THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL
School had at least two days that made us as happy as children could
well be. One was the first day of the term, and the other was the last.
Anxious days and weeks and much nervous expectation led up to the first
day of school; we wondered what our teacher would be like, and eagerly
picked up and told and retold all the gossip that floated from her last
place as to her good points and her bad,—especially her bad. Then there
was always the question as to what pupils would be at school; what new
faces we should see and what old ones would be gone, and whether or not
we should like the new ones better than the old. Our minds were firmly
made up on this point before we went to school, and no possible
circumstance could make us change the opinion, or rather the
determination, we had formed. Then we speculated and negotiated as to
who should be our seat-mate for the term, or until we fought. There was
always the question of studies and classes, and whether the new teacher
would let us begin where the old left off, or whether we should have to
commence the book over again. We almost always began again, and thus the
first parts of our books were badly worn and thumbed, while the pages in
the back were fresh and new.
We looked forward to the last day with all the expectancy of the first.
Long before this the work began to drag; the novelty had all worn off,
and our life was a constant battle with the teacher to see how much we
need not do. As the last day drew near, our minds were filled with
visions of how easy life would be when there was no school, and of the
pleasure the summer held in store for us. On the last day we had no
lessons to recite, and in the afternoon our parents were invited in, and
we spoke pieces and read essays,—that is, the boys generally spoke the
pieces and the girls read the essays. Somehow a boy never could write an
essay, and even if he could manage to write one it would be beneath his
dignity to stand up on the platform and read from little sheets of
notepaper tied with red or blue ribbon. But this task seemed especially
to fit the girls. In the first place, they could write better than the
boys,—letters or essays or anything of the kind. In the next place, they
could not be thought of as standing bolt upright and facing the whole
school, visitors and all; they were too shy to stand out alone with
nothing in their hands to hide their faces. So the girls read essays on
Success, and Work, and Truthfulness, and Spring, and things like that,
while the boys spoke pieces. Sometimes we were afraid, but after a
little practice we promptly answered to our names, and went on the
platform and spoke with the greatest assurance, holding our heads up and
making the gestures according to printed forms laid down in the books.
I fancy that none of us ever really understood anything about the pieces
that we spoke. I remember in a general way that they were mainly of our
country, and brave boys fighting and winning victories and dying, and
about the evils and dangers of strong drink. We had a great many pieces
about intemperance, ambition, and the like. I especially remember one
boy, with red hair and freckles and a short neck and large warts on his
hands, who used always to speak a piece entitled “How have the Mighty
Fallen.” I don’t know who wrote it, or where it came from, or what has
become of it; but I remember the piece almost as well as if I heard it
yesterday. This boy was the prize speaker of the school, and the piece
told about Alexander and Cæsar and Napoleon, and how and why they
failed. Their lack of success was due to ambition and strong drink. I
know this piece made a deep impression on my mind, and I always vowed
that I never would fail as Alexander and Cæsar and Napoleon had
done,—and I never have. I remember that once my father came to school on
the last day, in the afternoon, to hear us speak; and when I got home at
night he told me that the boy who spoke the piece about How the Mighty
had Fallen had all the elements of an orator, and he predicted that some
day he would make his mark in the world. I felt that I would have given
everything I possessed if only my father had said that about me. I know
that in my tactful way I led up again and again to the piece that I had
spoken, but about this my father said not a single word.
How I envied that red-headed lad, and how I wondered if there really was
any chance that I might come out as well as he! For some years my
remembrance of this youth had passed away, until the last time I went
back home. Then, as I drove past his house with never a thought of my
old-time friend, I looked over into the weed-covered yard,—perhaps it
was weedy before, but I did not so remember it,—and there I saw a man
with a hoe in his hand cleaning out a drain that ran from the cellar to
the ditch in front of the house. I looked closely at him, and I never in
the world should have known him; but he came down to the fence, and
leaned on his hoe, and hailed me as I passed. No doubt he had heard that
I had come to town. Then I remembered the piece about How the Mighty had
Fallen, and the little red-headed boy at school; but this boy’s hair was
white, he was bent, and his clothes were about the color of his hair and
hands and face in those far-off years when he spoke the piece. I was
shocked, but I tried not to let him know it. I asked him how he was, and
how he was getting along; and he told me he was very well, and was doing
first-rate. And then I thought of my poor father, who said that he had
all the elements of an orator and would make his mark some day. Well,
perhaps he had made his mark, even though he was cleaning out a
cellar-drain,—and, after all, this is better work than making speeches,
however fine.
To go back to the last day of school. I remember one piece that we used
to speak, about Marco Bozzaris, and how he got into a fight with some
Turks; and first he was killed, and then he killed the Turks, as it
seemed to me. I had no idea who the Turks were, or why Marco Bozzaris
was fighting them, or what it was all about; but I seemed to think there
were certain parts of the piece that should be spoken in a loud voice,
and certain others that should be said very softly. The book I learned
it from had characters or figures that told us when we should speak
softly and when we should speak loudly, and we always followed the
instructions of the book. If it had told us to speak loudly when it said
softly, and softly instead of loudly, we would have done it that way
without a thought that it could make any difference with the piece. I
have no doubt that if I should read “Marco Bozzaris” to-day I should
read it loudly and softly in just the same places that I did at school,
without any more regard for what it meant than I had then.
But there was one piece that I always thought especially fine. It was
about Casabianca. The name now sounds to me like a Spanish name, but I
am sure I had no thought then of what it was. It might have been a
Swedish or an Irish name, for all I knew. I remember that this
Casabianca was a lad about my own age, and somehow he was on a ship in a
battle, and his father was with him. His father was called away on some
important matter, and told Casabianca to stand right there on a certain
spot and wait until he got back. Something must have detained him,—as I
recall it, he was killed, or something of that kind,—at any rate, he did
not get back, and it grew dark, and Casabianca began to cry. Pretty
soon, to make matters worse, a fire broke out on board the ship, and the
smoke began to smother him and the flames to roll around him. The other
people on the ship ran to the shore, and they called to him to run too,
and the gang-plank had not been taken in or burned, and he had lots of
time to get away; but no, his father had gone off, and had told
Casabianca to wait until he returned, and he proposed to wait. So he
called wildly for his father a great many times; but his father did not
come. Still the boy stood fast, and the flames crept slowly up until he
was burned to cinders at his post.
This was a very exciting story, and we used to speak it with voices loud
and soft, and with gestures that looked like rolling fire and smoke. I
did not really know then, but I know now, that this piece was written by
somebody who fancied himself or herself a poet, and that it was written
to teach a moral lesson. I remember that the last line read: “But the
noblest thing that perished there was that young and faithful heart.”
From this I am sure that the lesson meant to be taught was the great
virtue of obeying your parents.
I cannot recall that I ever heard any of our teachers say a word about
this poem, so I infer that they must have approved its sentiments. Of
course I am old enough now to know that a boy who would stick to a
burning ship like that might just as well get burned up and be done with
it at once. But I cannot exactly make up my mind what punishment should
be given to the poet or the book-publisher or the teacher who allowed
this sort of heroics to be given to a child.
In our pieces and in our lessons a great deal was said about the duties
that children owe their parents, a great deal about how much our parents
had done for us, and how kind and obedient we should be to them. But I
cannot recall that there was a single line about the duties that parents
owe to children, and how much they should do for the child who had
nothing to say about his own entrance into the world. It is true that
these books were written for children, but just as true that the
children were to become parents, and that most of them would get little
instruction beyond the district school. Which fact may to some extent
account for the great number of bad and foolish parents in the world.
Many of these pieces told how much we owed the country, and of our duty
to live for it and fight for it, and if need be to die for it. I cannot
recall that a single one ever told of any duty the country owed to us,
or anything that should be given in return for our service and our
lives. All of which shows what a great handicap we children suffered by
being obliged to go to school.
After the last piece had been spoken, the teacher put on her most
serious face (she always had a variety of faces to put on) and told us
how she loved us all,—although she had never said a word of this sort
before,—how good and faithful and studious we had been; she told us how
kind our parents were to let us go to school, how sad she felt at the
final parting, and how impossible it was that the little group could
ever be gathered together again this side of heaven, which she trusted
all of us would some day reach, so that she might meet us once again. At
this we began to regret that we had not treated her better and been more
obedient to her rules. Then we felt sad, and drew our coat-sleeves
across our eyes, and wished that she would stop talking and let us go
out. Finally she spoke the last words and dismissed the school, and our
days of captivity were done. Each child snatched his carefully packed
books and slate, and with shouts and laughter rushed through the
schoolhouse door into the free open world outside.