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THE FARMER AND SOLDIER.
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arise. They sat by his bed and soothed his worn heart with kindness, and told him the simple narrative of all that had befallen them in their quiet abode.
"Among all my troubles," said he, and I have had many, none has so bowed me down, as my sin in leaving home without the knowledge of my parents, to become a soldier, when I knew it was against their will. I have felt the pain of wounds, but there is nothing like the sting of conscience. When I have lain perishing with hunger, and parching with thirst, a prisoner in the enemy's hands, the image of my home, and of my ingratitude, would be with me, when I lay down, and when I rose up. I would think I saw my mother bending tenderly