WHAT A SUMMER BROUGHT FORTH.
BY EMMA A. OPPER,
AUTHOR OF "SUSANNE," "BARBARA AND DILL,"
ETC., ETC., ETC.
CHAPTER XVIII.
IN THE DEPTHS OF WOE.
Collin stood staring at Trudy. She had not loosened her clinching hold for an instant, and, before he had realized it, the last warning had been shouted, the plank had been withdrawn, and the Sandy Hook was moving off. And he stood on the pier.
Many emotions were rife in his good-looking, boyish face, but anger was chief among them.
"Trudy," he said, sharply, "what are you doing? What have you done?"
He looked after the moving boat.
Trudy tried to stop her shower of tears, and Collin could but look at her. It was a rare thing to see Trudy cry, and it was on his account she was crying.
"Well, what's the matter?" he demanded, gruffly enough. "You've got what you wanted, haven't you? What are you going to do now? What are you going to do with me? Tell me that!"
With a reckless laugh, Collin turned into the freight-office and threw himself down on a box in an unnoticed corner. And Trudy followed her prisoner.
"I saw you from up the beach, Collin," she said, "and I couldn't let you run away! How could I? That would have been the worst! How could you have wanted to, Collin?"
"The worst! Worse than what?" snapped Collin. His head hung in his hands, and his eyes were sullenly lowered. "The worst has happened. You'd see things plain enough if you stood in my place, Trudy, and you'd feel! Do you want me to tell you just how things stand?" Collin asked, fiercely.
"You know only too well! I've lost my place because I was a fool, and worse than a fool! That Grand View business is all over town. More than one fellow has said 'Grand View' to me and snickered. It's got around worse than the thing was, too! Gus Morey told me he heard we'd started to steal the best horse and buggy in Conover's stables and got snapped up at Buxton. I've lost my place, and do you think I can get another, with a thing of that sort hanging over my head? I guess not!
"I'll tell you the truth, Trudy," continued Collin. "I have tried two or three places—and it was for your sake I did it—before I made up my mind to clear out. I'd have done anything. I tried to get something to do at the Riggs House; and I went up to the sawmill and the canning factory; and I got the same answer everywhere. They'd all heard the story, and they said they didn't want a boy with a recommendation of that kind.
"Dolph Freeman's all right; it's all smooth enough for him," said Collin, grinding his heel. "I was bad enough, but I didn't do anything sneaking mean, the way he did. But he isn't going to suffer for it; not a bit. His father's got money, and Dolph can go on loafing around town and getting other fellows into trouble. He'll never get come up with.
"Well, I know it was my own fault, anyhow. Nobody could have got me into any trouble if I'd done the right way. But it's done, and look at me now. The whole town is down on me. And mother," said Collin, grimly—"mother's the worst! This thing has soured her till she hasn't a kind word or thought for me. She said she ought to turn me out of the house; that I was a torment and a disgrace to her, and she ought not to put up with me. I believe she'd be glad to be rid of me."
"Collin!" exclaimed Trudy, who was far from believing that.
"What else can I think? I do believe it! And if she thinks that way now, what will she think when she reads the note I left for her? I couldn't face her, and tell her I'd taken that money, but she knows it by this time. And I'd like to know how I'm going to see her after that! She won't believe I meant to put it back; she won't believe anything; she's down on me, and I can't stand it!
"I can't stay here with everybody against me and no way to turn. The best thing I can do, and the only thing, is to take myself off; and I'm going to do it. I don't know what'll happen to me, nor what'll become of me. But I'm going. You've stopped me this time, whatever you did it for. I'm not worth your worrying, Trudy; I'll tell you that. But I'll go yet."
Trudy stood looking at her captive in more hopelessness than she would admit to herself. She knew that this, Collin's first serious trouble, had overwhelmed him till he had despaired.
She could see plainly enough the weakness of his arguments, and she foresaw the misery into which he was ready and anxious, in his despondency, to plunge.
But how to make him see it? That was another matter, and one which staggered the faithful, anxious girl. To run away! What folly, and what sure ruin! But, if Collin would not see that hard truth?
Trudy's heart sank. She had gained her point, for once; but beyond that, which was little, would she prevail? Collin was young and headstrong and in the depths of woe, and what would, in spite of her, be the outcome, Trudy feared to think.
"Collin—Collin!" she was beginning, entreatingly, when hurrying steps on the pier-planks made her look up.
Rosalie Scott was coming towards them at a quick trot, looking this way and that, searchingly, till she saw Trudy.
"Well," she cried. "If I ever! What a girl you are! What were you after? If I ever saw such a runner! I knew you could row, and now I know you can run. I thought you'd seen a ghost, or something worse. You'd have run the other way, though. Anyhow," said Rosalie, dropping down on a second box to get her breath, "I thought I'd see what it was, and I didn't think you'd mind, if I did."
She looked from Trudy to Collin, with undisguised wonder. Collin only stared at her. Trudy smiled, but with quivering lips, and traces of her tears were plain.
"Why-y," Rosalie stammered. "Something's the matter!"
She was the picture of amazement and curiosity, and Collin could not help smiling. He was dazzled, too, by the gay apparition in the yellow-ribboned dress, the big, daisy-trimmed hat and the patent-leather shoes.
Neither he nor Trudy denied that something was the matter. Neither spoke.
"Well," said Rosalie, with the good-nature which was a part of her, though half-pouting, "I'm intruding, I suppose. I didn't think it was anything private, or—solemn."
Her bright eyes turned from one to the other, a funny twinkle in them.
Trudy could not speak, but Collin roused himself.
"I don't know what we're staying here for," he said, shortly. "I'd got started to take the boat, but Trudy stopped me. That's what she was running for. The boat's gone, and we'd better go. I don't know what Trudy's going to do with me now. Maybe she knows."
He got up, his bundle sagging from a nerveless hand and his face dull, and they turned up the pier.
"You are in trouble," said Rosalie, soberly. "I'm sorry I came. That's the way I always do, you know. I do things before I think. And I'm sorry for you."
Collin made a husky sound of acknowledgment. To Trudy, he muttered:
"I don't know where I'm going. I won't go home—I daren't."
And Trudy answered:
"Go to the Browns with me, then, Collin?"
But he shook his head.
CHAPTER XIX.
MRS. SCOTT'S IDEA.
Softly humming, Rosalie walked a little apart and pretended to find great interest in the still water, the scattering row-boats and the few belated bathers along the shore.
For want of other occupation she took off her hat and swung it till the daisy-wreath was in peril. Trudy and Collin walked in silence.
But the active brain of Miss Rosalie Scott was by no means idle. She hummed, but she smiled, too; she swung her hat, but she had a thoughtful frown—not only that, a determined one.
Trudy was destined to see yet another remarkable instance of the impulsiveness without which Rosalie Scott would not have been Rosalie Scott, and which worked for good or ill as the case happened.
When they had covered the pier and had passed up the street as far as the Bellevue Hotel, had reached its broad entrance, she suddenly turned.
"Come in for a minute," she said—"both of you. Oh, don't look so scared—just for a minute! Trudy Carr has promised me a visit for a long time, anyhow, and—well, you'll have to come. Come!"
Rosalie was in earnest. She took them each by the hand and pulled them up the wide piazza steps, reiterating her commands. And Collin Spencer, who had had no notion of complying, found himself, before he could get his breath back, standing in one of the fine great parlors of the Bellevue Hotel, gaping in confusion at a long mirror and blue plush chairs.
"There, now, sit down," said Rosalie. She ran to a small knob in the wall and pressed it, and to the brass-buttoned boy who appeared said, "Please ask Mrs. Scott to come here."
She went to the door when he had gone, and stood with her back against it.
"You shan't get away. Sit down, I say. It's only a notion of mine, that's all. I know you won't care. Maybe it can't do any good, but it won't do any harm. I know something is the matter, and I—I'd like to have my mother hear about it. If you knew her! She's so good to everybody, and always does just the right thing, too. I've known her to help so many people and think nothing of it. That's the way she's made. I don't know what's the matter, but I know you got me out of an awful fix, Trudy Carr, and that my mother knows it, too, and—"
The door was pushed open.
"Why, Rosalie," said the newcomer, "your father and Uncle Angus are here. I thought you were to meet them at the boat?"
"I didn't, mamma," Rosalie answered. "This is Trudy Carr again, and—"
"Collin Spencer," added Trudy.
And Rosalie's mother, who had a face of sweet refinement, with clear gray eyes, and wore a handsome dark gown with billowy-lace falling from neck and sleeves, and had a pleasant voice and smile—Rosalie's mother shook hands with Trudy Carr and Collin Spencer, and sat down near them. And Rosalie brought a stool and perched herself between them.
"Now," she said, imploringly—"now do!"
Collin was getting every moment stiffer and redder. He felt like an intruder, and, despite these softening influences, made up his mind not to say a word. It was nobody's business but his. It was his own miserable affair. He neither asked help nor wanted it.
How, then, did the story get itself told? Collin supposed that Trudy must have started it, for he did not.
He sat bewildered by all this strange and unwelcome situation, while slowly, drawn out by questions and gentle comments, his trouble was told.
His first weak mistake, the disaster at Buxton, Trudy's attempt at righting matters and her failure, and all the dreary facts of the present condition of things. By degrees, the lady who sat with thoughtfully-lowered eyes and knit brows heard it all.
"Don't think it was my idea to tell you, ma'am," Collin ended, the blood mounting in his sturdy face.
"Doesn't mamma know that?" Rosalie cried, impatiently.
She had got her way, and she was highly satisfied.
"And don't think I'm asking you to do anything for me," Collin proudly persisted. "I don't know what you could do; I don't expect anything—I didn't want to come in."
"And she knows all that, too," said Rosalie, knocking down his protests like tenpins.
Her mother sat thinking.
"I wish I knew what to say," she said, sincerely, "or what to do. I should be glad to do something, believe me. I am deeply sorry for you, my boy. It seems to me that your case is a peculiarly hard one. I am glad I have heard your story, for I can give you my sympathy, if nothing more. You made a mistake; you were thoughtless and weak; yes, you did wrong. But—I can't help saying it—it seems to me that your punishment is too great. You have escaped nothing; the worst has come. The worst fault was not yours, and yet you are suffering most. At least, don't be ashamed of having told me," said Mrs. Scott, that ready sympathy of which her face spoke strongly roused.
"I wish I could help you," she declared. "Not only does your case deserve it, but Trudy Carr here"—she smiled brightly. "I feel as though I knew Trudy Carr. I have heard nothing but items concerning her since Rosalie first saw her. And that little adventure on the bay is not to be forgotten. Yes, I would help you gladly."
"There's only one way for me," said Collin. "If I could go back there to work, and show Mr. Conover what I can be and do, there'd be some chance for me; I could 'live it down.' But that's gone up."
"That is the only way, or the best by far," was Mrs. Scott's quiet agreement. "I wish it might be. I had an idea about it—I wonder—I want to do what I can. I might send a note to Mr. Conover." And then she added, with an impulsiveness much like Rosalie's own, "I will go myself. We'll go together. I have an idea, as I said. Come, it will do no harm to try."
Collin was getting used to bewilderments, to being hustled and managed like a baby instead of a tall, seventeen-year-old boy. One thing—he had not been remarkably successful at managing himself.
And when, ten minutes later, he stood with Mrs. Scott, her bright young daughter and Trudy in Mr. Conover's livery-stable, he kept a stiff upper lip and waited for what should come.
Mr. Conover came forward to meet the oddly-assorted four. For Collin Spencer he had only unsmiling surprise, and his glance at Trudy was puzzled. But he knew by sight the lady from the Bellevue Hotel, and he raised his hat with an inquiring face, and drew forward the only chair the stable boasted. Accepting it, Rosalie's mother wasted no time in getting to the point, and wasted no words.
"First, Mr. Conover," she began, "I must apologize for being an interferer, for that is what I am. My business concerns this boy. I have just now heard his story from the beginning."
"About the trick he played me?" said Mr. Conover, half doubting the interest of such a lady in such a case.
"That exactly; all about his foolish escapade and the result of it. About the effort of this little girl, Trudy Carr, to save him, and about the discovery and discharge. And, Mr. Conover, I want to ask nothing less than that you take the boy back into your service on a month's trial. I feel convinced that the consequences of his error are almost more than he deserves, and perhaps more than you realize, Mr. Conover. He was led into it by a bad companion, whom he has certainly dropped. First impressions go for something. I cannot but believe the boy himself is steady and trustworthy. And then the anxiety of this girl, who seems to have been such a friend to him—"
Mrs. Scott's voice was a little unsteady.
"And his position now is pitiable. The story has spread through the town in exaggerated forms. He has tried to get work elsewhere and on that account failed. I cannot see what is before the boy unless you can forgive and take him back, for it is here only, it seems both to him and to me, that he can redeem himself. I ask you to take him on a month's trial, and I wish to give bonds for his good behavior. I am Mrs. John Scott."
This, then, was Mrs. Scott's idea of which she had spoken. Surely a convincing one. She opened her purse, took five ten-dollar bills therefrom and handed them to the young livery-stable keeper.
Mr. Conover looked at her in astonishment, slowly rubbing his smooth-shaven head.
"I—Mrs. Scott," he said, with earnestness, "I don't want to take the money. I begin to see how it is; I see you're right. To tell the truth, I was afraid I'd been a little hard on the boy. I knew that young cur of a Freeman was to blame for it, and I was sorry on the girl's account and all; but I was hasty, I suppose. I shouldn't have done anything, though, about taking him back; but now that you've made me see it plainer yet, and if he's in such a bad fix as all that, why, I'll give him another chance," said the young man. "But never mind the money; I'll try him."
"Keep it," Mrs. Scott answered, "and if he does not do his best, it is forfeited. I think he will."
Poor Collin! Perhaps in all the course of his troubles he had known no sharper moment than that. He looked around the group. Several of the stable-hands had gathered, Sim Miles, with a broadly smiling face, being among them.
The tears sprung to Collin's honest blue eyes. Nor was he ashamed of them.
"I will do my best," was all he could say.
"All right; come around to-morrow, Spencer," said Mr. Conover, bluffly, seeing that the scene threatened to be rather a moving one, and he went back to his business.
CHAPTER XX.
AN IMPORTANT LETTER.
His visitors turned away.
Rosalie, whose triumph was supreme, could not wholly control herself. She gave an occasional hop as they went.
Trudy's face shone, and her eyes were starry. As for Collin, he felt that silence was best.
"Go and tell your mother, Collin," Trudy whispered. "You won't be afraid to see her now."
"I'm going there," Collin answered—they stood at the corner of his street. "I'll go; and all I can say is, that I shan't ever forget what you've all done for me. You've saved me—that's what. I don't know what would have become of me. And you'll never be sorry for it."
And, choking somewhat, Collin Spencer turned down the street to his mother's home.
It seemed to Trudy that it was the strangest piece of good fortune in the world which had taken place. After all the dark worry her true young heart had known, she could hardly believe it. And yet a stranger thing was to happen then and there.
As they walked on, Trudy's eyes turned down the street and fixed themselves upon a figure coming rapidly towards them, or as rapidly as was possible. The figure, which was small and bent in the shoulders, limped. Rosalie saw it at the same instant.
"See! who is that?" she asked, in wonder.
"It's Ichabod," said Trudy—"why, it's Ichabod! And I left him sick abed. Whatever is the matter?"
Ichabod came hurriedly limping on. It became plain that he had seen them and was hastening to reach them; and Trudy ran forward.
"Why, Ichabod," she cried, in remonstrance, "if you didn't get up! Were you able? No; see how tired you are!"
Certainly Ichabod was. He leaned against the fence a minute, and then, giving it up, sat down on the grass beside it, pulling off his old hat and fanning himself.
Something else dawned upon Trudy. Ichabod was excited. That indeed seemed to be the greater cause of his exhaustion, for he sat blinking up at Trudy in a peculiar manner and tried vainly to speak.
Mrs. Scott and Rosalie had come up, and paused. Too courteous to smile, they looked their perplexity.
"What is the matter, Ichabod?" said Trudy, again. She began to feel some alarm. "What made you get up? What have you been doing?"
Ichabod, slowly and painfully, rose to his feet.
"I was calc'lating to git up. Didn't I say to ye I was? Didn't I say I was goin' to git up soon as ever I could? And what fer did I say? Why, I was goin' to ask a favor o' Mr. Doolittle—jest a leetle favor."
"Oh!" said Trudy, remembering.
She had forgotten the old man's queer talk about the box in the closet, and the papers in the box, and his odd eagerness concerning them.
"Seein' you—" continued the old man. "Well, I couldn't stan' it another minute arter that. I jest got up. I was kind o' weak in my legs to the fust, but I got thar. I got to Mr. Doolittle's office, and thar he was settin'. He knows me, Mr. Doolittle does, and I wan't afraid to ask that leetle favor of him."
Ichabod had got back his breath and his composure now. He covered his bald head with his hat, planted himself against the fence, his little, twinkling eyes fixed on Trudy with an intense gaze, and continued his story:
"Thar he set. And I walked in and I says to him, 'Air ye willin' to do sump'n fer me, Mr. Doolittle?' And says he, 'Yes I be, Ichabod.' And says I, 'It ain't goin' to take but jest a minute, Mr. Doolittle.' And says he, 'Go ahead, Ichabod.'
"Says I, 'I was lookin' in the closet of the garret bed-room up to Mrs. Spencer's house, whar I've been stayin', and I found a leetle box, shoved 'way back, as though it wan't no use, anyhow. And, kind o' hankerin' to know what 'twas, I broke it open. And thar was papers in it,' says I— 'and letters.
"'I can't read none myself,' says I— 'only jest a leetle; but I looked over them letters, and I worked and I figured, and I studied out a leetle here and a leetle thar, till I begun to suspicion sump'n. Sump'n awful quare—awful quare! And this here one,' says I, 'I've fetched down to ye, fer ye to jest look at. And if there ain't nothin' in it,' says I, 'why, all right, and thank ye fer yer trouble. And if thar is sump'n—' says I.
"And I handed him over that thar ole letter, and then I set still, and I had my ole eyes glued right onto his face, and I ketched my breath and I waited.
"'Well, I'll see, Ichabod,' says he. 'Ole letters are quare things, Ichabod,' says he; 'but I'll look at it.'
"And he looked. He looked it up and down two er three times, and then he read it clean through two er three times more. And then he took up his spectacles off'n the table, and he read it ag'in, and he looked jest as astonished as if he'd seen a ghost.
"Says he, 'I can't make it out. Reuben Wallace has been dead a year, and this is the fust breath o' evidence that he left any money, although everybody in this town has been clean up a stump about his not leavin' any. But this letter—dated two months afore he died,' says he, 'is from a coal merchant in New York, findin' that in the printin' up top o' the letter. And it makes reference to the sum o' forty thousand dollars invested by Reuben Wallace in his business. There's more in it,' says he; 'but that's the principal thing.'
"And he got up and stood thar, shakin' his head and lookin' as if a feather'd knock him down. And, says he, 'if this means anything at all, Ichabod, it means an awful lot! It means that Reuben Wallace was worth forty thousand dollars at the time of his death, and that that forty thousand dollars was invested with this New York coal merchant. Thar's one thing fer us to do, Ichabod,' says he, 'and that's to write to this man in New York and see what's the meanin' of all this 'ere! That's a simple thing, and I'll do it,' says he. 'I'll do it, this minute.' And down he sot and begun to write; and when he'd got done with that air old letter, I put it back into my pocket ag'in.
"And," pursued Ichabod, whose voice had grown shrill as ever, in excitement, "I come away and I set to lookin' ye up, to tell ye every word Mr. Doolittle said—every word. And I've been pretty nigh all over the town, and was jest thinkin' o' startin' up thar to the Browns, when I see ye."
Ichabod mopped his face and head with his handkerchief.
Trudy stood still, in a dazed condition, which allowed her neither to move nor speak; but Mrs. Scott, who had listened with close attention, though finding it hard to understand a tale which, for her, had begun in the middle, asked, with practical interest:
"And what is the name of the coal merchant in whose hands this money is placed?"
"Angus Pritchard," replied Ichabod, nodding his head several times.
He drew the letter from his pocket.
"Here 'tis, down to the bottom. Angus Pritchard, that's what 'tis."
"Angus Pritchard!" Mrs. Scott repeated, in a voice of utter amazement; and Rosalie stood now as stock still as Trudy. "Angus Pritchard is my husband's uncle—yes, and a coal merchant in New York. And he is at the Bellevue Hotel at this moment!"
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
[WORK AND PLAY.]
BY KARL WINSHIP.
"Have you watered Prince this evening, Roswell?" asked Mr. Hofford, as his sixteen-year-old son came into the room at supper time and dropped into his seat at the table.
"Yes, sir," answered Roswell, sulkily.
"And brought in the wood and coal?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then you may go to the village to-night."
"I don't want to go to the village."
For the first time Mr. Hofford appeared to notice his son's air of discontent, and he asked, kindly:
"What's the matter, Roswell? Are you sick?"
"No; I'm just tired out, that's all," replied the boy, giving the table-leg a little kick.
"Tired, are you?"
"Yes, I am. I am worked to death."
Mr. Hofford laughed pleasantly.
"You don't look as if you were in danger of dying. And I don't think you do more work than other boys of your age."
"I don't know about that," rejoined Roswell, in a discontented voice; "but I know I'm working from morning to night. I have to attend to everything in the way of chores, until I'm so tired that I can't read or study. And I never have any time for play."
"I am sorry for that," said Mr. Hofford, gravely, "because all boys ought to have time for play. I thought I saw you playing football yesterday?"
"Oh, I play some," admitted Roswell, "but nothing like I want to. I wish I had nothing to do but play, like Rollo there."
"You'd soon get tired of living a dog's life," said Mrs. Hofford, with an amused look.
"No, I wouldn't," said Roswell, confidently. "I never had enough play."
"Very well," said Mr. Hofford, with a queer smile. "To-morrow is Tuesday; suppose you start in and play."
"And not do any work?"
"Certainly not; no work for yourself, or anybody else."
Roswell looked at his father, as if disbelieving his ears.
"I mean it," continued Mr. Hofford. "I will tend to the horse and cow, Jennie will do the house chores and run the errands, and your mother will do the rest. You will have nothing to do but play, and I hope you will enjoy yourself."
"I'm sure I shall!" declared Roswell, joyfully.
When he opened his eyes the next morning it was bright daylight, and he sprang out of bed very hurriedly, forgetting the changed condition of affairs. Then, as recollection dawned upon him, he dressed slowly and went down stairs to breakfast.
There was no one there but his mother, who said "Good-morning!" pleasantly.
"My!" he exclaimed, glancing at the clock; "if it isn't ten minutes to nine! I'll be late for school."
"You are not to go to school," said his mother, quietly. "Going to school is not play."
"But I'll miss my promotion, if I don't go," pleaded Roswell, aghast at the thought.
"Can't help it. You must not do anything but play."
Roswell laughed.
"Very well," he said, lightly.
Then he finished his breakfast in silence and strolled out.
He walked around the yard for five or ten minutes, whistling shrilly; took a look in the barn at Prince and then set off to the village. It was almost deserted, the boys being at school—all but a few loaferish fellows, with whom Roswell did not care to associate.
About ten o'clock he returned home, got a book and read until dinner-time.
Somehow he did not have much of an appetite, and after dinner he took his fishing tackle and went off to the creek.
When he returned at dusk, he had a string of perch.
"Where's my fish-knife, Jennie?" he asked, as he laid the fish on the bench in the wash-house.
"Jennie will clean the fish, Roswell," called out his mother. "Catching fish is play; cleaning them is work."
"Pshaw!" said Roswell, impatiently.
He was rather proud of his ability to prepare fish for the pan.
At supper Mr. Hofford asked him how he was enjoying himself, and Roswell answered that he was doing very well. After supper, when the table was cleared, he got out a lot of traps and set to work on an electrical machine he was trying to make, but his father promptly checked him.
"That won't do, Roswell. Work is strictly forbidden."
"But this is for myself."
"No matter. It is not play. You had better go to the village and play."
Roswell got up angrily, put away the machine and went out. In an hour he came back, saying he had had a quarrel with Perry Gantley, and had a headache. So he went to bed.
The next morning he rigged up a swing in the woods back of the house, and amused himself for an hour, and then went fishing, but, as he had no luck, he hardly spoke a word at dinner-time.
During the afternoon he read for a few minutes, and then took a walk through the woods, returning so tired that he was glad to go to bed right after supper.
Thursday was simply dreadful. It rained all day, and Roswell read until his eyes ached. Then he tried to sleep, romped with Rollo awhile, and at last went to the barn.
Mrs. Hofford followed him presently, and found him currying Prince.
"Come, Roswell, this won't do," she said, quickly. "No work."
Roswell threw down the currycomb with an impatient exclamation, and returned to the house.
He did not make his appearance at all at supper, and Jennie reported that he was lying in bed, asleep. She supposed Mr. Hofford smiled, but made no remark.
Friday morning Roswell came down very early and Mr. Hofford met him coming in with an armful of wood.
"Here! What does this mean?" he asked, sternly.
"I'm going back to work," replied Roswell, flushing up, but laughing at the same time.
"It is not possible you are tired of play?"
"No, not tired; but—"
"But you think it is more fun when sandwiched between work?"
"Yes, sir."
"I am glad you have made the discovery for yourself," said Mr. Hofford, with a smile. "Fun or play is never thoroughly enjoyable unless we have earned the right to it by hard work. A perfectly idle boy or man is never happy, and no person knows the absolute pleasure in work until they are deprived of it, It is a good lesson to learn, my son, and I am glad you have learned it so early."
[NEW YEAR'S DAY.]
|
The aged and the young, man, woman, child, Unite in social glee; even stranger dogs, Meeting with bristling back, soon lay aside Their snarling aspect, and in sportive chase, Excursive scour, or wallow in the snow. With sober cheerfulness, the grandam eyes Her offspring 'round her, all in health and peace; And thankful that she's spared to see this day Return once more, breathes low a secret prayer, That God would shed a blessing on their heads. —James Grahame. |
