Burns made no answer: I wondered at her silence. "Why," thought I, "does
she not explain that she could neither clean her nails nor wash her face,
as the water was frozen?"
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My attention was now called off by Miss Smith desiring me to hold a skein
of thread: while she was winding it, she talked to me from time to time,
asking whether I had ever been at school before, whether I could mark,
stitch, knit, &c.; till she dismissed me, I could not pursue my
observations on Miss Scatcherd's movements. When I returned to my seat,
that lady was just delivering an order of which I did not catch the
import; but Burns immediately left the class, and going into the small
inner room where the books were kept, returned in half a minute, carrying
in her hand a bundle of twigs tied together at one end. This ominous
tool she presented to Miss Scatcherd with a respectful curtesy; then she
quietly, and without being told, unloosed her pinafore, and the teacher
instantly and sharply inflicted on her neck a dozen strokes with the
bunch of twigs. Not a tear rose to Burns' eye; and, while I paused from
my sewing, because my fingers quivered at this spectacle with a sentiment
of unavailing and impotent anger, not a feature of her pensive face
altered its ordinary expression.
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