ond Reader, you took your books and left
school. That was what the other boys expected of you, and it was the
only thing for you to do if you had the least self-respect, for you were
put back to the Second Reader after having failed to read the Third, and
it was a public shame which nothing but leaving that school could wipe
out. The other boys would have a right to mock you if you did not do it;
and as soon as the class was dismissed you went to your desk as
haughtily as you could, and began putting your books and your slate and
your inkstand together, with defiant glances at the teacher; and then
when twelve o'clock came, or four o'clock, and the school was let out,
you tucked the bundle under your arm and marched out of the room, with
as much majesty as could be made to comport with a chip hat and bare
feet; and as you passed the teacher you gave a twist of the head that
was meant to carry dismay to the heart of your enemy. I note all these
particulars carefully, so as to show the boys of the present day what
fools the boys of the past were; though I think they will hardly believe
it. My boy was once that kind of fool; but not twice. He left school
with all his things at twelve o'clock, and he returned with them at one;
for his father and mother did not agree with him about the teacher's
behavior in putting him back. No boy's father and mother agreed with him
on this point; every boy returned in just the same way; but somehow the
insult had been wiped out by the mere act of self-assertion, and a boy
kept his standing in the world as he could never have done if he had not
left school when he was put back.

The Hydraulic ran alongside of the Academy, and at recess the boys had a
good deal of fun with it, one way and another, sailing shingles with
stones on them, and watching them go under one end of the culvert and
come out of the other, or simply throwing rocks into the water. It does
not seem very exciting when you tell of it, but it really was exciting;
though it was not so exciting as to go down to the mills, where the
Hydraulic plunged over that great wheel into the Miami. A foot-bridge
crossed it that you could jump up and down on and almost make touch the
water, and there were happier boys, who did not go to school, fishing
there with men who had never gone. Sometimes the schoolboys ventured
inside of the flour-mill and the iron-foundry, but I do not think this
was often permitted; and, after all, the great thing