asked a dozen eager voices

at once.

[ocr errors]

"I'll tell ye,” replied the boy, lowering his voice, and assuming a look of awe, as he thought of what he was about to relate. "They took him—that is, his father and the masterthey took him last night here to the school-house — only think of that, all alone in the night!—and then the master gave him, I do spose, one of the terriblest hidings that ever was heard of."

"What! right afore his father?" exclaimed several of the older boys, evidently surprised and disconcerted to hear of this new mode of punishment, which might soon be adopted in their own cases.

"Yes," replied the former, "and then kept him half the night, forzino, talking to him like a minister, till he most cried himself to death, they said. How awful! wa'nt it, now?"

"Why, I rather he'd a killed me," responded one of the former, in which he seemed to be joined by both old and young; all of whom, for different reasons, saw much to dislike and dread in the picture.

"Well, I give in beat," observed the young bully, who, as before intimated, was meditating resistance to the punishment in question; "somehow, I can't get the hang of this new master. He does every thing so different from what a fellow is looking for; and I have about concluded we may as well mind our own business, and let him alone."

"So, Mike, you have come to my opinion at last, have you?" said Tom Bunker, who had been listening in silence. "Now I have said but little about this affair, from first to last; and if you had had a chance to go on with the shine you was thinking of, I can't say what part I should have taken, if the master had needed help; but I want to tell you I think he has used us all like a gentleman, and I would fight for him. And now, Mike, what do you say to backing him

up in keeping order, and using him as he wants to use us, for the rest of the winter?"

"That is what I have been thinking of myself - I am agreed," answered Mike.

"Well, then, boys," rejoined Tom, "let us all hands now into the house for our books; and the one that learns the most, and behaves the best, shall be the best fellow."

The crisis had passed. In the defeat of this last and impotent attempt to break down the authority of our schoolmaster, his triumph was completed. All seemed to understand this; and, for the remainder of the season, no school could have been more distinguished for good order and obedience.

All troubles in regard to government being now at an end, and no others being anticipated by Locke, he urged his pupils forward in their studies with all the incitements he could command. But even this may sometimes, perhaps, be carried too far. At all events, he was accused of so doing, in connection with an event which soon occurred, and which came near breaking up his school. But the relation of this unexpected and painful incident, we will reserve for a new chapter.

CHAPTER V.

"So swift the ill-of such mysterious kind,
That fear with pity mingled in each mind.""

CRABBE.

Ir was near the middle of the dark and dreary season which characterizes our northern clime. Old Winter had taken his January nap. And having protracted longer than usual his cold, sweaty slumbers, he had now, as if to make amends for his remissness, aroused himself with a rage and fury which seemed to show his determination to expel the last vestige of his antagonistic element, heat, that had thus invaded and for a while disarmed him, for ever from his dominions. The whole season, indeed, to drop the metaphorical for plain language, had been one of uncommon mildness. A warm and broken December had been succeeded by a still warmer and more thawy January. And so little had people been made aware of the presence of winter thus far, that their doors were often left open, and small fires only were either used or required. But the cold weather now set in with intense severity, and compelled all to keep tightly closed doors and roaring fires.

The school-house, which we have been for some time making the scene of action, had been built the preceding fall; and the interior, consequently, had been freshly plastered; while the wood-work of the doors and windows, already tight before from its newness, had been swollen by the recent thawy weather; so that the whole room, by this, and the finishing operation of the frost in closing up the remaining

interstices, had been made almost wholly impervious to the admission of any fresh air from without. From this, however, no evil consequences, owing to the mildness of the season, and the attendant circumstances we have mentioned, had resulted to the school. But scarcely a week had elapsed, after the change of weather just described, before the scholars, though apparently much enjoying the contrasted comforts of their tight, stove-heated room, while the cold, savage blasts could be heard raging and howling without, became very visibly affected. A livid paleness overspread their features; while their every appearance and movement indicated great and increasing languor and feebleness. The general health of the school, in short, including that of the master, seemed to be rapidly failing. These indications were soon followed by several instances of so great illness as to confine its victims to their homes, and even to their beds. Among the latter was the case of the only son and child of a poor, but pious and intelligent widow, by the name of Marvin, which excited in the bosom of Locke feelings of the deepest sorrow for the misfortune of the boy, and sympathy in the affliction of his doating parent. And it was not without reason that both teacher and parent were touched with peculiar grief on the occasion; for the boy, who was about ten years old, was not only kind and amiable in disposition, but a very excellent scholar. And now, almost for the first time, having the advantages of good instruction, and his ambition. and natural love of learning having been kindled into enthusiasm by the various incitements held out to him by his instructor, with whom he had become a secret favorite, he pursued his studies with an ardor and assiduity which knew no relaxation. And having made surprising progress in grammar, during the few weeks the school had kept, he had recently solicited and obtained leave to commence arithmetic, to which he was giving his whole heart and soul, when he

was thus snatched from his engrossing pursuit by the hand of sickness.

These cases of sickness, and especially the more serious one of the good and studious little Henry, the boy we have particularized, produced much sensation in the neighborhood. And the cause, not only of these instances of absolute illness, but of the altered and sickly appearance of the whole school, which now excited observation and uneasiness, began to be generally discussed. As no epidemic was prevailing in the country, and as all other schools in the vicinity, as far as could be heard from, were even unusually healthy, it was soon concluded that the present unhealthiness must be occasioned by something wrong about the school-house, or in the manner of conducting the school. And as nothing amiss could possibly be perceived in the school-house, which all pronounced warm and comfortable, it was settled that the fault, of course, must be looked for in the master. Some averred that the latter, by undue severity, or by some other means, had broken down the spirit of his scholars, which had caused them to become melancholy, drooping, and sickly. Others said that he had made the scholars study so hard, that it had caused their health to give way under the tasks which they were induced, through fear, or some mysterious influence he had obtained over their minds, to perform. And there were yet others who carried still farther the idea thrown out by those last named, and contended that the master must have resorted to some unlawful art or power, which he had exercised upon his pupils, not only to subjugate them, but somehow to give them an unnatural thirst for their studies, and as unnatural a power of mastering them. In proof of this, one man cited the instance of his son, who, having become half-crazed on his arithmetic, and having worked all one evening on a sum which he could not do, went to bed, leaving his slate upon the table, but rose some time in the

« ΠροηγούμενηΣυνέχεια »