It was
about Six Stars school, here, and the boy's name was Ernest, and the
teacher's Leander. It was told to my pap by his pap, so you can see
that as a le-gend it was older than them of Henery Holmes."
"It certainly sounds more interestin'," exclaimed Isaac Bolum.
Old Mr. Holmes started to protest, but Aaron Kallaberger quieted him
with an offering of tobacco. By the time his pipe was going, Josiah
was well into his story.
"Of all the teachers that ever tot in Six Stars this here Leander was
the most fe-rocious. He was six foot two inches tall in his stockin's,
and weighed no more than one hundred and thirty pound, stripped, but he
was wiry. His arms was like long bands of iron. His legs was like
hickory saplin's, and when he wasn't usin' them he allus kept them
wound round the chair, so as to unspring 'em at a moment's notice and
send himself flyin' at the darin' scholar. His face was white and all
hung with hanks of black hair; his eyes was one minute like still
intellectual pools and the next like burnin' coals of fire--that was my
pap's way of puttin' it.
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