Referring to her teacher of long ago, Dr. Eleanor Burnside recently related this incident in her school life: “I recall when a little girl in her school Clara Barton’s friendly interest in the progress of her pupils; unvarying patience, no matter what the circumstances might be. I do not think she knew how to scold, nor were scoldings and other manifestations of ill temper necessary. Her quiet, firm word, pleasantly expressed, seemed sufficient always.”
Speak gently; it is better far
To rule by love than fear—
Speak gently; ’tis a little thing
Dropped in the heart’s deep well;
The good, the joy, which it may bring,
Eternity shall tell.
Not easily disturbed, Miss Barton did not notice little misdemeanors by the children at all. She seemed not to observe one day when some fun was started by a boy sitting back of Joe Davis. The mischievous boy was putting his finger in Joe’s red hair and pretending his finger was burnt. Of course it amused the children, but only for a moment. To govern too much is worse than to govern too little. This was an incident merely of a child’s humor, requiring no reprimand. “But no matter what happened, Clara Barton did not scold. Her pupils loved her and that made what she did, and what she said too, right.”
The old desk used by Clara Barton recently has been found in possession of one of the old families at Bordentown, New Jersey. By tracing back the ownership it has been proved conclusively to be the original desk used by Miss Barton. The desk refuted the libel that she was a disciplinarian, and not a humanitarian. The libel referred to was that she had a particularly unruly boy; that she seized him by the nape of the neck, lifted the lid of the desk and dropped him inside. Now that the desk has been discovered, her admirers point to the interesting fact that it doesn’t have a top lid; it has a small drawer.
Childhood is ever of the living present. Up the stream of time the eye keeps fixed on memory’s treasures of youth. In one of the battles of the Civil War, Clara Barton stooped down to place the empty sleeve, then useless to the bullet-shattered right arm, over the shoulder of a soldier boy. Recognizing the face of his former teacher the fair-haired lad dropped his face into the folds of her dress, then threw his left arm around her neck, in deepest grief, crying: “Why, Miss Barton, don’t you know me? I am Charlie Hamilton who used to carry your satchel to school.”