u steal the reading of some brief passage of
"Lazy Lawrence," or of the "Hungarian Brothers," and muse about it for
hours afterward to the great detriment of your ciphering; or, deeply
lost in the story of the "Scottish Chiefs," you fall to comparing such
villains as Menteith with the stout boys who tease you; and you only
wish they could come within reach of the fierce Kirkpatrick's claymore.

But you are frighted out of this stolen reading by a circumstance that
stirs your young blood very strangely. The master is looking very sourly
on a certain morning, and has caught sight of the little weak-eyed boy
over beyond you, reading "Roderick Random." He sends out for a long
birch rod, and having trimmed off the leaves carefully,--with a glance
or two in your direction,--he marches up behind the bench of the poor
culprit,--who turns deathly pale,--grapples him by the collar, drags him
out over the desks, his limbs dangling in a shocking way against the
sharp angles, and having him fairly in the middle of the room, clinches
his rod with a new, and, as it seems to you, a very sportive grip.

You shudder fearfully.

"Please don't whip me," says the boy, whimpering.

"Aha!" says the smirking pedagogue, bringing down the stick with a
quick, sharp cut,--"you don't like it, eh?"

The poor fellow screams, and struggles to escape; but the blows come
faster and thicker. The blood tingles in your finger-ends with
indignation.

"Please don't strike me again," says the boy, sobbing, and taking
breath, as he writhes about the legs of the master; "I won't read
another time."

"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