caught him suddenly by the collar, and, with one great pull, had
him out over his desk and on the open floor. He gave him a sharp fling
backwards and stood looking at him.

The rough-and-tumble fighters all clinch, as everybody knows; and Abner
Briggs, Junior, was one of that kind. He remembered how he had floored
Master Weeks, and he had just "spunk" enough left in him to try to repeat
his former successful experiment an the new master. He sprang at him,
open-handed, to clutch him. So the master had to strike,--once, but very
hard, and just in the place to tell. No doubt, the authority that doth
hedge a schoolmaster added to the effect of the blow; but the blow was
itself a neat one, and did not require to be repeated.

"Now go home," said the master, "and don't let me see you or your dog
here again." And he turned his cuffs down over the gold sleeve-buttons.

This finished the great Pigwacket Centre School rebellion. What could be
done with a master who was so pleasant as long as the boys behaved
decently, and such a terrible fellow when he got "riled," as they called
it? In a week's time everything was reduced to order, and the
school-committee were delighted. The master, however, had received a
proposition so much more agreeable and advantageous, that he informed the
committee he should leave at the end of his month, having in his eye a
sensible and energetic young college-graduate who would be willing and
fully competent to take his place.

So, at the expiration of the appointed time, Bernard Langdon, late master
of the School District No. 1, Pigwacket Centre, took his departure from
that place for another locality, whither we shall follow him, carrying
with him the regrets of the committee, of most of the scholars, and of
several young ladies; also two locks of hair, sent unbeknown to payrents,
one dark and one warmish auburn, inscribed with the respective initials
of Alminy Cutterr and Arvilly Braowne.

CHAPTER IV

THE MOTH FLIES INTO THE CANDLE.

The invitation which Mr. Bernard Langdon had accepted came from the Board
of Trustees of the "Apollinean Female Institute," a school for the
education of young ladies, situated in the flourishing town of Rockland.
This was an establishment on a considerable scale, in which a hundred
scholars or thereabouts were taught the ordinary English branches,
several of the modern languages, something of Latin, if desired, with a
little natural philosophy, me