24 THE MODEL MERCHANT 



Eichard's journey being over, he had of course to set to work 

 to get his own living ; and as the first struggles for a maintenance, 

 with really few exceptions, are the same in all ages and countries, 

 we can readily imagine the conflicting thoughts which possessed him. 

 How many of us have experienced the same feelings, — now despairing 

 of success; now disheartened by sharp and angry words from employers 

 and their subordinates, or galled by false insinuations and the mis- 

 repesentation of our best motives ; now envious at the more rapid 

 progress of others, or their (to our views) unmerited promotion; 

 and now repining at the want of opportunity for distinction, feeling 

 that we have the ability, if a way were only opened, and thinking 

 it a long time to wait. Even if we do not accept the narrative 

 of Whittington's early adventures (so far at least as concerns his 

 rough treatment by the cook, at the house where he first ob- 

 tained employment), some disappointment seems, according to 

 tradition, to have led him to qiiit the metropolis soon after he had • 

 arrived there, and wearied, vexed at heart, and depressed in spirit, he 

 sat down at the first milestone out of London, and there heard the 

 sound of Bow bells pronouncing to his ears, — 

 " Turn again AVhittington, 

 Lord Mayor of London." 

 A stone continued to mark the spot for many centuries, to which 

 tradition points as Whittington's stone. It has been objected that 

 this stone could not have been erected to commemorate such an event, 

 but that it was the basement plinth of an ancient village cross. Be it 

 so ! the idea is so much the more beautiful, and not the less probable, 

 when we think of the poor boy sitting down at the foot of the cross, 

 there to reflect upon the past and to look forward to the future. 

 Crosses were very common in those days in the centre of nearly every 

 village ; whither, then, could poor Eichard better seek for rest when no 

 friendly house was open to him. We can well imagine the thoughts 

 which would crowd into his mind, either as to the toil entailed by that 

 high stool at which he sat at his master's desk, or the drudgery of 

 sweeping out his master's shop, but wc should form a very erroneous 

 impression of what commerce was then if we were to judge of it by the 

 vast warehouses of our own day, and the really comfortable clerks' 

 offices, decorated with maps and charts of every country- under the 



