It was the harrowing science of arithmetic which caused the most trouble, and even to this day—but that is a different story. I had a confirmed habit of becoming hopelessly muddled in my multiplication table. When floundering in the numerical labyrinth I would hear just the faintest little sigh, and, looking up, would see a dear little forehead showing the most cunning wrinkles of resignation. It was then that horrid wickedness would take possession of me, and I would intentionally make more mistakes just to see those eyes reproach me for my stupidity. I would also make errors in my spelling and reading to have the pleasure of being chided in her modulated voice.
My course of education had now run on for months and the beginning of winter gave us the chance to elaborate it. The free lectures of the Board of Education were a boon quickly taken advantage of by us. Almost every night we went to Cooper Union or some public school where an interesting lecture was announced. To be sure I was not at first a howling success as an attendant. I could stand the illustrated lectures, but astronomy and political economy without pictures always produced the lullaby effect on me, and I was often on the verge of snoring. All this disappointed my professor, but did not discourage her.
Summer came and my knowledge of botany was destined to be enriched. Strange are the paradoxes of fate. No class loves flowers as much as the poor, and no class has less of them than they. Ah, it is pitiful, I tell you, to wander through the streets inhabited by my people, and to see never a patch of green, a fragrant oasis, in this stretch of barren, joyless materialism. There is no time there for flowers, where even the cabbages in front of the dingy grocery stores look withered and seared, and where there is no other watchword than, "Work, work, or we will be homeless and starving." That one thought rules the brains of my fellows with an iron grasp. With the close of their daily toil their day's worry is not over. Listen to the talks on the stoops and in the doorways of the tenements and you will be the witness of much fretting. Often all this mind's botheration is not necessary. There is no actual want, no threatening danger of it. Yet, the poor find a gruesome pleasure in dwelling in the midst of their horrors, and the roll of their organ of misery churns along on an endless chain.
And I believe that this is so because the child life of the East Side is dwarfed and deprived of all that is dear to a child's natural desires. Every year brings improvements. Men and women with hearts of gold are working like Trojans among the children of the poor, and the harder they work the more are they appreciated by their charges. I cannot rid myself of the opinion that in the aiding of the children lies the only solution of our social troubles. Teach them to be natural—a difficult feat, to swing themselves above their level in intellect and not by imitating the modes and fashions of the idle rich in the shoddy fabrics offered to them by unscrupulous dealers, and we will have advanced miles nearer to the goal which is desired by all who love their fellow men, not with mushy sentiment, but with intelligence.
Still, in spite of all that is done, the yearning look in the eyes of the children is still there, and I would not care to have the heart of the man who can see the unspoken wish in the childish gaze when beholding a flower, no matter how scraggy, and then laugh at it as at a freak of humor.
My acquaintance with the denizens of the kingdom of flowers was exceedingly limited. My teacher had noticed this and forthwith set to work to remedy this other defect in my education.
As early as May did we begin our out-of-door course. We did it by means of excursions. I did not care to have this arrangement all one-sided and we agreed to change off in the management of our personally conducted tours. We both had to work during the week and could only indulge in our excursions on Sundays. So, on one outing she would be the supreme director and dictator; I, on the next.
Candor compels me to confess that my outings always led us dangerously near to Coney Island, if not quite to it, yet, people can enjoy themselves even there, for it is the same old ocean, and the same sea air there as elsewhere, and it only lies with the visitor how to spend the holiday.
On her Sundays I was always kept in the dark as to our destination until we reached it. It invariably proved to be some quiet country place, with nooks and brooks and all the charming props which set the stage of nature with tranquil loveliness. After depositing the luncheon in some shady spot, the professor would trip from flower to flower, from tree to tree, and deliver little sermons on birds, flowers and minerals. There is no schoolroom like God's own nature, and in a way which I cannot describe to you, I learned that there was a life abounding in purity, in the understanding of things, and based in the wisdom of a wise Father. Step by step my faithful teacher led me on, until there was no doubt travailing me, until I could stand in street, or field, or forest, and feel my soul, my own undying soul.
There never were other days like these and, surely, there never will be again.