You are not tired , father ? '' `` Tired ! '' echoed Caleb with a great burst of animation . `` What should tire me , Bertha ? I was never tired . What does it mean ? '' To give the greater force to his words , he checked himself in an involuntary imitation of two half-length stretching and yawning figures on the mantel-shelf , who were represented as in one eternal state of weariness from the waist upwards ; and hummed a fragment of a song . It was a Bacchanalian song , something about a Sparkling Bowl . He sang it with an assumption of a Devil-may-care voice , that made his face a thousand times more meagre and more thoughtful than ever . `` What ! You 're singing , are you ? '' said Tackleton , putting his head in at the door . `` Go it ! I ca n't sing . '' Nobody would have suspected him of it . He had n't what is generally termed a singing face , by any means . `` I ca n't afford to sing , '' said Tackleton . `` I 'm glad you can . I hope you can afford to work too . Hardly time for both , I should think ? ''
`` If you could only see him , XXXXX , how he 's winking at me ! ''
Bacchanalian Bertha Caleb Nobody Tackleton father mantel-shelf song times tire