Page:Whyte-Melville--Bones and I.djvu/230

 "Come here," said he to the winner. "Go into my study, and fetch me my big Bible."

The urchin obeyed, and returned bearing a ponderous quarto volume, "Now," continued his reverence, "start fair, and run it over again."

The competitors wished no better fun, and finished this time with a dead heat.

"Good boys! Good boys!" said the parson, reflectively "Ah! I thought the weight would bring you together."

Yes; how surely the weight brings us together! How often have we not seen the universal handicap run out over the course of daily life? Some of us start so free, so lighthearted, so full of hope and confidence, expecting no less than to gallop in alone. Presently the weight begins to tell; the weight that we have voluntarily accepted, or the weight imposed on us by the