Page:A history of booksellers, the old and the new.djvu/421

THOMAS TEGG. 381 who am now one of the chief booksellers in London, have risen." His master, kindness itself before the indentures were signed, turned out to be "a tyrant as well as an infidel." " Every market-day he got drunk and came home and beat the whole of us. Once I said, ' I have done nothing to deserve a beating.' 1 Young English rascal,' said he, * you may want it when I am too busy, so I will give it to you now.' " Tegg's fellow-apprentice had, like him, an ambition, but it was to become the first whistler in the kingdom. Tegg's apprenticeship had by this time become intolerable, and, as he had been latterly engaged in reading " Robinson Crusoe" and " Roderick Random," he resolved to run away and lead an adventurous life himself. Though it was in the depth of winter, he travelled along on foot, sleeping sometimes under hedges laden with hoar-frost. But soon his little hoard- ing of ten shillings was exhausted ; at Berwick, therefore, he tried to make a livelihood by selling chap-books, but was recognised for a runaway ap- prentice and had again to fly. At this period he tells us he found out the utility of pawnbrokers' shops, and discovered, also, the value of small sums. " He who has felt the want of a penny is never likely to dissipate a pound." Another lesson, too, he gathered from his wanderings, which was always when in trouble to apply to a woman. " Never," he says, " did I plead to a woman in vain." At Newcastle he made the acquaintance of Bewick, the engraver ; there he might have remained, but his heart was set upon reaching London. At Sheffield he was seized by the parish officer for travelling on Sunday, but when he told his story the severity of Bumbledom itself re- lented, and the beadle found him a home, and even