As population and prosperity increased, their almost
illiterate teachers gave place to a better class; and many of my
Georgia readers will remember as among these the old Irish preachers,
Cummings, and that remarkable brute, Daniel Duffee. He was an Irishman
of the Pat Freney stripe, and I fancy there are many, with gray heads
and wrinkled fronts, who can look upon the cicatrices resulting from
his merciless blows, and remember that Milesian malignity of face,
with its toad-like nose, with the same vividness with which it
presents itself to me to-day. Yes, I remember it, and have cause. When
scarcely ten years of age, in his little log school-house, the
aforesaid resemblance forced itself upon me with such _vim_ that
involuntarily I laughed. For this outbreak against the tyrant's rules
I was called to his frowning presence.
"What are you laughing at, you whelp?" was the rude inquiry.
Tremblingly I replied: "You will whip me if I tell you."
"And you little devil, I will whip you if you don't," was his
rejoinder, as he reached for his well-trimmed hickory, one of many
conspicuously displayed upon his table.
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