THE BOY IN CHURCH.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XI, Issue 52, 23 February 1876, Page 4

THE BOY IN CHURCH.

He *waß playing at the gate when I went past,. and I heard his father call out: " Boy, you want to gallop in here and get ready for meeting." " Shi!" briefly replied the lad. "Shi! I'U'shi you, young man, if you don't trot in here lively. You'd be as bad as Jessie Pomeroy, if left without a father for three months." " I would, hey." "No sees, young man — it's time you were getting ready for church. The .minister was giving out his text when the father and boy came in. There was considerable improvement in the boy's -looks. His hair had been greased and . combed, he had on his Sunday jacket, and there waa a religious look in his eyes aB he fell iuto the pew. I ought to have listened closely to the sermon, but I did not. The boy and his father were io the pew next ahead, and I couldn't help but watch bim. I have my opioion about forcing boys of ten or twelve years of age to listen to sermons which not one adult mind in five can fully grasp, and I was willing to chance my theory on that boy-'s notions. He got alone, very well for the first 10 minutes. Then be asked his father what time it was, and when the parent replied with a warning shake of the head, the boy cast round him for something to interest his mind. The preacher settled down to his discourse, and the boy settled down to his plan of wearying away the coming hour. . He reached over 1 and got hold of his father's silk hat, and was trying to remove the band, when the parent took it away and bent over and whispered: "Boy, if you don't pay attention to the preacher, I'll break your neck wheu we get home." The lad fixed his eyes on the clergyman. He saw that the good man had auburn hair, blue eyes, florid complexion, and was well dressed. He heard bim make use of such words as "fortuitous," f* unexampled," and " repellent," and without being able to tell whether they referred to a new kind of stringbeans or the gospel of Christian light, he reached out and secured his father's cane. He punched at several flies, crammed the. silver bead into his mouth until he turned purple in the face, and finally reached over and jabbed a woman under the left shoulder. His father then grasped the cane, laid it away, and whispered. " Young man, I'll tan the hide off you when we get home. The words were intended to make the. boy pay strict attention to the balance of the sermon. He straightened up, looked at the preacher again, and tried hard to understand the discourse. Tho good man was trying to explain tbe difference between the theoretical and practical Christianity, and in two minutes the lad's eyea were fixed on the chandeliers. He counted the number of burners over and over, and, forgetting himself for a moment, he began to sing. His father gave bim a kick, and leaned over and whispered: "Ob, my boy! I'll make you jump the moment we get into the house." Knowing tbat his father would keep bis word, but yet hoping to break the force of thie prospective "peeling " by

being really good for the next half hour, the boy faoed the clergyman again. He knit his browa, and finally showed bis determination to understand and interest himself in all that was said. The good man was drawing a parallel, and a dozen of ihe ohuroh membtrß were half asleep. It was discouraging, •and after two or three minutes ihe boy got hold of a piece of paper, wadded it up, stuffed it in his mouth, and ohewed it awhile, and then balancing the wad on his thumb, he elevated it 10ft towards the ceiling. The law of gravitation applies to paper-wads as well as to iron weights. This one came down in a short time, and, as luck would have it, struck the bald pate of the half-sleep sexton. The victim gave a start of alarm, and the boy's father pinohed him savagely and whispered : "Oh 1 I'll fix you for this. Just let me get you home once." I couldn't see how the boy was to blame. He couldn't understand one word in ten of the sermon ; he saw a dozen men around hira asleep ; it was a hot day ; he was a nervous boy aad was used to moving around, and his own father had been gazing out of the window in an absent way tor a quarter of an hour. He made a last grand effort. He braced his nerves, shut his teeth hard, and sat erect as a new hitching-poßt. The clergyman seemed to look right at the boy aB he used twenty big words in succession, and the lad gave it up. He opened the pew-door, and was trying to entice a small dog to oome ih, when his father awoke and whispered : *' You wait ; oh, you just wait !" The exercises closed just then, and the boy walked home behind his parent to get a dressiDg-down for not having the mental calibre of a full-grown man, and for not sitting still and going to sleep like his father.