28 Silk and Scarlet, 



never ask you to pay no more /" — that *ull be nigh forty 

 years since. 



His Butcher Dal ! things does come to mind so ; 

 Apprenticeship, j-^g ^^y you puts it. I'll show you where 

 I was put prentice to a butcher ; Mr. Hubbard they 

 called him ; that was the very self-same spot ; many's 

 the sheep I've killed. I .could skin a head like wink- 

 ing ; I liked the going to market best ; he had a little 

 blue frock made for me, all trim and nice. One mar- 

 ket-day he leaves me at home, and said I should drive 

 the dung-cart. I served him out for that ; blame me, 

 if I didn't First thing I did was to drive against 

 every gate-post, and I pulls one or two of 'em down. 

 Then I tied the horse and cart to a gate, close by a 

 dung-heap, and took out the greyhounds, and had a 

 good course. When I gets to the horse again, the 

 cart had sunk into the dung and nearly choked it ; so 

 I whips out my knife, and cuts the bridle, and off 

 home to Cottesmore. When Mr. Hubbard comes 

 back, he says, " Where s my boy V and then he off after 

 me. He wanted me sadly to come back with him ; 

 but I says, " Sir^ your kindness to me is more than I 

 deserve; it's no nse, my mind is set tipon horses ; 

 and has been to this day. 



Tricks of Boy- I'd only be thirteen when I went to the 

 hood. racing stables. Oh, dear ! what monkey 



tricks I was up to ! When I was at Barham Downs, 

 some mountebanks comes to Canterbury, and the 

 trainer lends me his pony, and away I goes. I thought 

 I could do as they did ; so coming home, I jumps on 

 the saddle, and there I stands ; up comes a postchaise, 

 and I gallops by the side of it all the way home ; the 

 driver and the people inside laughing at me ; one ot 

 them pitched me a shilling. If they sent me any- 

 where on a pony, I used to ride through all the water 

 I could : I had once well-nigh been drownded. That 

 A Quid pro Quo. biHy-goat job ; that's all in my first lec- 

 ture ; I just wish you'd seen it ; he ran 



