r was a village
schoolmaster. I went when about twelve years old to a pottery at
Burslem. My father told me pretty well what I have told you. I
determined to try hard at any rate. I worked in every spare hour to
improve myself generally, and I went three evenings a week to the art
school. I liked it, and the master told me if I stuck to it I might be a
painter some day. I did stick to it, and at twenty could paint well
enough to go into that branch of pottery. I stuck to it, and at
five-and-twenty was getting as high pay as any one in Burslem, except
one or two foreign artists. I am thirty now. I still paint at times on
china, but I am now getting well known as an artist, and am, I hope, a
gentleman."

"I'll do it," the boy said, rising slowly to his feet and coming close
to the artist. "I'll do it, sir. They call me Bull-dog, and I'll stick
to it."

"Very well," the artist said, holding out his hand; "that's a bargain,
Jack. Now, give me your name and address; here are mine. It's the 1st of
June to-day. Now perhaps it will help you a little if I write to you on
the 1st of June every year; and you shall answer me, telling me how you
are getting on, and whether I can in any way give you help or advice. If
I don't get an answer from you, I shall suppose that you have got tired
of it and have given it up."

"Don't you never go to suppose that, sir," the boy said earnestly. "If
thou doesn't get an answer thou'llt know that I've been killed, as
father was, in a fall or an explosion. Thank you, sir." And the boy
walked quietly off, with the old bull-dog lazily waddling behind him.

"There are the makings of a man in that boy," the artist said to
himself. "I wish though I had finished his figure before we began to
talk about his plans for the future. I shall be very proud of that boy
if he ever makes a name for himself."

That evening Jack sat on a low stool and gazed into the fire so steadily
and silently that Bill Haden, albeit not given to observe his moods,
asked:

"What ail'st, lad? What be'st thinkin' o'?"

Jack's thoughts were so deep that it took him some time to shake them
off and to turn upon his stool.

"Oi'm thinking o' getting larning."

"Thinking o' getting larning!" the miner repeated in astonishment, "why,
'ee be just a dun o' getting larning. 'Ee ha' been at it for the last
foive year, lad, and noo thou'st going to be done wi' it and to work in
the pit."

"Oi'm a going to work in the pit, dad, an