o its former
melancholy, and he drooped under the weight of the injustice of which he
was the victim.

From that day forward he refused to attend either the night prayers of
the "false priest," or to go to any of his meetings, and to the hour of
his death this resolution could never be shaken by all the wiles of his
persecutors. Several new arts and schemes were tried to vanquish his
resolution, but all to no purpose. He was alternately coaxed and
threatened, but all attempts either to flatter or force him proved
ineffectual. He was several times locked up in a dark room, which was
the terror of a young nephew of the parson, who was in the house, but
which had far less terror for this young confessor than the smiles of
his false friends. He was heard by young Sam, who often went to the door
of the dread prison, chanting his favorite hymn, thus:--

"Ave Maria! hear the prayer
Of thy poor, helpless child;
Beneath thy sweet, maternal care,
Preserve me undefiled."

And when spoken to through the keyhole, he answered that he was not a
bit afraid of "Spookes," and that there was plenty of light for him to
say his prayers. Even the parson himself, in company with his wife, went
to listen at the door of where their prisoner was confined, and for a
moment their hard hearts even were softened by the sweet, plaintive
chant of the "Ave Maria."

"Are you sorry for your disobedience, now, Eugene?" said the parson;
"and will you attend prayers and meeting when you are told?"

"I can't promise to do what would displease God, and what my brother
Paul and the priest told me not to do, sir," said the child.

"Don't you know, Eugene, the priest is a wicked man, and the Lord will
punish you in a dark dungeon, darker than that room you are in, if you
do not do what I tell you?" added the persecuting parson.

All this talk was lost on poor Eugene, who continued chanting his little
hymn, or repeating the "Hail Mary" and "Holy Mary," for his father and
mother's souls. In a word, after a series of whippings, confinements,
and scoldings, after compelling him either to eat flesh on Friday, or
fast all day without any other food, Parson Dilman, out of sheer shame,
gave him up, and confessed himself vanquished by the Catholic child. He
did not give him up for good, however, but, by way of making more sure
of his victim, he sent him out into the country, to undergo the
treatment of a more zealous and perfect disciplinarian tha