"If you meet old Mr. Calamity in your way, the kind of man who tells you that you have no ground of expectation, and that everything in the world is going to ruin, just whistle, and luck will come to you, my boy. I only wish that I had my documents--my pamphlets, I mean. I would have left them to you in my will. In the present state of society one must save or be a slave--that also I wrote down in my documents. It is a pity that it is so, but it is. Save what you can while you are young, and it will give your mind leisure to work when you are older. _That_ was in my pamphlets. I hope that I may live to see you the best printer in the colonies." The boy absorbed the spirit of these proverbial sayings. They were to his liking and bent of mind. But there came into his young face a shadow. "Uncle Ben, I know what you say is true. I have listened to you; now I would like you to hear me. You saw the boys going to the Latin School this morning?" "Yes, Ben." "I can not go there." "O Ben! that is hard," said Jenny, who was by his side. "But you can go to school, Ben," said Uncle Benjamin. "Where, uncle?" "To life--and graduate there as well as any of them." "I would like to study Latin." "Well, what is to hinder you, Ben? One only needs to learn the alphabet to learn all that can be known through books. You know _that_ now." "I would like to learn French. Other boys can; I can not." "The time will come when you can. The gates open before a purpose. You can study French later in life, and, it may be, make as good use of French as any of them." "Why can not I do as other boys?" "You can, Ben. You can so live that the Boston Latin School to which you can not go now will honor you some day." "I would be sorry to see another boy feel as I have felt when I have seen the boys going to that school with happy faces to learn the things that I want to know. But father has done the best that he can for me." "Yes, Ben, he has, and you only need to do the best that you can for yourself to graduate at the head of all in the school of life. I know how to feel for you, Ben. I have stood in shoes like yours many times. When you have done as I have told you, then think of me. The world may soon forget me. I want you so to live that it will not as soon forget you." The cloud passed from the boy's face. Hope came to him, and he was merry again. He locked Jenny in his arms, whirled her around, and said: "I am glad to hear the bells ring for other boys, even if I must go to my trade."