The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1895-06-19
IN HER YOUNG DAYS.
an HAMILTON IN TIE DAYSSHE
WAS A TEACHER.


,,s Tascher-Her Advice TO Girls when
About to Graduate.
Hamilton, Mass, has been noted for
manv years and is still for its Methodist
camp meeting every August at Asbury
rove, 1t has also been famous for hav-
inc produced Abby Dodge, known to
ibe American public as "Gail Hamil-
ton ,, from the end of her Christian
name. Abigail, and her birthplace. And
por many years Miss Dodge lived at Ham
;lton, and it was there she wrote all her
books.
No one who had the good fortune to
10 assigned to her classes in those days
and the privilege Of continuing gen
prous hour daily for course Of years
tbrongh grammar, rhetoric, English lit
erature. logic, etc., could fail to appre-
c;ate the unreasonable advantage or
cease to hold the teacher, lavish with
her intellectual treasures, in affection
ate remembrance. That the regard was
mutual may we'll be believed if one
reads between the lines in her "Gala
Days'' and can interpret her illusions
to the girls OF that period, where she
ipvokes them by name, land the rest
Of you, dearly beloved and longed for
KNOWING you and from you, all, do
mot know what girls can be?"
The course in English literature, her
speciality, was very comprehensive and
declared on the authority of Yale vale
djctorian to be better than that Of Yale
at that time. This was before everybody
was highly educated-before the day Of
the college annex and the woman's col
lege, and just before everybody was too
busy making history, marches or have
locks to think of anything else.
Miss Dodge then was not above aver
age height, possibly under, not special
" slender or petite, and certainly not
the opposite; hair not abundant, light
brown; eyes grayish blue; complexion
fair, where color came and went quick
". Her mouth was generous and the
teeth conspicuously full, even and regu-
lar. She was modest, unaffected and
unassuming, essentially feminine in
way, manner and voice. Her habit Of
mind being scholarly, she always seemed
studious when not engaged in converse
ton ANY one supposing that she at all
suggested the self asserting, screeching
amazon, with platform stride and voice,
or an untamed shrew clasping a mus
tard pot would be vastly mistaken.
Earnest and intense, she was doubtless
frequently subject to mlsinterpretation,
as are all who relieve the tension by
dropping into badinage.
She did not put herself forward or
advertise herself in any way. She was
called forward because she could not be
hid and in response she went forward
and made herself speedily the mistress
Of the situation. In ordinary converse
ton she was piquant and forceful, and
she taught with "some of Miss Dodge's
vim, as they called the ineffable some
thing which distinguished her mode OF
teaching. She herself might have called
it SOUL" as she one day reused
pupil, listless for the nonce, with,
OCdu you give Us a AbCAC VA OA1"NO SoS%~
Of yours, Miss Blank"
She believed that "fun and frOhc do
not lower the life they UNNECESSARILY
ighten." She was reverent, deeply SO,
where reverence was due, but she could
aim little arrows of wit betimes so as
to pierce the dignity of dulhess and
leave it to collapse at leisure She
dressed plainly, chiefly in blues, grays
and browns, without taste probably, for
dress was an incident with her.
1t was whispered that she had the
largest salary ever paid to a woman for
teaching, and that she had already lift
ed mortgage for her father. 1t may
nave been mere schoolOom romanclng,
but it was believed by many who wor-
shipped afar off, as also the floating idea
1 that she had refused innumerable offers
OF marriage from teachers, doctors, law
i yers and priests.
One had to study the whole lesson
and gather information from all high
ways, byways and approaches not to be
caught empty handed in recitation One
was sure to have been well drilled IL
the uses of shall and will, and happy
fhe student, especially if a natural low
Ct OF literature, who was trained by her
TO love and be loyal to the English
mother tongue.
Reading her earlier books, one almost
4ves over again some of the red letter
Jays Of the classroom. 1t may have been
N the moral science Monday class when,
something suggesting, she turned alb
toptly with, IF you are any Of you 60
s !ng to be robbers-mind, l am not urg-
ns you to robbery, but if you should
some day set out to be robbers, be high