n, and the whole school, made
sleepy by the warmth from the stove, lounged on their benches and
drowsed on their books, and even the little girl, sitting idly on the
rostrum, nodded wearily. But right in the midst of the silence, and just
before the pupils were dismissed for noon, something so startling
happened that the little girl's curls fairly stiffened in alarm.

The teacher clapped his hands, the children followed with a hurried
banging of their books and slates, and, instantly, before the little
girl had time to think what it all meant, the scholars, with one accord,
began to roar at the top of their lungs.

"Scotland's burning! Scotland's burning!"

they cried, rapping their knuckles upon their desks in the rhythm of
galloping horses,--

"More water! More water!
Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!
More water! More water!"

The little girl straightened herself and a gray light crept up to where
the flush had been, so that every freckle of the hateful thirteen stood
out clearly. Near her, the teacher was standing, with his feet planted
wide apart and his eyes raised to the ceiling. And before him, shouting
and pounding and staring with crimson faces into his, were the pupils.

"Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!"

they yelled. It brought back to the little girl that terrible moment
when the farm-house, with a dripping-pan full of hog-fat flaming in the
oven, was threatened with destruction.

"Scotland's burning! Scotland's burning!"

sounded the warning again. No one moved. But, not knowing just how near
Scotland might be, and fearful for her safety with danger so imminent,
she did not wait longer. Clutching her hat and book, with a bound she
cleared the distance to the youngest brother, and, with a stifled cry,
leaped into his arms.

But in her excitement she had forgotten Luffree, lying asleep under the
bench, and had jumped squarely upon one soft, outstretched paw. The dog
sprang up with a howl of pain, the school stopped its singing, and the
angry teacher left the rostrum and advanced toward the little girl. The
next moment he dragged the dog from under the bench by the scruff of the
neck and hurled him out of the door; the next, he shook an admonishing
finger in the very face of the thirteen unlucky freckles.

* * * * *

LATE that afternoon, the eldest brother paddled across the sloughs in
the bull-boat, and had a talk with t