His father discovered it, so he shut Dick in the cellar for two days and gave him nothing but bread and water.
This punishment had some effect. Dick behaved better for one week, but the Thursday following he went to a fight in the neighbourhood, and staid there all day among gamblers and pickpockets.
His father saw Dick on his way home, and gave him such a beating that he laid down on the path-way unable to stir. Old Joseph, an honest basket-maker, and another man who lived in the village, came by and together they carried him home, where he was for some days confined to his bed; and he was so much hurt by the severe beating, that for a whole week he could not walk further than to the bench at the door.
Poor Dick, as you will recollect, had lost his mother! Ah! it is a sad loss for children when God takes away their mothers. Nobody in the house cared about Dick, nobody tried to persuade his father to treat him kindly, or advised Dick to behave better. If any body noticed him it was only to laugh and say, “Ah! you idle fellow, you have got what you deserve.”
A few doors off lived a poor woman named Maud. Her husband was a pedlar, and was absent from the village a great part of the year; but she staid at home and earned her living by making lace.
This good woman had a daughter named Jenny, about the same age as Richard, but she had been brought up in a very different manner; for as soon as Jenny could understand what was said to her, her parents had taught her to love and serve God, as the Bible directs us. She learned to pray regularly, and attended divine service every Sunday.
Whenever Jenny was naughty, her mother used to remind her that God saw her, and that she had disobeyed his word, which tells us, that children are to honor their parents, to be gentle and industrious, and always to speak the truth.
Sometimes it was necessary to punish Jenny, but her parents did not chastise her in wrath, but with kindness, as we read in the book of Proverbs; “Withhold not correction from the child for if thou beatest him with the rod he shall not die. Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell.” (Prov. xxiii. 13, 14.)