Part 8 (2/2)
Arrived at Geauga Seminary, they called upon the princ.i.p.al and announced for what purpose they had come.
”Well, young men, I hope you mean to work?” he said.
”Yes, sir,” answered James promptly. ”I am poor, and I want to get an education as quick as I can.”
”I like your sentiments, and I will help you as far as I can.”
The boys succeeded in hiring a room in an old unpainted building near the academy for a small weekly sum. It was unfurnished, but they succeeded in borrowing a few dilapidated chairs from a neighbor who did not require them, and some straw ticks, which they spread upon the floor for sleeping purposes. In one corner they stowe their frying-pans, kettles, and dishes, and then they set up housekeeping in humble style.
The Geauga Seminary was a Freewill Baptist inst.i.tution, and was attended by a considerable number of students, to whom it did not, indeed, furnish what is called ”the higher education,” but it was a considerable advance upon any school that James had hitherto attended. English grammar, natural philosophy, arithmetic, and algebra--these were the princ.i.p.al studies to which James devoted himself, and they opened to him new fields of thought. Probably it was at this humble seminary that he first acquired the thirst for learning that ever afterward characterized him.
Let us look in upon the three boys a night or two after they have commenced housekeeping.
They take turns in cooking, and this time it is the turn of the one in whom we feel the strongest interest.
”What have we got for supper, boys?” he asks, for the procuring of supplies has fallen to them.
”Here are a dozen eggs,” said Henry Bounton, his cousin.
”And here is a loaf of bread, which I got at the baker's,” said his friend.
”That's good! We'll have bread and fried eggs. There is nothing better than that.”
”Eggs have gone up a cent a dozen,” remarks Henry, gravely.
This news is received seriously, for a cent means something to them.
Probably even then the price was not greater than six to eight cents a dozen, for prices were low in the West at that time.
”Then we can't have them so often,” said James, philosophically, ”unless we get something to do.”
”There's a carpenter's-shop a little way down the street,” said Henry.
”I guess you can find employment there.”
”I'll go round there after supper.”
Meanwhile he attended to his duty as cook, and in due time each of the boys was supplied with four fried eggs and as much bread as he cared for. Probably b.u.t.ter was dispensed with, as too costly a luxury, until more prosperous times.
When supper was over the boys took a walk, and then, returning to their humble room, spent the evening in preparing their next morning's lessons.
In them James soon took leading rank, for his brain was larger, and his powers of application and intuition great, as Dr. Robinson had implied.
From the time he entered Geauga Seminary probably he never seriously doubted that he had entered upon the right path.
CHAPTER IX.
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