it must seem strange to you that when I can use my fists so well,
apparently, I should all this while have avoided every chance for
trouble with others. The fact of the matter is, Doctor Carmack, that I
am constituted very like my father was; and once upon a time his temper
got the better of him, so that he attacked a man who had insulted him,
and seriously injured him. That man always had a limp through the
remainder of his life. He and my father became good friends, but my
dad could never forgive himself for what he did. He used to say that
it was a mercy he had not actually killed the man in his blind passion.
And after he died, my good mother, seeing that I had just the same
Morgan temper, once I was thoroughly aroused, feared that it might get
me into some dreadful trouble. And so she told me about my father, and
I made her that solemn promise which, until Friday night, had never
been broken."

There was a suspicious moisture in the eyes of the doctor. He squeezed
the hand of Hugh vigorously, as though he could easily love such a
manly boy.

"Of course you told your good mother all about it, Hugh, when you got
home?" he went on to say, with a trace of huskiness in his voice.

"I could not have slept a wink, sir, if I had not gone to her room, and
kneeling beside her bed poured out the whole story. She cried a
little, because, I suppose, it brought back some old memories that had
often saddened her; but she told me again and again I had done exactly
as she would have wished me to. Oh! she is the most sensible mother
any fellow ever had, I assure you, sir."

"And I also believe that you are supremely blessed in that respect,