o have them kept in their virgin state, and
became quite animated as he walked up and down the aisle fulminating
against the possible offender. In the course of his sulphury remarks
he threatened condign punishment upon the base miscreant who should
dare use his penknife on one of those desks. His address was equal
to a course in "Paradise Lost," nor was it without its effect upon
the audience. Every boy in the room felt in his pocket to make sure
that it contained his knife, and every one began to wonder just where
he would find the whetstone when he went home. We were all eager for
school to close for the day that we might set about the important
matter of whetting our knives. Henceforth wood-carving was a part of
the regular order in our school, but it was done without special
supervision. Of course, each boy could prove an alibi when his own
desk was under investigation. It would not be seemly, in this
connection, to give a verbatim report of the conversations of us boys
when we assembled at our rendezvous after school. Suffice it to say
that the teacher's ears must have burned. The consensus of opinion
was that, if the teacher didn't want the desks carved, he should not
have told us to carve them. We seemed to think that he had said, in
substance, that he knew we were a gang of young rascallions, and
that, if he didn't intimidate us, we'd surely be guilty of some form
of vandalism. Then he proceeded to point out the way by suggesting
penknives; and the trick was done. We were ever open to suggestions.

We had another teacher whose pet aversion was match heads. Cicero
and Demosthenes would have apologized to him could they have come in
when he was delivering one of his eloquent orations upon this
engaging theme. His vituperative vocabulary seemed unlimited,
inexhaustible, and cumulative. He raved, and ranted, and exuded
epithets with the most lavish prodigality. It seemed to us that he
didn't care much what he said, if he could only say it rapidly and
forcibly. In the very midst of an eloquent period another match head
would explode under his foot, and that seemed to answer the purpose
of an encore. The class in arithmetic did not recite that afternoon.
There was no time for arithmetic when match heads were to the fore.
I sometimes feel a bit guilty that I was admitted to such a good show
on a free pass. The next day, of course, the Gatling guns resumed
their activity; the girls screeched as they