The Comet 1897 The Comet Vol I Issue 5 | Page 11

THE COMET: MAY, 1898. 11
with us.
Such a time was always-made a great occasion.
The house was turned over to us, and we had rare games and romping.
No lessons were known the next day.
" The girls M the school played janitor

How About It?

You ' ll soon need new Shoes arid Slippers for Commencement.
Are we going to get a larger share of
,
dividing
themselves
into
groups
your trade?
which took it day about or week about sweeping the school room.
The room
New Exclusive
Styles
for Summer Wear.
was. heated by a wood stove, and the wood was cut and fires made by the boys.
Sometimes they were compelled to forage for wood on the creek nearby.
Water for drinking purposes was obtained
Black or brown shades.
Prices
$ 1.50
Y ~ lU ' llbe delighted if you give us a call.

BURT SHOE CO., 610 Congress Ave.
to
$ 3.00.
from the creek and brought
by
the
boys,
who
were
always
glad
to
go for it in order to escape the dread-
perfect picture of that sweet face, ever
of the. same subject matter was always
ful bore of a school kept in session for
framed in the flawing silky brown hair,
acceptable.
nine long hours a day, and generally
if only chemistry could develop a neg-
" We used
Davies '
arithmetics,
but
under rigid discipline.
The writer was
ative of the memory.
after attaining
some advancement
did
fond of ' his books, and did well in his
The two usually led their classes. He
not recite in class.
Eaoo boy worked
studies,
but in the endless afternoons
" lV ' 3. Sfoud of getting
her
at
the head
through
the ' book pretty
much at
his
he often sat at a window and longed
of the
spelling
class, and,
by getting
own pleasure and at h is own pace; the
for
the
freedom
of the
animals
out-
and holding
the
place next, isol ' ating
bright,
industrious
ones
rapidly;
the
side.
her from. the rest and thus cutting off dull and lazy ones more slowly, or not
" The
session
usually
lasted
four
his rivals.
If she missed
a word he
working
at all.
months
in the winter
and two in the
spelled it and passed up, but, strange
" So much for the old country SChool;
summer,
the intermediate
months
be-
to say, the next easy word that
came
the school
master
is gone
and
his
ing devoted to the planting
and ga th-
his way ' he was sure to miss and she
place
has
been
taken
by
the
dainty
ering
of crops,
in
which
work,
of
gained her accustomed place.
The Iit-
young lady from the city, who has a
course, the children aided.
" The texts used were primeval
as
tie favorite returned ' his Jl.~ rtialHy, and cozy school room, supplied the attachment was the joke of the two I S ~" apparatus, teaches at
with modthirty dolwere
also the disciplin
and methods
families
and of the neigihborhood.
lars a moutz.
tells beautiful
stories,
is.
of instruction.
All gradually
improv- I
the
impersonation
01
e- " ntleness and
ed as the writer
grew
older and
had
"' A
sunbeam kissed a silver ripple,
kindness,
and
Who would
jTl ' Oi. JaG " c
become almost modern by the time he
Naught
shall dissever ' thee and me.
fain
at
sight of a bloody nose.
Th ' e
was old enough to attend a high school
In night ' s
wide
darkness
passed
the
change, in the writer ' s
opinion,
is not
that ' had been established
in a distant
beam away,
an una lloyrrl gain."
town.
They served their purpose pret-
The ripple mingled
w ith the sea.'
ty well however. Those crude schools did about as good work in some instances as the modern city schools.
" The speller USEd has been mentioned, Webster ' s " blue back." All who have used or examined it know that it groups the words according to length and accent and not according to use, meaning, flifficult spelling or any other reasonable principle. The groups are large or small according as the learned author was sleepy or not when he was making up the groups, it seems. No definitions were given worth mentioning, and a quantity of reading matter was interspersed which was never read. We stood up in line to spell, and words missed WEre passed down the line, the one who succeeded in spelling tile word being allowed to pass above all who had missed it. The head of the class was, of course, the place of honor. This plan was sometimes varied, but all teachers had the class stand up and spell orally.
" The writer had his romance, or rather romances, as have so many before him. From eight to ten his flame was a Iit ' tle dark-eyed, brown- ' haired, curly-headed girl of his own age. He-could now produce for his readers a
" And so it was with this childhood love affair. Her father moved to a distant State, and she sleeps to-day beneath the turf of another clime, while the wrLer-well he is writing this account. Other attachments ' have long since overshadowed ', hio, but none hav = left a more delicatelyc inted memory.
" Voleused the old McGuffey readers, and the excerpts they contained were the only glimpses we got of litera-. UTe. Fortunately many of them were very good and many of them throughout tile series I can repeat to-day verbatim. Story reading was impossible, for we had no books; and if we hac! had ' all the books in the world it would have been regarded as quite as much out of pl-ace in the school as the playing of cards. Stories were told us at our homes, but were never told nor read at school.
" History we did not study, but the advanuced ' s: tudents were allowed to read it as a substitute for the readers, This prtvjlege was the mark of high advancement, and was so much appreciated by myself that I read not one nor two texts, but everyone that I ' could buy or borrow. A new version
EXCHANGES.( For Latin Pupils.)
Puer ex Saganaw, lens ad school; Videt in meadow
Infestus mule. Ille approacheso maguus sorrow, Puer i, skyward-
Funeral to-morrow. Moral.
Qui videt a thing Non ei well known;
Est vene for him Relingue id alone.
" j thought I knew I knew it all, But now I must confess
The more 1 know I know I know I know 1 know the less." •
" Tempus Iugir," said the Romans;
Yes; alas, ' tis fleeting on, Ever coming Ever going Life is short, and soon ' tis done; But as I think of next vacatipn, Pouring over these lessons huge Ever harder, Ever longer;
All I say is: " Let her fudge."-Ex_