For years
Ernest bore all this. Then come a time when he was called to a
position of responsibility in the school. One after another, the
biggest boys had fallen. A few had gradyeated. Others had argyed with
the teacher and become as broken reeds, was stedyin' regular and bein'
polite like. In them years, whether he wanted it or not, Ernest had
rose up. His repytation was spotless. His age entitled him to the
Fifth Reader class, but he was still spellin' out words in the Third;
fractions was only a dream to him, and he couldn't 'a' told you the
difference between a noun and a wild carrot. But through it all he'd
been so humble and polite that Leander looked on him as a kind of
half-witted lamb."
[Illustration: Leander.]
"This here is the longest fairy story I ever heard tell of," said Elmer
Spiker, "We haven't even had a sign of the prin-cess."
"And there is a prin-cess in this here le-gend," returned Josiah. "She
was a be-yutiful one, too. Her name was Pinky Binn, a dotter of the
house of Binn, the Binns of Turkey Walley.
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