Beaming on us with his smiling blue eyes, he rubbed his hands gently as he warmed them. "I hope we are going to have a pleasant term of school together," he said, in a tone as soft as silk. "And it will not be my fault if we don't have a real quiet, nice time." We learned later that it was his custom always to begin school with a beautiful speech of honeyed words--the calm before the storm. "Of course we have to have order in the schoolroom," he said apologetically. "I confess that I like to have the room orderly, and that I do not like to hear whispering in study hours. When the scholars go out and come in at recess time, too, it sort of disturbs me to have crowding and noise. I never wish to be hard or unreasonable with my scholars--I never am, if I can avoid it. But these little things, as you all know, have to be mentioned sometimes, if we are going to have a really pleasant and profitable term. "There is another thing that always make me feel nervous in school hours, and that is buzzing with the lips while you are getting your lessons, I don't like to speak about it, and there may be no need for it, but lips buzzing in study hours always make me feel queer. It's just as easy to get your lessons with your eyes as with your lips, and for the sake of my feelings I hope you will try to do so. "Speaking of lessons," he went on, "I don't believe in giving long ones. I always liked short, easy lessons myself, and I suppose you do." In point of fact he gave the longest, hardest lessons of any teacher we ever had! We had to put in three or four hours of hard study every evening in order to keep up; and if we failed-- By this time some of the larger boys--Newman Darnley, Ben Murch, Absum Glinds and Melzar Tibbetts--were smiling broadly and winking at one another. The new master, they thought, was "dead easy." Later in the morning, when the bell rang for the boys to come in from their recess, Newman and many of the others pushed in at the doorway, pell-mell, as usual. Before they were fairly inside the room the new master, calm and smiling, stood before them. One of his long arms shot out; he collared Newman and, with a trip of the foot, flung him on the floor. Ben Murch, coming next, landed on top of Newman. Alfred Batchelder, Ephraim Darnley, Absum Glinds, Melzar Tibbetts and my cousin, Halstead, followed Ben, till with incredible suddenness nine of the boys, all almost men-grown, were piled in a squirming heap on the floor! Filled with awe, we smaller boys stole in to our seats, casting frightened glances at the teacher, who stood beaming genially at the heap of boys on the floor. "Lie still, lie still," he said, as some of the boys at the bottom of the pile struggled to get out. "Lie still. I suppose you forgot that it disturbs me to have crowding and loud trampling. Try and remember that it disturbs me." Turning away, he said, "The girls may now have their recess."