NAT had rushed up the stairs and thrown himself on his bed with that sense of injury which is so keen at seventeen, and which compels us to find relief in tramping heavily, and flinging ourselves down without taking off our boots. A few passionate tears, however, wore off its sharpest edge, and with renewed vigour he soon sat up again; and it was not without even some feeling of enjoyment that he began to ask himself what was the next thing he should do. His mother’s order did not concern him much; Nat was quick in compunction, and not slow in penitence, but in spite of these qualities it must be owned that he was not the ideal of an obedient son. An artist might have taken his picture as he sat up on the bed, with his eyes still bright with tears, and a face alive for fun, and his hair as rough as its want of length would permit, for it had crisp ends, although cut too short for curls. A handsome boy! (all the members of his family were good-looking), with deep-set, grey eyes beneath fair, curved eyebrows, and lips which, though small and full, yet found themselves able to close as obstinately as thin lips could do. It was a face undeveloped, passionate, full of contradicting, opposing qualities; a face that was rich in many promises, but whose future must yet remain a problem. Under any circumstances he would not have been easily trained, and his home education had not been satisfactory; he was too young to appreciate what was best in his mother, and his father’s career could only be thought of as a disgrace. We commend such lads’ characters to the instruction of experience; but Experience is an instructor who teaches with the stick. Guarded at home, educated in a Board School, trained to out-door work, and yet in too many respects unguarded, untrained, uneducated, at this moment sore with anger, and with a pinch of hunger, all ready for adventures, and ripe for mischief, Nat sat up upon the bed and considered what he should do. A lad of his nature does not long reflect; adventures lie ready and can be found easily. ‘I’ll go to t’ Farm, an’ take Miss Gillan’s basket. I’d like to see Miss Gillan, they say such things o’ her! An’ Alice’ll give me a bit o’ cake; I’m sure I’m in want of it, goin’ without my supper! She’ll like be vexed if she knows that mother’s angered, but I can’t attend always to what Alice says. I’ll try an’ see Miss Gillan, although it is so late; they _do_ talk so of her, all the lads do!’