"However," proceeded Nelson, "according to your advice to us in such cases, I took no notice at the time: but in the evening, as he happened to come along the path by our garden, I said to him, 'Absalom, I do wish you would pay a little more attention at school, I really fancied to-day you were singing something of a song.' 'Well,' said he, 'suppose I was—what then? 'twas only a bit of a tune that a man was singing in at father's, one night last week; and father said, that altering the words a little, it would just suit us boys of the Sunday-school. There is no harm (he continued) in the words, I will tell you what they were.' But they seemed to me, Sir, to be part of a very mischievous ballad, signifying that instead of Churches and Prayer Books, people had better sit in public houses and study newspapers; that Church-going is time-wasting, and so forth. So it is plain that the boy is encouraged at home in his bad ways; and, as you ask me the question, Sir, I fear it is not much better with the two Yawns; for I dare say you must have observed that there are six or seven people, who always come late into Church, rain or shine, morning or evening, and amongst them Master Yawn comes in as regularly as possible just about the end of the first Lesson."
"Yes," I said, "I have observed it, and have long wished for an opportunity of inquiring into the cause of such a practice."
After some other observations we parted, and it happened, as I before observed, that on the same day my neighbour Yawn came to our house to borrow a milking bucket, which I very readily lent him, though not with my servant's good will, as such articles seldom returned from the farmer's in exactly as good a condition as they went.
Seeing him, then, go out of the yard with the bucket in his hand, I met him at the garden gate, and said to him at once, "I do wish, Mr. Yawn, you would speak to Lawrence and the little boy, for by their irregularity and extreme idleness, they vex me very much, and do harm to the other boys in the school."
"Sir," he replied, making a low bow, "I am very sorry indeed to come troubling again so soon for a bucket, but our people
