master's money in his pocket, if he had been sure his master would have
been the only man to suffer for it; but he was a cautious youth, and
quite determined to run no risks on his own account. So he stayed out
his apprenticeship, and committed no act of dishonesty that was at all
likely to be discovered, reserving his plan of emigration for a future
opportunity. And the circumstances under which he carried it out were in
this wise. Having been at home a week or two partaking of the family
beans, he had used his leisure in ascertaining a fact which was of
considerable importance to him, namely, that his mother had a small sum
in guineas painfully saved from her maiden perquisites, and kept in the
corner of a drawer where her baby-linen had reposed for the last twenty
years--ever since her son David had taken to his feet, with a slight
promise of bow-legs which had not been altogether unfulfilled. Mr. Faux,
senior, had told his son very frankly, that he must not look to being set
up in business by _him_: with seven sons, and one of them a very healthy
and well-developed idiot, who consumed a dumpling about eight inches in
diameter every day, it was pretty well if they got a hundred apiece at
his death. Under these circumstances, what was David to do? It was
certainly hard that he should take his mother's money; but he saw no
other ready means of getting any, and it was not to be expected that a
young man of his merit should put up with inconveniences that could be
avoided. Besides, it is not robbery to take property belonging to your
mother: she doesn't prosecute you. And David was very well behaved to
his mother; he comforted her by speaking highly of himself to her, and
assuring her that he never fell into the vices he saw practised by other
youths of his own age, and that he was particularly fond of honesty. If
his mother would have given him her twenty guineas as a reward of this
noble disposition, he really would not have stolen them from her, and it
would have been more agreeable to his feelings. Nevertheless, to an
active mind like David's, ingenuity is not without its pleasures: it was