The subject of this sketch was born at St. Anstell, in Cornwall, on the 3d March, 1765. His parents were both members of families long resident in Cornwall. They were in but poor circumstances, the father being employed chiefly as a farm-laborer. Now and then he worked in connection with the tin mines of the neighborhood. Hard work, scant fare, and great economy were necessary to enable the parents to bring up their young family respectably. We may judge of their circumstances by the fact that the father found it not at all an easy thing to carry out a worthy determination he had formed to send his three children to school, where the fee for each scholar was only one penny per week. Little Sammy's progress hardly compensated for this small outlay, for he was dull and careless and shockingly fond of playing truant. However, his school life did not last long. He was removed at the age of eight, as already stated, and put to work as a _buddle-boy_. The pits in which the tin-ore is washed after being broken up are called _buddles_, and it was the business of the buddle-boy to stir up the sediment of ore and metal at the bottom of the pit, in order that the stream of water which passed through it might carry off the sandy particles and leave the mineral behind. For this work Samuel was to receive three halfpence a week. But the poor little fellow was early taught the meaning of the terms "bad debt" and "failure in business." His master kept the wages back, intending to pay them, as was customary, to the father. At the end of eight weeks the employer failed, and Samuel never received his first instalment of wages. When another man took the business, shortly after, the boys were paid twopence per week, and for the two years in which he continued at this work, the little buddle-boy never received more than this miserable pittance. It must be confessed that Samuel was a wilful, headstrong fellow. The circumstances which led to his removal from home were hardly to his credit. His own mother died when he was nine years old. She was a good woman, and took great pains to save her boy from the bad influence of low company at the tin-works. Samuel, though young and reckless, cherished a deep regard for his mother. About a year and a half after her death the father married again, and Samuel, not liking the idea of having a "new mother," made himself as obnoxious to her as he could. This improper conduct could not be permitted, and it was especially wrong in this instance, as the "new mother" was very attentive and kind to the children. "At the age of ten and a half," says his biographer, Samuel "was apprenticed for nine years to a shoemaker, living in a sequestered hamlet about three miles from St. Austell. His father and family at this time were not far distant, but removing soon after to Polpea, in Tywardreath, the poor lad's intercourse with his relatives was, in a great measure, suspended, and he felt the loneliness of his situation."