Martinsburg weekly independent. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1873-1875, 1875-01-16

authority given by the trustees,
where there were trustees, or by
custom where there were none,t the
occasion of his monday absence
was availed Of by the " big boys"
to bar him OUT Having done
this in a way which the phrase
sufficiently Indicates, they awaited
his return. An order to unfasten
the door and windows-for both
were carefully barred''-follow-
ed, but generally accompanied
with tone of voice and a glance
of the pedagogical eye,. which
plainly signified " Barkus is wilt
ing. This was answered with a
petition in writing, or verbal, for
one or two weeks holiday and
certain quantity ofapples, with SUI
gar-cakes and beer added, if there
happened to be any Aunt Min
ty' in that line, near enough to
supply them. After little par
leying, or negotiation, to use a
more dignified phrase, the enforc-
ed terms Of the petition were usu-
ally complied with to the joy OF
the scholars. But now and then a
srusty old teacher( one. as testy and
as crusty, as Washington Irving
would take offence at some fancied
insult by word or act, and stand
out.
In the barring out" of Dickey
Wood" your correspondent, who
drew up the petition, happened to
make grandiloquent comparison
Of himself and his associates to the
+" fathers of the Revolution stand
ing out against the tyrranical Brit
ish," &c. The " MASTER" happen
ing to be an Englishman, took this
in high dudgeon, as meant to be a
slurring PERSONAL---VERY. Hence the
trouble. For more than week
/ think, nearly two weeks-did he
come, day after day, and demand
an unconditional surrender of the
premises, in the most spiteful terms
imaginable, but in vain until he
proclaimed expulsion as the penal
ty of further " rebellion against his
authority" as he pronouced it,and
SO thinned our ranks, that the
captain" seeing himself almost
alone, ordered a formal restoration
of the school-house. Does some
reader ask how we subsisted a? Ian
swer, an abundance of nice things
furnished by our parents, who en-
joyed the sport until the "expul-
sion" proclamation gave so unusu-
ally serious turn to matters. After
sending in supplies by day, they
came in considerable numbers on a
certain dark night, and with muf-
fed faces and altered voices secon-
ded the demand of our teacher
pretending that they were trustees
speaking by authority.
This they did,as your corresp0n-
dents father told him afterwards,
"to try the pluck of their sons."-
Nor did they find them wanting
there in-for orders were given to
crack any fingers that attempted to
enter by the old laterly-sliding
windows, as now and then there
were feints of doing. How many
parental fingers really were crack
ed, know not. only know that
my father, in the same spirit that
caused him to join in the trial of
our pluck, pretended to be angry
with me for ordering my own fa-
theirs fingers cracked. This | had
virtually done, as the one who
played captain on the well-re-
membered occasion.
1t was for leading the" barring
out" party that the attempt at re-
venge with an inordinate fiogging,
In which the weak and shOrt-win-
ded old schoolmaster was mastered
by his scholar, referred to above,
was made-no doubt intensified by
the old mans memory of the fame
led insult which our petition for a
holiday recess and apples, cakes
and beer" contained.
j. +. S.