"That won't hurt one side more'n it will the other," said Mrs. Farnham.
"Besides," said Pen, "more of us had to sit down on short words than long ones last year."
"Sit down?" asked Port.
"When they missed. You'll see when you get there," replied Corry. "It's awful to sit down on a mistake, with a whole meeting-house full of people looking at you and laughing."
"I should say it was."
There were four pairs of eyes in that one house, right away after breakfast, busy over the long rows of words in some spelling-books, and wondering if there were any there they had forgotten.
"I knew 'em all once," said Pen; "but they always look different when you're told 'em from the pulpit."
Over at the Stebbins homestead it was very much the same.
"Vosh," said his mother, "you was a dreadful long time at the barn."
"Well, mother, I staid till I'd spelled over every thing I could see. There's a good many names to things around a stable, and I spelled every one of 'em."