Uncommonly Common Schools.--Annual School District
Meeting.--Accounts for Contingent Expenses.--Turtle and Old
Gulick's Boy.--"That are Glass."--The Colonel starts the
Wheels again.--Bulliphant's Tactics.--Have we hired "Deacon
Fluett's Darter," or not?--Isabel Strickett.--Bunker Hill
and Turkey.--Sah-Jane Beagles.--The Question settled.
Common schools are said to be the engine of popular liberty. I think we had
some of the most _un_-commonly common schools, at Puddleford, that could be
found anywhere under the wings of the American eagle. Our system was, of
course, the same as that of all other townships in the state, but its
administration was not in all respects what it should be. Our schools were
managed by Puddlefordians, and they were responsible only for the talent
which had been given them. Every citizen knows that our government is a
piece of mechanism, made up of wheels within wheels, and while these wheels
are in one sense totally independent, and stand still or turn as they are
moved or let alone, yet they may indirectly affect the whole. In other
words, our government is like a cluster of Chinese balls, curiously wrought
within, and detached from each other, and yet it is, after all, but one
ball. There is something beautiful in the construction and operation of
this piece of machinery. A school district is one machine, a township
another, a county another, and a state another--all independent
organizations, yet every community must work its own organization. They are
not operated afar off by some great central power, over the heads of the
people; but they are worked _by_ the people themselves, for themselves.
However clumsily the work may be performed at first, practice makes
perfect, and men become the masters, as well as the administrators of their
own laws.
We had an annual school district meeting in the village of Puddleford--and
there were many others in the country at the same time--for the township
was cut up into several districts, and I never attended one that did not
end in a "row," to use a western classical expression. The business of
these meetings was all prescribed by statute, and it amounted to settling
and allowing the accounts of the board for the last school year, voting
contingent fund for the next, determining whether a school should be taught
by a male or a female teacher, and for how many months, and the election of
new officers.
The last meeting I attended, Longbow was in the chair by virtue of his
office as president of the school district board. Being organized, the
clerk of the board presented his account for contingent expenses, and
Longbow wished to know "if the meetin' would pass 'em."
Turtle "wanted to hear 'em read."
Longbow said "the only account they had was in their head."
Turtle said "that warn't 'cordin' to the staterts."
Longbow said "he'd risk that--his word was as good as anybody's writin', or
any statert."
Turtle said "he'd hear what they was, but 'twarn't right, and for his
part, he didn't b'lieve the board know'd what they'd been about for the
last six months."
Longbow raised his green shade from his blind eye, rose on his feet, looked
down very ferociously upon Turtle, stamped his foot, and informed Ike "that
this was an org'nized meetin', and he mustn't reflect on-ter the officers
of the _de_-strict; 'twas criminal!"
The account was then repeated by Longbow, item by item, and among the rest
was two shillings for setting glass.
When glass was mentioned, Turtle sprang to his feet again. "Thar, old man,"
he exclaimed, rapping his knuckles on the desk, "thar's where I'se got
you--thar's a breach er trust, a squand'rin' of funds, that ain't a-going
to go down in this ere meetin'. Old Gulick's boy broke that are glass just
out of sheer dev'ltry, and you s'pose this ere school _de_-strict is
a-goin' to pay for't? What do you s'pose these ere staterts was passed for?
What do you s'pose you was 'lected for? To pay for old Gulick's boy?--Well,
I rather caklate not, by the light of this ere moon--not in this ere age of
Puddleford."
Squire Longbow took a large chew of plug-tobacco, which I thought he nipped
off very short, and remained standing, with his eyes fixed on Turtle.
Sile Bates rose, and said "he wanted to know the particulars 'bout that are
glass."
Longbow said "the board 'spended money in their 'scretion, and 'twarn't fur
Turtle or Bates, or anybody else, to 'raign 'em up 'fore this 'ere
meetin'."
Here was a long pause. The "Colonel" finally arose, put his hand
deliberately into his pocket, drew out a quarter, and flung it at the
Squire, and "hop'd the meetin' would go on, as it was the first public
gathering that he ever knew blocked by twenty-five cents."
This settled the difficulty, and the report for contingent expenses was
adopted.
Bulliphant then said he had a motion. He "moved that we hire Deacon
Fluett's darter to keep our school."
The Squire said "the meetin' couldn't hire, but it could say male or female
teacher."
Bulliphant "moved we hire a female, and we recommend Deacon Fluett's
darter."
Bates said "he jest as 'lieve have one of Fluett's two-year olds."
The "Colonel" said "she couldn't spell Baker."
Swipes thought "she was scarcely fit to _go_ to school."
Turtle said "the meetin' hadn't got nothin' to do with it, nohow, and the
whole motion was agin law."
Bulliphant, who had become a little out of humor, then "moved that we don't
hire Deacon Fluett's darter."
Bates declared "the motion out of order."
The Squire said "he guess'd the motion was proper. The staterts said the
meetin' shouldn't hire anybody, but the de-strict board should; and this
ere motion was jest 'cordin' to statert."
But the meeting voted down Bulliphant's motion, and Bulliphant then
declared that the vote was "tan-ter-mount to a resolve to hire the woman."
Here was a parliamentary entanglement that occupied an hour; but the
"Colonel" settled it at last, by reminding the president "that it was _two_
negatives that made one affirmative--not one;" and the Squire said "so he
believed he had seen it laid down inter the books."
But I cannot attempt to report the proceedings of this miscellaneous body.
The business occupied some four or five hours, and was finally brought to a
close. A new school board was elected, and your humble servant was one of
the number; positively the first office that was ever visited upon him.
The great question with two of the members of our board, in hiring a
teacher, was the price. Qualification was secondary. The first application
was made by a long-armed, red-necked, fiery-headed youth of about nineteen
years, who had managed to run himself up into the world about six feet two
inches, and who had not worn off his flesh by hard study, and who carried
about him digestive organs as strong as the bowels of a thrashing-machine.
He "wanted a school, 'cause he had nothing else to do in the winter
months."
He was accordingly introduced to our School Inspectors; the only one of
whom I knew was Bates. The other two were rather more frightened at the
presentation than the applicant himself.
Bates proposed first to try the gentleman in geography and history.
"Where's Bunker Hill?" inquired Bates, authoritatively.
"Wal, 'bout that," said Strickett--our applicant called his name Izabel
Strickett--"'bout that, why, it's where the battle was fit, warn't it?"
"Jes so," replied Bates; "and where was that?"
"Down at the east'ard."
"Who did the fightin' there?"
"Gin'rul Washington fit all the revolution."
"Where's Spain?"
"Where?" repeated Strickett--"Spain? where is it?"
"Yes! where?"
[Illustration: JIM BUZZARD AND THE AGER.
"Them 'ere doctors don't get any of their stuff down my throat. If I can't
stand it as long as the _ager_, then I'll give in."--Page 186.]
"Wal, now," exclaimed Strickett, looking steadily on the floor, "I'll be
darn'd if that ere hain't just slipped my mind."
"Where's Turkey?"
"O, yes," said Strickett, "Turkey--the place they _call_ Turkey--if you'd
ask'd me in the street, I'd told you right off, but I've got so fruster'd I
don't know nothin';" and thinking a moment, he exclaimed, "it's where the
Turks live. I thought I know'd."
"How many States are there in the Union?"
"'Tween twenty-live and thirty--throwin' out Canady."
Bates then attempted an examination in reading and spelling. "Spell hos!"
said Bates.
"H--o--s."
"Thunder!" roared Bates. Bates _did_ know how to spell horse. He had seen
notices of stray horses, and a horse was the most conspicuous object in
Puddleford, excepting, of course, Squire Longbow. "H--o--s! that's a
hos-of-a-way to spell hos!" and Bates looked at Strickett very severely,
feeling a pride of his own knowledge.
Strickett said "he us'd the book when he teach'd school--he didn't teach
out of his head--and he didn't believe the 'spectors themselves could spell
Ompompanoosuck right off, without getting stuck."
Izabel's examination was something after this sort, through the several
English branches; yet a majority of the Board of School Inspectors decided
to give him a certificate, if we said so, as he was to teach our school,
and we were more interested than they in his qualifications; and whether
the Inspectors knew what his qualifications really were, "this deponent
saith not." Strickett "sloped."
The next application was by letter. The epistle declared that the applicant
"brok'd his arm inter a saw-mill, and he couldn't do much out-door work
till it heal'd up agin, and if we'd hire him to carry on our school, he
tho't he would make it go well 'nough,"--but the School Board decided that
all-powerful as sympathy might be, it could scarcely drive a district
school under such orthography, syntax, and prosody.
Next appeared Mrs. Beagle, in behalf of her "Sah-Jane." "She know'd
Sah-Jane, and she know'd Sah-Jane was jist the thing for the Puddleford
school; and if we only know'd Sah-Jane as well as she know'd Sah-Jane, we'd
have her, cost what it might." She said "Sah-Jane was a most s'prisin'
gal--she hung right to her books, day _and_ night--and she know'd she had a
sleight at teachin'. Mr. Giblett's folks told Mr. Brown's folks, so she
heer'd, that if they ever _did_ get Sah-Jane into that ere school, she'd
make a buzzin' that would tell some."
Sah-Jane's case was, however, indefinitely postponed. Some objections,
among other things, on the score of age, were suggested. This roused the
wrath of Mrs. Beagle, and she "guessed her Sah-Jane was old enough to teach
a Puddleford school--if she tho't she warn't, she'd bile her up in-ter
soap-grease, and sell her for a shillin' a quart!--and as for the
_de_-strict board, they'd better go to a school-marm themselves, and larn
somethin', or be 'lected over agin, she didn't care which;" and Mrs. Beagle
left at a very quick step, her face much flushed and full of cayenne and
vengeance.
There were a great many more applications, and at last the board hired--I
say the _board_--_I_ didn't. But the other members overruled me, and price,
not qualification, settled the question at last.
This was the way the machinery was worked in our school district, during
the very early days of Puddleford. As the stream never rises above the
fountain-head, education was quite feeble. But we do better now--there is
less friction on our gudgeons, and if Puddleford should turn out a
President one of these days, it would be nothing more than what our
glorious institutions have before "ground out" under more discouraging
circumstances.