From my earliest days to the present time I have been gradually climbing
up the ladder towards a comfortable berth on the top; and if a ratlin
has given way beneath my feet, I always have had a firm hold above my
head. The first step I took was off the mud on to dry ground. I can
recollect nothing clearly before that time. I was born on board a river
barge, and never left it, winter nor summer, till I was fully six years
old. One day the barge took the mud, which is not surprising,
considering that I was the only person on deck. I ran to the helm to
turn her head off the shore, but it was too late--there she stuck hard
and fast. My mother was below, tending my father, and he lay dying. It
was the barge's last voyage, and his too. Both had seen much service.
The barge never moved again, but went on rotting and rotting till the
owner sold her and she was broken up.
Father died that night, and a boat came and took mother and me on shore,
with father's body, and such property as we possessed--not much, I
fancy,--a kettle and pot, some plates, and knives, and cups, and a few
clothes,--we hadn't wanted furniture, and with these mother and I had to
begin the world. She said things might have been worse, for she might
have had a dozen children instead of one, and debts to pay--and she
didn't owe a farthing, which was a great comfort in her affliction.
My mother was indeed, while she lived, a very good mother to me, for she
taught me to distinguish right from wrong, to love the former and to
hate the latter. As may be supposed, she was very poor, and I was often
without a meal. I know, too, that she frequently stinted herself to
give me food. She lived on the banks of the Thames somewhere below
London, and I very soon found my way down to the mud, where I now and
then used to pick up odds and ends, bits of iron and copper, and
sometimes even coin, and chips of wood. The first my mother used to
sell, and I often got enough in the week to buy us a hearty meal; the
last served to boil our kettle when we had any food to cook in it. Few
rich people know how the poor live; our way was a strange one. My poor
mother used to work with her needle, and go out as a charwoman, and to
wash, when she could get any one to wash for, but that was seldom; and
toil as hard as she might, a difficult matter she had to pay the rent of
the little room in which we lived. She felt sorely the struggle she had
to endure with poverty, for she had seen better days--far better, I
suspect,--and was not accustomed to it. She was, I have reason to
believe, well educated--at all events, much above most persons in the
station in life she then occupied; and, young as I was, she taught me to
read, and to repeat poetry, and to sing psalms; and though I forget
nearly all the events of my life at that time, I remember many of the
verses she taught me; they have been a wonderful comfort to me through
life. My mother had married unwisely, I have no doubt, and if she ever
had any relations, they discarded her; so she was very soon reduced to
the condition I have described, aided by an illness which at length
terminated in her death.
I was about eight years old when I became an orphan; but my intellects
were sharpened by exercise, and I was as precocious as many children
double my age. As I was able to do something to gain my own livelihood,
the people of the house where we lodged took compassion on me, and,
instead of sending me to the workhouse, gave me the corner of a garret
to sleep in. I understood the compact, and worked harder than ever.
Young as I was I felt my mother's loss most bitterly. We had been all
in all to each other, and I should have broken down altogether with
grief, had not my kind host roused me up and advised me to go out and
try and do something to gain my livelihood. Hunger is a severe
taskmaster; it makes many an idle man work.
I now became a regular mudlark, though I got employment when I could by
running on errands and in assisting the boatmen on the river. I was one
summer's day, with a number of other boys, wading up to my knees in the
water, when a boat with several gentlemen on a pleasure excursion came
down the river, and pulled into the shore near where we were. Some of
the gentlemen landed, while the others who remained in the boat amused
themselves by throwing halfpence into the water for us to dive after.
They scattered them about in every direction, so that many coins were
altogether lost; for as the boys rushed after them they drove them into
the mud.
At last, as I was standing some way from the other boys, a gentleman
threw a penny towards me; but it passed over my head and fell into deep
water, and directly afterwards I heard him exclaim--
"Dear me! I've lost my ring--my diamond ring, too. I would not have
lost it for a hundred pounds."
As he had been throwing pence in various directions, he had no notion
where it had fallen, though he naturally concluded that it had come off
at one of those times. As I saw that he was very much annoyed at his
loss I felt sorry for him; so I went up to him, and told him that I
would hunt about for his ring, and that if I found it I would gladly
bring it to him, provided he would tell me where he lived.
"But don't you bargain for a reward?" asked one of his companions.
"That depends upon how far off the gentleman lives," I replied. "If
near at hand this errand may be only worth a sixpence; but if far off,
perhaps he won't think a shilling too much to give me."
"I'll tell you what, my man; I'll gladly give you ten shillings if you
find it; but I fear there is little chance of your so doing," replied
the gentleman, smiling.
"There's nothing like trying, sir," I replied; "and if you'll tell me
your name and where you live, if I pick it up you shall have it again."
"Well, then, you must inquire for Mr Wells, -- Street, -- Square,
London," said the gentleman.
"If you write it down I shall have less chance of forgetting it," I
replied.
"That would be little use to you, my man," he observed; "you cannot
read, I should suppose."
"But I can, though," I replied. "Give me your card, and you will see I
speak the truth."
On this one of the gentlemen drew out a card from his pocket, and wrote
some words on it with a pencil, while I washed my hands and dried them
in my shirt-sleeves. He then handed me the card. I looked at it and
saw that it was in a language I could not understand.
"Those are Latin words, and I did not say I could read any language," I
observed, handing him back his card.
"You are right, my boy," said the gentleman who had lost his ring; "but
here are some lines in English: let us hear if you can read them."
I looked at the lines attentively: they were at the commencement of a
poem my mother had taught me; so I not only read them off fluently, but,
to the great surprise of all present, went on repeating the succeeding
ones.
"Bravo! bravo!" exclaimed the gentlemen, highly delighted. "You're a
genius, my lad--a perfect marvel. A mudlark spout poetry! Truly the
schoolmaster is abroad."
"Who taught you your learning, my boy?" asked another.
"My mother, sir," I replied, calmly, and rather surprised at their
expressions, for I saw nothing wonderful in my performance.
"I should like to see this mother of yours; she must be out of the
common way too," observed the same person.
"Mother is dead, sir," I answered, crying; for the very mention of her
name wrung my young heart with grief.
"There is something more here than meets the eye," said Mr Wells. "My
poor boy, don't cry. Come to-morrow to my house, whether you find my
ring or not. In the meantime here is half a crown; your poetry deserves
it."
I took the money almost mechanically; for I was thinking of my mother,
and was scarcely aware of the amount of wealth I was receiving.
On seeing Mr Wells give me money, the other gentlemen did the same, and
some even gave me as much as five shillings; so that I felt as if coin
was raining down on me from the skies. My tears dried up, and, for a
minute, I felt supremely happy; but on a sudden the thought occurred to
me, that if my mother had been alive how happy it would have made her,
and I burst forth into tears again.
Mr Wells on this asked me why I cried; so I told him the truth, and he
believed me; though I believe, from the expression of some of the other
gentlemen's faces, that they fancied I was crying to gain their
compassion: at all events, they gave me no more money, and their
companions returning to the boat, they shoved off and continued their
course down the river.
As soon as they were gone I began to collect my thoughts, and to
consider my best chance of finding the lost ring. As I heard Mr Wells
say that he would not have lost it for a hundred pounds, I believed that
was its value, and though I had no just conception of how much a hundred
pounds was, I knew that it must be a great deal of money. I was
therefore very anxious to restore it to the kind gentleman.
Here I benefited by my good mother's instruction; and I believed her
spirit watched over me to keep me from evil; for it never occurred to
me, as I am sorry to say it did to some of the other boys who overheard
the gentleman's observation, that it would be easier if the ring was
found to sell it and secure its value, than to trust to the chance of
obtaining a small reward by returning it to its proper owner.
I fortunately overheard them plotting to secure the ring for themselves,
and I determined to counteract their plan. Though the water was deep
where the ring had fallen there was no current, as it was in a little
bay in the bank of the river, and what was more, I remembered that the
ground was rather harder than that surrounding it, and that it rose
slightly outside.
These circumstances gave me hopes of finding the ring; so I sat down at
some little distance on the bank, pretending to be counting the money I
had received, but in reality watching narrowly the spot where I thought
it had fallen.
I do not mean to say that I was indifferent to my good fortune, but I
honestly believe I thought much more of the pleasure it would give the
poor people who had charitably taken care of me in my destitution, than
of the benefit I should myself derive from it.
The tide had only run off a very little when the ring was thrown in, so
that I had a considerable time to wait; but though I grew very hungry,
and felt that I might enjoy a plentiful meal, I would not quit my post;
indeed, I was accustomed to starve, so that did not incommode me much.
Slowly the tide receded, and one after one the other boys went away. At
last the bank appeared, and the intervening space was left with very
little water over it. I was in hopes that none of the other boys would
return to interrupt me in my search; but, to my annoyance, just as the
mud was left quite clear, two of them came back, and immediately tucking
up their trousers, hurried into the mud.