DAVID COPPERFIELD

ELECBOOK CLASSICS
DAVID
COPPERFIELD
Charles Dickens
ELECBOOK CLASSICS
ebc0004. Charles Dickens: David Copperfield
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DAVID
COPPERFIELD
THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND
EXPERIENCE OF DAVID
COPPERFIELD THE YOUNGER
CHARLES DICKENS
AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED TO
THE HON. Mr. AND Mrs RICHARD WATSON,
OF ROCKINGHAM, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.
David Copperfield
4
Contents
Ck on number to go to Chapter
Chapter 1. I AM BORN.......................................................................10
Chapter 2. I OBSERVE ......................................................................26
Chapter 3. I HAVE A CHANGE ........................................................46
Chapter 4. I FALL INTO DISGRACE..............................................67
Chapter 5. I AM SENT AWAY FROM HOME................................93
Chapter 6. I ENLARGE MY CIRCLE OF
AQUAINTANCE ..............................................................................118
Chapter 7. MY ‘FIRST HALF’ AT SALEM HOUSE ...................128
Chapter 8. MY HOLIDAYS. ESPECIALLY ONE
HAPPY AFTERNOON ......................................................................152
Chapter 9. I HAVE A MEMORABLE BIRTHDAY ......................173
Chapter 10. I BECOME NEGLECTED, AND AM
PROVIDED FOR ................................................................................189
Chapter 11. I BEGIN LIFE ON MY OWN ACOUNT,
AND DON’T LIKE IT.........................................................................216
Chapter 12. LIKING LIFE ON MY OWN AOUNT
NO BETTER, I FORM A GREAT RESOLUTION ........................238
Chapter 13. THE SEQUEL OF MY RESOLUTION ....................251
Chapter 14. MY AUNT MAKES UP HER MIND
ABOUT ME..........................................................................................278
Chapter 15. I MAKE ANOTHER BEGINNING ...........................300
Chapter 16. I AM A NEW BOY IN MORE SENSES
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THAN ONE..........................................................................................313
Chapter 17. SOMEBODY TURNS UP...........................................342
Chapter 18. A RETROSPECT .........................................................366
Chapter 19. I LOOK ABOUT ME, AND MAKE A
DISCOVERY .......................................................................................376
Chapter 20. STEERFORTH’S HOME ...........................................399
Chapter 21. LITTLE EM’LY............................................................411
Chapter 22. SOME OLD SCENES, AND SOME NEW
PEOPLE...............................................................................................438
Chapter 23. I CORROBORATE MR. DICK, AND
CHOOSE A PROFESSION...............................................................468
Chapter 24. MY FIRST DISSIPATION .........................................488
Chapter 25. GOOD AND BAD ANGELS .......................................500
Chapter 26. I FALL INTO CAPTIVITY.........................................527
Chapter 27. TOMMY TRADDLES .................................................548
Chapter 28. Mr. MICAWBER’S GAUNTLET ...............................561
Chapter 29. I VISIT STEERFORTH AT HIS HOME,
AGAIN ..................................................................................................588
Chapter 30. A LOSS..........................................................................598
Chapter 31. A GREATER LOSS .....................................................609
Chapter 32. THE BEGINNING OF A LONG
JOURNEY............................................................................................622
Chapter 33. BLISSFUL....................................................................647
Chapter 34. MY AUNT ASTONISHES ME ..................................670
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Chapter 35. DEPRESSION..............................................................682
Chapter 36. ENTHUSIASM.............................................................710
Chapter 37. A LITTLE COLD WATER .........................................733
Chapter 38. A DISSOLUTION OF PARTNERSHIP...................744
Chapter 39. WICKFIELD AND HEEP...........................................767
Chapter 40. THE WANDERER.......................................................793
Chapter 41. DORA’S AUNTS ..........................................................805
Chapter 42. MISCHIEF....................................................................827
Chapter 43. ANOTHER RETROSPECT .......................................854
Chapter 44. OUR HOUSEKEEPING .............................................865
Chapter 45. Mr. DICK FULFILS MY AUNT’S
PREDICTIONS ...................................................................................886
Chapter 46. INTELLIGENCE .........................................................907
Chapter 47. MARTHA ......................................................................926
Chapter 48. DOMESTIC...................................................................941
Chapter 49. I AM INVOLVED IN MYSTERY ..............................956
Chapter 50. Mr. PEGGOTTY’S DREAM COMES
TRUE ....................................................................................................973
Chapter 51. THE BEGINNING OF A LONGER
JOURNEY............................................................................................987
Chapter 52. I ASSIST AT AN EXPLOSION...............................1010
Chapter 53. ANOTHER RETROSPECT .....................................1042
Chapter 54. Mr. MICAWBER’S TRANSACTIONS ...................1049
Chapter 55. TEMPEST...................................................................1070
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Chapter 56. THE NEW WOUND, AND THE OLD ....................1086
Chapter 57. THE EMIGRANTS....................................................1095
Chapter 58. ABSENCE...................................................................1110
Chapter 59. RETURN.....................................................................1119
Chapter 60. AGNES ........................................................................1141
Chapter 61. I AM SHOWN TWO INTERESTING
PENITENTS .....................................................................................1153
Chapter 62. A LIGHT SHINES ON MY WAY ............................1170
Chapter 63. A VISITOR..................................................................1182
Chapter 64. A LAST RETROSPECT ...........................................1193
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PREFACE TO 1850 EDITION
do not fid it easy to get sufficiently far away fro this Bok,
in th first sensations of having finished it, to refer to it wth
th composure which this formal headig would se to
require My interest in it, is so recent and strong; and my mind is
s divided between pleasure and regret—plasure i th
acevemet of a lg degn, regret in the sparation from many
cpan—that I am i danger of wearying the reader whom I
love, with persal confidences, and private emtions.
Besides which, all that I could say of th Story, to any purpo,
I have endeavoured to say in it.
It would coern the reader lttle, perhaps, to know, how
sorrofully th pen is laid dow at th cl of a tw-years’
imagiative task; or ho an Authr fes as if he were dismsing
some portion of himself into th shadowy world, w a crod of
the creature of his brai are gog from him for ever. Yet, I have
nothing el to tell; unless, indeed, I were to confe (wich might
be of less moment still) that no on can ever believe this Narrative,
in th reading, more than I have believed it in th writing.
Intead of lookig back, therefore, I will lok forward. I cannot
cose this Volum mre agreeably to mysf, than with a hopeful
glan towards the tim when I shal again put forth my two gree
leave once a month, and with a faithful remembrance of th
geal sun and showers that have falen on the laves of David
Cpperfield, and made me happy.
Londo, October, 1850.
I
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PREFACE TO THE CHARLES DICKENS
EDITION
I
rearked in the origial Prefac to th Book, that I did not
find it easy to get sufficiently far away fro it, in th first
sensation of having finished it, to refer to it wth th
mposure which this formal heading would see to require My
interest in it was so recent and strong, and my md was so
divided between plasure and regret—plasure in th
acevemet of a lg degn, regret in the sparation from many
companions—that I was in danger of wearying th reader wth
persal confidences and private emtions.
Besides which, all that I could have said of th Story to any
purpose, I had endeavoured to say in it.
It would coern the reader little, perhaps, to know how
sorrofully th pen is laid dow at th cl of a tw-years’
imagiative task; or ho an Authr fes as if he were dismsing
some portion of himself into th shadowy world, w a crod of
the creature of hi brai are gog from him for ever. Yet, I had
nothing el to tell; unless, indeed, I were to confe (wich might
be of less moment still), that no on can ever believe this
Narrative, in the readig, mre than I beved it in the writig.
So true are the avowal at the present day, that I can no
nly take th reader into on confidence more Of all my books, I
like th th best. It will be easily believed that I am a fod parent
to every chd of my fany, and that n one can ever love that
family as dearly as I love th But, like many fond parents, I have
in my heart of hearts a favourite chid. And hi name is DAVID
1869
COPPERFIELD.
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Chapter 1
I AM BORN
W
hether I sal turn out to be the hero of my own life, or
wthr that station wi be hed by anybody el, th
pages must show. To begin my life with the beginnig
of my lfe, I recrd that I was born (as I have be informed and
believe) o a Friday, at twve o’clock at night. It was remarked
that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, siultaneusly.
In coderati of the day and hour of my birth, it was
deared by the nurse, and by so sage wo i th
ghbourhood who had take a lvely interest in m sveral
month before thre was any possibility of our beming
personally acquaited, first, that I was detid to be unlucky in
life; and secondly, that I was privileged to se ghts and spirits;
both thes gifts invitably attacg, as they beved, to al
unlucky infants of eithr gender, born toards th sall hurs o
a Friday night.
I nd say nthing here, on the first head, beause nothing can
sho better than my history whthr that prediction was verifid
or falsified by th result. On th send branch of th queti, I
wll only reark, that unles I ran through that part of my
inheritance while I was still a baby, I have not come into it yet. But
I do not at al coplai of having be kept out of this property;
and if anybody el should be in th pret ejoymt of it, h is
heartiy wee to keep it.
I was born with a caul, which was advertised for sale, i th
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nespapers, at th low price of fiften guineas. Whthr sea-going
peopl were short of moy about that tim, or were short of faith
and preferred cork jackets, I don’t kn; all I know is, that thre
was but one solitary biddig, and that was from an attorney
connected with th bill-broking busine, w offered tw pounds
i cas, and the balane in sherry, but deed to be guaranteed
fro droning o any highr bargain. Consequently th
advertisement was withdrawn at a dead loss—for as to sherry, my
poor dear mother’s own sherry was i the market then—and te
years afterwards, th caul was put up in a raffle dow in our part
of the country, to fifty mbers at half-a-crown a head, the winr
to spend five shillings. I was pret myself, and I remember to
ave felt quite unmfortabl and confusd, at a part of myself
beg diposed of in that way. The caul was won, I rect, by an
old lady with a hand-basket, who, very reluctantly, produced from
it th stipulated five shillings, all in halfpence, and twpe
halfpey short—as it took an ime tim and a great waste of
arithtic, to endeavour withut any effect to prove to her. It is a
fact wh wi be log rebered as rearkabl do there,
that she was never drod, but died triumphantly in bed, at
nnety-two. I have understood that it was, to the last, her proudet
boast, that sh nver had be on the water i her lfe, excpt
upon a bridge; and that over her tea (to w se was extremely
partial) she, to th last, expressed her indignation at th impiety of
marinrs and others, who had the presumpti to go ‘meandering’
about the world. It was i vai to repret to her that s
nveiences, tea perhaps included, resulted fro this
objectionabl practice. She alays returnd, with greater
ephasis and with an instinctive knledge of th strength of her
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objection, ‘Let us have no meanderig.’
Not to meander mysf, at pret, I wi go back to my birth.
I was born at Blundersto, in Suffolk, or ‘thre by’, as they say
in Sctland. I was a posthumous chid. My fathr’s eye had closd
upon the light of this world sx moths, when mi oped o it.
There is sothing strange to me, eve now, i the refletio that
h never saw me; and something stranger yet in th shadoy
remembran that I have of my first childish assocations wth h
te grave-stone in the churcyard, and of the indefinabl
mpassion I usd to fe for it lying out al thre in th dark
nght, when our little parlour was warm and bright with fire and
candl, and the doors of our house were—alost cruely, it
sed to me sometimes—bolted and locked against it.
An aunt of my fathr’s, and consequently a great-aunt of mine,
of w I shall have more to relate by and by, was th principal
magnate of our family. Mi Trotwd, or Miss Betsy, as my poor
mther alays caled her, when she suffictly overcam her
dread of this formidable persage to mention her at all (wich
was sedom), had be married to a husband younger than hersef,
who was very hands, except in the see of the homely adage,
‘hands is, that handsome doe’—for he was strongly suspected
of having beaten Mis Betsey, and even of having onc, on a
disputed queti of supplies, made some hasty but determd
arrangemets to throw her out of a two pair of stairs’ window.
Th evidences of an inmpatibiity of temper iduced Mi
Betsey to pay him off, and effect a separatio by mutual cot.
He went to India with his capital, and there, accrdig to a wild
legend in our family, he was oce see riding o an ephant, i
pany with a Baboon; but I think it must have been a Baboo—
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or a Begum. Anyhow, from India tidigs of hi death reached
home, with te years How they affected my aunt, nobody knew;
for imdiately upo the separation, she took her maide nam
again, bought a cottage in a hamlet on th sea-coast a long way off,
establd herself there as a sgle woan with one srvant, and
was understod to live secluded, ever afterwards, in an inflxibl
retiremt.
My father had onc been a favourite of hers, I beeve; but s
was mortaly affronted by his marriage, on the ground that my
mothr was ‘a wax dol’. She had never see my mothr, but she
kn her to be nt yet twenty. My father and Mis Betsey never
met again. He was double my mothr’s age wh he marrid, and
of but a deate cotitution. He did a year afterwards, and, as I
have said, six month before I came into the world.
This was the state of matters, on the afternoon of, what I may
be excused for calling, that evetful and important Friday. I can
ake n caim therefore to have known, at that tim, how matters
stood; or to have any remebrane, founded on the evide of
my own senses, of what follows.
My mother was sitting by the fire, but poorly i health, and very
low in spirits, lookig at it through her tears, and despondig
heaviy about herself and the fatherl little stranger, who was
already welcomd by some grosses of prophtic pi, in a drawer
upstairs, to a wrld nt at al excted on the subject of his arrival;
my mother, I say, was sitting by the fire, that bright, windy March
aftern, very timid and sad, and very doubtful of ever coming
alve out of the trial that was before her, when, lifting her eye as
e drid them, to the widow oppote, se saw a strange lady
cg up the garde
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My mther had a sure forebodig at the send glanc, that it
was Mis Betsey. The setting sun was glowing on the strange lady,
over the garden-fenc, and se cam walkig up to the door with a
fel rigidity of figure and coposure of cuntenan that culd
have belonged to nobody el
When se reached the house, se gave another proof of her
idetity. My father had often hinted that sh sdom cducted
hrsf like any ordinary Christian; and now, instead of ringing th
be, she came and looked in at that idential wido, presing th
d of her no against the glas to that extent, that my poor dear
mothr usd to say it became perfetly flat and white in a moment.
Sh gave my mother suc a turn, that I have always be
nvinced I am indebted to Miss Betsy for having be born o a
Friday.
My mother had left her cair i her agitati, and gone bend
it in th cornr. Miss Betsy, lookig round th ro, sly and
inquiringly, began on th othr side, and carrid her eye o, like
a Saracen’s Head in a Dutc clk, until thy reached my mothr.
Then she made a frown and a geture to my mother, lke one w
was acustomed to be obeyed, to co and open the door. My
mothr went.
‘Mrs. David Copperfield, I think,’ said Miss Betsy; th
phasis referring, perhaps, to my mothr’s mournng weds, and
hr condition.
‘Yes,’ said my mother, faitly.
‘Miss Trotwd,’ said th visitor. ‘You have heard of her, I dare
ay?’
My mothr answered she had had that pleasure. And she had a
disagreabl consciusness of not appearing to imply that it had
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be an overpowring pleasure
‘Now you see her,’ said Mis Betsey. My mother bet her head,
and begged her to walk in
They went into the parlour my mother had c from, the fire
i the bet room on the other side of the pasage not being
lghted—nt having be lghted, inded, si my father’s
funeral; and when they were both seated, and Mi Betsey said
nthing, my mther, after vaiy trying to restrai hersef, began
to cry. ‘Oh tut, tut, tut!’ said Miss Betsy, in a hurry. ‘Do’t do that!
Cme, come!’
My mothr couldn’t hep it notwithtanding, so she cried unti
e had had her cry out.
‘Take off your cap, child,’ said Mi Betsey, ‘and lt me see you.’
My mothr was to much afraid of hr to refuse compliance
with this odd request, if sh had any dipotion to do s
Therefore she did as she was tod, and did it with suc nrvous
hands that her hair (wich was luxuriant and beautiful) fe al
about her fac
‘Why, bls my heart!’ exclaimed Miss Betsey. ‘You are a very
Baby!’
My mother was, no doubt, unusualy youthful in appearan
even for her years; she hung her head, as if it were her fault, poor
thing, and said, sobbing, that indeed she was afraid she was but a
childish widow, and would be but a chidish mothr if she lived. In
a short paus w ensued, she had a fancy that she felt Miss
Betsey touch her hair, and that with no ungentl hand; but,
lookig at her, in her timd hope, sh found that lady sitting with
th skirt of hr dress tucked up, her hands foded on on knee,
and her feet upon the fender, frowng at the fire
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‘In the name of Heaven,’ said Miss Betsey, suddeny, ‘why
Rookery?’
‘Do you mean th house, ma’am?’ asked my mothr.
‘Why Rookery?’ said Mis Betsey. ‘Cookery would have been
more to th purpo, if you had had any practical ideas of life,
either of you.’
‘The nam was Mr. Copperfield’s choic,’ returned my mther.
‘When he bought the house, he liked to think that there were
rooks about it.’
The evenig wid made suc a diturbane just no, amg
s tall od e-tree at the bottom of the garde, that nether
my mothr nor Miss Betsy could forbear glanng that way. As
th elms bent to on anthr, like giants wh were whispering
secrets, and after a fe sends of such repose, fe into a vit
flurry, tossing thr wild arm about, as if thr late confideces
were realy too wicked for their peac of mid, so
weatherbeaten ragged old rooks’-nets, burdeg their higher
branche, swung like wreks upo a stormy sea.
‘Where are the birds?’ asked Miss Betsey.
‘Th—?’ My mother had been thkig of somethg else.
‘The rooks—what has be of them?’ asked Mis Betsey.
‘There have not be any s we have lived here,’ said my
mther. ‘We thought—Mr. Copperfied thought—it was quite a
large rookery; but the nts were very old one, and the birds have
derted them a log whe.’
‘David Copperfield al over!’ crid Mi Betsey. ‘David
Copperfield from head to foot! Cal a house a rookery when
there’s not a rook near it, and take the birds on trust, beause he
sees the nets!’
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‘Mr. Copperfield,’ returned my mother, ‘is dead, and if you dare
to speak unkindly of him to me—’
My poor dear mothr, I suppos, had some momentary
itenti of ctting an asault and battery upon my aunt, who
culd easy have settled her with one hand, even if my mther had
be i far better training for suc an eunter than s was that
eveing. But it passed with th acti of rising fro her chair; and
she sat dow again very meekly, and faited.
When se cam to herself, or when Mi Betsey had retored
hr, whichever it was, she found th latter standing at th wdo
Th twilight was by this time shading dow into darkness; and
diy as they saw eac other, they could nt have do that
without the aid of the fire.
‘Well?’ said Miss Betsy, coming back to her chair, as if she had
only bee taking a casual look at th propect; ‘and w do you
expect—’
‘I am al i a tremble,’ faltered my mother. ‘I don’t kn wat’s
the matter. I shal di, I am sure!’
‘No, no, n,’ said Mi Betsey. ‘Have some tea.’
‘Oh dear me, dear me, do you thk it w do me any god?’
cried my mothr in a helpless manr.
‘Of course it will,’ said Miss Betsy. ‘It’s nothg but fancy.
What do you cal your girl?’
‘I do’t know that it will be a girl, yet, ma’am,’ said my mother
innocently.
‘Bless th Baby!’ excaimed Miss Betsy, unnsciusly quoting
th send sentit of th pincus in th drawer upstairs, but
applying it to my mothr instead of me, ‘I don’t mean that. I mean
your servant-girl.’
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‘Peggotty,’ said my mother.
‘Peggotty!’ repeated Mis Betsey, with so indignati ‘Do
you mean to say, chd, that any human beg has gon ito a
Cristian church, and got hersf named Peggotty?’
‘It’s her surnam,’ said my mothr, faintly. ‘Mr. Cpperfield
calld hr by it, becaus her Christian name was th same as
mine.’
‘Here! Peggotty!’ crid Mis Betsey, opeg the parlour door.
‘Tea. Your mistress is a little un Don’t dawdl.’
Having issued this mandate with as much potentiality as if she
ad be a regnzed authrity in th house ever since it had
been a house, and having looked out to cofront the amazed
Peggotty cog along the pasage with a candl at the sund of a
strange voice, Miss Betsy shut th door again, and sat dow as
before: with her feet on the fender, the skirt of her dres tucked
up, and her hands folded on one knee.
‘You wre speaking about its beg a girl,’ said Miss Betsy. ‘I
have no doubt it wil be a girl. I have a pretimt that it must
be a girl Now chd, from the mot of the birth of this girl—’
‘Perhaps boy,’ my mother tok the liberty of puttig in.
‘I tel you I have a pretimt that it must be a girl,’ returned
Miss Betsy. ‘Do’t contradict. Fro th moment of this girl’s
birth, chd, I itend to be her fried. I intend to be her godmther,
and I beg you’l call her Betsey Trotwood Copperfied. There must
be no mistakes in life with this Betsey Trotwood. There must be n
trifling with her affections, poor dear. She must be we brought
up, and we guarded fro reposng any fo confidences whre
thy are not deserved. I must make that my care.’
There was a twitc of Mis Betsey’s head, after eac of thes
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senteces, as if hr on od wrogs were working within her, and
she repressed any plainer reference to th by strong constraint.
So my mothr suspected, at least, as she observed her by th low
glimmer of th fire: to much scared by Miss Betsy, to unasy in
hersef, and too subdued and bewildered altogether, to obsrve
anythg very clearly, or to kn what to say.
‘And was David god to you, chid?’ asked Mi Betsy, w
e had been sit for a lttle whe, and the motions of her head
had gradually ceased. ‘Were you cofortable together?’
‘We wre very happy,’ said my mothr. ‘Mr. Copperfield was
only too good to me’
‘What, he spoilt you, I suppo?’ returnd Miss Betsy.
‘For beg quite al and dependet on myself in this rough
rld agai, yes, I fear he did indeed,’ sobbed my mother.
‘Well! Don’t cry!’ said Miss Betsy. ‘You were not equally
matcd, child—if any tw people can be equally matcd—and so
I asked the question. You were an orphan, weren’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘And a governs?’
‘I was nursry-governess in a family whre Mr. Copperfield
came to vit. Mr. Copperfield was very kind to me, and tok a
great deal of ntic of m, and paid m a good deal of attenti,
and at last propod to me. And I accepted him. And so we were
marrid,’ said my mothr simply.
‘Ha! Por Baby!’ mused Miss Betsy, with her fron still bent
upon the fire. ‘Do you know anything?’
‘I beg your pardo, ma’am,’ faltered my mother.
‘About kepig house, for instance,’ said Mi Betsey.
‘Not much, I fear,’ returned my mother. ‘Not so much as I could
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wish. But Mr. Copperfield was teacng me—’
(‘Muc h kn about it hif!’) said Mi Betsy in a
parenthsis.
—‘Ad I hope I should have improved, beg very anxious to
larn, and he very patiet to teach me, if the great mfortune of
his death’—my mothr broke dow again here, and could get no
farther.
‘Well, we!’ said Miss Betsy.
—‘I kept my houskepig-book regularly, and balanced it with
Mr. Copperfield every night,’ cried my mothr in anothr burst of
distress, and breaking dow again.
‘Well, we!’ said Miss Betsy. ‘Do’t cry any more.’
—‘Ad I am sure we never had a word of difference respeting
it, except w Mr. Cpperfield objected to my thre and five
beg too muc like eac other, or to my putting curly tai to my
sevens and nis,’ resumed my mothr in anthr burst, and
breaking dow agai
‘You’ll make yourself ill,’ said Miss Betsy, ‘and you know that
wll not be god eithr for you or for my god-daughter. Cme! You
mustn’t do it!’
This argumet had so share i quieting my mther, though
hr increasing indisposition had a larger on Thre was an
interval of slence, only broke by Mi Betsy’s occasially
ejaculatig ‘Ha!’ as she sat with her feet upon the fender.
‘David had bought an anuity for himelf with his moy, I
kn,’ said she, by and by. ‘What did he do for you?’
‘Mr. Copperfield,’ said my mothr, answering with some
difficulty, ‘was so considerate and god as to secure th reversion
f a part of it to me.’
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‘How much?’ asked Miss Betsey.
‘A hundred and five pounds a year,’ said my mother.
‘He might have don worse,’ said my aunt.
The word was appropriate to the mot. My mother was s
uc worse that Peggotty, cog in with the teaboard and
candles, and seeng at a glance ho ill she was,—as Miss Betsy
mght have do sooner if there had be light eough,—
cveyed her upstairs to her own room with all sped; and
immediatey dispatcd Ham Peggotty, her nephe, wh had
be for some days past secreted in th house, unknn to my
mothr, as a specal messenger in case of emrgey, to fetc th
nurs and doctor.
Those aled pors were coderably astoed, when they
arrived within a few miutes of eac other, to find an unknown
lady of portetous appearance, sitting before th fire, wth hr
boet tied over her left arm, stoppig her ears wth jeweers’
ctton. Peggotty knowing nothing about her, and my mther
saying nothing about her, she was quite a mystery in th parlur;
and the fact of her having a magazi of jewellers’ ctton in her
pocket, and sticking th article in her ears in that way, did not
detract fro th solemnity of her prece.
Th doctor having bee upstairs and come dow again, and
having satisfied hif, I suppose, that thre was a probabiity of
this unknn lady and hif having to sit thre, face to face, for
some hours, laid hif out to be polite and social. He was th
eekest of his sex, the midest of little me He sidled i and out of
a ro, to take up th les space. He walked as softly as th Ghot
in Hamt, and more slowly. He carrid his head on on side,
partly in modest depreiati of himsef, partly in modest
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propitiati of everybody el. It is nothing to say that he hadn’t a
wrd to thro at a dog. He couldn’t have thro a word at a mad
dog. He might have offered him one gently, or half a one, or a
fragmt of one; for he spoke as slowly as he walked; but he
wuldn’t have bee rude to him, and he couldn’t have bee quick
with him, for any earthly coderatin.
Mr. Chillip, lookig mildly at my aunt with his head on on sde,
and making her a littl bow, said, in allusion to th jellers’
ctton, as he softly touched his left ear:
‘Some lcal irritati, ma’am?’
‘What!’ repld my aunt, pullg the cotton out of one ear lke a
cork.
Mr. Cillip was so alarmed by her abruptness—as he tod my
mothr afterwards—that it was a mercy he didn’t lose his prece
of mind. But he repeated sweetly:
‘Some lcal irritati, ma’am?’
‘Nonse!’ replied my aunt, and corked hrsf again, at o
blow
Mr. Cillip could do nothing after this, but sit and look at her
feebly, as she sat and looked at the fire, unti he was caled
upstairs again. After some quarter of an hour’s absence, he
returned.
‘We?’ said my aunt, takig the cotton out of the ear naret to
hi
‘Well, ma’am,’ returnd Mr. Chilp, ‘we are—we are
progressing slly, ma’am.’
‘Ba—a—ah!’ said my aunt, with a perfet shake o th
teptuous interjection. And corked hersef as before.
Really—really—as Mr. Chillip told my mothr, he was almost
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shoked; speaking i a profesional poit of vi alon, he was
alt shocked. But he sat and loked at her, notwithstandig, for
narly two hours, as s sat lookig at the fire, until he was again
alled out. After another abse, he agai returned.
‘Well?’ said my aunt, takig out the cotto on that side agai
‘Well, ma’am,’ returnd Mr. Chilp, ‘we are—we are
progressing
sloy, ma’am.’
‘Ya—a—ah!’ said my aunt. With such a snarl at him, that Mr.
illip absolutely could not bear it. It was really calulated to
break his spirit, he said afterwards. He preferred to go and sit
upon the stairs, i the dark and a strong draught, until he was
again sent for.
Ham Peggotty, who went to the national shool, and was a very
dragon at his catech, and who may therefore be regarded as a
credible wtns, reported next day, that happenng to peep in at
the parlour-door an hour after this, he was intantly deried by
Miss Betsy, th walking to and fro in a state of agitation, and
pounced upo before he could make his escape. That thre wre
now occasional sounds of fet and voices overhad which he
inferred th cotton did not exclude, fro th circumstance of h
vidently being clutched by th lady as a victim on wh to
xpend hr superabundant agitation wh th sounds were
loudet. That, marcng him constantly up and dow by th collar
(as if he had been takig too muc laudanum), se, at those tim,
shook him, rumpld his hair, made light of his lnen, stopped his
ears as if she cfounded them wth her own, and otherwis
tousled and maltreated hm. This was in part confirmed by hi
aunt, who saw him at half past twelve o’cock, soon after his
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release, and affirmd that he was th as red as I was.
Th mild Mr. Chillip could not posbly bear malice at such a
time, if at any time. He sidled into th parlur as soo as he was at
lberty, and said to my aunt in his meeket maner:
‘Well, ma’am, I am happy to congratulate you.’
‘What upo?’ said my aunt, sharply.
Mr. Chilp was fluttered agai, by the extreme severity of my
aunt’s manner; so he made her a littl bow and gave hr a lttl
smil, to molify her.
‘Mercy on th man, wat’s h doing!’ crid my aunt,
impatiently. ‘Can’t he speak?’
‘Be calm, my dear ma’am,’ said Mr. Chillip, in his softet
accents.
‘Thre is no longer any occasion for unasiness, ma’am Be
calm.’
It has since be considered almost a mirac that my aunt
didn’t shake him, and sake what he had to say, out of hi Sh
only shook her own head at him, but in a way that made h quai
‘Well, ma’am,’ resumed Mr. Cillip, as soo as h had courage, ‘I
am happy to congratulate you. All is now over, ma’am, and we
over.’
During the five miutes or so that Mr. Chp devoted to the
delivery of this oration, my aunt eyed him narroy.
‘Ho is she?’ said my aunt, folding her arm with hr bot
stil tied on one of them.
‘Well, ma’am, se wi soon be quite cofortable, I hope,’
returnd Mr. Cillip. ‘Quite as comfortabl as we can expect a
young mother to be, under thes melanholy doti
circumstance. Thre cant be any objection to your seng hr
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pretly, ma’am. It may do hr god.’
‘And she. Ho is she?’ said my aunt, sharply.
Mr. Chilp laid his head a little more on one sde, and looked at
my aunt like an amiabl bird.
‘Th baby,’ said my aunt. ‘How is she?’
‘Ma’am,’ returned Mr. Chip, ‘I apprehended you had known
It’s a boy.’
My aunt said nver a word, but took her bot by the strings,
in th manr of a sling, aimed a bl at Mr. Cillip’s had wth it,
put it on bent, walked out, and never came back. She vanished like
a disconteted fairy; or like on of th supernatural beings,
w it was popularly supposed I was entitld to see; and never
came back any more
No. I lay in my basket, and my mothr lay i hr bed; but
Betsey Trotwood Copperfid was for ever in the land of dream
and sadows, the tremendous region whenc I had so latey
travelld; and the light upon the window of our room shone out
upo th earthy bourne of all such travellers, and th mound
above the ashes and the dust that on was he, without whom I
had never been.
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Chapter 2
I OBSERVE
T
h first objects that assume a distict prece before me,
as I look far back, into th blank of my infany, are my
mther with her pretty hair and youthful sape, and
Peggotty with no shape at al, and eyes so dark that they seemed to
darke their whole neghbourhood in her fac, and ceeks and
arms so hard and red that I wodered th birds didn’t peck her in
preferenc to appl
I beeve I can reber the two at a little ditan apart,
dwarfed to my sight by stoopig down or kneelng on the floor,
and I going unteadiy from the one to the other. I have an
impresion on my mind which I cannot distiguish fro actual
rebrane, of the touch of Peggotty’s forefinger as she used to
hold it out to me, and of its beg roughened by ndlwork, like a
pocket nutmg-grater.
This may be fancy, though I think the mery of mot of us can
go farthr back into such times than many of us suppose; just as I
beeve the por of obsrvati in numbers of very young
childre to be quite woderful for its css and accuracy.
Indeed, I thk that most gron men wh are rearkable in this
respet, may with greater propriety be said not to have lot the
faculty, than to have acquired it; the rather, as I generally obsrve
such men to retain a certain fre, and gentleness, and
capacity of beg plased, wh are also an inheritance thy have
preserved from their chdhood.
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I might have a mgivig that I am ‘manderig’ i stoppig to
say this, but that it brigs me to remark that I buid thes
nclusions, in part upo my own experice of myself; and if it
should appear fro anythng I may set dow in th narrative that
I was a child of cl observation, or that as a man I have a strong
mry of my chdhood, I undoubtedly lay clai to both of these
characteristics.
Lookig back, as I was saying, into the blank of my infancy, the
first objects I can remember as standing out by thlve fro a
cfusi of things, are my mther and Peggotty. What e do I
remember? Let me see
There co out of the cloud, our house—not nw to me, but
quite familiar, in its earliest remembran On th ground-floor is
Peggotty’s kitchen, opeg ito a back yard; with a pigeon-house
on a po, in the cetre, without any pigens in it; a great dogkenne i a corner, without any dog; and a quantity of fowls that
look terribly tall to me, walkig about, in a macg and ferocius
manner. Thre is on cock wh gets upo a post to cro, and
ses to take particular notice of me as I look at him through th
kitchen window, who make me sver, he is so fierce Of the geese
outside the side-gate who co waddlg after me with their lg
nks stretched out when I go that way, I dream at night: as a man
virod by wid beasts might dream of lis.
Here is a long pasage—wat an enrmous perspective I make
of it!—ladig from Peggotty’s kitchen to the front door. A dark
store-room opens out of it, and that is a place to be run past at
nght; for I do’t know what may be among those tubs and jars
and old tea-cts, when there is nobody in there with a diyburnig lght, letting a muldy air co out of the door, in whic
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thre is th smell of soap, pickles, pepper, candles, and coffe, al
at one whff. Then there are the two parlours: the parlour i w
we sit of an eveg, my mother and I and Peggotty—for Peggotty
is quite our companion, wh her work is done and w are al—
and the bet parlour where we sit on a Sunday; grandly, but not s
fortably. There is sothing of a doful air about that room to
m, for Peggotty has told me—I do’t know when, but apparently
age ago—about my father’s funral, and the cpany having
their black cloaks put on. On Sunday night my mther reads to
Peggotty and m in there, how Lazarus was raid up from the
dead. And I am so frighted that thy are afterwards obliged to
take m out of bed, and show me the quiet churchyard out of the
bedroom window, with the dead all lyig i their grave at rest,
below th solemn moo
There i nthing half so gree that I know anywhere, as the
grass of that churchyard; nothg half so shady as its tre;
nthing half so quiet as its tombstone The shp are feedig
there, when I kneel up, early in the morng, in my little bed i a
coset within my mther’s room, to look out at it; and I see the red
lght shg on the sun-dial, and think within mysf, ‘Is the sundial glad, I wonder, that it can tel the tim agai?’
Here is our pew in th church. What a high-backed pew! With a
window near it, out of whic our house can be seen, and is see
any tim during the morning’s servic, by Peggotty, who lke
to make hersef as sure as sh can that it’s nt beg robbed, or is
not in flam. But thugh Peggotty’s eye wanders, she is much
offended if mine doe, and frons to me, as I stand upo th seat,
that I am to lok at the clrgyman But I can’t always look at hi—
I know him without that white thing on, and I am afraid of hi
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wndering why I stare so, and perhaps stopping th service to
quire—and what am I to do? It’s a dreadful thing to gape, but I
must do something. I look at my mothr, but she preteds not to
me. I look at a boy in th aisl, and he makes faces at me. I
look at the sunght cog i at the open door through the porch,
and there I see a stray sheep—I do’t mean a sr, but mutto—
half making up his mind to come into th church. I fe that if I
looked at hi any lger, I mght be tempted to say sothing out
loud; and what would beme of me th! I look up at th
umtal tablts o the wall, and try to think of Mr. Bodgers
late of this parish, and wat th fegs of Mrs. Bodgers must
have been, wen afflti sore, lg ti Mr. Bodgers bore, and
physicians were in vain. I wonder whthr thy called i Mr.
illip, and he was in vain; and if so, ho he likes to be reminded
of it onc a week. I look from Mr. Chillip, i his Sunday nekcoth,
to th pulpit; and thk what a god place it would be to play in,
and what a castle it would make, with anthr boy coming up th
tairs to attack it, and having the velvet cus with the tas
thro dow on his head. In time my eye gradually shut up; and,
from seg to hear the clrgyman sigig a drowsy sog in the
heat, I hear nothing, until I fall off the seat with a crash, and am
take out, mre dead than alive, by Peggotty.
Ad now I see the outside of our house, with the latticd
bedro-wdow standing ope to let in th swet-smelg air,
and the ragged old rooks’-nets sti danglg in the el-tree at
the bottom of the front garde Now I am i the garde at the
back, beyod the yard where the empty pigeon-house and dogkeel are—a very preserve of butterfl, as I reber it, with a
high fen, and a gate and padlock; where the fruit custers o the
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tre, riper and richer than fruit has ever be since, i any othr
garden, and where my mother gathers so in a basket, we I
stand by, boltig furtive goberri, and trying to look unmoved.
A great wd rises, and th summer is go in a moment. We are
playig in the winter twilght, dang about the parlour. Wh
my mothr is out of breath and rests hrsf i an ebo-chair, I
watch her windig her bright curls round her fingers, and
straiteg her wait, and nobody knows better than I do that sh
likes to look so well, and is proud of beg so pretty.
That is amg my very earliest impresions. That, and a sense
that we were both a little afraid of Peggotty, and submitted
oursves in most things to her direction, were among th first
opi—if they may be s caled—that I ever derived from what
I saw
Peggotty and I were sitting one nght by the parlour fire, alone
I had be readig to Peggotty about crocodi I must have read
very perspicuously, or th poor soul must have be deeply
interested, for I remember she had a cudy ipre, after I
had do, that they were a sort of vegetabl I was tired of readig,
and dead spy; but having leave, as a high treat, to st up until
my mothr came home fro speding th eveing at a
neighbour’s, I would rathr have did upo my post (of course)
than have go to bed. I had reacd that stage of sleepiness w
Peggotty seemed to swell and grow iy large. I propped
my eyelids open wth my two forefingers, and loked
perseverigly at her as sh sat at work; at the little bit of waxcandl se kept for her thread—how old it looked, beg so
rinkled i al directions!—at th littl house with a thatched rof,
were the yard-measure lved; at her work-box with a sldig lid,
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wth a view of St. Paul’s Cathedral (wth a pik do) paited on
the top; at the bras thimble on her finger; at hersef, whom I
thought lovely. I felt so slpy, that I kn if I lt sight of
anythng for a moment, I was go
‘Peggotty,’ says I, suddey, ‘were you ever married?’
‘Lord, Master Davy,’ replied Peggotty. ‘What’s put marriage i
your head?’
She answered with such a start, that it quite awoke me. And
then she stopped in her work, and looked at m, with her ndl
draw out to its thread’s legth.
‘But were you ever married, Peggotty?’ says I. ‘You are a very
handsome woan, an’t you?’
I thought her in a different style from my mther, crtaiy; but
of another school of beauty, I codered her a perfect example.
Thre was a red velvet fotsto in th best parlur, on which my
mther had paited a ngay. The ground-work of that stool, and
Peggotty’s cplxion appeared to m to be on and the sam
thing. The stool was sooth, and Peggotty was rough, but that
made no difference.
‘Me handsome, Davy!’ said Peggotty. ‘Lawk, no, my dear! But
wat put marriage in your head?’
‘I do’t know!—You mustn’t marry more than one person at a
tim, may you, Peggotty?’
‘Certainly not,’ says Peggotty, with th proptet decision
‘But if you marry a person, and the perso di, why then you
may marry another person, mayn’t you, Peggotty?’
‘You may,’ says Peggotty, ‘if you choose, my dear. That’s a
matter of opinion.’
‘But what is your opinion, Peggotty?’ said I.
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I asked her, and looked curiously at her, beause she looked s
curiusly at me.
‘My opinion is,’ said Peggotty, taking her eye fro me, after a
littl idecision and going o with her work, ‘that I never was
marrid myself, Master Davy, and that I don’t expect to be. That’s
al I know about the subjet.’
‘You an’t cros, I suppose, Peggotty, are you?’ said I, after
stting quiet for a miute.
I realy thought s was, s had be so short with me; but I
was quite mistaken: for she laid aside her work (wich was a
stockig of her own), and opeg her arm wide, took my curly
had wthin th, and gave it a god squeze I kn it was a
good squeeze, beause, beg very plump, whenever she made any
lttle exertion after sh was dred, so of the buttons on the
back of her gown fle off. Ad I rect two bursting to the
opposite side of th parlur, while she was hugging me.
‘Now let me hear so mre about the Crorkidills,’ said
Peggotty, who was nt quite right in the nam yet, ‘for I an’t heard
half enough.’
I culdn’t quite understand why Peggotty looked so queer, or
why sh was so ready to go back to the crocodi However, we
returned to those moters, with fresh wakeful o my part,
and we lft their eggs in the sand for the sun to hatch; and we ran
away from them, and baffled them by cotantly turnig, whic
they were unabl to do quickly, on accunt of their unwiedy
make; and we went into the water after them, as natives, and put
sharp pieces of timber dow thr throats; and in short we ran th
whole crocodi gauntlet. I did, at least; but I had my doubts of
Peggotty, who was thoughtfully stikig her ndl into various
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parts of her face and arms, all th time.
We had exhausted the crocodi, and begun with the alligators,
when the garde-be rang. We went out to the door; and there
was my mother, lookig unusually pretty, I thought, and with her
a gentleman with beautiful black hair and wiskers, w had
walked ho with us fro church last Sunday.
As my mothr stoped dow on th threshod to take me in her
arms and kiss me, th gentleman said I was a more highly
priviged little felw than a moarch—or sthing like that; for
my later understanding comes, I am seble, to my aid here
‘What do that man?’ I asked him, over her shoulder.
He patted me on the head; but sohow, I didn’t lke hi or hi
deep voice, and I was jealus that his hand should touc my
mothr’s in toucng me—which it did. I put it away, as w as I
could.
‘Oh, Davy!’ remontrated my mother.
‘Dear boy!’ said th gentleman. ‘I cant wonder at h
devoti!’
I never saw such a beautiful colour on my mothr’s face before
She gently chid me for beig rude; and, keeping me c to hr
saw, turned to thank the gentlan for takig s muc troubl
as to brig her home. She put out her hand to hi as she spoke,
and, as he met it with his own, sh gland, I thought, at me
‘Let us say “god nght”, my fine boy,’ said the getlan,
when he had bet his head— I saw him!—over my mothr’s littl
glove.
‘Good night!’ said I.
‘C! Let us be the bet friends in the world!’ said the
gentleman, laughng. ‘Shake hands!’
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My right hand was in my mother’s left, so I gave him the othr.
‘Why, that’s the wrong hand, Davy!’ laughed the gentlan
My mothr dre my right hand forward, but I was resolved, for
my former reason, nt to give it him, and I did nt. I gave hi the
other, and he shook it heartily, and said I was a brave fellw, and
wnt away.
t this miute I se him turn round i the garde, and give us a
last look with his il-omened black eyes, before the door was shut.
Peggotty, who had nt said a word or moved a finger, seured
the fastegs intantly, and we al went ito the parlour. My
mther, ctrary to her usual habit, intead of cog to the
elbo-cair by the fire, reaied at the other end of the room, and
sat singing to hersf.
—‘Hope you have had a plasant eveing, ma’am,’ said
Peggotty, standig as stiff as a barrel in the ctre of the room,
wth a candlestick in her hand.
‘Much oblged to you, Peggotty,’ returned my mther, i a
cheerful voice, ‘I have had a very pleasant evenig.’
‘A stranger or so makes an agreabl change,’ suggested
Peggotty.
‘A very agreeable change, indeed,’ returned my mother.
Peggotty ctiuing to stand motio in the middl of the
ro, and my mothr resuming her singig, I fe asleep, thugh I
was not so sound asleep but that I could hear voices, wthut
hearig what they said. Wh I half awoke from this
unmfortabl doze, I found Peggotty and my mothr both in
tears, and both talking. ‘Not such a on as this, Mr. Cpperfield
wuldn’t have lked,’ said Peggotty. ‘That I say, and that I swear!’
‘Good Heaves!’ cried my mothr, ‘you’ll drive me mad! Was
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ever any por girl so il-usd by her servants as I am! Why do I do
myself th injustice of calg myself a girl? Have I never be
arried, Peggotty?’
‘God kns you have, ma’am,’ returned Peggotty. ‘Th, ho
can you dare,’ said my mothr—‘you know I don’t mean ho can
you dare, Peggotty, but how can you have the heart—to make m
uncfortabl and say suc bitter things to me, when you are
wel aware that I haven’t, out of this place, a sgl fried to turn
to?’
‘The more’s the reason,’ returned Peggotty, ‘for saying that it
wn’t do. No! That it won’t do. No! No price could make it do.
No!’—I thought Peggotty would have thrown the candltik
away, she was so emphatic with it.
‘Ho can you be so aggravatig,’ said my mothr, shedding
mre tears than before, ‘as to talk in suc an unjust manr! How
can you go on as if it was al settled and arranged, Peggotty, when
I tel you over and over agai, you cruel thing, that beyond the
commonest civiities nothing has pasd! You talk of admrati
What am I to do? If people are so silly as to idulge th sentit,
i it my fault? What am I to do, I ask you? Would you wis me to
shave my had and black my face, or disfigure myself with a burn,
or a scald, or something of that sort? I dare say you would,
Peggotty. I dare say you’d quite enjoy it.’
Peggotty sd to take this aspersi very muc to heart, I
thought.
‘And my dear boy,’ cried my mothr, coming to th elbow-chair
in which I was, and caressing me, ‘my own littl Davy! Is it to be
nted to me that I am wantig in affection for my preious
treasure, the dearest little fellow that ever was!’
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‘Nobody nver went and hinted n suc a thing,’ said Peggotty.
‘You did, Peggotty!’ returnd my mothr. ‘You know you did.
What el was it possible to infer fro what you said, you unkind
creature, wh you know as we as I do, that on hs account oly
last quarter I wouldn’t buy mysf a new paraso, though that old
green one is frayed the whole way up, and the frige is perfectly
mangy? You know it is, Peggotty. You can’t dey it.’ Then, turnig
affectinately to me, with her chk agait mi, ‘A I a naughty
mama to you, Davy? Am I a nasty, cruel, sfih, bad mama? Say I
am, my child; say “ye”, dear boy, and Peggotty will love you; and
I don’t love
Peggotty’s love is a great deal better than m, Davy.
you at all, do I?’
At this, we all fel a-crying together. I think I was the ludet of
th party, but I am sure we were all sincere about it. I was quite
heart-broke mysf, and am afraid that i the first tranports of
wounded tendern I cald Peggotty a ‘Beast’. That honet
creature was in deep affliction, I remember, and must have
be quite buttonl on the occason; for a lttle volly of those
xplosive went off, wh, after having made it up wth my
mther, she kneeld do by the elbo-cair, and made it up wth
me.
We went to bed greatly dejected. My sobs kept wakig me, for a
long time; and wh on very strong sob quite hoisted me up in
bed, I found my mothr sitting on th coverlt, and leang over
me. I fell asleep in her arms, after that, and slpt soundly.
Whethr it was th followng Sunday w I saw th gentleman
agai, or whether there was any greater lapse of ti before he
reappeared, I cannot recall. I don’t profes to be car about dates.
But thre he was, in church, and he walked ho wth us
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afterwards He cam i, too, to look at a famus geranium we had,
i the parlour-window. It did not appear to me that he took muc
ti of it, but before he wet he asked my mothr to give hi a
bit of the bl She begged him to choose it for himf, but he
refused to do that—I could not understand why—so she plucked it
for hm, and gave it into his hand. He said he would never, never
part with it any more; and I thought he must be quite a fool not to
know that it would fal to pieces in a day or tw
Peggotty began to be le with us, of an eveg, than sh had
always be My mother deferred to her very muc—more than
usual, it occurred to me—and we were all thre excelt friends;
stil we were different from what we used to be, and were not so
fortabl among ourseves Sotim I fancd that Peggotty
perhaps objected to my mothr’s wearing all th pretty dresses she
had in her drawrs, or to her going so often to vist at that
neighbour’s; but I couldn’t, to my satisfacti, make out h it
was
Gradually, I became usd to seng th gentleman with th
black wiskers. I liked him no better than at first, and had th
same unasy jealusy of him; but if I had any reason for it beyod
a chid’s instinctive dislike, and a geral idea that Peggotty and I
could make much of my mothr withut any hlp, it certainly was
not the reason that I might have found if I had bee older. No such
thing came into my mind, or near it. I could observe, in littl
pieces, as it were; but as to making a net of a number of th
pieces, and catcng anybody in it, that was, as yet, beyond me.
On autumn mornig I was with my mother i the front
garde, when Mr. Murdstone—I kn him by that nam now—
came by, on horseback. He red up his horse to salute my
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mther, and said he was going to Lowestoft to se s friends
who were there with a yact, and merrily proposed to take me on
th saddle before him if I would like th ride.
Th air was so clear and pleasant, and th horse seed to like
the idea of the ride s muc himf, as he stood snorting and
pawing at the garde-gate, that I had a great dere to go. So I was
t upstairs to Peggotty to be made spruce; and i the mantim
Mr. Murdstone diounted, and, with his horse’s bridl draw
over his arm, walked slowly up and down on the outer side of the
seetbriar fence, we my mother walked sowly up and do on
the inr to kep him cpany. I rect Peggotty and I pepig
out at them from my little window; I recot how closey they
seemed to be examg the sweetbriar between them, as they
strolld alg; and how, from beg i a perfectly angel temper,
Peggotty turnd cross in a moment, and brusd my hair th
rog way, excessivey hard.
Mr. Murdstone and I were soon off, and trotting along on the
green turf by the side of the road. He held m quite easy wth one
arm, and I don’t thk I was restles usually; but I could not make
up my mid to sit in front of hi without turnig my head
sometimes, and lookig up in his face. He had that kind of shallow
black eye—I want a better word to expres an eye that has no
depth in it to be looked into—which, w it is abstracted, see
fro some peculiarity of light to be disfigured, for a moment at a
time, by a cast. Several times wh I glanced at hi, I observed
that appearance wth a sort of awe, and wondered what he was
thinking about so closy. His hair and whiskers wre blacker and
thicker, looked at so near, than eve I had given th credit for
beg. A square about th lowr part of his face, and th
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dotted indiation of the strog black beard he saved ce every
day, reminded me of th wax-wrk that had travelled ito our
nghbourhood so half-a-year before. This, hi regular
eyebro, and the ri whte, and black, and brown, of hi
mplexi—cfound hi complexi, and hs mmory!—made
me thk him, in spite of my misgivings, a very handsome man. I
have no doubt that my poor dear mother thought him so too.
We wet to an hotel by the sea, where two getl wre
okig cigars in a room by themve Eac of them was lyig
o at least four chairs, and had a large rough jacket o In a cornr
was a heap of coats and boat-cloaks, and a flag, all bundled up
together.
They both rolld on to their feet in an untidy srt of manner,
w we came in, and said, ‘Halloa, Murdsto! We thught you
were dead!’
‘Not yet,’ said Mr. Murdstoe.
‘And who’s this shaver?’ said one of the gentl, takig hold
of me
‘That’s Davy,’ returned Mr. Murdstone
‘Davy wh?’ said the getlman ‘Jo?’
‘Copperfield,’ said Mr. Murdstone
‘What! Betcng Mrs. Copperfield’s encumbran?’ cried th
gentleman. ‘Th pretty littl widow?’
‘Quinion,’ said Mr. Murdsto, ‘take care, if you please
Somebody’s sharp.’
‘Wh is?’ asked th gentleman, laughng. I looked up, quikly;
beg curius to kn
‘Only Broks of Sheffid,’ said Mr. Murdsto
I was quite reeved to find that it was ony Brooks of Sheffield;
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for, at first, I realy thought it was I.
There sed to be sthing very coal in the reputation of
Mr. Brooks of Sheffield, for both the gentl laughed heartily
w he was mentioned, and Mr. Murdsto was a god deal
amusd also. After some laughng, th gentleman wh he had
calld Quiion, said:
‘And what is th opinion of Broks of Sheffid, in reference to
the projected bus?’
‘Why, I don’t know that Brooks understands muc about it at
pret,’ repld Mr. Murdstone; ‘but he is nt genraly
favourable, I believe’
Thre was more laughter at this, and Mr. Quiion said h
uld ring th be for some sherry in wh to drink to Broks.
This h did; and w th wi came, he made me have a littl,
wth a biscuit, and, before I drank it, stand up and say, ‘Cfus
to Brooks of Shffied!’ The toast was recved with great
applause, and such harty laughter that it made me laugh to; at
whic they laughed the more. In short, we quite enjoyed
ourselves.
We walked about on the clff after that, and sat on the gras,
and looked at thgs through a telescope—I could make out
nothing myself w it was put to my eye, but I preteded I
culd—and then we cam back to the hotel to an early dier. Al
the tim we were out, the two gentl smked iantly—
whic, I thought, if I might judge from the sm of their rough
cats, they must have been dog, ever sie the coats had first
c home from the taior’s I must nt forget that we went on
board the yact, where they al three deded into the cabi,
and were busy with some papers. I saw th quite hard at wrk,
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when I looked down through the open skylight. They left me,
during this tim, with a very ni man with a very large head of
red hair and a very smal shy hat upon it, who had got a crossbarred shirt or waistcoat on, with ‘Skylark’ in capital letters across
the ct. I thought it was his nam; and that as he lived on board
ship and hadn’t a stret door to put his name o, h put it thre
instead; but w I cald him Mr. Skylark, he said it meant th
vessel.
I obsrved al day that Mr. Murdstone was graver and steadier
than the two gentln. They were very gay and carel They
joked freely with one another, but sedom with him It appeared to
m that he was mre clver and cod than they were, and that they
regarded him with sothing of my own feeg. I remarked that,
oce or twice wh Mr. Quinion was talking, h looked at Mr.
Murdsto sideways, as if to make sure of his not beg
diplased; and that onc when Mr. Pasdge (the other
gentleman) was in high spirits, he trod upo his fot, and gave h
a secret caution with his eye, to observe Mr. Murdsto, w was
tting stern and sit. Nor do I rect that Mr. Murdstone
laughd at all that day, except at th Sheffid joke—and that, by
th by, was his own.
We wt home early in the evenig. It was a very fin evenig,
and my mothr and he had anothr stroll by th swetbriar, wile
I was set in to get my tea. Wh he was gon, my mther asked
me all about th day I had had, and wat thy had said and done. I
mentioned what thy had said about her, and she laughd, and
tod me thy were impudet fe wh talked no—but I
knew it plased hr. I kne it quite as we as I kn it now I tok
th opportunity of asking if she was at all acquainted with Mr.
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Brooks of Sheffield, but se anered No, only she supposed he
must be a manufacturer in th knife and fork way.
Can I say of her fac—altered as I have reason to remeber it,
perished as I know it is—that it is go, wh here it comes before
at this itant, as ditit as any fac that I may choose to look
o in a croded stret? Can I say of her innocnt and girl
beauty, that it faded, and was no more, w its breath fals o my
ceek no, as it fel that nght? Can I say she ever changed, when
my rembrance brigs her back to life, thus only; and, truer to
its loving youth than I have be, or man ever is, still hds fast
wat it cherished th?
I write of her just as sh was when I had gone to bed after this
talk, and she came to bid me god night. She kneeled dow
playfuly by th side of th bed, and laying her chin upo her
hands, and laughing, said:
‘What was it they said, Davy? Tel m again I can’t believe it.’
‘“Beitching—”’ I began.
My mothr put her hands upo my lips to stop me.
‘It was never betcg,’ she said, laughg. ‘It never could
have been betcg, Davy. No I kn it wasn’t!’
‘Ye, it was. “Beitching Mrs Copperfield”,’ I repeated stoutly.
‘And, “pretty.”’
‘No, no, it was nver pretty. Not pretty,’ iterposed my mother,
laying her fingers on my lips again.
‘Yes it was. “Pretty little widow.”’
‘What foish, impudent creatures!’ cried my mothr, laughng
and covering her face. ‘What ridiculous men! An’t thy? Davy
dear—’
‘Well, Ma.’
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‘Don’t tel Peggotty; sh might be angry with them I am
dreadfully angry with them mysf; but I would rather Peggotty
didn’t kn.’
I proised, of course; and we kissed on anothr over and over
again, and I soo fe fast asleep.
It sees to me, at this distance of time, as if it wre th next day
w Peggotty broached th striking and adventurous proposition
I am about to meti; but it was probably about two moths
afterwards.
We were sittig as before, one evenig (when my mother was
out as before), in copany with the stockig and the yardmasure, and the bit of wax, and the box with St. Paul’s on the ld,
and the crocodi bok, when Peggotty, after lookig at me several
times, and opeing hr mouth as if she were going to speak,
without dog it—w I thought was merely gapig, or I should
have be rathr alarmed—said coaxigly:
‘Master Davy, how should you like to go alg with me and
that be a
spend a fortnght at my brothr’s at Yarmuth? Wouldn’t
treat?’
‘Is your brother an agreeabl man, Peggotty?’ I inquired,
provisionally.
‘Oh, what an agreeable man he i!’ crid Peggotty, holdig up
hr hands. ‘Thn thre’s th sea; and th boats and ships; and th
fishermen; and th beach; and Am to play with—’
Peggotty meant her nephe Ham, mentioned in my first
chapter; but she spoke of him as a mors of English Grammar.
I was flusd by her summary of delights, and replied that it
wuld indeed be a treat, but what would my mothr say?
‘Why then I’ll as good as bet a guina,’ said Peggotty, itent
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upon my fac, ‘that se’l lt us go. I’l ask her, if you like, as soon
as ever she co home. There no!’
‘But wat’s she to do while we’re away?’ said I, putting my
sall ebows on the tabl to argue the pot. ‘She can’t live by
herself.’
If Peggotty were lookig for a hole, al of a sudden, in the heel
of that stockig, it must have been a very lttle one ideed, and not
worth darnig.
‘I say! Peggotty! She can’t live by herself, you kn.’
‘Oh, bls you!’ said Peggotty, lking at me agai at last. ‘Don’t
you know? Sh’s going to stay for a fortnight with Mrs. Grayper.
Mrs. Grayper’s going to have a lot of copany.’
Oh! If that was it, I was quite ready to go. I waited, i th
utmost impatice, until my mothr came home fro Mrs
Grayper’s (for it was that idetial neighbour), to ascertain if w
uld get leave to carry out this great idea. Without beg narly
so much surprid as I had expected, my mothr entered into it
readily; and it was all arranged that night, and my board and
lodging during th visit were to be paid for.
Th day soo came for our going. It was such an early day that
it came soo, eve to me, wh was in a fever of expectation, and
half afraid that an earthquake or a fiery mountai, or so other
great cvuls of nature, might interpose to stop the expeditio
We wre to go in a carrir’s cart, which departed in th morning
after breakfast. I would have given any my to have be
allowd to wrap myself up over-night, and slp in my hat and
boots.
It touches me nearly now, although I tel it lightly, to rect
how eager I was to leave my happy home; to think how little I
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suspeted what I did leave for ever.
I am glad to rellect that wh th carrir’s cart was at th
gate, and my mther stood there kig me, a grateful fondn
for her and for the old plac I had nver turned my back upo
before, made me cry. I am glad to kn that my mothr cried to,
and that I felt her heart beat against mine
I am glad to rect that when the carrier began to mve, my
mther ran out at the gate, and calld to him to stop, that sh
ght ki m o mre. I am glad to dw upon the earntne
and love with which she lifted up her face to mine, and did so.
we left her standig i the road, Mr. Murdstone cam up to
were she was, and seemed to expotulate with her for beg s
moved. I was looking back round th awning of th cart, and
wndered wat business it was of hi Peggotty, wh was also
lookig back on the other side, seemed anything but satisfid; as
the fac sh brought back i the cart deted.
I sat lokig at Peggotty for so tim, in a reverie on this
supposititious case: wthr, if she were emplyed to lose me like
the boy in the fairy tal, I should be abl to track my way home
agai by the butto she would sed.
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Chapter 3
I HAVE A CHANGE
T
h carrir’s hrse was th laziest horse in th world, I
should hope, and suffled along, with his head down, as if
he lked to kep peopl waitig to whom the package
re directed. I fancied, indeed, that h sometimes chuckled
audibly over this refletio, but the carrier said he was only
troubled with a cough. The carrier had a way of keepig hi head
down, like his horse, and of droopig seepiy forward as he drove,
with one of his arm on eac of hi knees. I say ‘drove’, but it
struck me that the cart would have gone to Yarmouth quite as wel
without hi, for the horse did al that; and as to coversatio, he
had no idea of it but whistlng.
Peggotty had a basket of refreshments on her knee, w
would have lasted us out handsy, if we had be going to
Lodon by the sam coveyan. We ate a good deal, and slept a
good deal Peggotty always went to slp with her c upo the
handl of the basket, her hold of whic never relaxed; and I could
nt have believed un I had heard her do it, that one
defencels woman could have snred so much.
We made so many deviations up and dow lanes, and wre
such a long time delivering a bedstead at a public-huse, and
callg at other plac, that I was quite tired, and very glad, when
we saw Yarmouth. It looked rather spogy and sppy, I thought,
as I carried my eye over the great dul waste that lay acro th
river; and I could not help wonderig, if the world were realy as
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round as my gegraphy bok said, h any part of it came to be so
flat. But I refleted that Yarmouth might be stuated at one of the
poles; which would account for it.
w drew a little narer, and saw the whole adjact prospet
lyig a straight low lin under the sky, I hinted to Peggotty that a
mound or so might have improved it; and also that if th land had
be a lttle more separated from the sea, and the town and the
tide had nt be quite so muc mixed up, like toast and water, it
would have be nr. But Peggotty said, with greater ephas
than usual, that we must take things as we found them, and that,
for her part, sh was proud to call hersef a Yarmouth Bloater.
Wh we got into the street (whic was strange eough to m)
and smelt th fish, and pitch, and oakum, and tar, and saw th
aiors walkig about, and the carts jingling up and down over the
sto, I felt that I had done so busy a plac an injustice; and said
as muc to Peggotty, who heard my expre of deght with
great complacency, and told me it was we knn (I suppo to
those who had the good fortune to be born Bloaters) that
Yarmouth was, upon the whole, the fint place in the univers
‘Here’s my Am!’ screamd Peggotty, ‘grod out of kndge!’
He was waitig for us, in fact, at the publ-house; and asked
me h I found myself, like an old acquaintance. I did not fe, at
first, that I knew him as we as h knew me, beause h had never
come to our house since th night I was born, and naturally h had
th advantage of me. But our intimacy was much advanced by h
takig m on hi back to carry me home. He was, nw, a huge,
strong fellw of six feet high, broad i proportion, and roundshouldered; but with a simperig boy’s face and curly light hair
that gave him quite a shepish look. He was dred in a canvas
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jacket, and a pair of such very stiff trousers that thy would have
tood quite as well alone, without any lgs in them And you
culdn’t so properly have said he wore a hat, as that he was
vered in a-top, like an old building, with something pitchy.
Ham carrying me on hi back and a small box of ours under h
arm, and Peggotty carrying another small box of ours, we turned
dow lanes bestre with bits of chips and littl hillocks of sand,
and went past gas-wrks, rope-walks, boat-builders’ yards,
shipwrights’ yards, ship-breakers’ yards, caulkers’ yards, riggers’
lofts, smith’ forge, and a great litter of such plac, until w came
out upon the dul waste I had already seen at a ditan; wen
Ham said,
‘Yon’s our house, Mas’r Davy!’
I looked in all direction, as far as I could stare over th
lderness, and away at th sea, and away at th river, but no
huse could I make out. There was a black barge, or s other
kind of superannuated boat, nt far off, high and dry on the
ground, wth an iro fun sticking out of it for a chimney and
sokig very coy; but nothing el in the way of a habitation
that was visibl to me.
‘That’s not it?’ said I. ‘That ship-lookig thing?’
‘That’s it, Mas’r Davy,’ returned Ham
If it had be Aladdin’s palace, roc’s egg and all, I suppo I
could not have be more charmed with th romantic idea of
living in it. Thre was a delghtful door cut in th side, and it was
roofed in, and there were little widows i it; but the wderful
charm of it was, that it was a real boat wich had no doubt be
upon the water hundreds of tim, and whic had never be
inteded to be lived in, o dry land. That was th captivation of it
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to m If it had ever be meant to be lved i, I might have
thught it small, or innveient, or lonely; but never having bee
designed for any such us, it became a perfet abode
It was beautifully clean inside, and as tidy as possibl Thre
as a tabl, and a Dutc clk, and a chet of drawers, and on th
t of drawrs there was a tea-tray with a paiting on it of a lady
with a paraso, takig a walk with a mtary-lookig cd who was
trundlg a hoop. The tray was kept from tumblg down, by a
bibl; and th tray, if it had tumbled dow, would have smasd a
quantity of cups and saucrs and a teapot that were grouped
around the bok. On the wal there were so con cured
picture, framd and glazed, of scripture subjets; such as I have
ver see since in th hands of pedlars, wthut seng th w
terior of Peggotty’s brother’s house agai, at one view. Abraham
in red gog to sacrifice Isaac in blue, and Danie in ye cast
ito a de of green l, were the mot prot of the. Over
th littl manteshef, was a picture of th ‘Sarah Jane’ lugger,
buit at Sunderland, with a real little woode stern stuck on to it; a
wrk of art, combining composition with carpetry, wich I
cdered to be one of the mot enviabl po that th
world could afford. There were so hooks i the beam of the
ceiling, th us of which I did not divi th; and some lockers
and boxe and conveiences of that sort, wich served for seats
and eked out the chairs.
this I saw in the first glan after I crossd the threshold—
cd-lke, acrdig to my theory—and then Peggotty oped a
littl door and shod me my bedro. It was th completest and
mt derable bedroom ever se—in the stern of the ve; wth
a lttle window, where the rudder used to go through; a little
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lookig-glas, just the right height for me, naid agait the wall,
and framed with oyster-slls; a littl bed, which thre was just
room eough to get into; and a ngay of seawd in a blue mug
on the table. The wal were whtewashed as whte as mik, and
the patchwork counterpane made my eyes quite ache with its
brightness. On thing I particularly noticed in th delightful
use, was th smel of fish; which was so searchig, that wh I
tok out my pocket-handkerchief to wipe my nose, I found it st
exactly as if it had wrapped up a lobster. On my impartig this
discovery in confidece to Peggotty, she informd m that hr
brothr dealt in lobsters, crabs, and crawfish; and I afterwards
found that a heap of th creatures, in a state of wnderful
nglomerati with on anothr, and never leaving off pinching
watever thy laid hod of, were usualy to be found i a littl
ooden outhouse where the pots and kettl were kept.
We were welcomd by a very civil wan in a wite apron,
whom I had se curtseying at the door when I was on Ham’s
back, about a quarter of a mile off. Likew by a most beautiful
ttle girl (or I thought her so) with a neklac of blue beads on,
who wouldn’t let me ki her when I offered to, but ran away and
hd hersf. By and by, wh we had dined in a sumptuous
anr off bod dabs, meted butter, and potatoes, with a chop
for me, a hairy man with a very good-natured fac cam home. As
he calld Peggotty ‘Las’, and gave her a hearty smack on the
ceek, I had n doubt, from the general propriety of her cduct,
that he was her brother; and s he turned out—being presently
itroduced to m as Mr. Peggotty, the master of the house
‘Glad to see you, sir,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘You’ll find us rough,
sir, but you’l find us ready.’
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I thanked hi, and repld that I was sure I should be happy in
such a delightful plac
‘How’s your Ma, sir?’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘Did you leave her
pretty jolly?’
I gave Mr. Peggotty to understand that sh was as joly as I
could wish, and that she desired her compliments—wich was a
polite fiction on my part.
‘I’m much obleeged to her, I’m sure,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘Well,
sir, if you can make out here, fur a fortnut, ’log wi’ her,’ ndding
at his sister, ‘and Ham, and littl Em’ly, we shall be proud of your
company.’
Having done th hours of his house in this hospitabl
anr, Mr. Peggotty went out to was himf in a kettleful of
hot water, remarkig that ‘cd would never get his muck off’. He
soo returnd, greatly improved in appearance; but so rubicund,
that I couldn’t help thinkig his fac had this i con with the
lbsters, crabs, and crawfis,—that it went into the hot water very
black, and came out very red.
After tea, w th door was shut and all was made snug (th
nights being cold and misty now), it seed to me th most
delicious retreat that th imagiation of man could conceive. To
hear the wind getting up out at sa, to know that the fog was
repig over the delate flat outside, and to look at the fire, and
think that there was no house near but this on, and this one a
boat, was lke eantmet. Little Em’ly had overc her
shynss, and was sitting by my side upo th lowst and least of
th lockers, wich was just large eugh for us tw, and just fitted
ito the cy corner. Mrs. Peggotty with the white apron, was
kntting on the oppote side of the fire. Peggotty at her
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needlrk was as muc at home wth St. Paul’s and the bit of
wax-candl, as if they had never known any other roof. Ham, who
had bee giving me my first lesson in all-fours, was trying to
rellect a sche of teing fortun with th dirty cards, and was
printing off fishy impressions of h thumb on all th cards he
turnd. Mr. Peggotty was smokig his pipe. I felt it was a time for
conversati and confidece.
‘Mr. Peggotty!’ says I.
‘Sir,’ says he
‘Did you give your so the nam of Ham, beaus you lved in a
sort of ark?’
Mr. Peggotty seemed to thk it a deep idea, but anered:
‘No, sir. I never giv him n name.’
‘Who gave him that nam, then?’ said I, putting questio
umber two of the catec to Mr. Peggotty.
‘Why, sir, hi father giv it him,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘I thought you were his father!’
‘My brother Joe was his father,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘Dead, Mr. Peggotty?’ I hinted, after a repetful pause.
‘Drodead,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
I was very muc surprisd that Mr. Peggotty was not Ham’s
father, and began to wonder whether I was mtake about hi
relatiship to anybody el thre I was so curius to know, that I
made up my md to have it out with Mr. Peggotty.
‘Littl Em’ly,’ I said, glancing at hr. ‘Sh is your daughter, isn’t
s, Mr. Peggotty?’
‘No, sir. My brothr-in-law, Tom, was her father.’
I couldn’t hp it. ‘—Dead, Mr. Peggotty?’ I hited, after
anothr respectful silence.
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‘Drodead,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
I felt the difficulty of resumg the subjet, but had nt got to
the bottom of it yet, and must get to the bottom show. So I
said:
‘Haven’t you any chdre, Mr. Peggotty?’
‘No, master,’ he anered with a short laugh. ‘I’m a
bachdore’
‘A bacher!’ I said, astoished. ‘Why, w’s that, Mr.
Peggotty?’ poting to the person in the apron who was kntting.
‘That’s Missis Gummidge,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘Gummdge, Mr. Peggotty?’
But at this pot Peggotty—I mean my own peuliar Peggotty—
made such impresive motis to me not to ask any more
questions, that I could ony st and look at al the st cpany,
until it was tim to go to bed. Then, i the privacy of my own little
abi, she informed m that Ham and Em’ly were an orphan
phew and nece, whom my host had at different tim adopted
i their cdhood, when they were left detitute: and that Mrs.
Gummidge was th widow of his partner in a boat, w had died
very poor. He was but a poor man himf, said Peggotty, but as
good as gold and as true as steel—those were her si The only
subjet, she informd me, on which he ever shod a vit
temper or swore an oath, was this gerosity of his; and if it were
ever referred to, by any one of them, he struck the table a heavy
bl wth his right hand (had split it on on such ocasion), and
swore a dreadful oath that he would be ‘Gormed’ if he didn’t cut
and run for god, if it was ever mentioned again. It appeared, in
anr to my inquiri, that nbody had the last idea of the
etymgy of this terribl verb passive to be gormd; but that thy
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all regarded it as cotituting a most solem impreation.
I was very sensible of my entertainer’s godne, and listed
to the wome’s going to bed in another lttle crib like m at the
opposite ed of th boat, and to him and Ham hangig up tw
hamks for themsves on the hooks I had nticd i the roof,
i a very luxurious state of mid, enhaned by my beg seepy. As
umber gradually stole upo m, I heard the wind howlig out at
sea and comng on acro th flat so fircely, that I had a lazy
appren of the great dep risg in the night. But I bethought
myself that I was in a boat, after all; and that a man like Mr.
Peggotty was nt a bad perso to have on board if anything did
happen.
Nothg happened, however, worse than morng. At as
oon as it shone upon the oyster-shell frame of my mirror I was
out of bed, and out with little Em’ly, pikig up sto upo the
beach
‘You’re quite a sailr, I suppose?’ I said to Em’ly. I don’t kn
that I suppod anything of the kid, but I felt it an act of gallantry
to say something; and a shiing sail cl to us made such a pretty
littl image of itself, at th moment, in her bright eye, that it came
into my head to say this.
‘No,’ replied Em’ly, shaking her head, ‘I’m afraid of the sea.’
‘Afraid!’ I said, with a beng air of boldness, and lookig
very big at the mighty ocean ‘ I an’t!’
‘Ah! but it’s crue,’ said Em’ly. ‘I have seen it very crue to some
of our me I have seen it tear a boat as big as our house, al to
pieces.’
‘I hope it was’t the boat that—’
‘That father was drownded in?’ said Em’ly. ‘No. Not that on, I
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never see that boat.’
‘Nor him?’ I asked her.
Little Em’ly shook her head. ‘Not to remeber!’
Here was a cocidence! I immediatey went into an
explanati how I had never se my own father; and how my
mothr and I had always lved by oursves in th happiest state
imagiable, and lived so th, and alays meant to live so; and
h my fathr’s grave was in th churchyard near our huse, and
saded by a tree, beath the boughs of wh I had walked and
heard the birds sg many a pleasant morng. But there were
differenc between Em’ly’s orphanhood and m, it
appeared. She had lt her mother before her father; and where
r fathr’s grave was no o kn, except that it was somewre
in th depth of th sea.
‘Besides,’ said Em’ly, as she looked about for shels and
pebbles, ‘your fathr was a gentleman and your mothr is a lady;
and my fathr was a fisherman and my mothr was a fisherman’s
daughter, and my uncle Dan is a fisherman.’
‘Dan is Mr. Peggotty, is he?’ said I.
‘Unc Dan—yoder,’ anered Em’ly, noddig at the boathouse
‘Yes. I mean him. He must be very god, I should thk?’
‘Good?’ said Em’ly. ‘If I was ever to be a lady, I’d give him a skyblue coat with diamd buttons, nankeen trousers, a red velvet
waistcoat, a cocked hat, a large gold watc, a silver pipe, and a box
of moy.’
I said I had n doubt that Mr. Peggotty wel derved thes
treasures. I must acknowledge that I felt it difficult to picture hi
quite at his ease i th raiment propod for him by his grateful
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lttle nie, and that I was particularly doubtful of the poy of the
cocked hat; but I kept th sentiments to myself.
Little Em’ly had stopped and looked up at the sky i her
eumration of th arti, as if thy were a glrious vision. We
wnt on again, picking up she and pebbl
‘You would like to be a lady?’ I said.
Emily looked at me, and laughd and nodded ‘ye’.
‘I should like it very much. We would all be gentlefoks
together, then. Me, and uncle, and Ham, and Mrs. Gumidge. We
wuldn’t mid then, when there co stormy wather.—Not for
our on sakes, I mean. We would for th poor fishermen’s, to be
sure, and we’d help ’em with mony wh thy come to any hurt.’
This sed to me to be a very satisfactory and therefore nt at al
improbable picture I expred my pleasure in th conteplation
of it, and little Em’ly was emboded to say, shyly,
‘Do’t you think you are afraid of th sea, now?’
It was quiet enough to reasure me, but I have no doubt if I had
se a moderately large wave come tumblng in, I should have
take to my hee, with an awful rectio of her drowned
relatis. Hover, I said ‘No,’ and I added, ‘You don’t se to be
ether, though you say you are,’—for sh was walkig muc too
nar the brik of a sort of old jetty or wooden causeway we had
strolled upo, and I was afraid of her falling over.
‘I’m nt afraid i this way,’ said little Em’ly. ‘But I wake when it
blows, and tremble to thk of Un Dan and Ham and beeve I
hear ’e crying out for help. That’s why I should lke so muc to
be a lady. But I’m not afraid in this way. Not a bit. Lok here!’
She started fro my side, and ran along a jagged tiber wich
protruded from the place we stood upo, and overhung the deep
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water at s height, without the least defen The indet i so
impred o my remembrance, that if I were a draughtsan I
could draw its form hre, I dare say, accurately as it was that day,
and littl Em’ly spriging forward to her destruction (as it
appeared to me), with a look that I have nver forgotten, directed
far out to sea.
The light, bod, fluttering lttle figure turned and cam back
safe to me, and I soo laughd at my fears, and at th cry I had
uttered; fruitlssly in any case, for thre was no on near. But
there have been tim si, in my manhood, many tim there
have be, when I have thought, Is it pobl, amg the
pobitie of hidde things, that in the sudde rash of the
child and her wid look so far off, thre was any mrciful attracti
of her into danger, any tempting her towards him permtted on the
part of her dead father, that her lfe mght have a can of edig
that day? There has be a ti sie when I have wodered
wthr, if th life before her could have be reveald to me at a
glance, and so revealed as that a child could fuly coprend it,
and if her preservation could have depended on a mtion of my
hand, I ought to have held it up to save her. There has be a tim
since—I do not say it lasted long, but it has be—whn I have
asked mysf the question, would it have be better for lttle
Em’ly to have had the waters close above her head that morning i
my sight; and wh I have answered Yes, it would have be
This may be preature I have set it dow to soo, perhaps.
But let it stand.
We strolled a long way, and loaded oursves wth things that
w thught curius, and put some stranded starfish carefuly back
ito the water—I hardly know enough of the rac at this mot
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to be quite crtai whether they had reas to fee oblged to us
for dog s, or the reverse—and then made our way home to Mr.
Peggotty’s dwellg. We stopped under the lee of the lobsterouthuse to exchange an innocent kiss, and went in to breakfast
glowing with health and plasure.
‘Like two young mavis,’ Mr. Peggotty said. I kn this
ant, i our loal dialet, lke two young thrush, and recved
it as a compliment.
Of course I was i love with littl Em’ly. I am sure I loved that
baby quite as truly, quite as tenderly, with greater purity and more
diteretedn, than can enter into the bet love of a later tim
f life, hgh and enobling as it is. I am sure my fancy raised up
something round that blue-eyed mite of a child, which
etherealzed, and made a very angel of her. If, any suny foren,
she had spread a littl pair of wings and fln away before my
eye, I don’t think I should have regarded it as muc more than I
had had reas to expet.
We usd to walk about that dim old flat at Yarmuth in a loving
manr, hours and hours. The days sported by us, as if Tim had
nt grown up himf yet, but were a cd too, and always at play.
I told Em’ly I adored her, and that unss she confed she
adored me I should be reduced to th necessity of killing myself
wth a sword. She said she did, and I have no doubt she did.
A to any sense of iequality, or youthfuln, or other difficulty
in our way, littl Em’ly and I had no such troubl, becaus w had
no future. We made no more provision for groing oder, than w
did for growing younger. We were the admration of Mrs.
Gummidge and Peggotty, wh usd to whisper of an eveg w
sat, lovingly, on our littl locker side by side, ‘Lor! wasn’t it
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beautiful!’ Mr. Peggotty smild at us fro bend his pipe, and
Ham grind all the eveg and did nthing e They had
something of th sort of pleasure in us, I suppose, that thy might
have had in a pretty toy, or a poket mode of the Coloeum
I soon found out that Mrs. Gumdge did not always make
herself s agreeable as se mght have been expeted to do, under
the crcumtanc of her resde with Mr. Peggotty. Mrs.
Gummidge’s was rathr a fretful disposition, and she wimpered
more sometimes than was comfortabl for othr parties in so smal
an establit. I was very sorry for her; but there were
mts when it would have be mre agreeable, I thought, if
Mrs. Gumdge had had a cveniet apartment of her own to
retire to, and had stopped thre unti her spirits revived.
Mr. Peggotty went occasionally to a public-huse cald Th
Willg Mid. I discvered this, by his being out on th second or
third eveing of our visit, and by Mrs. Gumidge’s looking up at
the Dutch clock, betwee eight and ni, and saying he was there,
and that, what was more, she had knn in th morning h wuld
go there
Mrs. Gummidge had be in a low state all day, and had burst
ito tears in the forenoon, when the fire smked. ‘I am a l lorn
creetur’,’ wre Mrs. Gummidge’s words, wh that unpleasant
occurree took place, ‘and everythik go cotrary with me.’
‘Oh, it’ll soo leave off,’ said Peggotty—I agai mean our
Peggotty—‘and bede, you know, it’s nt mre diagreeable to
you than to us.’
‘I feel it more,’ said Mrs. Gumidge
It was a very cod day, with cutting blasts of wind. Mrs.
Gummidge’s pecular cornr of th fireside seed to me to be th
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warmt and snuggest in th place, as her chair was certainly th
asiest, but it didn’t suit hr that day at all. She was constantly
complaig of th cold, and of its occasioning a visitation in hr
back which she called ‘th creps’. At last she shed tears o that
subjet, and said again that she was ‘a lone lorn cretur’ and
everythnk went contrary with her’.
‘It is certainy very cold,’ said Peggotty. ‘Everybody must fe it
so.’
‘I feel it more than othr peopl,’ said Mrs. Gummidge
So at dinr; wh Mrs. Gummidge was alays hped
idiatey after me, to whom the preferenc was give as a
visitor of distinction. Th fish were small and bony, and th
potatoes were a little burnt. We all acknowldged that we felt this
something of a disappontment; but Mrs. Gumidge said she felt it
more than w did, and shed tears again, and made that formr
dearatin with great bitterne
rdigly, when Mr. Peggotty cam home about ni o’cock,
this unfortunate Mrs. Gummidge was knitting in her cornr, in a
very wretched and miserabl condition. Peggotty had be
rkig ceerfully. Ham had been patcg up a great pair of
waterboots; and I, with little Em’ly by my sde, had be readig
to them Mrs. Gumdge had never made any other remark than a
forlorn sigh, and had nver raid her eye si tea.
‘Well, Mates,’ said Mr. Peggotty, takig his seat, ‘and h are
you?’
We all said something, or looked something, to wlcom h,
except Mrs. Gumdge, who only shook her head over her
kntting.
‘What’s am?’ said Mr. Peggotty, with a clap of hi hands
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‘Cheer up, old Mawther!’ (Mr. Peggotty meant old girl)
Mrs. Gumdge did nt appear to be abl to chr up. Sh took
out an old black silk handkercf and wiped her eye; but istead
of putting it in her pocket, kept it out, and wiped th again, and
still kept it out, ready for us
‘What’s am, dam?’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘Nothg,’ returned Mrs. Gumidge. ‘You’ve come fro Th
Wig Mind, Dan’l?’
‘Why yes, I’ve took a short spe at The Wig Mind tonight,’
said Mr. Peggotty.
‘I’m sorry I should drive you there,’ said Mrs. Gummidge.
‘Drive! I do’t want no drivig,’ returned Mr. Peggotty with an
honest laugh. ‘I only go too ready.’
‘Very ready,’ said Mrs. Gummidge, shaking hr had, and
wiping hr eye. ‘Ye, yes, very ready. I am sorry it should be
along of me that you’re so ready.’
‘Alg o’ you! It an’t alg o’ you!’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘Don’t ye
beeve a bit on it.’
‘Yes, yes, it is,’ cried Mrs. Gummidge. ‘I kn what I am I kn
that I am a lone lorn cretur’, and not only that everythnk go
trary with m, but that I go cotrary with everybody. Yes, yes
I fe more than othr people do, and I sho it more. It’s my
misfortun’.’
I realy couldn’t help thinkig, as I sat takig in all this, that the
misfortune exteded to some othr members of that famly besides
Mrs. Gumdge. But Mr. Peggotty made no suc retort, only
anrig with another entreaty to Mrs. Gumdge to chr up.
‘I an’t what I could wish myself to be,’ said Mrs. Gumidge. ‘I
am far from it. I know what I am My troubl has made m
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contrary. I fe my troubles, and thy make me contrary. I wish I
didn’t fe ’em, but I do. I wish I could be harded to ’em, but I
an’t. I make th house unmfortabl I don’t wder at it. I’ve
made your sister so all day, and Master Davy.’
Here I was suddenly melted, and roared out, ‘No, you haven’t,
Mrs. Gummidge,’ in great mental distress.
‘It’s far fro right that I should do it,’ said Mrs. Gummidge. ‘It
an’t a fit return. I had better go into the house and di I am a lo
rn cretur’, and had muc better not make mysf cotrary here.
If thinks must go contrary with me, and I must go contrary myself,
lt me go cotrary in my paris Dan’l, I’d better go ito the house,
and die and be a riddance!’
Mrs. Gumdge retired with thes words, and betook hersef to
bed. Wh s was gone, Mr. Peggotty, who had not exhibited a
trace of any feelg but the profoundest sympathy, looked round
upo us, and nodding hi head with a lively expression of that
sentiment still animating his face, said in a whisper:
‘She’s been thkig of the old ’un!’
I did nt quite understand what old on Mrs Gummidge was
uppod to have fixed her mind upon, until Peggotty, on seg
m to bed, explaid that it was the late Mr. Gumdge; and that
her brother always took that for a receved truth on suc
ccasis, and that it always had a moving effect upo hm. Some
time after he was in his hammock that night, I heard him myself
repeat to Ham, ‘Poor thing! Sh’s be thinkig of the old ’un!’
And whver Mrs. Gumdge was overcome in a similar manner
during th remainder of our stay (wich happened some fe
tim), he always said the sam thing in extenuati of the
circumstance, and always with th tenderet comiseration.
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So th fortnight slipped away, varid by nothing but th
variati of the tide, which altered Mr. Peggotty’s tim of going
out and coming in, and altered Ham’s engagements also. Whe th
atter was uneployed, he sotim walked with us to show us
th boats and ships, and once or twice he tok us for a ro I don’t
know wy o slight set of impresions should be more
particularly associated wth a place than anthr, thugh I believe
this obtais with most people, in reference especally to th
asati of their chdhood. I nver hear the nam, or read the
name, of Yarmuth, but I am reminded of a certain Sunday
mrnig on the beach, the be ringig for church, little Em’ly
leang on my shoulder, Ham lazily dropping sto into th
ater, and th sun, away at sea, just breaking through th heavy
mist, and shoing us th ships, like thr own shadows.
At last the day cam for going home I bore up against the
sparatio from Mr. Peggotty and Mrs. Gumdge, but my agony
of mind at leavig littl Em’ly was pircing. We went arm-i-arm
to th public-huse whre th carrir put up, and I proised, on
the road, to write to her. (I reded that prom afterwards, in
characters larger than th in wich apartmts are usually
anuncd i manusript, as beg to let.) We were greatly
overcome at parting; and if ever, in my life, I have had a void made
in my heart, I had on made that day.
Now, all th time I had bee on my visit, I had bee ungrateful
to my home agai, and had thought little or nothing about it. But I
was no soor turnd toards it, than my reproachful young
conscice seed to poit that way with a ready finger; and I felt,
all th more for th sinking of my spirits, that it was my nest, and
that my mothr was my comforter and friend.
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This gaid upo me as we went alg; so that the narer we
dre, th more familiar th objects became that we passed, th
re excted I was to get there, and to run into her arm But
Peggotty, intead of sharig in those tranports, tried to ck
them (though very kidly), and looked cofused and out of sorts.
Blundersto Rookery would come, hover, in spite of hr,
wen the carrier’s hors pleasd—and did. How we I reect it,
on a cod grey afternoon, with a dul sky, threateg rain!
Th door oped, and I looked, half laughng and half crying in
my pleasant agitation, for my mothr. It was not she, but a strange
rvant.
‘Why, Peggotty!’ I said, ruefuly, ‘i’t she come hoe?’
‘Yes, yes, Master Davy,’ said Peggotty. ‘She’s come home. Wait
a bit, Master Davy, and I’ll—I’l tel you sothing.’
Betw her agitation, and her natural awkwardn in getting
out of the cart, Peggotty was makig a mot extraordiary festoon
of herself, but I felt too blank and strange to tell her s Wh s
had got down, sh took m by the hand; led me, wonderig, ito
the kitchen; and shut the door.
‘Peggotty!’ said I, quite frightend. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothng’s th matter, bls you, Master Davy dear!’ she
answered, assuming an air of sprightline
‘Somethig’s the matter, I’m sure. Where’s mama?’
‘Where’s mama, Master Davy?’ repeated Peggotty.
‘Ye Why has’t sh c out to the gate, and what have we
come in here for? Oh, Peggotty!’ My eyes were ful, and I felt as if I
were going to tumbl do
‘Bless th precious boy!’ cried Peggotty, taking hod of me.
‘What is it? Speak, my pet!’
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‘Not dead, to! Oh, she’s not dead, Peggotty?’
Peggotty crid out No! with an astonig volum of voic; and
then sat down, and began to pant, and said I had given her a turn.
I gave her a hug to take away the turn, or to give her another
turn in the right directin, and then stood before her, lokig at
hr in anxius inquiry.
‘You see, dear, I should have told you before now,’ said
Peggotty, ‘but I hadn’t an opportunity. I ought to have made it,
perhaps, but I couldn’t azackly’—that was alays the substitute
for exactly, in Peggotty’s mitia of words—‘bring my mid to it.’
‘Go on, Peggotty,’ said I, more frightened than before
‘Master Davy,’ said Peggotty, untying her bonnet with a shakig
hand, and speakig in a breathles sort of way. ‘What do you
think? You have got a Pa!’
I trembld, and turned white Sothing—I do’t know what,
or how—connted with the grave i the curchyard, and the
raising of th dead, seed to strike me like an un
wind.
‘A ne one,’ said Peggotty.
‘A ne one?’ I repeated.
Peggotty gave a gasp, as if sh were sallwing sthing that
was very hard, and, putting out her hand, said:
‘Come and see him’
‘I don’t want to see him.’
—‘And your mama,’ said Peggotty.
I ceased to draw back, and we went straight to th best parlur,
were she left me. On one side of the fire, sat my mther; on th
other, Mr. Murdstone My mother dropped her work, and arose
hurriedly, but timdly I thought.
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‘No, Clara my dear,’ said Mr. Murdstoe. ‘Recolct! cotro
yoursf, always ctrol yoursf! Davy boy, how do you do?’
I gave him my hand. After a moment of suspe, I went and
kissed my mothr: she kissd me, patted me gently o th
houlder, and sat down again to her work. I culd not look at her, I
culd nt look at him, I knew quite well that he was lookig at us
both; and I turned to the window and looked out there, at s
rubs that were droopig their heads in the cod.
As soo as I could crep away, I crept upstairs. My od dear
bedro was changed, and I was to lie a long way off. I rambled
dowstairs to find anythng that was like itself, so altered it al
eemed; and roamed ito the yard. I very soon started back from
there, for the empty dog-ke was fild up with a great dog—
deep mouthd and black-haired like Him—and he was very angry
at the sight of me, and sprang out to get at me
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Chapter 4
I FALL INTO DISGRACE
I
f th ro to which my bed was removed were a sntient
thing that could give evide, I might appeal to it at this
day—who seeps there no, I woder!—to bear witn for
m what a heavy heart I carried to it. I went up there, hearig the
dog in the yard bark after m al the way whil I clbed the
stairs; and, looking as blank and strange upo th ro as th
room looked upon m, sat down with my small hands crossd, and
thought.
I thought of the oddet things. Of the shape of the room, of the
cracks in th ceig, of th paper on th wals, of th flaws i th
ndow-glass making ripples and dimples on th propect, of th
ashing-stand beg rickety on its thre legs, and having a
disconteted something about it, which reminded me of Mrs
Gumdge under the influence of the old one. I was cryig al th
time, but, except that I was coscious of beg cod and dejected, I
am sure I never thught why I cried. At last in my desolati I
began to cder that I was dreadfully in lve with little Em’ly,
and had be torn away from her to co here where n one
d to want me, or to care about me, half as muc as sh did.
This made such a very miserabl piece of business of it, that I
rolled myself up in a cornr of th counterpan, and cried myself
to sleep.
I was awoke by somebody saying ‘Here he is!’ and unvering
my ht had. My mothr and Peggotty had come to look for me,
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and it was one of them who had do it.
‘Davy,’ said my mother. ‘What’s the matter?’
I thought it was very strange that s should ask me, and
anered, ‘Nothig.’ I turned over on my fac, I reect, to hide
y tremblg lp, which ansred her with greater truth. ‘Davy,’
said my mother. ‘Davy, my child!’
I dare say no words she could have uttered wuld have affected
me so much, th, as her calg me her chid. I hd my tears i th
bedcloth, and pressed her fro me with my hand, w she
uld have raised me up.
‘This is your doig, Peggotty, you cruel thing!’ said my mothr.
‘I have no doubt at al about it. Ho can you rencil it to your
conscice, I woder, to prejudice my own boy against m, or
against anybody wh is dear to me? What do you mean by it,
Peggotty?’
Poor Peggotty lfted up her hands and eyes, and ony anered,
in a sort of paraphrase of th grace I usually repeated after dir,
‘Lord forgive you, Mrs. Copperfield, and for wat you have said
this miute, may you never be truly sorry!’
‘It’s enugh to distract me,’ cried my mothr. ‘In my
honeymoon, too, when my mt inveterate enemy might relet,
o would thk, and not envy me a littl peace of mind and
happi Davy, you naughty boy! Peggotty, you savage creature!
Oh, dear me!’ cried my mothr, turning fro on of us to th
other, in her pettis wilful manner, ‘what a troublese world this
is, wh on has th most right to expect it to be as agreabl as
possibl!’
I felt the touch of a hand that I knew was nther hers nor
Peggotty’s, and sipped to my fet at th bed-side. It was Mr.
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Murdstone’s hand, and he kept it on my arm as he said:
‘What’s this? Clara, my love, have you forgotten?—Firmnes,
my dear!’
‘I am very sorry, Edward,’ said my mother. ‘I meant to be very
good, but I am so unfortable.’
‘Indeed!’ he answered. ‘That’s a bad hearig, so soo, Clara.’
‘I say it’s very hard I should be made so nw,’ returned my
mothr, pouting; ‘and it is—very hard—isn’t it?’
He dre hr to him, whispered in her ear, and kissd her. I
kn as well, when I saw my mother’s head lan down upo hi
houlder, and her arm touch hi nek—I knew as well that he
could mould her plant nature into any form he cho, as I know,
now, that he did it.
‘Go you bew, my lve,’ said Mr. Murdstone ‘David and I will
down, together. My fried,’ turnig a darkeg fac on
Peggotty, w h had watcd my mothr out, and dismissed her
wth a nod and a smile; ‘do you know your mistre’s name?’
‘She has be my mistress a long time, sir,’ answered Peggotty,
‘I ought to kn it.’
‘That’s true,’ he answered. ‘But I thught I hard you, as I came
upstairs, address her by a name that is not hrs. She has taken
mine, you kn. Wi you remember that?’
Peggotty, wth some unasy glances at me, curtseyed hersf
out of the room without replying; seg, I suppose, that sh was
xpected to go, and had no excuse for reaiing. Whe w tw
were left alone, he shut the door, and sitting on a chair, and
hding me standing before him, looked steadily into my eye. I
felt my own attracted, no less steadily, to his. As I recal our beig
opposed thus, face to face, I see again to hear my heart beat fast
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and high
‘David,’ h said, making hs lips thin, by preng th
together, ‘if I have an obstiate horse or dog to deal with, what do
you think I do?’
‘I don’t kn.’
‘I beat him.’
I had answered in a kind of breathles wisper, but I felt, in my
silence, that my breath was shorter now
‘I make him wi, and smart. I say to myself, “I’ll conquer that
fellw”; and if it were to cot him al the blood he had, I should do
it. What is that upo your face?’
‘Dirt,’ I said.
He kn it was th mark of tears as we as I. But if he had
asked the question twenty tim, eac tim with twenty blows, I
believe my baby heart would have burst before I would have tod
hi so
‘You have a good deal of intelligence for a little felw,’ he said,
with a grave sm that beged to him, ‘and you understood m
very we, I see. Wash that face, sir, and come dow with me.’
He poted to the wasg-stand, whic I had made out to be
ke Mrs. Gumdge, and mtioned me with his head to obey him
directly. I had lttle doubt then, and I have le doubt now, that he
wuld have knked me dow withut th least compunction, if I
had hesitated.
‘Clara, my dear,’ he said, wh I had done his bidding, and h
walked me ito the parlour, with his hand stil on my arm; ‘you
wll not be made unmfortabl any more, I hope We shall soo
prove our youthful humours.’
God help m, I might have been iproved for my whole lfe, I
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mght have be made another creature perhaps, for life, by a
kind word at that season A wrd of euraget and
explanation, of pity for my childish ignoran, of welcom ho,
of reasuranc to me that it was home, might have made me
dutiful to him in my heart henceforth, instead of in my hypocritical
utside, and might have made me respect instead of hate him. I
thought my mther was srry to se me standig in the room so
scared and strange, and that, pretly, wh I sto to a chair, she
followd me with her eye more sorrofully still—missing,
perhaps, some fredo in my chidish tread—but th word was
t spoke, and the tim for it was gon
We did alone, we three together. He seemed to be very fond
of my mother—I am afraid I lked him no the better for that—
and she was very fond of him I gathered from what they said, that
an eder sister of his was comng to stay with th, and that she
as expeted that evenig. I am nt certai wether I found out
then, or afterwards, that, without beg actively crned i any
business, h had some share in, or some annual charge upo th
profits of, a wi-mrchant’s house in London, with which hi
famy had be conneted from his great-grandfather’s tim, and
in which his sister had a similar interest; but I may mention it i
this place, whthr or no.
fter dinner, when we were sitting by the fire, and I was
ditating an escape to Peggotty without having the hardihood to
slip away, lest it should offed th master of th huse, a coac
drove up to th garde-gate and he went out to receive th visitor.
My mothr followd him. I was timidly followng her, w she
turned round at the parlour door, in the dusk, and takig me i
r embrace as she had bee usd to do, wispered me to love my
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ne fathr and be obedient to him. She did th hurridly and
sretly, as if it were wrong, but tenderly; and, putting out her
hand behnd her, held mine in it, until we came near to wre h
as standig in the garde, where she let m go, and drew hers
through his arm
It was Mis Murdstone who was arrived, and a gloomy-lookig
lady se was; dark, lke her brother, whom she greatly resebld
in face and voice; and with very heavy eyebro, nearly meeting
over her large no, as if, beg diabld by the wrongs of her sex
fro waring whiskers, she had carrid th to that account. She
brought with her two uncpromig hard black boxes, with her
initial on th lds in hard brass nais. Whe she paid th
achman se took her moy out of a hard steel purse, and sh
kept the purse in a very jai of a bag which hung upon her arm by
a heavy chain, and shut up like a bite I had never, at that time,
se such a metal lady altogethr as Miss Murdsto was.
Sh was brought into the parlour with many toke of wel,
and thre formally regnized my mothr as a ne and near
reati. Th she lked at me, and said:
‘Is that your boy, sister-in-law?’
My mothr acknowledged me.
‘Genrally speakig,’ said Miss Murdsto, ‘I don’t like boys
How d’ye do, boy?’
Under th euragig circumstances, I replied that I was
very we, and that I hoped she was the sam; wth suc an
indifferent grace, that Miss Murdsto disposed of me i tw
words:
‘Wants maner!’
Having uttered whic, with great dititn, s begged the
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favour of beg shown to her room, whic beam to m from that
ti forth a place of awe and dread, wherein the two black boxes
wre never see ope or knn to be left unlocked, and wre (for
I peeped in once or twice wh she was out) numerous littl ste
fetters and rivets, with whic Mis Murdstone embehed hersef
w she was dressed, geraly hung upo th looking-glass in
formidabl array.
As we as I could make out, she had come for god, and had no
itenti of ever going again Sh began to ‘hp’ my mther nxt
mrnig, and was in and out of the store-coset all day, putting
things to rights, and makig havoc in the old arrangets.
t the first remarkabl thing I obsrved i Mi Murdstone
as, hr beg constantly haunted by a suspicion that th servants
had a man sreted sere on the premi. Under th
influence of this delusion, she dived into th coal-car at th most
untiy hours, and scarcy ever opened the door of a dark
cupboard withut clapping it to again, in th belief that she had
got him
Though there was nothing very airy about Mis Murdstone, sh
was a perfect Lark i pot of getting up. Sh was up (and, as I
beve to this hour, lookig for that man) before anybody in the
huse was stirring. Peggotty gave it as her opinion that she eve
slept wth o eye ope; but I could not concur in this idea; for I
tried it mysf after hearig the suggesti thrown out, and found
it couldn’t be done
On the very first mornig after her arrival s was up and
ringing hr be at cock-cro Whe my mothr came dow to
breakfast and was going to make the tea, Mis Murdstone gave her
a kind of peck on th chek, which was her nearet approach to a
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kiss, and said:
‘No, Clara, my dear, I am come hre, you kn, to reeve you
of all the troubl I can You’re muc too pretty and thoughtle’—
my mothr blusd but laughd, and seed not to dislke this
character—‘to have any duti imposed upo you that can be
undertake by me If you’ll be so good as give m your keys, my
dear, I’l attend to al this sort of thing in future.’
Fro that time, Miss Murdsto kept th keys in hr on lttl
jail all day, and under her pi all night, and my mothr had no
mre to do with them than I had.
My mother did not suffer her authority to pas from her without
a sadow of protest. On nght when Mis Murdstone had be
developig crtai household plan to her brother, of whic he
signifid his approbation, my mothr suddenly began to cry, and
said sh thought sh might have be consulted.
‘Cara!’ said Mr. Murdstone sterny. ‘Clara! I wonder at you.’
‘Oh, it’s very we to say you woder, Edward!’ cried my mother,
‘and it’s very wel for you to talk about firmn, but you wouldn’t
like it yourself.’
Firmss, I may observe, was th grand quality on which both
Mr. and Miss Murdsto tok thr stand. Hover I mght have
xpressed my comprension of it at that time, if I had be cald
upo, I neverthless did clearly comprend in my own way, that
it was another nam for tyrany; and for a crtai gloomy,
arrogant, devil’s humour, that was in them both. The cred, as I
should state it now, was th. Mr. Murdsto was firm; nobody in
world was to be so firm as Mr. Murdstone; nobody e in h
world was to be firm at al, for everybody was to be bet to his
firm. Mi Murdsto was an exception She might be firm,
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but only by relatiship, and in an inferir and tributary degre
My mothr was anothr exception She might be firm, and must
be; but ony in bearig their firmn, and firmly bevig there
was no other firmn upon earth.
‘It’s very hard,’ said my mother, ‘that in my ow house—’
‘My own house?’ repeated Mr. Murdstone ‘Clara!’
‘Our own house, I mean,’ faltered my mother, evidetly
frightened—‘I hope you must know what I mean, Edward—it’s
very hard that in your own house I may not have a word to say
about domestic matters. I am sure I managed very well before w
re married. There’s evide,’ said my mother, sobbig; ‘ask
Peggotty if I didn’t do very we when I was’t interfered with!’
‘Edward,’ said Miss Murdsto, ‘let thre be an end of this. I go
tomorrow.’
‘Jan Murdstone,’ said her brother, ‘be sit! How dare you to
iuate that you do’t know my character better than your
wrds imply?’
‘I am sure,’ my poor mother wet on, at a grievous
diadvantage, and with many tears, ‘I do’t want anybody to go. I
should be very mirabl and unhappy if anybody was to go. I
don’t ask much. I am not unreasable. I only want to be
consulted sometimes. I am very much obliged to anybody w
assists me, and I only want to be consulted as a mere form,
stim I thought you were plasd, on, with my beg a
littl inxpericed and girlish, Edward—I am sure you said so—
but you seem to hate me for it n, you are so severe.’
‘Edward,’ said Mi Murdstone, agai, ‘let there be an ed of
this I go tomorrow.’
‘Jan Murdstone,’ thundered Mr. Murdstone ‘Wi you be
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silent? Ho dare you?’
Miss Murdsto made a jai-deivery of hr pockethandkerchief, and held it before her eyes.
‘Clara,’ he continued, loking at my mother, ‘you surprise me!
You astound m! Yes, I had a satisfaction in the thought of
marrying an inxpericed and artls pers, and forming hr
character, and infusing into it some amunt of that firmss and
decision of wich it stod in need. But wh Jan Murdsto is
kind eough to c to my astanc i this endeavour, and to
assume, for my sake, a condition something lke a husekeeper’s,
and when she meets with a bas return—’
‘Oh, pray, pray, Edward,’ cried my mother, ‘don’t accuse me of
beg ungrateful. I am sure I am not ungrateful. No one ever said I
was before. I have many faults, but nt that. Oh, don’t, my dear!’
‘When Jane Murdsto meets, I say,’ he went on, after waiting
until my mother was sit, ‘wth a bas return, that feeg of
mine is chilled and altered.’
‘Do’t, my love, say that!’ implored my mothr very piteusly.
‘Oh, don’t, Edward! I can’t bear to hear it. Whatever I am, I am
affectionate. I kn I am affectionate. I wouldn’t say it, if I wasn’t
sure that I am Ak Peggotty. I am sure s’ll tel you I’m
affectionate.’
‘Thre is no extent of mere weakness, Clara,’ said Mr.
Murdsto in reply, ‘that can have th least wight wth me. You
lse breath.’
‘Pray lt us be friends,’ said my mother, ‘I couldn’t lve under
coldness or unkidne. I am so sorry. I have a great many defects,
I know, and it’s very good of you, Edward, with your strength of
mnd, to endeavour to correct them for me Jan, I do’t object to
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anything. I should be quite broken-hearted if you thought of
lavig—’ My mother was too muc overc to go on.
‘Jan Murdstone,’ said Mr. Murdstone to his siter, ‘any harsh
words betwee us are, I hope, unn. It is not my fault that s
unusual an occurrence has take place tonight. I was betrayed
into it by anthr. Nor is it your fault. You were betrayed into it by
another. Let us both try to forget it. And as this,’ he added, after
thes magnanous words, ‘i not a fit sc for the boy—David,
go to bed!’
I could hardly find the door, through th tears that stood i my
eye. I was so sorry for my mothr’s distress; but I groped my way
out, and groped my way up to my room in the dark, without eve
having the heart to say good night to Peggotty, or to get a candl
from her. When her cog up to look for me, an hour or so
afterwards, awoke me, she said that my mothr had go to bed
poorly, and that Mr. and Mis Murdstone were sitting alone
Gog do next mrnig rather earlir than usual, I pausd
outside the parlour door, on hearig my mother’s voic She was
very earnetly and humbly entreating Mis Murdstone’s pardon,
wich that lady granted, and a perfet renciliati tok place. I
nver kn my mother afterwards to give an opi on any
matter, wthut first appealg to Miss Murdsto, or withut
having first ascertained by some sure means, what Miss
Murdsto’s opiion was; and I never saw Miss Murdsto, w
out of temper (she was infirm that way), move her hand towards
her bag as if sh were going to take out the keys and offer to resgn
them to my mther, without sg that my mother was in a
terribl fright.
The gloomy tait that was i the Murdstone blood, darked
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the Murdstone region, wh was austere and wrathful. I have
thught, since, that its assumng that character was a necesary
conseque of Mr. Murdsto’s firmss, which wouldn’t allow
to lt anybody off from the utmot weight of the severest
penalties he could fid any excuse for. Be this as it may, I we
rember the tremdous visages with whic we used to go to
church, and th changed air of th place. Again, th dreaded
Sunday comes round, and I file into th old pew first, like a
guarded captive brought to a conded service. Again, Mi
Murdsto, in a black velvet go, that looks as if it had bee
made out of a pall, fos clos upo me; th my mothr; th
her husband. There is n Peggotty now, as in the old tim Agai, I
liste to Miss Murdsto mumbling th responses, and
ephasizing al th dread wrds wth a crue relish. Again, I see
her dark eyes ro round the curc wen se says ‘mirabl
sinners’, as if she were calling all th congregati names. Again, I
catch rare glips of my mther, moving her lips timdly betwee
the two, with one of them muttering at eac ear like low thunder.
Again, I woder with a sudden fear whthr it is likely that our
good old clrgyman can be wrong, and Mr. and Mis Murdstone
right, and that all the angel in Heave can be detroying angels.
Again, if I move a finger or relax a muscle of my face, Mi
Murdsto pokes me with her prayer-bok, and makes my side
ache
Yes, and again, as we walk ho, I note some neighbours
lookig at my mothr and at me, and whispering. Again, as th
thre go on arm-in-arm, and I linger behnd alon, I follow some of
those looks, and wder if my mother’s step be realy not so light
as I have see it, and if th gaiety of her beauty be really almost
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wrrid away. Again, I wonder whthr any of th neighbours call
to mid, as I do, how we used to walk home together, s and I;
and I wonder stupidly about that, all th dreary dismal day.
There had be s talk on ocasns of my going to
boardig-school. Mr. and Mis Murdstone had origiated it, and
my mther had of cours agreed with them. Nothg, however,
was concluded on the subjet yet. In the mantim, I learnt
l at home. Shal I ever forget those leons! They were
presided over nominally by my mothr, but really by Mr.
Murdsto and his sister, wh were always pret, and found
them a favourabl occason for giving my mother lons in that
miscalled firmss, wich was th bane of both our lives. I believe
I was kept at home for that purpose. I had be apt enough to
learn, and wiing enugh, wh my mothr and I had lived alon
together. I can faitly rember larng the alphabet at her
kn To this day, when I look upon the fat black ltters i the
primer, th puzzling novelty of thr shapes, and th easy godnature of O and Q and S, s to pret themve agai before
m as they used to do But they recal no feeg of digust or
reluctan On the cotrary, I se to have walked along a path of
flowers as far as the crocodie-book, and to have be ceered by
the gentl of my mother’s voic and manner all the way. But
th solem lessons which succeeded th, I remember as th
death-blow of my peace, and a grievous daily drudgery and
mry. They were very log, very numrous, very hard—perfectly
unitelgible, so of them, to m—and I was genrally as muc
bedered by them as I beeve my poor mther was herself.
Let me remember ho it usd to be, and bring on morning
back again.
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I co into the snd-bet parlour after breakfast, with my
books, and an exerc-book, and a slate. My mther i ready for
m at her writig-dek, but not half so ready as Mr. Murdstone in
easy-chair by the window (though he pretends to be readig a
bok), or as Miss Murdsto, sitting near my mothr stringig
steel beads The very sight of the two has suc an influence over
m, that I begi to fee the words I have be at ifite pai to
get into my head, al sldig away, and going I do’t know where I
wder where they do go, by the by?
I hand the first book to my mother. Perhaps it is a gramar,
perhaps a history, or geography. I take a last drownig look at the
page as I give it into her hand, and start off aloud at a racing pace
while I have got it fresh. I trip over a word. Mr. Murdstone looks
up. I trip over another word. Mis Murdstone looks up. I redden,
tumbl over half-a-dozen words, and stop. I think my mther
wuld sho me th book if she dared, but she doe not dare, and
she says softly:
‘Oh, Davy, Davy!’
‘No, Clara,’ says Mr. Murdstoe, ‘be firm with the boy. Don’t
say, “Oh, Davy, Davy!” That’s chdi He knows his leon, or he
does not kn it.’
‘He do not know it,’ Mis Murdstone iterpose awfully.
‘I am realy afraid he doe not,’ says my mother.
‘Then, you s, Clara,’ returns Mis Murdstone, ‘you should just
give him th book back, and make him know it.’
‘Yes, certaiy,’ says my mother; ‘that is wat I inted to do, my
dear Jan. No, Davy, try once more, and don’t be stupid.’
I obey the first claus of the injuntio by trying once more, but
am not so sucssful with th secod, for I am very stupid. I
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tumbl down before I get to the old plac, at a pot where I was
al right before, and stop to think. But I can’t think about the
lesson. I thk of th number of yards of net in Miss Murdsto’s
cap, or of th price of Mr. Murdsto’s dressing-gon, or any such
ridiculous problem that I have no busine with, and don’t want to
ave anythng at all to do with Mr. Murdsto makes a movement
of impatice which I have be expectig for a long time. Miss
Murdsto doe th same. My mothr glances submissivey at
th, shuts th book, and lays it by as an arrear to be wrked out
when my other tasks are do
There is a pi of the arrears very soon, and it sell like a
rollg snowball The bigger it gets, the more stupid I get. The cas
is so hopes, and I fe that I am waling i such a bog of
n, that I give up all idea of getting out, and abando mysf
to my fate. Th despairing way in wh my mothr and I look at
eac other, as I blunder on, is truly melancholy. But the greatest
effect in th miserabl lesson is wh my mothr (thnking
nbody i observing her) trie to give me the cue by the motion of
hr lips. At that instant, Miss Murdsto, wh has be lyig in
ait for nothing el all along, says in a deep warng voice:
‘Clara!’
My mothr starts, colours, and smil faitly. Mr. Murdsto
mes out of his chair, takes th bok, thro it at me or boxes my
ears with it, and turns me out of the room by the shoulders
Even wen the lons are do, the worst is yet to happe, in
th shape of an appaling sum. Th is invented for me, and
devered to me oraly by Mr. Murdstone, and begi, ‘If I go into a
ceesemonger’s shop, and buy five thousand double-Gluceter
che at fourpence-halfpeny each, pret paymt’—at which
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I see Mi Murdstone sretly overjoyed. I pore over the ceeses
without any result or enghtenmet until dir-tim, when,
having made a Mulatto of mysf by getting the dirt of the sate
into th pores of my skin, I have a slice of bread to hlp me out
wth th che, and am considered in disgrace for th rest of th
evenig.
It ses to me, at this distance of time, as if my unfortunate
studies geraly tok this course. I could have done very well if I
had be without the Murdstone; but the influen of the
Murdsto upo me was like th fascinati of tw snakes o a
wretced young bird. Even when I did get through the morng
with tolerabl credit, there was nt muc gaind but dinner; for
Miss Murdsto never could endure to see me untasked, and if I
rasy made any show of beg unemployed, cald her brother’s
attention to me by saying, ‘Clara, my dear, thre’s nothg like
wrk—give your boy an exercise’; which causd me to be clapped
down to s nw labour, there and then A to any recreatio
with other chdren of my age, I had very little of that; for the
gloomy theogy of the Murdstone made al chdre out to be a
sarm of little vipers (though there was a chid once set in th
midst of th Disciples), and hed that thy contaminated on
another.
The natural result of this treatmet, ctiued, I suppose, for
some six month or more, was to make me sullen, dul, and
dogged. I was nt made the le s by my s of beg daiy
more and more shut out and alienated fro my mothr. I belve I
should have be almost stupefied but for on circumstance.
It was this. My fathr had left a small colti of boks i a
littl ro upstairs, to wich I had access (for it adjod my own)
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and whic nobody else in our house ever troubled. From that
bld lttle room, Roderik Random, Peregri Pickl,
Humphrey Cliker, To Jo, the Vicar of Wakefied, Don
Quixote, Gi Blas, and Robi Crusoe, cam out, a glorious host,
to keep me company. Thy kept alive my fancy, and my hpe of
sthing beyond that place and tim,—they, and the Arabian
Nights, and the Tale of the Ge,—and did me no harm; for
watever harm was in so of them was not there for m; I knew
nthing of it. It is astonisg to me nw, how I found tim, i the
midst of my porings and blunderings over heavier th, to read
those books as I did. It i curious to me how I could ever have
consold myself under my sal troubl (wich were great
troubl to me), by impersatig my favourite characters i
them—as I did—and by putting Mr. and Mis Murdstone into al
th bad o—wich I did to I have bee Tom Jos (a child’s
Tom Jone, a harml creature) for a week together. I have
sustained my own idea of Roderick Rando for a month at a
stretch, I verily believe I had a greedy relis for a few volum of
Voyages and Traves—I forget wat, now—that were on th
ves; and for days and days I can remmber to have gone about
my region of our house, armd with the cetre-pi out of an old
st of boot-trees—the perfect realzatio of Captai Sobody, of
th Royal British Navy, in danger of beg bet by savages, and
resolved to sel his life at a great price. Th Captain never lost
dignity, fro having his ears boxed with th Latin Grammar. I did;
but th Captain was a Captain and a hro, in despite of all th
gramars of all the languages in the world, dead or alve
This was my only and my constant comfort. Whe I thk of it,
th picture always ris in my mind, of a summer eveing, th
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boys at play in th churchyard, and I sitting on my bed, reading as
if for life. Every barn in the nghbourhood, every stone i the
church, and every fot of th churchyard, had some assocation of
its on, i my mind, conneted with th books, and stod for
some locality made famous in th. I have se Tom Pipes go
bing up the church-steeple; I have watched Strap, with the
knapsack on his back, stopping to rest hf upo th wketgate; and I know that Codore Trunn held that club with
Mr. Pickl, in the parlour of our little village alehouse
The reader now understands, as wel as I do, what I was when I
came to that poit of my youthful history to wich I am now
ming again.
On mrnig when I went into the parlour with my books, I
found my mther lookig anxious, Mis Murdstone lookig firm,
and Mr. Murdstone bindig sothing round the bottom of a
cane—a lith and limber cane, which he left off binding wh I
came in, and poised and switched in th air.
‘I tel you, Cara,’ said Mr. Murdsto, ‘I have be often
flgged myself.’
‘To be sure; of course,’ said Mi Murdsto
‘Certainly, my dear Jane,’ faltered my mothr, meekly. ‘But—
but do you think it did Edward good?’
‘Do you think it did Edward harm, Clara?’ asked Mr.
Murdstone, gravey.
‘That’s th point,’ said his sister.
To this my mother returned, ‘Crtaiy, my dear Jane,’ and said
no more
I felt appreve that I was persally interested in this
dialogue, and sought Mr. Murdstone’s eye as it lghted on mi
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‘Now, David,’ he said—and I saw that cast again as he said it—
‘you must be far mre careful today than usual.’ He gave the can
anothr poise, and anothr switch; and having finished h
preparation of it, laid it dow bede him, wth an ipresive look,
and took up his book.
This was a god frer to my prece of mind, as a
begig. I felt th words of my less slipping off, not on by
one, or li by li, but by the entire page; I tried to lay hold of
th; but thy seed, if I may so expres it, to have put skate
on, and to ski away from m with a smoothnes there was no
cheking.
We began badly, and went on wors I had come in with an idea
of distiguishig myself rathr, conceiving that I was very w
prepared; but it turned out to be quite a mtake Book after book
was added to the heap of faiures, Mis Murdstone beg firmly
watchful of us all the tim And when we cam at last to the five
thusand che (canes h made it that day, I remember), my
mther burst out crying.
‘Cara!’ said Mis Murdsto, in her warnig voic
‘I am nt quite we, my dear Jan, I thk,’ said my mother.
I saw hm wik, solemnly, at his sister, as he ro and said,
taking up th cane:
‘Why, Jan, we can hardly expect Clara to bear, wth perfect
firmn, the worry and tormet that David has occasd her
today. That would be stoical. Clara is greatly strengthd and
improved, but w can hardly expect so much fro her. David, you
and I wi go upstairs, boy.’
A he took me out at the door, my mother ran towards us. Mis
Murdstone said, ‘Clara! are you a perfect fool?’ and iterfered. I
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saw my mothr stop her ears th, and I heard her crying.
He walked me up to my ro sly and gravey—I am crtai
he had a delight in that formal parade of exeuting justi—and
w we got thre, suddenly twisted my head under his arm.
‘Mr. Murdsto! Sir!’ I cried to him. ‘Do’t! Pray don’t beat me!
I have tried to learn, sir, but I can’t learn wile you and Miss
Murdstone are by. I can’t inded!’
‘Can’t you, indeed, David?’ he said. ‘We’l try that.’
He had my head as in a vice, but I twd round him someh,
and stopped him for a momnt, entreating him not to beat me. It
was oly a moment that I stopped him, for he cut me heavily an
itant afterwards, and i the sam itant I caught the hand with
w h hed me in my mouth, betw my teth, and bit it
through. It sets my teeth on edge to think of it.
He beat me then, as if he would have beaten me to death Above
al the no we made, I heard them runnig up the stairs, and
crying out—I heard my mther crying out—and Peggotty. Then he
was go; and th door was locked outside; and I was lying,
fevered and hot, and torn, and sore, and raging in my puny way,
upon the floor.
How wel I rect, when I beam quiet, what an unnatural
stillns seed to reign through th wh house! Ho wll I
remember, w my smart and passion began to coo, ho wicked
I began to fee!
I sat listeing for a long wh, but thre was not a sound. I
crawled up fro th flr, and saw my face i th glass, so
swollen, red, and ugly that it almost frighted me. My stripes
re sore and stiff, and made me cry afresh, wh I moved; but
they were nthing to the guilt I felt. It lay heavir on my breast
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than if I had be a most atrocious criminal, I dare say.
It had begun to grow dark, and I had shut the window (I had
be lyig, for the mot part, with my head upon the s, by turns
crying, dozing, and looking listlssly out), wh th key was
turnd, and Miss Murdsto came in with some bread and meat,
and mk. Thes s put down upon the table without a word,
glarig at me the whil with exeplary firmn, and then retired,
lkig the door after her.
Long after it was dark I sat there, wonderig whether anybody
e wuld come. Whe this appeared improbabl for that night, I
undressed, and went to bed; and, thre, I began to wnder
fearfully what would be done to me. Whethr it was a criminal act
that I had ctted? Whether I should be taken into custody,
and sent to prison? Whethr I was at al in danger of being
hanged?
I never shall forget th waking, next morng; th beig
ceerful and fresh for the first mot, and then the beg
wighd dow by th stal and dismal oppre of
rembrance Mis Murdstone reappeared before I was out of
bed; told me, in so many words, that I was free to walk i the
garde for half an hour and n loger; and retired, lavig the
door ope, that I might avail myself of that permssion.
I did so, and did so every morng of my imprisonment, which
lasted five days. If I could have seen my mther alone, I should
have gone down o my knees to her and beught her forgivenes;
but I saw no on, Miss Murdsto excepted, during th w
ti—except at evenig prayers i the parlour; to wh I was
rted by Mi Murdstone after everybody els was placd;
wre I was stationed, a young outlaw, al al by myself near th
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door; and wce I was solemly conducted by my jair, before
any one arose from the devotional poture. I only obsrved that
my mothr was as far off fro me as she could be, and kept hr
fac another way so that I never saw it; and that Mr. Murdstone’s
and was bound up in a large linen wrapper.
Th length of th five days I can convey no idea of to any on
Thy occupy th place of years in my remembran Th way in
wich I listed to all th incidents of th huse that made
themsves audible to m; the rigig of be, the openig and
shutting of doors, th murmuring of voices, th fotsteps o th
stairs; to any laughng, whistlng, or singig, outside, wich
sed more dismal than anythng e to me in my soltude and
disgrace—th uncertain pace of th hours, especally at night,
when I would wake thinkig it was mrnig, and find that the
famy were not yet gone to bed, and that all the lgth of nght
had yet to come—th depred dream and nightmare I had—
the return of day, noon, afternoon, eveg, when the boys played
in th churchyard, and I watcd th fro a distance within th
room, beg asamd to show mysf at the window lest they
should kn I was a prisoner—th strange sensation of never
hearig mysf speak—the fletig iterval of sthing lke
cherfulnes, which came with eating and driking, and wnt
away with it—th setting in of rain on eveing, wth a fre smel,
and its coming dow faster and faster betw m and th church,
until it and gatherig nght sed to quen me in gloom, and
fear, and remors—all this appears to have go round and round
for years itead of days, it is so vividly and strongly stamped on
y rembrance On the last nght of my restrait, I was
awakened by hearig my own name spoken in a whisper. I started
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up in bed, and puttig out my arm in the dark, said:
‘Is that you, Peggotty?’
There was no imdiate aner, but prestly I heard my
name again, in a to so very mysterious and awful, that I thk I
should have gone ito a fit, if it had nt occurred to me that it must
have co through the keyhole.
I groped my way to the door, and putting my own lips to the
keyh, whispered: ‘Is that you, Peggotty dear?’
‘Yes, my ow precious Davy,’ she replid. ‘Be as soft as a
muse, or the Cat’l hear us.’
I understod this to mean Mi Murdsto, and was sensible of
the urgency of the cas; her room beg close by.
‘How’s mama, dear Peggotty? Is she very angry with me?’
I could hear Peggotty crying softly on her side of the keyhole, as
I was doig on min, before she answered. ‘No Not very.’
‘What is going to be do with me, Peggotty dear? Do you
know?’
‘School. Near London,’ was Peggotty’s aner. I was oblged to
get her to repeat it, for sh spoke it the first tim quite down my
throat, i cnsequen of my having forgotten to take my muth
away from the keyhole and put my ear there; and though her
wrds tickled me a god deal, I didn’t hear th
‘When, Peggotty?’
‘Tomorrow.’
‘Is that the reason why Mis Murdstone took the clothes out of
my drawers?’ which she had done, thugh I have forgotten to
mention it.
‘Yes,’ said Peggotty. ‘Box.’
‘Shan’t I see mama?’
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‘Yes,’ said Peggotty. ‘Morng.’
Then Peggotty fitted her mouth close to the keyhole, and
devered thes words through it with as muc feeg and
earntn as a keyhole has ever be the medium of
cunating, I will venture to asrt: shooting in eac broken
littl sente in a convulve littl burst of its own.
‘Davy, dear. If I ain’t bee azackly as intimate wth you. Lately,
as I usd to be. It ain’t becaus I don’t love you. just as wll and
mre, my pretty poppet. It’s beaus I thought it better for you.
And for someo el besides. Davy, my darling, are you listeg?
Can you hear?’
‘Ye-ye-ye-yes, Peggotty!’ I sobbed.
‘My own!’ said Peggotty, with infinte copasson. ‘What I want
to say, is That you must nver forget me For I’l never forget you.
Ad I’l take as muc care of your mama, Davy. As ever I tok of
you. And I wo’t leave her. The day may c wen se’ll be glad
to lay her poor head. On her stupid, cross old Peggotty’s arm
again. And I’l write to you, my dear. Thugh I ain’t no schoar.
d I’l—I’ll—’ Peggotty fel to kig the keyhole, as s culdn’t
kiss me.
‘Thank you, dear Peggotty!’ said I. ‘Oh, thank you! Thank you!
Wi you prom m o thing, Peggotty? Wi you write and tell
Mr. Peggotty and littl Em’ly, and Mrs. Gummidge and Ham, that
I am nt so bad as they might suppo, and that I set ’e all my
lve—epeally to little Em’ly? Wi you, if you plas, Peggotty?’
Th kind soul proised, and we both of us kissed th keyh
with the greatest affecti—I patted it with my hand, I rect, as
f it had be her honet face—and parted. From that night there
grew up in my breast a feeg for Peggotty whic I cant very
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wll defi. She did not replace my mothr; no on could do that;
but she came into a vacancy in my heart, which cd upo hr,
and I felt towards her sothing I have never felt for any other
human beg. It was a sort of comal affection, to; and yet if she
had died, I cannot think what I should have do, or how I should
have acted out the tragedy it would have be to m
In the mornig Mis Murdstone appeared as usual, and told m
I was going to shool; whic was not altogether suc news to me
as she supposed. She also informd me that wh I was dred, I
was to come dowstairs into th parlur, and have my breakfast.
Thre, I found my mothr, very pale and wth red eye: into w
arms I ran, and begged her pardo fro my suffering soul
‘Oh, Davy!’ s said. ‘That you could hurt anyone I lve! Try to
be better, pray to be better! I forgive you; but I am so grieved,
Davy, that you should have such bad passions in your heart.’
Thy had persuaded her that I was a wiked fellow, and she
was mre srry for that than for my going away. I felt it sorely. I
tried to eat my parting breakfast, but my tears dropped upon my
bread-and-butter, and trickled into my tea. I saw my mothr look
at me sotim, and then glanc at the watchful Mis Murdstone,
and than look down, or look away.
‘Master Cpperfield’s box thre!’ said Miss Murdsto, wh
whee were heard at the gate.
I looked for Peggotty, but it was not sh; nether sh nor Mr.
Murdstone appeared. My former acquaitan, the carrier, was at
the door. the box was take out to his cart, and lifted in ‘Cara!’
said Miss Murdsto, in her warning note
‘Ready, my dear Jan,’ returned my mother. ‘Good-bye, Davy.
You are going for your own good. Good-bye, my chd. You wil
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c home in the holidays, and be a better boy.’
‘Clara!’ Miss Murdsto repeated.
‘Certainly, my dear Jane,’ replied my mothr, wh was hding
me. ‘I forgive you, my dear boy. God bls you!’
‘Clara!’ Miss Murdsto repeated.
Miss Murdsto was god enugh to take me out to th cart,
and to say on the way that sh hoped I would repet, before I
cam to a bad end; and then I got into the cart, and the lazy horse
walked off with it.
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Chapter 5
I AM SENT AWAY FROM HOME
W
e might have gone about half a mi, and my pokethandkercef was quite wet through, when the carrier
stopped short. Loking out to ascertain for what, I saw,
to my amazet, Peggotty burst from a hedge and clb ito the
cart. She tok me in both her arms, and squezed me to hr stays
unti the presure on my n was extremely paiful, though I
nver thought of that til afterwards when I found it very tender.
Not a sgl word did Peggotty speak. Reasig one of her arm,
s put it down in her poket to the elbow, and brought out so
paper bags of cakes wich she crammed into my pockets, and a
purs wich she put into my hand, but not on word did she say.
fter another and a final squeeze with both arm, s got down
fro th cart and ran away; and, my belf is, and has always
be, without a sotary button on her gown. I piked up o, of
sveral that were rollg about, and treasured it as a kepsake for
a long time.
Th carrir looked at me, as if to inquire if she were comng
back. I shook my head, and said I thought not. ‘Then c up,’
said th carrir to th lazy horse; wh came up accordigly.
Having by this time crid as much as I posbly could, I began
to think it was of no us crying any more, epecialy as neithr
Roderik Rando, nor that Captain in th Royal British Navy, had
ever cried, that I could remember, in trying situation. Th carrir,
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handkerchief should be spread upo the horse’s back to dry. I
thanked him, and assented; and particularly small it looked, under
th circumstances
I had n lure to exame the purse. It was a stiff leather
purs, with a snap, and had thre bright shings in it, wich
Peggotty had evidetly pod up with whiteg, for my greater
delight. But its most precious contets were tw half-cro
folded togethr in a bit of paper, on wich was written, i my
mother’s hand, ‘For Davy. With my love.’ I was so overcome by
this, that I asked the carrier to be so good as to reach me my
pocket-handkerchief again; but he said he thught I had better do
without it, and I thought I realy had, so I wiped my eyes on my
sleeve and stopped myself.
For good, too; though, in cequene of my previous eotio,
I was still occasionaly seized with a stormy sob. After we had
jogged on for s little tim, I asked the carrier if he was going
all th way.
‘Al the way where?’ inquired the carrier.
‘Thre,’ I said.
‘Where’s there?’ inquired the carrier.
‘Near Lodo,’ I said.
‘Why that horse,’ said th carrir, jerking th rein to point h
out, ‘would be deader than pork afore he got over half the ground.’
‘Are you only going to Yarmouth then?’ I asked.
‘That’s about it,’ said the carrier. ‘Ad there I shall take you to
the stage-cutch, and the stage-cutch that’l take you to—wherever
it is.’
A this was a great deal for the carrier (whose nam was Mr.
Barki) to say—h beg, as I obsrved in a formr chapter, of a
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phgmati temperamt, and nt at all coversatioal—I offered
hm a cake as a mark of attention, which h ate at o gulp,
exactly like an elphant, and which made no more impresion on
is big face than it would have don on an elephant’s.
‘Did she make ’e, nw?’ said Mr. Barki, always leang
forward, i hi souchg way, on the footboard of the cart with an
arm on each knee
‘Peggotty, do you mean, sir?’
‘Ah!’ said Mr. Barkis. ‘Her.’
‘Ye. She makes all our pastry, and doe all our cookig.’
‘Do she thugh?’ said Mr. Barkis. He made up hs mouth as if to
whistl, but he didn’t whistle He sat lookig at the horse’s ears, as
if he saw something ne thre; and sat so, for a considerable time.
By and by, he said:
‘No sweethearts, I b’leve?’
‘Sweetmats did you say, Mr. Barki?’ For I thought he wanted
sthing el to eat, and had potedly aluded to that
description of refret.
‘Hearts,’ said Mr. Barki. ‘Sweet hearts; n pers walks wth
her!’
‘With Peggotty?’
‘Ah!’ he said. ‘Her.’
‘Oh, no She never had a sweetheart.’
‘Didn’t she, thugh!’ said Mr. Barki
Again h made up his mouth to whistle, and again he didn’t
whistl, but sat lookig at the horse’s ears.
‘So sh make,’ said Mr. Barki, after a lg iterval of
refletion, ‘all the appl parstie, and doos al the cookig, do s?’
I replied that such was th fact.
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‘Well I’l te you what,’ said Mr. Barki. ‘P’raps you might be
ritin’ to her?’
‘I shall certainly write to her,’ I rejod.
‘Ah!’ he said, sloy turng his eyes toards me. ‘Wel! If you
was writin’ to her, p’raps you’d rellect to say that Barki was
llin’; would you?’
‘That Barkis is wing,’ I repeated, innocently. ‘Is that all th
message?’
‘Ye-es,’ he said, coiderig. ‘Ye-es. Barkis is wi’.’
‘But you wil be at Blunderstone agai tomorrow, Mr. Barki,’ I
said, falterig a little at the idea of my beg far away from it then,
and could give your own message so much better.’
As he repudiated this suggestion, hover, with a jerk of h
ad, and oce more confirmed his previous requet by saying,
wth profound gravity, ‘Barkis is willin’. That’s th mesage,’ I
readily undertok its tranission. Whi I was waitig for th
ach i the hotel at Yarmouth that very afternoon, I procured a
st of paper and an inkstand, and wrote a note to Peggotty,
wich ran thus: ‘My dear Peggotty. I have come here safe. Barkis
is wg. My love to mama. Yours affectionately. P.S. He says he
particularly wants you to know—Barki is willing .’
Whe I had taken this cossion o myself propectivey, Mr.
Barkis relapsed into perfet silence; and I, feg quite wrn out
by all that had happed lately, lay dow on a sack in th cart and
fel asleep. I spt soundly until we got to Yarmouth; whic was so
tirely nw and strange to me in the in-yard to whic we drove,
that I at onc abandod a latent hope I had had of meeting with
s of Mr. Peggotty’s famy there, perhaps even wth lttle Em’ly
herself.
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Th coach was in th yard, shiing very much all over, but
wthut any hrses to it as yet; and it looked in that state as if
nthing was mre unlikey than its ever going to London. I was
thinkig this, and wonderig what would ultimately be of my
box, wich Mr. Barkis had put dow on th yard-pavet by th
po (he having drive up the yard to turn his cart), and al what
would ultimately be of m, when a lady looked out of a bowwindow where s fowls and jots of meat were hangig up,
and said:
‘Is that the little gentlan from Blunderstone?’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ I said.
‘What nam?’ iquired the lady.
‘Copperfield, ma’am,’ I said.
‘That won’t do,’ returned the lady. ‘Nobody’s dinner is paid for
hre, in that name.’
‘Is it Murdsto, ma’am?’ I said.
‘If you’re Master Murdstoe,’ said the lady, ‘why do you go and
give another nam, first?’
I explained to th lady h it was, wh than rang a bell, and
called out, ‘Wiam! show the coffee-room!’ upon whic a waiter
cam rung out of a kitchen on the oppote side of the yard to
sho it, and sed a god deal surprised wh he was only to
how it to me
It was a large long ro with some large maps in it. I doubt if I
could have felt much stranger if th maps had be real foreign
untries, and I cast away in th middle of th. I felt it was
taking a liberty to sit dow, with my cap i my hand, o th cornr
of the chair nearet the door; and when the waiter laid a cloth on
purpo for me, and put a set of castors on it, I thk I must have
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turnd red al over with modesty.
He brought me so chops, and vegetabl, and took the cvers
off in such a bounng manner that I was afraid I must have give
so offence. But he greatly reeved my md by puttig a
cair for me at the tabl, and sayig, very affably, ‘Now, six-foot!
come on!’
I thanked hi, and tok my seat at th board; but found it
extremely difficult to handl my knfe and fork with anythig like
dexterity, or to avoid splasg mysf with the gravy, whil he
was standing opposite, starig so hard, and making me blus in
the mot dreadful maner every ti I caught his eye. After
watcng me into th second chop, he said:
‘Thre’s half a pint of ale for you. Will you have it no?’
I thanked h and said, ‘Ye.’ Upon which he poured it out of a
jug ito a large tumblr, and held it up against the light, and made
t look beautiful.
‘My eye!’ he said. ‘It seems a god deal, don’t it?’
‘It do se a good deal,’ I anered with a se. For it was
quite deghtful to me, to find him so plasant. He was a twinklgeyed, pimple-faced man, with his hair standing upright all over hi
head; and as he stood with one arm a-kibo, holdig up the glas
to the light with the other hand, he looked quite friendly.
‘Thre was a gentlman here, yesterday,’ he said—‘a stout
gentleman, by th name of Topsawyer—perhaps you kn him?’
‘No,’ I said, ‘I don’t thk—’
‘In bres and gaiters, broad-brimmed hat, grey coat,
speckled choker,’ said th waiter.
‘No,’ I said bashfuly, ‘I have’t the pleasure—’
‘He cam in here,’ said the waiter, lookig at the light through
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the tumblr, ‘ordered a glas of this ale— would order it—I told
hm not—drank it, and fe dead. It was to old for hm. It oughtn’t
to be draw; that’s the fact.’
I was very muc shocked to hear of this mlancholy acdet,
and said I thought I had better have so water.
‘Why you se,’ said the waiter, stil lookig at the light through
the tumblr, wth one of his eyes shut up, ‘our peopl do’t like
things being ordered and left. It offends ’em. But I’ll drik it, if you
like. I’m usd to it, and us is everythng. I don’t think it’ll hurt me,
if I thro my head back, and take it off quick. Shal I?’
I replied that he would much oblige me by driking it, if he
thought he culd do it safely, but by n mean otherwis When he
did thro his head back, and take it off quick, I had a horrible fear,
I cfes, of seeing hi meet the fate of the lamted Mr.
Topsawyer, and fall lifeless on th carpet. But it didn’t hurt hm.
On the cotrary, I thought he seemed the fresher for it.
‘What have we got here?’ he said, putting a fork into my di
‘Not chops?’
‘Chops,’ I said.
‘Lord bless my soul!’ he excaimed, ‘I didn’t kn thy were
hops Why, a chop’s the very thing to take off the bad effects of
that beer! Ain’t it lucky?’
So he took a chop by the bo in one hand, and a potato i the
othr, and ate away with a very god appetite, to my extre
atisfaction. He afterwards took another chop, and another potato;
and after that, another chop and another potato. When we had
done, h brought me a pudding, and having set it before me,
sed to rumate, and to beme absent i h md for some
moments
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‘How’s the pie?’ he said, rousg himself.
‘It’s a pudding,’ I made answer.
‘Pudding!’ he exclaimed. ‘Why, bls me, so it is! What!’ lookig
at it nearer. ‘You don’t mean to say it’s a batter-pudding!’
‘Yes, it is indeed.’
‘Why, a batter-pudding,’ h said, takig up a table-spo, ‘is my
favourite pudding! Ain’t that lucky? Come on, littl ’un, and let’s
who’l get mot.’
The waiter certaiy got mot. He entreated m more than once
to co in and win, but what with his table-spoon to my tea-spoon,
his dispatc to my dispatch, and his appetite to my appetite, I was
ft far bed at the first mouthful, and had n chan with him I
never saw anyo enjoy a puddig so much, I thk; and h
laughd, wh it was all go, as if his enjoymt of it lasted sti
Fidig him so very friendly and copanionabl, it was th
that I asked for the pe and ink and paper, to write to Peggotty.
He nt only brought it imdiatey, but was good enough to look
over me whe I wrote the letter. When I had fined it, he asked
m where I was going to school.
I said, ‘Near Lodo,’ wh was al I knew.
‘Oh! my eye!’ he said, lookig very low-spirited, ‘I am sorry for
that.’
‘Why?’ I asked him.
‘Oh, Lord!’ he said, sakig his head, ‘that’s the school where
thy broke th boy’s ribs—tw ribs—a littl boy he was I should
say he was—lt me see—how old are you, about?’
I told him betwee eight and nin
‘That’s just his age,’ he said. ‘He was eght years and sx month
old when they broke hi first rib; eight years and eight moths old
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w thy broke his second, and did for him.’
I could not disguise fro myself, or fro th waiter, that this
was an unmfortabl coidence, and inquired ho it was done
His answer was not cherig to my spirits, for it consisted of tw
dismal words, ‘With whpping.’
The blowing of the coach-horn in the yard was a seasonabl
diversi, which made m get up and hestatingly inquire, i the
mingled pride and diffidence of having a purs (wich I tok out of
my pocket), if thre were anythng to pay.
‘Thre’s a sheet of letter-paper,’ he returned. ‘Did you ever buy
a shet of letter-paper?’
I could nt reber that I ever had.
‘It’s dear,’ he said, ‘on account of the duty. Threepence. That’s
th way we’re taxed in this country. Thre’s nothing e, except
the waiter. Never mid the ink. I lose by that.’
‘What should you—what should I—how muc ought I to—what
wuld it be right to pay th waiter, if you plase?’ I stammered,
blusng.
‘If I hadn’t a famy, and that famy hadn’t the cowpok,’ said
th waiter, ‘I wouldn’t take a sixpen If I didn’t support a aged
pairit, and a lovely sister,’—here th waiter was greatly
agitated—‘I wouldn’t take a farthng. If I had a god place, and
was treated we here, I should beg acceptance of a trifle, istead
of takig of it. But I live on broke wittles—and I seep on the
cal’—here the waiter burst into tears
I was very much conrned for his misfortunes, and felt that
any regnition short of ninepence would be mere brutality and
hardn of heart. Therefore I gave him one of my three bright
shillings, which he received with much humility and verati,
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and spun up with his thumb, directly afterwards, to try the
goodn of.
It was a littl disconcerting to me, to fid, w I was beg
helped up bed the coach, that I was suppod to have eaten al
the dinner without any astanc I divered this, from
overhearig the lady i the bow-window say to the guard, ‘Take
are of that chd, George, or he’l burst!’ and from obsrving that
the wome-srvants who were about the plac cam out to look
and giggl at me as a young phe My unfortunate friend
th waiter, wh had quite revered his spirits, did not appear to
be diturbed by this, but joind in the genral admratio without
beg at all confusd. If I had any doubt of him, I suppo this half
awaked it; but I am id to believe that with the sipl
nfidence of a chid, and th natural reliance of a child upo
superir years (qualiti I am very sorry any childre should
preaturely change for worldly wisdom), I had no serious mtrust
of him on the whole, even then
I felt it rather hard, I must own, to be made, without derving
it, the subjet of joke betwee the coachman and guard as to the
cach drawg heavy bed, on acunt of my sitting there, and
as to the greater expediy of my traveling by waggon. The story
of my suppod appetite getting wind among the outside
passegers, thy were merry upo it likew; and asked me
whether I was going to be paid for, at school, as two brothers or
three, and whether I was cotracted for, or wet upo the regular
terms; with other plasant questions. But the worst of it was, that I
knew I should be ashamd to eat anything, when an opportunity
offered, and that, after a rather light dir, I should remai
ungry all night—for I had left my cakes behnd, at th hote, in
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my hurry. My appresion wre realized. Whe we stopped for
supper I couldn’t muster courage to take any, thugh I should
have liked it very much, but sat by th fire and said I didn’t want
anythng. This did not save me fro more jokes, ethr; for a
husky-voicd gentlan with a rough fac, who had be eating
out of a sandwic-box narly al the way, except when he had be
drikig out of a bottle, said I was lke a boa-ctrictor who took
eugh at o meal to last him a long time; after which, he
actualy brought a ras out upo himf with bod bef.
We had started from Yarmouth at three o’cock in the
afternoon, and we were due in Londo about eight next mornig.
It was Mid-sumer weather, and the evenig was very pleasant.
When we pasd through a viage, I pitured to mysf wat th
insides of th houses were like, and what th iabitants wre
about; and when boys cam runng after us, and got up bend
and sung there for a little way, I wodered whether their fathers
re alve, and wether they Were happy at home. I had plenty to
think of, threfore, besides my mind running continualy on th
kind of place I was going to—wich was an awful speculation.
Sometimes, I remember, I resigned myself to thughts of h
and Peggotty; and to endeavouring, in a cfusd bld way, to
real ho I had felt, and what sort of boy I usd to be, before I bit
Mr. Murdsto: which I couldn’t satisfy myself about by any
mans, I sd to have bitten him i suc a remte antiquity.
The night was not so plasant as the eveg, for it got cy;
and beg put betwee two gentl (the rough-facd one and
another) to prevet my tumbling off the coach, I was nearly
smothred by thr falling asleep, and completely blocking me up.
Thy squezed me so hard somtimes, that I could not hep crying
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out, ‘Oh! If you plas!’—w thy didn’t like at al, beaus it
wke them. Oppote me was an elderly lady in a great fur coak,
who looked in the dark more like a haystack than a lady, se was
rapped up to such a degre This lady had a basket with her, and
s hadn’t known what to do with it, for a log tim, until sh
found that on acunt of my legs beg short, it could go
undernath me. It cramped and hurt me so, that it made me
perfetly miserabl; but if I moved in th least, and made a glass
that was in th basket rattl against something el (as it was sure
to do), sh gave me the cruellt poke with her foot, and said,
‘Come, don’t you fidget. Your bo are young enough, I’m sure!’
At last th sun ro, and th my companion seed to slp
easier. Th difficulties under which thy had laboured all night,
and which had found utteran in th most terrific gasps and
sorts, are nt to be coved. As the sun got higher, their slp
beam lghter, and so they gradually one by one awoke I
rellect beg very much surprised by th feint everybody made,
then, of not havig been to sleep at al, and by the unc
indignation with which everyo repeld th charge. I labour
under th same kid of astonishment to this day, having invariably
obsrved that of al human weakn, the one to whic our
c nature i the least diposed to cofe (I cant imagi
y) is the weakn of havig go to sleep in a coach.
What an amazing place Lodo was to me wh I saw it in th
distance, and ho I believed all th adventure of all my favourite
ro to be constantly enacting and re-enactig thre, and h I
vaguey made it out in my ow mid to be fulr of woders and
wickedne than all th cities of th earth, I need not stop here to
relate. We approacd it by degree, and got, in due tim, to the
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inn in th Whiteapel district, for which we were bound. I forget
whether it was the Blue Bull, or the Blue Boar; but I know it was
th Blue Something, and that its likeness was painted up on th
back of the coach.
The guard’s eye lghted on me as he was getting down, and he
said at th boking-office door:
‘Is there anybody here for a yoongster booked i the nam of
Murdstone, from Bloonderstone, Sooffolk, to be left til cald for?’
Nobody anered.
‘Try Copperfield, if you please, sr,’ said I, looking hlplessly
dow
‘Is there anybody here for a yoongster, booked in the nam of
Murdstone, from Bloonderstone, Sooffolk, but ownig to the nam
Is
f Copperfield, to be left ti calld for?’ said th guard. ‘Co!
there anybody?’
No There was nobody. I looked anxiously around; but the
inquiry made no impression on any of th bystanders, if I except a
man i gaiters, with one eye, who suggested that they had better
put a brass coar round my neck, and ti me up in th stabl
ladder was brought, and I got down after the lady, who was
ke a haystack: nt daring to stir, until her basket was remved.
Th coach was clear of passengers by that time, th luggage was
very soon ceared out, the horse had been taken out before the
luggage, and n the coach itsf was wheeled and backed off by
s hostlers, out of the way. Sti, nbody appeared, to caim the
dusty youngster from Blunderstone, Suffolk.
More sotary than Robion Crusoe, who had nobody to lk at
hi and s that he was stary, I went into the bookig-offic,
and, by invitation of the clrk on duty, pasd bend the cunter,
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and sat down on the scale at whic they weighed the luggage.
Here, as I sat looking at th parcs, package, and boks, and
inhaling th smell of stables (ever since associated with that
morng), a prossion of most tredous considerations began
to marc through my mind. Suppog nobody should ever fetc
, how lg wuld they cot to keep m there? Would they
keep m long enugh to spend seven shings? Should I sleep at
nght in on of those woode bi, with the other luggage, and
was mysf at the pump in the yard in the mornig; or should I
be turned out every night, and expeted to c agai to be lft
till called for, wh th office oped next day? Supposing thre
as no mistake i th case, and Mr. Murdsto had devised this
plan to get rid of me, what should I do? If thy allowd me to
remain thre until my seven shillings were spent, I couldn’t hpe
to remai there when I began to starve. That would obviously be
inconveient and unplasant to th custors, besides entailing
on the Blue Whatever-it-was, the rik of funeral expe. If I
started off at oce, and tried to walk back ho, ho could I ever
find my way, how could I ever hope to walk s far, how could I
make sure of anyone but Peggotty, eve if I got back? If I found
out the nearet proper authoriti, and offered mysf to go for a
soldier, or a sailor, I was such a littl fellow that it was most lkely
they wouldn’t take m in Thes thoughts, and a hundred other
suc thoughts, turned me burng hot, and made m giddy with
appresion and dismay. I was in th height of my fever w a
man entered and whispered to th clerk, wh pretly slanted me
off th scale, and pushed me over to him, as if I were weighd,
bought, delivered, and paid for.
I went out of the offic, hand in hand with this n
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acquaitan, I stole a look at him He was a gaunt, sallow young
man, with hollow cheks, and a chin almost as black as Mr.
Murdsto’s; but thre th likeness ended, for his wiskers wre
shaved off, and his hair, instead of beg glsy, was rusty and dry.
He was dred in a suit of black clths which were rathr rusty
and dry too, and rather short in the seeves and legs; and he had a
wite neck-kerchief o, that was not over-clean. I did not, and do
not, suppose that this neck-kerchief was all th line h wre, but
it was al he showed or gave any hint of.
‘You’re the ne boy?’ he said. ‘Yes, sir,’ I said.
I supposed I was. I didn’t kn
‘I’m on of the masters at Salm House,’ he said.
I made hi a bow and felt very much overawed. I was so
ashamed to allude to a commonplace thing like my box, to a
schoar and a master at Salem Hous, that we had go some littl
ditan from the yard before I had the hardihood to meti it.
We turned back, o my humbly inuatig that it mght be useful
to me hereafter; and he told the clrk that the carrier had
instruction to call for it at noo
‘If you please, sir,’ I said, wh we had accomplished about th
same distance as before, ‘is it far?’
‘It’s dow by Blackhath,’ he said.
‘Is that far, sr?’ I diffidetly asked.
‘It’s a god step,’ he said. ‘We shall go by th stage-coach. It’s
about six miles.’
I was s fait and tired, that the idea of holdig out for six mi
re, was too muc for me I took heart to tell him that I had had
nthing all nght, and that if he would alw me to buy sothing
to eat, I should be very muc obliged to him He appeared
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surprised at this—I se him stop and look at me n—and after
considering for a fe moments, said he wanted to call on an od
person who lived not far off, and that the bet way would be for m
to buy so bread, or whatever I lked bet that was wholese,
and make my breakfast at her house, whre we could get some
milk.
Accordingly w looked in at a baker’s wndow, and after I had
made a series of proposal to buy everything that was bious i
the shop, and he had rejected them one by oe, w deded i
favour of a ni little laf of brown bread, which cot me
threepenc. Then, at a grocer’s shop, we bought an egg and a s
of streaky bac; which sti lft what I thought a good deal of
change, out of th second of th bright shillings, and made me
consider London a very cheap place. Th provisions laid in, we
nt on through a great noise and uproar that confusd my wary
head beyond deription, and over a bridge whic, n doubt, was
London Bridge (inded I think he told m s, but I was half
asleep), until we came to th poor pers’s huse, wich was a
part of some alms-huses, as I knew by thr look, and by an
inscription on a sto over th gate which said thy wre
tabld for twenty-five poor wo
The Master at Sal House lifted the latch of one of a number
of littl black doors that were all alke, and had each a lttl
diamd-paned window on on side, and anthr littl diamdpand window above; and we went into the little house of one of
these poor old women, who was blowing a fire to make a little
aucepan bo. On seeing the master enter, the old woan stopped
with the bews on her kn, and said sothing that I thought
sunded lke ‘My Charly!’ but on seeing m co in too, she got
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up, and rubbig her hands made a cfused sort of half curtsey.
‘Can you cook this young gentlan’s breakfast for him, if you
please?’ said th Master at Salem Hous
‘Can I?’ said the old woman ‘Ye can I, sure!’
‘Ho’s Mrs. Fibbitson today?’ said th Master, lookig at
anothr old woan in a large chair by th fire, wh was such a
bundl of cothes that I feel grateful to this hour for not having sat
upon her by mitake.
‘Ah, se’s poorly,’ said the first old woman ‘It’s one of her bad
days. If the fire was to go out, through any acdet, I verily
believe she’d go out to, and never com to life again.’
A they looked at her, I looked at her al Although it was a
warm day, s sed to think of nothing but the fire. I fancd
se was jealous even of the saucepan on it; and I have reason to
know that she tok its impresment into th service of bog my
egg and brong my bacon, in dudgen; for I saw her, with my o
discomfited eye, shake her fist at me once, wh th culinary
operati were going on, and no on el was lookig. The sun
treamd i at the little window, but sh sat with her own back
and the back of the large chair toards it, screenig the fire as if
she were sedulously keeping it warm, instead of it keepig her
warm, and watcng it in a most distrustful manner. Th
pletion of the preparatins for my breakfast, by relievig the
fire, gave her suc extreme joy that se laughed aloud—and a very
unmelodious laugh she had, I must say.
I sat dow to my bron loaf, my egg, and my rasher of bacon,
wth a basin of milk besdes, and made a most delicious meal
Wh I was yet i the full enjoymet of it, the old woman of the
huse said to th Master:
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‘Have you got your flute with you?’
‘Yes,’ he returned.
‘Have a bl at it,’ said the old woman, coaxigly. ‘Do!’
Th Master, upo this, put his hand undernath th skirts of h
at, and brought out his flute in thre piecs, which he scred
togethr, and began immediatey to play. My impresion is, after
many years of consideration, that thre never can have be
anybody in the world who played worse. He made the mot dial
unds I have ever heard produced by any mean, natural or
artifical I don’t know what the tune were—if there were suc
things in the performance at al, whic I doubt—but the ifluen
f th strai upo me was, first, to make me thk of al my
sorro until I could hardly keep my tears back; th to take away
my appetite; and lastly, to make me so sleepy that I couldn’t keep
my eye ope They begin to close agai, and I begin to nod, as the
rellection rises fre upo me. Once more th littl ro, wth
its ope cornr cupboard, and its square-backed chairs, and its
angular little staircas ladig to the room above, and its three
peacock’s feathers diplayed over the mantelpiece—I reber
wonderig when I first went in, what that peacock would have
thought if he had known what his finry was doomed to c to—
fades fro before me, and I nod, and slp. Th flute becomes
inaudible, th whs of th coach are heard instead, and I am o
my journey. Th coach jolts, I wake with a start, and th flute has
me back agai, and the Master at Sal House is sittig with hi
legs crossed, playig it dolefuly, while th old woman of th house
looks on delighted. She fades in her turn, and he fades, and all
fade, and there is n flute, n Master, n Sal House, n David
Cpperfield, no anythng but heavy sleep.
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I dreamd, I thought, that onc whil he was blowing ito this
dial flute, the old woman of the house, who had gone narer
and nearer to him in her ecstati admration, laned over the back
of his chair and gave him an affectionate squeze round th nek,
wich stopped his playig for a moment. I was in th middle state
between sleepig and wakig, either then or idiately
afterwards; for, as he resumed—it was a real fact that he had
stopped playig—I saw and heard th same od wan ask Mrs
Fibbits if it was’t delicious (maning th flute), to which Mrs
Fibbits replied, ‘Ay, ay! yes!’ and nodded at th fire: to which, I
am persuaded, she gave the credit of the whole performane.
When I seemed to have be dozig a log whe, the Master at
Sal House unrewed his flute into the three pi, put them
up as before, and tok me away. We found th coac very near at
hand, and got upon the roof; but I was so dead slpy, that when
stopped on th road to take up somebody el, thy put me
ide where there were no pasengers, and where I sept
profoundly, until I found the coach going at a footpac up a steep
hi amg green leaves. Prestly, it stopped, and had c to its
destination.
A short walk brought us—I mean the Master and me—to Sal
House, whic was enosed with a high brik wall, and looked very
dull. Over a door in this wal was a board wth SALEM HOUSE
upon it; and through a gratig in this door we were surveyed when
rang th be by a surly face, which I found, on th door being
opened, beged to a stout man wth a bul-neck, a wooden leg,
overhangig templ, and his hair cut close al round his head.
‘Th ne boy,’ said the Master.
The man with the wooden lg eyed me al over—it didn’t take
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lg, for there was not muc of m—and lked the gate bed
us, and took out the key. We were going up to the house, amg
some dark heavy trees, when he caled after my conductor. ‘Hal!’
We looked back, and he was standig at the door of a lttle
dge, where he lived, with a pair of boots in his hand.
‘Here! Th cobbler’s be,’ he said, ‘sce you’ve be out, Mr.
Mell, and h says h can’t med ’em any more He says thre ain’t
a bit of th original bot left, and he wonders you expect it.’
With thes words he threw the boots towards Mr. Mel, who
wnt back a fe paces to pick th up, and looked at th (very
disconsolatey, I was afraid), as we went on togethr. I observed
then, for the first tim, that the boots he had on were a good deal
th wors for wear, and that his stoking was just breaking out in
one place, like a bud.
Salem Hous was a square brick buiding with wings; of a bare
and unfurnished appearance. All about it was so very quiet, that I
said to Mr. Mell I supposed th boys were out; but he sed
surprised at my not knowg that it was hoday-time. That all th
boys were at their several home That Mr. Creakl, the
propritor, was dow by th sea-side with Mrs. and Miss Creakl;
and that I was sent in hiday-time as a punishmnt for my
misdog, al of which he explaid to me as we wet alg.
I gazed upon the schoolroom into whic he took me, as the
mt forlorn and deate place I had ever seen. I see it n A
long ro with thre long ro of desks, and sx of forms, and
bristling al round with pegs for hats and slate. Scraps of old
copy-boks and exercises litter th dirty flr. Some silkworms’
huses, made of th same materials, are scattered over th desks.
Two mirable lttle whte mi, lft bed by their ownr, are
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running up and dow in a fusty castle made of pasteboard and
wre, lookig in al the corners with their red eyes for anythig to
at. A bird, in a cage very little bigger than hif, make a
mournful rattl now and th in hopping on his perc, tw inche
gh, or dropping fro it; but neithr sings nor chirps. Thre is a
strange unwholee smell upo the room, like mdewed
crduroys, swt appl wantig air, and rotten books There
uld not well be more ink splashed about it, if it had be rofless
fro its first contructi, and th skies had raind, snd,
haid, and blown ink through the varying seasons of the year.
Mr. Mell having left me while he took hi irreparable boots
upstairs, I wnt softly to th upper end of th ro, observig all
this as I crept alg. Suddenly I came upo a pasteboard placard,
beautifully written, whic was lyig on the dek, and bore thes
words: ‘Take care of him. He bites.’
I got upon the dek imdiately, apprehensve of at least a
great dog underneath. But, though I looked all round with anxious
eye, I could see nothing of hi I was still engaged in peering
about, wh Mr. Me came back, and asked m wat I did up
there?
‘I beg your pardo, sir,’ says I, ‘if you please, I’m lking for th
dog.’
‘Dog?’ he says. ‘What dog?’
‘Isn’t it a dog, sir?’
‘Isn’t what a dog?’
‘That’s to be take care of, sir; that bites’
‘No, Copperfied,’ says he, gravey, ‘that’s not a dog. That’s a
boy. My instruction are, Copperfid, to put this placard o your
back. I am srry to make suc a beging with you, but I must do
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it.’ With that he took me down, and tied the placard, which was
atly constructed for th purpo, o my shoulders like a
knapsack; and whrever I went, afterwards, I had th consolation
f carrying it.
What I suffered fro that placard, nobody can imagine
Whethr it was possible for people to see me or not, I alays
fancied that somebody was readig it. It was no relief to turn
round and find nobody; for wherever my back was, there I
iagid sbody always to be That cruel man with the woode
leg aggravated my sufferings. He was in authrity; and if he ever
saw me lang against a tree, or a wal, or the house, he roared
out fro his lodge door in a stupedous voice, ‘Hallo, you sir! You
Cpperfield! Sho that badge conspicuous, or I’ll report you!’ Th
playground was a bare graved yard, ope to all the back of the
huse and th offices; and I knew that th servants read it, and th
butcr read it, and th baker read it; that everybody, in a word,
who cam backwards and forwards to the house, of a mrning
when I was ordered to walk there, read that I was to be take care
of, for I bit, I rellect that I positivey began to have a dread of
myself, as a kid of wid boy wh did bite
Thre was an old door in this playground, on which th boys
ad a custo of carving thr names. It was completely covered
wth such inscription. In my dread of th end of th vacati and
thr coming back, I could not read a boy’s name, withut
he would read,
inquiring in what to and with what ephasis
‘Take care of him He bite.’ There was one boy—a crtai J.
Steerforth—who cut hi nam very deep and very often, who, I
conceived, would read it in a rathr strong voice, and afterwards
pul my hair. There was another boy, one Tommy Traddl, who I
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dreaded would make game of it, and preted to be dreadfully
frighted of me. Thre was a third, George Deple, wh I fancied
wuld sing it. I have looked, a littl shrinking creature, at that
door, until the owners of al the nam—there were five-and-forty
of them in the school then, Mr. Mell said—seemed to sed m to
Cventry by geral acamation, and to cry out, each in hs o
ay, ‘Take care of him. He bites!’
It was th same with th plac at th desks and forms. It was
the sam with the groves of derted bedsteads I peeped at, on my
way to, and wh I was in, my own bed. I remember dreamng
nght after night, of beg with my mother as s used to be, or of
going to a party at Mr. Peggotty’s, or of traveg outside the
stage-coach, or of dining again with my unfortunate friend th
aiter, and in al th circumstances making people scream and
stare, by th unappy disclosure that I had nothing on but my
lttle night-shrt, and that placard.
In th monotony of my life, and in my constant appresion of
the re-opeg of the school, it was suc an iupportabl
affliti! I had log tasks every day to do with Mr. Mell; but I did
them, there beg n Mr. and Mis Murdstone here, and got
through them without digrac Before, and after them, I walked
about—supervised, as I have mentioned, by th man wth th
woode lg. How vividly I cal to mid the damp about the house,
the gree cracked flagstone i the court, an old laky water-butt,
and the dioloured trunks of so of the grim tree, whic
d to have dripped more in th rai than othr tre, and to
ave blown les in th sun! At on we dined, Mr. Me and I, at th
upper end of a lg bare dining-room, full of deal tabl, and
sg of fat. Then, we had mre tasks until tea, which Mr. Mel
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drank out of a blue teacup, and I out of a tin pot. All day long, and
until seven or eight in the eveg, Mr. Mell, at hi own detacd
dek i the schoolroom, worked hard with pen, ink, ruler, books,
and writing-paper, making out th bis (as I found) for last halfyear. Wh he had put up h things for the night he took out his
flute, and bl at it, until I almt thought he would gradually
blow his whole beg into the large hole at the top, and ooze away
at th keys
I picture my small self in th diy-lighted ros, sitting with
my head upo my hand, listeg to th doleful performance of
Mr. Mell, and cong tomorro’s lessons. I picture myself wth
my boks shut up, still listeg to th doleful performanc of Mr.
Mel, and listeg through it to what used to be at home, and to
the blowing of the wind on Yarmouth flats, and feeg very sad
and slitary. I piture mysf going up to bed, among the unusd
ros, and sitting on my bed-side crying for a comfortabl wrd
fro Peggotty. I picture myself comng dowstairs in th morng,
and lookig through a lg ghastly gas of a staircas window at
the school-bell hangig on the top of an out-house with a
wathrck above it; and dreading th time wh it shall ring J.
Sterforth and th rest to work: which is only second, in my
forebodig appre, to the tim when the man with the
woode leg shal unlok the rusty gate to give adm to the
awful Mr. Creakle. I cant thk I was a very dangerous
character in any of th aspects, but in all of th I carrid th
same warng on my back.
Mr. Mel never said muc to m, but he was never harsh to me
I suppose we were company to each othr, withut talking. I forgot
to meti that he would talk to himf sotim, and grin, and
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clench hs fist, and grid hs teth, and pull his hair in an
unaccountabl manr. But he had th pecularities: and at first
they frightend me, though I soon got used to them
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Chapter 6
I ENLARGE MY CIRCLE OF ACQUAINTANCE
I
had ld this lfe about a mth, when the man with the
woode leg began to stump about with a mp and a bucket of
water, fro which I inferred that preparations were making
to reve Mr. Creakle and the boys. I was not mtake; for th
p cam ito the schoolroom before lg, and turned out Mr.
Mell and me, w lved wre w could, and got on ho we could,
for so days, during whic we were always in the way of two or
three young wome, who had rarely shown themsves before, and
wre so continualy in th midst of dust that I szed almost as
muc as if Sal House had been a great snuff-box.
On day I was informed by Mr. Mel that Mr. Creakl would be
home that eveg. In the eveg, after tea, I heard that he was
c Before bedti, I was fetched by the man with the woode
g to appear before him
Mr. Creakle’s part of the house was a good deal mre
cfortabl than ours, and he had a sug bit of garde that looked
pleasant after th dusty playground, which was such a desrt in
mniature, that I thought no one but a caml, or a drodary,
culd have felt at home in it. It seemed to m a bod thg even to
take notic that the pasage looked cfortable, as I went on my
way, tremblg, to Mr. Creakle’s pres: wh s abashed me,
when I was ushered ito it, that I hardly saw Mrs. Creakl or Mis
reakl (who were both there, in the parlour), or anything but Mr.
Creakle, a stout gentleman wth a bunch of watc-chain and seals,
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in an arm-chair, wth a tumbler and bottl beside h
‘So!’ said Mr. Creakle. ‘This is th young gentleman w
teth are to be filed! Turn him round.’
The woode-legged man turned me about so as to exhibit the
placard; and having afforded tim for a full survey of it, turned m
about agai, with my fac to Mr. Creakle, and poted hielf at
Mr. Creakle’s side. Mr. Creakl’s fac was fiery, and hi eyes wre
small, and deep in his head; he had thick ves in his foread, a
littl nose, and a large chi. He was bald on th top of his head;
and had s thin wet-lookig hair that was just turnig grey,
brushed across eac templ, s that the two sde iterlaced o hi
foread. But th circumstance about him which impred me
most, was, that he had no voice, but spoke in a wisper. Th
xerti this cost him, or th consciousss of talking i that
feble way, made his angry face so much more angry, and hi thick
veins so much thicker, wh he spoke, that I am not surprised, on
lookig back, at this pecularity striking me as hs chief o ‘No,’
said Mr. Creakle. ‘What’s the report of th boy?’
‘There’s nothing against him yet,’ returned the man with the
wooden leg. ‘There has be no opportunity.’
I thought Mr. Creakl was diappoted. I thought Mrs. and
Miss Creakle (at wh I now glanced for th first time, and wh
were, both, thin and quiet) were not diappointed.
‘Come here, sir!’ said Mr. Creakle, bekonig to me
‘C here!’ said the man with the woode lg, repeatig the
gesture.
‘I have th happine of kning your fathr-in-law,’ whispered
Mr. Creakle, takig me by the ear; ‘and a worthy man he i, and a
you
man of a strong character. He knows me, and I kn h Do
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know me? Hey?’ said Mr. Creakle, pinching my ear with ferocious
playfuls.
‘Not yet, sir,’ I said, flching with th pain
‘Not yet? Hey?’ repeated Mr. Creakle. ‘But you wi soo. Hey?’
‘You wi so. Hey?’ repeated the man with the wooden lg. I
afterwards found that he genrally acted, with hi strong voic, as
Mr. Creakl’s interpreter to the boys.
I was very much frighted, and said, I hped so, if h pleased.
I felt, all th while, as if my ear were blazig; he pinched it so
hard.
‘I’l tell you what I am,’ whpered Mr. Creakle, letting it go at
last, with a scre at parting that brought the water ito my eye
‘I’m a Tartar.’
‘A Tartar,’ said the man with the woode lg.
‘When I say I’l do a thg, I do it,’ said Mr. Creakle; ‘and wen I
say I wi have a thg don, I wi have it don.’
‘—Will have a thing done, I wi have it done,’ repeated th man
with the woode leg.
‘I am a determd character,’ said Mr. Creakl ‘That’s what I
am. I do my duty. That’s what I do My flesh and blood’—he looked
at Mrs. Creakl as he said this—‘wh it rises against me, is not
my fl and bld. I discard it. Has that fe’—to th man with
th wode leg—‘ben here again?’
‘No,’ was the answer.
‘No,’ said Mr. Creakle. ‘He kns better. He kns me. Let h
keep away. I say let him keep away,’ said Mr. Creakle, strikig hi
hand upon the table, and lookig at Mrs. Creakl, ‘for he knows
m Now you have begun to know me too, my young fried, and
you may go Take him away.’
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I was very glad to be ordered away, for Mrs. and Mis Creakl
re both wiping thr eye, and I felt as unmfortabl for th
as I did for myself. But I had a petiti on my mind which
concerned me so nearly, that I couldn’t hep saying, thugh I
wdered at my own courage:
‘If you please, sir—’
Mr. Creakle whspered, ‘Hah! What’s this?’ and bent his eye
upo me, as if he would have burnt me up with them.
‘If you please, sir,’ I faltered, ‘if I might be ald (I am very
sorry indeed, sir, for what I did) to take this writing off, before th
boys come back—’
Whether Mr. Creakle was in earnt, or whether he only did it
to frighten me, I do’t know, but he made a burst out of hi chair,
before which I prepitatey retreated, withut waiting for th
rt Of the man with the woode leg, and never onc stopped
until I reached my own bedro, whre, finding I was not
pursued, I went to bed, as it was tim, and lay quakig, for a
cupl of hours.
Next mornig Mr. Sharp cam back. Mr. Sharp was the first
master, and superior to Mr. Mel Mr. Mel took his mal with the
boys, but Mr. Sharp dined and supped at Mr. Creakle’s table. He
was a lp, deate-lookig gentlan, I thought, with a good deal
f nose, and a way of carrying his had on on side, as if it were a
lttle too heavy for him His hair was very smooth and wavy; but I
was informd by th very first boy wh came back that it was a wig
he said), and that Mr. Sharp went out every
(a secod-hand o
Saturday afternoon to get it curled.
It was n other than Tommy Traddl who gave me this pi
of intellge He was the first boy who returned. He introduced
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hif by informig me that I should find his nam on the righthand crner of the gate, over the top-bot; upon that I said,
‘Traddles?’ to which he replied, ‘Th same,’ and th h asked me
for a full account of myself and family.
It was a happy circumstance for me that Traddl came back
first. He enjoyed my placard so much, that he saved me fro th
embarrast of either diure or coealt, by prestig
m to every other boy who cam back, great or sal, idiately
on hi arrival, i this form of introduction, ‘Look here! Here’s a
gam!’ Happiy, too, the greater part of the boys cam back lowspirited, and were not so boisterous at my expen as I had
expected. Some of th certaiy did dan about me like wild
Indians, and th greater part could not resist th teptati of
preteding that I was a dog, and patting and soothng me, lest I
should bite, and sayig, ‘Lie dow, sir!’ and calg me Tozer.
This was naturaly confusing, among so many strangers, and cost
m so tears, but on the whole it was muc better than I had
anticpated.
I was nt cdered as beg formaly receved into the school,
however, until J. Steerforth arrived. Before this boy, who was
reputed to be a great scholar, and was very good-lookig, and at
last half-a-doze years my sor, I was carried as before a
magistrate. He iquired, under a shd in the playground, ito the
particulars of my punishment, and was plased to expre hi
pinion that it was ‘a jolly sham’; for wich I beame bound to
ever afterwards
‘What money have you got, Copperfield?’ he said, walking aside
with m when he had diposed of my affair in these terms I told
hm seven shillings.
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‘You had better give it to me to take care of,’ he said. ‘At least,
you can if you like. You nedn’t if you don’t like.’
I hasted to comply with his friendly suggestion, and opeing
Peggotty’s purs, turnd it upside dow into his hand.
‘Do you want to spend anythg no?’ he asked me.
‘No thank you,’ I replied.
‘You can, if you like, you kn,’ said Steerforth ‘Say the word.’
‘No, thank you, sir,’ I repeated.
‘Perhaps you’d like to spend a couple of shillings or so, in a
bottl of currant wi by and by, up in th bedro?’ said
Steerforth ‘You beg to my bedro, I find.’
It crtainly had nt occurred to me before, but I said, Yes, I
should like that.
‘Very good,’ said Steerforth. ‘You’l be glad to sped another
shilling or so, in almond cakes, I dare say?’
I said, Yes, I should like that, to
‘And anthr shilling or so in biscuits, and anothr in fruit, e?’
said Sterforth ‘I say, young Copperfield, you’re going it!’
I smed beause he sed, but I was a lttle troubled in my
mnd, too.
‘Well!’ said Sterforth ‘We must make it stretc as far as we
can; that’s al I’ll do th best in my powr for you. I can go out
wen I lke, and I’l suggle the prog in.’ With the words he put
th money in his pocket, and kindly told me not to make myself
unasy; he would take care it should be all right. He was as god
as h wrd, if that were all right which I had a secret misgiving
was nearly all wrog—for I feared it was a waste of my mothr’s
two half-crowns—though I had preserved the pi of paper they
wre wrapped i: wich was a precious saving. Whe we went
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upstairs to bed, h producd th wh seven shings’ worth, and
laid it out on my bed in the moonlight, saying:
‘There you are, young Copperfid, and a royal spread you’ve
got.’
I culdn’t think of dog the honours of the feast, at my tim of
lfe, whil he was by; my hand shook at the very thought of it. I
begged him to do me the favour of predig; and my request
beg sded by the other boys who were in that room, he
acceded to it, and sat upo my pillow, handing round th viands—
wth perfet fairne, I must say—and dispensing th currant wi
in a littl glass wthut a fot, which was his own property. As to
, I sat on his left hand, and the rest were grouped about us, on
the nearet beds and on the floor.
Ho well I ret our sitting thre, talking i wispers; or
their talkig, and my respetfully listeg, I ought rather to say;
the moonlght fallg a lttle way into the room, through the
window, paiting a pal window on the floor, and the greater part
of us in shadow, excpt wh Sterforth dipped a matc into a
phosphorus-box, when he wanted to look for anything on the
board, and shed a blue glare over us that was go directly! A
certain mysterious feing, consequent on th darkness, th
crey of th revel, and th whisper in wich everythng was said,
steals over me again, and I liste to all thy tell me with a vague
feing of solemity and awe, which makes me glad that thy are
all so near, and frightes me (thugh I feign to laugh) wh
Traddl pretends to see a ghost in the corner.
I heard all kids of things about the school and al begig to
it. I heard that Mr. Creakle had nt preferred his clai to beg a
Tartar withut reason; that he was th sternest and most severe of
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masters; that he laid about him, right and left, every day of his lfe,
charging i amg th boys like a troper, and slashing away,
unmrcifuly. That he kn nthing himf, but the art of
sasg, beg more ignrant (J. Sterforth said) than the lwest
boy in the school; that he had be, a good many years ago, a
sal hop-dealr in the Borough, and had take to the shoolig
business after beg bankrupt in hops, and making away wth Mrs
reakle’s money. With a god deal more of that sort, wich I
wdered how they knew.
I heard that the man with the woode leg, whose nam was
Tungay, was an obstiate barbarian w had formrly assisted in
th hop business, but had come into th schoastic l wth Mr.
reakle, in conquence, as was supposed amg th boys, of hi
aving broke his leg in Mr. Creakle’s service, and having done a
deal of dihonest work for him, and knowing hi srets. I heard
that wth th singl exception of Mr. Creakle, Tungay considered
the whole establt, masters and boys, as hi natural
ies, and that th only delight of his life was to be sour and
malicious. I hard that Mr. Creakl had a son, wh had not be
Tungay’s friend, and who, astig in the school, had once held
s remtran with his father on an occas when its
discipline was very cruelly exercised, and was suppod, besides,
to have protested agait his father’s usage of his mother. I heard
that Mr. Creakle had turned him out of doors, i cequene; and
that Mrs. and Mi Creakle had been i a sad way, ever si
But the greatet woder that I heard of Mr. Creakle was, there
beg one boy in the school on whom he nver ventured to lay a
hand, and that boy beg J. Steerforth. Steerforth himelf
confirmed this w it was stated, and said that he should like to
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begin to se him do it. On beig asked by a mild boy (nt me) h
would prod if he did begin to see him do it, h dipped a
match ito hi phosphorus-box on purpoe to shed a glare over his
reply, and said h would commence by knking him dow with a
blow on the forehead from the seven-and-sxpenny ink-bottle that
was alays on the mantelpiece. We sat in the dark for s ti,
breathles
I heard that Mr. Sharp and Mr. Mell were both supposed to be
retcedly paid; and that when there was hot and cod meat for
dier at Mr. Creakle’s table, Mr. Sharp was alays expeted to
say he preferred cold; which was again corroborated by J.
Sterforth, the only parlour-boarder. I heard that Mr. Sharp’s wig
didn’t fit him; and that he needn’t be so ‘bouneable’—soebody
e said ‘bumptious’—about it, beaus his on red hair was very
plaiy to be see bed.
I heard that on boy, w was a coal-mrchant’s son, came as a
set-off against th coal-bill, and was cald, on that account,
‘Exchange or Barter’—a nam sted from the arithmetic book
as expresg th arrangemet. I heard that the table beer was a
robbery of parents, and th pudding an imposti. I hard that
Miss Creakle was regarded by th sc hool in general as beg i
ve with Steerforth; and I am sure, as I sat in the dark, thkig of
his nice voice, and hi fi face, and his easy mannr, and h
curling hair, I thught it very likely. I heard that Mr. Mell was not
a bad srt of fellw, but hadn’t a sixpence to bles himelf with;
and that there was no doubt that old Mrs. Mel, hi mother, was as
poor as job. I thought of my breakfast then, and what had sounded
like ‘My Charley!’ but I was, I am glad to remember, as mute as a
mous about it.
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The hearig of al this, and a good deal more, outlasted the
banquet s tim The greater part of the guests had gone to bed
as so as the eating and drikig were over; and we, who had
remaind wispering and listeing half-undred, at last betok
ourselves to bed, too.
‘Good night, young Copperfield,’ said Steerforth ‘I’ll take care
of you.’
‘You’re very kid,’ I gratefuly returned. ‘I am very much
oblged to you.’
‘You haven’t got a sister, have you?’ said Sterforth, yawing.
‘No,’ I answered.
‘That’s a pity,’ said Steerforth. ‘If you had had one, I should
think sh would have be a pretty, timd, little, bright-eyed srt
of girl. I should have liked to know her. Good night, young
Cpperfield.’
‘Good night, sir,’ I replied.
I thought of hi very muc after I went to bed, and raid
mysf, I rect, to look at him where he lay in the moonlight,
wth his handsome face turnd up, and his head reg easly o
is arm. He was a pers of great powr in my eye; that was, of
curs, th reas of my mid rung on hi No ved future
dimly glanced upo him in th moobeams. Thre was no
shadowy picture of his fotsteps, in th garde that I dreamed of
walkig in all night.
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Chapter 7
MY ‘FIRST HALF’ AT SALEM HOUSE
S
chool began in earnest nxt day. A profound ipreson
was made upo me, I remember, by th roar of voices in
the schoolroom suddenly beg hushed as death when
Mr. Creakle entered after breakfast, and stod in th doorway
lookig round upo us lke a giant i a story-book surveying hi
captive
Tungay stood at Mr. Creakle’s elbo He had n occason, I
thught, to cry out ‘Silence!’ so ferociously, for th boys were al
struck spees and motiless.
Mr. Creakle was se to speak, and Tungay was heard, to this
effect.
‘No, boys, this is a n half. Take care what you’re about, in
this new half. Come fre up to th lessons, I advi you, for I
come fre up to th punishment. I won’t flch. It w be of no
use your rubbig yourseves; you won’t rub the marks out that I
sal give you. Now get to work, every boy!’
When th dreadful exordium was over, and Tungay had
stumped out agai, Mr. Creakle cam to where I sat, and tod me
that if I were famus for biting, he was famus for biting, too. He
then showed me the can, and asked m what I thought of that, for
a tooth? Was it a sarp tooth, hey? Was it a double tooth, hey?
Had it a deep prog, hey? Did it bite, hey? Did it bite? At every
question he gave me a flehy cut with it that made m writhe; so I
was very soon made free of Sal House (as Steerforth said), and
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was very soo in tears also.
Not that I mean to say th were speal marks of distinction,
whic only I recved. On the cotrary, a large majority of the boys
(especially th smaller on) were visited wth smilar instances of
ntic, as Mr. Creakle made the round of the schoolroom. Half the
etablishment was writhng and crying, before th day’s wrk
began; and ho much of it had writhd and cried before th day’s
work was over, I am realy afraid to rect, lt I should s to
exaggerate.
I should thk thre never can have bee a man wh enjoyed
his profesion more than Mr. Creakle did. He had a delght in
cutting at the boys, whic was like the satisfaction of a cravig
appetite. I am confidet that he couldn’t resist a chubby boy,
especially; that thre was a fascination in such a subjet, w
made him restless in his mind, until h had sred and marked
hi for the day. I was chubby mysf, and ought to know. I am
sure wh I thk of th fellow now, my bld rises against h
th th disinterested indignation I should fe if I could have
known al about hi without having ever be in his power; but it
rises hotly, becaus I kn him to have be an incapabl brute,
who had no more right to be pod of the great trust he held,
than to be Lord High Admral, or Coander-in-Chif—i ether
of which capacities it is probable that he would have done
infinitely less miscf.
Miserabl littl propitiators of a remorss Idol, ho abject w
re to hi! What a laun in life I thk it n, on lokig back,
to be so mean and servi to a man of such parts and pretes!
Here I sit at th desk again, watcng his eye—humbly
watcng hs eye, as he rules a cipherig-bok for anthr victim
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w hands have just bee flatted by that idential ruler, and
w is trying to wipe th sting out wth a pocket-handkerchief. I
have plty to do I do’t watch hi eye i idl, but beaus I
am morbidly attracted to it, in a dread desire to kn wat h w
do next, and whthr it will be my turn to suffer, or somebody
e’s A lane of smal boys beyond me, with th same interest in
eye, watch it too. I think he knows it, though he pretends he
don’t. He makes dreadful mouth as he rules th cipherig-book;
and nw he throws his eye sideways down our lan, and we all
droop over our books and tremble. A mot afterwards we are
again eyeng him. An unappy culprit, found guity of imperfet
exercise, approache at hs coand. Th culprit falters excuses,
and profes a determiatin to do better tomorrow. Mr. Creakl
cuts a joke before he beats him, and w laugh at it,—mrabl
ttle dogs, we laugh, with our visages as white as ashes, and our
hearts sikig into our boots.
Here I sit at th desk again, on a drosy summer afternn. A
buzz and hum go up around me, as if th boys were so many
bluebottle A cloggy seati of the lukewarm fat of mat is upon
m (we did an hour or two ago), and my head i as heavy as s
uc lead. I would give the world to go to sp. I st with my eye
on Mr. Creakle, blkig at him lke a young owl; when seep
overpowrs me for a minute, he still loos through my slumber,
ruling th ciphering-boks, until he softly coms bend me and
wake m to plair perceptio of him, with a red ridge across my
back.
Here I am i the playground, with my eye sti fasated by
hi, though I can’t see him The window at a lttle ditan from
whic I know he is having his dinner, stands for him, and I eye
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that instead. If he shos his face near it, m assumes an
implring and submssive expresion If he looks out through th
glas, the bodest boy (Steerforth excepted) stops in the mddl of
a shout or yell, and bemes conteplative On day, Traddles
(the mt unfortunate boy i the world) breaks that window
accidentally, with a bal. I shudder at this moment with th
tremendous sati of seeing it do, and feelg that the bal
has bounded on to Mr. Creakle’s sacred head.
Poor Traddl! In a tight sky-blue suit that made his arm and
legs like German sausage, or roly-poy puddings, h was th
merrit and most miserable of all th boys. He was alays beig
caned—I thk h was caned every day that half-year, except on
holiday Monday when he was only ruler’d on both hands—and
was always going to write to hi uncl about it, and nver did.
After laying his head on th desk for a littl while, he would cher
up, sohow, begin to laugh agai, and draw skeetons al over hi
ate, before his eyes were dry. I used at first to woder wat
comfort Traddles found in drawig sketos; and for some time
looked upo him as a srt of hermit, who remided hielf by
th symbos of mortality that caning couldn’t last for ever. But I
beeve he oy did it beause they were easy, and didn’t want any
features.
He was very honourable, Traddl was, and held it as a so
duty i the boys to stand by one another. He suffered for this on
veral occasons; and particularly once, when Steerforth laughed
in church, and th Beadle thught it was Traddl, and tok h
ut. I see him now, going away in custody, despised by th
gregation. He nver said who was the real offender, though he
smarted for it next day, and was imprisond so many hours that h
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cam forth with a whole curchyard-full of skeetons sarmg al
ver his Latin Dictionary. But he had his reard. Sterforth said
there was nothing of the snak i Traddl, and we all felt that to
be the highest prai For my part, I could have gone through a
god deal (thugh I was much less brave than Traddl, and
nothing like so old) to have won such a rempen
To se Sterforth walk to church before us, arm-in-arm with
Miss Creakle, was o of th great sights of my life. I didn’t thk
Miss Creakle equal to littl Em’ly in poit of beauty, and I didn’t
lve her (I didn’t dare); but I thought her a young lady of
extraordiary attractio, and in pot of gentity nt to be
urpasd. Wh Sterforth, i white trousers, carried her paras
for her, I felt proud to know him; and believed that she could nt
choose but adore him with al her heart. Mr. Sharp and Mr. Mel
re both notabl personages i my eyes; but Steerforth was to
them what the sun was to two stars
Steerforth cotiued his protection of me, and proved a very
useful friend; since nobody dared to any one whom he
honoured with his countenane. He culdn’t—or at al events he
didn’t—defend m from Mr. Creakle, who was very severe with
; but wenever I had been treated worse than usual, he alays
told me that I wanted a littl of his pluck, and that h wuldn’t
have stood it himf; whic I felt he intended for encurageent,
and codered to be very kid of hi There was oe advantage,
and only one that I know of, in Mr. Creakle’s severity. He found
my placard in his way wh he came up or dow behnd th form
which I sat, and wanted to make a cut at me in passg; for this
reason it was soo taken off, and I saw it no more
An accidental circumstance cemented th intimacy betw
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Sterforth and me, in a manner that inpired me with great pride
and satisfacti, thugh it sometimes led to innveien It
happed o one occas, when he was dog me the honour of
talkig to m i the playground, that I hazarded the observati
that something or somebody—I forget what now—was like
something or somebody in Peregri Pikle. He said nothing at
the tim; but when I was going to bed at night, asked me if I had
got that book?
I told hi n, and explaid how it was that I had read it, and
al those other books of whic I have made metin.
‘And do you reect them?’ Steerforth said.
‘Oh yes,’ I replied; I had a god memory, and I believed I
rellected th very we
‘Th I te you what, young Copperfield,’ said Steerforth, ‘you
sal tell ’e to me I can’t get to slp very early at nght, and I
genrally wake rather early in the mornig. We’ll go over ’e one
after anothr. We’ll make some regular Arabian Nights of it.’
I felt extremy flattered by this arranget, and we
commenced carrying it into exeution that very eveing. What
ravages I comitted on my favourite authrs in th course of my
iterpretation of them, I am not in a conditin to say, and should
be very unwilg to know; but I had a profound faith in them, and
I had, to th best of my belief, a simple, earnt manner of
narrating what I did narrate; and th qualities went a long way.
The drawback was, that I was often slpy at nght, or out of
spirits and indisposed to resume th story; and th it was rathr
hard wrk, and it must be don; for to disappoint or to displease
Sterforth was of course out of the question. In the mornig, too,
when I felt weary, and should have enjoyed another hour’s repo
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very much, it was a tiresome thing to be rousd, like th Sultana
Scheherazade, and forced ito a lg story before the getting-up
be rang; but Sterforth was resute; and as he explaid to m,
in return, my sums and exercises, and anythng in my tasks that
was to hard for me, I was no loser by th transaction. Let me do
myself justice, hover. I was moved by no iterested or selfish
motive, nor was I moved by fear of him. I admired and loved hi,
and his approval was return enugh. It was so precious to me that
I look back on these trifl, nw, with an acg heart.
Steerforth was coderate, too; and showed hi cderati,
in on particular instance, in an unflchig manr that was a
littl tantalizing, I suspect, to poor Traddles and th rest.
Peggotty’s promd letter—what a cofortabl ltter it was!—
arrived before ‘th half’ was many weks old; and with it a cake in
a perfet nest of oranges, and tw bottl of cowlip w This
treasure, as i duty bound, I laid at the feet of Steerforth, and
begged him to dispense.
‘No, I’ll te you what, young Copperfield,’ said he: ‘th wi
shall be kept to wet your whistle wh you are story-telling.’
I blusd at th idea, and begged hi, in my modesty, not to
think of it. But he said he had observed I was somtimes hoars—
a littl ropy was his exact expresion—and it should be, every
drop, devoted to th purpo he had mentioned. Accordigly, it
was locked up in his box, and drawn off by hf in a phial, and
admiistered to me through a piece of quill in th cork, wh I
was suppod to be in want of a restorative Sometimes, to make it
a more sovereign specfic, he was so kind as to squeze orange
juice into it, or to stir it up with ginger, or dissve a peppermt
drop in it; and althugh I cannot assert that th flavour was
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improved by th experiments, or that it was exactly th
pound one would have chose for a stomac, the last thing
at night and the first thing i the morng, I drank it gratefully and
was very sensible of his attention.
We s, to me, to have been mths over Peregri, and
month more over th othr stories. Th institution never flagged
for want of a story, I am certain; and th wi lasted out almost as
wel as the matter. Poor Traddl—I never think of that boy but
wth a strange disposition to laugh, and with tears in my eye—
was a sort of chorus, in geral; and affected to be convuld wth
mirth at th comic parts, and to be overcome with fear wh thre
as any passage of an alarming character in th narrative Th
rather put m out, very often It was a great jest of his, I rect,
to pretend that he culdn’t kep his teeth from chattering,
wver mention was made of an Alguazill in conxion with th
adventure of Gil Blas; and I remember that wh Gil Blas met
th captain of th robbers in Madrid, this unlucky joker
cunterfeited suc an ague of terror, that he was overheard by Mr.
Creakl, who was prowlig about the pasage, and handsy
flogged for dirderly coduct in the bedroom. Whatever I had
wthin me that was romantic and dreamy, was euraged by so
muc story-telg in the dark; and in that respet the pursuit may
not have be very profitable to me. But th beg cherished as a
kind of plaything i my room, and the conscus that this
acplist of mi was bruited about among the boys, and
attracted a good deal of ntic to me though I was the youngest
there, stiulated me to exertion. In a shool carried on by seer
cruelty, whthr it is presided over by a dunce or not, thre is not
likely to be much learnt. I belve our boys were, gerally, as
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ignrant a st as any shoolboys in existence; they were too muc
troubld and knocked about to learn; they could n more do that
to advantage, than any on can do anythng to advantage i a life
of cotant mifortune, tormet, and worry. But my lttle vanty,
and Steerforth’s help, urged m on show; and without saving
me fro much, if anythng, in th way of punishment, made me,
for the tim I was there, an excpti to the genral body,
insomuch that I did steadily pick up some crumbs of knledge
In this I was much assisted by Mr. Me, w had a liking for me
that I am grateful to rember. It alays gave me pai to observe
that Steerforth treated him with systemati diparagemet, and
seldom lost an occasion of wounding his fegs, or inducng
others to do so This troubld m the more for a log tim, beause
I had s told Steerforth, from whom I could n more kep suc
a secret, than I could keep a cake or any othr tangible possession,
about the two old wome Mr. Mel had taken me to se; and I was
always afraid that Sterforth would let it out, and twit him with it.
We little thought, any one of us, I dare say, when I ate my
breakfast that first morning, and went to slp under the shadow
of the peacock’s feathers to the sound of the flute, what
cquence would co of the introduction ito those almhuses of my insignfiant pers. But th visit had its unfore
nseque; and of a serius sort, to, in thr way.
One day wh Mr. Creakle kept th house fro indisposition,
whic naturaly diffused a lively joy through the shool, there was
a god deal of noise in th course of th morning’s wrk. Th great
relief and satisfacti expericed by th boys made th difficult
to manage; and though the dreaded Tungay brought his woode
leg in twice or thrice, and tok notes of th principal offenders’
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names, no great impression was made by it, as thy were pretty
sure of getting into troubl tomorrow, do what they would, and
thought it wis, no doubt, to enjoy themve today.
It was, properly, a half-hiday; beig Saturday. But as th
noise in th playground would have disturbed Mr. Creakl, and
the weather was not favourabl for going out walkig, we were
ordered into school in the afternoon, and set s lghter tasks
than usual, whic were made for the occas It was the day of
the week on whic Mr. Sharp went out to get hi wig curled; s
Mr. Mel, who always did the drudgery, whatever it was, kept
shool by himf. If I could asate the idea of a bul or a bear
with anyone so md as Mr. Mell, I should think of hi, i
xion with that afternoon when the uproar was at its height,
as of one of those anal, baited by a thousand dogs. I recall hi
bedig his acng head, supported on his bony hand, over th
book on h dek, and wretchedly endeavouring to get on with his
tires work, amidst an uproar that mght have made the
Speaker of th Hous of Commons giddy. Boys started in and out
of their plac, playig at pus in the corner with other boys; there
re laughng boys, singing boys, talking boys, dancing boys,
hling boys; boys shuffld with thr fet, boys whrled about
hm, grinning, making faces, mimickig him behd h back and
before his eye; mimicking his poverty, his bots, his coat, hi
ther, everythig begig to him that they should have had
consideration for.
‘Silence!’ cried Mr. Mell, suddely rising up, and striking hi
desk wth th bok. ‘What doe this mean! It’s impossible to bear
it. It’s maddeng. How can you do it to me, boys?’
It was my bok that he struck his desk with; and as I stod
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beside hi, foing his eye as it glanced round th ro, I saw
th boys all stop, some suddenly surprid, some half afraid, and
some sorry perhaps.
Steerforth’s place was at the bottom of the school, at the
opposite end of th long ro. He was lounging wth his back
against th wal, and his hands in his pockets, and looked at Mr.
Mell with his mouth shut up as if he were whistlg, wh Mr. Me
ooked at hi
‘Si, Mr. Sterforth!’ said Mr. Mell
‘Silence yourself,’ said Sterforth, turning red. ‘Whom are you
talkig to?’
‘Sit dow,’ said Mr. Me
‘Sit dow yourself,’ said Steerforth, ‘and mind your busss.’
There was a titter, and so applaus; but Mr. Mel was s
ite, that silence immediatey succeeded; and on boy, wh had
darted out bed hi to imtate his mther agai, changed his
mind, and preteded to want a pen meded.
‘If you thk, Steerforth,’ said Mr. Me, ‘that I am not
acquaited with the power you can establih over any md
here’—he laid his hand, without codering what he did (as I
suppod), upon my head—‘or that I have not obsrved you,
within a few miutes, urging your juniors on to every srt of
outrage against me, you are mistake’
‘I do’t give mysf the troubl of thinkig at al about you,’ said
Sterforth, coolly; ‘s I’m not mistaken, as it happens.’
‘And w you make us of your position of favouritism here,
sir,’ pursued Mr. Mell, with his lip treblg very much, ‘to insult
a gentleman—’
‘A what?—wre is he?’ said Sterforth
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Here somebody cried out, ‘Shame, J. Sterforth! To bad!’ It
was Traddl; wh Mr. Mell instantly discfited by biddig
hi hold hi tongue.
—‘To insult on wh is not fortunate in life, sir, and wh never
gave you the least offen, and the many reasons for not iultig
whom you are old enough and wis enough to understand,’ said
Mr. Mel, with his lps tremblig more and more, ‘you cot a
mean and base acti. You can sit dow or stand up as you please,
sir. Copperfield, go on.’
‘Young Cpperfield,’ said Sterforth, coming forward up th
ro, ‘stop a bit. I te you what, Mr. Me, on for al When you
take the liberty of callg me man or bas, or anything of that
sort, you are an impudent beggar. You are alays a beggar, you
know; but wh you do that, you are an impudent beggar.’
I am nt clar whether he was going to strike Mr. Mell, or Mr.
Mell was going to strike him, or thre was any such intention o
either side. I saw a rigidity co upon the whole shool as if they
had been turnd into stone, and found Mr. Creakle in the midst of
us, with Tungay at his side, and Mrs and Mi Creakle lookig i
at th dor as if thy were frighted. Mr. Me, with hi elbo on
is desk and his face in his hands, sat, for some moments, quite
still.
‘Mr. Mel,’ said Mr. Creakl, sakig hi by the arm; and hi
isper was so audibl now, that Tungay felt it uncesary to
repeat his words; ‘you have not forgotten yourself, I hope?’
‘No, sir, no,’ returnd th Master, shoing h face, and shaking
his had, and rubbig his hands in great agitation. ‘No, sir. No. I
have rebered mysf, I—n, Mr. Creakle, I have nt forgotte
myself, I—I have remembered myself, sir. I—I—could wish you
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had rebered me a little sooner, Mr. Creakle. It—it—wuld
have be more kind, sir, more just, sir. It would have saved me
something, sir.’
Mr. Creakl, lookig hard at Mr. Mell, put hi hand on Tungay’s
houlder, and got his feet upon the form cose by, and sat upon the
dek. After sti lookig hard at Mr. Mel from hi throne, as he
shook hi head, and rubbed his hands, and remaied i the sam
tate of agitati, Mr. Creakle turned to Steerforth, and said:
‘No, sir, as he don’t condescend to te me, what is this?’
Steerforth evaded the question for a little whe; lookig i
scorn and anger on his opponent, and remaining slent. I could not
hlp thking eve in that interval, I remember, what a nobl
fellow h was in appearance, and ho hoy and plain Mr. Me
ooked oppod to him
‘What did he man by talkig about favourite, then?’ said
Steerforth at legth
‘Favourites?’ repeated Mr. Creakl, with th veins in hi
forehead swellig quickly. ‘Who talked about favourites?’
‘He did,’ said Steerforth
‘And pray, what did you mean by that, sir?’ demanded Mr.
reakle, turning angriy on his assistant.
‘I meant, Mr. Creakle,’ he returned in a l voice, ‘as I said; that
no pupil had a right to avail himself of his position of favouritism
to degrade me’
‘To degrade you?’ said Mr. Creakle. ‘My stars! But give me
leave to ask you, Mr. What’s-your-name’; and here Mr. Creakle
folded his arms, cane and all, upo hi chet, and made such a
knot of his brows that his little eyes were hardly visble be
them; ‘whether, wen you talk about favourites, you showed
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proper respect to me? To me, sir,’ said Mr. Creakl, darting h
ad at him suddenly, and drawig it back again, ‘th principal of
th establhment, and your employer.’
‘It was not judicious, sir, I am wiing to admt,’ said Mr. Mell. ‘I
should nt have do s, if I had been cool.’
Here Sterforth struck in
‘Th he said I was mean, and th he said I was base, and then
I cald him a beggar. If I had been cool, perhaps I shouldn’t have
calld hi a beggar. But I did, and I am ready to take the
cequenc of it.’
Withut considering, perhaps, whthr thre wre any
cquence to be take, I felt quite in a glow at this gallant
speech. It made an impreson on the boys too, for there was a lo
tir amg them, though no one spoke a word.
‘I am surprisd, Steerforth—although your candour do you
honour,’ said Mr. Creakle, ‘does you honour, certaiy—I am
surprised, Sterforth, I must say, that you should attach such an
pitht to any pers eplyed and paid in Salem Hous, sir.’
Steerforth gave a short laugh.
‘That’s not an answer, sir,’ said Mr. Creakle, ‘to my reark. I
expect more than that fro you, Steerforth’
If Mr. Me looked homely, in my eyes, before the hands
boy, it wuld be quite impossibl to say ho hoy Mr. Creakle
lked. ‘Let him deny it,’ said Steerforth
‘Deny that he is a beggar, Steerforth?’ crid Mr. Creakle. ‘Why,
were do he go a-beggig?’
‘If he is nt a beggar himf, his near relatio’s on,’ said
Steerforth. ‘It’s al the sam.’
He glanced at me, and Mr. Me’s hand gently patted m upo
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the shoulder. I looked up with a flush upon my fac and remorse
my heart, but Mr. Mel’s eye were fixed on Sterforth. He
ctiued to pat m kindly on the shoulder, but he looked at him
‘Since you expect me, Mr. Creakl, to justify myself,’ said
Steerforth, ‘and to say what I mean,—what I have to say is, that h
mothr lives on charity in an alms-huse.’
Mr. Mell still looked at him, and still patted me kindly o th
shoulder, and said to hif, in a whisper, if I hard right: ‘Ye, I
thought so’
Mr. Creakl turned to his astant, with a severe frown and
laboured polte:
‘No, you hear what this gentleman says, Mr. Me Have th
godness, if you please, to set him right before th assembled
shool.’
‘He is right, sir, without correcti,’ returned Mr. Mel, in the
midst of a dead silece; ‘what he has said is true.’
‘Be so good then as deare publy, wi you,’ said Mr. Creakle,
putting his head on one side, and rollig his eyes round the shool,
‘whthr it ever came to my knowledge until this moment?’
‘I beeve not directly,’ he returned.
‘Why, you kn not,’ said Mr. Creakle. ‘Don’t you, man?’
‘I appred you never supposed my worldly circumtan to
be very god,’ replied th assistant. ‘You kn what my position
is, and alays has be, here.’
‘I appred, if you come to that,’ said Mr. Creakl, with h
veins swelling again bigger than ever, ‘that you’ve bee in a wrog
poti altogether, and mitook this for a carity school. Mr. Mel,
w’ll part, if you please. Th soor th better.’
‘Thre is no time,’ answered Mr. Me, rising, ‘like the preset.’
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‘Sir, to you!’ said Mr. Creakle.
‘I take my leave of you, Mr. Creakle, and al of you,’ said Mr.
Mell, glancing round th ro, and again patting me gently on th
houlders ‘Jam Steerforth, the bet wi I can lave you is that
you may come to be ashamed of what you have done today. At
present I wuld prefer to see you anythig rather than a frid, to
me, or to anyo in wh I feel an interest.’
One mre he laid hi hand upon my shoulder; and then takig
his flute and a fe boks fro hs desk, and leaving th key in it
for his sucor, he went out of the school, with hi property
under hi arm Mr. Creakle then made a speech, through Tungay,
in wich h thanked Sterforth for asserting (thugh perhaps to
army) the indepedenc and repectabity of Sal House; and
wich h wund up by shaking hands with Sterforth, while we
gave three crs—I did nt quite know what for, but I suppod
for Steerforth, and so joind in them ardetly, though I felt
mrable. Mr. Creakle then cand Toy Traddl for beg
discovered in tears, instead of chers, on account of Mr. Me’s
departure; and went back to hi sofa, or his bed, or wherever he
had co from.
We were left to oursve no, and loked very blank, I
rellect, on on anthr. For myself, I felt so much self-reproach
and cotritio for my part in what had happed, that nthing
would have enabld m to kep back my tears but the fear that
Steerforth, who often looked at me, I saw, mght think it
unfriendly—or, I should rathr say, considerig our relative age,
and the feeg with whic I regarded hi, undutiful—if I showed
th etion wich distressed me. He was very angry with
Traddl, and said he was glad he had caught it.
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Poor Traddl, who had pasd the stage of lyig with hi head
upon the dek, and was relvig himf as usual with a burst of
skeletos, said he didn’t care. Mr. Me was il-used.
‘Who has il-used him, you girl?’ said Steerforth.
‘Why, you have,’ returned Traddles.
‘What have I do?’ said Steerforth.
‘What have you do?’ retorted Traddl ‘Hurt his feegs,
and lost him his situati.’
‘His feings?’ repeated Sterforth disdainfully. ‘Hi feings
wil soon get the better of it, I’ll be bound. His feegs are nt like
yours, Miss Traddl As to his situation—which was a precious
, was’t it?—do you suppose I am not going to write ho, and
take care that he gets so my? Poy?’
We thought this intenti very noble in Sterforth, whose
mothr was a widow, and rich, and wuld do almost anythng, it
was said, that h asked hr. We were all extrey glad to se
Traddl so put down, and exalted Sterforth to the ski:
especially w h told us, as he condescended to do, that what he
ad done had bee done expresly for us, and for our caus; and
that h had conferred a great bo upo us by unlfishly doig it.
But I must say that when I was going on with a story in the dark
that nght, Mr. Mel’s old flute sed mre than on to sound
mournfully in my ears; and that wh at last Sterforth was tired,
and I lay dow in my bed, I fancied it playing so sorrofully
sere, that I was quite wretced.
I soon forgot him in the cotemplati of Steerforth, who, i an
easy amateur way, and wthout any book (he seed to me to
know everything by heart), took s of hi clas until a n
aster was found. The nw master cam from a gramar school;
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and before he entered on his duties, did in the parlour one day,
to be introduced to Steerforth. Steerforth approved of hi highly,
and told us he was a Brick. Without exactly understandig what
learned distiction was meant by this, I respected him greatly for
it, and had n doubt whatever of his superior knowledge: though
he nver took the pai with me—not that I was anybody—that
Mr. Mel had take
There was only one other event in this half-year, out of the daiy
shool-life, that made an impreson upon me whic sti survives
It survive for many reasons
On afternoon, when we were al harasd into a state of dire
confusion, and Mr. Creakl was laying about him dreadfully,
Tungay came in, and called out in his usual strong way: ‘Visitors
for Copperfield!’
A few words were interchanged betwee him and Mr. Creakl,
as, wh th visitors were, and what ro thy wre to be sho
to; and then I, who had, acrdig to custom, stood up on the
anunct beg made, and felt quite faint with astonit,
was told to go by the back stairs and get a can fril on, before I
repaired to the dig-room. The orders I obeyed, in suc a
flutter and hurry of my young spirits as I had never knn before;
and when I got to the parlour door, and the thought cam into my
head that it might be my mother—I had only thought of Mr. or
Miss Murdsto unti th—I dre back my hand fro th lock,
and stopped to have a sob before I went in
t first I saw nobody; but feeg a preure agait the door, I
looked round it, and there, to my amazet, were Mr. Peggotty
and Ham, duckig at m with their hats, and squeezig o
another agait the wall I could not help laughing; but it was
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much more in th pleasure of seeng th, than at th appearance
they made We shook hands in a very cordial way; and I laughed
and laughd, until I puld out my pocket-handkerchief and wiped
my eyes
Mr. Peggotty (who never shut hi muth onc, I rember,
during th visit) shod great conrn wh he saw me do this,
and nudged Ham to say something.
‘Chr up, Mas’r Davy bor’!’ said Ham, in his smperig way.
‘Why, how you have growed!’
‘Am I gro?’ I said, dryig my eyes. I was nt cryig at
anything i particular that I know of; but sohow it made me
cry, to see old friends.
‘Growed, Mas’r Davy bor’? Ai’t he growed!’ said Ham
‘Ai’t he groed!’ said Mr. Peggotty.
They made m laugh agai by laughing at eac other, and then
w all thre laughd until I was in danger of crying again.
‘Do you know how mama is, Mr. Peggotty?’ I said. ‘And how my
dear, dear, old Peggotty is?’
‘Onmmon,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘And little Em’ly, and Mrs. Gumdge?’
‘On—co,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
There was a s Mr. Peggotty, to relve it, took two
prodigious lobsters, and an enrmous crab, and a large canvas bag
of shrimps, out of hi pockets, and piled th up in Ham’s arms.
‘You see,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘kng as you was partial to a
lttle rel with your wittle when you was along with us, we took
the liberty. The old Mawther bid ’e, sh did. Mrs. Gumdge
bid ’e Yes,’ said Mr. Peggotty, slowly, who I thought appeared
to stik to the subjet on acunt of having no other subjet ready,
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‘Mrs. Gumidge, I do assure you, she bid ’em.’
I expred my thanks; and Mr. Peggotty, after lookig at Ham,
w stod smiling shepishly over th shellfish, withut making
any attempt to help him, said:
‘We co, you see, the wid and tide makig in our favour, i
one of our Yarmouth lugs to Graves’. My ster se wrote to m
the nam of th here place, and wrote to me as if ever I cand to
me to Grave’, I was to come over and inquire for Mas’r Davy
and give her dooty, humbly wisg hi well and reporting of the
fam’ly as they was onon toe-be-sure. Little Em’ly, you see,
she’ll write to my sister wh I go back, as I se you and as you
was similarly o, and so we make it quite a merry-gorounder.’
I was obliged to cder a lttle before I understood what Mr.
Peggotty mant by this figure, expreve of a coplte crc of
itellge I then thanked him heartily; and said, with a
consciusness of reddeing, that I supposed littl Em’ly was
altered to, since we usd to pick up shels and pebbles o th
beach?
‘She’s getting to be a woman, that’s wot sh’s getting to be,’ said
Mr. Peggotty. ‘Ak hi .’
He meant Ham, who beamed with deght and ast over the
bag of shrimps.
‘Her pretty fac!’ said Mr. Peggotty, with his own shg lke a
lght.
‘Her learng!’ said Ham.
‘Her writing!’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘Why it’s as black as jet! And so
large it is, you might see it anywres.’
It was perfectly deghtful to behold with what enthusias Mr.
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Peggotty became inspired wh he thught of his littl favourite
He stands before me agai, his bluff hairy fac irradiatig with a
joyful love and pride, for which I can find no description. Hi
honest eyes fire up, and sparkle, as if their depths were stirred by
something bright. His broad chet heave with pleasure. Hi
strong loo hands clench thlve, in his earntnss; and h
phasze what he says with a right arm that shows, i my pigmy
vi, like a sldge-hammer.
Ham was quite as earnt as he I dare say thy wuld have said
muc more about her, if they had not been abashed by the
unexpeted cg in of Steerforth, who, seeing me i a crner
speakig wth tw strangers, stopped in a song he was singing,
and said: ‘I didn’t know you were here, young Copperfield!’ (for it
was not th usual visitig ro) and crod by us on his way out.
I am not sure wthr it was in th pride of havig such a
frid as Steerforth, or in the dere to explai to him how I cam
to have suc a friend as Mr. Peggotty, that I cald to him as he
was going away. But I said, modestly—Good Heave, ho it al
back to me this log tim afterwards!—
‘Don’t go, Steerforth, if you pleas. Th are two Yarmouth
boatm—very kind, good pepl—who are relations of my nurse,
and have come fro Graved to see me.’
‘Aye, aye?’ said Sterforth, returnig. ‘I am glad to s them
How are you both?’
Thre was an ease in his manner—a gay and light manr it
was, but not swaggering—which I still believe to have born a kind
of enchantmt with it. I still believe him, in virtue of this carriage,
his animal spirits, his delghtful voice, his handsome face and
figure, and, for aught I know, of so inborn power of attraction
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besides (wich I thk a fe people posss), to have carrid a
spel wth him to which it was a natural weakne to yid, and
wich not many perss could wthstand. I could not but se h
pleasd they were with him, and how they seemed to open their
harts to him in a moment.
‘You must let them kn at hoe, if you please, Mr. Peggotty,’ I
said, ‘whn that letter is sent, that Mr. Sterforth is very kind to
, and that I do’t know what I should ever do here without
hi’
‘Nonse!’ said Sterforth, laughng. ‘You mustn’t te th
anything of the sort.’
‘And if Mr. Sterforth ever c ito Norfolk or Suffolk, Mr.
Peggotty,’ I said, ‘whle I am thre, you may depend upo it I shal
brig hi to Yarmouth, if he wil lt me, to se your house You
nver saw suc a good house, Steerforth. It’s made out of a boat!’
‘Made out of a boat, is it?’ said Steerforth ‘It’s the right sort of a
house for suc a thorough-built boatman’
‘So ’tis, sir, so ’ti, sir,’ said Ham, gring. ‘You’re right, young
gen’l’m’n! Mas’r Davy bor’, gen’l’m’n’s right. A through-built
boatman! Hor, hor! That’s what he is, to!’
Mr. Peggotty was no le plasd than his neph, though his
modesty forbade him to claim a persal compliment so
vociferously.
‘Well, sir,’ he said, bong and chuckling, and tucking i th
ends of hi nkercf at his breast: ‘I thankee, sr, I thankee! I do
my endeavours in my line of life, sir.’
‘Th best of men can do no more, Mr. Peggotty,’ said Steerforth
He had got his nam already.
‘I’ll pound it, it’s wot you do yourself, sir,’ said Mr. Peggotty,
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sakig his head, ‘and wot you do wel—right well! I thanke, sir.
I’m obleeged to you, sr, for your weg maner of me. I’m
rough, sir, but I’m ready—last ways, I hope I’m ready, you
unnrstand. My house ai’t muc for to se, sr, but it’s hearty at
your service if ever you should come alg with Mas’r Davy to see
it. I’m a reg’lar Dodman, I am,’ said Mr. Peggotty, by which he
meant snail, and this was in allus to his beg sl to go, for he
had attempted to go after every ste, and had show or
othr come back again; ‘but I wish you both well, and I wish you
happy!’
Ham ehoed this stit, and we parted with them in the
heartiet manr. I was alt tempted that eveg to tel
Sterforth about pretty little Em’ly, but I was too timd of
mtig her nam, and too muc afraid of his laughing at m I
rember that I thought a good deal, and in an unasy srt of
way, about Mr. Peggotty having said that s was getting o to be
a woman; but I decded that was nonsen
We tranported the shfi, or the ‘reh’ as Mr. Peggotty had
modestly cald it, up into our ro unbserved, and made a great
supper that eveg. But Traddl couldn’t get happily out of it.
He was to unfortunate eve to come through a supper like
anybody e He was take il in the night—quite prostrate he
was—i consequen of Crab; and after beg drugged with black
draughts and blue pi, to an extent whic Depl (whose father
was a doctor) said was enugh to underm a hrse’s
constituti, received a caning and six chapters of Grek
Testamt for refusig to cofe
Th rest of th half-year is a jumble in my reti of th
daiy strife and struggle of our lives; of the wanng sumr and
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the changing season; of the frosty mornigs when we were rung
out of bed, and the cod, cld sm of the dark nights when we
were rung into bed agai; of the evenig schoolroom diy lghted
and indifferently warmed, and the mrng schoolroom whic was
thing but a great shverig-mac; of the alternati of bod
bef with roast bef, and bod mutton with roast mutton; of cods
f bread-and-butter, dog’s-eared lesson-books, cracked slate,
tear-blotted copy-boks, canings, rulerings, hair-cuttings, rainy
Sundays, suet-puddings, and a dirty atmosphere of ink,
surrounding all.
I well remeber though, how the ditant idea of the holidays,
after seeg for an immen time to be a stationary speck, began
to c towards us, and to grow and grow. How from counting
month, we came to weks, and th to days; and ho I th
began to be afraid that I should not be sent for and w I learnt
from Steerforth that I had been set for, and was certainly to go
h, had dim forebodings that I might break my leg first. Ho
th breaking-up day changed its place fast, at last, fro th wek
after next to next week, this week, the day after tomorrow,
tomorrow, today, tonight—when I was inde the Yarmouth mai,
and going home
I had many a broke sleep inside th Yarmuth mail, and many
an ioheret dream of al the thgs. But wen I awoke at
iterval, the ground outside the window was nt the playground
of Salem Hous, and th sound in my ears was not th sound of
Mr. Creakl giving it to Traddl, but the sound of the cacan
touchig up the horse
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Chapter 8
MY HOLIDAYS. ESPECIALLY ONE HAPPY
AFTERNOON
W
hen w arrived before day at the in where the mai
stopped, which was not th inn whre my friend th
aiter lived, I was sho up to a nice littl bedro,
with DOLPHIN paited on the door. Very cold I was, I know,
ntwithstandig the hot tea they had given me before a large fire
downstairs; and very glad I was to turn into the Dophi’s bed, pul
the Dophi’s blankets round my head, and go to slp.
Mr. Barki the carrier was to call for me in the morning at ni
o’cock. I got up at eight, a little giddy from the shortne of my
nght’s rest, and was ready for him before the appoted tim He
received me exactly as if not five minutes had elapsed since we
were last together, and I had ony be ito the hotel to get cange
for sixpen, or somethg of that sort.
so as I and my box were in the cart, and the carrier
seated, th lazy horse walked away with us all at his accustod
pace.
‘You look very wll, Mr. Barkis,’ I said, thinking he would like
to know it.
Mr. Barkis rubbed his chek with hs cuff, and th looked at
his cuff as if he expected to fid some of th bl upo it; but
made no othr acknowledget of th compliment.
‘I gave your message, Mr. Barkis,’ I said: ‘I wrote to Peggotty.’
‘Ah!’ said Mr. Barkis.
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Mr. Barki seemed gruff, and anered driy.
‘Was’t it right, Mr. Barki?’ I asked, after a little hestatin.
‘Why, no,’ said Mr. Barkis.
‘Not the meage?’
‘Th message was right enugh, perhaps,’ said Mr. Barkis; ‘but
it co to an end there.’
Not understanding what he meant, I repeated inquisitivey:
‘Came to an end, Mr. Barki?’
‘Nothing co of it,’ he explaid, lookig at m sideways. ‘No
answer.’
‘Thre was an answer expected, was thre, Mr. Barkis?’ said I,
opeg my eye For this was a nw light to me
‘Whe a man says he’s wi’,’ said Mr. Barkis, turng hi
glance slly on me again, ‘it’s as much as to say, that man’s awaitin’ for a answer.’
‘We, Mr. Barki?’
‘Well,’ said Mr. Barkis, carrying his eye back to his horse’s
ears; ‘that man’s been a-waiti’ for a aner ever sie.’
‘Have you told her so, Mr. Barki?’
‘No—n,’ growled Mr. Barki, refleting about it. ‘I ai’t got n
I
call to go and te her so. I never said sx wrds to hr myself,
ain’t a-goin’ to tell her so’
‘Would you like me to do it, Mr. Barkis?’ said I, doubtfuly. ‘You
might tell her, if you would,’ said Mr. Barkis, wth anothr slow
look at me, ‘that Barkis was a-waiti’ for a answer. Says you—
wat name is it?’
‘Her name?’
‘Ah!’ said Mr. Barkis, with a nd of his head.
‘Peggotty.’
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‘Crisen name? Or nat’ral name?’ said Mr. Barkis.
‘Oh, it’s not her Christian name. Her Christian name is Clara.’
‘Is it thugh?’ said Mr. Barkis.
He seemed to find an ime fund of refletion in this
circumstance, and sat ponderig and inwardly wistling for some
tim
‘Well!’ h resumed at lgth. ‘Says you, “Peggotty! Barkis is
waitin’ for a answer.” Says she, perhaps, “Answer to what?” Says
you, “To what I tod you.” “What is that?” says she. “Barkis i
’,” says you.’
This extrey artful suggestion Mr. Barki accompanied with
a nudge of his ebo that gave me quite a stitch in my side. After
that, he slouched over his horse in his usual manner; and made n
other referen to the subjet excpt, half an hour afterwards,
taking a pi of chalk fro hi pocket, and writing up, inside th
tilt of the cart, ‘Clara Peggotty’—apparently as a private
memorandum
Ah, what a strange feing it was to be gog h w it was
t home, and to find that every object I looked at, remided m of
th happy old ho, which was like a dream I could never dream
again! Th days wh my mothr and I and Peggotty were all in
al to one another, and there was n one to co between us, ro
up before me s sorrowfully on the road, that I am not sure I was
glad to be there—nt sure but that I would rather have remaid
away, and forgotten it in Sterforth’s company. But thre I was;
and soon I was at our house, where the bare old el-trees wrung
their many hands i the bleak wintry air, and shreds of the old
rooks’-nets drifted away upo the wind.
The carrier put my box do at the garde-gate, and lft me I
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walked along the path towards the house, glancg at the
wdows, and fearig at every step to see Mr. Murdstone or Mi
Murdstone lowering out of one of them. No fac appeared,
however; and beg co to the house, and knowing how to open
the door, before dark, without knockig, I went in with a quiet,
timid step.
God kns h infanti th memory may have bee, that was
awakened with me by th sound of my mothr’s voice in th od
parlur, wh I set fot in th hall. She was singing i a low to. I
think I must have lai in her arm, and heard her sigig so to m
when I was but a baby. The strai was nw to me, and yet it was s
d that it filled my heart bri-ful; like a friend com back fro a
long absence.
I believed, from the sotary and thoughtful way in whic my
mther murmured her sog, that she was alone. Ad I wt sftly
ito the room. Sh was sitting by the fire, sucklng an ifant,
whose tiny hand she held against her nek. Her eyes were lookig
dow upo its face, and she sat singing to it. I was so far right, that
se had n other copan
I spoke to her, and she started, and cried out. But seeng me,
she called me her dear Davy, her own boy! and cong half across
th ro to meet me, knd dow upo th ground and kissed
me, and laid my had dow on her bosom near th littl creature
that was nestling thre, and put its hand to my lips.
I wish I had died. I wish I had died th, with that feing in my
heart! I should have been mre fit for Heaven than I ever have
been sie.
‘He is your brothr,’ said my mother, fondlg me. ‘Davy, my
pretty boy! My poor child!’ Th she kissed me mre and more,
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and clasped me round th neck. This she was doing w
Peggotty cam runnig in, and bounced down on the ground
bede us, and went mad about us both for a quarter of an hour.
It seemed that I had nt be expeted s soon, the carrier
beg much before his usual time. It seed, to, that Mr. and
Miss Murdsto had go out upo a visit i th neighbour
hood,
and would nt return before night. I had never hoped for this I
had never thught it possible that we thre could be togethr
undisturbed, oce more; and I felt, for th time, as if th old days
re come back.
We did together by the firesde Peggotty was in attendanc
to wait upo us, but my mothr wouldn’t let her do it, and made
her di with us. I had my own old plate, with a brown view of a
man-of-war in full sai upon it, which Peggotty had hoarded
somewre all th time I had bee away, and wuld not have had
broke, she said, for a hundred pounds. I had my on od mug
wth David on it, and my own old littl knife and fork that wuldn’t
cut.
Wh we were at tabl, I thought it a favourabl ocas to tel
Peggotty about Mr. Barki, who, before I had finised what I had
to tel her, began to laugh, and throw her apron over her fac
‘Peggotty,’ said my mother. ‘What’s the matter?’
Peggotty only laughed the mre, and held her apron tight over
hr face wh my mothr tried to pull it away, and sat as if hr
had were in a bag.
‘What are you doig, you stupid creature?’ said my mothr,
laughng.
‘Oh, drat the man!’ cried Peggotty. ‘He wants to marry me.’
‘It wuld be a very god matc for you; wouldn’t it?’ said my
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mothr.
‘Oh! I don’t kn,’ said Peggotty. ‘Don’t ask me. I wouldn’t have
m if he was made of god. Nor I wouldn’t have anybody.’
‘Thn, why don’t you tell him so, you ridiculous thg?’ said my
mothr.
‘Te hi s,’ retorted Peggotty, lookig out of her apron. ‘He
has never said a word to me about it. He knows better. If he was to
make so bold as say a word to me, I should slap his face.’
Her own was as red as ever I saw it, or any other fac, I think;
but she only covered it again, for a fe moments at a ti, w
was take with a violet fit of laughter; and after two or three
of those attacks, went on with her dir.
I remarked that my mother, though s sd when Peggotty
looked at her, beam more srious and thoughtful. I had seen at
first that she was changed. Her face was very pretty still, but it
looked careworn, and too deate; and her hand was so thin and
white that it sed to me to be almt transparet. But the
change to which I now refer was superadded to this: it was in her
manner, which beame anxius and fluttered. At last she said,
putting out her hand, and laying it affectinately on the hand of
her old servant,
‘Peggotty, dear, you are not going to be married?’
‘Me, ma’am?’ returned Peggotty, staring. ‘Lord blss you, no!’
‘Not just yet?’ said my mother, tederly.
‘Never!’ crid Peggotty.
My mother took her hand, and said:
‘Don’t lave me, Peggotty. Stay with me. It wi not be for log,
perhaps. What should I ever do withut you!’
‘Me leave you, my preious!’ cried Peggotty. ‘Not for all th
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world and hi wife. Why, what’s put that in your siy little
head?’—For Peggotty had be used of old to talk to my mther
sometimes like a chid.
But my mothr made no answer, except to thank hr, and
Peggotty went running on in her own fashion.
‘Me leave you? I think I se mysf. Peggotty go away from you?
I should lke to catch her at it! No, no, n,’ said Peggotty, sakig
her head, and foldig her arm; ‘not she, my dear. It is’t that
there ai’t so Cats that would be wel eough plasd if s did,
but they sha’n’t be plasd. They shall be aggravated. I’l stay with
you till I am a cross cranky old wman. And w I’m to deaf,
and too lam, and too bld, and too mumbly for want of teeth, to
be of any use at al, eve to be found fault with, than I sal go to
my Davy, and ask him to take me in.’
‘And, Peggotty,’ says I, ‘I shall be glad to se you, and I’l make
you as welcom as a que’
‘Bl your dear heart!’ crid Peggotty. ‘I know you will!’ And
se kied m beforehand, in grateful acknowldgeent of my
hspitality. After that, she covered her head up with hr apro
agai and had another laugh about Mr. Barki After that, se took
the baby out of its little cradl, and nursed it. After that, s
ared the dir tabl; after that, cam in with another cap on,
and her work-box, and the yard-measure, and the bit of waxcandl, al just the sam as ever.
We sat round the fire, and talked deghtfully. I told them what
a hard master Mr. Creakle was, and thy pitied me very much. I
told them what a fi few Sterforth was, and what a patron of
mine, and Peggotty said she would walk a score of miles to se
I took the little baby in my arm when it was awake, and
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nursd it lovingly. Whe it was asleep again, I crept clos to my
mothr’s side according to my old custo, broke now a long
tim, and sat with my arm embracig her wait, and my little red
ceek on her shoulder, and onc more felt her beautiful hair
droping over me—like an angel’s wng as I usd to thk, I
rellect—and was very happy indeed.
While I sat thus, lookig at th fire, and seng picture in th
red-ht coals, I almost believed that I had never bee away; that
Mr. and Miss Murdsto were such picture, and wuld vanish
when the fire got lw; and that there was nthing real in all that I
remembered, save my mothr, Peggotty, and I.
Peggotty darnd away at a stoking as long as she could see,
and th sat with it drawn on her left hand like a glve, and her
needl in her right, ready to take another stitc whenever there
as a blaze. I cant conceive wh stokings thy can have be
that Peggotty was always darning, or wre such an unfailing
supply of stokings i want of darning can have come fro. Fro
my earliest infany she sees to have be always emplyed in
that class of needlewrk, and never by any chance in any othr.
‘I wonder,’ said Peggotty, who was sotim sezed with a fit
of wondering on some most unxpected topic, ‘what’s beme of
Davy’s great-aunt?’
‘Lor, Peggotty!’ observed my mother, rousing herself fro a
reverie, ‘what no you talk!’
‘Well, but I realy do woder, ma’am,’ said Peggotty.
‘What can have put such a pers in your head?’ inquired my
mther. ‘Is there nobody el in the world to co there?’
‘I don’t know ho it is,’ said Peggotty, ‘unles it’s o account of
beg stupid, but my head nver can pik and choose its peopl
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They co and they go, and they do’t c and they do’t go,
just as they like. I woder what’s beme of her?’
‘How absurd you are, Peggotty!’ returned my mother. ‘On
uld suppose you wanted a second visit fro her.’
‘Lord forbid!’ cried Peggotty.
‘We then, do’t talk about suc unfortabl things, there’s a
god soul,’ said my mothr. ‘Miss Betsy is shut up in her cottage
by the sea, n doubt, and wi reai there. At al events, se is nt
lkey ever to trouble us agai’
‘No!’ musd Peggotty. ‘No, that ai’t lkey at al—I wonder, if
se was to di, whether she’d leave Davy anythig?’
‘Good gracus me, Peggotty,’ returned my mother, ‘what a
nonsenical wan you are! w you kn that she tok offence
at th poor dear boy’s ever being born at all.’
‘I suppose she wouldn’t be inclined to forgive him now,’ hinted
Peggotty.
‘Why should she be incld to forgive him now?’ said my
mther, rather sharply.
‘No that he’s got a brothr, I mean,’ said Peggotty.
My mother imdiately began to cry, and wodered how
Peggotty dared to say suc a thing.
‘As if this poor littl innocent in its cradle had ever done any
harm to you or anybody else, you jealous thing!’ said se. ‘You had
muc better go and marry Mr. Barki, the carrier. Why do’t you?’
‘I should make Mi Murdsto happy, if I was to,’ said
Peggotty.
‘What a bad disposti you have, Peggotty!’ returnd my
mothr. ‘You are as jealous of Miss Murdsto as it is possible for
a ridiulus creature to be You want to kep the keys yoursef,
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and give out all th things, I suppose? I shouldn’t be surprised if
you did. Whe you know that she only doe it out of kindness and
the bet intenti! You know sh do, Peggotty—you know it
w’
Peggotty muttered sthing to the effect of ‘Bother the bet
itenti!’ and sothing el to the effect that there was a little
to much of th best intentions going on
‘I kn what you mean, you cro thg,’ said my mother. ‘I
understand you, Peggotty, perfectly. You know I do, and I wonder
you do’t cour up lke fire. But one pot at a tim Mis
Murdstone is the pot now, Peggotty, and you sa’n’t eape from
it. Haven’t you heard her say, over and over again, that she thks
I am too thoughtles and too—a—a—’
‘Pretty,’ suggested Peggotty.
‘Well,’ returned my mother, half laughg, ‘and if she i so silly
as to say so, can I be blamed for it?’
‘No one says you can,’ said Peggotty.
‘No, I should hope nt, indeed!’ returned my mother. ‘Have’t
you heard her say, over and over again, that o this account she
ed to spare me a great deal of trouble, wh she thks I am
am
not suited for, and wh I really don’t kn myself that I
suited for; and is’t s up early and late, and going to and fro
continualy—and doe’t she do all sorts of things, and grope ito
all sorts of places, coal-h and pantri and I don’t know wre,
that can’t be very agreeable—and do you mean to inuate that
there is not a sort of devotion in that?’
‘I don’t inuate at al,’ said Peggotty.
‘You do, Peggotty,’ returned my mother. ‘You nver do
anythng el, excpt your wrk. You are always insinuating. You
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revel in it. And when you talk of Mr. Murdstone’s good
intentions—’
‘I never talked of ’em,’ said Peggotty.
‘No, Peggotty,’ returned my mother, ‘but you insinuated. That’s
will
what I told you just no That’s the worst of you. You
insinuate I said, at th moment, that I understod you, and you
s I did. Wh you talk of Mr. Murdstone’s good itentins, and
pretend to slght them (for I do’t beeve you realy do, in your
hart, Peggotty), you must be as we convinced as I am h god
they are, and how they actuate him in everythig. If he seems to
have be at all stern with a crtain person, Peggotty—you
understand, and so I am sure doe Davy, that I am not alluding to
anybody pret—it is solely beaus he is satisfied that it is for a
certain pers’s benefit. He naturally loves a certain pers, o
my account; and acts solely for a certain pers’s god. He is
better able to judge of it than I am; for I very wll kn that I am a
weak, light, girli creature, and that he is a firm, grave, srious
man And he take,’ said my mother, with the tears whic were
egendered i hr affectionate nature, stealing dow her face, ‘h
take great pai with me; and I ought to be very thankful to hi,
and very submssive to hi eve in my thughts; and w I am
nt, Peggotty, I worry and conde mysf, and fee doubtful of
my own heart, and don’t kn what to do.’
Peggotty sat with her ch on the foot of the stockig, lookig
stly at the fire.
‘Thre, Peggotty,’ said my mother, changig her to, ‘do’t let
us fall out with one another, for I couldn’t bear it. You are my true
friend, I kn, if I have any i th wrld. Whe I call you a
ridiulus creature, or a vexatious thing, or anything of that sort,
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Peggotty, I only mean that you are my true fried, and always
have been, ever si the night when Mr. Copperfield first brought
m home here, and you cam out to the gate to met me’
Peggotty was not slow to respod, and ratify the treaty of
friedsp by giving me one of her bet hugs. I think I had so
glips of the real character of this coversation at the tim; but
I am sure, now, that th god creature originated it, and tok her
part i it, mrely that my mother might cofort hersef with the
littl contradictory summary in which she had indulged. Th
design was efficacius; for I remember that my mothr sed
mre at eas during the rest of the eveg, and that Peggotty
obsrved her le
When we had had our tea, and the ashes were thrown up, and
the candl suffed, I read Peggotty a chapter out of the Crocodi
Book, in rembrane of old tim—se took it out of her poket:
I do’t know wether she had kept it there ever si—and then
we talked about Sal House, whic brought me round again to
Steerforth, who was my great subjet. We were very happy; and
that evenig, as the last of its rac, and detied evermre to cose
that volume of my life, wi never pass out of my memory.
It was almost te o’clock before we hard th sound of ws.
We all got up then; and my mother said hurriedly that, as it was so
ate, and Mr. and Mis Murdstone approved of early hours for
young peopl, perhaps I had better go to bed. I kid her, and
wnt upstairs with my candle directly, before thy came in. It
appeared to my chidish fancy, as I ascended to th bedro
where I had be imprid, that they brought a cod blast of air
ito the house wh blew away the old famar feelig like a
feather.
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I felt uncfortable about going down to breakfast i the
mrnig, as I had never set eye on Mr. Murdstone since the day
w I coitted my memorable offence. Hover, as it must be
do, I went down, after two or three fal starts half-way, and as
many runs back on tiptoe to my own room, and prested mysf
in th parlur.
He was standig before the fire with his back to it, whe Mis
Murdsto made th tea. He looked at me steadily as I etered,
but made no sign of regnition whatever. I went up to him, after a
moment of confusion, and said: ‘I beg your pardo, sir. I am very
sorry for what I did, and I hope you will forgive me.’
‘I am glad to hear you are sorry, David,’ he replied.
The hand he gave m was the hand I had bitten I culd not
restrain my eye fro resting for an instant on a red spot upo it;
but it was not so red as I turnd, wh I met that sinister
expression in his face.
‘How do you do, ma’am?’ I said to Mi Murdstoe.
‘Ah, dear me!’ sighd Mi Murdsto, giving me th tea-caddy
soop intead of her fingers. ‘How lg are the holidays?’
‘A month, ma’am.’
‘Countig from when?’
‘From today, ma’am.’
‘Oh!’ said Miss Murdstoe. ‘Th here’s one day off.’
She kept a calendar of th hoidays in th way, and every
morng cheked a day off in exactly th same manner. She did it
gloomiy until sh cam to ten, but when sh got ito two figures
e beam mre hopeful, and, as the ti advand, even jocular.
It was on this very first day that I had the mifortune to throw
her, though sh was not subjet to suc weakn i genral, ito
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a state of vit conternation. I came into th ro wre she
and my mther were sitting; and the baby (who was only a few
ks od) beg o my mothr’s lap, I tok it very carefully in my
arms. Suddely Miss Murdsto gave such a scream that I all but
dropped it.
‘My dear Jane!’ cried my mothr.
‘Good heavens, Clara, do you see?’ exclaid Mi Murdstone.
‘See what, my dear Jan?’ said my mother; ‘whre?’
‘He’s got it!’ cried Miss Murdsto ‘Th boy has got th baby!’
Sh was lp with horror; but stiffend hersef to make a dart
at me, and take it out of my arms. Th, she turnd faint; and was
very il that they were oblged to give her chrry brandy. I was
y interdited by her, on her recvery, from touchig my
brother any more on any pretenc whatever; and my poor mother,
w, I could see, wished othrwise, meekly confirmed th
terdit, by saying: ‘No doubt you are right, my dear Jan’
On another occas, when we three were together, this sam
dear baby—it was truly dear to me, for our mother’s sake—was the
innocent occasi of Miss Murdsto’s gog into a passion. My
mther, who had been lookig at its eyes as it lay upon her lap,
said:
‘Davy! come here!’ and lked at min
I saw Mis Murdstone lay her beads down.
‘I declare,’ said my mother, getly, ‘thy are exactly alke. I
suppose thy are mi I thk thy are th colour of mine. But
they are woderfully alke’
‘What are you talkig about, Clara?’ said Mis Murdsto
‘My dear Jan,’ faltered my mother, a little abashed by th
harsh tone of this iquiry, ‘I find that the baby’s eye and Davy’s
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are exactly alike’
‘Clara!’ said Miss Murdsto, rising angrily, ‘you are a postive
fo sometimes.’
‘My dear Jane,’ remontrated my mothr.
‘A postive fo,’ said Miss Murdsto ‘Wh el could compare
my brothr’s baby wth your boy? Thy are not at all alike Thy
are exactly unlike. Thy are utterly dissimilar in all repets I
hope they w ever reai so. I wi not sit here, and hear suc
mparis made.’ With that she stalked out, and made th door
bang after her.
In short, I was not a favourite with Miss Murdsto In short, I
was nt a favourite there with anybody, not even with mysf; for
those who did lke m could not show it, and those who did nt,
shod it so plainly that I had a sensitive consciusness of always
appearing constrained, borish, and dull
I felt that I made them as unfortabl as they made me If I
cam ito the room were they were, and they were talkig
together and my mother seemed cheerful, an anxious cloud would
steal over her fac from the mot of my entran If Mr.
Murdsto wre in hs best humour, I cheked him. If Miss
Murdsto were in her worst, I intensified it. I had percpti
ough to know that my mother was the victi always; that s
as afraid to speak to me or to be kid to me, lt sh suld give
them so offence by her maner of dog so, and reve a
lecture afterwards; that she was not only ceasely afraid of her
own offendig, but of my offendig, and uneasy watched their
looks if I only moved. Therefore I reved to kep mysf as muc
ut of thr way as I could; and many a wintry hour did I har th
church clock strike, w I was sitting in my cherless bedro,
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wrapped in my little great-coat, poring over a bok.
In the eveg, sotim, I went and sat with Peggotty i the
kitchen There I was cofortabl, and nt afraid of beig mysf.
But neithr of th resources was approved of in th parlur. Th
tormting humour which was dominant thre stopped th
both. I was stil held to be nary to my poor mother’s training,
and, as on of her trials, could not be suffered to absent myself.
‘David,’ said Mr. Murdstone, one day after dinner when I was
going to leave the room as usual; ‘I am srry to obsrve that you
are of a sullen disposition.’
‘As sulky as a bear!’ said Miss Murdsto
I stood sti, and hung my head.
‘No, David,’ said Mr. Murdstoe, ‘a sul obdurate
disposition is, of all tempers, th worst.’
‘And th boy’s is, of all such disposition that ever I have se,’
remarked his sister, ‘th most confirmed and stubborn. I thk, my
dear Clara, eve you must observe it?’
‘I beg your pardo, my dear Jan,’ said my mother, ‘but are you
quite sure—I am certain you’ll excuse me, my dear Jane—that you
understand Davy?’
‘I should be somewhat asamed of mysef, Cara,’ returned Mi
Murdstone, ‘if I culd nt understand the boy, or any boy. I do’t
profess to be profound; but I do lay claim to com sense’
‘No doubt, my dear Jane,’ returnd my mothr, ‘your
understandig is very vigorous—’
‘Oh dear, no! Pray don’t say that, Clara,’ interpod Miss
Murdstone, angrily.
‘But I am sure it is,’ resumed my mother; ‘and everybody kn
it is. I profit so much by it myself, i many ways—at least I ought
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to—that no on can be more convinced of it than myself; and
therefore I speak with great diffidee, my dear Jan, I asure
you.’
‘We’ll say I do’t understand the boy, Clara,’ returned Mis
Murdstone, arrangig the little fetters on her wrists ‘We’ll agree,
if you please, that I don’t understand him at all. He i much to
deep for me. But perhaps my brothr’s penetration may enable
hm to have some insight into his character. And I beve my
brother was speakig on the subject when we—not very
decently—interrupted him.’
‘I think, Clara,’ said Mr. Murdsto, in a low grave voice, ‘that
thre may be better and more dispassiate judge of such a
question than you.’
‘Edward,’ replied my mothr, timidly, ‘you are a far better judge
of all questions than I preted to be Both you and Jan are I oy
said—’
‘You only said something wak and isiderate,’ h replied.
‘Try not to do it again, my dear Clara, and keep a watc upo
yoursf.’
My mothr’s lips moved, as if she answered ‘Ye, my dear
Edward,’ but she said nothing aloud.
‘I was sorry, David, I remarked,’ said Mr. Murdsto, turnig
his head and his eye stiffly toards me, ‘to observe that you are of
a sul disposti. This is not a character that I can suffer to
develop itself beath my eye withut an effort at improvet.
You must endeavour, sir, to change it. We must edeavour to
change it for you.’
‘I beg your pardo, sir,’ I faltered. ‘I have never meant to be
sullen s I came back.’
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‘Don’t take refuge in a li, sir!’ he returned so fiercy, that I
saw my mther ivoluntariy put out her tremblg hand as if to
iterpose betwee us. ‘You have withdraw yoursef in your
sulnnes to your own room. You have kept your own room when
you ought to have been here. You know now, onc for al, that I
require you to be here, and nt there Further, that I require you
to bring obediene here. You kn me, David. I wi have it don.’
Miss Murdsto gave a hoars chuckl
‘I wi have a repetful, propt, and ready bearig toards
ysf,’ he ctiued, ‘and towards Jan Murdsto, and towards
your mothr. I will not have this ro shunned as if it wre
infected, at th pleasure of a chid. Sit dow’
He ordered me like a dog, and I obeyed like a dog.
‘On thg more,’ he said. ‘I observe that you have an
attachment to low and common company. You are not to associate
with srvants. The kitchen will nt improve you, in the many
respects in which you need improvet. Of th wman w
abets you, I say nothg—se you, Clara,’ addresg my mther
in a lowr voice, ‘from od assocations and long-established
fancies, have a weakness respeting her which is not yet
overco’
‘A most unaccountabl delusion it is!’ cried Miss Murdsto
‘I only say,’ he resumed, addressing me, ‘that I disapprove of
your preferring such company as Mistress Peggotty, and that it is
to be abandoned. Now, David, you understand m, and you know
what wil be the consequen if you fai to obey me to the letter.’
I kn well—better perhaps than he thought, as far as my poor
mther was cornd—and I obeyed him to the letter. I retreated
to my own room no more; I took refuge with Peggotty no more;
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but sat weariy i the parlour day after day, lookig forward to
nght, and bedti
What irks cotrait I underwent, sitting in the sam
attitude hours upon hours, afraid to move an arm or a leg lt Mis
Murdsto should complain (as she did on th least pretece) of
my restlessne, and afraid to move an eye lest she should lght o
some look of dislike or scrutiy that would find ne caus for
cplait in mi! What intolerable dulne to sit liteg to the
tickig of the clock; and watchig Mis Murdstone’s lttle shy
steel beads as she strung them; and woderig whether she would
ever be marrid, and if so, to what sort of unappy man; and
counting th division i th moulding of th chimney-piece; and
wanderig away, with my eye, to the ceg, among the curls and
corkscres in th paper on th wall!
What walks I tok alon, dow muddy lanes, in th bad winter
weather, carrying that parlour, and Mr. and Mis Murdstone in it,
everywhere: a motrous lad that I was oblged to bear, a
daymare that thre was no posbility of breaking i, a wight that
brooded on my wits, and blunted them!
What mals I had in since and embarrassmt, always feg
that thre were a knife and fork to many, and that mine; an
appetite to many, and that mine; a plate and chair to many, and
th mine; a somebody to many, and that I!
What evenigs, when the candl cam, and I was expeted to
ploy myself, but, not daring to read an etertaining book, pored
over so hard-headed, harder-hearted treati o arithmeti;
when the tabl of weights and measures st themve to tune,
as ‘Rule Britana’, or ‘Away with Meany’; wen they
wouldn’t stand sti to be larnt, but would go threadig my
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grandmther’s needl through my unfortunate head, i at one ear
and out at th othr! What yaws and dozes I lapsed ito, in spite
f all my care; what starts I came out of concealed sps wth;
what anrs I nver got, to little obsrvati that I rarely made;
wat a blank spac I seemed, wh everybody overlooked, and
yet was i everybody’s way; what a heavy relf it was to hear Mis
Murdstone hai the first stroke of nin at night, and order me to
bed!
Thus the holidays lagged away, until the mornig cam when
Miss Murdsto said: ‘Here’s th last day off!’ and gave me th
closg cup of tea of th vacati
I was nt sorry to go. I had lapsd ito a stupid state; but I was
recvering a little and lookig forward to Sterforth, albet Mr.
Creakle lood behd hm. Again Mr. Barkis appeared at th
gate, and again Miss Murdsto in her warning voice, said: ‘Clara!’
w my mothr bent over me, to bid me fare
I kid her, and my baby brother, and was very sorry then; but
nt srry to go away, for the gulf betwee us was there, and the
partig was there, every day. And it i nt s muc the embrac
gave m, that lives i my mnd, though it was as fervent as
uld be, as what followed the embrace.
I was in th carrir’s cart wh I hard hr caling to me. I
looked out, and she stood at the garden-gate alone, holdig her
baby up in her arm for me to se It was cd sti wathr; and
nt a hair of her head, nr a fold of her dres, was stirred, as sh
ooked itently at me, holdig up her chd.
So I lot her. So I saw her afterwards, in my seep at school—a
st pre nar my bed—lookig at me with the sam intent
fac—holdig up her baby in her arm
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Chapter 9
I HAVE A MEMORABLE BIRTHDAY
I
pas over al that happed at school, until the anniversary of
my birthday came round in Marc Except that Sterforth
as more to be admired than ever, I remember nothing. He
was going away at the end of the half-year, if nt sooner, and was
more spirited and independet than before in my eye, and
therefore more engaging than before; but beyond this I rember
nthing. The great rembranc by whic that tim is marked i
my mind, se to have swallowd up all lesser rellections, and
to exist ale.
It is even difficult for me to beeve that there was a gap of full
tw month betw my return to Salem Hous and th arrival of
that birthday. I can only understand that the fact was so, beause I
know it must have be so; othrwise I should fe convinced that
there was no interval, and that the one occas trod upon the
other’s heels
How wel I rect the kid of day it was! I sm the fog that
hung about the place; I see the hoar frost, ghostly, through it; I feel
my rimy hair fall clammy on my chek; I look along th dim
perspetive of the shoolroom, with a sputtering candl here and
there to light up the foggy mornig, and the breath of the boys
wreathing and smokig in the raw cold as they blow upon their
fingers, and tap their feet upon the floor. It was after breakfast,
and we had be sumoned in from the playground, when Mr.
Sharp entered and said:
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‘David Copperfied is to go into the parlour.’
I expeted a hamper from Peggotty, and brightened at th
order. So of the boys about m put i their caim not to be
forgotten i the ditributio of the good things, as I got out of my
sat with great alacrity.
‘Don’t hurry, David,’ said Mr. Sharp. ‘Thre’s time eugh, my
boy, do’t hurry.’
I mght have be surprisd by the feeg tone in whic he
spoke, if I had given it a thought; but I gave it no until
afterwards I hurried away to the parlour; and there I found Mr.
Creakle, sitting at his breakfast with th cane and a newpaper
before hi, and Mrs. Creakl with an oped letter in her hand.
But no hamper.
‘David Copperfield,’ said Mrs. Creakle, leadig me to a sfa, and
sitting dow bede me. ‘I want to speak to you very particularly. I
have sothing to tel you, my chd.’
Mr. Creakle, at whom of course I looked, shook hi head
without lookig at me, and stopped up a sgh with a very large
pi of buttered toast.
‘You are too young to know how the world changes every day,’
said Mrs. Creakle, ‘and h th people in it pass away. But we all
ave to learn it, David; so of us wh we are young, s of us
en we are old, some of us at al times of our lives.’
I looked at her earnetly.
‘When you cam away from home at the ed of the vacation,’
said Mrs. Creakle, after a pause, ‘were they al w?’ After another
pause, ‘Was your mama well?’
I trebld withut distictly kning why, and still looked at
her earnetly, makig n attempt to anr.
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‘Beause,’ said she, ‘I grieve to tell you that I hear this morng
your mama is very ill.’
A mt ro between Mrs. Creakle and me, and her figure
d to mve in it for an itant. Then I felt the burng tears
run dow my face, and it was steady again.
‘She is very dangerously ill,’ she added.
I knew all now
‘She is dead.’
There was n nd to tel m so I had already broke out into a
desolate cry, and felt an orphan in th wide world.
She was very kind to me. She kept me thre all day, and left me
alon sometimes; and I cried, and wore myself to slp, and awoke
and cried again. Whe I could cry no more, I began to thk; and
th th oppression on my breast was heaviest, and my grief a dull
pain that thre was no ease for.
d yet my thoughts were idl; not intent on the calamty that
weighed upon my heart, but idly lotering nar it. I thought of our
house shut up and hushed. I thought of the little baby, who, Mrs.
reakle said, had bee pining away for some ti, and wh, thy
beved, would di too. I thought of my father’s grave in the
churchyard, by our house, and of my mothr lying thre beath
the tree I knew so we. I stood upon a cair wen I was lft alone,
and looked into the glas to see how red my eyes wre, and how
sorroful my face. I considered, after some hours were go, if my
tears wre realy hard to fl no, as thy sed to be, what, in
nnexi with my loss, it would affect me most to think of w I
dre nar home—for I was going home to the funeral I am
sbl of having felt that a dignity attacd to m amg the rest
of th boys, and that I was important in my affliction.
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If ever child were strike with sincere grief, I was But I
remember that this importance was a kind of satisfacti to me,
when I walked i the playground that afternoon whil the boys
were in school. Wh I saw them glang at me out of the
wndows, as thy went up to thr classes, I felt distinguished, and
looked mre meanholy, and walked sower. Wh school was
over, and they cam out and spoke to me, I felt it rather good i
ysf nt to be proud to any of them, and to take exactly the
same notice of th all, as before
I was to go home next nght; not by the mai, but by the heavy
night-coach, which was called th Farmr, and was principally
used by country-people travellg short itermediate ditan
upon the road. We had no story-tellg that evenig, and Traddl
insisted on lending me his pillow I don’t kn wat god h
thught it wuld do me, for I had on of my on: but it was all h
ad to lend, poor fellow, except a shet of letter-paper full of
skeltos; and that h gave me at partig, as a soothr of my
sorro and a contributi to my peace of mind.
I lft Sal House upo the morrow afternoon. I lttle thought
then that I left it, never to return. We traved very slowly al
ght, and did nt get into Yarmouth before n or ten o’cock i
the mornig. I looked out for Mr. Barki, but he was not there; and
itead of him a fat, short-winded, mrry-lookig, lttle old man in
black, with rusty little bunhes of ribbo at the knees of his
bres, black stokings, and a broad-brimmed hat, came puffing
up to the coach window, and said:
‘Master Copperfield?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Will you come with me, young sir, if you please,’ h said,
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openig the door, ‘and I sal have the pleasure of takig you
home.’
I put my hand in his, wondering who he was, and we walked
away to a shop i a narro stret, on which was written OMER,
DRAPER, TAILOR, HABERDASHER, FUNERAL FURNISHER,
&c It was a close and stiflg little shop; full of al sorts of cothing,
made and unade, including on wido full of beaver-hats and
bonnets We went into a little back-parlur bend the shop, where
we found three young wome at work on a quantity of black
materials, whic were heaped upon the tabl, and lttle bits and
cuttings of whic were littered all over the floor. There was a good
fire in th ro, and a breathles sml of warm black crape—I did
nt know what the sml was then, but I know no
The three young wome, who appeared to be very idustrious
and comfortable, raised thr heads to look at me, and th wnt
o with thr work. Stitch, stitch, stitch. At th same time thre
am from a workshop across a lttle yard outside the window, a
regular sound of hamrig that kept a kid of tune: Rat—tat-tat,
Rat—tat-tat, Rat—tat-tat, without any variati
‘We,’ said my coductor to one of the three young wome
‘How do you get on, Miie?’
‘We shal be ready by th trying-on time,’ she replied gaily,
wthut loking up. ‘Don’t you be afraid, father.’
Mr. Omer took off hi broad-brid hat, and sat down and
panted. He was so fat that he was obliged to pant s tim before
he could say:
‘That’s right.’
‘Fathr!’ said Miie, playfuly. ‘What a porpoise you do gro!’
‘Well, I don’t kn h it is, my dear,’ he replied, considerig
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about it. ‘I am rather so.’
‘You are such a comfortable man, you see,’ said Mi ‘You
take things so easy.’
‘No use takig ’em othrwise, my dear,’ said Mr. Omer.
‘No, ideed,’ returned his daughter. ‘We are al pretty gay here,
thank Heave! Ain’t we, fathr?’
‘I hpe so, my dear,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘As I have got my breath
w, I think I’l masure this young scholar. Would you walk into
th shop, Master Copperfield?’
I preceded Mr. Omer, in coplan with his request; and after
shoing me a ro of cloth which he said was extra super, and to
good mournig for anything short of parents, he took my various
dimensions, and put th dow i a book. Whi he was rerdig
them he calld my attenti to his stock in trade, and to crtai
fashion wich h said had ‘just come up’, and to certain othr
fashion which he said had ‘just go out’.
‘And by that srt of thing we very often lo a little mit of
mony,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘But fashion are lke human begs. They
c in, nbody knows when, why, or how; and they go out,
nbody knows when, why, or how. Everything is lke life, i my
opinion, if you look at it in that poit of vi.’
I was to sorroful to discus th queti, wich wuld
possibly have be beyod me under any crcumstances; and Mr.
Omr took me back into the parlour, breathing with s
diffiulty on the way.
He th called dow a littl break-neck range of steps behd a
door: ‘Bring up that tea and bread-and-butter!’ whic, after so
tim, during whic I sat lookig about me and thinkig, and
lteg to the stitcg i the room and the tune that was beg
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hamred across the yard, appeared on a tray, and turned out to
be for me.
‘I have be acquaited with you,’ said Mr. Omer, after
watcng me for some minutes, during wich I had not made
muc impreon on the breakfast, for the black things detroyed
my appetite, ‘I have be acquaited with you a log tim, my
young frid.’
‘Have you, sir?’
‘Al your life,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘I may say before it. I knew your
father before you. He was five foot ni and a half, and he lays i
five-and-twen-ty foot of ground.’
‘Rat—tat-tat, Rat—tat-tat, Rat—tat-tat,’ across the yard.
‘He lays i five and twen-ty foot of ground, if he lays i a
fraction,’ said Mr. Omer, pleasantly. ‘It was either hi request or
hr direction, I forget which.’
‘Do you know how my little brother is, sir?’ I inquired.
Mr. Omer shook his head.
‘Rat—tat-tat, Rat—tat-tat, Rat—tat-tat.’
‘He is in his mother’s arms,’ said he
‘Oh, poor little fellow! Is he dead?’
‘Don’t mind it more than you can hep,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘Ye
The baby’s dead.’
My wunds broke out afresh at this inteigece. I left th
scarcy-tasted breakfast, and wnt and rested my head on
another table, in a corner of the little room, whic Minni hastiy
cared, let I should spot the mourning that was lyig there with
my tears Sh was a pretty, good-natured girl, and put my hair
away fro my eye with a soft, kind touc; but she was very
cherful at having nearly fiished her work and being in god
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time, and was so different fro me!
Pretly the tune left off, and a good-lookig young fellow
cam across the yard into the room. He had a hamr i hi hand,
and his mouth was ful of littl nails, which he was obliged to take
out before he could speak.
‘Well, Joram!’ said Mr. Omer. ‘How do you get on?’
‘Al right,’ said Joram ‘Don, sir.’
Min cured a lttle, and the other two girls smd at one
another.
‘What! you were at it by candle-light last night, w I was at
the club, then? Were you?’ said Mr. Omer, suttig up one eye.
‘Ye,’ said Joram. ‘As you said we could make a littl trip of it,
and go over togethr, if it was don, Mi and me—and you.’
‘Oh! I thought you were going to leave me out altogether,’ said
Mr. Omer, laughng till he coughd.
‘—A you was so good as to say that,’ resumd the young man,
‘why I turned to with a wil, you s Wi you give m your opi
of it?’
‘I wi,’ said Mr. Omer, rising. ‘My dear’; and he stopped and
turned to me: ‘would you like to see your—’
‘No, father,’ Mi interpod.
‘I thought it might be agreeable, my dear,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘But
perhaps you’re right.’
I can’t say ho I kn it was my dear, dear mothr’s coffin that
thy went to look at. I had never heard o making; I had never
s o that I know of.—but it cam ito my mid what the no
was, whil it was going on; and when the young man entered, I am
sure I knew what he had been dog.
The work beg nw find, the two girls, whose nam I had
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not heard, brusd th shreds and threads fro thr dres, and
went into the shop to put that to rights, and wait for customrs
Minnie stayed bend to fod up what thy had made, and pack it
in tw baskets. This she did upo her kn, humming a lively
lttle tune the whil Joram, who I had n doubt was her lover,
came in and sto a kiss fro her while she was busy (h didn’t
appear to md m, at al), and said her father was gone for the
chaise, and h must make haste and get himself ready. Th he
nt out again; and th she put hr thimbl and scissors in hr
pocket, and stuck a nedle threaded with black thread neatly in
the bo of her gown, and put on her outer clothing smartly, at a
lttle glas bed the door, in whic I saw the refletio of her
pleased face.
this I obsrved, stting at the tabl i the corner with my
had leaning o my hand, and my thughts running on very
different things. The chai soon cam round to the front of the
shop, and th baskets being put in first, I was put in next, and
th thre followd. I remember it as a kind of half chaise-cart,
half pianoforte-van, paited of a sobre cour, and draw by a
black horse with a log tai. There was plenty of ro for us al
I do not thk I have ever expericed so strange a feg i
y life (I am wisr now, perhaps) as that of beg with them,
reberig how they had be employed, and seg them
ejoy the ride I was nt angry with them; I was more afraid of
th, as if I were cast away amg creatures with w I had no
cunty of nature. They were very chrful. The old man sat in
front to drive, and the two young peopl sat bed hi, and
wenever he spoke to them leand forward, the one on one side of
hi cubby fac and the other on the other, and made a great deal
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of him They would have talked to m too, but I held back, and
moped in my cornr; scared by thr love-making and hlarity,
thugh it was far fro boisterous, and almost wdering that no
judgement cam upon them for their hardn of heart.
So, wh thy stopped to bait th horse, and ate and drank and
ejoyed themve, I could touch nothing that they touched, but
kept my fast unbroken. So, when we reached home, I dropped out
of the chai bend, as quickly as pobl, that I might not be in
their copany before those so windows, lookig bldly on
m like closed eyes once bright. Ad oh, how little need I had had
to think what would move me to tears when I cam back—sg
the window of my mother’s room, and nxt it that whic, in the
better tim, was m!
I was i Peggotty’s arm before I got to the door, and sh took
m into the house Her grief burst out when sh first saw m; but
she controlled it soo, and spoke in whispers, and walked softly, as
if th dead could be disturbed. She had not bee in bed, I found,
for a long time. She sat up at night still, and watcd. As long as
r poor dear pretty was above th ground, she said, she would
nver dert her.
Mr. Murdstone took no heed of m when I went into the parlour
were he was, but sat by the firede, weepig sently, and
ponderig in his elbo-chair. Miss Murdsto, w was busy at
hr writing-desk, which was covered with letters and papers, gave
me her cold finger-nails, and asked me, in an iro wisper, if I had
bee measured for my mournng.
I said: ‘Yes.’
‘And your shirts,’ said Miss Murdsto; ‘have you brought ’em
home?’
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‘Yes, ma’am. I have brought hoe al my clths.’
This was all th consolation that her firmss administered to
me. I do not doubt that she had a choice pleasure in exhbiting
what se called her sef-comand, and her firmnes, and her
strength of mind, and her common sense, and th wh diabolical
catalogue of her unamiabl qualities, on such an occasi. She was
particularly proud of her turn for busss; and she shod it now
in reducng everythng to pen and ink, and beig moved by
nthing. All the rest of that day, and from mornig to nght
afterwards, she sat at that desk, scratchig compodly with a
hard pen, speaking in th same imperturbabl whisper to
verybody; never relaxing a muscle of her face, or softeing a to
of her voic, or appearig with an atom of her dre astray.
Her brother took a book sotim, but nver read it that I
saw He would ope it and lk at it as if he were readig, but
would remai for a whole hour without turnig the leaf, and then
put it down and walk to and fro in the room. I used to sit with
folded hands watchig hi, and cunting his footsteps, hour after
hour. He very sdom spoke to her, and nver to me He sed to
be the only restles thing, excpt the clocks, in the whole
tionl house
In thes days before the funeral, I saw but lttle of Peggotty,
except that, in passing up or dow stairs, I alays found hr c
to the room where my mother and her baby lay, and except that
she came to me every night, and sat by my bed’s had wile I wnt
to slp. A day or two before the burial—I think it was a day or two
before, but I am conscious of confusion in my mind about that
havy time, wth nothing to mark its progress—she tok me into
the room. I only rect that underneath so white covering on
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the bed, wth a beautiful clean and freshnes al around it,
there seemed to me to lie embodied the so sti that was
the house; and that when she would have turned the cver
gently back, I crid: ‘Oh n! oh no!’ and held her hand.
If th funeral had be yesterday, I could not rellect it better.
The very air of the bet parlour, when I went in at the door, the
bright condition of th fire, th shiing of th wi in th
deanters, the patterns of the glas and plate, the faint swt
sell of cake, the odour of Mis Murdstone’s dres, and our black
cloths. Mr. Chillip is in th ro, and comes to speak to me.
‘And ho is Master David?’ he says, kidly.
I cant tell him very well I give him my hand, which he holds
in hi
‘Dear me!’ says Mr. Chillp, mkly smiling, with sothg
shining in his eye ‘Our littl friends gro up around us. Thy
grow out of our knowledge, ma’am?’ This is to Mis Murdstone,
who make n reply.
‘Thre is a great improvement here, ma’am?’ says Mr. Chillp.
Miss Murdsto merely answers with a fron and a formal
bed: Mr. Chillip, discomfited, go into a cornr, keepig me wth
m, and opes his mouth no more
I remark this, beause I remark everything that happe, not
beause I care about mysf, or have do se I cam home. Ad
now th bel begins to sound, and Mr. Omer and anthr come to
ake us ready. As Peggotty was wont to tel m, log ago, the
follwers of my father to the sam grave were made ready in the
sam room.
There are Mr. Murdstone, our neghbour Mr. Grayper, Mr.
Clip, and I. Wh we go out to the door, the Bearers and their
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lad are in the garden; and they move before us do the path,
and past the el, and through the gate, and ito the curchyard,
were I have so ofte heard the birds sig on a sumer morng.
We stand around the grave. The day seems differet to me from
very other day, and the light not of the sam colour—of a sadder
colour. Now thre is a solemn hush, which we have brought fro
with what is resting in th mould; and while we stand
bareheaded, I hear the vo of the clergyman, soundig rete in
th ope air, and yet distinct and plain, saying: ‘I am th
Resurrection and th Life, saith th Lord!’ Th I hear sobs; and,
standing apart among th lookers-o, I se that god and faithful
rvant, whom of al the peopl upo earth I lve the bet, and
unto wh my childish heart is certain that th Lord wi o day
say: ‘Well done’
There are many fac that I know, amg the little crowd; fac
that I knew in churc, when m was alays wderig there;
fac that first saw my mther, when sh cam to the vilage in her
youthful bloom. I do nt mnd them—I mid nothing but my
grif—and yet I see and know them al; and even i th
background, far away, see Minni lookig on, and her eye glang
on her sweetheart, who is near m
It is over, and th earth is filled in, and we turn to come away.
Before us stands our house, so pretty and unchanged, so linked in
y md with the young idea of what is gone, that al my sorrow
has be nthing to the sorrow it call forth. But they take me on;
and Mr. Chillip talks to me; and wh we get h, puts some
water to my lips; and wh I ask hi leave to go up to my ro,
dismisse me with th gentleness of a woman.
A th, I say, is yeterday’s event. Events of later date have
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floated from m to the shore where al forgotten things wil
reappear, but this stands like a high rock in th ocan.
I kn that Peggotty would co to me in my room. The
Sabbath stillness of th time (th day was so like Sunday! I have
forgotten that) was suited to us both. Sh sat down by my sde
upo my littl bed; and hoding my hand, and sometimes putting it
to her lips, and sometimes smoothng it wth hrs, as she might
have coforted my little brother, told me, in her way, al that s
ad to tell concerning what had happened.
‘Sh was never wll,’ said Peggotty, ‘for a long ti She was
uncrtai in her mid, and nt happy. Wh her baby was born, I
thought at first sh would get better, but s was mre deate,
and sunk a lttle every day. Sh used to like to sit alone before her
baby came, and th she cried; but afterwards she usd to sng to
t—so sft, that I onc thought, when I heard her, it was lke a
voice up in th air, that was rising away.
‘I think s got to be more timd, and mre frightend-like, of
late; and that a hard word was like a blow to hr. But she was
always the sam to me Sh never canged to her fooli Peggotty,
didn’t my sweet girl.’
Here Peggotty stopped, and sftly beat upon my hand a little
whil
‘The last tim that I saw her like her own old sef, was the night
w you came ho, my dear. Th day you wnt away, she said
to m, “I never shal se my pretty darlig agai Sothing tel
so, that tell the truth, I know.”
‘She tried to hold up after that; and many a tim, when they
told her sh was thoughtle and light-hearted, made beve to be
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s; but it was al a bygone then Sh nver told her husband what
se had told me—she was afraid of saying it to anybody e—ti
one night, a little more than a week before it happed, when sh
said to him: “My dear, I thk I am dying.”
‘“It’s off my mind now, Peggotty,” sh told me, when I laid her
in her bed that night. “He wi believe it more and more, poor
fellow, every day for a fe days to come; and th it wi be past. I
am very tired. If this is slp, sit by me while I sleep: don’t leave
me. God blss both my chidre! God protet and keep my
fathrless boy!”
‘I never left her afterwards,’ said Peggotty. ‘She often talked to
them two downstairs—for sh lved them; sh culdn’t bear not to
lve anyone who was about her—but when they went away from
hr bed-side, she always turnd to me, as if thre was rest wre
Peggotty was, and nver fe asp in any other way.
‘On the last nght, in the eveg, sh kid m, and said: “If
my baby should di too, Peggotty, plas let them lay him in my
arm, and bury us together.” (It was do; for the poor lamb lived
but a day beyond her.) “Let my dearet boy go with us to our
resting-plac,” she said, “and te him that his mothr, wh she
ay here, blesd him not once, but a thousand tim”’
Anothr silen fod this, and anthr gentle beating o my
hand.
‘It was pretty far in the nght,’ said Peggotty, ‘when sh asked
me for some drink; and wh she had taken it, gave me such a
patiet s, the dear!—s beautiful!
‘Daybreak had co, and the sun was rig, when she said to
me, ho kind and considerate Mr. Copperfield had always bee to
her, and how he had borne with her, and told her, when s
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doubted hersef, that a lving heart was better and stronger than
isdom, and that he was a happy man in hrs “Peggotty, my
dear,” she said then, “put me narer to you,” for she was very
wak. “Lay your god arm undernath my neck,” she said, “and
turn me to you, for your fac is going far off, and I want it to be
ar.” I put it as she asked; and oh Davy! th time had come wh
y first parting words to you were true—when sh was glad to lay
her poor head on her stupid cross old Peggotty’s arm—and s
died like a child that had go to sleep!’
Thus ended Peggotty’s narration. From the mot of my
knowing of the death of my mother, the idea of her as se had
been of late had vand from me I remebered her, from that
instant, oly as th young mothr of my earliest impresions, wh
had be used to wind her bright curls round and round her
finger, and to dance with me at twilght in the parlour. What
Peggotty had told me now, was s far from briging me back to
the later period, that it rooted the earlr image in my mid. It may
be curius, but it is true. In her death she winged her way back to
her calm untroubled youth, and cancelled al the rest.
The mother who lay in the grave, was the mther of my ifancy;
th littl creature in her arms, was myself, as I had once be,
hushed for ever on her bo
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Chapter 10
I BECOME NEGLECTED, AND AM PROVIDED
FOR
T
he first act of bus Mis Murdstone performed when
the day of the soty was over, and light was freely
admtted ito the house, was to give Peggotty a moth’s
arning. Much as Peggotty would have disliked such a service, I
beeve se would have retaied it, for my sake, in preferenc to
th best upo earth She told me w must part, and told me wy;
and we condoled with one another, in al sincerity.
A to me or my future, not a word was said, or a step take
Happy thy would have be, I dare say, if thy could have
dismissed me at a month’s warng to I mustered courage once,
to ask Mis Murdstone when I was going back to shool; and sh
anered dryly, she beeved I was not gog back at al I was tod
nthing more. I was very anxious to know what was going to be
do with m, and so was Peggotty; but nether sh nor I culd
pick up any information on th subjet.
Thre was on change in my condition, which, wh it reved
m of a great deal of pret uneas, mght have made me, if I
had be capabl of considering it closy, yet more unmfortabl
about the future. It was this The constrait that had be put
upo me, was quite abandoned. I was so far fro beg required
to keep my dull post in th parlur, that on several occasions,
when I took my seat there, Mis Murdstone frowned to m to go
away. I was s far from beg warned off from Peggotty’s soty,
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that, provided I was not in Mr. Murdsto’s, I was never sought
out or inquired for. At first I was in daily dread of hs taking my
educati i hand agai, or of Mis Murdstone’s devoting herself
to it; but I soon began to think that suc fears were groundl,
and that al I had to anticpate was neglt.
I do nt cve that this diovery gave me muc pai then I
was still giddy with th shok of my mothr’s death, and i a kind
of stunnd state as to all tributary things. I can rect, ided, to
have speculated, at odd times, on th posbility of my not beg
taught any more, or cared for any mre; and growing up to be a
shabby, moody man, lounging an idle lfe away, about th viage;
as well as on the feasibity of my getting rid of this piture by
gog away sere, lke the hero in a story, to seek my
fortune: but thes were trant vis, daydreams I sat lookig
at sotim, as if they were faitly paited or written on the wall
f my ro, and which, as thy melted away, left th wall blank
again.
‘Peggotty,’ I said i a thughtful whisper, on eveg, wh I
was warmig my hands at the kitchen fire, ‘Mr. Murdstone like
le than he used to. He nver lked m muc, Peggotty; but he
wuld rather not even see m n, if he can help it.’
‘Perhaps it’s his sorro,’ said Peggotty, stroking my hair.
‘I am sure, Peggotty, I am sorry to If I beved it was hi
sorro, I should not thk of it at all. But it’s not that; oh, no, it’s
t that.’
‘How do you know it’s nt that?’ said Peggotty, after a si
‘Oh, his sorro is anthr and quite a different thing. He i
sorry at this moment, sitting by th fireside with Mi Murdsto;
but if I was to go in, Peggotty, he would be sothing bede’
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‘What would he be?’ said Peggotty.
‘Angry,’ I answered, with an involuntary imitation of his dark
frown. ‘If he was only sorry, he wouldn’t look at m as he do I
am only sorry, and it makes me fe kinder.’
Peggotty said nthing for a lttle whil; and I warmed my
hands, as silent as she
‘Davy,’ she said at length
‘Ye, Peggotty?’
‘I have tried, my dear, all ways I could thk of—al th ways
there are, and all the ways there ai’t, in short—to get a suitabl
rvice here, in Blundersto; but thre’s no such a thg, my
love’
‘And what do you mean to do, Peggotty,’ says I, wistfuly. ‘Do
you mean to go and seek your fortune?’
‘I expet I shal be forced to go to Yarmouth,’ repld Peggotty,
‘and live there’
‘You might have gone farther off,’ I said, brighteng a little,
‘and bee as bad as lost. I shall se you sometimes, my dear od
Peggotty, there You won’t be quite at the other ed of the world,
wll you?’
‘Contrary ways, plas God!’ crid Peggotty, with great
animation. ‘As long as you are here, my pet, I shall come over
every week of my life to see you. One day, every week of my life!’
I felt a great weight taken off my mid by this proise: but
eve this was nt all, for Peggotty went on to say:
‘I’m a-going, Davy, you se, to my brother’s, first, for another
fortnight’s visit—just till I have had time to look about me, and get
to be somethg like myself again. Now, I have bee thking that
perhaps, as they don’t want you here at pret, you might be let
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to go along with me’
If anything, short of beg in a different relatio to every one
about m, Peggotty excpted, could have given me a se of
pleasure at that time, it would have be this projet of all othrs
Th idea of being again surrounded by th hot faces, shining
we o m; of reg the peacefuln of the sweet Sunday
mrnig, when the be were ringig, the stone droppig in the
water, and th shadowy ships breaking through th mist; of
roamg up and down with little Em’ly, telg her my troubl,
and fidig charm against th in th shels and pebbles o th
beach; made a calm in my heart. It was ruffld next moment, to be
sure, by a doubt of Mis Murdstone’s giving her cot; but eve
that was set at rest soon, for sh cam out to take an eveg grope
in th store-clost while we were yet in conversati, and
Peggotty, wth a boldne that amazed me, broached th topic on
the spot.
‘Th boy wi be idl thre,’ said Miss Murdsto, loking into a
pickle-jar, ‘and idleness is th rot of all evil. But, to be sure, he
would be idl here—or anywhere, in my opi’
Peggotty had an angry anr ready, I could se; but sh
swallowd it for my sake, and reaid silent.
‘Humph!’ said Miss Murdsto, sti keeping her eye on th
pickles; ‘it is of more importance than anythng el—it is of
paramount importance—that my brothr should not be disturbed
or made unmfortable. I suppo I had better say yes.’
I thanked her, withut making any demontration of joy, lest it
should induc her to withdraw her ast. Nor culd I help
thinking this a prudet course, since she looked at me out of th
pickle-jar, with as great an access of sourne as if hr black eye
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had absorbed its contets. Hover, th permission was given,
and was nver retracted; for when the mth was out, Peggotty
and I were ready to depart.
Mr. Barkis came into th house for Peggotty’s boxes. I had
nver known hi to pas the garde-gate before, but on this
occason he cam into the house Ad he gave m a look as he
shouldered the largest box and went out, whic I thought had
meaning in it, if meaning could ever be said to fid its way into Mr.
Barkis’s viage
Peggotty was naturally in low spirits at leaving wat had bee
r h so many years, and whre th tw strong attachments of
hr life—for my mothr and myself—had bee formd. She had
be walkig i the churchyard, too, very early; and s got into
the cart, and sat in it with her handkerchief at her eyes.
So long as she remained in this condition, Mr. Barkis gave no
sign of life whatever. He sat in his usual plac and attitude lke a
great stuffed figure. But when sh began to look about her, and to
speak to me, he nodded h had and grind several times I have
t the least ntion at whom, or what he meant by it.
‘It’s a beautiful day, Mr. Barki!’ I said, as an act of poltess.
‘It ain’t bad,’ said Mr. Barkis, wh geraly qualified hi
spee, and rarely committed himself.
‘Peggotty i quite cfortabl nw, Mr. Barki,’ I remarked, for
his satisfacti
‘Is she, thugh?’ said Mr. Barki
fter refleting about it, with a sagacus air, Mr. Barki eyed
hr, and said:
‘Are you pretty cofortabl?’
Peggotty laughed, and anered in the affirmative.
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‘But realy and truly, you know. Are you?’ growled Mr. Barki,
sdig narer to her on the seat, and nudgig her with his elbo
‘Are you? Realy and truly pretty comfortable? Are you? Eh?’
At each of th inquiries Mr. Barki shuffld nearer to hr, and
gave her anothr nudge; so that at last w wre all croded
together in the left-hand corner of the cart, and I was so squeezed
that I could hardly bear it.
Peggotty calling hs attention to my sufferings, Mr. Barkis gave
a lttle mre room at onc, and got away by degree But I
culd nt help obsrving that he sed to think he had hit upon
a woderful expedient for expresg himf in a neat, agreeable,
and poited manr, withut th inconveience of inventig
conversati. He manfestly chuckled over it for some time. By
and by he turned to Peggotty agai, and repeatig, ‘Are you pretty
cfortabl though?’ bore down upon us as before, until the
breath was nearly edged out of my body. By and by h made
another det upo us with the sam inquiry, and the sam
result. At length, I got up whver I saw him coming, and
standig on the foot-board, pretended to look at the prospet; after
whic I did very wel
He was so polite as to stop at a publ-huse, exprey o our
acunt, and entertai us with broild mutton and ber. Eve
when Peggotty was i the act of drikig, he was sezed with one
of those approac, and alt choked her. But as we drew
nearer to th end of our journey, he had more to do and les time
for galantry; and when we got on Yarmouth pavemt, we were
all to much shake and jolted, I appred, to have any leisure
for anythig els
Mr. Peggotty and Ham waited for us at the old plac They
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receved me and Peggotty in an affectiate manner, and shook
hands with Mr. Barki, who, with his hat on the very back of hi
ad, and a shame-faced leer upo his counteance, and
pervading his very legs, preted but a vacant appearance, I
thought. Thy eac took one of Peggotty’s trunks, and we were
going away, w Mr. Barkis solemnly made a sign to me with hi
forefinger to co under an arcay.
‘I say,’ grod Mr. Barkis, ‘it was al right.’
I looked up into his face, and ansred, with an attempt to be
very profound: ‘Oh!’
‘It didn’t come to a end there,’ said Mr. Barkis, ndding
cfidetially. ‘It was al right.’
Again I answered, ‘Oh!’
‘You kn wh was wi’,’ said my friend. ‘It was Barkis, and
Barkis only.’
I nodded assent.
‘It’s al right,’ said Mr. Barki, shakig hands; ‘I’m a friend of
your’n You made it all right, first. It’s al right.’
In his attempts to be particularly lucd, Mr. Barkis was so
extrey mysterious, that I might have stod lookig in his face
for an hour, and mt asuredly should have got as muc
formati out of it as out of the fac of a clock that had stopped,
but for Peggotty’s callg me away. As we were going along, sh
asked me what he had said; and I told her he had said it was al
right.
‘Like hi ipudence,’ said Peggotty, ‘but I do’t mind that!
Davy dear, wat should you think if I was to thk of being
married?’
‘Why—I suppose you would like me as much th, Peggotty, as
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you do now?’ I returnd, after a littl consideration.
Greatly to th astonishment of th passengers in th stret, as
well as of her relatio going on before, the good sul was obliged
to stop and embrac m on the spot, with many protestations of
her unalterabl lve.
‘Tell me what should you say, darlg?’ she asked again, w
this was over, and we were walkig on.
‘If you were thinkig of beg married—to Mr. Barki,
Peggotty?’
‘Ye,’ said Peggotty.
‘I should think it would be a very good thing. For then you
know, Peggotty, you would always have the horse and cart to
bring you over to see me, and could come for nothing, and be sure
f coming.’
‘The s of the dear!’ crid Peggotty. ‘What I have be
thinking of, this month back! Yes, my preious; and I thk I
should be mre idependet altogether, you se; let al my
workig with a better heart in my own house, than I culd i
anybody e’s n I do’t know what I mght be fit for, now, as a
servant to a stranger. And I shall be always near my pretty’s
resting-plac,’ said Peggotty, musing, ‘and be able to see it w I
like; and wh I lie do to rest, I may be laid not far off from my
darlig girl!’
We nether of us said anything for a lttle whil
‘But I wouldn’t so much as give it anthr thught,’ said
Peggotty, cherily ‘if my Davy was anyways against it—not if I had
be asked in church thirty times thre times over, and was
wearig out the ring in my poket.’
‘Lok at me, Peggotty,’ I replied; ‘and see if I am nt realy glad,
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and don’t truly wish it!’ As indeed I did, with all my heart.
‘Well, my lfe,’ said Peggotty, givig me a squeeze, ‘I have
thought of it nght and day, every way I can, and I hope the right
way; but I’ll thk of it again, and speak to my brothr about it,
and in th meantime we’ll keep it to oursves, Davy, you and me.
Barkis is a god plain creature,’ said Peggotty, ‘and if I tried to do
my duty by him, I thk it wuld be my fault if I wasn’t—if I wasn’t
pretty cofortabl,’ said Peggotty, laughing heartily. This
quotation fro Mr. Barkis was so appropriate, and tickled us both
so much, that we laughd again and again, and were quite in a
pleasant humour wh we came with vi of Mr. Peggotty’s
cttage.
It looked just th same, except that it may, perhaps, have
shrunk a littl in my eye; and Mrs. Gummidge was waiting at th
door as if se had stood there ever sie. Al with was the sam,
down to the seawd in the blue mug in my bedroom. I went into
the out-house to look about me; and the very sam lobsters, crabs,
and crawfish possessed by th same desire to pinch th wrld i
genral, appeared to be in the sam state of coglration in the
same old cornr.
But there was no little Em’ly to be s, s I asked Mr. Peggotty
were she was
‘She’s at shool, sr,’ said Mr. Peggotty, w iping th heat
cequent o the porterage of Peggotty’s box from his forehead;
‘she’l be hom,’ lokig at the Dutch clock, ‘i from twenty
minutes to half-an-hur’s time. We all on us fe th loss of hr,
bles ye!’
Mrs. Gummidge moaned.
‘Cheer up, Mawthr!’ cried Mr. Peggotty.
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‘I fe it more than anybody el,’ said Mrs Gumidge; ‘I’m a
l lrn cretur’, and s used to be a’mt the only thing that
didn’t go contrary with me.’
Mrs. Gummidge, whimpering and shaking her head, applied
hersef to blowing the fire. Mr. Peggotty, lookig round upo us
wile she was so engaged, said in a low voice, wich h shaded
with his hand: ‘The old ’un!’ From this I rightly cjetured that
no improvet had taken plac since my last vit in th state of
Mrs. Gummidge’s spirits.
No, the whole place was, or it should have been, quite as
deghtful a plac as ever; and yet it did not impre m in the
same way. I felt rathr disappoited with it. Perhaps it was
beause lttle Em’ly was nt at home. I knew the way by wh sh
would co, and pretly found mysf strollig alg the path to
meet her.
A figure appeared in th distance before long, and I soo knew
it to be Em’ly, wh was a littl creature still in stature, thugh she
as grown But when she drew narer, and I saw her blue eyes
ookig bluer, and her dipld fac lookig brighter, and her
w self prettir and gayer, a curius feg came over me that
made me preted not to know her, and pass by as if I were lookig
at something a long way off. I have done such a thing since in later
lfe, or I am mistaken.
Little Em’ly didn’t care a bit. She saw m w enough; but
itead of turnig round and callg after m, ran away laughing.
This obliged me to run after her, and s ran so fast that we were
very near the cottage before I caught her.
‘Oh, it’s you, is it?’ said lttle Em’ly.
‘Why, you knew wh it was, Em’ly,’ said I.
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‘And didn’t you know wh it was?’ said Em’ly. I was going to
kiss hr, but she covered her cherry lips with her hands, and said
she wasn’t a baby now, and ran away, laughng more than ever,
ito the house
Sh sd to deght in teasig me, whic was a change in her
I wondered at very muc The tea table was ready, and our little
locker was put out in its old place, but instead of cong to st by
me, she went and bestod her company upo that grumblg
Mrs. Gumdge: and on Mr. Peggotty’s inquirig why, rumpld
her hair al over her fac to hide it, and culd do nthing but
laugh
‘A little pus, it is!’ said Mr. Peggotty, patting her with his great
hand.
‘So sh’ i! so sh’ is!’ cried Ham. ‘Mas’r Davy bor’, so sh’ is!’ and
h sat and chuckld at hr for some time, in a state of mingled
admration and deght, that made his face a burnig red.
Little Em’ly was spoed by them al, in fact; and by n one
re than Mr. Peggotty himf, whom s could have caxed ito
anythng, by only gog and laying her chek against his rough
isker. That was my opinion, at least, wh I saw her do it; and I
held Mr. Peggotty to be thoroughly in the right. But s was s
affectionate and swet-natured, and had such a plasant manr
of being both sly and shy at once, that she captivated me more
than ever.
She was teder-hearted, too; for when, as we sat round the fire
after tea, an allus was made by Mr. Peggotty over hs pipe to
th loss I had sustained, th tears stod in her eye, and she
looked at me so kindly acro th tabl, that I felt quite thankful to
her.
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‘Ah!’ said Mr. Peggotty, takig up her curls, and runnig them
over his hand lke water, ‘here’s another orphan, you see, sr. And
here,’ said Mr. Peggotty, giving Ham a backhanded knock in the
ct, ‘i another of ’e, though he do’t look muc like it.’
‘If I had you for my guardian, Mr. Peggotty,’ said I, shakig my
head, ‘I do’t think I should feel much like it.’
‘Well said, Mas’r Davy bor’!’ cried Ham, in an ecstasy. ‘Horah!
We said! Nor mre you wouldn’t! Hor! Hor!’—Here he returned
Mr. Peggotty’s back-hander, and lttle Em’ly got up and kid Mr.
Peggotty. ‘And ho’s your friend, sir?’ said Mr. Peggotty to me.
‘Steerforth?’ said I.
‘That’s the nam!’ crid Mr. Peggotty, turnig to Ham ‘I
knowd it was something in our way.’
‘You said it was Rudderford,’ observed Ham, laughng.
‘We!’ retorted Mr. Peggotty. ‘Ad ye ster with a rudder, do’t
ye? It ai’t fur off. How is he, sir?’
‘He was very we indeed when I came away, Mr. Peggotty.’
‘Thre’s a friend!’ said Mr. Peggotty, stretcng out his pipe
‘Thre’s a friend, if you talk of friends! Why, Lord love my hart
alve, if it ai’t a treat to look at him!’
‘He is very handsome, is he not?’ said I, my heart warmg with
this praise.
‘Handsome!’ cried Mr. Peggotty. ‘He stands up to you lke—like
a—wy I don’t kn what he do’t stand up to you like He’s s
bold!’
‘Ye! That’s just his character,’ said I. ‘He’s as brave as a lion,
and you can’t think how frank he i, Mr. Peggotty.’
‘And I do suppose, now,’ said Mr. Peggotty, looking at me
through the soke of his pipe, ‘that in the way of bok-larng
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h’d take the wid out of a’most anythg.’
‘Yes,’ said I, delghted; ‘he kns everythg. He is
astonishingly clever.’
‘There’s a friend!’ murmured Mr. Peggotty, with a grave toss of
his head.
‘Nothing se to cot him any trouble,’ said I. ‘He knows a
task if he only looks at it. He is th best cricketer you ever saw. He
ll give you almost as many men as you lke at draughts, and beat
you easy.’
Mr. Peggotty gave his head another toss, as muc as to say: ‘Of
course he wi’
‘He is such a speaker,’ I pursued, ‘that he can win anybody
over; and I don’t know wat you’d say if you were to hear hi
g, Mr. Peggotty.’
Mr. Peggotty gave his head another toss, as muc as to say: ‘I
have no doubt of it.’
‘Thn, he’s such a gerous, fi, noble fellow,’ said I, quite
carrid away by my favourite th, ‘that it’s hardly possible to
give him as much praise as h deserve. I am sure I can never fe
thankful eough for the genrosity with whic he has protected
m, so muc younger and lwer in the school than himf.’
I was rung on, very fast inded, wen my eyes reted on
lttle Em’ly’s fac, whh was bet forward over the table, litenig
wth the deepest atteti, her breath held, her blue eyes
sparkling like je, and th colour mantlng in her cheks. She
looked so extraordinarily earnt and pretty, that I stopped in a
srt of woder; and they al obsrved her at the sam ti, for as I
stopped, they laughed and looked at her.
‘Em’ly is like me,’ said Peggotty, ‘and would like to see him.’
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Em’ly was confusd by our all observing her, and hung dow
her head, and her fac was covered with blushes. Glang up
pretly through her stray curls, and seg that we were al
ookig at her sti (I am sure I, for one, could have looked at her
for hours), she ran away, and kept away ti it was nearly bedtime.
I lay do in the old lttle bed i the stern of the boat, and the
wnd came moang on across th flat as it had done before. But I
culd nt help fancying, nw, that it moaned of those who were
gone; and itead of thinkig that the sea might ris in the night
and float the boat away, I thought of the sa that had ris, s I
last hard th sounds, and drod my happy ho I rellect,
as the wind and water began to sound faiter in my ears, putting a
short claus ito my prayers, petitioning that I might grow up to
marry littl Em’ly, and so dropping lovingly asleep.
Th days passed pretty much as thy had passed before,
except—it was a great exception—that littl Em’ly and I seldo
andered on the beach n She had tasks to learn, and needlwrk to do; and was absent during a great part of each day. But I
felt that we should nt have had those old wanderings, even if it
had be othrwise. Wid and full of childish whs as Em’ly was,
se was more of a little woan than I had supposed. She sed
to have got a great ditan away from me, i little more than a
year. She liked me, but she laughd at me, and tormted me; and
when I went to meet her, stole home another way, and was
laughng at th door wh I came back, disappoited. Th best
tim were when sh sat quietly at work in the doorway, and I sat
on the wooden step at her feet, readig to her. It seems to me, at
this hur, that I have never see such sunlight as on th bright
April afternoons; that I have never s suc a sunny lttle figure
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as I used to se, stting in the doorway of the old boat; that I have
never bed such sky, such water, such glrified ships saig
away into gode air.
On the very first eveg after our arrival, Mr. Barki appeared
in an exceedigly vacant and awkward condition, and with a
bundl of oranges tied up in a handkerchef. As he made no
allusion of any kind to this property, h was supposd to have left
it behd hm by accident wh he went away; until Ham, running
after hm to restore it, came back with th information that it was
tended for Peggotty. After that occasn he appeared every
eveg at exactly the sam hour, and alays with a little bundl,
to wich h never alluded, and which he regularly put bend th
door and left there. The offerigs of affecti were of a mot
varius and eccentric desription. Amg th I remember a
double set of pigs’ trotters, a huge pin-cus, half a bushe or so
of appl, a pair of jet earrings, some Spanish oions, a box of
dominoe, a canary bird and cage, and a leg of pickled pork.
Mr. Barkis’s wng, as I reber it, was altogethr of a
peculiar kid. He very seldom said anythng; but wuld sit by th
fire in much th same attitude as h sat i his cart, and stare
heaviy at Peggotty, who was oppote One nght, beg, as I
suppose, inspired by love, he made a dart at th bit of wax-candle
she kept for her thread, and put it in his waistcat-pocket and
carried it off. After that, his great deght was to produce it when it
was wanted, sticking to th lining of his pocket, i a partially
melted state, and pocket it again wh it was done wth. He
eemed to enjoy himf very muc, and not to feel at al caled
upon to talk. Eve when he took Peggotty out for a walk o the
flats, he had no unasine on that had, I belve; conteting
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hmself with now and th asking her if she was pretty
comfortable; and I remember that sometimes, after h was go,
Peggotty would throw her apron over her fac, and laugh for halfan-hour. Inded, we were al mre or le amused, excpt that
miserabl Mrs. Gummidge, wh courtsip would appear to have
bee of an exactly parallel nature, she was so continualy
reded by the tranacti of the old one.
At length, wh th term of my visit was nearly expired, it was
given out that Peggotty and Mr. Barki were going to make a day’s
holiday together, and that little Em’ly and I were to acpany
them I had but a broke slp the night before, in anticpation of
the pleasure of a whole day with Em’ly. We were al astir beti
the morning; and whil we were yet at breakfast, Mr. Barki
appeared i th distance, driving a chaise-cart toards th object
of his affections.
Peggotty was dred as usual, in her nat and quiet mournig;
but Mr. Barkis bld in a ne blue coat, of which th tair had
given him suc good measure, that the cuffs would have rendered
glve unnecessary in th coldest weathr, wile th coar was so
hgh that it pushed his hair up on ed o th top of h had. Hi
bright buttons, to, were of th larget size. Rendered complete by
drab pantaloon and a buff waitcoat, I thought Mr. Barki a
phenomon of respectabity.
When we were al i a bustl outsde the door, I found that Mr.
Peggotty was prepared with an old shoe, whic was to be thrown
after us for luck, and whic he offered to Mrs. Gumdge for that
purpo
‘No It had better be done by smebody e, Dan’l,’ said Mrs
Gummidge ‘I’m a lone lorn cretur’ myself, and everythnk that
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reminds me of cretur’s that ain’t lone and lorn, go contrary
wth me.’
‘Come, old gal!’ cried Mr. Peggotty. ‘Take and heave it.’
‘No, Dan’l,’ returnd Mrs. Gumidge, whpering and shaking
hr head. ‘If I felt less, I could do more You don’t fe like me,
Dan’l; thinks do’t go cotrary with you, nor you with them; you
had better do it yourself.’
But here Peggotty, who had be going about from one to
another in a hurried way, kig everybody, caled out from the
cart, in which we all were by this time (Em’ly and I o tw littl
chairs, side by side), that Mrs. Gummidge must do it. So Mrs
Gummidge did it; and, I am sorry to relate, cast a damp upo th
festive character of our departure, by immediatey bursting ito
tears, and snkig subdued ito the arm of Ham, with the
declaration that she knd she was a burde, and had better be
carrid to th Hous at once. Which I really thught was a sensible
idea, that Ham mght have acted on.
ay we went, however, on our holiday excursi; and the first
thing w did was to stop at a church, whre Mr. Barki tid th
horse to so rai, and went in with Peggotty, lavig lttle Em’ly
and me alon in th chaise I tok that occasi to put my arm
round Em’ly’s waist, and propo that as I was going away so very
soo now, we should determ to be very affectionate to o
another, and very happy, al day. Little Em’ly cnseting, and
alwing me to ki her, I beam deperate; iformig her, I
rellect, that I never could love anthr, and that I was prepared
to shed the blood of anybody who should aspire to her affecti
How mrry lttle Em’ly made hersef about it! With what a
demure assumpti of beig immeny older and wir than I,
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th fairy littl woman said I was ‘a silly boy’; and th laughd so
charmingly that I forgot th pain of beg called by that
disparagig name, in th plasure of looking at her.
Mr. Barkis and Peggotty were a god while in th church, but
cam out at last, and then we drove away into the cuntry. As we
were going along, Mr. Barki turned to m, and said, with a
wink,—by the by, I should hardly have thought, before, that he
could wink:
‘What name was it as I wrote up in the cart?’
‘Cara Peggotty,’ I anred.
‘What name would it be as I should write up now, if thre was a
tilt here?’
‘Cara Peggotty, agai?’ I suggested.
‘Cara Peggotty Barki !’ he returned, and burst ito a roar of
laughter that shook the chai
In a word, they were married, and had gone into the church for
n other purpose Peggotty was resved that it should be quietly
do; and the clerk had give her away, and there had been n
tnsses of th ceremony. She was a littl confusd w Mr.
Barkis made this abrupt announcement of thr union, and could
not hug me enugh in token of her unimpaired affection; but she
soo became hersf again, and said she was very glad it was over.
We drove to a little in in a by-road, where we wre expeted,
and where we had a very cofortable dier, and pasd the day
with great satisfactio If Peggotty had be married every day for
the last te years, she could hardly have been more at her eas
about it; it made no sort of difference in her: she was just th same
as ever, and went out for a stroll with littl Em’ly and me before
tea, while Mr. Barkis philosphicaly smoked hi pipe, and ejoyed
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hmself, I suppose, wth th conteplation of hi happiness. If so,
it sharpened h appetite; for I distinctly call to mid that,
although he had eaten a good deal of pork and greens at dinner,
and had finised off with a fowl or two, he was obliged to have cold
boiled bacon for tea, and disposed of a large quantity withut any
emoti
I have often thought, sie, what an odd, int, out-of-theway kind of wedding it must have be! We got into th chaise
agai soon after dark, and drove cy back, lookig up at the
stars, and talkig about th. I was thr chief exponent, and
oped Mr. Barki’s mnd to an amazig extent. I told him al I
knew, but he would have beeved anything I might have taken it
ito my head to ipart to him; for he had a profound veneratio
for my abiities, and informd his wife in my harig, o that very
occasi, that I was ‘a young Roeus’—by which I thk h meant
prodigy.
When w had exhausted the subject of the stars, or rather when
I had exhausted th mental faculties of Mr. Barkis, littl Em’ly and
I made a cloak of an old wrapper, and sat under it for th rest of
the journey. Ah, how I loved her! What happi (I thought) if we
were married, and were going away anywhere to live among the
tree and i the fieds, nver growing older, never growing wisr,
childre ever, ramblng hand in hand through sunshi and
among flowery meadows, laying down our heads o m at night,
i a sweet sleep of purity and peace, and buried by the birds when
w were dead! Some such picture, with no real wrld in it, bright
with the light of our innce, and vague as the stars afar off, was
my md al the way. I am glad to think there were two suc
guil hearts at Peggotty’s marriage as little Em’ly’s and mi I
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am glad to thk th Loves and Graces tok such airy forms in its
homely proceson.
We, we cam to the old boat agai in good tim at night; and
there Mr. and Mrs. Barki bade us good-bye, and drove away
sugly to their own home I felt then, for the first tim, that I had
lt Peggotty. I should have gone to bed with a sore heart inded
under any other roof but that whic shtered little Em’ly’s head.
Mr. Peggotty and Ham kn what was in my thoughts as well
as I did, and were ready with some supper and thr hspitable
faces to drive it away. Littl Em’ly came and sat besde me o th
ker for the only tim in all that vist; and it was altogether a
wderful close to a woderful day.
It was a nght tide; and soon after we went to bed, Mr. Peggotty
and Ham went out to fish. I felt very brave at beig left alon i
th solitary house, th protetor of Em’ly and Mrs. Gummidge,
and only wished that a lion or a serpet, or any ill-disposed
mter, would make an attack upon us, that I might detroy him,
and cover myself with glry. But as nothing of th sort happened
to be walkig about on Yarmouth flats that nght, I provided the
bet substitute I could by dreamg of dragons until mrnig.
With mrnig cam Peggotty; who cald to me, as usual, under
my wido as if Mr. Barkis the carrier had been fro first to last a
dream too. After breakfast she took m to her own home, and a
beautiful littl home it was. Of all th moveables in it, I must have
be impressed by a certain od bureau of some dark wd in th
parlour (the til-floored kitchen was the general stting-room),
with a retreating top whic oped, lt down, and beam a dek,
wthin wich was a large quarto edition of Foxe’s Bok of Martyrs.
This precious volume, of which I do not ret o wrd, I
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immediatey discovered and immediatey applied myself to; and I
never visited th house afterwards, but I kneeled o a chair,
opened the casket where th ge was enrid, spread my arm
ver th desk, and fell to devouring th bok afresh. I was chiefly
edified, I am afraid, by th picture, wich wre numerous, and
repreted al kinds of dial horrors; but the Martyrs and
Peggotty’s house have been inparable in my mid ever si,
and are now
I took leave of Mr. Peggotty, and Ham, and Mrs. Gumdge,
and little Em’ly, that day; and pasd the nght at Peggotty’s, i a
lttle room in the roof (with the Crocodie Book on a shf by the
bed’s head) which was to be always mine, Peggotty said, and
should alays be kept for me in exactly the same state.
‘Young or old, Davy dear, as log as I am alve and have this
use over my head,’ said Peggotty, ‘you shall fid it as if I
expeted you here diretly miute. I sal keep it every day, as I
used to kep your old little room, my darlig; and if you was to go
to Ca, you mght think of it as beg kept just the sam, al the
time you were away.’
I felt th truth and constancy of my dear old nurs, with all my
hart, and thanked her as we as I could. That was not very wll,
for she spoke to me thus, with her arm round my neck, in th
rnig, and I was going home in the mornig, and I went home
the morning, with hersef and Mr. Barki i the cart. They lft
m at the gate, not easy or lightly; and it was a strange sght to
m to se the cart go on, takig Peggotty away, and leavig m
under the old el-trees lookig at the house, in wh there was
no face to look on mine with love or liking any more
And now I fell into a state of neglt, which I cannt look back
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upo withut compassion. I fell at oce into a soltary codition,—
apart fro all friendly notice, apart fro th society of all othr
boys of my own age, apart fro all companionship but my ow
spiritless thughts,—which see to cast its gl upo this
paper as I write
What would I have give, to have be set to th hardet
shool that ever was kept!—to have been taught sthing,
anyhow, anywhere! No suc hope dawed upo m They diked
m; and they suly, sterny, steadiy, overlooked me. I thk Mr.
Murdsto’s means were straited at about this time; but it is
lttle to the purpose He could nt bear me; and in putting me from
hi he tried, as I beve, to put away the ntion that I had any
claim upo him—and succeeded.
I was nt actively il-used. I was not beate, or starved; but the
wrong that was do to me had n interval of reltig, and was
done in a systeatic, passions manr. Day after day, wk
after wek, month after month, I was codly neglted. I wnder
sometimes, w I thk of it, what thy would have done if I had
be take with an il; whthr I shuld have lai do in my
lonely ro, and languished through it in my usual soltary way,
or whether anybody would have helped me out.
Whe Mr. and Miss Murdsto were at ho, I tok my meals
th them; in their abse, I ate and drank by mysf. At al ti
I lounged about the house and neghbourhood quite diregarded,
except that thy were jealous of my making any friends: thking,
perhaps, that if I did, I might complain to someo For this
reason, though Mr. Chlip often asked m to go and s hi (he
was a widowr, having, some years before that, lost a littl small
light-haired wife, wh I can just remember conting i my
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own thoughts with a pal tortois-shel cat), it was but sdo that
I enjoyed the happi of pasg an afternoon in hi coset of a
surgery; readig so book that was new to m, with the s of
the whole Pharmacpoeia cg up my n, or poundig
something in a mortar under his mild direction
For th same reason, added no doubt to th old diike of hr, I
was seldom allowd to visit Peggotty. Faithful to her pro, she
either cam to see m, or met m soere near, on every
wk, and never epty-handed; but many and bitter were th
disappoitmts I had, in beg refused permission to pay a visit
to her at her house So few tim, however, at log interval, I
was allwed to go there; and then I found out that Mr. Barki was
thing of a mr, or as Peggotty dutifully expred it, was ‘a
littl near’, and kept a heap of money in a box under his bed,
wich he preteded was only ful of coats and trousers. In this
coffer, his riche hid thlve with such a tenacious modesty,
that th smallest instalments could only be tempted out by artifice;
s that Peggotty had to prepare a log and elaborate sc, a
very Gunpowder Plot, for every Saturday’s expe
l this time I was so conscius of th waste of any proise I
had given, and of my beg utterly negleted, that I should have
been perfectly mirable, I have n doubt, but for the old books
They were my only cfort; and I was as true to them as they
wre to me, and read th over and over I don’t know ho many
times more
I now approach a perid of my life, which I can nver lose th
remembran of, while I remember anythng: and th rellection
of whic has often, without my invocation, c before me lke a
ghost, and haunted happir tim
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I had been out, one day, loterig soere, in the ltl,
mditative manr that my way of life engendered, when, turning
the crner of a lan nar our house, I cam upon Mr. Murdstone
walkig with a gentlan. I was cfused, and was going by them,
w th gentleman cried:
‘What! Brooks!’
‘No, sir, David Copperfield,’ I said.
‘Don’t te me. You are Broks,’ said the getlan ‘You are
Broks of Sheffield. That’s your name.’
At th words, I observed th gentleman more attentivey. Hi
laugh comng to my remembrance to, I kn him to be Mr.
Qui, whom I had gon over to Lowestoft with Mr. Murdstone
to se, before—it is no matter—I ned not recall when
‘And how do you get on, and where are you beg educated,
Broks?’ said Mr. Quiion.
He had put his hand upo my shoulder, and turned me about,
to walk with them I did nt know what to reply, and gland
dubiously at Mr. Murdstone
‘He is at home at prest,’ said the latter. ‘He is nt beg
educated anywre I do’t kn what to do with hi He is a
difficult subjet.’
That old, double look was on me for a moment; and th h
eyes darkeed with a frown, as it turned, i its avers,
elsere.
‘Humph!’ said Mr. Quin, lookig at us both, I thought. ‘Fi
weather!’
Silence ensued, and I was cosiderig ho I could best
digage my shoulder from his hand, and go away, when he said:
‘I suppose you are a pretty sharp fellow still? Eh, Broks?’
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‘Aye! He is sharp enugh,’ said Mr. Murdsto, impatitly.
‘You had better let him go. He will not thank you for troublg
hi’
On this hint, Mr. Quinion released me, and I made th best of
my way home Lookig back as I turned into the front garde, I
saw Mr. Murdstone lang agait the wicket of the churchyard,
and Mr. Qui talkig to him They were both lookig after me,
and I felt that they were speakig of m
Mr. Qui lay at our house that night. After breakfast, the
nxt mornig, I had put my chair away, and was going out of the
room, when Mr. Murdstone calld m back. He then gravey
repaired to anthr tabl, whre his sister sat hrsf at hr desk.
Mr. Quinion, with his hands in his pockets, stod lookig out of
wndow; and I stod looking at th all.
‘David,’ said Mr. Murdsto, ‘to th young this is a world for
acti; not for moping and drog in.’
—‘As you do,’ added his sister.
‘Jane Murdsto, leave it to me, if you plase. I say, David, to
the young this is a world for action, and not for mpig and
droing in. It is especally so for a young boy of your disposition,
whic require a great deal of correctig; and to whic n greater
srvic can be do than to force it to coform to the ways of the
wrking world, and to bend it and break it.’
‘For stubbornness wn’t do here,’ said his sister ‘What it wants
is, to be crusd. And crusd it must be. Shall be, to!’
He gave her a look, half i remtran, half in approval, and
went on:
‘I suppose you know, David, that I am not rich. At any rate, you
know it now You have received some coiderable education
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already. Education is costly; and eve if it were not, and I could
afford it, I am of opiion that it would not be at all advantageus to
you to be kept at school. What is before you, is a fight with the
world; and the sooner you begin it, the better.’
I think it occurred to me that I had already begun it, in my poor
way: but it occurs to me nw, whether or no
‘You have heard the “countig-house” metid stim,’
said Mr. Murdstone
‘Th counting-huse, sir?’ I repeated. ‘Of Murdsto and
Grinby, in th wi trade,’ he replied.
I suppose I looked uncertain, for he went on hastily:
‘You have heard the “countig-house” metid, or the
business, or th cellars, or th wharf, or something about it.’
‘I think I have heard th business mentioned, sir,’ I said,
reberig what I vaguely knew of his and his ster’s
resources. ‘But I don’t know wh’
‘It do not matter when,’ he returned. ‘Mr. Qui manages
that business.’
I gland at the latter deferentialy as he stood lookig out of
window.
‘Mr. Quinion suggests that it gives emplyment to some othr
boys, and that he se n reas why it shouldn’t, on the sam
terms, give employmet to you.’
‘He having,’ Mr. Quinion observed in a low voice, and half
turning round, ‘no othr prospect, Murdsto’
Mr. Murdstone, with an impatiet, eve an angry gesture,
resumed, withut noticing what he had said:
‘Those terms are, that you wil earn enough for yoursef to
provide for your eatig and drikig, and poket-money. Your
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lodging (wich I have arranged for) will be paid by me. So w
your washing—’
‘—Which wi be kept dow to my estiate,’ said his sister.
‘Your clothes wil be looked after for you, too,’ said Mr.
Murdstone; ‘as you wil nt be abl, yet aw, to get them for
yoursf. So you are now going to Londo, David, with Mr.
Quinion, to begin th world on your own account.’
‘In short, you are provided for,’ observed hi sister; ‘and wi
please to do your duty.’
Though I quite understood that the purpose of this
announcement was to get rid of me, I have no distict
remembran whthr it pleased or frighted me. My impression
is, that I was in a state of confusion about it, and, oatig
betwee the two pots, touched nther. Nor had I muc tim for
the claring of my thoughts, as Mr. Qui was to go upo the
mrrow.
Bed me, on th morro, in a much-wrn littl white hat,
wth a black crape round it for my mothr, a black jacket, and a
pair of hard, stiff corduroy trousers—which Miss Murdsto
dered the bet armur for the legs in that fight with the world
wich was now to come off. behd me so attired, and wth my
littl wrldly all before me in a small trunk, sitting, a lone lorn
child (as Mrs. Gumidge might have said), in th post-cai that
was carrying Mr. Quiion to th London coac at Yarmuth! See,
how our house and church are lenig in the ditan; how the
grave beath the tree is blotted out by interveng objects; how
th spire poits upwards fro my old playground no more, and
th sky is empty!
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Chapter 11
I BEGIN LIFE ON MY OWN ACCOUNT, AND
DON’T LIKE IT
I
know enough of the world now, to have alt lot the
capacity of beg much surprid by anythng; but it is matter
of some surprise to me, eve now, that I can have be so
easily thro away at such an age A chid of excellent abiities,
and with strong powrs of observation, quick, eager, delicate, and
soo hurt bodily or mentally, it sees wonderful to me that
nobody should have made any sign in my behalf. But none was
made; and I became, at ten years old, a littl labouring hind in th
rvice of Murdsto and Griby.
Murdsto and Grinby’s wareuse was at th waterside. It was
dow in Blackfriars. Modern improvets have altered th
plac; but it was th last house at th bottom of a narro stret,
curving down hil to the river, with so stairs at the end, where
peopl took boat. It was a crazy old house with a wharf of its own,
abutting o the water when the tide was i, and on the mud when
the tide was out, and lterally overrun with rats. Its pand
ros, discoloured with th dirt and smoke of a hundred years, I
dare say; its decaying flrs and staircase; th squeaking and
sufflig of the old grey rats down in the cars; and the dirt and
rotten of the plac; are things, not of many years ago, in my
mnd, but of the pret intant. They are al before me, just as
they were in the evi hour when I wt amg them for the first
tim, with my tremblig hand in Mr. Qui’s
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Murdsto and Grinby’s trade was among a god many kinds of
people, but an important branch of it was th supply of ws and
spirits to certain packet ships. I forget now whre thy chiefly
went, but I think there were so among them that made voyages
both to the East and Wet Indi I know that a great many epty
bottle were one of the consequen of this traffic, and that
crtai m and boys were employed to exame them agait th
ght, and reject those that were flawd, and to rinse and was
them. When the empty bottl ran short, there were labe to be
pasted o full one, or crks to be fitted to them, or seal to be put
upo th corks, or finished bottl to be packed in casks. All th
rk was my work, and of the boys emplyed upo it I was one.
There were three or four of us, cunting m My workig plac
as etablished in a cornr of th wareuse, whre Mr. Quinion
uld see m, when he chose to stand up on the bottom rai of his
tool i the counting-house, and look at me through a window
above the dek. Hither, on the first mornig of my s auspiusly
beginnig lfe on my own acunt, the oldet of the regular boys
was sumd to sho me my busine. His name was Mick
Walker, and he wore a ragged apron and a paper cap. He iformed
me that his fathr was a bargean, and walked, in a black velvet
head-dres, i the Lord Mayor’s Show. He al iformed me that
our pripal asate would be another boy whom he itroduced
by the—to me—extraordinary nam of Mealy Potatoes I
discovered, hover, that this youth had not be christed by
that nam, but that it had be betowed upo him i the
warehouse, on acunt of his cplxio, whic was pal or
maly. Mealy’s father was a waterman, who had the additional
distiction of beg a fireman, and was egaged as such at on of
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the large theatres; where so young reati of Mealy’s—I thk
his littl sister—did Imps in th Pantoimes
No words can express th secret agoy of my soul as I sunk ito
this companionship; compared th heforth everyday
assocate with th of my happier chid
hood—not to say with
Sterforth, Traddles, and th rest of th boys; and felt my hope
of growing up to be a learned and ditiguished man, crushed i
y bo The deep rebrane of the see I had, of beg
utterly withut hope now; of th shame I felt in my position; of th
ry it was to my young heart to beve that day by day what I
had learned, and thught, and delighted in, and raid my fany
and my emulation up by, would pass away fro me, littl by littl,
nver to be brought back any more; cant be written As often as
Mick Walker wnt away in th course of that forenoo, I mingled
my tears with the water in whic I was wasg the bottle; and
sobbed as if thre were a flaw in my own breast, and it were in
danger of bursting.
Th counting-huse clock was at half past twve, and thre
as geral preparation for going to dinner, wh Mr. Quiion
tapped at the counting-house window, and bekoned to me to go
in. I wnt in, and found thre a stoutish, middle-aged pers, in a
brown surtout and black tights and shoes, with n more hair upo
is had (wich was a large on, and very shining) than thre is
upon an egg, and with a very extenve fac, whic he turned ful
upo me. His cloths were shabby, but he had an imposing shirtcoar o. He carrid a jaunty sort of a stick, with a large pair of
rusty tassels to it; and a quizzing-glass hung outside his coat,—for
ornamt, I afterwards found, as he very sedom looked through
it, and couldn’t see anythng wh he did.
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‘This,’ said Mr. Quiion, in alus to mysef, ‘is he.’
‘This,’ said th stranger, with a certain condescendig ro in hi
voice, and a certain indescribable air of doig somthing gente,
wich impred me very much, ‘is Master Copperfid. I hope I
see you we, sir?’
I said I was very wll, and hoped he was. I was sufficiently ill at
ease, Heave knows; but it was not in my nature to complain
uc at that ti of my life, so I said I was very we, and hoped
he was
‘I am,’ said the stranger, ‘thank Heaven, quite we. I have
recved a ltter from Mr. Murdstone, in whic he mtins that
he would dere me to recve into an apartmet in the rear of my
huse, wich is at pret unccupid—and is, in short, to be let
as a—in short,’ said th stranger, with a smile and in a burst of
cfide, ‘as a bedroom—the young beginner whom I have no
th pleasure to—’ and th stranger waved hs hand, and settld h
chin in his shirt-coar.
‘This is Mr. Micawber,’ said Mr. Quinion to me.
‘Ahm!’ said the stranger, ‘that is my name.’
‘Mr. Micawber,’ said Mr. Qui, ‘i known to Mr. Murdstone
He takes orders for us on commission, wh he can get any. He
has be written to by Mr. Murdstone, on the subjet of your
lodgings, and he wi receive you as a lodger.’
‘My address,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘is Windsor Terrace, City
Road. I—in short,’ said Mr. Miawber, with the same geteel air,
and in another burst of cofidence—‘I lve there.’
I made hi a bow
‘Under th impresion,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘that your
peregrination in this metropois have not as yet be extensive,
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and that you might have so difficulty i petratig the arcana
of the Modern Babyl in the direti of the City Road,—in
short,’ said Mr. Micawber, in anthr burst of confidece, ‘that you
might lose yourself—I shall be happy to call this eveg, and
ital you in the knowldge of the nearest way.’
I thanked h wth all my heart, for it was friendly in him to
offer to take that troubl
‘At what hour,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘shal I—’
‘At about eight,’ said Mr. Qui
‘At about eight,’ said Mr. Miawber. ‘I beg to wish you god day,
Mr. Quinion. I wi intrude no longer.’
So he put on his hat, and went out with his can under his arm:
very upright, and hummg a tune when he was clar of the
counting-huse
Mr. Qui then formaly engaged me to be as useful as I culd
in th wareuse of Murdsto and Griby, at a salary, I thk, of
six shings a wk. I am not clar whthr it was six or seven. I
am ind to believe, fro my uncertainty on th head, that it
was six at first and seven afterwards. He paid me a wk dow
(from his own pocket, I believe), and I gave Mealy sixpence out of
it to get my trunk carried to Windsr Terrac that night: it beg
to heavy for my strength, small as it was. I paid sixpece more for
my dinner, which was a meat pie and a turn at a neighbouring
pump; and passed th hour which was allowd for that meal, in
walkig about the streets
t the appoted tim in the eveg, Mr. Micawber
reappeared. I washed my hands and face, to do th greater hour
to his gentility, and we walked to our house, as I suppose I must
now call it, togethr; Mr. Micawber impressing th name of
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strets, and th shapes of cornr house upo me, as w wnt
along, that I might find my way back, easy, in the morning.
Arrived at this house in Windsor Terrace (wich I noticed was
shabby like himself, but also, like himself, made all th sho it
could), h preted me to Mrs. Miawber, a thin and faded lady,
nt at all young, who was stting in the parlour (the first floor was
altogether unfurnid, and the blids were kept do to deude
the neghbours), with a baby at her breast. This baby was one of
twin; and I may remark here that I hardly ever, in al my
experice of th family, saw both th twins detached fro Mrs
Miawber at the sam ti. One of them was alays takig
refreshment.
There were two other cdren; Master Miawber, aged about
four, and Mi Miawber, aged about three. The, and a darkcplexioned young woman, with a habit of snorting, who was
rvant to the famy, and informed me, before half an hour had
expired, that she was ‘a Orfling’, and came fro St. Luke’s
workhouse, in the neghbourhood, cplted the establihmet.
My room was at the top of the house, at the back: a close chamber;
stecilled al over with an ornament which my young imagination
repreted as a blue muffin; and very scantily furnd.
‘I nver thught,’ said Mrs. Micawber, when she came up, tw
and all, to show me the apartmet, and sat down to take breath,
‘before I was marrid, wh I lived with papa and mama, that I
should ever find it nary to take a lodger. But Mr. Miawber
beg in difficulties, all considerations of private feg must give
way.’
I said: ‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘Mr. Micawber’s difficulties are almost overwming just at
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pret,’ said Mrs. Miawber; ‘and wthr it is posble to bring
hi through them, I do’t know. Wh I lived at home with papa
and mama, I realy should have hardly understood what the word
meant, in th sen in which I now emply it, but experitia doe
it,—as papa usd to say.’
I cannot satisfy myself whthr she told me that Mr. Miawber
had been an officr in the Marin, or whether I have imagied it.
I only know that I beve to this hour that he WAS i the Marin
onc upo a tim, without knowing why. He was a srt of town
traveller for a number of misclaneus huses, now; but made
lttle or nothing of it, I am afraid.
‘If Mr. Micawber’s creditors wll not give him tim,’ said Mrs.
Miawber, ‘they must take the coequenc; and the sooner they
bring it to an issue th better. Bld cant be obtained fro a
sto, neithr can anythng on account be obtaind at pret (nt
to mention law expenses) fro Mr. Miawber.’
I never can quite understand whthr my precious selfdepedenc cofused Mrs Miawber in referee to my age, or
wether se was so full of the subject that she would have talked
about it to the very twin if there had be nbody el to
communicate with, but this was th strain in which she began, and
s went on acrdigly al the tim I kn her.
Poor Mrs. Miawber! She said she had trid to exert herself,
and s, I have no doubt, she had. The cetre of the street door was
perfetly covered with a great brass-plate, on which was engraved
‘Mrs. Micawber’s Boardig Establishment for Young Ladies’: but I
nver found that any young lady had ever been to school there; or
that any young lady ever cam, or proposed to co; or that the
least preparation was ever made to receive any young lady. Th
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only visitors I ever saw, or hard of, wre creditors. They used to
me at all hours, and some of th were quite ferocious. One
dirty-faced man, I thk h was a boot-maker, usd to edge hif
into th passage as early as seven o’clock in th morng, and cal
up the stairs to Mr. Micawber—‘C! You ain’t out yet, you
kn. Pay us, wi you? Don’t hide, you kn; that’s mean. I
wouldn’t be mean if I was you. Pay us, wil you? You just pay us,
d’ye hear? C!’ Revig n ansr to thes taunts, he would
munt i his wrath to the words ‘swindlrs’ and ‘robbers’; and
thes beg inffectual too, would stim go to the extremty of
crossing th stret, and roaring up at th windows of th second
floor, where he knew Mr. Miawber was At the ti, Mr.
Micawber would be tranported with grief and mortification, eve
to th length (as I was once made aware by a scream fro hs wfe)
of makig mtions at himelf with a razor; but within half-an-hour
afterwards, h wuld polish up hi shos with extraordinary pains,
and go out, hummg a tune with a greater air of gentity than
ver. Mrs. Micawber was quite as elastic. I have knn hr to be
thrown into faiting fits by the kig’s taxes at three o’cock, and to
eat lamb chops, breaded, and drink warm ale (paid for wth tw
tea-spoons that had gone to the pawbroker’s) at four. On one
ccasi, w an exeution had just be put in, coming home
through some chance as early as six o’clock, I saw her lyig (of
curse with a twin) under the grate in a swoon, with her hair al
torn about her fac; but I nver kn her more chrful than s
was, that very sam nght, over a veal cutlet before the kitchen
fire, telling me stories about her papa and mama, and th
pany they used to keep.
In this house, and wth this family, I passed my leisure time. My
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on exclusive breakfast of a penny loaf and a penywrth of milk,
I provided myself. I kept anothr small loaf, and a modicum of
che, on a particular shef of a particular cupboard, to make my
supper o w I came back at night. This made a ho in th six
or seven shillings, I kn wll; and I was out at th wareuse all
day, and had to support myself on that money all th wk. Fro
Monday morng until Saturday night, I had no advic, n
unl, no enuraget, no conation, no assistance, no
support, of any kind, fro anyo, that I can call to mid, as I
hope to go to heave!
I was so young and chidish, and so littl qualified—ho could I
be otherwis?—to undertake the whole carge of my own
existece, that often, in going to Murdsto and Griby’s, of a
morng, I could not resist th stale pastry put out for sale at halfprice at th pastrycoks’ doors, and spet in that th money I
should have kept for my dier. Then, I went without my dinner,
or bought a roll or a se of puddig. I remeber two puddig
shops, betw which I was divided, according to my fiances
One was in a court clos to St. Martin’s Curch—at th back of th
church,—which is now removed altogethr. Th pudding at that
shop was made of currants, and was rathr a speal puddig, but
was dear, twopeyworth nt beg larger than a pennyworth of
mre ordinary puddig. A good shop for the latter was in the
Strand—somre in that part which has be rebuilt si It
was a stout pale pudding, heavy and flabby, and wth great flat
raisins in it, stuck in w at wde distances apart. It came up ht
at about my time every day, and many a day did I dine off it. Whe
I dined regularly and handsomely, I had a saveloy and a peny
laf, or a fourpey plate of red beef from a cook’s shop; or a plate
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of bread and cheese and a glas of beer, from a mrable od
public-huse opposte our plac of business, called th Li, or th
Lion and sothing el that I have forgotten On, I rember
carrying my own bread (whic I had brought from home in the
morng) under my arm, wrapped in a pi of paper, like a book,
and going to a famous alamode beef-huse near Drury Lane, and
ordering a ‘sall plate’ of that deacy to eat with it. What the
waiter thught of such a strange littl appariti cong i all
alon, I don’t kn; but I can se hm now, staring at me as I ate
y dir, and briging up the other waiter to look. I gave hi a
halfpey for himelf, and I wis he hadn’t taken it.
We had half-an-hour, I think, for tea. When I had moy
eough, I used to get half-a-pit of ready-made cffee and a s
f bread and butter. Whe I had none, I usd to look at a venison
shop in Flt Stret; or I have strolled, at such a time, as far as
Covet Garde Market, and stared at the piappl. I was fond of
wanderig about th Adelphi, beaus it was a mysterious plac,
wth those dark arc. I se mysf emergig one evenig from
of the arc, on a little publ-house cose to the river,
wth an ope space before it, whre some coal-havers wre
dancig; to look at whom I sat down upo a beh. I wonder what
they thought of me!
I was such a chid, and so littl, that frequently wh I went into
th bar of a strange public-huse for a glass of ale or porter, to
moiste wat I had had for dir, thy were afraid to give it me. I
reber oe hot evenig I wet into the bar of a publ-house,
and said to th landlord:
‘What is your best—your very best—ale a glass?’ For it was a
special occasion. I don’t kn what. It may have be my
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birthday.
‘Twpence-halfpeny,’ says th landlord, ‘is th price of th
Genui Stunning al’
‘Th,’ says I, producing the mony, ‘just draw me a glass of th
Genuie Stung, if you please, with a god head to it.’
The landlrd looked at m in return over the bar, from head to
fot, wth a strange smile on hi face; and instead of drawing th
ber, looked round th scre and said somethg to his wfe. She
am out from bend it, with her work in her hand, and joind
hm in surveying me. Here we stand, all thre, before me now Th
landlord in his shirt-sleeve, leaning against th bar widoframe; his wife lookig over the little half-door; and I, i s
nfusion, looking up at th fro outsde th partition. Thy
asked me a god many quetis; as, wat my name was, ho old
I was, where I lived, how I was employed, and how I cam there.
To all of which, that I might coit nobody, I invented, I am
afraid, appropriate aners They served me with the ale, though I
suspect it was not th Genui Stunning; and th landlord’s wfe,
opeg the little half-door of the bar, and bedig down, gave m
my money back, and gave me a kiss that was half admring and
half compassionate, but all woany and god, I am sure
I know I do not exaggerate, unsciously and untentionaly,
th scantis of my resources or th difficulties of my life. I know
that if a shing were given me by Mr. Quinion at any time, I spent
it in a dinr or a tea. I kn that I wrked, fro morng unti
night, wth common men and boys, a shabby child. I know that I
lunged about the streets, inuffictly and unsatisfactorily fed. I
know that, but for the mercy of God, I might easy have be, for
any care that was take of m, a little robber or a little vagabod.
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Yet I held some station at Murdsto and Grinby’s to Besides
that Mr. Quinion did what a careless man so occupid, and dealing
with a thing s anomalous, culd, to treat me as one upon a
different footing from the rest, I nver said, to man or boy, how it
was that I cam to be there, or gave the least indiatio of beg
sorry that I was thre That I suffered in secret, and that I suffered
exquisitey, no on ever kne but I. Ho much I suffered, it is, as I
have said already, utterly beyond my power to tel But I kept my
on counl, and I did my wrk. I kn fro th first, that, if I
could not do my work as we as any of th rest, I could not hod
myself above sight and contept. I soo beame at least as
expeditious and as skiful as either of the other boys. Though
perfectly famar with them, my cduct and manner were
differet enough from theirs to place a space between us. They
and the mn generaly spoke of me as ‘the little gent’, or ‘the
young Suffolker.’ A certain man named Gregory, wh was
foreman of the packers, and another namd Tipp, who was the
carman, and wore a red jacket, usd to addres me sometimes as
‘David’: but I thk it was mostly wh we were very confidential,
and when I had made so efforts to entertai them, over our
wrk, wth some results of th old readings; which were fast
perishing out of my remembran Mealy Potato upro oce,
and rebelled agait my being so distiguished; but Mick Walker
sttled him in no tim
My rescue fro this kind of existece I considered quite
pess, and abandoned, as such, altogethr. I am solemnly
convinced that I never for on hour was reciled to it, or was
thrwise than miserably unappy; but I bore it; and eve to
Peggotty, partly for the love of her and partly for sam, never i
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any letter (though many pasd betwee us) reveald the truth.
Mr. Micawber’s difficulties were an additi to th distressed
state of my mind. In my forlrn state I became quite attached to
the famy, and used to walk about, busy with Mrs. Micawber’s
calculations of ways and means, and heavy with th weight of Mr.
Micawber’s debts. On a Saturday night, which was my grand
treat,—partly beause it was a great thing to walk home with six or
seven shings in my pocket, looking into th shops and thinking
wat such a sum would buy, and partly becaus I wnt h
arly,—Mrs. Micawber would make the mot heart-rendig
confidences to me; also on a Sunday morng, w I mixed th
portion of tea or coffe I had bought over-night, in a littl shavingpot, and sat late at my breakfast. It was nothing at all unusual for
Mr. Micawber to sob violetly at the beging of one of thes
Saturday night coversatio, and sig about jack’s delight beg
his lovely Nan, toards th end of it. I have known hm come
h to supper with a fld of tears, and a decaration that
nthing was nw left but a jail; and go to bed makig a calulati
f th expense of putting bo-wndows to th huse, ‘in case
anythng turnd up’, which was his favourite expresion. And Mrs
Micawber was just th same.
A curius equality of friendship, originating, I suppos, in our
respective circumstances, sprung up betw me and th
people, notwithtanding th ludicrous disparity in our years. But I
never allowd myself to be prevailed upo to accept any invitati
to eat and drik with them out of their stock (knwing that they
got on badly with the butcher and baker, and had often not too
muc for themve), until Mrs. Micawber took m into her etire
confidence. This she did on eveing as fos:
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‘Master Copperfield,’ said Mrs. Micawber, ‘I make no stranger
of you, and therefore do not hesitate to say that Mr. Miawber’s
difficulties are coming to a crisis.’
It made me very miserabl to hear it, and I looked at Mrs
Miawber’s red eyes with the utmt sympathy.
‘With th exception of th he of a Dutc che—wich is not
adapted to the wants of a young famy’—said Mrs. Micawber,
‘thre is really not a scrap of anythng in th larder. I was
accustod to speak of th larder wh I lived wth papa and
mama, and I us th wrd almost unnsciusly. What I mean to
xpre is, that there is nothing to eat in the house’
‘Dear me!’ I said, in great concern
I had tw or thre shillings of my wk’s money i my pocket—
fro which I preum that it must have be o a Wednday
night w w hld this conversati—and I hastily producd
them, and with heartfelt emotion begged Mrs. Miawber to acpt
of th as a loan But that lady, kissing me, and making me put
th back in my pocket, replied that she couldn’t think of it.
‘No, my dear Master Copperfield,’ said she, ‘far be it from my
thughts! But you have a discretion beyond your years, and can
render me anothr kind of service, if you wi; and a service I w
thankfully accept of.’
I begged Mrs. Micawber to nam it.
‘I have parted with the plate mysef,’ said Mrs. Miawber. ‘Six
tea, tw salt, and a pair of sugars, I have at different times
borrod money on, in secret, with my own hands. But th twins
are a great tie; and to me, with my rectio, of papa and
mama, the tranacti are very paiful. There are sti a few
trifles that we could part with. Mr. Micawber’s feings would
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never allow him to dipo of them; and Ckett’—thi was the girl
from the workhouse—‘beg of a vulgar mnd, would take paiful
liberties if so much confidence was reposed in her. Master
Cpperfield, if I might ask you—’
I understood Mrs. Miawber now, and begged her to make use
f me to any extent. I began to dispose of th more portable
artic of property that very eveg; and went out on a silar
expedition alt every mornig, before I went to Murdstone and
Grinby’s.
Mr. Micawber had a fe boks o a littl chiffonier, wich h
aled the lbrary; and those wet first. I carried th, one after
another, to a bookstal i the City Road—o part of whic, nar
our house, was alt al bookstal and bird shops then—and
sd them for whatever they would brig. The keeper of th
bokstall, wh lived in a littl house bend it, usd to get tipsy
every night, and to be violetly scded by hi wfe every mrng.
More than onc, when I wet there early, I had audi of hi i
a turn-up bedstead, with a cut in his foread or a black eye,
bearig witns to his excesses over-night (I am afraid h was
quarrelsom in hi drik), and he, with a shaking hand,
edeavouring to find th nedful shillings in on or othr of th
pokets of his clothes, which lay upon the floor, while h wife,
with a baby in her arm and her shoes down at heel, never lft off
rating him. Sometimes he had lost hs money, and th h wuld
ask me to cal again; but his wife had always got some—had taken
is, I dare say, while he was drunk—and secretly completed th
bargai on the stairs, as we went down together. At the
pawnbroker’s shop, too, I began to be very well known. The
principal gentleman wh officiated bend th counter, tok a
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good deal of notic of m; and often got m, I rect, to de a
Latin noun or adjective, or to conjugate a Latin verb, in his ear,
wile he transacted my busss. After all th ocasi Mrs
Micawber made a lttle treat, whic was genrally a supper; and
thre was a peculiar relish in th meals wh I we remember.
At last Mr. Micawber’s difficulties came to a crisis, and he was
arreted early one morng, and carried over to the King’s Ben
Pris i the Borough. He told me, as he went out of the house,
that th God of day had now go dow upo him—and I really
thought his heart was broke and m too. But I heard,
afterwards, that he was se to play a lively game at skittl,
before noon.
On the first Sunday after he was take there, I was to go and
se him, and have dinnr with him. I was to ask my way to such a
place, and just short of that plac I should see suc another place,
and just short of that I should see a yard, which I was to cros, and
keep straight o unti I saw a turnkey. All this I did; and wh at
last I did se a turnkey (poor little fellow that I was!), and thought
h, wh Roderick Random was in a debtors’ pri, thre was a
man there with nothing on him but an old rug, the turnkey sam
before my dimmed eye and my beating heart.
Mr. Micawber was waitig for me within the gate, and we went
up to his room (top story but one), and crid very muc He
solemnly conjured me, I remember, to take warning by his fate;
and to observe that if a man had twty pounds a-year for hi
income, and spent ninete pounds ninete shilings and
sixpence, h would be happy, but that if he spent twty pounds
he would be miserabl After which h borrod a shilling of
m for porter, gave m a written order on Mrs. Micawber for the
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amount, and put away his pocket-handkerchief, and chered up.
We sat before a lttle fire, with two briks put within the rusted
grate, on on each side, to prevet its burning to many coals;
until another debtor, who shared the room with Mr. Micawber,
came in fro th bakehuse with th loin of mutton which was
ur joint-stok repast. Th I was sent up to ‘Captain Hopkins’ in
the room overhead, with Mr. Micawber’s cplts, and I was
is young friend, and would Captain Hopkins lend me a knife and
fork.
aptain Hopkis lent me th knife and fork, wth h
mpliments to Mr. Micawber. Thre was a very dirty lady i h
ttle room, and two wan girls, his daughters, with shock heads of
hair. I thught it was better to borro Captain Hopkin’s knife and
fork, than Captain Hopkis’s cob. Th Captain hif was i
th last extreity of shabbiss, with large whiskers, and an old,
old brown great-coat with no other coat bew it. I saw hi bed
rolled up in a cornr; and what plate and dishe and pots he had,
on a self; and I divind (God knows how) that though the tw
girls wth th shok heads of hair were Captain Hopkins’s
childre, th dirty lady was not marrid to Captain Hopkins. My
timd stati o hi threshold was not occupid more than a
couple of mnutes at most; but I came dow again with all this in
my knowledge, as surely as th knife and fork were in my hand.
There was sothg gipsy-lke and agreeable i the dier,
after all. I tok back Captain Hopkis’s knife and fork early in th
afternoon, and went home to cofort Mrs. Micawber with an
account of my visit. She faited wh she saw m return, and
made a lttle jug of egg-hot afterwards to coole us whil we
talked it over.
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I do’t know how the household furniture cam to be sold for
th family befit, or wh sold it, except that I did not. Sold it was,
hver, and carrid away in a van; except th bed, a fe chairs,
and th kitc tabl With th possessions we eamped, as it
wre, in th tw parlurs of th eptied huse in Widsor
Terrace; Mrs. Micawber, th childre, th Orflg, and myself; and
lved i those rooms nght and day. I have n idea for how log,
thugh it ses to me for a long time. At last Mrs Micawber
resolved to move into th prison, wre Mr. Micawber had now
ured a room to himf. So I took the key of the house to the
landlrd, who was very glad to get it; and the beds were st over
to th King’s Be, except mine, for which a littl ro was hred
outside the wall in the neghbourhood of that Intitutio, very
much to my satisfacti, si th Micawbers and I had beme
too used to one another, in our troubl, to part. The Orfling was
likew accomdated with an inexpensive lodging in th same
nghbourhood. Mine was a quiet back-garret with a slopig roof,
commanding a plasant prospect of a tiberyard; and wh I tok
possession of it, with th reflti that Mr. Micawber’s troubl
ad com to a crisis at last, I thught it quite a paradise
l this time I was working at Murdsto and Griby’s in th
same co way, and with th same co companions, and
with the sam se of unrited degradati as at first. But I
never, happily for me no doubt, made a single acquaintance, or
spoke to any of the many boys whom I saw daiy in going to the
wareuse, in coming fro it, and in proling about th strets at
meal-times. I led th same secretly unappy life; but I led it in th
same lonely, self-reiant manr. Th only changes I am conscious
of are, firstly, that I had grown more shabby, and sendly, that I
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was nw relieved of muc of the weight of Mr. and Mrs.
Micawber’s cares; for some relatives or friends had egaged to
help them at their pret pas, and they lved mre cfortably
in th prison than thy had lived for a long while out of it. I usd to
breakfast with them nw, i virtue of so arranget, of whic
I have forgotten the detai I forget, too, at what hour the gates
were oped in the morning, admtting of my going i; but I know
that I was often up at six o’clock, and that my favourite loungingplace in the interval was old Lodon Bridge, where I was wot to
sit in o of th sto recesses, watcng th people gog by, or to
ook over the balustrade at the sun sg i the water, and
lghting up the golde flame on the top of the Monumt. The
Orflig met me here sotim, to be told s astonig
fictions respectig th wharves and th Tor; of which I can say
n mre than that I hope I beeved them mysf. In the evenig I
used to go back to the pri, and walk up and down the parade
th Mr. Micawber; or play casino with Mrs. Micawber, and har
rem of her papa and mama. Whther Mr. Murdstone
knew were I was, I am unabl to say. I never tod them at
Murdsto and Grinby’s.
Mr. Micawber’s affairs, althugh past thr crisis, wre very
much involved by reas of a certain ‘Ded’, of wich I usd to
ar a great deal, and which I suppose, now, to have bee some
formr composition wth hs creditors, thugh I was so far fro
beg car about it then, that I am coous of having
confounded it with th demoniacal parcts wich are hld
to have, onc upon a tim, obtaid to a great extent in Germany.
At last this doumt appeared to be got out of the way, sohow;
at al events it ceased to be the rok-ahead it had be; and Mrs
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Micawber informd me that ‘her family’ had decided that Mr.
Miawber should apply for his rease under the Insvent Debtors
Act, which would set him fre, she expected, in about six weks.
‘And then,’ said Mr. Miawber, who was present, ‘I have n
doubt I sall, plas Heave, begin to be beforehand with the
wrld, and to live in a perfetly new manr, if—in short, if
anythg turns up.’
By way of going in for anything that might be on the cards, I
call to mid that Mr. Micawber, about this tim, cposed a
petition to the House of Co, prayig for an alteration i the
law of imprisonment for debt. I set dow this remembrance hre,
becaus it is an instance to myself of th manr in which I fitted
my old books to my altered life, and made stories for myself, out of
th strets, and out of men and women; and ho some main poits
in th character I shal unnsciusly develop, I suppose, i
writig my life, were gradually formig all this whil
Thre was a cub in th pri, in which Mr. Miawber, as a
gentleman, was a great authrity. Mr. Micawber had stated hi
dea of this petition to the club, and the club had strongly
approved of the sam. Wherefore Mr. Miawber (who was a
thoroughy good-natured man, and as active a creature about
everythng but his own affairs as ever existed, and never so happy
as when he was busy about sothing that could nver be of any
profit to him) set to work at the petition, invented it, engrossd it
o an immense shet of paper, spread it out on a tabl, and
appoted a tim for all the club, and all within the wall if they
cho, to come up to his ro and sign it.
Whe I heard of this approaching ceremony, I was so anxius to
ee them al c in, one after another, though I knew the greater
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part of them already, and they me, that I got an hour’s leave of
absence fro Murdsto and Griby’s, and etabld myself i a
cornr for that purpo As many of th pricipal members of th
ub as culd be got into the small room without fillg it,
supported Mr. Micawber in front of the petition, whil my old
fried Captai Hopki (who had wased himelf, to do honour to
so solemn an occasion) stationed hif clos to it, to read it to al
who were unacquaited with its cotets. The door was then
thrown ope, and the genral population began to c i, in a
long file: several waitig outside, w o etered, affixed h
signature, and wnt out. To everybody in succession, Captain
Hopkins said: ‘Have you read it?’—‘No.’—‘Would you like to hear
it read?’ If he weakly shod th least disposition to har it,
Captain Hopkis, in a loud sonorous voice, gave him every word of
it. Th Captain wuld have read it twty thusand times, if
twenty thousand peopl would have heard him, one by one I
remember a certain luscious ro he gave to such phrases as ‘Th
people’s repretatives in Parliament assebled,’ ‘Your
petitioners therefore humbly approac your honourable house,’
‘His gracious Majesty’s unfortunate subjets,’ as if th words were
something real i his mouth, and delicious to taste; Mr. Micawber,
manwhil, lteg with a little of an author’s vanity, and
conteplatig (nt severely) th spikes on th opposite wall
I walked to and fro daiy between Southwark and
Blackfriars, and lounged about at meal-times in obscure strets,
the stones of whic may, for anything I know, be worn at this
t by my cdi feet, I woder how many of the peopl
were wantig in the crowd that used to co filg before m in
review agai, to the echo of Captai Hopki’s vo! When my
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thoughts go back, now, to that slow agony of my youth, I wonder
h much of th histories I invented for such people hangs like a
mt of fany over we-rebered facts! When I tread the old
ground, I do nt wonder that I se to se and pity, going on
before me, an innocent romantic boy, making his imagiative
rld out of such strange experices and sordid things!
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Chapter 12
LIKING LIFE ON MY OWN ACCOUNT NO
BETTER, I FORM A GREAT RESOLUTION
I
n due tim, Mr. Micawber’s petition was ripe for hearig; and
that gentleman was ordered to be discharged under th Act,
to my great joy. His creditors were not implacabl; and Mrs
Miawber informed me that even the revegeful boot-maker had
deared in ope court that he bore him no mal, but that when
y was owing to him he lked to be paid. He said he thought it
was human nature
M r Micawber returned to the King’s Bench when his cas was
ver, as some fe were to be settld, and some formalities
bserved, before he could be actually released. Th club received
hi with tranport, and held an harmo metig that eveg in
is hour; while Mrs. Micawber and I had a lamb’s fry i private,
surrounded by th sleeping family.
‘On such an occasi I wi give you, Master Copperfield,’ said
Mrs. Micawber, ‘in a little more flip,’ for w had been havig some
already, ‘th memory of my papa and mama.’
‘Are they dead, ma’am?’ I iquired, after drikig the toast i a
w-glass
‘My mama departed this life,’ said Mrs. Micawber, ‘before Mr.
Micawber’s difficulties comced, or at least before thy beame
presing. My papa lived to bai Mr. Micawber several times, and
then expired, regretted by a numrous circe.’
Mrs. Micawber shook her head, and dropped a pious tear upo
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the twin who happed to be in hand.
I culd hardly hope for a mre favourabl opportunity of
putting a queti in which I had a near interest, I said to Mrs
Micawber:
‘May I ask, ma’am, wat you and Mr. Micawber inted to do,
now that Mr. Micawber is out of his difficultis, and at liberty?
Have you settled yet?’
‘My family,’ said Mrs. Micawber, wh always said th tw
words with an air, though I never could diover who cam under
th denominati, ‘my famly are of opinion that Mr. Miawber
should quit London, and exert his talents i th country. Mr.
Micawber is a man of great talent, Master Copperfield.’
I said I was sure of that.
‘Of great talt,’ repeated Mrs. Micawber. ‘My family are of
opi, that, with a lttle interest, sothing might be do for a
man of his abity in the Custom House. The influene of my famy
beg lal, it i their wis that Mr. Micawber should go down to
Plymouth. They think it indipeable that he should be upo the
spot.’
‘That he may be ready?’ I suggested.
‘Exactly,’ returned Mrs. Miawber. ‘That he may be ready—in
case of anythng turng up.’
‘And do you go to, ma’am?’
The evets of the day, in cbiati with the twin, if not with
th flip, had made Mrs Miawber hysterical, and she shed tears as
she replied:
‘I nver will dert Mr. Micawber. Mr. Micawber may have
concealed his difficulties fro me in th first instance, but h
sangui teper may have led hm to expect that he would
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overcome th. Th pearl neklace and bracelts wich I
inherited fro mama, have be disposed of for les than half
their value; and the set of coral, whic was the weddig gift of my
papa, has bee actually thro away for nothing. But I never wi
dert Mr. Micawber. No!’ crid Mrs. Micawber, mre affected
than before, ‘I never wi do it! It’s of no use askig me!’
I felt quite unmfortabl—as if Mrs. Miawber supposed I had
asked her to do anything of the srt!—and sat lookig at her i
alarm.
‘Mr. Micawber has his faults I do not deny that h is
improvident. I do not deny that he has kept me in th dark as to
is resources and his liabiities both,’ she went on, lookig at th
wal; ‘but I nver wil dert Mr. Micawber!’
Mrs. Micawber having now raised her voice into a perfet
scream, I was so frighted that I ran off to th club-ro, and
disturbed Mr. Micawber in th act of predig at a long tabl, and
ladig the chorus of
Gee up, Dobbi,
Gee ho, Dobbi,
Gee up, Dobbi,
Gee up, and gee ho—o—o!
—with th tidings that Mrs. Miawber was in an alarming state,
upo which he immediatey burst into tears, and came away wth
me wth his waitcat ful of th heads and tails of shrips, of
wich he had be partaking.
‘Emma, my angel!’ cried Mr. Micawber, runing into th ro;
‘what is the matter?’
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‘I never wi desert you, Micawber!’ she exclaimed.
‘My life!’ said Mr. Micawber, taking her in his arms. ‘I am
perfetly aware of it.’
‘He is th parent of my chidre! He is th fathr of my twins!
He is th husband of my affections,’ cried Mrs. Miawber,
struggling; ‘and I ne—ver—will—desert Mr. Micawber!’
Mr. Micawber was so deeply affected by this prof of hr
devotion (as to me, I was diolved i tears), that he hung over her
in a passionate manner, implring her to look up, and to be cal
But the more he asked Mrs. Micawber to look up, the more sh
fixed her eyes on nthing; and the more he asked her to cpose
herself, the mre she wouldn’t. Consequently Mr. Miawber was
oon so overco, that he migld his tears with hers and m;
until he begged me to do him the favour of takig a chair on the
staircase, whil he got her into bed. I would have take my leave
for the night, but he would not hear of my dog that until the
strangers’ be should ring. So I sat at th staircase wido, unti
he cam out with another chair and joined me
‘Ho is Mrs. Miawber now, sir?’ I said.
‘Very low,’ said Mr. Miawber, shaking his head; ‘reaction Ah,
th has been a dreadful day! We stand ale n—everythig is
gone from us!’
Mr. Micawber pred my hand, and groaned, and afterwards
sd tears I was greatly touched, and diappoted too, for I had
expected that we should be quite gay on this happy and longlooked-for occasn. But Mr. and Mrs. Micawber were s used to
thr od difficulties, I thk, that thy felt quite shipwrecked wh
they cam to coder that they were relasd from them A their
easticity was departed, and I never saw th half so wretched as
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on this night; inuc that when the be rang, and Mr.
Miawber walked with me to the lodge, and parted from m there
with a blg, I felt quite afraid to leave him by himf, he was
so profoundly miserabl
But through all th confusion and low of spirits in which
w had be, so unxpectedly to me, involved, I plaiy discerned
that Mr. and Mrs. Miawber and their famy were going away
fro London, and that a parting betw us was near at hand. It
was in my walk home that night, and i the spl hours whic
follwed when I lay i bed, that the thought first occurred to m—
though I do’t know how it cam into my head—w afterwards
shaped itself into a settld resoluti
I had gron to be so accustod to th Micawbers, and had
be so itiate wth th in thr distresses, and was so utterly
friendless withut th, that th prospect of being thro upo
some new shift for a lodging, and going oce more among
unknown peopl, was like beg that mot turned adrift into
my pret life, with such a knledge of it ready made as
experice had given me. All th sensitive fegs it wounded so
cruelly, al th shame and misery it kept alive within my breast,
became more poignant as I thught of this; and I determd that
the life was unendurable.
That thre was no hope of eape fro it, unless th ecape was
my own act, I kn quite we I rarely hard fro Miss
Murdstone, and nver from Mr. Murdstone: but two or three
parcels of made or mnded clothes had c up for m, cognd
to Mr. Quinion, and in each thre was a scrap of paper to th effect
that J. M. trusted D. C. was applying hif to bus, and
devoting himf wholly to his duties—not the least hit of my ever
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beg anythng el than th co drudge ito wich I was fast
sttlig do
Th very next day shod me, while my mid was in th first
agitation of what it had conceived, that Mrs. Micawber had not
spoke of their going away without warrant. They took a lodgig
i the house where I lived, for a week; at the expirati of w
tim they were to start for Plymouth. Mr. Micawber himf cam
down to the counting-house, in the afternoon, to tell Mr. Qui
that he must relinquish me on th day of his departure, and to give
me a hgh character, which I am sure I deserved. And Mr.
Quinion, calling in Tipp th carman, wh was a marrid man, and
had a room to let, quartered me prospetively on him—by our
mutual cot, as he had every reason to think; for I said nthing,
though my resution was now take
I pasd my evegs with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber, during the
remaig term of our resde under the sam roof; and I think
we beam fonder of one another as the tim went on. On the last
Sunday, thy invited me to dinner; and we had a loin of pork and
apple sauce, and a puddig. I had bought a spotted woode horse
over-night as a parting gift to little Wilki Micawber—that was
th boy—and a doll for littl Ema. I had also bestod a shing
on the Orflig, who was about to be dibanded.
We had a very plasant day, thugh we were al in a teder
state about our approachig separati
‘I shall never, Master Copperfield,’ said Mrs Micawber, ‘revert
to th perid wh Mr. Micawber was in difficulties, wthut
thinking of you. Your conduct has alays be of th most delicate
and obliging description. You have never bee a lodger. You have
been a frid.’
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‘My dear,’ said Mr. Micawber; ‘Copperfield,’ for so he had be
accustod to call me, of late, ‘has a hart to fe for th distresse
f his fellow-creatures w thy are bed a cloud, and a head
to plan, and a hand to—i short, a genral abity to dipose of
such availabl property as could be made away with’
I expressed my sense of this comdati, and said I was very
srry we were going to lo one another.
‘My dear young friend,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘I am oder than
you; a man of some experice i life, and—and of some
experice, in short, in difficulties, gerally speaking. At pret,
and until sothing turns up (whic I am, I may say, hourly
expecting), I have nothing to besto but advice. Still my advice i
far worth takig, that—i short, that I have never take it
mysf, and am the’—here Mr. Miawber, who had been beamg
and smiling, all over his head and face, up to th pret moment,
cecked himf and frowned—‘the mirabl wretch you behold.’
‘My dear Micawber!’ urged his wife
‘I say,’ returned Mr. Micawber, quite forgetting himf, and
smilg again, ‘th miserabl wretch you bed. My advice is,
never do tomorro what you can do today. Prorastination is th
thief of tim Coar him!’
‘My poor papa’s maxim,’ Mrs. Micawber observed.
‘My dear,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘your papa was very we in hi
ay, and Heave forbid that I should disparage him. Take him for
all i all, w ne’er shall—i short, make th acquaintance,
probably, of anybody el pog, at his tim of life, the sam
legs for gaiters, and able to read th same description of prit,
wthut spectacles But he applied that maxi to our marriage, my
dear; and that was so far preaturey entered into, in
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cequence, that I nver revered the expee.’ Mr. Miawber
looked aside at Mrs Micawber, and added: ‘Not that I am sorry for
it. Quite th contrary, my love.’ After which, he was grave for a
minute or so.
‘My othr piece of advice, Copperfield,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘you
know. Annual inme twty pounds, annual expediture
ninete ninete and six, result happis. Annual income
twenty pounds, anual expediture twenty pounds ought and sx,
reult miry. The bloss is blghted, the leaf is withered, the god
of day go do upon the dreary scene, and—and in short you
are for ever floored. As I am!’
To make his example the more impresve, Mr. Miawber drank
a glass of punh with an air of great enjoymet and satisfaction,
and whistled th College Hornpipe.
I did not fai to assure him that I would store thes prepts i
my mind, thugh indeed I had no need to do so, for, at th time,
they affected me visbly. Next morning I mt the whole famy at
the cach offic, and saw them, with a delate heart, take their
plac outsde, at the back.
‘Master Copperfield,’ said Mrs. Micawber, ‘God bls you! I
never can forget all that, you kn, and I never would if I could.’
‘Copperfid,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘farewell! Every happi
and prosperity! If, i th progress of revolving years, I could
persuade myself that my blighted destiny had be a warning to
you, I should feel that I had nt occupied another man’s plac in
xistece altogethr in vain. In case of anythng turning up (of
wich I am rathr confidet), I shall be extrey happy if it
should be in my powr to improve your prospects.’
I think, as Mrs. Micawber sat at the back of the coach, with the
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childre, and I stod in th road lookig wistfuly at th, a mist
ceared from her eyes, and se saw what a little creature I realy
was. I thk so, beaus she beckond to me to clib up, with
quite a new and mothrly expression in her fac, and put hr arm
round my neck, and gave me just such a kiss as s mght have
given to her own boy. I had barely tim to get down agai before
th coach started, and I could hardly see th family for th
handkerchifs they waved. It was gone in a miute. The Orflg
and I stood lookig vacantly at eac other in the mddl of the
road, and then shook hands and said good-bye; she going back, I
suppose, to St. Luke’s workhuse, as I wet to begi my weary day
at Murdsto and Grinby’s.
But with n intentin of pasg many mre weary days there
No. I had resolved to run away.—To go, by some means or othr,
down into the country, to the only relation I had i the world, and
tel my story to my aunt, Mis Betsey. I have already observed that
I don’t know ho this desperate idea came into my brain. But,
onc there, it reaid there; and hardeed into a purpose than
whic I have never entertaid a more determid purpose in my
lfe. I am far from sure that I beeved there was anythig hopeful
in it, but my mid was throughly made up that it must be carrid
ito executi
Again, and again, and a hundred times again, since th night
when the thought had first occurred to me and banid sp, I
had gone over that old story of my poor mother’s about my birth,
whic it had be o of my great deghts in the old tim to hear
hr te, and wh I kn by heart. My aunt walked into that
story, and walked out of it, a dread and awful persage; but thre
was one lttle trait i her behaviour whic I liked to dwell on, and
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wich gave me some fait shado of enuraget. I could not
forget how my mother had thought that she felt her touch her
pretty hair with no ungentl hand; and though it might have be
altogether my mother’s fany, and mght have had no foundation
watever in fact, I made a littl picture, out of it, of my terribl
aunt reltig towards the girli beauty that I rected s wel
and loved so much, which softed th wh narrative. It is very
possibl that it had be in my mid a long time, and had
gradualy engedered my determati
As I did not eve know whre Miss Betsy lived, I wrote a long
ltter to Peggotty, and asked her, indetally, if s rembered;
preteding that I had hard of such a lady living at a certain place
I named at random, and had a curisity to know if it were th
am In the curse of that ltter, I told Peggotty that I had a
particular ocasion for half a guina; and that if she could lend me
that sum until I could repay it, I should be very much obliged to
r, and would te her afterwards what I had wanted it for.
Peggotty’s answer soo arrived, and was, as usual, full of
affectionate devoti. She end th half guina (I was afraid
se must have had a world of trouble to get it out of Mr. Barki’s
box), and told me that Mis Betsey lived nar Dover, but whether
at Dover itself, at Hyth, Sandgate, or Foketo, she could not
say. One of our me, however, informig me on my askig him
about thes plac, that they were al cose together, I ded this
ough for my object, and resved to set out at the end of that
week.
Beig a very honet little creature, and unwilg to digrac
the mery I was going to leave bend m at Murdstone and
Grinby’s, I considered myself bound to remain until Saturday
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nght; and, as I had been paid a week’s wage i advane wen I
first cam there, not to pret mysf i the cunting-house at the
usual hour, to receive my stiped. For this expres reason, I had
borrowed the half-guina, that I mght not be without a fund for
my traveg-expe Acrdigly, when the Saturday night
came, and we were all waiting in th wareuse to be paid, and
Tipp th carman, wh always tok predece, went in first to
draw his my, I shook Mick Walker by the hand; asked him,
w it came to his turn to be paid, to say to Mr. Quinion that I
had go to move my box to Tipp’s; and, bidding a last god night
to Mealy Potatoes, ran away.
My box was at my old lodgig, over th water, and I had writte
a directi for it on the back of one of our addres cards that we
naild on th casks: ‘Master David, to be left till called for, at th
ach Office, Dover.’ This I had in my pocket ready to put o th
box, after I should have got it out of the house; and as I went
toards my lodgig, I looked about me for someo wh would
help me to carry it to the bookig-offic
There was a log-legged young man with a very little epty
donkey-cart, standing near th Obelisk, in th Blackfriars Road,
whose eye I caught as I was going by, and who, addresg m as
‘Sixpe’orth of bad ha’pe,’ hoped ‘I should know him agi to
sar to’—i alus, I have no doubt, to my starig at hi I
stopped to assure hm that I had not done so in bad manrs, but
uncrtai whether he might or might not like a job.
‘Wot job?’ said the log-legged young man
‘To move a box,’ I answered.
‘Wot box?’ said the log-legged young man
I told hi mine, which was dow that stret thre, and wich I
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wanted him to take to the Dover coach offic for sixpe
‘Done with you for a tanner!’ said the log-legged young man,
and directly got upo his cart, which was nothing but a large
de tray o ws, and rattld away at such a rate, that it was
as much as I could do to keep pace with the donkey.
There was a defiant manr about this young man, and
particularly about th way in wich he ched straw as he spoke
to me, that I did not much like; as th bargain was made, hover,
I took him upstairs to the room I was leavig, and we brought the
box dow, and put it on his cart. Now, I was uning to put th
direction-card o thre, lest any of my landlord’s family should
fathom what I was dog, and detain me; s I said to the young
man that I would be glad if he wuld stop for a mnute, w h
am to the dead-wal of the Kig’s Benh prion. The words were
n sooner out of my mouth, than he rattled away as if he, my box,
the cart, and the dokey, wre al equaly mad; and I was quite out
of breath with running and calling after h, w I caught hm at
th place appointed.
Being much flusd and excted, I tumbled my half-guia out
of my pocket in pulling th card out. I put it in my mouth for
safety, and though my hands trembled a good deal, had just tied
th card on very much to my satisfacti, wh I felt myself
violetly chucked under the ch by the log-legged young man,
and saw my half-guina fly out of my mouth into his hand.
‘Wot!’ said th young man, seizing me by my jacket coar, with
a frightful grin. ‘This is a pol case, is it? You’re a-going to bolt,
are you? C to the po, you young warmi, co to the
pollis!’
‘You give me my money back, if you please,’ said I, very much
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frightened; ‘and lave m alone.’
‘Co to th pollis!’ said th young man. ‘You shall prove it
yourn to th pollis.’
‘Give me my box and money, wi you,’ I cried, bursting into
tears
Th young man still replied: ‘C to th polis!’ and was
dragging me againt the dokey in a violet manner, as if there
re any affinity betw that animal and a magistrate, w h
changed his mind, jumped into th cart, sat upo my box, and,
excaimg that he would drive to the po straight, rattled away
harder than ever.
I ran after him as fast as I could, but I had n breath to call out
with, and should nt have dared to cal out, now, if I had. I
narrowly eaped beg run over, twenty tim at last, in half a
mile. Now I lost him, now I saw him, now I lost him, now I was cut
at with a whip, nw shouted at, now down in the mud, now up
again, now rung into somebody’s arms, now running headlong
at a post. At length, confusd by fright and hat, and doubting
whether half London might not by this tim be turning out for my
apprehens, I left the young man to go where he would with my
box and money; and, pantig and crying, but never stopping,
faced about for Grech, wich I had understod was on th
Dover Road: takig very little mre out of the world, towards the
retreat of my aunt, Mis Betsey, than I had brought into it, on the
nght when my arrival gave her so muc umbrage
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Chapter 13
THE SEQUEL OF MY RESOLUTION
F
or anything I know, I may have had so wild idea of
running all th way to Dover, wh I gave up th pursuit
of the young man with the donkey-cart, and started for
Greich. My scattered senses were soo colted as to that
point, if I had; for I came to a stop in th Kent Road, at a terrace
wth a piece of water before it, and a great foish image in th
middle, bling a dry shel. Here I sat dow on a doorstep, quite
spent and exhausted with th efforts I had already made, and wth
hardly breath enough to cry for the lo of my box and half-guina.
It was by this tim dark; I heard the clocks strike ten, as I sat
resting. But it was a sumr night, fortunatey, and fi weathr.
Whe I had revered my breath, and had got rid of a stifling
sensation in my throat, I ro up and went on. In th mdst of my
ditress, I had no ntion of going back. I doubt if I should have had
any, thugh thre had be a Swiss snow-drift in th Kent Road.
But my standing possesd of only thre-halfpen in th wrld
(and I am sure I wonder how they came to be left in my pocket o
a Saturday night!) troubld m no the le beause I went on. I
began to picture to myself, as a srap of newpaper iteigece,
my beig found dead in a day or tw, under some hdge; and I
trudged on mirably, though as fast as I culd, until I happed
to pas a little shop, where it was written up that ladi’ and
gentlemen’s wardrobes wre bought, and that th best price was
given for rags, bo, and kitchen-stuff. The master of this shop
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was sitting at th door in his shirt-sleeve, smokig; and as thre
re a great many coats and pairs of trousers dangling fro th
low ceiling, and only tw feble candles burng iside to sho
at thy were, I fancied that h looked like a man of a revengeful
disposition, w had hung all his enies, and was enjoying
hielf.
My late experie with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber suggested to
m that here might be a mean of kepig off the wolf for a little
e. I wet up the nxt by-street, took off my waitcat, roed it
neatly under my arm, and came back to th shop door.
‘If you please, sir,’ I said, ‘I am to sell this for a fair price.’
Mr. Dollby—Dolloby was the nam over the shop door, at
last—took the waitcoat, stood his pipe on its head, agait the
door-post, went into the shop, followed by m, snuffed the two
candles with his fingers, spread th waistcat on th counter, and
looked at it there, held it up against the lght, and looked at it
there, and ultimately said:
‘What do you call a price, now, for this here littl wekit?’
‘Oh! you kn best, sir,’ I returned modestly.
‘I can’t be buyer and ser to,’ said Mr. Doby. ‘Put a price
o this here littl weskit.’
‘Would eightepence be?’—I hinted, after some hesitation.
Mr. Doby rod it up agai, and gave it me back. ‘I shuld
rob my famy,’ he said, ‘if I was to offer nipence for it.’
This was a disagreabl way of putting th busine; becaus it
imposed upo me, a perfet stranger, th unplasantne of asking
Mr. Dolloby to rob hi famly on my account. My circumstances
beg so very pressing, hover, I said I would take ninepence for
it, if he plasd. Mr. Dooby, nt without s grumblg, gave
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nnepence. I wised him good night, and walked out of the shop
the ricr by that sum, and the poorer by a waitcoat. But when I
buttoned my jacket, that was not muc Inded, I foresaw pretty
carly that my jacket would go next, and that I should have to
make th best of my way to Dover in a shirt and a pair of trousers,
and mght de mysf lucky if I got there eve in that trim But
my mind did not run so much on this as might be suppod.
Beyond a geral impression of th distance before me, and of th
young man with the dokey-cart having used me cruelly, I think I
had no very urgent sen of my difficulties wh I once again set
off with my ninepence in my pocket.
plan had occurred to me for pasg the nght, whic I was
going to carry into exeutio This was, to li bed the wall at
the back of my old shool, in a crner where there used to be a
haystack. I imagid it would be a kind of company to have th
boys, and the bedroom where I used to te the stori, s near me:
although the boys would know nothing of my beg there, and the
bedro would yid me no sheter.
I had had a hard day’s wrk, and was pretty well jaded wh I
came climbing out, at last, upo th level of Blackheath. It cost me
s troubl to find out Sal House; but I found it, and I found a
haystack in th cornr, and I lay dow by it; having first walked
round th wal, and looked up at th wndows, and se that al
as dark and silent with Never shall I forget th lonely
sati of first lyig down, without a roof above my head!
Sleep came upo me as it came o many othr outcasts, against
whom house-doors were loked, and house-dogs barked, that
nght—and I dreamd of lyig on my old shool-bed, talkig to the
boys in my room; and found mysf sitting upright, with
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Sterforth’s name upo my lips, lookig wildly at th stars that
wre glisteg and glimmering above me. Whe I remembered
were I was at that untiy hour, a feelig stole upon m that
made me get up, afraid of I don’t kn what, and walk about. But
the faiter gliring of the stars, and the pal light i the sky
wre th day was coming, reassured me: and my eye being very
havy, I lay dow again and slpt—thugh with a knowledge in my
sleep that it was cold—until th warm beams of th sun, and th
ringig of the getting-up be at Sal House, awoke me If I could
have hoped that Steerforth was there, I would have lurked about
until he cam out ale; but I knew he must have left lg snce.
Traddles still remaind, perhaps, but it was very doubtful; and I
had not suffict cofide in his diretion or good luck,
however strong my relian was on his good nature, to wis to
trust hi with my stuation. So I crept away from the wall as Mr.
Creakl’s boys were getting up, and struck into the log dusty
track whic I had first known to be the Dover Road when I was
one of them, and w I little expeted that any eyes would ever
see me the wayfarer I was no, upo it.
What a different Sunday morning fro th old Sunday morng
at Yarmouth! In due tim I heard the church-be ringig, as I
plodded on; and I met people wh were going to church; and I
passed a church or tw whre th congregati were inside, and
th sound of singig came out into th sunshi, while th beadle
sat and cooled himf in the shade of the porch, or stood beneath
the yew-tree, with hi hand to his forehead, glowerig at me going
by. But th peace and rest of th od Sunday morning wre o
everythig, except m. That was the differee. I felt quite wiked
in my dirt and dust, wth my tangled hair. But for th quiet picture
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I had cjured up, of my mother in her youth and beauty, weepig
by th fire, and my aunt relenting to her, I hardly thk I should
have had the curage to go on until next day. But it always went
before me, and I fod.
I got, that Sunday, through three-and-twenty m o the
straight road, though not very easy, for I was new to that kind of
to. I see mysf, as evenig cl in, cg over the bridge at
Roter, footsore and tired, and eating bread that I had bought
for supper. One or two little house, with the ntic, ‘Lodgings for
Travers’, hangig out, had tempted me; but I was afraid of
spedig the few pee I had, and was even mre afraid of th
vicious looks of th trampers I had met or overtaken. I sought no
ster, therefore, but the sky; and toilg into Chatham,—w,
in that night’s aspect, is a mere dream of chalk, and drawbridges,
and mastles ships i a muddy river, rofed like Noah’s arks,—
crept, at last, upo a sort of gras-grown battery overhangig a
lane, whre a sentry was walkig to and fro Here I lay dow, near
a can; and, happy i th society of th sentry’s fotsteps,
though he knew no more of my beg above hi than the boys at
Salem Hous had know of my lyig by th wal, spt soundly
until mornig.
Very stiff and sore of fot I was in th morng, and quite dazed
by the beatig of drums and marchig of troops, whic sed to
hem m i on every side when I wet do toards the log
narrow street. Feg that I could go but a very little way that day,
if I were to resrve any strength for getting to my journey’s end, I
resolved to make th sale of my jacket its pricipal busines.
Ardigly, I took the jacket off, that I mght learn to do without
it; and carrying it under my arm, began a tour of inspeti of th
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various slop-shops
It was a likely place to sel a jacket in; for th dealers in sendhand cloths were numerous, and were, gerally speaking, o th
ook-out for customers at their shop doors. But as mot of them
had, hangig up among their stock, an officr’s cat or two,
epaulettes and all, I was rendered timid by th costly nature of
their dealgs, and walked about for a log tim without offering
my mercandis to anyo
This mdety of m directed my attentin to the marin-store
shops, and such shops as Mr. Doby’s, in preferece to th
regular dealers At last I found one that I thought looked
proising, at th cornr of a dirty lane, ending in an enclosure ful
f stinging-nttl, against th palings of which some second-hand
saiors’ cothes, that seemed to have overflowed the shop, were
fluttering amg s cts, and rusty guns, and oilki hats, and
certain trays full of so many od rusty keys of so many sizes that
they seemed various enough to open al the doors in the world.
Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was
darked rather than lighted by a lttle window, overhung with
cloths, and was descended ito by some steps, I went with a
palpitatig hart; wich was not relieved wh an ugly old man,
wth th lowr part of his face all covered with a stubbly grey
beard, rushed out of a dirty den behd it, and sezed me by th
hair of my head. He was a dreadful old man to lok at, in a filthy
flann waitcoat, and smling terribly of rum. His bedstead,
cvered with a tumbld and ragged pi of patchwork, was i the
de he had co from, where another little window showed a
prospect of more stiging-nttl, and a lame donkey.
‘Oh, what do you want?’ grid th old man, in a firc,
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monotonous wh ‘Oh, my eye and limbs, what do you want?
Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goro, goro!’
I was so much dismayed by th words, and particularly by th
repetiti of th last unknn on, which was a kind of rattl in
hi throat, that I could make no aner; hereupon the old man,
still hoding me by th hair, repeated:
‘Oh, what do you want? Oh, my eye and limbs, what do you
want? Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goro!’—
whic he srewed out of himf, with an energy that made his
ye start in his head.
‘I wanted to kn,’ I said, tremblg, ‘if you would buy a jacket.’
‘Oh, let’s see the jacket!’ crid the old man ‘Oh, my heart on
fire, show the jacket to us! Oh, my eyes and lbs, brig the jacket
out!’
With that he took his tremblig hands, which were lke the
claws of a great bird, out of my hair; and put on a pair of
spectacles, not at all ornamental to his inflamed eye
‘Oh, ho much for th jacket?’ cried th old man, after
examg it. ‘Oh—goroo!—how muc for the jacket?’
‘Half-a-cro,’ I answered, reverig myself.
‘Oh, my lungs and liver,’ cried th old man, ‘n! Oh, my eye,
no! Oh, my limbs, no! Eightepen Goro!’
Every ti he uttered th ejaculati, his eyes seed to be i
danger of startig out; and every setenc he spoke, he devered
in a sort of tune, alays exactly th same, and more lke a gust of
wnd, which begins low, mounts up high, and fals again, than any
othr comparison I can fid for it.
‘We,’ said I, glad to have closed the bargain, ‘I’l take
eighteenpee.’
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‘Oh, my liver!’ cried th old man, throng th jacket on a shef.
‘Get out of the shop! Oh, my lungs, get out of the shop! Oh, my
eye and libs—goro!—do’t ask for money; make it an
exchange.’ I never was so frightened in my life, before or sine; but
I told hi humbly that I wanted money, and that nothing e was
f any us to me, but that I would wait for it, as he desred,
outside, and had no wish to hurry him. So I went outside, and sat
do in the shade in a crner. And I sat there so many hours, that
th shade became sunlight, and th sunight became shade again,
and still I sat thre waitig for th money.
Thre never was such anthr drunken madman in that li of
bus, I hope. That he was well known i the nghbourhood,
and enjoyed the reputation of having sod hif to the devil, I
soo understod fro th visits he received fro th boys, wh
ntinualy came skirmishig about th shop, shouting that
lgend, and calg to him to brig out his gold. ‘You ain’t poor,
you know, Charly, as you pretend. Bring out your gold. Bring out
s of the gold you sold yoursef to the devil for. C! It’s i the
lg of the mattres, Charly. Rip it open and lt’s have so!’
This, and many offers to lend him a knife for th purpo,
exasperated him to suc a degree, that the whole day was a
succession of rushe on his part, and flights on th part of th
boys. Sometimes in his rage he would take me for on of th,
and come at me, mouthng as if he were going to tear me i pieces;
th, remembering me, just i time, wuld dive ito th shop, and
lie upo his bed, as I thught fro th sound of his voice, yelling
i a frantic way, to his own windy tune, the ‘Death of Neon’; with
an Oh! before every li, and iumrable Goroos interspersed.
if this were not bad enough for me, the boys, ctig me
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with the establhmet, on acunt of the patie and
persverance wth wich I sat outsde, half-dressed, pelted me,
and usd me very ill all day.
He made many attempts to induc m to cnset to an
excange; at one tim cog out with a fisg-rod, at another
wth a fiddle, at anthr wth a cocked hat, at anothr with a flute
But I resisted al th overtures, and sat thre in desperation;
each time asking him, with tears in my eye, for my money or my
jacket. At last h began to pay me in halfpence at a time; and was
full two hours getting by easy stage to a shg.
‘Oh, my eyes and limbs!’ he then crid, peepig hideousy out of
the shop, after a log pause, ‘w you go for twope more?’
‘I can’t,’ I said; ‘I shal be starved.’
‘Oh, my lungs and liver, wi you go for threpece?’
‘I would go for nothing, if I could,’ I said, ‘but I want th money
badly.’
‘Oh, go-ro!’ (it is really imposble to express h h twisted
this ejaculati out of himelf, as he peeped round the door-post at
m, showing nthing but his crafty old head); ‘w you go for
fourpee?’
I was so fait and weary that I closed with this offer; and takig
the moy out of his claw, not without tremblg, went away mre
hungry and thrsty than I had ever been, a lttle before sunet. But
at an expee of threepenc I soon refreshed mysf copltey;
and, being in better spirits th, limped seve miles upo my
road.
My bed at nght was under another haystack, where I rested
cfortably, after havig wased my bltered feet in a stream,
and dred th as we as I was able, with some co leave
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Wh I took the road again nxt mrning, I found that it lay
through a succession of hop-grounds and orchards. It was
sufficiently late in th year for th orchards to be ruddy wth ripe
appl; and i a fe places th hop-pikers were already at work. I
thought it al extremy beautiful, and made up my mnd to slp
among the hops that nght: imagig s crful
companionship i th long perspective of poles, with th graceful
ave twing round them
Th trampers were wors than ever that day, and inspired me
wth a dread that is yet quite fre in my mind. Some of th wre
most ferocious-lkig ruffians, wh stared at me as I went by;
and stopped, perhaps, and cald after me to come back and speak
to th, and wh I tok to my hes, stod me. I rellect o
young fellow—a tinker, I suppose, fro hi walt and brazier—
who had a woman with him, and who facd about and stared at
m thus; and then roared to me in suc a tremdous voic to
c back, that I halted and looked round.
‘Come here, when you’re cald,’ said the tiker, ‘or I’ll rip your
young body open.’
I thought it bet to go back. A I dre nearer to them, trying to
propitiate the tinker by my looks, I obsrved that the woman had a
black eye.
‘Where are you going?’ said the tinker, grippig the bo of
my shirt with his blackend hand.
‘I am gog to Dover,’ I said.
‘Where do you co from?’ asked the tinker, giving his hand
anothr turn in my shirt, to hod me more securely.
‘I come fro Lodo,’ I said.
‘What lay are you upon?’ asked the tinker. ‘Are you a prig?’
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‘N-n,’ I said.
‘A’t you, by G—? If you make a brag of your honety to me,’
said the tiker, ‘I’ll knk your brai out.’
With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me,
and then loked at me from head to foot.
‘Have you got the pri of a pit of ber about you?’ said the
tiker. ‘If you have, out with it, afore I take it away!’
I should crtainly have produced it, but that I met the woman’s
ook, and saw her very slghtly shake her head, and form ‘No!’ with
hr lips.
‘I am very poor,’ I said, attempting to s, ‘and have got n
money.’
‘Why, wat do you mean?’ said th tiker, looking so sterny at
me, that I almost feared he saw th money in my pocket.
‘Sir!’ I stammered.
‘What do you mean,’ said the tinker, ‘by wearig my brother’s
k handkerchief! Give it over here!’ And he had mi off my nek
in a moment, and tossed it to th woman.
The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if sh thought this a
joke, and tossed it back to me, nodded oce, as slightly as before,
and made the word ‘Go!’ with her lips. Before I could obey,
however, the tiker sezed the handkercef out of my hand with a
roughs that thre me away like a feathr, and putting it looy
round his own nk, turned upon the woman with an oath, and
knocked her do I nver shal forget seg her fall backward on
the hard road, and li there with her bot tumbld off, and her
hair al whtened in the dust; nr, when I looked back from a
distance, seng her sitting on th pathay, which was a bank by
the roadsde, wipig the blood from her fac with a corner of her
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shawl, while he went on ahead.
This adventure frighted me so, that, afterwards, w I saw
any of th people coming, I turnd back until I could find a
hidig-plac, where I remaid until they had gone out of sight;
wich happened so often, that I was very seriusly delayed. But
under this difficulty, as under all th othr difficulties of my
journey, I seed to be sustained and led o by my fanciful
picture of my mothr in her youth, before I came into th wrld. It
always kept me company. It was thre, amg th hops, w I lay
dow to sleep; it was with me on my waking in th morning; it
wnt before me all day. I have assocated it, ever since, wth th
sunny stret of Canterbury, dozing as it were in th hot light; and
with the sight of its old house and gateways, and the statey, grey
Cathedral, with the rooks saig round the towers. Wh I cam,
at last, upo th bare, wde dows near Dover, it relieved th
tary aspet of the sc with hope; and not until I reached that
first great ai of my journey, and actualy set foot i the town
itself, on th sixth day of my flight, did it desert me. But th,
strange to say, w I stod with my ragged sho, and my dusty,
sunburnt, half-clothd figure, in th place so long desired, it
seemed to van lke a dream, and to leave me helpl and
dispirited.
I iquired about my aunt among the boatm first, and
received varius answers. On said she lived in th South
Foreland Light, and had singed hr wiskers by doig so; anothr,
that sh was made fast to the great buoy outside the harbour, and
could only be visited at half-tide; a third, that she was locked up in
Maidsto jai for chid-stealing; a fourth, that she was se to
unt a broom in the last high wind, and make direct for Calai
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Th fly-drivers, among w I inquired next, were equaly jo
and equaly direspetful; and the shopkeepers, nt lkig my
appearance, geraly replied, withut hearing what I had to say,
that they had got nothing for me I felt mre mirable and
destitute than I had done at any perid of my rung away. My
money was all go, I had nothing left to dispo of; I was hungry,
thirsty, and worn out; and sed as distant fro my end as if I
had remaied in London.
Th morning had worn away in th inquiries, and I was
ttig on the step of an empty shop at a street corner, near th
arket-plac, deliberating upo wanderig towards those other
plac which had be mentioned, wh a fly-driver, coming by
with his carriage, dropped a horseoth. Sothing good-natured
in th man’s face, as I handed it up, enuraged me to ask him if
he could tell m where Mis Trotwood lived; though I had asked
the question so often, that it almt did upon my lips
‘Trotwood,’ said he. ‘Let me see. I know the nam, too. Old
lady?’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘rathr.’
‘Pretty stiff in the back?’ said he, makig hielf upright.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I should thk it very likey.’
‘Carries a bag?’ said he—‘bag with a good deal of room in it—i
gruffish, and comes dow upo you, sharp?’
My heart sank within me as I acknowledged the undoubted
accuracy of this desription.
‘Why then, I te you what,’ said he. ‘If you go up there,’ poitig
wth his whip toards th heights, ‘and keep right o till you come
to some huses facing th sea, I thk you’l hear of her. My
opinion is she won’t stand anythng, so here’s a penny for you.’
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I accepted th gift thankfully, and bought a loaf wth it.
Dispatcng this refret by th way, I went in th direction
my friend had indicated, and walked on a god distance withut
coming to th huses h had mentiond. At length I saw some
before m; and approacg them, went into a lttle shop (it was
at we usd to call a geral shop, at ho), and inquired if thy
culd have the goodn to tell me where Mis Trotwood lved. I
addred myself to a man bend th counter, w was wighng
s ric for a young woman; but the latter, takig the inquiry to
hersef, turned round quickly.
‘My mistress?’ she said. ‘What do you want with her, boy?’
‘I want,’ I replied, ‘to speak to her, if you please.’
‘To beg of her, you mean,’ retorted the damsel
‘No,’ I said, ‘indeed.’ But suddeny rememberig that in truth I
came for no othr purpo, I hed my peace in confusion, and felt
my face burn
My aunt’s handmaid, as I supposed she was fro wat she had
said, put her ric i a little basket and walked out of the shop;
telling me that I could follow her, if I wanted to kn whre Miss
Trotwd lived. I neded no second permission; thugh I was by
this time in such a state of consternation and agitation, that my
lgs shook under m I followed the young woman, and we soon
cam to a very neat little cottage with chrful bow-windows: in
front of it, a smal square gravelld court or garden ful of flowers,
carefully tended, and smelling deliciously.
‘This is Miss Trotwd’s,’ said th young woan. ‘No you
know; and that’s all I have got to say.’ With whic words s
urrid into th house, as if to shake off th responsibility of my
appearance; and left me standing at th garde-gate, looking
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disconsolatey over th top of it toards th parlur wido,
wre a muslin curtain partly undrawn in th middle, a large
round green sreen or fan fastened on to the widows, a smal
tabl, and a great chair, suggested to me that my aunt mght be at
that moment seated in awful state
My shos were by this time in a woful condition Th soles had
sed themsves bit by bit, and the upper leathers had broken and
burst until the very shape and form of shoes had departed from
th. My hat (wich had served me for a night-cap, to) was so
crusd and bent, that no old battered handleles saucpan o a
dungh ned have bee ashamed to vi with it. My shirt and
trousers, stained with heat, dew, grass, and th Kentish soil o
whic I had spt—and torn besde—mght have frightend the
birds from my aunt’s garden, as I stood at the gate. My hair had
known no comb or brus since I left London My face, neck, and
hands, fro unaccustod exposure to th air and sun, wre
burnt to a berry-brown. From head to foot I was powdered alt
as wite with chalk and dust, as if I had come out of a lime-kiln. In
this plight, and with a strong consciusness of it, I waited to
introduc myself to, and make my first impression on, my
formidable aunt.
The unbroken stillnes of the parlour window leadig me to
ifer, after a whe, that she was not there, I lfted up my eyes to
the window above it, where I saw a florid, plasant-lookig
getlan, wth a grey head, who shut up one eye in a grotesque
anr, ndded his head at me sveral tim, shook it at me as
ften, laughd, and went away.
I had be discomposd enugh before; but I was so much th
more discposed by this unxpected beaviur, that I was on th
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point of sking off, to think ho I had best prod, wh thre
am out of the house a lady with her handkerchief tied over her
cap, and a pair of gardeing glve on her hands, warig a
gardeg poket like a toll-man’s apron, and carrying a great
knife I kn hr immediatey to be Miss Betsy, for she came
talkig out of the house exactly as my poor mother had so often
deribed her stalkig up our garde at Blunderstone Rookery.
‘Go away!’ said Miss Betsy, shaking her head, and making a
ditant chop in the air with her knfe. ‘Go along! No boys here!’
I watched her, with my heart at my lips, as se marched to a
crner of her garden, and stooped to dig up so little root there.
Then, without a scrap of curage, but with a great deal of
desperati, I went softly in and stod bede her, toucng her
with my figer.
‘If you please, ma’am,’ I began
She started and looked up.
‘If you please, aunt.’
‘Eh?’ exclaid Mi Betsey, in a to of amazement I have
ver heard approached.
‘If you please, aunt, I am your nephew.’
‘Oh, Lord!’ said my aunt. Ad sat flat dow in the garde-path
‘I am David Copperfield, of Blundersto, in Suffolk—whre
you came, on th night wh I was born, and saw my dear mama. I
have be very unappy since she did. I have be slighted, and
taught nothing, and thrown upon mysf, and put to work nt fit
for me. It made me run away to you. I was robbed at first setting
out, and have walked al the way, and have never spt i a bed
since I began th journey.’ Here my self-support gave way all at
onc; and with a movemet of my hands, intended to show her my
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ragged state, and call it to witnss that I had suffered somethg, I
broke into a passion of crying, which I suppose had be pent up
wth me al the week.
My aunt, with every sort of expression but wonder discarged
from her countenan, sat on the grave, starig at me, until I
began to cry; when sh got up in a great hurry, coared m, and
took m ito the parlour. Her first procedig there was to unlok
a tal pres, bring out several bottl, and pour some of th
tents of each into my mouth I thk they must have been take
out at random, for I am sure I tasted and water, anhovy
sauce, and salad dresg. When she had admtered th
restorative, as I was still quite hysterical, and unable to contro
my sobs, she put me on th sofa, with a shawl under my had, and
the handkercef from her own head under my feet, lt I should
suly the cover; and then, sitting hersef down bed the gree
fan or scren I have already mentioned, so that I could not se hr
face, ejaculated at intervals, ‘Mercy on us!’ letting th
xclamations off like minute guns.
After a time she rang the be. ‘Janet,’ said my aunt, when her
servant came in. ‘Go upstairs, give my compliments to Mr. Dik,
and say I wish to speak to hi’
Jant looked a lttle surprisd to se me lyig stiffly on the sfa
(I was afraid to move lest it should be displeasng to my aunt), but
went on her errand. My aunt, with her hands bed her, walked
up and do the room, until the gentlan who had squinted at
m from the upper window cam in laughing.
‘Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt, ‘do’t be a foo, because nobody can be
re direet than you can, when you choose. We all know that.
So do’t be a fool, whatever you are.’
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Th gentleman was serius immediatey, and looked at me, I
thought, as if he would entreat me to say nthing about the
window.
‘Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt, ‘you have heard me mention David
Cpperfield? Now don’t preted not to have a memory, becaus
you and I know better.’
‘David Copperfid?’ said Mr. Dick, wh did not appear to me to
remember much about it. ‘David Copperfield? Oh ye, to be sure
David, certainly.’
‘Well,’ said my aunt, ‘this is his boy—hs son He wuld be as
like his fathr as it’s possible to be, if he was not so like hs mothr,
too.’
‘His son?’ said Mr. Dick. ‘David’s son? Indeed!’
‘Yes,’ pursued my aunt, ‘and he has don a pretty piece of
business. He has run away. Ah! His sister, Betsy Trotwd, never
would have run away.’ My aunt shook her head firmy, cofidet
i the character and behaviour of the girl who never was born
‘Oh! you thk she wouldn’t have run away?’ said Mr. Dick.
‘Bless and save th man,’ exclaimed my aunt, sharply, ‘ho he
talks! Don’t I know she wouldn’t? She would have lived with her
god-mther, and we should have been devoted to one another.
Where, i the nam of woder, should his siter, Betsey Trotwood,
have run from, or to?’
‘Nore,’ said Mr. Dick.
‘Well then,’ returned my aunt, softened by the reply, ‘how can
you preted to be wo-gathring, Dik, wh you are as sharp as
a surgen’s lancet? Now, here you see young David Cpperfield,
and the question I put to you is, what shal I do with him?’
‘What shal you do with him?’ said Mr. Dick, febly, scratchig
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hi head. ‘Oh! do with him?’
‘Yes,’ said my aunt, with a grave lok, and hr forefinger hd
up. ‘Come! I want some very sound advice.’
‘Why, if I was you,’ said Mr. Dick, coiderig, and lkig
vacantly at me, ‘I should—’ Th conteplation of me seed to
inspire hm wth a sudde idea, and he added, brikly, ‘I should
was him!’
‘Jant,’ said my aunt, turnig round with a quiet triumph,
whic I did not then understand, ‘Mr. Dik sets us all right. Heat
the bath!’
Althugh I was deeply interested in this dialogue, I could not
hlp observing my aunt, Mr. Dik, and Janet, while it was i
progress, and completing a survey I had already be engaged in
akig of the room.
My aunt was a tall, hard-featured lady, but by no mans illookig. Thre was an inflxibiity in her face, in her voice, i hr
gait and carriage, amply suffit to account for th effect she had
made upo a gentle creature like my mothr; but her feature
were rather hands than otherwis, though unbedig and
austere I particularly noticed that she had a very quick, bright
eye Her hair, which was grey, was arranged i tw plain divi,
under what I believe would be called a mob-cap; I mean a cap,
much more common th than now, with side-pieces fasteg
under th chi. Her dres was of a laveder colour, and perfetly
neat; but scantiy made, as if she desred to be as littl
cumbered as possibl I remember that I thught it, in form,
more like a riding-habit with th superfluous skirt cut off, than
anythng e. She wre at her side a gentlman’s gold watc, if I
might judge fro its size and make, wth an appropriate chain and
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seals; she had some lin at her throat not unlike a shirt-collar,
and things at her wrists like littl shirt-wristbands.
Mr. Dick, as I have already said, was grey-haded, and flrid: I
should have said al about him, in saying so, had nt his head been
curiously bowed—nt by age; it remded me of o of Mr.
Creakle’s boys’ heads after a beating—and his grey eye
prot and large, with a strange kind of watery brightne in
th that made me, in cobination with his vacant manner, h
submission to my aunt, and his childish delight w she praised
hi, suspect him of beg a little mad; though, if he were mad,
how he cam to be there puzzld me extremey. He was dresd
like any othr ordinary gentleman, in a loo grey morng coat
and waistcoat, and wite trousers; and had his watc in his fob,
and his money in his pockets: which he rattld as if he were very
proud of it.
Jant was a pretty bloomig girl, of about ntee or twenty,
and a perfet picture of neatness. Thugh I made no furthr
observation of her at th moment, I may mention hre wat I did
not discver until afterwards, namely, that she was o of a seri
of protégées whom my aunt had take into her servic expresy to
educate in a renouncement of mankind, and w had geraly
cpleted their abjuration by marrying the baker.
Th ro was as neat as Janet or my aunt. As I laid dow my
pe, a mot since, to think of it, the air from the sa cam
blowing in agai, mxed with the perfume of the flowers; and I saw
th old-fashioned furniture brightly rubbed and polished, my
aunt’s iviolabl cair and table by the round gree fan in the
bow-window, the drugget-covered carpet, the cat, the kettleholder, the two canaries, the old cha, the punbowl full of drid
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ro-laves, th tal pres guarding al sorts of bottl and pots,
and, wonderfully out of kepig with the rest, my dusty sef upon
the sofa, takig nte of everythig.
Jant had gon away to get the bath ready, when my aunt, to
my great alarm, became in on moment rigid with indignation,
and had hardly voice to cry out, ‘Janet! Donkeys!’
Upon which, Janet came running up th stairs as if th huse
re in flam, darted out on a lttle pi of green i front, and
warnd off tw saddle-donkeys, lady-ridden, that had preumd to
t hoof upon it; while my aunt, rushg out of the house, sezed
th bridle of a third animal laden wth a bestriding child, turnd
hi, ld hi forth from those sacred precits, and boxed the ears
of the unlucky urch in attendan who had dared to profan that
halwed ground.
To this hour I do’t know whether my aunt had any lawful right
of way over that patch of green; but she had settled it in her own
mnd that sh had, and it was al the sam to her. The one great
outrage of her life, deandig to be cotantly aveged, was the
pasage of a dokey over that imaculate spot. In whatever
occupati she was engaged, hover interesting to her th
nversati in which she was taking part, a donkey turnd th
current of her ideas in a moment, and she was upo h straight.
Jugs of water, and waterig-pots, were kept in seret plac ready
to be discarged on th offending boys; sticks were laid in ambush
bend the door; sal were made at al hours; and inant war
prevaid. Perhaps th was an agreeabl excitemet to th
dokey-boys; or perhaps the more sagacous of the donkeys,
understandig how the cas stood, deghted with cnstitutional
obstinacy i coming that way. I only know that thre were thre
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alarms before th bath was ready; and that on th ocasion of th
last and most desperate of all, I saw my aunt engage, singlehanded, wth a sandy-haded lad of fiften, and bump his sandy
head against her own gate, before he seemed to cprehend what
was the matter. Thes iterrupti were of the more ridiulus to
m, beause se was giving m broth out of a table-spoon at the
tim (havig firmy persuaded hersef that I was actualy starving,
and must receive nourishment at first in very small quantiti),
and, wile my mouth was yet ope to receive th spo, she would
put it back into the bas, cry ‘Janet! Dokeys!’ and go out to the
assault.
The bath was a great cofort. For I began to be snsibl of
acute pains in my libs fro lyig out in th fids, and was now
so tired and low that I could hardly keep myself awake for five
utes together. Wh I had bathed, they (I mean my aunt and
Janet) enrobed me in a shirt and a pair of trousers belonging to
Mr. Dik, and tied m up i two or three great saw What srt of
bundl I looked like, I don’t know, but I felt a very hot one. Feeling
al very fait and drowsy, I soon lay down on the sfa agai and
fell aslep.
It might have be a dream, originating in th fancy which had
occupied my md so long, but I awoke with th impression that
my aunt had come and bent over me, and had put my hair away
fro my face, and laid my head more comfortably, and had th
tood lookig at m The words, ‘Pretty fellw,’ or ‘Poor fellw,’
sd to be i my ears, too; but certainly there was nothing el,
wen I awoke, to lad me to beeve that they had been uttered by
my aunt, who sat i the bow-window gazig at the sea from
bed th gre fan, which was mounted on a kid of swive, and
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turned any way.
We dined soo after I awoke, off a roast fo and a pudding; I
sitting at table, not unlike a trusd bird myself, and moving my
arms with considerable difficulty. But as my aunt had swathd me
up, I made no complait of beig inveienced. All this time I
was deply anxious to know what sh was going to do with m; but
she tok hr dinnr in profound silen, except wh she
ccasially fixed her eye on me sitting opposite, and said, ‘Mercy
upo us!’ which did not by any means reve my anxity.
The coth beg drawn, and s shrry put upon the tabl (of
wich I had a glass), my aunt sent up for Mr. Dik again, w
joined us, and looked as wi as he could when she requested him
to attend to my story, which she elcited fro me, gradualy, by a
course of quetis. During my recital, she kept her eye on Mr.
Dik, who I thought would have gone to slp but for that, and
who, whensever he lapsd into a se, was checked by a frown
from my aunt.
‘Whatever possesd that poor unfortunate Baby, that she must
go and be marrid again,’ said my aunt, wh I had fiished, ‘I
can’t conceive.’
‘Perhaps she fe in love with her secod husband,’ Mr. Dick
suggested.
‘Fel in love!’ repeated my aunt. ‘What do you mean? What
business had she to do it?’
‘Perhaps,’ Mr. Dick simpered, after thinking a littl, ‘she did it
for pleasure.’
‘Pleasure, indeed!’ replied my aunt. ‘A mighty pleasure for th
poor Baby to fix her simple faith upo any dog of a fellow, certai
to il-use her in so way or other. What did se propose to
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herself, I should like to know! She had had one husband. She had
seen David Copperfield out of the world, who was alays rung
after wax do from his cradl She had got a baby—oh, there
wre a pair of babi wh she gave birth to this child sitting here,
that Friday nght!—and what more did s want?’
Mr. Dick seretly shook his head at me, as if he thought there
was no getting over this
‘She couldn’t even have a baby like anybody else,’ said my aunt.
‘Where was this child’s sister, Betsy Trotwd? Not forthing.
Don’t tell me!’
Mr. Dick seed quite frighted.
‘That lttle man of a dotor, with his head on one sde,’ said my
aunt, ‘Jellps, or whatever his name was, wat was he about? Al
is—
could do, was to say to me, like a robin redbreast—as he
“It’s a boy.” A boy! Yah, the imbety of the whe set of ’em!’
The heartin of the ejaculati startled Mr. Dik excdigly;
and me, too, if I am to tel the truth.
‘And then, as if this was nt eough, and s had nt stood
sufficiently in th light of this chid’s sister, Betsy Trotwd,’ said
my aunt, ‘s marri a send time—gos and marri a
Murderer—or a man with a nam like it—and stands i this child’s
lght! Ad the natural coquence is, as anybody but a baby
mght have fores, that he prowls and wanders He’s as lke
Cain before he was gro up, as he can be.’
Mr. Dick looked hard at me, as if to idetify me in this
character.
‘And then there’s that woman with the Pagan nam,’ said my
aunt, ‘that Peggotty, she goes and gets married next. Becaus sh
she goes and
has not se enough of the evi attendig suc things,
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gets married nxt, as the chd relates I ony hope,’ said my aunt,
sakig her head, ‘that her husband is one of those Poker
husbands who abound in the newspapers, and will beat her well
with one’
I could not bear to hear my old nurs so decried, and made th
subjet of such a wish. I told my aunt that indeed she was
take That Peggotty was the bet, the truest, the mot faithful,
most devoted, and most self-deying friend and servant in th
rld; wh had ever loved me dearly, wh had ever loved my
mothr dearly; w had hd my mothr’s dying head upo her
arm, o wh face my mothr had imprited her last grateful
kiss. And my remembrance of th both, choking me, I broke
down as I was trying to say that her home was my home, and that
all she had was mine, and that I would have go to her for
sheter, but for hr humble station, which made me fear that I
mght brig s troubl on her—I broke do, I say, as I was
tryig to say so, and laid my face in my hands upo the table.
‘Well, we!’ said my aunt, ‘th child is right to stand by th
who have stood by him—Jant! Donkeys!’
I thoroughy beeve that but for those unfortunate dokeys, we
hould have c to a good understandig; for my aunt had laid
her hand on my shoulder, and the impule was upon me, thus
embodeed, to embrace her and beeech her protection. But th
interruption, and th disorder she was thro into by th struggl
utside, put an end to al softer ideas for th pret, and kept my
aunt indignantly deaig to Mr. Dik about her determiati
to appeal for redre to the laws of her country, and to brig
actions for trespas against the whole donkey proprietorshp of
Dover, until tea-tim
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After tea, we sat at the window—o the look-out, as I imagid,
fro my aunt’s sharp expre of face, for more invaders—unti
dusk, wh Janet set candles, and a backgam-board, on th
table, and puled do the blds
‘No, Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt, with her grave lok, and her
forefinger up as before, ‘I am gog to ask you anothr queti
Lok at this child.’
‘David’s son?’ said Mr. Dick, with an attetive, puzzld face.
‘Exactly so,’ returnd my aunt. ‘What would you do with hm,
now?’
‘Do with David’s son?’ said Mr. Dick.
‘Ay,’ replied my aunt, ‘with David’s son’
‘Oh!’ said Mr. Dick. ‘Yes. Do with—I should put him to bed.’
‘Janet!’ cried my aunt, with th same complacent triumph that I
had remarked before. ‘Mr. Dick sets us all right. If the bed is
ready, we’ll take him up to it.’
Jant reporting it to be quite ready, I was take up to it; kidly,
but in some sort like a prir; my aunt gog in frot and Janet
bringing up th rear. Th only circumstance which gave me any
ne hope, was my aunt’s stopping on th stairs to iquire about a
s of fire that was prevalt there; and janet’s replying that s
ad bee making tinder dow in th kitcn, of my od shirt. But
there were no other clothes in my room than the odd heap of
things I wore; and when I was lft there, with a little taper whic
my aunt forearnd me would burn exactly five minutes, I heard
them lok my door on the outside Turnig thes things over i my
mind I deed it posble that my aunt, w could kn nothing
of me, might suspet I had a habit of runng away, and took
preautions, on that acunt, to have me in safe kepig.
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The room was a pleasant one, at the top of the house,
overlooking th sea, on which th moo was shining brilliantly.
After I had said my prayers, and th candle had burnt out, I
rember how I stil sat lookig at the moonlight on the water, as
if I could hope to read my fortun in it, as in a bright bok; or to
my mothr with her child, coming fro Heave, along that
sg path, to look upo me as she had looked when I last saw
r swet face. I remember ho th solemn feg wth wich at
lgth I turned my eye away, yieded to the seati of gratitude
and rest wich th sight of th white-curtained bed—and ho
much more th lyig softly dow upo it, nestlng in th swhite sheets!—ipired. I rember how I thought of al the
stary plac under the night sky where I had slpt, and how I
prayed that I never mght be huseless any more, and never might
forget the houseles I reber how I seemed to float, then,
dow th melany glry of that track upo th sea, away ito
th world of dreams.
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Chapter 14
MY AUNT MAKES UP HER MIND ABOUT ME
O
n going do in the mornig, I found my aunt musg so
profoundly over the breakfast table, with her elbow on
the tray, that the cotets of the urn had overflowed the
teapot and were laying the whole table-cloth under water, when
my entran put her meditations to flight. I felt sure that I had
been the subject of her reflecti, and was more than ever
anxious to know her itentins towards me Yet I dared not
express my anxity, lest it should give her offence.
My eyes, however, not beg so muc under ctro as my
tongue, were attracted towards my aunt very often during
breakfast. I never could look at her for a fe moments togethr
but I found her lookig at me—in an odd thoughtful manner, as if
I were an ime way off, intead of beg on the other sde of
the smal round table. When se had fined her breakfast, my
aunt very deberately land back i her chair, kntted her brows,
folded hr arms, and conteplated me at her leisure, with such a
fixedness of attention that I was quite overpowred by
ebarrassment. Not having as yet fiished my on breakfast, I
attempted to hide my cofusi by procedig with it; but my
knife tumbled over my fork, my fork tripped up my knife, I
chipped bits of baco a surprising height into th air instead of
cutting them for my own eating, and choked mysf with my tea,
wich persisted in gog th wrog way instead of th right o,
until I gave in altogether, and sat blushig under my aunt’s close
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scrutiny.
‘Hallo!’ said my aunt, after a long time.
I looked up, and met her sharp bright glan respectfully.
‘I have writte to him,’ said my aunt.
‘To—?’
‘To your fathr-in-law,’ said my aunt. ‘I have sent hm a letter
that I’l trouble him to attend to, or he and I will fall out, I can tell
!’
‘Does he kn where I am, aunt?’ I inquired, alarmed.
‘I have tod him,’ said my aunt, with a nd.
‘Shal I—be—given up to him?’ I faltered.
‘I don’t kn,’ said my aunt. ‘We shal see.’
‘Oh! I can’t thk what I shal do,’ I exclaid, ‘if I have to go
back to Mr. Murdstone!’
‘I do’t know anything about it,’ said my aunt, shakig her
had. ‘I can’t say, I am sure. We shal see.’
My spirits sank under th words, and I became very dowcast
and heavy of heart. My aunt, withut appearing to take much hd
of me, put o a coarse apron wth a bib, which she tok out of th
pres; washed up th teacups with her own hands; and, wh
everythig was wased and set in the tray agai, and the cloth
folded and put on the top of the whole, rang for Jant to remve it.
Sh next swpt up the crumbs with a little broom (putting on a
pair of gloves first), until there did nt appear to be o
microscopic speck left on th carpet; next dusted and arranged th
ro, which was dusted and arranged to a hair’s breadth already.
Wh al thes tasks were performed to her satisfaction, s took
off the gloves and apron, folded them up, put them i the
particular cornr of th pre fro which thy had be taken,
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brought out her work-box to her own table i the open window,
and sat down, with the gree fan betwee her and the lght, to
work.
‘I wish you’d go upstairs,’ said my aunt, as she threaded her
nedle, ‘and give my coplments to Mr. Dick, and I’l be glad to
know how he gets on with his Memorial’
I ro with all alacrity, to acquit myself of this comission.
‘I suppose,’ said my aunt, eyeng me as narroy as she had
eyed the ndle i threadig it, ‘you think Mr. Dik a short nam,
eh?’
‘I thught it was rather a short name, yesterday,’ I confessed.
‘You are not to suppose that he hasn’t got a longer name, if he
cho to us it,’ said my aunt, with a loftier air. ‘Babley—Mr.
Riard Bably—that’s the gentlan’s true nam’
I was going to suggest, with a mdet se of my youth and the
famarity I had be already guilty of, that I had better give hi
th full benefit of that name, wh my aunt went on to say:
‘But do’t you cal him by it, whatever you do He can’t bear his
am That’s a peularity of his Though I do’t know that it’s
much of a pecularity, eithr; for he has be ill-usd enugh, by
some that bear it, to have a mortal antipathy for it, Heave knows.
Mr. Dick is his nam here, and everywhere els, n—if he ever
wnt anywre el, wh he don’t. So take care, chid, you don’t
call him anything but Mr. Dick.’
I proised to obey, and went upstairs with my message;
thinking, as I wnt, that if Mr. Dick had be working at hi
Memrial lg, at the sam rate as I had se him workig at it,
through the open door, when I cam down, he was probably
getting on very well indeed. I found him still drivig at it with a
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long pen, and his head almost laid upo th paper. He was so
intent upo it, that I had ampl leisure to observe th large paper
kite in a cornr, th confusion of bundles of manusript, th
umber of pens, and, above al, the quantity of ink (whic he
seemed to have i, i half-gal jars by the doze), before he
obsrved my beg present.
‘Ha! Phobus!’ said Mr. Dick, layig dow his pen ‘How does
the world go? I’l tell you what,’ he added, in a lower tone, ‘I
shouldn’t wish it to be mentioned, but it’s a—’ here he beckond to
me, and put his lips clos to my ear—‘it’s a mad world. Mad as
Bedlam, boy!’ said Mr. Dick, takig snuff from a round box on the
table, and laughng heartily.
Without preumig to give my opi on this question, I
delivered my mesage
‘Well,’ said Mr. Dick, in answer, ‘my complments to her, and
I—I beeve I have made a start. I thk I have made a start,’ said
Mr. Dick, passg his hand among his grey hair, and castig
anythng but a confident look at his manusript. ‘You have be to
hool?’
‘Yes, sir,’ I answered; ‘for a short time.’
‘Do you rellect th date,’ said Mr. Dick, lookig earntly at
me, and taking up his pen to note it dow, ‘wn King Charles th
First had his head cut off?’ I said I beeved it happened in the
year sixtee hundred and forty-ni
‘We,’ returned Mr. Dik, scratchg his ear with his pe, and
lookig dubiously at m ‘So the books say; but I do’t see how
that can be. Becaus, if it was so long ago, ho could th people
about hi have made that mitake of putting so of the troubl
out of his head, after it was taken off, into mine?’
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I was very much surprised by th inquiry; but could give no
information on th poit.
‘It’s very strange,’ said Mr. Dick, wth a despondent look upo
is papers, and wth his hand among his hair again, ‘that I never
can get that quite right. I never can make that perfectly clar. But
n matter, no matter!’ he said chrfully, and rousig hif,
‘there’s tim enough! My coplts to Mis Trotwood, I am
getting on very wel inded.’
I was going away, when he directed my attenti to the kite.
‘What do you think of that for a kite?’ he said.
I answered that it was a beautiful on I should thk it must
have been as muc as seve feet high
‘I made it. We’ll go and fly it, you and I,’ said Mr. Dick. ‘Do you
se this?’
He shod me that it was covered with manusript, very closy
and laboriously written; but so plainly, that as I looked along the
l, I thought I saw so alluson to Kig Charles the First’s
head again, in one or two plac
‘Thre’s plenty of string,’ said Mr. Dick, ‘and wh it fls high,
it takes th facts a long way. That’s my manr of diffusing ’em. I
don’t kn whre thy may come dow It’s accordig to
circumstance, and th wind, and so forth; but I take my chance of
that.’
His fac was so very mild and pleasant, and had somethg so
reverend in it, thugh it was hale and harty, that I was not sure
but that he was having a good-humoured jest with m So I
laughd, and he laughd, and we parted th best friends possibl
‘Well, chid,’ said my aunt, when I wet dowstairs. ‘Ad what
of Mr. Dick, this morng?’
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I informd her that he sent hi compliments, and was getting o
very well indeed.
‘What do you thk of him?’ said my aunt.
I had so shadowy idea of endeavouring to evade the
question, by replying that I thought him a very ni gentlan;
but my aunt was nt to be so put off, for sh laid her work down in
r lap, and said, folding her hands upo it:
‘Co! Your sister Betsy Trotwd would have told me what
she thught of anyo, directly. Be as like your sister as you can,
and speak out!’
‘Is he—i Mr. Dick—I ask becaus I don’t know, aunt—is h at
all out of his mind, th?’ I stammered; for I felt I was o
dangerous ground.
‘Not a mors,’ said my aunt.
‘Oh, indeed!’ I observed faitly.
‘If there is anything in the world,’ said my aunt, with great
decision and force of maner, ‘that Mr. Dick is not, it’s that.’
I had nthing better to offer, than another timd, ‘Oh, ided!’
‘He has been called mad,’ said my aunt. ‘I have a selfish
pleasure in saying he has be called mad, or I should nt have
had th befit of his society and advice for th last ten years
and upwards—i fact, ever sie your siter, Betsey Trotwood,
disappoited me.’
‘So long as that?’ I said.
‘And nice people thy were, wh had th audacity to call h
mad,’ pursued my aunt. ‘Mr. Dik is a sort of distant conxion of
m—it do’t matter how; I nedn’t enter into that. If it hadn’t
been for m, his own brother would have shut him up for life.
That’s all.’
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I am afraid it was hypocritical i me, but sng that my aunt
felt strongly on th subjet, I tried to look as if I felt strongly to
‘A proud fool!’ said my aunt. ‘Beaus his brother was a little
ccentri—thugh h is not half so eccentric as a god many
peopl—he didn’t like to have him visble about his house, and
sent hi away to some private asylum-place: thugh h had be
left to his particular care by thr deceasd fathr, wh thught
hm almost a natural. And a wise man he must have be to think
so! Mad himself, no doubt.’
Again, as my aunt looked quite convinced, I endeavoured to
look quite conviced also.
‘So I stepped in,’ said my aunt, ‘and made him an offer. I said,
“Your brother’s san—a great deal mre san than you are, or
ever wil be, it is to be hoped. Let him have his little i, and
come and live with me. I am nt afraid of him, I am nt proud, I
am ready to take care of him, and shal nt i-treat hi as s
peopl (besdes the asylum-folks) have do” After a good deal of
squabblg,’ said my aunt, ‘I got hi; and he has been hre ever
since. He is th most friendly and amable creature in existece;
and as for advice!—But nobody knows wat that man’s md is,
except myself.’
My aunt smoothed her dres and shook her head, as if s
oothed defian of the whole world out of the one, and shook it
out of the other.
‘He had a favourite sister,’ said my aunt, ‘a god creature, and
very kind to him. But she did wat thy all do—tok a husband.
And he did what they al do—made her wretced. It had suc an
effect upon the md of Mr. Dick ( that’s not madnes, I hope!) that,
cbid with his fear of his brother, and his sense of his
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unkidn, it threw him into a fever. That was before he cam to
me, but th reti of it is oppreve to him eve now Did he
ay anything to you about Kig Charl the First, chd?’
‘Yes, aunt.’
‘Ah!’ said my aunt, rubbing her nose as if she were a littl
vexed. ‘That’s his allegorical way of expresing it. He connects hi
illns with great disturban and agitation, naturaly, and that’s
the figure, or the sie, or whatever it’s called, whic he chooses
to use. And why shouldn’t he, if he thinks proper!’
I said: ‘Certaiy, aunt.’
‘It’s not a bus-lke way of speaking,’ said my aunt, ‘nr a
wrldly way. I am aware of that; and that’s th reason why I insist
upo it, that there shan’t be a word about it in his Memorial’
‘Is it a Memorial about his own history that he is writing, aunt?’
‘Yes, chid,’ said my aunt, rubbig her no agai ‘He is
memorialzing th Lord Cancellor, or th Lord Somebody or
other—one of those peopl, at al events, who are paid to be
memorialzed—about his affairs. I suppose it wi go in, o of
th days He has’t be abl to draw it up yet, withut
introducg that mode of expressing hif; but it don’t signify; it
keeps him employed.’
In fact, I found out afterwards that Mr. Dik had be for
upwards of ten years edeavouring to keep King Charles th First
out of the Memrial; but he had be cotantly getting into it,
and was there no
‘I say again,’ said my aunt, ‘nbody kns what that man’s
mind is except myself; and he’s th most ameable and friendly
creature in exiten If he like to fly a kite stim, what of
that! Franklin usd to fly a kite He was a Quaker, or somethg of
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that sort, if I am not mistaken. And a Quaker flying a kite is a
much more ridiculous object than anybody el.’
If I could have supposed that my aunt had recounted these
particulars for my espeal behoof, and as a pi of cfide in
, I should have felt very muc ditiguished, and should have
augured favourably from suc a mark of her good opi But I
culd hardly help obsrving that she had launcd into them,
chiefly becaus th queti was raised in her own mid, and with
very little referen to me, though sh had addred hersef to m
the abse of anybody els
t the sam tim, I must say that the genrosity of her
campionsp of poor harml Mr. Dick, nt only inpired my
young breast with some selfi hope for myself, but warmd it
unsfiy towards her. I beve that I began to know that there
was sthing about my aunt, ntwithstandig her many
etrictie and odd humours, to be honured and trusted in
Thugh she was just as sharp that day as on th day before, and
was in and out about the dokeys just as often, and was thrown
ito a tremdous state of indignatin, when a young man, going
by, ogled Jant at a window (whic was one of the gravest
misdeanours that could be comitted against my aunt’s
dignity), she seed to me to comand more of my respect, if not
less of my fear.
Th anxity I underwt, in th interval which necessarily
eapsd before a reply could be recved to her letter to Mr.
Murdsto, was extre; but I made an endeavour to suppres it,
and to be as agreeable as I could in a quiet way, both to my aunt
and Mr. Dik. The latter and I would have gone out to fly the great
kite; but that I had sti n other clothes than the anything but
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ornamtal garmets with whic I had be derated on the first
day, and wh confid me to th house, except for an hur after
dark, wh my aunt, for my halth’s sake, paraded me up and
down on the clff outside, before going to bed. At lgth the reply
fro Mr. Murdsto came, and my aunt informd me, to my
ifinte terror, that he was cog to speak to her hersef o the
next day. On th next day, still bundled up in my curius
habits, I sat cunting the tim, flushed and heated by the
conflict of sinking hpe and ring fears within me; and waitig to
be startled by the sight of the gloomy fac, whose no-arrival
tartled m every miute
My aunt was a littl more iperius and stern than usual, but I
obsrved n other toke of her preparig hersef to receve the
visitor so much dreaded by me. She sat at wrk i th wdo,
and I sat by, with my thoughts runng astray on all pobl and
imposble results of Mr. Murdsto’s visit, until pretty late in th
aftern Our dinner had bee indefinitely postponed; but it was
growing so late, that my aunt had ordered it to be got ready, when
she gave a sudden alarm of donkeys, and to my conternation and
amazet, I beheld Mis Murdstone, on a sde-saddl, ride
deliberately over th sacred piece of gre, and stop in frot of th
house, lookig about her.
‘Go along with you!’ cried my aunt, shaking hr had and hr
fist at the window. ‘You have n bus there. How dare you
trespass? Go along! Oh! you bod-faced thing!’
My aunt was so exasperated by th coolness with which Mi
Murdstone looked about her, that I realy beeve she was
tionl, and unabl for the mot to dart out acrdig to
custo. I seized th opportunity to inform her wh it was; and that
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th gentleman now coming near th offender (for th way up was
very step, and he had dropped bed), was Mr. Murdstone
elf.
‘I don’t care wh it is!’ cried my aunt, still shaking hr had and
gesticulating anythng but we fro th bow-wndow ‘I wn’t
be trespassed upo I won’t allow it. Go away! Janet, turn hi
round. Lead hm off!’ and I saw, fro behd my aunt, a sort of
hurrid battl-piece, in which th donkey stod reisting
everybody, with all his four legs planted different ways, w
Jant tried to pull him round by the bridl, Mr. Murdstone tried to
lad him on, Mis Murdstone struck at Jant with a paras, and
sveral boys, who had co to se the egagemt, shouted
vigorously. But my aunt, suddey derying among them the
young malefactor w was th donkey’s guardian, and wh was
one of the mot inveterate offenders agait her, though hardly i
is tes, rushed out to th scene of acti, pounced upo hm,
captured him, dragged him, with his jacket over his head, and his
hee grindig the ground, into the garde, and, callg upon
Jant to fetch the cotabl and justi, that he mght be take,
trid, and executed on the spot, held him at bay there. Th part of
th business, hover, did not last long; for th young rascal,
beig expert at a varity of fets and dodge, of wich my aunt
had no ception, soon went whoopig away, lavig so deep
impresion of his nailed bots i th flr-beds, and taking hi
dokey in triumph with him
Miss Murdsto, during th latter portion of th contet, had
diounted, and was nw waitig with her brother at the bottom
of th steps, until my aunt should be at leisure to receive th. My
aunt, a lttle ruffled by the cobat, marched past them ito the
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house, with great dignity, and took n notic of their pre,
until thy were announced by Janet.
‘Shal I go away, aunt?’ I asked, trebling.
‘No, sir,’ said my aunt. ‘Crtainly not!’ With which she pushed
me into a cornr near her, and fed Me i wth a chair, as if it
wre a prison or a bar of justice. Th posti I contiued to
ccupy during th wh interview, and fro it I now saw Mr. and
Miss Murdsto enter th ro
‘Oh!’ said my aunt, ‘I was nt aware at first to wh I had th
pleasure of objectig. But I don’t alw anybody to ride over that
turf. I make no exceptions. I don’t allow anybody to do it.’
‘Your regulati is rathr awkward to strangers,’ said Miss
Murdstone
‘Is it!’ said my aunt.
Mr. Murdstone sed afraid of a renwal of hostilitie, and
iterposig began:
‘Miss Trotwd!’
‘I beg your pardo,’ observed my aunt with a ke lok. ‘You
are the Mr. Murdstone who married the wido of my late nphew,
David Copperfield, of Blundersto Rookery!—Though why
Rookery, I don’t know!’
‘I am,’ said Mr. Murdsto
‘You’ll excuse my sayig, sir,’ returned my aunt, ‘that I thk it
wuld have be a much better and happier thing if you had left
that poor child alon’
‘I s far agree with what Mis Trotwood has remarked,’
observed Mi Murdsto, bridling, ‘that I consider our lamented
Cara to have be, in all esntial respects, a mere chid.’
‘It is a comfort to you and me, ma’am,’ said my aunt, ‘wh are
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getting on in life, and are not likey to be made unhappy by our
personal attractio, that nbody can say the sam of us’
‘No doubt!’ returnd Miss Murdsto, thugh, I thught, not
with a very ready or gracus ast. ‘And it certainly might have
be, as you say, a better and happir thing for my brother if he
had never entered into suc a marriage I have always be of that
opinion.’
‘I have no doubt you have,’ said my aunt. ‘Janet,’ rigig th
bel, ‘my compliments to Mr. Dick, and beg him to come dow.’
Until he cam, my aunt sat perfectly upright and stiff, frownig
at th wall. Whe he came, my aunt performed th ceremony of
itroduction.
‘Mr. Dick. A old and itimate friend. On w judget,’
said my aunt, wth ephasis, as an admoniti to Mr. Dick, wh
as bitig hi forefinger and lkig rather fooish, ‘I rey.’
Mr. Dick took his finger out of hi mouth, on this hit, and
stood amg the group, with a grave and attentive expren of
fac
My aunt ind her head to Mr. Murdstone, who went on:
‘Miss Trotwd: o th receipt of your letter, I considered it an
act of greater justice to myself, and perhaps of more respect to
you—’
‘Thank you,’ said my aunt, still eyeng hm keenly. ‘You nedn’t
mind me.’
‘To answer it in pers, hover inconveient th journey,’
pursued Mr. Murdstone, ‘rather than by ltter. This unhappy boy
w has run away fro his friends and his occupati—’
‘And whe appearance,’ interpoed his sister, directig geral
attention to me in my indefinabl costum, ‘is perfetly scandalous
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and disgraceful.’
‘Jane Murdstone,’ said her brother, ‘have the goodn nt to
iterrupt m This unhappy boy, Mis Trotwood, has been the
occasi of much domestic troubl and unasiness; both during
th lifetime of my late dear wife, and since. He has a sullen,
rebeus spirit; a viot temper; and an untoward, itractable
disposition. Both my sister and myself have edeavoured to
rrect his vices, but ineffectualy. And I have felt—we both have
felt, I may say; my sister being fully in my confide—that it is
right you should receive this grave and dispassiate assuran
fro our lips.’
‘It can hardly be necesary for me to confirm anythng stated by
my brother,’ said Mis Murdstone; ‘but I beg to obsrve, that, of al
the boys in the world, I beeve th is the worst boy.’
‘Strog!’ said my aunt, shortly.
‘But nt at al too strong for the facts,’ returned Mis
Murdstone
‘Ha!’ said my aunt. ‘Wel, sir?’
‘I have my own opi,’ resumd Mr. Murdstone, whose fac
darked more and more, th more he and my aunt observed each
othr, wich thy did very narroy, ‘as to th best mode of
bringing him up; thy are founded, i part, o my knowledge of
hm, and in part on my knledge of my on means and
resources. I am responsible for th to myself, I act upo th,
and I say n mre about them It is enough that I place this boy
under the eye of a frid of my own, i a repectable bus; that
it doe not plase him; that he runs away fro it; makes hmself a
c vagabod about the country; and c here, in rags, to
appeal to you, Miss Trotwd. I wish to set before you,
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honourably, the exact coequenc—so far as they are with my
knowledge—of your abetting him in this appeal’
‘But about the respectabl bus first,’ said my aunt. ‘If h
had be your own boy, you would have put hi to it, just the
same, I suppo?’
‘If he had been my brother’s own boy,’ returned Mis
Murdstone, strikig in, ‘h character, I trust, would have be
altogether different.’
‘Or if th poor child, his mothr, had be alive, h wuld still
ave go into th respectable business, would he?’ said my aunt.
‘I believe,’ said Mr. Murdsto, with an iation of his had,
‘that Clara would have disputed nothing wich myself and my
sister Jane Murdsto were agred was for th best.’
Miss Murdsto confirmed this with an audibl murmur.
‘Humph!’ said my aunt. ‘Unfortunate baby!’
Mr. Dick, w had be rattlg his money all this time, was
rattling it so loudly now, that my aunt felt it necesary to chek
hi with a look, before saying:
‘Th poor child’s annuity died with her?’
‘Did with her,’ repld Mr. Murdstone
‘And there was n settlet of the lttle property—the house
and garde—the what’s-its-name Rookery without any rooks in
it—upon her boy?’
‘It had been lft to her, uncnditialy, by her first husband,’
Mr. Murdstone began, when my aunt caught hi up with the
greatest irascibility and impatice.
‘Good Lord, man, there’s n occason to say that. Left to her
unditionaly! I thk I see David Copperfield lookig forward to
any condition of any sort or kind, thugh it stared him poit-blank
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in th face! Of course it was left to her unnditionaly. But w
she marrid again—wh she tok that most disastrous step of
marrying you, in short,’ said my aunt, ‘to be plain—did no o put
in a word for th boy at that time?’
‘My late wife loved her second husband, ma’am,’ said Mr.
Murdsto, ‘and trusted implcitly in hi’
‘Your late wife, sir, was a most unrldly, most unappy, most
unfortunate baby,’ returned my aunt, sakig her head at hi
‘That’s what she was And nw, what have you got to say next?’
‘Merey this, Miss Trotwd,’ he returnd. ‘I am here to take
David back—to take him back unditionally, to dispose of hi
as I think proper, and to deal with him as I think right. I am not
here to make any prom, or give any pldge to anybody. You
may possibly have som idea, Miss Trotwd, of abetting hm i
is running away, and in his complaits to you. Your mannr,
wich I must say doe not see intended to propitiate, induces me
to think it possible. Now I must caution you that if you abet h
ce, you abet him for god and all; if you step in betw hi
and me, now, you must step in, Miss Trotwd, for ever. I cannt
trifl, or be trifld with. I am here, for the first and last tim, to
take hi away. Is he ready to go? If h is not—and you tell me h
is not; on any pretece; it is indifferent to me what—my doors are
ut against him henforth, and yours, I take it for granted, are
open to him’
To this addre, my aunt had listed with the closet attenti,
stting perfectly upright, with her hands folded on one kn, and
lookig griy on the speaker. Wh he had fined, se turned
hr eye so as to comand Miss Murdsto, withut othrwise
disturbing her attitude, and said:
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‘Well, ma’am, have you got anything to remark?’
‘Inded, Mis Trotwood,’ said Mis Murdstone, ‘al that I culd
say has be so we said by my brothr, and all that I know to be
th fact has be so plainly stated by him, that I have nothing to
add except my thanks for your polite. For your very great
politess, I am sure,’ said Miss Murdsto; with an iroy which
no more affected my aunt, than it discompod th cannon I had
sept by at Chatham
‘And what do the boy say?’ said my aunt. ‘Are you ready to
go, David?’
I anred n, and entreated her not to let me go. I said that
neithr Mr. nor Miss Murdsto had ever liked me, or had ever
bee kind to me. That thy had made my mama, w always loved
me dearly, unappy about me, and that I knew it we, and that
Peggotty kn it. I said that I had be more mrable than I
thought anybody could believe, who only knew how young I was
And I begged and prayed my aunt—I forget in what terms now,
but I rember that they affected me very muc then—to
befriend and protect me, for my father’s sake
‘Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt, ‘what shal I do with this chid?’
Mr. Dick codered, hestated, brightened, and rejoined, ‘Have
measured for a suit of clothes directly.’
‘Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt triumphantly, ‘give me your hand, for
your common sense is invaluable.’ Having shake it wth great
crdialty, sh puld me towards her and said to Mr. Murdstone:
‘You can go when you like; I’ll take my chan with the boy. If
h’s al you say he is, at least I can do as much for hm then, as you
have don. But I don’t beeve a word of it.’
‘Miss Trotwd,’ rejod Mr. Murdsto, shrugging hi
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shoulders, as he ro, ‘if you were a gentleman—’
‘Bah! Stuff and nse!’ said my aunt. ‘Don’t talk to me!’
‘Ho exquisitey polite!’ exclaimed Mi Murdsto, rising.
‘Overpowerig, realy!’
‘Do you think I do’t know,’ said my aunt, turnig a deaf ear to
th sister, and continuing to addre th brothr, and to shake hr
had at him with infite expression, ‘what kind of life you must
have led that poor, unappy, misdireted baby? Do you think I
do’t know what a woeful day it was for the soft little creature
wen you first cam i her way—srkig and makig great eyes
at her, I’ll be bound, as if you couldn’t say bo! to a goe!’
‘I never heard anythg so elegant!’ said Miss Murdstoe.
‘Do you think I can’t understand you as well as if I had se
you,’ pursued my aunt, ‘no that I do se and hear you—wich, I
tell you candidly, is anythng but a plasure to me? Oh yes, bles
us! who so smooth and siky as Mr. Murdstone at first! The poor,
beghted innocent had never see such a man. He was made of
swetness. He worsipped her. He doted o hr boy—tenderly
doted on hi! He was to be another father to him, and they were
al to live together in a garde of rose, weren’t they? Ugh! Get
alg with you, do!’ said my aunt.
‘I never hard anythng like this pers in my life!’ excaimed
Miss Murdsto
‘And when you had made sure of the poor little fool,’ said my
aunt—‘God forgive me that I should cal her so, and she go
you won’t go i a hurry—beaus you had nt do wrong
ere
eough to her and hers, you must begin to trai her, must you?
begin to break her, like a poor caged bird, and war hr deluded
life away, in teaching her to sing your notes?’
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‘This is eithr insanty or intoxicati,’ said Miss Murdsto, in
a perfect agony at nt beg abl to turn the current of my aunt’s
addres toards hersf; ‘and my suspicion is that it’s intoxiati’
Miss Betsy, withut taking th least notice of th iterruption,
ctiued to addre hersef to Mr. Murdstone as if there had be
no such thing.
‘Mr. Murdstone,’ sh said, shakig her finger at him, ‘you were
a tyrant to the sipl baby, and you broke her heart. Sh was a
you ever saw
loving baby—I kn that; I knew it years before
her—and through the bet part of her weakn you gave her the
wunds she died of. There is the truth for your cfort, however
you like it. And you and your instruments may make th most of
it.’
‘Aow me to inquire, Mis Trotwood,’ iterposed Mis
Murdsto, ‘wh you are plased to call, in a choice of words i
ich I am not expericed, my brothr’s instruments?’
‘It was clar enough, as I have told you, years before you ever
saw her—and why, in th mysterious dispensatis of Providence,
you ever did see her, is more than humanity can compred—it
was car eough that the poor soft little thing would marry
somebody, at some time or othr; but I did hope it wouldn’t have
be as bad as it has turned out. That was the tim, Mr.
Murdstone, when sh gave birth to her boy here,’ said my aunt; ‘to
the poor chd you sotim tormeted her through afterwards,
wich is a disagreabl remembrance and makes th sight of h
odius no Aye, aye! you needn’t wie!’ said my aunt. ‘I know
it’s true without that.’
He had stood by the door, al this while, observant of her with a
smil upo his face, thugh his black eyebro were heavily
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contracted. I remarked now, that, thugh th smile was on his face
still, his colour had go in a moment, and he seed to breath
as if he had been rung.
‘Good day, sir,’ said my aunt, ‘and good-bye! Good day to you,
to, ma’am,’ said my aunt, turng suddenly upo hs sister. ‘Let
m see you ride a dokey over my green agai, and as sure as you
have a head upon your shoulders, I’l knk your bonnet off, and
tread upon it!’
It would require a paiter, and n co paiter too, to
depict my aunt’s face as she delivered hersf of this very
unxpected sentit, and Miss Murdsto’s fac as she heard it.
But the maner of the speech, n le than the matter, was s
firy, that Miss Murdsto, withut a word in answer, discretly
put her arm through her brother’s, and walked haughtily out of
the cottage; my aunt remaig in the window lookig after them;
prepared, I have no doubt, in cas of the dokey’s reappearan,
to carry her threat into instant exeution.
No attempt at defianc beg made, however, her fac gradually
relaxed, and beame so pleasant, that I was emboded to kiss
and thank her; whic I did with great heartin, and with both
my arm casped round her nek. I then shook hands with Mr.
Dick, who shook hands with me a great many tim, and haied
this happy cl of th prodings with repeated bursts of
laughter.
‘You’ll consider yourself guardian, jointly with me, of this chid,
Mr. Dick,’ said my aunt.
‘I shal be delghted,’ said Mr. Dick, ‘to be the guardian of
David’s son.’
‘Very god,’ returned my aunt, ‘ that’s settled. I have been
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thkig, do you kn, Mr. Dick, that I might cal him Trotwd?’
‘Certainy, certaiy. Cal h Trotwd, certaiy,’ said Mr.
Dick. ‘David’s son’s Trotwd.’
‘Trotwd Copperfield, you mean,’ returnd my aunt.
‘Ye, to be sure. Yes. Trotwd Copperfield,’ said Mr. Dick, a
lttle abashd.
My aunt tok so kindly to th noti, that some ready-made
cothes, whic were purchasd for me that afternoon, were
marked ‘Trotwood Copperfied’, in her own handwritig, and in
indelibl markig-ink, before I put th on; and it was settld that
al the other cothes whic were ordered to be made for me (a
cplete outfit was bepoke that afternoon) should be marked i
the sam way.
Thus I began my ne life, in a ne name, and wth everythng
nw about m Now that the state of doubt was over, I felt, for
many days, like o in a dream. I never thught that I had a
curius couple of guardians, in my aunt and Mr. Dick. I nver
thought of anything about mysf, dititly. The two things
clearest in my mind wre, that a remote had come upo th
d Blundersto life—which seed to li in th haze of an
immeasurable distance; and that a curtain had for ever fal on
y lfe at Murdstone and Griby’s. No one has ever raied that
curtain si I have lifted it for a moment, eve in this narrative,
with a reluctant hand, and dropped it gladly. The rembrance of
that life is fraught with so much pain to me, with so much mental
suffering and want of hope, that I have nver had the curage
even to exame how log I was doomed to lad it. Whether it
lasted for a year, or more, or less, I do not know I only know that
it was, and ceased to be; and that I have written, and there I leave
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it.
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Chapter 15
I MAKE ANOTHER BEGINNING
M
r. Dick and I soo became th best of friends, and very
often, when hi day’s work was do, went out together
to fly the great kite. Every day of his life he had a lg
stting at the Memrial, whic nver made the last progres,
however hard he laboured, for King Charl the First alays
strayed into it, soor or later, and th it was thro aside, and
another one begun. The patience and hope with whic he bore
thes perpetual diappotmets, the mild perceptio he had that
there was sothing wrong about Kig Charl the First, the
feebl efforts he made to keep him out, and the crtaity wth
ich he came in, and tumbld th Memorial out of all shape,
made a deep impresion on me. What Mr. Dick supposed would
come of th Memorial, if it were completed; wre h thught it
was to go, or what he thought it was to do; he kn no mre than
anybody e, I believe Nor was it at all necesary that he should
troubl himself with such quetis, for if anythng wre certain
under the sun, it was crtai that the Memrial never would be
finished. It was quite an affectig sight, I usd to think, to see hi
with the kite when it was up a great height in the air. What he had
told me, in his ro, about his belief i its dissating th
statets pasted on it, which were nothing but od leave of
abortive Memrials, mght have be a fancy with hi stim;
but not when he was out, lookig up at the kite i the sky, and
feing it pul and tug at his hand. He never looked so sere as he
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did then I used to fancy, as I sat by him of an eveg, on a gree
ope, and saw him watch the kite high in the quiet air, that it
lifted hi mind out of its confusion, and bore it (suc was my
boyish thught) into th skies. As he wound th string i and it
cam lwer and lwer down out of the beautiful lght, until it
fluttered to the ground, and lay there like a dead thing, he sd
to wake gradually out of a dream; and I remember to have se
take it up, and look about him in a lot way, as if they had
both co down together, so that I pitid him with al my heart.
While I advanced in friendship and intimacy with Mr. Dick, I
did not go backward in th favour of his staun friend, my aunt.
She tok so kindly to me, that, in th course of a fe wks, she
hortened my adopted nam of Trotwood ito Trot; and even
euraged m to hope, that if I wet on as I had begun, I might
take equal rank in her affections with my sister Betsy Trotwd.
‘Trot,’ said my aunt one evenig, when the backgam-board
was placd as usual for hersef and Mr. Dick, ‘w must not forget
your educati’
This was my ony subjet of anxiety, and I felt quite deghted
by her referring to it.
‘Should you like to go to school at Canterbury?’ said my aunt.
I replied that I should like it very much, as it was so near her.
‘Good,’ said my aunt. ‘Should you like to go tomorro?’
Beig already n stranger to the genral rapidity of my aunt’s
voutions, I was not surprid by th suddens of th propoal,
and said: ‘Ye.’
‘Good,’ said my aunt agai ‘Janet, hire the grey pony and
chaise tomorro morng at te o’clock, and pack up Master
Trotwood’s clothes tonight.’
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I was greatly elated by the orders; but my heart smote me for
my sefihnes, when I witnd their effect on Mr. Dik, who was
so low-spirited at th propect of our separati, and played so i
in conseque, that my aunt, after giving him several admonitory
raps on th knuckl with her dice-box, shut up th board, and
declined to play with him any more. But, on hearing fro my aunt
that I should sometimes come over on a Saturday, and that h
uld sometimes come and se me on a Wednday, he revived;
and vowed to make another kite for those occasons, of
proportions greatly surpassg the pret one In the morning he
was dowarted again, and wuld have sustaid hif by
giving me all th money he had i h possession, god and silver
too, if my aunt had not interposed, and lted the gift to five
shillings, which, at his earnt petiti, were afterwards increased
to ten We parted at the garde-gate i a mt affectiate
manr, and Mr. Dik did nt go into the house until my aunt had
drive me out of sight of it.
My aunt, wh was perfetly indifferent to public opinion, drove
the grey poy through Dover in a masterly manr; stting high
and stiff lke a state coachman, keepig a steady eye upo hi
rever he went, and making a poit of not letting him have hi
n way in any respet. Whe we came ito th country road, she
permitted him to relax a little, however; and lookig at m down i
a valy of cushion by her side, asked me whthr I was happy?
‘Very happy indeed, thank you, aunt,’ I said.
She was much gratified; and both her hands being ocupied,
patted me on the head with her whip.
‘Is it a large school, aunt?’ I asked.
‘Why, I don’t kn,’ said my aunt. ‘We are gog to Mr.
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Wickfid’s first.’
‘Does he kep a shool?’ I asked.
‘No, Trot,’ said my aunt. ‘He keeps an office.’
I asked for n mre iformati about Mr. Wikfied, as sh
ffered none, and w conversed on othr subjets until we came to
Canterbury, where, as it was market-day, my aunt had a great
opportunity of insinuatig th grey pony among carts, baskets,
vegetabl, and huckster’s goods The hair-breadth turns and
twists we made, dre dow upo us a varity of speeche fro th
people standing about, which were not always complimentary; but
my aunt drove on with perfet indifference, and I dare say would
have take her own way with as muc coolne through an
enemy’s country.
t legth we stopped before a very old house bulgig out over
th road; a huse wth long low lattice-window bulgig out still
farther, and beam with carved heads on the ends bulgig out too,
s that I fancid the whole house was lanig forward, trying to
se wh was passing on th narro pavement below It was quite
spotl in its clanliness. Th od-fashioned brass knker o th
w arced door, ornamted with carved garlands of fruit and
flrs, twinkld like a star; th tw sto steps descending to th
door wre as wite as if thy had be covered with fair line; and
all th angl and cornrs, and carvings and mouldings, and
quait little pan of glass, and quaiter lttle windows, though as
d as th hi, were as pure as any sn that ever fe upo th
When the poy-chai stopped at the door, and my eyes wre
intent upo th house, I saw a cadaverous face appear at a sal
window on the ground floor (in a little round tower that formed
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o side of th house), and quickly disappear. Th low arched door
then opened, and the fac cam out. It was quite as cadaverous as
t had loked i the window, though i the grai of it there was
that tinge of red wich is sometimes to be observed in th skis of
red-haired peopl It beged to a red-haired perso—a youth of
fifteen, as I take it now, but lookig muc older—whose hair was
ropped as close as the closest stubble; who had hardly any
eyebro, and no eyeashes, and eyes of a red-brown, s
unshetered and unshaded, that I remember wonderig ho he
nt to sleep. He was high-suldered and bony; dressed in
decent black, with a white wisp of a neckcloth; buttod up to th
throat; and had a log, lank, sketon hand, whic particularly
attracted my attenti, as he stood at the poy’s head, rubbig hi
chin with it, and looking up at us in th chaise.
‘Is Mr. Wickfid at ho, Uriah Hep?’ said my aunt.
‘Mr. Wickfid’s at ho, ma’am,’ said Uriah Hep, ‘if you’l
plas to walk i there’—pointig with his lg hand to the room
he meant.
We got out; and lavig him to hold the poy, went into a log
low parlur looking toards th stret, fro th window of which
I caught a glimps, as I went in, of Uriah Hep breathing ito th
pony’s nostrils, and immediatey covering th with his hand, as if
h were putting some spel upo hm. Opposite to th tall od
chimney-piece were tw portraits: on of a gentleman wth grey
hair (thugh not by any means an od man) and black eyebro,
who was lookig over so papers tied together with red tape; the
other, of a lady, with a very placd and sweet expreson of fac,
who was lookig at me
I beve I was turning about in search of Uriah’s picture, wh,
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a door at the farther end of the room opeg, a gentlan
tered, at sight of whom I turned to the first-metid portrait
again, to make quite sure that it had not come out of its frame. But
it was stationary; and as th gentleman advanced ito th light, I
saw that he was s years older than when he had had his
picture painted.
‘Miss Betsy Trotwd,’ said th gentleman, ‘pray walk in. I was
gaged for a moment, but you’l excuse my being busy. You kn
my motive. I have but one in life.’
Miss Betsy thanked him, and we went into his ro, wich
was furnished as an office, with boks, papers, tin boxes, and so
forth. It looked into a garde, and had an iron safe let ito the
wal; s imdiatey over the mantelsf, that I wodered, as I sat
dow, ho th sweps got round it wh thy swept th chimney.
‘Well, Mis Trotwood,’ said Mr. Wikfied; for I soon found that
it was he, and that he was a lawyer, and steward of the estate of a
ric gentlan of the county; ‘what wind blows you here? Not an
ill wind, I hope?’
‘No,’ replied my aunt. ‘I have nt come for any law’
‘That’s right, ma’am,’ said Mr. Wikfied. ‘You had better c
for anythng el.’ His hair was quite white now, thugh h
eyebro were sti black. He had a very agreeable fac, and, I
thught, was handsome. Thre was a certain richness in hi
plexion, which I had be log acustomd, under Peggotty’s
tuition, to cot wth port wi; and I fancied it was in his voice
to, and referred his groing corpulcy to th same caus He
as very cleanly dressed, in a blue coat, striped waitcat, and
nankeen trousers; and his fi frilled shirt and cambri nekcth
looked unusually soft and white, reminding my strog fancy (I
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call to mid) of the plumage on the breast of a san
‘This is my nephe,’ said my aunt.
‘Was’t aware you had one, Mis Trotwood,’ said Mr. Wikfied.
‘My grand-nphew, that is to say,’ observed my aunt.
‘Wasn’t aware you had a grand-nephe, I give you my word,’
said Mr. Wickfid.
‘I have adopted him,’ said my aunt, with a wave of her hand,
importing that hi knledge and his ignorance were all on to
her, ‘and I have brought him here, to put to a shool where he may
be thoroughly wel taught, and wel treated. Now tell me where
that school is, and what it is, and al about it.’
‘Before I can advi you properly,’ said Mr. Wickfid—‘th od
questi, you kn. What’s your motive in th?’
‘Deuce take th man!’ excaimed my aunt. ‘Always fishing for
mtive, when they’re on the surface! Why, to make the cd
happy and usful.’
‘It must be a mxed motive, I thk,’ said Mr. Wickfield, shakig
h head and smiling inredulusly.
‘A mixed fiddlstick,’ returned my aunt. ‘You claim to have o
plain motive in all you do yourself. You don’t suppo, I hpe, that
you are the only plai dealer in the world?’
‘Ay, but I have ony one motive in life, Mis Trotwood,’ he
rejoined, smg. ‘Other peopl have dozens, scres, hundreds. I
have only one. There’s the differe However, that’s bede th
question. The bet shool? Whatever the motive, you want the
best?’
My aunt nodded assent.
‘At th best w have,’ said Mr. Wickfid, condering, ‘your
nephe couldn’t board just now’
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‘But he could board somewre e, I suppo?’ suggested my
aunt.
Mr. Wickfid thught I could. After a littl discussion, h
proposed to take my aunt to the school, that she might see it and
judge for hersef; al, to take her, with the sam object, to two or
three house where he thought I could be boarded. My aunt
ebracig the proposal, we were al three going out together,
w he stopped and said:
‘Our lttle fried here might have so mtive, perhaps, for
objectig to the arrangets. I think we had better leave hi
behd?’
My aunt seed disposed to contet th poit; but to facilitate
matters I said I would gladly remain bend, if thy pleased; and
returnd into Mr. Wickfid’s office, whre I sat dow again, in th
air I had first occupid, to await their return.
It so happened that this chair was opposite a narro passage,
w ended in the little crcular room where I had seen Uriah
Heep’s pal fac lookig out of the window. Uriah, having take
th pony to a neighbouring stable, was at work at a desk i this
ro, which had a brass frame on th top to hang paper upo, and
o which th writing he was making a copy of was th hangig.
Though his fac was towards m, I thought, for so tim, the
writig beg betwee us, that he could not se me; but lookig
that way mre attentivey, it made m uncofortable to obsrve
that, every no and then, hi sleepl eyes would c be th
riting, like tw red sun, and stealthly stare at me for I dare say
a wh minute at a time, during which his pen wnt, or preteded
to go, as clverly as ever. I made several attempts to get out of
thr way—such as standing on a chair to look at a map on th
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other side of the room, and poring over the coum of a Kenti
wspaper—but they alays attracted me back agai; and
wenever I looked toards those two red sun, I was sure to find
th, eithr just rising or just setting.
At length, much to my relief, my aunt and Mr. Wickfid came
back, after a pretty long absence. Thy were not so succesful as I
culd have wised; for though the advantages of the school were
undeniable, my aunt had not approved of any of th boardinghouse proposed for m
‘It’s very unfortunate,’ said my aunt. ‘I don’t kn what to do,
Trot.’
‘It does happe unfortunatey,’ said Mr. Wikfied. ‘But I’ll tell
you what you can do, Mi Trotwd.’
‘What’s that?’ inquired my aunt.
‘Leave your nphew here, for the present. He’s a quit fel
He wn’t disturb me at all. It’s a capital house for study. As quiet
as a monastery, and almost as roy. Leave him here.’
My aunt evidently liked the offer, though se was deate of
acceptig it. So did I. ‘Co, Miss Trotwd,’ said Mr. Wickfid.
‘This is th way out of th difficulty. It’s only a temporary
arranget, you know. If it don’t act well, or do’t quite acrd
with our mutual covence, he can easy go to the right-about.
There wil be tim to find so better plac for him in the
manwhil You had better determi to leave him here for the
present!’
‘I am very much oblged to you,’ said my aunt; ‘and so is he, I
see; but—’
‘Co! I kn wat you mean,’ cried Mr. Wickfid. ‘You shal
not be oppressed by th receipt of favours, Miss Trotwd. You
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may pay for him, if you like We won’t be hard about terms, but
you shall pay if you wi.’
‘On that understanding,’ said my aunt, ‘thugh it doen’t lessen
the real obligatio, I shal be very glad to leave him’
‘Then co and see my littl housekeeper,’ said Mr. Wikfield.
We accordigly went up a wonderful od staircase; wth a
balustrade s broad that we might have gone up that, alt as
easily; and ito a shady old drawing-ro, lighted by some thre
or four of the quait windows I had looked up at from the street:
wich had od oak seats i th, that seed to have come of th
am tree as the shg oak floor, and the great beams in the
ceiling. It was a prettily furnished ro, with a piano and some
lvey furnture in red and green, and so flowers It sed to
be al old nooks and corners; and in every nook and crner there
as some quer littl tabl, or cupboard, or bokcase, or seat, or
sthing or other, that made m think there was nt suc
another good corner in the room; until I lked at the next one,
and found it equal to it, if not better. On everything there was the
same air of retirement and clanss that marked th house
utside.
Mr. Wikfield tapped at a door in a corner of the pand wal,
and a girl of about my own age came quickly out and kissed hi
On hr face, I saw immediatey th placid and swet expresion of
the lady whose piture had looked at me dotairs. It seed to
my imagination as if th portrait had gron wmanly, and th
riginal remained a child. Althugh her face was quite bright and
happy, there was a tranquilty about it, and about her—a quiet,
god, calm spirit—that I never have forgotten; that I shall never
forget. Th was his little housekeeper, his daughter Agn, Mr.
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Wikfield said. Wh I heard how he said it, and saw how he held
her hand, I guessd what the one motive of his lfe was
She had a little basket-trifle hangig at her side, wth keys in it;
and she looked as staid and as discret a housekeeper as th od
house culd have. She listened to her father as he told her about
me, with a plasant face; and wh he had concluded, propod to
y aunt that we shuld go upstairs and s my ro We al wt
together, s before us: and a glorious old room it was, with mre
oak beams, and diamond panes; and th broad balustrade gog
al the way up to it.
I cannot cal to mind whre or w, i my childhod, I had
se a staid glass window in a church. Nor do I ret its
ubjet. But I know that when I saw her turn round, i the grave
ght of the old staircas, and wait for us, above, I thought of that
wndow; and I associated something of its tranquil brightne with
Agnes Wickfid ever afterwards.
My aunt was as happy as I was, in th arranget made for
me; and w went dow to th drawig-ro again, we plasd
and gratified. As she wuld not hear of stayig to dinner, lest she
should by any chance fail to arrive at ho with th grey pony
before dark; and as I appred Mr. Wikfied kn her too wel
to argue any pot with her; so lunh was provided for her
there, and Agn wet back to her govern, and Mr. Wikfield to
offic So we were left to take leave of one another without any
restrait.
She tod m that everythig would be arranged for m by Mr.
Wikfied, and that I should want for nthing, and gave m the
kindet words and th best advice.
‘Trot,’ said my aunt in conclusion, ‘be a credit to yourself, to me,
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and Mr. Dick, and Heaven be with you!’
I was greatly overcome, and could only thank her, again and
agai, and send my lve to Mr. Dick.
‘Never,’ said my aunt, ‘be mean in anythng; never be false;
never be crue Avod th thre vices, Trot, and I can always be
hopeful of you.’
I proised, as we as I could, that I wuld not abus hr
kindn or forget her admtion.
‘Th pony’s at the door,’ said my aunt, ‘and I am off! Stay hre.’
With the words she embraced m hastiy, and wet out of th
room, sutting the door after her. At first I was startled by so
abrupt a departure, and almost feared I had displeased her; but
wen I looked into the street, and saw how dejectedly she got into
the chai, and drove away without lookig up, I understood her
better and did not do her that injusti
By five o’cock, which was Mr. Wikfield’s dir-hour, I had
mustered up my spirits again, and was ready for my knife and
fork. Th cloth was only laid for us tw; but Agnes was waiting in
the drawg-room before dir, went down with her father, and
sat oppote to him at tabl I doubted whether he could have
did without her.
We did not stay there, after dinner, but cam upstairs ito the
drawing-ro again: in on snug cornr of which, Agnes set
glas for her father, and a deanter of port win I thought he
wuld have missed its usual flavour, if it had be put thre for
hi by any other hands
Thre he sat, taking his wi, and taking a god deal of it, for
two hours; we Agn played on the piano, worked, and talked to
m and me. He was, for th most part, gay and cherful with us;
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but sotim his eyes rested on her, and he fel into a broodig
state, and was silent. She alays observed this quickly, I thught,
and always roused him with a questio or cares Then he cam
ut of his meditati, and drank more wi
gn made the tea, and presded over it; and the ti pasd
away after it, as after dinr, until she wnt to bed; w hr
fathr tok her in his arms and kissed her, and, she being go,
ordered candles in his office. Th I went to bed to
But i the course of the eveg I had rambld down to the
door, and a lttle way alg the street, that I might have another
pep at the old house, and the grey Cathedral; and might think of
my coming through that old city on my journey, and of my passing
the very house I lived in, withut kng it. A I came back, I saw
Uriah Hep shutting up th office; and feing friendly toards
verybody, went in and spoke to hm, and at parting, gave hm my
hand. But oh, what a clamy hand his was! as ghostly to the touch
as to the sight! I rubbed mi afterwards, to warm it, and to rub his
off.
It was such an unmfortabl hand, that, wh I went to my
ro, it was still cod and wet upo my memory. Leaning out of
the wdow, and seing oe of the fac on the beam-eds lookig
at me sideways, I fancied it was Uriah Hep got up thre
how, and shut him out in a hurry.
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Chapter 16
I AM A NEW BOY IN MORE SENSES THAN ONE
N
ext mrnig, after breakfast, I entered on school life
again. I wnt, accompanied by Mr. Wickfid, to th
scene of my future studies—a grave buiding i a
courtyard, wth a learned air about it that seed very well suited
to th stray roks and jackdaws wh came dow fro th
athedral towers to walk with a clrkly bearig on the grasplot—and was introducd to my ne master, Doctor Strong.
Doctor Strong looked almost as rusty, to my thking, as th tal
ron rai and gates outside the house; and alt as stiff and
heavy as the great stone urns that flanked them, and were set up,
o th top of th red-brick wall, at regular distances al round th
urt, lke subliated skittle, for Tim to play at. He was in his
brary (I man Doctor Strong was), with his cothes nt
particularly we brusd, and his hair not particularly w
mbed; his kn-smalls unbracd; his long black gaiters
unbuttod; and his shos yawing like tw caverns o th
hearth-rug. Turnig upon m a lustrel eye, that remnded m
of a lg-forgotten bld old horse who onc used to crop the
gras, and tumbl over the grave, in Blunderstone churchyard, he
said he was glad to se me: and th he gave me hi hand; w I
didn’t kn what to do with, as it did nthg for itsef.
But, sitting at work, not far from Doctor Strong, was a very
pretty young lady—whom he cald Annie, and who was his
daughter, I supposed—wh got me out of my difficulty by kning
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dow to put Doctor Strong’s shos on, and button his gaiters,
w she did with great cheerfuln and quikn Wh s
had find, and we were going out to the shoolroom, I was
much surprised to hear Mr. Wickfid, in bidding her god
mrnig, addre her as ‘Mrs. Strong’; and I was wonderig could
she be Doctor Strong’s son’s wfe, or could she be Mrs. Doctor
Strong, w Doctor Strong himself unnsciously enlighted
me.
‘By the by, Wickfield,’ he said, stoppig in a passage with hi
and on my shoulder; ‘you have not found any suitable provision
for my wife’s cous yet?’
‘No,’ said Mr. Wickfield. ‘No Not yet.’
‘I could wish it done as soo as it can be done, Wikfid,’ said
Doctor Strong, ‘for Jack Maldon is needy, and idl; and of those
two bad things, worse things sotim co What do Dotor
Watts say,’ he added, looking at me, and moving his had to th
time of his quotation, ‘“Satan fids some miscf still, for idle
hands to do.”’
‘Egad, Doctor,’ returned Mr. Wikfied, ‘if Doctor Watts kn
ankid, he might have written, with as muc truth, “Satan finds
some mischief still, for busy hands to do.” Th busy people acve
their full share of mef in the world, you may rey upon it.
What have the peopl be about, who have been the bust i
getting moy, and i getting power, this ctury or two? No
mischief?’
‘Jack Maldo wi nver be very busy in gettig either, I expect,’
said Doctor Strong, rubbing his chi thughtfully.
‘Perhaps not,’ said Mr. Wickfid; ‘and you bring me back to th
queti, wth an apolgy for digressing. No, I have not be able
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to dispose of Mr. Jack Maldon yet. I believe,’ he said this with
some hsitation, ‘I pentrate your motive, and it makes th thing
more difficult.’
‘My motive,’ returnd Doctor Strong, ‘is to make some suitable
provision for a cous, and an old playfe, of Annie’s.’
‘Yes, I kn,’ said Mr. Wickfield; ‘at hoe or abroad.’
‘Aye!’ replied th Doctor, apparently wonderig why he
phasized th words so much. ‘At ho or abroad.’
‘Your own expression, you know,’ said Mr. Wickfid. ‘Or
abroad.’
‘Surely,’ the Doctor anered. ‘Surely. One or other.’
‘On or other? Have you no choic?’ asked Mr. Wikfied.
‘No,’ returned the Doctor.
‘No?’ with astoshment.
‘Not the least.’
‘No motive,’ said Mr. Wickfield, ‘for meang abroad, and nt at
home?’
‘No,’ returned the Doctor.
‘I am bound to beeve you, and of cours I do beeve you,’ said
Mr. Wickfid. ‘It mght have simplified my office very much, if I
had known it before. But I cofe I entertaid another
impresion.’
Doctor Strong regarded hm wth a puzzled and doubting look,
wich almost immediatey subsided into a smile that gave me
great encuragemet; for it was full of amabity and seetn,
and thre was a simplicity in it, and indeed in his wh manner,
when the studius, poderig frost upon it was got through, very
attractive and hopeful to a young schoar like me. Repeatig ‘n’,
and ‘not the last’, and other short asurances to the sam
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purport, Dotor Strong jogged on before us, at a queer, uneve
pace; and we fod: Mr. Wickfid, looking grave, I observed,
and shakig his head to himelf, without knowing that I saw him
The schoolroom was a pretty large hall, on the quietest sde of
the house, cofroted by the stately stare of so half-dozen of
the great urns, and candig a pep of an old seuded garde
begig to the Dotor, where the peaches were ripening o the
suny suth wal There were two great aloes, in tubs, on the turf
outsde the widows; the broad hard leaves of w plant
(lkig as if thy were made of paited ti) have ever si, by
assocation, be symboical to me of silen and retirement.
bout five-and-twenty boys were studiusy engaged at their
books when we went in, but they rose to give the Dotor good
mrng, and reaied standig when they saw Mr. Wikfield and
me.
‘A new boy, young gentlemen,’ said th Doctor; ‘Trotwd
Cpperfield.’
On Adam, who was the head-boy, then stepped out of his
plac and welcomd me. He looked like a young crgyman, i h
white cravat, but he was very affable and good-humoured; and he
shod me my plac, and preted me to th masters, in a
gentlmanly way that would have put me at my eas, if anything
could.
It seemed to m so lg, however, sie I had been amg suc
boys, or among any companion of my own age, except Mick
Walker and Mealy Potato, that I felt as strange as ever I have
done in my life. I was so conscious of having passed through
scenes of which thy could have no knledge, and of having
acquired experices foreign to my age, appearance, and
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condition as on of th, that I half believed it was an imposture
to c there as an ordiary little schoolboy. I had be, in the
Murdstone and Griby tim, however short or log it may have
been, s unused to the sports and gam of boys, that I knew I was
awkward and ixpericed in th commonest things belongig to
th Whatever I had learnt, had so slipped away fro me in th
rdid cares of my lfe from day to night, that now, when I was
xamd about what I kn, I kn nothing, and was put into the
lwest form of the school. But, troubled as I was, by my want of
boyish skill, and of bok-larning to, I was made infinitely more
unmfortabl by th consideration, that, in what I did know, I
was much farthr removed fro my copanions than in wat I
did not. My mind ran upo what thy would think, if thy knew of
my familiar acquaintance with th King’s Bench Pri? Was
thre anythng about me which would reveal my prodings i
nnexi with th Micawber family—al th pawngs, and
seings, and suppers—in spite of myself? Suppose some of th
boys had seen m cog through Canterbury, wayworn and
ragged, and should find me out? What would thy say, w made
so light of money, if thy could kn ho I had scraped my
halfpee together, for the purchas of my daiy savey and beer,
or my slices of puddig? Ho would it affect th, wh were so
innocent of London life, and London strets, to discover ho
knowing I was (and was ashamed to be) in some of th meant
phas of both? Al this ran in my head s muc, on that first day
at Doctor Strong’s, that I felt ditrustful of my slghtest look and
gesture; shrunk within myself whsoever I was approached by
one of my new shoolfellows; and hurried off the miute school
was over, afraid of comitting myself in my respon to any
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friendly notice or advan
But thre was such an influe in Mr. Wickfid’s od huse,
that when I knked at it, with my nw school-books under my
arm, I began to fe my unasiness softeg away. As I went up to
y airy old room, the grave shadow of the staircase seemed to fal
upo my doubts and fears, and to make th past more indistict. I
sat thre, sturdily conning my boks, until dinr-time (w wre
out of school for good at three); and went down, hopeful of
beng a passable sort of boy yet.
gn was in the drawg-room, waitig for her father, who was
detaid by someo in his office. She met me with her plasant
se, and asked m how I liked the school. I told her I should like
t very muc, I hoped; but I was a little strange to it at first.
‘You have never been to school,’ I said, ‘have you?’
‘Oh yes! Every day.’
‘Ah, but you mean here, at your own home?’
‘Papa culdn’t spare m to go anywhere els,’ she anered,
smilg and shaking her head. ‘His housekeeper must be in hi
house, you know.’
‘He is very fond of you, I am sure,’ I said.
She ndded ‘Yes,’ and wt to the door to liten for his cog
up, that sh might met him on the stairs. But, as he was nt
there, se cam back agai
‘Mama has be dead ever sie I was born,’ she said, in her
quiet way. ‘I only kn hr picture, dowstairs. I saw you lookig
at it yesterday. Did you think wh it was?’
I told her yes, becaus it was so like hersf.
‘Papa says so, to,’ said Agnes, plased. ‘Hark! That’s papa
now!’
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Her bright calm face lghted up with pleasure as she went to
eet hi, and as they cam in, hand in hand. He greeted me
rdially; and told me I should certaiy be happy under Doctor
Strong, who was one of the gentlt of men.
‘Thre may be some, perhaps—I don’t know that thre are—
w abus his kidnss,’ said Mr. Wikfid. ‘Never be o of
th, Trotwd, in anythng. He is th least suspicious of
mankid; and whether that’s a merit, or whether it’s a blemih, it
deserve consideration in all dealings with th Doctor, great or
small.’
He spoke, I thught, as if he were weary, or dissatisfied with
thing; but I did not pursue the question in my mind, for
dinner was just then annund, and we went down and took the
same seats as before
We had scarcely done so, wh Uriah Hep put in hs red had
and his lank hand at th door, and said:
‘Here’s Mr. Maldo begs the favour of a word, sir.’
‘I am but this moment quit of Mr. Maldon,’ said his master.
‘Yes, sir,’ returnd Uriah; ‘but Mr. Maldo has come back, and
he begs the favour of a word.’ As he held the door open with hi
hand, Uriah looked at me, and looked at Agn, and looked at the
di, and looked at the plates, and looked at every object in th
room, I thought,—yet sed to look at nthing; he made suc an
appearance al th while of keeping his red eye dutifuly o h
master. ‘I beg your pardo. It’s ony to say, o reflecti,’ observed
a voice bed Uriah, as Uriah’s head was pushed away, and th
speaker’s substituted—‘pray excuse me for this intrusion—that as
it se I have no choic in the matter, the sooner I go abroad the
better. My cousin Annie did say, w we talked of it, that she
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lked to have her frieds within reach rather than to have them
banished, and th old Doctor—’
‘Doctor Strong, was that?’ Mr. Wikfied interposed, gravey.
‘Doctor Strog, of course,’ returned the othr; ‘I cal hm the od
Doctor; it’s al the same, you kn.’
‘I don’t know,’ returned Mr. Wikfied.
‘Well, Doctor Strong,’ said the other—‘Doctor Strong was of the
same mind, I believed. But as it appears fro th course you take
with m he has changed his md, why there’s no more to be said,
excpt that the sooner I am off, the better. Therefore, I thought I’d
c back and say, that the sooner I am off the better. Wh a
plunge i to be made into the water, it’s of n use lgerig o the
bank.’
‘Thre shall be as littl lingerig as possible, in your case, Mr.
Maldo, you may depend upo it,’ said Mr. Wickfield.
‘Thank’e,’ said the other. ‘Much obliged. I do’t want to look a
gift-horse in the mouth, whic is not a gracus thing to do;
othrwise, I dare say, my cous Annie could easly arrange it in
her own way. I suppo Annie would ony have to say to the old
Doctor—’
‘Meaning that Mrs Strong would only have to say to her
husband—do I fo you?’ said Mr. Wickfid.
‘Quite so,’ returned the other, ‘—would only have to say, that
she wanted such and such a thing to be so and so; and it would be
so and so, as a matter of course.’
‘And why as a matter of course, Mr. Maldo?’ asked Mr.
Wikfield, sedatey eatig his dier.
‘Why, becaus Annie’s a charmng young girl, and th old
Doctor—Dotor Strong, I mean—is not quite a charming young
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boy,’ said Mr. Jack Maldo, laughing. ‘No offence to anybody, Mr.
Wickfid. I only mean that I suppo some compesati is fair
and reasonable in that sort of marriage’
‘Compensation to the lady, sir?’ asked Mr. Wickfield gravey.
‘To the lady, sir,’ Mr. Jack Maldo answered, laughg. But
appearig to remark that Mr. Wikfied went on with his dir i
the sam sedate, ivable maner, and that there was no hope
of makig hi relax a mus of his fac, he added: ‘However, I
have said what I cam to say, and, with another apoogy for this
intrusion, I may take myself off. Of course I shall observe your
directins, in coderig the matter as one to be arranged
betwee you and me soy, and nt to be referred to, up at the
Doctor’s.’
‘Have you dined?’ asked Mr. Wickfid, with a moti of hi
hand towards the table
‘Thank’ee. I am gog to dine,’ said Mr. Maldo, ‘with my
cousin Annie Good-bye!’
Mr. Wickfid, withut rising, looked after hm thughtfully as
h went out. He was rathr a shallow sort of young gentleman, I
thought, with a hands fac, a rapid utterance, and a cfidet,
bod air. Ad this was the first I ever saw of Mr. Jack Maldo;
whom I had nt expeted to see s soon, when I heard the Doctor
speak of him that mrnig.
When we had did, we wet upstairs agai, were everythig
went on exactly as on the previus day. Agn set the glas and
decanters in th same cornr, and Mr. Wickfid sat dow to drik,
and drank a god deal Agnes played th piano to him, sat by him,
and wrked and talked, and played some games at dominoe with
me. In god time she made tea; and afterwards, w I brought
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do my books, looked into them, and showed me what she knew
of th (wich was no slight matter, thugh she said it was), and
what was the bet way to learn and understand them I s her,
wth her modest, orderly, placid manner, and I har hr beautiful
calm voice, as I write th words. Th influence for all god,
wich she came to exercise over me at a later time, begins already
to descend upo my breast. I love littl Em’ly, and I don’t love
Agnes—no, not at all in that way—but I fe that thre are
goodn, peace, and truth, wherever Agn is; and that the sft
light of th coloured wido in th church, see long ago, fals o
her always, and on m when I am near her, and on everything
around.
The tim having co for her withdrawal for the night, and s
aving left us, I gave Mr. Wickfid my hand, preparatory to going
away myself. But he cheked me and said: ‘Shuld you like to stay
wth us, Trotwd, or to go elsewhere?’
‘To stay,’ I answered, quickly.
‘You are sure?’
‘If you please. If I may!’
‘Why, it’s but a dul lfe that we lead hre, boy, I am afraid,’ h
said.
‘Not more dul for me than Agns, sir. Not dul at al!’
‘Than Agn,’ he repeated, walkig slowly to the great cypiece, and leaning against it. ‘Than Agnes!’
He had drank w that evenig (or I fand it), unti his eyes
were bloodshot. Not that I culd s them now, for they were cast
dow, and shaded by his hand; but I had noticed th a littl
whil before.
‘Now I wonder,’ he muttered, ‘whether my Agn tires of me
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Wh suld I ever tire of her! But that’s differet, that’s quite
different.’
He was musing, not speaking to me; so I reaid quiet.
‘A dull old house,’ he said, ‘and a monotonous lfe; but I must
have her near me I must keep her nar m If the thought that I
may die and leave my darling, or that my darling may die and
leave me, comes lke a spetre, to distress my happiest hours, and
i only to be drowned in—’
He did nt supply the word; but pacg slowly to the plac
where he had sat, and meanaly going through the action of
pouring wi fro th empty decanter, set it dow and paced
back again.
‘If it is miserabl to bear, wh she is hre,’ h said, ‘what
wuld it be, and she away? No, n, no I cant try that.’
He leand against th chiy-piece, broding so long that I
could not decide whthr to run th risk of disturbing him by
going, or to remai quietly where I was, until he should co out
of his reverie. At legth he aroused himf, and looked about the
room until his eyes enuntered m
‘Stay with us, Trotwood, eh?’ he said in his usual manr, and
as if he were answerig somethg I had just said. ‘I am glad of it.
You are cpany to us both. It is wholese to have you here.
Wholese for m, wholese for Agn, wholes perhaps for
al of us.’
‘I am sure it is for me, sir,’ I said. ‘I am so glad to be here.’
‘That’s a fi fellow!’ said Mr. Wickfid. ‘As long as you are
glad to be here, you shal stay here.’ He shook hands with m upo
it, and clapped me on th back; and told me that wh I had
anythng to do at night after Agnes had left us, or w I wshed to
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read for my own plasure, I was free to c down to hi room, if
h were thre and if I desired it for company’s sake, and to sit wth
m. I thanked him for his consideration; and, as he went dow
oon afterwards, and I was nt tired, went down too, with a book
i my hand, to avai mysf, for half-an-hour, of his permon.
But, seg a light in the little round offic, and idiatey
feeg mysf attracted towards Uriah Heep, who had a sort of
fascinati for me, I went in thre instead. I found Uriah readig a
great fat book, with suc detrative attentin, that hi lank
forefinger followd up every line as he read, and made clammy
tracks along th page (or so I fuly believed) like a snai
‘You are workig late tonight, Uriah,’ says I.
‘Yes, Master Copperfield,’ says Uriah.
A I was getting on the stool oppote, to talk to him more
conveiently, I observed that he had not such a thing as a s
about him, and that he could only wide his muth and make two
hard creases dow his cheks, on on each side, to stand for on
‘I am nt doig office-wrk, Master Copperfield,’ said Uriah
‘What work, then?’ I asked.
‘I am improving my legal knowledge, Master Copperfield,’ said
Uriah. ‘I am going through Tidd’s Practic Oh, what a writer Mr.
Tidd is, Master Copperfield!’
My sto was such a tor of observation, that as I watcd hi
reading on again, after this rapturous exclamation, and foing
up th lines with his forefinger, I observed that hs nostrils, wich
wre thin and poited, with sharp dints in th, had a singular
and most unmfortabl way of expandig and contractig
themsves—that they seemed to twkle intead of hi eyes,
w hardly ever twkled at al
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‘I suppose you are quite a great lawyer?’ I said, after looking at
hm for some time.
‘Me, Master Copperfield?’ said Uriah. ‘Oh, no! I’m a very umbl
pers.’
It was no fany of mne about his hands, I observed; for he
frequently ground th palms against each othr as if to squeze
th dry and warm, besdes often wiping th, i a stealthy way,
o his pocket-handkerchief.
‘I am well aware that I am th umblest pers going,’ said
Uriah Heep, mdetly; ‘let the other be where he may. My mther
is likew a very umbl pers We live in a numble abode,
Master Copperfield, but have much to be thankful for. My fathr’s
formr callg was umbl He was a sexto.’
‘What is he nw?’ I asked.
‘He is a partaker of glry at pret, Master Copperfield,’ said
Uriah Hep. ‘But we have muc to be thankful for. Ho muc
ave I to be thankful for in livig with Mr. Wickfield!’
I asked Uriah if he had bee with Mr. Wickfid long?
‘I have be with him, gog on four year, Master Copperfield,’
said Uriah; shutting up his bok, after carefully markig th place
were he had lft off. ‘Si a year after my father’s death. How
muc have I to be thankful for, in that! How muc have I to be
thankful for, in Mr. Wikfied’s kid intenti to give m my
articles, which would othrwise not lay within th umbl means of
mothr and self!’
‘Thn, wh your articled time is over, you’ll be a regular
lawyer, I suppo?’ said I.
‘With th blssing of Providence, Master Copperfield,’ returnd
Uriah.
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‘Perhaps you’l be a partner in Mr. Wickfid’s business, o of
the days,’ I said, to make mysf agreeable; ‘and it w be
Wikfield and Heep, or Heep late Wikfied.’
‘Oh no, Master Copperfield,’ returnd Uriah, shakig his head,
‘I am much to umble for that!’
He certainly did look unmmonly like th carved face on th
beam outside my window, as he sat, in his humility, eyeing m
sideways, with his mouth widened, and th creass in hi cheks.
‘Mr. Wickfid is a most excellent man, Master Copperfield,’
said Uriah. ‘If you have known him log, you know it, I am sure,
muc better than I can inform you.’
I replied that I was certain he was; but that I had not kn
m long myself, thugh he was a friend of my aunt’s
‘Oh, inded, Master Copperfid,’ said Uriah ‘Your aunt is a
swet lady, Master Copperfield!’
He had a way of writhig when he wanted to expres
thusiasm, which was very ugly; and which diverted my attention
fro th compliment he had paid my relati, to th snaky
twistings of his throat and body.
‘A swet lady, Master Copperfield!’ said Uriah Hep. ‘Sh has a
great admration for Mi Agn, Master Copperfid, I beeve?’
I said, ‘Yes,’ bodly; not that I knew anythg about it, Heaven
forgive me!
‘I hope you have, to, Master Copperfield,’ said Uriah ‘But I am
sure you must have.’
‘Everybody must have,’ I returned.
‘Oh, thank you, Master Copperfield,’ said Uriah Hep, ‘for that
remark! It is so true! Umbl as I am, I know it i so true! Oh, thank
you, Master Copperfield!’ He writhd himsef quite off his sto in
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the exctet of his feegs, and, beg off, began to make
arrangets for going home
‘Mothr wll be expecting me,’ he said, referring to a pale,
inexpresive-faced watc in his pocket, ‘and getting unasy; for
though we are very umble, Master Copperfid, w are muc
attaced to one another. If you would co and see us, any
aftern, and take a cup of tea at our lowy dweng, mothr
would be as proud of your copany as I should be’
I said I should be glad to come.
‘Thank you, Master Copperfield,’ returnd Uriah, putting hi
bok away upo th shef—‘I suppose you stop hre, some time,
Master Copperfield?’
I said I was going to be brought up there, I believed, as log as I
remaied at shool.
you would come
‘Oh, inded!’ exclaid Uriah. ‘I should think
into th busine at last, Master Copperfield!’
I proteted that I had no vis of that sort, and that no such
sche was entertained in my bealf by anybody; but Uriah
insisted on blandly replying to all my assurances, ‘Oh, yes, Master
Cpperfield, I should thk you would, indeed!’ and, ‘Oh, ideed,
Master Cpperfield, I should thk you would, certainly!’ over and
over agai Beig, at last, ready to leave the offic for the nght, he
asked me if it would suit my conveience to have th light put out;
and on my anerig ‘Yes,’ intantly extiguised it. After
shaking hands with me—his hand felt like a fish, i th dark—h
opened the door into the street a very little, and crept out, and
sut it, leavig me to grope my way back into the house: whic
st me some troubl and a fal over his sto This was th
proximate caus, I suppose, of my dreamng about hm, for wat
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appeared to me to be half the night; and dreamg, amg other
things, that he had laund Mr. Peggotty’s house on a piratial
xpediti, with a black flag at th masthad, bearig th
inscription ‘Tidd’s Practice’, under wich diaboical esign h was
arrying me and little Em’ly to the Spanih Mai, to be drowned.
I got a lttle the better of my uneas when I went to school
nxt day, and a good deal the better next day, and s shook it off
by degree, that in le than a fortnight I was quite at home, and
happy, amg my new companions. I was awkward eugh in
thr games, and backward enugh in thr studies; but custo
uld improve me in th first respect, I hoped, and hard work in
the sd. Ardigly, I went to work very hard, both in play
and in earnt, and gaied great codati Ad, i a very
littl wile, th Murdsto and Grinby life became so strange to
that I hardly beeved in it, whe my preent life grew s
familiar, that I seed to have bee leadig it a long time.
Doctor Strong’s was an exceent school; as different from Mr.
Creakle’s as god is fro evil. It was very gravey and decorously
ordered, and on a sound syste; with an appeal, in everythng, to
the honour and good faith of the boys, and an avowed intentin to
rely on thr possession of th qualities unles thy proved
thlve unrthy of it, which worked wonders. We all felt that
w had a part in th management of th place, and in sustaining
its character and dignity. He, we soo became warmly attached
to it—I am sure I did for on, and I never knew, in all my time, of
any other boy beg otherwis—and learnt with a good wil,
desirig to do it credit. We had nobl games out of hurs, and
plenty of liberty; but even then, as I reber, we were we
spoken of in th to, and rarely did any disgrac, by our
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appearance or manr, to th reputati of Doctor Strong and
Doctor Strog’s boys
So of the higher scholars boarded i the Doctor’s house, and
through th I learnd, at second hand, some particulars of th
Doctor’s history—as, how he had nt yet been married twelve
mths to the beautiful young lady I had s i the study, whom
h had marrid for love; for she had not a sixpen, and had a
world of poor relations (so our fellows said) ready to sarm the
Doctor out of house and home. Al, how the Doctor’s cgitating
manr was attributabl to his beg always egaged i lookig
out for Grek rots; which, in my innocen and ignorance, I
supposed to be a botanical furor on th Doctor’s part, especially as
he always looked at the ground when he walked about, until I
understood that they were roots of words, with a vie to a n
Dictionary which he had in conteplation. Adams, our had-boy,
w had a turn for mathatics, had made a calculation, I was
informd, of th time this Dictionary wuld take in completing, o
th Doctor’s plan, and at th Doctor’s rate of going. He considered
that it might be done in on thusand six hundred and forty-n
years, counting fro th Doctor’s last, or sixty-sd, birthday.
But the Doctor hielf was the idol of the whole school: and it
must have be a badly copoed school if he had been anything
e, for h was th kindet of men; with a simple faith in him that
mght have touched the stone hearts of the very urns upon the
wal A he walked up and down that part of the courtyard whic
as at th side of th house, wth th stray roks and jackdaw
ookig after him with their heads coked syly, as if they kn
much more knowg thy were in wrldly affairs than h, if
any srt of vagabod culd only get near enough to his creakig
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shos to attract his attention to on sentece of a tale of distress,
that vagabond was made for the next two days. It was so ntorious
in th house, that th masters and had-boys tok pais to cut
thes marauders off at angle, and to get out of windows, and turn
them out of the curtyard, before they could make the Dotor
aware of thr prece; which was sometimes happily effected
within a few yards of him, without his knowing anything of the
matter, as he jogged to and fro. Outside his own doai, and
unprotected, he was a very sheep for the shearers. He wuld have
taken his gaiters off his legs, to give away. In fact, thre was a story
current amg us (I have no idea, and nver had, on what
authrity, but I have believed it for so many years that I fe quite
certain it is true), that on a froty day, on wnter-time, h actually
did besto his gaiters on a beggar-wman, wh ocasioned some
sandal i the nghbourhood by exhibiting a fine infant from door
to door, wrapped in th garmts, wich wre universally
recgnized, beg as well known in the victy as the Cathedral.
The legend added that the only person who did nt idetify them
was the Doctor himelf, who, when they were shortly afterwards
diplayed at the door of a lttle sed-hand shop of n very good
repute, where suc things were taken in excange for gin, was
more than once observed to handle th approvingly, as if
admiring some curius novelty in th pattern, and conidering
them an iprovemet on his own.
It was very pleasant to see th Doctor with his pretty young
wfe. He had a fatherly, begnant way of showig his fondn for
hr, which seed in itself to expres a god man. I often saw
them walkig in the garde where the peaches were, and I
sometimes had a nearer observation of th in th study or th
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parlour. Sh appeared to me to take great care of the Dotor, and
to like him very muc, though I never thought her vitaly
interested in th Dictionary: some cumbrous fragments of wich
wrk th Doctor always carrid in his pockets, and in th lining of
hi hat, and genrally sed to be expoundig to her as they
walked about.
I saw a good deal of Mrs. Strong, both beause she had take a
lkig for me on the morning of my itroduction to the Dotor, and
was alays afterwards kind to me, and interested in me; and
becaus she was very fond of Agnes, and was often backwards and
forwards at our house. Thre was a curius constraint betw
her and Mr. Wikfied, I thought (of whom se seemed to be
afraid), that nver wore off. When she cam there of an evenig,
she always shrunk fro acceptig his escort ho, and ran away
wth me instead. Ad sometimes, as we were running gaily across
the Cathedral yard together, expetig to met nobody, we would
meet Mr. Jack Maldo, wh was always surprised to see us
Mrs. Strong’s mama was a lady I took great delight in Her
nam was Mrs. Marklham; but our boys used to cal her the Old
Soldier, o account of her geralip, and th skill with which
s marshalld great force of relatio agait the Dotor. Sh
as a lttle, sarp-eyed wan, who used to wear, when she was
dred, on unchangeable cap, ornamented wth some artificial
flrs, and tw artificial butterflies supposed to be hovering
above the flowers There was a superstitio among us that this cap
had com fro France, and could only originate i th
workmanship of that ingenious nation: but al I crtaiy know
about it, i, that it alays made its appearance of an eveing,
whereoever Mrs. Marklham made her appearance; that it was
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carried about to friedly metigs in a Hindoo basket; that the
butterfli had the gift of tremblg cotantly; and that they
improved th shiing hours at Doctor Strong’s expense, like busy
bees.
I obsrved the Old Soldir—nt to adopt the nam
disrepectfully—to pretty god advantage, on a nght wich is
made memorabl to me by somethg el I shal relate. It was th
ght of a little party at the Dotor’s, whic was given on the
occason of Mr. Jack Maldo’s departure for India, whither he was
going as a cadet, or sthing of that kid: Mr. Wikfied having
at length arranged th business. It happened to be th Doctor’s
birthday, too. We had had a holday, had made preents to him in
the mornig, had made a speh to him through the head-boy, and
had cheered him until we were hoarse, and until he had sed
tears. Ad now, in th eveg, Mr. Wickfid, Agnes, and I, went
to have tea with him in his private capacty.
Mr. Jack Maldo was there, before us. Mrs. Strong, dred i
white, with chrry-coloured ribbo, was playig the piano, when
we went in; and he was lanig over her to turn the leave The
clear red and white of her complexi was not so bling and
flower-lke as usual, I thought, when she turned round; but s
ooked very pretty, Woderfully pretty.
‘I have forgotte, Doctor,’ said Mrs Strog’s mama, wh w
were seated, ‘to pay you the coplts of the day—though they
are, as you may suppo, very far fro being mere compliments in
my case. Allow me to wish you many happy returns.’
‘I thank you, ma’am,’ replied the Doctor.
‘Many, many, many, happy returns,’ said the Old Soldier. ‘Not
only for your own sake, but for Annie’s, and Jo Maldon’s, and
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many other peopl’s It seems but yesterday to me, John, when
you were a little creature, a head shorter than Master Cpperfied,
makig baby lve to Ane bed the gooseberry bus in th
back-garden’
‘My dear mama,’ said Mrs. Strog, ‘never mind that n’
‘Anie, don’t be absurd,’ returned her mother. ‘If you are to
blush to hear of suc things nw you are an old married woman,
when are you not to blush to hear of them?’
‘Old?’ exclaimed Mr. Jack Maldo. ‘Aie? Com!’
‘Yes, Jo,’ returned the Soldier. ‘Virtualy, an od married
wman. Althugh not old by years—for w did you ever har
m say, or who has ever heard me say, that a girl of twenty was old
by years!—your cousin is th wife of th Doctor, and, as such, wat
I have described hr. It is we for you, Jo, that your cousin is
the wife of the Doctor. You have found in him an ifluential and
kind frind, who will be kider yet, I venture to predict, if you
deserve it. I have no fal pride I never hesitate to admit, frankly,
that there are so mebers of our famy who want a frid. You
wre o yourself, before your cousin’s influence raised up on for
you.’
The Doctor, in the goodn of his heart, waved hi hand as if to
make lght of it, and save Mr. Jack Maldo from any further
remnder. But Mrs. Marklham canged her cair for one nxt the
Doctor’s, and putting her fan on his coat-sleeve, said:
‘No, really, my dear Doctor, you must excuse me if I appear to
dwell o this rathr, becaus I fe so very strongly. I cal it quite
my monomania, it is such a subjet of mine. You are a blsing to
us. You realy are a Boon, you know.’
‘Nonnse, nonsen,’ said th Doctor.
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‘No, no, I beg your pardo,’ retorted the Old Soldier. ‘With
nobody pret, but our dear and confidetial friend Mr.
Wikfied, I cant cot to be put down. I shall begin to assrt
the privieges of a mther-i-law, if you go on lke that, and scold
you. I am perfetly hot and outspoken What I am saying, i
at I said wh you first overpowred me wth surprise—you
remember ho surprised I was?—by propoing for Anie. Not
that there was anything so very muc out of the way, in the mre
fact of th propoal—it would be ridiculous to say that!—but
beause, you having known her poor father, and having known
her from a baby six moths old, I hadn’t thought of you i suc a
lght at all, or inded as a marrying man in any way,—sply that,
you know.’
‘Aye, aye,’ returned the Doctor, god-humuredly. ‘Never
mind.’
‘But I do mind,’ said th Old Soldier, laying her fan upo hi
lips. ‘I mind very much. I real th things that I may be
tradited if I am wrong. We! Then I spoke to Ae, and I tod
her what had happed. I said, “My dear, here’s Doctor Strong
has postively be and made you th subjet of a handsome
declaration and an offer.” Did I pres it in th least? No. I said,
“Now, Annie, tell me the truth this mt; i your heart free?”
“Mama,” she said cryig, “I am extremely young”—which was
perfectly true—“and I hardly know if I have a heart at al” “Then,
my dear,” I said, “you may rey upo it, it’s free. At al events, my
love,” said I, “Dotor Strong is in an agitated state of mind, and
must be answered. He cant be kept in his pret state of
suspense.” “Mama,” said Annie, still crying, “would h be
unhappy without me? If he would, I honour and respect hi so
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muc, that I think I wil have him” So it was sttled. And then,
and not ti th, I said to Annie, “Annie, Doctor Strong w not
only be your husband, but he wil repret your late father: he
wil represt the head of our famy, he will represt the wisdom
and station, and I may say th means, of our famly; and wi be, in
hort, a Boon to it.” I used the word at the tim, and I have used it
agai, today. If I have any merit it is coteny.’
Th daughter had sat quite silent and still during this speech,
with her eyes fixed on the ground; her cousi standig nar her,
and lookig on the ground too. She nw said very sftly, i a
tremblg voic:
‘Mama, I hope you have finisd?’
‘No, my dear Annie,’ returnd th Old Soldier, ‘I have not quite
not. I
fid. Since you ask me, my love, I reply that I have
cplai that you realy are a lttle unnatural towards your own
family; and, as it is of no us complaig to you. I mean to
mplai to your husband. Now, my dear Doctor, do look at that
silly wife of yours.’
As th Doctor turnd his kind face, with its smile of siplicity
and gentl, towards her, she drooped her head mre. I noticd
that Mr. Wikfied looked at her steadiy.
‘When I happed to say to that naughty thing, the other day,’
pursued her mother, shakig her head and her fan at her,
playfuly, ‘that thre was a famly circumstance sh might mention
to you—indeed, I think, was bound to mention—she said, that to
mention it was to ask a favour; and that, as you were to gerous,
and as for her to ask was alays to have, she wouldn’t.’
‘Anie, my dear,’ said the Doctor. ‘That was wrog. It robbed
me of a plasure.’
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‘Almost the very words I said to her!’ excaid her mother.
‘Now realy, another tim, when I know what she would tell you
but for this reason, and won’t, I have a great mind, my dear
Doctor, to tell you myself.’
‘I shall be glad if you will,’ returnd th Doctor.
‘Shal I?’
‘Certaiy.’
‘Wel, th, I wi!’ said th Old Soldier. ‘That’s a bargain.’ Ad
having, I suppose, carrid hr point, she tapped th Doctor’s hand
sveral tim with her fan (whic sh kid first), and returned
triumphantly to her formr station.
Some more company coming in, among wh were th tw
masters and Adams, th talk became geral; and it naturaly
turned on Mr. Jack Maldo, and his voyage, and the country he
was going to, and his varius plans and propects. He was to leave
that night, after supper, in a post-cai, for Graved; whre th
ship, i which he was to make th voyage, lay; and was to be
gone—un he cam home on leave, or for his health—I do’t
know h many years. I rellect it was settld by geral cont
that India was quite a misreprented country, and had nothing
objectinable i it, but a tiger or two, and a lttle heat i the warm
part of the day. For my own part, I looked on Mr. Jack Maldo as a
modern Sindbad, and pictured him th bosom friend of al th
Rajah in th East, sitting under canopi, smokig curly golden
pipes—a mile long, if thy could be straighted out.
Mrs. Strong was a very pretty siger: as I kn, who often
ard her singing by hersf. But, whthr she was afraid of
singing before people, or was out of voice that eveing, it was
certain that she couldn’t sing at all. She tried a duet, oce, wth
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hr cousin Maldon, but could not so much as begin; and
afterwards, when s tried to sig by hersef, although sh began
swetly, her voice died away on a sudden, and left hr quite
ditressd, with her head hangig down over the keys. The good
Doctor said she was nervous, and, to reve hr, propod a round
game at cards; of which he kn as much as of th art of playing
the trombo But I remarked that the Old Soldir took hi into
custody directly, for her partner; and intructed him, as the first
preiminary of initiati, to give her all th silver he had in hi
pocket.
We had a merry game, not made th les merry by th Doctor’s
mistake, of which he committed an innumerabl quantity, in spite
of the watchfuln of the butterfli, and to their great
aggravati Mrs. Strong had ded to play, on the ground of
not feg very well; and her cousin Maldo had excused hmself
becaus h had some packing to do. Whe he had done it,
however, he returned, and they sat together, talkig, on the sofa.
From tim to tim she cam and looked over the Doctor’s hand,
and told him what to play. She was very pale, as she bent over
hi, and I thought her finger trembld as sh poted out the
cards; but th Doctor was quite happy in her attention, and tok
no notice of this, if it were so.
At supper, we were hardly so gay. Everyo appeared to fe
that a partig of that sort was an awkward thing, and that th
arer it approached, th more awkward it was. Mr. Jack Maldon
tried to be very talkative, but was not at hi eas, and made
atters worse And they were not improved, as it appeared to m,
by th Old Soldier: w contiually reald passage of Mr. Jack
Maldo’s youth
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The Doctor, however, who felt, I am sure, that he was makig
everybody happy, was we plased, and had no suspicion but that
we were al at the utmot height of enjoyment.
‘Anni, my dear,’ said he, lookig at his watch, and filg his
glass, ‘it i past your cousin jack’s time, and we must not detai
m, since time and tide—both conrned in this case—wait for no
man. Mr. Jack Maldon, you have a long voyage, and a strange
untry, before you; but many men have had both, and many men
wil have both, to the ed of tim The winds you are going to
tempt, have wafted thousands upon thousands to fortune, and
brought thusands upo thusands happily back.’
‘It’s an affectig thing,’ said Mrs. Markleham—‘hover it’s
viewed, it’s affectig, to see a fin young man one has known from
an ifant, going away to the other end of the world, lavig al he
knows bend, and not knowing what’s before him A young man
really we deserve contant support and patroage,’ looking at
th Doctor, ‘wh makes such sacrifices.’
‘Time w go fast wth you, Mr. Jack Maldo,’ pursued th
Doctor, ‘and fast wth all of us Some of us can hardly expect,
perhaps, i the natural course of things, to greet you on your
return. The nxt bet thing is to hope to do it, and that’s my cas I
sal not weary you with good advic You have long had a good
mde before you, in your cusi Ane. Imitate her virtues as
arly as you can.’
Mrs. Marklam fanned hersef, and shook her head.
‘Farel, Mr. Jack,’ said th Doctor, standing up; on which we
all stod up. ‘A prosperous voyage out, a thriving carer abroad,
and a happy return ho!’
We al drank the toast, and al shook hands with Mr. Jack
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Maldo; after whic he hastiy took leave of the ladi who were
there, and hurried to the door, where he was reved, as he got
into th chaise, wth a tredous broadside of chers discharged
by our boys, who had asbld on the lawn for the purpose.
Rung i amg them to swl the ranks, I was very near the
chaise wh it rolled away; and I had a lvely impression made
upo me, in th midst of th noise and dust, of having see Mr.
Jack Maldon rattl past with an agitated face, and somethg
cherry-cured in his hand.
fter another broadsde for the Doctor, and another for the
Doctor’s wfe, th boys dispersd, and I went back into th house,
where I found the guests al standig i a group about the Dotor,
discussing ho Mr. Jack Maldon had go away, and ho h had
borne it, and how he had felt it, and al the rest of it. In the mdst
of thes remarks, Mrs. Marklham crid: ‘Where’s Annie?’
No Ae was there; and when they caled to her, no An
replied. But all presing out of th ro, in a crod, to see what
was the matter, we found her lyig on the hall floor. There was
great alarm at first, until it was found that sh was in a soon, and
that the soon was yiedig to the usual mean of recvery; when
the Doctor, who had lifted her head upon his knee, put her curls
aside with hi hand, and said, lokig around:
‘Poor Ae! She’s s faithful and teder-hearted! It’s th
parting fro her old playfe and friend—her favourite cous—
that has done this. Ah! It’s a pity! I am very sorry!’
When she opened her eyes, and saw were se was, and that
w were all standing about her, she aro with assistance: turning
hr head, as she did so, to lay it on th Doctor’s shoulder—or to
de it, I do’t know whic We went into the drawg-room, to
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lave her with the Doctor and her mther; but se said, it seemed,
that sh was better than s had be si morning, and that sh
would rather be brought among us; so they brought her i, lookig
very white and weak, I thught, and sat her on a sofa.
‘Annie, my dear,’ said her mothr, doing something to her
dres ‘See here! You have lot a bo Wi anybody be so good as
find a ribbo; a crry-coloured ribbo?’
It was the one she had worn at her bo We al looked for it; I
myself looked everywre, I am certain—but nobody could find it.
‘Do you rellect whre you had it last, Annie?’ said her
mothr.
I wondered how I could have thought she looked white, or
anythig but burng red, w she anered that se had had it
safe, a lttle whil ago, s thought, but it was not worth lookig
for.
Neverthless, it was looked for again, and stil not found. She
treated that there might be no mre sarcg; but it was sti
sought for, in a desultory way, until she was quite we, and th
mpany tok thr departure
We walked very sly ho, Mr. Wikfid, Agn, and I—
Agnes and I admiring th mooght, and Mr. Wickfid scarcely
raig his eyes from the ground. Wh we, at last, reached our
on door, Agnes discovered that she had left her littl reticule
bend. Deghted to be of any servic to her, I ran back to fetch it.
I wnt into th supper-ro whre it had be left, which was
deserted and dark. But a door of communicati betw that and
the Doctor’s study, where there was a light, beg ope, I pased
on there, to say what I wanted, and to get a candl
Th Doctor was sitting in his easy-cair by th fireside, and h
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young wife was on a stool at his feet. The Doctor, with a
complacent sile, was reading alud some manuscript
explanati or statet of a theory out of that itermiabl
Dictionary, and she was looking up at hi But with such a face as
I never saw. It was so beautiful in its form, it was so ashy pale, it
was so fixed in its abstraction, it was so full of a wild, sleepwalkig, dreamy horror of I do’t know what. The eye were wide
open, and her brown hair fell in two ric clusters on her shoulders,
and on her wte dres, dirdered by the want of the lot ribbon.
Distinctly as I ret hr look, I cant say of what it was
xpressive, I cannot eve say of what it is expreve to me now,
rising again before my older judget. Penite, humliation,
same, pride, lve, and trustfuln—I see them al; and i them
all, I see that horror of I don’t know what.
My entrance, and my saying what I wanted, rousd hr. It
disturbed th Doctor to, for wh I went back to replace th
andl I had take from the table, he was patting her head, in his
fatherly way, and saying he was a merci drone to lt her tempt
hi into readig on; and he would have her go to bed.
But she asked hi, in a rapid, urgent manr, to let her stay—
to lt her fee asured (I heard her murmur so broke words to
this effect) that she was in his confidece that night. And, as she
turned again towards him, after glancg at m as I lft the room
and went out at the door, I saw her cross her hands upo his knee,
and look up at him with th same face, something quieted, as h
resumed his reading.
It made a great impre on me, and I remembered it a long
tim afterwards; as I shall have occas to narrate when the tim
mes.
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Chapter 17
SOMEBODY TURNS UP
I
t has not occurred to me to meti Peggotty s I ran
away; but, of course, I wrote her a letter almost as soo as I
was hused at Dover, and anthr, and a longer letter,
containing all particulars fully reated, wh my aunt tok me
formaly under her protection. On my beg settled at Doctor
Strong’s I wrote to her agai, detaig my happy cnditi and
prospects. I never could have derived anythng like th pleasure
from spendig the my Mr. Dik had given m, that I felt in
dig a gold half-guina to Peggotty, per pot, ed in this
last letter, to discharge th sum I had borrod of her: in which
epistle, not before, I mentioned about th young man with th
dokey-cart.
To th communicatis Peggotty replied as proptly, if not
as concisy, as a mercant’s clerk. Her utmost powrs of
expression (wich were certainly not great in ink) were exhausted
i the attempt to write what s felt on the subjet of my journey.
Four side of inoherent and interjectional beginnings of
senteces, that had no end, except blts, were inadequate to afford
her any relf. But the blots were more expreve to me than the
best composition; for thy shod me that Peggotty had be
crying all over th paper, and what could I have desired more?
I made out, without muc difficulty, that sh could nt take
quite kindly to my aunt yet. The notic was too short after s lg
a prepossion th othr way. We never kn a pers, she
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wrote; but to think that Miss Betsy should see to be so different
from what se had been thought to be, was a Moral!—that was her
wrd. She was evidently sti afraid of Mi Betsy, for she sent hr
grateful duty to her but timdly; and sh was evidetly afraid of
me, to, and entertained th probabiity of my runing away agai
oon: if I mght judge from the repeated hits s threw out, that
the coach-fare to Yarmouth was always to be had of her for the
asking.
She gave me on piece of inteigece which affected me very
muc, namy, that there had been a sal of the furnture at our
old home, and that Mr. and Mis Murdsto were gone away, and
th house was shut up, to be let or sold. God knows I had no part
i it whe they reaied there, but it paied m to thk of th
dear old plac as altogether abandod; of the weeds growing tall
the garde, and the fall lave lyig thick and wet upon the
paths. I iagid how the winds of winter would howl round it,
how the cod rai would beat upo the window-glas, how the
moon would make ghosts on the wal of the empty rooms,
watchig their sotude all nght. I thought afres of the grave i
the churcyard, undernath the tree: and it seemed as if the house
re dead to, now, and all coted with my fathr and mothr
wre faded away.
There was n other news in Peggotty’s letters. Mr. Barki was
an exct husband, s said, though sti a little near; but we all
had our faults, and se had plty (though I am sure I do’t know
wat thy were); and he sent hi duty, and my littl bedro was
always ready for me Mr. Peggotty was wel, and Ham was wel,
and Mrs.. Gummidge was but poorly, and littl Em’ly wouldn’t
sd her lve, but said that Peggotty might sed it, if sh lked.
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All this inteigece I dutifully imparted to my aunt, only
resrving to mysf the meti of lttle Em’ly, to whom I
instictivey felt that she would not very tenderly incl While I
was yet ne at Doctor Strong’s, she made several excursions over
to Canterbury to see me, and alays at unsasonabl hours: wth
th vi, I suppose, of taking me by surprise. But, fiding me w
ployed, and bearig a god character, and harig o all hands
that I rose fast in the school, se soon diontinued these vists. I
saw her on a Saturday, every thrd or fourth week, when I wt
over to Dover for a treat; and I saw Mr. Dick every alternate
Wedneday, wh he arrived by stage-coac at noo, to stay unti
xt morng.
On thes occasns Mr. Dik never traved without a leathern
writing-desk, containing a supply of stationery and th Memorial;
i relation to whic doumt he had a notion that tim was
beginnig to pre nw, and that it really must be got out of hand.
Mr. Dick was very partial to gingerbread. To render his visits
the more agreeable, my aunt had intructed me to open a credit
for hm at a cake shop, wich was hampered with th stipulati
that he should not be served with more than one sg’s-worth
in th course of any on day. This, and th reference of all h littl
bi at the county in where he slpt, to my aunt, before they were
paid, induced me to suspect that he was only allowd to rattl h
money, and not to spend it. I found on furthr investigation that
this was so, or at least there was an agreet betwee hi and
my aunt that h should account to her for all his disbursents.
As he had no idea of deciving her, and alays desired to plase
r, h was thus made chary of launching into expense. On this
point, as we as on all othr possible poits, Mr. Dik was
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convinced that my aunt was th wisest and most wonderful of
wmen; as h repeatedly told me with infite secrey, and alays
in a wisper.
‘Trotwd,’ said Mr. Dick, with an air of mystery, after
imparting this confidence to me, on Wednday; ‘wh’s th man
that hide near our house and frightens her?’
‘Frighte my aunt, sir?’
Mr. Dik ndded. ‘I thought nothing would have frightend
hr,’ he said, ‘for she’s—’ here he whispered softly, ‘don’t mention
it—th wisest and most wonderful of women.’ Having said which,
h dre back, to observe th effect which this descripti of her
made upo me.
‘Th first time he came,’ said Mr. Dick, ‘was—let me see—
sxteen hundred and forty-ne was the date of King Charl’s
xeution. I thk you said sixte hundred and forty-n?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I don’t know h it can be,’ said Mr. Dik, sorely puzzled and
shakig his head. ‘I don’t thk I am as old as that.’
‘Was it in that year that th man appeared, sir?’ I asked.
‘Why, really’ said Mr. Dick, ‘I don’t see ho it can have be i
that year, Trotwood. Did you get that date out of history?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I suppose history never lies, doe it?’ said Mr. Dick, wth a
gleam of hope.
‘Oh dear, no, sir!’ I replied, most decisivey. I was igenuous
and young, and I thought so
‘I can’t make it out,’ said Mr. Dick, shaking hi head. ‘Thre’s
sthing wrong, sowhere However, it was very soon after the
mtake was made of putting s of the trouble out of King
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Carles’s had into my head, that th man first came. I was
alking out wth Miss Trotwd after tea, just at dark, and thre
he was, close to our house’
‘Walkig about?’ I inquired.
‘Walkig about?’ repeated Mr. Dick. ‘Let me see, I must
rellect a bit. N-no, no; he was not walking about.’
I asked, as the shortest way to get at it, what he WAS dog.
‘Well, he was’t there at al,’ said Mr. Dick, ‘until h came up
behd hr, and whspered. Th she turnd round and faited,
and I stood stil and looked at him, and he walked away; but that
he should have been hdig ever sie (i the ground or
somewre), is th most extraordiary thing!’
‘Has he be hidig ever sie?’ I asked.
‘To be sure he has,’ retorted Mr. Dick, noddig hi head
gravey. ‘Never cam out, til last night! We were walkig last
night, and he came up behd her again, and I knew him again.’
‘Ad did he frighte my aunt again?’
‘All of a shiver,’ said Mr. Dick, counterfeting that affection and
making hs teth chatter. ‘Hed by th palings. Cried. But,
Trotwood, c here,’ getting me c to him, that he might
wisper very softly; ‘why did she give him money, boy, in th
oonlight?’
‘He was a beggar, perhaps.’
Mr. Dick shook his head, as utterly renouncg the suggesti;
and having repld a great many tim, and with great cfide,
‘No beggar, n beggar, n beggar, sir!’ went on to say, that from
hi window he had afterwards, and late at night, se my aunt give
this person my outside the garde rai in the moonlight, who
th slunk away—into th ground again, as he thught probable—
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and was seen n more: whe my aunt cam hurriedly and sretly
back into the house, and had, eve that mornig, be quite
differet fro her usual self; which preyed on Mr. Dick’s mind.
I had nt the last belief, i the outset of this story, that the
unknown was anything but a deus of Mr. Dik’s, and one of the
line of that ill-fated Price wh ocasioned hm so much difficulty;
but after so refletion I began to entertai the question whether
an attempt, or threat of an attempt, mght have be twic made
to take poor Mr. Dick hif from under my aunt’s protection,
and whether my aunt, the stregth of whose kid feelig toards
m I kn fro hersf, might have be induced to pay a price
for his peace and quiet. As I was already much attached to Mr.
Dick, and very solicitous for his welfare, my fears favoured this
supposition; and for a long time his Wednesday hardly ever came
round, without my entertaining a migivig that he would not be
on the coach-box as usual There he alays appeared, however,
grey-headed, laughing, and happy; and he nver had anything
more to tell of th man wh could frighte my aunt.
The Wedndays wre the happit days of Mr. Dick’s lfe;
they were far from beg the least happy of mi He s beam
known to every boy in the school; and though he nver took an
active part in any game but kite-flyig, was as deply iterested i
al our sports as anyone among us. How often have I se him,
intent upo a matc at marbls or pegtop, looking on with a face
of unutterabl iterest, and hardly breathing at the critial tim!
How often, at hare and hounds, have I se hi mounted on a
lttle knoll, ceerig the whole field on to action, and wavig his
hat above his grey head, oblivious of King Charl the Martyr’s
ad, and all belongig to it! Ho many a summer hour have I
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known to be but blssful minutes to hi in th cricket-field! Ho
any witer days have I se hi, standig blue-nd, in th
ow and east wind, lookig at the boys going down the log slde,
and clapping his worsted glve in rapture!
He was an universal favourite, and his ingenuity in littl things
as transcdent. He could cut oranges into such devices as none
of us had an idea of. He could make a boat out of anything, from a
skewr upwards. He could turn cramp-bos into chesmen;
fashion Roman chariots fro old court cards; make spoked wh
out of ctton reels, and bird-cages of old wire. But he was greatest
of all, perhaps, in th arti of string and straw; wth wich w
re all persuaded he could do anythng that could be done by
hands
Mr. Dick’s renow was not long confind to us After a fe
Wednedays, Doctor Strong hif made som inquiries of me
about hm, and I tod hm all my aunt had tod me; which
interested th Doctor so much that he requeted, on th occasion
f his next visit, to be preted to hi This ceremony I
performed; and th Doctor begging Mr. Dick, whsoever h
should not find me at th coach office, to come on thre, and rest
hielf until our mornig’s work was over, it soon pased into a
custo for Mr. Dick to come on as a matter of course, and, if we
re a littl late, as often happened on a Wednesday, to walk
about the courtyard, waitig for me Here he made the
acquaitanc of the Dotor’s beautiful young wife (palr than
formerly, al this tim; more rarely se by me or anyone, I think;
and not so gay, but not le beautiful), and s beam mre and
more familiar by degre, until, at last, he would come into th
hool and wait. He always sat i a particular corner, on a
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particular sto, which was cald ‘Dick’, after hi; here he would
st, with his grey head bet forward, attentivey lteg to
whatever mght be going on, with a profound venration for the
learnng he had never bee able to acquire
This venration Mr. Dik extended to the Dotor, whom he
thought the mt subtl and acpled phosopher of any age.
It was log before Mr. Dik ever spoke to hi othrw than
bareheaded; and even when he and the Doctor had struck up
quite a friedsp, and would walk together by the hour, on that
side of th courtyard which was known amg us as Th Doctor’s
Walk, Mr. Dick would pul off his hat at interval to show his
respect for wisdom and knowledge Ho it ever came about that
th Doctor began to read out scraps of th famous Dictionary, in
th walks, I never knew; perhaps h felt it all th same, at first,
as readig to hif. Hover, it pasd into a custo to; and
Mr. Dick, listeg wth a face shig with pride and pleasure, in
heart of hearts beved the Ditinary to be the mt
deghtful book in the world.
I think of them going up and down before those shoolroom
wndows—th Doctor reading with his complacent sile, an
occasonal flouris of the manusript, or grave motion of his head;
and Mr. Dik listeg, enchaid by interest, with his poor wits
aly wanderig God knows were, upon the wigs of hard
wrds—I think of it as on of th pleasantet things, in a quiet
way, that I have ever se I fee as if they might go walkig to and
fro for ever, and the world might sohow be the better for it—as
if a thusand thgs it makes a noi about, were not on half so
good for it, or me
Agnes was o of Mr. Dik’s friends, very soo; and in ofte
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cg to the house, he made acquaintanc with Uriah. The
friendship betw hif and me increased continualy, and it
was maitaid on this odd foting: that, while Mr. Dick came
professedly to look after me as my guardian, h always consulted
m in any little matter of doubt that arose, and invariably guided
hielf by my advic; not only having a high respet for my native
sagacty, but considerig that I inherited a good deal from my
aunt.
On Thursday mornig, when I was about to walk with Mr.
Dick from the hotel to the coach offic before going back to school
(for we had an hour’s shool before breakfast), I met Uriah i the
stret, wh reminded me of th pro I had made to take tea
wth hmself and his mothr: adding, with a writh, ‘But I didn’t
expect you to keep it, Master Copperfield, we’re so very umbl’
I really had not yet bee able to make up my mid whthr I
liked Uriah or detested hm; and I was very doubtful about it still,
as I stod lookig hm i th face in th stret. But I felt it quite an
affrot to be suppoed proud, and said I ony wanted to be asked.
‘Oh, if that’s all, Master Copperfield,’ said Uriah, ‘and it really
isn’t our umbls that prevets you, wi you come this eveg?
But if it is our umbl, I hope you wn’t mind oning to it,
Master Copperfield; for we are we aware of our condition.’
I said I would mention it to Mr. Wickfid, and if h approved,
as I had no doubt he would, I would come with plasure. So, at six
o’clock that evenig, wh was one of the early offic evenigs, I
announced myself as ready, to Uriah.
‘Mother wil be proud, indeed,’ he said, as we walked away
togethr. ‘Or she would be proud, if it wasn’t sinful, Master
Cpperfield.’
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‘Yet you didn’t mind supposing I was proud this morng,’ I
returned.
‘Oh dear, no, Master Copperfield!’ returnd Uriah. ‘Oh, beve
, n! Suc a thought never cam into my head! I shouldn’t have
deemed it at all proud if you had thought us too umble for you.
Because we are so very umbl’
‘Have you bee studying much law lately?’ I asked, to change
the subject.
‘Oh, Master Copperfield,’ he said, with an air of sf-deal, ‘my
reading is hardly to be called study. I have passed an hour or tw
the eveg, sotim, with Mr. Tidd.’
‘Rathr hard, I suppos?’ said I. ‘He is hard to me sometimes,’
returned Uriah. ‘But I do’t know what he might be to a gifted
pers.’
After beatig a lttle tune on hi c as he walked on, with the
two forefingers of his skeeton right hand, he added:
‘Thre are expressions, you see, Master Cpperfield—Lati
words and terms—i Mr. Tidd, that are trying to a reader of my
umble attaits’
‘Would you like to be taught Lati?’ I said brikly. ‘I wi teac it
you with pleasure, as I learn it.’
‘Oh, thank you, Master Copperfield,’ he answered, shaking h
ad. ‘I am sure it’s very kid of you to make th offer, but I am
much to umbl to accept it.’
‘What nonsen, Uriah!’
‘Oh, ideed you must excuse me, Master Copperfield! I am
greatly oblged, and I should like it of al things, I assure you; but I
am far too umbl There are peopl enough to tread upo me i
y lowly state, without my dog outrage to their feegs by
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possessing learning. Learning ain’t for me. A pers like myself
had better not aspire If he is to get o in life, h must get o
umbly, Master Copperfield!’
I never saw his mouth so wide, or th creases in hs cheks so
deep, as when he devered hif of the stits: shakig
his had all th time, and writhng modestly.
‘I thk you are wrog, Uriah,’ I said. ‘I dare say there are
veral things that I could teach you, if you would like to larn
them’
‘Oh, I don’t doubt that, Master Copperfield,’ he answered; ‘nt
i the least. But not beg umble yoursef, you do’t judge wel,
perhaps, for them that are I won’t provoke my betters with
knowledge, thank you. I’m much to umbl Here is my umbl
dweng, Master Copperfield!’
We entered a low, old-fashioned ro, walked straight into
from the street, and found there Mrs. Heep, who was the dead
iage of Uriah, only short. She receved m with the utmot
humility, and apolgized to me for giving hr son a kiss, observing
that, lwly as they were, they had their natural affecti, whic
they hoped would give no offen to anyone It was a perfectly
decent ro, half parlur and half kitcn, but not at all a sug
room. The tea-things were set upon the table, and the kettle was
boiling o th hb. Thre was a chet of drawers with an escritore
top, for Uriah to read or write at of an evenig; there was Uriah’s
blue bag lyig do and vomiting papers; there was a copany of
Uriah’s boks coanded by Mr. Tidd; thre was a cornr
cupboard: and there were the usual arti of furnture. I do’t
remember that any idividual object had a bare, pid, spare
ook; but I do reber that the whole place had.
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It was perhaps a part of Mrs. Heep’s humilty, that she sti wre
weeds Notwithstandig the laps of tim that had occurred s
Mr. Heep’s deas, se sti wore weeds I thk there was so
mpromise i th cap; but othrwise she was as wedy as in th
arly days of her mourng.
‘This is a day to be remembered, my Uriah, I am sure,’ said Mrs
Heep, makig the tea, ‘when Master Copperfid pays us a vit.’
‘I said you’d thk so, mothr,’ said Uriah.
‘If I could have wisd father to remai among us for any
reas,’ said Mrs. Heep, ‘it would have be, that he might have
known his company this afternn.’
I felt embarrased by the coplts; but I was sbl,
too, of beg entertaid as an honoured guest, and I thought Mrs.
Heep an agreeabl woan
‘My Uriah,’ said Mrs Heep, ‘has lked forward to this, sir, a
long while. He had his fears that our umbls stod in th way,
and I joined in them mysf. Umble we are, umbl we have be,
umble we shal ever be,’ said Mrs. Heep.
‘I am sure you have n oasion to be so, ma’am,’ I said, ‘uness
you like’
‘Thank you, sir,’ retorted Mrs. Heep. ‘We know our stati and
are thankful in it.’
I found that Mrs. Heep gradually got nearer to me, and that
Uriah gradually got oppote to me, and that they respetfully
pld m with the choict of the eatabl on the table. There was
thing particularly choic there, to be sure; but I took the will for
the deed, and felt that they were very attetive. Presently they
began to talk about aunts, and then I told them about m; and
about fathers and mthers, and then I told them about m; and
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then Mrs. Heep began to talk about fathers-i-law, and then I
began to tel her about mi—but stopped, beause my aunt had
advisd m to observe a si on that subjet. A tender young
crk, however, would have had n more chan against a pair of
corkscres, or a tender young toth against a pair of dentits, or a
lttle suttleock agait two battledores, than I had againt Uriah
and Mrs Hep. Thy did just what thy liked with me; and
wormed things out of me that I had no dere to tel, with a
certainty I blus to thk of. th more especially, as in my juvenile
frankn, I tok some credit to myself for being so confidetial
and felt that I was quite th patro of my tw respectful
tertairs.
They were very fond of one another: that was certai I take it,
that had its effect upo me, as a touch of nature; but the ski with
w the one folld up whatever the other said, was a touch of
art which I was sti les prof agait. Whe thre was nothg
mre to be got out of me about mysf (for on the Murdstone and
Grinby life, and on my journy, I was dumb), they began about Mr.
Wikfied and Agn Uriah threw the ball to Mrs. Heep, Mrs.
Hep caught it and thre it back to Uriah, Uriah kept it up a littl
ile, th sent it back to Mrs. Hep, and so thy wnt o tossing
it about until I had n idea who had got it, and was quite
bedered. Th bal itself was alays changing to Now it was
Mr. Wickfid, now Agne, now th excelce of Mr. Wickfid,
now my admirati of Agnes; now th extent of Mr. Wickfid’s
business and resources, now our domestic life after dinnr; now,
the win that Mr. Wikfied took, the reas why he took it, and
th pity that it was h tok so much; now on thg, now anthr,
then everything at onc; and all the tim, without appearig to
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speak very often, or to do anything but stim eurage them
a lttle, for fear they should be overc by their humity and the
honour of my copany, I found mysf perpetually ltting out
sthing or other that I had no bus to let out and sg the
effect of it in th twinklg of Uriah’s dinted nostrils.
I had begun to be a lttle unfortable, and to wis mysf well
ut of th visit, wh a figure coming dow th stret passed th
door—it stood open to air the room, whic was warm, the weather
beig clos for th time of year—cam back again, looked in, and
walked in, excaiming loudly, ‘Copperfield! Is it possibl?’
It was Mr. Micawber! It was Mr. Miawber, with his eye-glass,
and his walking-stick, and his shirt-collar, and h gente air, and
th condescending ro in his voice, all complete!
‘My dear Cpperfield,’ said Mr. Miawber, putting out his hand,
‘this is ideed a meetig wich is calculated to impres th mind
wth a sen of th instability and uncertainty of all human—in
short, it is a most extraordinary meetig. Walking along th stret,
refleting upo the probabity of sothing turnig up (of whic I
am at pret rathr sangui), I find a young but valued friend
turn up, w is connected with th most evetful perid of my life;
I may say, with the turnig-pot of my exiten Copperfied, my
dear fe, ho do you do?’
I cannot say—I really cannot say—that I was glad to se Mr.
Micawber there; but I was glad to see hi too, and shook hands
with him, heartily, inquirig how Mrs. Micawber was.
‘Thank you,’ said Mr. Miawber, wavig his hand as of old, and
settling h chi in his shirt-coar. ‘She is tolerably convalescent.
Th twins no longer derive thr susteance fro Nature’s
founts—i short,’ said Mr. Micawber, in one of hi bursts of
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confidence, ‘thy are weaned—and Mrs. Miawber is, at pret,
my travelling companion She will be rejoiced, Cpperfield, to
renew her acquaitan with one who has proved hielf i al
respects a worthy minister at th sacred altar of friendship.’
I said I should be deghted to se her.
‘You are very god,’ said Mr. Micawber.
Mr. Micawber th smild, settld hs chi again, and looked
about him
‘I have discovered my friend Copperfid,’ said Mr. Micawber
gentey, and without addreg himf particularly to anyone,
‘not in solitude, but partaking of a social meal in company with a
wdow lady, and on wh is apparently her offsprig—in short,’
said Mr. Micawber, in anthr of his bursts of confidece, ‘her son
I shall este it an hour to be preted.’
I could do no les, under th circumstances, than make Mr.
Miawber known to Uriah Heep and his mther; w I
acrdigly did. A they abased themsves before hi, Mr.
Micawber tok a seat, and waved his hand in his most courtly
manner.
‘Any friend of my friend Copperfield’s,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘has
a persal claim upo myself.’
‘We are to umble, sir,’ said Mrs. Heep, ‘my son and me, to be
th friends of Master Cpperfield. He has be so god as take hi
tea with us, and we are thankful to him for his copany, al to
you, sir, for your notice.’
‘Ma’am,’ returned Mr. Micawber, with a bow, ‘you are very
obliging: and what are you doing, Copperfield? Still in th w
trade?’ I was excessivey anxius to get Mr. Micawber away; and
replied, with my hat in my hand, and a very red face, I have no
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doubt, that I was a pupil at Doctor Strong’s.
‘A pupi?’ said Mr. Micawber, raig his eyebrows. ‘I am
extremely happy to hear it. Athough a mind like my fried
Copperfid’s’—to Uriah and Mrs Heep—‘do not require that
cultivation wh, withut his knowledge of men and things, it
would require, sti it i a ric so teeg with latent vegetation—
in short,’ said Mr. Micawber, smiling, i anothr burst of
confidence, ‘it is an intet capabl of getting up th classics to
any extent.’
Uriah, with hi lg hands slowly twing over one another,
made a ghastly writhe from the wait upwards, to expre hi
ncurrence in this estimati of me.
‘Shal we go and see Mrs. Miawber, sir?’ I said, to get Mr.
Micawber away.
‘If you wil do her that favour, Cpperfied,’ repld Mr.
Micawber, rising. ‘I have no scruple in saying, in th prece of
our friends hre, that I am a man wh has, for some years,
conteded against th pressure of pecuniary difficulties.’ I kn
was certain to say something of this kind; h alays wuld be
so boastful about his difficulties. ‘Soti I have ri superir
to my difficulties. Sometimes my difficulties have—in short, have
floored me. There have be ti when I have admtered a
succession of facers to th; thre have be tis wh thy
have been too many for me, and I have given in, and said to Mrs.
Micawber, in the words of Cato, “Plato, thu reasest w. It’s al
up no I can sh fight no more” But at n ti of my life,’ said
Mr. Miawber, ‘have I enjoyed a higher degree of satifacti than
in pourig my griefs (if I may describe difficulties, chiefly arig
out of warrants of attorney and promry notes at two and four
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month, by that word) into th bosom of my friend Cpperfield.’
Mr. Micawber cld this handsome tribute by saying, ‘Mr.
Heep! Good evenig. Mrs. Heep! Your srvant,’ and then walkig
out with me in his most fashionabl manner, making a god deal
of noise on th pavement with his shos, and humg a tune as
we went.
It was a littl inn whre Mr. Micawber put up, and h ocupied
a littl ro in it, partitioned off fro th commercal ro, and
strongly flavoured with tobac-smoke I thk it was over th
kitcn, becaus a warm greasy smel appeared to come up
through the cks i the floor, and there was a flabby
perspiration on th walls. I know it was near th bar, o account of
th smell of spirits and jinglng of glasses. Here, recumbet on a
small sofa, undernath a picture of a race-hrse, with her head
cose to the fire, and her feet pusg the mustard off the dumbwaiter at the other end of the room, was Mrs. Micawber, to whom
Mr. Micawber entered first, saying, ‘My dear, alw m to
introduc to you a pupil of Doctor Strong’s.’
I noticd, by the by, that although Mr. Micawber was just as
uc cfused as ever about my age and standig, he alays
rembered, as a gente thing, that I was a pupi of Dotor
Strong’s.
Mrs. Micawber was amazed, but very glad to s me I was very
glad to se her too, and, after an affectiate greetig o both
sides, sat dow on th small sofa near her.
‘My dear,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘if you wi mention to
pperfield what our pret position is, which I have no doubt h
ll like to know, I wi go and look at th paper th wile, and se
ether anythig turn up among the advertiements.’
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‘I thught you were at Plymuth, ma’am,’ I said to Mrs
Micawber, as he wet out.
‘My dear Master Copperfield,’ she replied, ‘we wnt to
Plymouth.’
‘To be on the spot,’ I hited.
‘Just so,’ said Mrs. Micawber. ‘To be on the spot. But, the truth
is, talent is not wanted in th Custo Hous Th local ifluence of
my family was quite unavailing to obtai any employment in that
department, for a man of Mr. Micawber’s abiities. Thy wuld
rather not have a man of Mr. Micawber’s abiities He wuld oly
sho th deficieny of th othrs. Apart fro which,’ said Mrs
Micawber, ‘I wi not disguise fro you, my dear Master
Copperfield, that when that branch of my famy which is settld in
Plymuth, beame aware that Mr. Micawber was accompanied by
myself, and by littl Wikis and his sister, and by th twins, thy
did not receive him with that ardour which h might have
xpected, beg so newy releasd fro captivity. In fact,’ said
Mrs. Micawber, lwering her voic,—‘thi i betwee ourseves—
our reception was co.’
‘Dear me!’ I said.
‘Yes,’ said Mrs. Miawber. ‘It is truly paiful to contemplate
mankind in such an aspect, Master Copperfield, but our reception
as, decidedly, coo. Thre is no doubt about it. In fact, that
branch of my family which is settld in Plymuth beame quite
persal to Mr. Micawber, before we had be there a week.’
I said, and thought, that they ought to be ashamed of
themsves
‘Sti, so it was,’ cotiued Mrs. Micawber. ‘Under such
circumstance, what could a man of Mr. Micawber’s spirit do? But
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o obvius course was left. To borro, of that branch of my
famy, the moy to return to London, and to return at any
sacrifi’
‘Thn you all came back again, ma’am?’ I said.
‘We all came back again,’ replied Mrs Micawber. ‘Since th, I
have consulted othr branche of my family on th course which it
is most expedient for Mr. Micawber to take—for I maitai that he
must take some course, Master Copperfield,’ said Mrs. Miawber,
argumetativey. ‘It i clar that a famiy of sx, nt inudig a
domestic, cant live upo air.’
‘Certainy, ma’am,’ said I.
‘The opi of those other bran of my famy,’ pursued
Mrs. Micawber, ‘is, that Mr. Micawber should immediatey turn
is attention to coals.’
‘To what, ma’am?’
‘To coals,’ said Mrs Miawber. ‘To the coal trade. Mr. Micawber
was inducd to think, on inquiry, that there mght be an opeg
for a man of his talent in th Medway Coal Trade. Th, as Mr.
Micawber very properly said, th first step to be taken clearly was,
to come and see th Medway. Whi we came and saw. I say “we”,
Master Copperfield; for I nver wil,’ said Mrs. Micawber with
eotio, ‘I nver will dert Mr. Micawber.’
I murmured my admirati and approbation.
‘We came,’ repeated Mrs Micawber, ‘and saw the Medway. My
opinion of th coal trade on that river is, that it may require talent,
but that it certainly require capital. Talent, Mr. Micawber has;
capital, Mr. Micawber has not. We saw, I thk, th greater part of
th Medway; and that is my individual conclus Beg so near
hre, Mr. Micawber was of opinion that it would be rash not to
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c on, and se the Cathedral. Firstly, on acunt of its beg s
ll worth seeng, and our never having se it; and secodly, o
acunt of the great probabity of sothing turnig up i a
cathedral to. We have be here,’ said Mrs. Miawber, ‘three
days. Nothing has, as yet, turned up; and it may not surpris you,
my dear Master Copperfield, so much as it wuld a stranger, to
know that we are at pret waitig for a rettan fro London,
to discharge our pecuniary obligatis at this hote. Until th
arrival of that remttan,’ said Mrs. Micawber with muc feeg,
‘I am cut off fro my ho (I allude to lodgings i Pentoville),
fro my boy and girl, and fro my twins.’
I felt the utmot sympathy for Mr. and Mrs. Micawber i this
anxius extreity, and said as much to Mr. Micawber, w now
returnd: adding that I only wished I had money eugh, to lend
them the amount they needed. Mr. Miawber’s aner expresd
th disturbance of his mind. He said, shakig hands wth me,
‘Copperfield, you are a true friend; but w th wrst comes to
th worst, no man is withut a friend wh is possesd of shaving
material’ At this dreadful hint Mrs. Miawber threw her arm
round Mr. Micawber’s neck and entreated him to be calm. He
pt; but so far revered, almost immediatey, as to ring th be
for th waiter, and bespeak a hot kidney pudding and a plate of
shrimps for breakfast in th morning.
When I took my leave of them, they both presd me s muc to
me and dine before thy went away, that I could not refuse. But,
as I kn I culd not co next day, wh I suld have a god
deal to prepare in the evenig, Mr. Miawber arranged that he
wuld call at Doctor Strong’s in th course of th morning (havig
a pretimt that the remttan would arrive by that pot), and
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propo th day after, if it would suit me better. Accordingly I was
alled out of shool nxt foreno, and found Mr. Micawber i the
parlur; w had cald to say that th dinner would take place as
proposed. When I asked him if the remittan had co, he
pred my hand and departed.
As I was lookig out of window that same eveg, it surprid
me, and made me rathr unasy, to see Mr. Micawber and Uriah
Heep walk past, arm in arm: Uriah humbly sebl of the honour
that was done him, and Mr. Miawber taking a bland delight in
xtending his patroage to Uriah But I was still more surprid,
wen I wet to the little hotel nxt day at the appoted dierhur, wich was four o’clock, to find, fro what Mr. Micawber
said, that h had go ho with Uriah, and had drunk brandyand-water at Mrs. Heep’s
‘And I’ll tell you what, my dear Copperfield,’ said Mr.
Micawber, ‘your friend Hep is a young fe wh might be
attorney-genral If I had known that young man, at the period
w my difficulties came to a crisis, al I can say is, that I believe
y creditors would have be a great deal better managed than
they were.’
I hardly understood how this could have been, seeing that Mr.
Micawber had paid them nothing at all as it was; but I did not lke
to ask. Neithr did I like to say, that I hoped he had not bee to
unative to Uriah; or to inquire if they had talked muc
about me. I was afraid of hurting Mr. Micawber’s feelgs, or, at al
vets, Mrs. Miawber’s, she being very sensitive; but I was
uncfortable about it, too, and often thought about it afterwards
We had a beautiful littl dinner. Quite an elgant dish of fish;
th kidney-ed of a loi of veal, roasted; fried sausage-meat; a
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partridge, and a puddig. There was wi, and there was strog
al; and after dinner Mrs. Micawber made us a bowl of hot pun
with her own hands
Mr. Micawber was unmmonly convivial. I never saw hi such
god company. He made his face shine with th pun, so that it
looked as if it had be varnished all over. He got cherfully
sentimental about th to, and propod suc to it; observing
that Mrs. Miawber and himelf had been made extremey sug
and cfortable there and that he nver should forget th
agreeable hours they had pasd in Canterbury. He proposed m
afterwards; and he, and Mrs. Micawber, and I, took a revie of our
past acquaintance, i th course of which we sold th property all
over agai Then I proposed Mrs. Micawber: or, at last, said,
modestly, ‘If you’ll allow me, Mrs Micawber, I shall now have th
pleasure of drinking your health, ma’am’ On whic Mr. Micawber
devered an eulgium on Mrs. Micawber’s character, and said s
had ever be his guide, phosopher, and fried, and that he
wuld remmend me, wh I came to a marrying time of life, to
marry such anthr woman, if such anothr woman could be
found.
As th punch disappeared, Mr. Miawber became sti more
friendly and convivial. Mrs. Miawber’s spirits beming evated,
to, we sang ‘Auld Lang Syn’. Wh we cam to ‘Here’s a hand,
my trusty frere’, we al joind hands round the table; and when we
declared w would ‘take a right gude Wilie Waught’, and hadn’t
th least idea what it meant, we were really affected.
In a word, I never saw anybody so thoroughly jovial as Mr.
Miawber was, do to the very last mot of the evenig, when
I took a hearty farewell of hif and hi amable wife.
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Cnsequently, I was not prepared, at seven o’ck next morning,
to receive th followng comunicati, dated half past nine i th
evenig; a quarter of an hour after I had left him:—
‘My DEAR YOUNG FRIEND,
‘Th die is cast—all is over. Hiding th ravages of care with a
sickly mask of mirth, I have not informd you, this eveg, that
there is no hope of the rettane! Under the crcumstan,
alike humiliating to endure, humiliating to conteplate, and
humiliating to reate, I have discharged th pecuniary labiity
contracted at this establishment, by giving a note of hand, made
payable fourteen days after date, at my rede, Pentovi,
London. Whe it bemes due, it wi not be taken up. Th result
is destruction. Th bolt is impending, and th tre must fall.
‘Let th wretched man wh now addres you, my dear
Cpperfield, be a beacon to you through life. He write with that
intention, and in that hope If h could thk hf of so much
use, one gleam of day mght, by pobity, petrate into the
cherless dunge of his reaig existece—thugh hi
gevity is, at present (to say the least of it), extremely
problematial.
‘This is th last communicati, my dear Copperfield, you wi
ever reve
‘Fro
The
‘Beggared Outcast,
‘WILKINS MICAWBER.’
I was s shocked by the cotets of this heart-rendig letter,
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that I ran off directly towards the lttle hotel with the itentin of
takig it on my way to Doctor Strong’s, and trying to soothe Mr.
Micawber with a word of cofort. But, half-way there, I met the
London coach with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber up bed; Mr.
Micawber, th very picture of tranquil ejoymt, smiling at Mrs
Micawber’s coversation, eating walnuts out of a paper bag, with a
bottl sticking out of his breast pocket. As thy did not see me, I
thought it bet, al things codered, nt to se them So, with a
great weight take off my mid, I turned into a by-street that was
the narest way to school, and felt, upon the whole, relieved that
thy were go; thugh I still liked th very much, neverthless.
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Chapter 18
A RETROSPECT
M
y school-days! The sit glidig on of my existence—
the unseen, unfelt progress of my lfe—from cdhood
up to youth! Let me think, as I look back upo that
fling water, now a dry channel overgron with leave, whthr
thre are any marks along its course, by which I can remember
how it ran
mt, and I occupy my place i the Cathedral, where we
all wnt togethr, every Sunday morng, asbling first at
shool for that purpose. The earthy sm, the sun air, the
sati of the world beg shut out, the resundig of the organ
through th black and white arched galleri and aisles, are wings
that take me back, and hold me hovering above those days, i a
half-sleeping and half-waking dream.
I am nt the last boy in the school. I have ris in a few mths,
over sveral heads But the first boy se to me a mighty
creature, dweng afar off, wh giddy height is unattainable.
gn says ‘No,’ but I say ‘Ye,’ and tell her that sh little thinks
at stores of knowldge have be mastered by the wderful
Being, at whose place she thks I, even I, weak aspirant, may
arrive in time. He is not my private friend and public patro, as
Sterforth was, but I hod him in a reverential respect. I chiefly
wnder wat h’ll be, wh he leave Doctor Strong’s, and what
mankind wi do to maitai any place against him.
But wh is this that breaks upo me? This is Mi Shephrd,
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whom I love.
Miss Shephrd is a boarder at th Misses Nettingal’
etablishment. I adore Miss Shephrd. She is a littl girl, i a
spenr, with a round face and curly flaxe hair. Th Misses
Nettingall’ young ladi co to the Cathedral too. I cant lk
upon my book, for I must look upon Mis Shpherd. Wh the
choristers chaunt, I hear Mi Shephrd. In th srvice I mentally
irt Mis Shpherd’s nam—I put her in among the Royal
Family. At ho, in my own ro, I am sometimes moved to cry
out, ‘Oh, Mis Shepherd!’ in a tranport of love.
For some time, I am doubtful of Miss Shephrd’s fegs, but,
at legth, Fate beg propitius, we meet at the dang-school. I
have Miss Shephrd for my partnr. I touc Miss Shephrd’s
glove, and fee a thrill go up the right arm of my jacket, and co
out at my hair. I say nothing to Mis Shpherd, but we understand
each othr. Miss Shephrd and myself live but to be united.
Why do I seretly give Mi Shphrd twve Brazi nuts for a
present, I woder? They are not expresve of affecti, they are
difficult to pack into a parce of any regular shape, they are hard to
crack, even in room doors, and they are oily when cracked; yet I
fe that thy are appropriate to Miss Shephrd. Soft, seedy
biuits, al, I betow upon Mis Shepherd; and oranges
innumerabl Once, I kiss Miss Shephrd in th cloak-ro
Ecstasy! What are my agoy and idignation next day, w I
har a flying rumour that th Misses Nettingall have stod Mi
Shpherd in the stocks for turnig in her toes!
Miss Shephrd being th on pervading th and vision of my
lfe, how do I ever co to break with her? I can’t cove. Ad
yet a coolness gros betw Miss Shephrd and myself.
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Whispers reach m of Miss Shephrd having said she wished I
wuldn’t stare s, and havig avowed a preferenc for Master
Jo—for Jo! a boy of no merit watever! The gulf between
m and Mi Shepherd wide At last, one day, I meet the Mi
Nettingalls’ establishment out walking. Miss Shephrd makes a
face as she go by, and laugh to her companion All is over. Th
devoti of a lfe—it ses a life, it is al th same—is at an end;
Miss Shephrd comes out of th morning service, and th Royal
Famy know her n more.
I am higher in the school, and n one breaks my peace. I am not
at all polite, now, to th Misses Nettingalls’ young ladies, and
shouldn’t dote on any of them, if they were twic as many and
twenty tim as beautiful I think the dancig-school a tireso
affair, and woder why the girl can’t dane by themsves and
lave us al I am growing great in Latin verse, and nglt the
laces of my bots. Doctor Strong refers to me in publ as a
proising young schoar. Mr. Dik is wid with joy, and my aunt
remts me a guina by the next pot.
The sade of a young butcher ris, like the apparitio of an
armed head in Macbeth Who is this young butcr? He is th
terror of the youth of Canterbury. There is a vague beef abroad,
that th bef suet with which h anoints h hair gives h
unnatural strength, and that he is a match for a man. He is a
broad-faced, bul-nked, young butcr, with rough red cheks,
an ill-conditioned mind, and an injurius tongue. His main us of
this tongue, is, to disparage Doctor Strong’s young gentlemen. He
says, publicly, that if thy want anythng he’ll give it ’em. He
names idividuals among th (mysf included), wh he could
undertake to sttle with one hand, and the other tied bed him
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He waylays the smallr boys to punh their unprotected heads,
and cal calges after m i the ope streets For th
sufficient reasons I resolve to fight th butcr.
It i a sumer evenig, do i a green holl, at the corner of
a wall I mt the butcher by appotmet. I am attended by a
st body of our boys; the butcher, by two other butchers, a
young publan, and a swep. Th preiminaries are adjusted, and
the butcher and mysf stand fac to fac In a mot the
butcher lights ten thousand candl out of my left eyebrow. In
another mt, I do’t know where the wal is, or where I am, or
wre anybody is. I hardly kn which is myself and which th
butcr, we are alays in such a tangle and tussle, knking about
upon the trodde grass Sotim I s the butcher, bloody but
cfidet; sotim I se nthing, and sit gaspig on my
sed’s knee; sometimes I go in at th butcr madly, and cut my
knuckles ope agait his face, wthut appearing to discompose
m at all. At last I awake, very quer about th head, as fro a
giddy sp, and s the butcher walkig off, congratulated by the
two other butchers and the sweep and publian, and putting on
his coat as h go; fro wich I augur, justly, that th victory is
his.
I am taken ho in a sad plight, and I have beef-steaks put to
my eyes, and am rubbed with vigar and brandy, and find a great
puffy place bursting out on my upper lip, which swells
immoderately. For thre or four days I remain at ho, a very illlookig subjet, with a green shade over my eyes; and I should be
very dull, but that Agnes is a sister to me, and condo wth me,
and reads to me, and makes th time light and happy. Agnes has
y cofide copltely, alays; I tell her all about the butcher,
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and the wrongs he has heaped upon m; she thinks I culdn’t have
do otherwis than fight the butcher, whil sh srinks and
trembl at my having fought him
Tim has stolen on unobsrved, for Adam i not the head-boy
i the days that are co no, nr has he been th many and
many a day. Adam has left the school so lg, that when he c
back, on a vit to Doctor Strog, there are not many there, bede
ysf, who know him Adam is going to be cald to the bar
almost directly, and i to be an advoate, and to wear a wig. I am
surprised to find him a meeker man than I had thught, and les
imposng i appearance. He has not staggered th world yet,
ether; for it goes on (as well as I can make out) pretty muc the
same as if he had never jod it.
A blank, through wich th warrirs of poetry and history
march on in stately hosts that se to have n end—and what
c nxt! I am the head-boy, nw! I look down on the l of
boys below me, with a codescending interest in such of th as
brig to my mind the boy I was mysf, when I first cam there
That littl fe ses to be no part of me; I remember him as
sthing left bed upo the road of life—as sthing I have
passed, rathr than have actually bee—and almost thk of h
as of soone el
d the lttle girl I saw on that first day at Mr. Wikfid’s,
wre is she? Gone also. In her stead, th perfet likeness of th
picture, a child likeness no more, moves about th huse; and
Agnes—my swet sister, as I call hr in my thughts, my
counllor and friend, th better angel of th lives of all wh come
wthin her calm, god, self-deying influence—is quite a woman.
What othr changes have come upo me, besides th change
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i my growth and looks, and i the knowledge I have garnered al
this whil? I wear a gold watch and chain, a ring upon my little
finger, and a long-tailed coat; and I us a great deal of bear’s
grease—which, taken in conjunction with th ring, looks bad. Am I
in love again? I am. I worsp th eldest Miss Larkis.
The edet Mis Larki is nt a lttle girl. Sh is a tall, dark,
black-eyed, fi figure of a woan The eldet Mi Larki i not
a chicken; for th youngest Miss Larkis is not that, and th eldest
must be thre or four years older. Perhaps th eldest Mi Larkins
may be about thirty. My passion for her is beyond all bounds.
Th eldest Mi Larki kns officers. It is an awful thing to
bear. I see them speakig to her in the street. I see them cross th
way to meet her, when her bot (she has a bright taste i
bots) is se coming dow th pavement, accompanied by her
sister’s bot. She laugh and talks, and ses to like it. I sped
a god deal of my own spare time in walking up and dow to meet
her. If I can bow to her onc i the day (I know her to bow to,
knowing Mr. Larkins), I am happier. I deserve a bo now and
then The raging ago I suffer on the night of the Rac Ball,
wre I know th eldest Miss Larkins wi be dang wth th
litary, ought to have so copeation, if there be evehanded justice in th world.
My passion takes away my appetite, and makes m war my
nest silk nekerchief continualy. I have no relief but in putting
on my bet clothes, and having my boots cand over and over
agai I seem, then, to be worthier of the eldet Mi Larki
Everythng that belongs to her, or is connected wth hr, is
preus to me Mr. Larki (a gruff old gentlan with a doubl
chin, and on of his eye immovabl in his head) is fraught wth
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iteret to m. Wh I can’t meet his daughter, I go where I am
likely to meet him. To say ‘Ho do you do, Mr. Larkis? Are th
young ladi and all th family quite well?’ sees so poited, that I
blus
I think contiualy about my age Say I am sevente, and say
that sevete is young for th eldet Miss Larkins, wat of that?
Besides, I shall be on-and-twty in no time almost. I regularly
take walks outside Mr. Larkins’s house in th eveg, thugh it
cuts me to the heart to se the officrs go in, or to hear them up i
th drawing-ro, whre th eldest Mi Larkins plays th harp. I
even walk, on two or three occasons, in a skly, spoony manner,
round and round the house after the famy are gone to bed,
wndering which is th eldest Mi Larkis’s chamber (and
pitching, I dare say now, o Mr. Larkis’s instead); wishig that a
fire would burst out; that the asbld crowd would stand
appalld; that I, dasg through them with a ladder, might rear it
agait her window, save her in my arm, go back for sthing
se had lft bed, and peri in the flam For I am geraly
ditereted in my love, and think I could be cotet to make a
figure before Miss Larkins, and expire
Generally, but not alays. Sometimes brighter visions ri
before me When I dres (the occupation of two hours), for a great
ball given at th Larkis’s (th anticipation of thre weks), I
indulge my fancy with pleasng image I picture myself taking
courage to make a declaration to Miss Larkins. I picture Mi
Larki sikig her head upon my shoulder, and saying, ‘Oh, Mr.
Cpperfield, can I believe my ears!’ I picture Mr. Larkis waiting
o me next morning, and saying, ‘My dear Copperfield, my
daughter has told me all. Youth is no objection. Here are twty
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thusand pounds. Be happy!’ I picture my aunt relentig, and
blsing us; and Mr. Dik and Doctor Strong being pret at th
marriage cremony. I am a sensible fe, I believe—I believe, o
lookig back, I mean—and modest I am sure; but all this go on
twithstandig. I repair to the enanted house, where there are
lights, chattering, music, flrs, officers (I am sorry to see), and
the eldet Mi Larki, a blaze of beauty. She i dresd in blue,
with blue flowers in her hair—forget-me-nots—as if SHE had any
nd to wear forget-me-nts. It is the first really grown-up party
that I have ever be invited to, and I am a lttle unfortabl;
for I appear not to belong to anybody, and nobody appears to have
anythng to say to me, except Mr. Larkins, wh asks me h my
shoolfellows are, whic he needn’t do, as I have nt c there to
be inulted.
But after I have stood in the doorway for so tim, and
feasted my eyes upon the godde of my heart, she approac
me—she, th eldest Mi Larkins!—and asks me pleasantly, if I
danc?
I stammer, with a bo, ‘With you, Miss Larkis.’
‘With no on el?’ inquire Miss Larkis.
‘I should have no pleasure in dang with anyo else.’
Miss Larkins laugh and bluss (or I think she bluss), and
says, ‘Next tim but one, I sall be very glad.’
The tim arrives ‘It is a waltz, I think,’ Mis Larki doubtfully
observe, w I pret myself. ‘Do you waltz? If not, Captain
Baiey—’
But I do waltz (pretty well, to, as it happen), and I take Miss
Larkins out. I take her sternly fro th side of Captain Bailey. He
is wretched, I have no doubt; but he is nothing to me. I have be
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wretched, to I waltz with th eldest Miss Larkins! I don’t kn
where, among whom, or how log. I oy know that I s about
in space, with a blue angel, in a state of blssful derium, until I
find myself alon with her in a littl ro, resting on a sofa. She
admires a flr (pink camellia japona, price half-a-cro), in
my button-hole I give it her, and say:
‘I ask an intimabl price for it, Miss Larkins.’
‘Inded! What i that?’ returns Mis Larki
‘A floer of yours, that I may treasure it as a miser doe god.’
‘You’re a bod boy,’ says Miss Larkins. ‘Thre.’
She gives it me, not displeased; and I put it to my lips, and th
to my breast. Mis Larki, laughing, draw her hand through
my arm, and says, ‘No take me back to Captai Baiey.’
I am lost i th reti of this delicius interview, and th
altz, wh she comes to me again, wth a plain elderly gentleman
who has be playig whist al nght, upon her arm, and says: ‘Oh!
here i my bod fried! Mr. Chtl wants to know you, Mr.
Cpperfield.’
I fe at on that he is a frid of th famy, and am muc
gratified.
‘I admire your taste, sir,’ says Mr. Chtl ‘It doe you credit. I
suppose you don’t take much interest in hops; but I am a pretty
large grower mysf; and if you ever like to co over to our
nghbourhood—nghbourhood of Ashford—and take a run
about our place,—w shall be glad for you to stop as long as you
like.’
I thank Mr. Chtl warmly, and shake hands. I thk I am i a
happy dream. I waltz with th eldest Miss Larkins once again. She
says I waltz so well! I go ho in a state of unspeakabl bliss, and
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waltz i iagiation, al night long, with my arm round th blue
aist of my dear divinity. For some days afterwards, I am lost in
rapturous reflections; but I nther see her in the street, nor when
I call. I am imperfetly consold for this disappoitmt by th
sacred pledge, th perished flr.
‘Trotwd,’ says Agns, one day after dinner. ‘Who do you thk
i going to be married tomorrow? Soone you admre.’
‘Not you, I suppose, Agns?’
‘Not me!’ raig her cherful face fro th music she i
pying. ‘Do you hear hi, Papa?—Th eldest Mi Larkis.’
‘To—to Captai Baiey?’ I have just enough powr to ask.
‘No; to no Captai To Mr. Chestle, a hop-gror.’
I am terribly dejected for about a week or two. I take off my
rig, I wear my worst clths, I use no bear’s grease, and I
frequently lament over th late Mi Larkis’s faded flr. Being,
by that tim, rather tired of this kind of life, and having recved
nw provocati from the butcher, I throw the flower away, go out
with the butcher, and gloriously defeat him
Th, and th reumpti of my rig, as we as of th bear’s
grease in moderati, are th last marks I can discern, now, in my
progress to sevente
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Chapter 19
I LOOK ABOUT ME, AND MAKE A DISCOVERY
I
am doubtful wthr I was at hart glad or sorry, wh my
shool-days drew to an end, and the tim cam for my leavig
Doctor Strong’s I had be very happy there, I had a great
attachment for th Doctor, and I was et and distiguished i
that lttle world. For thes reas I was sorry to go; but for other
reasons, unsubstantial enugh, I was glad. Misty ideas of beg a
young man at my own diposal, of the importan attacg to a
young man at his own diposal, of the wonderful things to be se
and done by that magnificent animal, and th wonderful effects he
uld not fai to make upo socty, lured me away. So powrful
re th visionary considerations in my boyish mind, that I
seem, acrdig to my prest way of thinkig, to have lft shool
without natural regret. The separation has nt made the
impresion on me, that othr separatis have. I try in vai to
recall h I felt about it, and what its circumstan were; but it is
not momentous in my reti. I suppose th opeg prospect
confusd me. I kn that my juvenile experices went for littl or
nthing then; and that lfe was mre like a great fairy story, whic
I was just about to begin to read, than anything el
My aunt and I had hed many grave deliberatis on th calling
to which I should be devoted. For a year or more I had
edeavoured to find a satisfactory anr to her often-repeated
question, ‘What I would lke to be?’ But I had no particular likig,
that I could discver, for anythng. If I could have be ispired
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wth a knowledge of th science of navigati, taken th command
of a fast-sailing expediti, and go round th wrld o a
triumphant voyage of divery, I think I might have cdered
myself completely suited. But, in th absence of any such
miraculous provision, my desire was to apply myself to some
pursuit that would not lie too heaviy upo her purse; and to do
my duty in it, whatever it might be
Mr. Dick had regularly assisted at our coun, with a
meditative and sage demeanur. He never made a suggestion but
onc; and on that occason (I do’t know what put it in his head),
he suddey proposed that I should be ‘a Brazir’. My aunt
received this propoal so very ungraciously, that he never
ventured o a sed; but ever afterwards confined hif to
ookig watchfully at her for her suggesti, and rattling his
money.
‘Trot, I te you what, my dear,’ said my aunt, one morng in
the Christmas seas when I lft school: ‘as this knotty pot is
still unttld, and as we must not make a mistake in our decision
f we can help it, I think we had better take a little breathing-tim
In th meanwhile, you must try to look at it fro a new point of
view, and not as a shoolboy.’
‘I wi, aunt.’
‘It has occurred to me,’ pursued my aunt, ‘that a lttle cange,
and a glps of lfe out of doors, may be useful in helpig you to
know your own mind, and form a cor judget. Suppose you
were to go down into the old part of the country agai, for
itanc, and s that—that out-of-the-way woan with the
savagest of names,’ said my aunt, rubbig hr nose, for she could
nver thoroughly forgive Peggotty for beg so calld.
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‘Of all thgs in th world, aunt, I should like it best!’
‘Well,’ said my aunt, ‘that’s lucky, for I should like it to But it’s
natural and ratial that you should like it. And I am very we
persuaded that whatever you do, Trot, wll always be natural and
rational’
‘I hope so, aunt.’
‘Your sister, Betsy Trotwd,’ said my aunt, ‘would have be
as natural and ratioal a girl as ever breathed. You’l be worthy of
her, won’t you?’
‘I hope I shall be worthy of you, aunt. That wi be enough for
me.’
‘It’s a mercy that poor dear baby of a mothr of yours didn’t
live,’ said my aunt, looking at me approvingly, ‘or she’d have be
so vain of her boy by this time, that hr soft littl had wuld have
be cpltely turned, if there was anything of it lft to turn.’
(My aunt always excused any weakness of her own in my bealf,
by transferring it in this way to my poor mothr.) ‘Bless me,
Trotwood, how you do remid m of her!’
‘Pleasantly, I hope, aunt?’ said I.
‘He’s as like her, Dick,’ said my aunt, ephatically, ‘he’s as lke
her, as sh was that afternoon before s began to fret—bl my
heart, he’s as lke her, as he can look at m out of his two eyes!’
‘Is he indeed?’ said Mr. Dick.
‘And he’s lke David, to,’ said my aunt, decisivey.
‘He is very like David!’ said Mr. Dick.
‘But what I want you to be, Trot,’ resumed my aunt, ‘—I don’t
man physialy, but mrally; you are very wel physialy—i, a
firm fellow. A fin firm fellow, with a wi of your own With
resoluti,’ said my aunt, shaking her cap at me, and clenchig
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hr hand. ‘With determation. With character, Trot—with
trength of caracter that i nt to be influend, excpt on good
reason, by anybody, or by anything. That’s what I want you to be
That’s what your father and mother might both have be,
Heave knows, and be the better for it.’
I intimated that I hoped I should be what sh deribed.
‘That you may begin, in a sal way, to have a relanc upon
yourself, and to act for yourself,’ said my aunt, ‘I shall send you
upon your trip, al I did think, onc, of Mr. Dik’s going with
you; but, on second thughts, I shal keep him to take care of me.’
Mr. Dick, for a moment, looked a littl disapponted; until th
honour and dignty of having to take care of the mot wonderful
wan i the world, retored the sun to his fac
‘Besides,’ said my aunt, ‘thre’s the Memorial—’
‘Oh, certaiy,’ said Mr. Dick, in a hurry, ‘I inted, Trotwd, to
get that done immediatey—it really must be done immediatey!
Ad then it wil go in, you know—and then—’ said Mr. Dik, after
cheking hif, and pausg a long time, ‘thre’ll be a pretty
kettle of fis!’
In pursuan of my aunt’s kind sheme, I was shortly
afterwards fitted out with a hands purse of moy, and a
portmanteau, and tederly dismissed upo my expediti. At
parting, my aunt gave me som god advice, and a god many
kisses; and said that as her object was that I should look about me,
and should think a littl, she would red me to stay a fe
days in London, if I liked it, eithr on my way dow ito Suffok,
or i cg back. In a word, I was at liberty to do what I would,
for thre wks or a month; and no othr conditions were imposed
upon my freedo than the before-metioned thinkig and lookig
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about m, and a pldge to write three tim a week and faithfully
report mysf.
I went to Canterbury first, that I mght take lave of Agn and
Mr. Wikfield (my old room in whose house I had not yet
relinquished), and also of th god Doctor. Agnes was very glad to
me, and told me that th house had not bee like itself since I
had left it.
‘I am sure I am not like myself wh I am away,’ said I. ‘I se
to want my right hand, when I m you. Though that’s nt saying
muc; for there’s no head in my right hand, and no heart.
Everyone who knows you, coults with you, and i guided by you,
Agnes.’
‘Everyo w knows me, spois me, I believe,’ she answered,
siling.
‘No. it’s beause you are lke no one els. You are so good, and
so swet-tepered. You have such a gentle nature, and you are
always right.’
‘You talk,’ said Agne, breaking ito a plasant laugh, as she sat
at work, ‘as if I were th late Miss Larkins.’
‘Come! It’s nt fair to abuse my cofidenc,’ I anered,
reddeg at the reecti of my blue enaver. ‘But I sal
nfide in you, just th same, Agnes. I can never gro out of that.
Whever I fall into trouble, or fal in love, I shall always tell you, if
you’ll let me—even wh I come to fal in love in earnt.’
‘Why, you have always be in earnet!’ said Agn, laughig
again.
‘Oh! that was as a chd, or a shoolboy,’ said I, laughing i my
turn, not without beg a little same-facd. ‘Ti are altering
now, and I suppose I shal be in a terribl state of earntns on
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day or other. My woder is, that you are nt i earnt yoursf, by
this time, Agnes.’
Agn laughed agai, and shook her head.
‘Oh, I know you are not!’ said I, ‘beause if you had bee you
would have told m Or at least’—for I saw a fait blush i her
face, ‘you wuld have let me fid it out for myself. But thre is no
you, Agnes. Someo of a
one that I know of, who derves to lve
nbler character, and more worthy altogether than anyone I have
ever seen here, must ri up, before I give my conset. In the tim
to come, I shall have a wary eye o all admirers; and shall exact a
great deal fro th succesful on, I assure you.’
We had go on, so far, in a mixture of confidential jest and
earnt, that had long gron naturally out of our familiar
relatis, begun as mere childre But Agnes, now suddely liftig
up her eye to mine, and speakig in a different manner, said:
‘Trotwood, there i sthing that I want to ask you, and that I
may nt have another opportunity of askig for a log tim,
perhaps—something I wuld ask, I thk, of no on el. Have you
obsrved any gradual alteration in Papa?’
I had obsrved it, and had often wondered whether se had too.
I must have shon as much, now, in my face; for her eye wre in
a moment cast dow, and I saw tears in th
‘Tell me what it is,’ she said, in a l voice.
‘I think—shall I be quite plain, Agns, liking hi so much?’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘I think he do himf no good by the habit that has ireasd
upon him sie I first cam here. He is often very nervous—or I
fany so’
‘It is not fancy,’ said Agne, shakig her head.
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‘His hand trebl, hi spee is not plain, and his eye look
wld. I have remarked that at th times, and w h i least like
hmself, he is most certain to be wanted on some business.’
‘By Uriah,’ said Agns.
‘Ye; and the s of beg unfit for it, or of not having
understood it, or of having shown his cnditin in spite of himf,
ses to make him so unasy, that next day h is wrs, and next
day wors, and so he becomes jaded and haggard. Do not be
alarmed by what I say, Agnes, but in this state I saw hi, only th
other evenig, lay down his head upon his dek, and sed tears
like a child.’
Her hand passd softly before my lips while I was yet speaking,
and i a mt she had met her father at the door of the room,
and was hangig on his shoulder. The expreson of her fac, as
they both looked towards me, I felt to be very touchig. There was
such deep fondness for him, and gratitude to hm for al his love
and care, in her beautiful look; and thre was such a fervet
appeal to me to deal tenderly by hi, eve in my it thoughts,
and to let no harsh cnstruction find any place against hi; sh
as, at oce, so proud of him and devoted to hi, yet so
compassionate and sorry, and so reliant upo me to be so, to; that
nothing she could have said would have expressed more to me, or
moved me more
We were to drink tea at the Doctor’s. We wet there at the usual
hour; and round the study fireside found the Doctor, and his
young wife, and her mothr. Th Doctor, wh made as much of my
going away as if I were going to Cha, recved me as an
honoured guest; and called for a log of wood to be thrown on the
fire, that he might se the fac of hi old pupi reddeg in the
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blaze
‘I shall not see many more new faces in Trotwd’s stead,
Wickfid,’ said th Doctor, warming hs hands; ‘I am getting lazy,
and want ease I shall relinquish al my young people in anthr
sx moth, and lad a quiter life’
‘You have said so, any time th ten years, Doctor,’ Mr.
Wikfield anered.
‘But no I mean to do it,’ returnd the Doctor. ‘My first master
wll succeed me—I am in earnt at last—s you’ll soo have to
arrange our contracts, and to bind us firmly to th, like a couple
of knave’
‘And to take care,’ said Mr. Wickfid, ‘that you’re not imposed
on, e? A you crtainly would be, in any cotract you should
make for yourself. Wel! I am ready. Thre are wors tasks than
that, in my calling.’
‘I shall have nothing to think of then,’ said the Dotor, with a
smil, ‘but my Dictionary; and th othr contract-bargain—
Annie.’
A Mr. Wikfid gland towards her, stting at the tea table by
Agnes, she sed to me to avod his look with such unnted
hsitation and tidity, that his attention beame fixed upo hr,
as if sthing were suggested to his thoughts.
‘Thre is a post come in fro India, I obsrve,’ he said, after a
short silence.
‘By the by! and ltters from Mr. Jack Maldon!’ said the Doctor.
‘Indeed!’
‘Poor dear Jack!’ said Mrs. Markleham, shakig her head. ‘That
tryig cate!—like lvig, they te me, on a sand-heap,
underneath a burnig-glas! He looked strong, but he was’t. My
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dear Doctor, it was his spirit, not hs cotituti, that h ventured
o so boldly. A, my dear, I am sure you must perfetly
rellect that your cous never was strong—not wat can be
calld robust, you kn,’ said Mrs. Marklam, with emphasis, and
lookig round upo us genrally, ‘—from the tim when my
daughter and hif were chdre together, and walkig about,
arm-in-arm, th livelong day.’
Annie, thus addressed, made no reply.
‘Do I gather from what you say, ma’am, that Mr. Maldo is il?’
asked Mr. Wickfid.
‘Ill!’ replied th Old Soldier. ‘My dear sir, h’s all sorts of
things.’
‘Except we?’ said Mr. Wickfield.
‘Excpt we, indeed!’ said th Old Soldier. ‘He has had dreadful
strokes of th sun, no doubt, and jungle fevers and agues, and
every kind of thing you can mention. As to hs liver,’ said th Old
Soldier resignedly, ‘that, of course, he gave up altogethr, wh he
first went out!’
‘Dos he say all this?’ asked Mr. Wickfid.
‘Say? My dear sir,’ returned Mrs. Marklham, sakig her head
and her fan, ‘you little know my poor Jack Maldo when you ask
that question. Say? Not he. You might drag him at the hee of
four wid horse first.’
‘Mama!’ said Mrs. Strog.
‘Anie, my dear,’ returned her mother, ‘one for al, I must
realy beg that you wil nt interfere with me, unle it i to
confirm what I say. You kn as we as I do that your cousin
Maldo would be dragged at the heels of any number of wid
hrses—why should I confine myself to four! I won’t confi
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mysf to four—eght, sixtee, two-and-thirty, rather than say
anythg calulated to overturn the Doctor’s plans.’
‘Wickfield’s plans,’ said th Doctor, stroking hi face, and
lookig pentently at his adviser. ‘That is to say, our joint plans for
hm. I said mysef, abroad or at hoe.’
‘And I said’ added Mr. Wickfid gravey, ‘abroad. I was th
means of sending him abroad. It’s my responsibiity.’
‘Oh! Reponsbilty!’ said the Old Sodir. ‘Everything was do
for the bet, my dear Mr. Wikfield; everythig was do for th
kindet and bet, we know. But if the dear fellow can’t live there,
he can’t lve there. And if he can’t live there, he’ll die there, sooner
than he’l overturn the Doctor’s plan I know him,’ said the Old
Soldier, fanning hersf, in a sort of calm prophtic agoy, ‘and I
know he’l die there, sooner than he’l overturn the Doctor’s plan’
‘Well, we, ma’am,’ said the Doctor cheerfuly, ‘I am nt bigoted
to my plans, and I can overturn them mysf. I can substitute s
thr plans. If Mr. Jack Maldon comes ho on account of i
alth, he must not be allowd to go back, and w must edeavour
to make some more suitable and fortunate provision for him in
this country.’
Mrs. Marklam was so overc by this genrous speh—
wich, I ned not say, she had not at all expected or led up to—
that she could only te th Doctor it was like hif, and go
veral times through that operation of kissg th sticks of hr
fan, and th tapping his hand with it. After which she gently chid
hr daughter Annie, for not being more demonstrative w such
kindn were showered, for her sake, on her old playfellow; and
etertained us with some particulars conrning othr deserving
members of her famly, wh it was desirabl to set o thr
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deserving legs
l this time, her daughter An never once spoke, or lifted up
her eyes. A this tim, Mr. Wikfied had his glan upon her as
she sat by his own daughter’s side. It appeared to me that h never
thought of beg observed by anyone; but was so itent upon her,
and upon h own thoughts in cnnexi with her, as to be quite
absorbed. He now asked wat Mr. Jack Maldo had actually
written in referen to himf, and to whom he had written?
‘Why, here,’ said Mrs. Marklam, takig a letter fro th
chimney-piece above th Doctor’s head, ‘th dear fe says to
th Doctor hmself—wre is it? Oh!—“I am sorry to inform you
that my health is suffering severely, and that I fear I may be
reduced to th necessity of returning ho for a time, as th oly
hope of restorati” That’s pretty plai, poor fellow! His only
hpe of restoration! But Annie’s letter is plainer still. Annie, sho
me that letter again.’
‘Not no, mama,’ she pleaded in a l to
‘My dear, you absutey are, on so subjects, oe of the mt
ridiulus perso i the world,’ returned her mother, ‘and
perhaps the mot unnatural to the clai of your own famiy. We
ver should have hard of th letter at all, I believe, unles I had
asked for it myself. Do you call that confidece, my love, toards
Dotor Strong? I am surprisd. You ought to know better.’
The letter was reluctantly produced; and as I handed it to the
old lady, I saw how the unwillg hand from whic I took it,
trembld.
‘Now let us se,’ said Mrs. Marklham, putting her glas to her
eye, ‘whre th passage is. “Th remembrance of od times, my
dearest Ae”—and s forth—it’s nt there. “The amable old
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Proctor”—who’s he? Dear m, An, how ilgibly your cousi
Maldon write, and ho stupid I am! “Dotor,” of course. Ah!
amiabl indeed!’ Here she left off, to kiss her fan again, and shake
it at the Doctor, who was lookig at us in a state of placd
satisfacti ‘Now I have found it. “ You may nt be surprisd to
har, A,”—n, to be sure, kng that he never was realy
strong; what did I say just now?—“that I have undergo so much
in this distant plac, as to have decded to leave it at all hazards;
o sick leave, if I can; on total regnation, if that is not to be
btaind. What I have endured, and do endure here, is
insupportabl.” And but for th proptitude of that best of
creatures,’ said Mrs. Marklham, telgraphig the Doctor as
before, and refoldig the ltter, ‘it would be inupportabl to m to
think of.’
Mr. Wikfid said nt one word, though the old lady loked to
hm as if for his commentary o this intelligence; but sat severely
st, with hi eye fixed on the ground. Long after the subjet
was dismissed, and othr topics occupid us, he remained so;
seldom raig his eye, unless to rest th for a moment, wth a
thoughtful frown, upon the Doctor, or his wife, or both.
Th Doctor was very fond of music. Agnes sang with great
swetness and expresion, and so did Mrs. Strong. Thy sang
together, and played duets together, and we had quite a lttle
ncert. But I remarked tw things: first, that thugh Annie soo
revered her coposure, and was quite herself, there was a blank
betw her and Mr. Wikfid which separated th wlly fro
ach othr; sedly, that Mr. Wickfid seed to dislike th
timacy betwee her and Agn, and to watch it with uneas
And now, I must confess, th rellection of what I had see on
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that night when Mr. Maldo went away, first began to return upo
me with a meaning it had never had, and to trouble me. Th
innocent beauty of hr face was not as innocent to me as it had
been; I mtrusted the natural grace and charm of her maner;
and when I looked at Agn by her side, and thought how good
and true Agne was, suspicions aro within me that it was an illassorted friendship.
She was so happy in it hersf, hover, and th othr was so
happy too, that they made the eveg fly away as if it were but an
hur. It closd in an incident which I we remember. Thy wre
taking leave of each othr, and Agnes was going to ebrac hr
and ki her, when Mr. Wikfield stepped between them, as if by
accident, and dre Agnes quikly away. Th I saw, as thugh all
the iterveng tim had be canced, and I were sti standig
in th doorway on th night of th departure, th expression of
that night in the fac of Mrs. Strog, as it confroted his.
I cannot say wat an impresion this made upo me, or ho
pobl I found it, when I thought of her afterwards, to
separate hr fro this look, and remember her face in its innocent
loveliness again. It haunted me wh I got ho I sed to have
ft the Doctor’s roof with a dark cloud lwering on it. The
reveren that I had for his grey head, was migld with
cration for his faith in those who were treacerous to hi,
and with resetmt against those who injured him The
impending shadow of a great affliction, and a great disgrace that
had no distict form in it yet, fell like a stain upo th quiet plac
ere I had wrked and played as a boy, and did it a cruel wrong.
I had n pleasure in thinkig, any more, of the grave old broadlaved aloe-trees, wh reaied sut up in themsves a
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hundred years together, and of the trim smooth gras-plot, and the
sto urns, and th Doctor’s walk, and th congeial sound of th
Cathedral be hoverig above them al It was as if the tranqui
anctuary of my boyhood had be sacked before my fac, and its
peac and honour given to the winds
But mrnig brought with it my parting from the old house,
wich Agne had fid with her influe; and that occupied my
mind sufficiently. I should be thre again soo, no doubt; I might
seep agai—perhaps often—i my old room; but the days of my
ihabiting there were gone, and the old tim was past. I was
heavir at heart when I packed up suc of my books and cothes as
til remaid there to be set to Dover, than I cared to show to
Uriah Hep; wh was so officious to help me, that I uncharitably
thought hi mighty glad that I was going.
I got away from Agn and her father, sohow, with an
different show of beg very manly, and took my seat upon the
box of th London coach. I was so softed and forgiving, gog
through the town, that I had half a mind to nod to my old eny
the butcher, and throw him five shgs to drik. But he looked
such a very obdurate butcr as he stod scraping th great blk
in th shop, and morever, his appearance was so littl improved
by the lo of a front tooth whic I had knocked out, that I thought
it best to make no advan
Th main object on my mid, I remember, wh w got fairly
o th road, was to appear as old as possible to th coachman, and
to speak extremy gruff. The latter pot I acved at great
persal inveience; but I stuck to it, becaus I felt it was a
grown-up sort of thing.
‘You are going through, sir?’ said th coachman.
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‘Ye, William,’ I said, condescendingly (I kn hm); ‘I am going
to London. I shal go down ito Suffolk afterwards’
‘Shooting, sir?’ said the coacan
He knew as we as I did that it was just as likely, at that time of
year, I was going down there whalg; but I felt coplimted,
too.
‘I don’t kn,’ I said, pretending to be undecided, ‘whther I
shall take a shot or not.’
‘Birds is got wery shy, I’m tod,’ said Wiiam.
‘So I understand,’ said I.
‘Is Suffok your county, sir?’ asked William.
‘Yes,’ I said, with some importance. ‘Suffolk’s my county.’
‘I’m told th dumplings is unmmon fi dow thre,’ said
Willam.
I was not aware of it myself, but I felt it necesary to uphd th
institution of my county, and to evince a familiarity wth th; so
I shook my head, as muc as to say, ‘I believe you!’
‘And the Puns,’ said Wiliam. ‘Thre’s cattle! A Suffolk
Punch, when he’s a good un, is worth his weight in gold. Did you
ever breed any Suffolk Punches yoursf, sir?’
‘N-n,’ I said, ‘nt exactly.’
‘Here’s a ge’l’n bed me, I’l pound it,’ said Wiiam, ‘as has
bred ’em by wholesale.’
Th gentleman spoke of was a gentlman with a very
unprosing squint, and a prot chi, wh had a tal white
hat on with a narrow flat bri, and whose cose-fitting drab
trousers sed to button al the way up outside hi legs from hi
bots to his hips. His chi was cocked over th coachman’s
houlder, so nar to me, that his breath quite tickld the back of
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my head; and as I looked at hi, he leered at the laders wth th
eye with which he didn’t squit, in a very kng manr.
‘Ai’t you?’ asked Wiliam.
‘Ai’t I what?’ said the getlman bed.
‘Bred them Suffolk Punches by wholeale?’
‘I should think s,’ said the gentlan. ‘There ain’t n sort of
orse that I ain’t bred, and no sort of dorg. Orse and dorgs is some
m’s fancy. They’re wittle and drik to me—lodging, wife, and
childre—reading, writig, and ’rithtic—snuff, tobacker, and
seep.’
‘That ain’t a sort of man to se sitting bend a coac-box, is it
thugh?’ said William in my ear, as he handled th reins.
I cotrued this remark into an idiation of a wis that he
should have my place, so I blusngly offered to resign it.
‘Well, if you don’t mind, sir,’ said Willam, ‘I think it would be
mre correct.’
I have always considered this as th first fall I had in life Whe
I booked my place at the coach offic I had had ‘Box Seat’ written
agait the entry, and had give the book-keeper half-a-cro. I
was got up in a speal great-coat and shawl, expresly to do
hur to that distinguished emce; had glrified myself upo
it a god deal; and had felt that I was a credit to th coach. And
hre, in th very first stage, I was supplanted by a shabby man
th a squint, wh had no othr merit than smelng like a liverystables, and being able to walk across me, more like a fly than a
human beg, while th horses were at a canter!
A distrust of myself, which has often bet me in lfe o small
ccasis, w it would have be better away, was assuredly
not stopped in its groth by this littl incident outside th
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Canterbury coac It was in vain to take refuge in gruffns of
spee I spoke fro th pit of my stoach for th rest of th
journey, but I felt completely extinguished, and dreadfully young.
It was curius and interesting, neverthless, to be sitting up
there bed four hors: we educated, we dresd, and with
plty of my i my poket; and to lok out for the plac where
I had slpt on my weary journey. I had abundant occupati for
my thughts, in every conspicuous landmark on th road. Whe I
looked down at the trampers whom we pasd, and saw that wellrebered style of fac turned up, I felt as if the tiker’s
blacked hand were in th bo of my shrt agai Wh we
attered through the narrow street of Chatham, and I caught a
glpse, in pasg, of the lan were the old mter lved w
had bought my jacket, I stretched my nek eagerly to look for the
place were I had sat, i the sun and i the shade, waitig for my
money. Whe we came, at last, within a stage of London, and
pased the veritable Sal House where Mr. Creakle had laid
about him with a heavy hand, I would have given al I had, for
lawful permin to get down and thras him, and let al the boys
out like so many caged sparro
We wet to the Gode Cross at Charig Cross, then a mouldy
srt of establt in a cose neghbourhood. A waiter showed
me ito th coffe-ro; and a chambermaid introducd me to my
small bedchamber, wich smelt like a hackney-cach, and was
shut up like a famly vault. I was still painfully conscius of my
youth, for nobody stod in any awe of me at all: th chambermaid
beg utterly indifferent to my opi on any subjet, and the
waiter beig famliar with me, and offering advice to my
inexperice.
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‘Well n,’ said the waiter, i a to of cofidence, ‘what wuld
you like for dinner? Young gentlemen likes poultry i geral:
have a fowl!’
I tod hi, as majetialy as I could, that I was’t in th
humour for a fowl
‘Ai’t you?’ said the waiter. ‘Young getlmen is geraly tired
of bef and mutton: have a weal cutlet!’
I assented to this propoal, in default of being able to suggest
anythng el
‘Do you care for taters?’ said th waiter, with an insinuating
smil, and his head on on side. ‘Young gentlemen gerally has
be overdod with taters.’
I commanded him, in my deepet voice, to order a veal cutlt
and potatoes, and all things fitting; and to inquire at the bar if
there were any letters for Trotwood Copperfid, Esquire—wh I
kn there were not, and couldn’t be, but thought it manly to
appear to expect.
He soon cam back to say that there were no (at whic I was
much surprid) and began to lay th cloth for my dinnr in a box
by th fire. While h was so egaged, he asked me what I would
take with it; and on my replying ‘Half a pit of shrry,’ thought it a
favourable opportunity, I am afraid, to extract that measure of
win from the stale leavigs at the bottoms of several small
decanters. I am of this opinion, beaus, w I was reading th
spaper, I observed hi bend a low wde partition, wich
was his private apartmt, very busy pourig out of a number of
th vessels ito on, like a chet and druggist making up a
prescription. Whe th wi came, to, I thught it flat; and it
certainly had more English crumbs in it, than were to be expected
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in a foreign wi in anythng like a pure state, but I was bashful
ough to drik it, and say nothing.
Being th i a pleasant fram of mid (from which I infer that
poisonng is not alays disagreabl i some stage of th
pross), I resolved to go to th play. It was Covent Garde
Theatre that I chose; and there, from the back of a cetre box, I
saw Julius Caear and th ne Pantoime. To have all th
nobl Romans alive before me, and walkig i and out for my
etertainmet, itead of beg the stern taskmasters they had
been at school, was a mot novel and deghtful effect. But the
mgld realty and mystery of the whole show, the ifluenc upon
me of th poetry, th lights, th music, th company, th smooth
stupedous changes of glittering and brilliant scry, were so
dazzlg, and oped up suc iltable regions of delight, that
when I cam out into the raiy street, at twelve o’cock at nght, I
felt as if I had co from the couds, where I had be ladig a
romantic life for age, to a bawing, splashing, link-lighted,
umbrea-strugglig,
hackny-coac-jostlig,
patten-ckig,
muddy, miserabl world.
I had eerged by another door, and stood i the street for a
lttle whe, as if I realy were a stranger upo earth: but th
unceremonious pushing and hustling that I received, soo recalled
m to mysf, and put m in the road back to the hotel; whither I
wnt, revolving th glrious vision all th way; and whre, after
some porter and oysters, I sat revolving it still, at past on o’clock,
wth my eyes on the coffee-room fire
I was so fid with th play, and with th past—for it was, i a
manner, like a shining transparecy, through which I saw my
earlir lfe moving along—that I do’t know when the figure of a
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handsome w-formed young man dred with a tasteful easy
negligece wich I have reason to remember very well, became a
real prece to me. But I ret beg conscious of hi
mpany withut having noticed his coming i—and my sti
ttig, musg, over the coffee-room fire
t last I rose to go to bed, muc to the relf of the slpy
waiter, who had got the fidgets in his legs, and was twistig them,
and hitting them, and putting them through al kids of
ctortions in his smal pantry. In going towards the door, I
passed th pers wh had come in, and saw hi plaiy. I turnd
directly, came back, and looked again. He did not kn me, but I
knew him in a moment.
t another tim I mght have wanted the cofide or the
de to speak to him, and might have put it off until next day,
and mght have lot him But, in the then coditi of my md,
wre th play was still running high, hi formr proteti of me
appeared so deserving of my gratitude, and my old love for hi
overflowed my breast so fresy and spontanously, that I wet up
to him at onc, with a fast-beating heart, and said:
‘Steerforth! won’t you speak to me?’
He looked at me—just as he used to look, sotim—but I saw
no regnition in his face.
‘You don’t remember me, I am afraid,’ said I.
‘My God!’ he suddeny exclaimed. ‘It’s littl Copperfield!’
I grasped hi by both hands, and could nt let them go. But for
very shame, and th fear that it might displease him, I could have
ld him round th neck and crid.
‘I nver, nver, nver was s glad! My dear Sterforth, I am s
overjoyed to see you!’
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‘And I am rejoicd to see you, too!’ he said, shakig my hands
heartily. ‘Why, Copperfied, old boy, do’t be overpowered!’ And
yet he was glad, too, I thought, to s how th deght I had in
meeting him affected me.
I brusd away th tears that my utmost resoluti had not
bee able to keep back, and I made a clumsy laugh of it, and we
at down together, side by side
‘Why, how do you co to be here?’ said Steerforth, clappig
m on the shoulder.
‘I cam here by the Canterbury coach, today. I have been
adopted by an aunt down i that part of the country, and have just
you c to be here,
finished my education thre Ho do
Steerforth?’
‘Wel, I am what thy call an Oxford man,’ he returnd; ‘that is
to say, I get bored to death down there, periodially—and I am on
my way now to my mothr’s. You’re a devilish amiable-lookig
fellow, Copperfield. just what you usd to be, now I look at you!
Not altered i the least!’
‘I knew you idiately,’ I said; ‘but you are more easy
remembered.’
He laughed as he ran his hand through the clustering curls of
his hair, and said gaiy:
‘Ye, I am on an expedition of duty. My mother lives a lttle way
out of town; and the roads beg i a beastly cnditi, and our
house tedious enough, I remaid here tonight itead of going
on. I have nt be in town half-a-dozen hours, and those I have
bee dozing and grumbling away at th play.’
‘I have be at the play, to,’ said I. ‘At Covet Garde. What a
deghtful and magnifit etertainmet, Sterforth!’
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Steerforth laughed heartily.
‘My dear young Davy,’ he said, clappig me o the shoulder
again, ‘you are a very Daisy. Th daisy of th fid, at sunrise, is
nt fresher than you are. I have been at Covet Garden, too, and
thre never was a more miserabl busines. Holloa, you sir!’
Th was addresd to the waiter, who had been very attetive
to our regnition, at a distance, and now came forward
deferentially.
‘Where have you put my friend, Mr. Copperfield?’ said
Steerforth.
‘Beg your pardo, sir?’
‘Where do he sleep? What’s his number? You know what I
man,’ said Sterforth
‘Well, sir,’ said the waiter, wth an apologeti air. ‘Mr.
pperfield is at pret in forty-four, sir.’
‘And wat th devil do you mean,’ retorted Sterforth, ‘by
putting Mr. Copperfield into a littl loft over a stable?’
‘Why, you see we was’t aware, sir,’ returned the waiter, sti
apolgetically, ‘as Mr. Copperfield was anyways particular. We can
give Mr. Copperfield seventy-tw, sir, if it would be preferred.
Next you, sir.’
‘Of course it would be preferred,’ said Sterforth ‘And do it at
onc.’ The waiter imdiatey withdrew to make the exchange
Sterforth, very much amusd at my having bee put into fortyfour, laughd again, and clapped me on th shoulder again, and
ivited m to breakfast with hi nxt mornig at ten o’cock—an
ivitation I was ony too proud and happy to acpt. It beg n
pretty late, we tok our candles and went upstairs, wre w
parted wth friendly heartiss at his door, and whre I found my
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nw room a great improvemt on my old one, it nt beg at all
musty, and having an immense four-pot bedstead i it, wich was
quite a lttle landed estate. Here, amg piws enough for six, I
soo fe asleep in a blissful condition, and dreamd of ancient
Rome, Sterforth, and friendship, until th early morng coacs,
rumbling out of th archway undernath, made me dream of
thunder and the gods
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Chapter 20
STEERFORTH’S HOME
W
hn th chambermaid tapped at my door at eight
o’clock, and informd me that my shavig-water was
utside, I felt severely th having no occasion for it,
and blusd in my bed. Th suspicion that she laughd to, wh
she said it, preyed upo my mind all th time I was dreng; and
gave me, I was conscious, a sneaking and guilty air w I passed
her on the staircase, as I was going down to breakfast. I was so
nsitivey aware, indeed, of beg younger than I could have
ished, that for some time I could not make up my mind to pass
r at all, under th ignobl circumstances of th case; but,
hearig her there with a broom, stood peepig out of window at
King Charles on horseback, surrounded by a maze of hackneycoaches, and lookig anythng but regal in a drizzling rai and a
dark-brown fog, until I was admd by the waiter that the
gentleman was waitig for me.
It was nt in the coffee-room that I found Steerforth expetig
me, but in a snug private apartmt, red-curtained and Turkeycarpeted, where the fire burnt bright, and a fin hot breakfast was
t forth on a tabl covered wth a clean cloth; and a cherful
ature of the room, the fire, the breakfast, Steerforth, and al,
was sg i the lttle round mirror over the sideboard. I was
rathr bashful at first, Sterforth beg so self-pod, and
egant, and superior to me in all respets (age iuded); but hi
asy patronage soon put that to rights, and made me quite at
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home I could not enough admre the change he had wrought i
the Goden Cross; or copare the dul forlorn state I had held
yesterday, with this morng’s comfort and this morning’s
entertaient. A to the waiter’s famarity, it was quenced as if
it had nver be He attended on us, as I may say, in sackcoth
and ashes.
‘Now, Cpperfield,’ said Sterforth, wh we were alon, ‘I
should like to har what you are doing, and whre you are going,
and all about you. I fe as if you were my property.’ Glowing with
pleasure to find that he had still this interest in me, I told him ho
y aunt had proposed the little expedition that I had before m,
and whithr it tended.
‘As you are in n hurry, then,’ said Steerforth, ‘come home with
to Highgate, and stay a day or two. You wil be plasd with my
mther—she is a lttle vain and prosy about me, but that you can
forgive her—and she wi be pleasd with you.’
‘I should like to be as sure of that, as you are kind eugh to say
you are,’ I anred, smiling.
‘Oh!’ said Steerforth, ’everyone who like me, has a cai on
hr that is sure to be ackndged.’
‘Thn I thk I shall be a favourite,’ said I.
‘Good!’ said Sterforth ‘Co and prove it. We wi go and se
the lons for an hour or two—it’s sothing to have a fresh fellow
lke you to show them to, Copperfied—and then we’l journey out
to Highgate by the coach.’
I could hardly belve but that I was in a dream, and that I
should wake pretly in number forty-four, to the sotary box in
the cffee-room and the famar waiter agai After I had writte
to my aunt and tod her of my fortunate meetig with my admired
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old schoolfellow, and my acptan of his ivitatio, we went out
i a hackny-chariot, and saw a Panrama and so other sights,
and took a walk through the Museum, where I could not help
obsrving how muc Steerforth knew, on an infinte variety of
subjets, and of how lttle acunt he sed to make his
knowledge
‘You’ll take a high degree at coege, Steerforth,’ said I, ‘if you
have not done so already; and thy will have god reason to be
proud of you.’
‘I take a degre!’ cried Sterforth ‘Not I! my dear Daiy—w
you mid my callg you Daiy?’
‘Not at al!’ said I.
‘That’s a good felw! My dear Daiy,’ said Steerforth, laughing.
‘I have not the least dere or intenti to ditiguish mysf i
that way. I have done quite sufficient for my purpo I fid that I
am heavy company enough for mysf as I am.’
‘But the fam—’ I was beginnig.
‘You romantic Daiy!’ said Sterforth, laughng still more
heartily: ‘why should I troubl mysf, that a parce of heavyheaded felws may gape and hold up their hands? Let them do it
at some othr man There’s fame for hi, and he’s wee to it.’
I was abasd at having made so great a mistake, and was glad
to cange the subjet. Fortunatey it was nt difficult to do, for
Steerforth culd always pas from one subject to another with a
carelesss and lightnss that were his own.
Lunch sucded to our sight-seeing, and the short winter day
wre away so fast, that it was dusk wh th stage-coac stopped
with us at an old brik house at Highgate on the sumt of the hi
An elderly lady, thugh not very far advanced in years, wth a
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proud carriage and a handsome face, was in th doorway as w
alghted; and greetig Steerforth as ‘My dearest Jam,’ folded
hm i hr arm. To this lady he preted me as his mothr, and
se gave me a stately wee.
It was a gente old-fashioned house, very quiet and orderly.
From the windows of my room I saw al London lyig in the
ditanc lke a great vapour, with here and there so lights
twinklg through it. I had oy tim, i dreg, to glan at the
sd furnture, the framed pi of work (done, I supposed, by
Steerforth’s mother when she was a girl), and so pitures in
crayos of ladi with powdered hair and bodices, comng and
going on the wall, as the nwly-kidld fire crackld and
sputtered, when I was caled to dier.
Thre was a second lady in th dining-ro, of a slight short
figure, dark, and nt agreeable to look at, but with s
appearan of good loks too, who attracted my attenti: perhaps
beause I had nt expeted to see her; perhaps beause I found
mysf sitting oppote to her; perhaps beause of sthing really
rearkable in hr. Sh had black hair and eager black eye, and
was thin, and had a scar upo hr lip. It was an old scar—I should
rathr call it seam, for it was not discoloured, and had haled
years ago—whic had onc cut through her muth, downward
toards th chin, but was now barely visibl acro th tabl,
except above and o hr upper lip, th shape of which it had
altered. I coluded in my own mind that she was about thirty
years of age, and that she wed to be married. Sh was a lttl
dilapidated—like a house—with having bee so long to let; yet
had, as I have said, an appearan of good looks Her thin
d to be th effect of some wasting fire within her, which
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found a vet in her gaunt eyes
She was introducd as Miss Dartle, and both Sterforth and h
ther caled her Roa. I found that she lved there, and had be
for a long time Mrs. Sterforth’s companion. It appeared to me
that she never said anythng she wanted to say, outright; but
hnted it, and made a great deal more of it by this practice. For
example, when Mrs Steerforth obsrved, more in jest than
earnt, that se feared her so led but a wid life at coge, Mi
Dartle put in thus:
‘Oh, realy? You know how ignrant I am, and that I only ask
for iformatin, but is’t it always so? I thought that kid of lfe
was on al hands understood to be—eh?’
‘It is education for a very grave profesion, if you mean that,
Rosa,’ Mrs Sterforth answered with som coldness.
‘Oh! Yes! That’s very true,’ returned Miss Dartl. ‘But isn’t it,
though?—I want to be put right, if I am wrong—i’t it, realy?’
‘Realy what?’ said Mrs. Steerforth
‘Oh! You mean it’s not!’ returnd Miss Dartle. ‘Wel, I’m very
glad to hear it! Now, I kn what to do! That’s th advantage of
asking. I shall never allow people to talk before me about
wastefulness and profligacy, and so forth, in connexi with that
lfe, any more.’
‘And you wi be right,’ said Mrs. Steerforth ‘My son’s tutor is a
conscitius gentleman; and if I had not implicit reliance o my
s, I should have relian on him’
‘Should you?’ said Miss Dartle. ‘Dear me! Ccientious, is h?
Really conscientious, now?’
‘Yes, I am convinced of it,’ said Mrs. Steerforth
‘How very nice!’ exclaimed Mi Dartl. ‘What a comfort! Realy
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ctious? Then he’s nt—but of course he can’t be, if he’s
really conscitius Well, I shal be quite happy i my opinion of
hi, from this tim You can’t think how it elevate him i my
opinion, to kn for certain that he’s really conscientious!’
Her own views of every question, and her correcti of
everythng that was said to which she was opposed, Miss Dartle
insinuated i th same way: sometimes, I could not conceal fro
myself, wth great powr, thugh in contradiction eve of
Sterforth An instance happened before dinner was done. Mrs
Sterforth speakig to me about my intenti of going down into
Suffolk, I said at hazard how glad I should be, if Steerforth would
only go there with me; and explaing to him that I was going to
se my old nurs, and Mr. Peggotty’s family, I reminded hm of th
boatman whom he had seen at school.
‘Oh! That bluff felw!’ said Steerforth. ‘He had a son with hi,
hadn’t he?’
‘No. That was hi nephew,’ I repld; ‘whom he adopted,
though, as a son. He has a very pretty little nie too, whom he
adopted as a daughter. In short, his house—or rather his boat, for
he lves i one, on dry land—i full of pepl who are objects of his
genrosity and kidn You would be deghted to se that
household.’
‘Should I?’ said Steerforth. ‘Well, I think I should. I must se
at can be done It would be worth a journey (nt to mention th
pleasure of a journey with you, Daisy), to see that sort of people
together, and to make one of ’e’
My heart leaped with a new hpe of pleasure. But it was in
reference to the tone in whic he had spoke of ‘that sort of
peopl’, that Mis Dartle, whose sparklg eyes had be watchful
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of us, now broke i agai
‘Oh, but, realy? Do te me. Are they, thugh?’ she said.
‘Are they what? And are who what?’ said Steerforth.
‘That srt of peopl—Are they realy anal and clods, and
begs of another order? I want to know so much.’
‘Why, there’s a pretty wide separation betwee them and us,’
said Steerforth, with indifferee. ‘They are not to be expeted to
be as sensitive as we are Thr delicacy is not to be shoked, or
hurt easy. They are woderfully virtuous, I dare say—s
people conted for that, at least; and I am sure I don’t want to
tradit them—but they have not very fin natures, and they
may be thankful that, like thr coarse rough skins, thy are not
easily wounded.’
‘Really!’ said Miss Dartle. ‘Wel, I don’t know, now, wh I have
be better pleased than to hear that. It’s so consoling! It’s such a
deght to know that, when they suffer, they do’t fee! Sotim
I have be quite unasy for that sort of people; but now I shal
just dismiss th idea of th, altogethr. Live and learn I had my
doubts, I cofess, but no they’re cleared up. I didn’t kn, and
now I do kn, and that shos th advantage of asking—do’t it?’
I believed that Steerforth had said what he had, in jest, or to
draw Miss Dartle out; and I expected him to say as much w she
was gone, and we two were sitting before the fire. But he merely
asked me what I thought of her.
‘She is very clever, is she nt?’ I asked.
‘Clever! She brigs everythig to a gridsto,’ said Steerforth,
and sharpens it, as she has sharpened her own face and figure
the years past. She has worn herself away by ctant
sharpenng. She is all edge.’
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‘What a remarkabl scar that is upo her lip!’ I said.
Sterforth’s face fe, and he pausd a moment.
‘Why, the fact is,’ he returned, ‘I did that.’
‘By an unfortunate accident!’
‘No. I was a young boy, and she exasperated me, and I thre a
hamr at her. A promg young angel I must have been!’ I was
deply sorry to have touched on suc a paiful them, but that
was uss now
‘She has borne the mark ever sie, as you see,’ said Steerforth;
‘and she’ll bear it to her grave, if she ever rests in on—thugh I
can hardly beeve she wi ever ret anywhere. She was th
motherlss chid of a sort of cous of my father’s. He died one day.
My mother, who was then a widow, brought her here to be
pany to her. She has a coupl of thousand pounds of her own,
and save th interest of it every year, to add to th principal.
There’s the history of Mi Roa Dartl for you.’
‘And I have n doubt she loves you like a brothr?’ said I.
‘Humph!’ retorted Sterforth, lookig at the fire. ‘Som
brothrs are not loved over much; and some love—but help
yourself, Cpperfield! We’l drik th daisies of th fid, in
mpliment to you; and th lilies of th valley that toil not, neithr
do thy spin, in compliment to me—th more sham for me!’ A
moody smil that had overspread his feature cleared off as he
said this merrily, and he was his own frank, winning self again.
I could not help glancing at th scar with a paiful interest
when we went in to tea. It was nt log before I obsrved that it
was th most susptibl part of her face, and that, wh she
turned pal, that mark altered first, and beam a dul, ladcoloured streak, lengthg out to its full extent, like a mark i
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ivisble ink brought to the fire. There was a little altercati
betw her and Sterforth about a cast of th dice at back
gam—when I thought her, for one mot, i a storm of rage;
and then I saw it start forth like the old writig on the wall
It was no matter of wonder to me to find Mrs. Sterforth
devoted to her so Sh sed to be able to speak or think about
nothing el. She shod me his picture as an infant, in a locket,
wth some of his baby-hair in it; she shod me his picture as h
had been when I first knew him; and se wore at her breast hi
picture as h was now All th letters he had ever written to her,
she kept in a cabit near her own chair by th fire; and she wuld
have read me so of them, and I should have be very glad to
hear them too, if he had nt interposed, and coaxed her out of the
design
‘It was at Mr. Creakl’s, my s tell m, that you first beam
acquainted,’ said Mrs Sterforth, as she and I wre talking at o
table, we they played backgam at another. ‘Indeed, I
rellect his speaking, at that time, of a pupil younger than hmself
who had take hi fancy there; but your nam, as you may
suppose, has not lived in my memory.’
‘He was very gerous and nble to me in those days, I asure
you, ma’am,’ said I, ‘and I stod in ned of such a friend. I should
have been quite crushed without him’
‘He is alays gerous and nble,’ said Mrs. Steerforth,
proudly.
I subscribed to this with all my heart, God knows. She kn I
did; for th statess of her manr already abated toards me,
except wh she spoke in praise of him, and th hr air was
always lofty.
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‘It was nt a fit school genraly for my so,’ said she; ‘far from
it; but thre wre particular circumtan to be considered at th
time, of more importance eve than that selection My son’s hgh
spirit made it desrabl that h should be placed with some man
felt its superirity, and would be contet to bo hmself
before it; and we found such a man thre’
I kn that, knowing the fel Ad yet I did not depi him
the more for it, but thought it a redeg quality in hi if he
could be allowd any grace for not resistig on so irresistible as
Steerforth.
‘My so’s great capacty was tempted on, there, by a feeg of
voluntary emulation and conscious pride,’ th fond lady went on to
say. ‘He would have risen agait all constraint; but h found
hielf the monarch of the place, and he haughtily determid to
be worthy of his stati It was like himf.’
I ecd, with all my heart and soul, that it was like himself.
‘So my so took, of his own will, and on no cpulon, to the
course in which he can alays, wh it is his plasure, outstrip
every competitor,’ she pursued. ‘My son iforms me, Mr.
pperfield, that you were quite devoted to him, and that when
you met yesterday you made yoursf known to him with tears of
joy. I should be an affected woman if I made any pretece of being
surprised by my son’s inspirig such emtions; but I cant be
indifferent to anyo wh is so sensible of hi merit, and I am very
glad to se you hre, and can assure you that he fes an unusual
friendship for you, and that you may rely on his proteti.’
Miss Dartle played backgammon as eagerly as she did
everything els If I had se her, first, at the board, I should have
fand that her figure had got thin, and her eye had got large,
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over that pursuit, and n other in the world. But I am very muc
mistake if she missd a wrd of this, or lost a look of mine as I
received it with th utmost pleasure, and honoured by Mrs
Sterforth’s confidence, felt older than I had don si I left
Canterbury.
Wh the eveg was pretty far spet, and a tray of glas
and deanters cam in, Steerforth promd, over the fire, that he
would seriously think of going down ito the country with m
There was no hurry, he said; a week hence wuld do; and hi
mothr hospitably said th same. While w wre talking, h more
than once calld me Daisy; which brought Miss Dartle out again.
‘But really, Mr. Copperfield,’ she asked, ‘is it a nickname? Ad
why do he give it you? Is it—eh?—beaus he thinks you young
and innocent? I am so stupid in th thgs.’
I coured in replyig that I beeved it was
‘Oh!’ said Miss Dartle. ‘No I am glad to kn that! I ask for
information, and I am glad to kn it. He thks you young and
innocent; and so you are hi friend. Well, that’s quite delightful!’
Sh went to bed soon after this, and Mrs. Sterforth retired too.
Sterforth and I, after ligerig for half-an-hour over the fire,
talkig about Traddl and al the rest of them at old Sal
House, went upstairs together. Sterforth’s room was next to
m, and I went i to look at it. It was a piture of cofort, full of
easy-cairs, cushion and fotstos, worked by his mothr’s hand,
and with no sort of thing omitted that culd help to render it
cplete. Fially, her hands features looked down o her
darlg fro a portrait on th wall, as if it were eve somthing to
her that her like should watch him while he spt.
I found the fire burng clar enough in my room by this tim,
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and th curtains drawn before th widos and round th bed,
giving it a very snug appearance. I sat dow i a great chair upo
th harth to meditate on my happine; and had enjoyed th
nteplation of it for some time, wh I found a likene of Miss
Dartle looking eagerly at me fro above th chimney-piece.
It was a startlg likeness, and necesariy had a startling look.
Th painter hadn’t made th scar, but I made it; and thre it was,
coming and gog; now confined to th upper lip as I had se it at
dier, and no showig the whole extet of the wound iflted
by the hamr, as I had seen it when she was pasate
I wodered peeviy why they couldn’t put her anywhere els
tead of quartering her on m To get rid of her, I undred
quickly, extinguisd my light, and went to bed. But, as I fell
asleep, I could not forget that she was still thre lookig, ‘Is it
realy, though? I want to know’; and when I awoke i the night, I
found that I was unasily asking all sorts of people in my dreams
whether it realy was or not—without knowing what I mant.
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Chapter 21
LITTLE EM’LY
T
here was a servant in that house, a man who, I
understod, was usually with Sterforth, and had come
into his service at th University, wh was in appearance
a pattern of repectabity. I beeve there never existed i his
station a more respectable-lking man. He was taciturn, softfoted, very quiet in his manr, deferential, obsrvant, alays at
hand wh wanted, and never near w not wanted; but h
great claim to conderation was hi respectabiity. He had not a
plant fac, he had rather a stiff nk, rather a tight sooth head
wth short hair clinging to it at th sides, a soft way of speaking,
wth a pecular habit of whispering th letter S so distictly, that
he seemed to use it ofter than any other man; but every
peularity that he had he made respectable. If hi n had be
upside-dow, h would have made that respectable. He
surrounded hmself wth an atmosphre of respectabiity, and
walked secure in it. It would have be next to impossibl to
suspect him of anythng wrog, he was so throughly respectable.
Nobody could have thought of putting hi i a livery, he was so
ghly respectable. To have imposed any derogatory wrk upo
, would have be to inflt a wanto inult on th fegs of a
most respectable man. And of this, I noticed—th wmen-servants
in th housed were so intuitivey conscius, that thy always
did such work thlve, and gerally while he read th paper
by the pantry fire.
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Such a self-ctained man I never saw. But in that quality, as i
every other he pod, he only seemed to be the more
respectable. Eve th fact that no on kn h Cristian name,
sed to form a part of hs respectability. Nothg could be
bjected against his surnam, Littimer, by which he was known.
Peter might have be hanged, or Tom tranported; but Littimr
was perfetly respectable.
It was oasioned, I suppose, by th reverend nature of
respectability in th abstract, but I felt particularly young i this
man’s prece. Ho old he was himself, I could not gues—and
that again went to his credit on th same score; for in th calss
of respectability h might have numbered fifty years as we as
thirty.
Littimr was in my room in the morning before I was up, to
brig m that reproacful savig-water, and to put out my
cothes. Wh I undrew the curtains and looked out of bed, I saw
m, in an equabl temperature of respectability, unaffected by th
ast wind of January, and nt eve breathing frostily, standig my
boots right and lft in the first dang potion, and blowing
specks of dust off my coat as he laid it dow like a baby.
I gave him god morng, and asked him what o’clock it was.
He took out of his poket the mt respectable huntig-watch I
ever saw, and preventig the sprig with hi thumb from openig
far, lked i at th fac as if he were coultig an oracular
oyster, shut it up again, and said, if I plasd, it was half past eight.
‘Mr. Steerforth wi be glad to hear ho you have rested, sir.’
‘Thank you,’ said I, ‘very we indeed. Is Mr. Steerforth quite
ll?’
‘Thank you, sir, Mr. Steerforth i tolerably well’ Aother of hi
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characteristics—no us of superlative A co cal medium
always
‘Is there anything mre I can have the honour of dog for you,
sir? Th warning-bell wi ring at nine; th family take breakfast at
half past ni’
‘Nothing, I thank you.’
‘I thank you, sir, if you plas’; and with that, and with a lttle
inclation of his head wh he passd th bed-side, as an apolgy
for correctig me, he went out, shutting the door as delicately as if
I had just fal into a swet sleep on which my life depended.
Every morng we held exactly th coversation: nver any
mre, and nver any les: and yet, invariably, however far I might
have been lfted out of mysf over-night, and advanced towards
maturer years, by Sterforth’s companionip, or Mrs
Sterforth’s confidence, or Mi Dartle’s conversati, in th
prece of this most repetabl man I beame, as our smaller
poets sing, ‘a boy again’.
He got horse for us; and Steerforth, who knew everything,
gave me le in ridig. He provided foil for us, and Steerforth
gave me lens in fencig—gloves, and I began, of the sam
master, to improve in boxing. It gave me no manr of corn
that Sterforth should find me a novice in th sciences, but I
never could bear to sho my want of skill before th respectabl
Littimr. I had n reas to beve that Littimr understood suc
arts himf; he nver led m to suppo anything of the kid, by
so much as th vibration of on of his respectable eyeashes; yet
whenver he was by, whil we were practisg, I fet mysf the
gret and most inexpericed of mortals.
I am particular about this man, becaus he made a particular
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effect o me at that time, and becaus of what tok place
thereafter.
The week pased away in a mt deghtful maner. It pasd
rapidly, as may be supposed, to o etranced as I was; and yet it
gave me so many occasion for knowg Sterforth better, and
admiring him more in a thusand respects, that at its clos I
seemed to have been with him for a muc lger ti. A dasg
way he had of treating m like a plaything, was mre agreeable to
m than any behaviour he could have adopted. It remnded m of
our old acquaintance; it seed th natural seque of it; it shod
me that h was unchanged; it relieved me of any unasiness I
mght have felt, in coparig my merits with hi, and masuring
my claims upo his friendship by any equal standard; above all, it
was a familiar, unrestrained, affectionate demeanour that he usd
towards no one els As he had treated me at shool differently
fro all th rest, I joyfully believed that he treated me in life
unlke any other fried he had. I beeved that I was nearer to hi
heart than any other fried, and my own heart warmed with
attact to hi He made up his mid to go with me into the
cuntry, and the day arrived for our departure. He had be
doubtful at first whether to take Littimr or not, but deded to
leave hi at ho Th respectable creature, satisfied wth hs lot
watever it was, arranged our portmanteaux on the little carriage
that was to take us ito Londo, as if they were intended to defy
th shoks of age, and received my modestly proffered donati
with perfect tranquillity.
We bade adiu to Mrs. Sterforth and Mis Dartle, with many
thanks on my part, and much kindness o th devoted mothr’s.
The last thing I saw was Littimr’s unruffled eye; fraught, as I
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fancied, with th silent conviction that I was very young indeed.
What I felt, in returng so auspiciously to th old familiar
plac, I shall not endeavour to describe We went dow by th
Mail. I was so conrned, I ret, eve for th hour of
Yarmuth, that when Steerforth said, as we drove through its dark
strets to th inn, that, as we as he could make out, it was a god,
queer, out-of-the-way kid of hole, I was highly plasd. We went
to bed on our arrival (I obsrved a pair of dirty shoes and gaiters
in connexi with my old friend th Dophn as w passd that
door), and breakfasted late in th morng. Sterforth, w was in
great spirits, had be strolling about th beac before I was up,
and had made acquaintance, he said, with half th boatmen in th
place. Moreover, he had s, in the ditan, what he was sure
must be the idetical house of Mr. Peggotty, with smoke cog
out of the chy; and had had a great md, he told me, to walk
i and swear he was mysf grown out of knowledge.
‘When do you propose to itroduce m there, Daiy?’ he said. ‘I
am at your disposal. Make your own arrangets.’
‘Why, I was thinkig that this eveg would be a good tim,
Steerforth, when they are al sittig round the fire. I should like
you to see it wh it’s snug, it’s such a curius place.’
‘So be it!’ returned Steerforth. ‘Thi evenig.’
‘I shall nt give them any notic that we are here, you know,’
said I, delghted. ‘We must take them by surprise.’
‘Oh, of course! It’s n fun,’ said Steerforth, ‘unss w take them
by surprise. Let us se th native in thr aborigial condition.’
‘Though they are that sort of pepl that you metid,’ I
returned.
‘Aha! What! you rellect my skirmishe with Rosa, do you?’ h
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exclaid with a quick look. ‘Confound the girl, I am half afraid of
hr. She’s like a gobl to me. But never mid her. Now wat are
you going to do? You are going to se your nurse, I suppose?’
‘Why, yes,’ I said, ‘I must see Peggotty first of al’
‘Well,’ repld Steerforth, lookig at his watch. ‘Suppo I
deliver you up to be cried over for a couple of hurs Is that long
enough?’
I anred, laughing, that I thought we might get through it in
that tim, but that he must c al; for he would find that hi
renow had preded him, and that he was almost as great a
persage as I was.
‘I’ll come anywre you like,’ said Steerforth, ‘or do anythg
you like Tell m where to co to; and in two hours I’l produce
myself in any state you plase, sentimental or comical.’
I gave hm mnute direction for fidig th residence of Mr.
Barkis, carrir to Blundersto and elre; and, on this
understandig, went out alone There was a sharp bracg air; the
ground was dry; th sea was crisp and car; th sun was diffusng
abundan of lght, if nt muc warmth; and everything was fres
and lively. I was so fre and lively myself, in th plasure of beig
there, that I could have stopped the peopl in the streets and
shaken hands with th
The streets looked smal, of cours. The streets that w have
y s as chdre alays do, I beve, wh we go back to
them But I had forgotten nthing i them, and found nthing
changed, until I came to Mr. Omer’s shop. OMER AND JORAM
was now written up, whre OMER usd to be; but th inscription,
DRAPER, TAILOR, HABERDASHER, FUNERAL FURNISHER,
&c., reaied as it was.
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My footsteps sed to tend so naturally to the shop door, after
I had read the words from over the way, that I wt acro th
road and looked i. There was a pretty woan at the back of th
hop, dang a little chd in her arm, while another lttle fellow
clung to hr apron. I had no difficulty in regnizing eithr Minnie
or Mine’s chdre The glas door of the parlour was nt open;
but in th workshop across th yard I could faintly hear th old
tune playing, as if it had never left off.
‘Is Mr. Omer at hoe?’ said I, enterig. ‘I should lke to see
hm, for a moment, if he is.’
‘Oh yes, sr, he i at home,’ said Min; ‘the weather do’t suit
hi asthma out of doors. Joe, call your grandfather!’
The lttle fellow, who was holdig her apron, gave suc a lusty
shout, that the sound of it made him basful, and he buried h
fac in her skirts, to her great admration. I heard a heavy puffing
and bling coming toards us, and soo Mr. Omer, shorterwinded than of yore, but nt muc older-lookig, stood before me
‘Servant, sir,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘What can I do for you, sir?’
‘You can shake hands wth me, Mr. Omr, if you plase,’ said I,
putting out my own. ‘You were very good-natured to me onc,
wen I am afraid I didn’t sho that I thught so.’
‘Was I though?’ returned the old man ‘I’m glad to hear it, but I
don’t remember wh. Are you sure it was me?’
‘Quite.’
‘I think my mery has got as short as my breath,’ said Mr.
Omer, lookig at me and shakig his head; ‘for I don’t remeber
you.’
‘Don’t you remember your comg to the coac to meet me, and
my having breakfast here, and our ridig out to Blunderstone
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together: you, and I, and Mrs. Joram, and Mr. Joram too—who
was’t her husband then?’
‘Why, Lord bl my soul!’ excaid Mr. Omer, after beg
thro by his surprise into a fit of coughng, ‘you don’t say so!
Minnie, my dear, you ret? Dear me, yes; th party was a lady,
I thk?’
‘My mother,’ I rejoined.
‘To—be—sure,’ said Mr. Omer, toucg my waistcoat with hi
forefinger, ‘and thre was a littl child to! Thre was tw parties.
The lttle party was laid alg with the other party. Over at
Blunderston it was, of course Dear me! Ad how have you been
since?’
Very well, I thanked hi, as I hoped he had been too.
‘Oh! nthg to grumble at, you kn,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘I find
my breath gets short, but it sedom gets loger as a man gets older.
I take it as it comes, and make th most of it. That’s th best way,
ain’t it?’
Mr. Omer coughd again, in conseque of laughng, and was
asted out of hi fit by his daughter, who now stood close bede
us, dancing her smallest child on th counter.
‘Dear me!’ said Mr. Omer. ‘Yes, to be sure. Tw parties! Why, in
that very ride, if you’ll believe me, th day was named for my
Miie to marry Joram. “Do name it, sir,” says Joram. “Yes, do,
fathr,” says Minnie. And now he’s come into th bus And
look here! The youngest!’
Min laughed, and stroked her banded hair upo her
templ, as her father put one of his fat fingers ito the hand of the
child she was dancing on th counter.
‘Tw parties, of course!’ said Mr. Omer, noddig his head
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retrospectivey. ‘Ex-actly so! And Joram’s at work, at this minute,
on a grey one with siver nai, not this measuremt’—the
masuremt of the dang chd upon the counter—‘by a good
two in—Wi you take sthing?’
I thanked hi, but declined.
‘Let me see,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘Barkis’s the carrier’s wife—
Peggotty’s th boatman’s sister—she had something to do with
your family? She was in service thre, sure?’
My anrig i the affirmative gave him great satisfactio
‘I believe my breath wi get long next, my memory’s getting so
much so,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘Wel, sir, we’ve got a young reati of
hers here, under artic to us, that has as elgant a taste in the
dres-makig bus—I asure you I do’t beeve there’s a
Duchess in England can touc her.’
‘Not little Em’ly?’ said I, invountarily.
‘Em’ly’s her name,’ said Mr. Omer, ‘and she’s little to But if
you’l beeve m, se has suc a fac of her own that half the
wmen in this to are mad against her.’
‘Nonnse, fathr!’ cried Miie.
‘My dear,’ said Mr. Omer, ‘I don’t say it’s the case with you,’
winkig at m, ‘but I say that half the wome i Yarmouth—ah!
and in five mile round—are mad agait that girl.’
‘Then she should have kept to her own stati i life, father,’
said Minni, ‘and nt have given them any hold to talk about her,
and then they couldn’t have don it.’
‘Culdn’t have done it, my dear!’ retorted Mr. Omer. ‘Culdn’t
have do it! Is that your knowldge of life? What is there that any
wman couldn’t do, that she shouldn’t do—especally on th
ubject of another woman’s good looks?’
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I realy thought it was al over with Mr. Omr, after he had
uttered this libeus plasantry. He coughed to that extent, and
his breath eluded all his attempts to rever it with that obstinacy,
that I fully expected to see his head go dow bend th counter,
and his lttle black brehes, with the rusty lttle bunhes of
ribbons at th knees, come quivering up in a last iffectual
truggle At lgth, however, he got better, though he sti panted
hard, and was s exhausted that he was obliged to sit on the stool
of the shop-desk.
‘You se,’ he said, wiping his head, and breathing with
difficulty, ‘she has’t taken much to any companions here; she
asn’t taken kindly to any particular acquaintances and friends,
not to mention swetharts In conquence, an ill-natured story
got about, that Em’ly wanted to be a lady. Now my opi i, that
it came into circulation principally on account of hr sometimes
aying, at the school, that if se was a lady se would lke to do sand-s for her un—do’t you s?—and buy hi suc-and-suc
fin things.’
‘I asure you, Mr. Omr, sh has said so to m,’ I returned
eagerly, ‘wh we were both children.’
Mr. Omer nodded his head and rubbed his chi. ‘Just so. Th
out of a very little, she could dres herself, you see, better than
that made things unplasant.
t others could out of a deal, and
Moreover, s was rather what might be cald wayward—I’l go
so far as to say what I should cal wayward myself,’ said Mr. Omer;
‘—didn’t know her own mid quite—a lttle spoild—and culdn’t,
at first, exactly bind hersf dow No more than that was ever
said against her, Minni?’
‘No, father,’ said Mrs. Joram. ‘That’s the worst, I beeve.’
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‘So when she got a stuati,’ said Mr. Omer, ‘to keep a
fractius old lady company, thy didn’t very we agre, and sh
didn’t stop. At last she came here, appreticed for thre years.
Nearly tw of ’em are over, and she has bee as god a girl as ever
was. Worth any six! Minnie, is she worth any six, now?’
‘Yes, father,’ replied Miie. ‘Never say I detracted from her!’
‘Very god,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘That’s right. And so, young
gentleman,’ he added, after a fe moments’ furthr rubbing of h
chin, ‘that you may not consider me long-winded as we as shortbreathed, I beeve that’s al about it.’
As thy had spoken in a subdued to, while speakig of Em’ly,
I had no doubt that she was near. On my asking now, if that were
not so, Mr. Omr nodded yes, and nodded toards th door of th
parlur. My hurrid inquiry if I might peep in, was answered with
a fre permssion; and, looking through th glass, I saw her sitting
at her work. I saw her, a mot beautiful little creature, with the
coudl blue eyes, that had looked into my chdi heart, turned
laughingly upon another chd of Min’s who was playig near
her; with enough of wilfuln in her bright fac to justify what I
had heard; with much of th old capricious coyn lurkig in it;
but with nothing in her pretty looks, I am sure, but what was
meant for godness and for happiness, and what was o a god
and happy course
Th tune across th yard that seed as if it never had left off—
alas! it was the tune that never does leave off—was beatig, sftly,
al the whe.
‘Wouldn’t you lke to step in,’ said Mr. Omer, ‘and speak to her?
Walk in and speak to her, sir! Make yourself at ho!’
I was to bashful to do so th—I was afraid of confusg her,
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and I was no less afraid of confusg myself.—but I informd
myself of th hour at which she left of an eveing, in order that our
visit might be timed accordingly; and taking leave of Mr. Omer,
and his pretty daughter, and hr lttl chidre, went away to my
dear old Peggotty’s
Here sh was, in the tild kitchen, cookig dir! The mt
I knocked at th door she oped it, and asked me wat I pleased
to want. I looked at her with a s, but sh gave me no s i
return. I had nver ceasd to write to her, but it must have be
ven years since we had met.
‘Is Mr. Barkis at ho, ma’am?’ I said, feignng to speak
roughly to her.
‘He’s at hoe, sir,’ returned Peggotty, ‘but he’s bad abed with
th rhumatics.’
‘Don’t he go over to Blundersto n?’ I asked.
‘Whe he’s we he do,’ she answered.
‘Do you ever go there, Mrs Barki?’
She looked at me more attentivey, and I noticed a quick
mvemet of her hands towards eac other.
‘Beaus I want to ask a question about a house there, that they
call th—wat is it?—th Rookery,’ said I.
She took a step backward, and put out her hands i an
undeded frightened way, as if to keep me off.
‘Peggotty!’ I crid to her.
Sh crid, ‘My darling boy!’ and we both burst into tears, and
wre locked in on anthr’s arms.
What extravagances she comitted; what laughng and crying
over me; wat pride she shod, what joy, what sorro that she
pride and joy I might have bee, could never hod me in a
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fond ebrace; I have nt the heart to tel I was troubld with n
misgivig that it was young in me to respond to her emtions. I
had never laughd and cried in all my life, I dare say—nt eve to
r—more frey than I did that morng.
‘Barkis wi be so glad,’ said Peggotty, wiping her eye wth hr
apron, ‘that it’ll do hi more god than pints of liniment. May I go
and te him you are here? Will you come up and se hm, my
dear?’
Of curse I would. But Peggotty could not get out of the room
as easy as s meant to, for as often as s got to the door and
looked round at m, she cam back agai to have another laugh
and another cry upon my shoulder. At last, to make the matter
easier, I went upstairs with her; and having waited outsde for a
mute, wile s said a word of preparati to Mr. Barkis,
preted myself before that invalid.
He received me with absolute enthusas. He was to
rheumatic to be sake hands with, but he begged me to shake the
tassel o th top of his nightcap, which I did most cordialy. Whe
I sat dow by th side of th bed, he said that it did hm a wrld of
good to fee as if he was drivig m on the Blunderston road
agai As he lay in bed, fac upward, and s cvered, wth that
excpti, that he sed to be nthing but a fac—lke a
cventional cerubi—he lked the queerest object I ever
behld.
‘What name was it, as I wrote up in th cart, sir?’ said Mr.
Barkis, with a sl rhumatic smil
‘Ah! Mr. Barki, we had so grave talks about that matter,
hadn’t we?’
‘I was willin’ a long time, sir?’ said Mr. Barki
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‘A log time,’ said I.
‘And I don’t regret it,’ said Mr. Barkis. ‘Do you remember wat
you told me onc, about her makig al the appl parstie and
dog al the cookig?’
‘Yes, very we,’ I returned.
‘It was as true,’ said Mr. Barkis, ‘as turnips is. It was as true,’
said Mr. Barki, nodding his nightcap, wich was hs only mean
f emphasis, ‘as taxes is. And nothing’s truer than th.’
Mr. Barkis turnd his eye upo me, as if for my assent to this
result of his refltis in bed; and I gave it.
‘Nothing’s truer than them,’ repeated Mr. Barki; ‘a man as
poor as I am, fids that out in his mid w h’s laid up. I’m a
very poor man, sir!’
‘I am sorry to hear it, Mr. Barkis.’
‘A very poor man, indeed I am,’ said Mr. Barkis.
Here hi right hand cam slowly and feebly from under the
bedcthes, and with a purpose uncrtai grasp took hold of a
stick which was looy tid to th side of th bed. After some
poking about wth this istrument, in th course of which his face
assumed a varity of distracted expresion, Mr. Barkis poked it
against a box, an end of which had bee visible to me all th time.
Th his face became compod.
‘Old clths,’ said Mr. Barki
‘Oh!’ said I.
‘I wish it was Moy, sir,’ said Mr. Barkis.
‘I wish it was, indeed,’ said I.
‘But it ain’t,’ said Mr. Barkis, opeing both his eye as wide as
h possibly could.
I expressed myself quite sure of that, and Mr. Barkis, turning
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his eye more gently to his wife, said:
‘She’s the usefullt and bet of wo, C. P. Barki A th
praise that anyo can give to C. P. Barkis, she deserve, and
more! My dear, you’ll get a dinner today, for company; something
good to eat and drik, wil you?’
I should have proteted against this uncesary demonstration
my honour, but that I saw Peggotty, on the oppote side of the
bed, extremey anxious I should nt. So I held my peace.
‘I have got a trifle of money somewre about me, my dear,’
said Mr. Barki, ‘but I’m a lttle tired. If you and Mr. David wil
leave me for a short nap, I’ll try and find it wh I wake.’
We lft the room, i cplianc with this request. Wh we got
outside the door, Peggotty informed me that Mr. Barki, beg
nw ‘a lttle nearer’ than he used to be, always resrted to this
same device before producg a single coin fro his store; and
that he endured unheard-of agonie in crawg out of bed ale,
and takig it from that unucky box. In effect, w preently heard
hm uttering suppressed groans of th most dismal nature, as this
magpie proding racked him in every joint; but wile Peggotty’s
eye wre full of compassion for him, she said hi gerous
impulse wuld do hm god, and it was better not to chek it. So
he groand on, until he had got ito bed again, suffering, I have n
doubt, a martyrdom; and th cald us in, preteding to have just
wke up fro a refreng slp, and to produc a guinea fro
under his pillow His satisfacti in which happy imposition on us,
and in having prerved th impenetrable secret of th box,
appeared to be a sufficient compenati to him for all hi
tortures
I prepared Peggotty for Steerforth’s arrival and it was not lg
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before he cam. I am persuaded she knew no differee between
hi having be a personal benefactor of hers, and a kind friend to
me, and that she would have received him with th utmost
gratitude and devoti in any case. But his easy, spirited god
humour; his genial manner, his handsome looks, his natural gift of
adapting himself to whsoever he pleased, and making direct,
when he cared to do it, to the mai pot of interest in anybody’s
heart; bound her to him wholly in five miutes. Hi manr to m,
alone, would have won her. But, through al these causes
bid, I serely beeve she had a kid of adorati for him
before he left the house that night.
He stayed there with me to dir—if I were to say willgly, I
should nt half expre how readiy and gaiy. He went into Mr.
Barkis’s ro like light and air, brighteing and refreng it as if
h wre halthy wathr. Thre was no noise, no effort, no
consciusness, in anythng h did; but i everythng an
indescribable lightns, a seing impossibiity of doing anythng
e, or doig anythng better, which was so graceful, so natural,
and agreeable, that it overc me, even n, in th
remembran
We made mrry in the littl parlour, were the Book of
Martyrs, unthumbed since my time, was laid out upo th desk as
f old, and whre I now turnd over its terrific picture,
rememberig th old senations thy had awakened, but not
feelig them. When Peggotty spoke of what she cald my room,
and of its beg ready for me at night, and of her hopig I would
occupy it, before I could so much as look at Sterforth, hsitating,
h was possessed of th wh case
‘Of course,’ h said. ‘You’l sleep hre, wile w stay, and I shal
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seep at the hotel.’
‘But to bring you so far,’ I returned, ‘and to separate, seems bad
companionship, Sterforth’
‘Why, i the nam of Heaven, where do you naturaly beg?’
h said. ‘What is “ss”, compared to that?’ It was settld at
onc
He maitaid all his deghtful qualiti to the last, until we
started forth, at eight o’cock, for Mr. Peggotty’s boat. Inded, they
were more and more brightly exhibited as the hours went on; for I
thought eve then, and I have no doubt now, that the
consciusness of succes in his determation to please, inspired
hm with a ne delacy of percpti, and made it, subtle as it
was, more easy to him If anyone had told m, then, that al this
as a briant gam, played for the excitement of the mot, for
th eployment of hgh spirits, in th thughtls love of
superirity, in a mere wasteful careles course of winning what
was worthss to him, and next minute thro away—I say, if
anyo had tod me such a lie that night, I woder in wat manner
of receiving it my indignation would have found a vent! Probably
only i an increase, had that be possible, of th romanti
feings of fidelity and friendship with which I walked beside hm,
over the dark wintry sands towards the old boat; the wind sghing
around us eve more mournfully, than it had sighd and moand
upon the night when I first darked Mr. Peggotty’s door.
‘This is a wid kid of place, Sterforth, is it not?’
‘Dismal enugh in th dark,’ he said: ‘and th sea roars as if it
wre hungry for us. Is that the boat, where I see a lght yoder?’
‘That’s the boat,’ said I.
‘And it’s the same I saw this morng,’ he returnd. ‘I came
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straight to it, by instict, I suppose.’
We said no more as we approached th light, but made softly
for the door. I laid my hand upo the latch; and whispering
Steerforth to keep close to me, wet in
A murmur of voices had bee audible on th outside, and, at th
moment of our entrance, a clapping of hands: which latter noise, I
was surprised to see, proded fro th geraly disconsolate
Mrs. Gummidge. But Mrs. Gummidge was not th only pers
there who was unusually excted. Mr. Peggotty, hi fac lghted up
with unc satisfaction, and laughing with all his mght, held
hi rough arm wide ope, as if for little Em’ly to run ito them;
Ham, with a mixed expresion in his face of admrati,
exultation, and a lumberig sort of basfuln that sat upon h
very wll, hld littl Em’ly by th hand, as if he were preting
her to Mr. Peggotty; little Em’ly hersef, blushig and shy, but
deghted with Mr. Peggotty’s deght, as her joyous eye
xpressed, was stopped by our entrance (for she saw us first) in
the very act of spriging from Ham to ntl i Mr. Peggotty’s
brace In the first glips we had of them al, and at the
mt of our pasg from the dark cod night ito the warm
lght room, this was the way in whic they were all eployed: Mrs.
Gummidge in th background, capping hr hands like a
madwoan.
Th littl picture was so instantaneusly dissved by our going
i, that one mght have doubted whether it had ever be I was in
the midst of the astond famy, fac to fac with Mr. Peggotty,
and holdig out my hand to him, when Ham shouted:
‘Mas’r Davy! It’s Mas’r Davy!’
In a moment we were all shaking hands wth o anthr, and
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askig one another how we did, and telg one another how glad
we were to mt, and al talkig at on Mr. Peggotty was so
proud and overjoyed to see us, that he did not know what to say or
do, but kept over and over again shakig hands wth me, and th
with Sterforth, and then with me, and then rufflig his saggy
hair al over hi head, and laughing with suc glee and triumph,
that it was a treat to se him
‘Why, that you two gent’l—gent’l growed—should
c to this here roof tonight, of al nghts in my life,’ said Mr.
Peggotty, ‘i suc a thing as never happed afore, I do rightly
believe! Em’ly, my darlg, come here! Come here, my littl witc!
Thre’s Mas’r Davy’s friend, my dear! Thre’s th gent’lman as
you’ve heerd on, Em’ly. He c to see you, alg with Mas’r
Davy, on the brightest night of your unce’s life as ever was or wi
be, Gorm the t’other one, and horroar for it!’
After delivering this spe all in a breath, and wth
xtraordinary anation and pleasure, Mr. Peggotty put on of h
large hands rapturously on each side of his ni’s face, and
kissing it a dozen times, laid it with a gentle pride and love upo
is broad chet, and patted it as if hi hand had be a lady’s.
Then he lt her go; and as sh ran into the little chamber where I
used to sleep, looked round upo us, quite hot and out of breath
wth his un satisfacti
‘If you tw gent’lmen—gent’lmen grod now, and such
gent’l—’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘So th’ are, so th’ are!’ cried Ham. ‘Wel said! So th’ are. Mas’r
Davy bor’—gent’len growed—so th’ are!’
‘If you two gent’l, gent’l growed,’ said Mr. Peggotty,
‘don’t ex-cuse m for beg i a state of mid, when you
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understand matters, I’ll arks your pardo Em’ly, my dear!—She
knows I’m a going to tel,’ here his deght broke out agai, ‘and
has made off. Would you be so good as look arter her, Mawther, for
a minute?’
Mrs. Gummidge nodded and disappeared.
‘If this ai’t,’ said Mr. Peggotty, sitting down among us by the
fire, ‘the brightest night o’ my life, I’m a shellfi—bied too—and
more I can’t say. This here littl Em’ly, sir,’ in a low voice to
Steerforth, ‘—her as you see a blushig here just now—’
Sterforth only nodded; but with such a plasd expresion of
iterest, and of particpatio in Mr. Peggotty’s feegs, that the
latter answered him as if he had spoken.
‘To be sure,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘That’s her, and so she is.
Thankee, sir.’
Ham nodded to me several times, as if he would have said so
too.
‘This hre lttle Em’ly of ours,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘has be, in
ur house, what I suppose (I’m a ignorant man, but that’s my
beef) n one but a lttle bright-eyed creetur can be in a house
She ain’t my chid; I never had on; but I couldn’t love her more
You understand! I culdn’t do it!’
‘I quite understand,’ said Steerforth
‘I kn you do, sir,’ returned Mr. Peggotty, ‘and thankee agai
Mas’r Davy, he can remmber what sh was; you may judge for
your own self what she is; but neithr of you can’t fuly kn wat
she has be, is, and will be, to my loving art. I am rough, sir,’ said
Mr. Peggotty, ‘I am as rough as a Sea Porkypi; but no o,
unles, mayhap, it is a wman, can kn, I think, what our littl
Em’ly i to me. And betwixt oursves,’ sinking hs voice lowr yet,
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‘that wman’s name ain’t Missis Gumdge neithr, thugh she
has a world of merits.’ Mr. Peggotty ruffled his hair again, with
both hands, as a further preparati for what he was going to say,
and went on, with a hand upo eac of his knees:
‘There was a certai person as had know’d our Em’ly, from the
ti when her father was drownded; as had seen her ctant;
when a babby, when a young gal, when a woman. Not muc of a
person to look at, he warn’t,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘sething o’ my
own buid—rough—a good deal o’ the sou’-wester in hi—wery
salt—but, on the whole, a honest sort of a cap, with his art i the
right plac’
I thought I had never se Ham grin to anything like the extent
to which he sat grinning at us now
‘What do this here bled tarpaul go and do,’ said Mr.
Peggotty, with his fac one high noon of ejoymet, ‘but he l
that there art of his to our little Em’ly. He folrs her about, he
makes hf a sort o’ servant to her, he loses in a great measure
is relish for his wittl, and in th long-run he makes it clear to
me wt’s amiss. Now I could wish myself, you see, that our littl
Em’ly was i a fair way of being marrid. I could wish to see her,
at all ewts, under article to a host man as had a right to
defend her. I do’t know how log I may live, or how soon I may
die; but I kn that if I was capsized, any night, in a gale of wd
in Yarmuth Roads here, and was to see th to-lights shig
for th last time over th rollers as I couldn’t make no head
agait, I could go do quieter for thinkig “There’s a man
ashore there, iron-true to my little Em’ly, God bl her, and no
rog can touc my Em’ly whe so be as that man lves.”’
Mr. Peggotty, in sipl earntne, waved his right arm, as if
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he were waving it at the town-lights for the last tim, and then,
exchangig a nd with Ham, whose eye he caught, proceeded as
before
‘We! I counls him to speak to Em’ly. He’s big enough, but
he’s basfullr than a little un, and he do’t like So I speak.
“What! Him!” says Em’ly. “Him that I’ve know’d so intimate s
many years, and like so much. Oh, Uncle! I never can have him.
He’s suc a good fellow!” I gives her a ki, and I says no mre to
her than, “My dear, you’re right to speak out, you’re to choose for
yourself, you’re as fre as a littl bird.” Th I aways to hm, and I
says, “I wish it could have be so, but it can’t. But you can both
be as you was, and wot I say to you is, Be as you was with her, lke
a man” He says to me, a-shaking of my hand, “I w!” h says
d he was—honurabl and manful—for two year going on, and
we was just the sam at home here as afore.’
Mr. Peggotty’s face, which had varid in its expresion with th
various stage of his narrative, now resumd all its former
triumphant delight, as he laid a hand upo my kne and a hand
upon Sterforth’s (previously wetting them both, for the greater
emphas of the action), and divided the followig speech between
us:
‘A of a sudde, on eveg—as it mght be tonight—c
ttle Em’ly from her work, and him with her! There ai’t so muc
in that, you’ll say. No, beause he take care on her, like a brother,
arter dark, and indeed afore dark, and at all times. But this
tarpaul chap, he take hold of her hand, and he cri out to me,
joyful, “Lok here! This is to be my littl wfe!” Ad she says, half
bold and half shy, and half a laughng and half a crying, “Ye,
Uncl! If you please.”—If I plase!’ cried Mr. Peggotty, rolling hi
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had in an ecstasy at th idea; ‘Lord, as if I should do anythnk
e!—“If you plas, I am steadir now, and I have thought better
of it, and I’l be as good a little wife as I can to him, for he’s a dear,
god fellow!” Th Misis Gumidge, she claps her hands like a
play, and you come in. Theer! the murder’s out!’ said Mr.
Peggotty—‘You c i! It took place this here pret hour; and
here’s the man that’ll marry her, the miute sh’s out of her tim’
Ham staggered, as wel he mght, under the blow Mr. Peggotty
dealt hm i hi unbounded joy, as a mark of confidece and
friedsp; but feeg cald upo to say sothing to us, he said,
with muc falterig and great difficulty:
‘She warn’t n higher than you was, Mas’r Davy—when you
first co—when I thought what sh’d grow up to be I s her
gron up—get’lmen—like a flr. I’d lay dow my life for her—
Mas’r Davy—Oh! most contet and cherful! She’s more to me—
gent’lmen—than—s’s all to me that ever I can want, and more
than ever I—than ever I could say. I—I love her true. There ai’t a
gent’lan i al the land—nor yet saig upo all the sea—that
can love his lady more than I love her, thugh thre’s many a
common man—wuld say better—wat he meant.’
I thught it affecting to see such a sturdy fellow as Ham was
w, tremblg i the strength of what he felt for the pretty little
reature who had won hi heart. I thought the sipl cofide
reposed i us by Mr. Peggotty and by himself, was, in itself,
affecting. I was affected by th story altogethr. Ho far my
emotio were ifluend by the recoections of my chdhood, I
do’t know. Whether I had c there wth any ligerig fany
that I was sti to love lttle Em’ly, I do’t know. I know that I was
filled wth pleasure by all this; but, at first, with an indescribably
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sensitive pleasure, that a very littl would have changed to pain
Therefore, if it had depeded upo me to touch the prevaig
chord amg them with any ski, I should have made a poor hand
of it. But it depended upo Sterforth; and he did it with such
addres, that in a fe minutes we were all as easy and as happy as
it was possible to be
‘Mr. Peggotty,’ he said, ‘you are a thoroughly good fellw, and
derve to be as happy as you are tonight. My hand upo it! Ham,
I give you joy, my boy. My hand upon that, too! Daiy, stir the fire,
and make it a brisk on! and Mr. Peggotty, unless you can induce
your gentl ni to co back (for whom I vacate this sat i the
cornr), I shall go. Any gap at your fireside on such a night—such
a gap last of al—I wouldn’t make, for the wealth of the Indi!’
So Mr. Peggotty went into my old room to fetch little Em’ly. At
first lttle Em’ly didn’t like to co, and then Ham went. Pretly
they brought her to the firesde, very muc cfused, and very
shy,—but she soo became more assured w s found h
gently and respectfully Sterforth spoke to her; ho skilfuly he
avoided anything that would embarras her; how he talked to Mr.
Peggotty of boats, and ships, and tides, and fish; h h referred
to me about the tim when he had s Mr. Peggotty at Sal
House; how deghted he was with the boat and all begig to it;
how lightly and easy he carried on, until he brought us, by
degre, into a charmed circle, and we were al talkig away
without any resrve.
Em’ly, inded, said little al the evenig; but se looked, and
listed, and her face got anated, and she was charming.
Steerforth told a story of a dial spwreck (whic arose out of
hi talk with Mr. Peggotty), as if he saw it all before hi—and little
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Em’ly’s eyes were fastened on hi al the ti, as if se saw it too.
He told us a merry adventure of his own, as a relief to that, with as
muc gaity as if the narrative were as fresh to him as it was to
us—and lttle Em’ly laughed until the boat rang with the musal
sounds, and we all laughd (Sterforth to), in irresistible
sympathy with what was so plasant and light-hearted. He got Mr.
Peggotty to sig, or rather to roar, ‘When the stormy winds do
blow, do blow, do blow’; and he sang a saior’s sog himelf, s
pathtically and beautifully, that I could have almost fancied that
the real wind crepig sorrowfully round the house, and
murmurig l through our unbroken se, was there to liten.
As to Mrs. Gummidge, h rousd that victi of despondecy
with a suc nver attaid by anyone el (so Mr. Peggotty
iformed m), se the dease of the old one. He left her so littl
leisure for being miserabl, that she said next day she thught she
must have bee bewtcd.
But h set up no monopoly of th geral attention, or th
versation. Wh little Em’ly grew more courageus, and talked
(but still bashfuly) across th fire to me, of our od wanderigs
upo th beach, to pick up shels and pebbles; and w I asked
hr if she rellected ho I usd to be devoted to her; and wh
we both laughed and redded, castig thes looks back on the
pleasant old times, so unreal to look at now; h was slent and
attentive, and observed us thoughtfully. Sh sat, at this tim, and
al the evenig, on the old loker in her old lttle crner by th
fire—Ham bede her, where I used to sit. I could nt satisfy
mysf whether it was in her own little tormenting way, or i a
maidenly rerve before us, that she kept quite ce to the wal,
and away fro him; but I observed that she did so, all th eveg.
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A I rember, it was alt midnght when we took our leave.
We had had some biscuit and dried fish for supper, and Sterforth
had produced from his poket a full flask of Hollands, whic we
men (I may say we men, now, withut a blus) had eptied. We
parted merrily; and as thy all stod croded round th door to
ght us as far as they could upo our road, I saw the st blue
eyes of little Em’ly pepig after us, from bed Ham, and heard
hr soft voice calg to us to be careful ho we wet.
‘A mt egaging little Beauty!’ said Sterforth, takig my arm
‘Wel! It’s a quaint place, and thy are quaint company, and it’s
quite a new seati to mix with them’
‘How fortunate we are, to,’ I returned, ‘to have arrived to
tnss thr happiss in that intended marriage! I never saw
people so happy. Ho delightful to see it, and to be made th
arers in their honest joy, as we have be!’
‘That’s rather a chuckl-headed felw for the girl; is’t he?’
said Steerforth.
He had be s hearty with him, and with them all, that I felt a
shok in this unxpected and cold reply. But turning quickly upo
, and seeing a laugh in his eyes, I anered, muc reeved:
‘Ah, Steerforth! It’s well for you to joke about the poor! You
may skirmish wth Miss Dartle, or try to hide your sympath in
jest from me, but I know better. When I see how perfectly you
understand th, ho exquisitey you can enter into happine
like th plain fisherman’s, or humour a love lke my od nurs’s, I
know that thre is not a joy or sorro, not an emtion, of such
people, that can be indifferent to you. And I admire and love you
for it, Steerforth, twenty ti the more!’
He stopped, and, lookig in my face, said, ‘Daisy, I beve you
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are in earnt, and are god. I wish we all were!’ Next moment h
was gaiy sigig Mr. Peggotty’s sog, as we walked at a round
pace back to Yarmuth
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Chapter 22
SOME OLD SCENES, AND SOME NEW PEOPLE
S
teerforth and I stayed for more than a fortnight i that part
of the country. We were very muc togethr, I nd not
say; but occasonaly we were asunder for so hours at a
tim He was a good saior, and I was but an idifferent one; and
when he went out boatig with Mr. Peggotty, whic was a
favourite amusemet of his, I geraly reaied ashore. My
occupati of Peggotty’s spare-ro put a constraint upo me,
from whic he was free: for, knowing how asduously sh
attended o Mr. Barki al day, I did nt like to remai out late at
nght; whereas Sterforth, lyig at the In, had nothing to cnsult
but hi own humour. Thus it cam about, that I heard of his
akig lttle treats for the fisrm at Mr. Peggotty’s house of
call, ‘Th Willg Mind’, after I was in bed, and of hi beg aflat,
wrapped in fisrmn’s clothes, whole moght nights, and
cg back when the mrnig tide was at flood. By this tim,
hver, I knew that his restles nature and bold spirits delighted
to find a vent i rough toil and hard weathr, as in any othr
mans of exctemt that preted itsf fresy to him; so n
f his prodigs surprised me.
ther cause of our beg sotim apart, was, that I had
naturally an interest in going over to Blunderstone, and revisting
the old famliar scene of my chdhood; while Steerforth, after
beg there onc, had naturally no great iterest i going there
again. Hence, on thre or four days that I can at once real, w
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wnt our several ways after an early breakfast, and met again at a
late dinner. I had no idea how he employed hi tim i the
interval, beyond a geral knowledge that he was very popular i
the plac, and had twenty mean of actively diverting hif
where another man mght not have found one.
For my own part, my occupati in my soltary pilgriage was
to recall every yard of th old road as I wnt along it, and to haunt
the old spots, of whic I never tired. I haunted them, as my
memory had often done, and lingered amg th as my younger
thoughts had ligered when I was far away. The grave beath the
tree, where both my parents lay—on whic I had looked out, when
it was my fathr’s only, with such curius feings of compassi,
and by which I had stod, so desolate, wh it was oped to
receive my pretty mothr and her baby—th grave wich
Peggotty’s own faithful care had ever since kept neat, and made a
garde of, I walked nar, by the hour. It lay a lttle off the
churchyard path, in a quiet cornr, not so far removed but I could
read th names upo th sto as I walked to and fro, startld by
th sound of th church-bel wh it struck th hour, for it was like
a departed vo to me My reflections at the ti were alays
asated with the figure I was to make in life, and the
ditiguished things I was to do My echoing footsteps went to n
other tune, but were as constant to that as if I had c home to
build my castls in the air at a lvig mother’s side
There were great changes in my old home The ragged nts, s
g derted by the rooks, were go; and the trees wre lpped
and topped out of their rembered shape The garde had run
wild, and half the windows of the house were shut up. It was
ccupied, but only by a poor lunati gentleman, and th people
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who took care of him He was always sitting at my little window,
lookig out ito the curchyard; and I wondered whether his
ramblg thoughts ever went upon any of the fanci that used to
occupy m, o the roy morngs when I peeped out of that
sam lttle window i my night-clothes, and saw the shp quietly
feedig in the light of the risg sun
Our old nghbours, Mr. and Mrs. Grayper, were gone to South
Aerica, and the rai had made its way through the roof of their
epty huse, and stained th outer walls. Mr. Chllip was marrid
again to a tall, raw-boned, high-nd wife; and thy had a weaze
ttle baby, with a heavy head that it culdn’t hold up, and two
wak starig eye, with which it seed to be alays wdering
wy it had ever been born
It was with a singular jumble of sadns and pleasure that I
used to liger about my native plac, until the reddeg winter
sun admd me that it was tim to start on my returnig walk.
But, w th place was left bend, and especialy wh
Steerforth and I were happiy seated over our dier by a blazig
fire, it was delicious to thk of having be thre So it was,
though i a sftened degree, when I wet to my neat room at
nght; and, turnig over the leave of the crocodi-book (whic
as alays there, upon a little table), rebered with a grateful
hart h blt I was i having such a friend as Sterforth, such a
fried as Peggotty, and suc a substitute for what I had lot as my
excellent and gerous aunt.
My nearet way to Yarmouth, in cg back from thes lg
walks, was by a ferry. It landed m on the flat between the to
and th sea, wh I could make straight across, and so save
ysf a considerabl circuit by the high road. Mr. Peggotty’s
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house beg on that waste-place, and nt a hundred yards out of
my track, I always looked in as I went by. Sterforth was pretty
sure to be there expetig m, and we went on together through
the frosty air and gatherig fog towards the twinklg lghts of the
town.
On dark eveg, when I was later than usual—for I had, that
day, bee making my partig visit to Blundersto, as w wre
w about to return home—I found him alone in Mr. Peggotty’s
house, sitting thoughtfully before the fire. He was so itent upon
his own refltis that he was quite unnscius of my approach.
This, indeed, he might easly have be if he had be less
absorbed, for fotsteps fell noiselesly on th sandy ground
outsde; but even my entran faied to rouse him I was standig
cose to hi, lookig at hi; and sti, with a heavy brow, he was
lost in his meditatis.
He gave such a start wh I put my hand upo his shoulder,
that he made me start to
‘You come upo me,’ h said, almost angrily, ‘like a reproachful
ghost!’
‘I was obliged to announce myself, someh,’ I replied. ‘Have I
calld you dow fro th stars?’
‘No,’ he answered. ‘No’
‘Up fro anywre, then?’ said I, takig my seat near him.
‘I was lookig at th picture in th fire,’ he returnd.
‘But you are spoiling th for me,’ said I, as he stirred it
quickly with a piece of burng wod, striking out of it a train of
red-ht sparks that went carering up th littl chimney, and
roarig out into the air.
‘You would not have se them,’ he returned. ‘I detest this
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mongrel time, neithr day nor night. Ho late you are! Where
have you be?’
‘I have be takig lave of my usual walk,’ said I.
‘And I have be sitting here,’ said Sterforth, glancing round
the room, ‘thikig that al the peopl we found so glad on the
nght of our cg down, mght—to judge from the pret
wasted air of th plac—be dispersd, or dead, or come to I don’t
know what harm. David, I wis to God I had had a judius father
the last twenty years!’
‘My dear Sterforth, what is th matter?’
‘I wish with all my soul I had be better guided!’ h exclaimed.
‘I wish with all my soul I could guide myself better!’
Thre was a passionate dejection in his manner that quite
amazed me. He was more unke himself than I could have
supposed possible.
‘It would be better to be this poor Peggotty, or his lout of a
nph,’ he said, getting up and leang modiy agait the
chimney-piece, wth his face toards th fire, ‘than to be myself,
twenty tim ricr and twenty tim wisr, and be the tormet to
myself that I have be, in this Devil’s bark of a boat, wthin th
ast half-hour!’
I was s cfounded by the alteratio in him, that at first I
culd ony observe him in sie, as he stood lang hi head
upon his hand, and lookig gloomiy do at the fire. At lgth I
begged hi, with al the earnetne I felt, to tel m what had
occurred to cross h so unusually, and to let me sympathze with
, if I culd not hope to advis him Before I had well
uded, he began to laugh—fretfully at first, but soon with
returnig gaity.
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‘Tut, it’s nothing, Daiy! nothing!’ he repld. ‘I told you at the
in in Londo, I am heavy copany for mysf, sotim I have
be a nghtmare to mysf, just now—must have had one, I think.
At odd dul times, nursry tales come up into th memory,
unregnzed for what they are. I beeve I have been cfoundig
myself with th bad boy wh “didn’t care”, and beame fod for
lons—a grander kid of going to the dogs, I suppo What old
w cal the horrors, have been creepig over me from head to
foot. I have been afraid of mysf.’
‘You are afraid of nothg else, I thk,’ said I.
‘Perhaps nt, and yet may have enough to be afraid of too,’ he
answered. ‘Well! So it go by! I am not about to be hipped again,
David; but I te you, my god fell, once more, that it would have
bee well for me (and for more than me) if I had had a steadfast
and judious father!’
His fac was always full of expre, but I never saw it
express such a dark kind of earntns as wh he said th
rds, with his glance bent on th fire
‘So much for that!’ he said, making as if he tossed somethg
lght into the air, with his hand.
“‘Why, beg go, I am a man agai,”
like Macbeth Ad now for dinnr! If I have not (Macbeth-like)
broke up th feast with most admired disorder, Daisy.’
‘But where are they al, I woder!’ said I.
‘God kns,’ said Steerforth ‘After strog to the ferry lking
for you, I strolled in here and found th place deserted. That set
me thking, and you found me thking.’
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The advet of Mrs. Gumdge with a basket, explaid h th
house had happened to be empty. She had hurried out to buy
sthing that was neded, agait Mr. Peggotty’s return with the
tide; and had left th door ope in th meanwh, lest Ham and
lttle Em’ly, with whom it was an early night, should c home
ile she was go. Sterforth, after very much improving Mrs
Gummidge’s spirits by a cherful salutati and a jo embrace,
tok my arm, and hurrid me away.
He had improved his own spirits, no les than Mrs
Gummidge’s, for thy were again at thr usual fl, and h was
full of vivacus conversati as we went along.
‘And so,’ h said, gaily, ‘we abandon this bucaneer life
tomorro, do we?’
‘So w agreed,’ I returned. ‘Ad our plac by the coach are
taken, you know’
‘Ay! there’s n hep for it, I suppoe,’ said Steerforth ‘I have
alt forgotten that there is anything to do in the world but to go
out tossing on th sea here. I wish thre was not.’
‘As long as th novelty should last,’ said I, laughng.
‘Like enough,’ he returned; ‘though there’s a sarcasti mang
i that obsrvati for an amable piece of ine like my
young friend. Wel! I dare say I am a capricious fellow, David. I
know I am; but while th iro is hot, I can strike it vigorously to I
could pas a reasonably god examation already, as a pilot in
thes waters, I think.’
‘Mr. Peggotty says you are a woder,’ I returned. ‘A nautial
phenomon, eh?’ laughed Steerforth.
‘Indeed he do, and you know how truly; I know how ardet
you are in any pursuit you follow, and ho easily you can master
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it. And that amaze me most in you, Sterforth—that you should
be contented with such fitful uses of your powrs.’
‘Ctented?’ h answered, merrily. ‘I am never conteted,
except wth your fres, my gentle Daisy. As to fitfulness, I
have never learnt th art of binding myself to any of th ws o
the Ixio of the days are turng round and round. I
missed it someh in a bad appreticeship, and now don’t care
about it.—You know I have bought a boat down here?’
‘What an extraordiary fellow you are, Steerforth!’ I exclaid,
stopping—for this was th first I had heard of it. ‘When you may
never care to come near th plac again!’
‘I do’t know that,’ he returned. ‘I have take a fancy to the
plac At all evets,’ walkig me briskly on, ‘I have bought a boat
that was for sale—a clipper, Mr. Peggotty says; and so she is—and
Mr. Peggotty will be master of her in my absence.’
‘No I understand you, Steerforth!’ said I, exultigly. ‘You
preted to have bought it for yoursf, but you have realy do s
to cofer a befit on him I mght have known as muc at first,
knowing you. My dear kind Sterforth, ho can I te you what I
think of your gerosity?’
‘Tus!’ he answered, turng red. ‘Th less said, the better.’
‘Didn’t I know?’ crid I, ‘didn’t I say that there was not a joy, or
sorro, or any emtion of such host harts that was indifferent
to you?’
‘Aye, aye,’ h answered, ‘you tod m al that. There let it rest.
We have said enough!’
Afraid of offendig him by pursuig the subject when he made
so light of it, I oly pursued it in my thughts as we went on at
eve a quicker pace than before
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‘She must be ney rigged,’ said Steerforth, ‘and I shal lave
Littimr bend to se it do, that I may know sh is quite
mplete. Did I te you Littimer had come dow?’
‘ No.’
‘Oh yes! cam do this morng, with a letter from my
mothr.’
A our looks mt, I obsrved that he was pal even to his lips,
though he looked very steadiy at m I feared that s differen
betwee him and his mother might have ld to hi beg i the
frame of mind in which I had found him at th solitary fireside. I
hited so
‘Oh no!’ he said, shakig his head, and giving a sght laugh.
‘Nothg of the sort! Yes. He is come dow, that man of min.’
‘Th same as ever?’ said I.
‘The sam as ever,’ said Sterforth. ‘Ditant and quiet as the
North Pole. He shal see to the boat beg fresh namd. She’s th
“Stormy Petrel” no What do Mr. Peggotty care for Stormy
Petrel! I’ll have her christed agai’
‘By what name?’ I asked.
‘Th “Little Em’ly”.’
A he had cotiued to look steadiy at me, I took it as a
reminder that he objected to being extod for his consideration. I
could not help shoing in my face ho much it plased me, but I
said littl, and he resumed his usual smil, and seed relieved.
‘But see here,’ he said, lookig before us, ‘where the origial
ttle Em’ly co! And that felw with her, eh? Upon my soul,
h’s a true knight. He never leaves her!’
Ham was a boat-builder in th days, having improved a
natural ingenuity in that handicraft, until he had beme a skild
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wrkman. He was in his wrkig-dres, and looked rugged
eough, but manly withal, and a very fit protector for the
bloomig lttle creature at his side Inded, there was a frankn
in h face, an hoty, and an undisguid sho of his pride in
her, and hi lve for her, whic were, to m, the bet of good looks
I thought, as they cam towards us, that they were wel matched
eve in that particular.
She withdre her hand timidly fro his arm as we stopped to
speak to th, and blusd as she gave it to Sterforth and to me.
When they pased on, after we had exchanged a few words, sh
did nt like to replac that hand, but, stil appearig timd and
ctraid, walked by hersef. I thought al this very pretty and
engagig, and Steerforth seemed to thk so too, as w looked
after them fadig away in the light of a young moon.
Suddenly thre passed us—evidently foing th—a young
woman whose approac we had nt obsrved, but whose fac I
saw as sh went by, and thought I had a fait rembranc of.
She was lightly dressed; looked bold, and haggard, and flauntig,
and poor; but sd, for the tim, to have given all that to the
wnd which was bling, and to have nothg in hr mind but
going after them As the dark ditant lvel, absrbig their figures
into itself, left but itself vibl betw us and th sea and cuds,
hr figure disappeared in like manner, still no nearer to th than
before
‘That i a black shadow to be following the girl,’ said Sterforth,
standing still; ‘what doe it mean?’
He spoke in a low voice that sounded almost strange to Me
‘She must have it in her mind to beg of them, I thk,’ said I.
‘A beggar wuld be no novelty,’ said Sterforth; ‘but it is a
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strange thing that the beggar should take that shape tonight.’
‘Why?’ I asked.
‘For n better reason, truly, than beause I was thinkig,’ he
said, after a paus, ‘of somethg like it, wh it came by. Where
th Devil did it come fro, I woder!’
‘From th shado of this wal, I thk,’ said I, as w erged
upo a road on which a wal abutted.
‘It’s gone!’ he returned, lookig over his shoulder. ‘Ad al ill go
with it. Now for our dir!’
But he looked agai over his shoulder towards the sea-lin
glimmering afar off, and yet again. And he wondered about it, in
some broke expressions, several times, in th short remainder of
our walk; and only seemed to forget it wen the lght of fire and
candle sho upo us, seated warm and merry, at table.
Littimer was thre, and had his usual effect upo me. Whe I
said to hi that I hoped Mrs. Sterforth and Mis Dartle were
wll, he answered respectfuly (and of course repetably), that
thy wre tolerably we, he thanked me, and had sent thr
compliments. This was all, and yet he seed to me to say as
plainly as a man culd say: ‘You are very young, sir; you are
exceedigly young.’
We had almost finished dir, wh taking a step or tw
toards the table, from the corner where he kept watch upo us,
or rather upo me, as I felt, he said to his master:
‘I beg your pardo, sir. Miss Mor is dow here.’
‘Who?’ cried Sterforth, much astonished.
‘Miss Mor, sir.’
‘Why, what on earth does she do here?’ said Sterforth
‘It appears to be her native part of the cuntry, sr. Sh iforms
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m that se make one of her professonal vists here, every year,
sir. I met hr i th stret this aftern, and she wished to kn
if she might have th hour of waiting on you after dinner, sir.’
‘Do you know th Giantes in queti, Daisy?’ inquired
Steerforth.
I was obliged to confes—I felt ashamed, eve of being at this
diadvantage before Littimr—that Mis Mowcher and I were
wlly unacquainted.
‘Then you sal know her,’ said Steerforth, ‘for she is one of the
seven wonders of th world. Whe Miss Mor comes, sho hr
in.’
I felt some curisity and excitet about this lady, especially
as Sterforth burst into a fit of laughing when I referred to her,
and positivey refused to answer any queti of which I made hr
the subject. I reaied, therefore, in a state of cderabl
expetati until the cloth had be removed so half an hour,
and we were sitting over our deanter of win before the fire,
when the door oped, and Littimr, with hi habitual serenty
quite undisturbed, announced:
‘Miss Mor!’
I looked at the doorway and saw nothing. I was sti lookig at
the doorway, thinkig that Mis Mowcher was a log whil
making her appearance, w, to my infinite astonishment, thre
came waddling round a sofa which stod betw me and it, a
pursy dwarf, of about forty or forty-five, with a very large head and
face, a pair of roguish grey eye, and such extrey littl arms,
that, to eable hersf to lay a finger archly agait her snub nos,
as se ogld Steerforth, she was oblged to meet the finger halfway, and lay her nose against it. Her chi, which was wat i
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calld a double chi, was so fat that it entirely swallowd up th
strings of hr bonnet, bow and al Throat she had none; waist she
ad none; legs she had none, worth mentioning; for thugh she
was more than ful-szed down to where her wait would have
been, if se had had any, and though she termated, as human
begs gerally do, i a pair of fet, she was so shrt that she
stod at a common-sized chair as at a tabl, restig a bag she
carrid on th seat. This lady—dred in an off-hand, easy styl;
briging her no and her forefinger together, with the difficulty I
have deribed; standig with her head nariy on one side,
and, with on of her sharp eye shut up, making an unmmony
knowig fac—after oglig Steerforth for a few mots, broke
to a torrent of words
‘What! My flr!’ she pleasantly began, shakig her large had
at hi ‘You’re there, are you! Oh, you naughty boy, fie for shame,
what do you do so far away from home? Up to mef, I’ll be
bound. Oh, you’re a dowy fe, Sterforth, so you are, and I’m
another, ai’t I? Ha, ha, ha! You’d have betted a hundred pound to
five, n, that you wouldn’t have seen me here, wouldn’t you?
Bles you, man alve, I’m everywhere. I’m here and there, and
were nt, like the cojurer’s half-cro i the lady’s
handkercher. Talkig of handkerchers— and talkig of ladi—
wat a comfort you are to your blessed mothr, ain’t you, my dear
boy, over one of my shoulders, and I do’t say whic!’
Miss Mor untid her bot, at this passage of hr
discourse, thre back th strings, and sat dow, panting, on a
footstool i front of the fire—makig a kid of arbour of the dining
tabl, which spread its mahgany sheter above her head.
‘Oh my stars and what’s-thir-nam!’ she wnt o, clapping a
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hand o each of her littl knees, and glanng shredly at me, ‘I’m
of too full a habit, that’s the fact, Steerforth. After a flight of stairs,
it gives me as much troubl to draw every breath I want, as if it
was a bucket of water. If you saw me lookig out of an upper
window, you’d think I was a fi woman, wouldn’t you?’
‘I should thk that, wherever I saw you,’ replied Steerforth
‘Go alg, you dog, do!’ crid the lttle creature, makig a whisk
at him with the handkerchif with whic sh was wipig her fac,
‘and don’t be impudent! But I give you my word and hur I was
at Lady Mithrs’s last wek— there’s a woman! How she wears!—
and Mithers himf cam ito the room where I was waitig for
her—there’s a man! Ho he wears! and his wig too, for he’s had it
thes ten years—and he went on at that rate in the copltary
line, that I began to thk I should be obliged to ring th bell. Ha!
ha! ha! He’s a plasant wretch, but he wants principl’
‘What were you doing for Lady Mithrs?’ asked Sterforth
‘That’s telgs, my bled infant,’ sh retorted, tappig her
nose again, screg up her face, and twklg her eye like an
you mid! You’d lke to
imp of supernatural inteigece. ‘Never
know whether I stop her hair from falg off, or dye it, or touch up
her coplxion, or improve her eyebrows, wouldn’t you? Ad s
you shal, my darlig—when I tell you! Do you know what my
great grandfather’s nam was?’
‘No,’ said Steerforth
‘It was Walker, my sweet pet,’ replied Mi Mor, ‘and he
came of a long li of Walkers, that I inrit all th Hokey estate
from.’
I never bed anythng approaching to Miss Mor’s wik
except Miss Mor’s self-possion. She had a wderful way
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too, when lteg to what was said to her, or when waitig for an
aner to what she had said hersef, of pausig with her head
cungly on one sde, and one eye turned up lke a magpi’s
Altogethr I was lost in amazemt, and sat starig at her, quite
oblvious, I am afraid, of the laws of potene
She had by this time drawn th chair to her side, and was busily
egaged i producig from the bag (plungig in her short arm to
the shoulder, at every dive) a number of sal bottl, spoges,
combs, bruss, bits of flanne, littl pairs of curling-iro, and
othr instruments, which she tumbled in a hap upo th chair.
Fro this employment she suddenly desisted, and said to
Sterforth, much to my confusion:
‘Who’s your friend?’
‘Mr. Copperfield,’ said Steerforth; ‘he wants to kn you.’
‘Well, then, he sal! I thought he looked as if he did!’ returned
Miss Mor, waddling up to me, bag in hand, and laughng o
me as she came. ‘Face like a peach!’ standing on tipto to pinch
my ck as I sat. ‘Quite tempting! I’m very fond of peaches
Happy to make your acquaintance, Mr. Copperfield, I’m sure.’
I said that I cgratulated mysf on having the honour to make
rs, and that th happines was mutual
‘Oh, my goodn, how pote we are!’ exclaid Mis
Mowcher, makig a preposterous attempt to cover her large fac
with her morsel of a hand. ‘What a world of gam and spinnage
it is, thugh, ain’t it!’
This was addred cfidetialy to both of us, as the morse of
a hand came away fro th face, and burid itself, arm and all, i
the bag again
‘What do you mean, Miss Mor?’ said Sterforth
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‘Ha! ha! ha! What a refreshig set of humbugs we are, to be
sure, ain’t w, my swet chid?’ replied that mors of a woman,
feelig i the bag with her head on one sde and her eye in the air.
‘Lok hre!’ taking something out. ‘Scraps of th Russian Prince’s
nails. Prince Alphabet turnd topsy-turvy, I call him, for hi
am’s got all the letters in it, higgldy-piggledy.’
‘Th Russian Price is a client of yours, is he?’ said Sterforth
‘I believe you, my pet,’ replied Miss Mor. ‘I keep hs nail
in order for him. Twice a wek! Fingers and to.’
‘He pays we, I hope?’ said Steerforth
‘Pays, as he speaks, my dear child—through th nose,’ replied
Miss Mor. ‘Non of your clos shavers th Prince ain’t. You’d
say so, if you saw his moustachios Red by nature, black by art.’
‘By your art, of course,’ said Steerforth
Miss Mor winked assent. ‘Forced to send for me. Couldn’t
his dye; it did very well in Russia, but
hlp it. Th cimate affected
it was no go here. You never saw such a rusty Prince in all your
born days as he was. Like old iro!’
‘Is that wy you called him a humbug, just now?’ inquired
Steerforth.
‘Oh, you’re a broth of a boy, ain’t you?’ returnd Miss Mor,
shaking her head vitly. ‘I said, what a set of humbugs w wre
in geral, and I shod you th scraps of th Price’s nais to
prove it. Th Prince’s nails do more for me in private families of
the gente sort, than al my talets put together. I always carry
’e about. They’re the bet introduction. If Mis Mowcher cuts the
Prince’s nais, she must be all right. I give ’em away to th young
ladies. They put ’em in albums, I beeve. Ha! ha! ha! Upon my life,
“th wh social syste” (as th mn call it w thy make
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spees in Parlament) is a syste of Prince’s nails!’ said this
least of women, trying to fold her short arm, and noddig hr
large head.
Sterforth laughd heartily, and I laughd to Miss Mor
continuing all th time to shake her head (wich was very much
on one side), and to look ito the air with one eye, and to wk
with the other.
‘Well, we!’ she said, smitig her smal knees, and rig, ‘ths is
nt bus. Come, Steerforth, let’s explore the poar regions, and
have it over.’
She then seted two or three of the lttle itrumts, and a
lttle bottle, and asked (to my surpris) if the tabl would bear. On
Sterforth’s replying in th affirmative, she pushed a chair against
it, and begging th assistance of my hand, mounted up, pretty
nbly, to the top, as if it were a stage.
‘If either of you saw my ankl,’ se said, when she was safely
elevated, ‘say so, and I’l go home and detroy mysf!’
‘I did not,’ said Sterforth
‘I did not,’ said I.
‘Well then,’ cried Miss Mor,’ I’l cot to live. No,
ducky, ducky, ducky, come to Mrs. Bod and be kied.’
This was an invocati to Sterforth to place hif under her
hands; wh, accordingly, sat himself dow, with his back to th
tabl, and his laughing face towards m, and submitted hi head to
hr inspection, evidetly for no othr purpo than our
entertaient. To see Mi Moher standig over hi, lookig
at his rich profusion of bron hair through a large round
magnifying glass, which she tok out of her pocket, was a most
amazig spectacle.
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‘You’re a pretty felw!’ said Mis Mowcher, after a brif
ipection. ‘You’d be as bald as a friar on the top of your head in
twelve moths, but for me just half a mute, my young fried,
and we’ll give you a polishig that shall keep your curls on for th
xt ten years!’
With this, sh tilted so of the cotets of the lttle bottle on to
one of the little bits of flann, and, again imparting so of the
virtues of that preparati to one of the little brushes, began
rubbig and srapig away with both on the crown of Sterforth’s
head in the bust maner I ever witnd, talkig al the ti
‘Thre’s Charly Pyegrave, the duke’s son,’ she said. ‘You kn
arley?’ peepig round into his face.
‘A little,’ said Steerforth
‘What a man he is! There’s a whisker! As to Charley’s legs, if
thy were only a pair (wich thy ain’t), thy’d defy competition.
Would you beve he tried to do without me—in the Life-Guards,
too?’
‘Mad!’ said Steerforth
‘It looks like it. Hover, mad or sane, he tried,’ returnd Mi
Mowcher. ‘What do he do, but, l and behold you, he goes into a
perfumer’s shop, and wants to buy a bottle of the Madagasar
Liquid.’
‘Charley do?’ said Steerforth.
‘Charley do But they haven’t got any of the Madagascar
Liquid.’
‘What is it? Something to drik?’ asked Sterforth
‘To drink?’ returnd Miss Mor, stopping to slap his chek.
‘To doctor his own moustachios with, you know. There was a
wman in th shop—elderly female—quite a Griffin—w had
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nver even heard of it by name. “Beggig pardo, sir,” said th
Griffin to Charley, “it’s not—not—not rouge, is it?” “Rouge,” said
Carly to the Griffin “What the unmetiabl to ears polite, do
you think I want with rouge?” “No offence, sir,” said th Griffin;
“w have it asked for by so many nam, I thought it might be”
Now that, my child,’ continued Mi Mor, rubbing all th
ti as busy as ever, ‘is another intan of the refresg
humbug I was speakig of. I do sothing in that way mysf—
perhaps a god deal—perhaps a littl—sharp’s th wrd, my dear
boy—nver mid!’
‘In what way do you mean? In the rouge way?’ said Sterforth.
‘Put this and that together, my tender pupi,’ returned the wary
Mowcher, touchig her no, ‘work it by the rule of Serets in al
trade, and the product will give you the dered result. I say I do a
she calls it lip-salve
lttle i that way mysf. One Dowager,
Anothr, she call it gloves. Another, she cals it tucker-edging.
Anothr, she cals it a fan. I cal it whatever they call it. I supply it
for ’e, but we kep up the trick s, to one another, and make
believe with such a face, that thy’d as soo thk of laying it o,
before a whole drawg-room, as before me And when I wait upon
’em, thy’ll say to me sometimes— with it on—thick, and no
mtake—“How am I lookig, Mowcher? Am I pal?” Ha! ha! ha!
ha! Is’t that refreshig, my young friend!’
I never did in my days behd anythng like Mor as she
tood upon the dig tabl, iteny enjoying this refreshmet,
rubbig busy at Steerforth’s head, and wiking at me over it.
‘Ah!’ she said. ‘Suc things are not much in demand
hereabouts. That sets m off again! I haven’t se a pretty woman
since I’ve be here, jey.’
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‘No?’ said Steerforth
‘Not the ghost of one,’ repld Mis Mowcher.
‘We culd show her the substan of one, I think?’ said
Steerforth, addresg his eyes to m. ‘Eh, Daiy?’
‘Yes, indeed,’ said I.
‘Aha?’ cried th littl creature, glanng sharply at my face, and
then peepig round at Steerforth’s. ‘Umph?’
The first excamati sounded lke a questio put to both of us,
and the sed like a question put to Steerforth only. She sed
to have found no anr to either, but ctiued to rub, with her
head on oe sde and her eye turned up, as if she were lookig for
an answer in th air and were confident of its appearing pretly.
‘A sister of yours, Mr. Copperfield?’ she cried, after a paus,
and still keeping the same lok-out. ‘Aye, aye?’
‘No,’ said Steerforth, before I could reply. ‘Nothing of the srt.
On th contrary, Mr. Copperfield usd—or I am much mistaken—
to have a great admratio for her.’
‘Why, has’t he now?’ returned Mis Mowcher. ‘Is he fickl?
Oh, for shame! Did he sip every flr, and change every hur,
until Polly his passion requited?—Is her name Polly?’
Th Elfin suddenss with which she pounced upo me wth
this question, and a sarcg look, quite dioncrted me for a
moment.
‘No, Mi Mor,’ I replied. ‘Her name is Emily.’
‘Aha?’ she cried exactly as before. ‘Umph? What a rattl I am!
Mr. Copperfield, ain’t I voatile?’
Her tone and look impld sothing that was nt agreeabl to
m in coexio with the subject. So I said, i a graver maner
than any of us had yet assumed: ‘Sh is as virtuous as she is pretty.
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She is engaged to be marrid to a most worthy and deserving man
her own stati of life. I esteem her for her good se, as muc
as I admre her for her good looks’
‘Well said!’ cried Sterforth ‘Hear, hear, hear! Now I’ll quech
th curiity of this littl Fatia, my dear Daisy, by leaving hr
nothing to guess at. She is at pret appreticed, Miss Mor,
or artied, or whatever it may be, to Omer and Joram,
Haberdashers, Mirs, and so forth, in this to. Do you
observe? Omer and Joram. Th pro of which my friend has
spoken, is made and etered into wth hr cousin; Cristian name,
Ham; surnam, Peggotty; occupati, boat-builder; also of this
to She lives with a relative; Christian name, unknown;
surnam, Peggotty; occupati, seafaring; also of this to. She is
the prettiet and mt engaging lttle fairy in the world. I admre
hr—as my friend doe—excdingly. If it were not that I might
appear to disparage her Intended, which I know my friend wuld
nt like, I would add, that to me se seems to be throg herself
away; that I am sure sh mght do better; and that I sar sh was
born to be a lady.’
Miss Mor listed to th words, wh were very slowly
and distinctly spoken, with her head o o side, and hr eye in
th air as if she were still lookig for that answer. Whe h cased
she became brisk again in an instant, and rattld away with
surprising volubility.
‘Oh! Ad that’s all about it, is it?’ she excaimed, trimming hi
iskers wth a littl restless pair of scissors, that went glancing
round his head in all directions. ‘Very wll: very wll! Quite a long
story. Ought to ed “and they lived happy ever afterwards”;
oughtn’t it? Ah! What’s that gam at forfeits? I love my lve with
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an E, beause se’s entig; I hate her wth an E, beause se’s
gaged. I took her to the sign of the exquiste, and treated her
wth an elopemet, her nam’s Emiy, and se live in the east?
Ha! ha! ha! Mr. Copperfied, ai’t I volatil?’
Merely lookig at me with extravagant slyn, and not waitig
for any reply, sh ctiued, without drawg breath:
‘There! If ever any scapegrac was trimd and touched up to
perfection, you are, Steerforth. If I understand any noddl in th
world, I understand yours. Do you hear me when I tell you that,
my darling? I understand yours,’ peepig dow ito h face. ‘Now
you may mizzle, jemmy (as we say at Court), and if Mr.
Copperfid wi take the chair I’l operate on hi’
‘What do you say, Daiy?’ inquired Sterforth, laughig, and
resigning his seat. ‘Will you be improved?’
‘Thank you, Mis Mowcher, not this eveg.’
‘Don’t say n,’ returned the little woman, lookig at m with the
aspect of a connoisseur; ‘a littl bit more eyebro?’
‘Thank you,’ I returnd, ‘some othr time.’
‘Have it carried half a quarter of an in towards the templ,’
said Miss Mor. ‘We can do it in a fortnght.’
‘No, I thank you. Not at pret.’
‘Go in for a tip,’ s urged. ‘No? Let’s get the saffoldig up,
th, for a pair of whiskers. Come!’
I could not hlp blusng as I decd, for I felt we were on my
weak pot, no But Mis Mowcher, findig that I was not at
pret disposed for any decorati within th range of hr art,
and that I was, for the tim beg, proof against the blandits
of the sal bottle wh she held up before one eye to enforce her
persuasions, said w wuld make a begig on an early day, and
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requested the aid of my hand to ded from her elevated stati
Thus assisted, she skipped dow with much agiity, and began to
ti her double chin into her bonnet.
‘Th fee,’ said Steerforth, ‘is—’
‘Five bob,’ replied Mi Mor, ‘and dirt cheap, my chicken.
Ain’t I volatile, Mr. Copperfield?’
I replied poltely: ‘Not at all.’ But I thught she was rathr so,
w she tossed up his tw half-cros like a gobl pieman,
caught th, dropped th in her pocket, and gave it a loud slap.
‘That’s th Till!’ observed Miss Mor, standing at th chair
again, and replacing i th bag a miscellanus colti of littl
bjects she had emptied out of it. ‘Have I got all my traps? It see
so. It won’t do to be like long Ned Beadwd, wh thy tok h
to church “to marry him to somebody”, as he says, and left th
bride behnd. Ha! ha! ha! A wiked rascal, Ned, but droll! Now, I
know I’m going to break your hearts, but I am forced to lave you.
You must call up all your fortitude, and try to bear it. Good-bye,
Mr. Cpperfield! Take care of yourself, jokey of Norfok! Ho I
have be rattlig on! It’s all the fault of you two wretc I
forgive you! “Bob swore!”—as th Englishman said for “Good
nght”, when he first learnt Fre, and thought it so like Engl
“Bob swore,” my ducks!’
With the bag sung over her arm, and rattlig as sh waddld
away, she waddled to th door, whre she stopped to inquire if she
hould lave us a lok of her hair. ‘A’t I volatil?’ she added, as a
ctary on this offer, and, with her finger on her no,
departed.
Sterforth laughd to that degre, that it was impossibl for me
to help laughing too; though I am not sure I should have do so,
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but for this induct. Wh we had had our laugh quite out,
whic was after s tim, he told me that Mis Mowcher had
quite an exteve coexio, and made hersf useful to a variety
of peopl in a variety of ways. So peopl trifld with her as a
mere oddity, h said; but she was as shredly and sharply
observant as anyo he knew, and as long-haded as she was
hort-armd. He told m that what she had said of beg here, and
there, and everywhere, was true enough; for se made lttl darts
into th provinces, and sed to pick up custors everywre,
and to know everybody. I asked him what her dispoition was:
wthr it was at all mischievous, and if her sympath were
genrally on the right side of things: but, not sucdig i
attracting his attenti to thes questio after two or three
attempts, I forbore or forgot to repeat them He told me intead,
wth much rapidity, a god deal about her skill, and her profits;
and about her beg a scientific cupper, if I should ever have
ccasi for her service in that capacity.
She was th pricipal th of our conversati during th
evenig: and when we parted for the nght Steerforth cald after
me over the banisters, ‘Bob swore!’ as I wet dowstairs
I was surprid, wh I came to Mr. Barkis’s huse, to fid
Ham walking up and dow in frot of it, and still more surprised
to larn from hi that little Em’ly was ide I naturally inquired
wy he was not there too, intead of pacg the streets by himelf?
‘Why, you se, Mas’r Davy,’ h rejod, in a hsitating manner,
‘Em’ly, she’s talkig to some ’un in here.’
‘I should have thought,’ said I, sg, ‘that that was a reason
for your beg in here too, Ham’
‘Well, Mas’r Davy, in a geral way, so ’t would be,’ he returnd;
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‘but look’ee here, Mas’r Davy,’ lowring his voice, and speaking
very gravey. ‘It’s a young woman, sir—a young woman, that Em’ly
kned once, and doe’t ought to kn no more.’
Wh I heard thes words, a light began to fall upo the figure I
had se following them, s hours ago.
‘It’s a poor wurem, Mas’r Davy,’ said Ham, ‘as is trod under foot
by al the to. Up street and do street. The md o’ th
churchyard don’t hod any that the folk shrik away fro, more.’
‘Did I s her tonight, Ham, on the sand, after we met you?’
‘Keping us in sight?’ said Ham. ‘It’s like you did, Mas’r Davy.
Not that I know’d then, sh was theer, sir, but alg of her
creepig soon arterwards under Em’ly’s little wider, when sh
th light come, and whispering “Em’ly, Em’ly, for Christ’s
sake, have a woan’s heart toards me. I was oce lke you!”
Those was so words, Mas’r Davy, fur to hear!’
‘Thy were indeed, Ham. What did Em’ly do?’
‘Says Em’ly, “Martha, is it you? Oh, Martha, can it be you?”—
for they had sat at work together, many a day, at Mr. Omr’s’
‘I rellect her now!’ cried I, recalling on of th tw girls I had
seen when I first wet there. ‘I reect her quite we!’
‘Martha Endel,’ said Ham. ‘Tw or three year oder than Em’ly,
but was at the school with her.’
‘I never heard her name,’ said I. ‘I didn’t mean to interrupt you.’
‘For the matter o’ that, Mas’r Davy,’ replied Ham, ‘al’s tod
a’most in them words, “Em’ly, Em’ly, for Christ’s sake, have a
wman’s hart toards me. I was once like you!” She wanted to
peak to Em’ly. Em’ly couldn’t speak to her theer, for her lovig
uncle was come ho, and he wouldn’t—n, Mas’r Davy,’ said
Ham, with great earntne, ‘h couldn’t, kind-natur’d, tenderCharles Dicke
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hearted as he i, s them two together, side by side, for all the
treasures that’s wreked in th sea.’
I felt ho true this was. I kn it, on th instant, quite as we as
Ham
‘So Em’ly write in pen o a bit of paper,’ he pursued, ‘and
gives it to her out o’ winder to brig here. “Show that,” s says,
“to my aunt, Mrs. Barkis, and she’ll set you dow by hr fire, for
the love of me, till unc is gone out, and I can c” By and by
s tel m what I tel you, Mas’r Davy, and asks me to brig her.
What can I do? Sh do’t ought to know any suc, but I can’t
deny her, when the tears is on her face.’
He put his hand into th breast of his shaggy jacket, and tok
out with great care a pretty little purse
‘And if I could deny hr wh th tears was on her face, Mas’r
Davy,’ said Ham, tederly adjusting it on th rough palm of hi
hand, ‘how could I dey her when she give m this to carry for
hr—knowing what she brought it for? Such a toy as it is!’ said
Ham, thoughtfully lookig on it. ‘With suc a little moy i it,
Em’ly my dear.’
I shook hi warmly by the hand when he had put it away
again—for that was more satisfactory to me than saying
anything—and we walked up and down, for a miute or two, i
The door oped then, and Peggotty appeared, bekonig
to Ham to come in. I wuld have kept away, but she came after
me, entreatig me to come in to Even then, I wuld have avoded
the room where they al were, but for its beg the neat-tild
kitchen I have metid more than onc The door opening
immediatey into it, I found myself among th before I
considered whithr I was gog.
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The girl—the sam I had s upon the sands—was near the
fire. Sh was stting on the ground, with her head and one arm
lying on a chair. I fancied, fro th dispoition of her figure, that
Em’ly had but nwly ris from the chair, and that the forlorn
head might perhaps have be lyig on her lap. I saw but little of
th girl’s face, over which her hair fell loo and scattered, as if she
ad be disorderig it with her own hands; but I saw that she
was young, and of a fair cplxio Peggotty had be crying. So
had little Em’ly. Not a word was spoke when we first went i; and
th Dutc clock by th dresser seed, in th silence, to tick twice
as loud as usual Em’ly spoke first.
‘Martha wants,’ she said to Ham, ‘to go to Lodo.’
‘Why to Lodo?’ returned Ham.
He stood betwee them, lookig on the prostrate girl with a
mxture of cpason for her, and of jealousy of her holdig any
companionship wth hr w h loved so we, which I have
always remembered distictly. Thy both spoke as if she were ill;
in a soft, suppressed to that was plainly hard, althugh it
hardly ro above a whisper.
‘Better thre than hre,’ said a third voice aloud—Martha’s,
though she did not move. ‘No one knows m there. Everybody
knows m here.’
‘What wi she do there?’ inquired Ham
She lifted up her head, and looked darkly round at him for a
moment; th laid it dow again, and curved her right arm about
her nek, as a woman in a fever, or in an agony of pai from a shot,
mght twist hersef.
‘She will try to do wel,’ said little Em’ly. ‘You do’t know what
se has said to us. Does he—do they—aunt?’
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Peggotty shook her head copasnately.
‘I’ll try,’ said Martha, ‘if you’l hep me away. I nver can do
wrs than I have done here. I may do better. Oh!’ wth a dreadful
ver, ‘take m out of the streets, where the whole to knows
me fro a child!’
A Em’ly held out her hand to Ham, I saw hi put i it a little
canvas bag. She tok it, as if she thught it were her purs, and
made a step or tw forward; but finding her mistake, came back to
where he had retired near m, and showed it to him
‘It’s al yourn, Em’ly,’ I could hear him say. ‘I have’t nt in al
the wureld that ai’t yourn, my dear. It ai’t of no deght to me,
except for you!’
The tears ro freshly in her eyes, but se turned away and
went to Martha. What she gave her, I do’t know. I saw her
stoping over hr, and putting money in her bosom. She
ispered somthing, as she asked was that enugh? ‘More than
enough,’ the other said, and took her hand and kid it.
Then Martha arose, and gatherig her saw about her,
covering her face with it, and wping aloud, wnt sly to th
door. She stopped a moment before going out, as if she would have
uttered sthing or turned back; but no word pasd her lips
Making th same low, dreary, wretched moaning in her shawl, she
nt away.
the door cosed, lttle Em’ly looked at us three in a hurried
manr and then hid her fac i her hands, and fel to sobbig.
‘Doen’t, Em’ly!’ said Ham, tappig her gently on the shoulder.
‘Doen’t, my dear! You do’t ought to cry so, pretty!’
‘Oh, Ham!’ she exclaimed, sti wping pitifully, ‘I am not so
good a girl as I ought to be! I know I have not the thankful heart,
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stim, I ought to have!’
‘Yes, yes, you have, I’m sure,’ said Ham.
‘No! no! no!’ cried littl Em’ly, sobbig, and shaking hr had. ‘I
am nt as good a girl as I ought to be Not nar! nt nar!’ And sti
she cried, as if her heart would break.
‘I try your love to much. I kn I do!’ she sobbed. ‘I’m ofte
ross to you, and changeabl with you, when I ought to be far
differet. You are nver so to me. Why am I ever so to you, wen I
should think of nthing but how to be grateful, and to make you
happy!’
‘You always make me so,’ said Ham, ‘my dear! I am happy i
the sight of you. I am happy, al day log, in the thoughts of you.’
‘Ah! that’s not enough!’ sh crid. ‘That is beause you are
good; nt beause I am! Oh, my dear, it mght have be a better
fortune for you, if you had been fond of soone el—of sone
steadier and much worthr than me, wh was all bound up in
you, and never vain and changeable like me!’
‘Poor lttle teder-heart,’ said Ham, in a l voice. ‘Martha has
overst her, altogether.’
‘Please, aunt,’ sobbed Em’ly, ‘come here, and lt me lay my
head upo you. Oh, I am very mirable tonight, aunt! Oh, I am
nt as good a girl as I ought to be I am not, I know!’
Peggotty had hasted to the chair before the fire. Em’ly, with
her arm around her nek, kneeled by her, lokig up mot
earntly into her fac
‘Oh, pray, aunt, try to hep me! Ham, dear, try to hep me! Mr.
David, for th sake of old times, do, please, try to help me! I want
to be a better girl than I am I want to fee a hundred tim mre
thankful than I do I want to fee mre, what a bld thing it is to
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be th wife of a god man, and to lead a peaceful life Oh me, o
me! Oh my heart, my heart!’
She dropped her face on my old nurs’s breast, and, ceasing
this supplicati, w in its agoy and grief was half a woan’s,
half a child’s, as all her manner was (beng, i that, more natural,
and better suited to her beauty, as I thought, than any other
manner could have bee), wept silently, w my od nurs
hushed her like an infant.
She got caler by degrees, and then we soothed her; no
talkig enuragigly, and nw jestig a little with her, until sh
began to rai her head and speak to us. So we got on, until s
was abl to sm, and then to laugh, and then to st up, half
ashamd; whil Peggotty recald her stray ringlts, drid her
eye, and made her neat again, lest her un should wnder,
wen she got home, why his darlg had been cryig.
I saw her do, that nght, what I had nver se her do before. I
saw her innocently kiss her cho husband o th chek, and
crep clos to his bluff form as if it were her best support. Whe
they went away together, in the wang mlight, and I lked
after them, coparig their departure in my mind with Martha’s, I
saw that she hed his arm with both hr hands, and sti kept clos
to him
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Chapter 23
I CORROBORATE MR. DICK, AND CHOOSE A
PROFESSION
Wh I awoke in the morning I thought very muc of little
Em’ly, and hr emtion last night, after Martha had left. I felt as if
I had come into th knowledge of th domestic weaknesses and
tenderne in a sacred confidece, and that to disclose th,
even to Steerforth, would be wrong. I had no getlr feelig
towards anyone than towards the pretty creature who had be
my playmate, and wh I have always bee persuaded, and shall
always be persuaded, to my dyig day, I th devotedly loved. Th
repetition to any ears—even to Sterforth’s—of what sh had be
unabl to repres when her heart lay open to me by an acdet, I
felt would be a rough deed, unworthy of mysf, unworthy of the
lght of our pure chdhood, which I always saw encircg her
head. I made a reution, therefore, to keep it in my own breast;
and thre it gave her image a new grace
While we were at breakfast, a letter was delivered to me fro
my aunt. As it contaid matter on which I thught Sterforth
uld advise me as w as anyo, and on which I kn I should
be deghted to consult him, I resved to make it a subjet of
discussion on our journey ho For th pret we had eugh
to do, in taking leave of all our friends. Mr. Barkis was far fro
beg the last amg them, in his regret at our departure; and I
beeve would even have opened the box agai, and sacrifid
anothr guinea, if it would have kept us eight-and-forty hours in
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Yarmouth. Peggotty and al her famiy were full of grief at our
going. The whole house of Omr and Joram turned out to bid us
god-bye; and thre were so many seafaring volunters in
attedan on Steerforth, when our portmanteaux wet to th
ach, that if we had had the baggage of a regimt with us, we
should hardly have wanted porters to carry it. In a wrd, w
departed to th regret and admirati of all concerned, and left a
us.
great many pepl very sorry bend
Do you stay log here, Littimr?’ said I, as he stood waitig to
see the coach start.
‘No, sir,’ he replied; ‘probably nt very log, sir.’
‘He can hardly say, just now,’ observed Sterforth, carelesly.
‘He kns what he has to do, and he’ll do it.’
‘That I am sure he wi,’ said I.
Littimr touched his hat in acknowledgeent of my good
opinion, and I felt about eight years old. He toucd it oce more,
wishing us a god journey; and we left hm standing o th
pavement, as respectable a mystery as any pyramd in Egypt.
For some littl time we hld no conversati, Sterforth being
unusually silent, and I beig sufficiently engaged in wonderig,
wth mysf, when I should see the old plac agai, and wat
nw canges mght happe to m or them in the meanwhil At
length Sterforth, becoming gay and talkative in a moment, as h
uld become anythng he liked at any moment, pulled me by th
arm:
‘Fid a voice, David. What about that letter you were speaking
of at breakfast?’
‘Oh!’ said I, takig it out of my pocket. ‘It’s fro my aunt.’
‘And what doe she say, requiring consideration?’
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‘Why, she reminds me, Steerforth,’ said I, ‘that I came out on
this expeditio to look about me, and to think a little’
‘Which, of course, you have don?’
‘Inded I can’t say I have, particularly. To tel you the truth, I
am afraid I have forgotten it.’
‘Wel! look about you now, and make up for your negligece,’
said Sterforth. ‘Look to the right, and you’l se a flat country,
with a good deal of marsh i it; lok to the left, and you’ll se the
same. Lok to th frot, and you’ll find no difference; look to th
rear, and thre it is still.’ I laughd, and replied that I saw no
suitable profesion in th wh propect; which was perhaps to be
attributed to its flatne
‘What says our aunt on the subject?’ iquired Steerforth,
glang at the letter in my hand. ‘Does sh suggest anything?’
‘Why, yes,’ said I. ‘She asks me, here, if I thk I should like to
be a protor? What do you think of it?’
‘Well, I don’t kn,’ replied Steerforth, coy. ‘You may as w
do that as anythng el, I suppose?’
I could not help laughng again, at his balancing all calgs and
profession so equally; and I told him so.
‘What is a protor, Sterforth?’ said I.
‘Why, he is a sort of monkish attorny,’ replied Sterforth ‘He
is, to some faded courts hed in Doctors’ Co,—a lazy old
nook near St. Paul’s Churchyard—what solicitors are to th courts
of law and equity. He is a funtiary whose existenc, i th
atural course of things, would have termiated about two
hundred years ago I can tell you best what he is, by teing you
what Doctors’ Commns is It’s a lttle out-of-the-way place, where
thy administer what is called eciastial law, and play all kinds
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of tricks with obste old mnsters of acts of Parliamt, whic
three-fourths of the world know nothing about, and the other
fourth supposes to have be dug up, in a foil state, i th days
f th Edwards. It’s a plac that has an ancient monopoly i suits
about people’s wis and people’s marriage, and dispute amg
ships and boats.’
‘Nonnse, Sterforth!’ I exclaimed. ‘You don’t mean to say that
there is any affinity betwee nautical matters and eastial
atters?’
‘I don’t, indeed, my dear boy,’ he returnd; ‘but I mean to say
that thy are managed and decded by th same set of people,
dow in that same Doctors’ Cos. You shal go thre on day,
and find them blundering through half the nautical terms in
Young’s Dictionary, apropos of th “Nancy” having run dow th
“Sarah Jane”, or Mr. Peggotty and the Yarmouth boatm having
put off in a gal of wind with an anhor and cable to the “Ne”
Indiaman in distress; and you shall go thre anothr day, and find
them deep in the evide, pro and co, repectig a cergyman
has misbeaved himself; and you shall find th judge in th
nautical case, th advoate in th clergyman’s case, or
contrariise. Thy are like actors: now a man’s a judge, and now
he i nt a judge; now he’s one thing, now he’s another; now he’s
thing e, cange and change about; but it’s always a very
pleasant, profitable littl affair of private thatricals, preted to
an unly select audice.’
‘But advocates and protors are not on and th same?’ said I, a
lttle puzzld. ‘Are they?’
‘No,’ returned Steerforth, ‘th advocates are civians—men
have taken a doctor’s degre at colge—wich is th first
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reason of my knowing anything about it. The proctors employ the
advocates Both get very cofortabl fee, and altogether they
make a mghty sug little party. On the whole, I would
recd you to take to Dotors’ Coons kindly, David. They
plume themsves o their getity there, I can te you, if that’s
any satisfacti.’
I made allwanc for Sterforth’s light way of treating the
subjet, and, cderig it with referen to the staid air of
gravity and antiquity which I associated with that ‘lazy od nook
near St. Paul’s Churchyard’, did not fe indispod toards my
aunt’s suggestion; wich she left to my fre decsion, making no
srupl of tellig me that it had occurred to her, on her lately
visiting hr on protor in Doctors’ Co for th purpo of
sttlig her will in my favour.
‘That’s a laudabl proceedig on the part of our aunt, at al
events,’ said Steerforth, when I metid it; ‘and oe dervig
of all enuraget. Daisy, my advice is that you take kidly to
Doctors’ Common.’
I quite made up my mind to do so. I th tod Sterforth that
my aunt was in town awaiting m (as I found from her letter), and
that she had taken lodgigs for a wek at a kind of private hte at
Lioln’s Inn Fields, where there was a stone staircase, and a
conveient door i th rof; my aunt beig firmly persuaded that
every house in London was going to be burnt down every night.
We aceved the ret of our journy pleasantly, sti
recurring to Doctors’ Common, and anticipating th distant days
I should be a protor thre, which Sterforth pictured in a
variety of humorous and whimal lights, that made us both
mrry. Wh we cam to our journy’s end, he wet ho,
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egaging to call upo me nxt day but one; and I drove to
Lincoln’s Inn Fids, whre I found my aunt up, and waitig
supper.
If I had bee round th world since we parted, we could hardly
have be better pleased to meet again. My aunt cried outright as
se embraced m; and said, pretendig to laugh, that if my poor
mther had be alive, that siy little creature would have shd
tears, she had no doubt.
‘So you have left Mr. Dik bed, aunt?’ said I. ‘I am sorry for
that. Ah, Jant, ho do you do?’
As Janet curtsied, hopig I was well, I observed my aunt’s
visage legthen very muc
‘I am sorry for it, to,’ said my aunt, rubbing her no. ‘I have
had no peace of mid, Trot, s I have been here.’ Before I could
ask why, she tod me.
‘I am conviced,’ said my aunt, laying her hand with
lanholy firmn on the table, ‘that Dik’s character is nt a
caracter to kep the dokeys off. I am cofidet he wants
trength of purpose I ought to have left Jant at home, itead,
and then my mnd mght perhaps have be at eas If ever there
was a donkey trespasg on my gree,’ said my aunt, with
ephasis, ‘thre was on this aftern at four o’clock. A cod
know it was a
feelig cam over me from head to foot, and I
donkey!’
I tried to comfort her on this poit, but she rejected conation.
‘It was a donkey,’ said my aunt; ‘and it was the one with the
stumpy tail wich that Murdering sister of a woan rode, wh
e cam to my house.’ Th had been, ever sie, the only nam
y aunt knew for Mi Murdstone. ‘If there is any Donkey i
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Dover, whose audacty it is harder to me to bear than another’s,
that,’ said my aunt, strikig the table, ‘is the animal!’
Jant ventured to suggest that my aunt might be diturbig
herself unnariy, and that she beeved the dokey in
question was then egaged in the sand-and-gravel l of bus,
and was not availabl for purpo of trepass. But my aunt
wuldn’t hear of it.
Supper was cofortably served and hot, though my aunt’s
rooms were very high up—whether that she might have more
stone stairs for her moy, or might be narer to the door in the
roof, I do’t know—and coted of a roast fowl, a steak, and
some vegetabl, to al of which I did ampl justice, and wich
wre all excelt. But my aunt had her own ideas conrning
London provision, and ate but littl
‘I suppose this unfortunate fo was born and brought up in a
cellar,’ said my aunt, ‘and never tok th air except o a hackney
coach-stand. I hope the steak may be beef, but I do’t beeve it.
Nothing’s genuine in th plac, in my opinion, but th dirt.’
‘Don’t you think the fowl may have co out of the cuntry,
aunt?’ I hinted.
‘Crtaiy nt,’ returned my aunt. ‘It would be no plasure to a
London tradesan to sel anythng which was what he preteded
it was.’
I did not venture to controvert this opinion, but I made a god
supper, wich it greatly satisfid her to see me do. Whe th tabl
as cleared, Janet assisted her to arrange her hair, to put o hr
nightcap, wich was of a smarter contructi than usual (‘in case
of fire’, my aunt said), and to fold her gown back over her knees,
thes beg her usual preparati for warmg hersef before
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going to bed. I then made her, acrdig to crtai etablihed
regulations from which no deviatin, however sght, culd ever be
permitted, a glass of hot win and water, and a sl of toast cut
ito log thin strips With thes acpants we were left
alon to finish th eveing, my aunt sitting opposite to me
drinking hr w and water; soaking her strips of toast in it, on
by one, before eating them; and lookig begnantly on me, from
among the borders of her nightcap.
‘We, Trot,’ sh began, ‘what do you think of the proctor plan?
Or have you not begun to think about it yet?’
‘I have thught a god deal about it, my dear aunt, and I have
talked a good deal about it with Sterforth. I like it very muc
indeed. I like it exceedigly.’
‘Come!’ said my aunt. ‘That’s cheerig!’
‘I have ony one difficulty, aunt.’
‘Say what it is, Trot,’ she returned.
‘Why, I want to ask, aunt, as this sees, fro what I
understand, to be a lted profes, whether my entran into
it would not be very expensive?’
‘It wi cost,’ returned my aunt, ‘to article you, just a thusand
pounds.’
‘No, my dear aunt,’ said I, drawig my chair nearer, ‘I am
unasy in my mind about that. It’s a large sum of money. You have
xpeded a great deal o my educati, and have alays be as
liberal to me in all thgs as it was possible to be You have be
th soul of gerosity. Surely thre are some ways in which I
mght begin life with hardly any outlay, and yet begin with a good
hope of getting on by resutio and exertio Are you sure that it
would not be better to try that course? Are you crtai that you
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can afford to part with so muc moy, and that it is right that it
should be so expended? I only ask you, my second mothr, to
nsider. Are you certain?’
My aunt fined eatig the piece of toast on wh se was
then engaged, lookig m full in the fac al the whil; and then
tting hr glass on th chiy-piece, and folding her hands
upo her folded skirts, replied as fol:
‘Trot, my child, if I have any object in life, it is to provide for
your being a god, a sensible, and a happy man I am bent upo
it—so is Dick. I should like some people that I know to har Dick’s
versation on the subjet. Its sagacty is wonderful But no on
knows th resources of that man’s intet, except myself!’
She stopped for a moment to take my hand betw hers, and
went on:
‘It’s in vai, Trot, to recall th past, unless it works some
ifluen upon the pret. Perhaps I might have be better
frieds with your poor father. Perhaps I mght have be better
friends wth that poor chid your mothr, eve after your sister
Betsey Trotwood diappoted me Wh you cam to me, a little
runaway boy, all dusty and way-worn, perhaps I thought so From
that tim until now, Trot, you have ever be a credit to me and a
pride and a plasure. I have no othr claim upo my means; at
last’—hre to my surpris sh hestated, and was cfused—‘n, I
have no othr claim upo my means—and you are my adopted
child. Only be a loving child to me in my age, and bear with my
wims and fancies; and you wi do more for an old wan w
prime of life was not so happy or conciliating as it might have
been, than ever that old woan did for you.’
It was th first time I had heard my aunt refer to hr past
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history. Thre was a magnanity in her quiet way of doig so,
and of dismissing it, which would have exalted hr i my respect
and affection, if anythng could.
‘Al is agreed and understod between us, n, Trot,’ said my
aunt, ‘and we need talk of this no more. Give me a kiss, and w’l
go to the Co after breakfast tomorrow.’
We had a lg chat by the fire before we wet to bed. I slept in a
room on the sam floor with my aunt’s, and was a little diturbed
i the course of the night by her knockig at my door as often as
she was agitated by a distant sound of hackney-cache or marketcarts, and inquirig, ‘if I hard th egis?’ But toards morng
she slept better, and suffered me to do so to
At about mid-day, w set out for th office of Messrs Spenlow
and Jorki, in Doctors’ Commons. My aunt, who had this other
geral opinion in refere to London, that every man she saw
was a pikpocket, gave me her purse to carry for her, whic had
ten guineas in it and some silver.
We made a pause at the toy shop in Fleet Street, to see th
giants of Sait Dunstan’s strike upon the be—we had timd our
going, so as to catch them at it, at twelve o’cock—and then went
o toards Ludgate Hill, and St. Paul’s Churchyard. We were
crossing to th formr place, wh I found that my aunt greatly
acrated her speed, and loked frightened. I obsrved, at th
same time, that a lowring ill-dred man wh had stopped and
stared at us in passing, a littl before, was coming so clos after us
as to brus against her.
‘Trot! My dear Trot!’ cried my aunt, in a terrifid wisper, and
pressing my arm ‘I don’t kn what I am to do.’
‘Don’t be alarmed,’ said I. ‘Thre’s nthg to be afraid of. Step
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ito a shop, and I’ll soon get rid of this fellow.’
‘No, no, child!’ she returned. ‘Don’t speak to him for the world. I
entreat, I order you!’
‘Good Heaven, aunt!’ said I. ‘He is nothg but a sturdy beggar.’
‘You do’t know what he is!’ repld my aunt. ‘You don’t know
who he is! You do’t know what you say!’
We had stopped in an empty door-way, wile this was passing,
and he had stopped too.
‘Don’t look at him!’ said my aunt, as I turned my head
indignantly, ‘but get me a coach, my dear, and wait for me in St.
Paul’s Churchyard.’
‘Wait for you?’ I replied.
‘Yes,’ rejoind my aunt. ‘I must go ale. I must go with him.’
‘With him, aunt? This man?’
‘I am in my senses,’ she replied, ‘and I te you I must. Get mea
coach!’
Hover much astonished I might be, I was sensible that I had
no right to refuse compliance with such a pereptory command. I
hurrid away a fe paces, and called a hackney-carit which was
passing empty. Almost before I could let dow th steps, my aunt
sprang i, I do’t know how, and the man followed. She waved her
hand to m to go away, so earnetly, that, al confounded as I was,
I turned from them at onc In dog so, I heard her say to the
coachman, ‘Drive anywre! Drive straight on!’ and pretly th
arit pasd m, going up the hill
What Mr. Dik had told me, and wat I had supposd to be a
delus of hi, now came into my mind. I could not doubt that this
person was the person of whom he had made suc mysterious
mti, though what the nature of his hold upo my aunt culd
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possibly be, I was quite unable to imagine After half an hour’s
ing in th churchyard, I saw th chariot coming back. Th
driver stopped beside me, and my aunt was sitting in it al
She had not yet sufficiently revered fro her agitation to be
quite prepared for th visit we had to make. She desired me to get
ito the charit, and to tell the cacan to drive sowly up and
do a lttle whe. She said n more, except, ‘My dear chd,
never ask me what it was, and don’t refer to it,’ until she had
perfetly regained her compoure, wh she told me she was quite
hersef nw, and we might get out. On her giving m her purse to
pay the driver, I found that al the guinas were gone, and only the
loose siver reaied.
Doctors’ Common was approached by a littl low archway.
Before w had taken many paces dow th stret beyod it, th
noise of th city seed to melt, as if by magic, into a softed
ditanc A few dul curts and narrow ways brought us to the skylighted offices of Spenlow and Jorkins; in th vestibul of which
temple, accessibl to pilgrims withut th ceremony of knking,
three or four clerks were at wrk as cpyits. On of the, a littl
dry man, sitting by himelf, who wore a stiff brown wig that looked
as if it were made of gingerbread, ro to receive my aunt, and
show us into Mr. Spew’s room.
‘Mr. Spenl’s in Court, ma’am,’ said the dry man; ‘it’s an
Arche day; but it’s clos by, and I’ll sed for him directly.’
A we were left to look about us whil Mr. Spew was fetched,
I availed myself of th opportunity. Th furniture of th ro was
d-fashioned and dusty; and th gre baize on th top of th
riting-tabl had lost all its colour, and was as wthred and pale
as an old pauper. There were a great many bundl of papers on it,
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some edorsd as Allegatis, and some (to my surprise) as Libels,
and s as beg i the Ctory Curt, and so in the
Arc Court, and so in the Prerogative Court, and so i th
dmralty Court, and so in the Degates’ Court; giving me
occason to wonder muc, how many Courts there might be in the
gross, and how log it would take to understand them all Besde
the, there were sundry ime manusript Books of Evidenc
take on affidavit, strongly bound, and tied together i masve
ts, a set to each caus, as if every caus were a history in ten or
twenty volum Al this looked tolerably expeve, I thought, and
gave me an agreabl noti of a protor’s busines. I was castig
my eyes wth ireasg coplacy over the and many siar
objects, w hasty fotsteps were heard in th ro outside, and
Mr. Spenlow, in a black go trimmed with white fur, came
hurrying in, takig off his hat as he cam
He was a littl light-haired gentleman, with undeniable boots,
and th stiffest of white cravats and shirt-coars. He was buttod
up, mighty trim and tight, and must have take a great deal of
pains with his whkers, wh were accurately curld. His god
watc-chain was so massive, that a fany came across me, that he
ought to have a siy golde arm, to draw it out with, like those
whic are put up over the goldbeaters’ shops He was got up with
such care, and was so stiff, that he could hardly bed hif;
beg oblged, wh he glanced at some papers on his desk, after
stting down i hi chair, to move his whole body, from the bottom
of his spine, like Pun
I had previously bee preted by my aunt, and had bee
urteusly received. He now said:
‘And s, Mr. Copperfield, you thk of enterig ito our
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profession? I casually mentioned to Miss Trotwd, wh I had
the plasure of an iterview with her the other day,’—with
anothr inclination of his body—Punch again—‘that thre was a
vacancy hre. Miss Trotwd was god enugh to mention that
she had a nephe wh was her pecular care, and for w she
as seeking to provide gentely in life. That nephe, I beve, I
have no the pleasure of’—Punch agai I bod my
acknledgets, and said, my aunt had mentioned to me that
there was that openig, and that I beeved I should like it very
much. That I was strongly ind to like it, and had taken
diatey to the proposal That I culd nt absutely pldge
mysf to like it, until I kn sothing more about it. That
although it was little e than a matter of form, I preumd I
should have an opportunity of trying how I liked it, before I bound
myself to it irrevocably.
‘Oh surely! surely!’ said Mr. Spenlow ‘We always, in th house,
propose a mth—an intiatory moth. I should be happy, mysf,
to propose two mths—three—an indefinite period, in fact—but I
have a partner. Mr. Jorki’
‘And th preium, sir,’ I returnd, ‘is a thusand pounds?’
‘And th preium, Stamp included, is a thusand pounds,’ said
Mr. Spenlo ‘A I have mtid to Mis Trotwood, I am
actuated by no mercary considerations; fe mn are less so, I
beeve; but Mr. Jorki has hi opi on the subjects, and I
am bound to respect Mr. Jorkins’s opinions. Mr. Jorkins thinks a
thousand pounds too lttle, in short.’
‘I suppose, sir,’ said I, still desirig to spare my aunt, ‘that it is
not th custo here, if an articled clrk wre particularly usful,
and made hmself a perfet master of his profe’—I could not
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hlp blusng, this looked so lke praising myself—‘I suppo it i
t the custom, in the later years of his tim, to alw him any—’
Mr. Spenl, by a great effort, just lifted his head far enough
ut of his cravat to shake it, and answered, anticipating th wrd
‘salary’:
‘No. I wil nt say what coderati I might give to that pot
mysf, Mr. Copperfied, if I were unfettered. Mr. Jorki is
immovable.’
I was quite dismayed by th idea of this terribl Jorkis. But I
found out afterwards that he was a mild man of a heavy
teperamt, whose plac in the bus was to keep hif i
the background, and be cnstantly exhibited by nam as the mot
obdurate and ruthle of me If a clrk wanted his salary raid,
Mr. Jorkins wouldn’t liste to such a proposition. If a client wre
slow to settl his bill of costs, Mr. Jorkins was resolved to have it
paid; and however paiful thes things might be (and alays
were) to the feegs of Mr. Spew, Mr. Jorki would have his
bod. The heart and hand of the good angel Spenlow would have
be alays ope, but for the restraig den Jorki As I
have grown older, I think I have had experienc of s other
huses doig busss on th principl of Spenlow and Jorkis!
It was settld that I should begin my month’s probation as soo
as I pleased, and that my aunt need neithr remain in to nor
return at its expiration, as th arti of agret, of wich I
was to be th subjet, could easily be sent to hr at h for hr
sgnature. Wh we had got so far, Mr. Spew offered to take m
to Court then and there, and show me what sort of place it was
I was wilg enough to know, we went out with this object,
leavig my aunt behnd; wh would trust hersf, she said, in no
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such place, and wh, I thk, regarded al Courts of Law as a sort
of powder-mils that might blow up at any tim
Mr. Spenlow coducted me through a paved courtyard formd
of grave brick house, which I inferred, fro th Doctors’ names
upon the doors, to be the offical abidig-plac of the learnd
advocates of wh Sterforth had told me; and into a large dull
room, not unlike a chape to my thinkig, on the lft hand. The
upper part of this ro was fed off fro th rest; and thre, o
the two sides of a raid platform of the horse-shoe form, stting on
easy od-fashioned dining-ro chairs, were sundry gentlemen in
red gowns and grey wigs, whom I found to be the Dotors
aforeaid. Blking over a littl desk like a pulpit-dek, in th
urve of the horse-shoe, was an old gentlan, whom, if I had se
in an aviary, I should certaiy have taken for an owl, but who,
I learnd, was the presdig judge. In the space with the horsshoe, lower than thes, that is to say, on about the lvel of the
floor, were sundry other gentl, of Mr. Spew’s rank, and
dred lke hi i black gowns with white fur upon them, sitting
at a log gree tabl Their cravats were in genral stiff, I thought,
and thr looks haughty; but in this last respect I pretly
ceived I had do them an injusti, for wen two or three of
them had to ris and ansr a questio of the predig digntary,
I never saw anythng more shepish. Th public, repreted by a
boy with a coforter, and a shabby-genteel man sretly eatig
crumbs out of his coat pockets, was warming itself at a stove i th
centre of th Court. Th languid stillness of th place was only
broke by th chirping of this fire and by th voice of on of th
Doctors, who was wandering slowly through a perfect library of
evide, and stoppig to put up, from tim to tim, at little
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roadsde inns of argumet on the journey. Altogether, I have
never, on any ocasion, made on at such a coy, dosey, odfasd, tim-forgotten, slpy-headed lttle famiy-party in al
my life; and I felt it would be quite a soothng opiate to belong to it
in any character—except perhaps as a suitor.
Very wel satisfid with the dreamy nature of this retreat, I
iformed Mr. Spew that I had se enough for that tim, and
w rejod my aunt; in company with wh I pretly departed
from the Comm, feelig very young when I wet out of
Spenlow and Jorkis’s, on account of th clerks poking on
another with their pe to pot me out.
We arrived at Lincoln’s Inn Fields withut any new adventure,
except encunterig an unucky dokey in a ctermger’s cart,
w suggested painful assocations to my aunt. We had anothr
long talk about my plans, wh we were safely hused; and as I
knew she was anxious to get home, and, between fire, food, and
pickpockets, could never be condered at her ease for half-anhour in London, I urged her not to be unfortable o my
acunt, but to leave m to take care of mysf.
‘I have not be here a week tomorrow, without cdering
that too, my dear,’ sh returned. ‘There is a furnhed little st of
cambers to be lt in the Adeph, Trot, whic ought to suit you to
a marve’
With this brief introducti, she producd fro hr pocket an
advertisement, carefully cut out of a nepaper, setting forth that
in Buckingham Stret in th Adephi thre was to be let furnished,
wth a vi of th river, a singularly desirable, and compact set of
cambers, formig a gente resde for a young gentlan, a
mber of one of the In of Court, or otherwise, with idiate
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possession. Terms moderate, and could be taken for a month oly,
if required.
‘Why, this i the very thing, aunt!’ said I, flushed with the
possibl dignity of living in chambers
‘Thn come,’ replied my aunt, immediatey resuming th
boet she had a mute before laid asde. ‘We’l go and look at
’em.’
Aay we went. The advertist directed us to apply to Mrs.
rupp o th preises, and we rung th area be, which we
supposed to communicate with Mrs. Crupp. It was not until w
had rung three or four ti that we could prevai on Mrs. Crupp
to communicate with us, but at last she appeared, being a stout
lady with a flun of flannel petticoat below a nanke go
‘Let us see th chambers of yours, if you please, ma’am,’ said
my aunt.
‘For this gentleman?’ said Mrs. Crupp, feg in her pocket for
her keys.
‘Yes, for my nephew,’ said my aunt.
‘And a swet set thy is for sich!’ said Mrs. Crupp.
So we went upstairs
They were on the top of the house—a great pot with my aunt,
beig near th fire-escape—and consisted of a littl half-blind
entry where you could see hardly anythig, a lttle stone-bld
pantry whre you could see nothing at all, a sitting-ro, and a
bedroom. The furniture was rather faded, but quite good enough
for me; and, sure enough, the river was outside the windows.
I was deghted with the plac, my aunt and Mrs. Crupp
wthdre into th pantry to discuss th terms, wh I reaid o
th sitting-ro sofa, hardly daring to think it posible that I could
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be destined to live in such a nobl residen After a single combat
of so duratio they returned, and I saw, to my joy, both in Mrs.
rupp’s countenance and in my aunt’s, that th deed was done
‘Is it th last occupant’s furniture?’ inquired my aunt.
‘Yes, it is, ma’am,’ said Mrs. Crupp.
‘What’s become of him?’ asked my aunt.
Mrs. Crupp was taken with a troubl cough, in th mdst
of which she articulated with much difficulty. ‘He was tok ill hre,
ma’am, and—ugh! ugh! ugh! dear me!—and he did!’
‘Hey! What did he die of?’ asked my aunt.
‘Well, ma’am, he died of drink,’ said Mrs. Crupp, i confidence.
‘And smke.’
‘Smoke? You don’t mean chimneys?’ said my aunt.
‘No, ma’am,’ returned Mrs. Crupp. ‘Cigars and pipes.’
‘That’s nt catchig, Trot, at any rate,’ remarked my aunt,
turnig to me
‘No, indeed,’ said I.
In short, my aunt, seeing how enraptured I was with th
pre, took them for a mth, with leave to remai for twelve
month wh that time was out. Mrs Crupp was to find linen, and
to cok; every othr necessary was already provided; and Mrs
rupp exprey intimated that she should alays yearn toards
me as a son. I was to take possession th day after tomorro, and
Mrs. Crupp said, thank Heave she had now found summun she
uld care for!
On our way back, my aunt informd me ho she confidently
trusted that the lfe I was nw to lead would make me firm and
self-reant, which was all I wanted. She repeated this several
tim nxt day, in the interval of our arrangig for the
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transmission of my cloths and boks fro Mr. Wickfid’s;
relative to whic, and to all my late holiday, I wrote a log letter to
Agnes, of which my aunt tok charge, as she was to leave on th
uceedig day. Not to legthen the partiulars, I need only add,
that she made a handsome provision for all my posble wants
during my month of trial; that Sterforth, to my great
disappoitmt and hers to, did not make h appearance before
she went away; that I saw her safely seated in th Dover coach,
exulting in th comng discomfiture of th vagrant donkeys, wth
Jant at her side; and that when the coach was gone, I turned my
face to th Adelphi, pondering on th old days wh I usd to
roam about its subterranean arche, and on th happy change
whic had brought me to the surfac
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Chapter 24
MY FIRST DISSIPATION
I
t was a wonderfully fin thing to have that lofty castl to
myself, and to fe, wh I shut my outer door, like Robinson
rus, w h had got into his fortificati, and puld hi
ladder up after him. It was a woderfully fi thg to walk about
town with the key of my house in my poket, and to know that I
could ask any fellow to come ho, and make quite sure of its
beg inconveient to nobody, if it were not so to me. It was a
wonderfully fin thing to let mysf i and out, and to co and go
without a word to anyone, and to ring Mrs. Crupp up, gaspig,
from the depths of the earth, when I wanted her—and when sh
as disposed to come. All this, I say, was woderfully fi; but I
must say, to, that thre were times wh it was very dreary.
It was fin in the mornig, particularly in the fin mornigs. It
looked a very fresh, free life, by daylght: sti fresher, and mre
free, by sunght. But as the day deed, the lfe seed to go
down too. I don’t know how it was; it sldom looked well by
candl-light. I wanted sobody to talk to, then I md Agn I
found a tredous blank, in th place of that smiling repostory
of my confidece. Mrs. Crupp appeared to be a long way off. I
thought about my predecesr, who had died of drik and soke;
and I could have wisd he had be s good as to live, and not
bother me with his deas
fter two days and nghts, I felt as if I had lived there for a year,
and yet I was nt an hour older, but was quite as muc tormeted
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by my own youthfulness as ever.
Sterforth not yet appearing, which induced me to appred
that he must be il, I left th Co early on th thrd day, and
walked out to Highgate. Mrs. Sterforth was very glad to s m,
and said that he had gone away with one of his Oxford frieds to
see another who lived near St. Aban, but that se expeted hi
to return tomorrow. I was so fond of him, that I felt quite jealous of
his Oxford friends.
A she presd me to stay to dier, I reaied, and I beeve
we talked about nothing but him al day. I told her how muc the
people liked hm at Yarmuth, and what a delghtful companion
he had be Mis Dartle was full of hits and mysterious
questions, but took a great interest in al our procedigs there,
and said, ‘Was it really thugh?’ and so forth, so often, that she got
everythig out of me she wanted to know. Her appearan was
xactly what I have deribed it, when I first saw her; but the
society of th tw ladies was so agreabl, and came so natural to
me, that I felt myself falg a littl in love with her. I could not
hlp thking, several times in th course of th eveing, and
particularly when I walked home at night, what deghtful
company she would be in Buckingham Stret.
I was takig my coffee and roll in the morning, before going to
th Commons—and I may observe in th place that it is surprising
h much coffe Mrs. Crupp usd, and h wak it was,
cderig—w Steerforth himelf walked in, to my
unbounded joy.
‘My dear Steerforth,’ cried I, ‘I began to thk I should nver
se you again!’
‘I was carried off, by force of arm,’ said Sterforth, ‘the very
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nxt mrnig after I got home Why, Daiy, what a rare old
bacor you are here!’
I showed him over the establihmet, not omitting the pantry,
with n lttle pride, and he coded it highly. ‘I tell you what,
od boy,’ h added, ‘I shal make quite a to-huse of this place,
unl you give me notic to quit.’
This was a deghtful hearig. I told hi if he waited for that, he
would have to wait till doomsday.
‘But you shal have some breakfast!’ said I, with my hand o th
be-rope, ‘and Mrs. Crupp shal make you so fresh coffee, and
I’l toast you s bac in a bacor’s Dutch-oven, that I have
got here.’
‘No, no!’ said Sterforth. ‘Don’t ring! I can’t! I am going to
breakfast with one of the fel who is at the Piazza Hote, in
Covet Garde.’
‘But you’ll come back to dir?’ said I.
‘I can’t, upo my life. There’s nothing I should like better, but I
must remai with thes two felws. We are al three off together
tomorrow mornig.’
‘Th brig them here to dinner,’ I returnd. ‘Do you thk they
wuld come?’
‘Oh! they wuld c fast enough,’ said Steerforth; ‘but we
should innveience you. You had better come and di wth us
ere.’
I wuld not by any means consent to this, for it occurred to me
that I realy ought to have a little house-warmg, and that there
ver could be a better opportunity. I had a new pride i my
ros after his approval of th, and burnd with a desire to
develop thr utmost resources. I threfore made him pro
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positivey in th names of his tw friends, and we appointed six
o’cock as the dinner-hour.
Whe he was go, I rang for Mrs Crupp, and acquainted hr
wth my desperate design. Mrs. Crupp said, in th first plac, of
course it was we knn she couldn’t be expected to wait, but she
knew a handy young man, who she thought could be prevaid
upo to do it, and wh terms would be five shillings, and wat I
pleased. I said, certainly we would have him. Next Mrs. Crupp said
it was car she couldn’t be i tw plac at once (wich I felt to be
reasonabl), and that ‘a young gal’ statid i the pantry with a
bedro candle, thre never to desist fro washig plate, would
be indispensable. I said, what would be th expense of this young
female? and Mrs. Crupp said she supposed eightepen wuld
neithr make me nor break me. I said I supposed not; and that was
sttled. Then Mrs. Crupp said, No about the dier.
It was a remarkabl itan of want of forethought on the part
of the ironmger who had made Mrs. Crupp’s kitchen fireplace,
that it was capabl of cokig nothing but chops and mashed
potato. As to a fish-kittl, Mrs. Crupp said, we! would I oly
c and look at the range? She couldn’t say fairer than that.
Would I come and look at it? As I should not have bee much th
iser if I had lked at it, I decled, and said, ‘Never md fish.’
But Mrs. Crupp said, Don’t say that; oysters was in, why not th?
So that was settld. Mrs. Crupp th said wat she wuld
remmend would be this. A pair of hot roast fos—fro th
pastry-cook’s; a di of stewed beef, with vegetabl—fro th
pastry-ck’s; tw littl cornr things, as a raid pie and a dish of
kidnys—fro th pastrycok’s; a tart, and (if I liked) a shape of
jelly—from th pastrycok’s. This, Mrs Crupp said, would leave
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her at full lberty to cotrate her mid o the potatoes, and to
serve up th che and celery as she could wish to see it don
I acted on Mrs. Crupp’s opi, and gave the order at the
pastry-cook’s mysf. Walkig along the Strand, afterwards, and
obsrving a hard mttled substanc i the window of a ham and
bef shop, which rebled marble, but was labed ‘Mok
Turtle’, I wnt in and bought a slab of it, which I have si see
reason to believe would have sufficed for fifte people. This
preparation, Mrs. Crupp, after some difficulty, coted to warm
up; and it shrunk so much in a liquid state, that w found it wat
Sterforth cald ‘rather a tight fit’ for four.
Th preparations happily completed, I bought a littl dessert
i Covet Garde Market, and gave a rather exteve order at a
retail wi-mrchant’s in that vicinity. Whe I came home in th
afternoon, and saw the bottle draw up i a square o the pantry
floor, they looked so numrous (though there were two mg,
wich made Mrs. Crupp very unmfortabl), that I was
absutey frightened at them.
One of Sterforth’s friends was named Grainger, and th othr
Markham. Thy were both very gay and lively fellow; Grainger,
sthing older than Steerforth; Markham, youthful-lookig, and
I should say not mre than twenty. I observed that the latter
always spoke of himself indefinitely, as ‘a man’, and seldom or
nver in the first perso sigular.
‘A man might get on very wel here, Mr. Cpperfied,’ said
Markham—mang himf.
‘It’s not a bad situation,’ said I, ‘and th ros are really
commodius.’
‘I hope you have both brought appetites with you?’ said
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Steerforth.
‘Upo my honour,’ returned Markham, ‘town se to sarpe
a man’s appetite A man is hungry all day long. A man is
perpetualy eatig.’
Beig a lttle ebarrasd at first, and feeg muc too young
to presde, I made Steerforth take the head of the table wh
dinnr was announced, and seated myself opposite to hm.
Everythig was very good; we did nt spare the w; and he
exerted himf so briantly to make the thing pas off wel, that
thre was no paus in our festivity. I was not quite such god
company during dinr as I could have wished to be, for my chair
was opposte th door, and my attention was distracted by
obsrving that the handy young man went out of the room very
often, and that his shadow always preted itself, immediatey
afterwards, on the wall of the entry, with a bottle at its muth. The
‘young gal’ likew ocasioned me some unas: not so much
by negleting to was the plate, as by breakig them For beg of
an inquisitive disposition, and unable to confi hersf (as her
positive instructions were) to th pantry, she was cotantly
perig in at us, and ctantly imaging hersf deteted; in
wich bef, she several times retired upo th plate (with wich
she had carefuly paved th flr), and did a great deal of
destruction.
The, however, were smal drawbacks, and easy forgotte
en the coth was ceared, and the deert put on the table; at
whic period of the entertait the handy young man was
discovered to be spees. Giving him private direction to seek
the soty of Mrs. Crupp, and to remve the ‘young gal’ to the
basement also, I abandoned myself to enjoymt.
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I began, by beig singularly cherful and light-harted; all sorts
of half-forgotten things to talk about, cam rushg into my mid,
and made m hd forth in a mt unted manner. I laughd
heartiy at my own joke, and everybody els’s; caled Steerforth to
order for not pasg the win; made several engagemts to go to
Oxford; announced that I meant to have a dinner-party exactly
like that, once a wek, unti furthr notice; and madly tok so
muc snuff out of Graiger’s box, that I was obliged to go ito the
pantry, and have a private fit of sneezing ten minutes long.
I went on, by passing th wi faster and faster yet, and
continualy starting up with a corkscre to ope more wi, long
before any was nded. I proposed Steerforth’s health. I said he
was my dearest friend, the protector of my boyhood, and the
companion of my pri I said I was delighted to propo h
health. I said I owed him more obligatio than I culd ever repay,
and held him i a higher admrati than I could ever expres I
finished by saying, ‘I’ll give you Sterforth! God bls him!
Hurrah!’ We gave him three tim three, and another, and a good
one to fin with. I broke my glass i going round the tabl to
shake hands with him, and I said (in tw wrds) ‘Sterforth—
you’retheguidigstarofmyexistee.’
I wet on, by findig suddenly that somebody was in the mddl
of a sog. Markham was the siger, and he sang ‘When the heart
of a man is depressed with care’. He said, wh he had sung it, he
would give us ‘Woan!’ I took objecti to that, and I culdn’t
allow it. I said it was not a respectful way of propoing th toast,
and I would nver permit that toast to be drunk in my house
otherwis than as ‘The Ladi!’ I was very high with him, maiy I
think becaus I saw Sterforth and Grainger laughng at me—or
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at him—or at both of us He said a man was not to be dictated to I
said a man was He said a man was not to be inulted, th I said
he was right there—nver under my roof, where the Lares were
sacred, and th law of hopitalty paramount. He said it was no
derogation from a man’s dignty to cfe that I was a devil
good fell I intantly proposed his health.
I was smking,
Sobody was smoking. We wre al smoking.
and trying to suppre a risg tendey to shudder. Sterforth
had made a speech about me, i the course of whic I had be
affected almt to tears I returned thanks, and hoped the pret
company wuld dine wth me tomorro, and th day after—each
day at five o’cock, that we might enjoy the plasures of
conversati and society through a long eveg. I felt called upo
to propo an individual. I would give th my aunt. Miss Betsy
Trotwood, the bet of her sex!
Sobody was lang out of my bedroom window, refreshig
hi forehead agait the cool sto of the parapet, and feeg the
air upo his face. It was myself. I was addresing myself as
‘Copperfield’, and saying, ‘Why did you try to smoke? You might
have known you couldn’t do it.’ Now, somebody was unsteadily
cteplatig his features in the lookig-glas That was I too. I
was very pale in th lookig-glass; my eye had a vacant
appearance; and my hair—only my hair, nothing el—looked
drunk.
Sobody said to me, ‘Let us go to the theatre, Cpperfied!’
Thre was no bedro before me, but again th jingling tabl
vered with glas; the lamp; Graiger on my right hand,
Markham on my left, and Sterforth opposite—all stting i a mist,
and a lg way off. The theatre? To be sure. The very thing. C
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along! But thy must excuse me if I saw everybody out first, and
turned the lamp off—in case of fire
Owing to some confusion in th dark, th door was go. I was
feelig for it in the widow-curtai, when Steerforth, laughig,
tok me by th arm and led me out. We wnt dowstairs, o
behd anthr. Near th bottom, somebody fe, and rolled dow
Somebody e said it was Copperfid. I was angry at that false
report, until, findig mysf on my back in the pasage, I began to
think there might be s foundatio for it.
very foggy night, with great rings round the lamps in the
I codered
strets! Thre was an indistict talk of its beg wt.
it froty. Sterforth dusted me under a lamp-pot, and put my hat
into shape, which somebody producd fro somewre in a most
extraordiary manner, for I hadn’t had it o before. Sterforth
then said, ‘You are al right, Copperfied, are you not?’ and I told
hi, ‘Neverberrer.’
A man, sitting i a pigeon-hole-place, looked out of the fog, and
tok money fro somebody, inquirig if I was on of th
gentl paid for, and appearig rather doubtful (as I rember
i the glips I had of him) whether to take the my for m or
nt. Shortly afterwards, we were very high up i a very hot
theatre, lookig down into a large pit, that sd to m to ske;
th people with wh it was crammed were so indistict. Thre
was a great stage, too, lookig very clean and sooth after the
streets; and there were peopl upo it, talkig about sothing or
other, but nt at al intellgibly. There was an abundance of bright
lghts, and there was mus, and there were ladi down in the
boxes, and I don’t kn what more. Th wh buiding looked to
me as if it were learning to swim; it coducted itself in such an
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unaccountabl manr, wh I tried to steady it.
On sbody’s mtion, we resved to go downstairs to the
dres-boxes, whre th ladies were A gentleman lounging, full
dred, o a sofa, with an opera-glass in hi hand, passd before
y vie, and als my own figure at full legth in a glas Then I
was being usred into o of th boxes, and found myself
saying something as I sat dow, and peopl about me crying
‘Silence!’ to somebody, and ladies casting idignant glances at me,
and—what! yes!—Agne, sitting on the seat before m, i the sam
box, wth a lady and gentleman beside her, wh I didn’t kn. I
s her fac nw, better than I did then, I dare say, with its
deble look of regret and wonder turned upon me
‘Agnes!’ I said, thickly, ‘Lorblsmer! Agns!’
‘Hush! Pray!’ she anered, I could not ceive wy. ‘You
disturb th company. Lok at th stage!’
I tried, on her injunction, to fix it, and to hear sthing of
what was going on there, but quite in vain I looked at her agai by
and by, and saw her shrink ito her corner, and put her gloved
hand to her forehead.
‘Agnes!’ I said. ‘I’mafraidyou’rerwell’
‘Yes, yes. Do nt mind me, Trotwd,’ she returned. ‘Liste!
Are you going away soon?’
‘Agoarawaysoo?’ I repeated.
‘Yes.’
I had a stupid intentin of replying that I was going to wait, to
hand her dowstairs. I suppose I expressed it, someh; for after
se had looked at me attetively for a lttle whe, she appeared to
understand, and replied in a low to: ‘I know you wi do as I ask
you, if I tell you I am very earnt in it. Go away now, Trotwd,
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for my sake, and ask your friends to take you ho’
Sh had s far improved me, for the tim, that though I was
angry with her, I felt asamd, and with a short ‘Goori!’ (whic I
itended for ‘Good night!’) got up and went away. They follwed,
and I stepped at onc out of the box-door into my bedroom, where
only Sterforth was with me, heping me to undres, and whre I
was by turns telling him that Agnes was my sister, and adjuring
hi to brig the corksre, that I might ope another bottle of
win
Ho somebody, lying in my bed, lay saying and doing all this
over again, at cross purpo, in a feverish dream all nght—th
bed a rocking sea that was never still! Ho, as that somebody
slowly settld dow into myself, did I begin to parc, and fe as if
my outer covering of ski were a hard board; my tongue the
bottom of an empty kettle, furred with lg srvic, and burnig
up over a slow fire; the palms of my hands, hot plates of mtal
ich no ice could coo!
But the agony of mid, the rerse, and same I felt when I
became conscius next day! My horror of having committed a
thousand offen I had forgotten, and which nthing could ever
expiate—my rellection of that indelibl look which Agne had
given me—th torturing imposbility of communating with her,
nt knowing, Beast that I was, how sh cam to be in Londo, or
were she stayed—my digust of the very sight of the ro were
the revel had be held—my rackig head—the sl of ske,
the sght of glas, the impobity of going out, or eve getting
up! Oh, what a day it was!
Oh, wat an eveg, wh I sat do by my fire to a bas of
mutton broth, dipld all over with fat, and thought I was going
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the way of my predecesr, and should suceed to hi dial story
as we as to his chambers, and had half a mind to rush expre to
Dover and reveal al! What an evenig, when Mrs Crupp, cog
i to take away the broth-bas, produced one kidney on a ceeseplate as the entire reai of yeterday’s feast, and I was realy
incld to fall upo her nankeen breast and say, in hartfet
peten, ‘Oh, Mrs. Crupp, Mrs. Crupp, never mind the broke
meats! I am very miserabl!’—only that I doubted, eve at that
pass, if Mrs. Crupp were quite th sort of woman to confide in!
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Chapter 25
GOOD AND BAD ANGELS
I
was going out at my door on the mornig after that
deplorabl day of headac, sickne, and repentance, with
an odd confusion i my mind reative to th date of my
dinnr-party, as if a body of Titans had taken an ermous lever
and pushed th day before yesterday some month back, w I
saw a ticket-porter coming upstairs, with a letter in his hand. He
was takig his tim about his errand, then; but when he saw m
on the top of the staircas, lookig at him over the banters, he
swung into a trot, and came up panting as if he had run hif
ito a state of exhaustion.
‘T. Copperfield, Esquire,’ said th tiket-porter, toucng his hat
with his little can
I could scarcely lay caim to th name: I was so disturbed by th
nviction that th letter came fro Agnes. Hover, I told hm I
was T. Copperfield, Esquire, and he believed it, and gave me th
letter, wich h said required an answer. I shut him out on th
andig to wait for the anr, and went into my chambers again,
in such a nervous state that I was fai to lay th letter dow on my
breakfast tabl, and famarize mysf with the outside of it a little,
before I could reve to break the seal
I found, wh I did ope it, that it was a very kind note,
containing no refere to my condition at th thatre All it said
was, ‘My dear Trotwood. I am stayig at the house of papa’s aget,
Mr. Waterbrook, in Ely Place, Holborn Wi you c and see m
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today, at any tim you like to appot? Ever yours affectiately,
AGNES.’
It tok me such a long time to write an answer at al to my
satisfaction, that I don’t know what the ticket-porter can have
thought, unl he thought I was learng to write I must have
written half-a-doze answers at least. I began on, ‘Ho can I ever
hpe, my dear Agnes, to efface fro your remembrance th
disgusting impression’—thre I didn’t like it, and th I tore it up.
I began another, ‘Shakepeare has obsrved, my dear Agn, how
strange it i that a man should put an eny into his mouth’—that
remnded m of Markham, and it got no farther. I eve tried
poetry. I began on note, in a sx-syllable line, ‘Oh, do not
rember’—but that asated itsf with the fifth of November,
and became an absurdity. After many attempts, I wrote, ‘My dear
Agnes. Your letter is like you, and what could I say of it that would
be highr praise than that? I will come at four o’clock.
Affectionately and sorrofully, T..’ With this miive (wich I
was in twty minds at once about recallg, as soo as it was out
of my hands), th ticket-porter at last departed.
If the day were half as tremedous to any other professonal
gentleman in Doctors’ Commons as it was to me, I sincerey
believe h made some expiation for hi share in that rotten old
ecclesiastical che. Althugh I left th office at half past thre,
and was proling about th place of appoitmt wthin a fe
utes afterwards, the appoted tim was excded by a full
quarter of an hour, acrdig to the clock of St. Andre’s,
Holborn, before I could muster up sufficient desperati to pull
the private be-handl lt into the left-hand door-post of Mr.
Waterbrook’s house
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The professonal bus of Mr. Waterbrook’s establient
was do on the ground-floor, and the gente bus (of whic
there was a good deal) in the upper part of the buidig. I was
hown into a pretty but rather close drawg-room, and there sat
Agnes, netting a purs
She looked so quiet and god, and reded me so strongly of
my airy fresh school days at Canterbury, and the sodden, smky,
stupid wretc I had be the other night, that, nobody beg by, I
yided to my self-reproach and sham, and—i short, made a fo
f myself. I cannot deny that I shed tears. To this hour I am
undecded whthr it was upo th wh th wisest thing I could
have don, or the most ridiculus
‘If it had be anyo but you, Agnes,’ said I, turning away my
head, ‘I should nt have mided it half so muc But that it should
have bee you wh saw me! I almost wish I had bee dead, first.’
She put her hand—its touch was lke n other hand—upo my
arm for a moment; and I felt so befriended and comforted, that I
could not help moving it to my lips, and gratefuly kissing it.
‘Sit dow,’ said Agnes, cherfuly. ‘Do’t be unappy,
Trotwood. If you cannot cofidently trust me, whom will you
trust?’
‘Ah, Agns!’ I returnd. ‘You are my god Ange!’
She smd rather sadly, I thought, and shook her head.
‘Ye, Agnes, my god Angel! Always my god Ange!’
‘If I were, indeed, Trotwd,’ she returned, ‘thre is oe thg
that I should set my heart on very muc’
I looked at her inquirigly; but already with a foreknowledge of
her meang.
‘On warng you,’ said Agne, with a steady glance, ‘against
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your bad Angel’
‘My dear Agns,’ I began, ‘if you mean Steerforth—’
‘I do, Trotwd,’ she returned. ‘Th, Agns, you wrog h
very much. He my bad Agel, or anyo’s! He, anythg but a
guide, a support, and a friend to me! My dear Agnes! Now, is it not
unjust, and unke you, to judge him fro what you saw of me th
other night?’
‘I do nt judge him from what I saw of you the other night,’ sh
quietly replied.
‘From what, then?’
‘From many things—trifle in themve, but they do nt s
to me to be so, when they are put together. I judge hi, partly
from your acunt of him, Trotwood, and your caracter, and the
influence he has over you.’
Thre was always somethg in her modest voice that seed
to touch a chord within m, ansrig to that sound alone It was
always earnet; but when it was very earnet, as it was nw, there
as a thri in it that quite subdued me. I sat lookig at hr as she
cast her eye dow on her work; I sat seing still to liste to hr;
and Sterforth, in spite of all my attachment to hm, darked i
that tone
‘It is very bold in me,’ said Agne, looking up again, ‘wh have
lived i such secusion, and can know so littl of th world, to give
you my advice so confidetly, or eve to have this strong opiion
But I know in what it is engendered, Trotwood,—i how true a
remebrance of our having grown up together, and i how true
an interest i all relating to you. It is that which makes me bold. I
am certain that what I say is right. I am quite sure it is. I fe as if it
wre soone els speakig to you, and nt I, wen I cauti you
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that you have made a dangerous friend.’
Again I looked at her, again I listed to hr after she was
silent, and again his image, thugh it was still fixed in my heart,
darked.
‘I am not so unreasonable as to expect,’ said Agnes, resumng
her usual tone, after a lttle whil, ‘that you wil, or that you can, at
oce, change any sentiment that has beme a conviction to you;
least of all a sentit that is roted in your trusting disposti
You ought not hastiy to do that. I only ask you, Trotwood, if you
ever think of me—I mean,’ with a quiet s, for I was going to
interrupt hr, and she kn why, ‘as ofte as you think of me—to
thk of what I have said. Do you forgive me for al this?’
‘I wi forgive you, Agnes,’ I replied, ‘wh you come to do
Sterforth justice, and to like him as we as I do.’
‘Not until th?’ said Agne
I saw a passing shado on her face wh I made this mention
f him, but she returnd my sm, and we were again as
unrerved in our mutual confidece as of old.
‘And when, Agns,’ said I, ‘wi you forgive me the othr night?’
‘Whn I recall it,’ said Agnes.
She wuld have diissed th subjet so, but I was to ful of it
to allow that, and insisted on teg her ho it happened that I
had disgraced myself, and what chain of accidental circumtan
had had the theatre for its final lnk. It was a great relf to m to
do this, and to enlarge on the obligatio that I owed to Sterforth
for his care of me wh I was unable to take care of myself.
‘You must not forget,’ said Agnes, calmly changing th
nversati as soo as I had concluded, ‘that you are alays to
tel m, nt only when you fall into troubl, but when you fall in
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lve. Who has sucded to Mis Larki, Trotwood?’
‘No one, Agn’
‘Someone, Trotwood,’ said Agn, laughing, and holdig up her
finger.
‘No, Agnes, upo my word! Thre is a lady, certainly, at Mrs
Steerforth’s house, who is very clever, and whom I like to talk to—
Miss Dartle—but I don’t adore her.’
Agnes laughd again at her own pentration, and told me that if
I were faithful to her in my confidece she thught she should
kep a lttle register of my violet attacts, with the date,
duration, and termiati of eac, like the table of the reign of
the kigs and queens, i the History of England. Then she asked
me if I had see Uriah.
‘Uriah Heep?’ said I. ‘No Is he in Lodo?’
‘He c to the offic dotairs, every day,’ returned Agn
‘He was in Lodo a week before m. I am afraid on diagreeabl
bus, Trotwood.’
‘On some busine that makes you unasy, Agnes, I se,’ said I.
‘What can that be?’
Agn laid asde her work, and repld, foldig her hands upo
one another, and lookig pevely at me out of those beautiful
sft eyes of hers:
‘I beve he is going to enter into partnership with papa.’
‘What? Uriah? That mean, fawning fellow, worm hielf into
such protion!’ I cried, indignantly. ‘Have you made no
remonstrance about it, Agnes? Consider what a connexi it is
lkey to be You must speak out. You must not alw your father to
take such a mad step. You must prevet it, Agnes, wh thre’s
tim’
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Stil lookig at me, Agn shook her head while I was speakig,
with a fait sm at my warmth: and then repld:
‘You remeber our last coversation about papa? It was not
lg after that—not more than two or three days—when he gave
m the first itimatio of what I tell you. It was sad to se him
trugglig betwee his dere to repret it to me as a matter of
choice o his part, and hi inability to conceal that it was forcd
upo hi I felt very sorry.’
‘Forced upo him, Agn! Who forces it upon him?’
‘Uriah,’ she replied, after a moment’s hesitati, ‘has made
hmself indispesabl to papa. He is subtle and watcful. He has
astered papa’s weakn, fostered them, and take advantage
of them, until—to say all that I man in a word, Trotwood,—until
papa is afraid of hi’
There was mre that s might have said; more that sh kn,
or that she suspected; I carly saw I could not give her pain by
asking what it was, for I kn that she withld it fro me, to
pare her father. It had log be going on to this, I was sebl:
yes, I could not but fee, on the last refletion, that it had be
going on to this for a lg tim I remaid st.
‘His ascendancy over papa,’ said Agnes, ‘is very great. He
professes humlity and gratitude—wth truth, perhaps: I hope so—
but his posti is really on of powr, and I fear h makes a hard
us of his powr.’
I said he was a hound, wich, at th moment, was a great
satisfacti to me.
‘At the tim I speak of, as the tim when papa spoke to me,’
pursued Agn, ‘h had told papa that he was going away; that he
was very srry, and unwillg to leave, but that he had better
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prospects. Papa was very much depressed th, and more bod
do by care than ever you or I have se hi; but h sd
reeved by th expedient of the partnrsp, though at the sam
time he seemed hurt by it and asamed of it.’
‘And ho did you receive it, Agnes?’
‘I did, Trotwood,’ se repld, ‘what I hope was right. Feg
sure that it was necessary for papa’s peace that th sacrifi
hould be made, I etreated hi to make it. I said it would lghten
the load of his life—I hope it wil!—and that it would give m
increased opportunities of beg his companion. Oh, Trotwd!’
cried Agnes, putting her hands before her face, as her tears started
o it, ‘I almost fe as if I had be papa’s eny, instead of h
ving cd. For I know how he has altered, in his devotion to me
I know how he has narrowed the circe of his sympathi and
duties, in the concentrati of his whole md upo me I know
what a multitude of things he has shut out for my sake, and how
hi anxious thoughts of me have shadowed his life, and weakened
hi strength and enrgy, by turnig them always upon on idea. If
I could ever set this right! If I could ever wrk out his restoration,
as I have so innocently be th caus of hi decli!’
I had never before se Agnes cry. I had se tears in her eye
when I had brought new honours home from shool, and I had
seen them there wen w last spoke about her father, and I had
seen her turn her gentl head asde when we took lave of one
another; but I had never se her grieve like this It made me s
sorry that I could only say, in a foish, helpless manr, ‘Pray,
Agnes, don’t! Don’t, my dear sister!’
But Agnes was to superir to me i character and purpo, as
I know well nw, whatever I might know or not know then, to be
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lg in need of my entreati. The beautiful, cal maner, w
ake her so differet in my rebrane from everybody els,
came back again, as if a cloud had passd fro a sere sky.
‘We are not likely to remain alon much longer,’ said Agnes,
‘and we I have an opportunity, let me earntly entreat you,
Trotwood, to be friendly to Uriah. Do’t repel him Do’t rest
(as I thk you have a geral dispoition to do) what may be
unngeial to you in him. He may not deserve it, for we know no
certain ill of him. In any case, think first of papa and me!’
Agn had n tim to say more, for the room door opened, and
Mrs. Waterbrook, who was a large lady—or who wore a large
dres: I don’t exactly kn which, for I don’t kn wich was
dres and which was lady—cam saig in. I had a dim
reti of havig seen her at the theatre, as if I had seen her
in a pale magi lantern; but she appeared to remember m
perfetly, and sti to suspect me of being in a state of intoxiati
Fidig by degrees, however, that I was sber, and (I hope) that
I was a modet young gentlan, Mrs. Waterbrook sftend
toards me considerably, and iquired, firstly, if I wnt much ito
th parks, and secondly, if I went much into socty. On my
replying to both thes questions in the negative, it occurred to m
that I fell again in her god opiion; but she concealed th fact
gracefully, and invited me to dinnr next day. I acpted th
invitati, and tok my leave, making a call on Uriah in th office
as I went out, and leaving a card for him in his absence.
When I wet to dier next day, and on the street door beg
opened, plunged into a vapour-bath of haunch of mutton, I divind
that I was not the only guest, for I imdiatey idetified the
ticket-porter in disguise, assistig th family servant, and waitig
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at the foot of the stairs to carry up my name. He loked, to the best
of his ability, w h asked me for it confidentially, as if he had
never se me before; but w did I know hi, and well did he
know me. Conscience made cowards of us both
I found Mr. Waterbrook to be a middl-aged gentlan, with a
short throat, and a good deal of shrt-coar, who only wanted a
black no to be the portrait of a pug-dog. He told me he was
happy to have the honour of makig my acquaitan; and when I
had paid my homage to Mrs. Waterbrook, presented me, with
much ceremony, to a very awful lady in a black velvet dres, and a
great black velvet hat, whom I remeber as lookig like a near
reati of Hamet’s—say his aunt.
Mrs. Henry Spiker was th lady’s name; and hr husband was
there too: so cod a man, that his head, intead of beg grey,
seemed to be sprikld with hoar-frost. Imme deferee was
shon to th Henry Spikers, male and feale; which Agnes tod
me was o account of Mr. Henry Spiker beg solicitor to
something Or to Somebody, I forget what or which, remotely
cted with the Treasury.
I found Uriah Hep among th company, in a suit of black, and
i dep humity. He told me, when I shook hands with hi, that
h was proud to be noticed by me, and that h really felt obliged to
me for my condescension. I could have wshed h had be less
oblged to me, for he hovered about me in his gratitude al the rest
of the evenig; and whenever I said a word to Agn, was sure,
wth his shadowless eye and cadaverous face, to be looking
gauntly down upon us from bed.
There were other guests—al id for the occas, as it struck
m, like the wine But there was one who attracted my attenti
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before he cam in, on acunt of my hearig him anunced as
Mr. Traddles! My mind fl back to Salem Hous; and could it be
Tommy, I thought, who used to draw the sketons!
I looked for Mr. Traddl with unusual interest. He was a sober,
steady-lookig young man of retiring manrs, with a co head
of hair, and eye that were rather wide ope; and he got into an
obscure cornr so soo, that I had some difficulty in making h
ut. At length I had a god vi of him, and eithr my vision
deceived me, or it was th old unfortunate Tommy.
I made my way to Mr. Waterbrok, and said, that I belved I
had the plasure of seg an old shoolfellow there.
‘Inded!’ said Mr. Waterbrook, surprisd. ‘You are too young to
have been at school with Mr. Henry Spiker?’
‘Oh, I don’t mean him!’ I returnd. ‘I mean th gentleman
named Traddles.’
‘Oh! Aye, aye! Indeed!’ said my hot, with much diminished
interest. ‘Pobly.’
‘If it’s really th same pers,’ said I, glancing toards hm, ‘it
was at a place cald Sal House where we were together, and he
was an excellent fe’
‘Oh yes. Traddl is a good felw,’ returned my host nddig
hi head with an air of toleratio ‘Traddl is quite a good fellow.’
‘It’s a curius coiciden,’ said I.
‘It is really,’ returnd my hot, ‘quite a coincidence, that
Traddl shuld be here at al: as Traddl was ony invited th
rng, when the place at table, iteded to be occupid by Mrs
Henry Spiker’s brothr, became vacant, in consequence of hi
indisposti. A very gentlemany man, Mrs. Henry Spiker’s
brother, Mr. Copperfied.’
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I murmured an assent, which was ful of feing, considerig
that I kn nthing at all about him; and I inquired what Mr.
Traddles was by profe
‘Traddl,’ returned Mr. Waterbrook, ‘i a young man readig
for the bar. Yes. He is quite a god fel—nbody’s eney but hi
own.’
‘Is he his ow eny?’ said I, sorry to hear this.
‘We,’ returned Mr. Waterbrook, pursig up his mouth, and
playig with his watc-chain, in a comfortabl, properous sort of
way. ‘I should say he was one of those me who stand i their own
lght. Yes, I should say he would nver, for example, be worth five
hundred pound. Traddl was reded to me by a
professional friend. Oh yes. Yes. He has a kind of talent for
drawing briefs, and statig a case in writing, plainy. I am able to
throw sothing in Traddl’s way, i the course of the year;
something—for him—cosiderable. Oh ye Yes.’
I was much impressed by th extrey comfortabl and
satisfied manr i wich Mr. Waterbrok delivered himself of
th lttle wrd ‘Yes’, every no and then. There was woderful
expression i it. It completely conveyed th idea of a man wh had
be born, nt to say with a siver spo, but with a scalg-ladder,
and had gon on munting al the heights of life one after another,
until nw he looked, from the top of the fortifiations, with the eye
of a phopher and a patron, on the peopl down in the trenc
My reflections on th theme wre sti in progre wen dier
was annund. Mr. Waterbrook went down with Hamt’s aunt.
Mr. Henry Spiker took Mrs. Waterbrook. Agn, whom I should
have liked to take mysf, was given to a siperig fellow with
weak lgs. Uriah, Traddl, and I, as the junior part of the
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company, went dow last, ho we could. I was not so vexed at
losing Agnes as I might have be, since it gave me an opportunity
of makig mysf known to Traddl on the stairs, who greeted me
with great fervour; whil Uriah writhed with suc obtrusive
satisfacti and self-abasement, that I could gladly have pitched
hm over th banisters. Traddles and I were separated at tabl,
beg bited i two remte crners: he in the glare of a red velvet
lady; I, i th gl of Hamlet’s aunt. Th dinner was very long,
and th conversati was about th Aristoracy—and Bld. Mrs
Waterbrok repeatedly tod us, that if she had a weakness, it was
Blood.
It occurred to me several tim that we should have got on
better, if we had nt be quite so gente We were so excdigly
gente, that our scope was very limited. A Mr. and Mrs. Gulpidge
re of th party, w had something to do at secod-hand (at
last, Mr. Gulpidge had) with the law bus of the Bank; and
what with the Bank, and what with the Treasury, we were as
exclusive as the Court Circular. To med the matter, Hamet’s
aunt had th famly faig of indulgig in soliloquy, and held forth
in a desultory mannr, by hersf, on every topic that was
troduced. Thes were few enough, to be sure; but as we always
fell back upo Bld, she had as wide a fid for abstract
speculati as her nephe hif.
We might have bee a party of Ogres, the coversatio
assumed such a sangui complexi
‘I cfe I am of Mrs. Waterbrook’s opi,’ said Mr.
Waterbrok, wth his wi-glass at his eye ‘Othr things are all
very wel in their way, but give m Blood!’
‘Oh! There is nothg,’ obsrved Hamet’s aunt, ‘s satisfactory
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beau-ideal of—of al
to on! Thre is nothing that is so much on’s
that sort of thing, speakig genrally. There are s lw mnds
(not many, I am happy to beeve, but there are some) that would
prefer to do what I should call bow dow before idols. Potively
Idols! Before service, intellect, and so on. But th are itangible
points. Bld is not so. We see Bld in a nse, and we kn it. We
meet with it in a chi, and we say, “Thre it is! That’s Bld!” It is
an actual matter of fact. We pot it out. It admts of no doubt.’
Th simpering fe with th weak legs, w had taken Agne
down, stated the question more devey yet, I thought.
‘Oh, you kn, deuce take it,’ said this getlan, lking
round the board with an ibe sm, ‘w can’t forego Blood,
you know. We must have Blood, you know. So young fellows,
you know, may be a littl bend thr station, perhaps, in poit of
educati and behaviour, and may go a little wrong, you know,
and get themve and other peopl ito a variety of fixes—and
al that—but deuc take it, it’s delightful to reflet that they’ve got
Bld in ’em! Myself, I’d rathr at any time be knoked dow by a
man who had got Blood in him, than I’d be piked up by a man
who hadn’t!’
This stit, as cpresg the genral questio into a
nutshel, gave the utmot satisfactio, and brought the gentlan
to great notic until the ladi retired. After that, I observed that
Mr. Gulpidge and Mr. Henry Spiker, who had hitherto be very
distant, entered into a defensive alliance against us, th common
enemy, and exchanged a mysterius dialogue acro the table for
our defeat and overthro
‘That affair of the first bod for four thousand five hundred
pounds has not taken th course that was expected, Spiker,’ said
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Mr. Gulpidge.
‘Do you mean the D. of A.’s?’ said Mr. Spiker.
‘Th C. of B.’s!’ said Mr. Gulpidge
Mr. Spiker raised his eyebro, and looked much concerned.
‘When the question was referred to Lord—I nedn’t nam hi,’
said Mr. Gulpidge, cheking himself—
‘I understand,’ said Mr. Spiker, ‘N.’
Mr. Gulpidge darkly nodded—‘was referred to him, hi answer
was, “Moey, or no rease.”’
‘Lord bls my soul!’ cried Mr. Spiker.
“‘Moey, or n rease,”’ repeated Mr. Gulpidge, firmy. ‘Th
xt in reversi—you understand me?’
‘K.,’ said Mr. Spiker, with an omus lk.
‘—K. then potively refused to sign He was attended at
Newarket for that purpo, and he point-blank refused to do it.’
Mr. Spiker was so interested, that he beame quite stoy.
‘So th matter rests at this hour,’ said Mr. Gulpidge, throng
hmself back in his chair. ‘Our friend Waterbrok wi excus me if
I forbear to explai mysf genrally, on accunt of the magnitude
f th interests involved.’
Mr. Waterbrook was only too happy, as it appeared to m, to
have such interests, and such names, eve hnted at, across h
tabl He assumed an expression of gly inteige (thugh I
am persuaded he kn no more about th discussion than I did),
and highly approved of th discretion that had be observed. Mr.
Spiker, after th receipt of such a confidence, naturally desired to
favour his friend with a confidence of hi own; threfore th
foregoing dialgue was succeeded by anothr, in which it was Mr.
Gulpidge’s turn to be surprised, and that by anthr in wich th
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surpris cam round to Mr. Spiker’s turn agai, and s o, turn
and turn about. All this tim we, the outsiders, remaid
oppressed by th tredous interests involved in th
nversati; and our hot regarded us with pride, as th victi
of a salutary aw and astonist. I was very glad inded to get
upstairs to Agn, and to talk with her i a crnr, and to
itroduce Traddl to her, who was shy, but agreeabl, and the
same god-natured creature sti As he was oblged to leave early,
on acunt of going away next morng for a moth, I had nt
nearly so much conversati with him as I could have wished; but
w exchanged addresses, and proised oursve th pleasure of
another meeting when he should co back to town. He was
greatly iterested to hear that I kn Sterforth, and spoke of him
with suc warmth that I made him tel Agn what he thought of
hi But Agn only looked at m the while, and very slghtly
shook her head when ony I obsrved her.
As she was not among people with wh I believed she could
be very muc at ho, I was alt glad to hear that s was
going away within a fe days, thugh I was sorry at th propect
of parting from her agai s soon. This caused me to remai until
al the cpany were gone Coversg with her, and hearig her
sing, was such a delightful reder to me of my happy life in th
grave old house she had made so beautiful, that I could have
remaid there half the night; but, having no excus for stayig
any lger, when the lights of Mr. Waterbrook’s sty were al
snuffed out, I tok my leave very much against my iation. I
felt then, mre than ever, that sh was my better Ange; and if I
thought of her sweet fac and placd se, as though they had
shone on m from so removed beg, like an Angel, I hope I
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thought no harm.
I have said that the copany were all gone; but I ought to have
excepted Uriah, whom I do’t inude in that denomination, and
who had nver cased to hover near us. He was close bed m
when I went downstairs. He was close bede me, when I walked
away fro th huse, slowly fitting his long sketo fingers into
the sti lger fingers of a great Guy Fawke pair of gloves
It was in no disposition for Uriah’s company, but i
remembran of th etreaty Agnes had made to me, that I asked
hi if he would co hom to my rooms, and have so coffee.
‘Oh, realy, Master Copperfield,’ he rejoind—‘I beg your
pardo, Mister Copperfield, but th othr comes so natural, I don’t
like that you should put a constraint upo yourself to ask a
numble pers like me to your ouse’
‘Thre is no constraint in th case,’ said I. ‘Will you come?’
‘I should lke to, very much,’ replied Uriah, with a writh
‘Well, then, come alg!’ said I.
I could nt help beg rather short with him, but he appeared
nt to mind it. We went the nearet way, without coversg muc
upon the road; and he was so humbl in respect of those
scarecro glve, that he was still putting th o, and sed to
ave made no advane in that labour, when we got to my place.
I led him up th dark stairs, to prevet his knking hs had
against anythng, and really his damp cold hand felt so like a frog
in mine, that I was tempted to drop it and run away. Agnes and
hspitality prevailed, hover, and I conducted him to my firede.
Wh I lghted my candl, he fel ito mek tranports with the
room that was revealed to him; and when I heated the cffee i an
unassuming blk-tin vessel in which Mrs. Crupp delighted to
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prepare it (cefly, I beeve, beause it was nt iteded for th
purpo, being a shavig-pot, and becaus thre was a patent
invention of great price mouldering away in th pantry), h
professed so much emtion, that I could joyfully have scalded him.
‘Oh, really, Master Copperfield,—I mean Mister Cpperfield,’
said Uriah, ‘to see you waiting upo me is what I never could have
xpected! But, on way and anthr, so many things happen to me
wich I never could have expected, I am sure, in my umbl station,
that it sees to rai blsings on my ed. You have hard
something, I des-say, of a change in my expectations, Master
Cpperfield,—I should say, Mister Copperfield?’
As he sat on my sofa, with hi long knees drawn up under hi
ffee-cup, hi hat and gloves upo the ground close to him, his
spoo gog softly round and round, his shadowless red eye,
wich looked as if thy had scorcd thr lashe off, turnd
towards me without lookig at me, the diagreeable dits I have
formrly described in his nostrils coming and gog with h
breath, and a snaky undulati pervading his frame fro his chin
to his boots, I decided i my own mind that I disliked hi
tensey. It made m very uncfortabl to have him for a guest,
for I was young then, and unused to diguis what I so strongly
felt.
‘You have heard sothing, I de-say, of a change in my
expectation, Master Copperfield,—I should say, Mister
Cpperfield?’ observed Uriah.
‘Yes,’ said I, ‘somethg.’
‘Ah! I thught Miss Agnes would know of it!’ h quietly
returned. ‘I’m glad to find Mi Agns kns of it. Oh, thank you,
Master—Mister Copperfield!’
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I culd have thrown my bootjack at him (it lay ready on the
rug), for having etrapped me into the diure of anything
concernng Agne, hover immaterial. But I oly drank my
cffee.
‘What a prophet you have shown yoursef, Mister Copperfied!’
pursued Uriah. ‘Dear m, what a prophet you have proved
yoursef to be! Do’t you rember saying to me once, that
perhaps I should be a partner in Mr. Wickfid’s business, and
You may nt rect it;
perhaps it might be Wickfid and Hep?
but when a person i umble, Master Copperfield, a person
treasures such things up!’
‘I rellect talkig about it,’ said I, ‘thugh I certainly did not
thk it very likey then.’
‘Oh! who would have thught it likely, Mister Copperfield!’
returnd Uriah, ethusiasticaly. ‘I am sure I didn’t myself. I
rellect saying with my ow lips that I was much to umbl So I
considered myself really and truly.’
He sat, with that carved grin on his face, lookig at the fire, as I
looked at hi
‘But th umblt perss, Master Copperfield,’ he pretly
resumd, ‘may be the intrumets of good. I am glad to think I
have been the itrumet of good to Mr. Wikfield, and that I may
be more so. Oh what a worthy man he is, Mister Copperfield, but
how imprudent he has been!’
‘I am sorry to hear it,’ said I. I could not hep adding, rathr
pointedly, ‘on all accounts.’
‘Decidedly so, Mister Copperfield,’ replied Uriah ‘On all
accounts Mi Agnes’s above all! You don’t remember your ow
I rember how
quent expres, Master Copperfield; but
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you said on day that everybody must admre her, and how I
thanked you for it! You have forgot that, I have no doubt, Master
Cpperfield?’
‘No,’ said I, driy.
‘Oh how glad I am you have not!’ exclaid Uriah. ‘To think
that you should be the first to kidl the sparks of ambitio i my
umble breast, and that you’ve not forgot it! Oh!—Would you
excuse me asking for a cup more coffe?’
Sothing i the ephas he laid upon the kidlg of those
sparks, and somethg in th glance he directed at me as he said it,
had made me start as if I had se hm illuminated by a blaze of
lght. Realld by hi request, preferred in quite another tone of
voic, I did the honours of the shavig-pot; but I did them with an
unsteadiss of hand, a sudden sense of beig no matc for him,
and a perplxed suspius anxiety as to what he might be going to
say next, which I felt could not escape his observation
He said nothg at al He stirred his coffe round and round, h
sipped it, h felt his chi softly with his grily hand, he looked at
the fire, he looked about the room, he gasped rather than sd at
me, he writhd and undulated about, in his deferential servility, h
stirred and sipped again, but he left th real of th
nversati to me.
‘So, Mr. Wikfied,’ said I, at last, ‘who i worth five hundred of
you—or me’; for my life, I thk, I could not have helped dividing
that part of th sentece with an awkward jerk; ‘has bee
imprudet, has he, Mr. Hep?’
‘Oh, very imprudet indeed, Master Cpperfield,’ returnd
Uriah, sighing modestly. ‘Oh, very much so! But I wish you’d cal
me Uriah, if you please. It’s like old times.’
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‘Well! Uriah,’ said I, bolting it out with some difficulty.
‘Thank you,’ he returned, with fervour. ‘Thank you, Master
Copperfid! It’s lke the blowig of old breezes or the rigig of
you say Uriah I beg your pardo. Was I making
od bes to hear
any observation?’
‘About Mr. Wickfield,’ I suggested.
‘Oh! Yes, truly,’ said Uriah. ‘Ah! Great imprudece, Master
Cpperfield. It’s a topic that I wouldn’t touc upo, to any soul but
you. Even to you I can only touch upon it, and no mre. If anyo
els had been i my place durig the last few years, by th ti he
would have had Mr. Wikfied (oh, what a worthy man he i,
Master Copperfield, to!) under h thumb. Un—der—his thumb,’
said Uriah, very slowly, as he stretcd out his cruel-lookig hand
above my table, and pred hi own thumb upon it, until it shook,
and shook the room.
If I had be obliged to lok at him with hi splay foot on Mr.
Wickfid’s head, I think I could scarcely have hated him more
‘Oh, dear, yes, Master Copperfield,’ he proded, in a soft
voic, mot remarkably cotrastig with the action of hi thumb,
wich did not diminish its hard pressure in th least degre,
‘thre’s no doubt of it. Thre would have be loss, disgrac, I
don’t kn what at all. Mr. Wickfid knows it. I am th umbl
instrument of umbly serving him, and he puts me on an emce
I hardly could have hoped to reach. How thankful should I be!’
With his face turned towards me, as he finisd, but without
lookig at me, he took his crooked thumb off the spot where he
had planted it, and slowly and thoughtfully scraped hi lank jaw
th it, as if he were shavig hielf.
I recot well how indignantly my heart beat, as I saw his
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crafty fac, with the appropriatey red lght of the fire upon it,
preparig for something el
‘Master Copperfield,’ he began—‘but am I keeping you up?’
‘You are not kepig m up. I genrally go to bed late.’
‘Thank you, Master Copperfield! I have rin fro my umbl
station s first you usd to addres me, it is true; but I am
umble sti I hope I nver shal be otherwe than umble. You wi
not think th wors of my umbls, if I make a littl confidece
to you, Master Copperfield? Wi you?’
‘Oh no,’ said I, with an effort.
‘Thank you!’ He tok out his pocket-handkerchief, and began
iping th pals of hi hands. ‘Miss Agnes, Master Copperfield—’
‘Well, Uriah?’
‘Oh, ho pleasant to be called Uriah, spontaneusly!’ he cried;
and gave himelf a jerk, lke a cvulsve fis ‘You thought her
lookig very beautiful tonight, Master Copperfield?’
‘I thought her lookig as she alays do: superior, in al
respects, to everyo around her,’ I returnd.
‘Oh, thank you! It’s so true!’ he crid. ‘Oh, thank you very muc
for that!’
‘Not at al,’ I said, loftily. ‘There is no reason why you should
thank me.’
‘Why that, Master Copperfield,’ said Uriah, ‘is, in fact, th
fide that I am going to take the liberty of repog. Umble
as I am,’ he wiped his hands harder, and looked at th and at th
fire by turns, ’umble as my mothr is, and lowy as our poor but
honest roof has ever been, the image of Mi Agn (I do’t mid
trusting you wth my secret, Master Copperfield, for I have alays
verfld toards you since th first moment I had th pleasure
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of beding you in a pony-say) has be in my breast for years.
Oh, Master Copperfid, with what a pure affection do I love th
ground my Agnes walks on!’
I believe I had a delirious idea of sezig the red-hot poker out
of the fire, and rung him through with it. It went from me with
a shok, like a bal fired fro a rifl: but th image of Agne,
outraged by so muc as a thought of this red-headed anial’s,
remaind in my mind wh I looked at him, sitting all awry as if
his mean soul griped his body, and made me giddy. He sed to
ell and grow before my eyes; the room seemed full of the echoes
of his voice; and th strange feing (to which, perhaps, no o is
quite a stranger) that all this had ocurred before, at some
idefite tim, and that I kn what he was going to say next,
tok possession of me.
A timely observation of th sen of powr that thre was in h
fac, did mre to brig back to my rembrance the entreaty of
Agnes, in its ful forc, than any effort I could have made. I asked
hm, with a better appearance of composure than I could have
thught possible a minute before, wthr h had made h
feings knn to Agnes.
‘Oh no, Master Cpperfield!’ he returnd; ‘oh dear, no! Not to
anyo but you. You see I am only just emrging fro my lowy
stati I rest a good deal of hope on her observing how useful I
am to her father (for I trust to be very useful to hi ided, Master
Copperfield), and how I smooth the way for him, and kep hi
straight. She’s so much attached to her fathr, Master Copperfield
(o, what a lovely thing it is in a daughter!), that I think she may
come, on his account, to be kid to me.’
I fathomed the depth of the rasal’s whole scheme, and
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understood why he laid it bare.
‘If you’ll have the goodn to kep my sret, Master
Cpperfield,’ he pursued, ‘and not, in genral, to go against me, I
shall take it as a particular favour. You wouldn’t wish to make
unpleasantness. I kn what a friendly hart you’ve got; but
having only known me on my umble footing (on my umblest I
should say, for I am very umbl sti), you mght, unbeknown, go
against me rathr, with my Agnes. I cal hr mine, you se, Master
Cpperfield. Thre’s a song that says, “I’d crons resign, to call
her mi!” I hope to do it, one of these days.’
Dear Agnes! So much to loving and to god for anyo that I
could thk of, was it posble that she was rerved to be th wife
f such a wretch as th!
‘Thre’s no hurry at pret, you know, Master Cpperfield,’
Uriah proded, i hs simy way, as I sat gazing at him, with this
thought in my mind. ‘My Agn is very young sti; and mther and
m will have to work our way upwards, and make a good many
n arrangements, before it would be quite covenit. So I sal
ave time gradualy to make her familiar with my hpe, as
opportunities offer. Oh, I’m so much oblged to you for this
confidence! Oh, it’s such a relief, you can’t think, to know that you
understand our stuation, and are certain (as you wouldn’t wish to
make unplasantness in th family) not to go against me!’
He took the hand whic I dared not withhold, and having given
it a damp squeze, referred to his pale-faced watc
‘Dear me!’ he said, ‘it’s past on Th moments slip away so, i
th confidence of old times, Master Cpperfield, that it’s almost
half past one!’
I anred that I had thought it was later. Not that I had really
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thught so, but becaus my conversatial powrs wre
effectualy scattered.
‘Dear me!’ he said, considering. ‘Th ouse that I am stopping
at—a sort of a private hote and boarding ouse, Master
Cpperfield, near the New River ed—w have gone to bed thes
two hours.’
‘I am sorry,’ I returned, ‘that there is ony oe bed hre, and
that I—’
‘Oh, don’t think of mentioning beds, Master Copperfield!’ he
would you have any
rejod estatically, drawig up on leg. ‘But
objections to my laying dow before th fire?’
‘If it comes to that,’ I said, ‘pray take my bed, and I’ll lie dow
before the fire.’
His repudiation of this offer was almost shri enugh, in th
xcess of its surprise and humility, to have penetrated to th ears
f Mrs. Crupp, th slping, I suppose, in a distant chamber,
stuated at about the level of lw-water mark, soothed in her
slumbers by th ticking of an inrrigibl clk, to which she
always referred me wh we had any littl differe on th sre
f punctuality, and which was never less than thre-quarters of an
hour too slow, and had always be put right in the morng by
th best authrities. As no arguments I could urge, i my
bedered condition, had th least effect upo his modesty i
inducing hm to accept my bedro, I was oblged to make th
bet arrangets I could, for his repo before the fire. The
mattress of th sofa (wich was a great deal to short for his lank
figure), the sofa piws, a blanket, the tabl-cver, a can
breakfast-cloth, and a great-coat, made hm a bed and covering,
for which he was more than thankful. Having lent h a night-cap,
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wich h put o at once, and in which he made such an awful
figure, that I have never worn one sin, I left hi to his rest.
I never shall forget that night. I never shall forget h I turnd
and tumbled; ho I wearied myself with thking about Agnes and
this creature; h I considered what could I do, and what ought I
to do; how I could co to no other cous than that the bet
curse for her peac was to do nthing, and to kep to mysf what
I had heard. If I went to sleep for a fe moments, th iage of
Agn with her tender eyes, and of her father lookig fondly on
her, as I had s often seen hi look, arose before me with
appealg face, and fild me with vague terrors. Wh I awoke,
th rellection that Uriah was lyig in th next ro, sat heavy
o me like a waking nightmare; and oppressed me with a leaden
dread, as if I had had some meanr quality of devil for a lodger.
The poker got into my dozig thoughts bede, and wouldn’t
c out. I thought, betwee slpig and wakig, that it was sti
red hot, and I had snatced it out of the fire, and run him through
the body. I was s haunted at last by the idea, though I kn there
as nothing in it, that I sto into th next ro to look at him.
There I saw him, lyig on his back, with his lgs extendig to I
do’t know where, gurgligs takig plac in his throat, stoppages
in hi nose, and his mouth ope like a post-office. He was so much
worse in realty than in my ditepered fancy, that afterwards I
was attracted to him in very repulsion, and could not hlp
wandering in and out every half-hour or so, and takig another
look at him. Sti, th long, long night seed heavy and hpe
as ever, and no proise of day was in th murky sky.
Whe I saw hm going dowstairs early in th morning (for,
thank Heave! he would not stay to breakfast), it appeared to me
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as if the nght was going away in his person. Wh I went out to
th Cmmons, I charged Mrs. Crupp with particular directions to
ave the windows ope, that my stting-room mght be aired, and
purged of his prece.
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Chapter 26
I FALL INTO CAPTIVITY
I
saw no more of Uriah Hep, until th day wh Agnes left
to I was at th coach office to take leave of her and see her
go; and there was he, returnig to Canterbury by the sam
nveyance. It was some smal satisfacti to me to observe h
pare, short-waited, high-shouldered, mulberry-coloured greatcoat percd up, in company with an umbrea like a sal tet, o
th edge of th back seat on th rof, while Agnes was, of course,
inside; but what I underwt in my efforts to be friendly with hm,
wile Agnes looked o, perhaps derved that littl rempen
t the coach window, as at the dinner-party, he hovered about us
without a mot’s itermi, lke a great vulture: gorging
hmself on every syllable that I said to Agnes, or Agnes said to me.
In th state of troubl into which his disclosure by my fire had
thrown me, I had thought very muc of the words Agn had used
i referen to the partnership. ‘I did what I hope was right.
Feing sure that it was necessary for papa’s peace that th
sacrifi should be made, I entreated him to make it.’ A miserabl
foreboding that she would yid to, and sustain hrsf by, th
am feg in refere to any sacrifice for h sake, had
oppresd me ever sie. I knew how she loved him I knew what
the devotion of her nature was I knew from her own lips that s
regarded hersef as the it cause of his errors, and as owing
hm a great debt she ardently desred to pay. I had no consolation
in seeng ho different she was fro this detestable Rufus wth
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the mulberry-coloured great-coat, for I felt that in the very
difference betw th, in th self-deial of her pure soul and
th sordid base of his, th greatest danger lay. All this,
doubtles, he knew thoroughly, and had, i his cung,
cdered we
Yet I was so certain that th propect of such a sacrifice afar off,
must destroy th happine of Agnes; and I was so sure, fro hr
manner, of its beg un by hr th, and having cast no
sadow on her yet; that I culd as soon have injured her, as given
her any warnig of what impended. Thus it was that we parted
wthut explanation: she waving her hand and smiling fare
from the coach window; her evil genius writhig on the roof, as if
h had her in his clutche and triumphed.
I could nt get over this farewel glimps of them for a log
time. Whe Agnes wrote to tell me of hr safe arrival, I was as
mrable as when I saw her gog away. Whenever I fel ito a
thughtful state, this subjet was sure to pret itself, and all my
unasss was sure to be redoubled. Hardly a night passed
wthut my dreaming of it. It became a part of my life, and as
inseparabl fro my life as my own head.
I had ampl leisure to refi upo my unasiness: for
Steerforth was at Oxford, as he wrote to me, and wen I was not at
the Comm, I was very muc ale. I beeve I had at th ti
some lurking distrust of Sterforth I wrote to him most
affectinately i reply to hi, but I think I was glad, upon the
w, that he could not come to London just th. I suspect th
truth to be, that th influence of Agnes was upo me, undisturbed
by th sight of hm; and that it was th more powrful with me,
becaus she had so large a share in my thughts and interest.
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In th meantime, days and weks slipped away. I was articled to
Spenlow and Jorkis. I had ninety pounds a year (exclusve of my
huse-ret and sundry coateral matters) fro my aunt. My
rooms were egaged for twelve mths certai: and though I sti
found them dreary of an eveg, and the evenigs log, I could
settl dow into a state of equabl low spirits, and resign myself to
ffee; whic I se, on lookig back, to have take by the gal
at about this period of my exiten At about this tim, too, I
made thre discoveri: first, that Mrs. Crupp was a martyr to a
curius disorder called ‘th spazzums’, which was geraly
accompanied with inflamati of th nose, and required to be
nstantly treated with peppermint; secondly, that somethg
peular in the teperature of my pantry, made the brandy-bottl
burst; thirdly, that I was alone i the world, and muc given to
rerd that circumstan in fragments of English versificati
On th day wh I was artid, no festivity tok place, beyod
my having sandwiche and sherry into th office for th clerks,
and going alone to the theatre at night. I went to s The Stranger,
as a Doctors’ Cos sort of play, and was so dreadfully cut up,
that I hardly knew mysf in my own glas when I got home. Mr.
Spenlow remarked, on this occasi, wh we conluded our
bus, that he should have be happy to have seen me at hi
house at Norwood to cebrate our beg connected, but for
his domestic arrangets beg in some disorder, o account of
th expected return of his daughter fro finishing her education
at Paris But, he itimated that when se cam home he should
hope to have the pleasure of entertaig me I knew that he was a
wdowr
with
on
daughter,
and
expred
my
acknledgets
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Mr. Spenlow was as good as his word. In a week or two, he
referred to this engagement, and said, that if I would do hm th
favour to come dow next Saturday, and stay till Monday, he
would do him th
uld be extrey happy. Of course I said I
favour; and he was to drive me dow in his phaeton, and to bring
me back.
Wh the day arrived, my very carpet-bag was an objet of
venration to the stipediary crks, to whom the house at
Norwood was a sacred mystery. One of them iformed me that he
had heard that Mr. Spenlow ate entirely off plate and china; and
another hinted at champagne beg cotantly on draught, after
the usual custom of table-beer. The old clerk with the wig, whose
name was Mr. Tiffey, had bee dow o bus several times i
th course of his carer, and had on each oasion penetrated to
th breakfast-parlur. He described it as an apartmt of th most
sumptuous nature, and said that he had drunk bron East India
sherry thre, of a quality so precious as to make a man wk. We
had an adjournd cause in the Constory that day—about
excounating a baker who had be objectig in a vestry to a
paving-rate—and as th evidence was just twice th length of
Robinson Crus, accordig to a calulation I made, it was rathr
late in the day before we find. However, we got hi
xcommunicated for six weks, and senteced in no end of costs;
and then the baker’s proctor, and the judge, and the advocates o
both side (who were al narly related), went out of town together,
and Mr. Spenlow and I drove away in th phaeton.
Th phaeton was a very handsome affair; th hrses arched
their neks and lfted up their legs as if they knew they beged
to Doctors’ Cmmons. Thre was a god deal of competition in th
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Cmmon o all poits of display, and it turnd out some very
choice equipages th; thugh I always have codered, and
always sal coder, that in my tim the great artic of
competition thre was starch: which I think was worn among th
proctors to as great an extent as it is in the nature of man to bear.
We were very plasant, going down, and Mr. Spew gave m
some hints in reference to my profesion He said it was th
geteelest professon i the wrld, and must on no acunt be
nfounded wth th profession of a solicitor: beg quite anthr
sort of thing, infinitely more exclusive, les mechanical, and more
profitable. We tok thgs much more easily in th Cos than
they could be take anywre else, he observed, and that set us, as
a privileged cass, apart. He said it was impossibl to conal th
disagreabl fact, that we were chiefly emplyed by solicitors; but
he gave me to understand that they were an iferior race of m,
universally looked dow upo by al protors of any pretesions.
I asked Mr. Spenl what he codered the bet sort of
professional bus? He replied, that a god case of a disputed
wil, where there was a neat little estate of thirty or forty thousand
pounds, was, perhaps, th best of all. In such a case, he said, not
only wre thre very pretty pickings, in th way of arguments at
every stage of the proceedigs, and mountai upo muntai of
evide on interrogatory and counter-interrogatory (to say
nthing of an appeal lyig, first to the Degates, and then to the
Lords), but, the cots beg pretty sure to co out of the estate at
last, both sides went at it in a lively and spirited manr, and
expense was no cosideration. Th, he launched into a geral
eulogium on the Com. What was to be partiularly admred
(h said) in th Co, was its compactns. It was th most
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conveiently organized place in th world. It was th coplete
idea of snugness. It lay i a nuts For example: You brought a
divorc case, or a restitution case, into th Consistory. Very god.
You tried it in th Cosistory. You made a quiet littl round game
of it, among a family group, and you played it out at leisure
Suppose you were not satisfied with th Cnsistory, wat did you
do then? Why, you wet into the Arc. What was the Arc?
The sam curt, in the sam room, with the sam bar, and the
same practitirs, but anthr judge, for thre th Consistory
judge could plead any court-day as an advocate. Wel, you played
your round gam out agai Sti you were nt satisfid. Very good.
What did you do then? Why, you went to the Degates Who were
the Degates? Why, the Ecastial Degates were the
advocates without any bus, who had looked on at the round
gam when it was playig in both courts, and had s the cards
uffled, and cut, and played, and had talked to al the players
about it, and now cam fresh, as judge, to settle the matter to the
satisfaction of everybody! Disontented peopl might talk of
corruption in th Common, cl in th Commons, and th
cessity of reforming th Commons, said Mr. Spelow solemnly,
in conclusion; but wh th pri of wat per bushe had be
ghest, the C had be bust; and a man might lay his
hand upon hi heart, and say this to the whole world,—‘Touch the
Cmmon, and dow comes th country!’
I lited to all this with attentin; and though, I must say, I had
my doubts whether the country was quite as muc obliged to the
Cmmon as Mr. Spenlow made out, I respectfuly deferred to hi
pinion. That about th price of what per bushe, I modestly felt
was too muc for my strength, and quite settled the question. I
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have nver, to this hour, got the better of that bus of wheat. It
has reappeared to annihilate me, al through my life, in conxion
th all kinds of subjets I don’t kn now, exactly, what it has to
do with m, or what right it has to crush me, on an infinte variety
of occas; but whenever I see my old frid the busel brought
i by the head and shoulders (as he always is, I observe), I give up
a subjet for lost.
This is a digresion. I was not the man to touch the Co,
and brig dow th country. I submissivey expred, by my
silence, my acquiescence in all I had heard fro my superir in
years and knledge; and we talked about “Th Stranger” and th
Drama, and th pairs of horses, until we came to Mr. Spenlow’s
gate.
There was a lovely garde to Mr. Spew’s house; and though
that was nt the bet tim of the year for seg a garde, it was so
beautifully kept, that I was quite enanted. There was a
carmg law, there were clusters of trees, and there wre
perspective walks that I could just distingui in th dark, arched
over with trellis-wrk, on which shrubs and flrs gre in th
growing sason. ‘Here Mis Spew walks by herself,’ I thought.
‘Dear me!’
We went ito the house, whic was chrfully lighted up, and
into a hal whre thre were all sorts of hats, caps, great-coats,
plaids, glve, wips, and walking-sticks. ‘Where is Miss Dora?’
said Mr. Spew to the servant. ‘Dora!’ I thought. ‘What a
beautiful name!’
We turned into a room nar at hand (I think it was the idetical
breakfast-ro, made memorable by th bron East Indian
sherry), and I hard a voice say, ‘Mr. Copperfield, my daughter
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Dora, and my daughter Dora’s confidential friend!’ It was, no
doubt, Mr. Spenlow’s voice, but I didn’t know it, and I didn’t care
it was. Al was over in a moment. I had fulfilled my destiny.
I was a captive and a slave I loved Dora Spelow to distraction!
She was more than human to me. She was a Fairy, a Sylph, I
do’t know wat se was—anythig that n one ever saw, and
everythig that everybody ever wanted. I was sald up i an
abyss of love in an instant. Thre was no pausing on th brik; no
lookig down, or lookig back; I was gon, headlg, before I had
s to say a word to her.
‘I,’ obsrved a we-remembered vo, when I had bod and
murmured sothg, ‘have seen Mr. Copperfield before.’
Th speaker was not Dora. No; th confidential friend, Miss
Murdstone!
I do’t think I was muc astond. To the bet of my
judget, no capacity of astonishment was left in me. Thre was
thing worth metig in the material world, but Dora
Spew, to be astonid about. I said, ‘How do you do, Mis
Murdstone? I hope you are w’ She anered, ‘Very w’ I said,
‘How i Mr. Murdstone?’ Sh repld, ‘My brother is robust, I am
oblged to you.’
Mr. Spenlow, w, I suppose, had be surprid to see us
regnize each othr, th put in his word.
‘I am glad to find,’ he said, ‘Copperfield, that you and Mi
Murdstone are already acquaited.’
‘Mr. Cpperfield and myself,’ said Miss Murdsto, with severe
mposure, ‘are conxions. We were once slightly acquainted. It
was in his childish days. Circumstances have separated us sinc I
should nt have known him’
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I repld that I should have known her, anywhere. Wh was
true enough.
‘Miss Murdsto has had th godness,’ said Mr. Spelow to
me, ‘to accept th office—if I may so desribe it—of my daughter
Dora’s confidential friend. My daughter Dora having, unappily,
n mther, Mis Murdstone is obliging enough to be her
companion and protetor.’
A passing thught occurred to me that Miss Murdsto, like th
pocket instrument called a life-prerver, was not so much
degnd for purposes of protection as of asault. But as I had
n but pasg thoughts for any subjet save Dora, I glancd at
hr, directly afterwards, and was thking that I saw, in her
prettily pettish manr, that she was not very much inclind to be
particularly confidential to her companion and protetor, wh a
bel rang, which Mr. Spenlow said was th first dinner-bell, and so
carrid me off to dress.
The idea of dreg one’s sef, or dog anything in the way of
acti, in that state of love, was a littl to ridiculous. I could oly
sit dow before my fire, biting th key of my carpet-bag, and thk
of th captivating, girlish, bright-eyed lovely Dora. What a form
she had, what a face she had, what a gracful, variable, echanting
manner!
Th bell rang again so soo that I made a mere scramble of my
dresing, instead of th careful operation I could have wished
under th circumstances, and went dowstairs. Thre was some
cpany. Dora was talkig to an old gentlan with a grey head.
Grey as he was—and a great-grandfather into the bargai, for he
said so—I was madly jealus of him.
What a state of mind I was in! I was jealus of everybody. I
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culdn’t bear the idea of anybody knowing Mr. Spew better
than I did. It was torturing to me to hear them talk of occurrence
in which I had had no share Whe a most amiabl pers, wth a
hghly polished bald head, asked me across th dinner tabl, if that
wre th first occasion of my seeng th grounds, I could have
do anything to him that was savage and revengeful.
I do’t reber who was there, except Dora. I have not th
ast idea what we had for dinner, bede Dora. My impresio is,
that I dined off Dora, etirely, and sent away half-a-doze plate
untouched. I sat next to her. I talked to her. Sh had the mt
deghtful lttle voic, the gayest lttle laugh, the plasantet and
most fascinating littl ways, that ever led a lost youth into hpe
avery. Sh was rather diutive altogether. So muc the more
precious, I thught.
Whe she wnt out of th ro with Miss Murdsto (n othr
ladi were of the party), I fell into a reverie, only diturbed by the
cruel appre that Mi Murdsto would disparage me to
her. The amabl creature with the pod head told me a log
story, whic I think was about gardeg. I think I heard hi say,
‘my gardener’, several ti I seed to pay the deepest atteti
to him, but I was wanderig in a garde of Ede al the whil, with
Dora.
My appres of beg disparaged to th object of my
egrossing affection were revived wh we went into th drawigro, by th grim and distant aspect of Miss Murdsto But I was
reeved of them in an unexpeted maner.
‘David Copperfield,’ said Mi Murdstone, bekonig me asde
to a wido. ‘A word.’
I confronted Miss Murdsto al
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‘David Copperfield,’ said Mi Murdstone, ‘I need nt earge
upon famiy circumtance They are nt a tempting subjet.’
‘Far fro it, ma’am,’ I returned.
‘Far fro it,’ assented Miss Murdsto ‘I do not wish to revive
the mry of past differenc, or of past outrages I have
received outrage fro a pers—a feale I am sorry to say, for
th credit of my sex—w is not to be mentioned withut scorn
and digust; and therefore I would rather not meti her.’
I felt very firy on my aunt’s account; but I said it wuld
certainly be better, if Miss Murdsto plased, nt to mention hr.
I could not hear her disrespectfuly mentioned, I added, withut
expressing my opiion in a decided to
Miss Murdsto shut her eye, and disdainfully inclind her
head; then, sowly opeg her eyes, resumd:
‘David Cpperfied, I sal nt attempt to diguis the fact, that
I formed an unfavourabl opi of you in your chdhood. It may
have be a mtake one, or you may have ceasd to justify it.
That i not in question betwee us no I beg to a famiy
remarkabl, I believe, for so firmn; and I am nt the
creature of circumstance or change. I may have my opiion of you.
You may have your opi of me’
I inced my head, in my turn
‘But it is not necesary,’ said Miss Murdsto, ‘that th
pinions should come into colision here. Under existig
circumstance, it is as we on all accounts that thy should not. As
the can of lfe have brought us together agai, and may brig
us together on other occas, I would say, lt us meet here as
distant acquaintances. Family circumtan are a sufficient
reason for our only meeting o that foting, and it is quite
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unnary that either of us should make the other the subject of
remark. Do you approve of this?’
‘Miss Murdsto,’ I returnd, ‘I thk you and Mr. Murdsto
usd me very cruey, and treated my mothr wth great
unkindne I shall alays thk so, as long as I live But I quite
agree in what you propose.’
Miss Murdsto shut her eye again, and bent hr had. Th,
just toucng th back of my hand with th tips of her cold, stiff
fingers, s walked away, arrangig the little fetters on her wrists
and round her neck; which seed to be th same set, i exactly
the sam state, as when I had se her last. The reded m, in
reference to Miss Murdsto’s nature, of th fetters over a jail
door; suggestig on the outside, to al beholders, what was to be
xpected within.
A I know of the ret of the evenig is, that I heard the empres
of my heart sig enanted balads i the Fre language,
genrally to the effect that, whatever was the matter, we ought
always to dance, Ta ra la, Ta ra la! accpanying hersef o a
glrified instrument, reblng a guitar. That I was lost i
blssful delirium That I refused refret. That my soul
reiled fro pun particularly. That wh Miss Murdsto tok
hr into custody and led her away, she smiled and gave me hr
deus hand. That I caught a view of mysf i a mirror, lookig
perfetly imbecile and idiotic. That I retired to bed i a most
maudlin state of mind, and got up in a crisis of feble infatuation.
It was a fin mrnig, and early, and I thought I would go and
take a stroll down one of those wire-arched walks, and idulge my
passion by dweling on her image On my way through th hall, I
euntered her littl dog, wh was called Jip—short for Gipsy. I
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approaced him tenderly, for I loved even hi; but he showed hi
hole set of teeth, got under a cair expresy to sarl, and
wuldn’t hear of th least familiarity.
The garde was cool and sotary. I walked about, wonderig
wat my feings of happiness would be, if I could ever beme
egaged to this dear wonder. As to marriage, and fortune, and all
that, I believe I was alt as intly undegnig then, as
when I loved lttle Em’ly. To be allwed to call her ‘Dora’, to write
to her, to dote upon and worship her, to have reas to think that
w she was with othr people she was yet midful of me,
sed to me th sumit of human ambiti—I am sure it was
the sumt of mi There is n doubt watever that I was a
lackadaial young spooney; but there was a purity of heart in all
this, that prevets my having quite a conteptuous rellection of
it, let me laugh as I may.
I had not bee walkig long, wh I turnd a cornr, and met
hr. I tingle again fro head to fot as my rellection turns that
cornr, and my pen shake in my hand.
‘You—are—out early, Miss Spen,’ said I.
‘It’s so stupid at ho,’ she replied, ‘and Miss Murdsto i so
absurd! She talks such nonsen about its beg necesary for th
day to be aired, before I come out. Aired!’ (Sh laughd, here, in
th most melodius manner.) ‘On a Sunday morng, w I don’t
must
practise, I must do somethg. So I tod papa last night I
come out. Besides, it’s th brightet time of th wh day. Don’t
you think so?’
I hazarded a bod flght, and said (not without stamring) that
it was very bright to me then, thugh it had been very dark to me a
minute before
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‘Do you mean a compliment?’ said Dora, ‘or that th weathr
has really changed?’
I stamred worse than before, in replying that I mant n
plimt, but the plai truth; though I was not aware of any
change having taken place in th weathr. It was i th state of my
own feeligs, I added basfully: to clenc the explanati
I never saw such curl—h could I, for thre never wre such
curls!—as those se shook out to hide her blushes As to the straw
at and blue ribbons which was on th top of th curl, if I could
only have hung it up i my room i Buckigham Street, what a
priceless possession it would have be!
‘You have just come ho fro Paris,’ said I.
‘Yes,’ said se. ‘Have you ever been there?’
‘No’
‘Oh! I hope you’l go soon! You would lke it so muc!’
Trac of deep-sated anguih appeared in my cunteane.
That she should hope I would go, that she should thk it possible
I could go, was insupportable. I depreciated Paris; I depreated
France. I said I wouldn’t leave England, under existing
circumstance, for any earthy consideration. Nothing should
induce me. In short, she was shaking th curls again, w th
ttle dog cam rung alg the walk to our relf.
He was mortally jealus of me, and persisted i barkig at me.
She took him up in her arm—oh my goodn!—and caressed
hm, but he persisted upo barking still. He wouldn’t let me touc
m, wh I tried; and th she beat him. It icreased my
sufferings greatly to se the pats sh gave him for punist on
th bridge of his blunt nose, while he winked his eye, and licked
hr hand, and still groled within himself like a littl double-bass.
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At legth he was quiet—wel he might be with her dipld ch
upo his head!—and we walked away to look at a greuse
‘You are not very intiate with Miss Murdsto, are you?’ said
Dora.— ‘My pet.’
(The two last words were to the dog. Oh, if they had only be
to me!)
‘No,’ I replied. ‘Not at al so.’
‘She is a tiresome creature,’ said Dora, poutig. ‘I can’t thk
wat papa can have be about, wh he cho such a vexatius
thing to be my companion. Who wants a protetor? I am sure I
do’t want a protector. Jip can protect m a great deal better than
Miss Murdsto,—can’t you, Jip, dear?’
He ony wiked lazily, when she kied his bal of a head.
‘Papa calls her my confidential friend, but I am sure she is no
such thing—is she, Jip? We are not going to confide i any such
cross people, Jip and I. We mean to besto our confidece wre
we like, and to find out our own friends, itead of having them
found out for us—don’t we, Jip?’
jip made a cofortabl n, in ansr, a little like a tea-kettle
when it sigs A for me, every word was a new heap of fetters,
riveted above the last.
‘It is very hard, becaus we have not a kind Mama, that we are
to have, instead, a sulky, gly od thing like Miss Murdsto,
always fowing us about—i’t it, Jip? Never mnd, Jip. We won’t
be confidential, and we’ll make oursves as happy as we can in
spite of hr, and we’ll teas her, and not plase her—wn’t we,
Jip?’
If it had lasted any longer, I think I must have go dow o my
kn on the grave, with the probabity before m of grazig
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them, and of beg presently ejected from the premi bede
But, by good fortune the greehouse was not far off, and thes
words brought us to it.
It contained quite a sho of beautiful geranium We loitered
along i front of them, and Dora often stopped to admre this o
or that one, and I stopped to admre the sam one, and Dora,
laughng, held th dog up childishly, to smell th flrs; and if w
I was The sct of a
re not all thre in Fairyland, certaiy
geranium leaf, at this day, strikes me with a half comal half
serius wonder as to what change has come over me in a moment;
and then I se a straw hat and blue ribbons, and a quantity of
curls, and a littl black dog being held up, i tw slender arms,
against a bank of blssom and bright leave
Miss Murdsto had be looking for us. She found us hre;
and prested her uncgenial cheek, the little wrikl in it fild
wth hair powder, to Dora to be kissed. Th she tok Dora’s arm
in hrs, and marcd us into breakfast as if it were a soldier’s
funeral.
Ho many cups of tea I drank, becaus Dora made it, I don’t
know. But, I perfectly rember that I sat sg tea until my
whole nervous system, if I had had any in those days, must have
go by th board. By and by we wet to churc Mi Murdsto
was betwee Dora and m in the pew; but I heard her sg, and
th congregati vanished. A serm was delivered—about Dora,
of course—and I am afraid that is all I know of th service.
We had a quiet day. No company, a walk, a family dinner of
four, and an evenig of lookig over books and pitures; Mis
Murdstone with a homiy before her, and her eye upon us, keepig
guard vigilantly. Ah! littl did Mr. Spenlow imagi, wh he sat
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opposite to me after dinnr that day, with his pocket-handkerchief
over hi head, how fervently I was embracg him, in my fany, as
so-i-law! Little did he think, when I took leave of hi at
nght, that he had just given hi full cot to my beg egaged
to Dora, and that I was invoking blsings on his head!
We departed early in the morng, for w had a Salvage cas
g on in the Admralty Court, requirig a rather acurate
knowledge of th wh science of navigati, in which (as we
uldn’t be expected to kn much about th matters in th
mmon) th judge had entreated tw old Trinity Masters, for
charity’s sake, to come and help him out. Dora was at th
breakfast-tabl to make th tea again, hover; and I had th
lanholy plasure of takig off my hat to her in the phaeton, as
e stood on the door-step with Jip in her arm
What th Admiralty was to me that day; what nonsen I made
of our case i my mind, as I listed to it; ho I saw ‘DORA’
engraved upon the blade of the siver oar wh they lay upo th
table, as the emblem of that high juriditi; and how I felt when
Mr. Spenlow went home without m (I had had an inan hope
that he might take me back again), as if I wre a marir myself,
and th ship to which I belonged had said away and left me o a
desert island; I shall make no fruitlss effort to describe If that
sleepy old court could rous itself, and pret in any vibl form
th daydreams I have had in it about Dora, it would reveal my
truth.
I don’t mean th dreams that I dreamed on that day al, but
day after day, from week to week, and term to term. I went there,
nt to attend to what was going on, but to think about Dora. If ever
I betowed a thought upon the cas, as they dragged their sow
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length before me, it was only to wonder, in th matrimonial case
(remberig Dora), how it was that married pepl culd ever be
thrwise than happy; and, in th Prerogative cases, to consider, if
the moy in questio had be lft to me, what were the foremt
steps I should idiatey have take in regard to Dora. Within
th first wk of my passion, I bought four sumptuous
aistcoats—not for myself; I had no pride in th; for Dora—and
tok to wearing straw-coloured kid glve in th strets, and laid
the foundations of al the corns I have ever had. If the boots I wore
at that perid could only be producd and compared with th
atural size of my feet, they would show what the state of my heart
was, in a most affecting manner.
And yet, wretched cripple as I made myself by this act of
homage to Dora, I walked mi upon mles daiy in the hope of
seeing her. Not only was I soon as well known on the Norwood
Road as th postmen on that beat, but I pervaded London
ke. I walked about the streets were the bet shops for ladi
re, I haunted th Bazaar like an unquiet spirit, I fagged through
th Park again and again, long after I was quite knocked up.
Sometimes, at long intervals and on rare ocasions, I saw her.
Perhaps I saw her glve waved in a carriage window; perhaps I
mt her, walked with her and Mis Murdstone a little way, and
spoke to her. In th latter case I was alays very miserabl
afterwards, to think that I had said nothing to the purpose; or that
se had n idea of the extent of my devotion, or that she cared
nthing about m I was always lookig out, as may be supposed,
for another invitation to Mr. Spenlow’s house I was always beg
diappoted, for I got no
Mrs. Crupp must have be a woan of penetration; for wh
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this attact was but a few weeks old, and I had nt had the
courage to write more explicitly eve to Agnes, than that I had
been to Mr. Spenlow’s house, ‘whose famy,’ I added, ‘consts of
one daughter’;—I say Mrs. Crupp must have been a wan of
petrati, for, even i that early stage, she found it out. Sh
am up to me one evenig, when I was very lo, to ask (she beg
then afflited with the dirder I have metid) if I could oblge
her with a lttle tincture of cardamums mixed with rhubarb, and
flavoured with seven drops of the esse of coves, whic was the
best remedy for her complaint;—or, if I had not such a thing by
m, with a lttle brandy, whic was the nxt bet. It was nt, sh
remarked, so palatabl to her, but it was the next bet. As I had
never eve hard of th first remedy, and always had th second
in th clt, I gave Mrs. Crupp a glass of th second, which (that I
might have no suspicion of its beg devoted to any improper us)
she began to take in my prece.
‘Cheer up, sir,’ said Mrs. Crupp. ‘I can’t abear to see you so, sr:
I’m a mothr myself.’
myself, but
I did not quite percve th application of this fact to
I smiled on Mrs. Crupp, as begny as was in my powr.
‘Co, sir,’ said Mrs. Crupp. ‘Excus me. I know what it is, sir.
There’s a lady in the cas.’
‘Mrs. Crupp?’ I returned, reddeg.
‘Oh, bls you! Kep a god heart, sir!’ said Mrs. Crupp,
nddig euragemet. ‘Never say die, sir! If Sh do’t s
be
upo you, thre’s a many as wi You are a young gentleman to
smild on, Mr. Copperfull, and you must learn your walue, sir.’
Mrs. Crupp alays caled m Mr. Copperfull: firstly, no doubt,
becaus it was not my name; and secondly, I am ind to thk,
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in some indistinct association with a washig-day.
‘What makes you suppose thre is any young lady in th case,
Mrs. Crupp?’ said I.
‘Mr. Cpperfull,’ said Mrs. Crupp, with a great deal of feg,
‘I’m a mother myself.’
For so tim Mrs. Crupp culd only lay her hand upo her
nanke bo, and fortify hersef against returnig pai with
sips of her medicine At length she spoke again.
‘When the pret set were took for you by your dear aunt, Mr.
Cpperfull,’ said Mrs. Crupp, ‘my remark were, I had now found
summun I could care for. “Thank Ev’in!” were the expression, “I
have now found summun I can care for!”—You don’t eat enugh,
sir, nor yet drink.’
‘Is that what you found your supposition on, Mrs. Crupp?’ said
I.
‘Sir,’ said Mrs. Crupp, in a to approachig to severity, ‘I’ve
laundressed othr young gentlemen besides yourself. A young
gentlan may be over-careful of hielf, or he may be undercareful of himelf. He may brush his hair too regular, or too unregular. He may wear his boots muc too large for him, or muc
too smal That is accrdig as the young gentlan has hi
origial character formed. But let him go to whic extrem he
may, sir, there’s a young lady in both of ’em.’
Mrs. Crupp shook her head in suc a determied manner, that
I had not an inch of vantage-ground left.
‘It was but th gentleman wich died hre before yourself,’ said
Mrs. Crupp, ‘that fell in love—wth a barmaid—and had his
aistcoats tok in directly, thugh much sweled by driking.’
‘Mrs. Crupp,’ said I, ‘I must beg you nt to coct the young
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lady in my cas with a barmaid, or anythg of that sort, if you
please.’
‘Mr. Cpperfull,’ returned Mrs. Crupp, ‘I’m a mther mysf,
and not likely. I ask your pardo, sir, if I intrude I should never
w to intrude where I were not wee. But you are a young
gentleman, Mr. Copperfull, and my adwice to you is, to cher up,
sr, to keep a good heart, and to know your own walue. If you was
to take to sthing, sr,’ said Mrs. Crupp, ‘if you was to take to
skittle, now, whic is healthy, you might find it divert your md,
and do you good.’
With thes words, Mrs. Crupp, affectig to be very careful of the
brandy—which was all go—thanked me with a majestic curtsey,
and retired. As her figure diappeared ito the gloom of the entry,
this counl certaiy preted itself to my mind in th light of a
slight liberty on Mrs. Crupp’s part; but, at th same time, I was
ntet to receive it, in anthr point of vi, as a wrd to th
ise, and a warning in future to keep my secret better.
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Chapter 27
TOMMY TRADDLES
I
t may have be in conseque of Mrs. Crupp’s advice, and,
perhaps, for n better reason than beause there was a
certain similarity in th sound of th word skittl and
Traddl, that it cam ito my head, nxt day, to go and look after
Traddles. Th time h had mentioned was more than out, and he
lived in a littl stret near th Veteriary College at Camden
To, which was pricipally teanted, as on of our clrks w
lived in that direction informd me, by gentlemen studets, w
bought live donkeys, and made experiments on th quadrupeds
in thr private apartmts. Having obtaid fro this clerk a
directi to the acade grove in question, I set out, the sam
aftern, to visit my old sc
hoolfellow.
I found that th stret was not as desirabl a on as I could have
wisd it to be, for the sake of Traddl The inhabitants appeared
to have a propety to throw any little trifl they were not in
ant of, into the road: which not ony made it rank and sloppy, but
untidy too, on accunt of the cabbage-lave The refuse was not
wlly vegetable eithr, for I myself saw a sho, a doubled-up
saucpan, a black bonnet, and an umbrea, in varius stage of
decomposition, as I was lookig out for th number I wanted.
The geral air of the place reded m forcbly of the days
when I lived with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber. An inderibable
aracter of faded gentity that attacd to the house I sought,
and made it unke all th othr houses in th stret—thugh thy
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wre all buit on on monotonous pattern, and looked like th
arly copies of a blundering boy wh was learning to make huses,
and had nt yet got out of his cramped brik-and-mrtar
pothooks—reminded m stil more of Mr. and Mrs. Miawber.
Happeg to arrive at the door as it was oped to the afternoon
mlkman, I was remded of Mr. and Mrs. Micawber more forcibly
yet.
‘No,’ said the mikman to a very youthful servant girl. ‘Has
that there little bi of m be heerd on?’
‘Oh, master says he’ll atted to it immediate,’ was the reply.
‘Beause,’ said th mikman, going on as if he had received no
answer, and speaking, as I judged fro his to, rathr for th
dification of somebody wthin th house, than of th youthful
rvant—an impre which was strengthd by his manr of
glarig down the pasage—‘beaus that there little bill has be
running so long, that I begin to believe it’s run away altogethr,
and never won’t be heerd of. Now, I’m nt a going to stand it, you
know!’ said th milkman, still throng his voice into th house,
and glarig down the pasage
to his dealig in the mid artic of mlk, by the by, there
ver was a greater anomaly. His deportment would have be
firce in a butcr or a brandy-mrchant.
The voic of the youthful servant beam fait, but s sd
to m, from the action of her lips, agai to murmur that it would
be attended to imdiate
‘I tell you what,’ said th milkman, looking hard at her for th
first time, and takig her by the chi, ‘are you fond of mik?’
‘Yes, I likes it,’ she replied. ‘God,’ said the milkman ‘Th you
wn’t have none tomorro D’ye hear? Not a fragment of mik you
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won’t have tomorrow.’
I thought se seemed, upon the whole, reeved by the prospet
of having any today. The mikman, after shakig his head at her
darkly, relasd her ch, and with anything rather than good-wil
oped his can, and depoted the usual quantity in the famy jug.
This do, he went away, muttering, and uttered the cry of his
trade next door, in a vidictive shrik.
‘Does Mr. Traddles lve here?’ I then inquired.
A mysterious voice fro th end of th passage replied ‘Ye.’
Upon which the youthful servant replied ‘Yes.’
‘Is he at hoe?’ said I.
Again th mysterious voice replied in th affirmative, and again
th servant ecd it. Upo this, I walked in, and in pursuance of
th servant’s directions walked upstairs; concious, as I passed th
back parlour-door, that I was surveyed by a mysterius eye,
probably belonging to th mysterious voice.
Wh I got to the top of the stairs—the house was only a story
high above the ground floor—Traddl was on the landig to met
me. He was delighted to see me, and gave me we, with great
heartin, to hi little room. It was in the front of the house, and
extrey neat, thugh sparely furnished. It was his only ro, I
saw; for thre was a sofa-bedstead in it, and his blacking-brushe
and blackig were amg his books—on the top shelf, bed a
dictionary. His tabl was covered with papers, and h was hard at
wrk in an old coat. I looked at nothing, that I know of, but I saw
verythng, eve to th prospect of a church upo his chia
inkstand, as I sat dow—and this, to, was a faculty confirmed in
me i th old Micawber times. Varius ingeus arrangets he
ad made, for th disguise of his chet of drawers, and th
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accomdation of his bots, his shavig-glass, and so forth,
particularly impressed thlve upo me, as evideces of th
same Traddl w usd to make models of elphants’ dens in
riting-paper to put flies in; and to comfort himself under ill
usage, with the merabl works of art I have so often mtid.
In a cornr of th ro was something neatly covered up with a
large white cloth I could not make out what that was.
‘Traddles,’ said I, shaking hands with him again, after I had sat
dow, ‘I am delghted to see you.’
‘I am delighted to se you, Copperfield,’ he returned. ‘I am very
glad ided to s you. It was beause I was thoroughly glad to se
you when we met in Ely Place, and was sure you were thoroughly
glad to se me, that I gave you this address instead of my addre
at chambers’
‘Oh! You have chambers?’ said I.
‘Why, I have th fourth of a ro and a pasage, and th fourth
of a cerk,’ returned Traddl. ‘Three others and mysf unte to
have a st of chambers—to look bus-like—and we quarter the
clerk to Half-a-cro a wek he costs me.’
His old simple character and god teper, and smething of h
old unlucky fortune al, I thought, smd at m in the sm with
wich he made this explanation.
‘It’s not beause I have the least pride, Copperfield, you
understand,’ said Traddl, ‘that I do’t usually give my addre
here. It’s only on acunt of those who co to m, who mght nt
lke to co here. For mysf, I am fighting my way on i the
wrld against difficulties, and it would be ridiculus if I made a
pretenc of dog anythig els.’
‘You are readig for the bar, Mr. Waterbrook informed m?’
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said I.
‘Why, yes,’ said Traddl, rubbing his hands slowly over o
another. ‘I am readig for the bar. The fact i, I have just begun to
keep my terms, after rather a lg delay. It’s some time se I was
articd, but the paymet of that hundred pounds was a great pull
great pull!’ said Traddl, with a wince, as if he had had a tooth
out.
‘Do you know what I can’t help thinkig of, Traddl, as I st
here lookig at you?’ I asked him
‘No,’ said he
‘That sky-blue suit you used to wear.’
‘Lord, to be sure!’ cried Traddl, laughng. ‘Tight in th arms
and legs, you know? Dear me! We! Those were happy tim,
weren’t they?’
‘I think our schoolmaster might have made them happir,
without dog any harm to any of us, I acknowledge,’ I returned.
‘Perhaps h might,’ said Traddles. ‘But dear me, thre was a
good deal of fun going on Do you rember the nights in the
bedro? Wh we usd to have th suppers? And wh you
used to te the stori? Ha, ha, ha! And do you reber when I
got cand for crying about Mr. Mel? Old Creakl! I should like to
see him agai, too!’
‘He was a brute to you, Traddl,’ said I, idignantly; for hi
god humour made me fe as if I had se hm beate but
yesterday.
‘Do you think s?’ returned Traddl ‘Realy? Perhaps he was
rather. But it’s al over, a log whe. Old Creakle!’
‘You were brought up by an uncle, then?’ said I.
‘Of course I was!’ said Traddl ‘Th on I was alays gog to
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write to. Ad alays didn’t, eh! Ha, ha, ha! Yes, I had an un
then. He did soon after I left school.’
‘Indeed!’
‘Ye. He was a retired—wat do you cal it!—draper—clothmercant—and had made me hi heir. But he didn’t like me w
I grew up.’
‘Do you really mean that?’ said I. He was so composd, that I
fand he must have so other meang.
‘Oh dear, yes, Copperfield! I mean it,’ replied Traddl. ‘It was
an unfortunate thing, but he didn’t like me at all. He said I was’t
at all what he expected, and so he marrid his housekeeper.’
‘And what did you do?’ I asked.
‘I didn’t do anythg in particular,’ said Traddles. ‘I lved wth
them, waitig to be put out in the world, until his gout
unfortunatey fl to his stoach—and so he died, and so she
marrid a young man, and so I was’t provided for.’
‘Did you get nothing, Traddl, after all?’
‘Oh dear, yes!’ said Traddles. ‘I got fifty pounds. I had never
bee brought up to any profe, and at first I was at a loss what
to do for myself. Hover, I began, with th assistance of th son
f a professional man, wh had be to Salem Hous—Yawr,
wth his nose on on side. Do you rellect him?’
No. He had not been there with me; al the no were straight
in my day.
‘It do’t matter,’ said Traddl ‘I began, by man of hi
assistance, to copy law writings That didn’t answer very wll; and
th I began to state cases for th, and make abstracts, and that
sort of work. For I am a pldding kind of fellow, Cpperfield, and
had learnt th way of doig such things pithly. Well! That put it i
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my head to enter myself as a law studet; and that ran away wth
all that was left of th fifty pounds. Yawr reded me to
one or two other offic, however—Mr. Waterbrook’s for one—and
I got a good many jobs I was fortunate enough, too, to be
acquaited with a person i the publg way, who was getting
up an Encyclopaedia, and he set me to work; and, indeed’
(glancing at his tabl), ‘I am at wrk for hm at this minute. I am
not a bad compiler, Copperfield,’ said Traddles, prerving th
same air of cherful confidece in all he said, ‘but I have no
invention at all; not a particle. I suppose thre never was a young
man with les originality than I have.’
As Traddles seed to expect that I should assent to this as a
matter of course, I nodded; and he went on, with th same
sprightly patice—I can find no better expresion—as before
‘So, by lttle and little, and nt living high, I managed to srape
up th hundred pounds at last,’ said Traddles; ‘and thank Heave
that’s paid—thugh it was—thugh it certainly was,’ said
Traddl, wing agai as if he had had another tooth out, ‘a pul
I am living by th sort of work I have mentioned, still, and I hpe,
one of thes days, to get coted with s newspaper: whic
uld alt be the makig of my fortune. No, Copperfield, you
are s exactly what you used to be, with that agreeable fac, and
it’s so plasant to see you, that I sha’n’t coal anythng.
Therefore you must know that I am engaged.’
Engaged! Oh, Dora!
‘She is a curate’s daughter,’ said Traddl; ‘one of te, dow in
Devonshire. Yes!’ For h saw me glance, involuntariy, at th
prospect on th inkstand. ‘That’s th church! You come round
here to the left, out of th gate,’ tracg hi finger along the
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ikstand, ‘and exactly where I hold th pe, there stands th
house—facg, you understand, towards the church’
The deght with whic he entered into thes particulars, did
not fully pret itself to me until afterwards; for my selfish
thoughts were makig a ground-plan of Mr. Spenlow’s house and
garde at th same moment.
‘She is such a dear girl!’ said Traddl; ‘a littl older than me,
but the dearet girl! I told you I was going out of town? I have
been do there. I walked there, and I walked back, and I had th
t delightful tim! I dare say ours is lkey to be a rather log
egagemt, but our mtto i “Wait and hope!” We always say
that. “Wait and hpe,” w always say. And she wuld wait,
Cpperfield, ti she was sixty—any age you can mention—for me!’
Traddles ro fro hi chair, and, with a triumphant sile, put
hi hand upo the white cloth I had obsrved.
‘However,’ he said, ‘it’s nt that we haven’t made a beging
towards housekepig. No, n; we have begun. We must get on by
degree, but we have begun. Here,’ drawg the coth off with
great pride and care, ‘are tw pieces of furniture to commence
wth. This flr-pot and stand, she bought hersf. You put that
in a parlur wndow,’ said Traddles, falling a littl back fro it to
urvey it with the greater admratio, ‘wth a plant in it, and—and
there you are! This little round tabl with the marbl top (it’s two
fet ten in circumferece), I bought. You want to lay a bok dow,
you kn, or somebody comes to see you or your wife, and wants a
plac to stand a cup of tea upo, and—and thre you are again!’
said Traddl ‘It’s an admirabl piece of wrkmanship—firm as a
rock!’ I praisd them both, highly, and Traddl replaced the
cvering as carefully as he had remved it.
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‘It’s nt a great deal towards the furnig,’ said Traddl, ‘but
it’s somethg. Th tabl-cloth, and pillow-cases, and arti of
that kind, are what discourage me most, Cpperfield. So doe th
iromongery—candle-boxe, and gridiros, and that sort of
necesaries—becaus th things te, and mount up. Hover,
“wait
and hope!” And I asure you she’s the dearest girl!’
‘I am quite certai of it,’ said I.
‘In the meantime,’ said Traddles, comg back to his chair; ‘and
this is the end of my prosig about mysf, I get on as well as I can
I don’t make much, but I don’t sped much. In geral, I board
wth the peopl dotairs, who are very agreeable pepl indeed.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Micawber have se a good deal of life, and are
xcellent company.’
‘My dear Traddl!’ I quickly exclaimed. ‘What are you talking
about?’
Traddles looked at me, as if he wondered what I was talking
about.
‘Mr. and Mrs. Micawber!’ I repeated. ‘Why, I am itimately
acquaited with them!’
An opportun double knock at th door, which I kne w
fro od experice in Windsor Terrace, and wh nobody but
Mr. Miawber could ever have knocked at that door, reved any
doubt in my mind as to their beg my old frieds I begged
Traddles to ask his landlord to walk up. Traddl accordingly did
s, over the banter; and Mr. Miawber, nt a bit canged—hi
tights, his stick, his shirt-coar, and his eye-glass, all th same as
ever—came into the room with a geteel and youthful air.
‘I beg your pardo, Mr. Traddl,’ said Mr. Micawber, with the
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od ro i his voice, as he cheked himself in humming a soft tune
‘I was nt aware that there was any idividual, ali to this
tement, in your sanctum’
Mr. Micawber slightly bod to me, and puld up his shirtcoar.
‘How do you do, Mr. Micawber?’ said I.
in
‘Sir,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘you are exceedigly oblgig. I am
statu quo.’
‘And Mrs. Micawber?’ I pursued.
‘Sir,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘she is also, thank God, in statu quo’
‘And th childre, Mr. Micawber?’
‘Sir,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘I rejoice to reply that they are,
lke, in the enjoymt of salubrity.’
All this time, Mr. Miawber had not knn me in th least,
though he had stood fac to fac with m But now, sg me
e, he examed my features with more atteti, fell back,
cried, ‘Is it posble! Have I th pleasure of again beding
Copperfield!’ and shook me by both hands with the utmot
fervour.
‘Good Heave, Mr. Traddl!’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘to think that
I should find you acquainted with th friend of my youth, th
mpanion of earlier days! My dear!’ calg over th banisters to
Mrs. Micawber, whil Traddl looked (with reason) not a little
amazed at this description of me. ‘Here is a gentlan in Mr.
Traddl’s apartmet, whom he wis to have the plasure of
presentig to you, my love!’
Mr. Micawber imdiatey reappeared, and shook hands with
me again.
‘And ho is our god friend th Doctor, Cpperfield?’ said Mr.
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Miawber, ‘and al the circe at Canterbury?’
‘I have no but god accounts of them,’ said I.
‘I am most delghted to hear it,’ said Mr. Miawber. ‘It was at
Canterbury where we last mt. With the shadow, I may
figuratively say, of that religius edifi immortalized by Caucr,
wich was anciently th resort of Pilgri fro th remotest
cornrs of—in short,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘in th immediate
ghbourhood of the Cathedral.’
I replied that it was. Mr. Micawber contiued talking as volubly
as he culd; but nt, I thought, without showing, by so marks of
concern in his countean, that he was sesible of sounds in th
xt room, as of Mrs. Micawber wasg her hands, and hurriedly
opeg and sutting drawrs that were uneasy in their action.
‘You find us, Copperfid,’ said Mr. Miawber, with one eye on
Traddl, ‘at pret establihed, on what may be degnated as a
small and unassuming scal; but, you are aware that I have, i th
urse of my carer, surmunted difficulties, and conquered
obstac You are no stranger to the fact, that there have been
perids of my life, wh it has be requisite that I should paus,
until certain expected evets should turn up; wh it has be
cesary that I should fall back, before making what I trust I shal
not be accused of preumption in terming—a spring. Th pret
i one of those mtous stages in the life of man You find m,
fallen back, for a sprig; and I have every reason to beeve that a
vigorous leap will shortly be th result.’
I was expresing my satisfacti, wh Mrs. Micawber came in;
a little more slatternly than sh used to be, or so sh sd now,
to my unaccustod eye, but still with some preparation of
herself for copany, and with a pair of brown gloves on.
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‘My dear,’ said Mr. Micawber, leadig her toards me, ‘here is a
gentlan of the nam of Copperfied, who wis to renew hi
acquaintance with you.’
It would have be better, as it turned out, to have led gently up
to this announcement, for Mrs. Micawber, beg i a delate state
f health, was overcome by it, and was taken so unll, that Mr.
Micawber was obliged, in great trepidati, to run do to the
water-butt i the backyard, and draw a basful to lave her brow
wth. She presently revived, however, and was realy pleasd to
ee m We had half-an-hour’s talk, al together; and I asked her
about the twin, who, sh said, were ‘grown great creatures’; and
after Master and Mis Micawber, whom s deribed as ‘absute
giants’, but they were not produced on that occas
Mr. Micawber was very anxius that I should stay to dinner. I
should nt have be avers to do so, but that I imagid I
detected troubl, and calculati relative to the extent of the cod
mat, i Mrs. Miawber’s eye. I therefore pleaded another
egagement; and observing that Mrs. Micawber’s spirits were
immediatey lighted, I reisted all persuasion to forego it.
But I told Traddl, and Mr. and Mrs. Micawber, that before I
culd think of lavig, they must appot a day when they would
come and dine wth me. Th occupatis to which Traddles stod
pledged, redered it necesary to fix a somewat distant o; but
an appoitmt was made for th purpo, that suited us al, and
then I took my leave.
Mr. Micawber, under pretece of shoing me a nearer way
than that by which I had come, accompanied me to th cornr of
the street; beg anxious (he explaid to me) to say a few wrds
to an old friend, in confidence.
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‘My dear Cpperfield,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘I need hardly te
you that to have beath our roof, under existig crcumtan, a
md like that wh gleam—if I may be ald the expreson—
wich glam—in your friend Traddl, is an unspeakable
comfort. With a washerwman, wh exposes hard-bake for sale in
her parlour-window, dwellig next door, and a Bow-street officr
residing over th way, you may imagi that his society is a source
of consolation to myself and to Mrs. Micawber. I am at pret, my
dear Copperfield, engaged in th sale of corn upo commissi. It
is not an avoation of a remunerative description—i othr words,
it doe not pay—and some teporary embarrassments of a
peunary nature have been the coequene. I am, however,
delighted to add that I have now an immediate propect of
sthing turnig up (I am nt at liberty to say in what directi),
whic I trust wil enabl m to provide, permanetly, both for
mysf and for your fried Traddl, in whom I have an unaffected
interest. You may, perhaps, be prepared to hear that Mrs
Micawber i in a state of health which renders it not whlly
iprobabl that an addition may be ultimately made to those
pledge of affection which—in short, to th infantine group. Mrs
Miawber’s famy have been s good as to expres their
dissatisfacti at this state of things. I have merely to observe, that
I am not aware that it is any business of thrs, and that I repel
that exhibition of feeg with scrn, and with defian!’
Mr. Micawber then shook hands with m agai, and lft me
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Chapter 28
Mr. MICAWBER’S GAUNTLET
U
nti the day arrived on whic I was to etertain my
ney-found od friends, I lived pricipally on Dora and
coffe In my love-lrn condition, my appetite
languished; and I was glad of it, for I felt as thugh it would have
be an act of perfidy towards Dora to have a natural relis for my
dinnr. Th quantity of walkig exercise I tok, was not i this
respect attended with its usual coquence, as th
diappotmet counteracted the fresh air. I have my doubts, too,
founded on th acute experice acquired at this perid of my life,
wthr a sound ejoymt of animal fod can develop itself
freey i any human subjet who is alays in tormet from tight
bots. I thk th extreities require to be at peac before th
stoach will conduct itself with vigour.
On th ocas of this domesti littl party, I did not repeat my
formr extensive preparation. I merely provided a pair of soles, a
small leg of mutton, and a pigen-pi Mrs Crupp broke out into
rebellion o my first bashful hint in reference to th cookig of th
fish and jot, and said, with a dignified sen of injury, ‘No! No,
sir! You will not ask me sich a thg, for you are better acquainted
wth me than to suppo me capabl of doing wat I cannot do
with ampial satisfactio to my own feegs!’ But, in the end, a
compromise was effected; and Mrs. Crupp consented to acve
this feat, on condition that I dined fro ho for a fortnight
afterwards.
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Ad here I may remark, that what I underwent from Mrs.
Crupp, i cequenc of the tyrany she establed over me,
was dreadful. I never was so much afraid of anyo. We made a
compromise of everythng. If I hsitated, she was taken wth that
wnderful disorder which was alays lyig in ambush in hr
syste, ready, at th shortest notice, to prey upo her vitals. If I
rang th bell impatitly, after half-a-doze unavailing modest
pulls, and she appeared at last—which was not by any mean to be
relied upo—she would appear with a reproachful aspect, sk
breathle on a chair near the door, lay her hand upon her
nankeen bosom, and beme so ill, that I was glad, at any sacrifice
of brandy or anything e, to get rid of her. If I objected to having
my bed made at five o’clock in th aftern—wch I do still
think an unfortable arrangeent—oe motion of her hand
towards the sam nanke regio of wounded sebity was
enough to make m falter an apology. In short, I would have do
anything in an honourable way rather than give Mrs. Crupp
offence; and se was the terror of my life.
I bought a second-hand dumb-waiter for this dinnr-party, in
prefere to re-engagig the handy young man; against whom I
had conceived a prejudice, in consequence of meeting hm i th
Strand, one Sunday mrning, in a waitcoat remarkably lke one
f mine, which had be missing si th formr occasion Th
‘young gal’ was re-engaged; but on the stipulatio that sh should
only brig i the di, and then withdraw to the landig-plac,
beyond the outer door; where a habit of snffing she had
ctracted would be lot upo the guests, and were her retirig
o th plate would be a physical impossibiity.
Having laid in the material for a bo of punch, to be
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compounded by Mr. Micawber; having provided a bottl of
laveder-water, tw wax-candles, a paper of mixed pins, and a
pincushion, to assist Mrs. Miawber in her toilette at my drengtabl; having al causd the fire in my bedroom to be lighted for
Mrs. Micawber’s conveience; and having laid th clth with my
own hands, I awaited the result with coposure.
At th appoited time, my thre visitors arrived togethr. Mr.
Micawber wth more shirt-coar than usual, and a ne ribbon to
is eye-glass; Mrs. Miawber with her cap in a whitey-bro
paper parc; Traddl carrying th parc, and supporting Mrs
Micawber on his arm. Thy were all delighted with my residen
Whe I conducted Mrs. Micawber to my dresing-table, and she
saw th scal on which it was prepared for her, she was in such
rapture, that she calld Mr. Miawber to come in and look.
‘My dear Copperfield,’ said Mr. Miawber, ‘ths is luxurius.
This is a way of life wh reminds me of th perid w I was
myself in a state of celibacy, and Mrs. Micawber had not yet be
solicited to plight her faith at th Hymeneal altar.’
‘He means, solicited by him, Mr. Copperfield,’ said Mrs
Micawber, archly. ‘He cannot answer for othrs.’
‘My dear,’ returned Mr. Micawber with sudde sriousn, ‘I
have no desre to answer for othrs I am to wll aware that
wen, in the inrutable derees of Fate, you wre rerved for
me, it is possible you may have be rerved for o, destid,
after a protracted struggl, at length to fal a victim to pecunary
involvets of a complicated nature I understand your allus,
my love. I regret it, but I can bear it.’
‘Micawber!’ exclaimed Mrs. Micawber, in tears. ‘Have I
derved this! I, who never have derted you; who never WILL
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desert you, Micawber!’
‘My lve,’ said Mr. Miawber, much affected, ‘you wi forgive,
and our old and tried friend Copperfid wi, I am sure, forgive,
th momentary lacerati of a wounded spirit, made sensitive by a
recent colision with th Mi of Por—in othr wrds, wth a
ribald Turnck attacd to the water-works—and will pity, nt
condemn, its excesses’
Mr. Miawber then embraced Mrs. Miawber, and presd my
hand; leaving me to infer fro this broke allusion that hi
domestic supply of water had be cut off that aftern, in
cquence of default in the paymet of the copany’s rates
To divert hi thoughts from this meanholy subjet, I iformed
Mr. Micawber that I relied upo him for a bowl of punh, and led
hm to th lemons. His recent despodency, not to say despair,
was go in a moment. I never saw a man so throughly ejoy
hielf amd the fragrane of l-peel and sugar, the odour of
burnig rum, and the steam of bog water, as Mr. Micawber did
that afternoon. It was wonderful to se hi face shg at us out of
a thin cud of th delicate fumes, as he stirred, and mixed, and
tasted, and looked as if he were makig, intead of punh, a
fortun for his family dow to th latest posterity. As to Mrs
Micawber, I don’t know whthr it was th effect of th cap, or th
aveder-water, or the pi, or the fire, or the wax-candl, but s
came out of my ro, comparatively speakig, lovey. Ad the lark
was never gayer than that exct woman
I suppose—I never ventured to iquire, but I suppose—that
Mrs Crupp, after frying th soles, was taken i Becaus w broke
down at that pot. The leg of mutton cam up very red within,
and very pale withut: besdes having a foreign substance of a
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gritty nature sprinkld over it, as if it had had a fall into th ashe
of that remarkabl kitchen fireplac But we were nt i cditi
to judge of this fact fro th appearance of th gravy, forasmuc
as the ‘young gal’ had dropped it al upon the stairs—where it
remaid, by the by, in a lg train, until it was worn out. The
pigen-pie was not bad, but it was a delusive pi: th crust beg
like a diappoiting head, phrenologically speaking: full of lumps
and bumps, with nthing particular undernath. In short, the
banquet was such a failure that I should have be quite
unhappy—about the faiure, I man, for I was alays unhappy
about Dora—if I had nt be relieved by the great good humour
of my company, and by a bright suggestion fro Mr. Micawber.
‘My dear friend Copperfield,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘accidents w
occur i the bet-regulated fam; and in fam not regulated
by that pervading influe which santifi wh it eances
the—a—I would say, in short, by the influence of Woan, in the
lofty character of Wife, thy may be expected with confidence, and
must be borne with phosophy. If you will allw me to take the
liberty of remarking that thre are fe comestibls better, in thr
way, than a Devil, and that I beve, with a little divison of labour,
w could accomplish a god on if th young pers in attedance
could produc a gridiro, I would put it to you, that this littl
misfortune may be easly repaired.’
Thre was a gridiro in th pantry, on which my morning
rasher of bacon was cooked. We had it in, in a twklg, and
immediatey applied oursve to carrying Mr. Miawber’s idea
ito effect. The divison of labour to whic he had referred was
this:—Traddles cut th mutton into slices; Mr. Miawber (w
uld do anythng of this sort to perfeti) covered th wth
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pepper, mustard, salt, and caye; I put th o th gridiro,
turned them with a fork, and took them off, under Mr. Micawber’s
direction; and Mrs. Micawber heated, and continually stirred,
some mushro ketcup in a littl saucpan. Whe we had sl
ough do to begin upo, we fell-to, with our sve sti tucked
up at th wrist, more slices sputtering and blazing on th fire, and
our attenti divided betwee the mutton on our plate, and the
mutton then preparig.
What with the novety of th cookery, the excee of it, th
bustl of it, the frequent starting up to look after it, the frequent
sitting dow to dispose of it as th crisp slices came off th
gridiro hot and hot, th beg so busy, so flusd wth th fire, so
amusd, and in th midst of such a tempting noise and savour, we
reducd the leg of mutton to the bo My own appetite cam back
mraculusly. I am asamd to recrd it, but I realy beve I
forgot Dora for a little whil I am satisfid that Mr. and Mrs.
Micawber could not have enjoyed th feast more, if thy had sold a
bed to provide it. Traddl laughed as heartily, alt the whole
time, as he ate and worked. Indeed we all did, all at once; and I
dare say there was never a greater suc
We were at the height of our enjoyment, and were al busy
egaged, in our several departments, endeavouring to bring th
ast batch of sl to a state of perfection that should crown the
feast, wh I was aware of a strange prece in th ro, and my
eyes encuntered those of the staid Littir, standig hat in hand
before me.
‘What’s the matter?’ I involuntariy asked.
‘I beg your pardo, sir, I was directed to come in. Is my master
not here, sir?’
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‘No’
‘Have you not seen him, sir?’
‘No; do’t you co from him?’
‘Not immediatey so, sir.’
‘Did he tell you you would find him here?’
‘Not exactly so, sir. But I should think he mght be here
tomorrow, as he has not been here today.’
‘Is he comg up fro Oxford?’
‘I beg, sir,’ he returned repectfuly, ‘that you wi be seated,
and allw me to do this’ With whic he took the fork from my
unresistig hand, and bent over th gridiro, as if hs w
attention were contrated on it.
We should not have be much discomposed, I dare say, by th
appearance of Sterforth hmself, but we became in a moment th
ket of the mek before his respetabl serving-man Mr.
Micawber, hummg a tun, to show that he was quite at eas,
subsded into hi chair, with th handle of a hastily concealed fork
sticking out of th bosom of his coat, as if h had stabbed hf.
Mrs. Micawber put on her brown gloves, and asumd a genteel
languor. Traddles ran his greasy hands through his hair, and stod
it bolt upright, and stared in confusion on th tabl-cth As for
me, I was a mere infant at th head of my own tabl; and hardly
ventured to glance at th respectable phe, wh had come
from Heave knows where, to put my establt to rights.
Meanwhil he took the mutton off the gridiron, and gravey
handed it round. We al took s, but our appreciation of it was
go, and w merely made a sho of eating it. As we severaly
pused away our plates, he noeley reved them, and st on
the ceese. He took that off, too, when it was do with; cleared
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the table; pid everythig on the dumb-waiter; gave us our wglasses; and, of his own accord, wd th dumb-waiter into th
pantry. All th was done in a perfet manner, and h never raised
hi eyes from what he was about. Yet hi very elbows, when he
had his back toards me, seemed to teem with the expres of
his fixed opinion that I was extrey young.
‘Can I do anythng more, sir?’
I thanked hi and said, No; but would he take n dinr
hielf?
‘Noe, I am oblged to you, sir.’
‘Is Mr. Steerforth cog from Oxford?’
‘I beg your pardo, sir?’
‘Is Mr. Steerforth cog from Oxford?’
‘I should iagi that he mght be here tomorrow, sr. I rather
thought he mght have be here today, sr. The mitake is m,
no doubt, sir.’
‘If you should see him first—’ said I.
‘If you’ll excuse me, sir, I don’t thk I shall se hi first.’
‘In case you do,’ said I, ‘pray say that I am sorry h was nt hre
today, as an old shoolfelw of his was here.’
‘Indeed, sir!’ and he divided a bow betw me and Traddl,
with a glanc at the latter.
He was mving sftly to the door, when, in a forlorn hope of
saying something naturally—which I never could, to this man—I
said:
‘Oh! Littimer!’
‘Sir!’
‘Did you remain lg at Yarmuth, that time?’
‘Not particularly so, sir.’
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‘You saw the boat completed?’
‘Yes, sir. I reaid bed on purpose to see the boat
completed.’
‘I know!’ He raised his eye to mine respectfuly.
‘Mr. Sterforth has not see it yet, I suppose?’
‘I really can’t say, sir. I thk—but I really can’t say, sir. I wish
you good night, sir.’
He cprehended everybody prest, in the repetful bo
th wich h followd th words, and disappeared. My visitors
eemed to breathe mre freely when he was go; but my own
relf was very great, for bede the ctrait, arig from that
extraordinary sense of beig at a disadvantage which I alays had
in this man’s prece, my conscience had embarrassed me wth
ispers that I had mistrusted his master, and I could not repre
a vague uneasy dread that he might find it out. How was it, having
s little in reality to coal, that I always DID fee as if this man
were findig me out?
Mr. Micawber roused m from this refltion, whic was
blded wth a certain remorsful appresion of seeng
Steerforth hielf, by betowig many encums on the abst
Littimr as a mot respetabl felw, and a thoroughly admrabl
rvant. Mr. Micawber, I may remark, had take his full share of
th geral bo, and had received it with infinite condescension.
‘But pun, my dear Copperfield,’ said Mr. Micawber, tastig it,
‘like time and tide, waits for no man. Ah! it is at th pret
moment in high flavour. My love, wi you give me your opiion?’
Mrs. Miawber pronounced it exceent.
‘Thn I w drik,’ said Mr. Micawber, ‘if my friend Copperfield
wil permit me to take that soal liberty, to the days when my
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frid Copperfield and mysf were younger, and fought our way
in th world side by side. I may say, of myself and Cpperfid, i
words we have sung together before now, that
“We twa hae run about the brae
And pu’d th goans’ fi”
—in a figurative poit of vi—on several ocasions. I am not
exactly aware,’ said Mr. Micawber, with th od roll in his voice,
and the old inderibabl air of saying sothing gente, ‘what
gowan may be, but I have n doubt that Copperfied and mysf
wuld frequetly have take a pul at them, if it had been feasbl.’
Mr. Miawber, at the then present mt, took a pul at hi
punch. So we all did: Traddl evidetly lost in wonderig at wat
distant time Mr. Micawber and I could have be comrades in th
battle of the world.
‘Ahem!’ said Mr. Micawber, claring his throat, and warmig
with the punh and with the fire. ‘My dear, another glass?’
Mrs. Micawber said it must be very littl; but w couldn’t allow
that, so it was a glassful
‘As we are quite cofidential here, Mr. Copperfield,’ said Mrs
Micawber, sipping hr punch, ‘Mr. Traddl being a part of our
domesticity, I should much like to have your opinion o Mr.
Micawber’s prospects. For corn,’ said Mrs. Miawber
argumentativey, ‘as I have repeatedly said to Mr. Miawber, may
be gentlany, but it is not remunrative. Coon to the
extent of two and npence in a fortnight cannot, however lted
our ideas, be considered remunerative.’
We were all agred upo that.
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‘Thn,’ said Mrs Micawber, wh prided hersf on taking a
cear view of thgs, and keepig Mr. Miawber straight by her
woman’s wisdo, when he mght otherwis go a little crooked,
‘then I ask mysf this questio If crn is not to be reld upon,
wat is? Are coals to be relied upo? Not at al We have turnd
our attenti to that experimt, on the suggesti of my famy,
and we find it falacious.’
Mr. Micawber, leang back in his chair with his hands in hi
pockets, eyed us aside, and nodded his had, as much as to say
that th case was very clearly put.
‘Th articles of corn and coals,’ said Mrs. Micawber, still more
argumtatively, ‘being equaly out of the question, Mr.
pperfield, I naturaly look round the world, and say, “What is
thre in which a pers of Mr. Miawber’s talent is likely to
succeed?” Ad I exclude th doing anythng o commission,
becaus comssion is not a certainty. What is best suited to a
pers of Mr. Miawber’s pecular teperament is, I am
nvinced, a certainty.’
Traddl and I both expred, by a feeg murmur, that this
great discovery was no doubt true of Mr. Micawber, and that it did
hm much credit.
‘I w not conceal fro you, my dear Mr. Copperfield,’ said Mrs
Micawber, ‘that I have long felt th Breing business to be
particularly adapted to Mr. Micawber. Look at Barclay and
Perkins! Lok at Truman, Hanbury, and Buxton! It is on that
extensve footing that Mr. Micawber, I know from my own
knowledge of him, is calulated to shi; and th profits, I am told,
are e-nor-mous! But if Mr. Micawber cannot get into th firms—
wich decline to answer his letters, wh he offers his services
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even in an inferior capacty—wat is the use of dwellg upon that
idea? None. I may have a conviction that Mr. Miawber’s
manners—’
‘Hem! Realy, my dear,’ interpoed Mr. Micawber.
‘My love, be silt,’ said Mrs. Micawber, layig hr bro glve
on hi hand. ‘I may have a covition, Mr. Copperfield, that Mr.
Micawber’s manrs peculiarly qualify hm for th Banking
business. I may argue within myself, that if I had a depost at a
bankig-house, the manrs of Mr. Micawber, as repreting
that bankig-huse, wuld inspire confidence, and must extend
th connexi. But if th varius banking-huses refuse to avai
thlve of Mr. Miawber’s abilities, or receive th offer of th
that idea? No
th cotumely, what is the use of dwellg upon
to origiatig a bankig-bus, I may know that there are
bers of my famy who, if they chose to plac their my i
Mr. Micawber’s hands, mght found an establhmet of that
description. But if thy do not choose to place their my in Mr.
Micawber’s hands—wh thy don’t—wat is th us of that?
Again I conted that we are no farthr advanced than w wre
before’
I shook my head, and said, ‘Not a bit.’ Traddl al shook hi
ad, and said, ‘Not a bit.’
‘What do I deduce fro this?’ Mrs. Miawber went on to say,
still with th same air of putting a case lucidly. ‘What is th
nclusion, my dear Mr. Copperfield, to which I am irresistibly
brought? Am I wrog in saying, it is clear that we must live?’
I answered ‘Not at all!’ and Traddl answered ‘Not at all!’ and
I found myself afterwards sagely adding, al, that a pers must
either live or die.
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‘Just so,’ returned Mrs. Miawber, ‘It is precisely that. Ad th
fact is, my dear Mr. Copperfield, that we can not live wthut
something widely different fro existig circumtances shortly
turning up. Now I am conviced, myself, and this I have pointed
out to Mr. Micawber several tim of late, that things cant be
xpected to turn up of thlve. We must, in a measure, assist to
turn them up. I may be wrong, but I have formed that opi’
Both Traddles and I applauded it highly.
‘Very we,’ said Mrs. Miawber. ‘Th wat do I reend?
Here is Mr. Micawber with a varity of qualificatis—with great
talent—’
‘Realy, my lve,’ said Mr. Micawber.
‘Pray, my dear, alw me to coude Here is Mr. Micawber,
I should say,
with a variety of qualfiatins, with great talt—
with genus, but that may be the partialty of a wife—’
Traddles and I both murmured ‘No.’
‘And here is Mr. Micawber withut any suitable position or
employmt. Where do that repobity ret? Clearly on
society. Th I would make a fact so disgraceful known, and
boldly challenge socty to set it right. It appears to me, my dear
Mr. Copperfied,’ said Mrs. Micawber, forcibly, ‘that what Mr.
Micawber has to do, is to throw down the gauntlet to sty, and
say, in effect, “Show me who wil take that up. Let the party
immediatey step forward.”’
I vetured to ask Mrs. Miawber ho this was to be don
‘By advertising,’ said Mrs. Micawber—‘in all th papers. It
appears to me, that what Mr. Miawber has to do, in justice to
mself, in justice to hi famy, and I wi even go so far as to say i
justice to society, by which he has be hithrto overlooked, is to
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advertise in all th papers; to describe himself plainly as so-and-s,
wth such and such qualifiations and to put it thus: “ Now employ
me, on remunerative term, and addres, post-paid, to W. M., Post
Office, Camden To.”’
‘This idea of Mrs. Miawber’s, my dear Copperfield,’ said Mr.
Micawber, making his shirt-collar meet in frot of his chi, and
glancing at me sideways, ‘is, in fact, th Leap to which I alluded,
w I last had th pleasure of seeng you.’
‘Advertising is rathr expensive,’ I rearked, dubiusly.
‘Exactly so!’ said Mrs. Micawber, prerving th same logical
air. ‘Quite true, my dear Mr. Copperfid! I have made th
identical observation to Mr. Micawber. It is for that reason
specially, that I thk Mr. Miawber ought (as I have already said,
in justice to himself, in justice to his family, and in justice to
society) to raise a certain sum of money—o a bill.’
Mr. Micawber, leang back in his chair, trifled wth his eyeglas and cast his eye up at the ceg; but I thought hi
obsrvant of Traddl, too, who was lookig at the fire.
‘If n member of my famy,’ said Mrs. Micawber, ‘is possessed
of sufficient natural feing to negotiate that bill—I believe thre is
a better busss-term to express what I mean—’
Mr. Micawber, with his eye still cast up at th ceiling,
suggested ‘Discount.’
‘To discount that bill,’ said Mrs. Micawber, ‘thn my opinion i,
that Mr. Micawber should go into the Cty, should take that bi
to the Money Market, and should dipose of it for what he can
get. If the idividual i the Money Market oblige Mr. Micawber to
sustain a great sacrifice, that is betw thlve and thr
conscices. I vi it, steadily, as an investment. I remmend Mr.
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Miawber, my dear Mr. Copperfield, to do the sam; to regard it as
an investment which is sure of return, and to make up his mind to
any sacrifi’
I felt, but I am sure I don’t kn why, that this was self-deying
and devoted in Mrs. Micawber, and I uttered a murmur to that
effect. Traddl, who took his tone from me, did lkewis, sti
ookig at the fire.
‘I w nt,’ said Mrs. Miawber, finshing her pun, and
gathering her scarf about her shoulders, preparatory to her
withdrawal to my bedroom: ‘I will not protract thes remarks o
th subjet of Mr. Micawber’s pecuniary affairs. At your fireside,
my dear Mr. Copperfild, and in th prece of Mr. Traddl,
who, though not so old a friend, is quite one of ourselves, I culd
not refrain fro making you acquainted with th course I advise
Mr. Micawber to take I fee that the tim is arrived when Mr.
Miawber should exert himelf and—I w add—asrt hielf,
and it appears to me that th are th means. I am aware that I
am merely a female, and that a mascul judget is usualy
cdered mre copetet to the diuss of suc questions;
still I must not forget that, wh I lived at ho with my papa and
mama, my papa was in the habit of sayig, “Emma’s form is
fragile, but hr grasp of a subjet is inferir to none” That my
papa was too partial, I well know; but that he was an obsrver of
character in some degre, my duty and my reason equally forbid
me to doubt.’
With thes words, and restig our etreatie that s would
grac the remaig circulatio of the punh with her pre,
Mrs. Micawber retired to my bedroom. And realy I felt that s
was a nble woman—the srt of woman who might have be a
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Roman matro, and don all manner of heroic thgs, in times of
public troubl
In th fervour of this impresion, I congratulated Mr. Miawber
on the treasure he poed. So did Traddl. Mr. Miawber
extended hs hand to each of us in succesion, and th covered
his face with his pocket-handkerchief, which I think had more
snuff upo it than he was aware of. He then returned to the pun,
i the hight state of exhilarati
He was ful of elque He gave us to understand that i our
childre w lved agai, and that, under th presure of pecunary
difficulties, any accession to thr number was doubly wlcom
He said that Mrs. Micawber had latterly had her doubts on this
point, but that h had dispelled th, and reassured her. As to her
famy, they were totaly unworthy of her, and their setits
were utterly indifferent to him, and they mght—I quote hi own
expression—go to th Devi
Mr. Micawber then delivered a warm eulgy on Traddl He
said Traddl’s was a character, to th steady virtues of which he
(Mr. Micawber) could lay no cai, but whic, he thanked Heave,
h could admire. He feingly alluded to th young lady, unknn,
whom Traddl had honoured with his affecti, and who had
reciproated that affection by huring and blsing Traddl
with her affecti Mr. Micawber pldged her. So did I. Traddl
thanked us both, by saying, with a splty and honety I had
s enough to be quite charmd with, ‘I am very muc oblged
to you indeed. And I do assure you, she’s th dearet girl!—’
Mr. Micawber took an early opportunity, after that, of hintig,
my
wth th utmost delicacy and ceremony, at th state of
affections. Nothing but th serius assurance of hs friend
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Cpperfield to th contrary, he observed, could deprive him of th
impresion that his friend Copperfid loved and was beloved.
After feeg very hot and uncfortable for so tim, and after
a god deal of blusng, stammering, and denying, I said, having
my glass in my hand, ‘Well! I would give th D.!’ wich so
excited and gratified Mr. Micawber, that he ran with a glass of
punch ito my bedro, in order that Mrs. Micawber might drink
D., wh drank it with enthusasm, crying fro with, in a shri
voice, ‘Hear, hear! My dear Mr. Copperfield, I am delighted. Hear!’
and tappig at the wal, by way of applaus
Our coversatio, afterwards, took a more worldly turn; Mr.
Micawber tellg us that he found Camde Town invet,
and that the first thing he coteplated dog, when the
advertisement should have be th caus of somethg
satisfactory turning up, was to move. He mentioned a terrace at
the wetern end of Oxford Street, frontig Hyde Park, on w he
had always had hi eye, but whic he did nt expet to attai
diatey, as it would require a large establit. There
uld probably be an interval, he explained, in which he should
contet hf wth th upper part of a house, over some
respectable place of business—say in Piccadilly,—which would be
a cheerful situati for Mrs. Miawber; and where, by throg
out a bow-window, or carrying up the roof another story, or
makig s lttle alteration of that sort, they might live,
comfortably and reputably, for a fe years. Whatever was
rerved for hi, he expresy said, or wherever his abode mght
be, we might rely on this—there would always be a room for
Traddles, and a knife and fork for m We acknowledged h
kindness; and he begged us to forgive his having launched into
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th practial and business-like detais, and to excuse it as
natural in on wh was making entirely ne arrangets in life
Mrs. Micawber, tapping at th wall again to kn if tea were
ready, broke up this particular phas of our friendly conversati
She made tea for us i a mot agreeable manr; and, whenever I
went near her, i handig about the tea-cups and bread-andbutter, asked me, in a whisper, whthr D. was fair, or dark, or
whether se was short, or tal: or sothing of that kid; whic I
think I liked. After tea, we discusd a varity of topics before th
fire; and Mrs. Micawber was good enough to sig us (in a smal,
thin, flat voice, wich I remembered to have considered, wh I
first knew her, the very table-beer of acousti) the favourite
balads of ‘Th Dashig White Sergeant’, and ‘Little Taffl’. For
both of the sogs Mrs. Miawber had been famus wen s
lived at ho with her papa and mama. Mr. Micawber told us, that
when he heard her sg the first one, on the first occas of his
eeing her beneath the parental roof, she had attracted hi
attenti in an extraordiary degree; but that when it cam to
Little Taffli, he had resved to win that woman or peris in the
attempt.
It was between te and eleven o’cock when Mrs. Miawber
ro to replace her cap in th whitey-bro paper parc, and to
put on her bonnet. Mr. Micawber took the opportunity of Traddl
putting on his great-coat, to slp a ltter into my hand, with a
wispered requet that I would read it at my leisure I also tok
the opportunity of my holdig a candl over the banters to light
them down, when Mr. Micawber was going first, ladig Mrs.
Micawber, and Traddl was folwing with the cap, to detain
Traddl for a mt on the top of the stairs.
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‘Traddl,’ said I, ‘Mr. Micawber do’t man any harm, poor
fell: but, if I were you, I wouldn’t led him anythg.’
‘My dear Copperfield,’ returnd Traddles, smiling, ‘I have’t got
anythng to lend.’
‘You have got a name, you kn,’ said I.
‘Oh! You cal that sothing to lend?’ returned Traddl, with a
thoughtful look.
‘Certaiy.’
‘Oh!’ said Traddles. ‘Ye, to be sure! I am very much oblged to
you, Copperfield; but—I am afraid I have lent hi that already.’
‘For the bi that is to be a certai investmt?’ I inquired.
‘No,’ said Traddl ‘Not for that one This is the first I have
hard of that on I have bee thking that h wll most lkely
propose that one, on the way home. Min’s another.’
‘I hope there wil be nothing wrong about it,’ said I. ‘I hope not,’
said Traddl ‘I should think nt, though, beause he told me,
only th othr day, that it was provided for. That was Mr.
Micawber’s expressi, “Provided for.”’
Mr. Micawber lookig up at this junture to where we were
standing, I had only time to repeat my caution. Traddl thanked
me, and desceded. But I was much afraid, w I observed th
god-natured manr in which he went dow with th cap i h
and, and gave Mrs. Micawber his arm, that h wuld be carrid
ito the Moy Market nek and heels
I returnd to my fireside, and was musing, half gravey and half
laughing, o the caracter of Mr. Micawber and the old relatio
betw us, wh I hard a quick step ascendig th stairs At
first, I thought it was Traddl cog back for sothing Mrs.
Micawber had left bend; but as th step approached, I kn it,
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and felt my heart beat high, and the blood rush to my fac, for it
was Sterforth’s.
I was never unmindful of Agnes, and she never left that
sanctuary in my thughts—if I may cal it so—whre I had placd
her from the first. But when he entered, and stood before me with
hi hand out, the darkn that had fall on him changed to light,
and I felt cofounded and ashamd of having doubted one I loved
s heartily. I lved her n the le; I thought of her as the sam
bengnant, gentle angel in my life; I reproached myself, not hr,
wth having done him an injury; and I would have made him any
atonemet if I had known what to make, and how to make it.
‘Why, Daisy, od boy, dumb-foundered!’ laughd Sterforth,
shaking my hand heartily, and throng it gaily away. ‘Have I
detected you in another feast, you Sybarite! Thes Dotors’
Comm fellows are the gayet me in to, I beeve, and beat
us sober Oxford people al to nothing!’ His bright glance wnt
mrrily round the room, as he took the seat on the sofa oppote to
m, whic Mrs. Micawber had rectly vacated, and stirred the
fire into a blaze.
‘I was so surprised at first,’ said I, giving hi welcom with all
the cordiality I felt, ‘that I had hardly breath to greet you with,
Steerforth.’
‘Well, the sight of m is good for sore eyes, as the Scotc say,’
replied Sterforth, ‘and so is th sight of you, Daisy, in ful bl
How are you, my Bacanal?’
‘I am very we,’ said I; ‘and not at all Bacchanalan toght,
though I cofes to another party of three.’
‘All of w I met in th stret, talking loud in your praise,’
returned Sterforth. ‘Who’s our fried in the tights?’
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I gave him th best idea I could, in a fe wrds, of Mr.
Micawber. He laughd hartily at my feble portrait of that
gentleman, and said he was a man to know, and he must know
m. ‘But wh do you suppose our othr friend is?’ said I, i my
turn.
‘Heaven knows,’ said Steerforth. ‘Not a bore, I hope? I thought
he looked a little like one.’
‘Traddles!’ I replied, triumphantly.
‘Who’s he?’ asked Sterforth, in his careless way.
‘Don’t you remeber Traddl? Traddl in our room at Sal
House?’
‘Oh! That fellw!’ said Steerforth, beatig a lump of cal on the
top of the fire, with the poker. ‘Is he as sft as ever? And were th
deuc did you pick hi up?’
I extolld Traddl i reply, as highly as I could; for I felt that
Steerforth rather sghted him Steerforth, dig the subject
with a lght nd, and a sm, and the remark that he would be
glad to see the old felw too, for he had always been an odd fis,
inquired if I could give him anythng to eat? During most of this
short dialogue, when he had nt be speakig i a wild vivacous
manr, he had sat idly beatig on the lump of coal with the
poker. I observed that he did the sam thing whil I was getting
out th remains of th pige-pie, and so forth
‘Why, Daisy, here’s a supper for a king!’ h exclaimed, starting
out of his si with a burst, and takig his seat at the table ‘I
shall do it justice, for I have come fro Yarmuth.’
‘I thought you cam from Oxford?’ I returned.
‘Not I,’ said Steerforth ‘I have been seafaring—better
employed.’
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‘Littimr was here today, to inquire for you,’ I remarked, ‘and I
understood him that you were at Oxford; though, now I think of it,
h certainly did not say so.’
‘Littimr is a greater fool than I thought him, to have be
inquiring for me at al,’ said Sterforth, jovially pouring out a glas
f wi, and drinking to me. ‘As to understanding hm, you are a
cleverer fell than most of us, Daiy, if you can do that.’
‘That’s true, inded,’ said I, mving my chair to the table ‘So
you have been at Yarmouth, Steerforth!’ intereted to know al
about it. ‘Have you been there log?’
‘No,’ he returned. ‘A escapade of a week or so’
‘And h are thy all? Of course, littl Emy is not marrid
yet?’
‘Not yet. Going to be, I believe—i so many wks, or month,
or sthing or other. I have nt seen muc of ’e By the by’; he
laid down hi knfe and fork, which he had be usig with great
diligen, and began feeg in his pokets; ‘I have a letter for you.’
‘From whom?’
‘Why, from your old nurse,’ he returned, takig so papers
out of his breast pocket. “‘J. Sterforth, Esquire, debtor, to Th
Wig Mind”; that’s nt it. Patie, and we’l find it pretly.
Old what’s-his-name’s in a bad way, and it’s about that, I beeve.’
‘Barkis, do you mean?’
‘Ye!’ still feing in his pockets, and looking over thr
contets: ‘it’s all over with poor Barkis, I am afraid. I saw a littl
apothecary there—surgeon, or whatever he i—who brought your
worship ito the world. He was mighty learnd about the cas, to
me; but th upshot of his opinion was, that th carrir was making
his last journey rathr fast.—Put your hand into th breast pocket
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of my great-coat on the chair yonder, and I think you’ll find the
ltter. Is it there?’
‘Here it is!’ said I.
‘That’s right!’
It was from Peggotty; sthing le legibl than usual, and
brif. It iformed m of her husband’s hope state, and hinted
at his being ‘a littl nearer’ than heretofore, and consequently
mre difficult to manage for his own cofort. It said nthing of her
warines and watcng, and praised him highly. It was writte
with a plain, unaffected, homey pity that I kn to be genui,
and ended with ‘my duty to my ever darlg’—maning myself.
While I deciphered it, Sterforth continued to eat and drik.
‘It’s a bad job,’ he said, wh I had done; ‘but th sun sets every
day, and people die every minute, and we mustn’t be sared by th
lot. If we faid to hold our own, beause that equal foot
at all men’s doors was heard knocking somewre, every object in
this world would slp from us. No! Ride on! Rough-shod if nd be,
sooth-shod if that wil do, but ride on! Ride on over al obstac,
and win th race!’
‘And wi what race?’ said I.
‘Th race that on has started in,’ said he. ‘Ride on!’
I nticd, I remeber, as he paused, lookig at me with his
andsome head a littl thro back, and his glass raid in h
hand, that, though the freshnes of the sea-wind was on his fac,
and it was ruddy, thre were traces in it, made since I last saw it,
as if he had appld hielf to so habitual strai of the fervent
ergy which, wh rousd, was so passionately rousd wth
I had it in my thoughts to remotrate with him upon his
deperate way of pursuig any fany that he took—such as this
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buffeting of rough sas, and bravig of hard weather, for
example—when my md gland off to the imdiate subject of
our conversati again, and pursued that instead.
‘I tell you what, Sterforth,’ said I, ‘if your hgh spirits w liste
to me—’
‘Thy are potent spirits, and will do whatever you like,’ he
anered, movig from the tabl to the firede agai
‘Th I te you what, Steerforth I thk I wi go do and see
my old nurse. It is not that I can do her any good, or render her
any real service; but she is so attached to me that my visit w
ave as much effect on her, as if I could do both. She w take it so
kindly that it wll be a comfort and support to her. It is no great
effort to make, I am sure, for such a friend as she has be to me.
Wouldn’t you go a day’s journy, if you were in my plac?’
His fac was thoughtful, and he sat considerig a little before he
answered, in a l voice, ‘Wel! Go. You can do no harm.’
‘You have just come back,’ said I, ‘and it would be in vain to ask
you to go with me?’
‘Quite,’ he returned. ‘I am for Highgate tonight. I have not se
my mothr this long time, and it lies upo my coce, for it’s
something to be loved as she loves her prodigal son.—Bah!
Nonsen!—You mean to go tomorro, I suppose?’ he said,
holdig m out at arm’s lgth, with a hand on eac of my
shoulders.
‘Yes, I thk so.’
‘We, then, do’t go till nxt day. I wanted you to c and stay
a few days with us Here I am, on purpose to bid you, and you fly
off to Yarmouth!’
‘You are a n felw to talk of flying off, Steerforth, who are
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always rung wild on so unknown expeditio or other!’
He looked at me for a moment withut speaking, and th
rejoined, sti hodig me as before, and givig me a shake:
‘Co! Say th next day, and pass as much of tomorro as you
can wth us! Who knows wen we may meet agai, els? Come!
Say th next day! I want you to stand betw Roa Dartl and
me, and keep us asunder.’
‘Would you love eac other too muc, without me?’
‘Yes; or hate,’ laughed Steerforth; ‘no matter whic Come! Say
the next day!’
I said the nxt day; and he put on his great-coat and lighted his
cigar, and set off to walk hme. Fidig hm in this intention, I put
on my own great-coat (but did nt light my own cigar, having had
enough of that for one while) and walked with him as far as the
ope road: a dul road, th, at night. He was in great spirits all
the way; and when we parted, and I looked after hi gog s
galantly and airily homeward, I thought of hi saying, ‘Ride on
over al obstac, and wi the rac!’ and wied, for the first ti,
that he had so worthy rac to run.
I was undreg in my own room, when Mr. Micawber’s letter
tumbld on the floor. Thus reminded of it, I broke the seal and
read as fos. It was dated an hour and a half before dinner. I am
t sure whether I have metid that, when Mr. Micawber was
at any particularly desperate crisis, he usd a sort of legal
phrasegy, which he seed to thk equivalent to wnding up
his affairs.
‘SIR—for I dare not say my dear Copperfield,
‘It is expedient that I should inform you that th undersigned is
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Crusd. Some flkering efforts to spare you th preature
knowledge of his calamtous positi, you may observe in him this
day; but hope has sunk beath the horizo, and the undersignd
is Crusd.
‘Th pret comunicati is penned within th persal
range (I cant call it th society) of an individual, in a state
osey bordering on itoxication, employed by a broker. That
individual is in legal possesion of th preises, under a distress
for rent. His inventory include, not only th chattels and effects of
every description belonging to th undersigned, as yearly teant of
this habitation, but als those appertaig to Mr. Thomas
Traddles, lodger, a member of th Honourable Society of th Inner
Templ
‘If any drop of gloom were wantig in the overflowing cup,
wich is now “cmmended” (in th language of an immortal
Writer) to th lips of th undersigned, it wuld be found i th
fact, that a friedly acptanc granted to the undersignd, by the
£23l 4s.
before-metioned Mr. Thomas Traddl, for the sum of
9½d. is over due, and i not provided for. Also, in th fact that th
living repobiliti cging to th undersigned wi, in th
urse of nature, be inreasd by the sum of one mre helpl
victim; wh miserabl appearance may be looked for—i round
numbers—at th expiration of a perid not exceeding six lunar
mths from the pret date.
‘After preising thus much, it would be a work of
supererogation to add, that dust and ashes are for ever scattered
‘On
‘Th
‘Head
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‘Of
‘WILKINS MICAWBER.’
Poor Traddl! I kn enough of Mr. Micawber by this tim, to
foreee that he might be expeted to recver the blow; but my
nght’s rest was srely ditresd by thoughts of Traddl, and of
the curate’s daughter, who was one of ten, down in Devonsre,
and wh was such a dear girl, and w wuld wait for Traddles
(ominous praise!) until she was sixty, or any age that could be
mentioned.
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Chapter 29
I VISIT STEERFORTH AT HIS HOME, AGAIN
I
mentioned to Mr. Spenlow in th morning, that I wanted
lave of abs for a short tim; and as I was not i the
receipt of any salary, and consequently was not obnoxius to
th implacable Jorkins, thre was no difficulty about it. I tok that
opportunity, wth my voice sticking in my throat, and my sight
failing as I uttered th words, to express my hope that Miss
Spew was quite well; to whic Mr. Spew repld, with n
re emotio than if he had been speakig of an ordiary human
beg, that he was muc obliged to me, and s was very wel
We articd crks, as germs of the patrican order of proctors,
wre treated wth so much conideration, that I was almost my
own master at al tim A I did not care, however, to get to
Highgate before one or two o’cock in the day, and as we had
another little excunation cas in court that mornig, whic
as cald Th office of th judge proted by Tipkis against
Bullock for his soul’s correction, I pasd an hour or tw in
attendanc on it with Mr. Spew very agreeably. It arose out of a
suffle between two churcardens, one of whom was alged to
ave pushed th othr against a pump; th handle of wich pump
projecting ito a school-house, whic shool-house was under a
gabl of th church-rof, made th push an ecclesastical offence.
It was an amusig cas; and set me up to Highgate, on the box of
th stage-coach, thinking about th Commons, and what Mr.
Spenlow had said about touchig the Commons and briging
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down the country.
Mrs. Steerforth was pleasd to see m, and so was Roa Dartl
I was agreeably surprisd to find that Littimr was nt there, and
that we were attended by a modet little parlour-maid, with blue
ribbons in her cap, wh eye it was much more pleasant, and
much less disconcerting, to catc by accident, than th eye of that
respectable man. But what I particularly observed, before I had
been half-an-hour in the house, was the close and attetive watc
Miss Dartle kept upo me; and th lurkig manner in w she
eemed to copare my fac wth Steerforth’s, and Steerforth’s
with m, and to l in wait for sothing to co out betwee
the two. So surely as I looked towards her, did I se that eager
visage, with its gaunt black eye and searching bro, intent o
; or pasg suddenly from mi to Steerforth’s; or
compreding both of us at once. In this lynx-lke scrutiny she
as so far fro falterig w she saw I observed it, that at such a
tim she only fixed her piercig look upon me with a more itent
expression still. Blams as I was, and kn that I was, in
reference to any wrog she could possibly suspect me of, I shrunk
before her strange eyes, quite unabl to endure their hungry
lustre
day, she seed to pervade the whole house. If I talked to
Sterforth in his ro, I heard her dress rustle in th littl galry
outside. Wh he and I engaged in so of our old exerci o
the lawn bend the house, I saw her fac pas from window to
window, like a wanderig light, until it fixed itslf in one, and
watched us. Wh we all four went out walkig in the afternoon,
she closd her thin hand on my arm like a sprig, to keep me back,
while Steerforth and his mother went on out of hearig: and then
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spoke to me.
‘You have been a lg tim,’ she said, ‘wthout cog here. Is
your profession really so engaging and interesting as to absorb
your w attention? I ask becaus I alays want to be informd,
wen I am ignrant. Is it realy, thugh?’
I replied that I liked it we enugh, but that I certainly could
not claim so much for it.
‘Oh! I am glad to know that, beause I always like to be put
right when I am wrong,’ said Roa Dartle ‘You mean it is a little
dry, perhaps?’
‘Well,’ I replied; ‘perhaps it was a little dry.’
‘Oh! and that’s a reas why you want relief and change—
excitet and al that?’ said she ‘A! very true! But isn’t it a
littl—Eh?—for him; I don’t mean you?’
A quik glan of her eye toards the spot where Steerforth
as walkig, with his mothr leaning o his arm, shod me
whom sh meant; but beyond that, I was quite lot. And I looked
so, I have no doubt.
‘Don’t it—I don’t say that it does, mind I want to know—do’t it
rathr engross him? Don’t it make hm, perhaps, a lttl more
remiss than usual in his vits to his bldly-doting—e?’ With
anothr quick glance at th, and such a glance at me as seed
to look into my inrmost thoughts.
‘Miss Dartle,’ I returnd, ‘pray do not thk—’
‘I don’t!’ she said. ‘Oh dear me, don’t suppose that I think
anythng! I am not suspicious I only ask a queti. I don’t state
any opiion. I want to found an opinion on what you tell me. Th,
it’s not so? Wel! I am very glad to kn it.’
‘It certainly is not th fact,’ said I, perplexed, ‘that I am
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acuntable for Steerforth’s having be away from home lger
than usual—if he has be: which I really don’t kn at this
moment, unless I understand it fro you. I have not se hm this
lg whil, until last night.’
‘No?’
‘Indeed, Mi Dartl, no!’
As she looked ful at me, I saw her face gro sharper and paler,
and the marks of the old wound lgthen out until it cut through
th disfigured lip, and deep into th nethr lip, and slanted dow
the fac There was sothing potively awful to m i this, and
in th brightness of her eye, as she said, lookig fixedly at me:
‘What is he dog?’
I repeated th wrds, more to myself than her, being so
amazed.
‘What is he dog?’ sh said, with an eagerne that sd
eugh to consum her like a fire. ‘In wat is that man assistig
hi, who never looks at me without an inrutabl falsehood in his
eyes? If you are honourable and faithful, I do’t ask you to betray
your friend. I ask you only to tell me, is it anger, is it hatred, is it
pride, is it restlessness, is it some wild fany, is it love, wat is it,
that is leading him?’
‘Miss Dartle,’ I returnd, ‘ho shall I tell you, so that you wi
beeve m, that I know of nothing in Steerforth different from
what there was when I first cam here? I can think of nothing. I
firmly believe thre is nothing. I hardly understand eve wat you
mean.’
As she still stod lookig fixedly at me, a twitching or
throbbing, fro which I could not dissociate th idea of pai, came
into that cruel mark; and lifted up th cornr of her lip as if wth
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scorn, or with a pity that despised its object. She put hr hand
upon it hurriedly—a hand s thin and deate, that when I had
seen her hold it up before the fire to shade her fac, I had
cpared it i my thoughts to fin porceai—and saying, in a
quick, firce, passionate way, ‘I swear you to secrey about this!’
said not a word more.
Mrs. Sterforth was particularly happy in her son’s society, and
Sterforth was, on this ocasion, particularly attentive and
respectful to hr. It was very interestig to me to see th
together, not only on acunt of their mutual affectin, but
beause of the strog personal reblane between them, and
th mannr in which what was haughty or impetuous in him was
ftend by age and sx, i her, to a gracus dignity. I thought,
more than oce, that it was well no serius caus of division had
ever co betwee them; or two suc natures—I ought rather to
express it, tw such shades of th same nature—might have be
harder to ree than the two extremest oppotes in creati
Th idea did not originate in my own discernment, I am bound to
fes, but in a spe of Rosa Dartl’s.
She said at dinner:
‘Oh, but do tell me, thugh, somebody, becaus I have be
thkig about it al day, and I want to kn.’
‘You want to know what, Roa?’ returned Mrs. Sterforth.
‘Pray, pray, Rosa, do nt be mysterious.’
‘Mysterius!’ she cried. ‘Oh! really? Do you consider me so?’
‘Do I cotantly etreat you,’ said Mrs. Steerforth, ‘to speak
plaiy, in your own natural manr?’
‘Oh! then this i not my natural manr?’ sh rejoind. ‘Now
you must really bear wth me, becaus I ask for information We
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nver know ourselves.’
‘It has beme a second nature,’ said Mrs. Sterforth, withut
any displeasure; ‘but I remember,—and so must you, I thk,—
when your manner was different, Roa; when it was nt so
guarded, and was more trustful.’
‘I am sure you are right,’ sh returned; ‘and so it is that bad
habits grow upon on! Realy? Les guarded and mre trustful?
How can I, iperceptibly, have changed, I wonder! We, that’s
very odd! I must study to regain my formr self.’
‘I wish you would,’ said Mrs. Steerforth, with a smile.
‘Oh! I realy w, you know!’ she anered. ‘I wi learn
frankn from—let m see—from Jam’
‘You cant learn frankns, Rosa,’ said Mrs. Steerforth
quickly—for thre was alays some effect of sarcasm i wat Rosa
Dartle said, thugh it was said, as this was, in th most
unscious manr in th world—‘in a better sc
hool.’
‘That I am sure of,’ she answered, with un fervour. ‘If I
am sure of anythg, of course, you kn, I am sure of that.’
Mrs. Steerforth appeared to me to regret havig been a lttl
ttled; for sh pretly said, in a kid ton:
‘Wel, my dear Rosa, we have not heard what it is that you want
to be satisfied about?’
‘That I want to be satisfied about?’ she replied, with provoking
cdn ‘Oh! It was only whether peopl, who are lke eac other
i their moral cotitution—i that the phras?’
‘It’s as god a phrase as anthr,’ said Sterforth
‘Thank you:—whether peopl, who are like eac other i their
mral ctitution, are i greater danger than people not so
circumstanced, supposng any serius caus of variance to ari
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betw th, of beig divided angrily and deeply?’
‘I should say yes,’ said Steerforth
‘Should you?’ she retorted. ‘Dear me! Supposg then, for
instance—any unkely thing wi do for a supposti—that you
and your mother were to have a serious quarrel’
‘My dear Roa,’ interposed Mrs. Steerforth, laughing goodnaturedly, ‘suggest some othr supposti! Jams and I know our
duty to eac other better, I pray Heave!’
‘Oh!’ said Mis Dartle, nddig her head thoughtfully. ‘To be
sure. That wuld prevet it? Why, of course it would. Exactly.
Now, I am glad I have be so fo as to put th case, for it is so
very good to know that your duty to eac other would prevet it!
Thank you very much.’
One othr littl circumstance connected with Mi Dartle I
must not omit; for I had reason to reber it thereafter, wen al
th irremediable past was redered plain. During th wh of this
day, but especially fro this perid of it, Sterforth exerted
hmself with his utmost skill, and that was wth h utmost eas, to
charm this singular creature into a pleasant and pleased
companion. That he should sucd, was no matter of surprise to
me. That she should struggl against th fascinating influence of
hi deghtful art—deghtful nature I thought it then—did nt
surprise me ethr; for I knew that she was sometimes jaundiced
and pervers I saw her features and her manr slowly change; I
saw her look at him with growing admration; I saw her try, more
and more faintly, but alays angrily, as if she coded a
wakness in hersf, to resist th captivating powr that h
possesd; and finally, I saw her sharp glance softe, and her smil
become quite gentle, and I ceased to be afraid of her as I had really
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be al day, and we al sat about the fire, talkig and laughing
together, with as little rerve as if we had been chdren.
Whether it was beause we had sat there so lg, or beause
Steerforth was reved nt to lo the advantage he had gaied, I
do not kn; but w did not reai in th dining-ro more than
five miutes after her departure. ‘She i playig her harp,’ said
Sterforth, softly, at th drawing-ro door, ‘and nobody but my
mther has heard her do that, I beeve, the three years.’ He said
it with a curius smile, which was go directly; and we wnt into
the room and found her alone.
‘Don’t get up,’ said Steerforth (wich she had already don)’ my
dear Rosa, don’t! Be kid for once, and sig us an Irish song.’
‘What do you care for an Irih sog?’ sh returned.
‘Much!’ said Steerforth. ‘Much mre than for any other. Here is
Daisy, to, loves music fro his soul. Sing us an Irish song, Rosa!
and let me sit and liste as I usd to do.’
He did nt touch her, or the chair from whic she had ris, but
sat hf near th harp. She stod beside it for some littl wh,
i a curious way, going through the mtion of playig it with her
right hand, but not soundig it. At lgth sh sat down, and dre
it to her with on sudden acti, and played and sang.
I don’t know what it was, in her touc or voice, that made that
sg the mt unearthly I have ever heard in my lfe, or can
imagi Thre was something fearful i th reality of it. It was as
f it had nver be written, or set to mus, but sprung out of
passion with her; which found imperfet utterance in th low
sounds of hr voice, and crouched again wh all was sti I was
dumb when she laned bede the harp agai, playig it, but nt
sundig it, with her right hand.
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A minute more, and this had rousd me fro my trance:—
Steerforth had left his seat, and gone to her, and had put hi arm
aughingly about her, and had said, ‘Ce, Roa, for the future we
wll love each othr very much!’ And she had struck him, and had
thrown him off with the fury of a wild cat, and had burst out of the
room.
‘What is the matter with Roa?’ said Mrs. Sterforth, cog in
‘She has be an angel, mother,’ returned Steerforth, ‘for a
lttle whe; and has run ito the oppote extreme, sie, by way of
compensati.’
‘You should be careful not to irritate her, Jam Her temper
has be soured, rember, and ought not to be tried.’
Rosa did not come back; and no othr mention was made of
her, until I went with Steerforth into his room to say Good night.
Then he laughed about her, and asked m if I had ever se suc a
firce littl piece of incomprebiity.
I expressed as much of my astoishment as was th capabl of
expression, and asked if he could gues what it was that she had
taken so much amiss, so suddenly.
‘Oh, Heave knows,’ said Steerforth. ‘Aything you like—or
nthing! I told you s took everything, hersef inuded, to a
grindsto, and sharpend it. She is an edge-to, and require
great care in dealig with. Sh is always dangerous. Good nght!’
‘Good nght!’ said I, ‘my dear Sterforth! I shall be go before
you wake in the morng. Good nght!’
He was unwilg to let m go; and stood, holdig me out, with a
hand on eac of my shoulders, as he had do in my own room.
‘Daisy,’ he said, with a smile—‘for thugh that’s not the name
your godfathers and godmothers gave you, it’s the nam I lke bet
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to call you by—and I wish, I wish, I wish, you could give it to me!’
‘Why so I can, if I choose,’ said I.
‘Daisy, if anythng should ever separate us, you must thk of
me at my best, old boy. Come! Let us make that bargain. Thk of
me at my best, if circumstances should ever part us!’
‘You have no bet to me, Sterforth,’ said I, ‘and n worst. You
are always equaly loved, and cherid in my heart.’
So much compunction for having ever wroged him, eve by a
sape thought, did I fee within me, that the cfeon of
having done so was rising to my lips. But for th reluctance I had
to betray the cofide of Agn, but for my uncrtaity how to
approach th subjet with no risk of doing so, it wuld have
reached them before he said, ‘God bl you, Daiy, and good
night!’ In my doubt, it did not reach them; and we shook hands,
and we parted.
I was up wth th dul dawn, and, having dressed as quietly as I
could, looked into his ro. He was fast asleep; lying, easily, wth
head upon his arm, as I had often se him lie at shool.
Th time came i its season, and that was very soo, wh I
alt wondered that nthing troubld his repo, as I looked at
hi But he slpt—lt me think of him s agai—as I had often
seen him sleep at school; and thus, in this sent hour, I left him
—Never mre, oh God forgive you, Steerforth! to touch that
passive hand in love and friendship. Never, never more!
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Chapter 30
A LOSS
I
got down to Yarmouth in the eveg, and went to the i I
kn that Peggotty’s spare room—my room—was likey to
have occupatio eough in a little whil, if that great Vistor,
before whose presenc al the lvig must give place, were not
already in th house; so I betok myself to th inn, and dined
thre, and engaged my bed.
It was ten o’cock when I went out. Many of the shops were
sut, and the town was dul Wh I cam to Omr and Joram’s, I
found the shutters up, but the shop door standig ope A I could
obtain a perspective vi of Mr. Omr inside, smokig his pipe by
the parlour door, I entered, and asked him how he was
‘Why, blss my life and soul!’ said Mr. Omer, ‘ho do you find
yoursf? Take a sat.—Smoke nt diagreeable, I hope?’
‘By no means,’ said I. ‘I lke it—in somebody else’s pipe.’
‘What, not in your own, eh?’ Mr. Omer returnd, laughng. ‘A
the better, sr. Bad habit for a young man Take a seat. I smoke,
mysf, for the asthma.’
Mr. Omer had made ro for me, and placed a chair. He now
sat dow again very much out of breath, gasping at his pipe as if it
contained a supply of that necesary, withut which h must
perish.
‘I am sorry to have heard bad ne of Mr. Barkis,’ said I.
Mr. Omer looked at me, with a steady countenan, and shook
his head.
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‘Do you know how he is tonight?’ I asked.
‘The very question I should have put to you, sr,’ returned Mr.
Omer, ‘but on acunt of delicacy. It’s one of the drawbacks of our
line of busss. Whe a party’s ill, we can’t ask ho th party is.’
The difficulty had not occurred to me; though I had had my
appresion to, wh I went in, of hearing th od tune. On its
beg metid, I regnized it, hover, and said as muc
‘Yes, yes, you understand,’ said Mr. Omer, noddig hs had.
‘We dursn’t do it. Bl you, it would be a shock that the genrality
of partie mightn’t recver, to say “Omr and Joram’s
mpliments, and ho do you find yourself this morning?”—or
this aftern—as it may be.’
Mr. Omr and I nodded at eac other, and Mr. Omer recruited
his wid by th aid of hi pipe
‘It’s one of the things that cut the trade off from attenti they
could often wish to sho,’ said Mr. Omr. ‘Take myself. If I have
known Barki a year, to mve to as he went by, I have known him
forty years But I can’t go and say, “ho is he?”’
I felt it was rather hard on Mr. Omer, and I tod him so.
‘I’m not more self-intereted, I hope, than anothr man,’ said
Mr. Omer. ‘Lok at me! My wind may fail me at any moment, and
it ain’t likely that, to my own knowledge, I’d be slf-intereted
under such circumtan. I say it ain’t likely, in a man w know
does go, as if a pair of bes was cut
wind will go, when it
ope; and that man a grandfathr,’ said Mr. Omer.
I said, ‘Not at al’
‘It ain’t that I complain of my line of business,’ said Mr. Omer.
‘It ain’t that. So good and so bad goes, no doubt, to al
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minded.’
Mr. Omer, with a very complacent and amiabl face, tok
several puffs in silen; and th said, resuming his first point:
‘Accordingly w’re obleeged, in ascertaining ho Barkis go
on, to lt ourselves to Em’ly. She knows what our real objects
are, and she don’t have any more alarms or suspicions about us,
than if we was so many lambs. Minnie and Joram have just
stepped dow to th house, in fact (s’s thre, after hours,
helpig her aunt a bit), to ask her how he is tonight; and if you was
to plas to wait till they c back, they’d give you full
partic’lers. Wi you take something? A glass of srub and water,
now? I smoke o srub and water, myself,’ said Mr. Omer, taking
up his glass, ‘beause it’s considered softeg to th passage, by
whic this troubl breath of mi gets ito action. But, Lord
bls you,’ said Mr. Omer, huskiy, ‘it ai’t the passages that’s out
of order! “Give me breath enugh,” said I to my daughter Miie,
“and I’l fid passages, my dear.”’
He really had no breath to spare, and it was very alarmng to
him laugh Whe he was again in a condition to be talked to, I
thanked hi for the proffered refreshmet, wh I deed, as I
had just had dinr; and, observing that I would wait, since h was
so god as to invite me, until his daughter and his son-in-law came
back, I inquired ho littl Emily was?
‘Well, sr,’ said Mr. Omer, removing his pipe, that he might rub
hi c: ‘I tell you truly, I shall be glad when her marriage has
taken place.’
‘Why so?’ I inquired.
‘Well, she’s unttld at pret,’ said Mr. Omer. ‘It ain’t that
she’s not as pretty as ever, for she’s prettir—I do assure you, she
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i prettier. It ai’t that she do’t work as we as ever, for she do
She was worth any six, and sh is worth any six. But sohow sh
wants heart. If you understand,’ said Mr. Omer, after rubbig hi
chin again, and smokig a littl, ‘wat I mean i a geral way by
th expression, “A long pull, and a strong pull, and a pull
altogether, my heartie, hurrah!” I should say to you, that that
was—i a genral way—what I mi i Em’ly.’
Mr. Omer’s face and manr went for so much, that I could
conscitiusy nod my head, as divining his meang. My
quickness of appresion seed to plase him, and he went on:
‘Now I consider this is principally on account of her being in an
unsttled state, you see. We have talked it over a good deal, her
uncle and myself, and her swethart and myself, after busine;
and I consider it is principally o account of hr beg unttld.
You must always ret of Em’ly,’ said Mr. Omer, shakig hi
head gently, ‘that s’s a mot extraordiary affectinate little
thing. The proverb says, “You can’t make a sk purse out of a
sw’s ear.” We, I do’t know about that. I rather think you may, if
you begin early in lfe. She has made a home out of that old boat,
sir, that stoe and marbl couldn’t beat.’
‘I am sure she has!’ said I.
‘To se the clging of that pretty little thing to her unc,’ said
Mr. Omr; ‘to s the way sh holds on to him, tighter and tighter,
and cler and closer, every day, is to see a sght. No, you know,
there’s a struggle going on when that’s the cas Why should it be
made a longer on than is needful?’
I lted attentivey to the good old fellow, and acquied,
wth al my heart, in what he said.
‘Threfore, I mentiond to them,’ said Mr. Omer, in a
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comfortabl, easy-gong to, ‘this. I said, “No, don’t consider
Em’ly naild dow in point of time, at all. Make it your on time.
Her services have be more valuable than was supposed; her
learnng has be quiker than was supposed; Omr and Joram
can run thr pen through what remains; and she’s fre w you
wis If sh like to make any little arranget, afterwards, i the
way of dog any little thing for us at home, very wel If sh do’t,
very w still We’re n losers, anyh.” For—don’t you see,’ said
Mr. Omr, touchig m with his pipe, ‘it ai’t likey that a man so
hort of breath as mysf, and a grandfather too, would go and
her?’
strain points with a littl bit of a blue-eyed blsom, like
‘Not at al, I am certai,’ said I.
‘Not at al! You’re right!’ said Mr. Omer. ‘Wel, sir, her cousin—
you know it’s a cous she’s going to be marrid to?’
‘Oh yes,’ I replied. ‘I kn him we.’
‘Of course you do,’ said Mr. Omr. ‘Well, sir! Her cousin beg,
as it appears, in god work, and we to do, thanked me in a very
many sort of manner for this (conductig hif altogether, I
must say, in a way that gives me a hgh opiion of hm), and wnt
and took as cfortable a little house as you or I could wis to
cap eye on. That little house i nw furnihed right through, as
at and coplte as a do’s parlour; and but for Barki’s illne
avig take this bad turn, poor fel, they would have be man
and wfe—I dare say, by this time. As it is, thre’s a
postponement.’
‘And Emiy, Mr. Omer?’ I iquired. ‘Has she be more
ttled?’
‘Why that, you kn,’ he returned, rubbig his doubl chi
again, ‘can’t naturally be expected. Th prospect of th change
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and separation, and al that, is, as one may say, cose to her and far
away from her, both at once Barki’s death needn’t put it off
much, but hs lingerig might. Anyway, it’s an uncertain state of
matters, you se’
‘I see,’ said I.
‘Consequently,’ pursued Mr. Omer, ‘Em’ly’s sti a little dow,
and a lttle fluttered; perhaps, upon the whole, sh’s more s than
e was Every day she seems to get fonder and fonder of her
uncle, and more loth to part fro all of us A kind wrd fro me
brigs the tears into her eye; and if you was to se her with my
daughter Min’s lttle girl, you’d never forget it. Ble my heart
alive!’ said Mr. Omr, pondering, ‘ho she loves that chid!’
Having so favourable an opportunity, it occurred to me to ask
Mr. Omr, before our cversation should be iterrupted by the
return of his daughter and her husband, whether he knew
anything of Martha.
‘Ah!’ h rejod, shakig his head, and looking very much
dejected. ‘No god. A sad story, sir, hover you come to know it. I
nver thought there was harm in the girl. I wouldn’t wis to
mention it before my daughter Miie—for she’d take me up
directly—but I never did. None of us ever did.’
Mr. Omer, hearig his daughter’s footstep before I heard it,
toucd me with his pipe, and shut up on eye, as a caution. She
and her husband came in immediatey afterwards.
Their report was, that Mr. Barki was ‘as bad as bad could be’;
that he was quite unscious; and that Mr. Chillip had
murnfully said in the kitchen, on going away just now, that the
Collge of Physan, the College of Surgeons, and Apothecari’
Hall, if they were al calld i together, couldn’t help hi He was
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past both Colleges, Mr. Chlip said, and th Hall could only poi
Hearig this, and larning that Mr. Peggotty was there, I
determid to go to the house at onc I bade good night to Mr.
Omr, and to Mr. and Mrs. Joram; and directed my steps thither,
wth a solem feg, wich made Mr. Barkis quite a ne and
different creature.
My low tap at the door was anred by Mr. Peggotty. He was
not so much surprised to se me as I had expected. I remarked
this in Peggotty, to, wh she came dow; and I have see it
since; and I thk, in th expectation of that dread surpri, al
thr changes and surpri dwidle into nothing.
I shook hands with Mr. Peggotty, and pased ito the kitchen,
wile h softly closd th door. Littl Emily was sitting by th fire,
wth her hands before her face. Ham was standing near her.
We spoke in whispers; listeg, betw wiles, for any sound
i the room above. I had not thought of it on the occas of my
last vit, but ho strange it was to me, now, to miss Mr. Barkis out
of the kitchen!
‘This is very kid of you, Mas’r Davy,’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘It’s onmmon kind,’ said Ham
‘Em’ly, my dear,’ cried Mr. Peggotty. ‘See hre! Here’s Mas’r
Davy co! What, cr up, pretty! Not a wured to Mas’r Davy?’
There was a tremblig upon her, that I can s now. The
coldness of her hand wh I toucd it, I can fe yet. Its oly sign
f animation was to shrink fro mine; and th she glided fro
the cair, and creepig to the other side of her unce, bod
hrsf, silently and trebling still, upo his breast.
‘It’s such a loving art,’ said Mr. Peggotty, smoothng her rich
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hair with his great hard hand, ‘that it can’t abear the srrer of this
It’s nat’ral in young folk, Mas’r Davy, when they’re new to thes
here trial, and timd, lke my little bird,—it’s nat’ral’
Sh clung the closer to him, but nther lifted up her fac, nr
spoke a wrd.
‘It’s getting late, my dear,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘and here’s Ham
c fur to take you home Theer! Go along with t’other loving
art! What’ Em’ly? Eh, my pretty?’
The sound of her voic had not reached me, but he bet hi
ad as if he listed to her, and th said:
‘Let you stay with your unce? Why, you doen’t man to ask m
that! Stay with your unc, Moppet? Wh your husband that’l be
s soon, is here fur to take you home? Now a person wouldn’t
think it, fur to se this lttle thing alongside a rough-weather cap
lke m,’ said Mr. Peggotty, lookig round at both of us, with
infinite pride; ‘but th sea ain’t more salt in it than she has
fondn in her for her unc—a foolh lttle Em’ly!’
‘Em’ly’s in the right in that, Mas’r Davy!’ said Ham. ‘Lokee
here! A Em’ly wi of it, and as she’s hurried and frightened,
like, besides, I’ll leave her ti morng. Let me stay to!’
‘No, no,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘You doen’t ought—a marrid man
like you—or what’s as god—to take and hul away a day’s wrk.
d you do’t ought to watch and work both. That won’t do You
go home and turn in You ai’t aferd of Em’ly not beig took good
care on, I know.’ Ham yielded to this persuason, and took his hat
to go. Even when he kied her.—and I nver saw hi approac
her, but I felt that nature had given hi the soul of a gentlan—
se seemed to clg closer to her unce, even to the avoidane of
her chosen husband. I sut the door after him, that it might cause
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n diturban of the quiet that prevaid; and when I turned
back, I found Mr. Peggotty sti talkig to her.
‘Now, I’m a going upstairs to tel your aunt as Mas’r Davy’s
re, and that’ll cheer her up a bit,’ h said. ‘Sit ye dow by th
fire, th while, my dear, and warm th mortal cod hands. You
doe’t need to be so fearsome, and take on so much. What? You’ll
go along with m?—We! c alg with me—c! If her unc
was turned out of house and home, and forced to lay down in a
dyke, Mas’r Davy,’ said Mr. Peggotty, with no less pride than
before, ‘it’s my bef sh’d go along with him, nw! But there’l be
someo el, soo,—someo el, soo, Em’ly!’
Afterwards, wen I wet upstairs, as I pased the door of my
littl chamber, which was dark, I had an idistinct impre of
her beg within it, cast down upon the floor. But, whether it was
really she, or wthr it was a confusion of th shadows in th
room, I do’t know n
I had lure to think, before the kitchen fire, of pretty little
Emily’s dread of death—wich, added to what Mr. Omr had told
m, I took to be the cause of her beg s unlike herself—and I had
lure, before Peggotty cam down, eve to think more ltly
of the weakn of it: as I sat counting the tickig of the ck, and
deepenig my see of the so hush around m. Peggotty took
me i hr arms, and blessed and thanked me over and over again
for being such a comfort to her (that was what she said) in hr
ditres Sh then entreated me to co upstairs, sbbig that Mr.
Barkis had always liked me and admired me; that he had ofte
talked of me, before he fe into a stupor; and that s beved, i
case of hs cong to hif again, he would brighte up at sight
of me, if he could brighten up at any earthly thing.
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Th probability of his ever doig so, appeared to me, wh I
saw him, to be very smal He was lyig wth his had and
shoulders out of bed, in an unfortable attitude, half restig o
th box wich had cost hm so much pai and troubl I learned,
that, wh he was past creping out of bed to ope it, and past
assuring hif of its safety by means of th divining rod I had
seen him use, he had required to have it placed on the cair at th
bed-sde, where he had ever si embracd it, night and day. His
arm lay o it now Time and th world were slipping fro beneath
, but the box was there; and the last words he had uttered
were (in an explanatory tone) ‘Old clothes!’
‘Barkis, my dear!’ said Peggotty, almost cherfully: bendig
over him, while her brother and I stood at the bed’s foot. ‘Here’s
my dear boy—my dear boy, Master Davy, wh brought us
together, Barki! That you st mage by, you know! Wo’t you
speak to Master Davy?’
He was as mute and senselss as th box, fro which his form
derived th only expression it had.
‘He’s a going out with the tide,’ said Mr. Peggotty to me, bend
his hand.
My eye were di and s were Mr. Peggotty’s; but I repeated in
a whisper, ‘With th tide?’
‘Pepl can’t di, alg the coast,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ’except
when the tide’s pretty nigh out. They can’t be born, unle it’s
pretty nigh in—not properly born, til flood. He’s a going out with
the tide. It’s ebb at half-arter three, slack water half an hour. If he
lves till it turns, he’l hold his own till past the flood, and go out
with the next tide’
We remaid there, watchig him, a log tim—hours. What
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mysterious influe my prece had upo hi in that state of
his senses, I shal not preted to say; but wh h at last began to
ander febly, it is certain he was muttering about drivig me to
hool.
‘He’s comng to hif,’ said Peggotty.
Mr. Peggotty toucd me, and whispered with much awe and
reveren ‘They are both a-going out fast.’
‘Barkis, my dear!’ said Peggotty.
‘C. P. Barkis,’ he cried faitly. ‘No better woman anywre!’
‘Lok! Here’s Master Davy!’ said Peggotty. For h n opened
hi eyes
I was on the pot of askig him if he knew me, when he tried to
stretc out hs arm, and said to me, distinctly, with a plasant
smil:
‘Barkis is wiin’!’
Ad, it beg lw water, he went out with the tide
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Chapter 31
A GREATER LOSS
I
t was nt diffiult for me, on Peggotty’s sotation, to resve
to stay where I was, until after the remai of the poor carrier
should have made thr last journey to Blundersto She had
lg ago bought, out of her own savings, a little pi of ground in
our old churcyard near the grave of ‘her sweet girl’, as se alays
aled my mother; and there they were to ret.
In kepig Peggotty copany, and dog all I could for her
(little enough at the utmot), I was as grateful, I rejoic to think, as
ve now I could wish myself to have be. But I am afraid I had a
supre satisfacti, of a persal and professional nature, i
takig charge of Mr. Barki’s wi, and expoundig its contets
I may caim the merit of having origiated the suggesti that
th will should be looked for in th box. After som search, it was
found i the box, at the botto of a hors’s n-bag; wherein
(besides hay) thre was discovered an old god watc, with chai
and seals, wich Mr. Barki had worn on his wedding-day, and
w had nver been seen before or sie; a siver tobacstopper, in th form of a leg; an imitation lemon, ful of minute
cups and saucrs, which I have some idea Mr. Barki must have
purcased to pret to me wh I was a child, and afterwards
found himelf unabl to part with; eighty-seven guieas and a half,
i guineas and half-guinas; two hundred and ten pounds, in
perfetly clean Bank notes; certain receipts for Bank of England
stok; an old horsesho, a bad shilling, a piece of camphor, and an
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oyster-shel From the circumtanc of the latter artic having
be much polished, and displaying prismatic colours o th
inside, I colude that Mr. Barkis had some geral ideas about
pearls, which never resolved thlve into anythng defite
For years and years, Mr. Barki had carried this box, on al his
journeys, every day. That it might the better eape ntic, he had
invented a fiction that it belonged to ‘Mr. Blackboy’, and was ‘to be
left wth Barkis ti called for’; a fabl he had elaboratey writte
th lid, in characters now scarcely legible.
He had hoarded, al these years, I found, to good purpoe. His
property in money amounted to nearly thre thusand pounds Of
this he bequeathed the iterest of one thousand to Mr. Peggotty
for his life; on his decease, th priipal to be equaly divided
betwee Peggotty, lttle Emy, and m, or the survivor or
survivors of us, share and share alike. Al th rest he died
pod of, he bequeathed to Peggotty; whom he lft resduary
lgatee, and s exeutrix of that his last will and testamt.
I felt myself quite a protor wh I read this document alud
wth all possibl ceremony, and set forth its provisions, any
number of tim, to those whom they cornd. I began to think
there was more in the Commons than I had suppod. I examed
the wi with the deepest atteti, pronounced it perfectly formal
in all respects, made a pencil-mark or so in th margin, and
thought it rathr extraordiary that I kn s muc
In this abstruse pursuit; in making an account for Peggotty, of
all th property into which she had come; in arranging all th
affairs in an orderly manr; and in beg hr refere and advir
on every pot, to our joint delight; I pasd the week before the
funeral I did nt s little Emy in that interval, but they told m
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s was to be quietly married in a fortnight.
I did not attend the funeral in character, if I may venture to say
so. I mean I was not dressed up in a black coat and a streamer, to
frighten the birds; but I walked over to Blunderstone early in the
morng, and was in th churchyard w it came, atteded only
by Peggotty and her brother. The mad gentlan looked on, out of
my littl wndow; Mr. Chillip’s baby wagged its heavy head, and
rod its goggle eyes, at the clergyman, over its nurse’s shoulder;
Mr. Omer breathed short i the background; no one els was
there; and it was very quiet. We walked about the curchyard for
an hour, after all was over; and pulled some young leave fro th
tree above my mother’s grave.
A dread falls o me here A clud is lowring on th distant
town, towards whic I retracd my solitary steps I fear to
approach it. I cant bear to think of what did come, upo that
memorable night; of what must come agai, if I go on
It is no wrs, beaus I write of it. It would be no better, if I
stopped my most uning hand. It is done Nothing can undo it;
nothing can make it othrwise than as it was.
My old nurse was to go to London with me nxt day, on the
bus of the wil Little Emy was pasg that day at Mr.
Omr’s We were all to met in the old boathouse that night. Ham
would brig Emiy at the usual hour. I would walk back at my
lure. The brother and siter would return as they had c,
and be expectig us, wh th day closd in, at th fireside.
I parted fro th at th wicket-gate, whre visionary Strap
had rested with Roderick Random’s knapsack in th days of yore;
and, istead of going straight back, walked a littl distance on th
road to Lowestoft. Then I turned, and walked back towards
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Yarmuth I stayed to dine at a decent alehuse, some mile or tw
from the Ferry I have metid before; and thus the day wore
away, and it was eveing wh I reached it. Rain was falg
heaviy by that tim, and it was a wild night; but there was a mo
bend the clouds, and it was not dark.
I was soo within sight of Mr. Peggotty’s huse, and of th light
within it shg through the window. A little flounderig across
the sand, whic was heavy, brought me to the door, and I went in
It looked very cofortable inded. Mr. Peggotty had smoked his
veing pipe and thre wre preparation for some supper by and
by. The fire was bright, the ashes were thrown up, the loker was
ready for little Emy in her old plac In her own old place sat
Peggotty, once more, lookig (but for her dress) as if she had
never left it. She had fallen back, already, on th society of th
rk-box wth St. Paul’s upon the ld, the yard-measure in th
ttage, and the bit of wax-candl; and there they al were, just as
if thy had never be disturbed. Mrs. Gummidge appeared to be
fretting a littl, in her old cornr; and consequently looked quite
atural, too.
‘You’re first of the lot, Mas’r Davy!’ said Mr. Peggotty with a
happy face. ‘Don’t keep in that coat, sir, if it’s wet.’
‘Thank you, Mr. Peggotty,’ said I, giving him my outer coat to
hang up. ‘It’s quite dry.’
‘So ’tis!’ said Mr. Peggotty, feing my shoulders. ‘As a chip! Sit
ye dow, sir. It ain’t o’ no us saying welcom to you, but you’re
lcom, kind and harty.’
‘Thank you, Mr. Peggotty, I am sure of that. We, Peggotty!’
said I, giving her a kiss. ‘And ho are you, old woman?’
‘Ha, ha!’ laughed Mr. Peggotty, sitting down bede us, and
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rubbig his hands in his see of relief from recet trouble, and in
the genui heartin of his nature; ‘there’s not a woman in the
wureld, sir—as I tel her—that ned to fee more easy i her mnd
than her! She done her dooty by th departed, and th departed
know’d it; and th departed done what was right by hr, as she
done wat was right by th departed;—and—and—and it’s al
right!’
Mrs. Gummidge groaned.
‘Cheer up, my pritty mawther!’ said Mr. Peggotty. (But he
shook his head asde at us, evidently snsibl of the tendency of
the late occurren to recal the mery of the old one) ‘Doen’t
be do! Cheer up, for your own sef, on’y a little bit, and see if a
god deal more doe’t come nat’ral!’
‘Not to me, Dan’l,’ returned Mrs. Gumidge. ‘Nothk’s nat’ral
to me but to be l and lorn.’
‘No, no,’ said Mr. Peggotty, soothg her sorro
‘Yes, yes, Dan’l!’ said Mrs Gumdge. ‘I ai’t a pers to live
with them as has had my lft. Thinks go too cotrary with me
I had better be a riddanc’
‘Why, how should I ever sped it without you?’ said Mr.
Peggotty, with an air of serious remnstran ‘What are you a
talkig on? Doe’t I want you more no, than ever I did?’
‘I know’d I was never wanted before!’ cried Mrs. Gummidge,
wth a pitiabl whimper, ‘and now I’m tod so! Ho could I expect
to be wanted, being so lone and lorn, and so contrary!’
Mr. Peggotty seemed very muc shocked at himf for havig
made a speh capable of this unfeeg cotruction, but was
prevented from replyig, by Peggotty’s pulg hi seeve, and
shaking her head. After looking at Mrs. Gumidge for some
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moments, in sore distress of mind, h glanced at th Dutc clock,
ro, snuffed th candle, and put it in th window
‘Theer!’said Mr. Peggotty, ceeriy. ‘Theer we are, Mi
Gummidge!’ Mrs. Gummidge slightly groaned. ‘Lighted up,
accordi’ to custo! You’re a wonderi’ what that’s fur, sir! Well,
it’s fur our little Em’ly. You se, the path ai’t over lght or
ceerful arter dark; and when I’m here at the hour as she’s a
c’ home, I puts the light in the winder. That, you se,’ said
Mr. Peggotty, bedig over me with great gle, ‘mts two objects
She says, says Em’ly, “Theer’s he!” she says. Ad likese, says
Em’ly, “My unce’s theer!” Fur if I ai’t theer, I never have n light
showed.’
‘You’re a baby!’ said Peggotty; very fond of him for it, if she
thought so
‘We,’ returned Mr. Peggotty, standig with his legs pretty wide
apart, and rubbig his hands up and down them in h
mfortable satisfacti, as h looked alternatey at us and at th
fire. ‘I doe’t kn but I am. Not, you see, to lok at.’
‘Not azackly,’ observed Peggotty.
‘No,’ laughed Mr. Peggotty, ‘not to look at, but to—to consider
on, you know. I doen’t care, blss you! No I te you. When I go a
lookig and lookig about that theer pritty house of our Em’ly’s,
I’m—I’m Gormed,’ said Mr. Peggotty, with sudde emphas—
‘theer! I can’t say more—if I do’t fee as if the littlet things was
r, a’most. I takes ’em up and I put ’em dow, and I toucs of
’em as delicate as if thy was our Em’ly. So ’tis with her little
boets and that. I couldn’t see one on ’em rough used a
purpose—not fur the whole wured. There’s a babby fur you, in
the form of a great Sea Porkypi!’ said Mr. Peggotty, relvig hi
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earntn with a roar of laughter.
Peggotty and I both laughed, but nt so loud.
‘It’s my opi, you se,’ said Mr. Peggotty, with a deghted
face, after some furthr rubbing of his legs, ‘as this is alg of my
havin’ played with her so much, and made belve as w was
Turks, and Frenc, and sharks, and every wariety of forirs—
bless you, yes; and lions and whales, and I doe’t kn what all!—
when sh warn’t n higher than my kn I’ve got ito the way on
it, you know. Why, this here candle, now!’ said Mr. Peggotty,
gleefully holdig out his hand towards it, ‘ I know wery wel that
arter sh’s married and gone, I sal put that candl theer, just the
sam as n I know wery wel that when I’m here o’ nights (and
were els should I live, bl your arts, whatever fortun’ I co
to!) and sh ain’t here or I ain’t theer, I shal put the candl i
the wder, and st afore the fire, pretendig I’m expetig of her,
like I’m a doing now There’s a babby for you,’ said Mr. Peggotty,
with another roar, ‘i the form of a Sea Porkypi! Why, at the
present mute, wen I see the candl sparkle up, I says to mysf,
“She’s a looking at it! Em’ly’s a coming!” There’s a babby for you,
i the form of a Sea Porkypi! Right for al that,’ said Mr.
Peggotty, stopping in hi roar, and smitig his hands togethr; ‘fur
hre she is!’
It was only Ham The night should have turned mre wet s
I cam i, for he had a large sou’wester hat on, souchd over his
fac
‘Wheer’s Em’ly?’ said Mr. Peggotty.
Ham made a moti with his head, as if she wre outside. Mr.
Peggotty took the light from the window, trimd it, put it on the
tabl, and was busily stirring th fire, wh Ham, wh had not
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moved, said:
‘Mas’r Davy, wi you come out a minute, and see wat Em’ly
and me has got to show you?’
We went out. As I pasd him at the door, I saw, to my
astonishment and fright, that he was deadly pale. He pushed me
hastiy ito the open air, and cosed the door upon us Ony upon
us two.
‘Ham! what’s the matter?’
‘Mas’r Davy!—’ Oh, for hi broke heart, how dreadfully he
wept!
I was paralysed by th sight of such grief. I don’t kn what I
thought, or what I dreaded. I could only look at him
‘Ham! Por god fe! For Heave’s sake, tell m wat’s th
atter!’
‘My love, Mas’r Davy—the pride and hope of my art—her that
I’d have did for, and would die for now—she’s go!’
‘Gone!’
‘Em’ly’s run away! Oh, Mas’r Davy, think how she’s run away,
w I pray my god and gracious God to ki her (hr that is so
dear above all things) sooner than let her co to ruin and
disgrace!’
The fac he turned up to the troubld sky, the quiverig of his
clasped hands, th agoy of his figure, reai associated with th
lonely waste, in my remembran, to this hur. It is always night
there, and he is the only object in the sc
‘You’re a schoar,’ he said, hurriedly, ‘and kn wat’s right
and best. What am I to say, indoors? Ho am I ever to break it to
, Mas’r Davy?’
I saw th door move, and instinctivey tried to hd th latc o
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the outside, to gai a mot’s tim It was too late. Mr. Peggotty
thrust forth his face; and never could I forget th change that
came upo it when he saw us, if I were to live five hundred years.
I remember a great wai and cry, and th wmen hanging about
hm, and we all standing in th ro; I with a paper in my hand,
whic Ham had given m; Mr. Peggotty, with his vest torn ope,
his hair wild, his face and lips quite white, and bld trickling
dow his bosom (it had sprung fro his mouth, I thk), looking
fixedly at me
‘Read it, sir,’ he said, in a low shivering voice. ‘Slow, plase. I
doen’t kn as I can understand.’
In the midst of the since of death, I read thus, from a blotted
ltter:
‘“When you, who love me s muc better than I ever
have deserved, eve wh my mid was innocent, see
this, I shall be far away.”’
‘I shall be fur away,’ he repeated slowly. ‘Stop! Em’ly fur away.
Wel!’
‘“When I leave my dear home—my dear home—oh, my
dear home!—in the morng,”’
the letter bore date on the previus nght:
‘“—it w be never to come back, unless he brings me
back a lady. This will be found at night, many hurs
after, instead of me. Oh, if you knew ho my hart is
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torn. If eve you, that I have wronged s muc, that
never can forgive me, could only kn what I suffer! I
am to wicked to write about myself! Oh, take comfort
in thking that I am so bad. Oh, for mercy’s sake, te
uncle that I never loved him half so dear as now Oh,
don’t remember ho affectionate and kind you have all
been to m—do’t reber we were ever to be
arried—but try to think as if I did when I was lttle,
and was buried sere. Pray Heave that I am
going away fro, have compassi on my uncle! Te
m that I never loved him half so dear. Be hs comfort.
Love so god girl that wi be what I was on to
unc, and be true to you, and worthy of you, and know
no sham but me. God bls all! I’ll pray for all, ofte,
o my kn If he don’t brig me back a lady, and I
don’t pray for my own self, I’l pray for all. My parting
lve to un My last tears, and my last thanks, for
unce!”’
That was all.
He stod, long after I had ceasd to read, still lookig at me. At
lgth I ventured to take hi hand, and to entreat him, as well as I
could, to endeavour to get some comand of himself. He replied,
‘I thankee, sir, I thankee!’ withut movig.
Ham spoke to him Mr. Peggotty was so far sensibl of hi
affliti, that he wrung his hand; but, otherwis, he remaied i
th same state, and no on dared to disturb him.
Slowly, at last, he moved his eyes from my fac, as if he were
wakig from a vison, and cast them round the room. Then he
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said, in a low voice:
‘Who’s the man? I want to know his nam’
Ham glanced at me, and suddenly I felt a shok that struck me
back.
‘Thre’s a man suspected,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘Who is it?’
‘Mas’r Davy!’ implored Ham ‘Go out a bit, and lt me te h
at I must. You doen’t ought to hear it, sir.’
I felt the shock agai I sank down in a chair, and tried to utter
s reply; but my tongue was fettered, and my sight was weak.
‘I want to kn his name!’ I heard said once more
‘For some time past,’ Ham faltered, ‘thre’s been a servant
about here, at odd tim There’s be a gen’l’n too. Both of ’e
beged to one another.’
Mr. Peggotty stood fixed as before, but nw lookig at him
‘Th servant,’ pursued Ham, ‘was seen alg with—our poor
girl—last night. He’s be in hidig about here, this week or over.
He was thought to have gone, but he was hidig. Do’t stay,
Mas’r Davy, do’t!’
I felt Peggotty’s arm round my nk, but I culd nt have
mved if the house had be about to fall upon me
‘A strange chay and hos was outsde to, this morng, o
the Norwich road, a’most afore the day broke,’ Ham wt o. ‘Th
rvant went to it, and come fro it, and wnt to it again. Whe h
went to it agai, Em’ly was ngh him The t’other was inde He’s
the man’
‘For the Lord’s love,’ said Mr. Peggotty, falg back, and
putting out his hand, as if to kep off what he dreaded. ‘Doen’t tell
me his name’s Sterforth!’
‘Mas’r Davy,’ exclaimed Ham, in a broke voice, ‘it ai’t n fault
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of yourn—and I am far from laying of it to you—but his nam i
Sterforth, and he’s a damd viain!’
Mr. Peggotty uttered no cry, and sd no tear, and moved n
more, unti h seed to wake again, all at once, and pulled dow
is rough coat fro its peg in a cornr.
‘Bear a hand with this! I’m struck of a heap, and can’t do it,’ he
said, impatitly. ‘Bear a hand and hep me. Well!’ w
somebody had done so. ‘Now give me that thr hat!’
Ham asked him whithr he was going.
‘I’m a going to sek my nie I’m a going to sk my Em’ly. I’m
a going, first, to stave i that theer boat, and sik it where I would
have drownded him, as I’m a lving soul, if I had had one thought
of what was in hi! A he sat afore me,’ he said, wildly, holdig
out his clenched right hand, ‘as he sat afore me, face to face, strike
me dow dead, but I’d have dronded hm, and thught it right!—
I’m a gog to seek my niece.’
‘Where?’ crid Ham, iterposig himelf before the door.
‘Aywhere! I’m a going to sek my n through the wureld.
I’m a going to find my poor n i her sham, and brig her
back. No one stop me! I tel you I’m a going to sek my ni!’
‘No, no!’ cried Mrs. Gumidge, coming betw th, in a fit
of crying. ‘No, no, Dan’l, not as you are now Seek her in a littl
ile, my lone lorn Dan’l, and that’ll be but right! but not as you
are no Sit ye down, and give me your forgive for having
ever been a worrit to you, Dan’l—wat have my cotrari ever
be to this!—and let us speak a word about them tim when s
was first an orphan, and when Ham was too, and when I was a
poor widder woman, and you took me in It’l soften your poor
heart, Dan’l,’ laying her head upo hi shoulder, ‘and you’ll bear
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your sorrow better; for you know the prom, Dan’l, “A you have
do it unto one of the least of thes, you have do it unto me”,—
and that can nver fai under this roof, that’s be our ster for
so many, many year!’
He was quite passive now; and wh I hard h crying, th
pul that had be upo me to go do upo my kn, and
ask their pardo for the delation I had caused, and curse
Sterforth, yieded to a better feeg, My overcarged heart found
th same ref, and I cried to
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Chapter 32
THE BEGINNING OF A LONG JOURNEY
W
hat is natural in me, is natural in many othr men, I
infer, and so I am not afraid to write that I never had
lved Sterforth better than when the tie that bound
me to hm were broke. In th kee distress of th discovery of hi
unworthin, I thought more of al that was briant i hi, I
softed more toards all that was god i hm, I did more justice
to the qualti that might have made him a man of a nobl nature
and a great nam, than ever I had do in the height of my
devoti to him. Deply as I felt my own unnscius part in h
poutio of an honest home, I beeved that if I had been brought
face to face with him, I could not have uttered o reproach. I
should have lved him s well sti—though he fasnated m no
ger—I should have held in so muc tenderne the mry of
my affection for hm, that I thk I should have bee as weak as a
spirit-wunded child, in all but th entertainment of a thught that
we culd ever be re-united. That thought I never had. I felt, as he
had felt, that all was at an end betw us What hi
rembrance of me were, I have never known—they were lght
eugh, perhaps, and easily dismisd—but mi of him wre as
th remembrances of a cherished friend, wh was dead.
Yes, Sterforth, long removed fro th scenes of this poor
hitory! My sorrow may bear ivoluntary witne agait you at
the judget Throne; but my angry thoughts or my reproac
ver wll, I kn!
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The nws of what had happed soon spread through the town;
insomuch that as I passed alg th strets next morng, I
overheard the peopl speakig of it at their doors. Many were hard
upon her, so few were hard upon him, but towards her sd
father and her lover there was but one stient. Amg al kids
f people a respect for th in thr distress prevailed, wich was
full of gentlene and delicacy. Th seafaring men kept apart,
wen those two were seen early, walkig with sow steps on th
beach; and stood in knots, talkig cpasonately among
themsves
It was on the beach, close down by the sa, that I found them It
would have be easy to perceve that they had not slpt al last
nght, eve if Peggotty had faid to tell me of their sti stting just
as I lft them, when it was broad day. They looked wrn; and I
thought Mr. Peggotty’s head was bowed in one night more than in
all th years I had knn him. But thy were both as grave and
steady as th sea itself, th lyig beath a dark sky, waveles—
yet with a heavy roll upo it, as if it breathd i its rest—and
touched, on the horizo, with a strip of sivery light from the
unseen sun
‘We have had a mrt of talk, sir,’ said Mr. Peggotty to me, when
we had all three walked a lttle whil in since, ‘of what we ought
and doen’t ought to do. But we see our course no’
I happed to glan at Ham, then lookig out to sa upon the
ditant light, and a frightful thought cam into my mnd—not that
his face was angry, for it was not; I recall nothing but an
expression of stern determation in it—that if ever h
untered Sterforth, he would kill him.
‘My dooty here, sir,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘is don. I’m a gog to
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sek my—’ h stopped, and went on in a firmr voice: ‘I’m a going
to seek her. That’s my dooty evermore.’
He shook his head when I asked hi where he would seek her,
and inquired if I were going to London tomorrow? I told hi I had
nt gone today, fearig to lo the chan of beg of any servic to
hi; but that I was ready to go when he would.
‘I’ll go alg with you, sir,’ he rejoind, ‘if you’re agreeable,
tomorrow.’
We walked again, for a while, in silence.
‘Ham,’ he presetly resumed,’ he’ll hod to his preset wrk,
and go and live along with my siter. The old boat yonder—’
‘Wi you dert the old boat, Mr. Peggotty?’ I gently interposed.
‘My station, Mas’r Davy,’ he returned, ‘ai’t there no loger;
and if ever a boat foundered, sie there was darkn on the fac
f the deep, that one’s go dow. But n, sr, n; I doen’t mean as
it should be deserted. Fur fro that.’
We walked again for a wh, as before, unti he explained:
‘My wishe is, sir, as it shall look, day and night, winter and
summer, as it has always looked, since she fust kn’d it. If ever
she should come a wanderig back, I wouldn’t have th old place
s to cast her off, you understand, but se to tempt her to
draw ngher to ’ t, and to pep in, maybe, like a ghost, out of the
wind and rai, through the old winder, at the old seat by the fire.
Th, maybe, Mas’r Davy, sen’ none but Missis Gummidge
there, sh might take heart to crep i, tremblg; and mght c
to be laid down in her old bed, and rest her weary head where it
was once so gay.’
I could nt speak to him in reply, though I tried.
‘Every nght,’ said Mr. Peggotty, ‘as reg’lar as the night co,
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th candle must be stod in its old pan of glass, that if ever she
should see it, it may see to say “Co back, my chid, come
back!” If ever thre’s a knock, Ham (partic’ler a soft knk), arter
dark, at your aunt’s door, doen’t you go nigh it. Let it be her—nt
you—that sees my fal chid!’
He walked a little i front of us, and kept before us for so
minutes. During this interval, I glanced at Ham again, and
observing th same expresion on his face, and his eye still
directed to the ditant lght, I touched his arm
Twice I called hm by hi name, in th to in wh I might
have trid to rouse a seeper, before he heeded me. Wh I at last
inquired on what his thughts were so bent, he replied:
‘On what’s afore me, Mas’r Davy; and over yon.’
‘On the lfe before you, do you mean?’ He had poted
confusdly out to sea.
‘Ay, Mas’r Davy. I doen’t rightly know how ’ti, but from over
yo there seemed to me to c—the end of it lke,’ lookig at me
as if he were wakig, but with the same determed face.
‘What end?’ I asked, posssed by my formr fear.
‘I doen’t kn,’ h said, thughtfuly; ‘I was calg to mind that
the beginnig of it al did take place here—and then the end c
But it’s go! Mas’r Davy,’ he added; answering, as I thk, my
look; ‘you han’t no call to be afeerd of me: but I’m kiender
muddled; I don’t fare to fe no matters,’—wich was as much as
to say that he was not himf, and quite cofounded.
Mr. Peggotty stopping for us to join him: we did so, and said no
more. Th remembran of this, in connexi with my formr
thought, however, haunted me at interval, eve until the
inexorable end came at its appointed time.
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We inbly approached th old boat, and entered. Mrs
Gummidge, no longer moping in her especal cornr, was busy
preparig breakfast. Sh took Mr. Peggotty’s hat, and placd his
at for him, and spoke so comfortably and softly, that I hardly
knew her.
‘Dan’l, my god man,’ said she, ‘you must eat and drik, and
kep up your strength, for without it you’l do nowt. Try, that’s a
dear soul! A if I disturb you wth my cicketten,’ she meant hr
chattering, ‘tel me so, Dan’l, and I won’t.’
When she had srved us al, she withdrew to the wdow, were
she sedulously employed hersf in repairing some shirts and
other cothes begig to Mr. Peggotty, and neatly foldig and
packing th in an old oikin bag, such as sailors carry.
Meanwhile, she continued talkig, in th same quiet manr:
‘All times and seas, you know, Dan’l,’ said Mrs. Gummidge,
‘I shall be allus here, and everythnk wi look accordin’ to your
wishe. I’m a poor schoar, but I shall write to you, odd times,
when you’re away, and sed my letters to Mas’r Davy. Maybe
you’ll write to me to, Dan’l, odd times, and te me ho you fare to
fe upo your lone lorn journies’
‘You’ll be a soltary woman heer, I’m afeerd!’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘No, no, Dan’l,’ she returned, ‘I shan’t be that. Doen’t you mind
m I shal have enough to do to kep a Bee for you’ (Mrs.
Gummidge meant a ho), ‘agai you come back—to keep a
Ben hre for any that may hap to come back, Dan’l. In th fi
tim, I shal set outside the door as I used to do If any sould come
ngh, they sal s the old widder woman true to ’e, a log way
off.’
What a change in Mrs Gumidge in a littl time! She was
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anothr woman. She was so devoted, she had such a quick
perception of what it would be wel to say, and what it would be
to leave unsaid; she was so forgetful of herself, and so
regardful of the sorrow about her, that I held her i a sort of
venration. The work sh did that day! There were many things to
be brought up from the beach and stored in the outhouse—as oars,
nts, sai, cordage, spars, lobster-pots, bags of ballast, and the
lke; and though there was abundane of astane redered,
there beg nt a pair of workig hands on al that shore but
would have laboured hard for Mr. Peggotty, and be well paid i
beg asked to do it, yet she persisted, all day long, i toiling under
weights that sh was quite unequal to, and fagging to and fro on
all sorts of uncesary errands. As to deplorig her misfortunes,
se appeared to have entirey lot the reecti of ever havig
had any. She preserved an equable ceerfuln i the mdst of
her sympathy, whic was nt the least astonig part of the
cange that had co over her. Querulousn was out of the
question. I did nt eve observe her voic to falter, or a tear to
esape from her eyes, the whole day through, until twilght; when
s and I and Mr. Peggotty beg alone together, and he having
fal aseep i perfect exhaustion, she broke into a halfsuppred fit of sobbing and crying, and taking me to th door,
said, ‘Ever ble you, Mas’r Davy, be a frid to hi, poor dear!’
Th, she immediatey ran out of th house to wash her face, in
order that sh might sit quietly bede hi, and be found at work
there, when he should awake. In short I left her, when I went away
at nght, the prop and staff of Mr. Peggotty’s afflitin; and I could
nt mditate eough upon the l that I read in Mrs.
Gummidge, and th new experice she unfoded to me
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It was betw nine and ten o’ck wh, strog in a
mlanholy manner through the town, I stopped at Mr. Omr’s
door. Mr. Omer had take it s muc to heart, his daughter told
me, that h had bee very low and poorly all day, and had go to
bed withut his pipe.
‘A deceitful, bad-harted girl,’ said Mrs. Joram ‘Thre was no
good in her, ever!’
‘Don’t say so,’ I returned. ‘You don’t thk so.’
‘Yes, I do!’ cried Mrs. Joram, angrily.
‘No, no,’ said I.
Mrs. Joram tossd her head, endeavouring to be very stern and
cross; but she could not comand her softer self, and began to cry.
I was young, to be sure; but I thought muc the better of her for
this sympathy, and fancied it became hr, as a virtuous wife and
mothr, very well indeed.
‘What wi she ever do!’ sobbed Mi. ‘Where wi she go!
What w beme of hr! Oh, ho could she be so cruel, to hersf
and him!’
I rebered the ti when Mi was a young and pretty
girl; and I was glad se rebered it too, so feeligly.
‘My littl Miie,’ said Mrs. Joram, ‘has only just now be got
to sleep. Eve in her sleep she is sobbing for Em’ly. A day long,
littl Minnie has cried for her, and asked me, over and over again,
wether Em’ly was wiked? What can I say to her, when Em’ly
tid a ribbon off hr own neck round littl Minnie’s th last night
she was here, and laid her head dow on th pillow beside hr ti
she was fast asleep! Th ribbon’s round my littl Minnie’s neck
n It ought not to be, perhaps, but what can I do? Em’ly i very
bad, but they were fond of one another. And the cd knows
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nthing!’
Mrs. Joram was so unappy that her husband came out to take
care of her. Leavig them together, I went home to Peggotty’s;
more melany myself, if possibl, than I had be yet.
That good creature—I mean Peggotty—al untired by her late
anxities and sleepless nights, was at her brothr’s, whre she
ant to stay til mornig. An od woman, who had be
employed about the house for so weeks past, wh Peggotty
had been unabl to attend to it, was the house’s only other
occupant besides myself. As I had no ocasion for her services, I
sent her to bed, by no means against her wi, and sat dow before
the kitchen fire a little whil, to think about all this
I was bldig it with the deathbed of the late Mr. Barki, and
was drivig out with the tide towards the ditanc at whic Ham
had looked so singularly in th morng, wh I was recalled fro
my wanderings by a knock at th door. Thre was a knker upo
the door, but it was not that whic made the sund. The tap was
from a hand, and low down upon the door, as if it were given by a
child.
It made me start as much as if it had bee th knock of a
footman to a person of dititi I opeed the door; and at first
looked down, to my amazet, on nthing but a great umbrea
that appeared to be walking about of itself. But pretly I
discovered undernath it, Mi Mor.
I might not have be prepared to give the little creature a very
kind reception, if, o her removing th umbrela, which her
utmot efforts were unabl to shut up, se had shown me the
‘voatile’ expression of face which had made so great an
impresion on me at our first and last meetig. But her face, as she
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turned it up to mi, was so earnt; and when I reeved her of
the umbrella (w would have be an invenit one for th
Irish Giant), she wrung hr lttl hands in such an afflted
manr; that I rather ind towards her.
‘Miss Mor!’ said I, after glancing up and dow th epty
stret, withut distinctly kning what I expected to se bedes;
‘ho do you come here? What is th matter?’ She motid to me
with her short right arm, to shut the umbrela for her; and pasg
m hurriedly, went into the kitchen Wh I had cosed the door,
and followd, with th umbrela in my hand, I found hr stting o
the corner of the fender—it was a lo iro one, with two flat bars
at top to stand plate upo—in th shado of th boiler, swaying
herself backwards and forwards, and chafig her hands upon her
knee like a pers in pain.
Quite alarmed at beg th only recipient of this untimely visit,
and the only spetator of this portentous beaviour, I excaid
agai, ‘Pray tell me, Mis Mowcher, what is the matter! are you
ill?’
‘My dear young soul,’ returned Mis Mowcher, squeezig her
hands upon her heart one over the other. ‘I am il here, I am very
i To think that it should c to this, when I might have known
it and perhaps preveted it, if I hadn’t be a thughtls fo!’
Again hr large bot (very disproportiate to th figure)
went backwards and forwards, in her sayig of her lttle body to
and fro; while a most gigantic bot rocked, in unison wth it,
upon the wal
‘I am surprised,’ I began, ‘to see you so distressed and
serius’—whn she interrupted me
‘Yes, it’s alays so!’ she said. ‘Thy are al surprid, th
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inconsiderate young people, fairly and full gron, to see any
natural feeg in a lttle thing like m! They make a plaything of
m, use m for their amuset, throw me away when they are
tired, and wonder that I fee mre than a toy horse or a woode
soldier! Ye, yes, that’s the way. The old way!’
‘It may be, with othrs,’ I returned, ‘but I do assure you it is not
with me Perhaps I ought not to be at all surprisd to se you as
you are now: I kn so littl of you. I said, wthut consideration,
what I thought.’
‘What can I do?’ returned the little woman, standig up, and
holdig out her arm to show herself. ‘See! What I am, my father
was; and my sister is; and my brothr is. I have worked for sister
and brother thes many years—hard, Mr. Copperfied—all day. I
must live. I do n harm. If there are peopl so unreflectig or s
rue, as to make a jet of me, what is left for me to do but to make
a jest of mysf, them, and everythig? If I do s, for the ti,
whose fault is that? Mine?’
No Not Mis Mowcher’s, I perceved.
‘If I had shon myself a sensitive dwarf to your false friend,’
pursued the little woman, shakig her head at m, with
reproacful earntne, ‘how muc of his help or good will do you
think I should ever have had? If little Mowcher (who had no hand,
young gentleman, in th making of hersf) addressed hersf to
, or the like of him, beause of her mifortune, when do you
suppose hr sall vo would have be heard? Littl Mor
wuld have as much ned to live, if she was th bitterest and
dullest of pigm; but she couldn’t do it. No. She might wistl for
her bread and butter ti she died of Ar.’
Miss Mor sat dow on th feder agai, and tok out hr
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handkerchief, and wiped her eyes.
‘Be thankful for me, if you have a kid hart, as I thk you
have,’ she said, ‘that while I kn we what I am, I can be cheerful
and endure it all. I am thankful for myself, at any rate, that I can
find my tiny way through the world, without beg beholde to
anyo; and that in return for all that is thro at me, in foy or
vanty, as I go along, I can throw bubbl back. If I do’t brood
over al I want, it is the better for me, and not the worse for
anyone If I am a plaything for you giants, be gentl with me’
Miss Mor replacd her handkercf in her pocket, looking
at me with very intent expresion all th while, and pursued:
‘I saw you in th stret just now You may suppo I am not
abl to walk as fast as you, with my short legs and short breath,
and I couldn’t overtake you; but I guesd where you cam, and
cam after you. I have be here before, today, but the good
woman wasn’t at home’
‘Do you know her?’ I deanded.
of her, and about her,’ sh repld, ‘from Omr and
‘I kn
Joram I was there at seven o’cock this morning. Do you
remember what Sterforth said to me about this unfortunate girl,
that tim when I saw you both at the in?’
The great bot on Mis Mowcher’s head, and the greater
bonnet on the wall, began to go backwards and forwards agai
en she asked th question.
I rembered very wel what sh referred to, having had it in
y thoughts many tim that day. I told her so
‘May the Father of al Evi cofound him,’ said the little woan,
holdig up her forefinger between m and her sparklg eyes, ‘and
ten tim mre cofound that wicked srvant; but I beved it was
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you wh had a boyish passion for her!’
‘I?’ I repeated.
‘Chld, chid! In th name of bld ill-fortun,’ cried Miss
Mowcher, wringing her hands ipatietly, as sh went to and fro
agai upon the fender, ‘why did you prai her so, and blush, and
look diturbed? ‘
I culd nt cnceal from mysf that I had do this, though for
a reason very different fro her supposition.
‘What did I know?’ said Miss Mor, taking out her
handkerchief agai, and giving one little stamp on the ground
wver, at short intervals, she applied it to hr eye wth both
ands at once. ‘He was crosing you and whdling you, I saw; and
you were soft wax in his hands, I saw Had I lft the room a
minute, w his man told me that “Young Innocen” (s he
alld you, and you may call him “Old Guit” all the days of your
lfe) had set his heart upon her, and se was giddy and liked him,
but his master was resolved that no harm should come of it—more
for your sake than for hers—and that that was thr bus
here? How could I but beeve him? I saw Steerforth soothe and
please you by his praise of her! You were th first to mention hr
nam You owned to an old admration of her. You were hot and
cd, and red and white, al at onc when I spoke to you of her.
did I think—but that you were a young
What could I thk—wat
liberti in everythng but experice, and had fallen ito hands
that had experie enough, and could manage you (havig the
fany) for your own good? Oh! oh! oh! They were afraid of my
findig out the truth,’ excaid Mis Mowcher, getting off the
fender, and trotting up and do the kitchen with her two short
arms distressfully lifted up, ‘beause I am a sharp littl thg—I
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nd be, to get through the world at al!—and they deved m
altogether, and I gave the poor unfortunate girl a letter, whic I
fully beve was the beging of her ever speakig to Littimr,
who was left bed on purpose!’
I stood amazed at the revelatio of al this perfidy, lookig at
Miss Mor as she walked up and dow th kitcn until she
as out of breath: when she sat upo the fender agai, and, dryig
her fac with her handkerchief, shook her head for a log tim,
without otherwise moving, and without breakig s
‘My country rounds,’ she added at length, ‘brought me to
Norwich, Mr. Cpperfield, th nght before last. What I happed
to find there, about their seret way of cog and going, without
you—wich was strange—led to my suspectig somethg wrog.
I got into the coach from Londo last night, as it cam through
Norwic, and was here this morning. Oh, oh, oh! too late!’
Poor lttle Mowcher turned s chy after al her crying and
fretting, that s turned round on the fender, putting her poor
lttle wet feet in amg the ashes to warm them, and sat lookig at
the fire, lke a large do I sat in a chair on the other side of the
harth, lost in unappy refltis, and looking at th fire to, and
sometimes at her.
‘I must go,’ she said at last, rising as she spoke. ‘It’s late. You
don’t mistrust me?’
Meting hr sharp glance, wich was as sharp as ever wh she
asked me, I could not on that short challenge answr no, quite
frankly.
‘Co!’ said she, acceptig th offer of my hand to hlp hr
over the fender, and lookig wistfully up into my fac, ‘you know
you wouldn’t mistrust me, if I was a ful-sized woman!’
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I felt that there was muc truth in this; and I felt rather
ashamed of myself.
‘You are a young man,’ she said, ndding. ‘Take a wrd of
advic, eve from three foot nothing. Try nt to asate bodiy
defects with mental, my god friend, except for a solid reason.’
Sh had got over the fender now, and I had got over my
suspicion. I told her that I beved she had given me a faithful
account of hersf, and that we had both be hapls instruments
in designng hands. She thanked me, and said I was a god fe
‘Now, md!’ s excaid, turning back on her way to the
door, and lookig srewdly at me, with her forefinger up agai—‘I
have so reason to suspect, from what I have heard—my ears
are always ope; I can’t afford to spare what powrs I have—that
they are go abroad. But if ever they return, if ever any one of
th returns, while I am alive, I am more likely than anthr,
going about as I do, to find it out soon. Whatever I know, you sal
know. If ever I can do anythig to serve the poor betrayed girl, I
wll do it faithfully, plase Heave! And Littimer had better have a
bloodhound at his back, than little Mowcher!’
I placed implicit faith in this last statet, wh I marked th
look with which it was accompanied.
‘Trust me no more, but trust me n le, than you would trust a
full-sized wan,’ said th littl creature, toucng me appealingly
on the writ. ‘If ever you see me agai, unlke what I am no, and
lke what I was when you first saw me, obsrve what copany I
am in Cal to mid that I am a very hepl and defe lttl
thing. Think of me at ho with my brothr like myself and sister
like myself, w my day’s wrk i done. Perhaps you wn’t, th,
be very hard upon m, or surprisd if I can be ditresd and
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serius. Good night!’
I gave Miss Mor my hand, with a very different opiion of
her from that whic I had hitherto entertaid, and oped the
door to lt her out. It was not a triflg bus to get the great
umbrela up, and properly balanced in her grasp; but at last I
succesfully accomplished this, and saw it go bobbig dow th
treet through the rai, without the least appearanc of having
anybody undernath it, except w a heavier fal than usual fro
some over-carged water-spout sent it toppling over, on on side,
and divered Mis Mowcher strugglig violetly to get it right.
After makig on or two sall to her relf, whic were rendered
futile by th umbrea’s hopping on again, like an immen bird,
before I could reach it, I came in, went to bed, and spt ti
morng.
In the mornig I was joind by Mr. Peggotty and by my old
nurse, and we went at an early hour to the cach offic, where
Mrs. Gummidge and Ham were waiting to take leave of us
‘Mas’r Davy,’ Ham whispered, drawing me aside, wile Mr.
Peggotty was stowing his bag among the luggage, ‘h life i quite
broke up. He doen’t know wheer he’s going; he doen’t know—
what’s afore him; he’s bound upo a voyage that’l last, o and off,
all th rest of his days, take my wured for ‘t, unless h fids wat
he’s a sekig of. I am sure you’ll be a frid to him, Mas’r Davy?’
‘Trust me, I wi indeed,’ said I, shaking hands with Ham
earntly.
‘Thankee. Thankee, very kid, sr. One thg furder. I’m in
good employ, you know, Mas’r Davy, and I han’t no way now of
spendig what I gets. Money’s of n use to me n more, excpt to
lve. If you can lay it out for him, I sal do my work with a better
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art. Though as to that, sir,’ and he spoke very steadiy and midly,
‘you’re not to think but I shall work at all times, like a man, and act
th best that lays in my powr!’
I told h I was wll conviced of it; and I hinted that I hoped
the tim might eve co, when he would case to lad the ly
life he naturaly conteplated now
‘No, sir,’ h said, shaking hs had, ‘all that’s past and over wth
me, sir. No on can never fi th place that’s epty. But you’ll
bear in mid about th money, as thr’s at all times some laying
by for him?’
Redig hi of the fact, that Mr. Peggotty derived a steady,
though certaiy a very moderate in from the bequest of hi
ate brother-in-law, I promed to do s We then took leave of
eac other. I cant lave him even n, wthout reberig
wth a pang, at once his modest fortitude and his great sorro
As to Mrs. Gummidge, if I were to edeavour to describe h
e ran do the street by the side of the coach, seg nthg
but Mr. Peggotty on the roof, through the tears sh tried to
repress, and dashing hersf against th people wh were comng
in th opposte direction, I should enter on a task of some
difficulty. Therefore I had better leave her sittig on a baker’s
door-step, out of breath, with no shape at all remaig i her
bonnet, and one of her shoes off, lyig on the pavemet at a
considerable distance.
Wh we got to our journey’s end, our first pursuit was to look
about for a little lodgig for Peggotty, where her brother culd
have a bed. We were so fortunate as to fid on, of a very can
and cheap description, over a chandlr’s shop, only tw strets
removed fro me. Whe we had engaged this domicile, I bought
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some cold meat at an eating-huse, and tok my fe-travellers
home to tea; a proceedig, I regret to state, wh did not meet
with Mrs. Crupp’s approval, but quite the cotrary. I ought to
observe, hver, in explanation of that lady’s state of mind, that
she was much offended by Peggotty’s tucking up her widow’s
gown before sh had be ten mutes in the place, and stting to
work to dust my bedroom. This Mrs. Crupp regarded in the light
of a liberty, and a liberty, she said, was a thing she never allowd.
Mr. Peggotty had made a cuniati to me on the way to
London for which I was not unprepared. It was, that he purpod
first seg Mrs. Sterforth. As I felt bound to ast hi i this,
and als to mediate betwee them; with the vie of sparing the
mther’s feegs as muc as pobl, I wrote to her that night. I
told her as mdly as I culd what his wrong was, and what my own
share in his injury. I said he was a man in very com life, but of
a mt gentl and upright character; and that I ventured to
express a hpe that she wuld not refuse to see hi in his heavy
trouble. I metid two o’cock in the afternoon as the hour of
our cog, and I set the ltter mysf by the first cach in the
morng.
t the appoted tim, we stood at the door—the door of that
house where I had be, a few days sie, s happy: where my
youthful cfidence and warmth of heart had been yielded up s
frey: whic was closed agait m henceforth: whic was nw a
waste, a ruin
No Littimer appeared. Th pleasanter face which had replaced
his, on th ocas of my last visit, answered to our sums,
and went before us to the drawg-room. Mrs. Sterforth was
ttig thre Roa Dartl glded, as we wet in, fro anthr part
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of the room and stood bed her chair.
I saw, diretly, in his mother’s fac, that she knew from himelf
wat he had do. It was very pal; and bore the trac of deeper
eotio than my letter alone, weaked by the doubts her
fondness would have raid upo it, wuld have be likely to
reate. I thought her more like him than ever I had thought her;
and I felt, rather than saw, that the resblan was not lt on
my companion.
Sh sat upright i her arm-cair, with a statey, imvable,
passion air, that it sed as if nothing could disturb. She
ooked very steadfastly at Mr. Peggotty when he stood before her;
and he looked quite as steadfastly at hr. Rosa Dartle’s kee
glance comprended all of us. For some moments not a wrd was
spoken.
Sh motioned to Mr. Peggotty to be seated. He said, i a lo
voice, ‘I shouldn’t fe it nat’ral, ma’am, to sit dow in this house
I’d soor stand.’ And this was sucded by anothr silen,
wich she broke thus:
‘I know, with dep regret, what has brought you here. What do
you want of me? What do you ask me to do?’
He put his hat under his arm, and feing in hs breast for
Emy’s letter, took it out, unfolded it, and gave it to her. ‘Plas to
read that, ma’am. That’s my niece’s hand!’
She read it, in th same statey and impassive way,—untouched
by its contets, as far as I could see,—and returnd it to him.
‘“Unless he brigs me back a lady,”’ said Mr. Peggotty, tracing
out that part with his finger. ‘I co to know, ma’am, whether he
wil kep his wured?’
‘No,’ she returned.
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‘Why not?’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘It is impossible. He would disgrace himself. You cant fai to
know that she is far below him.’
‘Raise her up!’ said Mr. Peggotty.
‘She is unducated and ignorant.’
‘Maybe she’s not; maybe she is,’ said Mr. Peggotty. ‘I think nt,
ma’am; but I’m n judge of them things. Teach her better!’
‘Si you oblge me to speak more plaiy, wh I am very
uning to do, hr humble conxions would reder such a thing
imposble, if nothg el did.’
‘Hark to this, ma’am,’ he returned, slowly and quietly. ‘You
know what it is to love your child. So do I. If she was a hundred
times my child, I couldn’t love her more. You doe’t kn what it
is to lose your chid. I do. All th heaps of riche in th wureld
would be nwt to m (if they was mi) to buy her back! But, save
hr fro this disgrace, and she shal never be disgraced by us. Not
one of us that sh’s growed up amg, not on of us that’s lived
along with her and had her for their al in all, thes many year, wil
ver look upo her pritty face again. We’ll be contet to let hr be;
w’ll be contet to think of her, far off, as if she was undernath
another sun and sky; we’ll be ctet to trust her to her
husband,—to her littl chidre, p’raps,—and bide th time w
all of us shall be alike in quality afore our God!’
The rugged eloquen with whic he spoke, was not devoid of
all effect. She still prerved her proud manner, but thre was a
touc of softness in her voice, as she answered:
‘I justify nothing. I make no counter-accusati But I am sorry
to repeat, it is imposble. Such a marriage wuld irretrievably
blight my son’s carer, and ruin his prospects. Nothg is more
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certain than that it never can take place, and never w If thre is
any other copeatio—’
‘I am lookig at the like of the fac,’ iterrupted Mr.
Peggotty, with a steady but a kidlg eye, ‘that has looked at me,
in my h, at my fireside, in my boat—wr not?—smiling and
friendly, wh it was so treacherous, that I go half wid wh I
think of it. If the lke of that fac do’t turn to burng fire, at
th thught of offering money to me for my child’s blight and ruin,
it’s as bad. I doen’t kn, beg a lady’s, but what it’s worse.’
She changed now, in a moment. A angry flus overspread her
feature; and she said, i an intolerant manr, grasping th armcair tightly with her hands:
me for opeing such a pit
‘What copesati can you make to
betw me and my son? What is your love to mine? What is your
separati to ours?’
Miss Dartle softly toucd her, and bent dow hr had to
isper, but she would not hear a word.
‘No, Roa, nt a word! Let the man lte to what I say! My s,
who has be the object of my life, to whom its every thought has
be devoted, w I have gratified fro a child in every wish,
from whom I have had n separate existenc si his birth,—to
take up in a moment with a miserabl girl, and avod me! To repay
my confidece with systeati deception, for hr sake, and quit
m for her! To set this wretcd fany, agait his mther’s clai
upo his duty, love, respect, gratitude—claims that every day and
hour of his life should have strengthened into ties that nthing
could be prof agait! Is this no injury?’
Again Rosa Dartle tried to sooth her; again inffectually.
‘I say, Rosa, not a word! If he can stake his all upo th lightest
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object, I can stake my al upon a greater purpose. Let him go
where he wil, with the means that my lve has seured to him!
Do h think to reduce me by long abse? He kns hi
ther very little if he do Let him put away his whim now, and
he is welce back. Let him nt put her away nw, and he nver
shall come near me, living or dying, wh I can raise my hand to
make a sign against it, unless, beig rid of her for ever, he comes
humbly to m and begs for my forgive This is my right. This
will have. This is th separati that
is th acknowledget I
thre is betw us! And is this,’ she added, looking at hr visitor
with the proud intolerant air with whic sh had begun, ‘n
jury?’
Whe I heard and saw the mother as she said the wrds, I
seemed to hear and see the so, defyig them. A that I had ever
se in him of an unyiding, wlful spirit, I saw i hr. All th
understandig that I had now of hi mdireted ergy, beam
an understanding of her character to, and a percpti that it
was, in its stronget sprigs, th same.
Sh now obsrved to m, aloud, resumg her former restrait,
that it was usss to hear more, or to say more, and that she
begged to put an ed to the intervie Sh rose with an air of
dignity to leave the room, when Mr. Peggotty signfied that it was
eedl
‘Doen’t fear m beg any hindranc to you, I have no mre to
say, ma’am,’ he rearked, as he moved toards the door. ‘I come
beer with no hope, and I take away no hope I have done wat I
thowt should be do, but I nver looked fur any good to co of
my stan’ng whre I do. This has be to evil a house fur me and
mine, fur me to be in my right sens and expect it.’
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With this, we departed; lavig her standig by her ebowchair, a picture of a nobl prece and a handsome face.
We had, on our way out, to cross a paved hal, with glass sides
and roof, over whic a vin was traid. Its leaves and shoots were
gree then, and the day beg suny, a pair of glas doors ladig
to the garde were thrown ope Roa Dartle, entering this way
wth a no step, when we were close to them, addresd
herself to me:
‘You do we,’ she said, ‘indeed, to brig this fell here!’
Such a concentration of rage and scrn as darked her face,
and flashed i her jet-black eyes, I culd nt have thought
compressible eve into that fac. Th scar made by th hammer
was, as usual in this excited state of her feature, strongly marked.
Wh the throbbig I had se before, cam into it as I looked at
hr, she absolutely lifted up her hand, and struck it.
‘This is a fe,’ she said, ‘to champion and bring here, is h
not? You are a true man!’
‘Miss Dartle,’ I returnd, ‘you are surely not so unjust as to
ndemn me!’
‘Why do you bring division betw th tw mad creatures?’
s returned. ‘Don’t you know that they are both mad with their
on self-will and pride?’
‘Is it my doing?’ I returnd.
‘Is it your doing!’ she retorted. ‘Why do you bring this man
here?’
‘He i a deeply-ijured man, Mi Dartl,’ I repld. ‘You may
nt kn it.’
‘I know that Jam Steerforth,’ she said, with her hand o her
bo, as if to prevet the storm that was raging there, from beg
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loud, ‘has a fal, corrupt heart, and is a traitor. But wat ned I
know or care about this fellow, and his common ni?’
‘Miss Dartle,’ I returnd, ‘you deepe th injury. It is suffit
already. I will only say, at parting, that you do him a great wrong.’
‘I do hi no wrog,’ she returnd. ‘Thy are a depraved,
wrthss set. I would have her whipped!’
Mr. Peggotty pasd on, without a word, and went out at the
door.
‘Oh, sham, Miss Dartle! sham!’ I said indignantly. ‘Ho can
you bear to trample on his undeserved affliction!’
‘I would trample on them al,’ she anered. ‘I wuld have hi
use pulled dow. I would have her branded on th face, dred
in rags, and cast out i th strets to starve. If I had th powr to
sit in judget on her, I would see it done. See it done? I wuld
do it! I detest her. If I ever could reproach hr wth hr infamous
ndition, I wuld go anywre to do so. If I could hunt her to her
grave, I would. If there was any word of cofort that would be a
solace to her in her dyig hour, and only I posd it, I wouldn’t
part with it for Life itself.’
Th mere vemence of her words can convey, I am sensible,
but a wak ipre of th passion by which she was possesd,
and wich made itself articulate in her wh figure, thugh her
voice, instead of beg raid, was lowr than usual. No
description I could give of her would do justice to my rellection
of her, or to her entire deveran of herself to her anger. I have
se pasion in many forms, but I have never se it in such a
form as that.
Wh I joind Mr. Peggotty, he was walkig slowly and
thoughtfully down the hill He told me, as soon as I cam up with
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hi, that having nw diarged his mind of what he had
purposed dog in London, he mant ‘to set out on hi travels’,
that nght. I asked him where he meant to go? He only ansred,
‘I’m a gog, sir, to seek my niece.’
We went back to the little ldgig over the chandlr’s shop, and
there I found an opportunity of repeatig to Peggotty what he had
said to me. She informd me, in return, that he had said th same
to hr that morning. She knew no more than I did, whre he was
going, but sh thought he had s project saped out i hi
mind.
I did not lke to leave him, under such circumstances, and we
al three did together off a beefsteak pie—wh was one of th
any good things for whic Peggotty was famus—and whic was
curiusly flavoured on this occasi, I ret w, by a
miscelanus taste of tea, coffe, butter, bacon, che, ne
loave, fired, candles, and walut ketcup, contiually
asdig from the shop. After dir we sat for an hour or s
ar the window, without talkig muc; and then Mr. Peggotty got
up, and brought his oilskin bag and his stout stick, and laid th
on the table
He accepted, fro his sister’s stok of ready mony, a small
um on acunt of his lgacy; barely enough, I should have
thought, to keep him for a moth. He promd to cuniate
with me, when anything befel hi; and he slung his bag about
hi, took his hat and stik, and bade us both ‘Good-bye!’
‘A good attend you, dear od woman,’ he said, ebracg
Peggotty, ‘and you to, Mas’r Davy!’ shakig hands wth me. ‘I’m
a-going to seek her, fur and wide If she should c home whil
I’m away—but ah, that ain’t like to be!—or if I should brig her
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back, my meang is, that she and me shall live and di wre no
one can’t reproac her. If any hurt should co to me, remeber
that the last words I lft for her was, “My uncanged lve is with
my darling child, and I forgive her!”’
He said this solemnly, bare-haded; th, putting on his hat, he
went down the stairs, and away. We fowed to the door. It was a
warm, dusty evenig, just the ti when, in the great mai
thoroughfare out of whic that by-way turned, there was a
teporary lul in the eternal tread of feet upon the pavet, and
a strong red sun He turned, alone, at the crner of our sady
stret, into a gl of light, in which we lost him.
Rarely did that hour of the eveg co, rarely did I wake at
nght, rarely did I look up at the moon, or stars, or watch the
falg rain, or hear the wind, but I thought of his sotary figure
toiling on, poor pilgrim, and reald th words:
‘I’m a going to sek her, fur and wide If any hurt should c
to me, rember that the last words I lft for her was, “My
unchanged love is with my darlg chid, and I forgive her!”’
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Chapter 33
BLISSFUL
All this time, I had go on loving Dora, harder than ever. Her
idea was my refuge in disappoitmt and distress, and made
s amends to m, even for the lo of my frid. The more I
pitied myself, or pitid othrs, th more I sought for consolation i
the image of Dora. The greater the acumulation of det and
trouble i the world, the brighter and the purer shone the star of
Dora high above the world. I do’t think I had any defite idea
were Dora cam from, or i what degree she was reated to a
higher order of begs; but I am quite sure I should have scouted
the notion of her beg siply human, like any other young lady,
wth indignation and contept.
If I may so express it, I was steped in Dora. I was not merely
over head and ears in love with her, but I was saturated through
and through. Enough lve mght have be wrung out of me,
mtaphoricaly speakig, to drown anybody i; and yet there
uld have remained enugh within me, and all over me, to
pervade my entire existece.
The first thing I did, on my own accunt, when I cam back,
was to take a night-walk to Norwood, and, lke the subjet of a
venerable riddl of my chdhood, to go ‘round and round the
house, without ever touchig the house’, thinking about Dora. I
believe th th of this incompreble conundrum was th
moo No matter what it was, I, th moo-struck slave of Dora,
perambulated round and round the house and garde for two
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hurs, looking through crevices in th palings, getting my chin by
dit of violet exertion above the rusty nai on the top, blowig
kisses at th lights in th windows, and romantically calling o th
ght, at interval, to shd my Dora—I do’t exactly know what
fro, I suppose fro fire. Perhaps fro mice, to wich she had a
great objecti
My love was so much in my mind and it was so natural to me to
nfide in Peggotty, wh I found her again by my side of an
veg with the old st of industrial iplts, busy makig
the tour of my wardrobe, that I imparted to her, in a suffictly
roundabout way, my great seret. Peggotty was strongly
iterested, but I could not get her into my vie of the cas at al
She was audaciously prejudiced in my favour, and quite unable to
understand why I should have any misgivings, or be low-spirited
about it. ‘The young lady might think hersef well off,’ s
bserved, ‘to have such a beau. Ad as to her Pa,’ she said, ‘what
did th gentleman expect, for gracious sake!’
I obsrved, however, that Mr. Spenl’s proctorial go and
stiff cravat took Peggotty down a lttle, and inpired her with a
greater reveren for the man who was gradually beg mre
and more etherealzed i my eyes every day, and about whom a
refleted radianc sd to me to beam when he sat eret in
urt among his papers, lke a littl lighthuse in a sea of
stationery. Ad by th by, it usd to be unly strange to me
to coder, I remeber, as I sat in Court too, how those di old
judge and doctors wuldn’t have cared for Dora, if thy had
known her; how they wouldn’t have gone out of their senses with
rapture, if marriage with Dora had be proposed to them; how
Dora mght have sung, and played upon that glorifid guitar, until
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she led me to the verge of madn, yet not have tempted one of
those slow-goers an in out of his road!
I despised th, to a man. Froze-out od garders in th
flower-beds of the heart, I took a personal offene agait them al
The Benh was nthing to me but an inbl blunderer. The
Bar had n more tendern or potry in it, than the bar of a
public-huse
Takig the managemt of Peggotty’s affairs into my own
hands, with no littl pride, I proved th will, and came to a
sttlet with the Legacy Duty-offic, and took her to the Bank,
and soon got everything into an orderly trai We varied the legal
character of th prodings by going to se some perspirig
Wax-wrk, in Fleet Street (melted, I should hope, the twenty
years); and by viting Miss Linwod’s Exhbiti, which I
reber as a Mausoeum of needlrk, favourabl to sefexamination and repentance; and by inspectig th Tor of
London; and going to the top of St. Paul’s Al thes wonders
afforded Peggotty as muc pleasure as she was abl to enjoy,
under existig circumstances: except, I thk, St. Paul’s, wich,
from her log attact to her work-box, beam a rival of the
picture o th ld, and was, in some particulars, vanquished, she
dered, by that work of art.
Peggotty’s business, wich was what we usd to call ‘commonform busine’ i th Cmmons (and very light and lucrative th
-form bus was), beg settled, I took her down to the
offic one mrnig to pay her bi Mr. Spew had stepped out,
old Tiffey said, to get a gentlan sorn for a marriage li;
but as I kn he would be back directly, our place lying c to
the Surrogate’s, and to the Vicar-Geral’s offic too, I told
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Peggotty to wait.
We were a little like undertakers, in the Commons, as regarded
Probate transactions; geraly making it a rule to look more or
less cut up, wh we had to deal with clients in mournng. In a
sar feeg of delicacy, we were always blithe and lght-hearted
with the li clts Therefore I hinted to Peggotty that s
would find Mr. Spew muc recvered from the shock of Mr.
Barkis’s decease; and indeed he came in like a bridegro
But nether Peggotty nor I had eyes for him, when we saw, i
pany with him, Mr. Murdstone. He was very little changed.
His hair looked as thk, and was certainly as black, as ever; and
hi glanc was as lttle to be trusted as of old.
‘Ah, Copperfield?’ said Mr. Spenl ‘You kn this getlman,
I beeve?’
I made my gentlan a ditant bow, and Peggotty barely
regnized hm. He was, at first, somewat discrted to meet
us two together; but quickly deded what to do, and cam up to
me.
‘I hope,’ he said, ‘that you are doig we?’
‘It can hardly be interesting to you,’ said I. ‘Ye, if you wish to
know’
We looked at eac other, and he addresd himf to Peggotty.
‘And you,’ said he. ‘I am sorry to observe that you have lst your
husband.’
‘It’s nt the first lo I have had in my lfe, Mr. Murdstone,’
repld Peggotty, tremblg from head to foot. ‘I am glad to hope
that there is nobody to blame for this one,—nbody to anr for
it.’
‘Ha!’ said he; ‘that’s a cfortable refletion. You have do
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your duty?’
‘I have not worn anybody’s life away,’ said Peggotty, ‘I am
thankful to think! No, Mr. Murdstone, I have not worrited and
frightened any seet creetur to an early grave!’
He eyed her gloomiy—remrsefuly I thought—for an intant;
and said, turning his head toards me, but lookig at my fet
instead of my face:
‘We are not likely to enunter soo again;—a source of
satisfacti to us both, no doubt, for such meetings as this can
ver be agreeable. I do not expet that you, who alays rebeed
agait my just authority, exerted for your befit and
reformati, should owe me any good-wil no There is an
antipathy betwee us—’
‘An old on, I believe?’ said I, interrupting him.
He smild, and shot as evil a glance at me as could come fro
dark eyes
‘It rankld in your baby breast,’ he said. ‘It embittered the life of
your poor mother. You are right. I hope you may do better, yet; I
hope you may correct yoursf.’
Here he ended the dialogue, whic had be carried o i a lo
voice, in a cornr of th outer office, by passg into Mr. Spelow’s
room, and saying aloud, i hi smoothest manr:
‘Gentl of Mr. Spenlow’s profession are accustod to
family differe, and kn ho complicated and difficult thy
always are!’ With that, he paid th money for his licence; and,
recvig it natly folded from Mr. Spew, together with a sake
of the hand, and a pote wis for hi happi and the lady’s,
went out of the offic
I might have had more difficulty i cotraining myself to be
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silent under his wrds, if I had had less difficulty in impresing
upon Peggotty (who was only angry on my acunt, good
creature!) that w wre not in a plac for recrimination, and that I
beught her to hold her peace. She was so unusually roused, that
I was glad to compound for an affectionate hug, elicited by this
revival i her md of our old injurie, and to make the bet I
could of it, before Mr. Spenlow and th clerks
Mr. Spenlow did not appear to know what th conxion
betwee Mr. Murdstone and mysf was; whic I was glad of, for I
could not bear to acknledge him, eve in my own breast,
remebering what I did of the history of my poor mther. Mr.
Spew sed to think, if he thought anything about the matter,
that my aunt was the lader of the state party in our famy, and
that thre was a rebe party comanded by somebody e—so I
gathered at least from what he said, whil we were waitig for Mr.
Tiffey to make out Peggotty’s bi of cots
‘Miss Trotwd,’ he remarked, ‘is very firm, no doubt, and not
lkey to give way to oppotion. I have an admration for her
character, and I may congratulate you, Copperfield, on being on
the right side Differen betwee relatio are muc to be
deplored—but they are extremely geral—and the great thg i,
to be on the right side’: meang, I take it, o the sde of the
moneyed interest.
‘Rather a good marriage this, I beve?’ said Mr. Spe
I explaid that I kn nthing about it.
‘Inded!’ he said. ‘Speakig from the few words Mr. Murdstone
dropped—as a man frequently do on the occas—and from
at Miss Murdsto let fall, I should say it was rathr a god
marriage’
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‘Do you mean that thre is money, sir?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ said Mr. Spen, ‘I understand there’s mony. Beauty
to, I am tod.’
‘Indeed! Is his ne wife young?’
‘Just of age,’ said Mr. Spenl ‘So latey, that I shuld thk
they had be waitig for that.’
‘Lord deliver her!’ said Peggotty. So very emphatically and
unxpectedly, that we were all thre discposed; until Tiffey
came in with th bi
Old Tiffey soon appeared, however, and handed it to Mr.
Spenlow, to look over. Mr. Spenlow, settling his chi in hi cravat
and rubbing it softly, wnt over th ites with a depreatory air—
as if it were all Jorkins’s doing—and handed it back to Tiffey wth
a bland sigh
‘Ye,’ he said. ‘That’s right. Quite right. I should have be
extremely happy, Copperfield, to have lited the charge to th
actual expenditure out of pocket, but it is an irksom icident in
my professional life, that I am not at liberty to consult my o
wis I have a partner—Mr. Jorki’
As he said this with a gentle melancholy, which was th nxt
thing to making no charge at all, I expressed my
acknowledgets on Peggotty’s behalf, and paid Tiffey in
bankntes Peggotty then retired to her ldgig, and Mr. Spe
and I wt ito Court, where we had a divorce-suit cog on,
under an ingeous little statute (repealed n, I beeve, but i
virtue of whic I have se several marriage anulld), of whic
the merits were the. The husband, whose nam was Thomas
Benjamin, had taken out his marriage licence as Thas only;
suppreng th Benjamin, in case he should not find himself as
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comfortabl as he expected. Not findig himf as cofortable as
he expeted, or beg a little fatigued with his wife, poor fellow, he
now came forward, by a friend, after beig marrid a year or tw,
and decared that his name was Thas Benjami, and threfore
he was not married at all Wh the Court cofirmd, to his great
satisfacti
I must say that I had my doubts about th strict justice of this,
and was nt even frightened out of them by the busel of wheat
wich rencil all analies. But Mr. Spelow argued th
atter with me He said, Look at the world, there was good and
evi i that; look at the eccastial law, there was good and evi
in that. It was al part of a system. Very god. There you were!
I had nt the hardihood to suggest to Dora’s father that pobly
we mght eve iprove the world a little, if we got up early in the
mrnig, and took off our coats to the work; but I cfed that I
thought we might improve the Co Mr. Spew repld
that h wuld particularly advise me to dismiss that idea fro my
mnd, as nt beg worthy of my gentlany character; but that
he would be glad to hear from me of what iprovement I thought
th Cmmons susceptible?
Taking that part of th Commons which happened to be nearet
to us—for our man was unmarried by this tim, and we were out
of Court, and strog past th Prerogative Office—I submitted
that I thought the Prerogative Offic rather a queerly managed
institution. Mr. Spenlow iquired in what respect? I replied, with
all due deference to his experice (but with more deference, I am
afraid, to his being Dora’s fathr), that perhaps it was a littl
nonsenical that th Registry of that Court, containing th origial
lls of all perss leavig effects with th imme province of
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Canterbury, for thre wh centuries, should be an accidental
buidig, never degnd for the purpose, leasd by the registrars
for their Ow private emoumet, unsafe, nt even asrtaid to
be fire-prof, choked with th important documents it hd, and
positivey, fro th rof to th basement, a mercary speculati
of the registrars, who took great fees from the publ, and
crammed th public’s wis away anyh and anywre, having no
other object than to get rid of them chaply. That, perhaps, it was
a littl unreasable that th registrars in th receipt of profits
amountig to eight or ni thousand pounds a year (to say nthing
of th profits of th deputy registrars, and clerks of seats), should
nt be obliged to sped a little of that my, i findig a
reasonably safe place for th important documents wh al
classes of people wre compelled to hand over to th, whthr
thy would or no. That, perhaps, it was a lttl unjust, that all th
great offices in this great office should be magnificent sinecures,
we the unfortunate workig-cerks i the cd dark room
upstairs were the worst rewarded, and the last codered m,
doing iportant services, in Lodo. That perhaps it was a littl
indecent that th pricipal registrar of all, wh duty it was to
find th public, constantly resorting to this plac, all needful
accomdation, should be an ermous sinecurist i virtue of
that pot (and might be, bede, a clrgyman, a pluralt, the
hder of a staff in a cathdral, and what not),—while th publ
as put to th inconveience of which we had a specimen every
aftern w th office was busy, and which we knew to be
quite monstrous. That, perhaps, in short, this Prerogative Office of
the diocese of Canterbury was altogether suc a petit job, and
such a pernicious absurdity, that but for its beg squezed away
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in a cornr of St. Paul’s Churchyard, which fe people knew, it
must have bee turnd completely inde out, and upside dow,
long ago
Mr. Spenlow smiled as I became modestly warm on th subjet,
and then argued this question with m as he had argued the other.
He said, what was it after all? It was a questio of feeg. If the
publ felt that their wil were in safe kepig, and took it for
granted that the offic was nt to be made better, who was the
wrs for it? Nobody. Who was th better for it? All th
Sinecurists. Very we. Th th god predoated. It might not
was perfect; but what he objected to,
be a perfet syste; nothing
was, the inrti of the wedge. Under the Prerogative Offic, th
untry had be glorious. Inrt the wedge into the Prerogative
Office, and th country would cease to be glrious. He cosidered
it the pripl of a gentleman to take things as he found them;
and he had n doubt the Prerogative Offic would last our ti. I
deferred to his opin, though I had great doubts of it mysf. I
find he was right, however; for it has not only lasted to the pret
mt, but has do s in the teeth of a great parliamtary
report made (not too wigly) eighteen years ago, wen al th
bjections of mine were set forth in detail, and w th existing
stoage for wills was described as equal to th accumulati of
only tw years and a half more What thy have done with th
since; whthr thy have lost many, or whthr thy sell any, now
and then, to the butter shops; I do’t know. I am glad mi i nt
there, and I hope it may not go there, yet aw
I have set all this dow, in my pret blissful chapter, becaus
re it comes into its natural place. Mr. Spenlow and I falling ito
this conversati, proged it and our saunter to and fro, unti we
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diverged into geral topics. Ad so it came about, in th end, that
Mr. Spew told m this day week was Dora’s birthday, and he
wuld be glad if I would come dow and jo a littl piic on th
ccasi. I went out of my sen immediatey; became a mere
drivellr nxt day, on rept of a lttle lac-edged seet of ntepaper, ‘Favoured by papa. To red’; and passed th interveg
perid in a state of dotage
I think I coitted every possibl absurdity in th way of
preparati for th bld event. I turn hot wen I reber th
cravat I bought. My bots might be placed in any coti of
instruments of torture I provided, and sent dow by th Norwd
cach the nght before, a deate little hamper, amountig in
itself, I thught, almost to a declaration. Thre were crackers in it
with the tenderet mttoes that could be got for moy. At six in
the mornig, I was in Covent Garde Market, buying a bouquet
for Dora. At ten I was on horseback (I hired a gallant grey, for the
occason), with the bouquet in my hat, to kep it fresh, trotting
down to Norwood.
I suppo that when I saw Dora in the garden and preteded
nt to see her, and rode past the house pretendig to be anxiously
lookig for it, I comitted tw small fories which othr young
gentlemen in my circumstances might have committed—becaus
did find th
thy cam so very natural to me But oh! wh I
house, and did diount at the garde-gate, and drag those stonyhearted boots across the lawn to Dora stting on a garde-seat
under a lilac tre, what a spetac she was, upo that beautiful
rnig, among the butterfli, in a white chp bot and a dre
f celestial blue! Thre was a young lady wth hr—comparativey
stricken in years—almost twty, I should say. Her name was Miss
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Mis. and Dora calld her Julia. She was th bosom friend of Dora.
Happy Mi Mis!
Jip was thre, and Jip would bark at me again. Whe I
presented my bouquet, he gnashed his teeth with jealousy. We he
mght. If he had the last idea how I adored hi mtress, wel he
mght!
‘Oh, thank you, Mr. Copperfield! What dear flrs!’ said Dora.
I had had an itention of saying (and had bee studying th
bet form of words for three mi) that I thought them beautiful
her. But I couldn’t manage it. She was
before I saw th so near
too bewilderig. To se her lay the flowers against her little
dimpled chi, was to lose all prece of mind and powr of
language i a feble ecstasy. I wonder I didn’t say, ‘Kil me, if you
have a heart, Mis Mill Let me die here!’
Then Dora held my flowers to Jip to sm Then Jip growled,
and wouldn’t sl them Then Dora laughed, and held them a
lttle closer to Jip, to make him Then Jip laid hold of a bit of
geranium with his teth, and worrid imagiary cats in it. Th
Dora beat hm, and pouted, and said, ‘My poor beautiful flrs!’
as compassionately, I thught, as if Jip had laid hod of me. I
wised he had!
‘You’ll be so glad to har, Mr. Copperfield,’ said Dora, ‘that that
cross Miss Murdsto is not here. She has go to hr brothr’s
marriage, and wi be away at least thre weks. Isn’t that
deghtful?’
I said I was sure it must be delightful to her, and all that was
delightful to hr was delightful to me. Miss Mis, with an air of
superir wisdom and bevolence, smiled upo us
‘She i the mt diagreeable thg I ever saw,’ said Dora. ‘You
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can’t beeve how il-tepered and shockig she i, Jula.’
‘Yes, I can, my dear!’ said Jula.
‘You can, perhaps, love,’ returned Dora, with her hand on
Jula’s. ‘Forgive my nt exceptig you, my dear, at first.’
I learnt, fro this, that Mi Mills had had her trials in th
urs of a chequered existee; and that to the, perhaps, I
mght refer that wis benignity of manner whic I had already
noticed. i found, in th course of th day, that this was th case:
Miss Mills having be unappy i a misplaced affection, and
beg understood to have retired from the world o her awful
stok of experice, but still to take a calm interest in th
unblighted hopes and loves of youth.
But now Mr. Spenlow cam out of the house, and Dora went to
hm, saying, ‘Lok, papa, wat beautiful flrs!’ And Miss Mi
ed thoughtfully, as who should say, ‘Ye Mayflies, ejoy your
brief existence in th bright morning of life!’ And we all walked
from the lawn towards the carriage, which was getting ready.
I shall never have such a ride again. I have never had such
another. There were only those three, their hamper, my hamper,
and the guitar-cas, in the phaeton; and, of course, the phaeton
was ope; and I rode bed it, and Dora sat with her back to the
hrses, lookig toards me. She kept th bouquet clos to hr o
th cushion, and wouldn’t allow Jip to sit on that side of her at al,
for fear he should crush it. She often carried it i her hand, often
refreshed herself with its fragrane. Our eyes at those ti ofte
t; and my great astonit is that I didn’t go over the head of
my gallant grey into the carriage
There was dust, I beeve. There was a good deal of dust, I
believe I have a fait impression that Mr. Spenlow remonstrated
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wth me for riding in it; but I kn of none I was sensible of a mist
of lve and beauty about Dora, but of nothing el He stood up
sometimes, and asked me what I thught of th prospect. I said it
was delightful, and I dare say it was; but it was all Dora to me. Th
un she Dora, and the birds sang Dora. The suth wd blew
Dora, and the wid flowers in the hedges were al Doras, to a bud.
My comfort is, Miss Mis understod me. Mi Mis alon could
eter into my feegs thoroughly.
I do’t know how log we were going, and to this hour I know
as lttle were w wet. Perhaps it was nar Guidford. Perhaps
Arabian-nght magian, oped up the place for the day,
and shut it up for ever when we came away. It was a green spot, on
a hil, carpeted with soft turf. There were shady trees, and heather,
and, as far as the eye could see, a ri landsape.
It was a trying thing to find people here, waiting for us; and my
jealousy, even of the ladi, knew n bounds. But al of my own
x—especially on impostor, thre or four years my elder, with a
red wisker, on which he established an amount of preumption
not to be endured—wre my mortal fo
We all unpacked our baskets, and emplyed oursves in
getting dinnr ready. Red Whisker preteded h could make a
salad (wich I don’t beve), and obtruded himsef on public
ntic So of the young ladi wasd the lettuce for him, and
sliced th under hi directions. Dora was among th I felt that
fate had pitted me against this man, and on of us must fal
Red Whisker made his salad (I wondered ho thy could eat it.
Nothing should have inducd me to touch it!) and voted hif
ito the charge of the win-cear, whic he ctructed, beg an
igenious beast, in the hollow trunk of a tree By and by, I saw
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hi, with the majority of a lobster on his plate, eating hi dinner at
the feet of Dora!
I have but an indistinct idea of what happed for some time
after this baleful object preted itself to my vi. I was very
merry, I know; but it was holow merriment. I attached myself to a
young creature in pink, with little eye, and flrted with her
desperately. She received my attentions with favour; but whthr
o my account solely, or becaus she had any design on Red
Whisker, I can’t say. Dora’s health was drunk. Whe I drank it, I
affected to interrupt my conversati for that purpo, and to
resume it immediatey afterwards. I caught Dora’s eye as I bowd
to her, and I thought it looked appealg. But it looked at m over
th head of Red Whisker, and I was adamant.
The young creature in pik had a mother in gree; and I rather
think the latter separated us from mtives of poy. Howbet,
there was a geral breakig up of the party, whe the reants
of the dir were beg put away; and I strolled off by mysf
among the tree, i a raging and remrseful state I was debating
wether I should pretend that I was not we, and fly—I do’t
know were—upon my galant grey, wen Dora and Mi Mi
met me.
‘Mr. Copperfield,’ said Miss Mis, ‘you are dul.’
I begged her pardon. Not at all.
you are dul.’
‘And Dora,’ said Mi Mi, ‘
Oh dear no! Not in th least.
‘Mr. Cpperfield and Dora,’ said Miss Mis, with an almost
verabl air. ‘Enough of this. Do not allow a trivial
misunderstanding to withr th blssoms of spring, wh, once
put forth and blighted, cannot be red. I speak,’ said Miss
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Mis, ‘from experice of th past—th remote, irrevocabl past.
Th gushing fountais which sparkle in th sun, must not be
stopped in mere caprice; th oasis in th desert of Sahara must not
be plucked up idly.’
I hardly knew wat I did, I was burng al over to that
extraordiary extent; but I took Dora’s lttle hand and kid it—
and she let me! I kissed Miss Mis’s hand; and we all seed, to
y thinkig, to go straight up to the seventh heave We did nt
c do agai We stayed up there al the evenig. At first we
trayed to and fro amg the tree: I with Dora’s shy arm draw
through mine: and Heave kns, foy as it all was, it would have
been a happy fate to have be struck imrtal with those fooli
feeligs, and have stayed amg the trees for ever!
But, muc too soon, we heard the others laughing and talkig,
and calg ‘whre’s Dora?’ So we wet back, and they wanted
Dora to sig. Red Whker would have got the guitar-cas out of
the carriage, but Dora tod him nobody knew where it was, but I.
So Red Whisker was done for in a moment; and I got it, and I
unlocked it, and I took the guitar out, and I sat by her, and I held
her handkerchief and gloves, and I drank in every note of her dear
voice, and she sang to me who loved her, and al the others mght
applaud as muc as they liked, but they had nothing to do with it!
I was intoxicated with joy. I was afraid it was to happy to be
real, and that I should wake in Buckingham Stret pretly, and
hear Mrs. Crupp clkig the teacups in getting breakfast ready.
But Dora sang, and othrs sang, and Miss Mis sang—about th
slumbering es i th caverns of Memory; as if she were a
hundred years od—and th eveg came on; and we had tea,
with the kettle bog gipsy-fason; and I was sti as happy as
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ever.
I was happier than ever wh th party broke up, and th othr
people, defeated Red Whisker and all, went thr several ways,
and we went ours through the sti eveg and the dyig light,
wth swet scents ring up around us Mr. Spe beig a littl
drowsy after the champagn—honour to the so that grew the
grape, to the grape that made the win, to the sun that riped it,
and to the merchant who adulterated it!—and beg fast aslp i
a corner of the carriage, I rode by the side and talked to Dora. Sh
admired my hrse and patted him—o, what a dear littl hand it
looked upo a horse!—and her shaw would nt keep right, and
now and th I dre it round her with my arm; and I eve fancied
that Jip began to se how it was, and to understand that he must
make up hi mind to be friends with me.
That sagacous Mis Mill, too; that amiable, though quite used
up, recuse; that little patriarch of sthing l than twenty,
w had done with th wrld, and mustn’t o any account have
the slumbering echoes in the caverns of Memry awaked; what
a kind thing she did!
‘Mr. Cpperfield,’ said Miss Mis, ‘c to this side of th
carriage a moment—if you can spare a moment. I want to speak to
you.’
Behold m, o my gallant grey, bendig at the side of Mis
Mis, with my hand upo the carriage door!
‘Dora is coming to stay with me. She is coming ho with me
the day after tomorrow. If you would like to call, I am sure papa
wuld be happy to see you.’ What could I do but ivoke a silent
blsing on Miss Mis’s head, and store Miss Mis’s addre in th
curest cornr of my memory! What could I do but te Mi Mis,
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wth grateful looks and fervet words, ho much I appreiated her
god offices, and what an inestiabl value I set upo her
friendship!
Th Miss Mis benignantly dismissed me, sayig, ‘Go back to
Dora!’ and I went; and Dora laned out of the carriage to talk to
me, and we talked all th rest of th way; and I rode my gallant
grey s cose to the whee that I grazed his near fore leg agait it,
and ‘took the bark off’, as his ownr told me, ‘to the tune of three
pun’ sivin’—which I paid, and thught extrey cheap for so
much joy. What time Miss Mis sat looking at th moo,
murmuring vers—and realing, I suppo, th ancient days
she and earth had anythng in common
Norwd was many miles to near, and w reached it many
hours too soon; but Mr. Spew cam to hielf a little short of it,
and said, ‘You must come in, Copperfield, and rest!’ and I
consenting, w had sandwiche and wi-and-water. In th light
ro, Dora blusng looked so lovely, that I could not tear myself
away, but sat there starig, in a dream, until the snoring of Mr.
Spenlow inspired me with sufficient concious to take my
leave So w parted; I riding all th way to London with th
farell touc of Dora’s hand still light on mine, recalling every
incident and word ten thusand times; lyig dow i my on bed
at last, as enraptured a young noodl as ever was carried out of hi
five wits by love.
Wh I awoke nxt mornig, I was resute to deare my
passion to Dora, and kn my fate. Happines or miry was now
the question. There was no other question that I kn of in the
wrld, and only Dora could give th answer to it. I passed thre
days i a luxury of wretchedness, torturing myself by putting
Charles Dicke
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Classic
David Copperfield
665
every coeivable variety of diuragig cotructi on al that
ever had taken place betw Dora and me. At last, arrayed for
th purpo at a vast expen, I went to Miss Mi’s, fraught with
a decaration.
Ho many times I went up and dow th stret, and round th
quare—painfully aware of beg a muc better anr to the old
riddle than th original on—before I could persuade myself to go
up th steps and knk, is no matter now Eve wh, at last, I had
knocked, and was waitig at the door, I had so flurried thought
of askig if that were Mr. Blackboy’s (in itatin of poor Barki),
begging pardon, and retreating. But I kept my ground.
Mr. Mills was not at ho I did not expect h wuld be.
Nobody wanted him. Miss Mis was at ho Miss Mis would do.
I was shon into a ro upstairs, whre Miss Mis and Dora
wre. Jip was thre Miss Mis was copyig music (I ret, it
was a ne song, called ‘Affection’s Dirge’), and Dora was painting
flrs. What were my feings, wh I regnized my ow
flowers; the idential Covet Garden Market purchas! I canot
say that they were very