ed his boy till he
bled because he ran away to go fishing. It's all slavery, pure and
simple."

"In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return
unto the ground," said Ezra Tower.

"If God said it, he made slaves of us all," said young Trove.
"When I look around here and see people wasted to the bone with
sweat and toil, too weary often to eat the bread they have earned,
when I see their children dying of consumption from excess of
labour and pork fat, I forget the slaves of man and think only of
these wretched slaves of God."

But Polly was not of them the teacher pitied. She was a bit
discontented; but surely she was cheerful and well fed. God gave
her beauty, and the widow saw it, and put her own strength between
the curse and the child. Folly had her task every day, but Polly
had her way, also, in too many things, and became a bit selfish, as
might have been expected. But there was something very sweet and
fine about Polly. They were plain clothes she wore, but nobody
save herself and mother gave them any thought. Who, seeing her
big, laughing eyes, her finely modelled face, with cheeks pink and
dimpled, her shapely, white teeth, her mass of dark hair, crowning
a form tall and straight as an arrow, could see anything but the
merry-hearted Polly?

"Miss Vaughn, you will please remain a few moments after school,"
said the teacher one day near four o'clock. Twice she had been
caught whispering that day, with the young girl who sat behind her.
Trove had looked down, stroking his little mustache thoughtfully,
and made no remark. The girl had gone to work, then, her cheeks
red with embarrassment.

"I wish you'd do me a favour, Miss Polly," said the teacher, when
they were alone.

She blushed deeply, and sat looking down as she fussed with her
handkerchief. She was a bit frightened by the serious air of that
big young man.

"It isn't much," he went on. "I'd like you to help me teach a
little. To-morrow morning I shall make a map on the blackboard,
and while I am doing it I'd like you to conduct the school. When
you have finished with the primer class I'll be ready to take hold
again."

She had a puzzled look.

"I thought you were going to punish me," she answered, smiling.

"For what?" he inquired.

"Whispering," said she.

"Oh, yes! But you have read Walter Scott, and you know ladies are
to be honoured, not punished. I shouldn't know how to do such a
thing. When you've be