u have experienced this reluctance to
resuming work after a day of pleasure. It is a universal experience.
And now that we are on this subject, I will add, that I have
observed in you an increasing desire to get away from work. You make
many excuses and they seem to you to be good ones. Can you tell me
how many days you have been out of the shop in the last three
months?"

"No, I cannot," was the reply, made in a tone indicating a slight
degree of irritation.

"Well, I can, Henry."

"How many is it, then?"

"Ten days."

"Never!"

"It is true, for I kept the count."

"Indeed, then, you are mistaken. I was only out a gunning three
times, and a fishing twice."

"And that makes five times. But don't you remember the day you were
made sick by fatigue?"

"Yes, true, but that is only six."

"And the day you went up the mountain with the party?"

"Yes."

"And the twice you staid away because it stormed?"

"But, William, that has nothing to do with the matter. If it stormed
so violently that I couldn't come to the shop, that surely is not to
be set down to the account of pleasure-taking."

"And yet, Henry, I was here, and so were all the workmen but
yourself. If there had not been in your mind a reluctance to coming
to the shop, I am sure the storm would not have kept you away. I am
plain with you, because I am your friend, and you know it. Now, it
is this increasing reluctance on your part, that alarms me. Do not,
then, add fuel to a flame, that, if thus nourished, will consume
you."

"But, William----"

"Don't make excuses, Henry. Think of the aggregate of ten lost days.
You can earn a dollar and a half a day, easily, and do earn it
whenever you work steadily. Ten days in three months is fifteen
dollars. All last winter, Ellen went without a cloak, because you
could not afford to buy one for her; now the money that you could
have earned in the time wasted in the last three months, would have
bought her a very comfortable one--and you know that it is already
October, and winter will soon be again upon us. Sixty dollars a year
buys a great many comforts for a poor man."

Henry Thorne remained silent for some moments. He felt the force of
William Moreland's reasoning; but his own inclinations were stronger
than his friend's arguments. He wanted to go with two or three
companions a gunning, and even the vision of his young wife
shrinking in the keen winter wind, was not sufficient to conquer
this desire.