gradually succeeded. In the midst of incessant toil, he labored to carry forward the cultivation of his mind, studying even astronomy, history, and metaphysics. He was induced to pursue the latter study chiefly because it required fewer books to consult than either of the others. "It appeared to be a thorny path," he said, "but I determined, nevertheless, to enter, and accordingly began to tread it."

III.29

Added to his labors in shoemaking and metaphysics, Drew became a local preacher and a class leader; over-flowing with activity he also entered eagerly into the discussion of politics, and he even ran some risk of becoming a gad-about and busybody. Politicians resorted to his shoemaking shop to talk politics, and he went to theirs for a similar purpose. This so encroached uponhis time that he found it necessary sometimes to work until midnight to make up for the hours lost during the day. Shoemakers are proverbially political characters, and Drew's fervor soon became the talk of the village. While busy one night hammering away at a shoe-sole, a little boy, seeing a light in the shop, put his mouth to the keyhole of the door, and called out in a shrill pipe, "Shoemaker! shoemaker! work by night and run about by day!" A friend, to whom Drew afterwards told the story, asked, "And did you not run after the boy, and strap him?" "No, no," was the reply; "had a pistol been fired off at my ear, I could not have been more dismayed or confounded. I dropped my