hard time of it; and when I was just turned of twenty-one
and was free of my apprenticeship, she had but little to
live upon but what I could bring home, and what she could
earn by her needle. This was no grief to me, for I was
fond of my trade, and I had learned it well. My old
master was fond of me, and would trust me with work of a
good deal of responsibility. I neither drank nor
smoked, nor was I over-fond of the amusements which took
up a good deal of the time of my fellow-workmen. I was
most pleased when, on pay-day, I could carry home to my
mother ten, fifteen, or even twenty dollars--could throw
it into her lap, and kiss her and make her kiss me.

"Here is the oil for the lamp, my darling," I would
say; or, "Here is the grease for the wheels"; or, "Now
you must give me white sugar twice a day." She was a
good manager, and she made both ends meet very well.

I had no thought of leaving my master when my
apprenticeship was over, nor had he any thought of
letting me go. We understood each other well, he liked
me and I liked him. He knew that he had in me one man
who was not afraid of work, as he would say, and who
would not shirk it. And so, indeed, he would often put
me in charge of parties of workmen who were much older
than I was.

So it was that it happened, perhaps some months after
I had become a journeyman, that he told me to take a gang
of men, whom he named, and to go quite up-town in the