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Charles Dickens
Chapter 3
Charles Dickens
 
 
1       The carrier's horse was the laziest horse in the world, I should
2  hope, and shuffled along, with his head down, as if he liked to
3  keep people waiting to whom the packages were directed. I fancied,
4  indeed, that he sometimes chuckled audibly over this reflection,
5  but the carrier said he was only troubled with a cough.
6  The carrier had a way of keeping his head down, like his horse, and
7  of drooping sleepily forward as he drove, with one of his arms on
8  each of his knees. I say 'drove', but it struck me that the cart
9  would have gone to Yarmouth quite as well without him, for the
10  horse did all that; and as to conversation, he had no idea of it
11  but whistling.

12       Peggotty had a basket of refreshments on her knee, which would have
13  lasted us out handsomely, if we had been going to London by the
14  same conveyance. We ate a good deal, and slept a good deal.
15  Peggotty always went to sleep with her chin upon the handle of the
16  basket, her hold of which never relaxed; and I could not have
17  believed unless I had heard her do it, that one defenceless woman
18  could have snored so much.

19       We made so many deviations up and down lanes, and were such a long
20  time delivering a bedstead at a public-house, and calling at other
21  places, that I was quite tired, and very glad, when we saw
22  Yarmouth. It looked rather spongy and soppy, I thought, as I
23  carried my eye over the great dull waste that lay across the river;
24  and I could not help wondering, if the world were really as round
25  as my geography book said, how any part of it came to be so flat.
26  But I reflected that Yarmouth might be situated at one of the
27  poles; which would account for it.

28       As we drew a little nearer, and saw the whole adjacent prospect
29  lying a straight low line under the sky, I hinted to Peggotty that
30  a mound or so might have improved it; and also that if the land had
31  been a little more separated from the sea, and the town and the
32  tide had not been quite so much mixed up, like toast and water, it
33  would have been nicer. But Peggotty said, with greater emphasis
34  than usual, that we must take things as we found them, and that,
35  for her part, she was proud to call herself a Yarmouth Bloater.

36       When we got into the street (which was strange enough to me) and
37  smelt the fish, and pitch, and oakum, and tar, and saw the sailors
38  walking about, and the carts jingling up and down over the stones,
39  I felt that I had done so busy a place an injustice; and said as
40  much to Peggotty, who heard my expressions of delight with great
41  complacency, and told me it was well known (I suppose to those who
42  had the good fortune to be born Bloaters) that Yarmouth was, upon
43  the whole, the finest place in the universe.

44       'Here's my Am!' screamed Peggotty, 'growed out of knowledge!'

45       He was waiting for us, in fact, at the public-house; and asked me
46  how I found myself, like an old acquaintance. I did not feel, at
47  first, that I knew him as well as he knew me, because he had never
48  come to our house since the night I was born, and naturally he had
49  the advantage of me. But our intimacy was much advanced by his
50  taking me on his back to carry me home. He was, now, a huge,
51  strong fellow of six feet high, broad in proportion, and
52  round-shouldered; but with a simpering boy's face and curly light
53  hair that gave him quite a sheepish look. He was dressed in a
54  canvas jacket, and a pair of such very stiff trousers that they
55  would have stood quite as well alone, without any legs in them.
56  And you couldn't so properly have said he wore a hat, as that he
57  was covered in a-top, like an old building, with something pitchy.

58       Ham carrying me on his back and a small box of ours under his arm,
59  and Peggotty carrying another small box of ours, we turned down
60  lanes bestrewn with bits of chips and little hillocks of sand, and
61  went past gas-works, rope-walks, boat-builders' yards, shipwrights'
62  yards, ship-breakers' yards, caulkers' yards, riggers' lofts,
63  smiths' forges, and a great litter of such places, until we came
64  out upon the dull waste I had already seen at a distance; when Ham
65  said,

66       'Yon's our house, Mas'r Davy!'

67       I looked in all directions, as far as I could stare over the
68  wilderness, and away at the sea, and away at the river, but no
69  house could I make out. There was a black barge, or some other
70  kind of superannuated boat, not far off, high and dry on the
71  ground, with an iron funnel sticking out of it for a chimney and
72  smoking very cosily; but nothing else in the way of a habitation
73  that was visible to me.

74       'That's not it?' said I. 'That ship-looking thing?'

75       'That's it, Mas'r Davy,' returned Ham.

76       If it had been Aladdin's palace, roc's egg and all, I suppose I
77  could not have been more charmed with the romantic idea of living
78  in it. There was a delightful door cut in the side, and it was
79  roofed in, and there were little windows in it; but the wonderful
80  charm of it was, that it was a real boat which had no doubt been
81  upon the water hundreds of times, and which had never been intended
82  to be lived in, on dry land. That was the captivation of it to me.
83  If it had ever been meant to be lived in, I might have thought it
84  small, or inconvenient, or lonely; but never having been designed
85  for any such use, it became a perfect abode.

86       It was beautifully clean inside, and as tidy as possible. There
87  was a table, and a Dutch clock, and a chest of drawers, and on the
88  chest of drawers there was a tea-tray with a painting on it of a
89  lady with a parasol, taking a walk with a military-looking child
90  who was trundling a hoop. The tray was kept from tumbling down, by
91  a bible; and the tray, if it had tumbled down, would have smashed
92  a quantity of cups and saucers and a teapot that were grouped
93  around the book. On the walls there were some common coloured
94  pictures, framed and glazed, of scripture subjects; such as I have
95  never seen since in the hands of pedlars, without seeing the whole
96  interior of Peggotty's brother's house again, at one view. Abraham
97  in red going to sacrifice Isaac in blue, and Daniel in yellow cast
98  into a den of green lions, were the most prominent of these. Over
99  the little mantelshelf, was a picture of the 'Sarah Jane' lugger,
100  built at Sunderland, with a real little wooden stern stuck on to
101  it; a work of art, combining composition with carpentry, which I
102  considered to be one of the most enviable possessions that the
103  world could afford. There were some hooks in the beams of the
104  ceiling, the use of which I did not divine then; and some lockers
105  and boxes and conveniences of that sort, which served for seats and
106  eked out the chairs.

107       All this I saw in the first glance after I crossed the threshold -
108  child-like, according to my theory - and then Peggotty opened a
109  little door and showed me my bedroom. It was the completest and
110  most desirable bedroom ever seen - in the stern of the vessel; with
111  a little window, where the rudder used to go through; a little
112  looking-glass, just the right height for me, nailed against the
113  wall, and framed with oyster-shells; a little bed, which there was
114  just room enough to get into; and a nosegay of seaweed in a blue
115  mug on the table. The walls were whitewashed as white as milk, and
116  the patchwork counterpane made my eyes quite ache with its
117  brightness. One thing I particularly noticed in this delightful
118  house, was the smell of fish; which was so searching, that when I
119  took out my pocket-handkerchief to wipe my nose, I found it smelt
120  exactly as if it had wrapped up a lobster. On my imparting this
121  discovery in confidence to Peggotty, she informed me that her
122  brother dealt in lobsters, crabs, and crawfish; and I afterwards
123  found that a heap of these creatures, in a state of wonderful
124  conglomeration with one another, and never leaving off pinching
125  whatever they laid hold of, were usually to be found in a little
126  wooden outhouse where the pots and kettles were kept.

127       We were welcomed by a very civil woman in a white apron, whom I had
128  seen curtseying at the door when I was on Ham's back, about a
129  quarter of a mile off. Likewise by a most beautiful little girl
130  (or I thought her so) with a necklace of blue beads on, who
131  wouldn't let me kiss her when I offered to, but ran away and hid
132  herself. By and by, when we had dined in a sumptuous manner off
133  boiled dabs, melted butter, and potatoes, with a chop for me, a
134  hairy man with a very good-natured face came home. As he called
135  Peggotty 'Lass', and gave her a hearty smack on the cheek, I had no
136  doubt, from the general propriety of her conduct, that he was her
137  brother; and so he turned out - being presently introduced to me as
138  Mr. Peggotty, the master of the house.

139       'Glad to see you, sir,' said Mr. Peggotty. 'You'll find us rough,
140  sir, but you'll find us ready.'

141       I thanked him, and replied that I was sure I should be happy in
142  such a delightful place.

143       'How's your Ma, sir?' said Mr. Peggotty. 'Did you leave her pretty
144  jolly?'

145       I gave Mr. Peggotty to understand that she was as jolly as I could
146  wish, and that she desired her compliments - which was a polite
147  fiction on my part.

148       'I'm much obleeged to her, I'm sure,' said Mr. Peggotty. 'Well,
149  sir, if you can make out here, fur a fortnut, 'long wi' her,'
150  nodding at his sister, 'and Ham, and little Em'ly, we shall be
151  proud of your company.'

152       Having done the honours of his house in this hospitable manner, Mr.
153  Peggotty went out to wash himself in a kettleful of hot water,
154  remarking that 'cold would never get his muck off'. He soon
155  returned, greatly improved in appearance; but so rubicund, that I
156  couldn't help thinking his face had this in common with the
157  lobsters, crabs, and crawfish, - that it went into the hot water
158  very black, and came out very red.

159       After tea, when the door was shut and all was made snug (the nights
160  being cold and misty now), it seemed to me the most delicious
161  retreat that the imagination of man could conceive. To hear the
162  wind getting up out at sea, to know that the fog was creeping over
163  the desolate flat outside, and to look at the fire, and think that
164  there was no house near but this one, and this one a boat, was like
165  enchantment. Little Em'ly had overcome her shyness, and was
166  sitting by my side upon the lowest and least of the lockers, which
167  was just large enough for us two, and just fitted into the chimney
168  corner. Mrs. Peggotty with the white apron, was knitting on the
169  opposite side of the fire. Peggotty at her needlework was as much
170  at home with St. Paul's and the bit of wax-candle, as if they had
171  never known any other roof. Ham, who had been giving me my first
172  lesson in all-fours, was trying to recollect a scheme of telling
173  fortunes with the dirty cards, and was printing off fishy
174  impressions of his thumb on all the cards he turned. Mr. Peggotty
175  was smoking his pipe. I felt it was a time for conversation and
176  confidence.

177       'Mr. Peggotty!' says I.

178       'Sir,' says he.

179       'Did you give your son the name of Ham, because you lived in a sort
180  of ark?'

181       Mr. Peggotty seemed to think it a deep idea, but answered:

182       'No, sir. I never giv him no name.'

183       'Who gave him that name, then?' said I, putting question number two
184  of the catechism to Mr. Peggotty.

185       'Why, sir, his father giv it him,' said Mr. Peggotty.

186       'I thought you were his father!'

187       'My brother Joe was his father,' said Mr. Peggotty.

188       'Dead, Mr. Peggotty?' I hinted, after a respectful pause.

189       'Drowndead,' said Mr. Peggotty.

190       I was very much surprised that Mr. Peggotty was not Ham's father,
191  and began to wonder whether I was mistaken about his relationship
192  to anybody else there. I was so curious to know, that I made up my
193  mind to have it out with Mr. Peggotty.

194       'Little Em'ly,' I said, glancing at her. 'She is your daughter,
195  isn't she, Mr. Peggotty?'

196       'No, sir. My brother-in-law, Tom, was her father.'

197       I couldn't help it. '- Dead, Mr. Peggotty?' I hinted, after
198  another respectful silence.

199       'Drowndead,' said Mr. Peggotty.

200       I felt the difficulty of resuming the subject, but had not got to
201  the bottom of it yet, and must get to the bottom somehow. So I
202  said:

203       'Haven't you ANY children, Mr. Peggotty?'

204       'No, master,' he answered with a short laugh. 'I'm a bacheldore.'

205       'A bachelor!' I said, astonished. 'Why, who's that, Mr. Peggotty?'
206  pointing to the person in the apron who was knitting.

207       'That's Missis Gummidge,' said Mr. Peggotty.

208       'Gummidge, Mr. Peggotty?'

209       But at this point Peggotty - I mean my own peculiar Peggotty - made
210  such impressive motions to me not to ask any more questions, that
211  I could only sit and look at all the silent company, until it was
212  time to go to bed. Then, in the privacy of my own little cabin,
213  she informed me that Ham and Em'ly were an orphan nephew and niece,
214  whom my host had at different times adopted in their childhood,
215  when they were left destitute: and that Mrs. Gummidge was the widow
216  of his partner in a boat, who had died very poor. He was but a
217  poor man himself, said Peggotty, but as good as gold and as true as
218  steel - those were her similes. The only subject, she informed me,
219  on which he ever showed a violent temper or swore an oath, was this
220  generosity of his; and if it were ever referred to, by any one of
221  them, he struck the table a heavy blow with his right hand (had
222  split it on one such occasion), and swore a dreadful oath that he
223  would be 'Gormed' if he didn't cut and run for good, if it was ever
224  mentioned again. It appeared, in answer to my inquiries, that
225  nobody had the least idea of the etymology of this terrible verb
226  passive to be gormed; but that they all regarded it as constituting
227  a most solemn imprecation.

228       I was very sensible of my entertainer's goodness, and listened to
229  the women's going to bed in another little crib like mine at the
230  opposite end of the boat, and to him and Ham hanging up two
231  hammocks for themselves on the hooks I had noticed in the roof, in
232  a very luxurious state of mind, enhanced by my being sleepy. As
233  slumber gradually stole upon me, I heard the wind howling out at
234  sea and coming on across the flat so fiercely, that I had a lazy
235  apprehension of the great deep rising in the night. But I
236  bethought myself that I was in a boat, after all; and that a man
237  like Mr. Peggotty was not a bad person to have on board if anything
238  did happen.

239       Nothing happened, however, worse than morning. Almost as soon as
240  it shone upon the oyster-shell frame of my mirror I was out of bed,
241  and out with little Em'ly, picking up stones upon the beach.

242       'You're quite a sailor, I suppose?' I said to Em'ly. I don't know
243  that I supposed anything of the kind, but I felt it an act of
244  gallantry to say something; and a shining sail close to us made
245  such a pretty little image of itself, at the moment, in her bright
246  eye, that it came into my head to say this.

247       'No,' replied Em'ly, shaking her head, 'I'm afraid of the sea.'

248       'Afraid!' I said, with a becoming air of boldness, and looking very
249  big at the mighty ocean. 'I an't!'

250       'Ah! but it's cruel,' said Em'ly. 'I have seen it very cruel to
251  some of our men. I have seen it tear a boat as big as our house,
252  all to pieces.'

253       'I hope it wasn't the boat that -'

254       'That father was drownded in?' said Em'ly. 'No. Not that one, I
255  never see that boat.'

256       'Nor him?' I asked her.

257       Little Em'ly shook her head. 'Not to remember!'

258       Here was a coincidence! I immediately went into an explanation how
259  I had never seen my own father; and how my mother and I had always
260  lived by ourselves in the happiest state imaginable, and lived so
261  then, and always meant to live so; and how my father's grave was in
262  the churchyard near our house, and shaded by a tree, beneath the
263  boughs of which I had walked and heard the birds sing many a
264  pleasant morning. But there were some differences between Em'ly's
265  orphanhood and mine, it appeared. She had lost her mother before
266  her father; and where her father's grave was no one knew, except
267  that it was somewhere in the depths of the sea.

268       'Besides,' said Em'ly, as she looked about for shells and pebbles,
269  'your father was a gentleman and your mother is a lady; and my
270  father was a fisherman and my mother was a fisherman's daughter,
271  and my uncle Dan is a fisherman.'

272       'Dan is Mr. Peggotty, is he?' said I.

273       'Uncle Dan - yonder,' answered Em'ly, nodding at the boat-house.

274       'Yes. I mean him. He must be very good, I should think?'

275       'Good?' said Em'ly. 'If I was ever to be a lady, I'd give him a
276  sky-blue coat with diamond buttons, nankeen trousers, a red velvet
277  waistcoat, a cocked hat, a large gold watch, a silver pipe, and a
278  box of money.'

279       I said I had no doubt that Mr. Peggotty well deserved these
280  treasures. I must acknowledge that I felt it difficult to picture
281  him quite at his ease in the raiment proposed for him by his
282  grateful little niece, and that I was particularly doubtful of the
283  policy of the cocked hat; but I kept these sentiments to myself.

284       Little Em'ly had stopped and looked up at the sky in her
285  enumeration of these articles, as if they were a glorious vision.
286  We went on again, picking up shells and pebbles.

287       'You would like to be a lady?' I said.

288       Emily looked at me, and laughed and nodded 'yes'.

289       'I should like it very much. We would all be gentlefolks together,
290  then. Me, and uncle, and Ham, and Mrs. Gummidge. We wouldn't mind
291  then, when there comes stormy weather. - Not for our own sakes, I
292  mean. We would for the poor fishermen's, to be sure, and we'd help
293  'em with money when they come to any hurt.' This seemed to me to
294  be a very satisfactory and therefore not at all improbable picture.
295  I expressed my pleasure in the contemplation of it, and little
296  Em'ly was emboldened to say, shyly,

297       'Don't you think you are afraid of the sea, now?'

298       It was quiet enough to reassure me, but I have no doubt if I had
299  seen a moderately large wave come tumbling in, I should have taken
300  to my heels, with an awful recollection of her drowned relations.
301  However, I said 'No,' and I added, 'You don't seem to be either,
302  though you say you are,' - for she was walking much too near the
303  brink of a sort of old jetty or wooden causeway we had strolled
304  upon, and I was afraid of her falling over.

305       'I'm not afraid in this way,' said little Em'ly. 'But I wake when
306  it blows, and tremble to think of Uncle Dan and Ham and believe I
307  hear 'em crying out for help. That's why I should like so much to
308  be a lady. But I'm not afraid in this way. Not a bit. Look
309  here!'

310       She started from my side, and ran along a jagged timber which
311  protruded from the place we stood upon, and overhung the deep water
312  at some height, without the least defence. The incident is so
313  impressed on my remembrance, that if I were a draughtsman I could
314  draw its form here, I dare say, accurately as it was that day, and
315  little Em'ly springing forward to her destruction (as it appeared
316  to me), with a look that I have never forgotten, directed far out
317  to sea.

318       The light, bold, fluttering little figure turned and came back safe
319  to me, and I soon laughed at my fears, and at the cry I had
320  uttered; fruitlessly in any case, for there was no one near. But
321  there have been times since, in my manhood, many times there have
322  been, when I have thought, Is it possible, among the possibilities
323  of hidden things, that in the sudden rashness of the child and her
324  wild look so far off, there was any merciful attraction of her into
325  danger, any tempting her towards him permitted on the part of her
326  dead father, that her life might have a chance of ending that day?
327  There has been a time since when I have wondered whether, if the
328  life before her could have been revealed to me at a glance, and so
329  revealed as that a child could fully comprehend it, and if her
330  preservation could have depended on a motion of my hand, I ought to
331  have held it up to save her. There has been a time since - I do
332  not say it lasted long, but it has been - when I have asked myself
333  the question, would it have been better for little Em'ly to have
334  had the waters close above her head that morning in my sight; and
335  when I have answered Yes, it would have been.

336       This may be premature. I have set it down too soon, perhaps. But
337  let it stand.

338       We strolled a long way, and loaded ourselves with things that we
339  thought curious, and put some stranded starfish carefully back into
340  the water - I hardly know enough of the race at this moment to be
341  quite certain whether they had reason to feel obliged to us for
342  doing so, or the reverse - and then made our way home to Mr.
343  Peggotty's dwelling. We stopped under the lee of the
344  lobster-outhouse to exchange an innocent kiss, and went in to
345  breakfast glowing with health and pleasure.

346       'Like two young mavishes,' Mr. Peggotty said. I knew this meant,
347  in our local dialect, like two young thrushes, and received it as
348  a compliment.

349       Of course I was in love with little Em'ly. I am sure I loved that
350  baby quite as truly, quite as tenderly, with greater purity and
351  more disinterestedness, than can enter into the best love of a
352  later time of life, high and ennobling as it is. I am sure my
353  fancy raised up something round that blue-eyed mite of a child,
354  which etherealized, and made a very angel of her. If, any sunny
355  forenoon, she had spread a little pair of wings and flown away
356  before my eyes, I don't think I should have regarded it as much
357  more than I had had reason to expect.

358       We used to walk about that dim old flat at Yarmouth in a loving
359  manner, hours and hours. The days sported by us, as if Time had
360  not grown up himself yet, but were a child too, and always at play.
361  I told Em'ly I adored her, and that unless she confessed she adored
362  me I should be reduced to the necessity of killing myself with a
363  sword. She said she did, and I have no doubt she did.

364       As to any sense of inequality, or youthfulness, or other difficulty
365  in our way, little Em'ly and I had no such trouble, because we had
366  no future. We made no more provision for growing older, than we
367  did for growing younger. We were the admiration of Mrs. Gummidge
368  and Peggotty, who used to whisper of an evening when we sat,
369  lovingly, on our little locker side by side, 'Lor! wasn't it
370  beautiful!' Mr. Peggotty smiled at us from behind his pipe, and
371  Ham grinned all the evening and did nothing else. They had
372  something of the sort of pleasure in us, I suppose, that they might
373  have had in a pretty toy, or a pocket model of the Colosseum.

374       I soon found out that Mrs. Gummidge did not always make herself so
375  agreeable as she might have been expected to do, under the
376  circumstances of her residence with Mr. Peggotty. Mrs. Gummidge's
377  was rather a fretful disposition, and she whimpered more sometimes
378  than was comfortable for other parties in so small an
379  establishment. I was very sorry for her; but there were moments
380  when it would have been more agreeable, I thought, if Mrs. Gummidge
381  had had a convenient apartment of her own to retire to, and had
382  stopped there until her spirits revived.

383       Mr. Peggotty went occasionally to a public-house called The Willing
384  Mind. I discovered this, by his being out on the second or third
385  evening of our visit, and by Mrs. Gummidge's looking up at the
386  Dutch clock, between eight and nine, and saying he was there, and
387  that, what was more, she had known in the morning he would go
388  there.

389       Mrs. Gummidge had been in a low state all day, and had burst into
390  tears in the forenoon, when the fire smoked. 'I am a lone lorn
391  creetur',' were Mrs. Gummidge's words, when that unpleasant
392  occurrence took place, 'and everythink goes contrary with me.'

393       'Oh, it'll soon leave off,' said Peggotty - I again mean our
394  Peggotty - 'and besides, you know, it's not more disagreeable to
395  you than to us.'

396       'I feel it more,' said Mrs. Gummidge.

397       It was a very cold day, with cutting blasts of wind. Mrs.
398  Gummidge's peculiar corner of the fireside seemed to me to be the
399  warmest and snuggest in the place, as her chair was certainly the
400  easiest, but it didn't suit her that day at all. She was
401  constantly complaining of the cold, and of its occasioning a
402  visitation in her back which she called 'the creeps'. At last she
403  shed tears on that subject, and said again that she was 'a lone
404  lorn creetur' and everythink went contrary with her'.

405       'It is certainly very cold,' said Peggotty. 'Everybody must feel
406  it so.'

407       'I feel it more than other people,' said Mrs. Gummidge.

408       So at dinner; when Mrs. Gummidge was always helped immediately
409  after me, to whom the preference was given as a visitor of
410  distinction. The fish were small and bony, and the potatoes were
411  a little burnt. We all acknowledged that we felt this something of
412  a disappointment; but Mrs. Gummidge said she felt it more than we
413  did, and shed tears again, and made that former declaration with
414  great bitterness.

415       Accordingly, when Mr. Peggotty came home about nine o'clock, this
416  unfortunate Mrs. Gummidge was knitting in her corner, in a very
417  wretched and miserable condition. Peggotty had been working
418  cheerfully. Ham had been patching up a great pair of waterboots;
419  and I, with little Em'ly by my side, had been reading to them.
420  Mrs. Gummidge had never made any other remark than a forlorn sigh,
421  and had never raised her eyes since tea.

422       'Well, Mates,' said Mr. Peggotty, taking his seat, 'and how are
423  you?'

424       We all said something, or looked something, to welcome him, except
425  Mrs. Gummidge, who only shook her head over her knitting.

426       'What's amiss?' said Mr. Peggotty, with a clap of his hands.
427  'Cheer up, old Mawther!' (Mr. Peggotty meant old girl.)

428       Mrs. Gummidge did not appear to be able to cheer up. She took out
429  an old black silk handkerchief and wiped her eyes; but instead of
430  putting it in her pocket, kept it out, and wiped them again, and
431  still kept it out, ready for use.

432       'What's amiss, dame?' said Mr. Peggotty.

433       'Nothing,' returned Mrs. Gummidge. 'You've come from The Willing
434  Mind, Dan'l?'

435       'Why yes, I've took a short spell at The Willing Mind tonight,'
436  said Mr. Peggotty.

437       'I'm sorry I should drive you there,' said Mrs. Gummidge.

438       'Drive! I don't want no driving,' returned Mr. Peggotty with an
439  honest laugh. 'I only go too ready.'

440       'Very ready,' said Mrs. Gummidge, shaking her head, and wiping her
441  eyes. 'Yes, yes, very ready. I am sorry it should be along of me
442  that you're so ready.'

443       'Along o' you! It an't along o' you!' said Mr. Peggotty. 'Don't
444  ye believe a bit on it.'

445       'Yes, yes, it is,' cried Mrs. Gummidge. 'I know what I am. I know
446  that I am a lone lorn creetur', and not only that everythink goes
447  contrary with me, but that I go contrary with everybody. Yes, yes.
448  I feel more than other people do, and I show it more. It's my
449  misfortun'.'

450       I really couldn't help thinking, as I sat taking in all this, that
451  the misfortune extended to some other members of that family
452  besides Mrs. Gummidge. But Mr. Peggotty made no such retort, only
453  answering with another entreaty to Mrs. Gummidge to cheer up.

454       'I an't what I could wish myself to be,' said Mrs. Gummidge. 'I am
455  far from it. I know what I am. My troubles has made me contrary.
456  I feel my troubles, and they make me contrary. I wish I didn't
457  feel 'em, but I do. I wish I could be hardened to 'em, but I an't.
458  I make the house uncomfortable. I don't wonder at it. I've made
459  your sister so all day, and Master Davy.'

460       Here I was suddenly melted, and roared out, 'No, you haven't, Mrs.
461  Gummidge,' in great mental distress.

462       'It's far from right that I should do it,' said Mrs. Gummidge. 'It
463  an't a fit return. I had better go into the house and die. I am
464  a lone lorn creetur', and had much better not make myself contrary
465  here. If thinks must go contrary with me, and I must go contrary
466  myself, let me go contrary in my parish. Dan'l, I'd better go into
467  the house, and die and be a riddance!'

468       Mrs. Gummidge retired with these words, and betook herself to bed.
469  When she was gone, Mr. Peggotty, who had not exhibited a trace of
470  any feeling but the profoundest sympathy, looked round upon us, and
471  nodding his head with a lively expression of that sentiment still
472  animating his face, said in a whisper:

473       'She's been thinking of the old 'un!'

474       I did not quite understand what old one Mrs. Gummidge was supposed
475  to have fixed her mind upon, until Peggotty, on seeing me to bed,
476  explained that it was the late Mr. Gummidge; and that her brother
477  always took that for a received truth on such occasions, and that
478  it always had a moving effect upon him. Some time after he was in
479  his hammock that night, I heard him myself repeat to Ham, 'Poor
480  thing! She's been thinking of the old 'un!' And whenever Mrs.
481  Gummidge was overcome in a similar manner during the remainder of
482  our stay (which happened some few times), he always said the same
483  thing in extenuation of the circumstance, and always with the
484  tenderest commiseration.

485       So the fortnight slipped away, varied by nothing but the variation
486  of the tide, which altered Mr. Peggotty's times of going out and
487  coming in, and altered Ham's engagements also. When the latter was
488  unemployed, he sometimes walked with us to show us the boats and
489  ships, and once or twice he took us for a row. I don't know why
490  one slight set of impressions should be more particularly
491  associated with a place than another, though I believe this obtains
492  with most people, in reference especially to the associations of
493  their childhood. I never hear the name, or read the name, of
494  Yarmouth, but I am reminded of a certain Sunday morning on the
495  beach, the bells ringing for church, little Em'ly leaning on my
496  shoulder, Ham lazily dropping stones into the water, and the sun,
497  away at sea, just breaking through the heavy mist, and showing us
498  the ships, like their own shadows.

499       At last the day came for going home. I bore up against the
500  separation from Mr. Peggotty and Mrs. Gummidge, but my agony of
501  mind at leaving little Em'ly was piercing. We went arm-in-arm to
502  the public-house where the carrier put up, and I promised, on the
503  road, to write to her. (I redeemed that promise afterwards, in
504  characters larger than those in which apartments are usually
505  announced in manuscript, as being to let.) We were greatly overcome
506  at parting; and if ever, in my life, I have had a void made in my
507  heart, I had one made that day.

508       Now, all the time I had been on my visit, I had been ungrateful to
509  my home again, and had thought little or nothing about it. But I
510  was no sooner turned towards it, than my reproachful young
511  conscience seemed to point that way with a ready finger; and I
512  felt, all the more for the sinking of my spirits, that it was my
513  nest, and that my mother was my comforter and friend.

514       This gained upon me as we went along; so that the nearer we drew,
515  the more familiar the objects became that we passed, the more
516  excited I was to get there, and to run into her arms. But
517  Peggotty, instead of sharing in those transports, tried to check
518  them (though very kindly), and looked confused and out of sorts.

519       Blunderstone Rookery would come, however, in spite of her, when the
520  carrier's horse pleased - and did. How well I recollect it, on a
521  cold grey afternoon, with a dull sky, threatening rain!

522       The door opened, and I looked, half laughing and half crying in my
523  pleasant agitation, for my mother. It was not she, but a strange
524  servant.

525       'Why, Peggotty!' I said, ruefully, 'isn't she come home?'

526       'Yes, yes, Master Davy,' said Peggotty. 'She's come home. Wait a
527  bit, Master Davy, and I'll - I'll tell you something.'

528       Between her agitation, and her natural awkwardness in getting out
529  of the cart, Peggotty was making a most extraordinary festoon of
530  herself, but I felt too blank and strange to tell her so. When she
531  had got down, she took me by the hand; led me, wondering, into the
532  kitchen; and shut the door.

533       'Peggotty!' said I, quite frightened. 'What's the matter?'

534       'Nothing's the matter, bless you, Master Davy dear!' she answered,
535  assuming an air of sprightliness.

536       'Something's the matter, I'm sure. Where's mama?'

537       'Where's mama, Master Davy?' repeated Peggotty.

538       'Yes. Why hasn't she come out to the gate, and what have we come
539  in here for? Oh, Peggotty!' My eyes were full, and I felt as if
540  I were going to tumble down.

541       'Bless the precious boy!' cried Peggotty, taking hold of me. 'What
542  is it? Speak, my pet!'

543       'Not dead, too! Oh, she's not dead, Peggotty?'

544       Peggotty cried out No! with an astonishing volume of voice; and
545  then sat down, and began to pant, and said I had given her a turn.

546       I gave her a hug to take away the turn, or to give her another turn
547  in the right direction, and then stood before her, looking at her
548  in anxious inquiry.

549       'You see, dear, I should have told you before now,' said Peggotty,
550  'but I hadn't an opportunity. I ought to have made it, perhaps,
551  but I couldn't azackly' - that was always the substitute for
552  exactly, in Peggotty's militia of words - 'bring my mind to it.'

553       'Go on, Peggotty,' said I, more frightened than before.

554       'Master Davy,' said Peggotty, untying her bonnet with a shaking
555  hand, and speaking in a breathless sort of way. 'What do you
556  think? You have got a Pa!'

557       I trembled, and turned white. Something - I don't know what, or
558  how - connected with the grave in the churchyard, and the raising
559  of the dead, seemed to strike me like an unwholesome wind.

560       'A new one,' said Peggotty.

561       'A new one?' I repeated.

562       Peggotty gave a gasp, as if she were swallowing something that was
563  very hard, and, putting out her hand, said:

564       'Come and see him.'

565       'I don't want to see him.'

566       - 'And your mama,' said Peggotty.

567       I ceased to draw back, and we went straight to the best parlour,
568  where she left me. On one side of the fire, sat my mother; on the
569  other, Mr. Murdstone. My mother dropped her work, and arose
570  hurriedly, but timidly I thought.

571       'Now, Clara my dear,' said Mr. Murdstone. 'Recollect! control
572  yourself, always control yourself! Davy boy, how do you do?'

573       I gave him my hand. After a moment of suspense, I went and kissed
574  my mother: she kissed me, patted me gently on the shoulder, and sat
575  down again to her work. I could not look at her, I could not look
576  at him, I knew quite well that he was looking at us both; and I
577  turned to the window and looked out there, at some shrubs that were
578  drooping their heads in the cold.

579       As soon as I could creep away, I crept upstairs. My old dear
580  bedroom was changed, and I was to lie a long way off. I rambled
581  downstairs to find anything that was like itself, so altered it all
582  seemed; and roamed into the yard. I very soon started back from
583  there, for the empty dog-kennel was filled up with a great dog -
584  deep mouthed and black-haired like Him - and he was very angry at
585  the sight of me, and sprang out to get at me.

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