te, and there, joining in the
sports of some group of youngsters, which the place rarely wanted, he
would play out half a game at marbles, or honey-pots, or hy-spy, and,
when he saw his master or a customer approaching, bolt back again The
thing was not deemed seemly; but Francie, when spoken to on the subject,
could speak as sensibly as any young person of his years. He needed
relaxation, he used to say, though he never suffered it to interfere
with his proper business; and where was there safer relaxation to be
found than among innocent children? This, of course, was eminently
rational, and even virtuous. And so, when his term of apprenticeship had
expired, Francie was despatched, not without hope of success, to
Newfoundland,--where he had relations extensively engaged in the fishing
trade,--to serve as one of their clerks. He was found to be a competent
clerk; but unluckily there was but little known of the interior of the
island at the time; and some of the places most distant from St. John's,
such as the Bay and River of Exploits, bore tempting names; and so,
after Francie had made many inquiries at the older inhabitants regarding
what was to be seen amid the scraggy brushwood and broken rocks of the
inner country, a morning came in which he was reported missing at the
office; and little else could be learned respecting him, than that at
early dawn he had been seen setting out for the woods, provided with
staff and knapsack. He returned in about a week, worn out and
half-starved. He had not been so successful as he had anticipated, he
said, in providing himself by the way with food, and so he had to turn
back ere he could reach the point on which he had previously determined;
but he was sure he would be happier in his next journey. It was palpably
unsafe to suffer him to remain exposed to the temptation of an
unexplored country; and as his friends and superiors at St. John's had
just laden a vessel with fish for the Italian market during Lent,
Francie was despatched with her as supercargo, to look after the sales,
in a land of which every footbreadth had been familiar to men for
thousands of years, and in which it was supposed he would have no
inducement to wander. Francie, however, had read much about Italy; and
finding, on landing at Leghorn, that he was within a short distance of
Pisa, he left ship and cargo to take care of themselves, and set out on
foot to see the famous hanging tower, and the great marble cathe