ho' that I was hurrying still. I saw that father loved him
better than me, and whiles that vexed me, but most times it didn't, for
I cared about the lad as well as father did, and he liked me the same.
He never went far without me; and whether he fought, or whether he
drunk, I must be wi' him and help.

"Well, so we went on till, as I said, I was seventeen, and he eighteen.
We never had a word till then; we were as brothers should be. But at
this time we had a quarrel, the first we ever had; ay, and the last,
for we got something to mind this one by.

"We both worked in the same pit. It was the Southstone Pit; happen
you've heard of it. No? Well, thus things get soon forgot. Father had
been an overman there, but was doing better now above ground. He and
mother kept a bit shop; made money.

"There was a fair in our village, a poor thing enough; but when we boys
were children we used to look forward to it eleven months out o'
twelve, and the day it came round we used to go to father, and get
sixpence, or happen a shilling apiece to spend.

"Well, time went on till we came to earn money; but still we kept up
the custom, and went to the old man reg'lar for our fairin', and he
used to laugh and chaff us as he'd give us a fourpenny or such, and we
liked the joke as well as he.

"Well this time--it was in '12, just after the comet, just the worst
times of the war, the fair came round, 24th of May, I well remember,
and we went in to the old man to get summut to spend--just for a joke
like.

"He'd lost money, and been vexed; so when Jack asked him for his
fairin' he gi'ed him five shillin', and said, 'I'll go to gaol but what
my handsome boy shan't have summut to treat his friends to beer.' But
when I axed him, he said, 'Earn man's wages, and thee'll get a man's
fairin,' and heaved a penny at me.

"That made me wild mad, I tell you. I wasn't only angry wi' the old
man, but I was mad wi' Jack, poor lad! The devil of jealousy had got
into me, and, instead of kicking him out, I nursed him. I ran out o'
the house, and away into the fair, and drunk, and fought, and swore
like a mad one.

"I was in one of the dancing booths, half drunk, and a young fellow
came to me, and said, 'Where has thee been? Do thee know thy brother
has foughten Jim Perry, and beaten him?'

"I felt like crying, to think my brother had fought, and I not there to
set him up. But I swore, and said, 'I wish Jim Perry had killed un;'
and then I sneaked o