DAYS OF STUDY, WORK AND PLAY
The Schoolhouse in the Woods. Maple Sugar-making. The Orator of the
Dawn. A Boyish Prank. Capturing the Eagle's Nest.
At three years of age, he trudged off to school with his brother
Charles. Though Charles was three years the senior, the little fellow
struggled to keep pace with him in all their childish play and work.
Two miles the children walked daily to the schoolhouse, a long walk
for a toddler of three. But it laid the foundation of that strong,
rugged constitution that has carried him so unflinchingly through
the hard work of these later years. The walk to school was the most
important part of the performance, for lessons had no attraction for
the boy as yet. But the road through the woods to the schoolhouse was
a journey of ever new and never-ending excitement. The road lay along
a silver-voiced brook that rippled softly by shadowy rock, or splashed
joyous and exultant down its boulder-strewn path. It was this same
brook whose music drifted into his little attic bedroom at night,
stilled to a faint, far-away murmur as the wind died down, rising to a
high, clear crescendo of rushing, tumbling water as the breeze stirred
in the tree tops and brought to him the forest sounds. Hour after
hour he lay awake listening to it, his childish imagination picturing
fairies and elves holding their revels in the woods beyond. An
oratorical little brook it was, unconsciously leaving an impress of
its musical speech on the ears of the embryo orator. Moreover, in its
quiet pools lurked watchful trout. Few country boys could walk along
such a stream unheeding its fascinations, especially when the doors
of a school house opened at the farther end, and many an hour when
studies should have claimed him, he was sitting by the brookside,
care-free and contented, delightedly fishing. Nor are any berries
quite so luscious as those which grow along the country road to
school. It takes long, long hours to satisfy the keen appetite of
a boy, and lessons suffered during the berry seasons. Another keen
excitement of the daily journey through a living world of mystery and
enchantment was the search for frogs. Woe to the unlucky frog that
fell in the way of the active, curious boy. Some one had told him that
old, old countryside story, "If you kill a frog, the cows will give
bloody milk." Eager to see such a phenomenon, he watched sharply. Let
an unlucky frog give one unfortunate croak, quick, sure-aimed, flew a
stone, and he raced home at night to see the miracle performed. He was
just a boy as other boys--mischievous, disobedient, fonder of play
than work or study. But underneath, uncalled upon as yet, lay that
vein of perseverance as unyielding as the granite of his native hills.
The schoolhouse inside was not unattractive. Six windows gave plenty
of light, and each framed woodland pictures no painter's canvas could
rival. The woods were all about and the voice of the little
brook floated in, always calling, calling--at least to one small
listener--to come out and see it dance and sparkle and leap from rock
to rock. If he gained nothing else from his first school days but a
love and appreciation of nature's beauties, it was a lesson well worth
learning. To feed the heart and imagination of a child with such
scenery is to develop unconsciously a love of the beautiful which
brings a pure joy into life never to be lost, no matter what stress
and storm may come. In the darkest, stormiest hours of his later life,
to think back to the serene beauty of those New England hills was as a
hand of peace laid on his troubled spirit.
This love and joy in nature--and the trait was already in his
blood--was at first all that he gained from his trips to school. Then
came a teacher with a new way of instructing, a Miss Salina Cole, who
had mastered the art of visual memory. She taught her pupils to make
on the mind a photographic impression of the page, which could be
recalled in its entirety, even to the details of punctuation. This
was a process of study that appealed immediately to Russell's boyish
imagination. Moreover, it was something to "see if he could do,"
always fascinating to his love of experiment and adventure. It had
numerous other advantages. It was quick. It promised far-reaching
results. If page after page of the school books could be stored in the
mind and called up for future reference, getting an education would
become an easy matter. Besides, they could be called up and pondered
on in various places--fishing, for instance. He quickly decided
to would master this new method, and he went at it with his
characteristic energy and determination. Concentrating all his mental
force, he would study intently the printed page, and then closing his
eyes, repeat it word for word, even giving the punctuation marks. With
the other pupils, Salina Cole was not so successful, but with Russell
Conwell, the results were remarkable. It was a faculty of the utmost
value to him in after years. When in military camp and far from books,
he would recall page after page of his law works and study them during
the long days of garrison duty as easily as though the printed book
were in his hand.
But the work was of more value to him than the mere mastery of
something new. It whetted his appetite for more. He began to want to
know. School became interesting, and he plunged into studies with an
interest and zest that were unflagging. And as he studied, ambitions
awoke. The history of the past, the accomplishments of great men
stirred him. He began to dream of the things to do in the days to
come.
Outside of school hours his time was filled with the ordinary duties
of the farm. In the early spring, the maple sugar was to be made
and there were long, difficult tramps through woods in those misty,
brooding days when the miracle of new life is working in tree and vine
and leaf. Often the very earth seemed hushed as if waiting in awe for
this marvelous change that transforms brown earth and bare tree to a
vision of ethereal, tender green. But his books went with him, and in
the long night watches far in the woods alone, when the pans of sirrup
were boiling, he studied. So enrapt did he become that sometimes the
sugar suffered, and the patience of his father was sorely taxed when
told the tale of inattention.
It was during those long night watches that he learned by heart two
books of Milton's "Paradise Lost," and so firmly were they fixed
in the boyish memory that at this day, Dr. Conwell can repeat them
without a break. Many a time as the shadows lightened and the dim,
misty dawn came stealing through the forest, would the small boy step
outside the rude sugar-house and repeat in that musical, resonant
voice that has since held audiences enthralled, Milton's glorious
"Invocation to the Light." Strange scene--the great shadowy forest,
the distant mist-enfolded hills, the faintly flushing morning sky,
the faint splash of a little mountain stream breaking the brooding
stillness, and the small boy with intent, inspired face pouring out
his very heart in that wonderful invocation:
"Hail, holy light, offspring of Heaven, Firstborn
Or of the Eternal, co-eternal beam,
May I express thee Unblamed? since God is light,
And never but in unapproached light
Dwelt from eternity--dwelt then in thee,
Bright effluence of bright essence increate!
Or hear'st thou, rather, pure Eternal Stream,
Whose fountain who shall tell? Before the sun,
Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice
Of God as with a mantle didst invest
The rising world of waters dark and deep,
Won from the void and formless Infinite!"
Later in spring there was plowing, though the farm was so rocky and
stony, there was little of that work to do. But here and there, a
sunny hilltop field made cultivation worth while, and as he followed
the patient oxen along the shining brown furrow, he looked away to the
encircling hills so full of mystery and fascination. What was there?
What was beyond? Then into the the morning and well into the afternoon
they pried and labored. They dug away earth and exerted to the utmost
their childish strength. Charles would soon have given up the gigantic
task, but Russell was not of the stuff that quits, and so they toiled
on. The father and mother at home wondered and searched for the boys.
Then as they began truly to get alarmed, from the woods to the south
came a crash and roar, the sound of trees snapping and then a shock
that made the earth tremble. The rock had fallen, traversing a mile,
in its downward rush to the river bed. Flushed and triumphant the
boys returned, and the neighbors who had heard the noise, when it was
explained to them, went to see the wreckage. It had dropped first a
fall of fifteen feet, where it had paused an instant. Then the earth
giving way under its tons of weight, it had plowed a deep furrow right
down the mountain side, dislodging rocks, uprooting trees, until with
a mighty crash, it struck the borders of the stream where it stands to
this day, a monument to boyish ingenuity and perseverance.
But of all the mischievous pranks of these childish days, the one that
had perhaps the greatest influence on his life was the capture of
an eagle's nest from the top of a dead hemlock. To the north of the
farmhouse a hill rises abruptly, covered with bare, outcropping rocks,
their fronts sheer and steep. On top clusters a little sombre grove
of hemlock trees, and from the midst of these rose the largest one,
straight, majestic, swaying a little in the wind that swept on from
the distant hills. In the top of this tree, an eagle had built her
nest, and it had long been a secret ambition of the boy to capture
it, the more resolved upon because it seemed impossible. One day in
October he left his sheep, ran to the foot of the hill, and with the
sure-footed agility of a mountain boy climbed the rocks and began the
ascent of the tree. From the top of a high ledge nearby two men hid
and watched him. A fall meant death, and many a time their hearts
stood still, as the intrepid lad placed his foot on a dead branch only
to have it break under him, or reached for a limb to find it give way
at his touch. The tree was nearly fifty feet high and at some time a
stroke of lightning had rent it, splintering the trunk. Only one limb
was left whole, the others had been broken off or shattered by the
storms of winter. In the very crown of the tree swayed the nest, a
rude, uncouth thing of sticks and hay.
Up and up he climbed, stopping every now and then in the midst of his
struggles to call to the sheep if he saw them wandering too far. He
had only to call them by name to bring them nibbling back again.
"Not a man in the mountains," wrote one of those who watched him in
that interesting sketch of Mr. Conwell's life, "Scaling the Eagle's
Nest," "would have thought it possible to do anything else but shoot,
that nest down. When we first saw him he was half way up the great
tree, and was tugging away to get up by a broken limb which was
swinging loosely about the trunk. For a long time he tried to break it
off, but his little hand was too weak. Then he came down from knot to
knot like a squirrel, jumped to the ground, ran to his little jacket
and took his jack-knife out of the pocket. Slowly he clambered up
again. When he reached the limb, he clung to another with his left
hand, threw one leg over a splintered knot and with the right hand
hacked away with his knife.
"'He will give it up,' we both said.
"But he did not. He chipped away until at last the limb fell to the
ground. Then he pocketed his knife, and bravely strove to get up
higher. It was a dizzy height even for a grown hunter, but the boy
never looked down. He went on until he came to a place about ten feet
below the nest, where there was a long, bare space on the trunk, with
no limbs or knots to cling to. He was baffled then. He looked up at
the nest many times, tried to find some place to catch hold of the
rough bark and sought closely for some rest higher up to put his foot
on. But there was none. An eagle's nest was a rare thing to him, and
he hugged the tree and thought. Suddenly he began to descend again
hastily, and soon dropped to the ground. Away he ran down through the
ravines, leaped the little streams and disappeared toward his home.
In a few minutes the torn straw hat and blue shirt came flitting back
among the rocks and bushes. He called the sheep to him, talked to
them, and shook his finger at them, then he clambered up the tree
again, dragging after him a long piece of his mother's clothes line.
At one end of it, he had tied a large stone, which hindered his
progress, for it caught in the limbs and splinters. The wind blew his
torn straw hat away down a side cliff, and one side of his trousers
was soon torn to strips. But he went on. When he got to the smooth
place on the tree again, he fastened one end of the rope about his
wrist, and then taking the stone which was fastened to the other end,
he tried to throw it up over the nest. It was an awkward and dangerous
position, and the stone did not reach the top. Six or seven times he
threw that stone up, and it fell short or went to one side, and nearly
dragged him down as it fell.
"The boy felt for his knife again, opened it with his teeth as he held
on, and hauling the rope up, cut off a part of it. He threw a short
piece around the trunk and tied himself with it to the tree. Then
he could lean back for a longer throw. He tied the rope to his hand
again, and threw the stone with all his energy. It went straight as an
arrow, drew the rope squarely over the nest and fell down the other
side of the tree. After a struggle he reached around for the stone,
and tied that end of the rope to a long broken limb. When he drew the
other end of the rope which had been fastened to his hand, it broke
down the sides of the nest, and an old bird arose with a wild scream.
"Then he loosed the rope which held him to the tree, and pulling
himself up with his hands on the scaling line, digging his bare toes,
heels and knees at times into the ragged bark, he was up in two
minutes to the nest."
"That is a child's ambition," said one of the men, as they both drew a
breath of relief, when he stepped safely to the ground. "Wait until he
has a man's ambition. If that vein of perseverance doesn't run out, he
will do something worth while."