green sand enabled him to lead a jolly life.
Through the curator of the Geological Museum
and an optician, who dealt in fossils and
antiquities, he managed to drive a roaring trade.
His sides shook with laughter while relating
the tricks he played upon a learned professor
there. In the neighbourhood of Yarmouth,
he made the acquaintance of an " archaeological
parson, easy to do." At the remembrance of
his visits to this "easy" divine, Jack indulged
in immoderate mirth, pronouncing him,
however, to be " of a good sort, and a right liberal
fellow." He had got to that degree of
insolence in which, while despising his dupes, he
could dole out to them a sort of contemptuously
compassionate praise. The clergyman
showed his antiquities freely, and gave an
unlimited order to collect specimens of Roman or
British implements. Jack immediately set to
work with a will, and soon produced a valuable
assortment, delighting his patron with forms
quite unique- the invention of his own fertile
brain. The Yarmouth gains soon melted in the
beer-pot, and then Tramp, Tramp, Tramp, with
empty pockets.

At Colchester he fell in with a travelling
Jew, who collected paintings, china,
furniture, or any other antique article for the
London dealers. Jack said this man was no
blockhead; but Jack cheated him nevertheless.
Jack's antiquities delighted the son of
Israel, who never suspected their origin, and
who was incautious enough to mention the
marts in London where he could dispose of
them. This was precisely what Jack wanted,
for to London he had resolved to go. He took
in his Hebrew customer deeply, making him
many things. The Jew at length became aware
of their spurious nature, but was far from
cutting the acquaintance in consequence; on
the contrary, he subsequently bought his
productions regularly.

In London he got introduced to Mr. Tennant,
of the Strand- a step which turned out
to be the beginning of the end. On him he
called to dispose, at first, of fossils only, but
afterwards sold flints and other antiquities. On
being asked, later on, " Did you take them in
at the British Museum?" Jack replied, " Why,
of course I did!" And again, " They have lots
of my things, and good things they are, too."

For twelve months Jack honoured London
with his presence, manufacturing, chiefly flints,
all the while, and obtaining his supplies of raw
material by taking boat to the chalk at Wool-
wich. At length the dealers (and the museums
too) becoming overcharged with flints, Jack
feared their very plentifulness might arouse
suspicion. He therefore resolved upon a
return to Yorkshire, but cunningly took a different
route, directing his " walks" through Bedford
and Northampton, where he found three ready
dupes.

"Here," says Jack, " I did best of any."

For all, he made large collections of flints,
"spicing" them sometimes with a few genuine
fossils. At Nottingham he found two
antiquaries, and duped both. There; by way of "a
rest from the cares and anxieties of business,"
he took a " holiday," to visit the battle-ground
of Wallerby Field (Charles I. and Cromwell).

At York he became known to the then
curator of the museum, and regretted greatly
he had no flints to " do" him with. All
his stock in trade had been left at
Nottingham, and the intermediate country had
yielded no flint. The curator furnished him
with money to go to Bridlington, and
collect chalk fossils and shells, which he did, and
supplied to the York Museum. He remained
on the coast about twelve months, attending
wholly to fossils, and appearing to have a final
chance of lapsing at last into an honest life.

An unfortunate walk to North Shields one
day brought him to the beach, where he found
flint among the shingle. The temptation was
irresistible. Jack set to work on the spot to
make forged celts. With a spurious collection
he went to Durham, and there resumed his
former trade, selling a few as genuine (with a
plausible history attached) to private indivduals
who " took an interest in antiquities."

After another replenish on the Yorkshire
coast, Jack conceived the idea of visiting
Ireland, thinking that his English beats would
well bear " rest." He accordingly started on
his Irish walk, heavily laden with antiquities for
the sons of Erin. He says he did well- saw
all the best things in the north of the island,
traversing it entirely on foot, highly delighted
with the scenery. Sometimes he collected
fossils, sometimes he made a few flints. He had
much rather manufacture them than pick up
genuine ones for sale; " gathering them was
such a trouble." From Dublin he returned,
via Liverpool, to York, aiming for the coast,
in search of flint. Although he " did well" in
Ireland, improvident habits soon exhausted his
cash, and he reached his store of wealth, the
coast, in a state of utter indigence.

After a twelve months' sober fit, he felt a
"longing to see other parts of England." At
Bottesford, in the Vale of Belvoir, he found a
great open quarry of lias, yielding numerous
fossils. This was a grand prize; and he stopped
here some time, working the quarry to a large
extent. The first basketful he got there he sent
to a clergyman of Peterborough- a sort of
recognition of past kindnesses, which Jack was
not backward in according, and perhaps the
only redeeming trait in his character. But he
soon atoned for this virtuous weakness. At St.
Alban's he found a good customer, to whom he
sold spurious flint-knives, arrow-heads, and
"drills." The cleverest trick was providing
an ancient silver coin to order, out of the handle
of a German silver teaspoon.

At Devizes (where he sold both fossils and
forged flints to the museum), Jack was deemed
so remarkable a being that he was solicited to
sit for his first portrait. His cartes accordingly
were freely sold as photographs of " The Old
Antiquarian."

At the close of 1859, Jack returned to London