leaving a gleam of sunshine on the young man's path.

Now Salmon was one who would never, if he could help it, abandon an
undertaking in which he had once embarked. But when convinced that
persistence was hopeless, then, however reluctantly, he would give it
up. On the present occasion, he was not only spending his time and
exhausting his energies in a pursuit which grew each day more and more
dubious, but his conscience was stung with the thought that he was
wronging others. Kind as Mrs. Markham was to him, he did not like to
look her in the face and feel that he owed her a debt which was always
increasing, and which he knew not how he should ever pay.

"Why don't you get a place in the Department?" said Williams, that
enviable fellow, who had light duties, several hours each day to
himself, and eight hundred a year!

"That's more easily said than done!" And Salmon shook his head.

"No, it isn't!" The fortunate Williams sat with his legs upon the table,
one foot on the other, a pipe in his mouth, and a book in his hand,
enjoying himself. "You have an uncle in the Senate. Ask him to use his
influence for you. He can get you a place." And puffing a fragrant cloud
complacently into the air, he returned to his pleasant reading.

Salmon walked the room. He went out and walked the street. A sore
struggle was taking place in his breast. Should he give up the school?
Should he go and ask this thing of his uncle? Oh, for somebody to whom
he could go for counsel and sympathy!

"Williams is perhaps right I may wait a year, and not get another pupil.
Meanwhile I am growing shabby. I need a new pair of boots. My
washerwoman must be paid. Why not get a clerkship as a temporary thing,
if nothing more? My uncle can get it for me, without any trouble to
himself. It is not like asking him for money."

Yet he dreaded to trouble the Senator even thus much. Proud and
sensitive natures do not like to beg favors, any way.

"I'll wait one day longer. Then, if not a pupil applies, I'll go to my
uncle--"

He waited twenty-four hours. Not a pupil. Then, desperate and
discouraged at last, Salmon buttoned his coat, and walked fast through
the streets to his uncle's boarding-house.

It was evening. The Senator was at home.

"Well, Salmon?" inquiringly. "How do you get on?"

"Poorly," said Salmon, sitting down, with his hat on his knee.

"You must have patience, boy!" said the Senator, laying down a pamphlet
open at the page where he