23. Drake.
24. Crabbe.
CHAPTER V.
A DAY AT SCHOOL.
Early the next Monday morning, a sleigh drove up to Mrs. Page’s door, containing a large man wrapped in a shaggy bear-skin coat, a girl about fourteen years old, to whose cheeks the frosty morning air had lent a beautiful glow, and a boy whose age might have been between twelve and thirteen years. The girl and boy hurried into the house, and were warmly greeted by all the family. They were Katharine and Otis Sedgwick, and had boarded in the family for six months past, during which period they had attended the academy. They belonged in a town about ten miles distant. Their father, after hitching his horse in the shed, and throwing a blanket over him, came in to have a chat with the family, and to settle the “term bills” with Marcus. He stopped about half an hour, and then set out for home; after which the young folks began to prepare for school.
The academy building was about a mile distant from Mrs. Page’s. In good weather, Marcus and the students in the family usually walked to and from school, taking their dinners with them. This first morning of the new term was a bright though cool one, and soon after half-past eight o’clock, the six “academicians,” as Ronald called them, might have been seen wending their way through the snow-path, towards a little white belfry that gleamed over the tops of an evergreen forest in the distance.
At nine o’clock the bell rang, and as the students assembled in the hall, it was found that the attendance was quite large. The old scholars took their former seats, and desks were assigned to the new ones. Mr. Upton, the preceptor, then touched a little hand-bell—the signal for silence; after which he took the Bible, and read from it a passage rich in instruction to the young—the fourth chapter of Proverbs. Every head was then bowed, as he offered up a simple and fervent prayer for the divine blessing upon the students and teachers there assembled.
After these exercises were concluded, Mr. Upton went to the large blackboard, facing the school, and wrote upon it this sentence, in characters that could be seen in the remotest part of the room:
“EXALT HER, AND SHE SHALL PROMOTE THEE.”
“‘Exalt her’—can any one tell me what this refers to?” inquired Mr. Upton.
“Wisdom,” was the general answer from all parts of the room.