Wednesday—25 lines Hebrew; 8 lines Syriac; 11 hours forging.
"Who was Elihu Burritt? He was a New England blacksmith who worked on an average 10 hours a day at his forge; but who studied in his spare moments until he became known and honored all over the world as 'the learned blacksmith.' He became great—not by forging—but by the way he used his afterwork hours."
IV
WORKING HARDER
"It was the rule of his life to study not how little he could do, but how much."
These words were spoken of a great publisher and might have been made the text of the volume issued to commemorate the centenary of the business house founded by the man of whom they were spoken.
The young man was sixteen when his father drove him from their country home to the city, and apprenticed him to a firm of printers.
As an apprentice he and another young man were frequently partners in working an old-fashioned hand press. "One applied the ink with hand-balls, and the other laid on sheets and did the pulling. They changed work at regular intervals, one inking and the other pulling." The biographer who gives this description of the work of the two, adds that his hero was accustomed to remain at his press after the other men had quit work whenever he could secure a partner to assist him.
The young man's fellow worker was often persuaded to assist him in these extra efforts—usually much against his will. While he often felt like rebelling because of his partner's ambition to do his utmost for his employers, he could not restrain his admiration for the man's industry.
Once the unwilling partner said: "Often, after a good day's work, he would say to me, 'Let's break the back of another token (two hundred and fifty impressions)—just break its back.' I would often consent reluctantly but he would beguile me, or laugh at my complaints, and never let me off till the token was completed, fair and square. It was a custom for us in the summer to do a clear half-day's work before the other boys and men got their breakfast. We would meet by appointment in the grey of the early morning and go down to the printing-room."
Fellow workmen made sport of the ambitious young man, not only because of what they felt was his excessive industry, but because of his homespun clothes and heavy cow-hide boots. He seldom retorted, but once, when jests had gone further than usual, he said to a tormentor: "When I am out of my time and set up for myself, and you need employment, as you probably will, come to me and I will give you work." The man little thought the prophecy would be fulfilled, but forty years after, when the industrious apprentice was mayor of the city and one of the world's leading publishers, he was reminded of the promise made to the tormentor, and the promised position was given to him. The workman who believed in doing more than was expected of him had won his way to fame and fortune, while his derider had made no progress.