Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 December 1883 — The Difference. [ARTICLE]

The Difference.

There are those who applaud the soldier Who exposes himself to the fire of a battery, merely Ao obtain a drink of water. But the veteran derides him as foolhardy. A fool may be brave from instinct and ignorance of the danger to be encountered. A rash, vain, overconfident man or boy is prone to imitate the hardihood of the foot True courage refuses to run a risk for the sake of a trifling object, or from mere wantonness. The following incident illustrates the difference between the rashness which is vain and the courage which reflects. One afternoon, last summer, several, boys were bathing in a canal through which the water was brought that turned the wheel of a cotton-mill. At the lower end of the canal was a gate by 4hich the flow of water was regulated. Tom Dash was a gocd swimmer whose recklessness made him rash. While swimming near the gate, he saw that it was partly raised. “Boys, he shouted, “lets dive-under the gate and come up on the other side! 111 lead! who’ll follow ?” The boys, whose flagging interest was aroused by the rash proposal, began to discuss the possibility of the feat. “I’m going to try it,” said Tom, “and I dare you fellows to follow me!” Two of the boys said at once that they would follow Tom; but Will Jones said “it was a foolish risk and he wouldn’t attempt it. ” Tom called him a “coward,” and the two boys on the bank sneered at him because he was “afraid.” Will made no reply, but quietly watched Tom as he was getting ready for the dive.. Tom mounted the wall on one side of the canal and plunged into the water. The boys scrambled to the other side of the gate to see him come up. Ten seconds passed, but nothing was seen of Tom. A moment more of waiting and peering into the black water, and the boys began to realize that they stood face to face with death. “Somebody must go down after him,” said one. “Who’ll go?” A splash answered him. Will had dove down. The boys looked at each other, but not a word was spoken. At last, they saw two bodies slowly rising to the surface, one hanging in the arms of the other. The almost ex->. hausted Will, with the help of the other boys, dragged himself and his harden ashore. Aid was summoned, and as Tom had been but a short time in the water, he was soon resuscitated. Tom had succeeded in .getting halfway under the gate, when his bathingdress caught on a large nail, and he was unable to extricate himself. ’lt was in this terrible grip that Will found him. The boys went home thinking that one is not a coward because he is not a fool, —Youth's Companion.