Among his first strongly-developed tastes was the love of birds and animals, which he inherited from his father. Blackbirds were his special favourites. The hedges between Dewley and Black Callerton were capital bird-nesting places; and there was not a nest there that he did not know of. When the young birds were old enough, he would bring them home with him, feed them, and teach them to fly about the cottage unconfined by cages. One of his blackbirds became so tame, that, after flying about the doors all day, and in and out of the cottage, it would take up its roost upon the bed-head at night. And most singular of all, the bird would disappear in the spring and summer months, when it was supposed to go into the woods to pair and rear its young, after which it would reappear at the cottage, and resume its social habits during the winter. This went on for several years. George had also a stock of tame rabbits, for which he built a little house behind the cottage, and for many years he continued to pride himself upon the superiority of his breed. After he had driven the gin for some time at Dewley and Black Callerton, he was taken on as an assistant to his father in firing the engine at Dewley. This was a step of promotion which he had anxiously desired, his only fear being lest he should be found too young for the work. Indeed, he used afterwards to relate how he was wont to hide himself when the owner of the colliery went round, in case he should be thought too little a boy to earn the wages paid him. Since he had modelled his clay engines in the bog, his young ambition was to be an engineman; and to be an assistant fireman was the first step towards this position. Great therefore was his joy when, at about fourteen years of age, he was appointed assistant-fireman, at the wage of a shilling a day. But the coal at Dewley Burn being at length worked out, the pit was ordered to be “laid in,” and old Robert and his family were again under the necessity of shifting their home; for, to use the common phrase, they must “follow the wark.” They removed accordingly to a place called Jolly’s Close, a few miles to the south, close behind the village of Newburn, where another coal-mine belonging to the Duke of Northumberland, called “the Duke’s Winnin,” had recently been opened out. [Picture: Newburn on the Tyne] One of the old persons in the neighbourhood, who knew the family well, describes the dwelling in which they lived as a poor cottage of only one room, in which the father, mother, four sons, and two daughters, lived and slept. It was crowded with three low-poled beds. The one apartment served for parlour, kitchen, sleeping-room, and all.