“It is a little hard to-day, but not half so hard as—some other things!”
And just then the laughing and talking suddenly stopped, for Mr. Lennox opened the door, but Johnny had already heard a subdued whistle from one quarter and a mocking “Since when?” from another, and, what, was worse, he was sure Ned had heard them too.
To some boys it would have been nothing but a relief to find that, as Tiny had suggested, Ned’s persecutors were very much like sheep, and, with but few exceptions, followed Johnny’s lead before long, and made themselves so friendly that only a very vindictive person could have stood upon his dignity, and refused to respond. Ned was not vindictive, but he was shy and reserved; he had been hurt to the quick by the causeless cruelty of his schoolmates, and it was many days before he was “hail fellow well met” with them, although he tried hard not only to forgive, but to do what is much more difficult—forget.
As for Johnny, when he saw how, after a trifling hesitation, a few meaningless jeers and taunts, the tide turned, and Ned was taken into favor, his heart was full of remorse. It seemed to him that he had never before so clearly understood the meaning of the words, “Inasmuch as ye did it not to the least of these My brethren, ye did it not to Me.”
Some one has likened our life to a journey; we keep on, but we can never go back, and, as “we shall pass this way but once,” shall we not keep a bright lookout for the chances to help, to comfort, to encourage? How many loads we might lighten, how many rough places we might make smooth for tired feet! Not a day passes without giving us opportunities. Think how beautiful life might be made, and, then,—think what most of us make of it! Travellers will wander fearlessly through dark and winding ways with a torch to light their path, and a slender thread as a clue to lead them back to sunlight and safety. The Light of the World waits to “lighten our darkness, that we sleep not in death.” If we “hold fast that which is good,” we have the clue.
CHAPTER XI.
BATTLE AND VICTORY.
