My Days by R. K. Narayan Page B

giggling, I felt relieved at the prompt manner in which Anweruddin had obeyed me. Now he came back from his seat holding up the right book. I didn’t ask for any explanation of his conduct; it was not necessary. I met his challenge by briskly taking the book, turning to page seventy, and saying, “Now read aloud to the class, face the class.” Still with a leer, he took the book, but instead of reading said, “Please let me go out,” and held up his forefinger, which indicates from time immemorial that one wants to be let out for “Number One.” I had done the same thing at Lutheran Mission whenever I wished to leave the classroom; and the worst teacher in the world cannot reject that request. I let him go. He walked off majestically, but before the class could continue in this mood of entertainment, I read out, “‘So all day long the noise of battle roll’d/. . . until King Arthur’s table . . .’” et cetera et cetera. A few boys listened to my reading, a few talked among themselves. I raised the pitch of my voice and, “This poem by Tennyson . . .” Two more boys stood in their seats holding up their forefingers. “Yes,” I said, and announced, “Whoever wishes to go out, may go, but don’t disturb the other classes.” Half the class walked out and never came back, and I read on about twenty lines, wondering in what manner I should explain their meaning to whoever cared to stay. They didn’t seem to care for Tennyson or anyone, but were chatting among themselves. Luckily for me the bell rang, and thus concluded my first experience of teaching. It was also perhaps the last.
    Soon I got into trouble with the headmaster. He sent me next to a fifth form to handle a physics class. When I pleaded that I was a history man, he brushed aside my objection and said that since the physics teacher was absent, I should take on his duties and keep the class engaged. It sounded silly to me, but I obeyed him. The fifth-form juniors were a more disorderly crowd than the sixth-form boys whom I had taught first. The boys kept pouncing on each other, grabbing, flinging their caps in the air, shouting challenges, and denouncing one another; it looked less like a classroom, more like a festival crowd on rampage. I wondered if the physics teacher purposely kept away rather than deal with these young devils. I resented the headmaster’s devilry in sending me into this confusion on my very first day.
    I hammered the table with my fist several times and shouted, “Silence, silence!” That produced silence for a brief second while the boys paused to stare at the teacher with wonder and contempt. Then they resumed the hubbub, which rose like an ocean’s roar, fifty boys jabbering away at different pitches. I watched them for a little while and said, “You must all write a composition now, ten lines on how you spent your last holiday, now out with your notebooks and pencils, come on.” A handful displayed some response, and took out their notebooks and turned the pages and bit their pencil points, but many others, watching these conformists with interest, made no move to start writing. I repeated the theme of the composition and then added, “Whoever has finished the writing may show it to me and go.” This was a good incentive as presently they all came over to my table and piled their notebooks on it. I felt smothered, to read fifty compositions! I quickly added, “Take away your notebooks and leave. Show them to me later.” “When?” someone asked, and before I could muster an answer they left their notebooks on the table and fled like a flock of released birds. I painstakingly collected the notebooks and left them in the custody of the school clerk at the administrative office. I spent the rest of the day in the room of a colleague who was trying to guide me in this wilderness. We went for a walk in