There is a school-
house near,--a very airy, empty shed; but even this is an
improvement, for usually the school is held in the church.
The churches vary from log-huts to those like Shepherd's,
and the schools from nothing to this little house that sits
demurely on the county line. It is a tiny plank-house, perhaps
ten by twenty, and has within a double row of rough unplaned
benches, resting mostly on legs, sometimes on boxes. Oppo-
site the door is a square home-made desk. In one corner are
the ruins of a stove, and in the other a dim blackboard. It
is the cheerfulest schoolhouse I have seen in Dougherty, save in
town. Back of the schoolhouse is a lodgehouse two stories
high and not quite finished. Societies meet there,--societies
"to care for the sick and bury the dead"; and these societies
grow and flourish.
We had come to the boundaries of Dougherty, and were
about to turn west along the county-line, when all these sights
were pointed out to us by a kindly old man, black, white-
haired, and seventy. Forty-five years he had lived here, and
now supports himself and his old wife by the help of the steer
tethered yonder and the charity of his black neighbors.
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