prompt:
Chapter: I landed in London on a wintry autumn evening. It was dark and raining,
and I saw more fog and mud in a minute than I had seen in a year. I
walked from the Custom House to the Monument before I found a coach;
and although the very house-fronts, looking on the swollen gutters, were
like old friends to me, I could not but admit that they were very dingy
friends.

I have often remarked--I suppose everybody has--that one's going away
from a familiar place, would seem to be the signal for change in it.
As I looked out of the coach window, and observed that an old house on
Fish-street Hill, which had stood untouched by painter, carpenter, or
bricklayer, for a century, had been pulled down in my absence; and that
a neighbouring street, of time-honoured insalubrity and inconvenience,
was being drained and widened; I half expected to find St. Paul's
Cathedral looking older.

For some changes in the fortunes of my friends, I was prepared. My aunt
had long been re-established at Dover, and Traddles had begun to get
into some little practice at the Bar, in the very first term after my
departure. He had chambers in Gray's Inn, now; and had told me, in his
last letters, that he was not without hopes of being soon united to the
dearest girl in the world.

They expected me home before Christmas; but had no idea of my returning
so soon. I had purposely misled them, that I might have the pleasure of
taking them by surprise. And yet, I was perverse enough to feel a chill
and disappointment in receiving no welcome, and rattling, alone and
silent, through the misty streets.

The well-known shops, however, with their cheerful lights, did something
for me; and when I alighted at the door of the Gray's Inn Coffee-house,
I had recovered my spirits. It recalled, at first, that so-different
time when I had put up at the Golden Cross, and reminded me of the
changes that had come to pass since then; but that was natural.

'Do you know where Mr. Traddles lives in the Inn?' I asked the waiter,
as I warmed myself by the coffee-room fire.

'Holborn Court, sir. Number two.'

'Mr. Traddles has a rising reputation among the lawyers, I believe?'
said I.

'Well, sir,' returned the waiter, 'probably he has, sir; but I am not
aware of it myself.'

This waiter, who was middle-aged and spare, looked for help to a waiter
of more authority--a stout, potential old man, with a double chin,
in black breeches and stockings, who came out of a place like a
churchwarden's pew, at the end of the coffee-room, where he kept company
with a cash-box, a Directory, a Law-list, and other books and papers.

'Mr. Traddles,' said the spare waiter. 'Number two in the Court.'

The potential waiter waved him away, and turned, gravely, to me.

'I was inquiring,' said I, 'whether Mr. Traddles, at number two in the
Court, has not a rising reputation among the lawyers?'

'Never heard his name,' said the waiter, in a rich husky voice.

I felt quite apologetic for Traddles.

'He's a young man, sure?' said the portentous waiter, fixing his eyes
severely on me. 'How long has he been in the Inn?'

'Not above three years,' said I.

The waiter, who I supposed had lived in his churchwarden's pew for forty
years, could not pursue such an insignificant subject. He asked me what
I would have for dinner?

I felt I was in England again, and really was quite cast down on
Traddles's account. There seemed to be no hope for him. I meekly ordered
a bit of fish and a steak, and stood before the fire musing on his
obscurity.

As I followed the chief waiter with my eyes, I could not help thinking
that the garden in which he had gradually blown to be the flower he
was, was an arduous place to rise in. It had such a prescriptive,
stiff-necked, long-established, solemn, elderly air. I glanced about the
room, which had had its sanded floor sanded, no doubt, in exactly the
same manner when the chief waiter was a boy--if he ever was a boy,
which appeared improbable; and at the shining tables, where I saw
myself reflected, in unruffled depths of old mahogany; and at the lamps,
without a flaw in their trimming or cleaning; and at the comfortable
green curtains, with their pure brass rods, snugly enclosing the boxes;
and at the two large coal fires, brightly burning; and at the rows of
decanters, burly as if with the consciousness of pipes of expensive old
port wine below; and both England, and the law, appeared to me to be
very difficult indeed to be taken by storm. I went up to my bedroom
to change my wet clothes; and the vast extent of that old wainscoted
apartment (which was over the archway leading to the Inn, I remember),
and the sedate immensity of the four-post bedstead, and the indomitable
gravity of the chests of drawers, all seemed to unite in sternly
frowning on the fortunes of Traddles, or on any such daring youth. I
came down again to my dinner; and even the slow comfort of the meal,
and the orderly silence of the place--which was bare of guests, the Long
Vacation not yet being over--were eloquent on the audacity of Traddles,
and his small hopes of a livelihood for twenty years to come.

I had seen nothing like this since I went away, and it quite dashed my
hopes for my friend. The chief waiter had had enough of me. He came near
me no more; but devoted himself to an old gentleman in long gaiters, to
meet whom a pint of special port seemed to come out of the cellar of its
own accord, for he gave no order. The second waiter informed me, in a
whisper, that this old gentleman was a retired conveyancer living in the
Square, and worth a mint of money, which it was expected he would leave
to his laundress's daughter; likewise that it was rumoured that he had
a service of plate in a bureau, all tarnished with lying by, though more
than one spoon and a fork had never yet been beheld in his chambers
by mortal vision. By this time, I quite gave Traddles up for lost; and
settled in my own mind that there was no hope for him.

Being very anxious to see the dear old fellow, nevertheless, I
dispatched my dinner, in a manner not at all calculated to raise me in
the opinion of the chief waiter, and hurried out by the back way. Number
two in the Court was soon reached; and an inscription on the door-post
informing me that Mr. Traddles occupied a set of chambers on the top
storey, I ascended the staircase. A crazy old staircase I found it to
be, feebly lighted on each landing by a club--headed little oil wick,
dying away in a little dungeon of dirty glass.

In the course of my stumbling upstairs, I fancied I heard a pleasant
sound of laughter; and not the laughter of an attorney or barrister, or
attorney's clerk or barrister's clerk, but of two or three merry girls.
Happening, however, as I stopped to listen, to put my foot in a hole
where the Honourable Society of Gray's Inn had left a plank deficient,
I fell down with some noise, and when I recovered my footing all was
silent.

Groping my way more carefully, for the rest of the journey, my heart
beat high when I found the outer door, which had Mr. TRADDLES painted on
it, open. I knocked. A considerable scuffling within ensued, but nothing
else. I therefore knocked again.

A small sharp-looking lad, half-footboy and half-clerk, who was very
much out of breath, but who looked at me as if he defied me to prove it
legally, presented himself.

'Is Mr. Traddles within?' I said.

'Yes, sir, but he's engaged.'

'I want to see him.'

After a moment's survey of me, the sharp-looking lad decided to let me
in; and opening the door wider for that purpose, admitted me, first,
into a little closet of a hall, and next into a little sitting-room;
where I came into the presence of my old friend (also out of breath),
seated at a table, and bending over papers.

'Good God!' cried Traddles, looking up. 'It's Copperfield!' and rushed
into my arms, where I held him tight.

'All well, my dear Traddles?'

'All well, my dear, dear Copperfield, and nothing but good news!'

We cried with pleasure, both of us.

'My dear fellow,' said Traddles, rumpling his hair in his excitement,
which was a most unnecessary operation, 'my dearest Copperfield, my
long-lost and most welcome friend, how glad I am to see you! How
brown you are! How glad I am! Upon my life and honour, I never was so
rejoiced, my beloved Copperfield, never!'

I was equally at a loss to express my emotions. I was quite unable to
speak, at first.

'My dear fellow!' said Traddles. 'And grown so famous! My glorious
Copperfield! Good gracious me, WHEN did you come, WHERE have you come
from, WHAT have you been doing?'

Never pausing for an answer to anything he said, Traddles, who had
clapped me into an easy-chair by the fire, all this time impetuously
stirred the fire with one hand, and pulled at my neck-kerchief with
the other, under some wild delusion that it was a great-coat. Without
putting down the poker, he now hugged me again; and I hugged him; and,
both laughing, and both wiping our eyes, we both sat down, and shook
hands across the hearth.

'To think,' said Traddles, 'that you should have been so nearly coming
home as you must have been, my dear old boy, and not at the ceremony!'

'What ceremony, my dear Traddles?'

'Good gracious me!' cried Traddles, opening his eyes in his old way.
'Didn't you get my last letter?'

'Certainly not, if it referred to any ceremony.'

'Why, my dear Copperfield,' said Traddles, sticking his hair upright
with both hands, and then putting his hands on my knees, 'I am married!'

'Married!' I cried joyfully.

'Lord bless me, yes!' said Traddles--'by the Reverend Horace--to
Sophy--down in Devonshire. Why, my dear boy, she's behind the window
curtain! Look here!'

To my amazement, the dearest girl in the world came at that same
instant, laughing and blushing, from her place of concealment. And a
more cheerful, amiable, honest, happy, bright-looking bride, I believe
(as I could not help saying on the spot) the world never saw. I kissed
her as an old acquaintance should, and wished them joy with all my might
of heart.

'Dear me,' said Traddles, 'what a delightful re-union this is! You are
so extremely brown, my dear Copperfield! God bless my soul, how happy I
am!'

'And so am I,' said I.

'And I am sure I am!' said the blushing and laughing Sophy.

'We are all as happy as possible!' said Traddles. 'Even the girls are
happy. Dear me, I declare I forgot them!'

'Forgot?' said I.

'The girls,' said Traddles. 'Sophy's sisters. They are staying with us.
They have come to have a peep at London. The fact is, when--was it you
that tumbled upstairs, Copperfield?'

'It was,' said I, laughing.

'Well then, when you tumbled upstairs,' said Traddles, 'I was romping
with the girls. In point of fact, we were playing at Puss in the Corner.
But as that wouldn't do in Westminster Hall, and as it wouldn't look
quite professional if they were seen by a client, they decamped. And
they are now--listening, I have no doubt,' said Traddles, glancing at
the door of another room.

'I am sorry,' said I, laughing afresh, 'to have occasioned such a
dispersion.'

'Upon my word,' rejoined Traddles, greatly delighted, 'if you had seen
them running away, and running back again, after you had knocked, to
pick up the combs they had dropped out of their hair, and going on in
the maddest manner, you wouldn't have said so. My love, will you fetch
the girls?'

Sophy tripped away, and we heard her received in the adjoining room with
a peal of laughter.

'Really musical, isn't it, my dear Copperfield?' said Traddles. 'It's
very agreeable to hear. It quite lights up these old rooms. To an
unfortunate bachelor of a fellow who has lived alone all his life, you
know, it's positively delicious. It's charming. Poor things, they have
had a great loss in Sophy--who, I do assure you, Copperfield is, and
ever was, the dearest girl!--and it gratifies me beyond expression
to find them in such good spirits. The society of girls is a very
delightful thing, Copperfield. It's not professional, but it's very
delightful.'

Observing that he slightly faltered, and comprehending that in the
goodness of his heart he was fearful of giving me some pain by what he
had said, I expressed my concurrence with a heartiness that evidently
relieved and pleased him greatly.

'But then,' said Traddles, 'our domestic arrangements are, to say
the truth, quite unprofessional altogether, my dear Copperfield. Even
Sophy's being here, is unprofessional. And we have no other place of
abode. We have put to sea in a cockboat, but we are quite prepared to
rough it. And Sophy's an extraordinary manager! You'll be surprised how
those girls are stowed away. I am sure I hardly know how it's done!'

'Are many of the young ladies with you?' I inquired.

'The eldest, the Beauty is here,' said Traddles, in a low confidential
voice, 'Caroline. And Sarah's here--the one I mentioned to you as having
something the matter with her spine, you know. Immensely better! And the
two youngest that Sophy educated are with us. And Louisa's here.'

'Indeed!' cried I.

'Yes,' said Traddles. 'Now the whole set--I mean the chambers--is only
three rooms; but Sophy arranges for the girls in the most wonderful way,
and they sleep as comfortably as possible. Three in that room,' said
Traddles, pointing. 'Two in that.'

I could not help glancing round, in search of the accommodation
remaining for Mr. and Mrs. Traddles. Traddles understood me.

'Well!' said Traddles, 'we are prepared to rough it, as I said just now,
and we did improvise a bed last week, upon the floor here. But there's
a little room in the roof--a very nice room, when you're up there--which
Sophy papered herself, to surprise me; and that's our room at present.
It's a capital little gipsy sort of place. There's quite a view from
it.'

'And you are happily married at last, my dear Traddles!' said I. 'How
rejoiced I am!'

'Thank you, my dear Copperfield,' said Traddles, as we shook hands
once more. 'Yes, I am as happy as it's possible to be. There's your old
friend, you see,' said Traddles, nodding triumphantly at the flower-pot
and stand; 'and there's the table with the marble top! All the other
furniture is plain and serviceable, you perceive. And as to plate, Lord
bless you, we haven't so much as a tea-spoon.'

'All to be earned?' said I, cheerfully.

'Exactly so,' replied Traddles, 'all to be earned. Of course we have
something in the shape of tea-spoons, because we stir our tea. But
they're Britannia metal.'

'The silver will be the brighter when it comes,' said I.

'The very thing we say!' cried Traddles. 'You see, my dear Copperfield,'
falling again into the low confidential tone, 'after I had delivered my
argument in DOE dem. JIPES versus WIGZIELL, which did me great service
with the profession, I went down into Devonshire, and had some serious
conversation in private with the Reverend Horace. I dwelt upon the fact
that Sophy--who I do assure you, Copperfield, is the dearest girl!--'

'I am certain she is!' said I.

'She is, indeed!' rejoined Traddles. 'But I am afraid I am wandering
from the subject. Did I mention the Reverend Horace?'

'You said that you dwelt upon the fact--'

'True! Upon the fact that Sophy and I had been engaged for a long
period, and that Sophy, with the permission of her parents, was more
than content to take me--in short,' said Traddles, with his old frank
smile, 'on our present Britannia-metal footing. Very well. I then
proposed to the Reverend Horace--who is a most excellent clergyman,
Copperfield, and ought to be a Bishop; or at least ought to have enough
to live upon, without pinching himself--that if I could turn the corner,
say of two hundred and fifty pounds, in one year; and could see my
way pretty clearly to that, or something better, next year; and could
plainly furnish a little place like this, besides; then, and in that
case, Sophy and I should be united. I took the liberty of representing
that we had been patient for a good many years; and that the
circumstance of Sophy's being extraordinarily useful at home, ought not
to operate with her affectionate parents, against her establishment in
life--don't you see?'

'Certainly it ought not,' said I.

'I am glad you think so, Copperfield,' rejoined Traddles, 'because,
without any imputation on the Reverend Horace, I do think parents, and
brothers, and so forth, are sometimes rather selfish in such cases.
Well! I also pointed out, that my most earnest desire was, to be useful
to the family; and that if I got on in the world, and anything should
happen to him--I refer to the Reverend Horace--'

'I understand,' said I.

'--Or to Mrs. Crewler--it would be the utmost gratification of my
wishes, to be a parent to the girls. He replied in a most admirable
manner, exceedingly flattering to my feelings, and undertook to obtain
the consent of Mrs. Crewler to this arrangement. They had a dreadful
time of it with her. It mounted from her legs into her chest, and then
into her head--'

'What mounted?' I asked.

'Her grief,' replied Traddles, with a serious look. 'Her feelings
generally. As I mentioned on a former occasion, she is a very superior
woman, but has lost the use of her limbs. Whatever occurs to harass
her, usually settles in her legs; but on this occasion it mounted to the
chest, and then to the head, and, in short, pervaded the whole system
in a most alarming manner. However, they brought her through it by
unremitting and affectionate attention; and we were married yesterday
six weeks. You have no idea what a Monster I felt, Copperfield, when I
saw the whole family crying and fainting away in every direction! Mrs.
Crewler couldn't see me before we left--couldn't forgive me, then, for
depriving her of her child--but she is a good creature, and has done so
since. I had a delightful letter from her, only this morning.'

'And in short, my dear friend,' said I, 'you feel as blest as you
deserve to feel!'

'Oh! That's your partiality!' laughed Traddles. 'But, indeed, I am in a
most enviable state. I work hard, and read Law insatiably. I get up at
five every morning, and don't mind it at all. I hide the girls in the
daytime, and make merry with them in the evening. And I assure you I am
quite sorry that they are going home on Tuesday, which is the day before
the first day of Michaelmas Term. But here,' said Traddles, breaking off
in his confidence, and speaking aloud, 'ARE the girls! Mr. Copperfield,
Miss Crewler--Miss Sarah--Miss Louisa--Margaret and Lucy!'

They were a perfect nest of roses; they looked so wholesome and fresh.
They were all pretty, and Miss Caroline was very handsome; but there was
a loving, cheerful, fireside quality in Sophy's bright looks, which was
better than that, and which assured me that my friend had chosen well.
We all sat round the fire; while the sharp boy, who I now divined had
lost his breath in putting the papers out, cleared them away again, and
produced the tea-things. After that, he retired for the night, shutting
the outer door upon us with a bang. Mrs. Traddles, with perfect pleasure
and composure beaming from her household eyes, having made the tea, then
quietly made the toast as she sat in a corner by the fire.

She had seen Agnes, she told me while she was toasting. 'Tom' had taken
her down into Kent for a wedding trip, and there she had seen my aunt,
too; and both my aunt and Agnes were well, and they had all talked of
nothing but me. 'Tom' had never had me out of his thoughts, she really
believed, all the time I had been away. 'Tom' was the authority for
everything. 'Tom' was evidently the idol of her life; never to be shaken
on his pedestal by any commotion; always to be believed in, and done
homage to with the whole faith of her heart, come what might.

The deference which both she and Traddles showed towards the Beauty,
pleased me very much. I don't know that I thought it very reasonable;
but I thought it very delightful, and essentially a part of their
character. If Traddles ever for an instant missed the tea-spoons that
were still to be won, I have no doubt it was when he handed the Beauty
her tea. If his sweet-tempered wife could have got up any self-assertion
against anyone, I am satisfied it could only have been because she was
the Beauty's sister. A few slight indications of a rather petted and
capricious manner, which I observed in the Beauty, were manifestly
considered, by Traddles and his wife, as her birthright and natural
endowment. If she had been born a Queen Bee, and they labouring Bees,
they could not have been more satisfied of that.

But their self-forgetfulness charmed me. Their pride in these girls, and
their submission of themselves to all their whims, was the pleasantest
little testimony to their own worth I could have desired to see. If
Traddles were addressed as 'a darling', once in the course of that
evening; and besought to bring something here, or carry something there,
or take something up, or put something down, or find something, or fetch
something, he was so addressed, by one or other of his sisters-in-law,
at least twelve times in an hour. Neither could they do anything without
Sophy. Somebody's hair fell down, and nobody but Sophy could put it up.
Somebody forgot how a particular tune went, and nobody but Sophy could
hum that tune right. Somebody wanted to recall the name of a place in
Devonshire, and only Sophy knew it. Something was wanted to be written
home, and Sophy alone could be trusted to write before breakfast in
the morning. Somebody broke down in a piece of knitting, and no one but
Sophy was able to put the defaulter in the right direction. They were
entire mistresses of the place, and Sophy and Traddles waited on them.
How many children Sophy could have taken care of in her time, I can't
imagine; but she seemed to be famous for knowing every sort of song that
ever was addressed to a child in the English tongue; and she sang dozens
to order with the clearest little voice in the world, one after another
(every sister issuing directions for a different tune, and the Beauty
generally striking in last), so that I was quite fascinated. The best
of all was, that, in the midst of their exactions, all the sisters had
a great tenderness and respect both for Sophy and Traddles. I am sure,
when I took my leave, and Traddles was coming out to walk with me to the
coffee-house, I thought I had never seen an obstinate head of hair, or
any other head of hair, rolling about in such a shower of kisses.

Altogether, it was a scene I could not help dwelling on with pleasure,
for a long time after I got back and had wished Traddles good night. If
I had beheld a thousand roses blowing in a top set of chambers, in that
withered Gray's Inn, they could not have brightened it half so much.
The idea of those Devonshire girls, among the dry law-stationers and the
attorneys' offices; and of the tea and toast, and children's songs, in
that grim atmosphere of pounce and parchment, red-tape, dusty wafers,
ink-jars, brief and draft paper, law reports, writs, declarations, and
bills of costs; seemed almost as pleasantly fanciful as if I had
dreamed that the Sultan's famous family had been admitted on the roll of
attorneys, and had brought the talking bird, the singing tree, and the
golden water into Gray's Inn Hall. Somehow, I found that I had taken
leave of Traddles for the night, and come back to the coffee-house, with
a great change in my despondency about him. I began to think he would
get on, in spite of all the many orders of chief waiters in England.

Drawing a chair before one of the coffee-room fires to think about him
at my leisure, I gradually fell from the consideration of his happiness
to tracing prospects in the live-coals, and to thinking, as they broke
and changed, of the principal vicissitudes and separations that had
marked my life. I had not seen a coal fire, since I had left England
three years ago: though many a wood fire had I watched, as it crumbled
into hoary ashes, and mingled with the feathery heap upon the hearth,
which not inaptly figured to me, in my despondency, my own dead hopes.

I could think of the past now, gravely, but not bitterly; and could
contemplate the future in a brave spirit. Home, in its best sense, was
for me no more. She in whom I might have inspired a dearer love, I had
taught to be my sister. She would marry, and would have new claimants on
her tenderness; and in doing it, would never know the love for her that
had grown up in my heart. It was right that I should pay the forfeit of
my headlong passion. What I reaped, I had sown.

I was thinking. And had I truly disciplined my heart to this, and could
I resolutely bear it, and calmly hold the place in her home which she
had calmly held in mine,--when I found my eyes resting on a countenance
that might have arisen out of the fire, in its association with my early
remembrances.

Little Mr. Chillip the Doctor, to whose good offices I was indebted in
the very first chapter of this history, sat reading a newspaper in the
shadow of an opposite corner. He was tolerably stricken in years by this
time; but, being a mild, meek, calm little man, had worn so easily, that
I thought he looked at that moment just as he might have looked when he
sat in our parlour, waiting for me to be born.

Mr. Chillip had left Blunderstone six or seven years ago, and I had
never seen him since. He sat placidly perusing the newspaper, with his
little head on one side, and a glass of warm sherry negus at his
elbow. He was so extremely conciliatory in his manner that he seemed to
apologize to the very newspaper for taking the liberty of reading it.

I walked up to where he was sitting, and said, 'How do you do, Mr.
Chillip?'

He was greatly fluttered by this unexpected address from a stranger, and
replied, in his slow way, 'I thank you, sir, you are very good. Thank
you, sir. I hope YOU are well.'

'You don't remember me?' said I.

'Well, sir,' returned Mr. Chillip, smiling very meekly, and shaking his
head as he surveyed me, 'I have a kind of an impression that something
in your countenance is familiar to me, sir; but I couldn't lay my hand
upon your name, really.'

'And yet you knew it, long before I knew it myself,' I returned.

'Did I indeed, sir?' said Mr. Chillip. 'Is it possible that I had the
honour, sir, of officiating when--?'

'Yes,' said I.

'Dear me!' cried Mr. Chillip. 'But no doubt you are a good deal changed
since then, sir?'

'Probably,' said I.

'Well, sir,' observed Mr. Chillip, 'I hope you'll excuse me, if I am
compelled to ask the favour of your name?'

On my telling him my name, he was really moved. He quite shook hands
with me--which was a violent proceeding for him, his usual course being
to slide a tepid little fish-slice, an inch or two in advance of his
hip, and evince the greatest discomposure when anybody grappled with
it. Even now, he put his hand in his coat-pocket as soon as he could
disengage it, and seemed relieved when he had got it safe back.

'Dear me, sir!' said Mr. Chillip, surveying me with his head on one
side. 'And it's Mr. Copperfield, is it? Well, sir, I think I should have
known you, if I had taken the liberty of looking more closely at you.
There's a strong resemblance between you and your poor father, sir.'

'I never had the happiness of seeing my father,' I observed.

'Very true, sir,' said Mr. Chillip, in a soothing tone. 'And very much
to be deplored it was, on all accounts! We are not ignorant, sir,' said
Mr. Chillip, slowly shaking his little head again, 'down in our part of
the country, of your fame. There must be great excitement here, sir,'
said Mr. Chillip, tapping himself on the forehead with his forefinger.
'You must find it a trying occupation, sir!'

'What is your part of the country now?' I asked, seating myself near
him.

'I am established within a few miles of Bury St. Edmund's, sir,' said
Mr. Chillip. 'Mrs. Chillip, coming into a little property in that
neighbourhood, under her father's will, I bought a practice down there,
in which you will be glad to hear I am doing well. My daughter is
growing quite a tall lass now, sir,' said Mr. Chillip, giving his little
head another little shake. 'Her mother let down two tucks in her frocks
only last week. Such is time, you see, sir!'

As the little man put his now empty glass to his lips, when he made this
reflection, I proposed to him to have it refilled, and I would keep him
company with another. 'Well, sir,' he returned, in his slow way, 'it's
more than I am accustomed to; but I can't deny myself the pleasure
of your conversation. It seems but yesterday that I had the honour of
attending you in the measles. You came through them charmingly, sir!'

I acknowledged this compliment, and ordered the negus, which was soon
produced. 'Quite an uncommon dissipation!' said Mr. Chillip, stirring
it, 'but I can't resist so extraordinary an occasion. You have no
family, sir?'

I shook my head.

'I was aware that you sustained a bereavement, sir, some time ago,' said
Mr. Chillip. 'I heard it from your father-in-law's sister. Very decided
character there, sir?'

'Why, yes,' said I, 'decided enough. Where did you see her, Mr.
Chillip?'

'Are you not aware, sir,' returned Mr. Chillip, with his placidest
smile, 'that your father-in-law is again a neighbour of mine?'

'No,' said I.

'He is indeed, sir!' said Mr. Chillip. 'Married a young lady of that
part, with a very good little property, poor thing.---And this action
of the brain now, sir? Don't you find it fatigue you?' said Mr. Chillip,
looking at me like an admiring Robin.

I waived that question, and returned to the Murdstones. 'I was aware of
his being married again. Do you attend the family?' I asked.

'Not regularly. I have been called in,' he replied. 'Strong
phrenological developments of the organ of firmness, in Mr. Murdstone
and his sister, sir.'

I replied with such an expressive look, that Mr. Chillip was emboldened
by that, and the negus together, to give his head several short shakes,
and thoughtfully exclaim, 'Ah, dear me! We remember old times, Mr.
Copperfield!'

'And the brother and sister are pursuing their old course, are they?'
said I.

'Well, sir,' replied Mr. Chillip, 'a medical man, being so much in
families, ought to have neither eyes nor ears for anything but his
profession. Still, I must say, they are very severe, sir: both as to
this life and the next.'

'The next will be regulated without much reference to them, I dare say,'
I returned: 'what are they doing as to this?'

Mr. Chillip shook his head, stirred his negus, and sipped it.

'She was a charming woman, sir!' he observed in a plaintive manner.

'The present Mrs. Murdstone?'

'A charming woman indeed, sir,' said Mr. Chillip; 'as amiable, I am sure,
as it was possible to be! Mrs. Chillip's opinion is, that her spirit
has been entirely broken since her marriage, and that she is all but
melancholy mad. And the ladies,' observed Mr. Chillip, timorously, 'are
great observers, sir.'

'I suppose she was to be subdued and broken to their detestable mould,
Heaven help her!' said I. 'And she has been.'

'Well, sir, there were violent quarrels at first, I assure you,' said
Mr. Chillip; 'but she is quite a shadow now. Would it be considered
forward if I was to say to you, sir, in confidence, that since the
sister came to help, the brother and sister between them have nearly
reduced her to a state of imbecility?'

I told him I could easily believe it.

'I have no hesitation in saying,' said Mr. Chillip, fortifying himself
with another sip of negus, 'between you and me, sir, that her mother
died of it--or that tyranny, gloom, and worry have made Mrs. Murdstone
nearly imbecile. She was a lively young woman, sir, before marriage, and
their gloom and austerity destroyed her. They go about with her, now,
more like her keepers than her husband and sister-in-law. That was
Mrs. Chillip's remark to me, only last week. And I assure you, sir, the
ladies are great observers. Mrs. Chillip herself is a great observer!'

'Does he gloomily profess to be (I am ashamed to use the word in such
association) religious still?' I inquired.

'You anticipate, sir,' said Mr. Chillip, his eyelids getting quite
red with the unwonted stimulus in which he was indulging. 'One of Mrs.
Chillip's most impressive remarks. Mrs. Chillip,' he proceeded, in the
calmest and slowest manner, 'quite electrified me, by pointing out
that Mr. Murdstone sets up an image of himself, and calls it the Divine
Nature. You might have knocked me down on the flat of my back, sir,
with the feather of a pen, I assure you, when Mrs. Chillip said so. The
ladies are great observers, sir?'

'Intuitively,' said I, to his extreme delight.

'I am very happy to receive such support in my opinion, sir,' he
rejoined. 'It is not often that I venture to give a non-medical opinion,
I assure you. Mr. Murdstone delivers public addresses sometimes, and it
is said,--in short, sir, it is said by Mrs. Chillip,--that the darker
tyrant he has lately been, the more ferocious is his doctrine.'

'I believe Mrs. Chillip to be perfectly right,' said I.

'Mrs. Chillip does go so far as to say,' pursued the meekest of little
men, much encouraged, 'that what such people miscall their religion, is
a vent for their bad humours and arrogance. And do you know I must say,
sir,' he continued, mildly laying his head on one side, 'that I DON'T
find authority for Mr. and Miss Murdstone in the New Testament?'

'I never found it either!' said I.

'In the meantime, sir,' said Mr. Chillip, 'they are much disliked;
and as they are very free in consigning everybody who dislikes them
to perdition, we really have a good deal of perdition going on in
our neighbourhood! However, as Mrs. Chillip says, sir, they undergo a
continual punishment; for they are turned inward, to feed upon their own
hearts, and their own hearts are very bad feeding. Now, sir, about that
brain of yours, if you'll excuse my returning to it. Don't you expose it
to a good deal of excitement, sir?'

I found it not difficult, in the excitement of Mr. Chillip's own brain,
under his potations of negus, to divert his attention from this topic
to his own affairs, on which, for the next half-hour, he was quite
loquacious; giving me to understand, among other pieces of information,
that he was then at the Gray's Inn Coffee-house to lay his professional
evidence before a Commission of Lunacy, touching the state of mind of a
patient who had become deranged from excessive drinking. 'And I assure
you, sir,' he said, 'I am extremely nervous on such occasions. I could
not support being what is called Bullied, sir. It would quite unman
me. Do you know it was some time before I recovered the conduct of that
alarming lady, on the night of your birth, Mr. Copperfield?'

I told him that I was going down to my aunt, the Dragon of that night,
early in the morning; and that she was one of the most tender-hearted
and excellent of women, as he would know full well if he knew her
better. The mere notion of the possibility of his ever seeing her again,
appeared to terrify him. He replied with a small pale smile, 'Is she so,
indeed, sir? Really?' and almost immediately called for a candle, and
went to bed, as if he were not quite safe anywhere else. He did not
actually stagger under the negus; but I should think his placid little
pulse must have made two or three more beats in a minute, than it had
done since the great night of my aunt's disappointment, when she struck
at him with her bonnet.

Thoroughly tired, I went to bed too, at midnight; passed the next day on
the Dover coach; burst safe and sound into my aunt's old parlour while
she was at tea (she wore spectacles now); and was received by her, and
Mr. Dick, and dear old Peggotty, who acted as housekeeper, with open
arms and tears of joy. My aunt was mightily amused, when we began to
talk composedly, by my account of my meeting with Mr. Chillip, and of
his holding her in such dread remembrance; and both she and Peggotty
had a great deal to say about my poor mother's second husband, and 'that
murdering woman of a sister',--on whom I think no pain or penalty would
have induced my aunt to bestow any Christian or Proper Name, or any
other designation.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Return David returns to London, where he visits Traddles, who has recently married. Traddles is still poor, but he and his wife are very happy. At the inn, David encounters Mr. Chillip, his old family physician. Mr. Chillip says he is now living next door to Mr. and Miss Murdstone, who have destroyed Mr. Murdstone's second wife and are as cruel and nasty as ever


prompt:
Chapter: My aunt and I, when we were left alone, talked far into the night. How
the emigrants never wrote home, otherwise than cheerfully and hopefully;
how Mr. Micawber had actually remitted divers small sums of money, on
account of those 'pecuniary liabilities', in reference to which he had
been so business-like as between man and man; how Janet, returning into
my aunt's service when she came back to Dover, had finally carried out
her renunciation of mankind by entering into wedlock with a thriving
tavern-keeper; and how my aunt had finally set her seal on the same
great principle, by aiding and abetting the bride, and crowning the
marriage-ceremony with her presence; were among our topics--already
more or less familiar to me through the letters I had had. Mr. Dick,
as usual, was not forgotten. My aunt informed me how he incessantly
occupied himself in copying everything he could lay his hands on, and
kept King Charles the First at a respectful distance by that semblance
of employment; how it was one of the main joys and rewards of her life
that he was free and happy, instead of pining in monotonous restraint;
and how (as a novel general conclusion) nobody but she could ever fully
know what he was.

'And when, Trot,' said my aunt, patting the back of my hand, as we sat
in our old way before the fire, 'when are you going over to Canterbury?'

'I shall get a horse, and ride over tomorrow morning, aunt, unless you
will go with me?'

'No!' said my aunt, in her short abrupt way. 'I mean to stay where I
am.'

Then, I should ride, I said. I could not have come through Canterbury
today without stopping, if I had been coming to anyone but her.

She was pleased, but answered, 'Tut, Trot; MY old bones would have
kept till tomorrow!' and softly patted my hand again, as I sat looking
thoughtfully at the fire.

Thoughtfully, for I could not be here once more, and so near Agnes,
without the revival of those regrets with which I had so long been
occupied. Softened regrets they might be, teaching me what I had failed
to learn when my younger life was all before me, but not the less
regrets. 'Oh, Trot,' I seemed to hear my aunt say once more; and I
understood her better now--'Blind, blind, blind!'

We both kept silence for some minutes. When I raised my eyes, I found
that she was steadily observant of me. Perhaps she had followed the
current of my mind; for it seemed to me an easy one to track now, wilful
as it had been once.

'You will find her father a white-haired old man,' said my aunt, 'though
a better man in all other respects--a reclaimed man. Neither will you
find him measuring all human interests, and joys, and sorrows, with his
one poor little inch-rule now. Trust me, child, such things must shrink
very much, before they can be measured off in that way.'

'Indeed they must,' said I.

'You will find her,' pursued my aunt, 'as good, as beautiful, as
earnest, as disinterested, as she has always been. If I knew higher
praise, Trot, I would bestow it on her.'

There was no higher praise for her; no higher reproach for me. Oh, how
had I strayed so far away!

'If she trains the young girls whom she has about her, to be like
herself,' said my aunt, earnest even to the filling of her eyes with
tears, 'Heaven knows, her life will be well employed! Useful and happy,
as she said that day! How could she be otherwise than useful and happy!'

'Has Agnes any--' I was thinking aloud, rather than speaking.

'Well? Hey? Any what?' said my aunt, sharply.

'Any lover,' said I.

'A score,' cried my aunt, with a kind of indignant pride. 'She might
have married twenty times, my dear, since you have been gone!'

'No doubt,' said I. 'No doubt. But has she any lover who is worthy of
her? Agnes could care for no other.'

My aunt sat musing for a little while, with her chin upon her hand.
Slowly raising her eyes to mine, she said:

'I suspect she has an attachment, Trot.'

'A prosperous one?' said I.

'Trot,' returned my aunt gravely, 'I can't say. I have no right to tell
you even so much. She has never confided it to me, but I suspect it.'

She looked so attentively and anxiously at me (I even saw her tremble),
that I felt now, more than ever, that she had followed my late thoughts.
I summoned all the resolutions I had made, in all those many days and
nights, and all those many conflicts of my heart.

'If it should be so,' I began, 'and I hope it is-'

'I don't know that it is,' said my aunt curtly. 'You must not be ruled
by my suspicions. You must keep them secret. They are very slight,
perhaps. I have no right to speak.'

'If it should be so,' I repeated, 'Agnes will tell me at her own good
time. A sister to whom I have confided so much, aunt, will not be
reluctant to confide in me.'

My aunt withdrew her eyes from mine, as slowly as she had turned them
upon me; and covered them thoughtfully with her hand. By and by she
put her other hand on my shoulder; and so we both sat, looking into the
past, without saying another word, until we parted for the night.

I rode away, early in the morning, for the scene of my old school-days.
I cannot say that I was yet quite happy, in the hope that I was gaining
a victory over myself; even in the prospect of so soon looking on her
face again.

The well-remembered ground was soon traversed, and I came into the quiet
streets, where every stone was a boy's book to me. I went on foot to the
old house, and went away with a heart too full to enter. I returned; and
looking, as I passed, through the low window of the turret-room where
first Uriah Heep, and afterwards Mr. Micawber, had been wont to sit,
saw that it was a little parlour now, and that there was no office.
Otherwise the staid old house was, as to its cleanliness and order,
still just as it had been when I first saw it. I requested the new maid
who admitted me, to tell Miss Wickfield that a gentleman who waited on
her from a friend abroad, was there; and I was shown up the grave old
staircase (cautioned of the steps I knew so well), into the unchanged
drawing-room. The books that Agnes and I had read together, were on
their shelves; and the desk where I had laboured at my lessons, many
a night, stood yet at the same old corner of the table. All the little
changes that had crept in when the Heeps were there, were changed again.
Everything was as it used to be, in the happy time.

I stood in a window, and looked across the ancient street at the
opposite houses, recalling how I had watched them on wet afternoons,
when I first came there; and how I had used to speculate about the
people who appeared at any of the windows, and had followed them with my
eyes up and down stairs, while women went clicking along the pavement in
pattens, and the dull rain fell in slanting lines, and poured out of the
water-spout yonder, and flowed into the road. The feeling with which
I used to watch the tramps, as they came into the town on those wet
evenings, at dusk, and limped past, with their bundles drooping over
their shoulders at the ends of sticks, came freshly back to me; fraught,
as then, with the smell of damp earth, and wet leaves and briar, and the
sensation of the very airs that blew upon me in my own toilsome journey.

The opening of the little door in the panelled wall made me start and
turn. Her beautiful serene eyes met mine as she came towards me. She
stopped and laid her hand upon her bosom, and I caught her in my arms.

'Agnes! my dear girl! I have come too suddenly upon you.'

'No, no! I am so rejoiced to see you, Trotwood!'

'Dear Agnes, the happiness it is to me, to see you once again!'

I folded her to my heart, and, for a little while, we were both silent.
Presently we sat down, side by side; and her angel-face was turned upon
me with the welcome I had dreamed of, waking and sleeping, for whole
years.

She was so true, she was so beautiful, she was so good,--I owed her so
much gratitude, she was so dear to me, that I could find no utterance
for what I felt. I tried to bless her, tried to thank her, tried to tell
her (as I had often done in letters) what an influence she had upon me;
but all my efforts were in vain. My love and joy were dumb.

With her own sweet tranquillity, she calmed my agitation; led me back to
the time of our parting; spoke to me of Emily, whom she had visited,
in secret, many times; spoke to me tenderly of Dora's grave. With the
unerring instinct of her noble heart, she touched the chords of my
memory so softly and harmoniously, that not one jarred within me; I
could listen to the sorrowful, distant music, and desire to shrink from
nothing it awoke. How could I, when, blended with it all, was her dear
self, the better angel of my life?

'And you, Agnes,' I said, by and by. 'Tell me of yourself. You have
hardly ever told me of your own life, in all this lapse of time!'

'What should I tell?' she answered, with her radiant smile. 'Papa is
well. You see us here, quiet in our own home; our anxieties set at rest,
our home restored to us; and knowing that, dear Trotwood, you know all.'

'All, Agnes?' said I.

She looked at me, with some fluttering wonder in her face.

'Is there nothing else, Sister?' I said.

Her colour, which had just now faded, returned, and faded again. She
smiled; with a quiet sadness, I thought; and shook her head.

I had sought to lead her to what my aunt had hinted at; for, sharply
painful to me as it must be to receive that confidence, I was to
discipline my heart, and do my duty to her. I saw, however, that she was
uneasy, and I let it pass.

'You have much to do, dear Agnes?'

'With my school?' said she, looking up again, in all her bright
composure.

'Yes. It is laborious, is it not?'

'The labour is so pleasant,' she returned, 'that it is scarcely grateful
in me to call it by that name.'

'Nothing good is difficult to you,' said I.

Her colour came and went once more; and once more, as she bent her head,
I saw the same sad smile.

'You will wait and see papa,' said Agnes, cheerfully, 'and pass the
day with us? Perhaps you will sleep in your own room? We always call it
yours.'

I could not do that, having promised to ride back to my aunt's at night;
but I would pass the day there, joyfully.

'I must be a prisoner for a little while,' said Agnes, 'but here are the
old books, Trotwood, and the old music.'

'Even the old flowers are here,' said I, looking round; 'or the old
kinds.'

'I have found a pleasure,' returned Agnes, smiling, 'while you have been
absent, in keeping everything as it used to be when we were children.
For we were very happy then, I think.'

'Heaven knows we were!' said I.

'And every little thing that has reminded me of my brother,' said Agnes,
with her cordial eyes turned cheerfully upon me, 'has been a welcome
companion. Even this,' showing me the basket-trifle, full of keys, still
hanging at her side, 'seems to jingle a kind of old tune!'

She smiled again, and went out at the door by which she had come.

It was for me to guard this sisterly affection with religious care. It
was all that I had left myself, and it was a treasure. If I once shook
the foundations of the sacred confidence and usage, in virtue of which
it was given to me, it was lost, and could never be recovered. I set
this steadily before myself. The better I loved her, the more it behoved
me never to forget it.

I walked through the streets; and, once more seeing my old adversary the
butcher--now a constable, with his staff hanging up in the shop--went
down to look at the place where I had fought him; and there meditated
on Miss Shepherd and the eldest Miss Larkins, and all the idle loves and
likings, and dislikings, of that time. Nothing seemed to have survived
that time but Agnes; and she, ever a star above me, was brighter and
higher.

When I returned, Mr. Wickfield had come home, from a garden he had, a
couple of miles or so out of town, where he now employed himself almost
every day. I found him as my aunt had described him. We sat down to
dinner, with some half-dozen little girls; and he seemed but the shadow
of his handsome picture on the wall.

The tranquillity and peace belonging, of old, to that quiet ground in my
memory, pervaded it again. When dinner was done, Mr. Wickfield taking no
wine, and I desiring none, we went up-stairs; where Agnes and her little
charges sang and played, and worked. After tea the children left us; and
we three sat together, talking of the bygone days.

'My part in them,' said Mr. Wickfield, shaking his white head, 'has much
matter for regret--for deep regret, and deep contrition, Trotwood, you
well know. But I would not cancel it, if it were in my power.'

I could readily believe that, looking at the face beside him.

'I should cancel with it,' he pursued, 'such patience and devotion, such
fidelity, such a child's love, as I must not forget, no! even to forget
myself.'

'I understand you, sir,' I softly said. 'I hold it--I have always held
it--in veneration.'

'But no one knows, not even you,' he returned, 'how much she has done,
how much she has undergone, how hard she has striven. Dear Agnes!'

She had put her hand entreatingly on his arm, to stop him; and was very,
very pale.

'Well, well!' he said with a sigh, dismissing, as I then saw, some trial
she had borne, or was yet to bear, in connexion with what my aunt had
told me. 'Well! I have never told you, Trotwood, of her mother. Has
anyone?'

'Never, sir.'

'It's not much--though it was much to suffer. She married me in
opposition to her father's wish, and he renounced her. She prayed him
to forgive her, before my Agnes came into this world. He was a very hard
man, and her mother had long been dead. He repulsed her. He broke her
heart.'

Agnes leaned upon his shoulder, and stole her arm about his neck.

'She had an affectionate and gentle heart,' he said; 'and it was broken.
I knew its tender nature very well. No one could, if I did not. She
loved me dearly, but was never happy. She was always labouring, in
secret, under this distress; and being delicate and downcast at the time
of his last repulse--for it was not the first, by many--pined away
and died. She left me Agnes, two weeks old; and the grey hair that you
recollect me with, when you first came.' He kissed Agnes on her cheek.

'My love for my dear child was a diseased love, but my mind was all
unhealthy then. I say no more of that. I am not speaking of myself,
Trotwood, but of her mother, and of her. If I give you any clue to what
I am, or to what I have been, you will unravel it, I know. What Agnes
is, I need not say. I have always read something of her poor mother's
story, in her character; and so I tell it you tonight, when we three are
again together, after such great changes. I have told it all.'

His bowed head, and her angel-face and filial duty, derived a more
pathetic meaning from it than they had had before. If I had wanted
anything by which to mark this night of our re-union, I should have
found it in this.

Agnes rose up from her father's side, before long; and going softly to
her piano, played some of the old airs to which we had often listened in
that place.

'Have you any intention of going away again?' Agnes asked me, as I was
standing by.

'What does my sister say to that?'

'I hope not.'

'Then I have no such intention, Agnes.'

'I think you ought not, Trotwood, since you ask me,' she said, mildly.
'Your growing reputation and success enlarge your power of doing good;
and if I could spare my brother,' with her eyes upon me, 'perhaps the
time could not.'

'What I am, you have made me, Agnes. You should know best.'

'I made you, Trotwood?'

'Yes! Agnes, my dear girl!' I said, bending over her. 'I tried to tell
you, when we met today, something that has been in my thoughts since
Dora died. You remember, when you came down to me in our little
room--pointing upward, Agnes?'

'Oh, Trotwood!' she returned, her eyes filled with tears. 'So loving, so
confiding, and so young! Can I ever forget?'

'As you were then, my sister, I have often thought since, you have ever
been to me. Ever pointing upward, Agnes; ever leading me to something
better; ever directing me to higher things!'

She only shook her head; through her tears I saw the same sad quiet
smile.

'And I am so grateful to you for it, Agnes, so bound to you, that there
is no name for the affection of my heart. I want you to know, yet don't
know how to tell you, that all my life long I shall look up to you,
and be guided by you, as I have been through the darkness that is past.
Whatever betides, whatever new ties you may form, whatever changes may
come between us, I shall always look to you, and love you, as I do now,
and have always done. You will always be my solace and resource, as you
have always been. Until I die, my dearest sister, I shall see you always
before me, pointing upward!'

She put her hand in mine, and told me she was proud of me, and of what I
said; although I praised her very far beyond her worth. Then she went
on softly playing, but without removing her eyes from me. 'Do you know,
what I have heard tonight, Agnes,' said I, strangely seems to be a part
of the feeling with which I regarded you when I saw you first--with
which I sat beside you in my rough school-days?'

'You knew I had no mother,' she replied with a smile, 'and felt kindly
towards me.'

'More than that, Agnes, I knew, almost as if I had known this story,
that there was something inexplicably gentle and softened, surrounding
you; something that might have been sorrowful in someone else (as I can
now understand it was), but was not so in you.'

She softly played on, looking at me still.

'Will you laugh at my cherishing such fancies, Agnes?'

'No!'

'Or at my saying that I really believe I felt, even then, that you could
be faithfully affectionate against all discouragement, and never cease
to be so, until you ceased to live?---Will you laugh at such a dream?'

'Oh, no! Oh, no!'

For an instant, a distressful shadow crossed her face; but, even in the
start it gave me, it was gone; and she was playing on, and looking at me
with her own calm smile.

As I rode back in the lonely night, the wind going by me like a restless
memory, I thought of this, and feared she was not happy. I was not
happy; but, thus far, I had faithfully set the seal upon the Past, and,
thinking of her, pointing upward, thought of her as pointing to that
sky above me, where, in the mystery to come, I might yet love her with
a love unknown on earth, and tell her what the strife had been within me
when I loved her here.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Agnes David returns to Miss Betsey's, where Mr. Dick and Peggotty now live. David and his aunt talk through the night. He inquires whether Agnes has any lovers. Miss Betsey tells him that Agnes has many admirers but only one love--but she does not reveal the identity of Agnes's love. The next day, David goes to visit Agnes. He tells her how much he reveres her, no matter what new ties she should choose to make in her life. Agnes seems troubled by his declarations of affection. Mr. Wickfield has completely recovered his old sense of calm, and the house is just as it was when David and Agnes were children. The school that Agnes runs is successful, and peace, prosperity, and happiness have returned to the house. Mr. Wickfield briefly recounts the story of his sickness, his obsession with Agnes's mother after she died, and his obsession with Agnes later. Mr. Wickfield is grateful to Agnes for helping him to recover


prompt:
Chapter: For a time--at all events until my book should be completed, which would
be the work of several months--I took up my abode in my aunt's house at
Dover; and there, sitting in the window from which I had looked out at
the moon upon the sea, when that roof first gave me shelter, I quietly
pursued my task.

In pursuance of my intention of referring to my own fictions only when
their course should incidentally connect itself with the progress of my
story, I do not enter on the aspirations, the delights, anxieties, and
triumphs of my art. That I truly devoted myself to it with my strongest
earnestness, and bestowed upon it every energy of my soul, I have
already said. If the books I have written be of any worth, they will
supply the rest. I shall otherwise have written to poor purpose, and the
rest will be of interest to no one.

Occasionally, I went to London; to lose myself in the swarm of life
there, or to consult with Traddles on some business point. He had
managed for me, in my absence, with the soundest judgement; and my
worldly affairs were prospering. As my notoriety began to bring upon
me an enormous quantity of letters from people of whom I had no
knowledge--chiefly about nothing, and extremely difficult to answer--I
agreed with Traddles to have my name painted up on his door. There, the
devoted postman on that beat delivered bushels of letters for me; and
there, at intervals, I laboured through them, like a Home Secretary of
State without the salary.

Among this correspondence, there dropped in, every now and then, an
obliging proposal from one of the numerous outsiders always lurking
about the Commons, to practise under cover of my name (if I would take
the necessary steps remaining to make a proctor of myself), and pay me
a percentage on the profits. But I declined these offers; being already
aware that there were plenty of such covert practitioners in existence,
and considering the Commons quite bad enough, without my doing anything
to make it worse.

The girls had gone home, when my name burst into bloom on Traddles's
door; and the sharp boy looked, all day, as if he had never heard of
Sophy, shut up in a back room, glancing down from her work into a sooty
little strip of garden with a pump in it. But there I always found her,
the same bright housewife; often humming her Devonshire ballads when no
strange foot was coming up the stairs, and blunting the sharp boy in his
official closet with melody.

I wondered, at first, why I so often found Sophy writing in a copy-book;
and why she always shut it up when I appeared, and hurried it into the
table-drawer. But the secret soon came out. One day, Traddles (who had
just come home through the drizzling sleet from Court) took a paper out
of his desk, and asked me what I thought of that handwriting?

'Oh, DON'T, Tom!' cried Sophy, who was warming his slippers before the
fire.

'My dear,' returned Tom, in a delighted state, 'why not? What do you say
to that writing, Copperfield?'

'It's extraordinarily legal and formal,' said I. 'I don't think I ever
saw such a stiff hand.'

'Not like a lady's hand, is it?' said Traddles.

'A lady's!' I repeated. 'Bricks and mortar are more like a lady's hand!'

Traddles broke into a rapturous laugh, and informed me that it was
Sophy's writing; that Sophy had vowed and declared he would need a
copying-clerk soon, and she would be that clerk; that she had acquired
this hand from a pattern; and that she could throw off--I forget how
many folios an hour. Sophy was very much confused by my being told all
this, and said that when 'Tom' was made a judge he wouldn't be so ready
to proclaim it. Which 'Tom' denied; averring that he should always be
equally proud of it, under all circumstances.

'What a thoroughly good and charming wife she is, my dear Traddles!'
said I, when she had gone away, laughing.

'My dear Copperfield,' returned Traddles, 'she is, without any
exception, the dearest girl! The way she manages this place; her
punctuality, domestic knowledge, economy, and order; her cheerfulness,
Copperfield!'

'Indeed, you have reason to commend her!' I returned. 'You are a happy
fellow. I believe you make yourselves, and each other, two of the
happiest people in the world.'

'I am sure we ARE two of the happiest people,' returned Traddles. 'I
admit that, at all events. Bless my soul, when I see her getting up
by candle-light on these dark mornings, busying herself in the day's
arrangements, going out to market before the clerks come into the Inn,
caring for no weather, devising the most capital little dinners out of
the plainest materials, making puddings and pies, keeping everything in
its right place, always so neat and ornamental herself, sitting up
at night with me if it's ever so late, sweet-tempered and encouraging
always, and all for me, I positively sometimes can't believe it,
Copperfield!'

He was tender of the very slippers she had been warming, as he put them
on, and stretched his feet enjoyingly upon the fender.

'I positively sometimes can't believe it,' said Traddles. 'Then our
pleasures! Dear me, they are inexpensive, but they are quite wonderful!
When we are at home here, of an evening, and shut the outer door, and
draw those curtains--which she made--where could we be more snug? When
it's fine, and we go out for a walk in the evening, the streets
abound in enjoyment for us. We look into the glittering windows of the
jewellers' shops; and I show Sophy which of the diamond-eyed serpents,
coiled up on white satin rising grounds, I would give her if I could
afford it; and Sophy shows me which of the gold watches that are
capped and jewelled and engine-turned, and possessed of the horizontal
lever-escape-movement, and all sorts of things, she would buy for me if
she could afford it; and we pick out the spoons and forks, fish-slices,
butter-knives, and sugar-tongs, we should both prefer if we could both
afford it; and really we go away as if we had got them! Then, when we
stroll into the squares, and great streets, and see a house to let,
sometimes we look up at it, and say, how would THAT do, if I was made
a judge? And we parcel it out--such a room for us, such rooms for the
girls, and so forth; until we settle to our satisfaction that it
would do, or it wouldn't do, as the case may be. Sometimes, we go at
half-price to the pit of the theatre--the very smell of which is cheap,
in my opinion, at the money--and there we thoroughly enjoy the play:
which Sophy believes every word of, and so do I. In walking home,
perhaps we buy a little bit of something at a cook's-shop, or a little
lobster at the fishmongers, and bring it here, and make a splendid
supper, chatting about what we have seen. Now, you know, Copperfield, if
I was Lord Chancellor, we couldn't do this!'

'You would do something, whatever you were, my dear Traddles,' thought
I, 'that would be pleasant and amiable. And by the way,' I said aloud,
'I suppose you never draw any skeletons now?'

'Really,' replied Traddles, laughing, and reddening, 'I can't wholly
deny that I do, my dear Copperfield. For being in one of the back rows
of the King's Bench the other day, with a pen in my hand, the fancy came
into my head to try how I had preserved that accomplishment. And I am
afraid there's a skeleton--in a wig--on the ledge of the desk.'

After we had both laughed heartily, Traddles wound up by looking with a
smile at the fire, and saying, in his forgiving way, 'Old Creakle!'

'I have a letter from that old--Rascal here,' said I. For I never was
less disposed to forgive him the way he used to batter Traddles, than
when I saw Traddles so ready to forgive him himself.

'From Creakle the schoolmaster?' exclaimed Traddles. 'No!'

'Among the persons who are attracted to me in my rising fame and
fortune,' said I, looking over my letters, 'and who discover that they
were always much attached to me, is the self-same Creakle. He is not
a schoolmaster now, Traddles. He is retired. He is a Middlesex
Magistrate.'

I thought Traddles might be surprised to hear it, but he was not so at
all.

'How do you suppose he comes to be a Middlesex Magistrate?' said I.

'Oh dear me!' replied Traddles, 'it would be very difficult to answer
that question. Perhaps he voted for somebody, or lent money to somebody,
or bought something of somebody, or otherwise obliged somebody, or
jobbed for somebody, who knew somebody who got the lieutenant of the
county to nominate him for the commission.'

'On the commission he is, at any rate,' said I. 'And he writes to me
here, that he will be glad to show me, in operation, the only true
system of prison discipline; the only unchallengeable way of making
sincere and lasting converts and penitents--which, you know, is by
solitary confinement. What do you say?'

'To the system?' inquired Traddles, looking grave.

'No. To my accepting the offer, and your going with me?'

'I don't object,' said Traddles.

'Then I'll write to say so. You remember (to say nothing of our
treatment) this same Creakle turning his son out of doors, I suppose,
and the life he used to lead his wife and daughter?'

'Perfectly,' said Traddles.

'Yet, if you'll read his letter, you'll find he is the tenderest of
men to prisoners convicted of the whole calendar of felonies,' said I;
'though I can't find that his tenderness extends to any other class of
created beings.'

Traddles shrugged his shoulders, and was not at all surprised. I had not
expected him to be, and was not surprised myself; or my observation of
similar practical satires would have been but scanty. We arranged the
time of our visit, and I wrote accordingly to Mr. Creakle that evening.

On the appointed day--I think it was the next day, but no
matter--Traddles and I repaired to the prison where Mr. Creakle was
powerful. It was an immense and solid building, erected at a vast
expense. I could not help thinking, as we approached the gate, what
an uproar would have been made in the country, if any deluded man had
proposed to spend one half the money it had cost, on the erection of an
industrial school for the young, or a house of refuge for the deserving
old.

In an office that might have been on the ground-floor of the Tower of
Babel, it was so massively constructed, we were presented to our old
schoolmaster; who was one of a group, composed of two or three of the
busier sort of magistrates, and some visitors they had brought. He
received me, like a man who had formed my mind in bygone years, and
had always loved me tenderly. On my introducing Traddles, Mr. Creakle
expressed, in like manner, but in an inferior degree, that he had always
been Traddles's guide, philosopher, and friend. Our venerable instructor
was a great deal older, and not improved in appearance. His face was
as fiery as ever; his eyes were as small, and rather deeper set. The
scanty, wet-looking grey hair, by which I remembered him, was almost
gone; and the thick veins in his bald head were none the more agreeable
to look at.

After some conversation among these gentlemen, from which I might have
supposed that there was nothing in the world to be legitimately taken
into account but the supreme comfort of prisoners, at any expense, and
nothing on the wide earth to be done outside prison-doors, we began
our inspection. It being then just dinner-time, we went, first into the
great kitchen, where every prisoner's dinner was in course of being set
out separately (to be handed to him in his cell), with the regularity
and precision of clock-work. I said aside, to Traddles, that I wondered
whether it occurred to anybody, that there was a striking contrast
between these plentiful repasts of choice quality, and the dinners, not
to say of paupers, but of soldiers, sailors, labourers, the great bulk
of the honest, working community; of whom not one man in five hundred
ever dined half so well. But I learned that the 'system' required high
living; and, in short, to dispose of the system, once for all, I found
that on that head and on all others, 'the system' put an end to all
doubts, and disposed of all anomalies. Nobody appeared to have the least
idea that there was any other system, but THE system, to be considered.

As we were going through some of the magnificent passages, I inquired of
Mr. Creakle and his friends what were supposed to be the main advantages
of this all-governing and universally over-riding system? I found
them to be the perfect isolation of prisoners--so that no one man in
confinement there, knew anything about another; and the reduction of
prisoners to a wholesome state of mind, leading to sincere contrition
and repentance.

Now, it struck me, when we began to visit individuals in their cells,
and to traverse the passages in which those cells were, and to have the
manner of the going to chapel and so forth, explained to us, that there
was a strong probability of the prisoners knowing a good deal about each
other, and of their carrying on a pretty complete system of intercourse.
This, at the time I write, has been proved, I believe, to be the case;
but, as it would have been flat blasphemy against the system to have
hinted such a doubt then, I looked out for the penitence as diligently
as I could.

And here again, I had great misgivings. I found as prevalent a fashion
in the form of the penitence, as I had left outside in the forms of the
coats and waistcoats in the windows of the tailors' shops. I found a
vast amount of profession, varying very little in character: varying
very little (which I thought exceedingly suspicious), even in words. I
found a great many foxes, disparaging whole vineyards of inaccessible
grapes; but I found very few foxes whom I would have trusted within
reach of a bunch. Above all, I found that the most professing men were
the greatest objects of interest; and that their conceit, their vanity,
their want of excitement, and their love of deception (which many
of them possessed to an almost incredible extent, as their histories
showed), all prompted to these professions, and were all gratified by
them.

However, I heard so repeatedly, in the course of our goings to and fro,
of a certain Number Twenty Seven, who was the Favourite, and who really
appeared to be a Model Prisoner, that I resolved to suspend my judgement
until I should see Twenty Seven. Twenty Eight, I understood, was also
a bright particular star; but it was his misfortune to have his glory
a little dimmed by the extraordinary lustre of Twenty Seven. I heard so
much of Twenty Seven, of his pious admonitions to everybody around him,
and of the beautiful letters he constantly wrote to his mother (whom he
seemed to consider in a very bad way), that I became quite impatient to
see him.

I had to restrain my impatience for some time, on account of Twenty
Seven being reserved for a concluding effect. But, at last, we came to
the door of his cell; and Mr. Creakle, looking through a little hole in
it, reported to us, in a state of the greatest admiration, that he was
reading a Hymn Book.

There was such a rush of heads immediately, to see Number Twenty Seven
reading his Hymn Book, that the little hole was blocked up, six or seven
heads deep. To remedy this inconvenience, and give us an opportunity of
conversing with Twenty Seven in all his purity, Mr. Creakle directed the
door of the cell to be unlocked, and Twenty Seven to be invited out into
the passage. This was done; and whom should Traddles and I then behold,
to our amazement, in this converted Number Twenty Seven, but Uriah Heep!

He knew us directly; and said, as he came out--with the old writhe,--

'How do you do, Mr. Copperfield? How do you do, Mr. Traddles?'

This recognition caused a general admiration in the party. I rather
thought that everyone was struck by his not being proud, and taking
notice of us.

'Well, Twenty Seven,' said Mr. Creakle, mournfully admiring him. 'How do
you find yourself today?'

'I am very umble, sir!' replied Uriah Heep.

'You are always so, Twenty Seven,' said Mr. Creakle.

Here, another gentleman asked, with extreme anxiety: 'Are you quite
comfortable?'

'Yes, I thank you, sir!' said Uriah Heep, looking in that direction.
'Far more comfortable here, than ever I was outside. I see my follies,
now, sir. That's what makes me comfortable.'

Several gentlemen were much affected; and a third questioner, forcing
himself to the front, inquired with extreme feeling: 'How do you find
the beef?'

'Thank you, sir,' replied Uriah, glancing in the new direction of this
voice, 'it was tougher yesterday than I could wish; but it's my duty to
bear. I have committed follies, gentlemen,' said Uriah, looking round
with a meek smile, 'and I ought to bear the consequences without
repining.' A murmur, partly of gratification at Twenty Seven's celestial
state of mind, and partly of indignation against the Contractor who had
given him any cause of complaint (a note of which was immediately made
by Mr. Creakle), having subsided, Twenty Seven stood in the midst of
us, as if he felt himself the principal object of merit in a highly
meritorious museum. That we, the neophytes, might have an excess of
light shining upon us all at once, orders were given to let out Twenty
Eight.

I had been so much astonished already, that I only felt a kind of
resigned wonder when Mr. Littimer walked forth, reading a good book!

'Twenty Eight,' said a gentleman in spectacles, who had not yet spoken,
'you complained last week, my good fellow, of the cocoa. How has it been
since?'

'I thank you, sir,' said Mr. Littimer, 'it has been better made. If I
might take the liberty of saying so, sir, I don't think the milk which
is boiled with it is quite genuine; but I am aware, sir, that there is
a great adulteration of milk, in London, and that the article in a pure
state is difficult to be obtained.'

It appeared to me that the gentleman in spectacles backed his Twenty
Eight against Mr. Creakle's Twenty Seven, for each of them took his own
man in hand.

'What is your state of mind, Twenty Eight?' said the questioner in
spectacles.

'I thank you, sir,' returned Mr. Littimer; 'I see my follies now, sir.
I am a good deal troubled when I think of the sins of my former
companions, sir; but I trust they may find forgiveness.'

'You are quite happy yourself?' said the questioner, nodding
encouragement.

'I am much obliged to you, sir,' returned Mr. Littimer. 'Perfectly so.'

'Is there anything at all on your mind now?' said the questioner. 'If
so, mention it, Twenty Eight.'

'Sir,' said Mr. Littimer, without looking up, 'if my eyes have not
deceived me, there is a gentleman present who was acquainted with me
in my former life. It may be profitable to that gentleman to know, sir,
that I attribute my past follies, entirely to having lived a thoughtless
life in the service of young men; and to having allowed myself to be led
by them into weaknesses, which I had not the strength to resist. I hope
that gentleman will take warning, sir, and will not be offended at my
freedom. It is for his good. I am conscious of my own past follies. I
hope he may repent of all the wickedness and sin to which he has been a
party.'

I observed that several gentlemen were shading their eyes, each with one
hand, as if they had just come into church.

'This does you credit, Twenty Eight,' returned the questioner. 'I should
have expected it of you. Is there anything else?'

'Sir,' returned Mr. Littimer, slightly lifting up his eyebrows, but not
his eyes, 'there was a young woman who fell into dissolute courses, that
I endeavoured to save, sir, but could not rescue. I beg that gentleman,
if he has it in his power, to inform that young woman from me that
I forgive her her bad conduct towards myself, and that I call her to
repentance--if he will be so good.'

'I have no doubt, Twenty Eight,' returned the questioner, 'that the
gentleman you refer to feels very strongly--as we all must--what you
have so properly said. We will not detain you.'

'I thank you, sir,' said Mr. Littimer. 'Gentlemen, I wish you a good
day, and hoping you and your families will also see your wickedness, and
amend!'

With this, Number Twenty Eight retired, after a glance between him and
Uriah; as if they were not altogether unknown to each other, through
some medium of communication; and a murmur went round the group, as his
door shut upon him, that he was a most respectable man, and a beautiful
case.

'Now, Twenty Seven,' said Mr. Creakle, entering on a clear stage with
his man, 'is there anything that anyone can do for you? If so, mention
it.'

'I would umbly ask, sir,' returned Uriah, with a jerk of his malevolent
head, 'for leave to write again to mother.'

'It shall certainly be granted,' said Mr. Creakle.

'Thank you, sir! I am anxious about mother. I am afraid she ain't safe.'

Somebody incautiously asked, what from? But there was a scandalized
whisper of 'Hush!'

'Immortally safe, sir,' returned Uriah, writhing in the direction of
the voice. 'I should wish mother to be got into my state. I never should
have been got into my present state if I hadn't come here. I wish mother
had come here. It would be better for everybody, if they got took up,
and was brought here.'

This sentiment gave unbounded satisfaction--greater satisfaction, I
think, than anything that had passed yet.

'Before I come here,' said Uriah, stealing a look at us, as if he would
have blighted the outer world to which we belonged, if he could, 'I was
given to follies; but now I am sensible of my follies. There's a deal
of sin outside. There's a deal of sin in mother. There's nothing but sin
everywhere--except here.'

'You are quite changed?' said Mr. Creakle.

'Oh dear, yes, sir!' cried this hopeful penitent.

'You wouldn't relapse, if you were going out?' asked somebody else.

'Oh de-ar no, sir!'

'Well!' said Mr. Creakle, 'this is very gratifying. You have addressed
Mr. Copperfield, Twenty Seven. Do you wish to say anything further to
him?'

'You knew me, a long time before I came here and was changed, Mr.
Copperfield,' said Uriah, looking at me; and a more villainous look
I never saw, even on his visage. 'You knew me when, in spite of my
follies, I was umble among them that was proud, and meek among them that
was violent--you was violent to me yourself, Mr. Copperfield. Once, you
struck me a blow in the face, you know.'

General commiseration. Several indignant glances directed at me.

'But I forgive you, Mr. Copperfield,' said Uriah, making his forgiving
nature the subject of a most impious and awful parallel, which I shall
not record. 'I forgive everybody. It would ill become me to bear malice.
I freely forgive you, and I hope you'll curb your passions in future. I
hope Mr. W. will repent, and Miss W., and all of that sinful lot. You've
been visited with affliction, and I hope it may do you good; but you'd
better have come here. Mr. W. had better have come here, and Miss W.
too. The best wish I could give you, Mr. Copperfield, and give all of
you gentlemen, is, that you could be took up and brought here. When I
think of my past follies, and my present state, I am sure it would be
best for you. I pity all who ain't brought here!'

He sneaked back into his cell, amidst a little chorus of approbation;
and both Traddles and I experienced a great relief when he was locked
in.

It was a characteristic feature in this repentance, that I was fain to
ask what these two men had done, to be there at all. That appeared to be
the last thing about which they had anything to say. I addressed
myself to one of the two warders, who, I suspected from certain latent
indications in their faces, knew pretty well what all this stir was
worth.

'Do you know,' said I, as we walked along the passage, 'what felony was
Number Twenty Seven's last "folly"?'

The answer was that it was a Bank case.

'A fraud on the Bank of England?' I asked. 'Yes, sir. Fraud, forgery,
and conspiracy. He and some others. He set the others on. It was a deep
plot for a large sum. Sentence, transportation for life. Twenty Seven
was the knowingest bird of the lot, and had very nearly kept himself
safe; but not quite. The Bank was just able to put salt upon his
tail--and only just.'

'Do you know Twenty Eight's offence?'

'Twenty Eight,' returned my informant, speaking throughout in a low
tone, and looking over his shoulder as we walked along the passage, to
guard himself from being overheard, in such an unlawful reference
to these Immaculates, by Creakle and the rest; 'Twenty Eight (also
transportation) got a place, and robbed a young master of a matter of
two hundred and fifty pounds in money and valuables, the night before
they were going abroad. I particularly recollect his case, from his
being took by a dwarf.'

'A what?'

'A little woman. I have forgot her name?'

'Not Mowcher?'

'That's it! He had eluded pursuit, and was going to America in a flaxen
wig, and whiskers, and such a complete disguise as never you see in all
your born days; when the little woman, being in Southampton, met
him walking along the street--picked him out with her sharp eye in a
moment--ran betwixt his legs to upset him--and held on to him like grim
Death.'

'Excellent Miss Mowcher!' cried I.

'You'd have said so, if you had seen her, standing on a chair in the
witness-box at the trial, as I did,' said my friend. 'He cut her face
right open, and pounded her in the most brutal manner, when she took
him; but she never loosed her hold till he was locked up. She held so
tight to him, in fact, that the officers were obliged to take 'em
both together. She gave her evidence in the gamest way, and was highly
complimented by the Bench, and cheered right home to her lodgings. She
said in Court that she'd have took him single-handed (on account of what
she knew concerning him), if he had been Samson. And it's my belief she
would!'

It was mine too, and I highly respected Miss Mowcher for it.

We had now seen all there was to see. It would have been in vain to
represent to such a man as the Worshipful Mr. Creakle, that Twenty Seven
and Twenty Eight were perfectly consistent and unchanged; that exactly
what they were then, they had always been; that the hypocritical knaves
were just the subjects to make that sort of profession in such a place;
that they knew its market-value at least as well as we did, in the
immediate service it would do them when they were expatriated; in
a word, that it was a rotten, hollow, painfully suggestive piece of
business altogether. We left them to their system and themselves, and
went home wondering.

'Perhaps it's a good thing, Traddles,' said I, 'to have an unsound Hobby
ridden hard; for it's the sooner ridden to death.'

'I hope so,' replied Traddles.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: I am shown Two Interesting Penitents David receives a letter from Mr. Creakle, who has heard of David's fame. Now a magistrate, Mr. Creakle asks David to come to his prison to witness his new form of punishment, which he says is the perfect way to reform prisoners. At the prison, David and Traddles are told of two prisoners who prove just how well Mr. Creakle's system works. The first of the prisoners is Uriah, who is serving a life term in prison for defrauding the Bank of England. Uriah tells David, Traddles, and the guards that he wishes everyone could go to jail to improve their lives. The second prisoner is Littimer, who attempted to rob someone but was apprehended by Miss Mowcher, who recognized him in the street and stopped his getaway