Into the Light. . . . . . . . . . . . 274

CHAPTER XXXIV.
"How it Came Out" . . . . . . . . . . 278




The Hoosier School-Master.




CHAPTER I

A PRIVATE LESSON FROM A BULLDOG.


"Want to be a school-master, do you? You? Well, what would _you_ do in
Flat Crick deestrick, _I'd_ like to know? Why, the boys have driv off
the last two, and licked the one afore them like blazes. You might teach
a summer school, when nothin' but children come. But I 'low it takes a
right smart _man_ to be school-master in Flat Crick in the winter.
They'd pitch you out of doors, sonny, neck and heels, afore Christmas."

The young man, who had walked ten miles to get the school in this
district, and who had been mentally reviewing his learning at every step
he took, trembling lest the committee should find that he did not know
enough, was not a little taken aback at this greeting from "old Jack
Means," who was the first trustee that he lighted on. The impression