CHAPTER XVII.
BENJAMIN LOOKS FOR A PLACE WHEREIN TO START IN LIFE.
Besides his instruction from encouraging Mr. Brownell and his Uncle Benjamin, little Benjamin Franklin had spent one year at school and several years of self-instruction under helps. His father needed him in the candle shop, and he could not give him a larger education with so many mouths to feed.
Young Ben did not like his occupation in the candle shop. He worked with his hands while his heart was absent, and his imagination was even farther away.
He had a brother John who had helped his father when a boy, who married and moved to Rhode Island to follow there his father's trade as a candle and soap maker. John's removal doubled the usefulness of little Ben among the candle molds and soap kettles. He saw how this kind of work would increase as he grew older; he longed for a different occupation, something that would satisfy his mental faculties and give him intellectual opportunities, and his dreams went sailing to the seas and lands where his brother Josiah had been. There were palms in his fancy, gayly plumed birds, tropical waters, and a free life under vertical suns—India, the Spanish Main, the ports of the Mediterranean. He talked so much of going to sea that his father saw that his shop was not the place for this large-brained boy with an inventive faculty.
"Ben," said Josiah Franklin one day, "this is no place for you—you are not balanced like other boys; your head is canted the other way. You'll be running off to sea some day, just as Josiah did. Come, let us go out into the town, and I will try to find another place for you. You will have to become an apprentice boy."
"Anything, father, but this dull work. I seem here to be giving all my time to nothing. Soap and candles are good and useful things, but people can make them who can do nothing else. I want a place that will give me a chance to work with my head. What is my head for?"
"I don't know, Ben; it will take time to answer that. You do seem to have good faculties, if you are my son. I would be glad to have you do the very best that you are capable of doing, and Heaven knows that I would give you an education if I were able. Come, let us go."
They went out into the streets of Boston town. The place then contained something more than two thousand houses, most of them built of timber and covered with cedar shingles; a few of them were stately edifices of brick and tiles. It had seven churches, and they were near the sign of the Blue Ball: King's Chapel, Brattle Street, the Old Quaker, the New North, the New South, the New Brick, and Christ Church. There was a free writing school on Cornhill, a school at the South End, and another writing school on Love Lane. Ben Franklin could not enter these simple school doors for the want of means. To gain the Franklin Medal, provided by legacy of Benjamin Franklin, is now the high ambition of every Boston Latin schoolboy. There were fortifications on Fort Hill and a powder house on the Common. There were inns, taverns, and ordinaries everywhere. Boston was a town of inns with queer names; Long Wharf was the seaway to the ships. Chatham Street now was then a fair green lane; Salem Street was a place of property people or people of "quality."
In King's Chapel was a state pew for the royal Governors. On the pulpit stood an hourglass in a frame of brass. The pillars were hung with escutcheons of the king.
Ben may have passed the old Latin School which at first was established at a place just east of King's Chapel. If so, he must have wished to be entered there as a pupil again. The school has distributed his medals now for several generations. He may have passed the old inns like the Blue Anchor Tavern, or the Royal Exchange, or the fire of 1711 may have wiped out some of these old historic buildings, and new ones to take their places may have been rising or have been but recently completed. The old Corner Bookstore was there, for it was built directly after the fire of 1711. It is the oldest brick building now standing in the city, and one of the few on which little Ben's eyes could have rested. A new town arose after the fire.
Josiah Franklin and little Ben visited the workshops of carpenters, turners, glaziers, and others, but, although they had a good time together in the study, the kind father could not find a place that suited his son. Ben did not like to be apprenticed to any of the tradesmen that he met.
He had a brother James, of a bright mind but of no very amiable disposition, who was a printer. He had been to London to improve his trade, and on his return he became the one printer in the town.
One evening, between the violin and the Bible, Josiah Franklin suddenly said:
"Ben, you look here!"
"What, father?" asked the boy, starting.
"It all comes to me what you ought to do. You should become a printer."
"That I would like, father."
"Then the way is clear—let me apprentice you to James."
"Would he have me, father? We do not always get on well together. I want to learn the printer's trade; that would help me on to an education."
Josiah Franklin was now a happier man. Ben would have no more desire to go to sea. If he could become anything out of the ordinary, the printer's trade would be the open way.
He went to his son James and presented the matter. As a result, they drew up an indenture.
This indenture, which may be found in Franklin's principal biographies, was a very queer document, but follows the usual form of the times of George I. It was severe—a form by which a lad was practically sold into slavery, and yet it contained the demands that develop right conduct in life. Ben was not constituted to be an apprentice boy under these sharp conditions even to his own brother. But all began well. His mother, who worried lest he should follow the example of his brother Josiah, now had heart content. His father secured an apprentice, and probably had drawn up for him a like form of indenture.
Benjamin, too, was happy now. He saw that his new way of life led to somewhere—where? He would do his best to make it lead to the best in life. He started with a high resolve, which we are sorry he did not always fulfill in the letter, though the spirit of it never was lost.
His successor in the tallow shop does not seem to have been more happy than he. His name was Tinsley. There appeared in the New England Courant of 1722 the following queer advertisement, which we copy because it affords a picture of the times:
Ran away from his Master, Mr. Josiah Franklin, of Boston, Tallow-Chandler, on the first of this instant July, an Irish Man-servant, named William Tinsley, about 20 Years of Age, of a middle Stature, black Hair, lately cut off, somewhat fresh-coloured Countenance, a large lower Lip, of a mean Aspect, large Legs, and heavy in his Going. He had on, when he went away, a felt Hat, a white knit Cap, striped with red and blue, white Shirt, and neck-cloth, a brown coloured Jacket, almost new, a frieze Coat, of a dark Colour, grey yarn Stockings, leather Breeches, trimmed with black, and round to'd Shoes. Whoever shall apprehend the said runaway Servant, and him safely convey to his above said Master, at the blue Ball, in Union street, Boston, shall have forty Shillings Reward, and all necessary Charges paid.
As this advertisement was continued for three successive weeks, we are at liberty to conclude that William Tinsley was not "apprehended."
Let the reader be glad that he did not live in those days. The best of all ages is now.
"And so you have begun life as a printer?" said Uncle Benjamin. "A printer's trade is one after my own heart. It develops thought. If I could have only kept my pamphlets until now, you would have printed the notes that I made. One of them says that what people want is not favors or patronage of any kind, but justice. Remember that, Ben. What the world wants is justice. You may become a printer in your own right some day."
"I want to become one, uncle. That is just what is in my heart. I can see success in my mind."
"But you can do it if you will. Everything goes down before 'I will!' The Alps fell before Hannibal. Have a deaf ear, Ben, toward all who say 'You can't!' Such men don't count with those in the march; they are stragglers. Don't you be laughed down by anybody. Hold your head high; there is just as much royal blood in your veins as there is in any king on earth. There is no royal blood but that which springs from true worth. I put that down in my documents years ago.
"Life is too short to stop to quarrel with any one by the way. If a man calls you a fool, you need not come out under your own signature and deny it. Your life should do that. I am quoting from my pamphlets again.
"If you meet old Mr. Calamity in your way, the kind of man who tells you that you have no ground of expectation, and that everything in the world is going to ruin, just whistle, and luck will come to you, my boy. I only wish that I had my documents—my pamphlets, I mean. I would have left them to you in my will. In the present state of society one must save or be a slave—that also I wrote down in my documents. It is a pity that it is so, but it is. Save what you can while you are young, and it will give your mind leisure to work when you are older. That was in my pamphlets. I hope that I may live to see you the best printer in the colonies."
The boy absorbed the spirit of these proverbial sayings. They were to his liking and bent of mind. But there came into his young face a shadow.
"Uncle Ben, I know what you say is true. I have listened to you; now I would like you to hear me. You saw the boys going to the Latin School this morning?"
"Yes, Ben."
"I can not go there."
"O Ben! that is hard," said Jenny, who was by his side.
"But you can go to school, Ben," said Uncle Benjamin.
"Where, uncle?"
"To life—and graduate there as well as any of them."
"I would like to study Latin."
"Well, what is to hinder you, Ben? One only needs to learn the alphabet to learn all that can be known through books. You know that now."
"I would like to learn French. Other boys can; I can not."
"The time will come when you can. The gates open before a purpose. You can study French later in life, and, it may be, make as good use of French as any of them."
"Why can not I do as other boys?"
"You can, Ben. You can so live that the Boston Latin School to which you can not go now will honor you some day."
"I would be sorry to see another boy feel as I have felt when I have seen the boys going to that school with happy faces to learn the things that I want to know. But father has done the best that he can for me."
"Yes, Ben, he has, and you only need to do the best that you can for yourself to graduate at the head of all in the school of life. I know how to feel for you, Ben. I have stood in shoes like yours many times. When you have done as I have told you, then think of me. The world may soon forget me. I want you so to live that it will not as soon forget you."
The cloud passed from the boy's face. Hope came to him, and he was merry again. He locked Jenny in his arms, whirled her around, and said:
"I am glad to hear the bells ring for other boys, even if I must go to my trade."
"I like the spirit of what you say," said Uncle Benjamin. "You have the blood of Peter Folger and of your Great-uncle Tom in your veins. Peter gave his heart to the needs of the Indians, and to toleration; your Great-uncle Tom started the subscription for the bells of Nottingham, and became a magistrate, and a just one. You may not be able to answer the bell of the Latin School, but if you are only true to the best that is in you, little Ben, you may make bells ring for joy. I can hear them now in my mind's ear. Don't laugh at your old uncle; you can do it, little Ben—can't he Jenny?"
"He just can—I can help him. Ben can do anything—he may make the Latin School bell ring for others yet—like Uncle Tom. He is the boy to do it, and I am the sister to help him to do it—ain't I, Uncle Benjamin?"