Aunt 'Liza's Hero and Other Stories Part 7

"Well, s'pose she is?" said the squire. "She ain't askin' nothin' but the schoolhouse for an evening, and I've got power to let her have that. I'm school agent, ain't I?"

"I don't say the contrary. But to my way of thinkin', she's just a-wastin' time over a lot of foolishness. Hey, Schmidt?"

"Yah, das ist so!" a.s.sented the man in the rocking-chair, as he took his pipe from his mouth. "I tolt mein poy I shust dook him oudt of school and put him to voork ven I hear some more of dose grazy idees."

"Crazy? Nothing crazy about it!" interrupted the old squire, hotly.

"I'll just tell you, gentlemen, it was a mighty good deed old Abel Dawson quit teaching here. He'd run along in the same old rut for the last ten year, till things had just about dried up. I made a visit to 'em last fall. I put some questions to the scholars, too. There wa'n't but four out of the hull of 'em that was exactly sure who the President of these United States was. Nary one could name the Vice-President!"

"Dey lairn goot vot vos in de book," said Schmidt.

"Yes!" roared the squire. "Abel stood over them with a rod, and frightened the spelling-book into 'em till they could say it off, back'ards or forrards. But they was like a lot of skeered parrots that didn't understand what they _was_ saying."

"Dot vos more goot as learn 'em yoost foolishness--badriodism und der flag und all dot plab 'bout der country und der Union."

"Look out, now, Schmidt! I ain't goin' to set still and hear you calling patriotism 'blab.' I tell you in only nine weeks Miss Atworth's got the poor little souls waked up. They never knew before that they _had_ a country. History and geography mean something to them now. She'll make intelligent citizens out of 'em if you'll keep your hands off. I'm out in my guess if she don't give this whole towns.h.i.+p a shakin' up before this thing is over, and teach 'em some public sperit."

Mr. Gates gave a sniff. "They say she's had a piano hauled out from the city, too," he said. "Hope she don't intend to levy on the parents to pay for it. She'll get nothing out of me. I'll tell her that right now."

"Shucks!" cried the squire, as he handed Schmidt his _Zeitung_. "Neither of _you_ needn't worry. She's too smart to expect to get blood out of turnips."

"Vell, all I haf to say," was Schmidt's parting remark, as he wound his blue woollen m.u.f.fler about his neck, "if she keeps on mit dose voolishness, I dake mein Karl oudt of school, right avay alretty. Dot vos better dot he voork as to vaste his time so."

"Poor little Miss Atworth!" sighed Mrs. Hardy, as she watched the two men tramp off together. "I'm powerful glad she's boarding with us. The whole neighbourhood is down on her new-fangled ways. I'm going right out now and make something extry nice and hot for supper. It's pretty near sundown, and she'll come in soon all wore out with her day's work."

The little teacher did need the good cheer and "extry nice" supper that awaited her in the cosy kitchen, for she had felt much discouraged as she trudged homeward through the falling snow. Her pupils had nearly all been telling her the same thing that day. It was that their parents scouted the idea of helping her to celebrate Was.h.i.+ngton's Birthday.

She had come from a distant town to teach the Hardyville school in hope to lay up enough money to complete her art course; but now it seemed to her that something more important than art demanded her services and the small sum she had saved. The dull, colourless lives of the children appealed irresistibly to her sympathies, and she was often amazed at the utter absence of any spirit of patriotism.

"How could the poor children learn patriotism?" said Mrs. Hardy. "Their parents don't feel it, except for their Vaterland. And certainly nothing has been done by the public round here to make the children love this country. Such lives! The parents get up before daylight, and dig till dark. They usually force the boys and girls to live like overworked horses. All they think of is making money. That big room up-stairs in the schoolhouse was built for a public hall. It has not been opened for fifteen years for any kind of an entertainment, not even a magic lantern show. It is the same old treadmill existence year in and year out. The children don't get their lives brightened--no public holidays are celebrated here, not even the Fourth of July. How can they love the country?"

"I shall certainly give them something better," Miss Atworth had said, and the upshot was her determination to celebrate Was.h.i.+ngton's Birthday. The indifference or hostility of the parents had but roused her American spirit, even to the resolve that she would bear the entire expense herself, if none would contribute from their plenty.

"Ten dollars," she reflected, "will buy decorations and material for costumes and stage curtains. Another ten will rent a piano. Most of the children have never even seen one. All my spare time must go to getting up the entertainment, and all my savings, too. Well, I'm glad--I guess I can give up so much for my country. It will be worth while if I can make its 'Father's' birthday the greatest gala day these poor little souls have ever known."

Not a particle of encouragement did she get from any of the parents except Peter Dowling, a one-armed veteran of the Civil War, and he was much more discouraging than he meant to be.

"Go on, I wish you luck, young lady," he would observe. "You can count on me for anything a one-armed man can do. But what's the use? I've tried and tried to get some 'Merican sentiment into these youngsters.

'Tain't no go--and never will be. But you can count on me to hooray for you all the same. I'll be thar if n.o.body else is."

"Maybe you tried to scold them into patriotism, as the squire does,"

said the little teacher. "I don't think that's the best way."

"It didn't work, anyhow," said the veteran, and walked away.

Miss Atworth's programme, besides the decoration of the schoolhouse, comprised tableaux and the recitation of patriotic poems and addresses by her larger pupils. But most of the children soon received strict orders to hurry home at four o'clock, to attend to the milking and evening ch.o.r.es. They were also kept at work till the last possible minute in the morning. But with only noon-time and recess for practising their parts, her enthusiasm worked wonders.

"It ought to be a grand success," said Miss Atworth, as she took a final approving survey of the decorations the afternoon of the twenty-first.

"Only it's a little too warlike. I wish I had an old-fas.h.i.+oned pruning-hook to hang across that sword between the windows."

"Mr. Schmidt has one," volunteered Sarah Gates. "But he's so mad about our wasting so much time, as he calls it, that it's as much as a fellow's head is worth to ask him for it. I heard him tell pa he was going to keep Karl at home to-morrow night. Isn't that mean?"

"Keep Karl at home!" cried Miss Atworth, in dismay. "He couldn't be so mean as that!"

Karl was the brightest pupil in her room--a big, manly boy of sixteen.

He was kept at home every spring and fall to help with the work, although his father was not poor. She had taken an especial interest in him from the first, had drilled him carefully in his declamation, and counted on him as the star of the entertainment.

"Pa wasn't going to let me come, either," continued Sarah, "till ma told him you'd picked me out of all the school to be the G.o.ddess of Liberty, and that I was going to have a gold crown on, and gold stars spangled over my dress. Ma's awful proud because I was chosen to be a G.o.ddess."

The little teacher smiled. She was not without worldly wisdom, and had given Sarah such a prominent part in the hope that it might conciliate the whole Gates family. Fortunately nothing was required of the G.o.ddess but long hair and a pretty face--about all Sarah had to boast of. She simply could not learn.

Miss Atworth locked the door and started rapidly homeward. What should she do if Karl must be left out of the performance? A quarter of a mile brought her to the lane leading from the pike to the Schmidt place, and there she stopped with sudden resolve.

"I'll beard that old lion in his den, and ask him for his pruning-hook.

That will be an excuse for going, and will give me an opportunity to plead Karl's cause."

It was nearly dark when Miss Atworth ran up the squire's front walk, and danced through the house into the kitchen.

"Oh, such luck!" she cried, gaily. "I went to see Mr. Schmidt, and some good angel prompted me to speak to him in German. It was such bad German--perhaps that's what pleased him. Anyway it thawed him right out.

He lent me his pruning-hook, and showed me over his big barn. Of course I admired his fine cattle, and then, as he got more and more pleased at my showing such an astonis.h.i.+ng lot of sense, I praised Karl so highly that he made a complete surrender. He is coming to-morrow night to bring the whole Schmidt family, from the old _gross.m.u.tter_, to the baby.

Hurrah for Was.h.i.+ngton's Birthday!"

Never had the old public hall held such an astonished and delighted audience as the one that crowded into it that memorable night. Gay festoons of bunting, countless little flags, and wreaths of evergreen transformed the dingy old place completely.

A large picture of Was.h.i.+ngton placidly beamed from its place of honour.

Over and around it, reaching almost across the stage, was draped a great silken flag, borrowed for the occasion.

Peter Dowling, in his old blue army clothes, with one sleeve pinned across his breast, sat far back, looking bewildered by the wonders the little teacher had accomplished.

Miss Atworth had arranged the programme with great tact. Each child felt prominent, and those who, she secretly knew, would be failures in anything else, were honoured beyond measure when she skilfully grouped them into a series of effective historical tableaux.

"It's enough to make even a graven image feel patriotic," whispered Squire Hardy to his wife, as the children's sweet voices made the room ring with the grand old national airs.

Declamations followed each other in rapid succession. Then came a scene, with recitations, in which Uncle Sam and all the States of the Union took part. The very air seemed charged with the little teacher's electrical spirit of patriotic enthusiasm.

It was at its height when Karl came forward to give the famous speech of Patrick Henry. His delivery was so much better than the rehearsals had led her to expect that even Miss Atworth was surprised. He seemed to find an inspiration in the crowd. A storm of applause followed the "Give me liberty or give me death."

"What shall we do?" she whispered in dismay as the persistent clapping of many hands called him back. "I wish you had prepared for an encore."

"Oh, I know!" said Karl, and in another instant was on the stage again.

In the deep hush that followed, his clear, musical voice rose in German.

He was reciting "_Mein Vaterland_." Old grandmothers who knew but a few words of English rocked themselves back and forth in excited delight; Mr. Schmidt beamed with vast smiles; many an eye grew dim, thinking of the old beloved home across the seas. But the boy was thinking of his own native country. There was no mistaking his meaning, as he turned in closing, to wave his hand toward the portrait and the flag:

"My Fatherland!" he cried with true feeling, and then, after a moment of general surprise, deafening applause broke out.

As it subsided Miss Atworth stepped forward to announce the last song, but Peter Dowling, his face aflame with new delight and old memories, rose, stalked up the aisle as if unconscious of all the eyes fixed on him, and swung himself up on the high platform with one long step.

"Friends," he began, "I've been livin' kind of dead among ye for many's the year. Now I want to say a word or two. I ain't no great at speechifyin', but these old songs and pieces we've been a-listenin' to have spirited me up like the trumpet doos an old war-horse."