THOMAS EDWARD. 55 



began to tear up the heather, and as he rested for a 

 time, another lad came up and asked, " Fad are ye 

 looking for ? " 



" A thing like an eel," he replied ; " will ye come 

 and help me?' : "Na, na!' said the lad; "I dinna 

 want to be bitten to death ; but I ken that what ye are 

 looking for is among that heap o' stanes there." 



Away went Edward, and commenced lifting off the 

 stones one by one, but no eel did he see. In despair, 

 he turned over a heap of turf which was near, and there 

 was the ugly creature he had been long in search of. 

 Down he pounced on it in a moment with both hands, 

 and grasped it tight. Away he started home and ran 

 in to his mother with the thing wriggling in his hands, 

 saying, " See, see, mither, what a bonnie beastie ! ' Away 

 she fled, and some neighbours after her, with the cry of 

 " A snake ! " " A snake ! ' He was told to take it to 

 Doctor Ferguson, a chemist near, and there he went, 

 followed by a number of boys, who kept, however, at a 

 very respectful distance. When the doctor saw it, he 

 ordered the boy out of the shop, and told him to stand 

 in the middle of the street until he had got a bott] . 

 This was soon found, and he was told to put it in there 

 and cork it up at once. He did so safely, and then 

 received from the chemist fourpence for the biggest 

 adder which had ever been seen in the whole country. 



He was fast acquiring idle habits, and the parents 

 began to think what trade he could be placed at, and 

 although only six years old he went to work at a tobacco 

 factory for fourteenpence per week. He did not si ay 1< >ng 

 here, for he had heard that at one of the factories some 



