“Who wants it broke up, you old fool?” demanded Toledo, a man who had been named after the city from which he had come, and who had been from the first one of the fiercest opponents of the school. “I move the appointment uv a committee of three to wait on the teacher, see if the school wants anything money can buy, take up subscriptions to git it, an’ lay out any feller that don’t come down with the dust when he’s went fur.”
“Hurray!” “Bully!” “Good!” “Sound!” “Them’s the talk!” and other sympathetic expressions, were heard from the members of the late anti-school party.
The judge, who, by virtue of age, was the master of ceremonies and general moderator of the camp, very promptly appointed a committee, consisting of Toledo and two miners, whose attire appeared the most respectable in the place, and instructed them to wait on the schoolmarm, and tender her the cordial support of the miners.
Early the next morning the committee called at the schoolhouse, attached to which were two small rooms in which teachers were expected to keep house.
The committee found the teacher “putting to rights” the schoolroom. Her dress was tucked up, her sleeves rolled, her neck hidden by a bright handkerchief, and her hair “a-blowin’ all to glory,” as Toledo afterward expressed it. Between the exertion, the bracing air, and the excitement caused by the newness of everything, Miss Brown’s pleasant face was almost handsome.
“Mornin’, marm,” said Toledo, raising a most shocking hat, while the remaining committee-men expeditiously ranged themselves behind him, so that the teacher might by no chance look into their eyes.
“Good-morning, gentlemen,” said Miss Brown, with a cheerful smile; “please be seated. I suppose you wish to speak of your children?”
Toledo, who was a very young man, blushed, and the whole committee was as uneasy on its feet as if its boots had been soled with fly-blisters. Finally, Toledo answered:
“Not much, marm, seein’ we ain’t got none. Me an’ these gentlemen’s a committee from the boys.”
“From the boys?” echoed Miss Brown. She had heard so many wonderful things about the Golden State, that now she soberly wondered whether bearded men called themselves boys, and went to school.