The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1878-11-07
.Despsed and Rejected Of Men.
by MARY 4. PARSONS.

After all, it is not easy to be sympa-
&hctically interested in boy to whom
you have explained fifty times that two
aud TWO can't make five, and then to have
&liu say, for the fifty-hrst time, that it
does; or, il he catches the warning shake
of your aching head, as he is drouing out
Fl" TO have him droop, in his dull
way, and say: Il DIN know" Then,
900, when his clothes are so dirty that
persons with delicate stomachs turn away
from him with shuddcrinS Ugh" how
Ian one think of him, Tom Dolan and
}is like, all over the world, as any por-
sion Of those the Master meant when he
said Feed my lambSl'
Dear, no. 1t seems almost irreverent
90 think of lambs in such connection.
Dne might think Of cur, or whelp, or
brute; but never lamb.
So its not to be wondered at that Miss
Wilton, the teacher, did not love Tom;
especially as, studying being a thing ut
terly beyond his comprehension, and
playing something he did measurably
understand, he was troublesome boy.
Don't you see that when a boy has no
idea what you mean when you say
study and YET has a very definite idea
IF the manufacture and the use of paper
wads, he is much more likely to neglect
(he studying while he makes the boys in
front hop lively"-an cXhilaratiug pro-
cess to him!
~ bad name sticks, when once it is
fastened on boy or man, ali the mischief
that could not be directly traced to some
other scholar was laid to Toms charge.
b. to,
had ouly been asleep, or stupidity draw
ing pictures on his desk with forchnger
iampered with saliva.
Oue day jim White scattered snuff
around, 50 that the occupants of half
4 dozen benches were set to snoezins vi0-
emily.
Nothing could exceed the falsely-ac-
cused. maltyr-ske expression Of Jim's
face, when asked if he knew anything
about i. He never said Tom did it. lie was
above telling tales # a Schoolmate. But
Le glanced at Tom. who sat near by, rs
much IS to say: Poor Tom He don't
know any letter than to do such things
s. Miss Wilton asked Joe Smith, who
didn't know nothin about it; aud Tim
Benton, Jim Whites crony, who didn't
know. but guessed Tom done it,"
She went back to Tom, and, fading a
paper If snuff in his desk, she whipped
aim >eyerely-frst for bringing snuff to
school, and then telling a lie.
After this punishment, vicariously yet
uawiiingly borne, Tom rubbed into his
face still more dirt from his filthy jacket
sleeve, T. which lie always transferred his
tears.
Perhaps ,his made him look more ag-
grava;ing than usual when, school being
dismissed, he danned his very dilapilated
straw hat. At any rate, Joe Smith
thought il would be rare sport to set on
fire the loose straw sticking up from Toms
frowsy head-so ''as to let some light into
his skull, he said.
When Tom found where the smell of
smoke came from, he snatched off hi
hat with a wild scream OF terror, aud ran
back into the woods, where flowed
noisy brook. The idea that the silly
creature could really mean TO try to save
The wreck, which at frs; was scarcely
more than a head band, So amused the
boys tina, their shouts of ieering laugh
ter penetrated even his duh brain with a
sense OF being miserab.y wrongcd, and
tossing the still smoking fragment of
hat into the brook. he watched il float
away, through fast falling tears.
There would only be more torture from
the boys, if he ventured out from his
hiding place till they were all gone home.
Added to this reason, for delay was the
moral certainty that his mother, herself a
hard working, often il-used woman,
would beat him for coming home hatless
SO he stayed, watching the merry water
dance over the stones, soothed by it,
though be didn't know why, till hunger
forced him to brave the whipping and all
she rest.
He stayed his steps little as he drew
near home, meditating on how he might
reach in at the pantry window and help
himself to supper, if only he had jack
knife % cut away one of the laths that
were used to bar the open window in hot
weather.
He was walking slowly, when his bare
zoe received prick from something lying
on the ground. His start of pain kicked
the cause directly into sight. That
breas, pin, with the golden beetle on it,
surely never belonged 10 any but the
teacher tor had he not gszed at it, Won
dering, all the time she was explaining
his geography lesson to him that very
morDingi
He had vague sense of queerness