A second day in Mary Carrow's school

A cool, rainy morning. The boys and girls all came to school with thick shoes on, and coats and shawls to protect them from the wet. When Mary came, she told her scholars she was glad to find the rain had not kept them at home. Mary smiled, and looked around to see if they had all come, and she counted. Charles Linn and Harry Linn, and their sister Lucy. Lily Forester, and her brother Eddy. Susan Field, and Ellen Raby.

All here, but Carry Deacon. Mary said, “Who can tell why Carry has not come to school? I do not like to miss one of my little scholars. I like to have them all with me.”

No one could tell why Carry had not come. Mary then helped the smaller scholars to take off their coats and shawls; and she showed them how to hang up their wet things to dry on the pegs in the entry; and she bade them put their umbrellas into a pail, which stood by the door on purpose to receive them. Mary asked if they had all brought their dinners? And one said, “I have brought mine.” And another said, “We have brought ours.” And Mary said, “We have brought ours.” It was not far for Mary and the Linns to go home to dinner; but she liked to indulge her scholars when she could, and she knew she could not please them better than to stay and dine with them on rainy days.

The boys and girls put their dinner-baskets into a little closet outside the school-room door; and then Mary rang her bell—the signal that it was time to collect. While they were putting their dinner-baskets away, Harry Linn said to Lily Forester,

“Lily, are you glad it’s a rainy day? I am.”

Lily said, “I am glad, too.”

“Harry, what have you got for dinner?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said. “Mary put up our dinner while I was looking at father when he was getting into the wagon.”

“I’ll tell you what I’ve got, Harry,” said Lily; “a little pie with my name on it! Do you remember about Anne Lyle, and the little pie with her name on it? I told mother about it, when I went home, and she said if I was a good girl, she would make me a little pie, and put my name on it. Look here, Harry. I will show you.” And Lily lifted up the cloth that was over their dinner, and there was a little patty-pan pie, with L. F. plainly stamped on it.

Harry said, “How nice that is! Will you give me some of it, Lily?”

And Lily told Harry she would cut it in halves at dinner-time, and give him the largest half.

Mary rang her little bell again, and Harry and Lily went into school.

While the scholars were taking their seats, Carry Deacon arrived. She was very wet, and her face was red; and she looked fretted and tired. Mary said,

“I am glad to see you, Carry; but what is the matter? How did you get so wet?”

Carry told Mary her umbrella was broken, and it did not keep the rain off.

“You are so wet, Carry,” said Mary, “that I fear you will be sick; and you are too far off from home to be sent back in the rain.”

Mary thought a minute what she should do, and then she told Charles Linn, (who was the largest boy in the school,) to run home to his mother, and ask her to please to lend a pair of Lucy’s shoes and stockings, for a little girl to wear, who had come to school very wet. Charles Linn was an obliging, lively boy, and he ran off at once. While he was gone, Mary took off Carry’s wet shawl, and sent her into the little room adjoining the school-room, to wash her face and her feet. There was a pitcher of water out in the little room, and soap, and a basin, and a cup, and a towel. Before Carry had done washing her feet, Charles Linn came back with the dry shoes and stockings. Then Mary went out to Carry, and she helped her to put them on. And she took a little pocket comb out of her pocket, and combed Carry’s hair smoothly, and then brought her into school. Mary was sure Carry had done something wrong, but she did not ask her about it, because Carry always told the truth. Mary thought she would be very kind to Carry, and then Carry would perhaps come and tell her about the mishaps of her walk to school, without being asked. Carry was a very giddy, careless little girl, and she sometimes forgot to do as she was told, when she did not really mean to be naughty.

This was Grammar morning; and while Mary attended to the grammar-class, Harry, and Lily, and Ellen Raby, looked over their spelling-lesson.

Charles Linn was at the head of the grammar-class. Mary asked Charles if he could tell her what a NOUN was? Charles said, a noun was the grammatical name of any thing that we could see, or feel, or taste, or smell. Mary asked the scholar who stood next in the class, to point to something in the room which was a noun. She pointed to a book, and Mary said, “That is right.” Then Mary asked the next one, why book was a noun, and her little scholar could not tell. The one who stood below her answered. She said, book was a noun because we could see it; and she went above the girl who had missed. Mary said to one, “Think of a noun which you can taste, and tell me what it is.” And he answered, “Apple.”

Carry Deacon was the one who had missed, and Mary asked Carry to think of something which she liked to look at and play with. Carry said, “Kittens.”

“Now tell me, Carry, what a noun is?”

Carry answered, “A noun is the name of any thing that we can see.”

“Then what is a kitten?”

“O, now I know,” Carry said. “Kitten is a noun, because I can see it.”

Mary questioned her scholars until she thought they understood all about a noun; and then she told them, the next grammar-lesson would be the Adjective.

“Now you may take your seats,” Mary said, “and look over your reading-lesson, while I hear the little ones spell.”

Harry Linn, and Lily Forester, and Ellen Raby, said a spelling-lesson; and there were some words in their lesson which Mary explained to them, because they did not understand what these words meant. Ellen Raby spelled Wild Deer, and she asked Harry Linn if he knew what a wild deer was? Harry said, “I guess it is a goat. Let us ask Mary.”

Mary told them it was not a goat, and she would see if she could find a picture of a wild deer to show them. She had a large book, full of pictures; and there were horses, and cows and goats, and many different kinds of animals in it.

Mary soon found a picture of a wild deer, and all the scholars wished to come and look at it. She told them they might come. And they asked her to please to tell them something about a wild deer. Mary told them, that the part of America where they lived, and where the school-house stood, was once a great forest of trees, where only Indians lived, and wild deers and other animals. She told them that the Indians used to hunt the wild deer, and shoot them, that they might have them to eat. Their flesh was very tender and good, and was called venison.

“Why are there not any wild deer here now, Mary?” asked Ellen.

“Because there is no place for them to live in. The forests, where they like to live, are all cut down; and now, instead of forests, we have fine farms, and houses on them to live in.”

“Who cut down the forests, Mary?” said Ellen.

“Our forefathers, who came here a great while ago.”

“But why did not our forefathers let the pretty little wild deers stay here, Mary?”

“They would not stay,” Mary said. “They are afraid of people, of men and women, and of little boys and girls, and they ran away from them.”

“Where did they go, Mary?”

“Away into the forests, which are many hundreds of miles from here. When our forefathers came here, they wanted houses to live in, and something to eat; and they built themselves houses, and cut down the trees before they could plant corn, and wheat, and rye, and potatoes. They had to cut down the trees before they could make farms.”

Carry looked as if she did not quite understand Mary, and Mary said, “You know, Carry, your mother told you, you might have a little garden of your own, and she gave you a little piece of ground to make your garden of, which was full of cedar bushes; and do you not remember, you asked your father if he would cut down the cedar bushes, so that you could have a nice smooth place for your flower seeds?”

Carry said, “Yes, I remember it, and father cut down all the cedar bushes for me, and then he dug up the ugly roots, and he took out a spade one morning and dug up the ground and made it soft. And then mother gave me some flowers out of her garden, and she showed me how to plant them in my garden; and she gave me some seeds, and she showed me how to make little holes in the ground to hold the seeds. I put the seeds in the little holes and covered them up with the soft earth, and mother says they will grow into beautiful flowers by and by.”

“Do you understand now, Carry,” said Mary, “why our forefathers cut down the forest trees?