THE ADVENTURES OF



and, by the advice of Mr. Boone and other parents,
opened a school in the neighborhood. It was not
then as it is now. Good schoolhouses were not
scattered over the land; nor were schoolmasters
always able to teach their pupils. The school-
house where the boys of this settlement went was
a log cabin, built in the midst of the woods. The
schoolmaster was a strange man: sometimes good-
humored, and then indulging the lads; sometimes
surly and ill-natured, and then beating them se-
verely. It was his usual custom, after hearing the
first lessons of the morning, to allow the children
to be out for a half hour at play, during which time
he strolled off to refresh himself from his labors.
He always walked in the same direction, and the
boys thought that after his return, when they
were called in, he was generally more cruel than
ever. They were whipped more severely, and
oftentimes without any cause. They observed
this, but did not know the meaning of it. One
morning young Boone asked that he might go out,
and had scarcely left the schoolroom, when he saw
a squirrel running over the trunk of a fallen tree.
True to his nature, he instantly gave chase, until
at last the squirrel darted into a bower of vines
and branches. Boone thrust his hand in, and, to his
surprise, laid of hold of a bottle of whiskey. This
was in the direction of his master's morning walks,
and he thought now that he understood the secret of



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