yet, his resolutions were only built upon his own poor, wavering will; and, hence, as yet, they were utterly rooted up, and swept away by the first assault of the raging storm when it arose in its restless fury; as yet, I and those who loved him well could only watch him from a distance, and humbly pray for those better and those holier things, whose advent we could not descry through what appeared the ever-thickening gloom which gathered round his steps. I did not see much of him after the interview which I have just described, and, to tell the truth, I could scarcely regret it. I found myself powerless to work any permanent change in him, and it was so painful to me to look upon his wasting form and to know, as I did but too well, that he was throwing himself away, body and soul, for time and eternity, utterly and hopelessly, unless God should interpose and work the change which his right hand alone seemed able to effect, that it was a positive relief not to see him at all. It was, as well as I remember, about nine months after my return that he came to my lodgings rather late one night. He appeared to me to look wretchedly ill and nervous, and excitable to a degree which I had never before witnessed. He only laughed, however, at my anxious words, and I found that he had come to make me promise to go on the morrow to witness a rowing match on the river, in which he was to take a prominent part, to pull the stroke oar, I think he expressed it. It was a matter in which, naturally speaking, I did not take the slightest interest. Moreover, I was very much engaged with my duties, but he pressed me so earnestly, and seemed so anxious about it, that, to please him, I promised to go. On the morrow I went, agreeably to my promise, and found large crowds of people assembled on the banks of the river where the match was to come off. Poor Tom seemed greatly delighted that I had kept my promise to him, and was in high spirits. He remained with me until it was time for him to go and take his place in the boat. As he left me he seemed so much excited that I begged of him earnestly to try and calm himself. "All right," he cried, as he turned away; "keep your eye on the red, and see how gloriously we'll beat them." He went his way, and, instead of keeping my eye on the red, his colour, I became so absorbed in my melancholy reflections concerning him and his poor life, that I had forgotten all about the race until I was recalled to myself by the shouts of the crowd who were pressing along the banks of the river. As a louder shout than usual fell upon my ear, I raised my eyes and I saw that a most exciting race was taking place. The three boats were close abreast, and it seemed impossible to predict which would carry off the prize. Thus they rowed for some hundreds of yards or so, with no perceptible change in their relative positions. They were only about fifty yards from the goal when, with a bound which seemed to lift her fairly out of the water, Tom's boat shot ahead. Two or three vigorous strokes more, and, amid the frantic shouts of the enthusiastic crowd, she passed the post, winning by half her own length. Almost immediately after, it struck me that there was great noise and confusion among the crowd, but for a moment or two, I did not heed it, thinking that it was nothing more than the excitement resulting from the race. Presently, I remarked them thronging round the place where the boats had stopped, but, still I did not heed it. A second or two more, CHAPTER XV. COMING RIGHT. AND now, before I bring this simple narrative to a close, I must return for a few moments to the history of one whom I introduced to the notice of my reader in my introductory pages, but whose name, for various reasons, I have not since mentioned. Poor Tom Bowman! Were it not that my little history would be incomplete without it, I would fain pass his story by with a silent tear, with a sigh of regret for the life that was thrown away, for the noble faculties and the generous instincts that were wasted on frivolous or unworthy objects. It was poor Tom's misfortune to find himself, in early life, placed in that unfortunate position in which a man may say of himself that he is "lord of himself, that heritage of woe." Young, rich, and handsome; with passions within his breast that were fearfully strong for good or for evil; with no father's authority to restrain him; no father's voice to pour sage words of loving counsel into his deluded ear; with all the false glitter, all the seducing glare of the world appealing to him in its most attractive forms; with that same world fawning about his feet and spreading its fairest flowers upon his path, what wonder if poor Tom, spite of all his naturally good dispositions, his noble qualities, his open, generous heart, did but enter upon the great journey that was before him, the ocean of life, to be drifted full sail to shipwreck, as utter as it was speedy, as hopeless as it was complete? Such histories, the histories of faculties abused, and of talents thrown away; of young lives wasted, ay, and worse than wasted; of noble affections and of generous sympathies misspent upon objects from which they should have shrunk in loathing disgust, are surely ineffably painful; yet, alas, they are but too true and too common, and the pen that would fain pass them by, would fain cover them over with a loving, if, perchance, a partial gloss, is constrained to write them down in simple and in earnest truth, that all who run may read; that all may learn that the life which is not devoted to duty is thrown away; that all may know that the path of duty, duty animated and enlivened by faith, is before the feet of every man, no matter how young, how rich, or how heedless he may be; that all may know that it is the path of duty, and not of inclination, which leads to happiness here, and to something which is more than happiness in the better land beyond the everlasting shores And, hence, dear Tom, if with a loving pen, with a pen that shall touch as lightly as may be on thy failings, that shall extol to the utmost the noble qualities with which thy generous heart ran over, I venture to write in a few simple words the record of thy life, surely, oh, surely, it is not that I may bring that poor, wasted life of thine in undue prominence before the world; not that I may say one word of thee which may be unbecoming or unworthy of the trusting love, the boundless confidence, thou didst ever repose in him whose hand pens, with a love which few, perhaps, may guess, what may be the story of a wasted life, but what shall surely be the best tribute to thy memory which his hand can pay. So long as the world is what it is, so long will there be sad stories, like to thine, to be told. May there always be a tender voice to tell the tale, a gentle hand to deal lightly with the sad history of human weakness and of human sorrow! May there be always those who can think and who can act as the poet sings "And when I speak of such among the flock as swerved If thine was one of these sad tales, it was a tale that was not all dark, all gloomy, all without hope, without many a bright, many a redeeming trait. At its worst it is but a tale of an aimless life, of broken purposes, of aspirations unfulfilled, of keen affections wasted and thrown away-of generous instincts, worked upon by designing hands, perverted and abused. Whatever there was of foolishness, of indis cretion, and, it may have been, of sin, in thy poor life, has been weighed in the balance and has been judged long ere this. I believe in my very heart that the divine hand of Him whose mercies are above all his works, hath long since washed thee in his cleansing blood, hath long since clothed thee in the robe of his loving and his gracious condonation, hath long since made thy ransomed soul whiter than the driven snow; and if this be so, what mortal tongue shall dare to pass a harsher sentence on thee than that which thy Maker's gentle voice hath already spoken ? But if all the world were with brazen |