good men and women were there. Perhaps God had not so plainly shown them
the wrong. Perhaps they had never found that verse: "Avoid it, pass not
by it." Perhaps--oh, _anything_--it was nothing to him now. This much was
certain: he had done wrong. Such a heavy, _heavy_ heart as Tip had
to-night. "What _should_ he do? What would Kitty say, if she found it
out? Oh, what would Mr. Dewey think, or Mr. Holbrook? and then, above
all else, came the thought, What could Jesus, looking down on him now
from heaven, what could _He_ think of him? This thought brought the
bitter tears, but it brought him also on his knees; and he said,--

"Oh, Jesus Christ, in spite of it all, you _know_ I love you. Won't you
forgive me and let me try again?" Long he knelt there, trying to get
close to Christ, and his Saviour did not leave him alone. It was only
yesterday he had learned the verse, and it came to him softly now: "Thou
art a God ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, of great
kindness."

In his sore trouble, Tip's lamp had not failed him.




CHAPTER XII.

"He honoureth them that fear the Lord."


Slowly, but surely, as the late autumn days came on, Tip was growing into
a better place in the schoolroom, in the opinion of his teachers and his
schoolmates. In Mr. Burrows' school, ten was the perfect mark, and _x_