most
wholly unknown. The boys used to be allowed to go out of
school to study in the warm summer days, and would find some
place in a field, and sometimes up in the belfry of the little
schoolhouse. I remember studying Caesar there with George
Brooks, afterward judge, and reading with him an account of
some battle where Caesar barely escaped being killed, on which
Brooks's comment was "I wish to thunder he had been!"

I am afraid the boys did not respect the property of the
owners of the neighboring apple orchards, as undoubtedly
the better-trained boys of modern times do now. We understood
the law to be that all apples that grew on the branches extending
over the highway were public property, and I am afraid that
when the owner was not about we were not very particular as
to the boundary line. This seems to have been a trait of
boy nature for generations. You know Sidney Smith's account
of the habit of boys at his school to rob a neighboring orchard,
until the farmer bought a large, savage bulldog for his protection.
Some of the big boys told Sidney that if a boy would get down
on his hands and knees and go backward toward the dog the
dog would be frightened, and he could get the apples. He
tried the experiment unsuccessfully, and with the result that
concluded, as he says, that "it makes no difference to a bulldog
which end of a boy he gets hold of, if he only gets a good
hold."

The discipline of the schoolmaster in those days was pretty
severe. For slight offences the boys were deprived of their
recess or compelled to study for an hour after the school
was dismissed. The chief weapon of torture was the ferule,
to the efficacy of which I can testify from much personal
knowledge. The master had in his desk, however, a cowhide
for gross cases. I do not remember knowing how that felt
from personal experience, but I remember very well seeing
it applied occasionally to the big boys.

In the infant schools, which were kept by women, of course
the discipline was not expected to be so severe. The schoolmistress
in those days wore what was called a busk--a flat piece of
lancewood, hornbeam, or some other like tough and elastic
wood, thrust into a sort of pocket or sheath in her dress,
which came up almost to the chin and came down below the waist.
This was intended to preserve the straightness and grace of
her figure. When the small boy misbehaved, the schoolma'am
would unsheath this weapon, and for some t