No More Learning

We
are positively corrupting people. We are bound to think of that. I can't
help thinking of it, Dora. It is a reflection I am unable to dismiss,
and it sometimes makes me very uneasy. There, dear, that's all. Come
now. Don't be foolish! '

Dora would not allow me, for a long time, to remove the handkerchief.
She sat sobbing and murmuring behind it, that, if I was uneasy, why had
I ever been married? Why hadn't I said, even the day before we went to
church, that I knew I should be uneasy, and I would rather not? If I
couldn't bear her, why didn't I send her away to her aunts at Putney, or
to Julia Mills in India? Julia would be glad to see her, and would not
call her a transported page; Julia never had called her anything of the
sort. In short, Dora was so afflicted, and so afflicted me by being
in that condition, that I felt it was of no use repeating this kind of
effort, though never so mildly, and I must take some other course.

What other course was left to take? To 'form her mind'? This was a
common phrase of words which had a fair and promising sound, and I
resolved to form Dora's mind.

I began immediately. When Dora was very childish, and I would
have infinitely preferred to humour her, I tried to be grave--and
disconcerted her, and myself too. I talked to her on the subjects which
occupied my thoughts; and I read Shakespeare to her--and fatigued her
to the last degree. I accustomed myself to giving her, as it were quite
casually, little scraps of useful information, or sound opinion--and she
started from them when I let them off, as if they had been crackers.
No matter how incidentally or naturally I endeavoured to form my little
wife's mind, I could not help seeing that she always had an instinctive
perception of what I was about, and became a prey to the keenest
apprehensions. In particular, it was clear to me, that she thought
Shakespeare a terrible fellow. The formation went on very slowly.

I pressed Traddles into the service without his knowledge; and whenever
he came to see us, exploded my mines upon him for the edification of
Dora at second hand. The amount of practical wisdom I bestowed upon
Traddles in this manner was immense, and of the best quality; but it
had no other effect upon Dora than to depress her spirits, and make her
always nervous with the dread that it would be her turn next. I found
myself in the condition of a schoolmaster, a trap, a pitfall; of always
playing spider to Dora's fly, and always pouncing out of my hole to her
infinite disturbance.

Still, looking forward through this intermediate stage, to the time
when there should be a perfect sympathy between Dora and me, and when I
should have 'formed her mind' to my entire satisfaction, I persevered,
even for months. Finding at last, however, that, although I had been
all this time a very porcupine or hedgehog, bristling all over with
determination, I had effected nothing, it began to occur to me that
perhaps Dora's mind was already formed.

On further consideration this appeared so likely, that I abandoned
my scheme, which had had a more promising appearance in words than in
action; resolving henceforth to be satisfied with my child-wife, and to
try to change her into nothing else by any process. I was heartily tired
of being sagacious and prudent by myself, and of seeing my darling under
restraint; so I bought a pretty pair of ear-rings for her, and a collar
for Jip, and went home one day to make myself agreeable.

Dora was delighted with the little presents, and kissed me joyfully; but
there was a shadow between us, however slight, and I had made up my mind
that it should not be there. If there must be such a shadow anywhere, I
would keep it for the future in my own breast.

I sat down by my wife on the sofa, and put the ear-rings in her ears;
and then I told her that I feared we had not been quite as good company
lately, as we used to be, and that the fault was mine. Which I sincerely
felt, and which indeed it was.

'The truth is, Dora, my life,' I said; 'I have been trying to be wise. '

'And to make me wise too,' said Dora, timidly. 'Haven't you, Doady? '

I nodded assent to the pretty inquiry of the raised eyebrows, and kissed
the parted lips.

'It's of not a bit of use,' said Dora, shaking her head, until the
ear-rings rang again. 'You know what a little thing I am, and what I
wanted you to call me from the first. If you can't do so, I am afraid
you'll never like me. Are you sure you don't think, sometimes, it would
have been better to have--'

'Done what, my dear? ' For she made no effort to proceed.

'Nothing! ' said Dora.

'Nothing? ' I repeated.

She put her arms round my neck, and laughed, and called herself by her
favourite name of a goose, and hid her face on my shoulder in such a
profusion of curls that it was quite a task to clear them away and see
it.

'Don't I think it would have been better to have done nothing, than to
have tried to form my little wife's mind? ' said I, laughing at myself.
'Is that the question? Yes, indeed, I do. '

'Is that what you have been trying? ' cried Dora. 'Oh what a shocking
boy! '

'But I shall never try any more,' said I. 'For I love her dearly as she
is. '

'Without a story--really? ' inquired Dora, creeping closer to me.

'Why should I seek to change,' said I, 'what has been so precious to me
for so long! You never can show better than as your own natural self, my
sweet Dora; and we'll try no conceited experiments, but go back to our
old way, and be happy. '

'And be happy! ' returned Dora. 'Yes! All day! And you won't mind things
going a tiny morsel wrong, sometimes? '

'No, no,' said I. 'We must do the best we can. '

'And you won't tell me, any more, that we make other people bad,' coaxed
Dora; 'will you? Because you know it's so dreadfully cross! '

'No, no,' said I.

'It's better for me to be stupid than uncomfortable, isn't it? ' said
Dora.

'Better to be naturally Dora than anything else in the world. '

'In the world! Ah, Doady, it's a large place! '

She shook her head, turned her delighted bright eyes up to mine, kissed
me, broke into a merry laugh, and sprang away to put on Jip's new
collar.

So ended my last attempt to make any change in Dora. I had been unhappy
in trying it; I could not endure my own solitary wisdom; I could not
reconcile it with her former appeal to me as my child-wife. I resolved
to do what I could, in a quiet way, to improve our proceedings myself,
but I foresaw that my utmost would be very little, or I must degenerate
into the spider again, and be for ever lying in wait.

And the shadow I have mentioned, that was not to be between us any more,
but was to rest wholly on my own heart? How did that fall?

The old unhappy feeling pervaded my life. It was deepened, if it were
changed at all; but it was as undefined as ever, and addressed me like
a strain of sorrowful music faintly heard in the night. I loved my wife
dearly, and I was happy; but the happiness I had vaguely anticipated,
once, was not the happiness I enjoyed, and there was always something
wanting.

In fulfilment of the compact I have made with myself, to reflect my mind
on this paper, I again examine it, closely, and bring its secrets to the
light. What I missed, I still regarded--I always regarded--as something
that had been a dream of my youthful fancy; that was incapable of
realization; that I was now discovering to be so, with some natural
pain, as all men did. But that it would have been better for me if my
wife could have helped me more, and shared the many thoughts in which I
had no partner; and that this might have been; I knew.

Between these two irreconcilable conclusions: the one, that what I felt
was general and unavoidable; the other, that it was particular to me,
and might have been different: I balanced curiously, with no distinct
sense of their opposition to each other. When I thought of the airy
dreams of youth that are incapable of realization, I thought of the
better state preceding manhood that I had outgrown; and then the
contented days with Agnes, in the dear old house, arose before me, like
spectres of the dead, that might have some renewal in another world, but
never more could be reanimated here.

Sometimes, the speculation came into my thoughts, What might have
happened, or what would have happened, if Dora and I had never known
each other? But she was so incorporated with my existence, that it
was the idlest of all fancies, and would soon rise out of my reach and
sight, like gossamer floating in the air.

I always loved her. What I am describing, slumbered, and half awoke, and
slept again, in the innermost recesses of my mind. There was no evidence
of it in me; I know of no influence it had in anything I said or did. I
bore the weight of all our little cares, and all my projects; Dora held
the pens; and we both felt that our shares were adjusted as the case
required. She was truly fond of me, and proud of me; and when Agnes
wrote a few earnest words in her letters to Dora, of the pride and
interest with which my old friends heard of my growing reputation, and
read my book as if they heard me speaking its contents, Dora read them
out to me with tears of joy in her bright eyes, and said I was a dear
old clever, famous boy.

'The first mistaken impulse of an undisciplined heart. ' Those words of
Mrs. Strong's were constantly recurring to me, at this time; were almost
always present to my mind. I awoke with them, often, in the night; I
remember to have even read them, in dreams, inscribed upon the walls
of houses. For I knew, now, that my own heart was undisciplined when it
first loved Dora; and that if it had been disciplined, it never
could have felt, when we were married, what it had felt in its secret
experience.

'There can be no disparity in marriage, like unsuitability of mind and
purpose. ' Those words I remembered too. I had endeavoured to adapt
Dora to myself, and found it impracticable. It remained for me to adapt
myself to Dora; to share with her what I could, and be happy; to bear
on my own shoulders what I must, and be happy still. This was the
discipline to which I tried to bring my heart, when I began to think.
It made my second year much happier than my first; and, what was better
still, made Dora's life all sunshine.

But, as that year wore on, Dora was not strong. I had hoped that lighter
hands than mine would help to mould her character, and that a baby-smile
upon her breast might change my child-wife to a woman. It was not to be.
The spirit fluttered for a moment on the threshold of its little prison,
and, unconscious of captivity, took wing.

'When I can run about again, as I used to do, aunt,' said Dora, 'I shall
make Jip race. He is getting quite slow and lazy. '

'I suspect, my dear,' said my aunt quietly working by her side, 'he has
a worse disorder than that. Age, Dora. '

'Do you think he is old? ' said Dora, astonished. 'Oh, how strange it
seems that Jip should be old! '

'It's a complaint we are all liable to, Little One, as we get on in
life,' said my aunt, cheerfully; 'I don't feel more free from it than I
used to be, I assure you. '

'But Jip,' said Dora, looking at him with compassion, 'even little Jip!
Oh, poor fellow! '

'I dare say he'll last a long time yet, Blossom,' said my aunt, patting
Dora on the cheek, as she leaned out of her couch to look at Jip, who
responded by standing on his hind legs, and baulking himself in various
asthmatic attempts to scramble up by the head and shoulders. 'He must
have a piece of flannel in his house this winter, and I shouldn't wonder
if he came out quite fresh again, with the flowers in the spring. Bless
the little dog! ' exclaimed my aunt, 'if he had as many lives as a cat,
and was on the point of losing 'em all, he'd bark at me with his last
breath, I believe! '

Dora had helped him up on the sofa; where he really was defying my aunt
to such a furious extent, that he couldn't keep straight, but barked
himself sideways. The more my aunt looked at him, the more he reproached
her; for she had lately taken to spectacles, and for some inscrutable
reason he considered the glasses personal.

Dora made him lie down by her, with a good deal of persuasion; and when
he was quiet, drew one of his long ears through and through her hand,
repeating thoughtfully, 'Even little Jip! Oh, poor fellow! '

'His lungs are good enough,' said my aunt, gaily, 'and his dislikes are
not at all feeble. He has a good many years before him, no doubt. But if
you want a dog to race with, Little Blossom, he has lived too well for
that, and I'll give you one. '

'Thank you, aunt,' said Dora, faintly. 'But don't, please! '

'No? ' said my aunt, taking off her spectacles.

'I couldn't have any other dog but Jip,' said Dora. 'It would be so
unkind to Jip! Besides, I couldn't be such friends with any other dog
but Jip; because he wouldn't have known me before I was married,
and wouldn't have barked at Doady when he first came to our house. I
couldn't care for any other dog but Jip, I am afraid, aunt. '

'To be sure! ' said my aunt, patting her cheek again. 'You are right. '

'You are not offended,' said Dora. 'Are you? '

'Why, what a sensitive pet it is! ' cried my aunt, bending over her
affectionately. 'To think that I could be offended! '

'No, no, I didn't really think so,' returned Dora; 'but I am a little
tired, and it made me silly for a moment--I am always a silly little
thing, you know, but it made me more silly--to talk about Jip. He
has known me in all that has happened to me, haven't you, Jip? And I
couldn't bear to slight him, because he was a little altered--could I,
Jip? '

Jip nestled closer to his mistress, and lazily licked her hand.

'You are not so old, Jip, are you, that you'll leave your mistress yet? '
said Dora. 'We may keep one another company a little longer! '

My pretty Dora! When she came down to dinner on the ensuing Sunday, and
was so glad to see old Traddles (who always dined with us on Sunday), we
thought she would be 'running about as she used to do', in a few days.
But they said, wait a few days more; and then, wait a few days more; and
still she neither ran nor walked. She looked very pretty, and was very
merry; but the little feet that used to be so nimble when they danced
round Jip, were dull and motionless.

I began to carry her downstairs every morning, and upstairs every night.
She would clasp me round the neck and laugh, the while, as if I did it
for a wager. Jip would bark and caper round us, and go on before, and
look back on the landing, breathing short, to see that we were coming.
My aunt, the best and most cheerful of nurses, would trudge after us, a
moving mass of shawls and pillows. Mr. Dick would not have relinquished
his post of candle-bearer to anyone alive. Traddles would be often at
the bottom of the staircase, looking on, and taking charge of sportive
messages from Dora to the dearest girl in the world. We made quite a gay
procession of it, and my child-wife was the gayest there.

But, sometimes, when I took her up, and felt that she was lighter in
my arms, a dead blank feeling came upon me, as if I were approaching
to some frozen region yet unseen, that numbed my life. I avoided the
recognition of this feeling by any name, or by any communing with
myself; until one night, when it was very strong upon me, and my aunt
had left her with a parting cry of 'Good night, Little Blossom,' I sat
down at my desk alone, and tried to think, Oh what a fatal name it was,
and how the blossom withered in its bloom upon the tree!


CHAPTER 49. I AM INVOLVED IN MYSTERY


I received one morning by the post, the following letter, dated
Canterbury, and addressed to me at Doctor's Commons; which I read with
some surprise:


'MY DEAR SIR,

'Circumstances beyond my individual control have, for a considerable
lapse of time, effected a severance of that intimacy which, in the
limited opportunities conceded to me in the midst of my professional
duties, of contemplating the scenes and events of the past, tinged by
the prismatic hues of memory, has ever afforded me, as it ever must
continue to afford, gratifying emotions of no common description. This
fact, my dear sir, combined with the distinguished elevation to which
your talents have raised you, deters me from presuming to aspire to
the liberty of addressing the companion of my youth, by the familiar
appellation of Copperfield! It is sufficient to know that the name to
which I do myself the honour to refer, will ever be treasured among
the muniments of our house (I allude to the archives connected with our
former lodgers, preserved by Mrs. Micawber), with sentiments of personal
esteem amounting to affection.

'It is not for one, situated, through his original errors and a
fortuitous combination of unpropitious events, as is the foundered Bark
(if he may be allowed to assume so maritime a denomination), who
now takes up the pen to address you--it is not, I repeat, for one
so circumstanced, to adopt the language of compliment, or of
congratulation. That he leaves to abler and to purer hands.

'If your more important avocations should admit of your ever tracing
these imperfect characters thus far--which may be, or may not be, as
circumstances arise--you will naturally inquire by what object am I
influenced, then, in inditing the present missive? Allow me to say that
I fully defer to the reasonable character of that inquiry, and proceed
to develop it; premising that it is not an object of a pecuniary nature.

'Without more directly referring to any latent ability that may
possibly exist on my part, of wielding the thunderbolt, or directing
the devouring and avenging flame in any quarter, I may be permitted
to observe, in passing, that my brightest visions are for ever
dispelled--that my peace is shattered and my power of enjoyment
destroyed--that my heart is no longer in the right place--and that I no
more walk erect before my fellow man. The canker is in the flower.
The cup is bitter to the brim. The worm is at his work, and will soon
dispose of his victim. The sooner the better. But I will not digress.
'Placed in a mental position of peculiar painfulness, beyond the
assuaging reach even of Mrs. Micawber's influence, though exercised in
the tripartite character of woman, wife, and mother, it is my intention
to fly from myself for a short period, and devote a respite of
eight-and-forty hours to revisiting some metropolitan scenes of past
enjoyment. Among other havens of domestic tranquillity and peace of
mind, my feet will naturally tend towards the King's Bench Prison. In
stating that I shall be (D. V. ) on the outside of the south wall of
that place of incarceration on civil process, the day after tomorrow,
at seven in the evening, precisely, my object in this epistolary
communication is accomplished.

'I do not feel warranted in soliciting my former friend Mr. Copperfield,
or my former friend Mr. Thomas Traddles of the Inner Temple, if that
gentleman is still existent and forthcoming, to condescend to meet me,
and renew (so far as may be) our past relations of the olden time. I
confine myself to throwing out the observation, that, at the hour and
place I have indicated, may be found such ruined vestiges as yet

'Remain,
'Of
'A
'Fallen Tower,
'WILKINS MICAWBER.

'P. S. It may be advisable to superadd to the above, the statement that
Mrs. Micawber is not in confidential possession of my intentions. '


I read the letter over several times.
Making due allowance for Mr.
Micawber's lofty style of composition, and for the extraordinary relish
with which he sat down and wrote long letters on all possible and
impossible occasions, I still believed that something important lay
hidden at the bottom of this roundabout communication. I put it down,
to think about it; and took it up again, to read it once more; and
was still pursuing it, when Traddles found me in the height of my
perplexity.

'My dear fellow,' said I, 'I never was better pleased to see you. You
come to give me the benefit of your sober judgement at a most opportune
time. I have received a very singular letter, Traddles, from Mr.
Micawber. '

'No? ' cried Traddles. 'You don't say so? And I have received one from
Mrs. Micawber! '

With that, Traddles, who was flushed with walking, and whose hair, under
the combined effects of exercise and excitement, stood on end as if he
saw a cheerful ghost, produced his letter and made an exchange with me.
I watched him into the heart of Mr. Micawber's letter, and returned the
elevation of eyebrows with which he said "'Wielding the thunderbolt,
or directing the devouring and avenging flame! " Bless me,
Copperfield! '--and then entered on the perusal of Mrs. Micawber's
epistle.

It ran thus:


'My best regards to Mr. Thomas Traddles, and if he should still remember
one who formerly had the happiness of being well acquainted with him,
may I beg a few moments of his leisure time? I assure Mr. T. T. that I
would not intrude upon his kindness, were I in any other position than
on the confines of distraction.

'Though harrowing to myself to mention, the alienation of Mr. Micawber
(formerly so domesticated) from his wife and family, is the cause of my
addressing my unhappy appeal to Mr. Traddles, and soliciting his best
indulgence. Mr. T. can form no adequate idea of the change in Mr.
Micawber's conduct, of his wildness, of his violence. It has gradually
augmented, until it assumes the appearance of aberration of intellect.
Scarcely a day passes, I assure Mr. Traddles, on which some paroxysm
does not take place. Mr. T. will not require me to depict my feelings,
when I inform him that I have become accustomed to hear Mr. Micawber
assert that he has sold himself to the D. Mystery and secrecy have
long been his principal characteristic, have long replaced unlimited
confidence. The slightest provocation, even being asked if there is
anything he would prefer for dinner, causes him to express a wish for a
separation. Last night, on being childishly solicited for twopence, to
buy 'lemon-stunners'--a local sweetmeat--he presented an oyster-knife at
the twins!

'I entreat Mr. Traddles to bear with me in entering into these details.
Without them, Mr. T. would indeed find it difficult to form the faintest
conception of my heart-rending situation.

'May I now venture to confide to Mr. T. the purport of my letter? Will
he now allow me to throw myself on his friendly consideration? Oh yes,
for I know his heart!

'The quick eye of affection is not easily blinded, when of the female
sex. Mr. Micawber is going to London. Though he studiously concealed his
hand, this morning before breakfast, in writing the direction-card which
he attached to the little brown valise of happier days, the eagle-glance
of matrimonial anxiety detected, d, o, n, distinctly traced. The
West-End destination of the coach, is the Golden Cross. Dare I fervently
implore Mr. T. to see my misguided husband, and to reason with him?
Dare I ask Mr. T. to endeavour to step in between Mr. Micawber and his
agonized family? Oh no, for that would be too much!

'If Mr. Copperfield should yet remember one unknown to fame, will Mr.
T. take charge of my unalterable regards and similar entreaties? In
any case, he will have the benevolence to consider this communication
strictly private, and on no account whatever to be alluded to, however
distantly, in the presence of Mr. Micawber. If Mr. T. should ever
reply to it (which I cannot but feel to be most improbable), a letter
addressed to M. E. , Post Office, Canterbury, will be fraught with
less painful consequences than any addressed immediately to one, who
subscribes herself, in extreme distress,

'Mr. Thomas Traddles's respectful friend and suppliant,

'EMMA MICAWBER. '


'What do you think of that letter? ' said Traddles, casting his eyes upon
me, when I had read it twice.

'What do you think of the other? ' said I. For he was still reading it
with knitted brows.

'I think that the two together, Copperfield,' replied Traddles,
'mean more than Mr. and Mrs. Micawber usually mean in their
correspondence--but I don't know what. They are both written in good
faith, I have no doubt, and without any collusion. Poor thing! ' he was
now alluding to Mrs. Micawber's letter, and we were standing side by
side comparing the two; 'it will be a charity to write to her, at all
events, and tell her that we will not fail to see Mr. Micawber. '

I acceded to this the more readily, because I now reproached myself with
having treated her former letter rather lightly. It had set me thinking
a good deal at the time, as I have mentioned in its place; but my
absorption in my own affairs, my experience of the family, and my
hearing nothing more, had gradually ended in my dismissing the subject.
I had often thought of the Micawbers, but chiefly to wonder what
'pecuniary liabilities' they were establishing in Canterbury, and to
recall how shy Mr. Micawber was of me when he became clerk to Uriah
Heep.

However, I now wrote a comforting letter to Mrs. Micawber, in our
joint names, and we both signed it. As we walked into town to post it,
Traddles and I held a long conference, and launched into a number of
speculations, which I need not repeat. We took my aunt into our counsels
in the afternoon; but our only decided conclusion was, that we would be
very punctual in keeping Mr. Micawber's appointment.

Although we appeared at the stipulated place a quarter of an hour before
the time, we found Mr. Micawber already there. He was standing with his
arms folded, over against the wall, looking at the spikes on the top,
with a sentimental expression, as if they were the interlacing boughs of
trees that had shaded him in his youth.

When we accosted him, his manner was something more confused, and
something less genteel, than of yore. He had relinquished his legal suit
of black for the purposes of this excursion, and wore the old surtout
and tights, but not quite with the old air. He gradually picked up more
and more of it as we conversed with him; but, his very eye-glass seemed
to hang less easily, and his shirt-collar, though still of the old
formidable dimensions, rather drooped.

'Gentlemen! ' said Mr. Micawber, after the first salutations, 'you are
friends in need, and friends indeed. Allow me to offer my inquiries with
reference to the physical welfare of Mrs. Copperfield in esse, and
Mrs. Traddles in posse,--presuming, that is to say, that my friend Mr.
Traddles is not yet united to the object of his affections, for weal and
for woe. '

We acknowledged his politeness, and made suitable replies. He then
directed our attention to the wall, and was beginning, 'I assure you,
gentlemen,' when I ventured to object to that ceremonious form of
address, and to beg that he would speak to us in the old way.

'My dear Copperfield,' he returned, pressing my hand, 'your cordiality
overpowers me. This reception of a shattered fragment of the Temple once
called Man--if I may be permitted so to express myself--bespeaks a heart
that is an honour to our common nature. I was about to observe that
I again behold the serene spot where some of the happiest hours of my
existence fleeted by. '

'Made so, I am sure, by Mrs. Micawber,' said I. 'I hope she is well? '

'Thank you,' returned Mr. Micawber, whose face clouded at this
reference, 'she is but so-so. And this,' said Mr. Micawber, nodding
his head sorrowfully, 'is the Bench! Where, for the first time in many
revolving years, the overwhelming pressure of pecuniary liabilities was
not proclaimed, from day to day, by importune voices declining to vacate
the passage; where there was no knocker on the door for any creditor
to appeal to; where personal service of process was not required, and
detainees were merely lodged at the gate! Gentlemen,' said Mr. Micawber,
'when the shadow of that iron-work on the summit of the brick structure
has been reflected on the gravel of the Parade, I have seen my children
thread the mazes of the intricate pattern, avoiding the dark marks. I
have been familiar with every stone in the place. If I betray weakness,
you will know how to excuse me. '

'We have all got on in life since then, Mr. Micawber,' said I.

'Mr. Copperfield,' returned Mr. Micawber, bitterly, 'when I was an
inmate of that retreat I could look my fellow-man in the face, and punch
his head if he offended me. My fellow-man and myself are no longer on
those glorious terms! '

Turning from the building in a downcast manner, Mr. Micawber accepted
my proffered arm on one side, and the proffered arm of Traddles on the
other, and walked away between us.

'There are some landmarks,' observed Mr. Micawber, looking fondly back
over his shoulder, 'on the road to the tomb, which, but for the impiety
of the aspiration, a man would wish never to have passed. Such is the
Bench in my chequered career. '

'Oh, you are in low spirits, Mr. Micawber,' said Traddles.

'I am, sir,' interposed Mr. Micawber.

'I hope,' said Traddles, 'it is not because you have conceived a dislike
to the law--for I am a lawyer myself, you know. '

Mr. Micawber answered not a word.

'How is our friend Heep, Mr. Micawber? ' said I, after a silence.

'My dear Copperfield,' returned Mr. Micawber, bursting into a state of
much excitement, and turning pale, 'if you ask after my employer as
YOUR friend, I am sorry for it; if you ask after him as MY friend,
I sardonically smile at it. In whatever capacity you ask after my
employer, I beg, without offence to you, to limit my reply to this--that
whatever his state of health may be, his appearance is foxy: not to
say diabolical. You will allow me, as a private individual, to
decline pursuing a subject which has lashed me to the utmost verge of
desperation in my professional capacity. '

I expressed my regret for having innocently touched upon a theme
that roused him so much. 'May I ask,' said I, 'without any hazard of
repeating the mistake, how my old friends Mr. and Miss Wickfield are? '

'Miss Wickfield,' said Mr. Micawber, now turning red, 'is, as she always
is, a pattern, and a bright example. My dear Copperfield, she is the
only starry spot in a miserable existence. My respect for that young
lady, my admiration of her character, my devotion to her for her love
and truth, and goodness! --Take me,' said Mr. Micawber, 'down a turning,
for, upon my soul, in my present state of mind I am not equal to this! '

We wheeled him off into a narrow street, where he took out his
pocket-handkerchief, and stood with his back to a wall. If I looked as
gravely at him as Traddles did, he must have found our company by no
means inspiriting.

'It is my fate,' said Mr. Micawber, unfeignedly sobbing, but doing even
that, with a shadow of the old expression of doing something genteel;
'it is my fate, gentlemen, that the finer feelings of our nature have
become reproaches to me. My homage to Miss Wickfield, is a flight of
arrows in my bosom. You had better leave me, if you please, to walk the
earth as a vagabond. The worm will settle my business in double-quick
time. '

Without attending to this invocation, we stood by, until he put up his
pocket-handkerchief, pulled up his shirt-collar, and, to delude any
person in the neighbourhood who might have been observing him, hummed a
tune with his hat very much on one side. I then mentioned--not knowing
what might be lost if we lost sight of him yet--that it would give me
great pleasure to introduce him to my aunt, if he would ride out to
Highgate, where a bed was at his service.

'You shall make us a glass of your own punch, Mr. Micawber,' said
I, 'and forget whatever you have on your mind, in pleasanter
reminiscences. '

'Or, if confiding anything to friends will be more likely to relieve
you, you shall impart it to us, Mr. Micawber,' said Traddles, prudently.

'Gentlemen,' returned Mr. Micawber, 'do with me as you will! I am a
straw upon the surface of the deep, and am tossed in all directions by
the elephants--I beg your pardon; I should have said the elements. '

We walked on, arm-in-arm, again; found the coach in the act of starting;
and arrived at Highgate without encountering any difficulties by the
way. I was very uneasy and very uncertain in my mind what to say or do
for the best--so was Traddles, evidently. Mr. Micawber was for the most
part plunged into deep gloom. He occasionally made an attempt to smarten
himself, and hum the fag-end of a tune; but his relapses into profound
melancholy were only made the more impressive by the mockery of a hat
exceedingly on one side, and a shirt-collar pulled up to his eyes.

We went to my aunt's house rather than to mine, because of Dora's not
being well. My aunt presented herself on being sent for, and welcomed
Mr. Micawber with gracious cordiality. Mr. Micawber kissed her hand,
retired to the window, and pulling out his pocket-handkerchief, had a
mental wrestle with himself.

Mr. Dick was at home. He was by nature so exceedingly compassionate of
anyone who seemed to be ill at ease, and was so quick to find any such
person out, that he shook hands with Mr. Micawber, at least half-a-dozen
times in five minutes. To Mr. Micawber, in his trouble, this warmth, on
the part of a stranger, was so extremely touching, that he could
only say, on the occasion of each successive shake, 'My dear sir, you
overpower me! ' Which gratified Mr. Dick so much, that he went at it
again with greater vigour than before.

'The friendliness of this gentleman,' said Mr. Micawber to my aunt, 'if
you will allow me, ma'am, to cull a figure of speech from the vocabulary
of our coarser national sports--floors me. To a man who is struggling
with a complicated burden of perplexity and disquiet, such a reception
is trying, I assure you. '

'My friend Mr. Dick,' replied my aunt proudly, 'is not a common man.