It's not so easy
as you might suppose. I played it on being a shipwrecked mariner from
Blyth; I don't know where Blyth is, do you? but I thought it sounded
natural. I begged from a little beast of a schoolboy, and he forked out
a bit of twine, and asked me to make a clove hitch; I did, too, I know I
did, but he said it wasn't, he said it was a granny's knot, and I was a
what-d'ye-call-'em, and he would give me in charge. Then I begged from
a naval officer--he never bothered me with knots, but he only gave me
a tract; there's a nice account of the British navy!--and then from a
widow woman that sold lollipops, and I got a hunch of bread from her.
Another party I fell in with said you could generally always get bread;
and the thing to do was to break a plateglass window and get into gaol;
seemed rather a brilliant scheme. Pass the beef.'
'Why didn't you stay at Browndean?' Morris ventured to enquire.
'Skittles!' said John. 'On what? The Pink Un and a measly religious
paper? I had to leave Browndean; I had to, I tell you. I got tick at
a public, and set up to be the Great Vance; so would you, if you were
leading such a beastly existence! And a card stood me a lot of ale and
stuff, and we got swipey, talking about music-halls and the piles of tin
I got for singing; and then they got me on to sing "Around her splendid
form I weaved the magic circle," and then he said I couldn't be Vance,
and I stuck to it like grim death I was.
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