Bound to Rise
"Sit up to the table, children, breakfast's ready." The speaker was a woman of middle age, not good-looking in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but nevertheless she looked good. She was dressed with extreme plainness, in a cheap calico; but though cheap, the dress was neat. The children she addressed were six in number, varying in age from twelve to four. The oldest, Harry, the hero of the present story, was a broad-shouldered, sturdy boy, with a frank, open face, resolute, though good-natured. "Father isn't here," said Fanny, the second child. "He'll be in directly. He went to the store, and he may stop as he comes back to milk." The table was set in the center of the room, covered with a coarse tablecloth. The breakfast provided was hardly of a kind to tempt an epicure. There was a loaf of bread cut into slices, and a dish of boiled potatoes. There was no butter and no meat, for the family were very poor.
was just coming to thank you, but," he stammered, "I--I--don't know
where to begin. I'm tickled nearly to death. It's a beauty, sure!"
He looked down, growing red in the face, as he dug his toe in the
gravel. Then he said, bashfully: "You've more than put me on a wheel,
Judge Parker. I can't help feeling that you've started me on the right
track for life, too. I'm glad you had that put on it."
His stubby fingers rested caressingly on the little silver plate
between the handle-bars, on which was engraved the motto that had come
to mean so much: "_He that is faithful in that which is least is
faithful also in much._"
THE END.
* * * * *
"Sit up to the table, children, breakfast's ready." The speaker was a woman of middle age, not good-looking in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but nevertheless she looked good. She was dressed with extreme plainness, in a cheap calico; but though cheap, the dress was neat. The children she addressed were six in number, varying in age from twelve to four. The oldest, Harry, the hero of the present story, was a broad-shouldered, sturdy boy, with a frank, open face, resolute, though good-natured. "Father isn't here," said Fanny, the second child. "He'll be in directly. He went to the store, and he may stop as he comes back to milk." The table was set in the center of the room, covered with a coarse tablecloth. The breakfast provided was hardly of a kind to tempt an epicure. There was a loaf of bread cut into slices, and a dish of boiled potatoes. There was no butter and no meat, for the family were very poor.