Were I writing a library instead of a volume, I would take up, for the satisfaction of my readers, link by link, the chain of consequences, from the mighty to the insignificant; also, if time and eternity permitted, trace the genealogy of the memorable porker (upon whose forcible seizure all these events depended), back to the time when Adam was not required to show a tailor's bill unpaid, as a portent of gentility, or Eve thought it a wife's duty to henpeck her husband.
As I cannot do this, I will, by an analogous example, show that equally--to me at least--important consequences have been deduced from as unimportant and remote causes; and that the writing of this volume, my being a swamp doctor in 1848, and having been steamboat cook, cabin-boy, gentleman of leisure, plough-boy, cotton-picker, and almost a printer, depended when I was ten years old on a young lady wearing "No. 2" shoes, when common sense and the size of her foot whispered "fives." And now to show the connexion between these remote facts.
The death of my mother when I was very young breaking up our family circle, I became an inmate of the family of a married brother, whose wife, to an imperious temper, had, sadly for me, united the companionship of several younger brothers, whose associates I became when I entered her husband's door. Living in a free state, and his straitened circumstances permitting him but one hired servant, much of the family drudgery fell upon his wife, who up to my going there devolved a portion upon her brothers, but which all fell to my share as soon as I became domiciliated. I complained to my brother; but it was a younger brother arraigning a loved wife, and we all know how such a suit would be decided. Those only who have lived in similar circumstances can appreciate my situation; censured for errors and never praised for my industry, the scapegoat of the family and general errand-boy of the concern, waiting upon her brothers when I would fain have been at study or play, mine was anything but an enviable life. This condition of things continued until I had passed my tenth year, when, grown old by drudgery and wounded feelings, I determined to put into effect a long-cherished plan, to run away and seek my fortune wheresoever chance might lead or destiny determine.