m and orderly, with such pleasant
customs, and all the people sensible and energetic and healthy. There
was "Music" again in the German class, which was another alleviation;
though it was the same old "Star Spangled Banner" over again. Ramsey
was tired of the song and tired of "My Country 'Tis of Thee"; they were
bores, but it was amusing to sing them in German. In German they sounded
"sort o' funny," so he didn't mind this bit of the day's work.

Half an hour later there arrived his supreme trial of this particular
morning. Arithmetic then being the order of business before the house,
he was sent alone to the blackboard, supposedly to make lucid the proper
reply to a fatal conundrum in decimals, and under the glare and focus of
the whole room he breathed heavily and itched everywhere; his brain at
once became sheer hash. He consumed as much time as possible in getting
the terms of the problem stated in chalk; then, affecting to be critical
of his own handiwork, erased what he had done and carefully wrote it
again. After that, he erased half of it, slowly retraced the figures,
and stepped back as if to see whether perspective improved their
appearance. Again he lifted the eraser.

"Ramsey Milholland!"

"Ma'am?"

"Put down that eraser!"

"Yes'm. I just thought--"

Sharply bidden to get forward with his task, he explained in a feeble
voice that he had first to tie a shoe string and stooped to do so, but
was not permitted. Miss Ridgely tried to stimulate him with hints and
suggestion; found him, so far as decimals went, mere protoplasm, and,
wondering how so helpless a thing could live, summoned to the board
little Dora Yocum, the star of the class, whereupon Ramsey moved toward
his seat.

"Stand still, Ramsey! You stay right where you are and try to learn
something from the way Dora does it."

The class giggled, and Ramsey stood, but learned nothing. His
conspicuousness was unendurable, because all of his schoolmates
naturally found more entertainment in watching him than in following
the performance of the capable Dora. He put his hands in and out of his
pockets; was bidden to hold them still, also not to shuffle his feet;
and when in a false assumption of ease he would have scratched his head
Miss Ridgely's severity increased, so that he was compelled to give over
the attempt.

Instructed to watch every figure chalked up by the mathematical wonder,
his eyes, grown sodden, were unable to remove themselves fro