n would receive several
shots, before its misery would be terminated by a fatal one. When one
fowl was killed, a fresh one was brought forth. Each man who fired at
the mark, paid a trifling sum for the privilege, and was entitled to
the fowl, if he killed it.

Oscar and his young companions lingered around the grounds for an hour
or two, familiarizing themselves with scenes of shameful cruelty, and
breathing an atmosphere loaded with pollution and moral death. The
repugnance which Oscar at first felt to the party and its doings was so
far overcome, that before he left he himself fired one or two shots,
with a rifle which was lent to him.

Oscar reached home before the hour for dinner. As he entered the
sitting-room, his mother, who had missed him, inquired where he had
been all the forenoon.

"I 've been with Alf," he replied.

His mother did not notice this evasion of her question, but added:

"Why do you want to be with Alfred so much? It seems to me you might
find better company. I 'm afraid he is not so good a boy as he might
be. I don't like his looks very much."

"Why, mother," said Oscar, "Alf is n't a bad boy, and I never heard
anybody say he was. I like him first-rate--he 's a real clever fellow."

"He may be clever enough, but I do not think he is a very good
associate for you," replied Mrs. Preston.

"Who ought to know best about that, you or I?" said Oscar, with a
pertness for which he was becoming a little too notorious. "I see Alf
every day, but you don't know hardly anything about him. At my rate, I
'll risk his hurting me."

Oscar's grandmother looked at him with astonishment, as he uttered
these words. He felt the silent rebuke, and turned his head from her.

"Well," added Mrs. Preston, "if Alfred is not a bad boy himself, I do
not believe that the kind of people you spend so much of your time
with, around the hotel-stable, will do either you or him any good. The
lessons a boy learns among tavern loungers do not generally make him
any better, to say the least. I wish you would keep away from such
places--I should feel a good deal easier if you would."

The subject was dropped, and dinner,--the event of Thanksgiving-day, in
every New England home,--soon began to engross the attention of the
household. It was a pleasant feast, to old and young. The children
forgot all their little, fanciful troubles, and the traces of care were
chased from their parents' brows for the hour.