Miss Elinor’s gentle ways had, from the first, made her a great favorite. There were never any rebellions, any doubtful conduct, in the few classes she undertook to hear recite in her sick-room. Her very infirmity endeared her to the hearts of her scholars.
This wreath for an engraving that hung at the foot of her bed, was the only Christmas-green Elinor desired to have placed in her apartment, and on that account, as well as from devotion to her personally, many pairs of little hands were eager to achieve the honor of the task. Very patient, therefore, were their youthful owners with their writing, this afternoon,—very exact were they to cross the t’s, dot the i’s, and avoid pens, as Melinda expressed it, “that scratched like sixty.”
Miss Milly had done very wisely in holding out this reward, for never before had such attention and such care been visible in the class. Nelly sat at her high desk, as busy and as excited to win as any child there. Her copy-book lay before her, and though she had not as yet reached beyond “pot-hooks and trammels,” she was quite as likely to come off victor as those who wrote with ease and accuracy, because it was not a question of penmanship, but of neatness and industry, as I have already said; for the first quality, the books themselves were to speak; and Miss Milly’s watchful eyes were the judges of the latter, as, from time to time, she raised them from her own writing and scanned the little group.
Scratch, scratch, scratch went the pens, and papers rustled, and fingers flew about their work till the hour being up, Miss Milly rang her bell as a signal for perfect silence.
“It is time to put away your pens, children,” she said, in a clear voice; and at once they were laid aside.
Nelly was just placing her blotting paper between the leaves of her writing-book, when a sorrowful exclamation near her made her turn her head. This exclamation came from Melinda, who sat a few benches off. Her eyes were fixed with a look of most profound distress on a large blot which a drop of ink from her pen had just left in the centre of the day’s copy. Her sleeve had accidentally swept over it too,—and there it was, a great, black disfigurement! And on this afternoon of all others! Melinda wrote a very pretty hand. She was an ambitious girl, and had done her very best, that she might win the prize. Nelly saw the tears rise in her eyes, and her cheeks flush with the bitterness of her disappointment.
“Oh, dear!” cried Lucy Rook, a little girl, who sat next; “Oh, dear! there’s a blot, Melindy!”
“Yes,” was the answer; “I wonder if I could scratch it out, so that the page will look neatly again. Lucy, lend me your knife, will you?”
Mistress Lucy looked straight at Melinda, and laughed a little cruel, mocking laugh. In the rattle of papers and temporary confusion of the room, she thought herself unheard by the teacher.
“Who wouldn’t play tag, yesterday, eh?” asked Lucy. “Who spoiled the game; did you hear anybody say?”