one, and up to his room without disturbing his parents,
who had retired some time before.

The next morning he awoke with a severe headache, and seemed generally
out of tune.

The mere thought of what he had done--how he had disgraced himself by
going to a public bar, and there drinking to intoxication--caused him
the deepest sorrow and regret; but when he fully realized what a severe
wound his conduct would inflict upon his mother and father, and how they
would grieve over it--when he thought what the people of the town would
say, and remembered that he had actually called in this lamentable state
at Dr. Dutton's house--the place of all others he would have wished to
avoid--he became sick at heart as well as in body, and his tumultuous
feelings were only soothed by tears of honest repentance.

However, Fred hurriedly dressed himself, went to the store as usual, and
commenced his accustomed labors. He saw at once, by Mr. Rexford's
manner, that he did not know what had happened the previous night, and
this afforded him a slight temporary relief; still, he knew it was only
a question of time before his employer would learn the whole story.

When this took place, what would be the result? Would he lose his
situation? He knew that Mr. Rexford was a stern man, having little
charity for the faults of others. That his clerk should have been
intoxicated the previous night would undoubtedly irritate him greatly.

Fred imagined that every one whom he saw knew of what he had done, and
looked upon him with disgust. He felt tempted to leave the village, and
never be seen again where he had so disgraced himself. Could he only go
to some new place, among strangers, and commence life over again, he
might have a better chance to work his way upward; but here this shame
would always hang, like a dark cloud, above him.

On reflection, however, he saw that it would be both unmanly and
ungrateful to leave his parents.

No; he was the guilty party, and he must stay here, where the
unfortunate occurrence had taken place, and here try, by the strictest
discipline, and the most watchful care, to regain his former standing
among his friends.

As Fred thought over the occurrences of the past few weeks--of Matthew's
decided hostility, of his course at the party, and his sudden friendship
since that time--of his treachery and meanness the night before, in
getting him to call at Dr. Dutton's while intoxicated, and his deception
in so sudden