Oscar nervously spread the slice of bread before him, but made no reply.  His mother continued her reproofs, in the same sad but affectionate tone.  She appealed to his sense of right, to his gratitude, and to his hopes of future success and respectability in life.  She described the sad end to which these beginnings of wrong-doing would inevitably lead him, and earnestly besought him to try to do better, before his bad habits should become confirmed.  Her earnest manner, and her pale, haggard cheeks, down which tears were slowly stealing, touched the feelings of Oscar.  Moisture began to gather in his eyes, in spite of himself.  He tried to appear very much interested in the food he was eating, and to look as though he was indifferent to what his mother was saying.  And, in a measure, he did succeed in choking down those good feelings which were beginning to stir in his heart, and which, mistaken boy! he thought it would be unmanly to betray.

Yes, he was mistaken—­sadly mistaken.  Unmanly to be touched by a mother’s grief, and to be moved by a mother’s tender entreaties!  Unmanly to acknowledge that we have done wrong, or to express sorrow for the wrong act!  Unmanly to resolve to resist temptation in the future!  Where is this monstrous law of manliness to be found?  If anywhere, it must be only in the code of pirates and desperadoes, who have renounced all human laws and ties.

The school hour was at hand, and Oscar was obliged to start as soon as he had finished his breakfast.  Had he not stifled the better promptings of his heart, and thus done violence to his nature, he would not have left his mother without assuring her that he felt sorry for his misconduct; for he did feel some degree of regret, although he was too proud to acknowledge it.  His mother, however, saw some tokens of feeling which he could not wholly conceal, and she left him with a sad heart, but with the hope that at least some faint impression had been made upon him.

And, indeed, some impression was made upon Oscar’s heart.  The feeling of sullenness with which he awoke, had subsided into something resembling “low spirits.”  Nor was this all the effect his mother’s conversation had upon him.  As he lay awake in the morning, he had planned the secret destruction of a beautiful sled which had been given to George, the winter previous, and which was very precious in the eyes of the owner; but now he relinquished this mean and revengeful design.  Little George thus escaped the dreaded “after-clap,” but he never knew what a blow it would have been, nor how near he came to feeling its full force.

CHAPTER IV.

THE HOTEL.