house, and told the family that he was in an anxious state of
mind. This was joyful news to the sweet and pious household, and the
little boy was urged to feel that he was a sinner, to repent, and to
become that night a Christian; he was prayed over, and told to read the
Bible, and put to bed with the injunction to repeat all the texts of
Scripture and hymns he could think of. John did this, and said over
and over the few texts he was master of, and tossed about in a real
discontent now, for he had a dim notion that he was playing the
hypocrite a little. But he was sincere enough in wanting to feel, as
the other boys and girls felt, that he was a wicked sinner. He tried to
think of his evil deeds; and one occurred to him; indeed, it often came
to his mind. It was a lie; a deliberate, awful lie, that never injured
anybody but himself John knew he was not wicked enough to tell a lie to
injure anybody else.

This was the lie. One afternoon at school, just before John's class was
to recite in geography, his pretty cousin, a young lady he held in great
love and respect, came in to visit the school. John was a favorite with
her, and she had come to hear him recite. As it happened, John felt
shaky in the geographical lesson of that day, and he feared to be
humiliated in the presence of his cousin; he felt embarrassed to that
degree that he could n't have "bounded" Massachusetts. So he stood up
and raised his hand, and said to the schoolma'am, "Please, ma'am, I
've got the stomach-ache; may I go home?" And John's character for
truthfulness was so high (and even this was ever a reproach to him),
that his word was instantly believed, and he was dismissed without
any medical examination. For a moment John was delighted to get out of
school so early; but soon his guilt took all the light out of the summer
sky and the pleasantness out of nature. He had to walk slowly, without
a single hop or jump, as became a diseased boy. The sight of a woodchuck
at a distance from his well-known hole tempted John, but he restrained
himself, lest somebody should see him, and know that chasing a woodchuck
was inconsistent with the stomach-ache. He was acting a miserable part,
but it had to be gone through with. He went home and told his mother the
reason he had left school, but he added that he felt "some" better now.
The "some" did n't save him. Genuine sympathy was lavished on him.
He had to swallow a stiff dose of nasty "picra,"--the horror of al