I wants to make your flesh creep.
Despair seldom comes with the first severe shock of misfortune. A man has confidence in untried friends, he remembers the many offers of service so freely made by his boon companions when he wanted them not; he has hope -- the hope of happy inexperience.
Oliver Twist
There is something about a roused woman, especially if she add to all her other strong passions, the fierce impulses of recklessness and despair, which few men like to provoke.
David Copperfield
It is a fact which will be long remembered as remarkable down there, that she was never drowned, but died triumphantly in bed, at ninety-two. I have understood that it was, to the last, her proudest boast that she never had been on the water in her life, except upon a bridge, and that over her tea (to which she was extremely partial) she, to the last, expressed her indignation at the impiety of mariners and others, who had the presumption to go "meandering" about the world. It was in vain to represent to her that some conveniences, tea perhaps included, resulted from this objectionable practice. She always returned, with greater emphasis and with an instinctive knowledge of the strength of her objection, "Let us have no meandering."
My mother had a sure foreboding at the second glance that it was Miss Betsey. The setting sun was glowing on the strange lady over the garden-fence, and she came walking up to the door with a fell rigidity of figure and composure of countenance that could have belonged to nobody else.
"Miss Trotwood," said the visitor. "You have heard of her, I dare say?"
My mother answered that she had had that pleasure. And she had the disagreeable consciousness of not appearing to imply that it had been an overpowering pleasure.
My poor dear mother, I suppose, had some momentary intention of committing and assault and battery upon my aunt, who could easily have settled her with one hand, even if my mother had been in far better training for such an encounter than she was that evening.
He was the meekest of his sex, the mildest of little men. He sidled in and out of a room to take up the less space.
He couldn't have thrown a word at a mad dog. He might have offered him one gently, or half a one, or a fragment of one, for he spoke as slowly as he walked, but he wouldn't have been quick with him, for any earthly consideration.
Mr. Chillip was fluttered again by the extreme severity of my aunt's manner, so he made her a little bow, and have her a little smile to mollify her.
Peggotty and I were sitting one night by the parlour fire, alone. I had been reading to Peggotty about crocodiles. I must have read very perspicuously, or the poor soul must have been deeply interested, for I remember that she had a cloudy impression, after I had done, that they were a sort of vegetable.
...I would rather have died upon my post (of course) than have gone to bed. I had reached that stage of sleepiness when Peggotty seemed to swell and grow immensely large. I propped my eyelids open with my two forefingers, and looked perseveringly at her as she sat at work...
I could observe, in little pieces, as it were, but, as to making a net of a number of these pieces, and catching anybody in it, that was, as yet, beyond me.
...the wonderful charm of it was that it was a real boat, which had no doubt been upon the water hundreds of times, and which had never been intended to be lived in, on dry land. That was the captivation of it to me. If it had ever been meant to be lived in, I might have thought it small, or inconvenient, or lonely, but never having been designed for any such use, it became a perfect abode.
Nothing happened, however, worse than morning.
Of course I was in love with little Em'ly. I am sure I loved that baby quite as truly, quite as tenderly, with greater purity and more disinterestedness, than can enter into the best love of a later time of life, high and ennobling as it is. I am sure my fancy raised up something round that blue-eyed mite of a child, which etherealized, and made a very angel of her.
As to any sense of inequality, or youthfulness, or other difficulty in our way, little Em'ly and I had no such trouble, because we had no future. We made no more provision for growing older, than we did for growing younger.
'I am a lone lorn creetur...and everythink goes contrary with me.'
'Yes, yes, it is,' cried Mrs. Gummidge. 'I know what I am. I know that I am a lone lorn creetur', and not only that everythink goes contrary with me, but that I go contrary with everybody. Yes, yes. I feel more than other people do, and I show it more. It's my misfortun'.'
I really couldn't help thinking, as I sat taking in all this, that the misfortune extended to some other members of that family besides Mrs. Gummidge.
'I an't what I could wish myself to be,' said Mrs. Gummidge. 'I am far from it. I know what I am. My troubles has made me contrary. I feel my troubles, and they make me contrary. I wish I didn't feel 'em, but I do. I wish I could be hardened to to 'em, but I an't...'
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.
He knew it was the mark of tears as well as I. But if he had asked the question twenty times, each
My stripes were sore and stiff, and made me cry afresh, when I moved; but they were nothing to the guilt I felt. It lay heavier on my breast than if I had been a most atrocious criminal, I dare say.
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.
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 dont' know where. I wonder where they do go, by the by?
But these solemn lessons which succeeded those, I remember as the death-blow of my peace, and a grievous daily drudgery and misery.
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 O and Q and S, seem to present themselves again before me as they used to do.
Again, I see her dark eyes roll around the church when she says 'miserable sinners', as if she were calling all the congregation names.
"Whatever I am, I am affectionate. I know I am affectionate. I wouldn't say it, if I wasn't sure that I am."
"I am sure I am not ungrateful. No one ever said I was before. I have many faults, but not that."
"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."
The creed, as I should state it now, was this. Mr. Murdstone 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 must be; but only in bearing their firmness, and firmly believing there was no other firmness on earth.
Firmness, I may observe, was the grand quality on which both Mr. 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 a 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.
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.
"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!"
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.
"What is going to be done with me, Peggotty dear? Do you know?"
"School. Near London," was Peggotty's answer. I was obliged to get her to repeat it, for she spoke it the first time quite down my throat, in consequence of my having forgotten to take my mouth away from the keyhole and put my ear there, and though her words tickled me a good deal, I didn't hear them.
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.
In a school carried on by sheer cruelty, whether it is presided over bya dunce or not, there is not likely to be much learnt.
...they were pretty sure of getting into trouble tomorrow, do what they would, and thought it wise, no doubt, to enjoy themselves today.
Ah, what a strange feeling it was to be going home when it was not home, and to find that every objet I looked at, reminded me of the happy old home, which was like a dream I could never dream again!
She was singing in a low tone. I think i must have lain in her arms, and heard her singing so to me when I was but a baby. The strain was new to me, and yet it was so old that it filled my heart brim-full; like a friend come back from a long absence.
I wish I had died. I wish I had died then, with that feeling in my heart! I should have been more fit for Heaven than I ever have been since.
...'he takes great pains with me; and I ought to be very thankful to him, and very submissive to him even in my thoughts; and when I am not, Peggotty, I worry and condemn myself, and feel doubtful of my own heart, and don't know what to do.'
'When I call you a ridiculous creature, or a vexatious thing, or anything of that sort, Peggotty, I only mean that you are my true friend, and always have been...'
We were very happy; and that evening, as the last of its race, and destined evermore to close that volume of my life, will never pass out of my memory.
In short, I was not a favorite there with anybody, not even with myself; for th ose who did like me could not sh ow it, and those who did not, showed it so plainly that I had a sensitive consciousness of always appearing constrained, boorish, and dull.
What walks I took alone, down muddy lanes, in the bad winter weather, carrying that parlour, and Mr. and Miss Murdstone in it, everywhere: a monstrous load that I was obliged to bear, a daymare that there was no possibility of breaking in, a weight that brooded on my wits, and blunted them!
What meals I had in silence and embarrassment, always feeling that there were a knife and fork too many, and that mine; an appetite too many, and that mine; a plate and chair too many, and those mine; a somebody too many, and that I!
...what a blank space I seemed, which everybody overlooked, and yet was in everybody's way...
'When you came away from home at the end of the vacation,' said Mrs. Creakle, after a pause, 'were they all well?' After another pause, 'Was your mama well?'
I tremebled without distinctly knowing why, and still looked at her earnestly, making no attempt to answer.
'Because,' said she, 'I grieve to tell you that I hear this morning your mama is very ill'
A mist rose between Mrs. Creakle and me, and her figure seemed to move in it for an instant. Then I felt the burning tears run down my face, and it was steady again.
'She is very dangerously ill,' she added.
I knew all now.
'She is dead.'
Then I hear sobs; and, standing apart among the lookers-on, I see that good and faithful servant, whom of all the people upon earth I love the best, and unto whom my childish heart is certain that the Lord will one day say: 'Well done.'
Before us stands our house, so pretty and unchanged, so linked in my mind with the young idea of what is gone, that all my sorrow has been nothing to the sorrow it calls forth.
I do not doubt that she had a choice pleasure in exhibiting what she called her self-command, and her firmness, and her strength of mind, and her common sense, and the whole diabolical catalogue of her unamiable qualities, on such an occasion.
The mother who lay in the grave was the mother of my infancy; the little creature in her arms was myself, as I had once been, hushed for ever on her bosom.
'If he was only sorry, he wouldn't look at me as he does. I am only sorry, and it makes me feel kinder.'
I looked up into his face, and answered, with an attempt to be very profound: 'Oh!'
In his attempts to be particularly lucid, Mr. Barkis was so extremely mysterious, that I might have stood looking in his face for an hour, and most assuredly should have got as much information out of it as out of the face of a clock that has stopped...
When she had finished her breakfast, my aunt very deliberately leaned back in her chair, knitted her brows, folded her arms, and contemplated me at her leisure, with such a fixedness of attention that I was quite overpowered by embarrassment. Not having as yet finished my own breakfast, I attempted to hide my confusion by proceeding with it, but my knife tumbled over my fork, my fork tripped up my knife, I chipped bits of bacon a surprising height into the air instead of cutting them for my own eating, and choked myself with my tea, which persisted in going the wrong way instead of the right one, until I gave in altogether, and sat blushing under my aunt's close scrutiny.
"Oh!" said my aunt, "I was not aware at first to whom I had the pleasure of objecting."
"You are no stranger to the fact that there have been periods of my life, when it has been requisite that I should pause, until certain expected events should turn up, when it has been necessary that I should fall back, before making what I trust I shall not be accused of presumption in terming - a spring. The present is one of those momentous stages in the life of a man. You find me, fallen back, for a spring, and I have every reason to believe that a vigorous leap will shortly be the result." - Mr. Micawber
He was so extremely conciliatory in his manner that he seemed to apologize to the very newspaper for taking the liberty of reading it.
He quite shook hands with me -- which was a violent proceeding for him, his usual course being to slide a tepid little fish-slice, an inch or two in advanace of his hip, and evince the greatest discomposure when anybody grappled with it.
She was so true, she was so beautiful, she was so good -- I owed her so much gratitude, she was so dear to me, that I could find no utterance for what I felt. I tried to bless her, tried to thank her, tried to tell her (as I had often done in letters) what an influence she had upon me, but all my efforts were in vain. My love and joy were dumb.
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