Read Online Jane Slayre by Sherri Browning Erwin - Free Book Online

misarranged limbs. I reasoned I was safe enough. I would prove myself a good child with nothing to fear at my new school.
    The tall woman now left me to the more ordinary Miss Miller. Miss Miller, red-faced and careworn, was hurried in gait and action like one who had a multiplicity of tasks on hand. She looked, indeed, what I afterwards found she really was, an underteacher.
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    She led me along, passing from compartment to compartment, from passage to passage, of a large and irregular building. We emerged from the total and somewhat dreary silence pervading that portion of the house and came upon the hum of many voices as we entered a wide, long room, with great tables, two at each end.
    A congregation of girls of every age, from nine or ten to twenty, sat on benches around the tables. Seen by the dim light of the candles, two on each table, their number to me appeared countless, though not in reality exceeding eighty. They were uniformly dressed in brown stuff frocks of quaint fashion, and long holland pinafores. They were apparently going over tomorrow's lesson. The hum I had heard was the combined result of their whispered repetitions.
    Miss Miller signed to me to sit on a bench near the door. She walked up to the top of the long room. "Monitors, collect the lesson books and put them away!"
    Four tall girls arose from different tables and went around gathering the books.
    "Monitors, fetch the supper trays!" Miss Miller said, once the books were gathered and put away.
    The tall girls went out and returned presently, each bearing a tray with a thin oaten cake divided into portions, and a pitcher of water and a mug in the middle of each tray. The portions were handed around. Those who liked took a draught of the water, the mug being common to all. When it came to my turn, I drank, for I was thirsty, but did not touch the food, excitement and fatigue rendering me incapable of eating.
    Once the meal was over, Miss Miller read prayers, and the classes filed off, two and two, upstairs. By the time I reached my room, I was so overcome with weariness that I barely noticed what sort of a place the bedroom was, except that, like the schoolroom, it was long. Tonight I was to be Miss Miller's bedfellow. She helped me undress. Once tucked in, I glanced at the long rows of beds, each filled with two occupants. In as little as ten minutes, the single
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    light was extinguished, and amid silence and complete darkness I fell asleep.
    The night passed rapidly. I was too tired even to dream. When I opened my eyes, a loud bell was ringing. The girls got up quickly and started dressing. Day had not yet begun to dawn, and rush-lights burned in the room. I rose reluctantly. It was bitter cold, and I dressed as well as I could for shivering, and washed when there was a basin at liberty, which did not soon occur as there was but one basin to every six girls on the stands down the middle of the room. Some barely shivered, seemingly insensitive to the cold. I couldn't imagine that I would ever get used to such extreme frigidity inside.
    Again, the bell rang. All formed in file, two and two, and I joined in as in that order we descended the stairs and entered the cold and dimly lit schoolroom.
    "Form classes!" Miss Miller said.
    A great tumult succeeded for some minutes, during which Miss Miller repeatedly exclaimed, "Silence!" and "Order!" When it subsided, I saw them all drawn up in four semicircles, before four chairs, placed at the four tables. All held books in their hands, and a great book, like a Bible, lay on each table before the vacant seat.
    A distant bell tinkled. Immediately three ladies entered the room; each walked to a table and took her seat. Miss Miller assumed the fourth vacant chair, which was that nearest the door, and around which the smallest of the children were assembled. I was called to this inferior class and placed at the bottom of it.
    Business now began. The day's prayer was read, then certain texts of Scripture were