bring out the bottle-hang care: it killed the cat." The grog did not, however, bring back old Tom's spirits; the evening passed heavily, and were tired to our beds at a seasonable hour, as we were to drop down to the schooner early the next morning. That night I did not close my eyes. I ran over, in my mind, all that had passed, and indignation took full possession of my soul. My whole life passed in review before me. I travelled back to my former days-to the time which had been almost obliterated from my memory, when I had navigated the barge with my father. Again was the scene of his and my mother's death presented to my view; again I saw him disappear, and the column of black smoke ascend to the sky. The Domine, the matron, Marables, and Fleming, the scene in the cabin-all passed in rapid succession. I felt that I had done my duty, and that I had been unjustly treated; my head ached with tumultuous and long-suppressed feelings. Reader, I stated that when I was first taken in hand by Mr. Drummond I was a savage, although a docile one, to be reclaimed by kindness, and kindness only. You may have been surprised at the rapid change which took place in a few years; that change was produced by kindness. The conduct of Mr. Drummond, of his amiable wife and daughter, had been all kindness; the Domine and the worthy old matron had proved equally beneficent. Marables had been kind; and, although now and then, as in the case of the usher at the school, and Fleming on board the lighter, I had received injuries, still, these were but trifling checks to the uninterrupted series of kindness with which I had been treated by every body. Thus was my na ture rapidly changed from a system of kindness assisted by education; and had this been followed up, in a few years my new character would have been firmly established. But the blow was now struck, injustice roused up the latent feelings of my nature, and when I rose the next morning I was changed. I do not mean to say that all that precept and education had done for me was overthrown; but if not overthrown, it was so shaken to the base, so rent from the summit to the foundation, that, at the slightest impulse, in a wrong direction, it would have fallen in and left nothing but a mixed chaos of ruined prospects. If any thing could hold it together, it was the kindness and affection of Sarah, to which I would again and again return in my revolving thoughts, as the only and bright star to be discovered in my clouded horizon. How dangerous, how foolish, how presump VOL. II. tuous, is it in adults to suppose that they can read the thoughts and the feelings of those of a tender age! How often has this presumption, on their part, been the ruin of a young mind, which, if truly estimated and duly fostered, would have blossomed and produced good fruit! The blush of honest indignation is as dark as the blush of guilt-and the paleness of concentrated courage as marked as that of fear-the firmness of conscious innocence is but too often mistaken as the effrontery of hardened vice-and the tears springing from a source of injury, the tongue tied from the oppression of a wounded heart, the trembling and agitation of the little frame convulsed with emotion, have often and often been ascribed by prejudging and self-opinionated witnesses, to the very opposite passions to those which have produced them. Youth should never be judged harshly, and even when judged cor |