o say, she had hardly spoken these words when the house began
to shake! They all knew too well what it meant, that frightful rocking
and rumbling; the ground was opening under their feet!

Kyzie, though she may have feared it vaguely all along, was taken
entirely by surprise, and did--what do you think? As quick as a flash,
without waiting for a second thought, she turned and jumped out of the
window!

Next moment, remembering the children, she screamed for them to follow
her, and they poured out of the house, some by the window, some by the
door, all shrieking like mad.

It was a wild scene,--the frantic teacher, the terrified children,--and
Kyzie will never cease to blush every time she recalls it. For there was
no earthquake after all! It was only the new "colonel" and his men
blasting a rock in the mine!

Of course this escapade of the young teacher amused the people of Castle
Cliff immensely. They called it "the little schoolma'am's earthquake";
and the little schoolma'am heard of it and almost wished it had been a
real earthquake and had swallowed her up.

"Oh, Papa Dunlee! Oh, Mamma Dunlee!" she cried, her cheeks crimson, her
eyelids swollen from weeping. "I keep finding out that I'm not half so
much of a girl as I thought I was! What does make me do such ridiculous
things?"

"You are only very young, you dear child," replied her parents.

They pitied her sincerely and did their best to console her. But they
were wise people, and perhaps they knew that their eldest daughter
needed to be humbled just a little. It was hard, very hard, yet
sometimes it is the hard things which do us most good.

"O mamma, don't ask me to go down to dinner. I can't, I can't!"

"No indeed, darling, your dinner shall be sent up to you. What would you
like?"

"No matter what, mamma--I don't care for eating. I can't ever hold up my
head any more. And as for going into that school again, I never, never,
never will do it."

"I think you will, my daughter," said Mr. Dunlee, quietly. "I think

William Babington Maxwell (18661938) was a British novelist. He was a son of novelist Mary Elizabeth Braddon. Though nearly 50 years old at the outbreak of the First World War, he was accepted as a lieutenant in the Royal Fusiliers and served in France until 1917.

Cyrus Townsend Brady (December 20, 1861 January 24, 1920) was a journalist, historian and adventure writer. His most well-known work is Indian Fights and Fighters. He was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, and graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1883. He was also a deacon in the Episcopal church. His first wife was Clarissa Guthrie, who died in 1890. His second wife was Mary Barrett.

Rebecca Sophia Clarke (1833-1906), also known as Sophie May, was an American author of childrens fiction. Using her nieces and nephews as inspiration, she wrote realistic stories about children. She wrote 45 books between 1860 and 1903. The most popular being the Little Prudy books. She lived most of her life in her native town of Norridgewock, Maine, where she lived out her life with her sister, who was also a successful author.