" Gentlemen,-The lady for whom I ordered your Food is six months advanced in pregnancy, and Was
suffering severely from indigestion, constipation. throwing up her meals shortly after eating them, having a
great deal of heartburn, and being constantly obliged to resort to physic o r the enema. and sometimes both.
I am happy to inform you that your Food produced immediate relief.  I authorise the publication of this note if YOU thin!
it may benefit other sufferers, and remain, gentlemen, faithfully yours, " THOS. WOODHOUSE.
"3 Sidney Terrace, Reading, Berks., Qec. 3, 1847.
"Gentlemen,-I am happy t o he able t o Inform you t i a t the person for whom the forme: quantity Was
procured has derived very great benefit from its use; distressing symptoms of long standmg have been
removed. and a feeling of restored health induced. Having witnessed the beneficial effects in the above-
mentioned case, I can with confidence recommend it, and shall have much pleasure in so doing whenever a n
opportunity offers. I am, gentlemen, very truly yours,
's JAMES SH ORLANQ, late Surgeon, 96th Regiment.'"
"21, Broad Street, Golden Square, Londqn, Nov. 20,.1547.
(Details of nineteen years'dyspepsia nervousness, sickness a t the stomach and vomitmg, and liver com.
plaint, and three weeks' " Revalenta" ireatment,)-" 1 humbly and sincerely thank God and yoLIrSelVeS a
His instruments, &c. " ISABEL'LA GRELLIERE.''
"Winslow, Bucks, Jan.22, 1848.
"I have found it t o he a simple, though very efficacious and pleasant food, doing good t o my own and
others' functional disorders. (Rev.) CHARLES KERR."
'6Athol-street, Perth, May 2, 1848.
"Some time has now elapsed since the lady [who had heen a n invalid for thirteen years from want of
digestion, accompanied with cough and general prostration of strength) for whom I procured yoor ' Arabica
Food, has been using it daily as directed, and I am happy to say that i t has produced a most salutary chal;e
in her system, &c. "JAMES PORTER.
Southwick Park, Fareham, Hants, Oct. 31, 1848.
" Gentlemen,-I sincerely thank you for yourkind attention. When I began taking the ' Revalenta' I was in
'@
as deplorable a condition as can well he imagined. I was confined t o bed, and so weak that I could neither
stand nor walk, &C. &c. I am happy t o say that I get stronger, and my health better every day, &c. &c.
l 4 JOHN VASS, Land Steward."
Similar expressions of gratitude from William Hunt, Esq., Barrister-at-law, King's College, Cambridge;
James Shorland, Esq., late Surgeon, 96th Regt., Reading, Berks; ana 5,000 other correspondents.
I n canisters a t 4s. 6d.; 41b. a t i l s , ; 101b. a t 22s.; super-refined quality, 41b. 228. j and 81b. 338, ; suitably
packed for all climates. 81b. and IOlb. canisters forwarded by Du Barry & Co., on receipt of Post-office o r
bankers' orders (carriage free) t o any town or railroad station connected by rail with London.
 LOCOCK'S P U L M O N I C W A F E R S . ,
&++* Snzall books, coorttwLorting many hu+zdreds of properly authenticated Testimorzials, may be
had from evely Agent.
THE POLLOWING ARE A FEW LETTERS WHICH HAVE JUST BEEN RECEIVED :-
Cure of 5 0 years' Asthma. I Important to all who Sing.
B.~tractof a letter from Mr. J. Cunningham, farmer, 1 From S. Pearsall, Eq.,Her Majesty's Concerts, and
Ardingly, near Brighton. Vicar Choral of LichJeld Cathedral.
Sir,-1 feel it a duty incumbent on me to inform Lichfield, July 10, 1848.
you, for the beneat of others similarly affiicted,of the Gentlemen,--A lady of distinction, having pointed
astonishing relief afforded to my wife by Dr. Locock's out to me the qualities of Dr. Locock's Wafers, I was
Wafers. induced to make a trial of a box, and from this trial I
She was affected with confirmed asthma for fifty am happy to give my testimonial in their favour. I
years, from which her SufPerings were dreadful. She 6nd by allowing a few of the wafers (taken in the
was recommended last winter by a friend to try the course of the day) to gradually dissolve in the mouth,
wafers; she didso, and the effect was truly astonish- my voice become bright and clear, and the tone full
ing; indeed, the first box gave her immediate relief. and distinct. They are decidedly the most effi~adons
(Signed) J. CUNNINGHAM. Of any I have ever used.
Witness, Mr.W. W. Payne, 18, North Street, Brighton. S. PEARSALL.

They have a pleasant taste. Price 1s<EMAIL_ADDRESS>2s. 9d., and 11s. per box.
AGENTS : DA SILVA & GO., 1, Bride-lane, Fleet-street, London. Sold by all Medicine Vendors.
PRICE, Is. l:d., 2s. gd., and 11s. per box.
The Only Medicine recommended to be
taken by Females !
B E W A R E OF IMITATIONS!
Unprincipled Persons Counterfeit this medi-
cine in the form of PILLS &c. Purchasers
must therefore observe t d t none are Gen-
uine buz " W A F E R S , ~and that thy, words
DR. LOCOCK'S W A F E Z Z S
are in the Stamp outside each Box.
OBSERVE.-There are various Countgrfeit Mediohes,
havztzg words on the Stamp so NEARLY RESEMBLING
THESE, as to mislead the unwary. Purchasers
must therefore strictly observe the above Caution.
Prepared only by the Propnetor's Agents, DA SILVA & CO.,
1, Bride Lane, Fleet S t , London.Sold by all MedicineVendors.
86
10 ADVERTISEMENTS.
11"EKIRBY, BEARD & C?S
PLUS OLTRI\ NEEDLES,
USE
WITH LARGE DRILLED EYES.
Sold by every Draper,&c.inthe United KinBdom.
THE NEW PATENT SHOWER BATH.
R. AND J. SLACK, 335, STRAND,
Opposite Somerset House,
Beg to call attention t o their n e w Shower Bath a s a n article f a r superior to a n y bath ever introduced i t s
action being so simple that a child can fill it. T h e great inconvenience i n t h e old shower bath was'the
difficulty in raising the water, t h e pump requiring great labour, and conseqnent liability t o get out of order;
all these objections are obviated in this bath. May he seen in operation a t 336, Strand, where may he inspected
the most extensive assortment of haths, toilet sets, nlckel and electro-plated ware, and every article in fur-
nishing ironmongery a t prices much lower than a n y other house where quality is considered. Sponging
Baths, from 75, 6d.j Hip ditto, 19s. and 21s.; Portable Shower Baths and Curtains, 7s. 6d,
Their Catalogue, containing Two Hundred Drawings and Prices, may be hacl
gratis, or sent, post-free, to any part.
-- - --
THE I N V l S l B L E V E N T I L A T I N G HEADS OF HAIR.
ihe Nee@ ROSS & SON'S METHOD O F MEASURING
oard T H E HEAD.
$ = /,%,-. :
-- - -
..Z?Q~(?U-~
I&-
Inches. / ~~ghths.
The Round of the Head
- --
... ___I/__-
.- I
From Ear t o Ear ..........
From Forehead to Poll.. ...
_____I-
I
- I I -
These inimitable works of art, for both Ladies a n d
Gentlemen, from One Guinea-and-a-half upwards.
infallible.
BOTANIC WATER AND BEAR'S CREASE. When t h e Hair is becoming thin, and falling off, the only
effectual remedy is the use of t h e above named articles, applied alternately ; the Botanic Water t o cleanse
and stimulate, and the Bear's Grease t o nourish it.
THE N E W TOOTH-PICK TOOTH-BRUSH, thoroughly cleansing between t h e Teeth when used up and
down, and polishing the surface when used crossways, t h e hair warranted never t o come out. I n four
strengths, viz., No. 1, hard ; No. 2, less hard ; No. 3, medium; No. 4, soft.
THE DOUBLE ANTI-PRESSURE NAIL BRUSH; T H E TRIPLE HAlR BRUSH; T H E MEDlUM SHAVING,
BRUSH. THE " RENOVATOR" CLOTHES BRUSH. These articles being t h e illventions of Ross & SONS,
the p n h l ~ care requested to observe their names stamped o n each.
If you wish to avoid all the torture "which Shaving has entailed upon your chins," t r y ROSS & SON'S
RAILWAY STROP AND RAZOR, and if Travellers, supply yourselves with t h e ROSSIAN DRESSING CASE,
which contains the largest number of conveniences i n t h e smallest compass.
.-. -
Address, ROSS & SONS, 119 and 120 Bishopsgate Street, London.
J. I N ~ R W I C K , 1 R ALSABI COPAIBA, and a11 other
68, PRINCES STREET, LEICESTER &IUBRE, IJ medicines of a nauseous character, may now he
Begs t o announce that he has just received from the taken w~thoutinconv~mence,by means of the PATENT
Continent a large and well selected Stock of ORGANIC CAPSULES. These Capsules w ~ l he l found
superior to those made rvich Gelatine. They remain
PURE MEERSCHAUM PIPES,)' entire until they have passed through the stomach into
Warranted of the finest quality and most approved the intestines; and the medicine heine efficientlv
shanes. brouelit in contact with the oreans it is-intended to
~NDERWICK~S REGISTERED HYDRAULIC TUBE, affecc the usual nausea and undeasant eructations are
The latest improvement in Smoking. 2s. tid each. avoided. E V A N S& LESCAEE,London, Patentees;
WHOLESALE A N D RETAIL WAREHOUSE, f o r and aU Med~cineVendors throughout the kingdom.
every description of Smoking Apparatus, 58,
PRINCES STREET, ~ ~ C B S T ESQUARE.
U *** Ask for the Patent Flexible Capsules.
87
ADVERTISEMENTS. 11
-- - - -- - --
ALPACA UMBRELLAS.
THE superiority of Alpaca over every other material for Umbrellas, being
now generally acknowledged, and the Patentees having granted licenses to
several of the largest Manufacturers, the Public are respectfully informed
that they may be procured of most Umbrella Dealers in the Kingdom,
at the price of 10s. 6d. and upwards.
W. & J. SANGSTER,
140, Regent Street; 94, Fleet Street; and 10, Royal Exchange.
N.B. Upwards of 35,000 of these Umbrellas have been already sold.
W. & J. S. have also always on hand a very extensive Stock of cheap
SILK UMBRELLAS,
From 7s. to 10s. 6d. ; and best ditto from 15s. to 21s.
DEFORMITIES OF T H E CHEST AND SPINE.
EAGLAND'S newly invented INVISIBLE SPINE
SUPPORTERS will be foilnd well deserving the atten-
tion of the Medical Profession, and of persons suffering
under Spinal deformity and its consequences. As any
attempt a t a description must needs fall short of giving
a correct idea of the plan itself, Mr. EAGLAND solicits
a n inspection. They are beautifully simple and emi-
nently successful, quite imperceptible, and conceal the
deformity from the keenest observer. Mr. E. has the
pleasure t o add, that he is empowered to refer t o ladies
of the highest respectability a s to the remedial effects
produced by their use.
12, COVENTRY STREET, HAYMARKET,
LONDON.
*,* Hours Eleven till Six.
~ -
T H E GENTLEMAN'S REAL HEAD OF HAIR or INVISIBLE PERUKE
The principle upon which this Peruke is made is so superior to everything get
produced, that the hlanufacturer invites the honour of a visit from the Sceptic and the
Connoisseur, that one may be convinced and the other gratified, by inspecting this and
other novel and beautiful specimens of the Perruqueian Art, a t the establishment of the
Sole Inventor, F. Browne, 47, FENCHURCH-ST.
F. BROWNE'S INFALLIBLE MODE O F MEASURING T H E HEAD.
Round the head in the manner of a
the Ears loose ................................................... 1 to 1.
.-
From the Forehead over to the poll,
way as required ....................
.......................... 2 to 2.
From one Temple to the other, across the rise or: As marked
Crown-of the head to where the Hair grows ............' 3 to 3.

KEATING'S COUGH LOZENGES.
A CERTAIN REMEDY for disorders of
Difficulty of Breathing-in Redundancy of Phlegm-in Incipient CONSUMPTION
the PULMONARY
ORGANS-
(of which C O U ~isHthe
most positive indication) they are of unerring efficacy. In ASTH~IA,
a n d in WINTER COUGH, they have nevw
been known to fail.
Prepared and sold in Boxes, Is. 1&d and Tins, 2s. gd 4s 6d., and 10s. 6d., each, by THOMASKEATINC
Chemist,, &c., N?. 79, St. Paul's ~h;;ch Yard, ~ondon,"and Retail by all Druggists and Patent ~ e d i c i n ;
Vendors in the K~ngdom.
88
DOUDNEYS
t@itater@roofer$, BaWtTO maRer8, anD 1PCaiIor8
QUEEN V I C T O R I A , QUEEN ADELAIDE,
H.R.H. Prince Albert, H.R.H. The Duchess of Kent,
KING LOUIS PHILIPPE,
And the ROYAL FAMILIES of ENGLAND and FRANCE,
The DOUDNEYS motto is "none but Good Articles can be cheap,"
and withthis ever in view they have, by increasing efforts, established a R e a d y Money business of great extent
among the strong holds of)the old fashioned unr~riousCredit System. As to the character and recom-
mendatory influence of the approbation which has been bestowed upon their endeavours; let their l?i& Royal
Appointments, and their Patronage Book filled with the Royal, Illustrious, and Noble nimes
of their customers, testify.
The New Patterns for Spring and Summer wear are now ready for
inspection at the Old Prices so famous in seasons past, viz. :-Summer Waistcoats 7s. each, or 3 for 20s.-
Summer Trousers 10s. 6d. per pail: or 3 for 30s.-Summer Coats, the beautiful light material 10s. 6d.-21s. and 30s.
The Queens Victoria and Adelaide, and the Royal and Noble Duchesses
of Kent and Cambridge, Sutherland and Bnccleuch, constantly wear Doudney's elegant Regintered Cloak, ina
variety of Waterproof, materials for Winter Wraps and the Promenade.-'I Every Lady should see these graceful Gar-
ments." ( T i d e Morning Post, September 2 6 6 1 ~ ) They surpass all others for School Cloaks for the sons and daugliters.
For Gentlemen.-The Roval Registered Cloak. as made for
I X . l R . 1 1 .   Su;..lb duwn to tile
useful Guinea Cloak.
The New Patent Belt for Riding or general exercise, the only really effectual
protection against rupture; the support commencing at the bottom edge of the belt, and producing an uniform upward
pressure. They may be enlarged or tightened to the extent of six inches at pleasure, and never produce indigcstion
either in Ladies or Gentlemen. They are attached to Drawers with excellerit effect. The most eminent of the Faculty
are recommending these in preference to all others.
LIVERIES. Three Guineas the Plain Suit of Best Quality. Ready Money
doe8 it!!! and a very extensive practice among families of first distinction insures satisfactory results.
Habit Makers by Special Appointment to Queen Victoria and
the Ladies of the Court. A Superfine Cloth Habit for 4 Guineas,
Waterproof Irish Poplin. The DOUDNEYS are the sole manufac-
turers of this beautiful article to HER MAJESTY AND T H E PRINCE CONSORT. Gentlemen's Coats, Ladies
Cloaks, and lengths for Dresses can be obtained only at their Establishment.
Country Gentlemen wishing to be Respectably Dressed at low Prices should
send for a Book of detail, self-measurement and all the System of business, or if 3 ox 4 Gentlemen unite, a Traveller
will wait upon them.
17, OLD BOND ST~KBURLINGTON ARCADE
49. LOMBARD ~ ~ ~ ~ i ~ - ~ s t a b 1784.
lished
89
90
91
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
CHAPTER IV.
I FALL INTO DISGRACE.
IFthe room to which my bed was removed, were a sentient thing that
could give evidence, I might appeal to it at this day-who sleeps there
now, I wonder !-to bear witness for me what a heavy heart I carried to
it. I went up there, hearing the dog in the yard bark after me all the
way while I climbed the stairs ; and, looking as blank and strange upon the
room as the room looked upon me, sat down with my small hands crossed,
and thought.
I thought of the oddest things. Of the shape of the room, of the cracks
in the ceiling, of the paper on the wall, of the flaws in the window-glass
making ripples and dimples on the prospect, of the washing-stand being
ricketty on its three legs, and having a discontented something about it,
which reminded me of Mrs. Gummidge under the influence of the old one.
I was crying all the time, but, except that I was conscious of being cold
and dejected, I am sure I never thought why I cried. At last in my
desolation I began to consider that I was dreadfully in love with little
Em'ly, and had been torn away from her to come here where no one
seemed to want me, or to care about me, half as much as she did. This
made such a very miserable piece of business of it, that I rolled myself up
in a corner of the counterpane, and cried myself to sleep.
I was awoke by somebody saying " Here he is ! " and uncovering my
hot head. My mother and Peggotty had come to look for me, and it was
one of them who had done it.
uDavy,'y said my mother. "What 's the matter? "
I thought it very strange that she should ask me, and answered,
" Nothing." I turned over on my face, I recollect, to hide my trembling
lip, which answered her with greater truth.
"Davy," said my mother. "Davy, my child !"
I dare say no words she could have uttered, would have affected me so
much, then, as her calling me her child. I hid my tears in the bedclothes,
and pressed her from me with my hand, when she would have raised
me up.
 said my mother.
"1 have no doubt at all about it. How can you reconcile it to your
conscience, I wonder, to prejudice my own boy against me, or against
anybody who is dear to me? What do you mean by it, Peggotty ? "
Poor Peggotty lifted up her hands and eyes, and only answered, in a
sort of paraphrase of the grace I usually repeated after dinner, "Lord
forgive you, Mrs. Copperfield, and for what you have said this minute,
may you never be truly sorry !"
'< It 's enough to distract me," cried my mother. " In my honeymoon,
too, when my most inveterate enemy might relent, one would think, and
not envy me a little peace of mind and happiness.  Peggotty, you savage creature ! Oh, dear me !" cried my mother,
D
92
34 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
turning from one of us to the other, in her pettish wilful manner, "what
a troublesome world this is, when one has the most right to expect it to
be as agreeable as possible ! "
I felt the touch of a hand that I knew was neither her's nor Peggotty's,
and slipped to my feet at the bed-side. I t was Mr. Murdstone's hand,
and he kept it on my arm as he said:
"What's this ? Clara, my love, have you forgotten? -Firmness,
my dear !"
"I am very sorry, Edward," said my mother. " I meant to be very
good, but I am so uncomfortable."
" Indeed ! " he answered. "That's a bad hearing, so soon, Clara."
" I say it 's very hard I should be made so now," returned my mother,
pouting; " and it is-very hard-isn't i t ? "
He drew her to him, whispered in her ear, and kissed her. I knew as
well, when I saw my mother's head lean down upon his shoulder, and her
arm touch his neck-I knew as well that he could mould her pliant nature
into any form he chose, as I know, now, that he did it.
 "David and I will
come down, together.  "
" She has been my mistress a long time, sir," answered Peggotty. "I
ought to it."
"That's true," he answered. "But I thought I heard you, as I came
up-stairs, address her by a name that is not hers. She has taken mine, you
know. Will you remember that ? "
Peggotty, with some uneasy glances at me, curtseyed herself out of the
room without replying ; seeing, I suppose, that she was expected to go,
and had no excuse for remaining. When we two were left alone, he shut the
door, and sitting on a chair, and holding me standing before him, looked
steadily into my eyes. I felt my own attracted, no less steadily, to his.
As I recall our being opposed thus, face to face, I seem again to hear my
heart beat fast and high.
"David," he said, making his lips thin, by pressing them together,
"if I have an obstinate horse or dog to deal with, what do you think
I do?"
" I don't know."
" I beat him."
I had answered in a kind of breathless whisper, but I felt, in my silence,
that my breath was shorter now.
" I make him wince, and smart. I say to myself, ' I '11 conquer that
fellow; ' and if it were to cost him all the blood he had, I should do it.
What is that upon your face ? "
"Dirt," I said.
H e knew it was the mark of tears as well as I. But if he had asked
the question twenty times, each time with twenty blows, I believe my baby
heart would have burst before I would have told him so.
" You have a good deal of intelligence for a little fellow," he said, with
a grave smile that belonged to him, and you understood me very well, I
see. Wash that face, sir, and come down with me "
93
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 35
He pointed to the washing-stand, which I had made out to be like
Mrs. Gummidge, and motioned me with his head to obey him directly. I
had little doubt then, and I have less doubt now, that he would have
knocked me down without the least compunction, if I had hesitated.
" Clara, my dear," he said, when I had done his bidding, and he walked
me into the parlor, with his hand still on my arm ; "you will not be made
uncomfortable any more, I hope. We shall soon improve our youthful
humours."
 A word of encouragement and explanation, of pity for my
childish ignorance, of welcome home, of reassurance to me that it was
home, might have made me dutiful to him in my heart henceforth, instead
of in my hypocritical outside, and might have made me respect instead of
hate him. I thought my mother was sorry to see me standing in the
room so scared and strange, and that, presently, when I stole to a chair,
she followed me with her eyes more sorrowfully still-missing, perhaps,
some freedom in my childish tread-but the word was not spoken, and
the time for it was gone.
We dined alone, we three together. He seemed to be very fond of
my mother-I am afraid I liked him none the better for that-and she
was very fond of him. I gathered from what they said, that an elder
sister of his was coming to stay with them, and that she was expected
that evening. I am not certain whether I found out then, or afterwards,
that, without being actively concerned in any business, he had some share
in, or some annual charge upon the profits of, a wine-merchant's house in
London, with which his family had been connected from his great-grand-
father's time, and in which his sister had a similar interest; but I may
mention it in this place, whether or no.
After dinner, when we were sitting by the fire, and I was meditating
an escape to Peggotty without having the hardihood to slip away, lest
it should offend the master of the house, a coach drove up to the
garden-gate, and he went out to receive the visitor. My mother followed
him. I was timidly following her, when she turned round at the parlor-
door, in the dusk, and taking me in her embrace as she had been used to
do, whispered me to love my new father and be obedient to him. She
did this hurriedly and secretly, as if it were wrong, but tenderly; and,
putting out her hand behind her, held mine in it, until we came near to
where he was standing in the garden, where she let mine go, and drew
her's through his arm.
I t was Miss Murdstone who was arrived, and a gloomy-looking lady
she was ; dark, like her brother, whom she greatly resembled in face and
voice ; and with very heavy eyebrows, nearly meeting over her large nose, as
if, being disabled by the wrongs of her sex from wearing whiskers, she had
carried them to that account. She brought with her, two uncompromising
hard black boxes, with her initials on the lids in hard brass nails.
 I had never, at that
time, seen such a metallic lady altogether as Miss Murdstone was.
D 2
94
36 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
She was brought into the parlor with many tokens of welcome, and
there formally recognised my mother as a new and near relation. Then
she looked at me, and said :
cc I s that your boy, sister-in-law ? "
My mother acknowledged me.
c c Generally speaking," said Miss Murdstone, '< I don't like boys.
How d' ye do, boy ? "
Under these encouraging circumstances, I replied that I was very well,
and that I hoped she was the same; with such an indifferent grace, that
Miss Murdstone disposed of me in two words :
'' Wants manner !"
Having uttered which, with great distinctness, she begged the favor of
being shewn to her room, which became to me from that time forth a
place of awe and dread, wherein the two black boxes were never seen open or
known to be left unlocked, and where (for I peeped in once or twice when
she was out) numerous little steel fetters and rivets, with which Miss
Murdstone embellished herself when she was dressed, generally hung
upon the looking-glass in formidable array.
As well as I could make out, she had come for good, and had no
intention of ever going again. She began to " helpJ' my mother next
morning, and was in and out of the store-closet all day, putting things to
rights, and making havoc in the old arrangements. Almost the first
remarkable thing I observed in Miss Murdstone was, her being constantly
haunted by a suspicion that the servants had a man secreted somewhere
on the premises. Under the influence of this delusion, she dived into the
coal-cellar at the most untimely hours, and scarcely ever opened the door
of a dark cupboard without clapping it to again, in the belief that she
had got him.
Though there was nothing very airy about Miss Murdstone, she was a
perfect Lark in point of getting up. She was up (and, as I believe to this
hour, looking for that man) before anybody in the house was stirring.
Peggotty gave it as her opinion that she even slept with one eye open ;
but I could not concur in this idea ; for I tried it myself after hearing the
suggestion thrown out, and found it couldn't be done.
On the very first morning after her arrival she was up and ringing her
bell at cock-crow. When my mother came down to breakfast and was
going to make the tea, Miss Murdstone gave her a kind of peck on the
cheek, which was her nearest approach to a kiss, and said :
" Now, Clara, my dear, I am come here, you know, to relieve you of all
the trouble I can. You're much too pretty and thoughtlessJJ-my mother
blushed but laughed, and seemed not to dislike this character-" to have
any duties imposed upon you that can be undertaken by me. If you'll be
so good as give me your keys, my dear, 1'11 attend to all this sort of thing
in future."

My mother did not suffer her authority to pass from her without a
shadow of protest. One night when Miss Murdstone had been developing
certain household plans to her brother, of which he signified his approba-
95
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 37
tion, my mother suddenly began to cry, and said she thought she might
have been consulted.
'< Clara!" said Mr. Murdstone sternly. " Clara ! I wonder at you."
" Oh, it's very well to say you wonder, Edward !" cried my mother,
and it's very well for you to talk about firmness, but you wouldn't like
it yourself."
Firmness, I may observe, was the grand quality on which both Mr. and
Miss Murdstone took their stand. However I might have expressed my
comprehension of it at that time, if I had been called upon, I nevertheless
did clearly comprehend in my own way, that it was another name for
tyranny ; and for a certain gloomy, arrogant, devil's humour, that was in
them both. The creed, as I should state it now, was this. Mr. Murd-
stone was firm ; nobody in his world was to be so firm as Mr. Murdstone ;
nobody else in his world was to be firm at all, for everybody was to be
bent to his firmness. Miss Murdstone was an exception. She might be
firm, but only by relationship, and in an inferior and tributary degree. My
mother was another exception. She might be firm, and must be; but
only in bearing their firmness, and firmly believing there was no other
firmness upon earth.
" It's very hard," said my mother, "that in my own house-"
"My own house?" repeated Mr. Murdstone. " Clara!"
" Our own house, I mean," faltered my mother, evidently frightened
-" I hope you must know what I mean, Edward-it 's very hard that in
your own house I may not have a word to say about domestic matters.
I am sure I managed very well before we were married. There's evi-
dence," said my mother, sobbing ; " ask Peggotty if I didn't do very well
when I wasn't interfered with !"
" Edward," said Miss Murdstone, " let there be an end of this. I go
to-morrow."
" Jane Murdstone," said her brother, "be silent ! How dare you to
insinuate that you don't know my character better than your words imply ? "
" I am sure," my poor mother went on, at a grievous disadvantage, and
with many tears, " I don't want anybody to go. I should be very
miserable and unhappy if anybody was to go. I don't ask much. I am
not unreasonable. I only want to be consulted sometimes. I am very
much obliged to anybody who assists me, and I only want to be consulted
as a mere form, sometimes.
" Edward," said Miss Murdstone,-again,- - " let there be an end of this.
I go to-moGow."
c c Jane Murdstone," thundered Mr. Murdstone. "Will you be silent?
 "
Miss Murdstone made a jail-delivery of her pocket-handkerchief, and
held it before her eyes.
 You
astound me ! Yes, I had a satisfaction in the thought of marrying an
inexperienced and artless person, and forming her character, and infusing
into it some amount of that firmness and decision of which it stood in
need.  I am sure I am not ungrateful. No one ever said I was,
before. I have many faults, but not that. Oh, don't, my dear !"
"When Jane Murdstone meets, I say," he went on, after waiting until
my mother was silent, "with a base return, that feeling of mine is chilled
and altered."
"Don't, my love, say that!" implored my mother, very piteously.
" Oh, don't, Edward ! I can't bear to hear it. Whatever I am, I am
affectionate. I know I am affectionate. I wouldn't say it, if I wasn't
certain that I am. Ask Peggotty. I am sure she '11 tell you I 'm &ec-
tionate."
"There is no extent of mere weakness, Clara," said Mr. Murdstone in
reply, "that can have the least weight with me. You lose breath."
" Pray let us be friends," said my mother, " I couldn't live under
coldness or unkindness. I am so sorry. I have a great many defects, I
know, and it's very good of you, Edward, with your strength of mind, to
endeavour to correct them for me. Jane, I don't object to anything.
I should be quite broken-hearted if you thought of leaving-" My
mother was too much overcome to go on.
" Jane Murdstone," said Mr. Murdstone to his sister, " any harsh words
between us are, I hope, uncommon. I t is not my fault that so unusual an
occurrence has taken place to-night. I was betrayed into it by another.
Nor is it your fault. You were betrayed into it by another. Let us
both try to forget it. And as this," he added, after these magnanimous
words, " is not a fit scene for the boy-David, go to bed ! "
I could hardly find the door, through the tears that stood in my eyes.
I was so sorry for my mother's distress ; but I groped my way out, and
groped my way up to my room in the dark, without even having the
heart to say good night to Peggotty, or to get a candle from her. When
her coming up to look for me, an hour or so afterwards, awoke me,
she said that my mother had gone to bedpoorly, and that Mr. and Miss
Murdstone were sitting alone.
Going down next morning rather earlier than usual, I paused outside
the parlor-door, on hearing my mother's voice. She was very earnestly
and humbly entreating Miss Murdstone's pardon, which that lady granted,
and a perfect reconciliation took place. I never knew my mother after-
wards to give an opinion on any matter, without first appealing to Miss
Murdstone, or without having first ascertained, by some sure means, what
Miss Murdstone's opinion was ; and I never saw Miss Murdstone, when out
of temper (she was infirm that way), move her hand towards her bag as if
she were going to take out the keys and offer to resign them to my
mother, without seeing that my mother was in a terrible fright.
The gloomy taint that was in the Murdstone blood, darkened the
Murdstone religion, which was austere and wrathful. I have thought,
since, that its assuming that character was a necessary consequence of
Mr. Murdstone's firmness, which wouldn't allow him to let any body off
from the utmost weight of the severest penalties he could find any excuse
for. Be this as it may, I well remember the tremendous visages with
97
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
which we used to go to church, and the changed air of the place. Again,
the dreaded Sunday comes round, and I file into the old pew first,
like a guarded captive brought to a condemned service. Again, Miss
Murdstone, in a black velvet gown, that looks as if it had been made
out of a pall, follows close upon me; then my mother; then her
husband. There is no Peggotty now, as in the old time. Again, I listen
to Miss Murdstone mumbling the responses, and emphasising all the
dread words with a cruel relish. Again, I see her dark eyes roll round the
church when she says "miserable sinners," as if she were calling all
the congregation names. Again, I catch rare glimpses of my mother,
moving her lips timidly between the two, with one of them muttering at
each ear like low thunder. Again, I wonder with a sudden fear whether
it is likely that our good old clergyman can be wrong, and Mr. and Miss
Murdstone right, and that all the angels in Heaven can be destroying angels.
Again, if I move a finger or relax a muscle of my face, Miss Murdstone
pokes me with her prayer-book, and makes my side ache.
Yes, and again, as we walk home, I note some neighbours looking at my
mother, and at me, and whispering. Again, as the three go on arm-in-arm,
and I linger behind alone, I follow some of those looks, and wonder if my
mother's step be really not so light as I have seen it, and if the gaiety of
her beauty be really almost worried away. Again, I wonder whether any
of the neighbours call to mind, as I do, how we used to walk home
together, she and I; and I wonder stupidly about that, all the dreary
dismal day.
There had been some talk on occasions of my going to boarding-
school. Mr. and Miss Murdstone had originated it, and my mother had
of course agreed with them. Nothing, however, was concluded on the
subject yet. I n the meantime, I learnt lessons at home.
Shall I ever forget those lessons ! They were presided over nominally
by my mother, but really by Mr. Murdstone and his sister, who were always
present, and found them a favourable occasion for giving my mother
lessons in that miscalled firmness, which was the bane of both our lives.
I believe I was kept at home, for that purpose. I had been apt enough to
learn, and willing enough, when my mother and I had lived alone together.
I can faintly remember learning the alphabet at her knee. To this day,
when I look upon the fat black letters in the primer, the puzzling novelty
of their shapes, and the easy good-nature of 0 and Q and S, seem to
present themselves again before me as they used to do. But they recall no
feeling of disgust or reluctance. On the contrary, I seem to have walked
along a path of flowers as far as the crocodile-book, and to have been
cheered by the gentleness of my mother's voice and manner all the way.
But these solemn lessons which succeeded those, I remember as the death-
blow at my peace, and a grievous daily drudgery and misery. They were
very long, very numerous, very hard-perfectly unintelligible, some of
them, to me-and I was generally as much bewildered by them as I
believe my poor mother was herself.
Let me remember how it used to be, and bring one morning back
again.
I come into the second-best parlor after breakfast, with my books,
and an exercise-book, and a slate.  The very sight of these
two has such an influence over me, that I begin to feel the words I have
been at infinite pains to get into my head, all sliding away, and going I
don't know where. I wonder where they do go, by-the-by ?
I hand the first book to my mother. Perhaps it is a grammar, perhaps
a history, or geography. I take a last drowning look at the page as I give
it into her hand, and start off aloud at a racing pace while I have got it
fresh. I trip over a word. Mr. Murdstone looks up. I trip over
another word. Miss Murdstone looks up. I redden, tumble over half-a-
dozen words, and stop. I think my mother would show me the book if
she dared, but she does not dare, and she says softly :
" Oh, Davy, Davy! "
" Now, Clara," says Mr. Murdstone, "be firm with the boy. Don't
say ' Oh, Davy, Davg !' That's childish. He knows his lesson, or he does
n i t know it.""
" H e does not know it," Miss Murdstone interposes awfully.
"I am really afraid he does not," says my mother.
"Then you see, Clara," returns Miss Murdstone, "you should just
give him the book back, and make him know it."
" Yes, certainly," says my mother ; " that is what I intend to do, my
dear Jane.
I obey the first clause of the injunction by trying once more, but am
not so successful with the second, for I am very stupid. I tumble down
before I get to the old place, at a point where I was all right before, and
stop to think. But I can't think about the lesson. I think of the
number of yards of net in Miss Murdstone's cap, or of the price of
Mr. Murdstone's dressing-gown, or any such ridiculous problem that I
have no business with, and don't want to have anything at all to do with.
Mr. Murdstone makes a movement of impatience which I have been
expecting for a long time. Miss Murdstone does the same. My mother
glances submissively at them, shuts the book, and lays it by as an arrear
to be worked out when my other tasks are done.
There is a pile of these arrears very soon, and it swells like a rolling
snowball.  The case is so
hopeless, and I feel that I am wallowing in such a bog of nonsense, that I
give up all idea of getting out, and abandon myself to my fate. The
despairing way in which my mother and I look at each other, as I blunder
on, is truly melancholy. But the greatest effect in these miserable lessons
is when my mother (thinking nobody is observing her) tries to give me
the cue by the motion of her lips. At that instant, Miss Murdstone, who has
been lying in wait for nothing else all along, says in a deep warning voice :
'' Clara ! "
My mother starts, colors, and smiles faintly. Mr. Murdstone comes
out of his chair, takes the book, throws it at me or boxes my ears with
it, and turns me out of the room by the shoulders.
 This is invented for me, and delivered to me
orally by Mr. Murdstone, and begins, " I f I go into a cheesemonger's
99
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
shop, and buy five thousand double-Gloucester cheeses at fourpence-
halfpenny each, present payment "-at which I see Miss Murdstone
secretly overjoyed. I pore over these cheeses without any result or enlighten-
ment until dinner-time ; when, having made a Mulatto of myself by getting
the dirt of the slate into the pores of my skin, I have a slice of bread to
help me out with the cheeses, and am considered in disgrace for the rest
of the evening.
I t seems to me, at this distance of time, as if my unfortunate studies
generally took this course. I could have done very well if I had been without
the Murdstones ;but the influence of the Murdstones upon me was like the
fascination of two snakes on a wretched young bird. Even when I did get
through the morning with tolerable credit, there was not much gained but
dinner; for Miss Murdstone never could endure to see me untasked, and
if I rashly made any show of being unemployed, called her brother's
attention to me by saying, " Clara, my dear, there's nothing like work-
give your boy an exercise;" which caused me to be clapped down to some
new labor, there and then. As to any recreation with other children of
my age, I had very little of that; for the gloomy theology of the
Murdstones made all children out to be a swarm of little vipers (though
there was a child once set in the midst of the Disciples), and held that
they contaminated one another.
The natural result of this treatment, continued, I suppose, for some six
months or more, was to make me sullen, dull, and dogged. I was not
made the less so, by my sense of being daily more and more shut out and
alienated from my mother. I believe I should have been almost stupified
but for one circumstance.
I t was this. My father had left a small collection of books in a little room
up-stairs, to which I had access (for it adjoined my own) and which nobody
else in our house ever troubled. From that blessed little room, Roderick
Random, Peregrine Pickle, Humphrey Clinker, Tom Jones, The Vicar of
Wakefield, Don Quixote, Gil Blas, and RobinsonCrusoe, came out, a glorious
host, to keep me company. They kept alive my fancy, and my hope of some-
thing beyond that place and time,-they, and the Arabian Nights, and the
Tales of the Genii,-and did me no harm ; for whatever harm was in some
of them was not there for me ;I knew nothing of it. It is astonishing to
me now, how I found time, in the midst of my porings and blunderings
over heavier themes, to read those books as I did. I t is curious to me
how I could ever have consoled myself under my small troubles (which
were great troubles to me), by impersonating my favorite characters in
them-as I did-and by putting Mr. and Miss Murdstone into all the bad
ones-which I did too. I have been Tom Jones (a child's Tom Jones,
a harmless creature) for a week together. I have sustained my own idea
of Roderick Random for a month at a stretch, I verily believe. I had a
greedy relish for a few volumes of Voyages and Travels-I forget what,
now-that were on those shelves ; and for days and days I can remember
to have gone about my region of our house, armed with the centre-piece
out of an old set of boot-trees-the perfect realisation of Captain Somebody,
of the Royal British Navy, in danger of being beset by savages, and
resolved to sell his life at a great price. The Captain never lost dignity,
from having his ears boxed with the Latin Grammar. I did ; but the
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42 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
Captain was a Captain and a hero, in despite of all the grammars of all
the languages in the world, dead or alive.
This was my only and my constant comfort. When I think of it, the
picture always rises in my mind, of a summer evening, the boys at play in
the churchyard, and I sitting onmy bed, reading as if for life. Every barn
in the neighbourhood, every stone in the church, and every foot of the
churchyard, had some association of its own, in my mind, connected with
these books, and stood for some locality made famous in them. I have
seen Tom Pipes go climbing up the church-steeple ; I have watched Strap,
with the knapsack on his back, stopping to rest himself upon the wicket-
gate; and I know that Commodore Trunnion held that club with
Mr. Pickle, in the parlor of our little village alehouse.
The reader now understands as well as I do, what I was when I came
to that point of my youthful history to which I am now coming again.
One morning when I went into the parlor with my books, I found
my mother looking anxious, Miss Murdstone looking firm, and Mr.
Murdstone binding something round the bottom of a cane-a lithe and
limber cane, which he left off binding when I came in, and poised and
switched in the air.
" I tell you, Clara," said Mr. Murdstone, "I have been often flogged
myself."
" To be sure ; of course," said Miss Murdstone.
" Certainly, my dear Jane," faltered my mother, meekly. " But-but
do you think it did Edward good ?"
"Do you think it did Edward harm, Clara?" asked Mr. Murdstone,
gravely.
"That's the point !" said his sister.
T o this my mother returned, "Certainly, my dear Jane," and saidno more.
I felt apprehensive that I was personally interested in this dialogue,
and sought Mr. Murdstone's eye as it lighted on mine.
"Now, David," he said-and I saw that cast again, as he saidit-" you
must be far more careful to-day than usual." H e gave the cane another
poise, and another switch; and having finished his preparation of it, laid it
down beside him, with an expressive look, and took up his book.
This was a good freshener to my presence of mind, as a beginning. I
felt the words of my lessons slipping off, not one by one, or line by line,
but by the entire page. I tried to lay hold of them ;but they seemed, if I
may so express it, to have put skates on, and to skim away from me with a
smoothness there was no checking.
We began badly, and went on worse. I had come in, with an idea of
distinguishing myself rather, conceiving that I was very well prepared ;
but it turned out to be quite a mistake. Book after book was added to
the heap of failures, Miss Murdstone being firmly watchful of us all the
time. And when we came at last to the five thousand cheeses (canes he
made it that day, I remember), my mother burst out crying.
" Clara ! " said Miss Murdstone, in her warning voice.
" I am not quite well, my dear Jane, I think," said my mother.
I saw him wink, solemnly, at his sister, as he rose and said, taking up
the cane :
"Why, Jane, we can hardly expect Clara to bear, with perfect firmness,
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OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 43
the worry and torment that David has occasioned her to-day. That
would be stoical. Clara is greatly strengthened and improved, but we
can hardly expect so much from her. David, you and I will go up-stairs,
boy."
As he took me out at the door, my mother ran towards us.  I saw
my mother stop her ears then, and I heard her crying.
H e walked me up to my room slowly and gravely-I am certain he
had a delight in that formal parade of executing justice-and when we
got there, suddenly twisted my head under his arm.
" Mr. Murdstone ! Sir !" I cried to him. "Don't ! Pray don't beat
me ! I have tried to learn, sir, but I ean't learn while you and Miss
Murdstone are by. I ean't indeed ! "
" Can't you, indeed, David?" he said. " We 1' 1 try that."
H e had my head as in a vice, but I twined round him somehow, and
stopped him for a moment, entreating him not to beat me. I t was only
for a moment that I stopped him, for he cut me heavily an instant
afterwards, and in the same instant I caught the hand with which he held
me in my mouth, between my teeth, and bit it through. I t sets my teeth
on edge to think of it.
He beat me then, as if he would have beaten me to death. Above all
the noise we made, I heard them running up the stairs, and crying out-
I heard my mother crying out-and Peggotty. Then he was gone ; and
the door was locked outside ; and I was lying, fevered and hot, and torn,
and sore, and raging in my puny way, upon the floor.
How well I recollect, when I became quiet, what an unnatural stillness
seemed to reign through the whole house ! How well I remember, when
my smart and passion began to cool, how wicked I began to feel !
I sat listening for a long while, but there was not a sound. I crawled
up from the floor, and saw my face in the glass, so swollen, red, and ugly,
that it almost frightened me. My stripes were sore and stiff, and made me
cry afresh, when I moved; but they were nothing to the guilt I felt. I t
lay heavier on my breast than if I had been a most atrocious criminal, I
dare say.
 These she put down upon
the table without a word, glaring at me the while with exemplary firmness,
and then retired, locking the door after her.
Long after it was dark I sat there, wondering whether anybody else
would come. When this appeared improbable for that night, I undressed,
and went to bed ; and, there, I began to wonder fearfully what would be
done to me. Whether it was a criminal act that I had committed?
Whether I should be taken into custody, and sent to prison? Whether
I was at all in danger of being hanged?
I never shall forget the waking, next morning; the being cheerful and
fresh for the first moment, and then the being weighed down by the stale
and dismal oppression of remembrance. Miss Murdstone reappeared
before I was out of bed; told me, in so many words, that I was free to
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44 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
walk in the garden for half an hour and no longer ; and retired, leaving
the door open, that I might avail myself of that permission.
I did so, and did so every morning of my imprisonment, which lasted
five days. If I could have seen my mother alone, I should have gone
down on my knees to her and besought her forgiveness; but I saw no one,
Miss Murdstone excepted, during the whole time-except at evening
prayers in the parlor; to which I was escorted by Miss &turdstone after
everybody else was placed; where I was stationed, a young outlaw, all
alone by myself near the door; and whence I was solemnly conducted by
my jailer, before anyone arose from the devotional posture. I only
observed that my mother was as far off from me as she could be, and kept
her face another way so that I never saw it; and that Mr. $turdstone's
hand was bound up in a large linen wrapper.
The length of those five days I can convey no idea of to any one.
They occupy the place of years in my remembrance. The way in which
I listened to all the incidents of the house that made themselves audible
to me; the ringing of bells, the opening and shutting of doors, the
murmuring of voices, the footsteps on the stairs; to any laughing,
whistling, or singing, outside, which seemed more dismal than anything
else to me in my solitude and disgrace-the uncertain pace of the hours,
especially at night, when I would wake thinking it was morning, and
find that the family were not yet gone to bed, and that all the length of
night had yet to come-the depressed dreams and nightmares I had-the
return of day, noon, afternoon, evening, when the boys played in the
churchyard, and I watched them from a distance within the room, being
ashamed to show myself at the window lest they should know I was a
prisoner-the strange sensation of never hearing myself speak-the
fleeting intervals of something like cheerfulness, which came with eating
and drinking, and went away with it-the setting in of rain one evening,
with a fresh smell, and its coming down faster and faster between me
and the church, until it and gathering night seemed to quench me in
gloom, and fear, and remorse-all this appears to have gone round and
round for years instead of days, it is so vividly and strongly stamped on
my remembrance.
On the last night of my restraint, I was awakened by hearing my own
name spoken in a whisper. I started up in bed, and putting out my arms
in the dark, said :
" I s that you, Peggotty ? "
There was no immediate answer, but presently I heard my name again,
in a tone so very mysterious and awful, that I think I should have gone
into a fit, if it had not occurred to me that it must have come through the
keyhole.
I groped my way to the door, and putting my own lips to the keyhole,
whispered :
" I s that you, Peggotty, dear?"
"Yes, my own precious Davy," she replied. "Be as soft as a mouse,
or the Cat '11 hear us."
I understood this to mean Miss Murdstone, and was sensible of the
urgency of the case ; her room being close by.
" How's mama, dear Peggotty ? Is she very angry with me? "
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OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 45
I could hear Peggotty crying softly on her side of the keyhole, as I was
doing on mine, before she answered. "No. Not very."
" What is going to be done with me, Peggotty dear ? Do you know ? "
" School. Near London," was Peggotty's answer.  "
" TO-morrow."
"Is that the reason why Miss Murdstone took the clothes out of my
drawers ?" which she had done, though I have forgotten to mention it.
" Yes," said Peggotty. " Box."
" Shan't I see mama ? "
" Yes," said Peggotty. " Morning."
Then Peggotty fitted her mouth close to the keyhole, and delivered these
words through it with as much feeling and earnestness as a keyhole has
ever been the medium of communicating, I will venture to assert : shoot-
ing in each broken little sentence in a convulsive little burst of its own.
" Davy, dear.  Lately, as I
used to be. I t ain't becase I don't love you. Just as well and more, my
pretty poppet. It's because I thought it better for you. And for some one
else besides. Davy, my darling, are you listening ? Can you hear ? "
" Ye-ye-ye-yes, Peggotty !" I sobbed.
" My own !" said Peggotty, with infinite compassion. " What I want
to say, is. That you must never forget me. For I 1' 1 never forget you. And
I 1' 1 take as much care of your mama, Davy. As ever I took of you. And I
won't leave her. The day may come when she '11 be glad to lay her poor
head.  And I'll write to
you, my dear. Though I ain't no scholar. And I 'll-I 'll-" Peggotty
fell to kissing the keyhole, as she couldn't kiss me.
"Thank you, dear Peggotty !" said I. <' Oh, thank you ! Thank
you ! Will you promise me one thing, Peggotty ? Will you write and
tell Mr. Peggotty and little Em'ly and &s. Gummidge and Ham, that
I am not so bad as they might suppose, and that I sent 'em all my love-
especially to little Em'ly ? Will you, if you please, Peggotty ?"
The kind soul promised, and we both of us kissed the keyhole with the
greatest affection-I patted it with my hand, I recollect, as if it had been
her honest face-and parted. From that night there grew up in my
breast, a feeling for Peggotty, which I cannot very well define. She did
not replace my mother; no one could do that; but she came into a
vacancy in my heart, which closed upon her, and I felt towards her some-
thing I have never felt for any other human being. I t was a sort of comical
affection too ; and yet if she had died, I cannot think what I should have
done, or how I should have acted out the tragedy it would have been
to me.
I n the morning Miss Murdstone appeared as usual, and told me I was
going to school; which was not altogether such news to me as she
supposed. She also informed me that when I was dressed, I was to come
down-stairs into the parlor, and have my breakfast. There, I found my
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THX PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
mother, very pale and with red eyes : into whose arms I ran, and begged
her pardon from my suffering soul.
c c Oh, Davy !" she said. " That you could hurt any one I love ! Try to
be better, pray to be better ! I forgive you; but I am so grieved, Davy,
that you should have such bad passions in your heart."
They had persuaded her that I was a wicked fellow, and she was more
sorry for that, than for my going away. I felt it sorely. I tried to eat
my parting breakfast, but my tears dropped upon my bread-and-butter,
and trickled into my tea. I saw my mother look at me sometimes,
and then glance at the watchful Miss Murdstone, and then look down, or
look away.
" Master Copperfield's box there !" said Miss Murdstone, when wheels
were heard at the gate.
I looked for Peggotty, but it was not she ; neither she nor Mr. Murdstone
appeared. My former acquaintance, the carrier, was at the door; the
box was taken out to his cart, and lifted in.
" Clara ! " said Miss Murdstone, in her warning note.
"Ready, my dear Jane," returned my mother. " Good bye, Davy.
You are going for your own good. Good bye, my child. You will come
home in the holidays, and be a better boy."
" Clara !" Miss Murdstone repeated.
" Certainly, my dear Jane," replied my mother, who was holding me.
" I forgive you, my dear boy.  "
" Clara ! " Miss Murdstone repeated.
Miss Murdstone was good enough to take me out to the cart, and to
say on the way that she hoped I would repent, before I came to a bad
end; and then I got into the cart, and the lazy horse walked off with it.
CHAPTER V.
I AM SENT AWAY FROM HOME.
WE might have gone about half a mile, and my pocket-handkerchief was
quite wet through, when the carrier stopped short.
Looking out to ascertain what for, I saw, to my amazement, Peggotty
burst from a hedge and climb into the cart. She took me in both her
arms, and squeezed me to her stays until the pressure on my nose was
extremely painful, though I never thought of that till afterwards when I
found it very tender. Not a single word did Peggotty speak. Releasing
one of her arms, she put it down in her pocket to the elbow, and brought
out some paper bags of cakes which she crammed into my pockets, and a
purse which she put into my hand, but not one word did she say. After
another and a final squeeze with both arms, she got down from the cart
and ran away; and, my belief is, and has always been, without a solitary
button on her gown. I picked up one, of several that were rolling about,
and treasured it as a keepsake for a long time.
The carrier looked at me, as if to enquire if she were coming back.
105
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
I shook my head, and said I thought not. "Then come up," said the
carrier to the lazy horse ; who came up accordingly.
Having by this time cried as much as I possibly could, I began to think
it was of no use crying any more, especially as neither Roderick Random,
nor that Captain in the Royal British Navy, had ever cried, that I could
remember, in trying situations. The carrier, seeing me in this resolution,
proposed that my pocket-handkerchief should be spread upon the horse's
back to dry. I thanked him, and assented; and particularly small it
looked, under those circumstances.
I had now leisure to examine the purse. I t was a stiff leather
purse, with a snap, and had three bright shillings in it, which Peggotty
had evidently polished up with whitening, for my greater delight. But
its most precious contents were two half-crowns folded together in a bit of
paper, on which was written, in my mother's hand, "For Davy. With my
love." I was so overcome by this, that I asked the carrier to be so good
as reach me my pocket-handkerchief again ; but he said he thought I had
better do without it ; and I thought I really had ; so I wiped my eyes
on my sleeve and stopped myself.
For good, too ; though, in consequence of my previous emotions, I was
still occasionally seized with a stormy sob. After we had jogged on for
some little time, I asked the carrier if he was going all the way.
" All the way where ? " enquired the carrier.
"There," I said.
"Where 's there ? " enquired the carrier.
" Near London ? " I said.
"Why that horse," said the carrier, jerking the rein to point him out,
"would be deader than pork afore he got over half the ground."
" Are you only going to Yarmouth then ? " I asked.
" That's about it, " said the carrier. " And there I shall take you to
the stage-cutch, and the stage-cutch that 1' 1 take you to-wherever it is. "
As this was a great deal for the carrier (whose name was Mr. Barkis)
to say-he being, as I observed in a former chapter, of a phlegmatic
temperament, and not at all conversational-I offered him a cake as a
mark of attention, which he ate at one gulp, exactly like an elephant, and
which made no more impression on his big face than it would have done
on an elephant's.
" Did she make 'em, now ? " said Xlr. Barkis, always leaning forward,
in his slouching way, on the footboard of the cart with an arm on each
knee.
" Peggotty, do you mean, sir ? "
" Ah ! " said Mr. Barkis. Her. "
" Yes. She makes all our pastry, and does all our cooking. "
" Do she though? " said Mr. Barkis.
H e made up his mouth as if to whistle, but he didn't whistle. H e sat
looking at the horse's ears, as if he saw something new there ;and sat so,
for a considerable time. By-and-by, he said :
" NO sweethearts, I b'lieve ? "
" Sweetmeats did you say, Mr. Barkis? " For I thought he wanted
something else to eat, and had pointedly alluded to that description of
refreshment.
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48 THE PERSONAL HISTORY ATID EXPERIENCE
" Hearts, " said Mr.Barkis. " Sweet hearts; no person walks with her !"
" With Peggotty ? "
" Ah !" he said. " Her. "
" Oh, no. She never had a sweetheart. "
" Didn't she though ! " said Mr. Barkis.
Again he made up his mouth to whistle, and again he didn't whistle,
but sat looking at the horse's ears.
" So she makes," said Mr. Barkis, after a long interval of reflection,
" all the apple parsties, and doos all the cooking, do she ? "
I replied that such was the fact.
" Well. I'll tell yon what, " said Mr. Barkis. " P'raps you might be
writin' to her ? "
" I shall certainly write to her, " I rejoined.
 " Well ! If you
was writin' to her, p'raps you'd recollect to say that Barkis was willin' ;
would YOU. "
" That Barkis is willing, " I repeated, innocently. " I s that all the
message ? "
" Ye-es, " he said, considering. " Ye-es. Barkis is willin'. "
cr But you will be at Blunderstone again to-morrow, Mr. Barkis, " I
said, faltering a little at the idea of my being far away from it then, " and
could give your own message so much better. "
As he repudiated this suggestion, however, with a jerk of his head, and
once more confirmed his previous request by saying, with profound gravity,
c r Barkis is willin'. That's the message," I readily undertook its
transmission. While I was waiting for the coach in the hotel at Yarmouth
that very afternoon, I procured a sheet of paper and an inkstand, and
wrote a note to Peggotty which ran thus : " My dear Peggotty. I have
come here safe. Barkis is willing. My love to mama. Yours aEec-
tionately. P. S. H e says he particularly wants you to know-Barkis is
willing. "
When I had taken this commission on myself prospectively, Mr. Barkis
relapsed into perfect silence ;and I, feeling quite worn out by all that had
happened lately, lay down on a sack in the cart and fell asleep. I slept
soundly until we got to Yarmouth ;which was so entirely new and strange
to me in the inn-yard to which we drove, that I at once abandoned a
latent hope I had had of meeting with some of Mr. Peggotty's family
there, perhaps even with little Enl'ly herself.
The coach was in the yard, shining very much all over, but without
any horses to i t as yet; and it looked in that state as if nothing was more
unlikely than its ever going to London. I was thinking this, and
wondering what would ultimately become of my box, which Mr. Barkis
had put down on the yard-pavement by the pole (he having driven up
the yard to turn his cart), and also what would ultimately become of me,
when a lady looked out of a bow-window where some fowls and joints of
meat were hanging up, and said :
" Is that the little gentleman from Blunderstone? "
"Yes, ma'am," I said.
"What name ? " enquired the lady.
" Copperfield, ma'am," I said.
107
O F DAVID COPPERFIELD.
"That won't do," returned the lady. " Nobody's dinner is paid for
here, in that name."
" I s it Murdstone, ma'am 3 " I said.
" If you're Master Murdstone," said the lady, "why do you go and
give another name, first ? "
I explained to the lady how it was, who then rang a bell, and called
out, "William ! show the coffee-room ! " upon which a waiter came
running out of a kitchen on the opposite side of the yard to show it,
and seemed a good deal surprised when he found he was only to show
it to me.
I t was a large long room with some large maps in it. I doubt if I
could have felt much stranger if the maps had been real foreign countries,
and I cast away in the middle of them. I felt it was taking a liberty to
sit down, with my cap in my hand, on the corner of the chair nearest the
door; and when the waiter laid a cloth on purpose for me, and put a set
of castors on it, I think I must have turned red all over with modesty.
  "
I thanked him, and took my seat at the board ; but found it extremely
difficult to handle my knife and fork with anything like dexterity,
or to avoid splashing myself with the gravy, while he was standing
opposite, staring so hard, and making me blush in the most dreadful
manner every time I caught his eye. After watching me into the second
chop, he said :
" There's half a pint of ale for you. Will you have it now ? "
I thanked him, and said "Yes." Upon which he poured it out of a jug into
a large tumbler, and held it up against the light, andmade it look beautiful.
" My eye ! " he said. " I t seems a good deal, don't i t ? "
" I t does seem a good deal," I answered with a smile. For it was quite
delightful to me, to find him so pleasant.
" There was a gentleman here, yesterday," he said-" a stout gentleman,
by the name of Topsawyer-perhaps you know him!"
" No," I said, " I don't think-"
" I n breeches and gaiters, broad-brimmed hat, grey coat, speckled
choaker," said the waiter.
"No," I said bashfully, "I haven't the pleasure-"
" He came in here," said the waiter, looking at the light through the
tumbler, " ordered a glass of this ale-would order it-I told him not-
drank it, and fell dead. I t was too old for him. I t oughtn't to be
drawn ; that 's the fact."
I was very much shocked to hear of this melancholy accident, and said
I thought I had better have some water.
 I t offends 'em. But I ' l l drink it, if you like. I'm
E
108
50 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
used to it, and use is everything. I don't think it '11 hurt me, if I throw
my head back, and take it off quick. Shall I ? "
I replied that he would much oblige me by drinking it, if he thought he
could do it safely, but by no means otherwise. When he did throw his
head back, and take it off quick, I had a horrible fear, I confess, of seeing
him meet the fate of the lamented Mr. Topsawyer, and fall lifeless on the
carpet. But it didn't hurt him. On the contrary, I thought he seemed
the fresher for it.
" What have we got here ? " he said, putting a fork into my dish. " Not
chops ? "
" Chops," I said.
"Lord bless my soul ! " he exclaimed, "I didn't know they were chops.
Why, a chop's the very thing to take off the bad effects of that beer !
Ain't it lucky 2 "
So he took a chop by the bone in one hand, and a potato in the other,
and ate away with a very good appetite, to my extreme satisfaction. H e
afterwards took another chop, and another potato ; and after that, another
chop and another potato. When we had done, he brought me a pudding,
and having set it before me, seemed to ruminate, and to become absent i n
his mind for some moments.
"How's the pie? " he said, rousing himself.
" It's a pudding," I made answer.
"Pudding ! " he exclaimed. " Why, bless me, so it is ! What ! "
looking at it nearer. "You don't mean to say i t 's a batter-pudding ! "
'I Yes, it is indeed."
"Why, a batter-pudding," he said, taking up a table-spoon, ''$ my
favorite pudding! Ain't that lucky ?
The waiter certainly got most. H e entreated me more than once to
come in and win, but what with his table-spoon to my tea-spoon, his
dispatch to my dispatch, and his appetite to my appetite, I was left far
behind at the first mouthful, and had no chance with him. I never saw
any one enjoy a pudding so much, I think; and he laughed, when it was
all gone, as if his enjoyment of it lasted still.
Finding him so very friendly and companionable, it was then that I
asked for the pen and ink and paper, to write to Peggotty. He not only
brought it immediately, but was good enough to look over me while I
wrote the letter. When I had finished it, he asked me where I was going
to school.
I said, "Near London," which was all I knew.
" Oh, my eye !" he said, looking very low-spirited, " I am sorry for that."
" Why ?" I asked him.
" Oh, Lord ! " he said, shaking his head, " that's the school where they
broke the boy's ribs-two ribs-a little boy he was. I should say he
was-let me see-how old are you, about?"
I told him between eight and nine.
" That's just his age," he said. " H e was eight years and six months
old when they broke his first rib ; eight years and eight months old when
they broke his second, and did for him."
I could not disguise from myself, or from the waiter, that this was an
109
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 51
uncomfortable coincidence, and enquired how it was done. His answer was
not cheering to my spirits, for it consisted of two dismal words, "With
whopping."
The blowing of the coach-horn in the yard was a seasonable diversion,
which made me get up and hesitatingly enquire, in the mingled pride and
diffidence of having a purse (which I took out of my pocket), if there
were anything to pay.
"There's a sheet of letter-paper," he returned. " Did you ever buy a
sheet of letter-paper ? "
I could not remember that I ever had.
"It 'S dear," he said, " on account of the duty. Threepence. That's
the way we're taxed in this country. There's nothing else, except the
waiter. Never mind the ink. I l o s e by that.''
.'What should you-what should I-how much ought I to-what
would i t be right to pay the waiter, if you please? " I stammered, blushing.
"If I hadn't a family, and that family hadn't the cowpock," said the
waiter, "I wouldn't take a sixpence. If I didn't support a aged pairint,
and a lovely sister,"-here the waiter was greatly agitated-" I wouldn't
take a farthing. If I had a good place, and was treated well here, I should
beg acceptance of a trifle, instead of taking of it. But I live on broken
wittles-and I sleep on the coals "-here the waiter burst into tears.
I was very much concerned for his misfortunes, and felt that any recog-
nition short of ninepence would be mere brutality and hardness of heart.
Therefore I gave him one of my three bright shillings, which he received
with much humility and veneration, and spun up with his thumb, directly
afterwards, to try the goodness of.
I t was a little disconcerting to me, to find, when I was being helped up
behind the coach, that I was supposed to have eaten all the dinner without
any assistance. I discovered this, from overhearing the lady in the bow-
window, say to the guard, "Take care of that child, George, or he 1' 1
burst ! " and from observing that the women-servants who were about the
place came out to look and giggle at me as a young phenomenon. My
unfortunate friend the waiter, who had quite recovered his spirits, did not
appear to be disturbed by this, but joined in the general admiration
without being at all confused. If I had any doubt of him, I suppose this
half-awakened it ; but I am inclined to believe that with the simple con-
fidence of a child, and the natural reliance of a child upon superior years
(qualities I am very sorry any children should prematurely change for
worldly wisdom), I had no serious mistrust of him on the whole,
even then.
I felt it rather hard, I must own, to be made, without deserving it, the
subject of jokes between the coachman and guard as to the coach drawing
heavy behind, on account of my sitting there, and as to the greater expe-
diency of my travelling by waggon. The story of my supposed appetite
getting wind among the outside passengers, they were merry upon it
likewise ;and asked me whether I was going to be paid for, at school, as two
brothers or three, and whether I was contracted for, or went upon the
regular terms; with other pleasant questions. But the worst of it
was, that I knew I should be ashamed to eat anything, when an oppor-
tunity offered, and that, after a rather light dinner, I should remain hungry
E 2
110
.J 2 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
all night-for I had left my cakes behind, at the hotel, in my hurry. My
apprehensions were realised. When we stopped for supper I couldn't
muster courage to take any, though I should have liked it very much, but
sat by the fire and said I didn't want anything. This did not save me
from more jokes, either ; for a husky-voiced gentleman with a rough face,
who had been eating out of a sandwich-box nearly all the way, except
when he had been drinking out of a bottle, said I was like a boa
constrictor who took enough at one meal to last him a long time ; after
which, he actually brought a rash out upon himself with boiled beef.
We had started from Yarmouth at three o'clock in the afternoon, and
we were due in London about eight next morning. I t was Midsummer
weather, and the evening was very pleasant. When we passed through a
village, I pictured to myself what the insides of the houses were like, and
what the inhabitants were about; and when boys came running after us,
and got up behind and swung there for a little way, I wondered whether
their fathers were alive, and whether they were happy at home. I had plenty
to think of, therefore, besides my mind running continually on the kind of
place I was going to-which was an awful speculation. Sometimes,I remem-
ber, I resigned myself to thoughts of home and Peggotty ; and to endeavour-
ing, in a confused blind way, to recall how I had felt, and what sort of boy
I used to be, before I bit Mr. Murdstone : which I couldn't satisfy myself
about by any means, I seemed to have bitten him in such a remote antiquity.
The night was not so pleasant as the evening, for it got chilly; and
being put between two gentlemen (the rough-faced one and another) to
prevent my tumbling off the coach, I was nearly smothered by their
falling asleep, and completely blocking me up. They squeezed me so hard
sometimes, that I could not help crying out, " Oh ! If you please ! "
-which they didn't like at all, because it woke them. Opposite me was
an elderly lady in a great fur cloak, who looked in the dark more like a
haystack than a lady, she was wrapped up to such a degree. This lady
had a basket with her, and she hadn't known what to do with it, for a
long time, until she found that on account of my legs being short, it could
go underneath me. I t cramped and hurt me so, that it made me per-
fectly miserable ; but if I moved in the least, and made a glass that was
in the basket rattle against something else (as it was sure to do), she gave
me the cruellest poke with her foot, and said, '< Come, don't you fidget.
Yow bones are young enough, I ' m sure! "
At last the sun rose, and then my companions seemed to sleep easier.
The difficulties under which they had laboured all night, and which had
found utterance in the most terrific gasps and snorts, are not to be con-
ceived. As the sun got higher, their sleep became lighter, and so they
gradually one by one awoke. I recollect being very much surprised by
the feint everybody made, then, of not having been to sleep at all, and by
the uncommon indignation with which every one repelled the charge. I
labor under the same kind of astonishment to this day, having invariably
observed that of all human weaknesses, the one to which our common
nature is the least disposed to confess (I cannot imagine why) is the
weakness of having gone to sleep in a coach.
What an amazing place London was to me when I saw it in the distance,
and how I believed all the adventures of all my favorite heroes to be
constantly enacting and re-enacting there, and how I vaguely made it out
111
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 55
in my own mind to be fuller of wonders and wickedness than all the cities
of the earth, I need not stop here to relate. We approached it by degrees,
and got, in due time, to the inn in the Whitechapel district, for which we
were bound. I forget whether it was the Blue Bull, or the Blue Boar ;
but I know it was the Blue Something, and that its likeness was painted
up on the back of the coach.
The guard's eye lighted on me as he was getting down, and he said at
the booking-office door :
" I s there anybody here for a yoongster booked in the name of & h d -
stone, from BIoonderstone, Sooffolk, to be left till called for ?"
Nobody answered.
" Try Copperfield, if you please, sir," said I, looking helplessly down.
" I s there anybody here for a yoongster, booked in the name of Murd-
stone,from Bloonderstone, Sooffolk, but owning to the name of Copperfield,
to be left till called for ?" said the guard. " Come ! 1s there anybody?"
No. There was nobody. I looked anxiously around; but the enquiry
made no impression on any of the bystanders, if I except a man in gaiters,
with one eye, who suggested that they had better put a brass collar round
my neck, and tie me up in the stable.
A ladder was brought, and I got down after the lady, who was like a
haystack : fiot daring to stir, until her basket was removed. The coach
was clear of passengers by that time, the luggage was very soon cleared
out, the horses had been taken out before the luggage, and now the coach
itself was wheeled and backed off by some hostlers, out of the way. Still,
nobody appeared, to claim the dusty youngster fromBlunderstone, Suffolk.
More solitary than Robinson Crusoe, who had nobody to look at him
and see that he was solitary, I went into the booking-office, and, by invita-
tion of the clerk on duty, passed behind the counter, and sat down on the
scale at which they weighed the luggage. Here, as I sat looking at the
parcels, packages, and books, and inhaling the smell of stables (ever since
associated with that morning), a procession of most tremendous considera-
tions began to march through my mind. Supposing nobody should ever
fetch me, how long would they consent to keep me there? Would they
keep me long enough to spend seven shillings ? Should I sleep at night
in one of those wooden binns with the other luggage, and wash myself at
the pump in the yard in the morning; or should I be turned out every
night, and expected to come again to be left till called for, when the office
opened next day ? Supposing there was no mistake in the case, and Mr.
Murdstone had devised this plan to get rid of me, what should I do ? If
they allowed me to remain there until my seven shillings were spent, I
couldn't hope to remain there when I began to starve. That would obviously
be inconvenient and unpleasant to the customers, besides entailing on the
Blue Whatever-it-was, the risk of funeral expenses. If I started off at
once, and tried to walk back home, how could I ever find my way, how
could I ever hope to walk so far, how could I make sure of any one but
Peggotty, even if I got back ? If I found out the nearest proper authori-
ties, and offered myself to go for a soldier, or a sailor, I was such a little
fellow that it was most likely they wouldn't take me in. These thoughts,
and a hundred other such thoughts, turned me burning hot, and made me
giddy with apprehension and dismay. I was in the height of my fever
112
54 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
when a man entered and whispered to the clerk, who presently slanted me
off the scale, and pushed me over to him, as if I were weighed, bought,
delivered, and paid for.
As I went out of the office, hand in hand with this new acquaintance,
I stole a look at him. He was a gaunt, sallow young man, with hollow
cheeks, and a chin almost as black as Mr, Mnrdstone's; but there the
likeness ended, for his whiskers were shaved off, and his hair, instead of
being glossy, was rusty and dry. He was dressed in a suit of black clothes
which were rather rusty and dry too, and rather short in the sleeves and
legs ; and he had a white neck-kerchief on that was not over-clean. I did
not, and do not, suppose that this neck-kerchief was all the linen he wore,
but it was all he showed or gave any hint of.
" You 're the new boy ? " he said.
" Yes, sir," I said.
I supposed I was. I didn't know.
"I 'm one of the masters at Salem House," he said.
I made him a bow and felt very much overawed.  We turned back, on my humbly
insinuating that it might be useful to me hereafter ; and he told the clerk
that the carrier had instructions to call for it at noon.
" If you please, sir," I said, when we had accomplished about the same
distance as before, " is it far ? "
" It's down by Blackheath," he said.
"Is that far, sir ? " I diffidently asked.
"It's a good step," he said. "We shall go by the stage-coach. I t ' s
about six miles."
I was so faint and tired, that the idea of holding out for six miles more,
was too much for me. I took heart to tell him that I had had nothing all
night, and that if he would allow me to buy something to eat, I should be
very much obliged to him. He appeared surprised at this-I see him stop
and look at me now-and after considering for a few moments, said he
wanted to call on an old person who lived not far 08,and that the best
way would be for me to buy some bread, or whatever I liked best that was
.rvholesome, and make my breakfast at her house, where we could get
some milk.
Accordingly ure looked in at a baker's window, and after I had made a
series of proposals to buy everything that was bilious in the shop, and lie
had rejected them one by one, we decided in favour of a nice little loaf of
brown bread, which cost me threepence. Then, at a grocer's shop, we
bought an egg and a slice of streaky bacon ; which still left what I thought
a good deal of change, out of the second of the bright shillings, and made
me consider London a very cheap place. These provisions laid in, we went
on through a great noise and uproar that confused my weary head beyond
description, and over a bridge which, no doubt, was London Bridge
(indeed I think he told me so, but I was half asleep), until we came to the
poor person's house, which was a part of some alms-houses, as I knew by
their look, and by an inscription on a stone over the gate, which said they
were established for twenty-five poor women.
113
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
The Master at Salem House lifted the latch of one of a number of little
black doors that were all alike, and had each a little diamond-paned
window on one side, and another little diamond-paned window above ;
and we went into the little house of one of these poor old women, who was
blowing a fire to make a little saucepan boil. On seeing the master enter, the
old woman stopped with the bellows on her knee, and said something that
I thought sounded like "My Charley ! " but on seeing me come in too,
she got up, and rubbing her hands made a confused sort of half curtsey.
" Can you cook this young gentleman's breakfast for him, if you please? "
said the Master at Salem House.
" Can I ?" said the old woman. " Yes can I , sure !"
" How's Mrs. Fibbitson to-day ?" said the Master, looldng at another
old woman in a large chair by the fire, who was such a bundle of clothes
that I feel grateful to this hour for not having sat upon her by mistake.
" Ah, she's poorly," said the first old woman. " I t 's one of her
bad days.
As they looked at her, I looked at her also. Although it was a warm
day, she seemed to think of nothing but the fire. I fancied she was jealous
even of the saucepan on it ; and I have reason to know that she took its
impressment into the service of boiling my egg and broiling my bacon, in
dudgeon; for I saw her, withmy own discomfited eyes, shake her fist at me
once, when those culinary operations were going on, and no one else was
looking. The sun streamed in at the little window, but she sat with her
own back and the back of the large chair towards it, screening the fire as if
she were sedulously keeping it warm, instead of it keeping her warm, and
watching it in a most distrustful manner. The completion of the prepara-
tions for my breakfast, by relieving the fire, gave her such extreme joy that
she laughed aloud-and a very unmelodious laugh she had, I must say.
I sat down to my brown loaf, my egg, and my rasher of bacon, with a
bason of milk besides, and made a most delicious meal. While I was yet
in the full enjoyment of it, the old woman of the house said to the Master :
" Have you got your flute with you?"
" Yes," he returned.
" Have a blow at it," said the old woman, coaxingly. "Do !"
 My impression is, after many years of con-
sideration, that there never can have been anybody in the worId who
played worse. H e made the most dismal sounds I have ever heard pro-
duced by any means, natural or artificial. I don't know what the tunes
were-if there were such things in the performance at all, which I doubt
-but the influence of the strain upon me was, first, to make me think of
all my sorrows until I could hardly keep my tears back; then to take
away my appetite; and lastly to make me so sleepy that I couldn't keep
my eyes open. They begin to close again, and I begin to nod, as the
recollection rises fresh upon me. Once more the little room with its
open corner cupboard, and its square-backed chairs, and its angular little
staircase leading to the room above, and its three peacock's feathers dis-
played over the mantelpiece-I remember wondering when I first went in,
114
56 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
what that peacock would have thought if he had known what his finery
was doonied to come to-fades from before me, and I nod, and sleep.
The flute becomes inaudible, the wheels of the coach are heard instead,
and I am on my journey. The coach jolts, I wake with a start, and the
flute has come back again, and the Master at Salem House is sitting with
his legs crossed, playing it dolefully, while the old woman of the house
looks on delighted. She fades in her turn, and he fades, and all fades,
and there is no flute, no Master, no Salem House, no David Copperfield,
no anything but heavy sleep.
 I was in the middle state between sleeping and waking, either
then or immediately afterwards ; for, as he resumed-it was a real fact
that he had stopped playing-I saw and heard the same old woman ask
Mrs. Fibbitson if it wasn't delicious (meaning the flute), to which Mrs.
Fibbitson replied, '< Ay, ay ! Yes ! " and nodded at the fire : to which, I
am persuaded, she gave the credit of the whole performance.
When I seemed to have been dozing a long while, the Master at Salem
House unscrewed his flute into the three pieces, put them up as before,
and took me away. We found the coach very near at hand, and got upon
the roof; but I was so dead sleepy, that when we stopped on the road to
take up somebody else, they put me inside where there were no passengers,
and where I slept profoundly, until I found the coach going at a footpace
up a steep hill among green leaves. Presently, it stopped, and had come
to its destination.
A short walk brought us-I mean the Master and me-to Salem House,
which was enclosed with a high brick wall, and looked very dull. Over a
door in this wall was a board with SALEMHOUSEupon it ; and through
a grating in this door we were surveyed when we rang the bell by a
surly face, which I found, on the door being opened, belonged to a stout
man with a bull-neck, a wooden leg, overhanging temples, and his hair cut
close all round his head.
" The new boy," said the Master.
The man with the wooden leg eyed me all over-it didn't take long,
for there was not much of me-and locked the gate behind us, and took
out the key. We were going up to the house, among some dark heavy
trees, when he called after my conductor.
" Hall0 ! "
We looked back, and he was standing at the door of a little lodge, where
he lived, with a pair of boots in his hand.
" Here ! The cobbler's been," he said, " since you 've been out,
Mr. Mell, and he says he can't mend 'em any more. H e says there an't
a bit of the original boot left, and he wonders you expect it."
With these words he threw the boots towards Mr. Mell, who went back
a few paces to pick them up, and looked at them (very disconsolately,
I was afraid), as we went on together. I observed then, for the first
time, that the boots he had on were a good deal the worse for wear, and
that his stocking was just breaking out in one place, like a bud.
115
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD. 57
Salem House was a square brick building with wings ; of a bare and
unfurnished appearance. All about it was so very quiet, that I said to
Mr. Mell I supposed the boys were out ; but he seemed surprised at my not
knowing that it was holiday-time. That all the boys were at their several
homes. That Mr. Creakle, the proprietor, was down by the sea-side with
Mrs. and Miss Creakle ; and that I was sent in holiday-time as a punish-
ment for my misdoing, all of which he explained to me as we went along.
I gazed upon the schoolroom into which he took me, as the most
forlorn and desolate place I had ever seen. I see it now. A long room
with three long rows of desks, and six of forms, and bristling all round
with pegs for hats and slates. Scraps of old copybooks and exercises,
litter the dirty floor. Some silkworms' houses, made of the same materials,
are scattered over the desks. Two miserable little white mice, left behind
by their owner, are running up and down in a fusty castle made of paste-
board and wire, looking in all the corners with their red eyes for anything
to eat. A bird, in a cage a very little bigger than himself, makes a mournful
rattle now and then in hopping on his perch, two inches high, or dropping
from it ; but neither sings nor chirps. There is a strange unwholesome
smell upon the room, like mildewed corduroys, sweet apples wanting air,
and rotten books. There could not well be more ink splashed about it, if
it had been roofless from its first construction, and the skies had rained,
snowed, hailed, and blown ink through the varying seasons of the year.
Mr. Me11 having left me while he took his irreparable boots up-stairs, I
went softly to the upper end of the room, observing all this as I crept
along. Suddenly I came upon a pasteboard placard, beautifully written,
which was lying on the desk, and bore these words-" Take care of him.
H e bites."
I got upon the desk immediately, apprehensive of at least a great dog
underneath. But, though I looked all round with anxious eyes, I could
see nothing of him. I was still engaged in peering about, when Mr. Mell
came back, and asked me what I did up there.
" I beg your pardon, sir," says I, <' if you please, I 'm looking for the
dog."
" Dog,? " says he. " What dog ? "
" Isn t it a dog, sir ?  "
" That's to be taken care of, sir; that bites."
" No, Copperfield," says he gravely, " that's not a dog. That 's a boy.
My instructions are, Copperfield, to put this placard on your back. I am
sorry to make such a beginning with you, but I must do it."
With that, he took me down, and tied the placard, which was neatly
constructed for the purpose, on my shoulders like a knapsack; and
wherever I went, afterwards, I had the consolation of carrying it.
What I suffered from that placard, nobody can imagine. Whether
it was possible for people to see me or not, I always fancied that
somebody was reading it. I t was no relief to turn round and find
nobody; for wherever my back was, there I imagined somebody always
to be. That cruel man with the wooden leg, aggravated my sufferings.
H e was in authority; and if he ever saw me leaning against a tree,
or a wall, or the house, he roared out from his lodge-door in a
116
THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
stupendous voice, "Hallo, you sir ! You Copperfield! Show that
badge conspicuous, or I'll report you!" The playground was a
bare gravelled yard, open to all the back of the house and the offices;
and I knew that the servants read it, and the butcher read it, and
the baker read i t ; that everybody, in a word, who came backwards
and forwaxds to the house, of a morning when I was ordered to walk
there, read that I was to be taken care of, for I bit. I recollect that I posi-
tively began to have a dread of myself, as a kind of wild boy who did bite.
There was an old door in this playground, on which the boys had
a custom of carving their names. I t was completely covered with
such inscriptions. I n my dread of the end of the vacation and
their coming back, I could not read a boy's name, without enquiring
in what tone and with what emphasis he would read, "Take care
of him. H e bites." There was one boy-a certain J. Steerforth-
who cut his name very deep and very often, who, I conceived, would
read it in a rather strong voice, and afterwards pull my hair. There
was another boy, one Tommy Traddles, who I dreaded would make game
of it, and pretend to be dreadfully frightened of me. There was a third,
George Demple, who I fancied would sing it. I have looked, a little
shrinking creature, at that door, until the owners of all the names-there
were five-and-forty of them in the school then, Mr. Me11 said-seemed to
send me to Coventry by general acclamation, and to cry out, each in his
own way, '< Take care of him. He bites ! "
I t was the same with the places at the desks and forms. I t was the
same with the groves of deserted bedsteads I peeped at, on my way to,
and when I was in, my own bed. I remember dreaming night after night,
of being with my mother as she used to be, or of going to a party at
Mr. Peggotty's, or of travelling outside the stage-coach, or of dining again
with my unfortunate friend the waiter, and in all these circumstances
making people scream and stare, by the unhappy disclosure that I had
nothing on but my little night-shirt, and that placard.
I n the monotony of my life, and in my constant apprehension of the
reopening of the school, it was such an insupportable affliction ! I had
long tasks every day to do with Mr. Mell; but I did them, there being no
Mr. and Miss Murdstone here, and got through them without disgrace.
Before, and after them, I walked about-supervised, as I have mentioned,
by the man with the woodenleg. How vividly I call to mind the damp
about the house, the green cracked flagstones in the court, an old leaky
water-butt, and the discolored trunks of some of the grim trees, which
seemed to have dripped more in the rain than other trees, and to
have blown less in the sun ! At one we dined, Mr. Me11 and I, at the
upper end of a long bare dining-room, full of deal tables, and smelling of
fat. Then, we had more tasks until tea, which Mr. Me11 drank out
of a blue teacup, and I out of a tin pot. All day long, and until seven
or eight in the evening, Mr. Mell, at his own detached desk in the
schoolroom, worked hard with pen, ink, ruler, books, and writing-paper,
making out the bills (as I found) for last half-year. When he had put
up his things for the night he took out his flute, and blew at it,
until I almost thought he would gradually blow his whole being into
the large hole at the top, and ooze away at the keys.
117
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
I picture my small self in the dimly-lighted rooms, sitting with my
head upon my hand, listening to the doleful performance of Mr. Mell, and
conning to-morrow's lessons. I picture myself with my books shut up,
still listening to the doleful performance of Mr. Mell, and listening through
i t to what used to be at home, and to the blowing of the wind on
Yarmouth flats, and feeling very sad and solitary. I picture myself
going u p to bed, among the unused rooms, and sitting on my bed-side
crying for a comfortable word from Peggotty. I picture myself coming
down stairs in the morning, and looking through a long ghastly gash
of a staircase-window, at the school-bell hanging on the top of an
outhouse, with a weathercock above it ; and dreading the time when it
shall ring J. Steerforth and the rest to work : which is only second, in my
foreboding apprehensions, to the time when the man with the wooden leg
shall unlock the rusty gate to give admission to the awful Mr. Creakle.
I cannot think I was a very dangerous character in any of these aspects,
but in all of them I carried the same warning on my back.
Mr. Me11 never said much to me, but he was never harsh to me. I
suppose we were company to each other, without talking. I forgot to
mention that he would talk to himself sometimes, and grin, and clench his
fist, and grind his teeth, and pull his hair in an unaccountable manner.
But he had these peculiarities : and at first they frightened me, though I
soon got used to them.
CHAPTER TI.
I ENLARGE MY CIRCLE OF ACQUAINTANCE.
I HAD led this life about a month, when the man with the wooden leg
began to stump about with a mop and a bucket of water, from which I
inferred that preparations were making to receive Mr. Creakle and the
boys. I was not mistaken; for the mop came into the schoolroom before
long, and turned out Mr. Me11 and me, who lived where we could, and
got on how we could, for some days, during which we were always in
the way of two or three young women, who had rarely shown themselves
before, and were so continually in the midst of dust that I sneezed almost
as much as if Salem House had been a great snuff-box.
One day I was informed by Mr. Mell, that Mr. Creakle would be home
that evening. I n the evening, after tea, I heard that he was come. Before
bed-time, I was fetched by the man with the wooden leg to appear
before him.
Mr. Creakle's part of the house was a good deal more comfortable than
ours, and he had a snug bit of garden that looked pleasant after the dusty
playground, which was such a desert in miniature, that I thought no one
but a camel, or a dromedary, could have felt at home in it. I t seemed to
me a bold thing even to take notice that the passage looked comfortable,
as I went on my way, trembling, to Mr. Creakle's presence : which so
118
60 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERLENCE
abashed me, when I was ushered into it, that I hardly saw Mrs. Creakle
or Miss Creakle (who were both there, in the parlor), or anything but
Mr. Creakle, a stout gentleman with a bunch of watch-chain and seals, in
an arm-chair, with a tumbler and bottle beside him.
"So ! " said Mr. Creakle. " This is the young gentleman whose teeth
are to be filed ! Turn him round."

H e was bald on the top of his head ; and had some thin wet-looking hair
that was just turning grey, brushed across each temple, so that the two
sides interlaced on his forehead. But the circumstance about him which
impressed me most, was, that he had no voice, but spoke in a whisper.
The exertion this cost him, or the consciousness of talking in that feeble
way, made his angry face so much more angry, and his thick veins so
much thicker, when he spoke, that I am not surprised, on looking back,
at this peculiarity striking me as his chief one.
" Now, " said Mr. Creakle. " What's the report of this boy ? "
" There's nothing against him yet, " returned the man with the wooden
leg. " There has been no opportunity. "
I thought Mr. Creakle was disappointed. I thought Mrs. and Miss
Creakle (at whom I now glanced for the first time, and who were, both,
thin and quiet) were not disappointed.
" Come here, sir ! " said Mr. Creakle, beckoning to me.
" Come here ! " said the man with the wooden leg, repeating the
gesture.
"I have the happiness of knowing your father-in-law," whispered
Mr. Creakle, taking me by the ear; " and a worthy man he is, and a
man of a strong character. He knows me, and I know him. Do you
know me ? Hey ? " said Mr. Creakle, pinching my ear with ferocious
playfulness.
"Not yet, sir," I said, flinching with the pain.
"Not yet ? Hey? " repeated Mr. Creakle. "But you will soon. Hey ? "
" You will soon. Hey ? " repeated the man with the wooden leg. I
afterwards found that he generally acted, with his strong voice, as
Mr. Creakle's interpreter to the boys.
I was very much frightened, and said, I hoped so, if he pleased. I felt,
all this while, as if my ear were blazing ; he pinched it so hard.
" I'll tell you what I am," whispered Mr. Creakle, letting it go at last,
with a screw at parting that brought the water into my eyes. "I 'm a
Tartar."
" A Tartar," said the man with the wooden leg.
" When I say I'll do a thing, I do it," said Mr. Creakle ; '< and when
I say I will have a thing done, I will have it done."
"-Will have a thing done, I will have it done," repeated the man
with the wooden leg.
" I am a determined character," said Mr. Creakle. " That 's what I
am. I do my duty. That's what I do My flesh and blood "-he
119
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
looked at Mrs. Creakle as he said this-" when it rises against me, is not
my flesh and blood. I discard it. Has that fellow," to the man with
the wooden leg, " been here again ? "
" No," was the answer.
" No," said Mr. Creakle. " H e knows better. He knows me. Let
him keep away. I say let him keep away," said Mr. Creakle, striking his
hand upon the table, and looking at Mrs. Creakle, "for he knows me.
Now you have begun to know me too, my young friend, and you may go.
Take him away."
I was very glad to be ordered away, for Mrs. and Miss Creakle were
both wiping their eyes, and I felt as uncomfortable for them, as I did
for myself. But I had a petition on my mind which concerned me so
nearly, that I couldn 't help saying, though I wondered at my own courage :
" If you please, sir-"
Mr. Creakle whispered, " Hah ? What's this ? " and bent his eyes
upon me, as if he would have burnt me up with them.
" If you please, sir," I faltered, "if I might be allowed (I am very
sorry indeed, sir, for what I did) to take this writing off, before the boys
come back-"
Whether Mr Creakle was in earnest, or whether he only did it to
frighten me I don't know, but he made a burst out of his chair, before
which I precipitately retreated, without waiting for the escort of the
man with the wooden leg, and never once stopped until I reached
my own bedroom, where, finding I was not pursued, I went to bed, as
it was time, and lay quaking, for a couple of hours.
Next morning Mr. Sharp came back. Mr. Sharp was the first master,
and superior to Mr. Mell. Mr. Me11 took his meals with the boys, hut
Mr. Sharp dined and supped at Mr. Creakle's table. He was a limp,
delicate-looking gentleman, I thought, with a good deal of nose, and a way
of carrying his head on one side, as if it were a little too heavy for
him. His hair was very smooth and wavy; but I was informed by the
very first boy who came back that it was a wig (a second-hand one he
said), and that Mr. Sharp went out every Saturday afternoon to get it
curled.
 He was the first boy who returned. He introduced himself
by informing me that I should find his name on the right-hand corner of
the gate, over the top bolt ; upon that I said, " Traddles ? " to which
he replied, "The same," and then he asked me for a full account of myself
and &mily.
I t was a happy circumstance for me that Traddles came back first. H e
enjoyed my placard so much, that he saved me from the embarrassment of
either disclosure or concealment, by presenting me to every other boy who
came back, great or smal1,immediatelyon his arriva1,in this form of introduc-
tion, "Look here ! Here's a game ! " Happily, too, the greater part of the
boys came back low-spirited, and were not so boisterous at my expense as
I had expected. Some of them certainly did dance about me like wild
Indians, and the greater part could not resist the temptation of pretending
that I was a dog, and patting and smoothing me lest I should bite, and
saying, "Lie down, sir !" and calling me Towzer. This was naturally
120
62 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
confusing, among so many strangers, and cost me some tears, but on the
whole it was much better than I had anticipated.
I was not considered as being formally received into the school, however,
until J. Steerforth arrived. Before this boy, who was reputed to be a
great scholar, and was very good-looking, and at least half-a-dozen years
my senior, I was carried as before a magistrate. H e enquired, under a shed
in the playground, into the particulars of my punishment, and was pleased
to express his opinion that it was " a jolly shame ;" for which I became
bound to him ever afterwards.
"What money have you got, Copperfield? " he said, walking aside with
me when he had disposed of my affair in these terms.
I told him seven shillings.
" You had better give it to me to take care of," he said. "At least,
you can if you like. You needn't if you don't like."
I hastened to comply with his friendly suggestion, and open in^
Peggotty's purse, turned it upside down into his hand.
" Do you want to spend anything now? " he asked me.
" No, thank you," I replied.
" You can if you like, you know," said Steerforth. " Say the word."
"No, thank you, sir," I repeated.
" Perhaps you'd like to spend a couple of shillings or so, in a bottle of
currant wine by-and-by, up in the bedroom? " said Steerforth. " You
belong to my bedroom, I find."
It certainly had not occurred to me before, but I said, Yes, I should
like that.
"Very good," said Steerforth. " You'll be glad to spend another
shilling or so, in almond cakes, I dare say? "
1 said, Yes, I should like that, too.
" And another shilling or so in biscuits, and another in fruit, eh? "
said Steerforth. " I say, young Copperfield, you 're going it ! "
I smiled because he smiled, but I was a little troubled in my mind, too.
" Well ! " said Steerforth. " We must make it stretch as far as we
can; that's all. I 'll do the best in my power for you. I can go out
when I like, and I'll smuggle the prog in." With these words he put the
money in his pocket, and kindly told me not to make myself uneasy; he
would take care it should be all right.
 When we went up-stairs
to bed, he produced the whole seven shillings' worth, and laid it out on
my bed in the moonlight, saying :
"There you are, young Copperfield, and a royal spread you 'ye got ! "
I couldn't think of doing the honors of the feast, at my time of life,
while he was by; my hand shook at the very thought of it. I begged
him to do me the favor of presiding; and my request being seconded by
the other boys who were in that room, he acceded to it, and sat upon my
pillow, handing round the viands-with perfect fairness, I must say-and
dispensing the currant wine in a little glass without a foot, which was his
own property. As to me, I sat on his left hand, and the rest were grouped
about us, on the nearest beds and on the floor.
121
OF DAVID COPPERFIELD.
How .well I recollect our sitting there, talking in whispers ; or their
talking, and my respectfully listening, I ought rather to say; the moon-
light falling a little way into the room, through the window, painting a
pale window on the floor, and the greater part of us in shadow, except
when Steerforth dipped a match into a phosphorous-box, when he wanted
to look for anything on the board, and shed a blue glare over us that was
gone directly ! A certain mysterious feeling, consequent on the darkness,
the secresy of the revel, and the whisper in which everything was said,
steals over me again, and I listen to all they tell me with a vague feeling
of solemnity and awe, which makes me glad that they are all so near, and
frightens me (though I feign to laugh) when Traddles pretends to see
a ghost in the corner.
I heard all kinds of things about the school and all belonging to it. I
heard that Mr. Creakle had not preferred his claim to being a Tartar
without reason; that he was the-sternest and most severe of masters;
that he laid about him, right and left, every day of his life, charging in
among the boys like a trooper, and slashing away, unmercifully. That he
knew nothing himself, but the art of slashing, being more ignorant (J.
Steerforth said) than the lowest boy in the school; that he had been,
a good many years ago, a small hop-dealer in the Borough, and had taken
to the schooling business after being bankrupt in hops, and making away
with Mrs. Creakle's money. With a good deal more of that sort, which
I wondered how they knew.
I heard that the man with the wooden leg, whose name was Tungay,
was an obstinate barbarian who had formerly assisted in the hop business,
but had come into the scholastic line with Mr. Creakle, in consequence,
as was supposed among the boys, of his having broken his leg in Mr.
Creakle's service, and having done a deal of dishonest work for him, and
knowing his secrets. I heard that with the single exception of Mr.
Creakle, Tungay considered the whole establishment, masters and boys,
as his natural enemies, and that the only delight of his life was to be sour
and malicious. I heard that Mr. Creakle had a son, who had not been
Tungay's friend, and who, assisting in the school, had once held some
remonstrance with his father on an occasion when its discipline was very
cruelly exercised, and was supposed, besides, to have protested against
his father's usage of his mother. I heard that Mr. Creakle had turned
him out of doors, in consequence; and that Mrs. and Miss Creakle had
been in a sad way, ever since.
But the greatest wonder that I heard of Mr. Creakle was, there being
one boy in the school on whom he never ventured to lay a hand, and that
boy being J. Steerforth. Steerforth himself confirmed this when it was
stated, and said that he should like to begin to see him do it. On being
asked by a mild boy (not me) how he would proceed if he did begin to see
him do it, he dipped a match into his phosphorous-box on purpose to sheda
glare over his reply, and said he would commence by knocking him down
with a blow on the forehead from the seven-and-sixpenny ink-bottle that was
always on the mantelpiece. We sat in the dark for some time, breathless.
I heard that Mr. Sharp and Mr. Me11 were both supposed to be
wretchedly paid; and that when there was hot and cold meat for dinner at
Mr. Creakle's table, Mr. Sharp was always expected to say he preferred
122
64 THE PERSONAL HISTORY AND EXPERIENCE
cold; which was again corroborated by J. Steerforth, the only parlor-
boarder. I heard that Mr. Sharp's wig didn't fit him; and that he
needn't be so " bounceable"-somebody else said " bumptious "-about it,
because his own red hair was very plainly to be seen behind.
I heard that one boy, who was a coal-merchant's son, came as a set-off
against the coal-bill, and was called on that account "Exchange or
Barter "-a name selected from the arithmetic-book as expressing this
arrangement. I heard that the table-beer was a robbery of parents, and
the pudding an imposition. I heard that Miss Creakle was regarded by the
school in general as being in love with Steerforth; and I am sure, as I sat
in the dark, thinking of his nice voice, and his fine face, and his easy
manner, and his curling hair, I thought it very likely. I heard that
Mr. Me11 was not a bad sort of fellow, but hadn't a sixpence to bless
himself with ; and that there was no doubt that old Mrs. Mell, his mother,
was as poor as Job. I thought of my breakfast then, and what had
sounded like "My Charley ! " but I was, I am glad to remember, as mute
as a mouse about it.
The hearing of all this, and a good deal more, outlasted the banquet
some time. The greater part of the guests had gone to bed as soon as
the eating and drinking were over; and we, who had remained whisper-
ing and listening half undressed, at last betook ourselves to bed, too.
" Good night, young Copperfield," said Steerforth, "I'll take care
of you."
"You 're very kind," I gratefully returned. " I am very much obliged
to you."
"You haven't got a sister, have you? " said Steerforth, yawning.
" NO," I answered.
" That's a pity," said Steerforth. "If you had had one, I should
think she would have been a pretty, timid, little, bright-eyed sort of girl.
I should have liked to know her. Good night, young Copperfield."
" Good night, sir," I replied.
I thought of him very much after I went to bed, and raised myself, I
recollect, to look at him where he lay in the moonlight, with his handsome
face turned up, and his head reclining easily on his arm. He was a
person of great power in my eyes ; that was of course the reason of my
mind running on him. No veiled future dimly glanced upon him in the
moonbeams. There was no shadowy picture of his footsteps, in the
garden that I dreamed of walking in all night.
123
COMPLETION
KNIGHT'S SHILLING VOLUMES
FOR ALL READERS,
PUBLISHED BY
C. COX, 12, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND.
POSTSCRIPT, BY THE EDITOR,
TO THE CONCLUDING VOLUME OF THE SERIES, ENTITLED
RAMBLES BY RIVERS : THE THAMES," VOL. 11.
THISSeries was commenced in June, 1844. I t has been continued, first in
Weekly Volumes, and subsequently in Monthly Volumes, for five years. The
Series is now terminated with the publication of the 186th volume.
The Series divides itself into three distinct portions :-
The Weekly and Monthly Volulnes - - - - - -
The cabinet Portrait ~ a l l e of
r ~British Worthies - - 12
The Cabinet History of England - - - - - - - 26--186
I n the original announcement of this work I thus stated the objects which IL
would endeavour to attain :-
" W e propose to place within the reach of all readers a series of books
which shall ultimately comprehend something like that range of literature
which well-educated persons desire to have a t their command. I n this series
there will be no attempt a t exclusiveness. W e shall not take up the most
false and dangerous opinion that the understandings of the masses should be
written down to, nor will mere didactic instruction only be attempted. A
taste for knowledge is not so induced. The recreation of genial and amusing
reading should be offered in connexion with what is solid and serious. The
publishers possess many valuable copyrights which may be readily adapted to
this purpose. There is a great deal also to be done anew, in the way of
judicious compilations, of translations from foreign works, and of original
productions by authors of ability, conceived in a right spirit. W e have many
offers of assistance from writers of established reputation, who feel that the
circulation of their thoughts in a cheap pocket volume is a tribute to their
usefulness and their reputation. W e have no want of materials to conduct
this undertaking steadily and extensively."
I now venture to believe that I have accomplished what I proposed to do.
First,-I have endeavoured to produce a series of books which comprehends
something like that range of literature which well-educated persons desire to
have at their command. Without attempting any very exact classification of
B
124
COMPLETION OF KNIGHT'S SHILLING VOLUMES.
the various subjects of these volumes, they may be thus distributed into large
departments of knowledge :-
. ----
Vnlq.
 I t would be contrary to the principles upon which I have always
regarded the duties of those who labour in the great cause of making good
literature cheap, if I had in this series presumed it necessary to write down
to the understandings of the masses. I shall never cease to believe that
whatever is best and most permanent in literature has a character of univer-
sality ; and that whenever attempts are made to " write down " to a class, or
" write up " to a class, the thing so produced is worthy of small regard, and
has little influence in its own day, and less upon the future.
Lastly,-In stating that I should introduce valuable copyrights into this
Series, and that I had offers of assistance from writers of established repu-
tation, it may be sufficient to point to the names of the various authors" of
these volumes, all of which are original, to show that I have fulfilled this
portion of my undertaking.
The property of this large Series passed out of my hands as its publisher in
the beginning of 1847, in consequence of business arrangements connected
with a dissolution of partnership. Since then the additions to the Series have
been, for the most part, reprints of copyright works, which were formerly
published by me. I have never ceased to consider myself responsible for the
general character of the work, although my editorial labours had terminated
when about two-thirds of the Series were completed. I may truly add, that
my desire for the constant and increasing circulation of these Volumes con-
tinues unabated ; for I may venture to hope that each and all have a tendency
to carry forward that intellectual progress upon which the future destiny of
this country so essentially depends. And I may confidently state that in this
extensive series no single work, and no portion of a work, can be found, that
may not safely be put into the hands of the young and the uninformed, with
the security that it will neither mislead nor corrupt.
KNIGHT.
CHARLES
St. John's Wood,
April 24, 1849.
* See List of Contributors to the Series, next page.
125
C. COX, 12, K I N G W I L L I A M S T R E E T , S T R A N D . 3
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List of Contributors to the Series.
LORDBROUGHAM. REV.C. G. NICOLAY. RALPHN. WORNUM.
LORD NUGENT. W. YOUATT. W. WITTICH.
CHARLES KNIGHT,Editor. JAMES RENNIE,A.M. A. VIEUSSEUX.
PROFESSOR LONG. W. MARTIN. G. H. LEWES.
E. W. LANE. DR.KITTO. MADAMEBLAZDE BURY.
CHARLES LAMB. SIR CHARLES BELL. A. RAMSAY.
A. T. MALKIN, A.M. SIRJOHN FRANCIS DAVIS. T. C. BANPIELD.
MRS. JAMESON. MRS. POOLE. GEORGE DENNIS.
MISS MARTINEAU. DR. LANKESTER. JAMES THORNE.
G. L. CRAIK,A.M. DR.SOUTHWOOD SMITH. GEORGE DODD.
C. MAC FARLANE. T. R. PLANCH~. JOHN SAUNDERS.
A. DE MORGAN.
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LORD BROUGHAM'S WORKS.
6 vols., price 6s., 4 vols., price 4s.,
Lord Brougham's Statesmen of the
Time of George 111. A new edition, corrected Lord Brougham and Sir C. Bell's
by the Author. Edition of Paley's Natural Theology.
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Science, and of Political Science.
LIST OF STATESMEN WHO APPEAR IN THE HISTORICAL SKETCHES:-
George 111. Mr. Grattan. Lord Liwrpool. Danton.
Lord Chatham. Mr. Wilberforce. Mr. Tierney. Camille Desmoulins-
Lord North. Mr. Cannine. Lord Nelson. St. Just.
Lord Loughborough. Sir Samuel i(omi1ly. Lord Kine. Sidyes.
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Lord Chief-Justice Gibbs. Gustavus 111. Note on Mr. Curran. Earl Camden.
Sir William Grant. The Emperor Joseph. Neckar. John Wilkes.
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of China. New editions. KNIGHT.
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can throw light on the laws and institu- long literary life, chiefiy with the view of
tions of a people to whom, we think, that lLdoing something to advance the Edu-
justice has not been rendered by foreign- cation of the people."
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" No work of recent date on the same I n this edition Mr. Knight has added
topics better merits and will better repay to each Tale a few Scenes from Shak-
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Miss Martinean.
soere. which mav be advantaeeouslv read
dter'the perus& of the ale, to krnish
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2 vols., price 2s., the wonderful dramas upon which the
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Miss Martineau's Tales :-Feats on
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Mrs. Jameson's Lives of the Early Birds. By JAMESRENXIE,A.M. New edi-
Italian Painters, and of the Progress of the Art tions.
in Italv. " So clear and untechnical are the de-
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Giotto. also Baccio dells Porta perusing them, will see wonders where
Lorenzo Ghiberti. and 11 Frate. formerly he saw nothing."- Glasgow Ex-
Masaccio.
Filippo Lippi and Ange-
lic~ da Fiesole.
Benozzo Gozzoli.
Lionardo da Vinci.
Michael An elo.
Andrea del garto.
Raphael Sanzio d'Urbino.
aminer.
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to man, to enable him to 'Lreplenish the
Knight's Life of Caxton, the First earth and subdue it;" and who by their
- Printer.
English remarkable sagacity have, in vanous
" The Father of Printing could not states of society, deserved to be regarded
have found a more suitable or a more
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as his especial friends.
Monkeys-Sketches of Natural History.
Results of Machinery. 1vol., price Is.,
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100 Woodcuts.
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The two tracts, originally published 6 vols., price Gs.,
separately, are here incorporated and Sketches in Natural History-Mam-
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Production of Wealth being thus fully, malia. GOO Woodcuts.
though popularly, expounded. The sta- These volumes, with the Elephant,
tistical details are brought up to the pre- Horse, and Dog, complete the Class
sent time. Mammalia.
127
C. COX, 12, KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND, 5
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Tasso's Jerusalem. Bacon and his Works, grc.
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" It is a t least doubtful whether any of attractions of a life of Bacon; a complete
the modern renderings of the Tuscan epic bibliography of his different works ; a his-
are, on the whole, superior in strength tory of each from its first conception to
and richness of expression to this of our its finished form; a distinct exposition of
' British Fairfax,' which secured the praise its scope and tendency; a selection of
their most beautiful and instructive pas-
of Milton, Waller, Hnme, and Collins."--
-.-
Shefield Mercury.
Mind amongst the Spindles.
sages ; and a general estimate of the phi-
losopher and his writings, a t once charac-
terised by logical acumen, and a deep,
fresh sense of imaginative grandeur."-
Atheneum.
1 vol., price ls.,
Mind amongst the Spindles : a Selec- -.-
tion from tbe Lowell Offering. With Introduc- Pursuit of Knowledge.
tion, by C. KNIGHT. 3 vols., price 3s.,
'' We believe that great good may be The Purrnit of Knowledge under
effected by a knowledge diffised in every By G' L' CEAIK, A'M' New
building throughout the land where there
is a mule or a loom, of what the factory edition.
girls of Lowell have done to exhibit the A body of examples to show how the
cheering influences of 'Mind amongst the most unpropitious circumstances have
-.-
Spindles.' "-17.Knight.
Working Man.
been unable to conquer an ardent desire
-.-
for the acquisition of knowledge.
1 vol., price ls., Female Examples.
Memoirs of a Working Man. With Pursuit of Knowledge.
Preface, by C. KNIGHT. 2 vols., price 2s.,
This work shows how a man, through Female Examples of the l?ursuit of
self-education and self-government, may ~ ~ ~ i f f i ~ ~~ l t B~ l . L.
i ~ ~G. ~ d
become intelligent, respectable, and
happy, even in the humblest walks of
cRAIK,
*.M. A N~~ work.
life.
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ing has crept into the world-and Woman
the Companion has taken place of Woman
Food of Man.
the Prey, the Toy, or the Drudge, have
2 vols., price 2s., female authorship risen in tone and in
The Food of Man. By Dr. LANKESTER. temper, and female knowledge increased
in scope and accuracy. The book before
New edition. us, then, produces no longer the pain ex-
'<We should recommend every house- cited by the statement of grievances un-
keeper and every farmer to have a copy redressed. As a record, i t is full of anec-
of this most useful publication in his dote and interest. The book, as it stands,
house for the benefit of his family."- is a pleasant one-worthy of being ac-
Cork Examiner.
-.-
Literature and Learning.
cepted by all thoughtful women and ho-
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nourable men."-Atheneum.
6 vols., price 6s., Wittich's Norway.
History of Literature and Learning I vol., price IS.,
in England, from the Earliest Tlme to the Pre- A Visit to the Western Coast of
sent Day ; with Specimens of the Principal N ~ B~ W. ~ WITTICH.
~ ~ with ~a ~~~~i~
.
Writers. By G. 1;. CRAIK,A.M. of the Author, by GEORGELONG.
g L An invaluable text-book to all stu-
" Nr. Wittich was one of the most dis-
dents of English literature."-Critic. tinguished geographers of modern times ;
-.- in knowledge of the subject, and in the
method of handling it, inferior to none;
Spenser and his Poetry. and only less known because his labours
3 vols., price 3s., have not appeared, like those of Ritter and
Spenser and his Poetry. BY G. L. others, in voluminous works that bear the
author's name. He has contributed more
CRAIK,A.M. largely to the diffusion of geographical
The object of this publication is to pre- knowledge, and more largely to the giv-
sent not merely an account of Spenser ing to i t some scientific method and pre-
and his works, but such an edition of his cision, than any person who has yet lived
poetry as shall contain all of it that is of in the British Islands."-Memoir, by G.
universal and indestructible interest. Lmg.
128
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British Commerce.
I Lane's Arabian Tales.
1 vol., price Is.,
3 vols., price 3s.,
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the Earliest Time to the Present Day. By Selected from the Arabian Nights.
G. L. CRAIK,A.M. " One of the peculiar and most inter-
' L To the merchant, the capitalist, the esting features of Mr. Lane's new trans-
manufacturer, the tradesman, to all who lation of' The Thousand and One Nights '
are desirous of knowing by what means is the introduction, by the way of notes,
England has arrived a t her present state of many short tales or anecdotes, which
of commercial greatness and prosperity, form an integral portion of the vast col-
we recommend this work as the cheapest lection of stories, the principal of which
and by far the best mode of obtaining the are known in England as 'The Arabian
desired information."-Lincoln Standard. Nights' Entertainments,' but which have
been for the most part omitted by all pre-
vious European translators. I t appeared
Physical Geography. to the Editor of the Weekly Volume that
these Anecdotes would form of them-
2 vols., price 2s., 1 selves a valuable little work, illustrating
as they do many Oriental customs and
Curiosities of Physical Geography. modes of thought!'-Editor's Pr.$ace.
By W. WITTICH.
CONTENTS -
: Snow-Mountains -Glaciers
lanches -Mountain-Slips -
- Ava-
Icebergs and Ice- The Xost Senses.
fields-The Gulf-Stream-The Samoom-Trade-
Winds -Monsoons- -
Plains and Deserts The 2 vols., price 2s.,
Sahara-The Selva, or Forest Desert of the Ama-
zonas-The Pampas-The Llanos-Earthquakes The Lost Senses-
-Volcanoes. Deafness and Blindness. By Dr. KITTO.
" An account of some of the most re- Dr. Kitto, when twelve years old, was
markable of these phenomena is offered deprived of his hearing by falling from
to the public in these volumes. The a ladder; and the work is a record of
author has endeavoured to avoid all mi- his experience, observations, and reflec-
nute details, but tried to convey to the tions with regard to his calamity during
reader a complete idea of the most promi-
nent characteristics of these phenomena.
H e has also tried t o point out the effects
-.-
a deafness of twenty-eight years.
MoliGre, Racine, k c .
which some of these phenomena have had
in promoting the interests of the human 2 vols., price 2s.,
race, and the dispersion of civilization Moli'ere, Racine, and the French