Part 17 (1/2)
Mary made out a roll-call, and by unanimous consent it was agreed to arrange the cla.s.s as it then stood, or rather squatted, with the Herculean Ben at the top, and gradually diminis.h.i.+ng in size till it reached the vanis.h.i.+ng point with Cacta, who was ten and the least terrifying of all.
”And now,” ventured the teacher, with the courage of a white rabbit, ”what have you been in the habit of studying?”
Absolute silence on the part of the cla.s.s, which confronted its questioner straight as a row of bottles, presenting faces imperturbable as so many sphinxes.
Other questions met with an equally disheartening response. Miss Carmichael sat up straight, pushed back the persistent curls from her face, and bent every energy towards the achievement of a ”firm” demeanor.
”Clematis,” said she, wisely selecting perhaps the least formidable of the cla.s.s, ”I want you to give me some idea of the kind of work you have been doing, so that we may all be able to understand each other. Now, in your mathematics, for instance, which of you have finished with your arithmetic, and which-”
”What do you mean?” begged Clematis, somewhat tearful.
”Where are you in your arithmetic?
”Nowhere, ma'am.”
”Do you mean you have never learned any?” Mary Carmichael shuddered as she icily put the question.
”Yes, ma'am.”
”Is that the case with all of you?”
Emphatic nods left no room for doubt.
”Then we'll leave that for the present. If you will tell me, Clematis, what kind of work you have been doing in your history and English, we will get to work on those to-day. What books have you been using?”
Not unnaturally, Clematis, who was emotional and easily impressed, began to feel as though she were a criminal. She sobbed in a helpless, feminine way. Ben spoke up, fearsomely, from the top of the cla.s.s.
”We 'ain't got no books,” said he, in grim rebuke, as though to put an end to a profitless discussion.
”Do you wish me to understand,” quavered Mary, ”that you have had no studies-that you-can't read?-that you-don't know-anything?”
”That's it,” said Ben, with the nearest approach to cheerfulness he had yet manifested.
Meanwhile there lay on the teacher's ”desk” copies of Clodd's _Childhood of the World_, two of that excellent series of _History Primers_, and _The Young Geologist_, all carefully selected, in the fulness of Mary's ignorance, for the little pupils of her imagination. She had brought no primer, as Mrs. Yellett's letter had distinctly said that the youngest child was ten and that all were comparatively advanced in their studies.
More than ever Mary longed to penetrate the mystery of that Irish linen decoy, for without doubt it was to be her melancholy fate to conduct this giant band through the alphabet!
Accordingly she wrote out the letters of the alphabet with large simplicity and a sublime renunciation of flourish. The cla.s.s received it tepidly. Mary grew eloquent over its unswerving verities. The cla.s.s remained lukewarm. The difference between a and b was a matter of indifference to the house of Yellett. They regarded their teacher's strenuous efforts to furnish a key to the acquirement of the alphabet with the amused superiority of ”grown-ups” watching infant antics with pencil and paper. Meanwhile her fear of the cla.s.s increased in proportion as her ability to hold its attention diminished. The backbone of the school was plainly wilting. The little scholars, armed to the teeth, no longer sat up straight as tenpins. After twenty-five minutes of educational experience, satiety bowled them over.
A single glance had convinced Ben that the alphabet was beneath contempt.
He yawned automatically at regular intervals-long, dismal yawns that threatened to terminate in a howl, the unchecked, primitive type of yawn that one hears in the cages of the zoological gardens on a dull day. Miss Carmichael raised interrogatory eyebrows, but she might as well have looked reproof at a Bengal tiger.
The cla.s.s was rapidly promoted to c-a-t, cat; but these dizzy intellectual heights left them cold and dull. Ben began to clean his revolver, and on being asked why he did not pay attention to his lessons, answered, briefly:
”It's all d--d foolishness.”
Cacta and Clem were pulling each other's hair. Mary affected not to see this sisterly exchange of torture. Ned whittled a stick; and, in chorus, when their teacher told them that d-o-g spelled dog, they shouted derision, and affirmed that they had no difficulty in compelling the obedience of Stump even without this particular bit of erudition. Though Mary had always abhorred corporal punishment, she began to see arguments in its favor.
With the handleless tub as an elbow-rest the teacher took counsel with herself. Strategy must be employed with the intellectual conquest of the Brobdingnags. Summoning all the pedagogical dignity of which she was capable, she asked: