There the matter stood. Until he did, and at the same time made a public apology, Mr. Blackman would not consider him a pupil.
Dick sat down under a tree to think it over. Such a pity to leave school just as he was trying to learn something; but—put that example on the board again? He never could. Expelled! How grieved his mother would be; but a public apology,—never! To be sure, he ought to obey Mr. Blackman; he had really been trying to; but this,—this was too hard. How could he?
What was it Tod said? “My can, ’cause your hand is so big.” How queer that should remind him of his talk with old Aunty McFane, about masters! What did she say?
“My Master will help over all the hard places if you ask him.”
His mother prayed, Dick knew, but he had never really felt like it himself. God was so great; but then, he cared for the sparrows. He was so great? Why, that was the very reason he could help everybody. What was the text his mother had repeated only last Sabbath evening? “I, the Lord thy God, will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, I will help thee.”
The boys stared the next morning, and some of them, I am sorry to say, sneered a little, when Dick, after saying, “I am sorry, sir,” went resolutely to work upon his example again; but Mr. Blackman shook him heartily by the hand, remarking,—
“Only keep on in this way, Dick, my boy, and you’ll surely make a worthy man as well as a fine scholar.”
And Dick, with a bright smile on his face, thought, “‘My can,’ because God’s hand is ‘so big,’ and he does help folks when they ask him.”