Giles had seniority at the ironworks and so had no trouble arranging the boy's transfer to the finery. There Giles put him to work handling the long iron bar with which three or four pigs at a time were maneuvered so that the bellows-heated charcoal would melt them uniformly. The boy developed a nice touch, and Giles soon found himself paying a compliment.
"You have a good hand and a natural wit for this trade, Joseph. You have an agreeable disposition, too — except, as I've noticed when the other apprentices rag you about your stepfather's occupation. Take a leaf from the owner's book. He's strong-minded, all right. But he knows it's better to hide it sometimes. He sells his product with smiles and soft words, not by bludgeoning his customers when they resist."
Privately, the older man doubted the boy would listen. The mold of Joseph's life was already formed, and the molten iron of his character was already pouring into it; circumstances and illiterate parents had no doubt condemned the boy to a life of obscurity. Unless, of course, one of his occasional violent outbursts didn't condemn him to death in a brawl first.
Yet, perhaps because Giles was growing older and realized that he had been foolish when he chose a bachelor's life, he continued to encourage Joseph. He taught him not only the trade of ironmaking but its lore.
"Iron rules the world, my boy. It breaks the sod and spans the continents — wins the wars, too.'' The Archer furnace cast cannonballs for the Navy.