The orphan boy, whom his mother in her dying moments committed in faith to God, had fallen into good hands. He, who through storm and tempest directs the sea-bird to her nest amid the breakers, and hears her young ones when they cry in their lonely nest on the ocean rock, had numbered his steps. Ben knew how to treat a boy, because he liked them, and understood their feelings.
The reason John was so much attached to his brother Ben, who was so much older, arose, not merely from his being his brother, but because Ben not only loved him, but always made due allowance for a boy’s nature and feelings. The amusements and employments of men, and boys also, in those old times, were not so far apart as they are now; they could fish and hunt in company, and the boy could be very useful to the man, and this brought them together, and kept their mutual sympathies alive and fresh. He did not, therefore, because Charles had caught three hundred weight of fish, tell him he must be up by daylight the next morning and catch four hundred; he knew boys better than that; knew that while Charles needed no other stimulus than his own noble, grateful heart to urge him on to exertions, yet he was aching to let John know what he had done. He said to him, “Well, Charles, we’ll have a chowder out of the heads of some of these biggest cod (there’s nothing equal to a cod’s head for a chowder), and save a couple to fry, and take the rest over to the main land in the morning; you can go to the house and get John to go to the store with you, and sell them, and get half money and the rest in groceries. You can stay all night with John, and come off the next morning.”
Charles’s eyes flashed with delight at this, and he could hardly contain himself till Ben was out of sight; and then he got behind a bush and jumped right up and down with delight. He lost no time in going to tell the good news to Sally, between whom and himself there were no secrets, but the most perfect sympathy.
“O, mother!” he cried, “don’t you think father’s going to let me take the fish to the store, and stay all night! only think! stay all night with John, mother!”
Sally added (if possible) to his happiness by saying, “I’m glad of it, Charlie, for I want some errands done; and I want you to take over some eggs and butter, and get some coffee, sugar, and flax, and carry some yarn to Hannah Murch, for her to weave for me. Now you see how much help you can be.”
“Yes, mother; and what a good thing it is to have my canoe to go in, and catch fish to sell, and get things; it pays—don’t it?”
“I guess it does pay; for, if you didn’t go, Ben would have to leave his work and go.”
“And I shall see Mr. Murch?”
“Yes; John will go over there with you; and I’ll get breakfast by daylight, so that you can make a long day of it.”
“Mother, I like Mr. Murch; he’s such a pleasant way, and he says such cute things, somehow you can’t help liking him; when I hear him, it seems just as if something was drawing me right to him. Don’t you like him, mother?”