is a general habit in luxurious homes.' And he tightened his lips.
'General habit wherever they don't prefer whiskey,' said Stuart.
'I fear so,' the school-master replied, smiling. 'That poison shall never enter my house, gentlemen, any more than tobacco. And as I cannot reform the adults of Sharon, I am doing what I can for their children. Little Hugh Straight is going to say his 'Lochinvar' very pleasingly, Mr. Stuart. I went over it with him last night. I like them to be word perfect,' he continued to me, 'as failures on exhibition night elicit unfavorable comment.'
'And are we to expect failures also?' I inquired.
'Reuben Gadsden is likely to mortify us. He is an earnest boy, but nervous; and one or two others. But I have limited their length. Reuben Gadsden's father declined to have his boy cut short, and he will give us a speech of Burke's; but I hope for the best. It narrows down, it narrows down. Guy Jeffries and Leola Mattern are the two.'
'The parents seem to take keen interest,' said I.
Mr. Eastman smiled at Stuart. 'We have no reason to suppose they have changed since last year,' said he. 'Why, sir,' he suddenly exclaimed, 'if I did not feel I was doing something for the young generation here, I should leave Sharon to-morrow! One is not appreciated, not appreciated.'
He spoke fervently of various local enterprises, his failures, his hopes, his achievements; and I left his house honoring him, but amazed—his heart was so wide and his head so narrow; a man who would purify with simultaneous austerity the morals of Lochinvar and of Sharon.
'About once a month,' said Stuart, 'I run against a new side he is blind on. Take his puzzlement as to whether they prefer verse or prose. Queer and dumb of him that, you see. Sharon does not know the difference between verse and prose.'
'That's going too far,' said I.
'They don't,' he repeated, 'when it comes to strawberry night. If the piece is about something they understand, rhymes do not help or hinder. And of course sex is apt to settle the question.'
'Then I should have thought Leola—' I began.
'Not the sex of the speaker. It's the listeners. Now you take women. Women generally prefer something that will give them a good cry. We men want to laugh mostly.'
'Yes,' said I; 'I would rather laugh myself, I think.'
'You'd know you'd rather if you had to live in Sharon. The laugh is one of the big differences between women and men, and I would give you my views about it, only my Sunday-off time is up, and I've got to go to telegraphing.'
'Our ways are together,' said I. 'I'm going back to the railroad hotel.'
'There's Guy,' continued Stuart. 'He took the prize on 'The Jumping Frog.' Spoke better than Leola, anyhow. She spoke 'The Wreck of the Hesperus.' But Guy had the back benches—that's where the men sit—pretty well useless. Guess if there had been a fire, some of the fellows would have been scorched before they'd have got strength sufficient to run out. But the ladies did not laugh much. Said they saw nothing much in jumping a frog. And if Leola had made 'em cry good and hard that night, the committee's decision would have kicked up more of a fuss than it did. As it was, Mrs. Mattern got me alone; but I worked us around to where Mrs. Jeffries was having her ice-cream, and I left them to argue it out.'
'Let us adhere to that policy,' I said to Stuart; and he replied nothing, but into the corner of his eye wandered that lurking smile which revealed that life brought him compensations.
He went to telegraphing, and I to revery concerning strawberry night. I found myself wishing now that there could have been two prizes; I desired both Leola and Guy to be happy; and presently I found the matter would be very close, so far at least as my judgment went. For boy and girl both brought me their selections, begging I would coach them, and
