him.* But I can't get Josiah to bear in mind that he was a boy himself once; for, though Ben may be a little flighty, I'm sure there's no vice in the child."

And, now that her thoughts had been diverted into a more lively channel, she rose from her seat, and began to busy herself with making the apple and pumpkin pie that she had promised the children for that day's feast.

"It was only a packman with tapes and ribbons," said Josiah, as he shortly rejoined the couple; "but even he had got hold of the news of our misfortune."

"Well, but, Josiah," expostulated the brother, looking up sideways, like a bird, from the book in which he was writing, "don't you remember the time, man alive, when you used to walk over from Banbury to the smithy at Ectont every week, and go nutting and birds'-nesting with us boys in Sywell Wood, on God's-day, without ever setting foot in His house? and do you recollect, too, how we boys 'ud carry off the old iron from the forge,

"My early readiness in learning to read," says our hero, in the account he gives of himself" (and which must have been very early, as I can not remember the time when I could not read), and the opinion of all friends that I should certainly make a good scholar, encouraged him (my father) in this purpose of his-of putting me to the Church."-Franklin's Life, p. 7.

"Some notes which some of my uncles, who had some curiosity in collecting family anecdotes, once put into my hands, furnished me with several particulars relative to our ancestors. From these notes I learned that they lived in the village of Ecton, in Northamptonshire, on a freehold of about thirty acres, for at least 300 years, and how much longer could not be ascertained. This small estate would not have served for their maintenance without the business of a smith, which had continued in the family down to my uncle's time, the eldest son always being brought up to that employment -a custom which he and my father followed with regard to their eldest sons."-Life of Franklin, p. 2 and 3.

and sell it to the traveling tinker, who used to come round with his cart once a month, and put up at the 'World's End' (that was the sign of the inn at Ecton, Abiah," he added, parenthetically, "and the half-way house between Northampton and Wellingborough, in Old England), and how we let father accuse Mat Wilcox-you remember old Mat-who was helping him at the forge then, of stealing his metal, without ever saying a word to clear the poor man? Ah! Josiah, Josiah, we can always see the mote in another's eye-'

"Say no more, Ben," exclaimed the reproved brother; 66 we are but weak vessels at best."

"Now confess, husband," interrupted the wife, as she continued rolling out the paste before her till it was like a sheet of buff leather, "isn't it better that I got you to sleep on your anger before punishing the poor lad? It is but fright, after all, that has driven him from us; and when he returns, let me beg of you to use reason rather than the whip with him."

666

"Yes, Abiah," dryly observed the husband, Spare the rod,' and-" (he nodded his head as much as to say, "I needn't tell you the consequence")" that is ever a woman's maxim.”

At this moment the side door opened stealthily, and Deborah (dressed for the morning's work in a long checked pinafore reaching from the throat to the heels, so that the young woman looked like a great overgrown girl) thrust her head in the crevice, and gave her mother" a look". -one of those significant household glances which refer to a thousand and odd little family matters never intended for general ears.

"You can come in now, Deborah," cried the mother, who, still engaged in the preparation of her apple and pumpkin pie, was busy thumbing patches of lard over the broad sheet of paste, and

MISSING: A YOUNG GENTLEMAN

39

converting it in appearance into a huge palette covered with dabs of white paint. "Have you finished all up stairs ?" she inquired, looking round for the moment.

The girl, in her anxiety for her brother, did not stop to answer the question, but said in an under tone, as she drew close up to her mother's side, "Has father forgiven Ben?"

The dame, however, on her part, merely replied, "There, child, never mind about that just now; you'll know all in good time," and immediately began to catechise her on her domestic duties. "Have you put a good fire in 'the keeping-room,' and sanded the floor nicely, and got out some more knives and forks for the children? for, remember, we shall sit down upward of a score to dinner to-day."

But Deborah was too intent to listen to any thing but the fate of the boy, whom she loved better than all her brothers, for she had been allowed to nurse him when a baby, though but a mere child herself at the time, and had continued his toy-maker in general up to the present moment. So she pulled her mother timidly by the apron, and said, as she glanced hastily at her father, to assure herself that he was still arguing with Uncle Benjamin, "Will father let him come back home? have you found out where he's gone to yet? and do you really think, mother, he's run away to sea?" adding the next minute, with a start, as the thought suddenly flashed upon her, "Oh dear me! I quite forgot to tell you, mother, a man brought this letter to the side door, and said I was to deliver it privately to you."

"What a head you have, child!" exclaimed the dame, as, dusting the flour from her hands, she snatched the note from the girl, and hastily tore it open.

But her eye had hardly darted backward and forward over the first few lines before the mother uttered a faint scream, and staggered back to the bee-hive chair.

In a minute the husband and Uncle Benjamin were at her side, and Deborah, seizing the vinegar cruet from the dresser-shelf, was bathing her mother's temples with the acid.

"God be praised! my boy's at Ruth's," the dame at length gasped out, in answer to the anxious group around her; "Holmes has sent a note here to say he will bring him round in the evening," and she pointed languidly to the letter which had fallen on the floor.

CHAPTER III.

THE FRANKLIN FAMILY.

JOSIAH FRANKLIN retained sufficient of the austere habits of the Puritans and the early Nonconformists to have made it a rule-even if his limited means and large family (no fewer than thirteen of whom occasionally sat together at his table*) had not made it a matter of necessitythat the food partaken of by the little colony of boys and girls he had to support should be of the plainest possible description. Simple fare, however, was so much a matter of principle with Josiah (despising, as he did, all "lusting after the flesh-pots"), that he never permitted at his board

*By his first wife my father had four children born in America (besides three previously in England), and by a second ten others-in all, seventeen-of whom I remember to have seen thirteen sitting together at his table, who all grew up to years of maturity, and were married."-Autobiography, p. 9.

any of those unseemly exhibitions of delight or disgust which certain youngsters are wont to indulge in on the entry of any dish more or less toothsome than the well-known and ever-dreaded scholastic "stick-jaw."*

In so primitive a household, therefore, there must have been some special cause for the compounding of so epicurean a dish as the beforementioned apple and pumpkin pie-some extraordinary reason why Dame Franklin should have instructed Deborah, as she did, "to be sure and put out plenty of maple sugar for the children," besides a gallon of the dried apples and peaches to be stewed for supper"-and why that turkey and those "canvas-back ducks" (so highly prized among the creature-comforts of America) were ere long twirling away in front of the bright, cherryred fire, and filling the whole house with their savory perfumet-and why, too, the brisket of

*"Little or no notice was ever taken of what related to the victuals on the table-whether well or ill cooked-in or out of season-of good or bad flavor-preferable or inferior to this or that other thing of the kind; so that I was brought up in such perfect inattention to these matters as to be quite indifferent what kind of food was set before me. Indeed, I am so unobservant of it, that to this day I can scarce tell, a few hours after dinner, of what dishes it consisted. This has been a great convenience to me in traveling, when my companions have sometimes been very unhappy for want of a suitable gratification of their more delicate, because better instructed tastes and appetites."-Life of Franklin, p. 9.

†The white, or canvas-back duck, derives its name from the color of the feathers between the wings being of a light brown tint, like canvas. These birds breed on the borders of the great Northern lakes, and in winter frequent the Susquehanna and Potomac rivers, in order that they may feed on the bulbous root of a grass that grows on the flats there, and which has much the flavor of celery. It is to the feeding on this root that the peculiarly delicious flavor of their flesh is attributed. They are held in as great esteem in America as grouse with us, and are frequently sent as a