nction, and spent all his
spare time mastering Gurney's shorthand and reading early and late at
the British Museum. A more industrious apprentice in the lower grades of
the literary profession has never been known, and the consciousness of
opportunities used to the most splendid advantage can hardly have been
absent from the man who was shortly to take his place at the head of it
as if to the manner born. Lowten and Guppy, and Swiveller had been
observed from this office lad's stool; he was now greatly to widen his
area of study as a reporter in Doctors' Commons and various police
courts, including Bow Street, working all day at law and much of the
night at shorthand. Some one asked John Dickens, during the first eager
period of curiosity as to the man behind "Pickwick," where his son
Charles was educated. "Well really," said the prodigal father, "he may
be said--haw--haw--to have educated himself." He was one of the most
rapid and accurate reporters in London when, at nineteen years of age,
in 1831, he realized his immediate ambition and "entered the gallery" as
parliamentary reporter to the _True Sun_. Later he was reporter to the
_Mirror of Parliament_ and then to the _Morning Chronicle_. Several of
his earliest letters are concerned with his exploits as a reporter, and
allude to the experiences he had, travelling fifteen miles an hour and
being upset in almost every description of known vehicle in various
parts of Britain between 1831 and 1836. The family was now living in
Bentwick Street, Manchester Square, but John Dickens was still no
infrequent inmate of the sponging-houses. With all the accessories of
these places of entertainment his son had grown to be excessively
familiar. Writing about 1832 to his school friend Tom Mitton, Dickens
tells him that his father has been arrested at the suit of a wine firm,
and begs him go over to Cursitor Street and see what can be done. On
another occasion of a paternal disappearance he observes: "I own that
his absence does not give me any great uneasiness, knowing how apt he is
to get out of the way when anything goes wrong." In yet another letter
he asks for a loan of four shillings.

In the meanwhile, however, he had commenced author in a more creative
sense by penning some sketches of contemporary London life, such as he
had attempted in his school days in imitation of the sketches published
in the _London_ and other magazines of that day. The first of these
appeared in th