Note 1 — Chapter XII · PLASTER OF PARIS IN AGRICULTURE

“Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, North America, in 1706. He was the youngest1 of seventeen children. Hence, as his father was a poor tallow-chandler and soap-boiler, he could not acquire at home anything beyond a knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic. At ten years of age he was taken from school and set to performing small tasks about the house. He cut candle-wicks and poured the tallow into the molds, waited on customers in his father’s shop, and ran errands. His work brought him in a few pence which he did not yet know how to spend judiciously. He tells us the following little story on this subject, which we may all profit by.