stable custom; but it was necessary, he suppos'd, to
drink strong beer, that he might be strong to labor. I endeavored to
convince him that the bodily strength afforded by beer could only be in
proportion to the grain or flour of the barley dissolved in the water
of which it was made; that there was more flour in a pennyworth of
bread; and therefore, if he would eat that with a pint of water, it
would give him more strength than a quart of beer. He drank on,
however, and had four or five shillings to pay out of his wages every
Saturday night for that muddling liquor; an expense I was free from.
And thus these poor devils keep themselves always under.

Watts, after some weeks, desiring to have me in the composing-room, I
left the pressmen; a new bien venu or sum for drink, being five
shillings, was demanded of me by the compositors. I thought it an
imposition, as I had paid below; the master thought so too, and forbad
my paying it. I stood out two or three weeks, was accordingly
considered as an excommunicate, and bad so many little pieces of
private mischief done me, by mixing my sorts, transposing my pages,
breaking my matter, etc., etc., if I were ever so little out of the
room, and all ascribed to the chappel ghost, which they said ever
haunted those not regularly admitted, that, notwithstanding the
master's protection, I found myself oblig'd to comply and pay the
money, convinc'd of the folly of being on ill terms with those one is
to live with continually.

I was now on a fair footing with them, and soon acquir'd considerable
influence. I propos'd some reasonable alterations in their chappel[4]
laws, and carried them against all opposition. From my example, a
great part of them left their muddling breakfast of beer, and bread,
and cheese, finding they could with me be suppli'd from a neighboring
house with a large porringer of hot water-gruel, sprinkled with pepper,
crumbl'd with bread, and a bit of butter in it, for the price of a pint
of beer, viz., three half-pence. This was a more comfortable as well as
cheaper breakfast, and kept their heads clearer. Those who continued
sotting with beer all day, were often, by not paying, out of credit at
the alehouse, and us'd to make interest with me to get beer; their
light, as they phrased it, being out. I watch'd the pay-table on
Saturday night, and collected what I stood engag'd for them, having to
pay sometimes near thirty shillings a week on their account. T