|THE children had bought the School-teacher a hat. It had been a large
undertaking, and the cause of innumerable secret conferences in the
grove behind the schoolhouse. The purchase of so costly a thing as a
hat required a certain sum of money. To raise this sum of money, the
children had been put to the most desperate straits. Every tiny store
that any child possessed had been brought forward and contributed to the
common fund. The difficulty did not lie in the drawing on this store.
Although every contribution meant a sacrifice to the donor, no child had
hesitated. There had been no question about what each should give, and
no inquiry as to a holding back of resources. Every child had simply
given all he had.
Ancient two-cent pieces with holes in them, worn nickles, one or
two long-treasured ten-cent pieces, and one-cent pieces thumbed with
counting, were withdrawn from snuffboxes, essence of coffee boxes, pill
boxes, holes in the wall, from under the loose stones of the hearth and
other safety deposit places--wherever the child had deemed it expedient
to keep his treasures. Sometimes, however, this treasure was in
the custody of older persons, and the obtaining of it had presented
difficulties.
The whole school had often gone into counsel on these cases, ways and
means devised, a proper motive constructed, and the child strengthened
and drilled. When the device succeeded, the whole school for that
day rejoiced, when it failed, the school was depressed, but it was not
defeated, and some other plan was brought forward. Some of the plans
were exceedingly ingenious, and, as a rule, the school prevailed.
However, when the whole store was finally collected, or as much as could
be had, the children were confronted with a staggering disappointment;
the entire fund, for all the counting and recounting of it, could not be
made to exceed sixty-four cents. A wholesale borrowing, right and left,
had added only eleven cents. Now, 't was well-known that a hat could not
be purchased for less than a dollar, and when it became evident that the
fund must fail by a fourth of that sum the children were in despair.
For a day or two almost the whole school was in tears.
Then, individually, it resorted to desperate devices. One whose
grandfather had been accustomed to present him with ten cents on
Christmas day endeavored to secure an advancement. A small child had
hailed the doctor as he passed along the road, and had offered to work
for him all the remainder of his life for ten cents paid down in cash.
Another had approached the minister, after the Sunday collection, and
endeavored to borrow a twenty-five-cent piece out of the hat.
These ventures had failed, and the latter with the perilous result that
the minister had all but extracted the secret for the money, and his
withering commentaries on a teacher who inculcated the spirit of avarice
into little children had so stricken the child with terror that it had
been afraid to tell the school what it had done.
This brief lapse into madness, the practical leadership of Martha, the
miller's little girl, and the small hoy, David, was presently able to
cheek. They pointed out what it was useless to do. But for the present
they were not able to bring forward any plan that it seemed worth while
to undertake. At this season the only natural product of the mountain
that could be exchanged for money was hickory nuts, and the value of
this product was in doubt. Sometimes, early in certain seasons, the
storekeeper had been known to give twenty-five cents for a bushel of
choice hickory nuts, not the gross shellbark nut, but the small, round,
sweet-kerneled nut of the smooth-bark hickory.
The school had considered this, but had come always against two serious
difficulties. To secure a bushel of these small nuts would require a
considerable searching of the mountains, and, despite the fact that the
children were very small, each had duties at home that occupied
Saturdays, and the evening fragments of the day. On Sundays, an austere
theology imposed by the minister compelled them to attend the Sunday
sermon and to practice the most rigorous inactivity under pain of
hideous consequences. The insurmountable difficulty, however, lay in
the fact that they could not get a bushel of hickory nuts over the long
distance to the country store.
An unexpected event suddenly removed this difficulty. Coming
breathlessly to the school on a Friday morning, little David announced
that his father was going to the country store on Tuesday with the wagon
to bring home a barrel of salt, and that he had obtained permission to
accompany him. At once the school took up the possibility of securing
the bushel of hickory nuts. It was immediately evident that within so
brief a time the thing could not be done unless the whole of Sunday were
devoted to the labor of it. The school promptly decided.
This expedition did not arise from any failure to appreciate the perils
of the decision. Corporal chastisement under the home roof was certain
to follow; and the hideous tortures vividly presented by the minister,
awaiting at the threshold of his future life, that one who broke the
Sabbath day, was scarcely less certain. Nevertheless, not a child of the
whole school hesitated.
The complete success of the venture strengthened the school to bear the
immediate consequences.
Corporal chastisement in the mountains was not apt to be a thing lightly
administered. But it was a hardship which even the smallest children had
come to regard as one of the inevitable conditions of life. As to
that other penalty, which awaited them at the hands of an outraged and
vindictive deity, they were somehow of the opinion that this malignant
god could not inflict his punishments except through some overt act of
the minister who was his executive agent. Thus, if they could outwit
this dangerous penal vicegerent, the thing could be turned aside. In
travail of this problem, they hit upon the plan of going over the head
of the minister and claiming a direct authorization for their act. When
approached for an explanation of their conduct they solemnly announced
that an angel had come down through the roof of the schoolhouse and
directed them not to attend the religious services on this Sunday.
Transported by the success of their undertaking; by the exquisite
pleasure of making this presentation to the Schoolteacher; by the joy
which his evident happiness in it carried to every heart; they had
neglected to perfect the details of this story. Fortunately they agreed
upon the personal aspect of the angel, since every child, when driven
to describe this divine messenger, simply followed the guidance of
his affections, and presented the School-teacher. But upon a close and
searching examination there had been a divergence. How had the angel been
clothed? Some of the children, put upon inquisition, had replied that
he had nothing at all on; and others, feeling the need for appropriate
vestments, had declared that the angel wore a red coat and blue
breeches.
Seizing upon this point, as a protruding limb, the minister had finally
drawn up the whole hidden body of the incident. And he was now on
his way to confront the School-teacher with this piece of outrageous
conduct. It was evening when he arrived. The school was coming through
the little grove down into the road. The School-teacher walked among
them. The grove was full of voices--the laughter of children. The
School-teacher wore his new hat, and every now and then he took it off
and held it in his hand that he might the better admire it. From the day
that he had received it, he had never ceased to express his appreciation
of it. He continued always to regard it, as if in it were merged, as
in a symbol, all the little sacrifices of every child, and all the love
that had strengthened each one to bear what the thing had cost him.
This never-ceasing appreciation of the School-teacher for his present
had transported the school with pleasure. This acute happiness the
children were not always able to control. Sometimes pride overcame one,
and he would tell how much he had contributed.
And always the smaller children wished to hold the hat in their hands,
so that it quickly gathered a border of little fingerprints.
Even the tiny boy, who had been too little to help in the purchase
of the present, but who somehow dimly understood that all had given
something toward this article, had brought forward a rooster feather,
which he had found, and insisted that it be added to the hat. And the
School-teacher had very carefully pinned this crimson feather to the
band.
Moreover, the habit which the Schoolteacher had acquired of taking off
his hat in order to admire it before the children, seemed to adhere to
him when he was by himself: Of late, those who had watched him as he
passed along the mountain roads, had observed him at this habit and
had marked how his face, profoundly sad when he was alone, always
immediately brightened.
The school trooping about the Schoolteacher was emerging from the grove
when the minister got out of his buggy.
He tied the horse to a sapling with one of the lines. Then he drew his
cotton gloves a little closer over his hands, buttoned his long black
coat down to its last button, and stood out in the road to await the
coming of the School-teacher. The children and the School-teacher
stopped when they saw him. The pleasant laughing voices ceased. The
children gathered around the School-teacher. The smallest ones came
close up and took hold of his hands.
The minister addressed the Schoolteacher. His voice was high and sharp.
“Do you know what the school children have done?”
The School-teacher regarded the minister with his deep, calm, gray-blue
eyes.
“Yes,” he said.
“Did you know that they were going to do it?”
“Yes.”
“Did you try to prevent it?”
“No.”
The lines in the minister's face hardened.
“That's all I wanted to know,” he said. “It is now perfectly evident
that you are no fit person to have charge of school children. The
community must get rid of you.”
He turned about in the road, untied his horse, got into his buggy and
took up the lines. He raised one of the lines in his cotton-gloved
hand to bring it down on the horse's back, but he paused with his arm
extended, and turned about toward the School-teacher. He thrust his head
to one side. His defective eye straining to see.
“Do you have any fear of God at all?” he said.
The School-teacher's calm, gentle voice did not change, it did not
hesitate. “No,” he said, “none at all.”