“Well,” said Forester, as he was about to close the conversation, “I am very glad that you concluded to confess your fault.  I am very glad, too, that you did not go a-fishing this afternoon under the sort of permission which I gave you.  I infer from these two things that you wish to be cured of these faults, and to become a boy of firm moral principle.  Now it is a rule with me, generally, not to punish a boy for what he confesses of his own accord.  Still, I think it probable it would be better for you to have some punishment for this.  It would help to make a strong impression upon your mind, and make it much more easy for you to resist such temptations in time to come.  But you may decide this question yourself.  If you choose to submit to a punishment, and will tell me so to-morrow morning, I will think of some suitable one for you.  If you do not say any thing to me about it, I shall not punish you.”  So saying, Forester bade Marco good night.

The next morning, Marco met Forester on the stairs, as he was coming down to breakfast, and told him that he thought he should feel better to be punished.  So Forester reflected upon the subject, and at nine o’clock, when Marco went in to commence his studies, Forester told him that he had concluded upon his punishment.

“What is it to be?” said Marco.

“It is for me not to allow you to study,” replied Forester, “all this forenoon, but to require you to sit still at your desk, with nothing to do.  You see it will be a sort of solitary imprisonment, only your prison will in itself be a pleasant place.”

Marco thought that this would not be a very severe punishment, but he found, in enduring it, that it was in fact much more severe than he had imagined.  He got very tired indeed, long before the forenoon was out.  He concluded that solitary imprisonment for years, in a gloomy dungeon, must be a terrible punishment indeed.

A year or two after this time, when Marco had been entirely cured of all such faults, he one day asked Forester to explain to him how he knew where he went on this memorable forenoon; and Forester willingly explained it to him.  It seems that Forester’s father, though a very gentle and kind-hearted man, was a very shrewd one, and having been accustomed to the discovery, in the course of his practice, of all sorts of pranks and roguery, was less disposed to place confidence in others till he knew the confidence was deserved, than Forester himself was, who had less experience.  And when he knew that Forester had gone away, leaving Marco alone, he doubted a little whether he would remain industriously at his work.  While he was thinking of this, he heard a slight noise which Marco made with his feet against the clapboards of the house in getting out the window.  He therefore came into the study a moment afterward, and found that Marco had gone.  He looked out the window and saw him going off toward the other boys.  Just at that moment the man came to help him prune his trees, but before he began this work he went into the house to James, called him to a window and pointed out Marco to him, and said,