“Why don’t you go on the stage?”
“I?” answered Peal, “how could I do that?”
“All you have to do is to say ‘I will.’”
This was a new doctrine, for since his third year young Peal had not used the words “I” and “will.” He had trained himself to neither wish nor will, and he begged his friend not to lead him into temptation.
But the commercial traveller came again; he came many times, and once he was accompanied by a famous singer; and one evening Peal, after much applause from a professor of singing, took his fate into his own hands.
He said good-bye to his master, and over a glass of wine heartily thanked his friend, the commercial traveller, for having given him self-confidence and will,—“will, that iron bar, which keeps a man’s back erect and prevents him from grovelling on all fours.” And he swore a solemn oath never to forget his friend, who had taught him to have faith in himself.
Then he went to say good-bye to his parents.
“I will be a singer,” he said in a loud voice, which echoed through the room.
The father glanced at the horse-whip, and the mother cried; but it was no use.
“Don’t lose yourself, my darling boy,” were the mother’s last words.