What Happened to Tad by Mary E. Ropes — Read

OLD Renard, as Tad soon found, was a Jack-of-all-trades. He could turn his hand to most things, though he did no sort of work well or thoroughly. But he was a bit of a tinker, a basket-maker, and mender; he could do a bit of rough cobbling for any villager who wanted a pair of boots mended; he could put a passable patch in a pair of trousers; and he could even play the dentist after a fashion of his own, and take out teeth, often getting a sound tooth by mistake, and very cheerfully giving any amount of pain for his fee.

Then, too, he was a bit of a pedlar, and generally carried about with him a box of cheap jewellery, relics, and knick-knacks, on which, by aid of his glib tongue, he made a fair profit. He also sold patent pills and ointments and quack remedies to the ignorant folk, besides earning many a dishonest penny by the telling of their fortunes. But it was by the lads in his employ that he made the most regular part of his income, and Tad soon found that his new work was by no means a bed of roses, and that old Foxy was quite as fully bent upon making him serve with rigour, as were the old Egyptian task-masters with their Israelite bondsmen.