Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-05-11


There were three assistant masters.
Peach, the mathematical master, was the
only one in the place OF whom we were
the least afraid. He was a middle-aged
man, gross and pursy, with white doughy
face, illumlDed by small black eyes. We
abhorre1 him for his habit of favOritsm,
which led him to pet two or three boys
and vent his spleen on ali the others. We
called him Pike because of the vOracity
with which he ate at table. During the
first years of his mastership Pike persist
entity declined to send up any one to be
logged, not from tender or humanitarian
motives, but from sheer squeamishness
on the subject of the swish, it being the
function OF the master who reported him
to hold the hands of the victim during the
operation. But one day, in a rage, he sent
up Davis of the upper third; and having
once tasted blood, and rather liked 1t, he
never afterward failed to report one or
-two of us when the weeks work was over
hauled on Monday morning.
Longreed, the third master, was a tall,
gawky fellow, with sandy hair and weak
chest, who exercised a minimum of au-
thOrity in the school. We despised him
at first, for, three weeks after ne came, he
went down on his knees to the fourth form
and prayed them not TO sing "'Rule Bri-
tannia' in class, lest TOZer should over
hear and take his situation from him.
But in time we came to like him, for he
was as soft as milk and good natured,
and would beard TOZeT in his study and
try 10 beg of any decent fellow who hap
pened to be under sentence Of a whack-
ing. At school entertainment, in his
first year, he read ''The May Queen" by
which name he was ever alterward known.
The May Queen, when he first came,
taught French as well as English; buthis
attachments in the Gallic tongue were in
considerable and TOzer shortly alterward
engaged a resident French master. His
name was Gringier, which was soon cor
rupted by us into Ginger, Ginger was
big stout man, with black hair, red cheeks
and an eye as merry as that reverend per-
sons in ''Ing0ldsby," whom Nelly Dean
poisoned through the medium Of Warden
pie. Ginger had an Unsuitable appetite
for mischlevOus and unlawful sport OF all
kinds. and aided and abetted us in most
of our nefarious exploits.
TOzer's sister Sophia assisted him in the
capacity of matrOn. She was of the same
age and cOmeliness as her brother, and
mad an inveterate hatred for boys. She
was small, thin and wizened, and went
hopping like a bird. She could, however,
run upon occasion; and it was owing to
the astonishing form she displayed IN her
famous pursuit oil Teddy, twice round the
playground and over TOZer's lawn, that
She received the appellation Of Gregor,
after the horse of that name which won
the Derby, or some other great race, that
same year. 1t was GregOr who first took
in hand the new boys on their arrival at
the school, She pOunced on them the in
slant they set foot on the mat, demanded
the KEY of their box and proceeded forth
with to a minute examination of the con-
tents, sorting out all such articles as she
considered unfit for school use and setting
them aside until the end of term, by which
time they were not untrequently missing
Active to most perniciOus extent, she
was liable to be found up and about at
any hour of the day or night; she would
rouse ToZer from his slumbers at midnight
to acquaint him that she had found pile
of crusts under the table in the hall, and
at six in the morning, that he might not
oversleep himself. In her zeal for him
and for the school, and in her unsleeping
anxiety to have some fellow or another
always within range of the swish, she
bored and worried the old man almost to
the point of extinction. He had made
many efforts to get rid of her, but she
stuck to him with the tenacity of one of
the mustard-plasters she was so fond Of
prescribing for US. She cherished a hope
less love for the May Queen, who ran from
her.