Glengarry Schooldays

R >> Ralph Connor >> Glengarry Schooldays


A swift, shamed glance round, and his eyes rested on her face. That
face was sweet and grave as she leaned toward him, and said, "Thank you,
Thomas. That was well done." And Thomas, still looking at her, flushed
to his hair roots and down the back of his neck, while the scowl on his
forehead faded into a frown, and then into smoothness.

"And if you always try your best like that, Thomas, you will be a great
and good man some day."

Her voice was low and soft, as if intended for him alone, but in the
sudden silence that followed the laughter it thrilled to every heart in
the room, and Thomas was surprised to find himself trying to swallow a
lump in his throat, and to keep his eyes from blinking; and in his face,
stolid and heavy, a new expression was struggling for utterance. "Here,
take me," it said; "all that I have is thine," and later days brought
the opportunity to prove it.

The rest of the reading lesson passed without incident. Indeed, there
pervaded the whole school that feeling of reaction which always succeeds
an emotional climax. The master decided to omit the geography and
grammar classes, which should have immediately followed, and have dinner
at once, and so allow both children and visitors time to recover tone
for the spelling and arithmetic of the afternoon.

The dinner was an elaborate and appalling variety of pies and cakes,
served by the big girls and their sisters, who had recently left
school, and who consequently bore themselves with all proper dignity and
importance. Two of the boys passed round a pail of water and a tin cup,
that all the thirsty might drink. From hand to hand, and from lip to
lip the cup passed, with a fine contempt of microbes. The only point
of etiquette insisted upon was that no "leavings" should be allowed to
remain in the cup or thrown back into the pail, but should be carefully
flung upon the floor.

There had been examination feasts in pre-historic days in the Twentieth
school, when the boys indulged in free fights at long range, using as
missiles remnants of pie crust and cake, whose consistency rendered them
deadly enough to "bloody" a nose or black an eye. But these barbaric
encounters ceased with Archie Munro's advent, and now the boys vied with
each other in "minding their manners." Not only was there no snatching
of food or exhibition of greediness, but there was a severe repression
of any apparent eagerness for the tempting dainties, lest it should be
suspected that such were unusual at home. Even the little boys felt that
it would be bad manners to take a second piece of cake or pie unless
specially pressed; but their eager, bulging eyes revealed only too
plainly their heart's desire, and the kindly waiters knew their duty
sufficiently to urge a second, third, and fourth supply of the toothsome
currant or berry pie, the solid fruit cake, or the oily doughnut, till
the point was reached where desire failed.

"Have some more, Jimmie. Have a doughnut," said the master, who had been
admiring Jimmie's gastronomic achievements.

"He's had ten a'ready," shouted little Aleck Sinclair, Jimmie's special
confidant.

Jimmie smiled in conscious pride, but remained silent.

"What! eaten ten doughnuts?" asked the master, feigning alarm.

"He's got four in his pocket, too," said Aleck, in triumph.

"He's got a pie in his own pocket," retorted Jimmie, driven to
retaliate.

"A pie!" exclaimed the master. "Better take it out. A pocket's not the
best place for a pie. Why don't you eat it, Aleck?"

"I can't," lamented Aleck. "I'm full up."

"He said he's nearly busted," said Jimmie, anxiously. "He's got a
pain here," pointing to his left eye. The bigger boys and some of the
visitors who had gathered round shouted with laughter.

"Oh, pshaw, Aleck!" said the master, encouragingly, "that's all right.
As long as the pain is as high up as your eye you'll recover. I tell you
what, put your pie down on the desk here, Jimmie will take care of it,
and run down to the gate and tell Don I want him."

Aleck, with great care and considerable difficulty, extracted from his
pocket a segment of black currant pie, hopelessly battered, but still
intact. He regarded it fondly for a moment or two, and then, with a very
dubious look at Jimmie, ran away on his errand for the master.

It took him some little time to find Don, and meanwhile the master's
attention was drawn away by his duty to the visitors. The pie left to
Jimmie's care had an unfortunately tempting fringe of loose pieces about
it that marred its symmetry. Jimmie proceeded to trim it into shape. So
absorbed did he become in this trimming process, that before he realized
what he was about, he woke suddenly to the startling fact that the pie
had shrunk into a comparatively insignificant size. It would be worse
than useless to save the mutilated remains for Aleck; there was nothing
for it now but to get the reproachful remnant out of the way. He was
so busily occupied with this praiseworthy proceeding that he failed to
notice Aleck enter the room, flushed with his race, eager and once more
empty.

Arriving at his seat, he came upon Jimmie engaged in devouring the pie
left in his charge. With a cry of dismay and rage he flung himself upon
the little gourmand, and after a short struggle, secured the precious
pie; but alas, bereft of its most delicious part--it was picked clean
of its currants. For a moment he gazed, grief-stricken, at the leathery,
viscous remnant in his hand. Then, with a wrathful exclamation, "Here,
then, you can just take it then, you big pig, you!" He seized Jimmie by
the neck, and jammed the sticky pie crust on his face, where it stuck
like an adhesive plaster. Jimmie, taken by surprise, and rendered
nerveless by the pangs of an accusing conscience, made no resistance,
but set up a howl that attracted the attention of the master and the
whole company.

"Why, Jimmie!" exclaimed the master, removing the doughy mixture from
the little lad's face, "what on earth are you trying to do? What is
wrong, Aleck?"

"He ate my pie," said Aleck, defiantly.

"Ate it? Well, apparently not. But never mind, Aleck, we shall get you
another pie."

"There isn't any more," said Aleck, mournfully; "that was the last
piece."

"Oh, well, we shall find something else just as good," said the master,
going off after one of the big girls; and returning with a doughnut
and a peculiarly deadly looking piece of fruit cake, he succeeded in
comforting the disappointed and still indignant Aleck.

The afternoon was given to the more serious part of the school
work--writing, arithmetic, and spelling, while, for those whose
ambitions extended beyond the limits of the public school, the master
had begun a Euclid class, which was at once his despair and his
pride. In the Twentieth school of that date there was no waste of the
children's time in foolish and fantastic branches of study, in showy
exercises and accomplishments, whose display was at once ruinous to
the nerves of the visitors, and to the self-respect and modesty of
the children. The ideal of the school was to fit the children for the
struggle into which their lives would thrust them, so that the boy who
could spell and read and cipher was supposed to be ready for his life
work. Those whose ambition led them into the subtleties of Euclid's
problems and theorems were supposed to be in preparation for somewhat
higher spheres of life.

Through the various classes of arithmetic the examination proceeded, the
little ones struggling with great seriousness through their addition
and subtraction sums, and being wrought up to the highest pitch of
excitement by their contest for the first place. By the time the fifth
class was reached, the air was heavy with the feeling of battle. Indeed,
it was amazing to note how the master had succeeded in arousing in the
whole school an intense spirit of emulation. From little Johnnie Aird up
to Thomas Finch, the pupils carried the hearts of soldiers.

Through fractions, the "Rule of Three," percentages, and stocks, the
senior class swept with a trail of glory. In vain old Peter MacRae
strewed their path with his favorite posers. The brilliant achievements
of the class seemed to sink him deeper and deeper into the gloom of
discontent, while the master, the minister and his wife, as well as
the visitors, could not conceal their delight. As a last resort the old
dominie sought to stem their victorious career with his famous problem
in Practice, and to his huge enjoyment, one after another of the class
had to acknowledge defeat. The truth was, the master had passed lightly
over this rule in the arithmetic, considering the solution of problems
by the method of Practice as a little antiquated, and hardly worthy of
much study. The failure of the class, however, brought the dominie his
hour of triumph, and so complete had been the success of the examination
that the master was abundantly willing that he should enjoy it.

Then followed the judging of the copy-books. The best and cleanest book
in each class was given the proud distinction of a testimonial written
upon the first blank page, with the date of the examination and the
signatures of the examiners attached. It was afterwards borne home in
triumph by the happy owner, to be stored among the family archives,
and perhaps among the sacred things that mothers keep in their holy of
holies.

After the copy-books had been duly appraised, there followed an hour
in which the excitement of the day reached its highest mark. The whole
school, with such of the visitors as could be persuaded to join, were
ranged in opposing ranks in the deadly conflict of a spelling-match. The
master, the teacher from the Sixteenth, and even the minister's wife,
yielded to the tremendous pressure of public demand that they should
enter the fray. The contest had a most dramatic finish, and it was felt
that the extreme possibility of enthusiasm and excitement was reached
when the minister's wife spelled down the teacher from the Sixteenth,
who every one knew, was the champion speller of all the country that lay
toward the Front, and had a special private armory of deadly missiles
laid up against just such a conflict as this. The tumultuous triumph
of the children was not to be controlled. Again and again they followed
Hughie in wild yells, not only because his mother was a great favorite
with them all, but because she had wrested a victory from the champion
of the Front, for the Front, in all matters pertaining to culture and
fashion, thought itself quite superior to the more backwoods country of
the Twentieth.

It was with no small difficulty that the master brought the school to
such a degree of order that the closing speeches could be received with
becoming respect and attention. The trustees, according to custom, were
invited to express their opinion upon the examination, and upon school
matters generally. The chairman, John Cameron, "Long John," as he was
called, broke the ice after much persuasion, and slowly rising from
the desk into which he had compressed his long, lank form, he made his
speech. Long John was a great admirer of the master, but for all that,
and perhaps because of that, he allowed himself no warmer words of
commendation than that he was well pleased with the way in which
the children had conducted themselves. "They have done credit to
themselves," he said, "and to their teacher. And indeed I am sorry he is
leaving us, for, so far, I have heard no complaints in the Section."

The other trustees followed in the path thus blazed out for them by Long
John. They were all well pleased with the examination, and they were
all sorry to lose the master, and they had heard no complaints. It
was perfectly understood that no words of praise could add to the high
testimony that they "had heard no complaints."

The dominie's speech was a little more elaborate. Somewhat reluctantly
he acknowledged that the school had acquitted itself with "very
considerable credit," especially the "arith-MET-ic" class, and indeed,
considering all the circumstances, Mr. Munro was to be congratulated
upon the results of his work in the Section. But the minister's warm
expression of delight at the day's proceedings, and of regret at the
departure of the master, more than atoned for the trustees' cautious
testimony, and the dominie's somewhat grudging praise.

Then came the moment of the day. A great stillness fell upon the school
as the master rose to make his farewell speech. But before he could
say a word, up from their seats walked Betsy Dan and Thomas Finch,
and ranged themselves before him. The whole assemblage tingled with
suppressed excitement. The great secret with which they had been
burdening themselves for the past few weeks was now to be out. Slowly
Thomas extracted the manuscript from his trousers pocket, and smoothed
out its many folds, while Betsy Dan waited nervously in the rear.

"Oh, why did they set Thomas to this?" whispered the minister's wife,
who had a profound sense of humor. The truth was, the choice of the
school had fallen upon Ranald and Margaret Aird. Margaret was quite
willing to act, but Ranald refused point-blank, and privately persuaded
Thomas to accept the honor in his stead. To this Thomas agreed, all the
more readily that Margaret, whom he adored from a respectful distance,
was to be his partner. But Margaret, who would gladly have been
associated with Ranald, on the suggestion that Thomas should take his
place, put up her lower lip in that symbol of scorn so effective with
girls, but which no boy has ever yet accomplished, and declared that
indeed, and she would see that Tom Finch far enough, which plainly
meant "no." Consequently they had to fall back upon Betsy Dan, who, in
addition to being excessively nervous, was extremely good-natured.
And Thomas, though he would greatly have preferred Margaret as his
assistant, was quite ready to accept Betsy Dan.

The interval of waiting while Thomas deliberately smoothed out the
creases of the paper was exceedingly hard upon Betsy Dan, whose face
grew redder each moment. Jimmie Cameron, too, who realized that the
occasion was one of unusual solemnity, was gazing at Thomas with
intense interest growing into amusement, and was holding his fingers
in readiness to seize his nose, and so check any explosion of snickers.
Just as Thomas had got the last fold of his paper straightened out, and
was turning it right end up, it somehow slipped through his fingers to
the floor. This was too much for Jimmie, who only saved himself from
utter disgrace by promptly seizing his nose and holding on for dear
life. Thomas gave Jimmie a passing glare and straightened himself up
for his work. With a furious frown he cleared his throat and began in
a solemn, deep-toned roar, "Dear teacher, learning with regret that you
are about to sever your connection," etc., etc. All went well until
he came to the words, "We beg you to accept this gift, not for its
intrinsic value," etc., which was the cue for Betsy Dan. But Betsy Dan
was engaged in terrorizing Jimmie, and failed to come in, till, after an
awful pause, Thomas gave her a sharp nudge, and whispered audibly, "Give
it to him, you gowk." Poor Betsy Dan, in sudden confusion, whipped her
hand out from under her apron, and thrusting a box at the master, said
hurriedly, "Here it is, sir." As Thomas solemnly concluded his address,
a smile ran round the room, while Jimmie doubled himself up in his
efforts to suppress a tempest of snickers.

The master, however, seemed to see nothing humorous in the situation,
but bowing gravely to Thomas and Betsy Dan, he said, kindly, "Thank you,
Thomas! Thank you, Elizabeth!" Something in his tone brought the school
to attention, and even Jimmie forgot to have regard to his nose. For
a few moments the master stood looking upon the faces of his pupils,
dwelling upon them one by one, till his eyes rested upon the wee tots in
the front seat, looking at him with eyes of innocent and serious wonder.
Then he thanked the children for their gift in a few simple words,
assuring them that he should always wear the watch with pride and
grateful remembrance of the Twentieth school, and of his happy days
among them.

But when he came to say his words of farewell, and to thank them for
their goodness to him, and their loyal backing of him while he was their
teacher, his voice grew husky, and for a moment wavered. Then, after
a pause, he spoke of what had been his ideal among them. "It is a good
thing to have your minds trained and stored with useful knowledge, but
there are better things than that. To learn honor, truth, and right; to
be manly and womanly; to be self-controlled and brave and gentle--these
are better than all possible stores of learning; and if I have taught
you these at all, then I have done what I most wished to do. I have
often failed, and I have often been discouraged, and might have given up
were it not for the help I received at my worst times from our minister
and from Mrs. Murray, who often saved me from despair."

A sudden flush tinged the grave, beautiful face of the minister's young
wife. A light filled her eyes as the master said these words, for she
remembered days when the young man's pain was almost greater than he
could bear, and when he was near to giving up.

When the master ceased, the minister spoke a few words in appreciation
of the work he had done in the school, and in the whole Section, during
his three years' stay among them, and expressed his conviction that many
a young lad would grow into a better man because he had known Archibald
Munro, and some of them would never forget what he had done for them.

By this time all the big girls and many of the visitors were openly
weeping. The boys were looking straight in front of them, their faces
set in an appearance of savage gloom, for they knew well how near they
were to "acting like the girls."

After a short prayer by the minister, the children filed out past the
master, who stood at the door and shook hands with them one by one. When
the big boys, and the young men who had gone to school in the winter
months, came to say good by, they shook hands silently, and then stood
close about him as if hating to let him go. He had caught for them in
many a close base-ball match; he had saved their goal in many a fierce
shinny fight with the Front; and while he had ruled them with an iron
rule, he had always treated them fairly. He had never failed them; he
had never weakened; he had always been a man among them. No wonder they
stood close about him and hated to lose him. Suddenly big Bob Fraser
called out in a husky voice, "Three cheers for the captain!" and every
one was glad of the chance to let himself out in a roar. And that was
the last of the farewells.



CHAPTER IV

THE NEW MASTER


Right in front of the school door, and some little distance from it, in
the midst of a clump of maples, stood an old beech-tree with a dead top,
and half-way down where a limb had once been and had rotted off, a
hole. Inside this hole two very respectable but thoroughly impudent red
squirrels had made their nest. The hole led into the dead heart of the
tree, which had been hollowed out with pains so as to make a roomy, cosy
home, which the squirrels had lined with fur and moss, and which was
well stored with beechnuts from the tree, their winter's provisions.

Between the boys and the squirrels there existed an armed neutrality. It
was understood among the boys that nothing worse than snowballs was to
be used in their war with the squirrels, while with the squirrels it
was a matter of honor that they should put reasonable limits to their
profanity. But there were times when the relations became strained, and
hence the holidays were no less welcome to the squirrels than to the
boys.

To the squirrels this had been a day of unusual anxiety, for the school
had taken up again after its two weeks' holidays, and the boys were a
little more inquisitive than usual, and unfortunately, the snow happened
to be good for packing. It had been a bad day for nerves, and Mr. Bushy,
as the boys called him, found it impossible to keep his tail in one
position for more than one second at a time. It was in vain that his
more sedate and self-controlled partner in life remonstrated with him
and urged a more philosophic mind.

"It's all very well for you, my dear," Mr. Bushy was saying, rather
crossly I am afraid, "to urge a philosophic mind, but if you had the
responsibility of the family upon you--Goodness gracious! Owls and
weasels! What in all the woods is that?"

"Can't be the wolves," said Mrs. Bushy, placidly, "it's too early for
them."

"Might have known," replied her husband, quite crossly; "of course it's
those boys. I wonder why they let them out of school at all. Why can't
they keep them in where it is warm? It always seems to me a very silly
thing anyway, for them to keep rushing out of their hole in that stupid
fashion. What they do in there I am sure I don't know. It isn't the
least like a nest. I've seen inside of it. There isn't a thing to eat,
nor a bit of hair or moss. They just go in and out again."

"Well, my dear," said his wife, soothingly, "you can hardly expect them
to know as much as people with a wider outlook. We must remember they
are only ground people."

"That's just it!" grumbled Mr. Bushy. "I only wish they would just keep
to themselves and on the ground where they belong, but they have the
impudence to come lumbering up here into our tree."

"Oh, well," replied his partner, calmly, "you must acknowledge they do
not disturb our nest."

"And a good thing for them, too," chattered Mr. Bushy, fiercely,
smoothing out his whiskers and showing his sharp front teeth, at which
Mrs. Bushy smiled gently behind her tail.

"But what are they doing now?" she inquired.

"Oh, they are going off into the woods," said Mr. Bushy, who had
issued from his hole and was sitting up on a convenient crotch. "And I
declare!" he said, in amazed tones, "they haven't thrown one snowball at
me. Something must be badly wrong with them. Wonder what it is? This is
quite unprecedented."

At this Mrs. Bushy ventured carefully out to observe the extraordinary
phenomenon, for the boys were actually making their way to the gate, the
smaller ones with much noisy shouting, but the big boys soberly enough
engaged in earnest conversation. It was their first day of the new
master, and such a day as quite "flabbergastrated," as Don Cameron said,
even the oldest of them. But of course Mr. and Mrs. Bushy knew nothing
of this, and could only marvel.

"Murdie," cried Hughie to Don's big brother, who with Bob Fraser, Ranald
Macdonald, and Thomas Finch was walking slowly toward the gate, "you
won't forget to ask your pa for an excuse if you happen to be late
to-morrow, will you?"

Murdie paid no attention.

"You won't forget your excuse, Murdie," continued Hughie, poking him in
the back.

Murdie suddenly turned, caught him by the neck and the seat of his
trousers, and threw him head first into a drift, from which he emerged
wrathful and sputtering.

"Well, I hope you do," continued Hughie, "and then you'll catch it. And
mind you," he went on, circling round to get in front of him, "if you
want to ask big Bob there for his knife, mind you hold up your hand
first." Murdie only grinned at him.

The new master had begun the day by enunciating the regulations under
which the school was to be administered. They made rather a formidable
list, but two of them seemed to the boys to have gone beyond the limits
of all that was outrageous and absurd. There was to be no speaking
during school hours, and if a boy should desire to ask a question of his
neighbor, he was to hold up his hand and get permission from the master.
But worse than all, and more absurd than all, was the regulation that
all late comers and absentees were to bring written excuses from parents
or guardians.

"Guardian," Thomas Finch had grunted, "what's that?"

"Your grandmother," whispered Don back.

It was not Don's reply that brought Thomas into disgrace this first
day of the new master's rule, it was the vision of big Murdie Cameron
walking up to the desk with an excuse for lateness, which he had
obtained from Long John, his father. This vision breaking suddenly in
upon the solemnity of Thomas Finch's mind, had sent him into a snort of
laughter, not more to the surprise of the school than of himself. The
gravity of the school had not been greatly helped by Thomas sheepish
answer to the master's indignant question, "What did you do that for,
sir?"

"I didn't; it did itself."

On the whole, the opening day had not been a success. As a matter of
fact, it was almost too much to expect that it should be anything but
a failure. There was a kind of settled if unspoken opinion among the
children that no master could ever fill Archibald Munro's place in the
school. Indeed, it was felt to be a kind of impertinence for any man to
attempt such a thing. And further, there was a secret sentiment among
the boys that loyalty to the old master's memory demanded an attitude of
unsympathetic opposition to the one who came to take his place. It did
not help the situation that the new master was unaware of this state of
mind. He was buoyed up by the sentiments of enthusiastic admiration
and approval that he carried with him in the testimonials from his last
board of trustees in town, with which sentiments he fully agreed, and
hence he greeted the pupils of the little backwoods school with an airy
condescension that reduced the school to a condition of speechless and
indignant astonishment. The school was prepared to tolerate the man who
should presume to succeed their former master, if sufficiently humble,
but certainly not to accept airy condescension from him.