Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1886-03-26

buht sue uhu buCCetubu IN ODthlulnR DOhFu IN
the only family in the village which had the
distinction OF owning piano and, by pay
ing small sun extra, she had obtained the
use Of this piano for an hour each day-the
best investment Of Little B lis life, IN the re-.
qnel showed.
II was bitter winter on Prince Edward
Island. BY New Years time the roads we're
many OF them well.nigh impossible. Fierce
winds swept 10 and fro, obliterating by noon
tracks which had been clear In the morning /;
and nobody went abroad IL he could help it.
New Years Day opened fercest Of all, with
scurries Of snow, lowering sky, and wind
that threatened to be a gale before night
But, for all that, the tying posts behind the
Wissan Bridge school-house were crowded
full of steaming horses under buffalo robes,
which must stamp and paw and shiver and
endure the day as best they might, while the
New Y ears examination went on. Every body
had come. The fame Of the singing of the
Wssan Bridge school had spread far and
near, and 1t had been whispered that there
was to be piece sung which was finer than
anything ever sung in the Charlottetown
churches.
The school-house was decorated with aver.
greens-pine and sprucs. The New Years
Day having fallen on a Monday, Little Bel
had had II clear working day on the Saturday
aud Sandy had been busy every evening for
week drawing the boughs on their sleds aud
piling them up in the yard. The teachers
desk bad been removed, and in its place stood
the shining red mahogany piano "a new and
wonderful sight to many eyes there.
All was ready, the room crowded full, and
the board of trustees not yet arrived There
sat their three big arm-chairs on the raised
platform, emp,y-a depressing aud perpex.
ing sight to Little Bel, who, in her blue me.
riuo gown, with knot of pink ribbon at h 3r
throat, aud roll of white paper (her sched-
ule OF exerciset) in her hand, stood on the
left band of the piano, her eyes fixed expect
antly on the doors. The minutes heightened
out into quarter Of an hour-half an hour.
Anxously Bel consulted with her father what
should be done.
The roads are something fearful, child, "
he replied I'VE must make big allowance
for that They're sure to be comm, at least
some one o them. 1t was never known that
they failed on the New Years examination
an it would seem a sore dsrespect to begin
without them here"
Before be had flushed speaking there was
heard a merry jingling of bells outside -doz
ems and dozens it seemed and hilarious voc
es and laughter, and the snorting Of over
driven horses, aud the stamping of feet, aud
looked in his neighbor's face. What sounds
were these Who ever heard sober school
board arrive in such fashion as this? But il
was the school board nothing less a good
deal more, however. Little b lis heart sank
within her as she saw the foremost figure en-
tering the room. What evil destiny had
brought Sandy Bruce in the character of
school visitor that day SANDY Bruce, retir-
ed school-teacher himself superintendent OF
the hospital 10 CnarlOttetown, road. master,
ship owner, e1ciseman Sandy Bruce, whose
sharp aud unexpected questions had been
known to hoor the best OF scholars aud upset
the plans Of the best Of teachers. Yet here
be WAS, Sandy Bruce himself aud it was his
fierce little Norwegian ponies, with their sill
yer bells and fur collars, the admiration of all
ChArottetown, that had made such clatter
and stamping outside, and were still keeping
II up, for every time they stirred the bells
tinkled like peal of chimes Aud woe
upon woe, behind him came, not ,rs friend
and pastor, Mr. Allan, but the crusty old Dal.
getty, whose doing it had been year before,
as Bel very we'll knew, that the five pound
supplement had been only condltionally prom
sed.
Conflicting emotions turned Bells face scar
let as she advanced to meet them the most
casual observer could not have failed to see
tuhN pituOmiuhttht duh Oauul DTuCc
was no casual observer nothing escaped his
keen glance and keener intuition and it was
almost with wicked twinkle in his little ha-
eel eyes that he said, still shaking of the
snow, stamping and putting:
'Eh. but ye we're not looking for me, teach.
er The minister was sent for to go to old
Elspie Breadalbsne, who's dyin' the morn
and happened by as he was startiu', and he
made me promise to come in his place ; an
picked up my friend Dalgetty here few miles
back, wi his horse hounderin' in the drifts
Except for me, ye'd had no board at all here
to-day, so hope yen give me no bad vel
come"
AS be spoke he was studying her face where
the color came and went like waves not a
thought in the girls heart he did not read.
Poor little lasse :" he was thinking to him
self, shes shaking in her shoes wi fear O.
me. I'll not put her out. She's dainty
blossom of girl. What's kept her from be-
ing trodden down by these Wssau Bridge
racketers, I'd like to know"
But when he seated himself on the plat
form, aud took his first look at the rows OF
pupils in the centre OF the room, he was near
starting with amazement. The Wissan Bridge
''racketers, as he had mentally called them,
we're not to be seen. Very well he knew
many Of them by sight, for his shipping busi
this was not the first time he had been inside
the school house, which had been so long the
dread and terror of school boards aud teach
ers alike A puzzled frown gathered between
Sandy Bruce's eyebrows as he gazA Id
What has happened to the youngsters,
then ?"-hsve they all been convarted i this
twelvemonth 2" he was thinking Aud the
fitting, perplexed thought did not escaps the
observation of john Mcdonald, who was as
quick reader of faces rs Sandy himself, and
had been by no means free from anxiety for
his Little Bel when he saw the redoubtsble
visage of the excseman appear in the door
way.
Hes takin' it in quick, the way the bairn's
got them a in hand" thought John. "If
only she can hold hersel cool now !"
No danger. Bel was not the one to lose a
battle by appearing to quail in the outset,
however clearly she might see herself out
numbered. Aud sympathetic and eager
glances from her constables, Archie and S Lu-
dy, told her that they we're all ready for the
fray. These glances Sandy Bruce chsnced to
intercept, and they heightened his bewilder-
ment. To him Archie McLsod was by no
means a stranger, having had occasion more
than once to deal with him, boy as he was, for
complications with riotous misdOings. He
had happened to know, also that it was At
chic Mcleod who had been head and front of
the last years revolt in the school, the one
boy that hitherto no teacher had been able TO
control And here stood Archie Mcleod, Tis-
ing 10 his place, leader of the form, glancing
down on the boys around him with the eye
of a general, watching the teachers eye,
meanwhile, as dog watches for his masters
signal
And the orderly, yet alert and joyously ca
ger, expression of the whole schoOl-it had
so much the look of a miracle to Sandy Bruce's
eye that, not having been for years acoustom-
ed to the restraint of the technical official
dignity of school visitor, he was on the point
of giving loud whistle of establishment.
Luckily recollecting himself in time, he
smothered the whistle, and the " Whew
what's all this ?" which had been on his
tongues end, in a vigorous and unnecessary
blowing of his nose. And before that was
over, and his eyes well wiped, there stood the
whole school on their feet before him, and
the room ringing with such chorus as was
never heard in Prince Edward school room
before. This completed his bewilderment,
and swallowed it up in delight. II Sandy
Bruce had an overmasterinR passion in his
rugged nature, it was for music. To the
sound of the bagpipes, he had often said, he
would march to death and mot know it for
dyin'." The drum and the fife could draw
him as quickly now as when he was boy,
and sweet singing of a womsn's voice was all
the token he wanted of the certainty of heaven
and the existence of angels.
When Little Bells clear, hute-like soprano