same as the beginning: the Proverbs,--the Commandments,--and the
Golden Rule.



CHAPTER III

NO GIFT FROM THE FAIRIES


From my father I learned many things. He taught me to be
skilful and proud of it. He taught me to expect no gift from
life, but that what I got I must win with my hands. He taught me
that good men would bring forth good fruits. This was all the
education he could give me, and it was enough.

My father was an iron worker, and his father before him. My
people had been workers in metal from the time when the age of
farming in Wales gave way to the birth of modern industries. They
were proud of their skill, and the secrets of the trade were
passed from father to son as a legacy of great value, and were
never told to persons outside the family. Such skill meant good
wages when there was work. But there was not work all the time.
Had there been jobs enough for all we would have taught our trade
to all. But in self-protection we thought of our own mouths
first. All down the generations my family has been face to face
with the problem of bread.

My Grandfather Davies, held a skilled job at the blast furnace
where iron was made for the rolling mill in which my father was a