CHAPTER V.
THE RIDGE COLLEGE The school over which Gordon had undertaken to preside was not a very advanced seminary of learning, and possibly the young teacher did not impart to his pupils a great deal of erudition.
His predecessors in the schoolmaster's chair had been, like their patrons, the product of a system hardly less conservative than that of the Locrians.

Any one who proposed an innovation would have done so with a rope about his neck, and woe to him if it proved unsuccessful.
When Gordon reported first to the squire, the old man was manifestly pleased.
"Why, you've growed considerable.

I didn't have no idea you'd be so big a man." He measured him with satisfaction.

"You must be nigh as big as your pa." "I'm broader across the shoulders, but not so tall," said the young man.
"He is a pretty tall man," said the squire, slowly, with the light of reflection in his eye.

"You're a-goin' to try the Ridge College, are you ?" He had a quizzical twinkle in his eye as it rested on the younger man's face.
"I'm going to try it." And Gordon's face lit up.