‘None o’ that, I say, young feller,’ repeated Sam firmly. ‘No man serves

him but me. And now we’re upon it, I’ll let you into another secret

besides that,’ said Sam, as he paid for the beer. ‘I never heerd, mind

you, or read of in story-books, nor see in picters, any angel in tights

and gaiters--not even in spectacles, as I remember, though that may ha’

been done for anythin’ I know to the contrairey--but mark my vords, Job

Trotter, he’s a reg’lar thoroughbred angel for all that; and let me see

the man as wenturs to tell me he knows a better vun.’ With this

defiance, Mr. Weller buttoned up his change in a side pocket, and, with

many confirmatory nods and gestures by the way, proceeded in search of

the subject of discourse.

They found Mr. Pickwick, in company with Jingle, talking very earnestly,

and not bestowing a look on the groups who were congregated on the

racket-ground; they were very motley groups too, and worth the looking

at, if it were only in idle curiosity.

‘Well,’ said Mr. Pickwick, as Sam and his companion drew nigh, ‘you will

see how your health becomes, and think about it meanwhile. Make the

statement out for me when you feel yourself equal to the task, and I

will discuss the subject with you when I have considered it. Now, go to

your room. You are tired, and not strong enough to be out long.’

Mr. Alfred Jingle, without one spark of his old animation--with nothing

even of the dismal gaiety which he had assumed when Mr. Pickwick first

stumbled on him in his misery--bowed low without speaking, and,

motioning to Job not to follow him just yet, crept slowly away.

‘Curious scene this, is it not, Sam?’ said Mr. Pickwick, looking good-

humouredly round.

‘Wery much so, Sir,’ replied Sam. ‘Wonders ‘ull never cease,’ added Sam,

speaking to himself. ‘I’m wery much mistaken if that ‘ere Jingle worn’t

a-doin somethin’ in the water-cart way!’

The area formed by the wall in that part of the Fleet in which Mr.

Pickwick stood was just wide enough to make a good racket-court; one

side being formed, of course, by the wall itself, and the other by that

portion of the prison which looked (or rather would have looked, but for

the wall) towards St. Paul’s Cathedral. Sauntering or sitting about, in

every possible attitude of listless idleness, were a great number of

debtors, the major part of whom were waiting in prison until their day

of ‘going up’ before the Insolvent Court should arrive; while others had

been remanded for various terms, which they were idling away as they

best could. Some were shabby, some were smart, many dirty, a few clean;

but there they all lounged, and loitered, and slunk about with as little

spirit or purpose as the beasts in a menagerie.

Lolling from the windows which commanded a view of this promenade were a

number of persons, some in noisy conversation with their acquaintance

below, others playing at ball with some adventurous throwers outside,

others looking on at the racket-players, or watching the boys as they

cried the game. Dirty, slipshod women passed and repassed, on their way

to the cooking-house in one corner of the yard; children screamed, and

fought, and played together, in another; the tumbling of the skittles,

and the shouts of the players, mingled perpetually with these and a

hundred other sounds; and all was noise and tumult--save in a little

miserable shed a few yards off, where lay, all quiet and ghastly, the

body of the Chancery prisoner who had died the night before, awaiting

the mockery of an inquest. The body! It is the lawyer’s term for the

restless, whirling mass of cares and anxieties, affections, hopes, and

griefs, that make up the living man. The law had his body; and there it

lay, clothed in grave-clothes, an awful witness to its tender mercy.

‘Would you like to see a whistling-shop, Sir?’ inquired Job Trotter.

‘What do you mean?’ was Mr. Pickwick’s counter inquiry.

‘A vistlin’ shop, Sir,’ interposed Mr. Weller.

‘What is that, Sam?--A bird-fancier’s?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick.

‘Bless your heart, no, Sir,’ replied Job; ‘a whistling-shop, Sir, is

where they sell spirits.’ Mr. Job Trotter briefly explained here, that

all persons, being prohibited under heavy penalties from conveying

spirits into debtors’ prisons, and such commodities being highly prized

by the ladies and gentlemen confined therein, it had occurred to some

speculative turnkey to connive, for certain lucrative considerations, at

two or three prisoners retailing the favourite article of gin, for their

own profit and advantage.

‘This plan, you see, Sir, has been gradually introduced into all the

prisons for debt,’ said Mr. Trotter.

‘And it has this wery great advantage,’ said Sam, ‘that the turnkeys

takes wery good care to seize hold o’ ev’rybody but them as pays ‘em,

that attempts the willainy, and wen it gets in the papers they’re

applauded for their wigilance; so it cuts two ways--frightens other

people from the trade, and elewates their own characters.’

‘Exactly so, Mr. Weller,’ observed Job.

‘Well, but are these rooms never searched to ascertain whether any

spirits are concealed in them?’ said Mr. Pickwick.

‘Cert’nly they are, Sir,’ replied Sam; ‘but the turnkeys knows

beforehand, and gives the word to the wistlers, and you may wistle for

it wen you go to look.’

By this time, Job had tapped at a door, which was opened by a gentleman

with an uncombed head, who bolted it after them when they had walked in,

and grinned; upon which Job grinned, and Sam also; whereupon Mr.

Pickwick, thinking it might be expected of him, kept on smiling to the

end of the interview.

The gentleman with the uncombed head appeared quite satisfied with this

mute announcement of their business, and, producing a flat stone bottle,

which might hold about a couple of quarts, from beneath his bedstead,

filled out three glasses of gin, which Job Trotter and Sam disposed of

in a most workmanlike manner.

‘Any more?’ said the whistling gentleman.

‘No more,’ replied Job Trotter.

Mr. Pickwick paid, the door was unbolted, and out they came; the

uncombed gentleman bestowing a friendly nod upon Mr. Roker, who happened

to be passing at the moment.

From this spot, Mr. Pickwick wandered along all the galleries, up and

down all the staircases, and once again round the whole area of the

yard. The great body of the prison population appeared to be Mivins, and

Smangle, and the parson, and the butcher, and the leg, over and over,

and over again. There were the same squalor, the same turmoil and noise,

the same general characteristics, in every corner; in the best and the

worst alike. The whole place seemed restless and troubled; and the

people were crowding and flitting to and fro, like the shadows in an

uneasy dream.

‘I have seen enough,’ said Mr. Pickwick, as he threw himself into a

chair in his little apartment. ‘My head aches with these scenes, and my

heart too. Henceforth I will be a prisoner in my own room.’

And Mr. Pickwick steadfastly adhered to this determination. For three

long months he remained shut up, all day; only stealing out at night to

breathe the air, when the greater part of his fellow-prisoners were in

bed or carousing in their rooms. His health was beginning to suffer from

the closeness of the confinement, but neither the often-repeated

entreaties of Perker and his friends, nor the still more frequently-

repeated warnings and admonitions of Mr. Samuel Weller, could induce him

to alter one jot of his inflexible resolution.

CHAPTER XLVI. RECORDS A TOUCHING ACT OF DELICATE FEELING, NOT UNMIXED

WITH PLEASANTRY, ACHIEVED AND PERFORMED BY Messrs. DODSON AND FOGG

It was within a week of the close of the month of July, that a hackney

cabriolet, number unrecorded, was seen to proceed at a rapid pace up

Goswell Street; three people were squeezed into it besides the driver,

who sat in his own particular little dickey at the side; over the apron

were hung two shawls, belonging to two small vixenish-looking ladies

under the apron; between whom, compressed into a very small compass, was

stowed away, a gentleman of heavy and subdued demeanour, who, whenever

he ventured to make an observation, was snapped up short by one of the

vixenish ladies before-mentioned. Lastly, the two vixenish ladies and

the heavy gentleman were giving the driver contradictory directions, all

tending to the one point, that he should stop at Mrs. Bardell’s door;

which the heavy gentleman, in direct opposition to, and defiance of, the

vixenish ladies, contended was a green door and not a yellow one.

‘Stop at the house with a green door, driver,’ said the heavy gentleman.

‘Oh! You perwerse creetur!’ exclaimed one of the vixenish ladies. ‘Drive

to the ‘ouse with the yellow door, cabmin.’

Upon this the cabman, who in a sudden effort to pull up at the house

with the green door, had pulled the horse up so high that he nearly

pulled him backward into the cabriolet, let the animal’s fore-legs down

to the ground again, and paused.

‘Now vere am I to pull up?’ inquired the driver. ‘Settle it among

yourselves. All I ask is, vere?’

Here the contest was renewed with increased violence; and the horse

being troubled with a fly on his nose, the cabman humanely employed his

leisure in lashing him about on the head, on the counter-irritation

principle.

‘Most wotes carries the day!’ said one of the vixenish ladies at length.

‘The ‘ouse with the yellow door, cabman.’

But after the cabriolet had dashed up, in splendid style, to the house

with the yellow door, ‘making,’ as one of the vixenish ladies

triumphantly said, ‘acterrally more noise than if one had come in one’s

own carriage,’ and after the driver had dismounted to assist the ladies

in getting out, the small round head of Master Thomas Bardell was thrust

out of the one-pair window of a house with a red door, a few numbers

off.

‘Aggrawatin’ thing!’ said the vixenish lady last-mentioned, darting a

withering glance at the heavy gentleman.

‘My dear, it’s not my fault,’ said the gentleman.

‘Don’t talk to me, you creetur, don’t,’ retorted the lady. ‘The house

with the red door, cabmin. Oh! If ever a woman was troubled with a

ruffinly creetur, that takes a pride and a pleasure in disgracing his

wife on every possible occasion afore strangers, I am that woman!’

‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Raddle,’ said the other little

woman, who was no other than Mrs. Cluppins.

‘What have I been a-doing of?’ asked Mr. Raddle.

‘Don’t talk to me, don’t, you brute, for fear I should be perwoked to

forgit my sect and strike you!’ said Mrs. Raddle.

While this dialogue was going on, the driver was most ignominiously

leading the horse, by the bridle, up to the house with the red door,

which Master Bardell had already opened. Here was a mean and low way of

arriving at a friend’s house! No dashing up, with all the fire and fury

of the animal; no jumping down of the driver; no loud knocking at the

door; no opening of the apron with a crash at the very last moment, for

fear of the ladies sitting in a draught; and then the man handing the

shawls out, afterwards, as if he were a private coachman! The whole edge

of the thing had been taken off--it was flatter than walking.

‘Well, Tommy,’ said Mrs. Cluppins, ‘how’s your poor dear mother?’

‘Oh, she’s very well,’ replied Master Bardell. ‘She’s in the front

parlour, all ready. I’m ready too, I am.’ Here Master Bardell put his

hands in his pockets, and jumped off and on the bottom step of the door.

‘Is anybody else a-goin’, Tommy?’ said Mrs. Cluppins, arranging her

pelerine.

‘Mrs. Sanders is going, she is,’ replied Tommy; ‘I’m going too, I am.’

‘Drat the boy,’ said little Mrs. Cluppins. ‘He thinks of nobody but

himself. Here, Tommy, dear.’

‘Well,’ said Master Bardell.

‘Who else is a-goin’, lovey?’ said Mrs. Cluppins, in an insinuating

manner.

‘Oh! Mrs. Rogers is a-goin’,’ replied Master Bardell, opening his eyes

very wide as he delivered the intelligence.

‘What? The lady as has taken the lodgings!’ ejaculated Mrs. Cluppins.

Master Bardell put his hands deeper down into his pockets, and nodded

exactly thirty-five times, to imply that it was the lady-lodger, and no

other.

‘Bless us!’ said Mrs. Cluppins. ‘It’s quite a party!’

‘Ah, if you knew what was in the cupboard, you’d say so,’ replied Master

Bardell.

‘What is there, Tommy?’ said Mrs. Cluppins coaxingly. ‘You’ll tell _me_,

Tommy, I know.’

No, I won’t,’ replied Master Bardell, shaking his head, and applying

himself to the bottom step again.

‘Drat the child!’ muttered Mrs. Cluppins. ‘What a prowokin’ little

wretch it is! Come, Tommy, tell your dear Cluppy.’

‘Mother said I wasn’t to,’ rejoined Master Bardell, ‘I’m a-goin’ to have

some, I am.’ Cheered by this prospect, the precocious boy applied

himself to his infantile treadmill, with increased vigour.

The above examination of a child of tender years took place while Mr.

and Mrs. Raddle and the cab-driver were having an altercation concerning

the fare, which, terminating at this point in favour of the cabman, Mrs.

Raddle came up tottering.

‘Lauk, Mary Ann! what’s the matter?’ said Mrs. Cluppins.

‘It’s put me all over in such a tremble, Betsy,’ replied Mrs. Raddle.

‘Raddle ain’t like a man; he leaves everythink to me.’

This was scarcely fair upon the unfortunate Mr. Raddle, who had been

thrust aside by his good lady in the commencement of the dispute, and

peremptorily commanded to hold his tongue. He had no opportunity of

defending himself, however, for Mrs. Raddle gave unequivocal signs of

fainting; which, being perceived from the parlour window, Mrs. Bardell,

Mrs. Sanders, the lodger, and the lodger’s servant, darted precipitately

out, and conveyed her into the house, all talking at the same time, and

giving utterance to various expressions of pity and condolence, as if

she were one of the most suffering mortals on earth. Being conveyed into

the front parlour, she was there deposited on a sofa; and the lady from

the first floor running up to the first floor, returned with a bottle of

sal-volatile, which, holding Mrs. Raddle tight round the neck, she

applied in all womanly kindness and pity to her nose, until that lady

with many plunges and struggles was fain to declare herself decidedly

better.

‘Ah, poor thing!’ said Mrs. Rogers, ‘I know what her feelin’s is, too

well.’

Ah, poor thing! so do I,’ said Mrs. Sanders; and then all the ladies

moaned in unison, and said they knew what it was, and they pitied her

from their hearts, they did. Even the lodger’s little servant, who was

thirteen years old and three feet high, murmured her sympathy.

‘But what’s been the matter?’ said Mrs. Bardell.

‘Ah, what has decomposed you, ma’am?’ inquired Mrs. Rogers.

‘I have been a good deal flurried,’ replied Mrs. Raddle, in a

reproachful manner. Thereupon the ladies cast indignant glances at Mr.

Raddle.

‘Why, the fact is,’ said that unhappy gentleman, stepping forward, ‘when

we alighted at this door, a dispute arose with the driver of the

cabrioily--’ A loud scream from his wife, at the mention of this word,

rendered all further explanation inaudible.

‘You’d better leave us to bring her round, Raddle,’ said Mrs. Cluppins.

‘She’ll never get better as long as you’re here.’

All the ladies concurred in this opinion; so Mr. Raddle was pushed out

of the room, and requested to give himself an airing in the back yard.

Which he did for about a quarter of an hour, when Mrs. Bardell announced

to him with a solemn face that he might come in now, but that he must be

very careful how he behaved towards his wife. She knew he didn’t mean to

be unkind; but Mary Ann was very far from strong, and, if he didn’t take

care, he might lose her when he least expected it, which would be a very

dreadful reflection for him afterwards; and so on. All this, Mr. Raddle

heard with great submission, and presently returned to the parlour in a

most lamb-like manner.

‘Why, Mrs. Rogers, ma’am,’ said Mrs. Bardell, ‘you’ve never been

introduced, I declare! Mr. Raddle, ma’am; Mrs. Cluppins, ma’am; Mrs.

Raddle, ma’am.’

‘Which is Mrs. Cluppins’s sister,’ suggested Mrs. Sanders.

‘Oh, indeed!’ said Mrs. Rogers graciously; for she was the lodger, and

her servant was in waiting, so she was more gracious than intimate, in

right of her position. ‘Oh, indeed!’

Mrs. Raddle smiled sweetly, Mr. Raddle bowed, and Mrs. Cluppins said,

‘she was sure she was very happy to have an opportunity of being known

to a lady which she had heerd so much in favour of, as Mrs. Rogers.’ A

compliment which the last-named lady acknowledged with graceful

condescension.

‘Well, Mr. Raddle,’ said Mrs. Bardell; ‘I’m sure you ought to feel very

much honoured at you and Tommy being the only gentlemen to escort so

many ladies all the way to the Spaniards, at Hampstead. Don’t you think

he ought, Mrs. Rogers, ma’am?’

Oh, certainly, ma’am,’ replied Mrs. Rogers; after whom all the other

ladies responded, ‘Oh, certainly.’

‘Of course I feel it, ma’am,’ said Mr. Raddle, rubbing his hands, and

evincing a slight tendency to brighten up a little. ‘Indeed, to tell you

the truth, I said, as we was a-coming along in the cabrioily--’

At the recapitulation of the word which awakened so many painful

recollections, Mrs. Raddle applied her handkerchief to her eyes again,

and uttered a half-suppressed scream; so that Mrs. Bardell frowned upon

Mr. Raddle, to intimate that he had better not say anything more, and

desired Mrs. Rogers’s servant, with an air, to ‘put the wine on.’

This was the signal for displaying the hidden treasures of the closet,

which comprised sundry plates of oranges and biscuits, and a bottle of

old crusted port--that at one-and-nine--with another of the celebrated

East India sherry at fourteen-pence, which were all produced in honour

of the lodger, and afforded unlimited satisfaction to everybody. After

great consternation had been excited in the mind of Mrs. Cluppins, by an

attempt on the part of Tommy to recount how he had been cross-examined

regarding the cupboard then in action (which was fortunately nipped in

the bud by his imbibing half a glass of the old crusted ‘the wrong way,’

and thereby endangering his life for some seconds), the party walked

forth in quest of a Hampstead stage. This was soon found, and in a

couple of hours they all arrived safely in the Spaniards Tea-gardens,

where the luckless Mr. Raddle’s very first act nearly occasioned his

good lady a relapse; it being neither more nor less than to order tea

for seven, whereas (as the ladies one and all remarked), what could have

been easier than for Tommy to have drank out of anybody’s cup--or

everybody’s, if that was all--when the waiter wasn’t looking, which

would have saved one head of tea, and the tea just as good!

However, there was no help for it, and the tea-tray came, with seven

cups and saucers, and bread-and-butter on the same scale. Mrs. Bardell

was unanimously voted into the chair, and Mrs. Rogers being stationed on

her right hand, and Mrs. Raddle on her left, the meal proceeded with

great merriment and success.

‘How sweet the country is, to be sure!’ sighed Mrs. Rogers; ‘I almost

wish I lived in it always.’

‘Oh, you wouldn’t like that, ma’am,’ replied Mrs. Bardell, rather

hastily; for it was not at all advisable, with reference to the

lodgings, to encourage such notions; ‘you wouldn’t like it, ma’am.’

‘Oh! I should think you was a deal too lively and sought after, to be

content with the country, ma’am,’ said little Mrs. Cluppins.

‘Perhaps I am, ma’am. Perhaps I am,’ sighed the first-floor lodger.

‘For lone people as have got nobody to care for them, or take care of

them, or as have been hurt in their mind, or that kind of thing,’

observed Mr. Raddle, plucking up a little cheerfulness, and looking

round, ‘the country is all very well. The country for a wounded spirit,

they say.’

Now, of all things in the world that the unfortunate man could have

said, any would have been preferable to this. Of course Mrs. Bardell

burst into tears, and requested to be led from the table instantly; upon

which the affectionate child began to cry too, most dismally.

‘Would anybody believe, ma’am,’ exclaimed Mrs. Raddle, turning fiercely

to the first-floor lodger, ‘that a woman could be married to such a

unmanly creetur, which can tamper with a woman’s feelings as he does,

every hour in the day, ma’am?’

‘My dear,’ remonstrated Mr. Raddle, ‘I didn’t mean anything, my dear.’

‘You didn’t mean!’ repeated Mrs. Raddle, with great scorn and contempt.

‘Go away. I can’t bear the sight on you, you brute.’

‘You must not flurry yourself, Mary Ann,’ interposed Mrs. Cluppins. ‘You

really must consider yourself, my dear, which you never do. Now go away,

Raddle, there’s a good soul, or you’ll only aggravate her.’

‘You had better take your tea by yourself, Sir, indeed,’ said Mrs.

Rogers, again applying the smelling-bottle.

Mrs. Sanders, who, according to custom, was very busy with the bread-

and-butter, expressed the same opinion, and Mr. Raddle quietly retired.

After this, there was a great hoisting up of Master Bardell, who was

rather a large size for hugging, into his mother’s arms, in which

operation he got his boots in the tea-board, and occasioned some

confusion among the cups and saucers. But that description of fainting

fits, which is contagious among ladies, seldom lasts long; so when he

had been well kissed, and a little cried over, Mrs. Bardell recovered,

set him down again, wondering how she could have been so foolish, and

poured out some more tea.

It was at this moment, that the sound of approaching wheels was heard,

and that the ladies, looking up, saw a hackney-coach stop at the garden

gate.

‘More company!’ said Mrs. Sanders.

‘It’s a gentleman,’ said Mrs. Raddle.

‘Well, if it ain’t Mr. Jackson, the young man from Dodson and Fogg’s!’

cried Mrs. Bardell. ‘Why, gracious! Surely Mr. Pickwick can’t have paid

the damages.’

‘Or hoffered marriage!’ said Mrs. Cluppins.

‘Dear me, how slow the gentleman is,’ exclaimed Mrs. Rogers. ‘Why

doesn’t he make haste!’

As the lady spoke these words, Mr. Jackson turned from the coach where

he had been addressing some observations to a shabby man in black

leggings, who had just emerged from the vehicle with a thick ash stick

in his hand, and made his way to the place where the ladies were seated;

winding his hair round the brim of his hat, as he came along.

‘Is anything the matter? Has anything taken place, Mr. Jackson?’ said

Mrs. Bardell eagerly.

‘Nothing whatever, ma’am,’ replied Mr. Jackson. ‘How de do, ladies? I

have to ask pardon, ladies, for intruding--but the law, ladies--the

law.’ With this apology Mr. Jackson smiled, made a comprehensive bow,

and gave his hair another wind. Mrs. Rogers whispered Mrs. Raddle that

he was really an elegant young man.

‘I called in Goswell Street,’ resumed Mr. Jackson, ‘and hearing that you

were here, from the slavey, took a coach and came on. Our people want

you down in the city directly, Mrs. Bardell.’

‘Lor!’ ejaculated that lady, starting at the sudden nature of the

communication.

‘Yes,’ said Mr. Jackson, biting his lip. ‘It’s very important and

pressing business, which can’t be postponed on any account. Indeed,

Dodson expressly said so to me, and so did Fogg. I’ve kept the coach on

purpose for you to go back in.’

‘How very strange!’ exclaimed Mrs. Bardell.

The ladies agreed that it _was _ very strange, but were unanimously of

opinion that it must be very important, or Dodson & Fogg would never

have sent; and further, that the business being urgent, she ought to

repair to Dodson & Fogg’s without any delay.

There was a certain degree of pride and importance about being wanted by

one’s lawyers in such a monstrous hurry, that was by no means

displeasing to Mrs. Bardell, especially as it might be reasonably

supposed to enhance her consequence in the eyes of the first-floor

lodger. She simpered a little, affected extreme vexation and hesitation,

and at last arrived at the conclusion that she supposed she must go.

‘But won’t you refresh yourself after your walk, Mr. Jackson?’ said Mrs.

Bardell persuasively.

‘Why, really there ain’t much time to lose,’ replied Jackson; ‘and I’ve

got a friend here,’ he continued, looking towards the man with the ash

stick.

‘Oh, ask your friend to come here, Sir,’ said Mrs. Bardell. ‘Pray ask

your friend here, Sir.’

‘Why, thank’ee, I’d rather not,’ said Mr. Jackson, with some

embarrassment of manner. ‘He’s not much used to ladies’ society, and it

makes him bashful. If you’ll order the waiter to deliver him anything

short, he won’t drink it off at once, won’t he!--only try him!’ Mr.

Jackson’s fingers wandered playfully round his nose at this portion of

his discourse, to warn his hearers that he was speaking ironically.

The waiter was at once despatched to the bashful gentleman, and the

bashful gentleman took something; Mr. Jackson also took something, and

the ladies took something, for hospitality’s sake. Mr. Jackson then said

he was afraid it was time to go; upon which, Mrs. Sanders, Mrs.

Cluppins, and Tommy (who it was arranged should accompany Mrs. Bardell,

leaving the others to Mr. Raddle’s protection), got into the coach.

‘Isaac,’ said Jackson, as Mrs. Bardell prepared to get in, looking up at

the man with the ash stick, who was seated on the box, smoking a cigar.

‘Well?’

‘This is Mrs. Bardell.’

‘Oh, I know’d that long ago,’ said the man.

Mrs. Bardell got in, Mr. Jackson got in after her, and away they drove.

Mrs. Bardell could not help ruminating on what Mr. Jackson’s friend had

said. Shrewd creatures, those lawyers. Lord bless us, how they find

people out!

‘Sad thing about these costs of our people’s, ain’t it,’ said Jackson,

when Mrs. Cluppins and Mrs. Sanders had fallen asleep; ‘your bill of

costs, I mean.’

‘I’m very sorry they can’t get them,’ replied Mrs. Bardell. ‘But if you

law gentlemen do these things on speculation, why you must get a loss

now and then, you know.’

‘You gave them a _cognovit _for the amount of your costs, after the

trial, I’m told!’ said Jackson.

‘Yes. Just as a matter of form,’ replied Mrs. Bardell.

‘Certainly,’ replied Jackson drily. ‘Quite a matter of form. Quite.’

On they drove, and Mrs. Bardell fell asleep. She was awakened, after

some time, by the stopping of the coach.

‘Bless us!’ said the lady. ‘Are we at Freeman’s Court?’

‘We’re not going quite so far,’ replied Jackson. ‘Have the goodness to

step out.’

Mrs. Bardell, not yet thoroughly awake, complied. It was a curious

place: a large wall, with a gate in the middle, and a gas-light burning

inside.

‘Now, ladies,’ cried the man with the ash stick, looking into the coach,

and shaking Mrs. Sanders to wake her, ‘Come!’ Rousing her friend, Mrs.

Sanders alighted. Mrs. Bardell, leaning on Jackson’s arm, and leading

Tommy by the hand, had already entered the porch. They followed.

The room they turned into was even more odd-looking than the porch. Such

a number of men standing about! And they stared so!

‘What place is this?’ inquired Mrs. Bardell, pausing.

‘Only one of our public offices,’ replied Jackson, hurrying her through

a door, and looking round to see that the other women were following.

‘Look sharp, Isaac!’

‘Safe and sound,’ replied the man with the ash stick. The door swung

heavily after them, and they descended a small flight of steps.

‘Here we are at last. All right and tight, Mrs. Bardell!’ said Jackson,

looking exultingly round.

‘What do you mean?’ said Mrs. Bardell, with a palpitating heart.

‘Just this,’ replied Jackson, drawing her a little on one side; ‘don’t

be frightened, Mrs. Bardell. There never was a more delicate man than

Dodson, ma’am, or a more humane man than Fogg. It was their duty in the

way of business, to take you in execution for them costs; but they were

anxious to spare your feelings as much as they could. What a comfort it

must be, to you, to think how it’s been done! This is the Fleet, ma’am.

Wish you good-night, Mrs. Bardell. Good-night, Tommy!’

As Jackson hurried away in company with the man with the ash stick

another man, with a key in his hand, who had been looking on, led the

bewildered female to a second short flight of steps leading to a

doorway. Mrs. Bardell screamed violently; Tommy roared; Mrs. Cluppins

shrunk within herself; and Mrs. Sanders made off, without more ado. For

there stood the injured Mr. Pickwick, taking his nightly allowance of

air; and beside him leant Samuel Weller, who, seeing Mrs. Bardell, took

his hat off with mock reverence, while his master turned indignantly on

his heel.

‘Don’t bother the woman,’ said the turnkey to Weller; ‘she’s just come

in.’

‘A prisoner!’ said Sam, quickly replacing his hat. ‘Who’s the

plaintives? What for? Speak up, old feller.’

‘Dodson and Fogg,’ replied the man; ‘execution on _cognovit _for costs.’

‘Here, Job, Job!’ shouted Sam, dashing into the passage. ‘Run to Mr.

Perker’s, Job. I want him directly. I see some good in this. Here’s a

game. Hooray! vere’s the gov’nor?’

But there was no reply to these inquiries, for Job had started furiously

off, the instant he received his commission, and Mrs. Bardell had

fainted in real downright earnest.

CHAPTER XLVII. IS CHIEFLY DEVOTED TO MATTERS OF BUSINESS, AND THE

TEMPORAL ADVANTAGE OF DODSON AND FOGG--MR. WINKLE REAPPEARS UNDER

EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCES--MR. PICKWICK’S BENEVOLENCE PROVES STRONGER

THAN HIS OBSTINACY

Job Trotter, abating nothing of his speed, ran up Holborn, sometimes in

the middle of the road, sometimes on the pavement, sometimes in the

gutter, as the chances of getting along varied with the press of men,

women, children, and coaches, in each division of the thoroughfare, and,

regardless of all obstacles stopped not for an instant until he reached

the gate of Gray’s Inn. Notwithstanding all the expedition he had used,

however, the gate had been closed a good half-hour when he reached it,

and by the time he had discovered Mr. Perker’s laundress, who lived with

a married daughter, who had bestowed her hand upon a non-resident

waiter, who occupied the one-pair of some number in some street closely

adjoining to some brewery somewhere behind Gray’s Inn Lane, it was

within fifteen minutes of closing the prison for the night. Mr. Lowten

had still to be ferreted out from the back parlour of the Magpie and

Stump; and Job had scarcely accomplished this object, and communicated

Sam Weller’s message, when the clock struck ten.

‘There,’ said Lowten, ‘it’s too late now. You can’t get in to-night;

you’ve got the key of the street, my friend.’

‘Never mind me,’ replied Job. ‘I can sleep anywhere. But won’t it be

better to see Mr. Perker to-night, so that we may be there, the first

thing in the morning?’

‘Why,’ responded Lowten, after a little consideration, ‘if it was in

anybody else’s case, Perker wouldn’t be best pleased at my going up to

his house; but as it’s Mr. Pickwick’s, I think I may venture to take a

cab and charge it to the office.’ Deciding on this line of conduct, Mr.

Lowten took up his hat, and begging the assembled company to appoint a

deputy-chairman during his temporary absence, led the way to the nearest

coach-stand. Summoning the cab of most promising appearance, he directed

the driver to repair to Montague Place, Russell Square.

Mr. Perker had had a dinner-party that day, as was testified by the

appearance of lights in the drawing-room windows, the sound of an

improved grand piano, and an improvable cabinet voice issuing therefrom,

and a rather overpowering smell of meat which pervaded the steps and

entry. In fact, a couple of very good country agencies happening to come

up to town, at the same time, an agreeable little party had been got

together to meet them, comprising Mr. Snicks, the Life Office Secretary,

Mr. Prosee, the eminent counsel, three solicitors, one commissioner of

bankrupts, a special pleader from the Temple, a small-eyed peremptory

young gentleman, his pupil, who had written a lively book about the law

of demises, with a vast quantity of marginal notes and references; and

several other eminent and distinguished personages. From this society,

little Mr. Perker detached himself, on his clerk being announced in a

whisper; and repairing to the dining-room, there found Mr. Lowten and

Job Trotter looking very dim and shadowy by the light of a kitchen

candle, which the gentleman who condescended to appear in plush shorts

and cottons for a quarterly stipend, had, with a becoming contempt for

the clerk and all things appertaining to ‘the office,’ placed upon the

table.

‘Now, Lowten,’ said little Mr. Perker, shutting the door, ‘what’s the

matter? No important letter come in a parcel, is there?’

‘No, Sir,’ replied Lowten. ‘This is a messenger from Mr. Pickwick, Sir.’

‘From Pickwick, eh?’ said the little man, turning quickly to Job. ‘Well,

what is it?’

‘Dodson and Fogg have taken Mrs. Bardell in execution for her costs,

Sir,’ said Job.

‘No!’ exclaimed Perker, putting his hands in his pockets, and reclining

against the sideboard.

‘Yes,’ said Job. ‘It seems they got a cognovit out of her, for the

amount of ‘em, directly after the trial.’

‘By Jove!’ said Perker, taking both hands out of his pockets, and

striking the knuckles of his right against the palm of his left,

emphatically, ‘those are the cleverest scamps I ever had anything to do

with!’

‘The sharpest practitioners I ever knew, Sir,’ observed Lowten.

‘Sharp!’ echoed Perker. ‘There’s no knowing where to have them.’

‘Very true, Sir, there is not,’ replied Lowten; and then, both master

and man pondered for a few seconds, with animated countenances, as if

they were reflecting upon one of the most beautiful and ingenious

discoveries that the intellect of man had ever made. When they had in

some measure recovered from their trance of admiration, Job Trotter

discharged himself of the rest of his commission. Perker nodded his head

thoughtfully, and pulled out his watch.

‘At ten precisely, I will be there,’ said the little man. ‘Sam is quite

right. Tell him so. Will you take a glass of wine, Lowten?’

No, thank you, Sir.’

‘You mean yes, I think,’ said the little man, turning to the sideboard

for a decanter and glasses.

As Lowten _did _mean yes, he said no more on the subject, but inquired

of Job, in an audible whisper, whether the portrait of Perker, which

hung opposite the fireplace, wasn’t a wonderful likeness, to which Job

of course replied that it was. The wine being by this time poured out,

Lowten drank to Mrs. Perker and the children, and Job to Perker. The

gentleman in the plush shorts and cottons considering it no part of his

duty to show the people from the office out, consistently declined to

answer the bell, and they showed themselves out. The attorney betook

himself to his drawing-room, the clerk to the Magpie and Stump, and Job

to Covent Garden Market to spend the night in a vegetable basket.

Punctually at the appointed hour next morning, the good-humoured little

attorney tapped at Mr. Pickwick’s door, which was opened with great

alacrity by Sam Weller.

‘Mr. Perker, sir,’ said Sam, announcing the visitor to Mr. Pickwick, who

was sitting at the window in a thoughtful attitude. ‘Wery glad you’ve

looked in accidentally, Sir. I rather think the gov’nor wants to have a

word and a half with you, Sir.’

Perker bestowed a look of intelligence on Sam, intimating that he

understood he was not to say he had been sent for; and beckoning him to

approach, whispered briefly in his ear.

‘You don’t mean that ‘ere, Sir?’ said Sam, starting back in excessive

surprise.

Perker nodded and smiled.

Mr. Samuel Weller looked at the little lawyer, then at Mr. Pickwick,

then at the ceiling, then at Perker again; grinned, laughed outright,

and finally, catching up his hat from the carpet, without further

explanation, disappeared.

‘What does this mean?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick, looking at Perker with

astonishment. ‘What has put Sam into this extraordinary state?’

‘Oh, nothing, nothing,’ replied Perker. ‘Come, my dear Sir, draw up your

chair to the table. I have a good deal to say to you.’

‘What papers are those?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick, as the little man

deposited on the table a small bundle of documents tied with red tape.

‘The papers in Bardell and Pickwick,’ replied Perker, undoing the knot

with his teeth.

Mr. Pickwick grated the legs of his chair against the ground; and

throwing himself into it, folded his hands and looked sternly--if Mr.

Pickwick ever could look sternly--at his legal friend.

‘You don’t like to hear the name of the cause?’ said the little man,

still busying himself with the knot.

‘No, I do not indeed,’ replied Mr. Pickwick.

‘Sorry for that,’ resumed Perker, ‘because it will form the subject of

our conversation.’

‘I would rather that the subject should be never mentioned between us,

Perker,’ interposed Mr. Pickwick hastily.

‘Pooh, pooh, my dear Sir,’ said the little man, untying the bundle, and

glancing eagerly at Mr. Pickwick out of the corners of his eyes. ‘It

must be mentioned. I have come here on purpose. Now, are you ready to

hear what I have to say, my dear Sir? No hurry; if you are not, I can

wait. I have this morning’s paper here. Your time shall be mine. There!’

Hereupon, the little man threw one leg over the other, and made a show

of beginning to read with great composure and application.

‘Well, well,’ said Mr. Pickwick, with a sigh, but softening into a smile

at the same time. ‘Say what you have to say; it’s the old story, I

suppose?’

‘With a difference, my dear Sir; with a difference,’ rejoined Perker,

deliberately folding up the paper and putting it into his pocket again.

‘Mrs. Bardell, the plaintiff in the action, is within these walls, Sir.’

‘I know it,’ was Mr. Pickwick’s reply.

‘Very good,’ retorted Perker. ‘And you know how she comes here, I

suppose; I mean on what grounds, and at whose suit?’

‘Yes; at least I have heard Sam’s account of the matter,’ said Mr.

Pickwick, with affected carelessness.

‘Sam’s account of the matter,’ replied Perker, ‘is, I will venture to

say, a perfectly correct one. Well now, my dear Sir, the first question

I have to ask, is, whether this woman is to remain here?’

‘To remain here!’ echoed Mr. Pickwick.

‘To remain here, my dear Sir,’ rejoined Perker, leaning back in his

chair and looking steadily at his client.

‘How can you ask me?’ said that gentleman. ‘It rests with Dodson and

Fogg; you know that very well.’

‘I know nothing of the kind,’ retorted Perker firmly. ‘It does _not

_rest with Dodson and Fogg; you know the men, my dear Sir, as well as I

do. It rests solely, wholly, and entirely with you.’

‘With me!’ ejaculated Mr. Pickwick, rising nervously from his chair, and

reseating himself directly afterwards.

The little man gave a double-knock on the lid of his snuff-box, opened

it, took a great pinch, shut it up again, and repeated the words, ‘With

you.’

‘I say, my dear Sir,’ resumed the little man, who seemed to gather

confidence from the snuff--‘I say, that her speedy liberation or

perpetual imprisonment rests with you, and with you alone. Hear me out,

my dear Sir, if you please, and do not be so very energetic, for it will

only put you into a perspiration and do no good whatever. I say,’

continued Perker, checking off each position on a different finger, as

he laid it down--‘I say that nobody but you can rescue her from this den

of wretchedness; and that you can only do that, by paying the costs of

this suit--both of plaintive and defendant--into the hands of these

Freeman Court sharks. Now pray be quiet, my dear sir.’

Mr. Pickwick, whose face had been undergoing most surprising changes

during this speech, and was evidently on the verge of a strong burst of

indignation, calmed his wrath as well as he could. Perker, strengthening

his argumentative powers with another pinch of snuff, proceeded--

‘I have seen the woman, this morning. By paying the costs, you can

obtain a full release and discharge from the damages; and further--this

I know is a far greater object of consideration with you, my dear sir--a

voluntary statement, under her hand, in the form of a letter to me, that

this business was, from the very first, fomented, and encouraged, and

brought about, by these men, Dodson and Fogg; that she deeply regrets

ever having been the instrument of annoyance or injury to you; and that

she entreats me to intercede with you, and implore your pardon.’

‘If I pay her costs for her,’ said Mr. Pickwick indignantly. ‘A valuable

document, indeed!’

‘No “if” in the case, my dear Sir,’ said Perker triumphantly. ‘There is

the very letter I speak of. Brought to my office by another woman at

nine o’clock this morning, before I had set foot in this place, or held

any communication with Mrs. Bardell, upon my honour.’ Selecting the

letter from the bundle, the little lawyer laid it at Mr. Pickwick’s

elbow, and took snuff for two consecutive minutes, without winking.

‘Is this all you have to say to me?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick mildly.

‘Not quite,’ replied Perker. ‘I cannot undertake to say, at this moment,

whether the wording of the cognovit, the nature of the ostensible

consideration, and the proof we can get together about the whole conduct

of the suit, will be sufficient to justify an indictment for conspiracy.

I fear not, my dear Sir; they are too clever for that, I doubt. I do

mean to say, however, that the whole facts, taken together, will be

sufficient to justify you, in the minds of all reasonable men. And now,

my dear Sir, I put it to you. This one hundred and fifty pounds, or

whatever it may be--take it in round numbers--is nothing to you. A jury

had decided against you; well, their verdict is wrong, but still they

decided as they thought right, and it _is_ against you. You have now an

opportunity, on easy terms, of placing yourself in a much higher

position than you ever could, by remaining here; which would only be

imputed, by people who didn’t know you, to sheer dogged, wrongheaded,

brutal obstinacy; nothing else, my dear Sir, believe me. Can you

hesitate to avail yourself of it, when it restores you to your friends,

your old pursuits, your health and amusements; when it liberates your

faithful and attached servant, whom you otherwise doom to imprisonment

for the whole of your life; and above all, when it enables you to take

the very magnanimous revenge--which I know, my dear sir, is one after

your own heart--of releasing this woman from a scene of misery and

debauchery, to which no man should ever be consigned, if I had my will,

but the infliction of which on any woman, is even more frightful and

barbarous. Now I ask you, my dear sir, not only as your legal adviser,

but as your very true friend, will you let slip the occasion of

attaining all these objects, and doing all this good, for the paltry

consideration of a few pounds finding their way into the pockets of a

couple of rascals, to whom it makes no manner of difference, except that

the more they gain, the more they’ll seek, and so the sooner be led into

some piece of knavery that must end in a crash? I have put these

considerations to you, my dear Sir, very feebly and imperfectly, but I

ask you to think of them. Turn them over in your mind as long as you

please. I wait here most patiently for your answer.’

Before Mr. Pickwick could reply, before Mr. Perker had taken one

twentieth part of the snuff with which so unusually long an address

imperatively required to be followed up, there was a low murmuring of

voices outside, and then a hesitating knock at the door.

‘Dear, dear,’ exclaimed Mr. Pickwick, who had been evidently roused by

his friend’s appeal; ‘what an annoyance that door is! Who is that?’

‘Me, Sir,’ replied Sam Weller, putting in his head.

‘I can’t speak to you just now, Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘I am engaged

at this moment, Sam.’

‘Beg your pardon, Sir,’ rejoined Mr. Weller. ‘But here’s a lady here,

Sir, as says she’s somethin’ wery partickler to disclose.’

‘I can’t see any lady,’ replied Mr. Pickwick, whose mind was filled with

visions of Mrs. Bardell.

‘I wouldn’t make too sure o’ that, Sir,’ urged Mr. Weller, shaking his

head. ‘If you know’d who was near, sir, I rayther think you’d change

your note; as the hawk remarked to himself vith a cheerful laugh, ven he

heerd the robin-redbreast a-singin’ round the corner.’

‘Who is it?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick.

‘Will you see her, Sir?’ asked Mr. Weller, holding the door in his hand

as if he had some curious live animal on the other side.

‘I suppose I must,’ said Mr. Pickwick, looking at Perker.

‘Well then, all in to begin!’ cried Sam. ‘Sound the gong, draw up the

curtain, and enter the two conspiraytors.’

As Sam Weller spoke, he threw the door open, and there rushed

tumultuously into the room, Mr. Nathaniel Winkle, leading after him by

the hand, the identical young lady who at Dingley Dell had worn the

boots with the fur round the tops, and who, now a very pleasing compound

of blushes and confusion, and lilac silk, and a smart bonnet, and a rich

lace veil, looked prettier than ever.

‘Miss Arabella Allen!’ exclaimed Mr. Pickwick, rising from his chair.

‘No,’ replied Mr. Winkle, dropping on his knees. ‘Mrs. Winkle. Pardon,

my dear friend, pardon!’

Mr. Pickwick could scarcely believe the evidence of his senses, and

perhaps would not have done so, but for the corroborative testimony

afforded by the smiling countenance of Perker, and the bodily presence,

in the background, of Sam and the pretty housemaid; who appeared to

contemplate the proceedings with the liveliest satisfaction.

‘Oh, Mr. Pickwick!’ said Arabella, in a low voice, as if alarmed at the

silence. ‘Can you forgive my imprudence?’

Mr. Pickwick returned no verbal response to this appeal; but he took off

his spectacles in great haste, and seizing both the young lady’s hands

in his, kissed her a great number of times--perhaps a greater number

than was absolutely necessary--and then, still retaining one of her

hands, told Mr. Winkle he was an audacious young dog, and bade him get

up. This, Mr. Winkle, who had been for some seconds scratching his nose

with the brim of his hat, in a penitent manner, did; whereupon Mr.

Pickwick slapped him on the back several times, and then shook hands

heartily with Perker, who, not to be behind-hand in the compliments of

the occasion, saluted both the bride and the pretty housemaid with right

good-will, and, having wrung Mr. Winkle’s hand most cordially, wound up

his demonstrations of joy by taking snuff enough to set any half-dozen

men with ordinarily-constructed noses, a-sneezing for life.

‘Why, my dear girl,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘how has all this come about?

Come! Sit down, and let me hear it all. How well she looks, doesn’t she,

Perker?’ added Mr. Pickwick, surveying Arabella’s face with a look of as

much pride and exultation, as if she had been his daughter.

‘Delightful, my dear Sir,’ replied the little man. ‘If I were not a

married man myself, I should be disposed to envy you, you dog.’ Thus

expressing himself, the little lawyer gave Mr. Winkle a poke in the

chest, which that gentleman reciprocated; after which they both laughed

very loudly, but not so loudly as Mr. Samuel Weller, who had just

relieved his feelings by kissing the pretty housemaid under cover of the

cupboard door.

‘I can never be grateful enough to you, Sam, I am sure,’ said Arabella,

with the sweetest smile imaginable. ‘I shall not forget your exertions

in the garden at Clifton.’

‘Don’t say nothin’ wotever about it, ma’am,’ replied Sam. ‘I only

assisted natur, ma’am; as the doctor said to the boy’s mother, after

he’d bled him to death.’

‘Mary, my dear, sit down,’ said Mr. Pickwick, cutting short these

compliments. ‘Now then; how long have you been married, eh?’

Arabella looked bashfully at her lord and master, who replied, ‘Only

three days.’

‘Only three days, eh?’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘Why, what have you been doing

these three months?’

‘Ah, to be sure!’ interposed Perker; ‘come, account for this idleness.

You see Mr. Pickwick’s only astonishment is, that it wasn’t all over,

months ago.’

‘Why the fact is,’ replied Mr. Winkle, looking at his blushing young

wife, ‘that I could not persuade Bella to run away, for a long time. And

when I had persuaded her, it was a long time more before we could find

an opportunity. Mary had to give a month’s warning, too, before she

could leave her place next door, and we couldn’t possibly have done it

without her assistance.’

Upon my word,’ exclaimed Mr. Pickwick, who by this time had resumed his

spectacles, and was looking from Arabella to Winkle, and from Winkle to

Arabella, with as much delight depicted in his countenance as

warmheartedness and kindly feeling can communicate to the human face--

‘upon my word! you seem to have been very systematic in your

proceedings. And is your brother acquainted with all this, my dear?’

‘Oh, no, no,’ replied Arabella, changing colour. ‘Dear Mr. Pickwick, he

must only know it from you--from your lips alone. He is so violent, so

prejudiced, and has been so--so anxious in behalf of his friend, Mr.

Sawyer,’ added Arabella, looking down, ‘that I fear the consequences

dreadfully.’

‘Ah, to be sure,’ said Perker gravely. ‘You must take this matter in

hand for them, my dear sir. These young men will respect you, when they

would listen to nobody else. You must prevent mischief, my dear Sir. Hot

blood, hot blood.’ And the little man took a warning pinch, and shook

his head doubtfully.

‘You forget, my love,’ said Mr. Pickwick gently, ‘you forget that I am a

prisoner.’

‘No, indeed I do not, my dear Sir,’ replied Arabella. ‘I never have

forgotten it. I have never ceased to think how great your sufferings

must have been in this shocking place. But I hoped that what no

consideration for yourself would induce you to do, a regard to our

happiness might. If my brother hears of this, first, from you, I feel

certain we shall be reconciled. He is my only relation in the world, Mr.

Pickwick, and unless you plead for me, I fear I have lost even him. I

have done wrong, very, very wrong, I know.’ Here poor Arabella hid her

face in her handkerchief, and wept bitterly.

Mr. Pickwick’s nature was a good deal worked upon, by these same tears;

but when Mrs. Winkle, drying her eyes, took to coaxing and entreating in

the sweetest tones of a very sweet voice, he became particularly

restless, and evidently undecided how to act, as was evinced by sundry

nervous rubbings of his spectacle-glasses, nose, tights, head, and

gaiters.

Taking advantage of these symptoms of indecision, Mr. Perker (to whom,

it appeared, the young couple had driven straight that morning) urged

with legal point and shrewdness that Mr. Winkle, senior, was still

unacquainted with the important rise in life’s flight of steps which his

son had taken; that the future expectations of the said son depended

entirely upon the said Winkle, senior, continuing to regard him with

undiminished feelings of affection and attachment, which it was very

unlikely he would, if this great event were long kept a secret from him;

that Mr. Pickwick, repairing to Bristol to seek Mr. Allen, might, with

equal reason, repair to Birmingham to seek Mr. Winkle, senior; lastly,

that Mr. Winkle, senior, had good right and title to consider Mr.

Pickwick as in some degree the guardian and adviser of his son, and that

it consequently behoved that gentleman, and was indeed due to his

personal character, to acquaint the aforesaid Winkle, senior,

personally, and by word of mouth, with the whole circumstances of the

case, and with the share he had taken in the transaction.

Mr. Tupman and Mr. Snodgrass arrived, most opportunely, in this stage of

the pleadings, and as it was necessary to explain to them all that had

occurred, together with the various reasons pro and con, the whole of

the arguments were gone over again, after which everybody urged every

argument in his own way, and at his own length. And, at last, Mr.

Pickwick, fairly argued and remonstrated out of all his resolutions, and

being in imminent danger of being argued and remonstrated out of his

wits, caught Arabella in his arms, and declaring that she was a very

amiable creature, and that he didn’t know how it was, but he had always

been very fond of her from the first, said he could never find it in his

heart to stand in the way of young people’s happiness, and they might do

with him as they pleased.

Mr. Weller’s first act, on hearing this concession, was to despatch Job

Trotter to the illustrious Mr. Pell, with an authority to deliver to the

bearer the formal discharge which his prudent parent had had the

foresight to leave in the hands of that learned gentleman, in case it

should be, at any time, required on an emergency; his next proceeding

was, to invest his whole stock of ready-money in the purchase of five-

and-twenty gallons of mild porter, which he himself dispensed on the

racket-ground to everybody who would partake of it; this done, he

hurra’d in divers parts of the building until he lost his voice, and

then quietly relapsed into his usual collected and philosophical

condition.

At three o’clock that afternoon, Mr. Pickwick took a last look at his

little room, and made his way, as well as he could, through the throng

of debtors who pressed eagerly forward to shake him by the hand, until

he reached the lodge steps. He turned here, to look about him, and his

eye lightened as he did so. In all the crowd of wan, emaciated faces, he

saw not one which was not happier for his sympathy and charity.

‘Perker,’ said Mr. Pickwick, beckoning one young man towards him, ‘this

is Mr. Jingle, whom I spoke to you about.’

‘Very good, my dear Sir,’ replied Perker, looking hard at Jingle. ‘You

will see me again, young man, to-morrow. I hope you may live to remember

and feel deeply, what I shall have to communicate, Sir.’

Jingle bowed respectfully, trembled very much as he took Mr. Pickwick’s

proffered hand, and withdrew.

‘Job you know, I think?’ said Mr. Pickwick, presenting that gentleman.

‘I know the rascal,’ replied Perker good-humouredly. ‘See after your

friend, and be in the way to-morrow at one. Do you hear? Now, is there

anything more?’

‘Nothing,’ rejoined Mr. Pickwick. ‘You have delivered the little parcel

I gave you for your old landlord, Sam?’

‘I have, Sir,’ replied Sam. ‘He bust out a-cryin’, Sir, and said you wos

wery gen’rous and thoughtful, and he only wished you could have him

innockilated for a gallopin’ consumption, for his old friend as had

lived here so long wos dead, and he’d noweres to look for another.’

Poor fellow, poor fellow!’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘God bless you, my

friends!’

As Mr. Pickwick uttered this adieu, the crowd raised a loud shout. Many

among them were pressing forward to shake him by the hand again, when he

drew his arm through Perker’s, and hurried from the prison, far more sad

and melancholy, for the moment, than when he had first entered it. Alas!

how many sad and unhappy beings had he left behind!

A happy evening was that for at least one party in the George and

Vulture; and light and cheerful were two of the hearts that emerged from

its hospitable door next morning. The owners thereof were Mr. Pickwick

and Sam Weller, the former of whom was speedily deposited inside a

comfortable post-coach, with a little dickey behind, in which the latter

mounted with great agility.

‘Sir,’ called out Mr. Weller to his master.

‘Well, Sam,’ replied Mr. Pickwick, thrusting his head out of the window.

‘I wish them horses had been three months and better in the Fleet, Sir.’

‘Why, Sam?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick.

‘Wy, Sir,’ exclaimed Mr. Weller, rubbing his hands, ‘how they would go

if they had been!’

CHAPTER XLVIII. RELATES HOW MR. PICKWICK, WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF SAMUEL

WELLER, ESSAYED TO SOFTEN THE HEART OF MR. BENJAMIN ALLEN, AND TO

MOLLIFY THE WRATH OF MR. ROBERT SAWYER

Mr. Ben Allen and Mr. Bob Sawyer sat together in the little surgery

behind the shop, discussing minced veal and future prospects, when the

discourse, not unnaturally, turned upon the practice acquired by Bob the

aforesaid, and his present chances of deriving a competent independence

from the honourable profession to which he had devoted himself.

‘Which, I think,’ observed Mr. Bob Sawyer, pursuing the thread of the

subject--‘which, I think, Ben, are rather dubious.’

‘What’s rather dubious?’ inquired Mr. Ben Allen, at the same time

sharpening his intellect with a draught of beer. ‘What’s dubious?’

‘Why, the chances,’ responded Mr. Bob Sawyer.

‘I forgot,’ said Mr. Ben Allen. ‘The beer has reminded me that I forgot,

Bob--yes; they _are _dubious.’

‘It’s wonderful how the poor people patronise me,’ said Mr. Bob Sawyer

reflectively. ‘They knock me up, at all hours of the night; they take

medicine to an extent which I should have conceived impossible; they put

on blisters and leeches with a perseverance worthy of a better cause;

they make additions to their families, in a manner which is quite awful.

Six of those last-named little promissory notes, all due on the same

day, Ben, and all intrusted to me!’

‘It’s very gratifying, isn’t it?’ said Mr. Ben Allen, holding his plate

for some more minced veal.

‘Oh, very,’ replied Bob; ‘only not quite so much so as the confidence of

patients with a shilling or two to spare would be. This business was

capitally described in the advertisement, Ben. It is a practice, a very

extensive practice--and that’s all.’

‘Bob,’ said Mr. Ben Allen, laying down his knife and fork, and fixing

his eyes on the visage of his friend, ‘Bob, I’ll tell you what it is.’

‘What is it?’ inquired Mr. Bob Sawyer.

‘You must make yourself, with as little delay as possible, master of

Arabella’s one thousand pounds.’

‘Three per cent. consolidated bank annuities, now standing in her name

in the book or books of the governor and company of the Bank of

England,’ added Bob Sawyer, in legal phraseology.

‘Exactly so,’ said Ben. ‘She has it when she comes of age, or marries.

She wants a year of coming of age, and if you plucked up a spirit she

needn’t want a month of being married.’

‘She’s a very charming and delightful creature,’ quoth Mr. Robert

Sawyer, in reply; ‘and has only one fault that I know of, Ben. It

happens, unfortunately, that that single blemish is a want of taste. She

don’t like me.’

‘It’s my opinion that she don’t know what she does like,’ said Mr. Ben

Allen contemptuously.

‘Perhaps not,’ remarked Mr. Bob Sawyer. ‘But it’s my opinion that she

does know what she doesn’t like, and that’s of more importance.’

‘I wish,’ said Mr. Ben Allen, setting his teeth together, and speaking

more like a savage warrior who fed on raw wolf’s flesh which he carved

with his fingers, than a peaceable young gentleman who ate minced veal

with a knife and fork--‘I wish I knew whether any rascal really has been

tampering with her, and attempting to engage her affections. I think I

should assassinate him, Bob.’

‘I’d put a bullet in him, if I found him out,’ said Mr. Sawyer, stopping

in the course of a long draught of beer, and looking malignantly out of

the porter pot. ‘If that didn’t do his business, I’d extract it

afterwards, and kill him that way.’

Mr. Benjamin Allen gazed abstractedly on his friend for some minutes in

silence, and then said--

‘You have never proposed to her, point-blank, Bob?’

‘No. Because I saw it would be of no use,’ replied Mr. Robert Sawyer.

‘You shall do it, before you are twenty-four hours older,’ retorted Ben,

with desperate calmness. ‘She shall have you, or I’ll know the reason

why. I’ll exert my authority.’

‘Well,’ said Mr. Bob Sawyer, ‘we shall see.’

‘We shall see, my friend,’ replied Mr. Ben Allen fiercely. He paused for

a few seconds, and added in a voice broken by emotion, ‘You have loved

her from a child, my friend. You loved her when we were boys at school

together, and, even then, she was wayward and slighted your young

feelings. Do you recollect, with all the eagerness of a child’s love,

one day pressing upon her acceptance, two small caraway-seed biscuits

and one sweet apple, neatly folded into a circular parcel with the leaf

of a copy-book?’

‘I do,’ replied Bob Sawyer.

‘She slighted that, I think?’ said Ben Allen.

‘She did,’ rejoined Bob. ‘She said I had kept the parcel so long in the

pockets of my corduroys, that the apple was unpleasantly warm.’

‘I remember,’ said Mr. Allen gloomily. ‘Upon which we ate it ourselves,

in alternate bites.’

Bob Sawyer intimated his recollection of the circumstance last alluded

to, by a melancholy frown; and the two friends remained for some time

absorbed, each in his own meditations.

While these observations were being exchanged between Mr. Bob Sawyer and

Mr. Benjamin Allen; and while the boy in the gray livery, marvelling at

the unwonted prolongation of the dinner, cast an anxious look, from time

to time, towards the glass door, distracted by inward misgivings

regarding the amount of minced veal which would be ultimately reserved

for his individual cravings; there rolled soberly on through the streets

of Bristol, a private fly, painted of a sad green colour, drawn by a

chubby sort of brown horse, and driven by a surly-looking man with his

legs dressed like the legs of a groom, and his body attired in the coat

of a coachman. Such appearances are common to many vehicles belonging

to, and maintained by, old ladies of economic habits; and in this

vehicle sat an old lady who was its mistress and proprietor.

‘Martin!’ said the old lady, calling to the surly man, out of the front

window.

‘Well?’ said the surly man, touching his hat to the old lady.

‘Mr. Sawyer’s,’ said the old lady.

‘I was going there,’ said the surly man.

The old lady nodded the satisfaction which this proof of the surly man’s

foresight imparted to her feelings; and the surly man giving a smart

lash to the chubby horse, they all repaired to Mr. Bob Sawyer’s

together.

‘Martin!’ said the old lady, when the fly stopped at the door of Mr.

Robert Sawyer, late Nockemorf.

‘Well?’ said Martin.

‘Ask the lad to step out, and mind the horse.’

‘I’m going to mind the horse myself,’ said Martin, laying his whip on

the roof of the fly.

‘I can’t permit it, on any account,’ said the old lady; ‘your testimony

will be very important, and I must take you into the house with me. You

must not stir from my side during the whole interview. Do you hear?’

‘I hear,’ replied Martin.

‘Well; what are you stopping for?’

‘Nothing,’ replied Martin. So saying, the surly man leisurely descended

from the wheel, on which he had been poising himself on the tops of the

toes of his right foot, and having summoned the boy in the gray livery,

opened the coach door, flung down the steps, and thrusting in a hand

enveloped in a dark wash-leather glove, pulled out the old lady with as

much unconcern in his manner as if she were a bandbox.

‘Dear me!’ exclaimed the old lady. ‘I am so flurried, now I have got

here, Martin, that I’m all in a tremble.’

Mr. Martin coughed behind the dark wash-leather gloves, but expressed no

sympathy; so the old lady, composing herself, trotted up Mr. Bob

Sawyer’s steps, and Mr. Martin followed. Immediately on the old lady’s

entering the shop, Mr. Benjamin Allen and Mr. Bob Sawyer, who had been

putting the spirits-and-water out of sight, and upsetting nauseous drugs

to take off the smell of the tobacco smoke, issued hastily forth in a

transport of pleasure and affection.

‘My dear aunt,’ exclaimed Mr. Ben Allen, ‘how kind of you to look in

upon us! Mr. Sawyer, aunt; my friend Mr. Bob Sawyer whom I have spoken

to you about, regarding--you know, aunt.’ And here Mr. Ben Allen, who

was not at the moment extraordinarily sober, added the word ‘Arabella,’

in what was meant to be a whisper, but which was an especially audible

and distinct tone of speech which nobody could avoid hearing, if anybody

were so disposed.

‘My dear Benjamin,’ said the old lady, struggling with a great shortness

of breath, and trembling from head to foot, ‘don’t be alarmed, my dear,

but I think I had better speak to Mr. Sawyer, alone, for a moment. Only

for one moment.’

‘Bob,’ said Mr. Allen, ‘will you take my aunt into the surgery?’

‘Certainly,’ responded Bob, in a most professional voice. ‘Step this

way, my dear ma’am. Don’t be frightened, ma’am. We shall be able to set

you to rights in a very short time, I have no doubt, ma’am. Here, my

dear ma’am. Now then!’ With this, Mr. Bob Sawyer having handed the old

lady to a chair, shut the door, drew another chair close to her, and

waited to hear detailed the symptoms of some disorder from which he saw

in perspective a long train of profits and advantages.

The first thing the old lady did, was to shake her head a great many

times, and began to cry.

‘Nervous,’ said Bob Sawyer complacently. ‘Camphor-julep and water three

times a day, and composing draught at night.’

‘I don’t know how to begin, Mr. Sawyer,’ said the old lady. ‘It is so

very painful and distressing.’

‘You need not begin, ma’am,’ rejoined Mr. Bob Sawyer. ‘I can anticipate

all you would say. The head is in fault.’

‘I should be very sorry to think it was the heart,’ said the old lady,

with a slight groan.

‘Not the slightest danger of that, ma’am,’ replied Bob Sawyer. ‘The

stomach is the primary cause.’

‘Mr. Sawyer!’ exclaimed the old lady, starting.

‘Not the least doubt of it, ma’am,’ rejoined Bob, looking wondrous wise.

‘Medicine, in time, my dear ma’am, would have prevented it all.’

‘Mr. Sawyer,’ said the old lady, more flurried than before, ‘this

conduct is either great impertinence to one in my situation, Sir, or it

arises from your not understanding the object of my visit. If it had

been in the power of medicine, or any foresight I could have used, to

prevent what has occurred, I should certainly have done so. I had better

see my nephew at once,’ said the old lady, twirling her reticule

indignantly, and rising as she spoke.

‘Stop a moment, ma’am,’ said Bob Sawyer; ‘I’m afraid I have not

understood you. What _is_ the matter, ma’am?’

‘My niece, Mr. Sawyer,’ said the old lady: ‘your friend’s sister.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ said Bob, all impatience; for the old lady, although much

agitated, spoke with the most tantalising deliberation, as old ladies

often do. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘Left my home, Mr. Sawyer, three days ago, on a pretended visit to my

sister, another aunt of hers, who keeps the large boarding-school, just

beyond the third mile-stone, where there is a very large laburnum-tree

and an oak gate,’ said the old lady, stopping in this place to dry her

eyes.

‘Oh, devil take the laburnum-tree, ma’am!’ said Bob, quite forgetting

his professional dignity in his anxiety. ‘Get on a little faster; put a

little more steam on, ma’am, pray.’

‘This morning,’ said the old lady slowly--‘this morning, she--’

‘She came back, ma’am, I suppose,’ said Bob, with great animation. ‘Did

she come back?’

‘No, she did not; she wrote,’ replied the old lady.

‘What did she say?’ inquired Bob eagerly.

‘She said, Mr. Sawyer,’ replied the old lady--‘and it is this I want to

prepare Benjamin’s mind for, gently and by degrees; she said that she

was--I have got the letter in my pocket, Mr. Sawyer, but my glasses are

in the carriage, and I should only waste your time if I attempted to

point out the passage to you, without them; she said, in short, Mr.

Sawyer, that she was married.’

What!’ said, or rather shouted, Mr. Bob Sawyer.

‘Married,’ repeated the old lady.

Mr. Bob Sawyer stopped to hear no more; but darting from the surgery

into the outer shop, cried in a stentorian voice, ‘Ben, my boy, she’s

bolted!’

Mr. Ben Allen, who had been slumbering behind the counter, with his head

half a foot or so below his knees, no sooner heard this appalling

communication, than he made a precipitate rush at Mr. Martin, and,

twisting his hand in the neck-cloth of that taciturn servitor, expressed

an obliging intention of choking him where he stood. This intention,

with a promptitude often the effect of desperation, he at once commenced

carrying into execution, with much vigour and surgical skill.

Mr. Martin, who was a man of few words and possessed but little power of

eloquence or persuasion, submitted to this operation with a very calm

and agreeable expression of countenance, for some seconds; finding,

however, that it threatened speedily to lead to a result which would

place it beyond his power to claim any wages, board or otherwise, in all

time to come, he muttered an inarticulate remonstrance and felled Mr.

Benjamin Allen to the ground. As that gentleman had his hands entangled

in his cravat, he had no alternative but to follow him to the floor.

There they both lay struggling, when the shop door opened, and the party

was increased by the arrival of two most unexpected visitors, to wit,

Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Samuel Weller.

The impression at once produced on Mr. Weller’s mind by what he saw,

was, that Mr. Martin was hired by the establishment of Sawyer, late

Nockemorf, to take strong medicine, or to go into fits and be

experimentalised upon, or to swallow poison now and then with the view

of testing the efficacy of some new antidotes, or to do something or

other to promote the great science of medicine, and gratify the ardent

spirit of inquiry burning in the bosoms of its two young professors. So,

without presuming to interfere, Sam stood perfectly still, and looked

on, as if he were mightily interested in the result of the then pending

experiment. Not so, Mr. Pickwick. He at once threw himself on the

astonished combatants, with his accustomed energy, and loudly called

upon the bystanders to interpose.

This roused Mr. Bob Sawyer, who had been hitherto quite paralysed by the

frenzy of his companion. With that gentleman’s assistance, Mr. Pickwick

raised Ben Allen to his feet. Mr. Martin finding himself alone on the

floor, got up, and looked about him.

‘Mr. Allen,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘what is the matter, Sir?’

‘Never mind, Sir!’ replied Mr. Allen, with haughty defiance.

‘What is it?’ inquired Mr. Pickwick, looking at Bob Sawyer. ‘Is he

unwell?’

Before Bob could reply, Mr. Ben Allen seized Mr. Pickwick by the hand,

and murmured, in sorrowful accents, ‘My sister, my dear Sir; my sister.’

‘Oh, is that all!’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘We shall easily arrange that

matter, I hope. Your sister is safe and well, and I am here, my dear

Sir, to--’

‘Sorry to do anythin’ as may cause an interruption to such wery pleasant

proceedin’s, as the king said wen he dissolved the parliament,’

interposed Mr. Weller, who had been peeping through the glass door; ‘but

there’s another experiment here, sir. Here’s a wenerable old lady a--

lyin’ on the carpet waitin’ for dissection, or galwinism, or some other

rewivin’ and scientific inwention.’

‘I forgot,’ exclaimed Mr. Ben Allen. ‘It is my aunt.’

‘Dear me!’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘Poor lady! Gently Sam, gently.’

‘Strange sitivation for one o’ the family,’ observed Sam Weller,

hoisting the aunt into a chair. ‘Now depitty sawbones, bring out the

wollatilly!’

The latter observation was addressed to the boy in gray, who, having

handed over the fly to the care of the street-keeper, had come back to

see what all the noise was about. Between the boy in gray, and Mr. Bob

Sawyer, and Mr. Benjamin Allen (who having frightened his aunt into a

fainting fit, was affectionately solicitous for her recovery) the old

lady was at length restored to consciousness; then Mr. Ben Allen,

turning with a puzzled countenance to Mr. Pickwick, asked him what he

was about to say, when he had been so alarmingly interrupted.

‘We are all friends here, I presume?’ said Mr. Pickwick, clearing his

voice, and looking towards the man of few words with the surly

countenance, who drove the fly with the chubby horse.

This reminded Mr. Bob Sawyer that the boy in gray was looking on, with

eyes wide open, and greedy ears. The incipient chemist having been

lifted up by his coat collar, and dropped outside the door, Bob Sawyer

assured Mr. Pickwick that he might speak without reserve.

‘Your sister, my dear Sir,’ said Mr. Pickwick, turning to Benjamin

Allen, ‘is in London; well and happy.’

‘Her happiness is no object to me, sir,’ said Benjamin Allen, with a

flourish of the hand.

‘Her husband _is_ an object to _me_, Sir,’ said Bob Sawyer. ‘He shall be

an object to me, sir, at twelve paces, and a pretty object I’ll make of

him, sir--a mean-spirited scoundrel!’ This, as it stood, was a very

pretty denunciation, and magnanimous withal; but Mr. Bob Sawyer rather

weakened its effect, by winding up with some general observations

concerning the punching of heads and knocking out of eyes, which were

commonplace by comparison.

‘Stay, sir,’ said Mr. Pickwick; ‘before you apply those epithets to the

gentleman in question, consider, dispassionately, the extent of his

fault, and above all remember that he is a friend of mine.’

‘What!’ said Mr. Bob Sawyer. ‘His name!’ cried Ben Allen. ‘His name!’

‘Mr. Nathaniel Winkle,’ said Mr. Pickwick.

Mr. Benjamin Allen deliberately crushed his spectacles beneath the heel

of his boot, and having picked up the pieces, and put them into three

separate pockets, folded his arms, bit his lips, and looked in a

threatening manner at the bland features of Mr. Pickwick.

‘Then it’s you, is it, Sir, who have encouraged and brought about this

match?’ inquired Mr. Benjamin Allen at length.

‘And it’s this gentleman’s servant, I suppose,’ interrupted the old

lady, ‘who has been skulking about my house, and endeavouring to entrap

my servants to conspire against their mistress.--Martin!’

‘Well?’ said the surly man, coming forward.

‘Is that the young man you saw in the lane, whom you told me about, this

morning?’

Mr. Martin, who, as it has already appeared, was a man of few words,

looked at Sam Weller, nodded his head, and growled forth, ‘That’s the

man.’ Mr. Weller, who was never proud, gave a smile of friendly

recognition as his eyes encountered those of the surly groom, and

admitted in courteous terms, that he had ‘knowed him afore.’

‘And this is the faithful creature,’ exclaimed Mr. Ben Allen, ‘whom I

had nearly suffocated!--Mr. Pickwick, how dare you allow your fellow to

be employed in the abduction of my sister? I demand that you explain

this matter, sir.’

‘Explain it, sir!’ cried Bob Sawyer fiercely.

‘It’s a conspiracy,’ said Ben Allen.

‘A regular plant,’ added Mr. Bob Sawyer.

‘A disgraceful imposition,’ observed the old lady.

‘Nothing but a do,’ remarked Martin.

‘Pray hear me,’ urged Mr. Pickwick, as Mr. Ben Allen fell into a chair

that patients were bled in, and gave way to his pocket-handkerchief. ‘I

have rendered no assistance in this matter, beyond being present at one

interview between the young people which I could not prevent, and from

which I conceived my presence would remove any slight colouring of

impropriety that it might otherwise have had; this is the whole share I

have had in the transaction, and I had no suspicion that an immediate

marriage was even contemplated. Though, mind,’ added Mr. Pickwick,

hastily checking himself--‘mind, I do not say I should have prevented

it, if I had known that it was intended.’

‘You hear that, all of you; you hear that?’ said Mr. Benjamin Allen.

‘I hope they do,’ mildly observed Mr. Pickwick, looking round, ‘and,’

added that gentleman, his colour mounting as he spoke, ‘I hope they hear

this, Sir, also. That from what has been stated to me, sir, I assert

that you were by no means justified in attempting to force your sister’s

inclinations as you did, and that you should rather have endeavoured by

your kindness and forbearance to have supplied the place of other nearer

relations whom she had never known, from a child. As regards my young

friend, I must beg to add, that in every point of worldly advantage he

is, at least, on an equal footing with yourself, if not on a much better

one, and that unless I hear this question discussed with becoming temper

and moderation, I decline hearing any more said upon the subject.’

‘I wish to make a wery few remarks in addition to wot has been put

for’ard by the honourable gen’l’m’n as has jist give over,’ said Mr.

Weller, stepping forth, ‘wich is this here: a indiwidual in company has

called me a feller.’

‘That has nothing whatever to do with the matter, Sam,’ interposed Mr.

Pickwick. ‘Pray hold your tongue.’

‘I ain’t a-goin’ to say nothin’ on that ‘ere pint, sir,’ replied Sam,

‘but merely this here. P’raps that gen’l’m’n may think as there wos a

priory ‘tachment; but there worn’t nothin’ o’ the sort, for the young

lady said in the wery beginnin’ o’ the keepin’ company, that she

couldn’t abide him. Nobody’s cut him out, and it ‘ud ha’ been jist the

wery same for him if the young lady had never seen Mr. Vinkle. That’s

what I wished to say, sir, and I hope I’ve now made that ‘ere

gen’l’m’n’s mind easy.

A short pause followed these consolatory remarks of Mr. Weller. Then Mr.

Ben Allen rising from his chair, protested that he would never see

Arabella’s face again; while Mr. Bob Sawyer, despite Sam’s flattering

assurance, vowed dreadful vengeance on the happy bridegroom.

But, just when matters were at their height, and threatening to remain

so, Mr. Pickwick found a powerful assistant in the old lady, who,

evidently much struck by the mode in which he had advocated her niece’s

cause, ventured to approach Mr. Benjamin Allen with a few comforting

reflections, of which the chief were, that after all, perhaps, it was

well it was no worse; the least said the soonest mended, and upon her

word she did not know that it was so very bad after all; what was over

couldn’t be begun, and what couldn’t be cured must be endured; with

various other assurances of the like novel and strengthening

description. To all of these, Mr. Benjamin Allen replied that he meant

no disrespect to his aunt, or anybody there, but if it were all the same

to them, and they would allow him to have his own way, he would rather

have the pleasure of hating his sister till death, and after it.

At length, when this determination had been announced half a hundred

times, the old lady suddenly bridling up and looking very majestic,

wished to know what she had done that no respect was to be paid to her

years or station, and that she should be obliged to beg and pray, in

that way, of her own nephew, whom she remembered about five-and-twenty

years before he was born, and whom she had known, personally, when he

hadn’t a tooth in his head; to say nothing of her presence on the first

occasion of his having his hair cut, and assistance at numerous other

times and ceremonies during his babyhood, of sufficient importance to

found a claim upon his affection, obedience, and sympathies, for ever.

While the good lady was bestowing this objurgation on Mr. Ben Allen, Bob

Sawyer and Mr. Pickwick had retired in close conversation to the inner

room, where Mr. Sawyer was observed to apply himself several times to

the mouth of a black bottle, under the influence of which, his features

gradually assumed a cheerful and even jovial expression. And at last he

emerged from the room, bottle in hand, and, remarking that he was very

sorry to say he had been making a fool of himself, begged to propose the

health and happiness of Mr. and Mrs. Winkle, whose felicity, so far from

envying, he would be the first to congratulate them upon. Hearing this,

Mr. Ben Allen suddenly arose from his chair, and, seizing the black

bottle, drank the toast so heartily, that, the liquor being strong, he

became nearly as black in the face as the bottle. Finally, the black

bottle went round till it was empty, and there was so much shaking of

hands and interchanging of compliments, that even the metal-visaged Mr.

Martin condescended to smile.

‘And now,’ said Bob Sawyer, rubbing his hands, ‘we’ll have a jolly

night.’

‘I am sorry,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘that I must return to my inn. I have

not been accustomed to fatigue lately, and my journey has tired me

exceedingly.’

‘You’ll take some tea, Mr. Pickwick?’ said the old lady, with

irresistible sweetness.

‘Thank you, I would rather not,’ replied that gentleman. The truth is,

that the old lady’s evidently increasing admiration was Mr. Pickwick’s

principal inducement for going away. He thought of Mrs. Bardell; and

every glance of the old lady’s eyes threw him into a cold perspiration.

As Mr. Pickwick could by no means be prevailed upon to stay, it was

arranged at once, on his own proposition, that Mr. Benjamin Allen should

accompany him on his journey to the elder Mr. Winkle’s, and that the

coach should be at the door, at nine o’clock next morning. He then took

his leave, and, followed by Samuel Weller, repaired to the Bush. It is

worthy of remark, that Mr. Martin’s face was horribly convulsed as he

shook hands with Sam at parting, and that he gave vent to a smile and an

oath simultaneously; from which tokens it has been inferred by those who

were best acquainted with that gentleman’s peculiarities, that he

expressed himself much pleased with Mr. Weller’s society, and requested

the honour of his further acquaintance.

‘Shall I order a private room, Sir?’ inquired Sam, when they reached the

Bush.

‘Why, no, Sam,’ replied Mr. Pickwick; ‘as I dined in the coffee-room,

and shall go to bed soon, it is hardly worth while. See who there is in

the travellers’ room, Sam.’

Mr. Weller departed on his errand, and presently returned to say that

there was only a gentleman with one eye; and that he and the landlord

were drinking a bowl of bishop together.

‘I will join them,’ said Mr. Pickwick.

‘He’s a queer customer, the vun-eyed vun, sir,’ observed Mr. Weller, as

he led the way. ‘He’s a-gammonin’ that ‘ere landlord, he is, sir, till

he don’t rightly know wether he’s a-standing on the soles of his boots

or the crown of his hat.’

The individual to whom this observation referred, was sitting at the

upper end of the room when Mr. Pickwick entered, and was smoking a large

Dutch pipe, with his eye intently fixed on the round face of the

landlord; a jolly-looking old personage, to whom he had recently been

relating some tale of wonder, as was testified by sundry disjointed

exclamations of, ‘Well, I wouldn’t have believed it! The strangest thing

I ever heard! Couldn’t have supposed it possible!’ and other expressions

of astonishment which burst spontaneously from his lips, as he returned

the fixed gaze of the one-eyed man.

‘Servant, sir,’ said the one-eyed man to Mr. Pickwick. ‘Fine night,

sir.’

‘Very much so indeed,’ replied Mr. Pickwick, as the waiter placed a

small decanter of brandy, and some hot water before him.

While Mr. Pickwick was mixing his brandy-and-water, the one-eyed man

looked round at him earnestly, from time to time, and at length said--

‘I think I’ve seen you before.’

‘I don’t recollect you,’ rejoined Mr. Pickwick.

‘I dare say not,’ said the one-eyed man. ‘You didn’t know me, but I knew

two friends of yours that were stopping at the Peacock at Eatanswill, at

the time of the election.’

‘Oh, indeed!’ exclaimed Mr. Pickwick.

‘Yes,’ rejoined the one-eyed man. ‘I mentioned a little circumstance to

them about a friend of mine of the name of Tom Smart. Perhaps you’ve

heard them speak of it.’

‘Often,’ rejoined Mr. Pickwick, smiling. ‘He was your uncle, I think?’

‘No, no; only a friend of my uncle’s,’ replied the one-eyed man.

‘He was a wonderful man, that uncle of yours, though,’ remarked the

landlord shaking his head.

‘Well, I think he was; I think I may say he was,’ answered the one-eyed

man. ‘I could tell you a story about that same uncle, gentlemen, that

would rather surprise you.’

‘Could you?’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘Let us hear it, by all means.’

The one-eyed bagman ladled out a glass of negus from the bowl, and drank

it; smoked a long whiff out of the Dutch pipe; and then, calling to Sam

Weller who was lingering near the door, that he needn’t go away unless

he wanted to, because the story was no secret, fixed his eye upon the

landlord’s, and proceeded, in the words of the next chapter.

CHAPTER XLIX. CONTAINING THE STORY OF THE BAGMAN’S UNCLE

My uncle, gentlemen,’ said the bagman, ‘was one of the merriest,

pleasantest, cleverest fellows, that ever lived. I wish you had known

him, gentlemen. On second thoughts, gentlemen, I don’t wish you had

known him, for if you had, you would have been all, by this time, in the

ordinary course of nature, if not dead, at all events so near it, as to

have taken to stopping at home and giving up company, which would have

deprived me of the inestimable pleasure of addressing you at this

moment. Gentlemen, I wish your fathers and mothers had known my uncle.

They would have been amazingly fond of him, especially your respectable

mothers; I know they would. If any two of his numerous virtues

predominated over the many that adorned his character, I should say they

were his mixed punch and his after-supper song. Excuse my dwelling on

these melancholy recollections of departed worth; you won’t see a man

like my uncle every day in the week.

‘I have always considered it a great point in my uncle’s character,

gentlemen, that he was the intimate friend and companion of Tom Smart,

of the great house of Bilson and Slum, Cateaton Street, City. My uncle

collected for Tiggin and Welps, but for a long time he went pretty near

the same journey as Tom; and the very first night they met, my uncle

took a fancy for Tom, and Tom took a fancy for my uncle. They made a bet

of a new hat before they had known each other half an hour, who should

brew the best quart of punch and drink it the quickest. My uncle was

judged to have won the making, but Tom Smart beat him in the drinking by

about half a salt-spoonful. They took another quart apiece to drink each

other’s health in, and were staunch friends ever afterwards. There’s a

destiny in these things, gentlemen; we can’t help it.

‘In personal appearance, my uncle was a trifle shorter than the middle

size; he was a thought stouter too, than the ordinary run of people, and

perhaps his face might be a shade redder. He had the jolliest face you

ever saw, gentleman: something like Punch, with a handsome nose and

chin; his eyes were always twinkling and sparkling with good-humour; and

a smile--not one of your unmeaning wooden grins, but a real, merry,

hearty, good-tempered smile--was perpetually on his countenance. He was

pitched out of his gig once, and knocked, head first, against a

milestone. There he lay, stunned, and so cut about the face with some

gravel which had been heaped up alongside it, that, to use my uncle’s

own strong expression, if his mother could have revisited the earth, she

wouldn’t have known him. Indeed, when I come to think of the matter,

gentlemen, I feel pretty sure she wouldn’t, for she died when my uncle

was two years and seven months old, and I think it’s very likely that,

even without the gravel, his top-boots would have puzzled the good lady

not a little; to say nothing of his jolly red face. However, there he

lay, and I have heard my uncle say, many a time, that the man said who

picked him up that he was smiling as merrily as if he had tumbled out

for a treat, and that after they had bled him, the first faint

glimmerings of returning animation, were his jumping up in bed, bursting

out into a loud laugh, kissing the young woman who held the basin, and

demanding a mutton chop and a pickled walnut. He was very fond of

pickled walnuts, gentlemen. He said he always found that, taken without

vinegar, they relished the beer.

‘My uncle’s great journey was in the fall of the leaf, at which time he

collected debts, and took orders, in the north; going from London to

Edinburgh, from Edinburgh to Glasgow, from Glasgow back to Edinburgh,

and thence to London by the smack. You are to understand that his second

visit to Edinburgh was for his own pleasure. He used to go back for a

week, just to look up his old friends; and what with breakfasting with

this one, lunching with that, dining with the third, and supping with

another, a pretty tight week he used to make of it. I don’t know whether

any of you, gentlemen, ever partook of a real substantial hospitable

Scotch breakfast, and then went out to a slight lunch of a bushel of

oysters, a dozen or so of bottled ale, and a noggin or two of whiskey to

close up with. If you ever did, you will agree with me that it requires

a pretty strong head to go out to dinner and supper afterwards.

‘But bless your hearts and eyebrows, all this sort of thing was nothing

to my uncle! He was so well seasoned, that it was mere child’s play. I

have heard him say that he could see the Dundee people out, any day, and

walk home afterwards without staggering; and yet the Dundee people have

as strong heads and as strong punch, gentlemen, as you are likely to

meet with, between the poles. I have heard of a Glasgow man and a Dundee

man drinking against each other for fifteen hours at a sitting. They

were both suffocated, as nearly as could be ascertained, at the same

moment, but with this trifling exception, gentlemen, they were not a bit

the worse for it.

‘One night, within four-and-twenty hours of the time when he had settled

to take shipping for London, my uncle supped at the house of a very old

friend of his, a Bailie Mac something and four syllables after it, who

lived in the old town of Edinburgh. There were the bailie’s wife, and

the bailie’s three daughters, and the bailie’s grown-up son, and three

or four stout, bushy eye-browed, canny, old Scotch fellows, that the

bailie had got together to do honour to my uncle, and help to make

merry. It was a glorious supper. There was kippered salmon, and Finnan

haddocks, and a lamb’s head, and a haggis--a celebrated Scotch dish,

gentlemen, which my uncle used to say always looked to him, when it came

to table, very much like a Cupid’s stomach--and a great many other

things besides, that I forget the names of, but very good things,

notwithstanding. The lassies were pretty and agreeable; the bailie’s

wife was one of the best creatures that ever lived; and my uncle was in

thoroughly good cue. The consequence of which was, that the young ladies

tittered and giggled, and the old lady laughed out loud, and the bailie

and the other old fellows roared till they were red in the face, the

whole mortal time. I don’t quite recollect how many tumblers of whiskey-

toddy each man drank after supper; but this I know, that about one

o’clock in the morning, the bailie’s grown-up son became insensible

while attempting the first verse of “Willie brewed a peck o’ maut”; and

he having been, for half an hour before, the only other man visible

above the mahogany, it occurred to my uncle that it was almost time to

think about going, especially as drinking had set in at seven o’clock,

in order that he might get home at a decent hour. But, thinking it might

not be quite polite to go just then, my uncle voted himself into the

chair, mixed another glass, rose to propose his own health, addressed

himself in a neat and complimentary speech, and drank the toast with

great enthusiasm. Still nobody woke; so my uncle took a little drop

more--neat this time, to prevent the toddy from disagreeing with him--

and, laying violent hands on his hat, sallied forth into the street.

‘It was a wild, gusty night when my uncle closed the bailie’s door, and

settling his hat firmly on his head to prevent the wind from taking it,

thrust his hands into his pockets, and looking upward, took a short

survey of the state of the weather. The clouds were drifting over the

moon at their giddiest speed; at one time wholly obscuring her; at

another, suffering her to burst forth in full splendour and shed her

light on all the objects around; anon, driving over her again, with

increased velocity, and shrouding everything in darkness. “Really, this

won’t do,” said my uncle, addressing himself to the weather, as if he

felt himself personally offended. “This is not at all the kind of thing

for my voyage. It will not do at any price,” said my uncle, very

impressively. Having repeated this, several times, he recovered his

balance with some difficulty--for he was rather giddy with looking up

into the sky so long--and walked merrily on.

‘The bailie’s house was in the Canongate, and my uncle was going to the

other end of Leith Walk, rather better than a mile’s journey. On either

side of him, there shot up against the dark sky, tall, gaunt, straggling

houses, with time-stained fronts, and windows that seemed to have shared

the lot of eyes in mortals, and to have grown dim and sunken with age.

Six, seven, eight storey high, were the houses; storey piled upon

storey, as children build with cards--throwing their dark shadows over

the roughly paved road, and making the dark night darker. A few oil

lamps were scattered at long distances, but they only served to mark the

dirty entrance to some narrow close, or to show where a common stair

communicated, by steep and intricate windings, with the various flats

above. Glancing at all these things with the air of a man who had seen

them too often before, to think them worthy of much notice now, my uncle

walked up the middle of the street, with a thumb in each waistcoat

pocket, indulging from time to time in various snatches of song, chanted

forth with such good-will and spirit, that the quiet honest folk started

from their first sleep and lay trembling in bed till the sound died away

in the distance; when, satisfying themselves that it was only some

drunken ne’er-do-weel finding his way home, they covered themselves up

warm and fell asleep again.

‘I am particular in describing how my uncle walked up the middle of the

street, with his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets, gentlemen, because, as

he often used to say (and with great reason too) there is nothing at all

extraordinary in this story, unless you distinctly understand at the

beginning, that he was not by any means of a marvellous or romantic

turn.

‘Gentlemen, my uncle walked on with his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets,

taking the middle of the street to himself, and singing, now a verse of

a love song, and then a verse of a drinking one, and when he was tired

of both, whistling melodiously, until he reached the North Bridge,

which, at this point, connects the old and new towns of Edinburgh. Here

he stopped for a minute, to look at the strange, irregular clusters of

lights piled one above the other, and twinkling afar off so high, that

they looked like stars, gleaming from the castle walls on the one side

and the Calton Hill on the other, as if they illuminated veritable

castles in the air; while the old picturesque town slept heavily on, in

gloom and darkness below: its palace and chapel of Holyrood, guarded day

and night, as a friend of my uncle’s used to say, by old Arthur’s Seat,

towering, surly and dark, like some gruff genius, over the ancient city

he has watched so long. I say, gentlemen, my uncle stopped here, for a

minute, to look about him; and then, paying a compliment to the weather,

which had a little cleared up, though the moon was sinking, walked on

again, as royally as before; keeping the middle of the road with great

dignity, and looking as if he would very much like to meet with somebody

who would dispute possession of it with him. There was nobody at all

disposed to contest the point, as it happened; and so, on he went, with

his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets, like a lamb.

‘When my uncle reached the end of Leith Walk, he had to cross a pretty

large piece of waste ground which separated him from a short street

which he had to turn down to go direct to his lodging. Now, in this

piece of waste ground, there was, at that time, an enclosure belonging

to some wheelwright who contracted with the Post Office for the purchase

of old, worn-out mail coaches; and my uncle, being very fond of coaches,

old, young, or middle-aged, all at once took it into his head to step

out of his road for no other purpose than to peep between the palings at

these mails--about a dozen of which he remembered to have seen, crowded

together in a very forlorn and dismantled state, inside. My uncle was a

very enthusiastic, emphatic sort of person, gentlemen; so, finding that

he could not obtain a good peep between the palings he got over them,

and sitting himself quietly down on an old axle-tree, began to

contemplate the mail coaches with a deal of gravity.

‘There might be a dozen of them, or there might be more--my uncle was

never quite certain on this point, and being a man of very scrupulous

veracity about numbers, didn’t like to say--but there they stood, all

huddled together in the most desolate condition imaginable. The doors

had been torn from their hinges and removed; the linings had been

stripped off, only a shred hanging here and there by a rusty nail; the

lamps were gone, the poles had long since vanished, the ironwork was

rusty, the paint was worn away; the wind whistled through the chinks in

the bare woodwork; and the rain, which had collected on the roofs, fell,

drop by drop, into the insides with a hollow and melancholy sound. They

were the decaying skeletons of departed mails, and in that lonely place,

at that time of night, they looked chill and dismal.

‘My uncle rested his head upon his hands, and thought of the busy,

bustling people who had rattled about, years before, in the old coaches,

and were now as silent and changed; he thought of the numbers of people

to whom one of these crazy, mouldering vehicles had borne, night after

night, for many years, and through all weathers, the anxiously expected

intelligence, the eagerly looked-for remittance, the promised assurance

of health and safety, the sudden announcement of sickness and death. The

merchant, the lover, the wife, the widow, the mother, the school-boy,

the very child who tottered to the door at the postman’s knock--how had

they all looked forward to the arrival of the old coach. And where were

they all now?

‘Gentlemen, my uncle used to _say _that he thought all this at the time,

but I rather suspect he learned it out of some book afterwards, for he

distinctly stated that he fell into a kind of doze, as he sat on the old

axle-tree looking at the decayed mail coaches, and that he was suddenly

awakened by some deep church bell striking two. Now, my uncle was never

a fast thinker, and if he had thought all these things, I am quite

certain it would have taken him till full half-past two o’clock at the

very least. I am, therefore, decidedly of opinion, gentlemen, that my

uncle fell into a kind of doze, without having thought about anything at

all.

‘Be this as it may, a church bell struck two. My uncle woke, rubbed his

eyes, and jumped up in astonishment.

‘In one instant, after the clock struck two, the whole of this deserted

and quiet spot had become a scene of most extraordinary life and

animation. The mail coach doors were on their hinges, the lining was

replaced, the ironwork was as good as new, the paint was restored, the

lamps were alight; cushions and greatcoats were on every coach-box,

porters were thrusting parcels into every boot, guards were stowing away

letter-bags, hostlers were dashing pails of water against the renovated

wheels; numbers of men were pushing about, fixing poles into every

coach; passengers arrived, portmanteaus were handed up, horses were put

to; in short, it was perfectly clear that every mail there, was to be

off directly. Gentlemen, my uncle opened his eyes so wide at all this,

that, to the very last moment of his life, he used to wonder how it fell

out that he had ever been able to shut ‘em again.

‘“Now then!” said a voice, as my uncle felt a hand on his shoulder,

“you’re booked for one inside. You’d better get in.”

‘“I booked!” said my uncle, turning round.

‘“Yes, certainly.”

‘My uncle, gentlemen, could say nothing, he was so very much astonished.

The queerest thing of all was that although there was such a crowd of

persons, and although fresh faces were pouring in, every moment, there

was no telling where they came from. They seemed to start up, in some

strange manner, from the ground, or the air, and disappear in the same

way. When a porter had put his luggage in the coach, and received his

fare, he turned round and was gone; and before my uncle had well begun

to wonder what had become of him, half a dozen fresh ones started up,

and staggered along under the weight of parcels, which seemed big enough

to crush them. The passengers were all dressed so oddly too! Large,

broad-skirted laced coats, with great cuffs and no collars; and wigs,

gentlemen--great formal wigs with a tie behind. My uncle could make

nothing of it.

‘“Now, are you going to get in?” said the person who had addressed my

uncle before. He was dressed as a mail guard, with a wig on his head and

most enormous cuffs to his coat, and had a lantern in one hand, and a

huge blunderbuss in the other, which he was going to stow away in his

little arm-chest. “_are _you going to get in, Jack Martin?” said the

guard, holding the lantern to my uncle’s face.

‘“Hollo!” said my uncle, falling back a step or two. “That’s familiar!”

‘“It’s so on the way-bill,” said the guard.

‘“Isn’t there a ‘Mister’ before it?” said my uncle. For he felt,

gentlemen, that for a guard he didn’t know, to call him Jack Martin, was

a liberty which the Post Office wouldn’t have sanctioned if they had

known it.

‘“No, there is not,” rejoined the guard coolly.

‘“Is the fare paid?” inquired my uncle.

‘“Of course it is,” rejoined the guard.

‘“It is, is it?” said my uncle. “Then here goes! Which coach?”

‘“This,” said the guard, pointing to an old-fashioned Edinburgh and

London mail, which had the steps down and the door open. “Stop! Here are

the other passengers. Let them get in first.”

‘As the guard spoke, there all at once appeared, right in front of my

uncle, a young gentleman in a powdered wig, and a sky-blue coat trimmed

with silver, made very full and broad in the skirts, which were lined

with buckram. Tiggin and Welps were in the printed calico and waistcoat

piece line, gentlemen, so my uncle knew all the materials at once. He

wore knee breeches, and a kind of leggings rolled up over his silk

stockings, and shoes with buckles; he had ruffles at his wrists, a

three-cornered hat on his head, and a long taper sword by his side. The

flaps of his waist-coat came half-way down his thighs, and the ends of

his cravat reached to his waist. He stalked gravely to the coach door,

pulled off his hat, and held it above his head at arm’s length, cocking

his little finger in the air at the same time, as some affected people

do, when they take a cup of tea. Then he drew his feet together, and

made a low, grave bow, and then put out his left hand. My uncle was just

going to step forward, and shake it heartily, when he perceived that

these attentions were directed, not towards him, but to a young lady who

just then appeared at the foot of the steps, attired in an old-fashioned

green velvet dress with a long waist and stomacher. She had no bonnet on

her head, gentlemen, which was muffled in a black silk hood, but she

looked round for an instant as she prepared to get into the coach, and

such a beautiful face as she disclosed, my uncle had never seen--not

even in a picture. She got into the coach, holding up her dress with one

hand; and as my uncle always said with a round oath, when he told the

story, he wouldn’t have believed it possible that legs and feet could

have been brought to such a state of perfection unless he had seen them

with his own eyes.

‘But, in this one glimpse of the beautiful face, my uncle saw that the

young lady cast an imploring look upon him, and that she appeared

terrified and distressed. He noticed, too, that the young fellow in the

powdered wig, notwithstanding his show of gallantry, which was all very

fine and grand, clasped her tight by the wrist when she got in, and

followed himself immediately afterwards. An uncommonly ill-looking

fellow, in a close brown wig, and a plum-coloured suit, wearing a very

large sword, and boots up to his hips, belonged to the party; and when

he sat himself down next to the young lady, who shrank into a corner at

his approach, my uncle was confirmed in his original impression that

something dark and mysterious was going forward, or, as he always said

himself, that “there was a screw loose somewhere.” It’s quite surprising

how quickly he made up his mind to help the lady at any peril, if she

needed any help.

‘“Death and lightning!” exclaimed the young gentleman, laying his hand

upon his sword as my uncle entered the coach.

‘“Blood and thunder!” roared the other gentleman. With this, he whipped

his sword out, and made a lunge at my uncle without further ceremony. My

uncle had no weapon about him, but with great dexterity he snatched the

ill-looking gentleman’s three-cornered hat from his head, and, receiving

the point of his sword right through the crown, squeezed the sides

together, and held it tight.

‘“Pink him behind!” cried the ill-looking gentleman to his companion, as

he struggled to regain his sword.

‘“He had better not,” cried my uncle, displaying the heel of one of his

shoes, in a threatening manner. “I’ll kick his brains out, if he has

any--, or fracture his skull if he hasn’t.” Exerting all his strength,

at this moment, my uncle wrenched the ill-looking man’s sword from his

grasp, and flung it clean out of the coach window, upon which the

younger gentleman vociferated, “Death and lightning!” again, and laid

his hand upon the hilt of his sword, in a very fierce manner, but didn’t

draw it. Perhaps, gentlemen, as my uncle used to say with a smile,

perhaps he was afraid of alarming the lady.

‘“Now, gentlemen,” said my uncle, taking his seat deliberately, “I don’t

want to have any death, with or without lightning, in a lady’s presence,

and we have had quite blood and thundering enough for one journey; so,

if you please, we’ll sit in our places like quiet insides. Here, guard,

pick up that gentleman’s carving-knife.”

‘As quickly as my uncle said the words, the guard appeared at the coach

window, with the gentleman’s sword in his hand. He held up his lantern,

and looked earnestly in my uncle’s face, as he handed it in, when, by

its light, my uncle saw, to his great surprise, that an immense crowd of

mail-coach guards swarmed round the window, every one of whom had his

eyes earnestly fixed upon him too. He had never seen such a sea of white

faces, red bodies, and earnest eyes, in all his born days.

‘“This is the strangest sort of thing I ever had anything to do with,”

thought my uncle; “allow me to return you your hat, sir.”

‘The ill-looking gentleman received his three-cornered hat in silence,

looked at the hole in the middle with an inquiring air, and finally

stuck it on the top of his wig with a solemnity the effect of which was

a trifle impaired by his sneezing violently at the moment, and jerking

it off again.

‘“All right!” cried the guard with the lantern, mounting into his little

seat behind. Away they went. My uncle peeped out of the coach window as

they emerged from the yard, and observed that the other mails, with

coachmen, guards, horses, and passengers, complete, were driving round

and round in circles, at a slow trot of about five miles an hour. My

uncle burned with indignation, gentlemen. As a commercial man, he felt

that the mail-bags were not to be trifled with, and he resolved to

memorialise the Post Office on the subject, the very instant he reached

London.

‘At present, however, his thoughts were occupied with the young lady who

sat in the farthest corner of the coach, with her face muffled closely

in her hood; the gentleman with the sky-blue coat sitting opposite to

her; the other man in the plum-coloured suit, by her side; and both

watching her intently. If she so much as rustled the folds of her hood,

he could hear the ill-looking man clap his hand upon his sword, and

could tell by the other’s breathing (it was so dark he couldn’t see his

face) that he was looking as big as if he were going to devour her at a

mouthful. This roused my uncle more and more, and he resolved, come what

might, to see the end of it. He had a great admiration for bright eyes,

and sweet faces, and pretty legs and feet; in short, he was fond of the

whole sex. It runs in our family, gentleman--so am I.

‘Many were the devices which my uncle practised, to attract the lady’s

attention, or at all events, to engage the mysterious gentlemen in

conversation. They were all in vain; the gentlemen wouldn’t talk, and

the lady didn’t dare. He thrust his head out of the coach window at

intervals, and bawled out to know why they didn’t go faster. But he

called till he was hoarse; nobody paid the least attention to him. He

leaned back in the coach, and thought of the beautiful face, and the

feet and legs. This answered better; it whiled away the time, and kept

him from wondering where he was going, and how it was that he found

himself in such an odd situation. Not that this would have worried him

much, anyway--he was a mighty free and easy, roving, devil-may-care sort

of person, was my uncle, gentlemen.

‘All of a sudden the coach stopped. “Hollo!” said my uncle, “what’s in

the wind now?”

‘“Alight here,” said the guard, letting down the steps.

‘“Here!” cried my uncle.

‘“Here,” rejoined the guard.

‘“I’ll do nothing of the sort,” said my uncle.

‘“Very well, then stop where you are,” said the guard.

‘“I will,” said my uncle.

‘“Do,” said the guard.

‘The passengers had regarded this colloquy with great attention, and,

finding that my uncle was determined not to alight, the younger man

squeezed past him, to hand the lady out. At this moment, the ill-looking

man was inspecting the hole in the crown of his three-cornered hat. As

the young lady brushed past, she dropped one of her gloves into my

uncle’s hand, and softly whispered, with her lips so close to his face

that he felt her warm breath on his nose, the single word “Help!”

Gentlemen, my uncle leaped out of the coach at once, with such violence

that it rocked on the springs again.

‘“Oh! you’ve thought better of it, have you?” said the guard, when he

saw my uncle standing on the ground.

‘My uncle looked at the guard for a few seconds, in some doubt whether

it wouldn’t be better to wrench his blunderbuss from him, fire it in the

face of the man with the big sword, knock the rest of the company over

the head with the stock, snatch up the young lady, and go off in the

smoke. On second thoughts, however, he abandoned this plan, as being a

shade too melodramatic in the execution, and followed the two mysterious

men, who, keeping the lady between them, were now entering an old house

in front of which the coach had stopped. They turned into the passage,

and my uncle followed.

‘Of all the ruinous and desolate places my uncle had ever beheld, this

was the most so. It looked as if it had once been a large house of

entertainment; but the roof had fallen in, in many places, and the

stairs were steep, rugged, and broken. There was a huge fireplace in the

room into which they walked, and the chimney was blackened with smoke;

but no warm blaze lighted it up now. The white feathery dust of burned

wood was still strewed over the hearth, but the stove was cold, and all

was dark and gloomy.

‘“Well,” said my uncle, as he looked about him, “a mail travelling at

the rate of six miles and a half an hour, and stopping for an indefinite

time at such a hole as this, is rather an irregular sort of proceeding,

I fancy. This shall be made known. I’ll write to the papers.”

‘My uncle said this in a pretty loud voice, and in an open, unreserved

sort of manner, with the view of engaging the two strangers in

conversation if he could. But, neither of them took any more notice of

him than whispering to each other, and scowling at him as they did so.

The lady was at the farther end of the room, and once she ventured to

wave her hand, as if beseeching my uncle’s assistance.

‘At length the two strangers advanced a little, and the conversation

began in earnest.

‘“You don’t know this is a private room, I suppose, fellow?” said the

gentleman in sky-blue.

‘“No, I do not, fellow,” rejoined my uncle. “Only, if this is a private

room specially ordered for the occasion, I should think the public room

must be a _very _comfortable one;” with this, my uncle sat himself down

in a high-backed chair, and took such an accurate measure of the

gentleman, with his eyes, that Tiggin and Welps could have supplied him

with printed calico for a suit, and not an inch too much or too little,

from that estimate alone.

‘“Quit this room,” said both men together, grasping their swords.

‘“Eh?” said my uncle, not at all appearing to comprehend their meaning.

‘“Quit the room, or you are a dead man,” said the ill-looking fellow

with the large sword, drawing it at the same time and flourishing it in

the air.

‘“Down with him!” cried the gentleman in sky-blue, drawing his sword

also, and falling back two or three yards. “Down with him!” The lady

gave a loud scream.

‘Now, my uncle was always remarkable for great boldness, and great

presence of mind. All the time that he had appeared so indifferent to

what was going on, he had been looking slily about for some missile or

weapon of defence, and at the very instant when the swords were drawn,

he espied, standing in the chimney-corner, an old basket-hilted rapier

in a rusty scabbard. At one bound, my uncle caught it in his hand, drew

it, flourished it gallantly above his head, called aloud to the lady to

keep out of the way, hurled the chair at the man in sky-blue, and the

scabbard at the man in plum-colour, and taking advantage of the

confusion, fell upon them both, pell-mell.

‘Gentlemen, there is an old story--none the worse for being true--

regarding a fine young Irish gentleman, who being asked if he could play

the fiddle, replied he had no doubt he could, but he couldn’t exactly

say, for certain, because he had never tried. This is not inapplicable

to my uncle and his fencing. He had never had a sword in his hand

before, except once when he played Richard the Third at a private

theatre, upon which occasion it was arranged with Richmond that he was

to be run through, from behind, without showing fight at all. But here

he was, cutting and slashing with two experienced swordsman, thrusting,

and guarding, and poking, and slicing, and acquitting himself in the

most manful and dexterous manner possible, although up to that time he

had never been aware that he had the least notion of the science. It

only shows how true the old saying is, that a man never knows what he

can do till he tries, gentlemen.

‘The noise of the combat was terrific; each of the three combatants

swearing like troopers, and their swords clashing with as much noise as

if all the knives and steels in Newport market were rattling together,

at the same time. When it was at its very height, the lady (to encourage

my uncle most probably) withdrew her hood entirely from her face, and

disclosed a countenance of such dazzling beauty, that he would have

fought against fifty men, to win one smile from it and die. He had done

wonders before, but now he began to powder away like a raving mad giant.

‘At this very moment, the gentleman in sky-blue turning round, and

seeing the young lady with her face uncovered, vented an exclamation of

rage and jealousy, and, turning his weapon against her beautiful bosom,

pointed a thrust at her heart, which caused my uncle to utter a cry of

apprehension that made the building ring. The lady stepped lightly

aside, and snatching the young man’s sword from his hand, before he had

recovered his balance, drove him to the wall, and running it through

him, and the panelling, up to the very hilt, pinned him there, hard and

fast. It was a splendid example. My uncle, with a loud shout of triumph,

and a strength that was irresistible, made his adversary retreat in the

same direction, and plunging the old rapier into the very centre of a

large red flower in the pattern of his waistcoat, nailed him beside his

friend; there they both stood, gentlemen, jerking their arms and legs

about in agony, like the toy-shop figures that are moved by a piece of

pack-thread. My uncle always said, afterwards, that this was one of the

surest means he knew of, for disposing of an enemy; but it was liable to

one objection on the ground of expense, inasmuch as it involved the loss

of a sword for every man disabled.

‘“The mail, the mail!” cried the lady, running up to my uncle and

throwing her beautiful arms round his neck; “we may yet escape.”

‘“May!” cried my uncle; “why, my dear, there’s nobody else to kill, is

there?” My uncle was rather disappointed, gentlemen, for he thought a

little quiet bit of love-making would be agreeable after the

slaughtering, if it were only to change the subject.

‘“We have not an instant to lose here,” said the young lady. “He

(pointing to the young gentleman in sky-blue) is the only son of the

powerful Marquess of Filletoville.”

‘“Well then, my dear, I’m afraid he’ll never come to the title,” said my

uncle, looking coolly at the young gentleman as he stood fixed up

against the wall, in the cockchafer fashion that I have described. “You

have cut off the entail, my love.”

‘“I have been torn from my home and my friends by these villains,” said

the young lady, her features glowing with indignation. “That wretch

would have married me by violence in another hour.”

‘“Confound his impudence!” said my uncle, bestowing a very contemptuous

look on the dying heir of Filletoville.

‘“As you may guess from what you have seen,” said the young lady, “the

party were prepared to murder me if I appealed to any one for

assistance. If their accomplices find us here, we are lost. Two minutes

hence may be too late. The mail!” With these words, overpowered by her

feelings, and the exertion of sticking the young Marquess of

Filletoville, she sank into my uncle’s arms. My uncle caught her up, and

bore her to the house door. There stood the mail, with four long-tailed,

flowing-maned, black horses, ready harnessed; but no coachman, no guard,

no hostler even, at the horses’ heads.

‘Gentlemen, I hope I do no injustice to my uncle’s memory, when I

express my opinion, that although he was a bachelor, he had held some

ladies in his arms before this time; I believe, indeed, that he had

rather a habit of kissing barmaids; and I know, that in one or two

instances, he had been seen by credible witnesses, to hug a landlady in

a very perceptible manner. I mention the circumstance, to show what a

very uncommon sort of person this beautiful young lady must have been,

to have affected my uncle in the way she did; he used to say, that as

her long dark hair trailed over his arm, and her beautiful dark eyes

fixed themselves upon his face when she recovered, he felt so strange

and nervous that his legs trembled beneath him. But who can look in a

sweet, soft pair of dark eyes, without feeling queer? I can’t,

gentlemen. I am afraid to look at some eyes I know, and that’s the truth

of it.

‘“You will never leave me,” murmured the young lady.

‘“Never,” said my uncle. And he meant it too.

‘“My dear preserver!” exclaimed the young lady. “My dear, kind, brave

preserver!”

‘“Don’t,” said my uncle, interrupting her.

‘“‘Why?” inquired the young lady.

‘“Because your mouth looks so beautiful when you speak,” rejoined my

uncle, “that I’m afraid I shall be rude enough to kiss it.”

‘The young lady put up her hand as if to caution my uncle not to do so,

and said--No, she didn’t say anything--she smiled. When you are looking

at a pair of the most delicious lips in the world, and see them gently

break into a roguish smile--if you are very near them, and nobody else

by--you cannot better testify your admiration of their beautiful form

and colour than by kissing them at once. My uncle did so, and I honour

him for it.

‘“Hark!” cried the young lady, starting. “The noise of wheels, and

horses!”

‘“So it is,” said my uncle, listening. He had a good ear for wheels, and

the trampling of hoofs; but there appeared to be so many horses and

carriages rattling towards them, from a distance, that it was impossible

to form a guess at their number. The sound was like that of fifty

brakes, with six blood cattle in each.

‘“We are pursued!” cried the young lady, clasping her hands. “We are

pursued. I have no hope but in you!”

‘There was such an expression of terror in her beautiful face, that my

uncle made up his mind at once. He lifted her into the coach, told her

not to be frightened, pressed his lips to hers once more, and then

advising her to draw up the window to keep the cold air out, mounted to

the box.

‘“Stay, love,” cried the young lady.

‘“What’s the matter?” said my uncle, from the coach-box.

‘“I want to speak to you,” said the young lady; “only a word. Only one

word, dearest.”

‘“Must I get down?” inquired my uncle. The lady made no answer, but she

smiled again. Such a smile, gentlemen! It beat the other one, all to

nothing. My uncle descended from his perch in a twinkling.

‘“What is it, my dear?” said my uncle, looking in at the coach window.

The lady happened to bend forward at the same time, and my uncle thought

she looked more beautiful than she had done yet. He was very close to

her just then, gentlemen, so he really ought to know.

‘“What is it, my dear?” said my uncle.

‘“Will you never love any one but me--never marry any one beside?” said

the young lady.

‘My uncle swore a great oath that he never would marry anybody else, and

the young lady drew in her head, and pulled up the window. He jumped

upon the box, squared his elbows, adjusted the ribands, seized the whip

which lay on the roof, gave one flick to the off leader, and away went

the four long-tailed, flowing-maned black horses, at fifteen good

English miles an hour, with the old mail-coach behind them. Whew! How

they tore along!

‘The noise behind grew louder. The faster the old mail went, the faster

came the pursuers--men, horses, dogs, were leagued in the pursuit. The

noise was frightful, but, above all, rose the voice of the young lady,

urging my uncle on, and shrieking, “Faster! Faster!”