Johnston Annie Fellows
Aunt 'Liza's Hero, and Other Stories

WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY AT HARDYVILLE

"BLAME that pig-headed Schmidt!"

Squire Hardy was in the sitting-room talking to his wife. "To think of his kickin' just because the little schoolma'am is bound to celebrate the day! Her askin' for nothing except leave to use the schoolhouse! Confound him! The rest of the Germans'd be patriotic enough – they are all 'round these parts – if Schmidt wa'n't so everlastingly down on us, and used his influence with the rest!"

"He's a well-meaning, peaceable neighbour, Hiram," said the squire's wife, placidly.

"So's horses and cows. Gimme folks that's got some public spirit in 'em. Think of the men that took up the land all round these parts when we come in – all full of Fourth of July. I wisht they hadn't been so keen to sell out at a profit – that's the worst of us Americans. When they sold out, of course the Germans come in, – couldn't blame 'em a mite, – an' Schmidt he come fust, an' he bejuggled all the rest. An' he's pretty nigh bejuggled the Gateses and two or three other American families like 'em, that's gettin' more like Schmidt year by year. Why, there ain't been a mite of public improvement done this ten year back."

"Oh, now, Hiram, we've got the post-office."

"Yes – much thanks to the rest of 'em! It was me worked and kicked and badgered till I got them a tri-weekly mail, and much use they make of it!"

The squire gazed at the post-office as he spoke. It consisted of an ash "seketary" in one corner of the sitting-room, and was much more than commodious enough for the few letters and newspapers that came to Hardyville three times a week, brought from the county town, eight miles away, by a carrier with a gig. The squire was delivering his opinions as usual while waiting for the carrier to appear.

"I don't rec'lect much public improvements ever bein' in Hardyville," said Mrs. Hardy, drily.

"There would 'a' been," said her husband, testily. "There would 'a' been if the Americans had kept on. To think of them beginning to sell out and move furder west – just as they were gettin' their land into shape for havin' some time to themselves to improve things! Thank goodness, they did put up the church and schoolhouse – I guess we'd never have had neither if it wasn't for the American spirit here when this settlement begun."

"Sho, Hiram? You can't say but what the German folks keeps the church and schoolhouse going."

"Going – yes, going to rack and ruin all the same! Schoolhouse leakin' like sixty – and catch 'em taxin' themselves for a new roof! I wonder Miss Atworth can stay in the place – her and the children mirin' shoe-mouth deep in mud to get to school in the winter! Nary a rod of corduroy will they lay to give their own young ones a decent walk. But they keep their cattle comfortable enough – that means money in their pockets. All they care about is having their corn and stock turn out well. They don't care if the hull township, and the hull Union, too, for that matter, was to go to the dogs. Hello! here comes Jack with the mail-bag!"

A little while later Squire Hardy was in the act of distributing the bag's small contents, when two farmers walked in without even stopping to stamp the mud off their cowhide boots. Mrs. Hardy kept on placidly knitting beyond the fireplace; she was used to such invasions of the sitting-room, from which she had removed the carpet soon after the post-office was granted to the sleepy settlement.

"Draw up to the fire, Mr. Gates," she said, hospitably. "Take that rocker, Mr. Schmidt."

Mr. Gates kicked his feet against the andirons to rid them of clay and snow.

"Cold day," he remarked, settling his coon-skin cap more firmly on his head. "What's this I hear about the new teacher?"

"Well, what?" snapped the squire, looking around.

"Some say she's dead sot on gettin' up them doin's on Washington's Birthday."

"Well, s'pose she is?" said the squire. "She ain't askin' nothin' but the schoolhouse for an evening, and I've got power to let her have that. I'm school agent, ain't I?"

"I don't say the contrary. But to my way of thinkin', she's just a-wastin' time over a lot of foolishness. Hey, Schmidt?"

"Yah, das ist so!" assented the man in the rocking-chair, as he took his pipe from his mouth. "I tolt mein poy I shust dook him oudt of school and put him to voork ven I hear some more of dose grazy idees."

"Crazy? Nothing crazy about it!" interrupted the old squire, hotly. "I'll just tell you, gentlemen, it was a mighty good deed old Abel Dawson quit teaching here. He'd run along in the same old rut for the last ten year, till things had just about dried up. I made a visit to 'em last fall. I put some questions to the scholars, too. There wa'n't but four out of the hull of 'em that was exactly sure who the President of these United States was. Nary one could name the Vice-President!"

"Dey lairn goot vot vos in de book," said Schmidt.

"Yes!" roared the squire. "Abel stood over them with a rod, and frightened the spelling-book into 'em till they could say it off, back'ards or forrards. But they was like a lot of skeered parrots that didn't understand what they was saying."

"Dot vos more goot as learn 'em yoost foolishness – badriodism und der flag und all dot plab 'bout der country und der Union."

"Look out, now, Schmidt! I ain't goin' to set still and hear you calling patriotism 'blab.' I tell you in only nine weeks Miss Atworth's got the poor little souls waked up. They never knew before that they had a country. History and geography mean something to them now. She'll make intelligent citizens out of 'em if you'll keep your hands off. I'm out in my guess if she don't give this whole township a shakin' up before this thing is over, and teach 'em some public sperit."

Mr. Gates gave a sniff. "They say she's had a piano hauled out from the city, too," he said. "Hope she don't intend to levy on the parents to pay for it. She'll get nothing out of me. I'll tell her that right now."

"Shucks!" cried the squire, as he handed Schmidt his Zeitung. "Neither of you needn't worry. She's too smart to expect to get blood out of turnips."

"Vell, all I haf to say," was Schmidt's parting remark, as he wound his blue woollen muffler about his neck, "if she keeps on mit dose voolishness, I dake mein Karl oudt of school, right avay alretty. Dot vos better dot he voork as to vaste his time so."

"Poor little Miss Atworth!" sighed Mrs. Hardy, as she watched the two men tramp off together. "I'm powerful glad she's boarding with us. The whole neighbourhood is down on her new-fangled ways. I'm going right out now and make something extry nice and hot for supper. It's pretty near sundown, and she'll come in soon all wore out with her day's work."

The little teacher did need the good cheer and "extry nice" supper that awaited her in the cosy kitchen, for she had felt much discouraged as she trudged homeward through the falling snow. Her pupils had nearly all been telling her the same thing that day. It was that their parents scouted the idea of helping her to celebrate Washington's Birthday.

She had come from a distant town to teach the Hardyville school in hope to lay up enough money to complete her art course; but now it seemed to her that something more important than art demanded her services and the small sum she had saved. The dull, colourless lives of the children appealed irresistibly to her sympathies, and she was often amazed at the utter absence of any spirit of patriotism.

"How could the poor children learn patriotism?" said Mrs. Hardy. "Their parents don't feel it, except for their Vaterland. And certainly nothing has been done by the public round here to make the children love this country. Such lives! The parents get up before daylight, and dig till dark. They usually force the boys and girls to live like overworked horses. All they think of is making money. That big room up-stairs in the schoolhouse was built for a public hall. It has not been opened for fifteen years for any kind of an entertainment, not even a magic lantern show. It is the same old treadmill existence year in and year out. The children don't get their lives brightened – no public holidays are celebrated here, not even the Fourth of July. How can they love the country?"

"I shall certainly give them something better," Miss Atworth had said, and the upshot was her determination to celebrate Washington's Birthday. The indifference or hostility of the parents had but roused her American spirit, even to the resolve that she would bear the entire expense herself, if none would contribute from their plenty.

"Ten dollars," she reflected, "will buy decorations and material for costumes and stage curtains. Another ten will rent a piano. Most of the children have never even seen one. All my spare time must go to getting up the entertainment, and all my savings, too. Well, I'm glad – I guess I can give up so much for my country. It will be worth while if I can make its 'Father's' birthday the greatest gala day these poor little souls have ever known."

Not a particle of encouragement did she get from any of the parents except Peter Dowling, a one-armed veteran of the Civil War, and he was much more discouraging than he meant to be.

"Go on, I wish you luck, young lady," he would observe. "You can count on me for anything a one-armed man can do. But what's the use? I've tried and tried to get some 'Merican sentiment into these youngsters. 'Tain't no go – and never will be. But you can count on me to hooray for you all the same. I'll be thar if nobody else is."

"Maybe you tried to scold them into patriotism, as the squire does," said the little teacher. "I don't think that's the best way."

"It didn't work, anyhow," said the veteran, and walked away.

Miss Atworth's programme, besides the decoration of the schoolhouse, comprised tableaux and the recitation of patriotic poems and addresses by her larger pupils. But most of the children soon received strict orders to hurry home at four o'clock, to attend to the milking and evening chores. They were also kept at work till the last possible minute in the morning. But with only noon-time and recess for practising their parts, her enthusiasm worked wonders.

"It ought to be a grand success," said Miss Atworth, as she took a final approving survey of the decorations the afternoon of the twenty-first. "Only it's a little too warlike. I wish I had an old-fashioned pruning-hook to hang across that sword between the windows."

"Mr. Schmidt has one," volunteered Sarah Gates. "But he's so mad about our wasting so much time, as he calls it, that it's as much as a fellow's head is worth to ask him for it. I heard him tell pa he was going to keep Karl at home to-morrow night. Isn't that mean?"

"Keep Karl at home!" cried Miss Atworth, in dismay. "He couldn't be so mean as that!"

Karl was the brightest pupil in her room – a big, manly boy of sixteen. He was kept at home every spring and fall to help with the work, although his father was not poor. She had taken an especial interest in him from the first, had drilled him carefully in his declamation, and counted on him as the star of the entertainment.

"Pa wasn't going to let me come, either," continued Sarah, "till ma told him you'd picked me out of all the school to be the Goddess of Liberty, and that I was going to have a gold crown on, and gold stars spangled over my dress. Ma's awful proud because I was chosen to be a goddess."

The little teacher smiled. She was not without worldly wisdom, and had given Sarah such a prominent part in the hope that it might conciliate the whole Gates family. Fortunately nothing was required of the goddess but long hair and a pretty face – about all Sarah had to boast of. She simply could not learn.

Miss Atworth locked the door and started rapidly homeward. What should she do if Karl must be left out of the performance? A quarter of a mile brought her to the lane leading from the pike to the Schmidt place, and there she stopped with sudden resolve.

"I'll beard that old lion in his den, and ask him for his pruning-hook. That will be an excuse for going, and will give me an opportunity to plead Karl's cause."

It was nearly dark when Miss Atworth ran up the squire's front walk, and danced through the house into the kitchen.

"Oh, such luck!" she cried, gaily. "I went to see Mr. Schmidt, and some good angel prompted me to speak to him in German. It was such bad German – perhaps that's what pleased him. Anyway it thawed him right out. He lent me his pruning-hook, and showed me over his big barn. Of course I admired his fine cattle, and then, as he got more and more pleased at my showing such an astonishing lot of sense, I praised Karl so highly that he made a complete surrender. He is coming to-morrow night to bring the whole Schmidt family, from the old grossmutter, to the baby. Hurrah for Washington's Birthday!"

Never had the old public hall held such an astonished and delighted audience as the one that crowded into it that memorable night. Gay festoons of bunting, countless little flags, and wreaths of evergreen transformed the dingy old place completely.

A large picture of Washington placidly beamed from its place of honour. Over and around it, reaching almost across the stage, was draped a great silken flag, borrowed for the occasion.

Peter Dowling, in his old blue army clothes, with one sleeve pinned across his breast, sat far back, looking bewildered by the wonders the little teacher had accomplished.

Miss Atworth had arranged the programme with great tact. Each child felt prominent, and those who, she secretly knew, would be failures in anything else, were honoured beyond measure when she skilfully grouped them into a series of effective historical tableaux.

"It's enough to make even a graven image feel patriotic," whispered Squire Hardy to his wife, as the children's sweet voices made the room ring with the grand old national airs.

Declamations followed each other in rapid succession. Then came a scene, with recitations, in which Uncle Sam and all the States of the Union took part. The very air seemed charged with the little teacher's electrical spirit of patriotic enthusiasm.

It was at its height when Karl came forward to give the famous speech of Patrick Henry. His delivery was so much better than the rehearsals had led her to expect that even Miss Atworth was surprised. He seemed to find an inspiration in the crowd. A storm of applause followed the "Give me liberty or give me death."

"What shall we do?" she whispered in dismay as the persistent clapping of many hands called him back. "I wish you had prepared for an encore."

"Oh, I know!" said Karl, and in another instant was on the stage again.

In the deep hush that followed, his clear, musical voice rose in German. He was reciting "Mein Vaterland." Old grandmothers who knew but a few words of English rocked themselves back and forth in excited delight; Mr. Schmidt beamed with vast smiles; many an eye grew dim, thinking of the old beloved home across the seas. But the boy was thinking of his own native country. There was no mistaking his meaning, as he turned in closing, to wave his hand toward the portrait and the flag:

"My Fatherland!" he cried with true feeling, and then, after a moment of general surprise, deafening applause broke out.

As it subsided Miss Atworth stepped forward to announce the last song, but Peter Dowling, his face aflame with new delight and old memories, rose, stalked up the aisle as if unconscious of all the eyes fixed on him, and swung himself up on the high platform with one long step.

"Friends," he began, "I've been livin' kind of dead among ye for many's the year. Now I want to say a word or two. I ain't no great at speechifyin', but these old songs and pieces we've been a-listenin' to have spirited me up like the trumpet doos an old war-horse."

As he spoke he waved the stump of his right arm so vigorously that the empty sleeve was torn from its pinning across his breast and flapped pathetically.

"I want to say," he went on, "that I fit for that old flag, and yet, livin' here so long, and never a celebration for young or old, I'd half forgot my patriotism. It's our school-teacher has woke me up to seeing the truth. Now that we hev beat our swords into pruning-hooks, and peace has pitched her tent alongside ours to stay, I can't help thinking there's danger in settlin' down too comfortable and off gyard like.

"This country," he raised his voice higher, "ain't teaching its children enough of the feelin' of patriotism. It takes the same kind of principle to make a good citizen that it doos a good soldier. It ought to be the very bone and sinew of every school in this whole land. I could talk all night on that subject, now I've got started. But what I want to say is this:

"I propose that we all get out our pocket-books, and throw in to get a handsome flag to fly over this schoolhouse. Take an old soldier's word for it, there ain't no greater inspiration anywhere, to make a fellow put in his best licks, and come out on top. Now, Miss Teacher, I'll just get the sense of this meeting."

He paused a moment, then turned to the audience: "All who want to express their thanks for this evening's entertainment, and are willing a collection should be took, say aye!"

Such a storm of ayes followed, that Peter caught up his slouched hat and began to pass it around, with his only arm. Dimes and quarters clinked into it, while an occasional dollar showed how deeply selfish hearts had been stirred by the uplifting influences of the hour.

Miss Atworth seated herself at the piano, and beckoned to the bewildered Goddess of Liberty to lead the States again across the stage. Some of the smaller ones straggled sadly out of line, but as Karl, at a nod from his teacher, caught the great flag from its place and stood with it in the midst of them, every voice rang out full and true on the chorus:

 
"Yes, we'll rally round the flag, boys,
We'll rally once again,
Shouting the battle-cry of freedom!"
 

People seemed loath to go when it was all over. They came up to the teacher with awkward expressions of pleasure and appreciation.

"I'll never forget this night," drawled one faded, overworked woman, to whose eyes the rich colours and tinsel of the stage decorations had seemed a part of fairyland. "That music was so sweet, and my little Meta looked like a picture with her hair curled, and that beautiful dress on you made her. I really didn't know she was so pretty. I'm going to fix her up and get her a lot of nice things after this."