Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-11-09

purchase of 100 cartridges. "You can save
better than 1 can, Dick" she explained
''I like nice things to eat, and it doesn't
matter to you. Besides, boys ought to dc
these things"
Dick grumbled little at the arrange.
ment, but went out and made the purchases,
which the children were then on their way
to test. Revolvers did not lie in the scheme
of their daily life as decreed for them by
the guardian who was incorrectly supposed
to stand in the place of mother to these
two orphans. Dick had been under her
care for six years, during which time she
had made her profit of the allowances sup
posed to be expended on his clothes, and,
partly through thoughtlessness, partly
through natural desire to pain-she was a
widow of some years anxions to marry
again-had made his days burdensome on
his young shoulders. Where he had looked
then hate. Where he, growing older, had
sought little sympathy, she gave him
ridicule. The many hours that she could
spare from the ordering of her small house
she devoted to what she called the home
training of Dick Heldar. Her religion,
manufactured in the main by her own
intelligence and an ardent study of the
Scriptures, was an aid to her in this
matter. AT such times as she herself
was not personally displeased with Dick,
she left him to understand that he had a
heavy account to settle with his Creator;
wherefore Dick learned to loathe his God as
intensely as he loathed Mrs. Jennett; and
this is not wholesome frame of mind for
the young. Since she chose to regard him
as a hopeless liar, when dread of pain drove
him to his first untrutb, he naturally devel-
oped into liar, but an economical and self
contained one, never throwing away the
least unnecessary fb, and never hesitating
at the blacklist, if it were only plausible,
that might make his life little easier. The
treatment taught him ct least the power of
living alone-a power that was OF service to
him when he went to public school and
the boys laughed at his clothes, which were
poor in quality and much mended. In the
holidays he returned to the teachings of
Mrs. Jennett, and, that the chain OF disci-
pline might not be weakened by association
with the world, was generally beaten, on
one countor another, before he had been IL
hours under her roof.
The autumn of one year brought him a
companion in bondage, long-haired, gray
eyed little atom, as self-contained as him
self, who moved about the house silently
and for the first few weeks spoke only to the
goat that was her chiefest friend on earth
and lived in the back garden. Mrs Jennett
objected to the goat on the grounds that he
was n-Christian-which he certainly was.
"Then," said the atom, choosing her words
very deliberately, "I shall write to nv law
yer-peoples and tell them that you are a
very bad woman. Amomma is mine, mine,
mineF' Mrs. Jennett made a movement to
the hall, where certain umbrellas and canes
stood in a rack. The atom understood as
clearly as Dick what this meant ''I have
been beaten before" she said, still in the
same passionless voice; 81 have been beaten
worse than you can ever beat me. If YOU
beat me shall write to my lawyer-peoples
and tell them that you do not give me
enough to eat. l am not afraid of YOU"
Mrs. Jennett did not 20 into the hall, and
the atom, after q pause to assure herself
that danger OF war was past, went out to
weep bitterly on Amomma's neck.
Dick learned to know her as Maisie. and
at first mistrusted her profoundly. for he
feared that she might interfere with the
small liberty OF action left to him. She did
not, however, and she volunteered no friend
illness until Dick had taken the first steps.
Long before the holidays were over the
stress Of punishment shared in common
drove the children together, If it were snly j