he did not wish his son’s eyes to be red and swollen with crying when he should reach his destination.

Soon after the train slowed into the station at which they were to alight. The good old lady softened so far as to bid the bareheaded boy good-bye as he stumbled out of the car. The first thing to be done was to buy him a hat, since his parents had not been so provident as to take along an extra one. This was managed by leaving him and his father at the depot, while Mrs. Lawrence went to the nearest hat store. The good soul also bought some sugar-plums to replace the present which Will had lost.

As soon as the novelty of Will’s new hat had worn off, so far, at least, as to allow it to remain quietly on his head, he and his mother went to spend the rest of the day at the house of a relative, while Mr. Lawrence made his way to a law office.

About nightfall the three returned to the depot, took passage by the cars, and were soon on their way homeward.

It was still early in the evening, but the family party did not expect to reach home till past midnight.

Will was thinking—not of his latest blunders, but of some second-hand presents that he had received from his cousin, Henry. Mr. Lawrence, who was accustomed to travel, seemed inclined to fall asleep—in fact, they had not proceeded far on their way when a gentle snoring evinced that he was indeed asleep. Will fancied that his mother also seemed tired and drowsy, and he hastily[29] concluded that his parents would have to depend upon him to be awakened when the train reached their station.

[29]

This thought kept the boy on the alert, and he took pride in the confidence thus placed in him. To him, however, the time passed much more slowly than when going to the city in the morning. This was only to be expected. Then, the sun was shining bright, the car was full of people, and his parents were wide-awake and in a humor to talk to him; now, it was night,—calm and starlit, but night,—the three were almost entirely alone in the car, and his parents were tired, sleepy, and silent.

Nevertheless, much as he wished to keep awake, he at last fell into a doze, from which he was aroused by the train’s coming to a stop and the brakesman’s shouting out the name of a station. The name seemed familiar, and Will, rubbing his eyes and yawning, at once began to reason, aloud: “Our station! I must wake pa and ma, or the train will go on.”

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