&&000 CANADIAN SCHOOLBOOKS                                                          CA606.TXT
GRADE 6, 1960s
Samples from OISE/UT Toronto by dph 9-10 December 2003
1st edited by dph 20 December 2003
Re-edited 21 June 2005

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=Speck got a job. He worked hard. He got a better job. He found a girl he liked. He worked
harder than ever and got a better job. He married the girl. They moved to a new house. They had
a son, then a daughter, then another son, then another daughter, and finally another son.
They seemed to be one of the nicest families ever, but one day =Speck, when he was sixty-seven
years old, noticed that his youngest son, then seventeen years old, seemed troubled, so =Speck
said to him, "What's the matter with you, boy?"
 I'm lonesome," the boy said.
"Don't be silly," =Speck said. "You're home. I'm here, your mother's here, your brothers and
sisters are here."
"I'm lonesome just the same," =Speck's son said.
"Why?" =Speck said.
"I don't know," the boy said. "I guess I just don't want to be a human being, that's all."
"Well, now isn't that just fine?" =Speck said. "Whether you like it or not, you are a human being,
and there isn't anything else you can be. There isn't anything better to be. I've gone to a lot of
trouble getting here, and I should think you might show a little appreciation."
=Speck's son knew his father was right, but he just couldn't help it, he was lonesome, and he just
didn't like being a human being.
He wanted to be something better, only he didn't know what, or where to go in order to be what
he believed he would rather be.
He stayed home another year, and then, one day, he packed up and went off.
He left a note for his father and mother. It was a fine, intelligent, well-written note. He told them
he hoped they wouldn't be too disappointed in him, but he just had to go off on his own and find
out for himself  if he might not be something better than a human being.
=Speck's son went around the world.
One day he came back and found his father sitting on the front porch.



But it was only a purse the man brought forth. He spoke swiftly in a low tone. Gold coins
glittered in the light streaming out from the open door of the store.
The guard looked over his shoulder and, nodding, took the purse. He motioned his prisoner
toward the store.
"Senor =Moran." =PaulVelasco's voice was husky with emotion. "Move over and drive. Drive
like mad. A telephone message reached the store. The guard dare not let me go. It would mean
his death. But you are someone he can overlook. You may pass if you hurry."
That was all that Senor =Velasco said. No mention of the two passengers in the rear
compartment. No mention of what Tod was to do with them. But =TodMoran understood. He
moved across to the wheel. His hand touched the gear shift. "=Senor," he said, and his voice was
low, "you may count on me."
"Then I shall thank you to my last dying moment."
=Tod  looked straight ahead. He let the clutch into low gear. The car jerked forward. Into second
it moved, into high. It gathered speed as it struck the lane running into open country. The steady
murmur of its motor was like the drumming beat of its driver's heart.
At ten that night =TodMoran reached =LaGuaira. When he drove out upon the wooden wharf, his
eyes sought his ship, moored there with her portholes agleam in the night. Her cargo for
=Venezuela had already been discharged; it lay piled on the dock.
As he sprang out, a small seaman came running down the gangway. "Where's the skipper,
=Toppy?"
"In his cabin, sir. He's worried about you."
=Toppy's eyes opened wide when =Tod unlocked the trunk and ushered out his two passengers.
The woman's eyes were dry. Grief too deep for tears showed on her face. The boy clung to her,
afraid.
"We can take you both to =Panama, =senora. You have friends there?"
She nodded. He hurried them up the gangway.
When they entered the saloon cabin, Captain =Jarvis sprang to his feet.



There was no time to cry out before he struck the water and went under. He heard a muffled
roaring above his head and knew it was the propeller a few feet from him. Then the sound was
gone, as the boat passed on. He thrashed about, trying to disentangle the leader that had become
wrapped around his left wrist.
He knew he had to rise to the surface in a matter of seconds, or he would drown. But his heavy
clothing hampered him, and the leader was kept taut by the fish on the other end. Miraculously,
the pull slackened for a second; the leader slipped off, and then Chip was stroking upward.
He burst above the water at last and gasped for air. Paddling just enough to keep himself afloat,
he breathed heavily to get oxygen back into his tortured lungs. The water was bitterly cold. He
blinked and vigorously shook the stinging salt water out of his eyes. At last he was able to look
around.
Nothing but thick, silent fog everywhere. The =Dipsy-Do, with =BenBurson calmly asleep in the
wheelhouse, had vanished !
Terrified, he listened for the =Dipsy-Do's engine. But he could hear the engines of trollers in
every direction, and they all sounded alike. If he could attract the attention of any one of them, he
would surely be rescued.
"Help ! Help ! " he yelled at the top of his voice.
There was no reply. A boat would have to be nearby for its crew to hear his voice above the noise
of its own motor. He called again and again; there was nothing else to do. No swimmer could last
long in these icy currents; an hour or so at best. Then he would get a cramp and would helplessly
drown. He told himself that he must keep moving, for it was the only way he could keep warm. A
miracle might happen ! Some boat might get off course and come near him. But he knew this was
unlikely. The fleet was headed away from him, for home.
His thoughts went back to the =Dipsy-Do, and =BenBurson. The last time =Chip had seen him,
=Ben had been sleeping soundly. 


"For the great, the beautiful =Rikki-tikki's sake I will stop," said =Darzee. "What is it, Oh Killer
of the terrible =Nag?" "Where is =Nagaina, for the third time?"
"On the rubbish heap by the stables, mourning for =Nag. Great is =Rikki-tikki with the white
teeth."  "Bother my white teeth ! Have you ever heard where she keeps her eggs?"
"In the melon bed, on the end nearest the wall, where the sun strikes nearly all day. She hid them
there three weeks ago."
"And you never thought it worth while to tell me? The end nearest the wall, you said?"
"=Rikki-tikki, you are not going to eat her eggs?"
"Not eat exactly; no. =Darzee, if you have a grain of sense you will fly off to the stables and
pretend that your wing is broken, and let =Nagaina chase you away to this bush. I must get to the
melon bed, and if I went there now she'd see me."
=Darzee was a feather-brained little fellow who could never hold more than one idea at a time in
his head; and just because he knew that =Nagaina's children were born in eggs like his own, he
didn't think at first that it was fair to kill them. But his wife was a sensible bird, and she knew
that cobra's eggs meant young cobras later on; so she flew off from the nest and left =Darzee to
keep the babies warm and continue his song about the death of =Nag. =Darzee was very like a
man in some ways. She fluttered in front of =Nagaina by the rubbish heap, and cried out, "Oh,
my wing is broken ! The boy in the house threw a stone at me and broke it." Then she fluttered
more desperately than ever. =Nagaina lifted up her head and hissed, "You warned =Rikki-tikki
when I, would have killed him. Indeed and truly, you've chosen a bad place to be lame in." And
she moved toward =Darzee's wife, slipping along over the dust.
"The boy broke it with a stone!" shrieked =Darzee's wife.
"Well ! It may be some consolation to you when you're dead to.




have been there in the night. Anyway, you're just a kid. They won't do anything to you. But =Cy
could put me into reform school if he found out I did it. You wouldn't want that, =Michael. You'd
miss your pal. =Cy hates my father. He thinks the wood lot belongs to him along with the cove
he bought. So long, now, and remember-no squealing ! "
=Michael walked a few yards with his head high. He was glad to do something for =Lennie.
=Lennie had called him "pal". But he was, if anything, more frightened. If reform school
threatened =Lennie, it might threaten him. He suddenly felt very old.
For the next few days every knock at the door sent chills down his spine. He was irritable and
absent-minded when =Ma spoke to him. Was the Mountie coming to take him to reform school?
=Ma =Lovey threw many worried glances in his direction.
For the next few days =Michael did his best to avoid the Mountie. He thought the Mountie might
be looking for him, but not looking too hard, not hard enough to come up to Ma's and talk to him
before her.
But the day came when he saw the Mountie and =Scout walking toward him, on the high rocks,
and there was no escape from him. The Mountie had already seen him. =Scout was racing toward
him.
"Hello, =Michael." The Mountie stopped when he reached him.
=Michael said, "Hello, Captain =Mackay ! " He reached down and greeted =Scout. Then he
glanced quickly up the hill. Inside he had an uneasy feeling that =Lennie might be about and
think he was squealing.
"By the way, =Michael," the Mountie put his hand in his pocket and brought out the muffler, "is
this yours?" The Mountie held it out to him. "=Cy found it," he added, eyeing =Michael
shrewdly. =Michael grabbed the gay tartan. He felt  light all over. =Cy wasn't going to do
anything after all ! =Cy didn't want to hurt Ma =Lovey. "You wouldn't want to tell me anything,
would you, =Michael?"
For an instant the temptation to do so was almost more than =Michael could resist. He liked the
Mountie, and he thought the Mountie liked him. But-there was =Lennie. He'd have to tell
=Lennie's.



"Now what," said the cameo-cutter, "did he mean by that?" "I wonder," grunted =Rufus, "I
wonder."
=Tito wondered, too. And =Bimbo, his head at a thoughtful angle, looked as if he had been doing
a heavy piece of pondering. By nightfall the argument had been forgotten. If the smoke had
increased, no one saw it in the dark. Besides, it was =Caesar's birthday and the town was in
holiday mood. =Tito and =Bimbo were among the merry-makers, dodging the charioteers who
shouted at them. A dozen times they almost upset baskets of sweets and jars of Vesuvian wine,
said to be as fiery as the streams inside the volcano, and a dozen times they were cursed and
cuffed. But =Tito never missed his footing. He was thankful for his keen ears and quick
instinct-most thankful of all for =Bimbo.
They visited the uncovered theatre and, though =Tito could not see the faces of the actors, he
could follow the play better than most of the audience, for their attention wandered-they were
distracted by the scenery, the costumes, the by play, even by themselves-while Tito's whole
attention was centred in what he heard. Then to the city walls, where the people of =Pompeii
watched a mock naval battle in which the city was attacked by the sea and saved after thousands
of flaming arrows had been exchanged and countless colored torches had been burned. Though
the thrill of flaring ships and lighted skies was lost to =Tito, the shouts and cheers excited him as
much as any and he cried out with the loudest of them.
The next morning there were two of the beloved raisin and sugar cakes for his breakfast. =Bimbo
was unusually active and thumped his bit of a tail until Tito was afraid he would wear it out. The
boy could not imagine whether =Bimbo was urging him to some sort of game or was trying to
tell something. After a while, he ceased to notice =Bimbo. He felt drowsy. Last night's late hours
had tired lim. Besides, there was a heavy mist in the air-no, a thick fog rather than a misty fog
that got into his throat and scraped it and made him cough. He walked as far as the marine gate to
get a breath of the sea. But the blanket of haze had spread all over the bay and even the salt air
seemed smoky.

When the water-clock marks the hour in the great bell-tower in =Peking, the bell's voice of liquid
thunder cries: =Ko-Ngai, =Ko-Ngai, =Ko-Ngai. All the gargoyles that decorate the green roofs of
the temple shiver, and the paper lanterns and the coils of herbs in the shops tremble. The sleepy
blue flies swarm up in the marketplace, hang still for a moment in the air, then settle once more
on the melons until the next thunderous =Ko-Ngai, =Ko-Ngai frightens them again. And they do
this each day, as they have ever since the first stupendous sound rolled over the city more than
five hundred years ago. Children hearing the bell ask their mothers about it and why it cries
=Ko-Ngai instead of some other sound more like the little brass bells in the family shrines. And
this is the story they are told, just as it was told to their mothers when they were children.
Many years ago, when the =Ming Emperor =Yung-Lo ruled over =China, he commanded his
chief minister =Kuan-Yu to build a bell for the city of such size and beauty of tone that it would
be heard for a hundred.. He ordered that the voice of the bell should be sweetened with brass,
deepened with gold, and made sibilant with silver. Moreover, over, the outside of the bell should
be decorated with the symbols of his majesty and the sayings from the sacred books.
In obedience to his commands, =Kuan-Yu assembled a company of master moulders, renowned
bellsmiths with great knowledge of alloys. He sent for musicians who could detect a flaw even in
the note of a bird's song.
For many weeks they labored, carefully weighing and measuring materials, preparing the moulds,
and laying wood for a fire beneath the monstrous melting pot. They labored like giants,
neglecting rest and sleep in order that the Emperor's wish might be fulfilled as speedily as
possible.



According to the old saying, "Where there is smoke there is fire" ; and likewise, where there are
tales of big fish there is bound to be one. That's what I say now, but a week ago I wouldn't have
believed it.
My third summer in the =Arkansas =Ozarks was about to end, and I was still hearing stories of a
big bass that had never been caught. I had first heard of him two years before, when I had only
begun to
fall in love with the =BigBuffalo River, particularly that part of it just above the forks in
=Newton County, =Arkansas. That day I had been working slowly downstream, doing more
exploring than fishing, when I came to a spring shaded by a giant chinquapin. I drank niy fill, and
lay down in the shade to rest.
While I was wondering how many bushels of chinquapins such a tree would bear, I heard a
squirrel scolding something on the rocky bluff across the river. I spotted the squirrel in a scrubby
pine, and then, lower down, I saw a man sitting in a niche of rock. He had a gun held ready, and
he was still as the cliff itself.
The only sure sign that the fellow was not dead or sleeping was the peering attitude of his head.
He was leaning forward and staring into the river below him. Apparently he had not heard the
squirrel, though it was only about ten steps above and behind him.
I whistled. The man looked at me, and I pointed to the squirrel.  He turned his head toward where
I pointed, then he casually lifted the gun and shot the squirrel. The report of the gun, rebounding
from the bluff, was deafening. The squirrel came tumbling down so near the man that he had
only to get to his feet to pick it up.
Then he climbed easily up the bluff and entered the thick, scrubby growth of cedar and pine on
the top. A few minutes later he appeared on the spring path and dropped the squirrel at my feet.

=Jean sighed.
"Perhaps I should get rid of my big black dog," he said. "Tomorrow I will take him back to the
=Indians."
So next day =Jean hitched his horse to the cart and waited until he saw =AndreDrouillard at work
in his garden. Then he whistled loudly toward the yard, made a great show of helping his dog
climb up between the wheels and drove past =Andre's house with one arm curved out in a bow,
as if it were around the dog's neck.
"=Aurevoir, =Andre ! " he called. Then he looked at the empty half of the seat. "Bark goodbye to
=AndreDrouillard, fellow, for you are leaving here forever."
=Jean drove out to the =Indian village and spent the day with his friends, eating and talking. It
seemed a bad waste of time when there was so much to be done on the farm, but on the other
hand, it was worth idling all day in order to end the big black dog matter.
Dusk was falling as he rounded the curve near his home. He saw the shadowy figure of =Andre
=Drouillard waiting for him near his gate. A feeling of foreboding came over =Jean.
"What is it?" he asked his neighbour. "Do you have some bad news for me?"
"It's about your big black dog," said =Andre. "He has come back home. Indeed he beat you by an
hour. It was that long ago I saw him running down the road to your house with his big red tongue
hanging out of his mouth and lifting one paw this way and another paw that way.
=Jean was filled with rage. For a twist of tobacco, he would have
struck =Andre with his horsewhip.
=Andre Drouillard," he shouted, "you are a liar! I just left the
big black dog with the =Indians. They have tied him up."
=Andre sneered.
"A liar am I?" We shall see who is the liar. Wait until the others
see your big black dog running around again."
So =Jean might as well have accused =Andre of being a chicken thief


 "That's what He means."
"What do you want?" =Eduardo shouted back. "Am I to blame because there are families that
can't earn a living? The cane crop is poor this year."
=Eduardo's anger was something to be avoided quickly; it was well known. "No, Elephant, dear,
you are not to blame," said =Ramoncito. "We don't say you are."
"Then shut up, the two of you ! "
"I just think," said =Lazaro in the clear, sweet voice, "it's a shame to take gifts to rich kids like us
when it's the poor kids that need them."
"Me, too. My father is giving me a bicycle," added =Ramoncito. "What do I want with a domino
set and a silly card game that's supposed to teach me how to spell?"
"Father =Miguel told us what to do," said =Eduardo grimly, "and we're going to do it."
But not a hundred yards farther on a small boy of seven or eight, in a shirt made of secondhand
cheesecloth washed white for the holiday, ran excitedly into the street, crying, "Oh, Kings, Kings
! We live here, senores, at Number =22! "
=Eduardo reined in so sharply that he hurt his mare's dainty mouth. Leaning down from his
saddle, he bellowed in a voice that frightened the boy nearly out of his senses: "What's your
name? Is there light in your house so we can see? Then take us there. Monkey, gallop back and
get that girl that was howling!"
In the one-room house at Number =22, where an entire family slept on the clay floor and the only
light was that from a small candle, they handed out half a dozen packages, =Eduardo angry,
=Ramoncito scared but determined, and Lazaro struggling to control the giggle that always
bothered him at the wrong moment. The thanks of the little boy and girl shamed them so terribly
that they got away quickly, shutting the rickety door behind them with a slam. They gathered
around the horses.
"Well, anyhow," said =Eduardo, "those two won't bawl all night.


"Look, you want to sell that horse?" =Michael said.
"Maybe, =Joey said. "I don't know. Worth a hundred dollars. Easy." "I'll give you twenty-five,"
=Michael said.
They settled at fifty. =Joey went out and took off the saddle and bridle and stored them in
=Michael's barn. He stood for a moment running his hand along the buckskin's back. He had
raised it from a colt, kept it in his house through the first winter, broken it. Up at =Quesnel and at
=Ashcroft it had won all the cowboy races. Everybody knew =Billy, =JoeyJoseph's horse. But
=Joey wanted to buy an automobile. He could get one for fifty dollars at =Lillouet, a =1929 Ford.
It would run. =Joey pictured himself driving into town with his wife and his mother in the back
seat. Certainly a man must have an automobile.
He walked down the road towards the reservation, but stopped to look back at =Billy. The
buckskin's ears were up. He whinnied to =Joey, but =Joey turned around and walked on as fast as
he could in his high-heeled boots.
That night =Billy jumped the corral fence and was at the door of =Joey's cabin in the morning.
=Joey rode him up to Michael's ranch, bareback, and tied him to the porch. =Michael put the
buckskin in a box stall, but in the night he kicked it down and =Joey found him at his door again
next day. Again =Joey rode him up bareback and handed him over to =Michael. Tonight, he said,
he was going to take the bus down to =Lillouet and get his car. He told =Michael to tie =Billy up
better. =Michael tied him up better, but in the night he broke the halter and started down the hill.
Next morning early =Joey rode him up to =Michael's place bareback. No one was up at the ranch
yet. =Joey went to the stable and got his saddle and bridle and put them on =Billy. He went into
the kitchen and left something on the table. He mounted =Billy and galloped down the hill. When
=Michael got up, he found his fifty dollars in crumpled bills on the kitchen table.
That is why =JoeyJoseph never did get his automobile.


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