Ever after that, even before the calf knew that this scent belonged to a
man, or had seen a man, it would run away from it.

Your parents are constantly doing for you what that mother caribou did
for her little one. When they tell you that such and such a thing is
wrong, and you must not do it; when again they tell you there is danger
in going to a certain place, or in chumming with a particular boy or
girl, they are again doing the same thing for you. And when they punish
you, as that mother caribou did her calf, it is because they know the
danger far better than you, and they know that your safety depends upon
keeping away from such things.

Then, bye and bye, perhaps, as you grow older, you will begin to see
for yourself what the danger meant, just as the little caribou might
some day see a hunter for itself. And then you will no longer think your
parents cruel or strict; you will be thankful that they were so wise and
kind.

THE REPENTANCE OF SAMUEL JOHNSON

When you begin to study English literature you will hear a great deal
about Samuel Johnson, who wrote one of the first English dictionaries,
and was a great scholar. Johnson's father was a bookseller, who used to
have a little shop in the market-place, where he sold books on
market-days. One day, when Johnson was a boy, his father took sick and
asked Samuel to go to the market-place and sell books for him. Johnson
was ashamed of such work, and refused to go.

But many years afterward, when he had become an old man and was back on
a visit to his native village, he was missed from breakfast one morning
by the friends with whom he was staying. On his return at supper-time he
told his friends how he had spent the day. It was fifty years ago that
day when he had refused to help his father. He says: "To do away with
the sin of this disobedience, I this day went in a post-chaise to
Uttoxeter, and going into the market at the time of high business,
uncovered my head and stood with it bare an hour before the stall which
my father had formerly used, exposed to the sneers of standers-by and
the inclemency of the weather; a penance by which I trust I have
propitiated Heaven for this only instance, I believe, of contumacy to my
father."

That is a story worth remembering when you are ashamed of doing
something which your parents have asked you to do, perhaps to carry a
parcel on the street or to mow the lawn. You will see sometime, I hope,
that all honest