A TRUE 'AMBITION. (To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.")
Silt,--Will you allow me to bring before your notice the follow- ing case, which, I believe, only needs to be stated in order to- call forth the sympathy which it deserves P—There is at Heb- burn, which adjoins my parish, a lad who has been working in.
coal•pits since he was eight years old. A few years since, seeing another boy reducing a pound to farthings with a bit of chalk, he was fired with the ambition to educate himself. In four months in his spare hours he did 1,150 sums. He has since then taken up Greek, Latin, German, algebra, and history, at first from pure love of study, but latterly the desire to become. a teacher has possessed him. The extraordinary part of my story, however, is yet to be told. In order to support himself he has to work in the pit from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. At 7 a.m. he goes to bed and sleeps till 12, when he gets up and comes to the• board school here, nearly a mile distant, where he works till 4 p.m. On his return home, he frequently studies for three hours more before returning to his night-work in the pit. He has recently sat for a Queen's scholarship at the diocesan training college, which I fully believe he would have passed but for his writing. The hard work of hewing, &c., so. uuoteaclies his hand, that he despairs of succeeding in the examination in July (when he is to sit again), unless he can find some lighter employment in the meantime. I can not but hope, however, that when his ease is known, he- may be set free to devote himself entirely to his books till the time of the examination. " If I could but get my foot on the lowest rung of the ladder, I feel sure I could get up." These are his own words, which Ought to plead better than I can do. I feel I cannot convey the deep interest which this case has excited in my own mind, and in that of Mr. Wilier, head master of the Grange Board School here, who has been the lad's beat friend. I can only say that he or I will thankfully receive any subscriptions which your readers may think well to bestow.
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