the beginning of December, he hired as bookkeeper with Aaron Chambers, who had a lumber shanty, taking out oak timber near Peter McArthur’s, in the township of Beckwith. He started on foot and walked to Franktown, fifteen miles, and arrived there at dark only to find that he had five miles farther to go to reach the shanty, through a section of country and bush roads that he knew nothing about; but by following closely the directions given him, he succeeded in finding the place some two or three hours after dark. This was Saturday night. Chambers had hired him to keep his books, and on Sunday informed him that besides keeping the books he would have to cook for the men and chop the fire-wood. This he refused to do, and on Monday morning left the shanty and footed it home. He continued to work on the farm until about sixteen years old, when he was apprenticed to James Thompson (the present sheriff), to learn the printing business in the old _Bathurst Courier_ office (now the _Perth Courier_). This was in May, 1839. About two years and a half after this, in the beginning of winter, he left the _Courier_ office, took the stage to Brockville, thence by stage to Kingston (there were no railroads in those days), and arrived there at night penniless but not despairing. The Kingston _News_ had just been started by S. and J. Rowlands, and he got work on this newspaper. The following summer he returned home, his father having died in the meantime, and worked for about two years longer in the _Courier_ office. Ere he had been a year in the _Courier_, for the first time, he became convinced that if he was to succeed in the printing business, he must acquire a better education than he then had. A young lawyer in town, Henry Sache, who was sometimes hard up through nobody’s fault but his own, offered to sell him a Latin dictionary cheap. He closed the bargain and bought it, and at once determined to study Latin. The reader will no doubt smile when informed that he commenced his studies by committing the Latin dictionary to memory! A few evenings afterwards Mr. Sache, coming in and finding him intent at the dictionary, asked what he was doing. He replied that he had commenced to study Latin, and was learning the dictionary off by heart. His visitor smiled, and informed him that he would never learn the language that way—that he must get a Latin grammar, study that, and then commence to translate. But where was he to get a Latin grammar? Sache had sold his, and there was none for sale in Perth. The nearest place was Brockville; and so he got the stage-driver on his next trip to buy him one and bring it out, and how he exulted over the possession of that book! Every spare moment was thenceforth devoted to study, and with some assistance that he got from Ephraim Patterson, who was then studying for the church, he made pretty rapid progress. This intercourse with Patterson had induced in him a desire to study for the Church of England ministry.