“I am glad to hear it. It is my desire that John should not lose any time. In fact, we should have little difficulty in filling Mr. Barclay’s place, but for requiring a knowledge of Latin. For example, there is an experienced teacher in the next town, Epaminondas Smith, who has been teaching for fourteen years, and would be glad of the place, but he only teaches English branches. He has a great reputation for management, stands six feet in his stockings, and weighs a hundred and ninety-five pounds. I went into his school once. I tell you, Mr. Howard, the boys were as still as mice. They knew what they would get if they broke the rules.”
Walter was large for his age; still he only measured five feet six inches in height, and weighed but one hundred and twenty-eight pounds. While General Wall was speaking, he could not help observing that he was comparing unfavorably his small physical proportions with those of the redoubted Epaminondas Smith. He might have felt discouraged, but he remembered that one of the most effective teachers at the Essex Institute, who commanded the general respect and obedience of the students, was an inch shorter than himself, and probably weighed no more.
“Is the school hard to manage?” he asked.
“No, I should say not. Mr. Barclay has had no trouble that I have heard of. Still he is an experienced teacher.”
“That is an advantage, of course,” said Walter, answering the implication. “But he tells me that he succeeded as well in his first school, though he was less than a year older than I am now.”
“That is encouraging. I have spoken to my fellow-trustees, Dr. Owens and Squire Griffiths, Mr. Howard, and we have determined to give you a trial; that is, if you pass a satisfactory examination. I am afraid the doctor won’t be able to come this evening, as he has to visit a patient five miles distant. However, he said he was willing to agree to anything the squire and myself might decide upon. Have you long been in the West, Mr. Howard?”
“No, sir; I have never before been as far west as Wisconsin. I spent the last three months in Ohio, however.”
“We hardly call Ohio a Western State. We always look upon it as in the East.”
“The West is a large country,” remarked Walter.
“It is very large, and has vast resources. Its prairies are immense in extent, its rivers are numerous and long, its mines are the richest in the world,” said General Wall, rather oratorically.