I was so
busy I did not hear them till I was caught by the legs and swung
to a shoulder, where I sat kicking. 'You see his tastes, William,'
said my grandfather to my father; 'he's white o' face and slim o'
body, but he'll no carry on your hopes.' And more he said to the
point, though what it was I knew not. But I think it to have been
suggestion (I heard him say it later) that I would bring Glasgow up
to London by the sword (good doting soul!) as my father brought it
by manufactures, gaining honour thereby.
"However that may be, I would not rest till my grandfather had put
the musket into my arms. I could scarcely lift it, but from the
first it had a charm for me, and now and then, in spite of my
mother's protests, I was let to handle it, to learn its parts, to
burnish it, and by-and-bye--I could not have been more than six
years old--to rest it on a rock and fire it off. It kicked my
shoulder roughly in firing, but I know I did not wink as I pulled
the trigger. Then I got a wild hunger to fire it at all times; so
much so, indeed, that powder and shot were locked up, and the musket
was put away in my grandfather's chest.
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