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[Illustration: "NOT THERE, NOT THERE, MY CHILD!"]
THE HOOSIER SCHOOL-BOY
By
EDWARD EGGLESTON
New York
Charles Scribner's Sons
1919
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Copyright, 1883, By
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Copyright, 1910, By
FRANCES G. EGGLESTON
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. The New Scholar 3
II. King Milkmaid 15
III. Answering Back 23
IV. Little Christopher Columbus 34
V. Whiling Away Time 43
VI. A Battle 48
VII. Hat-ball and Bull-pen 58
VIII. The Defender 70
IX. Pigeon Pot-pie 80
X. Jack and His Mother 97
XI. Columbus and His Friends 102
XII. Greenbank Wakes Up 113
XIII. Professor Susan 119
XIV. Crowing After Victory 127
XV. An Attempt To Collect 137
XVI. An Exploring Expedition 148
XVII. Housekeeping Experiences 154
XVIII. Ghosts 166
XIX. The Return Home 177
XX. A Foot-race for Money 189
XXI. The New Teacher 203
XXII. Chasing the Fox 210
XXIII. Called To Account 222
XXIV. An Apology 229
XXV. King's Base and a Spelling-lesson 238
XXVI. Unclaimed Top-strings 243
XXVII. The Last Day of School, and The Last
Chapter of the Story 252
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ILLUSTRATIONS
"Not there, not there, my child!" Frontispiece
FACING PAGE
Jack amusing the small boys with stories of
hunting, fishing, and frontier adventure 44
"Cousin Sukey," said little Columbus, "I want to
ask a favor of you" 120
Bob Holliday carries home his friend 258
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THE HOOSIER SCHOOL-BOY
CHAPTER I
THE NEW SCHOLAR
While the larger boys in the village school of Greenbank were having a
game of "three old cat" before school-time, there appeared on the
playground a strange boy, carrying two books, a slate, and an atlas
under his arm.
He was evidently from the country, for he wore a suit of brown jeans, or
woollen homespun, made up in the natural color of the "black" sheep, as
we call it. He shyly sidled up to the school-house door, and looked
doubtfully at the boys who were playing, watching the familiar game as
though he had never seen it before.
The boys who had the "paddles" were standing on three bases, while three
others stood each behind a base and tossed the ball around the triangle
from one hole or base to another. The new-comer soon perceived that, if
one with a paddle, or bat, struck at the ball and missed it, and the
ball was caught directly, or "at the first bounce," he gave up his bat
to the one who had "caught him out." When the ball was struck, it was
called a "tick," and when there was a tick, all the batters were obliged
to run one base to the left, and then the ball thrown between a batter
and the base to which he was running "crossed him out," and obliged him
to give up his "paddle" to the one who threw the ball.
"Four old cat," "two old cat," and "five old cat" are, as everybody
knows, played in the same way, the number of bases or holes increasing
with the addition of each pair of players.
It is probable that the game was once--some hundreds of years ago,
maybe--called "three hole catch," and that the name was gradually
corrupted into "three hole cat," as it is still called in the interior
States, and then became changed by mistake to "three old cat." It is, no
doubt, an early form of our present game of base-ball.
It was this game which the new boy watched, trying to get an inkling of
how it was played. He stood by the school-house door, and the girls who
came in were obliged to pass near him. Each of them stopped to scrape
her shoes, or rather the girls remembered the foot-scraper because they
were curious to see the new-comer. They cast furtive glances at him,
noting his new suit of brown clothes, his geography and atlas, his
arithmetic, and, last of all, his face.
"There's a new scholar," said Peter Rose, or, as he was called, "Pewee"
Rose, a stout and stocky boy of fourteen, who had just been caught out
by another.
"I say, Greeny, how did you get so brown?" called out Will Riley, a
rather large, loose-jointed fellow.
Of course, all the boys laughed at this. Boys will sometimes laugh at
any one suffering torture, whether the victim be a persecuted cat or a
persecuted boy. The new boy made no answer, but Joanna Merwin, who, just
at that moment, happened to be scraping her shoes, saw that he grew red
in the face with a quick flush of anger.
"Don't stand there, Greeny, or the cows'll eat you up!" called Riley, as
he came round again to the base nearest to the school-house.
Why the boys should have been amused at this speech, the new scholar
could not tell--the joke was neither new nor witty--only impudent and
coarse. But the little boys about the door giggled.
"It's a pity something wouldn't eat you, Will Riley--you are good for
nothing but to be mean." This sharp speech came from a rather tall and
graceful girl of sixteen, who came up at the time, and who saw the
annoyance of the new boy at Riley's insulting words. Of course the boys
laughed again. It was rare sport to hear pretty Susan Lanham "take down"
the impudent Riley.
"The bees will never eat you for honey, Susan," said Will.
Susan met the titter of the playground with a quick flush of temper and
a fine look of scorn.
"Nothing would eat you, Will, unless, maybe, a turkey-buzzard, and a
very hungry one at that."
This sharp retort was uttered with a merry laugh of ridicule, and a
graceful toss of the head, as the mischievous girl passed into the
school-house.
"That settles you, Will," said Pewee Rose. And Bob Holliday began
singing, to a doleful tune:
"Poor old Pidy,
She died last Friday."
Just then, the stern face of Mr. Ball, the master, appeared at the door;
he rapped sharply with his ferule, and called: "Books, books, books!"
The bats were dropped, and the boys and girls began streaming into the
school, but some of the boys managed to nudge Riley, saying:
"Poor old creetur,
The turkey-buzzards eat her,"
and such like soft and sweet speeches. Riley was vexed and angry, but
nobody was afraid of him, for a boy may be both big and mean and yet
lack courage.
The new boy did not go in at once, but stood silently and faced the
inquiring looks of the procession of boys as they filed into the
school-room with their faces flushed from the exercise and excitement of
the games.
"I can thrash him easy," thought Pewee Rose.
"He isn't a fellow to back down easily," said Harvey Collins to his next
neighbor.
Only good-natured, rough Bob Holliday stopped and spoke to the new-comer
a friendly word. All that he said was "Hello!" But how much a boy can
put into that word "Hello!" Bob put his whole heart into it, and there
was no boy in the school that had a bigger heart, a bigger hand, or half
so big a foot as Bob Holliday.
The village school-house was a long one built of red brick. It had taken
the place of the old log institution in which one generation of
Greenbank children had learned reading, writing, and Webster's
spelling-book. There were long, continuous writing-tables down the sides
of the room, with backless benches, so arranged that when the pupil was
writing his face was turned toward the wall--there was a door at each
end, and a box stove stood in the middle of the room, surrounded by a
rectangle of four backless benches. These benches were for the little
fellows who did not write, and for others when the cold should drive
them nearer the stove.
The very worshipful master sat at the east end of the room, at one side
of the door; there was a blackboard--a "newfangled notion" in 1850--at
the other side of the door. Some of the older scholars, who could afford
private desks with lids to them, suitable for concealing smuggled apples
and maple-sugar, had places at the other end of the room from the
master. This arrangement was convenient for quiet study, for talking on
the fingers by signs, for munching apples or gingerbread, and for
passing little notes between the boys and girls.
When the school had settled a little, the master struck a sharp blow on
his desk for silence, and looked fiercely around the room, eager to find
a culprit on whom to wreak his ill-humor. Mr. Ball was one of those
old-fashioned teachers who gave the impression that he would rather beat
a boy than not, and would even like to eat one, if he could find a good
excuse. His eye lit upon the new scholar.
"Come here," he said, severely, and then he took his seat.
The new boy walked timidly up to a place in front of the master's desk.
He was not handsome, his face was thin, his eyebrows were prominent, his
mouth was rather large and good-humored, and there was that shy twinkle
about the corners of his eyes which always marks a fun-loving spirit.
But his was a serious, fine-grained face, with marks of suffering in it,
and he had the air of having been once a strong fellow; of late,
evidently, shaken to pieces by the ague.
"Where do you live?" demanded Mr. Ball.
"On Ferry Street."
"What do they call you?" This was said with a contemptuous, rasping
inflection that irritated the new scholar. His eyes twinkled, partly
with annoyance and partly with mischief.
"They _call_ me Jack, for the most part,"--then catching the titter that
came from the girls' side of the room, and frightened by the rising
hurricane on the master's face, he added quickly: "My name is John
Dudley, sir."
"Don't you try to show your smartness on me, young man. You are a
new-comer, and I let you off this time. Answer me that way again, and
you will remember it as long as you live." And the master glared at him
like a savage bull about to toss somebody over a fence.
The new boy turned pale, and dropped his head.
"How old are you?" "Thirteen."
"Have you ever been to school?"
"Three months."
"Three months. Do you know how to read?"
"Yes, sir," with a smile.
"Can you cipher?" "Yes, sir."
"In multiplication?" "Yes, sir."
"Long division?"
"Yes, sir; I've been half through fractions."
"You said you'd been to school but three months!" "My father taught
me."
There was just a touch of pride in his voice as he said this--a sense of
something superior about his father. This bit of pride angered the
master, who liked to be thought to have a monopoly of all the knowledge
in the town.
"Where have you been living?"
"In the Indian Reserve, of late; I was born in Cincinnati."
"I didn't ask you where you were born. When I ask you a question, answer
that and no more."
"Yes, sir." There was a touch of something in the tone of this reply
that amused the school, and that made the master look up quickly and
suspiciously at Jack Dudley, but the expression on Jack's face was as
innocent as that of a cat who has just lapped the cream off the milk.