exact square. Of course, a log could be "snaked" to the fire-place as
long as the building, and a file of boys thirty feet in length, could
all stand in front of the fire on a footing of the most democratic
equality. Sections of logs cut out here and there, admitted light and
air instead of windows. The surrounding forest furnished ample supplies
of fuel. A spring at hand, furnished with various gourds, quenched the
frequent thirst of the pupils. A ponderous puncheon door, swinging on
substantial wooden hinges, and shutting with a wooden latch, completed
the appendages of this primeval seminary.

To this central point might he seen wending from the woods, in every
direction of the compass, flaxen-headed boys and girls, clad in
homespun, brushing away the early dews, as they hied to the place, where
the Hibernian, clothed in his brief authority, sometimes perpetrated
applications of birch without rhyme or reason; but much oftener allowed
his authority to be trampled upon, according as the severe or loving
humor prevailed. This vacillating administration was calculated for any
result, rather than securing the affectionate respect of the children.
Scarcely the first quarter had elapsed, before materials for revolt had
germinated under the very throne of the school-master.

Young Boone, at this time, had reached the second stage of teaching the
young idea how to shoot. His satchel already held paper marked with
those mysterious hieroglyphics, vulgarly called _pot-hooks_, intended to
be gradually transformed to those clerkly characters, which are called
hand-writing.

The master's throne was a block of a huge tree, and could not be said,
in any sense, to be a cushion of down. Of course, by the time he had
heard the first lessons of the morning, the master was accustomed to let
loose his noisy subjects, to wanton and bound on the grass, while he
took a turn abroad to refresh himself from his wearying duties. While he
was thus unbending his mind, the observant urchins had remarked, that
he always directed his walk to a deep grove not far distant. They had,
possibly, divined that the unequal tempers of his mind, and his rapid
transitions from good nature to tyrannical moroseness, and the reverse,
were connected with these promenades. The curiosity of young Boone had
been partially excited. An opportunity soon offered to gratify it.

Having one day received the accustomed permission to retire a few
minutes from school, the d