HIS EARLY LIFE AS A COUNTRY WEAVER. 83 



men winna sup it." "Just sae," replied the churl; "and 

 if they winna tak' it, I'll sup it mysal' ! " continued " the 

 nasty greedy glide," * an opinion with which John would 

 righteously and indignantly conclude the tale. 



In these places by Don side, John was pursuing several 

 studies, of which more anon. Of these there was one in 

 particular which he was strenuously endeavouring, with 

 his hardening fingers, to conquer the mysteries of " pokers, 

 hooks and hangers," for it was only now that, by help of a 

 copy-book, our student learnt to write. There is no 

 evidence that he had done this before his thirtieth year, 

 being contented for ten years with the newly discovered 

 delights of reading. His copy-book now lies before me, as 

 then written by him in August, 1830, that is in his thirty- 

 sixth year. It contains a very good setting, by some skilled 

 hand, of capital and small letters of various sizes, ending 

 with the well-written, encouraging line, " Take care, and 

 you'll write well." John's care is evident on every page, 

 and his success, in view of his late beginning, encouraging 

 and creditable. He also does a double stroke of scholastic 

 business by writing out his Latin exercises for he had 

 attacked even the language of Rome as a means of 

 caligraphic practice. 



What a curious commentary was all this private, 

 studious toil, under the shade of the groves of this 

 Paradise by the Don, on the beneficent curse of labour 

 pronounced on our too feeble, unlettered progenitors in the 

 Paradise on the Hiddekel ! How long was it, it may be 

 wondered, before the curse took the form of framing pot- 

 hooks on papyrus by the young Jubals and Jabals of the 

 * The gled, an old Anglo-Saxon word for the kite. 



