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taken this resolution, he proposed to his brother, if he would give him weekly only half what his board had hitherto cost, to board himself, an offer which was immediately accepted. He presently found that by adhering to his new system of diet he could still save half what his brother allowed him. This," says he, was an additional fund for buying of books: but I had another advantage in it. My brother and the rest going from the printing-house to their meals, I remained there alone, and despatching presently my light repast, (which was often no more than a biscuit, or a slice of bread, an handful of raisins, or a tart from the pastrycook's, and a glass of water,) had the rest of the time, till their return, for study; in which I made the greater progress, from that greater clearness of head and quicker apprehension which generally attend temperance in eating and drinking.' It was about this time that, by means of Cocker's Arithmetic, he made himself master of that science, which he had twice attempted in vain to learn while at school; and that he also obtained some acquaintance with the elements of geometry, by the perusal of a Treatise on Navigation. He mentions, likewise, among the works which he now read, Locke on the Human Understanding, and the Port-Royal Art of Thinking, together with two little sketches on the arts of Logic and Rhetoric, which he found at the end of an English Grammar, and which initiated him in the Socratic mode of disputation, or that way of arguing by which an antagonist, by being questioned, is imperceptibly drawn into admissions which are afterwards dexterously turned against him. Of this method of reasoning he became, he tells us, excessively fond, finding it very safe for himself and very embarrassing for those against whom he used it; but he afterwards abandoned it, apparently from a feeling that it gave ad

vantages rather to cunning than to truth, and was better adapted to gain victories in conversation, than either to convince or to inform.

A few years before this his brother had begun to publish a newspaper, the second that had appeared in America. This brought most of the literary people of Boston occasionally to the printing office; and young Franklin often heard them conversing about the articles that appeared in the newspaper, and the approbation which particular ones received. At last, inflamed with the ambition of sharing in this sort of fame, he resolved to try how a communication of his own would succeed. Having written his paper, therefore, in a disguised hand, he put it at night under the door of the printing-office, where it was found in the morning, and submitted to the consideration of the critics, when they met as usual. "They read it," says he ; "commented on it in my hearing; and I had the exquisite pleasure of finding it met with their approbation; and that in their different guesses at the author, none were named but men of some character among us for learning and ingenuity." "I suppose," he adds, "that I was rather lucky in my judges, and that they were not really so very good as I then believed them to be." Encouraged, however, by the success of this attempt, he sent several other pieces to the press in the same way, keeping his secret, till, as he expresses it, all his fund of sense for such performances was exhausted. He then discovered himself, and immediately found that he began to be looked upon as a person of some consequence by his brother's literary acquaintances.

This newspaper soon after afforded him, very unexpectedly, an opportunity of extricating himself from his indenture to his brother, who had all along treated him with great harshness, and to whom his rising literary reputation only made him more an

object of envy and dislike. An article which they had admitted having offended the local government, his brother, as proprietor of the paper, was not only sentenced to a months' imprisonment, but prohibited from any longer continuing to print the offensive journal. In these circumstances, it was determined that it should appear for the future in the name of Benjamin, who had managed it during his brother's confinement; and in order to prevent it being alleged that the former proprietor was only screening himself behind one of his apprentices, the indenture by which the latter was bound was given up to him; he at the same time, in order to secure to his brother the benefit of his services, signing new indentures for the remainder of his time, which were to be kept private. "A very flimsy scheme it was," says Franklin ; "however, it was immediately executed; and the paper was printed accordingly under my name for several months. At length a fresh difference arising between my brother and me, I took upon me to assert my freedom, presuming that he would not venture to produce the new indentures. It was not fair in me to take this advantage; and this I therefore reckon one of the first errata of my life; but the unfairness of it weighed little with me, when under the impressions of resentment for the blows his passion too often urged him to bestow upon me, though he was otherwise not an ill-natured man perhaps I was too saucy and provoking."

Finding, however, that his brother, in consequence of this exploit, had taken care to give him such a character to all those of his own profession in Boston, that nobody would employ him there, he now resolved to make his way to New York, the nearest place where there was a printer; and accordingly, after selling his books to raise a little money, he embarked on board a vessel for that city, without communicating

his intention to his friends, who he knew would oppose it. In three days he found himself at the end of his voyage, near three hundred miles from his home, at the age of seventeen, without the least recommendation, as he tells us, or knowledge of any person in the place, and with very little money in his pocket. Worst of all, upon applying to the only printer likely to give him any employment, he found that this person had nothing for him to do, and that the only way in which he could serve him was by recommending him to proceed to Philadelphia, a hundred miles farther, where he had a son, who, he believed, might employ him. We cannot follow our runaway through the disastrous incidents of this second journey; but, for the reason which he states himself, we shall allow him to give his own most graphic description of his first appearance in Philadelphia.

After concluding the account of his voyage, "I have been the more particular," says he, "in this description of my journey, and shall be so of my first entry into that city, that you may, in your mind, compare such unlikely beginnings with the figure Í have since made there. I was in my working dress, my best clothes coming round by sea. I was dirty, from my being so long in the boat; my pockets were stuffed out with shirts and stockings; and I knew no one, nor where to look for lodging. Fatigued with walking, rowing, and the want of sleep, I was very hungry; and my whole stock of cash consisted in a single dollar, and about a shilling in copper coin, which I gave to the boatmen for my passage. first they refused it, on account of my having rowed; but I insisted on their taking it. Man is sometimes more generous when he has little money than when he has plenty; perhaps to prevent his being thought

At

to have but little. I walked towards the top of the street, gazing about till near Market-street, where I met a boy with bread. I had often made a meal of dry bread, and inquiring where he had bought it, I went immediately to the baker's he directed me to. I asked for biscuits, meaning such as we had at Boston; that sort, it seems, was not made in Philadelphia. I then asked for a threepenny loaf, and was told they had none. Not knowing the different prices nor the names of the different sorts of bread, I told him to give me three penny-worth of any sort. He gave me, accordingly, three great puffy rolls. I was surprised at the quantity, but took it; and having no room in my pockets, walked off with a roll under each arm, and eating the other. Thus I went up Market-street, as far as Fourth-street, passing by the door of Mr. Read, my future wife's father, when she, standing at the door, saw me, and thought I made, as I certainly did, a most awkward, ridiculous appearance. Then I turned and went down Chesnutstreet and part of Walnut-street, eating my roll all the way, and coming round found myself again at Market-street Wharf, near the boat I came in, to which I went for a draught of the river water; and being filled with one of my rolls, gave the other two to a woman and her child that came down the river in the boat with us, and were waiting to go farther. Thus refreshed, I walked again up the street, which by this time had many clean dressed people in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined them, and thereby was led into the great meeting-house of the Quakers, near the market. I sat down among them; and after looking round a while, and hearing nothing said, being very drowsy, through labour and want of rest the preceding night, I fell fast asleep, and continued so till the meeting broke up, when