When the summer was about spent, and the last harvest had been gathered in the valleys, the master bethought him of gathering in a few ripened shoots of the young idea, and of having his Harvest Home, or Examination.  So the savants and professionals of Smith’s Pocket were gathered to witness that time-honored custom of placing timid children in a constrained positions and bullying them as in a witness box.  As usual in such cases, the most audacious and self-possessed were the lucky recipients of the honors.  The reader will imagine that in the present instance Mliss and Clytie were preeminent, and divided public attention; Mliss with her clearness of material perception and self-reliance, Clytie with her placid self-esteem and saintlike correctness of deportment.  The other little ones were timid and blundering.  Mliss’s readiness and brilliancy, of course, captivated the greatest number and provoked the greatest applause.  Mliss’s antecedents had unconsciously awakened the strongest sympathies of a class whose athletic forms were ranged against the walls, or whose handsome bearded faces looked in at the windows.  But Mliss’s popularity was overthrown by an unexpected circumstance.

McSnagley had invited himself, and had been going through the pleasing entertainment of frightening the more timid pupils by the vaguest and most ambiguous questions delivered in an impressive funereal tone; and Mliss had soared into astronomy, and was tracking the course of our spotted ball through space, and keeping time with the music of the spheres, and defining the tethered orbits of the planets, when McSnagley impressively arose.  “Meelissy! ye were speaking of the revolutions of this yere yearth and the move-MENTS of the sun, and I think ye said it had been a doing of it since the creashun, eh?” Mliss nodded a scornful affirmative.  “Well, war that the truth?” said McSnagley, folding his arms.  “Yes,” said Mliss, shutting up her little red lips tightly.  The handsome outlines at the windows peered further in the schoolroom, and a saintly Raphael face, with blond beard and soft blue eyes, belonging to the biggest scamp in the diggings, turned toward the child and whispered, “Stick to it, Mliss!” The reverend gentleman heaved a deep sigh, and cast a compassionate glance at the master, then at the children, and then rested his look on Clytie.  That young woman softly elevated her round, white arm.  Its seductive curves were enhanced by a gorgeous and massive specimen bracelet, the gift of one of her humblest worshipers, worn in honor of the occasion.  There was a momentary silence.  Clytie’s round cheeks were very pink and soft.  Clytie’s big eyes were very bright and blue.  Clytie’s low-necked white book muslin rested softly on Clytie’s white, plump shoulders.  Clytie looked at the master, and the master nodded.  Then Clytie spoke softly: 

“Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, and it obeyed him!” There was a low hum of applause in the schoolroom, a triumphant expression on McSnagley’s face, a grave shadow on the master’s, and a comical look of disappointment reflected from the windows.  Mliss skimmed rapidly over her astronomy, and then shut the book with a loud snap.  A groan burst from McSnagley, an expression of astonishment from the schoolroom, a yell from the windows, as Mliss brought her red fist down on the desk, with the emphatic declaration: