[Sidenote: Toy Mouse]
(3) _Practical jokes—a more serious kind of teasing._ Imogene and
Charles Rogers were two orphans, living with elderly relatives who
wanted to bring them up wisely, but did not know how. They were full to
overflowing of animal spirits, bubbling with fun, restlessly eager to
fill every moment with good times. Miss Spires, their teacher, was
somewhat short-sighted, and that is why, when a little mechanical mouse
ran from the second row of chairs right up to her feet, she thought it a
live one and jumped and screamed.
Imogene and Charles, who had bought the mouse at the ten-cent store,
were delighted past all bounds, and all the children laughed. Miss
Spires thought she had been insulted, and without much ceremony put the
two children behind the piano. They were not at all resentful, for here
they had a good chance to plan more mischief, and made a conspiracy to
secure a repetition of the entertaining panic of the morning by putting
two of their pet rabbits into Miss Spires’ desk at noon. This great joke
worked as well as the first—even better. Miss Spires sent the “dreadful
children” to the principal for correction, with a message which made the
principal look at the young scapegraces gravely. But she was a wise
principal. She said:
“What did Miss Spires do when you made the mouse run up to her feet?”
“She just screeched!” gurgled Imogene in reminiscent delight.
“She jumped as high as my head!” Charles had a good imagination.
“Did she screech when you put the rabbits into her desk?”
“She hopped all around like a chicken, and asked who did that.”
“What did you say?”
“I said we did, and she didn’t think it a good joke, but she said we
were bad children and sent us to you.”
“Do you think you are bad? What is it, to be bad?”
“Swearing.”
“Biffing people that ain’t as big as you are.”
“And telling lies. That’s ’specially bad.”
“Yes, that’s all true. But do you know, good things are sometimes bad,
when they are put in the wrong places, and done at the wrong times.” The
principal had a long talk with the children, in which she discovered
that their attitude toward control was very good, but that their ideas
of appropriateness were very primitive. This was because their elders
had tried to repress them instead of guiding them, and being made of
irrepressible stuff they had simply overrun boundaries.
“Why don’t you try to guide those play instincts that are so strong in
Imogene and Charles?” she asked Miss Spires later. Miss Spires’ reply
shows just why she failed as a teacher:
“It’s not my business to study their ‘instincts.’ I’m here to teach them
to read and write and cipher.”