The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-03-21 00:00:00

THE SCHOOLMASTER STILL WANTED

There are still a few corners of the Western and
Southern States whore the schoolmaster has not yet
penetrated. A little town in Texas, from whence
comes the story I am about to tell, is one of these
plsces (says the New York Correspondent of the
Pictorial World). Some emigrants from Ohio and
Illinois settled there; and soon began to agitate for
the erection of a school house, and the employment of
a teacher. A townmeeting was called to consi& : the
proposition; and one of the Northerus MEdad a neat
little speech, tellinz the blessings which education had
brought with it to Ohio and I II:note. When he eat down
an old man in the corner arose, gave the customary
hitch to his corduroys, pushed back his hat a trifle, and
answered thus "Stranger, opts yer Ohlo State y er' ve got
a big penitentiary full of people, baba% yer Well, yer've
got iarnin' up than lip in the Ills is State yer've got a
big penitentiary fall of people ; yer've got larnin' thar ;
I but I've lived here for thirty-seven years in peace anti

happiness. I's undo' nigher, noel M tew Kan, _
sleep vertiAly so n't 'fraid auy of
my boys go to the penitentiary for forgin' notes, cos
they can't none of 'em writ l" (Sensation in the
audience, and sympathy mnnifeet.) Another of the
new comers then spoke, arguing in favcur of educa-
tion; and then a tall, Isnk native stood ad. &IA
" fixed him w.th his glittering eye," while he beckoned
with an exceedingly dizty linger, and made tic speech.
" See here, mister! ain't )con the tuschine man "
Yee," said be, "I did sell some machinery here last
year." Again that finger beckoned ominously.
" Wad, when the wheat got ripe, all the people
went to neighbour Johnson's to see bow yer Imo win'
machine would operate, We got the 'tarnal thing into
the field, and neighber Johnson he hitched his young
tilly into the shafs. She idlers was a fructious critter,
and the firet thing we knowed she give a flounce and
caught neighbor Johnson's boy bill's leg an' cut it clean
on (Manllest sensation.) Then, mister, in lust
abut two weeks, yer parduer he come around, ped .in'
wooden legs, and neighbor Johnson had to buy one of
them me things. Nice eddicated people you are ! You
understand it, you do! Fust you sell the machines,
and then yer pardner he furnishes wooden legs !" This
ended the matter; and no schoolmaster will be welcome
in that village for some time to come.

gsla, aml 'I with

a ball an elastic cord attached so that when firms
in the face of the paeser•by it might be stoned within
an inch or ea of the mark. When the subject operated
upon had his head close to a lamp•post, or better still
close to another head, the efft ct of this experiment wag
most pleasing. Other ingenious contrivances to the
same philanthropic pur Late might be mentioned, blame
pereent purpose is to warn the pedestrian public against
the latent invention in this line. There In a small wooden
wheel bevelled on the edge and worked by • strip&
eomewhist on the principle of a kite, no aa to ran
between the lege of passengers and trip them up, Au
the previous playthings in vogue in the London streets
having beta in the form of miesiles, it is for these the
daring traveller who attempta a abort cut keeps a look-
out, and he consequently falls an easy victim. It is
needless to say the little instrument is immensely
popular with the boys of the street. Indeed, ft is by
no means unlikely that its attractions may account
for the thin attendances at the schools which have been
lately complained of at school-board meetings,