To return: I continued thus employed in my father's business for
two years, that is, till I was twelve years old; and my brother John,
who was bred to that business, having left my father, married, and set
up for himself at Rhode Island, there was all appearance that I
was destined to supply his place, and become a tallow-chandler.
But my dislike to the trade continuing, my father was under
apprehensions that if he did not find one for me more agreeable,
I should break away and get to sea, as his son Josiah had done,
to his great vexation. He therefore sometimes took me to walk with him,
and see joiners, bricklayers, turners, braziers, etc., at their work,
that he might observe my inclination, and endeavor to fix it on some
trade or other on land. It has ever since been a pleasure to me
to see good workmen handle their tools; and it has been useful to me,
having learnt so much by it as to be able to do little jobs myself
in my house when a workman could not readily be got, and to construct
little machines for my experiments, while the intention of making
the experiment was fresh and warm in my mind. My father at last
fixed upon the cutler's trade, and my uncle Benjamin's son Samuel,
who was bred to that business in London, being about that time
established in Boston, I was sent to be with him some time on liking.
But his expectations of a fee with me displeasing my father,
I was taken home again.

From a child I was fond of reading, and all the little money
that came into my hands was ever laid out in books. Pleased with
the Pilgrim's Progress, my first collection was of John Bunyan's
works in separate little volumes. I afterward sold them to enable
me to buy R. Burton's Historical Collections; they were small
chapmen's books, and cheap, 40 or 50 in all. My father's little