The Wit and Humor of America, Volume III. (of X.)
you'll be all right. His lay is discipline and reading. Well, good luck to you!"

   Miss Bailey took heart of grace. The children read surprisingly well, were absolutely good, and the enemy

   under convoy of the friendly Principal would be much less terrifying than the enemy at large and alone. It was, therefore, with a manner almost serene that she turned to greet the kindly concerned Principal and the dreaded "Gum Shoe Tim." The latter she found less ominous of aspect than she had been led to fear, and the Principal's charming little speech of introduction made her flush with quick pleasure. And the anxious eyes of Sadie Gonorowsky, noting the flush, grew calm as Sadie whispered to Eva, her close cousin:

   "Say, Teacher has a glad. She's red on the face. It could to be her papa."

   "No. It's comp'ny," answered Eva sagely. "It ain't her papa. It's comp'ny the whiles Teacher takes him by the hand."

   The children were not in the least disconcerted by the presence of the large man. They always enjoyed visitors, and they liked the heavy gold chain which festooned the wide waistcoat of this guest; and, as they watched him, the Associate Superintendent began to superintend.

   He looked at the children all in their clean and smiling rows; he looked at the flowers and the gold-fish; at the pictures and the plaster casts; he looked at the work of the last term and he looked at Teacher. As he looked he swayed gently on his rubber heels and decided that he was going to enjoy the coming quarter of an hour. Teacher pleased him from the first. She was neither old nor ill-favored, and she was most evidently nervous. The combination appealed both to his love of power and his peculiar sense of humor. Settling deliberately in the chair of state, he began:

   "Can the children sing, Miss Bailey?"

   They could sing very prettily and they did.

   "Very nice, indeed," said the voice of visiting author

   ity. "Very nice. Their music is exceptionally good. And are they drilled? Children, will you march for me?"

   Again they could and did. Patrick marshaled his line in time and triumph up and down the aisles to the evident interest and approval of the "comp'ny," and then Teacher led the class through some very energetic Swedish movements. While arms and 
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