A SPIRIT OF MISCHIEF. 179 



fingers to indicate the number of pence he wanted for 

 his goods. When he afterwards learnt EngHsh, 

 Faroni used to despatch him every Monday morning 

 with about forty shilhngs' worth of prints, telling him 

 to sell them as fast as he could, and then to return 

 home. The only money he received at starting was 

 fourpence. Faroni would say: "While you have 

 goods you have money ; if you want money make 

 haste and sell your goods." At the end of eighteen 

 months Bianconi's apprenticeship was up ; Faroni then 

 offered to take him back to his father in Italy, but he 

 preferred to remain in Ireland, where he started in 

 business for himself. He wandered about the countrv 

 selling his prints, but at last growing tired of this sort 

 of life, he settled at Carrick-on-Suir as a carver and 

 gilder and print-seller. Not getting on very well there 

 he removed to Waterford, and made a third removal in 

 1809 to Clonmel. Here his trade flourished, but he 

 had never forgotten the long journeys he formerly 

 took on foot when wandering about Ireland as a 

 hawker. 



At Clonmel he began to employ assistants in his 

 trade, and kept three German gilders at work at this 

 time. He seems to have been imbued with a per- 

 petual spirit of mischief. On one occasion he suffered 

 in consequence. 



He was driving a car from Clonmel to Thurles, 

 and he had with him a large looking-glass with a gilt 

 frame upon which he had expended a fortnight's labour. 

 Moved by some spirit of mischief, he began to tickle 

 the horse he w^as driving with a straw ; the result was 

 that the animal ran away down a steep hill, the car 

 was capsized and smashed to pieces, and the glass was 

 shivered into a thousand atoms. 



N 2 



