Those days were not easy times for printers, nor was the freedom of the press any more respected than liberty of conscience. Trouble very soon arose between the new paper and the authorities chiefly on account of the "Courant's" free handling of the church. Already the free-thinking party which afterwards formed into the Unitarian church was showing its head, and the writers for the "Courant" were among the most outspoken. The climax was reached when one day the paper appeared with a diatribe containing such words as these: "For my own part, when I find a man full of religious cant and palaver, I presently suspect him to be a knave,"--a sentiment which the religious authorities very properly took as an insult to themselves. James was arrested and imprisoned for a month, and on his release was forbidden to print the "Courant." To escape this difficulty the old indenture of Benjamin was canceled and the paper was printed in his name; at the same time, however, a new indenture was secretly made so that James might still, if he desired, claim his legal rights in the apprentice. It was a "flimsy scheme," and held but a little while. Bickerings had been constant between the two brothers, and Benjamin was especially resentful for the blows his master's passion too often urged him to bestow. "My mind now is set, My heart's thought, on wide waters,"-- said the youth in the old Anglo-Saxon poem, and this same sea-longing was bred in the bones of our Boston apprentice. Now at length the boy would break away; at least he would voyage to another home, though he might give up the notion of becoming a sailor. He intimates, moreover, that the narrow bigotry of New England in religion was distasteful to him--as we may well believe it was. Yet he always retained an affectionate memory of the place of his birth; and only two years before his death he wrote pleasantly regarding the citizens of that town, "for besides their general good sense, which I value, the Boston manner, turn of phrase, and even tone of voice and accent in pronunciation, all please and seem to refresh and revive me." The newspapers of those days were full of advertisements for runaway apprentices, and Benjamin was one to get his freedom in the same way. He sold his books for a little cash, took secret passage in a sloop for New York, and in three days (some time in October, 1723) found himself in that strange city "without the least recommendation or knowledge of anybody in the place." The voyage had been uneventful save for an incident which happened while they were becalmed off Block Island. The crew here employed themselves in catching cod, and to Franklin, at this time a devout vegetarian, the taking of every fish seemed a kind of unprovoked murder, since none of them had done or could do their catchers any injury. But he had been formerly a great lover of fish, and the smell of the frying-pan was most tempting. He balanced some