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'^^^ 




Herbert 



Dick Langdon's Career 



IN 



SATAN'S SCHOOLS, AND CHRIST'S 
SCHOOLS. 



EV 

MRS. S. A. F. HERBERT. 




AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY, 

PARK AVENUE AND FORTIETH STREET, 
NEW YORK. 



THE NEW TOM 
rilgLIC IIBEAEY 

94125B 

AirrOK, LENOX AxNI> 
TILDES' FOUNDATKMS 



COITTRIGHT. iSl5 
AMEiUCAN TRACT, SOCIETY. 



t^ 




-•- 



PART I. 
SATAN'S SCHOOLS. 

CHAPTER I. 
An Introduction to the Schools 9 

CHAPTER II. 
Disobedience 14 

CHAPTER III. 
Deceit 93 

CHAPTER IV. 
Sabbath-Breaking 97 

CHAPTER V. 
Prodigality 37 

CHAPTER VI. 

Smoldng 47 

CHAPTER VII. 
Gambling S4 



40X1421 



4 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Fighting , . . 59 

CHAPTER IX. 
Stealing - 64 

CHAPTER X. 
Rejoicing in Iniquity 69 

CHAPTER XL 
Drankenness 73 

♦' 

PART II. 
CHRIST'S SCHOOLS. 

CHAPTER I. 
The Young Teacher . 8i 

CHAPTER II. 
Repentance 91 

CHAPTER III. 
Submisrion ^9^ 

CHAPTER ly. 
Faith HI 

CHAPTER V. 
Obedience . . . "7 

CHAPTER VI. 
Tntth ia8 



CONTENTS. 5 

CHAPTER VII. 
Forgiveness • I53 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Love 137 

CHAPTER IX. 
Patience ^43 

CHAPTER X. 

Hope 150 

CHAPTER XL 

Joy 155 

CHAPTER XII. 
Large-Heartedness i^ 

CHAPTER XIII. 
Self-Sacrifice 168 

CHAPTER XIV. 
Candor 17^ 

CHAPTER XV. 

Deliverance from Evil 186 

CHAPTER XVI. 
All Things New . • aoo 

CHAPTER XVII. 
Zeal 909 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
Grace Triumphant • • • S17 



6 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIX. 
Patient Continuance m6 

CHAPTER XX. 
Life from Death 333 

CHAPTER XXL 
Safety • • ••••••••• 343 



PART I, 

SATAN'S SCHOOLS. 



DICK LANGDON^S CAREER. 



CHAPTER I. 

AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SCHOOLS. 

Ernest was a Christian. By this I mean 
that he loved Christ and endeavored to obey 
him. 

This did not make him the less joyful in his 
play and recreation, and skating was his special 
delight. One fine winter afternoon he came 
home from the pond much earlier than usual, 
with his skates over his shoulder and his cheeks 
aglow with the healthful exercise. His mother, 
who was surprised to see him so early, and 
thought him less merry than usual, said, 

" Have you had any trouble, Ernest?'* 

**No, mother; only I don't like to attend 
such a swearing-school as is kept at the pond. I 
came away on that account." 

** A swearing-school I" exclaimed his mother. 
**Who teaches it?" 



10 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

"Oh, the bad boys. They are teaching the 
little ones to swear before they are old enough to 
know what the words mean. There was little 
Eddie Wilson, this afternoon; he was saying some 
bad words, and just as I was going to ask him 
not to, James Larkin spoke up and said, 

*' ' Can't you swear better than that, Ed ?' 

" 'No,' said Eddie; ' I can't swear very well 
as yet; but Dick Langdon 's teaching me, and he 
can swear first-rate.' 

'*I got a chance to speak to Eddie out of hear- 
ing of the rest, and asked him if he didn't know 
it was wicked to use such words, and he said, 

***No, I don't think it's wicked. I think 
it's nice, because the big boys do so; and they 
give me candy and gum for saying like them.' " 

** Does n't Eddie know the third command- 
ment?" 

*'Yes, mother; I found he had learned it in 
the infant Sabbath-school class, but didn't seem 
to think it had anything to do with what he was 
saying; and he is so pleased with the idea of get- 
ting the dreadful words from the big boys that it 
is almost of no use to talk to him. That 's the 
way the bad boys are all the time trying to make 
the little ones just like themselves." 

*' Yes," said the mother, **bad boys are very 
apt to set themselves to doing Satan's work — 



AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SCHOOLS. II 

which is to try to make others as sinful and mis- 
erable as they themselves are, I should say Satan 
was the principal of the swearing-school, and the 
wicked boys were his assistants." 

Will my reader stop here for a few minutes' 
thought and answer the following questions? 

Has Satan any schools in your town? 

If so, where are they kept? 

Who are the scholars ? 

What branches are taught ? 

Will that kind of education fit you for useful- 
ness and happiness in time and in eternity ? 

If the first question, ** Has Satan any schoob 
in your town?" were put to me, I should say 
without hesitation that he has, and that it has 
never been my privilege to live in any place 
where he has not. 

As to where these schools are kept, I answer, 
At the comers of the streets, at the stores and sa- 
loons, especially those where tobacco, beer, and 
intoxicating drinks are sold; at the livery-stables, 
the small workshops, the engine-houses, the 
schoolhouse yards; indeed, in every place where 
one can be found, old or young, who is willing 
to tempt and teach another to do wrong. 

And this brings us to the questions, *' Who are 
the teachers?" and ** Who are the scholars?" I 
think Ernest's mother was right in saying that 



13 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

Satan is the principal of this great school of sin 
and temptation, and that he is very glad to make 
every one, and especially every boy, who is ready 
to obey and imitate him, an assistant in his insti- 
tution, which has been incorporated for the ex- 
press purpose of fitting candidates for admission 
to his infernal kingdom. I hope the boys will 
realize that I speak very earnestly and solemnly 
of Satan, his work, his wages, and his abode of 
endless despair. Though it is a terrible truth, 
we cannot doubt what the Bible teaches, that 
there is a personal devil who, '' as a roaring lion^ 
walketh about seeking whom he may devour/* 
making it his special work to tempt to sin for the 
express purpose of bringing its fearful punish- 
ment upon all whom he can win to himself. So, 
when children have angry, envious, and revenge- 
ful feelings; when they have a desire to be diso- 
bedient and disrespectful to their parents and 
teachers, to lie, steal, break the Sabbath, or do 
anything which God has forbidden, very likely it 
is Satan who, all unseen, is influencing their 
minds and tempting them to this evil. But, Sa- 
tan cannot get on as fast as he desires in his bad 
work by simply influencing the minds of young 
people by his own suggestions and those of his in- 
visible servants; so he puts it into the heart of 
every boy whom he gets fairly won over to his 



AN INTRODUCTION TO THE SCHOOLS. I3 

side to turn tempter, like himself, and see how 
many others he can make equally bad. Thus 
every one who will go with those who do evil, 
and will learn to be like them, becomes a scholar 
in this terrible school of sin. 

Now I have told you what I mean by Satan's 
schools, where I think they are kept, and who are 
the teachers and who are the scholars. 

The next question was about the branches 
taught. Can you tell me what the first bad les- 
son was which Satan ever learned or taught ? It 
begins with '*D,'' and I think you will easily 
guess it. It is the primary study in all his 
schools. You may be sure Satan thinks it very 
important to get the children well started in this 
branch at an early age; for he goes into every 
family, giving private lessons to the youngest 
members, and, unless you have a very little babe 
at your house, I fear every one of you has already 
made some progress in this study. 



14 DICK langdon's career. 

CHAPTER II. 

DISOBEDIENCE. 

I DARE say the boys did not find it very hard 
to guess that the first lesson in sin which Satan 
ever learned or taught was disobedience. If he 
had not disobeyed God he would now be an angel 
in heaven instead of an inhabitant of hell. The 
Bible gives us reason to think that, just as soon as 
Satan disobeyed God, he began to teach the terri- 
ble lesson to others; for we know that he became 
the leader of a host of disobedient angels who for 
sin were eternally banished from heaven. 

Dick Langdon, who has been mentioned as 
teaching the little boys to swear, had learned the 
lesson of disobedience in his infancy, when his 
fond young mother, almost overwhelmed with 
sorrow and care, had let him do as he pleased, 
and his intemperate father had either neglected or 
abused him. 

Disobedience came very naturally to Dick, 
who had a strong will of his own and fine powers 
for good or evil. The boys may all be very sure 
that the highest and best faculties will be well 
appreciated and sought for in the schools of evil. 



DISOBEDIENCE. 15 

and that what you usually call smartness will 
prove no protection from bad influences. 

Dick's father was naturally gifted, and had 
taken a high stand as a scholar when a boy and 
afterwards in his business relations. At this pe- 
riod of his life he married a beautiful girl of great 
culture and refinement, who had never known 
hardship and whom any man might have been 
proud to love and cherish. He doubtless meant 
to make her happy, but habits of evil formed in 
boyhood, and held in control while he won his 
fair bride, returned upon him even in the first 
year after his marriage, and grew upon him until 
they mastered and ruined him. 

When my story opens he was a confirmed 
drunkard, prematurely old at thirty-five years of 
actual age, and the heaviest of griefe and burdens 
to his suffering family. 

Dick loved his youthfiil and gifted mother, 
and he was to her the very heart of every hope 
and joy that lingered in her desolate life. It was 
very hard for her to believe evil of him; indeed, 
she would not; she shut her eyes to his wrong 
ways and to the dangers which beset him. She 
compelled herself to think that her large-hearted, 
talented boy could not, with his father's fearful 
example before his eyes, be foolish enough to 
choose a course of redclessness. As to any con« 



i6 DICK langdon's career. 

trol or authority over him, she had never attempt- 
ed it Disobedience to her, allowed to pass un- 
punished, had been his first downward step. 

He did a great many things to please his mo- 
ther, and he thought it was well for boys to love 
their mothers; but as to obeying them, he scorned 
the very mention of it. Having become one of 
Satan's assistants, he was continually teaching 
other boys lessons of disobedience and insubordi- 
nation, especially to any woman who was in a 
place of authority over them. 

Perhaps I cannot better tell you how far Dick 
had already got in the way of evil, and in so doing 
warn you against the sin of disobedience, than by 
telling you how he had been behaving at school 
and with what results. 

The principal thing which had kept Dick 
from going down hill faster than he had was that 
he attended an excellent public grammar-school. 
He was a quick, bright scholar, with a natural 
thirst for knowledge, which his mother took every 
possible means to stimulate; and by exciting his 
ambition and by perpetual coaxing she kept his 
attendance tolerably regular. She denied herself 
almost necessary food and clothing, and toiled 
with her needle by night, to keep him respectably 
clothed for his school, and was pleased that he 
never seemed to care how ragged a suit he put on 



DISOBEDIENCE. 17 

Saturdays and out of school hours, because he 
would give her a kiss when he had donned the 
worst clothes he possessed, saying, 

'' It saves your spoiling your fine eyes nights, 
pretty mamma, and I'm not a bit ashamed of 
rags." 

Then his mother would view admiringly the 
face and figure of her boy, thinking, 

*' He is handsome even in rags ! Oh, what a 
treasure my Dick is !" She little imagined that, 
while he really did like to save the eyes of his 
'* pretty mamma,** he was getting almost to take 
pride in rags, because he associated out of school 
with a set of bad boys who wore them and who 
regarded him as a sort of hero and leader. 

The school was under such good discipline 
that the ill-disposed boys found it very difficult to 
do the mischief they would, and they admired 
Dick for his boldness and ingenuity in finding a 
way. 

Instant obedience was a rule of the school 
which no one dared violate. But Dick abhorred 
the rule, and one day Satan whispered to him in 
the recitation-room to try not doing as he was told 
by Miss Barnard, one of the assistant teachers. 
He seldom did anything by halves, and made the 
daring experiment of sitting still in his seat when 
told to put a sum on the blackboard. The teacher 

IMck Laatdon't Owmt. 2 ^ - 



l8 DICK i^ngdon's CAEEER. 

did not compel obedience, and very unwisely let 
the act pass without reporting him to the prin- 
cipal for discipline, fearing that if she did she 
might be blamed for lack of authority over her 
pupils. 

*'Now, fellows," said Dick the next day at 
recess, '* just you see what jolly times we '11 have 
in that room. Miss Barnard don't dare to report 
us," 

** I would n't date to do what you done," said 
<i>ne of the boys. 

'* Where 's your grammar?'* replied Dick. 

" In my desk. Why, what of it?" 

** Nothing, only use it occasionally," said 
Dick, and there was a general laugh in his favor. 

**Boys," continued Dick, **of course I would 
not get you into trouble, and there is no need of 
your doing anything that will. I only did what 
I did to see what would be done, and nothing was 
done. So you see if what I did can be done, 
there 's no risk in what I 'd ask to have done." 

**What shall be done? We'll do it," said a 
special follower of Dick. 

**Well, I'll tell you what we'll do. You 
know those long settees in the redtation-room, 
made of oak and iron, are very heavy, which is 
the reason they keep in place; but we can move 
them. When we ^le in to recite, the first fellow 



DISOBEDIENCE. 19 

that gets to a settee just pat your knee to it with 
all your strength and push the end of it snug up 
against the one back of it It'll be an accident, 
of course, and the rest of those that belong in that 
settee can't get in if they would, and how will 
those innocently coming on get by? It'll be a 
sort of mixed scene, and who 's to tell who whis- 
pers and who laughs and who whistles and who 
would like to be good if he only could? How 's 
that purring pussy-cat. Miss Barnard, going to 
get any recitation at all out of us ? It '11 be jolly 1 
I 'm in a hurry to try it on/' 

*' We '11 do it I" chorused the boys. 

They did it, with the very results which Dick 
had predicted; and having done that, they pro- 
ceeded to do so many ingeniously annoying bad 
things of Dick's planning that I must leave them 
all to be imagined. The result was that Miss 
Barnard resigned her situation and left in the 
middle of a term, before another teacher had been 
secured to fill the vacancy. 

The principal and the remaining teachers took 
turns in hearing that division, and, advised by 
Dick, they behaved beautifully. He even went 
so far as to say to the principal one day out of 
school hours, 

**We boys miss Miss Barnard badly. We 
.oved her, sir. Isn't she coming back?" 



PJO DICK LANGDON'S career. 

Not another boy in school would have ven- 
tured to speak so; but Dick was fearless. 

It was not long before the new assistant arrived. 
She had left her home and come a long journey 
to fill what she supposed to be a very desirable 
situation in one of the most orderly of schools. 

When she came into the great hall and saw 
the boys all seated in perfect order, industriously 
studying, with the room so still that she could 
hear the ticking of the clock, her heart leaped for 
joy, for she knew that in that room obedience 
reigned. She went into the library, which was 
a small room directly back of the teacher's plat- 
form and desk, and left the scholars as she had 
found them, without a teacher; for all the assist- 
ants were hearing lessons in the recitation-rooms, 
and the principal, who was out, had told her that 
the scholars in the hall did just as well when he 
was absent as when he was there. She could 
watch the school unseen from the library, and she 
found he was right; there was perfect order. 

By-and-by the principal came in and called 
upon a certain division of the school to rise, and 
introduced to them their new teacher, and she 
went away with them into a recitation-room ad- 
joining the hall. It was Dick's division, which, 
at his instigation, had its plans all laid to have 
what they called *' a jolly old time '* at the very 



DISOBEDIENCE. ai 

beginning of the new administration; for, they 
said, ** She '11 never dare to tell she could n't keep 
order the first minute, and of course she can't 
keep order if we wont come to order." 

She stood at the desk all ready to make a 
pretty little speech, saying what good boys they 
were and what a delightful time she expected to 
have instructing them, when, the door having 
been silently closed, she found herself in a scene 
of the wildest confusion. More discordant sounds 
than there were boys in the room startled her 
ears — buzzing, whispering, talking, muttering, 
sighing, groaning, humming, singing, whistling, 
scraping, shuffling, rapping, and more other ings 
than you can imagine. The scene was indescri- 
bable; it was all in the line of mischief and con- 
fusion which the inventive genius of more than a 
score of boys could make it 

The new teacher, who stood at the desk, was 
a very young and very little lady, *'Not out of 
her teens, and hasn't got her growth yet," so the 
boys whispered. ** Any one of us could pitch her 
out of the window quicker than you could say 
scaV She couldn't hear herself speak for the 
tumult; she didn't know one scholar from an- 
other, even by sight; her cheeks glowed, not with 
anger, but with the grief and disappointment of 
this cruel reception; and she felt more like laying 



22 DICK LANGDON'S CARBBR. 

her head down upon the desk and having a hearty 
cry than like accepting the challenge to battle. 
DonH you think, my reader, that the boys be- 
haved shamefully and deserved to be severely 
punished? Don't you pity the teacher? What 
could she do? What do you think she did Aol 
I must wait till the next chapter to finish the 
story; but I will tell you now that she did some- 
thing better than crying, and something that 
brought the room to order in a twinkling. 

The teacher knew without being told, the in- 
stant the door closed and the uproar began, that 
her particular division had had a poor teacher, 
who had not enforced obedience, and thus had let 
Satan into her recitation-room to usurp her place 
and keep a school of his own liking. 



DECEIT. a3 

CHAPTER III. 

DECaSIT. 

The ugly black wall which separated the reci- 
tation-room from the hall was deceit The new 
teacher saw it instantly, saw that it had been built 
there to hide the wrong-doing from the eyes of 
the good principal, who ought to know it all, and 
she threw the wall down with one stroke of her 
little hand. It was useless to speak (as I before 
said, she could not even hear herself in such a 
Babel), so she just turned the knob of the recita- 
tion-room door and threw it wide open into the 
hall. Then she stepped silently back to her desk, 
and it was not ten seconds before every scholar was 
in his seat and the room was so still you could 
have heard a pin fall; only nobody would have 
ventured to drop one. The teacher did not make 
any speech. She thought, * * * Actions speak louder 
than words.' I think the boys understand me." 
So she went pleasantly from one to another, ta- 
king each one's name, looking him steadily in the 
eye as she did so; thus many eyes fell before her 
gaze, and I am happy to say that Dick's were of 
the number. Then she threw her whole pow^ 



24 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

into the recitation, and made it so interesting that, 
when the bell rang for its close, Dick thought, 
** Can we have been here a whole hour?" 

It was recess now, and as the boys went out 
they whiq)ered one to another, ''We sha' n't have 

any more goings on in No. lo without Mr. B 

knowing it." 

When the boys were all gone from the recita- 
tion-room the principal came in, and the teacher 
said, with a painful blush, *' You saw, sir, I was 
obliged to open my door to bring the boys to oider. 
There was a perfect riot till I did it" 

''And afterwards?" questioned Mr. B . 

" There was order and attention to the recita- 
tion. The boys are bright and easily interested. 
I think they will behave well, too, if there is an 
open door between you and me. You will allow 
that, I trust." 

"Certainly," replied the principal. "Your 
predecessor shut the door, which should ever have 
been open, by trjdng to hide from me the bad 
conduct of the boys in that class; but it became 
public, and she was dimissed from her charge. If 
she had been sincere, she would have found no 
trouble. * Honor and right keep open doors,' and 
I thank you for opening the one which she closed. 
Every one of those boys must make you a public 
apology or leave the school." 



DECEIT. 25 

** Thank you, but leave them to me for a little. 
I hope they will apologize without compulsion." 

When the boys came in for a recitation after 
recess they left the door open as requested and 
took their seats in perfect order. When they had 
done so, the teacher said very gently, 

''My boys, how many of you think you did 
right when you came in here with me the first 
time ? How many think it was an honorable and 
kind reception? Hands up, those who think so." 

If Dick had raised his hand several others 
would have done the same, without half realising 
what the act said; but he realised, and kept his 
hand and his eyes too down, and no hands went 
up. 

** How many of you are ready to say to me, ^I 
beg your pardon '?" 

Dick's hand is up instantly; the scholars glance 
questioningly at him and one another; a few hands 
rise, then more and more, till all are up. 

*' You may say it then in concert, three times, 
to make sure of a full chorus, and speak up loud 

and let Mr. B hear you, for we will have no 

secrets from him." 

The teacher raised her hand for a signal, and 
the boys brought it out in fine chorus: 

'' I beg your pardon; / 6e^ your pardon; I BEG 

YOUR PARDON* '^ 



a6 DICK LANGtX)N'S CARBEIL 

** Wdl said, boys,'' spoke Mr. B , appear- 
ing at the open door. ** How many will give this 
lady reason to say to me to-night, * The boys do 
just as well when the recitation-room door is closed 
as when it is open '? Those who will, say * L* " 

A foil chorus of ** I*s " responded. 

"Well, then, we will close this door,'* said 

the teacher, as Mr. B turned away. **'Tis 

all the same to us, closed or open, since there is 
to be no wall of deceit here." 

Results proved that Satan beat a hasty retreat 
just at that time from that roomj he never likes 
to keep school in any place that isn't well shut 
up from all good by the black wall of deceit. 

Dick, who was naturally brave and had been 
trained by his mother to be courteous, felt very 
much ashamed of himself for advising the boys 
to give a stranger such a reception, and with the 
frankness which was also one of his traits he told 
them he should ''cut up somewhere else, not in 
No. ID. ' ' He really did better at school than any- 
where else, but it was only his mind which was 
taught. The Bible was a book not studied or even 
read, and as it was a public school, all religious 
instruction was by law practically forbidden. 



SABBATH-BREAKING. 2/ 

CHAPTER IV. 

SABBATH-BREAKING. 

Dick was a confirmed Sabbath-breaker long 
before he became established in some of the other 
sins which Satan delights to teach. His mother, 
who had been brought up to respect the day and 
to attend public worship, had always accompa- 
nied her husband to church as long as she could 
induce him to go; but when this was impossible 
she timidly shrank from public notice of any 
kind, and after the necessity of remaining at 
home with her babes was over, never overcame 
the many obstacles which prevented her attend- 
ance. Had the love of Christ dwelt in her heart, 
she might have done otherwise and constrained 
Dick to remember the Sabbath. As it was, while 
his mother gave respectful observance to the day 
at home, and advised and wished him to go to 
church and Sabbath-school, he never complied 
with her wishes, and spent the day as he pleased. 
He never let his mother know how badly he spent 
it Really he learned and did and taught more 
evil on that day than on any other of the week. 

Satan had succeeded in instilling into Dick » 



28 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

great contempt for religious instruction in every 
form, and he did not hesitate to act as his assist- 
ant in teaching the same lesson to others and in 
luring them from all sacred influences. He had 
taken a great fancy to a bright, affectionate, well- 
disposed boy named Willy Goodwin, who was 
younger than himself and a near neighbor. We 
will step into Willy's home on a certain Sabbath 
which proved a sadly-eventful one in his history, 
for you will soon see that in doing so I am by no 
means neglecting to tell you of Dick. 

** I must start for Sabbath-school very early," 
said Willy to his sister Martha; **for the * juvenile 
choir ' is to sing half an hour before school, and 
my teacher says they can't spare me." 

** You will be the only one of the family at 
church," said kind sister Martha, as she brushed 
her brother's soft hair and buttoned his clean col- 
lar; **for father is out of town and mother is sick, 
and I must stay with her. But you '11 be a good 
boy if you are all alone, wont you, Willy?" 

**Yes, indeed," replied Willy confidently. 
But at the very first comer he passed he came 
upon one of Satan's schools, attended by a 
company of Sabbath-breakers headed by Dick, 
who, on seeing Willy, instantly called out to 
him, 

** Halloa, Will ! can you spestk to a fellow of a 



SABBATH-BREAKING. 29 

Sabba'-day morning, or wouldn't your mammy 
approve of it ?" 

**Good-moming, Dick. What are you up to 
here?" said Willy, pausing to answer, when he 
knew it would be better to pass on in silence. 

**We're up to * snuff,' sweet-scented * snuff' 
too," replied Dick. ** We 're off for old Gruffy's 
meadow to * hook * strawberries; the ground 's 
red with them. Better go with us, Will. No 
need of Sunday-schools and meeting-houses such 
a splendid day as this, when a pious boy like you 
can find 'books in the running brooks, sermons in 
stones, and good in everything,' as I heard my 
school-marm remark. Come, what say, little 
Methodist?" 

**Oh, I can't go," replied Willy in a waver- 
ing tone, allowing his mind to dwell upon the 
thought of the first ripe strawberries, the ** splen- 
did day," and the fact that none of his folks 
would know whether he went to meeting or 
not. 

*'0h, yes, you can go too; and, what's more, 
you shall!" cried the boys, surrounding Willy. 
**Now Dick has blabbed to you, we'll take you 
along any way, so that you needn't be sending a 
committee of deacons after us." 

Now Willy knew that they could not compel 
him to go; but he made an excuse of their threat i 



30 DICK langdon's career. 

to walk along with them, saying, **Well, I will 
go on a piece with you any way, just to show 
that I am not mean enough to tell of you." 

**You are more of a man than I took you 
for," cried Dick, clapping him on the back. ** I 
say, you pick into my basket and I will sell your 
berries for you to-morrow with mine, and give 
you half of all I get They will bring a tip-top 
price, I tell you, they are so early !" 

There is not room to relate all that took place; 
but Willy was absent from Sabbath-school and 
from meeting, and got home about noon, with 
his face very hot and red and his light pants 
badly stained with strawberries. Martha was in 
her mother's darkened room, and Willy crept up 
stairs and changed his pants unnoticed. That 
afternoon he stayed at home and waited upon his 
mother, so that Martha could go to church. 

The boys had found a good many berries, and 
on Monday Dick handed Willy twenty-five cents 
as his share of the pay, saying, 

*' You see, Will, my man, this business pays 
better than that old Sunday-school." The fact 
was that because Dick had taken a fancy to 
bright, active little Will he was sparing no pains 
to draw him into his own wicked set 

** How came you to be so rich, my son?" said 
Willy's fitiher cheerfully, as he happened to pass 



SABBATH-BREAKING. 3I 

the window where he stood counting over his lit- 
tle pile of five-cent pieces, 

Willy started, blushed, and at last managed to 
stammer, 

*'I earned it, father, picking wild strawber- 
ries." 

''That is well, my boy," replied his father. 
" I like to have you earn money for yourself, that 
you may know its value. Here is twenty-five 
cents more to go with it for your encouragement; 
only try and make a good use of it;" and Willy's 
father hurried away, thinking, "Now my little 
boy is glad." But his father's kindness made 
Willy feel very miserable. 

It was rather strange, and very unfortunate, 
that Willy's evil doings were not found out at his 
home that week; but he had several hair-breadth 
escapes, and used a great deal of deceit to avoid 
exposure. His mother asked how the pants were 
so stained, and he covered the truth with a lie. 
Then his Sabbath-school teacher called, and see- 
ing Willy first alone, inquired the cause of his ab- 
sence fix>m his class. And he said, *' My x&other 
was sick last Sabbath, and I stayed at home to 
wait upon her." When his mother came in the 
teacher said she was glad to find that Willy had 
stayed at home last Sabbath to help her when 
mck. Then his mother stroked his hair lovii^iy 



32 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

as she said, thinking of the afternoon, ''Yes, he 
was a dear boy, and such a comfort that he got 
me almost well before sunset." And the loving 
touch of his mother's soft hand made Willy very 
miserable. 

As the days and nights went by Willy grew 
more and more wretched thinking of his hidden 
sin, till at last conscience, God's voice in his 
heart, smote him so terribly that he almost arose 
in the dead of the night to go through the dark- 
ness to his father's bedside and wake him to hear 
the full confession of his sin. How fondly would 
his father have folded his son to his heart, for- 
giving him all I 

But Willy smothered the voice of conscience 
with the excuse that he ought not to disturb his 
father's rest, and that the morning would be soon 
enough, when really he knew that, unless he were 
awake and arose long before his usual time, his 
father would be gone to the city. I^ate in the 
night he got to sleep, and did not awake till 
Martha called him two hours after his father left. 

Willy proved the truth of the familiar lines, 

" * Almost ' cannot avail ; 
* Almost ' is but to fail ;'' 

for when we don't obey the voice of conscience 
she soon stops speaking, and it becomes compara- 
tively easy to do wrong. The first steps in sin are 



«ABBATH-BREAKING. 33 

usually little steps, and Willy's looks like a great 
one; but we must remember that Willy's ** first 
step" was only the error of pausing to answer 
Dick when he stopped him so improperly on his 
way to Sabbath-school; and if you will read over 
the account of what followed you w411 see that the 
steps were not so very long. 

Dick showed Willy a good deal of attention, 
which flattered his pride, because Dick was older 
and a kind of leader among the boys, and he soon 
made Willy begin to feel ashamed of goodness. 
Oh, that is a sad step downward, a long stride 
towards destruction ! 

**He'd be a nice fellow, would Will, if he 
wasn't so goody, wouldn't he, boys?" asked 
Dick of the others in his set; and they answered, 

** I do n't know. I guess he can't be anything 
but goody; canyon. Will?" 

**Bet I could if I tried," answered poor 
tempted Willy. ''Was n't I kind of bad with- 
out trying that Sunday I went hooking straw- 
berries?" 

Both Dick and Willy knew how to speak in 
very good English, but both of them when com- 
panying with ** rowdies" tried to talk like them, 
and Dick was getting accustomed to it. 

'' Yes, yes, that you was," cried the boys; and 
Dick put in, 

OWk Lasfdon's CarMr. ^ 



34 wot tANGDON'S CAREER. 

** I tell you he knows the way to be something 
besides goody. Why, he's that cute to his ma 
and the Sunday-school marm that one of 'em 
thinks he was at home and t' other thinks he was 
at meeting, and his pa praised him for earning 
the money and gave him some more to encourage 
him!" 

** Bully for you, Will! What are you going 
ter do with the money ?" asked one. 

Willy hesitated about replying to this ques- 
tion. He had hidden the silver away out of sight, 
because it made him so wretched to look at it. 
He had as yet no bad uses for money, and he had 
lain awake at night thinking whether he should 
feel any better if he gave that money away in 
benevolence. 

** Bet a dollar he 's thinkin' of sendin' of it to 
convert the heathen," cried one of the boys. 

Willy had thought of it, but was about to deny 
the charge when Dick saved him the falsehood by 
saying, 

**Safe bettin' dollars when you ha' n't got a 
dollar to bet, nor nobody else one to bet with. 
Will 's keepin' his half a dollar so that he can 
bet; eh. Will?" 

" I '11 bet half of it that I wont send t' other 
half to the heathen," answered Willy. Then the 
boys applauded, and Dick whispered to him. 



SABBATH-BREAKING. 35 

**I'll tell you, Will, what I'd do with it if 
'twas mine. I'd — " 

** No whisperin' ; talk out," cried a great fel- 
low bigger than Dick, pushing himself between 
the speakers, almost overturning Willy. 

Dick at once gave the big boy battle, coming 
off as usual triumphant in the fight Willy won- 
dered what Dick would do with the money if it 
were his. He did not have a chance to ask him 
then, but a few days later Dick told him in ac- 
tions which *' speak louder than words," and 
which will be given to the reader in the next 
chapter. 

Willy was not happy with this set of bad 
boys, but he thought he was still more wretched at 
home, where his concealed wrong-doing was con- 
tinually haunting him. His mother was confined 
to her room by sickness, his sister overwhelmed 
with work, and his father away from home much 
of the time on a business which took him to the 
neighboring seaport. Thus Willy was left much 
to himself at a time when he needed a great deal 
of help. 

His good friend conscience made several hard 
efforts to get a hearing, but Satan was there too 
with his bad advice. He made Willy think it 
would almost kill his poor sick mother to know 
how wicked her dear boy had been, and that his 



36 DICK langdon's career. 

tired, overburdened father had trouble enough 
when he came home, on account of sickness and 
poverty, without his bringing to light his own 
bad conduct So he added the greatest sorrow of 
all to those which his parents were bearing cheer- 
fully, by forsaking the ways of pleasantness and 
peace for those of sin and sorrow. 

Sabbath-breaking is a sin which never is prac- 
tised alone, but brings a host of others in its 
train; and Dick little realised when he acted as 
Satan* s assistant in tempting Willy away from 
Sunday-school and church what grief and shame 
he was bringing to that happy household. 

Willy became much attached to Dick, and 
followed him into evil which was represented to 
him to be good, until he began to lose the keen 
sense of wrong-doing which had attended his first 
acts, and the things which are lovely and of good 
report began to lose for him their charms. 

Willy will appear again in the course of Dick's 
history, but at this point he drops out of it, be- 
cause the family removed to the city, where the 
invalid wife and mother would not be so much 
separated from her husband. 



PRODIGALITY. 37 



CITAPTER V. 

PRODIGALITY. 

Ernest was crossing the bridge one Satur* 
day afternoon. At the same time a gentleman 
mounted upon a fine black horse came rapidly 
upon the bridge from the opposite direction. A 
strong wind was blowing, which very uncere- 
moniously lifted the light straw hat from the 
gentleman's head and wafted it away down 
stream, landing it, however, upon the shore be- 
hind him. Ernest began to run in pursuit of the 
hat, but paused in a moment as Dick, who was 
nearer the hat, being on that side of the bridge, 
called out in cheerful tones, 

** Halloa, mister ! Hold on, and I'll get your 
hat." 

Dick, who seldom failed in anything he un- 
dertook, soon recovered the hat and brought it 
in triumph to the owner, who had reined in his 
high-spirited horse and awaited him upon the 
bridge. Dick seemed in great danger of losing 
a part, at least, of his own palm-leaf hat as he 
came upon the bridge facing the breeze, for the 
brim was so nearly toni off that it only hung to 



38 DICK langdon's career. 

the body of the hat by a few frail shreds; and 
as the gentlemen viewed Dick, with his flashing 
eyes, glowing cheeks, rags, and tatters, he said, 
while his hand sought his pocket, 

** Thank you, my boy! Upon my word, you 
are a fine study for either a painter or a philan- 
thropist!" So saying, he put a silver coin into 
Dick's hand and rode rapidly away. 

** How much has he given you, Dick? How 
much? how much?'' shouted the boys at the 
comer, all running together and crowding round 
their favorite and leader. 

'* A quarter !" cried Dick, showing the money. 
**No, 'ta'n't neither, boys, I declare; it's a half- 
dollar — a whole half-dollar; three cheers for a 
whole half-dollar !" and Dick, wild with delight, 
plucked at his dilapidated hat to aid in giving 
the cheers. Alas ! the two departments of the 
concern, which barely hung together before, now 
parted company entirely, leaving the hat proper 
sticking fast to its owner's curly head, and the 
brim, its broken straws bristling savagely, in 
Dick's excited grasp. 

** Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah I" shouted he, bran- 
dishing the hat-brim high in the air, undaunted 
by peals of laughter from the bystanders. *' Hur- 
rah for a whole half-dollar! Now I'm rich 
enough to treat you all. Come, Ernest, you 



PRODIGALITY. 39 

shall go too, though you did refuse to go with 
us to-day; for you're a good fellow, after all; 
come !'' Ernest, who was quietly walking home 
upon the sidewalk, answered cheerfully, 

'*No, thank you, Dick. A good supper at 
home is the best * treat' Come now, Dick, don't 
waste your precious half-dollar at that store. 
Come down here with me to Nelson's and get 
you a new hat; they have some nice straw hats 
for fifty cents. 

** Hurrah, boys! isn't that a good one?" 
shouted merry Dick, again brandishing the hat- 
brim. *' Just as if my hat was n't a perfect beau- 
ty," taking oflF the hat proper, holding it up to 
be admired, and then putting it back upon his 
head with an emphatic thump upon the top, 
** We '11 have something to eat better than straw 
out of our fifty cents, boys; wont we though?" 

So while Ernest walked quietly home, the 
troop of boys went to the comer store, where 
Dick treated them to candy and nuts; and while 
they were busy eating, he slipped into the back 
store and with the remaining pence bought for 
himself a glass of beer. 

*' Ah !" say some of my bright young readers, 
** intemperance is the subject of this chapter !" 

No, my boys; I did not mean to write about 
that now, but about something that is pretty sure 



40 DICK langdon's career. 

to lead to it; and that is prodigality. Is prodigal- 
ity a word which some of you hardly understand? 
Then I must tell you that it means waste, espe- 
cially the waste of money; and that is a lesson 
which is speedily learned in these street schools. 
Show me a boy who has kept twenty-five cents 
of his own in his pocket a month, reserved for 
some good use, to buy a new book or garment, a 
present for a friend, to send books, bread, or 
clothing to the destitute, or to add to his own 
little fund in the savings-bank, invested to in- 
sure the means of education or a start in busi- 
ness, and he will be a boy who does not attend 
Satan's schools and who is likely to prosper. 
On the other hand, a boy in whose pocket a 
penny burns until it is spent for candy, cake, or 
peanuts is the one whose money is likely soon 
to go for tobacco and strong drink, and who is 
surely on the straight road to poverty, be his fa- 
ther ever so wealthy. 

Shall I tell you about a prodigal I once 
knew? His father was rich and honored; the 
son's prodigality was deemed no unpardonable 
sin. As a boy he made a great show of spending 
lavishly, and, as he falsely called it, generously, 
all the money he could get. He acted, on a 
large scale very much as Dick did with his half- 
dollar. As he grew up he was called by careless 



PRODIGAI.ITY* 4^ 

observers a good-natured, whole-hearted, liberal 
fellow; rather wasteful, to be sure; wild, too, and 
fond of a high time, but likely to sober down into 
a worthy and generous manhood when he had 
**sown his wild oats'' and become settled in life. 
So thought pretty Rose, the refined, cultured, 
and cherished one who consented to become his 
bride. Woe to her that she did not remember 
what a bitter harvest springs from the sowing of 
wild oats ! She died young, of a broken heart, 
and their only son and only daughter were soon 
laid beside her. When, in my schooldays, I went 
botanizing, I used to pause by their family bury- 
ing-place, long since passed into the hands of 
strangers, and sadly read the inscriptions on the 
tasteful marble monuments of the mother and 
children. The husband and father I knew then, 
for he lived in our village, a destitute, vicious, 
and prematurely old man, boarding himself in 
a miserable room over a grocery. The last relic 
of his liberal prodigality was displayed in keep- 
ing a lean old horse, hungry like himself, which 
he always lent, gracefully declining compensa- 
tion, to any of the boys or girls who coaxed him. 
At last the horse died a very natural death, and 
his master seemed in a fair way to follow him. 
Sometimes the man went hungry, sometimes he 
walked into our houses at meal-times, thus silently 



42 Dick langdon's career- 

begging an invitation to eat with the family; 
and sometimes he was fed with the baskets of cold 
provisions which charity often set in the entry 
beside his door. But his constitution was broken 
by vice, and the miserable suflferer was soon car- 
ried to the poorhouse, where he used to console 
himself with the remark, ** The town owes me a 
living; I 've given away enough in my better 
days to support me to a good old age." Had his 
money been wisely given for the public good, 
his consolation might have been well-founded,' 
but alas! there was no one to say, **Your lav- 
ished wealth has blessed me." So at last, after 
lingering years of misery, he died a pauper's 
death, and, how much worse, the death of a 
hardened sinner! His last breath was a curse. 
By suflferance of the owner of the land, they 
made his grave beside the graves of his wife and 
children, but no stone will ever mark it This 
sad story is literally true. Another, as true and 
of the same nature, comes to my mind, which is 
quite as sad, only — . But I will tell you. 

John Hendrick was prodigal, and had a right 
to be, if culture, wealth, social standing, and a long 
line of honored ancestry could make that right 
which is always wrong. Laughably prodigal as 
a boy, he became foolishly prodigal as a man. 
How loftily he left his change upon the counter I 



PRODIGAUTY. 43 

how wantonly sunk his silver dollars in the water, 
skipping them for sport, as others did stones 
upon the surface of the river ! How recklessly 
he bought and sold elegant equipages ! how lav- 
ishly expended in all directions, without a thought 
of incomes ! By-and-by friends warned him that 
even his estate would never bear it. He only 
laughed in derision. Was he not Judge Hend- 
rick's grandson? Were not his estate and repu- 
tation inexhaustible ? But one day he opened his 
eyes to the fact that he had spent his last dollar. 
His wife had property, which he had never 
touched: that went next. By that time the gen- 
erous man was desperate: he must have money to 
waste ! He managed to get his sister's estate into 
his hands, and that also vanished. The wife is 
dead now: the brother and sister live. He has 
repented towards God and man; but even the 
mercy of God cannot avert in this life the natural 
consequences of his sin. A few years ago they 
were supported by an allowance from a distant 
relative. It became insufficient to pay the board 
of both, and the brother, too feeble to. earn any- 
thing, and deeply sensible of the injustice he had 
done his now aged sister, divided to her nearly all 
the allowance, and moving into that same mis- 
erable room over the store, slept upon the floor, 
and ate oftentimes the bread of charity. 



44 MCK langdon's career. 

These true stories are sad: let me tell you a 
cheerful one of two bright little boys whose pa- 
rents were not rich. These boys were generous, 
yet quite the opposite of prodigal. Other children 
with whom they associated wondered how it was 
they always had money of their own in one pocket, 
and ** family money'' in the other: why the contri- 
bution box never passed them unheeded, and they 
were always prepared to do the handsome thing. 
They made purchases for their father's family, 
taking money from the common purse and re- 
turning the balance uncounted except by them- 
selves, because they could be fully trusted not to 
spend the family money as their own. Their own 
money, saved or earned by themselves, they man- 
aged on their own account, buying and giving 
according to their own judgment. Men observ- 
ing that they could be trusted, desired their ser- 
vices where other boys had proved unfaithful, pay- 
ing them liberally because uncounted funds were 
safe in their hands. This was when they were 
lads from ten to seventeen. James, the younger, 
bought his piano with his own money when boys 
and girls of wealthier families were only longing 
for one, and William went directly from the high 
school to college, at seventeen, saying he had 
enough of his own for at least one year, and if 
anything should occur to prevent his parents from 



PRODIGALITY. 45 

giving or lending him the rest for his college 
course, he would stop and earn it. Those boys 
began right. They were taught both the worth 
and the worthlessness of money before they were 
old enough to write the word prodigality; and 
they not only heard, but learned, the lessons 
taught. For an example of the lessons, when they 
received their first half-dimes and dimes they 
were told that money was valueless except for 
what it would get ; that it was good to buy plenty 
of nourishing food — that was what their father 
did with his — but theirs would be worse than lost 
in buying things to eat between meals, when they 
had all they needed at their own home. It would 
be well spent in buying something to eat for any 
one who was hungry. Heeding this lesson, they 
never longed for the dainties which they saw dis- 
played on the streets, and in the stores, never 
seeming to associate them with the idea of a 
good time. They did not feel that they must get 
rid of money just as soon as they had it, but re- 
served it until a real use presented. Each had 
his bank-book early in childhood, becoming an 
intelligent capitalist before he learned his alpha- 
bet. Each learned also to be truly generous, by 
giving wisely of his own money, the value of which 
he realized. 
You all know the sin of "the prodigal son** 



46 Dick i^angdon's career. 

was in part that he ** wasted his substance.'* Be 
careful of your money, boys. Don't hoard it like 
misers, just to have and keep, but save it for a 
good purpose, or use it wisely in some way that 
will do real good to yourselves or others. 

Do not think that my story is wandering too 
far from Dick. He had but fifty cents to waste, 
and I feared you would think that a small matter, 
and fail to learn from it the lesson this chapter 
should teach; so I have stopped to show you how 
it was with those who had fifty thousand dollars, 
instead of fifty cents, with which to be prodigal. 
Now we will return to our hero's history, and 
follow it more closely than heretofore, since by 
this time my readers must be fully aware that it 
is given not simply to entertain, but to warn you 
against his sins, and to inspire you to a noble 
Christian life. 



SMOKING. 47 

CHAPTER VI. 

SMOKING. 

" That Indian weed 
Of which the Devil sow^d the seed." 

We left Dick drinking his glass of beer in 
the back shop. When he set down the tumbler 
without having quite emptied it, one of Satan's 
assistants, who sat there smoking, said, 

''Dick, you didn't drink that as if you half 
enjoyed it. You needed a cigar first to make it 
relish. Here is one for you now, my boy; only 
let me see you use it." 

''Thank you, I don't smoke," said Dick 
doggedly. He hated the very sight and smell, to 
say nothing of the taste, of tobacco; but was 
ashamed to own it there. 

"Never '11 be a man till you do," retorted 
the smoker, proceeding to light the cigar from 
his own; adding, as he once more held it out to 
Dick, 

"Here, now smoke this like a gentleman, 
and begin to be somebody." 

Dick thought the ringleader of all the best 
fellows in school ought "to be somebody;" so 
he put the thing which he actually loathed he* 



48 DICK langdon's career. 

tween his lips, and began to puflf away as much 
like an adept as possible. But although he had 
often tried to prepare himself for this ordeal by 
smoking moss, sweet-fern, catnip, and even a 
little tobacco in his father's pipe, still his stomach 
rebelled; and he found himself so sick and diiszy 
as to compel a hasty retreat to the open air. 
The boys, who were just finishing their peanuts, 
greeted him with a shout. 

•'Halloo, Dick! got a cigar? Give us a 
whifi*, that 's you;" and three or four hands were 
at once outstretched for the cigar. 

Dick surrendered it gladly, and following 
where the rest led, soon found himself seated 
with the boys on some waste boards in the cellar 
of the new church, in the upper part of which 
the carpenters were yet busy. 

**Now we can smoke it all round,'' said 
Dick; *'so those who don't know how may learn; 
and if a fellow happens to be sick there is nobody 
to see or poke fun at him." 

So the cigar went from mouth to mouth, 
while brains grew giddy, eyes dim, and stom- 
achs sick; but I spare you a description of the 
disgusting scene. 

Meanwhile, Ernest was stopped on his way 
home from school as he was passing a poor tene- 
ment OQ a back street, by Dick's mother, wha 



SMOKING. 49 

was holding a fretful child two or three years 
old, and who came to the door, inquiring, 

'* Ernest, have you seen my Dick since 
school?" 

** Yes'm, I have,'' replied Ernest briefly, em- 
barrassed by a doubt as to whether he ought to 
speak of Dick's bad ways to his mother. 

** Where was he?" asked the mother anx- 
iously. 

'*At L 's, the comer store," replied Ei^ 

nest. 

The mother turned a shade paler and sat 
down as if stricken, upon the door-sill; for at 
that shop her husband bought the tobacco and 
rum which made the whole family so miserable. 

'* O Ernest!" she cried in a tone of anguish, 
'* tell me truly what my boy goes there for." 

''Indeed, I hope he does not go for much 
harm," replied Ernest. '*He only went this 
afternoon, to buy a treat for the boys with fifty 
cents which a man gave him for running after 
his hat; and he invited me to go too; but I 
couldn't stop. I saw them eating only candy 
and peanuts as I passed." 

''Baby want candy too; baby want Dick 
come 'ome. Dick p'omised come 'ome; p'om- 
ised bring candy too." Thus the baby spoke foi 
herself; and the mother added* 



50 DICK langdon's career. 

"Yes; Dick promised to come directly from 
school to take care of the baby. She is teething, 
and feverish, and wears me out so; besides that, 
the work is all undone/' And the mother rose 
to go in with an air of utter discouragement and 
exhaustion. 

**P11 run right back and see if I can't find 
Dick," said Ernest. *' And here, baby; I'll give 
you this pretty alley," taking a brightly-colored 
glass ball from his pocket, *' if you will sit on the 
bed and play with it till I come back, and then I 
will bring you a great yellow orange." 

Baby grasped the wonderful ball, and sat con- 
tentedly upon the hard bed; while the mother, 
relieved from the exhausting weight of the child, 
began to speak the thanks which Ernest did not 
stop to hear. His search for Dick was in vain; 
for he never thought of looking in the cellar of 
the church, where you know he was hidden away 
with the cigar. 

Ernest, who was never prodigal of his cents, 
but always kept them for a good use, bought the 
biggest orange he could find for baby, and felt 
repaid tenfold by her delight, as hugging it first 
to her little bosom, and then sucking the refresh- 
ing juice, she went to sleep upon the bed with 
the orange still at her lips. 

Ernest now went home as quickly as possible 



SMOKING. 5X 

and having told his mother all that had passed, 
got her permission to go to Dick's home after 
supper with a present of a basket of nice apples. 
He found Dick's mother in such anxiety about 
her boy, who had not yet returned, that he once 
more set out in pursuit of him. But again his 
search was a fruitless one; for, although he did 
go to the church, he found it fast locked, the 
workmen having all left for the night The fact 
was, when the carpenters had finished their day's 
work, they locked all the doors before leaving, 
and among them the door to the cellar, where 
the boys still were, sick from the effect of the cigar. 
And there they were left all night ! Do you 
suppose the sickness and weariness, the hunger 
and cold of their imprisonment, made Dick and 
his companions think of the evils of tobacco, or 
resolve to forsake its use ? Oh, no ! They only 
thought they were foolish to get locked in. Boys 
who get together by themselves to learn to smoke 
are apt to succeed in spite of diflSculties; and the 
poison which nature at first makes them abhor 
soon becomes to them sweet as '* honey-dew," 
which is one of the names given to tobacco by 
Satan's assistants. It is truly wonderful how 
soon even a little child can learn to like this 
herb, from which every living thing naturallv 
turns with disgust 



52 DICK langdon's career- 

I once knew a little boy, three years old, 
bright, pretty, healthy, altogether as fine a boy 
as heart could wish. I knew him a year later, 
thin, pale, spiritless, fearfully diseased in body 
and mind. 

** What is the matter with little Benny?'' said 
I to his mother. 

'*I don't know," was her reply; "he is get- 
ting all run down, and so dull and stupid he will 
not even play; and I fear we shall lose him." 
And the tears ran down her cheeks as she ca- 
ressed her only child. 

'*I have just found out what ails the boy," 
said the family physician, to whom I soon after 
mentioned the case; **he is dying from the effects 
of tobacco." 

'' But sir, you surely do not mean to say that 
little child uses tobacco?" 

'*I do," he replied. **I was myself aston- 
ished to find that the boys in the street had 
taught him to chew it; and he begs and steals 
it from his grandfather, who smokes, or gets the 
boys to buy it with his own pennies; so that it 
is almost constantly in his mouth, and is ruin- 
ing him utterly in body and mind." 

The physician, not without great patience and 
perseverance, convinced the parents of these facts; 
and the child, entirely deprived of the tobacco. 



SMOKING. 53 

gradually regained his health and mental vigor, 
and in another year had quite recovered. 

Thus little Benny, while they yet called him 
**baby," ran out upon the sidewalk, and get- 
ting into one of Satan's schools learned, as his 
very first lesson there, the use of tobacco — a les- 
son, which, but for God's interposing mercy, 
had been his utter ruin.. 

Yes, the use of tobacco is always one of the 
branches taught in Satan's schools; and those 
who learn this lesson are likely to go on to the 
far more ruinous ones of which you will read in 
following the history of Dick. 



54 DICK LANGDON'S C. TilEER. 

CHAPTER VII- 

GAMBLING. 

Dick and the other boys, who went to the cel^ 
lar under the church to learn to smoke and were 
locked in, were compelled to remain there all night 
I will not attempt to tell you of their suflferings, or 
of the distress of their parents and friends as they 
sought for them in vain; neither can I tell you 
how wretched and ashamed they felt as they crept 
to their homes in the morning, having been re- 
leased by one of the carpenters, who happened to 
go to the unfinished building Sunday morning 
for a forgotten coat, just in time to prevent them 
from committing damage in breaking their way 
out. 

Dick's mother was overjoyed to see her boy, 
and was quite satisfied as to the cause of his ab- 
sence when he told her that he had been acciden- 
tally locked up for the night. As for his father, 
he was sleeping off the effects of the rum drank 
the previous evening, and cared nothing either 
for his son's absence or for his return. 

On Monday morning being told of Ernest's 
kindness to his mother and the baby, Dick ex- 
claimed, *' Yes, Ernest is a bully boy; and I wvsh 



GAMBUNG. 55 

I had taken his advice Saturday and bought me a 
hat with my money: for see here, mother, this is 
all that is left of my palm-leaf." 

The mother smiled faintly at the ludicrous ef- 
fect of the brimless hat, with its border of tangled 
curls; but the smile ended in a groan as she said, 
** And poor mother has not even twenty-five cents 
with which to buy her boy a new one.'* 

** Never mind, mother,'' said Dick cheerfully. 
**I'll earn a new one before school-time; for I 
know where I can get a job at sawing wood. So, 
at noon, you will see me walking home in my 
new hat" 

Hastily finishing his breakfast, he hurried off 
in search of work. 

He went at once to Mr. Brown's, near the 
schoolhouse, where a large lot of wood lay waiting 
to be sawed, split, and piled. Seeing Mr. Brown 
in the garden, Dick accosted him in his usual off- 
hand manner: **Good morning, sir," with a bow, 
and comical flourish of his hand in the direction 
of the hat-crown. ** Want to hire a smart boy to 
saw up that wood?" 

** Well, I don't know," said Mr. Brown, smil- 
ing. **I am getting rather old and stiff to do it 
myself: so may be I will hire you, if you will 
keep steady to your work, and make a good use 
of the money." 



56 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

**Now, see here sir,*' replied Dick, grabbing 
off liis hat, and whirling it round on the tip of 
his fore-finger before Mr. Brown's eyes; ** would it 
not be a good use of my money to buy a new hat 
with it?" 

**Yes," said Mr. Brown, laughing. 

** Well, then," said Dick, '' I will saw with all 
my might till school-time for twenty cents; and 
on my way to school I '11 pay the money towards 
a new hat. 

'^Agreed; there is the saw," said Mr. Brown. 

Dick went to work with a will, and pleased 
his employer so well, that at half-past eight, he 
handed him fifty cents instead of the promised 
twenty, saying that he must start for school early 
in order to buy his hat by the way; and that he 
would give him the whole job of sawing to do, if 
he continued to work so well. 

When school was done, Dick started for home 
in excellent spirit, thinking of his new hat and 
eight cents in his pocket which remained of the 
hat money. For they had shown Dick a little 
favor at the hat-shop that morning, selling him 
a half-dollar straw hat for forty-two cents. But, 
alas ! in going home, he must pass the school of 
evil at the comer, and he was there stopped by 
some of his companions who were playing marbles 
on the sidewalk. 



GAMBLING. 57 

'* We play for keeps T' cried one of the boys.: 
**I'll lend you some marbles to begin with, Ettck;: 
and you'll win *em back, and a bagfull for yourself 
besides in a jiffy, I Ul bet, because you always do 
beat, you know, whether it *s one thing or another. * ' 

Dick accepted the offer; but he lost instead of 
winning, and soon spent three of his cents for 
marbles, to repay those borrowed and to commence 
another game. This time he won and in half an 
hour went home with his stock of marbles more 
than doubled. His first impulse was to tell his 
mother all about the extra money he had earned; 
but then he thought how nice it would be to have 
money of which she did not know, to buy marbles 
with, in case he lost his in play; so he decided to 
deceive her, and let her think that all the money 
he had earned had been spent for the hat. So, 
when she kissed his cheek and called him ** mo- 
ther's bright, brave boy, mother's hope and com- 
fort," his heart, instead of leaping for joy, sank 
with shame and misery. 

Dick had intended to saw wood a while after 
school at night ; but he excused himself on the 
plea of fatigue and went to play marbles at the 
comer instead. Just as he was finishing a game 
in which he was the winner, the man who had 
given him thie cigar came out of the store, and 
touching him on the shoulder, beckoned him into 



58 DICK langdon's career. 

a little back room, where three lads, somewhat 
older than Dick, were seated around a table, with 
cards in their hands. 

"These boys,'' said the man, ** want to know 
how to play something better than marbles, and I 
am going to teach them to play cards. I will tell 
you all about the game, and then I will sit here 
and see who remembers and plays best. Each 
one is to stake a dime, and he who wins the game 
has the whole. What say, Dick ? Will you do it ?' ' 

Poor Dick, proud to have been the one chosen 
for the game, proud of having the requisite money 
and proudly confident too, of ability to win the 
game, sat down and learned his first lesson in gam- 
bling. First lesson? Ah, no! that was learned 
when he first played to win marbles. Yes, Satan's 
teaching in this branch often begins with that 
easy lesson. 

Dick won the game at cards and with it all 
the dimes, which amounted, you know, to forty 
cents,and then, as one of the players was obliged 
to leave, he also went home. But his gains only 
made him unhappy; he well knew that they did 
not rightly belong to him; yet he burned with 
eager desire to win more in the same way. 

Thus Dick proved, in his own sad experience, 
that gambling is one of the branches taught in 
Satan's schools. 



FIGHTING. 59 



CHAPTER VIII. 

FIGHTING. 

" He that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city." 

Satan's assistants, in the shape of the older 
boys, delight in setting the smaller ones upon 
each other, like dogs or untamed beasts; and very 
many come to think that a fight is noble, and to 
shun it is weak and cowardly. Many a truly- 
courageous boy who, grown to manhood, cheer- 
fully risked or gave his life for our country's sal- 
vation, found in boyhood his moral courage taxed 
to the utmost in resisting the well-nigh over- 
whelming influence to engage in these petty and 
ceaseless brawls. 

Ernest, who was as brave as he was good, had 
never suffered himself to be drawn into a single 
fight; but sometimes he had to come home from 
school crying out, 

^*Oh, mother! I have had such a fight with 
myself to keep from fighting when the boys dared 
me to do it!" 

Then his mother would tell him how it is ever 
the weak and ignorant who are most ready to fly 
like savages into a contest, and how slow to do it 



6o DICK langdon's career. 

are the truly noble and refined. She would tell 
him a true story of a great and brave man who 
faced the world's scorn by refusing to fight a duel; 
and of another who, not having the moral courage 
to face that scorn, slew the bosom friend who had 
challenged him, and then longed, in vain remorse 
to lie down in the grave with him whom his own 
hand had slain. 

When we left Dick, he had just taken his first 
lesson in card-playing. Gambling and fighting 
ever go hand in hand. Ask, if you doubt it, any 
city policeman concerning the nightly brawls in 
the gaming-saloons. Dick, although one of the 
best-natured of boys, had been taking street- 
lessons in fighting from his infancy, and made 
it a point of honor to pitch battle with every 
bully who dared him to the contest When, 
therefore, Ernest one evening met a group of 
young men bearing Dick home, apparently life- 
less, he was not surprised to hear that he had 
been fighting with a grown-up boy, and had 
got a blow in the temple which had *' settled 
him.'' 

* ' Go ahead, Ernest, will you, and let his mo- 
ther know before we come upon her?" added one 
of the bearers. 

They were already almost at the door, and 
Ernest, hastening forward, stood almost breath- 



FIGHTING. 6l 

less before the mother, quite at his wits' end as to 
how he should break the sad news. 

** Do you know where Dick is?" was her first 
eager inquiry. 

** He is on his way home, but is hurt One 
of the big boys has hit him and made him faint, 
or something of the kind, and they are bringing 
him in,'' stammered Ernest, driven to make his 
message brief by the sound of feet already at the 
door. 

Dick's mother neither fainted nor screamed as 
she looked on the death-white face of her boy; 
she was too familiar with anguish for that. She 
motioned them to lay him upon the bed, and, 
kneeling beside him, searched in silence for any 
signs of life. 

*^He is not dead!" said she, turning quickly 
to Ernest. '*0h, if we could but have a doctor 
at once!" 

'*I will run for ours," cried Ernest, as he al- 
most flew to call him. 

It was not far, and the doctor, himself benev- 
olent, was not slow in catching something of 
Ernest's ardor and in hastening to the suflferer. 
Under his judicious care Dick soon began to 
breathe and to move; but his mind was bewil- 
dered, and the words he spoke wild and unmean- 
ing 



62 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

A youtH, perhaps sixteen years old, had ling- 
ered when the doctor had ordered the room 
cleared; but his presence evidently excited Dick, 
and the physician again motioned him away. 
The lad beckoned Ernest to the door and groaned 
aloud as he cried, 

'*It was I who struck that blow. I quarrelled 
with him about the deal of the cards and dared 
him to fight; and then in a rage because he, so 
much younger than I, was getting the better of 
me, I struck him that blow on the head. Oh, if 
he dies or is made foolish by it I will kill myself! 
I will never live to see it !'' 

Ernest was silent, not knowing what to re- 
ply. 

*'I shall stay here," said the lad, throwing 
himself down on the steps; *' I will not leave the 
door till I know the worst '* 

Ernest went in. Dick became more quiet and 
inclined to sleep. 

''Some one must sit by him all night," said 
the doctor, ''to keep the bandages about his head 
wet with ice-water and to give these medicines 
hourly. If we can prevent a congestion of blood 
in the head all will be well." 

Finding that Ernest's presence seemed to pro- 
mote the mental quiet so essential to his patient, 
the doctor consented to his getting leave from hij 



FIGHTING. 63 

parents to share the night's watch with Dick's 
mother. Dick slept a good deal, and Ernest stole 
out several times to find the lad still upon the 
steps, waiting and listening. At last, hoping 
something from the quiet within, he went home, 
bearing with him his fear and remorse. 

Past midnight Dick's father came home 
drunk; too drunk, fortunately, to quarrel; too 
drunk for anything but to tumble down upon a 
pallet which his wife had spread for him and 
there grunt and sleep like the brute into which 
rum had converted him. 

*' Oh, mother," said Ernest when he appeared 
at home the next morning, '*Dick is better: he 
knows us now, and the doctor says the danger is 
over. The young man who struck him came 
there at daybreak, and he cried and sobbed like a 
babe, and said he would never dare another boy to 
fight while he lived. But only think, even now 
Dick tells his mother he will fight just as quick 
another time for all this: he 'wont be made a 
coward by anybody's knockdowns!' Isn't it 
dreadful!" 

'*It is, indeed, my son; but Dick was taught 
at the street comers when a very little boy to 
think it smart and brave to fight, and lessons 
thus learned are not easily unlearned." 



64 DICK LANGDON'S CAREKiU 



CHAPTER IX. 

STEAI.ING. 

Another evil lesson which Dick was early 
taught in Satan's schools was stealing. Does 
my youthful reader say, 

" I did not think Dick would steal. He might 
smoke, gamble, fight, and waste the little he had 
honestly earned, but I thought he was too large- 
hearted to commit such a contemptible sin as 
stealing '7 

Ah, but Satan's teachers make the first lessons 
in every vice easy and attractive; and one of these 
first instructed Dick, when very young, in the art 
of slyly and adroitly appropriating to himself an 
apple, a handful of nuts, or anything else displayed 
at the store. It seemed to him and to some others 
only amusing to see a child possess himself of 
these things, under the very eyes of their owner, 
so slyly and deftly as to escape detection; and as 
he was always very free with what he ** hooked," 
the older boys all cheered him on, sharing his 
spoils and calling him *'a cunning rogue," a 
**cute monkey," and other names which he re- 
{[arded as highly complimentary. 



STEAI.ING. 65 

This lesson well learned, it was but a slight 
advance to lighten the overloaded trees, bushes, 
and vines of the farmers* orchards and gardens; 
and Dick's bad teachers, the older boys, instruct- 
ed him as some of the heathen do their children, 
that the sin lies not in stealing, but in being 
found out in it Dick, who was very bright, 
alert, and cunning, was seldom discovered in his 
small thefts, and became an adept in petty lar- 
ceny while he yet passed for an honest boy. 

When Satan finds a boy has thoroughly learned 
the lesson of pilfering in the groceries, candy- 
shops, bakeries, gardens, and orchards, he does 
not think very much about the higher branches 
of the science of stealing, although he knows 
our reform schools, penitentiaries, and State pris- 
ons are full of thieves, robbers, and housebreak- 
ers, who commenced just in this way. He knows 
how many burglars and highwaymen, who in 
other lands have paid the penalty of these crimes 
upon the gallows, have in their dying confessions 
disclosed the fact that it was success in these lit- 
tle beginnings of theft which lured them on to 
their fearful end. 

We have seen that when Dick set out to earn 
anything by hard work he was successful; but it 
seemed so much easier to him one day to slip into 
his pocket a dollar bill which the storekeeper left 

Wak Lucdea't Ommt. C 



66 DICK i^angdon's career. 

carelessly upon the counter, than to make his 
bones ache by earning it at Mr. Brown's wood- 
pile, that he stole the bank-note, and not being 
detected, grew bolder in his thefts, altogether 
neglecting his work, being found instead at the 
card or billiard-table, which kept him always in 
want of money. 

Satan loves to have people in debt, for debt is 
a fruitful source of crime and misery, which are 
his delight; so he gave one of his assistants a hint 
to lend Dick a couple of dollars when he was in 
straits for it, whispering, 

** Just let him be in debt to you, and you can 
bend him to your will, for the borrower is ever 
the lender's slave." 

This boy Robert had also another power over 
Dick, in having seen him steal the one-dollar bill; 
so he thought he could make him do as he pleased 
in a plan which he had formed for getting some 
more money. The plan was for Dick, who was 
skilful in all such arts, to hide himself somewhere 
in the store and get locked in. Then in the night 
he was to rob the money-drawer, let himself out, 
and share the spoils with Robert, who being large 
and strong, was to act as guard and protector on 
the outside; thus, in fact, throwing all the risk of 
detection, and in the eyes of the law, all the 
crime of housebreaking, upon Dick. 



STEAUNG, 67 

Thus the big boys who lead the younger ones 
into sin always leave a door of escape open to 
themselves through which they can run away, 
leaving those whom they have brought into trou- 
ble to bear all the sad consequences. 

Robert, after dunning Dick for what he owed 
him, and threatening to expose his theft if he did 
not pay, until he dreaded the very sight of him, 
after in every possible way working his mind up 
to the highest pitch for money, finally proposed 
his plan and gained Dick's reluctant consent 
to it 

He easily succeeded in secreting himself and 
getting locked in; but when in the stillness of the 
night he found himself alone in the store, his 
heart misgave him; he realized for a moment 
how rapidly he was advancing in the school of 
crime, and would have given anything to have 
waked in his hard bed at home finding it all a 
dreadful dream. 

Alas! it was no dream. He heard Robertas sig- 
nal whistle beneath the back window, and knew 
he was waiting there to share the spoils and would 
betray him in his guilt unless he received the 
money. He lighted a lamp, broke open the 
drawer, took the contents — a few dollars, all in 
change — and joining Robert, shared the money, 
paying him his debt besides. 



68 DICK langdon's career. 

Dick was arrested, tried, and condemned, for 
the crime of housebreaking, and sent to jail alone, 
Robert clearing himself of all share in the guilt 

Boys, beware of the very beginnings of theft 
A child who has learned to take even an apple 
which does not belong to him has entered upon a 
dangerous way. 

One of the very first and easiest lessons taught 
in Satan^s schools is called by his assistants 
*' hooking," which word means nothing less than 
stealing. 



ILEJOICING IN INIQUITY. 69 



CHAPTER X. 

REJOICING IN INIQUITY. 

You may be sure that Satan, who has his 
schools in so many better places, had one in jail 
also, and Dick during his term of attendance 
learned some new lessons of evil, of which I can 
mention but one this time. Everj^body in the 
town where Dick lived, thought that when he got 
out of jail he would come home hanging his head 
in shame, blushing and hiding his face at the 
slightest allusion to his crime. Instead of this, 
the good were grieved and the bad rejoiced to find, 
that during his absence Dick had learned the sad 
lesson of taking pleasure in his evil ways. He 
walked the streets with a proud, defiant air and 
head erect, shaking hands gleefully with his ac- 
quaintances, alluding with a smile or laugh to 
the fact of having made himself famous and taken 
a vacation at the expense of the State. Ernest, 
who feared Dick would be too much broken 
down by his disgrace ever to try to be good again, 
called at once with words of comfort and encour- 
agement for the fallen upon his tongue^s end, but 



70 DICK langdon's career. 

returned without uttering one of them, quite 
shocked into silence by the change in Dick. 

** Mother," cried he on reaching home, ** I did 
not say one of the kind things I meant to to Dick, 
because, instead of feeling sorry and ashamed, he 
is proud and boastful of his sin and its punish- 
ment. How can he feel so!" And Ernest's 
mother replied, 

" Paul says of certain people in the old city of 
Philippi, whose end was destruction, that their 
glory was in their shame; and the same fate is 
predicted of those Thessalonians who had pleas- 
ure in unrighteousness." 

''Dick did not feel so before he went away," 
replied Ernest. ''When I went to see him, after 
his trial, he could not hold his head up, and cried 
and wondered I would give my hand to a crimi- 
nal; and when I tried to encourage him, he only 
said, ' Never, never ! after being in jail I can 
never look honest people in the face again. * Now 
he says, *Em, you'll never come to anything in 
your humdrum way of living; 'tis enough sight 
better to do something worth while and let folks 
see you 're up to snuff and do n't care for all the 
judges, juries, and jails Uncle Sam can muster.' " 

"This lesson of boasting himself in evil, 
which Dick seems to have learned in prison, is a 
long step in the downward road, my son. In the 



REJOICING IN INIQUITY. 71 

intercourse which he doubtless had, by stealth if 
not by permission, with the wicked immates, he 
was taught by those who * sleep not except they 
have done mischief, and their sleep is taken away 
unless they cause some to fall. ' Nothing tends 
more rapidly to this fall than the recounting of 
their own evil deeds for the very purpose of glory- 
ing in them, to which such are always addicted.'' 

Now, I trust none of the boys who read this 
book will ever have a chance to learn the lesson 
of rejoicing in iniquity in such 3, place as Dick 
did; but I would assure you that you may be 
tempted to this great sin without going in the 
least out of your way to learn it. To show you 
this, I will tell you the truth about a boy in one 
of ,*the Boston public schools. A dear friend of 
mine, going to board with this boy's mother, in- 
quired of her respecting his progress at school. 
She answered, 

*' Harry has always done first-rate until this 
term, bringing home excellent reports, and mourn- 
ing over every bad mark; but now he seems to 
have lost all his ambition, only laughing at his 
errors and failures, and indeed, seeming to delight 
in them. What can it mean?" 

'* Perhaps it means that some bad boys are 
making him think that black marks are an hon- 
or." 



yz DICK langdon's career. 

The mother could hardly credit this; but, not 
many weeks after, my friend learned that it was 
truly so. It was a rule that all who were in their 
seats five minutes before the doors closed should 
receive two credits. As Harry's cousin Albert 
was hastening in one morning, he called out to 
Harry, whom he saw loitering about. 

** Come, Harry, hurry up and you can get two 
credits this morning to ofiFset some of those bad 
marks yesterday." 

**I don't want 'em oflFset," replied Harry. 
"I got the black marks on purpose, and mean to 
get all I can to-day: for Ned and John and Jem 
and I are going to see which can get the most 
this week; and the one who does is the best fel- 
low. See if I do n't manage to get the most !" 

He easily managed it, to his mother's bitter 
grief, and the joy of Satan's assistants — Ned, John, 
and Jem. 

Thus Harry, who, the previous terms of that 
year, had won diplomas for good deportment and 
recitations, and had been his teacher's pride and 
praise and his mother's hope and joy, was now 
learning in this school of Satan to glory in his 
shame, and to have pleasure in unrighteousness. 
Boys, beware of this lesson I 



DRUNKENNESS, 73 



CHAPTER XI. 

DRUNKENNESS. 

You already know that Dick's father was a 
drunkard. When he was married, he was a fine, 
healthy, industrious, prosperous man; and his 
bright young wife little thought of the wretched 
years which were in store for her. Now, her 
husband had used the fiery poison of alchohol so 
long, that his naturally superior mental faculties 
were ruined, and his physical powers were all 
prostrated. I will not say he had become a brute: 
that, my dear boy, would be a libel upon your 
noble horse, your gentle cow, your faithful dog, 
your graceful kitten, who are all as God made 
them to be. Dick's father, by drunkenness had 
fallen far below the brute; being only a curse to 
those who had once loved him, and whom he 
once had loved. 

It was certainly dreadful to have him live; 
but ah ! it was far more dreadful to have him die 
without a ray of light upon his future, as he did 
soon after Dick's trial for house-breaking. I 
have only space to tell you that he got a hurt in 
one of his drunken quarrels, from which a healthy 
man would readily have recovered; but inflamed 



74 i^iCK langdon's career. 

as his whole system was with alcoholic poisoiii 
it brought on a fever, which speedily ended his 
days. His wife wept bitterly over his coflSn, 
remembering all the love of those earlier years, 
and all the blighted hopes, the anguish, and heart- 
break which had come with the intoxicating 
cup. Dick, melted into tenderness by grief, 
strove to comfort her; and turning to him she 
answered, 

** Ah, Dick ! there is one drop of comfort, only 
one, in my bitter cup. You know what might 
have been but for rum; you know what it has 
done for him and for us, and you never can, never 
will, taste it. Promise me, promise me, Dick." 
Dick promised; he was ready to say anything to 
pacify his mother; but, alas! his promise was 
worthless; for, among all his other lessons in evil, 
he had not failed to learn the lesson of untruth- 
fulness. 

Still Dick meant to keep his word, for he 
could not be indiflFerent to the bitter lesson of his 
father's hard, cruel life and fearful death. In 
view of that life he had early learned to loathe 
the very thought of the cup; and the teachers of 
Satan's schools had found him one of their most 
obstinate scholars in learning the lesson of intem- 
perance, for between him and that cup stood his 
father's disfigured form, his hand of insane fury. 



DRUNKENNESS. 75 

But Satan at last triumphed in spite of all, as he 
ever will over those who put themselves under 
his teaching. Dick could not smoke, gamble, 
cheat, swear, and have pleasure in those who did 
such things without at last yielding to the influ- 
ences around him by drinking too. Thus when 
he made his promise to his mother over his fa- 
ther's coflSn he knew, what she did not, that he 
had often already drank strong ale and wine, and 
sometimes even whiskey and rum. 

For two or three evenings after the funeral 
Dick stayed at home with his mother, and while 
baby Etta slept they formed plans for the future, 
the poor desolate heart beginning to build hope 
for itself upon the ruins of the past, all founded 
and centred in the fond assurance that the son 
could never be, as the father had been, a drunk- 
ard. Dick thought it dull work to stay at home 
through those long evenings; for when a lad has 
learned to spend the early hours of the night 
abroad with bad associates, the charms of home 
and a loving mother's presence have lost their 
power; so after a few evenings of unwelcome re- 
straint Dick found his way once more to his old 
haunts. Hours went by, and the patient mother, 
busy in repairing a suit of clothes for her boy, 
excused his absence, thinking no evil, until it 
grew very late; then, although worried and dis- 



76 DICK langdon's career. 

tressed, she still comforted herself with the 
thought, ** Whatever else he does, he never 
drinks, and while he does not, there is hope for 
him." 

Past midnight she heard an approaching step 
which she knew was not her son's, and her trem- 
bling hand admitted the bearer of evil tidings. 

**Dick wanted me to come and tell you he 
wont be home to-night; but he 's well enough off, 
he says; you need n't worry." 

What mother would rest with such a message? 
Cross-questioning elicited the fact: that Dick 
was in forced confinement, having been taken up 
for inflicting a serious wound upon one of his 
companions in a drunken street-brawl, in which 
he had also been slightly wounded. He was to 
be tried the next day for his offence. Furnishing 
herself with bandages for his wound, the mother 
left her sleeping Etta alone, hastening to gain 
admittance to her erring boy. One thought of 
comfort she hugged to her aching heart by the 
way: 

** He was not, cannot have been drunk, for he 
never drinks. It is only this terrible fighting no- 
tion he has got, of which I hope some of these 
hard knocks will yet cure him." 

She entered the temporary prison and ap- 
proached the prostrate form, trembling with fear 



DRUNKENNESS. 77 

for his wound as she saw him lie with blood upon 
his face, hands, and garments. 

"Never fear for that, ma'am," said the kind 
attendant; **he has only a little cut under the 
edge of his hair; it is of slight account" 

But the mother stood with clenched hands and 
a fixed gaze of agony viewing that face. It was 
not the wound; but the truth was horror to her 
soul — ^her boy was drunk ! 

Without a word, without relaxing a muscle 
from that fearful look, she turned to go. The at- 
tendant, frightened to see her face, spoke again: 

" He will come round all right in the morn- 
ing; it is only a little too much whiskey." 

* * Never, never I' ' groaned the mother. * * Was 
it ever all right with his father in the morning? 
Is the drunkard's grave, just filled over yonder, 
all right?" 

She closed the door and went out alone through 
the darkness to her d^olate home. She found the 
little one awake, crying for ** ma " and ** Dit " by 
turns. The poor mother sat down, hugging the 
child to her breaking heart 

**Where's Dit?" questioned Etta. 

"Where, where?" sobbed the mother, for the 
first time finding relief in tears. " Oh, why did I 
not rule him while I could ? Why did I indulge 
him so foolishly and let him go to the places where 



yS DICK langdon's career. 

Satan teaches all evil, even to the little children ? 
O baby ! God help me to keep you as I did not 
himl" 

The next day Dick had his trial and was sent 
away to the Reform School. 

Bad as he had become, he had by no means 
got to the end of the lessons which are taught by 
those who love darkness better than light There 
were yet more fearful sins, such as licentiousness, 
perjury, burglary, murder, suicide, which lay in 
the road he was travelling. Glad indeed am I 
that the facts of Dick's future history are such as 
to permit me at this point to follow him out oi 
Satan's schools. 



PART II, 

CHRIST'S SCHOOLSc 



THE YOUNG TEACHER. 8l 



CHAPTER I. 

THE YOUNG TEACHER. 

The Reform school, as Dick found it, was 
scarcely a favorable place for reform. The boys 
composing it, each sent there for some sin, had all 
been pupils in Satan's schools, and their wily de- 
ceiver was not likely to let any one escape him 
there for lack of teaching. In the schoolrooms, 
the sleeping -rooms, the working -grounds, the 
playgrounds, everywhere, Satan in the Reform 
School had still his schools, instructed by faithful 
assistants, ready and proud to follow the sugges- 
tions of their principal. 

At the very threshold Dick was met by the 
teachers of these schools of vice and heartily wel- 
comed to the lessons and counsels of those far 
worse than himself; and he would have gone on- 
ward with swift feet down the broad and even 
descending way to those gates of death which 
open into Satan's kingdom of eternal despair, had 
he not found also within those walls one of Christ's 
schools. 

You will perhaps think I mean that the insti- 
tution was a school of Christian influence, or if 

Dick Lancdon's Ommt. ^ 



82 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

not so altogether, that Dick found himself there 
compelled to attend a Sabbath-school whose faith- 
ful teachers, inspired, like the dear teachers in 
yours, with a Christ-like love of souls, strove with 
earnest prayer and eflFort to win him to the service 
of their adored Redeemer. But I am sorry to say, 
that whatever of such purely Christian influence 
the Dicks of this hour may find in the reform 
schools, it was absent from that to which our Dick 
was sent. The reform of the pupils was doubt- 
less sought by all the teachers, and plenty of good 
moral instruction was dealt out to them; but that 
is not what I mean by a school of Christ. The 
motto over the entrance of all Christ's schools is, 
** Except a man be bom again, he cannot see the 
kingdom of God." There are a great many 
schools in our land called "good" and * 'excel- 
lent" which raise a very different motto. 

Very many times had Dick been urged to re- 
form, very many times had he resolved to do so ; 
just so many times had all his good resolutions 
been swept to the winds by the first breath of Sa- 
tan's temptations. Even his mother's instructions, 
which centered not in the cross, had availed no 
more than a spider's web across that downward 
road. If, then, even a mother's good and fond, 
but Christless counsels prevail not, what could 
avail the best efforts of Christless strangers I 



THE YOUNG TEACHER. 83 

Blessed was it for Dick, that Christ had in the 
reform school one little temple consecrated to him- 
self alone, though that temple was only the peni- 
tent, trusting heart of one of the smallest boys 
there. This boy, named William, had indeed, like 
Dick, been sent there for the commission of sins 
learned in Satan's schools; but, unlike Dick, he 
bore there the memory and the instruction of a 
mother who had early taught him to lisp the name 
of Jesus and besought him with her dying breath 
to walk in his way, commending her orphan boy 
with faith which grasped the eternal promise, into 
his keeping who is the Father of the fatherless; 
and although, for a time it did seem as if God, 
forgetful of his promise, was sufiFering Willy to 
fall into Satan's hands, he did not suffer it, but 
sought him out of the reform school, by that un- 
seen Spirit which can enter the blackest prison 
walls, and the blackest heart, with converting and 
cleansing power. 

Has my reader already thought of the Willy, 
who dropped out of our sight just as Dick and his 
associates were luring him into evil ways? and 
are you asking if this Willy can be he ? 

Yes, he is the very same. If you are surprised 
to find him in the reform school, you can't be half 
so much so as Dick was when he saw him there 
the first morning after his arrival. He was not 



84 DICK i^angdon's carekil 

only astonished but moved by the sight He had 
always liked Willy, and he was too frank and 
honest by nature not to admit to himself at once 
that it was due to his own evil influence that good 
little Willy got turned from right to wrong ways. 
Now they were both in a prison, and the younger 
and better boy had got there first. Dick tried 
to harden his heart and not care, but really he 
was touched, grieved, almost softened by the sad 
fact. 

He thought Willy must hate the very sight of 
him, and when the boys were allowed to go into 
the yard for a recess, under charge of monitors, 
he was careful not to go near him, and when he 
saw Willy coming over to him he dreaded the 
reproaches which he felt sure Willy would utter; 
seating himself on a bench in a corner he turned 
his head away pretending not to see him. But 
Willy came to his side and putting his hand 
gently on Dick's shoulder said, 

** We 're in trouble together, Dick. We '11 be 
friends and try and help each other, wont we?" 

*'Why Will," cried Dick, **I should think 
you 'd hate me! Did n't I start you on your way 
here?" 

* * My own wrong-doing started me, ' ' said Willy. 
'* I 'm trying to do right now." 

** That's more than I can say for myself, so 



THE YOUNG TEACHER. 85 

don't follow me any more. I never wished you 
evil, Will. I liked you. If you'r trying to be 
good here, I don't want to hinder you; so just 
you let me alone and I will you. We can't be 
friends." 

* * Do n' t say so, Dick. We are friends. Le t ' s 
try and help each other." 

** I tell you. Will, I don't want to do you any 
more hurt; and I'm sure to if you don't let me 
alone. I'll take your part though if any of the 
big boys plague you and you need anybody to 
fight your battles. ' ' 

** Fighting isn't allowed here, Dick; but I 
know you mean to be kind to me, and I thank 
you. I have n't a friend here, nor a friend in the 
world. I 'm not going to let you alone, nor let 
you do me any hurt So now, Dick, don't you 
try to shake me off any more." 

*'Well, I wont then. Tell me how such a 
good boy as you ever got here so soon." 

" If I tell you now, I must make a short story 
of it, Dick; and I don't think I could bear to 
make it long. 

**You know we moved to the city so as to 
have father near us. He was a pilot, and could 
be with my poor sick mother oftener there. But 
she grew worse and only lived a few weeks. 
Sometimes I was glad she died without ever 



86 DiciC langdon's career. 

knowing how bad I had grown, and sometimes 
I would have given all the world for a chance to 
confess the truth to her. It wasn't but a few 
weeks after she died that sister Martha and I 
were both taken sick the same day with measles. 
We were poor, and father was not at home; and 
sister took cold trying to keep about to take care 
of me, and she died and I lived. It seemed dread- 
ful to me at first; but now I 'm glad she was the 
one to go, because she loved the Saviour and went 
right to heaven to be with him and with mother, 
which I couldn't possibly have done then. 

** After I got better I was so lonesome and 
miserable that I went into the streets for com- 
pany and got with a set of very bad boys and fell 
into their ways, managing to keep it from father, 
who was away so much. 

** One day a policeman brought me word that 
father was drowned. I never saw even his dead 
face. There was some accident on a boat, and 
he went overboard at sea and was never found. 
Soon I was ragged and hungry, destitute and des- 
perate. Instead of leaving the bad fellows and 
trying to earn bread honestly, I let them lead me 
and make a tool of me to do their riskiest work. 
So I was engaged with them in a robbery and got 
sent here. I'm better oflF now, Dick. I ' ve found 
the best pf friends." 



THE YOUNG TEACHER. 87 

** Only just now you said you had n't a friend 
in the world!" 

''I'm always forgetting that Jesus is in the 
world, though we can't see him. He is the friend 
I found, or, rather, he 's found me. Oh, Dick — " 

Dick wondered what Willy would have said if 
the bell had not rung for the boys to be silent and 
form in line to go back to their places. What 
could it be that, even amid such a tale of sorrows 
and in such a place, made Willy's cheeks glow 
and his eyes, just before full of tears, beam with 
eager delight? 

Satan, who always trembles at the name of 
Christ, began to be anxious lest he should lose 
his eflScient assistant Dick, and he whispered in 
his ears, 

''Oh, it's only a little religious nonsense Will 
has picked up with his thinking about his mo- 
ther and the rest of his dead folks. You '11 soon 
help him shake it off." 

"Will I?" thought Dick, who supposed Sa- 
tan's whisper to be his own thought; " will I, or 
wont I? Haven't I done that dear little fellow 
mischief enough yet ? I wont, Dick Langdon, so 
there ! I wont try to make him think religion is 
only folly. I '11 let him love a doll-baby if it 
will comfort him !" 

So Satan, thus answered, skulked away, and 



88 DICK t^ANGDON'S CAREEIU 

although, as you will soon see, Dick did not keep 
his promise as fully as he intended, still the 
thought did him good. The first step in his up- 
ward career was a sincere desire not to lead Willy 
into any more evil. The first blow he gave Sa- 
tan was a decided refusal to act the part of a 
tempter. 

Thus we find Willy possessing the *'new 
heart," which Jesus says every one must have- 
who would serve him here or live with him in 
heaven. You will, perhaps, say, **What has 
this to do with Christ's schools?" Just this, that 
Willy, having first become Christ's scholar, learn- 
ing at his feet those lessons of penitence and trust 
which made him **a new creature," became also 
one of Christ's teachers, striving to impart these 
same precious lessons to others. This was Christ's 
school in which Dick was to learn his first lesson 
of availing good. Do you think it must have 
been very hard for Willy to teach Christ's les- 
sons? Perhaps you will not think so when you 
learn in what a childlike, easy way he first spoke 
a direct lesson of good to Dick. 

**Dick, have you any mother?" asked Willy, 
coming to Dick's side as he sat lonely and sad a 
few days after his arrival. 

**Yes," said Dick shortly; for the thought of 
his mother cut his heart 



THE YOUNa TEACHER. 89 

**0 Dickl I am glad you have a mother. 
My mother is in heaven. I can never see her, 
write to her, speak to her again, until I go to her 
there." 

** Unlucky for you, if you want to see her, that 
she has gone to that nice place," answered Dick 
recklessly, **for, by all accounts, the gates are all 
fast locked to such sinners as you and I are." 

**But, Dick, Jesus opens the gate to every sin- 
ner that knocks; it says so here in his own words: 
* Every one that asketh receiveth; and he that 
seeketh findeth; to him that knocketh it shall be 
opened.' " 

* * What ! the gate of heaven ? I do n' t believe 
it says a word about a gate; let's see." 

Dick meant to puzzle and tease Willy into 
silence, and Satan thought it a fine time to make 
Dick break all his good resolutions, about not 
disturbing Willy's faith in religion. But Willy's 
faith was founded on a Rock against which Satan 
is always bruising himself 

** Now, Dick, you are older than I, and bright- 
er, too," answered Willy pleasantly; **and you 
know, or may know if you will read it, that it 
means just as I say. Not that there is any real 
gate, as we know of," 

**Or any real Jesus, as we know of," inter- 
rupted Dick; thus revealing to Willy the terrible 



go DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

fact that skepticism was one of the lessons which 
he had learned in Satan's schools. 

**0 Dick!'' cried Willy, his eyes filling with 
tears, **I am so sorry, so sorry you don't know 
there is a Jesus." 

**How do you know there is? I'd like to 
know that." 

**Why, I never doubted it, even when I hated 
to hear of him, because my mother loved him so. 
She could never have loved any one so, that — that 
wasn't real; and now, O Dick, I love him my- 
self, and I know for myself. Did you ever read 
the life of Jesus here in the Testament?" 

*'Well — n-o, not much of it; but then" — 

**If you would only read this book — my Tes- 
tament ! Will you if I lend it to you ? I can 
borrow another. ' ' 

**Well, yes, I will read it; for when I tell a 
fellow I don't believe in a man, I don't like to 
be obliged to answer, *no,' when he turns round 
cool as a cucumber, and says, 'Did you ever read 
his life?' Pretty cute that, for a little boy not 
so bright as myself; eh, Willy !" 

Willy, though no fool, was not bright enough 
to see in what he had been **cute;" neither did 
he know, in putting that blessed book into Dick's 
hands, what a faithful teacher he had proved him- 
self in Christ's schools. 



REPENTANCE. 91 

CHAPTER II. 

REPENTANCE. 

Dick kept his promise to read the life of Christ 
in the little Testament which Willy sent him. 

He did not read it because he had promised to 
do so, or because he thought it a duty. He 
liked to read any interesting book, and thought, 
with truth, that it was a shame for a boy of his 
years to be obliged to say **No," when asked 
whether he had ever read the life of Christ. So 
he began to read and was deeply interested. It 
was all new to him. He had not heard it at 
home daily, or been taught it weekly from the 
pulpit and in the Sabbath-school, like yourselves. 
If he had ever heard that Jesus died for sinners, 
the words hardly had for him a meaning. But 
by the time he had read the gospels through, that 
greatest of all facts, the death of Jesus on Calva- 
ry, had sunk down, not only into his mind, but 
into his heart also; for Willy was asking Jesus to 
come to Dick's heart as he read the Testament; 
and He did come. Don't you think it strange, 
that after Willy had been asking his heavenly 
Father very earnestly to make Dick interested 



93 DICK LANGJ>0N'S CAREER. 

about Jesus and his cross, he was astonished to 
have Dick walk up to him one morning and 
say, **I am interested?" It is strange, boys, that 
he was not expecting it. But I will tell you a 
little sad secret of my own: I do just so strangely 
myself. When I ask my dear, kind father here, 
to give me anything he has promised, I expect 
it; but when I ask my dearer, kinder, heavenly 
Father, I am surprised that he keeps his word. 
I know it grieves him that I do not trust him. 
But I must not talk of this, but of Dick, who 
walked up to Willy and said, 

**I am interested in your Testament; what 
say to having a talk about it?" 

*'I am so glad!" Willy said aloud, while in 
his heart he whispered, '*Dear Heavenly Father, 
I thank you; forgive my doubting." 

**You say you're glad to talk, and then sit 
mum as" — 

'*DonH you know folks can't talk so well 
when they are very glad or very sorry? and it 
makes me both to think of Jesus." 

** How's that?" 

** Can't you begin to think, Dick?" 

**I just begin to think I ought to be sorry." 

**Do you? O Dick, I am glad!" Willy, 
being again astonished, again whispered a little 
Drayer in his heart; and Dick said. 



REPENTANCE. 93 

"You 're glad if I 'm sorry?' 

"Yes, if you 're sorry the right way,'* 

"What way is that?' 

" Wheu you were sent to jail, that time you 
told me about, wasn't you sorry for what you 
did just because it sent you there?" 

"Yes, I was." 

" But that kind of being sorry did n't do any 
good, for as soon as you got out you went right 
on doing just as bad or worse things. Everybody 
is sorry for his sins that way; but there is another 
way Jesus wants us to be sorry before he can for- 
give us." 

" Yes, like that man who said, * God be mer- 
ciful to me a sinner;' or like Peter, who ' went out 
and wept bitterly' when Jesus looked at him." 

"Yes, Dick. The first time that I think I 
ever felt sorry the right way, I kept saying over 
and over in my mind this verse, which I had 
heard my mother sing very softly to herself as she 
went about her work: 

" * Was it for crimes that / had done 

He groaned upon the tree ? 

Amazing pity, grace unknown. 

And love beyond degree !* " 

"*The tree' means the cross; don't it, Wil- 
ly? It was strange he shonld do it for anybody; 
but for me — not for me; you would n't pretend to 



94 i>iCK i^angdon's career. 

say he groaned and bled there for such a bad fel- 
low as poor Dick ?" 

** Yes, for every one of us, and most of all for 
the worst: 

" * Not the righteous—sinners 
Jesus came to call.' 

My mother used to sing that too." 

*'I wish this Jesus was in the world now, 
Willy. I would make bold to ask him if he 
thought it worth his while to forgive such a bad 
fellow as Dick and try to make anything of him. 
But he is n't here, and I don't know what to do." 
Dick tried hard to keep a tear from falling as he 
spoke. 

** But he is here, Dick. I pray to him every 
day, and he hears me. When I felt as you do, I 
asked him to forgive me, and he did. Come in 
here and let us kneel down and say just what we 
would if we could see Jesus." 

Dick hesitated. The proceeding seemed to 
him a bold stroke; it was going farther than he 
intended. But Willy kept praying for him in his 
heart, ** Jesus, please make him come to you. 
Oh, do, do !" And then he knelt down, holding 
and pulling Dick by the hand; and so he knelt 
down too; and when Willy had first prayed, Dick 
said, half choking with the eflfort, 

** lyord Jesus, you know just what a bad boy I 



REPENTANCE. C^ 

am. Do make me sorry the right way; and if 
you can forgive me and make me good, please do. 
Amen." 

** Don't put in any ifs," said Willy. *'Do 
you think, after Jesus has died to forgive us, he 
wont or can't, if we will only let him ?" 

Dick shook his head doubtfully and sadly, 
saying, 

**I am so bad, Willy; you 've no idea ! There 
is the belli We must go with the other boys 
now; I hate to." 

**Are you going to do right to-day, Dick? 
If you are sorry the right way, you will leave oflf 
doing the things you are sorry for. If you do n't, 
Jesus can't forgive you. Now don't swear or lie 
or quarrel or break any of the rules to-day." 

** I wont; I mean, I '11 try not to. And, Wil- 
ly" — Dick colored up and choked and had hard 
work to get it out, but did at last — ** Willy, that 's 
a good fellow, you know Jesus best; just you ask 
him to help me, will you?" 

So repentance was Dick's first lesson in Christ's 
school. 



96 DICK LANGDON^S CAREER. 



CHAPTER III. 

SUBMISSION. 

Dick had been so long accustomed to do wrong 
that he found it hard to do right even for one 
day. 

The boys, noticing his changed deportment, 
teased and tempted him almost beyond endurance, 
and Satan, fearing to lose such a promising pupil, 
left no art untried to turn his thoughts away from 
Christ's teachings. 

But Dick, who had a strong will of his own, 
which he had long used in heairtily serving Sa- 
tan, used the same will now in resisting him, with 
such good eflfect that the great adversary saw he 
must strike him unawares through some weak 
point of the armor of resistance which he had put 
on, if he would not be the loser in the conflict. 

Now Dick had naturally a very warm heart 
and a very quick temper, and Satan, who is will- 
ing to use both good and bad weapons in his war- 
fare, took advantage of both these traits of char- 
acter in his efforts to keep Dick out of the path 
to heaven. As you read on you will not fail to 
see just how it was managed. 



SUBMISSION. 97 

**What has come over Dick to make him so 
dumpish?" said a boy, good-naturedly enough, 
noticing that at recess he stayed away from the 
set of bad ones with whom he had begun to be 
intimate. 

**0h, didn't you know," cried Peter Martin, 
an ill-looking fellow who was within sight and 
hearing of Dick, **that he's under * concern of 
mind,' and is meditatin' goin' on pilgrimage to 
the New Jerusalem in company with brother Will 
Wingood? Prosperous journey to the pilgrims 
and plenty of psalm singin' on the road. 

" ' Hark ! from the tombs a doleful sound !* " 

Peter sang the above words through his nose, 
with the thumb and fingers of his right hand also 
extended from that facial projection in an expres- 
sive gesture of contempt towards Willy and Dick, 
who stood together trying to get a chance to speak 
of serious interests. 

Both the singing and the gesture were brought 
to an untimely end by a tremendous blow from 
Dick's fist, so successfully struck upon the offend- 
ing nose that the owner of it, though much the 
larger boy, was laid flat, the blood streaming 
from his nostrils. 

It would be difficult to tell which of three per- 
sons was most shocked by this sudden occurrence: 
Martin, who lay groaning on the ground amid the 

P*<ik LauKdun's Career. "T 



98 DICK langdon's career. 

mingled jeers and commiserations of the group 
around him, Willy, whose fond hopes for his 
friend were for the moment turned to despair, or 
poor Dick himself, who felt the instant after he 
struck the blow as if he would give the right hand 
which did it to have the deed undone; for, with 
the quick despair of an ardent nature, he too was 
ready to give up as lost all hope of change to a 
better life. 

Dick was immediately reported for fighting 
by the monitor in charge of the playground, and 
in a few minutes was called, with the victim of 
his hard blow, before one of the teachers, Mr. 
Elton, to answer for his behavior. 

** What have you been doing, Langdon ?" said 
Mr. Elton sternly. This teacher really possessed 
the most culture, refinement, and kindness of any 
in the school; but knowing nothing of Dick's new 
purposes for good, and having seen him mingling 
from choice with the worst boys as a leader in 
evil, he felt it his duty to treat with severity this 
open disregard of all order and discipline. 

** I have done very wrong,*' said Dick humbly. 

But Mr. Elton could not see the humility, and 
was too much accustomed to have boys say what- 
ever they thought most likely to save them from 
punishment, to think the words a sincere expres- 
sion of penitence^ 



SUBMISSION. 99 

*' You are reported as having suddenly sprung 
upon Martin, without any attack or even threat on 
his part, felling him to the ground with a single 
well-aimed blow in the face from your doubled fist. '' 

Mr. Elton glanced from Dick to Peter, who 
with his purple nose already swollen to double 
size, dark circles under his eyes, and an old hand- 
kerchief stanching the still flowing blood, pre- 
sented a pitiful aspect. 

**The report is true, sir," replied Dick. 
*'Had Martin at any previous time, attacked 
or threatened you ?" 

**No, sir." 

'*Have you any excuse to offer for this vio- 
lence?" 

**No, sir." 

**Have you any explanation, whatever, that 
you wish to make ?" 

''No, sir." 

Dick's answers were truly prompted by a self- 
accusing repentance, too deep to utter or even to 
have any excuse or palliation of his offence. But 
Mr. Elton, never having seen in Dick before the 
slightest trace of shame or contrition in view of 
Wrong-doing, very naturally mistook his brevity 
and composure for indications of indifference or 
obstinacy. Still wishing to give every possible 
opportunity for both parties to explain he said, 

94125B 



lOO DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

'' Martin, have you anything to present Have 
you a standing quarrel with Dick?" 

*' Me, sir? No, indeed, sir! The boys all know 
Dick and I have always been good friends. I 
havn't the least notion what has set him against 
me, sir." 

*' Is the monitor's report and Dick's admission 
that you did not provoke this attack, even by 
words, true?" 

* * Certain true, sir. I never spoke any way but 
peaceably to Dick in my life, and havn't spoke a 
word of any kind to him to-day sir ; he wont pre- 
tend I have." 

** Has he spoken to you to-day, Langdon?" 

**No, sir." 

**What were you doing at the time of the 
attack, Martin?" 

''I just happened to be singing sir, nothing, 
bad either and nothing to do with Dick. He just 
knocked the words out of my mouth, when he 
sprung at me and did what you see, sir." 

** Martin, you may go. Langdon, now we are 
alone have you anything to say for yourself?" 

"No, sir." 

**You admit the truth of all the statements 
that have been made?" 

**Yes, sir." 

** You knew that fighting, either in sport or 



SUBMISSION. lOI 

in earnest under any pretence or provocation was 
strictly forbidden?" 

'*Yes, sir, I did." 

** Langdon, when boys come here thinking to 
make the ground allowed them for healthful rec- 
reation a battle ground, even if they think they 
have just battles to fight, the rules require me to 
use the rod in convincing them that they must 
keep the peace. A still severer punishment is 
due to one who makes an unprovoked attack, or 
at the very best one with provocation too slight 
to be worth mentioning." 

Dick utterly dumb with self-accusation, was 
still supposed to be sullen. 

*' Take oflF your jacket, Langdon. The use of 
the rod is always abhorent to me, but if anything 
could make me willing to use it, it would be to 
teach one who delights in giving blows, how blows 
feel." 

A whipping followed, probably the severest one 
ever inflicted by gentle Mr. Elton, the more so for 
the fact that still mistaking the culprit's silence for 
obstinacy, he thought it his duty to continue the 
punishment till stubbornness was broken by pain. 

At last looking straight at Dick's pale, quiet, 
face and detecting there neither emotion nor a 
bad spirit, he was greatly puzzled and asked him 
if he felt sorry for his oflfence. 



I02 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

*'I am sorry, Mr. Elton.'' Dick said it just 
as quietly in the samt deep tones that he had said, 
**No, sir," and **Yes, sir,'' before his punish- 
ment. 

'* If my severity has made you sorry I suppose 
it is justified," said Mr. Elton more to himself 
than to Dick. But Dick considered himself ad- 
dressed and that respect required reply and a truth- 
ful one and he said, 

'' No punishment is so great as I deserve, but 
I don't think* it has made me any more sorry." 

Mr. Elton viewed the boy with profound as- 
tonishment Naturally a man of kindly instincts 
and quick perception, he could no longer fail to 
see that the lad was sincere. He could not under- 
stand him and he made him a study. Not being 
himself a penitent believer in Jesus Christ, it was 
not easy for him to understand the case fully, but 
he . had sympathy with noble sentiments and the 
desire to cherish them both in himself and in 
others. The^ better to understand Dick he in- 
quired, 

'* When did you first feel truly sorry for your 
act?" 

'* The very minute I did it." 

**Why?" 

'*0h, Mr. Elton, I can't tell you half the 
reasons why." Dick's voice was choked with 



SUBMISSION. 103 

emotion now, and tears, that had not come with 
bodily pain, were waiting leave to fall. *'I was 
trying to obey Christ, and — ^and — failed/' 

** But, my poor boy, I am sorry to feel obliged 
io say that since you came here you have not ap- 
peared to be even trying to do right" 

**That is true, sir. I have been trying to do 
about as wrong as I possibly could, almost ever 
since I can remember, till quite lately — till Willy 
Goodwin lent me his Testament for me to read 
the history of Jesus Christ." 

**Do you mean that it was a new history to 
you?" 

'* Yes, sir. When Willy asked me if I had 
ever read the life of Jesus, I felt ashamed that I 
never had, and I told him I would; and I went 
about it just as I would to read the life of Wash- 
ington, or anybody I should be mortified not to 
know about. But, oh, Mr. Elton, it's so differ- 
ent, so strange, so wonderful! Willy said, and 
the Testament says, that the love and pity and — 
and — dying are for the worst, and so I hoped they, 
might be for me; and I did n't mean to do wrong 
any more; I hated the very thought of it. Then, 
all in a minute — you know what I mean, sir: I've 
lost my chance." 

** Are you going to do about as wrong as you 
possibly can again, Langdon, because you think 



I04 DICK i^angdon's career. 

you have failed of some great good you had in 
view?" 

''No, Mr. Elton; I mean to try very hard not 
to be as I have been. I will try to do right, and 
when I fail, as I see I'm likely to, I'll bear the 
consequences as well as I can." 

''Was that the way you were feeling when 
you made me those short answers ?" 

"Yes, sir. If they seemed disrespectful I 
did n't mean it. I wished I had anything to say, 
but I hadn't." 

" You were ready to say truly that you were 
sorry and ashamed, and wished and would try to 
do better?" 

" Oh, yes, sir; more sorry and ashamed than I 
could possibly tell you, and determined to try to 
do right: but so sure I shall still do wrong that I 
do n't dare to promise anything !" 

" And you felt that you deserved punishment, 
and therefore took it patiently." 

" It was deserved, and I tried to bear it will- 
ingly." 

"Langdon, in a few minutes we must go. 
Give me your hand and your pardon for misun- 
derstanding you: mistaking your penitence for 
pride, sullenness, and obstinacy. Don't despair 
because you are surprised into evil. After what 
has passed, will you consider me your friend?" 



SUBMISSION. 105 

*'May I? Oh, thank you, Mr. Elton! But 
I'm not fit." 

*' Then you honestly forgive me?" 

**No, Mr. Elton. There is nothing to for- 
give." 

'* We must differ about that. Are you will- 
ing to ask Martin's pardon before the school for 
your unprovoked attack?" 

**I am more than willing to ask his pardon, 
and I 'd like to have everybody who knows what 
I did hear me; but I can't say * unprovoked,' be- 
cause I was provoked out of all sense and reason. " 

*' Ah ! What was — But I will ask witness- 
es, as I own I should have done before I judged 
your case. I put no faith then in Martin's word, 
but I failed to remember that there is such a 
thing as self-condemnation." 

Dick only understood that Mr. Elton was 
troubled, and said remorsefully, 

'*I am very sorry; but I can't say I meant to 
deceive you. What provoked me so at the time 
seemed nothing the minute I realized what I had 
done." 

'' Let me say plainly, Langdon, that I find no 
fault with you for your silence as to what pro- 
voked you. We must go now to the school-room, 
where I shall soon call on you for your public 
apology. Let it be only an honest one." 



io6 DICK langdon's career. 

When Mr. Elton and Dick came from the lit- 
tle room where they had been, into the large 
school-hall, there was a good deal of curiosity 
among both teachers and scholars as to what had 
passed. The head master, Mr. Hawkins, a hard, 
almost savage-looking man, commonly called by 
the pupils *'01d Hawk," because of the mer- 
ciless manner in which he pounced upon and 
handled his victim, went aside with Mr. Elton, 
and the boys wished they knew what he said. 
We can have the privilege, and may learn from 
the conversation a little of the trying position in 
which Dick's new-found friend was placed. 

Without even the forms of that courtesy which 
almost invariably exists among associates, in every 
business and calling, Mr. Hawkins began: 

*'Mr. Elton, I judge by appearances, that you 
have failed to give that ringleader of disturbance, 
Langdon, the thorough thrashing he deserves, and 
I am going to call him up here, and give it to 
him lively; make an example of him for his own 
inprovement, and that of the school. Let them all 
see if there's to be knocking down, and blood-let- 
ting, who is the one authorized to do it !" 

Mr. Elton replied very calmly. 

**Mr. Hawkins, I know I have sometimes 
failed to punish with deserved severity, and Lang- 
don's appearance naturally leads you to think I 



SUBMISSION. 107 

have now; but I assure you I have administered 
the rod more severely than I ever did in my life, 
before, as his waled back will testify. I thought 
him sullen, because he was silent, and had, withal, 
a little of your feeling, that one who gives blows 
should be. made to feel them. I think the boy is 
really sorry, and anxious to reform. I trust you 
will think I have been severe enough, in this in- 
stance, waiting at least for a fresh oflfence, before 
you punish." 

**0h, a little more of the same sauce that has 
served so well will not be amiss!" replied Mr. 
Hawkins; and he was turning to call up Dick, 
when Mr. Elton detained him by saying firmly. 

''Stop a moment, if you please, Mr. Hawkins, 
and let me be understood. If I remain here as a 
teacher all cases of discipline entrusted to me will 
be settled by me with the offender. I will not 
believe that you intend it, but to add to Langdon's 
punishment as you propose would be, to me, a 
personal and public insult, destructive to my in- 
fluence." 

** And if I persist, you will resign, and leave, 
giving the true reason?" 

*'Yes." 

''Well, let the fellow go this time! He'll 
come into my hands soon enough. You are too 
useful to be spared, Mr. Elton; besides, I like your 



io8 DICK langdon's career. 

having thrashed him, and you've more pluck 
than I gave you credit for. I 've high hopes of. 
you as a comrade." 

**The matter is not ended. I^angdon is to 
apologize, and — " 

'*Go ahead, Elton ! Finish up your case ac- 
cording to the finest rules of moral science. Only 
one thing I ask, as a special favor, for the general 
good: tell the school you gave Langdon his lick- 
ing.'' 

Mr. Elton turned, and addressed the school. 

*%angdon, who has been severely punished 
with the rod for his assault upon Martin, admits 
that the infliction was deserved, and desires to 
make a public apology." 

A suppressed yet emphatic, * * Humph !' ' expres- 
sive of profound contempt, issued from the lips of 
Mr. Hawkins, and was audible to the pupils near- 
est his desk, but not to Dick, who thus called upon 
by Mr. Elton rose and said in calm, earnest tones. 

**I am sorry that I broke the rules of the 
school, and will try to keep them in future. I am 
also sorry, Martin, that I struck you, and I beg 
your pardon." 

As Dick took his seat, Mr. Elton again spoke: 

**At the time this case came to me for disci- 
pline, I dismissed Martin, without examining as to 
the truth of some statements which he made, and 



SUBMISSION. 109 

which struck me as very improbable. Now, I 
will test them by witnesses; for whatever provo- 
cation of the assault was given is still unknown to 
me. First, I will ask the monitor if he can state 
of his own knowledge what Martin was doing at 
the time?" 

The monitor stated that he was not looking 
in Martin's direction at the time, but turned in 
season to see Langdon in the act of rushing for- 
ward to strike the blow. Then Mr. Elton asked: 

**How many saw and heard what Martin was 
doing, at the time I^angdon started to go to him ? 
Hands up." 

Several hands were raised for many saw at the 
time and all knew, just what Martin did to 
provoke Dick; and he had himself boasted that he 
lied about it to Mr. Elton. So the truth was soon 
told. It did not bring much excuse for Dick's 
violence, but Mr. Elton saw that it's starting 
point was indignation at the sneer cast upon Willy 
and his religion, which was quite a help in the 
unravelling of the puzzle concerning him. 

*'You deliberately lied to me, Martin," said 
Mr. Elton, ** when I questioned you as to the cause 
of the attack, and — " 

*'No sir, I only said — " 

**Be silent, Martin. The words you used are 
of no consequence, since it was your full intention 



no PICK langdon's career* 

to deceive, which is lying. It is a great oflfence 
under any circumstances, and to your teacher in a 
case of discipline, a grievous one, which will al- 
ways be severely punished by me. You are forbid- 
den to hold any communication, whatever, with 
the rest of the pupils, until permission is given 
you by Mr. Hawkins. As you are more with him 
him than me, he will please enforce obedience." 

*'With the greatest pleasure," said Mr. Haw- 
kins, rising to call the classes to pass to the reci- 
tation rooms. **It wont embarrass me a bit, that 
the doctor might not think one of my thrashings 
healthy for Martin's broken head. A live coal, 
applied with a pair of pincers to the end of the 
tongue, is an excellent remedy for one who insults a 
teacher with a lie, and the counter-irritation might 
take down the swelling in his nose." The school 
laughed without restraint, as they were always 
allowed to do, at this kind of ridicule from Mr. 
Hawkins. Nothing ever escaped his sight, and 
it did not please him that neither Mr. Elton, Dick, 
nor Willy smiled. A time came when he recalled 
the fact in a tumult of mental strife. 

The better portion of the school felt that Mar- 
tin had acted a very mean part, and were very in- 
consistently ready to make a hero of Dick, both 
for knocking him down, and for being sorrj^ for 
it But Dick knew nothing of this. 



FAITH. Ill 



CHAPTER IV. 



FAITH. 



That evening Willy, who had been breathing 
unspoken prayers for Dick all day, got leave to 
see him alone. To his joy he found him reading 
in the very same little Testament he had loaned 
him. 

**0 Dick," he cried, ''you haven't got dis- 
couraged and given up trying, have you I I'm 
so glad of that !" 

* ' I ' 11 never stop trying to be better, ' ' answered 
Dick. ''It has been a hard day, but not half so 
hard as I deserved. Think, when I had promised 
you and myself to bear everything for Christ's 
sake, just think of my pitching into the first fel- 
low that crossed my temper with a sneer! It 
roiled me most because it was at good things and 
you; but that's no excuse. It was all in a min- 
ute, and I never can tell anybody how bad I felt 
the next." 

"Try and tell me a little of how you felt." 

" I felt, ' it is a gone case for poor Dick now ! 
I have lost my chance. I can't ever be good, and 
so Jesus can't ever forgive me, and \ may just as 



112 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

well give up trying.' Then I looked over where 
you stood watching me with such a distressed face 
and with your hands clasped as if you were pray- 
ing for me, and I remembered all I had been 
reading here in your Testament about Jesus and 
what he did and suflfered for us, and I decided in 
an instant, * I wont do another bad thing because 
I ' ve done one. I '11 try to act right now, and let 
God do just what he thinks best with me. I de- 
serve the worst' " 

** But, Dick," cried Willy, quite staggered by 
what his friend expressed, ''we can't bear what 
we deserve, and God don't want we should. He 
promises to forgive us, for Christ's sake, and wants 
us to trust him that he will." 

*' Yes, I know; and I thought I was sorry, and 
had asked him to forgive me, and was going to 
do right; and the very first thing I knew I was 
acting just as bad as ever. He can't mean to for- 
give such?" 

'' Yes, he does, Dick, if you're sorry you did 
it and don't want to any more. He's just as 
willing, I'm sure, to forgive you what you did 
to-day as what you had done before." 

** You think he wants me to believe that he 
will?" 

'*Yes, you must trust him to forgive you 
everything always. ' ' 



FAITH. 113 

But Dick had not yet learned that lesson fully, 
and answered still, 

*'Even if I'm so bad he can't forgive me, I 
will keep on trying to obey him and let him do 
just what he pleases with me." 

Willy thought, '*That is a strange way to 
feel; it isn't the way I feel. It isn't faith, I 
know; but then it is something good. Let me 
see, what is it? Well, it seems to be submission; 
and perhaps Jesus will let that answer for Dick a 
while, and turn it into faith for him by-and by." 

Still Willy did not feel very easy about Dick 
while he refused fully to trust the promises of 
Christ, all of whose words he himself believed, 
just as you believe the promises of your father, if 
you are so happy as to have one who never de- 
ceives you. So he said to Dick, 

** You say you will let Jesus do just what he 
pleases to you, which can't be worse than you 
deserve. And I guess that is partly, but not 
wholly, the way he wants us to feel; because, you 
see, we can't bear what we deserve; and Jesus 
don't want we should, and has died that we 
needn't. He wants to forgive us, and wants us 
to come and ask him to, and to tnist hint that he 
will^ because he has promised, ' ' 

** I do n't want to doubt, Willy. You thought 
this morning that if I, who have been bad all my 

Dlcli L«ngtlon'B C«rMr. 3 



114 ^iCK langdon's career. 

life, came to Jesus sorry and ashamed of it all, 
and resolving to try to do right in future, Christ 
would surely forgive me; and I tried to believe he 
would, though it seemed too good to be true. 
Now, do you say, if this same bad, forgiven Dick, 
in about half an hour flies into a rage at a 'trifle, 
and knocks a boy down with a blow that might 
have killed him, Jesus promises to forgive him 
that, too, as well as all the rest, just the moment 
he repents and asks him? Do you find any such 
promise as that in your Bible, Willy?'' 

'* Why yes, Dick, to be sure I do. If I did n't 
what would become of me, sinning every hour? 
You must trust him to forgive you everything — 
what you did to-day or may do to-morrow, just as 
much as all the past. It was bad to get angry 
and strike Martin; but I don't believe Jesus is 
half so sorry that you have done that as he is to 
have you think he isn't ready to forgive you for 
it" 

'' Sorry ! Do you think he cares?" 

'* Why, Dick ! Do n't you think even / care 
enougli to be real sorry and ready to do most any- 
thing I can to help you?" 

*'Yes, indeed. If I didn't, I wouldn't be 
talking it over with you." 

**But don't you see that Jesus, who died on 
the cross for you, must care a million times more 



FAITH. 115 

than I do, and be a million times more willing to 
talk it over with you, and forgive and help you ? 
Only you must trust him, for he don't promise to 
do anything for any one who don't trust him. 
The biggest sin of all, and the only one he can't 
and wont forgive, is unbelief, which means — 
means, ' not trusting. ' " 

** I 'd like to see again where it says so, though 
I do remember now that the Testament was all 
full of telling us about it — believe, believe^ be- 
UEVE; as if that, after all, was what they all 
thought the most of wanting us to do." 

** Certainly; it is just the one only thing that 
can save any of us, Dick." Willy opened the 
Bible and read aloud some very precious texts, of 
which I will only give a few: 

**For God so loved the world that he gave his 
only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on 
him should not perish, but have everlasting life." 
'*This is the work of God, that ye believe on 
Him whom he hath sent" Jesus said, *' He that 
believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall 
he live; ^nd whosoever Hveth and believeth in 
me shall never die." ** Believe on the Lord Je- 
sus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." '* Without 
faith it is impossible to please Him." **Him 
that Cometh to me I will in no wise cast out." 

Then he read where Jesus commands us to for- 



ii6 DICK langdon's career. 

give one another even seventy and seven times in 
one day; and when Dick had heard all, he said, 

** I do believe, Willy, it is worse to think he 
wont forgive it than it was to do it; still it seems 
too much to ask, and as if I couldn't think he 
would. I wonder if trusting is easy work. Do 
you do it always just when you ought?" 

''No, indeed, Dick. I am always failing just 
there. None of us would ever trust enough to 
get forgiven, I do believe, if Christ didn't help 
us; but he can and will if we ask him. You re- 
member the man who said, * Lord, I believe; help 
thou mine unbelief.' " 

When Dick, alone in his hard and narrow bed, 
that night, prayed as he had never prayed before, 
the cry was not so much, *'I/)rd, forgive," as 
*' Lord, help, teach, make me to trust thee !" 

And Dick learned the lesson oi faith. 



OBEDIENCE. IIJ 



CHAPTER V. 



OBEDIENCE. 



Dick suffered so much for the first notable sin 
in the new life which he meant to lead, that he 
thought as he reflected upon the events of that 
day, 

** If God will only forgive me this once, I will 
never, never, behave so badly again." 

The feeling which he had was unlike anything 
he ever felt before about his wrong-doing. He 
really hated what he had done because it was for- 
bidden of God ; and he meant not to disobey any 
more. He had yet to learn by bitter experience 
how difiicult the lesson of obedience is, even to 
the most devoted pupil in Christ's school, who has 
not learned it in early youth. 

When he made that public promise to try to 
keep the rules of the school in future, he was quite 
honest, but had not had time to think of all which 
it involved. When he did think, he realized bet- 
ter than before what his Saviour meant in the 
words which had seemed very sweet to him as he 
read them: **Take my yoke upon you and learit 



Il8 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye 
shall find rest unto your souls.'* 

Dick had never bent his neck to take the yoke 
of any obedient service, and the lesson was not an 
easy one. But he had entered with all his heart 
into the service of his new Master, and he sooa 
realized that his own wishes and habits must be 
changed not only in great things but even in what 
he regarded as trifling matters; for no disobedi- 
ence could be a trifle. 

** Willy, do you think it is wrong to whisper 
in school," inquired Dick. 

* * Why certainly ; I do n' t see how you can even 
ask such a question." 

**0h, I am not going to whisper, because I 
promised to keep the rules, and that is one of 
them, and I know it would be a sin to break my 
promise; but if I had not promised I do n't know 
but I might whisper." 

*'It would be wrong, then, all the same, I'm 
very sure," replied Willy, whose mind was clear 
about it because he had been trained to obey in 
little things. 

*' As to the actual wrong of whispering, I do n't 
believe the Bible says, * Thou shalt not whisper,' 
does it?" 

**Dick, don't speak that way of the Bible!" 
cried Willy in dismay, thinking he meant to trifle. 



OBEDIENCE. 119 

**Why, Willy, how shocked you look! I 
wouldn't speak irreverently of that precious 
Bible for any thing. But I do mean just what I 
said: the Bible don't say I mustn't whisper in 
school; and if it wasn't for my promise, I don't 
see but that I might sometimes, when I know it's 
for a good purpose. I want to do right, but I 
don't like this being tied up like a baby, with a 
string of useless little rules." 

**0 Dick, I'm sure you know better if you'll 
only stop to think. Even the rules about little 
things are necessary, and for our good. How could 
we study if whispering was allowed? But that 
isn't the reason we must not do it. The Bible 
says we must obey those that are in authority over 
us. It means our parents, teachers, and all 
such; and the laws of the land. We are im- 
prisoned here for having broken the laws that 
were made for good reasons. You'll see it a 
great deal plainer than I can tell you, Dick, if 
you'll only think, because you know the most." 

Willy did not realize that he was by far wiser 
than his older friend on the subject of obedience, 
because he had learned it from his cradle, and 
had never failed to know that disobedience was 
wrong, even when he practiced it in the days of 
his wandering. 

Dick however, was candid, and clear-sighted, 



I20 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

and when he had thought the matter over and 
consulted his Testament, came to the correct de- 
cision that service to Christ required obedience 
even in the smallest matters, to those who were in 
authority over him, unless they required him to 
do what God forbids. He bent his neck cheerfully 
to the yoke, because it was Christ's, while yet he 
knew that for him it might not prove easy, because 
he had not worn it hitherto. 

Quite an undesirable intimacy existed between 
Dick and his seat-mate, John, who though not 
so hardened in sin as some others was still a. bad 
boy, especially full of mischief, and, withal, an 
inveterate whisperer. 

On the very day of the above conversation, 
no sooner had Dick begun the diligent study of 
his arithmetic lesson than up went the half of the 
desk-cover belonging to John, who, while he rat- 
tled slates and books as if in search of something, 
was buzzing in Dick's ears a plan for some mis- 
chievous **fun" at recess. Our hero tried to 
cypher away, giving no heed to his neighbor. 

''Desk cover down !" called the teacher, Mr. 
Hardings, and down it went with a slam. 

''It seems you don't know the use of a desk,'* 
said Mr. Harding. "Take your book and slate 
and stand in the floor." 

John was obliged to obey, and Dick, thinking 



OBEDIENCE. 121 

himself well rid of a serious annoyance, learned 
his arithmetic lesson, and recited it to the entire 
satisfaction of his teacher. 

But John had not studied any while standing 
in the floor, having spent his time in trying to 
make the school laugh at queer and vulgar pic- 
tures, which he drew upon his slate under pre- 
tence of cyphering when Mr. Harding was look- 
ing in his direction, and held up for their inspec- 
tion when he turned in another direction. He 
thought himself undiscovered in these games, 
and when he made an entire failure of his arith- 
metic lesson said, 

*'I've been studying it all the forenoon and 
couldn't do a mite of it." 

Mr. Harding made no reply to this, save to 
order him to stop after school, when he found 
some very offensive pictures in his desk and it 
ended in John's getting a hard whipping. 

**It's every bit your doing" cried John, 
angrily, when he next met Dick, *4f you had 
answered me * yes ' or * no ' when I put up my 
desk-cover and asked a civil question, I should n't 
have kept it up long enough to get noticed. Now 
I just want to know what you meant by not an* 
s wering ? Were you mad ?' ' 

** No, John: I never felt friendlier; but I have 
decided not to whisper any more." 



123 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

** Not whisper ! Why not?" 

"Because it's forbidden. Don't you know 1 
promised to try to keep the rules. * No whisper- 
ing ' is one of them. " 

** Pish! We all have to promise when we 're 
licked. It don't amount to anything, only that 
we knock under for that time. Nobody looks for 
anything else." 

**But I am sure Mr. Elton will in my case, 
because I promised of my own accord and only 
just what I want to try to do." 

* * Mighty fine ! You had better pretend !' ' 

** I 've been so bad, I don't wonder you think 
it is ridiculous, John. But the worse one is, the 
more need of change. You may as well under- 
stand at once that I am in earnest when I say I 
mean to do just as well as, can; not because I 
must, but because I want to. So don't whisper 
to me any more, for I shan't answer you." 

**Will Wingood is the only fellow here that 
don't dare to whisper ; he has got no more pluck 
than a fresh water clam. Who'd have thought 
one licking would have started you so far on the 
pilgrimage along with him, just as Martin said!" 

**If my memory serves me, Martin's remark 
occurred before what you call the * licking.' But 
seriously John, I have started on a pilgrimage 
with Willy, for whom I have the highest regard, 



OBEDIENCE. 123 

if by pilgrimage you mean the way to heaven. 
It IS what we 're trying for and we 'd like to have 
you go too," 

" How good you b« ! 
Oh, let us see 
How many *U go 
Along with me !" 

John who was bright though ignorant, had a 
gift at making rhymes as well as pictures. The 
above were accompanied by the same contemptu- 
ous gesture towards Dick which Martin had used, 
and when John had made it he turned on his heel 
and ran away to a knot of the worst boys in school 
who were always putting their heads together 
over some evil scheme. 

Dick was not in the least angered ; his folly 
and sin in Martin's case were too fresh in his 
memory to allow him to fall again into the snare. 
He stood looking sadly after John, fearing that he 
had not said the right thing to him, when Willy, 
who had been watching at a distance, came to him 
saying, 

*' Never mind, Dick, * blessed are they that 
are persecuted." 

'' Will they persecute me, Willy ?" 

** They will persecute us both if we do right. 
They always have plagued me all they could in 
small ways, although I never had much to do 
with them; but they had made up their minds 



124 T>ICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

that you were one with them, a ring-leader in 
evil, and they will try to make you pay dear for 
leaving their set." 

**We can bear to suflfer in obeying Christ, 
can't we, Willy?" 

'*Yes," he replied. Then, although they 
longed to be together, they separated going as 
duty required each to his own task. 

John hastened to say what he wished to the 
bad boys he had joined, because they would not 
be together long and Martin was stealing this rare 
opportunity to break the rules of silence which he 
found very burdensome. The group kept out of 
hearing, and no one was allowed to enter it till 
he pledged himself, under penalties peculiar to 
themselves, to report that Martin had not spoken 
a word if called to bear testimony as to the facts. 
And they said among themselves for the benefit 
of those least inured to falsehood, 

'' He has n't spoke a word, he has spoken thou- 
sands." As soon as John had taken this pledge 
he cried, 

**Dick has set up for a saint. He got me 
licked to-day, because he was too good to whisper 
so much as *yes' or *no;' and what's more, he 
isn't sorry he did it and says he wont whisper 
any more, because it's wrong, and he's going to 
keep the rules because it 's right !'* 



OBEDIENCE. 125 

"Just think of it ! Dick Langdon !" 

**Bet he has caught that disease religion, of 
Wingood. They say it is catching." 

/* Awfully by spells; we don't want any of it 
spreading round here, eh, fellows?" 

* * No. No. We do n' t, we do n't," shouted 
the pupils of Satan in concert. And the reader 
will please understand that almost every one of 
these worst boys, being thoroughly versed in the 
profane and vulgar language of the adversary's 
schools, interlarded what I write of their talk with 
such oaths and obscene words as should never be 
even quoted. I would not even call them to 
mind by so much as this statement, were it not 
essential to the truth of my story. No one who 
begins the use of improper language is safe from 
going to this extreme. 

**If Dick wont whisper to you, John, stick 
pins in him," suggested one. 

*'Darnin' needles," amended another. 

''We'll make it hotter than fire for him!" 
put in Martin, making up in virulence of tone for 
what he dared not put in loudness. 

So the threats went round till it was finally 
concluded that both Dick and Willy, but especial- 
ly Dick, might as well be martys burning at the 
stake by a slow fire, as to try to be religious in 
that Reform School. 



126 DICK I^ANGDON'S CAREER. 

** See here, fellows," said Martin in the same 
deep tones of hatred, *'what a sweet scrape I got 
him into only just doing nothing. We'll get 
him into worse* ones doing something. His tem- 
per's like gunpowder, a spark '11 fire it oflf." 

'* Better not fire any more sparks into that 
powder-house till you get over the eflfects of that 
last explosion," said one, who, not liking Martin 
over much, was willing to have his joke upon his 
still swollen and discolored face- 
But although the laugh was thus turned on 
Martin, it was likely to be no laughing matter for 
their mutual enemies in the end. 

'*You needn't think to try that on to Dick 
again," said John. **He isn't any fool of a 
fish, I tell you, to swallow the same hook 
twice." 

"Mighty wise you are ! Most as smart as you 
were fooling Harding about the ciphering !" mut- 
tered Martin. 

'* You 'd better twit on licking !" cried John. 
"See what you'll catch from Old Hawk. I 
warn you faithfully as a mother, he '11 catch you 
talking without any of us blabbing." 

"Dry up on that," cried one. "What makes 
you think, John, that Dick won't bite at the same 
hook again?" 

"Best of reasons. I've tried him. I used 



OBEDIENCE- 127 

Martin's expressive gesture, called Wingood a 
clam, and hove at him some of my best original 
poetry ; and he never so much as winked. ' ' 

Here a bell that must be heeded cut short the 
plotting; but the schemers muttered as they sepa- 
rated. 

'' We '11 make him catch it V 



128 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 



CHAPTER VI. 

TRUTH. 

Dick was not naturally a deceitful boy; he 
was too bold for that, and was always inclined to 
speak out the truth and take the consequences. 
Still, as he did not learn when a little boy to do 
it as a duty as well as an impulse, his lessons in 
Satan's schools had led him to disregard the 
truth whenever it seemed most convenient to do 
so, and especially when he thought he could do 
any one a favor. His schoolmates had come to 
feel that they were secure from any report of their 
evil deeds through his lips; his uniform practice 
being to make out a fair case for them without 
regard for facts, or to do him full justice without 
much regard for his own interest. 

But his few lessons in Christ's schools had 
taught him how sacred in God's sight is the truth, 
and while he had doubted the necessity of keep- 
ing all the school regulations, he was too clear- 
sighted to think, even for a moment, that it would 
do for one who hoped to please God, to trifle with 
the truth. When he reflected that refusing to 
deceive would surely get him into trouble with 



TRUTH. 129 

the boys, he whispered to himself, ''Blessed are 
they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake. " 

One morning when the wholfe school was as- 
sembled, one of the teachers took a pack of cards 
from his desk, and holding it up, said, 

''This pack of cards was found this morning 
in the dormitory; and a thorough investigation 
will be made as to who is responsible for its being 
there. It will be the wisest course for those who 
are guilty to own it without compulsion. All 
who have ever seen or handled these cards will 
rise." 

No one rose. In vain the teacher urged, 
promising light punishment or pardon to those 
who confessed. No one would own that he had 
ever seen or handled the cards, which very plain- 
ly reported for themselves the touch of many 
soiled fingers. Dick was thankful that the teach- 
er expressed himself just as he did, for although 
he had never seen or handled the cards, he knew 
of them, and had been told by whom they were 
smuggled into the building about two weeks pre- 
viously; and he felt that he would suflfer almost 
anything rather than tell of his schoolmates, es- 
pecially when he had no guilt of his own in the 
matter to confess. In his heart he prayed, "O 
Jesus ! what shall I do, if he asks me what I know 
about the cards? I must not, must not lie I'* 



130 DICK i^angdon's career. 

The test came sooner than Dick expected; for, 
after vainly urging all to rise who had seen or 
handled the cards, he turned to poor troubled 
Dick, saying very sternly, 

** Richard Langdon, rise from your seat" 

Dick rose, pale from the inward conflict, but 
with a manner calm and respectftil. 

**I^angdon, we hoped you were trying to im- 
prove. Why do you not confess what you have 
had to do with these cards?" 

Dick was silent, looking down, and wondering 
whether it would be best to say that he had had 
nothing to do with them. 

* * Langdon, have you ever before seen or handled 
these cards?" 

''No, sir." 

*'Have you any knowledge how a pack of 
cards came within the buildings?" 

After painful hesitation Dick replied, 

''Yes, sir." 

"Then tell us what you know." 

" If I had had anything to do with it myself I 
would own it, sir; but I had not. I only heard 
the cards were here and how they came here, and 
I do n't want to tell of others. I wish they would 
own up for themselves." 

Groans and other signs of disgust came from 
the boys. Commanding silence, the teacher said, 



TRUTH. 131 

** There are reasons, Langdon, why you can- 
tiot be excused from telling all you know of this 
matter. You will be severely punished if you do 
not at once reply to our questions." 

*' I am willing to be punished if you will only 
excuse me from answering any more questions," 
pleaded Dick. 

** That will not do; we must get at the truth. 
Do you know where we found or were likely to 
find these cards?" 

''Somewhere in the dormitory," replied Dick, 
who knew the boys were playing cards there the 
previous night. A titter ran round the school- 
room, and the teacher replied sternly, 

*'Do not add impudence to guilt! I had 
stated they were found in the dormitory. Do 
you know where the cards were secreted?" 

" No, sir, I do not I did not mean to be dis- 
respectful, and beg your pardon." 

** What do you know of the way in which the 
cards came within the building?" 

"One who is present told me how they were 
brought here. He expected me to keep his se- 
cret, but I cannot lie," faltered Dick in evident 
distress. 

** What a bad boy expects of you is of little ac- 
count: we expect and command you to answer 
our last question." 



132 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

Dick obeyed; but no words he had ever spoken 
l^ad hurt him so much in their uttering as those 
with which he confessed that his seat-mate, John, 
had told him the manner in which his cousin 
from the city, when permitted to call on him, 
had, by previous agreement, smuggled in the 
cards. 

"Yet you pretend to say, Langdon, that this 
is all you know, and that you never saw or 
touched the cards yourself ?'' replied the teacher 
witheringly. **Do I tell you what you did not 
know before when I say these cards were found 
secreted in your mattress ?' ' 

Groans and hisses for poor Dick filled the 
room, but he was silent. His troubled counte- 
nance grew calm as he thanked God in his heart 
that he had been enabled to speak the truth. 



J^O&GIVENESS. IJ3 

CHAPTER VII. 

FORGIVENESS. 

Dick felt that he had no friend but Willy in 
all the school. The teachers thought he was try" 
ing to deceive them, and his o£fence against his 
school-mates in revealing their wrong-doing was 
the last which a schoolboy can ever overlook. 

Alone in the room to which he had been sent 
for solitary confinement while the aflFair of the 
cards was under investigation, he fell upon his 
knees and tried to pray. His thoughts were all 
in a tumult, and he tried to calm them by rever- 
ently repeating the Lord's Prayer. 

** Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debt- 
ors.'' 

Dick paused at these words, started up from 
his kneeling posture, and paced his room with 
flushed cheeks and flashing eyes. 

Forgive ! Oh, how could he forgive even the 
teachers who so cruelly misunderstood him, much 
less the boys who had maliciously ensnared him 
to save themselves, and now heaped scorn upon 
him for what they knew he regarded a simple act 
of duty? 



134 i>iCK langdon's career. 

**If they would ask me to forgive them, or 
were sorry even without asking me, I could do 
it," thought Dick; **but I am afraid God means 
we must forgive before they even want we 
should." 

Dick had his Testament in his pocket, and re- 
membering that somewhere in Matthew he had 
read about the king's wicked servant who would 
not forgive his fellow-servant, he found the place 
in the last half of the eighteenth chapter, and, 
after reading it, almost concluded that it might be 
right to wait until he was asked before he forgave 
the boys. '* For," reasoned Dick, ** it says, *His 
fellow-servant fell down at his feet and besought 
him, . . . and he would not;' so perhaps I may 
wait till they ask me." 

But Dick could not finish the Lord's Prayer. 
Anxious as he was to go on with it that he might 
pray, '* Deliver me from evil," he could not get 
over the words, "As we forgive our debtors;" for 
he kept remembering that in the sixth chapter of 
Matthew the very next words after the prayer are, 
**Por if ye forgive men their trespasses, your 
Heavenly Father will also forgive you ; but if ye 
forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your 
Father forgive your trespasses." He opened his 
Testament again, reading the prayer and the 
words which follow. Then his eye fell upon a 



Il'ORGIVENESS. 135 

verse at the top comer of the same page: '* Bless 
them that curse you, do good to them that hate 
you, and pray for them which despitefully use 
you and persecute you." Matt. 5:44. 

Poor Dick was clear as to his duty now, as 
every one ever will be who sincerely seeks to 
know it from the Bible, though it was still hard, 
very hard to do his duty; but God helped him to 
conquer himself and to forgive at last. Then he 
could ask his Father to deliver him from evil, to 
bring him safely through all his troubles. 

Late in the afternoon Mr. Elton came to hear 
the lessons which had been assigned to Dick for 
the day. He had learned them thoroughly; he 
said them well, and his manner towards his teach- 
er was gentle and respectful. 

"I confess I do not know what to make of 
you, Richard," said Mr. Elton when the tasks 
were completed. " It does seem to me now that 
you are innocent in this matter. If you are, you 
must forgive me that, while trying to act the part 
of a true friend towards you, I have still taken it 
for granted that you were deceiving us." 

"I forgave you this morning, and the boys 
too — which was harder. It should not have been 
hard, but it was. I have so often deceived that I 
did not deserve to be trusted, and I wonder that 
you can believe me now. I can't say how much 



136 DICK langdon's career. 

I thank you, Mr. Elton, or how hard I will try to 
deserve your confidence." 

*' Do you say you forgive the boys for plotting 
to get you into this trouble and keeping you in it 
by their own deceit, while they hate, revile, and 
persecute you for honoring the truth they trample 
under foot?" 

*'Yes, sir, I think I do forgive them; I wish 
them well; I pray God will do them good; I 
would do every one of them good and no evil 
myself." 

'* Who taught you such a lesson as that, Rich- 
ard ? You never could have learned it of me." 

" I dare say not, sir: I was so hard at getting 
it But my Heavenly Father puts it very strong 
to me. I must have his forgiveness or die; and 
he will not forgive me until I have forgiven my 
worst enemy." 



W>VE. 137 



CHAPTER VIII. 

U)VE. 

The investigation respecting the cards result- 
ed very speedily in proving the truth of Dick's 
statement as to the means by which they came 
within the buildings. The teachers, with the ex- 
ception of Mr. Elton, did not, however, credit his 
assertion that he had never handled them. The 
boys knew him to be innocent, but they were all 
against him for having told of them, and pretend- 
ed to think him a liar, a hypocrite, and all evil 
things combined. Through Mr. Elton's influence 
he was exempted from punishment then, and was 
restored to his place in the schoolroom, but his 
position was a very trying one. 

**I thought I forgave the boys," said Dick to 
Willy, "but I fear I did not entirely. I don't 
know as I feel quite right towards them. It seems 
to me something is wanting." 

** Perhaps, while you forgive them, you don't 
love them enough, Dick." 

**IyOve them! O Willy, I never could love 
them unless they changed; they are too wicked 
and hateful." 



138 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

" You don't understand me, Dick. It is not 
that you are to love their bad ways; but surely 
you are to love bad people in the same manner 
that Jesus does, trying to do them good. ' Love 
your enemies; bless them that curse you, do good 
to them that hate you, and pray for them which 
despitefully use you and persecute you.' " 

*' I don't know, Willy, whether I love them 
or not, in the way Jesus meant. I hate their bad 
ways and thoughts, which I used to love, but I 
don't wish them any evil for all their abuse of 
me." 

"More than that, Dick; you see that if you 
would be a child of your Father in heaven, you 
must not only not wish them evil, but labor to do 
them good." 

'* If I do this, Willy, can I be sure that I have 
the love Jesus meant?" 

"Yes." 

"Willy, don't you think we ought to love 
our friends better than we do our enemies? I 
do n't think I can help loving you more than I do 
Peter Martin; and I know I love Mr. Elton a 
great deal more now than I possibly could before 
he was my friend." 

"I guess you are right there, Dick. I don't 
know a word in the Bible against loving our 
friends best, and I rather think it would be in- 



U)VE. 139 

gratitude if we did n't But it certainly says we 
must love our enemies too, and that, just because 
they are our enemies, we must try to do them 
good." 

Dick had been so unmercifully teased and tor- 
mented by the boys, that he had come to avoid 
them as much as possible; but after praying over 
the closing verses of the fifth chapter of Matthew, 
he went among them again, resolved to try to 
bear their abuse patiently and to watch for oppor- 
tunities to do them good. 

** I shall get a first-class licking this noon, any 
way," cried Peter Martin as Dick approached a 
group of boys. * * Old Hawk has been threatening 
to pounce upon me for a month, and at one o'clock 
I'm to catch a huge thrashing if I haven't got 
this sum done, and a huge thrashing if the stent I 
shirked yesterday isn't found hoed; and 'tis cer- 
tain sure I can't do both." 

A little more than a month had elapsed since 
Dick's assault upon Martin, who had verified 
John's words by getting caught by Mr. Hawkins 
himself in the act of speaking contrary to orders, 
and had received for it such a severe scourging 
that his back was not yet well. He was then 
sent into solitary confinement for a time, and 
when released the old restriction about not speak- 
ing was removed by Mr. Hawkins, as too trouble- 



140 i>iCK langdon's career. 

some to be enforced. He, however, threatened 
to '* pounce upon him " if he gave any occasion. 
Dick, on hearing what Martin said, felt real com- 
passion for him, and going close to him said, 

*'I will do the hoeing for you, Peter, instead 
of eating my dinner.'' 

**I bet you will! Oh, dear! how good you 
are !" said Martin derisively. 

'* I will indeed, Martin; so do try to finish the 
arithmetic lesson and escape all blame." 

Peter put his thumb to his nose and with his 
fingers made the old significant gesture of con- 
tempt towards Dick, who quietly left the play- 
ground in the direction of the field. He was 
obliged to work hard and fast to accomplish Mar- 
tin's task in season; but a few minutes before one 
o'clock he sought him to let him know that it 
was finished. He was puzzling over his slate. 

** The hoeing is all done; how goes the arith- 
metic, Peter?" said Dick cheerfully. 

The dread of the rod which he expected would 
speedily be upon him for this and a score of past 
offences, in one of ''old Hawks's" never-to-be- 
forgotten whippings, quite subdued Martin's pride, 
and he cried, 

*' Dick, have you done up that hoeing for me ! 
Now if I could only get this old answer out right! 
but the plaguey thing wont come !" 



LOVE. 141 

*' L/Ct me see. Oh, here is the mistake, Peter, 
just at the end; how fortunate that you have the 
most of it all right ! You correct it now while I 
look over to keep you right There now, that is 
the correct answer all straight; and you under- 
stand the work, don't you?'' Before he could 
answer, the teacher was heard coming, and Dick 
fled to his own seat; not from any sense of guilt, 
there being no rule to forbid giving help in les- 
sons, but from regard to Martin's feelings. 

*' It is lucky for you, Martin, that your hoeing 
is reported done, and it is luckier still for you if 
you have done that example," said Mr. Hawkins 
roughly. He was the terror of the school; deal- 
ing with other bad natures had made him almast 
savage, and to fall into his hands was the highest 
dread of the boys. Martin passed up his slate in 
silence. 

** Explain it," said Mr. Hawkins after read- 
ing the answer. 

Martin explained it correctly. 

'* Who helped you do this?" said Mr. Haw- 
kins crossly. He seemed indeed like a beast 
cheated of his prey. 

*' Nobody hasn't helped me," said Peter 
boldly. *' I have n't seen a soul but Dick since I 
began the sum, and he isn't likely to be much 
help to me very soon, I calculate." 



l^Z DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

*' Likely not," growled Mr. Hawkins as he 
left the room. 

'* Come, Dick Langdon, now preach me a 
sermon on lying," said Peter, turning to Dick. 

*'0 Peter, I am sorry you said you didn't 
have help." 

**0h, I don't wonder your feelings are easily 
hurt on the head of lying; but I did n't lie either. 
I said nobody helped me, and nobody didn't; for 
you 're a sight less than nobody, by all accounts;" 
and with the same old gesture of contempt towards 
Dick, Peter left the room. 

** * lyove your enemies; pray for them which 
despitefully use you,' " whispered Dick, as he 
bowed his head upon his desk. 



PATIENCE. 143 



CHAPTER IX. 

PATIENCE. 

My readers must not think that because Dick 
had become a Christian he found it easy to be 
good. It had cost him a terrible struggle to for- 
give and love his enemies, and it was only by 
thinking much what a great sinner he was him- 
self, and how lost he should be without his Heav- 
enly Father's pardon, that he succeeded for a time. 
He had hoped that the boys, with whom he had 
always been popular while he was bad, would be 
easily won over by his kindness: and he found 
himself greatly depressed and discouraged by 
Martin's cruel return for his favors. 

*'You must be patient," said Willy. "It 
wouldn't cost much to be forgiving, if people 
turned right about and treated you well just as 
soon as you were kind to them." 

But patience was not at all Dick's forte. He 
was quick, impulsive for good or evil, and could 
fight a brave battle with himself, or any one else. 
He had once fought down his angry feelings to- 
wards the boys, meaning it should be once for all; 
but when it came to that patient watchfulness, 



144 MCK i,angdon's career. 

which alone, even with God's help, can keep 
good feelings in the heart, he fell oflF sadly. So 
having thought over his wrongs in a spirit no lon- 
ger loving, and slept upon it, he went into the 
play-ground the next day thinking, **I haven't 
much patience with the boys, and I don't believe 
it would do much good if I had; they must be 
made to know that I haven't lost my spirit" 

Now it so happened that the little seat-mate 
John, who at heart was fond of Dick, had quite 
relented towards him, on hearing how nobly he 
had treated Martin, and had resolved to make up 
with him the first opportunity. As the first step 
towards the making up, he resolved to knock 
Dick's cap off, and throw it over the play-ground 
fence into the yard, where, to reach it, he must 
go back through the school-room. John had 
made up his mind that Dick would meekly return 
and get it, and if he did he meant to tell him he 
was sorry he had teazed him, and had known all 
the time that he was right, and that they were 
all treating him "meaner than dirt" 

According to the programme Dick's cap went 
over the fence. Quite contrary to the programme, 
John went after it head first, having been in- 
stantly seized in Dick's strong grasp, and tossed 
over the fence like a bag of potatoes. There was 
a scream when John went over, followed by a si* 



PATIENCE 14s 

lence^ and Dick grew pale, not more in terror for 
the result of his act, than at the thought that all 
his good resolutions were again broken. 

*' You've smashed his bones without doubt, if 
not killed him," cried a big boy gleefully; look- 
ing at Dick's white face. ** Better tell old Hawk, 
before he licks you, that you took John for a cat, 
and sent him over after your cap, expecting him 
to light on his feet whichever way he was thrown. ' ' 
Dick made no answer, but rushed to John's help 
through the school-room. 

**What is the matter, Richard," asked Mr. 
Elton, who was writing at his desk. 

**0, Mr. Elton, I got angry with John, and 
threw him over the pickets into the back-yard. 
Please do come, and see if I have killed him !" 

John, who was by no means killed, being 
much more frightened than hurt, picked himself 
up very tenderly, just as Mr. Elton and Dick ap- 
peared, eying the latter with mingled anger and 
awe. 

**0 John, tell me if you are much hurt? 
Where are you hurt?" cried Dick. 

^^I guess I'm not killed, as I thought: and 
none of my bones are broken either, ' ' replied John, 
reflectively, stretching his arms and legs one by 
one; "but then they might have been for all 
you, Dick Langdon. Do you see that stone 



146 DICK I^ANGDON'S career. 

post; I came within one of bringing up against 
that" 

** Richard, did you say you threw him over?'* 
asked Mr. Elton. 

*'Yes, sir." 

**What did he do to provoke you?" 

** Nothing, sir, worth minding. I haven't 
the least excuse." 

**John, what did you do to him?" 

** Knocked oflF his cap, sir, and hove it over 
here just to tease him, and see how good he would 
be; to see if believed in non-resistance." 

"Well, you find he don't: so stop teasing 
him in future. John, you may go." 

With an indigant glance at Dick, John return- 
ed to the play-ground where the boys, finding 
him none the worse for his fall, save a few 
scratches, had their laugh at his expense, and 
concluded not to give Dick up as altogether too 
good quite yet. 

As for Dick himself, he stood with Mr. Elton, 
alone, in one of the recitation rooms, filled with 
such bitter shame and regret as no one can under- 
stand who has not, by some rash or foolish deed, 
defeated his own deep-laid purpose of reform. 

** Richard, it is too true that you might have 
killed John," said Mr. Elton mildly. *'You 
could not see where you threw him upon the 



PATIENCE. 147 

Other side of the fence, and he fell within a foot 
of that stone post. ' ' 

** Yes, sir," answered Dick, shuddering. 

*'You did not mean to do such things any 
more, Richard." 

*'No, sir; but I did do if 

*' You do not say that you are sorry, or that 
you will try to do better in future.'' 

**Mr. Elton, you know—'' stammered Dick, 
choking. 

** Yes, your face tells me that ' sorry ' is not a 
word strong enough to express your regret And 
you wont give up trying?" 

'* No, sir, I dare not, I would not, I must not; 
but—" 

*' Well, Richard; but what?" 

'* Mr. Elton, I am dead discouraged. Is it so 
very, very hard to do as Christ tells us, even when 
we love him and wish to obey him?" 

'' It is very hard to be truly good, Richard. I 
have myself tried it a little sometimes, but never 
succeeded at all to my mind. As to love of 
Christ, ah! my boy, you have the start of me 
there; if you would tell me how to love God, I 
would try to tell you how to obey him better than 
we do now." 

Dick was sorely embarrassed. Standing, a 
self-condemned culprit awaiting punishment at 



148 DICK I^NGDON'S career. 

his teacher's hand, what could he do but be si- 
lent? Yet Mr. Elton waited as if he expected an 
answer. 

'*0h, Mr. Elton, I am sure you, who know 
the Bible, must love Jesus who died for you. I 
did not know that story of the cross until Willy 
lent me his Testament" 

*'It has had power to change you," said Mr. 
Elton reflectively. Dick hung his head in speech- 
less confusion, thinking his teacher's words a bit- 
ter irony. 

"Richard," said Mr. Elton, rousing himself 
from a reflection of several minutes, "I am very 
sorry that it is not possible for me to let your of- 
fence pass. Mr. Hawkins only reluctantly yield- 
ed to my entreaty to overlook the matter of the 
cards on the strength of my pledge for your fu- 
ture good behaviour and my promise to report 
your very next offence to him. Must I not keep 
my word?" 

"Yes, indeed, sir," cried brave Dick almost 
joyfully. "I deserve to be punished, and I will 
bear it patiently; but, oh, that wont — wont — what 
is the word, Mr. Elton, that means make up for 
the wrong?" 

" Atone. Do you mean that bearing patient- 
ly the severe punishment Mr. Hawkins will in- 
flict will not atone for your fault?" 



PATliKCB. 149 

"Yes, ^ir; that can't atone.'* 

*'But if you are very sorry and humble and 
patient and submissive, an^ are very severely 
punished, may you not feel that altogether you 
have in some measure atoned for it?" 

** Oh, no, sir ! Oh, not one bit !" 

Just here the door-knob turned slowly and a 
timid, anxious face peeped in. 

"Come, my good little Willy," said Mr. El- 
ton, '*we need you here. Tell Dick what can 
atone for his sin." 

"Oh, sir, we all know that! 'The blood of 
Jesus Christ'" 



150 DICK langdon's career. 



CHAPTER X. 

HOPE. 

Dick had always loved his mother. In his 
worst days at home he had often resolved to do 
better for her sake; but when the tide of tempta- 
tion set upon him his resolutions had all been 
swept before it, and her heart was made to bleed 
afresh for her only son. She was not a Christian, 
and had never sought herself or guided her son to 
the only source of true strength. When Dick's 
promise, made over his drunken father's coffin, 
never to taste the intoxicating cup, was broken, 
her heart despaired for him, and never had she 
been so utterly wretched as since he had been in 
the Reform School. The last prop of her strength 
broken in Dick's downfall, she would have sunk 
into utter hopelessness had it not been for the 
baby, for whose sake she must live and struggle 
on; for daily bread came only from the labor 
of her hands in washing, ironing, and sewing. 
One evening, as she was taking in the clean 
clothes from the line, some one passing called to 
her, 

**Mrs. lyangdon, there's a letter for you at 



HOPE- 151 

the post-office; been on the list a week or so; I 
thought may be you didn't know it" 

Mrs. Langdon said, ** Thank you,'' in her sub- 
dued way, while she thought, *'A letter! Who 
could write to me? Can it be Dick? Could he 
write me from that place? Would he think of 
me and do it?" 

Fifteen minutes later Mrs. Langdon lighted 
her little lamp and sat down to read the follow- 
ing letter: 

" State Reform School, September 10, 18 — . 

''My Dearest Mother: Do not think I 
have forgotten you because I have not written 
before. The boys here do not often write letters, 
but Mr. Elton, one of the teachers, has given me 
leave to write to you as often as I choose, and he 
reads and mails my letters. 

'' Dear mother, I am trying in earnest to be a 
better boy. You will not think my trying can 
ever amount to anything, when I have failed so 
many times before; but I do hope to be better 
now, for I pray to God every day, and many times 
a day, that I may. I am glad I was sent here, 
although I am sorry for the crime for which I was 
sent, because here in this place I have found the 
Bible, and have learned about Jesus Christ who 
came into the world to save sinners, of whom I 
am chief; and, oh, mother, I do hope he has for- 



152 DICK LANGDON^S CAREER. 

given my sins, and I want to obey him in future. 
And although I succeed very badly, I still hope 
and pray and try to do better. I feel that it is a 
very dreadful thing for one whom God has once 
forgiven to keep on disobeying him; yet that is 
just what I am doing every day of my life. But 
I don't despair; I keep on hoping and trjung. I 
think you used to have a Bible, laid away very 
choice somewhere, which none of us ever read. 
Please take it out and read it, for I know it will 
do you good and comfort you. Please read the 
fifteenth chapter of Luke. I like to read that 
O mother, if I had only learned it when I was a 
little boy ! Do teach little sister just as soon as 
she can understand to love and obey our Heaven- 
ly Father. 

** Mother, I meant to commence this letter by 
asking you to forgive me all my disobedience and 
all the grief I have caused you. Only to say * I 
am sorry' seems very cold. My eyes and my 
heart are full of tears as I write it. By and by I 
shall come to you — my term was short and is half 
out now — and when I come I will work for you, 
and help and comfort you all I can; and by 
Christ's help I will never, never go back to the 
bad ways which I learned in the wicked street 
schools. I will try to learn Christ's lessons; they 
are good lessons, dear mother, and I want you to 



HOPE. 153 

stndy them with mc. Then you can guide and 
help me. 

** We have a chance to learn here, if we try, 
and 1 am getting on very fast in my studies. Mr. 
Elton, who helps me all I need, says I learn very 
rapidly, and should hurt myself with study if it 
wasn't that we have to work a good deal too. 
How many times I disobeyed you by playing tru- 
ant from school ! How good for me if I had only 
had a kind father to punish me as I deserved. 
God forgive me for not heeding your entreaties 
and tears ! 

** Please write to me, according to the direc- 
tion which I send. Do write if it is only a line 
to say you are alive and well, and that you for- 
give me, and will hope better things in the future 
from your son, 

"DICK." 

"Naughty letter! makes mamma cry,'* lisped 
Etta trying to pull it from her mother's hand. 

"No, darling; good letter, blessed, blessed 
letter I Brother Dick has learned to be good. ' ' 

The child slept at last, prattling till her eyes 
closed of her brother Dick, who had always been 
kind to her, and of whom she remembered only 
good. Then the mother sought the neglected 
Bible. It was laid away in a drawer, wrapped 
in a dean cloth, as she had been wont to hide it— 



154 WCK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

a precious keepsake of her youth — from the greedy 
clutch of her husband, who would gladly have 
sold it for drink. She turned to the fifteenth 
chapter of Luke and read it 

** It isn't for me. There never will be joy in 
heaven over my repenting/' was her agonized 
thought. **My heart has been growing harder, 
harder, harder, all these years of my earthly mis- 
ery. God is not my loving Father. I can't go 
to him. I do n't know how to find him. O Dick, 
my poor neglected boy, God may well seek you, 
and find you, but me, never ! If I had lived by 
this book who knows but your father might ! If 
I had trained you by its teachings you would not 
be where you are." 

The little lamp burned dim and went out, un- 
heeded; the waning moon looked in upon the mo- 
ther's head, bowed there while she struggled with 
remorse. The gray dawn found her pleading, 
'*Por Thy name's sake, O Lord, pardon mine 
iniquity; for it is great." As the jising sun 
lighted the room she arose and turned the leaves 
of her Bible no longer despairingly. Over the 
mountains of her sin the wounded feet came, 
seeking her pleading soul. The wounded hand 
of mercy grasped her. Hope, heaven-born, dawned 
upon her with the morning light 



joi^ 155 



CHAPTER XI. 



JOY. 



Mr. Elton had a letter for Dick, which, ac- 
cording to the rules, he must open and read be- 
fore giving it to its rightful owner. The teacher 
was a gentleman, and felt repugnance at the act 
of breaking the seal, but he was accustomed to 
put down that sentiment in the discharge of many 
official duties; so he opedfed the letter and read: 

"September 15, 18— 

*'My Dear Son: It was good to hear from 
you; before you wrote, it seemed as if I had lost 
you, but now I have found you, my own dear 
boy. 

"And, Dick, I must tell you at once that I 
hope my Heavenly Father has found me, and that 
I have found him. I had no rest after your letter 
came, until I could say with you, *I do hope that 
Jesus has forgiven my sins.' Ah ! my poor boy, 
how many of the sins of your youth lie at my 
door. You ask me to forgive you; I do, indeed. 
But can you forgive me, who should have guided 
your infant feet to God, instead of leaving them 



156 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

to Stray as they did ? I can't write of these things, 
but I long for your coming. 

**It seems like a new world to me, my boy. 
The clouds were so black overhead, that I never 
thought to see light again, but light has broken 
through. There is joy in my heart, there is joy 
in yours; and in the chapter you asked me to 
read it says, 'There is joy in heaven over one 
sinner that repenteth.' If that very word had 
not been in the Bible I do n't know as I ever could 
have found my way out of the darkness. 

'*Baby remembers *Dit,' and she always in- 
sists that *Dit is dood.' You will be anxious to 
know how I have got along in supporting myself 
and your little sister. We have not suffered: I 
have been able to get work, which has supplied 
our actual wants. I have work waiting now to 
be done, and must therefore say good-by. Write 
very often to your own 

"MOTHER." 

When Mr. Elton had read the letter he sent 
it by a trusty messenger to Dick, and then sat 
absorbed in thought; and his thought went up to 
to God. He had always led an upright life; the 
most fault-finding had never been able to take 
any exception to his conduct, and his tastes were 
averse to all things low and ungentlemanly. Yet 
this refined and elevated nature had found some- 



JOY. 157 

thing in Dick's simple heart-experience — the ex- 
perience of the poor condemned culprit of the 
Reform School, which touched his heart, and 
made him think of himself as a sinner in God's 
sight; and now, again, the words of the mother's 
letter moved him to thoughtfulness and prayer. 
For years he had been seeking to ennoble him- 
self, striving to shun the low and attain the high, 
yet he had found no rest, no inward fountain of 
joy, like that springing up in the hearts of these 
repentant ones; no testimony that angels rejoiced 
over him, or that God was pleased with him. 
Now he began to fear that he was quite on the 
wrong track, in his attempt to journey upward; 
that he had not yet found the door of entrance 
into the heavenly way; and groping for it he 
found it less easily than poor Dick, because it 
was so much harder for him, than for Dick, to 
give up all thought of fitness in himself, and 
cling only to Christ's promise to the penitent 
sinner. 

Dick was accustomed to go to Mr. Elton's 
room for instruction an hour every morning. 
This morning he found his teacher looking pale; 
and thinking him ill, exclaimed, 

''Mr. Elton, were you sick last night? Is 
there anything I can do for you?" 

"Come here, Dick. I think I can tell you 



158 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

better than any one else. It is not my body, but 
my soul that is sick. Do you know what that 
means?" 

**Yes, Mr. Elton, I do know." 

''Well, Dick, when the soul is sick is there 
any remedy?" 

''The Bible tells us, sir: it says, 'Yes.' " 

"There are so many if's, so many conditions, 
which I fear I do not meet." 

" It don't seem so to me, sir. It seems to me 
that Jesus is very willing, very anxious to save 
sinners." 

"I do not doubt that, but the difficulties in 
me seem insurmountable." 

" Too great for God, Mr. Elton ?" 

"I would speak with great reverence when I 
answer yes, I fear the difficulties in my own case 
are too great even for God to overcome." 

"Don't say so, Mr, Elton; please don't think 
so ! Does the Bible say anything like that, even 
of the chief of sinners ?' ' 

"The Bible seems very clear on one fearful 
point, that without holiness no man shall see the 
Lord ; and I have n't a bit of holiness. I ' ve spent 
the night looking it over, and I find all that I 
had thought holy to be vile in God's sight, to 
whom the very heavens are not clean. Now 
what is to be done?" 



JOY. 159 

"Why, Mr. Elton, if you feel so, you can go 
right to Christ and he will forgive you. You 
know if you felt righteous, you couldn't go near 
him, because it is only sinners to whom he says, 
*Come.'" 

** But the Bible, from beginning to end, shows 
God the hater and punisher of sin." 

*'And O, Mr. Elton, it shows him to us as 
the lover of the sinner, even to the death on 
the cross." 

Mr. Elton grasped the Bible with both hands. 
" Let me hold that thought, Dick. I shall do it 
best alone; come back in an hour. 

Dick went away to pray. 

*'Mr. Elton turned the leaves of his Bible 
thoughtfully. He was very calm, as one under 
the weight of fearful responsibility. He searched 
to know if the God of the Bible, hating sin, yet 
loves the sinner, and he found God in Christ, at 
Calvary's cross, loving the sinner even unto death. 
He was reading in the Gospel of John, his lashes 
wet with manly tears, when Dick rapped timid- 
ly at his door. 

'*You told me to come in an hour," said 
Dick, apologetically, when he had opened the 
door in response to Mr. Elton's quiet '* Come.'* 

"I am glad to see you, but am surprised that 
the hour is gone. Look here, Dick, isn't this 



i6o DICK langdon's career. 

wonderful: 'That whosoever believeth in Him 
should not perish, but have eternal life.* 'For 
God so loved the world, that he gave his only- 
begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, 
should not perish, but have everlasting life? ' " 

''Yes, sir. I often wonder what could God 
find to love in us — ^sinners, full of what he ab- 
hors!" 

" Until to-day I was blind to the fact that sin 
makes us unfit for his love. Now, in the dawn- 
ing light, I see that we are indeed unworthy of 
his notice; yet he loves something immor^^al 
within us, which his grace, with our consent, can 
make capable of heaven." 

Dick looked a little bewildered. 

" God loves the immortal soul he breathed into 
us, Dick, and will save it from sin, for Christ's 
sake, if we will accept his terms," 

"Yes, sir, I understand that." 

"And what are the terms, Dick?" 

"That we hate our sins, and try to stop sin- 
ning, and trust Jesus to forgive and save us be- 
cause he promises that he will." 

" Yes," replied Mr. Elton, very thoughtfully, 
" these surely are the terms, repentance and faith. 
* There is none other name under heaven, given 
among men, whereby we must be saved.' You 
remember, Dick, how in Gethsemane Christ 



JOY. l6l 

prayed that if it were possible the cup might pass 
from4iim, and it was not possible?" 

"Yes, sir, you mean if there had been any 
other way to save sinners, Christ need not have 
suffered." 

"And if we could become holy by our own 
resolves and efforts, we should not need Christ. I 
believe his word, and accept him as my Saviour." 

And again there was joy in heaven. 



IB 



l62 DICK I«ANGDON'S CARE^K. 

CHAPTER XII. 

IJIRGB-HEARTBDNBSS. 

" I HAVE some news for you, Richard,** said 
Mr. Elton, about a month after the events of our 
last chapter. 

"Is it good, or bad news, sir?" asked Dick^ 
unable to decide that question from his teacher's 
quiet manner. 

"I think you will regard the news as partly 
good and partly bad. I am to leave the Reform 
School in about a week, to become principal of 
the Academy at Lyme." 

"That is good news, I am, sure, Mr. Elton; I 
am right glad for you, sir." 

"I had flattered myself, Richard, that I should 
leave a sad heart missing me." 

"My heart, selfish as it is, isn't quite mean 
enough to want to keep you in a place like this 
for its own benefit" 

"Here is my hand on that statement, and may 
your heart never grow top small to hold it" 

"Growing small must be a queer kind of 
growth !" 

"It is a common form of heart disease, Rich- 



U^^RGE-HKARTEDNKSS, 163 

ard, but not constitutional with you, I imagine: 
if it were, grace and nature would have a hard 
tussle before you rejoiced to part with a dear friend 
purely for his own good." 

**I am glad for you; but I haven't stopped to 
think how hard it will be to struggle on without 
you. I feel I shan't be very brave in beaming it, 
but I am sure I wouldn't keep you. Much as I 
may long to see you, I shall never wish you back 
here." 

"You have understood the painfulness of my 
position more fully than I supposed." 

Dick's eyes flashed up a look of intelligence 
into his teacher's, as he replied, 

"With Mr. Hawkins at the head, and such a 
set of boys to rule, what a life you have led !" 

The conversation, which )vas in the school- 
room, was here interrupted, and Mr. Elton, with 
his eyes upon a book, thought, instead of reading: 

"Richard is a noble boy; altogether he pos- 
sesses an uncommon make-up of good qualities. 
For the animal part, he has a finely developed, 
healthy body, which would soon, however, have 
gone to ruin but for his reform. Then his mind 
is of no common order. Where others walk he 
runs; he only walks where others stumble and 
fall. He was bom to be a marked character, a 
leader in good or evil, and now that he has begun 



164 DICK I^ANGDON'S career. 

to live unto God, he is a strange being indeed; all 
the forces of his soul seem to have gone over from 
Satan to Christ I wish I could see a hundredth 
part the change in my own heart that I see in his; 
but his is one of those strong, ardent natures 
which loves, and hates, and serves with a will. 
The more reason he should be educated into fit- 
ness for any service to which God may call him. 
I wish I could have him with me at Lyme; it is 
only pleasure to teach a mind like his. But then 
there is dear, timid, little Willy, his heart loving 
and confiding as a girPs, his sufferings here are 
greater in some respects than Richards' s since the 
boys have set upon them both as in partnership. 
I can take only one of them away, and it is as 
hard for me to decide which, as it was for Mr. 
Dustin to select one of his children to be delivered 
from the Indian's tomahawk." 

In explanation of Mr. Elton's thoughts, be it 
here told that in reply to a petition to the proper 
authorities for the release of Dick and Willy, be- 
fore the expiration of their term of confinement, 
on the plea of thorough reform, and good deport- 
ment, a letter had been received promising to 
pardon out one of them — whichever should be 
recommended — ^but declining, for reasons which 
need not here be mentioned, to release both. 

**I want Richard, there is no denying that I 



LARGE-HEARTEDNESS. 165 

do want him most ! I love Willy, for a precious, 
winsome boy, but Richard is becoming my friend. 
I want to judge impartially, but the balance of 
duty is so even that it is hard to tell which way 
it turns. The other teachers leave it all to me; 
neither of the boys is a favorite with Mr. Haw- 
kins, who is ready to sign away either or both of 
them. I believe I will leave it to the boys them- 
selves; which ever remains will be sustained by 
the thought that the other had the benefit I 
wonder what Willy will say when he knows I am 
going." Mr. Elton called Willy into his room 
that afternoon, saying to him as he had said to 
Dick. 

*' I have some news for you.'* 

*'What news can there be for me, sir," said 
Willy, remembering sadly that he had not a rel- 
ative to write a letter on his account. 

"I am going to leave here soon, to become 
principal of the Academy at Lyme." 

Willy was instantly sensible of the existence 
of a great lump in his throat; his eyes filled with 
tears and ran over in spite of him. 

** I knew you would be sorry to lose me, Willy, 
but 'tis better for me, you know and the remain- 
ing months of your stay will be gone at last" 

''If I had any one to go to then! I haven't 
a friend on earth but you and Dick." 



i66 DICK i^angdon's career. 

*' Perhaps the heavenly Friend comes nearer 
to you on that account'' 

**He wont while I feel as rebellious as I do 
just now," sobbed Willy, and quite overcome, he 
turned and rushed away that he might be alone. 

Again Mr. Elton sat and thought, then he sent 
for Dick, and told him of the case and that it had 
been his purpose to try and find a home for Willy 
at Lyme, and to make some arrangement, if pos- 
sible, for Dick to attend his school, adding, 

**Now only one can be released, Richard, and 
I find it impossible to decide between you." 

*'Mr. Elton, how can you hesitate a moment 
between us?" 

** Why should I not hesitate?" 

** Willy is the one to go. He has been here 
longest, and is least able to bear what must be 
borne here. I certainly should not go to leave 
him here without a friend, after all he has done 
for me. Do you remember how much I owe 
him?" 

** I see that you remember it, Richard ; and I, 
too, remember a debt of gratitude I owe to one of 
my pupils here." 

** I have no doubt you may feel that you owe 
him gratitude ; but that is nothing to my debt, 
you know I owe him everything." 

'* Willy is n't the one to whom my debt is due, 



I^RGE-HEARTEDNESS. 167 

Richard ; I suppose you can't guess whom else I 
could mean?" 

** Surely not me, Mr. Elton ! I don't know 
what I have done for you but give you trouble." 

** Never mind, some other time I will explain 
to you. So you are quite decided that Willy is 
the one to go?" 

*' Yes, sir, and I'm so glad for him, and for 
you, that I shan't mind a bit staying out my 
time, I 'm older and stronger than Willy. Then 
you have started me so in my studies that I can 
learn with the other teachers, and they will let 
me have letters from you and Willy and mother, 
and my Bible and Christ will be just as near me 
here as anywhere. I shall get on finely." 

** Well done, Richard! Go and hunt up Willy, 
who is breaking his heart over the thought of los- 
ing me. You will make him the happiest boy in 
the land." 

** I will tell him there was a petition that he 
be pardoned out for good conduct, and that the 
petition is granted, and you are going to take him 
with you to Lyme. It wont be wrong to leave 
all out about myself, will it, Mr. Elton?" 

** No, Richard, it is quite the opposite of wrong 
to forget all about ourselves." 



i68 DICK langdon's career- 

chapter XIII. 

SELF-SACRIFICE. 

Dick had said that he should be so glad for 
Mr. Elton and Willy that it would be easy for him 
to stay out his time at the reform school. He had 
a brave heart and a generous purpose, too strong 
to be bent or broken, and he bore himself cheer- 
fully, even joyfully, until all the leave-takings 
were over, and his only dear friends had left him, 
alone with his enemies, and worse still, the enemies 
of the Saviour whom he was trying to love and 
serve. But when they were quite gone, and he 
no longer needed to be cheerful on account of their 
presence, his heart sank like lead; the coming 
months of his imprisonment, which his thoughts 
had passed over as only a little moment, stood out 
before him as an almost interminable succession 
of weeks, days, hours, minutes, which it seemed 
almost impossible he could ever live through, 
when the present moment was so hard to bear. 
He realized that a look into the new Bible, which 
Mr. Elton had given him as a parting gift and a 
few minutes of prayer might help him, but it was 
the hour for work, and to that he must go. As 



SKI<F-SACRIFICE. l6g 

he bent himself to his task in the garden it did 
not occur to him that although his beloved friends 
were gone, and although he could not escape to 
his closet to seek his Saviour, that best friend was 
still with him, ready to listen to his heart's faint- 
est whisper. Dick had been a quick scholar in 
Christ's schools, but he was yet a very young 
Christian, with volumes and volumes of God's 
love to sinners lying before him with the leaves 
all uncut 

Dick was never a mope, or an idler, and the 
deep rooted carrots yielded themselves rapidly to 
his hands, while some tears which he was too 
proud to be caught brushing away, fell on the 
mellow soil. He was greatly discouraged by his 
own low spirits, having made the very common 
mistake of thinking that if he did a right and 
noble deed, God would so help him in doing it 
that he would not feel the sacrifice of his own 
interests and pleasure. He had not reflected that 
there would be no crosses for us to bear if God 
bore them all for us. 

'*Lost every friend you have in creation, hey, 
Dick ! Better try to pick up some of your old 
ones; they might do better than nothing, upon a 
pinch." The voice was familiar, but it seemed 
to come from beneath him, and it took Dick a few 
seconds to perceive that his former seatmate, John, 



170 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

in digging a ditch for drainage, had come quite 
near him just the other side of the hedge, 

**I would like to be friends with you, John, 
but I am not surprised that you do n't feel like it, 
and can't have confidence in me since the day I 
got so angry with you, I wish I could do any- 
thing to c6nvince you how sorry I am." 

A derisive giggle and a shower of soft mud 
from the drain, adroitly thrown at him over the 
hedge, was the only response. John had been 
very bitter against Dick ever since he threw him 
over the picket fence. 

As Dick washed the mud from his face and 
eyes at the pump, Mr. Osborne, the general sti* 
perintendent of the farm, approached him, say- 
ing, 

" How came that, Langdon ?" 

''It came by my own doings, sir," said 
Dick, thinking remorsefully of his conduct to 
John. 

**How so? Been spattering yourself with 
mire?" 

** Yes, sir; so to speak." 

''Metaphorically, as the books call it, is it? 
Your own fault then, you think, that the boys be- 
spatter you so freely?" 

" It was this time, sir." 

' ' You threw first ? Did you ?' ' 



SELF-SACRIFICE. l^^ 

'*I did." Dick's thought went to the time 
he threw John, and he felt he might rightly evade 
the truth to save his enemy from blame at his 
own expense. 

'*That is a bad admission for you, Dick. You 
know the rule: hard work, and extra hours of it, 
in the ditches for such doings. Get you a spade 
and be at it I thought you were above such fol- 
ly now, Langdon." 

Dick went quietly for the spade, but soon re- 
turned to Mr. Osborne, saying, 

**I am directed to report to you, sir, that so 
many boys have to-day been sent to the ditches 
that there is not a spade left'* Mr. Osborne re- 
flected a moment, and Dick added, "John is in 
the drain just over here; he is not strong, and I 
am. May I take his spade, and let him come 
here?" 

*'I have quite as much faith in you as in 
him; you may keep your own work;" and Mr, 
Osborne turned to leave. Dick eagerly followed 
him. 

**Mr. Osborne, you said *may' keep it, not 
must Will you be so kind as to allow me to 
take John's place at the ditching?" 

**He was sent yesterday for throwing dirty 
water on you." 

'*Yes, I know.'* 



172 DICK I^ANGDON'S CAREER. 

" It will be for a whole month of hard work if 
you exchange." 

** Yes, sir; I am glad it is," 

'* Very well; go if you choose." 

'* Will you please order John to the garden, 
and say nothing of me? I haven't treated him 
well, and he might not wish any favors from 
me." 

Mr. Osborne passed the word for John with a 
look of surprise, and was again hurrying away 
when Dick, who somehow did not feel that he 
was yet quite right, strove to relieve his con- 
science by saying, 

*' Mr. Osborne, I am sorry for all that has been 
wrong. I desire to do right" 

''Are you sorry you pelted some one with 
mud just now?" There was a twinkle in the su- 
perintendent's keen eye as he said it. 

''I am sorry for every bit of mud I ever threw 
at any one," answered Dick, blushing at his own 
lame attempt at deceit. 

'*Dick, you never were the boy to tell lies, in 
your worst estate; what has come over you to de- 
ceive for no purpose, now you are a better fellow? 
You threw no dirt at any one. John threw 
mud upon you, without provocation, from the 
drain." 

*'I did not mean to lie." Dick looked seri- 



SELF-SACRIFICE. 1 73 

ously troubled now. *' I said I threw first, mean- 
ing I was the first offender, throwing John over 
the pickets once, as you perhaps know. I beg 
your pardon for attempting to deceive you." 

**You wish to work a month at ditching to 
atone to John. Shall I put on another month of 
hard work for the deceit?" 

** Yes, sir." It was cheerfully spoken. 

** I wont do it, Dick. You 'd better go to gar- 
dening and let John do his own digging. I will 
give you some pleasanter work over here, out of 
harm's way, training up those vines." 

''Don't deny me the privilege of taking 
John's place." 

"Very well. Only when you get tired of it 
let me know, and I'll send John to exchange 
places with you. The worst boys are doing that 
work, and you are not likely to find your situa- 
tion very pleasant." 

"You are very kind, Mr. Osborne." 

"I'm the friend of every boy that behaves 
himself, and the enemy of every one that don't," 
replied Mr. Osborne, with more roughness in his 
words than in his countenance. Dick, who had 
not been much in the garden, had known him 
very slightly until now. 

As John came by one gate, Dick went by an- 
other, and John was set to work in the garden 



174 DICK i^angdon's career. 

without knowing why. Dick did not fear hard 
labor, but when it came to working two hours ex- 
tra time, which he wanted for his studies, he rea- 
lized more of the self-denial he had undertaken; 
but having put his hand to the plough, he was 
not the one to look back. When, after finishing 
his evening lessons, he took out his new Bible to 
read in it for the first time, the following note 
from Mr. Elton falling from it, was eagerly 
caught and read by the lonely lad: 

*' My Dear Boy: There have been so many 
la:^ cares here that I have only a few minutes to 
write; but you will soon hear from me by mail. 
You have pleased your Heavenly Father, I feel 
sure, in your true spirit of self-sacrifice for Willy 
and myself Don't feel discouraged if, after we 
are gone, your heart fails you and you don't seem 
to have the comfort, even from heaven, that you 
would like. You took up this cross so joyfully 
that you have hardly realized it yet, and God may 
let you feel its weight But remember how much 
he loves you, and how surely he will relieve you 
of every burden which that love does not give you 
to bear. The first day will perhaps be the hard- 
est 

**I pray that God will raise you up friends in 
the school, but even if he does not, try to cling 
the closer to him. And remember the beatitude, 



SEI<F-SACRIFICE. I75 

* Blessed are they which are persecuted for right- 
eousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heav- 
en.' The Christian is the only one who can re- 
joice at his own troubles. 

**Good-by, dear Richard, until we meet 

"EDWARD ELTON." 



176 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

CHAPTER XIV. 

CANDOR. 

A FEW days after Mr. Elton left the Reform 
School, Dick wrote to him as follows: 

State Reform School, October 13, 18—. 

*'Mr. Edward Elton: My dear sir, I thank 
you for the kind words you left for me in the 
Bible and for your letter of Tuesday, which made 
me very glad. I was not a bit brave the day 
you left, and behaved like a baby; so in the 
evening when I first found time to open my new 
Bible, and discovered your letter, it was comfort- 
ing to know that you hadn't expected any better 
things of me. 

*' I do not find myself quite so friendless here 
in the school as I expected, but I hope I shall 
not on that account fail of fulfilling your wish, 
that I may keep very close to my Heavenly Fa- 
ther. The day you left I got a little acquainted 
with Mr. Osborne in a very queer way, which I 
should have thought would have set him against 
me; but instead of that he seems to like me, and 
while he is very strict, is very kind. John, too, 
has become as much my friend as he used to be. 



CANDOR. 177 

He was sent to work a month at digging drains, 
as a punishment, and as I am a big fellow and 
he is a little one, and as I deserved to be working 
there a great deal more than he did, I got leave 
to exchange places, meaning that he shouldn't 
know but that I too was sent as a punishment; 
but he found out somehow, and it has made him 
my friend again, which I am sure I don't deserve 
in the least, after the wrong that I did him. I 
believe all the rest of the boys hate, me and Him 
I try to serve. I know I don't always feel 
towards them as I should, when they persecute 
me in such small, mean ways, but I try to do 
right towards them; still I guess there is some 
pride, mixed up, I hope, with something better, 
in the way I walk amid their insults and abuse. 
I don't think I have any claim to the beatitude 
you bade me remember. To be sure I am 'per- 
secuted for righteousness' sake,' but then I know 
God finds much in my heart which must prevent 
him from giving me that great reward which is 
for those who bear persecution aright. I only 
dare hope that he forgives me. 

"I must go to my work and not write any 
more now. 

''Thursday Evening — I have something 
good to tell you, Mr. Elton. This afternoon Mr. 

Dick Lan^don'* Cm-mt. I 2 



178 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

Hawkins sent for me to show me a letter he had 
received, shortening the time of my stay here to 
only two months longer, if I have certificates of 
good conduct at that time. I presume I owe it 
all to you, and I thank you. Mr. Hawkins was 
rough as usual, and remarked, * I dare say, Lang- 
don, you will fall to fighting, or worse, and lose 
your chance for release; and you need n't expect 
any favors from me. I shall tell the truth when 
the time comes.' *I hope you will, sir,' I re- 
plied, before I had time to think that silence was 
most becoming, meaning that I couldn't wish 
any one to lie in my favor. But Mr. Hawkins 
fired up and said, *Do you mean an insult, Lang- 
don?' *No, sir,' I replied, 'indeed I do not. I 
mean — ' 'That's enough,' said Mr. Hawkins, 
*no palaver for me; mind your p'sand q's, Lang- 
don!' and he dismissed me. I'm sure I don't 
know whether he really thinks I spoke improper- 
ly or not 

'* I don't feel very certain of getting out be- 
fore the regular time, because I know I have so 
many enemies here who will try to get me intQ 
trouble, so that the teachers must give bad re- 
ports of me. But I will try not to deserve any; 
you know in what sense I mean that; in one 
sense I know I deserve a prison all my life for 
the sins that brought me here; so I have every 



CANDOR. 179 

reason to be patient and submissive, but I am far 

from that 

*'I write more freely than I should, because 

I am to seal my letters to you. We are permitted 

to write so to absent teachers, and I rejoice in 

this mark of confidence towards you, whom they 

might regard as not a teacher if they chose. Give 

my love to Willy. I meant to write him a letter 

with this, but there is not time, I am more glad 

than I can tell that he is out of this place, and 

with you. 

*' Ever gratefully yours, 

" RICHARD LANGDON." 

If Dick could have heard the conversation of 
some of his schoolmates at the time he was wri- 
ting his letter, he would have felt even less hope 
of escaping their malice. 

**I say, Martin, have you forgot that thump 
in the face from Dick Langdon's hard fist?'* 

''If he has, I haven't," spoke in a pert 
youngster, commonly called "Jimmy," '*the 
way Peter's face looked the next three weeks 
isn't easily forgot;" and he giggled at his own 
recollection. 

**Shut up !'^ retorted Martin, boxing Jimmy's 
ears. *' You can bet though, fellows, that I re- 
member Dick most affectionately!" and he set 
his teeth in hatred. 



l8o DICK IvANGDON'S CAREER. 

*'He has a mighty lordly way of walking 
over all the small favors we shower upon him in 
the shape of dirty water, mud, brickbats, slits in 
clothing, lost books, boots, and hats; ghosts at 
his bedside, and other attentions too numerous 
to mention. No use to try to tease the life out 
of him that way; he's too tough." 

** What then ?" growled Martin. 

*' Get him into another scrape with the facul- 
ty of this mighty college," replied Aiken, the 
first speaker, one of the oldest and wickedest, but 
best educated boys in the school. ** There is no 
Prof. Elton here now for him to come it over — 
the sly hypocrite — " 

"Dick's no hypocrite; nobody believes that !" 
ventured little John. 

*'Not when he threw you over the pickets, 
like the dead lamb you thought yourself, till you 
found you could bleat for your ma on the other 
side. There was a streak of sincerity along 
there, eh! Johnnie?" 

John was silenced but not convinced. 

*'What great good of getting him into a 
scrape with the teachers?" asked one; *4t's a 
sight riskier for us, and no worse for him than 
what we 've been doing." 

**I'll tell you the good," replied Aiken: **E1- 
ton keeps petitioning, and word has come from 



CANDOR* l8l 

headquarters pardoning Dick out in two months, 
if the teachers report favorable then. M we want 
his most improving society any longer we must 
work for it." 

*'How?" again growled Martin, strong at ha- 
ting, but weak at plotting his own vengeance. 

''Make the teachers' reports unfavorable, and 
we have him," replied Aiken. "He'll feel that 
more than three hundred and sixty-five lickings." 

"Let's hear your plans, Aikeu." 

"They're not matured yet," replied Aiken 
loftily, "but if you leave it to me to plan and di- 
rect, I'll bet my whiskers on bringing it out fav- 
orable as you'd wish for Dick Langdon." And 
Aiken complacently stroked a face, naturally 
handsome, but now spoiled by craft and cunning. 
He had an ambition somewhat like that of Mil- 
ton's Satan to "reign in hell." 

"How many months will it take your plans to 
mature, Aiken?" said Johnnie. "Maybe Dick 
will be gone before they come to a head." 

" Possibly; meantime, boys, do your best, and 
when you want any help let me know," said 
Aiken, as he walked away. Jimmy followed 
him, mimicking his air and motions, stepping 
so lightly that Aiken did not perceive he was fol- 
lowed, and wondered at the explosion of laughter 
which followed his exit 



l82 DICK LANGDON'S CARBEK. 

"Who wants to be lorded over by Tim Aik- 
en?** said Jimmy, returning in high feather from 
following Aiken. ** Let's get up a plan for our- 
selves." 

** Plan away Jimmy! go it! Hurrah for Jim- 
my's plan! Let's hear it Hear! hear! Let's 
have a speech, Jimmy !" came in subdued chorus 
from the boys who, although watched at a dis- 
tance by a very sleepy and ineflScient monitor, 
dared not be too noisy. 

"Gentlemen and fellow students," commenced 
Jimmy, assuming, with a low bow, a speaker's 
attitude, * ' gentlemen and fellow students — ^ahem — 
I regret to announce to you that my very brilliant 
plans, like those of the illustrious Aiken, are not 
yet matured." And Jimmy stroked his fair chin 
in admirable caricature of Aiken. The outburst 
which followed this sally made the sleepy monitor 
look up, and Jimmy instantly assuming another 
attitude, and producing from his pocket a very 
innocent skipping-jack, of his own manufacture, 
began to display it as the ostensible cause of the 
merriment. 

"Bring that here, Jim ! Why are you always 
creating some noise or mischief? If you make 
any more disturbance I shall report you 1" spoke 
up the monitor. 

Jimmy, with a ludicrous air of meekness, gave 



CANDOR. 183 

up the gay toy, and returning demurely to the 
group he had left, whispered, 

**Now, boys, let's be as still as mice and have 
a good solemn talk while pussy goes to sleep. 
Hush ! that isn't worth laughing at; keep still, and 
listen to my plan, and we'll see if we can't mature 
it about as sudden as a thunder-shower. Really, 
I have got a plan, and Aiken hasn't ; but if we 
go at it without him he '11 upset our dish to spite 
us; so let's get him back and tell him it's just been 
hinted at to do so and so, but we can't without 
him, and he must be captain." 

The rest agreed, and Jimmy brought back 
Aiken adroitly suggesting to him a scheme which 
he had long entertained but not with any refer- 
ence to Dick. 

*'It may as well be tliat as anything," said 
Aiken condescendingly: what we have to mature 
is, how to put all the blame of it on Dick, and 
get him into trouble by it." 

The boys had put their heads very close togeth- 
er, and they hereafter spoke so low that the moni- 
tor, who had been broken of his rest the previous 
night, actually did go to sleep, thus giving alert 
Jimmy and scheming Aiken an opportunity to 
make several arrangements in the school-room, 
very necessary for the bad business of the night 

Meantime, Dick, having finished bis letter tQ 



184 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

Mr. Elton, and his usual evening studies, thought* 
fully read a chapter in his Bible, committed him- 
self into his Heavenly Father's keeping, and 
went quietly to sleep in his hard bed, quite un- 
conscious of the plottings of his enemies. 

It was late in the night, and very dark, when 
he waked with the feeling that some one was near 
his bed, and expecting some tricks of the boys, 
he lay quite still, breathing as if asleep. 

He felt the blanket very skillfully drawn away 
from between the quilt and sheet; felt his mat- 
tress raised by the slipping of a hand beneath it 
at the foot, then a stealthy step in the direction 
of his clothes, near the head of his bed. 

*' Watch coming on your side !" spoke the low- 
est possible whisper. 

**Run with the things, and finish up quick: 
I'll skulk;" replied a whisper as faint; and a cau- 
tious step retreated on the dark side, while the 
approaching watchman's light revealed a dark 
figure creeping beneath Dick's cot. 

*%ook here, watchman," spoke Dick very 
quietly as the light came near, *'I wish you'd 
oblige me by getting me another blanket; mine 
is gone, and I am cold: here is something, too, 
under my mattress which do n't belong to me, 
and which I will thank you to carry immediately 
to Mr. Hawkins. There is, also, a boy under my 



CANDOR. 185 

bed, who cught to have been in his own long 
ago !" 

Jimmy was speedily dragged from under the 
bed, and led off by the watchman. 

Dick was provided with another blanket, and 
folding it about him, quietly finished his night's 
sleep, while Jimmy's plan '* matured like a thun- 
der-shower," under the eye of Mr. Hawkins. 



i86 DICK i^angdon's career. 

CHAPTER Xy. 

DElrlVERANCE FROM EVIL. 

Dick was awakened the next morning by the 
usual rising-bell, from a sleep so sound that it 
took him a minute to collect his thoughts about 
the disturbances of the previous night. 

Then he began to wonder what Jimmy and 
the boys could have been trying to do, and wheth- 
er he had acted right in revealing Jimmy to the 
watchman. 

Conscience said, ** You were quite right, Dick. 
Boys who are prowling about for mischief at mid- 
night should not be concealed and protected by 
the friends of peace and good order." 

Dick felt cheerful as he listened to conscience, 
yet he braced himself to meet fresh persecution 
from his schoolmates as a consequence. 

When he dressed, he discovered that his vest 
and handkerchief were among the missing, and 
on thoroughly searching his cot for them he found 
the handkerchief wrapped about a memorandum- 
book, with the name of Mr. Hawkins written 
upon the paper cover. 

Dick had never found Mr. Hawkins ready to 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL, 187 

believe his word, or in any way put confidence in 
him, and it was therefore with no little trepida- 
tion that he knocked at the door of his private 
room to deliver up the book. 

**Mr. Hawkins opened his door in response 
to the knock, and fixed his eyes on Dick without 
saying a word, waiting for him to make known 
his errand, which he did by saying, 

**I presume, sir, you received a key which I 
found last night under my mattress. This morn- 
ing on removing the mattress, in search of my 
missing vest and handkerchief, I found this also 
wrapped in the handkerchief and I return it to 
you without having opened it" 

** I suppose you know the book?" 

**Yes, sir; it seems to be the note-book in 
which you keep memorandums of our deport- 
ment, and such matters." 

*'Did you find your vest?" 

•'No, sir." 

" Your best course, Langdon, is to tell me, 
now, all you know of last night's scrapes." 

'*I know nothing whatever, Mr. Hawkins, 
except what I presume the watchman has already 
told you." 

'* Repeat all you know." 

** I was awakened in the night by the presence 
of some one near my bed. It was too dark to 



i88 DICK langdon's career. 

recognize any one. I pretended to be still asleep, 
and while lying thus felt my blanket drawn off, 
and my mattress raised as if a hand was thrust 
under it. Then I heard some one go to my clothes 
and move them. Just afterwards some one on 
the side away from the clothes whispered very 
low, * Watch, coming on your side,' and the one 
near the clothes answered in the same faint whis- 
per, * Here, run with the things, and finish all up 
quick; I'll skulk.' 

**The watchman's light appeared just as a 
boy was creeping under my bed. I felt under 
the mattress without getting up, and found a key 
which r handed the watchman, asking him to 
take it at once to you. I also told him that my 
blanket was gone, and that there was a boy hid- 
den under my bed. He pulled him out and led 
him away. Another blanket was sent to me, and 
I wrapped up in it and went to sleep and didn't 
wake again till the rising-bell rang. When I 
dressed I missed my vest and handkerchief, and 
on searching my cot for them found my handker- 
chief wrapped round the book I have given you." 

'' Did you find anything else?" 

•* I did not." 

'* Did you know who was under your bed?" 

'' I did not until the watchman drew him out; 
then I saw that it was Jimmy." 



DEUVERANCE FROM EVIL. 189 

**If this is all you have to say, you may go.*' 

Dick felt that Mr. Hawkins had treated him 
like a gentleman in comparison with former in- 
terviews, but he feared that what the boys called 
"bottled thunder " was in store for him. He got 
a few minutes retirement, and read how meek- 
ly Christ bore false accusation, and prayed for 
strength to endure whatever was before him. 
Then he attended quietly to his usual tasks, 
avoiding all communication with others. 

He was a little surprised to see Jimmy and all 
the boys at breakfast as if nothing had happened. 
But when he entered the school-room with the 
rest at the usual hour, the mystery of the mischief 
was solved. 

Seated at the central desk was a very poorly- 
executed but truly ludicrous eflSgy of Mr. Hawk- 
ins, dressed incongruously in that gentlemans' 
very best broadcloth coat, and very worst panta- 
loons and hat, devoted to out-of-door use in hard 
storms. In his right hand he held uplifted the 
rod of chastisement, and in his left the memo- 
randum-book returned by Dick. 

All the teachers, except Mr. Hawkins, were 
in their usual places as the scholars filed into their 
seats, eyeing the absurd figure, some with amuse- 
ment and curiosity, some with anxiety, and oth- 
ers with dismay. 



igo DICK langdon's career. 

** What will Old Hawk say and do?" was the 
question uppermost in most of their minds, while 
the perpetrators of the insult grew pale with ter- 
ror at sight of the memorandum-book. Dick 
wondered at sight of it in that place, and while 
he bore up bravely, felt almost sure that Mr. 
Hawkins supposed him to be profoundly deceitful, 
as he did in the case of the cards, and would dis- 
grace and punish him as the prime perpetrator of 
the gross insult. 

The reader may as well know here what was 
not definitely stated in a previous chapter, that 
when Mr. Elton had been obliged to report Dick's 
violence to John, Mr. Hawkins had vented his 
pent up wrath towards him in a severe whipping. 
Dick's natural fortitude and a sense of remorse 
for his own fault had enabled him to endure as 
best such pain can be endured; but it will never 
be remembered without a shudder. 

But innocent of the crime in question, he sat 
outwardly calm but deeply moved, awaiting issues 
which he expected would speedily consign him 
again to those merciless hands and destroy his last 
hope of release before the expiration of his term. 
Dick fortified himself by thinking, ** * The way of 
transgressors is hard.* I am in this place for my 
sins, and I must expect to suffer in consequence. 
And I was the means of bringing Willy here too; 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL. 191 

whatever I have to bear will be no more than I 
deserve." 

But there was not very much time for Dick's 
bitter reflections to have their way before Mr. 
Hawkins came in, walked quietly up in front of 
his accustomed seat, and deliberately surveyed 
the effigy. One of the teachers rose and placed 
a chair for him near the desk. Without a * * thank 
you " he pushed it aside saying, 

*'I will wait for my own seat; it wont take 
long to vacate it Every one of you, who had a 
hand in this very shabby piece of work, step for- 
ward to undo it?" 

No one responded to this call. 
**So you think I don't know you! Think I 
was sound asleep all night while you were culti- 
vating artistic talents in executing this striking 
statue! Now I will tell you candidly, I hap- 
pened to wake up, and looked in here and saw 
you make it Generally, as you all know, I 'm 
a very mild man, but being broken of one's rest 
will make the gentlest man savage ! You wont 
get another chance to own your own doing, which 
you very well know always dulls *01d Hawk's' 
claws a trifle, Mr. Harding, you will find the 
names of these ambitious young artists on page 
fifteen of that note-book. Call them out here to 
receive due honors." 



192 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER* 

Mr. Harding took the book from the sem- 
blance of a hand which held it and read several 
names, beginning with Jimmy's and including 
Martin's and Aikin's, but not John's. They 
were obliged to come forward, one by one and 
face the school in a row. They were the real 
offenders, and of course Dick was not of the num- 
ber. He truly pitied them, and forgave them, as 
he thanked God in his heart for deliverance, thus 
far, from the snares of his enemies. 

*' The head engineer of this sublime structure 
is at liberty to give his orders, and have it out of 
the way speedily. Each one undo what he did.'* 

Very reluctantly the culprits began to undress 
the eflSgy, amid the laughter and derision of the 
school, which Mr. Hawkins encouraged instead 
of restraining. 

**Just think !" he said, as one held the image 
while another struggled to get off the sleeves of 
the dress-coat, ''think of the strain and exposure 
of that coat, which I assure the school cost more 
money than most of you ever honestly earned in 
your honored lives. Look out, Martin ! If you 
tear it, you ought to know 'Hawk's claws can 
tear as well. Aiken, why do you let that raw- 
hide which I have given you reason to respect, 
lie dishonored in the dust? Give it here; I'll 
see it held in honor. There," as the old panta- 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL. 193 

loons came off, ''Is that the last of the things 
from my closet? Where, my nimble Jimmy, did 
you put the key of my closet last night?'' 

"Jimmy, in ^lis terror, began twice over, ''I 
do n't—'' ' ' I never put—' ' 

*'None of that," roared Mr. Hawkins, hitting 
him across the lips with the tip of the raw-hide." 
*'Each of you will have enough to answer for, 
without any lies. You need n't whine, nor blame 
the *Hawk' for that. You'd have saved your- 
selves if you had taken a gentle hint on that 
head, which I threw away on all your hard heads 
when I called you out here. Now answer: Where 
did you put the key of my closet last night?" 

'* Under Langdon's mattress." 

*' What else did you put there?" 

'* Your note-book." 

*' What else?" 

** Nothing. Oh, don't! I only forgot about 
the handkerchief. ' ' 

** How came you by his handkerchief?" 

*' Took it out of his pocket" 

**When, and where?" 

**Last night out of his clothes," 

** Where was I^angdon?" 

**Inhisbed?'» 

*^Had he anything to do with planning this 
affair?" 

13 



194 i>iCK i^angdon's career. 

*' Not as I know of. I— Oh ! Ah I'' The in- 
terjections of the English language fail to give 
the wail with which poor heedless Jimmy greeted 
a second lash across the lips administered for even 
an evasion of the truth. 

*'Now answer. Had I^angdon been up with 
you last night?" 

'*No, sir." 

"Did he have anything to do with planning 
thisaflfair?" 

*'No, sir." 

"What else did you take from beside Lang- 
don's bed?" 

"His vest" 

"What did you do with it" 

"Gave it to the fellow that was with me." 

"Who was with you?" 

"Martin." 

" Martin, hand over that vest to its owner; he 
feels the want of it this cold day almost as much 
as he did his blanket last night The blanket 
comes first, does it? So I thought lyangdoni 
put on your vest Take charge of the blanket 
too. Roll it up neatly for him, Martin, tie it up 
with one of those strings which you found came 
oflF your statue so much harder than they went 
on, and place it on his desk." 

Martin had been obliged to rip up the body of 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL. 1 95 

the eflSgy, which was made of the blanket, stuffed, 
among the stuffing was found the vest. 

Dick's face bore a serious, almost troubled ex- 
pression thrpugh these exciting scenes in which 
he had such a deep personal concern. He felt 
profoundly thankful at his own vindication, but 
not in the least exultant. He remembered that 
his own wicked intimacy with these boys and his 
attack upon Martin were, in some degree, the 
cause of all the trouble, and he did not rejoice in 
their suffering. When Martin approached his 
seat with the vest he rose and stepped forward to 
meet him, looking sorrowfully concerned, took it 
gently from his hand, removed his jacket and put 
on the vest with no change of expression, as if he 
were scarcely conscious of the act, but absorbed 
in earnest thought. From first to last of these 
scenes there was no approach to a smile upon his 
lips. 

He was surprised to find and greatly respected 
the sense of justice which was very evident in 
Mr. Hawkins, and he wondered if he thought his 
apparent lack of all pity for those who had done 
wrong could possibly lead them to do better in 
the future. Such thoughts were cut short by an- 
other ringing question from Mr. Hawkins which 
concerned himself. 

* * Now, Master Jimmy, who * can' t tell a lie *— 



196 DICK I^ANGDON'S career. 

here he snapped his whip significantly — '*what 
was your object in prowling about Langdon's bed 
at midnight, putting stolen goods into his bed and 
carrying off his bedding and clothing ? That 's a 
long question, but I want a quick answer, and to 
the point.'' 

*' To lay it all on Dick, sir. But that wasn't 
any of my doings at first; it was the big boys' 
planning, because they hate him." 

'' Yes; and because you like fun you let them 
make a cat's paw of you to do their worst work. 
The more fool you. Here is that key. Put all 
my things exactly where you found them. lyook 
out for that coat Martin, away with the rest of 
these duds!" 

Kicking away a promiscuous heap of rags, 
straw, and paper, the stuffing of the figure, he 
took his seat, laying the rod with a resounding 
thud upon the outside of the desk as he said, 

** These boys will remain after school; there 's 
not time to settle with so many now." Then he 
commanded absolute order and opened the school 
as usual. 

That evening Dick gave Mr. Elton the story 
of the effigy in a sort of journal-letter which he 
kept to send him weekly. To this account he 
added, 

" I am sorry to know that the boys concerned 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL. 197 

were all very severely punished, Jimmy, how- 
ever, not so cruelly as Aiken, Martin, and the 
rest of the older ones. I presume they will all 
think that I rejoice, and will hate me more than 
ever; but they will hardly make such another 
weak attempt to get me into trouble. I am glad 
that previous to this last aflfair Mr. Hawkins had 
discovered who hid the cards in my bed. This I 
did not know until he sent for me to-day and 
said, 

** 'Before this effigy scrape I had learned that 
you had no hand in that matter of the cards, and 
Mr. Elton did us both a good turn in keeping my 
hands off you at that time. You had always been 
*'hail fellow'' with the worst till about that time. 
Now the bad ones all hate you. Why is it ?' 

*'I did not answer until he insisted; then I 
said, 

'' *They liked me, Mr. Hawkins, till I began 
to try to do right.' 

'* 'You're not likely to get much credit for 
trying to do right here. What 's your object ?' 

"You know what an eagle's eye he has; it 
looked me through while he spoke, as if he want- 
ed to know for a purpose. 

" 'My object,' I replied, 'is to serve Christ, 
who died to save my soul, at least as faithfully as 
I have served Satan, who seeks to destroy it' 



198 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

** 'That is a laudable enterprise, Langdon,^ he 
replied. * I guess you '11 hold out the remaining 
two months of your probation here. Two months 
after you get loose wont you write me a letter and 
tell me whether you are then serving Christ or 
Satan? I 'd like to know for my own edification 
how you are holding out.' 

**I answered very earnestly, *Mr. Hawkins, 
do you really mean that I may write you a letter 
two months after I get out ?' 

" ' Yes; only let it be honest. Do n't put in 
even a ''Dear Sir," when I know that of course 
at heart you hate me for that unmerciful thrash- 
ing I gave you.' 

"'I do not hate you, Mr. Hawkins,' I replied. 
' I deserved punishment; and even if I had not, I 
could n't wish or even dare to hate you at heart * 

'"Not dare?' 

" 'No, sir. If I hate even an enemy, I turn 
the Lord's Prayer into a curse upon myself when 
I repeat it' 

" ' Did Elton teach you that?' 

" ' No, sir. He said I could not have learned 
it of him. It came so hard to me that I think 
only God could have taught me. But you were 
not one of the enemies. I never felt you were, 
except, perhaps, a little while that first day about 
the cards; and then I soon took you off the enemy 



DELIVERANCE FROM EVIL, I99 

list, because you really thought me guilty, and I 
had given you reason to, by playing cards previ- 
ously with the bad boys. ' 

** *That sounds like candor and sound sense. 
Did you realize too that I shouldn't have thrashed 
you as I did simply for tossing that little monkey 
over the fence for his impudence ? It was for old 
and new, but chiefly for persistent lying about the 
cards, of which you were quite innocent' 

'' 'Yes, sir, I realized it, and that under the 
circumstances I ought not to expect you to be- 
lieve me. It was very kind of you to follow it 
up and let me know that you learned the truth.' 

'' * Not kind. I ' ve nothing to do with kind- 
ness. I 'd like to be as just as one can in such a 
place. But about that letter: write it, and mind 
you tell me truly whether you are serving God or 
the devil out of prison. Here is my full address. 
And, Langdon, I promise you that if you write 
I will answer you. And you needn't fear that 
Martin and Aiken and the rest of them will 
keep you here. I see through them. It's my 
vocation to see through everybody, and for my 
own information I 'm trying to see through you.* 

**Oh, Mr. Elton, do you think Mr. Hawkins 
can be asking himself if there is such a thing as 
heart change from evil to good?" 



200 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

ALI< THINGS NEW. 

It was New Year's Eve, a time for gladness, 
but Mrs. Langdon found it hard to be even cheer- 
ful. She had been almost sick for several weeks, 
with a succession of bad colds, which compelled 
her to give up the washing and ironing which 
she was accustomed to take in, and now that she 
was a little better, she found herself without mon- 
ey, almost without bread or fuel. To add to her 
cares she had not received her usual monthly 
letter from Dick at the reform school, and feared 
some evil had befallen him. 

As the early darkness gathered, and Etta com- 
plained that she was cold and hungry, the mother 
made the last cup of meal into gruel over the 
scanty fire, and feeding the child, hushed her to 
sleep with a story and a song; then, overwrought 
by the effort, bowed her head and wept long and 
bitterly; not rebelliously, for her trembling trust 
still clung to her Heavenly Father's promises. 
Rising up, at last, she put on her shawl and hood 
and taking a small bundle went forth, locking 
the cottage door behind her. The bundle was a 



ALL THINGS NEW. 20I 

garment for the making of which she was to re- 
ceive one dollar, and it seemed to her that sorely 
as she had often needed money in the past, she 
had never needed a dollar so much as she did 
the price of that work, 

'' Is Mrs. Ashton in ?'' she inquired of the ser- 
vant answering her ring. 

**Yes, but she has company this evening," 
was the reply, in not very patient tones. 

** I brought this work which should have been 
sent before; but I have not been well." Here 
Mrs. Langdon paused, blushed, hesitated, then 
bracing herself with the thought of her child, and 
a hungry morrow, added, *' If it is quite conveni- 
ent, I will wait for my pay." 

'* You 'd better not wait ; mistress is 'specially 
engaged to-night. She 's sure enough, you know, 
to send your pay," was the reply. 

Mrs. Langdon turned away without a word, 
and half blinded by starting tears, went home- 
ward. She had just passed the railroad station 
when a train arrived, unheeded by her save that 
she thought, sadly, not bitterly, as she hurried on, 
*'How busy and happy all the world but myself 
seems!" Then a hurrying step, in advance of 
all who had alighted from the train, came echo- 
ing behind her. The sound of that step thrilled 
her. It approached ; a tall boy's figure hurried 



202 DICK I^NGDON'S CAREER. 

past with a hasty glance, then paused and looked 
back. 

** Dick! My son, my soni" 

'* Mother!'' 

He drew her arm within his, and when he 
found how she trembled, turned aside to let others 
pass and walked slowly towards the old home. 
Neither felt like speaking until they sat down, 
hand in hand, at the fireside. 

*' How is it with you, my boy?" 

'* All well, dear mother; do I look otherwise?'' 

She looked him over proudly. He had grown 
and improved, almost out of any knowledge but 
a mother's. Health of body, mind, spirit, was 
written unmistakably in the noble figure, and 
handsome, open countenance. 

'* You look as my own boy should. I was anx- 
ious because I did not hear as usual." 

**I have been waiting to have a letter from 
you to answer, and I wanted to give you a glad 
surprise. I am pardoned out for reformation and 
good conduct. I have been hoping for this, and 
dared not tell you the hope; but I should have 
written to say I was well." 

** It is all right, Dick. I am so thankful, that 
I know not what to do or say. All the welcome 
I can give you is a full heart. I went out to carry 
some work home for which a dollar is due me ; if 



ALL THINGS NEW. Z03 

they had only paid me I could have given you 
a supper." 

**I received money to pay my fare home, 
and Mr. Elton lent me money to buy this suit of 
clothes. I walked all but the last ten miles, 
and have five dollars left. Is there any coal ?" 

**I think a hod full could be scraped up in 
the cellar, but I have no light, and the snow has 
stopped the windows so that I could not see even 
by day.'' Dick looked puzzled a moment and 
exclaimed, 

'' And you had not a penny left to buy a can- 
dle! Here is the old market basket; hug the fire, 
mother, and keep your shawl on until I come 
back." 

He was back from the nearest store in five 
minutes, without the basket, but with candles, 
which speedily brought to light, materials for a 
good fire, and when he returned from a second 
walk to the store, bringing the basket filled with 
groceries, bread, milk and meat, he found the 
kettle singing over the fire and the table set for 
supper. Then, just as the beefsteak, toast and 
coffee were ready, Etta waked up, insisting it was 
morning, and coaxing to get up and eat breakfast 
with ''Dit." When her mother, wondering at 
the instant recognition, asked her if Dick looked 
like Dick, she said. 



204 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

*' Yes, only more brother Dit than he used to 
be; what for did he stay 'way so long?" 

* ' To learn to be good ; to be more brother Dick 
than he used to be," replied the brother, with the 
soft arms about his neck. ** If it is morning Etta 
must be dressed ; let us see if Dick remembers 
how the little clothes go on." 

So Dick's presence brought joy that New 
Year's Eve. 

The next morning Dick went out in search of 
work, and returned at noon to say, very cheerfully 
that as he had supposed would be the case, people 
were rather shy of employing him, but that his 
old friend Ernest had got him a job at a dollar a 
day and board himself. 

''We shall get along nicely on that and my 
earnings, Dick. Mrs, Ashton sent me that dollar 
and some more sewing this morning, and my 
customers are waiting for me to take in the wash- 
ing and ironing again." 

*'You must not do that, mother, it is too 
hard." 

** It is not too hard. Work does not hurt me, 
only I took that terrible cold from carelessly 
hurrying out to the lines, from over the steaming 
tub. If I don't hurry, and wrap up warm when 
I go out, I shall not suffer." 

Dick had an unopened letter from Mr. Elton 



ALL THINGS NEW. 205 

which he sat down to read, but soon jumped up, 
exclaiming, 

*' Oh, mother, this is almost too good !'* 

'* What is it, my son?" 

'*Mr. Elton wants us all to move to Lyme. 
There is a lack of boarding-places for the stu- 
dents, and a boarding-house has been furnished to 
be opened next term — in about four weeks — and 
he wants you to be matron: to superintend, you 
know, and have a salary. And I am to have a 
scholarship, my tuition and board free* only if I 
don't stand high enough in my class at the end 
of the first term I must lose it; but I sha' n't lose 
itP' 

'* You must go, but I fear I am not compe- 
tent for such a position. Then Etta, you forget 
her." 

** No; Mr. Elton says, * I think that sunbeam, 
your little sister of whom you have told me, will 
be a welcome addition to the establishment; only 
we must all promise not to spoil her; and she can 
attend an excellent infant school we, fortunately, 
have here.' You have just the faculty for man- 
aging such a concern as that, mother, and as to 
Etta, she 's never any trouble anywhere because 
you have taught her to take care of herself and 
never interfere with your duties." 

*' She is good; if she were not it would be in 



206 DICK I^NGDON'S CAREER. 

vain for me to make the attempt I believe I 
have the faculty for housekeeping. I will go and 
try it a term.'' 

** He wants us as soon as we can conveniently 
come, so that you may get the housekeeping ar- 
ranged before the term commences and I may 
have a little start in my studies. He seems am- 
bitious to have me do well; and, mother, I mean 
to do my very best." 

'*How did you win such friendship from Mr. 
Elton?' 

*'I don't know, mother. I never could 
understand it. He trusted me when no one 
else could; and he says too that he was not 
Christ's disciple then, which makes it still stran- 
ger that he understood my new motives and de- 
sires." 

"But he is trying to serve God now, is he 
not?" 

**Yes. I don't understand some things he 
says to me. lyCt me read some words from one of 
his letters: * Richard, I can never repay the debt 
of gratitude I owe you. You taught me — what, 
indeed, I am inexcusable for not having learned 
before — the power of Christianity to transform 
the heart and life; and the silent influence of the 
pupil was made effective in the teacher's min^ 
and heart. I may do something for you in this 



AI«I« THINGS NEW. 207 

life: what you have done for me is for immortali- 
ty.'" 

Mrs. Langdon's voice was not quite steady as 
she replied, 

**That is easily understood, my son. In the 
soul's need of Christ there is no diflFerence be- 
tween one and another, for all have sinned 
alike. '» 



208 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

ZEAI«. 

At Lyme Richard lyangdon was no longer 
known as *'Dick/' and the "Dick'' of "Satan's 
Schools" was quite willing to lose himself in a 
better personality. 

Etta's silvery tones, however, often rang 
through the halls of the boarding-house, calling, 
"Dit, Dit!" and as the pattering feet ran to 
meet him, the teachers and pupils liked the glee- 
ful laugh of the usually sedate Richard as he car- 
ried the universal pet on his shoulder or tossed 
her up and caught her like the ball whose form 
she emulated. 

There was one other who frequently so far for- 
got herself as to say "Dick" — the refined and 
lady-like mother, who won universal esteem as 
manager of the boarding-house. In the sweet 
content she felt at her lost boy's return, engaged 
in the engrossing duties which effectually divert- 
ed her mind from the bitter past, she renewed her 
youthful beauty and bloom, looking quite too 
young to be the mother of the tall, thoughtful 
student who called her by that dear name and 



ZEAL. 209 

ever treated her with the tenderest a£fection and 
deference. This relationship she was sure to 
claim every time she inadvertently said " Dick " 
at the boarding-house table, at which she presi- 
ded, by adding *'My son," thus: 

''Dick, my son, before the young gentlemen 
leave the dining-room, please get them to decide 
by ballot at what hour dinner shall be served on 
the next holiday." 

The above sentence will give the boys a hint 
as to why Mrs. Langdon was very popular as 
"President" of the boarding-house, a term which 
they had given her, frequently addressing her as 
**Mrs. President" On the occasion just men- 
tioned, when the ballot was about to be taken, in 
merry mood, after dinner Mr. Elton, who was a 
boarder, withdrew, after remarking with the ut- 
most gravity that only the young gentlemen had 
been requested to vote. 

Mr. Elton told Dick, playfully and confiden- 
tially, that he was only disappointed in one thing 
respecting his mother : she was too young and 
handsome to be termed a ''matron!" 

"Yes, mother was always beautiful, only 
sometimes pale and worn with care and misery 
and toil. I can never do enough to atone to her 
for the grief I gave her. It cheers me to see her 
look like herself once more. But she is not very 



aio DICK langdon's career. 

young: she is thirty-five. She was married at 
eighteen, and I am sixteen.'* 

*' And I am thirty-six. You are very incon- 
sistent, Richard, for you and all the rest would 
have detained me to vote as a young gentleman ! 
Seriously, I look a great deal older than your mo- 
ther, don't you think so?" 

*' Indeed, I don't, Mr. Elton, although I'm 
sure I never should have thought of comparing 
your ages. The question of your age never oc- 
curred to me; it never does in those I honor; but 
you may be sure mother and all of us classed you 
with the young gentlemen. We sha' n't let you 
off again.'' 

Mr. Elton was pleased with Dick's answer, 
and Dick wondered that so great a man as the 
principal, with so many weighty matters on his 
hands, should do his mother the honor to notice 
either her youth or beauty. He had expected 
him to notice, with reference to the interests of 
the school, that she was cultured, refined in man- 
ner, and, withal, a good financier and house- 
keeper. 

Dick studied hard, and took the first place in 
his class by such decided superiority that no one 
thought of competing with him or questioning 
his right to the honor. In fact, he was doing two 
years' work in one, expecting to be promoted to a 



ZEAL. ail 

higher class the next term. It was not so much 
ambition to excel which incited him as the re- 
pentant thought often expressed to Mr. Elton 
when he urged him to spare himself, 

" I have wasted so much precious time! How 
can I ever retrieve it?" 

In his zeal for study he did not forget Christ. 
Willy, who was in the school, was very helpful 
to him as a Christian. Mr. Elton had found 
Willy a home in a religious family where he 
could have his board for services which he render- 
ed. He was so much more helpful than was ex- 
pected, especially in vacation, that his clothes 
also had been provided, without expense to Mr. 
Elton, who would cheerfully have given them. 

Willy was with a younger class in his studies, 
but was one with Dick in his Christian experience 
and influence. In a very quiet way they both 
assisted Mr. Elton in ascertaining who of the stu- 
dents hoped they were Christians, or desired to be 
such. Then a school prayer-meeting was formed: 
Dick and Willy were always there, ready to take 
part in it, and their hearty *'Come with us," in- 
fluenced the hesitating ones to join the prayerful 
band. Very quietly, but firmly, decidedly, even 
zealously, their influence was ever on the Lord's 
side. 

Willy's gratitude to Dick for letting him be 



212 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

the one to go first with Mr. Elton was as unbound- 
ed as was Dick's to him for leading him to Christ, 
and a friendship thus cemented was likely to be 
as enduring as existence; for neither of them felt 
that even death would sunder the ties that bound 
them. Willy would not tell Dick how he learned 
of the sacrifice he made in his behalf He only 
said Mr. Elton did not tell him; but when Dick 
asked the Principal how he supposed Willy found 
it out, he laughed; yet said in a tone of concern, 

*' Really Richard, I did mean to keep your 
generous secret, but when the dear boy begged to 
see your letters, I couldn't refuse him, and care- 
lessly gave him one which revealed it." 

While Dick did not in his zeal as a student 
forget his promises to his Saviour, there was one 
promise which he would perhaps have failed to 
remember had not Mr. Elton said to him, 

** Richard, have you forgotten Mr. Hawkins?" 

"Thank you for reminding me: I had for- 
gotten that I promised to write to him. What 
shall I say?" 

*'You are to tell him, are you not, whether 
you are serving Christ or Satan ? I trust it is not 
with you, as with so many, a doubtful question." 

Promptitude was one of Dick's virtues, and 
the next mail bore his letter. 



ZtAU 313 

" Lyatb Academy, March 5, 18— 

*'MiL Hawkins: My Dear Sir, — You will re- 
member that I had your permission to write to 
you, two months after my release from the Reform 
School. I was to tell you whether I was then 
serving Christ or Satan. I think I can say, with 
a clear concience, that I am serving God. It is 
my purpose, my hourly endeavor; and I pray that 
the purpose and endeavor may endure forever. 

** Perhaps I should not say more than to answer 
the question you desired. For your kind judg- 
ment of those last two months, and your favora- 
ble report to the managers of the institution, I 
cannot sufficiently express my gratitude. 
Most respectfully, 

RICHARD LANGDON." 

Mr. Elton, all unknown to Dick, sent Mn 
Hawkins a letter speaking very fully of the entire 
change religion had wrought in Dick's character. 

If Dick had been embarrassed in keeping his 
promise to write to Mr. Hawkins, that gentleman 
was much more perplexed in keeping his promise 
to reply. After a good deal of inward strife, 
which he felt he would not have any one know, 
he sat down quite in a rage with himself, dashed 
oflf the following, and mailed it without pausing 
for reflection. 



214 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

"State Reform School, March 7, 18 — 

'* Richard Langdon: You kept your prom- 
ise, and I keep mine. In fact, I more than keep it 
when I assure you it is my firm conviction that 
I have been serving Satan ever since I was born, 
and am serving him still, and shall serve him as 
long as I exist. . It is useless for you, or any other 
being, to seek for me a diflferent destiny. It is a 
bad service, and I congratulate you that you are 
out of it; but I love it. You owe me no thanks. 
''Sincerely yours, 

ROBERT HAWKINS." 

Dick, when weak and helpless, had felt the 
grind of the iron heel of this bad man's power, and 
deep in his heart were cut ineflFaceable memories 
of unjust suspicions and cruel taunts. But he 
had forgiven all unasked, even before Mr. Haw- 
kins did him any justice, and when he read this 
letter his heart went out in a strong, yearning de- 
sire that its words might prove false. They moved 
him deeply, and moved him to hope, not despair. 
He desired to show Mr. Elton the letter, and ask 
his sympathy and prayers for the man who felt 
that prayer for him was vain; but he regarded 
such a letter — a letter alluding to the inner life — 
as too sacred a trust to be placed in any hand but 
his to whom it was addressed. (Would it not be 
well for every Christian to be as tenderly consid* 



ZHAI.. 215 

crate in this, matter ?) Dick regarded it as a hope- 
ful circumstance that Mr. Hawkins felt he was 
in the power of evil and likely to remain in it 
forever. He thought, 

*'It is just the truth; is it possible that the 
Holy Spirit is showing it to him ?," 

It was no transient sentiment of good natured 
well-wishing that Dick felt for his former enemy, 
but an abiding, importunate desire that God 
would interpose to turn him from "the power of 
Satan unto God," and neither his studies, nor 
any other personal interest, quenched that desire. 
It followed him by day, lay down with him at 
night, and rose up with him in the morning. 
One morning, when it had thus risen with him, 
he spoke of it to Mr. Elton, with whom he was 
walking before breakfast. 

* * Mr. Elton, if you were followed by day and 
night, in every interval of leisure, by a strong de- 
sire for the spiritual welfare of a certain person, 
whom you had no personal reason to love, what 
would you think it meant ?'' 

'*I should hope it meant the Spirit was in- 
fluencing that person's soul, and influencing mine 
to plead for its conversion. I have been feeling 
just so about one we know." 

**SohaveI." 

**Whoisit, with you?" 



'ai6 DICK langdon's career. 

* * Mr. Hawkins* Who with you ? • 

*'Mr. Hawkins." 

**Then two of us were agreed touching some- 
thing we should ask. Let us claim that promise, 
and pray together," and from the shelter of the 
budding willows rose the importunate, united 
prayer of two hearts for a forgiven enemy. 

A month later Mr. Elton and Richard received 
in one envelope the following letters: 

"State Reform School, April 15, 18 — 

**Mr. Edward Elton: My Dear Sir, You 
have invited me to visit you at Lyme. I ac- 
cept your kind invitation, and will try to be with 
you on Saturday next, to spend the Sabbath. 
Very truly yours, 

"ROBERT HAWKINS." 

"My Dear LAngdon: That forever in Sa- 
tan's service is too terrible even for me. I am 
trying to get on Christ's yoke, but mine is a stiflF 
neck. Some words I must say to you and Mr. 
Elton may be helpful in bending a stiff neck, and 
breaking a hard heart. Pray that it prove so. 
** Sincerely, 

ROBERT HAWKINS." 

Mr, Elton and Richard clasped hands in 
thankfulness, thinking **the heart that prompted 
these words is already broken." 



GRACE TiauldPHANT. ilj 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

GRACE TRIUMPHANT. 

**I AM here,'' said Mr. Hawkins, refusing a 
seat in Mr. Elton's room, and walking the floor 
in evident mental conflict. 

*'I thank you that you are here," cried Mr. 
Elton, stopping the man in his walk and offering 
him both hands. 

Mr. Hawkins clasped his own behind him. 

*'I can't do it, Mr. Elton; I can't give you 
even one hand!" 

** Why not?" 

*' Why not, indeed! Because I am a fiend, 
but not a hypocrite. I hate goodness and good 
people. I love evil. I do not love God or his 
service or his servants. I am alive for the first 
time to the misery of such a state. I wish I 
could strike myself out of being. If killing my- 
self would do that — " He set his teeth fiercely. 

**It would not: your endless being is inevita- 
ble. God, who has created you — " 

**Will not let me go out of being if I desire it; 
yet you say, * God is love !' " 

** Yes, *God is love,* His anger is love, his 



2l8 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

justice is love, his wrath is love, his immutability 
is love^ We must not mistake love for pity or 
tenderness. God is pitiful and tender, but while 
he is all love, he is not all pity and tenderness. 
His love punishes sin with suflFering, rewards ho- 
liness with bliss. The sinner has every reason to 
tremble that God is changeless love, for that love 
condemns sin and the sinner.'* 

'* There is no help for me in all that" 

*' Surely not; there is no help for you any- 
where until you cease fighting against God for 
giving you the being which he created for bliss, 
not woe." 

*'If he created me for bliss, why does he not 
accomplish in me his purpose?" 

** You will not let him. He made your will 
free, even to the extent ]that it may resist his re- 
specting you. He is ' not willing that any should 
perish;' yet you may perish if you will, and the 
Spirit will not always strive to prevent it. But 
this fierce conflict within you shows that he is 
now striving." 

** Then you- truly think God desires my salva- 
tion?" 

'* Assuredly. While his love makes you 
wretched in your rebellion, his pity weeps over 
you, crying, * Ye will not come unto me that ye 
might have life V " 



GRACE TRIUMPHANT. 319 

*" Will not come?' * Will not come unto me 
that ye may have life?' " He repeated the words 
questioningly, seating himself with forced calm-* 
ness as he did so. 

** Yes, those are God's words, and they are the 
very spirit of God's will towards impenitent sin- 
ners, as revealed to ns in the Scriptures. God, 
who made mankind in holiness, would be his Sa- 
viour from the sin into which he has fallen and 
which he persists in choosing. God, in Christ, 
stands with outstretched hands of mercy, while 
he cries to us sinners, *Come, come, come unto 
me!' *Ye will not come!' *How oft would I 
have gathered you . . . and ye would not !' * I 
have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out 
my hand, and no man regarded !' " 

** What is the rest of the passage ? There is a 
denunciation." 

" I meant not to speak of that now. The rest 
is only for those who refuse to listen to the voice 
of Wisdom. You must not refuse. * ' 

** Let me hear the consequences. I remember 
it only vaguely." 

Mr. Elton turned to the passage and read it: 

" * Because I have called and ye refused, I have 
stretched out my hand and no man regarded, but 
ye have set at naught all my counsel and would 
none of my reproof, I also will laugh at your ca- 



220 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

lamity; I will mock when your fear comethi 
when your fear cometh as desolation and your de- 
struction cometh as a whirlwind, when distress 
and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they 
call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall 
seek me early, but they shall not find me.' " 

'*That is just," said Mr. Hawkins thought- 
fully. 

"Yes, God is love, but he is not all mercy. 
His love becomes justice in wrath to the sinner 
who, rejecting all the overtures of mercy, will not 
come to God for the gift of eternal life which he 
oflfers. There is no escape from your Creator's 
power and rule, and although he now calls, he 
will not always call." 

*' You put God's character in a new light to 
me, Mr. Elton. It claims my respect. I should 
use a stronger word, but perhaps cannot. I will 
ponder these things. Give me a room alone a lit- 
tle while." 

**Your bedroom is ready; but you have not 
eaten. Come down with me now to the dining- 
room, for as you are feeling you will not wish to 
meet the students at tea." 

** Would you have me stop to eat while these 
momentous interests are pending? My whole 
being is shaken; food would choke nie. Give 
me a glass of water and show me my room." 



GRACE TRIUMPHANT. 22X 

Mr. Elton complied without a word of remon- 
strance. Then he called Dick to his room. 

** Richard, go and ask Mr. Ash ton to take my 
place at supper, and ask your mother to excuse us 
both; then come up here. We have other work 
than eating and drinking just now." When 
Dick returned he said, 

"You know Mr. Hawkins has come. His 
whole being is stirred. He cannot eat, for mental 
and spiritual conflict. It is the crisis of his be- 
ing. We will pray for him." 

At nine o'clock Mr. Elton ventured to knock 
at Mr. Hawkin's door, and he opened it, looking 
white and stem, with bright, tearless eyes. 

** Can I do anything for you, body or spirit?" 
asked Mr Elton. 

** I fear not No one can help me. Nothing 
can avert my destiny. * The way of transgressors 
is hard. ' * The wages of sin is death. ' ' ' 

** ' But the gift of God is eternal life through 
Jesus Christ'" 

** Does it say that?" 

** See for yourself" 

Mr. Elton turned to the passage, **For the 
wages of sin is death: but the gift of God is eter- 
nal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord," leaving 
the Bible open at the place. On the same table 
stood a tray with the untasted supper which had 



222 DICK IJ^NGDON'S CAREER. 

been sent up. Glancing at it Mr. Elton said, 
"Try and eat; exhaustion of body is not favora- 
ble in this battle for eternal life." 

Mr. Hawkins glanced contemptuously at the 
supper, saying, '*It would choke me!" He did 
not ask Mr. Elton to stay, yet he lingered, reluc- 
tant to leave him, and said, "You speak of a 
dreaded destiny. Perhaps you have some mista- 
en idea of its nature which is an obstacle." 

"No; I care not to ask its nature. What I 
now feel is hell enough to justify the language of 
the Bible. The unquenchable fire, the undying 
worm are the inevitable consequence of the eter- 
nal growth of the sin that is in me." 

"Then you do not charjye your Maker with 
injustice, as you did an hour ago?" 

"No. Neither, I suppose, do the inhabitants 
of hell. The fact that I see God's justice brings 
me no nearer to him." 

" Yes, it is the first step, and a long one too; 
rather, it is a leap over a barrier which thousands 
never pass. Now look at his mercy in Christ. If 
God has come down to earth, clothed in humani- 
ty, to make the impossibility of the sinner's sal- 
vation possible, will you not avail yourself of the 
one only way? * There is none other name under 
heaven given among men whereby we must be 
saved.* ** 



GRACE TRIUMPHANT. 323 

"I have not viewed it in that light If I 
could feel that God came ! I seem to grasp some- 
thing there that might avail." 

'* You are right: you must grasp the thought 
of your Maker as your Redeemer. * The Word 
was God. All things were made by him; and 
without him was not anything made that was 
made. And the Word was made flesh and dwelt 
among us.' God the Creator came in Christ, 
* reconciling the world unto himself.' " 

Mr. Hawkins held up his hand as a signal for 
silence. ''Leave it right there," he said; *'let 
me think of only that" 

Mr. Elton left instantly. At midnight there 
was a gentle rap at Mr. Elton's door, and Mr. 
Hawkins entered, finding his friend still up, for 
he had watched and prayed. This time Mr. 
Hawkins extended both hands. 

"Help me if you can," he cried. **I see 
that God is love, even in my condemnation. I 
see there is mercy, pardon, salvation if I could 
and would do my part. ' What must I do to be 
saved?'" 

** * Bdieve on the I/Ord Jesus Christ, and thou 
shalt be saved.' " 

** What is it to believe on him?" 

**To trust him." 

^^ It is not plain to me." 



224 I^ICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

*' You find yourself a sinner, and, in conse- 
quence, justly lost to all good now and for ever ?' ' 

** I do; I know it and I feel iV 

*' You feel that you cannot save yourself?" 

*' Yes; I feel that no one but Gkni who made 
me is able to save me: that he will not, cannot, 
unless I believe." 

** You are willing to receive salvation as his 
free gift, and to take it just as he bids you?" 

** Yes, if I could only understand his will." 

'*His will is that you believe; that you trust 
his promise that for Christ's sake he will pardon 
the worst dinner that ever in penitent sincerity 
begs for mercy in that name — that only name." 

** Do you mean that belief in Christ is simply 
trusting him to save the guilty soul he has died to 
redeem?" 

*'Yes. At Christ's feet plead for salvation 
from your sin. Then take him at his word in 
his promises of pardoning mercy. To refuse to 
trust him is the only unpardonable sin, unbelief" 

*'Is it possible that this tremendous interest 
hangs upon an act so siniple?" 

'* You are in the raging sea, sinking* to your 
death. The life -boat approaches; a hand is 
stretcjied out within your reach. You may grasp 
it, and live; you may not grasp it, and die. It is ^ 
very simple and unspeakably momentous." 



GRACE T&IUMPHANT. 825 

After a minute of deep thought Mr. Hawkins 
rose, and kneeling, prayed in broken language for 
God's pardoning mercy in Jesus Christ, to him 
the chief of sinners. Finding that Mr. Elton, 
who was kneeling with him, did not pray, he 
turned to him, saying, *' Why do you not pray for 
me?'' 

Mr. Elton prayed. When they arose the fire 
of those fierce eyes was quenched in penitent 
tears. 



IS 



aa6 DICK I^NGDON'S CAR2$K&. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

PATIENT CONTINUANCS, 

The school at Lyme prospered, increasing in 
numbers and in public favor. Yet Mr. Elton 
was not satisfied with the fruit of his labors; for 
while his earnest endeavors to instruct his pupils 
in the literary course were crowned with success, 
he feared that all his prayers and efforts to make 
it a school for Christ were fruitless. In his aseal 
and ardor he forgot that right religious teaching 
ever must, and will, like the hidden leaven, work 
its own results. *' My word shall not return unto 
me void, but it shall accomplish that which I 
please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto 
I sent it." 

During the second term of Dick's connection 
with the school, he became absorbed in his studies 
to an excess which led him to become compara- 
tively indifferent to spiritual things, a change 
which Mr. Elton felt although he could find 
nothing in outward conduct to disapprove. One 
evening when they were alone, he said, 

^'Richard, you do not express to me that in^ 



PATIENT CONTINUANCE. 227 

terest respecting the salvation of the students 
which you did formerly.'* 

**It is not in my thoughts, Mr. Elton, as it 
was last term. My studies engross me. Then I 
prayed for the conversion of all the students, and 
very earnestly for several in particular, who came 
occasionally to our prayer-meeting, but not one 
of them became permanently changed, and my 
zeal has gradually died out; our meeting, too, has 
diminished in numbers and interest." 

**How many were present at the last meet- 
ing ?'' 

** I am sorry to say that I allowed an unusually 
hard Greek lesson to keep me away; indeed, to 
be quite sincere, lessons not unusually difficult 
have often kept me, it seemed so little use to go. 
Willy, who is always there, reported only four 
present" 

"Zeal in study is a good thing, Richard; a 
teacher is usually the last to find fault with it; 
but — I will only ask you to converse with your 
Saviour on this point" 

** A word spoken in due season, how good is 
it !" Our asealous young student had not gone so 
far from Christ that he could not find his way 
back, and the conversation with the unseen Friend 
produced results. 

Very quietly Dick sought out, one by one, the 



aa8 DICK langdon's career. 

absent members of the school prayer-meeting, 
and confessing to them his own negligence, invited 
them to be J)resent at the next meeting. When 
the evening came, Willy, who had known nothing 
of Dick's recent feelings and movements, was 
surprised by the attendance of a larger number 
than he had seen for weeks. Just as the hour of 
prayer was drawing to a close, one of the young- 
est boys present, who had never confessed him- 
self to be a Christian, rose and said he had hoped 
the previous term that he was beginning a reli- 
gious life, but losing the degree of interest he 
then felt, had relinquished that hope; but he now 
was resolved to seek Christ until he found him, 
and he wished they would pray for him before they 
separated. The student having charge of the 
meeting requested Dick to lead in prayer. It was 
a very broken prayer, more, for pardon for him- 
self than for any one else. When Dick rose from 
his knees, there was scarcely a dry eye in the 
room; the meeting was protracted half an hour, 
which was spent in mutual confession and con- 
secration. This meeting was followed by a state 
of awakened religious interest in the school, very 
favorable for Christian effort, and Mr. Elton re- 
joiced in welcoming one after another of his 
pupils as fellow-travellers in the heavenward 
journey. Dick said to him one day, 



PATIENT CONTINUANCE. 229 

**I will never allow myself again to feel that 
prayer and Christian eflfort for others are vain." 

** When did you feel so?" 

"At the close of last term, and the beginning 
of this, when no one of the boys for whom I had 
most hoped seemed to manifest a settled purpose 
to serve God. I became disheartened, and gave 
up my religious work, more on that account than 
any other; yet nearly all for whom I then la- 
bored are now sincerely interested." 

*' I do not blame you for your discouragement, 
Richard; it was natural, and I felt too much so 
myself; but the true way, doubtless, is to work 
right on, leaving the results with God, who alone 
can give them. * In the morning sow thy seed, 
and in the evening withhold not thy hand: for 
thou knowest not whether shall prosper either 
this or that, or whether they both shall be alike 
good.' I hope we shall both remember the les- 
son, but I fear we may forget it even after many 
teachings; it is a hard lesson, very hard." 

'*Why, Mr. Elton, I don't feel that I can 
ever forget it." 

**I do not like to damp your enthusiasm, but 
it will be remarkable if this experience proves 
suflScient to teach you the diflScult lesson of pa- 
tient continuance in well-doing, without regard 
to apparent results. It is a hard lesson to learn." 



230 DICK I^ANGDON'S CAREEJl. 

Enthusiastic Richard did not, perhaps, give 
the heed he should to these reiterated counsels of 
one older and wiser than himself, for soon after 
the commencement of the next term he said to 
his teacher, 

** How discouraging it is that so many of the 
boys appear to have lost the religious interest 
which they seemed to possess at the close of last 
term." 

**The change is perhaps more apparent than 
real; there is not, now, so much to draw out ex- 
pressions of their feelings. However that may 
be, remember you are to go right on, laboring 
and praying all the same, whether you do or do 
not see results." 

**Ah! Mr. Elton, the lesson is harder than I 
thought it," faltered Dick. 

"I do not think you have lost any genuine 
interest, or that many of the others have lost it 
beyond recall. Attention has been diverted dur- 
ing vacation, and the special glow of spiritual 
enthusiasm has passed; but the fruit of that en- 
thusiasm remains deep in the heart of every true 
Christian. Now your work and mine is not to 
drop back into a life which does not regard the 
reality of these things, but by still speaking to 
one and another of them, to quicken our own life 
and that of others, and while we continue to sow 



PATIBNT CONTINUANCB. a3X 

new seed, watch patiently the slowest growth of 
that already sprung up: for of some, even of the 
good seed, it says, ^some thirty fold. ' " 

Thus encouraged, Dick patiently continued 
his labors for Christ, and found, much to his grati- 
fication, that in almost every instance a sincere 
desire to lead a religious life still existed in the 
hearts of those who had expressed it the previous 
term. That awakening was the dawn of a bright- 
er spiritual day in the school at Lyme. 

The following extract fh)m a letter received 
by Mr. Elton from Mr. Hawkins, will show that 
through him Dick's influence was still felt at the 
Reform School. 

** With this new purpose to serve God, I felt 
at first that I must leave this place and seek a 
new field of labor, but second thought taught me 
rather to stay and do my best here. I am trying 
to make this a Reform School in something be- 
sides the name, a school for Christ, without whom 
I fear there is little reform deeper than the sur- 
face." 

**Does it trouble you to remember your stay 
at the Reform School?" asked Mr. Elton of 
Dick. 

**Oh, no! It was a favorite school of Satan, 
but it proved Christ's school to me, thanks to 
Willy's teaching." 



aja DICK langdon's career. 

**And to me, thanks to yours," added Mr* 
Elton. 

** I never can understand why you say that'' 
*'It was even so my boy, although you knew 
it not, and meant it not; we are all teachers for 
Christ or Satan, even if we do not realize the fact. 
*He that is not with me is against me; and he 
that gathereth not with me, scattereth abroad.' " 



CONTRITION, 233 



CHAPTER XX. 

CONTRITION, 

Dick often spoke of Willy, as in the conver- 
sation which closes the last chapter, alluding to 
the gratitude which he owed him. He had also 
frankly confessed to Mr. Elton that he considered 
himself the means of leading him into the bad 
ways and society which brought him to the Re- 
form school. Mr. Elton, Dick and his mother 
took counsel together over Willy's interests and 
mutually pledged themselves to make his educa- 
tion, support and establishment in business their 
care. 

Willy called himself happy at Lyme, was very 
diligent and proficient in his studies, and mani- 
fested such an affectionate and gentle spirit that it 
never ceased to be occasion for wonder to Dick 
that such a boy could ever have gone so far astray. 
He expressed this wonder one evening to Mr. 
Elton, who replied, 

*'I'm sorry to grieve you by saying it, Rich- 
ard, but I must remind you of the truth; you 
made use of these very traits of his character to 
lure him into evil. You, who have the stronger 



234 I>ICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

will and whose bolder qualities were his admira- 
tion, flattered him and won his love, giving him 
yours in return, and thus he followed you into 
sins which did not in themselves attract him. 
Then in the city, amid the desolation of his lost 
home, he found no friend but Satan's emissaries, 
who led him almost unresisting, putting him to 
every most dangerous use, so that he was sent to 
the Reform school for being implicated in their 
crimes rather than as having committed any of 
his own. These facts I learned when seeking his 
release." 

Mr. Elton said no more, because he saw that 
Dick had bowed his head upon the table at which 
they sat. He put his hand caressingly upon the 
bowed head, saying, 

*'Don't grieve over it to the forgetfulness of 
present duty. God has overruled it for your good 
and mine; we will never see Willy lack either 
love or comfort" 

Dick raised his head with tears, which he was 
ever slow to shed, upon his cheeks. Taking the 
hand which had caressed him, he kissed it and 
said, 

** Why have you never reproached me for not 
sorrowing enough over the sins of those evil 
years?" 

** Richard, * It is Christ that justifieth, who is 



CONTRITION. 235 

he that condemneth ?' We should remember the 
past enough to make us humble, prayerful for 
ourselves, merciful and tender to the enring, while 
in one sense we forget the things that are behind, 
in pressing forward.'* 

But thoughts of harm done to his beloved 
Willy had stirred deep fountains in Dick's soul, 
and to comfort him Mr. Elton said, 

**I did not mean to wound you so deeply. 
While I would not have you seek excuses for 
yourself, I can hardly forbear saying that I find 
many for you. One is that you never knew a 
father's care and discipline." 

*' And Willy, who had a fond Christian father, 
says his last act towards him was one of disobedi- 
ence, and that he dreams sometimes of seeing him 
and asking his forgiveness, and weeps to find it 
only a dream." 

**His father's and mother's prayers for their 
son are answered, Richard. Tell him I said the 
thought of that should give him peace." 

**Mr. Elton, I need a father's care and disci- 
pline still. I wish you would consent to bestow 
them. I will promise to render you love, defer- 
ence and obedience." 

Dick was surprised by Mr. Elton's response or 
rather lack of response, to his request Instead 
of replying he blushed and smiled and seemed 



^36 DICK langdon's career. 

embarrassed, which was very unusual. Then he 
put his arm tenderly over Dick's shoulder, which 
was also unusual. At last he said, . 

** You know I love you, Richard, and as I 'm 
your teacher, you may render me as many of the 
good things you have mentioned as you can. 
About the sonship we '11 speak at a future time," 

Mr. Elton looked so youthful with the flush 
still in his cheeks and that peculiar smile on his 
lips and in his eyes that Dick said, 

'* Excuse me, sir, wont you? I didn't know 
what I was asking. It can't be I suppose. I only 
wish it could." 

Then Mr. Elton laughed outright, which so 
astonished Dick that he rose and said he must go 
to his studies, and Mr. Elton gravely remarked 
that he too must be at work ! Then as Dick was 
going off, not a little worried lest he had done 
something improper, Mr. Elton called him back 
saying, 

*'Give me a good-night kiss, Richard." So 
they kissed each other for the first, but by no 
means for the last time. 

After that evening Dick was more watchfully 
tender to Willy than ever, and he in return dung 
yet closer to him. 

* * I ' ve nobody else to love, Richie ;' ' (this name 
was Willy's own peculiar substitute for **Dick;") 



CONTRITION. 337 

"only of course I have Mr. Elton, who isn't 
really mine; and you're not really mine either, 
but I feel more as if you were; I may call you 
my Richie mayn't I?" 

*' Yes, indeed you may ! You are my brother 
if you like. Oh, Willy, I often think if we had 
money, and were both going to college, that 
you would be a freshman when I was a sopho- 
more, and that I should perhaps get expelled 
for fighting my classmates when they undertook to 
'haze' you! But you may be sure I wouldn't 
mind running the risk could we but go ! As nei- 
ther of us can, we'll have each other here now, 
and we'll try and plan always to be near each 
other." 

Willy's acquiescence was rather faint; he felt 
that his ''Richie" would in some way get to col- 
lege, while he never should, and that Dick's 
sphere would be so far above his own as to sepa- 
rate them. 

Dick, who did not understand his sadness, 
asked, 

Willy, do they care for you, love you I mean, 
where you live." 

"They are very kind to me," answered Willy. 

Dick knew, then, that they were only kind, 
and that Willy's heart still ached for the love of 
near kindred. 



238 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

Not very long after this conversation, when 
Dick one day brought the letters from the post- 
office, at school recess, there was one in Mr. El- 
ton's care, for Willy. 

*' Call him into a recitation-room, and give it 
to him ;' ' said Mr. Elton : ' * I hope some good friend 
has remembered him." 

Dick left Willy in a little room not often used, 
alone with his letter. 

Several minutes after recess had closed, Willy, 
never before known to be absent from his seat at 
such a time, came from the little room into the 
school-room, his face disfigured with weeping, 
ax-d going straight to Mr. Elton^s desk laid the 
open letter before him, and without a word slip- 
ped away to his seat, and taking a book turned to 
his lesson. 

Mr. Elton wrote ** excused" opposite the tardy 
mark he had been obliged to give Willy, and put 
the unread letter in his pocket, till he could find 
time for it. 

'*Oh," thought Dick, greatly troubled, **can 
it be that my poor Willy's letter brought him 
fresh sorrow !" 

Mr. Elton took an opportunity to request both 
of them to remain in their seats when school was 
dismissed, and as soon as all the rest had left they 
went to him unbidden. 



CONTRITION. 239 

**0h, Richie," cried Willy, "look glad 1 be 
glad, not troubled! It's such news! Oh^ Mr. 
Elton !" 

**Yes, dear Willy," said Mr. Elton, with a 
tremor in his voice, *'I have read it, and I'm 
thankful to God for your sake, to the very bottom 
of my heart" 

**What is it?" cried Dick, **what can it be, 
to make you both like this !" 

Mr. Elton felt for the letter, but Willy drew 
Dick down to him, and hugged him about the 
neck, and said to him half in whispers for lack of 
voice. 

"Father is alive! An outward bound ship 
picked him pp, nearly insensible, floating on 
something, :.nd he's well now, and has just got 
home from abroad where the ship took him. He's 
coming Here to-night." 

Willy hid his face on Dick's shoulder, as his 
suppressed tears flowed afresh, and neither of the 
three cared to try his voice in speech for a few 
minutes. Then Mr. Elton handed Dick the let- 
ter, saying, 

"You and Willy can read it together. There 
is more good news besides the fact that Willy's 
father is alive; but that makes the rest seem of 
little account" And he left them alone with 
each other. 



240 DICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

Dick read the letter, and learned that it was 
in saving the life of a wealthy ship-owner that 
Mr. Goodwin was supposed to have perished. 
That this man, on learning that his preserver was 
living, had given him twenty thousand dollars 
by investing it, in Mr. Goodwin's name, in such 
a way that he could not refuse it, making him 
his partner as managing owner of several vessels. 

' ' This means, ' ' said Dick joyfully, * * that your 
father is a rich man, and on the road to greater 
wealth. He was a gentleman always, even when 
he was very poor.'* 

**Yes, and always so good!" added Willy. 
He would not have had Dick know for a greaf 
deal that his thoughts went back, at the moment, 
to his father's kind act in giving him, from his 
almost empty purse, twenty-five cents to add to 
his strawberry money, and to his own unconfessed 
sin which was his first serious departure from the 
road of virtue. Oh, how much of sorrowful con- 
fession he had to breathe upon the bosom of his 
loving father, who knowing all about his dear 
boy's sad wanderings had only written him words 
of encouragement and tenderness ! It is not 
strange, that over his joy, tears for a time had the 
mastery. 

"Oh ! come, Willy boy, cheer up ! said Dick 
at last "You do n't want your father to find you 



CONTRITION. {841 

sick. Think of it, you are the one who can go 
to college, and do anything you want to." 

''Yes, I hadn't thought," cried Willy start- 
ing up almost joyfully, ''Father will be willing, 
I am sure. You shall go first, and I, when I am 
fitted." 

Dick shook his head in decided negative. "I 
couldn't let him do that, Willy: don't you ask 
him. If I am to go, there will be some other 
way," 

"But Richie, think how much you've done 
for me I" 

" Sometimes I do," said Dick remorsefully. 

"Always taking my part, and being the one 
to stay there, to let me come here with Mr. Elton, 
and everything," added Willy. 

"My generous Willy! You're forgetting 
what brought you to that place." 

"No, Richie, I don't forget the sins which 
brought me there. But God has forgiven them, 
and so will father: I feel sure he will." 

'*Ah, Willy ! you are forgetting what I can ■ t, 
and don't wish to if I could, that I need youi 
father's forgiveness more than you do 1" 



9^ DICIC IAKOIX>N'S CAREER. 

CHAPTER XXI. 

SAFETY. 

The second year at Lyme glided by as sdiool 
years glide, being gone almost before we realize 
they axe half over, and Dick, having completed 
the course, was prepared to enter either college or ' 
a btisine^ life. 

He longed to continue the education which 
seenoed to his eager mind only fairly begun; but 
he kej^ that desire to himself, never having ex- 
pressed it to any one but Willy, who faithfully 
kept a promise, which Dick had coaxed him into 
snaking, never to reveal the fact to any one. His 
reason for thus smothering his own preference 
was that, being destitute of means, he felt that 
he ought to seek some position which would at 
least support him, instead of casting upon his mo- 
ther not only the burden of her own and Etta's 
maintenance, but that of helping him for years in 
a hard struggle for a collegiate training, which 
might leave him no nearer than at present to any 
pecuniary resource. 

He was a little surprised that Mr. Elton, in all 
the freedom of their intercourse, which had be- 



come mor^ and more intimate, nQver moatioQied 
the wbject of his future beyond the academy 
course. Near the close of the last term Mr. El- 
ton asked him one evening, somewhat abruptly, 
if he had laid any plans for the future^ or had any 
settled wish or purpose respecting it. 

*' I am glad you have mentioned the subject," 
replied Dick, '*for I want your advice, I must 
choose some paying business and try to find im- 
mediate employment in it You, who know me 
best, and who take such kindly interest in my 
welfare, are my best counsellor," 

** 'Kindly interest' is a cold word between us, 
Richard; but I will advise you none the less 
warmly. Go to college for the purpose of cul- 
ture, leaving the choice of your vocation to the 
matnrer judgment of the future." 

''I should like it, oh, so much, Mr. Elton! 
and I could accomplish it, doubtless, in time. I 
would not mind delay or struggle or hardship for 
myself, but for mother's sake I must not allow 
myself to attempt it. There are many shorter 
roads to useful and honorable employment My 
mother and sister are a sacred charge." 

Mr. Elton looked happy and as if he were 
very much pleased with Dick, as he replied, 

"True, my own Richard. You might well 
sacrifice your longing for further culture to 9eeu* 



^44 I>ICK LANGDON'S CAREER. 

ring the happiness of such a woman as your mo 
ther, or, indeed, of any mother, were it necessary. 
I like your spirit; but, as I should have told you 
earlier, the offering is not needed." 

'* But I think it is, Mr. Elton." 

** You will not think so when I tell you that I 
regard you even now as my son, and that it is my 
wish to gratify your desire for a liberal education. 
As you are constituted, it will promote your use- 
fulness and happiness. If you loved study less, I 
should not advise it, being no friend to forcing 
unwilling minds through the labor of a protract- 
ed literary course. You will look to me for the 
means. Your talents and faithfulness will secure 
you a scholarship at college; the rest I can easily 
meet" 

*'Mr. Elton, this is too much from one upon 
whom I have no claim: one to whom I already 
owe more than I can ever repay. I must show 
my gratitude for the past by taking my future 
support upon myself. Don't urge me or tempt 
me, for I must, indeed I must !" 

** My son will not feel so. Why, Richard, my 
boy, you look terribly puzzled, when usually you 
are so keen at guessing ! And I expected her to 
tell you when it was fully settled, some weeks 
ago. Others know; and the wedding outfit is be- 
ing made, or is made — I hardly know which, get- 



SAFETY. 345 

ting Yeady for school examination has engrossed 
me so. I ' ve been expecting your congratulations 
after my long probation. The day is set: the 
first Wednesday of vacation. ' ' 

Our bright Dick was utterly bewildered still, 
and Mr. Elton looked happy, amused, and em- 
barrassed^'ust so far, I mean, as an expressive 
face can look three things at the same time. 

**Do pity my stupidity," said Dick. **I have 
been getting ready for examination too. I do 
congratulate you, since you are happy. But who 
is the lady? and what can it have to do with my 
being your son and going to college?" 

*' No, I 'm not going to tell you. I 'm not in 
the habit, am I, of solving your problems for you? 
But listen now, and I will again state the problem 
which I have given you to solve. I do n't usual- 
ly have to state one twice to you, but you are very 
dull to-night. If I am to be married, and you are 
to be my son, who is to be the bride ? If you 
can't solve so simple a problem as that, having 
but one unknown quantity, you must — " 

Mr. Elton never finished his sentence, because 
Dick came to him with such a radiantly-glad, yet 
serious face, and with both hands outstretched to 
clasp his, that he was constrained to drop his 
pleasantry and be thoroughly in earnest. Dick 
stood with both Mr. Elton's hands in his own, 



946 DICK LANG^DON^S CAREER. 

and, looking straight into his eyes; said the rtry 
last thing that his teacher, with all his knowledge 
of his character, would have expected: 

*'Mr. Elton, are you sure that you love my 
mother?" 

** Richard, she is the first and the only woman 
I ever loved. When I first told her the fact and 
asked her to be my wife, she was utterly sur- 
prised and said she had never thought of such a 
possibility and could not answer such an unex- 
pected question. So I have, because she wished 
it, cheerfully waited a year to test our knowledge 
of our own hearts. Yes, I am sure V^ 

*'She is worthy even of you, Mr. Elton. Yet 
I am so surprised that I can't realize or express 
my joy 1" 

** And you are willing I should send my son to 
college?'* 

** Yes; I'm glad to owe you anything, every- 
thing. If ever a father had a dutiful son, you 
shall have one in me !" 

** I ask more than that of my son." 

" Can I give you more love as my father than 
is yours already?" 

**0h, yes, if I deserve more. Love's growth 
is limitless." 

Then they conversed long and earnestly of the 
future, and in all that was said Mr. Elton took it 



SAFETY. 247 

SO for granted that his Richard was never to dis- 
appoint his expectations that he said, 

** You don't seem to think it possible that I 
shall fall into temptation and sin at college.** 

*'It is true that I feel very sure you will do 
yourself and me credit; yet more: that you will 
honor the Saviour whose name we both confess.'* 

" Why do you trust me so? If I betray your 
confidence I shall be the most ungrateful of 
wretches! My very horror of ever doing so 
makes me tremble lest I may.'* 

'*If you were self-confident and forgetful of 
Christ, Richard, I should tremble for you, how- 
ever high your standing in deportment and schol- 
arship. If you were careless in your conduct and 
lazy over your books I should not put much trust 
in your professions or even your prayers. While 
you continue, as now, to work and watch and 
pray, you will be delivered from evil.*' 

** Thank you for such encouragement. Yet I 
am a little afraid of absence from you at college, 
where so many fall who have stood prreviously, 
and whose friends were as confident of them as 
you are of me.*' 

"College is a place of temptation, Richard. 
Satan wishes to make it his school, as he does 
every institution of education; but the most of 
those who fall there have taken many lessons of 



248 DICK LANGDON'S career. 

him and his assistants in those primary schools of 
evil which so nearly proved your ruin, yet have 
never, like you, turned from the power of Satan 
to God by repentance and faith in him, who alone 
can uphold and save.'' 

'* I will try to make college Christ's school to 
me." Dick said it very thoughtfully and earn- 
estly. 

*'It will prove Christ's school, Richard, to 
every one who loves and serves him there." 

We must leave Dick now. If we follow him 
to college in his freshman year we shall find him 
with Ernest as a classmate. Willy's home is 
with his father in the place where the university 
is situated, so that Dick has him for his dearest 
friend while Willy finishes fitting himself to enter 
the next year. 

In bidding Dick this reluctant adieu, we feel, 
with Mr% Elton, that we can trust him, not be- 
cause of his many noble traits of character, but 
because his feet are firmly placed upon the Rock, 
Christ Jesus, against which the fiercest tempests 
of Satan's temptation and Satan's rage must ever 
alike be broken. 



I 



i l l . -ii^J I III 



1. 



