y. Take your finger out of your mouth and go to
cutting candle wicks. It must make a family proud to have in it such a
promising one as you! You'll be apt to set something ablaze some day if
you keep on as you've begun."

He did.

Jamie the Scotchman went out, causing the bell on the door to ring. He
whistled lustily as he went down the street.

Little Benjamin sat cutting wicks for the candle molds and wondering at
the ways of the world. He had not intended to do wrong. He may have
thought that the stones, although put aside by the workmen, were common
property. He had made a mistake. But how are mistakes to be avoided in
life? He would ask his Uncle Benjamin, the poet, when he should meet
him. It was well, indeed, never to make a _second_ mistake, but better
not to make any mistake at all. Uncle Benjamin was wise, and could write
poetry. He would ask him.

Besides Jamie the Scotchman, who spent much time at the Blue Ball,
little Benjamin's brother James seems to have looked upon him as one
whose activities of mind were too obvious, and needed to be suppressed.

The evening that followed the disgrace of little Ben was a serious one
in the Franklin family. Uncle Ben had "gone to meeting" in the Old South
Church.

The shop, with its molded candles, dipped candles, ingot bars of soap,
pewter molds, and kettles, was not an unpleasant place in the evening,
and old sea captains used to drop in to talk with Josiah, and sometimes
the leading members of the Old South Church came to discuss church
affairs, which were really town affairs, for the church governed the
town.

On this particular night little Ben sat in the corner of the shop very
quietly, holding little Jane as usual. The time had come for a perfect
calm in his life, and he himself was well aware how becoming was silence
in his case.

Among those who used to come to the shop evenings to talk with Josiah
and Uncle Ben, the poet, was one Captain Holmes. He came to-night,
stamping his feet at the door, causing the bell to ring very violently
and the faces of some of the Franklin children to appear in the window
framed over the shop door. How comical they looked!

"Where's Ben to-night?" asked Captain Holmes.

Little Ben's heart thumped. He thought the captain meant _him_.

"He's gone to meetin'," said Josiah. "Come, sit down. Ben will be at
home early."

Little Ben's heart did not beat so fast now.

"Where's that boy o' yourn?" asked the captain.

Ben