Brite and Fair

by Henry A. Shute

that was the time father got mad and told him to go to hell and old Decon went off to see his lawyer. then father told the others that he wood do all he cood to make it rite and he took me round to all of them to their houses and made me beg their pardon. peeple were scraping the pictures off and washing them with hot water and evrybody was laffing.

Uncle Gilman and Mister Gechel and Horris Cobb all laffed and sed it was a good goke but the others were all feerful mad with me and father and not very mad with Pewt and Beany. that is all rite but the idea of me leading Pewt and Beany into temtasion makes me sick.

well Pewt got a licking and Beany got a licking and i got a licking and we have all got to stay in the house until school begins. but Beany had to go to chirch to keep his gob.

it is prety tuf to stay in a fellers room and to hear a circus band playing and not go jest becaus we tride to do the best we cood. ennyway i am glad i aint going to the reform school. father jest come in with a paper. he sed he had been arested and had to get bale. he sed old Decon Aspinwall had sewed him for 10 thousand dollars for defaiming his caracter. father sed old Decon had to go to Portsmouth for a lawyer, and that Amos Tuck and General Marstin and Judg Stickney and Alvy Wood all come up and sed they wood see him throug without paying a dam cent. father feals prety good tonite. Aunt Sarah says he always does when there is a chane for a fite.

this is the ferst time in my life i ever hoaped school wood begin. ennything is beter than staying in your room.

September 15, 186—-school begun today and i went. i dident supose i ever wood ruther go to school than stay in my room espeshully a school whitch is taugt by old Francis. but they is always sumthing lively taiking place in old Francis school. sumtimes Micky Guold is setting down on tacts or the points of pens whitch has been stuck in his seet so they wont fall over like a bent pin whitch aint mutch good enyway most of the time and hollering bludy merder and geting snached baldheaded for it by old Francis, or Beany or Bug Chadwick is being ferriled with a hard wood ruler with 2 hairs in the pam of there hand to splitt the old ruler into fraggments whitch i have never seen did yet in this life or licked sumwhere else whare nuthing will do enny good xcept a peace of paistboard or the Exeter Newsleter in the set of their britches, or Pop Clark is maid to eat a apple before the hoal school as fast as he can with rot and wirm holes and wirms and the stem and seeds and the coar or Skinny Bruce is being snaiked over 2 seets and put in the woodbox with the cuvver down because Gim Erly whitch sits behine Skinny put a pin in the toe of his shue and reeched over and kicked Tady Finton whitch sits in front of Skinny and old Francis wont believe Skinny but licks him onct for doing it and twict for liing about it whitch he says is twict as wirse as doing it, or Fatty Gilman is down on all foars and howling while old Francis lams him with the haff of the broom stick he stirs the fire with while Fatty is triing hard to crawl throug a chair whitch he cant do enny moar than the cammel cood crawl throug the ey of the needle in the bible.

All of them things is taiking place in old Francis school every day whitch makes it a very intersting place when you are not the feller whitch is doing them things but is setting down and waching them out of the coner of your ey and pertending to studdy hard whitch nobudy can do when sumbuddy is howling terruble and banging agenst seets and you never know when your tern wil come nex.

but it is lots beter than staying in your room and not seing the fellers and coppying there xamples and getting so far behine in your studdies that you are shoar to get licked evry day for a week or 2. there is sum fun in geting licked onct in a while if you have a chance to escaip and it is a grate deel moar fun if sumbuddy else gets licked for sumthing you have did. sumtimes a feller will tel on sumbuddy else and then evry feler whitch can lick him licks him the ferst time they gets the chance. but most of the fellers will take another fellers lickings without a yip. Old Francis lickings is wirse than 2 or 3 of another fellers lickings but aint so bad as 30 or 40 lickings whitch a feller is shoar to get if he tells on anuther feller to say nuthing about the girls running their tungs out at you and calling you tattle tail and stiking their nose up in the air when they goes by you whitch maiks a feller feal prety cheep whitch is sumtimes wirse than a licking.

So on the hoal i had ruther go to school than stay in my room whitch dont make enny diference becaus i have got to go ennyway wether i want to or not.

tonite i had to studdy Colburn arithmatic. it is the wirst book i ever studded. i bet there aint a boy in this wirld whitch doesnt want to paist time out of old Colburn. i had ruther be a merderer if nomuddy gnew it than be a feler whitch rote a arithmatic. Ennyway old Colburn had a key whitch tells jest how to do the xamples and has them all figgered out. teechers is aloud to have the key but the scholers cant have it. Enny time old Francis dont know how to do a xample he looks in his key and lerns how and then a feller whitch dont have a key is snached baldheaded becaus he dont know how to do it. i dont think that is fair. i had 10 xamples to do and i have got them all did. Cele done 4 and Keene 3 and father 3. so i am all rite tomorrow. father give me 2 bats in the ear befoar i undestood one xample. Keene gets mad but she dont dass to bat me. Cele is the best.