not disposed to enter upon a sailor's life contrary to
his parents' counsels, and he submitted to his father's decision with
as much cheerfulness and good feeling as could be expected in the
circumstances. He knew that it was little use to tease his father when
he said "no" to a project. His emphatic "no" usually put an end to all
controversy.

There is little doubt that Benjamin had been somewhat influenced by
his frolics in and on the water. For some time, as opportunity
offered, he had been down to the water both to bathe and take
boat-rides. He had become an expert swimmer in a very short time, and
not one of the boys so readily learned to manage a boat. He exhibited
so much tact in these water feats, that he was usually regarded as a
leader by the boys, and all matters of importance were referred to his
judgment. It was not strange that he should be more in love with an
ocean life after such pastimes with his comrades. Whether he admitted
it or not, it is probable that his desire to go to sea was greatly
increased by these pleasant times in and on the water.

It was certainly a poor prospect that was before the young
tallow-chandler. It was not a trade to call into exercise the higher
and nobler faculties of the mind and heart. On that account, no one
could expect that Benjamin would rise to much distinction in the
world; and this will serve to awaken the reader's surprise as he
becomes acquainted with the sequel. A little fellow, ten or twelve
years of age, cutting the wicks of candles, and filling the moulds,
does not promise to become a great statesman and philosopher. Yet
with no more promise than this some of the most distinguished men
commenced their career. Behold Giotti, as he tends his father's flock,
tracing the first sketches of the divine art in the sand with a clumsy
stick,--a deed so unimportant that it foreshadowed to no one his
future eminence. See Daniel Webster, the great expounder of the
American Constitution, sitting, in his boyhood, upon a log in his
father's mill, and studying portions of that Constitution which were
printed upon a new pocket-handkerchief; a trivial incident at the
time, but now bearing an important relation to that period of his life
when his fame extended to every land. Recall the early life of Roger
Sherman, bound as an apprentice to a shoemaker in consequence of his
father's poverty, with little education and no ancestral fame to
assist him,--how exceeding small the prom