From African to Yankee by Robert J. Cottrol

Author:Robert J. Cottrol [Cottrol, Robert J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780765619730
Google: IicCR0eQCfkC
Publisher: M.E. Sharpe
Published: 1998-01-15T16:19:17+00:00

Chapter IV.

By the request of my father I left Captain Childs and made preparations to go to school regularly, until I should complete my studies. The following week I entered Mr. John Lawton's school, kept in the brick school-house on Meeting street. He occupied the lower room in the building, and kept a private school. He had kept there for many years, and was called an excellent teacher, but his health was so feeble that he was unable to continue his school more than two quarters after I entered. He then broke up and went to live with his son in Newport.

The next man that took the school was Mr. John G. L. Haskins, a white preacher in the Methodist Church. In his school I began to cipher, using Daboll's Arithmetic. It was a hard study and required a strong mind and a clear head to master it. Father told me that if I paid for my own schooling, and wished to stop a day or two, I could do so; but if he paid it, I must go every day so as to finish my studies and go to work. I preferred to pay for my own schooling, which was three dollars a quarter. I also joined the evening class, paying one dollar and fifty cents a quarter, and twenty-five cents for ink and pens, which the teacher supplied us with. When the money for the quarter became due, I had no money to meet it, and told the teacher that, having no money, I thought I had better stop. He said I was improving very fast and had better keep on with my studies, as I was in the first class, and used an English reader and Walker's dictionary, which I was to purchase as soon as I could get the means, as I had to borrow. My friend James Gumes, a lad much younger than myself, also owed for a quarter's schooling. Mr. Haskins was anxious to have us continue in the school, and he gave us a job of sawing wood to encourage us. We got our saws sharpened by James's uncle for nothing, for he wanted to help us. The wood was walnut, and hard to saw. It was cold winter weather and the wood was covered with snow, and James got very sick of his job, and declared he would never saw wood for anybody any more. I had to saw a greater part of the wood in order to finish it. But it was no difficult task for me as I had been accustomed to saw wood ever since I was eight years old.

The second quarter became due, and I had not paid my first quarter. James was also in arrears. We made up our minds to leave, but Mr. Haskins coaxed us to stay, and still continued to dun us, saying: "Can't you bring me a little this afternoon?" I would tell him I had no possible prospect of getting anything, and had better stop coming.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.