THE SCHOOL-HOUSE. 
861 
its obligations, they will be far better qualified for the same situa- 
tion twenty years hence, than they are to-day. 
The metamorphosis of 
" books of stature small, 
Which, with pellucid horn secured, are " 
into Dictionaries, and volumes on Science, is quite as striking as the 
change from old to young, in the instructors. The very name of 
a horn-book is never heard to -day, and perhaps there are not half 
a dozen persons in an American country school district who know 
its meaning. In this respect, om- children of the present day have 
greatly the advantage over their predecessors ; few things are 
cheaper and more common now than books. Possibly fingers are 
also more clean, and do not need the sheath of horn to protect 
the paper ; though, upon consideration, it seems by no means cer- 
tain that the hands of modern little folk are so much better washed 
than those of their grand-parents, since it will be remembered that 
the dame's little troop for " unkempt hair," w^ere " sorely shent," 
and where the hair was required to be nicely combed, it is but nat- 
ural to suppose that faces and liands were well washed. 
The flock that came tripping out of the Red Brook school-house 
this afternoon was composed of boys and girls, varying in ages 
and sizes from the little chubby thing, half boy, half baby, to the 
elder sister, just beginning to put on the first airs of womanhood. 
Different codes of manners are found to prevail in different school- 
houses about the country : sometimes, when the children are at 
play before the door, or trudging on their way to or from home, 
the little girls will curtsey, and the boys bow to the passing stran- 
ger, showing that they have been taught to make their manners ; 
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