Nothing is more serious, more pleasant, and more diverting withal, than a boy’s brooding or exultation—one is the complement of the other—over his first girl. As, to a great extent, a man is moulded by the woman he marries, so to no less a degree is a boy’s character turned and shaped by the girl he adores. Either he descends to her level, or she draws him up, unconsciously, perhaps, to her own plane. Girls are missionaries who convert boys. Boys are mostly heathens. When a boy has a girl, he remembers to put on his cuffs and collars, and he doesn’t put his necktie into his pocket on the way to school.
In a boy’s life, the having of a girl is the setting up of an ideal. It is the new element, the higher something which abashes the unabashed, and makes John, who caused Henry’s nose to bleed, tremble when little Mary stamps her foot. It is like an atheist’s finding God, the sudden recognition of a higher and purer force against which all that he knows is powerless. Why doesn’t John bully Mary? It would be infinitely easier than his former exploit with Henry. But he doesn’t. He blushes in her presence, brings her the best apples, out of which heretofore he has enjoined the boys not to “take a hog-bite,” and, even though the parental garden grow none, comes by flowers for her in some way, queer boyish bouquets where dandelions press shoulders with spring-beauties, daffodils, and roses—strange democracy of flowerdom. He feels older and stronger.
In Fred’s case the object of adoration was no less a person than Elizabeth Simpson, the minister’s daughter. From early childhood they had seen and known each other at school, and between them had sprung up a warm childish friendship, apparently because their ways home lay along the same route. In such companionship the years sped; but Fred was a diffident boy, and he was seventeen and Elizabeth near the same before he began to feel those promptings which made him blushingly offer to carry her book for her as far as he went. She had hesitated, refused, and then assented, as is the manner of her sex and years. It had become a settled thing for them to walk home together, he bearing her burdens, and doing for her any other little service that occurred to his boyish sense of gallantry.
Without will of his own, and without returning the favour, he had grown in the Rev. Mr. Simpson’s esteem. This was due mostly to his guardian’s excellent work. In spite of his rebellion, training and environment had brought him greatly under her control, and when she began to admonish him about his lost condition spiritually she had been able to awaken a sort of superstitious anxiety in the boy’s breast. When Miss Prime perceived that this had been accomplished, she went forthwith to her pastor and unburdened her heart.
“Brother Simpson,” said she, “I feel that the Lord has appointed me an instrument in His hands for bringin’ a soul into the kingdom.” The minister put the tips of his fingers together and sighed piously and encouragingly. “I have been labourin’ with Freddie in the sperrit of Christian industry, an’ I believe that I have finally brought him to a realisin’ sense of his sinfulness.”
“H’m-m,” said the minister. “Bless the Lord for this evidence of the activity of His people. Go on, sister.”
“Freddie has at last come to the conclusion that hell is his lot unless he flees unto the mountain and seeks salvation.”
“Bless the Lord for this.”
“Now, Brother Simpson, I have done my part as fur as the Lord has showed me, except to ask you to come and wrastle with that boy.”
“Let not thy heart be troubled, Sister Prime, for I will come as you ask me, and I will wrastle with that boy as Jacob did of old with the angel.”
“Oh, Brother Simpson, I knowed you’d come. I know jest how you feel about pore wanderin’ souls, an’ I’m so glad to have yore strong arm and yore wisdom a-helpin’ me.”
“I hope, my sister, that the Lord may smile upon my poor labours, and permit us to snatch this boy as a brand from eternal burning.”
“We shall have to labour in the sperrit, Brother Simpson.”
“Yes, and with the understanding of the truth in our hearts and minds.”
“I’m shore I feel mighty uplifted by comin’ here today. Do come up to dinner Sunday, dear Brother Simpson, after preachin’.”
“I will come, Sister Prime, I will come. I know by experience the worth of the table which the Lord provides for you, and then at the same season I may be able to sound this sinful boy as to his spiritual state and to drop some seed into the ground which the Lord has mercifully prepared for our harvest. Goodbye, sister, goodbye. I shall not forget, Sunday after preaching.”
In accordance with his promise, the Rev. Mr. Simpson began to labour with Fred, with the result of driving him into a condition of dogged revolt, which only Miss Prime’s persistence finally overcame. When revival time came
