But the pleasantest times he had of all,
  Were the sociable hours he used to pass,
With his chair tipped back to a neighbor’s wall,
Making an unceremonious call,
  Over a pipe and a friendly glass: 
This was the finest pleasure, he said,
  Of the many he tasted here below: 
“Who has no cronies had better be dead,”
  Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.

The jolly old pedagogue’s wrinkled face
  Melted all over in sunshiny smiles;
He stirred his glass with an old-school grace,
Chuckled, and sipped, and prattled apace,
  Till the house grew merry from cellar to tiles. 
“I’m a pretty old man,” he gently said,
  “I’ve lingered a long time here below;
But my heart is fresh, if my youth is fled!”
  Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.

He smoked his pipe in the balmy air
  Every night, when the sun went down;
And the soft wind played in his silvery hair,
Leaving its tenderest kisses there,
  On the jolly old pedagogue’s jolly old crown;
And feeling the kisses, he smiled, and said: 
  " ’T is it glorious world down here below;
Why wait for happiness till we are dead?”
  Said this jolly old pedagogue, long ago.

He sat at his door one midsummer night,
  After the sun had sunk in the west,
And the lingering beams of golden light
Made his kindly old face look warm and bright,
  While the odorous night winds whispered, “Rest!”
Gently, gently, he bowed his head;
  There were angels waiting for him, I know;
He was sure of his happiness, living or dead,
  This jolly old pedagogue, long ago!

XXVI.  THE TEACHER AND SICK SCHOLAR. (135)

Shortly after the schoolmaster had arranged the forms and taken his seat behind his desk, a small white-headed boy with a sunburnt face appeared at the door, and, stopping there to make a rustic bow, came in and took his seat upon one of the forms.  He then put an open book, astonishingly dog’s-eared, upon his knees, and, thrusting his hands into his pockets, began counting the marbles with which they were filled; displaying, in the expression of his face, a remarkable capacity of totally abstracting his mind from the spelling on which his eyes were fixed.

Soon afterward, another white-headed little boy came straggling in, and after him, a red-headed lad, and then one with a flaxen poll, until the forms were occupied by a dozen boys, or thereabouts, with heads of every color but gray, and ranging in their ages from four years old to fourteen years or more; for the legs of the youngest were a long way from the floor, when he sat upon the form; and the eldest was a heavy, good-tempered fellow, about half a head taller than the schoolmaster.

At the top of the first form—­the post of honor in the school—­was the vacant place of the little sick scholar; and, at the head of the row of pegs, on which those who wore hats or caps were wont to hang them, one was empty.  No boy attempted to violate the sanctity of seat or peg, but many a one looked from the empty spaces to the schoolmaster, and whispered to his idle neighbor, behind his hand.