OLD-TIME SCHOOLS AND SCHOOL-BOOKS - online book

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	Beginnings 7 15 foote; two convenient windows in the lower room & one in the chamber." The watch house was " a leanto set at the back of. the chimney sixe foote wide" and it projected beyond the corner of i the house on either side two and one-half feet. It had a fireplace and it had " open windowes so that the watch might have an aspect 4 severall wayes." The building stood in the centre of the village on the borders of the parish green near the meeting house. In the schoolroom the scholars labored dur-


	Schoolhouse erected in 1649 at Dedham, Mass.
	ing the day, and in the lean-to a sentinel watched from the windows during the night. The master was permitted to keep the school in his own home in extreme weather; and during the heat of summer he might use the meeting-house, provided he kept it clean and mended all the windows that his boys broke. For a hundred years we find frequent mention of keeping schools in the meeting-houses. Those early churches were never invested with the religious sane-