though thirteen years old, he was like a child of six. He had been
an unusually intelligent boy, and his father had hurried him on too
fast, giving him all sorts of hard lessons, keeping at his books six
hours a day, and expecting him to absorb knowledge as a Strasburg
goose does the food crammed down its throat. He thought he was
doing his duty, but he nearly killed the boy, for a fever gave the
poor child a sad holiday, and when he recovered, the overtasked
brain gave out, and Billy's mind was like a slate over which a
sponge has passed, leaving it blank.

It was a terrible lesson to his ambitious father; he could not bear
the sight of his promising child, changed to a feeble idiot, and he
sent him away to Plumfield, scarcely hoping that he could be
helped, but sure that he would be kindly treated. Quite docile and
harmless was Billy, and it was pitiful to see how hard he tried to
learn, as if groping dimly after the lost knowledge which had cost
him so much.

Day after day, he pored over the alphabet, proudly said A and B,
and thought that he knew them, but on the morrow they were gone,
and all the work was to be done over again. Mr. Bhaer had infinite
patience with him, and kept on in spite of the apparent
hopelessness of the task, not caring for book lessons, but trying
gently to clear away the mists from the darkened mind, and give it
back intelligence enough to make the boy less a burden and an
affliction.

Mrs. Bhaer strengthened his health by every aid she could invent,
and the boys all pitied and were kind to him. He did not like their
active plays, but would sit for hours watching the doves, would dig