"So down I sat, and started this. Just at the beginning of it, where it can help to ease any pain in your heart, let me say a word about my going, for I want you to be happy always when you're thinking of me. So believe what I say: though we can't sit and talk together, as we have, still we'll never be parted. No! For the reason that I'll live on, not only in the spirit, but also in that fine brain of yours! And whenever you'll be wanting me, you'll think me with you, and there I'll be, never a day older, never a bit less red-headed, or dear to your loving eyes. So! We're friends, you and I, as long as memory lasts! "Lad dear, I called you rich once. You didn't understand all I meant by it, and I'm going to explain myself here. And I'll start the list of your riches with this: though you've been shut in, and worked hard, and fed none too well, and dressed badly, and cheated by Tom Barber out of the smiles, and the decent words of praise, and the consideration and politeness that's every child's honest due--in spite of all this, I say, you've gone right on, ignoring what you couldn't help, learning what you could, improving yourself, preserving your sense of humor (which is the power to see what's funny in everything), and never letting your young heart forget to sing. "'But,' you'll ask, 'how is it that not caring too much about food and clothes may be counted as a valuable possession?' And I'll answer, 'That man is strong, John, whose appetite is his servant, not his master. And that man is stronger yet if, wearing ragged, old clothes, all the same he can keep his pride high. For "Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?" Well, that's how it's been with you! "Some of your riches consist of things which you haven't got--now that sounds strange, does it not? And I don't mean the scarlet fever which you haven't, or a hair lip, or such like. No. You're rich in not being morbid, for instance,--in not dwelling on what's unpleasant, and ugly. Also because you don't harbor malice and ill-will. Because you don't fret, and sulk, and brood, all these goings-on being a sad waste of time. "And now let's count over the riches that you've got in your character. In the back of your Handbook, Mr. Roosevelt, writing about boy scouts, named four qualities for a fine lad: unselfish, gentle, strong, brave. They're your qualities, lad dear. And you proved the last one when you took that whipping with the ropes--ah, is a boy poor when he's got the spunk in him? He is not! Well, along with those four qualities I can honestly add these others: you're grateful, you're clean (in heart and in mouth, liking and speaking what's good), you're merciful, you're truthful, you're ambitious, you've got decent instincts--inherited, but a part of your riches, just the same.