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Elisha Cuthbert Photos Books: Martin Eden The Pickwick Papers The Sea Wolf |
Mr. Pickwick firmly; not one halfpenny.
Hooroar for the principle, as the money-lender said ven he
vouldnt renew the bill, observed Mr. Weller, who was clearing
away the breakfast-things.
Sam, said Mr. Pickwick, have the goodness to step downstairs.
Certnly, sir, replied Mr. Weller; and acting on Mr. Pickwicks
gentle hint, Sam retired.
No, Perker, said Mr. Pickwick, with great seriousness of
manner, my friends here have endeavoured to dissuade me from
this determination, but without avail. I shall employ myself as
usual, until the opposite party have the power of issuing a legal
process of execution against me; and if they are vile enough to
avail themselves of it, and to arrest my person, I shall yield
myself up with perfect cheerfulness and content of heart. When
can they do this?
They can issue execution, my dear Sir, for the amount of the
damages and taxed costs, next term, replied Perker, just two
months hence, my dear sir.
Very good, said Mr. Pickwick. Until that time, my dear
fellow, let me hear no more of the matter. And now, continued
Mr. Pickwick, looking round on his friends with a good-
humoured smile, and a sparkle in the eye which no spectacles
could dim or conceal, the only question is, Where shall we go next?
Mr. Tupman and Mr. Snodgrass were too much affected by
their friends heroism to offer any reply. Mr. Winkle had not yet
sufficiently recovered the recollection of his evidence at the trial,
to make any observation on any subject, so Mr. Pickwick paused
in vain.
Well, said that gentleman, if you leave me to suggest our
destination, I say Bath. I think none of us have ever been there.
Nobody had; and as the proposition was warmly seconded by
Perker, who considered it extremely probable that if Mr. Pickwick
saw a little change and gaiety he would be inclined to think
better of his determination, and worse of a debtors prison, it was
carried unanimously; and Sam was at once despatched to the
White Horse Cellar, to take five places by the half-past seven
oclock coach, next morning.
There were just two places to be had inside, and just three to
be had out; so Sam Weller booked for them all, and having
exchanged a few compliments with the booking-office clerk on
the subject of a pewter half-crown which was tendered him as a
portion of his change, walked back to the George and Vulture,
where he was pretty busily employed until bed-time in reducing
clothes and linen into the smallest possible compass, and exerting
his mechanical genius in constructing a variety of ingenious
devices for keeping the lids on boxes which had neither locks nor hinges.
The next was a very unpropitious morning for a journey--
muggy, damp, and drizzly. The horses in the stages that were
going out, and had come through the city, were smoking so, that
the outside passengers were invisible. The newspaper-sellers
looked moist, and smelled mouldy; the wet ran off the hats of
the orange-vendors as they thrust their heads into the coach
windows, and diluted the insides in a refreshing manner. The
Jews with the fifty-bladed penknives shut them up in despair; the
men with the pocket-books made pocket-books of them. Watch-
guards and toasting-forks were alike at a discount, and pencil-
cases and sponges were a drug in the market.
Leaving Sam Weller to rescue the luggage from the seven or
eight porters who flung themselves savagely upon it, the moment
the coach stopped, and finding that they were about twenty
minutes too early, Mr. Pickwick and his friends went for shelter
into the travellers room--the last resource of human dejection.
The travellers room at the White Horse Cellar is of course
uncomfortable; it would be no travellers room if it were not. It
is the right-hand parlour, into which an aspiring kitchen fireplace
appears to have walked, accompanied by a rebellious poker,
tongs, and shovel. It is divided into boxes, for the solitary confinement
of travellers, and is furnished with a clock, a looking-glass,
and a live waiter, which latter article is kept in a small kennel
for washing glasses, in a corner of the apartment.
One of these boxes was occupied, on this particular occasion,
by a stern-eyed man of about five-and-forty, who had a bald and
glossy forehead, with a good deal of black hair at the sides and
back of his head, and large black whiskers. He was buttoned up
to the chin in a brown coat; and had a large sealskin travelling-
cap, and The Pickwick Papers page 238 The Pickwick Papers page 240 |