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disputes henceforward. James acted, it is equally evident, a rash and tyrannical part; and under "the mortifying feeling of blows freely administered," there is little ground for surprise that this able and in other respects worthy lad resolved to quit his servitude. "It was not fair in me to take this advantage," he says; "and this I therefore notice as one of the first errata of my life: but the unfairness of it weighed little with me when under the impression of resentment for the blows his passion too often urged him to bestow upon me. Though he was otherwise not an ill-natured man- —perhaps I was too saucy and provoking."

His intention of leaving was avowed; and the brother took care so to prejudice all the neighbouring printers against him, that Franklin could entertain no prospect of employment at Boston. His character also was not in good savour with the ruling powers; and his father was too just a man not to avow his displeasure at his present determination. Covert measures were therefore resorted to in the management of his departure, which was concerted with his friend Collins; a passage being taken for him with the latter, in a New York vessel, as a lad whom an unfortunate intrigue had compelled to leave the place. He was now but seventeen; and escaping on board without molestation, found himself at New York in three days, a perfect stranger to all its inhabitants, almost pennyless, and without a line of recommendation.

But Franklin never wanted confidence in himself, nor despaired of his resources. Finding that one Bradford, the established printer there, had no employment for him, but considered it probable that a son of his at Philadelphia would give him work, he took the boat without hesitation for Amboy, leaving his chest and baggage to come to him by sea. The passage was stormy, and the boat had to pass a night on the coast of Long Island. Like many other young sailors, he now had his quantum sufficit of a seafaring life, and was compelled to digest his yet small acquirements

as a philosopher in the company of a drunken Dutchman, and the only literary companion in the boathonest John Bunyan and his patient Pilgrim. The evening he landed at Amboy, having been thirty hours on the water without food, or any drink except from a bottle of filthy rum, he was violently attacked with fever. His remedy was copious draughts of cold water, which, happening to produce perspiration, succeeded; and the following morning he started on foot for Burlington, fifty miles distant.

The next evening, after a very rainy day, which drenched him thoroughly, he was compelled to put up with the miserable accommodations of one of the lowest American inns by the road-side, and began heartily to repent having quitted his brother. A backward course however was now more impracticable than to go forward. A few miles from Burlington he found a titled innkeeper and traveller, a Dr Brown, who soon diverted his melancholy, and confirmed his sceptical opinions,and with whom he laid the foundation of an acquaintance which continued for many years. Arriving the third day, Saturday, at Burlington, he had the misfortune to find that all the Philadelphia boats had sailed, and that no other was expected to start before the Tuesday following. Asking advice as to his proceeding in the mean time, a charitable old woman, of whom he had purchased gingerbread, offered to lodge him, and supplied him with a plentiful dinner of ox-cheek, for the compliment of a pot of ale. In an evening walk however he was agreeably surprised to find a boat on the Delaware, sailing for the capital; he bargained for his passage, and went directly on board. He had not yet conciliated Neptune; for the wind fell, the boat was drifted into a creek of which her managers knew nothing, and another cold October night was spent by the young adventurer on the water-ushering in a miserable Sunday morning, which showed them they had passed Philadelphia; when they tacked, and reached the city between eight and nine.

Here again Franklin felt his destitution in no small degree. On the road his appearance had excited suspicion of his being a runaway lad; and it was not now improved by his second voyage, his hunger and fatigue, and the working dress he wore being crammed with dirty linen. His whole amount of money consisted of a shilling's-worth of copper, which he paid for his fare, and a single dollar.

"I walked," he observes, "towards the top of the street, looking eagerly on both sides, till I came to Market-street, where I met a child with a loaf of bread. Often had I made my dinner on dry bread, I inquired where he had bought it, and went straight to the baker's shop which he pointed out to me. I asked for some biscuits, expecting to find such as we had at Boston; but they made, it seems, none of that sort at Philadelphia. I then asked for a threepenny loaf. They made no loaves of that price. Finding myself ignorant of the prices, as well as of the different kinds of bread, I desired him to let me have threepennyworth of bread, of some kind or other. He gave me three large rolls. I was surprised at receiving so much; I took them however, and having no room in my pockets, I walked on with a roll under each arm, eating the third. In this manner, I went through Market-street to Fourth-street, and passed the house of Mr Read, the father of my future wife. She was standing at the door, observed me, and thought, with reason, that I made a very singular and grotesque appearance.

"I then turned the corner, and went through Chesnut-street, eating my roll all the way; and having made this round, I found myself again on Marketstreet-wharf, near the boat in which I arrived. I stepped into it to take a draught of the river-water; and finding myself satisfied with my first roll, I gave the other two to a woman and her child, who had come down the river with us in the boat, and was waiting to continue her journey. Thus refreshed, I regained the street, which was now full of well-dressed people,

all going the same way. I joined them, and was thus led to a large Quaker's meeting-house near the market-place. I sat down with the rest, and, after looking round me for some time, hearing nothing said, and being drowsy from my last night's labour and want of rest, I fell into a sound sleep. In this state I continued till the assembly dispersed, when one of the congregation had the goodness to wake me. This was consequently the first house I entered, or in which I slept, at Philadelphia."

Franklin was directed from that abode of quiet and quiet meditation, the Quaker's meeting-house, near the market, Philadelphia, by one of the congregation, to the Crooked Billet inn in Water-street, where he dined, and slept soundly till supper-time (six o'clock) when he had to endure many inquiries of the inmates as to his origin and plans. In the morning he sought the shop of Andrew Bradford, a printer, and was cheered by the sight of the only friend he had seen since he left home-the father, who had come up from New York on horseback. Young Bradford treated him hospitably, and offered to lodge him until he was better provided, but could give him no work: on which, the old man offered to proceed with him to one Keimer, another printer of the city; who, mistaking the elder Bradford for a fellow-citizen, received the youth with civility, and promised him employment in a few days. Franklin saw at a glance the character of his new master, who was the ready dupe of old Bradford's questions as to all his connexions and prospects, and in no small degree surprised and mortified when informed of his name.

In Keimer he found the professions of printer and author united, as in his own case; only this worthy son of the muses had not so ungratefully abandoned them. He was composing verses in solid printing-metal, not finding them to require the crucible of writing or further thought, and with but one pair of cases; this metallic stream proceeding solely out of “ small head."-Franklin says, with the greatest sim

one

plicity,- no one could help him!"-However, Franklin was the only pressman of the two, and found himself quickly the only man in Philadelphia who was well acquainted with the whole printing business. After getting Keimer's press into order, and working it for him, Bradford engaged him as a compositor, as well as to correct his own and his customers' blundering compositions. But jealousy was excited by this attempt to serve two masters; Keimer provided for him a lodging at Mr Read's (his own landlord) in a neighbouring street; and thus commenced Franklin's acquaintance with his future wife's family.

It was during this first voyage to Philadelphia, while the vessel was becalmed off Block Island, that Franklin was cured of his youthful fancy to relinquish animal food. From reading a treatise of one Tryon on the subject, he had in fact entirely abstained for some time from eating any thing that had life; even the taking of fish he considered as a species of murder, they having done nothing to deserve a violent death. But the crew at this time busily engaged themselves in catching cod, once a favourite dish of Franklin's. When it came from the fire, the smell was very tempting; he says, "I hesitated some time between principle and inclination, till at last recollecting, that when the cod had been opened, some small fish were found in its belly, I said to myself, If you eat one another, I see no reason why we may not eat you. I accordingly dined on the cod with no small degree of pleasure, and have since continued to eat like the rest of mankind, returning only occasionally to my vegetable plan. How convenient does it prove, to be a rational animal that knows how to find or invent a plausible pretext for whatever it has an inclination to do!"

Benjamin Franklin was thus, at one remove, in the very sphere he was formed to shine in. He was maintaining himself independently; and while at the head of his associates, and even of his employers, in every thing

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