that stool, and say them after me as I point them out to
you," said Mr Vellum.

With great patience he went over the alphabet again and again.

"Now I want to put them together, sir," said Nicholas, not content with
the extent of the first lesson. All day long he sat with the book
before him, and then took it with him to his home. That home, the abode
of his mother, a widow, with a pension of five shillings a week, which
enabled her to live, although too small to afford subsistence to her
son, was in a small garret up a dark stair in one of the poorest of the
back streets of Liverpool. Nicholas set working away by the flame of a
farthing rushlight, and at dawn he was up again poring over his book.

Old Vellum was so pleased with the progress made by his pupil, that he
continued to give him all the assistance in his power, not only teaching
him to read but to write. In a few weeks young Nicholas could do both
in a very creditable manner. Having thus gained the knowledge he
desired, dressed in a decent suit of clothes, he went round to various
offices in Liverpool offering to fill any vacant situation for which he
might be considered fit. Although he met with numerous rebuffs, he
persevered, and was finally taken into the small counting-house of which
Mr Peter Crank's father was the head. To the firm, through all its
various changes, he had remained attached, and though frequently offered
opportunities of bettering himself, had refused to leave it. "No, no;
I'll stick to my old friends," he always answered; "their interests are
mine, and although I am but a poor clerk, I believe I can forward them."

From the first, during all his leisure moments, of which he had not
many, he continued to study hard, and to improve himself, spending a
portion of his wages in books, which he obtained from Mr Vellum, who
allowed him also the run of his library. He was raised from grade to
grade until he became head clerk, and during the illness of Mr Crank
and the absence of Mr Trunnion, he so well managed the affairs of the
firm, that they felt bound to offer him a partnership in the business,
to the success of which he had so greatly contributed. Notwithstanding
his rise in the social circle, Nicholas Swab continued to be the same
unostentatious, persevering, painstaking man which he had been from the
first--upright in all his dealings, and generous to those who required a
helping hand.

Some of the transactions of the firm