No More Learning

Peggotty
meant by this figure, expressive of a complete circle of intelligence. I
then thanked him heartily; and said, with a consciousness of reddening,
that I supposed little Em'ly was altered too, since we used to pick up
shells and pebbles on the beach?

'She's getting to be a woman, that's wot she's getting to be,' said Mr.
Peggotty. 'Ask HIM. ' He meant Ham, who beamed with delight and assent
over the bag of shrimps.

'Her pretty face! ' said Mr. Peggotty, with his own shining like a light.

'Her learning! ' said Ham.

'Her writing! ' said Mr. Peggotty. 'Why it's as black as jet! And so
large it is, you might see it anywheres. '

It was perfectly delightful to behold with what enthusiasm Mr. Peggotty
became inspired when he thought of his little favourite. He stands
before me again, his bluff hairy face irradiating with a joyful love and
pride, for which I can find no description. His honest eyes fire up, and
sparkle, as if their depths were stirred by something bright. His broad
chest heaves with pleasure. His strong loose hands clench themselves,
in his earnestness; and he emphasizes what he says with a right arm that
shows, in my pigmy view, like a sledge-hammer.

Ham was quite as earnest as he. I dare say they would have said much
more about her, if they had not been abashed by the unexpected coming in
of Steerforth, who, seeing me in a corner speaking with two strangers,
stopped in a song he was singing, and said: 'I didn't know you were
here, young Copperfield! ' (for it was not the usual visiting room) and
crossed by us on his way out.

I am not sure whether it was in the pride of having such a friend as
Steerforth, or in the desire to explain to him how I came to have such a
friend as Mr. Peggotty, that I called to him as he was going away. But I
said, modestly--Good Heaven, how it all comes back to me this long time
afterwards--!

'Don't go, Steerforth, if you please. These are two Yarmouth
boatmen--very kind, good people--who are relations of my nurse, and have
come from Gravesend to see me. '

'Aye, aye? ' said Steerforth, returning. 'I am glad to see them. How are
you both? '

There was an ease in his manner--a gay and light manner it was, but not
swaggering--which I still believe to have borne a kind of enchantment
with it. I still believe him, in virtue of this carriage, his animal
spirits, his delightful voice, his handsome face and figure, and, for
aught I know, of some inborn power of attraction besides (which I think
a few people possess), to have carried a spell with him to which it was
a natural weakness to yield, and which not many persons could withstand.
I could not but see how pleased they were with him, and how they seemed
to open their hearts to him in a moment.

'You must let them know at home, if you please, Mr. Peggotty,' I said,
'when that letter is sent, that Mr. Steerforth is very kind to me, and
that I don't know what I should ever do here without him. '

'Nonsense! ' said Steerforth, laughing. 'You mustn't tell them anything
of the sort. '

'And if Mr. Steerforth ever comes into Norfolk or Suffolk, Mr.
Peggotty,' I said, 'while I am there, you may depend upon it I shall
bring him to Yarmouth, if he will let me, to see your house. You never
saw such a good house, Steerforth. It's made out of a boat! '

'Made out of a boat, is it? ' said Steerforth. 'It's the right sort of a
house for such a thorough-built boatman. '

'So 'tis, sir, so 'tis, sir,' said Ham, grinning. 'You're right, young
gen'l'm'n! Mas'r Davy bor', gen'l'm'n's right. A thorough-built boatman!
Hor, hor! That's what he is, too! '

Mr. Peggotty was no less pleased than his nephew, though his modesty
forbade him to claim a personal compliment so vociferously.

'Well, sir,' he said, bowing and chuckling, and tucking in the ends
of his neckerchief at his breast: 'I thankee, sir, I thankee! I do my
endeavours in my line of life, sir. '

'The best of men can do no more, Mr. Peggotty,' said Steerforth. He had
got his name already.

'I'll pound it, it's wot you do yourself, sir,' said Mr. Peggotty,
shaking his head, 'and wot you do well--right well! I thankee, sir. I'm
obleeged to you, sir, for your welcoming manner of me. I'm rough, sir,
but I'm ready--least ways, I hope I'm ready, you unnerstand. My house
ain't much for to see, sir, but it's hearty at your service if ever you
should come along with Mas'r Davy to see it. I'm a reg'lar Dodman,
I am,' said Mr. Peggotty, by which he meant snail, and this was in
allusion to his being slow to go, for he had attempted to go after every
sentence, and had somehow or other come back again; 'but I wish you both
well, and I wish you happy! '

Ham echoed this sentiment, and we parted with them in the heartiest
manner. I was almost tempted that evening to tell Steerforth about
pretty little Em'ly, but I was too timid of mentioning her name, and
too much afraid of his laughing at me. I remember that I thought a good
deal, and in an uneasy sort of way, about Mr. Peggotty having said that
she was getting on to be a woman; but I decided that was nonsense.

We transported the shellfish, or the 'relish' as Mr. Peggotty had
modestly called it, up into our room unobserved, and made a great supper
that evening. But Traddles couldn't get happily out of it. He was too
unfortunate even to come through a supper like anybody else. He was
taken ill in the night--quite prostrate he was--in consequence of Crab;
and after being drugged with black draughts and blue pills, to an extent
which Demple (whose father was a doctor) said was enough to undermine
a horse's constitution, received a caning and six chapters of Greek
Testament for refusing to confess.

The rest of the half-year is a jumble in my recollection of the daily
strife and struggle of our lives; of the waning summer and the changing
season; of the frosty mornings when we were rung out of bed, and the
cold, cold smell of the dark nights when we were rung into bed again; of
the evening schoolroom dimly lighted and indifferently warmed, and the
morning schoolroom which was nothing but a great shivering-machine; of
the alternation of boiled beef with roast beef, and boiled mutton with
roast mutton; of clods of bread-and-butter, dog's-eared lesson-books,
cracked slates, tear-blotted copy-books, canings, rulerings,
hair-cuttings, rainy Sundays, suet-puddings, and a dirty atmosphere of
ink, surrounding all.

I well remember though, how the distant idea of the holidays, after
seeming for an immense time to be a stationary speck, began to come
towards us, and to grow and grow. How from counting months, we came to
weeks, and then to days; and how I then began to be afraid that I should
not be sent for and when I learnt from Steerforth that I had been sent
for, and was certainly to go home, had dim forebodings that I might
break my leg first. How the breaking-up day changed its place fast, at
last, from the week after next to next week, this week, the day after
tomorrow, tomorrow, today, tonight--when I was inside the Yarmouth mail,
and going home.

I had many a broken sleep inside the Yarmouth mail, and many an
incoherent dream of all these things. But when I awoke at intervals, the
ground outside the window was not the playground of Salem House, and the
sound in my ears was not the sound of Mr. Creakle giving it to Traddles,
but the sound of the coachman touching up the horses.



CHAPTER 8. MY HOLIDAYS. ESPECIALLY ONE HAPPY AFTERNOON


When we arrived before day at the inn where the mail stopped, which was
not the inn where my friend the waiter lived, I was shown up to a nice
little bedroom, with DOLPHIN painted on the door. Very cold I was, I
know, notwithstanding the hot tea they had given me before a large fire
downstairs; and very glad I was to turn into the Dolphin's bed, pull the
Dolphin's blankets round my head, and go to sleep.

Mr. Barkis the carrier was to call for me in the morning at nine
o'clock. I got up at eight, a little giddy from the shortness of my
night's rest, and was ready for him before the appointed time. He
received me exactly as if not five minutes had elapsed since we were
last together, and I had only been into the hotel to get change for
sixpence, or something of that sort.

As soon as I and my box were in the cart, and the carrier seated, the
lazy horse walked away with us all at his accustomed pace.

'You look very well, Mr. Barkis,' I said, thinking he would like to know
it.

Mr. Barkis rubbed his cheek with his cuff, and then looked at his cuff
as if he expected to find some of the bloom upon it; but made no other
acknowledgement of the compliment.

'I gave your message, Mr. Barkis,' I said: 'I wrote to Peggotty. '

'Ah! ' said Mr. Barkis.

Mr. Barkis seemed gruff, and answered drily.

'Wasn't it right, Mr. Barkis? ' I asked, after a little hesitation.

'Why, no,' said Mr. Barkis.

'Not the message? '

'The message was right enough, perhaps,' said Mr. Barkis; 'but it come
to an end there. '

Not understanding what he meant, I repeated inquisitively: 'Came to an
end, Mr. Barkis? '

'Nothing come of it,' he explained, looking at me sideways. 'No answer. '

'There was an answer expected, was there, Mr. Barkis? ' said I, opening
my eyes. For this was a new light to me.

'When a man says he's willin',' said Mr. Barkis, turning his glance
slowly on me again, 'it's as much as to say, that man's a-waitin' for a
answer. '

'Well, Mr. Barkis? '

'Well,' said Mr. Barkis, carrying his eyes back to his horse's ears;
'that man's been a-waitin' for a answer ever since. '

'Have you told her so, Mr. Barkis? '

'No--no,' growled Mr. Barkis, reflecting about it. 'I ain't got no call
to go and tell her so. I never said six words to her myself, I ain't
a-goin' to tell her so. '

'Would you like me to do it, Mr. Barkis? ' said I, doubtfully. 'You might
tell her, if you would,' said Mr. Barkis, with another slow look at me,
'that Barkis was a-waitin' for a answer. Says you--what name is it? '

'Her name? '

'Ah! ' said Mr. Barkis, with a nod of his head.

'Peggotty. '

'Chrisen name? Or nat'ral name? ' said Mr. Barkis.

'Oh, it's not her Christian name. Her Christian name is Clara. '

'Is it though? ' said Mr. Barkis.

He seemed to find an immense fund of reflection in this circumstance,
and sat pondering and inwardly whistling for some time.

'Well! ' he resumed at length. 'Says you, "Peggotty! Barkis is waitin'
for a answer. " Says she, perhaps, "Answer to what? " Says you, "To what I
told you. " "What is that? " says she. "Barkis is willin'," says you. '

This extremely artful suggestion Mr. Barkis accompanied with a nudge
of his elbow that gave me quite a stitch in my side. After that, he
slouched over his horse in his usual manner; and made no other reference
to the subject except, half an hour afterwards, taking a piece of chalk
from his pocket, and writing up, inside the tilt of the cart, 'Clara
Peggotty'--apparently as a private memorandum.

Ah, what a strange feeling it was to be going home when it was not home,
and to find that every object I looked at, reminded me of the happy old
home, which was like a dream I could never dream again! The days when my
mother and I and Peggotty were all in all to one another, and there was
no one to come between us, rose up before me so sorrowfully on the road,
that I am not sure I was glad to be there--not sure but that I would
rather have remained away, and forgotten it in Steerforth's company. But
there I was; and soon I was at our house, where the bare old elm-trees
wrung their many hands in the bleak wintry air, and shreds of the old
rooks'-nests drifted away upon the wind.

The carrier put my box down at the garden-gate, and left me. I walked
along the path towards the house, glancing at the windows, and fearing
at every step to see Mr. Murdstone or Miss Murdstone lowering out of
one of them. No face appeared, however; and being come to the house, and
knowing how to open the door, before dark, without knocking, I went in
with a quiet, timid step.

God knows how infantine the memory may have been, that was awakened
within me by the sound of my mother's voice in the old parlour, when I
set foot in the hall. She was singing in a low tone. I think I must have
lain in her arms, and heard her singing so to me when I was but a baby.
The strain was new to me, and yet it was so old that it filled my heart
brim-full; like a friend come back from a long absence.

I believed, from the solitary and thoughtful way in which my mother
murmured her song, that she was alone. And I went softly into the room.
She was sitting by the fire, suckling an infant, whose tiny hand she
held against her neck. Her eyes were looking down upon its face, and she
sat singing to it. I was so far right, that she had no other companion.

I spoke to her, and she started, and cried out. But seeing me, she
called me her dear Davy, her own boy! and coming half across the room
to meet me, kneeled down upon the ground and kissed me, and laid my head
down on her bosom near the little creature that was nestling there, and
put its hand to my lips.

I wish I had died. I wish I had died then, with that feeling in my
heart! I should have been more fit for Heaven than I ever have been
since.

'He is your brother,' said my mother, fondling me. 'Davy, my pretty boy!
My poor child! ' Then she kissed me more and more, and clasped me round
the neck. This she was doing when Peggotty came running in, and bounced
down on the ground beside us, and went mad about us both for a quarter
of an hour.

It seemed that I had not been expected so soon, the carrier being much
before his usual time. It seemed, too, that Mr. and Miss Murdstone had
gone out upon a visit in the neighbourhood, and would not return before
night. I had never hoped for this.
I had never thought it possible that
we three could be together undisturbed, once more; and I felt, for the
time, as if the old days were come back.

We dined together by the fireside. Peggotty was in attendance to wait
upon us, but my mother wouldn't let her do it, and made her dine with
us. I had my own old plate, with a brown view of a man-of-war in full
sail upon it, which Peggotty had hoarded somewhere all the time I
had been away, and would not have had broken, she said, for a hundred
pounds. I had my own old mug with David on it, and my own old little
knife and fork that wouldn't cut.

While we were at table, I thought it a favourable occasion to tell
Peggotty about Mr. Barkis, who, before I had finished what I had to tell
her, began to laugh, and throw her apron over her face.

'Peggotty,' said my mother. 'What's the matter? '

Peggotty only laughed the more, and held her apron tight over her face
when my mother tried to pull it away, and sat as if her head were in a
bag.

'What are you doing, you stupid creature? ' said my mother, laughing.

'Oh, drat the man! ' cried Peggotty. 'He wants to marry me. '

'It would be a very good match for you; wouldn't it? ' said my mother.

'Oh! I don't know,' said Peggotty. 'Don't ask me. I wouldn't have him if
he was made of gold. Nor I wouldn't have anybody. '

'Then, why don't you tell him so, you ridiculous thing? ' said my mother.

'Tell him so,' retorted Peggotty, looking out of her apron. 'He has
never said a word to me about it. He knows better. If he was to make so
bold as say a word to me, I should slap his face. '

Her own was as red as ever I saw it, or any other face, I think; but she
only covered it again, for a few moments at a time, when she was taken
with a violent fit of laughter; and after two or three of those attacks,
went on with her dinner.

I remarked that my mother, though she smiled when Peggotty looked at
her, became more serious and thoughtful. I had seen at first that she
was changed. Her face was very pretty still, but it looked careworn, and
too delicate; and her hand was so thin and white that it seemed to me
to be almost transparent. But the change to which I now refer was
superadded to this: it was in her manner, which became anxious and
fluttered. At last she said, putting out her hand, and laying it
affectionately on the hand of her old servant,

'Peggotty, dear, you are not going to be married? '

'Me, ma'am? ' returned Peggotty, staring. 'Lord bless you, no! '

'Not just yet? ' said my mother, tenderly.

'Never! ' cried Peggotty.

My mother took her hand, and said:

'Don't leave me, Peggotty. Stay with me. It will not be for long,
perhaps. What should I ever do without you! '

'Me leave you, my precious! ' cried Peggotty. 'Not for all the world and
his wife. Why, what's put that in your silly little head? '--For Peggotty
had been used of old to talk to my mother sometimes like a child.

But my mother made no answer, except to thank her, and Peggotty went
running on in her own fashion.

'Me leave you? I think I see myself. Peggotty go away from you? I should
like to catch her at it! No, no, no,' said Peggotty, shaking her head,
and folding her arms; 'not she, my dear. It isn't that there ain't some
Cats that would be well enough pleased if she did, but they sha'n't be
pleased. They shall be aggravated. I'll stay with you till I am a cross
cranky old woman. And when I'm too deaf, and too lame, and too blind,
and too mumbly for want of teeth, to be of any use at all, even to be
found fault with, than I shall go to my Davy, and ask him to take me
in. '

'And, Peggotty,' says I, 'I shall be glad to see you, and I'll make you
as welcome as a queen. '

'Bless your dear heart! ' cried Peggotty. 'I know you will! ' And she
kissed me beforehand, in grateful acknowledgement of my hospitality.
After that, she covered her head up with her apron again and had another
laugh about Mr. Barkis. After that, she took the baby out of its little
cradle, and nursed it. After that, she cleared the dinner table;
after that, came in with another cap on, and her work-box, and the
yard-measure, and the bit of wax-candle, all just the same as ever.

We sat round the fire, and talked delightfully. I told them what a hard
master Mr. Creakle was, and they pitied me very much. I told them what a
fine fellow Steerforth was, and what a patron of mine, and Peggotty said
she would walk a score of miles to see him. I took the little baby in
my arms when it was awake, and nursed it lovingly. When it was asleep
again, I crept close to my mother's side according to my old custom,
broken now a long time, and sat with my arms embracing her waist, and my
little red cheek on her shoulder, and once more felt her beautiful
hair drooping over me--like an angel's wing as I used to think, I
recollect--and was very happy indeed.

While I sat thus, looking at the fire, and seeing pictures in the
red-hot coals, I almost believed that I had never been away; that Mr.
and Miss Murdstone were such pictures, and would vanish when the fire
got low; and that there was nothing real in all that I remembered, save
my mother, Peggotty, and I.

Peggotty darned away at a stocking as long as she could see, and then
sat with it drawn on her left hand like a glove, and her needle in her
right, ready to take another stitch whenever there was a blaze. I cannot
conceive whose stockings they can have been that Peggotty was always
darning, or where such an unfailing supply of stockings in want of
darning can have come from. From my earliest infancy she seems to have
been always employed in that class of needlework, and never by any
chance in any other.

'I wonder,' said Peggotty, who was sometimes seized with a fit of
wondering on some most unexpected topic, 'what's become of Davy's
great-aunt? ' 'Lor, Peggotty! ' observed my mother, rousing herself from a
reverie, 'what nonsense you talk! '

'Well, but I really do wonder, ma'am,' said Peggotty.

'What can have put such a person in your head? ' inquired my mother. 'Is
there nobody else in the world to come there? '

'I don't know how it is,' said Peggotty, 'unless it's on account of
being stupid, but my head never can pick and choose its people. They
come and they go, and they don't come and they don't go, just as they
like. I wonder what's become of her? '

'How absurd you are, Peggotty! ' returned my mother. 'One would suppose
you wanted a second visit from her. '

'Lord forbid! ' cried Peggotty.

'Well then, don't talk about such uncomfortable things, there's a good
soul,' said my mother. 'Miss Betsey is shut up in her cottage by the
sea, no doubt, and will remain there. At all events, she is not likely
ever to trouble us again. '

'No! ' mused Peggotty. 'No, that ain't likely at all. ---I wonder, if she
was to die, whether she'd leave Davy anything? '

'Good gracious me, Peggotty,' returned my mother, 'what a nonsensical
woman you are! when you know that she took offence at the poor dear
boy's ever being born at all. '

'I suppose she wouldn't be inclined to forgive him now,' hinted
Peggotty.

'Why should she be inclined to forgive him now? ' said my mother, rather
sharply.

'Now that he's got a brother, I mean,' said Peggotty.

My mother immediately began to cry, and wondered how Peggotty dared to
say such a thing.

'As if this poor little innocent in its cradle had ever done any harm to
you or anybody else, you jealous thing! ' said she. 'You had much better
go and marry Mr. Barkis, the carrier. Why don't you? '

'I should make Miss Murdstone happy, if I was to,' said Peggotty.

'What a bad disposition you have, Peggotty! ' returned my mother. 'You
are as jealous of Miss Murdstone as it is possible for a ridiculous
creature to be. You want to keep the keys yourself, and give out all the
things, I suppose? I shouldn't be surprised if you did. When you know
that she only does it out of kindness and the best intentions! You know
she does, Peggotty--you know it well. '

Peggotty muttered something to the effect of 'Bother the best
intentions! ' and something else to the effect that there was a little
too much of the best intentions going on.

'I know what you mean, you cross thing,' said my mother. 'I understand
you, Peggotty, perfectly. You know I do, and I wonder you don't colour
up like fire. But one point at a time. Miss Murdstone is the point now,
Peggotty, and you sha'n't escape from it. Haven't you heard her
say, over and over again, that she thinks I am too thoughtless and
too--a--a--'

'Pretty,' suggested Peggotty.

'Well,' returned my mother, half laughing, 'and if she is so silly as to
say so, can I be blamed for it? '

'No one says you can,' said Peggotty.

'No, I should hope not, indeed! ' returned my mother. 'Haven't you heard
her say, over and over again, that on this account she wished to spare
me a great deal of trouble, which she thinks I am not suited for, and
which I really don't know myself that I AM suited for; and isn't she up
early and late, and going to and fro continually--and doesn't she do
all sorts of things, and grope into all sorts of places, coal-holes and
pantries and I don't know where, that can't be very agreeable--and do
you mean to insinuate that there is not a sort of devotion in that? '

'I don't insinuate at all,' said Peggotty.

'You do, Peggotty,' returned my mother. 'You never do anything else,
except your work. You are always insinuating. You revel in it. And when
you talk of Mr. Murdstone's good intentions--'

'I never talked of 'em,' said Peggotty.

'No, Peggotty,' returned my mother, 'but you insinuated. That's what I
told you just now. That's the worst of you. You WILL insinuate. I said,
at the moment, that I understood you, and you see I did. When you talk
of Mr. Murdstone's good intentions, and pretend to slight them (for I
don't believe you really do, in your heart, Peggotty), you must be as
well convinced as I am how good they are, and how they actuate him in
everything. If he seems to have been at all stern with a certain person,
Peggotty--you understand, and so I am sure does Davy, that I am not
alluding to anybody present--it is solely because he is satisfied that
it is for a certain person's benefit. He naturally loves a certain
person, on my account; and acts solely for a certain person's good. He
is better able to judge of it than I am; for I very well know that I am
a weak, light, girlish creature, and that he is a firm, grave, serious
man. And he takes,' said my mother, with the tears which were engendered
in her affectionate nature, stealing down her face, 'he takes great
pains with me; and I ought to be very thankful to him, and very
submissive to him even in my thoughts; and when I am not, Peggotty, I
worry and condemn myself, and feel doubtful of my own heart, and don't
know what to do. '

Peggotty sat with her chin on the foot of the stocking, looking silently
at the fire.

'There, Peggotty,' said my mother, changing her tone, 'don't let us fall
out with one another, for I couldn't bear it. You are my true friend, I
know, if I have any in the world. When I call you a ridiculous creature,
or a vexatious thing, or anything of that sort, Peggotty, I only mean
that you are my true friend, and always have been, ever since the night
when Mr. Copperfield first brought me home here, and you came out to the
gate to meet me. '

Peggotty was not slow to respond, and ratify the treaty of friendship by
giving me one of her best hugs. I think I had some glimpses of the real
character of this conversation at the time; but I am sure, now, that
the good creature originated it, and took her part in it, merely that
my mother might comfort herself with the little contradictory summary in
which she had indulged. The design was efficacious; for I remember that
my mother seemed more at ease during the rest of the evening, and that
Peggotty observed her less.

When we had had our tea, and the ashes were thrown up, and the candles
snuffed, I read Peggotty a chapter out of the Crocodile Book, in
remembrance of old times--she took it out of her pocket: I don't know
whether she had kept it there ever since--and then we talked about Salem
House, which brought me round again to Steerforth, who was my great
subject. We were very happy; and that evening, as the last of its race,
and destined evermore to close that volume of my life, will never pass
out of my memory.

It was almost ten o'clock before we heard the sound of wheels. We all
got up then; and my mother said hurriedly that, as it was so late, and
Mr. and Miss Murdstone approved of early hours for young people, perhaps
I had better go to bed. I kissed her, and went upstairs with my candle
directly, before they came in. It appeared to my childish fancy, as I
ascended to the bedroom where I had been imprisoned, that they brought
a cold blast of air into the house which blew away the old familiar
feeling like a feather.

I felt uncomfortable about going down to breakfast in the morning, as
I had never set eyes on Mr. Murdstone since the day when I committed my
memorable offence. However, as it must be done, I went down, after two
or three false starts half-way, and as many runs back on tiptoe to my
own room, and presented myself in the parlour.

He was standing before the fire with his back to it, while Miss
Murdstone made the tea. He looked at me steadily as I entered, but made
no sign of recognition whatever. I went up to him, after a moment of
confusion, and said: 'I beg your pardon, sir. I am very sorry for what I
did, and I hope you will forgive me. '

'I am glad to hear you are sorry, David,' he replied.

The hand he gave me was the hand I had bitten. I could not restrain my
eye from resting for an instant on a red spot upon it; but it was not so
red as I turned, when I met that sinister expression in his face.

'How do you do, ma'am? ' I said to Miss Murdstone.

'Ah, dear me! ' sighed Miss Murdstone, giving me the tea-caddy scoop
instead of her fingers. 'How long are the holidays? '

'A month, ma'am. '

'Counting from when? '

'From today, ma'am. '

'Oh! ' said Miss Murdstone. 'Then here's one day off. '

She kept a calendar of the holidays in this way, and every morning
checked a day off in exactly the same manner. She did it gloomily until
she came to ten, but when she got into two figures she became more
hopeful, and, as the time advanced, even jocular.

It was on this very first day that I had the misfortune to throw her,
though she was not subject to such weakness in general, into a state of
violent consternation. I came into the room where she and my mother
were sitting; and the baby (who was only a few weeks old) being on
my mother's lap, I took it very carefully in my arms. Suddenly Miss
Murdstone gave such a scream that I all but dropped it.

'My dear Jane! ' cried my mother.

'Good heavens, Clara, do you see? ' exclaimed Miss Murdstone.

'See what, my dear Jane? ' said my mother; 'where? '

'He's got it!