The advertisement gave great prominence to the instruction, “No Irish need apply.” Now, my friend O’Gorman was an Irishman, and he was desirous of applying for the job. So he asked me if I would be good enough to don myself in his labourer’s clothes and try to secure the contract. I said I should be glad to do so. After receiving due instruction as to how to proceed in the application, I went and presented myself to the contractor. That individual, I found out, was a Scotchman of the name of Macpherson. He put different questions to me as to whether I was capable of doing the work, &c. One of his inquiries had reference to my abilities for drawing. Could I draw? “Yes,” I thought I could, and on a sheet of paper which Mr Macpherson supplied, I tried my hand at drawing. My production was satisfactory. “Can you find men?” he asked. “Yes,” said I. “What about the tools?” “Oh!” I had to reply, “I have no tools.” This notwithstanding, he said, I might start on the job next morning, and bring all my men. I completed my arrangements with the Messrs O’Gorman, and next morning my (?) workmen were “at it,” spades, picks, &c, being provided by Mr Macpherson. What may seem more surprising, I continued at my own work in the dockyard, besides acting (though really but nominally) as sub-contractor in the excavating work at the cemetery. In about a week, however, Mr Macpherson “smelt a rat,” and found out that the job was a hoax so far as I was concerned; nevertheless the work went on all right. The land was very soft and easily worked, being mostly formed of sand and pebbles; and the contract was completed within five weeks. The payment ran to 10s per day per man, all of us having agreed to go in share and share alike. So that with this and my work at the dock-yard I did very well, and “got on to my feet” again. Indeed, to make a long story short I had got to be a regular “masher.”
FALLING AMONG KEIGHLEY FRIENDS
I made up my mind to come back to Keighley, and let my folks see how I was getting on.
Home of my boyish days, how can I call,
Scenes to my memory that did befall?
How can my trembling pen find power to tell
The grief I experienced in bidding farewell?
Can I forget the days joyously spent
That flew on so rapidly, sweet with content?
Can I then quit thee, whose memory’s so dear,
Home of my boyish days, without one tear?
Can I look back on days that have gone by,
Without one pleasant thought, without one sigh?
Oh, no; though never these eyes may dwell
On thee, old cottage home I love so well;
Home of my childhood, wherever I be,
Thou art the nearest and dearest to me.
Accordingly I gave up my situation at the dockyard, and having bid adieu to Middlesborough, I took train for Bradford. In Bradford, I have to say to my sorrow, I fell in with some of my Keighley friends, and within a very short time I had been induced to part with all my money, and, in fact, some of my clothes. When I recovered my senses—for I must have lost them to act as I did—I found myself in a sad and sorry plight.
ENLISTING IN THE ARMY
The time chanced to be about the outbreak of the Crimean War, and they were “drumming up” for the army. There were recruiting sergeants to be met with at every turn. It is said that even a worm will turn when trodden on, and it did not require much of the sergeant’s persuasive oratory to induce me to take the Queen’s shilling and enlist in the West York Rifles.
I left yon fields so fair to view,
I left yon mountain pass and peaks;
I left two e’en so bonny blue,
A dimpled chin and rosy cheeks.
For a helmet gay and suit o’ red
I did exchange my corduroy;
I mind the words the sergeant said
When I, in sooth, was but a boy.