ll heartily forgive you, and I shall retain
the same good opinion of your character which I have long had.

_Tommy._--And is it really possible, sir, that you should have a good
opinion of me after all I have told you about myself?

_Mr Barlow._--I have always thought you a little vain and careless, I
confess, but at the same time I imagined you had both good sense and
generosity in your character; I depended upon _first_ to make you see
your faults, and upon the _second_ to correct them.

_Tommy._--Dear sir, I am very much obliged to you; but you have always
been extremely kind and friendly to me.

_Mr Barlow._--And therefore I told your father yesterday, who is very
much hurt at your quarrel with Harry, that though a sudden passion might
have transported you too far, yet, when you came to consider the matter
coolly, you would perceive your faults and acknowledge them; were you
not to behave in this manner, I owned I could say nothing in your
favour. And I was very much confirmed in this opinion, when I saw the
courage you exerted in the rescue of Harry's lamb, and the compassion
you felt for the poor Highlander. "A boy," said I, "who has so many
excellent dispositions, can never persist in bad behaviour. He may do
wrong by accident, but he will be ashamed of his errors, and endeavour
to repair them by a frank and generous acknowledgment. This has always
been the conduct of really great and elevated minds, while mean and
grovelling ones alone imagine that it is necessary to persist in faults
they have once committed."

_Tommy._--Oh, sir! I will go directly and entreat Harry to forgive me; I
am convinced that all you say is right. But will you not go with me? Do
pray, sir, be so good.

_Mr Barlow._--Gently, gently, my young friend, you are always for doing
everything in an instant. I am very glad you have taken a resolution
which will do you so much credit, and give so much satisfaction to your
own mind; but, before you execute it, I think it will be necessary to
speak to your father and mother upon the subject; and, in the mean time,
I will go and pay a visit to farmer Sandford, and bring you an account
of Harry.

_Tommy._--Do, sir, be so good; and tell Harry, if you please, that there
is nothing I desire so much as to see him, and that nothing shall ever
make me behave ill again. I have heard too, sir, that there was a poor
Black came begging to us, who saved Harry from the bull; if I could but
find him out, I