"Father Clark," or The Pioneer Preacher

by John Mason Peck

None had been seen in Lincoln County. Transylvania Seminary had been in operation in Lexington, ten or twelve years, where some of the higher branches of literature and science were taught, and many of the young men who became distinguished in law, politics, and medicine, in that commonwealth, received their education in that Seminary. After Mr. Clark had left the State in 1798, a Grammar School was opened in Lebanon, near the Royal Spring, in Fayette County, where the elements of Latin, Greek, and the sciences, were taught by Messrs. Jones and Worley.

The old books had to be used until Mr. Clark’s new method of teaching became known, and one of the employers visited Lexington on business. He returned with two dozen of Webster’s Spelling-Book, and more other school-books than ever before reached Lincoln County at one time. It was a real holiday for the boys and girls to look over these books.

The rude cuts, or coarse illustrations, as they would now be called, over the fables in the Spelling-Book, were examined and criticised, and the stories read, until they were “gotten by heart.” There was the boy that stole apples, then on the tree, and the farmer throwing tufts of grass to bring him down, and threatening “to try what virtue there was in stones.” Then came the country girl, with the pail of milk on her head, calculating the value when exchanged for eggs, these hatched into chickens, and the chickens sent to market at Christmas, and the profits invested in a new silk gown, in which she would eclipse all her female companions during the holidays. Inflated with vanity in her brilliant prospects, she acted out her feelings with a toss of the head, when down came her pail of milk, and with it all her imaginary happiness. And then there was the cat covered with meal, in the bottom of the meal-tub, while the young rats were about to enjoy themselves around the heap, until warned by an old and experienced rat, who “did not like that white heap yonder.” “The bear and the two friends,” furnished another fruitful source of mental speculation to the pupils of Mr. Clark in the recess of school; while the fable of the Farmer and Lawyer, and the amazing difference betwixt “your bull and my ox,” caused bursts of laughter.

Thus the school went on, and the influence of the master in controlling the feelings, the minds and habits of the pupils in school, or even on the road-side, or at home, was overwhelming. This was effected by an unusual commixture of firmness and kindness, dignity and familiarity, never known before in a Kentucky school.

It was some weeks after the new books were introduced, that Mr. Jesse Bush came into the settlement from Old Virginia, to see the country and make a visit to his brother, one of the patrons of the school. Thomas and Susan Bush were two bright eyed pupils of Father Clark, and were discovered one evening by their uncle as he walked along the lane that led to the house, gathering strips of loose, dry bark from the fence rails for “lightwood.” Such combustible articles in the fire-place were an excellent substitute for candles and lamps in new and frontier settlements. Uncle Jesse had taken quite a fancy to his nephew and niece. They had left the old dominion with their parents several years before this period, and had grown so much that their affectionate uncle would not have known them, had he met them any where else than at their parents’ on his arrival. Susan was now eleven and Thomas thirteen years old, and delighted to play and romp with him, no less than he did with them.

It was in the month of October—the days had perceptibly grown shorter and the nights longer. A fire was pleasant and comfortable, and the lightwood threw up a cheerful blaze, while the industrious scholars were getting their lessons until interrupted by their uncle.

“Tommy, my boy, come here. You and I have not had a frolic to-day. You are at that new spelling-book every moment. What do you find in that book?”

Thomas ran to his accustomed place between the knees of uncle Jesse, and looking him in the face, and catching hold of his beard of a week’s growth, responded:—

“I find a heap of things. Here are pretties.[35] Jest look at that ’ere boy in the tree. He’s stealing apples, and sez he won’t come down.”

“O, pshaw, Tom, that’s all a story. You don’t b’lieve a boy would get into an apple tree in the day time, when he know’d the old farmer would see him?”