Wilbur Cowan partook of this pessimism about the craft, and wondered if his father had heard the news.  If it had ceased to be important that a bright boy should set up a column of long primer, leaded, in a day, he might as well learn some other loose trade in which they couldn’t invent a machine to take the bread out of your mouth.  It was that summer he spent many forenoons on the steps of the ice wagon driven by his good friend, Bill Bardin.  Bill said you made good-enough money delivering ice, and it was pleasant on a hot morning to rumble along the streets on the back steps of the covered wagon, cooled by the great blocks of ice still in its sawdust.

When they came to a house that took only twenty-five pounds Bill would let him carry it in with the tongs—­unless it was one where Bill, a knightly person, chanced to sustain more or less social relations with the bondmaid.  And you could chip off pieces of ice to hold in your mouth, or cool your bare feet in the cold wet sawdust; and you didn’t have to be anywhere at a certain hour, but could just loaf along, giving people their ice when you happened to get there.  He wondered, indeed, if delivering ice were not as loose a trade as typesetting had been, and whether his father would approve of it.  It was pleasanter than sitting in a dusty printing office, and the smells were less obtrusive.  Also, Bill Bardin went about bareheaded and clad above the waist only in a sleeveless jersey that was tight across his broad chest and gave his big arms free play.  He chewed tobacco, too, like a printer, but cautioned his young helper against this habit in early youth.  He said if indulged in at too tender an age it turned your blood to water and you died in great suffering.  Wilbur longed for the return of his father, so he could tell him about the typesetting machine and about this other good loose trade that had opened so opportunely.

And there were other trades—­seemingly loose enough—­in which one drove the most delightful wagons, and which endured the year round and not, as with the ice trade, merely for the summer.  There was, for example, driving an express wagon.  Afternoons, when the ice chests of Newbern had been replenished and Bill Bardin disappeared in the more obscure interests of his craft, Wilbur would often ride with Rufus Paulding, Newbern’s express agent.  Rufus drove one excellent horse to a smart green wagon, and brought packages from the depot, which he delivered about the town.  Being a companionable sort, he was not averse to Wilbur Cowan’s company on his cushioned seat.  It was not as cool work as delivering ice, and lacked a certain dash of romance present in the other trade, but it was lively and interesting in its own way, especially when Rufus would remain on his seat and let him carry packages in to people with a book for them to sign.