We were both doing exceedingly well, and were in the main contented and happy, though I could not be entirely satisfied while my mother was separated from us. I said so much about this subject, that my father wrote to Mr. Collingsby, in Chicago, informing him that "the long-lost son" had been found. No answer was received; and another letter was written, which, however, produced no better result. Evidently Mr. Collingsby did not believe the statements contained in the letters, and he took no notice of them. Foiled in this manner, we were compelled to drop the matter for the time.
I worked at my trade for two years; and at the end of that time, although I was only fifteen, I did not think there was much more for me to learn in that business. Probably I should have continued to work at it, however, if Mr. Clinch had not abandoned his trade to go into the lumber business in Michigan. I had learned book-keeping pretty thoroughly, and I did not care to find a new place as a carpenter. I was rather desirous of practising what I had learned on the subject of accounts, and, with the advice of my father, I concluded to abandon, for the present, the Plane and Plank.
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