good, and who wanted a temporary relief.

To increase my little stock, I borrowed five pounds out of this fund, which was of great fervice to me:

In our new fituation we lived in a very frugal manner, often dining on potatoes, and quenching our thirft with water, being absolutely determined, if poffible, to make fome provifion for fuch difmal times as fickness,' fhortnefs of work, &c. which we had been fo frequently involved in before, and could fcarce help expecting to be our fate again. My wife foreboded it much more than I did, being of a more melancholy turn of

"To brood o'er forrows, and indulge their woe.

FRANCKLIN's Sophocles.

I lived in this ftrest fix months, and in that time increafed my ftock from five pounds, to twenty-five pounds.

"London the public there are candid and generous, and before my merit can have time to create me enemies, I'll fave money, and a fig for the Sultan and Sophy." ROVER.

This immenfe ftock I deemed too valuable to be buried in Featherstone-Street; and a shop and parlour being to let in ChifwellStreet, No. 46, I took them. This was at that time, and for fourteen years afterwards, a very dull and obfcure fituation: as few ever paffed through it, befides Spitalfield weavers on hanging days, and methodists on preaching nights; but still it was much better adapted for bufinefs than Featherstone-Street.

A fhort time after I came into ChifwellStreet to live, an odd circumftance occurred which caused a great deal of talk; Mrs. Chapman, who many years kept a ivery stable in Coleman-Street, had a cat big with kitten; this cat was one day feen to fly at a fowl, that was roafting by the fire, which The repeated feveral times, fo that she was at laft put out of the room; when this fowl was dreffed and eat, they gave poor pufs the bones, but this was not enough, for when The lay in, they found that he had marked her kitten, as inftead of two feet before, fhe had two wings, with fome short feathers on

them, the fingularity of this kitten drew great numbers to vifit her, which occafioned fo much trouble to Mrs. Chapman, that she figned the death warrant, and poor pufs was drowned, and afterwards buried in the dung heap.

I thought this ftory would read as well in my life, as in the Philofophical Transactions, which prevented me from troubling those learned authors with it.

A few weeks after I came into this Street> I bade a final adieu to the gentle craft, and converted my little ftock of leather, &c. into old books; and a great fale I had, confidering my stock; which was not only extremely fmall, but contained very little variety, as it principally confifted of divinity; for as I had not much knowledge, fo I feldom ventured out of my depth. Indeed, there was one class of books, which for the firft year or two that I called myself a bookfeller, I would not fell, for fuch was my ignorance, bigotry, fuperftition (or what you please) that I con

scientiously

fcientiously destroyed fuch books as fell into my hands which were written by freethinkers; for really fuppofing them to be dictated by his fable highness, I would neither read them myfelf, nor fell them to others.

You will perhaps be furprised when I inform you, that there are in London (and I fuppofe in other populous places) perfons who purchase every article which they have occafion for (and also many articles which they have no occafion for, nor ever will) at ftalls, beggarly fhops, pawnbrokers, &c. under the idea of purchafing cheaper than they could at refpectable shops, and of men of property. A confiderable number of these kind of customers I had in the beginning, who forfook my fhop as foon as I began to appear more refpectable, by introducing better order, poffeffing more valuable books, and having acquired a better judgment, &c. Notwithstanding which, I declare to you, upon my honour, that these very bargainhunters have given me double the price that O 2 I now

I now charge for thousands and tens of thoufands of volumes. For as a tradefman increases in refpectability and opulence, his opportunities of purchafing increase proportionably, and that the more he buys and fells, the more he becomes a judge of the real value of his goods. It was for want of this experience and judgement, ftock, &c. that for feveral years I was in the habit of charging more than double the price I now do for many thousand articles. But profeffed bargain-hunters often purchase old locks at the ftalls in Moorfields, when half the wards are rusted off or taken out, and give more for them than they would have paid for new ones to any reputable ironmonger. And what numerous inftances of this infatuation do we meet with daily at fales by auction, not of books only, but of many other arti-cles? Of which I could here adduce a variety of glaring inftances: but (not to tire you) a few of recent date fhall fuffice.-At the fale of Mr. Rigby's books at Mr. Chrif.ftie's, Martyn's Dictionary of Natural Hiftory fold for fifteen guineas, which then stood