From his "infancy," sir, "passionately fond of reading," nay, with the appetite of a vulture, with the digestion of an ostrich, attacking the great folios of polemic divinity in his father's library. Not a dull boy, either; not a precocious little bookworm; fond of play; doesn't dislike a little mischief; sometimes, as he tells us, "led the other boys into scrapes;" but in his intervals of play, in his leisure moments, up in the lonely garret when the rest of the family were asleep, holding converse in his childhood with the grave old non-conformists, Howe and Owen and Flavel and Baxter,--communing with the austerest lords of thought; the demigods of puritanism.
Franklin not a book-man? Why, he goes on to tell us that it was "this bookish inclination which at length determined his father to make him a printer," against his own inclination, which was for the sea; and when he had thus by constraint become a printer, his great consolation was, as he says, that "I now had access to better books. An acquaintance with the apprentices of booksellers enabled me sometimes to borrow a small one, which I was careful to return soon and clean. Often I sat up in my chamber reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening and was to be returned in the morning, lest it should be found missing."
Then he made the acquaintance of Mr. Matthew Adams, an ingenious, sensible man, "who had a pretty collection of books." He frequented the printing-office, took notice of the bright little apprentice, and "very kindly proposed to lend me such books as I chose to read." Having taken to a vegetable diet at the age of sixteen, he persuaded his brother to allow him in cash half the price of his board,--lived upon potatoes and hasty pudding,--soon found that he could save half even of that little allowance (which could not have exceeded two-and-six-pence a week, lawful money), and this poor little economy "was an additional fund for buying books." What would the poor, underfed boy, who was glad to buy books on the savings of his potato diet, have said could he have had free access to a hall like this, stored as it soon will be with its priceless treasures?
Further, sir, while working as a journeyman in England, he says, "I made the acquaintance of one William Wilcox, a bookseller, whose shop was next door. He had an immense collection of second-hand books."--(Somewhat, I suppose, like our friend Burnham, in Cornhill.)--"Circulating libraries were not then in use, but we agreed that on certain reasonable terms, which I have now forgotten, I might take, read, and return any of his works. This I esteemed a great advantage, and I made as much use of it as I could."