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But among ourselves I could bog him in a very short time; though I'd scorn to deprive the gintleman of his reputaytion or his place, even if he sent me a challenge of larnin' to-morrow, although he's too cute to venture on doing that hem, hem!"
Iola had found a school-room in the basement of a colored church, where the doors were willingly opened to her. Her pupils came from miles around, ready and anxious to get some "book larnin'." Some of the old folks were eager to learn, and it was touching to see the eyes which had grown dim under the shadows of slavery, donning spectacles and trying to make out the words.
An' I suppose, that you are acting the Pathrun, too, Thady, and intind to take this young wild-goose under your protection?" "Why, sir, isn't he a poor scholar? Sure he mustn't want his bit an' sup, nor his night's lodgin', anyhow. You're to give him his larnin' only, sir." "I suppose so, Mr. Thaddeus; but this is the penalty of celebrity.
Beside, she's so stuck up with cussed pride an larnin', that she thinks herself as good as white. I calclate old Foxey 'll bring down her notions a bit. She won't be long wi' him till she'll be glad to take a ramble in the woods wi' anybody that asks her. There'll be chance enough yet, I reckon."
"An' there is, then a whole room full of them, Master Danby. We are not people of no larnin' here, I can tell you. There is big books, an' little books, an' some awful purty books, an' some," she added doubtfully, "as is not so purty." "You know a great deal about books!" said the boy sarcastically. "An' sure I do. Haven't I dusted them once ivery year since I came to this blessed place?
Another roseate dream of childhood had been ruthlessly shattered, and he hated himself for having witlessly engendered it in her mind, since it could only be born to die unrealized. When she spoke again, it was to say with a telltale quaver in her subdued voice, "I reckon thet us mountain folks kaint never do worthwhile things, fer all sech take er mighty lot er larnin'."
"Yer maw allus was weakly-like," faltered the other; "she'd no call ter hitch up with Bill Falkner no how; she ort ter took a man with book larnin' like her daddy, ole Jedge White. It allus made yer paw mad 'cause she knowed more'n him. But Bill lowed he'd tame her an' he shor' tried hit on.
Now that Thady's out, I'll hould you, boys, that none of yez knows how to expound his name eh? do ye? But I needn't ax well, 'tis Thaddeus; and, maybe, that's as much as the priest that christened him knew. Boys, you see what it is to have the larnin' to lade the life of a gintleman, and to be able to talk deeply wid the clargy!
"I see you air dressed in cadet uniforms," remarked the farmer, as the party proceeded on its way. "Be you fellers from Pornell school?" "No; we come from Putnam Hall," answered Tom. "Oh, yes 'bout the same thing, I take it. How is matters up to the school larnin' a heap?" "We are trying to learn all we have to." "Had some trouble up thar, didn't ye? My wife's brother was a-tellin' me about it.
"But I can't make thim out. I've no larnin'." "I can read them," said Dick. "So c'n I," murmured Emmeline. "S-H-E-N-A-N-D-O-A-H," spelt Dick. "What's that?" enquired Paddy. "I don't know," replied Dick, rather downcastedly. "There you are!" cried the oarsman in a disgusted manner, pulling the boat round to the starboard side of the brig.
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