prompt:
Chapter: That 'ere your governor's luggage, Sammy?' inquired Mr. Weller of his
affectionate son, as he entered the yard of the Bull Inn, Whitechapel,
with a travelling-bag and a small portmanteau.

'You might ha' made a worser guess than that, old feller,' replied Mr.
Weller the younger, setting down his burden in the yard, and sitting
himself down upon it afterwards. 'The governor hisself'll be down here
presently.'

'He's a-cabbin' it, I suppose?' said the father.

'Yes, he's a havin' two mile o' danger at eight-pence,' responded the
son. 'How's mother-in-law this mornin'?'

'Queer, Sammy, queer,' replied the elder Mr. Weller, with impressive
gravity. 'She's been gettin' rayther in the Methodistical order lately,
Sammy; and she is uncommon pious, to be sure. She's too good a creetur
for me, Sammy. I feel I don't deserve her.'

'Ah,' said Mr. Samuel. 'that's wery self-denyin' o' you.'

'Wery,' replied his parent, with a sigh. 'She's got hold o' some
inwention for grown-up people being born again, Sammy--the new birth, I
think they calls it. I should wery much like to see that system in
haction, Sammy. I should wery much like to see your mother-in-law born
again. Wouldn't I put her out to nurse!'

'What do you think them women does t'other day,' continued Mr. Weller,
after a short pause, during which he had significantly struck the side
of his nose with his forefinger some half-dozen times. 'What do you
think they does, t'other day, Sammy?'

'Don't know,' replied Sam, 'what?'

'Goes and gets up a grand tea drinkin' for a feller they calls their
shepherd,' said Mr. Weller. 'I was a-standing starin' in at the pictur
shop down at our place, when I sees a little bill about it; "tickets
half-a-crown. All applications to be made to the committee. Secretary,
Mrs. Weller"; and when I got home there was the committee a-sittin' in
our back parlour. Fourteen women; I wish you could ha' heard 'em, Sammy.
There they was, a-passin' resolutions, and wotin' supplies, and all
sorts o' games. Well, what with your mother-in-law a-worrying me to go,
and what with my looking for'ard to seein' some queer starts if I did, I
put my name down for a ticket; at six o'clock on the Friday evenin' I
dresses myself out wery smart, and off I goes with the old 'ooman, and
up we walks into a fust-floor where there was tea-things for thirty, and
a whole lot o' women as begins whisperin' to one another, and lookin' at
me, as if they'd never seen a rayther stout gen'l'm'n of eight-and-fifty
afore. By and by, there comes a great bustle downstairs, and a lanky
chap with a red nose and a white neckcloth rushes up, and sings out,
"Here's the shepherd a-coming to wisit his faithful flock;" and in comes
a fat chap in black, vith a great white face, a-smilin' avay like
clockwork. Such goin's on, Sammy! "The kiss of peace," says the
shepherd; and then he kissed the women all round, and ven he'd done, the
man vith the red nose began. I was just a-thinkin' whether I hadn't
better begin too--'specially as there was a wery nice lady a-sittin'
next me--ven in comes the tea, and your mother-in-law, as had been
makin' the kettle bile downstairs. At it they went, tooth and nail. Such
a precious loud hymn, Sammy, while the tea was a brewing; such a grace,
such eatin' and drinkin'! I wish you could ha' seen the shepherd walkin'
into the ham and muffins. I never see such a chap to eat and drink--
never. The red-nosed man warn't by no means the sort of person you'd
like to grub by contract, but he was nothin' to the shepherd. Well;
arter the tea was over, they sang another hymn, and then the shepherd
began to preach: and wery well he did it, considerin' how heavy them
muffins must have lied on his chest. Presently he pulls up, all of a
sudden, and hollers out, "Where is the sinner; where is the mis'rable
sinner?" Upon which, all the women looked at me, and began to groan as
if they was a-dying. I thought it was rather sing'ler, but howsoever, I
says nothing. Presently he pulls up again, and lookin' wery hard at me,
says, "Where is the sinner; where is the mis'rable sinner?" and all the
women groans again, ten times louder than afore. I got rather savage at
this, so I takes a step or two for'ard and says, "My friend," says I,
"did you apply that 'ere obserwation to me?" 'Stead of beggin' my pardon
as any gen'l'm'n would ha' done, he got more abusive than ever:--called
me a wessel, Sammy--a wessel of wrath--and all sorts o' names. So my
blood being reg'larly up, I first gave him two or three for himself, and
then two or three more to hand over to the man with the red nose, and
walked off. I wish you could ha' heard how the women screamed, Sammy,
ven they picked up the shepherd from underneath the table--Hollo! here's
the governor, the size of life.'

As Mr. Weller spoke, Mr. Pickwick dismounted from a cab, and entered the
yard.

'Fine mornin', Sir,' said Mr. Weller, senior.

'Beautiful indeed,' replied Mr. Pickwick.

'Beautiful indeed,' echoes a red-haired man with an inquisitive nose and
green spectacles, who had unpacked himself from a cab at the same moment
as Mr. Pickwick. 'Going to Ipswich, Sir?'

'I am,' replied Mr. Pickwick.

'Extraordinary coincidence. So am I.'

Mr. Pickwick bowed.

'Going outside?' said the red-haired man.

Mr. Pickwick bowed again.

'Bless my soul, how remarkable--I am going outside, too,' said the red-
haired man; 'we are positively going together.' And the red-haired man,
who was an important-looking, sharp-nosed, mysterious-spoken personage,
with a bird-like habit of giving his head a jerk every time he said
anything, smiled as if he had made one of the strangest discoveries that
ever fell to the lot of human wisdom.

'I am happy in the prospect of your company, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Ah,' said the new-comer, 'it's a good thing for both of us, isn't it?
Company, you see--company--is--is--it's a very different thing from
solitude--ain't it?'

'There's no denying that 'ere,' said Mr. Weller, joining in the
conversation, with an affable smile. 'That's what I call a self-evident
proposition, as the dog's-meat man said, when the housemaid told him he
warn't a gentleman.'

'Ah,' said the red-haired man, surveying Mr. Weller from head to foot
with a supercilious look. 'Friend of yours, sir?'

'Not exactly a friend,' replied Mr. Pickwick, in a low tone. 'The fact
is, he is my servant, but I allow him to take a good many liberties;
for, between ourselves, I flatter myself he is an original, and I am
rather proud of him.'

'Ah,' said the red-haired man, 'that, you see, is a matter of taste. I
am not fond of anything original; I don't like it; don't see the
necessity for it. What's your name, sir?'

'Here is my card, sir,' replied Mr. Pickwick, much amused by the
abruptness of the question, and the singular manner of the stranger.

'Ah,' said the red-haired man, placing the card in his pocket-book,
'Pickwick; very good. I like to know a man's name, it saves so much
trouble. That's my card, sir. Magnus, you will perceive, sir--Magnus is
my name. It's rather a good name, I think, sir.'

'A very good name, indeed,' said Mr. Pickwick, wholly unable to repress
a smile.

'Yes, I think it is,' resumed Mr. Magnus. 'There's a good name before
it, too, you will observe. Permit me, sir--if you hold the card a little
slanting, this way, you catch the light upon the up-stroke. There--Peter
Magnus--sounds well, I think, sir.'

'Very,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Curious circumstance about those initials, sir,' said Mr. Magnus. 'You
will observe--P.M.--post meridian. In hasty notes to intimate
acquaintance, I sometimes sign myself "Afternoon." It amuses my friends
very much, Mr. Pickwick.'

'It is calculated to afford them the highest gratification, I should
conceive,' said Mr. Pickwick, rather envying the ease with which Mr.
Magnus's friends were entertained.

'Now, gen'l'm'n,' said the hostler, 'coach is ready, if you please.'

'Is all my luggage in?' inquired Mr. Magnus.

'All right, sir.'

'Is the red bag in?'

'All right, Sir.'

'And the striped bag?'

'Fore boot, Sir.'

'And the brown-paper parcel?'

'Under the seat, Sir.'

'And the leather hat-box?'

'They're all in, Sir.'

'Now, will you get up?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Excuse me,' replied Magnus, standing on the wheel. 'Excuse me, Mr.
Pickwick. I cannot consent to get up, in this state of uncertainty. I am
quite satisfied from that man's manner, that the leather hat-box is not
in.'

The solemn protestations of the hostler being wholly unavailing, the
leather hat-box was obliged to be raked up from the lowest depth of the
boot, to satisfy him that it had been safely packed; and after he had
been assured on this head, he felt a solemn presentiment, first, that
the red bag was mislaid, and next that the striped bag had been stolen,
and then that the brown-paper parcel 'had come untied.' At length when
he had received ocular demonstration of the groundless nature of each
and every of these suspicions, he consented to climb up to the roof of
the coach, observing that now he had taken everything off his mind, he
felt quite comfortable and happy.

'You're given to nervousness, ain't you, Sir?' inquired Mr. Weller,
senior, eyeing the stranger askance, as he mounted to his place.

'Yes; I always am rather about these little matters,' said the stranger,
'but I am all right now--quite right.'

'Well, that's a blessin', said Mr. Weller. 'Sammy, help your master up
to the box; t'other leg, Sir, that's it; give us your hand, Sir. Up with
you. You was a lighter weight when you was a boy, sir.'

True enough, that, Mr. Weller,' said the breathless Mr. Pickwick good-
humouredly, as he took his seat on the box beside him.

'Jump up in front, Sammy,' said Mr. Weller. 'Now Villam, run 'em out.
Take care o' the archvay, gen'l'm'n. "Heads," as the pieman says.
That'll do, Villam. Let 'em alone.' And away went the coach up
Whitechapel, to the admiration of the whole population of that pretty
densely populated quarter.

'Not a wery nice neighbourhood, this, Sir,' said Sam, with a touch of
the hat, which always preceded his entering into conversation with his
master.

'It is not indeed, Sam,' replied Mr. Pickwick, surveying the crowded and
filthy street through which they were passing.

'It's a wery remarkable circumstance, Sir,' said Sam, 'that poverty and
oysters always seem to go together.'

'I don't understand you, Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'What I mean, sir,' said Sam, 'is, that the poorer a place is, the
greater call there seems to be for oysters. Look here, sir; here's a
oyster-stall to every half-dozen houses. The street's lined vith 'em.
Blessed if I don't think that ven a man's wery poor, he rushes out of
his lodgings, and eats oysters in reg'lar desperation.'

'To be sure he does,' said Mr. Weller, senior; 'and it's just the same
vith pickled salmon!'

'Those are two very remarkable facts, which never occurred to me
before,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'The very first place we stop at, I'll make
a note of them.'

By this time they had reached the turnpike at Mile End; a profound
silence prevailed until they had got two or three miles farther on, when
Mr. Weller, senior, turning suddenly to Mr. Pickwick, said--

'Wery queer life is a pike-keeper's, sir.'

'A what?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'A pike-keeper.'

'What do you mean by a pike-keeper?' inquired Mr. Peter Magnus.

'The old 'un means a turnpike-keeper, gen'l'm'n,' observed Mr. Samuel
Weller, in explanation.

'Oh,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'I see. Yes; very curious life. Very
uncomfortable.'

'They're all on 'em men as has met vith some disappointment in life,'
said Mr. Weller, senior.

'Ay, ay,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Yes. Consequence of vich, they retires from the world, and shuts
themselves up in pikes; partly with the view of being solitary, and
partly to rewenge themselves on mankind by takin' tolls.'

'Dear me,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'I never knew that before.'

'Fact, Sir,' said Mr. Weller; 'if they was gen'l'm'n, you'd call 'em
misanthropes, but as it is, they only takes to pike-keepin'.'

With such conversation, possessing the inestimable charm of blending
amusement with instruction, did Mr. Weller beguile the tediousness of
the journey, during the greater part of the day. Topics of conversation
were never wanting, for even when any pause occurred in Mr. Weller's
loquacity, it was abundantly supplied by the desire evinced by Mr.
Magnus to make himself acquainted with the whole of the personal history
of his fellow-travellers, and his loudly-expressed anxiety at every
stage, respecting the safety and well-being of the two bags, the leather
hat-box, and the brown-paper parcel.

In the main street of Ipswich, on the left-hand side of the way, a short
distance after you have passed through the open space fronting the Town
Hall, stands an inn known far and wide by the appellation of the Great
White Horse, rendered the more conspicuous by a stone statue of some
rampacious animal with flowing mane and tail, distantly resembling an
insane cart-horse, which is elevated above the principal door. The Great
White Horse is famous in the neighbourhood, in the same degree as a
prize ox, or a county-paper-chronicled turnip, or unwieldy pig--for its
enormous size. Never was such labyrinths of uncarpeted passages, such
clusters of mouldy, ill-lighted rooms, such huge numbers of small dens
for eating or sleeping in, beneath any one roof, as are collected
together between the four walls of the Great White Horse at Ipswich.

It was at the door of this overgrown tavern that the London coach
stopped, at the same hour every evening; and it was from this same
London coach that Mr. Pickwick, Sam Weller, and Mr. Peter Magnus
dismounted, on the particular evening to which this chapter of our
history bears reference.

'Do you stop here, sir?' inquired Mr. Peter Magnus, when the striped
bag, and the red bag, and the brown-paper parcel, and the leather hat-
box, had all been deposited in the passage. 'Do you stop here, sir?'

'I do,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Dear me,' said Mr. Magnus, 'I never knew anything like these
extraordinary coincidences. Why, I stop here too. I hope we dine
together?'

'With pleasure,' replied Mr. Pickwick. 'I am not quite certain whether I
have any friends here or not, though. Is there any gentleman of the name
of Tupman here, waiter?'

A corpulent man, with a fortnight's napkin under his arm, and coeval
stockings on his legs, slowly desisted from his occupation of staring
down the street, on this question being put to him by Mr. Pickwick; and,
after minutely inspecting that gentleman's appearance, from the crown of
his hat to the lowest button of his gaiters, replied emphatically--

'No!'

'Nor any gentleman of the name of Snodgrass?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.

'No!'

'Nor Winkle?'

'No!'

'My friends have not arrived to-day, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'We will
dine alone, then. Show us a private room, waiter.'

On this request being preferred, the corpulent man condescended to order
the boots to bring in the gentlemen's luggage; and preceding them down a
long, dark passage, ushered them into a large, badly-furnished
apartment, with a dirty grate, in which a small fire was making a
wretched attempt to be cheerful, but was fast sinking beneath the
dispiriting influence of the place. After the lapse of an hour, a bit of
fish and a steak was served up to the travellers, and when the dinner
was cleared away, Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Peter Magnus drew their chairs up
to the fire, and having ordered a bottle of the worst possible port
wine, at the highest possible price, for the good of the house, drank
brandy-and-water for their own.

Mr. Peter Magnus was naturally of a very communicative disposition, and
the brandy-and-water operated with wonderful effect in warming into life
the deepest hidden secrets of his bosom. After sundry accounts of
himself, his family, his connections, his friends, his jokes, his
business, and his brothers (most talkative men have a great deal to say
about their brothers), Mr. Peter Magnus took a view of Mr. Pickwick
through his coloured spectacles for several minutes, and then said, with
an air of modesty--

'And what do you think--what _do_ you think, Mr. Pickwick--I have come
down here for?'

'Upon my word,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'it is wholly impossible for me to
guess; on business, perhaps.'

'Partly right, Sir,' replied Mr. Peter Magnus, 'but partly wrong at the
same time; try again, Mr. Pickwick.'

'Really,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'I must throw myself on your mercy, to tell
me or not, as you may think best; for I should never guess, if I were to
try all night.'

'Why, then, he-he-he!' said Mr. Peter Magnus, with a bashful titter,
'what should you think, Mr. Pickwick, if I had come down here to make a
proposal, Sir, eh? He, he, he!'

'Think! That you are very likely to succeed,' replied Mr. Pickwick, with
one of his beaming smiles.

'Ah!' said Mr. Magnus. 'But do you really think so, Mr. Pickwick? Do
you, though?'

'Certainly,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'No; but you're joking, though.'

'I am not, indeed.'

'Why, then,' said Mr. Magnus, 'to let you into a little secret, I think
so too. I don't mind telling you, Mr. Pickwick, although I'm dreadful
jealous by nature--horrid--that the lady is in this house.' Here Mr.
Magnus took off his spectacles, on purpose to wink, and then put them on
again.

'That's what you were running out of the room for, before dinner, then,
so often,' said Mr. Pickwick archly.

'Hush! Yes, you're right, that was it; not such a fool as to see her,
though.'

'No!'

'No; wouldn't do, you know, after having just come off a journey. Wait
till to-morrow, sir; double the chance then. Mr. Pickwick, Sir, there is
a suit of clothes in that bag, and a hat in that box, which, I expect,
in the effect they will produce, will be invaluable to me, sir.'

'Indeed!' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Yes; you must have observed my anxiety about them to-day. I do not
believe that such another suit of clothes, and such a hat, could be
bought for money, Mr. Pickwick.'

Mr. Pickwick congratulated the fortunate owner of the irresistible
garments on their acquisition; and Mr. Peter Magnus remained a few
moments apparently absorbed in contemplation.

'She's a fine creature,' said Mr. Magnus.

'Is she?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Very,' said Mr. Magnus. 'Very. She lives about twenty miles from here,
Mr. Pickwick. I heard she would be here to-night and all to-morrow
forenoon, and came down to seize the opportunity. I think an inn is a
good sort of a place to propose to a single woman in, Mr. Pickwick. She
is more likely to feel the loneliness of her situation in travelling,
perhaps, than she would be at home. What do you think, Mr. Pickwick?'

'I think it is very probable,' replied that gentleman.

'I beg your pardon, Mr. Pickwick,' said Mr. Peter Magnus, 'but I am
naturally rather curious; what may you have come down here for?'

'On a far less pleasant errand, Sir,' replied Mr. Pickwick, the colour
mounting to his face at the recollection. 'I have come down here, Sir,
to expose the treachery and falsehood of an individual, upon whose truth
and honour I placed implicit reliance.'

'Dear me,' said Mr. Peter Magnus, 'that's very unpleasant. It is a lady,
I presume? Eh? ah! Sly, Mr. Pickwick, sly. Well, Mr. Pickwick, sir, I
wouldn't probe your feelings for the world. Painful subjects, these,
sir, very painful. Don't mind me, Mr. Pickwick, if you wish to give vent
to your feelings. I know what it is to be jilted, Sir; I have endured
that sort of thing three or four times.'

'I am much obliged to you, for your condolence on what you presume to be
my melancholy case,' said Mr. Pickwick, winding up his watch, and laying
it on the table, 'but--'

'No, no,' said Mr. Peter Magnus, 'not a word more; it's a painful
subject. I see, I see. What's the time, Mr. Pickwick?'

Past twelve.'

'Dear me, it's time to go to bed. It will never do, sitting here. I
shall be pale to-morrow, Mr. Pickwick.'

At the bare notion of such a calamity, Mr. Peter Magnus rang the bell
for the chambermaid; and the striped bag, the red bag, the leathern hat-
box, and the brown-paper parcel, having been conveyed to his bedroom, he
retired in company with a japanned candlestick, to one side of the
house, while Mr. Pickwick, and another japanned candlestick, were
conducted through a multitude of tortuous windings, to another.

'This is your room, sir,' said the chambermaid.

'Very well,' replied Mr. Pickwick, looking round him. It was a tolerably
large double-bedded room, with a fire; upon the whole, a more
comfortable-looking apartment than Mr. Pickwick's short experience of
the accommodations of the Great White Horse had led him to expect.

'Nobody sleeps in the other bed, of course,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Oh, no, Sir.'

'Very good. Tell my servant to bring me up some hot water at half-past
eight in the morning, and that I shall not want him any more to-night.'

'Yes, Sir,' and bidding Mr. Pickwick good-night, the chambermaid
retired, and left him alone.

Mr. Pickwick sat himself down in a chair before the fire, and fell into
a train of rambling meditations. First he thought of his friends, and
wondered when they would join him; then his mind reverted to Mrs. Martha
Bardell; and from that lady it wandered, by a natural process, to the
dingy counting-house of Dodson & Fogg. From Dodson & Fogg's it flew off
at a tangent, to the very centre of the history of the queer client; and
then it came back to the Great White Horse at Ipswich, with sufficient
clearness to convince Mr. Pickwick that he was falling asleep. So he
roused himself, and began to undress, when he recollected he had left
his watch on the table downstairs.

Now this watch was a special favourite with Mr. Pickwick, having been
carried about, beneath the shadow of his waistcoat, for a greater number
of years than we feel called upon to state at present. The possibility
of going to sleep, unless it were ticking gently beneath his pillow, or
in the watch-pocket over his head, had never entered Mr. Pickwick's
brain. So as it was pretty late now, and he was unwilling to ring his
bell at that hour of the night, he slipped on his coat, of which he had
just divested himself, and taking the japanned candlestick in his hand,
walked quietly downstairs.

The more stairs Mr. Pickwick went down, the more stairs there seemed to
be to descend, and again and again, when Mr. Pickwick got into some
narrow passage, and began to congratulate himself on having gained the
ground-floor, did another flight of stairs appear before his astonished
eyes. At last he reached a stone hall, which he remembered to have seen
when he entered the house. Passage after passage did he explore; room
after room did he peep into; at length, as he was on the point of giving
up the search in despair, he opened the door of the identical room in
which he had spent the evening, and beheld his missing property on the
table.

Mr. Pickwick seized the watch in triumph, and proceeded to retrace his
steps to his bedchamber. If his progress downward had been attended with
difficulties and uncertainty, his journey back was infinitely more
perplexing. Rows of doors, garnished with boots of every shape, make,
and size, branched off in every possible direction. A dozen times did he
softly turn the handle of some bedroom door which resembled his own,
when a gruff cry from within of 'Who the devil's that?' or 'What do you
want here?' caused him to steal away, on tiptoe, with a perfectly
marvellous celerity. He was reduced to the verge of despair, when an
open door attracted his attention. He peeped in. Right at last! There
were the two beds, whose situation he perfectly remembered, and the fire
still burning. His candle, not a long one when he first received it, had
flickered away in the drafts of air through which he had passed and sank
into the socket as he closed the door after him. 'No matter,' said Mr.
Pickwick, 'I can undress myself just as well by the light of the fire.'

The bedsteads stood one on each side of the door; and on the inner side
of each was a little path, terminating in a rush-bottomed chair, just
wide enough to admit of a person's getting into or out of bed, on that
side, if he or she thought proper. Having carefully drawn the curtains
of his bed on the outside, Mr. Pickwick sat down on the rush-bottomed
chair, and leisurely divested himself of his shoes and gaiters. He then
took off and folded up his coat, waistcoat, and neckcloth, and slowly
drawing on his tasselled nightcap, secured it firmly on his head, by
tying beneath his chin the strings which he always had attached to that
article of dress. It was at this moment that the absurdity of his recent
bewilderment struck upon his mind. Throwing himself back in the rush-
bottomed chair, Mr. Pickwick laughed to himself so heartily, that it
would have been quite delightful to any man of well-constituted mind to
have watched the smiles that expanded his amiable features as they shone
forth from beneath the nightcap.

'It is the best idea,' said Mr. Pickwick to himself, smiling till he
almost cracked the nightcap strings--'it is the best idea, my losing
myself in this place, and wandering about these staircases, that I ever
heard of. Droll, droll, very droll.' Here Mr. Pickwick smiled again, a
broader smile than before, and was about to continue the process of
undressing, in the best possible humour, when he was suddenly stopped by
a most unexpected interruption: to wit, the entrance into the room of
some person with a candle, who, after locking the door, advanced to the
dressing-table, and set down the light upon it.

The smile that played on Mr. Pickwick's features was instantaneously
lost in a look of the most unbounded and wonder-stricken surprise. The
person, whoever it was, had come in so suddenly and with so little
noise, that Mr. Pickwick had had no time to call out, or oppose their
entrance. Who could it be? A robber? Some evil-minded person who had
seen him come upstairs with a handsome watch in his hand, perhaps. What
was he to do?

The only way in which Mr. Pickwick could catch a glimpse of his
mysterious visitor with the least danger of being seen himself, was by
creeping on to the bed, and peeping out from between the curtains on the
opposite side. To this manoeuvre he accordingly resorted. Keeping the
curtains carefully closed with his hand, so that nothing more of him
could be seen than his face and nightcap, and putting on his spectacles,
he mustered up courage and looked out.

Mr. Pickwick almost fainted with horror and dismay. Standing before the
dressing-glass was a middle-aged lady, in yellow curl-papers, busily
engaged in brushing what ladies call their 'back-hair.' However the
unconscious middle-aged lady came into that room, it was quite clear
that she contemplated remaining there for the night; for she had brought
a rushlight and shade with her, which, with praiseworthy precaution
against fire, she had stationed in a basin on the floor, where it was
glimmering away, like a gigantic lighthouse in a particularly small
piece of water.

'Bless my soul!' thought Mr. Pickwick, 'what a dreadful thing!'

'Hem!' said the lady; and in went Mr. Pickwick's head with automaton-
like rapidity.

'I never met with anything so awful as this,' thought poor Mr. Pickwick,
the cold perspiration starting in drops upon his nightcap. 'Never. This
is fearful.'

It was quite impossible to resist the urgent desire to see what was
going forward. So out went Mr. Pickwick's head again. The prospect was
worse than before. The middle-aged lady had finished arranging her hair;
had carefully enveloped it in a muslin nightcap with a small plaited
border; and was gazing pensively on the fire.

'This matter is growing alarming,' reasoned Mr. Pickwick with himself.
'I can't allow things to go on in this way. By the self-possession of
that lady, it is clear to me that I must have come into the wrong room.
If I call out she'll alarm the house; but if I remain here the
consequences will be still more frightful.'

Mr. Pickwick, it is quite unnecessary to say, was one of the most modest
and delicate-minded of mortals. The very idea of exhibiting his nightcap
to a lady overpowered him, but he had tied those confounded strings in a
knot, and, do what he would, he couldn't get it off. The disclosure must
be made. There was only one other way of doing it. He shrunk behind the
curtains, and called out very loudly--

'Ha-hum!'

That the lady started at this unexpected sound was evident, by her
falling up against the rushlight shade; that she persuaded herself it
must have been the effect of imagination was equally clear, for when Mr.
Pickwick, under the impression that she had fainted away stone-dead with
fright, ventured to peep out again, she was gazing pensively on the fire
as before.

'Most extraordinary female this,' thought Mr. Pickwick, popping in
again. 'Ha-hum!'

These last sounds, so like those in which, as legends inform us, the
ferocious giant Blunderbore was in the habit of expressing his opinion
that it was time to lay the cloth, were too distinctly audible to be
again mistaken for the workings of fancy.

'Gracious Heaven!' said the middle-aged lady, 'what's that?'

'It's--it's--only a gentleman, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, from behind
the curtains.

'A gentleman!' said the lady, with a terrific scream.

'It's all over!' thought Mr. Pickwick.

'A strange man!' shrieked the lady. Another instant and the house would
be alarmed. Her garments rustled as she rushed towards the door.

'Ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, thrusting out his head in the extremity of
his desperation, 'ma'am!'

Now, although Mr. Pickwick was not actuated by any definite object in
putting out his head, it was instantaneously productive of a good
effect. The lady, as we have already stated, was near the door. She must
pass it, to reach the staircase, and she would most undoubtedly have
done so by this time, had not the sudden apparition of Mr. Pickwick's
nightcap driven her back into the remotest corner of the apartment,
where she stood staring wildly at Mr. Pickwick, while Mr. Pickwick in
his turn stared wildly at her.

'Wretch,' said the lady, covering her eyes with her hands, 'what do you
want here?'

'Nothing, ma'am; nothing whatever, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick earnestly.

'Nothing!' said the lady, looking up.

'Nothing, ma'am, upon my honour,' said Mr. Pickwick, nodding his head so
energetically, that the tassel of his nightcap danced again. 'I am
almost ready to sink, ma'am, beneath the confusion of addressing a lady
in my nightcap (here the lady hastily snatched off hers), but I can't
get it off, ma'am (here Mr. Pickwick gave it a tremendous tug, in proof
of the statement). It is evident to me, ma'am, now, that I have mistaken
this bedroom for my own. I had not been here five minutes, ma'am, when
you suddenly entered it.'

'If this improbable story be really true, Sir,' said the lady, sobbing
violently, 'you will leave it instantly.'

'I will, ma'am, with the greatest pleasure,' replied Mr. Pickwick.

'Instantly, sir,' said the lady.

'Certainly, ma'am,' interposed Mr. Pickwick, very quickly. 'Certainly,
ma'am. I--I--am very sorry, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, making his
appearance at the bottom of the bed, 'to have been the innocent occasion
of this alarm and emotion; deeply sorry, ma'am.'

The lady pointed to the door. One excellent quality of Mr. Pickwick's
character was beautifully displayed at this moment, under the most
trying circumstances. Although he had hastily put on his hat over his
nightcap, after the manner of the old patrol; although he carried his
shoes and gaiters in his hand, and his coat and waistcoat over his arm;
nothing could subdue his native politeness.

'I am exceedingly sorry, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, bowing very low.

'If you are, Sir, you will at once leave the room,' said the lady.

'Immediately, ma'am; this instant, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, opening
the door, and dropping both his shoes with a crash in so doing.

'I trust, ma'am,' resumed Mr. Pickwick, gathering up his shoes, and
turning round to bow again--'I trust, ma'am, that my unblemished
character, and the devoted respect I entertain for your sex, will plead
as some slight excuse for this--' But before Mr. Pickwick could conclude
the sentence, the lady had thrust him into the passage, and locked and
bolted the door behind him.

Whatever grounds of self-congratulation Mr. Pickwick might have for
having escaped so quietly from his late awkward situation, his present
position was by no means enviable. He was alone, in an open passage, in
a strange house in the middle of the night, half dressed; it was not to
be supposed that he could find his way in perfect darkness to a room
which he had been wholly unable to discover with a light, and if he made
the slightest noise in his fruitless attempts to do so, he stood every
chance of being shot at, and perhaps killed, by some wakeful traveller.
He had no resource but to remain where he was until daylight appeared.
So after groping his way a few paces down the passage, and, to his
infinite alarm, stumbling over several pairs of boots in so doing, Mr.
Pickwick crouched into a little recess in the wall, to wait for morning,
as philosophically as he might.

He was not destined, however, to undergo this additional trial of
patience; for he had not been long ensconced in his present concealment
when, to his unspeakable horror, a man, bearing a light, appeared at the
end of the passage. His horror was suddenly converted into joy, however,
when he recognised the form of his faithful attendant. It was indeed Mr.
Samuel Weller, who after sitting up thus late, in conversation with the
boots, who was sitting up for the mail, was now about to retire to rest.

'Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick, suddenly appearing before him, 'where's my
bedroom?'

Mr. Weller stared at his master with the most emphatic surprise; and it
was not until the question had been repeated three several times, that
he turned round, and led the way to the long-sought apartment.

'Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick, as he got into bed, 'I have made one of the
most extraordinary mistakes to-night, that ever were heard of.'

'Wery likely, Sir,' replied Mr. Weller drily.

'But of this I am determined, Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick; 'that if I were
to stop in this house for six months, I would never trust myself about
it, alone, again.'

'That's the wery prudentest resolution as you could come to, Sir,'
replied Mr. Weller. 'You rayther want somebody to look arter you, Sir,
when your judgment goes out a wisitin'.'

'What do you mean by that, Sam?' said Mr. Pickwick. He raised himself in
bed, and extended his hand, as if he were about to say something more;
but suddenly checking himself, turned round, and bade his valet 'Good-
night.'

'Good-night, Sir,' replied Mr. Weller. He paused when he got outside the
door--shook his head--walked on--stopped--snuffed the candle--shook his
head again--and finally proceeded slowly to his chamber, apparently
buried in the profoundest meditation.

In a small room in the vicinity of the stableyard, betimes in the
morning, which was ushered in by Mr. Pickwick's adventure with the
middle--aged lady in the yellow curl-papers, sat Mr. Weller, senior,
preparing himself for his journey to London. He was sitting in an
excellent attitude for having his portrait taken; and here it is.

It is very possible that at some earlier period of his career, Mr.
Weller's profile might have presented a bold and determined outline. His
face, however, had expanded under the influence of good living, and a
disposition remarkable for resignation; and its bold, fleshy curves had
so far extended beyond the limits originally assigned them, that unless
you took a full view of his countenance in front, it was difficult to
distinguish more than the extreme tip of a very rubicund nose. His chin,
from the same cause, had acquired the grave and imposing form which is
generally described by prefixing the word 'double' to that expressive
feature; and his complexion exhibited that peculiarly mottled
combination of colours which is only to be seen in gentlemen of his
profession, and in underdone roast beef. Round his neck he wore a
crimson travelling-shawl, which merged into his chin by such
imperceptible gradations, that it was difficult to distinguish the folds
of the one, from the folds of the other. Over this, he mounted a long
waistcoat of a broad pink-striped pattern, and over that again, a wide-
skirted green coat, ornamented with large brass buttons, whereof the two
which garnished the waist, were so far apart, that no man had ever
beheld them both at the same time. His hair, which was short, sleek, and
black, was just visible beneath the capacious brim of a low-crowned
brown hat. His legs were encased in knee-cord breeches, and painted top-
boots; and a copper watch-chain, terminating in one seal, and a key of
the same material, dangled loosely from his capacious waistband.

We have said that Mr. Weller was engaged in preparing for his journey to
London--he was taking sustenance, in fact. On the table before him,
stood a pot of ale, a cold round of beef, and a very respectable-looking
loaf, to each of which he distributed his favours in turn, with the most
rigid impartiality. He had just cut a mighty slice from the latter, when
the footsteps of somebody entering the room, caused him to raise his
head; and he beheld his son.

'Mornin', Sammy!' said the father.

The son walked up to the pot of ale, and nodding significantly to his
parent, took a long draught by way of reply.

'Wery good power o' suction, Sammy,' said Mr. Weller the elder, looking
into the pot, when his first-born had set it down half empty. 'You'd ha'
made an uncommon fine oyster, Sammy, if you'd been born in that station
o' life.'

'Yes, I des-say, I should ha' managed to pick up a respectable livin','
replied Sam applying himself to the cold beef, with considerable vigour.

'I'm wery sorry, Sammy,' said the elder Mr. Weller, shaking up the ale,
by describing small circles with the pot, preparatory to drinking. 'I'm
wery sorry, Sammy, to hear from your lips, as you let yourself be
gammoned by that 'ere mulberry man. I always thought, up to three days
ago, that the names of Veller and gammon could never come into contract,
Sammy, never.'

'Always exceptin' the case of a widder, of course,' said Sam.

'Widders, Sammy,' replied Mr. Weller, slightly changing colour. 'Widders
are 'ceptions to ev'ry rule. I have heerd how many ordinary women one
widder's equal to in pint o' comin' over you. I think it's five-and-
twenty, but I don't rightly know vether it ain't more.'

'Well; that's pretty well,' said Sam.

'Besides,' continued Mr. Weller, not noticing the interruption, 'that's
a wery different thing. You know what the counsel said, Sammy, as
defended the gen'l'm'n as beat his wife with the poker, venever he got
jolly. "And arter all, my Lord," says he, "it's a amiable weakness." So
I says respectin' widders, Sammy, and so you'll say, ven you gets as old
as me.'

'I ought to ha' know'd better, I know,' said Sam.

'Ought to ha' know'd better!' repeated Mr. Weller, striking the table
with his fist. 'Ought to ha' know'd better! why, I know a young 'un as
hasn't had half nor quarter your eddication--as hasn't slept about the
markets, no, not six months--who'd ha' scorned to be let in, in such a
vay; scorned it, Sammy.' In the excitement of feeling produced by this
agonising reflection, Mr. Weller rang the bell, and ordered an
additional pint of ale.

'Well, it's no use talking about it now,' said Sam. 'It's over, and
can't be helped, and that's one consolation, as they always says in
Turkey, ven they cuts the wrong man's head off. It's my innings now,
gov'nor, and as soon as I catches hold o' this 'ere Trotter, I'll have a
good 'un.'

'I hope you will, Sammy. I hope you will,' returned Mr. Weller. 'Here's
your health, Sammy, and may you speedily vipe off the disgrace as you've
inflicted on the family name.' In honour of this toast Mr. Weller
imbibed at a draught, at least two-thirds of a newly-arrived pint, and
handed it over to his son, to dispose of the remainder, which he
instantaneously did.

'And now, Sammy,' said Mr. Weller, consulting a large double-faced
silver watch that hung at the end of the copper chain. 'Now it's time I
was up at the office to get my vay-bill and see the coach loaded; for
coaches, Sammy, is like guns--they requires to be loaded with wery great
care, afore they go off.'

At this parental and professional joke, Mr. Weller, junior, smiled a
filial smile. His revered parent continued in a solemn tone--

'I'm a-goin' to leave you, Samivel, my boy, and there's no telling ven I
shall see you again. Your mother-in-law may ha' been too much for me, or
a thousand things may have happened by the time you next hears any news
o' the celebrated Mr. Veller o' the Bell Savage. The family name depends
wery much upon you, Samivel, and I hope you'll do wot's right by it.
Upon all little pints o' breedin', I know I may trust you as vell as if
it was my own self. So I've only this here one little bit of adwice to
give you. If ever you gets to up'ards o' fifty, and feels disposed to go
a-marryin' anybody--no matter who--jist you shut yourself up in your own
room, if you've got one, and pison yourself off hand. Hangin's wulgar,
so don't you have nothin' to say to that. Pison yourself, Samivel, my
boy, pison yourself, and you'll be glad on it arterwards.' With these
affecting words, Mr. Weller looked steadfastly on his son, and turning
slowly upon his heel, disappeared from his sight.

In the contemplative mood which these words had awakened, Mr. Samuel
Weller walked forth from the Great White Horse when his father had left
him; and bending his steps towards St. Clement's Church, endeavoured to
dissipate his melancholy, by strolling among its ancient precincts. He
had loitered about, for some time, when he found himself in a retired
spot--a kind of courtyard of venerable appearance--which he discovered
had no other outlet than the turning by which he had entered. He was
about retracing his steps, when he was suddenly transfixed to the spot
by a sudden appearance; and the mode and manner of this appearance, we
now proceed to relate.

Mr. Samuel Weller had been staring up at the old brick houses now and
then, in his deep abstraction, bestowing a wink upon some healthy-
looking servant girl as she drew up a blind, or threw open a bedroom
window, when the green gate of a garden at the bottom of the yard
opened, and a man having emerged therefrom, closed the green gate very
carefully after him, and walked briskly towards the very spot where Mr.
Weller was standing.

Now, taking this, as an isolated fact, unaccompanied by any attendant
circumstances, there was nothing very extraordinary in it; because in
many parts of the world men do come out of gardens, close green gates
after them, and even walk briskly away, without attracting any
particular share of public observation. It is clear, therefore, that
there must have been something in the man, or in his manner, or both, to
attract Mr. Weller's particular notice. Whether there was, or not, we
must leave the reader to determine, when we have faithfully recorded the
behaviour of the individual in question.

When the man had shut the green gate after him, he walked, as we have
said twice already, with a brisk pace up the courtyard; but he no sooner
caught sight of Mr. Weller than he faltered, and stopped, as if
uncertain, for the moment, what course to adopt. As the green gate was
closed behind him, and there was no other outlet but the one in front,
however, he was not long in perceiving that he must pass Mr. Samuel
Weller to get away. He therefore resumed his brisk pace, and advanced,
staring straight before him. The most extraordinary thing about the man
was, that he was contorting his face into the most fearful and
astonishing grimaces that ever were beheld. Nature's handiwork never was
disguised with such extraordinary artificial carving, as the man had
overlaid his countenance with in one moment.

'Well!' said Mr. Weller to himself, as the man approached. 'This is wery
odd. I could ha' swore it was him.'

Up came the man, and his face became more frightfully distorted than
ever, as he drew nearer.

'I could take my oath to that 'ere black hair and mulberry suit,' said
Mr. Weller; 'only I never see such a face as that afore.'

As Mr. Weller said this, the man's features assumed an unearthly twinge,
perfectly hideous. He was obliged to pass very near Sam, however, and
the scrutinising glance of that gentleman enabled him to detect, under
all these appalling twists of feature, something too like the small eyes
of Mr. Job Trotter to be easily mistaken.

'Hollo, you Sir!' shouted Sam fiercely.

The stranger stopped.

'Hollo!' repeated Sam, still more gruffly.

The man with the horrible face looked, with the greatest surprise, up
the court, and down the court, and in at the windows of the houses--
everywhere but at Sam Weller--and took another step forward, when he was
brought to again by another shout.

'Hollo, you sir!' said Sam, for the third time.

There was no pretending to mistake where the voice came from now, so the
stranger, having no other resource, at last looked Sam Weller full in
the face.

'It won't do, Job Trotter,' said Sam. 'Come! None o' that 'ere nonsense.
You ain't so wery 'andsome that you can afford to throw avay many o'
your good looks. Bring them 'ere eyes o' yourn back into their proper
places, or I'll knock 'em out of your head. D'ye hear?'

As Mr. Weller appeared fully disposed to act up to the spirit of this
address, Mr. Trotter gradually allowed his face to resume its natural
expression; and then giving a start of joy, exclaimed, 'What do I see?
Mr. Walker!'

'Ah,' replied Sam. 'You're wery glad to see me, ain't you?'

'Glad!' exclaimed Job Trotter; 'Oh, Mr. Walker, if you had but known how
I have looked forward to this meeting! It is too much, Mr. Walker; I
cannot bear it, indeed I cannot.' And with these words, Mr. Trotter
burst into a regular inundation of tears, and, flinging his arms around
those of Mr. Weller, embraced him closely, in an ecstasy of joy.

'Get off!' cried Sam, indignant at this process, and vainly endeavouring
to extricate himself from the grasp of his enthusiastic acquaintance.
'Get off, I tell you. What are you crying over me for, you portable
engine?'

'Because I am so glad to see you,' replied Job Trotter, gradually
releasing Mr. Weller, as the first symptoms of his pugnacity
disappeared. 'Oh, Mr. Walker, this is too much.'

'Too much!' echoed Sam, 'I think it is too much--rayther! Now, what have
you got to say to me, eh?'

Mr. Trotter made no reply; for the little pink pocket-handkerchief was
in full force.

'What have you got to say to me, afore I knock your head off?' repeated
Mr. Weller, in a threatening manner.

'Eh!' said Mr. Trotter, with a look of virtuous surprise.

'What have you got to say to me?'

'I, Mr. Walker!'

'Don't call me Valker; my name's Veller; you know that vell enough. What
have you got to say to me?'

'Bless you, Mr. Walker--Weller, I mean--a great many things, if you will
come away somewhere, where we can talk comfortably. If you knew how I
have looked for you, Mr. Weller--'

'Wery hard, indeed, I s'pose?' said Sam drily.

'Very, very, Sir,' replied Mr. Trotter, without moving a muscle of his
face. 'But shake hands, Mr. Weller.'

Sam eyed his companion for a few seconds, and then, as if actuated by a
sudden impulse, complied with his request.

'How,' said Job Trotter, as they walked away, 'how is your dear, good
master? Oh, he is a worthy gentleman, Mr. Weller! I hope he didn't catch
cold, that dreadful night, Sir.'

There was a momentary look of deep slyness in Job Trotter's eye, as he
said this, which ran a thrill through Mr. Weller's clenched fist, as he
burned with a desire to make a demonstration on his ribs. Sam
constrained himself, however, and replied that his master was extremely
well.

'Oh, I am so glad,' replied Mr. Trotter; 'is he here?'

'Is yourn?' asked Sam, by way of reply.

'Oh, yes, he is here, and I grieve to say, Mr. Weller, he is going on
worse than ever.'

'Ah, ah!' said Sam.

'Oh, shocking--terrible!'

'At a boarding-school?' said Sam.

'No, not at a boarding-school,' replied Job Trotter, with the same sly
look which Sam had noticed before; 'not at a boarding-school.'

'At the house with the green gate?' said Sam, eyeing his companion
closely.

'No, no--oh, not there,' replied Job, with a quickness very unusual to
him, 'not there.'

'What was you a-doin' there?' asked Sam, with a sharp glance. 'Got
inside the gate by accident, perhaps?'

'Why, Mr. Weller,' replied Job, 'I don't mind telling you my little
secrets, because, you know, we took such a fancy for each other when we
first met. You recollect how pleasant we were that morning?'

'Oh, yes,' said Sam, impatiently. 'I remember. Well?'

'Well,' replied Job, speaking with great precision, and in the low tone
of a man who communicates an important secret; 'in that house with the
green gate, Mr. Weller, they keep a good many servants.'

'So I should think, from the look on it,' interposed Sam.

'Yes,' continued Mr. Trotter, 'and one of them is a cook, who has saved
up a little money, Mr. Weller, and is desirous, if she can establish
herself in life, to open a little shop in the chandlery way, you see.'

Yes.'

'Yes, Mr. Weller. Well, Sir, I met her at a chapel that I go to; a very
neat little chapel in this town, Mr. Weller, where they sing the number
four collection of hymns, which I generally carry about with me, in a
little book, which you may perhaps have seen in my hand--and I got a
little intimate with her, Mr. Weller, and from that, an acquaintance
sprung up between us, and I may venture to say, Mr. Weller, that I am to
be the chandler.'

'Ah, and a wery amiable chandler you'll make,' replied Sam, eyeing Job
with a side look of intense dislike.

'The great advantage of this, Mr. Weller,' continued Job, his eyes
filling with tears as he spoke, 'will be, that I shall be able to leave
my present disgraceful service with that bad man, and to devote myself
to a better and more virtuous life; more like the way in which I was
brought up, Mr. Weller.'

'You must ha' been wery nicely brought up,' said Sam.

'Oh, very, Mr. Weller, very,' replied Job. At the recollection of the
purity of his youthful days, Mr. Trotter pulled forth the pink
handkerchief, and wept copiously.

'You must ha' been an uncommon nice boy, to go to school vith,' said
Sam.

'I was, sir,' replied Job, heaving a deep sigh; 'I was the idol of the
place.'

'Ah,' said Sam, 'I don't wonder at it. What a comfort you must ha' been
to your blessed mother.'

At these words, Mr. Job Trotter inserted an end of the pink handkerchief
into the corner of each eye, one after the other, and began to weep
copiously.

'Wot's the matter with the man,' said Sam, indignantly. 'Chelsea water-
works is nothin' to you. What are you melting vith now? The
consciousness o' willainy?'

'I cannot keep my feelings down, Mr. Weller,' said Job, after a short
pause. 'To think that my master should have suspected the conversation I
had with yours, and so dragged me away in a post-chaise, and after
persuading the sweet young lady to say she knew nothing of him, and
bribing the school-mistress to do the same, deserted her for a better
speculation! Oh! Mr. Weller, it makes me shudder.'

'Oh, that was the vay, was it?' said Mr. Weller.

'To be sure it was,' replied Job.

'Vell,' said Sam, as they had now arrived near the hotel, 'I vant to
have a little bit o' talk with you, Job; so if you're not partickler
engaged, I should like to see you at the Great White Horse to-night,
somewheres about eight o'clock.'

'I shall be sure to come,' said Job.

'Yes, you'd better,' replied Sam, with a very meaning look, 'or else I
shall perhaps be askin' arter you, at the other side of the green gate,
and then I might cut you out, you know.'

'I shall be sure to be with you, sir,' said Mr. Trotter; and wringing
Sam's hand with the utmost fervour, he walked away.

'Take care, Job Trotter, take care,' said Sam, looking after him, 'or I
shall be one too many for you this time. I shall, indeed.' Having
uttered this soliloquy, and looked after Job till he was to be seen no
more, Mr. Weller made the best of his way to his master's bedroom.

'It's all in training, Sir,' said Sam.

'What's in training, Sam?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.

'I've found 'em out, Sir,' said Sam.

'Found out who?'

'That 'ere queer customer, and the melan-cholly chap with the black
hair.'

'Impossible, Sam!' said Mr. Pickwick, with the greatest energy. 'Where
are they, Sam: where are they?'

'Hush, hush!' replied Mr. Weller; and as he assisted Mr. Pickwick to
dress, he detailed the plan of action on which he proposed to enter.

'But when is this to be done, Sam?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.

'All in good time, Sir,' replied Sam.

Whether it was done in good time, or not, will be seen hereafter.

When Mr. Pickwick descended to the room in which he and Mr. Peter Magnus
had spent the preceding evening, he found that gentleman with the major
part of the contents of the two bags, the leathern hat-box, and the
brown-paper parcel, displaying to all possible advantage on his person,
while he himself was pacing up and down the room in a state of the
utmost excitement and agitation.

'Good-morning, Sir,' said Mr. Peter Magnus. 'What do you think of this,
Sir?'

'Very effective indeed,' replied Mr. Pickwick, surveying the garments of
Mr. Peter Magnus with a good-natured smile.

'Yes, I think it'll do,' said Mr. Magnus. 'Mr. Pickwick, Sir, I have
sent up my card.'

'Have you?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'And the waiter brought back word, that she would see me at eleven--at
eleven, Sir; it only wants a quarter now.'

'Very near the time,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Yes, it is rather near,' replied Mr. Magnus, 'rather too near to be
pleasant--eh! Mr. Pickwick, sir?'

'Confidence is a great thing in these cases,' observed Mr. Pickwick.

'I believe it is, Sir,' said Mr. Peter Magnus. 'I am very confident,
Sir. Really, Mr. Pickwick, I do not see why a man should feel any fear
in such a case as this, sir. What is it, Sir? There's nothing to be
ashamed of; it's a matter of mutual accommodation, nothing more. Husband
on one side, wife on the other. That's my view of the matter, Mr.
Pickwick.'

'It is a very philosophical one,' replied Mr. Pickwick. 'But breakfast
is waiting, Mr. Magnus. Come.'

Down they sat to breakfast, but it was evident, notwithstanding the
boasting of Mr. Peter Magnus, that he laboured under a very considerable
degree of nervousness, of which loss of appetite, a propensity to upset
the tea-things, a spectral attempt at drollery, and an irresistible
inclination to look at the clock, every other second, were among the
principal symptoms.

'He-he-he,' tittered Mr. Magnus, affecting cheerfulness, and gasping
with agitation. 'It only wants two minutes, Mr. Pickwick. Am I pale,
Sir?'

'Not very,' replied Mr. Pickwick.

There was a brief pause.

'I beg your pardon, Mr. Pickwick; but have you ever done this sort of
thing in your time?' said Mr. Magnus.

'You mean proposing?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Yes.'

'Never,' said Mr. Pickwick, with great energy, 'never.'

'You have no idea, then, how it's best to begin?' said Mr. Magnus.

'Why,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'I may have formed some ideas upon the
subject, but, as I have never submitted them to the test of experience,
I should be sorry if you were induced to regulate your proceedings by
them.'

'I should feel very much obliged to you, for any advice, Sir,' said Mr.
Magnus, taking another look at the clock, the hand of which was verging
on the five minutes past.

'Well, sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, with the profound solemnity with which
that great man could, when he pleased, render his remarks so deeply
impressive. 'I should commence, sir, with a tribute to the lady's beauty
and excellent qualities; from them, Sir, I should diverge to my own
unworthiness.'

'Very good,' said Mr. Magnus.

'Unworthiness for _her _only, mind, sir,' resumed Mr. Pickwick; 'for to
show that I was not wholly unworthy, sir, I should take a brief review
of my past life, and present condition. I should argue, by analogy, that
to anybody else, I must be a very desirable object. I should then
expatiate on the warmth of my love, and the depth of my devotion.
Perhaps I might then be tempted to seize her hand.'

'Yes, I see,' said Mr. Magnus; 'that would be a very great point.'

'I should then, Sir,' continued Mr. Pickwick, growing warmer as the
subject presented itself in more glowing colours before him--'I should
then, Sir, come to the plain and simple question, "Will you have me?" I
think I am justified in assuming that upon this, she would turn away her
head.'

'You think that may be taken for granted?' said Mr. Magnus; 'because, if
she did not do that at the right place, it would be embarrassing.'

'I think she would,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'Upon this, sir, I should
squeeze her hand, and I think--I think, Mr. Magnus--that after I had
done that, supposing there was no refusal, I should gently draw away the
handkerchief, which my slight knowledge of human nature leads me to
suppose the lady would be applying to her eyes at the moment, and steal
a respectful kiss. I think I should kiss her, Mr. Magnus; and at this
particular point, I am decidedly of opinion that if the lady were going
to take me at all, she would murmur into my ears a bashful acceptance.'

Mr. Magnus started; gazed on Mr. Pickwick's intelligent face, for a
short time in silence; and then (the dial pointing to the ten minutes
past) shook him warmly by the hand, and rushed desperately from the
room.

Mr. Pickwick had taken a few strides to and fro; and the small hand of
the clock following the latter part of his example, had arrived at the
figure which indicates the half-hour, when the door suddenly opened. He
turned round to meet Mr. Peter Magnus, and encountered, in his stead,
the joyous face of Mr. Tupman, the serene countenance of Mr. Winkle, and
the intellectual lineaments of Mr. Snodgrass.

As Mr. Pickwick greeted them, Mr. Peter Magnus tripped into the room.

'My friends, the gentleman I was speaking of--Mr. Magnus,' said Mr.
Pickwick.

'Your servant, gentlemen,' said Mr. Magnus, evidently in a high state of
excitement; 'Mr. Pickwick, allow me to speak to you one moment, sir.'

As he said this, Mr. Magnus harnessed his forefinger to Mr. Pickwick's
buttonhole, and, drawing him to a window recess, said--

'Congratulate me, Mr. Pickwick; I followed your advice to the very
letter.'

'And it was all correct, was it?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.

'It was, Sir. Could not possibly have been better,' replied Mr. Magnus.
'Mr. Pickwick, she is mine.'

'I congratulate you, with all my heart,' replied Mr. Pickwick, warmly
shaking his new friend by the hand.

'You must see her. Sir,' said Mr. Magnus; 'this way, if you please.
Excuse us for one instant, gentlemen.' Hurrying on in this way, Mr.
Peter Magnus drew Mr. Pickwick from the room. He paused at the next door
in the passage, and tapped gently thereat.

'Come in,' said a female voice. And in they went.

'Miss Witherfield,' said Mr. Magnus, 'allow me to introduce my very
particular friend, Mr. Pickwick. Mr. Pickwick, I beg to make you known
to Miss Witherfield.'

The lady was at the upper end of the room. As Mr. Pickwick bowed, he
took his spectacles from his waistcoat pocket, and put them on; a
process which he had no sooner gone through, than, uttering an
exclamation of surprise, Mr. Pickwick retreated several paces, and the
lady, with a half-suppressed scream, hid her face in her hands, and
dropped into a chair; whereupon Mr. Peter Magnus was stricken motionless
on the spot, and gazed from one to the other, with a countenance
expressive of the extremities of horror and surprise.

This certainly was, to all appearance, very unaccountable behaviour; but
the fact is, that Mr. Pickwick no sooner put on his spectacles, than he
at once recognised in the future Mrs. Magnus the lady into whose room he
had so unwarrantably intruded on the previous night; and the spectacles
had no sooner crossed Mr. Pickwick's nose, than the lady at once
identified the countenance which she had seen surrounded by all the
horrors of a nightcap. So the lady screamed, and Mr. Pickwick started.

'Mr. Pickwick!' exclaimed Mr. Magnus, lost in astonishment, 'what is the
meaning of this, Sir? What is the meaning of it, Sir?' added Mr. Magnus,
in a threatening, and a louder tone.

'Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, somewhat indignant at the very sudden manner
in which Mr. Peter Magnus had conjugated himself into the imperative
mood, 'I decline answering that question.'

'You decline it, Sir?' said Mr. Magnus.

'I do, Sir,' replied Mr. Pickwick; 'I object to say anything which may
compromise that lady, or awaken unpleasant recollections in her breast,
without her consent and permission.'

'Miss Witherfield,' said Mr. Peter Magnus, 'do you know this person?'

'Know him!' repeated the middle-aged lady, hesitating.

'Yes, know him, ma'am; I said know him,' replied Mr. Magnus, with
ferocity.

'I have seen him,' replied the middle-aged lady.

'Where?' inquired Mr. Magnus, 'where?'

'That,' said the middle-aged lady, rising from her seat, and averting
her head--'that I would not reveal for worlds.'

'I understand you, ma'am,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'and respect your
delicacy; it shall never be revealed by _me_ depend upon it.'

'Upon my word, ma'am,' said Mr. Magnus, 'considering the situation in
which I am placed with regard to yourself, you carry this matter off
with tolerable coolness--tolerable coolness, ma'am.'

'Cruel Mr. Magnus!' said the middle-aged lady; here she wept very
copiously indeed.

'Address your observations to me, sir,' interposed Mr. Pickwick; 'I
alone am to blame, if anybody be.'

'Oh! you alone are to blame, are you, sir?' said Mr. Magnus; 'I--I--see
through this, sir. You repent of your determination now, do you?'

'My determination!' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Your determination, Sir. Oh! don't stare at me, Sir,' said Mr. Magnus;
'I recollect your words last night, Sir. You came down here, sir, to
expose the treachery and falsehood of an individual on whose truth and
honour you had placed implicit reliance--eh?' Here Mr. Peter Magnus
indulged in a prolonged sneer; and taking off his green spectacles--
which he probably found superfluous in his fit of jealousy--rolled his
little eyes about, in a manner frightful to behold.

'Eh?' said Mr. Magnus; and then he repeated the sneer with increased
effect. 'But you shall answer it, Sir.'

'Answer what?' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Never mind, sir,' replied Mr. Magnus, striding up and down the room.
'Never mind.'

There must be something very comprehensive in this phrase of 'Never
mind,' for we do not recollect to have ever witnessed a quarrel in the
street, at a theatre, public room, or elsewhere, in which it has not
been the standard reply to all belligerent inquiries. 'Do you call
yourself a gentleman, sir?'--'Never mind, sir.'

Did I offer to say anything to the young woman, sir?'--'Never mind,
sir.'

Do you want your head knocked up against that wall, sir?'--'Never mind,
sir.' It is observable, too, that there would appear to be some hidden
taunt in this universal 'Never mind,' which rouses more indignation in
the bosom of the individual addressed, than the most lavish abuse could
possibly awaken.

We do not mean to assert that the application of this brevity to
himself, struck exactly that indignation to Mr. Pickwick's soul, which
it would infallibly have roused in a vulgar breast. We merely record the
fact that Mr. Pickwick opened the room door, and abruptly called out,
'Tupman, come here!'

Mr. Tupman immediately presented himself, with a look of very
considerable surprise.

'Tupman,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'a secret of some delicacy, in which that
lady is concerned, is the cause of a difference which has just arisen
between this gentleman and myself. When I assure him, in your presence,
that it has no relation to himself, and is not in any way connected with
his affairs, I need hardly beg you to take notice that if he continue to
dispute it, he expresses a doubt of my veracity, which I shall consider
extremely insulting.' As Mr. Pickwick said this, he looked encyclopedias
at Mr. Peter Magnus.

Mr. Pickwick's upright and honourable bearing, coupled with that force
and energy of speech which so eminently distinguished him, would have
carried conviction to any reasonable mind; but, unfortunately, at that
particular moment, the mind of Mr. Peter Magnus was in anything but
reasonable order. Consequently, instead of receiving Mr. Pickwick's
explanation as he ought to have done, he forthwith proceeded to work
himself into a red-hot, scorching, consuming passion, and to talk about
what was due to his own feelings, and all that sort of thing; adding
force to his declamation by striding to and fro, and pulling his hair--
amusements which he would vary occasionally, by shaking his fist in Mr.
Pickwick's philanthropic countenance.

Mr. Pickwick, in his turn, conscious of his own innocence and rectitude,
and irritated by having unfortunately involved the middle-aged lady in
such an unpleasant affair, was not so quietly disposed as was his wont.
The consequence was, that words ran high, and voices higher; and at
length Mr. Magnus told Mr. Pickwick he should hear from him; to which
Mr. Pickwick replied, with laudable politeness, that the sooner he heard
from him the better; whereupon the middle-aged lady rushed in terror
from the room, out of which Mr. Tupman dragged Mr. Pickwick, leaving Mr.
Peter Magnus to himself and meditation.

If the middle-aged lady had mingled much with the busy world, or had
profited at all by the manners and customs of those who make the laws
and set the fashions, she would have known that this sort of ferocity is
the most harmless thing in nature; but as she had lived for the most
part in the country, and never read the parliamentary debates, she was
little versed in these particular refinements of civilised life.
Accordingly, when she had gained her bedchamber, bolted herself in, and
began to meditate on the scene she had just witnessed, the most terrific
pictures of slaughter and destruction presented themselves to her
imagination; among which, a full-length portrait of Mr. Peter Magnus
borne home by four men, with the embellishment of a whole barrelful of
bullets in his left side, was among the very least. The more the middle-
aged lady meditated, the more terrified she became; and at length she
determined to repair to the house of the principal magistrate of the
town, and request him to secure the persons of Mr. Pickwick and Mr.
Tupman without delay.

To this decision the middle-aged lady was impelled by a variety of
considerations, the chief of which was the incontestable proof it would
afford of her devotion to Mr. Peter Magnus, and her anxiety for his
safety. She was too well acquainted with his jealous temperament to
venture the slightest allusion to the real cause of her agitation on
beholding Mr. Pickwick; and she trusted to her own influence and power
of persuasion with the little man, to quell his boisterous jealousy,
supposing that Mr. Pickwick were removed, and no fresh quarrel could
arise. Filled with these reflections, the middle-aged lady arrayed
herself in her bonnet and shawl, and repaired to the mayor's dwelling
straightway.

Now George Nupkins, Esquire, the principal magistrate aforesaid, was as
grand a personage as the fastest walker would find out, between sunrise
and sunset, on the twenty-first of June, which being, according to the
almanacs, the longest day in the whole year, would naturally afford him
the longest period for his search. On this particular morning, Mr.
Nupkins was in a state of the utmost excitement and irritation, for
there had been a rebellion in the town; all the day-scholars at the
largest day-school had conspired to break the windows of an obnoxious
apple-seller, and had hooted the beadle and pelted the constabulary--an
elderly gentleman in top-boots, who had been called out to repress the
tumult, and who had been a peace-officer, man and boy, for half a
century at least. And Mr. Nupkins was sitting in his easy-chair,
frowning with majesty, and boiling with rage, when a lady was announced
on pressing, private, and particular business. Mr. Nupkins looked calmly
terrible, and commanded that the lady should be shown in; which command,
like all the mandates of emperors, and magistrates, and other great
potentates of the earth, was forthwith obeyed; and Miss Witherfield,
interestingly agitated, was ushered in accordingly.

'Muzzle!' said the magistrate.

Muzzle was an undersized footman, with a long body and short legs.

'Muzzle!'

Yes, your Worship.'

'Place a chair, and leave the room.'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Now, ma'am, will you state your business?' said the magistrate.

'It is of a very painful kind, Sir,' said Miss Witherfield.

'Very likely, ma'am,' said the magistrate. 'Compose your feelings,
ma'am.' Here Mr. Nupkins looked benignant. 'And then tell me what legal
business brings you here, ma'am.' Here the magistrate triumphed over the
man; and he looked stern again.

'It is very distressing to me, Sir, to give this information,' said Miss
Witherfield, 'but I fear a duel is going to be fought here.'

'Here, ma'am?' said the magistrate. 'Where, ma'am?'

'In Ipswich.'

In Ipswich, ma'am! A duel in Ipswich!' said the magistrate, perfectly
aghast at the notion. 'Impossible, ma'am; nothing of the kind can be
contemplated in this town, I am persuaded. Bless my soul, ma'am, are you
aware of the activity of our local magistracy? Do you happen to have
heard, ma'am, that I rushed into a prize-ring on the fourth of May last,
attended by only sixty special constables; and, at the hazard of falling
a sacrifice to the angry passions of an infuriated multitude, prohibited
a pugilistic contest between the Middlesex Dumpling and the Suffolk
Bantam? A duel in Ipswich, ma'am? I don't think--I do not think,' said
the magistrate, reasoning with himself, 'that any two men can have had
the hardihood to plan such a breach of the peace, in this town.'

'My information is, unfortunately, but too correct,' said the middle-
aged lady; 'I was present at the quarrel.'

'It's a most extraordinary thing,' said the astounded magistrate.
'Muzzle!'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Send Mr. Jinks here, directly! Instantly.'

'Yes, your Worship.'

Muzzle retired; and a pale, sharp-nosed, half-fed, shabbily-clad clerk,
of middle age, entered the room.

'Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate. 'Mr. Jinks.'

'Sir,' said Mr. Jinks.

'This lady, Mr. Jinks, has come here, to give information of an intended
duel in this town.'

Mr. Jinks, not knowing exactly what to do, smiled a dependent's smile.

'What are you laughing at, Mr. Jinks?' said the magistrate.

Mr. Jinks looked serious instantly.

'Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate, 'you're a fool.'

Mr. Jinks looked humbly at the great man, and bit the top of his pen.

'You may see something very comical in this information, Sir--but I can
tell you this, Mr. Jinks, that you have very little to laugh at,' said
the magistrate.

The hungry-looking Jinks sighed, as if he were quite aware of the fact
of his having very little indeed to be merry about; and, being ordered
to take the lady's information, shambled to a seat, and proceeded to
write it down.

'This man, Pickwick, is the principal, I understand?' said the
magistrate, when the statement was finished.

'He is,' said the middle-aged lady.

'And the other rioter--what's his name, Mr. Jinks?'

'Tupman, Sir.'

Tupman is the second?'

'Yes.'

'The other principal, you say, has absconded, ma'am?'

'Yes,' replied Miss Witherfield, with a short cough.

'Very well,' said the magistrate. 'These are two cut-throats from
London, who have come down here to destroy his Majesty's population,
thinking that at this distance from the capital, the arm of the law is
weak and paralysed. They shall be made an example of. Draw up the
warrants, Mr. Jinks. Muzzle!'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Is Grummer downstairs?'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Send him up.'

The obsequious Muzzle retired, and presently returned, introducing the
elderly gentleman in the top-boots, who was chiefly remarkable for a
bottle-nose, a hoarse voice, a snuff-coloured surtout, and a wandering
eye.

'Grummer,' said the magistrate.

'Your Wash-up.'

'Is the town quiet now?'

'Pretty well, your Wash-up,' replied Grummer. 'Pop'lar feeling has in a
measure subsided, consekens o' the boys having dispersed to cricket.'

'Nothing but vigorous measures will do in these times, Grummer,' said
the magistrate, in a determined manner. 'If the authority of the king's
officers is set at naught, we must have the riot act read. If the civil
power cannot protect these windows, Grummer, the military must protect
the civil power, and the windows too. I believe that is a maxim of the
constitution, Mr. Jinks?'

Certainly, sir,' said Jinks.

'Very good,' said the magistrate, signing the warrants. 'Grummer, you
will bring these persons before me, this afternoon. You will find them
at the Great White Horse. You recollect the case of the Middlesex
Dumpling and the Suffolk Bantam, Grummer?'

Mr. Grummer intimated, by a retrospective shake of the head, that he
should never forget it--as indeed it was not likely he would, so long as
it continued to be cited daily.

'This is even more unconstitutional,' said the magistrate; 'this is even
a greater breach of the peace, and a grosser infringement of his
Majesty's prerogative. I believe duelling is one of his Majesty's most
undoubted prerogatives, Mr. Jinks?'

'Expressly stipulated in Magna Charta, sir,' said Mr. Jinks.

'One of the brightest jewels in the British crown, wrung from his
Majesty by the barons, I believe, Mr. Jinks?' said the magistrate.

'Just so, Sir,' replied Mr. Jinks.

'Very well,' said the magistrate, drawing himself up proudly, 'it shall
not be violated in this portion of his dominions. Grummer, procure
assistance, and execute these warrants with as little delay as possible.
Muzzle!'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Show the lady out.'

Miss Witherfield retired, deeply impressed with the magistrate's
learning and research; Mr. Nupkins retired to lunch; Mr. Jinks retired
within himself--that being the only retirement he had, except the sofa-
bedstead in the small parlour which was occupied by his landlady's
family in the daytime--and Mr. Grummer retired, to wipe out, by his mode
of discharging his present commission, the insult which had been
fastened upon himself, and the other representative of his Majesty--the
beadle--in the course of the morning.

While these resolute and determined preparations for the conservation of
the king's peace were pending, Mr. Pickwick and his friends, wholly
unconscious of the mighty events in progress, had sat quietly down to
dinner; and very talkative and companionable they all were. Mr. Pickwick
was in the very act of relating his adventure of the preceding night, to
the great amusement of his followers, Mr. Tupman especially, when the
door opened, and a somewhat forbidding countenance peeped into the room.
The eyes in the forbidding countenance looked very earnestly at Mr.
Pickwick, for several seconds, and were to all appearance satisfied with
their investigation; for the body to which the forbidding countenance
belonged, slowly brought itself into the apartment, and presented the
form of an elderly individual in top-boots--not to keep the reader any
longer in suspense, in short, the eyes were the wandering eyes of Mr.
Grummer, and the body was the body of the same gentleman.

Mr. Grummer's mode of proceeding was professional, but peculiar. His
first act was to bolt the door on the inside; his second, to polish his
head and countenance very carefully with a cotton handkerchief; his
third, to place his hat, with the cotton handkerchief in it, on the
nearest chair; and his fourth, to produce from the breast-pocket of his
coat a short truncheon, surmounted by a brazen crown, with which he
beckoned to Mr. Pickwick with a grave and ghost-like air.

Mr. Snodgrass was the first to break the astonished silence. He looked
steadily at Mr. Grummer for a brief space, and then said emphatically,
'This is a private room, Sir. A private room.'

Mr. Grummer shook his head, and replied, 'No room's private to his
Majesty when the street door's once passed. That's law. Some people
maintains that an Englishman's house is his castle. That's gammon.'

The Pickwickians gazed on each other with wondering eyes.

'Which is Mr. Tupman?' inquired Mr. Grummer. He had an intuitive
perception of Mr. Pickwick; he knew him at once.

'My name's Tupman,' said that gentleman.

'My name's Law,' said Mr. Grummer.

'What?' said Mr. Tupman.

'Law,' replied Mr. Grummer--'Law, civil power, and exekative; them's my
titles; here's my authority. Blank Tupman, blank Pickwick--against the
peace of our sufferin' lord the king--stattit in the case made and
purwided--and all regular. I apprehend you Pickwick! Tupman--the
aforesaid.'

'What do you mean by this insolence?' said Mr. Tupman, starting up;
'leave the room!'

'Hollo,' said Mr. Grummer, retreating very expeditiously to the door,
and opening it an inch or two, 'Dubbley.'

'Well,' said a deep voice from the passage.

'Come for'ard, Dubbley.'

At the word of command, a dirty-faced man, something over six feet high,
and stout in proportion, squeezed himself through the half-open door
(making his face very red in the process), and entered the room.

'Is the other specials outside, Dubbley?' inquired Mr. Grummer.

Mr. Dubbley, who was a man of few words, nodded assent.

'Order in the diwision under your charge, Dubbley,' said Mr. Grummer.

Mr. Dubbley did as he was desired; and half a dozen men, each with a
short truncheon and a brass crown, flocked into the room. Mr. Grummer
pocketed his staff, and looked at Mr. Dubbley; Mr. Dubbley pocketed his
staff and looked at the division; the division pocketed their staves and
looked at Messrs. Tupman and Pickwick.

Mr. Pickwick and his followers rose as one man.

'What is the meaning of this atrocious intrusion upon my privacy?' said
Mr. Pickwick.

'Who dares apprehend me?' said Mr. Tupman.

'What do you want here, scoundrels?' said Mr. Snodgrass.

Mr. Winkle said nothing, but he fixed his eyes on Grummer, and bestowed
a look upon him, which, if he had had any feeling, must have pierced his
brain. As it was, however, it had no visible effect on him whatever.

When the executive perceived that Mr. Pickwick and his friends were
disposed to resist the authority of the law, they very significantly
turned up their coat sleeves, as if knocking them down in the first
instance, and taking them up afterwards, were a mere professional act
which had only to be thought of to be done, as a matter of course. This
demonstration was not lost upon Mr. Pickwick. He conferred a few moments
with Mr. Tupman apart, and then signified his readiness to proceed to
the mayor's residence, merely begging the parties then and there
assembled, to take notice, that it was his firm intention to resent this
monstrous invasion of his privileges as an Englishman, the instant he
was at liberty; whereat the parties then and there assembled laughed
very heartily, with the single exception of Mr. Grummer, who seemed to
consider that any slight cast upon the divine right of magistrates was a
species of blasphemy not to be tolerated.

But when Mr. Pickwick had signified his readiness to bow to the laws of
his country, and just when the waiters, and hostlers, and chambermaids,
and post-boys, who had anticipated a delightful commotion from his
threatened obstinacy, began to turn away, disappointed and disgusted, a
difficulty arose which had not been foreseen. With every sentiment of
veneration for the constituted authorities, Mr. Pickwick resolutely
protested against making his appearance in the public streets,
surrounded and guarded by the officers of justice, like a common
criminal. Mr. Grummer, in the then disturbed state of public feeling
(for it was half-holiday, and the boys had not yet gone home), as
resolutely protested against walking on the opposite side of the way,
and taking Mr. Pickwick's parole that he would go straight to the
magistrate's; and both Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Tupman as strenuously
objected to the expense of a post-coach, which was the only respectable
conveyance that could be obtained. The dispute ran high, and the dilemma
lasted long; and just as the executive were on the point of overcoming
Mr. Pickwick's objection to walking to the magistrate's, by the trite
expedient of carrying him thither, it was recollected that there stood
in the inn yard, an old sedan-chair, which, having been originally built
for a gouty gentleman with funded property, would hold Mr. Pickwick and
Mr. Tupman, at least as conveniently as a modern post-chaise. The chair
was hired, and brought into the hall; Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Tupman
squeezed themselves inside, and pulled down the blinds; a couple of
chairmen were speedily found; and the procession started in grand order.
The specials surrounded the body of the vehicle; Mr. Grummer and Mr.
Dubbley marched triumphantly in front; Mr. Snodgrass and Mr. Winkle
walked arm-in-arm behind; and the unsoaped of Ipswich brought up the
rear.

The shopkeepers of the town, although they had a very indistinct notion
of the nature of the offence, could not but be much edified and
gratified by this spectacle. Here was the strong arm of the law, coming
down with twenty gold-beater force, upon two offenders from the
metropolis itself; the mighty engine was directed by their own
magistrate, and worked by their own officers; and both the criminals, by
their united efforts, were securely shut up, in the narrow compass of
one sedan-chair. Many were the expressions of approval and admiration
which greeted Mr. Grummer, as he headed the cavalcade, staff in hand;
loud and long were the shouts raised by the unsoaped; and amidst these
united testimonials of public approbation, the procession moved slowly
and majestically along.

Mr. Weller, habited in his morning jacket, with the black calico
sleeves, was returning in a rather desponding state from an unsuccessful
survey of the mysterious house with the green gate, when, raising his
eyes, he beheld a crowd pouring down the street, surrounding an object
which had very much the appearance of a sedan-chair. Willing to divert
his thoughts from the failure of his enterprise, he stepped aside to see
the crowd pass; and finding that they were cheering away, very much to
their own satisfaction, forthwith began (by way of raising his spirits)
to cheer too, with all his might and main.

Mr. Grummer passed, and Mr. Dubbley passed, and the sedan passed, and
the bodyguard of specials passed, and Sam was still responding to the
enthusiastic cheers of the mob, and waving his hat about as if he were
in the very last extreme of the wildest joy (though, of course, he had
not the faintest idea of the matter in hand), when he was suddenly
stopped by the unexpected appearance of Mr. Winkle and Mr. Snodgrass.

'What's the row, gen'l'm'n?'cried Sam. 'Who have they got in this here
watch-box in mournin'?'

Both gentlemen replied together, but their words were lost in the
tumult.

'Who is it?' cried Sam again.

Once more was a joint reply returned; and, though the words were
inaudible, Sam saw by the motion of the two pairs of lips that they had
uttered the magic word 'Pickwick.'

This was enough. In another minute Mr. Weller had made his way through
the crowd, stopped the chairmen, and confronted the portly Grummer.

'Hollo, old gen'l'm'n!' said Sam. 'Who have you got in this here
conweyance?'

'Stand back,' said Mr. Grummer, whose dignity, like the dignity of a
great many other men, had been wondrously augmented by a little
popularity.

'Knock him down, if he don't,' said Mr. Dubbley.

'I'm wery much obliged to you, old gen'l'm'n,' replied Sam, 'for
consulting my conwenience, and I'm still more obliged to the other
gen'l'm'n, who looks as if he'd just escaped from a giant's carrywan,
for his wery 'andsome suggestion; but I should prefer your givin' me a
answer to my question, if it's all the same to you.--How are you, Sir?'
This last observation was addressed with a patronising air to Mr.
Pickwick, who was peeping through the front window.

Mr. Grummer, perfectly speechless with indignation, dragged the
truncheon with the brass crown from its particular pocket, and
flourished it before Sam's eyes.

'Ah,' said Sam, 'it's wery pretty, 'specially the crown, which is
uncommon like the real one.'

'Stand back!' said the outraged Mr. Grummer. By way of adding force to
the command, he thrust the brass emblem of royalty into Sam's neckcloth
with one hand, and seized Sam's collar with the other--a compliment
which Mr. Weller returned by knocking him down out of hand, having
previously with the utmost consideration, knocked down a chairman for
him to lie upon.

Whether Mr. Winkle was seized with a temporary attack of that species of
insanity which originates in a sense of injury, or animated by this
display of Mr. Weller's valour, is uncertain; but certain it is, that he
no sooner saw Mr. Grummer fall than he made a terrific onslaught on a
small boy who stood next him; whereupon Mr. Snodgrass, in a truly
Christian spirit, and in order that he might take no one unawares,
announced in a very loud tone that he was going to begin, and proceeded
to take off his coat with the utmost deliberation. He was immediately
surrounded and secured; and it is but common justice both to him and Mr.
Winkle to say, that they did not make the slightest attempt to rescue
either themselves or Mr. Weller; who, after a most vigorous resistance,
was overpowered by numbers and taken prisoner. The procession then
reformed; the chairmen resumed their stations; and the march was re-
commenced.

Mr. Pickwick's indignation during the whole of this proceeding was
beyond all bounds. He could just see Sam upsetting the specials, and
flying about in every direction; and that was all he could see, for the
sedan doors wouldn't open, and the blinds wouldn't pull up. At length,
with the assistance of Mr. Tupman, he managed to push open the roof; and
mounting on the seat, and steadying himself as well as he could, by
placing his hand on that gentleman's shoulder, Mr. Pickwick proceeded to
address the multitude; to dwell upon the unjustifiable manner in which
he had been treated; and to call upon them to take notice that his
servant had been first assaulted. In this order they reached the
magistrate's house; the chairmen trotting, the prisoners following, Mr.
Pickwick oratorising, and the crowd shouting.

Violent was Mr. Weller's indignation as he was borne along; numerous
were the allusions to the personal appearance and demeanour of Mr.
Grummer and his companion; and valorous were the defiances to any six of
the gentlemen present, in which he vented his dissatisfaction. Mr.
Snodgrass and Mr. Winkle listened with gloomy respect to the torrent of
eloquence which their leader poured forth from the sedan-chair, and the
rapid course of which not all Mr. Tupman's earnest entreaties to have
the lid of the vehicle closed, were able to check for an instant. But
Mr. Weller's anger quickly gave way to curiosity when the procession
turned down the identical courtyard in which he had met with the runaway
Job Trotter; and curiosity was exchanged for a feeling of the most
gleeful astonishment, when the all-important Mr. Grummer, commanding the
sedan-bearers to halt, advanced with dignified and portentous steps to
the very green gate from which Job Trotter had emerged, and gave a
mighty pull at the bell-handle which hung at the side thereof. The ring
was answered by a very smart and pretty-faced servant-girl, who, after
holding up her hands in astonishment at the rebellious appearance of the
prisoners, and the impassioned language of Mr. Pickwick, summoned Mr.
Muzzle. Mr. Muzzle opened one half of the carriage gate, to admit the
sedan, the captured ones, and the specials; and immediately slammed it
in the faces of the mob, who, indignant at being excluded, and anxious
to see what followed, relieved their feelings by kicking at the gate and
ringing the bell, for an hour or two afterwards. In this amusement they
all took part by turns, except three or four fortunate individuals, who,
having discovered a grating in the gate, which commanded a view of
nothing, stared through it with the indefatigable perseverance with
which people will flatten their noses against the front windows of a
chemist's shop, when a drunken man, who has been run over by a dog-cart
in the street, is undergoing a surgical inspection in the back-parlour.

At the foot of a flight of steps, leading to the house door, which was
guarded on either side by an American aloe in a green tub, the sedan-
chair stopped. Mr. Pickwick and his friends were conducted into the
hall, whence, having been previously announced by Muzzle, and ordered in
by Mr. Nupkins, they were ushered into the worshipful presence of that
public-spirited officer.

The scene was an impressive one, well calculated to strike terror to the
hearts of culprits, and to impress them with an adequate idea of the
stern majesty of the law. In front of a big book-case, in a big chair,
behind a big table, and before a big volume, sat Mr. Nupkins, looking a
full size larger than any one of them, big as they were. The table was
adorned with piles of papers; and above the farther end of it, appeared
the head and shoulders of Mr. Jinks, who was busily engaged in looking
as busy as possible. The party having all entered, Muzzle carefully
closed the door, and placed himself behind his master's chair to await
his orders. Mr. Nupkins threw himself back with thrilling solemnity, and
scrutinised the faces of his unwilling visitors.

'Now, Grummer, who is that person?' said Mr. Nupkins, pointing to Mr.
Pickwick, who, as the spokesman of his friends, stood hat in hand,
bowing with the utmost politeness and respect.

'This here's Pickvick, your Wash-up,' said Grummer.

'Come, none o' that 'ere, old Strike-a-light,' interposed Mr. Weller,
elbowing himself into the front rank. 'Beg your pardon, sir, but this
here officer o' yourn in the gambooge tops, 'ull never earn a decent
livin' as a master o' the ceremonies any vere. This here, sir' continued
Mr. Weller, thrusting Grummer aside, and addressing the magistrate with
pleasant familiarity, 'this here is S. Pickvick, Esquire; this here's
Mr. Tupman; that 'ere's Mr. Snodgrass; and farder on, next him on the
t'other side, Mr. Winkle--all wery nice gen'l'm'n, Sir, as you'll be
wery happy to have the acquaintance on; so the sooner you commits these
here officers o' yourn to the tread-mill for a month or two, the sooner
we shall begin to be on a pleasant understanding. Business first,
pleasure arterwards, as King Richard the Third said when he stabbed the
t'other king in the Tower, afore he smothered the babbies.'

At the conclusion of this address, Mr. Weller brushed his hat with his
right elbow, and nodded benignly to Jinks, who had heard him throughout
with unspeakable awe.

'Who is this man, Grummer?' said the magistrate.

'Wery desp'rate ch'racter, your Wash-up,' replied Grummer. 'He attempted
to rescue the prisoners, and assaulted the officers; so we took him into
custody, and brought him here.'

'You did quite right,' replied the magistrate. 'He is evidently a
desperate ruffian.'

'He is my servant, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick angrily.

'Oh! he is your servant, is he?' said Mr. Nupkins. 'A conspiracy to
defeat the ends of justice, and murder its officers. Pickwick's servant.
Put that down, Mr. Jinks.'

Mr. Jinks did so.

'What's your name, fellow?' thundered Mr. Nupkins.

'Veller,' replied Sam.

'A very good name for the Newgate Calendar,' said Mr. Nupkins.

This was a joke; so Jinks, Grummer, Dubbley, all the specials, and
Muzzle, went into fits of laughter of five minutes' duration.

'Put down his name, Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate.

'Two L's, old feller,' said Sam.

Here an unfortunate special laughed again, whereupon the magistrate
threatened to commit him instantly. It is a dangerous thing to laugh at
the wrong man, in these cases.

'Where do you live?' said the magistrate.

'Vere ever I can,' replied Sam.

'Put down that, Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate, who was fast rising
into a rage.

'Score it under,' said Sam.

'He is a vagabond, Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate. 'He is a vagabond on
his own statement,--is he not, Mr. Jinks?'

'Certainly, Sir.'

'Then I'll commit him--I'll commit him as such,' said Mr. Nupkins.

'This is a wery impartial country for justice, 'said Sam.' There ain't a
magistrate goin' as don't commit himself twice as he commits other
people.'

At this sally another special laughed, and then tried to look so
supernaturally solemn, that the magistrate detected him immediately.

'Grummer,' said Mr. Nupkins, reddening with passion, 'how dare you
select such an inefficient and disreputable person for a special
constable, as that man? How dare you do it, Sir?'

'I am very sorry, your Wash-up,' stammered Grummer.

'Very sorry!' said the furious magistrate. 'You shall repent of this
neglect of duty, Mr. Grummer; you shall be made an example of. Take that
fellow's staff away. He's drunk. You're drunk, fellow.'

'I am not drunk, your Worship,' said the man.

'You _are _drunk,' returned the magistrate. 'How dare you say you are
not drunk, Sir, when I say you are? Doesn't he smell of spirits,
Grummer?'

'Horrid, your Wash-up,' replied Grummer, who had a vague impression that
there was a smell of rum somewhere.

'I knew he did,' said Mr. Nupkins. 'I saw he was drunk when he first
came into the room, by his excited eye. Did you observe his excited eye,
Mr. Jinks?'

'Certainly, Sir.'

'I haven't touched a drop of spirits this morning,' said the man, who
was as sober a fellow as need be.

'How dare you tell me a falsehood?' said Mr. Nupkins. 'Isn't he drunk at
this moment, Mr. Jinks?'

'Certainly, Sir,' replied Jinks.

'Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate, 'I shall commit that man for contempt.
Make out his committal, Mr. Jinks.'

And committed the special would have been, only Jinks, who was the
magistrate's adviser (having had a legal education of three years in a
country attorney's office), whispered the magistrate that he thought it
wouldn't do; so the magistrate made a speech, and said, that in
consideration of the special's family, he would merely reprimand and
discharge him. Accordingly, the special was abused, vehemently, for a
quarter of an hour, and sent about his business; and Grummer, Dubbley,
Muzzle, and all the other specials, murmured their admiration of the
magnanimity of Mr. Nupkins.

'Now, Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate, 'swear Grummer.'

Grummer was sworn directly; but as Grummer wandered, and Mr. Nupkins's
dinner was nearly ready, Mr. Nupkins cut the matter short, by putting
leading questions to Grummer, which Grummer answered as nearly in the
affirmative as he could. So the examination went off, all very smooth
and comfortable, and two assaults were proved against Mr. Weller, and a
threat against Mr. Winkle, and a push against Mr. Snodgrass. When all
this was done to the magistrate's satisfaction, the magistrate and Mr.
Jinks consulted in whispers.

The consultation having lasted about ten minutes, Mr. Jinks retired to
his end of the table; and the magistrate, with a preparatory cough, drew
himself up in his chair, and was proceeding to commence his address,
when Mr. Pickwick interposed.

'I beg your pardon, sir, for interrupting you,' said Mr. Pickwick; 'but
before you proceed to express, and act upon, any opinion you may have
formed on the statements which have been made here, I must claim my
right to be heard so far as I am personally concerned.'

'Hold your tongue, Sir,' said the magistrate peremptorily.

'I must submit to you, Sir--' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Hold your tongue, sir,' interposed the magistrate, 'or I shall order an
officer to remove you.'

'You may order your officers to do whatever you please, Sir,' said Mr.
Pickwick; 'and I have no doubt, from the specimen I have had of the
subordination preserved amongst them, that whatever you order, they will
execute, Sir; but I shall take the liberty, Sir, of claiming my right to
be heard, until I am removed by force.'

'Pickvick and principle!' exclaimed Mr. Weller, in a very audible voice.

'Sam, be quiet,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Dumb as a drum vith a hole in it, Sir,' replied Sam.

Mr. Nupkins looked at Mr. Pickwick with a gaze of intense astonishment,
at his displaying such unwonted temerity; and was apparently about to
return a very angry reply, when Mr. Jinks pulled him by the sleeve, and
whispered something in his ear. To this, the magistrate returned a half-
audible answer, and then the whispering was renewed. Jinks was evidently
remonstrating.

At length the magistrate, gulping down, with a very bad grace, his
disinclination to hear anything more, turned to Mr. Pickwick, and said
sharply, 'What do you want to say?'

'First,' said Mr. Pickwick, sending a look through his spectacles, under
which even Nupkins quailed, 'first, I wish to know what I and my friend
have been brought here for?'

'Must I tell him?' whispered the magistrate to Jinks.

'I think you had better, sir,' whispered Jinks to the magistrate.

'An information has been sworn before me,' said the magistrate, 'that it
is apprehended you are going to fight a duel, and that the other man,
Tupman, is your aider and abettor in it. Therefore--eh, Mr. Jinks?'

'Certainly, sir.'

'Therefore, I call upon you both, to--I think that's the course, Mr.
Jinks?'

'Certainly, Sir.'

'To--to--what, Mr. Jinks?' said the magistrate pettishly.

'To find bail, sir.'

'Yes. Therefore, I call upon you both--as I was about to say when I was
interrupted by my clerk--to find bail.'

Good bail,' whispered Mr. Jinks.

'I shall require good bail,' said the magistrate.

'Town's-people,' whispered Jinks.

'They must be townspeople,' said the magistrate.

'Fifty pounds each,' whispered Jinks, 'and householders, of course.'

'I shall require two sureties of fifty pounds each,' said the magistrate
aloud, with great dignity, 'and they must be householders, of course.'

'But bless my heart, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, who, together with Mr.
Tupman, was all amazement and indignation; 'we are perfect strangers in
this town. I have as little knowledge of any householders here, as I
have intention of fighting a duel with anybody.'

'I dare say,' replied the magistrate, 'I dare say--don't you, Mr.
Jinks?'

'Certainly, Sir.'

'Have you anything more to say?' inquired the magistrate.

Mr. Pickwick had a great deal more to say, which he would no doubt have
said, very little to his own advantage, or the magistrate's
satisfaction, if he had not, the moment he ceased speaking, been pulled
by the sleeve by Mr. Weller, with whom he was immediately engaged in so
earnest a conversation, that he suffered the magistrate's inquiry to
pass wholly unnoticed. Mr. Nupkins was not the man to ask a question of
the kind twice over; and so, with another preparatory cough, he
proceeded, amidst the reverential and admiring silence of the
constables, to pronounce his decision.

He should fine Weller two pounds for the first assault, and three pounds
for the second. He should fine Winkle two pounds, and Snodgrass one
pound, besides requiring them to enter into their own recognisances to
keep the peace towards all his Majesty's subjects, and especially
towards his liege servant, Daniel Grummer. Pickwick and Tupman he had
already held to bail.

Immediately on the magistrate ceasing to speak, Mr. Pickwick, with a
smile mantling on his again good-humoured countenance, stepped forward,
and said--

'I beg the magistrate's pardon, but may I request a few minutes' private
conversation with him, on a matter of deep importance to himself?'

'What?' said the magistrate. Mr. Pickwick repeated his request.

'This is a most extraordinary request,' said the magistrate. 'A private
interview?'

'A private interview,' replied Mr. Pickwick firmly; 'only, as a part of
the information which I wish to communicate is derived from my servant,
I should wish him to be present.'

The magistrate looked at Mr. Jinks; Mr. Jinks looked at the magistrate;
the officers looked at each other in amazement. Mr. Nupkins turned
suddenly pale. Could the man Weller, in a moment of remorse, have
divulged some secret conspiracy for his assassination? It was a dreadful
thought. He was a public man; and he turned paler, as he thought of
Julius Caesar and Mr. Perceval.

The magistrate looked at Mr. Pickwick again, and beckoned Mr. Jinks.

'What do you think of this request, Mr. Jinks?' murmured Mr. Nupkins.

Mr. Jinks, who didn't exactly know what to think of it, and was afraid
he might offend, smiled feebly, after a dubious fashion, and, screwing
up the corners of his mouth, shook his head slowly from side to side.

'Mr. Jinks,' said the magistrate gravely, 'you are an ass.'

At this little expression of opinion, Mr. Jinks smiled again--rather
more feebly than before--and edged himself, by degrees, back into his
own corner.

Mr. Nupkins debated the matter within himself for a few seconds, and
then, rising from his chair, and requesting Mr. Pickwick and Sam to
follow him, led the way into a small room which opened into the justice-
parlour. Desiring Mr. Pickwick to walk to the upper end of the little
apartment, and holding his hand upon the half-closed door, that he might
be able to effect an immediate escape, in case there was the least
tendency to a display of hostilities, Mr. Nupkins expressed his
readiness to hear the communication, whatever it might be.

'I will come to the point at once, sir,' said Mr. Pickwick; 'it affects
yourself and your credit materially. I have every reason to believe,
Sir, that you are harbouring in your house a gross impostor!'

'Two,' interrupted Sam. 'Mulberry agin all natur, for tears and
willainny!'

'Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'if I am to render myself intelligible to this
gentleman, I must beg you to control your feelings.'

'Wery sorry, Sir,' replied Mr. Weller; 'but when I think o' that 'ere
Job, I can't help opening the walve a inch or two.'

'In one word, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'is my servant right in
suspecting that a certain Captain Fitz-Marshall is in the habit of
visiting here? Because,' added Mr. Pickwick, as he saw that Mr. Nupkins
was about to offer a very indignant interruption, 'because if he be, I
know that person to be a--'

'Hush, hush,' said Mr. Nupkins, closing the door. 'Know him to be what,
Sir?'

'An unprincipled adventurer--a dishonourable character--a man who preys
upon society, and makes easily-deceived people his dupes, Sir; his
absurd, his foolish, his wretched dupes, Sir,' said the excited Mr.
Pickwick.

'Dear me,' said Mr. Nupkins, turning very red, and altering his whole
manner directly. 'Dear me, Mr.--'

'Pickvick,' said Sam.

'Pickwick,' said the magistrate, 'dear me, Mr. Pickwick--pray take a
seat--you cannot mean this? Captain Fitz-Marshall!'

'Don't call him a cap'en,' said Sam, 'nor Fitz-Marshall neither; he
ain't neither one nor t'other. He's a strolling actor, he is, and his
name's Jingle; and if ever there was a wolf in a mulberry suit, that
'ere Job Trotter's him.'

'It is very true, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, replying to the magistrate's
look of amazement; 'my only business in this town, is to expose the
person of whom we now speak.'

Mr. Pickwick proceeded to pour into the horror-stricken ear of Mr.
Nupkins, an abridged account of all Mr. Jingle's atrocities. He related
how he had first met him; how he had eloped with Miss Wardle; how he had
cheerfully resigned the lady for a pecuniary consideration; how he had
entrapped himself into a lady's boarding-school at midnight; and how he
(Mr. Pickwick) now felt it his duty to expose his assumption of his
present name and rank.

As the narrative proceeded, all the warm blood in the body of Mr.
Nupkins tingled up into the very tips of his ears. He had picked up the
captain at a neighbouring race-course. Charmed with his long list of
aristocratic acquaintance, his extensive travel, and his fashionable
demeanour, Mrs. Nupkins and Miss Nupkins had exhibited Captain Fitz-
Marshall, and quoted Captain Fitz-Marshall, and hurled Captain Fitz-
Marshall at the devoted heads of their select circle of acquaintance,
until their bosom friends, Mrs. Porkenham and the Misses Porkenhams, and
Mr. Sidney Porkenham, were ready to burst with jealousy and despair. And
now, to hear, after all, that he was a needy adventurer, a strolling
player, and if not a swindler, something so very like it, that it was
hard to tell the difference! Heavens! what would the Porkenhams say!
What would be the triumph of Mr. Sidney Porkenham when he found that his
addresses had been slighted for such a rival! How should he, Nupkins,
meet the eye of old Porkenham at the next quarter-sessions! And what a
handle would it be for the opposition magisterial party if the story got
abroad!

'But after all,' said Mr. Nupkins, brightening for a moment, after a
long pause; 'after all, this is a mere statement. Captain Fitz-Marshall
is a man of very engaging manners, and, I dare say, has many enemies.
What proof have you of the truth of these representations?'

'Confront me with him,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'that is all I ask, and all I
require. Confront him with me and my friends here; you will want no
further proof.'

'Why,' said Mr. Nupkins, 'that might be very easily done, for he will be
here to-night, and then there would be no occasion to make the matter
public, just--just--for the young man's own sake, you know. I--I--should
like to consult Mrs. Nupkins on the propriety of the step, in the first
instance, though. At all events, Mr. Pickwick, we must despatch this
legal business before we can do anything else. Pray step back into the
next room.'

Into the next room they went.

'Grummer,' said the magistrate, in an awful voice.

'Your Wash-up,' replied Grummer, with the smile of a favourite.

'Come, come, Sir,' said the magistrate sternly, 'don't let me see any of
this levity here. It is very unbecoming, and I can assure you that you
have very little to smile at. Was the account you gave me just now
strictly true? Now be careful, sir!'

Your Wash-up,' stammered Grummer, 'I-'

'Oh, you are confused, are you?' said the magistrate. 'Mr. Jinks, you
observe this confusion?'

'Certainly, Sir,' replied Jinks.

'Now,' said the magistrate, 'repeat your statement, Grummer, and again I
warn you to be careful. Mr. Jinks, take his words down.'

The unfortunate Grummer proceeded to re-state his complaint, but, what
between Mr. Jinks's taking down his words, and the magistrate's taking
them up, his natural tendency to rambling, and his extreme confusion, he
managed to get involved, in something under three minutes, in such a
mass of entanglement and contradiction, that Mr. Nupkins at once
declared he didn't believe him. So the fines were remitted, and Mr.
Jinks found a couple of bail in no time. And all these solemn
proceedings having been satisfactorily concluded, Mr. Grummer was
ignominiously ordered out--an awful instance of the instability of human
greatness, and the uncertain tenure of great men's favour.

Mrs. Nupkins was a majestic female in a pink gauze turban and a light
brown wig. Miss Nupkins possessed all her mamma's haughtiness without
the turban, and all her ill-nature without the wig; and whenever the
exercise of these two amiable qualities involved mother and daughter in
some unpleasant dilemma, as they not infrequently did, they both
concurred in laying the blame on the shoulders of Mr. Nupkins.
Accordingly, when Mr. Nupkins sought Mrs. Nupkins, and detailed the
communication which had been made by Mr. Pickwick, Mrs. Nupkins suddenly
recollected that she had always expected something of the kind; that she
had always said it would be so; that her advice was never taken; that
she really did not know what Mr. Nupkins supposed she was; and so forth.

'The idea!' said Miss Nupkins, forcing a tear of very scanty proportions
into the corner of each eye; 'the idea of my being made such a fool of!'

'Ah! you may thank your papa, my dear,' said Mrs. Nupkins; 'how I have
implored and begged that man to inquire into the captain's family
connections; how I have urged and entreated him to take some decisive
step! I am quite certain nobody would believe it--quite.'

'But, my dear,' said Mr. Nupkins.

'Don't talk to me, you aggravating thing, don't!' said Mrs. Nupkins.

'My love,' said Mr. Nupkins, 'you professed yourself very fond of
Captain Fitz-Marshall. You have constantly asked him here, my dear, and
you have lost no opportunity of introducing him elsewhere.'

'Didn't I say so, Henrietta?' cried Mrs. Nupkins, appealing to her
daughter with the air of a much-injured female. 'Didn't I say that your
papa would turn round and lay all this at my door? Didn't I say so?'
Here Mrs. Nupkins sobbed.

'Oh, pa!' remonstrated Miss Nupkins. And here she sobbed too.

'Isn't it too much, when he has brought all this disgrace and ridicule
upon us, to taunt me with being the cause of it?' exclaimed Mrs.
Nupkins.

'How can we ever show ourselves in society!' said Miss Nupkins.

'How can we face the Porkenhams?' cried Mrs. Nupkins.

'Or the Griggs!' cried Miss Nupkins.

'Or the Slummintowkens!' cried Mrs. Nupkins. 'But what does your papa
care! What is it to _him_!' At this dreadful reflection, Mrs. Nupkins
wept mental anguish, and Miss Nupkins followed on the same side.

Mrs. Nupkins's tears continued to gush forth, with great velocity, until
she had gained a little time to think the matter over; when she decided,
in her own mind, that the best thing to do would be to ask Mr. Pickwick
and his friends to remain until the captain's arrival, and then to give
Mr. Pickwick the opportunity he sought. If it appeared that he had
spoken truly, the captain could be turned out of the house without
noising the matter abroad, and they could easily account to the
Porkenhams for his disappearance, by saying that he had been appointed,
through the Court influence of his family, to the governor-generalship
of Sierra Leone, of Saugur Point, or any other of those salubrious
climates which enchant Europeans so much, that when they once get there,
they can hardly ever prevail upon themselves to come back again.

When Mrs. Nupkins dried up her tears, Miss Nupkins dried up hers, and
Mr. Nupkins was very glad to settle the matter as Mrs. Nupkins had
proposed. So Mr. Pickwick and his friends, having washed off all marks
of their late encounter, were introduced to the ladies, and soon
afterwards to their dinner; and Mr. Weller, whom the magistrate, with
his peculiar sagacity, had discovered in half an hour to be one of the
finest fellows alive, was consigned to the care and guardianship of Mr.
Muzzle, who was specially enjoined to take him below, and make much of
him.

'How de do, sir?' said Mr. Muzzle, as he conducted Mr. Weller down the
kitchen stairs.

'Why, no considerable change has taken place in the state of my system,
since I see you cocked up behind your governor's chair in the parlour, a
little vile ago,' replied Sam.

'You will excuse my not taking more notice of you then,' said Mr.
Muzzle. 'You see, master hadn't introduced us, then. Lord, how fond he
is of you, Mr. Weller, to be sure!'

'Ah!' said Sam, 'what a pleasant chap he is!'

'Ain't he?'replied Mr. Muzzle.

'So much humour,' said Sam.

'And such a man to speak,' said Mr. Muzzle. 'How his ideas flow, don't
they?'

'Wonderful,' replied Sam; 'they comes a-pouring out, knocking each
other's heads so fast, that they seems to stun one another; you hardly
know what he's arter, do you?'

That's the great merit of his style of speaking,' rejoined Mr. Muzzle.
'Take care of the last step, Mr. Weller. Would you like to wash your
hands, sir, before we join the ladies? Here's a sink, with the water
laid on, Sir, and a clean jack towel behind the door.'

'Ah! perhaps I may as well have a rinse,' replied Mr. Weller, applying
plenty of yellow soap to the towel, and rubbing away till his face shone
again. 'How many ladies are there?'

'Only two in our kitchen,' said Mr. Muzzle; 'cook and 'ouse-maid. We
keep a boy to do the dirty work, and a gal besides, but they dine in the
wash'us.'

'Oh, they dines in the wash'us, do they?' said Mr. Weller.

'Yes,' replied Mr. Muzzle, 'we tried 'em at our table when they first
come, but we couldn't keep 'em. The gal's manners is dreadful vulgar;
and the boy breathes so very hard while he's eating, that we found it
impossible to sit at table with him.'

'Young grampus!' said Mr. Weller.

'Oh, dreadful,' rejoined Mr. Muzzle; 'but that is the worst of country
service, Mr. Weller; the juniors is always so very savage. This way,
sir, if you please, this way.'

Preceding Mr. Weller, with the utmost politeness, Mr. Muzzle conducted
him into the kitchen.

'Mary,' said Mr. Muzzle to the pretty servant-girl, 'this is Mr. Weller;
a gentleman as master has sent down, to be made as comfortable as
possible.'

'And your master's a knowin' hand, and has just sent me to the right
place,' said Mr. Weller, with a glance of admiration at Mary. 'If I wos
master o' this here house, I should alvays find the materials for
comfort vere Mary wos.'

Lor, Mr. Weller!' said Mary blushing.

'Well, I never!' ejaculated the cook.

'Bless me, cook, I forgot you,' said Mr. Muzzle. 'Mr. Weller, let me
introduce you.'

'How are you, ma'am?' said Mr. Weller. 'Wery glad to see you, indeed,
and hope our acquaintance may be a long 'un, as the gen'l'm'n said to
the fi' pun' note.'

When this ceremony of introduction had been gone through, the cook and
Mary retired into the back kitchen to titter, for ten minutes; then
returning, all giggles and blushes, they sat down to dinner.

Mr. Weller's easy manners and conversational powers had such
irresistible influence with his new friends, that before the dinner was
half over, they were on a footing of perfect intimacy, and in possession
of a full account of the delinquency of Job Trotter.

'I never could a-bear that Job,' said Mary.

'No more you never ought to, my dear,' replied Mr. Weller.

'Why not?' inquired Mary.

''Cos ugliness and svindlin' never ought to be formiliar with elegance
and wirtew,' replied Mr. Weller. 'Ought they, Mr. Muzzle?'

'Not by no means,' replied that gentleman.

Here Mary laughed, and said the cook had made her; and the cook laughed,
and said she hadn't.

'I ha'n't got a glass,' said Mary.

'Drink with me, my dear,' said Mr. Weller. 'Put your lips to this here
tumbler, and then I can kiss you by deputy.'

'For shame, Mr. Weller!' said Mary.

'What's a shame, my dear?'

'Talkin' in that way.'

'Nonsense; it ain't no harm. It's natur; ain't it, cook?'

'Don't ask me, imperence,' replied the cook, in a high state of delight;
and hereupon the cook and Mary laughed again, till what between the
beer, and the cold meat, and the laughter combined, the latter young
lady was brought to the verge of choking--an alarming crisis from which
she was only recovered by sundry pats on the back, and other necessary
attentions, most delicately administered by Mr. Samuel Weller.

In the midst of all this jollity and conviviality, a loud ring was heard
at the garden gate, to which the young gentleman who took his meals in
the wash-house, immediately responded. Mr. Weller was in the height of
his attentions to the pretty house-maid; Mr. Muzzle was busy doing the
honours of the table; and the cook had just paused to laugh, in the very
act of raising a huge morsel to her lips; when the kitchen door opened,
and in walked Mr. Job Trotter.

We have said in walked Mr. Job Trotter, but the statement is not
distinguished by our usual scrupulous adherence to fact. The door opened
and Mr. Trotter appeared. He would have walked in, and was in the very
act of doing so, indeed, when catching sight of Mr. Weller, he
involuntarily shrank back a pace or two, and stood gazing on the
unexpected scene before him, perfectly motionless with amazement and
terror.

'Here he is!' said Sam, rising with great glee. 'Why we were that wery
moment a-speaking o' you. How are you? Where have you been? Come in.'

Laying his hand on the mulberry collar of the unresisting Job, Mr.
Weller dragged him into the kitchen; and, locking the door, handed the
key to Mr. Muzzle, who very coolly buttoned it up in a side pocket.

'Well, here's a game!' cried Sam. 'Only think o' my master havin' the
pleasure o' meeting yourn upstairs, and me havin' the joy o' meetin' you
down here. How are you gettin' on, and how is the chandlery bis'ness
likely to do? Well, I am so glad to see you. How happy you look. It's
quite a treat to see you; ain't it, Mr. Muzzle?'

'Quite,' said Mr. Muzzle.

'So cheerful he is!' said Sam.

'In such good spirits!' said Muzzle.

'And so glad to see us--that makes it so much more comfortable,' said
Sam. 'Sit down; sit down.'

Mr. Trotter suffered himself to be forced into a chair by the fireside.
He cast his small eyes, first on Mr. Weller, and then on Mr. Muzzle, but
said nothing.

'Well, now,' said Sam, 'afore these here ladies, I should jest like to
ask you, as a sort of curiosity, whether you don't consider yourself as
nice and well-behaved a young gen'l'm'n, as ever used a pink check
pocket-handkerchief, and the number four collection?'

'And as was ever a-going to be married to a cook,' said that lady
indignantly. 'The willin!'

'And leave off his evil ways, and set up in the chandlery line
arterwards,' said the housemaid.

'Now, I'll tell you what it is, young man,' said Mr. Muzzle solemnly,
enraged at the last two allusions, 'this here lady (pointing to the
cook) keeps company with me; and when you presume, Sir, to talk of
keeping chandlers' shops with her, you injure me in one of the most
delicatest points in which one man can injure another. Do you understand
that, Sir?'

Here Mr. Muzzle, who had a great notion of his eloquence, in which he
imitated his master, paused for a reply.

But Mr. Trotter made no reply. So Mr. Muzzle proceeded in a solemn
manner--

'It's very probable, sir, that you won't be wanted upstairs for several
minutes, Sir, because _my_ master is at this moment particularly engaged
in settling the hash of _your _master, Sir; and therefore you'll have
leisure, Sir, for a little private talk with me, Sir. Do you understand
that, Sir?'

Mr. Muzzle again paused for a reply; and again Mr. Trotter disappointed
him.

'Well, then,' said Mr. Muzzle, 'I'm very sorry to have to explain myself
before ladies, but the urgency of the case will be my excuse. The back
kitchen's empty, Sir. If you will step in there, Sir, Mr. Weller will
see fair, and we can have mutual satisfaction till the bell rings.
Follow me, Sir!'

As Mr. Muzzle uttered these words, he took a step or two towards the
door; and, by way of saving time, began to pull off his coat as he
walked along.

Now, the cook no sooner heard the concluding words of this desperate
challenge, and saw Mr. Muzzle about to put it into execution, than she
uttered a loud and piercing shriek; and rushing on Mr. Job Trotter, who
rose from his chair on the instant, tore and buffeted his large flat
face, with an energy peculiar to excited females, and twining her hands
in his long black hair, tore therefrom about enough to make five or six
dozen of the very largest-sized mourning-rings. Having accomplished this
feat with all the ardour which her devoted love for Mr. Muzzle inspired,
she staggered back; and being a lady of very excitable and delicate
feelings, she instantly fell under the dresser, and fainted away.

At this moment, the bell rang.

'That's for you, Job Trotter,' said Sam; and before Mr. Trotter could
offer remonstrance or reply--even before he had time to stanch the
wounds inflicted by the insensible lady--Sam seized one arm and Mr.
Muzzle the other, and one pulling before, and the other pushing behind,
they conveyed him upstairs, and into the parlour.

It was an impressive tableau. Alfred Jingle, Esquire, alias Captain
Fitz-Marshall, was standing near the door with his hat in his hand, and
a smile on his face, wholly unmoved by his very unpleasant situation.
Confronting him, stood Mr. Pickwick, who had evidently been inculcating
some high moral lesson; for his left hand was beneath his coat tail, and
his right extended in air, as was his wont when delivering himself of an
impressive address. At a little distance, stood Mr. Tupman with
indignant countenance, carefully held back by his two younger friends;
at the farther end of the room were Mr. Nupkins, Mrs. Nupkins, and Miss
Nupkins, gloomily grand and savagely vexed.

'What prevents me,' said Mr. Nupkins, with magisterial dignity, as Job
was brought in--'what prevents me from detaining these men as rogues and
impostors? It is a foolish mercy. What prevents me?'

'Pride, old fellow, pride,' replied Jingle, quite at his ease. 'Wouldn't
do--no go--caught a captain, eh?--ha! ha! very good--husband for
daughter--biter bit--make it public--not for worlds--look stupid--very!'

'Wretch,' said Mr. Nupkins, 'we scorn your base insinuations.'

'I always hated him,' added Henrietta.

'Oh, of course,' said Jingle. 'Tall young man--old lover--Sidney
Porkenham--rich--fine fellow--not so rich as captain, though, eh?--turn
him away--off with him--anything for captain--nothing like captain
anywhere--all the girls--raving mad--eh, Job, eh?'

Here Mr. Jingle laughed very heartily; and Job, rubbing his hands with
delight, uttered the first sound he had given vent to since he entered
the house--a low, noiseless chuckle, which seemed to intimate that he
enjoyed his laugh too much, to let any of it escape in sound.

'Mr. Nupkins,' said the elder lady,' this is not a fit conversation for
the servants to overhear. Let these wretches be removed.'

'Certainly, my dear,' Said Mr. Nupkins. 'Muzzle!'

'Your Worship.'

'Open the front door.'

'Yes, your Worship.'

'Leave the house!' said Mr. Nupkins, waving his hand emphatically.

Jingle smiled, and moved towards the door.

'Stay!' said Mr. Pickwick. Jingle stopped.

'I might,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'have taken a much greater revenge for the
treatment I have experienced at your hands, and that of your
hypocritical friend there.'

Job Trotter bowed with great politeness, and laid his hand upon his
heart.

'I say,' said Mr. Pickwick, growing gradually angry, 'that I might have
taken a greater revenge, but I content myself with exposing you, which I
consider a duty I owe to society. This is a leniency, Sir, which I hope
you will remember.'

When Mr. Pickwick arrived at this point, Job Trotter, with facetious
gravity, applied his hand to his ear, as if desirous not to lose a
syllable he uttered.

'And I have only to add, sir,' said Mr. Pickwick, now thoroughly angry,
'that I consider you a rascal, and a--a--ruffian--and--and worse than
any man I ever saw, or heard of, except that pious and sanctified
vagabond in the mulberry livery.'

'Ha! ha!' said Jingle, 'good fellow, Pickwick--fine heart--stout old
boy--but must _not _be passionate--bad thing, very--bye, bye--see you
again some day--keep up your spirits--now, Job--trot!'

With these words, Mr. Jingle stuck on his hat in his old fashion, and
strode out of the room. Job Trotter paused, looked round, smiled and
then with a bow of mock solemnity to Mr. Pickwick, and a wink to Mr.
Weller, the audacious slyness of which baffles all description, followed
the footsteps of his hopeful master.

'Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick, as Mr. Weller was following.

'Sir.'

Stay here.'

Mr. Weller seemed uncertain.

'Stay here,' repeated Mr. Pickwick.

'Mayn't I polish that 'ere Job off, in the front garden?' said Mr.
Weller.

'Certainly not,' replied Mr. Pickwick.

'Mayn't I kick him out o' the gate, Sir?' said Mr. Weller.

'Not on any account,' replied his master.

For the first time since his engagement, Mr. Weller looked, for a
moment, discontented and unhappy. But his countenance immediately
cleared up; for the wily Mr. Muzzle, by concealing himself behind the
street door, and rushing violently out, at the right instant, contrived
with great dexterity to overturn both Mr. Jingle and his attendant, down
the flight of steps, into the American aloe tubs that stood beneath.

'Having discharged my duty, Sir,' said Mr. Pickwick to Mr. Nupkins, 'I
will, with my friends, bid you farewell. While we thank you for such
hospitality as we have received, permit me to assure you, in our joint
names, that we should not have accepted it, or have consented to
extricate ourselves in this way, from our previous dilemma, had we not
been impelled by a strong sense of duty. We return to London to-morrow.
Your secret is safe with us.'

Having thus entered his protest against their treatment of the morning,
Mr. Pickwick bowed low to the ladies, and notwithstanding the
solicitations of the family, left the room with his friends.

'Get your hat, Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'It's below stairs, Sir,' said Sam, and he ran down after it.

Now, there was nobody in the kitchen, but the pretty housemaid; and as
Sam's hat was mislaid, he had to look for it, and the pretty housemaid
lighted him. They had to look all over the place for the hat. The pretty
housemaid, in her anxiety to find it, went down on her knees, and turned
over all the things that were heaped together in a little corner by the
door. It was an awkward corner. You couldn't get at it without shutting
the door first.

'Here it is,' said the pretty housemaid. 'This is it, ain't it?'

'Let me look,' said Sam.

The pretty housemaid had stood the candle on the floor; and, as it gave
a very dim light, Sam was obliged to go down on _his _knees before he
could see whether it really was his own hat or not. It was a remarkably
small corner, and so--it was nobody's fault but the man's who built the
house--Sam and the pretty housemaid were necessarily very close
together.

'Yes, this is it,' said Sam. 'Good-bye!'

'Good-bye!' said the pretty housemaid.

'Good-bye!' said Sam; and as he said it, he dropped the hat that had
cost so much trouble in looking for.

'How awkward you are,' said the pretty housemaid. 'You'll lose it again,
if you don't take care.'

So just to prevent his losing it again, she put it on for him.

Whether it was that the pretty housemaid's face looked prettier still,
when it was raised towards Sam's, or whether it was the accidental
consequence of their being so near to each other, is matter of
uncertainty to this day; but Sam kissed her.

'You don't mean to say you did that on purpose,' said the pretty
housemaid, blushing.

'No, I didn't then,' said Sam; 'but I will now.'

So he kissed her again.

'Sam!' said Mr. Pickwick, calling over the banisters.

'Coming, Sir,' replied Sam, running upstairs.

'How long you have been!' said Mr. Pickwick.

'There was something behind the door, Sir, which perwented our getting
it open, for ever so long, Sir,' replied Sam.

And this was the first passage of Mr. Weller's first love.

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

completion: While loading the coach to Ipswich, Mr. Weller tells Sam about the unsavory evangelist with whom his wife had taken up. Mr. Pickwick arrives and gets into conversation with a prissy, conceited man named Peter Magnus, who is also going to Ipswich. When the journey is over, Pickwick and Magnus register at a large inn, and Magnus tells Mr. Pickwick that he came to propose to a woman at that inn. That night Mr. Pickwick loses his way while trying to find his room. By mistake he enters the bedroom of a middle-aged woman, undresses, discovers his mistake, throws the lady into a panic, and makes a fumbling exit. He decides to wait in the hallway, where Sam finds him and leads him back to his room. Sam suspects that he has been after the ladies. The next morning Tony Weller tells Sam that it is a disgrace to the family honor to have been tricked by Job Trotter, and Sam reminds his father of the disgrace of letting an evangelist impose on him. A bit later Sam meets Job Trotter emerging from someone's yard. Job tries to evade him but does not succeed. Sam can extract no information about Jingle from him, but Job tells him that he himself is interested in marrying a cook for her savings. They part, and Sam tells Mr. Pickwick about a plan he has in mind. Mr. Pickwick has breakfast with Peter Magnus, who is very agitated. Magnus gets Mr. Pickwick's advice on proposing and rushes off. Then Tupman, Snodgrass, and Winkle arrive. Magnus returns to tell Mr. Pickwick that the lady has accepted him, and he invites him to meet his fiancee. She is, of course, the same lady Mr. Pickwick had frightened the night before. Embarrassment follows, which throws Magnus into a rage. He threatens to duel with Mr. Pickwick, who seems ready to accept. The lady, Miss Witherfield, is terrified and reports Mr. Pickwick and Tupman to the local justice, Mr. Nupkins, who has an exaggerated sense of authority. Mr. Nupkins sends his officers to arrest the two men. After a good deal of consternation, Mr. Pickwick and Tupman agree to go peacefully. Sam, on learning of his master's arrest, gets into a fight with the officers, who manage to subdue him. The Pickwickians are led away to the justice's, followed by a crowd of onlookers. Mr. Nupkins conducts the trial in a belligerent, high-handed manner. He fines Snodgrass and Winkle and requires a large bail from Mr. Pickwick and Tupman. Mr. Pickwick is furious, but after a private talk with Sam, he asks Nupkins for a quiet conference, in which Nupkins learns that his daughter's fashionable suitor is really the impostor Jingle. Realizing that this information could cause great social embarrassment for him and his family, Nupkins tells Mr. Pickwick that he can stay and confront Jingle. On learning the news, Mrs. Nupkins and her daughter berate Mr. Nupkins for their own poor judgment, but they decide it would be best to send Jingle and his servant off quietly. Sam, meanwhile, has dinner with the servants and strikes up a romance with the pretty housemaid, Mary. When Job Trotter turns up, the servants are ready for him, and the cook on whom he had designs rushes at him to tear his hair out. Jingle remains just as self-possessed as ever upon being exposed. But when he and Job leave the house they are dumped into the bushes by the butler. Having accomplished their purpose, Mr. Pickwick and Sam return to London.