And here begins a portion of Frank's history which I would be glad to pass over in silence. But, as many boys will probably read this story who are not altogether superior to temptation, and who do not yet know how easy it is for even a good-hearted, honest, and generous lad sometimes to forget his mother's lessons and his own promises, and commence that slow, gradual, downward course, which nearly always begins before we are aware, and from which it is then so hard to turn back; and as many may learn from his experience, and so save themselves much shame and their friends much anguish, it is better that Frank's history should be related without reserve. In the first place, he learned to smoke. He began by taking a whiff, now and then, out of the pipe of a comrade, just to be in fashion, and to keep himself warm those chill evenings and mornings. Then a tobacco planter gave him, in return for some polite act on his part, a bunch of tobacco leaves, which Frank, with his usual ingenuity, made up into cigars for himself and friends. The cigars consumed, he obtained more tobacco of some negroes, addicted himself to a pipe, and became a regular smoker. Now, I don't mean to say that this, of itself, was a very great sin. It was, however, a foolish thing in Frank to form at his age a habit which might tyrannize over him for life, and make him in the end, as he himself once said to John Winch, "a filthy, tobacco-spitting old man." But the worst of it was, he had promised his mother he would not smoke. He thought he had a good excuse for breaking his word to her. "I am sure," he said, "if she knew how cold I am sometimes, she wouldn't blame me." Unfortunately, however, when one promise has been broken, and nobody hurt, another is broken so easily! Ardent, sympathetic, fond of good-fellowship, Frank caught quickly the spirit of those around him. He loved approbation, and dreaded any thing that savored of ridicule. He disliked particularly the appellation of "the parson," which John Winch, finding that it annoyed him, used now whenever he wished to speak of him injuriously. Others soon fell into the habit of applying to him the offensive title, without malice indeed, and for no other reason, I suppose, than that nicknames are the fashion in the army. To call a man simply by his honest name seems commonplace; but to christen him the "Owl" if his eyes are big, or "Old Tongs" if his legs are long, or "Step-and-fetch-it" if he suffers himself to be made the underling and cats-paw of his comrades,--that is considered picturesque and amusing.