"Then thou shalt have an opportunity, and I will stand thy friend."
John Cassell now went forth as a disciple of the temperance cause. Remembering his experiences on the way to London he furnished himself with a watchman's rattle, with which he used to call together the people of the villages he visited.
A temperance paper thus speaks of him in 1837:—
"John Cassell, the Manchester carpenter, has been labouring, amidst many privations, with great success in the county of Norfolk. He is passing through Essex—(where he addressed the people, among other places, from the steps leading up to the pulpit of the Baptist chapel, with his carpenter's apron twisted round his waist)—on his way to London. He carries his watchman's rattle—an excellent accompaniment of temperance labour."
Cassell had a great regard for Thomas Whittaker. It was an address given by this gentleman which had first made him wish to become a public man.
When he called on Mr. Whittaker in Nottingham, as already related, after some conversation had taken place, he remarked:—
"I should like to hear thee again, Tom".
"Well," remarked Whittaker as a joke, "you can if you go with me to
Derby."
John accepted the invitation forthwith, much to his friend's chagrin, who was bothered to know what to do with him; for he was under the impression that some members of the family where he expected to lodge would not give a very hearty welcome to this rough fellow.
This is Mr. Whittaker's narrative of the sequel:—