row repeated it distinctly.

"_What!_" roared Joel. In his excitement he cleared the space between
them, and gained Mr. Harrow's side. "_Not go to Moose Island, Mr.
Harrow_?" his black eyes widening, and his face working fearfully.

"No," said Mr. Harrow, drawing a long breath, "you are not to go; so Dr.
Marks says."

"But I _must_ go," cried Joel, quite gone in passion.

"'Must' is a singular word to use here, Joel," observed Mr. Harrow
sternly.

"But I--oh, Mr. Harrow, do see if you can't help me to go." Joel
squirmed all over, and even clutched the under-teacher's arm piteously.

"Alas, Joel! it is beyond my power." Mr. Harrow shook his head. He
didn't think it necessary to state that he had already used every
argument he could employ to induce Dr. Marks to change his mind. "Some
strong pressure must be brought to bear upon Pepper, or he will amount
to nothing but an athletic lad. He must see the value of study," the
master had responded, and signified that the interview was ended, and
his command was to be carried out.

"Joel,"--Mr. Harrow was speaking--"be a man, and bear this as _you_ can.
You've had your chances for study, and not taken them. It is a case of
_must_ now. Remember, Dr. Marks is doing this in love to you. He has got
to fit you out as well as he can in this school, to take that place in
life that your mother wants you to fill. Don't waste a moment on vain
regrets, but buckle to your studies now."

It was a long speech for the under-teacher, and he had a hard time
getting through with it. At its end, Joel, half dazed with his
misfortune, but with a feeling that as a man, Dr. Marks and Mr. Harrow
had treated him, hurried back to his room, dragged his chair up to the
table, and pushing off the untidy collection of rackets, tennis balls,
boxing gloves, and other implements of his gymnasium work and his
recreation hours, lent his whole heart with a new impulse to his task.

Somehow he did not feel like crying, as had often been the case with
previous trials. "He said, 'Be a man,'" Joel kept repeating over and
over to himself, while the words of his lesson swam before his eyes.
"And so I will; and he said, Dr. Marks had got to make me as Mamsie
wanted me to be," repeated Joel to himself, taking a shorter cut with
the idea. "And so I will be." And he leaned his elbows on the table,
bent his head over his book, and clutching his stubby crop by both hands
and holding on tightly, he was soon lost to