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in the outer court-yard, the brothers proceeded down-stairs arm-in-arm.

Edward Dorrit, Esquire (once Tip), and his sister Fanny followed,

also arm-in-arm; Mr Plornish and Maggy, to whom had been entrusted the

removal of such of the family effects as were considered worth removing,

followed, bearing bundles and burdens to be packed in a cart.

In the yard, were the Collegians and turnkeys. In the yard, were Mr

Pancks and Mr Rugg, come to see the last touch given to their work.

In the yard, was Young John making a new epitaph for himself, on

the occasion of his dying of a broken heart. In the yard, was the

Patriarchal Casby, looking so tremendously benevolent that many

enthusiastic Collegians grasped him fervently by the hand, and the wives

and female relatives of many more Collegians kissed his hand, nothing

doubting that he had done it all. In the yard, was the man with the

shadowy grievance respecting the Fund which the Marshal embezzled, who

had got up at five in the morning to complete the copying of a perfectly

unintelligible history of that transaction, which he had committed to Mr

Dorrit's care, as a document of the last importance, calculated to stun

the Government and effect the Marshal's downfall. In the yard, was the

insolvent whose utmost energies were always set on getting into debt,

who broke into prison with as much pains as other men have broken out

of it, and who was always being cleared and complimented; while the

insolvent at his elbow--a mere little, snivelling, striving tradesman,

half dead of anxious efforts to keep out of debt--found it a hard

matter, indeed, to get a Commissioner to release him with much reproof

and reproach. In the yard, was the man of many children and many

burdens, whose failure astonished everybody; in the yard, was the man of

no children and large resources, whose failure astonished nobody. There,

were the people who were always going out to-morrow, and always putting

it off; there, were the people who had come in yesterday, and who

were much more jealous and resentful of this freak of fortune than

the seasoned birds. There, were some who, in pure meanness of spirit,

cringed and bowed before the enriched Collegian and his family; there,

were others who did so really because their eyes, accustomed to the

gloom of their imprisonment and poverty, could not support the light of

such bright sunshine. There, were many whose shillings had gone into his

pocket to buy him meat and drink; but none who were now obtrusively Hail

fellow well met! with him, on the strength of that assistance. It was

rather to be remarked of the caged birds, that they were a little shy

of the bird about to be so grandly free, and that they had a tendency to

withdraw themselves towards the bars, and seem a little fluttered as he

passed.

Through these spectators the little procession, headed by the two

brothers, moved slowly to the gate. Mr Dorrit, yielding to the vast

speculation how the poor creatures were to get on without him, was

great, and sad, but not absorbed. He patted children on the head

like Sir Roger de Coverley going to church, he spoke to people in the

background by their Christian names, he condescended to all present, and

seemed for their consolation to walk encircled by the legend in golden

characters, 'Be comforted, my people! Bear it!'

At last three honest cheers announced that he had passed the gate, and

that the Marshalsea was an orphan. Before they had ceased to ring in the

echoes of the prison walls, the family had got into their carriage, and

the attendant had the steps in his hand.

Then, and not before, 'Good Gracious!' cried Miss Fanny all at once,

'Where's Amy!'

Her father had thought she was with her sister. Her sister had thought

she was 'somewhere or other.' They had all trusted to finding her, as

they had always done, quietly in the right place at the right moment.

This going away was perhaps the very first action of their joint lives

that they had got through without her.

A minute might have been consumed in the ascertaining of these points,

when Miss Fanny, who, from her seat in the carriage, commanded the long

narrow passage leading to the Lodge, flushed indignantly.

'Now I do say, Pa,' cried she, 'that this is disgraceful!'

'What is disgraceful, Fanny?'

'I do say,' she repeated, 'this is perfectly infamous! Really almost

enough, even at such a time as this, to make one wish one was dead!

Here is that child Amy, in her ugly old shabby dress, which she was so

obstinate about, Pa, which I over and over again begged and prayed her

to change, and which she over and over again objected to, and promised

to change to-day, saying she wished to wear it as long as ever she

remained in there with you--which was absolutely romantic nonsense of

the lowest kind--here is that child Amy disgracing us to the last moment

and at the last moment, by being carried out in that dress after all.

And by that Mr Clennam too!'

The offence was proved, as she delivered the indictment. Clennam

appeared at the carriage-door, bearing the little insensible figure in

his arms.

'She has been forgotten,' he said, in a tone of pity not free from

reproach. 'I ran up to her room (which Mr Chivery showed me) and found

the door open, and that she had fainted on the floor, dear child.

She appeared to have gone to change her dress, and to have sunk down

overpowered. It may have been the cheering, or it may have happened

sooner. Take care of this poor cold hand, Miss Dorrit. Don't let it

fall.'

'Thank you, sir,' returned Miss Dorrit, bursting into tears. 'I believe

I know what to do, if you will give me leave. Dear Amy, open your eyes,

that's a love! Oh, Amy, Amy, I really am so vexed and ashamed! Do rouse

yourself, darling! Oh, why are they not driving on! Pray, Pa, do drive

on!'

The attendant, getting between Clennam and the carriage-door, with a

sharp 'By your leave, sir!' bundled up the steps, and they drove away.

BOOK THE SECOND: RICHES

CHAPTER 1. Fellow Travellers

In the autumn of the year, Darkness and Night were creeping up to the

highest ridges of the Alps.

It was vintage time in the valleys on the Swiss side of the Pass of the

Great Saint Bernard, and along the banks of the Lake of Geneva.

The air there was charged with the scent of gathered grapes. Baskets,

troughs, and tubs of grapes stood in the dim village doorways, stopped

the steep and narrow village streets, and had been carrying all day

along the roads and lanes. Grapes, split and crushed under foot, lay

about everywhere. The child carried in a sling by the laden peasant

woman toiling home, was quieted with picked-up grapes; the idiot sunning

his big goitre under the leaves of the wooden chalet by the way to the

Waterfall, sat Munching grapes; the breath of the cows and goats was

redolent of leaves and stalks of grapes; the company in every little

cabaret were eating, drinking, talking grapes. A pity that no ripe touch

of this generous abundance could be given to the thin, hard, stony wine,

which after all was made from the grapes!

The air had been warm and transparent through the whole of the bright

day. Shining metal spires and church-roofs, distant and rarely seen, had

sparkled in the view; and the snowy mountain-tops had been so clear that

unaccustomed eyes, cancelling the intervening country, and slighting

their rugged heights for something fabulous, would have measured them as

within a few hours easy reach. Mountain-peaks of great celebrity in the

valleys, whence no trace of their existence was visible sometimes for

months together, had been since morning plain and near in the blue sky.

And now, when it was dark below, though they seemed solemnly to recede,

like spectres who were going to vanish, as the red dye of the sunset

faded out of them and left them coldly white, they were yet distinctly

defined in their loneliness above the mists and shadows. Seen from these

solitudes, and from the Pass of the Great Saint Bernard, which was one

of them, the ascending Night came up the mountain like a rising water.

When it at last rose to the walls of the convent of the Great Saint

Bernard, it was as if that weather-beaten structure were another Ark,

and floated on the shadowy waves.

Darkness, outstripping some visitors on mules, had risen thus to

the rough convent walls, when those travellers were yet climbing the

mountain. As the heat of the glowing day when they had stopped to drink

at the streams of melted ice and snow, was changed to the searching cold

of the frosty rarefied night air at a great height, so the fresh beauty

of the lower journey had yielded to barrenness and desolation. A craggy

track, up which the mules in single file scrambled and turned from

block to block, as though they were ascending the broken staircase of

a gigantic ruin, was their way now. No trees were to be seen, nor any

vegetable growth save a poor brown scrubby moss, freezing in the chinks

of rock. Blackened skeleton arms of wood by the wayside pointed upward

to the convent as if the ghosts of former travellers overwhelmed by the

snow haunted the scene of their distress. Icicle-hung caves and cellars

built for refuges from sudden storms, were like so many whispers of the

perils of the place; never-resting wreaths and mazes of mist wandered

about, hunted by a moaning wind; and snow, the besetting danger of the

mountain, against which all its defences were taken, drifted sharply

down.

The file of mules, jaded by their day's work, turned and wound slowly

up the deep ascent; the foremost led by a guide on foot, in his

broad-brimmed hat and round jacket, carrying a mountain staff or two

upon his shoulder, with whom another guide conversed. There was no

speaking among the string of riders. The sharp cold, the fatigue of the

journey, and a new sensation of a catching in the breath, partly as if

they had just emerged from very clear crisp water, and partly as if they

had been sobbing, kept them silent.

At length, a light on the summit of the rocky staircase gleamed through

the snow and mist. The guides called to the mules, the mules pricked up

their drooping heads, the travellers' tongues were loosened, and in a

sudden burst of slipping, climbing, jingling, clinking, and talking,

they arrived at the convent door.

Other mules had arrived not long before, some with peasant riders and

some with goods, and had trodden the snow about the door into a pool

of mud. Riding-saddles and bridles, pack-saddles and strings of bells,

mules and men, lanterns, torches, sacks, provender, barrels, cheeses,

kegs of honey and butter, straw bundles and packages of many shapes,

were crowded confusedly together in this thawed quagmire and about the

steps. Up here in the clouds, everything was seen through cloud, and

seemed dissolving into cloud. The breath of the men was cloud, the

breath of the mules was cloud, the lights were encircled by cloud,

speakers close at hand were not seen for cloud, though their voices and

all other sounds were surprisingly clear. Of the cloudy line of mules

hastily tied to rings in the wall, one would bite another, or kick

another, and then the whole mist would be disturbed: with men diving

into it, and cries of men and beasts coming out of it, and no bystander

discerning what was wrong. In the midst of this, the great stable of the

convent, occupying the basement story and entered by the basement door,

outside which all the disorder was, poured forth its contribution of

cloud, as if the whole rugged edifice were filled with nothing else,

and would collapse as soon as it had emptied itself, leaving the snow to

fall upon the bare mountain summit.

While all this noise and hurry were rife among the living travellers,

there, too, silently assembled in a grated house half-a-dozen paces

removed, with the same cloud enfolding them and the same snow flakes

drifting in upon them, were the dead travellers found upon the mountain.

The mother, storm-belated many winters ago, still standing in the corner

with her baby at her breast; the man who had frozen with his arm raised

to his mouth in fear or hunger, still pressing it with his dry lips

after years and years. An awful company, mysteriously come together! A

wild destiny for that mother to have foreseen! 'Surrounded by so many

and such companions upon whom I never looked, and never shall look,

I and my child will dwell together inseparable, on the Great Saint

Bernard, outlasting generations who will come to see us, and will never

know our name, or one word of our story but the end.'

The living travellers thought little or nothing of the dead just then.

They thought much more of alighting at the convent door, and warming

themselves at the convent fire. Disengaged from the turmoil, which was

already calming down as the crowd of mules began to be bestowed in the

stable, they hurried shivering up the steps and into the building. There

was a smell within, coming up from the floor, of tethered beasts, like

the smell of a menagerie of wild animals. There were strong arched

galleries within, huge stone piers, great staircases, and thick walls

pierced with small sunken windows--fortifications against the mountain

storms, as if they had been human enemies. There were gloomy vaulted

sleeping-rooms within, intensely cold, but clean and hospitably prepared

for guests. Finally, there was a parlour for guests to sit in and sup

in, where a table was already laid, and where a blazing fire shone red

and high.

In this room, after having had their quarters for the night allotted

to them by two young Fathers, the travellers presently drew round the

hearth. They were in three parties; of whom the first, as the most

numerous and important, was the slowest, and had been overtaken by

one of the others on the way up. It consisted of an elderly lady, two

grey-haired gentlemen, two young ladies, and their brother. These were

attended (not to mention four guides), by a courier, two footmen, and