No More Learning

'

'Trust me, I will indeed,' said I, shaking hands with Ham earnestly.

'Thankee. Thankee, very kind, sir. One thing furder. I'm in good employ,
you know, Mas'r Davy, and I han't no way now of spending what I gets.
Money's of no use to me no more, except to live. If you can lay it out
for him, I shall do my work with a better art. Though as to that, sir,'
and he spoke very steadily and mildly, 'you're not to think but I shall
work at all times, like a man, and act the best that lays in my power! '

I told him I was well convinced of it; and I hinted that I hoped the
time might even come, when he would cease to lead the lonely life he
naturally contemplated now.

'No, sir,' he said, shaking his head, 'all that's past and over with me,
sir. No one can never fill the place that's empty. But you'll bear in
mind about the money, as theer's at all times some laying by for him? '

Reminding him of the fact, that Mr. Peggotty derived a steady,
though certainly a very moderate income from the bequest of his late
brother-in-law, I promised to do so. We then took leave of each other. I
cannot leave him even now, without remembering with a pang, at once his
modest fortitude and his great sorrow.

As to Mrs. Gummidge, if I were to endeavour to describe how she ran down
the street by the side of the coach, seeing nothing but Mr. Peggotty on
the roof, through the tears she tried to repress, and dashing herself
against the people who were coming in the opposite direction, I should
enter on a task of some difficulty. Therefore I had better leave her
sitting on a baker's door-step, out of breath, with no shape at all
remaining in her bonnet, and one of her shoes off, lying on the pavement
at a considerable distance.

When we got to our journey's end, our first pursuit was to look about
for a little lodging for Peggotty, where her brother could have a
bed. We were so fortunate as to find one, of a very clean and cheap
description, over a chandler's shop, only two streets removed from
me. When we had engaged this domicile, I bought some cold meat at an
eating-house, and took my fellow-travellers home to tea; a proceeding,
I regret to state, which did not meet with Mrs. Crupp's approval, but
quite the contrary. I ought to observe, however, in explanation of that
lady's state of mind, that she was much offended by Peggotty's tucking
up her widow's gown before she had been ten minutes in the place, and
setting to work to dust my bedroom. This Mrs. Crupp regarded in the
light of a liberty, and a liberty, she said, was a thing she never
allowed.

Mr. Peggotty had made a communication to me on the way to London for
which I was not unprepared. It was, that he purposed first seeing Mrs.
Steerforth. As I felt bound to assist him in this, and also to mediate
between them; with the view of sparing the mother's feelings as much
as possible, I wrote to her that night. I told her as mildly as I could
what his wrong was, and what my own share in his injury. I said he was a
man in very common life, but of a most gentle and upright character; and
that I ventured to express a hope that she would not refuse to see him
in his heavy trouble. I mentioned two o'clock in the afternoon as the
hour of our coming, and I sent the letter myself by the first coach in
the morning.

At the appointed time, we stood at the door--the door of that house
where I had been, a few days since, so happy: where my youthful
confidence and warmth of heart had been yielded up so freely: which was
closed against me henceforth: which was now a waste, a ruin.

No Littimer appeared. The pleasanter face which had replaced his, on the
occasion of my last visit, answered to our summons, and went before
us to the drawing-room. Mrs. Steerforth was sitting there. Rosa Dartle
glided, as we went in, from another part of the room and stood behind
her chair.

I saw, directly, in his mother's face, that she knew from himself what
he had done. It was very pale; and bore the traces of deeper emotion
than my letter alone, weakened by the doubts her fondness would have
raised upon it, would have been likely to create. I thought her more
like him than ever I had thought her; and I felt, rather than saw, that
the resemblance was not lost on my companion.

She sat upright in her arm-chair, with a stately, immovable, passionless
air, that it seemed as if nothing could disturb. She looked very
steadfastly at Mr. Peggotty when he stood before her; and he looked
quite as steadfastly at her. Rosa Dartle's keen glance comprehended all
of us. For some moments not a word was spoken.

She motioned to Mr. Peggotty to be seated. He said, in a low voice, 'I
shouldn't feel it nat'ral, ma'am, to sit down in this house. I'd sooner
stand. ' And this was succeeded by another silence, which she broke thus:

'I know, with deep regret, what has brought you here. What do you want
of me? What do you ask me to do? '

He put his hat under his arm, and feeling in his breast for Emily's
letter, took it out, unfolded it, and gave it to her. 'Please to read
that, ma'am. That's my niece's hand! '

She read it, in the same stately and impassive way,--untouched by its
contents, as far as I could see,--and returned it to him.

'"Unless he brings me back a lady,"' said Mr. Peggotty, tracing out that
part with his finger. 'I come to know, ma'am, whether he will keep his
wured? '

'No,' she returned.

'Why not? ' said Mr. Peggotty.

'It is impossible. He would disgrace himself. You cannot fail to know
that she is far below him. '

'Raise her up! ' said Mr. Peggotty.

'She is uneducated and ignorant. '

'Maybe she's not; maybe she is,' said Mr. Peggotty. 'I think not, ma'am;
but I'm no judge of them things. Teach her better! '

'Since you oblige me to speak more plainly, which I am very unwilling
to do, her humble connexions would render such a thing impossible, if
nothing else did. '

'Hark to this, ma'am,' he returned, slowly and quietly. 'You know what
it is to love your child. So do I. If she was a hundred times my child,
I couldn't love her more. You doen't know what it is to lose your child.
I do. All the heaps of riches in the wureld would be nowt to me (if they
was mine) to buy her back! But, save her from this disgrace, and she
shall never be disgraced by us. Not one of us that she's growed up
among, not one of us that's lived along with her and had her for their
all in all, these many year, will ever look upon her pritty face again.
We'll be content to let her be; we'll be content to think of her, far
off, as if she was underneath another sun and sky; we'll be content to
trust her to her husband,--to her little children, p'raps,--and bide the
time when all of us shall be alike in quality afore our God! '

The rugged eloquence with which he spoke, was not devoid of all effect.
She still preserved her proud manner, but there was a touch of softness
in her voice, as she answered:

'I justify nothing. I make no counter-accusations. But I am sorry to
repeat, it is impossible. Such a marriage would irretrievably blight my
son's career, and ruin his prospects. Nothing is more certain than
that it never can take place, and never will. If there is any other
compensation--'

'I am looking at the likeness of the face,' interrupted Mr. Peggotty,
with a steady but a kindling eye, 'that has looked at me, in my home, at
my fireside, in my boat--wheer not? ---smiling and friendly, when it was
so treacherous, that I go half wild when I think of it. If the likeness
of that face don't turn to burning fire, at the thought of offering
money to me for my child's blight and ruin, it's as bad. I doen't know,
being a lady's, but what it's worse. '

She changed now, in a moment. An angry flush overspread her features;
and she said, in an intolerant manner, grasping the arm-chair tightly
with her hands:

'What compensation can you make to ME for opening such a pit between me
and my son? What is your love to mine? What is your separation to ours? '

Miss Dartle softly touched her, and bent down her head to whisper, but
she would not hear a word.

'No, Rosa, not a word! Let the man listen to what I say! My son, who has
been the object of my life, to whom its every thought has been devoted,
whom I have gratified from a child in every wish, from whom I have had
no separate existence since his birth,--to take up in a moment with a
miserable girl, and avoid me! To repay my confidence with systematic
deception, for her sake, and quit me for her! To set this wretched
fancy, against his mother's claims upon his duty, love, respect,
gratitude--claims that every day and hour of his life should have
strengthened into ties that nothing could be proof against! Is this no
injury? '

Again Rosa Dartle tried to soothe her; again ineffectually.

'I say, Rosa, not a word! If he can stake his all upon the lightest
object, I can stake my all upon a greater purpose. Let him go where he
will, with the means that my love has secured to him! Does he think to
reduce me by long absence? He knows his mother very little if he does.
Let him put away his whim now, and he is welcome back. Let him not put
her away now, and he never shall come near me, living or dying, while
I can raise my hand to make a sign against it, unless, being rid of her
for ever, he comes humbly to me and begs for my forgiveness. This is my
right. This is the acknowledgement I WILL HAVE. This is the separation
that there is between us! And is this,' she added, looking at her
visitor with the proud intolerant air with which she had begun, 'no
injury? '

While I heard and saw the mother as she said these words, I seemed to
hear and see the son, defying them. All that I had ever seen in him of
an unyielding, wilful spirit, I saw in her. All the understanding that
I had now of his misdirected energy, became an understanding of her
character too, and a perception that it was, in its strongest springs,
the same.

She now observed to me, aloud, resuming her former restraint, that it
was useless to hear more, or to say more, and that she begged to put an
end to the interview. She rose with an air of dignity to leave the room,
when Mr. Peggotty signified that it was needless.

'Doen't fear me being any hindrance to you, I have no more to say,
ma'am,' he remarked, as he moved towards the door. 'I come heer with no
hope, and I take away no hope. I have done what I thowt should be done,
but I never looked fur any good to come of my stan'ning where I do.
This has been too evil a house fur me and mine, fur me to be in my right
senses and expect it. '

With this, we departed; leaving her standing by her elbow-chair, a
picture of a noble presence and a handsome face.

We had, on our way out, to cross a paved hall, with glass sides and
roof, over which a vine was trained. Its leaves and shoots were green
then, and the day being sunny, a pair of glass doors leading to the
garden were thrown open. Rosa Dartle, entering this way with a noiseless
step, when we were close to them, addressed herself to me:

'You do well,' she said, 'indeed, to bring this fellow here! '

Such a concentration of rage and scorn as darkened her face, and flashed
in her jet-black eyes, I could not have thought compressible even into
that face. The scar made by the hammer was, as usual in this excited
state of her features, strongly marked. When the throbbing I had seen
before, came into it as I looked at her, she absolutely lifted up her
hand, and struck it.

'This is a fellow,' she said, 'to champion and bring here, is he not?
You are a true man! '

'Miss Dartle,' I returned, 'you are surely not so unjust as to condemn
ME! '

'Why do you bring division between these two mad creatures? ' she
returned. 'Don't you know that they are both mad with their own
self-will and pride? '

'Is it my doing? ' I returned.

'Is it your doing! ' she retorted. 'Why do you bring this man here? '

'He is a deeply-injured man, Miss Dartle,' I replied. 'You may not know
it. '

'I know that James Steerforth,' she said, with her hand on her bosom, as
if to prevent the storm that was raging there, from being loud, 'has
a false, corrupt heart, and is a traitor. But what need I know or care
about this fellow, and his common niece? '

'Miss Dartle,' I returned, 'you deepen the injury. It is sufficient
already. I will only say, at parting, that you do him a great wrong. '

'I do him no wrong,' she returned. 'They are a depraved, worthless set.
I would have her whipped! '

Mr. Peggotty passed on, without a word, and went out at the door.

'Oh, shame, Miss Dartle! shame! ' I said indignantly. 'How can you bear
to trample on his undeserved affliction! '

'I would trample on them all,' she answered. 'I would have his house
pulled down. I would have her branded on the face, dressed in rags,
and cast out in the streets to starve. If I had the power to sit in
judgement on her, I would see it done. See it done? I would do it! I
detest her. If I ever could reproach her with her infamous condition, I
would go anywhere to do so. If I could hunt her to her grave, I would.
If there was any word of comfort that would be a solace to her in her
dying hour, and only I possessed it, I wouldn't part with it for Life
itself. '

The mere vehemence of her words can convey, I am sensible, but a weak
impression of the passion by which she was possessed, and which made
itself articulate in her whole figure, though her voice, instead of
being raised, was lower than usual. No description I could give of her
would do justice to my recollection of her, or to her entire deliverance
of herself to her anger. I have seen passion in many forms, but I have
never seen it in such a form as that.

When I joined Mr. Peggotty, he was walking slowly and thoughtfully down
the hill. He told me, as soon as I came up with him, that having now
discharged his mind of what he had purposed doing in London, he meant
'to set out on his travels', that night. I asked him where he meant to
go? He only answered, 'I'm a going, sir, to seek my niece. '

We went back to the little lodging over the chandler's shop, and there
I found an opportunity of repeating to Peggotty what he had said to
me. She informed me, in return, that he had said the same to her that
morning. She knew no more than I did, where he was going, but she
thought he had some project shaped out in his mind.

I did not like to leave him, under such circumstances, and we all three
dined together off a beefsteak pie--which was one of the many good
things for which Peggotty was famous--and which was curiously flavoured
on this occasion, I recollect well, by a miscellaneous taste of tea,
coffee, butter, bacon, cheese, new loaves, firewood, candles, and walnut
ketchup, continually ascending from the shop. After dinner we sat for an
hour or so near the window, without talking much; and then Mr. Peggotty
got up, and brought his oilskin bag and his stout stick, and laid them
on the table.

He accepted, from his sister's stock of ready money, a small sum on
account of his legacy; barely enough, I should have thought, to keep him
for a month. He promised to communicate with me, when anything befell
him; and he slung his bag about him, took his hat and stick, and bade us
both 'Good-bye! '

'All good attend you, dear old woman,' he said, embracing Peggotty, 'and
you too, Mas'r Davy! ' shaking hands with me. 'I'm a-going to seek her,
fur and wide. If she should come home while I'm away--but ah, that ain't
like to be! --or if I should bring her back, my meaning is, that she
and me shall live and die where no one can't reproach her. If any hurt
should come to me, remember that the last words I left for her was, "My
unchanged love is with my darling child, and I forgive her! "'

He said this solemnly, bare-headed; then, putting on his hat, he went
down the stairs, and away.
We followed to the door. It was a warm, dusty
evening, just the time when, in the great main thoroughfare out of which
that by-way turned, there was a temporary lull in the eternal tread of
feet upon the pavement, and a strong red sunshine. He turned, alone, at
the corner of our shady street, into a glow of light, in which we lost
him.

Rarely did that hour of the evening come, rarely did I wake at night,
rarely did I look up at the moon, or stars, or watch the falling rain,
or hear the wind, but I thought of his solitary figure toiling on, poor
pilgrim, and recalled the words:

'I'm a going to seek her, fur and wide. If any hurt should come to me,
remember that the last words I left for her was, "My unchanged love is
with my darling child, and I forgive her! "'



CHAPTER 33. BLISSFUL


All this time, I had gone on loving Dora, harder than ever. Her idea was
my refuge in disappointment and distress, and made some amends to me,
even for the loss of my friend. The more I pitied myself, or pitied
others, the more I sought for consolation in the image of Dora. The
greater the accumulation of deceit and trouble in the world, the
brighter and the purer shone the star of Dora high above the world. I
don't think I had any definite idea where Dora came from, or in what
degree she was related to a higher order of beings; but I am quite sure
I should have scouted the notion of her being simply human, like any
other young lady, with indignation and contempt.

If I may so express it, I was steeped in Dora. I was not merely over
head and ears in love with her, but I was saturated through and through.
Enough love might have been wrung out of me, metaphorically speaking,
to drown anybody in; and yet there would have remained enough within me,
and all over me, to pervade my entire existence.

The first thing I did, on my own account, when I came back, was to take
a night-walk to Norwood, and, like the subject of a venerable riddle of
my childhood, to go 'round and round the house, without ever
touching the house', thinking about Dora. I believe the theme of this
incomprehensible conundrum was the moon. No matter what it was, I, the
moon-struck slave of Dora, perambulated round and round the house and
garden for two hours, looking through crevices in the palings, getting
my chin by dint of violent exertion above the rusty nails on the top,
blowing kisses at the lights in the windows, and romantically calling
on the night, at intervals, to shield my Dora--I don't exactly know what
from, I suppose from fire. Perhaps from mice, to which she had a great
objection.

My love was so much in my mind and it was so natural to me to confide in
Peggotty, when I found her again by my side of an evening with the old
set of industrial implements, busily making the tour of my wardrobe,
that I imparted to her, in a sufficiently roundabout way, my great
secret. Peggotty was strongly interested, but I could not get her into
my view of the case at all. She was audaciously prejudiced in my favour,
and quite unable to understand why I should have any misgivings, or be
low-spirited about it. 'The young lady might think herself well off,'
she observed, 'to have such a beau. And as to her Pa,' she said, 'what
did the gentleman expect, for gracious sake! '

I observed, however, that Mr. Spenlow's proctorial gown and stiff cravat
took Peggotty down a little, and inspired her with a greater reverence
for the man who was gradually becoming more and more etherealized in my
eyes every day, and about whom a reflected radiance seemed to me to beam
when he sat erect in Court among his papers, like a little lighthouse in
a sea of stationery. And by the by, it used to be uncommonly strange
to me to consider, I remember, as I sat in Court too, how those dim old
judges and doctors wouldn't have cared for Dora, if they had known
her; how they wouldn't have gone out of their senses with rapture, if
marriage with Dora had been proposed to them; how Dora might have sung,
and played upon that glorified guitar, until she led me to the verge of
madness, yet not have tempted one of those slow-goers an inch out of his
road!

I despised them, to a man. Frozen-out old gardeners in the flower-beds
of the heart, I took a personal offence against them all. The Bench
was nothing to me but an insensible blunderer. The Bar had no more
tenderness or poetry in it, than the bar of a public-house.

Taking the management of Peggotty's affairs into my own hands, with
no little pride, I proved the will, and came to a settlement with the
Legacy Duty-office, and took her to the Bank, and soon got everything
into an orderly train. We varied the legal character of these
proceedings by going to see some perspiring Wax-work, in Fleet Street
(melted, I should hope, these twenty years); and by visiting Miss
Linwood's Exhibition, which I remember as a Mausoleum of needlework,
favourable to self-examination and repentance; and by inspecting the
Tower of London; and going to the top of St. Paul's. All these wonders
afforded Peggotty as much pleasure as she was able to enjoy, under
existing circumstances: except, I think, St. Paul's, which, from her
long attachment to her work-box, became a rival of the picture on the
lid, and was, in some particulars, vanquished, she considered, by that
work of art.

Peggotty's business, which was what we used to call 'common-form
business' in the Commons (and very light and lucrative the common-form
business was), being settled, I took her down to the office one morning
to pay her bill. Mr. Spenlow had stepped out, old Tiffey said, to get a
gentleman sworn for a marriage licence; but as I knew he would be
back directly, our place lying close to the Surrogate's, and to the
Vicar-General's office too, I told Peggotty to wait.

We were a little like undertakers, in the Commons, as regarded Probate
transactions; generally making it a rule to look more or less cut up,
when we had to deal with clients in mourning. In a similar feeling
of delicacy, we were always blithe and light-hearted with the licence
clients. Therefore I hinted to Peggotty that she would find Mr. Spenlow
much recovered from the shock of Mr. Barkis's decease; and indeed he
came in like a bridegroom.

But neither Peggotty nor I had eyes for him, when we saw, in company
with him, Mr. Murdstone. He was very little changed. His hair looked as
thick, and was certainly as black, as ever; and his glance was as little
to be trusted as of old.

'Ah, Copperfield? ' said Mr. Spenlow. 'You know this gentleman, I
believe? '

I made my gentleman a distant bow, and Peggotty barely recognized him.
He was, at first, somewhat disconcerted to meet us two together; but
quickly decided what to do, and came up to me.

'I hope,' he said, 'that you are doing well? '

'It can hardly be interesting to you,' said I. 'Yes, if you wish to
know. '

We looked at each other, and he addressed himself to Peggotty.

'And you,' said he. 'I am sorry to observe that you have lost your
husband. '

'It's not the first loss I have had in my life, Mr. Murdstone,' replied
Peggotty, trembling from head to foot. 'I am glad to hope that there is
nobody to blame for this one,--nobody to answer for it. '

'Ha! ' said he; 'that's a comfortable reflection. You have done your
duty? '

'I have not worn anybody's life away,' said Peggotty, 'I am thankful to
think! No, Mr. Murdstone, I have not worrited and frightened any sweet
creetur to an early grave! '

He eyed her gloomily--remorsefully I thought--for an instant; and said,
turning his head towards me, but looking at my feet instead of my face:

'We are not likely to encounter soon again;--a source of satisfaction to
us both, no doubt, for such meetings as this can never be agreeable. I
do not expect that you, who always rebelled against my just authority,
exerted for your benefit and reformation, should owe me any good-will
now. There is an antipathy between us--'

'An old one, I believe? ' said I, interrupting him.

He smiled, and shot as evil a glance at me as could come from his dark
eyes.

'It rankled in your baby breast,' he said. 'It embittered the life of
your poor mother. You are right. I hope you may do better, yet; I hope
you may correct yourself. '

Here he ended the dialogue, which had been carried on in a low voice,
in a corner of the outer office, by passing into Mr. Spenlow's room, and
saying aloud, in his smoothest manner:

'Gentlemen of Mr. Spenlow's profession are accustomed to family
differences, and know how complicated and difficult they always are! '
With that, he paid the money for his licence; and, receiving it neatly
folded from Mr. Spenlow, together with a shake of the hand, and a polite
wish for his happiness and the lady's, went out of the office.

I might have had more difficulty in constraining myself to be silent
under his words, if I had had less difficulty in impressing upon
Peggotty (who was only angry on my account, good creature! ) that we were
not in a place for recrimination, and that I besought her to hold her
peace. She was so unusually roused, that I was glad to compound for
an affectionate hug, elicited by this revival in her mind of our old
injuries, and to make the best I could of it, before Mr. Spenlow and the
clerks.

Mr. Spenlow did not appear to know what the connexion between Mr.
Murdstone and myself was; which I was glad of, for I could not bear to
acknowledge him, even in my own breast, remembering what I did of the
history of my poor mother. Mr. Spenlow seemed to think, if he thought
anything about the matter, that my aunt was the leader of the state
party in our family, and that there was a rebel party commanded by
somebody else--so I gathered at least from what he said, while we were
waiting for Mr. Tiffey to make out Peggotty's bill of costs.

'Miss Trotwood,' he remarked, 'is very firm, no doubt, and not likely
to give way to opposition. I have an admiration for her character, and
I may congratulate you, Copperfield, on being on the right side.
Differences between relations are much to be deplored--but they are
extremely general--and the great thing is, to be on the right side':
meaning, I take it, on the side of the moneyed interest.

'Rather a good marriage this, I believe? ' said Mr. Spenlow.

I explained that I knew nothing about it.

'Indeed! ' he said. 'Speaking from the few words Mr. Murdstone
dropped--as a man frequently does on these occasions--and from what Miss
Murdstone let fall, I should say it was rather a good marriage. '

'Do you mean that there is money, sir? ' I asked.

'Yes,' said Mr. Spenlow, 'I understand there's money. Beauty too, I am
told. '

'Indeed! Is his new wife young? '

'Just of age,' said Mr. Spenlow. 'So lately, that I should think they
had been waiting for that. '

'Lord deliver her! ' said Peggotty. So very emphatically and
unexpectedly, that we were all three discomposed; until Tiffey came in
with the bill.

Old Tiffey soon appeared, however, and handed it to Mr. Spenlow, to
look over. Mr. Spenlow, settling his chin in his cravat and rubbing it
softly, went over the items with a deprecatory air--as if it were all
Jorkins's doing--and handed it back to Tiffey with a bland sigh.

'Yes,' he said. 'That's right. Quite right. I should have been extremely
happy, Copperfield, to have limited these charges to the actual
expenditure out of pocket, but it is an irksome incident in my
professional life, that I am not at liberty to consult my own wishes. I
have a partner--Mr. Jorkins. '

As he said this with a gentle melancholy, which was the next thing to
making no charge at all, I expressed my acknowledgements on Peggotty's
behalf, and paid Tiffey in banknotes. Peggotty then retired to
her lodging, and Mr. Spenlow and I went into Court, where we had a
divorce-suit coming on, under an ingenious little statute (repealed
now, I believe, but in virtue of which I have seen several marriages
annulled), of which the merits were these. The husband, whose name was
Thomas Benjamin, had taken out his marriage licence as Thomas only;
suppressing the Benjamin, in case he should not find himself as
comfortable as he expected. NOT finding himself as comfortable as he
expected, or being a little fatigued with his wife, poor fellow, he
now came forward, by a friend, after being married a year or two, and
declared that his name was Thomas Benjamin, and therefore he was not
married at all. Which the Court confirmed, to his great satisfaction.

I must say that I had my doubts about the strict justice of this,
and was not even frightened out of them by the bushel of wheat which
reconciles all anomalies. But Mr. Spenlow argued the matter with me. He
said, Look at the world, there was good and evil in that; look at the
ecclesiastical law, there was good and evil in THAT. It was all part of
a system. Very good. There you were!

I had not the hardihood to suggest to Dora's father that possibly
we might even improve the world a little, if we got up early in the
morning, and took off our coats to the work; but I confessed that I
thought we might improve the Commons. Mr. Spenlow replied that he would
particularly advise me to dismiss that idea from my mind, as not being
worthy of my gentlemanly character; but that he would be glad to hear
from me of what improvement I thought the Commons susceptible?

Taking that part of the Commons which happened to be nearest to us--for
our man was unmarried by this time, and we were out of Court, and
strolling past the Prerogative Office--I submitted that I thought the
Prerogative Office rather a queerly managed institution. Mr. Spenlow
inquired in what respect? I replied, with all due deference to his
experience (but with more deference, I am afraid, to his being Dora's
father), that perhaps it was a little nonsensical that the Registry of
that Court, containing the original wills of all persons leaving effects
within the immense province of Canterbury, for three whole centuries,
should be an accidental building, never designed for the purpose, leased
by the registrars for their Own private emolument, unsafe, not even
ascertained to be fire-proof, choked with the important documents
it held, and positively, from the roof to the basement, a mercenary
speculation of the registrars, who took great fees from the public, and
crammed the public's wills away anyhow and anywhere, having no other
object than to get rid of them cheaply. That, perhaps, it was a little
unreasonable that these registrars in the receipt of profits amounting
to eight or nine thousand pounds a year (to say nothing of the profits
of the deputy registrars, and clerks of seats), should not be obliged to
spend a little of that money, in finding a reasonably safe place for the
important documents which all classes of people were compelled to hand
over to them, whether they would or no. That, perhaps, it was a little
unjust, that all the great offices in this great office should be
magnificent sinecures, while the unfortunate working-clerks in the cold
dark room upstairs were the worst rewarded, and the least considered
men, doing important services, in London. That perhaps it was a little
indecent that the principal registrar of all, whose duty it was to
find the public, constantly resorting to this place, all needful
accommodation, should be an enormous sinecurist in virtue of that post
(and might be, besides, a clergyman, a pluralist, the holder of a
staff in a cathedral, and what not),--while the public was put to the
inconvenience of which we had a specimen every afternoon when the office
was busy, and which we knew to be quite monstrous. That, perhaps,
in short, this Prerogative Office of the diocese of Canterbury was
altogether such a pestilent job, and such a pernicious absurdity, that
but for its being squeezed away in a corner of St. Paul's Churchyard,
which few people knew, it must have been turned completely inside out,
and upside down, long ago.

Mr. Spenlow smiled as I became modestly warm on the subject, and then
argued this question with me as he had argued the other. He said, what
was it after all? It was a question of feeling. If the public felt
that their wills were in safe keeping, and took it for granted that the
office was not to be made better, who was the worse for it? Nobody. Who
was the better for it? All the Sinecurists. Very well. Then the good
predominated. It might not be a perfect system; nothing was perfect;
but what he objected to, was, the insertion of the wedge. Under the
Prerogative Office, the country had been glorious. Insert the wedge into
the Prerogative Office, and the country would cease to be glorious. He
considered it the principle of a gentleman to take things as he found
them; and he had no doubt the Prerogative Office would last our time. I
deferred to his opinion, though I had great doubts of it myself. I find
he was right, however; for it has not only lasted to the present moment,
but has done so in the teeth of a great parliamentary report made (not
too willingly) eighteen years ago, when all these objections of mine
were set forth in detail, and when the existing stowage for wills was
described as equal to the accumulation of only two years and a half
more. What they have done with them since; whether they have lost many,
or whether they sell any, now and then, to the butter shops; I don't
know. I am glad mine is not there, and I hope it may not go there, yet
awhile.

I have set all this down, in my present blissful chapter, because here
it comes into its natural place. Mr. Spenlow and I falling into this
conversation, prolonged it and our saunter to and fro, until we diverged
into general topics. And so it came about, in the end, that Mr. Spenlow
told me this day week was Dora's birthday, and he would be glad if I
would come down and join a little picnic on the occasion. I went out of
my senses immediately; became a mere driveller next day, on receipt of
a little lace-edged sheet of note-paper, 'Favoured by papa. To remind';
and passed the intervening period in a state of dotage.

I think I committed every possible absurdity in the way of preparation
for this blessed event. I turn hot when I remember the cravat I bought.
My boots might be placed in any collection of instruments of torture.
I provided, and sent down by the Norwood coach the night before, a
delicate little hamper, amounting in itself, I thought, almost to a
declaration. There were crackers in it with the tenderest mottoes that
could be got for money. At six in the morning, I was in Covent Garden
Market, buying a bouquet for Dora. At ten I was on horseback (I hired a
gallant grey, for the occasion), with the bouquet in my hat, to keep it
fresh, trotting down to Norwood.

I suppose that when I saw Dora in the garden and pretended not to see
her, and rode past the house pretending to be anxiously looking for
it, I committed two small fooleries which other young gentlemen in my
circumstances might have committed--because they came so very natural
to me. But oh! when I DID find the house, and DID dismount at the
garden-gate, and drag those stony-hearted boots across the lawn to Dora
sitting on a garden-seat under a lilac tree, what a spectacle she was,
upon that beautiful morning, among the butterflies, in a white chip
bonnet and a dress of celestial blue! There was a young lady with
her--comparatively stricken in years--almost twenty, I should say. Her
name was Miss Mills. And Dora called her Julia. She was the bosom friend
of Dora. Happy Miss Mills!

Jip was there, and Jip WOULD bark at me again. When I presented my
bouquet, he gnashed his teeth with jealousy. Well he might. If he had
the least idea how I adored his mistress, well he might!

'Oh, thank you, Mr. Copperfield! What dear flowers! ' said Dora.

I had had an intention of saying (and had been studying the best form of
words for three miles) that I thought them beautiful before I saw them
so near HER. But I couldn't manage it.