gh it were yesterday the f

d. Twenty years it was, at least, before the time of this story. She was standing in the door of her little schoolhouse, the rui

passing of the summer. And as the old gentlewoman stood there in the open door of that rustic temple of learning, with the deep-shadowed, wooded hillside in the background, and, in fr

schoolteacher? Yes,--if you will. But, as I saw her standing there that day,--tall and slender, dressed in a simple gown that was fitting to her work,--there was a queenly dignity, a stately sweetness, in her bearing that made me feel, somehow, as if I had come unexpectedly into the

the foot of the hill; over the forest-clad mountains in the glory of their brown and gold; over the vast sweep of the tree-crowned Ozark ridges that receded wave after wave into the blu

as then, and not given overmuch to serious thought, I knew that the high, unwavering purpose, the loving sympathy, and tender understanding that shone in the calm depth of those eyes could belong only to one who habitually looks

n too old, she said, with her delightful little laugh, to be of much use in the larger schools of the more thickly p

an Wakefield had learned of the needs of the Elbow Rock school, and so, finally, had come into the hills. It was the influential Tom who secured for her the modest position. It was the motherly Mrs. Tom who made her at home in the Warden household. It was the

Connecticut; that she had a brother somewhere in some South-American country; that two other brothers had been killed in the Civil War; that she had taug

opinion, of the countryside, "is a doggone funny thing a

h a degree of authority,--added: "Hit sure is a dad burned shame, an' a plumb disgrace to the men of thi

some of these letters written by their backwoods teacher were addressed to men and women of such prominence in the world that their names were known even to

time,--that Auntie Sue invested the small savings of her working years in the little l

completed the modest establishment. About thirty acres of the land were cleared and under cultivation of a sort. The remaining acreage was in timber. The price, under the kindly and expert supervisi

hands whenever other needs arose; for, as time passed, there came to be in all the Elbow Rock district scarce a man, young or old, who did not now and then honor himself by doing some little job for Auntie Sue; while the women and girls, in the same neighborly spirit, brought from their own humble households many tokens of their loving thoughtfulnes

her day's work was over, down the winding road to her little home, there to watch, from the porch that overlooked the river, the sunset in the evening. And every year the daily climb grew a little harder; the days of work grew a little longe

g on the mountain-side. But in her little home beside the river she continued her work; not from text-books, in

ch, whose lives were as rough as the hills in which they were reared, and whose thoughts were often as crude as their half-savage and sometimes lawless customs, came to sit at the feet of this gentle one, who received them all with such kindly interest and instinctive

the great world of larger affairs who had need of the strength and courage and patience and hope they never failed to find in that little log house by the river. And so, in time, it came to be known that those letters written by Auntie Sue went to men and wo

to accommodate Auntie Sue's grown-up boys and girls when they came to visit her. But never was there a hired servant, so tha

ue hills, not one knew more of the real secret of Auntie Sue's life and character than did the Ozar

et. He learned--but that is my sto