After that it was the dominie's custom, on seeing the room cleared, to send in a smart boy--a dux was always chosen--who wedged a clod of earth or peat between doorpost and door.
Thus the school was locked up for the night.

The boy came out by the window, where he entered to open the door next morning.

In time grass hid the little path from view that led to the old school, and a dozen years ago every particle of wood about the building, including the door and the framework of the windows, had been burned by travelling tinkers.
The Board would have liked to leave the dominie in his white-washed dwelling-house to enjoy his old age comfortably, and until he learned that he had intended to retire.

Then he changed his tactics and removed his beard.

Instead of railing at the new school, he began to approve of it, and it soon came to the ears of the horrified Established minister, who had a man (Established) in his eye for the appointment, that the dominie was looking ten years younger.