friend a smart blow with the iron ramrod of a Springfield musket, all in
fun, you know. My friend was like Cowper, who wrote:

The man who hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves, by thumping on your back
His sense of your great merit,
Is such a friend as one had need
Be very much his friend, indeed,
To pardon or to bear it.

Well, he felt the smart of the iron ramrod, and his fury rose in a
whirlwind; and he got up, took the musket by the barrel, raised it back
for an awful blow, and was just about to crush the head of the joker
when a white face and the simple word "Jim!" brought him to his senses.
He dropped the musket and sank upon the grass in a paroxysm of
excitement, but was saved from murder just by a hair's breadth. He had
never curbed his temper before. Here he had been forced to overcome the
fury of a building all in flames. The lesson sank deep into his heart.
To-day nobody knows he has any temper at all.


THE SISTER'S INFLUENCE.

Again, as you are influential in the matter of the future prospects of
your sister, and can probably elevate her lot by your aid in forming
her character, so, too is she often, though to a smaller degree, potent
in turning the tides of your life. She has dear friends of her own sex.
They are at your house. They may come to see you by coming to see her.
You meet these girls at your home, and, perhaps, some day you wake up in
love. Now, if your sister, who admits these maidens into your home, has