The Columbus journal., 1884-02-27
OUR SPELLING HATCH.

OUR SPELLING HATCH. .
: ..rmust tell YOU, my dear. how much
I enjoyed the spelling match in your
school one afternoon; it reminded me
20 much ofwhen was young. m
right glad they have spelling matches
again in schools. When was girl
we young folks thought great deal Of
the spellin's we had, and this one of
yours brought back that old country
school-house where / got the little
learnin' have, SO that could shut my
eyes and see il, as plain as the day. =.
''It was placed on little rise of
ground, right at the edge of . big
grove of hickernut and walnut trees.
Old Squire Hepner gave the ground for
It out of his wOod-pastur lot, and in
summer time the grass grew thick, and
full of flowers down the slope in front
of the house, to the rail fence that shut
of the school ground from the road.
We used to eat our lunches in the fence
corners on spring days. H.
..You can't think how thick the grass
was, nor how bright and green the
moss was we'd find on the old rails.
And all along the edge of the grove,
and peepin' up SO shy and sweet and
modest-like, was the violets and daisies
and bluebells and yaller butter-cnps for
US to place in our hair and pile un the
teachers table.
Then in winter, we'd have such gay
times coastin' down the slope, and
skatin' on the pond Jest acrost the road.
Ne and my little brothers and sisters
walked two miles to 90 to that log
school-house, and thought nothin' of it.
Don't rremember well ev'ry one of
those old logs! Think / do! It wasn't
such q poor excuse for house as you
might think, either. 49,. -s Z
sIndeed, sFour-Mile school house, as
1t was called, was about the best one In
Greenaway township; for it was of
hewed logs, mind you, and had pine
floor and plastered ceilin', and most
of the school-houses were of rough logs,
with the bark on, and had dirt floors,
or at best, floors of rough boards.
.'Some of the other deestrickts were
jealous of our school-house. The next
that joined ours was one of the jealous
deestrickts, and the folks in it used to
say that they didn't care if we did have
such q fine house, they could spell our
school down any time if we'd only give
them q chance. But, of course, we
knew they couldn't. We believed we
could out-spell them, even if we did
have The best school-house
''Old Squire Hepner, he always took
. great interest in our school. He was
. peculiar kind of q man; folks would
call him cranky in these days, / sup
pose. He was so gruff and sullen that
you'd think he'd snap your head of.
.Eddication was the old squire's
hobby. He had no learnin' himself,
and used to tell us how he felt the need
of it. He thought people could not be
educated, unless they could spell clean
from b-a ba, to 'incommunicability' in
the speller. To know how to spell was
to him the foundation of al knowledge.
That was one of his curious notions.
..Well, Squire Hepner had heard that
/, the Red Haw deestrickt folks was
maxim their boasts that they could
.out-spell ours, and it angered him. His
daughter. Harriet, was the best speller
in our school, and they say her father
offered her the best cow on his place il
she'd spell the Red Haw school down.
Zone Friday afternoon the old squire
came stampin' into the schoOl-hOuse
when our school was havin' spellin'-
match. He was the director of our
deestrickt, and the boldest scholar
would be mute and meek enough when
he appeared. He had two little Jet
black eyes that seemed 10 see right
through you. He could make almost
any scholar wiggle in his seat by fast
enin' his eyes upon him.
1.-THE squire was the richest man In
Four Mile, but he never gave any
. money away, and that made it all the
more surprisin' when. Just 6elore the
school let out that night, he gotup and
in his short, jerky, gruff way said:
you've spelt pretty we'll this aft
ernoon, scholars. and I'm glad of it;
for, to my thinkin', spellin's the most
important thing a BODY can rarn.
In fact, it stan's to reason that
you've got to- be good spellers
fore you can be good readers, or real
good in anythin'. It's all well enough
TO know how to figger correctly, and
reckon grammar's well enough, tho
never TUX much stock in it. Geog-
raphy and algebray and history and al
that is good enough in its place. but,
'cordin' to my notion, spellin' beats 'em
all. :
land now to 'ncoursge you in bein'
good spoilers. and to stop the braggin'
Of some deestrickts not fer from here,
I'm gOin' 10 make it an obieck fer you