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"Make or Break," is the fifth of the serial stories published in "Our Boys and Girls"—a magazine which has become so much the pet of the author, that he never sits down to write a story for it without being impressed by a very peculiar responsibility. Twenty thousand youthful faces seem to surround him, crying out for something that will excite their minds, and thrill their very souls, while a calmer, holier voice, speaking in the tones of divine command, breathes gently forth, "Feed my lambs."
The lambs will not eat dry husks; they loathe the tasteless morsel which well-meaning sectarians offer them, and hunger for that which will warm their hearts and stir their blood. The heart may be warmed, and the blood may be stirred, without corrupting the moral nature. The writer has endeavored to meet this demand in this way, and he is quite sure that the patient, striving, toiling Leo, and the gentle, self-sacrificing, and devoted Maggie, do nothing in the story which will defile the mind or the heart of the young people. The Bible teaches what they sought to practice. He is satisfied that none of his readers will like Mr. Fitzherbert Wittleworth well enough to make him their model.
The author is willing the story should pass for what it is worth; and there is no danger that it will be over or undervalued, for the young people are even more critical than their elders. But the favor already bestowed upon it has added to the weight of the writer's obligation to the juvenile reading public; and in giving them the story in its present permanent form, he trusts that it will continue to be not only a source of pleasure, but a stimulus to higher aims, and a more resolute striving for what is worth having both in the moral and material world.
William T. Adams.
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