"
"Ah, you won't, sir,--won't you? I don't mean you shall, sir;" and the
blows fall thick and fast, until the poor fellow crawls back, utterly
crestfallen and heartsick, to sob over his books.
You grow into a sudden boldness; you wish you were only large enough to
beat the master; you know such treatment would make you miserable; you
shudder at the thought of it; you do not believe he would dare; you
know the other boy has got no father. This seems to throw a new light
upon the matter, but it only intensifies your indignation. You are sure
that no father would suffer it; or, if you thought so, it would sadly
weaken your love for him. You pray Heaven, that it may never be brought
to such proof.
----Let a boy once distrust the love or the tenderness of his parents,
and the last resort of his yearning affections--so far as the world
goes--is utterly gone. He is in the sure road to a bitter fate. His
heart will take on a hard, iron covering, that will flash out plenty of
fire in his after contact with the world, but it will never--never melt!
There are some tall trees, that overshadow an angle of the schoolhouse;
and the larger scholars play some very surprising gymnastic tricks upon
their lower limbs: one boy, for instance, will hang for an incredible
length of time by his feet with his head down; and when you tell Charlie
of it at night, with such additions as your boyish imagination can
contrive, the old nurse is shocked, and states very gravely that it is
dangerous, and that the blood all runs to the head, and sometimes bursts
out of the eyes and mouth.
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