worse. Why, you might be like me, with
your father and mother thousands of miles away. When Aggie is better,
you'll be able to go home--and it'll help your mother if she thinks you
are _almost_ as happy as if you were at home. It must be worse for
her--she has cried ever so over her letter--see, it's all tear-blots."

The troubles and disappointments of youth are bitter while they last,
but they soon pass, and the sun shines again. By the time Miss Ware, who
was a kind-hearted, sensible, pleasant woman, came to tell Fellowes how
sorry she was for him and his disappointment, the worst had gone by, and
the boy was resigned to what could not be helped.

[Illustration]

"Well, after all, one man's meat is another man's poison," she said,
smiling down on the two boys; "poor Tom has been looking forward to
spending his holidays all alone with us, and now he will have a friend
with him. Try to look on the bright side, Bertie, and to remember how
much worse it would have been if there had been no boy to stay with
you."

"I can't help being disappointed, Miss Ware," said Bertie, his eyes
filling afresh and his lips quivering.

"No, dear boy, you would be anything but a nice boy if you were not. But
I want you to try and think of your poor mother, who is full of trouble
and anxiety, and to write to her as brightly as you can, and tell her
not to worry about you more than she can help."

"Yes," said Bertie; but he turned his head away, and it was evident to
the school-mistress that his heart was too full to let him say more.

Still, he was a good boy, Bertie Fellowes, and when he wrote home to
his mother it was quite a bright every-day kind of letter, telling her
how sorry he was about Aggie, and detailing a few of the ways in which
he and Shivers meant to spend their holidays. His letter ended thus:--

"Shivers got a letter from his mother yesterday with three pounds in it:
if you happen to see Uncle Dick, will you tell him I want a 'Waterbury'
dreadfully?"

The last day of the term came, and one by one, or two by two, the
various boys went away, until at last only Bertie Fellowes and Shivers
were left in the great house. It had never appeared so large to either
of them before. The school-room seemed to have grown to about the size
of a church, the dining-room, set now with only one table instead of
three was not like the same, while the dormitory, which had never before
had any room to spare, was like a wilderness. To