street. As his pockets were filled with stockings and
shirts, he had to carry the other two loaves under his arms. No wonder a
girl standing in a doorway giggled as he passed by! Years afterwards,
when Franklin was rich and famous, and had married this very girl, the
two used to laugh well over the way he looked the first time she saw
him.

[Illustration: He began munching one of these as he went back into the
street. _Page 41._]

After one or two useless trips to England, Franklin settled down to the
printing business in Philadelphia. He was the busiest man in town.
Deborah, his wife, helped him, and he started a newspaper, a magazine, a
bookstore; he made ink, he made paper, even made soap (work that he
hated so when a boy!). Then he published every year an almanac. Into
this odd book, which people hurried to buy, he put some wise sayings,
which I am sure you must have heard many times. Such as: "Haste makes
waste"; "Well done is better than well said"; and "Early to bed and
early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise."

Franklin and his wife did so many things and did them well that they
grew rich. So when he was only forty-two, Franklin shut up all his shops
and took his time for studying out inventions. When you hear about the
different things he invented, you will not wonder that the colleges in
the country thought he ought to be honored with a degree and made him
Doctor Franklin. Here are some of his inventions: lightning-rods,
stoves, fans to cool hot rooms, a cure for smoking chimneys, better
printing-presses, sidewalks, street cleaning. He opened salt mines and
drained swamps so that they were made into good land. Then he founded
the first public library, the first police service, and the first fire
company. Doesn't it seem as if he thought of everything?

But better than all, Franklin always worked for the glory of America.
When King George was angry and bitter against our colonies, Franklin
went to England and stood his ground against the king and all his
council. He said the king had no right to make the colonies pay a lot of
money for everything that was brought over from England unless they had
some say as to how _much_ money it should be. If they paid taxes, they
wanted to vote. They were not willing to be just slaves under a hard
master.

"Very well, then," said the council, "then you colonists can't have any
more clothes from England."

Mr. Franklin answered back: "Very well, then, we