He wished, do you see, to know with
what weight the stone would fall down, and talked something about
gravitation--a word which I could never understand to the present day,
save that it turned out a grave matter to me. I, like a silly fellow
myself, must needs consent, and, flinging the stone up to a vast height,
contrived so that it fell into the parson's hand, which it cut
dreadfully. The parson flew into a great rage, more particularly as
everybody laughed at him, and, being a magistrate, ordered his clerk, who
was likewise constable, to conduct me to prison as a rogue and a
vagabond, telling my comrades that if they did not take themselves off,
he would serve them in the same manner. So Ned hopped off, and Giles ran
after him, without making any gathering, and I was led to Bridewell, my
mittimus following at the end of a week, the parson's hand not permitting
him to write before that time. In the Bridewell I remained a month,
when, being dismissed, I went in quest of my companions, whom, after some
time, I found up, but they refused to keep my company any longer; telling
me that I was a dangerous character, likely to bring them more trouble
than profit; they had, moreover, filled up my place. Going into a
cottage to ask for a drink of water, they saw a country fellow making
faces to amuse his children; the faces were so wonderful that Hopping Ned
and Biting Giles at once proposed taking him into partnership, and the
man--who was a fellow not very fond of work--after a little entreaty,
went away with them. I saw him exhibit his gift, and couldn't blame the
others for preferring him to me; he was a proper ugly fellow at all
times, but when he made faces his countenance was like nothing human. He
was called Ugly Moses. I was so amazed at his faces, that though poor
myself I gave him sixpence, which I have never grudged to this day, for I
never saw anything like them. The firm throve wonderfully after he had
been admitted into it. He died some little time ago, keeper of a
public-house, which he had been enabled to take from the profits of his
faces. A son of his, one of the children he was making faces to when my
comrades entered his door, is at present a barrister, and a very rising
one. He has his gift--he has not, it is true, the gift of the gab, but
he has something better, he was born with a grin on his face, a quiet
grin; he would not have done to grin through a collar like his father,
and would never ha