THE SNOW FRESHET.
There was rare confusion and riot at the red school-house. The weather
had changed suddenly, the wind blew from the south, the sun lay warm and
dazzling upon the snow-drifts; but its treacherous kisses subdued their
cold strength and wasted their beauty.
At last it settled into a regular "thaw"--a New England one at that.
From the mud, a stranger might have thought the very foundations of the
earth had been ploughed up. Every snow bank dissolved itself into a
pert little rivulet, that swelled the general tide, and formed a muddy
lake on each side of the road, along which horses and men passed so
bespattered and stained that one could easily believe they had been
formed entirely from clay, and were fast resolving themselves back to
the original element.
A tiny brook, that died out in dry weather and sprung to existence on
rainy days, ran along one end of the school-house. It had slept quietly
for weeks under its icy bridge, but woke up with great commotion as
thousands of tiny streams flowed down from the hills, and poured their
excited little wavelets into its channel, swelling the brook to such a
size that it evidently believed itself a stupendous sort of river. It
must have been so; nothing but that idea very firmly impressed, could
ever have excused the reckless conduct of that overgrown brook.
It raved, and scolded, and tore along its banks, tumbling the great
stones about, uprooting the poor little frozen shrubs that had clung in
fancied security to its brink. Fuming, splashing, and rioting madly
across the road, the brook plunged down a gully at one end of the
school-house, and set up a famous little waterfall on its own account.
Then, rampant and muddy, it hurled itself forward, melting the snow as
it went, and pouring over a high bank of the river, plunged in with
tumultuous violence, making the deeper and slower stream swell, and
eddy, and fume for a whole minute as it swallowed up the noisy affair.
The rush of this brook reached the boys caged up in the school-house,
and nearly drove them frantic. They could hear the snow sliding off the
roof of the school-house, and fall in heaps under the eaves, which
dripped with incessant moisture. Now and then came a crash of icicles,
breaking up the sunshine like splintered diamonds, and scattering broken
fragments of crystal all over the snow.
This riot of waters and crashing of ice were enough to disorganize the
best school in New England. The boys might be kept on the hard benches;
but no power on earth would tame them down to real study. There they
sat, burning with impatience, yet trying their best to look studious and
quiet, whenever the master's eyes were upon them.
For some reason, there was to be a half holiday that afternoon, and the
poor little sinners waited as restlessly as so many wild pigeons, with
their wings tied, for the hour which should contain their release.
A plan of operation for the afternoon had been already decided upon--I
do not think there was one dissenting voice--and of all the fun which
the whole year might bring there would be nothing equal to that which
they anticipated as soon as the school was dismissed.
But it really seemed as if twelve o'clock never would come! Those boys
began to think, one and all, that the master had never been so slow in
hearing the lessons. At last he became so irritated by their
restlessness and inattention, that great fears arose that the holiday
might be lost altogether.
When that horrible prophecy was whispered about--it originated with an
unhappy-looking little Belshazzar, who was afflicted with a step-father,
and who, from the vast stores of his experience, was always ready to
draw out sorrowful warnings--I say, when it got whispered about, several
of the larger boys nodded their heads at each other and looked
ferociously rebellious, while the little ones eyed them with profound
admiration. Just at that moment, the master's hand glided softly toward
the great ferule that lay upon his desk; and somehow, at that sight, the
mutineers became wonderfully interested in their lessons, and their
small admirers retreated into their spelling-books so far that there
seemed danger of their disappearing altogether.
The moment came at last. The master pulled out his silver watch, which
ticked so loud and wrathfully that it could be heard all over the
room--glanced at it, while every boy held his breath with anxiety. He
waited an instant, in order to give due solemnity to the occasion, then
down came the ferule on the desk with a grand crash. School was
dismissed.
Out rushed the boys, tumbling over each other in hot haste, shrieking,
hallooing, and plunging into the snow with shouts of eager delight. Even
Belshazzar forgot his forebodings, and was foremost in this race after
fun.
The teacher, a kind, elderly man, went to the school-house door and
watched the tumult benignly from beneath the steel-bowed spectacles that
had been hastily thrust across his forehead. His face, which had been
severe, in a strained effort to keep up the dignity of his school, now
beamed with infinite satisfaction, and rubbing his hands gleefully, he
was sorely tempted to take a share in the fun himself. Damming up a
torrent like that which came tumbling across the road, was something
worth while, even for a man.
The boys rushed down to the swollen brook where it entered the gulley
and made a tumultuous descent to the river, which was only concealed
from the bulk windows of the school-house by a growth of young hemlocks
that contrasted richly with the crusted snow. Here the boys were bound
to make a dam big enough to drown a fellow in, neck and heels. Who cared
for the mud? Who was afraid of the snow? Hurrah! hurrah! come on all
hands and pitch in. There is a broken rail. Look out for the loose
stones in that tumble-down, old wall. Bring up drift wood from the
river, dead branches from the trees; tear loads of moss from the white
oak stumps; bring any thing, every thing. Had any boy pluck enough to
drag out some logs from the school wood pile? "Oh, golly! there is the
master standing square in the door, and little Paul, the furrener,
talking to him. Hurrah! the master is sending him off to join the fun.
Isn't he a trump?"
Some of the boys stood still, knee deep in the water, frightened half to
death by that wicked word--trump. But Tom Hutchins cried out with
wonderful audacity, "Trump! who'se afeard? He's a high, low, jack, and
the game, he is! There he goes into the school-house just to give us a
chance at the wood pile. Come on, boys!"
Away the little fellows went, leaping like deer out of the mud, and
directly a whole team of boys came dragging a walnut log through the
snow, leaving a deep path all the way from the wood pile, which the
master never could be made to see, spectacles or no spectacles, anymore
than he could hear the tumbling logs close under the window where he was
sitting. I am inclined to think the boys were right, and that old man
was a trump, though he did belong to the church.
"Hurrah! stand from under," said Tom Hutchins, looking down upon a swarm
of schoolmates who were busy as bees in the mud and water of the gully.
"Here comes the crowner--A number one, and no mistake. Come up here and
give a boost, you chaps."
The boys sprang up the muddy sides of the gully, dripping like
water-gods, reckless of wet jackets, torn trowsers, and shoes from which
the water came up in gushes, and helped pitch that great, knotty log end
foremost into the gully, where it was to form a line for the water to
sweep over.
"Take it by the end--lift all at once--now, heave all together. Hurrah!
hurrah!"
Paul had, indeed, lingered around the school-house door till the master
sent him off to join the play. Then he went down to the brook and stood
disconsolate on its high bank, as all this wild fun went on. He was cold
and confused. No one asked him to help dam up the brook, so he stood in
the snow, buried to the ears in his overcoat and comforter, and thinking
that the watery sunshine was a very poor imitation of the tropical
warmth in which he had formerly luxuriated.
He was at a loss how to take part in their play; besides that, the very
roar of the water, and riot of the boys, reminded him of that fearful
night when he was made an orphan, and so recalled his sufferings, that
he longed to get beyond the sound. As for the boys, they were all too
much engaged to notice his abstraction or ask his assistance.