sentenced to a life-long helplessness so far as all but his hands were concerned, yet faced the situation with a dismal fortitude.
And George, having recently attained the proud dignity of a bank account, was sending his check for forty dollars till the whole twelve hundred was paid; and not a dollar of it did he regret, deeming that he got his money's worth in knowing that his father had his chance. Besides, he was getting to be more of a magnate every day. He had two news shops now instead of one, with an alert young woman in charge of the second. But there must have been too much distraction in so many business enterprises for a student's mind, for this year, his first in high school, George failed completely in his midwinter examinations. It was a crushing blow to his self-esteem.
"Better take it slower, George," urged his friends, the teachers.
And he did. Fewer studies allowed him more sleep, while the steadiness of his income and its equally steady enlargement brought additional ease to mind.
Almost as if in consequence of these things there began to take place a remarkable physical change in George. The intensive labors of the past three years had made him scrawny and nervous. He had been hollow-cheeked, big-eyed, rough-haired, almost ill-favored. But
