Tommy.—Yes, sir; but that is a different case. The poor are used to do many things which the rich never do.
Mr Barlow.—Are these things useful or not useful?
Tommy.—Why, to be sure, many of them are extremely useful; for, since I have acquired so much knowledge, I find they cultivate the ground, to raise corn; and build houses; and hammer iron, which is so necessary to make everything we use; besides feeding cattle, and dressing our victuals, and washing our clothes, and, in short, doing everything which is necessary to be done.
Mr Barlow.—What! do the poor do all these things?
Tommy.—Yes, indeed, or else they never would be done. For it would be a very ungenteel thing to labour at a forge like a blacksmith, or hold the plough like the farmer, or build a house like a bricklayer.
Mr Barlow.—And did not you build a house in my garden some little time ago?
Tommy.—Yes, sir; but that was only for my amusement; it was not intended for anybody to live in.
Mr Barlow.—So you still think it is the first qualification of a gentleman never to do anything useful; and he that does anything with that design, ceases to be a gentleman?
Tommy looked a little ashamed at this; but he said it was not so much his own opinion as that of the other young ladies and gentlemen with whom he had conversed.
"But," replied Mr Barlow, "you asked just now which were the best—the rich or the poor? But if the poor provide food and clothing, and houses, and everything else, not only for themselves but for all the rich, while the rich do nothing at all, it must appear that the poor are better than the