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CHAPTER I.
BEN BRUSTLES was only a poor shoeblack-boy who cleaned boots--ay, and
even shoes, for his daily bread. Such time as he could spare from his
avocation he devoted to diligent study of the doctrine of chance, as
exemplified in the practice of pitch-and-toss. Often and often, after
pitching and tossing in the cold wet streets for long weary hours,
he would return home without a halfpenny. Think of this, ye more
fortunate youths, who sit at home at ease, and play Loto for nuts! But
through all his vicissitudes, BEN kept a stout heart, never losing his
conviction that something--he knew not what--would eventually turn up.
Sometimes it was heads, at others tails: and in either case the poor
boy lost money by it--but he persevered notwithstanding, confident
that Fortune would favour him at last. It is this spirit of undaunted
enterprise that has made our England what it is!
[Illustration: Brustles Blacking.]
And one day Fortune did favour him. He observed, as he knelt before
his box, a portly and venerable person close by, who was engrossed
in studying, with apparent complacency, his own reflection in a
plate-glass shop-front.
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