He looked up and down the road, measured me with his eye, abandoned the idea of resistance, and replied:
“Well, your honour, if you won’t be too hard on a poor man which finds it hard to get a crust anyhow or way, I don’t mind telling you I never was a soldier.” I give his narrative as he related it to me.
“I don’t know who my parents ever was. The fust thing as I remember was the river side (the Thames), and running in low tide to find things. I used to beg, hold hosses, and sleep under dry arches. I don’t remember how I got any clothes. I never had a pair of shoes or stockings till I was almost a man. I fancy I am now nearly forty years of age.
“An old woman as kep a rag and iron shop by the water-side give me a lodging once for two years. We used to call her ‘Nanny;’ but she turned me out when she caught me taking some old nails and a brass cock out of her shop; I was hungry when I done it, for the old gal gi’ me no grub, nothing but the bare floor for a bed.
“I have been a beggar all my life, and begged in all sorts o’ ways and all sorts o’ lays. I don’t mean to say that if I see anything laying about handy that I don’t mouch it (i. e. steal it). Once a gentleman took me into his house as his servant. He was a very kind man; I had a good place, swell clothes, and beef and beer as much as I liked; but I couldn’t stand the life, and I run away.
“The loss o’ my arm, sir, was the best thing as ever happen’d to me: it’s been a living to me; I turn out with it on all sorts o’ lays, and it’s as good as a pension. I lost it poaching; my mate’s gun went off by accident, and the shot went into my arm, I neglected it, and at last was obliged to go to a orspital and have it off. The surgeon as ampitated it said that a little longer and it would ha’ mortified.
“The Crimea’s been a good dodge to a many, but it’s getting stale; all dodges are getting stale; square coves (i. e., honest folks) are so wide awake.”
“Don’t you think you would have found it more profitable, had you taken to labour or some honester calling than your present one?” I asked.
“Well, sir, p’raps I might,” he replied; “but going on the square is so dreadfully confining.”