Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

[Simon Spero <ses AT unc.edu>]

Thomas Beckett wrote:

> And remember, a Sweep is as lucky as lucky can be!

The really lucky ones get to run Linux: 
http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/swann/waterbabies/images/09967us2.jpg

( http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext97/wtrbs10h.htm )

Once upon a time there was a little chimney-sweep, and his name was Tom. 
That is a short name, and you have heard it before, so you will not have 
much trouble in remembering it. He lived in a great town in the North 
country, where there were plenty of chimneys to sweep, and plenty of 
money for Tom to earn and his master to spend. He could not read nor 
write, and did not care to do either; and he never washed himself, for 
there was no water up the court where he lived. He had never been taught 
to say his prayers. He never had heard of God, or of Christ, except in 
words which you never have heard, and which it would have been well if 
he had never heard. He cried half his time, and laughed the other half. 
He cried when he had to climb the dark flues, rubbing his poor knees and 
elbows raw; and when the soot got into his eyes, which it did every day 
in the week; and when his master beat him, which he did every day in the 
week; and when he had not enough to eat, which happened every day in the 
week likewise. And he laughed the other half of the day, when he was 
tossing halfpennies with the other boys, or playing leap-frog over the 
posts, or bowling stones at the horses’ legs as they trotted by, which 
last was excellent fun, when there was a wall at hand behind which to 
hide. As for chimney-sweeping, and being hungry, and being beaten, he 
took all that for the way of the world, like the rain and snow and 
thunder, and stood manfully with his back to it till it was over, as his 
old donkey did to a hail-storm; and then shook his ears and was as jolly 
as ever; and thought of the fine times coming, when he would be a man, 
and a master sweep, and sit in the public-house with a quart of beer and 
a long pipe, and play cards for silver money, and wear velveteens and 
ankle-jacks, and keep a white bull-dog with one gray ear, and carry her 
puppies in his pocket, just like a man. And he would have apprentices, 
one, two, three, if he could. How he would bully them, and knock them 
about, just as his master did to him; and make them carry home the soot 
sacks, while he rode before them on his donkey, with a pipe in his mouth 
and a flower in his button-hole, like a king at the head of his army. 
Yes, there were good times coming; and, when his master let him have a 
pull at the leavings of his beer, Tom was the jolliest boy in the whole 
town.