My Trip to New York
Though a brother, I was his apprentice and he considered himself my master. He expected the same services from me as he would from another; while I thought he asked too much of a brother. Our arguments were often brought before our father, and I guess I was either generally in right, or else a better debater, because the judgment was usually in my favor. But I disliked any my apprenticeship and wished for some opportunity to end it. I sold some of my books to get a little money and, with the help of a friend, made arrangements for my trip with a captain of a New York ship.
I three days I found myself in New York, nearly 300 miles from home. I was but a boy of 17, without the least recommendation to or knowledge of any person in the place, and with very little money in my pocket.
Having a trade, and supposing myself a good worker, I offered my services to the printer in the place, old Mr. William Bradford, who had been the first printer in Pennsylvania before he moved to New York. He could give me no employment, but he said, “My son at Philadelphia need assistant and if you go there, I believe he may hire you.”
Philadelphia was 100 miles further. I started out, however, and leaving my trunk of clothes to follow me by a larger ship. I hired a small boat to carry me as far as Amboy. Just outside New York harbor, a storm drove the little boat upon the shore of Long Island. With night approaching, the boatman and I had no choice but to wait until the wind stopped. We tried to sleep but we were so crowded and uncomfortable with the water crashing over the boat and leaking through to us, we had very little rest that night. We managed to reach Amboy the next evening, having been thirty hours on the water without food or any drink.
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