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Chapter IV
THE sun rose upon a tranquil world, and
beamed down upon the peaceful village like
a benediction.
Breakfast over, Aunt Polly had family
worship: it began with a prayer built from
the ground up of solid courses of
Scriptural quotations, welded together
with a thin mortar of originality; and
from the summit of this she delivered a
grim chapter of the Mosaic Law, as from
Sinai.
Then Tom girded up his loins, so to speak,
and went to work to "get his verses."
Sid had learned his lesson days before.
Tom bent all his energies to the
memorizing of five verses, and he chose
part of the Sermon on the Mount, because
he could find no verses that were shorter.
At the end of half an hour Tom had a vague
general idea of his lesson, but no more,
for his mind was traversing the whole
field of human thought, and his hands were
busy with distracting recreations.
Mary took his book to hear him recite, and
he tried to find his way through the fog:
"Blessed are the--a--a--"
"Poor"--
"Yes--poor; blessed are the poor--a--a--"
"In spirit--"
"In spirit; blessed are the poor in
spirit, for they--they--"
"THEIRS--"
"For THEIRS.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are they that mourn, for they--
they--"
"Sh--"
"For they--a--"
"S, H, A--"
"For they S, H--Oh, I don't know what it
is!"
"SHALL!"
"Oh, SHALL!
for they shall--for they shall--a--a--
shall mourn--a--a-- blessed are they that
shall--they that--a--they that shall
mourn, for they shall--a--shall WHAT?
Why don't you tell me, Mary?--what do you
want to be so mean for?"
"Oh, Tom, you poor thick-headed thing, I'm
not teasing you.
I wouldn't do that.
You must go and learn it again.
Don't you be discouraged, Tom, you'll
manage it--and if you do, I'll give you
something ever so nice.
There, now, that's a good boy."
"All right!
What is it, Mary, tell me what it is."
"Never you mind, Tom.
You know if I say it's nice, it is nice."
"You bet you that's so, Mary.
All right, I'll tackle it again."
And he did "tackle it again"--and under
the double pressure of curiosity and
prospective gain he did it with such
spirit that he accomplished a shining
success.
Mary gave him a brand-new "Barlow" knife
worth twelve and a half cents; and the
convulsion of delight that swept his
system shook him to his foundations.
True, the knife would not cut anything,
but it was a "sure-enough" Barlow, and
there was inconceivable grandeur in that--
though where the Western boys ever got the
idea that such a weapon could possibly be
counterfeited to its injury is an imposing
mystery and will always remain so,
perhaps.
Tom contrived to scarify the cupboard with
it, and was arranging to begin on the
bureau, when he was called off to dress
for Sunday-school.
Mary gave him a tin basin of water and a
piece of soap, and he went outside the
door and set the basin on a little bench
there; then he dipped the soap in the
water and laid it down; turned up his
sleeves; poured out the water on the
ground, gently, and then entered the
kitchen and began to wipe his face
diligently on the towel behind the door.
But Mary removed the towel and said:
"Now ain't you ashamed, Tom.
You mustn't be so bad.
Water won't hurt you."
Tom was a trifle disconcerted.
The basin was refilled, and this time he
stood over it a little while, gathering
resolution; took in a big breath and
began.
When he entered the kitchen presently,
with both eyes shut and groping for the
towel with his hands, an honorable
testimony of suds and water was dripping
from his face.
But when he emerged from the towel, he was
not yet satisfactory, for the clean
territory stopped short at his chin and
his jaws, like a mask; below and beyond
this line there was a dark expanse of
unirrigated soil that spread downward in
front and backward around his neck.
Mary took him in hand, and when she was
done with him he was a man and a brother,
without distinction of color, and his
saturated hair was neatly brushed, and its
short curls wrought into a dainty and
symmetrical general effect.
[He privately smoothed out the curls, with
labor and difficulty, and plastered his
hair close down to his head; for he held
curls to be effeminate, and his own filled
his life with bitterness.] Then Mary got
out a suit of his clothing that had been
used only on Sundays during two years--
they were simply called his "other
clothes"--and so by that we know the size
of his wardrobe.
The girl "put him to rights" after he had
dressed himself; she buttoned his neat
roundabout up to his chin, turned his vast
shirt collar down over his shoulders,
brushed him off and crowned him with his
speckled straw hat.
He now looked exceedingly improved and
uncomfortable.
He was fully as uncomfortable as he
looked; for there was a restraint about
whole clothes and cleanliness that galled
him.
He hoped that Mary would forget his shoes,
but the hope was blighted; she coated them
thoroughly with tallow, as was the custom,
and brought them out.
He lost his temper and said he was always
being made to do everything he didn't want
to do.
But Mary said, persuasively:
"Please, Tom--that's a good boy."
So he got into the shoes snarling.
Mary was soon ready, and the three
children set out for Sunday-school--a
place that Tom hated with his whole heart;
but Sid and Mary were fond of it.
Sabbath-school hours were from nine to
half-past ten; and then church service.
Two of the children always remained for
the sermon voluntarily, and the other
always remained too--for stronger reasons.
The church's high-backed, uncushioned pews
would seat about three hundred persons;
the edifice was but a small, plain affair,
with a sort of pine board tree-box on top
of it for a steeple.
At the door Tom dropped back a step and
accosted a Sunday-dressed comrade:
"Say, Billy, got a yaller ticket?"
"What'll you take for her?"
"What'll you give?"
"Piece of lickrish and a fish-hook."
"Less see 'em."
Tom exhibited.
They were satisfactory, and the property
changed hands.
Then Tom traded a couple of white alleys
for three red tickets, and some small
trifle or other for a couple of blue ones.
He waylaid other boys as they came, and
went on buying tickets of various colors
ten or fifteen minutes longer.
He entered the church, now, with a swarm
of clean and noisy boys and girls,
proceeded to his seat and started a
quarrel with the first boy that came
handy.
The teacher, a grave, elderly man,
interfered; then turned his back a moment
and Tom pulled a boy's hair in the next
bench, and was absorbed in his book when
the boy turned around; stuck a pin in
another boy, presently, in order to hear
him say "Ouch!"
and got a new reprimand from his teacher.
Tom's whole class were of a pattern--
restless, noisy, and troublesome.
When they came to recite their lessons,
not one of them knew his verses perfectly,
but had to be prompted all along.
However, they worried through, and each
got his reward--in small blue tickets,
each with a passage of Scripture on it;
each blue ticket was pay for two verses of
the recitation.
Ten blue tickets equalled a red one, and
could be exchanged for it; ten red tickets
equalled a yellow one; for ten yellow
tickets the superintendent gave a very
plainly bound Bible (worth forty cents in
those easy times) to the pupil.
How many of my readers would have the
industry and application to memorize two
thousand verses, even for a Dore Bible?
And yet Mary had acquired two Bibles in
this way--it was the patient work of two
years--and a boy of German parentage had
won four or five.
He once recited three thousand verses
without stopping; but the strain upon his
mental faculties was too great, and he was
little better than an idiot from that day
forth--a grievous misfortune for the
school, for on great occasions, before
company, the superintendent (as Tom
expressed it) had always made this boy
come out and "spread himself."
Only the older pupils managed to keep
their tickets and stick to their tedious
work long enough to get a Bible, and so
the delivery of one of these prizes was a
rare and noteworthy circumstance; the
successful pupil was so great and
conspicuous for that day that on the spot
every scholar's heart was fired with a
fresh ambition that often lasted a couple
of weeks.
It is possible that Tom's mental stomach
had never really hungered for one of those
prizes, but unquestionably his entire
being had for many a day longed for the
glory and the eclat that came with it.
In due course the superintendent stood up
in front of the pulpit, with a closed
hymn-book in his hand and his forefinger
inserted between its leaves, and commanded
attention.
When a Sunday-school superintendent makes
his customary little speech, a hymn-book
in the hand is as necessary as is the
inevitable sheet of music in the hand of a
singer who stands forward on the platform
and sings a solo at a concert --though
why, is a mystery: for neither the hymn-
book nor the sheet of music is ever
referred to by the sufferer.
This superintendent was a slim creature of
thirty-five, with a sandy goatee and short
sandy hair; he wore a stiff standing-
collar whose upper edge almost reached his
ears and whose sharp points curved forward
abreast the corners of his mouth--a fence
that compelled a straight lookout ahead,
and a turning of the whole body when a
side view was required; his chin was
propped on a spreading cravat which was as
broad and as long as a bank-note, and had
fringed ends; his boot toes were turned
sharply up, in the fashion of the day,
like sleigh-runners--an effect patiently
and laboriously produced by the young men
by sitting with their toes pressed against
a wall for hours together.
Mr. Walters was very earnest of mien, and
very sincere and honest at heart; and he
held sacred things and places in such
reverence, and so separated them from
worldly matters, that unconsciously to
himself his Sunday-school voice had
acquired a peculiar intonation which was
wholly absent on week-days.
He began after this fashion:
"Now, children, I want you all to sit up
just as straight and pretty as you can and
give me all your attention for a minute or
two.
There --that is it.
That is the way good little boys and girls
should do.
I see one little girl who is looking out
of the window--I am afraid she thinks I am
out there somewhere--perhaps up in one of
the trees making a speech to the little
birds.
[Applausive titter.] I want to tell you
how good it makes me feel to see so many
bright, clean little faces assembled in a
place like this, learning to do right and
be good."
And so forth and so on.
It is not necessary to set down the rest
of the oration.
It was of a pattern which does not vary,
and so it is familiar to us all.
The latter third of the speech was marred
by the resumption of fights and other
recreations among certain of the bad boys,
and by fidgetings and whisperings that
extended far and wide, washing even to the
bases of isolated and incorruptible rocks
like Sid and Mary.
But now every sound ceased suddenly, with
the subsidence of Mr. Walters' voice, and
the conclusion of the speech was received
with a burst of silent gratitude.
A good part of the whispering had been
occasioned by an event which was more or
less rare--the entrance of visitors:
lawyer Thatcher, accompanied by a very
feeble and aged man; a fine, portly,
middle-aged gentleman with iron-gray hair;
and a dignified lady who was doubtless the
latter's wife.
The lady was leading a child.
Tom had been restless and full of chafings
and repinings; conscience-smitten, too--he
could not meet Amy Lawrence's eye, he
could not brook her loving gaze.
But when he saw this small new-comer his
soul was all ablaze with bliss in a
moment.
The next moment he was "showing off" with
all his might --cuffing boys, pulling
hair, making faces--in a word, using every
art that seemed likely to fascinate a girl
and win her applause.
His exaltation had but one alloy--the
memory of his humiliation in this angel's
garden--and that record in sand was fast
washing out, under the waves of happiness
that were sweeping over it now.
The visitors were given the highest seat
of honor, and as soon as Mr. Walters'
speech was finished, he introduced them to
the school.
The middle-aged man turned out to be a
prodigious personage--no less a one than
the county judge--altogether the most
august creation these children had ever
looked upon--and they wondered what kind
of material he was made of--and they half
wanted to hear him roar, and were half
afraid he might, too.
He was from Constantinople, twelve miles
away--so he had travelled, and seen the
world--these very eyes had looked upon the
county court-house--which was said to have
a tin roof.
The awe which these reflections inspired
was attested by the impressive silence and
the ranks of staring eyes.
This was the great Judge Thatcher, brother
of their own lawyer.
Jeff Thatcher immediately went forward, to
be familiar with the great man and be
envied by the school.
It would have been music to his soul to
hear the whisperings:
"Look at him, Jim!
He's a going up there.
he's a going to shake hands with him--he
IS shaking hands with him!
By jings, don't you wish you was Jeff?"
Mr. Walters fell to "showing off," with
all sorts of official bustlings and
activities, giving orders, delivering
judgments, discharging directions here,
there, everywhere that he could find a
target.
The librarian "showed off"--running hither
and thither with his arms full of books
and making a deal of the splutter and fuss
that insect authority delights in.
The young lady teachers "showed off" --
bending sweetly over pupils that were
lately being boxed, lifting pretty warning
fingers at bad little boys and patting
good ones lovingly.
The young gentlemen teachers "showed off"
with small scoldings and other little
displays of authority and fine attention
to discipline--and most of the teachers,
of both sexes, found business up at the
library, by the pulpit; and it was
business that frequently had to be done
over again two or three times (with much
seeming vexation).
The little girls "showed off" in various
ways, and the little boys "showed off"
with such diligence that the air was thick
with paper wads and the murmur of
scufflings.
And above it all the great man sat and
beamed a majestic judicial smile upon all
the house, and warmed himself in the sun
of his own grandeur--for he was "showing
off," too.
There was only one thing wanting to make
Mr. Walters' ecstasy complete, and that
was a chance to deliver a Bible-prize and
exhibit a prodigy.
Several pupils had a few yellow tickets,
but none had enough --he had been around
among the star pupils inquiring.
He would have given worlds, now, to have
that German lad back again with a sound
mind.
And now at this moment, when hope was
dead, Tom Sawyer came forward with nine
yellow tickets, nine red tickets, and ten
blue ones, and demanded a Bible.
This was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky.
Walters was not expecting an application
from this source for the next ten years.
But there was no getting around it--here
were the certified checks, and they were
good for their face.
Tom was therefore elevated to a place with
the Judge and the other elect, and the
great news was announced from
headquarters.
It was the most stunning surprise of the
decade, and so profound was the sensation
that it lifted the new hero up to the
judicial one's altitude, and the school
had two marvels to gaze upon in place of
one.
The boys were all eaten up with envy--but
those that suffered the bitterest pangs
were those who perceived too late that
they themselves had contributed to this
hated splendor by trading tickets to Tom
for the wealth he had amassed in selling
whitewashing privileges.
These despised themselves, as being the
dupes of a wily fraud, a guileful snake in
the grass.
The prize was delivered to Tom with as
much effusion as the superintendent could
pump up under the circumstances; but it
lacked somewhat of the true gush, for the
poor fellow's instinct taught him that
there was a mystery here that could not
well bear the light, perhaps; it was
simply preposterous that this boy had
warehoused two thousand sheaves of
Scriptural wisdom on his premises--a dozen
would strain his capacity, without a
doubt.
Amy Lawrence was proud and glad, and she
tried to make Tom see it in her face--but
he wouldn't look.
She wondered; then she was just a grain
troubled; next a dim suspicion came and
went--came again; she watched; a furtive
glance told her worlds--and then her heart
broke, and she was jealous, and angry, and
the tears came and she hated everybody.
Tom most of all (she thought).
Tom was introduced to the Judge; but his
tongue was tied, his breath would hardly
come, his heart quaked--partly because of
the awful greatness of the man, but mainly
because he was her parent.
He would have liked to fall down and
worship him, if it were in the dark.
The Judge put his hand on Tom's head and
called him a fine little man, and asked
him what his name was.
The boy stammered, gasped, and got it out:
"Tom."
"Oh, no, not Tom--it is--"
"Thomas."
"Ah, that's it.
I thought there was more to it, maybe.
That's very well.
But you've another one I daresay, and
you'll tell it to me, won't you?"
"Tell the gentleman your other name,
Thomas," said Walters, "and say sir.
You mustn't forget your manners."
"Thomas Sawyer--sir."
"That's it!
That's a good boy.
Fine boy.
Fine, manly little fellow.
Two thousand verses is a great many--very,
very great many.
And you never can be sorry for the trouble
you took to learn them; for knowledge is
worth more than anything there is in the
world; it's what makes great men and good
men; you'll be a great man and a good man
yourself, some day, Thomas, and then
you'll look back and say, It's all owing
to the precious Sunday-school privileges
of my boyhood--it's all owing to my dear
teachers that taught me to learn--it's all
owing to the good superintendent, who
encouraged me, and watched over me, and
gave me a beautiful Bible--a splendid
elegant Bible--to keep and have it all for
my own, always--it's all owing to right
bringing up!
That is what you will say, Thomas--and you
wouldn't take any money for those two
thousand verses--no indeed you wouldn't.
And now you wouldn't mind telling me and
this lady some of the things you've
learned--no, I know you wouldn't--for we
are proud of little boys that learn.
Now, no doubt you know the names of all
the twelve disciples.
Won't you tell us the names of the first
two that were appointed?"
Tom was tugging at a button-hole and
looking sheepish.
He blushed, now, and his eyes fell.
Mr. Walters' heart sank within him.
He said to himself, it is not possible
that the boy can answer the simplest
question--why DID the Judge ask him?
Yet he felt obliged to speak up and say:
"Answer the gentleman, Thomas--don't be
afraid."
Tom still hung fire.
"Now I know you'll tell me," said the
lady.
"The names of the first two disciples
were--"
"DAVID AND GOLIAH!"
Let us draw the curtain of charity over
the rest of the scene.