I became, at ten years of age, a little worker in the service of Murdstone and Grinby. In this firm certain men and boys were employed to look at empty wine bottles against the light, to throw out those that were flawed, and to rinse and wash the rest.
When the empty bottles ran short, there were labels to be pasted on full ones, or corks to be fitted to them, or seals to be put upon the corks, or finished bottles to be packed into casks. All this work was my work, and, whenever I found myself alone, I mingled my tears with the water in which I was washing the bottles, and sobbed, as if there were a flaw in my own breast, and it were in danger of bursting.
I lived in a little room in the house of some very poor but kindly people. My breakfast, of a penny loaf and a pennyworth of milk, I provided myself. I kept another small loaf and a small piece of cheese on a certain shelf in a certain cupboard for my supper when I came home.
I was so young and childish, and so little suited to looking after myself altogether, that often, in going to work in the morning, I could not resist the stale pastry for sale at half price at the shop-doors. On that I spent the money I should havekept for my dinner. Then I went without my dinner, or bought a roll or a slice of pudding.
I remember two pudding-shops, between which I was divided according to the amount of money l had. The pudding at one shop was made with currants, and was rather a special pudding; but it was dear, twopence worth not being larger than a pennyworth of the more ordinary kind. This pudding was pale, heavy, and flabby, with great flat raisins in it, stuck in whole at wide distances apart. It came up hot every day at my dinner-time; and many a day did I dine off it.
When I dined in a proper and handsome manner, I had a saveloy and a penny loaf, or a fourpenny plate of red beef from a cook"s shop. Once I remember carrying my own bread under my arm, wrapped in a piece of paper, like a book, and going into a famous and stylish beef-house for a " small plate " of beef to eat with the bread. What the waiter thought of such a strange little figure coming in all alone I do not know. I can see him now staring at me as I ate my dinner, and bringing up the other waiter to look.
We had half an hour for tea. When I had money enough, Iused to get half a pint of coffee and a slice of bread and butter. When I had none, I used to look at a venison shop in Fleet Street; or I have strolled, at such a time, as far as the fruit market, and stared at the pine-apples.
Thus I worked from morning to night, and wandered about the streets, a shabby, under-fed child. But for the mercy of God, I might easily have been, for any care that was taken ofme, a little robber or a little vagabond.
Abridged from David Copperfield, by Chables DickensPoverty sits by the cradle of all our great men, and rocks them up to manhood. HeineGeneral.-The story of David Copperfield is drawn, like most great stories, from personal experience. It is not quite literally true, for there is a difference between a wine-merchant"s place and a blacking factory. Still the main incidents are alike. Have we boys in Australia struggling with circumstance? Do they all win through? What steps have been taken to mend matters? Can anything more be done? Recall any stories of men or women who have beaten a hard fate.
