"The boy stood on the burning deck, Whence all but he had fled."
Again and again the teacher made them read the lines, but each time some one would either lag behind or read faster than the others. While this was going on I was busy with my spelling lesson, as my class came after the one now hard at work with the boy "on the burning deck."
There was a click; I raised my eyes and looked toward the door; it slowly opened, then a tall man and a boy silently entered. I recognized them at once; the man was a friend of my father and the lad one of my playmates on my weekly visits home. The class on the floor was dismissed with a lecture on reading, and Gray-beard turned to call, "Next class," when he discovered the man and boy sitting on a bench near the door.
"How do you do, Wa-hon'-e-ga?" said Gray-beard, approaching the Indian with outstretched hand.
"Ka-gae'-ha!" (Friend) responded the Indian, his face brightening. Then in a low tone he called me to him and said, "I have brought your grandfather here to stay with you. Be as good to each other as you have always been, and try to learn the language of the White-chests."
The boy was a distant relative, and, following the peculiar system of kinship among the Indians, there was no impropriety in my addressing him as my grandfather, although we preferred to call each other friend.
"What does Wa-hon'-e-ga want?" asked Gray-beard, putting his hand on my shoulder.
"My friend," replied the Indian, looking with a kindly smile into the face of the teacher, "my wife wishes her son, this boy, to learn to speak the language of the Big-knives, [English] so I have come with him. We have brought him up with great care, and I think he will give you no trouble."