Chapter I: DO not think that I should devote a chapter in The Children of (1)

Dickens_ to Wilkins Micawber Junior if it were not for his parents, who were very amusing persons whom everybody ought to know. Wilkins Micawber Junior never did anything or said anything in particular. He was a child who was seen and not heard. He was always standing around listening to his father and mother, and he had to do a good deal of listening, for they talked incessantly, chiefly about themselves. And then he was always pointed at, when they wanted to tell of their troubles. He was about four years old when we first see him pointed at, and he had a sister who was a year younger. Then there were the twins, who were always in their mother’s arms.

The Micawbers lived in a shabby house on Windsor Terrace, where they took David Copperfield to board. That is, they lived there when Mr. Micawber was not in the Debtors’ Prison. David Copperfield found it a great relief to get away from the company of Mealy Potatoes, the boy he worked with in Murdstone’s establishment, and get into the friendly company of the Micawbers.

* * * * *

The Micawbers were always in trouble, but they enjoyed their troubles and were willing to share their enjoyment with anybody who would listen to them. Though David Copperfield was only twelve years old, Mr. Micawber always treated him as an equal, and used the largest words he could think of. David liked to be talked to that way, so they became great friends. Wilkins Micawber Junior stood by and listened, and thought his father was the most wonderful talker in the world. When he grew up and had a family to support and couldn’t do it, he would talk that way.

David Copperfield tells how he first met Mr. Micawber at the office of Murdstone and Grinby and went home with him to Windsor Terrace.

* * * * *

The counting-house clock was at half-past twelve, and there was general preparation for going to dinner, when Mr. Quinion tapped at the counting-house window, and beckoned to me to go in. I went in, and found there a stoutish, middle-aged person, in a brown surtout and black tights and shoes, with no more hair upon his head (which was a large one, and very shining) than there is upon an egg, and with a very extensive face, which he turned full upon me. His clothes were shabby, but he had an imposing shirt-collar on. He carried a jaunty sort of a stick, with a large pair of rusty tassels to it; and a quizzing-glass hung outside his coat,--for ornament, I afterwards found, as he very seldom looked through it, and couldn’t see anything when he did.

“This,” said Mr. Quinion, in allusion to myself, “is he.”

“This,” said the stranger, with a certain condescending roll in his voice, and a certain indescribable air of doing something genteel, which impressed me very much “is Master Copperfield. I hope I see you well, Sir?”

I said I was very well, and hoped he was. I was sufficiently ill at ease, Heaven knows; but it was not in my nature to complain much at that time of my life, so I said I was very well, and hoped he was.

“I am,” said the stranger, “thank Heaven, quite well. I have received a letter from Mr. Murdstone, in which he mentions that he would desire me to receive into an apartment in the rear of my house, which is at present unoccupied--and is, in short, to be let as a--in short,” said the stranger, with a smile and in a burst of confidence, “as a bedroom--the young beginner whom I have now the pleasure to--” and the stranger waved his hand, and settled his chin in his shirt-collar.

“This is Mr. Micawber,” said Mr. Quinion to me.

“Ahem!” said the stranger, “that is my name.”

“Mr. Micawber,” said Mr. Quinion, “is known to Mr. Murdstone. He takes orders for us on commission, when he can get any. He has been written to by Mr. Murdstone, on the subject of your lodgings, and he will receive you as a lodger.”

“My address,” said Mr. Micawber, “is Windsor Terrace, City Road. I--in short,” said Mr. Micawber, with the same genteel air, and in another burst of confidence--“I live there.”

I made him a bow.

“Under the impression,” said Mr. Micawber, “that your peregrinations in this metropolis have not as yet been extensive, and that you might have some difficulty in penetrating the arcana of the Modern Babylon in the direction of the City Road--in short,” said Mr. Micawber, in another burst of confidence, “that you might lose yourself--I shall be happy to call this evening, and install you in the knowledge of the nearest way.”

I thanked him with all my heart, for it was friendly in him to offer to take that trouble.

“At what hour,” said Mr. Micawber, “shall I----”

“At about eight,” said Mr. Quinion.

“At about eight,” said Mr. Micawber. “I beg to wish you good day, Mr. Quinion. I will intrude no longer.”

So he put on his hat, and went out with his cane under his arm: very upright, and humming a tune when he was clear of the counting-house.

Mr. Quinion then formally engaged me to be as useful as I could in the warehouse of Murdstone and Grinby, at a salary, I think, of six shillings a week. I am not clear whether it was six or seven. I am inclined to believe, from my uncertainty on this head, that it was six at first and seven afterwards. He paid me a week down (from his own pocket, I believe), and I gave Mealy sixpence out of it to get my trunk carried to Windsor Terrace at night: it being too heavy for my strength, small as it was. I paid sixpence more for my dinner, which was a meat pie and a turn at a neighboring pump; and passed the hour which was allowed for that meal, in walking about the streets.

At the appointed time in the evening, Mr. Micawber reappeared. I washed my hands and face, to do the greater honor to his gentility, and we walked to our house, as I suppose I must now call it, together; Mr. Micawber impressing the names of streets, and the shapes of corner houses upon me, as we went along, that I might find my way back, easily, in the morning.

Arrived at his house in Windsor Terrace (which I noticed was shabby like himself, but also, like himself, made all the show it could), he presented me to Mrs. Micawber, a thin and faded lady, not at all young, who was sitting in the parlor (the first floor was altogether unfurnished, and the blinds were kept down to delude the neighbors), with a baby at her breast. This baby was one of twins; and I may remark here that I hardly ever, in all my experience of the family, saw both the twins detached from Mrs. Micawber at the same time. One of them was always taking refreshment.

There were two other children; Master Micawber, aged about four, and Miss Micawber, aged about three. These, and a dark-complexioned young woman, with a habit of snorting, who was servant to the family, and informed me, before half-an-hour had expired, that she was “a Orfling,” and came from St. Luke’s workhouse, in the neighborhood, completed the establishment. My room was at the top of the house, at the back: a close chamber; stencilled all over with an ornament which my young imagination represented as a blue muffin; and very scantily furnished.

“I never thought,” said Mrs. Micawber, when she came up, twin and all, to show me the apartment, and sat down to take breath, “before I was married, when I lived with papa and mama, that I should ever find it necessary to take a lodger. But Mr. Micawber being in difficulties, all considerations of private feelings must give way.”

I said: “Yes, ma’am.”

“Mr. Micawber’s difficulties are almost overwhelming just at present,” said Mrs. Micawber, “and whether it is possible to bring him through them, I don’t know. When I lived at home with papa and mama, I really should have hardly understood what the word meant, in the sense in which I now employ it, but experientia does it--as papa used to say.”

I cannot satisfy myself whether she told me that Mr. Micawber had been an officer in the Marines, or whether I have imagined it. I only know that I believe to this hour that he _was_ in the Marines once upon a time, without knowing why. He was a sort of town traveller for a number of miscellaneous houses, now; but made little or nothing of it, I am afraid.

“If Mr. Micawber’s creditors _will not_ give him time,” said Mrs. Micawber, “they must take the consequences; and the sooner they bring it to an issue the better. Blood cannot be obtained from a stone, neither can anything on account be obtained at present (not to mention law expenses) from Mr. Micawber.”

I never can quite understand whether my precocious self-dependence confused Mrs. Micawber in reference to my age, or whether she was so full of the subject that she would have talked about it to the very twins if there had been nobody else to communicate with, but this was the strain in which she began, and she went on accordingly all the time I knew her.

Poor Mrs. Micawber! She said she had tried to exert herself; and so, I have no doubt, she had. The centre of the street door was perfectly covered with a great brass plate, on which was engraved, “Mrs. Micawber’s Boarding Establishment for Young Ladies,” but I never found that any young lady had ever been to school there; or that any young lady ever came, or proposed to come; or that the least preparation was ever made to receive any young lady. The only visitors I ever saw or heard of, were creditors. _They_ used to come at all hours, and some of them were quite ferocious. One dirty-faced man, I think he was a bootmaker, used to edge himself into the passage as early as seven o’clock in the morning, and call up the stairs to Mr. Micawber--“Come! You ain’t out yet, you know. Pay us, will you? Don’t hide, you know; that’s mean. I wouldn’t be mean if I was you. Pay us, will you? You just pay us, d’ye hear? Come!” Receiving no answer to these taunts, he would mount in his wrath to the words “swindlers” and “robbers”; and these being ineffectual, too, would sometimes go to the extremity of crossing the street, and roaring up at the windows of the second floor, where he knew Mr. Micawber was. At these times, Mr. Micawber would be transported with grief and mortification, even to the length (as I was once made aware by a scream from his wife) of making motions at himself with a razor; but within half an hour afterwards, he would polish up his shoes with extraordinary pains, and go out, humming a tune with a greater air of gentility than ever. Mrs. Micawber was quite as elastic. I have known her to be thrown into fainting fits by the King’s taxes at three o’clock, and to eat lamb chops, breaded, and drink warm ale (paid for with two teaspoons that had gone to the pawnbroker’s) at four. On one occasion, when an execution had just been put in, coming home through some chance as early as six o’clock, I saw her lying (of course with a twin) under the grate in a swoon, with her hair all torn about her face; but I never knew her more cheerful than she was, that very same night, over a veal cutlet before the kitchen fire, telling me stories about her papa and mama, and the company they used to keep.

* * * * *

The Micawbers’ affairs went from bad to worse, and Mrs. Micawber called David into consultation.

* * * * *

“Master Copperfield,” said Mrs. Micawber, “I make no stranger of you, and therefore do not hesitate to say that Mr. Micawber’s difficulties are coming to a crisis.”

It made me very miserable to hear it, and I looked at Mrs. Micawber’s red eyes with the utmost sympathy.

“With the exception of the heel of a Dutch cheese--which is not adapted to the wants of a young family,” said Mrs. Micawber--“there is really not a scrap of anything in the larder. I was accustomed to speak of the larder when I lived with papa and mama, and I use the word almost unconsciously. What I mean to express is, that there is nothing to eat in the house.”

“Dear me!” I said, in great concern.

I had two or three shillings of my week’s money in my pocket--from which I presume that it must have been on a Wednesday night when we held this conversation--and I hastily produced them, and with heartfelt emotion begged Mrs. Micawber to accept of them as a loan. But that lady, kissing me, and making me put them back in my pocket, replied that she couldn’t think of it.

“No, my dear Master Copperfield,” said she, “far be it from my thoughts! But you have a discretion beyond your years, and can render me another kind of service, if you will; and a service I will thankfully accept of.”

I begged Mrs. Micawber to name it.

“I have parted with the plate myself,” said Mrs. Micawber. “Six tea, two salt, and a pair of sugars, I have at different times borrowed money on, in secret, with my own hands. But the twins are a great tie; and to me, with my recollections of papa and mama, these transactions are very painful. There are still a few trifles that we could part with. Mr. Micawber’s feelings would never allow _him_ to dispose of them; and Clickett”--this was the girl from the workhouse--“being of a vulgar mind, would take painful liberties if so much confidence was reposed in her. Master Copperfield, if I might ask you----”

I understood Mrs. Micawber now, and begged her to make use of me to any extent. I began to dispose of the more portable articles of property that very evening; and went out on a similar expedition almost every morning, before I went to Murdstone and Grinby’s.

* * * * *

At last Mr. Micawber’s affairs got into such a bad state that he had to leave London. David tells of the parting.

* * * * *

I passed my evenings with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber, during the remaining term of our residence under the same roof; and I think we became fonder of one another as the time went on. On the last Sunday, they invited me to dinner; and we had a loin of pork and apple sauce, and a pudding. I had bought a spotted wooden horse overnight as a parting gift to little Wilkins Micawber--that was the boy--and a doll for little Emma. I had also bestowed a shilling on the Orfling, who was about to be disbanded.

We had a very pleasant day, though we were all in a tender state about our approaching separation.

“I shall never, Master Copperfield,” said Mrs. Micawber, “revert to the period when Mr. Micawber was in difficulties without thinking of you. Your conduct has always been of the most delicate and obliging description. You have never been a lodger. You have been a friend.”

“My dear,” said Mr. Micawber, “Copperfield,” for so he had been accustomed to call me of late, “has a heart to feel for the distresses of his fellow-creatures when they are behind a cloud, and a head to plan, and a hand to--in short, a general ability to dispose of such available property as could be made away with.”

I expressed my sense of this commendation, and said I was very sorry we were going to lose one another.

“My dear young friend,” said Mr. Micawber, “I am older than you; a man of some experience in life, and--and of some experience, in short, in difficulties, generally speaking. At present, and until something turns up (which I am, I may say, hourly expecting), I have nothing to bestow but advice. Still, my advice is so far worth taking, that--in short, that I have never taken it myself, and am the”--here Mr. Micawber, who had been beaming and smiling, all over his head and face, up to the present moment, checked himself and frowned--“the miserable wretch you behold.”

“My dear Micawber!” urged his wife.

“I say,” returned Mr. Micawber, quite forgetting himself, and smiling again, “the miserable wretch you behold. My advice is, never do to-morrow what you can do to-day. Procrastination is the thief of time. Collar him!”

“My poor papa’s maxim,” Mrs. Micawber observed.

“My dear,” said Mr. Micawber, “your papa was very well in his way, and Heaven forbid that I should disparage him. Take him for all in all, we ne’er shall--in short, make the acquaintance, probably, of anybody else possessing, at his time of life, the same legs for gaiters, and able to read the same description of print without spectacles. But he applied that maxim to our marriage, my dear; and that was so far prematurely entered into, in consequence, that I never recovered the expense.”

Mr. Micawber looked aside at Mrs. Micawber, and added: “Not that I am sorry for it. Quite the contrary, my love.” After which he was grave for a minute or so.

“My other piece of advice, Copperfield,” said Mr. Micawber, “you know. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen ought and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery. The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, the God of day goes down upon the dreary scene, and--and in short you are for ever floored. As I am!”

To make his example the more impressive, Mr. Micawber drank a glass of punch with an air of great enjoyment and satisfaction and whistled the College Hornpipe.

I did not fail to assure him that I would store these precepts in my mind, though indeed I had no need to do so, for, at the time, they affected me visibly. Next morning I met the whole family at the coach office, and saw them, with a desolate heart, take their places outside, at the back.

“Master Copperfield,” said Mrs. Micawber, “God bless you! I never can forget all that, you know, and I never would if I could.”

“Copperfield,” said Mr. Micawber, “farewell. Every happiness and prosperity. If, in the progress of revolving years, I could persuade myself that my blighted destiny had been a warning to you, I should feel that I had not occupied another man’s place in existence altogether in vain. In case of anything turning up (of which I am rather confident), I shall be extremely happy if it should be in my power to improve your prospects.”

I think, as Mrs. Micawber sat at the back of the coach, with the children, and I stood in the road looking wistfully at them, a mist cleared from her eyes, and she saw what a little creature I really was. I think so, because she beckoned to me to climb up, with quite a new and motherly expression in her face, and put her arm round my neck, and gave me just such a kiss as she might have given to her own boy. I had barely time to get down again before the coach started, and I could hardly see the family for the handkerchiefs they waved. It was gone in a minute.

ON THE ROAD TO DOVER

VI

ON THE ROAD TO DOVER

AFTER his friends the Micawbers had left London David Copperfield was very lonesome and decided to set out on a journey and find his aunt, Miss Betsy Trotwood. He had a box which he intended to send to the coach office in Dover, and he had a half-guinea in his pocket.

Unfortunately he met a long-legged young man who was driving a donkey cart, who robbed him of his box and his money. David followed the young man as long as he could and then sat down by the side of the road. He searched his pockets and found only three halfpence. But his experience with Mr. Micawber had taught him that he could borrow money at a pawn-shop. He tells the story of what happened.

* * * * *

I went to the next street and took off my waistcoat, rolled it neatly under my arm, and came to the shop door. Mr. Dolloby was the name over the door.

Mr. Dolloby took the waistcoat, spread it on the counter, held it up against the light, and at last said:

“What do you call a price for this here little weskit?”

“Oh, you know best, sir,” I returned modestly.

“I can’t be buyer and seller too,” said Mr. Dolloby. “Put a price on this little weskit.”

“Would eighteen pence be--” I hinted.

Mr. Dolloby rolled it up again and gave it back to me.

“I should rob my family if I was to offer ninepence for it.”

This was a disagreeable way of putting it, for I did not want to ask Mr. Dolloby to rob his family on my account. I would have to make the best of my way to Dover in a shirt and a pair of trousers.

That night I lay behind a wall. Never shall I forget the feeling of loneliness as I lay down without a roof over my head. But soon I was asleep, and slept until the warm beams of the sun awoke me.

The next day was Sunday. In due time I heard the church bells ringing. I passed a church or two where the congregations were inside. The peace and rest of Sunday morning were on everything but me. I felt quite wicked in my dust and dirt, and my tangled hair.

I got that Sunday to the bridge at Rochester footsore and tired, and eating food that I had bought for supper. I toiled on to Chatham and crept upon a sort of grass-grown battery, where a sentry was walking to and fro. Here I lay near a cannon, happy in the society of the sentry’s footsteps, though he knew nothing of my being there.

Very stiff and sore of foot I was in the morning, and quite dazed by the beating of drums and marching of troops, which seemed to hem me in on every side when I went down toward the long, narrow street. Feeling that I could go but a very little way that day, if I were to reserve my strength for getting to my journey’s end, I resolved to make the sale of my jacket its principal business. Accordingly, I took the jacket off, that I might learn to do without it; and carrying it under my arm, began a tour of inspection of the various slop-shops.

It was a likely place to sell a jacket in; for the dealers in second-hand clothes were numerous, and were, generally speaking, on the lookout for customers at their shop doors. But, as most of them had, hanging up among their stock, an officer’s coat or two, epaulets and all, I was rendered timid by the costly nature of their dealings, and walked about for a long time without offering my merchandise to any one.

This modesty of mine directed my attention to the marine-store shops, and such shops as Mr. Dolloby’s, in preference to the regular dealers. At last I found one that I thought looked promising, at the corner of a dirty lane, ending in an inclosure full of stinging nettles, against the palings of which some second-hand sailors’ clothes, that seemed to have overflown the shop, were fluttering among some cots, and rusty guns, and oilskin hats, and certain trays full of so many old rusty keys of so many sizes that they seemed various enough to open all the doors in the world.

Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was darkened rather than lighted by a little window, overhung with clothes, and was descended into by some steps, I went with a palpitating heart; which was not relieved when an ugly old man, with the lower part of his face all covered with a stubby gray beard, rushed out of a dirty den behind it, and seized me by the hair of my head. He was a dreadful old man to look at, in a filthy flannel waistcoat, and smelling terribly of rum. His bedstead, covered with a tumbled and ragged piece of patchwork, was in the den he had come from, where another little window showed a prospect of more stinging nettles, and a lame donkey.

“Oh, what do you want?” grinned this old man in a fierce, monotonous whine. “Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo, goroo!”

I was so much dismayed by these words, and particularly by the repetition of the last unknown one, which was a kind of rattle in his throat, that I could make no answer; whereupon the old man, still holding me by the hair, repeated:

“Oh, what do you want? Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want?”

“I want to know,” I said trembling, “if you would buy a jacket?”

“Oh, let’s see the jacket. Bring the jacket out.”

With that he took his trembling hands, which were like the claws of a bird, out of my hair.

“How much for the jacket?” cried the old man. “Oh, goroo, how much for the jacket?”

“Half a crown,” I answered.

“Oh, my lungs and liver, no. Oh, my eyes, no. Eighteen pence. Goroo.”

Every time he said goroo his eyes seemed in danger of popping out of his head.

“Well,” said I, “I’ll take eighteen pence.”

“Oh, my liver,” cried the old man, throwing the jacket on the shelf. “Get out of the shop. Don’t ask for money, make it an exchange.”

He made many attempts to make me consent to an exchange, at one time coming out with a fishing-rod, at another with a fiddle, at another with a cocked hat, at another with a flute. But I wanted the money to buy food. At last he began to pay me in halfpence at a time, and was full two hours getting by easy stages to a shilling.

My bed that night was under a haystack, where I rested comfortably, after having washed my blistered feet in a stream. When I took the road again next morning it was through hop fields and orchards. The orchards were ruddy with bright apples, and in a few places the hop-pickers were already at work. I thought it all extremely beautiful, and I would have enjoyed it if it had not been for the people I met on the road.

The trampers were worse than ever that day, and inspired me with a dread that is yet quite fresh in my mind. Some of them were most ferocious looking ruffians, who stared at me as I went by; and stopped, perhaps, and called after me to come back and speak to them; and when I took to my heels, stoned me. I recollect one young fellow--a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier--who had a woman with him, and who faced about and stared at me thus; and then roared at me in such a tremendous voice to come back, that I halted and looked round.

“Come here, when you’re called,” said the tinker, “or I’ll rip your young body open.”

I thought it best to go back. As I drew nearer to them, trying to propitiate the tinker by my looks, I observed that the woman had a black eye.

“Where are you going?” said the tinker, gripping the bosom of my shirt with his blackened hand.

“I’m going to Dover,” I said.

“Where do you come from?” asked the tinker, giving his hand another turn in my shirt to hold me more securely.

“I come from London,” I said.

“What lay are you upon?” asked the tinker. “Are you a prig?”

“N--no,” I said.

“Ain’t you! If you make a brag of your honesty to me,” said the tinker, “I’ll knock your brains out.”

With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me, and then looked at me from head to foot.

“Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you?” said the tinker. “If you have, out with it, afore I take it away.”

I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman’s look, and saw her very slightly shake her head, and form “No” with her lips.

“I am very poor,” I said, attempting to smile, “and have got no money.”

“Why, what do you mean?” said the tinker, looking so sternly at me, that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket.

“Sir!” I stammered.

“What do you mean,” said the tinker, “by wearing my brother’s silk handkerchief? Give it over here!” And he had mine off my neck in a moment, and tossed it to the woman.

The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this a joke, and tossing it back to me, nodded once, as slightly as before, and made the word “Go!” with her lips.

It was on the sixth day of my flight that I came to my aunt’s house. My shoes were by this time in a woeful condition. My hat was crushed and bent. My shirt and trousers were stained with peat, dew, grass, and the Kentish soil on which I had slept. My hair had known no comb or brush since I left London. From head to foot I was powdered with chalk as if I had come out of a lime kiln.

There came out of the house a lady with a handkerchief tied over her cap, a pair of gardening gloves on her hands, and carrying a great knife. I knew her, immediately, to be my Aunt Betsy.

“Go away!” said Miss Betsy, shaking her head. “Go along! No boys here!”

“If you please, ma’am,” I began. She started and looked up.

“If you please, aunt.”

“Eh!” exclaimed Miss Betsy in a tone of amazement I have never heard approached.

“If you please, aunt, I am your nephew.”

“Oh, Lord!” said my aunt, and sat flat down on the garden path.

“I am David Copperfield. I have been very unhappy since my mother died. I was put to work that was not fit for me. It made me run away to you. I was robbed when I set out and have walked all the way and have never slept in a bed since I began the journey.”

My aunt got up in a great hurry, collared me and took me into the parlor. Her first proceeding was to unlock a tall cupboard, bring forth several bottles, and pour some of the contents of each into my mouth. I think they must have been taken out at random, for I am sure I tasted aniseed water, anchovy sauce, and salad dressing. Then she put me on the sofa, with a shawl under my head, and, sitting by my side, repeated at intervals, “Mercy on us!”

Then I was given a bath, which was a great comfort. For I began to be sensitive of pains from lying out in the fields. When I had bathed they enrobed me in a shirt and a pair of trousers too big for me, and tied me up in two or three big shawls. What sort of a bundle I looked like I do not know. Feeling very drowsy, I lay down on the sofa and was soon fast asleep.

Then I was put to bed in a pleasant room at the top of the house. It was overlooking the sea, on which the moon was shining. After I had said my prayers and the candle had burned out I sat looking at the moonlight on the water. Then I turned to the white curtained bed. I remember how I thought of all the solitary places under the night sky where I had slept, and I prayed that I might never be houseless any more, and never might forget the houseless.

JOE THE FAT BOY

VII

JOE THE FAT BOY

WHEN we think of famous people, we take for granted that they did something remarkable. But this is not always true. One of the most famous characters of fiction is the Fat Boy in _The Pickwick Papers_. Everybody remembers him. But what did he do to earn his reputation? He did nothing at all but go to sleep under all circumstances. It was his gift.

Joe was the footman, or rather the footboy, of Mr. Wardle, a good-natured gentleman who lived at Dingley Dell. Now four other good-natured gentlemen had started out from London in search of adventures. Their names were Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Tupman, and Mr. Winkle. They didn’t know where they were going, but that didn’t matter. They intended to have a good time and to see the country. When they returned they were sure that they would have something to tell about. So when they came to the pleasant city of Rochester, they were delighted to find that there was to be a great review of the troops. The soldiers were to take part in a mimic battle. Everything was to be like real war, except that nobody was to be hurt. This was just what Mr. Pickwick and his friends wanted to see.

It was all very fine so long as the soldiers were firing in other directions. But it was different when Mr. Pickwick saw the muskets pointed in their direction. This was getting decidedly dangerous.

“What are they doing now?” inquired Mr. Pickwick.

“I rather think,” said Mr. Winkle, “that they are going to fire.”

“Nonsense,” said Mr. Pickwick.

“I--I--really think they are,” urged Mr. Snodgrass, somewhat alarmed.

“Impossible,” replied Mr. Pickwick. He had hardly uttered the words when the whole half-dozen regiments levelled their muskets at Mr. Pickwick and his friends, and there burst forth the most tremendous discharge. Mr. Pickwick assured his friends that there was no danger.

“But suppose,” said Mr. Winkle, “that some of the men should have ball cartridges by mistake. I heard something whistle in the air just now.”

“We had better throw ourselves on our faces, hadn’t we?” said Mr. Snodgrass.

“No, it’s over now,” said Mr. Pickwick.

But it wasn’t over. A minute after, the order was given to charge with fixed bayonets, and Mr. Pickwick and his friends saw the six regiments charging across the field to the very spot where they were standing.

“Get out of the way!” cried the officers.

“Where are we to go to?” screamed Mr. Pickwick.

There was nothing for Mr. Pickwick and his friends to do but to get out of the way as fast as they could. There was a gentle wind blowing, and it carried Mr. Pickwick’s hat across the field. He ran after it as fast as he could, till it went under the wheels of a carriage from which the horses had been taken out. In the carriage was a stout old gentleman in a blue coat and bright buttons, corduroy breeches and top boots, two young ladies in scarfs and feathers, and an aunt. At the back of the carriage was a huge hamper with cold chicken, ham, tongue, and all the materials for a picnic, and on the box sat a very fat and very red-faced boy, sound asleep.

The stout gentleman in the blue coat was Mr. Wardle, who instantly became a warm friend of Mr. Pickwick, and invited him to get into the carriage and have something to eat.

“Come along, sir, pray come up. Joe! That boy has gone to sleep again. Joe, let down the steps.” The fat boy rolled slowly off the box, let down the steps, and held the carriage door invitingly open.

“Room for you all, gentlemen,” said the stout man. “Joe, make room for one of these gentlemen on the box. Now, sir, come along.” And he pulled Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Snodgrass in by main force.

When they were all in the carriage, Mr. Wardle called to Joe, who had again gone to sleep, to prepare for the lunch.

“Now Joe, knives and forks.” The knives and forks were handed to the ladies and gentlemen inside.

“Plates, Joe, plates!” But Joe had dropped to sleep again. “Now, Joe, the fowls. Come hand in the eatables!”

There was something in the last words that roused Joe to the greatest activity, for he was always ready to eat.

“That’s right--look sharp. Now the tongue--now the pigeon pie. Take care of the veal and ham--mind the lobsters--take the salad out of the cloth--give me the dressing.” The various dishes were placed in everybody’s hands and on everybody’s knees.

“Now, ain’t this capital?” inquired Mr. Wardle.

“Capital!” said Mr. Winkle, who was carving a fowl on the box.

Everybody was eating and talking at the same time, and they felt that they had always known each other. All except Joe, who preferred a nap to conversation.

“Very extraordinary boy, that,” said Mr. Pickwick. “Does he always sleep that way?”

“Sleep!” said the old gentleman, “he’s always asleep. Goes on errands fast asleep, and snores as he waits at the table.”

“How very odd,” said Mr. Pickwick.

“Ah! odd indeed,” returned the old gentleman; “I’m proud of that boy--wouldn’t part with him on any account--he’s a natural curiosity! Here, Joe--Joe--take these things away, and open another bottle--d’ye hear?”

The fat boy rose, opened his eyes, swallowed the huge piece of pie he had been in the act of masticating when he last fell asleep, and slowly obeyed his master’s orders--gloating languidly over the remains of the feast, as he removed the plates, and deposited them in the hamper. The fresh bottle was produced, and speedily emptied: the hamper was made fast in its old place--the fat boy once more mounted the box--the spectacles and pocket-glass were again adjusted--and the evolutions of the military recommenced. There was a great fizzing and banging of guns, and starting of ladies--and then a mine was sprung, to the gratification of everybody--and when the mine had gone off, the military and the company followed its example, and went off too.

“Now, mind,” said the old gentleman, as he shook hands with Mr. Pickwick at the conclusion of a conversation which had been carried on at intervals, during the conclusion of the proceedings--“we shall see you all to-morrow.”

“Most certainly,” replied Mr. Pickwick.

“You have got the address?”

“Manor Farm, Dingley Dell,” said Mr. Pickwick, consulting his pocket-book.

“That’s it,” said the old gentleman. “I don’t let you off, mind, under a week; and undertake that you shall see everything worth seeing. If you’ve come down for a country life, come to me, and I’ll give you plenty of it. Joe--he’s gone to sleep again--Joe, help Tom put in the horses.”

The horses were put in--the driver mounted--the fat boy clambered up by his side--farewells were exchanged--and the carriage rattled off. As the Pickwickians turned round to take a last glimpse of it, the setting sun cast a rich glow on the faces of their entertainers, and fell upon the form of the fat boy. His head was sunk upon his bosom; and he slumbered again.

OLIVER TWIST

VIII

OLIVER TWIST

OLIVER TWIST was born in a poorhouse, where his mother died. The superintendent, Mr. Bumble, was a detestable man, who did all that he could to make the paupers in his institution even more unhappy than they were. He fed the boys on very thin gruel and gave them very little of that. One day when he was particularly hungry, Oliver said:

“Please, sir, I want some more.”

Every one was horrified, and poor Oliver was beaten and shut up in a little room where he could meditate on his sin. Soon after, he was given into the hands of Mr. Sowerberry, who was as cruel as Mr. Bumble himself. The upshot of it was that Oliver put a crust of bread, a shirt and two pairs of stockings in a bundle, and ran away. Of course, there was only one place to run away to, and that was London.

Oliver had been six days on the London road when he limped into the little town of Barnet. There he met a boy of his own age, who was the queerest-looking creature he had ever seen. His name was Jack Dawkins, but he was known by all the people who knew him as the Artful Dodger. He was a snub-nosed boy with a dirty face. His hat was on one side of his head and was always about to fall off. He wore a ragged coat which was too large for him, and had turned the coat-sleeves back half-way up his arms.

_Copyright by Charles Scribner’s Sons_

OLIVER’S FIRST MEETING WITH THE ARTFUL DODGER]

“Hullo, what’s the row?” said the Artful Dodger.

“I am very hungry and tired. I have walked a long way. I have been walking seven days.”

“Walking for sivin days! Come, you want grub, and you shall have it.”

He took Oliver into a little shop and bought some ham and bread, which was quietly devoured.

“Going to London?” said the strange boy.

“Yes.”

“Got any lodgings?”

“No.”

“Money?”

“No.”

The strange boy whistled; and put his hands into his pockets, as far as the big coat-sleeves would let them go.

“Do you live in London?” inquired Oliver.

“Yes, I do, when I’m at home,” replied the boy. “I suppose you want some place to sleep in to-night, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do,” answered Oliver. “I have not slept under a roof since I left the country.”

“Don’t fret your eyelids on that score,” said the boy. “I’ve got to be in London to-night; and I know a ’spectable old genelman as lives there, wot’ll give you lodgings for nothink, and never ask for the change; that is, if any genelman he knows interduces you. And don’t he know me? Oh, no! Not in the least! By no means. Certainly not!”

So Oliver Twist went with the Artful Dodger through the narrowest and crookedest streets in London till he came to the house of old Fagin, who kept a school for pickpockets. Every day the boys would be sent out on the streets and would come home at night with pocket-handkerchiefs and purses which they had snatched from people in the crowds.

Five or six boys were in the room, and Fagin was cooking sausages in a frying-pan.

“This is him, Fagin,” said the Artful Dodger; “my friend Oliver Twist.”

Fagin grinned, and shook hands. “We are glad to see you, Oliver. Dodger, take off the sausages and draw a tub near the fire for Oliver. Ah, you’re a-staring at the pocket-handkerchiefs! eh, my dear? We’ve just looked ’em out, ready for the wash; that’s all, Oliver; that’s all.”

Oliver wondered very much why they had so many handkerchiefs. Fagin employed him in picking out the marks in them, and that kept him busy for several days. One day he went out with the Artful Dodger and his friend Charley Bates. Dickens tells the story of their adventure:

The three boys sallied out; the Dodger with his coat-sleeves tucked up, and his hat cocked, as usual; Master Bates sauntering along with his hands in his pockets; and Oliver between them: wondering where they were going: and what branch of manufacture he would be instructed in, first.

The pace at which they went, was such a very lazy, ill-looking saunter, that Oliver soon began to think his companions were going to deceive the old gentleman, by not going to work at all. The Dodger had a vicious propensity, too, of pulling the caps from the heads of small boys and tossing them down areas; while Charley Bates exhibited some very loose notions concerning the rights of property, by pilfering divers apples and onions from the stalls at the kennel sides, and thrusting them into pockets which were so surprisingly capacious, that they seemed to undermine his whole suit of clothes in every direction. These things looked so bad, that Oliver was on the point of declaring his intention of seeking his way back, in the best way he could; when his thoughts were suddenly directed into another channel, by a very mysterious change of behavior on the part of the Dodger.

They were just emerging from a narrow court not far from the open square in Clerkenwell, which is yet called, by some strange perversion of terms, “The Green,” when the Dodger made a sudden stop and, laying his finger on his lip, drew his companions back again, with the greatest caution and circumspection.

“What’s the matter?” demanded Oliver.

“Hush!” replied the Dodger. “Do you see that old cove at the book-stall?”

“The old gentleman over the way?” said Oliver. “Yes, I see him.”

“He’ll do,” said the Dodger.

“A prime plant,” observed Master Charley Bates.

Oliver looked from one to the other, with the greatest surprise; but he was not permitted to make any inquiries; for the two boys walked stealthily across the road, and slunk close behind the old gentleman towards whom his attention had been directed. Oliver walked a few paces after them; and, not knowing whether to advance or retire, stood looking on in silent amazement.

The old gentleman was a very respectable-looking personage, with a powdered head and gold spectacles. He was dressed in a bottle-green coat with a black velvet collar; wore white trousers; and carried a smart bamboo cane under his arm. He had taken up a book from the stall, and there he stood, reading away, as hard as if he were in his elbow-chair, in his own study. It is very possible that he fancied himself there, indeed; for it was plain, from his utter abstraction, that he saw not the book-stall, nor the street, nor the boys, nor, in short, anything but the book itself; which he was reading straight through; turning over the leaf when he got to the bottom of a page, beginning at the top line of the next one, and going regularly on, with the greatest interest and eagerness.

What was Oliver’s horror and alarm as he stood a few paces off, looking on with his eyelids as wide open as they would possibly go, to see the Dodger plunge his hand into the old gentleman’s pocket and draw from thence a handkerchief! To see him hand the same to Charley Bates; and finally to behold them, both, running away around the corner at full speed!

In an instant the whole mystery of the handkerchiefs, and the watches, and the jewels, rushed upon the boy’s mind. He stood, for a moment, with the blood so tingling through all his veins from terror, that he felt as if he were in a burning fire; then, confused and frightened, he took to his heels and, not knowing what he did, made off as fast as he could lay his feet to the ground.

This was all done in a minute’s space. In the very instant when Oliver began to run, the old gentleman, putting his hand to his pocket, and missing his handkerchief, turned sharp round. Seeing the boy scudding away at such a rapid pace, he very naturally concluded him to be the depredator; and, shouting “Stop thief!” with all his might made off after him, book in hand.

But the old gentleman was not the only person who raised the hue-and-cry. The Dodger and Master Bates, unwilling to attract public attention by running down the open street, had merely retired into the very first doorway round the corner. They no sooner heard the cry, and saw Oliver running, than, guessing exactly how the matter stood, they issued forth with great promptitude and, shouting “Stop thief!” too, joined in the pursuit like good citizens.

Although Oliver had been brought up by philosophers, he was not theoretically acquainted with the beautiful axiom that self-preservation is the first law of nature. If he had been, perhaps he would have been prepared for this. Not being prepared, however, it alarmed him the more; so away he went like the wind, with the old gentleman and the two boys roaring and shouting behind him.

“Stop thief! Stop thief!” There is a magic in the sound. The tradesman leaves his counter, and the carman his wagon; the butcher throws down his tray; the baker his basket; the milkman his pail; the errand-boy his parcels; the schoolboy his marbles; the pavior his pickaxe; the child his battledore. Away they run, pell-mell, helter-skelter, slap-dash: tearing, yelling, and screaming: knocking down the passengers as they turn the corners, rousing up the dogs, and astonishing the fowls: and streets, squares, and courts re-echo with the sound.

“Stop thief! Stop thief!” The cry is taken up by a hundred voices, and the crowd accumulates at every turning. Away they fly, splashing through the mud, and rattling along the pavements: up go the windows, out run the people, onward bear the mob, a whole audience desert Punch in the very thickest of the plot, and, joining the rushing throng, swell the shout, and lend fresh vigor to the cry, “Stop thief! Stop thief!”

“Stop thief! Stop thief!” There is a passion _for hunting something_ deeply implanted in the human breast. One wretched breathless child, panting with exhaustion; terror in his looks; agony in his eyes; large drops of perspiration streaming down his face; strains every nerve to make head upon his pursuers; and as they follow on his track, and gain upon him every instant, they hail his decreasing strength with still louder shouts, and whoop and scream with joy. “Stop thief!” Ay, stop him for God’s sake, were it only in mercy!

Stopped at last. A clever blow. He is down upon the pavement; and the crowd eagerly gather round him: each newcomer, jostling and struggling with the others to catch a glimpse. “Stand aside!” “Give him a little air!” “Nonsense! he don’t deserve it.” “Where’s the gentleman?” “Here he is, coming down the street.” “Make room there for the gentleman!” “Is this the boy, sir!” “Yes.”

Oliver lay, covered with mud and dust, and bleeding from the mouth, looking wildly round upon the heap of faces that surrounded him, when the old gentleman was officiously dragged and pushed into the circle by the foremost of the pursuers.

“Yes,” said the gentleman, “I am afraid it is.”

“Afraid!” murmured the crowd. “That’s a good ’un.”

“Poor fellow!” said the gentleman, “he has hurt himself.”

“_I_ did that, sir,” said a great lubberly fellow, stepping forward; “and preciously I cut my knuckle agin his mouth. _I_ stopped him, sir.”

The fellow touched his hat with a grin, expecting something for his pains; but the old gentleman, eyeing him with an expression of dislike, looked anxiously round, as if he contemplated running away himself: which it is very possible he might have attempted to do, and thus afforded another chase, had not a police officer (who is generally the last person to arrive in such cases) at that moment made his way through the crowd, and seized Oliver by the collar.

“Come, get up,” said the man, roughly.

“It wasn’t me indeed, sir. Indeed, indeed, it was two other boys,” said Oliver, clasping his hands passionately, and looking round. “They are here somewhere.”

“Oh no, they ain’t,” said the officer. He meant this to be ironical, but it was true besides; for the Dodger and Charley Bates had filed off down the first convenient court they came to. “Come, get up!”

“Don’t hurt him,” said the old gentleman, compassionately.

“Oh no, I won’t hurt him,” replied the officer, tearing his jacket half off his back, in proof thereof. “Come, I know you; it won’t do. Will you stand upon your legs, you young devil?”

Oliver, who could hardly stand, made a shift to raise himself on his feet, and was at once lugged along the streets by the jacket-collar, at a rapid pace. The gentleman walked on with them by the officer’s side; and as many of the crowd as could achieve the feat, got a little ahead, and stared back at Oliver from time to time. The boys shouted in triumph; and on they went.

* * * * *

Fortunately this time things turned out for the best for Oliver. The old gentleman, whose name was Brownlow, believed his story and took him to his own home, where he treated him as if he were his own son. They lived in a pleasant house on a quiet street, and Mrs. Brownlow was as kind as her husband.

This was only one of the adventures of Oliver Twist. He always seemed to be falling in with unusually bad people, and then being rescued by unusually kind people, who lost no time in receiving him as one of the family. The changes in his fortune were as sudden as those in the _Arabian Nights_. But then everything came out right in the end.

THE JELLYBY CHILDREN

IX

THE JELLYBY CHILDREN