Explore "The Story of Pip as Told by Himself*" by Charles Dickens on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
At this time I was only an errand boy around the forge, and my education was limited to spelling out the names on the tombstones. So in the evenings they sent me to school to Mr. Wopsle's aunt, a worthy woman who used to go to sleep regularly from six to seven while her small class was supposed to study.
But I was lucky enough to find a friend in her granddaughter, Biddy. She was about my own age, and, while her shoes were generally untied and her hands sometimes dirty, her heart was in the right place and she had a good head. So with her help I struggled through my letters as if they had been a bramble-bush, getting considerably worried and scratched by each letter in turn. Then came the dreaded nine figures to add to my troubles. But at last I learned to read and cipher.