ederick, let me urge
you to beware of the first glass. I don't care whether it is gin, or
rum, or brandy. Don't touch it. If you are tempted to drink, be a
hero. Have courage to say "No, I'll not throw myself away. I think too
much of myself for that."
CHAP. XIII.
SAMUEL IN BOSTON.
Time wore away. The peddler's boy, when he made up his mind to go to
work in the factory, did not expect to spend his days there. He
purposed to enter the factory because he thought that that was the
best thing he could do _then_. You will recollect that he said to his
father, when the old gentleman asked him what he would like to do,
that there were a great many things which he should _like_ to do, and
that may be he would do them some day; but that as he could not do
them _then_, he thought he would go to work in the factory, and wait
until he could do them. Samuel, at length, began to think that it was
time for him to look for some other business a little more to his mind
than what he was doing then. So thought the good old peddler, his
father. His mother--alas! she had gone to her rest--her smiling face
had long been missed in the little cottage where she had dwelt so many
years. It was decided that Samuel should go to Boston. But what was
he to do there? That question gave others more anxiety than it gave
Samuel. "I don't know, to be sure," said he, "exactly what I'll find
to do. But I know I'll do _something_. I'll shovel dirt, if I can't
get anything else to do, and I can make a living at that."
He went to Boston. The first thing he did, after he got there, was to
walk straight to the house of Captain Lovechild. The captain was at
home, and glad to see him.
"Do you remember," the boy asked, "when you came to our house, a
great while ago, and brought your telescope with you?"
"Yes," the old man replied, "and I remember, too, how a certain little
fellow got almost crazy when he looked through the instrument, at the
moon and stars, and when I told him something about them."
"And do you remember _what_ you said?"
"No, I'm sure I don't."
"Well, I do, as plainly as if you had said it but yesterday; and it
was what you said about living to some purpose, and having a high aim,
and being governed by high principles, that put a new soul into me."
"And made you talk so largely?"
Samuel colored. "I was a foolish little creature, I suppose," he said.
"No, not a bit of it," said the captain, grasping the young man'
|