St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1878-03-22
His Own Worst Enemy.
A Sketch of a Life.
BY w. II. MERRILL.

The spirit of Mischief in the form O
an Angel, is phrase that pretty ac-
curately describes Mortimer Sewall as
he was at the age when the law begins
to hold human beings accountable
seven years old.
He might have sat for bust of limo,
cence,--but would have been pretty
sure to chip the nose off the marble
with the tack-hammer on the day after
it was finished. His complexion was
fair and clear as Il girls, but warm
tinted with blood pure and healthful
for three generations back. His fea-
lures were delicate and refined in theil
lines, yet strong and perfectly marked
in their proportions. The daIk brown
eyes, so frank, and soft, and soulful
looked forth from under their long
lashes as clear and innocent as the eyes
of Raphaefs sweetest cherub. Over the
wide, white brow, around the cherul
face, and down the fair round neck
/ fioated wavy mass of golden brown
hair. fine and soft as silk fiOgs. His
countenauce WAS mirror for lis emo
tions: clouded by ii breath, cleared by
a touch, disclosing-as it is well oul
older faces do nOt-the true image o
| his thought.
Mortimer was, in word, one of those
beautiful children whose faces bear the
impress of their Divine origin, but
whose dispositions and tendencies soor
furnish evidence, quite as clear, of the
fall of the race that they type.
His father was one of the unaccount-
ably belated men always to be found
ON the earth. He should have been
born a hundred years earlier, or not al
all. He was Puritan, who came d
century after the Puritans had finished
their work and gone to their reward.
stern, severely good man and intlexible
parent, he made no allowance in his
theories of family government, inherited
from rigorous ancestry, for the chang
ed conditions in which his children were
to be reared. Himself keeping pace
with the activities of his age, and being
so absorbed therein that he could afforl
no time for anything except commands
he relied on these to keep his boy
straight, and steady, and slow, in til,
good old way.
"My no, is No! sir, without any Yes
in it !" he was won't to say to his son
as he laid down the law to him. "Yol
are to do as tell you, and wait fo
reasons until you are old enough TO un
derstand them"
"The ''musts" and the "must nots
were his sufficient rules of government
The sweeter wisdom of the "cansn ant
the ''mays," to supplement the others
he never learned. However such pol
icy may result in other cases, Mortimer
not having been "bOrn resenerate," rap
10 InUnlnnn1 tn al
strong sense of duty, natural ben
toward goodness, Il filial love grounded
in fear and that knew and asked moth
ing better, the boy might have put Ol
the virtues that were laid out fol- him
like his Sunday clothes. But Mortimer
unfortunately, was not that kind of
boy and while not rebellious, or posi-
lively vicious, he began early to have
way of his own.
By the time he was twelve years old
the public school, and furtive expert
ences with his mates, had taught hin
some things of which bis father wa
blissfully ignorant. He became plausi
BILE instead of frank, and deceptive whel
by nature he was honest. He was to-
shrewd, and perhaps too dutiful, to .oil
issue with his parent but in hankin,
dangers and obstacles he was juvenil.
General Sherman.
His mother was heart-wise as al
mothers are i'll regard to the children
they love most. She was a woman O
high intelligence and the sweetest char
acter mild, fond, anxious, and trustin;
more to impulses and affection in guild
ing her children than to direct com
mands. She sought to keep her beau
tlful boy very near to her, feeling tina
there he would be happy and safe. Blu
other boys, and girls too, came between
them, and demanded her attention ant
care. And so the first born grew ava,
from her.
When he was sixteen he began to b.
a trouble to his father. He was ou
late at night, at times, on plausible pre-
texts, and was heard of in bad com
pany-quite implanted, of course !-ol
holidays. At such times his fathe
would indulge in brief gusts of anger
which he called "asserting his authori
ty,",their only effect being to max,
Mortimer, not the less determined, bu
more cautious.
eff you can't be Christian, do be
gentleman m he would say on such oc
casions. "And a gentleman you shal
be, if you stay in this house Thes,
lawless ways, and vagabOnd compan
ions, are not to be tolerated. Do yol
hear me, sir Your place is at home
when you are not in school. | shall Sc,
to it that your opportunities for maxim.
a man of yourself are not neglected, ant
upon your own head will be the blam,
and the shame if you throw then
awayw w
Yet the sunny temperament and tn,
open-hearted, generous traits that h,
inherited from his mother, kept the Lac
from becoming sullen under this re