‘Having taken my resolution, I had to summon up my courage to give John Watson warning; not that I in the least suspected he would say any thing more than, very well: but he had been a kind master, had relieved me in the day of my distress, had never imputed faults to me, of which I was not guilty, had fairly waited to give my faculties time to shew themselves, and had rewarded them with no common degree of praise when accident brought them to light. It was therefore painful to leave such a master. With my cap off, and unusual awkwardness in my manner, I went up to him, and he perceiving I was embarrassed, yet had something to say, began thus. “Well, Tom, what is the matter now?”—“Oh, Sir, nothing much is the matter: only I had just a word to say.”—“Well, well, don’t stand about it; let me hear.”—“Nay, Sir, it is a trifle; I only came to tell you, I think of going to London.”—“To London?”—“Yes, Sir, if you please.”—“When do you mean to go to London?”—“When my year is up, Sir.”—“To London! What the plague has put that whim into your head?”—“I believe you know my father is in London.”—“Well, what of that?”—“We have written together, so it is resolved on.”—“Have you got a place?”—“I don’t want one, Sir, I could not have a better than I have.”—“And what are you to do?”—“I can’t tell that yet, but I think of being a shoemaker.”—“Pshaw, you are a blockhead, and your father is a foolish man.”—“He loves me very dearly, Sir; and I love and honour him.”—“Yes, yes, I believe you are a good boy, but I tell you, you are both doing a very foolish thing. Stay at Newmarket, and I will be bound for it, you will make your fortune.”—“I would rather go back to my father, Sir, if you please.”—“Nay, then, pray take your own way.”—So saying, he turned from me with very visible chagrin, at which I felt some surprise; for I did not imagine it would give him the least concern, should any one lad in the stables quit his service. ‘Spring and summer kept passing away: Arnold continued to afford me difficulties which I continued to overcome: my good-tempered, pleasant friend, (for so he was) the breeches-maker, and I, used often to consult together; and his surprise that I should so soon have gone beyond him with respect to the theory of music, not a little flattered me. The honest psalm-singers were told I was about to leave them, and owned they were sorry to hear it, I gave them so much assistance. In short, such friends as a poor boy of fifteen, wholly unrelated in the town could have, all expressed a degree of regret at parting: my stable-companions were the only persons who expressed no emotion one way or the other. I must here, however, except poor Jack Clarke, who, as he was the first that introduced me to Newmarket, so he was the last, of whom I took leave.’ END OF MR. HOLCROFT’S NARRATIVE BOOK II CHAPTER I