closing in when we had done the thirty miles
to the town in which we were going to sleep.
We were too tired to go out that night, and
after a wash and a feed, went to bed. In
the morning we were astir in time to meet the
workmen coming to their breakfasts, and, having
ascertained from some of them that trade was
tolerably good in the town, we determined to
try for work there. Accordingly we called at
a number of shops, and at one of them my
companion (who belonged to a different branch
of the trade from mine) got employed; but I
was less fortunate, as every shop was full-
handed in my particular line. My companion—
though there had been no agreement to that
effect—offered to share his wages with me if I
liked to stay in the town for a week or two.
This liberal offer, however, I declined, and on
the following morning I started on my travels
alone. Then, for the first time, I began fully
to experience the real miseries of being on
tramp. I was very footsore; for, though I
had not been on the road the day before, I had
been walking about the streets of a busy town
and waiting about workshop gates all day.
Now that I had no one to speak to, each mile
seemed as long as two had previously done.
I had only got about seven miles on my way
when it began to rain heavily, and continued
to do so until my clothes were thoroughly
saturated. A cold wind rising as soon as the
rain ceased, my wet clothes were made to cling
round me in a horribly chilling manner. It was
dark, when, utterly weary and beginning to feel
uncomfortably feverish, I reached the town
which I had marked out as my resting-place for
the night. Having made the best of my way to
the public-house to which I had been
recommended by one who had "done" the line of
road, I ordered a supper, which I found I
could not eat, and went to bed. To bed, but
not to sleep; the feverish feeling increasing
during the night to an extent that kept me
tossing and tumbling from side to side until
daylight began to dawn, and then I got up,
weary and unrefreshed. Still I was determined
to push on, and I once more set out. The
morning was tolerably fine, and the fresh air
revived me considerably; my feet felt less
painful than they had felt on the previous day,
and, becoming a little more cheerful on making
these discoveries, I resolved that I would that
day "do" the larger half of the sixty-five
miles that still lay between me and London,
in which city I had made up my mind to wait
for work, if I met with none before reaching
it. I was disagreeably startled by the
commencement of a heavy pour of rain, which
lasted for several hours, and by which my
clothes were wetted through and through
before I could reach any adequate shelter.
With the chilling of my body my fever
returned, so at length, about noon, at which
time the rain was still coming down in torrents,
I recklessly sat down on a large stone by
the roadside, with a vague intention of writing
my name and address on a piece of paper,
fastening it to my jacket, and there and
then giving up the ghost. While searching
my pockets for a piece of pencil, with which
to carry out the first part of this plan, I fell
to reflecting upon my position, and by some
curious process of reasoning the method of which
(if it ever had any) I do not now recollect, I fully
persuaded myself that society in general, and
not my own wrong-headedness, was responsible
for the sad case in which I found myself.
Strange as it may seem, this idea afforded me
consolation, as did also the repetition to myself
of some lines that had been composed under
circumstances similar to those in which I then
was, by a former shopmate, and which ran
thus:

     Out in the rain, the pitiless rain,
     Suffering from hunger, cold, and pain,
     The weary tramp pursues his way,
     He has travelled many miles to-day,
     And many he must travel yet,
     Though his heart is heavy and garments wet.

By the time I had repeated this doggerel two
or three times, and fished out the piece of pencil
from the contents of my pockets, a considerable
modification had taken place in my views respecting
life and death. If I were to die, it occurred
to me that I might as well die in harness, while if
I were not to die—and I began to suspect that
I was by no means so near death as I had a few
minutes before supposed—I was only losing
time by sitting on a damp stone grumbling.
So, taking heart of grace, I rose to my feet
again, and walked on till about six o'clock
in the evening, when I reached a town in
which there was a club-house belonging to my
trade. Finding that I could have a bed in that
house, I took up my quarters there for the
night. After drinking a cup of tea, I leaned
my aching head against the back of the screen,
and fell into a restless snatchy kind of sleep,
from which I was aroused by feeling a cool soft
hand laid on my forehead. On looking up, I
found that the hand was that of the buxom
widow who was the landlady of the house.
She was fat, fair, and forty, and had a
countenance so comely and so beaming with
good nature, that it was a positive pleasure
to look upon it. As I gazed into her kind
matronly face, and met her pitying glance, I
felt fairly broken down. My troubles had
before only tended to make me sullen, and
to cause me to bring unfounded charges against
society, but the landlady's touch of nature
melted me in an instant, and, but that
there were two or three customers looking on,
I believe I should have laid my head on her
expansive bosom, and had what the ladies
call "a good cry." "Poor boy," she said,
when she saw that I was awake, "you're very
bad; but don't be cast down, we'll soon put
you to rights again; come with me, and I'll
give you something that will do you good."

I followed her into her own cozy little parlour,
where a warm bath for my feet, and a basin of
strongly dashed gruel, were speedily got ready,