“How far are we from the village?”
And much to our dismay, a rumbling answer came from the folds of the crazy-quilt, which we had to interpret as,
“Jes’ four mile!”
Ten minutes, later, however, we had the joy of arriving hungry, cold, but not without spirit, at the church door, where, under kerosene lamps, and on white paper table-cloths, was spread a meal of hot biscuits, hot yellow-eyed beans, hot pea beans, potato salad, hot kidney beans, dill pickles, pickled beets, four sorts of frosted cake, luscious lemon pies and coffee.
After the supper, the students went into my church and found a hundred of the villagers gathered, in spite of the storm. The quartette sang entrancingly their college jingles. The young professor swung his flaming clubs, until, when he was in the midst of some complicated spirals his alcohol-soaked rags burnt out, unexpectedly, and he had to apologize since he could not go on with his novel act because his “spirits had given out.” The reader gave, with great effect, a memorable quarrel between man and wife, and sparkling anecdotes which would have taken the dullness off a yokel’s heart. Then the star of the concert, the sleight-of-hand performer began his skilful mysteries. He made a pencil cling to the palm of his hand, brought flags and flowers from an empty hat, multiplied a billiard ball into six, wafted a half dollar into thin air, and, finally, produced a pack of cards, at the sight of which, I thought my deacons would institute proceedings of worldliness against me for allowing it, but which, when made to do the weirdest acts, finally reconciled even the most austere of them; so much so that one grim Puritan even came forward and held the pack—after much persuasion—while the man of mystery seemed to change them without the holder’s knowledge.
At the close of the entertainment, the college delegation, after going, every one, to the church women and declaring that they had never eaten a better supper than had been provided, got into the sleigh, the driver cracked his long whip with a deft explosion for the ears of the on-looking villagers, and with a hearty yell, they started on their way down the river road through the storm, and I stood with my wife at our door until their songs died away among the midnight shadows of the hills and storm.
Chapter XXXVI. A Chapter
of Sentiment and Literary Atmosphere,
Including the Account of
Sanderson, the Procrastinator.
How Two Prize Checks Were
Spent. A Parish of Talent
WHEN came the announcement of Spring, at college, after the lawns and the paths had dried, and when the evenings were filled with the throaty gurglings of hopping robins. A sign in front of the Commons announced, “Class Sing Tonight 7:30.” This is a “Sing;”
At seven o’clock the students gather by classes at four different parts of the campus: the seniors to sit on their double fence, the juniors to sit on the steps of the recitation hall, the sophomores to occupy the commodious steps of the Assembly Hall, and the freshmen to stand near the library.
Silence!