The Manitowoc tribune. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1866-1878, 1877-05-17
A Co,f,.tru School.

tenderly, forgiving its waywardness, and
brought the story to me.
Il Country School.
When I was little girl, I went to q
little school, which was kept by very
little lady, in q very little house. The
little lady herself lived in another little
house, which was divided from the little
school-house only by little garden. ]
did not know then how little the houses,
and the garden, and my school-teache1
were. Miss Caroline seemed large and
powerful to me and, as for her ferule, il
looked bigger to me than the big trees OF
California looked when I saw them 8
few years ago. But when went back,
a grown woman, to my old home, and
walked past Miss Caroline's cottage and
the little sehool-house, hardly could
believe my eyes, everything was so tiny;
and could have picked Miss Caroline
up under my arm.
The school-house had been shoe
makers snop once, and some of the shoe
There was the bench on which he used
to sit and work; this had little open
box at one end, where he used to keep
his tools this bench stood in the middle
of the room, in front of Miss Caroline's
desk, and all the classes sat on it to recite
their lessons The end which had the
open box on it was called the "head" OF
the class. Once L kept up sat the
head in spelling, whole week, and ]
grew SO used to having hold of the edge
of the box, and slipping my fingers back
and forth on it that when I lost my
place, and had boy or girl ON my left
side, I had hard work not to keep all the
time taking hold of their arms instead OF
the box. There used to be also little
drawer under the bench, at this end
but Miss Caroline had that taken of
after she found out that it was there Ned
Spofford hid the "spit-balls" he used
to fire up and down all the classes he re-
cited in. Oh, what a bad boy Ned Spot
ford was! But how we all did like him
Even Miss Caroline herself, I think,
liked him better than any other scholar
IN all the school and yet he gave he1
twice as much trouble as all the other
scholars put together. But he was Sc
good-natured and affectionate that no.
body could help loving him, in spite OF
his mischief. He never resisted nol
struggled when she had to punish him.
L really think he got feruled as often as
once week; but he used to hold out his
hand the minute she told him to, and
look straight into her eyes while she
struck him. Sometimes he would bite
his lips, and the tears would come into
his eyes, but he never cried, nor begged
off, as the rest of us did. He was as
brave as he was mischievous. Even
when he had to sit on the Ounce stool for
twenty minutes with his mouth wide
open and piece of corn-cob set firmly
between his teeth, he never cried. This
was Miss Caroline's worst punish
ment. [ think if she had tried If
once. to see how much it hurt. she
never would have had the heart to
1nfiict it on us. At first, when she
wedged in the piece of cob, you felt like
laughing that anybody should think
such thing as that could be much of a
punishment; but pretty soon your jaws
began to ache, and then the back of your
neck ached, and then the pain reached
up into the back of your head and into
your ears, and it became real torture ::
there was not a single boy in school
that could bear it without the tears
streaming down his cheeks except Ned
Spofford. Miss Caroline very rarely did
1t to girls [ think no one but Sarah KEEL
logg and I ever had it. We were the worst
girls III school; we two and Ned Spofford
were the three black sheep in Miss
Caroline's little fock.-Sare Holm,
IN ST Nicholas for Nag.