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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75331 ***
+
+Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
+New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
+public domain.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+                               THE
+
+                            FIRESIDE
+
+                           STORY BOOK:
+
+
+                           CONTAINING
+
+                     "WASTE NOT, WANT NOT,"
+
+                      "THE BRACELETS," AND
+
+                        "LAZY LAWRENCE."
+
+
+                               BY
+
+                        MARIA EDGEWORTH
+
+      AUTHOR OF "POPULAR TALES," "MORAL TALES," ETC. ETC.
+
+
+
+           With Illustrations from Original Designs.
+
+
+
+                          PHILADELPHIA:
+             GEO. S. APPLETON, 148 CHESTNUT STREET.
+
+                           NEW YORK:
+               D. APPLETON & CO., 200 BROADWAY.
+
+                           1 8 4 7.
+
+
+
+                               CONTENTS
+
+ WASTE NOT, WANT NOT
+
+ THE BRACELETS
+
+ LAZY LAWRENCE
+
+
+
+                               THE
+
+                            FIRESIDE
+
+                           STORY BOOK
+
+
+
+                       WASTE NOT, WANT NOT;
+
+                               OR,
+
+                     TWO STRINGS TO YOUR BOW.
+
+                           ———————————
+
+MR. GRESHAM, a Bristol merchant, who had, by honourable industry and
+economy, accumulated a considerable fortune, retired from business
+to a new house, which he had built upon the Downs, near Clifton. Mr.
+Gresham, however, did not imagine that a new house alone could make
+him happy; he did not propose to live in idleness and extravagance;
+for such a life would have been equally incompatible with his habits
+and his principles. He was fond of children, and as he had no sons, he
+determined to adopt one of his relations. He had two nephews, and he
+invited both of them to his house, that he might have an opportunity
+of judging of their dispositions, and of the habits which they had
+acquired.
+
+Hal and Benjamin, Mr. Gresham's nephews, were about ten years old.
+They had been educated very differently. Hal was the son of the elder
+branch of the family; his father was a gentleman, who spent rather
+more than he could afford; and Hal, from the example of the servants
+in his father's family, with whom he had passed the first years of his
+childhood, learned to waste more of every thing than he used. He had
+been told that "gentlemen should be above being careful and saving;"
+and he had unfortunately imbibed a notion that extravagance is the sign
+of a generous, and economy of an avaricious disposition.
+
+Benjamin, * on the contrary, had been taught habits of care and
+foresight; his father had but a very small fortune, and was anxious
+that his son should early learn that economy insures independence, and
+sometimes puts it in the power of those who are not very rich to be
+very generous.
+
+   * Benjamin, so called from Dr. Benjamin Franklin.
+
+The morning after these two boys arrived at their uncle's, they were
+eager to see all the rooms in the house. Mr. Gresham accompanied them,
+and attended to their remarks and exclamations.
+
+"O! What an excellent motto!" exclaimed Ben, when he read the following
+words, which were written in large characters, over the chimney-piece,
+in his uncle's spacious kitchen:
+
+                      Waste Not, Want Not.
+
+"Waste not, want not!" repeated his cousin Hal, in rather a
+contemptuous tone. "I think it looks too stingy to servants; and no
+gentleman's servants, cooks especially, would like to have such a mean
+motto always staring them in the face."
+
+Ben, who was not so conversant as his cousin in the ways of cooks and
+gentleman's servants, made no reply to these observations.
+
+Mr. Gresham was called away whilst his nephews were looking at the
+other rooms in the house. Some time afterwards he heard their voices in
+the hall.
+
+"Boys," said he, "what are you doing there!"
+
+"Nothing, sir," said Hal; "you were called away from us; and we did not
+know which way to go."
+
+"And have you nothing to do?" said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"No, Sir! Nothing," said Hal, in a careless tone, like one who was well
+content with the state of habitual idleness.
+
+"No, Sir, nothing!" replied Ben, in a voice of lamentation.
+
+"Come," said Mr. Gresham, "if you have nothing to do, lads, will you
+unpack these two parcels for me?"
+
+The two parcels were exactly alike, both of them well tied up with good
+whip-cord. Ben took his parcel to a table, and after breaking off the
+sealing-wax began carefully to examine the knot, and then to untie it.
+Hal stood still, exactly in the spot where the parcel was put into his
+hands, and tried first at one corner, and then at another, to pull the
+string off by force:
+
+"I wish these people wouldn't tie up their parcels so tight, as if they
+were never to be undone," cried he, as he tugged at the cord; and he
+pulled the knot closer instead of loosening it.
+
+"Ben! Why, how did ye get yours undone, man?—What's in your parcel? I
+wonder what is in mine! I wish I could get this string off; I must cut
+it."
+
+"O, no," said Ben, who had now undone the last knot of his parcel, and
+who drew out the length of string with exultation, "don't cut it, Hal;
+look what a nice cord this is, and yours is the same; it's a pity to
+cut it. 'Waste not, want not!' you know."
+
+"Pooh!" said Hal. "What signifies a bit of packthread?"
+
+"It is whip-cord," said Ben.
+
+"Well, whip-cord! What signifies a bit of whip-cord? You can get a bit
+of whip-cord twice as long as that for two-pence; and who cares for
+two-pence! Not I, for one! So here it goes," cried Hal, drawing out his
+knife; and he cut the cord precipitately in sundry places.
+
+"Lads! Have you undone the parcels for me?" said Mr. Gresham, opening
+the parlour door as he spoke.
+
+"Yes, sir," cried Hal; and he dragged off his half cut, half entangled
+string—"here's the parcel."
+
+"And here's my parcel, uncle; and here's the string," said Ben.
+
+"You may keep the string for your pains," said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"Thank you, sir," said Ben: "what an excellent whip-cord it is!"
+
+"And you, Hal," continued Mr. Gresham, "you may keep your string too if
+it will be of any use to you."
+
+"It will be of no use to me, thank you, sir," said Hal.
+
+"No, I am afraid not, if this be it," said his uncle, taking up the
+jagged, knotted remains of Hal's cord.
+
+A few days after this, Mr. Gresham gave to each of his nephews a new
+top.
+
+"But how's this?" said Hal. "These tops have no strings; what shall we
+do for strings?"
+
+"I have a string that will do very well for mine," said Ben. And he
+pulled out of his pocket the fine, long, smooth string which had tied
+up the parcel. With this he soon set up his top, which spun admirably
+well.
+
+"O, how I wish that I had but a string!" said Hal. "What shall I do for
+a string? I'll tell you what; I can use the string that goes round my
+hat!"
+
+"But then," said Ben, "what will you do for a hat-band?"
+
+"I'll manage to do without one," said Hal; and he took the string off
+his hat for his top. It was soon worn through; and he split his top by
+driving the peg too tightly into it.
+
+His cousin Ben let him set up his the next day; but Hal was not more
+fortunate or more careful when he meddled with other people's things
+than when he managed his own. He had scarcely played with it an hour
+before he split it, by driving in the peg too violently. Ben bore this
+misfortune with good humour.
+
+"Come," said he, "it can't be helped; but give me the string, because
+that may still be of use for something else."
+
+It happened some time afterwards that a lady who had been intimately
+acquainted with Hal's mother at Bath, that is to say, who had
+frequently met her at the card-table during the winter, now arrived at
+Clifton. She was informed by his mother that Hal was at Mr. Gresham's;
+and her sons, who were friends of his, came to see him, and invited him
+to spend the next day with them.
+
+Hal joyfully accepted the invitation. He was always glad to go out to
+dine, because it gave him something to do, something to think of, or at
+least something to say. Besides this, he had been educated to think it
+was a fine thing to visit fine people; and Lady Diana Sweepstakes (for
+that was the name of his mother's acquaintance) was a very fine lady;
+and her two sons intended to be very great gentlemen.
+
+He was in a prodigious hurry when these young gentlemen knocked at his
+uncle's door the next day; but just as he got to the hall door, little
+Patty called to him from the top of the stairs, and told him that he
+had dropped his pocket handkerchief.
+
+"Pick it up, then, and bring it to me quick, can't you, child?" cried
+Hal. "For Lady Di's sons are waiting for me."
+
+Little Patty did not know any thing about Lady Di's sons; but as she
+was very good-natured, and saw that her cousin Hal was, for some reason
+or other, in a desperate hurry, she ran down stairs as fast as she
+possibly could, towards the landing-place, where the handkerchief lay;
+but, alas! before she reached the handkerchief, she fell rolling down
+a whole flight of stairs, and when her fall was at last stopped by the
+landing-place, she did not cry, but she writhed, as if she was in great
+pain.
+
+"Where are you hurt, my love!" said Mr. Gresham, who came instantly on
+hearing the noise of some one falling down stairs. "Where are you hurt,
+my dear?"
+
+"Here, papa," said the little girl, touching her ankle, which she had
+decently covered with her gown; "I believe I am hurt here, but not
+much," added she, trying to rise; "only it hurts me when I move."
+
+"I'll carry you; don't move then," said her father; and he took her up
+in his arms.
+
+"My shoe, I've lost one of my shoes," said she.
+
+Ben looked for it upon the stairs, and he found it sticking in a loop
+of whip-cord, which was entangled round one of the balusters. When this
+cord was drawn forth, it appeared that it was the very same jagged,
+entangled piece which Hal had pulled off his parcel. He had diverted
+himself with running up and down stairs, whipping the balusters with
+it, as he thought he could convert it to no better use; and, with his
+usual carelessness, he at last left it hanging just where he happened
+to throw it when the dinner-bell rang.
+
+Poor little Patty's ankle was terribly sprained, and Hal reproached
+himself for his folly, and would have reproached himself longer,
+perhaps, if Lady Di Sweepstakes' sons had not hurried him away.
+
+In the evening Patty could not run about as she used to do; but she sat
+upon the sofa, and she said that she did not feel the pain of her ankle
+so much, whilst Ben was so good as to play at jackstraws with her.
+
+"That's right, Ben; never be ashamed of being good-natured to those
+who are younger and weaker than yourself," said his uncle, smiling at
+seeing him produce his whip-cord to indulge his little cousin with a
+game at her favourite cat's cradle. "I shall not think you one bit less
+manly because I see you playing at cat's cradle with a little child of
+six years old."
+
+Hal, however, was not precisely of his uncle's opinion; for when he
+returned in the evening, and saw Ben playing with his little cousin, he
+could not help smiling contemptuously, and asked if he had been playing
+at cat's cradle all night. In a heedless manner he made some inquiries
+after Patty's sprained ankle, and then he ran on to tell all the news
+he had heard at Lady Diana Sweepstakes'—news which he thought would
+make him appear a person of vast importance.
+
+"Do you know, uncle—Do you know, Ben," said he, "there's to be the most
+famous doings that ever were heard of upon the Downs here, the first
+day of next month, which will be in a fortnight, thank my stars! I wish
+the fortnight was over; I shall think of nothing else, I know, till
+that happy day comes!"
+
+Mr. Gresham inquired why the first of September was to be so much
+happier than any other day in the year.
+
+"Why," replied Hal, "Lady Diana Sweepstakes, you know, is a famous
+rider, and archer, and all that—"
+
+"Very likely," said Mr. Gresham, soberly; "but what then?"
+
+"Dear uncle!" cried Hal. "But you shall hear. There's to be a race upon
+the Downs, the first of September, and after the race, there's to be an
+archery meeting for the ladies, and Lady Diana Sweepstakes is to be one
+of them. And after the ladies have done shooting—now, Ben, comes the
+best part of it!—we boys are to have our turn, and Lady Di is to give a
+prize to the best marksman among us of a very handsome bow and arrow!
+Do you know, I've been practising already, and I'll show you to-morrow,
+as soon as it comes home, the famous bow and arrow that Lady Diana has
+given me; but perhaps," added he with a scornful laugh, "you like a
+cat's cradle better than a bow and arrow."
+
+Ben made no reply to this taunt at the moment; but the next day, when
+Hal's new bow and arrow came home, he convinced him that he knew how to
+use it well.
+
+"Ben," said his uncle, "you seem to be a good marksman, though you have
+not boasted of yourself. I'll give you a bow and arrow, and perhaps
+if you practise, you may make yourself an archer before the first of
+September; and in the meantime you will not wish the fortnight over,
+for you will have something to do."
+
+"O, sir," interrupted Hal, "but if you mean that Ben should put in for
+the prize, he must have a uniform."
+
+"Why must he?" said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"Why, sir, because every body has—I mean every body that's any body;
+and Lady Diana was talking about the uniform all dinner time, and it's
+settled all about it, except the buttons. The young Sweepstakes are to
+get theirs made first for patterns; they are to be white, faced with
+green; and they'll look very handsome, I'm sure, and I shall write to
+mamma to-night, as Lady Diana bid me, about mine; and I shall tell her
+to be sure to answer my letter, without fail, by return of the post:
+and then, if mamma makes no objections, which I know she won't, because
+she never thinks much about expense, and all that—then I shall bespeak
+my uniform, and get it made by the same tailor that makes for Lady
+Diana and the young Sweepstakes."
+
+"Mercy upon us!" said Mr. Gresham, who was almost stunned by the
+rapid vociferation with which this long speech about the uniform
+was pronounced. "I don't pretend to understand these things," added
+he, with an air of simplicity; "but we will inquire, Ben, into the
+necessity of the case; and if it is necessary, or if you think it
+necessary, that you shall have a uniform, why, I'll give you one."
+
+"You, uncle! Will you, indeed?" exclaimed Hal, with amazement painted
+in his countenance, "Well, that's the last thing in the world I should
+have expected! You are not at all the sort of person I should have
+thought would care about a uniform: and now I should have supposed
+you'd have thought it extravagant to have a coat on purpose only for
+one day. And I'm sure Lady Diana Sweepstakes thought as I do; for when
+I told her of that motto over your kitchen chimney, WASTE NOT, WANT
+NOT, she laughed, and said that I had better not talk to you about
+uniforms, and that my mother was the proper person to write to about
+my uniform; but I'll tell Lady Diana, uncle, how good you are, and how
+much she was mistaken."
+
+"Take care how you do that," said Mr. Gresham; "for perhaps the lady
+was not mistaken."
+
+"Nay, did not you say, just now, you would give poor Ben a uniform?"
+
+"I said I would if he thought it necessary to have one."
+
+"O, I'll answer for it he'll think it necessary," said Hal, laughing,
+"because it is necessary."
+
+"Allow him at least to judge for himself," said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"My dear uncle, but I assure you," said Hal, earnestly, "there's no
+judging about the matter, because, really, upon my word, Lady Diana
+said distinctly that her sons were to have uniforms, white, faced with
+green, and a green and white cockade in their hats."
+
+"May be so," said Mr. Gresham, still with the same look of calm
+simplicity. "Put on your hats, boys, and come with me. I know a
+gentleman whose sons are to be at this archery meeting; and we will
+inquire into all the particulars from him. Then after we have seen him,
+(it is not eleven o'clock yet,) we shall have time enough to walk on to
+Bristol, and choose the cloth for Ben's uniform, if it is necessary."
+
+"I cannot tell what to make of all he says," whispered Hal, as he
+reached down his hat; "do you think, Ben, he means to give you this
+uniform, or not?"
+
+"I think," said Ben, "that he means to give me one, if it is necessary,
+or, as he said, if I think it necessary."
+
+"And that to be sure you will; won't you? Or else you'll be a very
+great fool, I know, after all I've told you. How can any one in the
+world know so much about the matter as I, who have dined with Lady
+Diana Sweepstakes but yesterday, and heard all about it, from beginning
+to end? And as for this gentleman that we are going to, I'm sure, if he
+knows any thing about the matter, he'll say exactly the same as I do."
+
+"We shall hear," said Ben, with a degree of composure which Hal could
+by no means comprehend, when a uniform was in question.
+
+The gentleman upon whom Mr. Gresham called had three sons, who were
+all to be at this archery meeting; and they unanimously assured him,
+in the presence of Hal and Ben, that they had never thought of buying
+uniforms for this grand occasion, and that, amongst the number of their
+acquaintance, they knew of but three boys whose friends intended to be
+at such an unnecessary expense.
+
+Hal stood amazed.
+
+"Such are the varieties of opinion upon all the grand affairs of life,"
+said Mr. Gresham, looking at his nephews. "What amongst one set of
+people you hear asserted to be absolutely necessary, you will hear,
+from another set of people, is quite unnecessary. All that can be done,
+my dear boys, in these difficult cases, is to judge for ourselves,
+which opinions, and which people, are the most reasonable."
+
+Hal, who had been more accustomed to think of what was fashionable than
+of what was reasonable, without at all considering the good sense of
+what his uncle said to him, replied, with childish petulance, "Indeed,
+sir, I don't know what other people think; I only know what Lady Diana
+Sweepstakes said."
+
+The name of Lady Diana Sweepstakes Hal thought must impress all present
+with respect. He was highly astonished, when, as he looked round,
+he saw a smile of contempt upon every one's countenance; and he was
+yet further bewildered when he heard her spoken of as a very silly,
+extravagant, ridiculous woman, whose opinion no prudent person would
+ask upon any subject, and whose example was to be shunned, instead of
+being imitated.
+
+"Ay, my dear Hal," said his uncle, smiling at his look of amazement,
+"these are some of the things that young people must learn from
+experience. All the world do not agree in opinion about characters;
+you will hear the same person admired in one company and blamed in
+another; so that we must still come round to the same point, 'Judge for
+yourself.'"
+
+Hal's thoughts were, however, at present too full of the uniform
+to allow his judgment to act with perfect impartiality. As soon as
+their visit was over, and all the time they walked down the hill from
+Prince's Buildings towards Bristol, he continued to repeat nearly the
+same arguments which he had formerly used respecting necessity, the
+uniform, and Lady Diana Sweepstakes.
+
+To all this Mr. Gresham made no reply; and longer had the young
+gentleman expatiated upon the subject, which had so strongly seized
+upon his imagination, had not his senses been forcibly assailed at this
+instant by the delicious odours and tempting sight of certain cakes and
+jellies in a pastry-cook's shop.
+
+"O, uncle," said he, as he was going to turn the corner to pursue the
+road to Bristol, "look at those jellies," pointing to a confectioner's
+shop. "I must buy some of those good things; for I have got some
+half-pence in my pocket."
+
+"Your having half-pence in your pocket is an excellent reason for
+eating," said Mr. Gresham, smiling.
+
+"But I really am hungry," said Hal; "you know, uncle, it is a good
+while since breakfast."
+
+His uncle, who was desirous to see his nephews act without restraint,
+that he might judge of their characters, bid them do as they pleased.
+
+"Come then, Ben, if you've any half-pence in your pocket."
+
+"I am not hungry," said Ben.
+
+"I suppose that means that you've no half-pence," said Hal, laughing,
+with a look of superiority, which he had been taught to think the rich
+might assume towards those who were convicted either of poverty or
+economy.
+
+"Waste not, want not," said Ben to himself. Contrary to his cousin's
+surmise, he happened to have two-penny worth of half-pence actually in
+his pocket.
+
+At the very moment Hal stepped into the pastry-cook's shop, a poor
+industrious man, with a wooden leg, who usually sweeps the dirty corner
+of the walk which turns at this spot to the Wells, held his hat to
+Ben, who, after glancing his eye at the petitioner's well-worn broom,
+instantly produced his two-pence.
+
+"I wish I had more half-pence for you, my good man," said he; "but I've
+only two-pence."
+
+Hal came out of Mr. Millar's, the confectioner's shop, with a hat full
+of cakes in his hand.
+
+Mr. Millar's dog was sitting on the flags before the door; and he
+looked up with a wistful, begging eye at Hal, who was eating a
+queen-cake.
+
+Hal, who was wasteful even in his good nature, threw a whole queen-cake
+to the dog, who swallowed it for a single mouthful.
+
+"There goes two-pence in the form of a queen-cake," said Mr. Gresham.
+
+Hal next offered some of his cakes to his uncle and cousin.
+
+But they thanked him, and refused to eat any, because, they said, they
+were not hungry.
+
+So he ate and ate, as he walked along, till at last he stopped, and
+said, "This bun tastes so bad after the queen-cakes, I can't bear it!"
+And he was going to fling it from him into the river.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+"O, it is a pity to waste that good bun! We may be glad of it yet,"
+said Ben; "give it to me rather than to throw it away."
+
+"Why, I thought you said you were not hungry," said Hal.
+
+"True, I am not hungry now, but that is no reason why I should never be
+hungry again."
+
+"Well, there is the cake for you; take it, for it has made me sick; and
+I don't care what becomes of it."
+
+Ben folded the refused bit of his cousin's bun in a piece of paper, and
+put it into his pocket.
+
+"I'm beginning to be exceedingly tired, or sick, or something," said
+Hal, "and as there is a stand of coaches somewhere hereabouts, had we
+not better take a coach, instead of walking all the way to Bristol?"
+
+"For a stout archer," said Mr. Gresham, "you are more easily tired
+than one might have expected. However, with all my heart, let us take
+a coach; for Ben asked me to show him the cathedral yesterday; and I
+believe I should find it rather too much for me to walk so far, though
+I am not sick with eating good things."
+
+"The Cathedral!" said Hal, after he had been seated in the coach about
+a quarter of an hour, and had somewhat recovered from his sickness—"The
+cathedral! Why, are we only going to Bristol to see the cathedral? I
+thought we came out to see about a uniform."
+
+There was a dulness and melancholy kind of stupidity in Hal's
+countenance, as he pronounced these words, like one wakening from a
+dream, which made both his uncle and cousin burst out a laughing.
+
+"Why," said Hal, who was now piqued, "I'm sure you did say, uncle, you
+would go to Mr.—'s to choose the cloth for the uniform."
+
+"Very true; and so I will," said Mr. Gresham; "but we need not make a
+whole morning's work, need we, of looking at a piece of cloth? Cannot
+we see a uniform and a cathedral both in one morning?"
+
+They went first to the cathedral. Hal's head was too full of the
+uniform to take any notice of the painted window, which immediately
+caught Ben's unembarrassed attention. He looked at the large stained
+figures on the gothic window; and he observed their coloured shadows on
+the floor and walls.
+
+Mr. Gresham, who perceived that he was eager on all subjects to gain
+information, took this opportunity of telling him several things about
+the lost art of painting on glass, gothic arches, &c., which Hal
+thought extremely tiresome.
+
+"Come! Come! We shall be late indeed," said Hal; "surely you've looked
+long enough, Ben, at this blue and red window."
+
+"I'm only thinking about these coloured shadows," said Ben.
+
+"I can show you, when we go home, Ben," said his uncle, "an
+entertaining paper upon such shadows." *
+
+   * Vide Priestley's History of Vision, chapter on Coloured Shadows.
+
+"Hark!" cried Ben. "Did you hear that noise?"
+
+They all listened; and they heard a bird singing in the cathedral.
+
+"It's our old robin, sir," said the lad who had opened the cathedral
+door for them.
+
+"Yes," said Mr. Gresham, "there he is, boys—look—perched upon the
+organ. He often sits there, and sings, whilst the organ is playing."
+
+"And," continued the lad who showed the cathedral, "he has lived here
+these many winters; * they say he is fifteen years old; and he is so
+tame, poor fellow, that if I had a bit of bread he'd come down and feed
+in my hand."
+
+   * This is true.
+
+"I've a bit of bun here," cried Ben, joyfully producing the remains of
+the bun which Hal but an hour before would have thrown away. "Pray let
+us see the poor robin eat out of your hand."
+
+The lad crumbled the bun, and called to the robin, who fluttered and
+chirped, and seemed rejoiced at the sight of the bread; but yet he did
+not come down from his pinnacle on the organ.
+
+"He is afraid of us," said Ben; "he is not used to eat before
+strangers, I suppose."
+
+"Ah no, sir," said the young man with a deep sigh, "that is not the
+thing; he is used enough to eat before company. Time was he'd have come
+down for me, before ever so many fine folks, and have eat his crumbs
+out of my hand, at my first call. But, poor fellow, it's not his fault
+now; he does not know me now, sir, since my accident, because of this
+great black patch."
+
+The young man put his hand to his right eye, which was covered with a
+huge black patch.
+
+Ben asked what accident he meant; and the lad told him that, but a
+few weeks ago, he had lost the sight of his eye by the stroke of a
+stone, which reached him as he was passing under the rocks of Clifton,
+unluckily, when the workmen were blasting.
+
+"I don't mind so much for myself, sir," said the lad; "but I can't work
+so well now, as I used to do before my accident, for my old mother,
+who has had a stroke of the palsy; and I've a many little brothers and
+sisters, not well able yet to get their own livelihood, though they may
+be as willing as willing can be."
+
+"Where does your mother live?" said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"Hard by, sir, just close to the church here. It was her that always
+had the showing of it to strangers, till she lost the use of her poor
+limbs."
+
+"Shall we, may we, uncle, go that way? This is the house; is not it?"
+said Ben, when they went out of the cathedral.
+
+They went into the house. It was rather a hovel than a house; but poor
+as it was, it was as neat as misery could make it.
+
+The old woman was sitting up in her wretched bed, winding worsted;
+four meager, ill-clothed, pale children, were all busy, some of them
+sticking pins in paper for the pinmaker, and others sorting rags for
+the papermaker.
+
+"What a horrid place it is," said Hal, sighing. "I did not know
+there were such shocking places in the world. I've often seen
+terrible-looking tumble-down places, as we drove through the town in
+mamma's carriage; but then I did not know who lived in them; and I
+never saw the inside of any of them. It is very dreadful, indeed, to
+think that people are forced to live in this way. I wish mamma would
+send me some more pocket-money, that I might do something for them.
+I had half-a-crown; but," continued he, feeling in his pockets, "I'm
+afraid I spent the last shilling of it this morning, upon those cakes
+that made me sick. I wish I had my shilling now; I'd give it to these
+poor people."
+
+Ben, though he was all this time silent, was as sorry as his talkative
+cousin for all these poor people. But there was some difference between
+the sorrow of these two boys.
+
+Hal, after he was again seated in the hackney-coach, and had rattled
+through the busy streets of Bristol for a few minutes, quite forgot
+the spectacle of misery which he had seen; and the gay shops in Wine
+street, and the idea of his green and white uniform, wholly occupied
+his imagination.
+
+"Now for our uniforms," cried he, as he jumped eagerly out of the
+coach, when his uncle stopped at the woollen-draper's door.
+
+"Uncle," said Ben, stopping Mr. Gresham before he got out of the
+carriage, "I don't think a uniform is at all necessary for me. I'm very
+much obliged to you; but I would rather not have one. I have a very
+good coat; and I think it would be waste."
+
+"Well, let me get out of the carriage, and we will see about it," said
+Mr. Gresham; "perhaps the sight of the beautiful green and white cloth,
+and the epaulettes (have you ever considered the epaulettes?) may tempt
+you to change your mind."
+
+"O no," said Ben, laughing, "I shall not change my mind."
+
+The green cloth, and the white cloth, and the epaulettes, were
+produced, to Hal's infinite satisfaction. His uncle took up a pen, and
+calculated for a few minutes; then, showing the back of the letter,
+upon which he was writing, to his nephews, "Cast up these sums, boys,"
+said he, "and tell me whether I am right."
+
+"Ben, do you do it," said Hal, a little embarrassed; "I am not quick at
+figures."
+
+Ben was, and he went over his uncle's calculation very expeditiously.
+
+"It is right, is it?" said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"Yes, sir, quite right."
+
+"Then, by this calculation, I find I could for less than half the money
+your uniforms would cost purchase for each of you boys a warm great
+coat, which you will want, I have a notion, this winter upon the Downs."
+
+"O, sir," said Hal with an alarmed look; "but it is not winter yet; it
+is not cold weather yet. We shan't want great coats yet."
+
+"Don't you remember how cold we were, Hal, the day before yesterday,
+in that sharp wind, when we were flying our kites upon the Downs? And
+winter will come yet—I am sure, I should like to have a good warm great
+coat very much."
+
+Mr. Gresham took six guineas out of his purse; and he placed three of
+them before Hal, and three before Ben.
+
+"Young gentlemen," said he, "I believe your uniforms will come to about
+three guineas apiece. Now I will lay out this money for you just as you
+please, Hal, what say you?"
+
+"Why, sir," said Hal, "a great coat is a good thing, to be sure; and
+then, after the great coat, as you said it would only cost half as much
+as the uniform, there would be some money to spare, would not there?"
+
+"Yes, my dear, about five-and-twenty shillings."
+
+"Five-and-twenty shillings! I could buy and do a great many things, to
+be sure, with five-and-twenty shillings; but then, the thing is, I must
+go without the uniform, if I have the great coat."
+
+"Certainly," said his uncle.
+
+"Ah!" said Hal, sighing, as he looked at the epaulettes. "Uncle, if you
+would not be displeased, if I choose the uniform—"
+
+"I shall not be displeased at your choosing whatever you like best,"
+said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"Well, then, thank you, sir; I think I had better have the uniform;
+because, if I have not the uniform now directly, it will be of no use
+to me, as the archery meeting is the week after next, you know; and
+as to the great coat, perhaps, between this time and the very cold
+weather, which, perhaps, won't be till Christmas, papa will buy a great
+coat for me; and I'll ask mamma to give me some pocket-money to give
+away, and she will, perhaps."
+
+To all this conclusive, conditional reasoning, which depended upon
+perhaps, three times repeated, Mr. Gresham made no reply; but he
+immediately bought the uniform for Hal, and desired that it should
+be sent to Lady Diana Sweepstakes' sons' tailor, to be made up. The
+measure of Hal's happiness was now complete.
+
+"And how am I to lay out the three guineas for you, Ben?" said Mr.
+Gresham. "Speak—what do you wish for first?"
+
+"A great coat, uncle, if you please."
+
+Mr. Gresham bought the coat; and, after it was paid for,
+five-and-twenty shillings of Ben's three guineas remained.
+
+"What next, my boy?" said his uncle.
+
+"Arrows, uncle, if you please? Three arrows."
+
+"My dear, I promised you a bow and arrows."
+
+"No, uncle, you said a bow."
+
+"Well, I meant a bow and arrows. I'm glad you are so exact, however.
+It is better to claim less than more than what is promised. The
+three arrows you shall have. But go on;—how shall I dispose of these
+five-and-twenty shillings for you?"
+
+"In clothes, if you will be so good, uncle, for that poor boy who has
+got the great black patch on his eye."
+
+"I always believed," said Mr. Gresham, shaking hands with Ben, "that
+economy and generosity were the best friends, instead of being enemies,
+as some silly, extravagant people would have us think them. Choose
+the poor blind boys' coat, my dear nephew, and pay for it. There's no
+occasion for my praising you about the matter: your best reward is in
+your own mind, child; and you want no other, or I'm mistaken. Now jump
+into the coach, boys, and let's be off. We shall be late, I'm afraid,"
+continued he, as the coach drove on; "but I must let you stop, Ben,
+with your goods, at the poor boy's door."
+
+When they came to the house, Mr. Gresham opened the coach door, and Ben
+jumped out with his parcel under his arm.
+
+"Stay, stay! You must take me with you," said his pleased uncle. "I
+like to see people made happy as well as you do."
+
+"And so do I too!" said Hal. "Let me come with you. I almost wish my
+uniform was not gone to the tailor's, so I do."
+
+And when he saw the look of delight and gratitude with which the poor
+boy received the clothes which Ben gave him, and when he heard the
+mother and children thank him, Hal sighed, and said, "Well, I hope
+mamma will give me some more pocket-money soon."
+
+Upon his return home, however, the sight of the famous bow and arrow,
+which Lady Diana Sweepstakes had sent him, recalled to his imagination
+all the joys of his green and white uniform, and he no longer wished
+that it had not been sent to the tailor's.
+
+"But I do not understand, cousin Hal," said little Patty, "why you call
+this bow a famous bow. You say famous very often; and I don't know
+exactly what it means—a famous uniform—famous doings—I remember you
+said there was to be famous doings, the first of September, upon the
+Downs—What does famous mean?"
+
+"O, why, famous means—Now don't you know what famous means?—It means—It
+is a word that people say—It is the fashion to say it—It means—it means
+famous."
+
+Patty laughed, and said, "This does not explain it to me."
+
+"No," said Hal, "nor can it be explained. If you don't understand
+it, that's not my fault; everybody but little children, I suppose,
+understands it; but there's no explaining those sort of words, if you
+don't take them at once. There's to be famous doings upon the Downs,
+the first of September; that is, grand, fine. In short, what does it
+signify talking any longer, Patty, about the matter? Give me my bow;
+for I must go out upon the Downs and practise."
+
+Ben accompanied him with the bow and the three arrows which his uncle
+had now given to him; and every day these two boys went out upon the
+Downs, and practised shooting with indefatigable perseverance. Where
+equal pains are taken, success is usually found to be pretty nearly
+equal. Our two archers, by constant practise, became expert marksmen;
+and before the day of trial, they were so exactly matched in point of
+dexterity, that it was scarcely possible to decide which was superior.
+
+The long-expected first of September at length arrived. "What sort of a
+day is it?" was the first question that was asked by Hal and Ben, the
+moment that they awakened.
+
+The sun shone bright! But there was a sharp and high wind.
+
+"Ha!" said Ben. "I shall be glad of my good great coat to-day; for I've
+a notion it will be rather cold upon the Downs, especially when we are
+standing still, as we must whilst the people are shooting."
+
+"O, never mind! I don't think I shall feel cold at all," said Hal, as
+he dressed himself in his new green and white uniform; and he viewed
+himself with much complacency.
+
+"Good morning to you, uncle; how do you do?" said he in a voice of
+exultation, when he entered the breakfast-room.
+
+"How do you do?" seemed rather to mean,—How do you like me in my
+uniform?
+
+And his uncle's cool "Very well, I thank you, Hal," disappointed him,
+as it seemed only to say,—Your uniform makes no difference in my
+opinion of you.
+
+Even little Patty went on eating her breakfast much as usual, and
+talked of the pleasures of walking with her father to the Downs, and of
+all the little things which interested her, so that Hal's epaulettes
+were not the principal object of any one's imagination but his own.
+
+"Papa," said Patty, "as we go up the hill where there is so much red
+mud, I must take care to pick my way nicely; and I must hold up my
+frock, as you desired me; and perhaps you will be so good, if I am not
+troublesome, as to lift me over the very bad place where there are no
+stepping-stones. My ankle is entirely well, and I'm glad of that, or
+else I should not be able to walk as far as the Downs. How good you
+were to me, Ben, when I was in pain, the day I sprained my ankle; you
+played at jackstraws, and at cat's cradle, with me—O, that puts me
+in mind—Here are your gloves, which I asked you that night to let me
+mend. I've been a great while about them, but are not they very neatly
+mended, papa?—Look at the sewing."
+
+"I am not a very good judge of sewing, my dear little girl," said Mr.
+Gresham, examining the work with a close and scrupulous eye; "but, in
+my opinion, here is one stitch that is rather too long; the white teeth
+are not quite even."
+
+"O, papa, I'll take out that long tooth in a minute," said Patty,
+laughing. "I did not think that you would have observed it so soon."
+
+"I would not have you trust to my blindness," said her father, stroking
+her head fondly: "I observe every thing. I observe, for instance, that
+you are a grateful little girl, and that you are glad to be of use to
+those who have been kind to you; and for this I forgive you the long
+stitch."
+
+"But it's out, it's out, Papa," said Patty; "and the next time your
+gloves want mending, Ben, I'll mend them better."
+
+"They are very nice, I think," said Ben, drawing them on; "and I am
+much obliged to you. I was just wishing I had a pair of gloves to keep
+my fingers warm to-day, for I never can shoot well when my hands are
+numbed. Look, Hal—you know how ragged these gloves were; you said they
+were good for nothing but to throw away; now look, there's not a hole
+in them," said he, spreading his fingers.
+
+"Now, is it not very extraordinary," said Hal to himself, "that
+they should go on so long talking about an old pair of gloves,
+without scarcely saying a word about my new uniform? Well, the young
+Sweepstakes and Lady Diana will talk enough about it; that's one
+comfort."
+
+"Is not it time to think of setting out, sir?" said Hal to his uncle.
+"The company, you know, are to meet at the Ostrich, at twelve, and the
+race to begin at one, and Lady Diana's horses, I know, were ordered to
+be at the door at ten."
+
+Mr. Stephen, the butler, here interrupted the hurrying young gentleman
+in his calculations—"There's a poor lad, sir, below, with a great black
+patch on his right eye, who is come from Bristol, and wants to speak
+a word with the young gentlemen, if you please. I told him they were
+just going out with you, but he says he won't detain them above half a
+minute."
+
+"Show him up, show him up," said Mr. Gresham.
+
+"But I suppose," said Hal, with a sigh, "that Stephen mistook when he
+said the young gentlemen; he only wants to see Ben, I dare say; I'm
+sure he has no reason to want to see me."
+
+"Here he comes—O, Ben, he is dressed in the new coat you gave him,"
+whispered Hal, who was really a good-natured boy, though extravagant.
+"How much better he looks than he did in the ragged coat! Ah! He looked
+at you first, Ben!—And well he may!"
+
+The boy bowed, without any cringing but with an open, decent freedom in
+his manner, which expressed that he had been obliged, but that he knew
+his young benefactor was not thinking of the obligation. He made as
+little distinction as possible between his bows to the two cousins.
+
+"As I was sent with a message, by the clerk of our parish, to Redland
+chapel, out on the Downs, to-day, sir," said he to Mr. Gresham,
+"knowing your house lay in my way, my mother, sir, bid me call and
+make bold to offer the young gentlemen two little worsted balls that
+she had worked for them," continued the lad, pulling out of his pocket
+two worsted balls worked in green and orange-coloured stripes: "they
+are but poor things, sir, she bid me say, to look at, but, considering
+she has but one hand to work with, and that her left hand, you'll not
+despise 'em, we hopes."
+
+He held the balls to Ben and Hal.—"They are both alike, gentlemen,"
+said he; "if you'll be pleased to take 'em, they're better than they
+look, for they bound higher than your head. I cut the cork round for
+the inside myself, which was all I could do."
+
+"They are nice balls indeed; we are much obliged to you," said the boys
+as they received them; and they proved them immediately. The balls
+struck the floor with a delightful sound, and rebounded higher than
+Mr. Gresham's head. Little Patty clapped her hands joyfully—but now a
+thundering double rap at the door was heard.
+
+"The Master Sweepstakes, sir," said Stephen, "are come for Master Hal.
+They say that all the young gentlemen who have archery uniforms are to
+walk together, in a body, I think they say, sir; and they are to parade
+along the Well-walk, they desire me to say, sir, with a drum and fife,
+and so up the hill by Prince's Place, and all to go upon the Downs
+together, to the place of meeting. I am not sure I'm right, sir, for
+both the young gentlemen spoke at once, and the wind is very high at
+the street door, so that I could not well make out all they said; but I
+believe this is the sense of it."
+
+"Yes, yes," said Hal, eagerly, "it's all right; I know that is just
+what was settled the day I dined at Lady Diana's: and Lady Diana, and a
+great party of gentlemen, are to ride—"
+
+"Well, that is nothing to the purpose," interrupted Mr. Gresham. "Don't
+keep the Master Sweepstakes waiting; decide—do you choose to go with
+them, or with us?"
+
+"Sir, uncle, sir, you know, since all the uniforms agreed to go
+together—"
+
+"Off with you, then, Mr. Uniform, if you mean to go," said Mr. Gresham.
+
+Hal ran down stairs in such a hurry that he forgot his bow and arrows.
+Ben discovered this, when he went to fetch his own; and the lad from
+Bristol, who had been ordered by Mr. Gresham to eat his breakfast
+before he proceeded to Redland chapel, heard Ben talking about his
+cousin's bow and arrows.
+
+"I know," said Ben, "he will be sorry not to have his bow with him,
+because here are the green knots tied to it, to match his cockade; and
+he said that the boys were all to carry their bows, as part of the
+show."
+
+"If you'll give me leave, sir," said the poor Bristol lad, "I shall
+have plenty of time; and I'll run down to the Well-walk after the young
+gentleman, and take him his bow and arrows."
+
+"Will you? I shall be much obliged to you," said Ben.
+
+And away went the boy with the bow that was ornamented with green
+ribands.
+
+The public walk leading to the Wells was full of company. The
+windows of all the houses in St. Vincent's parade were crowded with
+well-dressed ladies, who were looking out in expectation of the archery
+procession. Parties of gentlemen and ladies, and a motley crowd of
+spectators, were seen moving backwards and forwards, under the rocks,
+on the opposite side of the water. A barge, with coloured streamers
+flying, was waiting to take up a party, who were going upon the water.
+The bargemen rested up their oars, and gazed with broad faces of
+curiosity upon the busy scene that appeared upon the public walk.
+
+The archers and archeresses were now drawn up on the flags under the
+semicircular piazza just before Mrs. Yearsley's library. A little band
+of children, who had been mustered by Lady Diana Sweepstakes' "spirited
+exertions," closed the procession. They were now all in readiness. The
+drummer only waited for her ladyship's signal: and the archers' corps *
+only waited for her ladyship's word of command to march.
+
+   * Pronounced core.
+
+"Where are your bow and arrows, my little man?" said her ladyship to
+Hal, as she reviewed her Lilliputian regiment. "You can't march, man,
+without your arms!"
+
+Hal had despatched a messenger for his forgotten bow, but the messenger
+returned not; he looked from side to side in great distress. "O,
+there's my bow coming, I declare!" cried he. "Look, I see the bow and
+the ribands; look now between the trees, Charles Sweepstakes, on the
+Hotwell-walk; it is coming!"
+
+"But you've kept us all waiting a confounded time," said his impatient
+friend. "It is that good-natured poor fellow from Bristol, I protest,
+that has brought it to me. I'm sure I don't deserve it from him," said
+Hal to himself, when he saw the lad with the black patch on his eye
+running, quite out of breath, towards him with his bow and arrows.
+
+"Fall back, my good friend, fall back," said the military lady, as soon
+as he had delivered the bow to Hal; "I mean stand out of the way, for
+your great patch cuts no figure amongst us. Don't follow so close, now,
+as if you belonged to us, pray."
+
+The poor boy had no ambition to partake the triumph; he fell back, as
+soon as he understood the meaning of the lady's words.
+
+The drum beat, the fife played, the archers marched, the spectators
+admired. Hal stepped proudly and felt as if the eyes of the whole
+universe were upon his epaulettes, or upon the facings of his uniform;
+whilst all the time he was considered only as part of a show. The walk
+appeared much shorter than usual, and he was extremely sorry that Lady
+Diana, when they were half way up the hill leading to Prince's Place,
+mounted her horse, because the road was dirty, and all the gentlemen
+and ladies who accompanied her, followed her example.
+
+"We can leave the children to walk, you know," said she to the
+gentleman who helped her to mount her horse. "I must call to some of
+them though, and leave orders where they are to join."
+
+She beckoned; and Hal, who was foremost, and proud to show his
+alacrity, ran on to receive her ladyship's orders. Now, as we have
+before observed, it was a sharp and windy day; and though Lady Diana
+Sweepstakes was actually speaking to him, and looking at him, he could
+not prevent his nose from wanting to be blowed; he pulled out his
+handkerchief, and out rolled the new ball, which had been given to him
+just before he left home, and which, according to his usual careless
+habits, he had stuffed into his pocket in a hurry.
+
+"O, my new ball!" cried he, as he ran after it.
+
+As he stooped to pick it up, he let go his hat, which he had hitherto
+held on with anxious care; for the hat, though it had a fine green and
+white cockade, had no band or string round it. The string, as we may
+recollect, our wasteful hero had used in spinning his top. The hat was
+too large for his head without this band; a sudden gust of wind blew
+it off; Lady Diana's horse started, and reared. She was a "famous"
+horsewoman, and sat him to the admiration of all beholders; but there
+was a puddle of red clay and water in this spot, and her ladyship's
+uniform-habit was a sufferer by the accident.
+
+"Careless brat!" said she. "Why can't he keep his hat upon his head?"
+
+In the meantime the wind blew the hat down the hill, and Hal ran after
+it, amidst the laughter of his kind friends, the young Sweepstakes,
+and the rest of the little regiment. The hat was lodged at length upon
+a bank. Hal pursued it: he thought this bank was hard, but, alas! The
+moment he set his foot upon it, the foot sank. He tried to draw it
+back, his other foot slipped, and he fell prostrate, in his green and
+white uniform, into the treacherous bed of red mud. His companions, who
+had halted upon the top of the hill, stood laughing spectators of his
+misfortune.
+
+It happened that the poor boy with the black patch upon his eye, who
+had been ordered by Lady Diana to "fall back," and to "keep at a
+distance," was now coming up the hill; and the moment he saw our fallen
+hero, he hastened to his assistance. He dragged poor Hal, who was a
+deplorable spectacle, out of the red mud; the obliging mistress of a
+lodging-house, as soon as she understood that the young gentleman was
+nephew to Mr. Gresham, to whom she had formerly let her house, received
+Hal, covered as he was with dirt.
+
+The poor Bristol lad hastened to Mr. Gresham's for clean stockings and
+shoes for Hal. He was unwilling to give up his uniform; it was rubbed
+and rubbed, and a spot here and there was washed out; and he kept
+continually repeating, "When it's dry it will all brush off, when it's
+dry it will all brush off, won't it?"
+
+But soon the fear of being too late at the archery meeting began to
+balance the dread of appearing in his stained habiliments; and he now
+as anxiously repeated, whilst the woman held the wet coat to the fire,
+"O, I shall be too late; indeed, I shall be too late; make haste; it
+will never dry; hold it nearer—nearer to the fire; I shall lose my turn
+to shoot; O give me the coat; I don't mind how it is, if I can but get
+it on."
+
+Holding it nearer and nearer to the fire dried it quickly, to be sure,
+but it shrank it also; so that it was no easy matter to get the coat
+on again. However, Hal, who did not see the red splashes, which, in
+spite of all the operations, were too visible upon his shoulders, and
+upon the skirts of his white coat behind, was pretty well satisfied to
+observe that there was not one spot upon the facings.
+
+"Nobody," said he, "will take notice of my coat behind, I dare say. I
+think it looks as smart almost as ever;" and under this persuasion, our
+young archer resumed his bow—his bow with green ribands now no more!
+And he pursued his way to the Downs.
+
+All his companions were far out of sight.
+
+"I suppose," said he to his friend with the black patch—"I suppose my
+uncle and Ben had left home before you went for the shoes and stockings
+for me?"
+
+"O yes, sir; the butler said they had been gone to the Downs a matter
+of a good half hour or more."
+
+Hal trudged on as fast as he possibly could. When he got upon the
+Downs, he saw numbers of carriages, and crowds of people, all going
+towards the place of meeting, at the Ostrich. He pressed forwards. He
+was at first so much afraid of being late, that he did not take notice
+of the mirth his motley appearance excited in all beholders. At length
+he reached the appointed spot. There was a great crowd of people; in
+the midst, he heard Lady Diana's loud voice betting upon some one who
+was just going to shoot at the mark.
+
+"So then the shooting is begun, is it?" said Hal. "O, let me in; pray
+let me into the circle. I'm one of the archers; I am, indeed; don't you
+see my green and white uniform?"
+
+"Your red and white uniform, you mean," said the man to whom he
+addressed himself; and the people, as they opened a passage for him,
+could not refrain from laughing at the mixture of dirt and finery which
+it exhibited.
+
+In vain, when he got into the midst of the formidable circle, he looked
+to his friends, the young Sweepstakes, for their countenance and
+support; they were amongst the most unmerciful of the laughers. Lady
+Diana also seemed more to enjoy than to pity his confusion.
+
+"Why could you not keep your hat upon your head, man?" said she,
+in her masculine tone. "You have been almost the ruin of my poor
+uniform-habit; but, thank God, I've escaped rather better than you
+have. Don't stand there, in the middle of the circle, or you'll have an
+arrow in your eyes, just now, I've a notion."
+
+Hal looked round in search of better friends.
+
+"O, where's my uncle? Where's Ben?" said he. He was in such confusion
+that, amongst the number of faces, he could scarcely distinguish one
+from another; but he felt somebody at this moment pull his elbow,
+and, to his great relief, he heard the friendly voice and saw the
+good-natured face of his cousin Ben.
+
+"Come back; come behind the people," said Ben; "and put on my great
+coat; here it is for you."
+
+Right glad was Hal to cover his disgraced uniform with the rough great
+coat which he had formerly despised. He pulled the stained, drooping
+cockade out of his unfortunate hat; and he was now sufficiently
+recovered from his vexation to give an intelligible account of his
+accident to his uncle and Patty, who anxiously inquired what had
+detained him so long, and what had been the matter. In the midst of the
+history of his disaster, he was just proving to Patty that his taking
+the hat-band to spin his top had nothing to do with his misfortune,
+and he was at the same time endeavouring to refute his uncle's opinion
+that the waste of the whip-cord, that tied the parcel, was the original
+cause of all his evils, when he was summoned to try his skill with his
+"famous" bow.
+
+"My hands are numbed; I can scarcely feel," said he, rubbing them, and
+blowing upon the ends of his fingers.
+
+"Come, come," cried young Sweepstakes, "I'm within one inch of the
+mark; who'll go nearer, I shall like to see. Shoot away, Hal. But first
+understand our laws; we settled them before you came upon the green.
+You are to have three shots, with your own bow and your own arrows; and
+nobody's to borrow or lend under pretence of other bows being better or
+worse, or under any pretence. Do you hear, Hal?"
+
+This young gentleman had good reasons for being so strict in these
+laws, as he had observed that none of his companions had such an
+excellent bow as he had provided for himself. Some of the boys had
+forgotten to bring more than one arrow with them, and by his cunning
+regulations that each person should shoot with his own arrows, many had
+lost one or two of their shots.
+
+"You are a lucky fellow: you have your three arrows," said young
+Sweepstakes. "Come, we can't wait whilst you rub your fingers,
+man—shoot away."
+
+Hal was rather surprised at the asperity with which his friend spoke.
+He little knew how easily acquaintances, who call themselves friends,
+can change, when their interest comes in the slightest degree in
+competition with their friendship. Hurried by his impatient rival, and
+with his hands so much benumbed that he could scarcely feel how to
+fix the arrow in the string, he drew the bow. The arrow was within a
+quarter of an inch of Master Sweepstakes' mark, which was the nearest
+that had yet been hit. Hal seized his second arrow—"If I have any
+luck," said he—But just as he pronounced the word luck, and as he bent
+his bow, the string broke in two, and the bow fell from his hands.
+
+"There, it's all over with you," cried Master Sweepstakes, with a
+triumphant laugh.
+
+"Here's my bow for him, and welcome," said Ben.
+
+"No, no, sir; that is not fair; that's against the regulation. You may
+shoot with your own bow if you choose it, or you may not, just as you
+think proper; but you must not lend it, sir."
+
+It was now Ben's turn to make his trial. His first arrow was not
+successful. His second was exactly as near as Hal's first.
+
+"You have but one more," said Master Sweepstakes. "Now for it!"
+
+Ben, before he ventured his last arrow, prudently examined the string
+of his bow; and as he pulled it to try its strength, it cracked.
+
+Master Sweepstakes clapped his hands with loud exultations and
+insulting laughter. But his laughter ceased, when our provident hero
+calmly drew from his pocket an excellent piece of whip-cord.
+
+"The everlasting whip-cord, I declare!" exclaimed Hal, when he saw that
+it was the very same that had tied up the parcel.
+
+"Yes," said Ben, as he fastened it to his bow, "I put it into my pocket
+to-day, on purpose, because I thought I might happen to want it."
+
+He drew his bow the third and last time.
+
+"O, papa," cried little Patty, as his arrow hit the mark, "it's the
+nearest; is not it the nearest?"
+
+Master Sweepstakes, with anxiety, examined the hit. There could be no
+doubt. Ben was victorious! The bow, the prize bow, was now delivered to
+him.
+
+And Hal, as he looked at the whip-cord, exclaimed, "How lucky this
+whip-cord has been to you, Ben!"
+
+"It is lucky, perhaps, you mean, that he took care of it," said Mr.
+Gresham.
+
+"Ay," said Hal, "very true; he might well say 'Waste not, want not;' it
+is a good thing to have two strings to one's bow."
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+                          THE BRACELETS.
+
+                           ———————————
+
+IN a beautiful and retired part of England lived Mrs. Villars, a
+lady whose accurate understanding, benevolent heart, and steady
+temper, peculiarly fitted her for the most difficult, as well as most
+important of all occupations—the education of youth. This task she
+had undertaken; and twenty young persons were put under her care,
+with the perfect confidence of their parents. No young people could
+be happier; they were good and gay, emulous, but not envious of each
+other; for Mrs. Villars was impartially just. Her praise they felt to
+be the reward of merit, and her blame they knew to be the necessary
+consequence of ill conduct; to the one, therefore, they patiently
+submitted, and in the other consciously rejoiced. They rose with fresh
+cheerfulness in the morning, eager to pursue their various occupations;
+they returned in the evening with renewed ardour to their amusements,
+and retired to rest satisfied with themselves and pleased with each
+other.
+
+Nothing so much contributed to preserve spirit of emulation in this
+little society as a small honorary distinction given annually, as the
+prize of successful application. The prize this year was peculiarly
+dear to each individual, as it was the picture of a friend whom
+they all dearly loved—it was the picture of Mrs. Villars in a small
+bracelet. It wanted neither gold, pearls, nor precious stones, to give
+it value.
+
+The two foremost candidates for the prize were Cecilia and Leonora.
+Cecilia was the most intimate friend of Leonora, but Leonora was only
+the favourite companion of Cecilia.
+
+Cecilia was of an active, ambitious, enterprising disposition; more
+eager in the pursuit than happy in the enjoyment of her wishes.
+Leonora was of a contented, unaspiring, temperate character, not
+easily roused to action, but indefatigable when once excited. Leonora
+was proud, Cecilia was vain. Her vanity made her more dependent upon
+the approbation of others, and therefore more anxious to please, than
+Leonora; but that very vanity made her, at the same time, more apt
+to offend. In short, Leonora was the most anxious to avoid what was
+wrong, Cecilia the most ambitious to do what was right. Few of their
+companions loved, but many were led by Cecilia, for she was often
+successful; many loved Leonora, but none were ever governed by her, for
+she was too indolent to govern.
+
+On the first day of May, about six o'clock in the evening, a great
+bell rang, to summon this little society into a hall, where the prize
+was to be decided. A number of small tables were placed in a circle in
+the middle of the hall; seats for the young competitors were raised
+one above another, in a semicircle, some yards distant from the table;
+and the judges' chairs, under canopies of lilacs and laburnums,
+forming another semicircle, closed the amphitheatre. Every one put
+their writings, their drawings, their works of various kinds, upon the
+tables appropriated for each. How unsteady were the last steps to these
+tables! How each little hand trembled as it laid down its claims! Till
+this moment every one thought herself secure of success, but now each
+felt an equal certainty of being excelled; and the heart which a few
+minutes before exulted with hope, now palpitated with fear.
+
+The works were examined, the preference adjudged; and the prize was
+declared to be the happy Cecilia's. Mrs. Villars came forward smiling,
+with the bracelet in her hand. Cecilia was behind her companions, on
+the highest row; all the others gave way, and she was on the floor in
+an instant. Mrs. Villa clasped the bracelet on her arm; the clasp was
+heard through the whole hall, and a universal smile of congratulation
+followed. Mrs. Villars kissed Cecilia's little hand; and "now," said
+she, "go and rejoice with your companions; the remainder of the day is
+yours."
+
+Oh! You whose hearts are elated with success, whose bosoms beat high
+with joy, in the moment of triumph, command yourselves; let that
+triumph be moderate, that it may be lasting. Consider that, though you
+are good, you may be better, and though wise, you may be weak.
+
+As soon as Mrs. Villars had given her the bracelet, all Cecilia's
+little companions crowded round her, and they all left the hall in an
+instant. She was full of spirits and vanity—she ran on, running down
+the flight of steps which led to the garden. In her violent haste,
+Cecilia threw down the little Louisa. Louisa had a china mandarin in
+her hand, which her mother had sent her that very morning; it was all
+broke to pieces by the fall.
+
+"Oh! My mandarin!" cried Louisa, bursting into tears.
+
+The crowd behind Cecilia suddenly stopped.
+
+Louisa sat on the lowest steps fixing her eyes upon the broken pieces;
+then, turning round, she hid her face in her hands upon the step above
+her. In turning, Louisa threw down the remains of the mandarin; the
+head, which she had placed in the socket, fell from the shoulders, and
+rolled bounding along the gravel-walk.
+
+Cecilia pointed to the head and to the socket, and burst out laughing;
+the crowd behind laughed too. At any other time they would have been
+more inclined to cry with Louisa; but Cecilia had just been successful,
+and sympathy with the victorious often makes us forget justice.
+
+Leonora, however, preserved her usual consistency. "Poor, Louisa!" said
+she, looking first at her, and then reproachfully at Cecilia.
+
+Cecilia turned sharply round, colouring, half with shame and half with
+vexation. "I could not help it, Leonora," said she.
+
+"But you could have helped laughing, Cecilia."
+
+"I didn't laugh at Louisa; and I surely may laugh, for it does nobody
+any harm."
+
+"I am sure, however," replied Leonora, "I should not have laughed if I
+had—"
+
+"No, to be sure you wouldn't, because Louisa is your favourite. I can
+buy her another mandarin the next time that old pedlar comes to the
+door, if that's all. I can do no more. Can I?" said she, turning round
+to her companions.
+
+"No, to be sure," said they, "that's all fair."
+
+Cecilia looked triumphantly at Leonora. Leonora let go her hand; she
+ran on, and the crowd followed. When she got to the end of the garden,
+she turned round to see if Leonora had followed her too; but was vexed
+to see her still sitting on the steps with Louisa.
+
+"I'm sure I can do no more than buy her another! Can I?" said she,
+again appealing to her companions.
+
+"No, to be sure," said they, eager to begin their plays.
+
+How many did they begin and leave off before Cecilia could be satisfied
+with any. Her thoughts were discomposed, and her mind was running upon
+something else; no wonder then that she did not play with her usual
+address. She grew still more impatient; she threw down the nine-pins:
+
+"Come, let us play at something else—at threading the needle," said
+she, holding out her hand.
+
+They all yielded to the hand which wore the bracelet. But Cecilia,
+dissatisfied with herself, was discontented with everybody else; her
+tone grew more and more peremptory—one was too rude, another too stiff;
+one was too slow, another too quick; in short, everything went wrong,
+and everybody was tired of her humours.
+
+The triumph of "success" is absolute, but short. Cecilia's companions
+at length recollected that though she had embroidered a tulip and
+painted a peach better than they, yet that they could play as well,
+and keep their tempers better: she was thrown out. Walking towards the
+house in a peevish mood, she met Leonora; she passed on.
+
+"Cecilia!" cried Leonora.
+
+"Well, what do you want with me?"
+
+"Are we friends?"
+
+"You know best."
+
+"We are; if you will let me tell Louisa that you are sorry—"
+
+Cecilia, interrupting her, "O! Pray let me hear no more about Louisa!"
+
+"What! Not confess that you were in the wrong! Oh, Cecilia! I had a
+better opinion of you."
+
+"Your opinion is of no consequence to me now; for you don't love me."
+
+"No, not when you are unjust, Cecilia."
+
+"Unjust! I am not unjust; and if I were, you are not my governess."
+
+"No, but am I not your friend?"
+
+"I don't desire to have such a friend, who would quarrel with me for
+happening to throw down little Louisa—how could I tell that she had
+a mandarin in her hand? And when it was broken, could I do more than
+promise her another? Was that unjust?"
+
+"But you know, Cecilia—"
+
+"'I know,'" ironically, "I know, Leonora, that you love Louisa better
+than you do me; that's the injustice!"
+
+"If I did," replied Leonora gravely, "it would be no injustice, if she
+deserved it better."
+
+"How can you compare Louisa to me!" exclaimed Cecilia, indignantly.
+
+Leonora made no answer, for she was really hurt at her friend's
+conduct; she walked on to join the rest of her companions. They were
+dancing in a round upon the grass. Leonora declined dancing, but they
+prevailed upon her to sing for them; her voice was not so sprightly,
+but it was sweeter than usual. Who sung so sweetly as Leonora? Or who
+danced so nimbly as Louisa?
+
+Away she was flying, all spirits and gayety, when Leonora's eyes full
+of tears, caught hers. Louisa silently let go her companions' hands,
+and quitting the dance, ran up to Leonora to inquire what was the
+matter with her.
+
+"Nothing," replied she, "that need interrupt you—Go, my dear, and dance
+again."
+
+Louisa immediately ran away to her garden, and pulling off her little
+straw hat, she lined it with the freshest strawberry leaves, and was
+upon her knees before the strawberry bed when Cecilia came by. Cecilia
+was not disposed to be pleased with Louisa at that instant, for two
+reasons: because she was jealous of her, and because she had injured
+her. The injury, however, Louisa had already forgotten; perhaps, to
+tell things just as they were, she was not quite so much inclined to
+kiss Cecilia as she would have been before the fall of her mandarin,
+but this was the utmost extent of her malice, if it can be called
+malice.
+
+"What are you doing there, little one?" said Cecilia in a sharp tone.
+"Are you eating your early strawberries here all alone?"
+
+"No," said Louisa, mysteriously; "I am not eating them."
+
+"What are you doing with them—can't you answer then? I'm not playing
+with you, child!"
+
+"Oh! As to that, Cecilia, you know I need not answer you unless I
+choose it; not but what I would, if you would only ask me civilly—and
+if you would not call me child."
+
+"Why should not I call you child?"
+
+"Because—because—I don't know;—but I wish you would stand out of my
+light, Cecilia, for you are trampling upon all my strawberries."
+
+"I have not touched one, you covetous little creature!"
+
+"Indeed—indeed, Cecilia, I am not covetous. I have not eaten one of
+them—they are all for your friend Leonora. See how unjust you are."
+
+"Unjust! That's a Cant word you learned of my friend Leonora, as you
+call her, but she is not my friend now."
+
+"Not your friend now!" exclaimed Louisa. "Then, I am sure you must have
+done something very naughty."
+
+"How!" said Cecilia, catching hold of her.
+
+"Let me go—Let me go!" cried Louisa, struggling. "I won't give you one
+of my strawberries, for I don't like you at all."
+
+"You don't, don't you?" said Cecilia, provoked and catching the
+strawberries over the hedge.
+
+"Will nobody help me!" exclaimed Louisa, snatching her hat again, and
+running away with all her force.
+
+"What have I done?" said Cecilia, recollecting herself. "Louisa!
+Louisa!"
+
+She called very loud, but Louisa would not turn back! She was running
+to her companions.
+
+They were still dancing, hand in hand, upon the grass, whilst Leonora,
+sitting in the middle, sang to them.
+
+"Stop! Stop! And hear me!" cried Louisa, breaking through them; and
+rushing up to Leonora, she threw her hat at her feet, and panting for
+breath—
+
+"It was full—almost full of my own strawberries," said she, "the first
+I ever got out of my own garden. They should all have been for you,
+Leonora, but now I have not one left. They are all gone!" said she; and
+she hid her face in Leonora's lap.
+
+"Gone! Gone where?" said every one at once, running up to her.
+"Cecilia! Cecilia!" said she, sobbing.
+
+"Cecilia!" repeated Leonora. "What of Cecilia?"
+
+"Yes, it was—it was."
+
+"Come along with me," said Leonora, unwilling to have her friend
+exposed; "come, and I will get you some more strawberries."
+
+"Oh, I don't mind the strawberries, indeed; but I wanted to have had
+the pleasure of giving them to you."
+
+Leonora took her up in her arms to carry her away, but it was too late.
+
+"What, Cecilia! Cecilia, who won the prize! It could not surely be
+Cecilia," whispered every busy tongue.
+
+At this instant the bell summoned them in.
+
+"There she is!—There she is!" cried they, pointing to an arbour, where
+Cecilia was standing, ashamed and alone; and as they passed her, some
+lifted up their hands and eyes with astonishment, others whispered and
+huddled mysteriously together, as if to avoid her. Leonora walked on,
+her head a little higher than usual.
+
+"Leonora!" said Cecilia, timorously, as she passed.
+
+"Oh, Cecilia! Who would have thought that you had a bad heart?"
+
+Cecilia turned her head aside and burst into tears.
+
+"Oh no, indeed, she has not a bad heart," cried Louisa, running up
+to her, and throwing her arms round her neck; "she's very sorry!—Are
+not you, Cecilia? But don't cry any more, for I forgive you with all
+my heart; and I love you now, though I said I did not when I was in a
+passion."
+
+"O, you sweet-tempered girl! How I love you," said Cecilia, kissing her.
+
+"Well then, if you do, come along with me, and dry your eyes, for they
+are so red."
+
+"Go, my dear, and I'll come presently."
+
+"Then I will keep a place for you next to me; but you must make haste,
+or you will have to come in when we have all set down to supper, and
+then you will be so stared at! So don't stay now."
+
+Cecilia followed Louisa with her eyes till she was out of sight. "And
+is Louisa," said she to herself, "the only one who would stop to pity
+me? Mrs. Villars told me that this day should be mine; she little
+thought how it would end!"
+
+Saying these words, Cecilia threw herself down upon the ground; her arm
+leaned upon a heap of turf which she had raised in the morning, and
+which in the pride and gayety of her heart, she had called her throne.
+
+At this instant, Mrs. Villars came out to enjoy the serenity of the
+evening, and passing by the arbour where Cecilia lay, she started;
+Cecilia rose hastily.
+
+"Who is there?" said Mrs. Villars.
+
+"It is I, madam."
+
+"And who is I?"
+
+"Cecilia."
+
+"Why, what keeps you here, my dear—where are your companions? This is,
+perhaps, one of the happiest days of your life."
+
+"O no, madam!" said Cecilia, hardly able to repress her tears.
+
+"Why, my dear, what is the matter?"
+
+Cecilia hesitated.
+
+"Speak, my dear. You know that when I ask you to tell me any thing as
+your friend, I never punish you as your governess; therefore you need
+not be afraid to tell me what is the matter."
+
+"No, madam, I am not afraid, but ashamed. You asked me why I was not
+with my companions. Why, madam, because they have all left me, and—"
+
+"And what, my dear?"
+
+"And I see that they all dislike me. And yet I don't know why they
+should, for I take as much pains to please as any of them. All my
+masters seem satisfied with me; and you yourself, ma'am, were pleased
+this very morning to give me this bracelet; and I am sure you would not
+have given it to any one who did not deserve it."
+
+"Certainly not. You did deserve it for your application—for your
+successful application. The prize was for the most assiduous, not for
+the most amiable."
+
+"Then if it had been for the most amiable, it would not have been for
+me?"
+
+Mrs. Villars, smiling—"Why, what do you think yourself, Cecilia? You
+are better able to judge than I am. I can determine whether or no
+you apply to what I give you to learn; whether you attend to what I
+desire you to do, and avoid what I desire you not to do. I know that
+I like you as a pupil, but I cannot know that I should like you as a
+companion, unless I were your companion; therefore I must judge of what
+I should do by seeing what others do in the same circumstances."
+
+"O, pray don't, ma'am; for then you would not love me neither. And yet
+I think you would love me; for I hope that I am as ready to oblige, and
+as good-natured, as—"
+
+"Yes, Cecilia, I don't doubt but that you would be very good-natured
+to me, but I am afraid that I should not like you unless you were
+good-tempered, too."
+
+"But, ma'am, by good-natured I mean good-tempered—it's all the same
+thing."
+
+"No, indeed, I understand by them two very different things. You are
+good-natured, Cecilia, for you are desirous to oblige and serve your
+companions, to gain them praise and save them from blame, to give them
+pleasure, and to relieve them from pain; but Leonora is good-tempered,
+for she can bear with their foibles, and acknowledge her own. Without
+disputing about the right, she sometimes yields to those who are in
+the wrong. In short, her temper is perfectly good, for it can bear and
+forbear."
+
+"I wish that mine could," said Cecilia, sighing.
+
+"It may," replied Mrs. Villars; "but it is not wishes alone which can
+improve us in any thing. Turn the same exertion and perseverance which
+have won you the prize to-day to this object, and you will meet with
+the same success; perhaps not on the first, the second, or the third
+attempt, but depend upon it that you will at last; every new effort
+will weaken your bad habits and strengthen your good ones. But you must
+not expect to succeed all at once; I repeat it to you, for habit must
+be counteracted by habit. It would be as extravagant in us to expect
+that all our faults could be destroyed by one punishment, were it ever
+so severe, as it was in the Roman emperor we were reading of a few days
+ago to wish that all the heads of his enemies were upon one neck, that
+he might cut them off by one blow."
+
+Here Mrs. Villars took Cecilia by the hand, and they began to walk home.
+
+Such was the nature of Cecilia's mind, that, when any object was
+forcibly impressed on her imagination, it caused temporary suspension
+of her reasoning faculties. Hope was too strong a stimulus for her
+spirits; and when fear did take possession of her mind, it was attended
+with total debility. Her vanity was now as much mortified as in the
+morning it had been elated. She walked on with Mrs. Villars in silence
+until they came under the shade of the elm tree walk, and then, fixing
+her eyes upon Mrs. Villars, she stopped short.
+
+"Do you think, madam," said she, with hesitation, "do you think, madam,
+that I have a bad heart?"
+
+"A bad heart, my dear! Why, what put that into your head?"
+
+"Leonora said that I had, ma'am, and I felt ashamed when she said so."
+
+"But, my dear, how can Leonora tell whether your heart be good or bad?
+However, in the first place, tell me what you mean by a bad heart."
+
+"Indeed, I do not know what is meant by it, ma'am; but it is something
+which every body hates."
+
+"And why do they hate it?"
+
+"Because they think that it will hurt them, ma'am, I believe; and that
+those who have bad hearts take delight in doing mischief; and that they
+never do any body good but for their own ends."
+
+"Then the best definition which you can give me of a bad heart is that
+it is some constant propensity to hurt others, and to do wrong for the
+sake of doing wrong."
+
+"Yes, ma'am, but that is not all neither; there is still something
+else meant; something which I cannot express—which, indeed, I never
+distinctly understood; but of which, therefore, I was the more afraid."
+
+"Well, then, to begin with what you do understand, tell me, Cecilia,
+do you really think it possible to be wicked merely for the love of
+wickedness? No human being becomes wicked all at once; a man begins by
+doing wrong because it is, or because he thinks it is for his interest;
+if he continues to do so, he must conquer his sense of shame, and lose
+his love of virtue. But how can you, Cecilia, who feel such a strong
+sense of shame, and such an eager desire to improve, imagine that you
+have a bad heart?"
+
+"Indeed, madam, I never did, until every body told me so, and then I
+began to be frightened about it. This very evening, ma'am, when I was
+in a passion, I threw little Louisa's strawberries away; which, I am
+sure, I was very sorry for afterwards; and Leonora and every body cried
+out that I had a bad heart; but I am sure that I was only in a passion."
+
+"Very likely. And when you are in a passion, as you call it, Cecilia,
+you see that you are tempted to do harm to others; if they do not feel
+angry themselves, they do not sympathize with you; they do not perceive
+the motive which actuates you, and then they say that you have a bad
+heart. I dare say, however, when your passion is over, and when you
+recollect yourself; you are very sorry for what you have done and said;
+are not you?"
+
+"Yes, indeed, madam, very sorry."
+
+"Then make that sorrow of use to you, Cecilia, and fix it steadily in
+your thoughts, as you hope to be good and happy, that, if you suffer
+yourself to yield to your passion upon every trifling occasion, anger
+and its consequences will become familiar to your mind; and in the same
+proportion your sense of shame will be weakened, till what you began
+with doing from sudden impulse you will end with doing from habit and
+choice; and then you would, indeed, according to our definition, have a
+bad heart."
+
+"Oh, madam! I hope—I am sure I never shall."
+
+"No, indeed, Cecilia; I do, indeed, believe that you never will; on the
+contrary, I think that you have a very good disposition, and, what is
+of infinitely more consequence to you, an active desire of improvement.
+Show me that you have, as much perseverance as you have candour, and I
+shall not despair of your becoming every thing that I could wish."
+
+Here Cecilia's countenance brightened, and she ran up the steps in
+almost as high spirits as she ran down them in the morning.
+
+"Good night to you, Cecilia," said Mrs. Villars, as she was crossing
+the hall.
+
+"Good night to you, madam," said Cecilia; and she ran up stairs to bed.
+
+She could not go to sleep, but she lay awake reflecting upon the events
+of the preceding day, and forming resolutions for the future; at the
+same time, considering that she had resolved, and resolved without
+effect, she wished to give her mind some more powerful motive; ambition
+she knew to be its most powerful incentive.
+
+"Have I not," said she to herself, "already won the prize of
+application, and cannot the same application procure me a much higher
+prize? Mrs. Villars said that if the prize had been promised to the
+most amiable, it would not have been given to me; perhaps it would not
+yesterday—perhaps it might not to-morrow; but that is no reason that I
+should despair of ever deserving it."
+
+In consequence of this reasoning, Cecilia formed a design of proposing
+to her companions that they should give a prize, the first of the
+ensuing month (the first of June), to the most amiable. Mrs. Villars
+applauded the scheme, and her companions adopted it with the greatest
+alacrity.
+
+"Let the prize," said they, "be a bracelet of our own hair." And
+instantly their shining scissors were procured, and each contributed a
+lock of her hair. They formed the most beautiful gradation of colours,
+from the palest auburn to the brightest black. Who was to have the
+honour of plaiting them was now the question.
+
+Caroline begged that she might, as she could plait very neatly, she
+said.
+
+Cecilia, however, was equally sure that she could do it much better,
+and a dispute would inevitably have ensued, if Cecilia, recollecting
+herself just as her colour rose to scarlet, had not yielded—yielded
+with no very good grace indeed, but as well as could be expected for
+the first time. For it is habit which confers ease; and without ease,
+even in moral actions, there can be no grace.
+
+The bracelet was plaited in the neatest manner by Caroline, finished
+round the edge with silver twist, and on it was worked, in the smallest
+silver letters, this motto, TO THE MOST AMIABLE. The moment it was
+completed, every body begged to try it on. It fastened with little
+silver clasps, and as it was made large enough for the eldest girls, it
+was too large for the youngest; of this they bitterly complained, and
+unanimously entreated that it might be cut to fit them.
+
+"How foolish!" exclaimed Cecilia. "Don't you perceive that, if you win
+it, you have nothing to do but to put the clasps a little further from
+the edge? But if we get it, we can't make it larger."
+
+"Very true," said they, "but you need not to have called us foolish,
+Cecilia!"
+
+It was by such hasty and unguarded expressions as these that Cecilia
+offended; a slight difference in the manner makes a very material one
+in the effect. Cecilia lost more love by general petulance than she
+could gain by the greatest particular exertions.
+
+How far she succeeded in curing herself of this defect, how far she
+became deserving of the bracelet, and to whom the bracelet was given,
+shall be told in the history of the first of June.
+
+
+                           ———————————
+
+                  CONTINUATION OF THE BRACELETS.
+
+THE first of June was now arrived, and all the young competitors were
+in a state of the most anxious suspense.
+
+Leonora and Cecilia continued to be the foremost candidates; their
+quarrel had never been finally adjusted, and their different
+pretensions now retarded all thoughts of a reconciliation.
+
+Cecilia, though she was capable of acknowledging any of her faults
+in public before all her companions, could not humble herself in
+private to Leonora; Leonora was her equal, they were her inferiors;
+and submission is much easier to a vain mind, where it appears to be
+voluntary, than when it is the necessary tribute to justice or candour.
+So strongly did Cecilia feel this truth that she even delayed making
+any apology, or coming to any explanation with Leonora, until success
+should once more give her the palm.
+
+If I win the bracelet to-day, said she to herself; I will solicit the
+return of Leonora's friendship; it will be more valuable to me than
+even the bracelet; and at such a time, and asked in such a manner, she
+surely cannot refuse it to me. Animated with this hope of a double
+triumph, Cecilia canvassed with the most zealous activity; by constant
+attention and exertion she had considerably abated the violence of her
+temper, and changed the course of her habits. Her powers of pleasing
+were now excited, instead of her abilities to excel; and, if her
+talents appeared less brilliant, her character was acknowledged to be
+more amiable; so great an influence upon our manners and conduct have
+the objects of our ambition. Cecilia was now, if possible, more than
+ever desirous of doing what was right, but she had not yet acquired
+sufficient fear of doing wrong. This was the fundamental error of her
+mind; it arose in a great measure from her early education.
+
+Her mother died when she was very young; and though her father had
+supplied her place in the best and kindest manner, he had insensibly
+infused into his daughter's mind a portion of that enterprising,
+independent spirit, which he justly deemed essential to the character
+of her brother. This brother was some years older than Cecilia, but he
+had always been the favourite companion of her youth; what her father's
+precepts inculcated, his example enforced, and even Cecilia's virtues
+consequently became such as were more estimable in a man than desirable
+in a female.
+
+All small objects and small errors she had been taught to disregard as
+trifles; and her impatient disposition was perpetually leading her into
+more material faults; yet her candour in confessing these, she had been
+suffered to believe, was sufficient reparation and atonement.
+
+Leonora, on the contrary, who had been educated by her mother in
+a manner more suited to her sex, had a character and virtues more
+peculiar to a female; her judgment had been early cultivated, and her
+good sense employed in the regulation of her conduct; she had been
+habituated to that restraint, which, as a woman, she was to expect in
+life, and early accustomed to yield; compliance in her seemed natural
+and graceful.
+
+Yet, notwithstanding the gentleness of her temper, she was in reality
+more independent than Cecilia; she had more reliance upon her own
+judgment, and more satisfaction in her own approbation. Though far
+from insensible to praise, she was not liable to be misled by the
+indiscriminate love of admiration; the uniform kindness of her manner,
+the consistency and equality of her character, had fixed the esteem and
+passive love of her companions.
+
+By passive love, we mean that species of affection which makes us
+unwilling to offend, rather than anxious to oblige; which is more a
+habit than an emotion of the mind. For Cecilia, her companions felt
+active love, for she was active in showing her love to them.
+
+Active love arises spontaneously in the mind, after feeling particular
+instances of kindness, without reflection on the past conduct or
+general character; it exceeds the merits of its object, and is
+connected with a feeling of generosity, rather than with a sense of
+justice.
+
+Without determining which species of love is the more flattering to
+others, we can easily decide which is the most agreeable feeling to
+our own minds; we give our hearts more credit for being generous than
+for being just; and we feel more self-complacency when we give our
+love voluntarily, than when we yield it as a tribute which we cannot
+withhold. Though Cecilia's companions might not know all this in
+theory, they proved it in practice; for they loved her in a much higher
+proportion to her merits than they loved Leonora.
+
+Each of the young judges were to signify their choice by putting a
+red or a white shell into a vase prepared for the purpose. Cecilia's
+colour was red, Leonora's white. In the morning nothing was to be seen
+but these shells, nothing talked of but the long-expected event of the
+evening. Cecilia, following Leonora's example, had made it a point of
+honour not to inquire of any individual her vote previous to their
+final determination.
+
+They were both sitting together in Louisa's room; Louisa was recovering
+from the measles. Every one, during her illness, had been desirous of
+attending her; but Leonora and Cecilia were the only two that were
+permitted to see her, as they alone had had the distemper. They were
+both assiduous in their care of Louisa; but Leonora's want of exertion
+to overcome any disagreeable feelings of sensibility often deprived her
+of presence of mind, and prevented her being so constantly useful as
+Cecilia. Cecilia, on the contrary, often made too much noise and bustle
+with her officious assistance, and was too anxious to invent amusements
+and procure comforts for Louisa, without perceiving that illness takes
+away the power of enjoying them.
+
+As she was sitting in the window in the morning, exerting herself to
+entertain Louisa, she heard the voice of an old pedlar who often used
+to come to the house. Down stairs she ran immediately to ask Mrs.
+Villars's permission to bring him into the hall.
+
+Mrs. Villars consented, and away Cecilia ran to proclaim the news to
+her companions; then first returning into the hall, she found the
+pedlar just unbuckling his box, and taking it off his shoulders. "What
+would you be pleased to want, Miss?" said he. "I've all kinds of
+tweezer-cases, rings, and lockets of all sorts," continued he, opening
+all the glittering drawers successively.
+
+"Oh!" said Cecilia, shutting the drawer of lockets which tempted her
+most. "These are not the things which I want; have you any china
+figures, any mandarins?"
+
+"Alack-a-day, Miss, I had a great stock of that same china ware, but
+now I'm quite out of them kind of things; but I believe," said he,
+rummaging in one of the deepest drawers, "I believe I have one left,
+and here it is."
+
+"Oh, that is the very thing! What's its price?"
+
+"Only three shillings, ma'am." Cecilia paid the money, and was just
+going to carry off the mandarin, when the pedlar took out of his
+greatcoat pocket a neat mahogany case; it was about a foot long, and
+fastened at each end by two little clasps; it had besides a small lock
+in the middle.
+
+"What is that?" said Cecilia, eagerly.
+
+"It's only a china figure, Miss, which I am going to carry to an
+elderly lady, who lives nigh at hand, and who is mighty fond of such
+things."
+
+"Could you let me look at it?"
+
+"And welcome, Miss," said he, and opened the case.
+
+"O goodness! How beautiful!" exclaimed Cecilia.
+
+It was a figure of Flora, crowned with roses, and carrying a basket
+of flowers in her hand. Cecilia contemplated it with delight. "How I
+should like to give this to Louisa," said she to herself; and at last
+breaking silence, "Did you promise it to the old lady?"
+
+"O no, Miss; I didn't promise it—she never saw it; and if so be that
+you'd like to take it, I'd make no more words about it."
+
+"And how much does it cost?"
+
+"Why, Miss, as to that, I'll let you have it for half-a-guinea."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Cecilia immediately produced the box in which she kept her treasure,
+and emptying it upon the table, she began to count the shillings; alas!
+there were but six shillings.
+
+"How provoking!" said she. "Then I can't have it—where's the mandarin?
+O I have it," said she, taking it up, and looking at it with the utmost
+disgust. "Is this the same that I had before?"
+
+"Yes, Miss, the very same," replied the pedlar, who, during this time,
+had been examining the little box out of which Cecilia had taken her
+money; it was of silver.
+
+"Why, ma'am," said he, "since you've taken such a fancy to the piece,
+if you've a mind to make up the remainder of the money, I will take
+this here little box, if you care to part with it."
+
+Now this box was a keepsake from Leonora to Cecilia.
+
+"No," said Cecilia hastily, blushing a little, and stretching out her
+hand to receive it.
+
+"Oh, Miss!" said he, returning it carelessly. "I hope there's no
+offence; I meant but to serve you, that's all. Such a rare piece of
+china-work has no cause to go a begging," added he, putting the Flora
+deliberately into the case; then turning the key with a jerk, he let it
+drop into his pocket: and lifting up his box by the leather straps, he
+was preparing to depart.
+
+"Oh, stay one minute!" said Cecilia, in whose mind there had passed
+a very warm conflict during the pedlar's harangue. "Louisa would so
+like this Flora," said she, arguing with herself; "besides, it would
+be so generous in me to give it to her instead of that ugly mandarin;
+that would be doing only common justice, for I promised it to her, and
+she expects it. Though, when I come to look at this mandarin, it is
+not even so good as hers was; the gilding is all rubbed off, so that
+I absolutely must buy this for her. O yes, I will, and she will be so
+delighted! And then every body will say it is the prettiest thing they
+ever saw, and the broken mandarin will be forgotten forever."
+
+Here Cecilia's hand moved, and she was just going to decide: "O! But
+stop," said she to herself; "consider Leonora gave me this box, and it
+is a keepsake. However, now we have quarreled, and I dare say that she
+would not mind my parting with it; I'm sure that I should not care if
+she was to give away my keepsake the smelling bottle, or the ring which
+I gave her. So what does it signify; besides, is it not my own, and
+have I not a right to do what I please with it?"
+
+At this dangerous instant for Cecilia, a party of her companions opened
+the door; she knew that they came as purchasers, and she dreaded her
+Flora's becoming the prize of some higher bidder.
+
+"Here," said she, hastily putting the box into the pedlar's hand,
+without looking at it; "take it, and give me the Flora."
+
+Her hand trembled, though she snatched it impatiently. She ran by,
+without seeming to mind any of her companions—she almost wished to turn
+back.
+
+Let those who are tempted to do wrong by the hopes of future
+gratification, or the prospect of certain concealment and impunity,
+remember that, unless they are totally depraved, they bear in their own
+hearts a monitor who will prevent their enjoying what they have ill
+obtained.
+
+In vain Cecilia ran to the rest of her companions, to display her
+present, in hopes that the applause of others would restore her own
+self-complacency; in vain she saw the Flora pass in due pomp from hand
+to hand, each vieing with the other in extolling the beauty of the
+gift and the generosity of the giver. Cecilia was still displeased
+with herself, with them, and even with their praise; from Louisa's
+gratitude, however, she yet expected much pleasure, and immediately she
+ran up stairs to her room.
+
+In the mean time Leonora had gone into the hall to buy a bodkin; she
+had just broken hers. In giving her change, the pedlar took out of his
+pocket, with some half-pence, the very box which Cecilia had sold him.
+Leonora did not in the least suspect the truth, for her mind was above
+suspicion; and besides, she had the utmost confidence in Cecilia.
+
+"I should like to have that box," said she, "for it is like one of
+which I was very fond."
+
+The pedlar named the price, and Leonora took the box; she intended to
+give it to little Louisa.
+
+On going to her room she found her asleep, and she sat down softly by
+her bed-side. Louisa opened her eyes.
+
+"I hope I didn't disturb you," said Leonora.
+
+"O no; I didn't hear you come in; but what have you got there?"
+
+"It is only a little box; would you like to have it? I bought it on
+purpose for you, as I thought perhaps it would please you; because it's
+like that which I gave Cecilia."
+
+"O yes! That out of which she used to give me Barbary drops. I am very
+much obliged to you. I always thought that exceedingly pretty; and
+this, indeed, is as like it as possible. I can't unscrew it; will you
+try?"
+
+Leonora unscrewed it.
+
+"Goodness!" exclaimed Louisa. "This must be Cecilia's box; look, don't
+you see a great L at the bottom of it?"
+
+Leonora's colour changed. "Yes," she replied calmly, "I see that, but
+it is no proof that it is Cecilia's; you know that I bought this box
+just now of the pedlar."
+
+"That may be," said Louisa; "but I remember scratching that L with my
+own needle, and Cecilia scolded me for it, too. Do go and ask her if
+she has lost her box—do," repeated Louisa, pulling her by the sleeve,
+as she did not seem to listen.
+
+Leonora indeed did not hear, for she was lost in thought; she was
+comparing circumstances which had before escaped her attention. She
+recollected that Cecilia had passed her as she came into the hall,
+without seeming to see her, but had blushed as she passed. She
+remembered that the pedlar appeared unwilling to part with the box, and
+was going to put it again into his pocket with the half-pence.
+
+"And why should he keep it in his pocket and not show it with his other
+things?"
+
+Combining all these circumstances, Leonora had no longer any doubt of
+the truth; for though she had honourable confidence in her friends, she
+had too much penetration to be implicitly credulous.
+
+"Louisa," she began, but at this instant she heard a step, which, by
+its quickness, she knew to be Cecilia's, coming along the passage. "If
+you love me, Louisa," said Leonora, "say nothing about the box."
+
+"Nay, but why not? I dare say she has lost it."
+
+"No, my dear, I am afraid she has not."
+
+Louisa looked surprised.
+
+"But I have reasons for desiring you not to say any thing about it."
+
+"Well, then, I won't, indeed."
+
+Cecilia opened the door, came forward smiling, as if secure of a good
+reception, and, taking the Flora out of the case, she placed it on the
+mantel-piece, opposite to Louisa's bed.
+
+"Dear, how beautiful," cried Louisa, starting up.
+
+"Yes," said Cecilia, "and guess who it's for?"
+
+"For me, perhaps!" said the ingenuous Louisa.
+
+"Yes, take it, and keep it for my sake; you know that I broke your
+mandarin."
+
+"O! But this is a great deal prettier and larger than that."
+
+"Yes, I know it is; and I meant that it should be so. I should only
+have done what I was bound to do if I had only given you a mandarin."
+
+"Well, and that would have been enough, surely; but what a beautiful
+crown of roses! And then that basket of flowers! They almost look as
+if I could smell them. Dear Cecilia! I'm very much obliged to you, but
+I won't take it by way of payment for the mandarin you broke; for I'm
+sure you could not help that; and, besides, I should have broken it
+myself by this time. You shall give it to me entirely, and I'll keep it
+as long as I live as your keepsake."
+
+Louisa stopped short and coloured. The word keepsake recalled the box
+to her mind, and all the train of ideas which the Flora had banished.
+
+"But," said she, looking up wishfully in Cecilia's face, and holding
+the Flora doubtfully, "did you—"
+
+Leonora, who was just quitting the room, turned her head back, and gave
+Louisa a look, which silenced her.
+
+Cecilia was so infatuated with her vanity, that she neither perceived
+Leonora's sign, nor Louisa's confusion, but continued showing off her
+present, by placing it in various situations, till at length she put it
+into the case, and laying it down with an affected carelessness upon
+the bed. "I must go now, Louisa. Good bye," said she, running up and
+kissing her; "but I'll come again presently;" then clapping the door
+after her, she went.
+
+But as soon as the fermentation of her spirits subsided, the sense
+of shame, which had been scarcely felt when mixed with so many other
+sensations, rose uppermost in her mind.
+
+"What?" said she to herself. "Is it possible that I have sold what
+I promised to keep for ever? And what Leonora gave me? And I have
+concealed it too, and have been making a parade of my generosity. O!
+What would Leonora, what would Louisa, what would every body think of
+me, if the truth were known?"
+
+Humiliated and grieved by these reflections, Cecilia began to search in
+her own mind for some consoling idea. She began to compare her conduct
+with the conduct of others of her own age; and at length, fixing her
+comparison upon her brother George, as the companion of whom, from her
+infancy, she had been habitually the most emulous, she recollected that
+an almost similar circumstance had once happened to him, and that he
+had not only escaped disgrace, but had acquired glory by an intrepid
+confession of his fault. Her father's words to her brother, on that
+occasion, she also perfectly recollected.
+
+"Come to me, George," he said, holding out his hand; "you are a
+generous, brave boy. They who dare to confess their faults will make
+great and good men."
+
+These were his words; but Cecilia, in repeating them to herself, forgot
+to lay that emphasis on the word men, which would have placed it in
+contradistinction to the word women. She willingly believed that the
+observation extended equally to both sexes, and flattered herself that
+she should exceed her brother in merit, if she owned a fault which she
+thought that it would be so much more difficult to confess.
+
+"Yes, but," said she, stopping herself, "how can I confess it? This
+very evening, in a few hours, the prize will now decided; Leonora or
+I shall win it. I have as good a chance as Leonora, perhaps a better;
+and must I give up all my hopes? All that I have been labouring for
+this month past! O, I never can;—if it were to-morrow, or yesterday, or
+any day but this, I would not hesitate, but now I am almost certain of
+the prize, and if I win it—well, why then I will—I think, I will tell
+all—yes, I will; I am determined," said Cecilia.
+
+Here a bell summoned them to dinner. Leonora sat opposite to her,
+and she was not a little surprised to see Cecilia look so gay and
+unrestrained.
+
+"Surely," said she to herself, "if Cecilia had done this, that I
+suspect, she would not, she could not look as she does."
+
+But Leonora little knew the cause of her gayety; Cecilia was never
+in higher spirits, or better pleased with herself; than when she had
+resolved upon a sacrifice or a confession.
+
+"Must not this evening be given to the most amiable? Whose, then, will
+it be?"
+
+All eyes glanced first at Cecilia and then at Leonora. Cecilia smiled;
+Leonora blushed.
+
+"I see that it is not yet decided," said Mrs. Villars.
+
+And immediately they ran up stairs, amidst confused whisperings.
+
+Cecilia's voice could be distinguished far above the rest.
+
+"How can she be so happy?" said Leonora to herself. "O, Cecilia, there
+was a time when you could not have neglected me so!—When we were always
+together, the best of friends and companions, our wishes, tastes, and
+pleasures the same. Surely she did once love me," said Leonora; "but
+now she is quite changed. She has even sold my keepsake, and would
+rather win a bracelet of hair from girls whom she did not always think
+so much superior to Leonora, than have my esteem, my confidence, and
+my friendship, for her whole life; yes, for her whole life, for I am
+sure she will be an amiable woman. Oh that this bracelet had never been
+thought of, or that I was certain of her winning it; for I am certain
+that I do not wish to win it from her. I would rather, a thousand times
+rather, that we were as we used to be, than have all the glory in the
+world. And how pleasing Cecilia can be when she wishes to please! How
+candid she is! How much she can improve herself!—Let me be just, though
+she has offended me—she is wonderfully improved within this last month;
+for one fault, and that against myself, should I forget all her merits?"
+
+As Leonora said these last words, she could but just hear the voices
+of her companions; they had left her alone in the gallery. She knocked
+softly at Louisa's door.
+
+"Come in," said Louisa. "I'm not asleep. Oh," said she, starting up
+with the Flora in her hand, the instant that the door was opened. "I'm
+so glad you are come, Leonora, for I did so long to hear what you were
+all making such a noise about—have you forgot that the bracelet—"
+
+"O yes! Is this the evening?"
+
+"Well, here's my white shell for you. I've kept it in my pocket this
+fortnight; and though Cecilia did give me this Flora, I still love you
+a great deal better."
+
+"Thank you, Louisa," said Leonora, gratefully "I will take your shell,
+and I shall value it as long as I live. But here is a red one, and if
+you wish to show me that you love me, you will give this to Cecilia.
+I know that she is particularly anxious for your preference, and I am
+sure that she deserves it."
+
+"Yes, if I could, I would choose both of you; but you know I can only
+choose which I like the best."
+
+"If you mean, my dear Louisa," said Leonora, "that you like me the
+best, I am very much obliged to you; for, indeed I wish you to love me;
+but it is enough for me to know it in private. I should not feel the
+least more pleasure at hearing it in public, or in having it made known
+to all my companions, especially at a time when it would give poor
+Cecilia a great deal of pain."
+
+"But why should it give her pain? I don't like her for being jealous of
+you."
+
+"Nay, Louisa, surely you don't think Cecilia jealous; she only tries
+to excel and to please. She is more anxious to succeed than I am, it
+is true, because she has a great deal more activity, and perhaps more
+ambition; and it would really mortify her to lose this prize. You know
+that she proposed it herself; it has been her object for this month
+past, and I am sure she has taken great pains to obtain it."
+
+"But, dear Leonora, why should you lose it?"
+
+"Indeed, my dear, it would be no loss to me; and, if it were, I would
+willingly suffer it for Cecilia; for, though we seem not to be such
+good friends as we used to be, I love her very much, and she will love
+me again, I'm sure she will; when she no longer fears me as a rival,
+she will again love me as a friend."
+
+Here Leonora heard a number of her companions running along the
+gallery. They all knocked hastily at the door, calling, "Leonora!
+Leonora! Will you never come? Cecilia has been with us this half hour."
+
+Leonora smiled. "Well, Louisa," said she, smiling, "will you promise
+me?"
+
+"O, I'm sure, by the way they speak to you, that they won't give you
+the prize!" said the little Louisa; and the tears started into her eyes.
+
+"They love me though, for all that; and as for the prize, you know whom
+I wish to have it."
+
+"Leonora! Leonora!" called her impatient companions. "Don't you hear
+us? What are you about?"
+
+"O, she never will take any trouble about any thing," said one of the
+party; "let's go away."
+
+"O go! Go! Make haste," cried Louisa; "don't stay, they are so angry—I
+will, I will, indeed!"
+
+"Remember, then, that you have promised me," said Leonora, and she left
+the room.
+
+During all this time Cecilia had been in the garden with her
+companions. The ambition which she had felt to win the first prize,
+the prize of superior talents and superior application, was not to be
+compared to the absolute anxiety which she now expressed to win this
+simple testimony of the love and approbation of her equals and rivals.
+
+To employ her exuberant activity, she had been dragging branches of
+lilacs, and laburnums, roses, and sweet-briar, to ornament the bower
+in which her fate was to be decided. It was excessively hot, but her
+mind was engaged, and she was indefatigable. She stood still, at last,
+to admire her works; her companions all joined in loud applause. They
+were not a little prejudiced in her favour by the great eagerness which
+she expressed to win their prize, and by the great importance which she
+seemed to affix to the preference of each individual.
+
+At last, "Where is Leonora?" cried one of them, and immediately, as we
+have seen, they ran to call her.
+
+Cecilia was left alone. Overcome with heat and too violent exertion,
+she had hardly strength to support herself; each moment appeared to her
+intolerably long; she was in a state of the utmost suspense, and all
+her courage failed her; even hope forsook her, and hope is a cordial
+which leaves the mind depressed and enfeebled.
+
+"The time is now come," said Cecilia; "in a few moments it will be
+decided. In a few moments! Goodness! How much I do hazard! If I should
+not win the prize, how shall I confess what I have done? How shall I
+beg Leonora to forgive me? I, who hoped to restore my friendship to her
+as an honour!—They are gone to seek for her—the moment she appears I
+shall be forgotten—what shall—what shall I do?" said Cecilia, covering
+her face with her hands.
+
+Such was her situation, when Leonora, accompanied by her companions,
+opened the hall door; they most of them ran forward to Cecilia. As
+Leonora came into the bower, she held out her hand to Cecilia—"We are
+not rivals, but friends, I hope," said she.
+
+Cecilia clasped her hand, but she was in too great agitation to speak.
+
+The table was now set in the arbour—the vase was now placed in the
+middle.
+
+"Well!" said Cecilia, eagerly, "who begins?"
+
+Caroline, one of her friends, came forward first, and then all the
+others successively.
+
+Cecilia's emotion was hardly conceivable.—"Now they are all in. Count
+them, Caroline!"
+
+"One, two, three, four; the numbers are both equal." There was a dead
+silence.
+
+"No, they are not," exclaimed Cecilia, pressing forward and putting a
+shell into the vase—"I have not given mine, and I give it to Leonora."
+Then snatching the bracelet, "It is yours, Leonora," said she; "take
+it, and give me back your friendship."
+
+The whole assembly gave a universal clap and shout of applause.
+
+"I cannot be surprised at this from you, Cecilia," said Leonora; "and
+do you then still love me as you used to do?"
+
+"O Leonora! Stop! Don't praise me; I don't deserve this," said she,
+turning to her loudly applauding companions; "you will soon despise
+me—O Leonora, you will never forgive me!—I have deceived you—I have
+sold—"
+
+At this instant Mrs. Villars appeared—the crowd divided—she had heard
+all that passed from her window.
+
+"I applaud your generosity, Cecilia," said she, "but I am to tell you
+that in this instance it is unsuccessful; you have it not in your power
+to give the prize to Leonora—it is yours—I have another vote to give
+you—you have forgotten Louisa."
+
+"Louisa! But surely, ma'am, Louisa loves Leonora better than she does
+me!"
+
+"She commissioned me, however," said Mrs. Villars, "to give you a red
+shell, and you will find it in this box."
+
+Cecilia started, and turned as pale as death—it was the fatal box.
+
+Mrs. Villars produced another box—she opened it—it contained the
+Flora—"And Louisa also desired me," said she, "to return you this
+Flora." She put it into Cecilia's hand—Cecilia trembled so that she
+could not hold it; Leonora caught it.
+
+"O, madam! O, Leonora!" exclaimed Cecilia. "Now I have no hope left. I
+intended, I was just going to tell—"
+
+"Dear Cecilia," said Leonora, "you need not tell it me; I know it
+already, and I forgive you with all my heart."
+
+"Yes, I can prove to you," said Mrs. Villars, "that Leonora has
+forgiven you: it is she who has given you the prize; it was she who
+persuaded Louisa to give you her vote. I went to see her a little while
+ago, and perceiving, by her countenance, that something was the matter,
+I pressed her to tell me what it was.
+
+"'Why, madam,' said she, 'Leonora has made me promise to give my shell
+to Cecilia. Now I don't love Cecilia half so well as I do Leonora;
+besides, I would not have Cecilia think I vote for her because she gave
+me a Flora.'
+
+"Whilst Louisa was speaking," continued Mrs. Villars, "I saw the silver
+box lying on the bed; I took it up, and asked if it was not yours, and
+how she came by it.
+
+"'Indeed, madam,' said Louisa, 'I could have been almost certain that
+it was Cecilia's; but Leonora gave it me, and she said that she bought
+it of the pedlar this morning. If any body else had told me so, I could
+not have believed them, because I remembered the box so well; but I
+can't help believing Leonora.'
+
+"'But did you not ask Cecilia about it?' said I.
+
+"'No, madam,' replied Louisa, 'for Leonora forbade me.'
+
+"I guessed her reason. 'Well,' said I, 'give me the box, and I will
+carry your shell in it to Cecilia.'
+
+"'Then, madam,' said she, 'if I must give it her, pray do take the
+Flora, and return it to her first, that she may not think it is for
+that I do it.'"
+
+"O, generous Leonora!" exclaimed Cecilia. "But indeed, Louisa, I cannot
+take your shell."
+
+"Then, dear Cecilia, accept of mine instead of it; you cannot refuse
+it—I only follow your example. As for the bracelet," added Leonora,
+taking Cecilia's hand, "I assure you I don't wish for it, and you do,
+and you deserve it."
+
+"No," said Cecilia, "indeed I do not deserve it; next to you, surely,
+Louisa deserves it best."
+
+"Louisa! O yes, Louisa," exclaimed every body with one voice.
+
+"Yes," said Mrs. Villars, "and let Cecilia carry the bracelet to
+her; she deserves that reward. For one fault I cannot forget merits,
+Cecilia; nor, I am sure, will your companions."
+
+"Then, surely, not your best friend," said Leonora, kissing her.
+
+Every body present was moved—they looked up to Leonora with respectful
+and affectionate admiration.
+
+"O, Leonora, how I love you! And how I wish to be like you!" exclaimed
+Cecilia. "To be as good, as generous!"
+
+"Rather wish, Cecilia," interrupted Mrs. Villars, "to be as just; to be
+as strictly honourable, and as invariably consistent.
+
+"Remember that many of our sex are capable of great efforts, of making
+what they call great sacrifices to virtue or to friendship; but few
+treat their friends with habitual gentleness, or uniformly conduct
+themselves with prudence and good sense."
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+                          LAZY LAWRENCE.
+
+                           ———————————
+
+IN the pleasant valley of Ashton, there lived an elderly woman of
+the name of Preston; she had a small, neat cottage, and there was
+not a weed to be seen in her garden. It was upon her garden that she
+chiefly depended for support; it consisted of strawberry-beds, and
+one small border for flowers. The pinks and roses she tied up in nice
+nosegays, and sent either to Clifton or Bristol to be sold; as to her
+strawberries, she did not send them to market, because it was the
+custom for numbers of people to come from Clifton, in the summer time,
+to eat strawberries and cream, at the gardens in Ashton.
+
+Now the widow Preston was so obliging, active, and good-humored, that
+every one who came to see her was pleased. She lived happily in this
+manner for several years; but, alas! One autumn she fell sick, and
+during her illness every thing went wrong: her garden was neglected,
+her cow died, and all the money which she had saved was spent in paying
+for medicines. The winter passed away, while she was so weak that she
+could earn but little by her work; and when the summer came, her rent
+was called for, and the rent was not ready in her little purse, as
+usual. She begged a few months' delay, and they were granted to her;
+but at the end of that time there was no resource but to sell her
+horse, Lightfoot.
+
+Now Lightfoot, though perhaps he had seen has best days, was a very
+great favourite: in his youth he had always carried the dame to market
+behind her husband; and it was now her little son Jem's turn to ride
+him. It was Jem's business to feed Lightfoot, and to take care of
+him; a charge which he never neglected; for, besides being a very
+good-natured, he was a very industrious boy.
+
+"It will go near to break my Jem's heart," said Dame Preston to
+herself, as she sat one evening beside the fire stirring the embers,
+and considering how she had best open the matter to her son, who stood
+opposite to her, eating a dry crust of bread, very heartily, for supper.
+
+"Jem," said the old woman, "what, art hungry?"
+
+"That I am, brave and hungry!"
+
+"Aye! No wonder, you've been brave hard at work—eh!"
+
+"Brave hard! I wish it was not so dark, mother, that you might just
+step out and see the great bed I've dug: I know you'd say it was no bad
+day's work—and oh, mother! I've good news; farmer Truck will give us
+the giant strawberries, and I am to go for 'em to-morrow morning; and
+I'll be back afore breakfast."
+
+"God bless the boy, how he talks! Four miles there, and four miles back
+again, afore breakfast."
+
+"Aye, upon Lightfoot, you know, mother, very easily; mayn't I?"
+
+"Aye, child."
+
+"Why do you sigh, mother?"
+
+"Finish thy supper, child."
+
+"I've done!" cried Jem, swallowing the last mouthful hastily, as if he
+thought he had been too long at supper. "And now for the great needle;
+I must see and mend Lightfoot's bridle afore I go to bed."
+
+To work he set, by the light of the fire, and the dame, having once
+more stirred it, began again with:
+
+"Jem, dear, does he go lame at all, now?"
+
+"What, Lightfoot? O la, no, not he! Never was so well of his lameness
+in all his life—he's grown quite young again, I think; and then he's so
+fat, he can hardly wag."
+
+"God bless him—that's right; we must see, Jem, and keep him fat."
+
+"For what, mother?"
+
+"For Monday fortnight, at the fair; he's to be—sold!"
+
+"Lightfoot!" cried Jem, and let the bridle fall from his hand. "And
+will mother sell Lightfoot?"
+
+"'Will,' no; but I 'must,' Jem."
+
+"'Must;' who says you 'must?' Why 'must' you, mother?"
+
+"I must, I say, child!—Why, must not I pay my debts honestly—and must
+not I pay my rent? And was not it called for long and long ago? And
+have not I had time? And did not I promise to pay it for certain Monday
+fortnight? And am not I two guineas short?—And where am I to get two
+guineas! So what signifies talking, child?" said the widow, leaning her
+head upon her arm. "Lightfoot must go."
+
+Jem was silent for a few minutes—"Two guineas; that's a great, great
+deal—if I worked, and worked, and worked ever so hard, I could noways
+earn two guineas afore Monday fortnight; could I, mother?"
+
+"Lord help thee, no; not an' work thyself to death."
+
+"But I could earn something, though, I say," cried Jem, proudly; "and I
+will earn something—if it be ever so little, it will be something; and
+I shall do my very best; so I will."
+
+"That I am sure of, my child," said his mother, drawing him towards her
+and kissing him. "You are always a good, industrious lad, that I will
+say, afore your face or behind your back; but it won't do now—Lightfoot
+must go."
+
+Jem turned away, struggling to hide his tears, and went to bed, without
+saying a word more. But he knew that crying would do no good, so he
+presently wiped his eyes, and lay awake, considering what he could
+possibly do to save the horse. "If I get ever so little," he still said
+to himself, "it will be something; and who knows but landlord might
+then wait a bit longer? And we might make it all up in time; for a
+penny a day might come to two guineas, in time."
+
+But how to get the first penny, was the question. Then he recollected,
+that one day, when he had been sent to Clifton, to sell some flowers,
+he had seen an old woman, with a board beside her covered with various
+sparkling stones, which people stopped to look at as they passed, and
+he remembered that some people bought the stones; one paid two-pence,
+another three-pence, and another six-pence for them; and Jem heard her
+say that she got them amongst the neighbouring rocks; so he thought
+that if he tried, he might find some too, and sell them as she had done.
+
+Early in the morning he awaked, full of this scheme, jumped up, dressed
+himself, and having given one look at poor Lightfoot in his stable, set
+off to Clifton, in search of the old woman, to inquire where she found
+her sparkling stones. But it was too early in the morning—the old woman
+was not at her seat; so he turned back again, disappointed.
+
+He did not waste his time waiting for her, but saddled and bridled
+Lightfoot, and went to farmer Truck's for the giant strawberries. A
+great part of the morning was spent in putting them into the ground.
+
+And as soon as that was finished, he set out again in quest of the old
+woman, whom to his great joy, he spied sitting at her corner of the
+street, with her board before her. But this old woman was deaf and
+cross; and when at last Jem made her hear his questions, he could get
+no answer from her but that she found the fossils where he would never
+find any more.
+
+"But can't I look where you looked?"
+
+"Look away, nobody hinders you," replied the old woman; and these were
+the only words she would say.
+
+Jem was not, however, a boy to be easily discouraged; he went to the
+rocks and walked slowly along, looking at all the stones as he passed.
+Presently he came to a place where a number of men were at work
+loosening some large rocks, and one amongst the workmen was stooping
+down, looking for something very eagerly; Jem ran up, and asked if he
+could help him.
+
+"Yes," said the man, "you can. I've just dropped amongst this heap of
+rubbish a fine piece of crystal that I got to-day."
+
+"What kind of a looking thing is it?" said Jem.
+
+"White, and like glass," said the man, and went on working, whilst Jem
+looked very carefully over the heap of rubbish for a great while.
+
+"Come," said the man, "it's gone for ever; don't trouble yourself any
+more, my boy."
+
+"It's no trouble; I'll look a little longer; we will not give it up so
+soon," said Jem; and after he had looked a little longer, he found the
+piece of crystal.
+
+"Thank'e," said the man; "you are a fine little industrious fellow."
+
+Jem, encouraged by the tone of voice in which the man spoke this,
+ventured to ask him the same questions which he had asked the old woman.
+
+"One good turn deserves another," said the man. "We are going to dinner
+just now, and shall leave off work; wait for me here, and I'll make it
+worth your while."
+
+Jem waited; and as he was very attentively observing how the workmen
+went on with their work, he heard somebody near him give a great
+yawn, and turning round, he saw stretched upon the grass, beside the
+river, a boy about his own age, whom he knew very well went in the
+village of Ashton by the name of Lazy Lawrence; a name which he most
+justly deserved, for he never did any thing from morning to night; he
+neither worked nor played, but sauntered or lounged about, restless
+and yawning. His father was an alehouse-keeper, and, being generally
+drunk, could take no care of his son; so that Lazy Lawrence grew every
+day worse and worse. However, some of the neighbours said that he was a
+good-natured, poor fellow enough, and would never do any one harm but
+himself; whilst others, who were wiser, often shook their heads, and
+told him that idleness was the root of all evil.
+
+"What, Lawrence!" cried Jem to him, when he saw him lying upon the
+grass. "What! Are you asleep?"
+
+"Not quite."
+
+"Are you awake?"
+
+"Not quite."
+
+"What are you doing there?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"What are you thinking of?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"What makes you lie there?"
+
+"I don't know—because I can't find anybody to play with me to-day; will
+you come and play?"
+
+"No, I can't; I'm busy."
+
+"Busy," cried Lawrence, stretching himself, "you are always busy—I
+would not be you for the world, to have so much to do, always."
+
+"And I," said Jem, laughing, "would not be you for the world, to have
+nothing to do."
+
+So they parted, for the workman just then called Jem to follow him. He
+took him home to his own house, and showed him a parcel of fossils,
+which he had gathered he said on purpose to sell, but had never had
+time yet to sort them. He set about it, however, now, and having picked
+out those which he judged to be the best, he put them into a small
+basket, and gave them to Jem to sell, upon condition that he should
+bring him half of what he got. Jem, pleased to be employed, was ready
+to agree to what the man proposed, provided his mother had no objection
+to it. When he went home to dinner, he told his mother his scheme, and
+she smiled and said he might do as he pleased, for she was not afraid
+of his being from home.
+
+"You are not an idle boy," said she, "so there is little danger of your
+getting into any mischief."
+
+Accordingly, Jem, that evening, took his stand, with his little basket,
+upon the bank of the river, just at the place where people land from
+a ferryboat, and where the walk turns to the wells, where numbers of
+people perpetually pass to drink the waters. He chose his place well,
+and waited almost all the evening, offering his fossils with great
+assiduity to every passenger; but not one person bought any.
+
+"Holla!" cried some sailors, who had just rowed a boat to land. "Bear a
+hand here, will you, my little fellow! And carry these parcels for us
+into yonder house."
+
+Jean ran down immediately for the parcels, and did what he was asked
+to do so quickly, and with so much good will, that the master of the
+boat took notice of him, and when he was going away stopped to ask
+him what he had got in his little basket. And when he saw that they
+were fossils, he immediately told Jem to follow him, for he was going
+to carry some shells he had brought from abroad to a lady in the
+neighbourhood, who was making a grotto.
+
+"She will very likely buy your stones into the bargain. Come along, my
+lad; we can but try."
+
+The lady lived but a very little way off, so that they were soon at
+her house. She was alone in her parlour, and was sorting a bundle of
+feathers of different colours. They lay on a sheet of pasteboard upon a
+window-seat, and it happened that as the sailor was bustling round the
+table to show off his shells, he knocked down the sheet of pasteboard,
+and scattered all the feathers. The lady looked very sorry, which Jem
+observing, he took the opportunity, whilst she was busy looking over
+the sailor's bag of shells, to gather together all the feathers, and
+sort them according to their different colours, as he had seen thorn
+sorted when he came first into the room.
+
+"Where is the little boy you brought with you? I thought I saw him here
+just now."
+
+"And here I am, ma'am," cried Jem, creeping from under the table with
+some few remaining feathers which he had picked from the carpet. "I
+thought," added he, pointing to the others, "I had better be doing
+something than standing idle, ma'am."
+
+She smiled, and pleased with his activity and simplicity, began to ask
+him several questions; such as who he was, where he lived, and what
+employment he had, and how much a day he earned by gathering fossils.
+
+"This is the first day I ever tried," said Jem. "I never sold any yet,
+and, if you don't buy 'em new, ma'am, I'm afraid nobody else will, for
+I have asked everybody else."
+
+"Come then," said the lady, laughing, "if that is the case, I think I
+had better buy them all."
+
+So emptying all the fossils out of his basket, she put half-a-crown
+into it. Jew's eyes sparkled with joy.
+
+"Oh! Thank you, ma'am," said he; "I will be sure and bring you as many
+more to-morrow."
+
+"Yes, but I don't promise you," said she, "to give half-a-crown
+to-morrow."
+
+"But perhaps, though you don't promise it, you will."
+
+"No," said the lady, "do not deceive yourself; I assure you that I will
+not. That, instead of encouraging you to be industrious, would teach
+you to be idle."
+
+Jem did not quite understand what she meant by this, but answered, "I'm
+sure I don't wish to be idle. If you knew all, you'd know I did not."
+
+"How do you mean, if I knew all?"
+
+"Why, I mean, if you knew about Lightfoot."
+
+"Who is Lightfoot?"
+
+"Why, mammy's horse," added Jem, looking out of the window. "I must
+make haste home and feed him, afore it get dark; he'll wonder what's
+gone with me."
+
+"Let him wonder a few minutes longer," said the lady, "and tell me the
+rest of your story."
+
+"I've no story, ma'am, to tell, but as how mammy says he must go to the
+fair, Monday fortnight, to be sold, if she can't get the two guineas
+for her rent; and I should be main sorry to part with him, for I love
+him, and he loves me; so I'll work for him, I will, all I can. To be
+sure, as mammy says, I have no chance, such a little fellow as I am, of
+earning two guineas afore Monday fortnight."
+
+"But are you in earnest willing to work?" said the lady. "You know
+there is a great deal of difference between picking up a few stones,
+and working steadily every day and all day long."
+
+"But," said Jem, "I would work every day and all day long."
+
+"Then," said the lady, "I will give you work. Come here to-morrow
+morning, and my gardener will set you to weed the shrubberies, and I
+will pay you six-pence a day. Remember, you must be at the gates by six
+o'clock."
+
+Jem bowed, thanked her, and went away.
+
+It was late in the evening, and he was impatient to get home to feed
+Lightfoot, yet he recollected that he had promised the man who had
+trusted him to sell the fossils, that he would bring him half of what
+he got for them. So he thought that he had better go to him directly;
+and away he went, running along by the water-side about a quarter of a
+mile, till he came to the man's house.
+
+He was just come home from work, and was surprised when Jem showed him
+the half-crown, saying, "Look what I got for the stones; you are to
+have half you know."
+
+"No," said the man, when he had heard his story, "I shall not take half
+of that; it was given to you. I expected but a shilling at the most,
+and the half of that is but six-pence; and that I'll take. Wife, give
+the lad two shillings, and take this half-crown."
+
+So the wife opened an old glove, and took out two shillings—and the
+man, as she opened the glove, put in his fingers and took out a little
+silver penny. "There, he shall have that into the bargain, for his
+honesty. Honesty is the best policy. There's a lucky penny for you,
+that I've kept ever since I can remember."
+
+"Don't you ever go to part with it, do you hear?" cried the woman.
+
+"Let him do what he will with it, wife," said the man.
+
+"But," argued the wife, "another penny would do just as well to buy
+gingerbread; and that's what it will go for."
+
+"No, that it shall not, I promise you," said Jem.
+
+And so he ran away home, fed Lightfoot, stroked him, went to bed,
+jumped up at five o'clock in the morning, and went singing to work, as
+gay as a lark.
+
+Four days he worked "every day and all day long," and the lady, every
+evening, when she came out to walk in her gardens, looked at his work.
+
+At last she said to her gardener, "This little boy works very hard."
+
+"Never had so good a little boy about the grounds," said the gardener;
+"he's always at his work, let me come by when I will, and he has got
+twice as much done as another would do; yes, twice as much, ma'am; for
+look here—he began at this here rose-bush, and now he's got to where
+you stand, ma'am; and here is the day's work that t'other boy, and he's
+three years older too, did to-day—I say measure Jem's fairly, and it's
+twice as much, I'm sure."
+
+"Well," said the lady to her gardener, "show me how much is a fair good
+day's work for a boy of his age."
+
+"Come at six o'clock, and go at six? About this much, ma'am," said the
+gardener, marking off a piece of the border with his spade.
+
+"Then, little boy," said the lady, "so much shall be your task every
+day; the gardener will mark it off for you; and, when you've done, the
+rest of the day you may do what you please."
+
+Jem was extremely glad of this; and the next day he had finished his
+task by four o'clock; so he had all the rest of the evening to himself.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+Jem was as fond of play as any little boy could be, and when he was at
+it, played with all the eagerness and gaiety imaginable; so, as soon as
+he had finished his task, fed Lightfoot, and put by the six-pence he
+had earned that day, he ran to the play-ground in the village, where he
+found a party of boys playing, and among them Lazy Lawrence, who indeed
+was not playing, but lounging upon a gate with his thumb in his mouth.
+
+The rest were playing at cricket. Jem joined them, and was the merriest
+and most active amongst them; till at last, when quite out of breath
+with running, he was obliged to give up to rest himself, and sat down
+upon the stile, close to the gate on which Lazy Lawrence was swinging.
+
+"And why don't you play, Lawrence?" said he.
+
+"I'm tired," said Lawrence.
+
+"Tired of what?"
+
+"I don't know well what tires me; grandmother says I'm ill, and I must
+take something—I don't know what ails me."
+
+"Oh, puh! Take a good race, one, two, three, and away, and you'll find
+yourself as well as ever. Come, run—one, two, three, and away."
+
+"Ah, no, I can't run indeed," said he, hanging back heavily; "you know
+I can play all day long if I like it, so I don't mind play as you do,
+who have only one hour for it."
+
+"So much the worse for you. Come now, I'm quite fresh again; will you
+have one game at ball? Do."
+
+"No, I tell you, I can't; I am tired as if I had been working all day
+long as hard as a horse."
+
+"Ten times more," said Jem; "for I have been working all day long as
+hard as a horse, and yet you see I'm not a bit tired; only a little out
+of breath just now."
+
+"That's very odd," said Lawrence, and yawned, for want of some better
+answer; then taking out a handful of half-pence—"See what I got from
+father to-day, because I asked him just at the right time, when he had
+drunk a glass or two; then I can get anything I want of him. See, a
+penny, two-pence, three-pence, four-pence—there's eight-pence in all;
+would you not be happy if you had eight-pence?"
+
+"Why, I don't know," said Jem, laughing, "for you don't seem happy, and
+you have eight-pence."
+
+"That does not signify, though I'm sure you only say that because you
+envy me—you don't know what it is to have eight-pence—you never had
+more than two-pence and three-pence at a time in all your life."
+
+Jem smiled; "Oh, as to that," said he, "you are mistaken, for I have at
+this very time more than two-pence, three-pence, or eight-pence either
+I have—let me see: stones, two shillings; then five days' work, that's
+five six-pences, that's two shillings and six-pence, in all makes four
+shillings and six-pence, and my silver penny is four and seven-pence."
+
+"Four and seven-pence—you have not," said Lawrence, roused so as
+absolutely to stand upright; "four and seven-pence! have you? Show it
+me, and then I'll believe you."
+
+"Follow me, then," cried Jem, "and I'll soon make you believe me; come."
+
+"Is it far?" said Lawrence, following, half running, half hobbling,
+till he came to the stable, where Jem showed him his treasure.
+
+"And how did you come by it? Honestly?"
+
+"Honestly; to be sure I did; I earned it all.
+
+"Lord bless me, earned it! Well, I've a great mind to work; but then it
+is such hot weather; besides, grandmother says I'm not strong enough
+yet for hard work; and besides, I know how to coax daddy out of money
+when I want it, so I need not work. But four and seven-pence—let's see,
+what will you do with it all?"
+
+"That's a secret," said Jem, looking great.
+
+"I can guess; I know what I'd do with it if it was mine. First, I'd buy
+my pockets full of gingerbread; then I'd buy never so many apples and
+nuts; don't you love nuts? I'd buy nuts enough to last me from this
+time to Christmas, and I'd make little Newton crack 'em for me, for
+that's the worst of nuts, there's the trouble of cracking 'em."
+
+"Well, you never deserve to have a nut."
+
+"But you'll give me some of yours?" said Lawrence, in a fawning tone,
+for he thought it easier to coax than to work. "You'll give me some of
+your good things, won't you?"
+
+"I shall not have any of these good things."
+
+"Then what will you do with all your money?"
+
+"Oh, I know very well what to do with it; but, as I told you, that's
+a secret, and I shan't tell it anybody. Come now, let's go back and
+play—their game's up, I dare say."
+
+Lawrence went back with him, full of curiosity, and out of humour with
+himself and his eight-pence. "If I had four and seven-pence," said he
+to himself, "I certainly should be happy!"
+
+
+The next day, as usual, Jem jumped up before six o'clock and went to
+his work, whilst Lazy Lawrence sauntered about without knowing what to
+do with himself. In the course of two days, he laid out six-pence of
+his money in apples and gingerbread, and as long as these lasted, he
+found himself well received by his companions; but at length the third
+day he spent his last half-penny, and when it was gone, unfortunately
+some nuts tempted him very much, but he had no money to pay for them;
+so he ran home to coax his father, as he called it.
+
+When he got home, he heard his father talking very loud, and at first
+he thought he was drunk; but when he opened the kitchen door, he saw he
+was not drunk, but angry.
+
+"You lazy dog!" cried he, turning suddenly upon Lawrence, and gave him
+such a violent box on the ear as made the light flash from his eyes.
+"You lazy dog! See what you have done for me,—look!—Look, look, I say!"
+Lawrence looked as soon as he came to the use of his senses, and with
+fear, amazement and remorse, beheld at least a dozen bottles burst, and
+the fine Worcestershire cider streaming over the floor. "Now did not I
+order you three days ago to carry these bottles to the cellar; and did
+not I charge you to wire the corks? Answer me, you lazy rascal; did not
+I?"
+
+"Yes," said Lawrence, scratching his head.
+
+"And why was it not done? I ask you," cried his father with renewed
+anger, as another bottle burst at the moment. "What do you stand there
+for, you lazy brat? Why don't you move? I say—No, no," catching hold of
+him, "I believe you can't move; but I'll make you," and he shook him,
+till Lawrence was so giddy, he could not stand. "What had you to think
+of? What had you to do all day long, that you could not carry my cider,
+my Worcestershire cider, to the cellar, when I bade you? But go, you'll
+never be good for anything, you are such a lazy rascal; get out of my
+sight!" So saying, he pushed him out of the house-door, and Lawrence
+sneaked off, seeing that this was no time to make his petition for
+half-pence.
+
+The next day he saw the nuts again, and wishing for them more than
+ever, went home in hopes that his father, as he said to himself,
+would be in a better humour. But the cider was still fresh in his
+recollection, and the moment Lawrence began to whisper the word
+half-penny in his ear, his father swore with a loud oath,—
+
+"I will not give you a half-penny, no not a farthing, for a month
+to come; if you want money, go work for it; I've had enough of your
+laziness—go work!"
+
+At these terrible words, Lawrence burst into tears, and going to the
+side of a ditch, sat down and cried for an hour. And, when he had cried
+till he could cry no more, he exerted himself so far as to empty his
+pockets, to see whether there might not be one half-penny left; and, to
+his great joy, in the farthest corner of his pocket one half-penny was
+found.
+
+With this he proceeded to the fruit woman's stall. She was busy
+weighing out some plums, so he was obliged to wait; and whilst he
+was waiting, he heard some people near him talking and laughing very
+loud. The fruit woman's stall was at the gate of an inn-yard; and,
+peeping through the gate into this yard, Lawrence saw a postillion and
+stable-boy about his own size, playing at pitch-farthing. He stood by
+watching them for a few minutes.
+
+"I began with but one half-penny," cried the stable-boy with an oath,
+"and now I have got two-pence!" added he, jingling the half-pence in
+his waistcoat pocket.
+
+Lawrence was moved at the sound, and said to himself, "If I begin with
+one half-penny, I may end like him with having two-pence; and it is
+easier to play at pitch-farthing than to work."
+
+So he stepped forward, presenting his half-penny, offering to toss up
+with the stable-boy, who, after looking him full in the face, accepted
+the proposal, and threw his half-penny into the air—"Head or tail?"
+cried he.
+
+"Head," replied Lawrence, and it came up head.
+
+He seized the penny, surprised at his own success, and would have gone
+instantly to have laid it out in nuts, but the stable-boy stopped him
+and tempted him to throw again. This time he lost; he threw again and
+won; and so he went on, sometimes losing, but most frequently winning,
+till half the morning was gone. At last, however, he chanced to win
+twice running, and finding himself master of three half-pence, said he
+would play no more.
+
+The stable-boy, grumbling, swore he would have his revenge another
+time, and Lawrence went and bought the nuts.
+
+"It is a good thing," said he to himself, "to play at pitch-farthing;
+the next time I want a half-penny, I'll not ask my father for it, nor
+go to work neither."
+
+Satisfied with this resolution, he sat down to crack his nuts at his
+leisure, upon the horse-block, in the inn-yard. Here, whilst he ate, he
+overheard the conversation of the stable-boys and postillions. At first
+their shocking oaths and loud wranglings frightened and shocked him;
+for Lawrence, though a lazy, had not yet learned to be a wicked boy.
+
+But, by degrees, he was accustomed to their swearing and quarrelling,
+and took a delight and interest in their disputes and battles. As this
+was an amusement which he could enjoy without any sort of exertion on
+his part, he soon grew so fond of it, that every day he returned to
+the stable-yard, and the horse-block became his constant seat. Here he
+found some relief from the insupportable fatigue of doing nothing, and
+here hour after hour, with his elbows on his knees, and his head on
+his hands, he sat, the spectator of wickedness. Gaming, cheating, and
+lying soon became familiar to him; and to complete his ruin, he formed
+a sudden and close intimacy with the stable-boy, with whom he at first
+began to game—a very bad boy. The consequences of this intimacy we
+shall presently see.
+
+
+But it is now time to inquire what little Jem has been doing all this
+while.
+
+One day after he had finished his task, the gardener asked him to stay
+a little while, to help him to carry some geranium pots into the hall.
+Jem, always active and obliging, readily stayed from play, and was
+carrying in a heavy flower-pot, when his mistress crossed the hall.
+
+"What a terrible litter," said she, "you are making here!—Why don't you
+wipe your shoes upon the mat?"
+
+Jem turned round to look for the mat, but he saw none.
+
+"O," said the lady, recollecting herself, "I can't blame you, for there
+is no mat."
+
+"No, ma'am," said the gardener, "nor I don't know when, if ever, the
+man will bring home those mats you bespoke, ma'am."
+
+"I am very sorry to hear that," said the lady; "I wish we could find
+somebody who would do them, if he can't—I should not care what sort of
+mats they were, so that one could wipe one's feet on them."
+
+Jem, as he was sweeping away the litter, when he heard these last
+words, said to himself, "Perhaps I could make a mat."
+
+And all the way home, as he trudged along whistling, he was thinking
+over a scheme for making mats, which, however bold it may appear, he
+did not despair of executing with patience and industry. Many were the
+difficulties which his "prophetic eye" foresaw; but he felt within
+himself that spirit which spurs men on to great enterprises, and makes
+them "trample on impossibilities."
+
+He recollected in the first place, that he had seen Lazy Lawrence,
+whilst he lounged upon the gate, twist a bit of heath into different
+shapes, and he thought, that if he could find some way of plaiting
+heath firmly together, it would make a very pretty green, soft mat,
+which would do very well for one to wipe one's shoes on. About a mile
+from his mother's house, on the common winch Jem rode over when he
+went to farmer Truck's for the giant strawberries, he remembered to
+have seen a great quantity of this heath; and, as it was now only
+six o'clock in the evening, he knew that he should have time to feed
+Lightfoot, stroke him, go to the common, return, and make one trial of
+his skill before he went to bed.
+
+Lightfoot carried him swiftly to the common, and there Jem gathered as
+much of the heath as he thought he should want. But what toil! What
+time! What pains did it cost him, before he could make any thing like
+a mat! Twenty times he was ready to throw aside the heath, and give up
+his project, from impatience of repeated disappointments. But still he
+persevered. Nothing truly great can be accomplished without toil and
+time. Two hours he worked before he went to bed.
+
+All his play hours the next day he spent at his mat; which in all, made
+five hours of fruitless attempts. The sixth, however, repaid him for
+the labours of the other five; he conquered his grand difficulty of
+fastening the heath substantially together; and at length completely
+finished a mat, which far surpassed his most sanguine expectations. He
+was extremely happy—sung—danced round it—whistled—looked at it again
+and again, and could hardly leave off looking at it when it was time to
+go to bed. He laid it by his bed-side, that he might see it the moment
+he awoke in the morning.
+
+And now came the grand pleasure of carrying it to his mistress. She
+looked full as much surprised as he expected, when she saw it, and when
+she heard who made it. After having duly admired it, she asked him how
+much he expected for his mat.
+
+"Expect!—Nothing, ma'am," said Jem. "I meant to give it you if you'd
+have it; I did not mean to sell it. I made it at my play hours, and I
+was very happy making it; and I'm very glad too that you like it; and
+if you please to keep it, Ma'am—that's all."
+
+"But that's not all," said the lady. "Spend your time no more in
+weeding my garden; you can employ yourself much better; you shall have
+the reward of your ingenuity as well as of your industry. Make as many
+more such mats as you can, and I will take care and dispose of them for
+you."
+
+"Thank'e, ma'am," said Jem, making his best bow, for he thought by the
+lady's looks that she meant to do him a favour, though he repeated to
+himself, "Dispose of them! What does that mean?"
+
+The next day he went to work to make more mats, and he soon learned
+to make them so well and quickly, that he was surprised at his own
+success. In every one he made, he found less difficulty, so that,
+instead of making two, he could soon make four, in a day. In a
+fortnight, he made eighteen. It was Saturday night when he finished,
+and he carried, at three journeys, his eighteen mats to his mistress's
+house, piled them all up in the hall, and stood with his hat off, with
+a look of proud humility, beside the pile, waiting for his mistress's
+appearance. Presently a folding door, at one end of the hall, opened,
+and he saw his mistress, with a great many gentlemen and ladies, rising
+from several tables.
+
+"O! There is my little boy and his mats," cried the lady.
+
+And, followed by all the rest of the company, she came into the hall.
+
+Jem modestly retired whilst they looked at his mats; but in a minute or
+two his mistress beckoned to him, and when he came into the middle of
+the circle, he saw that his pile of mats had disappeared.
+
+"Well," said the lady, smiling, "what do you see that makes you look so
+surprised?"
+
+"That all my mats are gone," said Jem; "but you are very welcome."
+
+"Are we!" said the lady. "Well, take up your hat and go home then, for
+you see it is getting late, and you know Lightfoot will wonder what's
+become of you."
+
+Jem turned round to take up his hat, which he had left on the floor.
+
+But how his countenance changed! The hat was heavy with shillings.
+Every one who had taken a mat had put in two shillings; so that for the
+eighteen mats, he had got thirty-six shillings.
+
+"Thirty-six shillings!" said the lady. "Five and seven-pence I think
+you told me you had earned already—how much does that make? I must add,
+I believe, one other six-pence to make out your two guineas."
+
+"Two guineas!" exclaimed Jem, now quite conquering his bashfulness, for
+at the moment he forgot where he was, and saw nobody that was by.
+
+"Two guineas!" cried he, clapping his hands together—"O Lightfoot! O
+mother!"
+
+Then recollecting himself; he saw his mistress, whom he now looked up
+to quite as a friend.
+
+"Will you thank them all," said he, scarcely daring to glance his eye
+round upon the company, "will you thank 'em? For you know I don't know
+how to thank 'em rightly."
+
+Every body thought, however, that they had been thanked rightly.
+
+"Now we won't keep you any longer—only," said his mistress, "I have one
+thing to ask you, that I may be by when you show your treasure to your
+mother."
+
+"Come, then," said Jem, "come with me now."
+
+"Not now," said the lady laughing, "but I will come to Ashton to-morrow
+evening; perhaps your mother can find me a few strawberries."
+
+"That she will," said Jem; "I'll search the garden myself."
+
+He now went home, it, a great restraint to wait till to-morrow evening
+before he told his mother.
+
+To console himself, he flew to the stable. "Lightfoot, you're not to be
+sold to-morrow! Poor fellow!" said he, patting him, and then could not
+refrain from counting out his money Whilst he was intent upon this, Jem
+was startled by a noise at the door; somebody was trying to pull up the
+latch. It opened, and there came in Lazy Lawrence, with a boy in a red
+jacket, who had a cock under his arm. They started when they got into
+the middle of the stable, and when they saw Jem, who had been at first
+hidden behind the horse.
+
+"We—we—we—came—" stammered Lazy Lawrence—"I mean, I came to—to—to—"
+
+"To ask you," continued the stable-boy in a bold tone, "whether you
+will go with us to the cock-fight on Monday? See, I've a fine cock
+here, and Lawrence told me you were a great friend of his, so I came."
+
+Lawrence now attempted to say something in praise of the pleasures of
+cock-fighting, and in recommendation of his new companion.
+
+But Jem looked at the stable-boy with dislike, and a sort of dread;
+then turning his eyes upon the cock with a look of compassion, said in
+a low voice to Lawrence, "Shall you like to stand by and see its eyes
+pecked out?"
+
+"I don't know," said Lawrence, "as to that; but they say a cock-fight
+is a fine sight, and it's no more cruel in me to go than another; and a
+great many go; and I've nothing else to do, so I shall go."
+
+"But I have something else to do," said Jem, laughing, "so I shall not
+go."
+
+"But," continued Lawrence, "you know Monday is the great Bristol fair,
+and one must be merry then, of all days in the year."
+
+"One day in the year, sure there's no harm in being merry," said the
+stable-boy.
+
+"I hope not," said Jem, "for I know, for my part, I am merry every day
+in the year."
+
+"That's very odd," said Lawrence; "but I know, for my part, I would
+not for all the world miss going to the fair, for at least it will be
+something to talk of for half a year after—come, you'll go, won't you?"
+
+"No," said Jem, still looking as if he did not like to talk before the
+ill-looking stranger.
+
+"Then what will you do with all your money?"
+
+"I'll tell you about that another time," whispered Jem; "and don't you
+go to see that cock's eyes pecked out; it won't make you merry, I'm
+sure."
+
+"If I had anything else to divert me," said Lawrence, hesitating and
+yawning.
+
+"Come," cried the stable-boy, seizing his stretching arm, "come along,"
+cried he; and pulling him away from Jem, upon whom he cast a look of
+extreme contempt, "leave him alone; he is not the sort. What a tool you
+are," said he to Lawrence the moment he got him out of the stable; "you
+might have known he would not go, else we should soon have trimmed him
+out of his four and seven-pence. But how came you to talk of four and
+seven-pence? I saw in the manger a hatful of silver."
+
+"Indeed!" exclaimed Lawrence.
+
+"Yes, indeed—but why did you stammer so when we first got in? you had
+liked to have blown us all up."
+
+"I was so ashamed," said Lawrence, hanging down his head.
+
+"Ashamed! But you must not talk of shame now. You are in for it, and I
+shan't let you off; you owe us half-a-crown, recollect, and I must be
+paid to-night, so see and get the money somehow or other."
+
+After a considerable pause, he added, "I'll answer for it he'd never
+miss half-a-crown out of all that silver."
+
+"But to steal," said Lawrence, drawing back with horror; "I never
+thought I should come to that—and from poor Jem too—the money that he
+has worked so hard for too."
+
+"But it is not stealing; we don't mean to steal, only to borrow it; and
+if we win, as we certainly shall, at the cock-fight, pay it back again,
+and he'll never know anything of the matter; and what harm will it do
+him? Besides, what signifies talking, you can't go to the cock-fight,
+or the fair either, if you don't; and I tell ye we don't mean to steal
+it; we'll pay it again on Monday night."
+
+Lawrence made no reply, and they parted without his coming to any
+determination.
+
+
+Here let us pause in our story—we are almost afraid to go on—the rest
+is very shocking—our little readers will shudder as they read. But it
+is better that they should know the truth, and see what the idle boy
+came to at last.
+
+In the dead of the night Lawrence heard somebody tap at his window. He
+knew well who it was, for this was the signal agreed upon between him
+and his wicked companion. He trembled at the thoughts of what he was
+about to do, and lay quite still, with his head under the bed-clothes,
+till he heard the second tap. Then he got up, dressed himself, and
+opened his window. It was almost even with the ground.
+
+His companion said to him in a hollow voice, "Are you ready?"
+
+He made no answer, but got out of the window and followed.
+
+When he got to the stable, a black cloud was just passing over the
+moon, and it was quite dark.
+
+"Where are you?" whispered Lawrence, groping about. "Where are you?
+Speak to me."
+
+"I am here; give me your hand."
+
+Lawrence stretched out his hand.
+
+"Is that your hand?" said the wicked boy, as Lawrence laid hold of him.
+"How cold it felt!"
+
+"Let us go back," said Lawrence; "it is not time yet."
+
+"It is no time to go back," replied the other, opening the door;
+"you've gone too far now to go back;" and he pushed Lawrence into the
+stable. "Have you found it? Take care of the horse—have you done? What
+are you about? Make haste, I hear a noise," said the stable-boy, who
+watched at the door.
+
+"I am feeling for the half-crown, but I can't find it."
+
+"Bring all together." He brought Jem's broken flower-pot, with all the
+money in it, to the door.
+
+The black cloud was now passed over the moon, and the light shone full
+upon them.
+
+"What do we stand here for?" said the stable-boy, snatching the
+flower-pot out of Lawrence's trembling hands, and pulling him away from
+the door.
+
+"Goodness!" cried Lawrence. "You won't take all—you said you'd only
+take half-a-crown, and pay it back on Monday—you said you'd only take
+half-a-crown!"
+
+"Hold your tongue," replied the other, walking on, deaf to all
+remonstrances. "If I am to be hanged ever, it shan't be for
+half-a-crown."
+
+Lawrence's blood ran cold in his veins, and he felt as if all his hair
+stood on end. Not another word passed.
+
+His accomplice carried off the money, and Lawrence crept, with all
+the horrors of guilt upon him, to his restless bed. All night he
+was starting from frightful dreams; or else, broad awake, he lay
+listening to every small noise, unable to stir, and scarcely daring to
+breathe—tormented by that most dreadful of all kinds of fear, that fear
+which is the constant companion of an evil conscience. He thought the
+morning would never come; but when it was day, when he heard the birds
+sing, and saw everything look cheerful as usual, he felt still more
+miserable.
+
+It was Sunday morning, and the bell rang for church. All the children
+of the village, dressed in their Sunday clothes, innocent and gay, and
+little Jem, the best and gayest among them, went flocking by his door
+to church.
+
+"Well, Lawrence," said Jem, pulling his coat as he passed, and saw
+Lawrence leaning against his father's door, "what makes you look so
+black?"
+
+"I!" said Lawrence, starting. "Why do you say that I look black?"
+
+"Nay, then," said Jem, "you look white enough, now, if that will please
+you; for you've turned as pale as death."
+
+"Pale!" replied Lawrence, not knowing what he said; and turned abruptly
+away, for he dared not stand another look of Jem's conscious that
+guilt was written in his face, he shunned every eye. He would now have
+given the world to have thrown off the load of guilt which lay upon
+his mind; he longed to follow Jem, to fall upon his knees, and confess
+all. Dreading the moment when Join should discover his loss, Lawrence
+dared not stay at home, and not knowing what to do, or where to go,
+he mechanically went to his old haunt at the stable-yard, and lurked
+thereabouts all day, with his accomplice, who tried in vain to quiet
+his fears and raise his spirits by talking of the next day's cock-fight.
+
+It was agreed that, as soon as the dusk of the evening came on, they
+should go together into a certain lonely field, and there divide their
+booty.
+
+In the meantime, Jem, when he returned from church, was very full
+of business, preparing for the reception of his mistress, of whose
+intended visit he had informed his mother. And whilst she was
+arranging the kitchen and their little parlour, he ran to search the
+strawberry-beds.
+
+"Why, my Jem, how merry you are to-day!" said his mother, when he came
+in with the strawberries, and was jumping about the room playfully.
+"Now keep those spirits of yours, Jem, till you want 'em, and don't
+let it come upon you all at once. Have it in mind that to-morrow is
+fair-day, and Lightfoot must go. I bade farmer Truck call for him
+to-night; he said he'd take him along with his own, and he'll be here
+just now—and then I know how it will be with you, Jem!"
+
+"So do I!" cried Jem, swallowing his secret with great difficulty, and
+then tumbling head over heels four times running.
+
+A carriage passed the window and stopped at the door. Jem ran out; it
+was his mistress. She came in smiling, and soon made the old woman
+smile too, by praising the neatness of everything in the house. But we
+shall pass over, however important they were deemed at the time, the
+praises of the strawberries, and of "my grandmother's china plate."
+Another knock was heard at the door.
+
+"Run, Jem," said his mother; "I hope it's our milk-woman with cream for
+the lady."
+
+No; it was farmer Truck come for Lightfoot.
+
+The old woman's countenance fell. "Fetch him out, dear," said she,
+turning to her son.
+
+But Jem was gone; he flew out to the stable the moment he saw the flap
+of farmer Truck's great coat.
+
+"Sit ye down, farmer," said the old woman, after they had waited about
+five minutes in expectation of Jem's return. "You'd best sit down, if
+the lady will give you leave, for he'll not hurry himself back again.
+My boy's a fool, madam, about that 'ere horse."
+
+Trying to laugh, she added, "I knew how Lightfoot and he would be loth
+enough to part—he won't bring him out till the last minute; so do sit
+ye down, neighbour."
+
+The farmer had scarcely sat down, when Jem, with a pale wild
+countenance, came back.
+
+"What's the matter?" said his mistress. "God bless the boy," said his
+mother, looking at him quite frightened, whilst he tried to speak,
+but could not. She went up to him, and then, leaning his head against
+her, he cried, "It's gone! It's all gone!" And bursting into tears, he
+sobbed as if his heart would break.
+
+"What's gone, love?" said his mother.
+
+"My two guineas—Lightfoot's two guineas. I went to fetch 'em to give
+you, mammy; but the broken flower-pot that I put them in and all's
+gone—quite gone!" repeated he, checking his sobs. "I saw them safe last
+night, and was showing 'em to Lightfoot; and I was so glad to think I
+had earned 'em all myself; and thought how surprised you'd look, and
+how glad you'd be, and how you'd kiss me, and all!"
+
+His mother listened to him with the greatest surprise, whilst his
+mistress stood in silence, looking first at the old woman, and then at
+Jem with a penetrating eye, as if she suspected the truth of his story,
+and was afraid of becoming the dupe of her own compassion. "This is a
+very strange thing!" said she gravely. "How came you to leave all your
+money in a broken flower-pot in the stable? How came you not to give it
+to your mother to take care of?"
+
+"Why, don't you remember," said Jem, looking up in the midst of his
+tears, "why, don't you remember you your own self bade me not to tell
+her about it till you were by?"
+
+"And did you not tell her?"
+
+"Nay, ask mammy," said Jem, a little offended; and when afterwards the
+lady went on questioning him in a severe manner, as if she did not
+believe him, he at last made no answer.
+
+"O, Jem! Jem! Why don't you speak to the lady?" said his mother.
+
+"I have spoke, and spoke the truth," said Jem proudly, "and she did not
+believe me."
+
+Still the lady, who had lived too long in the world to be without
+suspicion, maintained a cold manner, and determined to wait the event
+without interfering, saying only, she hoped the money would be found;
+and advised Joni to have done crying.
+
+"I have done," said Jem. "I shall cry no more."
+
+And as he had the greatest command over himself, he actually did not
+shed another tear, not even when the farmer got up to go, saying he
+could wait no longer.
+
+Jem silently went to bring out Lightfoot.
+
+The lady now took her seat where she could see all that passed at the
+open parlour window.
+
+The old woman stood at the door, and several idle people of the
+village, who had gathered round the lady's carriage examining it,
+turned about to listen.
+
+In a minute or two Jem appeared, with a steady countenance, leading
+Lightfoot; and when he came up, without saying a word, put the bridle
+into farmer Truck's hand.
+
+"He 'has been' a good horse!" said the farmer.
+
+"He 'is' a good horse!" cried Jem, and threw his arm over Lightfoot's
+neck, hiding his own face as he leaned upon him.
+
+At this instant a party of milk-women went by; and one of them, having
+set down her pail, came behind Jem, and gave him a pretty smart blow
+upon the back.
+
+He looked up.
+
+"And don't you know me?" said she.
+
+"I forget," said Jem.
+
+"I think I have seen your face before, but I forget."
+
+"Do you so? And you'll tell me just now," said she, half opening her
+hand, "that you forget who gave you this, and who charged you not to
+part with it too."
+
+Here she quite opened her large hand, and on the palm of it appeared
+Jem's silver penny.
+
+"Where," exclaimed Jem, seizing it, "O where did you find it? And have
+you—O tell me, have you got the rest of my money?"
+
+"I don't know nothing of your money—I don't know what you would be at,"
+said the milk-woman.
+
+"But where, pray tell me, where did you find this?"
+
+"With them that you gave it to, I suppose," said the milk-woman,
+turning away suddenly to take up her milk pail.
+
+But now Jem's mistress called to her through the window, begging her to
+stop, and joining in his entreaties to know how she came by the silver
+penny.
+
+"Why, madam," said she, taking up the corner of her apron, "I came by
+it in an odd way too. You must know my Betty is sick, so I come with
+the milk myself, though it's not what I'm used to; for my Betty—you
+know my Betty," said she, turning round to the old woman, "my Betty
+serves you, and she's a tight and stirring lassy, ma'am, I can assure—"
+
+"Yes, I don't doubt it," said the lady impatiently; "but about the
+silver penny?"
+
+"Why, that's true. As I was coming along all alone, for the rest came
+around, and I came a short cut across yon field—No, you can't see it,
+madam, where you stand, but if you were here—"
+
+"I see it, I know it," said Jem, out of breath with anxiety.
+
+"Well—well—I rested my pail upon the stile, and sets me down awhile,
+and there comes out of the hedge—I don't know well how, for they
+startled me so I'd like to have thrown down my milk—two boys, one about
+the size of he," said she, pointing to Jem, "and one a matter taller,
+but ill-looking like, so I did not think to stir to make way for them,
+and they were like in a desperate hurry; so, without waiting for the
+stile, one of 'em pulled at the gate, and when it would not open, for
+it was tied with a pretty stout cord, one of 'em whips out his knife
+and cuts it. Now have you a knife about you, sir?" continued the
+milk-woman to the farmer.
+
+He gave her his knife.
+
+"Here now, ma'am, just sticking as it were here, between the blade and
+the haft, was the silver penny. He took no notice, but when he opened
+it out, it falls. Still he takes no heed, but cuts the cord as I said
+before, and through the gate they went, and out of sight in half a
+minute. I picks up the penny, for my heart misgave me that it was the
+very one husband had a long time, and had given against my voice to
+he," pointing to Jem; "and I charged him not to part with it; and,
+ma'am, when I looked I knew it by the mark, so I thought I would show
+it to he," again pointing to Jem, "and let him give it back to those it
+belongs to."
+
+"It belongs to me," said Jem; "I never gave it to any body but—"
+
+"But," cried the farmer, "those boys have robbed him—it is they who
+have all his money."
+
+"O, which way did they go?" cried Jem. "I'll run after them."
+
+"No, no," said the lady, calling to her servant; and she desired him to
+take his horse and ride after them.
+
+"Ay," added farmer Truck, "do you take the road and I'll take the field
+way, and I'll be bound we'll have 'em presently."
+
+Whilst they were gone in pursuit of the thieves, the lady, who was now
+thoroughly convinced of Jem's truth, desired her coachman would produce
+what she had ordered him to bring with him that evening. Out of the
+boot of the carriage the coachman immediately produced a new saddle and
+bridle.
+
+How Jem's eyes sparkled when the saddle was thrown upon Lightfoot's
+back!
+
+"Put it on your horse yourself, Jem," said the lady; "it is yours."
+
+Confused reports of Lightfoot's splendid accoutrements, of the pursuit
+of the thieves, and of the fine and generous lady who was standing at
+dame Preston's window, quickly spread through the village, and drew
+every body from their houses. They crowded round Jem to hear the story.
+
+The children especially, who were all fond of him, expressed the
+strongest indignation against the thieves. Every eye was on the
+stretch; and now some who had run down the lane came back shouting,
+"Here they are! They've got the thieves!"
+
+The footman on horseback carried one boy before him, and the farmer,
+striding along, dragged another. The latter had on a red jacket, which
+Jem immediately recollected, and scarcely dared to lift his eyes to
+look at the boy on horseback.
+
+"Good heavens!" said he to himself. "It must be—yet surely it can't be
+Lawrence!"
+
+The footman rode on as fast as the people would let him. The boy's hat
+was slouched, and his head hung down, so that nobody could see his face.
+
+At this instant there was a disturbance in the crowd. A man who was
+half drunk pushed his way forwards, swearing that nobody should stop
+him; that he had a right to see, and he "would" see. And so he did; for
+forcing through all resistance, he staggered up to the footman just as
+he was lifting down the boy he had carried before him.
+
+"I 'will'—I tell you I 'will' see the thief!" cried the drunken man,
+pushing up the boy's hat.
+
+It was his own son.
+
+"Lawrence!" exclaimed the wretched father. The shock sobered him at
+once, and he hid his face in his hands.
+
+There was an awful silence. Lawrence fell on his knees, and, in a
+voice that could scarcely be heard, made a full confession of all the
+circumstances of his guilt.
+
+"Such a young creature so wicked! What could put such wickedness into
+your head?"
+
+"Bad company," said Lawrence.
+
+"And how came you—what brought you into bad company?"
+
+"I don't know, except it was idleness."
+
+While this was saying, the farmer was emptying Lazy Lawrence's pockets,
+and when the money appeared, all his former companions in the village
+looked at each other with astonishment and terror.
+
+Their parents grasped their little hands closer, and cried, "Thank God!
+He is not my son. How often, when he was little, we used, as he lounged
+about, to tell him that idleness was the root of all evil?"
+
+As for the hardened wretch, his accomplice, every one was impatient
+to have him sent to jail. He had put on a bold, insolent countenance,
+till he heard Lawrence's confession—till the money was found upon him,
+and he heard the milk-woman declare that she would swear to the silver
+penny which he had dropped. Then he turned pale, and betrayed the
+strongest signs of fear.
+
+"We must take him before the justice," said the farmer, "and he'll be
+lodged in Bristol jail."
+
+"O," said Jem, springing forwards when Lawrence's hands were going to
+be tied, "let him go—won't you—can't you let him go?"
+
+"Yes, madam, for mercy's sake," said Jem's mother to the lady; "'think
+what a disgrace to his family to be sent to jail."
+
+His father stood by, wringing his hands in an agony of despair.
+
+"It's all my fault," cried he. "I brought him up in idleness."
+
+"But he'll never be idle any more," said Jem. "Won't you speak for him,
+ma'am?"
+
+"Don't ask the lady to speak for him," said the farmer; "it's better he
+should go to Bridewell now, than to the gallows by-and-by."
+
+Nothing more was said, for every body felt the truth of the farmer's
+speech.
+
+
+Lawrence was sent to Bridewell for a month, and the stable-boy was
+transported to Botany Bay.
+
+During Lawrence's confinement, Jem often visited him, and carried him
+such little presents as he could afford to give; and Jem could afford
+to be "generous," because he was "industrious."
+
+Lawrence's heart was touched by his kindness, and his example struck
+him so forcibly, that when his confinement was ended, he resolved to
+set immediately to work. And, to the astonishment of all who knew him,
+soon became remarkable for industry; he was found early and late at his
+work, established a new character, and for ever lost the name of LAZY
+LAWRENCE.
+
+
+
+                           THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75331 ***