



Produced by Annie McGuire








[Illustration: HARPER'S

YOUNG PEOPLE

AN ILLUSTRATED WEEKLY.]

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VOL. I.--NO. 46. PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK. PRICE FOUR
CENTS.

Tuesday, September 14, 1880. Copyright, 1880, by HARPER & BROTHERS.
$1.50 per Year, in Advance.

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[Illustration: CALLING THE ROLL.--DRAWN BY T. THULSTRUP.]

WHO WAS PAUL GRAYSON?

BY JOHN HABBERTON,

AUTHOR OF "HELEN'S BABIES."


CHAPTER I.

THE NEW PUPIL.

The boys who attended Mr. Morton's Select School in the village of
Laketon did not profess to know more than boys of the same age and
advantages elsewhere; but of one thing they were absolutely certain, and
that was that no teacher ever rang his bell to assemble the school or
call the boys in from recess until just that particular instant when the
fun in the school-yard was at its highest, and the boys least wanted to
come in. A teacher might be very fair about some things: he might help a
boy through a hard lesson, or give him fewer bad marks than he had
earned; he might even forget to report to a boy's parent's all the cases
of truancy in which their son had indulged; but when a teacher once
laid his hand upon that dreadful bell and stepped to the window, it
really seemed as if every particle of human sympathy went out of him.

On one bright May morning, however, the boys who made this regular daily
complaint were few; indeed, all of them, except Bert Sharp, who had
three consecutive absences to explain, and no written excuse from his
father to help him out, were already inside the school-room, and even
Bert stood where he could look through the open door while he cudgelled
his wits and smothered his conscience in