A CAPITAL HIDING-PLA CE. 45

with you, and even if you hadn't been so kind to
me and didn't explain my lessons, I'd have worked
hard all the same, to keep my promise and please
father."
 "Then your father asked you to promise to work
well just before you came to me ? "
 Not exactly; he didn't ask me, I promised of my-
self. It was one evening," said Jack confidentially,
" father suddenly got so awfduly kind."
 "Don't say awful so frequently; Jack, I'm sure
there's nothing awful about kindness, so it's quite in-
appropriate."
 "Very well, sir, but father did get so kind,-he
pulled me right over to him," said Jack proudly; he
doesn't generally touch me; of course he pets Polly,
but she's a girl; then he said he did not like parting
with me, he had intended that I should go to a
boarding school, but instead of that I was to come
to you and not leave home; altogether it made me so
happy that I promised father I'd work hard."
 When Jack got home that day, Polly ran to meet
him at the door, with her face full of eagerness and
pleasure.
 "0 Jack! what do you think? Father says we
may have Florinda and Adolphus Brown to spend
next Saturday with us. And father said I might
choose what we would have for a treat that day. So