ALGER SERIES FOR BOYS.
UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME.
BY HORATIO ALGER, JR.
{about 50 titles}

TO
The Boys
WHOSE MEMORY GOES BACK WITH ME
TO THE BOARDING SCHOOL
AT POTOWOME
THIS VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED
BY
THE AUTHOR.

PREFACE
----

"PAUL PRESCOTT'S CHARGE" is presented to
the public as the second volume of the Campaign
Series.  Though wholly unlike the first
volume, it is written in furtherance of the same
main idea, that every boy's life is a campaign,
more or less difficult, in which success depends
upon integrity and a steadfast adherence to duty.

How Paul Prescott gained strength by
battling with adverse circumstances, and, under
all discouragements, kept steadily before him
the charge which he received from his dying
father, is fully told; and the author will be
glad if the record shall prove an incentive and
an encouragement to those boys who may have
a similar campaign before them.

PAUL PRESCOTT'S CHARGE.

I.

SQUIRE NEWCOME.

"HANNAH!"

The speaker was a tall, pompous-looking
man, whose age appeared to verge close upon
fifty.  He was sitting bolt upright in a high-
backed chair, and looked as if it would be
quite impossible to deviate from his position
of unbending rigidity.

Squire Benjamin Newcome, as he was
called, in the right of his position as Justice
of the Peace, Chairman of the Selectmen, and
wealthiest resident of Wrenville, was a man
of rule and measure.  He was measured in his
walk, measured in his utterance, and measured
in all his transactions.  He might be
called a dignified machine.  He had a very
exalted conception of his own position, and the
respect which he felt to be his due, not only
from his own household, but from all who
approached him.  If the President of the United
States had called upon him, Squire Newcome
would very probably have felt that he himself
was the party who conferred distinction, and
not received it.

Squire Newcome was a widower.  His wife,
who was as different from himself as could well
be conceived, did not live long after marriage. 
She was chilled to death, as it was thought, by
the dignified iceberg of whose establishment
she had become a part.  She had left, however,
a child, who had now grown to be a boy
of twelve.  This boy was a thorn in the side
of his father, who had endeavored in vain to
mould him according to his idea of propriety. 
But Ben was gifted with a spirit of fun, sometimes
running into mischief, which was constantly
bursting out in new directions, in spite
of his father's numerous and rather prosy lectures.

"Han-nah!" again called Squire Newcome,
separating the two syllables by a pause of
deliberation, and strongly accenting the last
syllable,--a habit of his with all proper names.

Hannah was the Irish servant of all work,
who was just then engaged in mixing up bread
in the room adjoining, which was the kitchen.

Feeling a natural reluctance to appear
before her employer with her hands covered with
dough, she hastily washed them.  All this,
however, took time, and before she responded
to the first summons, the second "Han-nah!"
delivered with a little sharp emphasis, had
been uttered.

At length she appeared at the door of the
sitting-room.

"Han-nah!" said Squire Newcome, fixing
his cold gray eye upon her, "when you hear my
voice a calling you, it is your duty to answer
the summons IMMEJIATELY."

I have endeavored to represent the Squire's
pronunciation of the last word.

"So I would have come IMMEJOUSLY," said
Hannah, displaying a most reprehensible
ignorance, "but me hands were all covered
with flour."

"That makes no difference," interrupted the
Squire.  "Flour is an accidental circumstance."

"What's that?" thought Hannah, opening
her eyes in amazement.

"And should not be allowed to interpose an
obstacle to an IMMEJIATE answer to my summons."

"Sir," said Hannah, who guessed at the
meaning though she did not understand the
words, "you wouldn't have me dirty the door-
handle with me doughy hands?"

"That could easily be remedied by ablution."

"There ain't any ablution in the house,"
said the mystified Hannah.

"I mean," Squire Newcome condescended
to explain, "the application of water--in
short, washing."

"Shure," said Hannah, as light broke in
upon her mind, "I never knew that was what
they called it before."

"Is Ben-ja-min at home?"

"Yes, sir.  He was out playin' in the yard
a minute ago.  I guess you can see him from
the winder."

So saying she stepped forward, and looking
out, all at once gave a shrill scream, and
rushed from the room, leaving her employer
in his bolt-upright attitude gazing after
her with as much astonishment as he was
capable of.

The cause of her sudden exit was revealed
on looking out of the window.

Master Benjamin, or Ben, as he was called
everywhere except in his own family, had got
possession of the black kitten, and appeared to
be submerging her in the hogshead of rainwater.

"O, you wicked, cruel boy, to drown poor
Kitty!" exclaimed the indignant Hannah,
rushing into the yard and endeavoring to
snatch her feline favorite--an attempt which
Ben stoutly resisted.

Doubtless the poor kitten would have fared
badly between the two, had not the window
opened, and the deliberate voice of his father,
called out in tones which Ben saw fit to heed.

"What?"

"Come into my presence immejiately, and
learn to answer me with more respect."

Ben came in looking half defiant.

His father, whose perpendicularity made
him look like a sitting grenadier, commenced
the examination thus:--

"I wish you to inform me what you was a
doing of when I spoke to you."

It will be observed that the Squire's dignified
utterances were sometimes a little at variance
with the rule of the best modern grammarians.

"I was trying to prevent Hannah from
taking the kitten," said Ben.

"What was you a doing of before Hannah
went out?"

"Playing with Kitty."