the clouterly appearance of my plough-boy carcase, the two extremes of
which were often exposed to all the inclemencies of all the seasons.
They would give me stray volumes of books; among them, even then, I
could pick up some observations, and one, whose heart, I am sure, not
even the "Munny Begum" scenes have tainted, helped me to a little
French. Parting with these my young friends and benefactors, as they
occasionally went off for the East or West Indies, was often to me a
sore affliction; but I was soon called to more serious evils. My
father's generous master died, the farm proved a ruinous bargain; and
to clench the misfortune, we fell into the hands of a factor, who sat
for the picture I have drawn of one in my tale of "Twa Dogs." My
father was advanced in life when he married; I was the eldest of seven
children, and he, worn out by early hardships, was unfit for labour.
My father's spirit was soon irritated, but not easily broken. There
was a freedom in his lease in two years more, and to weather these two
years, we retrenched our expenses. We lived very poorly; I was a
dexterous ploughman for my age; and the next eldest to me was a brother
(Gilbert), who could drive the plough very well, and help me to thrash
the corn. A novel-writer might, perhaps, have viewed these scenes with
some satisfaction, but so did not I; my indignation yet boils at the
recollection of the scoundrel factor's insolent, threatening letters,
which used to set us all in tears.

This kind of life--the cheerless gloom of a hermit, with the unceasing
moil of a galley slave, brought me to my sixteenth year; a little
before which period I first committed the sin of rhyme. You know our
country custom of coupling a man and woman together as partners in the
labours of harvest. In my fifteenth autumn my partner was a bewitching
creature, a year younger than myself. My scarcity of English denies me
the power of doing her justice in that language, but you know the