“Not very, papa.  But you know I hear you read it every morning and evening.”

“Yes; but I have sometimes been grieved to see that you paid very little attention.”

Max colored at that.  “Papa, I will try to do better,” he said.

“I hope you will,” said his father.  “You will enjoy the same religious advantages at Ion, and, my boy, try to profit by them, remembering that we shall have to render an account at last of the use or abuse of all our privileges.  I want you to promise me that you will read a few verses of the Bible every day, and commit at least one to memory.”

“I will, papa.  And what else shall I read?  You will let me have some story-books, won’t you?” Max said, entreatingly.

“Yes,” said his father, “I have no objection to stories of the right sort.  There are some very beautiful stories in the Bible; there are entertaining stories in history; and there are fictitious stories that will do you good and not harm.  I shall take care in future that you have plenty of wholesome mental food, so that you will have no excuse for craving such stuff as this,” he added, with a glance of disgust at what he held in his hand.  “It may go into the kitchen fire.”

“Mrs. Scrimp never burns the least little bit of paper, papa,” said Max.

“Indeed!  Why not?” asked his father, with an amused smile.

“She says it is wicked waste, because it is better than rags for the paper-makers.”

“Ah! well, then, we will tear these into bits and let them go to the paper-makers.”

Max was standing by his father’s side.  “Papa,” he said, with a roguish look into his father’s face, “don’t you think you would enjoy reading them first?”

The captain laughed.  “No, my son,” he said; “I have not the slightest inclination to read them.  Bring me that waste basket and you may help me tear them up.”

They began the work of destruction, Max taking the paper, the captain the book his son had been reading.  Presently something in it attracted his attention; he paused and glanced over several pages one after the other, till Max began to think he had become interested in the story.  But no; at that instant he turned from it to him, and Max was half frightened at the sternness of his look.

“My son,” he said, “I am astonished and deeply grieved that you could read and enjoy anything like this, for it is full of profanity; and reading or hearing such expressions is very likely to lead to the use of them.  Max, do you ever say such words?”

Max trembled and grew red and pale by turns, but did not speak.

“Answer me,” was his father’s stern command.

“Not often, papa.”

The captain barely caught the low breathed words.  “Not often? sometimes, then?” he groaned, covering his face with his hand.

“O papa, don’t be so grieved!  I’ll never do it again,” Max said in a broken voice.