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score of four or five shillings a week for this cursed beverage; an expence from which I was wholly exempt. Thus do these poor devils continue all their lives in a state of voluntary wretchedness and poverty. My example prevailed with several of them to renounce their abominable practice of bread and cheese with beer; and they procured, like me, from a neighbouring house, a good basin of warm gruel, in which was a small slice of butter, with toasted bread and nutmeg. This was a much better breakfast, which did not cost more than a pint of beer, namely, threehalfpence, and at the same time preserved the head clearer. Those who continued to gorge themselves with beer, often lost their credit with the publican, from neglecting to pay their score. They had then recourse to me to become security for them, their light, as they used to call it, being out. I attended at the pay-table every Saturday evening, to take up the little sums which I had made myself answerable for, and which sometimes amounted to near thirty shillings a week.

"This circumstance, added to my reputation of being a tolerable good gabber, or, in other words, skilful in the art of burlesque, kept up my importance in the chapel. I had, besides, recommended myself to the esteem of my master by my assiduous application to business, never observing Saint Monday. My extraordinary quickness in composing always procured me such work as was most urgent, and which is commonly best paid; and thus my time passed away in a very pleasant manner."

Franklin, from boyhood, was a capital swimmer. He had studied and practised Thevenot's doctrines ; and displayed, during his stay in London, that agility on the Thames which procured him great admiration. Returning one day with a party from Chelsea, he swam the greater part of the way from that place to Blackfriars bridge, displaying aquatic feats at which the spectators were astonished, and in which it appears he had few equals,

He frequently used a kite, when a boy, as a sort of sail for the human body. Swimming he calls a kind of rowing with the arms and legs; and the addition of a sail, as he terms it, was suggested by his approaching a pond, while flying a kite on a summer's day. "I tied," he says, "the string to a stake, and the kite ascended to a considerable height above the pond, while I was swimming. In a little time, being desirous of amusing myself with my kite, and of enjoying at the same time the pleasure of swimming, I returned, and loosing from the stake the string with the little stick which was fastened to it, went again into the water, where I found that, lying on my back, and holding the stick in my hands, I was drawn along the surface of the water in a very agreeable manner. Having then engaged another boy to carry my clothes round the pond to a place which I pointed out to him on the other side, I began to cross the pond with my kite, which carried me quite over without the least fatigue, and with the greatest pleasure imaginable. I was only obliged occasionally to halt a little in my course, and resist its progress, when it appeared that by following too quickly I lowered the kite too much; by doing which occasionally, I made it rise again. I have never since that time practised this singular mode of swimming, though I think it not impossible to cross in this manner from Dover to Calais. The packet-boat however is still preferable."

Sir William Wyndham sent for him, in consequence of his fame in this art, to teach his sons to swim, and proposed a handsome remuneration to him for his trouble: so that Franklin conceived, had he remained in England, he might have opened a swimming school with very good prospects of success. "Had the overture," he says, "been made earlier by sir William, and when he was less disposed than he now was to return to America, he would certainly have accepted it, and attempted some public establishment of the kind."

He also, about this time, entertained a proposal from a very intelligent and well-educated fellow

workman to travel over Europe with him, working by the way. But his good friend Denham, whom he frequently consulted, was against this project, and soon induced him to relinquish his present engagement, and prepare for returning to his native country.

Denham had come over to Europe to purchase goods for a general store in Philadelphia, in which he had of late been very successful. Admiring Franklin's industrious and frugal turn, he now invited him to become his assistant in arranging and packing the goods, and to engage with him afterwards as a superior clerk; promising that, as soon as he should be qualified for the adventure, he would commission him with a cargo of provisions for the West Indies, obtain him certain custom among his friends, and concern himself in his future establishment in a mercantile way. He was to have 50l. per annum at the commencement of the engagement; less, he says, than he now earned; but the better future prospects it offered, and the cheerful thoughts of returning home, induced him to close with it.

Franklin gives one trait of this amiable man's character, which must have inspired him with a high sense of his honour. Some years previous to his present appearance in England, he had failed in business at Bristol, and compounded with his creditors. On his return at this time in better circumstances, he invited all of them to an entertainment, which they considered only as a tribute of respect; but on the first remove of the plates, each creditor found upon the table an order on a banker for the payment of the balance originally due to him, with interest to the day.

Franklin passed about eighteen months in London, working hard at his business, improving his knowledge, and extending his acquaintance. But his friend Ralph, his book purchases, and occasionally frequenting the theatre, kept him poor. Twentyseven pounds out of his earnings went in the first item alone; his fellow-adventurer however seems

by no means to have spared endeavours to succeed in his turn.

The subject of this memoir took leave of the printing business, and closely engaged himself for some weeks in assisting his friend Denham in collecting his freight. They sailed from Gravesend for Philadelphia, 23d July 1726, on board the Berkshire, Clerk,

master.

The leisure-hours of this voyage were memorable for producing the first draft of Franklin's plan for his conduct in life, which there will be occasion to speak of shortly. His journal, kept throughout the voyage, exhibits the observant character of his mind. The following is a characteristic extract:

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Tuesday, August 9. "Took our leave of the land this morning. Calms the fore part of the day. In the afternoon, a small gale; fair. Saw a grampus.

"Friday, August 19.

Our

"This day we had a pleasant breeze at East. In the morning, we spied a sail upon our larboard bow, about two leagues distance. About noon, she put out English colours, and we answered with our ensign; and in the afternoon, we spoke with her. She was a ship of New York, Walter Kippen, master, bound from Rochelle in France, to Boston, with salt. captain and Mr D. went on board, and stayed till evening, it being fine weather. Yesterday, complaints being made that a Mr Gn, one of the passengers, had with a fraudulent design marked the cards, a court of justice was called immediately, and he was brought to trial in form. A Dutchman, who could speak no English, deposed by his interpreter, that when our mess was on shore at Cowes, the prisoner at the bar marked all the court cards on the back with a pen.

"I have sometimes observed, that we are apt to fancy the person that cannot speak intelligibly to us, proportionably stupid in understanding; and when we

speak two or three words of English to a foreigner, it is louder than ordinary, as if we thought him deaf, and that he had lost the use of his ears as well as his tongue. Something like this, I imagine, might be the case of Mr Gn; he fancied the Dutchman could not see what he was about, because he could not understand English, and therefore boldly did it before his face.

"The evidence was plain and positive; the prisoner could not deny the fact, but replied, in his defence, that the cards he marked were not those we commonly played with, but an imperfect pack which he afterwards gave to the cabin-boy. The attorney-general observed to the court, that it was not likely he should take the pains to mark the cards without some illdesign, or some further intention than just to give them, when he had done, to the boy, who understood nothing at all of cards. But another evidence, being called, deposed that he saw the prisoner in the main-top one day, when he thought himself unobserved, marking a pack of cards on the backs, some with the print of a dirty thumb, others with the top of his finger, &c. Now there being but two packs on board, and the prisoner having just confessed the marking of one, the court perceived the case was plain. In fine, the jury brought him in guilty, and he was condemned to be carried up to the round-top, and made fast there, in view of all the ship's company, during the space of three hours, that being the place where the act was committed, and to pay a fine of two bottles of brandy. But the prisoner resisting authority, and refusing to submit to punishment, one of the sailors stepped up aloft and let down a rope to us, which we, with much struggling, made fast about his middle, and hoisted him up into the air, sprawling, by main force. We let him hang, cursing and swearing, for near a quarter of an hour; but at length he crying out murder! and looking black in the face, the rope being overtort about his middle, we thought proper to let him down again; and our mess have excommunicated him till

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