He believed in the good little boys they put in the Sunday-school book; he had every confidence in them.

He longed to come across one of them alive once; but he never did.

They all died before his time, maybe.

Whenever he read about a particularly good one he turned over quickly to the end to see what became of him, because he wanted to travel thousands of miles and gaze on him; but it wasn't any use; that good little boy always died in the last chapter, and there was a picture of the funeral, with all his relations and the Sunday-school children standing around the grave in pantaloons that were too short, and bonnets that were too large, and everybody crying into handkerchiefs that had as much as a yard and a half of stuff in them.

He was always headed off in this way.