ne to whom honor is due, I can fancy the crowd of those whose fame
poets have sung, and to whose memory monuments have been raised,
dividing like the wave, and passing the great, and the noble, and the
mighty of the land, this poor, obscure old man stepping forward and
receiving the especial notice of Him who said, 'Inasmuch as ye did it to
one of the least of these, ye did it also to me.'"

CHAPTER XV.

THREE IMPORTANT EVENTS.

"Frank is coming into the factory to work," said Nat one day to Charlie.

"He is?" answered Charlie with some surprise, as he had not heard of it;
"when is he coming?"

"Next week I expect, if the place is ready for him. I am glad he is
coming, for he will be company for us."

"Are his parents so poor that he is obliged to work here for a living?"

"Yes; they are not able to keep him at school any longer, and they think
he is old enough now to do something to support himself."

"It is a dreadful thing to be poor, isn't it, Nat?"

"It is bad enough, but not the worst thing in the world," answered Nat.
"Dr. Franklin said it was worse to be _mean_."

"I shan't dispute with him on that point," replied Charlie, "for there
is only one side to that question. But I was thinking how poor boys are
obliged to work instead of going to school, and of the many hard things
they are obliged to meet."

"I think of it often," added Nat, "but then I remember that almost all
the men whose lives I have read, were poor boys, and this shows that
poverty is not so bad as some other things. But I don't quite believe
Dr. Franklin's remark about the ease of becoming rich."

"What was his remark?" inquired Charlie.

"'The way to wealth is as plain as the way to market,'" answered Nat;
"and if that isn't plain enough, I should like to know how it could be
made plainer."

"Well, I don't believe _that_," said Charlie. "If men could become rich
as easily as they can go to market, there would be precious few poor
people in the world. But is that really what he means?"

"Certainly; only _industry_ and _frugality_, he says, must be practised
in order to get it."

"That alters the case," answered Charlie, "but even then I can't quite
believe it. Are all industrious and frugal people wealthy?"

"No," replied Nat; "and that is the reason I doubt the truth of Dr.
Franklin's remark. Some of the most industrious and frugal people in the
world are poor."

The conversation was broken off here, and we will ta