The old watermen at the head of the Causeway, waiting to row people across to the Greenwich side, welcomed Crooks with a cheerful word as we approached. They were soon full of talk. The eldest told how he went to sea as a boy in the famous wooden ships turned out of Blackwall Yard. His aged companion remembered the stage coaches coming down from London to Blackwall. He was proud also of a memory of Queen Victoria's visit to the neighbourhood to see a Chinese junk. The two ancient watermen soon overflowed with reminiscences. One remembered his grandfather telling how King George the Fourth would come down to see the ships built at Blackwall, and how on one occasion a sailor who had come ashore and got drunk took a pint of ale to his Majesty in a pewter and asked him to drink to the Army and Navy. "Ah!" exclaimed the other, fetching a sigh; "but don't you remember that old Yarmouth fisherman who used to bring his smack round here from the Roads and sell herrings out of it on this very Causeway?" "Remember! What do _you_ think? That was the old man who would never keep farthings. In the evening, when he'd got a handful in the course of the day's trade, he would pitch them in the river for the boys to find." "Likely enough," interposed Crooks. "I mudlarked about here myself as a lad." The eldest of the ancient watermen would have it that this old boy from Yarmouth was the original of Mr. Peggotty, and that it was at Blackwall Dickens first made his acquaintance. He said he had often seen Dickens himself about those parts. We ventured a doubt. "Why, bless my life!" he cried; "ain't I talked to him at the Causeway here many a time?" This, of course, was unanswerable, so we asked what Dickens did when there. The ancient waterman thought a moment. "What did Dickens do?" he ruminated. "Now, let me see. What _did_ Dickens do? I know: Dickens used to go afloat!" The other declared that Dickens did more than that: he would often go into the fishing-smack. We immediately assumed that it was the fishing-smack of the old Yarmouth salt that was meant. We were wrong. It was another "Fishing Smack," one of the quaint old taverns by the river still standing in Coldharbour. CHAPTER V IN TRAINING FOR A CRAFTSMAN Three years in a Smithy--Provoking a Carman--Apprenticeship--Winning a Nickname--Activity of an Idle Apprentice--"Not Dead, but Drunk"--A Boisterous Celebration--The Workman's Pride in His Work. The three years in the blacksmith's shop in Limehouse Causeway, that commenced at the age of eleven after the errand-boy period, were years of hard work and long hours. The lad's working day began at six in the morning and often did not close until eight at night. Working overtime meant ten and twelve midnight before the day's work was done. He was paid for the overtime at the rate of a penny an hour.