It would surprise you to know how comfortable everything was in the school; it seemed almost as if we children were being allowed to give undue heed to the pleasures of this world, though I must confess that during the first hour of the morning session we were distressed by the smoke.
TOO MUCH SMOKE
When the room had been used as a Sabbath Day meeting-house, there was neither chimney nor fireplace, because Elder Brewster believed that too much bodily comfort would distract our thoughts from the duty we owed the Lord. But when the place had been turned into a schoolroom, it was necessary to have warmth, if for no other reason than that the smaller children might not be frost-bitten.
John Billington was hired to build a fireplace and chimney, and, as all in Plymouth know, he dislikes to work even as does his son James. Therefore it was that he failed to make the chimney of such height above the top of the fort as would admit of a fair draught, so Master Lyford declared, and we were sorely troubled with smoke until the fire had gained good headway.
It was the duty of the boys to provide wood and keep the fire burning; while we girls kept the room swept and cleanly, all of which tended to give us a greater interest in the school.
SCHOOL COMFORTS
For our convenience when learning to write, puncheon planks were fastened to the four sides of the room, with stakes on the front edges to serve as legs in order to hold them in a sloping position, and at such desk-like contrivances we stood while using a pen, or working at arithmetic with strips of birch-bark in the stead of paper. The same benches which had been built when the room was our meeting-house, served as seats when we had need to rest our legs.
Master Lyford built for himself a desk in the center of the room, where he could overlook us all, and so great was his desire for comfort, which was one of the complaints made against him by Governor Bradford, that he had fastened a short piece of puncheon plank to one side of the log which served as chair, so that he might lean his back against it when he was weary.