t wish to have me abused. 'You had
better go on and let my boys alone,' said he; 'they will most assuredly
abuse you if they get up, for I have got a very wicked set of boys.' I
told him the very reasons that he assigned why I should not see his
boys, were the reasons why I wished to see them, for if they were very
wicked boys, there was the greater necessity for their reformation; and
as to the abuse, that was the least of my troubles, for my Master had
been abused before me.

"'Well, sir,' said he, 'don't blame me, if you are abused.' He then
awoke his boys, and as they came out, I talked to them. Instead of
abusing, they listened attentively to me, and some of them were much
affected. They took my tracts, and I presume, read them.

"On leaving them, I remarked, that I supposed the most of them were
orphans, that I was the orphan's friend, and though I might never see
them again, they might be assured they had my prayers daily, that they
might be converted. There was one little fellow who, as I had observed,
looked very sober, and who at the last remark cried right out. As I
wished to take the same boat again, I stepped out of the station house,
but found it had left, and I was walking along, looking for another
boat, when I heard some one crying behind me, and turning round, saw
that it was the little fellow who wept so much in the station house.

"He said, 'Sir, you told me you was the orphan's friend; will you stop?
I want to ask you a question.'

"I asked him if it was because he had now discovered that he was a
sinner, that he cried, and wished me to talk with him.

"'No, sir,' said he, 'I knew that three years ago.'

"I perceived, from his answer, he was an interesting boy, and said to
him, 'Sit down here, my son. How old are you?'

"'Thirteen,' he replied.

"'Where did you come from?'

"He said, three years ago his father moved from Massachusetts to Wayne
county; he was a very poor man, and when they got to their journey's end
they had nothing left. His father obtained the privilege of building a
small log house to live in, on another man's land, but just as he had
got the house finished, he was taken sick and died. I asked him if his
father was a Christian, but afterwards regretted that I asked him the
question, for it was a long time before he could answer it.

"At length he said, 'No, sir, if he had been a Christian, we could have
given him up willingly. We had no hope for _him_; but my mother was