Authors: Louisa May Alcott
“And Ben said, ‘No, thank ‘y, not much fun in pounding a feather bed.’”
“Oh, he was
awfully
mad then, and chased Ben up the big maple.”
“He’s there now, for Sam won’t let him come down till he takes it all back.”
“Ben won’t; and I do believe he’ll have to stay up all night,” said Betty, distressfully.
“He won’t care, and we’ll have fun firing up his supper. Nut cakes and cheese will go splendidly; and maybe baked
pears wouldn’t get smashed, he’s such a good catch,” added Bab, decidedly relishing the prospect.
“If he does not come by teatime, we will go and look after him. It seems to me I have heard something about Sam’s troubling
him before, haven’t I?” asked Miss Celia, ready to defend her protege against all unfair persecution.
“Yes, ’m, Sam and Mose are always plaguing Ben. They are big boys, and we can’t make them stop. I won’t let the girls do it,
and the little boys don’t dare to, since Teacher spoke to them,” answered Bab.
“Why does not Teacher speak to the big ones?”
“Ben won’t tell of them, or let us. He says he’ll fight his own battles, and hates telltales. I guess he won’t like to have
us tell you, but I don’t care, for it
is
too bad!” and Betty looked ready to cry over her friend’s tribulations.
“I’m glad you did, for I will attend to it, and stop this sort of thing,” said Miss Celia, after the children had told some
of the tormenting speeches which had tried poor Ben.
Just then Thorny appeared, looking much amused, and the little girls both called out in a breath, “Did you see Ben and get
him down?”
“He got himself down in the neatest way you can imagine”; and Thorny laughed at the recollection.
“Where is Sam?” asked Bab.
“Staring up at the sky to see where Ben has flown to.”
“Oh, tell about it!” begged Betty.
“Well, I came along and found Ben treed, and Sam stoning him. I stopped that at once, and told the ‘fat boy’ to be off. He
said he wouldn’t till Ben begged his pardon; and Ben said he wouldn’t do it, if he stayed up for a week. I was just preparing
to give that rascal a scientific thrashing, when
a load of hay came along, and Ben dropped onto it so quietly that Sam, who was trying to bully me, never saw him go. It tickled
me so, I told Sam I guessed I’d let him off that time, and walked away, leaving him to hunt for Ben, and wonder where the
dickens he had vanished to.”
The idea of Sam’s bewilderment amused the others as much as Thorny, and they all had a good laugh over it before Miss Celia
asked —
“Where has Ben gone now?”
“Oh, he’ll take a little ride, and then slip down and race home full of the fun of it. But I’ve got to settle Sam. I won’t
have our Ben hectored by anyone —”
“But yourself,” put in his sister, with a sly smile, for Thorny
was
rather domineering at times.
“He doesn’t mind my poking him up now and then, it’s good for him; and I always take his part against other people. Sam is
a bully, and so is Mose; and I’ll thrash them both if they don’t stop.”
Anxious to curb her brother’s pugnacious propensities, Miss Celia proposed milder measures, promising to speak to the boys
herself if there was any more trouble.
“I have been thinking that we should have some sort of merrymaking for Ben on his birthday. My plan was a very simple one;
but I will enlarge it, and have all the young folks come, and Ben shall be king of the fun. He needs encouragement in well-doing,
for he does try; and now the first hard part is nearly over, I am sure he will get on bravely. If we treat him with respect,
and show our regard for him, others will follow our example; and that will be better than fighting about it.”
“So it will! What shall we do to make our party tip-top?” asked Thorny, falling into the trap at once; for he dearly
loved to get up theatricals, and had not had any for a long time.
“We will plan something splendid, a ‘grand combination,’ as you used to call your droll mixtures of tragedy, comedy, melodrama,
and farce,” answered his sister, with her head already full of lively plots.
“We’ll startle the natives. I don’t believe they ever saw a play in all their lives, hey, Bab?”
“I’ve seen a circus.”
“We dress up and do ‘Babes in the Wood,’” added Betty, with dignity.
“Pho! that’s nothing. I’ll show you acting that will make your hair stand on end, and you shall act too. Bab will be capital
for the naughty girls,” began Thorny, excited by the prospect of producing a sensation on the boards, and always ready to
tease the girls.
Before Betty could protest that she did not want her hair to stand up, or Bab could indignantly decline the role offered her,
a shrill whistle was heard, and Miss Celia whispered, with a warning look —
“Hush! Ben is coming, and he must not know anything about this yet.”
The next day was Wednesday, and in the afternoon Miss Celia went to hear the children “speak pieces,” though it was very seldom
that any of the busy matrons and elder sisters found time or inclination for these displays of youthful oratory. Miss Celia
and Mrs. Moss were all the audience on this occasion, but Teacher was both pleased and proud to see them, and a general rustle
went through the school as they came in, all the girls turning from the visitors to nod at Bab and Betty, who smiled all over
their round faces to see “Ma” sitting up “’side of Teacher,” and the boys grinned
at Ben, whose heart began to beat fast at the thought of his dear mistress coming so far to hear him say his piece.
Thorny had recommended Marco Bozzaris, but Ben preferred John Gilpin, and ran the famous race with much spirit, making excellent
time in some parts and having to be spurred a little in others, but came out all right, though quite breathless at the end,
sitting down amid great applause, some of which, curiously enough, seemed to come from outside; which in fact it did, for
Thorny was bound to hear but would not come in, lest his presence should abash one orator at least.
Other pieces followed, all more or less patriotic and warlike, among the boys; sentimental among the girls. Sam broke down
in his attempt to give one of Webster’s great speeches. Little Cy Fay boldly attacked
“Again to the battle, Achaians!”
and shrieked his way through it in a shrill, small voice, bound to do honor to the older brother who had trained him even
if he broke a vessel in the attempt. Billy chose a well-worn piece, but gave it a new interest by his style of delivery; for
his gestures were so spasmodic he looked as if going into a fit, and he did such astonishing things with his voice that one
never knew whether a howl or a growl would come next. When
“The woods against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed”;
Billy’s arms went round like the sails of a windmill; the “hymns of lofty cheer” not only “shook the depths of the desert
gloom,” but the small children on their little benches, and the schoolhouse literally rang “to the anthems of the free!” When
“the ocean eagle soared,” Billy appeared
to be going bodily up, and the “pines of the forest roared” as if they had taken lessons of Van Amburgh’s biggest lion. “Woman’s
fearless eye” was expressed by a wild glare; “manhood’s brow, severely high,” by a sudden clutch at the reddish locks falling
over the orator’s hot forehead, and a sounding thump on his blue checked bosom told where “the fiery heart of youth” was located.
“What sought they thus afar?” he asked, in such a natural and inquiring tone, with his eye fixed on Mamie Peters, that the
startled innocent replied, “Dunno,” which caused the speaker to close in haste, devoutly pointing a stubby finger upward at
the last line.
This was considered the gem of the collection, and Billy took his seat proudly conscious that his native town boasted an orator
who, in time, would utterly eclipse Edward Everett and Wendell Phillips.
Sally Folsom led off with “The Coral Grove,” chosen for the express purpose of making her friend Almira Mullet start and blush,
when she recited the second line of that pleasing poem,
“Where the purple
mullet
and gold-fish rove.”
One of the older girls gave Wordsworth’s “Lost Love” in a pensive tone, clasping her hands and bringing out the “O” as if
a sudden twinge of toothache seized her when she ended,
“But she is in her grave, and O,
The difference to me!”
Bab always chose a funny piece, and on this afternoon set them all laughing by the spirit with which she spoke the droll poem,
“Pussy’s Class,” which some of my young readers may have read. The “meou” and the “sptzzs” were capital,
and when the “fond mamma rubbed her nose,” the children shouted, for Miss Bab made a paw of her hand and ended with an impromptu
purr, which was considered the best imitation ever presented to an appreciative public. Betty bashfully murmured “Little White
Lily,” swaying to and fro as regularly as if in no other way could the rhymes be ground out of her memory.
“That is all, I believe. If either of the ladies would like to say a few words to the children, I should be pleased to have
them,” said Teacher, politely, pausing before she dismissed school with a song.
“Please, ’m, I’d like to speak my piece,” answered Miss Celia, obeying a sudden impulse; and, stepping forward with her hat
in her hand, she made a pretty curtsy before she recited Mary Howitt’s sweet little ballad, “Mabel on Midsummer Day.”
She looked so young and merry, and used such simple but expressive gestures, and spoke in such a clear, soft voice that the
children sat as if spellbound, learning several lessons from this new teacher, whose performance charmed them from beginning
to end, and left a moral which all could understand and carry away in that last verse —
“’T is good to make all duty sweet,
To be alert and kind;
’T is good, like Little Mabel,
To have a willing mind.”
Of course there was an enthusiastic clapping when Miss Celia sat down, but even while hands applauded, consciences pricked,
and undone tasks, complaining words, and sour faces seemed to rise up reproachfully before many of the children, as well as
their own faults of elocution.
“Now we will sing,” said Teacher, and a great clearing of throats ensued, but before a note could be uttered, the half-open
door swung wide, and Sancho, with Ben’s hat on, walked in upon his hind legs, and stood with his paws meekly folded, while
a voice from the entry sang rapidly —
“Benny had a little dog,
His fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Benny went,
The dog was sure to go.
“He went into the school one day,
Which was against the rule;
It made the children laugh and play
To see a dog —”
Mischievous Thorny got no further, for a general explosion of laughter drowned the last words, and Ben’s command “Out, you
rascal!” sent Sanch to the right-about in double-quick time.
Miss Celia tried to apologize for her bad brother, and Teacher tried to assure her that it didn’t matter in the least, as
this was always a merry time, and Mrs. Moss vainly shook her finger at her naughty daughters; they as well as the others would
have their laugh out, and only partially sobered down when the bell rang for “Attention.” They thought they were to be dismissed,
and repressed their giggles as well as they could in order to get a good start for a vociferous roar when they got out. But,
to their great surprise, the pretty lady stood up again and said, in her friendly way —
“I just want to thank you for this pleasant little exhibition, and ask leave to come again. I also wish to invite you all
to my boy’s birthday party on Saturday week. The
archery meeting is to be in the afternoon, and both clubs will be there, I believe. In the evening we are going to have some
fun, when we can laugh as much as we please without breaking any of the rules. In Ben’s name I invite you, and hope you will
all come, for we mean to make this the happiest birthday he ever had.”
There were twenty pupils in the room, but the eighty hands and feet made such a racket at this announcement that an outsider
would have thought a hundred children, at least, must have been at it. Miss Celia was a general favorite because she nodded
to all the girls, called the boys by their last names, even addressing some of the largest as “Mr.,” which won their hearts
at once, so that if she had invited them all to come and be whipped they would have gone, sure that it was some delightful
joke. With what eagerness they accepted the present invitation one can easily imagine, though they never guessed why she gave
it in that way, and Ben’s face was a sight to see, he was so pleased and proud at the honor done him that he did not know
where to look, and was glad to rush out with the other boys and vent his emotions in whoops of delight. He knew that some
little plot was being concocted for his birthday, but never dreamed of anything so grand as asking the whole school, Teacher
and all. The effect of the invitation was seen with comical rapidity, for the boys became overpowering in their friendly attentions
to Ben. Even Sam, fearing he might be left out, promptly offered the peaceful olive branch in the shape of a big apple, warm
from his pocket, and Mose proposed a trade of jackknives which would be greatly to Ben’s advantage. But Thorny made the noblest
sacrifice of all, for he said to his sister, as they walked home together —
“I’m not going to try for the prize at all. I shoot so much
better than the rest, having had more practice, you know, that it is hardly fair. Ben and Billy are next best, and about even,
for Ben’s strong wrist makes up for Billy’s true eye, and both want to win. If I am out of the way Ben stands a good chance,
for the other fellows don’t amount to much.”
“Bab does; she shoots nearly as well as Ben, and wants to win even more than he or Billy. She must have her chance at any
rate.”
“So she may, but she won’t do anything; girls can’t, though it’s good exercise and pleases them to try.”
“If I had full use of both my arms I’d show you that girls
can
do a great deal when they like. Don’t be too lofty, young man, for you may have to come down,” laughed Miss Celia, amused
by his airs.