How John Became a Man: Life Story of a Motherless Boy

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re, there was still the same pathetic expression in his deep, brown eyes, and now and then there could be observed in them a mischievous glance or a

for which his heart was craving. To be sure, his father was still kind, and sometimes John would imagine that he could even feel his father's love. At such times the boy would pre

grown up here on the prairie like a wild thing. He ha

umstances, to go seemed the best and proper thing to do. The sad events, he reasoned, were all in a lifetime; and he must make the best of them. The home would for a time seem desolate, he knew, but he thought that perhaps they

father's plans, he thought, "Perhaps it may be all right." His aunt was very kind while John and his father were preparing to move; and the day they bade her good-by she

take them with you. They will help you to forget that you are alone when your father is away at his work"; and she handed him a small cove

ows for that purpose, while others were hauling the grain to their barns to store it away for the winter's use. The broad corn leaves rustling in the wind seemed to whisper, "Winter is c

still soft and mild. Near the willows might still be seen the bending goldenrods, asters, and

idly about the doorway as if to bid the home-comers welcome, and then they were gone. A rabbit, hopping boldly about in the neglected doorway, stopped suddenly as if to ask why these people had

rn. After a while John found that his aunt had not forgotten that he would be very hungry, and soon he was sampling some large bread-and-meat sandwiches; his father, too, came for his share. Thus q

is little pets, the turkeys. They received his earliest attention in the morning, and it was their little beaks th

s to being left alone to hustle off to school in the early morning hours, where he must sit like a statue and prepare humdrum lessons, was t

e school; and his kindly, generous, and ambitious nature won him many friends. He was soon noted for his witty remarks, made i

an interest in his welfare; and though he constantly tried to smother the deep suffering he felt it still smoldered in his heart. Th