Breaking away : or, The fortunes of a student

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EARL A. SiBBLE;

in 2010 witii funding from

THE STARRY FLAG SERIES,

Chapter I. In Which Eenest Thoenton Inteoduces Himself

ERNEST THORNTON!" called Mr. Parasyte, the principal of the Parkville Liberal Institute, in a tone so stern and severe that it was impossible to mistake his meaning, or not to understand that a tempest was brewing. "Ernest Thornton!"

As that was my name, I replied to the summons by rising, and exhibiting my full length to all the boys assembled in the school-room — about one hundred in number.

" Ernest Thornton ! " repeated Mr. Parasyte, not

satisfied with the demonstration I had made.

" Sir ! " I replied, in a round, full, square tone, which was intended to convince the principal that I was ready to "face the music."

"Ernest Thornton, I am informed that you have been engaged in a fight," he continued, in a tone a little less sharj) than that with which he had pronounced my name; and I had the vanity to believe that the square tone in which I had uttered the single word I had been called upon to speak had produced a salutary impression upon him.

"I haven't been engaged in any fight, sir," I replied, with all the dignity becoming a boy of fourteen.

"Sir! what do you mean by denying it?" added Mr. Parasyte, working himself up into a magnificent mood, which was intended to crush me by its very majesty — but it didn't.

"I have not engaged in any fight, sir," I repeated, with as much decisicaa as the case seemed to require.

"Didn't you strike William Poodles?" demanded he, fiercely.

"Yes, sir, I did. Bill Poodles hit me in the head.

THE FORTUlSrES OF A STUDENT. 13

and I knocked him over in self-defence — that was all, sir."

"Don't you call that a fight, sir?" said Mr. Parasyte, knitting his brows, and looking savage enough to swallow me.

"No, sir; I do not. I couldn't stand still and let him pound me."

"You irritated him in the beginning, and provoked him to strike the blow. I hold you responsible for the fight."

"I had no intention to irritate him, and I did not wish to provoke him."

" I hold you responsible for the fight, Thornton," said the principal again.

I supposed he would, for Poodles was the son of a very wealthy and aristocratic merchant in the city of New York, while I belonged to what the principal regarded as an inferior order of society. At least twenty boys in the Parkville Liberal Institute came upon the recommendation of Poodle's father, while not a single one had been lured into these classic shades by the influence of my family «^if I could be said to belong to any family. 2

Besides, I was but a day scholar, and my uncle paid only tuition bills for me, while most of the pupils were boarders at the Institute.

I am writing of events which took place years ago, but I have seen no reason to change the opinion then formed, that Mr. Parasyte, the principal, was a "toady" of the first water; that he was a narrow-minded, partial man, in whom the j)rinciple of justice had never been developed. He was a good teacher, an excellent teacher ; by which I mean only to say that he had a rare skill and tact for imj^arting knowledge, the mere dry bones of art, science, and philosophy. He was a capital scholar himself, and a capital teacher; but that is the most that can be said of him.

I have no hesitation in saying that his influence upon the boys was bad, as that of every narrowtninded, partial, and unjust man must be ;. and if I had any boys to send away to a boarding school, they should go to a good and true man, even if I knew him to be, intellectually, an inferior teacher, rather than to such a person as Mr. Parasyte. He "toadied" to the rich boys, and oppressed th-p f>o<>nT ones. Poodles was the most important boy in the school, and he was never punished for his faults, which were not few, nor compelled to learn his lessons, as other boys were. But I think Poodles hated the magnate of the Parkville Liberal Institute as much as any other boy.

Parkville is situated on Lake Adieno, a beautiful sheet of water, twenty miles in length, in the very heart of the State of New York. The town was a thriving place of four thousand inhabitants, at which a steamboat stopped twice every day in her trip around the lake. The academy was located at the western verge of the town, while my home was about a mile beyond the eastern line of the village.

I lived with my uncle, Amos Thornton. His residence was a vine-clad cottage, built in the Swiss style, on the border of the lake, the lawn in front of it extending down to the water's edge. My uncle was a strange man. He had erected this cottage ten years before the time at which my story opens, when I was a mere child. He had employed in the beginning, before the house was completed,

16 r-KEAKKNG AWAY, OR

a man and his wife as gardener and housekeeper, and they had been residents in the cottage ever since.

I said that my uncle was a strange man; and so he was. He hardly ever spoke a word to any one, and never unless it was absolutely necessary to do so. He was not one of the talking kind; and old Jerry, the gardener, and old Betsey, the housekeeper, seemed to have been cast in the same mould. I never heard them talking to each other, and they certainly never spoke to me unless I asked them a question, and then only in the briefest manner.

I never knew what to make of my uncle Amos. He had a little room, which he called his library, in one corner of the house, which could be entered only by passing through his bedroom. In this apartment he spent most of his time, though he went out to walk every day, while I was at school; but, if he saw me coming, he always retreated to the house. He was gloomy and misanthropic; he never went to church himself, though he always compelled me to go, and also to attend the Sunday school. He did not go into society, and had little or noth-

\ng to do with, or to say to, the peoj^le of Parkville. He never troubled them, and they were content to let him alone.

As may well be sujDposed, my life at the cottage was not the pleasantest that could be imagined. It was hardly a home, only a stopping-place to me. It was gloom and silence there, and my uncle was the lord of the silent land. Such a Ufe was not to my taste, and I envied the boys and girls of my acquaintance in Parkville, as I saw them talking and laughing with their fathers and mothers, their brothers and sisters, or gathered in the social circle around the winter fire. It seemed to me that their cup of joy was full, while mine was empty. I longed for friends and companions to share T^dth me the cares and the pleasures of Ufe.

Of myself I knew little or nothing. My memory hardly reached farther back than the advent of my uncle at Lake Adieno, and all my early associations were connected with the cottage and its surroundings. I had a glimmering and indistinct idea of something before our coming to Parkville. It seemed to me that I had once known a motherly lady 2* with a sweet and lovely expression on her face; and I had a faint recollection of looking out upon a dreary waste of waters ; but I could not fix the idea distinctly in my mind. I supposed that the lady was my mother. I made several vain efforts to induce my uncle to tell me something about her; if he knew anything, he would not tell me.

Old Jerry and his wife evidently had no knowledge whatever in regard to me before my uncle brought me to Parkville. They could not tell me anything, and my uncle would not. Though I was a boy of only fourteen, this concealment of my birth and parentage troubled me. I was told that my father was dead ; and this was all the information I could obtain. Where he had lived, when and where he died, I was not permitted to know. If I asked a question, my uncle turned on his heel and left me, with no reply.

The vision of the motherly lady, distant and indistinct as it was, haunted me like a familiar melody. If the person was my mother, why should her very name be kept from me? If she was still living, why could I not go to her? If she was dead, why might I not water the green sod above her grave with my tears, and plant the sweetest flowers by her tombstone? I was dissatisfied with my lot, and I was determined, at no distant day, to wring from my silent uncle the particulars of my early history. I was so eager to get this knowledge that I was almost ready to take him by the throat, if need be, and force out the truth from between his closed lips.

I never had an opportunity to speak with him; but I could make the opportunity. He took no notice of me ; he avoided me ; he seemed hardly to be conscious of my existence. Yet he was not a hard man, in the common sense of the word. He clothed me as well as the best boys in the Institute. If I wanted anything for the table, old Jeny was ordered to procure it. When I was ten years old a little row-boat was furnished for me ; but before I was fourteen I wanted somethino: better, and told mv uncle so. He made me no reply; but on my next birthday a splendid sail-boat floated on the lake before the house, which Jerry said had been built for me. I told my silent lord that I was much obliged to him for his very acceptable present, when I happened to catch him on the lawn. He turned on his heel, and fled as though I had stung him with the sting of ingratitude.

If I wanted anything, I had only to mention it; and no one criticised my conduct, whatever I did. I was free to go and come when I pleased ; and though in vacation I was absent three days at once in my boat, no one asked me where I had been, oi what I had done. Neither my uncle nor his silent satellites ever expressed a fear that I might be drowned in my voyages in night and storm on the lake ; and I came to the conclusion that no one would care if I were lost.

I do not know how, under such a home government, I ever became a decent fellow. I do not know why I am not now a pirate, a freebooter, a pickpocket, or a nuisance to myself and the world in some other capacity. I have come to believe since that my inherited good qualities saved me under such an utter neglect of all home influences. It is a marvel to me that I was not ruined before I was twenty-one ; and from the deepest depths of my

THE ¥OETUNES OF A STUDENT. 21

heart I thank God for his mercy in sparing me from the fate which generally and natm*ally overtakes such a neglected child.

At the age of twelve, after I had passed through the common school of the town, I was admitted to the Parkville Liberal Institute, which I Avished to attend because a friend of mine in the town was there. My uncle did not object — he never objected to anything. Without pride or vanity I may say that I was a good scholar, and I took the highest rank at the academy. When I was about twelve years old, some instructions which I received in the Sunday school produced a strong impression on my mind, and led me to take my stand for life. I tried to be true to God and myself, to be just and manly in all things. Whatever the world may sneeringly say of goodness and truth, I am sure that I owe my popularity among the^boys of the Parkville Liberal Institute to these endeavors — not always successful — to do right.

Chapter II. In Which There Is Trouble In The Parkville Liberal Institute

I WISH to say in tlie beginning, and once for all, that I did not set myself uj) as a saint, or even as a model boy. I made no pretensions, but I did try to be good and true. I felt that I had no one in this world to rely upon for my fiiture; everything depended upon myself alone, and I realized the responsibility of building up my own character. I do not mean to assert that I had all these ideas and purposes clearly defined in my own mind; only that I had a simple abstract desire to be good, and to do good, without knowing precisely in what the being and the doing consisted. My notions, many of them, I am now aware, were crude and undefined.

I have observed that I was a favorite among the boys of the Institute, a kind of leader and oracle among them, though I was not fully conscious of the fact at the time. While I now think I owe the greater portion of the esteem and regard in which I was held by my companions to my desire to bo good and true, I must acknowledge that other circumstances had their influence upon them. I was the owner of the best boat on Lake Adieno, and to the boys this was a matter of no small consequence. There were half a dozen row-boats belonging to the academy, but nothing that carried a sail.

I always had money. I had only to ask my uncle for any sum I wanted, and it was given me, without a question as to its intended use. I mention the fact to his discredit, and it would have been a luxury to me to have had him manifest interest enough in my welfare to refuse my request.

I was naturally enterprising and fearless, and was therefore foremost in all feats of daring, in all trials of skill in athletic games. Indeed, to sum up the estimate which was made of me by my associates in school and the people of Parkville, I was " a smart boy." Perhaps my vanity was tickled once or twice by hearing this appellation applied to me ; but I am sure I was not spoiled by the favor with which ] was regarded.

Though I was not an unhappy boy, there was an aching void in my heart which I could not fill, a longing for such a home as hundreds of my young friends enjoyed ; and I would gladly have exchanged the freedom from restraint for which others envied me for the poorest home in the town, where I could have been welcomed by a fond mother, where I could have had a kind father to feel an interest in me.

During the spring, summer, and autumn months, when the wind and weather would permit, I went to school in my sail-boat. My course lay along the shore, and if I was becalmed and likely to . be tardy, I had only to moor my craft, and take to the road. At the noon intermission, therefore, my boat was available for use, and I always had a party.

On the day that I was called up charged with fighting, the Splash — for that was the suggestive name I had chosen for my trim little craft — was lying at the boat pier on the lake in front of the Institute building. The forenoon session of the school had just closed, and I had gone to the boat to eat my dinner, which I always carried in the stern locker.

Before I had finished. Bill Poodles came down .with an Arithmetic in his hand. It was the dinner hour of the boarding students, and I wondered that Bill was not in the refectory. Our class had a difficult lesson in arithmetic that day, which I had worked out in the solitude of my chamber at the cottage the preceding evening. The students had been prohibited, under the most severe penalty, from assisting each other; and it appeared that Bill had vainly applied to half a dozen of his classmates for help : none of them dared to afford it.

Bill Poodles was a disagreeable fellow, arrogant and " airy " as he was lazy and stupid. I doubt whether he ever learned a difficult task alone. The arithmetic lesson was a review of the principles which the class had gone over, and consisted of a dozen examples, printed on a slip of paper, to test the knowl 3

26 BEEAKING AWAY, OK

edge of the students ; and it was intimated that those who failed, would be sent down into a lower class. Bill dreaded anything like a degradation. Ho was proud, if he was lazy. He knew that I had performed the examples,- and while his fellowboarders were at dinner, he had stolen the opportunity to appeal to me for the assistance he so much needed.

Though Bill was a disagreeable fellow, and though, in common with a majority of the students, I disliked him, I would willingly have assisted him if the prohibition to do so had not been so emphatic. Mr. Parasyte was so particular in the present instance, that the following declaration had been printed on the examination paper, and each boy was required to sign it : —

" I declare upon my honor ^ that I have had no assistance whatever in solving these examples^ and that I have given none to others.^"*

Bill begged me to assist him. I reasoned with him, and told him he had better fail in the review than forfeit his honor by subscribing to a falsehood. He made light of my scruples ; and then I told him

I had already signed my own paper, and would not falsify my statement.

" Humph ! " exclaimed he, with a sneer. " You hadn't given any one assistance when you signed, but you can do it now, and it will be no He."

I was indignant at the proposition, it was so mean and base ; and I expressed myself squarely in regard to it. I had finished my dinner, and, closing the locker, stepped out of the boat upon the pier. Bill followed me, begging and pleading till I was disgusted with him. I told him then that I would not do what he asked if he teased me for a month. He was angry, and used insulting language. I turned on my heel to leave him. He intei-preted this movement on my part as an act of cowardice, and, coming up behind me, struck me a heavy blow on the back of the head with his fist. He was on the point of following it up with another, when, though he was eighteen years old, and half a foot taUer than I was, I hit him fairly in the eye, and knocked him over backwards, off the pier, and into the lake.

A madder fellow than Bill Poodles never floundered in shallow water. The lake where he fell was not more than two or three feet deep, and doubtless its soft bosom saved him from severe injury. He picked himself up, and, dripping from his bath, rushed to the shore. He was insane with passion. Seizing a large stone, he hurled it at me. I moved towards him, with the intention of checking his demonstration, when his valor was swallowed up in discretion, and he rushed towards the school building.

For this offence I was brought to the bar of Mr. Parasyte's uneven justice. Poodles had told his own story after changing his drabbled garments. It was unfortunate that there were no witnesses of the affi'ay, for the principal would sooner have doubted the evidence of his own senses than the word of Bill Poodles, simi3ly because it was not politic for him to do so. My accuser declared that he had spoken civilly and properly to me, and that I had insulted him. He had walked wp to me, and placed his hand upon my shoulder, simply to attract my attention, when I had struck him a severe blow in the face, which had knocked him over backwards into the lake.

In answer to this charge, I told the truth exactly as it was. Bill acknowledged that he had asked me some questions about the review lesson, which I had declined to answer. He was sorry he had offended so far, but was not angry at my refusal. He had determined to sacrifice his dinner, and his play during the intermission, to enable him to perform the examples. I persisted in the statement I had already made, and refused to modify it in any manner. It was the simple truth.

"Ernest Thornton," said Mr. Parasyte, solemnly, "hitherto I have regarded you with favor. I have looked upon you as a worthy and deserving boy, and I confess my surprise and grief at the event of to-day. Not content with the dastardly assault committed upon William Poodles, — whose devotion to his duty and his studies has been manifested by the sacrifice of his dinner, — you utter the most barefaced falsehood which it was ever my misfortune to hear a boy tell."

"I have told the truth, sir!" I exclaimed, my cheek burning with indignation.

" Silence, sir ! Such conduct and such a boy 3* so bkeaki:n^g away, or

cannot be tolerated at the Parkville Liberal Institute. But in consideration of your foiTuer good conduct, I purpose to give you an opportunity to redeem your character."

"My character don't need any redeeming," I declared, stoutly.

"I see you are in a very unhappy fi-ame of mind, and I fear you are incorrigible. But I must do my duty, and I proceed to pronounce your sentence, which is, that you be expelled from the Parkville Liberal Institute."

"Bill Poodles is the biggest liar in the school!" shouted a daring little fellow among my friends, who were astounded at the result of the examination, and at the sentence.

" That's so ! " said another.

" Yes ! " " Yes ! " " Yes ! " shouted a dozen more. *' Throw him over ! Bill Poodles is the liar ! "

Mr. Parasyte was appalled at this demonstration — a demonstration which never could ha^ve occurred without the provocation of the grossest injustice. The boys were well disciplined, and the order of the Institute was generally unexceptionable. Such

THE FOliTUXES OF A STUDENT. 31

a flurry had never before been known, and it was evident that the students intended to take the law into their own hands. They acted upon the impulse of the moment, and I judged that at least one half of them were engaged in the demonstration.

Poodles Was a boy of no principle ; he was notorious as a har ; and the boys regarded it as an outrage upon themselves and ujDon me that he should be believed, while my story appeared to have no weight whatever,

Mr. Parasyte trembled, not alone with rage, but with fear. The startling event then transphing threatened the peace, if not the very existence, of the Parkville Liberal Institute. I folded my arms, — for I felt my dignity, — and endeavored to be calm, though my bosom heaved and bounded with emotion. •

" Boys — young gentlemen, I — " the principal

began.

" Throw him over ! Put him out ! " yelled the students, excited beyond measure.

" Young gentlemen ! " shouted Mr, Parasyte.

" Three cheers for Ernest Thornton ! " hoarsely screamed Boh Hale, my intimate friend and longtime "crony,"

They were given with an enthusiasm which bordered on infatuation.

" Will you hear me, students ? " cried Mr, Parasyte.

"No!" "No!" "No!" "Throw him over!" "Put him out!"

The scene was almost as unpleasant to me as to the principal, proud as I was of the devotion of my friends. I did not wish to be vindicated in such a way, and I was anxious to put a stop to such disorderly proceedings. I raised my hand in an appeahng gesture.

"Fellow-students," said I; and the school-room was quiet.

Chapter III. In Which Ernest Is Expelled From The Paek- Velle Liberal Institute

FELLOW-STUDEKTS," I continued, when the school-room was still enough for me to be heard, " I am willing to submit to the rules of the Institute, and even to the injustice of the j^rincipal. For my sake, as well as for your own, behave like men."

I folded my anns, and was silent again. I felt

that it was better to suffer than to resist, and such

an exhibition of rowdyism was not to my taste. I

glanced at Mr. Parasyte, to intimate to him that he

. could say what he j^leased ; and he took the hint.

"Young gentlemen, this is a new experience to me. In twenty years as a teacher, I have never been thus insulted."

This was an imprudent remark.

84 BREAKIXG AY\^AY, OP.

" Be fair, then ! " shouted Bob Hale ; and the cry was repeated by others, until the scene of disorder promised to be renewed.

I raised my hand, and shook my head, deprecating the conduct of the boys. Once more they heeded, though it was evidently as a particular favor to me, rather than because it was in kee]3ing with their ideas of right and justice.

" I intend to be fan-, young gentlemen," continued Mr. Parasyte ; " that is the whole study of my life. I am astonished and mortified at this unlooked-for demonstration. I was about to make a further statement in regard to Thornton, when you interrujDted me. I told you that I jDurj^osed to give him an oj)portunity to redeem his character. I intend to do my duty on this painflil occasion, though the walls of the Parkville Liberal Institute should crumble above my head, and crush me in the dust."

" Let her crumble ! " said a reckless youth, as Mr. Parasyte waxed eloquent.

" Will you be silent, or will you compel me to resort to that which I abhor — to j^hysical force ? "

Some of the boys glanced at each other with a

THE FOKTUXES OF A STUDENT. 35

meaning smile when this remark was uttered ; but I shook my head, to signify my disapprobation of an}i;hing like resistance or tumult.

" Thornton," added Mr. Paras}1:e, turning to me, "I have faMy and impartially heard your story, and careiully weighed all yom- statements. I have come to the conclusion, deliberately and without prejudice, that you were the aggi-essor."

"I was not, sir," I rejDlied, as gently as I could speak, and yet as fiiTuly.

" It appears that Poodles placed his hand upon ■your arm merely to attract your attention ; whereupon you struck him a severe blow in the face, which caused him to reel and fall over backward mto the lake," said Mr. Parasyte, so pompously that I could not tell whether he intended to "back out" of his position or not.

" Poodles hit me iu the head, and was on the point of repeating the blow, when I knocked him over in self-defence."

" It does not appear to me that Poodles, who is a remarkably gentlemanly student, would have struck you for simply refusing to assist him about his exampies. Such a course would not be consistent witt the character of Poodles."

" IsTo, sir, I did not strike him at any time,* protested Poodles.

"I find it impossible to change my opinion of the merits of this case ; and for the good of the Parkville Liberal Institute, I must adhere to the sentence I have already — with regret and sorrow — pronounced upon you. But — "

There were again strong signs of another outbreak among the pupils, and I begged them to be silent.

"The conduct of Thornton in this painful emergency merits and receives my approbation. His love of order and his efforts to preserve proj^er decorum in the school-room are worthy of the highest commendation," continued Mr. Parasyte ; " and I would gladly remit the penalty I have imposed upon him without any conditions whatever ; but I feel that Buch a course, after the extraordinary events of this day, would be subversive of the discipline and good order which have ever characterized the Parkville Liberal Institute. I shall, however, impose a merely nominal condition upon Thornton, his compliance

With which shall immediately restore him to the full enjoyment of his rights and privileges as a member of this academy. I wish to be as lenient as j^ossible, and, as I observed, the penalty wdll be mei-ely nominal.

" As the quarrel occurred when the parties were alone, so also may the reparation be made in private ; for after Thornton's magnanimous behavior to-day^ under these trying circumstances, I do not wish to humiliate or mortify him. I wish that it were consistent with my ideas of stern duty to impose no penalty."

Mr. Parasyte had certainly retreated a long way from his original position. I did not wish to be expelled, and I hailed with satisfaction his manifestation of leniency ; and rather than lose the advantages of the school, I was willing to submit to the nominal penalty at which he hinted, supposing it would be a deprivation of some privilege.