“Well, well! who'd have thought it?” ejaculated Deacon Gridley. “That boy of the minister's must be plaguey smart. I never thought he'd be so successful. All the same, it seems to me a mighty poor investment to spend a thousand dollars on racin' to Europe. That money would buy quite a sizable farm.” Others, however, less narrow in their notions, heartily approved of the European trip. When three months later the minister came home, he looked like a new man. His eye was bright, his face bronzed and healthy, his step elastic, and he looked half a dozen years younger. “This all comes of having a good son,” he said, smiling, in reply to congratulations, “a son who, in helping himself, has been alive to help others.” Half a dozen years have passed. Grant Thornton is now a young man, and junior partner of Mr. Reynolds. He has turned his money to good account, and is counted rich for one of his age. He has renewed his acquaintance with Miss Carrie Clifton, whom he met for the first time as a summer boarder in Colebrook, and from their intimacy it wouldn't be surprising if Grant should some day become the wealthy jeweler's son-in-law. Uncle Godfrey has become reconciled to Grant's following his own course. It is easy to become reconciled to success. Willis Ford is confined in a penitentiary in a Western State, having been convicted of forgery, and there is small chance of his amendment. He has stripped his stepmother of her last penny, and she is compelled to live on the charity of a relative, who accords her a grudging welcome, and treats her with scant consideration. The bitterest drop in her cup of humiliation is the prosperity of Grant Thornton, toward whom she feels a fierce and vindictive hatred. As she has sown, so she reaps. Malice and uncharitableness seldom bring forth welcome fruit. THE END End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Helping Himself, by Horatio Alger