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HOW SCHOOLPOP WORKS

08/10/2005    
S. M. Smoller     e-mail

The Higgins Middle School
has adopted the FISH philosophy.

 

There existed many years ago in a quiet little village in the eastern part of Massachusetts, an old meeting house to which was attached a tower and steeple.  It happened that his old house was built not many years after the Witchcraft delusion, and the minds of the simple-hearted villagers were strongly tinctured with both the love, and fear, of the marvelous. There were some strange circumstances attending the erection of the house and steeple, for they were not built at the same time, which were calculated to awaken superstitious fears among such a population.

At the time appointed for raising the tower, a sudden tempest arose and so powerful was it, that it scattered about the lighter materials in the building and sent the men of the village back to their homes.  Another day was appointed and their work was hardly begun before a tremendous thunderstorm, attended by hail and rain, again interrupted their labors and again they were forced to abandon the work.  It was on this afternoon too, that the minister's cow was found dead in the field, having been struck by lightning while under a tree for shelter.  But at length, the steeple was raised; it however was still unfinished, when one of the carpenters fell from its top to the ground, a ghastly and mangled corpse.  A deep gloom for a long time hung over the village in consequence of this event, but still the work went on and at last it was finished. 

As the years passed on, these events appeared to occupy the minds of the people and as they dwelled constantly on each sad particular, they always connected it with the raising of the steeple, which was in this manner, fast gaining a bad reputation, wholly aside from any fault of its own.  Strange noises had also been heard and flashes of red light had been seen in the tower.

Subsequent events served to awaken further suspicions against the unfortunate structure, as will be seen by attending to a conversation which took place many years after, in the cottage of Joseph Stacey.  But before the conversation is related, we must first inform the reader who Jo Stacey was and where he resided, with such other particulars that will serve to elucidate our story. 

The Meeting House we have been speaking of was shunted on a plot of land, bounded on two sides by two roads and a small stream of water running on the other two sides, marked the remaining boundary.  On this spot of land, which seemed to belong to nobody in particular, there also stood a small school house, a gun house containing the brass cannon belonging to an artillery company, a blacksmith's shop and lastly, the little cottage and barn of Joseph Stacey.

The land where the cottage stood, as we before intimated, did not belong to him or to anybody else, but he seemed to belong to the land and had the care of everything on it.  It was his duty to take care of the meeting house and ring the bell, as he was the sexton of the parish.  He also swept school rooms and made the fires in the winter and twice a year, at May trainings and fall muster, he scoured the brass pieces of cannon in the gun house.  It was in the blacksmith's shop that he performed his daily living and he lived in the cottage. 

It was on a dark and cloudy evening in November, when Stacey entered his house and took his accustomed chair by the fire.  The supper things were on the table and the tea kettle was singing merrily in the fireplace while dame Stacey was busily employed in placing the best cakes and chocolate before her husband.

Stacey was evidently in a melancholy mood and his wife would have found it out, if she had not been too busily employed in providing for his comfort, to spend time to look upon his face. 

As it was, the first intimation she had of it, was when she handed him his chocolate and he waved it away with his hand and said he did not want anything.
 "Why Joseph, not want any chocolate?"
 "No, don't want anything.", said he, with a melancholy shake of the head.
 "Not want anything after working hard in the shop all this morning and walking almost 3 miles to bury old Straikers, that weighed 230 pounds when he was alive, and died sudden too. What ails you Jo?"
 "Nothing."
 "I don't believe that. Don't you feel well? What is it?"
  "Nothing.", and he compressed his lips, as much as to say that is all you'll get out of me. 

Dame Stacey had now made up her mind to be obstinate too and let him wait his own time to be communicative.  She now set herself to work to clear the things from the table, which she did with more haste and with much more cluttering than usual.  Having done this, she took a half knit stocking and sat down in a chair by the fire, knitting away most vigorously.  A long silence now ensued, which was first broken by the husband. 

"I won't be Sexton any longer."
The wife dropped her knitting work in an instant and explained in rather a soothing tone, "You don't say so, Joseph"
 "Yes I do, and I'll let the committee know it tomorrow."
 "Now, don't be rash Joseph.", says the relenting wife, "You don't always have to go so far to bury such corpses as old Straikers,  and besides, business will be better by and by and then you'll be sorry.   You remember that year when the typhus was about and how fast the money came in then?  It won't always be so healthy as it is now, and you may have good times again if you hold on."
"It ain't the burial.  I like that part well enough.  It's the meeting house. "

The wife's countenance fell at this announcement.  The worthy couple had often talked over the various legends connected with the haunted steeple and at each rehearsal with sadder hearts and more fearful forebodings. 

"I don't blame you  Jo, for not wanting to have anything to do with the steeple or the house either, for I don't believe it's all right about the pulpit.  Last Sabbath day, I was looking at the sounding board and if it didn't shake and tremble right over the minister's head, well, I couldn't see, that's all. All this comes of having Socininas and Armenians in the pulpit.  If Parson Morrill goes into our desk again, I expect to see that sounding board come right down on his head, and it would be just upon him."

Having been delivered of this charitable sentiment, she continued, "and there was the time of the bell, you know, that was missed when you went to toll for the funeral of widow Stakely.  It was that very night that the flesh and the gray hair was found in the box, floating in the pond.  Then, there was the old iron worker who drowned just 25 years after the man was killed by falling from the steeple.  I remember it, for I heard the minister tell it when he preached the sermon about Peter's denying his master.  The Sabbath after the new weather cock, he said this was an emblem of St. Peter's old rooster to remind us. "

The loquacious staid was here interrupted by her partner, who was evidently troubled and uneasy at the revival of these melancholy incidents and he desired her to hand him a swift dose of gin toddy from the cupboard.  We must here remind the reader that  Stacey did not belong to any temperance societies, such aides to good resolutions not having been then in existence.

He took a liberal draft from the pewter can and set it on the table.  It was the allusion to the missing clapper of the bell that had most troubled the sexton.  Against the earnest entreaties of his wife, he had consented to supply a new tongue and had secured it in the strongest manner from a danger of removal by mere mortal hands.  Notwithstanding this precaution, he had that afternoon received the appalling intelligence that this too was missing and that the bell of the haunted tower was again dumb. 

It was this that caused his melancholy.  He now felt fully assured that it had been spirited away by supernatural means. Strange fears crept over him and he at once resolved not to hold his office another day.  He had first dreaded to make the disclosure to his wife, but his courage gradually rose as the contents of the can continued to fall.  He not only gave up his purpose of resigning his office, but after repeated libations from the can, he began to boast of his future deeds of daring. 

"What",  says he, "shall Joseph Stacey, a member of the artillery with a good sword and belt, a good red coat and buff leather breeches and gaiters, having charge of two brass six pound field pieces, be afraid to meet a cowardly ghost that steals away bell clappers in the night?"

Not he. "As Sexton of the parish, I have faced death too many times for that."

With this eloquent speech, he drank off the remaining contents of the vessel and avowed his intention to put on his regimentals and watch in the tower that very night.

Let us follow as he finds his way to the door of the tower.  He enters and with a bold yet careful step, he ascends the well known flight of stairs.  He arrives on the level with the gallery.  He hears a sighing noise in the great open church; it is the wind and an occasional gust shakes the windows with doleful clattering. 

He ascends another flight; he is on a level with the ceiling.  Something strikes him with violence on his head.  It is a bat, one of the 10,000 with which the roof is inhabited.  He goes on up, up, up the narrow airway, now this way, now that, among timbers and braces until he arrives almost to the deck of the tower and finds the trap door wide open.

He looks up and sees a strange waving light, like a luminous cloud hanging over the bell deck.  He watches it attentively through the opening and sees it assume various colors and shapes.  Now a bell, now a spade, then a coffin, and again a brass cannon with its muzzle pointed directly at him. 

No wonder that terror seized the poor sexton to his own implements thus turned against him. He now had seen enough and wished to make his escape, but could not withdraw his eyes from the aperture above him.  At length, those appearances passed away and the cloud assumed a shadowy, waving form as when he first saw it.

Stacey now felt much relieved and watched the cloud for new formations.  It soon became more luminous and then a dark line appeared to form, then another,  and spread themselves out into the shape of well formed legs and arms, then a body partly human was affixed, and lastly a head.  If that may be called a head, which was only a glowing ball of fire. 

Our hero (albeit a hero no longer) witnessed this last change with greater terror than the former.  But, when he saw the figure take up the tongueless bell and quietly place it on his head for a covering, the red light streaming down from under it and two flaming holes burning through it, his knees smote together with terror and his hair stood erect. 

He turned from it and commenced a rapid descent over the narrow flight of stairs and to his extreme horror, he heard the bell fiend following after him. 

Stacey was well acquainted with the stairways and devious passages and arrived in good time at the head of the flight, leaving his pursuer far behind.  A thought here struck him, that he could allude his tormentor.  He therefore turned into the gallery of the house and ran behind the sinner's seats to the women's gallery, just as he descended the stairway in the corner, a sudden flash of light filled the house and to his utmost dismay he saw that the fiend had entered the gallery door. 

A rapid glance at the figure served to show him that the size and proportions of his body and limbs were the exact counterpart of those of the man he had buried that very afternoon three miles off.  In each hand, the specter held an iron tongue which Stacy recognized as the very ones which had been stolen.  These he would occasionally strike on the bell which covered his head and which omitted unearthly sounds.

Our fugitive did not tarry to make these observations but they passed through his mind in an instant, while the fiend was tramping through the gallery, crushing the old brass viol under his heavy tread.  And he himself, escaping to the door whose double bolts were soon withdrawn, and he found himself in the open air.  It was a night of Egyptian darkness.  Near and heavy thunders and vivid lightnings were heard and seen, but these were only common occurrences. 

The sexton had taken a direction different than which that led to his own house, whose portals were protected from supernatural beings by the horseshoe talisman. He saw his error and turning to remedy it, witnessed the bell demon emerging from the church door. His two eyes flaming through the sides of the bell with more intensity than ever. 

Stacey found it was now too late to retrace his steps. He ran as if for life and in order to facilitate his speed, he threw off his sword, belt and breastplate.  He knew these trappings were of no use to oppose spectral beings and he discarded them.  He had just passed a small bridge when he heard two successive splashes in the water behind him, by which he knew that his pursuer was also lightening himself for the race. He had thrown the iron clappers into the water and was now in full pursuit.

For sometime, the race was doubtful. They both ran with almost lightening speed, passing the old pine tree and on, on they went until the fugitive turned again suddenly to the left and ran up a long hill,  then called Hog Hill, but by modern refinement known as "swine eminence."  Still the demon followed him, although Stacey kept him a good distance behind and hoped to reach his home and his wife and safety. 

They had now reached the main road and their course was turned towards the cottage.  Hope was now added to the impulsive fear and the sexton exerted himself with all his might.  But his limbs were now weary from exhaustion and his breath grew shorter.  Dreadful were his feelings, as the specter approached him and he heard the stifled demonic laugh behind him. 

He renewed his efforts to escape but the light grew more intense and the laughter more loud.  He even thought he felt the hot breath of the demon on the back of his neck.  He saw now inside his quiet cottage, for which he reproached himself that he had strayed.  He strained to reach it for he saw by the demon light, the protective horseshoe was still over the door which was wide open for his admission. 

But, alas for poor Stacey, his limbs failed him, faintness seized him.  He felt the scalding breath, the laugh became a yell,  and horror of horrors,  he felt a hand grasp him by his shoulders - he shuddered - he awoke. 

The hand that grasped him was his wife's.  She, kind woman, had witnessed the troubled sleep of her husband, who had not left his chair since draining the pewter can.   And thus by shaking him gently by the shoulder,  awoke him from his slumber. 

It was sometime till Joseph could comprehend how he came into his cottage.  The events of the dream seemed real and his present condition seemed a happy vision.  The assistance of his good dame, who at length had understood the whole matter and resolved in the future to discard all superstition and gin toddy. 

A new and larger bell soon swung in the old steeple and Joseph Stacey continued for many years as sexton for the parish and when he was gathered to his Father, the newspapers of that day said of him, that he lived respected and died lamented.