'Oh, never mind; never mind. Pray don't disturb yourself about such
a trifle,' said Mr. Pickwick, observing the conflict of Bob Sawyer's
passions, as depicted in his countenance, 'cold water will do very
well.'
'Oh, admirably,' said Mr. Benjamin Allen.
'My landlady is subject to some slight attacks of mental derangement,'
remarked Bob Sawyer, with a ghastly smile; 'I fear I must give her
warning.'
'No, don't,' said Ben Allen.
'I fear I must,' said Bob, with heroic firmness. 'I'll pay her what
I owe her, and give her warning to-morrow morning.' Poor fellow! how
devoutly he wished he could!
Mr. Bob Sawyer's heart-sickening attempts to rally under this last blow,
communicated a dispiriting influence to the company, the greater part of
whom, with the view of raising their spirits, attached themselves with
extra cordiality to the cold brandy-and-water, the first perceptible
effects of which were displayed in a renewal of hostilities between the
scorbutic youth and the gentleman in the shirt. The belligerents vented
their feelings of mutual contempt, for some time, in a variety of
frownings and snortings, until at last the scorbutic youth felt it
necessary to come to a more explicit understanding on the matter;
when the following clear understanding took place. 'Sawyer,' said the
scorbutic youth, in a loud voice.
'Well, Noddy,' replied Mr. Bob Sawyer.
'I should be very sorry, Sawyer,' said Mr. Noddy, 'to create any
unpleasantness at any friend's table, and much less at yours,
Sawyer--very; but I must take this opportunity of informing Mr. Gunter
that he is no gentleman.'
'And I should be very sorry, Sawyer, to create any disturbance in the
street in which you reside,' said Mr. Gunter, 'but I'm afraid I shall
be under the necessity of alarming the neighbours by throwing the person
who has just spoken, out o' window.'
'What do you mean by that, sir?' inquired Mr. Noddy.
'What I say, Sir,' replied Mr. Gunter.
'I should like to see you do it, Sir,' said Mr. Noddy.
'You shall FEEL me do it in half a minute, Sir,' replied Mr. Gunter.
'I request that you'll favour me with your card, Sir,' said Mr. Noddy.
'I'll do nothing of the kind, Sir,' replied Mr. Gunter.
'Why not, Sir?' inquired Mr. Noddy.
'Because you'll stick it up over your chimney-piece, and delude your
visitors into the false belief that a gentleman has been to see you,
Sir,' replied Mr. Gunter.
'Sir, a friend of mine shall wait on you in the morning,' said Mr.
Noddy.
'Sir, I'm very much obliged to you for the caution, and I'll leave
particular directions with the servant to lock up the spoons,' replied
Mr. Gunter.
At this point the remainder of the guests interposed, and remonstrated
with both parties on the impropriety of their conduct; on which Mr.
Noddy begged to state that his father was quite as respectable as Mr.
Gunter's father; to which Mr. Gunter replied that his father was to the
full as respectable as Mr. Noddy's father, and that his father's son was
as good a man as Mr. Noddy, any day in the week. As this announcement
seemed the prelude to a recommencement of the dispute, there was another
interference on the part of the company; and a vast quantity of talking
and clamouring ensued, in the course of which Mr. Noddy gradually
allowed his feelings to overpower him, and professed that he had ever
entertained a devoted personal attachment towards Mr. Gunter. To this
Mr. Gunter replied that, upon the whole, he rather preferred Mr. Noddy
to his own brother; on hearing which admission, Mr. Noddy magnanimously
rose from his seat, and proffered his hand to Mr. Gunter. Mr. Gunter
grasped it with affecting fervour; and everybody said that the whole
dispute had been conducted in a manner which was highly honourable to
both parties concerned.
'Now,' said Jack Hopkins, 'just to set us going again, Bob, I don't mind
singing a song.' And Hopkins, incited thereto by tumultuous applause,
plunged himself at once into 'The King, God bless him,' which he sang as
loud as he could, to a novel air, compounded of the 'Bay of Biscay,' and
'A Frog he would.' The chorus was the essence of the song; and, as each
gentleman sang it to the tune he knew best, the effect was very striking
indeed.
It was at the end of the chorus to the first verse, that Mr. Pickwick
held up his hand in a listening attitude, and said, as soon as silence
was restored--
'Hush! I beg your pardon. I thought I heard somebody calling from
upstairs.'
A profound silence immediately ensued; and Mr. Bob Sawyer was observed
to turn pale.
'I think I hear it now,' said Mr. Pickwick. 'Have the goodness to open
the door.'
The door was no sooner opened than all doubt on the subject was removed.
'Mr. Sawyer! Mr. Sawyer!' screamed a voice from the two-pair landing.
'It's my landlady,' said Bob Sawyer, looking round him with great
dismay. 'Yes, Mrs. Raddle.'
'What do you mean by this, Mr. Sawyer?' replied the voice, with great
shrillness and rapidity of utterance. 'Ain't it enough to be swindled
out of one's rent, and money lent out of pocket besides, and abused
and insulted by your friends that dares to call themselves men, without
having the house turned out of the window, and noise enough made to
bring the fire-engines here, at two o'clock in the morning?--Turn them
wretches away.'
'You ought to be ashamed of yourselves,' said the voice of Mr. Raddle,
which appeared to proceed from beneath some distant bed-clothes.
'Ashamed of themselves!' said Mrs. Raddle. 'Why don't you go down and
knock 'em every one downstairs? You would if you was a man.' 'I should
if I was a dozen men, my dear,' replied Mr. Raddle pacifically, 'but
they have the advantage of me in numbers, my dear.'
'Ugh, you coward!' replied Mrs. Raddle, with supreme contempt. 'DO you
mean to turn them wretches out, or not, Mr. Sawyer?'
'They're going, Mrs. Raddle, they're going,' said the miserable Bob.
'I am afraid you'd better go,' said Mr. Bob Sawyer to his friends. 'I
thought you were making too much noise.'
'It's a very unfortunate thing,' said the prim man. 'Just as we were
getting so comfortable too!' The prim man was just beginning to have a
dawning recollection of the story he had forgotten.
'It's hardly to be borne,' said the prim man, looking round. 'Hardly to
be borne, is it?'
'Not to be endured,' replied Jack Hopkins; 'let's have the other verse,
Bob. Come, here goes!'
'No, no, Jack, don't,' interposed Bob Sawyer; 'it's a capital song,
but I am afraid we had better not have the other verse. They are very
violent people, the people of the house.'
'Shall I step upstairs, and pitch into the landlord?' inquired Hopkins,
'or keep on ringing the bell, or go and groan on the staircase? You may
command me, Bob.'
'I am very much indebted to you for your friendship and good-nature,
Hopkins,' said the wretched Mr. Bob Sawyer, 'but I think the best plan
to avoid any further dispute is for us to break up at once.'
'Now, Mr. Sawyer,' screamed the shrill voice of Mrs. Raddle, 'are them
brutes going?'
'They're only looking for their hats, Mrs. Raddle,' said Bob; 'they are
going directly.'
'Going!' said Mrs. Raddle, thrusting her nightcap over the banisters
just as Mr. Pickwick, followed by Mr. Tupman, emerged from the
sitting-room. 'Going! what did they ever come for?'
'My dear ma'am,' remonstrated Mr. Pickwick, looking up.
'Get along with you, old wretch!' replied Mrs. Raddle, hastily
withdrawing the nightcap. 'Old enough to be his grandfather, you willin!
You're worse than any of 'em.'
Mr. Pickwick found it in vain to protest his innocence, so hurried
downstairs into the street, whither he was closely followed by Mr.
Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Snodgrass. Mr. Ben Allen, who was dismally
depressed with spirits and agitation, accompanied them as far as London
Bridge, and in the course of the walk confided to Mr. Winkle, as
an especially eligible person to intrust the secret to, that he was
resolved to cut the throat of any gentleman, except Mr. Bob Sawyer, who
should aspire to the affections of his sister Arabella. Having expressed
his determination to perform this painful duty of a brother with proper
firmness, he burst into tears, knocked his hat over his eyes, and,
making the best of his way back, knocked double knocks at the door of
the Borough Market office, and took short naps on the steps alternately,
until daybreak, under the firm impression that he lived there, and had
forgotten the key.
The visitors having all departed, in compliance with the rather pressing
request of Mrs. Raddle, the luckless Mr. Bob Sawyer was left alone, to
meditate on the probable events of to-morrow, and the pleasures of the
evening.
CHAPTER XXXIII. Mr. WELLER THE ELDER DELIVERS SOME CRITICAL SENTIMENTS
RESPECTING LITERARY COMPOSITION; AND, ASSISTED BY HIS SON SAMUEL, PAYS A
SMALL INSTALMENT OF RETALIATION TO THE ACCOUNT OF THE REVEREND GENTLEMAN
WITH THE RED NOSE
The morning of the thirteenth of February, which the readers of this
authentic narrative know, as well as we do, to have been the day
immediately preceding that which was appointed for the trial of Mrs.
Bardell's action, was a busy time for Mr. Samuel Weller, who was
perpetually engaged in travelling from the George and Vulture to Mr.
Perker's chambers and back again, from and between the hours of nine
o'clock in the morning and two in the afternoon, both inclusive. Not
that there was anything whatever to be done, for the consultation
had taken place, and the course of proceeding to be adopted, had been
finally determined on; but Mr. Pickwick being in a most extreme state
of excitement, persevered in constantly sending small notes to his
attorney, merely containing the inquiry, 'Dear Perker. Is all going
on well?' to which Mr. Perker invariably forwarded the reply, 'Dear
Pickwick. As well as possible'; the fact being, as we have already
hinted, that there was nothing whatever to go on, either well or ill,
until the sitting of the court on the following morning.
But people who go voluntarily to law, or are taken forcibly there, for
the first time, may be allowed to labour under some temporary irritation
and anxiety; and Sam, with a due allowance for the frailties of
human nature, obeyed all his master's behests with that imperturbable
good-humour and unruffable composure which formed one of his most
striking and amiable characteristics.
Sam had solaced himself with a most agreeable little dinner, and was
waiting at the bar for the glass of warm mixture in which Mr. Pickwick
had requested him to drown the fatigues of his morning's walks, when a
young boy of about three feet high, or thereabouts, in a hairy cap and
fustian overalls, whose garb bespoke a laudable ambition to attain in
time the elevation of an hostler, entered the passage of the George and
Vulture, and looked first up the stairs, and then along the passage,
and then into the bar, as if in search of somebody to whom he bore a
commission; whereupon the barmaid, conceiving it not improbable that
the said commission might be directed to the tea or table spoons of the
establishment, accosted the boy with--
'Now, young man, what do you want?'
'Is there anybody here, named Sam?' inquired the youth, in a loud voice
of treble quality.
'What's the t'other name?' said Sam Weller, looking round.
'How should I know?' briskly replied the young gentleman below the hairy
cap. 'You're a sharp boy, you are,' said Mr. Weller; 'only I wouldn't
show that wery fine edge too much, if I was you, in case anybody took it
off. What do you mean by comin' to a hot-el, and asking arter Sam, vith
as much politeness as a vild Indian?'
''Cos an old gen'l'm'n told me to,' replied the boy.
'What old gen'l'm'n?' inquired Sam, with deep disdain.
'Him as drives a Ipswich coach, and uses our parlour,' rejoined the
boy. 'He told me yesterday mornin' to come to the George and Wultur this
arternoon, and ask for Sam.'
'It's my father, my dear,' said Mr. Weller, turning with an explanatory
air to the young lady in the bar; 'blessed if I think he hardly knows
wot my other name is. Well, young brockiley sprout, wot then?'
'Why then,' said the boy, 'you was to come to him at six o'clock to our
'ouse, 'cos he wants to see you--Blue Boar, Leaden'all Markit. Shall I
say you're comin'?'
'You may wenture on that 'ere statement, Sir,' replied Sam. And thus
empowered, the young gentleman walked away, awakening all the echoes
in George Yard as he did so, with several chaste and extremely correct
imitations of a drover's whistle, delivered in a tone of peculiar
richness and volume.
Mr. Weller having obtained leave of absence from Mr. Pickwick, who, in
his then state of excitement and worry, was by no means displeased at
being left alone, set forth, long before the appointed hour, and having
plenty of time at his disposal, sauntered down as far as the Mansion
House, where he paused and contemplated, with a face of great calmness
and philosophy, the numerous cads and drivers of short stages who
