re asylum, but create confusion. Once a flock of quail
came marching in demurely at the open door, while teacher and pupils
maintained a silence at the pretty sight. And once the place was
cleared by an invasion of hornets enraged at something. That was a
great day for the boys.

The studies were not as varied as in the cross-roads schools to-day.
There was the primer, and there were a few of the old Webster
spelling-books, but, while the stories of the boy in the apple tree and
the overweening milkmaid were familiar, the popular spelling-book was
Town's, and the readers were First, Second, Third and Fourth, and their
"pieces" included such classics as "Webster's Reply to Hayne" and
"Thanatopsis," and numerous clever exploits of S. P. Willis in blank
verse. Davie's Arithmetic was dominant, and, as for grammar, whenever
it was taught, Brown's was the favorite. There was, even then, in the
rural curriculum the outlining of that system of the common schools
which has made them of this same region unexcelled elsewhere in all the
world. There were strong men, men who could read the future,
controlling the legislation of some of the new States.

The studies mentioned, and geography were the duties now in hand, and
there was indifference or hopefulness or rivalry among those of the
little group as there is now in every school, from some new place in
Oklahoma to old Oxford, over seas. In all scholarship, it chanced that
this same boy, Grant Harlson, was easily in the lead. His mother, an
ex-teacher in another and older State, loving, regardful, tactful, had
taught him how to read and comprehend, and he had something of a taste
that way and a retentive memory. So, inside the rugged schoolroom, he
had a certain prestige. Outside, he took his chances.

CHAPTER V.

GRIM-VISAGED WAR.

It has been said that there were some twenty children in the school.
They were of various degrees and fortunes. There were the sons and
daughters of the land-owners, the pioneers, and there were the sons and
daughters of the men who worked for them, mostly the drifting class,
who occupied log houses on unclaimed ground and got flour or meal or
potatoes for their services with the steadier or more masterful. In
the school, though, there were no distinctions on this account. There
were but two measurements of standing among girls and boys together,
their relative importance in their classes, the teacher giving force to
this, and