"Of course," he said afterwards, in telling the story to his
mother, "I know that Lucy didn't know the sense of what she was
saying, but she did seem to know how to get at the "sensibliness"
of me. Just imagine, mother, how bad we would all have felt if I
had struck my own dear sister that God sent us to take care of!"
And that was so like Master Sunshine. He never willingly gave pain
to any living creature; and although he was sometimes careless and
forgetful, just like other boys, yet he was never known to be
wilfully unkind.
He loved his mother very dearly too, and perhaps it was from her
gentle ways that he had learned to be so thoughtful for others. He
told her all his joys, and all his secrets save one; and he dearly
loved the bedtime hour, when she read to him the stories that he
most admired,--stories of brave deeds were the kind he was always
asking for. But neither of them ever dreamed that the quiet
bedtime hours were teaching him to be a hero.
It did not seem possible that an eight-year-old boy could be a
hero such as one reads of in books.
Of course, he was going to do great things when he was a man. He
meant to make a great fortune, of which half was to be his
mother's; and if she chose to spend it on churches and
missionaries and schools, so much the better.
He was sure she would rather do this than buy herself handsome
dresses and diamond rings and ruby necklaces; and he was quite
certain that, when she wore her gray gown and her gray bonnet,
with the purple violets tucked under the brim, that she was the
most beautiful lady in the world.
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