0RIGINAI~ ENGLISH
AS

OUR

W!UTTF.N -BY

LIT~LE

·

ONES AT SCHOOL.

BY

HENRY

J. BARKER, B.A., F.R.S.L.

) (LATE LECTURER ON ENGLISH

~ANGUAGE AND LITERATU~E TO

PUPIL TEACHERS UNDE.R THE LONDON SCHOOL BoARD).

R(prz'nted. /rom "Lo11gman'.s 11/qgazin(," with Additions no/
before published.

7/
LONDON:
jARROLD

AND

SONS,

3,

PATERNOSTER

[All ri~hts rmn'td.]

BUILDINCS,

E.C.

/

'/
0
' ') (.

ORIGIN AL ENGLISH
AS

WRITTEN

BY OUR LITTLE ONES AT SCHOOL.
.I ,'

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I... ......

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1.::.r·-.

I.' O · ·· /

I<~ I~

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·Jllarbarll

.

~ollcge 1.Librar~
•.

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.

FHOM . TIIE FUND OF
.

.

OHAB,L -E S · MINO T
(Clas~ of 1828).

Received

PREFACE.

]UST

one word before I draw the curta.in, reader.

I beg to state that-apart from the fact that a few of the

pieces were sent to "Longman's Magazine "-thi5 work
is absolutely fresh and original.
The portions which appeared in "Longman's," under
the title of" Studies of Elementary School Life," at once
ca ught the atte nti on of edi tors of the da ily and weekly

Prbs, and were rec eived, I ~m informed, with an almost

1

unprecedented greeting wherever th a t excellen t magazin e
was read.
I can onl y hope th a t, in this complete form, " ORIGINAL

ENGLI SH" will be accepted with equal relish, and that it

'

.

will prove brimful of amusement, whilst at the same ti me
sho\\'in g how the ch ildren rega rd th e pagean t of life.
And now, withou t more ado, away to the Schoolroom
wit h
Yours faithfully,
THE

5, S hakesp eare' Vi'llas,
•

•
Cotten/ram Parl', S. W.

SCHOOLMASTER.

CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
11

PAGE:.

Too sure "-How the Schooimaster iaughs-The School·.. Srtn1s0n was the \Vonderf'..!!l!st m:in yo:i C":er seed""Her name it was Ddiler "-'·Tying them 300 foxes'
tails together"-" Here they are a comin " -That's
how it was-Agonistes . ..

13

CHAPTER II.
Rura1 -Toora1 Engli,;h - " Jam pucldin " -·"In the sweet
fields of EJen "-" Doct<ns bring babies to good little
boys' houses "-Rather different-Physiology with a
vengeance

22

CHAPTER III.

A little mathematician-A wofu.J ma~riage - " Settle it!"1\Iarl-Billiards with a lunatic-" The Turkey""Tu rkeys lay very dc:u e;;gs \1h c1t you can't afford"...

II
I

29

CHAPTER IV.

A skeleton in the cupbo::ml-A honcysuckled cottage" Our st-rcet "-Tom and Liza Ann-\\'hy did he
wobble?-"A visit to th e Zoo"-" Not so yeller_,iJ,S
in the picter book,. _,. \\-oulcl I all us love her?" ,.. .·

.;.;m.;i.-....

~

ClIAl'TLIZ \'.

~

-iR

-~

Th~

!i'.dc cripple - A false ch:irgc --''The prophet Elij:ih"

-~

~
:- ~i.fa

~

- " l3a by would 11evcr have no luck"

--~

~
-"'3~

~".?J

Cll A!.'TER \' l.
A blackboard sketch- JEneas, but classic in a different
sense__:_ Posies~" Honesty "~O t such a problem!A kind of a sort of a nice fe eling

-

~--

- - -..... - - - - -.............
--- ----

~-

~ -~-

~-- ~~--

54

CHAPTER VII.
,

CHAPTER XIII.
PACK

Aul c~sar aut nullus-Boys who get on-" All out of his
own head "-An embryo Macaulay-" The cow is a
noble quadrerped "--'-".Cream which rich people eats" 6J

PACK

Girls' exercises-Inspection Day-A girl's reason-" The
Life of Noah"-" The Salvation is knocked about and
pross.ecuted "-Under° the big, blue flag-Bravo, my
child !-"You have gained my highest mark"
113

CHAPTER VIII.
An odd Ind-" The Cat"-" Cats have 9 liveses, but which
is seldom required "-Q. E. D.-A civil war, 0 so civil
-Tt:e capital of China

CHAPTER XIV.

69

CHAPTER IX.
Generosity-Power of a mother-" Politeness "-Choked
over a rabbit-" Tell-tale-tit"-" Daniel in the Lion's
Den"-" He told them to go away with their screet in"
-"This is trew; say wot yer lik e"- " You wood pr:ip3
have cryd too "

75

,. Hold your faces without laughing! "-Out it come:-T.~ue
till death-Where is the cat?-" Bank Holiday " Never steal or break winders, for it is written in the
Bible "-Tachinends, Currunts, and Beens-.. All
change for Box Hill"
133

J

A funny Dutchwoman-" The man Jacob was by trade a
Patri:irch "-Behold, we will have his blood-The
Redbreast-\\"hat would you expect to see on rivers?True, in a sense

CHAPTER XVI.
A quiet boy-Taking a '.'new boy" round-" He m'.ght
have given them back thrippence "-George \Vas~rng·
ton-Sucking baby's .sweets-A croaky sort of no1seThe reason why an organ-grinder moves on-\Vhat a
nice house ours will be !
145

CHAP:fER XL
Dunces-Perhaps-Fagged out-Did h~ feel silly ?-Three
"H's " with three wrenches obligato-" 0 the country
is so nice<l "-"I seed her"-"There is only three
things wiser than the dog ." -How burglars may learn
a lesson

.CHAPTER XVII.

95

\Vhere, 0 wh ere ?-A poor coal vendor-I ca n 't a UJrd itBlackmailing schoolmasters and schoolmistres<;es-She'd
walk him before the·• beak"-•· A hcnvclop with black
:i.ll round"

121

CHAPTER XV.

CHAPTER X.

CHAPTER XII.

"For fear of the Capt in "_:Does the ocean jump?-" It did
rife me so "-A lad with a temper-Only an eye outA sensation-Upset-"' Yours, Mr.Kempson"-Modern
Babylon-Strange bed-fellows-That pistol again
...

Showy subjects-A musica,l prodigy~" My b~y, try to L>_~
as good as you are clever "-Seven years pen~! s~rv1tude-Dividing a boy .in two.- The stolen pencil-case-Bitter tears-How to make a horse , go-Poets and
spiders

..

ORIGINAL ENGLISH.
),
,;

CHAP.TER I.

~HE reader may well surmise that a school-

'tJJl1'

master's daily routine is a somewhat

humdrum one. ·And, in the mam, such is the
fact; but still there are flashes of colour that
light up from time to time the school-room's
sombre h orizon ; and it is this bright side of the
picture that I am now about to display.
That "Boys will b'e boys" as regards mischief,
al l p;i rents know to be true, quite as well as any
s ch ool mas ter can tell them ; but that "Boys will
be boys" whe n compelled to take part in the
intellectual gymnasium, parents do not know,
perhaps, quite as well a s the schoolmaster.

l4

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY 'LITTLE ORIGINALS.

Again, .there is this difference betwixt the
two exhibitions of boyishness :-in the first
instance it· is intentional on the lad's part ;

but it is one of those peculiar smiles of mine,
which·. I have heard my a~sistants term ventral.

whilst, in the second, it is altogether sweetly
innocent.
Indeed, it v is in this 11ai"ve impcrception of
distortion, in conjunction with an utter abandonto the matter in hand, that the whole
humour of schoo.1-boyishness lies. For example,
'' \\That is the feminine of hero.'?" I ask a secondclass (ages ten to twelve) during an afternoon
grammar lesson.
111e11t

There are very many hands thrust out at
once, but I cannot refrain from satisfying- the
eagerness of one poor little fellow right behind
there, who, in his de3ir.e to catch my eye, is

15

But I must not be led into giving examples of
my school diversions ·before I have finished my
few remarks. All in good time, and you shall
·have plenty of them.
It is now many year:;_ago since I determined
to collect, preserve, and pigeon-hole such compositions as from time to time are produced by
certain original youngsters ; and I now put _a
period to my odd engagement, and let the public
.
I
haye the results of it:
Let me Sa)", then that the various 1eces I
hall lace before yo

standing on tip-toe, with hair almost erect
-~ glistening eyes, and cheeks flushed and dis~
tended with excitement. "\Veil," I say to him,
"you tell me, Harry \Valker." "Sltero, Sir!''
shouts the little fellow, his eyes sparkling with

pleasur~ a·nd pride, whilst he is as certa~ . in . his
own mrnd of being correct and of gaining my
approving smile as he is assured there is a smi
above him.

\Vell, I, the schoolmaster, do smile ;

young.
Let me thank my friends in the profession,
. or co_nnected with it-inspectors, masters, and
mistresses-for.sending me their choicest diver-

...

'

16

E N GLISH AS 'fVRIT

·BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

s1ons. I insert some of th ese; but, in the main,
I rely on the experiences of myself and my own
pupils.
But now, fri end s, let me ush er you at once
into the schoolroom. Th ere b efore you sit the
merry, rogui sh little fell o\\'s (all warranted under
fourteen), covertly pok in g fun at you directly
you enter, ma!-: in g you fee l very nervous and
very old, . and just a little b it annoy ed and
ruffl ed.. But, n ever mind ; J'Olt ca n " bear away
the bell" b efore the little innoce nts this time, at
any rate; for ha_ve you not come, escorted by
the schoolmaster him self, with the specific
intention of pokin g fun at tltcm t

•

•

* ·

The first specimen I p lace b efore you shall be
the composition exercise ot a b oy whom I
recollect very well a~ a happy, cheery littl~
fellow, although he came f~om a very poor home.
He was one of' a class of fifty, who, on this
occasion, were bein g exa mined in ~ criptu re
knowleci ge.
After the oral examination, six questions were
set to be answered on paper, and the lads could
choose an y four of them.
'

.

()

, 17

The second question of the series. was," Give

---.

an outline of the life of Samson."
The p aper is d a ted
arch, 1880, nd I give
the effusion word for word from the lad's own
writing:"The life of Samson which I has to give.
S amson was the wond erf ullest man you ever
seed. lie was so mighty strong that he thought
no more of Li ons and Bears, than boys do of
cat,s and things. If you think he was a giant,

th ~ t's just where yer: wrong., coz he wasn't a bit
bicrner
th an vour
fathe'r is.
bl:>
J

But mind yer, he

bad very long h air, · and th a t's just where it
d ci\vn his n eck, and under
was. It w e nt ri oht
I:>
his coa t, and then all the way d own. That's

how it was.
"S amson b ecame very sinfull, for he got a
courtin a young woman \vho was a relati on of
the wickerd Phillistit\3. l\I en sh ould never court
young women fron1 other countries, e xcept th ey
are good. N eve r m ind · aba rt th em bein g nicet
looki ng, if th ey a re not good. \Vhv, this young
woman actsh ully \vurshipped them ugly little
imiges wot yev seed Misshinaries bring in bags,
and put in a row on the table.

As Samson was
B

18

BY LITTLE ORIC/f\.ALS.

ENGLISH AS WR!T

goin a courtin one dark night, a Lion sprung at
him from over a garding. And see yer, Samson
just cote it by the chin, and gev it sich a crack
betwixt its eyes, that it dropped down dead, like ·
as yev seed cows beliint butchers sh cps.
never know how strong he was.

You'll

'' \Vhen they got marrid, behold Samso n arskt
a riddle, \Vhile the Phillistins was all eating their
dinners round him. He told them ·that if th ey
could guess it, he would give them without jokin
30 new suits of close apiece. Didnt they try
after that; coz they knowd that if they found it
out, they'd never have to buy no more new
close.

But they couldnt riddle it, with all their

thinkin. Then that na sty irn ige woman went
and told them wot it WJ.S. So S amso n had to
give all of them 30 new suits.

How they wood
1arf while they was a carrying - them home, ·
speshully when they was trying them . on. But
Samson never fnrgived ti1e imige woman, and he
\voodnt be marrid to her no longer.
- "You \~oodnt think this strong

ma,j

wood

have gone and got marrid agen to anutlier imige
woman.

Behold he did, and the next one· \vas

worser than the first.

A reeal badun this one

.

.

. ~'!. -

•

'i·

• •

...,,-·-

~~~·:.-_.,;",._.;-,,..,:.-(" -.:·-~ :~-~·J: •.,-~~~J:i· l~l.'.';:_...;;:;;.·.

was.

Her name it was Deliler.

Never min<l

her uther name, coz people never used to have
two in those days; that's how it was. Deliler
. only pertended to love mighty Samson. But
. . she just hated him at the bottom, coz of his
tying them 300 foxes' tails together \vith straw,
li~htin

them all up, and chivying them ever so
all among the corn. Samson hadnt been rnarrid
lonrr
afore he becran
of them aS?:in.
He happened
b'
b
.....
to pick up in the street an old jobone of an ass;
and he went rirrht at a whole army of them with
it) and killed a~art a thousand of them just as if
they was flies. That's how it was.
"Deliler was all us a worrying Samson to tell .
her wot made him so 'm ighty strong.

He told

her all sorts of things abart switches and ropes,
but when 'she'd tied him \vith them, and cried
•Here they are a cornin,' Samson just sprung
up, and killed them right 'off as usuerl like flies.
At last mighty Samson told her ~bart riis long
bairs. Then this b a d imige woman got Samson
nicetly off to sleep, and clipp"eci'an his hair off as
short as yours, with a big pare of sizzers she'd
. · got lent her. And thfn the nasty woman nudged
l1im, and cried · out a gig~li n, ' Here they are a

:

.:

~I

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

comin.' But poor Samson couldn't do nothing
this time; arid when they busslcd him away to
a big dark prison with his hands tied behint him,
he said it served him right for tellin wot he
knowd. Poor Samson nearly cried. Then they

And see yer, afore anybody ·c ould stop him, he

put out both his eyes, and forced him to turn a

that."

20

:

tugged them t\vo big pillers right down, and the
top of the place came smashin in. . Sich a smash
it was, and it killed thern all their, as easy as
flies.

big stone \veel all day long. 0 that bad 11111ge
woman; that secund one, that was her.
"But I'll tell yer, them old · Phiilistins was
punished at last, just when they thought as they
was safe. Samson's hair began to grow agen
down his .back; and, as it got longer, ·he felt
hisself gettin mighty strong. · One arternoon
• abart 3,000 of them was eatin all sorts of nicet
vittles and getting drunk in a big round room,
and they kept taking turns at wurshi mg
1m1ges.

Then they sent. for poor blind

am son

to come to them and dance and do stro g things..
\Nhen Samson got in he arskt the lit le boy wot
held him, to lead him to where the wo' bi(T(Test
bb
pillers was. And the li'ttle boy di
thinking nothing at all aba rt it.
bowed h is· head d own, and prayed t o ~d just.
for a min it or two, and then he natcWed fast
hold of the pillers, and tugged a\\ ay like mad.

I •

Samson was killed too, but he didnt mind

I

El'·:CLISH AS U'R!T.

23

of" Mrs." was "1\1 r.,'' and from another that the
masculine of "lady'' \Vas "ge.n tleman;" and
then he asl.:ed a t11ird little fellow for the
masculine of "l\fadam."
"l\fadam, Adam,"

- CHAPTER IL

glibly res ponded this village prqdigy, little
dreaming of the niental shock he was giving his

..

m aster.
I find I have kept a record of a remarL:able
answer in grammar given by a little lad, Harry
·Sh arman. He was a scholar whom I had the

~! ~ HE answers a schoolmaster gets from his

~ 1}

pupils ,during .g rammar lessons are
often so extremely ludicrous and so utterly
devoid of pertinence, that it is not surprising

grcatest difficulty in instructing, on account of

1

that the intelligent public are asking the question

)his nerves b eing so sensitively strung.

'' \Vhat is the use of teaching the bare rules of
grammar to such a punctilious extent in our
.Gove rnment schools?"
The

effusion of his on ''doctors," is now in my hand,
and you shall have it. after I have given his

.

always thought that he was one of the little

a remark-

able masculine gender from one of his ~ciples ..
The village pedagogue \\'as dealin assiduously
with the grammatical distinction of sex, and
had got correctly from one lad tha the masc~line

"slight mi stake" i11 :grammaP' .
I will first simply state that Harry was a very,
very po·or lad, and . that he died of brain fever
at the b of twelve years six months, the result
.
of a fall ' the. district ' doctor said, b·ut I have

aae

ussi ng th e
su ject, and content myself with let ing my talcs
speak for themselves.

A schoolmaster of a rural school ot

An

'

I~

victims of educational overpressure.
Well, ~ was trying to instil into the boys the
mysteries of tl1e degrees of adjectives (regular
. and irregular), ·and, after giving the class
numerous examples of comparatives and super-

~

EA.GLISH AS l-VRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

Jatives, I concluded the l~sson by a recapitulatory
catechism. Amongst other questions, I asked
for the superlative of the adjective "nice," and
seeing Harry Sharman's hJnd instantly elevated,

select for themselves, and Harry chose the
extraordinary subject of "doctor~." As I remarked above, association was very strong with
Harry, and you will quite understand, reader,
why the lad's nervous temperament should have

I called upon him for the answer.

you

nm

arry's superlative
· 1fhe bump of
associ fro n-,,..,v~a~s"'"'""'.'.e~v"?"idi e- 1-1t:--;l_y_ '_" e~l~l-d eve loped in

led him to the ·choice of such a grim theme.
'' Tlte Doctor.-Being a doctor is a very good
trade. Doctors have most always niced black

Harry, and, as with most children, the
was more attractive than the abstract

wiskers at the side, and are tall men. They are
also very fierce-looking, but they are very useful.

And now I give you the essay written by
Harry only two weeks before he sa11k into his

poctors are men \~ho nev.er walk, except from a
carriaae
to a house door. Doctors are skinny
I:>

grave. The end came very quickly; he was at
school on the Thursday, and he died the followina
I:>

men, with black eyes. and coats.

I·

Thursday morning at nine . o'clock, just as the
school-bell wa~ echoing tl;rough the streets, and
. summoning all the neighbouring little people to
their daily tasks. The brazen bell might ring I
ring! ring! but Harry's ear was dead-· dead-,-,
and Harry's soul

W?S

already beyond the stars.

In those sweet fields of Eden
4)
Where the tree of life is blooming. ·

I should jus~ premise

Doctors bring

babies to good little .boys' houses.

I was very

good, and he brought my mother ours. It is a
e girl, ~nd it is called .A gnes. The doctor
has seen me three times for t11e purpose, cuz I
have headaches. · I\Jy mother looks at me'. and
cries when he's gone. I never tells mother I·
have headaches, e~cept h hurts 'me very much.
I love my mother. I · wish my head was same
as other boyses. · Yesday I arskt Webster if he
ever felt dizzy, and he said no. All boys I ask
says n~. What the do.crtor gives me makes me
feel worser. But mother likes me to take it, so

the boys to write upon any topic

.. - ~

.

~·.;.::

·~

E/\.GLISH AS · 1-VR!T

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

I don't mind. I wish I was a man, but I'J
rather be a· woman like mother. D octors hav'nt
niced houses. There is b o ttles all round and no

lad \Vas illegitimate), }ud to walk every day a
distance of two _miles from F--to H--,

washin.

where she was employed in a factory or warehouse, and her earni.n gs averaged eight shillings
a week. The . boy's school-fee was thre e pence,

Doctors hav'nt loud voices like men

you hears il1 the street, but th eir eyes are
brighter. I am not so fri g htened of doctors a~
of perlice. \\'hen I'm in b ed I can't sometimes
go to sleep.

and the mother never once failed to send it,
even when \vorlc was slack.
The question was, "Describe fully the Chord;:e

I can say my mo ney t a bl es best in

bed. I dreamed one night that the doct o r came
upstairs all in the dark, and took me ou · of bed ,
and gave me to a perlice to bury.
just afore he buri ed rne, and

B

Tendinec:e of the heart," and the following is the
lad's literal answer : / "The Chordc:e · T~ndi'nec:e are the cords, or,

I woke up
moth er was

better still, the thin rop es of the hum an being's
he art, which are . like ordinary sailor's thick

akissin me and cryin. l\Ioth er ays doct ors can
cure nearly all thin gs, and ti at th ey are kind
men. Headach es is not·d a n e rou s."

ropes, only the vafve.s of the auri'.:les st and for
th e ships, and the fleshy columns beneath for
th e anchor ; while · of cour.se on the sea, on · a

I shall now give a spe 1men of a rath er
different type; nam ely, the e. 'e rcise of a boy in
the seventh (or highest) st dard of the school.

sandbank most likely, ~he ship is _ the~ real ship
· itself, and the anchor the real anchor. Howev~r.
some books written by some an_c ient writers say

The subj ect under ex nination was A 11imal
PltysiologJ'! in which the class had received ten
months' instruction, a 1 sson having be~ given .
twice in each \veek.

too much about these . tendons, attaching far too
much in1portarn;::e to them . \Ve after always be
careful that we don 't fall into such ancient
mistakes, as a lot of :generations, that is, grand-

On referring to my iary I find that the . boy .
whose composition I transcribe, likewise came

fro~n a poverty-stricken home.

His mother (the

cl~ildren a nd great g~and - children , grown up

..

when we have been dead a hundred y ears from

ENGLISH AS WRIT
the present time, may smile at u~. just as we do
at them , and not buy our books we \\'rite.
"The

Chordcc

stra i;;h t, as you

Tendinece

111 i ;;'.it

go slanting, not

ti1i11 k."

The re::icJ c r \\· ii l notice tli .:it the fad's spe 11 i ng

is accurJ.tc th roughout, the after for kz'Ve to (a

CIIAPTER III.

very conimon lapsus calami with children), bein6

the only error in
subjoins

a

this

pen-and -ink

direction.
illu str:tt i\-e

I-Ic

also

J =;:'900R J AJ\IES

sketch,

__I];:

! There is one of his
exerc ises now iyi11;; before me. Jimmy

embellished with coloured pencil shading, and

was always an arrant dunce as regards reading

intituled "the Chorda! Tendincce in action·"
.
, but

land writing; but. he was one of the quickest

I am bound to confess that the illustration mi<Tht
b

little fellows at accounts

be very well taken to represent either a partly-

ha.cl und er my tuition.

sucked orange, or a dismantled sailing vessel.

\\'ith celerity and preci sion difficult problems,
involving

not

which 'u nde r

only

that

have ever

He c ould polish off

in tr icate

ord i1i;try

I

reasoning,

circu mstances,

but

would

li:ive required an acquait1tance with abstruse
a ritli rn et i cal met hods.

I

f ..

IIis father tended a factory engine, earned
wa(Tes, and was what is termed a
g ood rerrular
"'
b
cute, jolly fellow. He cou \d scrape the fiddle,
and sing a

good

song

at the ne ighb ouring

''Free-and-easy," besides having the additional

qualification· of being- able to tom-tom easy

accompaniments on the piano.

30

EXCLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE O!?ICI!IALS.

31

Thus the surroundings of little Jim were not

occasion, one of the barmaids brought his bread

of the most healthy nature, from a moral point
of view.

and cheese and pickles up, and at tJ1e same time

I for~et what became of Jimmy for the first

some most horrible tle\VS of his \vife's escapades

she took the opportunity of conveying to him

three or four years arter leaving school; but

on that evening.

when he was "about twentv
'J"' ears of aae
he
J
~ '

munication by saying, "And now, Jim, I told

occupied the post of billiard-marker at the house

you that you were a simpleton for going to

above-menti0ned "Free~and-easy"

church \\'iLh h e r, and now again I tell you that

tras held. And no\v comes the saddest ...•Jart of
my story.

you're a simpleton if you don't settle both her

where

the

The girl finished .her com-

The young man got connected with one of

a1id yourself this very night,"-or advice to that
. effect.
Little did the barmaid think of the

the flashy jades of the loca lity, a;1d t.he woman

. adual impress ion her word.s wer'e having upon

J a1~es

prevailed upon him to marry her. ·The youth

him ; for, reade r,

yielded ; and, before he had bee n married a

reaso n, even whilst she was whispering to him,

fortnight, the wom a n led him such a dance with

<rnd before th e night \Vas over he was lodged in

her midnight orgi es, tha~ the husband realized
too late-too late-the terrible mist a ke b e had
made.
\Veil, one evening Jim liad just turned the
gas. of the billiard-room down low-after some

customers had finished their game and departed
-and, taking advantage of a few moment(Nuiet,

'Wfllt

mad, lost his

the nearest asylum.
The poor affrighted barmaid confessed the
whole of the truth to the young man's parents
the followinrr day and it was from the father's
b
'
own lips that I subsequently became acquainted
\\·ith the painful facts.
Jim is now located

in

the county 3sylum,-a

for his supper, \vhich meal lie always took at

palati~l edifice, standillg upon a proud eminence,
and surrounded by nodding plantations and

the little table by the markin.:;;-board.

shaven la\\·ns.

lie straightway signalled down the speJ.king-tube
On this

One mi~rht
\\'ell be pardoned
b

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE. ORIGINALS.

for mistaking its cas~ellated facade, its soaring
1· ·
turrets, and - its g.mtmg
ranges of mullioned

saying he is sure to beat you, for his all-round

32

play is something marvellous.

windows, for some baronid.l seat.
About four months a~o I visited the institu-

t.

tion and was courteously escorted by the doctor

1

'

through the warJs, and into poor Jirn's presence.

~,
!
''

33

Besides, it will

do the patient good; I often have a game with

him mys elf."

So I assented, though I am but
an indifferent cueist.
The lunatic started by giving me a miss; then

There he was-rny quondam clever little mathe-_

I failed to score off the red.

matician-playing a game of billiards with one

made a splendid break of 6r, which included

of the attendants.

The grey metal-buttoned

such grand all -round cannons thdt I \vatched

jacket and ugly n~nkeen trousers, which con-

them come off one after another with bewildered

stitu~ed the uniform of the inmates, served to

a?1azement.

quite annihilate his identity,

for

I ~hould never

The fellow then

His ·estimation of angles

and

. imount of side was· almost' as scif'ntifically exact
as if lie were comp~lling his ball to traverse the

have.recogni sed him.
He immediately came up to me and asked me

grooves of occult geometrical fif_;ures.

When the

for a bit of tobacco; and when I introduced

lunatic at las t let me in, I scor~d fourteen, and

myself to him, my \Vords appeared to convey

received the congratulations of the doctor· then

no

apposite

medning,

for_ on

my

inq umng

persuasively," 1Vo7-u don't you know me, James?''
he merely said, curtly, "That's nothing to do

'\
. .
'
'
from a difficult opening, my strange opponent

went clean out with a quick, unfinished break.
Shortly after our game I bade th e poor mono-

\vi th to\Jacco ; my question, Sir, sirn ply required

maniac good -d ay.

' Yes ' or ' No.' "

t o hasten wit!1 me along th ose d isrnal corridors

I tl1cn requested the doctor

\Veil, I emptied my pouch of go1den4fl.ake into

and galleries towards the nearest exit, for I tolJ

his box , and .then the doctor said to me," Now,

. him there \Vas something peculiarly depressin g

if you really want a treat, Sir, just play a

to my spirits i1_i the very atmosphere of the place.

hundred up at billiards with him.

To see the poor wretche_; huddling

Excuse my

111

groups to

c

34

ENGLISH AS WRIT

the right and left, and grinning either vacantly
or spitefully -at us as we passed, gave me the
"shivers ; " nay, I confess I began -to feel a
nasty, nervous creepy feeling getting the ~etter of
me. I almost fancied that my own m111d was
losing its balance, and I half suspected that the
doctor \Vas noticing me, and was already considerately planning a trap for my detention
within the walls. This waking incubus (if I
may be allowed the expression) was - by no
means alleviated when the doctor suddenly led
-the way down a cut-throat-looking passage,

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

35

However, I was in haste to dep~rt; and, before
a few more minutes had passed, I had shaken
hands with him, and \vas lightly pacing it along
the gravel path that led down the slope and
through the meadows. I paused for a moment
midway down 'the hill, turned round, and lo:)ked
upon the lofty turrets just visible over the distant
depths of elms, and I know not whether it were
with sensations of pleasure or pain that I com-

whic:h dipped rapidly under ground.
However, he laughingly explained th at \v·e were

runed with myself and realized . that I was,
Jndeed, free and h~althy both in mi11d ~nd body,
whilst poor Jim and 'his fifteen hundred fellowinmates, whom I was leaving behind me on the
hill, were cooped up ;in a mockery of a palace,

merely traversing a private subterranean com-

with minds shack.'<:!d or hopel essly overturned.

-munication between the main building and
his own re sidence. This private under-ground
passage had b een constructed by ord er of the
present committee to enable the doctor to p ay
frequent surprise ·7,1 isits to the various wards, and

Turning back, re.a der, to . Jjmmy's life in the
old school days, the exercise now on the top of
the pile before me is the only memento I have.
It is a compositio11 upo!1 "The Turkey," and I
it Ee ore you just as the lad

thus to pounce swiftly upon any act of secret
brutality or other abu se on the paft of the
attendants.

"THE TURKEY.

·After a subterranean walk of a

"The Turkey is a large blew bird, genelly fat,

hundred yards, we emerged by a flight of steps
and a trap-door into the doctor's private library.

with thick legs. It h as no tail worth _mentio ning
at the side of a cock's tail , but it ha s in stead a

-.

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

long piece of skin hanging from its ~ead. an~
under its chin just like red tripe. This skm is
CTenelly dirty-at the bottom because of draggling

skin of the Turkey with a stick when the Turkey
is turned the other way, and then the boys ru.n

:n

the ground when the bird is a feeding.
"The Turkey is king of the goose and most

other birds, bu't the eagle can fight it.

It is like

a very big cock if it wasnt for the taiL

It is not

cruel to kill a Tu~key, if only you take it into
the back yard, and use a sharp knife, and the
Turkey is yours.
"The Turkey gives us 111ce Turkey to eat at

37

away and the Turkey runs after them.
"The Turkey makes a queer noise called
goblin, like as if there was bits of balls a rattlin
in its neck. Jt is a half tame bird, and if you
are kind to it, it will let you feed it. Boys
pretend they've got a bit of bread in their hand
when it is only oringe pill, and when the Turkey
comes up nicetly and picks it out of their hands,

turkey at the public house where I goes for the
beer. The landlord is a big heavy man, with a

x t sneezes it out of its mouth again, and then
chiveys them a long way up the road. Boys
like the Turkey to. rui1 after them, because they
get home quicker without feelin · tired, and the

white fat face, and black hair, and he arskt me

turkey has to go ' ~11 the way back, and you

if I'd swallered all the Turkey. Then the dirty
and one said as I'd grown fat since
m~11.
:-,, .larft,
ye§terday. The Turkey was a lot niceter than
beef, but I didnt tell them it \vas. · 'Ne had

genelly see . a Turkey along. with some ducks.
'
.
But the Turke,r is kind to the little ducks, which
is a lesson you learn to be kind to your ·little
·brothers and sisters. Never mal~e your little
brother cry by hiding behind a wall or tree, and
pertending to lose him, for Turkeys never pick

Christmas, if you can afford.

My father won· a

:.

sossige to it, but mother hart to buy that with a
sixpence. . My m.other earns all the vittles we
eat, except the meat, with washin at g~ttlemen's
houses, and my father drinks beer, and brings
the meat, and buys coals. All boys hate live
Turkeys, and Turkeys hate boys.

Boys hit . the
.
~

,:· .;,;'

__ ,.

:.,..:-~_;i;};.~~~_;:~ ~~~(~::;" ~: ~·

.

nor worrys neither ducks nor hens. ifurkeys lay
very ear eggs what.)-:ou cant afford, but t}J,ey
do not g1v·e Eutte.r or in ilk because they cant 'do
.•

t nree times."

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

39
ht: h ·s

CHAPTER IV.

A little girl's name, too, which occurs m one
of the essays, I shall likewise disguise. \\Tith

~HE next papers in my collection are two

essays by Tom - -·, one on "Our

these. excepti ons, I shall tran scrib e the
lad's
.
exercises word for word as they are before me.

Street," and the other on "A visit to the Zoo-

t;e was always dreadful at spelling, and these

\j_l1'

logical Gardens."
A certain event took place at school in connection with the lad's mother which forced the
fact to come to my knowledge that little Tom's
father had died on tlrn scaffold.
None but
myself and a divisional Member of the Board
became aware of it, and I need not say that we
never allowed the news to transpire. From that
time I "kept an eye" on the poor child, and did
all I could to render his school days happy.

1-I e was ~ goo~ lad in the l~i~hest sens of. the
term ; for, m spite of the v1c1ous surroundings
of the low, poverty-stricken locality in which he
lived, his little heart-thanks to a mother's
training-was as pure as the sunlight, and his

0

lips would have scorned a lie.

f

t1\vo pieces, I am , not su,rprised to find, fairly
teem with orthographi'cal errors.
Tom is now a journeyman plumber, and rents
a little honeysuckled cottage some miles out of
town. His moth er lives with him, and on each
Saturday, afternoon he hands over to h er pretty
\Ve!! every farthing he earns .. He was a rigid
abstainer when last I saw him two years ago;
but, as he said, he n.ever forced his opinions upon
His mother, · he told me, had
his mates.
earnestly desired him to live without intoxicants,
and that was !tis reason for being a teetotaler.
No other reason he had, and no other he wanted.
Tom is. not married ; bpt, if I were \v·riting a
romance, I should doubtless make him encracred
b
b
to a certain interesting little personage whom he

ENGLISH AS WRIT

EY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

speaks of in one of his exercises as Liza Ann.

all listen.

Bu~

cuddlin one anuther.

alas, reader, I am bound do\vn to facts;

I don't no why girls <l;re so fond of
Then when we hear a

and so I can give you no grounds for such an

man or anybody cumin up the passige, we drawr

Still, it may be so, and thus I will

our legs in, and we say, • \Vill yer pl,ectce mind

assumption.
leave it.

our feet, Sir?' and · the men nearly all us says

First I give you Tom's exercise on

'All right, littluns; keep sat still, and we'll walk
through the middle on yer.'

,, OUR

STREET."

"Our street is a long lane betwixt two big
streets.

But when a man

is drunk, we allus stan up, coz drunken men
have lost their senses.

Liza Ann, the little girl

Our street is not so clean as the big

wot lives up the next passige but comes to our

streets, coz yer mothers throw the slops and

~assige

to join in, she says she likes drunken

things in the gutter, and chucks bits of Lloyds

men better than dr~nken women.

and cabbige le.'.lves in the middle of the road.

that, coz drunken rhen are sometimes very kind

That's why there's allus a funny smell down our

and turn their trousers pockets inside out so as all

street, speshally when it's hot.. I like to sit with

their money can fall out amongst the children.

some more boys and girls in the dark passige wot

But drunken women allus look savage and want

is by the side of our house, and tell tails about

to scratch the big poleeceman· as pushes them

where you've been.

. on, and then they want' to fight the women as is

\Ve often sit there. waitin(Y
b

while our fathers and m'o thers cum home from
work.

She says

stannin at the door.s just alooking on.

I've seen ·more far away places than

'' Our home is on the second floor, but it is in

some of them, and the girls are all us a lrsking:
me to tell them wot I nose. The boys sit on

the front.

one side of the passige with their backs to the

winder.

walls, and the girls sit on the other side with

we have plenty of room, but I sometime feel

1

their arms round one another s bodies, and they -

.

'vVe have· one big room with two
,

winders, and a · little sort of room without a
There's only my mother a,nd me, so

frightened when the floor gives a crak coz of the
' boar'Cis a movin~.
-·.

-

'

:':.~-;~.;.. ~.. ,~~ii'-_,.';:-~~-"

-........ ,.-_,., ..~ .. :. .

~

- :•. "\,

43

ENGLISH AS T¥RIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

":\1y mother says my father is a soldyer, but
she doesnt no where he is, and she thinks he
died away in Afrika. I only just remember
him. It seems as if when I used to see him, he
was allus a ,wobblin about, and Liza Ann says
she thinks that praps it's coz he \\'as allus drunk,
but mother says it's all my fancy. ' There is not
many shops in our street, only greenstuff shops,
and fried fish shops. Some of the boys and
girls in our street don't have boots and stockins,
not even in winter, but my mother allus lets me
have boots and stockins. \Vhen hers and mine
want mend in together and she has not got much
money, she allus lets me tak mine to be mended
first. The sun don't seerµ to shine so nicetly
down our street as in th~ big streets, and flowers
and grdss won't grow neether ·back nor front. ·
There is . some people wot lives . on the same
floor as us, only they are porer tha~ us, and
that's why they haye the back of our floor. The
man he goes about sell in fish, · mostly herrins,
and they are a allus having herrins
their
dinners and s~1ppers, and it makes our room
smell so nasty that mother sneezes and can't
sleep sometimes.
They throw the badtins·

throuah the winder into the bin, a.nd the dogs
.
0
and cats wot live in our street find out the bins
and cum and eat the bestuns. The reason why
the houses in our street is so black bo.tl} inside
.. and out, is c~z the ·smoke from the chimb1y
doesnt go right. up outside and then into the
clouds same as in niced streets, but it cums down

42

.ft

the chimb1y agen and puffs into the room and
gets away out of the winder. This is all I know ·
fo\ once about our ~tree t ."
..
!fhe next essay i~ dated seven months later,
and the subject is ''A visit to the Zoological

l!

Gardens."
doubt I permitted the boys to choose their
0
n subject, and I likewise have no doubt that
j pelt the word Zoological for the little essayi.st,
since I observe that he has got it down quite
c rrectly. In fact it is a 'c ommon thing for boys
to ask the teacher ,to write their title on th~
blackboard;-the reason being, (surmise, that,
in the first place, they get a word or two read!
spelt for them, and, in the· secona, they receive

. . fr m it some kind of 'insriration to ~ommence

..

•his visit.

'•.

44

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ·oRIGINALS.
0

"A
,.

VISIT TO THE ZOOLOGICAL GARD ENS.

"Of all the animals in this world, the Zoological

Gardens is the most.

You go in by

a gate, and,

when you have got a bit way ·do\\·n, there they
are all round you.
it.

Ameriky can't be nothin to

They · can't run about and hurt you, coz

there's a kage dropped over them a11.

They

45

think as you can figlit, don't yer, little boy, just
coz you no I can't get out all coz of.this bloomin.
kage.
If I could only skweez through, I'd
swallow you and yer mother too.'

I said to

. my mother 'I should like to hear the lion
a roaring.'

vVhen

she said 'why

that .was

aroaring just now when the keeper looked in at
him.'

Then I nearly cried, I was so wild; why,

look so vexed c;oz you can see all they do and

it wasn't like thunder and lightnin at all.

It

can have a good stare all round at them; and

just opened its mouth wide, like as yev seed

they keep lookin in the corners to se·e if they

m 9n sittin at their doors and a gaping on Sunday

can't find some bushes and things to hide
behint.

afternoons, and it yoped no· louder than a apple

"The lion, \\·hich is the king of all the animals

cart man does.
"\Vhen we got to the -girraffs, I did like them.

wot ever lived, was so little that I shouldn't have

They are just the same· as the picters, only alive

noen it was him, only I have seen picters, and

and w;:ilking about.

my mother (aid 'Look, Tom, now you can say

the girraffs is so big, that · you'd say as they

as you've seen a lion.'

couldn't \vag erri . . But they can, just as easy

\Vhy he isn't quarter as

big as a eliphent, and he hasn't got no trunk.

I think the eliphent ~ould master him if he

They have little tails, but

as a little dog can, ·whether yer bleeve it or ..-:'.'.·~
don't. They look at you so n~cet, just like -.-

liked ; b~t the big silly won't try, coz he's so
kind, and doesn't want to be hna
Tlml·
.
'- o•
(f;r 1011 IS

carves.

yeller, but not' so yeller as in the picter . book
what the Board acv me
H e I oo 1(S . at yer
.
::>
•
through the b
1·i. ·'1 ,-r..,·,,,z; -.
ars 1 "e as wot he was sayrng f·yo~

skin is so thick that it can stay in its pond all

The hippopotamus

is

like a

mashed eliphent '~ith its trunk sawed off.
. . day without the water soak in through.

Its

It makes

yer .shiver when its eye~ look up at yer.
!

little

Its

EA.GLISH AS WRIT

, BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

eyes are like bits of hard, bright mud with no
white, and bleedin red skin all round.
"Kangeroos are so 11iccd that you can look a
long time at them without feelin tired. Their
back legs are about four times longer than the
front ones, and they are a lot too b1"0- b e l11n
·. d .
0
They sit up just like dorrs
a beaa.
i na
a11d th ey
.
a
::.;::,
01
have a bag rigl1t in front for their babies to roll

ab~ut in.

47

on 1s called jumbo, and it is .the nicetist
quadrerped ~sever was seed. It looks as if it
couldn't all of it die, it is so big. I held a bit of
bread out to it-, but it \vouldn't take it, coz ther.e
was a lady with a fine. dressed little girl who was.
a givit1 it sugar buns. I kem away cryin, coz J
should have liked to have told the boys as I
had fed jumbo. But I didn't, so I can't say it.

They run so silly, just as if they was
try111. to dance at the same time as ·they are

''My mother and me then sat down and eat
our bread and meat, and drank so'n1e milk she

runnrng. The fox, wot I thought was as bia as
•
'
b
carves, isn t worth a lookin at coz of its size.
It's not a bit of good it bein sly where it is now
coz there's no farmers nor huntin men allowed'
in the kages. It looks -as .if it wanted to be sly

h ) d brought in

but can't.

\Vhen I said to my mother 'how it

smell,' she said 'Come along to the other animals:
that's its slyness.'
'
"I like the eliphent ~ore than all the uthers,
ai1d my mother let me have a r1"de y
r
l
ou iee as
.
.
·
if you were in a balloon; 1\Iy motheO walked
by the side and kept a looking up and arskina
me how I . liked it, but I couldn't tell her till

i

bottle.

My

would stoop down arid kiss me a minit, and
once she arskt me if I would allus love her and
be a good boy. \Vhy in cou1·se I should, I don't
love. nobody else' like her. My mother didn't
seem as if she wanted to go bz.ick in the bus to
our street, for she kept sayin lo me 'Don't you
think the grass and trees is nicet, Tommy?' and
then I all us Silid '.Yes, mother,' and looked at
them coz she. wa11tcd me. I sat on her nee all
. - the way in the b~s, and went to sleep.

...

f

: .,._ . :. t~;~~~~-- .

ginger~beer

mother seemed to love me a deal that day, coz
when we sometimes' got to a quiet place, she

came down, coz I was rather frightened of talking
fear I should slip off. The elipheJ?t wot I r~de
;' f'.·'

a.

1
;

ENGLISH . AS WRIT.

-

49

.

one ; but the assistant was kept a month in
anxious suspense before he was examined by
the committee and exonerated. This assistant
was a particularly generous fellow, and I know
that he was especially kind to this poor lc,d,
often giving him a penny to spend out of sheer
CHAPTER V.

·~ER T AIN recollections-exemplifyinb" one
-or other of the many phases of primary
school work-attach to another of my little
u ~ ils. He was a crippl~, and had been rendered
. by a fall from his father's arms. Still, he
~va , 01~ the whole, a bright, cheerful little fellow ;
and, in spite of his dcfo1~mity, he entered with
ze t into all those game~ from which his affli~tion
dicil not perforce exclude him. However, I have
often seen the lad limp into a corner of the playgFound, and have a good cry all by himself, when
die lads with wl\om he was playing suddenly -

changed their game-as boys do-for one that
was too boisterous for him to take part~n.
The lad's father once wrote a letter of complaint to the Board, charging the teacher with
tripping the little lad up whilst crossina
.the
0
class-room.

The

char~e

was an utterly false ·

sympathy.
. Well . I give you an exercise by this boy
which was written when he was eleven years of

agf.

The questi~n . to ,b e answered was a
Scriptural one, namely;" Give a short account .of
the prophet Elijah." . Now the lad had evidently
forgotten his E!ija!t, .an.d you will note that he
artfully evades the que-stion, and actually gives
instea d a ~1istory of Elis/ta.
'' Elijah was a very good man, but not quite
so good as Elisha~ Elisha came after Elijah.
They was botli real profits, and was very much
respected.
Elijah ~vas taken up to Heaven
without dyin in bed, same as you and me will
bave to, but he went up in a chariet of fire jest

·, like fireworks as I onc.e seed at the Crystal
Palace, a.n d got cold wit~ .•standin all in the rain
a watching them with my uncle. But it was
f..ord Bekonsfield, not Elijah, as you seed blowed
D

ENGLISH AS

50

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

WRIT

to pass tki.t he wept.

up at the Palace. Elijah was blowed up on
Mount Sinai. Evcrythink got burnt exept his

miracles. You cant do it, because you did not
live in those days. · The lessons what you learn
is, allways to be good, and not to .think that

mantle, which Elisha catched hold of while
Elijah was arisin. Some peop le dont know as
' what the je\".,S called mantles, all gentiles calfs

nobody cares for you."
Another effort by this lad which I have

shawls; but they hadnt no trimmins.
"You couldnt tell men jews from women jews,
exept by the men having beards· and by their
big red feet.

preserved is a composition upon "Insects." I
think proper to withhold one sentence from it,
for a reason which I need not mention:. "Insects are very little things that fly or
\ rawl about. Yoµ mustnt ca1l things inseC:ts

The women's fe et was little and

white, and most allways nice and clean. They
used to wash them with preshus oil, not with
suds like you. The jews' mantles were more

1at's as bi()"
as a mou~c,
because you would 'be
b
.
ellinr£ a falsehood ·you would.

All insects are
ot to be killed, exc'ept the beetle, the spider,
nd the insects in dirty boys' hair. You should

beautiful than you think-some red, and some
blue.

.

This is ~vhat you call

They had no top hats and no trousers,

on acco.unt of th e burning sun.
"Elisha brought a youn g d ead man to life
again by lying on the top of him, . and blowin

ove all other insects.
"I once put my hand in my pocket, and sorne

into his mouth and up his nose. This m~de the
wind come into the young d ead m.an's ·b~Cly, and

beetles was in the corne'r of it, which I thought
was crumbs of bread. But when I felt them all

behold he sprang_ ri ght up on to the bed and

scriggle about in my hand, I fainted, I did. I
have n~ver liked beetles since they deceived me
'
.·
so._ If you tread hard on a beetle and your
boots are thin, it make.s the bottom of your foot

begun to sn eeze.

Then his mo'ther new he had

come round, and she fell on to his necl~sayi1~g,
'Here am I, ~1Y son.' And th~ y~~;i; ..
said, "So am I.' And so they kept a b~·sfrig[;-::.!

·tickle when the beetle cra•cl(s.

and Elisha saw all these thinrrs, and it : c~·~fY •

quickly, for how would you like scrunching

~ ~. .. "~ ~;'f;";~fl ,

~-;i6\v1y?

I

.: ;; ~,-;'i1l::.~~f{¥.\:.,;:__, '~ ..

...

.,_

-

All ways kill them

52

ENGLISH AS WRiT

B( LITTLE ORIGINALS.

"Spiders are the cruellist insects which ever
lived. They let some thread come ~ut of their
bodies, just same as you do when yer flying yer
kites, and then they make a web of it to catch
flies. Then they skwert juice on to it to make
it sticky, same as catchem alive papers what you
buy, and then they hide behind a leaf. \Vhen
the fly gets . cote, the spider comes from behind
the leaf, skwerts some more juice on to the fly's
wings so as it cant fly away, and then rolls it
over and sucks its blood.
"I have ' seed boys catch black beetles and
make them race, and then they kill the one as

Then the boy touches it behind, and it flies

loses. This is very cruel sport, most as bad as
rat catchin. How would you like to b e kill ed

53

away.
"Crickets are those insects that sing behind
the firegrate. Never kill crickets, fo.r I tell yer
I once killed a cricket while my mother was a
mangling and ·I was a rocking the baby by the
side of the mangle, lookin in the fire, and then
1
my mother began crying, saying baby would
never have no luck. Then I cried, and then the
baby started a crying and wouldnt go to sleep.
I'm sure I shant kill n,o more crickets, for I
1

loves our baby more than yer think:"

·"

because you cant run?
"The prettiest insect in all this world is the
ladybird. It is red with black dots. \Vhen
boys catch ladybirds th~y never kill them, but
th~y let them stand on the back of their hand,

..•

. f
~-1.::~ ~

:·:r.

.
'
. .
:r·~1;_;; . ;~ .:~~..:ltA~-~~r>:;~~5..~~: .~;~:l£>.-~·;,,_:_.,-.~:
.....~·

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_

ENGLISH AS TVRIT.

55

had the opportunity of standing behind him and
seeing him finish.
The drawing roughly represented a tall man
with thin angu_lar legs, carrying on his back a
little egg-shaped boy, whose arms were circling
the man's neck, whiist his diminutive legs were

CHAPTER VI.

1
l :~1~c:~i::, ~: :t~h:l;~c ;i~:i~ a: ri;;~:d~:~0::
\V

thrown out horizontally in the air. In addition
to the burden 011 his back, the man held in his

t

class he was, and whom, you will remember, the
father

shamelessly

charged

( Of course the young artist was very much
kakcn aback when, 011 completing his sketch and
taking a good big bit~ of his bloater, he suddenly
turned round and found me standing ove r him .
"\.Vell, Stevens," 1 asked, good-humouredly,
"\vhat does your drawing represent?"

with

I chanced to go ~nto the assistant's class-room
one dinner hour, the room being quite empty at
the time, with the exce~tion of two or three
boys who came from a distance, and had brought
their meal with them. \Vhen I got in the room

"If )' er . please, Sir," answcrc:d the lad, "It

stands for our teacher carrying the lame boy on
bis back last Saturday.''
And then I gathered from the lad, bit by bit,

one of. the lads-\\'hose . dinner consisted of a
thick hunch of bread and the half of a cold
bloater-. was en~ag.ecl in making a chalk sketch

right hand and the bread-and-herrinrr
iri his. left ,
b

what amounted to the follow ing detai ls.
The assistant, it would seem, was in th e habit
of taking his class for a Saturday country
ramble from time to time. He had done so on

that he did not observe my approach, and

the previous· Saturday,t and the little cripple, in

~none of t~ie b:ackboards.. He /as so.4Jeeply
rnterested

111

his work, with the chalk in his

50

.

left hand what looked like two long, straight,
clothes-props.

mentioned , and the assistant teacher in whose

cripple's
assault.

..
'

I
f

.·~

~-

56

57

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

spite of his affliction, turned up at the school

master. A non-colle_g iate's rem~neration under
the London School Board does not average that
of a navvy, and even the trained assistant's
salary is altogether . inadequate to the maintenance of anything like a respectable position.
But I have not got to the gist of my narrative.
\Vhat was the mea111ng of the little artist's

gates at the -appointed hour to accG.mpany the
party. \Vhen they got to H--, a village about
five miles out, the teacher, having made ail the
lads sit down _on a stretch of turf near a wayside
inn, went straightway inside the· hostelry, and
ordered for every youngster twope11I.1 y-worth of
bread and cheese, paying for the \\;hole out of
his own pocket.

drawing of the teacher and the crippled boy?

The food was brought out rn a huge · basket,
and distributed to the children. 1\-Ieanwhile the
teacher's young wife had tripped to a neighbouring homestead, whence she returned accompanied by a yokel, bearing on his yoke two

~ourney, when the lads had got to C--., a

pails of milk. Then, whi.lst the teacher was
seeing that his lads had plenty of bread and
cheese, his good little wife flitted about ,,·ith
mugs of sweet milk.
And, re.:ider, you will probably be surprised
to learn_that this assistant teaclHf's salary was
only seventy-five pounds a yec/r, and this in

spite of the fact that he was a Bac~elor of
Science. However, he had the misfortune not
to have been educated at a Training College,
and this is a terrible ban to a modern school•

\Yell, it was this.

It seems tl;rt on the return

)distance of four . miles ' from home, the little
cripple fairly broke down, and could not walk a
step further.
Then the teacher.
hauled the little fellow up
.·
.

on to his back, tucked his crutches away under
his owq. arm, and carried: the boy thus every
step of the way home. And the sight of the
teacher carrying the lame child had so worked
on our little artist's feelings and had so clung to
his memory, th~t, as if impelled by some
mesmeric influence, he had walked up to the
blackboard dufing · his dinner hour and · had
· made an effort to depict the scene.
"
Arn;l now .I noticed,.pn surveying the drawing
aaain that one of the little horizontal legs was
l:>

'

'

l
~

!

l1

.· ?,:

E N&LlSH AS fVRlT

BY LITTLE ORIGI!IALS.

only 11alf the length of the other; and this, I
surmised, was the manner in which the artist

for me. vVhen the lad was at sch ool, I remember, ,he often used to brjng his teacher some
little flower or oth er for a button-hole. This,
however, is no uncommon thing for boys to do;
a;1d I ha.ve frequently stuck in my coat some
rarrrred
nasturtium or some dila11idated doublebn
daisy which has been handed up to me by one
. or other of my little schola rs, rath er than hurt

. .

-

.

had attempted to pictorially con vey the fact
that the rider was_ as b oys term it, dolly-legged.
ll now knew, also, that what had looked to me
] ke clothes-p~ops, were in fact intended to
~p resent the cripple's crutches.
I thank thee, my lad, for thy uncouth little
$etch and thy simply-told tale of thy teacher's
ind act; for,
reader,. there was to my mjnd, as
.
~

.

w ch poetry and dignity in that young school1111.ster stooping for miles b eneath the burden of
·C!{>OOr gutter cripple, as in Virgil's pious hero
l.at ring his aged fath er and his hous ehold go?s
fun the ruins of Troy.
\
Now that I have me1rti ci ned the little artist
. '
Jilrny Steve ns, I \\·ill give a.n exercis e of his
· upn "Hones ty." It is written i'n a h a nd \vhich
I'lllly of my readers wou~d have canse to envy,

59

the .child's feelings by placing it aside. It is a
wondrous satisfaction to a boy.to be able to say
t~ ·his school-fellow~, :'That's my flower that the

I
' a wearing.
. '" .
,
masters
And now for Johnny Stevens' essay on
.
/

'."

ESTY. '

"Honesty is a · thin g what you can't see, but
only feet" You mustn't thirik th at because you
can't see it, yo~ haven't got to do it. For you
have. You can't see G~d, but your conshei1ses

~1er art ist nor clerk, but an ordinary~late­

t ells you that th ere •is God, you ~now that quit~
well.
Honesty is one of the most important
things that ever ~vas. .If everybody was honest, .

ll'l.Jt' on the railway, with grimy face and thick

how comfortable . should we be.

hay hands.

steals little things a1~d such, and yet they go
and thi~k they'~e got h,onesty. But they hav'nt

fmft. is simply as el<;gant as caligraphy well can
Ix. And yet Johnny now-six years later-is

Some months ago he called at

thst:hools and left a splendid bunch of roses .

.. ' •.

.. •"· •.

.: ~·.

·"

";. '1t/·,.;,-....:·,;· _,£

,:;.,, l~ ;:.;_;,

kd-··~iiAi;,,~~¥k~c._

·Some boys

I

•."'"·

6o

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

ENCiLlSH AS WRIT

got it, that'~ flat. It says in the Fir~t Standard
Reading Books, 'It is a sin to steal ·a pin;' so
there you are.
''Some foll~s think they have got honesty, if
they finds a thing in the street and keeps iL
Keeping things is stealing just the same. \Vhen
you finds anything, always give it to your
teachers or your mothers, and then you will have
honesty. I was once running after a man who
a perlicen1an was a taking to the station for
stealing, and when I kept a running round · him
and looking up into his face, what do you think ·
I seed? I seed he
couldn't look me straiaht
in
.
b
the eyes, much less stare me out. He was a
blushing, he was, I tell you~

I seed him.

Then

he swore at me and the other boys, and he telld .
the perliceman to drive us back.
And \he
perliceman was frightened of him, and · drove us
ba.ck. Praps that •man started with stealinrr
bits
b
of pencils and penknives.
"Some boys thinks that when th~ . copy
other boys' sums and spellings, they have got
honesty. But copying sums is as worse as
stealing · apples. If you can't do them there
sums called problems, scratch your heads and .

61

try. The inspector once gave us a problem to
do about a little boy as had ten sovrins give
him. by a gentleman, and if the boy give away
I 2 half-crowns, and l_ost I 3 shillings, a:nd spent
I I threepenny-pieces, and put two pound I 5 and
a hod penny into the savings bank, how much
would he have left in his pocket?
. "'Nell I couldn't do it at first, speshully as a
lady was a talking and a larfing with another
gentleman all the time I was a thinking. But I
,louldn't copy off of tl~~ ne'x t boy, though I new·
lie was a finding it out all right by his writing so
quick. I just shut my eyes and put my left
finger in my ear, anci's.cratched my head and I
thinked like mad, till I found out how to start ·
~

'

at it ; and I just finished it as the inspector was
a saying• 'All stop.; time's
up.' vVhen you nave
J
honesty, you have a kind of a sort of a nice .
feeling in your inside what is called happy; and
isn't this a lot better thaQ always being frightened
at people, and crqssing' over the road when you .
see a perliceman? You knows it is ; then
always have honesty, never mind about not

.

.· ,,

seemg 1t.

..

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

and work when they work."

In the playground

they are the merriest of the h1cp-y, fairly ·
perspiring with enthusiasm and energy, romping
"like mad," and making, meanwhil e, such havoc
with jacket and trousers as g enerally to 1frcessitate
an hour's darning and patching after bedtime
by a mother's never-tiring hands. They are
. invariably the "lead ers of sides," the arbiters

CHAPTER VII.
OYS
s et
animals. I
written by

in disputes, and the general referees of the
school-yard's busy round.

arc always delighted when they are
to \vrite an exercise upon domestic
have a large number of specimens
my pupils from time to time; and

\But in school hours it is they, likewise, who·
sittle down to their tasks quickly and in earnest.

whenever I re-peruse them, I am kept perforce
in a continu ous state of merriment.

Is it an arithmetic lesson? . vVell, they are the
lads whom problems don't frighten-not one

,,-

In every school there is always a moderate
pcrcen tage of boys

little bit; and who, f~r from blenching or wincing
when mental arithmetic is announced, fairly revel

otherwise they simply collapse ignominiously,

in the intellectual gytnnastics. Or is it a reading-

and fail to execute the requisite number of lines
for a complete class exercise. It ·is at1t Ca:sar

lesson? They are the , boys who read with
expression and feelil1g, although, perhaps, they
may not read half 's o fluently as their fellows.

a11t 1mllus with them. I have remarked, too,
that it is these little originals who, when their

'

.

Indeed; the effort of these little originals to

Lri ef school-life is over, are the very one•o get
on in the world and to chip their way .to comparative ease and comfort.

give appropriate emphasis and modulation to
the words and sentences they are enunciating
sometimes borders on the ludicrous. Still, the

Boys of this calibre ''play · when they play,

schoolmaster prefers such brave attempts to the

..

f
/

1

'

'i• ';

•

r"> ••

'

•/

' ·,

•, •

'<,

·~

.

ENGLISH AS WRIT

65

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

monotony and rapidity of the ordinary classboy.

-

it is In composition that
propensities and characteristics are
most striking. The bare sight of one
o these lads \vriting down an exercise "all out ·
ofl his own head," would be most amusina
to
0
a stranger, could he but watch the embry

ulay without be· CT 1imse1 hse ved.
position whilst seeking for an idra,
t 1en whils·t mentally clothing it in appropriat
terms, is an attitude of sheer intellectual abando z
the fingers of the left hand buried in hi
tanglt:d hair, arid ever and anon relaxing~1em ..
s Ives for a spasmodic scratch; the left ey
turned upward to the ceiting for inspiration, th
right being philosophically closed, as if to shut
out the disturbinrr
influences
b.
world. This is position ~o. 1.

floor, gets his right hand in pose, rests his
ear on the Lack of his left hand, rolls his ·
es, curls out his tongue, and lovingly commits
idea to pa per.
have chosen the exercise of Tom
on
"The Cow," because little Tom was just such a
lad as I have described. His parents were poor,
being cats'-meat vendors in a very small way.
Their customers were spread far and wide about
the district; and, in the last year of his school
life, the Board accorded Tom the privilege of
llalf-time, so that he .cou'l d assist his father in
his rounds. Thus the poor Lid had to work
bard \vith his brai11s in the mornings, whilst ii1
the afternoons he had 'to trudge weary mile after
weary mile with a huge basket of cats' food
swung upon his arm.

I forbear giving the lad's

full name, bcca~se now 11e is a junior partner in
a large firm of ''horse slaughterers," besides

Then, when the I.ad has got an idea, and has
r ,·ewise mentally "dressed . it up" ready fo

being the Chairman of a Local J3oard, and (as

riting down, he at once assumes positi9' No . .2
-that of the earnest scribe. He invariably licks
his pen first, then dips it deep down in the well,

still.
The following, the~, is a -verbatim transcrip-

he lately hinted to me) he has higher aims

tion of Tom's composition exercise on
..•

Jerks the excess of ink on to his trousers or

.

..

.

~

:....

~ .:-:~·L:L~; ·~-.4~;.t~:,~.-.•:; .

..• -.' :- •

E

:i

p

!'.:.

. ...~

-~

'

66

ENGLISH AS WRIT
"THE

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

cow's belly are what the milk comes through.
How thankful should we be. The cow makes
milk from grass. God teaches the cow how to
do it. A cow's feet is split in two, like sheeps;

Cow."

~·The

CO\v is a noble quadrerped, l:hough not
so noble as the horse, much less the roaring
Lion. It has four short legs, a big head for its
size, and a thick body. Its back legs are bent, .
and there's two big bones sticking: out just .
above. Its tail is more noble than the donkey's,
but nothin to q1m up to that of the

they are called hooves.
"Little cows are called carves. Carves are the
stupidist of all tame qu adrerpeds, except pig:>
and donk eys. \Vhen you drive a carf, never

race

prick it behind, but pu sh it gently with your flat
hand. Men are crewel to carves coz they cant

horse.
"The cow gives us m.ilk, and niced'beef, and
The reason wh y beef

? raw milk from . them. , You can genly fii~d
mushrooms in cows fi elds, but you mustnt go ll1
if there's a board tJp. How would your mothers

is so dear, is that cows cos t so much, a nd the
earth is gettin full of people. I allways have

like you to be call~ d. trespass?
"Bull s are very much like cows, but are fierce

beef to . my dinner on Sttndays ; on oth er days

qu a dre r~ eds.

shoolether.

How thankful should child ern be

to this tame quadrerped.

You can aqways tell bulls from
cows, coz bulls. are bbck, and not q nite so fat.
Dulls are not tame qu~drerp e ds, and they look

bread and drippin or bread and Lud, s ometimes
treacle.
"Mother says that if I'm hu11gry · on my

as if they could run. You can all ways tell them .
that way. When · my ·mother 'sees a bull she

rounds I can eat a bit of cat's meat if it doesnt
smell, but . I musti1t eat the liver, she says.
How thankful ought we to be to the

nice hot beef.
the cow.

~w

all ways stands with her back to the wall till its
gone past, and she holds my hand . . If a bull

for

Pertaters grows; they are not -on ·

wanted to hurt my mother, I should pull mother
e ows-a:te ~aint~d
yellow.

"The four things what you sees
,
~ ·

-~..

.

~- : \ ~11~~~~~

'

r

. -~

68

ENGLISH AS 'tVRlT.

When they are black and white, tbey are genly ·

·J

half bulls, so you must not go near them. ·
"There is · what is called cream, which rich

.:· .

people eats; it is got from cows which are all
white. How thankful should rich people be for
getting what they cali cream from the cow. You
can learn lessons from this poor quadrerpcd ;
not to kick, not to trespass, and not to persecute ·
peop l e. "

CHAPTER VIII.
\

'-:02!.~ O~IE nine years ago I had in my scl)ool

~

a boy in whom-on account of his odd,
· old-fashioned ways-I took a special interest. I
may say at once that he is. now a cle~er, prosperous
) young surveyor and _engineer out m the States,
and it was only the oth<:!r day that I received a
communication from him thanking me in the
most hearty terms for the attention he received
from me whilst he was a pupil in my school.
He tells me that if I should take a trip over to
the States he could have no greater gratification
. than in entertaining me, and he gives me to
understand that his fortunes a.re assured. He
sends me his carte-de-visitc, but I am bound to
say that I quiteJail to recognise him. Nine or
I

ten years ago he was a little stout plain-looking
. lad, .with bristled hair and patched clothes; but,
according to this presentment, he appears new

, .,,.,,.:,..

ENGLISH AS TVRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

.

to be a tall, almost handsome fellow, with a
commanding ·and philosophic air. Still I seem
to think that I can cull from his face the old

black and white, and uthers. \Vhen it is
ppy it does not bark, but breathes through its
se, instead of its mouth, but I can't remember
e name they call the noise. It is a little word,
1t I can't think of it, and it is wron~ to copy.
ats also mow, which you have all heard. \Vhen

merry twinkle of the eyes, and also a certain
earnestness of expression' \\'hich even as a chi id
rendered him quaint and odd.
Here is a composition exercise of his upon
"The Cat." . I see I have marked under it in

' u stroke this tame quadruped by drawing yer
· nd along its back, it cocks up its tail like a

b lue pencilling "Fair," but, in addition to this
class-mark, I have further added "Send the boy

Never
!er, so as you can't get no further.
oke the hairs acrost, as it makes all cats scrat
e mad. Its tail is about too foot long, and its
s about one each. Never stroke a cat under
e belly, as it is very u_n helthy.

to my desk at twelve;" and I have no doubt
but that, when he came to me, I sp ent a quarter
of an hour or so in an untutorial chat c;onducive
to the correction of his erratic ability, and to the

"Don't teese cats,' for, firstly it is wrong so to
do, and 2nd, cats have clawses which is longer

that bent of

then people think. Cats · have 9 liveses, but
\Yhich is seldom required in this country coz of
Christianity. Men cat's are allus called Tom,

_.

"

.

.

..~-

.......

and girl cats, Pus? or Tiss; b~t, queer as you
may think, all little cats are called kittens,
which is a wro,ng 'name which oughter be

~

"The house cat is a fourlegged Ii) quadruped, the legs as usuerl being ·at the

changed.

Its colours are striped, tortusshell,

bla~~)_:·_;-,

This. tame quadruped can see in the

dar*~;- so rats stand

corners. It is what is sometimes called a tame
animal, though it feeds on mice and birds · of
prey.

71

_

. f~Z~~L

no chants, much less mice.

I drawed our cat on some white tea paper, and .

.- .. .
•

.

.

.

. '. ..; 3.,.:s_: :"~'-'-_~_;~.,,.··~·A·_\, .i -· .

El\'GL!SH AS J.VRI F

BY LITTLE ORIGii!ALS.

I sold it to a boy who has a father for 20 p111s
and some coff drops. Cats are very-useful. I
can't remember one of the noises they make,

the second part of the question, al though I h·a v·e

thouf;h I've just been trying again_
RllO most an think S£eshully where
This is all about cats."
years of
~h e ir

But to return to our little fricnJs the scholars.
I was one day giving a class an oral examination in geography, when I asked the following
question, among::;~ others, "\Vhat is the capital
of China?"

confused and erroneous notions. The following
is a written answer to the question" Define a

Numbers of ea~er hands were soon waving m
the air, and as npny bright upturned faces
)earnestly sought to '.'catch the speaker's eye.;'

triangle (according to Euclid)." "A triangle may
· best be defined as the familiar square, only the

However, I turned my attention to a boy at the
end of bis row, who, I noti ced, had only elevated

72

probation, qften b etray by their examination papers, that th ey entertain strangely

former has tltrce corners or angles.

Th erefore

it is not a square. Q. E ..D."
Another pupil-teach er (a young lady aged
sixtee n), ga ve the followin g original an swer to
the English History question " \Vhat is a Civil
\Var? give a brief accou;1t of the causes which
led. to hostilities oet wee n Charles I. and his

read it.
it."

73

I presume I did not make · notes upon

his hand after some d eliberat ion, and even then
with evident diffidence.
"\Veil, \Villiam," I
interrogat ed, '' \Vhat do you say is the capital of
China?''
"Please, sir, noboJy knows," responded the lad, " becau's e the Chinese won't let
strangers from other countries go in and see!"
I may remark that such answers as these . it

Parliament."-" A Civil \Var, if I r~ ollect
rightly, is one in which the military ·are un-

would be very umvise on the teacher's part to

necessarily and punctiliou.sly civil or polite, .often
raising their helmets to each other before ·

of a mental effort of the pupil? and should not
the chief aim~ of the teacher be, not the cram ming of a crude mass of information into the

· eng ag ing in deadly comba t.

I cann ot answer

check or discourage, for are t!1ey not the result

"

·~

74

E4H

AS UTR/T.

\

heads of these youngsters, but to teach them
11ow to think for themselves? This is education ; the other, but the frivolous conveyance
of facts.

CHAPTER IX.

,lJ1.

N essay on 11 Politen·ess," by \Villiam
~
l\fartin, which now lies before me,
chlls up some pleasant memories of the lad's
i chool days. l\laitin~s f~ther was a working
,,.

engineer of superi~r ability, anc1 his wages were
good and regular. .Other than this I know
nothing of the family.
I am lik ewise unacquainted with \Villiam's career, for directly
'
.
after his leavi~g school the family removed
to a distant locality, at;1d I lost sight of them
altogether.
\Then \Villiam w'r ote this exercise on 11 Politeness,' he was in the fir:st class of the school, and
was .urneCI thirteen years ·of age.
find that
there are certain touches in his piece, which are
very characteristic of the lad's disposit ion. He
.

•

. i'

"·as so unselfish , so noble and g ene ro us, that he

76

ENGLISH AS WRIT

comm~nded

sides.

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

affection and admiration on all

77

The lad had brought his dinner to school with
him on this particular d~y, in 0rdet to ha~e ·

It was_ only cowardly and currl.sh spirits

that feared or envied \Villiam l\iartin; all others

extra time, it wo~ld . seem, for taking a pre-

loved and honoured him.

arranged stroll with two companions of about

I never saw that

grand text, "It)s more blessed to gi\•e than to

his own age.

No\v· the two lads (who were

rece_ive," better exemplified than in him ; and I

brothers) were prevented from coming to school

believe this could only have been the result of

that morning,

;,o

Martin had virtually brought

. his dinner to no purpose.

t h e most careful domestic training. - Beyond a

\Vhat did he do?

doubt, the parents' had brought their son up to

As s·o on as twelve o'clock cam·e, he sau'n~ered up

believe and .to feel that he had to live, not only

to a group of three or four little urchins who

for himself, but for the comfort of others; and

\\r rc huddled in a cor,n er of the school munching

such a healthy home influence, seconded by day

d'inners of the very · hu~blcst description, c::.nd he

or Sunday school teaching, had had its fullest

said," Here, you young sha\'ers, take and share

effect upon this dear lad.

He was the champion

;

this amongst you! "'and .li e thereupon gave each
: ;

(·

of the weaklings, and the companion of the

of them a good piece 'o f bread and juicy meat,

His highest p~easurc, I am sure, con-

and also equal porti o ns of a t e mpting fruit

strong.

s isted in rendering others happy.

Of course,

l\Iartin had his faults; but his. kind. thourrhtf
ulb

pasty.

Tlie boy then walked away to have a

hot dinner with l1i.$ mother at home.
1

Now, what I would \\' ish to point out is, not

ness and his generosity . were such as· I have
described.

only the circumstance that the nobility of the

One incident in connection -\vith 1\Iartin l

lad's disposition led him to give a\\'ay his dinner

_ remember a s if it h a d taken place but ye~·rday.

to those necessitous little scholars, but also the

T11e chief part of this interesting transaction I

fact that he must have intuitively known that

witnessed myself, ar.d I gathered one or two

when he. got l1ome he wn 1t!d

details subscq uently.

wl1at lie had dor:e.

1!Ct/

be blamed for

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

you are rn school and a boy throws a bit of
bread or anything at you over the desks, it 'is·
not polite to put your tongue out at him, or to
twiddle your fingers in front of your nose. Just
\rait till after school, . and then warn him what

This little · incident struck me forcibly at the
time, and I have often told the anecd_?te since.
\Vell might I speak of \Vill l\'I artin as a" dear"
lad, as I see I have done above, for I knO\V not
of.any trait in juvenile character so irresistibly

you'll do next. time; or if you find you are

lovable as indubi t able unselfishness.
And now I piace before you l\Iartin's exercise ·

bound to hit him, be pretty easy with him.
Some boys are very rude over the.ir meals.

on "Politeness," copying it exactly from the
lad's
-'

O\\'n

79

after

\Hiting.
" I'OLITE.l\ESS.

"Politeness is a rather diffi cult thing, especially
\rhen you are making a start. It means having
the sense to sometimes think of others as '.\·ell
as of yourselves. I\Iany people ha\'e not got it.
I don't know v:l1y, unl ess it is the start.
It is not polite to fight little boys, except th ey
throw stones at you.

Th en you can run after

them, and \Yhcn you've caught them, just do a
little Lit a t them, that's all. Remember that all

queer over a rabbit dinner. I don't talk much,
and don't ask for any more. It is not Qpolite to

little uoys . are simpletons, or they wouldn't do

leave vituals on your plate, especially anything
you don't like. If you don 't like turnips, it is

It is not the thing to make fun o~ little
chap because he is poorer than you. Let him
it.

alone if you don't want to play with him, for he
is as good as you, except the clothes.

\Vhen

. better-to eat well into your turnips first, while
you are hungry, and you'll eat the meat and
•
potatoes ·easy enough after. This is much better
f

.1·.,
·~

ENGLISH AS 1-VR!T

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

than being impolite, and leaving a lot of turnip
on the edge. It is not polite to tell tales of

The paper which I give next· is a Scripture
exercise, and is altogether of a different type.

boys.

The \vriter is vValter
, whom I recollect
as a roguish little fellow, ·always on ti1e alert" for

So

\Vhen a boy tells a tale, allways call

him" 'Tell tale tit,
Your tongue shall be split,
All the do.,.,.s in the town
Shall ha~· e a little bit.'

You'll see how red he will turn, and cant look .
you and the other boys in the face.
"Boys sl.wuld always be polite to girls, however

81

mischief, and constantly gettinrr into trouble for
breaches of discipline. He could not k~ep his
~

tongue still in class, and my only remedy was to
put him apart by himself. He was one of those
youngsters who can well nigh giggle on one side

or, the face, whilst l.ooking , sedate

vexing they may be. \Vhen anybody is giving
anything a\Yay, always let the girls have their
turn first. .They like it. Girls are 11ot so strong

with the other.
f have frequently heard suppressed titterings or
other sounds of l;l.ilarity proceed from that
portion of the room of which \Valter
was

as boys, their hair is long, and their faces are

the centre; but, however quickly I might turn

prettier; so you shoula' be gentle with t_he1~1.
If a· rrirl scratch es you on the cheek, or spits m .
b
.
your face, don't punch her, and don't tell her
mother. That would be mean. Just bold her
tight behind by h.er arms for a minute or two,

my head "towards him, his fe~tures would appear
as stolid as stone, or he \\'Ould sim.pJy turn an
eye upon me of vacant , listlessness or innocent
inquiry. Play was all he cared for; and he left
school a dunce-not because he couldn't, but

till she feels you could give it her if you had a
mind to. Then ~ay to. her kindly, 'J:?4'1't you

because he wouldn't, learn. However, when I
. have said this, I have said the worst about him;

do it again, for it is wrong;' give her a shakt.
or two, and let her go.
This is far . better

for, in other respects, h~ was an agreeable little
fellow. He was ahvays. ~villing to do. anything

than being unkind to her, and she will tha nk
you for your politeness, if she's anything_ of

for his teacher, except brain work ; a nd one

:i.

girl."

rould not long be in a temper with him, in spite
of his irritating little failing5.
F

BY LITT~E ORIGINALS.

ENGLISH AS iVRIT

I believe he liked the Scripture lesson better

than any oth~r. At any rate, it was during that
part of the scho~l work that he gave the least
trouble.
Here follo\\·s, then, this lad's account of
''DANIEL IN THE

' D E~.r "
L IONS

"It all happened, what I'm going to tell you

this paper about Daniel, in a country
thousands of miles fro1u here; further off tha _n

on

J ~riko

even.
"In that wild country they keep lions in dark

sellers under the ground, jest the same as your
fathers and mothers keep cocks and hens. They
catch these lions in the woods rarnd abart, put .
them in bags, bring them home on donkys what
they call mules, and dr?P them out of the bag
darn the hole, and then they put a big stone
over the hole.

How thankful shud we be that

there is no lions in this country ; v~Q'v, your
fathers couldnt have no bean feasts, and the
teachers woodnt get no childern to go wHl~ them
in their vans every year.

In our fields a~d

\voods theres only foxs and rabbits, so t_h ey
dont count.

"Now you couldnt guess for ever so long why
Daniel was put darn into the Lion's den, so I'll
tell you. It was for nothing else than just sayin
his prayers, what . do you thinker that?
He
woodnt never have been found out if he'd only
have kept to sayin his prayers when he got up
and when he went to bed; but he used for to
say them in the middle of th~ day, just arter his
dinner, and that's when some wickerd men seed
f ·im _from behin~ .·the bl'.nds. Then they split
on him to the krng, and the king was sorry fit
to cry, becose he lovd .Daniel like unto his
brother.
"These wickerd m~n with their nasty faces all
alarfin, caught hold of Daniel when it was gettin
dark, an'd pull~d him alo;1·g the streets to the
first hole they came tq where they new there
was some f earst lion's down. Then ,they th rusted
the stone off, and 'whipped him down just lik.e
winkin. And the poor king sat on the stone
cryin like his har,t' wood break, and the wickerd
nasty men kept runniq rarnd the king all alarfin.
"Then the good king went away to bed, and
•

•

see you, he couldnt

. t

_get off to sleep for thinkin

. wether the lions was a chawin poor Daniel.

EA'GUSH AS i-VRIT

n 1 en

they playf'd all l;:inds of me\\·sik to him,

but it only 1;1ade him wild, and he got up and
told them to go away \\'ith tlieir screetin.
_••And behold as soon as -it \vas light, he ran to
the lion's den~ and called out loud down the
hole, a saying 'Dan iel, Daniel, art thou alive, .
poor Daniel?' and bustin with cryin all the time.

CHAPTER X.

.JP REl\iEMBER

Daniel was alive, I tell you, walkin in and out

one of He~ Majesty's ~n­
d_ spectors of Schools ask111g a quest10n
i'i1 Grammar which evoked a very amusing

and rarnd abart the beastes, thinkin no rnor~

answer.

-And then (if you ·go and say yev heard anythink
like it afore, you just a say in it becose you no it), _

abart it thun if they was mice.
"God had sent a good Angil to take care of
Daniel becose he wasnt shamed of sayin all his

/

what abstruse

rarnd one anuther's nec;:ks, and a look.in at one
anuther's eyes and a cryin, you wood praps have
The king made

glibly and eagerly ; then following with
"Marquis," and · - bo-ettina
for answer "Marb

up his mind straigt off as he wood nev~ opray to
wooden imiges again, and Daniel was a frend of

chioness '' almost equally promptly; he finally

..

his till they both died and w_~s buryd."

asked "And what now is the feminine

\-·~:\
'-r'

'

{·
,.

of

"Dutchman?" "Duchess, sir," cried out nearly
the whole class without the slightest hesitation.

;,f\_1·_ ,
..

but I don't believe the

'\

if you could have seed the king.and liim a kissin

i-:.·
1_

on~,

representative of "_ n~y lords" put it with any
but justifiable intentions, for he was really a
good-hearted man, and a . thorough- lover of
children. He was dealing with the genders of
nouns, and, after asking the stereotyped
questions of" \iVhat is the feminine of "lion?..,
and getting "lio1less" · from the youngsters

,;

prayers. This is trew, shy · \\'hat you like.
"Daniel scrambled out through the hole, and

cryd too, there no~v I tell you.

The question was certainly a some-

f

SS

ENGLISH AS 1¥RJT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

gleanin, but think of yer mothers and sisters,

rn the land, and hot a bit of corn anywheres
round. The patriarch once gave. unfo Joseph a
coat all kindser colours, for childern liked
coloured close in those days. But his brothers

praps dying. Be fair.
"Patriarchs had mote fields

tha1'1

farmers

have, a lot bigger too. Nobody can't imagine.
Benjimun was the littlest son, but ~he loving
patriarch Jacob all us gave him the biggest mess
of corn, never mind how little lie was. They
allus called pudden, and porrij, and anything
like that, they al!us called it messes in those
,j

days. Joseph could eat a big mess, too; but
Rew bin and J uder who was the oldest couldn't
eat .as much as yer might think. The patriarch

\\'ere more riled still, what they called roth.
They couldn't never see him with his - red and
blue coat on, without sayin to one another,
behold we will have his blood. The patriarch
saw all these things, and he told them how his
hair was a turnin gray, more with their carryinson
~han with the famine.
He arsket them · to

Jacob never eat scarcely nothin, exept when

remember Abraham, Izak, and Jacob, and to
allus love their little brother. , And then Rewbin

there was a fcpnine.
"Joseph was very fond of dreaming.

and J uder and the 'other men answered unto him
that they couldn't stand his dreams, and that .if

The big

brothers would allus wal.::e him up \\·hen they
heard him adrearning, on they knew he was
adreaming all sorts of nasty things abart them.
He once dreamed they \\'ere nothin but stars;
they didn't like that mind yer; and he dreamed

he stopped a dreaming, they would be good unto
him, like as they was to Benjirnun. This is all
I can say about this lar'ge family."
Another essay by this lad will, I thinl-:, be
found equally inter,e sting. Tlie subject is

that the patriarch Jacob was the sun and his
wife the moon. Behold he was all us a drejf1ing.
He dreamed that his brothers were just.bits of
corn stuck up round him; and they were very
roth agenst him, speshully as there was a famine ·

"THE .RODIN REDBREAST."

'' I see a robin redbreast for the first time this
year, and I see the second one in \Vhitsun, else

. 'ENGLISH AS FVR!T

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

Easter. Tbem's the two I see. Boys and girls
thinks as sparrows is niced birds, but I've told
them nearly .twenty times as they don't know

there's a robin.' Then I was all a trembling,
and my throat felt so queer. I said 'where;
father?' and he said, 'on the top of that close

nothin at all abart it.

prop, through the pal ins just by that she rt, Jack'
I see it fair. It was. lookin strairrht
at me , and
b
I see every bit .o f the red. And Clara wispered
'pretty robin,' without movin, and I stood and

\Vhy, they can't sing, and

they haven't got a bit of red, not .even white,
anywheres aba~t there bodies. They're just worth ·
nothin.

They only pertend

they're

worth .

s..omething by flying away when you try to catch
them.
It's all pertending. \Vhy, they can't
tl.uild picter nests, and can only lay nasty
:nucky eggs.
Even police won't catch them,
:oz they know same as yer fathers, that they're
good.
•· \Vhcn I see that fir:'lt robin I uiu tremble.

to

l was on the top of a close prop in a gentlenan's back garden nearly in the country. My
ither had took me and my sister a long \\'alk to
.aniced place they call Hamst.e d, coz he was out
. i work, and rny mother, give him . fourpence as
f'e had got laun9rin.
My mother told my
ither to buy two cups of tea for himself, and

•e each for Clara and me, and she giv~OS some
W:ed bread and butter and two bread and
iippin in a paper with picters on.
;• My father said 'stop, Jack, don't move,

91

didn't wink longer than when yer play starin
outs. Then a lady with a white cap came out
of the back door, and begun a feelin at the
close, and she scared the robin away. Then she
fooked through the p~lins' at us, and said something as made us w~lk on.
Her face was
redder than yer mothers.
"As we was w:all~ing on I told my father
all abart what I learns at school abart the robin
redbreast, how it builds a ni.ced round nest in a
little bush, and . singing at peoples doors to
please them.
And Chra 'told all abart tlie
robins coverin up that littl e boy ;=ind girl what is
called the babes in the wood.

Father said as

men liked to sin~ <:tbart the death of cock robin,
what an old sparrow killed. \Ve arsket him to
sing it, and he said he 'would when he had past
the station, coz there ·was two railway men

..

_;- ~.

-..... --,:..

..

-··~

.. .

.

.

·,.-

JJY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

93

lookin at us as if we \\'as going into the station

with him on a Saturday to help him carry sum

without payiri.

sticks and things back to keep go~d fires.

"\Vhen we got by the side of some grass,
father sung it for us, and we did like. it.

The

robin just flew over a wall quick as you throw

There

stones, and dropped on a tree as was cut down,

was one line tome most, which was 'all the ·

and begun a singing ever so, straight ~ff.

birds in the air \\'Cnt a sine and a sobbin, \\'hen

twenty sparrows all trying their hardest couldn't

they heard of the death of pore cock robi 11.'

do anything like it.

Clara cryd a little bit, and she arsket fath er how

long enough in one place and have a rrood try

birds sined and sobbed, and father said as she

like as robins do.

was to arsk her mother \\'hen she got home.

a~·rn without mcanin to throw at all, they fly to

He said he felt cold and wanted his t e a.

t}'1e top of the spout, and ~ook at you till you've

vVhy

Them sparrows don't stop
.

b

'

\Vhy if. you just move yer

· "Our tea made us niced and warm, and there
was a big fire in the room, and a orgin man a
g laying outside.

\Vhen h e come in, th e \\'Oman

give him a cup or tea as lie to ok out, and my
fft ther said th e man d idn't p:-ty nothin for it.

niy father g ive lier four pennies.

There

so meone sitting- at our table as had a

\\ "JS

,

niced

S;mellin red li e rri11, \\ liich lie eJ.t all up e:-.::ert
.s:carcely anytliin~ at all.

I see him all the time,

I sec, too, that I ha\·c pinned to Johnny
~

\\'liittaker's p:tper, a slip containing a quaint

t:h ough he thou gh t as I \Vas lookin at t1tf pictcr

answer he

jpper, but I was lookin over the top of it a

geography.

watching him eatin.
"That other robin as I see was srng111g.

once

made

to

a

question

111

The inspector was examining a class, of which

1\Iy

mther was building a house, and he took m·e

] ohnny was a member, in elementary geography.
After dealing

. ..

}yith

the

definitions

(Cape,

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

94

River, Table-land, &c.), and the size and shape
of the earth, . he asked," 'What would you expect
to see on rivers, boys?" Of course he wanted
the answer "boats," or" vessels," but he by no
means got that answer from Johnny · \Vhittaker.

CHAPTER XI.

A goodly number of eager hands were at once
thro\vn out, and I have no doubt but that the.

'"'"' 0

you know I alwavs had a strangely
J
t3)
weak fondness for my Dunces; although
I confess that out of school,· I take pleasure in
. recapitulating their freaks of genius.
~

. great majority of the lads were going to give the
answer he wished for; but, unfortunately, he
pointed in the direction of Johnny \Vhittaker,
and said "You, boy, \vhat do you say we find
on rivers?"
"Bits o' sticks and straw, Sir!"
thinking of some neigh'bouring stream or gutter

) The quivering lip, the restless eye, the twitching fingers, and the. glances of wonderment to
right and left on hearing an ordinary class-fellow
giv'e an ordinary answer to an ordinary question!

in which he had dabbled for the hour together

How often have ! 'witnessed _these piteous signs

cried Johnny. ' Poor lad, he

was doubtless

catching the dirty refuse in its eddying course.

~

of incapacity. Heigho ! A tear in my eye!
.
You young ra~cals, you'll never know it, but you
provoke a tear almost as often as you provoke. you know-one of my stern ominous glances.

I

~

Here boy-it's twelve ·o'clock

J

see-take this

and buy yourself som_e thing to suck. Don't buy
it coloured now.! · There, there ; you'll be as
sharp as the other bo_ys some day, perhaps.
Georcre
Lee
was 'one of these poor little
:0
.
•
creatu'res of weak int"ellect. His father was a

. ·:~:

'

-~
.

f

-..

~.

~~;

~:

ENGLISH AS lVJ?IT

BY f-!TTLE ORIGINALS.

well-spoken, respectable man,-a hard-working

but was as .ignorant of Queen'.s English as a
Hottentot. He was tall and bony, badly pitted
with small-pox, and his long black hair was
smoothed and scented with some abominable

law \1;-riter, who had to catch his trqJn at nine in
slave throurrh
his folios in a coppert he morninrr
b'
~
. plate hand till dusk, on the tally system; and,
·when he crot
back to ·tlie bosom o( his family in
b

97.

the evening, he was often (he has told me) too
fagged out to chat with his Georgie, who liked

kind of oil.
The man made no secret of the fact that he
had received all his juvenile education at the

to stay up for a parting good-night fondle.
I recollect Georgie giving a striking answer in

Sunday School, and that the newspapers had
done duty for college and travel. There was

creorrraphy under circumstances which deserve a

al ways a ''daily" either in his hand . or perking

J

b

b

•

'

. foll relation.
J
The class . was being que.3tioned in

}forth out of his . breast pocket .
geo-

vVell, I remember 'this man once standing by

graphical outlines by one of the "m;:inagers"

me during a geogr~phy lesson, and (with a

of the school.
Every Board School has a group of "mana-

bland ar:ology to me) cynically interposing the
following question to the boys:-" If I bored a
hole ria,ht
throuah
the earth till I came out at
b
b
,

gers" attached to it; a·nd these gentlemen, as a
rule, are well educated, refined, and sympathetic.
However, there are exceptions; and these exceptional individuals have it in their power to
render themselves "flies in the ointment" to the

the other side, where should I be? " I need
not say that he . wanted for answe; ''New
. Zealand," or "The>, Pacific Ocean"; but, on his
pointing to poor shallow-minded Georgie Lee

Educatio.n Department, to the BoardO to their

(who was ~itting in the . front row right under

brother managers, and to the teachers:
.
The particular manager above referred to was

the manao-er's
nose) he got the prompt reply,
b
.

the owner of three or four oil-and-colour shops,

· " Off yer head, Sir! ·Yer can't do it!"
The manaaer
felt. that this little scholar had
b

had a comfortable villa residence in the suburbs,

made him look foolish ; and, taking the lad's
G

.,

::

\

ENGLTSH AS TVRiT

BY LITTLE ORIGIN ALS.

tiny ears in his big, coarse fingers, he gruffly
remonstrat~d, ''You silly little boy, I said 'If,
If, IF,' "-at the sa·me time giving Georgie's

niced it is to have yer heds art of the winders
and hould yer handkerchers up, and see the
different peepl e hooray to yer from · the side of

·ears three separate t\vitches on ·each of the

the rail way. Yer woodnt belceve.. They think
as we caq he~r them hoorayin, but we cant, coz
of the wheels making such a . niced loud noi~e.

H's."

He" pretended to perform the action
playfully; but I could see by the lad's screwedup features and raised hands that the manager's
wrenches were · not so innocent as he tri ed to
make them appear.
Here, before me, · reader, lies an essay of
George's upon

1

'

99

\Vhen we got past what th~ Supintendunt telld
us was \Nimmeldun, \Vichever side yer looked it
was all green, an green, an green . . It duz mak
. yer feel hungry, speshully with the wind gettin
) darn yer throats. , Yer woodn't beleeve.

vVhen

we got to Ashsted~ yer \Voodn't beleeve \~)la
COUNTRY."

niced ~lace it was; :why, I tell yer, its grefn all .,\
rarnd nt~ to the sky, an foxgluvs, an rose&.,~
bulldayz1s all abart. There's no roads, an no

"A Day in the Country is wot I has to g1v.
0 the country is so niced:
I have seed it 5 or 6 times.

Yer woodnt beleeve.

walls, 'an · no trespsin boards, an' there's no
pleecemen lives there. They havnt found it art.

It was like a grate

big green sea. Yer woodnt beleeve. I only see
it wunce a yere, \vhen .o ur Supintendunt taks the
Sunday School c:hildern all for nothin, a·n givs us
a tea an all sorts of niccd things. This time it

\Vhen wee'd had our dinners, the Supintendunt
plaid games with the .little boys. The Supin- ·
tendunt is a niced fat man, with white ·hair, allis

Sunday School, which is near the Ellifunt, to

a larfin, an a . big chain in his westcu tt. We
- plai? leapfrogs, 'an the Supintendunt took his

up an

coat· off, an nelt darn, an _w e jumped over him.

darn all the time, makin us joyn ha.ns. .Then

He has a niced white shirt, just like snow as yev

we all got up

seed.

was to Ashsted.

\Ve all woked: 4rrom our

Voxhole Station, the Supintendunt ru1~nin
into the train at Voxhole.

.How

-

·..: ~.;:{~~-~-

.

One boy as co.o dn't jump dropped on the

ENGLISH AS WRIT .

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

Supintendunt's nek, an muckied his n~ced white
sleeves with his boots. Then we all had teas
fur. nothin. I had 5 cups, a lot of bread and

than I ; but I assure you that without the
commas and periods I have inserted, the whole
essay would be utterly unintelligible to an
ordinary reader-in . spite of the fact that the
spelling is really not so bad.

100

butter, 3 slices 9f plum cake, an 4 kerrin buns.
I only seed 7 boys an girls . wot got ill. Then
the' boys an girls had races for nic~d prizes, bats,
and werkboxes, and all sorts of things. Then
\~e all sung a hii11 standin in a ring on the

hilside, with the Supintend unt in the middle, an
the big red sun neerly touching the ground.
Yer woodnt bcleeve.
like~ that

was.

I wonde~ wether Heaven's

The him we sung was-

" 'Tell me the old, old story,
Of Jes us an~ H.is love.'

"THE

IOI

Doc.

"The dog is the commonest kind of all livincr
h
brutes. Its ·. legs are four, and one tail of all
s.1zes.
)

Cats are very common in all larae towns
h

and streets, but dog.s ate more so. There is
only 3 things wiser . than the dog, which is
ourselves, all monkeys, and all eliphents. The
kinds of dogs is \vhat we say numerous; for

My teacher, \vho stood next to me, she started

how many . kinds of cats can you find except
house and wild? But dogs a·re namely, bull-dogs,

cryin a bit, she did. I seed her. I don't no
where we shall go next yere. This is a Day in

Newfoundlands; turriers, and other numerous.
You may call the colour~ numerous, except pink,

the Country, and it was all so niced.''
The next essay 'is one on "The Dog," by a

red, and blue. Many people ac.tuelly think as
numerous colours is not the best.

boy in the third standard of the school. O
I have been compelled to punctuate this piece

''The thing about .dogs is that they keep
gentlemen's house·s safe when they are asleep.

right and left, and still in one or t\vo instances .
I fail to gather the drift of the lad's meani~g.

Only think how frightened a robber must feel,
when, just as he is rutting his face to the

Perhaps the reader will manage to do so better

keyhole, he hears a sharp growl on the other

!

El\'GL!SH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE OR!G!NALS.

side of the keyhole. Then the robber runs away
quick, for he ~oes not know ,,·ether it is a lady's

fishing hook, and he runs right away a thinking

102

dog, or a bull-dog. \Vhen the robber gets home
and thinks abo ut it, he thanks the dog in his
heart for haYing tou;:;ht him a lesson not to
commit sin, for it is the 8 commandment.
"\Vlien a dog makes for a cat, this poor
creature runs a\\'ay, like as you've seen. If th eir
is a tree, the cat ·scratters up it, and b eg ins a
licking itself on a branch, and the dog can just ,
do nothing else than smell round the bottom of
.·

the tree, to see \\·ether it is a holler one. It's
never a holler one, and so the dog has to all\\'ays
go along back But if there's no tre es jus t
round, the dog gets the cat in the corn er of a
door or t\\'O brick walls.· !hen the cat makes
her body t\\'isc as big as what is flesh and bone,
by standing her hairs up strite, and she spits and

sneezes all over th e dog, so as he cant see what
he's a doing of. Then while he's clearin his

''Ladies' dogs is what you see in carriges
sitting looki11g over at you. They .have more
sense than all other clogs, and get far better
victles. They . won't eat bread, or anything like
that.

They have big eyes, and they can sit still

longer than other dogs.
"I once read a \Vvnderful tale of a doa
;::, which
?ad a sore leg. I forget how it got itself round.
/fhe leg was very sore.
"Also about two or three tales of Newfoundlands saving childern . from drownding. They
were all saved before· they had gone down three
tim es, and the Ne\vfoundland was patted.
Them's ' Newfoundlands as you see with their
tongues hanging out, bigger than bull-dogs, and
bent legs walking soft. ' If you think they cant .
a bit lame ' it is
swim count . of them walki1w
.
;::,

its

You might

world where Ne\vfoun<llands was a walkin round

you know, of all parts of the dog's
say as there was no skin, only

to hisself as he thought the cat '':'as a little one
when he see it in the yard.

not true, for look at them there ~hildren. There
has never been one boy or girl drownd in this

eyes a bit, she scratters him in the nose, which,
nose has got the littlest skin over it.

103

fl»sh,

a bit

of meet. .·.
The dog feels just as if he was cought with

a

.the pond."

·.·
·.'

.

·.

. ;.

• ENGLISH AS WRIT.

105

elementary schoolmaster has at . last made a ·
position for himsel( The Metropolitan Board
schoolmaster is al~ost without exception a
collegiate, a good · mathematician, and a
conscientious, scientific inquirer.

His instincts

CHAPTER XII.

and judgment lead him to look upon corporal
. punishment as a repugnant, but, at the same

URING the last riecade the question of
20
corporal punishment in elementary
schools has caused more anxiety to the masters
and mistresses, and has been brought before the
public more prominently perhaps than any other.
vVhat with the elaborated regulations of School
Boards, tl1e glaring animosity of certain magistrates to the School Board system and every-

time, a necessary part of his complicated duties;
ai1d he is a staunch opponent to anything

~

a~proaching

excessive chastisement.
How
often he wishes, indeed, that human nature were
not what it is, so that he could fling the rod
into the fire, and 'experience the delight of
having to teach a school of ignorant juvenile
angels!
Ninety~nine

has. become so unstable that a large proportion
of the profession ·are in a chronic state of
perturbation and constantly on the a.t for

parents out of a hundred object
to a teacher punishing a child upon the posterior
part, whilst nine out of every ten magistrates
declare that this method is the only legitimate
one, and week after week they mulct schoolmasters and schoolmistresses in sums varying

opportunities of forsaking the vocation to which
they have devoted themselves.

from £2 to £10 for directing punishment to the
· hand.
Nay, the Bench goes farther, and

This state of things is the more to be regretted

enunciates that it wi ll fine masters and mist resses

thing connected with it, and the threatening
intrusion of parents, the teacher's life is rendered
next to intolerable, whil.st his tenur~ ·of office

beca use it

is an indisputabl e fact that the

fo r chastising children for offences done out of

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

school, such · as breaking windows, annoying

it is, sir), and I was a eating my brc~d and por~
while my mare was going slow, when a score or
two of your boys started of throwing ice and
stones at me. They knew they could ~asy get
away before I could ·scramble down from my

106

pedestrians, and scribbling immoral-sentences .
on the walls, &c.
I will relate a circumstance that happened in
my own school"only last February.
I was sitting in the school about a quarter past
one, correcting some children's papers in arith- ·

107

seat, and I tell · you, sir, they have given me
what's for, and no mistake. The dirty sharp ice

metic ready for fhe afternoon session, when a
rat-tat sounded a t the door, and on my ''Come
in ! " there entered a great burly coal-vendor, ·

was more like lumps of lead, sir, and I feel so
dazed that I don't k now as I shan't faint afore-

black with coal-dust from

A.fter sincerely e}(pressrn,g my sympathy for
the poor fellow, I said to him "And what have

lo~g."

top to toe, and

holding his cap respectfully in his hand.
The coal-man asked "Are you the head
ma st e r, sir?" and on my answering in the
affirmative, he said "Look · here, sir, what your

you come to me for?·"
"vVell, sir,'' he answered, "I can pick

SIX

or

seven of them out, and I thought as you might

boys have done!" and at the same time he

think as they deserved ca ning."
''So they do,'". I said, "every one of them,
for I am constantiy ,warnin g my b oys aga in st
throwing. ·But as regards caning, I dare do no
such thing. Were I t o ch as ti se these b oys, my
ma n, t h e chances are t hat I should have just as
many su m mo nses · taken out against me before

turned each cheek and the b~ck of his hea d to
me for inspection. Then I saw that bright
streams of blood were c'o ursing down face and
neck, and making. little fountains through the
coal dus t o n all s ides of the poo r fell ow's he ad.
He then spoke somewhat as fo llows : ~
through the window. \ Vell, sir, I was on the

. to-morrow noon, and I should be fined heavily
for as many assaults. Now, in the first place, I

to1i of my perch (you see what a very high one

can't afford it, really I can't; and in th e second

'' T h at's my horse and van, sir, as you see

·1
~

.. -

.... .._·.:... .. • ..-

..

·· ··~~"-"--"..:, ;,l..;;,;. _~,.t;·'!;-.;"i

- •;~ .:"1·,~1h"'·.:-i;.

·.iJ~-

?~~J<P<"~rs--~

I

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

place, cases like yours will serve to teach the
p ublic that tl1ey are wrenching the roa from the .

get some more tin from the la~ies."
My
informant could give me no more details, but
she firmly . believed that this expression must
h ave had reference to intimidation of ~ome or
oth er of the mistresses;

108

schoolmaster's hands only to throw it into pickle
for their own backs. Yours is a comparatively
light matter; 'I can only hope · that you and
yours may never be the victims of more serious
ruffian ism."

I was led to make the above remarks by the
sight of the next exercise in my collection:

The poor bleeding fellow knew that I was

namely, that of
"Postmen."

speaking truth, and, overcome by the pain, or
my words, or both, he turned away blubbering
like a child.
The practice of parents b lack mailing schoolmasters and schoolmistress es is a particularly
hei nous one. I know an assistant who paid a
woman five shillings a week for a con siderable
time in return for her not carrying out ber
threat to summon him for giving her boy one
s roke behin<l with the cane.
But I suspect that it is chi efly the ladies who
beco me the prey oT parents. A h ead mistress
assures me that it came to her ea rs ~at one
afternoon three women were heard conversing
over their gin in a public-house next door to a
B'.l~rd Sch ool in \Vhit echapcl, and

proposed
that they shoulJ ''go to the bloomin> school and
01:e

IO<)

,,,

little

Isaac

Shepherd

on

lie was a good little lad for aught that I
ren) ember to the contrary, but his mother was a
, ·ixe n of a woman who neve r visited the schools
\\·ithout smelling strongly of spirits.
On one occasion she came in her usual state
a nd told the a ss istant before his class that she
\\'as going to walk him b e fore the Beak, unless.
h e made it straight with h er.
The assistant
\\'as certain he h ;:i,d n eve r touched little Ik ey,
bt1t the bitter thought of losing his reputation
led him for a moment to b etray \\;eak ness, and
11 e put his hand in his pocket to give h er what
silver he had.
However, he ,immediately recovered himself, and determined to adopt a
different policy. · He \\·ent, straiglit to th e door,
an d boldly ordered her out.

The foiled vmigo

no

EA'GL!SH AS lYRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINA LS.

then tried all her arts to g et him to assault her
in putting her out; and failing in thiS, she went
and dracrcred
her bo)· from the class, amidst the
bb

more boys was a looki11g at a postman un·
lo::king a pillar-box, and one of the boys
pushed his head into the hole and we all run
away, he \\'Ouldn't even run after us,'but only
told a polleeceman when he came round the

stifled applause of several of the scholars, and
then stalked cursing from the room.
Here, then, I give you Isaac Shepherd's essay
on
, "POST.\IE:\."

corner.

I I I

And when he came away from the

.polleecernan he was fri~htened of \\'diking our
way past us, but jumped on a tramway and
shammed not to see us . . Postmen allis nocks so

''Nobody could be happy in the world except
for the useful brrentleman \\·hat \\·e call. a postman.
For how wou\d you no \\'hether those arnts and
uncles of yours \\'ho live right acrost th e fi elds
and rivers was dead, if the gentl e m a n did not
brin rr a henvelope with black all round? You
~

would think they \Vas still alive, and you'd keep
all on writing to them. That is why postmen
are allis little thin men \\'ithout beards cuz they
have to keep on walking quick all day. They
ar~ not dn~ssed up' so fine as soldiers cuz they
havn't to go and fight acrost the se~ You
never see postme1: fight, not even w·ith their
fists, for they havn't got no time with all those
letters to take round.

I don 't think postmen

dare even fight boys, for when me and some

as \-to waken babies, and then they tries to look
a<:I if they didn't no as qaby was behind the door.
If the postman d oesn't bring your letters, you
can summons bim, that's why ttieyre so
frightened. Two or. · three postmen come together without letters at Christmas, and th ey
ask your~ mothers for a Christmas box. My
mother gave them a penny to share amongst
them, but some didn't.
Many boys become
postmen cuz they think it is a good trade, I
don't think they get good dinners, same as men
who hasn't to dres3 ~P· My_ father has a lot of
meat and bread, and . he keeps on a eaun.
Postmen allis black their boots, cuz they are
frightened of b~ing summ·oned. They are very
frightened men, and \von't hurt you whatever

I I2

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

you do. Never be cruel to them, for they have
to take care of their clothes more tll'ftn you, and
arc not so big as they would like. I once seed
a postman not dressed up, and he was smokin a
pipe, and he put it away when he seed me and
the other boys.

CHAPTER

XIII.

But we seed him though; and

some of the boys called out after him, 'you ' ll
. go an d get sum~11oned for smokin yer father's
pipe, y ou will.' But he wouldn't turn round,
and he puffed the terbacca out again as soon as
he got further on. This is all I no about postmen, exept they are very clean men most any
time you like to look.'J

J"!iI.

MISTRESS has s~nt n:e a .cl e rical effort
~
by one of her little pupils, and I feel
sure that those amongst my readers who are
mothers, or "grown-up sisters," will peruse it

w~th

especial pleas~re. However, as a rule, the
exercises of girls are riot nearly so .Piquant as
those by boys.
Girls' exercises are more
frequently characterized by earnestness, by a
pleasing halo of sympathy, and by pl a in matterof-fact pe.rspic~city ; and . these features are
observable to a greater or less extent whatever
be the age or standing of the little essayists.
The handwriting of this little girl is rea lly very

·..·
--.. ~
·.:
~
·
~ .

.

.

.

'

~'

...~·

A

.

good, and the whole paper neat ind attract ive.
One little sentence I have dec ided to \vitb hold .

~

''THE L IFE OF

NO ..\H.

" \Vh en th e g en tlem a n,. call ed Noa h lived, all
the people in the world was so fu ll of sins and
'II

I

14

EKG LISH AS

WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

I I

5

marrying, that the land smelt of wi~idness and
uncleanness. It was so bad that the breath of .

floatin.

the smell went up towards Heaven.
· "Noah use9 to actilly stand o'n heaps

of

into the ark, and he . told Noah to take Shem ,
Ham, and Jafit into it, and some ladi~s as well.

stones to preach to the people, and he told
them that if they would not ·be rightyess,

\Vhat a big thing it must have been, when it
took a hundred and twenty years to bifd it. I

God would send such a heavy shO\\·cr of rain as
. would drownd them all and \\·ash a\\'ay the

have never seen a real ship, but I know the ark

smell.

preaching, and at last it was finished ready for
God then dro\·e annirr1als of every so;t

was not like ?ur ships, cause it was more like a

But they only laught at him, and pushed

monster do6 kennel with rockers under, but no

him off the stones, and hussled the poor man

_h ~le. \Vhile Noah , was m.aking it, people used
to take days' outings ·from all p::irts to sec it,
like as people go µo\v to big London. But
those wickid people u.s ed to go only to make
fun of it, and to eat and drink and get marrid .
They acti!Jy had outin[:;s to !t on the very da._y
as Noah said h~ was a going in. I wunder
whether they felt kweer when they saw him
climbing up the high high ladder, and get in
the door at the top. ' I wU:nder whether they .felt

--·

..

about, just like I've seen people go on at tl1e
Salvation J\rmy when they are talkin good
things to us under the big blue flag.

The people

u sed to stand at the doors of their tents, and
boo and hoot at Noah; the same as the Army
men and women is laught and whissled at by
gentlemen standing at their doors and winders.
l\Iy father says he is sham ed to be called an
lnrrlishrnan
when • he sees how
the Salvation is
b
.
.
knocked about and prossecuted: He says people

1

will hold a drunkin man up, but wil ~rnock a

kweer when they heard the door bang, and sa w
the ladder pulled · up? But those poor sinful

Salvation dov,·n.

l\Iothcr s::iys the police is as

people \\·ho used to laugh at Noah and hussle

bad as the uthcrs, cause they pitend not to see

him about and try to f?Ct uth er p eopl e not

anythink of it.

to bkeve him, they hadnt time to think now.

" .); oah was bilding a ark when he wasn't

They hadnt time to laugh agen at him .
I

It

·,

116

ENGLISH AS 'VVRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

started rainin in torrents as hard as it could,
directly the door shut.
It was J.:oo late to
be sorry now, and nearly too late to cry. 0 too
late. All they could do was to run away, and
see what to do not to get <lrmvnded by the
porin rain. It soon got deeper and deeper, arid
those would be drownded quickest who could nt
get planks and things. Then when the ni g ht
came, I shouldn't think those on planks would
live long. In a week or two I am certin there
wouldnt be a single one left alive. Dear me,
how dredful that great high box-looking thing
must have seemed, ftoatin about on the water.
I think as even the ladies inside must have felt
frightened som etimes,

spe~hully

wh en it jerked ;

but then they knew that God was \Yith them all
the time, and its wonderful what that will do for

S;\fe for the ladies to get out.

117

H<;nv funny must

that Ararat l\lounting have looked with that big
cradle thin;; on the top, and Noah and his family
sittin at the door, and all the ~nnima1$ skamperins- away down the hillside, or flying in bunches.
through the air:
"Noah lived to be 950 years old. How nice.
I don't know whether ladies· lived as long as
gentlemen, but I should think that they did
nearly. vVhat a long time to be married. I
s}\ould like to think that my granmother would
-.. live on like that; but it's no use, spite of how
much I love her. ·Dear Granny. 0 God, you
are kind-the Teacher and the Salvation says,
kind er than our fathers and mothers, so do let
me s ee dear Granny up in. Heaven agen after

\Vb en Noah thought

she is burried. · She's quiet as good as those
ladies who \vent 'into the ark, she is; so you

the water might have gone down, he sent a
raven out; but it kept ?-Way, so the gentleman
was as w!se as ever. Then he let a dear little

must save my Gran~y.
"The lesson, I think, we ougt" to learn from
these things is, to take care that we are living

dove fly out, and the little thing soon ctme back
with a leaf or two in its mouth. But when he

as we know God · \vishes, and not to joss le and

people the Salvation says.

sent it out agen a week after, it didnt come b ack
to the ark agen.

So then Noah knc.v it was

.

.
. ~- •-'. ·- "'~~\·.:.;"""~-~::;E:;v •.

prossecute th e Sal vation Army, ju st ca use th ey
won't ge t drunk, and they like t o tell abou t God
at all ch a ntses."

II8

ENGLISH AS

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

TYRIT

I am informed by a mistress that a·n inspector

occurred in the piece · the child had read.

The

betwixt long and short division?"
The whole class \\'as nonplussed, w!th the

mistress informs me tl1at the inspector had such
a pleasant, chatty manner, that she really
believes her girls looked forward to and enjoyed
his visit.
If any_ child failed to· answer a

exception of one little item of a child. This
little lady turned up her innocent face to · the

question put -by _this gentleman, it was not
because she was timorous or nervous, but-

inspector, keeping her hands still beh ind her, and

frankly admits the mistress-because of incapacity, or on account of faultiness or weakness
in tuition.

asked of her scholars the following-question in
. mental arithmetic:-" \Vhat is the difference

said meekly and complacently, "Please, Sir, the
one is done long, and the other is done short."
''Bravo! my child," say I, (and so, no doubt,
thought the inspector)-a girl's reason, for su"re,
and a woman's, too, for the matter of that. It
brings t"o my mind those words about "Out of

·--\. A dear child, called l\1ary Cooper, had read
lier allotted piece \\ ith su~h appropriate emphasis
and such sym pat~1y of expression, that the
1

the mouths of babes c:nq sucklings hast Thou

inspector said to h~r" in his kind, sincere mann er,
"That was really b ~ autiful, my child ! And

ordained praise."

now," he added," if you can tell me the meani 1w

Another mistress, whose .school is situate in
one of the lowest parts of the Metropolis, sends
me a very pleasing d escription of a scene in her
school on "Inspection Day."
Her Maj esty's Inspector w~s examining the
firs t class in readin6. On each little gir,finishing
her prescribed pziragraph, the inspector fu rther
t ested her intellige nce by p ut ting a qu estion on
the meaning of some word or phrase \\'hich

"\

'

b

of that word '.turf,' I shall give y ou my very
best mark."
I\'leanings of word s are mountains of diffi_culty
t o so m e chi ld re n, and t l1e tears almost started
to Mary's eyes, be cau se sh e realiz ed that the
inspector 11au dianced to drop on a word whose
mea ning she lia<l not lately studied. Poor child!
I wonder bow. often she had frolicked and tripped
over Nature's emerald carpeting?
Po"ssibly

..

"<>'

~~

-.~R

g_

120

ENGLISH AS WRIT.

never. But 1\Iary liad plenty of 9etermination;
she felt that her very life almost de.pended on
giving an ans\Yer; and she lost no time in
exercisinrr her little brain to the utmost for some
"'
sort of definition; and just as the inspector was
saying, "\Vell, never mind, child, I will pass on,"

CHAPTER XIV.

she eagerly exclaimed, "Turf, Sir, is grass and ·
~HE paper before me by·\Villiam Kempson

clean dirt stuck together by God."
"A most excellent definition," said the inspector~ "in fact, the answer I looked for was
uot nearly so precise as that You have gained

.

YJ.L'i

on '"Seamen and the Sea,'' amusi11rr
as
b

it is in itself, at once calls up recollections of a
c}u-eer, the outlines of whi.ch are very typical of
some of the darker walks of life in this our

my highest mark.",
Reader, to the child who sees the sweeping

"Modern Babylon.''.
However, I will give the exerci se first, and,

uplands every week of its life, the question

afterwards,

would have presented no. difficulty ; but to dear
little 1\Iary Cooper the effort was similar in

I

will

relate

connectio_i1 with the lad's

what

I

know in

hi ~ tory.

character-yea, and as diffi cult in deg ree-as
" SEA~IEN AND
THE SEA.
I
.

the mental exertion experienced by a Grarnmar,_

School lad whilst construeing some racy verse

"Seaman are what we call sailors, and captins,
'
and training ship boys. ·The sai!Ors you see in

from Horace into .homely English prose. The
<lead language and its idiom could not be more
vague and

unfamiliar to

the lad tlln

the streets are nice little fat men, with red and
brown faces. They ware boy's coats and hats,

was

the original of the term "turf" to little Mary
Cooper.

and their trouse;s are too tite for them up above,
and too wide for them <;lown below.
them feel very riled.
f

It makes

Sailors don't ware collers,

122

E/\'GLISH AS WRIT

becose their necks are so

thick;

BY LITTLE ORIGIKALS.

and they

\\:ater was the ocheant, I felt as If I 'd just come

allways have their b oo ts blacked for fear the

all for nothin.

captin might meet them round a co rner.

They

sick, and I should have set down and done a

don't carry their best close in boxes; but they ty

good cry, only I h ad to keep follerin of the

them

t eacher, so I hadn't got time.

up in big red and blue han dke rchers

just like Christmas puddens.

Sailors are very

I 1001.; cd a t it till· I was needy

i\t last I felt so

riled that I went up and cot e hold

of the

fond of their mothers and sisters, and you neerly

teacher's coat, and I .said 'Ple;ise, sir, can you

all\\'ays sec them taking them out for a walk.

make it jump a bit?'

The reaso n \\'l1y sailors like to get drunk is

told me what a funny boy I was.

bccose it makes them roll about li ke as if they

i1e thought I was a kid<lin him.

was on the ocheant.

kiddin him at all. . I only wanted to see the

"You think as the sea is bigger th a n what .it
looks.

I have seed it once, and I wouldn't

beleeve tl1at it was th e och eant, till the t eacher
told me that it \\'as.

It \\·as ,\,hen our school

13ut

Ji ~

only !aught, and
I do beleeve
But I wasn't a

bcheant a carryin ' on . sa111e as my mother told
me it did.
"A lot of the boys got some of th e ocheant
up in th e ir hands; ~·nd drunk it.

You should

went from \Vaterloo to P ortsmouth, and nothing

have seed them spit it ot1t like ligh tnin.

to pay only a shilling.

Ju st afore I started

wouldn't' touch non e of the ocheant, I was so

from home that morning, my moth e r said to me
while she was brushin me up · niced, 'Billy,

riled.
"The ships are ·very niced to lo ok at, but

you'll see the waves jump rnountins high, if it

them with sails on scarse ly

only blows a bit:•

they didn't go half a.s quick as my boat goes

Then I said to her, 'Have

go

at all.

I

\Vhy,

you ever seed it give a jump mother? ~?-nd she

down

said 'No, Dilly, I've never seed th e sea, nor

think they build them a lot too l1 cvvy.

Them

ne ver shall ; but I've heerd on it, Billy.'

paddlin steam ers is the ones for goi n.

They

So when

the teacher told me that f1at piece of green

the street

when its been raining.

I

just begin to .puff a bit hrst, then the paddles go

12+

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

ENGLISH AS TVRIT

splashin round like mad, and off th ey start as if
th ey was going all round the world. I just tell
you strait, if it hadn't have been -ror them
steamers I shouldn't have injoyed rn};self a bit,
barrin the meat tea. Them steamers without
paddles go quick too, but they don' t make half
such a loud noise.
''The teacher took all the boys fr1 a big
steamer that was going to start the n ex t week
to cross the sea. There was some nasty dirty
men doin all sorts of queer things. Some was
having a game throwing buckets of . water all .
over the ship. Others of them kept a popping
down a dark hole, and then th ey'd come up agen
lau~hin.

Some was flinging ropes about as if
they was silly, and two of. th e m was a \Valkinrr
~

about here and there \\'ith a paint pot, and kept
touching one place and then another, but they
couldn't make up their minds to stop for long
anywJ1eres. So I askt the. teacher what all them

have beleeved it.

It .made me reglar riled, it

JicJ. There's a nasty smell abou.t ships, some- ·
thing like what our school smells on a hot day
when all the boys are standin together in our
room singing, only its a bit funnier. . You feel
as if you want . to he ill, but it won't let you.
The teach er said it once let liim be ill, and then
he felt b etter. Sailors never get ill when they
are on the ocheant, becose they know how to
put their legs when they are a walking.
." .My mother dosen't want me to be a sailor.
I

.

Sbc says that if ever I go for a sailor, she'll die
while I'm away. I ca11't make out wby it .is
·that your mothers · nev er want you to go for
sailors. It does rile ·me so, I do b eleeve I
should go if it wasn't for h er.

I know a boy

that got to be a sailor, all · from stealin some
black pudd en. · Instead of sending him to

fu111}y mucky men · was; and he said 'vVhy,

prison, they put him on' a Training ship, an<l
now he dressc:s in nic ed .s ailors' close, and is a
lot fatter than me. I'd go and steal some black

they're sailors, William, reeal sailors; an$ very
hard at work the poor fellers are.' W ~11, I'm

pudden if it wasn't a sin. Its no good of stealin
bits of sugar and · little things like that, becosc

sure as teacher wouldn't go and tell a story, but

· they only box your ears for it, and never think of

if anybody else had have told me that, I wouldn't

making you sailors.

It does rile

T.C

so.

Sugar

ENGLISH AS WRIT

iij'ust as good as black pudden, so why can't

•r

send you to the Training ship for stealin

.iit.

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

127

On several occas10ns he did senous bodily
harm to one or more of his school-fellows.

One ..

poor la cl he injured for !ife, by throwing a stone

"' I sometimes draw ships and then colour

'im yeller a11d blue \\'ith my penny box of
p ts. I can draw steamers best, becose you
sn't to draw no sails, but only two black lines
iifunnils, a11d its so niced and easy to draw the
mke a comi11 out. You just twirl your pe11cil
Jmd and round, and its do11e right. Before I
si the ochea11t I used to make fishes S\\'imming
•iround the steamer; but I don't now, becose
ize ver seed 011c single fi sh swimniing round
fliin stea mers at Portsmouth, much less chivyin
&another. It m a kes me riled to have to leave
:&11 out, but what's the ~opd of putting them
iif they're not there. The lesson what you
hn is,
ways to b e kind to sailors, and not to
5,!a.S the s ea can jump as high as the clouds,
\in it can only just shift about like sh avins."
!ind now for a f ei.v words in connection with
tka reer of the writer of the above essay.
1bis lad, vVilliam Kempson, possessed .~ne of
timost vic ious t e mp ers that eve r I have had t o
dFwith.

all

at him which cut the little fellow's right eye
open.

In addition to the loss of one of. his eyes,

· this innocent victim of Kcmpson's ungovernable
temper received · such a shock . to the nervous
system, that he became totally unfitted for life's
ordinary calls and duties, and he is a helpless
burden to his poor parents to this day.

I remember that I once called Kempson out
in f ront of the class f~r sorne ,gross misderneanour.
The lad was then

nearly~

thirteen years of age.

On his stepping out in obedience to my order, I
"' noticed him fumbling . i,ri his . pock et, but I did
not attach any significance to the action.

\rVhen

he was near me, I placed my hand gei1tly on his
shoulder, and I was about to give him a serious
talking to, when, with a sudden, startling movement, he drew a pistol from his pocket; and
sensationally present:ed it full up at my face.
"Touch me, if--," but before be co uld say or
do any more, I had wren ch ed th e weapon fro m
him with my left ha nd, whilst I gripped him

firmly with my right.

HG, then st ruggled like a

128

ENGLISH AS TVR!T

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

little maniac to recover the pistol, but, although
I am by no means a strong man, I not only
succeeOOd in keeping him pretty well at arm's
length, but also found time to collect my
thoughts as to wh a t was
with him. I <l ecic.Jed to
school, am.I then write
acqt1 a in~ing them with

the best course. to take
put him b odily out of
a note to the parents
the circumstances.
I

. got the young m.onster out of doors in spite of
.·.:·

all his desperate kicks and frantic stru;;gle.s; and

Kempson's father, scrawled on a dirty piece of
paper, and brought by the lad's sister, a girl sorrie ·
fourteen or fifteen years old.

26, --St.
" SKOOL'MASTER,

You send back that pistil of mine by
barer, or youl no what for. Rill won't cum no
more to your skool, and the Board be d--d .
Thank yer sta rs yer didn't kane him .
Yoors, Sir,
Mr. Kempson.''

on my 1d urn to the class-roo m a stone came
crashin g-th rough the window and fell near the
desk. Well, I never minded that, but at on ~ e
examined the pis tol in my han d .
I

foood that it \\'as a veritable

revolv er,

And so ended \Villiam Kempson's school
day.s.
The next I saw of ·him was some six or seven

althoug-h: of a very cl1 e;ip ·ma ke, and unloaded.

years after.

l\Ieanwhile, with the exce ption of three or four
0f the more unru ly spirits, the lads had sat silent
and over-awed during the wh ole · of th e scene;
crnd when they ~aw me 's1t down feebly at my

of Hampton and Thames Ditton for the day,
making sk etches; and on returning to the station
in the evening I caught an up train just moving
out. I hur.ried into the . nearest carriage; and

uable, aad bury my ashy pale_ features

my

thought myself fortunate, for I had an important

Hands, ~. beli~ve th~ little lookers o~ really
3:y rnpatlmed with their master.
·

engagement in town late·r on.
However, I found I had seated myself amidst

111

I wrote a note to the parents, and the next
morning I received the following repl)r froni

I had b een: in the neighbourhood

.

~

. ·a roystering set of turf rnen.

The compartment

wa5 charged with tobacco smoke and reeking
I
f
·.:

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

with the smell of spirits; but this was n.o thing
as compared with the foul languago.. I heard on
all sides of me :-turf arcana, blackguards' horse-

against mine by way · of reminding me of his
presence (a common trick with these men), and
said "Look here (winking), if you do anything
in that line (pointing to my book), I can always
do a bit of business \vith you."
The fellow-what with his half-drunken
condition and the denseness of smoke-had
evidently mistaken my little sketch-book for

130

play, ribald anecdotes, &c., and all inte~mingled
with frequent and repulsive oaths.
I pulled out my little sketch book, turned
over the leaves, and tried to seem indifferent
But I soon felt that one man who · sat opposite
. me, had ceased to join in the conversation, and

some betti~g records.

was eyeing me attentively from under his smoke
wreaths. At last I was startled to hear him

131

A bullying, undershot,

'remember \Nill Kempson, I know!"
I raised my eyes, and there Kempson was

tbick-set m'n to my left, belching with liquor,
tArust his head right athwart my shoulder,
and glanced rudely at . my book, almost getting
hold of it with his frouzy fingers. As soon as
he discovered its cont~nts, he burst into a horrible

before me ' a bier
bloated,
rakishly-dressed man,
b'
.
•

guffaw, ~nd blurted sneeringly at Kempson

who looked at least thirty or thirty-five, although

"\Vhy you silly idiot, they're nothing but b - -

be could only have just been out of his teens.

drawrins."
Kempson then leaned forward, looked contemptuously at the page for a mo_m cnt, and then
vented out a most foul and insulting epithet,

address me thus, "I say, schooln1aster, you'll

Villainy and deceit \Vere stamped as clearly on
fuis features~ as if his face had been an open book

ao me.

·.

I answered curtly ''I will take your "-vord for
it that you bear such a name," and with this I
:tu rned my eyes from him with disgust, ·and
~sumed my attention to my book.

spitting down, at the same time, (intentionally I
believe), on my boots . . He next turned to his
companions, and addressed them in a running
undertone but I could h~ve no doubt whatever

\\Tith the

~t most effrontery he then nudged his

knees

-I

from

'

his occasional gestures and

from his

132

.

ENGLISH AS

WRIT. .

listeners' coarse merriment and their vulgar
glances in my direction, that the hardened young
~inner was relating to them the pistOI episode;and that, no doubt, with additions.
I can scarcely express how relieved I was
when the trarn pulled up. I changed carriages
with alacrity, and this was the last I ever saw or
heard of the writer of" Seamen and the Sea."

CHAPTER XV.
. ~~ NE of the most interesting lads that ~ver
_ ;.:.~

passed through my school was little
Johnny Slinn. I disguise the name in this case,
as Slinn is now a rising y~ung comedian on 'the
:r'..ondon boards.
: '.
'

~
-~
'
• •

~,

.

-I

..

.•

-

L

./,;

.......

.

•

-

.

.

Johnny's powers of mimicry, even as a schoolboy, were, indeed, wonderful.
A favourite
pastime with him \~~~· to gather a semi-circle of
boys round him, and then defy. them to "hold
their faces" without laughing,". whilst he contorted
his features into all kinds of grotesque expressions and shapes.
The little band of subjects would endeavour
to fortify themselves against the embryo actor's
cajoleries, by purs~ng up their features, biting
their lips till they almost bled, or essaying to fix
their thoughts on extraneous things. But it was
'
.
all of · no avail. Before Johnny had subjected

.

;.'-,. · '

..

. - . . . ., ,
~

ENGLISH AS 'fVRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

them for one short minute to his facial pantomime, they all would be compelled, one after
the other, to relax their features, and break into
uncontrollable laughter.
Johnny generally commenced operations with
his victims by grinning savagely at them for a
second or two, and then suddenly bursting into
a most comical giggle. This preliminary farce
. itself ordinarily ~leared off about half of them,
and tl1ese \Vere instantly pulled out of the row
by Johnny's ." n:anager," and put by themselves
against the wall. Johnny would then resun:ie
his attack upon the others, by projecting out his
lower jaw bull-dog fashion, rolling his eyes like
a ghoul, making his i1ose play up and down like
a nibbling rabbit, causing his forehead to twitch
like automatic parchment, and all the time
giving vent to tbe most mirth-provoking sounds.
One or other of these appeals proved irresistible
to the risibility of his · onlookers, and in quick
s~1ccession they \Vere summarily summoned by

that just as the lads were about being dismissed
after the morning session, I was <?alled away for
a moment or two to attend to a visitor. But

134

Johnny's "manager" to fall back, till ~ whole
semi-circle had vanished.
·
I once caught Johnny entertaining pretty well
a whole class by imitating mysel(· It happened

135

this was time enough for Johnny to go through
a little performance ; for, on my. suddenly
returning by another entrance, there was the
little imp with my silk hat on his head, an eye ..
glass (one of his own) stuck above his cheek,
and my walking stick under his arm, whilst he
i.vas perambulating round the room with the
exact gait peculiar to . myself, and now and
~gain pretending · to gingerly remove bits · of
orange peel out of Eis path by ·a whisk of the
stick. As soon as he gathered-from the sudden
cessation of laughter-that I had returned to
the room, the young rascal instantly whipped
my hat -off his head, slipped the glass into his
mouth, and demurely walked up to me, saying,
"Please, Sir, I was a holding them for YOl:l while
you came back."
A year or two after Johnny Slinn left school,
there was a "wi1~dfall" in the family. Johnny's
uncle (on the · mother's side) returned from
Australia a fairly ·. wealthy man, and he
generously transferred a. part of his fo rt une to
his sister and her husband.

·.,
··"'

..:·

;,

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

- Young Slinn was placed in a city merchant's

what for, now I come to think, for I can do

dffice.

nothing . except give
fairly good recitati01:J . .
However, I am certain that Slinn · is one of the
"true-till-death" fibre, · and I believe he wouid
say as much for the schoolmaster.

However, although he was thoroughly

steady and attentive to business, he ~till entertained a strong desire to go upon the stage. He
j criined an Amateur Theatrical Society, and soon
bmame its choicest low comedian. · Before he
wi s eighteen he got an engagement in Scotland

w1tt.11 a good touring company, and after two or
tlmee years' provincial work, he succeeded in
ge£ting a footing ·on London boards. At the
present moment, I can safely _say, I know of no
low comedy actor of Slinn's age who is such a
. faYourite with the London theatre-going public ;
and I venture to prophesy that he is destined to
step into the very front rank of comedians. As
.
.
regards means, he is qui.te . independent of his
profession, for, at l1is uncle's death, he came into
a little fortune of £J,OOO.
j ohn Slinn is the only pupil of mme who
aftuwards became a close friend; for, although
he is fourteen
years my junior, we are bcrenuine
.
infun ates. ·1 like him as much for his kindly
. and exuberant disposition as I admire l~m for
Jiis marvellous genius; and he has atta~hed .·
liim1Self to me-well, really, I don't know ··

i37

a

I will just relate one more anecdote of him,
and then give you his juvenile effort, entitled,
" Bank Holiday."
Some months ago, he and I and a few friends
of "t!te profession" were sitting in Slinn's club
after the play. Whilst we were lounging on a

s7~tee, the pitiful _m~wi_n~ of a cat or kitten
reached our ears. The sounds proceeded from
a large, unlighted . room, the door of which
was just before us. : . The mewings were so
excruciatingly painful that we could not but
. I'

'

conclude that the creature was in some kind of
'
feline agony. I. ahvays was foolishly sensitive,
so-closing my Terence, which I was quietly
perusing-I told
companions that I could
stand it no longer, but that I should go into thl!
gloomy precincts and see what . the matter was.
Slinn said," Don't bother, old man, it's only-that

rriy

deuced cook's cat's
kitt.e n; it's always getting its
.
tail or one qf its legs fast in somewhere." '

~

'

.•.

ENGLISH AS T-VRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

However, I persisted in going to the 1"escue. I
struck a match, and, guided by the plaintive
mews, I made my way to the remote end of the
room. As I could see nothing, I knelt down,
and peered under the seats. \Vhen I did so, an

exactly to the letter!" And so I had been the
subject of a friendly wager; ·and that rogue

explosive burst of laughter broke upon my ears,
and I instantly rea.Jized that I had been terribly
victimized by Slinn's powers of mimicry.
I was so abashed that, on returning to the
gas-light of the room I had left, I did not know
where to turn my eyes. There my friends were
pretty well choking themselves 'vith laughter.
But where was Slinn? I looked round. The

139

Slinn, knowing my temperar:1ent, and .confident
in his own powers, had actually forecast the
monodrama for me.
· And now I transcribe Johnny Slinn's school
effusion. Bere and there I have modified the
punctuation ; · but, apart from that, I · give the
essay exactly as I find it.

) ',

---,,

..

.

"DANK . HOLIDAY.

"They call tbis ·happy day Bank holiday,

irrepressible fellow had placed himself on a high

becose the Banks shut up shop, so as people
cant put their money in, but has to spend it.

stool in the exact position of a school-boy about
to receive a flogging with the birch! "Please,
Sir, it wasn't me; I'm sure it wasn't me ! " he

People begin talking about Bank holiday a long
time afore it comes, but they don't . begin to
spree about much till the night afore. Bank

yelled out, ludicrously clinging to the legs of

holidays are the 11appiest days of all your life,
becose you can do nearly what you like, and the
p erli ce don't t ake no n otice of you . Yo u ca n

the stool w~th his 11ands, and violently kicking
out his heels behind in the air. Out I bu ~t into
a hearty laugh ; and, as I dropped down· into a

go into fields, and make your horses and donkeys

seat, fairly holding my sides, Slinn came forward
and said to one of the company, "Now, then,

go quick, and shout all about as hard as you
like, and . larf at people, and dress up in all

you can order the glasses to be filled, for y~u

different colours with guys on your faces , and
'you can do everythink but steal and b rake

can't deny that he went through the performance

140

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

ENGLISH AS WRIT

141

Mr. and Mrs. Binn and the childern, there was
that young man and his swcetart as both \vorks
at the b1ackin factery. · They ~all 'him Currunts, ·

winders. Never steal or brake winders, for it 1s
written in the Bible.
''Theres only one thing as sp'o.ils Bank
holiday, and that is not being fine and hot.
\Yhen it's wet all the !!entlemen
aet saviae
and
"
b
b
'

I don't know why; just same as they call my
father Tachinends. .Mr. Binn is a big strong
man with a ruff voice, so they daresnt call him

fight one another, and pull their sweetart~ and
miissises . about. I'm very sorry for them all

anythink, but they call his pony Beens.

Mr.

round, becose it is a shame for to see. But
when it's fine and hot, the gentlemen all larf and

Binn called out from the carrige, 'Now,
Tachinends, sharp's the word.' Then we all-

are kind, and the \~omen dance about and drink

walked out, and got in. \Ve had to sit all very
close together, and there wasnt room for one

beer like the gentlemen. Everybody's right,
arid boys don't get skittled round.

nfore. Mr. Binn the~ said, 'Are you all right
I . ,
,
. . .
. . .· .
behmd? and Currunts answered 'Right you

·'"Last Barik holiday was a regular good one. :
The man called Mr. Binn as lives four doors
from us has a little horse and barrow cart,
becose he goes about selUng green stuff. My
father, who is a shoe mender, did all their
childern's boots just for nothin at all th~ week
afore, so Mr. Binn told my father that him and
mother and baby and me could all go with him
in his carrige to Box Hill on the l\'Ionday. My
father said the green-stuff man got the best of
the bargain, becose he soled the childern'stlboots
very.thick, b~sides putting some new lastiks in
the missis's.

When the car.t came round, besides

,,

are, Guvnor, no mo.re for Box Hill this time!'
and then Mr. Bi1in l~t the pony go its fastest
.!

••

over the stones. Currunts kept lifting his hat
and yellin to different folks in the stre.et as he
'
.
knowd, but our .bdby begun crying as loud as it
could becose of the bum,ping up and down. At
last we got to parts · of London where Currunts
.

.

didn't know people ; the · roads got yeller~r, and
the houses werent so bl.ack and high.
"\:Vhen we .got . to · Merton there was more
fields than houses, anq .the sun began to shine
nice and hot,_ which stopped our baby crying.

...

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

There was a publik-house standing at the corner
of two roads,· and Currunts said, 'I vote as \Ve

grass. Dinners taste nicer at Box Hill than .
they do at home. \Ve just had as much as we

have our first licker up here,' and my father

liked to eat, and then there was plenty left for
tea and supper. Baby never cried at all, but
tumbled about on the grass, and looked at the
white ducks and hens, and listened to the

said, ' Not yet;' but Mr. Binn said, 'So we will,
Currunts, and ·you shall . stand.' I think my
father is rather frightened of l\Ir. Binn, becose

roundabout orgins.

Father wanted to go to the

Mr. Binn alhvays does what he likes. So l\Ir.
Binn pulled Beens up, and the gentlemen got

top of the Hill, but Mr. Binn said, 'Not me ; it's

out. The growd-up people had beer, and the
d1ildern had cherry brandy mixt with water.

good enough here!' so we didn't go. Currunts
and his sweetart went walking away by their~

"It was such a nice ride after that.

There

was big trees on both sides of the road nearly
all the way, and bewtiful fields right away
\vherever you looked.
nowhere.

The houses was just

But when we got nearly to Box Hill

I never seed anythink like it. It seemed as if
the road was sinking down in the middle of the
fields, and the fields seemed as if they was a
rising up to the clouds. You never seed anythink so pretty in all your life. Box Hill is the
prettyest of all, and it was ju st at the bo t.torn of
~
it that l\Ir. Binn said,' \Vo, Beens! All change
for Box Hill,' and the pony stopped, and we all
got out.
"After a bit, we had our dinner sitting on the

s~lves,

and he had his arm round her neck, and
she had hers round his cote tails.
Lots of
people kept coming all day till it was regular
jolly.

After tea the

y~ung

gentlemen and their

sweetarts played at kissin in the ring. I never
seed so many kisses in my life. Currunts made
them all larf by all ways lifting the girls' chins
up and kissin them do\'vn the neck. \Vhen it
was getting dark my father said be wanted to
play at it with them, but l\Tr. Binn said he
wo uldnt take him back home if he did . The n
my mother said, 'That's right, l\Ir. Binn,' and

Mr. Binn said, 'I'll look after him, l\Iissis.'
"When it got late, my mother and l\Irs. Binn
and the childcrn got in the cart, and sat talking

144

ENGLISH AS WRIT. .

while the gentlemen went inside the house and
drank beer. At last we all starred home, and it
felt so nice and queer riding in the dark. There
was a bewtiful big moon right before us, and I
could sce. l\Ir. Binn's head keep b obbin in the
middle of it while he was driving.

l\Iotlier told
CHAPTER XVI.

me after, that I went to sleep at a place called
Letherhead, and never woke lip till we \Vas
home. Next. morninoI was so sorry it was
b

HE boy who \\'rote the following two
essays on" Truthfulness" and'' Music'.'
as one of those "litt,le s'cholars who give the

!

over, you don't know."
·'

I

teacher next to no trouble.

He used to sit in

hi s class quiet and passive, and during play he
preferred to "look on;, or" see all's fair," rather

r
f..

than engage actively in any pastime.
I cann~t speak with certai.nty, but I have got

I

some notion that this lad. ' is dead. He left the
school before he was· turned twelve, on account

I

of his father 10sing 11is situation, and having to
accept ·,..,.·ork in some distant part of the
Metropolis. The. lad had very poor health, and,

l

in consequence, · the t.e achers dealt with him
very tenderly and leniently.
I do 'not remember that he was particula rly
bri ~ht in any of the subjects t a ught
f

iii

1,n

t he

ENGLISH AS WRIT

school, although I ~hould by no means include
him among-the dunces. His spellin~ was always
very fair.
He was a most thoughtful lad in many ways.
I have often seen him escort a" new boy" about
the play-ground during recreation time, until he
succeeded in getting him included in some one
or other of the ~hildren's games. He was never
amongst the lads who "make a rush'' for the
open air directly after dismissal; but he used to
walk quietly out of the school and into the street
as if he utterly failed to see any· necessity for
exuberant haste.
Here is the lad's essay on

"All story-tellers, what they call fibbers, are
guilty. They know that they have done what is
wrong, and so they can't look you in the face-.
That is how you find them out. It says in the
.Bible as all liars shant go to HeaveQ. There
was that apossle Peter, that was told by God to
strike Anninius and· Siphireh down dead for
saying as theyd given him all the money for the

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

147

stuff theyd sold, and behold they was telling a
lie, and dropped down dead, and. was buried
before morning. What lessons everybody should
learn from this. \.Vhy couldn't they have given
the apossle Peter every penny they'd' got that
, day, then perhaps he might have given them
thrippence or perhaps fourpence back. . But
what did they get? Nothing but just dying
right out, and noboddy sorry all round. Never
say-

)

"'You see my finger,
Is it wet, is it dry,
I'll cut my throat
·.,
Afore I lie,"

if you're not _sure as yc:>u're not telling them, or
you might drop down . dead without your tea,
and ever):'.boddy at home c.rying for you not
coming to it. I only say it when I know as its
Truthfulness; for if its ,Truthfulness, you can
keep on saying it, ·also dancing.
"There was that little Amerikan boy, as they
used to call Washinton,just because he would'nt
play with bad boys, and alway s used to say to
his mother when she asked him about cherry
trees and thin,gs, 'Mother, I can't tell you a lie,'
and scarstly ever got any canings, only talkings
.

' .t

•

E/\.GLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

to. His re_al name was George, and · he 11ad
more Truthfulness than nearly eve;y other boy

" MUSIC.

in that there place wl~ere he lived.

knows about him nearly, except them as
always telling stories to get things.

This is one

sucking only a little bit of her toffy. And my
father pulled my 11air more than boys pull,
which if I'd said I'd done it, I should have got
But I tell you, I

never thought of it \\'ith baby crying so, and my
father coming from behind.
"Noboddy likes boys as tell stories. There
is two or three b oys in our class t ell them, and
th ey are nearly always found out. The p;lice
can't touch you for it, but the thing is, \vhat
you'll get when you die. They're all wrote
down in a book ,~· ith all your \\'hispring. The
m~re

stories you tell, you'll only get mqye for it.
There is no more about Truthfulness,· except a
line or two, perhaps more."
Next, I give the lad's exercise on "Music"
written five months later:-

what you play. To · sing music is f<l;r cheaper
and easyer than to play it. At school you can
only learn to sin.g it. I am one of them boys as

is

of the best lessons you learn.
'.' I once told a story \rhich was a lie, about
· not making our · baby cry out, which I did with

clean off for Truthfuiness.

"Music -is of two kinds, what you s111g and

Everyboddy

'

.

makes a croaky

~ort

of noise when I sinrr
and so
b)

the teacher tells me and some other croaky boys
that when the class is singing we must only
li v en and not sing. The teacher once told me
I ,should make a g()od base singer. The reason

why my voice is cr?ak'y is because my. m?ther
gives me so much cod-liver oil from the hospital.
I like listening just as: well as singing, because,
while the boys are singing, if you keep putting
your finger in and out of your ears sharp and
quick, the singing sounds just like a concerteener
or kordiun playing.
"There is many i.nstrerments what you play:
the banjo, the kornit, the pianer, tl1 e street orgin,
and others.

The pianer is th e hardest to learn,

and the street orgin the easyest.
. "To play the street orgin, you've only got to
turn . a handle; and a tune comes out. When
you want to play another tune, you just sh ift a
f

EY LITTLE ORIGiNALS.

ENGLISH AS WRIT

I

5I

bit of tin at the side of the handle, that's all.
But you can't play as many tunes as you like,

except when he pinched it. The.n my mother ·
laughed, and told him as it was better than·

only about six.

getting marryd, and he said, 'Trust me for
getting marryd, missis, till I can count. 30.'
"It is only theni niggers as plays banjos.

That's why the orgin man has

to keep moving on, or else people would get
sick of him. "My brother plays the concerteener, and he
says as its very hard to learn.

Playing music on banjos is nearly as cheap and
. easy as singing it. Banjos always look dirty,
and they can't only make a funny noise.
"lVIy brother is saving up all he can to buy a
harmonium, and he says he means to have one
b y next Christmas. vVhat a nice house ours
will be when we have a harmonium under the
p a rler clock. vVe "shall move the little table

l\ly mother says

·as my brother is Yery good because he stops in
·and plays the concerteener, insted of spending
his money in the public-hou ses. Him and some
more young men some ti mes takes a walk into

I

the country, and plays their teeners as they go
along. J\Iy mother s::tys that thou g h my big
brother only h erns · half father's wages, that he

into the kitchen as sta:nds there now."

gives her m ore money to buy things with than
father do es.

My fath e r can't play a concer-

teer1er, but can only make hats.
"I have n ever seen ~ pianer only in shops.
They cost a great deal of money, pounds and
pounds.
" One of my brother's mates plays t~ kornit.
He learnt to play it at th e in stitute, and he only
had t o pay t upp ence a week he says.

.

He ke eps

it in a nice g reen bag, an d I hee rd h im tell _m y
moth er as it was hi s baby, and that it never cryd

•

EJYGL!SH AS 1-VRIT.

I

1
CHAPTER XVII.

every school there is generally one boy
who so con's picuously excels his schoolfellows in one or other of the showy subjects of
the curriculum, that he becomes the acknowledged ''head of the school" as regards tha~
particular department of study.
By showy
subjects I refer to such branches as recitation,
music, and the various "specific" courses.
The master is sometimes tempted to trot out
such a pupil before visitors, in order that the lad
may display his special ability.
At any rate the pupil soun recognises his own
superiority, and I .have frequently remarked
with. regret · how ~oon he gives himself airs of
. conceit, and assumes . a .dictatorial and afthoritative manner of speaking and acting.
So flagrant are these facts, that even rn-

spcctors-whose intercourse \vith the children is

'

:..: .. -

J53

comparatively limited ai:id remote-do not fail
to observe it, and, from time to time, they justly
take occasion in their reports to remark upon it
in very strong and condemnatory terms.
.
'
In the exercise of Fran..cis Crewt upon
"Perseverance," which I shall give shortly, the
reader can scarcely fail to perceive this unpleasing characteristic. This lad, as a reader of
...
music, was really a prodigy. In the metropolitan
""'·,and provincial Board schools the Tonic Sol-fa

sy~tem of notation i~ the Ol~e almost universally
adopted; and, I may· remark, that before a
child leaves school he poss~sses, as a rule, a very
fair acquaintance with sight-singing.
\Vell, you could put before Francis Crewt the
most difficylt piece you liked, ,and, after a quick
glance or two from leaf to leaf along the measures
or bars, he would turn back to the front page,
pull himself together, fix his large blue eyes
earnestly upon the _·music, and 'sing straight
through it . with ease . and confidence in correct
tune, and time, and expression.
At the Government examination the inspector
' aptitude in
was so struck with his n;markable
· the "ear tests," t.h at he called him out in front

154

El\.GLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

of the class, and just to see how far the lad's ear
for music would really permit him to go, he sang
a particularly difficult chant using nothing but
the syllable la. He then asked the boy if he
could write d~wn on a slip of paper the correct
musical notes of the chant. This Crewt did
·immediately, not only giving all the notes with

although it was not till the very last day-nay
· the very last hour-of his school life . that I

exactness, but also accurately dividing them

discover:ed the lad's real character.
Crewt had applied for and had all but

according to time. The inspector was simply
amazed, ari.d, I remember, he placed his hands
on the scholar's shoulders, and said to him

obtained a position as a barrister's office-boy, or
r~ther, it appeared ·to me, he was to be the joint

kindly and impressively, "My boy, I hope yon
will try to be as good as you are clever."

property of two ?f these gentlemen whose
chambers were on the same floor in the Temple.
One of these young men had written a · note

\i\T ell, reader, I have related to you how a few

askincr me to kindly furnish the applicant,

of my boys have made their little mark in the
world, and also how some have died early in .

b

~

'

Francis Crewt-who, he understood, was a
pupil in my . school-w~th ~ testimoni~l as to
character. He was · quite satisfied, he assured

life; whilst, I sincerely trust, the great buik of
my scholars have becorne good, honest, industri()us working m~n. And now it is with the
utmost pain that I briefly chronicle a startling
is now twenty-five

55

plice in a gigantic swindle in . the north of
England which not only rendered rich men
poor, but also scattered the life-savings of scores
of wori<:-a-day men and women to the ' winds.
He began at school, this career of deceit;

-

exception in the clever little Francis Cr~4h.

I

me, as regarded ability, and he concluded by
pointing out what a grand opening it was for
the lad, &c., &c., and that duties could be com-

He

years of age, and at the

menced in the morning.
I called Cre\\:t
to my desk, and for five or ten
.

.

begi nn ing of the prese nt year he wa s sentenced
at the county assizes to a term of se ven years

minutes I saic..l all I could to encourage my
I
pupil, and also to fortify his principles.

penal se rvitude for being the principal accom I

N

•

57

'ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

patted his head, and told him to return to . my
desk at half-.Past four when I woulc!. have 'the
testimonial ready for him. At closing time he
came anain
to me, and I handed
him his . testib
•

boys' dinners that occasionally had been sur- .

monial; and o_nce more,· in the stillness of the
empty schoolroom (for only the teachers were
present), I exhorted the lad to cling to the right
and the true.
He was apparently much moved, and, on
turning away, he pulled out his handkerchief to
place to his eyes, and at the same time there
dropped from his pocket something glittering to
the ground! It was a silver pencil-case. His
teacher, who was . standing by, at once exclaimed
"Why, why, that is mine!" .
R~ader, the rest of the· scene was so painful
to me, that I will ask you to permit me to
refrain from d es cribing it. I can only add that
before Crewt left the room it was known beyond
the shadow of a doubt that this theft of the
pencil-case \vas only the last of a long series of
. petty pilferings, the agent of which it had·!affled
all my ingenuity to discover.

The peg-tops,

the balls, and numerous other little articles
which had from time to time been sto len ;-the

1

reptitiously removed and
c~nsumed ;-the
valuables that one or other of the masters had
missed from their rooms in the most mysterious
manner ;-all these offences had been perpetrated
by this guilty, guilty lad.
The parents, who, at my request, came· th~
following day to see me, wept bitter tears of
sorrow in my private room over their son's shame
and delinquency. Angui~h such as theirs rnay
I}never witness again!
One thing particularly struck me about the
mother. Slie appeared to fear her son ;-to
stand in awe of this thirteen-year-old boy! and,
although her grief was as keen and pronounced
as the f~ther's, (nay, I thi1.1k it was more so),
still I could not but .receive the impression that
she herself had bad previous cause for thinking
her boy dishonest. , Could it be, I thought, that
she had found ber son o~t from time to time in
falsehood or theft at home, and had failed to
chastise him, or,
least, report the facts to her
husband? If so, 0 how terrible her punishment!

at

For it was now too late, ,and she knew it.
;{ owadays, lads of thirteen do not brook

ENGLISH AS WRIT

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

chastisement from a mother, and I frequently
overhear boys ·aver to one another tha t"they can
.. nearly fight the guvnor." So Francis Crewt,

recall to my readers that ''A little \earning is a
dangerous thing."

beina now thirteen, and the · son of working
.

159

"PERSEVERANCE, OR; TRY AGAIN.

~

people, must govfrom bad to worse; and, _a s you
are aware, reader, he did. However, all I know
of his career is told almost in a word. At about
sixteen years of ~ge he was a stockbroker's
clerk, and at twenty-one or two he had already
opened offices in one of the large cloth towns of
Yorkshire as an accountant and gene_ral agent.
Then, a few years later came that c(ucl financial
fraud which so shocked and startled the good
north country people at the time, and Francis
Crewt is now a convict at Dartmoor.
I remark that in the school exercise of
Francis Crewt-namely, an essay on " Perseverance "-th ere is a simpering vein of conceit
which is as displeasing as it is ridiculous. As
regard s the o rth ography, there is not a single
word spelt wrong throughout, and the Qiting,
alth ou gh not as good as several of my specimens,
is fluent and decided.

But the diclactive incli-

nation of the j uvcni!e writer, and the false:
s:milcs and conclusions he makes, wi ll, I think,

''Many people in this world think too little of
perseverance. They despise it because it is a
long word. But these foolish people should
remember that you can say it in two easy words,
which is 'Try Again.' Now if after that these
ob,s tinate men and women despise perseverance
I
.
they deserve to be prosecuted with the utmost
rigour of the law. And that is something awful,
let me tell you. But nobody will pity them, and
when such foolish people die, how can they
expect that any one will go to their funeral?
Nobody would think of going except just t\\'O
or three, for nearly everyone would say ' Let
him be buried with the utmost rigour of the
law.' I will now tell all people that perseverance 1s as easy as easy. There's nothing in it,
never mind it being a long wo rd .

It only

means, keep on trying and trying till you've
· done it. There now, what do you think I Let
me tell you people what a persevering poet
once wrote.

It was this

160

El\'GLISH AS 1VRIT
Ifat first you don't succeed,
Tiy, try, try again.

This poet, I tell you, people, wrote that \\'or<l
•Try,' three times over because .he knew very well
that the third time would pay for all. Suppose,
peopl e, you wanted to do some difficult thing,
say, make a horse go on that's stupid, and
stan<ls still anrl kicks out. Now is your time to
get pcrseveram:e. Don't flog it with a whip or
punch it on tl1e nose or kick it µnder the belly.

BY LITTLE ORIGINALS.

m:arly finished it, ask

i;im

161

whether it is sweet or.

sour, and you will find he will h~nd you over

all he has left.

There, didn't I tell you l

So

composition ·
marks from

TI1at is · not perseverance, but cruelty, pcoµle.

Just pat it and gee to it nicely, . and dra\~ it
gently forwards, and it will soon find out that
you have got perseverance, and it will b eg in to
go as hard as yo u like. There, di<ln't I tell you
so.

Or suppose a boy wants to have a bite of
an apple that a stingy mean boy has got. He

easy~ never mind how lon g; and rn I say try

can get a bite if he will only get perseverance

and try and try, till you can say to everybody

first.

Asking the stingy boy straight off for it

that you have got it i11siJc your hearts."

isn;t pcrscn~rancc, and you wouldn't get a bite.

Just walk by the side of Jiim, and sl1011· liir~all tl1e
things you've got in your pocket; then put your
arm around his shoulder as you are walking on;

<md tell him you like walking \Vith him better

rllan plJying about.

Then, when you see he l1as
L

