I had no hesitation in deciding to
be an engineer, though my father wished me to be a barrister.
But I kept constant to my resolution; and eventually he
succeeded, through his early acquaintance with George Stephenson,
in gaining for me an entrance to the engineering works of Robert
Stephenson and Co., at Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I started there as a
pupil on my fifteenth birthday, for an apprenticeship of five
years. I was to spend the first four years in the various
workshops, and the last year in the drawing-office.
I was now in my element. The working hours, it is true, were
very long,--being from six in the morning until 8.15 at night;
excepting on Saturday, when we knocked off at four. However, all
this gave me so much the more experience; and, taking advantage
of it, I found that, when I had reached the age of eighteen, I
was intrusted with the full charge of erecting one side of a
locomotive. I had to accomplish the same amount of work as my
mate on the other side, one Murray Playfair, a powerful,
hard-working Scotchman. My strength and endurance were sometimes
taxed to the utmost, and required the intervals of my labour to
be spent in merely eating and sleeping.
I afterwards went through the machine-shops. I was fortunate
enough to get charge of the best screw-cutting and brass-turning
lathe in the shop; the former occupant, Jack Singleton, having
just been promoted to a foreman's berth at the Messrs.
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