It certainly indicated much innate nobility of nature that this boy, under these circumstances, should have accepted the offer of the Quaker.

But David did this.

For six months he labored assiduously, without the slightest hope of reward, excepting that he would thus relieve his father, whom he had no great cause either to respect or love, from the embarrassment of the debt.
For a whole half-year David toiled upon the farm of the Quaker, never once during that time visiting his home.

At the end of the term he received his pay for those long months of labor, in a little piece of rumpled paper, upon which his father had probably made his mark.

It was Saturday evening.