teaching, he pursued a course of medical studies, and in 1839, having completed them, collected his worldly goods and removed to Newmarket, a place presenting a larger field for practice. There he commenced in earnest his chosen profession; but being of a delicate constitution, the exposure incident to a physician's life soon told upon his limited strength; he sickened and died "ere the sun of his life had reached its meridian." leaving his widow, with two little children, in indigent circumstances, to combat with a cold and selfish world. A wealthy merchant of the place, having no children, wished to adopt young David, offering to give him a college education, and leave him heir to his worldly possessions; but with a mother's love for her offspring, Mrs. Jewell refused the offer, and resolved to rear and educate her children as well as her limited means would allow. Being a woman of undaunted spirit, she opened a boarding-house for factory operatives, when factory girls were the intelligent daughters of New England farmers, who regarded this new industry as a most favorable opportunity for an honorable employment.
Having brothers in Massachusetts, and thinking to better sustain herself and children, Mrs. Jewell removed to Newton Upper Falls, Mass., following there the same occupation. In that village young Jewell first attended school, the teacher of which was a former pupil of his father. To render his mother more substantial assistance than he could afford her by doing irksome chores, he went to work in the factory when but nine years of age. receiving for a day's work,—from quarter of five in the morning until half past seven in the evening,—the very munificent sum of sixteen cents a day, or one dollar a week. He worked nine months and attended school three, every year, until he was nearly thirteen years of age, when the close confinement was found detrimental to his health, and he was taken from the mill and placed on a farm. The next three years he passed in healthful happy, out door work. Returning home from the farm, strong, robust and vigorous, he reentered the mill, where he was variously occupied, becoming familiar with the operations of the numerous machines in each department, but more particularly those pertaining to the carding-room, where his step-father, Thomas Truesdell (his mother having married again), was an overseer, learning as he pursued his work, gradually and insensibly, things that to-day are of incalculable benefit for the business in which he is now engaged. He little thought, however, when moving his stool from place to place, in order to facilitate his labor, he would some day be at the head of similar works, many times greater in magnitude, than those in which he was then engaged.
His inherited mechanical taste was developed by his life among machinery, and when he was seventeen years of age he gladly entered a machine-shop. Here his ready perception of form rendered his work attractive and his improvement rapid. Before completing his apprenticeship he felt keenly the want of a better education, and determined to obtain it. His exchequer was very low, but having the confidence of friends he readily obtained a loan, and in the spring of 1855, entered the Wesleyan Academy, at Wilbraham, Mass. The Principal, after a casual examination, said, "Well, you don't know much, do you?" Being quick at repartee, young Jewell replied: "No, sir. If I did, I would not be here." This brief sip at the fountain of knowledge only increased his thirst for more, and in September of the same year he entered the State Normal School, Bridgewater, Mass., under the regime of Marshall Conant, a life-long friend and counselor.
Mr. Jewell from the first was a favorite among his class-mates, courteous, genial, pleasant in disposition, somewhat careless withal, but physically vigorous and always the first at athletic sports when relieved from study. Mathematics, of which he was very fond, and Natural Philosophy, were his favorite branches
