1868] Teaching a Village School 



ever since remained slightly askew. That mishap 

 forced me to give up the Cold Creek position and 

 thus made very material changes in my life, as I 

 shall presently explain. 



When I recovered from the accident, my father 

 proposed me as teacher of the Gainesville school, a 

 venturesome suggestion at the best. Moreover, as 

 he was sole trustee, the proposition had to be voted 

 on by the people of the district. The decision went 

 against me, the opposition declaring truthfully that 

 I was only an overgrown boy of seventeen, not 

 adequate for the responsibility. Meanwhile, how- in South 

 ever, at South Warsaw, a manufacturing suburb of ^'^''^^^ 

 the county seat, a teacher had been bodily thrown 

 out by the boys, a habit in that particular school, 

 which was then considered the most unruly in the 

 county. Some thirty years before, my father had 

 taught there and had broken in the turbulent ele- 

 ment. They now needed the same discipline again. 

 I undertook the task, and through a regime of 

 "blood and iron" mingled with conciliation, I 

 managed to hold the position until the end of the 

 term, — that is to say, from November to March, — 

 when I entered upon my college course. 



As a matter of fact certain circumstances were in Coasting 

 my favor. On either side of the town stretched the 

 long slopes of the great hills bounding the Wyoming 

 valley, and often after school I used to go out coast- 

 ing with the pupils, sometimes sliding as far as two 

 miles at one run. Thus was established a friendly 

 truce neutralizing the hard feelings occasionally 

 engendered in the schoolhouse by the use of a nice 

 maple ferule which I at first employed more fre- 

 quently than I should now think wise, and which the 



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