`` Read the writing on the other side , '' said John . `` Why , John ! My Goodness , John ! '' `` Ah ! who 'd have thought it ? '' John returned . `` You never mean to say , '' pursued Dot , sitting on the floor and shaking her head at him , `` that it 's Gruff and Tackleton the toymaker ! '' John nodded . Mrs. Peerybingle nodded also , fifty times at least . Not in assent -- in dumb and pitying amazement ; screwing up her lips , the while , with all their little force -LRB- they were never made for screwing up ; I am clear of that -RRB- , and looking the good Carrier through and through , in her abstraction . Miss Slowboy , in the meantime , who had a mechanical power of reproducing scraps of current conversation for the delectation of the baby , with all the sense struck out of them , and all the nouns changed into the plural number , inquired aloud of that young creature , Was it Gruffs and Tackletons the toymakers then , and Would it call at Pastrycooks for wedding-cakes , and Did its mothers know the boxes when its fathers brought them home ; and so on . `` And that is really to come about ! '' said Dot . `` Why , she and I were girls at school together , John . '' He might have been thinking of her , or nearly thinking of her , perhaps , as she was in that same school-time . He looked upon her with a thoughtful pleasure , but he made no answer . `` And he 's as old ! As unlike her ! -- Why , how many years older than you is Gruff and Tackleton , John ? '' `` How many more cups of tea shall I drink to-night , at one sitting , than Gruff and Tackleton ever took in four , I wonder ? ''
replied John good-humouredly , as he drew a chair XXXXX the round table , and began at the cold ham .
as at for in of on than to upon with