Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1903-03-20

l never see one of these fellows swell
ing around with their petty larceny
pride that l don't think of little ex-
perence of mine when | was a boy. An
old fellow caught me lifting water
melon in his patch one afternoon, and
instead of cutting me and letting me go,
as had expected if l got caught, he
led me home by the ear to my ma and
told her what had been up to.
Your grandma had been raised on the
old fashioned plan, and she had never
heard of these newfangled theories Of
reasoning gently with child till its
under lip begins to stick out and its
eyes to fill with tears as it sees the err
ror of its ways. She fetched the tears
all right, but she did it with trunk
strap or a slipper. And your grandma
was pretty substantial woman. Moth
ing of the tootsy wootsy about her
foot and nothing of the airy fairy trifle
about her slipper. When she was
through l knew that I'd been licked
polished right off to n point-and then
she sent me to my room and told me
not to poke my nose out of it till
could recite the Ten Commandments
and the Sunday school lesson by heart.
! There was a whole chapter of it, and
an Old Testament chapter at that, but
/ laid right into it because / knew
ma, and supper was only two hours off.
/ can repeat that chapter still, forward
and backward, without missing a word
or stopping to catch my breath.
Every now and then old Doc Hoover
used to come into the Sunday school
room and scare the scholars into fits
by going around from class to class
and asking questions. That next Sun
day, for the first time. | was glad to
see him happen in, and l didn't try to
escape attention when he worked
around to our class. For ten minutes
I'd been busting for him to ask me to
recite a verse of the lesson, and when
he did | simply cut loose and recited
the whole chapter and threw in the
Ten Commandments for good measure.
1t sort of daZpd the Doc, because he
had come to me for information about
the Old Testament before, and we'd
never got much beyond "And Ahab
begat Jahab." or words to that effect.
But when he got over the shock he
made me stand right up before the
whole school and do it again. Patted
me on the head and said | was IAN
honor to my parents and an example to
my playmates.'
had been looking down all the time,
feeling mighty proud and scared, but
at that / couldn't help CHANGING up to
see the other boys admire me. But the
first person my eye lit on was your
grandma, standing in the back of the
room. where she had stopped for a mo-
ment on her way up to church, and
glaring at me in mighty unpleasant
way.
"Tel 'em, John" she said right out
loud before everybody.
There was no way to run, for the
elder had hold of my hand and there
was no place to hide. though | reckon
l could have crawlcd into a rat hole
So, to gain time, | blurted out:
'Tell 'em what, MANI.
"Tell 'em how you come to have your
lesson so nice
learned to hate notoriety right then
and there, put | knew lllere WIS nC
switching her off on to the weather
when she wanted to talk religion. Sc
l shut my eyes and let it come, though
it caught on my palate once or twice OF
the way out.
Hooked Il watermelon, man.
There wasn't any need for further
particulars with that crowd. and they
simply howled. Ma led me up to oul
pew, allowing that she'd tend to me
Monday for disgracing her in public
that way-and she did
That was a twelve grain dose with
out any sugar coat, but it sweat more
cant and false pride out of my system
than / could get back into it for the
next twenty years. l learned righ
there how to be humble, which Is
heap more important than knowing
how to be proud. There are mighty
few men that need any lessons in that