Page:RMBallantyne--Martin Rattler.djvu/244

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CHAPTER XXIII.

Martin meets with friends, and visits the diamond mines.

One day, after Martin had spent many weeks in wandering alone through the forest, during the course of which he was sometimes tempted to despair of seeing the face of man again, he discovered a beaten track, at the si^-ht of which his heart bounded with delight. It was a Saturday afternoon when he made this discovery, and he spent the Sab- bath day in rest beside it. For Martin had more than once called to remembrance the words which good Aunt Dorothy used to hear him repeat out of the Bible " Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." He had many long, earnest, and serious medi- tations in that silent forest, such as a youth would be very unlikely to have in almost any other circum- stances, except, perhaps, on a sick-bed ; and among other things he had been led to consider, that if he made no difference between Saturday and Sunday, he must certainly be breaking that commandment. So