...but he bore a brown scar to the end of his days." "One of the few things that I remember about my very first reading 20 some-odd years ago is how encouraged I felt after reading this sentence." Just curious, how did his baring a scar encourage you?
The part about "till the end of his days" made it sound like to me he wasn't going to die in just a minute. He was at least going to have some "days" left! LOL