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ADDED TO THE

BOSTON LIBRARY

23 mayo NEŽIBURAN 1870

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this volume is detained beyond that time.
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MATTHEWS
WORKS OF CHARLES DICKENS .

Library Edition .

VOL . XXIV .

GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
0

GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

OA
ST
BU

Y
AR
BR
LI

BY CHARLES DICKENS.

BOSTON :

TICK NOR AND FIELDS .

LONDON : CHAPMAN AND HALL .

1866.
D 555

8.24

UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY
MAR 5 1941
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

CHAPTER I.

My father's family name being Pirrip, and my christian name

Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing
longer or more explicit than Pip . So, I called myself Pip, and
came to be called Pip .
I give Pirrip as my father's family name, on the authority of
his tombstone and my sister - Mrs. Joe Gargery, who married
the blacksmith . As I never saw my father or my mother, and
never saw any likeness of either of them ( for their days were
long before the days of photographs ), my first fancies re
garding what they were like, were unreasonably derived from
their tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father's, gave
me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man , with
curly black hair. From the character and turn of the inscrip
tion, “ Also Georgiana Wife of the Above, " I drew a childish
conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly. To five
little stone lozenges, each about a foot and a half long, which
were arranged in a neat row beside their grave, and were sacred
to the memory of five little brothers of mine — who gave up try
ing to get a living exceedingly early in that universal struggle - I
am indebted for a belief I religiously entertained that they had
all been born on their backs with their hands in their trousers
pockets, and had never taken them out in this state of existence.
Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the
river wound, twenty miles of the sea. My first most vivid and
broad impression of the identity of things, seems to me to have
been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening.
At such a time I found out for certain, that this bleak place
overgrown with nettles was the churchyard ; and that Philip
Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the above,
B
2 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

were dead and buried ; and that Alexander, Bartholomew,

Abraham , Tobias, and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid , were
also dead and buried ; and that the dark flat wilderness beyond
the churchyard, intersected with dykes and mounds and gates,
with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes ; and that
the low leaden line beyond, was the river ; and that the dis
tant savage lair from which the wind was rushing, was the sea ;
and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and
beginning to cry, was Pip .
“ Hold your noise ! " cried a terrible voice, as a man started up
from among the graves at the side of the church porch . “ Keep
still , you little devil, or I'll cut your throat !”
A fearful man , all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg.
A man with no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag
tied round his head. A man who had been soaked in water, and
smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and
stung by nettles, and torn by briars ; who limped, and shivered ,
and glared and growled ; and whose teeth chattered in his head
as he seized me by the chin.
“ 0 ! Don't cut my throat, sir ," I pleaded in terror. “ Pray
don't do it, sir .”
66
“ Tell us your name ! " said the man . Quick !"
“ Pip , sir."
“ Once more," said the man, staring at me. 6 Give it mouth ! ”
“ Pip. Pip, sir.”
“ Show us where you live,” said the man. “ Pint out the place ! ”
I pointed to where our village lay, on the flat in -shore among
the alder-trees and pollards, a nile or more from the church.
The man, after looking at me for a moment, turned me upside
down, and emptied my pockets. There was nothing in them
but a piece of bread. When the church came to itself- for he
was so sudden and strong that he made it go head over heels
before me, and I saw the steeple under my feet-when the
church came to itself, I say, I was seated on a high tombstone,
trembling, while he ate the bread ravenously.
“ You young dog," said the man , licking his lips, “ what fat
cheeks you ha' got.
I believe they were fat, though I was at that time undersized
for my years, and not strong.
“ Darn Me if I couldn't eat 'em ,” said the man, with a threat
ening shake of his head, “ and if I han't half a mind to’t !”
| I earnestly expressed my hope that he wouldn't, and held
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 3

tighter to the tombstone on which he had put me ; partly, to

keep myself upon it ; partly, to keep myself from crying.
6 Now lookee here !” said the man . 66 Where's your mother ?"
“ There, sir ! ” said I.
He started , made a short run, and stopped and looked over
his shoulder.
“ There, sir !" I timidly explained . “Also Georgiana. That's
my mother .”
“ Oh !” said he, coming back . “ And is that your father alonger
your mother ?”
7
“ Yes, sir,” said I ; “ him too ; late of this parish .”
“ Ha ! ” he muttered then , considering. “Who d'ye live with
supposin' you're kindly let to live, which I han't made up my
mind about ?"
“ My sister, sir - Mrs. Joe Gargery - wife of Joe Gargery, the
blacksmith, sir.”
“ Blacksmith, eh ?" said he. And looked down at his leg.
After darkly looking at his leg and at me several times, he
came closer to my tombstone, took me by both arms, and tilted
me back as far as he could hold me ; so that his eyes looked
most powerfully down into mine, and mine looked most help
lessly up into his.
“ Now lookee here, " he said, " the question being whether
you're to be let to live. You know what a file is ?”
Yes, sir .”
“ And you know what wittles is ?”
“ Yes, sir ."
After each question he tilted me over a little more, so as to
give me a greater sense of helplessness and danger.
“ You get me a file . ” He tilted me again . “ And you get me
wittles.” He tilted me again . “ You bring 'em both to me." He
tilted me again. " Or I'll have your heart and liver out. " He
tilted me again .
I was dreadfully frightened, and so giddy that I clung to him
with both hands, and said, “ If you would kindly please to let
me keep upright, sir, perhaps I shouldn't be sick, and perhaps
I could attend more.”
He gave me a most tremendous dip and roll, so that the
church jumped over its own weather -cock . Then, he held me
by the arms, in an upright position on the top of the stone, and
went on in these fearful terms:
“ You bring me, to -morrow morning early, that file and them
4 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

wittles. You bring the lot to me, at that old Battery over
yonder. You do it, and you never dare to say a word or dare
to make a sign concerning your having seen such a person as
me, or any person sumever, and you shall be let to live. You
fail, or you go from my words in any partickler, no matter how
small it is, and your heart and your liver shall be tore out,
roasted and ate. Now , I ain't alone, as you may think I am.
There's a young man hid with me, in comparison with which
young man I am a Angel. That young man hears the words I
speak. That young man has a secret way pecooliar to himself,
of getting at a boy, and at his heart, and at his liver. It is in
wain for a boy to attempt to hide himself from that young man .
A boy may lock his door, may be warm in bed, may tuck him
self up, may draw the clothes over his head, may think himself
comfortable and safe, but that young man will softly creep and
creep his way to him and tear him open. I am a keeping that
young man from harming of you at the present moment, with
great difficulty. I find it wery hard to hold that young man
off of your inside. Now , what do you say ?”
I said that I would get him the file, and I would get him
what broken bits of food I could, and I would come to him at
the Battery, early in the morning.
“Say Lord strike you dead if you don't ! ” said the man .
I said so, and he took me down .
“ Now , " he pursued, " you remember what you've undertook,
and you remember that young man, and you get home ! "
“ Goo - good night, sir, " I faltered .
“ Much of that ! ” said he, glancing about him over the cold
wet flat. “ I wish I was a frog. Or a eel ! ”
At the same time, he hugged his shuddering body in both his
arms-clasping himself, as if to hold himself together — and
limped towards the low church wall. As I saw him go, picking
his way among the nettles, and among the brambles that bound
the green mounds, he looked in my young eyes as if he were
eluding the hands of the dead people, stretching up cautiously out
of their graves, to get a twist upon his ankle and pull him in.
When he came to the low church wall, he got over it, like a
man whose legs were numbed and stiff, and then turned round to
look for me. When I saw him turning, I set my face towards
home, and made the best use of my legs. But presently I looked
upermy shoulder, and saw him going on again towards the river,
still hugging himself in both arms, and picking his way with
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 5

his sore feet among the great stones dropped into the marshes
here and there, for stepping -places when the rains were heavy,
or the tide was in .
The marshes were just a long black horizontal line then , as I
stopped to look after him ; and the river was just another hori
zontal line, not nearly so broad nor yet so black ; and the sky
was just a row of long angry red lines and dense black lines
intermixed . On the edge of the river I could faintly make out
the only two black things in all the prospect that seemed to be
standing upright ; one of these was the beacon by which the
sailors steered - like an unhooped cask upon a pole - an ugly
thing when you were near it ; the other a gibbet, with some
chains hanging to it which had once held a pirate. The man
was limping on towards this latter, as if he were the pirate come
to life, and come down, and going back to hook himself up
again. It gave me a terrible turn when I thought so ; and as I
saw the cattle lifting their heads to gaze after him , I wondered
whether they thought so too. I looked all round for the horrible
young man , and could see no signs of him . But, now I was
frightened again , and ran home without stopping.

CHAPTER II.

My sister, Mrs. Joe Gargery, was more than twenty years older
than I, and had established a great reputation with herself and
the neighbours because she had brought me up " by hand .”
Having at that time to find out for myself what the expression
meant, and knowing her to have a hard and heavy hand, and to
be much in the habit of laying it upon her husband as well as
upon me, I supposed that Joe Gargery and I were both brought
up by hand .
She was not a good - looking woman , my sister ; and I had a
general impression that she must have made Joe Gargery marry
her by hand . Joe was a fair man , with curls of flaxen hair on
each side of his smooth face, and with eyes of such a very un
decided blue that they seemed to have somehow got mixed
with their own whites. He was a mild, good -natured, sweet
tempered , easy-going, foolish, dear fellow — a sort of Hercules
in strength, and also in weakness.
My sister, Mrs. Joe, with black hair and eyes, had such a
6 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

prevailing redness of skin that I sometimes used to wonder

whether it was possible she washed herself with a nutmeg
grater instead of soap. She was tall and bony, and almost
always wore a coarse apron, fastened over her figure behind
with two loops, and having a square impregnable bib in front,
that was stuck full of pins and needles. She made it a power
ful merit in herself, and a strong reproach against Joe, that she
wore this apron so much. Though I really see no reason why
she should have worn it all : or why, if she did wear it at all,
she should not have taken it off, every day of her life.
Joe's forge adjoined our house, which was a wooden house,
as many of the dwellings in our country were — most of them ,
at that time. When I ran home from the churchyard, the
forge was shut up, and Joe was sitting alone in the kitchen.
Joe and I being fellow -sufferers, and having confidences as such,
Joe imparted a confidence to me, the moment I raised the latch
of the door and peeped in at him opposite to it , sitting in the
chimney corner.
“ Mrs. Joe has been out a dozen times, looking for you, Pip .
And she's out now, making it a baker's dozen .”
6 Is she ? "
“ Yes, Pip, ” said Joe ; “ and what's worse, she's got Tickler
with her .”
At this dismal intelligence, I twisted the only button on my
waistcoat round and round, and looked in great depression at
the fire. Tickler was a wax - ended piece of cane, worn smooth
by collision with my tickled frame.
“ She sot down,” said Joe, “ and she got up , and she made a
grab at Tickler, and she Ram -paged out. That's what she did ,"
said Joe, slowly clearing the fire between the lower bars with
the poker, and looking at it : “ she Ram -paged out, Pip."
“ Has she been gone long, Joe ? ” I always treated him as a
larger species of child, and as no more than my equal.
" Weil,” said Joe, glancing up at the Dutch clock, “ she's been
on the Ram - page, this last spell, about five minutes, Pip. She's
a coming! Get behind the door, old chap, and have the jack
towel betwixt you . ”
I took the advice. My sister, Mrs. Joe, throwing the door
wide open, and finding an obstruction behind it, immediately
divined the cause, and applied Tickler to its further investiga
tion . She concluded by throwing me-I often served her as a
connubial missile — at Joe, who, glad to get hold of me on any
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 7

terms, passed me on into the chimney and quietly fenced me

up there with his great leg.
“ Where have you been , you young monkey ? ” said Mrs. Joe,
stamping her foot. “Tell me directly what you've been doing
to wear me away with fret and fright and worrit, or I'd have
you out of that corner if you was fifty Pips, and he was five
hundred Gargerys."
“ I have only been to the churchyard," said I, from my stool,
crying and rubbing myself.
Churchyard ! ” repeated my sister. - If it warn't for me
you'd have been to the churchyard long ago, and stayed there .
Who brought you up by hand ?"
“ You did , ” said I.
“ And why did I do it, I should like to know !" exclaimed my
sister.
I whimpered, “ I don't know ."
“ I don't !” said my sister. “ I'd never do it again ! I know
that. I may truly say I've never had this apron of mine off,
since born you were . It's bad enough to be a blacksmith's
wife ( and him a Gargery ) without being your mother.”
My thoughts strayed from that question as I looked dis
consolately at the fire. For, the fugitive out on the marshes
with the ironed leg, the mysterious young man , the file, the
food, and the dreadful pledge I was under to commit a larceny
on those sheltering premises, rose before me in the avenging
coals.
“Hah !” said Mrs. Joe, restoring Tickler to his station .
“ Churchyard, indeed ! You may well say churchyard, you
two." One of us, by -the -by, had not said it at all. “ You'll drive
me to the churchyard betwixt you, one of these days, and oh,
a pr- r-recious pair you'd be without me ! "
As she applied herself to set the tea -things, Joe peeped down
at me over his leg, as if he were mentally casting me and him
self up , and calculating what kind of pair we practically should
make, under the grievous circumstances foreshadowed . After
that, he sat feeling his right -side flaxen curls and whisker, and
following Mrs. Joe about with his blue eyes, as his manner
always was at squally times.
My sister had a trenchant way of cutting our bread -and
butter for us, that never varied. First, with her left hand she
jammed the loaf hard and fast against her bib — where it some
times got a pin into it, and sometimes a needle, which we
8 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

afterwards got into our mouths. Then she took some butter
(not too much ) on a knife and spread it on the loaf, in an
apothecary kind of way as if she were making a plaister - using
both sides of the knife with a slapping dexterity, and trimming
and moulding the butter off round the crust. Then, she gave
the knife a final smart wipe on the edge of the plaister, and then
sawed a very thick round off the loaf : which she finally, before
separating from the loaf, hewed into two halves, of which Joe
got one, and I the other.
On the present occasion, though I was hungry, I dared not
eat my slice. I felt that I must have something in reserve for
my dreadful acquaintance, and his ally the still more dreadful
young man . I knew Mrs. Joe's housekeeping to be of the
strictest kind, and that my larcenous researches might find
nothing available in the safe . Therefore I resolved to put my
hunk of bread -and -butter down the leg of my trousers.
The effort of resolution necessary to the achievement of this
purpose, I found to be quite awful. It was as if I had to make
up my mind to leap from the top of a high house, or plunge
into a great depth of water. And it was made the more dif
ficult by the unconscious Joe . In our already -mentioned
freemasonry as fellow -sufferers, and in his good -natured com
panionship with me, it was our evening habit to compare the
way we bit through our slices, by silently holding them up to
each other's admiration now and then—which stimulated us to
new exertions. To -night, Joe several times invited me, by the
display of his fast -diminishing slice, to enter upon our usual
friendly competition ; but he found me, each time, with my
yellow mug of tea on one knee , and my untouched bread -and
butter on the other. At last, I desperately considered that the
thing I contemplated must be done, and that it had best be done
in the least improbable manner consistent.with the circumstances.
I took advantage of a moment when Joe had just looked at me,
and got my bread -and -butter down my leg.
Joe was evidently made uncomfortable by what he supposed
to be my loss of appetite, and took a thoughtful bite outof his
slice, which he didn't seem to enjoy. He turned it about in his
mouth much longer than usual, pondering over it a good deal,
and after all gulped it down like a pill. He was about to take
another bite, and had just got his head on one side for a good
purchase on it, when his eye fell on me, and he saw that my
bread -and -butter was gone.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 9

The wonder and consternation with which Joe stopped on the

threshold of his bite and stared at me, were too evident to
escape my sister's observation.
“ What's the matter now ?” said she, smartly, as she put down
her cup
“ I say, you know !" muttered Joe, shaking his head at me in
very serious remonstrance. “ Pip , old chap ! You'll do your
1
self a mischief. It'll stick somewhere. You can't have chawed
it, Pip ."
“What's the matter now ? ” repeated my sister, more sharply
than before .
“ If you can cough any trifle on it up, Pip, I'd recommend
you to do it ,” said Joe, all aghast. “ Manners is manners, but
still your elth's your elth .”
By this time, my sister was quite desperate, so she pounced
on Joe, and, taking him by the two whiskers, knocked his head
for a little while against the wall behind him : while I sat in
the corner , looking guiltily on.
“ Now , perhaps you'll mention what's the matter," said my
9)
sister, out of breath , " you staring great stuck pig ."
Joe looked at her in a helpless way ; then took a helpless
bite, and looked at me again .
“ You know , Pip ,” said Joe, solemnly, with his last bite in his
cheek, and speaking in a confidential voice, as if we two were
quite alone, " you and me is always friends, and I'd be the last to
tell upon you, any time. But such a— ” he moved his chair, and
looked about the floor between us, and then again at me— “ sạch
a most oncommon bolt as that !”
“ Been bolting his food, has he ?” cried my sister.
“ You know , old chap,” said Joe, looking at me, and not at
Mrs. Joe, with his bite still in his cheek, “ I Bolted, myself,
when I was your age - frequent — and as a boy I've been among
& many Bolters ; but I never see your bolting equal yet, Pip,
and it's a mercy you ain't Bolted dead."
My sister made a dive at me, and fished me up by the hair :
saying nothing more than the awful words, “ You come along
and be dosed .”
Some medical beast had revived Tar -water in those days as a
fine medicine, and Mrs Joe always kept a supply of it in the
cupboard ; having a belief in its virtues correspondent to its
nastinoss. At the best of times, so much of this elixir was ad
ministered to me as a choice restorative, that I was conscious of
10 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

going about, smelling like a new fence. On this particular

evening the urgency of my case demanded a pint of this mixture,
which was poured down my throat, for my greater comfort, while
Mrs. Joe held my head under her arm , as a boot would be held
in a boot-jack. Joe got off with half a pint ; but was made to
swallow that (much to his disturbance, as he sat slowly munch
ing and meditating before the fire), “ because he had had a turn .”
Judging from myself, I should say he certainly had a turn after
wards, if he had had none before.
Conscience is a dreadful thing when it accuses man or boy ;
but when, in the case of a boy, that secret burden co -operates
with another secret burden down the leg of his trousers, it is
( as I can testify) a great punishment. The guilty knowledge
that I was going to rob Mrs. Joe-I never thought I was going
to rob Joe, for I never thought of any of the housekeeping pro
perty as his — united to the necessity of always keeping one hand
on my bread-and-butter as I sat, or when I was ordered about
the kitchen on any small errand, almost drove me out of my
mind . Then, as the marsh winds made the fire glow and flare,
I thought I heard the voice outside, of the man with the iron on
his leg who had sworn me to secresy, declaring that he couldn't
and wouldn't starve until to -morrow , but must be fed now. At
other times, I thought, What if the young man who was with so
much difficulty restrained from imbruing his hands in me,
should yield to a constitutional impatience, or should mistake
the time, and should think himself accredited to my heart and
liver to -night, instead of to -morrow ! If ever anybody's hair
stood on end with terror, mine must have done so then. But,
perhaps, nobody's ever did ?
It was Christmas Eve, and I had to stir the pudding for next
day, with a copper-stick, from seven to eight by the Dutch
clock . I tried it with the load upon my leg (and that made me
think afresh of the man with the load on his leg), and found the
tendency of exercise to bring the bread - and - butter out at my
ankle, quite unmanageable. Happily I slipped away, and depo
sited that part of my conscience in my garret bedroom .
.“ Hark !” said I, when I had done my stirring, and was taking
a final warm in the chimney corner before being sent up to bed ;
was that great guns, Joe ?”
6 Ah !” said Joe. “ There's another conwict off . ”
66 What does that mean , Joe ? ” said I.
Mrs. Joe, who always took explanations upon herself, said
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 11

snappishly, " Escaped. Escaped . ” Administering thedefinition

like Tar -water.
While Mrs. Joe sat with her head bending over her needle
work, I put my mouth into the forms of saying to Joe, “ What's
a convict ? ” Joe put his mouth into the forms of returning such
a highly elaborate answer, that I could make out nothing of it
but the single word , " Pip .”
** There was a conwict off last night,” said Joe, aloud, “ after
sunset- gun. And they fired warning of him . And now it ap
pears they're firing warning of another. "
“ Who's firing ?" said I.
“ Drat that boy," interposed my sister, frowning at me over her
work , “what a questioner he is. Ask no questions, and you'll
be told no lies.”
It was not very polite to herself, I thought, to imply that I
should be told lies by her, even if I did ask questions. But she
never was polite, unless there was company.
At this point, Joe greatly augmented my curiosity by taking
the utmost pains to open his mouth very wide, and to put it into
the form of a word that looked to me like “ sulks.” Therefore, I
naturally pointed to Mrs. Joe, and put my mouth into the form
of saying " her ? ” But Joe wouldn't hear of that, at all, and
again opened his mouth very wide, and shook the form of a most
emphatic word out of it. But I could make nothing of the
word .
“Mrs. Joe ,” said I, as a last resource, “ I should like to know
-if you wouldn't much mind — where the firing comes from ? ”
“Lord bless the boy !” exclaimed my sister, as if she didn't
quite mean that, but rather the contrary. “ From the Hulks.”
“ Oh - h ! " said I, looking at Joe. 6 Hulks !”
Joe gave a reproachful cough, as much as to say, “ Well, I
told you so ."
“ And please what's Hulks ? ” said I.
“ That's the way, with this boy ! ” exclaimed my sister, pointing
me out with her needle and thread, and shaking her head at me.
“ Answer him one question, and he'll ask you a dozen directly.
Hulks are prison -ships, right ' cross th' meshes. " We always used
that name for marshes in our country.
“ I wonder who's put into prison -ships, and why they're put
there ?” said I, in a general way, and with quiet desperation . .
It was too much for Mrs. Joe, who immediately rose . “ I tell
you what, young fellow , " said she, “ I didn't bring you up by hand
12 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

to badger people's lives out. It would be blame to me, and not

praise, if I had. People are put in the Hulks because they
murder, and because they rob, and forge, and do all sorts of
bad ; and they always begin by asking questions. Now, you
get along to bed !"
I was never allowed a candle to light me to bed, and, as I went
upstairs in the dark, with my head tingling - from Mrs. Joe's
thimble, having played the tambourine upon it, to accompany
her last words—I felt fearfully sensible of the great convenience
that the hulks were handy for me. I was clearly on my way
there. I had begun by asking questions, and I was going to rob
Mrs. Joe.
Since that time, which is far enough away now, I have often
thought that few people know what secresy there is in the young,
under terror. No matter how unreasonable the terror, so that it
be terror. I was in mortal terror of the young man who wanted
my heart and liver ; I was in mortal terror of my interlocutor
with the iron leg ; I was in mortal terror of myself, from whom
an awful promise had been extracted ; I had no hope of deliver
ance through my all-powerful sister, who repulsed me at every
turn ; I am afraid to think of what I might have done on re
quirement, in the secresy of my terror.
If I slept at all that night, it was only to imagine myself
drifting down the river on a strong spring tide, to the Hulks ; a
ghostly pirate calling out to me through a speaking -trumpet, as
I passed the gibbet-station, that I had better come ashore and be
hanged there at once, and not put it off. I was afraid to sleep,
even if I had been inclined , for I knew that at the first faint dawn
of morning I must rob the pantry. There was no doing it in
the night, for there was no getting a light by easy friction then ;
to have got one, I must have struck it out of flint and steel, and
have made a noise like the very pirate himself rattling his chains.
As soon as the great black velvet pall outside my little win
dow was shot with grey, I got up and went down stairs ; every
board upon the way, and every crack in every board , calling
after me, “ Stop thief !” and “ Get up, Mrs. Joe ! ” In the pantry,
which was far more abundantly supplied than usual, owing to
the season , I was very much alarmed, by a hare hanging up by
the heels, whom I rather thought I caught, when my back was
half turned , winking. I had no time for verification, no time
for selection, no time for anything, for I had no time to spare.
I stole some bread, some rind of cheese, about half a jar of
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 13

mincemeat ( which I tied up in my pocket -handkerchief with my

last night's slice), some brandy from a stone bottle (which I de
canted into a glass bottle I had secretly used for making that
intoxicating-fluid , Spanish -liquorice-water, up in my room ;
diluting the stone bottle from a jug in the kitchen cupboard ), a
meat bone with very little on it, and a beautiful round compact
pork pie. I was nearly going away without the pie, but I was
tempted to mount upon a shelf, to look what it was that was put
away so carefully in a covered earthenware dish in a corner , and
I found it was the pie, and I took it, in the hope that it was not
intended for early use, and would not be missed for some time.
There was a door in the kitchen communicating with the
forge ; I unlocked and unbolted that door, and got a file from
among Joe's tools. Then I put the fastenings as I had found
them, opened the door at which I had entered when I ran home
last night, shut it, and ran for the misty marshes .

CHAPTER III.

It was a rimy morning, and very damp. I had seen the damp
lying on the outside of my little window , as if some goblin had
been crying there all night, and using the window for a pocket
handkerchief. Now I saw the damp lying on the bare hedges
and spare grass, like a coarser sort of spiders' webs ; hanging
itself from twig to twig and blade to blade. On every rail and
gate, wet lay clammy, and the marsh -mist was so thick, that the
wooden finger on the post directing people to our village - a
direction which they never accepted, for they never came there
was invisible to me until I was quite close under it. Then, as
I looked up at it, while it dripped , it seemed to my oppressed
conscience like a phantom devoting me to the Hulks.
) The mist was heavier yet when I got out upon the marshes,
so that instead of my running at everything, everything seemed
to run at me. This was very disagreeable to a guilty mind.
The gates and dykes and banks came bursting at me through
the mist, as if they cried as plainly as could be, “ A boy with
Somebody-else's pork . pie ! Stop him !” The cattle came
upon me with like suddenness, staring out of their eyes, and
steaming out of their nostrils, " Holloa, young thief !” One
black ox, with a white cravat on who even had to my awakened
14 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

conscience something of a clerical air — fixed me so obstinately

with his eyes, and moved his blunt head round in such an
accusatory manner as I moved round, that I blubbered out to
him , “ I couldn't help it, sir ! It wasn't for myself I took it !”
Upon which he put down his head, blew a cloud of smoke out of
his nose, and vanished with a kick - up of his hind -legs and a
flourish of his tail.
All this time, I was getting on towards the river ; but how
ever fast I went, I couldn't warm my feet, to which the damp
cold seemed riveted , as the iron was riveted to the leg of the
man I was running to meet. I knew my way to the Battery,
pretty straight, for I had been down there on a Sunday with
Joe, and Joe, sitting on an old gun, had told me that when I
was 'prentice to him , regularly bound, we would have such
Larks there ! However, in the confusion of the mist, I found
myself at last too far to the right, and consequently had to try
back along the river -side, on the bank of loose stones above the
mud and the stakes that staked the tide out. Making my way
along here with all despatch, I had just crossed ditch which I
knew to be very near the Battery, and had just scrambled up
the mound beyond the ditch, when I saw the man sitting before
me. His back was towards me, and he had his arms folded , and
was nodding forward, heavy with sleep.
I thought he would be more glad if I came upon him with
his breakfast, in that unexpected manner, so I went forward
softly and touched him on the shoulder. He instantly jumped
up, and it was not the same man but another man !
And yet this man was dressed in coarso grey , too, and had a
great iron on his leg, and was lame, and hoarse, and cold, and
was everything that the other man was ; except that he had not
the same face, and had a flat, broad -brimmed, low - crowned felt
hat on . All this I saw in a moment, for I had only a moment
to see it in : he swore an oath at me, made a hit at me-it was a
round, weak blow that missed me and almost knocked himself
down, for it made him stumble — and then he ran into the mist
stumbling twice as he went, and I lost him.
“ It's the young man ! ” I thought, feeling my heart shoot as I
identified him. I dare say I should have felt a pain in my
liver, too, if I had known where it was.
I was soon at the Battery, after that, and there was the right
man - hugging himself and limping to and fro, as if he had
never all night left off hugging and limping - waiting for me.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 15

He was awfully cold, to be sure. I half expected to see him

drop down before my face and die of deadly cold. His eyes
looked so awfully hungry, too, that when I handed him the file
and he laid it down on the grass, it occurred to me he would
have tried to eat it, if he had not seen my bundle. He did not
turn me upside down, this time, to get at what I had, but left
me right side upwards while I opened the bundle and emptied
my pockets.
“ What's in the bottle, boy ? ” said he.
" Brandy," said I.
He was already handing mincemeat down his throat in the
most curious manner—more like a man who was putting it away
somewhere in a violent hurry, than a man who was eating it,
but he left off to take some of the liquor. He shivered all the
while, so violently, that it was quite as much as he could do to
keep the neck of the bottle between his teeth , without biting it
off.
“ I think you have got the ague,” said I.
“ I'm much of your opinion, boy ," said he.
“ It's bad about here,” I told him . “You've been lying out
on the meshes, and they're dreadful aguish. Rheumatic too."
“ I'll eat my breakfast afore they're the death of me, " said he,
“ I'd do that, if I was going to be strung up to that there gallows
as there is over there, directly arterwards. I'll beat the shivers
so far, I'll bet you . ”
He was gobbling mincemeat, meat-bone, bread , cheese, and
pork pie, all at once : staring distrustfully while he did so at
the mist all round us, and often stopping - even stopping his
jaws — to listen . Some real or fancied sound, some clink upon
the river or breathing of beast upon the marsh, now gave him &
start, and he said, suddenly :
“ You're not a deceiving imp ? You brought no one with you ? ”
No, sir ! No !”
“ Nor giv' no one the office to follow you ? ”
“ No !”
“ Well, ” said he, “ I believe you. You'd be but a fierce young
hound indeed, if at your time of life you could help to hunt a
wretched warmint, hunted as near death and dunghill as this
poor wretched warmint is !”
Something clicked in his throat as if he had works in him
like a clock , and was going to strike. And he smeared his
ragged rough sleeve over his eyes.
16 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Pitying his desolation, and watching him as he gradually .

settled down upon the pie , I made bold to say, “ I am glad you
enjoy it.”
“ Did you speak ? ”
“ I said I was glad you enjoyed it.”
" Thankee, my boy . I do ."
I had often watched a large dog of ours eating his food ; and
I now noticed a decided similarity between the dog's way of
eating, and the man’s. The man took strong sharp sudden bites,
just like the dog. He swallowed , or rather snapped up , every
mouthful, too soon and too fast ; and he looked sideways here
and there while he ate, as if he thought there was danger in
every direction, of somebody's coming to take the pie away .
He was altogether too unsettled in his mind over it, to ap
preciate it comfortably, I thought, or to have anybody to dine
with him, without making a chop with his jaws at the visitor.
In all of which particulars he was very like the dog.
“ I am afraid you won't leave any of it for him ," said I
timidly ; after a silence during which I had hesitated as to the
politeness of making the remark. “ There's no more to be got
where that came from .” It was the certainty of this fact that
impelled me to offer the hint.
“ Leave any for him ? Who's him ?" said my friend , stopping
in his crunching of pie-crust.
“ The young man . That you spoke of. That was hid with
you."
" Oh ah ! ” he returned, with something like a gruff laugh.
“ Him ? Yes, yes ! He don't want no wittles.”
“ I thought he looked as if he did , ” said I.
The man stopped eating, and regarded me with the keenest
scrutiny and the greatest surprise.
" Looked ? When ?”
“ Just now . ”
“ Where ?”
“ Yonder ,” said I, pointing ; “ over there, where I found him
nodding asleep, and thought it was you.”
He held me by the collar and stared at me so, that I began
to think his first idea about cutting my throat had revived .
“ Dressed like you, you know , only with a hat,” I explained,
trembling ; " and — and ” —I was very anxious to put this deli
cately— “ and with— the same reason for wanting to borrow a
file . Didn't you hear the cannon last night ? ”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 17
ly “ Then , there was firing ! ” he said to himself.
ou “ I wonder you shouldn't have been sure of that, " I returned,
“ for we heard it up at home, and that's further away, and we
were shut in besides."
Why, see now !” said he. “When a man’s alone on these
flats, with a light head and a light stomach , perishing of cold
d and want, he hears nothin' all night, but guns firing, and voices
f calling. Hears ? He sees the soldiers , with their red coats
lighted up by the torches carried afore, closing in round him.
Hears his number called, hears himself challenged, hears the
rattle of the muskets, hears the orders Make ready ! Present !
Cover him steady, men ! ' and is laid hands on — and there's
nothin' ! Why, if I see one pursuing party last night -coming
up in order, Damn 'em, with their tramp, tramp ---I see a
hundred. And as to firing ! Why, I see the mist shake with
the cannon , arter it was broad day . — But this man ;" he had said
all the rest as if he had forgotten my being there ; did you
notice anything in him ? ”
“ He had a badly bruised face,” said I, recalling what I hardly
knew I knew .
“ Not here ?" exclaimed the man , striking his left cheek
mercilessly, with the flat of his hand.
“ Yes, there ! ”
“ Where is he ?" He crammed what little food was left, into
the breast of his grey jacket. “ Show me the way he went. I'll
pull him down , like a bloodhound. Curse this iron on my sore
leg ! Give us hold of the file, boy. "
I indicated in what direction the mist had shrouded the other
man, and he looked up at it for an instant. But he was down
on the rank wet grass, filing at his iron like a madman, and not
minding me or minding his own leg, which had an old chafe
upon itand was bloody, but which he handled as roughly as if
it had no more feeling in it than the file. I was very much
afraid of him again, now that he had worked himself into this
fierce hurry, and I was likewise very much afraid of keeping
away from home any longer. I told him I must go, but he took
no notice, so I thought the best thing I could do was to slip off.
The last I saw of him, his head was bent over his knee and he
was working hard at his fetter, muttering impatient imprecations
at it and at his leg . The last I heard of him, I stopped in the
mist to listen, and the file was still going.

0
18 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

CHAPTER IV.

I FULLY expected to find a Constable in the kitchen , waiting

to take me up . But not only was there no Constable there
but no discovery had yet been made of the robbery. Mrs. Joe
was prodigiously busy in getting the house ready for the
festivities of the day, and Joe had been put upon the kitchen
door-step to keep him out of the dustpan — an article into which
his destiny always led him, sooner or later, when my sister was
vigorously reaping the floors of her establishment.
“And where the deuce ha' you been ? ” was Mrs. Joe's Christ
mas salutation , when I and my conscience showed ourselves.
I said I had been down to hear the Carols. " Ah ! well !"
observed Mrs. Joe. “ You might ha' done worse.” Not a doubt
of that I thought.
" Perhaps if I warn't a blacksmith's wife, and ( what's the
same thing) a slave with her apron never off, I should have been
to hear the Carols,” said Mrs. Joe. “ I'm rather partial to
Carols, myself, and that's the best of reasons for my never
hearing any."
Joe, who had ventured into the kitchen after me as the dust
pan had retired before us, drew the back of his hand across his
nose with a conciliatory air, when Mrs. Joe darted a look at him ,
and, when her eyes were withdrawn, secretly crossed his two
forefingers, and exhibited them to me, as our token that Mrs.
Joe was in a cross temper. This was so much her normal state,
that Joe and I would often , for weeks together, be, as to our
fingers, like monumental Crusaders as to their legs.
We were to have a superb dinner, consisting of a leg of
pickled pork and greens, and a pair of roast stuffed fowls . A
handsome mince-pie had been made yesterday morning ( which
accounted for the mincemeat not being missed) , and the
pudding was already on the boil. These extensive arrange
ments occasioned us to be cut off unceremoniously in respect of
breakfast ; “ for I an't,” said Mrs. Joe, “ I an't a going to have
no formal cramming and busting and washing up now , with
what I've got before me, I promise you !"
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS: 19

So, we had our slices served out, as if we were two thousand

troops on a forced march instead of a man and boy at home ;
and we'took gulps of milk and water, with apologetic counte
nances, from a jug on the dresser. In the mean time, Mrs. Joe
put clean white curtains up, and tacked a new flowered - flounce
across the wide chimney to replace the old one, and uncovered
the little state parlour across the passage, which was never
uncovered at any other time, but passed the rest of the year in
a cool haze of silver paper, which even extended to the four
little white crockery poodles on the mantelshelf, each with a
black nose and a basket of flowers in his mouth, and each the
counterpart of the other. Mrs. Joe was a very clean house
keeper, but had an exquisite art of making her cleanliness more
uncomfortable and unacceptable than dirt itself. Cleanliness is
next to Godliness, and some people do the same by their re
ligion .
My sister having so much to do, was going to church
vicariously ; that is to say , Joe and I were going. In his work
ing clothes, Joe was a well-knit characteristic -looking black
smith ; in his holiday clothes, he was more like a scarecrow in
good circumstances, than anything else. Nothing that he wore
then, fitted him or seemed to belong to him ; and everything
that he wore then, grazed him. On the present festive occasion
he emerged from his room, when the blithe bells were going,
the picture of misery, in a full suit of Sunday penitentials. As
to me, I think my sister must have had some general idea that
I was a young offender whom an Accoucheur Policeman had
taken up (on my birthday) and delivered over to her, to be
dealt with according to the outraged majesty of the law. I was
always treated as if I had insisted on being born in oppo
sition to the dictates of reason , religion, and morality, and
against the dissuading arguments of my best friends. Even
when I was taken to have a new suit of clothes, the tailor had
orders to make them like a kind of Reformatory, and on no ac
count to let me have the free use of my limbs.
Joe and I going to church, therefore, must have been a mov
ing spectacle for compassionate minds. Yet, what I suffered
outside , was nothing to what I underwent within . The terrors
that had assailed me whenever Mrs. Joe had gone near the
pantry, or out of the room, were only to be equalled by the
remorse with which my mind dwelt on what my hands had done.
Under the weight of my wicked secret, I pondered whether the
20 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Church would be powerful enough to shield me from the venge

ance of the terrible young man , if I divulged to that establish
ment . I conceived the idea that the time when the banns were
read and when the clergyman said, “ Ye are now to declare it ! ”
would be the time for me to rise and propose a private con
ference in the vestry . I am far from being sure that I might
not have astonished our small congregation by resorting to
this extreme measure, but for its being Christmas Day and no
Sunday.
Mr. Wopsle, the clerk at church, was to dine with us ; and
Mr. Hubble the wheelwright and Mrs. Hubble ; and Uncle
Pumblechook (Joe's uncle, but Mrs. Joe appropriated him ),
who was a well-to-do cornchandler in the nearest town, and
drove his own chaise - cart. The dinner hour was half-past one.
When Joe and I got home, we found the table laid, and Mrs.
Joe dressed, and the dinner dressing, and the front door un
locked (it never was at any other time) for the company to enter
by, and everything most splendid. And still, not a word of the
robbery.
The time came, without bringing with it any relief to my
feelings, and the company. came . Mr. Wopsle, united to a
Roman nose and a large shining bald forehead, had a deep voice
which he was uncommonly proud of ; indeed it was understood
among his acquaintance that if you could only give him his
head, he would read the clergyman into fits ; he himself con
66
fessed that if the Church was thrown open , ” meaning to compe
tition, he would not despair of making his mark in it. The
Church not being “ thrown open , ” he was, as I have said, our
clerk . But he punished the Amens tremendously ; and when
he gave out the psalm - always giving the whole verse—he
looked all round the congregation first, as much as to say, “ You
have heard our friend overhead ; obliga me with your opinion of
this style !"
I opened the door to the company — making believe that it
was a habit of ours to open that door— and I opened it first to
Mr. Wopsle, next to Mr. and Mrs. Hubble, and last of all to
Uncle Pumblechook . N.B. I was not allowed to call him uncle,
under the severest penalties.
“ Mrs. Joe,” said Uncle Pumblechook : a large hard -breathing
middle -aged slow man, with a mouth like a fish, dull staring
eyes, and sandy hair standing upright on his head, so that he
looked as if he had just been all but choked, and had that
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 21

moment come to ; “ I have brought you as the compliments of the

season I have brought you, Mum , a bottle of sherry wine — and
I have brought you, Mum , a bottle of port wine.”
Every Christmas Day he presented himself, as a profound
novelty, with exactly the same words, and carrying the two
bottles like dumb -bells. Every Christmas Day, Mrs. Joe
replied, as she now replied, “ Oh, Un - cle Pum - ble - chook !
This is kind ! ” Every Christmas Day, he retorted, as he now
retorted , “ It's no more than your merits. And now are you
all bobbish, and how's Sixpennorth of halfpence ?” meaning me.
We dined on these occasions in the kitchen, and adjourned ,
for the nuts and oranges and apples, to the parlour ; which was
a change very like Joe's change from his working clothes to his
Sunday dress. My sister was uncommonly lively on the present
occasion , and indeed was generally more gracious in the
society of Mrs. Hubble than in other company. I remember
Mrs. Hubble as a little curly sharp -edged person in sky - blue,
who held a conventionally juvenile position, because she had
married Mr. Hubble — I don't know at what remote period—
when she was much younger than he. I remember Mr. Hubble
as a tough high -shouldered stooping old man , of a sawdusty
fragrance, with his legs extraordinarily wide apart : so that in
my short days I always saw some miles of open country between
them when I met him coming up the lane.
Among this good company I should have felt myself, even if
I hadn't robbed the pantry, in a false position. Not because I
was squeezed in at an acute angle of the table -cloth, with the
table in my chest, and the Pumblechookian elbow in my eye, nor
because I was not allowed to speak (I didn't want to speak ), nor
because I was regaled with the scaly tips of the drumsticks of
the fowls, and with those obscure corners of pork of which the
pig, when living, had had the least reason to be vain. No ; I
should not have minded that, if they would only have left me
alone. But they wouldn't leave me alone. They seemed to
think the opportunity lost, if they failed to point the conversa
tion at me, every now and then , and stick the point into me. I
might have been an unfortunate little bull in a Spanish arena , I
got so smartingly touched up by these moral goads.
It began the moment we sat down to dinner. Mr. Wopsle
said grace with theatrical declamation — as it now appears to me,
something like a religious cross of the Ghost in Hamlet with
Richard the Third -- and ended with the very proper aspiration
22 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

that we might be truly grateful. Upon which my sister fixed

me with her eye, and said, in a low reproachful voice, “ Do you
hear that ? Be grateful."
“ Especially ,” said Mr. Pumblechook, " be grateful, boy, to
them which brought you up by hand .”
Mrs. Hubble shook her head, and contemplating me with a
mournful presentiment that I should come to no good, asked,
“ Why is it that the young are never grateful ?” This moral
mystery seemed too much for the company until Mr. Hubble
tersely solved it by saying, “ Naterally wicious . " Everybody
then murmured “ True ! " and looked at me in a particularly
unpleasant and personal manner,
Joe's station and influence were something feebler ( if pos
sible) when there was company, than when there was none.
But he always aided and comforted me when he could, in some
way of his own, and he always did so at dinner-time by giving
me gravy, if there were any . There being plenty of gravy to
day , Joe spooned into my plate, at this point, about half a pint.
A little later on in the dinner, Mr. Wopsle reviewed the sermon
with some severity, and intimated — in the usual hypothetical
case of the Church being “ thrown open ” —what kind of sermon
he would have given them . After favouring them with some
heads of that discourse, he remarked that he considered the sub
ject of the day's homily, ill chosen ; which was the less ex
cusable, he added , when there were so many subjects “ going
about.”
“ True again ,” said Uncle Pumblechook. “ You've hit it, sir !
Plenty of subjects going about, for them that know how to put
salt upon their tails. That's what's wanted . A man needn't
go far to find a subject, if he's ready with his salt - box. ” Mr.
Pumblechook added, after a short interval of reflection , “ Look
at Pork alone. There's a subject! If you want a subject, look
at Pork !"
“ True, sir. Many a moral for the young,” returned Mr.
Wopsle ; and I knew he was going to lug me in , before he said
it ; “ might be deduced from that text. ”
(" You listen to this ,” said my sister to me, in a severe paren
thesis.)
Joe gave me some more gravy.
“ Swine,” pursued Mr. Wopsle, in his deepest voice, and point
ing his fork at my blushes, as if he were mentioning my
christian name ; “ Swine were the companions of the prodigal.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 23

The gluttony of Swine is put before us, as an example to the

young ." (I thought this pretty well in him who had been
praising up the pork for being so plump and juicy .) “ What is
detestable in a pig, is more detestable in a boy."
“ Or girl," suggested Mr. Hubble.
“ Of course, or girl, Mr. Hubble ," assented Mr. Wopsle, rather
irritably, “ but there is no girl present. "
“ Besides," said Mr. Pumblechook, turning sharp on me, “ think
what you've got to be grateful for. If you'd been born a
Squeaker
66 He was, if ever a child was,” said my sister, most emphati
cally.
Joe gave me some more gravy .
Well, but I mean a four - footed Squeaker," said Mr. Pumble
chook . “ If you had been born such, would you have been here
now ? Not you
“ Unless in that form ," said Mr. Wopsle, nodding towards the
dish .
“ But I don't mean in that form , sir," returned Mr. Pumble
chook , who had an objection to being interrupted ; “ I mean ,
enjoying himself with his elders and betters, and improving him
self with their conversation , and rolling in the lap of luxury.
Would he have been doing that ? No, he wouldn't. And what
would have been your destination ?" turning on me again. “ You
would have been disposed of for so many shillings according to
the market price of the article, and Dunstable the butcher would
have come up to you as you lay in your straw , and he would
have whipped you under his left arm , and with his right he
would have tucked up his frock to get a penknife from out of
his waistcoat - pocket, and he would have shed your blood and
had your life. No bringing up by hand then . Not a bit of it !"
Joe offered me more gravy, which I was afraid to take.
“ He was a world of trouble to you , ma'am,” said Mrs. Hubble,
commiserating my sister.
“ Trouble ? " echoed my sister ; " trouble ? ” And then entered
on a fearful catalogue of all the illnesses I had been guilty of,
and all the acts of sleeplessness I had committed , and all the
high places I had tumbled from , and all the low places I had
tumbled into, and all the injuries I had done myself, and all the
times she had wished me in my grave, and I had contumaciously
refused to go there.
I think the Romans must have aggravated one another very
24 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

much, with their noses. Perhaps, they became the restless

people they were, in consequence . Anyhow , Mr. Wopsle's
Roman nose so aggravated me, during the recital of my misde
meanours, that I should have liked to pull it until he howled .
But, all I had endured up to this time, was nothing in compari
son with the awful feelings that took possession of me when the
pause was broken which ensued upon my sister's recital, and in
which pause everybody had looked at me (as I felt painfully
conscious ) with indignation and abhorrence.
“ Yet," said Mr. Pumblechook , leading the company gently
back to the theme from which they had strayed, “ Pork - re
garded as biled — is rich , too ; ain't it ? ”
“ Have a little brandy, uncle ,” said my sister.
O Heavens, it had come at last ! He would find it was weak ,
he would say it was weak, and I was lost ! I held tight to the
leg of the table under the cloth, with both hands, and awaited
my fate.
My sister went for the stone bottle, came back with the stone
bottle, and poured his brandy out : no one else taking any. The
wretched man trifled with his glass —took it up, looked at it
through the light, put it down - prolonged my misery. All this
time, Mrs. Joe and Joe were briskly clearing the table for the
pie and pudding.
I couldn't keep my eyes off him . Always holding tight by
the leg of the table with my hands and feet, I saw the miserable
creature finger his glass playfully, take it up , smile, throw his
head back , and drink the brandy off. Instantly afterwards, the
company were seized with unspeakable consternation, owing to
his springing to his feet, turning round several times in an
appalling spasmodic whooping -cough dance , and rushing out at
the door ; he then became visible through the window, violently
plunging and expectorating, making the most hideous faces, and
apparently out of his mind.
I held on tight, while Mrs. Joe and Joe ran to him. I didn't
know how I had done it, but I had no doubt I had murdered
him somehow . In my dreadful situation, it was a relief when
he was brought back, and, surveying the company all round as
if they had disagreed with him, sank down into his chair with
the one significant gasp , “ Tar !”
I had filled up the bottle from the tar -water jug. I knew he
would be worse by -and -by. I moved the table, like a Medium
of the present day, by the vigour of my unseen hold upon it.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 25

“ Tar !” cried my sister, in amazement. " Why, how ever

could Tar come there ?”
But, Uncle Pumblechook, who was omnipotent in that kitchen,
wouldn't hear the word, wouldn't hear of the subject, imperiously
waved it all away with his hand, and asked for hot gin -and
water. My sister, who had begun to be alarmingly meditative,
had to employ herself actively in getting the gin, the hot water,
the sugar, and the lemon -peel, and mixing them . For the time
at least, I was saved . I still held on the leg of the table, but
clutched it now with the fervour of gratitude.
By degrees, I became calm enough to release my grasp and
partake of pudding. Mr. Pumblechook partook of pudding.
All partook of pudding. The course terminated, and Mr. Pum
blechook had begun to beam under the genial influence of gin
and -water. I began to think I should get over the day, when
my sister said to Joe, “Clean plates — cold .”
I clutched the leg of the table again immediately, and pressed
it to my bosom as if it had been the companion of my youth
and friend of my soul. I foresaw what was coming, and I felt
that this time I really was gone.
" You must taste," said my sister, addressing the guests with
her best grace, “ you must taste, to finish with, such a delight
ful and delicious present of Uncle Pumblechook’s ! "
Must they ! Let them not hope to taste it !
“ You must know," said my sister, rising, “ it's a pie ; a savoury
pork pie."
The company murmured their compliments. Uncle Pumble
chook, sensible of having deserved well of his fellow - creatures,
said --quite vivaciously, all things considered — “Well, Mrs.
Joe, we'll do our best endeavours ; let us have a cut at this
same pie. ”
My sister went out to get it. I heard her steps proceed to
the pantry. I saw Mr. Pumblechook balance his knife. I saw
re-awakening appetite in the Roman nostrils of Mr. Wopsle.
I heard Mr. Hubble remark that " a bit of savoury pork pie
would lay atop of anything you could mention, and do no harm ,"
and I heard Joe say, “ You shall have some, Pip .” I have never
been absolutely certain whether I uttered a shrill yell of terror,
merely in spirit, or in the bodily hearing of the company. I
felt that I could bear no more, and that I must run away.
released the leg of the table, and ran for my life.
But, I ran no further than the house door, for there I ran
26 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

head foremost into a party of soldiers with their muskets : one

of whom held out a pair of handcuffs to me, saying, “Here you
are , look sharp, come on !”

CHAPTER V.

The apparition of a file of soldiers ringing down the butt -ends

of their loaded muskets on our door-step, caused the dinner
party to rise from table in confusion, and caused Mrs. Joe
re-entering the kitchen empty -handed, to stop short and stare,
in her wondering lament of “ Gracious goodness gracious me ,
what's gone — with the - pie ! ”
The sergeant and I were in the kitchen when Mrs. Joe stood
staring ; at which crisis I partially recovered the use of my
senses . It was the sergeant who had spoken to me, and he was
now looking round at the company, with his handcuffs invit
ingly extended towards them in his right hand, and his left on
my shoulder.
“Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen ,” said the sergeant, “but
as I have mentioned at the door to this smart young shaver "
(which he hadn't ), “ I am on a chase in the name of the king,
and I want the blacksmith . ”
“ And pray, what might you want with him ?” retorted my
sister, quick to resent his being wanted at all.
“ Missis," returned the gallant sergeant, " speaking for myself,
I should reply, the honour and pleasure of his fine wife's
acquaintance ; speaking for the king, I answer, a little job done."
This was received as rather neat in the sergeant; insomuch
that Mr. Pumblechook cried audibly, “ Good again ! "
“ You see, blacksmith ,” said the sergeant, who had by this
time picked out Joe with his eye, we have had an accident
with these, and I find the lock of one of ' em goes wrong, and
the coupling don't act pretty. As they are wanted for imme
diate service, will you throw your eye over them ? ”
Joe threw his eye over them, and pronounced that the job
would necessitate the lighting of his forge fire, and would take
nearer two hours than one. " Will it ? Then will you set
about it at once, blacksmith ,” said the off-hand sergeant, as it's
on his Majesty's service . And if my men can bear a hand
anywhere, they'll make themselves useful." With that, he
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 27

called to his men , who came trooping into the kitchen one
after another, and piled their arms in a corner . And then they
stood about, as soldiers do ; now, with their hands loosely
clasped before them ; now, resting a knee or a shoulder ; now ,
easing a belt or a pouch ; now , opening the door to spit stiftly
over their high stocks, out into the yard .
All these things I saw without then knowing that I saw them ,
for I was in an agony of apprehension. But, beginning to per
ceive that the handcuffs were not for me, and that the military
had so far got the better of the pie as to put it in the back
ground, I collected a little more of my scattered wits.
“ Would you give me the Time ? ” said the sergeant, addressing
himself to Mr. Pumblechook, as to a man whose appreciative
powers justified the inference that he was equal to thetime.
“ It's just gone half- past two . "
“That's not so bad," said the sergeant, reflecting ; ev
en if
I was forced to halt here nigh two hours, that'll do . How far
might you call yourselves from the marshes, hereabouts ?
Not above a mile, I reckon ?”
“ Just a mile,” said Mrs. Joe.
“That'll do. We begin to close in upon 'em about dusk .
A little before dusk , my orders are. That'll do.”
“ Convicts, sergeant ? " asked Mr. Wopsle, in a matter -of
course way .
“ Ay !" returned the sergeant, “ two. They're pretty well
known to be out on the marshes still, and they won't try to get
clear of ' em before dusk . Anybody here seen anything of any
such game ?”
Everybody, myself excepted, said no , with confidence. No
body thought of me.
“ Well ! " said the sergeant, " they'll find themselves trapped
in a circle, I expect, sooner than they count on. Now , black
smith ! If you're ready, His Majesty the King is .”
Joe had got his coat and waistcoat and cravat off, and his
leather apron on, and passed into the forge. One of the soldiers
opened its wooden windows, another lighted the fire, another
turned to at the bellows, the rest stood round the blaze, which
was soon roaring. Then Joe began to hammer and clink ,
hammer and clink, and we all looked on .
The interest of the impending pursuit not only absorbed the
general attention , but even made my sister liberal. She drew
a pitcher of beer from the cask , for the soldiers, and invited
28 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

the sergeant to take a glass of brandy. But Mr. Pumblechook

said, sharply, “ Give him wine, Mum. I'll engage there's no
Tar in that:” so, the sergeant thanked him and said that as he
preferred his drink without tar , he would take wine, if it was
equally convenient. When it was given him, he drank his
Majesty's health and compliments of the season , and took it all
at a mouthful and smacked his lips.
“ Good stuff, eh, sergeant ?” said Mr. Pumblechook.
“I'll tell you something,” returned the sergeant ; “ I suspect
that stuff's of your providing."
Mr. Pumblechook , with a fat sort of laugh , said , “ Ay, ay ?
Why ?"
“ Because , ” returned the sergeant, clapping him on the
shoulder, “you're a man that knows what's what.”
“ D'ye think so ?” said Mr. Pumblechook , with his former
laugh . “ Have another glass !" .
With you. Hob and nob,” returned the sergeant. 66 The
top of mine to the foot of yours — the foot of yours to the top
of mine -Ring once, ring twice — the best tune on the Musical
Glasses ! Your health . May you live a thousand years, and
never be a worse judge of the right sort than you are at the
present moment of your life ! ”
The sergeant tossed off his glass again and seemed quite
ready for another glass. I noticed that Mr. Pumblechook in
his hospitality appeared to forget that he had made a present
of the wine, but took the bottle from Mrs. Joe and had all the
credit of handing it about in a gush of joviality. Even I got
some . And he was so very free of the wine that he even called
for the other bottle and handed that about with the same
liberality, when the first was gone.
As I watched them while they all stood clustering about the
forge, enjoying themselves so much, I thought what terrible
good sauce for a dinner my fugitive friend on the marshes was.
They had not enjoyed themselves a quarter so much, before the
entertainment was brightened with the excitement he furnished .
And now, when they were all in lively anticipation of “the two
villains ” being taken, and when the bellows seemed to roar for
the fugitives, the fire to flare for them , the smoke to hurry
away in pursuit of them, Joe to hammer and clink for them,
and all the murky shadows on the wall to shake at them in
menace as the blaze rose and sank and the red-hot sparks
dropped and died, the pale afternoon outside, almost seemed
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 29

in my pitying young fancy to have turned pale on their account,

poor wretches.
At last, Joe's job was done, and the ringing and roaring
stopped . As Joe got on his coat, he mustered courage to pro
pose that some of us should go down with the soldiers and see
what came of the hunt. Mr. Pumblechook and Mr. Hubble
declined , on the plea of a pipe and ladies' society ; but Mr.
Wopsle said he would go, if Joe would . Joe said he was
agreeable, and would take me, if Mrs. Joe approved . We never
should have got leave to go, I am sure , but for Mrs. Joe's
curiosity to know all about it and how it ended. As it was,
she merely stipulated, “ If you bring the boy back with his head
blown to bits by a musket, don't look to me to put it together
again .”
The sergeant took a polite leave of the ladies, and parted
from Mr. Pumblechook as from a comrade ; though I doubt if
he were quite as fully sensible of that gentleman's merits under
arid conditions, as when something moist was going. His men
resumed their muskets and fell in . Mr. Wopsle, Joe, and I,
received strict charge to keep in the rear, and to speak no word
after we reached the marshes. When we were all out in the
raw air and were steadily moving towards our business, I trea
sonably whispered to Joe, " I hope, Joe, we shan't find them .”
And Joe whispered to me, “ I'd give a shilling if they had cut
and run , Pip.”
We were joined by no stragglers from the village, for the
weather wascold and threatening, the way dreary, the footing
bad, darkness coming on, and the people had good fires in-doors
and were keeping the day . A few faces hurried to glowing
windows and looked after us, but none came out. We passed
the finger - post, and held straight on to the churchyard. There,
we were stopped a few minutes by a signal from the sergeant's
hand, while two or three of his men dispersed themselves among
the graves, and also examined the porch . They came in again
without finding anything, and then we struck out on the open
marshes, through the gate at the side of the churchyard . A
bitter sleet came rattling against us here on the east wind, and
Joe took me on his back.
Now that we were out upon the dismal wilderness where they
little thought I had been within eight or nine hours and had
seen both men hiding, I considered for the first time, with great
dread, if we should come upon them, would my particular con
30 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
vict suppose that it was I who had brought the soldiers there ?
He had asked me if I was a deceiving imp, and he had said I
should be a fierce young hound if I joined the hunt against him.
Would he believe that I was both imp and hound in treacherous
earnest, and had betrayed him ?
It was of no use asking myself this question now. There I
was, on Joe's back , and there was Joe beneath me, charging at
the ditches like a hunter, and stimulating Mr. Wopsle not to
tumble on his Roman nose, and to keep up with us. The
soldiers were in front of us, extending into a pretty wide line
with an interval between man and man . We were taking the
course I had begun with , and from which I had diverged in the
mist. Either the mist was not out again yet, or the wind had
dispelled it. Under the low red glare of sunset, the beacon,
and the gibbet, and the mound of the Battery, and the opposite
shore of the river, were plain, though all of a watery lead
colour.
With my heart thumping like a blacksmith at Joe's broad
shoulder, I looked all about for any sign of the convicts. I
could see none, I could hear none. Mr. Wopsle had greatly
alarmed me more than once, by his blowing and hard breathing ;
but I knew the sounds by this time, and could dissociate them
from the object of pursuit. I got a dreadful start, when I
thought I heard the file still going ; but it was only a sheep
bell. The sheep stopped in their eating and looked timidly at
us ; and the cattle, their heads turned from the wind and sleet,
stared angrily as if they held us responsible for both annoy
ances ; but, except these things, and the shudder of the dying
day in every blade of grass, there was no break in the bleak
stillness of the marshes.
The soldiers were moving on in the direction of the old
Battery, and we were moving on a little way behind them , when,
all of a sudden , we all stopped. For, there had reached us on
the wings of the wind and rain, a long shout. It was repeated .
It was at a distance towards the east, but it was long and loud.
Nay, there seemed to be two or more shouts raised together — if
one might judge from a confusion in the sound.
To this effect the sergeant and the nearest men were speaking
under their breath, when Joe and I came up. After another
moment's listening, Joe (who was a good judge) agreed, and
Mr. Wopsle (who was a bad judge) agreed. The sergeant, a
decisive man , ordered that the sound should not be answered,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 31

but that the course should be changed, and that his men should
make towards it " at the double .” So we slanted to the right
(where the East was), and Joe pounded away so wonderfully,
that I had to hold on tight to keep my seat.
It was a run indeed now, and what Joe called, in the only
two words he spoke all the time, “ a Winder.” Down banks and
up banks, and over gates, and splashing into dykes, and break
ing among coarse rushes : no man cared where he went. As
we came nearer to the shouting, it became more and more
apparent that it was made by more than one voice. Sometimes,
it seemed to stop altogether, and then the soldiers stopped .
When it broke out again, the soldiers made for it at a greater
rate than ever, and we after them . After a while, we had so
run it down, that we could hear one voice calling “Murder ! "
and another voice, Convicts ! Runaways ! Guard ! This way
for the runaway convicts !” Then both voices would seem to be
stifled in a struggle, and then would break out again. And
when it had come to this, the soldiers ran like deer, and Joe
too.
The sergeant ran in first, when we had run the noise quite
down, and two of his men ran in close upon him . Their pieces
were cocked and levelled when we all ran in.
“ Here are both men !" panted the sergeant, struggling at the
bottom of a ditch . “ Surrender, you two ! and confound you for
two wild beasts ! Come asunder !"
Water was splashing, and mud was flying, and oaths were
being sworn , and blows were being struck , when some more
men went down into the ditch to help the sergeant, and dragged
out, separately, my convict and the other one. Both were
bleeding and panting and execrating and struggling ; but of
course I knew them both directly .
“ Mind !" said my convict, wiping blood from his face with
his ragged sleeves, and shaking torn hair from . his fingers ; “ I
took him ! I give him up to you ! Mind that ! ”
“ It's not much to be particular about,” said the sergeant ;
“it'll do you small good, my man , being in the same plight
yourself. Handcuffs there !"
“ I don't expect it to do me any good. I don't want it to do
me more good than it does now , ” said my convict, with a greedy
laugh . “ I took him He knows it That's enough for me.
The other convict was livid to look at, and, in addition to the
old bruised left side of his face, seemed to be bruised and torn all
32 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
over. He could not so much as get his breath to speak, until
they were both separately handcuffed, but leaned upon a soldier
to keep himself from falling.
“ Take notice, guard — he tried to murder me, ” were his first
words.
“ Tried to murder him ? ” said my convict, disdainfully . “Try,
and not do it ? I took him, and giv' him up ; that's what I
done . I not only prevented him getting off the marshes, but I
dragged him here - dragged him this far on his way back. He's
a gentleman, if you please, this villain . Now , the Hulks has
got its gentleman again, through me. Murder him ? Worth
my while, too, to murder him , when I could do worse and drag
him back !”
The other one still gasped, “ He tried — he tried — to - murder
me. Bear — bear witness .”
“ Lookee here ! ” said my convict to the sergeant. “ Single
handed I got clear of the prison - ship ; I made a dash and I
done it . I could ha' got clear of these death -cold flats like
wise - look at my leg : you won't find much iron on it—if I
hadn't made discovery that he was here. Let him go free ?
Let him profit by the means as I found out ? Let him make a
tool of me afresh and again ? Once more ? No, no, no. If I
had died at the bottom there ;” and he made an emphatic swing
at the ditch with his manacled hands ; “ I'd have held to him
with that grip, that you should have been safe to find him in
my hold .”
The other fugitive, who was evidently in extreme horror of
his companion, repeated , “ He tried to murder me . I should
have been a dead man if you had not come up ."
“ He lies ! ” said my convict, with fierce energy. “ He's a liar
born, and he'll die a liar. Look at his face ; ain't it written
there ? Let him turn those eyes of his on me. I defy him to
72
do it.”
The other, with an effort at a scornful smile —which could
not, however, collect the nervous working of his mouth into any
set expression, looked at the soldiers , and looked about at the
marshes and at the sky, but certainly did not look at the speaker.
“ Do you see him ?” pursued my convict. “ Do you see what a
villain he is ? Do you see those grovelling and wandering
eyes ? That's how he looked when we were tried together. He
never looked at me . ”
The other, always working and working his dry lips and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 33
1
turning his eyes restlessly about him far and near, did at last
turn them for a moment on the speaker, with the words, “ You
are not much to look at, ” and with a half -taunting glance at the
bound hands. At that point, my convict became so frantically
exasperated , that he would have rushed upon him but for the
interposition of the soldiers. “ Didn't I tell you," said the
other convict then, “ that he would murder me, if he could ?"
And any one could see that he shook with fear, and that there
broke out upon his lips, curious white flakes, like thin snow.
“ Enough of this parley,” said the sergeant. “Light those
torches."
As one of the soldiers, who carried a basket in lieu of a gun ,
went down on his knee to open it, my convict looked round him
for the first time, and saw me. I had alighted from Joe's back
on the brink of the ditch when we came up , and had not moved
since. I looked at him eagerly when he looked at me, and
slightly moved my hands and shook my head. I had been
waiting for him to see me, that I might try to assure him of my
innocence. It was not at all expressed to me that he even com
prehended my intention, for he gave me look that I did not
understand , and it all passed in a moment. But if he had
looked at me for an hour or for a day, I could not have remem
bered his face ever afterwards, as having been more attentive.
The soldier with the basket soon got a light, and lighted
three or four torches, and took one himself and distributed the
others. It had been almost dark before, but now it seemed
quite dark , and soon afterwards very dark . Before we departed
from that spot, four soldiers standing in a ring, fired twice into
the air. Presently we saw other torches kindled at some
distance behind us, and others on the marshes on the opposite
bank of the river. “ All right,” said the sergeant. “ March.”
We had not gone far when three cannon were fired ahead of us
with a sound that seemed to burst something inside my ear.
“ You are expected on board,” said the sergeant to my convict ;
" they know you are coming. Don't straggle , my man . Close
up here."
The two were kept apart, and each walked surrounded by a
separate guard . I had hold of Joe's hand now, and Joe carried
one of the torches. Mr. Wopsle had been for going back, but
Joe was resolved to see it out, so we went on with the party.
There was a reasonably good path now , mostly on the edge of
the river, with a divergence here and there where a dyke came,
D
31 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
with a miniature windmill on it and a muddy sluice - gate.
When I looked round, I could see the other lights coming in
after us . The torches we carried, dropped great blotches of fire
upon the track , and I could see those, too, lying smoking and
flaring. I could see nothing else but black darkness. Our
lights warmed the air about us with their pitchy blaze, and the
two prisoners seemed rather to like that, as they limped along
in the midst of the muskets . We could not go fast, because
of their lameness ; and they were so spent, that two or three
times we had to halt while they rested .
After an hour or so of this travelling, we came to a rough
wooden hut and a landing -place. There was a guard in the hut,
and they challenged, and the sergeant answered . Then, we
went into the hut where there was a smell of tobacco and white
wash , and a bright fire, and a lamp, and a stand of muskets, and
a drum , and a low wooden bedstead, like an overgrown mangle
without the machinery, capable of holding about a dozen
soldiers all at once. Threeor four soldiers who lay upon it in
their great-coats, were not much interested in us, but just lifted
their heads and took a sleepy stare, and then lay down again.
The sergeant made some kind of report, and some entry in a
book, and then the convict whom I call the other convict was
drafted off with his guard, to go on board first.
My convict never looked at me, except that once. While we
stood in the hut, he stood before the fire looking thoughtfully
at it, or putting up his feet by turns upon the hob, and looking
thoughtfully at them as if he pitied them for their recent
adventures. Suddenly, he turned to the sergeant, and re
marked :
“ I wish to say something respecting this escape . It
may prevent some persons laying under suspicion alonger
me.”
“ You can say what you like," returned the sergeant, standing
coolly looking at him with his arms folded, “ but you have no
call to say it here . You'll have opportunity enough to say
about it, and hear about it, before it's done with , you know . ”
“ I know , but this is another pint, a separate matter. A man
can't starve ; at least I can't. I took some wittles, up at the
willage over yonder — where the church stands a’most out on
the marshes.”
“ You mean stole ,” said the sergeant.
“ And I'll tell you where from. From the blacksmith's. ”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 35

“ Halloa ! ” said the sergeant, staring at Joe.

· Halloa , Pip !” said Joe, staring at me.
“ It was some broken wittles — that's what it was and a dram
)
of liquor, and a pie.”
Have you happened to miss such an article as a pie, black
smith ?" asked the sergeant, confidentially.
66
· My wife did , at the very moment when you came in . Don't
you know , Pip ? "
“ So, ” said my convict, turning his eyes on Joe in a moody
manner, and without the least glance at me ; “ so you're the
blacksmith, are you ? Then I'm sorry to say, I've eat your pie . '
“ God knows you're welcome to it—so far as it was ever mine, "
returned Joe, with a saving remembrance of Mrs. Joe. 66 We
don't know what you have done, but we wouldn't have you
starved to death for it, poor miserable fellow -creatur . – Would
us, Pip?"
The something that I had noticed before, clicked in the man’ss
throat again, and he turned his back. The boat had returned ,
and his guard were ready, so we followed him to the landing
place made of rough stakes and stones, and saw him put into
the boat, which was rowed by a crew of convicts like himself.
No one seemed surprised to see him , or interested in seeing
him , or glad to see him , or sorry to see him , or spoke a word,
except that somebody in the boat growled as if to dogs, “ Give
way , you ! ” which was the signal for the dip of the oars . By
the light of the torches, we saw the black Hulk lying out a
little way from the mud of the shore, like a wicked Noah's ark.
Cribbed and barred and moored by massive rusty chains, the
prison -ship seemed in my young eyes to be ironed like the
prisoners. We saw the boat go alongside, and we saw him
taken up the side and disappear. Then, the ends of the torches
were flung hissing into the water, and went out, as if it were all
over with him .

CHAPTER VI.

My state of mind regarding the pilfering from which I had

been so unexpectedly exonerated , did not impel me to frank
disclosure ; but I hope it had some dregs of good at the bottom
of it.
36 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

I do not recal that I felt any tenderness of conscience in

reference to Mrs. Joe, when the fear of being found out was
Lifted off me. But I loved Joe-perhaps for no better reason
in those early days than because the dear fellow let me love him
-and, as to him , my inner self was not so easily composed. It
was much upon my mind (particularly when I first saw him
looking about for his file) that I ought to tell Joe the wholo
truth . Yet I did not, and for the reason that I mistrusted that
if I did, he would think me worse than I was. The fear of
losing Joe's confidence, and of thenceforth sitting in the chimney
corner at night staring drearily at my for ever lost companion
and friend, tied up my tongue. I morbidly represented to my
self that if Joe knew it, I never afterwards could see him at the
fireside feeling his fair whisker, without thinking that he was
meditating on it. That, if Joe knew it, I never afterwards
could see him glance, however casually, at yesterday's meat or
pudding when it came on to -day's table, without thinking that
he was debating whether I had been in the pantry. That, if
Joe knew it, and at any subsequent period of our joint domestic
life remarked that his beer was flat or thick , the conviction that
he suspected Tar in it, would bring a rush of blood to my face.
In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right,
as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be
wrong. I had had no intercourse with the world at that time,
and I imitated none of its many inhabitants who act in this
manner . Quite an untaught genius, I made the discovery of the
line of action for myself.
As I was sleepy before we were far away from the prison
ship, Joe took me on his back again and carried me home. He
must have had a tiresome journey of it, for Mr. Wopsle, being
knocked up, was in such a very bad temper that if the Church
had been thrown open, he would probably have excommunicated
the whole expedition, beginning with Joe and myself. In his
lay capacity, he persisted in sitting down in the damp to such
an insane extent, that when his coat was taken off to be dried at
the kitchen fire, the circumstantial evidence on his trousers
would have hanged him if it had been a capital offence.
By that time, I was staggering on the kitchen floor like a
little drunkard , through having been newly set upon my feet,
and through having been fast asleep, and through waking in the
heat and lights and noise of tongues. As I came to myself ( with
the aid of a heavy thump between the shoulders, and the resto
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 37

rative exclamation “Yah ! Was there ever such a boy as this !"
from my sister) , I found Joe telling them about the convict's
confession , and all the visitors suggesting different ways by
which he had got into the pantry. Mr. Pumblechook made out,
after carefully surveying the premises, that he had first got upon
the roof of the forge, and had then got upon the roof of the
house, and had then let himself down the kitchen chimney by a
rope made of his bedding cut into strips ; and as Mr. Pumble
chook was very positive and drove his own chaise -cart - over
everybody-it was agreed that it must be so. Mr. Wopsle,
indeed, wildly cried out “ No ! " with the feeble malice of a tired
man ; but, as he had no theory, and no coat on, he was unani
mously set at naught — not to mention his smoking hard behind ,
as he stood with his back to the kitchen fire to draw the damp
out: which was not calculated to inspire confidence .
This was all I heard that night before my sister clutched me,
as a slumberous offence to the company's eyesight, and assisted
me up to bed with such a strong hand that I seemed to have
fifty boots on, and to be dangling them all against the edges of
the stairs. My state of mind, as I have described it, began before
I was up in the morning, and lasted long after the subject had
died out, and had ceased to be mentioned saving on exceptional
occasions.

CHAPTER VII.

At the time when I stood in the churchyard, reading the family

tombstones, I had just enough learning to be able to spell them
out. My construction even of their simple meaning was not
very correct, for I read " wife of the Above " as a complimentary
reference to my father's exaltation to a better world ; and if any
one of mydeceased's relations had been referred to as “ Below ," I
have no doubt I should have formed the worst opinions of that
member of the family. Neither were my notions of the theolo
gical positions to which my Catechism bound me, at all accurate ;
for, I have a lively remembrance that I supposed my declaration
that I was to “ walk in the same all the days of my life, ” laid me
under an obligation always to go through the village from our
house in one particular direction, and never to vary it by turn
ing down by the wheelwright's or up by the mill.
38 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

When I was old enough, I was to be apprenticed to Joe, and

until I could assume that dignity I was not to be what Mrs. Joe
called “ Pompeyed,” or ( as I render it) pampered . Therefore, I
was not only odd -boy about the forge, but if any neighbour
happened to want an extra boy to frighten birds, or pick up
stones, or do any such job, I was favoured with the employment.
In order, however, that our superior position might not be com
promised thereby, a money -box was kept on the kitchen mantel
shelf, into which it was publicly made known that all my earnings
were dropped . I have an impression that they were to be con
tributed eventually towards the liquidation of the National Debt,
but I know I had no hope of any personal participation in the
treasure.
Mr. Wopsle's great-aunt kept an evening school in the vil
lage ; that is to say, she was a ridiculous old woman of limited
means and unlimited infirmity, who used to go to sleep from six
to seven every evening, in the society of youth who paid two
pence per week each, for the improving opportunity of seeing
her do it. She rented a small cottage, and Mr. Wopsle had the
room up -stairs, where we students used to overhear him reading
aloud in a most dignified and terrific manner, and occasionally
bumping on the ceiling. There was a fiction that Mr. Wopsle
« examined ” the scholars, once a quarter . What he did on those
occasions was to turn up his cuffs, stick up his hair, and give us
Mark Antony's oration over the body of Cæsar. This was
always followed by Collins's Ode on the Passions, wherein I par
ticularly venerated Mr Wopsle as Revenge, throwing his blood
stained sword in thunder down, and taking the War denouncing
trumpet with a withering look. It was not with me then, as it
was in later life, when I fell into the society of the Passions,
and compared them with Collins and Wopsle, rather to the
disadvantage of both gentlemen .
Mr. Wopsle's great-aunt, besides keeping this Educational
Institution , kept in the same room - a little general shop. She
had no idea what stock she had, or what the price of anything in
it was ; but there was a little greasy memorandum -book kept in
a drawer, which served as a Catalogue of Prices, and by this
oracle Biddy arranged all the shop transactions. Biddy was
Mr. Wopsle's great-aunt's granddaughter ; I confess myself quite
unequal to the working out of the problem , what relation she
was to Mr. Wopsle. She was an orphan like myself ; like me,
too, had been brought up by hand . She was most noticeable, I
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 39

thought, in respect of her extremities ; for, her hair always

wanted brushing, her hands always wanted washing, and her
shoes always wanted mending and pulling up at heel. This
description must be received with a week -day limitation . On
Sundays she went to church elaborated .
Much of my unassisted self, and more by the help of Biddy
than of Mr. Wopsle’s great-aunt, I struggled through the
alphabet as if it had been a bramble-bush ; getting considerably
worried and scratched by every letter. After that, I fell among
those thieves, the nine figures, who seemed every evening to do
something new to disguise themselves and baffle recognition.
But, at last I began, in a purblind groping way , to read , write ,
and cipher, on the very smallest scale.
One night,I was sitting in the chimney corner with my slate,
expending great efforts on the production of a letter to Joe. I
think it must have been a full year after our hunt upon the
marshes, for it was a long time after, and it was winter and a
hard frost. With an alphabet on the hearth at my feet for re
ference, I contrived in an hour or two to print and smear this
epistle :
“ MI DEER JO i OPE U R KRWITE WELL i OPE i SHAL SON B
HABELL 4 2 TEEDGE U JO AN THEN WE shORL B SO GLODD AN
wEn i M PRENGTD 2 U JO woT LARX AN BLEVE ME INF XN
PIP . ”
There was no indispensable necessity for my communicating
with Joe by letter, inasmuch as he sat beside me and we were
alone. But, I delivered this written communication (slate and
all) with my own hand, and Joe received it as a miracle of eru
dition .
“ I say, Pip, old chap ! ” cried Joe, opening his blue eyes wide,
“ what a scholar you are ! Ain't you ? ”
66
I should like to be, ” said I, glancing at the slate as he held
it : with a misgiving that the writing was rather hilly.
“ Why, here's a J," said Joe, “and a 0 equal to anythink !
Here's a J and a 0, Pip, and a J-O, Joe. "
I had never heard Joe read aloud to any greater extent than
this monosyllable, and I had observed at church last Sunday,
when I accidentally held our Prayer- Book upside down, that it
seemed to suit his convenience quite as well as if it had been all
right. Wishing to embrace the present occasion of finding out
whether in teaching Joe, I should have to begin quite at the
beginning, I said , “Ah ! But read the rest, Joe. ”
40 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ The rest, eh , Pip ?” said Joe, looking at it with a slow ,

searching eye, “One, two, three. Why, here's three Js, and
three Os, and three J -O, Joes, in it, Pip ! "
I leaned over Joe, and, with the aid of my forefinger, read
him the whole letter.
“ Astonishing !” said Joe, when I had finished . “ You ARE &
scholar .”
" Hoy do you spell Gargery, Joe ?" I asked him , with a modest
patronage.
“ I don't spell it at all,” said Joe.
“ But supposing you did ?"
" It can't be supposed,” said Joe. “ Tho' I'm oncommon fond
of reading, too . "
“ Are you, Joe ? "
“ On-common. Give me,” said Joe, “ a good book, or a good
newspaper, and sit me down afore a good fire, and I ask no
better. Lord ! ” he continued , after rubbing his knees a little,
“when you do come to a J and a 0, and says you, ' Here, at last,
is a J-O, Joe , ' how interesting reading is !"
I derived from this, that Joe's education, like Steam , was yet
in its infancy. Pursuing the subject, I inquired :
“ Didn't you ever go to school, Joe, when you were as little as
me ?"
3
“ No, Pip ."
Why didn't you ever go to school, Joe, when you were as
little as me ? "
Well, Pip ,” said Joe, taking up the poker, and settling him
self to his usual occupation when he was thoughtful, of slowly
raking the fire between the lower bars : “I'll tell you. My
father, Pip, he were given to drink, and when he were overtook
with drink, he hammered away at my mother most onmerciful.
It were a'most the only hammering he did, indeed, 'xcepting at
myself. And he hammered at me with a wigour only to be
equalled by the wigour with which he didn't hammer at his
anwil.— You're a listening and understanding, Pip ?”
“Yes, Joe.”
66 )
• 'Consequence, my mother and me we ran away from my
father several times ; and then my mother she'd go out to work,
and she'd say, ' Joe,' she'd say, ‘ now, please God, you shall have
some schooling, child ,' and she'd put me to school. But my
father were that good in his hart that he couldn't abear to be
without us . So, he'd come with a most tremenjous crowd and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 41

make such a row at the doors of the houses where we was, that
they used to be obligated to have no more to do with us and to
give us up to him . And then he took us home and hammered us.
Which , you see, Pip ,” said Joe, pausing in his meditative raking
66
of the fire, and looking at me, were a drawback on my learn
ing. "
“ Certainly, poor Joe ! "
“ Though mind you, Pip , ” said Joe, with a judicial touch or
two ofthe poker on the top bar, “ rendering unto all their doo,
and maintaining equal justice betwixt man and man , my father
were that good in his hart, don't you see ? ”
I didn't see ; but I didn't say so .
“ Well ! ” Jóe pursued, " somebody must keep the pot abiling,
Pip, or the pot won't bile, don't you know ? ”
I saw that, and said so.
• 'Consequence, my father didn't make objections to my
going to work ; so I went to work at my present calling, which
were his too, if he would have followed it, and I worked tole
rable hard , I assure you, Pip. In time I were able to keep him,
and I kep him till he went off in a purple leptic fit. And it
were my intentions to have had put upon his tombstone that
Whatsume'er the failings on his part, Remember reader he were
that good in his hart.”
Joe recited this couplet with such manifest pride and careful
perspicuity, that I asked him if he had made ithimself ?
“ I made it,” said Joe, “my own self. I made it in a moment.
It was like striking out a horseshoe complete, in a single blow.
I never was so much surprised in all my life — couldn't credit
my own ed-to tell you the truth, hardly believed it were my
own ed. As I was saying, Pip, it were my intentions to have had
it cut over him ; but poetry costs money, cut it how you will,
small or large, and it were not done. Not to mention bearers,
all the money that could be spared were wanted for my mother.
She were in poor elth, and quite broke. She waren't long of fol
lowing, poor soul, and her share of peace come round at last .”
Joe's blue eyes turned a little watery ; he rubbed, first one of
them , and then the other, in à most uncongenial and uncomfort
able manner, with the round knob on the top of the poker.
“ It were but lonesome then, ” said Joe , “ living here alone,
and I got acquainted with your sister. Now , Pip ;" Joe looked
firmly at me, as if he knew I was not going to agree with him ;
your sister is a fine figure of a woman.
42 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Į could not help looking at the fire, in an obvious state of

doubt.
“ Whatever family opinions, or whatever the world's opinions,
on that subject may be, Pip, your sister is, ” Joe tapped the top
bar with the poker after every word following, “ a - fine - figure
-of-a - woman !"
I could think of nothing better to say than “ I am glad you
think so, Joe.”
“ So am I, ” returned Joe, catching me up . “ I am glad I think
80, Pip . A little redness, or a little matter of Bone, here or
there, what does it signify to Me?” .
I sagaciously observed, if it didn't signify to him , to whom
did it signify ?
“ Certainly !" assented Joe . “ That's it. You're right, old
chap ! When I got acquainted with your sister, it were the talk
how she was bringing you up by hand . Very kind of her too, all
the folks said , and I said, along with all the folks. As to you ,” Joe
pursued , with a countenance expressive of seeing something very
nasty indeed : “if you could have been aware how small and
flabby and mean you was, dear me , you'd have formed the most
contemptible opinions of yourself !”
Not exactly relishing this, I said , “ Never mind me, Joe. ”
“ But I did mind you, Pip, ” he returned, with tender sim
plicity. “ When I offered to your sister to keep company, and
to be asked in church at such times as she was willing and ready
to come to the forge, I said to her, “ And bring the poor little
child . God bless the poor little child ,” I said to your sister,
6
there's room for him at the forge ! ”
I broke out crying and begging pardon, and hugged Joe
round the neck : who dropped the poker to hug me, and to say ,
“ Ever the best of friends ; ain't us, Pip ? Don't cry, old chap !"
When this little interruption was over, Joe resumed :
“Well, you see, Pip , and here we are ! That's about where it
lights ; here we are ! Now , when you take me in hand in my
learning, Pip (and I tell you beforehand I am awful dull, most
awful dull), Mrs. Joe mustn't see too much of what we're up to.
It must be done, as I may say, on the sly. And why on the
sly ? I'll tell you why, Pip."
He had taken up the poker again ; without which, I doubt if
he could have proceeded in his demonstration .
“ Your sister is given to government."
“Given to government, Joe ?” I was startled , for I had some
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 43

shadowy idea ( and I am afraid I must add, hope) that Joe had
divorced her in favour of the Lords of the Admiralty, or Trea
sury.
“ Given to government, ” said Joe. “ Which I meantersay the
government of you and myself.”
" Oh !”
2
“ And she ain't over partial to having scholars on the premises , "
Joe continued, “and in partickler would not be over partial to
my being a scholar, for fear as I might rise. Like a sort of
rebel, don't you see ?”
I was going to retort with an inquiry, and had got as far as
“ Why— " when Joe stopped me.
Stay a bit. I know what you're a going to say, Pip ; stay a
bit ! I don't deny that your sister comes the Mo - gul over us,
now and again . I don't deny that she do throw us back -falls,
and that she do drop down upon us heavy. At such times as
when your sister is on the Ram -page, Pip,” Joe sank his voice
to a whisper and glanced at the door, “ candour compels fur to
admit that she is a Buster."
Joe pronounced this word , as if it began with at least twelve
capital Bs.
66
Why don't I rise ? That were your observation when I
broke it off, Pip ? "
" Yes, Joe."
66
Well,” said Joe, passing the poker into his left hand, that
he might feel his whisker ; and I had no hope of him whenever
he took to that placid occupation ; "your sister's a master-mind.
A master-mind .”
“ What's that?" I asked , in some hope of bringing him to a
stand . But, Joe was readier with his definition than I had ex
pected, and completely stopped me by arguing circularly, and
answering with a fixed look, “Her.”
“ And I ain't a master-mind,” Joe resumed , when he had un
fixed his look, and got back to his whisker. “And last of all,
Pip — and this I want to say very serous to you, old chap—I see
so much in my poor mother, of a woman drudging and slaving
and breaking her honest hart and never getting no peace in her
mortal days, that I'm dead afeerd of going wrong in the way of
not doing what's right by a womān, and I'd fur rather of the
two go wrong the ' tother way, and be a little ill- conwenienced
myself. I wish it was only me that got put out, Pip ; I wish
there warn't no Tickler for you, old chap ; I wish I could take
44 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

it all on myself ; but this is the up - and -down - and -straight on

it, Pip, and I hopo you'll overlook shortcomings ."
Young as I was, I believe that I dated a new admiration of
Joe from that night. We were equals afterwards, as we had
been before ; but, afterwards at quiet times when I sat looking
at Joe and thinking about him, I had a new sensation of feeling
conscious that I was looking up to Joe in my heart.
“ However ," said Joe, rising to replenish the fire ; "here's the
Dutch -clock a working himself up to being equal to strike Eight
of 'em, and she's not come home yet ! I hope Uncle Pumble
chook's mare99 mayn't have set a fore - foot on a piece o' ice, and
gone down .”
Mrs. Joe made occasional trips with Uncle Pumblechook on
market-days, to assist him in buying such household stuffs and
goods as required a woman's judgment; Uncle Pumblechook
being a bachelor and reposing no confidences in his domestic
servant. This was market-day, and Mrs. Joe was out on one of
these expeditions.
Joe made the fire and swept the hearth , and then we went to
the door to listen for the chaise -cart. It was a dry cold night,
and the wind blew keenly, and the frost was white and hard.
A man would die to -night of lying out on the marshes, I
thought. And then I looked at the stars, and considered how
awful it would be for a man to turn his face up to them as he
froze to death, and see no help or pity in all the glittering
multitude.
“ Here comes the mare ,” said Joe, “ ringing like a peal of
bells ! ”
The sound of her iron shoes upon the hard road was quite
musical, as she came along at a much brisker trot than usual.
We got a chair out, ready for Mrs. Joe's alighting, and stirred
up the fire that they might see a bright window, and took a final
survey of the kitchen that nothing might be out of its place.
When we had completed these preparations, they drove up ,
wrapped to the eyes. Mrs. Joe was soon landed , and Uncle
Pumblechook was soon down too, covering the mare with a cloth,
and we were soon all in the kitchen , carrying so much cold air
in with us that it seemed to drive all the heat out of the fire.
“ Now , " said Mrs. Joe, unwrapping herself with haste and
excitement, and throwing her bonnet back on her shoulders
where hung by the strings : “if this boy ain't grateful this
night, he never will be !"
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 45

I looked as grateful as any boy possibly could, who was

wholly uninformed why he ought to assume that expression.
" It's only to be hoped ,” said my sister, “ that he won't be
Pompeyed. But I have my fears . "
“ She ain't in that line, Mum, ” said Mr. Pumblechook. “She
knows better. ”
She ? I looked at Joe, making the motion with my lips and
eyebrows, “ She ?" Joe looked at me, making the motion with
his lips and eyebrows, “ She ?” My sister catching him in the
act, he drew the back of his hand across his nose with his usual
conciliatory air on such occasions, and looked at her.
“ Well ?” said my sister, in her snappish way . 66 What are
you staring at ? Is the house a - fire ? ”
“ – Which some individual, ” Joe politely hinted , " mentioned
--she.”
“ And she is a she, I suppose ?” said my sister . 66 Unless you
call Miss Havisham a he. And I doubt if even you'll go so far
as that.”
“ Miss Havisham , up town ?” said Joe.
“ Is there any Miss Havisham down town ?” returned my
sister. “ She wants this boy to go and play there. And of
course he's going. And he had better play there, ” said my
sister, shaking her head at me as an encouragement to be ex
tremely light and sportive, “ or I'll work him . ”
I had heard of Miss Havisham up town - everybody for miles
round, had heard of Miss Havisham up town - as an immensely
rich and grim lady who lived in a large and dismal house bar
ricaded against robbers, and who led a life of seclusion.
66
“ Well to be sure !” said Joe, astounded . I wonder how she
come to know Pip !"
66 Noodle !" cried “ Who said she knew him ? ”
my sister.
- Which some individual,” Joe again politely hinted, “ men
tioned that she wanted him to go and play there. "
66 And couldn't she ask Uncle Pumblechook if he knew of a
boy to go and play there ? Isn't it just barely possible that
Uncle Pumblechook may be a tenant of hers, and that he may
sometimes - we won't say quarterly or half yearly, for that
would be requiring too much of you — but sometimes -- go there
to pay his rent ? And couldn't she then ask Uncle Pumble
chouk if he knew of a boy to go and play there ? And couldn't
Uncle Pumblechook, being always considerate and thoughtful
for us -- though you may not think it, Joseph ," in a tone of the
46 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

deepest reproach, as if he were the most callous of nephews,

“then mention this boy, standing Prancing here ” —which I
solemnly declare I was not doing—“that I have for ever been a
willing slave to ?”
“Good again ! " cried Uncle Pumblechook. “Well put !
Prettily pointed ! Good indeed ! Now , Joseph, you know the
case . ”
“ No, Joseph,” said my sister, still in a reproachful manner,
while Joe apologetically drew the back of his hand across and
across his nose, “ you do not yet—though you may not think it
-know the case. You may consider that you do, but you do
not, Joseph. For you do not know that Uncle Pumblechook ,
being sensible that for anything we can tell, this boy's fortune
may be made by his going to Miss Havisham's, has offered to
take him into town to-night in his own chaise -cart, and to keep
him to - night, and to take him with his own hands to Miss
Havisham's to- morrow morning. And Lor-a -mussy me !" cried
my sister, casting off her bonnet in sudden desperation , “ here I
stand talking to mere Mooncalfs, with Uncle Pumblechook
waiting, and the mare catching cold at the door, and the boy
grimed with crock and dirt from the hair of his head to the sole
of his foot ! ”
With that, she pounced on me, like an eagle on a lamb, and
my face was squeezed into wooden bowls in sinks, and my head
was put under taps of water -butts, and I was soaped, and
kneaded, and towelled, and thumped , and harrowed , and rasped,
until I really was quite beside myself. (I may here remark
that I suppose myself to be better acquainted than any living
authority, with the ridgy effect of a wedding -ring, passing un
sympathetically over the human countenance.)
When my ablutions were completed, I was put into clean
linen of the stiffest character, like a young penitent into sack
cloth, and was trussed up in my tightest and fearfullest suit.
I was then delivered over to Mr. Pumblechook, who formally
received me as if he were the Sheriff, and who let off upon me
the speech that I knew he had been dying to make all along :
" Boy, be for ever grateful to all friends, but especially unto
them which brought you up by hand !"
“ Good -bye, Joe !”
“ God bless you, Pip, old chap !"
I had never parted from him before, and what with my feel
ings and what with soap -suds, I could at first see no stars from
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 47

the chaise- cart. But they twinkled out one by one, without
throwing any light on the questions why on earth I was going
to play at Miss Havisham’s, and what on earth I was expected
to play at.

CHAPTER VIII.

MR. PUMBLECHOOK's premises in the High -street of the market

town, were of a peppercorny and farinaceous character, as the
premises of a corn -chandler and seedsman should be. It
appeared to me that he must be a very happy man indeed, to
have so many little drawers in his shop ; and I wondered when
I peeped into one or two on the lower tiers, and saw the tied -up
brown paper packets inside, whether the flower-seeds and bulbs
ever wanted of a fine day to break out of those jails, and bloom.
It was in the early morning after my arrival that I enter
tained this speculation . On the previous night, I had been
sent straight to bed in an attic with a sloping roof, which was
so low in the corner where the bedstead was, that I calculated
the tiles as being within a foot of my eyebrows. In the same
early morning, I discovered a singular affinity between seeds
and corduroys. Mr. Pumblechook wore corduroys, and so did
his shopman ; and somehow , there was a general air and flavour
about the corduroys, so much in the nature of seeds, and a general
air and flavour about the seeds, so much in the nature of corduroys,
that I hardly knew which was which . The same opportunity
served me for noticing that Mr. Pumblechook appeared to con
duct his business by looking across the street at the saddler, who
appeared to transact his business by keeping his eye on the
coachmaker, who appeared to get on in life by putting his hands
in his pockets and contemplating the baker, who in his turn
folded his arms and stared at the grocer, who stood at his door
and yawned at the chemist. The watchmaker, always poring
over a little desk with a magnifying glass at his eye, and
always inspected by a group in smock - frocks poring over him
through the glass of his shop -window , seemed to be about the only
person in the High street whose trade engaged his attention.
Mr. Pumblechook and I breakfasted at eight o'clock in the
parlour behind the shop, while the shopman took his mug of
tea and hunch of bread-and- butter on a sack of peas in the front
48 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
premises. I considered Mr. Pumblechook wretched company .
Besides being possessed by my sister's idea that a mortifying
and penitential character ought to be imparted to my diet -
besides giving me as much crumb as possible in combination
with as little butter, and putting such a quantity of warm water
into my milk that it would have been more candid to have left
the milk out altogether — his conversation consisted of nothing
but arithmetic. On my politely bidding him Good morning,
he said, pompously, “ Seven times nine, boy ! ” And how should
I be able to answer , dodged in that way, in a strange place, on
an empty stomach ! I was hungry, but before I had swallowed
a morsel, he began a running sum that lasted all through the
breakfast. “ Seven ?” “ And four ?” “ And eight ?” “ And six ?”
“ And two ? ” “ And ten ?” And so on . And after each figure
was disposed of, it was as much as I could do to get a bite or a
sup, before the next came ; while he sat at his ease guessing
nothing, and eating bacon and hot roll, in (if I may be allowed
the expression ) a gorging and gormandising manner.
For such reasons, I was very glad when ten o'clock came and
we started for Miss Havisham's ; though I was not at all at my
ease regarding the manner in which I should acquit myself
under that lady's roof. Within a quarter of an hour we came to
Miss Havisham's house, which was of old brick, and dismal, and
had a great many iron bars to it. Some of the windows had
been walled up ; of those that remained, all the lower were
rustily barred . There was a court -yard in front, and that was
barred ; so, we had to wait, after ringing the bell, until some
one should come to open it. While we waited at the gate, I
peeped in (even then Mr. Pumblechook said, “ And fourteen ? "
but I pretended not to hear him ), and saw that at the side of the
house there was a large brewery . No brewing was going on in
it, and none seemed to have gone on for a long time.
A window was raised, and a clear voice demanded “ What
name ? ” To which my conductorreplied , “ Pumblechook . ” The
voice returned, “ Quite right," and the window was shut again,
and a young lady came across the court -yard, with keys in her
hand.
“ This," said Mr. Pumblechook , “ is Pip .”
“ This is Pip, is it ?” returned the young lady, who was very
pretty and seemed very proud ; come in , Pip ."
Mr. Pumblechook was coming in also, when she stopped him
with the gate.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 49
" Oh !” she said . Did you wish to see Miss Havisham ?"
“ If Miss Havisham wished to see me, " returned Mr. Pumble
chook, discomfited.
“ Ah !” said the girl ; “ but you see she don't.”
She said it so finally, and in such an undiscussible way , that
Mr. Pumblechook, though in a condition of ruffled dignity, could
not protest. But he eyed me severely — as if I had done any
thing to him !—and departed with the words reproachfully
delivered : “ Boy ! Let your behaviour here be a credit unto
them which brought you up by hand !” was not free from
apprehension that he would come back to propound through the
gate, “ And sixteen ?" But he didn't.
My young conductress locked the gate, and we went across
the court- yard . It was paved and clean, but grass was growing
in every crevice. The brewery buildings had a little lane of
communication with it ; and the woaden gates of that lane stood
open , and all the brewery beyond, stood open , away to the high
enclosing wall ; and all was empty and disused . The cold
wind seemed to blow colder there, than outside the gate ; and it
made a shrill noise in howling in and out at the open sides of
the brewery, like the noise of wind in the rigging of a ship at
sea .
She saw me looking at it, and she said, “ You could drink
without hurt all the strong beer that's brewed there now , boy .”
66
I should think I could, miss,” said I, in a shy way.
“ Better not try to brew beer there now , or it would turn out
sour, boy ; don't you think so ?”
“ It looks like it, miss .”
“ Not that anybody means to try, ” she added, "for that's all
done with , and the place will stand as idle as it is, till it falls.
As to strong beer, there's enough of it in the cellars already, to
drown the Manor House ."
GG
Is that the name of this house, miss ?”
“ One of its names, boy."
It has more than one, then , miss ?”
“ One more . Its other name was Satis ; which is Greek, or
Latin , or Hebrew , or all three - or all one to me - for enough.”
Enough House, " said I : “ that's a curious name, miss. ”
Yes,” she replied ; " but it meant more than it said . It meant,
when it was given, that whoever had this house, could want
nothing else. They must have been easily satisfied in those
days, I should think . But don't loiter, boy ."
E
50 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Though she called me “ boy ” so often, and with a carelessness

that was far from complimentary, she was of about my own age.
She seemed much older than I, of course , being a girl, and
beautiful and self-possessed ; and she was as scornful of me as
if she had been one-and -twenty, and a queen.
We went into the house by a side door - the great front
entrance had two chains across it outside — and the tirst thing I
noticed was, that the passages were all dark , and that she had
left a candle burning there. She took it up , and we went
through more passages and up a staircase, and still it was all
dark , and only the candle lighted us .
At last we came to the door of a room , and she said , “ Go in."
I answered, more in shyness than politeness, " After you, miss."
To this, she returned : “Don't be ridiculous, boy ; I am not
going in .” And scornfully walked away, and — what was worse
-took the candle with her
This was very uncomfortable, and I was half afraid . How
ever, the only thing to be done being to knock at the door, I
knocked, and was told from within to enter . I entered , there
fore, and found myself in a pretty large room, well lighted with
wax candles. No glimpse of daylight was to be seen in it. It
was a dressing -room , as I supposed from the furniture, though
much of it was of forms and uses then quite unknown to me .
But prominent in it was a draped table with a gilded looking
glass, and that I made out at first sight to be a fine lady's
dressing - table.
Whether I should have made out this object so soon , if there
had been no fine lady sitting at it, I cannot say. In an arm
chair, with an elbow resting on the table and her head leaning
on that hand, sat the strangest lady I have ever seen , or shall
ever see.
She was dressed in rich materials - satins, and lace, and silks
-all of white. Her shoes were white . And she had a long
white veil dependent from her hair, and she had bridal flowers
in her hair, but her hair was white . Some bright jewels
sparkled on her neck and on her hands, and some other jewels
lay sparkling on the table. Dresses, less splendid than the
dress she wore, and half -packed trunks, were scattered about,
She had not quite finished dressing, for she had but one shoe
on—the other was on the table near her hand - her veil was but
half arranged, her watch and chain were not put on, and some
lace for her bosom lay with those trinkets, and with her hand
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 51

kerchief, and gloves, and some flowers, and a Prayer-book, all

confusedly heaped about the looking - glass.
It was not in the first few moments that I saw all these things,
though I saw more of them in the first moments than might be
supposed. But, I saw that everything within my view which ought
to be white, had been white long ago, and had lost its lustre, and
was faded and yellow . I saw that the bride within the bridal
dress had withered like the dress, and like the flowers, and had
no brightness left but the brightness of her sunken eyes. I saw
that the dress had been put upon the rounded figure of a young
woman , and that the figure upon which it now hung loose, had
shrunk to skin and bone. Once, I had been taken to see some
ghastly wax -work at the Fair, representing I know not what
impossible personage lying in state. Once, I had been taken
to one of our old marsh churches to see a skeleton in the ashes
of a rich dress, that had been dug out of a vault under the
church pavement. Now , wax -work and skeleton seemed to have
dark eyes that moved and looked at me. I should have cried
out, if I could.
“ Who is it ?" said the lady at the table .
66
Pip, ma'am .”
“ Pip?"
“ Mr. Pumblechook’s boy, ma'am . Come-to play. ”
“ Come nearer ; let me look at you . Come close."
It was when I stood before her, avoiding her eyes, that I took
note of the surrounding objects in detail, and saw that her watch
had stopped at twenty minutes to nine, and that a clock in the
room had stopped at twenty minutes to nine.
“ Look at me," said Miss Havisham . 6. You are not afraid
of a woman who has never seen the sun since you were born ? ”
I regret to state that I was not afraid of telling the enormous
lie comprehended in the answer " No. "
“ Do you know what I touch here ? " she said , laying her hands ,
one upon the other, on her left side.
Yes, ma'am.” ( It made me think of the young man. )
• What do I touch ? '
“ Your heart.”
6 Broken !”
She uttered the word with an eager look , and with strong
emphasis, and with a weird smile that had a kind of boast in it.
Afterwards, she kept her hands there for a little while, and
slowly took them away as if they were heavy.
52 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ I am tired ," said Miss Havisham . “ I wantdiversion , and I

have done with men and women . Play . "
I think it will be conceded by my most disputatious reader,
that she could hardly have directed an unfortunate boy to do
anything in the wide world more difficult to be done under the
circumstances.
“ I sometimes have sick fancies , ” she went on, “ and I have a
sick fancy that I want to see some play. There, there ! " with
an impatient movement of the fingers of her right hand ; “ play,
play, play !”
For a moment, with the fear of my sister's working me before
my eyes, I had a desperate idea of starting round the room in the
assumed character of Mr. Pumblechook's chaise - cart. But, I
felt myself so unequal to the performance that I gave it up , and
stood looking at Miss Havisham in what I suppose she took for
a dogged manner, inasmuch as she said, when we had taken a
good look at each other :
66
‘ Are you sullen and obstinate ? ”
66
No, ma'am , I am very sorry for you, and very sorry I can't
play just now. If you complain of me I shall get into trouble
with my sister, so I would do it if I could ; but it's so new here,
and so strange, and so fine -- and melancholy - _ ” I stopped,
fearing I might say too much, or had already said it, and we
took another look at each other.
Before she spoke again, she turned her eyes from me, and
looked at the dress she wore, and at the dressing -table, and
finally
66 at herself in the looking -glass.
So new to him ," she muttered, “ so old to me ; so strange to
him, so familiar to me ; so melancholy to both of us ! Call
Estella .”
As she was still looking at the reflection of herself, I thought
she was still talking to herself, and kept quiet.
“Call Estella ,” she repeated , flashing a look at me. 6 You
can do that. Call Estella . At the door.”
To stand in the dark in a mysterious passage of an unknown
house, bawling Estella to a scornful young lady neither visible
nor responsive, and feeling it a dreadful liberty so to roar out her
name, was almost as bad as playing to order. But, she answered
at last, and her light came along the long dark passage like a star.
Miss Havisham beckoned her to come close, and took up a
jewel from the table, and tried its effect upon her fair young
bosom and against her pretty brown hair . - Your own, one day ,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 53

my dear, and you will use it well. Let me see you play cards
with this boy ."
“ With this boy ! Why, he is a common labouring - boy !",
I thought I overheard Miss Havisham answer - only it
seemed so unlikely— “ Well ? You can break his heart."
6. What do you play, boy ?” asked Estella of myself, with the
greatest disdain.
“Nothing but beggar my neighbour, Miss .”
66
Beggar him ," said Miss Havisham to Estella . So we sat
down to cards.
It was then I began to understand that everything in the room
had stopped, like the watch and the clock, a long time ago. I
noticed that Miss Havisham put down the jewel exactly on the
spot from which she had taken it up. As Estella dealt the
cards, I glanced at the dressing - table again , and saw that the
shoe upon it, once white, now yellow, had never been worn . I
glanced down at the foot from which the shoe was absent, and
saw that the silk stocking on it, once white, now yellow , had
been trodden ragged. Without this arrest of everything, this
standing still of all the pale decayed objects, not even the
withered bridal dress on the collapsed form could have looked
so like grave -clothes, or the long veil so like a shroud .
So she sat, corpse- like, as we played at cards ; the frillings
and trimmings on her bridal dress, looking like earthy paper.
I knew nothing then of the discoveries that are occasionally
made of bodies buried in ancient times, which fall to powder in
the moment of being distinctly seen ; but, I have often thought
since, that she must have looked as if the admission of the
natural light of day would have struck her to dust.
“ He calls the knaves, Jacks, this boy !” said Estella with dis
dain , before our first game was out. “ And what coarse hands
he has ! And what thick boots !"
I had never thought of being ashamed of my hands before ;
but I began to consider them a very indifferent pair. Her con
tempt for me was so strong, that 'it became infectious, and I
caught it.
She won the game, and I dealt. I misdealt, as was only
natural, when I knew she was lying in wait for me to do wrong ;
and she denounced me for a stupid, clumsy labouring -boy.
“ You say nothing of her, ” remarked Miss Havisham to me, as
she looked on. “ She says many hard things of you, but you say
nothing of her. What do you think of her ? ”
54 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ I don't like to say,” I stammered.

“ Tell me in my ear, ” said Miss Havisham , bending down.
I think she is very proud ," I replied , in a whisper.
" Anything else ? "
“ I think she is very pretty .”
“ Anything else ? "
“ I think she is very insulting . " ( She was looking at me then,
with a look of supreme aversion .)
" Anything else ?"
“ I think I should like to go home."
is so pretty ? ”
66“And never see her again, though she
I am not sure that I shouldn't like to see her again, but 1
should like to go home now .”
66
You shall go soon , ” said Miss Havisham , aloud. “ Play the
game out. "
Saving for the one weird smile at first, I should have felt
almost sure that Miss Havisham's face could not smile. It had
dropped into a watchful and brooding expression - most likely
when all the things about her had become transfixed — and it
looked as if nothing could ever lift it up again. Her chest had
dropped, so that she stooped ; and her voice had dropped, so
that she spoke low , and with a dead lull upon her ; altogether,
she had the appearance of having dropped, body and soul, with
in and without, under the weight of a crushing blow .
I played the game to an end with Estella, and she beggared
me. She threw the cards down on the table when she had won
them all, as if she despised them for having been won of me.
“ When shall I have you here again ? " said Miss Havisham .
" Let me think .”
I was beginning to remind her that to-day was Wednesday,
when she checked me with her former impatient movement of
the fingers of her right hand .
“ There, there ! I know nothing of days of the week ; I know
nothing of weeks of the year. Come again after six days. You
hear ? "
6. Yes, ma'am .”
Estella, take him down. Let him have something to eat,
and let him roam and look about him while he eats. Go, Pip . "
I followed the candle down, as I had followed the candle up,
and she stood it in the place where we had found it. Until she
opened the side entrance, I had fancied, without thinking about
it, that it must necessarily be night-time. The rush of the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 55

daylight quite confounded me, and made me feel as if I had

been in the candlelight of the strange room many hours .
“ You are to wait here, you boy,” said Estella ; and disap
peared and closed the door.
I took the opportunity of being alone in the court-yard, to
look at my coarse hands and my common boots. My opinion
of those accessories was not favourable. They had never
troubled me before, but they troubled me now, as vulgar appen
dages. I determined to ask Joe why he had ever taught me to
call those picture - cards, Jacks, which ought to be called knaves.
I wished Joe had been rather more genteely brought up , and
then I should have been so too.
She came back, with some bread and meat and a Little mug of
beer. She put the mug down on the stones of the yard, and
gave me the bread and meat without looking at me, as inso
lently as if I were a dog in disgrace. I was so humiliated,
hurt, spurned , offended, angry, sorry- I cannot hit upon the
right name for the smart - God knows what its name was — that
tears started to my eyes. The moment they sprang there, the
girl looked at me with a quick delight in having been the cause
of them . This gave me power to keep them back and to look
at her : so, she gave a nous toss—but with a sense, I
thought, of having made too sure that I was so wounded — and
left me.
But, when she was gone, I looked about me for a place to
hide my face in , and got behind one of the gates in the brewery
lane, and leaned my sleeve against the wall there, and leaned
my forehead on it and cried . As I cried, I kicked the wall,,
and took a hard twist at my hair ; so bitter were my feelings,
and so sharp was the smart without a name, that needed coun
teraction .
My sister's bringing up had made me sensitive. In the little
world in which children have their existence whosoever brings
them up , there is nothing so finely perceived and so finely felt,
as injustice. It may be only small injustice that the child can
be exposed to ; but the child is small, and its world is small,
and its rocking -horse stands as many hands high, according to
scale, as a big-boned Irish hunter. Within myself, I had sus
tained , from my babyhood , a perpetual conflict with injustice.
I had known, from the time when I could speak, that my sister,
in her capricious and violent coercion, was unjust to me. I had
cherished a profound conviction that her bringing me up by
56 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

hand, gave her no right to bring me up by jerks. Through all

my punishments, disgraces, fasts and vigils, and other peni
tential performances, I had nursed this assurance ; and to my
communing so much with it, in a solitary and unprotected way ,
I in great part refer the fact that I was morally timid and very
sensitive.
I got rid of my injured feelings for the time, by kicking them
into the brewery wall, and twisting them out of my hair, and
then I smoothed my face with my sleeve, and came from behind
the gate. The bread and meat were acceptable, and the beer
was warming and tingling, and I was soon in spirits to look
about me.
To be sure, it was a deserted place, down to the pigeon -house
in the brewery -yard, which had been blown crooked on its pole
by some high wind, and would have made the pigeons think
themselves at sea, if there had been any pigeons there to be
rocked by it. But, there were no pigeons in the dove-cot, no
horses in the stable, no pigs in the sty, no malt in the store
house, no smells of grains and beer in the copper or the vat.
All the uses and scents of the brewery might have evaporated
with its last reek of smoke. In a by - yard, there was a wilder
ness of empty casks, which had a certain sour remembrance of
better days lingering about them ; but it was too sour to be
accepted as a sample of the beer that was gone — and in
this respect I remember those recluses as being like most
others.
Behind the furthest end of the brewery, was a rank garden
with an old wall : not so high but that I could struggle up and
hold on long enough to look over it, and see that the rank
garden was the garden of the house, and that it was overgrown
with tangled weeds, but that there was a track upon the green
and yellow paths, as if some one sometimes walked there, and
that Estella was walking away from me even then. But she
seemed to be everywhere. For, when I yielded to the tempta
tion presented by the casks, and began to walk on them, I saw
her walking on them at the end of the yard of casks. She had
her back towards me, and held her pretty brown hair spread
out in her two hands, and never looked round, and passed out
of my view directly. So, in the brewery itself — by which I
mean the large paved lofty place in which they used to make
the beer, and where the brewing utensils still were . When I
first went into it, and, rather oppressed by its gloom , stood near
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 57

the door looking about me, I saw her pass among the extin
guished fires, and ascend some light iron stairs, and go out by
à gallery high overhead , as if she were going out into the
sky.
It was in this place, and at this moment, that a strange thing
happened to my fancy. I thought it a strange thing then , and
I thought it a stranger thing long afterwards. I turned my eyes
-a little dimmed by looking up at the frosty light — towards a
great wooden beam in a low nook of the building near me on
my right hand, and I saw a figure hanging there by the neck.
A figure all in yellow white, with but one shoe to the feet ; and
it hung so, that I could see that the faded trimmings of the dress
were like earthy paper, and that the face was Miss Havisham's,
with a movement going over the whole countenance as if she
were trying to call to me. In the terror of seeing the figure,
and in the terror of being certain that it had not been there a mo
ment before, I at first ran from it, and then ran towards it. And
my terror was greatest of all when I found no figure there.
Nothing less than the frosty light of the cheerful sky, the
sight of people passing beyond the bars of the court - yard gate,
and the reviving influence of the rest of the bread and meat and
beer, would have brought me round. Even with those aids, I
might not have come to myself as soon as I did , but that I saw
Estella approaching with the keys, to let me out. She would
have some fair reason for looking down upon me, I thought,
if she saw me frightened ; and she should have no fair reason.
She gave me a triumphant glance in passing me, as if she
rejoiced that my hands were so coarse and my boots were so
thick , and she opened the gate, and stood holding it . I was
passing out without looking at her, when she touched me with
a taunting hand .
Why don't you cry?”
“ Because I don't want to . "
“ You do ,” said she . “ You have been crying till you are half
blind, and you are near crying again now . "
She laughed contemptuously, pushed me out, and locked the
gate upon me. I went straight to Mr. Pumblechook's, and was
immensely relieved to find him not at home . So, leaving word
with the shopman on what day I was wanted at Miss Havisham's
again, I set off on the four -mile walk to our forge ; pondering,
as I went along, on all I had seen , and deeply revolving that I
was a common labouring -boy; that my hands were coarse ; that
 58 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

my boots were thick ; that I had fallen into a despicable habit

of calling knaves Jacks ; that I was much more ignorant than I
had considered myself last night, and generally that I was in a
low - lived bad way .

CHAPTER IX .

WHEN I reached home, my sister was very curious to know all

about Miss Havisham's, and asked a number of questions. And
I soon found myself getting heavily bumped from behind in the
nape of the neck and the small of the back, and having my face
ignominiously shoved against the kitchen wall, because I did
not answer those questions at sufficient length.
If a dread of not being understood be hidden in the breasts
of other young people to anything like the extent to which it
used to be hidden in mine — which I consider probable, as I
have no particular reason to suspect myself of having been a
monstrosity - it is the key to many reservations. I felt con
vinced that if I described Miss Havisham's as my eyes had seen
it, I should not be understood . Not only that, but I felt con
vinced that Miss Havisham too would not be understood ; and
although she was perfectly incomprehensible to me, I enter
tained an impression that there would be something coarse and
treacherous in my dragging her as she really was (to.say nothing
of Miss Estella ) before the contemplation of Mrs. Joe. Conse
quently, I said as little as I could, and had my face shoved
against the kitchen wall,
The worst of it was that that bullying old Pumblechook,
preyed upon by a devouring curiosity to be informed of all I
had seen and heard, came gaping over in his chaise - cart at tea
time, to have the details divulged to him. And the mere sight
of the torment, with his fishy eyes and mouth open, his sandy
hair inquisitively on end, and his waistcoat heaving with windy
arithmetic, made me vicious in my reticence.
“Well, boy,” Uncle Pumblechook began, as soon as he was
seated in the chair of honour by the fire. “ How did you get on
up town ? "
I answered, “ Pretty well, sir,” and my sister shook her fist
at me .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 59

" Pretty well ?" Mr. Pumblechook repeated. “ Pretty well is

no answer. Tell us what you mean by pretty well, boy ? ”
Whitewash on the forehead hardens the brain into a state of
obstinacy perhaps. Anyhow , with whitewash from the wall on
my forehead , my obstinacy was adamantine. I reflected for
some time, and then answered as if I had discovered a new idea,
“ I mean pretty well.”
My sister with an exclamation of impatience was going to fly
at me -- I had no shadow of defence, for Joe was busy in the
forge — when Mr. Pumblechook interposed with “ No ! Don't
lose your temper. Leave this lad to me, ma'am ; leave this lad
to me. Mr. Pumblechook then turned me towards him , as if
he were going to cut my hair, and said :
“ First ( to get our thoughts in order). Forty -three pence ?"
I calculated the consequences of replying “ Four Hundred
Pound,” and finding them against me, went as near the answer
as I could — which was somewhere about eightpence off. Mr.
Pumblechook then putme through my pence-table from “twelve
pence make one shilling,” up to “ forty pence make three and
fourpence, " and then triumphantly demanded, as if he had done
for me, “ Now ! How much is forty -three pence ? " To which
I replied, after a long interval of reflection, “ I don't know . "
And I was so aggravated that I almost doubt if I did know .
Mr. Pumbleckook worked his head like a screw to screw it
out of me, and said, “ Is forty -three pence seven and sixpence
three fardens, for instance ? ”
“ Yes ! ” said I. And although my sister instantly boxed my
ears, it was highly gratifying to me to see that the answer spoilt
his joke, and brought him to a dead stop.
66
Boy ! Whatlike is Miss Havisham ?” Mr. Pumblechook
began again when he had recovered ; folding his arms tight on
his chest and applying the screw.
66
Very tall and dark , ” I told him .
“ Is she, uncle ?” asked my sister.
Mr. Pumblechook winked assent ; from which I at once
inferred that he had never seen Miss Havisham , for she was
nothing of the kind.
“ Good !” said Mr. Pumblechook, conceitedly. ( “ This is the
way to have him ! We are beginning to hold our own, I think,
Mum ? " )
“ I am sure, uncle ," returned Mrs. Joe, “ I wish you had him
always : you know so well how to deal with him .”
60 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Now , boy ! What was she a doing of, when you went in
to -day ?" asked Mr. Pumblechook .
“ She was sitting," I answered , “ in a black velvet coach .”
Mr. Pumblechook and Mrs. Joe stared at one another - as
they well might — and both repeated, “In a black velvet coach ? ”
“ Yes,” said I. “ And Miss Estella — that’s her niece, I think
-handed her in cake and wine at the coach -window , on a gold
plate. And we all had cake and wine on gold plates. And I
got up behind the coach to eat mine, because she told me
to . ”
“ Was anybody else there ?” asked Mr. Pumblechook.
CG
Four dogs,” said I.
Large or small ? "
66
Immense,” said I. “ And they fought for veal cutlets out of
a silver basket . ”
Mr. Pumblechook and Mrs. Joe stared at one another again ,
in utter amazement. I was perfectly frantic — a reckless witness
under the torture — and would have told them anything.
“ Where was this coach , in the name of gracious ? ” asked my
sister.
“ In Miss Havisham's room . ” They stared again . “ But there
weren't any horses to it .” I added this saving clause, in the
moment of rejecting four richly caparisoned coursers which I
had had wild thoughts of harnessing.
“ Can this be possible, uncle ?" asked Mrs. Joe. “What can
the boy mean ?”
“ I'll tell you, Mum ," said Mr. Pumblechook . “ My opinion
is, it's a sedan - chair. She's flighty, you know -- very flighty
quite flighty enough to pass her days in a sedan -chair . ”
“ Did you ever see her in it, uncle ?” asked Mrs. Joe.
“ How could I ?” he returned, forced to the admission, “when
I never see her in my life ? Never clapped eyes upon her ! ”
“ Goodness, uncle ! And yet you have spoken to her ?"
“Why, don't you know,” said Mr. Pumblechook, testily, “ that
when I have been there, I have been took up to the outside of
her door, and the door has stood ajar, and she has spoke to me
that way . Don't say you don't know that, Mum . Howsever,
the boy went there to play. What did you play at, boy ? ”
“ We played with flags,” I said . (I beg to observe that I think
of myself with amazement, when I recal the lies I told on this
occasion .)
“ Flags ! " echoed my sister.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 61

“ Yes," said I. “ Estella waved a blue flag, and I waved a red

one, and Miss Havisham waved one sprinkled all over with
little gold stars, out at the coach -window . And then we all
waved our swords and hurrahed .”
“ Swords !" repeated my sister. “ Where did you get swords
from ?”
“ Out of a cupboard ,” said I. “ And I saw pistols in it — and
jam — and pills . And there was no daylight in the room , but it
was all lighted up with candles .”
“That's true, Mum ,” said Mr.Pumblechook, with a grave nod.
That's the state of the case, for that much I've seen myself.”
And then they both stared at me, and I, with an obtrusive show
of artlessness on my countenance, stared at them , and plaited
the right leg of my trousers with my right hand.
If they had asked me any more questions I should undoubtedly
have betrayed myself, for I was even then on the point of men
tioning that there was a balloon in the yard, and should have
hazarded the statement but for my invention being divided
between that phenomenon and a bear in the brewery . They
were so much occupied, however, in discussing the marvels I
had already presented for their consideration, that I escaped .
The subject still held them when Joe came in from his work to
have a cup of tea. To whom my sister, more for the relief of
her own mind than for the gratification of his, related my pre
tended experiences.
Now, when I saw Joe open his blue eyes and roll them all
round the kitchen in helpless amazement, I was overtaken by
penitence ; but only as regarded him — not in the least as re
garded the other two. Towards Joe, and Joe only, I considered
inyself a young monster, while they sat debating what results
would come to me from Miss Havisham's acquaintance and
favour. They had no doubt that Miss Havisham would “ do
something ” for me ; their doubts related to the form that some
thing would take. My sister stood out for “ property . ” Mr.
Pumblechook was in favour of a handsome premium for binding
me apprentice to some genteel trade- say, the corn and seed
trade, for instance. Joe fell into the deepest disgrace with
both, for offering the bright suggestion that I might only be
presented with one of the dogs who had fought for the veal
cutlets. “ If a fool's head can't express better opinions than
that,” said my sister, and you have got any work to do, you had
99
better go and do it." So he went.
62 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

After Mr. Pumblechook had driven off, and when my sister

was washing up , I stole into the forge to Joe, and remained by
him until he had done for the night. Then I said, “ Before the
fire66 goes out, Joe, I should like to tell you something."
Should you, Pip ?” said Joe, drawing his shoeing-stool near
the forge. “ Then tell us. What is it, Pip ?"
" Joe," said I , taking hold of his rolled -up shirt sleeve, and
twisting it between my finger and thumb, " you remember all
that about Miss Havisham's ?”
6 Remember ?” said Joe. “ I believe you ! Wonderful !"
“ It's a terrible thing, Joe ; it ain't true . ”
“ What are you telling of, Pip ?” cried Joe, falling back > in the
greatest amazement. You don't mean to say it's
“ Yes, I do ; it's lies, Joe. "
“But not all of it ? Why sure you don't mean to say, Pip,
that there was no black welwet co -ch ? ” For, I stood
shaking my head. “ But at least there was dogs, Pip ? Come,
Pip ,” said Joe, persuasively, “if there warn't no weal-cutlets, at
least there was dogs ?”
“ No, Joe . ”
“ A dog ?” said Joe. “ A puppy ? Come ? ”
“ No, Joe, there was nothing at all of the kind .”
As I fixed my eyes hopelessly on Joe, Joe contemplated me
in dismay. " Pip, old chap ! This won't do, old fellow ! I
say ! Where do you expect to go to ?”
It's terrible, Joe ; ain't it ?”
“ Terrible ? cried Joe. 66 Awful ! What possessed you ?"
“ I don't know what possessed me, Joe, " I replied, letting his
shirt sleeve go , and sitting down in the ashes at his feet, hanging
my head ; “ but I wish you hadn't taught me to call Knaves at
cards, Jacks ; and I wish my boots weren't so thick nor my
99
hands so coarse.”
And then I told Joe that I felt very miserable, and that I
hadn't been able to explain myself to Mrs. Joe and Pumble
chook, who were so rude to me, and that there had been a beau
tiful young lady at Miss Havisham’s who was dreadfully proud,
and that she had said I was common , and that I knew I was
common , and that I wished I was not common , and that the lies
had come of it somehow , though I didn't know how .
This was a case of metaphysics, at least as difficult for Joe to
deal with, as for me. But Joe took the case altogether out of
the region of metaphysics, and by that means vanquished it.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 63

“ There's one thing you may be sure of, Pip ,” said Joe, after
some rumination , " namely , that lies is lies. Howsever they
come, they didn't ought to come, and they come from the father
of lies, and work round to the same. Don't you tell no more of
' em , Pip. That ain't the way to get out of being common ,
old chap. And as to being common , I don't make it out at all
clear. You are oncommon in some things. You're oncommon
small. Likewise you're a oncommon scholar. "
“ No, I am ignorant and backward, Joe."
66
Why, see what a letter you wrote last night. Wrote in print
even ! I've seen letters - Ah ! and from gentlefolks !—that I'll
swear weren't wrote in print,” said Joe.
66
I have learnt next to nothing, Joe. You think much of me .
It's only that . ”
CG
"Well, Pip,” said Joe, “ be it so or be it son't, you must be a
common scholar afore you can be a oncommon one, I should
hope ! The king upon his throne, with his crown upon his ed,
can't sit and write his acts of Parliament in print, without
having begun, when he were a unpromoted Prince, with the
alphabet - Ah !” added Joe, with a shake of the head that was
full of meaning, "and begun at A too, and worked his way to Z.
And I know what that is to do, though I can't say I've exactly
done it."
There was some hope in this piece of wisdom , and it rather
encouraged me.
" Whether common ones as to callings and earnings ,” pursued
Joe, reflectively, " mightn't be the better of continuing for to
keep company with common ones, instead of going out to play
with oncommon ones — which reminds me to hope that there
were a flag, perhaps ?”
“No, Joe. "
" (I'm sorry there weren't a flag, Pip .) Whether that might
be or mightn't be, is a thing as can't be looked into now, with
out putting your sister on the Rampage ; and that's a thing not
to be thought of, as being done intentional. Lookee here, Pip,
at what is said to you by a true friend. Which this to you the
true friend say . If you can't get to be oncommon through
going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked .
So don't tell no more on 'em, Pip, and live well and die happy. "
“ You are not angry with me, Joe ?”
No, old chap. But bearing in mind that them were which I
meantersay of a stunning and outdacious sort — alluding to theni
64 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
which bordered on weal-cutlets and dog-fighting - a sincere
well -wisher would adwise, Pip, their being dropped into your
meditations, when you go up-stairs to bed . That's all, old
chap, and don't never do it no more.”
When I got up to my little room and said my prayers, I did
not forget Joe's recommendation, and yet my young mind was
in that disturbed and unthankful state, that I thought long after
I laid me down, how common Estella would consider Joe, a
mere blacksmith : how thick his boots, and how coarse his
hands. I thought how Joe and my sister were then sitting in
the kitchen, and how I had come up to bed from the kitchen,
and how Miss Havisham and Estella never sat in a kitchen,
but were far above the level of such common doings. I
fell asleep recalling what I “ used to do ” when I was at Miss
Havisham's ; as though I had been there weeks or months,
instead of hours : and as though it were quite an old subject of
remembrance, instead of one that had arisen only that day.
That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes
in me. But, it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected
day struck out of it, and think how different its course would
have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment
of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that
would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first
link on one memorable day.

CHAPTER X.

THE felicitous idea occurred to me a morning or two later when

I woke, that the best step I could take towards making myself
uncommon was to get out of Biddy everything she knew . In
pursuance of this luminous conception I mentioned to Biddy
when I went to Mr. Wopsle's great-aunt's at night, that I had
a particular reason for wishing to get on in life, and that I
should feel very much obliged to her if she would impart all
her learning to me. Biddy, who was the most obliging of girls,
immediately said she would, and indeed began to carry out her
promise within five minutes.
The Educational scheme or Course established by Mr.
Wopsle's great-aunt may be resolved into the following synopsis.
The pupils ate apples and put straws down one another's
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 65

backs, until Mr. Wopsle's great -aunt collected her energies,

and made an indiscriminate totter at them with a birch-rod.
After receiving the charge with every mark of derision , the
pupils formed in line and buzzingly passed a ragged book from
hand to hand. The book had an alphabet in it, some figures
and tables, and a little spelling — that is to say, it had had once .
As soon as this volume began to circulate, Mr. Wopsle's great
aunt fell into a state of coma ; arising either from sleep or a
rheumatic paroxysm . The pupils then entered among them
selves upon a competitive examination on the subject of Boots,
with the view of ascertaining who could tread the hardest upon
whose toes. This mental exercise lasted until Biddy made a
rush at them and distributed three defaced Bibles ( shaped as if
they had been unskilfully cut off the chump-end of something ),
more illegibly printed at the best than any curiosities of litera
ture I have since met with, speckled all over with ironmould,
and having various specimens of the insect world smashed
between their leaves. This part of the Course was usually
lightened by several single combats between Biddy and re
fractory students. When the fights were over, Biddy gave out
the number of a page, and then we all read aloud what we
could - or what we couldn't-in a frightful chorus ; Biddy
leading with a high shrill monotonous voice, and none of us
having the least notion of, or reverence for, what we were read
ing about. When this horrible din had lasted a certain time,
it mechanically awoke Mr. Wopsle’s great -aunt, who staggered
at a boy fortuitously, and pulled his ears. This was understood
to terminate the Course for the evening, and we emerged into
the air with shrieks of intellectual victory. It is fair to remark
that there was no prohibition against any pupil's entertaining
himself with a slate or even with the ink (when there was any),
but that it was not easy to pursue that branch of study in the
winter season, on account of the little general shop in which the
classes were holden - and which was also Mr. Wopsle’s great
aunt's sitting -room and bed - chamber — being but faintly illumi
nated through the agency of one low -spirited dip -candle and no
snuffers.
It appeared to me that it would take time, to become uncom
mon under these circumstances : nevertheless, I resolved to try
it , and that very evening Biddy entered on our special agree
ment, by imparting some information from her little catalogue
of Prices, under the head of moist sugar, and lending me, to
66 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

copy at home, a large old English D which she had imitated

from the heading of some newspaper, and which I supposed,
until she told me what it was, to be a design for a buckle.
Of course there was public -house in the village, and of
course Joe liked sometimes to smoke his pipe there. I had
received strict orders from my sister to call for him at the
Three Jolly Bargemen , that evening, on my way from school,
and bring him home at my peril. To the Three Jolly Barge
men, therefore, I directed my steps.
There was a bar at the Jolly Bargemen, with some alarmingly
long chalk scores in it on the wall at the side of the door, which
seemed to me to be never paid off. They had been there ever
since I could remember, and had grown more than I had. But
there was a quantity of chalk about our country, and perhaps
the people neglected no opportunity of turning it to account.
It being Saturday night, I found the landlord looking rather
grimly at these records, but as my business was with Joe and
not with him, I merely wished him good evening, and passed
into the common room at the end of the passage, where there
was a bright large kitchen fire, and where Joe was smoking his
pipe in company with Mr. Wopsle and a stranger. Joe greeted
me as usual with “Halloa , Pip , old chap ! " and the moment he
said that, the stranger turned his head and looked at me.
He was a secret- looking man whom I had never seen before.
His head was all on one side, and one of his eyes was half shut
up, as if he were taking aim at something with an invisible gun .
He had a pipe in his mouth, and he took it out, and, after
slowly blowing all his smoke away and looking hard at me all
the time, nodded . So, I nodded, and then he nodded again , and
made room on the settle beside him that I might sit down there .
But, as I was used to sit beside Joe whenever I entered that
place of resort, I said “ No, thank you, sir ,” and fell into the
space Joe made for me on the opposite settle . The strange
man, after glancing at Joe, and seeing that his attention was
otherwise engaged, nodded to me again when I had taken my
seat, and then rubbed his leg—in a very odd way , as it struck
me.
“ You was saying,” said the strange man , turning to Joe, “that
you was a blacksmith ."
“ Yes. I said it, you know , ” said Joe.
“ What'll you drink , Mr. ? You didn't mention your
name, by -the-by ."
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 67

Joe mentioned it now, and the strange man called him by it.
“ What'll you drink , Mr. Gargery ? At my expense ? To top
up with ? "
Well,” said Joe, “ to tell you the truth, I ain't much in the
99
habit of drinking at anybody's expense but my own .
“Habit ? No," returned the stranger, “but once and away ,and
on a Saturday night too. Come ! Put a nameto it, Mr. Gar
gery ."
66
• I wouldn't wish to be stiff company,” said Joe. - Rum .”
“ Rum ,” repeated the stranger. “And will the other gentle
man originate a sentiment ?”
“Rum," said Mr. Wopsle.
“ Three Rums ! ” cried the stranger, calling to the landlord .
“ Glasses round !” .
“ This other gentleman,” observed Joe, by way of introducing
Mr. Wopsle, “is a gentleman that you would like to hear give
it out. Our clerk at church.”
“ Aha ! ” said the stranger, quickly, and cocking his eye at me.
“ The lonely church, right out on the marshes, with the graves
round it !”
“ That's it,” said Joe.
The stranger, with a comfortable kind of grunt over his pipe,
put his legs up on the settle that he had to himself. He wore a
flapping broad -brimmed traveller's hat, and under it a handker
chief tied over his head in the manner of a cap : so that he
showed no hair. As he looked at the fire, I thought I saw
a cunning expression, followed by a half - laugh, come into his
face.
" I am not acquainted with this country , gentlemen , but it
seems a solitary country towards the river ."
“ Most marshes is solitary,” said Joe.
“ No doubt, no doubt. Do you find any gipsies, now, or
tramps, or vagrants of any sort, out there ? "
66
No, ” said Joe ; “ none but a runaway convict now and then.
And we don't find them , easy . Eh, Mr. Wopsle ?"
Mr. Wopsle, with a majestie remembrance of old disccmfiture,
assented ; but not warmly.
Seems you have been out after such ? ” asked the stranger.
Once ," returned Joe. “ Not that we wanted to take them ,
you understand ; we went out as lookers on ; me, and Mr.
Wopsle, and Pip. Didn't us, Pip ? ”
“ Yes, Joe.”
68 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

The stranger looked at me again - still cocking his eye, as if

he were expressly taking aim at me with his invisible gun — and
said , “ He's a likely young parcel of bones that. What is it
you call him ?”
“ Pip,” said Joe .
“ Christened Pip ? ”
“ No, not christened Pip . ”
“ Surname Pip ?”
“ No ,” said Joe ; “ it's a kind of a family name what he gave
himself when a infant, and is called by ."
"Son of yours ?"
" Well,” said Joe, meditatively --not, of course, that it could
be in anywise necessary to consider about it, but because it was
the way at the Jolly Bargemen to seem to consider deeply about
everything that was discussed over pipes ; “ well -- no. No, he
ain't."
" Nevvy ?" said the strange man.
“ Well,” said Joe, with the same appearance of profound
cogitation, “ he is not—no, not to deceive you, he is not-my
nevvy ."
“What the Blue Blazes is he ?” asked the stranger. Which
appeared to me to be an inquiry of unnecessary strength.
Mr. Wopsle struck in upon that ; as one who knew all about
relationships, having professional occasion to bear in mind what
female relations a man might not marry ; and expounded the
ties between me and Joe. Having his hand in, Mr. Wopsle
finished off with a most terrifically snarling passage from
Richard the Third, and seemed to think he had done quite
enough to account for it when he added, -as the poet says.”
And here I may remark that when Mr. Wopsle referred to me,
he considered it a necessary part of such reference to rumple
my hair and poke it into my eyes. I cannot conceive why
everybody of his standing who visited at our house should
always have put me through the same inflammatory process
under similar circumstances . Yet I do not call to mind that I
was ever in my earlier youth the subject of remark in our social
family circle, but some large-handed person took some such
ophthalmic steps to patronize me .
All this while, the strange man looked at nobody but me, and
looked at me as if he were determined to have a shot at me at
last, and bring me down. But he said nothing after offering
his Blue Blazes observation, until the glasses of rum - and -water
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 69
were brought ; and then he made his shot, and a most extraor
dinary shot it was.
It was not a verbal remark, but a proceeding in dumb-show ,
and was pointedly addressed to me. He stirred his rum -and
water pointedly at me, and he tasted his rum -and -water pointedly
at me. And he stirred it and he tasted it : not with a spoon
that was brought to him, but with a file.
He did this so that nobody but I saw the file ; and when he had
done it he wiped the file and put it in a breast- pocket. I knew
it to be Joe's file, and I knew that he knew my convict, the
moment I saw the instrument. I sat gazing at him , spell-bound .
But he now reclined on his settle, taking very little notice of
me, and talking principally about turnips.
There was a delicious sense of cleaning-up and making a
quiet pause before going on in life afresh , in our village on
Saturday nights, which stimulated Joe to dare to stay out half
an hour longer on Saturdays than at other times. The half
hour and the rum -and -water running out together, Joe got up
to CGgo, and took me by the hand .
Stop half a moment, Mr. Gargery," said the strange man .
“ I think I've got a bright new shilling somewhere in my pocket,
and if I have, the boy shall have it.”
He looked it out from a handful of small change, folded it in
some crumpled paper, and gave it to me. “ Yours !” said he.
“ Mind ! Your own.”
I thanked him, staring at him far beyond the bounds of good
manners, and holding tight to Joe. He gave Joe good -night,
and he gave Mr. Wopsle good -night (who went out with us), and
he gave me only a look with his aiming eye-no, not a look, for
he shut it up, but wonders may be done with an eye by hiding it.
On the way home, if I had been in a humour for talking, the
talk must have been all on my side, for Mr. Wopsle parted from
us at the door of the Jolly Bargemen , and Joe went all the way
home with his mouth wide open, to rinse the rum out with as
much air as possible. But I was in a manner stupified by
this turning up of my old misdeed and old acquaintance, and
could think of nothing else .
My sister was not in a very bad temper when we presented
ourselves in the kitchen , and Joe was encouraged by that un
usual circumstance to tell her about the bright shilling. “ A
66
bad un, I'll be bound,” said Mrs. Joe, triumphantly, or he
wouldn't have given it to the boy ! Let's look at it.”
70 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

I took it out of the paper, and it proved to be a good one .

“But what's this ?" said Mrs. Joe, throwing down the shilling
and catching up the paper. “ Two One-Pound notes ?”
Nothing less than two fat sweltering one-pound notes that
seemed to have been on terms of the warmest intimacy with all
the cattle markets in the county. Joe caught up his hat again,
and ran with them to the Jolly Bargemen to restore them to
their owner . While he was gone, I sat down on my usual stool
and looked vacantly at my sister, feeling pretty sure that the
man would not be there.
Presently, Joe came back, saying that the man was gone, but
that he, Joe, had left word at the Three Jolly Bargemen con
cerning the notes. Then my sister sealed them up in a piece
of paper, and put them under some dried rose -leaves in an
ornamental teapot on the top of a press in the state parlour.
There they remained, a nightmare to me, many and many a
night and day.
I had sadly broken sleep when I got to bed , through thinking
of the strange man taking aim at me with his invisible gun, and
of the guiltily coarse and common thing it was, to be on secret
terms of conspiracy with convicts—a feature in my low career
that I had previously forgotten. I was haunted by the file too.
A dread possessed me that when I least expected it, the file
would reappear. I coaxed myself to sleep by thinking of Miss
Havisham's, next Wednesday ; and in my sleep I saw the file
coming at me out of a door, without seeing who held it, and I
screamed myself awake.

CHAPTER XI.

At the appointed time I returned to Miss Havisham’s, and my

hesitating ring at the gate brought out Estella . She locked it
after admitting me, as she had done before, and again preceded
me into the dark passage where her candle stood. She took no
notice of me until she had the candle in her hand, when she
looked over her shoulder, superciliously saying, “ You are to come
thisway to -day,” and took me to quite another part of the house .
The passage was a long one, and seemed to pervade the whole
square basement of the Manor House. We traversed but one
side of the square , however, and at the end of it she stopped,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 71

and put her candle down and opened a door. Here, the day
light reappeared, and I found myself in a small paved court
yard, the opposite side of which was formed by a detached
dwelling -house, that looked as if it had once belonged to the
manager or head cierk of the extinct brewery. There was a
clock in the outer wall of this house. Like the clock in Miss
Havisham's room , and , like Miss Havisham's watch, it had
stopped at twenty minutes to nine.
We went in at the door, which stood open, and into a gloomy
room with a low ceiling, on the ground floor at the back. There
was some company in the room, and Estella said to me as she
joined it, “ You are to go and stand there, boy, till you are
wanted .” “ There,” being the window, I crossed to it, and stood
there,” in a very uncomfortable state of mind, looking out.
It opened to the ground, and looked into a most miserable
corner of the neglected garden , upon a rank ruin of cabbage
stalks, and one box -tree that had been clipped round long ago,
like a pudding, and had a new growth at the top of it, out
of shape and of a different colour, as if that part of the pud
ding had stuck to the saucepan and got burnt. This was my
homely thought, as I contemplated the box - tree. There had
been some light snow, overnight, and it lay nowhere else to my
knowledge ; but, it had not quite melted from the cold shadow
of this bit of garden, and the wind caught it up in little eddies
and threw it at the window , as if it pelted me for coming there .
I divined that my coming had stopped conversation in the
room, and that its other occupants were looking at me. I could
see nothing of the room except the shining of the fire in the
window -glass, but I stiffened in all my joints with the conscious
ness that I was under close inspection.
1 There were three ladies in the room and one gentleman .
Before I had been standing at the window five minutes, they
somehow conveyed to me that they were all toadies and hum
bugs, but that each of them pretended not to know that the
others were toadies and humbugs : because the admission that
he or she did know it, would have made him or her out to be a
toady and humbug.
They all had a listless and dreary air of waiting somebody's
pleasure, and the most talkative of the ladies had to speak quite
rigidly to repress a yawn. This lady, whose name was Camilla ,
very much reminded me of my sister, with the difference that
she was older, and (as I found when I caught sight of her) of a
 IONS .
72 GREAT EXPECTAT

blunter cast of features. Indeed, when I knew her better I

began to think it was a Mercy she had any features at all, so
very blank and high was the dead wall of her face.
“ Poor dear soul ! ” said this lady, with an abruptness of man
ner quite my sister's. “ Nobody's enemy but his own !”
“ It would be much more commendable to be somebody else's
enemy,” said the gentleman ; “ far more natural.”
“ Cousin Raymond,” observed another lady, “ we are to love
our neighbour."
Sarah Pocket, ” returned Cousin Raymond, " if a man is not
his own neighbour, who is ? ”
Miss Pocket laughed , and Camilla laughed and said ( checking
a yawn), “ The idea ! ” But I thought they seemed to think it
rather a good idea too. The other lady, who had not spoken
yet, said gravely and emphatically, “ Very true ! "
“ Poor soul !” Camilla presently went on (I knew they had all
been looking at me in the mean time), “ he is so very strange !
Would any one believe that when Tom's wife died, he actually
could not be induced to see the importance of the children's
having the deepest of trimmings to their mourning ? " Good
Lord ! ' says he, “ Camilla, what can it signify so long as the
poor bereaved little things are in black ?' So like Matthew !
The idea ! ”
“ Good points in him , good points in him , " said Cousin Ray
mond ; “ Heaven forbid I should deny good points in him ; but
he never had, and he never will have, any sense of the pro
prieties.”
“ You know I was obliged ,” said Camilla , “ I was obliged to
be firm . I said, ' It WILL NOT do, for the credit of the family.
I told him that, without deep trimmings, the family was dis
graced . I cried about it from breakfast till dinner. I injured
my digestion . And at last he flung out in his violent way, and
said, with a D, “ Then do as you like.' Thank Goodness it
will always be a consolation to me to know that I instantly
went out in a pouring rain and bought the things."
“ He paid for them , did he not ?” asked Estella .
“ It's not the question, my dear child, who paid for them ,"
returned Camilla, “ I bought them. And I shall often think of
that with peace, when I wake up in the night.”
The ringing of a distant bell, combined with the echoing of
some cry or call along the passage by which I had come, inter
rupted the conversation and caused Estella to say to me, “ Now ,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 73

boy !" On my turning round, they all looked at me with the

utmost contempt, and, as I went out, I heard Sarah Pocket say,
“ Well I am sure ! What next ! ” and Camilla add, with indigna
tion, “ Was there ever such a fancy ! The i-de - a ! "
As we were going with our candle along the dark passage,
Estella stopped all of a sudden, and, facing round, said in her
taunting manner, with her face quite close to mine :
“ Well ?”
“Well, miss ?" I answered , almost falling over her and check
ing myself.
She stood looking at me, and , of course, I stood looking at her.
"Am I pretty ?”
“ Yes ; I think you are very pretty."
“Am I insulting ? "
“ Not so much so as you were last time,” said I.
66 Not so much so ?”
- No.”
She fired when she asked the last question , and she slapped
my face with such force as she had, when I answered it.
“ Now ?" said she. “ You little coarse monster, whatdo you
hink of me now ?”
- I shall not tell you .”
“ Because you are going to tell, up -stairs. Is that it ?
No, " said I, “ that's not it.”
Why don't you cry again, you little wretch ?”
“ Because I'll never cry for you again ,” said I. Which was,
I suppose, as false a declaration as ever was made ; for I was
inwardly crying for her then , and I know what I know of the
pain she cost me afterwards.
We went on our way up -stairs after this episode; and , as we
were going up , we met a gentleman groping his way down .
“ Whom have we here? " asked the gentleman, stopping and
looking at me.
“ A boy,” said Estella.
He was a burly man of an exceedingly dark complexion, with
an exceedingly large head and a corresponding large hand. He
took my chin in his large hand and turned up my face to have a
look at me by the light of the candle. He was prematurely
bald on the top of his head, and had bushy black eyebrows that
wouldn't lie down but stood up bristling. His eyes were set
very deep in his head, and were disagreeably sharp and sus
picious. He had a large watch -chain, and strong black dots
74 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
where his beard and whiskers would have been if he had let
them. He was nothing to me, and I could have had no fore
sight then, that he ever would be anything to me, but it hap
pened that I had this opportunity of observing him well.
"Boy of the neighbourhood ? Hey ?" said he.
“ Yes, sir,” said I.
“ How do you come here ? ”
“ Miss Havisham sent for me, sir , ” I explained.
“ Well ! Behave yourself. I have a pretty large experience
of boys, and you're a bad set of fellows. Now mind !” said he,
biting the side of his great forefinger as he frowned at me, “ you
behave yourself ! ”
With those words, he released me—which I was glad of, for
his hand smelt of scented soap — and went his way down stairs .
I wondered whether he could be a doctor ; but no, I thought;
he couldn't be a doctor, or he would have a quieter and more
persuasive manner . There was not much time to consider the
subject, for we were soon in Miss Havisham's room, where she
and everything else were just as I had left them. Estella left
me standing near the door, and I stood there until Miss Havis
ham cast her eyes upon me from the dressing -table.
“ So ! ” she said, without being startled or surprised ; "the
days
66 have worn away, have they?” >
Yes, ma'am . To -day is
There, there, there ! " with the impatient movement of her
fingers. “ I don't want to know . Are you ready to play ? ”
I was obliged to answer in some confusion , “ I don't think I
am , ma'am .”
“ Not at cards again ?" she demanded with a searching look.
“ Yes, ma’am ; I could do that, if I was wanted.”
“ Since this house strikes you old and grave, boy ,” said Miss
Havisham , impatiently, " and you are unwilling to play, are you
willing to work ?"
I could answer this inquiry with a better heart than I had
been able to find for the other question, and I said I was quite
willing
6 Then go into that opposite room , ” said she, pointing at the
door behind me with her withered hand , “ and wait there till I
come. ”
I crossed the staircase landing, and entered the room she in
dicated. From that room , too, the daylight was completely ex
cluded, and it had an airless smell that was oppressive. A firo
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 75

had been lately kindled in the damp old -fashioned grate, and it
was more disposed to go out than to burn up, and the reluctant
smoke which hung in the room seemed colder than the clearer
air - like our own marsh mist. Certain wintry branches of
candles on the high chimneypiece faintly lighted the chamber :
or, it would be more expressive to say, faintly troubled its dark
ness. It was spacious, and I dare say had once been handsome,
but every discernible thing in it was covered with dust and
mould , and dropping to pieces. The most prominent object
was a long table with a tablecloth spread on it, as if a feast had
been in preparation when the house and the clocks all stopped
together. An epergne or centre -piece of some kind was in the
middle of this cloth ; it was so heavily overhung with cobwebs
that its form was quite undistinguishable ; and, as I looked
along the yellow expanse out of which I remember its seeming
to grow , like a black fungus, I saw speckled - legged spiders with
blotchy bodies running home to it, and running out from it, as
if some circumstance of the greatest public importance had just
transpired in the spider community,
I heard the mice too, rattling behind the panels, as if the
same occurrence were important to their interests. But, the
blackbeetles took no notice of the agitation, and groped about
the hearth in a ponderous elderly way, as if they were short
sighted and hard of hearing, and not on terms with one another .
These crawling things had fascinated my attention and I was
watching them from a distance, when Miss Havisham laid a
hand upon my shoulder . In her other hand she had a crutch
headed stick on which she leaned, and she looked like the
Witch of the place.
This,” said she, pointing to the long table with her stick, " is
where I will be laid when I am dead. They shall come and
look at me here . "
With some vague misgiving that she might get upon the table
then and there and die at once, the complete realisation of the
ghastly waxwork at the Fair, I shrank under her touch.
“ What do you think that is ?" she asked me, again pointing
with her stick ; “ that, where those cobwebs are ? "
" I can't guess what it is, ma'am.”
“ It's a great cake. A bride -cake. Mine ! "
She looked all round the room in a glaring manner, and then
said , leaning on me while her hand twitched my shoulder,
“ Come, come, come ! Walk me, walk me ! "
76 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
I made out from this, that the work I had to do, was to walk
Miss Havisham round and round the room . Accordingly, I
started at once, and she leaned upon my shoulder, and we went
away at a pace that might have been an imitation ( founded on my
first impulse under that roof ) of Mr. Pumblechook's chaise -cart.
She was not physically strong, and after a little time said,
“ Slower ! ” Still, we went at an impatient fitful speed, and as
we went, she twitched the hand upon my shoulder, and worked
her mouth, and led me to believe that we were going fast because
her thoughts went fast. After a while she said, “ Call Estella !”
so I went out on the landing and roared that name as I had done
on the previous occasion . When her light appeared, I returned
to Miss Havisham, and we started away again round and round
the room .
If only Estella had come to be a spectator of our proceedings,
I should have felt sufficiently discontented ; but, as she brought
with her the three ladies and the gentleman whom I had seen
below , I didn't know what to do. In my politeness, I would
have stopped ; but, Miss Havisham twitched my shoulder, and
we posted on — with a shame - faced consciousness on my part
that they would think it was all my doing.
“ Dear Miss Havisham ,” said Miss Sarah Pocket. How well
you look ! "
“ I do not,” returned Miss Havisham . “ I am yellow skin and
bone.”
Camilla brightened when Miss Pocket met with this rebuff ;
and she murmured, as she plaintively contemplated Miss Havis
ham , “ Poor dear soul ! Certainly not to be expected to look
well, poor thing. The idea !"
“ And how are you?” said Miss Havisham to Camilla . As we
were close to Camilla then, I would have stopped as a matter of
course, only Miss Havisham wouldn't stop. We swept on , and
I felt that I was highly obnoxious to Camilla .
“ Thank you, Miss Havisham ,” she returned , “ I am as well
as can be expected ."
“Why, what's the matter with you ?" asked Miss Havisham ,
with exceeding sharpness.
“ Nothing worth mentioning," replied Camilla . “ I don't wish
to make a display of my feelings, but I have habitually thought
of you more in the night than I am quite equal to.”
“ Then don't think of me,” retorted Miss Havisham .
* Very easily said ! ” remarked Camilla, amiably repressing a
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 77

sob, while a bitch came into her upper lip, and her tears over
flowed . 66 Raymond is a witness what ginger and sal volatile I
am obliged to take in the night. Raymond is a witness what
nervous jerkings I have in my legs. Chokings and nervous
jerkings, however, are nothing new to me when I think with
anxiety of those I love. If I could be less affectionate and sensi
tive, I should have a better digestion and an iron set of nerves .
I am sure I wish it could be so. But as to not thinking of you
in the night — The idea !" Here, a burst of tears .
The Raymond referred to, I understood to be the gentleman
present, and him I understood to be Mr. Camilla. He came to
the rescue at this point, and said in a consolatory and compli
mentary voice, “ Camilla, my dear, it is well known that your
family feelings are gradually undermining you to the extent of
making one of your legs shorter than the other."
“ I am not aware ,” observed the grave lady whose voice I had
heard but once , “ that to think of any person is to make a great
claim upon that person , my dear ."
Miss Sarah Pocket , whom I now saw to be a little dry brown
corrugated old woman , with a small face that might have been
made of walnut shells, and a large mouth like a cat's without
the whiskers, supported this position by saying, “ No, indeed ,
my dear. Hem ! "
“ Thinking is easy enough ," said the grave lady.
“What is easier, you know ? ” assented Miss Sarah Pocket.
“Oh yes , yes !" cried Camilla, whose fermenting feelings ap
peared to rise from her legs to her bosom. “ It's all very true !
It's a weakness to be so affectionate, but I can't help it. No
doubt my health would be much better if it was otherwise, still
I wouldn't change my disposition if I could . It's the cause of
much suffering, but it's a consolati to know I possess it, when
I wake up in the night." Here another burst of feeling.
Miss Havisham and I had never stopped all this time, but
kept going round and round the room : now , brushing against
the skirts of the visitors : now, giving them the whole length of
the dismal chamber .
“ There's Matthew !” said Camilla. “ Nevermixing with any
natural ties, never coming here to see how Miss Havisham is !
I have taken to the sofa with my staylace cut, and have lain
there hours, insensible, with my head over the side, and my hair
all down, and my feet I don't know where—_”
(“ Much higher than your head, my love, " said Mr. Camilla .)
78 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ I have gone off into that state, hours and hours, on account
of Matthew's strange and inexplicable conduct, and nobody has
thanked me.”
Really I must say I should think not ! ” interposed the grave
lady.
" You see , my dear, ” added Miss Sarah Pocket (a blandly
vicious personage ), “ the question to put to yourself is, who did
you expect to thank you , my love ? ”
“ Without expecting any thanks, or anything of the sort ,” re
sumed Camilla, “ I have remained in that state, hours and hours,
and Raymond is a witness of the extent to which I have choked ,
and what the total inefficacy of ginger has been, and I have
been heard at the pianoforte -tuner's across the street, where the
poor mistaken children have even supposed "it to be pigeons
cooing at a distance — and now to be told Here Camilla
put her hand to her throat, and began to be quite chemical as to
the formation of new combinations there.
When this same Matthew was mentioned , Miss Havisham
stopped me and herself, and stood looking at the speaker.
This change had a great influence in bringing Camilla’s chemis
try to a sudden end .
Matthew will come and see me at last,” said Miss Havisham ,
sternly, “ when I am laid on that table. That will be his place
--there," striking the table with her stick, "at my head ! And
yours will be there ! And your husband's there ! And Sarah
Pocket's there ! And Georgiana's there ! Now you all know
where to take your stations when you come to feast upon me.
And now go !”
At the mention of each name, she had struck the table with
her stick in a new place. She now said, “Walk me, walk me !"
and we went on again .
“ I suppose there's nothing to be done, ” exclaimed Camilla,
“but comply and depart. It's something to have seen the object
of one's love and duty, even for so short a time. I shall think
of it with a melancholy satisfaction when I wake up in the
night. I wish Matthew could have that comfort, but he sets it
at defiance. I am determined not to make a display of my
feelings, but it's very hard to be told one wants to feast on
one's relations —as if one was a Giant - and to be told to go .
The bare idea !”
Mr. Camilla interposing, as Mrs. Camilla laid her hand upon
her heaving bosom , that lady assumed an unnatural fortitude of
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 79

manner which I supposed to be expressive of an intention to

drop and choke when out of view , and kissing her hand to Miss
Havisham , was escorted forth . Sarah Pocket and Georgiana
contended who should remain last ; but, Sarah was too knowing
to be outdone, and ambled round Georgiana with that artful
slipperiness, that the latter was obliged to take precedence.
Sarah Pocket then made her separate effect of departing with
“ Bless you, Miss Havisham dear !” and with a smile of forgiving
pity on her walnut -shell countenance for the weaknesses of the
rest.
While Estella was away lighting them down , Miss Havisham
still walked with her hand on my shoulder, but more and more
slowly. At last she stopped before the fire, and said, after
muttering and looking at it some seconds :
“ This is my birthday, Pip .”
I was going to wish her many happy returns, when she lifted
her stick .
“ I don't suffer it to be spoken of. I don't suffer those who
were here just now, or any one to speak of it. They come here
on the day, but they dare not refer to it.”
Of course I made no further effort to refer to it.
“ On this day of the year, long before you were born, this
heap of decay,” stabbing with her crutched stick at the pile of
cobwebs on the table but not touching it, was brought here.
It and I have worn away together. The mice have gnawed at
it, and sharper teeth than teeth of mice have gnawed at me . ”
She held the head of her stick against her heart as she stood
looking at the table ; she in her once white dress, all yellow
and withered ; the once white cloth all yellow and withered ;
everything around, in a state to crumble under a touch.
66
When the ruin is complete ,” said she, with a ghastly look,
“ and when they lay me dead, in my bride's dress on the bride's
table — which shall be done, and which will be the finished
curse upon him so much the better if it is done on this day !"
She stood looking at the table as if she stood looking at her
own figure lying there. I remained quiet. Estella returned ,
and she too remained quiet. It seemed to me that we continued
thus a long time. In the heavy air of the room, and the heavy
darkness that brooded in its remoter corners, I even had an
a_larming fancy that Estella and I might presently begin to decay.
At length not coming out of her distraught state by degrees,
but in an instant, Miss Havisham said, “ Let me see you two
80 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
play cards ; why have you not begun ? ” With that, we returned
to her room , and sat down as before; I was beggared, as before ;
and again, as before, Miss Havisham watched us all the time,
directed my attention to Estella's beauty, and made me notice it
the more by trying her jewels on Estella's breast and hair.
Estella , for her part, likewise treated me as before ; except
that she did not condescend to speak. When we had played
some half-dozen games, a day was appointed for my return, and
I was taken down into the yard to be fed in the former dog -like
manner. There, too, I was again left to wander about as I
liked.
It is not much to the purpose whether a gate in that garden
wall which I had scrambled up to peep over on the last occasion
was, on that last occasion , open or shut. Enough that I saw no
gate then , and that I saw one now. As it stood open, and as I
knew that Estella had let the visitors out - for, she had returned
with the keys in her hand—I strolled into the garden, and
strolled all over it. It was quite a wilderness, and there were
old melon -frames and cucumber- frames in it, which seemed in
their decline to have produced a spontaneous growth of weak
attempts at pieces of old hats and boots, with now and then a
weedy offshoot into the likeness of a battered saucepan.
When I had exhausted the garden and a greenhouse with no
thing in it but a fallen -down grape-vine and some bottles, I
found myself in the dismal corner upon which I had looked out
of window . Never questioning for a moment that the house
was now empty, I looked in at another window , and found my
self, to my great surprise, exchanging a broad stare with a pale
young gentleman with red eyelids and light hair.
This pale young gentleman quickly disappeared, and re
appeared beside me. He had been at his books when I had found
myself staring at him, and I now saw that he was inky.
66
“ Halloa ! ” said he, young fellow !"
Halloa being a general observation which I had usually ob
served to be best answered by itself, I said " Halloa ! ” politely
omitting young fellow .
“ Who let you in ?” said he.
Miss Estella ."
CG
Who gave you leave to prowl about ?"
66 Miss Estella . ”
“ Come and fight , ” said the pale young gentleman .
What could I do but follow him ? I have often asked myself
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 81

the question since : but, what else could I do ? His manner

was so final and I was so astonished, that I followed where he led,
as if I had been under a spell.
“ Stop a minute, though,” he said, wheeling round before we
had gone many paces. “ I ought to give you a reason for fight
ing, too . There it is ! ” In a most irritating manner he
instantly slapped his hands against one another, daintily flung
one of his legs up behind him, pulled my hair, slapped his
hands again, dipped his head , and butted it into my stomach.
The bull - like proceeding last mentioned , besides that it was
unquestionably to be regarded in the light of a liberty, was par
ticularly disagreeable just after bread and meat . I therefore
hit out at him and was going to hit out again, when he said ,
“ Aha ! Would you ? ” and began dancing backwards and for
wards in a manner quite unparalleled within my limited ex
perience.
“ Laws of the game ! ” said he. Here, he skipped from his
left leg on to his right. " Regular rules ! ” Here, he skipped
from his right leg on to his left. “ Come to the ground, and go
through the preliminaries !” Here, he dodged backwards and
forwards, and did all sorts of things while I looked helplessly, at
him .
I was secretly afraid of him when I saw him so dexterous ;
but, I felt morally and physically convinced that his light head
of hair could have had no business in the pit of my stomach ,
and that I had a right to consider it irrelevant when so obtruded
on my attention. Therefore, I followed him without a word,
to a retired nook of the garden, formed by the junction of two
walls and screened by some rubbish. On his asking me if I was
satisfied with the ground, and on my replying Yes, he begged my
leave to absent himself for a moment, and quickly returned
with a bottle of water and a sponge dipped in vinegar. “ Avail
able for both ,” he said, placing these against the wall. And
then fell to pulling off, not only his jacket and waistcoat, but
his shirt too, in a manner at once light-hearted, business-like,
and bloodthirsty.
Although he did not look very healthy - having pimples on
his face, and a breaking out at his mouth - these dreadful pre
parations quite appalled me. I judged him to be about my own
age , but he was much taller, and he had a way of spinning him
self about that was full of appearance. For the rest, he was a
young gentleman in a grey suit (when not denuded for battle ) ,
G
82 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

with his elbows, knees, wrists, and heels, considerably in

advance of the rest of him as to development.
My heart failed me when I saw him squaring at me with
every demonstration of mechanical nicety, and eyeing my ana
tomy as if he were minutely choosing his bone. I never have
been so surprised in my life, as I was when I let out the first
blow, and saw him lying on his back, looking up at me with a
bloody nose and his face exceedingly fore -shortened.
But, he was on his feet directly, and after sponging himself
with a great show of dexterity began squaring again. The
second greatest surprise I have ever had in my life was seeing
him on his back again, looking up at me out of a black eye.
His spirit inspired me with great respect. He seemed to
have no strength, and he never once hit me hard , and he was
always knocked down ; but, he would be up again in a moment,
sponging himself or drinking out of the water -bottle, with the
greatest satisfaction in seconding himself according to form ,
and then came at me with an air and a show that made me
believe he really was going to do for me at last. He got
heavily bruised, for I am sorry to record that the more I hit
him , the harder I hit him ; but, he came up again and again
and again, until at last he got a bad fall with the back of his
head against the wall. Even after that crisis in our affairs, he
got up and turned round and round confusedly a few times,
not knowing where I was ; but finally went on his knees to his
sponge and threw it up : at the same time panting out, “ That
means you have won . ”
He seemed so brave and innocent, that although I had not
proposed the contest I felt but a gloomy satisfaction in my
victory. Indeed , I go so far as to hope that I regarded myself
while dressing, as a species of savage young wolf, or other wild
beast. However, I got dressed , darkly wiping my sanguinary
face at intervals, and I said, “ Can I help you ?” and he said,
“ No thankee,” and I said “ Good afternoon ,” and he said , “ Same
to you .”
When I got into the court-yard , I found Estella waiting with
the keys. But, she neither asked me where I had been, nor
why I had kept her waiting ; and there was a bright flush upon
her face, as though something had happened to delight her.
Instead of going straight to the gate, too, she stepped back into
the passage, and beckoned me.
“ Come here ! You may kiss me, if you like.”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 83

I kissed her cheek as she turned it to me. I think I would

have gone through a great deal to kiss her cheek. But, I felt
that the kiss was given to the coarse common boy as a piece of
money might have been, and that it was worth nothing.
What with the birthday visitors, and what with the cards,
and what with the fight, my stay had lasted so long, that when
I neared home the light on the spit of sand off the point on the
marshes was gleaming against a black night-sky, and Joe's
furnace was flinging a path of fire across the road.

CHAPTER XII.

My mind grew very uneasy on the subject of the pale young

gentleman. The more I thought of the fight, and recalled the
pale young gentleman on his back in various stages of puffy and
incrimsoned countenance, the more certain it appeared that
something would be done to me. I felt that the pale young
gentleman's blood was on my head, and that the Law would
avenge it. Without having any definite idea of the penalties
I had incurred , it was clear to me that village boys could not
go stalking about the country , ravaging the houses of gentle
folks and pitching into the studious youth of England, without
laying themselves open to severe punishment . For some days,
I even kept close at hoine, and looked out at the kitchen door
with the greatest caution and trepidation before going on an
errand, lest the officers of the County Jail should pounce upon
me. The pale young gentleman's nose had stained my trousers,
and I tried to wash out that evidence of my guilt in the dead of
night. I had cut my knuckles against the pale young gentle
man's teeth , and I twisted my imagination into a thousand
tangles, as I devised incredible ways of accounting for that
damnatory circumstance when I should be haled before the
Judges.
When the day came round for my return to the scene of the
deed of violence, my terrors reached their height. Whether
myrmidons of Justice, specially sent down from London, would
be lying in ambush behind the gate ? Whether Miss Havisham ,
preferring to take personal vengeance for an outrage done to
her house, might rise in those grave- clothes of hers, draw a
pistol, and shoot me dead ? Whether suborned boys — a
84 REAT EXPECTATIONS.

numerous band of mercenaries - might be engaged to fall upon

me in the brewery, and cuff me until I was no more ? It was
high testimony to my confidence in the spirit of the pale young
gentleman, that I never imagined him accessary to these retalia
tions ; they always came into my mind as the acts of injudicious
relatives of his, goaded on by the state of his visage and an
indignant sympathy with the family features.
However, go to Miss Havisham's I must, and go I did . And
behold ! nothing came of the late struggle. It was not alluded
to in any way, and no pale young gentleman was to be discovered
on the premises. I found the same gate open , and I explored
the garden, and even looked in at the windows of the detached
house ; but, my view was suddenly stopped by the closed
shutters within , and all was lifeless. Only in the corner where
the combat had taken place, could I detect any evidence of the
young gentleman's existence. There were traces of his gore
in that spot, and I covered them with garden -mould from the
eye of man .
On the broad landing between Miss Havisham's own room
and that other room in which the long table was laid out, I saw
& garden - chair - a light chair on wheels, that you pushed from
behind. It had been placed there since my last visit, and I
entered , that same day, on a regular occupation of pushing Miss
Havisham in this chair (when she was tired of walking with
her hand upon my shoulder) round her own room, and across
the landing, and round the other room. Over and over and
over again, we would make these journeys, and sometimes they
would last as long as three hours at a stretch. I insensibly
fall into a general mention of these journeys as numerous, be
cause it was at once settled that I should return every alternate
day at noon for these purposes, and because I am now going to
sum up a period of at least eight or ten months.
As we began to be more used to one another, Miss Havisham
talked more to me, and asked me such questions as what had I
learnt and what was I going to be ? I told her I was going to
be apprenticed to Joe, I believed ; and I enlarged upon my
knowing nothing and wanting to know everything, in the hope
that she might offer some help towards that desirable end . But,
she did not ; on the contrary, she seemed to prefer my being
ignorant. Neither did she ever give me any money- or any
thing but my daily dinner- nor even stipulate that I should be
paid for my services.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 85

Estella was always about, and always let me in and out, but
never told me I might kiss her again . Sometimes, she would
coldly tolerate me ; sometimes, she would condescend to me ;
sometimes, she would be quite familiar with me ; sometimes,
she would tell me energetically that she hated me. Miss
Havisham would often ask me in a whisper, or when we were
alone, “ Does she grow prettier and prettier, Pip ? " And when
I said Yes ( for indeed she did ) , would seem to enjoy it greedily.
Also, when we played at cards Miss Havisham would look on,
with a miserly relish of Estella's moods, whatever thcy were .
And sometimes, when her moods were so many and so contra
dictory of one another that I was puzzled what to say or do,
Miss Havisham would embrace her with lavish fondness, mur
muring something in her ear that sounded like “ Break their
hearts, my pride and hope, break their hearts and have no mercy !”
There was a song Joe used to hum fragments of at the forge,
of which the burden was Old Clem. This was not a very cere
monious way of rendering homage to a patron saint ; but I
believe Old Clem stood in that relation towards smiths. It was
a song that imitated the measure of beating upon iron, and was
a mere lyrical excuse for the introduction of Old Clem's re
spected name. Thus, you were to hammer boys round -Old
Clem ! With a thumpand a sound —Old Clem ! Beat it out, beat
it out - old Clem ! With a clink for the stout-Old Clem ! Blow
the fire, blow the fire -- Old Clem ! Roaring dryer, soaring
higher - old Clem ! One day soon after the appearance of the
chair, Miss Havisham suddenly saying to me, with the impatient
movement of her fingers, “ There, there, there ! Sing ! " I was
surprised into crooning this ditty as I pushed her over the floor .
It happened so to catch her fancy that, she took it up in a low
brooding voice as if she were singing in her sleep. After that, it
became customary with us to have it as we moved about, and
Estella would often join in ; though the whole strain was so
subdued , even when there were three of us, that it made less
noise in the grim old house than the lightest breath of wind .
What could I become with these surroundings ? How could
my character fail to be influenced by them ? Is it to be wondered
at if my thoughts were dazed, as my eyes were, when I came out
into the natural light from the misty yellow rooms ?
Perhaps, I might have told Joe about the pale young gentle
man , if I had not previously been betrayed into those enormous
inventions to which I had confessed . Under the circumstances,
86 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

I felt that Joe could hardly fail to discern in the pale young
gentleman, an appropriate passenger to be put into the black
velvet coach ; therefore, I said nothing of him . Besides : that
shrinking from having Miss Haversham and Estella discussed,
which had come upon me in the beginning, grew much more potent
as time went on. I reposed complete confidence in no one but
Biddy ; but , I told poor Biddy everything. Why it came natural
for me to do so, and why Biddy had a deep concern in every
thing I told her, I did not know then, though I think I know
Meanwhile, councils went on in the kitchen at home, fraught
with almost insupportable aggravation to my exasperated spirit.
That ass, Pumblechook, used often to come over of a night for
the purpose of discussing my prospects with my sister ; and I
really do believe (to this hour with less penitence than I ought
to feel), that if these hands could have taken a linchpin out of
his chaise -cart, they would have done it. The miserable man
was a man of that confined stolidity of mind, that he could not
discuss my prospects without having me before him — as it were ,
to operate upon — and he would drag me up from my stool
( usually by the collar) where I was quiet in a corner, and, put
ting me before the fire as if I were going to be cooked, would
begin by saying, “ Now , Mum , here is this boy ! Here is this
boy which you brought up by hand . Hold up your head, boy,
and be for ever grateful unto them which so did do. Now,
Mum , with respections to this boy !” And then he would rumple
my hair the wrong way — which from my earliest remembrance,
as already hinted, I have in my soul denied the right of any
fellow -creature to do and would hold me before him by the
sleeve : a spectacle of imbecility only to be equalled by himself.
Then, he and my sister would pair off in such nonsensical
speculations about Miss Havisham , and about what she would
do with me and for me, that I used to want — quite painfully
to burst into spiteful tears, fly at Pumblechook, and pummel him
all over .
In these dialogues, my sister spoke to me as if she were
morally wrenching one of my teeth out at every reference ; while
Pumblechook himself, self -constituted my patron , would sit su
pervising me with a depreciatory eye, like the architect of my for
tunes who thought himself engaged in a very unremunerative job.
In these discussions, Joe bore no part. But he was often
talked at, while they were in progress , by reason of Mrs. Joe's
perceiving that he was not favourable to my being taken from
the forge. I was fully old enough now , to be apprenticed to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 87

Joe ; and when Joe sat with the poker on his knees thought
fully raking out the ashes between the lower bars, my sister
would so distinctly construe that innocent action into opposition
on his part, that she would dive at him, take the poker out of
his hands, shake him, and put it away . There was a most irritating
end to every one of these debates. All in a moment, with
nothing to lead up to it, my sister would stop herself in a yawn ,
and catching sight of me as it were incidentally, would Swoop
upon me with, “ Come ! there's enough of you ! You get along to
bed ; you've given trouble enougo for one night, I hope ! ” As if
I had besought them as a favour to bother my life out.
We went on in this way for a long time, and it seemed
likely that we should continue to go on in this way for a long
time, when , one day Miss Havisham stopped short as she and I
were walking, she leaning on my shoulder ; and said with some
displeasure :
“ You are growing tall, Pip ! "
I thought it best to hint, through the medium of a meditative
look, that this might be occasioned by circumstances over which
I had no control.
She said no more atthe time ; but, she presently stopped and
looked at me again ; and presently again ; and after that, looked
frowning and moody. On the next day of my attendance, when our
usual exercise was over, and I had landed her at her dressing
table, she stayed me with a movement of her impatient fingers :
“Tell me the name again of that blacksmith of yours.”
“ Joe Gargery, ma'am .”
Meaning the master you were to be apprenticed to ?”
Yes, Miss Havisham .”
“ You had better be apprenticed at once . Would Gargery
come here with you, and bring your indentures, do you think ? ”
I signified that I had no doubt he would take it as an honour
to be asked .
« Then let him come.”
“ At any particular time, Miss Havisham ?”
There, there ! I know nothing about times. Let him come
soon , and come alone with you . "
When I got home at night, and delivered this message for
Joe, my sister “ went on the Rampage, ” in a more alarming
degree than at any previous period . She asked me and Joe
whether we supposed she was door -mats under our feet, and how
we dared to use her so, and what company we graciously
88 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

thought she was fit for ? When she had exhausted a torrent of
such inquiries, she threw a candlestick at Joe, burst into a loud
sobbing , got out the dustpan — which was always a very bad sign
-put on her coarse apron, and began cleaning up to a terrible
extent. Not satisfied with a dry cleaning, she took to a pail and
scrubbing -brush , and cleaned us out of house and home, so that
we stood shivering in the back yard. It was ten o'clock at
night before we ventured to creep in again, and then she asked
Joe why he hadn't married a Negress Slave at once ? Joe
offered no answer, poor fellow , but stood feeling his whisker and
looking dejectedly at me, as if he thought it really might have
been a better speculation .

CHAPTER XIII.

It was a trial to my feelings, on the next day but one, to see

Joe arraying himself in his Sunday clothes to accompany me to
Miss Havisham's. However, as he thought his court -suit neces
sary to the occasion, it was not for me to tell him that he looked
far better in his working dress ; the rather, because I knew he
made himself so dreadfully uncomfortable, entirely on my
account, and that it was for me he pulled up his shirt -collar so
very high behind, that it made the hair on the crown of his head
stand up like a tuft of feathers .
At breakfast -time my sister declared her intention of going
to town with us, and being left at Uncle Pumblechook's, and
called for “ when we had done with our fine ladies ” —a way of
putting the case, from which Joe appeared inclined to augur the
worst. The forge was shut up for the day, and Joe inscribed in
chalk upon the door ( as it was his custom to do on the very rare
occasions when he was not at work ) the monosyllable hout,
accompanied by a sketch of an arrow supposed to be fying in
the direction he had taken .
We walked to town, my sister leading the way in a very large
beaver bonnet, and carrying a basket like the Great Seal of Eng
land in plaited straw , a pair of pattens, a spare shawl, and an
umbrella, though it was a fine bright day. I am not quite clear
whether these articles were carried penitentially or ostenta
tiously ; but, I rather think they were displayed as articles of
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 89

property — much as Cleopatra or any other sovereign lady on the

Rampage might exhibit her wealth in a pageant or procession .
When we came to Pumblechook’s, my sister bounced in and
left us . As
it was almost noon, Joe and I held straight on to
Miss Havisham's house . Estella opened the gate as usual, and ,
the moment she appeared, Joe took his hat off and stood weigh
ing it by the brim in both his hands : as if he had some urgent
reason in his mind for being particular to half a quarter of an
ounce .
Estella took no notice of either of us, but led us the way that
I knew so well. I followed next to her, and Joe came last.
When I looked back at Joe in the long passage, he was still
weighing his hat with the greatest care, and was coming after us
in long strides on the tips of his toes.
Estella told me we were both to go in, so I took Joe by the
coat -cuff and conducted him into Miss Havisham's presence.
She was seated at her dressing - table, and looked round at us
immediately.
“ Oh ! " said she to Joe. “You are the husband of the sister of
this boy ?"
I could hardly have imagined dear old Joe looking so unlike
himself or so like some extraordinary bird ; standing, as he did,
speechless, with his tuft of feathers ruffled, and his mouth open
as if he wanted a worm .
“ You are the husband ," repeated Miss Haversham , “ of the
sister of this boy ?
It was very aggravating ; but, throughout the interview , Joe
persisted in addressing Me instead of Miss Haversham .
“Which I meantersay, Pip,” Joe now observed in a manner
that was at once expressive of forcible argumentation, strict con
fidence, and great politeness, “ as I hup and married your sister,
and I were at the time what you might call ( if you was anyways
>>
inclined) a single man .
“ Well !” said Miss Havisham . “And you have reared the boy,
with the intention of taking him for your apprentice ; is that so,
Mr. Gargery ?"
“ You know , Pip ,” replied Joe, “ as you and me were ever
friends, and it were looked for’ard to betwixt us, as being
calc'lated to lead to larks. Not but what, Pip , if you had ever
made objections to the business — such as its being open to black
and sut, or such -like - not but what they would have been
attended to, don't you see ? ”
 90 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

1 “ Has the boy,” said Miss Havisham , “ ever made any objec
tion ? Does he like the trade ? ”
“Which it is well beknown to yourself, Pip , ” returned Joe,
strengthening his former mixture of argumentation, confidence,
and politeness, “that it were the wish of your own hart.” (I saw
the idea suddenly break upon him that he would adapt his
epitaph to the occasion, before he went on to say ) “ And there
weren't no objection on your part, and Pip it were the great
wish of your hart !”
It was quite in vain for me to endeavour to make him sensible
that he ought to speak to Miss Havisham . The more I made
faces and gestures to him to do it, the more confidential, argu
mentative, and polite, he persisted in being to Me.
“ Have you brought his indentures with you ?? asked Miss
Havisham .
66
* Well, Pip, you know,” replied Joe, as if that were a little
unreasonable , “ you yourself see me put 'em in my 'at, and there
fore you know as they are here.” With which he took them
out, and gave them , not to Miss Havisham , but to me. I am
afraid I was ashamed of the dear good fellow — I know I was
ashamed of him — when I saw that Estella stood at the back of
Miss Havisham's chair, and that her eyes laughed mischievously.
I took the indentures out of his hand and gave them to Miss
Havisham .
You expected,” said Miss Havisham , as she looked them over,
66
no premium with the boy ? ”
“ Joe ! ” I remonstrated ; for he made no reply at all. “Why
don't you we
66
· Pip,” returned Joe, cutting me short as if he were hurt,
“ which I meantersay that were not a question requiring a
answer betwixt yourself and me, and which you know the answer
to be full well No. You know it to be No, Pip, and wherefore
should I say it ?”
Miss Havisham glanced at him as if she understood what he
really was, better than I had thought possible , seeing what he
was there ; and took up a little bag from the table beside her.
CG
· Pip has earned a premium here ,” she said , “and here it is.
There are five -and -twenty guineas in this bag. Give it to your
master, Pip ?"
As if he were absolutely out of his mind with the wonder
awakened in him by her strange figure and the strange room ,
Joe, even at this pass, persisted in addressing me.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 91
“ This is wery liberal on your part, Pip ,” said Joe, “ and it is as
such received and grateful welcome, though never looked for,
far nor near nor nowheres. And now , old chap ,” said Joe, con
veying to me a sensation, first of burning and then of freezing,
for I felt as if that familiar expression were applied to Miss
Havisham ; “and now , old chap, may we do our duty ! May
you and me do our duty, both on us by one and another, and by
them which your liberal present - have -- conweyed — to be - for
the satisfaction of mind - of - them as never— " here Joe showed
that he felt he had fallen into frightful difficulties, until he
triumphantly rescued himself with the words, "and from myself
far be it ! ” These words had such a round and convincing sound
for him that he said them twice.
“ Good - bye, Pip !" said Miss Havisham . “ Let them out,
Estella . ”
“ Am I to come again, Miss Havisham ? " I asked.
“ No. Gargery is your master now . Gargery ! One word ! ”
Thus calling him back as I went out of the door, I heard her
say to Joe, in a distinct emphatic voice, “ The boy has been a
good boy here, and that is his reward . Of course, as an honest
man , you will expect no other and no more.”
How Joe got out of the room , I have never been able to
determine ; but, I know that when he did get out he was steadily
proceeding up - stairs instead of coming down, and was deaf to
all remonstrances until I went after him and laid hold of him .
In another minute we were outside the gate, and it was locked,
and Estella was gone. When we stood in the daylight alone
again, Joe backed up against a wall, and said to me, “ Astonish
ing !" And there he remained so long, saying, “ Astonishing !" at
intervals, so often, that I began to think his senses were never
coming back . At length he prolonged his remark into “ Pip, I
do assure you this is as- ton -ishing ! ” and so, by degrees, became
conversational and able to walk away.
I have reason to think that Joe's intellects were brightened
by the encounter they had passed through, and that on our way
to Pumblechook’s, he invented a subtle and deep design. My
reason is to be found in what took place in Mr. Pumblechook's
parlour : where, on our presenting ourselves, my sister sat in
conference with that detested seedsman .
“ Well ! ” cried my sister, addressing us both at once. 66 And
what's happened to you ? I wonder you condescend to come
back to such poor society as this, I am sure I do ! ”
92 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“Miss Havisham ,” said Joe, with a fixed look at me, like an

effort of remembrance , “ made it wery partick'ler that we should
give her - were it compliments or respects, Pip ?"
• Compliments ,” I said .
“ Which that were my own belief ,” answered Joe—“her com
pliments to Mrs. J. Gargery
“ Much good they'll do me!" observed my sister ; but rather
gratified too.
“ And wishing,” pursued Joe, with another fixed look at me,
like another effort of remembrance, " that the state of Miss Havis
ham's elth were sitch as would have — allowed , were it, Pip ? ”
“Of her having the pleasure , " I added .
“ Of ladies' company,” said Joe. And drew a long breath .
Well ! ” cried my sister, with a mollified glance at Mr. Pum
blechook . “ She might have had the politeness to send that
message at first, but it's better late than never. And what did
she give young Rantipole here ?”
CG
She giv him ," said Joe, “ nothing.”
Mrs. Joe was going to break out, but Joe went on.
“ What she giv," said Joe, “ she giv' to his friends. “ And by
his friends,' were her explanation , “ I mean into the hands of his
sister, Mrs. J. Gargery.' Them were her words; " Mrs J. Gar
gery .' She mayn't have know'd , ” added Joe, with an appearance
of reflection, “ whether it were Joe or Jorge .”
My sister looked at Pumblechook : who smoothed the elbows
of his wooden armchair, and nodded at her and at the fire, as if
he had known all about it beforehand .
“ And how much have you got ?” asked my sister, laughing.
Positively, laughing !
66
What would present company say to ten pound ? " demanded
Joe .
" They'd say, ” returned my sister curtly, “ pretty well. Not
too much, but pretty well.”
“ It's more than that, then,” said Joe.
That fearful Impostor, Pumblechook, immediately nodded ,
and said, as he rubbed the arms of his chair : “ It's more than
that, Mum . ”
“Why you don't mean to say—— " began my sister .
“ Yes I do, Mum ," said Pumblechook ; “ but wait a bit. Go
on, Joseph. Good in you ! Go on !"
“ What would present company say,” proceeded Joe, “ to
twenty pound ?”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 93

" Handsome would be the word,” returned my sister.

6. Well, then , ” said Joe, “ it's more than twenty pound.”
That abject hypocrite, Pumblechook, nodded again, and said ,
with a patronising laugh, “ It's more than that, Mum . Good
again ! Follow her up , Joseph !"
" Then to make an end of it ,” said Joe, delightedly handing
2
the bag to my sister ; “ it's five -and -twenty pound.”
“ It's five-and -twenty pound, Mum ,” echoed that basest of
swindlers, Pumblechook, rising to shake hands with her ; " and
it's no more than your merits (as I said when my opinion was
asked ), and I wish you joy of the money
If the villain had stopped here, his case would have been
sufficiently awful, but he blackened his guilt by proceeding to
take me into custody, with a right of patronage that left all
his former criminality far behind .
“ Now you see, Joseph and wife ," said Pumblechook, as he
took me by the arm above the elbow , “ I am one of them that
always go right through with what they've begun. This boy
must be bound, out of hand . That's my way . Bound out of
hand .”
Goodness knows, Uncle Pumblechook ,” said my sister
(grasping the money), “ we're deeply beholden to you ."
“Never mind me, Mum ,” returned that diabolical corn
chandler. “ A pleasure's a pleasure all the world over. But
this boy, you know ; we must have him bound . I said I'd see
to it — to tell you the truth .”
The Justices were sitting in the Town Hall near at hand,
and we at once went over to have me bound apprentice to Joe in
the Magisterial presence. I say, we went over, but I was pushed
over by Pumblechook, exactly as if I had that moment picked a
pocket or fired a rick ; indeed , it was the general impression in
Court that I had been taken red - handed ; for, as Pumblechook
shoved me before him through the crowd, I heard some people
say , “ What's he done ? " and others, “ He's a young ’un, too, but
looks bad, don't he ? " One person of mild and benevolent
aspect even gave me a tract ornamented with a woodcut of a
malevolent young man fitted up with a perfect sausage-shop of
fetters, and entitled TO BE READ IN MY CELL.
The Hall was a queer place, I thought, with higher pews
in it than a church --and with people hanging over the pews
looking on -- and with mighty Justices (one with a powdered
head) leaning back in chairs, with folded arms, or taking snuff, or
94 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

going to sleep, or writing, or reading the newspapers -- and with

some shining black portraits on the walls, which my unartistic
eye regarded as a composition of hardbake and sticking - plaister.
Here, in a corner, my indentures were duly signed and attested,
and I was “ bound ;” Mr. Pumblechook holding me all the while
as if we had looked in on our way to the scaffold , to have those
little preliminaries disposed of.
When we had come out again, and had got rid of the boys
who had been put into great spirits by the expectation of seeing
me publicly tortured, and who were much disappointed to find
that my friends were merely rallying round me, we went back
to Pumblechook's . And there my sister became so excited by
the twenty - five guineas, that nothing would serve her but we
must have a dinner out of that windfall, at the Blue Boar, and
that Pumblechook must go over in his chaise-chart, and bring
the Hubbles and Mr. Wopsle .
It was agreed to be done ; and a most melancholy day I
passed . For, it inscrutably appeared to stand to reason , in the
minds of the whole company , that I was an excrescence on the
entertainment. And to make it worse, they all asked me from
time to time -in short, whenever they had nothing else to do—
why I didn't enjoy myself ? And what could I possibly do
then, but say that I was enjoying myself — when I wasn't !
However, they were grown up and had their own way, and
made the most of it. That swindling Pumblechook, exalted
into the beneficent contriver of the whole occasion, actually took
the top of the table ; and, when he addressed them on the
subject of my being bound, and had fiendishly congratulated
them on my being liable to imprisonment if I played at cards,
drank strong liquors, kept late hours or bad company, or in
dulged in other vagaries which the form of my indentures ap
peared to contemplate as next to inevitable, he placed me
standing on a chair beside him to illustrate his remarks .
My only other remembrances of the great festival are, That
they wouldn't let me go to sleep, but whenever they saw me
dropping off, woke me up and told me to enjoy myself. That,
rather late in the evening Mr. Wopsle gave us Collins's ode, and
threw his blood - stain'd sword in thunder down, with such effect,
that a waiter came in and said, “ The Commercials underneath
sent up their compliments, and it wasn't the Tumbler's Arms."
That, they were all in excellent spirits on the road home, and
sang O Lady Fair ! Mr. Wopsle taking the bass, and asserting
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 95

with a tremendously strong voice (in reply to the inquisitive

bore who leads that piece of music in a most impertinent
manner, by wanting to know all about everybody's private
affairs) that he was the man with his white locks flowing, and
that he was upon the whole the weakest pilgrim going.
Finally, I remember that when I got into my little bedroom ,
I was truly wretched , and had a strong conviction on me that
I should never like Joe's trade. I had liked it once, but once
was not now .

CHAPTER XIV .
It is a most miserable thing to feel ashamed of home . There
may be black ingratitude in the thing, and the punishment may
be retributive and well deserved ; but, that it is a miserable
thing, I can testify.
Home had never been a very pleasant place to me, because of
my sister's temper. But, Joe had sanctified it, and I believed
in it. I had believed in the best parlour as a most elegant
saloon ; I had believed in the front door, as a mysterious portal
of the Temple of State whose solemn opening was attended with a
sacrifice of roast fowls ; I had believed in the kitchen as a chaste
though not magnificent apartment; I had believed in the forge
as the glowing road to manhood and independence. Within a
single year all this was changed. Now, it was all coarse and
common, and I would not have had Miss Havisham and Estella
see it on any account.
How much of my ungracious condition of mind may have been
my own fault, how much Miss Havisham's, how much my
sister's, is now of no moment to me or to any one. The change
was made in me ; the thing was done. Well or ill done, excus
ably or inexcusably, it was done.
Once, it had seemed to me that when I should at last roll up
my shirt -sleeves and go into the forge, Joe's 'prentice, I should
be distinguished and happy. Now the reality was in my hold,
I only felt that I was dusty with the dust of small - coal, and
that I had a weight upon my daily remembrance to which the
anvil was a feather . There have been occasions in my later
life (I suppose as in most lives) when I have felt for a time as
if a thick curtain had fallen on all its interest and romance, to
96 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

shut me out from anything save dull endurance any more.

Never has that curtain dropped so heavy and blank, as when
my way in life lay stretched out straight before me through the
newly - entered road of apprenticeship to Joe.
I remember that at a later period of my “ time, ” I used to stand
about the churchyard on Sunday evenings, when night was
falling, comparing my own perspective with the windy marsh
view, and making out some likeness between them by thinking
how flat and low both were , and how on both there came an
unknown way and a dark mist and then the sea. I was quite
as dejected on the first working -day of my apprenticeship as in
that after-time ; but I am glad to know that I never breathed a
murmur to Joe while my indentures lasted. It is about the
only thing I am glad to know of myself in that connection.
For, though it includes what I proceed to add, all the merit
of what I proceed to add was Joe's. It was not because I was
faithful, but because Joe was faithful, that I never ran away and
went for a soldier or a sailor. It was not because I had a
strong sense of the virtue of industry, but because Joe had a
strong sense of the virtue of industry, that I worked with toler
able zeal against the grain . It is not possible to know how far
the influence of any amiable honest-hearted duty -doing man
flies out into the world ; but it is very possible to know how it
has touched one's self in going by, and I know right well that any
good that intermixed itself with my apprenticeship came of
plain contented Joe, and not of restless aspiring discontented me.
What I wanted, who can say ? How can I say, when I never
knew ? What I dreaded was, that in some unlucky hour I,
being at my grimiest and commonest, should lift up my eyes
and see Estella looking in at one of the wooden windows of the
forge. I was haunted by the fear that she would, sooner or
later, find me out, with a black face and hands, doing the
coarsest part of my work , and would exult over me and de
spise me. Often after dark , when I was pulling the bellows for
Joe, and we were singing Old Clem, and when the thought
how we used to sing it at Miss Havisham's would seem to show
me Estella's face in the fire, with her pretty hair fluttering in
the wind and her eyes scorning me, -often at such a time I
would look towards those pannels of black night in the wall
which the wooden windows then were, and would fancy that I
saw her just drawing her face away, and would believe that she
had come at last.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 97

After that, when we went in to supper, the place and the

meal would have a more homely look than ever, and I would
feel more ashamed of home than ever, in my own ungracious
breast.

CHAPTER XV.

As I was getting too big for Mr. Wopsle's great- aunt's room,
my education under that preposterous female terminated . Not,
however, until Biddy had imparted to me everything she knew ,
from the little catalogue of prices, to a comic song she had once
bought for a halfpenny. Although the only coherent part of
the latter piece of literature were the opening lines,
When I went to Lunnon town sirs,
Too rul loo rul
Too rul loo rul
Wasn't I done very brown sirs ?
Too rul loo rul
Too rul loo rul

-still, in my desire to be wiser, I got this composition by

heart with the utmost gravity ; nor do I recollect that I ques
tioned its merit, except that I thought (as I still do) the amount
of Too rul somewhat in excess of the poetry. In my hunger
for information, I made proposals to Mr. Wopsle to bestow
some intellectual crumbs upon me : with which he kindly com
plied. As it turned out, however, that he only wanted me for
a dramatic lay - figure, to be contradicted and embraced and
wept over and bullied and clutched and stabbed and knocked
about in a variety of ways, I soon declined that course of in
struction ; though not until Mr. Wopsle in his poetic fury had
severely mauled me.
Whatever I acquired, I tried to impart to Joe. This state
ment sounds so well, that I cannot in my conscience let it pass
unexplained. I wanted to make Joe less ignorant and common,
that he might be worthier of my society and less open to
Estella's reproach .
The old Battery out on the marshes was our place of
study, and a broken slate and a short piece of slate pencil
were our educational implements : to which Joe always
added a pipe of tobacco . I never knew Joe to remember
anything from one Sunday to another, or to acquire, under
H
98 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
my tuition, any piece of information whatever. Yet he
would smoke his pipe at the Battery with a far more sagacious
air than anywhere else — even with a learned air - as if he
considered himself to be advancing immensely. Dear fellow ,
I hope he did .
It was pleasant and quiet, out there with the sails on the
river passing beyond the earthwork, and sometimes, when the
tide was low , looking as if they belonged to sunken ships that
were still sailing on at the bottom of the water. Whenever I
watched the vessels standing out to sea with their white sails
spread, I somehow thought of Miss Havisham and Estella ;
and whenever the light struck aslant, afar off, upon a cloud
or sail or green hill-side or water-line, it was just the same. -
Miss Havisham and Estella and the strange house and the
strange life appeared to have something to do with everything
that was picturesque.
One Sunday when Joe, greatly enjoying his pipe , had so
plumed himself on being “most awful dull, ” that I had given
him up for the day, I lay on the earthwork for some time with
my chin on my hand, descrying traces of Miss Havisham and
Estella all over the prospect, in the sky and in the water, until
at last I resolved to mention a thought concerning them that
had been much in my head .
“ Joe , ” said I ; “ don't you think I ought to make Miss
Havisham a visit ? ”
“ Well, Pip, " returned Joe, slowly considering. “ What for ?"
“What for, Joe ? What is any visit made for ?"
“ There is some wisits p'r’aps,” said Joe, “ as for ever remains
open to the question, Pip. But in regard of wisiting Miss
Havisham . She might think you wanted something - expected
something of her ."
66 Don't
you think I might say that I did not, Joe ? ”
“ You might, old chap, ” said Joe. " And she might credit it.
Similarly she mightn't . ”
Joe felt, as I did, that he had made a point there, and he
pulled hard at his pipe to keep himself from weakening it by
repetition .
“ You see, Pip ,” Joe pursued, as soon as he was past that
danger, “ Miss Havisham done the handsome thing by you.
When Miss Havisham done the handsome thing by you, she
called me back to say to me as that were all.”
“ Yes, Joe . I heard her. ”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 99

“ ALL ," Joe repeated, very emphatically.

Yes, Joe. I tell you, I heard her . ”
“Which I meantersay, Pip, it might be that her meaning
were -Make a end on it !-As you was !—Me to the North ,
and you to the South !-Keep in sunders ! "
I had thought of that too, and it was very far from comfort
ing to me to find that he had thought of it ; for it seemed to
render it more probable.
“ But, Joe."
“ Yes, old chap."
“Here am I, getting on in the first year of my time, and,
since the day of my being bound, I have never thanked Miss
Havisham , or asked after her, or shown that I remember her . ”
“ That's true, Pip ; and unless you was to turn her out a set
of shoes all four round — and which I meantersay as even a set
of shoes all four round might not act acceptable as a present,
"
in a total wacancy of hoofs
“ I don't mean that sort of remembrance, Joe ; I don't mean
a present. "
But Joe had got the idea of a present in his head and must
harp upon it. “ Or even,” said he , “ if you was helped to knock- '
ing her up a new chain for the front door - or say a gross or
two of shark -headed screws for general use - or some light
fancy article, such as a toasting -fork when she took her muffins
-or a gridiron when she took a sprat or such like 1
“ I don't mean any present at all, Joe,” I interposed. .
“ Well,” said Joe, still harping on it as though I had particu
larly pressed it, “ if I was yourself, Pip, I wouldn't. No, I
would not. For what's a door -chain when she's got one always
up ? And shark -headers is open to misrepresentations. And if
it was a toasting -fork, you'd go into brass and do yourself no
credit . And the oncommonest workman can't show himself
oncommon in a gridiron - for a gridiron is a gridiron ,” said Joe,
steadfastly impressing it upon me, as if he were endeavouring
to rouse me from a fixed delusion , " and you may haim at what
you like, but a gridiron it will come out, either by your leave
or again your leave, and you can't help yourself
“My dear Joe , ” I cried, in desperation, taking hold of his
coat, “ don't go on in that way. I never thought of making
Miss Havisham any present .”
“ No, Pip ,” Joe assented, as if he had been contending for
that, all along ; “ and what I say to you is, you are right, Pip."
100 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Yes, Joe ; but what I wanted to say , was, that as we are

rather slack just now, if you would give me a half -holiday to
morrow , I think I would go up -town and make a call on Miss
Est - Havisham . ”
“ Which her name,” said Joe, gravely, “ ain't Estavisham , Pip,
unless she have been rechris'ened .”
“ I know , Joe, I know . It was a slip of mine. What do you
think of it, Joe ?"
In brief, Joe thought that if I thought well of it, he thought
well of it. But, he was particular in stipulating that if I were
not received with cordiality, or if I were not encouraged to
repeat my visit as a visit which had no ulterior object but was
simply one of gratitude for a favour received , then this experi
mental trip should have no successor. By these conditions I
promised to abide.
Now , Joe kept a journeyman at weekly wages whose name
was Orlick . He pretended that his christian name was Dolge
-a clear impossibility — but he was a fellow of that obstinate
disposition that I believe him to have been the prey of no delu
sion in this particular, but wilfully to have imposed that name
upon the village as an affront to its understanding. He was a
broad -shouldered loose -limbed swarthy fellow of great strength ,
never in a hurry, and always slouching. He never even seemed
to come to his work on purpose, but would slouch in as if by
mere accident; and when he went to the Jolly Bargemen to eat
his dinner, or went away at night, he would slouch out, like
Cain or the Wandering Jew, as if he had no idea where he was
going and no intention of ever coming back. He lodged at a
sluice -keeper's out on the marshes, and on working days would
come slouching from his hermitage, with his hands in his
pockets and his dinner loosely tied in a bundle round his neck
and dangling on his back. On Sundays he mostly lay all day
on sluice-gates, or stood against ricks and barns. He always
slouched, locomotively, with his eyes on the ground ; and,
when accosted or otherwise required to raise them , he looked up
in a half resentful, half puzzled way, as though the only
thought he ever had , was, that it was rather an odd and injurious
fact that he should never thinking
This morose journeyman had no liking for me. When I was
very small and timid , he gave me to understand that the Devil
lived in a black corner of the forge, and that he knew the fiend
very well : also that it was necessary to make up the fire, once
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 101

in seven years, with a live boy, and that I might consider

myself fuel. When I became Joe's 'prentice, Orlick was per
haps confirmed in some suspicion that I should displace him ;
howbeit, he liked me still less. Not that he ever said anything,
or did anything, openly importing hostility ; I only noticed that
he always beat his sparks in my direction, and that whenever I
sang Old Clem, he came in out of time.
Dolge Orlick was at work and present, next day, when I re
minded Joe of my half - holiday. He said nothing at the
moment, for he and Joe had just got a piece of hot iron between
them, and I was at the bellows ; but by - and -by he said, leaning
on his hammer :
66
•Now , master ! Sure you're not a going to favour only one
of us. If Young Pip has a half-holiday, do as much for Old
Orlick .” I suppose he was about five-and -twenty, but he usually
spoke of himself as an ancient person .
“ Why, what'll you do with a half -holiday, if you get it ? "
said Joe.
6 What'll I do with it ! What'll he do with it ? I'll do as
much with it as him ," said Orlick .
“ As to Pip, he's going up -town ,” said Joe.
“ Well then , as to Old Orlick , he's a going up - town ,” retorted
that worthy. Two can go up -town . Tain't only one wot can
go up - town ."
6 Don't lose your temper,” said Joe.
66
“ Shall if I like,” growled Orlick . · Some and their up -town
ing ! Now, master ! Come. No favouring in this shop. Be
a man !”
The master refusing to entertain the subject until the journey .
man was in a better temper, Orlick plunged at the furnace, drew
out a red -hot bar, made at me with it as if he were going to run
it through my body, whisked it round my head, laid it on the
anvil, hammered it out — as if it were I, I thought, and the
sparks were my spirting blood - and finally said , when he had
hammered himself hot and the iron cold, and he again leaned on
his hammer :
Now, master !"
“ Are you all right now ?" demanded Joe.
“Ah ! I am all right ,” said gruff Old Orlick.
“ Then, as in general you stick to your work as well as most
men ,” said Joe , " let it be a half -holiday for all.”
My sister had been standing silent in the yard, within hear
 102 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

ing - she was a most unscrupulous spy and listener - and she
instantly looked in at one of the windows.
“ Like you, you fool !” said she to Joe, “giving holidays to
great idle hulkers like that. You are a rich man, upon my life ,
to waste wages in that way . I wish I was his master !”
“ You'd be everybody's master, if you durst,” retorted Orlick ,
with an ill - favoured grin .
( " Let her alone ,” said Joe . )
“ I'd be a match for all noodles and all rogues," returned my
sister, beginning to work herself into a mighty rage. - And I
couldn't be a match for the noodles , without being a match for
your master , who's the dunder -headed king of the noodles . And
I couldn't be a match for the rogues , without being a match for
you, who are the blackest -looking and the worst rogue between
this and France . Now !"
“ You're a foul shrew, Mother Gargery ," growled the journey
man . “ If that makes a judge of rogues, you ought to be a
good’un .”
( “ Let her alone, will you ?” said Joe. )
“What did you say ?” cried my sister, beginning to scream .
“ What did you say ? What did that fellow Orlick say to me,
Pip ? What did he call me, with my husband standing by ?
0 ! 0 ! 0 ! " Each of these exclamations was a shriek ; and I
must remark of my sister, what is equally true of all the violent
women I have ever seen, that passion was no excuse for her,
because it is undeniable that instead of lapsing into passion, she
consciously and deliberately took extraordinary pains to force
herself into it, and became blindly furious by regular stages ;
“ what was the name that he gave me before the base man who
swore to defend me ? 0 ! Hold me ! O !"
12
“ Ah - h - h ! " growled the journeyman , between his teeth, “ I'a
hold you, if you was my wife. I'd hold you under the pump
and choke it out of you .”
(" I tell you , let her alone," said Joe .)
“ Oh ! To hear him !” cried my sister, with a clap of her
hands and a scream together --which was her next stage. “ To
hear the names he's giving me ! That Orlick ! In my own
house ! Me, a married woman ! With my husband standing
by ! O ! O !” Here my sister, after a fit of . clappings and
screamings, beat her hands upon her bosom and upon her knees,
and threw her cap off, and pulled her hair down — which were
the last stages on her road to frenzy. Being by this time a
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 103

perfect Fury and a complete success, she made a dash at the

door, which I had fortunately locked.
What could the wretched Joe do now, after his disregarded
parenthetical interruptions, but stand up to his journeyman,
and ask him what he meant by interfering betwixt himself and
Mrs. Joe ; and further whether he was man enough to come on ?
Old Orlick felt that the situation admitted of nothing less than
coming on, and was on his defence straightway ; so , without so
much as pulling off their singed and burnt aprons, they went at
one another, like two giants. But, if any man in that neigh
bourhood could stand up long against Joe, I never saw the man .
Orlick, as if he had been of no more account than the pale
young gentleman, was very soon among the coal-dust, and in
no hurry to come out of it. Then, Joe unlocked the door and
picked up my sister, who had dropped insensible at the window
(but who had seen the fight first I think ), and who was carried
into the house and laid down, and who was recommended to
revive, and would do nothing but struggle and clench her hands
in Joe's hair. Then came that singular calm and silence
which succeed all uproars ; and then with the vague sensation
which I have always connected with such a lull-namely, that
it was Sunday, and somebody was dead — I went up -stairs to
dress myself.
When I came down again, I found Joe and Orlick sweeping
up, without any other traces of discomposure than a slit in one
of Orlick’s nostrils, which was neither expressive nor ornamen
tal. A pot of beer had appeared from the Jolly Bargemen, and
they were sharing it by turns in a peaceable manner. The lull
had a sedative and philosophical influence on Joe, who followed
me out into the road to say, as a parting observation that might
do me good, “ On the Rampage, Pip, and off the Rampage, Pip ;
such is Life !"
With what absurd emotions ( for, we think the feelings that
are very serious in a man quite comical in a boy) I found iny
self again going to Miss Havisham's, matters little here. Nor,
how I passed and repassed the gate many times before I could
make up my mind to ring. Nor, how I debated whether I
should go away without ringing ; nor, how I should undoubt
edly have gone, if my time had been my own, to come back.
Miss Sarah Pocket came to the gate. No Estella.
How, then ? You here again ? ” said Miss Pocket. “ What
do you want ? "
104 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

When I said that I only came to see how Miss Havisham was,
Sarah evidently deliberated whether or no she should send me
about my business. But, unwilling to hazard the responsibility,
she let me in, and presently brought the sharp message that I
was to “ come up ."
Everything was unchanged, and Miss Havisham was alone.
“ Well ? " said she, fixing her eyes upon me. “ I hope you want
nothing ? You'll get nothing."
66
* No indeed, Miss Havisham . I only wanted you to know
that I am doing very well in my apprenticeship, and am always
much obliged to you .”
66
• There, there ! ” with the old restless fingers. 66 Come now
and then ; come on your birthday.-- Ay !" she cried suddenly ,
turning herself and her chair towards me, “ You are looking
round for Estella ? Hey ? ”
I had been looking round — in fact, for Estella — and I stam
mered that I hoped she was well.
66
Abroad ," said Miss Havisham ; “ educating for a lady ; far
out of reach ; prettier than ever ; admired by all who see her.
Do you feel that you have lost her ?”
There was such a malignant enjoyment in her utterance of
the last words, and she broke into such a disagreeable laugh,
that I was at a loss what to say. She spared me the trouble of
considering, by dismissing me. When the gate was closed upon
me by Sarah of the walnut-shell countenance, I felt more than
ever dissatisfied with my home and with my trade and with every
thing ; and that was all I took by that motion.
As I was loitering along the High -street looking in disconso
lately at the shop windows, and thinking what I would buy if I
were a gentleman, who should come out of the bookshop but
Mr. Wopsle. Mr. Wopsle had in his hand the affecting tragedy
of George Barnwell, in which he had that moment invested six
pence, with the view of heaping every word of it on the head of
Pumblechook, with whom he was going to drink tea. No
sooner did he see me, than he appeared to consider that a
special Providence had put a 'prentice in his way to be read at ;
and he laid hold of me, and insisted on my accompanying him to
the Pumblechookian parlour. As I knew it would be miserable
at home, and as the nights were dark and the way was dreary,
and almost any companionship on the road was better than none,
I made no great resistance ; consequently, we turned into
Pumblechook's just as the street and the shops were lighting up .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 105

As I never assisted at any other representation of George

Barnwell, I don't know how long it may usually take ; but I
know very well that it took until half -past nine o'clock that night,
and that when Mr. Wopsle got into Newgate, I thought he
never would go to the scaffold , he became so much slower than
at any former period of his disgraceful career. I thought it a
little too much that he should complain of being cut short in
his flower after all, as if he had not been running to seed, leaf
after leaf, ever since his course began. This, however, was a
mere question of length and wearisomeness. What stung me,
was the identification of the whole affair with my unoffending
self. When Barnwell began to go wrong, I declare I felt
positively apologetic, Pumblechook's indignant stare so taxe
me with it. Wopsle, too, took pains to present me in the worst
light. At once ferocious and maudlin I was made to murder
my uncle with no extenuating circumstances whatever ; Mill
wood put me down in argument, on every occasion ; it became
sheer monomania in my master's daughter to care a button for
me ; and all I can say for my gasping and procrastinating
conduct on the fatal morning, is, that it was worthy of the
general feebleness of my character. Even after I was happily
hanged and Wopsle had closed the book, Pumblechook sat star
ing at me, and shaking his head, and saying, “ Take warning,
boy, take warning ! " as if it were a well -known fact that I
contemplated murdering a near relation , provided I could
only induce one to have the weakness to become my benefactor.
It was a very dark night when it was all over, and when I
set out with Mr. Wopsle on the walk home. Beyond town, we
found a heavy mist out, and it fell wet and thick . The turn
pike lamp was a' blur, quite out of the lamp's usual place ap
parently, and its rays looked solid substance on the fog. We
were noticing this, and saying how that the mist rose with a
change of wind from a certain quarter of our marshes, when we
came upon a man, slouching under the lee of the turnpike house.
“Halloa ! ” we said, stopping. « Orlick there ? ”
“ Ah ! ” he answered, slouching out. “ I was standing by, a
minute, on the chance of company ."
“ You are late ," I remarked .
Orlick not unnaturally answered, “ Well ? And you're late."
“We have been ,” said Mr. Wopsle, exalted with his late per
formance, " we have been indulging, Mr. Orlick, in an intel
lectual evening."
106 GREAT EXPECTATIONS ,
old Orlick growled , as if he had nothing to say about that,
and we all went on together. I asked him presently whether he
had been spending his half-holiday up and down town ?
“ Yes ,” said he, “ all of it. I come in behind yourself. I
didn't see you, but I must have been pretty close behind you.
By66-the -by, the guns is going again.”
At the Hulks ?” said I.
“ Ay ! There's some of the birds flown from the cages. The
guns have been going since dark, about. You'll hear one pre
sently ."
In effect, we had not walked many yards further, when the
well - remembered boom came towards us, deadened by the mist,
and heavily rolled away along the low grounds by the river, as
if it were pursuing and threatening the fugitives.
“ A good night for cutting off in , " said Orlick . 66 We'd be
puzzled how to bring down a jail -bird on the wing, to- night. "
The subject was a suggestive one to me, and I thought about
it in silence. Mr. Wopsle, as the ill - requited uncle of the
evening's tragedy, fell to meditating aloud in his garden at
Camberwell. Orlick, with his hands in his pockets, slouched
heavily at my side. It was very dark , very wet, very muddy,
and so we splashed along. Now and then, the sound of the
signal cannon broke upon us again, and again rolled sulkily
along the course of the river. I kept myself to myself and my
thoughts. Mr. Wopsle died amiably at Camberwell, and ex
ceedingly game on Bosworth Field, and in the greatest agonies
at Glastonbury. Orlick sometimes growled , “Beat it out, beat
it out - old Clem ! With a clink for the stout -- old Clem ! "
I thought he had been drinking, but he was not drunk.
Thus, we came to the village. The way by which we ap
proached it, took us past the Three Jolly Bargemen , which we
were surprised to find — it being eleven o'clock - in a state of
commotion , with the door wide open , and unwonted lights that
had been hastily caught up and put down, scattered about.
Mr. Wopsle dropped in to ask what was the matter ( surmising
that a convict had been taken ), but came running out in a great
hurry.
6. There's something wrong,” said he, without stopping, “ up
at your place, Pip. Run all ! ”
“ What is it ?" I asked , keeping up with him. So did Orlick,
at my side.
66
I can't quite understand. The house seems to have been
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 107

violently entered when Joe Gargery was out . Supposed by

convicts. Somebody has been attacked and hurt.”
We were running too fast to admit of more being said, and we
made no stop until we got into our kitchen . It was full of
people ; the whole village was there, or in the yard ; and there
was a surgeon , and there was Joe, and there were a group of
women , all on the floor in the midst of the kitchen . The un
employed bystanders drew back when they saw me, and so I
became aware of my sister - lying without sense or movement on
the bare boards where she had been knocked down by a tre
mendous blow on the back of the head , dealt by some unknown
hand when her face was turned towards the fire — destined never
to be on the Rampage again, while she was wife of Joe.

CHAPTER XVI.

WITH my head full of George Barnwell, I was at first disposed

to believe that I must have had some hand in the attack upon
my sister, or at all events that as her near relation, popularly
known to be under obligations to her, I was a more legitimate
object of suspicion than any one else. But when , in the clearer
light of next morning, I began to reconsider the matter and to
hear it discussed around me on all sides, I took another view of
the case , which was more reasonable.
Joe had been at the Three Jolly Bargemen , smoking his pipe,
from a quarter after eight o'clock to a quarter before ten . While
he was there, my sister had been seen standing at the kitchen
door, and had exchanged Good Night with a farm - labourer
going home. The man could not be more particular as to the
time at which he saw her (he got into dense confusion when he
tried to be), than that it must have been before nine. When
Joe went home at five minutes before ten, he found her struck
down on the floor, and promptly called in assistance. The fire
had not then burnt unusually low, nor was the snuff of the
candle very long ; the candle, however, had been blown out.
Nothing had been taken away from any part of the house.
Neither, beyond the blowing out of the candle - which stood on
a table between the door and my sister, and was behind her
when she stood facing the fire and was struck- was there any
disarrangement of the kitchen, excepting such as she herself had
made, in falling and bleeding. But, there was one remarkable
108 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

piece of evidence on the spot. She had been struck with some
thing blunt and heavy, on the head and spine ; after the blows
were dealt, something heavy had been thrown down at her with
considerable violence, as she lay on her face. And on the
ground beside her, when Joe picked her up, was a convict's leg
iron which had been filed asunder.
Now, Joe , examining this iron with a smith's eye, declared
it to have been filed asunder some time ago . The hue and cry
going off to the Hulks, and people coming thence to examine
the iron, Joe's opinion was corroborated . They did not under
take to say when it had left the prison-ships to which it un
doubtedly had once belonged ; but they claimed to know for
certain that that particular manacle had not been worn by
either of two convicts who had escaped last night. Further,
one of those two was already retaken, and had not freed himself
of his iron .
Knowing what I knew, I set up an inference of my own here .
I believed the iron to be my convict’s iron— the iron I had seen
and heard him filing at, on the marshes — but my mind did not
accuse him of having put it to its latest use . For, I believed
one of two other persons to have become possessed of it, and to
have turned it to this cruel account. Either Orlick, or the
strange man who had shown me the file.
Now , as to Orlick ; he had gone to town exactly as he told
us when we picked him up at the turnpike, he had been seen
about town all the evening, he had been in divers companies
in several public -houses, and he had come back with myself
and Mr. Wopsle. There was nothing against him , save the
quarrel; and my sister had quarrelled with him , and with
everybody else about her, ten thousand times. As to the
strange man ; if he had come back for his two bank - notes there
could have been no dispute about them, because my sister was
fully prepared to restore them . Besides, there had been no
altercation ; the assailant had come in so silently and suddenly,
that she had been felled before she could look round .
It was horrible to think that I had provided the weapon,
however undesignedly, but I could hardly think otherwise. I
suffered unspeakable trouble while I considered and recon
sidered whether I should at last dissolve that spell of my child
hood and tell Joe all the story. For months afterwards, I every
day settled the question finally in the negative, and reopened
and reargued it next morning. The contention came, after all,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 109

to this ; – the secret was such an old one now, had so grown
into me and become a part of myself, that I could not tear it
away. In addition to the dread that, having led up to so much
mischief, it would be now more likely than ever to alienate
Joe from me if he believed it, I had the further restraining
dread that he would not believe it, but would assert it with the
fabulous dogs and veal -cutlets as a monstrous invention. How
ever, I temporized with myself, of course -- for, was I not
wavering between right and wrong, when the thing is always
done ? -and resolved to make a full disclosure if I should see
any such new occasion as a new chance of helping in the dis
covery of the assailant.
The Constables, and the Bow Street men from London - for, if
this happened in the days of the extinct red waistcoated police 1
—were about the house for a week or two, and did pretty much
what I have heard and read of like authorities doing in other
such cases . They took up several obviously wrong people, and
they ran their heads very hard against wrong ideas, and per
1
sisted in trying to fit the circumstances to the ideas, instead of
trying to extract ideas from the circumstances. Also, they
stood about the door of the Jolly Bargemen , with knowing and
reserved looks that filled the whole neighbourhood with admira
tion ; and they had a mysterious manner of taking their drink,
that was almost as good as taking the culprit. But not quite,
for they never did it.
Long after these constitutional powers had dispersed, my
sister lay very ill in bed. Her sight was disturbed , so that she
saw objects multiplied, and grasped at visionary teacups and
wine - glasses instead of the realities ; her hearing was greatly
impaired ; her memory also ; and her speech was unintelligible.
When, at last, she came round so far as to be helped down
stairs, it was still necessary to keep my slate always by her,
that she might indicate in writing what she could not indicate
in speech . As she was ( very bad handwriting apart ) a more
than indifferent speller, and as Joe was a more than indifferent
reader , extraordinary complications arose between them , which
I was always called in to solve . The administration of mutton
instead of medicine, the substitution of Tea for Joe, and the
2
baker for bacon, were among the mildest of my own mistakes. 1
However, her temper was greatly improved, and she was
1
patient. A tremulous uncertainty of the action of all her
limbs soon became a part of her regular state, and afterwards,
110 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

at intervals of two or three months, she would often put her

hands to her head, and would then remain for about a week at
a time in some gloomy aberration of mind. We were at a loss
to find a suitable attendant for her, until a circumstance hap
pened conveniently to relieve us. Mr. Wopsle’s great- aunt
conquered a confirmed habit of living into which she had fallen ,
and Biddy became a part of our establishment.
It may have been about a month after my sister's reappearance
in the kitchen, when Biddy came to us with a small speckled
box containing the whole of her worldly effects, and became a
blessing to the household . Above all, she was a blessing to
Joe, for the dear old fellow was sadly cut up by the constant
contemplation of the wreck of his wife, and had been accus
tomed, while attending on her of an evening, to turn to me
every now and then and say, with his blue eyes moistened ,
“ Such a fine figure of a woman as she once were, Pip !" Biddy
instantly taking the cleverest charge of her as though she had
studied her from infancy, Joe became able in some sort to
appreciate the greater quiet of his life, and to get down to the
Jolly Bargemen now and then for a change that did him good .
It was characteristic of the police people that they had all
more or less suspected poor Joe (though he never knew it),
and that they had to a man concurred in regarding him as one
of the deepest spirits they had ever encountered .
Biddy's first triumph in her new office, was to solve a difficulty
that had completely vanquished me . I had tried hard at it, but
had made nothing of it. Thus it was :
Again and again and again, my sister had traced upon the
slate, a character that looked like a curious T, and then with
the utmost eagerness had called our attention to it as something
she particularly wanted . I had in vain tried everything pro
ducible that began with a T, from tar to toast and tub . At
length it had come into my head that the sign looked like a
hammer, and on my lustily calling that word in my sister's ear,
she had begun to hammer on the table and had expressed a
qualified assent. Thereupon , I had brought in all our hammers,
one after another, but without avail. Then I bethought me of
a crutch , the shape being much the same, and I borrowed one
in the village, and displayed it to my sister with considerable
confidence . But she shook her head to that extent when she
was shown it, that we were terrified lest in her weak and
shattered state she should dislocate her neck .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 111
When my sister found that Biddy was very quick to under
stand her, this mysterious sign reappeared on the slate. Biddy
looked thoughtfully at it, heard my explanation, looked thought
fully at my sister, looked thoughtfully at Joe (who was always
represented on the slate by his initial letter), and ran into the
forge, followed by Joe and me.
• Why, of course ! " cried Biddy, with an exultant face . “ Don't
you see ? It's him !!!!
Orlick, without a doubt ! She had lost his name, and could
only signify him by his hammer. We told him why we wanted
him to come into the kitchen, and he slowly laid down his
hammer, wiped his brow with his arm , took another wipe at it
with his apron, and came slouching out; with a curious loose
vagabond bend in the knees that strongly distinguished him .
I confess that I expected to see my sister denounce him, and
that I was disappointed by the different result. She manifested
the greatest anxiety to be on good terms with him, was evidently
much pleased by his being at length produced, and motioned
that she would have him given something to drink . She
watched his countenance as if she were particularly wishful to
be assured that he took kindly to his reception, she showed
every possible desire to conciliate him , and there was an air of
humble propitiation in all she did, such as I have seen pervade
the bearing of a child towards a hard master. After that day,
a day rarely passed without her drawing the hammer on her
slate, and without Orlick's slouching in and standing doggedly
before her, as if he knew no more than I did what to make
of it.

CHAPTER XVII.

I now fell into a regular routine of apprenticeship -life, which

was varied, beyond the limits of the village and the marshes,
by no more remarkable circumstance than the arrival of my birth
day and my paying another visit to Miss Havisham . I found
Miss Sarah Pocket still on duty at the gate, I found Miss
Havisham just as I had left her, and she spoke of Estella in the
very same way, if not in the very same words. The interview
lasted but a few minutes, and she gave me a guinea when I was
going, and told me to come again on my next birthday. I may
mention at once that this became an annual custom. I tried to
112 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

decline taking the guinea on the first occasion, but with no

better effect than causing her to ask me very angrily, if I ex
pected more ? Then, and after that, I took it.
So unchanging was the dull old house, the yellow light in
the darkened room, the faded spectre in the chair by the dress
ing- table glass, that I felt as if the stopping of the clocks had
stopped Time in that mysterious place, and, while I and every
thing else outside it grew older, it stood still. Daylight never
entered the house as to my thoughts and remembrances of it,
any more than as to the actual fact. It bewildered me, and
under its influence I continued at heart to hate my trade and to
be ashamed of home.
Imperceptibly I became conscious of a change in Biddy,
however. Her shoes came up at the heel, her hair grew bright
and neat, her hands were always clean . She was not beautiful
-she was common, and could not be like Estella — but she was
pleasant and wholesome and sweet-tempered. She had not
been with us more than a year (I remember her being newly
out of mourning at the time it struck me), when I observed to
myself one evening that she had curiously thoughtful and
attentive eyes ; eyes that were very pretty and very good.
It came of my lifting up my own eyes from a task I was
poring at - writing some passages from a book, to improve
myself in two ways at once by a sort of stratagem — and see
ing Biddy observant of what I was about. I laid down my
pen, and Biddy stopped in her needlework without laying it
down .
66
Biddy ,” said I, “ how do you manage it ? Either I am very
stupid, or you are very clever . ”
“ What is it that I manage ? I don't know,” returned Biddy,
smiling
She managed our whole domestic life, and wonderfully ton ;
but I did not mean that, though that made what I did mean ,
more surprising
“ How do you manage, Biddy,” said I, “ to learn everything
that I learn , and always to keep up with me ?” I was beginning
to be rather vain of my knowledge, for I spent my birthday
guineas on it , and set aside the greater part of my pocket
money for similar investment ; though I have no doubt, now,
that the little I knew was extremely dear at the price.
66“ I might as well ask you," said Biddy, “ how you manage ?"
No ; because when I come in from the forge of a niglit,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 113

any one can see me turning to at it. But you never turn to at
it, 66 Biddy."
I suppose I must catch it—like a cough,” said Biddy, quietly ;
and went on with her sewing.
Pursuing my idea as I leaned back in my wooden chair and
looked at Biddy sewing away with her head on one side, I
began to think her rather an extraordinary girl. For, I called
to mind now, that she was equally accomplished in the terms of
our trade, and the names of our different sorts of work , and
our various tools. In short, whatever I knew , Biddy knew .
Theoretically, she was already as good a blacksmith as I, or
better.
“ You are one of those, Biddy, ” said I, “ who make the most of
every chance . You never had a chance before you came here,
and see how improved you are ! "
Biddy looked at me for an instant, and went on with her
sewing. “ I was your first teacher though ; wasn't I ? ” said she,
as she sewed .
“ Biddy !" I exclaimed , in amazement. “ Why, you are crying ! ”
“ No I am not , ” said Biddy, looking up and laughing. “ What
put that in your head ? ”
What could have put it in my head, but the glistening of a
tear as it dropped on her work ? I sat silent, recalling what a
drudge she had been until Mr. Wopsle’s great-aunt successfully
overcame that bad habit of living, so highly desirable to be got
rid of by some people. I recalled the hopeless circumstances by
which she had been surrounded in the miserable little shop and
the miserable little noisy evening school, with that miserable old
bundle of incompetence always to be dragged and shouldered .
I reflected that even in those untoward times there must have
been latent in Biddy what was now developing, for, in my first
uneasiness and discontent I had turned to her for help , as a
matter of course. Biddy sat quietly sewing, shedding no more
tears, and while I looked at her and thought about it all, it
occurred to me that perhaps I had not been sufficiently grateful
to Biddy. I might have been too reserved , and should have
patronized her more (though I did not use that precise word in
my meditations), with my confidence.
“ Yes, Biddy, ” I observed, when I had done turning it over,
you were my first teacher, and that at a time when we little
thought of ever being together like this, in this kitchen. ”
“ Ah , poor thing ! " replied Biddy. It was like her self-forget
I
114 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

fulness, to transfer the remark to my sister, and to get up and

be busy about her, making her more comfortable ; “ that's sadly
true !”
Well, ” said I, “ we must talk together a little more, as we
used to do. And I must consult you a little more, as I used to
do. Let us have a quiet walk on the marshes next Sunday,
Biddy, and a long chat.”
My sister was never left alone now ; but Joe more than
readily undertook the care of her on that Sunday afternoon, and
Biddy and I went out together. It was summer -time and lovely
weather. When we had passed the village and the church and
the churchyard, and were out on the marshes and began to see
the sails of the ships as they sailed on, I began to combine Miss
Havisham and Estella with the prospect, in my usual way.
When we came to the river -side and sat down on the bank, with
the water rippling at our feet, making it all more quiet than
it would have been without that sound, I resolved that it was a
good time and place for the admission of Biddy into my inner
confidence.
Biddy,” said I, after binding her to secrecy, " I want to be a
gentleman . "
“ Oh, I wouldn't, if I was you ! ” shereturned . “ I don't think
it would answer.”
“ Biddy,” said I, with some severity, “ I have particular reasons
for wanting to be a gentleman ."
* You know best, Pip ; but don't you think you are happier as
you are ? "
Biddy,” I exclaimed , impatiently, “ I am not at all happy as
I am . I am disgusted with my calling and with my life . I
have never taken to either, since I was bound. Don't be absurd .”
“ Was I absurd ?" said Biddy, quietly raising her eyebrows;
I am sorry for that ; I didn't mean to be. I only want you to
do well, and be comfortable. ”
“ Well then, understand once for all that I never shall or can
be comfortable - or anything but miserable — there, Biddy 1—
unless I can lead a very different sort of life from the life I
lead now .”
“ That's a pity ! " said Biddy, shaking her head with a sorrow
ful air .
Now , I too had so often thought it a pity, that, in the singu
lar kind of quarrel with myself which I was always carrying on,
I was half inclined to shed tears of vexation and distress when
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 115

Biddy gave utterance to her sentiment and my own . I told her

she was right, and I knew it was much to be regretted , but still
it was not to be helped.
“ If I could have settled down, " I said to Biddy, plucking up
the short grass within reach , much as I had once upon a time
pulled my feelings out of my hair and kicked them into the
brewery wall : “if I could have settled down and been but half
as fond of the forge as I was when I was little, I know it would
have been much better for me. You and I and Joe would have
wanted nothing then , and Joe and I would perhaps have gone
partners when I was out of my time, and I might even have
grown up to keep company with you , and we might have sat on
this very bank on a fine Sunday, quite different people. I should
have been good enough for you ; shouldn't I, Biddy ? ”
Biddy sighed as she looked at the ships sailing on, and re
turned for answer, “ Yes ; I am not over -particular .” It scarcely
sounded flattering, but I knew she meant well.
“ Instead of that," said I, plucking up more grass and chewing
CG
a blade or two, see how I am going on. Dissatisfied , and un
comfortable, and — what would it signify to me, being coarse
and common , if nobody had told me so !"
Biddy turned her face suddenly towards mine, and looked
far more attentively at me than she had looked at the sailing ships.
" It was neither a very true nor a very polite thing to say,”
she remarked , directing her eyes to the ships again . “ Who
said it ? ”
I was disconcerted, for I had broken away without quite sce
ing where I was going to. It was not to be shuffled off now,
however, and I answered , “ The beautiful young lady at Miss
Havisham's, and she's more beautiful than anybody ever was ,
and I admire her dreadfully, and I want to be a gentleman on
her account.” Having made this lunatic confession , I began to
throw my torn -up grass into the river, as if I had some thoughts
of following it.
“ Do you want to be a gentleman , to spite her or to gain her
over ?” Biddy quietly asked me, after a pause.
" I don't know," I moodily answered .
Because, if it is to spite her," Biddy pursued, “ I should
think - but you know best — that might be better and more inde
pendently done by caring nothing for her words. And if it is
to gain her over, I should think – but you know best- she was
not worth gaining over. ”
116 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Exactly what I myself had thought, many times. Exactly

what was perfectly manifest to me at the moment. But how
could I, a poor dazed village lad, avoid that wonderful incon
sistency into which the best and wisest of men fall every day ?
It maybe all quite true, " said I to Biddy, 66 but I admire her
dreadfully . ”
In short, I turned over on my face when I came to that, and
got a good grasp on the hair on each side of my head , and
wrenched it well. All the while knowing the madness of my
heart to be so very mad and misplaced, that I was quite con
scious it would have served my face right, if I had lifted it up
by my hair, and knocked it against the pebbles as a punishment
for belonging to such an idiot.
Biddy was the wisest of girls, and she tried to reason no
more with me. She put her hand , which was a comfortable
hand though roughened by work, upon my hands, one after an
other, and gently took them out of my hair. Then she softly
patted my shoulder in a soothing way, while with my face upon
my sleeve I cried a little - exactly as I had done in the brewery
yard — and felt vaguely convinced that I was very much ill used
by somebody, or by everybody : I can't say which.
66 I am glad of one thing,” said Biddy, “ and that is, that
you
have felt you could give me your confidence, Pip . And I am glad
of another thing, and that is, that of course you know you may
depend upon my keeping it and always so far deserving it. If
your first teacher (dear ! such a poor one, and so much in need
of being taught herself !) had been your teacher at the present
time, she thinks she knows what lesson she would set. But it
would be a hard one to learn, and you have got beyond her, and
it's of no use now . ” So, with a quiet sigh for me, Biddy rose
from the bank, and said , with a fresh and pleasant change of
voice, “ Shall we walk a little further, or go home ?”
66
Biddy,” I cried , getting up, putting my arm around her neck,
and giving her a kiss, “ I shall always tell you everything .”
“ Till you're a gentleman , " said Biddy.
“ You know I never shall be, so that's always. Not that I
have any occasion to tell you anything, for you know everything
I know — as I told you at home the other night.”
“ Ah ! ” said Biddy, quite in a whisper, as she looked away at
the ships. And then repeated, with her former pleasant change ;
“ shall we walk a little further, or go home ?”
I said to Biddy we would walk a little further, and we did so,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 117
and the summer afternoon toned down into the summer even
ing, and it was very beautiful. I began to consider whether
I was not more naturally and wholesomely situated, after all, in
these circumstances, than playing beggar my neighbour by
candlelight in the room with the stopped clocks, and being
despised by Estella . I thought it would be very good for me if
I could get her out of my head , with all the rest of those re
membrances and fancies, and could go to work determined to
relish what I had to do, and stick to it, and make the best of it .
I asked myself the question whether I did not surely know that
if Estella were beside me at that moment instead of Biddy, she
would make me miserable ? I was obliged to admit that I did
know it for a certainty, and I said to myself, " Pip , what a fool
you are !”
We talked a good deal as we walked , and all that Biddy said
seemed right. Biddy was never insulting, or capricious, or
Biddy to-day and somebody else to -morrow ; she would have
derived only pain, and no pleasure, from giving me pain ; she
would far rather have wounded her own breast than mine. How
could it be, then, that I did not like her much the better of the
two ?
Biddy ,” said I, when we were walking homeward , “ I wish
you could put me right.”
" I wish I could ! ” said Biddy.
“ If I could only get myself to fall in love with you — you
don't mind my speaking so openly to such an old acquaintance ? "
“ Oh dear, not at all ! ” said Biddy. 6. Don't mind me.
“ If I could only get myself to do it, that would be the thing
for me. ”
“ But you never will, you see,” said Biddy.
It didnot appear quite so unlikely to me that evening, as it
would have done if we had discussed it a few hours before. I
therefore observed I was not quite sure of that. But Biddy
said she was, and she said it decisively. In my heart I be
lieved her to be right ; and yet I took it rather ill, too, that she
should be so positive on the point.
When we came near the churchyard, we had to cross an em
bankment, and get over a stile near a sluice-gate. There
started up, from the gate, or from the rushes, or from the ooze
( which was quite in his stagnant way ), Old Orlick .
“ Halloa ! ” he growled , “ where are you two going ?”
“ Where should we be going, but home?"
118 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“Well then ,” said he, “ I'm jiggered if I don't see you home ! "
This penalty of being jiggered was a favourite supposititious
case of his. He attached no definite meaning to the word that I
am aware of, but used it, like his own pretended christian name,
to affront mankind, and convey an idea of something savagely
damaging. When I was younger, I had had a general belief
that if he had jiggered me personally, he would have done it
with a sharp and twisted hook .
Biddy was much against his going with us, and said to me in
a whisper, “ Don't let him come ; I don't like him." As I did
not like him either, I took the liberty of saying that we thanked
him , but we didn't want seeing home. He received that piece
of information with a yell of laughter, and dropped back, but
came slouching after us at a little distance.
Curious to know whether Biddy suspected him of having had
a hand in that murderous attack of which my sister had never
been able to give any account, I asked her why she did not like
him ?
“ Oh ! " she replied, glancing over her shoulder as he slouched
after us , “ because I-I am afraid he likes me . ”
“ Did he ever tell you he liked you ? ” I asked , indignantly.
" No," said Biddy, glancing over her shoulder again , " he
never told me so ; but he dances at me, whenever he can catch
my eye. ”
However novel and peculiar this testimony of attachment, I
did not doubt the accuracy of the interpretation . I was very
hot indeed upon Old Orlick’s daring to admire her ; as hot as if
it were an outrage on myself.
“ But it makes no difference to you, you know,” said Biddy,
calmly .
“ No, Biddy, it makes no difference to me ; only I don't like
it ; I don't approve of it.”
“ Nor I neither ,” said Biddy. “Though that makes no differ
ence to you.”
“ Exactly,” said I ; “but I must tell you I should have no
opinion of you , Biddy, if he danced at you with your own con
sent.”
I kept an eye on Orlick after that night, and, whenever cir
cumstances were favourable to his dancing at Biddy, got before
him, to obscure that demonstration . He had struck root in
Joe's establishment, by reason of my sister's sudden fancy for
him , or I should have tried to get him dismissed. He quite
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 119

understood and reciprocated my good intentions, as I had

reason to know thereafter.
And now , because my mind was not confused enough before ,
I complicated its confusion fifty thousand - fold, by having states
and seasons when I was clear that Biddy was immeasurably
better than Estella , and that the plain honest working life to
which I was born , had nothing in it to be ashamed of, but
offered me sufficient means of self-respect and happiness. At
those times, I would decide conclusively that my disaffection to
dear old Joe and the forge, was gone, and that I was growing
up in a fair way to be partners with Joe and to keep company
with Biddy - when all in a moment some confounding remem
brance of the Havisham days would fall upon me, like a destruc
tive missile, and scatter my wits again . Scattered wits take
a long time picking up ; and often , before I had got thern well
together, they would be dispersed in all directions by one stray
thought, that perhaps after all Miss Havisham was going to
make my fortune when my time was out.
If my time had run out, it would have left me still at the
height of my perplexities, I dare say . It never did run out,
however, but was brought to a premature end, as I proceed to
relate.

CHAPTER XVIII.

It was in the fourth year of my apprenticeship to Joe, and it

was a Saturday night. There was a group assembled round the
fire at the Three Jolly Bargemen, attentive to Mr. Wopsle as
he read the newspaper aloud . Of that group I was one.
A highly popular murder had been committed, and Mr.
Wopsle was imbrued in blood to the eyebrows. He gloated
over every abhorrent adjective in the description, and identified
himself with every witness at the Inquest. He faintly moaned,
“ I am done for,” as the victim , and he barbarously bellowed,
“ I'll serve you out,” as the murderer. He gave the medical
testimony, in pointed imitation of our local practitioner ; and
he piped and shook , as the aged turnpike-keeper who had
heard blows, to an extent so very paralytic as to suggest a doubt
regarding the mental competency of that witness . The coroner,
in Mr. Wopsle's hands, became Timon of Athens ; the beadle ,
Coriolanus. He enjoyed himself thoroughly, and we all enjoyed
120 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

ourselves, and were delightfully comfortable . In this cozy state

of mind we came to the verdict Wilful Murder.
Then, and not sooner, I became aware of a strange gentleman
leaning over the back of the settle opposite me, looking on.
There was an expression of contempt on his face, and he bit the
side of a great forefinger as he watched the group of faces..
"Well !” said the stranger to Mr. Wopsle, when the reading
was done, “ you have settled it all to your own satisfaction , I
have no doubt ?”
Everybody started and looked up, as if it were the murderer .
He looked at everybody coldly and sarcastically .
Guilty , of course ? ” said he. “ Out with it. Come ! "
“Sir, " returned Mr. Wopsle, " without having the honour of
your acquaintance, I do say Guilty .” Upon this we all took
courage to unite in a confirmatory murmur.
“ I know you do , ” said the stranger ; “ I knew you would . I
told you so . But now I'll ask you a question. Do you know ,
or do you not know , that the law of England supposes every
man to be innocent, until he is proved - proved — to be guilty ?"
“Sir,” Mr. Wopsle began to reply, “ as an Englishman myself,
"
I
“ Come ! ” said the stranger, biting his forefinger at him.
“ Don't evade the question . Either you know it, or you don't
know it. Which is it to be ?”
He stood with his head on one side and himself on one side, in
a bullying interrogative manner, and he threw his forefinger at
Mr. Wopsle — as it were to mark him out — before biting it again .
“ Now ! ” said he. “ Do you know it, or don't you know it ?"
“ Certainly I know it," replied Mr. Wopsle.
Certainly you know it. Then why didn't you say so at
first ? Now, I'll ask you another question ; " taking possession
of Mr. Wopsle, as if he had a right to him. - Do you know
that none of these witnesses have yet been cross -examined ?"
Mr. Wopsle was beginning, “ I can only say , ” when the
stranger stopped him .
is What ? You won't answer the question , yes or no ? Now,
I'll try you again .” Throwing his finger at him again . “ Attend
to me. Are you aware , or are you not aware, that none of these
witnesses have not been cross -examined ? Come, I only want
one word from you. Yes, or no ? ”
Mr. Wopsle hesitated, and we all began to conceive rather a
poor opinion of him.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 121

“ Come ! " said the stranger, “ I'll help you. You don't deserve
help, but I'll help you. Look at that paper you hold in your
hand. What is it ?"
" What is it ?" repeated Mr. Wopsle, eyeing it, much at a
loss.
66
Is it,” pursued the stranger in his most sarcastic and sus
picious manner , “ the printed paper you have just been reading
from ?”
Undoubtedly. ”
66
Undoubtedly. Now, turn to that paper, and tell me whether
it distinctly states that the prisoner expressly said that his legal
advisers instructed him altogether to reserve his defence ?"
" I read that just now ," Mr. Wopsle pleaded .
“ Never mind what you read just now , sir ; I don't ask you
what you read just now . You may read the Lord's Prayer
backwards, if you like - and, perhaps, have done it before to-day.
Turn to the paper . No, no, no, my friend ; not to the top of
the column ; you know better than that ; to the bottom, to the
bottom .” (We all began to think Mr. Wopsle full of subter
fuge.) “ Well ? Have you found it ? "
66
Here it is,” said Mr. Wopsle.
“ Now , follow that passage with your eye, and tell me whether
it distinctly states that the prisoner expressly said that he was
instructed by his legal advisers wholly to reserve his defence ?
Come ! Do you make that of it ? ”
Mr. Wopsle answered , - Those are not the exact words."
“ Not the exact words !” repeated the gentleman, bitterly . “Is
that the exact substance ?"
“ Yes," said Mr. Wopsle.
66
Yes," repeated the stranger, looking round at the rest of the
company with his right hand extended towards the witness,
Wopsle. “And now I ask you what you say to the conscience
of that man who, with that passage before his eyes, can lay his
head upon his pillow after having pronounced a fellow - creature
guilty, unheard ?"
We all began to suspect that Mr. Wopsle was not the man we
had thought him , and that he was beginning to be found out.
" And that same man , remember ,” pursued the gentleman,
that same man
throwing his finger at Mr. Wopsle heavily; 6
might be summoned as a juryman upon this very trial, and
having thus deeply committed himself, might return to the
bosom of his family and lay his head upon his pillow , after
 122 GREAT EXPECTATIONS

deliberately swearing that he would well and truly try the issuo
joined between Our Sovereign Lord the King and the prisoner
at the bar, and would a true verdict give according to the evi
dence, so help him God !"
We were all deeply persuaded that the unfortunate Wopsle
had gone too far, and had better stop in his reckless career
while there was yet time.
The strange gentleman , with an air of authority not to be
disputed, and with a manner expressive of knowing something
secret about every one of us that would effectually do for each
individual if he chose to disclose it, left the back of the settle,
and came into the space between the two settles, in front of the
fire, where he remained standing : his left hand in his pocket, /
and he biting the forefinger of his right.
“From information I have received ," said he, looking round
at us as we all quailed before him , “ I have reason to believe
there is a blacksmith among you, by name Joseph-or Joe
Gargery. Which is the man ?"
“ Here is the man ,” said Joe.
The strange gentleman beckoned him out of his place, and
- Joe went.
“You have an apprentice,” pursued the stranger, “ commonly
known as Pip ? Is he here ?"
“ I am here !" I cried .
The stranger did not recognise me, but I recognised him as
the gentleman I had met on the stairs, on the occasion of my
second visit to Miss Havisham . I had known him the moment
I saw him looking over the settle, and now that I stood confront
ing him with his hand upon my shoulder, I checked off again in
detail, his large head, his dark complexion , his deep -set eyes, his
bushy black eyebrows, his large watch - chain , his strong black
dots of beard and whisker, and even the smell of scented soap on
his great hand .
“ I wish to have a private conference with you two,” said he,
when he had surveyed me at his leisure. “ It will take a little
time. Perhaps we had better go to your place of residence.
I prefer not to anticipate my communication here ; you will
impart as much or as little of it as you please to your friends
afterwards ; I have nothing to do with that. ”
Amidst a wondering silence, we three walked out of the Jolly
Bargemen, and in a wondering silence walked home. While
going along, the strange gentleman occasionally looked at me,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 123

and occasionally bit the side of his finger. As we neared home,

Joe vaguely acknowledging the occasion as an impressive and
ceremonious one, went on ahead to open the front door. Our
conference was held in the state parlour, which was feebly
lighted by one candle .
It began with the strange gentleman's sitting down at the
table, drawing the candle to him , and looking over some entries
in his pocket- book. He then put up the pocket-book and set
the candle a little aside : after peering round it into the dark
ness at Joe and me, to ascertain which was which .
“ My name," he said, “is Jaggers, and I am a lawyer in
London . I am pretty well known. I have unusual business to
transact with you, and I commence by explaining that it is not
of my originating. If my advice had been asked, I should not
have been here. It was not asked, and you see me here. What
I have to do as the confidential agent of another, I do. No less,
no more .”
Finding that he could not see us very well from where he sat,
he got up , and threw one leg over the back of a chair and leaned
upon it ; thus having one foot on the seat of the chair, and one
foot on the ground .
“Now, Joseph Gargery, I am the bearer of an offer to relieve
you of this young fellow your apprentice. You would not
object to cancel his indentures at his request and for his good ?
You would not want anything for so doing ?”
“ Lord forbid that I should want anything for not standing in
Pip's way ,” said Joe, staring .
“ Lord forbidding is pious, but not to the purpose," returned
Mr. Jaggers. “ The question is, Would you want anything ?
Do you want anything ?”
“ The answer is, ” returned Joe, sternly, " No. "
I thought Mr. Jaggers glanced at Joe, as if he considered
him a fool for his disinterestedness. But I was too much be
wildered between breathless curiosity and surprise, to be sure
of it.
“ Very well,” said Mr. Jaggers. “ Recollect the admission
you have made, and don't try to go from it presently.”
“Who’s a going to try ?" retorted Joe.
“ I don't say anybody is. Do you keep a dog ?”
“ Yes, I do keep a dog ."
“ Bear in mind then , that Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is
a better. Bear that in mind, will you ? " repeated Mr. Jaggers,
124 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

shutting his eyes and nodding his head at Joe, as if he were

forgiving him something. “ Now, I return to this young fellow .
And the communication I have got to make is, that he has Great
Expectations ."
Joe and I gasped, and looked at one another.
“ I am instructed to communicate to him , " said Mr. Jaggers,
throwing his finger at me, sideways, " that he will come into a
handsome property. Further, that it is the desire of the
present possessor of that property , that he be immediately re
moved from his present sphere of life and from this place, and
be brought up as a gentleman — in a word, as a young fellow of
great expectations."
My dream was out ; my wild fancy was surpassed by sober
rcality ; Miss Havisham was going to make my fortune on a
grand scale.
Now, Mr. Pip ,” pursued the lawyer, “ I address the rest of
what I have to say, to you. You are to understand, first, that
it is the request of the person from whom I take my instruc
tions, that you always bear the name of Pip. You will have no
objection, I dare say , to your great expectations being encum
bered with that easy condition. But if you have any objection ,
this is the time to mention it. "
My heart was beating so fast, and there was such a singing in
my ears, that I could scarcely stammer I had no objection .
“ I should think not ! Now you are to understand, secondly,
Mr. Pip, that the name of the person who is your liberal bene
factor remains a profound secret, until the person chooses to
reveal it. I am empowered to mention that it is the intention
of the person to reveal it at first hand by word of mouth to
yourself. When or where that intention may be carried out, I
cannot say ; no one can say . It may be years hence . Now ,
you are distinctly to understand that you are most positively
prohibited from making any inquiry on this head, or any
allusion or reference, however distant, to any individual whom
soever as the individual, in all the communications you may
have with me . If you have a suspicion in your own breast,
keep that suspicion in your own breast. It is not the least to
the purpose what the reasons of this prohibition are ; they may
be the strongest and gravest reasons, or they may be mere
whim . This is not for you to inquire into . The condition is
laid down. Your acceptance of it, and your observance of it as
binding, is the only remaining condition that I am charged
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 125

with, by the person from whom I take my instructions, and for

whom I am not otherwise responsible. That person is the
person from whom you derive your expectations, and the secret
is solely held by that person and by me. Again, not a very
difficult condition with which to encumber such a rise in
fortune ; but if you have any objection to it, this is the time to
mention it. Speak out.
Once more, I stammered with difficulty that I had no
objection.
" I should think not ! Now, Mr. Pip, I have done with stipu
lations.” Though he called me Mr. Pip, and began rather to
make up to me, he still could not get rid of certain air of
bullying suspicion ; and even now he occasionally shut his eyes
and threw his finger at me while he spoke, as much as to
express that he knew all kinds of things to my disparagement,
if he only chose to mention them. “ We come next, to mere
details of arrangement. You must know that although I use the
term expectations' more than once, you are not endowed with
expectations only. There is already lodged in my hands, a
sum of money amply sufficient for your suitable education and
maintenance . You will please consider me your guardian .
Oh !” for I was going to thank him , “ I teil you at once , I am
paid for my services, or I shouldn't render them . It is con
sidered that you must be better educated, in accordance with
your altered position , and that you will be alive to the
importance and necessity of at once entering on that ad
vantage.”
I said I had always longed for it.
“ Never mind what you have always longed for, Mr. Pip,” he
retorted ; “keep to the record . If you long for it now, that's
enough. Am I answered that you are ready to be placed at
once, under some proper tutor ? Is that it ?”
I stammered yes, that was it.
“ Good . Now , your inclinations are to be consulted. I don't
think that wise, mind, but it's my trust. Have you ever heard
of any tutor whom you would prefer to another ? ”
I had never heard of any tutor but Biddy, and Mr. Wopsle's
great- aunt ; so, I replied in the negative.
“There is a certain tutor, of whom I have some knowledge,
who I think might suit the purpose," said Mr. Jaggers. “ I
don't recommend him , observe ; because I never recommend any
body. The gentleman I speak of is one Mr. Matthew Pocket.”
126 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Ah ! I caught at the name directly. Miss Havisham's rela

tion. The Matthew whom Mr. and Mrs. Camilla had spoken
of. The Matthew whose place was to be at Miss Havisham's
head, when she lay dead, in her bride's dress on the bride's
table.
“ You know the name ?” said Mr. Jaggers, looking shrewdly at
me, and then shutting up his eyes while he waited for my answer.
My answer was, that I had heard of the name.
“ Oh !” said he. “ You have heard of the name. But the
question is, what do you say of it ? "
I said, or tried to say, that I was much obliged to him for his
recommendation -
“No, my young friend ! ” he interrupted, shaking his great
head very slowly. " Recollect yourself !"
Not recollecting myself, I began again that I was much
obliged to him for his recommendation
“No, my young friend ,” he interrupted, shaking his head and
frowning and smiling both at once ; “ no, no, no ; it's very well
done, but it won't do ; you are too young to fix me wi it
Recommendation is not the word, Mr. Pip. Try another.”
Correcting myself, I said that I was much obliged to him for
his mention of Mr. Matthew Pocket
“ That's more like it ! ” cried Mr. Jaggers.
-And (I added ) I would gladly try that gentleman,
“ Good . You had better try him in his own house. The way
shall be prepared for you, and you can see his son first, who is
in London. When will you come to London ?”
I said ( glancing at Joe, who stood looking on, motionless ),
that I supposed I could come directly.
GG
First ,” said Mr. Jaggers, “ you should have some new clothes
to come in, and they should not be working clothes. Say this
day week. You'll want some money. Shall I leave you twenty
guineas ?”
He produced a long purse, with the greatest coolness, and
counted them out on the table and pushed them over to me.
This was the first time he had taken his leg from the chair. He
sat astride of the chair when he had pushed the money over,
and sat swinging his purse and eyeing Joe .
* Well, Joseph Gargery ? You look dumbfoundered ? "
“ I am !” said Joe, in a very decided manner .
“ It was understood that you wanted nothing for yourself,
remember ? "
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 127
“ It were understood , ” said Joe. 66 And it are understood .
And it ever will be similar according."
“But what,” said Mr. Jaggers, swinging his purse, " what if it
was in my instructions to make you a present, as compensation ? "
“ As compensation what for ? " Joe demanded .
“ For the loss of his services. "
Joe laid his hand upon my shoulder with the touch of a
woman . I have often thought him since, like the steam
hammer, that can crush a man or pat an eggshell, in his combi
nation of strength with gentleness. " Pip is that hearty welcome, "
said Joe, " to go free with his services, to honour and fortun', as
no words can tell him . But if you think as Money can make
compensation to me for the loss of the little child — what come
to the forge -- and ever the best of friends!
O dear good Joe, whom I was so ready to leave and so un
thankful to, I see you again, with your muscular blacksmith's
arm before your eyes, and your broad chest heaving, and your
voice dying away. O dear good faithful tender Joe, I feel the
loving tremble of your hand upon my arm , as solemnly this day
as if it had been the rustle of an angel's wing !
But I encouraged Joe at the time. I was lost in the mazes of
my future fortunes, and could not retrace the by-paths we had
trodden together. I begged Joe to be comforted , for (as he
said ) we had ever been the best of friends, and ( as I said ) we
ever would be so. Joe scooped his eyes with his disengaged
wrist, as if he were bent on gouging himself, but said not
another word .
Mr. Jaggers had looked on at this, as one who recognised in
Joe the village idiot, and in me his keeper. When it was
over, he said, weighing in his hand the purse he had ceased to
swing :
“ Now , Joseph Gargery, I warn you this is your last chance .
No half measures with me. Ifyou mean to take a present that
I have it in charge to make you, speak out, and you shall have
it. If on the contrary you mean to say , Here, to his
great amazement, he was stopped by Joe's suddenly working
round him with every demonstration of a fell pugilistic purpose.
“ Which I meantersay,” cried Joe, “ that if you come into my
place bull -baiting and badgering me, come out ! Which I
meantersay as sech if you're a man, come on ! Which I
meantersay that what I say, I meantersay and stand or fall by !"
I drew Joe away, and he immediately became placable ;
128 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

merely stating to me, in an obliging manner and as a polite ex

postulatory notice to any one whom it might happen to concern ,
that he were not a going to be bull -baited and badgered in his
own place . Mr. Jaggers had risen'when Joe demonstrated, and
had backed near the door. Without evincing any inclination to
come in again, he there delivered his valedictory remarks. They
were these.
66
" Well, Mr. Pip, I think the sooner you leave here — as you
are to be a gentleman — the better. Let it stand for this day
week , and you shall receive my printed address in the mean
time. You can take a backney -coach at the stage coach -office in
London, and come straight to me. Understand, that I express
no opinion , one way or other, on the trust I undertake. I am
paid for undertaking it, and I do so. Now , understand that
finally. Understand that ! "
He was throwing his finger at both of us, and I think would
have gone on , but for his seeming to think Joe dangerous, and
going off.
Something came into my head which induced me to run after
him as he was going down to the Jolly Bargemen where he had
left a hired carriage.
“ I beg your pardon, Mr. Jaggers.”
“ Halloa !” said he, facing round , “ what's the matter ? "
“ I wish to be quite right, Mr. Jaggers, and to keep to your
directions ; so I thought I had better ask. Would there be any
objection to my taking leave of any one I know , about here ,
before I go away- ??”
“ No,” said he, looking as if he hardly understood me.
“ I don't mean in the village only, but up town ? ”
" No," said he . “No objection ."
I thanked him and ran home again, and there I found that
Joe had already locked the front door and vacated the state
parlour, and was seated by the kitchen fire with a hand on each
knee, gazing intently at the burning coals. I too sat down
before the fire and gazed at the coals, and nothing was said for
a long time.
My sister was in her cushioned chair in her corner, and
Biddy sat at her needlework before the fire, and Joe sat next
Biddy, and I sat next Joe in the corner opposite my sister.
The more I looked into the glowing coals, the more incapable I
became of looking at Joe ; the longer the silence lasted , the
more unable I felt to speak .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 129

At length I got out, “ Joe, have you told Biddy ? ”

“ No, Pip ," returned Joe, still looking at the fire, and holding
his knees tight, as if he had private information that they
intended to make off somewhere, “ which I left it to yourself,
Pip ."
6 I would rather you told , Joe .”
" Pip's a gentleman of fortun ' then , ” said Joe, " and God bless
him in it !”
Biddy dropped her work , and looked at me. Joe held his
knees and looked at me. I looked at both of them . After a
pause, they both heartily congratulated me ; but there was
a certain touch of sadness in their congratulations, that I rather
resented .
I took it upon myself to impress Biddy (and through Biddy,
Joe ) with the grave obligation I considered my friendsunder, to
know nothing and say nothing about the maker of my fortune.
It would all come out in good time, I observed,and in the mean
while nothing was to be said, save that I had come into great
expectations from a mysterious patron . Biddy nodded her head
thoughtfully at the fire as she took up her work again, and said
she would be very particular ; and Joe, still detaining his knees,
said, “Ay, ay, I'll be ekervally partickler, Pip ; ” and then they
congratulated me again, and went on to express so much wonder
at the notion of my being a gentleman, that I didn't half like it.
Infinite pains were then taken by Biddy to convey to my
sister some idea of what had happened . To the best of my
belief, those efforts entirely failed. She laughed and nodded
her head a great many times, and even repeated after Biddy, the
words “ Pip ” and “ Property.” But I doubt if they had more
meaning in them than an election cry, and I cannot suggest a
darker picture of her state of mind.
I never could have believed it without experience, but as Joe
and Biddy became more at their cheerful ease again, I became
quite gloomy. Dissatisfied with my fortune, of course I could
not be ; but it is possible that I may have been , without quite
knowing it, dissatisfied with myself.
Anyhow , I sat with my elbow on my knee and my face upon
my hand, looking into the fire, as those two talked about my
going away, and about what they should do without me, and all
that. And whenever I caught one of them looking at me,
though never so pleasantly ( and they often looked at me
particularly Biddy ), I felt offended : as if they were expressing
K
130 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

some mistrust of me. Though Heaven knows they never did by

word or sign .
At those times I would get up and look out at the door ; for
our kitchen door opened at once upon the night, and stood open
on summer evenings to air the room . The very stars to which I
then raised my eyes, I am afraid I took to be but poor and
humble stars for glittering on the rustic objects among which I
had passed my life.
“ Saturday night,” said I, when we sat at our supper of bread
and - cheese and beer . “ Five more days, and then the day before
the day ! They'll soon go. "
· Yes, Pip,” observed Joe, whose voice sounded hollow in his
beer mug . They'll soon go.”
66
Soon , soon go,” said Biddy.
“ I have been thinking, Joe, that when I go down town on
Monday, and order my new clothes, I shall tell the tailor that
I'll come and put them on there, or that I'll have them sent to
Mr. Pumblechook’s . It would be very disagreeable to be stared
at by all the people here."
“ Mr. and Mrs. Hubble might like to see you in your new
gen -teel figure too, Pip ,” said Joe, industriously cutting his
bread with his cheese on it, in the palm of his left hand, and
glancing at my untasted supper as if he thought of the time
when we used to compare slices. “ So might Wopsle. And
the Jolly Bargemen might take it as a compliment."
“ That's just what I don't want, Joe. They would make such
a business of it— such a coarse and common business — that I
couldn't bear myself.”
Ah, that indeed , Pip!” said Joe. “ If you couldn't abear
yourself
Biddy asked me here, as she sat holding my sister's plate,
“Have you thought about when you'll show yourself to Mr.
Gargery, and your sister, and me ? You will show yourself to
us ; won't you ?"
Biddy,” I returned with some resentment, you are so ex
ceedingly quick that it's difficult to keep up with you .”
( “ She always were quick," observed Joe.)
“If you had waited another moment, Biddy, you would have
heard me say that I shall bring my clothes here in a bundle one
evening-most likely on the evening before I go away .”
Biddy said no more . Handsomely forgiving her, I soon
exchanged an affectionate good night with her and Joe, and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
131
When I go in m little r
t to y oom , I sat down
went up to bed .
and took a long look at it, as a mean little room that I should
soon be parted from and raised above , for ever. It was fur
nished with fresh young remembrances too, and even at the
same moment I fell into much the same confused division of
mind between it and the better rooms to which I was going, as I
had been in so often between the forge and Miss Havisham's,
and Biddy and Estella .
The sun had been shining brightly all day on the roof of my
attic, and the room was warm . As I put the window open and
stood looking out, I saw Joe come slowly forth at the dark door
below, and take a turn or two in the air ; and then I saw Biddy
come, and bring him a pipe and light it for him. He never
smoked so late , and it seemed to hint to me that he wanteil
comforting, for some reason or other .
He presently stood at the door immediately beneath me,
smoking his pipe, and Biddy stood there too, quietly talking to
him, and I knew that they talked of me , for I heard my name
mentioned in an endearing tone by both of them more than once.
I would not have listened for more , if I could have heard more :
so, I drew away from the window , and sat down in my one chair
by the bedside, feeling it very sorrowful and strange that this
first night of my bright fortunes should be the loneliest I had
ever known.
Looking towards the open window , I saw light wreaths from
Joe's pipe floating there, and I fancied it was like a blessing from
Joe - not obtruded on me or paraded before me, but pervading
the air we shared together. I put my light out, and crept into
bed ; and it was an uneasy bed now, and I never slept the old
sound sleep in it any more.

CHAPTER XIX.

MORNING made a considerable difference in my general prospect

of Life, and brightened it so much that it scarcely seemed the
same. What lay heaviest on my mind, was, the consideration
that six days intervened between me and the day of departure ;
for, I could not divest myself of a misgiving that something
might happen to London in the meanwhile, and that, when I
got there, it might be either greatly deteriorated or clean gone .
132 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Joe and Biddy were very sympathetic and pleasant when I

spoke of our approaching separation ; but they only referred to
it when I did . After breakfast, Joe brought out my indentures
from the press in the best parlour, and we put them in the fire,
and I felt that I was free. With all the novelty of my emanci
pation on me, I went to church with Joe, and thought, perhaps.
the clergyman wouldn't have read that about the rich man and
the kingdom of Heaven, if he had known all.
After our early dinner, I strolled out alone, proposing to
finish off the marshes at once, and get them done with . As I
passed the church, I felt (as I had felt during service in the
morning ) a sublime compassion for the poor creatures who were
destined to go there, Sunday after Sunday, all their lives through,
and to lie obscurely at last amongthe lowgreen mounds. I pro
mised myself that I would do something for them one of these
days, and formed a plan in outline for bestowing a dinner of roast
beef and plum - pudding, a pint of ale, and a gallon of condescen
sion, upon everybody in the village .
If I had often thought before, with something allied to shame,
of my companionship with the fugitive whom I had once seen
limping among those graves, what were my, thoughts on this
Sunday, when the place recalled the wretch, ragged and shiver .
ing, with his felon iron and badge ! My comfort was, that it
happened a long time ago, and that he had doubtless been trans
ported a long way off, and that he was dead to me, and might be
veritably dead into the bargain.
No more low wet grounds, no more dykes and sluices, no more
of these grazing cattle - though they seemed, in their dull man
ner, to wear a more respectful air now, and to face round, in
order that they might stare as long as possible at the possessor
of such great expectations— farewell, monotonous acquaintances
of my childhood, henceforth I was for London and greatness :
not for smith's work in general and for you ! I made my ex
ultant way to the old Battery, and, lying down there to consider
the question whether Miss Havisham intended me for Estella ,
fell asleep.
When I awoke, I was much surprised to find Joe sitting
beside me, smoking his pipe. He greeted me with a cheerful
smile on my opening my eyes, and said :
“ As being the last time, Pip, I thought I'd foller."
“ And Joe, I am very glad you did so . "
Thankee, Pip . "
T

GREAT EXP
ECTAT IONS. 133

“ You may be sure, dear Joe ,” I went on , after we had shaken

hands, " that I shall never forget you."
*No,no, Pip !” said Joe, in a comfortable tone, “ I'm sure of
that. Ay, ay, old chap ! Bless you, it were only necessary to
get it well round in a man's mind, to be certain on it. But it
took a bit of time to get it well round, the change come so on
common plump ; didn't it ?”
Somehow , I was not best pleased with Joe's being so mightily
secure of me. I should have liked him to have betrayed emo
tion, or to have said , “ It does you credit, Pip,” or something of
that sort . Therefore, I made no remark on Joe's first head :
merely saying as to his second , that the tidings had indeed
come suddenly, but that I had always wanted to be a gentleman,
and had often and often speculated on what I would do, if I
were one.
" Have you though ?" said Joe . “ Astonishing !"
“ It's a pity now, Joe,” said I, “ that you did not get on a little
more, when we had our lessons here ; isn't it ? ”
Well, I don't know,” returned Joe . “ I'm so awful dull. I'm
only master of my own trade. It were always a pity as I was
so awful dull ; but it's no more of a pity now , than it was — this
day twelvemonth - don't you see ?”
What I had meant was, that when I came into my property
and was able to do something for Joe, it would have been much
more agreeable if he had been better qualified for a rise in sta
tion . He was so perfectly innocent of my meaning, however,
that I thought I would mention it to Biddy in preference.
So, when we had walked home and had had tea, I took Biddy
into our little garden by the side of the lane, and, after throw
ing out in a general way for the elevation of her spirits, that I
should never forget her, said I had a favour to ask of her.
“And it is, Biddy,” said I, 66that you will not omit any op
portunity of helping Joe on, a little . ”
“ How helping him on ? " asked Biddy, with a steady sort of
glance.
Well ! Joe is a dear good fellow - in fact, I think he is the
dearest fellow that ever lived - but he is rather backward in
some things. For instance, Biddy, in his learning and his
manners . "
Although I was looking at Biddy as I spoke, and although she
opened her eyes very wide when I had spoken, she did not look
at me .
131 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Oh, his manners ! won't his manners do then ?” asked Biddy,

plucking a black currant leaf.
“ My dear Biddy, they do very well here-
“ Oh ! they do very well here ? ” interrupted Biddy, looking
closely at the leaf in her hand .
“ Hear me out — but if I were to remove Joe into a higher
sphere, as I shall hope to remove him when I fully come into
my property, they would hardly do him justice . "
“ And don't you think he knows that ?" asked Biddy.
It was such a very provoking question ( for it had never in the
manner occurred to me), that I said, snappishly,
66 distant
most
Biddy, what do you mean ? "
Biddy having rubbed the leaf to pieces between her hands
and the smell of a black currant bush has ever since recalled to
me that evening in the little garden by the side of the lane
said , “ Have you never considered that he may be proud ? ”
“Proud ?" I repeated, with disdainful emphasis.
“Oh ! there are many kinds of pride,” said Biddy, looking full
at me and shaking her head ; “pride is not all of one kind
“ Well ? What are you stopping for ?" said I.
“ Not all of one kind,” resumed Biddy. “ He may be too
proud to let any one take him out of a place that he is compe
tent to fill, and fills well and with respect. To tell you the
truth, I think he is : though it sounds bold in me to say so, for
you must know him far better than I do . "
Now , Biddy,” said I, “ I am very sorry to see this in you . I
did not expect to see this in you . You are envious, Biddy, and
grudging. You are dissatisfied on account of my rise in for
tune, and you can't help showing it ."
If you have the heart to think so , " returned Biddy, " say so .
Say so over and over again , if you have the heart to think so.”
* If you have the heart to be so, you mean , Biddy,” said I, in a
virtuous and superior tone ; “don't put it off upon me. I am
very sorry to see it, and it's a -- it's a bad side of human nature .
I did intend to ask you to use any little opportunities you might
have after I was gone, of improving dear Joe. But after this,
I ask you nothing. I am extremely sorry to see this in you ,
Biddy ,” I repeated. “ It's a — it's a bad side ofhuman nature.”
“ Whether you scold me or approve of me,” returned poor
Biddy, “ you may equally dependupon my trying to do all that
lies in my power , here, at all times. And whatever opinion you
take away of me, shall make no difference in my remembrance
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
135
of you . Yet a
Biddy, turning away her head .
I again warmly repeated that it was a bad side of human
naturo (in which sentiment, waiving its application , I have since
seen reason to think I was right), and I walked down the little
path away from Biddy, and Biddy went into the house, and I
went out at the garden gate and took a dejected stroll until
supper-time; again feeling it very sorrowful and strange that
this, the second night of my bright fortunes, should be as lonely
and unsatisfactory as the first.
But, morning once more brightened my view , and I extended
my clemency to Biddy, and we dropped the subject. Putting
on the best clothes I had, I went into town as early as I could
hope to find the shops open , and presented myself before Mr.
Trabb, the tailor : who was having his breakfast in the parlour
behind his shop, and who did not think it worth his while to
come out to me, but called me in to him.
66 Well !” said Mr. Trabb, in a hail- fellow -well-met kind of
way. “ How are you, and what can I do for you ?”
Mr. Trabb had sliced his hot roll into three feather beds, and
was slipping butter in between the blankets, and covering it up .
He was a prosperous old bachelor, and his open window looked
into a prosperous little garden and orchard , and there was a
prosperous iron safe let into the wall at the side of his fireplace,
and I did not doubt that heaps of his prosperity were put away
in it in bags.
“ Mr. Trabb ," said I, “it's an unpleasant thing to have to men .
tion , because it looks like boasting ; but I have come into a
handsome property.”
A change passed over Mr. Trabb. He forgot the butter in
bed, got up from the bedside, and wiped his fingers on the
table -cloth, exclaiming, " Lord bless my soul !"
“ I am going up to my guardian in London ,” said I, casually
drawing some guineas out of my pocket and looking at them;
" and I want a fashionable suit of clothes to go in . I wish to
pay for them," I added - otherwise I thought he might only pre
tend to make them , “ with ready money."
" My dear sir, " said Mr. Trabb, as he respectfully bent his
body, opened his arms, and took the liberty of touching me on
the outside of each elbow , “ don't hurt me by mentioning that.
May I venture to congratulate you ? Would you do me the
favour of stepping into the shop ? "
136 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Mr. Trabb's boy was the most audacious boy in all that coun
try -side. When I had entered he was sweeping the shop, and
he had sweetened his labours by sweeping over me. He was
still sweeping when I came out into the shop with Mr. Trabb ,
and he knocked the broom against all possible corners and
obstacles, to express ( as I understood it) equality with any
blacksmith , alive or dead .
“ Hold that noise ,” said Mr. Trabb, with the greatest sternness,
or I'll knock your head off ! Do me the favour to be seated,
sir . Now, this ,” said Mr. Trabb, taking down a roll of cloth ,
and tiding it out in a flowing manner over the counter , prepara
tory to getting his hand under it to show the gloss, “ is a very
sweet article. I can recommend it for your purpose , sir, because
it really is extra super. But you shall see some others. Give
me Number Four, you !" ( To the boy, and with a dreadfully
severe stare ; foreseeing the danger of that miscreant's brush
ing me with it, or making some other sign of familiarity .)
Mr. Trabb never removed his stern eye from the boy until he
had deposited number four on the counter and was at a safe dis
tance again. Then, he commanded him to bring number five,
>>
and number eight. “ And let me have none of your tricks here ,
said Mr. Trabb, “ or you shall repent it, you young scoundrel,
the longest day you have to live .”
Mr. Trabb then bent over number four, and in a sort of
deferential confidence recommended it to me as a light article
for summer wear, an article much in vogue among the nobility
and gentry, an article that it would ever be an honour to him to
reflect upon a distinguished fellow -townsman's ( if he might
claim me for a fellow -townsman ) having worn. 66 Are you
bringing numbers five and eight, you vagabond," said Mr. Trabb
66
to the boy after that, or shall I kick you out of the shop and
bring them myself ?"
I selected the materials for a suit, with the assistance of Mr.
Trabb's judgment, and re -entered the parlour to be measured .
For, although Mr. Trabb had my measure already, and had pre
viously been quite contented with it, he said apologetically that
it “ wouldn't do under existing circumstances, sir - wouldn't do
at all. ” So, Mr. Trabb measured and calculated me, in the par
lour, as if I were an estate and he the finest species of surveyor,
and gave himself such a world of trouble that I felt that no suit
of clothes could possibly remunerate him for his pains. When
he had at last done and had appointed to send the articles to Mr.
 GREA
T EXPECTA
TIONS .
137
Pumblechook's on the Thursday evening , he said , with his hand
, ,
upon the parlour lock, “ I know, sir,that London gentlemen
cannotbeexpected to patroniselocal work, as a rule ;butif
you would give me a turn now and then in the quality of a
townsman, I should greatly esteem it. Good morning, sir, much
obliged . - Door ! ”
The last word was flung at the boy, who had not the least
notion what it meant. But I saw him collapse as his master
rubbed me out with his hands, and my first decided experience
of the stupendous power of money, was, that it had morally laid
upon his back , Trabb's boy.
After this memorable event, I went to the hatter's and the
bootmaker's, and the hosier's, and felt rather like Mother Hub
bard's dog whose outfit required the services of so many trades .
I also went to the coach - office and took my place for seven
o'clock on Saturday morning. It was not necessary to explain
everywhere that I had come into a handsome property ; but
whenever I said anything to that effect, it followed that the
officiating tradesman ceased to have his attention diverted
through the window by the High -street, and concentrated his
mind upon me. When I had ordered everything I wanted, I
directed my steps towards Pumblechook's , and, as I approached
that gentleman'splace of business, I saw him standing athis door.
He was waiting for me with great impatience. He had been
out early with the chaise -cart, and had called at the forge and
heard the news. He had prepared a collation for me in the
Barnwell parlour, and he too ordered his shopman to 66 come out
of the gangway ” as my sacred person passed.
“My dear friend ,” said Mr. Pumblechook, taking me by both
hands, when he and I and the collation were alone, “ I give you
joy of your good fortune. Well deserved, well deserved ! "
This was coming to the point, and I thought it a sensible
way of expressing himself.
“ To think,” said Mr. Pumblechook , after snorting admiration
at me for some moments, “ that I should have been the humble
instrument of leading up to this, is a proud reward .”
I begged Mr. Pumblechook to remember that nothing was to
be ever said or hinted , on that point.
" My dear young friend," said Mr. Pumblechook ; " if you will
allow me to call you so
I murmured “ Certainly ,” and Mr. Pumblechook took me by
both hands again , and communicated a movement to his waist
138 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

coat, which had an emotional appearance , though it was rather

low down, “ My dear young friend , rely upon my doing my little
all in your absence, by keeping the fact before the mind of
Joseph . - Joseph !" said Mr. Pumblechook, in the way of a
compassionate adjuration . “ Joseph !! Joseph !!!” Thereupon
he shook his head and tapped it, expressing his sense of defi
ciency in Joseph .
“ But my dear young friend ,” said Mr. Pumblechook , “you
must be hungry, you must be exhausted . Be seated . Here is
a chicken had round from the Boar, here is a tongue had round
from the Boar, here's one or two little things had round from
the Boar, that I hope you may not despise. But do I ,” said Mr.
Pumblechook, getting up again the moment after he had sat
down, see afore me, him as I ever sported with in his times of
happy infancy ? And may I — may I-- ?"
This May I, meant might he shake hands ? I consented, and
he was fervent, and then sat down again.
“ Here is wine," said Mr. Pumblechook . “ Let us drink,
Thanks to Fortune, and may she ever pick out her favourites
with equal judgment ! And yet I cannot ,” said Mr. Pumble
chook, getting up again, see afore me One -- and likewise drink
to One — without again expressing - May I — may I-- ? "
I said he might, and he shook hands with me again, and
emptied his glass and turned it upside down. I did the same ;
and if I had turned myself upside down before drinking, the
wine could not have gone more direct to my head.
Mr. Pumblechook helped me to the liver wing, and to the
best slice of tongue (none of those out-of-the -way No Thorough
fares of Pork now ), and took , comparatively speaking, no care
of himself at all. “ Ah ! poultry, poultry ! You little thought,"
said Mr. Pumblechook , apostrophising the fowl in the dish ,
"when you was a young fledgling, what was in store for you.
You little thought you was to be refreshment beneath this
humble roof for one as -Call it a weakness, if you will,” said
Mr. Pumblechook, getting up again, " but may I ? may I- I
It began to be unnecessary to repeat the form of saying he
might, so he did it at once. How he ever did it so often with
out wounding himself with my knife, I don't know .
“ And your sister , " he resumed , after a little steady eating,
* which had the honour of bringing you up by hand ! It's a sad
picter, to reflect that she's no longer equal to fully understand
ing the honour. May-_- "
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
139

I saw he was about to come atme again, and I stopped him .

“ We'll drink her health ,” said I.
“Ah! ” cried Mr. Pumblechook, leaning back in his chair,
quiteflaccid with admiration, “ that's the way you know 'em,sir ! "
(I don't know who Sir was, but he certainly was not I, and
there was no third person present) ; " that's the way you know
the noble -minded , sir ! Ever forgiving and ever affable. It
might," said the servile Pumblechook, putting down his un
tasted glass in a hurry and getting up again, “ to a common
person , have the appearance of repeating — but may 1-- ? "
When he had done it, he resumed his seat and drank to my
sister. “ Let us never be blind ,” said Mr. Pumblechook, “ to her
faults of temper, but it is to be hoped she meant well.'
At about this time, I began to observe that he was getting
flushed in the face ; as to myself, I felt all face, steeped in wine
and smarting.
I mentioned to Mr. Pumblechook that I wished to have my
new clothes sent to his house, and he was ecstatic on my so
distinguishing him . I mentioned my reason for desiring to
avoid observation in the village, and he lauded it to the skies.
There was nobody but himself, he intimated, worthy of my con
fidence, and — in short, might he ? Then he asked me tenderly
if I remembered our boyish games at sums, and how we had
gone together to have me bound apprentice, and, in effect, how
he had ever been my favourite fancy and my chosen friend ? If
I had taken ten times as many glasses of wine as I had, I should
have known that he never had stood in that relation towards me,
and should in my heart of hearts have repudiated the idea . Yet
for all that, I remember feeling convinced that I had been much
mistaken in him , and that he was a sensible practical good
hearted prime fellow .
By degrees he fell to reposing such great confidence in me,
as to ask my advice in reference to his own affairs. He men
tioned that there was an opportunity for a great amalgamation
and monopoly of the corn and seed trade on those premises, if
enlarged, such as had never occurred before in that, or any
other neighbourhood . What alone was wanting to the realisa
tion of a vast fortune, he considered to be More Capital. Those
were the two little words, more capital. Now it appeared to
him ( Pumblechook ) that if that capital were got into the busi
ness, through a sleeping partner, sir - which sleeping partner
would have nothing to do but walk in, by self or deputy, when
140 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
ever he pleased, and examine the books — and walk in twice a
year and take his profits away in his pocket, to the tune of fifty
per cent . - it appeared to him that that might be an opening for
a young gentleman of spirit combined with property, which
would be worthy of his attention . But what did I think ? He
had great confidence in my opinion, and what did I think ? I
gave it as my opinion. 6. Wait a bit ! " The united vastness and
distinctness of this view so struck him , that he no longer asked if
he might shake hands with me, but said he really must -- and did.
We drank all the wine, and Mr. Pumblechook pledged him
self over and over again to keep Joseph up to the mark (I don't
know what mark ), and to render me efficient and constant ser
vice (I don't know what service). He also made known to me
for the first time in my life, and certainly after having kept his
secret wonderfully well, that he had always said of me, “ That
boy is no common boy, and mark me, his fortun ' will be no
common fortun ’. ” He said with a tearful smile that it was a
singular thing to think of now, and I said so too. Finally, I
went out into the air, with a dim perception that there was
something unwonted in the conduct of the sunshine, and found
that I had slumberously got to the turnpike without having
taken any account of the road.
There, I was roused by Mr. Pumblechook's hailing me. He
was a long way down the sunny street, and was making expres
sive gestures for me to stop. I stopped , and he came up
breathless.
“ No, my dear friend ,” said he, when he had recovered wind
for speech. “ Not if I can help it. This occasion shall not
entirely pass without that affability on your part . - May I, as an
old friend and well -wisher ? May I ? ”
We shook hands for the hundredth time at least, and he
ordered a young carter out of my way with the greatest indig
nation . Then, he blessed me and stood waving his hand to me
until I had passed the crook in the road ; and then I turned
into a field and had a long nap under a hedge before I pursued
my way home .
I had scant luggage to take with me to London, for little of
the little I possessed was adapted to my new station. But, I
began packing that same afternoon, and wildly packed up things
that I knew I should want next morning, in a fiction that there
was not a moment to be lost.
So, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, passed ; and on
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 1
141
1
I went to Mr. Pumblechook's, to put on my
Friday morning
new clothes and pay my visit to Miss Havisham . Mr. Pumble
chook's own room was given up to me to dress in , and was
decorated with clean towels expressly for the event. My clothes
were rather a disappointment, of course. Probably every new
and eagerly expected garment ever put on since clothes came in,
fell a trifle short of the wearer's expectation . But after I had
had my new suit on, some half an hour, and had gone through
an immensity of posturing with Mr. Pumblechook's very limited 1
dressing -glass, in the futile endeavour to see my legs, it seemed
to fit me better. It being inarket morning at a neighbouring
town some ten miles off, Mr. Pumblechook was not at home . I
had not told him exactly when I meant to leave, and was not
likely to shake hands with him again before departing. This
was all as it should be, and I went out in my new array : fear
fully ashamed of having to pass the shopinan , and suspicious
after all that I was at a personal disadvantage, something like
Joe's in his Sunday suit.
I went circuitously to Miss Havisham's by all the back ways,
and rang at the bell constrainedly, on account of the stiff long
fingers of my gloves. Sarah Pocket came to the gate, and
positively reeled back when she saw me so changed ; her wal
nut-shell countenance likewise, turned from brown to green and
yellow .
“ You ? ” said she. “You ? Good gracious ! What do you
want ?”
66
I am going to London, Miss Pocket ,” said I, “ and want to
say good -by to Miss Havisham . ”
I was not expected, for she left me locked in the yard, while
she went to ask if I were to be admitted . After a very short
delay, she returned and took me up, staring at me all the way .
Miss Havisham was taking exercise in the room with the long
spread table, leaning on her crutch stick . The room was
lighted as of yore , and at the sound of her entrance, she stopped
and turned. She was then just abreast of the rotted bride -cake.
66
“Don't go, Sarah ,” she said . • Well, Pip ? ”
“ I start for London, Miss Havisham , to-morrow,” I was 1
exceedingly careful what I said, “ and I thought you would
kindly not mind my taking leave of you ."
“ This is a gay figure, Pip,” said she, inaking her crutch stick
play round me, as if she, the fairy godmother who had changed
me, were bestowing the finishing gift.
142 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ I have come into such good fortune since I saw you last,
Miss Havisham , " I murmured . “And I am so grateful for it,
Miss Havisham ! "
“ Ay, ay ! ” said she, looking at the discomfited and envious
Sarah , with delight. “ I have seen Mr. Jaggers. I have heard
about it, Pip. So you go to -morrow ?"
“ Yes, Miss Havisham .”
And you are adopted by a rich person ?”
“ Yes, Miss Havisham .”
“ Not named?"
“ No, Miss Havisham . ”
“ And Mr. Jaggers is made your guardian ?"
66
Yes, Miss Havisham ."
She quite gloated on these questions and answers, so keen
was her enjoymentof Sarah Pocket's jealous dismay. “Well !"
she went on ; “ you have a promising career before you. Be
good - deserve it — and abide by Mr. Jaggers's instructions."
She looked at me, and looked at Sarah, and Sarah's countenance
wrung out of her watchful face a cruel smile. “ Good -by, Pip !
-you will always keep the name of Pip, you know .”
66
· Yes, Miss Havisham .”
Good -by, Pip !”
She stretched out her hand, and I went down on my knee
and put it to my lips. I had not considered how I should take
leave of her ; it came naturally to me at the moment, to do this .
She looked at Sarah Pocket with triumph in her weird eyes,
and so I left my fairy godmother, with both her hands on her
crutch stick , standing in the midst of the dimly lighted room
beside the rotten bride - cake that was hidden in cobwebs.
Sarah Pocket conducted me down, as if I were a ghost who
must be seen out. She could not get over my appearance, and
was in the last degree confounded . I said “ Good -by, Miss
Pocket ;" but she merely stared, and did not seem collected
enough to know that I had spoken . Clear of the house, I made
the best of my way back to Pumblechook's, took off my new
clothes, made them into a bundle, and went back home in my older
dress, carrying it —to speak the truth , —much more at my ease
too, though I had the bundle to carry .
And now, those six days which were to have run out so
slowly, had run out fast and were gone, and to -morrow looked
me in the face more steadily than I could look at it. As the
six evenings had dwindled away, to five, to four, to three, to two,
 GREA
T EXPECTA
TIONS.
143
I had becomemore and more
appreciative of the society of Joe
and Biddy. On this last evening , I dressed myself outin my
new clothes, for their delight, and sat in my splendouruntil
bedtime. We had a hot supper on the occasion , graced by the
inevitable roast fowl, and we had some flip to finish with. We
were all very low, and none the higher for pretending to be in
spirits.
I was to leave our village at five in the morning, carrying my
little hand -portmanteau, and I had told Joe that I wished to
walk away all alone. I am afraid -sore afraid — that this pur
pose originated in my sense of the contrast there would be be
tween me and Joe, if we went to the coach together. I had
pretended with myself that there was nothing of this taint in
the arrangement ; but when I went up to my little room on this
last night, I felt compelled to admit that it might be done so,
and had an impulse upon me to go down again and entreat Joe
to walk with me in the morning. I did not.
All night there were coaches in my broken sleep, going to
wrong places instead of to London, and having in the traces,
now dogs, now cats, now pigs, now men - never horses. Fan
tastic failures of journeys occupied me until the day dawned
and the birds were singing. Then, I got up and partly dressed ,
and sat at the window to take a last look out, and in taking it
fell asleep .
Biddy was astir so early to get my breakfast, that, although
I did not sleep at the window an hour, I smelt the smoke of
the kitchen fire when I started up with a terrible idea that it
must be late in the afternoon. But long after that, and long
after I heard the clinking of the teacups and was quite ready,
I wanted the resolution to go down stairs. After all, I re
mained up there, repeatedly unlocking and unstrapping my small
portmanteau and locking and strapping it up again , until Biddy
called to me that I was late.
It was a hurried breakfast with no taste in it. I got up from
the meal, saying with a sort of briskness, as if it had only just
occurred to me, “Well ! I suppose I must be off !" and then I
kissed my sister who was laughing and nodding and shaking in
her usual chair, and kissed Biddy, and threw my arms around
Jce's neck. Then I took up my little portmanteau and walked
oat. The last I saw of them, was, when I presently heard a
scuffle behind me, and looking back, saw Joe throwing an old
shoe after me and Biddy throwing another old shoe . I stopped
144 CREAT EXPECTATIONS .

then, to wave my hat, and dear old Joe waved his strong right
arm above his head, crying huskily “ Hooroar ! ” and Biddy put
her apron to her face.
I walked away at a good pace, thinking it was easier to go
than I had supposed it would be, and reflecting that it would
never have done to have an old shoe thrown after the coach, in
sight of all the High - street. I whistled and made nothing of
going. But the village was very peaceful and quiet, and the
light mists were solemnly rising, as if to show me the world,
and I had been so innocent and little there, and all beyond
was so unknown and great, that in a moment with a strong
heave and sob I broke into tears . It was by the finger-post at
the end of the village, and I laid my hand upon it, and said,
“ Good -by O my dear, dear friend !"
Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for
they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our
hard hearts . I was better after I had cried, than before -- more
sorry, more aware of my own ingratitude, more gentle. If I
had cried before, I should have had Joe with me then .
So subdued I was by those tears, and by their breaking out
again in the course of the quiet walk , that when I was on the
coach, and it was clear of the town, I deliberated with an aching
heart whether I would not get down when we changed horses,
and walk back , and have another evening at home, and a better
parting. We changed, and I had not made up my mind, and
still reflected for my comfort that it would be quite practicable
to get down and walk back, when we changed again . And
while I was occupied with those deliberations, I would fancy an
exact resemblance to Joe in some man coming along the road
towards us, and my heart would beat high. As if he could pos
sibly be there !
We changed again, and yet again, and it was now too late and
too far to go back, and I went on. And the mists had all
solemnly risen now , and the world lay spread before me .

THIS IS THE END OF THE FIRST STAGE OF PIP'S

EXPECTATIONS.
I

GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
145

CHAPTER XX .

The journey from our town to the metropolis, was a journey of

about five hours. It was a little past mid -day when the four
horse stage -coach by which I was a passenger, got into the ravel
of traffic frayed out about the Cross-Keys, Wood - street, Cheap
side, London .
We Britons had at that time particularly settled that it was
treasonable to doubt our having and our being the best of every
thing : otherwise, while I was scared by the immensity of
London, I think I might have had some faint doubts whether it
was not rather ugly, crooked, narrow , and dirty.
Mr. Jaggers had duly sent me his address ; it was, Little
Britain, and he had written after it on his card, “just out of
Smithfield, and close by the coach -office . " Nevertheless, a
hackney -coachman, who seemed to have as many capes to his
greasy great-coat as he was years old, packed me up in his coach
and hemmed me in with a folding and jingling barrier of steps,
as if he were going to take me fifty miles. His getting on liis
box, which I remember to have been decorated with an old
weather -stained pea - green hammercloth motheaten into rags, was
quite a work of time. It was a wonderful equipage, with six
great coronets outside, and ragged things behind for I don't
know how many footmen to hold on by, and a arrow below
them , to prevent amateur footmen from yielding to the tempta
tion.
I had scarcely had time to enjoy the coach and to think how
like a straw -yard it was, and yet how like a rag -shop, and to
wonder why the horses' nose -bags were kept inside, when I
observed the coachman beginning to get down, as if we were
going to stop presently. And stop we presently did, in a gloomy
street, at certain offices with an open door, whereon was painted
MR. JAGGERS .
“ How much ? ” I asked the coachman .
The coachman answered , “ A shilling - unless you wish to
>
make it more."
I naturally said I had no wish to make it more.
L
146 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Then it must be a shilling ,” observed the coachman . “ I

don't want to get into trouble. I know him !” He darkly closed
an eye at Mr. Jaggers’s name, and shook his head .
When he had got his shilling, and had in course of time com
pleted the ascent to his box, and had got away (which appeared
to relieve his mind ), I went into the front office with my little
portmanteau in my hand and asked , Was Mr. Jaggers at home ?
“ He is not ,” returned the clerk . “ He is in Court at present.
Am I addressing Mr. Pip ? "
I signified that he was addressing Mr. Pip.
“Mr. Jaggers left word would you wait in his room . He
couldn't say how long he might be, having a case on . But it
stands to reason , his time being valuable, that he won't be longer
than he can help .”
With those words, the clerk opened a door, and ushered me
into an inner chamber at the back . Here, we found a gentle
man with one eye, in a velveteen suit and knee- breeches, who
wiped his nose with his sleeve on being interrupted in the
perusal of the newspaper.
“ Go and wait outside, Mike,” said the clerk .
I began to say that I hoped I was not interrupting—— when
the clerk shoved this gentleman out with as little ceremony as I
ever saw used, and tossing his fur cap out after him , left me
alone.
Mr. Jaggers's room was lighted by a skylight only, and was a
most dismal place ; the skylight, eccentrically patched like a
broken head, and the distorted adjoining houses looking as if
they had twisted themselves to peep down at me through it.
There were not so many papers about, as I should have expected
to see ; and there were some odd objects about, that I should
not have expected to see — such as an old rusty pistol, a sword
in a scabbard , several strange - looking boxes and packages, and
two dreadful casts on a shelf, of faces peculiarly swollen , and
twitchy about the nose . Mr. Jaggers's own high -backed chair
was of deadly black horsehair, with rows of brass nails round it,
like a coffin ; and I fancied I could see how he leaned back in
it, and bit his forefinger at the clients. The room was but small,
and the clients seemed to have had a habit of backing up against
the wall : the wall, especially opposite to Mr. Jaggers’s chair,
being greasy with shoulders. I recalled, too , that the one-eyed
gentleman had shuffled forth against the wall when I was the
innocent cause of his being turned out.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
147
I sat down in the cliental chair placed over against Mr.

and becamefascinated bythe dismal atmosphere

Jaggers's chair,
of the place. I called to min that the clerk had the same air
of knowing something to everybody else's disadvantage, as his
masterhad. I wondered how many other clerks there were up
stairs, and whether they all claimed to have the same detrimental
mastery of their fellow -creatures. I wondered what was the
history of all the odd litter about the room , and how it came
there . I wondered whether the two swollen faces were of Mr.
Jaggers's family, and , if he were so unfortunate as to have had a
pair of such ill -looking relations, why he stuck them on that
dusty perch for the blacks and flies to settle on , instead of
giving them a place at home. Of course I had no experience of
à London summer day, and my spirits may have been oppressed
1
by the hot exhausted air, and by the dust and grit that lay thick
on everything. But I sat wondering and waiting in Mr. Jaggers's
close room, until I really could not bear the two casts on the
shelf above Mr. Jaggers’s chair, and got up and went out.
When I told the clerk that I would take a turn in the air
while I waited , he advised me to go round the corner and I
should come into Smithfield. So, I came into Smithfield ; and
the shameful place, being all asmear with filth and fat and blood
and foam , seemed to stick to me. $o, I rubbed it off with all
possible speed by turning into a street where I saw the great
black dome of Saint Paul's bulging at me from behind a grim
stone building which a bystander said was Newgate Prison .
Following the wall of the jail, I found the roadway covered with
straw to deaden the noise of passing vehicles ; and from this,
and from the quantity of people standing about, smelling strongly
of spirits and beer, I inferred that the trials were on.
While I looked about me here, an exceedingly dirty and
partially drunk minister of justice asked me if I would like to
step in and hear a trial or so : informing me that he could give
me a front place for half -a - crown, whence I should command a
full view of the Lord Chief Justice in his wig and robes - men
tioning that awful personage like waxwork , and presently offering
him at the reduced price of eighteenpence. As I declined the
proposal on the plea of an appointment, he was so good as to
take me into a yard and show me where the gallows was kept,
and also where people were publicly whipped , and then he
showed me the Debtors' Door, out of which culprits came to be
hanged ; heightening the interest of that dreadful portal by
148 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
giving me to understand that “ four on 'em ” would come out at
that door the day after to -morrow at eight in the morning, to
be killed in a row . This was horrible, and gave me a sickening
idea of London : the more so as the Lord Chief Justice's pro
prietor wore ( from his hat down to his boots and up again to
his pocket-handkerchief inclusive) mildewed clothes, which had
evidently not belonged to him originally, and which, I took it
into my head, he had bought cheap of the executioner. Under
these circumstances I thought myself well rid of him for a shil
ling.
I dropped into the office to ask if Mr. Jaggers had come in
yet, and I found he had not, and I strolled out again . This
time, I made the tour of Little Britain, and turned into Bartho
lomew Close ; and now I became aware that other people were
waiting about for Mr. Jaggers, as well as I. There were two
men of secret appearance lounging in Bartholomew Close, and
thoughtfully fitting their feet into the cracks of the pavement as
they talked together, one of whom said to the other when they
first passed me, that “ Jaggers would do it if it was to be done.”
There was a knot of three men and two women standing at a
corner, and one of the women was crying on her dirty shawl,
and the other comforted her by saying, as she pulled her own
shawl over her shoulders, “ Jaggers is for him , 'Melia, and what
more could you have ? ” There was a red -eyed little Jew who
came into the Close while I was loitering there, in company
with a second little Jew whom he sent upon an errand ; and
while the messenger was gone, I remarked this Jew , who was
of a highly excitable temperament, performing a jig of anxiety
under a lamp-post, and accompanying himself, in a kind of
frenzy, with the words, “Oh Jaggerth , Jaggerth, Jaggerth ! all
otherth ith Cag -Maggerth , give me Jaggerth !” These testi
monies to the popularity of my guardian made a deep impres
sion on me, and I admired and wondered more than ever .
At length , as I was looking out at the iron gate of Bartholo
mew Close into Little Britain, I saw Mr. Jaggers coming across
the road towards me. All the others who were waiting, saw
him at the same time, and there was quite a rush at him . Mr.
Jaggers, putting a hand on my shoulder and walking me on at
his side without saying anything to me, addressed himself to his
followers.
First, he took the two secret men.
“ Now , I have nothing to say to you ," said Mr. Jaggers, throw
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
149

ing his finger at them. “ I want to know no more than I know .

As to the result, it's a toss-up . I told youfrom the first it was
a toss-up . Have you paid Wemmick ?"
“ We made the money up this morning, sir , ” said one of the
men , submissively, while the other perused Mr. Jaggers's
face .
66• I don't ask
you when you made it up , or where, or whether
you made it up at all. Has Wemmick got it ? ”
62
Yes, sir ,” said both the men together.
“ Very well ; then you may go. Now, I won't have it ! ” said
Mr. Jaggers, waving his hand at them to put them 99 behind him.
• If you say a word to me, I'll throw up the case .
“We thought, Mr. Jaggers - _ " one of the men began, pulling
off his hat.
66 You
That's what I told you not to do ,” said Mr. Jaggers.
thought! I think for you ; that's enough for you. If I want
you, I know where to find you ; I don't want you to find me.
Now I won't have it. I won't hear a word.”
The two men looked at one another as Mr. Jaggers waved
them behind again, and humbly fell back and were heard no
more.
“ And now you !" said Mr. Jaggers, suddenly stopping, and
turning on the two women with the shawls, from whom the
three men had meekly separated— “ Oh ! Amelia , is it ? "
“Yes, Mr. Jaggers."
“ And do you remember,” retorted Mr. Jaggers, “ that but for
me you wouldn't be here and couldn't be here ?"
“ Oh yes, sir ! " exclaimed both women together. “ Lord bless
you , sir, well we knows that ! ”
“ Then why,” said Mr. Jaggers, “ do you come here ? "
“ My Bill, sir !" the crying woman pleaded.
66 Now , I tell
you what !” said Mr. Jaggers. “ Once for all.
If you don't know that your Bill's in good hands, I know it.
And if you come here, bothering about your Bill, I'll make an
example of both your Bill and you, and let him slip through my
fingers. Have you paid Wemmick ? ”
“ Oh yes, sir ! Every farden ."
Very well. Then you have done all you have got to do.
Say another word one single word — and Wemmick shall give
you your money back .”
This terrible threat caused the two women to fall off imme
diately. No one remained now but the excitable Jew , who had
150 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

already raised the skirts of Mr. Jaggers's coat to his lips several
times.
“ I don't know this man ! " said Mr. Jaggers, in the same
devastating strain . " What does this fellow want ? ”
“ Ma thear Mithter Jaggerth . Hown brother to Habraham
Latharuth !”
“ Who's he ?” said Mr. Jaggers. ' Let go of my coat.”
The suitor, kissing the hem of the garment again before re
linquishing it, replied, “ Habraham Latharuth, on thuthpithion
of plate .”
- You're too late , ” said Mr. Jaggers. 6 I am over the way. ”
“ Holy father, Mithter Jaggerth !" cried my excitable acquain
tance, turning white , “ don't thay you're again Habraham Latha
ruth ! ”
66
I am , ” said Mr. Jaggers, “ and there's an end of it. Get out
of the way ."
“ Mithter Jaggerth ! Half a moment! My hown cuthen'th
gone to Mithter Wemmick at thith prethenth minute, to hoffer
him hany termth . Mithter Jaggerth ! Half a quarter of a
moment ! If you'd have the condethenthun to be bought off
from the t'other thide — at any thuperior prithe !-money no
object ! -Mither Jaggerth - Mithter !"
My guardian threw his supplicant off with supreme indiffer
ence, and left him dancing on the pavement as if it were red
hot. Without further interruption, we reached the front office,
where we found the clerk and the man in velveteen with the fur
сар .
“ Here's Mike,” said the clerk , getting down from his stool,
and approaching Mr. Jaggers confidentially.
“ Oh !” said Mr. Jaggers, turning to the man , who was pulling
a lock of hair in the middle of his forehead, like the Bull in
Cock Robin pulling at the bell -rope ; " your man comes on this
afternoon . Well ?”
• Well, Mas’r Jaggers," returned Mike, in the voice of a
sufferer from a constitutional cold ; “ arter a deal o' trouble, I've
found one, sir, as might do. "
“ What is he prepared to swear ? ”
Well, Mas'r Jaggers ,” said Mike , wiping his nose on his fur
cap this time; " in a general way , anythink .”
Mr. Jaggers suddenly became most irate . “ Now , I warned
you before ,” said he, throwing his forefinger at the terrified
client, “ that if ever you presumed to talk in that way here, I'd
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
151
of you .
make an example You infernal scoundrel, how dare
te ll me that ?"
you
The client looked scared , but bewildered too, as if he were
unconscious what he had done.
“ Spooney ! ” said the clerk, in a low voice, giving him a stir
with his elbow . 6. Soft Head ! Need you say it face to
face ?"
“ Now , I ask you, you blundering booby ,” said my guardian,
very sternly , “ once more and for the last time, what the man
you have brought here is prepared to swear ?"
Mike looked hard at my guardian, as if he were trying to
learn a lesson from his face, and slowly replied, “ Ayther to
character, or to having been in his company and never left him
all the night in question .'
Now , be careful. In what station of life is this man ?”
Mike looked at his cap, and looked at the floor, and looked
at the ceiling, and looked at the clerk , and even looked at me,
before beginning to reply in a nervous manner, “ We've dressed
him up like -” when my guardian blustered out :
6 What ? You WILL, will you ? ”
(“ Spooney !” added the clerk again, with another stir.)
After some helpless casting about, Mike brightened and began
again :
“ He is dressed like a ' spectable pieman . A sort of a pastry
cook .”
“ Is he here ?” asked my guardian .
“ I left him ,” said Mike, “ a setting on some doorsteps round
"
the corner.”
“ Take him past that window , and let me see him .”
The window indicated, was the office window . We all three
vent to it, behind the wire blind, and presently saw the client
go by in an accidental manner, with a murderous- looking tall
individual, in a short suit of white linen and a paper cap.
This guileless confectioner was not by any means sober, and
had a black eye in the green stage of recovery, which was
painted over .
6 Tell him to take his witness away directly ,” said my guar
dian to the clerk , in extreme disgust, “and ask him what he
means by bringing such a fellow as that. ”
My guardian then took me into his own room , and while he
lunched , standing, from a sandwich -box and a pocket - flask of
sherry (he seemed to bully his very sandwich as he ate it),
152 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

informed me what arrangements he had made for me. I was

to go to “ Barnard's Inn ,” to young Mr. Pocket's rooms, where a
bed had been sent in for my accommodation ; I was to remain with
young Mr. Pocket until Monday ; on Monday I was to go with
him to his father's house on a visit, that I might try how I liked
it. Also, I was told what my allowance was to be—it was a very
liberal one — and had handed to me from one of my guardian's
drawers, the cards of certain tradesmen with whom I was to
deal for all kinds of clothes, and such other things as I could in
reason want. “ You will find your credit good, Mr. Pip ,” said
my guardian , whose flask of sherry smelt like a whole cask - full,
as he hastily refreshed himself, “but I shall by this means be
able to check your bills, and to pull you up if I find you out
running the constable. Of course you'll go wrong somehow ,
but that's no fault of mine."
After I had pondered a little over this encouraging sentiment,
I asked Mr. Jaggers if I could send for a coach ? He said it
was not worth while, I was so near my destination ; Wemmick
should walk round with me, if I pleased .
I then found that Wemmick was the clerk in the next room.
Another clerk was rung down from up -stairs to take his place
while he was out, and I accompanied him into the street, after
shaking hands with my guardian . We found a new set of
people lingering outside, but Wemmick made a way among
them by saying coolly yet decisively, “ I tell you it's no use ;
he won't have a word to say to one of you ;" and we soon got
clear of them , and went on side by side.

CHAPTER XXI.

CASTING my eyes on Mr. Wemmick as we went along, to see

what he was like in the light of day, I found him to be a dry
man , rather short in stature, with a square wooden face, whose
expression seemed to have been imperfectly chipped out with a
dull -edged chisel. There were some marks in it that might
have been dimples, if the material had been softer and the
instrument finer, but which , as it was, were only dints. The
chisel had made three or four of these attempts at embellish
ment over his nose, but had given them up without an effort to
smooth them off. I judged him to be a bachelor from the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
153
frayed condition ofhis linen, and he appeared to have sustained
a good many bereavements ; for he wore at least four mourning
rings , besides a brooch representing a lady and a weeping
willow at a tomb with an urn on it. I noticed, too, that several
rings and seals hung at his watch -chain, as if he were quite
laden with remembrances of departed friends. He had glitter
ing eyes - small, keen, and black — and thin wide mottled lips.
He had had them , to the best of my belief, from forty to fifty
years.
“ So you were never in London before ? ” said Mr. Wemmick
to me.
• No , ” said I.
I was new here once," said Mr. Wemmick . " Rum to think
of now !”
“ You are well acquainted with it now ?”
Why, yes, ” said Mr. Wemmick. “ I know the moves of it.”
“ Is it a very wicked place ? ” I asked, more for the sake of
saying something than for information.
“ You may get cheated, robbed, and murdered, in London .
But there are plenty of people anywhere, who'll do that for
you .”
“ If there is bad blood between you and them ,” said I, to soften
it off a little.
“ Oh ! I don't know about bad blood ,” returned Mr. Wemmick .
“ There's not much bad blood about. They'll do it, if there's
anything to be got by it . "
6. That makes it worse.”
“ You think so ?” returned Mr. Wemmick . 6. Much about the
same, I should say."
He wore his hat on the back of his head , and looked straight
before him : walking in a self - contained way as if there were
nothing in the streets to claim his attention. His mouth was
such a post -office of a mouth that he had a mechanical appear
ance of smiling. We had got to the top of Holborn Hill before
I knew that it was merely a mechanical appearance, and that he
was not smiling at all.
“ Do you know where Mr. Matthew Pocket lives ?" I asked
Mr. Wemmick.
“ Yes," said he, nodding in the direction. “ At Hammersmith ,
west of London . "
“ Is that far ?"
“ Well! Say five miles . ”
154 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Do you kuuw him ? ”

Why, you are a regular cross -examiner ! ” said Mr. Wemmick,
looking at me with an approving air. “ Yes, I know him . I
know him !”
There was an air of toleration or depreciation about his
utterance of these words, that rather depressed me ; and I was
still looking sideways at his block of a face in search of any
encouraging note to the text, when he said here we were at
Barnard's Inn . My depression was not alleviated by the
announcement, for, I had supposed that establishment to be an
hotel kept by Mr. Barnard , to which the Blue Boar in our town
was a mere public-house. Whereas I now found Barnard to be
a disembodied spirit, or a fiction, and his inn the dingiest
collection of shabby buildings ever squeezed together in a rank
corner as a club for Tom - cats.
We entered this haven through a wicket-gate, and were dis
gorged by an introductory passage into a melancholy little
square that looked to me like a flat burying -ground. I thought
it had the most dismal trees in it, and the most dismal sparrows,
and the most dismal cats, and the most dismal houses ( in
number half a dozen or so), that I had ever seen. I thought
the windows of the sets of chambers into which those houses
were divided , were in every stage of dilapidated blind and
curtain, crippled flower -pot, cracked glass, dusty decay, and
miserable makeshift ; while To Let To Let To Let, glared at
me from empty rooms, as if no new wretches ever came there,
and the vengeance of the soul of Barnard were being slowly
appeased by the gradual suicide of the present occupants and
their unholy interment under the gravel. A frouzy mourning
of soot and smoke attired this forlorn creation of Barnard, and
it had strewed ashes on its head, and was undergoing penance
and humiliation as a mere dust-hole. Thus far my sense of sight;
while dry rot and wet rot and all the silent rots that rot in neg
lected roof and cellar - rot of rat and mouse and bug and coach
ing -stables near at hand besides — addressed themselves faintly
to my sense of smell, and moaned, “ Try Barnard's Mixture.”
So imperfect was this realisation of the first of my great
expectations, that I looked in dismay at Mr. Wemmick . “ Ah !"
said he, mistaking me ; “the retirement reminds you of the
country. So it does me.”
He led me into a corner and conducted me up a flight of stairs
—which appeared to me to be slowly collapsing into sawdust, so
 GREAT EXP
ECTA TIONS . 155
that one of those days the upper lodgers would look out at their
doors and find themselves without the means of coming down
to a set of chambers on the top floor. MR. POCKET, JUN. , was
painted on the door, and there was a label on the letter-box,
" Return shortly."
" He hardly thought you'd come so soon ,” Mr. Wemmick
You don't want me any more ?”
explained .
“ No, thank you," said I.
As I keep the cash,” Mr. Wemmick observed , “we shall
most likely meet pretty often . Good day .”
“ Good day .”
I put out my hand, and Mr. Wemmick at first looked at it as
if he thought I wanted something. Then he looked at me, and
said , correcting himself,
“ To be sure ! Yes. You're in the habit of shaking hands ? ”
I was rather confused , thinking it must be out of the London
fashion , but said yes.
“ I have got so out of it ! " said Mr. Wemmick— " except at last.
Very glad, I'm sure, to make your acquaintance. Good day ! "
When we had shaken hands and he was gone, I opened the
staircase window and had nearly beheaded myself, for, the lines
had rotted away, and it came down like the guillotine. Happily
it was so quick that I had not put my head out. After this
escape, I was content to take a foggy view of the Inn through
the window's encrusting dirt, and to stand dolefully looking out,
saying to myself that London was decidedly overrated .
Mr. Pocket, Junior's, idea of Shortly was not mine, for I had
1
nearly maddened myself with looking out for half an hour, and
had written my name with my finger several times in the dirt of
every pane in the window , before I heard footsteps on the stairs.
Gradually there arose before me the hat, head, neckcloth, waist
coat, trousers, boots, of a member of society of about my own
standing. He had a paper bag under each arm and a pottle of
strawberries in one hand, and was out of breath .
"Mr. Pip?" said he.
" Mr. Pocket ?” said I.
“ Dear me !” he exclaimed . I am extremely sorry ; but I
knew there was a coach from your part of the country at midday,
and I thought you would come by that one. The fact is, I have
been out on your account — not that that is any excuse — for I
thought, coming from the country, you might like a little fruit
after dinner, and I went to Covent Garden Market to get it good .”
156 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

For a reason that I had, I felt as if my eyes would start out

of my head . I acknowledged his attention incoherently, and
began to think this was a dream .
Dear me ! ” said Mr. Pocket, Junior. “ This door sticks so ! "
As he was fast making jam of his fruit by wrestling with the
door while the paper-bags were under his arms, I begged him to
allow me to hold them . He relinquished them with an agreeable
smile, and combated with the door as if it were a wild beast . It
yielded so suddenly at last, that he staggered back upon me, and
I staggered back upon the opposite door, and we both laughed .
But still I felt as if my eyes must start out of my head, and as
if this must be a dream .
Pray come in ,” said Mr. Pocket, Junior. “ Allow me to lead
the way. I am rather bare here, but I hope you'll be able to
make out tolerably well till Monday. My father thought you
would get on more agreeably through to -morrow with me than
with him, and might like to take a walk about London . I am
sure I shall be very happy to show London to you. As to our
table, you won't find that bad, I hope, for it will be supplied
from our coffee -house here, and ( it is only right I should add )
at your expense, such being Mr. Jaggers's directions. As to
our lodging, it's not by any means splendid, because I have my
own bread to earn , and my father hasn't anything to give me,
and I shouldn't be willing to take it, if he had. This is our
sitting -room - just such chairs and tables and carpet and so
forth , you see, as they could spare from home. You mustn't
give me credit for the tablecloth and spoons and castors, be
cause they come for you from the coffee- house. This is my
little bedroom ; rather musty, but Barnard's is musty. This is
your bedroom ; the furniture's hired for the occasion , but I trust
it will answer the purpose ; if you should want anything, I'll go
and fetch it. The chambers are retired, and we shall be alone
together , but we shan't fight, I dare say. But, dear me, I beg
your pardon, you're holding the fruit all this time. Pray let
me take these bags from you. I am quite ashamed .”
As I stood opposite to Mr. Pocket, Junior, delivering him
the bags, One, Two, I saw the starting appearance come into
his own eyes that I knew to be in mine, and he said, falling
back :
“ Lord bless me, you're the prowling boy ! "
“And you ,” said I, " are the pale young gentleman ! "
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 157

CHAPTER XXII.
The pale young gentleman and I stood contemplating one an
other in Barnard's Inn , until we both burst out laughing. 66 The
idea of its being you ! ” said he. “ The idea of its being you ! "
said I. And then we contemplated one another afresh , and
laughed again. “Well !” said the pale young gentleman, reach
ing out his hand good -humouredly, “ it's all over now, I hope,
and it will be magnanimous in you if you'll forgive me for hav
ing knocked you about so .”
I derived from this speech that Mr. Herbert Pocket ( for
Herbert was the pale young gentleman's name) still rather con
founded his intention with his execution . But I made a modest
reply, and we shook hands warmly .
“ You hadn't come into your good fortune at that time?” said
Herbert Pocket.
“ No," said I.
“ No, ” he acquiesced : “ I heard it had happened very lately.
I was rather on the look - out for good fortune then .”
“ Indeed ?”
" Yes. Miss Havisham had sent for me, to see if she could
take a fancy to me . But she couldn't—at all events, she didn't .”
I thought it polite to remark that I was surprised to hear that.
“ Bad taste, ” said Herbert, laughing, “but a fact. Yes, she had
sent for me on a trial visit, and if I had come out of it success
fully, I suppose I should have been provided for ; perhaps I
should have been what-you -may -called it to Estella .”
“ What's that?” I asked , with sudden gravity.
He was arranging his fruit in plates while we talked, which
divided his attention, and was the cause of his having made this
lapse of a word . Affianced ,” he explained, still busy with the
fruit. “ Betrothed . Engaged. What's - his -named . Any word
of that sort . "
“ How did you bear your disappointment?" I asked.
“ Pooh ! " said he, “ I didn't care much for it. She's a Tartar . ”
“ Miss Havisham ?"
" I don't say no to that, but I meant Estella. That girl's
158 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

hard and haughty and capricious to the last degree, and has
been brought up by Miss Havisham to wreak revenge on all the
male sex .
“ What relation is she to Miss Havisham ?"
None,'' said he. “ Only adopted .”
66
Why should she wreak revenge on all the male sex ? What
revenge ?"
Lord, Mr. Pip !” said he. “ Don't you know ? "
No," said I.
66
Dear me ! It's quite a story, and shall be saved till dinner
time. And now let me take the liberty of asking you a question .
How did you come there, that day ? ”
I told him, and he was attentive until I had finished, and then
burst out laughing again, and asked me if I was sore afterwards ?
I didn't ask him if he was, for my conviction on that point was
perfectly established .
" Mr. Jaggers is your guardian , I understand ? " he went on .
“ Yes.”
- You know he is Miss Havisham's man of business and soli
citor, and has her confidence when nobody else has ?”
This was bringing me (I felt) towards dangerous ground. I
answered with a constraint I made no attempt to disguise, that
I had seen Mr. Jaggers in Miss Havisham's house on the very
day of our combat, but never at any other time, and that I be
lieved he had no recollection of having ever seen me there.
“ He was so obliging as to suggest my father for your tutor,
and he called on my father to propose it. Of course he knew
about my father from his connexion with Miss Havisham . My
father is Miss Havisham's cousin ; not that that implies familiar
intercourse between them, for he is a bad courtier and will not
propitiate her.”
Herbert Pocket had a frank and easy way with him that was
very taking. I had never seen any one then, and I have never
seen any one since, who more strongly expressed to me, in every
look and tone, a natural incapacity to do anything secret and
mean. There was something wonderfully hopeful about his
general air, and something that at the same time whispered to
me he would never be very successful or rich. I don't know
how this was. I became imbued with the notion on that first
occasion before we sat down to dinner, but I cannot define by
what means .
He was still a pale young gentleman, and had a certain con
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
159
quered languor about him in the midst of his spirits and brisk

ness, that did not seem indicativeof naturalstrength .He had

not a handsome face, but it was better than handsome : being
extremely amiable and cheerful. His figure was a little un
gainly, as in the days when my knuckles had taken such liberties
with it, but it looked as if it would always be light and young.
Whether Mr. Trabb's local work would have sat more gracefully
on him than on me, may be a question ; but I am conscious that
he carried off his rather old clothes, much better than I carried
off my new suit.
As he was so communicative, I felt that reserve on my part
would be a bad return unsuited to our years. I therefore told
him my small story, and laid stress on my being forbidden to
inquire who my benefactor was. I further mentioned that as I
had been brought up a blacksmith in a country place, and knew
very little of the ways of politeness, I would take it as a great
kindness in him if he would give me a hint whenever he saw me
at a loss or going wrong.
“ With pleasure ,” said he, “ though I venture to prophesy that
you'll want very few hints. I dare say we shall be often toge
ther, and I should like to banish any needless restraint between
us . Will you do me the favour to begin at once to call me by
my christian name, Herbert ?”
I thanked him , and said I would . I informed him in ex
change that my christian name was Philip.
“ I don't take to Philip,” said he, smiling, “for it sounds like
a moral boy out of the spelling -book, who was so lazy that he
fell into a pond, or so fat that he couldn't see out of his eyes, or
80 avaricious that he locked up his cake till the mice ate it, or
so determined to go a birds’-nesting that he got himself eaten by
bears who lived handy in the neighbourhood . I tell you what I
should like. We are so harmonious, and you have been a black
smith - would you mind it ? ”
“ I shouldn't mind anything that you propose ," I answered ,
“but I don't understand you .”
“Would you mind Handel for a familiar name ? There's a
charming piece of music by Handel, called the Harmonious
Blacksmith .”
" I should like it very much . ”
Then, my dear Handel, ” said he, turning round as the door
opened, “ here is the dinner, and I must beg of you to take the
top of the table, because the dinner is of your providing."
160 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

This I would not hear of, so he took the top, and I faced him .
It was a nice little dinner - seemed to me then, a very Lord
Mayor's Feast—and it acquired additional relish from being
eaten under those independent circumstances, with no old
people by, and with London all around us. This again was
heightened by a certain gipsy character that set the banquet off :
for , while the table was, as Mr. Pumblechook might have said,
the lap of luxury - being entirely furnished forth from the
coffee -house — the circumjacent region of sitting -room was of a
comparatively pastureless and shifty character : imposing on
the waiter the wandering habits of putting the covers on the
floor ( where he fell over them ), the melted butter in the arm
chair, the bread on the bookshelves, the cheese in the coal
scuttle, and the boiled fowl into my bed in the next room
where I found much of its parsley and butter in a state of con
gelation when I retired for the night. All this made the feast
delightful, and when the waiter was not there to watch me, my
pleasure was without alloy.
We had made some progress in the dinner, when I reminded
Herbert of his promise to tell me about Miss Havisham .
• True, " he replied . " I'll redeem it at once. Let me intro
duce the topic , Handel, by mentioning that in London it is not
the custom to put the knife in the mouth — for fear of accidents
and that while the fork is reserved for that use, it is not put
further in than necessary. It is scarcely worth mentioning,
only it's as well to do as other people do. Also, the spoon is
not generally used over - hand, but under. This has two advan
tages. You get at your mouth better (which after all is the
object), and you save a good deal of the attitude of opening
oysters, on the part of theright elbow . "
He offered these friendly suggestions in such a lively way ,
that we both laughed and I scarcely blushed .
“ Now , " he pursued, “ concerning Miss Havisham . Miss
Havisham , you must know , was a spoilt child. Her mother
died when she was a baby, and her father denied her nothing.
Her father was a country gentleman down in your part of the
world , and was a brewer. I don't know why it should be a
crack thing to be a brewer ; but it is indisputable that while
you cannot possibly be genteel and bake, you may be as genteel
as never was and brew . You see it every day .”
“ Yet a gentleman may not keep a public - house ; may he ?”
said I.
 GREA
T EXPECTAT
IONS.
161
“ Noton any account , ' returned Herbert ; “ but a public -house
leman . Well ! Mr. Havisham was very rich
may keep a gent So
and very proud. was his daughter ."
“ Miss Havisham was an only child ? ” I hazarded .
Stop a moment, I am coming to that. No, she was not
an only child ; she had a half -brother. Her father privately
married again — his cook, I rather think .”
“ I thought he was proud , ” said I.
My good Handel, so he was. He married his second wife
privately, because he was proud , and in course of time she died.
When she was dead, I apprehend he first told his daughter what
he had done, and then the son became a part of the family,
residing in the house you are acquainted with . As the son
grew a young man, he turned out riotous, extravagant, undutiful
-altogether bad . At last his father disinherited him ; but he
softened when he was dying, and left him well off, though not
nearly so well off as Miss Havisham . — Take another glass of
wine , and excuse my mentioning that society as a body does not
expect one to be so strictly conscientious in emptying one's
glass, as to turn it bottom upwards with the rim on one's nose."
I had been doing this, in an excess of attention to his recital.
I thanked him, and apologised . He said , " Not at all," and
resumed .
“ Miss Havisham was now an heiress, and you may suppose
was looked after as a great match . Her half -brother had now
ample means again, but what with debts and what with new
madness wasted them most fearfully again. There were
stronger differences between him and her, than there had been
between him and his father, and it is suspected that he che
rished a deep and mortal grudge against her as having influenced
the father's anger . Now, I come to the cruel part of the story
-merely breaking off, my dear Handel, to remark that a dinner
napkin will not go into a tumbler . ”
Why I was trying to pack mine into my tumbler, I am wholly
unable to say. I only know that I found myself, with a perse
verance worthy of a much better cause, making the most
strenuous exertions to compress it within those limits. Again I
thanked him and apologised , and again he said in the cheer
fullest manner, “ Not at all, I am sure !” and resumed.
“ There appeared upon the scene - say at the races, or the
public balls, or anywhere else you like — à certain man, who
made love to Miss Havisham. I never saw him ( for this
M
162 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

happened five -and -twenty years ago before you and I were,
Handel), but I have heard my father mention that he was a
showy-man, and the kind of man for the purpose. But that he
was not to be, without ignorance or prejudice, mistaken for a
gentleman, my father most strongly asseverates ; because it is a
principle of his that no man who was not a true gentleman at
heart, ever was, since the world began, a true gentleman in
manner . He says, no varnish can hide the grain of the wood ;
and that the more varnish you put on, the more the grain will
express itself. Well ! This man pursued Miss Havisham
closely, and professed to be devoted to her. I believe she had
not shown much susceptibility up to that time ; but all the sus
ceptibility she possessed , certainly came out then, and she
passionately loved him. There is no doubt that she perfectly
idolized him . He practised on her affection in that systematic
way , that he got great sums of money from her, and he induced
her to buy her brother out of a share in the brewery (which had
been weakly left him by his father ) at an immense price, on the
plea that when he was her husband he must hold and manage it
all. Your guardian was not at that time in Miss Havisham's
councils, and she was too haughty and too much in love, to be
advised by any one. Her relations were poor and scheming,
with the exception of my father ; he was poor enough, but not
time-serving or jealous. The only independent one among
them , he warned her that she was doing too much for this man ,
and was placing herself too unreservedly in his power. She
touk the first opportunity of angrily ordering my father out of
the house,
:) in his presence, and my father has never seen her
since."
I thought of her having said, “ Matthew will come and see
me at last when I am laid dead upon that table ; ” and I
asked Herbert whether his father was so inveterate against
her ?
“ It's not that ,” said he, “but she charged him , in the pre
sence of her intended husband, with being disappointed in the
hope of fawning upon her for his own advancement, and, if he
were to go to her now, it would look true - even to him and
even to her. To return to the man and make an end of him .
The marriage day was fixed, the wedding dresses were bought,
the wedding tour was planned out, the wedding guests were
invited . The
7 day came, but not the bridegroom . He wrote her
a letter
 GREA
T EXPECTAT
IONS. 163

« Which she received,” I struck in, “ when she was dressing

for her marriage ? At twentyminutes tonine pis
At the hour and minute," said Herbert, nodding, “at which
she afterwards stopped all the clocks. What was in it, further
than that it most heartlessly broke the marriage off, I can't tell
you, because I don't know . When she recovered from a bad
illness that she had, she laid the whole place waste , as you have
seen it, and she has never since looked upon the light of day.”
" Is that all the story ?" I asked , after considering it.
“ All I know of it; and indeed I only know so much, through
piecing it out for myself ; for my father always avoids it, and,
even when Miss Havisham invited me to go there, told me no
more of it than it was absolutely requisite I should understand .
But I have forgotten one thing. It has been supposed that the
man to whom she gave her misplaced confidence, acted through
out in concert with her half - brother ; that it was a conspiracy
between them ; and that they shared the profits.”
“ I wonder he didn't marry her and get all the property ,”
said I.
66He
mayhave been married already, and her cruel mortifica
tion may have been a part of her half9) -brother's scheme,” said
Herbert . “ Mind ! I don't know that ."
“ What became of the two men ? " I asked , after again con
sidering the subject.
“They fell into deeper shame and degradation - if there can
be deeper — and ruin .”
“ Are they alive now ?"
“ I don't know."
“ You said just now that Estella was not related to Miss
Havisham , but adopted. When adopted ?”
Herbert shrugged his shoulders. “There has always been an
Estella, since I have heard of a Miss Havisham . I know no
more . And now , Handel, " said he, finally throwing off the
story as it were , “ there is a perfectly open understanding between
us. All I know about Miss Havisham , you know.”
7
“ And all I know ," I retorted, “ you know .”
I fully believe it. So there can be no competition or per
plexity between you and me. And as to the condition on which
you hold your advancement in life - namely, that you are not to
inquire or discuss to whom you owe it - you may be very sure
that it will never be encroached upon , or even approached , bý'
me, or by any one belonging to me.
164 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

In truth, he said this with so much delicacy, that I felt the

subject done with, even though I should be under his father's
roof for years and years to come. Yet he said it with so much
meaning, too, that I felt he as perfectly understood Miss
Havisham to be my benefactress, as I understood the fact myself.
It had not occurred to me before, that he had led up to the
theme for the purpose of clearing it out of our way ; but we
were so much the lighter and easier for having broached it,
that now perceived this to be the case . We were very gay
and sociable, and I asked him, in the course of conversation ,
what he was ? He replied, " A capitalist: -an Insurer of Ships .”
I suppose he saw me glancing about the room in search of
some tokens of Shipping, or capital, for he added, “ In the
City .”
I had grand ideas of the wealth and importance of Insurers
of Ships in the City, and I began to think with awe, of having
laid a young Insurer on his back, blackened his enterprising
eye, and cut his responsible head open . But, again, there came
upon me, for my relief, that odd impression that Herbert Pocket
would never be very successful or rich.
“ I shall not rest satisfied with merely employing my capital
in insuring ships. I shall buy up some good Life Assurance
shares, and cut into the Direction . I shall also do a little in
the mining way. None of these things will interfere with my
chartering a few thousand tons on my own account. I think I
shall trade,” said he, leaning back in his chair, “ to the East
Indies, for silks, shawls, spices, dyes, drugs, and precious woods.
It's an interesting trade."
“ And the profits are large ?” said I.
66 Tremendous !” said he.
I wavered again , and began to think here were greater ex
pectations than my own.
“ I think I shall trade, also , ” said he, putting his thumbs in
his waistcoat pockets, “ to the West Indies, for sugar, tobacco,
and rum .
Also to Ceylon, specially for elephants’ tusks .”
“ You will want a good many ships,” said I.
“ A perfect fleet ," said he.
Quite overpowered by the magnificence of these transactions,
I asked him where the ships he insured mostly traded to at
present ?
“ I haven't begun insuring yet,” he replied. “ I am looking
about me. ”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
165
Somehow , that pursuit seemed more in keeping with Barnard's
Inn . I said( in a tone of conviction ), “ Ah -h !"
“ Yes. I am in a counting -house, and looking about me .”
" Is a counting-house profitable ? " I asked .
6 To ---do you mean to the young fellow who's in it ? ” he
asked, in reply.
“ Yes ; to you ."
“Why, n-no ; not to me." He said this with the air of one
carefully reckoning up and striking a balance. “ Not directly
profitable. Thatis, it doesn't pay me anything, and I have to
-keep myself."
This certainly had not a profitable appearance , and I shook
my head as if I would imply that it would be difficult to lay by
much accumulative capital from such a source of income .
“But the thing is," said Herbert Pocket, “ that you look
about you . That's the grand thing. You are in a counting
house, you know , and you look about you . "
It struck me as a singular implication that you couldn't be
out of a counting- house, you know , and look about you ; but I
silently deferred to his experience.
6. Then the time comes , ” said Herbert, “when you see your
opening. And you go in, and you swoop upon it and you make
your capital, and then there you are ! When you have once
made your capital, you have nothing to do but employ it. "
This was very like his way of conducting that encounter in
the garden ; very like. His manner of bearing his poverty, too,
exactly corresponded to his manner of bearing that defeat. It
seemed to me that he took all blows and buffets now, with just
the same air as he had taken mine then. It was evident that he
had nothing around him but the simplest necessaries, for every
thing that I remarked upon turned out to have been sent in on
my account from the coffee - house or somewhere else.
Yet, having already made his fortune in his own mind, he
was so unassuming with it that I felt quite grateful to him for
not being puffed up . It was a pleasant addition to his naturally
pleasant ways, and we got on famously. In the evening we
went out for a walk in the streets, and went half- price to the 1
Theatre ; and next day we went to church at Westminster
Abbey , and in the afternoon we walked in the Parks ; and I
wondered who shod all the horses there, and wished Joe did.
On a moderate computation , it was many months, that Sunday,
since I had left Joe and Biddy. The space interposed between
166 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

myself and them , partook of that expansion, and our marshes

were any distance off. That I could have been at our old church
in my old church -going clothes, on the very last Sunday that
ever was, seemed a combination of impossibilities, geographical
and social, solar and lunar. Yet in the London streets so
crowded with people and so brilliantly lighted in the dusk of
evening, therewere depressing hints of reproaches for that I
had put the poor old kitchen at home so far away ; and in the
dead of night, the footsteps of some incapable impostor of a
porter mooning about Barnard's Inn, under pretence of watching
it, fell hollow on my heart .
On the Monday morning at a quarter before nine, Herbert
went to the counting -house to report himself , to look about
him , too, I suppose — and I bore him company. He was to
come away in an hour or two to attend me to Hammersmith ,
and I was to wait about for him . It appeared to me that the
eggs from which young Insurers were hatched, were incubated
in dust and heat, like the eggs of ostriches, judging from the
places to which those incipient giants repaired on a Monday
morning. Nor did the counting -house where Herbert assisted,
show in my eyes as at all a good Observatory ; being a back
second floor up a yard, of a grimy presence in all particulars,
and with a look into another back second floor, rather than a
look out.
I waited about until it was noon , and I went upon 'Change,
and I saw fluey men sitting there under the bills about shipping,
whom I took to be great merchants, though I couldn't under
stand why they should all be out of spirits. When Herbert
came, we went and had lunch at a celebrated house which I then
quite venerated, but now believe to have been the most abject
superstition in Europe, and where I could not help noticing,
even then , that there was much more gravy on the tablecloths
and knives and waiters' clothes, than in the steaks. This colla
tion disposed of at a moderate price ( considering the grease :
which was not charged for ), we went back to Barnard's Inn and
got my little portmanteau, and then took coach for Hammer
smith . We arrived there at two or three o'clock in the after
noon , and had very little way to walk to Mr. Pocket's house.
Lifting the latch of a gate, we passed direct into a little garden
overlooking the river, where Mr. Pocket's children were playing
about. And unless I deceive myself on a point where my inte
rests or prepossessions are certainly not concerned, I saw that
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 167
Mr. and Mrs. Pocket's children were not growing up or being
brought up, but were tumbling up.
Mrs. Pocket was sitting on a garden chair under a tree, read
ing, with her legs upon another garden chair ; and Mrs. Pocket's
two nursemaids were looking about them while the children
played. “ Mamma,” said Herbert, “ this is young Mr. Pip .”
Upon which Mrs. Pocket received me with an appearance of
amiable dignity .
“ Master Alick and Miss Jane,” cried one of the nurses to two
of the children, “ if you go a bouncing up against them bushes
you'll fall over into the river and be drownded , and what'll your
pa say then !”
At the same time this nurse picked up Mrs. Pocket's hand
kerchief, and said, “ If that don't make six times you've dropped
it, Mum!" Upon which Mrs. Pocket laughed and said, “ Thank
you, Flopson," and settling herself in one chair only, resumed
her book . Her countenance immediately assumed a knitted and
intent expression as if she had been reading for a week, but
before she could have read half a dozen lines, she fixed her eyes
upon me, and said, “ I hope your mamma is quite well "" This
unexpected inquiry put me into such a difficulty that I began
saying in the absurdest way that if there had been any such
person I had no doubt she would have been quite well and
would have been very much obliged and would have sent her
compliments , when the nurse came to my rescue.
" Well!” she cried , picking up the pocket-handkerchief, “ if
that don't make seven times ! What Are you a doing of this 1
afternoon, Mum !” Mrs. Pocket received her property, at first
with a look of unutterable surprise as if she had never seen it
before, and then with a laugh of recognition, and said, “ Thank
you, Flopson , " and forgot me, and went on reading .
I found, now I had leisure to count them , that there were no
fewer than six little Pockets present, in various stages of tum
bling up . 1 had scarcely arrived at the total when a seventh
was heard, as in the region of air, wailing dolefully.
“If there ain't Baby ! " said Flopson, appearing to think it
most surprising. “ Make haste up, Millers.”
Millers, who was the other nurse , retired into the house, and
by dogrees the child's wailing was hushed and stopped, as if it
were a young ventriloquist with something in its mouth . Mrs.
Pocket read all the time, and I was curious to know what the
book could be.
168 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

We were waiting, I supposed, for Mr. Pocket to come out to

us ; at any rate we waited there, and so I had an opportunity of
observing the remarkable family phenomenon that whenever any
of the children strayed near Mrs. Pocket in their play, they
always tripped themselves up and tumbled over her - always
very much to her momentary astonishment, and their own more
enduring lamentation . I was at a loss to account for this sur
prising circumstance, and could not help giving my mind to
speculations about it, until by -and -by Millers came down with
the baby, which baby was handed to Flopson, which Flopson
was handing it to Mrs. Pocket, when she too went fairly head
foremost over Mrs. Pocket, baby and all, and was caught by
Herbert and myself.
“ Gracious me, Flopson ! ” said Mrs. Pocket, looking off her
book for a moment, “everybody's tumbling !”
“ Gracious you, indeed, Mum !” returned Flopson, very red in
the face ; “ what have you got there ?”
“ I got here, Flopson ? ” asked Mrs. Pocket.
“ Why, if it ain't your footstool ! ” cried Flopson . “ And if
you keep it under your skirts like that, who's to help tumbling !
Here ! Take the baby, Mum , and give me your book .”
Mrs. Pocket acted on the advice, and inexpertly danced the
infant a little in her lap, while the other children played about
it. This had lasted but a very short time, when Mrs. Pocket
issued summary orders that they were all to be taken into the
house for a nap . Thus I made the second discovery on that
first occasion, that the nurture of the little Pockets consisted of
alternately tumbling up and lying down .
Under these circumstances, when Flopson and Millers had
got the children into the house, like a little flock of sheep, and
Mr. Pocket came out of it to make my acquaintance, I was not
much surprised to find that Mr. Pocket was a gentleman with a
rather perplexed expression of face, and with his very grey hair
disordered on his head, as if he didn't quite see his way to
putting anything straight.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 169

CHAPTER XXIII.

MR. POCKET said he was glad to see me, and he hoped I was
not sorry to see him. “ For, I really am not,” he added , with
his son's smile, an alarming personage .” He was a young
looking man , in spite of his perplexities and his very grey hair,
and his manner seemed quite natural. I use the word natural,
in the sense of its being unaffected ; there was something comic
in his distraught way , as though it would have been downright
ludicrous but for his own perception that it was very near being
So. When he had talked with me a little, he said to Mrs. Pocket,
with a rather anxious contraction of his eyebrows, which were
black and handsome, “ Belinda, I hope you have welcomed Mr.
l'ip ?” And she looked up from her book, and said , “ Yes . ” She
then smiled upon me in an absent state of mind , and asked me
if I liked the taste of orange- flower water ? As the question had
no bearing, near or remote, on any foregone or subsequent trans
action, I considered it to have been thrown out, like her previous
approaches, in general conversational condescension .
I found out within a few hours, and may mention at once, that
Mrs. Pocket was the only daughter of a certain quite accidental
deceased Knight, who had invented for himself a conviction
that his deceased father would have been made a Baronet but
for somebody's determined opposition arising out of entirely per
sonal motives — I forget whose, if I ever knew — the Sovereign's,
the Prime Minister's, the Lord Chancellor's, the Archbishop of
Canterbury's, anybody's — and had tacked himself on to the
nobles of the earth in right of this quite supposititious fact. I
believe he had been knighted himself for storming the English
grammar at the point of the pen, in a desperate address engrossed
on vellum , on the occasion of the laying of the first stone of
some building or other, and for handing some Royal Personage
either the trowel or the mortar. Be that as it may , he had
directed Mrs. Pocket to be brought up from her cradle as one
who in the nature of things must marry a title, and who was to
be guarded from the acquisition of plebeian domestic knowledge.
So successful a watch and ward had been established over the
170 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

young lady by this judicious parent, that she had grown up

highly ornamental, but perfectly helpless and useless. With
her character thus happily formed , in the first bloom of her
youth she had encountered Mr. Pocket : who was also in the
first bloom of youth, and not quite decided whether to mount to
the Woolsack , or to roof himself in with a mitre. As his doing
the one or the other was a mere question of time, he and Mrs.
Pocket had taken Time by the forelock (when, to judge from
its length, it would seem to have wanted cutting), and had
married without the knowledge of the judicious parent.
judicious parent, having nothing to bestow or withhold but his
blessing, had handsomely settled that dower upon them after a
short struggle, and had informed Mr. Pocket that his wife was
6 a treasure for a Prince.” Mr. Pocket had invested the Prince's
treasure in the ways of the world ever since, and it was supposed
to have brought him in but indifferent interest. Still, Mrs.
Pocket was in general the object of a queer sort of respectful
pity, because she had not married a title ; while Mr. Pocket
was the object of a queer sort of forgiving reproach, because he
had never got one.
Mr. Pocket took me into the house and showed me my room :
which was a pleasant one, and so furnished as that I could use
it with comfort for my own private sitting -room . He then
knocked at the doors of two other similar rooms, and introduced
me to their occupants, by name Drummle and Startop. Drummle,
an old -looking young man of a heavy order of architecture, was
whistling. Startop, younger in years and appearance, was read
ing and holding his head, as if he thought himself in danger of
exploding it with too strong a charge of knowledge.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Pocket had such a noticeable air of being
in somebody else's hands, that I wondered who really was in
possession of the house and let them live there, until I found
this unknown power to be the servants. It was a smooth way
of going on , perhaps, in respect of saving trouble ; but it had
the appearance of being expensive, for the servants felt it
a duty they owed to themselves to be nice in their eating and
drinking, and to keep a deal of company down stairs. They
allowed a very liberal table to Mr. and Mrs. Pocket, yet it
always appeared to me that by far the best part of the house
to have boarded in, would have been the kitchen - always
supposing the boarder capable of self -defence, for, before I had
been there a week, a neighbouring lady with whom the family
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 171

were personally unacquainted, wrote in to say that she had

seen Millers slapping the baby. This greatly distressed
Mrs. Pocket, who burst into tears on receiving the note, and
said that it was an extraordinary thing that the neighbours
couldn't mind their own business.
By degrees I learnt, and chiefly from Herbert, that Mr.
Pocket had been educated at Harrow and at Cambridge, where
he had distinguished himself ; but that when he had had the
happiness of marrying Mrs. Pocket very early in life, he had
impaired his prospects and taken up the calling of a Grinder.
After grinding a number of dull blades — of whom it was remark
able that their fathers, when influential, were always going to
help him to preferment, but always forgot to do it when
the blades had left the Grindstone -- he had wearied of that
poor work and had come to London . Here, after gradually
failing in loftier hopes, he had “ read” with divers who had
lacked opportunities or neglected them , and had refurbished
divers others for special occasions, and had turned his acquire
ments to the account of literary compilation and correction, and
on such means, added to some very moderate private resources,
still maintained the house I saw .
Mr. and Mrs. Pocket had a toady neighbour ; a widow lady
of that highly sympathetic nature that she agreed with every
body, blessed everybody, and shed smiles and tears on every
body, according to circumstances. This lady's name was
Mrs. Coiler, and I had the honour of taking her down to dinner
on the day of my installation . She gave me to understand on
the stairs, that it was a blow to dear Mrs. Pocket that dear Mr.
Pocket should be under the necessity of receiving gentlemen to
read with him . That did not extend to me, she told me in a
gush of love and confidence ( at that time, I had known her
something less than five minutes ) ; if they were all like Me, it
would be quite another thing.
“ But dear Mrs. Pocket ,” said Mrs. Coiler, “ after her early
disappointment (not that dear Mr. Pocket was to blame in
that) ——”
66 , requires so much luxury and elegance
Yes, ma'am , ” I said, to stop her, for was afraid she was
going to cry.
99
“ And she is of so aristocratic a disposition
Yes, ma'am, ” I said again, with the same object as before.
" _that it is hard," said Mrs. Coiler, “ to have dear Mr.
Pocket's time and attention diverted from dear Mrs. Pocket. ”
172 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

I could not help thinking that it might be harder if the

butcher's time and attention were diverted from dear Mrs.
Pocket ; but I said nothing, and indeed had enough to do in
keeping a bashful watch upon my company -manners.
It came to my knowledge, through what passed between
Mrs. Pocket and Drummle, while I was attentive to my knife
and fork, spoon, glasses, and other instruments of self -destruction,
that Drummle, whose christian name was Bentley, was actually the
next heir but one to a baronetcy. It further appeared that the
book I had seen Mrs. Pocket reading in the garden , was all
about titles, and that she knew the exact date at which her grand
papa would have come into the book, if he ever had come at all.
Drummle didn't say much, but in his limited way (he struck me
as a sulky kind of fellow ) he spoke as one of the elect, and
recognised Mrs. Pocket as a woman and a sister. No one but
themselves and Mrs. Coiler the toady neighbour showed any
interest in this part of the conversation , and it appeared to me
that it was painful to Herbert ; but it promised to last a long
time, when the page came in with the announcement of a
domestic affliction . It was, in effect, that the cook had mislaid
the beef. To my unutterable amazement, I now , for the first
time, saw Mr. Pocket relieve his mind by going through a
performance that struck me as very extraordinary, but which
made no impression on anybody else, and with which I soon
became as familiar as the rest. He laid down the carving -knife
and fork - being engaged in carving at the moment - put his
two hands into his disturbed hair, and appeared to make an
extraordinary effort to lift himself up by it . When he had done
this, and had not lifted himself up at all, he quietly went on with
what he was about.
Mrs. Coiler then changed the subject and began to flatter me.
I liked it for a few moments, but she flattered me so very grossly
that the pleasure was soon over. She had a serpentine way of
coming close at me when she pretended to be vitally interested
in the friends and localities I had left, which was altogether
snaky and fork -tongued ; and when she made an occasional
bounce upon Startop ( who said very little to her), or upon
Drummle (who said less ), I rather envied them for being on the
opposite side of the table.
After dinner the children were introduced, and Mrs. Coiler
made admiring comments on their eyes, noses, and legs — a
sagacious way of improving their minds. There were four
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 173

little girls, and twolittle boys, besides the baby who might have
been either, and the baby's next successor who was as yet
neither. They were brought in by Flopson and Millers, much
as though those two non -commissioned officers had been recruit
ing somewhere for children and had enlisted these : while
Mrs. Pocket looked at the young Nobles that ought to have
been , as if she rather thought she had had the pleasure of in
specting them before, but didn't quite know what to make of
them .
“ Here ! Give me your fork , Mum , and take the baby,” said
Flopson. “ Don't take it that way, or you'll get its head under
the table .”
Thus advised, Mrs. Pocket took it the other way , and got its
head upon the table ; which was announced to all present by a
prodigious concussion.
Dear, dear ! give it me back , Mum,” said Flopson ; “ and
Miss Jane, come and dance the baby, do ! "
One of the little girls, a mere mite who seemed to have prema
turely taken upon herself some charge of the others, stepped out
of her place by me, and danced to and from the baby until it
left off crying, and laughed . Then all the children laughed ,
and Mr. Pocket (who in the mean time had twice endeavoured
to lift himself up by the hair ) laughed, and we all laughed and
were glad.
Flopson, by dint of doubling the baby at the joints like a
Dutch doll, then got it safely into Mrs. Pocket's lap, and gave
it the nutcrackers to play with : at the some time recommend
ing Mrs. Pocket to take notice that the handles of that instru
ment were not likely to agree with its eyes, and sharply charging
Miss Jane to look after the same. Then, the two purses left the
room, and had a lively scuffle on the staircase with a dissi
pated page who had waited at dinner, and who had clearly lost
half his buttons at the gaming -table.
I was made very uneasy in my mind by Mrs. Pocket's falling
into a discussion with Drummle respecting two baronetcies,
while she ate a sliced orange steeped in sugar and wine, and
forgetting all about the baby on her lap : who did most appal
ling things with the nutcrackers. At length little Jane per
ceived its young brains to be imperilled, softly left her place,
and with nany small artifices coaxed the dangerous weap
away. Mrs. Pocket finishing her orange at about the same time,
and not approving of this, said to Jane :
174 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
“You naughty child, how dare you ? Go and sit down this
instant !”
“ Mamma dear,” lisped the little girl, “ baby ood have put
hith eyeth out ."
“ How dare you tell me so ?” retorted Mrs. Pocket. “ Go and
sit down in your chair this moment ! ”
Mrs. Pocket's dignity was so crushing, that I felt quite
abashed : as if I myself had done something to rouse it.
CG
Belinda,” remonstrated Mr. Pocket, from the other end of
the table, “ how can you be so unreasonable ? Jane only inter
fered for the protection of baby ."
“ I will not allow anybody to interfere,” said Mrs.Pocket. “ I
am surprised, Matthew , that you should expose me to the affront
of interference . "
“ Good God !” cried Mr. Pocket, in an outbreak of desolate
desperation. “Are infants to be nutcrackered into their tombs,
and is nobody to save them ?”
“ I will not be interfered with by Jane," said Mrs. Pocket, with
a majestic glance at that innocent little offender. " I hope I
know my poor grandpapa's position . Jane, indeed !"
Mr. Pocket got his hands in his hair again, and this time really
did lift himself some inches out of his chair. “Hear this !” he
helplessly exclaimed to the elements. “ Babies are to be nut
crackered dead, for people's poor grandpapa's positions ! " Then
he let himself down again, and became silent.
We all looked awkwardly at the table - cloth while this was
going on. A pause succeeded , during which the honest and
irrepressible baby made a series of leaps and crows at little
Jane, who appeared to me to be the only member of the family
( irrespective of servants ) with whom it had any decided acquaint
ance .
" Mr. Drummle," said Mrs. Pocket, " will you ring for Flopson ?
Jane, you undutiful little thing, go and lie down. Now , baby
darling, come with ma !"
The baby was the soul of honour, and protested with all its
might. It doubled itself up the wrong way over Mrs. Pocket's
arm , exhibited a pair of knitted shoes and dimpled ankles to the
company in lieu of its soft ace, and was carried out in the
highest state of miutiny. And it gained its point after all, for I
saw it through the window within a few minutes, being nursed
by little Jane.
It happened that the other five children were left behind at
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 175

the dinner -table, through Flopson's having some private engage

ment, and their not being anybody else's business. I thus
became aware of the mutual relations between them and Mr.
Pocket, which were exemplified in the following manner . Mr.
Pocket, with the normal perplexity of his face heightened, and
his hair rumpled , looked at them for some minutes, as if he
couldn't make out how they came to be boarding and lodging in
that establishment, and why they hadn't been billeted by Nature
on somebody else. Then, in a distant, Missionary way he asked
them certain questions — as why little Joe had that hole in his
frill : who said , Pa, Flopson was going to mend it when she had
time— and how little Fanny came by that whitlow : who said ,
Pa, Millers was going to poultice it when she didn't forget.
Then, he melted into parental tenderness, and gave them a shil
ling apiece and told them to go and play ; and then as they
went out, with one very strong effort to lift himself up by the
hair he dismissed the hopeless subject.
In the evening there was rowing on the river. As Drummle
and Startop had each a boat, I resolved to set up mine, and to
cut them both out. I was pretty good at most exercises in which
country - boys are adepts, but, as I was conscious of wanting
elegance of style for the Thames - not to say for other waters
I at once engaged to place myself under the tuition of the winner
of a prize- wherry who plied at our stairs, and to whom I was
introduced by my new allies. This practical authority confused
me very much, by saying I had the arm of a blacksmith. If he
could have known how nearly the compliment lost him his pupil,
I doubt if he would have paid it.
There was a supper -tray after we got home at night, and I
think we should all have enjoyed ourselves, but for a rather dis
agreeable domestic occurrence. Mr. Pocket was in good spirits,
when a housemaid came in, and said, “ If you please, sir, I should
wish to speak to you ."
Speak to your master ?" said Mrs. Pocket, whose dignity was
roused again . “ How can you think of such a thing ? Go and
speak to Flopson. Or speak to me — at some other time.”
“ Begging your pardon , ma'am , " returned the housemaid, “ I
should wish to speak at once, and to speak to master.”
Hereupon, Mr. Pocket went out of the room, and we made
the best of ourselves until he ne back.
“ This is a pretty thing, Belinda ! ” said Mr. Pocket, return
ing with a countenance expressive of grief and despair. “ Here's
176 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

the cook lying insensibly drunk on the kitchen floor, with a

large bundle of fresh butter made up in the cupboard ready to
sell for grease ! "
Mrs. Pocket instantly showed much amiable einotion, and
said, “This is that odious Sophia's doing ! "
“ What do you mean , Belinda ?" demanded Mr. Pocket.
“ Sophia has told you ,” said Mrs. Pocket. “ Did I not see her
with my own eyes and hear her with my own ears, come into the
room just now and ask to speak to you ?"
“ But has she not taken me down stairs, Belinda, ” returned
Mr. Pocket, “and shown me the woman, and the bundle too ?”
“ And do you defend her, Matthew , ” said Mrs. Pocket, “ for
making mischief ?”
Mr. Pocket uttered a dismal groan .
“ Am I, grandpapa's granddaughter, to be nothing in the
house ?” said Mrs. Pocket. Besides, the cook has always been
à very nice respectful woman , and said in the most natural
manner when she came to look after the situation , that she felt
I was born to be a Duchess .”
There was a sofa where Mr. Pocket stood, and he dropped
upon it in the attitude of the Dying Gladiator. Still, in that
attitude he said, with a hollow voice, “ Good night, Mr. Pip ,
when I deemed it advisable to go to bed and leave him .

CHAPTER XXIV.

AFTER two or three days, when I had established myself in my

room and had gone backwards and forwards to London several
times, and had ordered all I wanted of my tradesmen , Mr. Pocket
and I had a long talk together. He knew more of my intended
career than I knew myself, for he referred to his having been
told by Mr. Jaggers that I was not designed for any profession ,
and that I should be well enough educated for my destiny if I
could " hold my own with the average of young men in pros
perous circumstances. I acquiesced , of course, knowing nothing
to the contrary .
He advised my attending certain places in London, for the
acquisition of such mere rudiments as I wanted, and my invest
ing him with the functions of explainer and director of all my
studies. He hoped that with intelligent assistance I should
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 177

meet with little to discourage me, and should soon be able to

dispense with any aid but his. Through his way of saying this,
and much more to similar purpose, he placed himself on confi
dential terms with me in an admirable manner ; and I may state
at once that he was always so zealous and honourable in fulfil
ling his compact with me, that he made me zealous and honour
able in fulfilling mine with him . If he had shown indifference
as a master, I have no doubt I should have returned the compli
ment as a pupil ; he gave me no such excuse , and each of us
did the other justice . Nor, did I ever regard him as having
anything ludicrous about him — or anything but what was serious,
honest, and good - in his tutor communication with me.
When these points were settled, and so far carried out as that
I had begun to work in earnest, it occurred to me that if I could
retain my bedroom in Barnard's Inn, my life would be agreeably
varied, while my manners would be none the worse for Herbert's
society . Mr. Pocket did not object to this arrangement, but
urged that before any step could possibly be taken in it, it must
be submitted to my guardian. I felt that his delicacy arose out
of the consideration that the plan would save Herbert some
expense, so I went off to Little Britain and imparted my wish
to Mr. Jaggers.
“If I could buy the furniture now hired for me," said I, " and
one or two other little things, I should be quite at home there."
“Go it ! " said Mr. Jaggers, with a short laugh. “ I told you
you'd get on . Well ! How much do you want?”
I said I didn't know how much .
“ Come ! ” retorted Mr. Jaggers. “ How much ? Fifty
pounds ? ”
" Oh , not nearly so much .”
“ Five pounds ?" said Mr. Jaggers.
This was such a great fall, that I said in discomfiture, “ Oh !
more than that.”
“ More than that, eh ? " retorted Mr. Jaggers, lying in wait for
me, with his hands in his pockets, his head on one side, and his
eyes on the wall behind me ; “ how much more ? "
“ It is so difficult to fix a sum ,” said I, hesitating.
“ Come !” said Mr. Jaggers. “ Let's get at it . Twice five ;
will that do ? Three times five ; will that do ? Four times
five ; will that do ? ”
I said I thought that would do handsomely .
“ Four times five will do handsomely, will it ? ” said Mr. Jag
N
178 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
gers, knitting his brows. “ Now , what do you make of four times
five ?"
“ What do I make of it ?"
“ Ah ! ” said Mr. Jaggers ; “ how much ?”
" I suppose you make it twenty pounds, " said I, smiling.
“ Never mind what I make it, my friend,” observed Mr.
Jaggers, with a knowing and contradictory toss of his head.
“ I want to know what you make it .”
Twenty pounds, of course. "
“ Wemmick !” said Mr. Jaggers, opening his office door.
“ Take Mr. Pip’s written order, and pay him twenty pounds ."
This strongly marked way of doing business made a strongly
marked impression on me, and that not of an agreeable kind.
Mr. Jaggers never laughed ; but he wore great bright creaking
boots ; and, in poising himself on those boots, with his large
head bent down and his eyebrows joined together, awaiting an
answer , he sometimes caused the boots to creak, as if they
laughed in a dry and suspicious way. As he happened to go
out now, and as Wemmick was brisk and talkative, I said to
Wemmick that I hardly knew what to make of Mr. Jaggers's
manner .
“Tell him that, and he'll take it as a compliment,” answered
Wemmick ;" he don't mean that you should know what to make
of it.-Oh ! " for I looked surprised , “ it's not personal ; it's pro
>>
fessional: only professional.”
Wemmick was at his desk, lunching — and crunching - on a
dry hard biscuit ; pieces of which he threw from time to time
into his slit of a mouth , as if he were posting them .
Always seems to me, ” said Wemmick , “ as if he had set a
man -trap and was watching it. Suddenly – click — you're
caught !"
Without remarking that man -traps were not among the ame
nities of life, I said I supposed he was very skilful ?
“ Deep , " said Wemmick , " as Australia .” Pointing with his
pen at the office floor, to express that Australia was understood,
for the purposes of the figure, to be syminetrically on the oppo
site spot of the globe. “If there was anything deeper, ” added
Wemmick, bringing his pen to paper, “ he'd be it ."
Then, I said I supposed he had a fine business, and Wemmick
said, “ Ca- pi-tal !" Then I asked if there were many clerks ?
to which he replied :
“ We don't run much into clerks, because there's only one
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 179

Jaggers, and people won't have him at second hand . There

are only four of us . Would you like to see 'em ? You are one
of us, as I may say ."
I accepted the offer. When Mr. Wemmick had put all the
biscuit into the post, and had paid me my money from a cash
box in a safe, the key of which safe he kept somewhere down
his back and produced from his coat -collar like an iron pigtail,
we went up -stairs. The house was dark and shabby, and the
greasy shoulders that had left their mark in Mr. Jaggers's room,
seemed to have been shuffling up and down the staircase for
years. In the front first floor, a clerk who looked something
between a publican and a rat- catcher — a large pale puffed swollen
man — was attentively engaged with three or four people of
shabby appearance, whom he treated as unceremoniously as
everybody seemed to be treated who contributed to Mr. Jaggers's
coffers . “ Getting evidence together," said Mr. Wemmick, as
we came out, “ for the Bailey.' In the room over that, a little
flabby terrier of a clerk with dangling hair (his cropping seemed
to have been forgotten when he was a puppy ) was similarly en
gaged with a man with weak eyes, whom Mr. Wemmick pre
sented to me as a smelter who kept his pot always boiling, and
who would melt me anything I pleased — and who was in an exces
sive white - perspiration, as if he had been trying his art on him
self.' In a back room, a high -shouldered man with a face -ache
tied up in dirty flannel, who was dressed in old black clothes that
bore the appearance of having been waxed, was stooping over
his work of making fair copies of the notes of the other two
gentlemen, for Mr. Jaggers's own use.
This was all the establishment. When we went down stairs
again , Wemmick led me into my guardian's room , and said,
“ This you've seen already ."
66
Pray , ” said I, as the two odious casts with the twitchy
leer upon them caught my sight again, “ whose likenesses are
those ?"
• These ?” said Wemmick, getting upon a chair, and blowing
the dust off the horrible heads before bringing them down .
“ These are two celebrated ones. Famous clients of ours that
got us a world of credit. This chap (why you must have come
down in the night and been peeping into the inkstand, to get
this blot upon your eyebrow , you old rascal ! ) murdered his
master, and, considering that he wasn't brought up to evidence ,
didn't plan it badly. "
180 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Is it like him ?" I asked, recoiling from the brute, as Wem

mick spat upon his eyebrow and gave it a rub with his
sleeve.
“ Like him ? It's himself, you know . The cast was made in
Newgate, directly after he was taken down. You had a par
ticular fancy for me, hadn't you, Old Artful ?" said Wemmick .
He then explained this affectionate apostrophe, by touching his
brooch representing the lady and the weeping willow at the
tomb with the urn upon it, and saying, “ Had it made for me
express ! ”
“ Is the lady anybody ? ” said I.
' No, " returned Wemmick . “ Only his game. (You liked
your bit of game, didn't you ?) No ; deuce a bit of a lady in the
case, Mr. Pip, except one -- and she wasn't of this slender lady
like sort, and you wouldn't have caught her looking after this
urn - unless there was something to drink in it.” Wemmick's
attention being thus directed to his brooch, he put down the
cast, and polished the brooch with his pocket-handkerchief.
“ Did that other creature come to the same end ? ” I asked .
“ He has the same look .”
“You're right,” said Wemmick ; “ it's the genuine look . Much
as if one nostril was caught up with a horsehair and a little
fish - hook . Yes, he came to the same end ; quite the natural
end here, I assure you. He forged wills, this blade did, if he
didn't also put the supposed testators to sleep too. You were a
gentlemanly Cove, though ” (Mr. Wemmick was again apostro
phising ), “and you said you could write Greek . Yah, Bounce
able ! What a liar you were . I never met such a liar as
you ! " Before putting his late friend on his shelf again, Wem
mick touched the largest of his mourning rings, and said, “Sent
out to buy it for me, only the day before. "
While he was putting up the other cast and coming down
from the chair, the thought crossed my mind that all his per
sonal jewellery was derived from like sources. As he had
shown no diffidence on the subject, I ventured on the liberty of
asking him the question, when he stood before me, dusting his
hands.
“ Oh yes,” he returned , " these are all gifts of that kind . One
brings another, you see ; that's the way of it . I always take
' em. They're curiosities. And they're property. They may
not be worth much, but, after all, they're property and portable.
It don't signify to you with your brilliant look-out, but as to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 181

myself, my guiding -star always is, Get hold of portable pro

perty ."
When I had rendered homage to this light, he went on to say
in a friendly manner :
“ If at any odd time when you have nothing better to do, you
wouldn't mind coming over to see me at Walworth, I could
offer you a bed , and I should consider it an honour. I have
not much to show you ; but such two or three curiosities as I
have got, you might like to look over ; and I am fond of a bit
of garden and a summer -house .”
I said I should be delighted to accept his hospitality .
66
Thankee,” said he : “ then we'll consider that it's to come
off, when convenient to you. Have you dined with Mr. Jaggers
yet ? "
“ Not yet." A
* Well,” said Wemmick, “ he'll give you wine, and good wine
I'll give you punch, and not bad punch. And now I'll tell you
something. When you go to dine with Mr. Jaggers, look at
his housekeeper. "
“ Shall I see something very uncommon ?”
“Well,” said Wemmick, “ you'll see a wild beast tamed . Not
so very uncommon , you'll tell me. I reply, that depeñds on
the original wildness of the beast, and the amount of taming.
It won't lower your opinion of Mr. Jaggers's powers. Keep
your eye on it."
I told him I would do so, with all the interest and curiosity
that his preparation awakened . As I was taking my departure,
he asked me if I would like to devote five minutes to seeing
Mr. Jaggers “at it ?"
For several reasons , and not least because I didn't clearly
know what Mr. Jaggers would be found to be “ at, " I replied in
the affirmative. We dived into the City, and came up in a
crowded police -court, where a blood -relation in the murderous
sense) of the deceased with the fanciful taste in brooches, was
standing at the bar, uncomfortably chewing something ; while
my guardian had a woman under examination or cross -examina
tion — I don't know which - and was striking her, and the bench ,
and everybody with awe. If anybody, of whatsoever degree,
said a word that he didn't approve of, he instantly required to
have it “ taken down.” If anybody wouldn't make an admission ,
he said, “I'll have it out of you !” and if anybody made an
admission , he said, “ Now I have got you ! " The magistrates
182 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

shivered under a single bite of his finger. Thieves and thief

takers hung in dread rapture on his words, and shrank when a
hair of his eyebrows turned in their direction. Which side he
was on, I couldn't make out, for he seemed to me to be grinding
the whole place in a mill ; I only know that when I stole out
on tiptoe, he was not on the side of the bench ; for, he was
making the legs of the old gentleman who presided , quite con
vulsive under the table, by his denunciations of his conduct as
the representative of British law and justice in that chair that
day.

CHAPTER XXV .

BENTLEY DRUMMLE, who was so sulky a fellow that he even took

up a book as if its writer had done him an injury, did not take
up an acquaintance in a more agreeable spirit. Heavy in figure,
movement, and comprehension - in the sluggish complexion of
his face, and in the large awkward tongue that seemed to loll
about in his mouth as he himself lolled about in a room-he
was idle, proud , niggardly, reserved , and suspicious. He came
of rich people down in Somersetshire, who had nursed this coin
bination of qualities until they made the discovery that it was
just of age and a blockhead . Thus, Bentley Drummle had
come to Mr. Pocket when he was a head taller than that gentle
man , and half a dozen heads thicker than most gentlemen.
Startop had been spoilt by a weak mother and kept at home
when he ought to have been at school, but he was devotedly at
tached to her, and admired her beyond measure . He had a
woman's delicacy of feature, and was as you may see, though
you never saw her, ” said Herbert to me— “ exactly like his
mother.” It was but natural that I should take to him much
more kindly than to Drummle, and that, even in the earliest
evenings of our boating, he and I should pull homeward abreast
of one another, conversing from boat to boat, while Bentley
Drummle came up in our wake alone, under the overhanging
banks and among the rushes. He would always creep in -shore
like some uncomfortable amphibious creature, even when the
tide would have sent him fast upon his way ; and I always think
of him as coming after us in the dark or by the back -water,
when our own two boats were breaking the sunset or the moon
light in mid - stream .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 183

Herbert was my intimate companion and friend. I presented

him with a half - share in my boat, which was the occasion of his
Often coming down to Hammersmith ; and my possession of a
half -share in his chambers often took me up to London. We
used to walk between the two places at all hours. I have an
affection for the road yet (though it is not so pleasant a road as it
was then ), formed in the impressibility of untried youth and hope.
When I had been in Mr. Pocket's family a month or two,
Mr. and Mrs. Camilla turned up. Camilla was Mr. Pocket's
sister. Georgiana, whom I had seen at Miss Havisham's on the
same occasion, also turned up . She was a cousin - an indiges
tive single woman , who called her rigidity religion, and her
liver love. These people hated me with the hatred of cupidity
and disappointment. As a matter of course, they fawned upon
me in my prosperity with the basest meanness. Towards Mr.
Pocket, as a grown -up infant with no notion of his own inte
rests, they showed the complacent forbearance I had heard them
express. Mrs. Pocket they held in contempt ; but they allowed
the poor soul to have been heavily disappointed in life, because
that shed a feeble reflected light upon themselves.
These were the surroundings among which I settled down,
and applied myself to my education. I soon contracted expen
sive habits, and began to spend an amount of money that within
a few short months I should have thought almost fabulous ; but
through good and evil I stuck to my books. There was no
other merit in this, than my having sense enough to feel my
deficiencies. Between Mr. Pocket and Herbert I got on fast ;
and, with one or the other always at my elbow to give me the
start I wanted , and clear obstructions out of my road, I must 1
have been as great a dolt as Drummle if I had done less.
I had not seen Mr. Wemmick for some weeks, when I thought
I would write him a note and propose to go home with him on
a certain evening. He replied that it would give him much
pleasure, and that he would expect me at the office at six
o'clock . Thither I went, and there I found him, putting the
key of his safe down his back as the clock struck .
“ Did you think of walking down to Walworth ?” said he.
." Certainly , " said I, “ if you approve."
Very much," was Wemmick’s reply, “ for I have had my legs
under the desk all day, and shall be glad to stretch them . Now,
I'll tell you what I have got for supper, Mr. Pip . I have got a
stewed steak — which is of home preparation - and a cold roast
184 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
fowl - which is from the cook's -shop. I think it's tender, be
cause the master of the shop was a Juryman in some cases of
ours the other day, and we let him down easy. I reminded him
of it when I bought the fowl, and I said, ' Pick us out a good
one, old Briton, because if we had chosen to keep you in the
box another day or two, we could have done it. He said to
that, ' Let me make you a present of the best fowl in the shop. '
I let him , of course . As far as it goes, it's property and port
able. You don't object to an aged parent, I hope ? ”
I really thought he was still speaking of the fowl, until he
added, " Because I have got an aged parent at my place ." I then
said what politeness required .
· So, you haven't dined with Mr. Jaggers yet?” he pursued, as
we walked along.
- Not yet.”
“ He told me so this afternoon when he heard you were com
ing. I expect you'll have an invitation to -morrow . He's going
to ask your pals, too. Three of 'em ; ain't there ?”
Although I was not in the habit of counting Drummle as one
of my intimate associates, I answered, “ Yes .”
66
* Well, he's going to ask the whole gang ; " I hardly felt com
plimented by the word ; " and whatever he gives you, he'll give
you good. Don't look forward to variety, but you'll have excel
lence. And there's another rum thing in his house," proceeded
Wemmick, after a moment's pause, as if the remark followed on
the housekeeper understood ; " he never lets a door or window
be fastened at night.”
“ Is he never robbed ?”
6. That's it !" returned Wemmick . “ He says, and gives it out
publicly, ' I want to see the man who'll rob me.' Lord bless
you , I have heard him , a hundred times if I have heard him
once, say to regular cracksmen in our front office, “ You know
where I live ; now, no bolt is ever drawn there ; why don't you
do a stroke of business with me ? Come ; can't I tempt you ? '
Not a man of them , sir, would be bold enough to try it on, for
love or money."
66
• They dread him so much ?” said I.
“ Dread him ," said Wemmick . “ I believe you they dread him .
Not but what he's artful, even in his defiance of them . No
silver, sir. Britannia metal, every spoon.”
“ So they wouldn't have much,” I observed, “ even if they- "
“Ah ! But he would have much ,” said Wemmick, cutting me
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
185

short, " and they know it. He'd have their lives, and the lives
of scores of 'em . He'd have all he could get. And it's impos
sible to say what he couldn't get, if he gave his mind to it. ”
I was falling into meditation on my guardian's greatness,
when Wemmick remarked :
" As to the absence of plate, that's only his natural depth , you
know . A river's its natural depth, and he's his natural depth .
Look at his watch -chain . That's real enough .”
“ It's very massive, " said I.
“ Massive ?” repeated Wemmick . “ I think so. And his
watch is a gold repeater, and worth a hundred pound if it's
worth a penny . Mr. Pip, there are about seven hundred thieves
in this town who know all about that watch ; there's not a man ,
a woman, or a child, among them , who wouldn't identify the
smallest link in that chain , and drop it as if it was red - hot, if
inveigled into touching it. "
At first with such discourse, and afterwards with conversation
of a more general nature, did Mr. Wemmick and I beguile the
time and the road, until he gave me to understand that we had
arrived in the district of Walworth .
It appeared to be a collection of black lanes, ditches, and
little gardens, and to present the aspect of a rather dull retire
ment. Wemmick's house was a little wooden cottage in the
midst of plots of garden, and the top of it was cut out and
painted like a battery mounted with guns .
66
Myown doing ,” said Wemmick. “Looks pretty ; don't it ? ”
I highly commended it. I think it was the smallest house I
ever saw ; with the queerest gothic windows (by far the greater
part of them sham ), and a gothic door, almost too small to get
in at.
“ That's a real flagstaff, you see,” said Wemmick, “and on
Sundays I run up a real flag. Then look here. After I have
crossed this bridge, I hoist it up — 50 — and cut off the commu
nication .”
The bridge was a plank, and it crossed a chasm about four
feet wide and two deep. But it was very pleasant to see the I
pride with which he hoisted it up and made it fast ; smiling as
he did so, with a relish and not merely mechanically.
“At nine o'clock every night, Greenwich time,” said Wemmick ,
“ the gun fires . There he is, you see ! And when you hear him
go, I think you'll say he's a Stinger."
The piece of ordnanco referred to, was mounted in a separate
186 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

fortress, constructed of lattice - work . It was protected from the

weather by an ingenious little tarpaulin contrivance in the
nature of an umbrella .
“ Then , at the back ," said Wemmick , “ out of sight, so as not to
impede the idea of fortifications — for it's a principle with me, if
you have an idea, carry it out and keep it up ,I don't know
whether that's your opinion-- "
I said , decidedly.
“ —At the back, there's a pig, and there are fowls and
rabbits ; then, I knock together my own little frame, you see,
and grow cucumbers ; and you'll judge at supper what sort of a
salad I can raise. So, sir ,” said Wemmick, smiling again, but
seriously too, as he shook his head, “ if you can suppose the
little place besieged , it would hold out a devil of a time in point
of provisions."
Then, he conducted me to a bower about a dozen yards off,
but which was approached by such ingenious twists of nath that
it took quite a long time to get at ; and in this retreat our
glasses were already set forth . Our punch was cooling in an
ornamental lake, on whose margin the bower was raised. This
piece of water (with an island in the middle which might have
been the salad for supper) was of a circular form , and he had
constructed a fountain in it, which, when you set a little mill
going and took a cork out of a pipe, played to that powerful
extent that it made the back of your hand quite wet.
" I am my own engineer, and my own carpenter, and my own
plumber, and my own gardener, and my own Jack of all Trades ,"
said Wemmick, in acknowledging my compliments . " Well ; it's
a good thing, you know . It brushes the Newgate cobwebs
away, and pleases the Aged. You wouldn't mind being at once
introduced to the Aged , would you ? It wouldn't put you out ? ”
I expressed the readiness I felt, and we went into the Castle.
There, we found, sitting by a fire, a very old man in a flannel
coat : clean , cheerful, comfortable, and well cared for, but in
tensely deaf.
“ Well, aged parent," said Wemmick, shaking hands with him
in a cordial and jocose way , “ how am you ?”
“ All right, John ; all right ! " replied the old man .
“ Here's Mr. Pip, aged parent,” said Wemmick, “and I wish
you could hear his name. Nod away at him, Mr. Pip ; that's
what he likes. Nod away at him , if you please, like winking ! "
66 This is a fine place of my son's, sir , ” cried the old man ,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
187

while I nodded as hard as I possibly could. “ This is a pretty

pleasure -ground, sir . This spot and these beautiful works
upon it ought to be kept together by the Nation, after my son's
time, for the people's enjoyment.”
“ You're as proud of it as Punch ; ain't you, Aged ?” said
Wemmick, contemplating the old man , with his hard face really
softened ; “ there's a nod for you ; ” giving him a tremendous
one ; " there's another for you ; ” giving him a still more tre
mendous one ; " you like that, don't you ? If you're not tired ,
Mr. Pip — though I know it's tiring to strangers — will you tip
him one more ? You can't think how it pleases him . "
I tipped him several more, and he was in great spirits. We
left him bestirring himself to feed the fowls, and we sat down
to our punch in the arbour ; where Wemmick told me as he
smoked a pipe, that it had taken him a good many years to
bring the property up to its present pitch of perfection .
“ Is it your own , Mr. Wemmick ? "
“ Oh yes,” said Wemmick . I have got hold of it, a bit at a
time. It's a freehold , by George ! "
“ Is it, indeed ? I hope Mr. Jaggers admires it ? ”
“ Never seen it, ” said Wemmick . 66 Never heard of it. Never
seen the Aged . Never heard of him . No ; the office is one
thing, and private life is another. When I go into the office,
I leave the Castle behind me, and when I come into the Castle,
I leave the office behind me. If it's not in any way disagreeable
to you , you'll oblige me by doing the same. I don't wish it
professionally spoken about.”
Of course I felt my good faith involved in the observance of
his request. The punch being very nice, we sat there drinking
it and talking, until it was almost nine o'clock. Getting near
gun - fire,” said Wemmick then , as he laid down his pipe ; “ it's
the Aged's treat."
Proceeding into the Castle again, we found the Aged heating
the poker, with expectant eyes, as a preliminary to the perform
ance of this great nightly ceremony . Wemmick.stood with his
watch in his hand until the moment was come for him to take the
red -hot poker from the Aged , and repair to the battery. He took
it, and went out, and presently the Stinger went off with a Bang
that shook the crazy little box of a cottage as if it must fall to
pieces, and made every glass and teacup in it ring. Upon this,
the Aged - who I believe would have been blown out of his arm
chair but for holding on by the elbows - cried out exultingly,
188 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
“ He's fired ! I heerd 'him ! " and I nodded at the old gentleman
until it is no figure of speech to declare that I absolutely could
not see him .
The interval between that time and supper, Wemmick devoted
to showing me his collection of curiosities. They were mostly
of a felonious character ; comprising the pen with which a
celebrated forgery had been committed , a distinguished razor
or two, some locks of hair, and several manuscript confessions
written under condemnation — upon which Mr. Wemmick set
particular value as being, to use his own words, “every one of
' em Lies, sir .” These were agreeably dispersed among small
specimens of china and glass, various neat trifles made by the
proprietor of the museum , and some tobacco -stoppers carved by
the Aged. They were all displayed in that chamber of the
Castle into which I had been first inducted , and which served,
not only as the general sitting -room but as the kitchen too, if I
might judge from a saucepan on the hob, and a brazen bijou
over the fireplace designed for the suspension of a roasting-jack.
There was a neat little girl in attendance, who looked after
the Aged in the day. When she had laid the supper -cloth, the
bridge was lowered to give her the means of egress, and she with
drew for the night. The supper was excellent; and though the
Castle was rather subject to dry -rot, insomuch that it tasted like a
bad nut, and though the pig might have been farther off, I was
heartily pleased with my whole entertainment. Nor was there
any drawback on my little turret bedroom , beyond there being
such a very thin ceiling between me and the flagstaff, that when
I lay down on my back in bed, it seemed as if I had to balance
that pole on my forehead all night.
Wemmick was up early in the morning, and I am afraid I
heard him cleaning my boots. After that, he fell to gardening,
and I saw him from my gothic window pretending to employ
the Aged, and nodding at him in a most devoted manner. Our
breakfast was as good as the supper, and at half- past eight
precisely we started for Little Britain . By degrees, Wemmick
got dryer and harder as we went along, and his mouth tightened
into a post -office again . At last, when we got to his place of
business and he pulled out his key from his coat -collar, he
looked as unconscious of his Walworth property as if the Castle
and the drawbridge and the arbour and the lake and the fountain
and the Aged, had all been blown into space together by the last
discharge of the Stinger.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
189

CHAPTER XXVI.

It fell out as Wemmick had told me it would, that I had an

early opportunity of comparing my guardian's establishment
with that of his cashier and clerk . My guardian was in his
room , washing his hands with his scented soap, when I went
into the office from Walworth ; and he called me to him , and
gave me the invitation for myself and friends which Wemmick
had prepared me to receive . “ No ceremony, " he stipulated ,
“ and no dinner dress, and say to-morrow.” I asked him where
we should come to ( for I had no idea where he lived ), and I
believe it was in his general objection to make anything like an
admission , that he replied, " Come here, and I'll take you home
with me. " I embrace this opportunity of remarking that he
washed his clients off, as if he were a surgeon or a dentist. He
had a closet in his room , fitted up for the purpose , which smelt
of the scented soap like a perfumer's shop. It had an unusually
large jack -towel on a roller inside the door, and he would wash
his hands, and wipe them and dry them all over this towel,
whenever he came in from a police -court or dismissed a client
from his room . When I and my friends repaired to him at six
o'clock next day, he seemed to have been engaged on a case of
a darker complexion than usual, for, we found him with his
head butted into this closet, not only washing his hands, but
laving his face and gargling his throat. And even when he had
done all that, and had gone all round the jack -towel, he took out
his penknife and scraped the case out of his nails before he put
his coat on .
There were some people slinking about as usual when we
passed out into the street, who were evidently anxious to speak
with him ; but there was something so conclusive in the halo of
scented soap which encircled his presence, that they gave it up
for that day. As we walked along westward, he was recognized
ever and again by some face in the crowd of the streets, and
whenever that happened he talked louder to me ; but he never
otherwise recognized anybody, or took notice that anybody
recognized him .
He conducted us to Gerrard -street, Soho, to a house on the
190 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

south side of that street. Rather a stately house of its kind ,

but dolefully in want of painting, and with dirty windows. He
took out his key and opened the door, and we all went into a
stone hall, bare, gloomy, and little used. So, up a dark -brown
staircase into a series of three dark -brown rooms on the first floor.
There were carved garlands on the panelled walls, and as he
stood among them giving us welcome, I know what kind of
loops I thought they looked like.
Dinner was laid in the best of these rooms ; the second was
his dressing - room ; the third , his bedroom . He told us that
he held the whole house, but rarely used more of it than we saw .
The table was comfortably laid — no silver in the service, of
course — and at the side of his chair was a capacious dumb
waiter, with a variety of bottles and decanters on it, and four
dishes of fruit for dessert. I noticed throughout, that he kept
everything under his own hand, and distributed everything
himself.
There was a bookcase in the room ; I saw from the backs of
the books, that they were about evidence, criminal law, criminal
biography, trials, acts of parliament, and such things. The
furniture was all very solid and good, like his watch -chain . It
had an official look, however, and there was nothing merely
ornamental to be seen. In a corner , was a little table of papers
with a shaded lamp ; so that he seemed to bring the office home
with him in that respect too, and to wheel it out of an evening
and fall to work .
As he had scarcely seen my three companions until now
for, he and I had walked together - he stood on the hearth -rug,
after ringing the bell, and took a searching look at them. To
my surprise, he seemed at once to be principally if not solely
interested in Drummle .
“ Pip ,” said he, putting his large hand on my shoulder and
moving me to the window , “ I don't know one from the other.
Who's the Spider ! ”
“ The spider ?” said I.
“ The blotchy, sprawly, sulky fellow . ”
"That's Bentley Drummle," I replied ; " the one with the
delicate face is Startop .”
Not making the least account of “the one with the delicate
face, ” he returned . · Bentley Drummle is his name, is it ? I
like the look of that fellow .”
He immediately began to talk to Drummle : not at all de
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
191
terred by his replyingin his heavy reticent way, but apparently
led on by it to screw discourse out of him. I was looking at
the two, when there came between me and them , the house
keeper, with the first dish for the table.
She was a woman of about forty, I supposed — but I may have
thought her younger than she was. Rather tall, of a lithe
nimble figure, extremely pale, with large faded eyes, and a
quantity of streaming hair. I cannot say whether any diseased
affection of the heart caused her lips to be parted as if she were
panting, and her face to bear a curious expression of suddenness
and fluttér ; but I know that I had been to see Macbeth at the
theatre, a night or two before, and that her face looked to me
as if it were all disturbed by fiery air, like the faces I had seen
rise out of the Witches' caldron.
She set the dish on , touched my guardian quietly on the arm
with a finger to notify that dinner was ready, and vanished .
We took our seats at the round table, and my guardian kept
Drummle on one side of him, while Startop sat on the other.
It was a noble dish of fish that the housekeeper had put on
table , and we had a joint of equally choice mutton afterwards,
and then an equally choice bird. Sauces, wines, all the ac
cessories we wanted , and all of the best, were given out by our
host from his dumb -waiter ; and when they had made the cir
cuit of the table, he always put them back again. Similarly,
he dealt us clean plates and knives and forks, for each
course , and dropped those just disused into two baskets on
the ground by his chair. No other attendant than the house
keeper appeared. She set on every dish ; and I always saw
in her face, a face rising out of the caldron . Years after
wards, I made a dreadful likeness of that woman , by causing a
face that had no other natural resemblance to it than it derived
from flowing hair, to pass behind a bowl of flaming spirits in
a dark room .
Induced to take particular notice of the housekeeper, both by
her own striking appearance and by Wemmick's preparation, I
observed that whenever she was in the room , she kept her eyes
attentively on my guardian, and that she would remove her
hands from any dish she put before him, hesitatingly, as if she
dreaded his calling her back , and wanted him to speak when
she was nigh, if he had anything to say . I fancied that I could
detect in his manner a consciousness of this, and a purpose of
always holding her in suspense.
192 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Dinner went off gaily , and, although my guardian seemed to

follow rather than originate subjects, I knew that he wrenched
the weakest part of our dispositions out of us. For myself, I
found that I was expressing my tendency to lavish expenditure,
and to patronise Herbert ,and to boast of my great prospects,
before I quite knew that I had opened my lips. It was so with
all of us, but with no cne more than Drummle : the develop
ment of whose inclination to gird in a grudging and suspicious
way at the rest, was screwed out of him before the fish was taken
off.
It was not then, but when we had got to the cheese, that our
conversation turned upon our rowing feats, and that Drummle was
rallied for coming up behind of a night in that slow amphibious
way of his. Drummle upon this, informed our host that he
much preferred our room to our company, and that as to skill
he was more than our master, and that as to strength he could
scatter us like chaff. By some invisible agency, my guardian
wound him up to a pitch little short of ferocity about this trifle ;
and he fell to baring and spanning his arm to show how muscu
lar it was, and we all fell to baring and spanning our arms in a
ridiculous manner .
Now, the housekeeper was at that time clearing the table ;
my guardian , taking no heed of her, but with the side of his
face turned from her, was leaning back in his chair biting the
side of his forefinger and showing an interest in Drummle, that,
to me, was quite inexplicable. Suddenly, he clapped his
large hand on the housekeeper's, like a trap, as she stretched
it across the table. So suddenly and smartly did he do this,
that we all stopped in ' our foolish contention .
" If you talk of strength , ” said Mr. Jaggers, " I'll show you &
wrist. Molly, let them see your wrist.”
Her entrapped hand was on the table, 66 but she had already
put her other hand behind her waist. · Master,” she said, in a
low voice , with her eyes attentively and entreatingly fixed upon
him. " Don't !”
" I'll show you a wrist,” repeated Mr. Jaggers, with an im
movable determination to show it. “ Molly , let them see your
wrist.”
“ Master ,” she again murmured . “ Please !"
“ Molly , ” said Mr. Jaggers, not looking at her, but obstinately
looking at the opposite side of the room, " let them see both
your wrists. Show them . Come ! "
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
193
He took his hand from hers, and turned that wrist up on the
table. She brought her other hand from behind her, and held
the two out side by side. The last wrist was much disfigured
deeply scarred and scarred across and across. When she held
her hands out, she took her eyes from Mr. Jaggers, and turned
them watchfully on every one of the rest of us in succession.
There's power here ,” said Mr. Jaggers, coolly tracing out
the sinews with his forefinger. “ Very few men have the power
of wrist that this woman has. It's remarkable what mere force
of grip there is in these hands. I have had occasion to notice
many hands ; but I never saw stronger in that respect, man's or
woman's, than these.”
While he said these words in a leisurely critical style, she
continued to look at every one of us in regular succession as we
sat. The moment he ceased, she looked at him again. “ That'll
do, Molly , ” said Mr. Jaggers, giving her a slight nod ; “ you
have been admired , and can go .' She withdrew her hands and
went out of the room, and Mr. Jaggers, putting the decanters
on from his dumb -waiter, filled his glass and passed round the
wine.
“ At half - past nine, gentlemen,” said he, “ we must break up.
Pray make the best use of your time. I am glad to see you all.
Mr. Drummle, I drink to you ."
If his object in singling out Drummle were to bring him
out still more, it perfectly succeeded . In a sulky triumph ,
Drummle showed his morose depreciation of the rest of us, in a
more and more offensive degree until he became downright in
tolerable. Through all his stages, Mr. Jaggers followed him
with the same strange interest. He actually seemed to serve as
a zest to Mr. Jaggers' wine.
In our boyish want of discretion I dare say we took too much
to drink, and I know we talked too much. We became particu
larly hot upon some boorish sneer of Drummle's, to the effect
that we were too free with our money. It led to my remarking,
with more zeal than discretion, that it came with a bad grace
from him, to whom Startop had lent money in my presence but
a week or so before.
“ Well,” retorted Drummle, “ he'll be paid ."
“ I don't mean to imply that he won't, ” said I, “but it might
make you hold your tongue about us and our money, I should
think .”
“ You should think !" retorted Drummle. “Oh Lord ! ”
194 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ I dare say,” I went on , meaning to be very severe, 6. that you

wouldn't lend money to any of us if we wanted it . "
You are right,” said Drummle. “ I wouldn't lend one of you
a sixpence. I wouldn't lend anybody a sixpence."
“ Rather mean to borrow under those circumstances, I should
say .” 1
“ You should say,” repeated Drummle . Oh Lord ! ”
This was so very aggravating — the more especially as I found
myself making no way against his surly obtuseness — that I said,
disregarding Herbert's efforts to check
• Come, Mr. Drummle, since we are on the subject, I'll tell
you what passed between Herbert here and me, when you
borrowed that money ."
“ I don't want to know what passed between Herbert there and
you ," growled Drummle. And I think he added in a lower
growl, that we might both go to the devil and shake ourselves .
CG
* I'll tell you, however ," said I, “ whether you want to know or
not. We said that as you put it into your pocket very glad to
get it, you seemed to be immensely amused at his being so weak
as to lend it .”
Drummle laughed outright, and sat laughing in our faces,
with his hands in his pockets and his round shoulders raised ;
plainly signifying that it was quite true, and that he despised us,
as asses all.
Hereupon Startop took him in hand, though with a much
better grace than I had shown , and exhorted him to be a little
more agreeable. Startop, being a lively bright young fellow ,
and Drummle being the exact opposite, the latter was always
disposed to resent him as a direct personal affront. He now
retorted in a coarse lumpish way, and Startop tried to turn the
discussion aside with some small pleasantry that made us all
laugh . Resenting this little success more than anything,
Drummle, without any threat or warning , pulled his hands
out of his pockets , dropped his round shoulders, swore , took up
a large glass, and would have flung it at his adversary's head ,
but for our entertainer's dexterously seizing it at the instant
when it was raised for that purpose.
“ Gentlemen , ” said Mr. Jaggers, deliberately putting down
the glass, and hauling out his gold repeater by its massive
chain , “ I am exceedingly sorry to announce that it's half-past
nine.”
On this hint we all rose to depart. Before we got to the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
195
street door, Startop was cheerily calling Drummle “old boy,” as
if nothing had happened. But the old boy was so far from
responding, that he would not even walk to Hammersmith on
the same side of the way ; so, Herbert and I, who remained in
town, saw them going down the street on opposite sides ; Star
top leading, and Drummle lagging behind in the shadow of the
houses, much as he was wont to follow in his boat.
As the door was not yet shut, I thought I would leave Herbert
there for a moment, and run up - stairs again to say a word to
my guardian. I found him in his dressing-room surrounded
by his stock of boots, already hard at it, washing his hands of
as .
I told him I had come up again to say how sorry I was that
anything disagreeable should have occurred , and that I hoped he 1
would not blame me much.
“ Pooh !” said he, sluicing his face, and speaking through the
water-drops ; " it's nothing Pip. I like that Spider though. "
He had turned towards me now , and was shaking his head, and
blowing, and towelling himself.
“ I am glad you like him , sir ,” said I— “ but I don't.”
66
No, no,” my guardian assented ; “don't have too much to do
with him . Keep as clear of him as you can . But I like the
fellow , Pip ; he is one of the true sort. Why, if I was a fortune
teller
Looking out of the towel, he caught my eye.
“But I am not a fortune-teller,” he said , letting his head drop
into a festoon of towel, and towelling away at his two ears.
“ You know what I am , don't you ? Good night, Pip .”
“ Good night, sir .
In about a month after that, the Spider's time with Mr.
Pocket was up for good, and, to the great relief of all the house
but Mrs. Pocket, he went home to the family hole.

CHAPTER XXVII. 1
“MY DEAR MR. PIP,
“ I write this by request of Mr. Gargery, for to let you know that he
is going to London in company with Mr. Wopsle and would be glad if
agreeable to be allowed to see you . He would call at Barnard's Hotel
Tuesday morning at nine o'clock, when if not agreeable please leave word.
Your poor sister is much the same as when you left. We talk of you in the
196 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
kitchen every night, and wonder what you are saying and doing. If now
considered in the light of a liberty, excuse it for the love of poor old days.
No more, dear Mr. Pip, from
“ Your ever obliged , and affectionate
66Servant,
BIDDY.

“ P.S. He wishes me most particular to write what larks. He says you

will understand . I hope and do not doubt it will be agreeable to see him
even though a gentleman, for you had ever a good heart, and he is a worthy
worthy man. I have read him all, excepting only the last little sentence,
and he wishes me most particular to write again what larks.”

I received this letter by post on Monday morning, and

therefore its appointment was for next day. Let me confess
exactly, with what feelings I looked forward to Joe's coming.
Not with pleasure, though I was bound to him by so many
ties ; no ; with considerable disturbance, some mortification, and
a keen sense of incongruity. If I could have kept him away by
paying money, I certainly would have paid money . My greatest
reassurance was, that he was coming to Barnard's Inn, not to
Hammersmith, and consequently would not fall in Bentley
Drummle's way. I had little objection to his being seen by
Herbert or his father, for both of whom I liad a respect ; but I
had the sharpest sensitiveness as to his being seen by Drummle,
whom I held in contempt. So, throughout life, our worst weak
nesses and meannesses are usually committed for the sake of
the people whom we most despise.
I had begun to be always decorating the chambers in some
quite unneccessary and inappropriate way or other, and very
expensive those wrestles with Barnard proved to be . By this
time, the rooms were vastly different from what I had found them,
and I enjoyed the honour of occupying a few prominent pages
in the books of a neighbouring upholsterer. I had got on so
fast of late, that I had even started a boy in boots--top boots -in
bondage and slavery to whom I might be said to pass my days.
For, after I had made this monster ( out of the refuse of my
washerwoman's family) and had clothed him with a blue coat,
canary waistcoat, white cravat, creamy breeches, and the boots
already mentioned, I had to find him a little to do and a great
deal to eat; and with both of those horrible requirements he
haunted my existence.
This avenging phantom was ordered to be on duty at eight on
Tuesday morning in the hall (it was two feet square, as charged
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 197

for floorcloth ), and Herbert suggested certain things for break

fast that he thought Joe would like . While I felt sincerely
obliged to him for being so interested and considerate, I had an
odd half-provoked sense of suspicion upon me, that if Joe had
been coming to see him, he wouldn't have been quite so brisk
about it.
However, I come into town on the Monday night to be ready
for Joe , and I got up early in the morning, and caused the
sitting-room and breakfast -table to assume their most splendid
appearance. Unfortunately the morning was drizzly, and an
angel could not have concealed the fact that Barnard was
shedding sooty tears outside the window, like some weak giant
of a Sweep .
As the time approached I should have liked to run away, but
the Avenger pursuant to orders was in the hall, and presently
I heard Joe, on the staircase. I knew it was Joe, by his
clumsy manner of coming up -stairs — his state boots being
always too big for him — and by the time it took him to read the
names on the other floors in the course of his ascent. When at
last he stopped outside our door, I could hear his finger tracing
over the painted letters of my name, and I afterwards distinctly
heard him breathing in at the keyhole. Finally he gave a faint
single rap, and Pepper--such was the compromising name of the
avenging boy - announced " Mr. Gargery ! " I thought he never
would have done wiping his feet, and that I must have gone
out to lift him off the mat, but at last he came in.
66 Jo how are you , Joe ?”
• e,
Pip, how air you, Pip ? "
With his good honest face all glowing and shining, and his
hat put down on the floor between us, he caught both my hands
and worked them straight up and down, as if I had been the
last-patented Pump .
“ I am glad to see you, Joe. Give me your hat.”
But Joe, taking it up carefully with both hands, like a bird's
nest with eggs in it, wouldn't hear of parting with that piece of
property, and persisted in standing talking over it in a most
uncomfortable way.
" Which you have that growed , " said Joe, " and that swelled ,
and that gentlefolked ; " Joe considered a little before he disco
vered this word ; as to be sure you are a honour to your king
and country. ”
“ And you, Joe, look wonderfully well.”
198 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Thank God ,” said Joe, “ I'm ekerval to most. And your

sister, she's no worse than she were . And Biddy, she's ever
right and ready. And all friends is no backerder, if not no
forarder. 'Ceptin ' Wopsle ; he's had a drop .”
All this time ( still with both hands taking great care of the
bird's-nest), Joe was rolling his eyes round and round the room ,
and round and round the flowered pattern of my dressing gown .
“ Had a drop, Joe ? ”
“ Why yes,” said Joe, lowering his voice, “ he's left the Church
and went into the playacting. Which the playacting have like
ways brought him to London along with me. And his wish
were,” said Joe , getting the bird's -nest under his left arm for
the moment, and groping in it for an egg with his right; “if no
offence, as I would ’and you that. "
I took what Joe gave me, and found it to be tho crumpled
playbill of a small metropolitan theatre, announcing the first
appearance, in that very week, of “ the celebrated Provincial
Amateur of Roscian renown , whose unique performance in the
highest tragic walk of our National Bard has lately occasioned
80 great a sensation in local dramatic circles. ”
“ Were you at his performance, Joe ? ” I inquired .
“ I were,” said Joe, with emphasis and solemnity.
“ Was there a great sensation ?”
CG
Why,” said Joe, “ yes, there certainly were a peck of orange
peel. Partickler when he see the ghost. Though I put it to
yourself, sir, whether it were calo'lated to keep a man up to his
work with a good hart, to be continiwally cutting in betwixt him
and the Ghost with “ Amen ! ' A man may have had a misfor
tun' and been in the Church ,” said Joe, lowering his voice to an
argumentative and feeling tone, “ but that is no reason why
you should put him out at such a time. Which I meantersay,
if the ghost of a man's own father cannot be allowed to claim
his attention, what can , Sir ? Still more, when his mourning
' at is unfortunately made so small as that the weight of the
black feathers brings it off, try to keep it on how you may.”
A ghost-seeing effect in Joe's own countenance informed me
that Herbert had entered the room. So, I presented Joe to
Herbert, who held out his hand ; but Joe backed from it, and
held on by the bird's-nest.
Your servant, Sir ,” said Joe, “ which I hope as you and Pip ”
--here his eye fell on the Avenger, who was putting some
toast on table, and so plainly denoted an intention to make
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 199

that young gentleman one of the family, that I frowned it down

and confused him more_ “ I meantersay, you two gentlemen
which I hope as you gets your elths in this close spot ? For
the present may be a wery good inn, according to London
opinions, ” said Joe, confidentially, “ and I believe its character
do stand i ; but I wouldn't keep a pig in it myself — not in the
case that I wished him to fatten wholesome and to eat with a
meller flavour on him .”
Having borne this flattering testimony to the merits of our
dwelling -place, and having incidentally shown this tendency
to call me sir , ” Joe, being invited to sit down to table,
looked all round the room for a suitable spot on which
to deposit his hat - as if it were only on some few very rare
substances in nature that it could find a resting -place
and ultimately stood it on an extreme corner of the chimney
piece, from which it ever afterwards fell off at intervals.
“ Do you take tea, or coffee, Mr. Gargery ?" asked Herbert,
who always presided of a morning.
Thankee, Sir,” said Joe, stiff from head to foot, “ I'll take
whichever is most agreeable to yourself .”
“ What do you say to coffee ?”
“ Thankee, Sir, " returned Joe, evidently dispirited by the
proposal, “ since you are so kind as make chice of coffee, I will
not run contrairy to your own opinions. But don't you nerer
find it a little 'eating ?” .
“Say tea then ," said Herbert, pouring it out.
Here Joe's hat tumbled off the mantelpiece, and he started out
of his chair and picked it up, and fitted it to the same exact
spot. As if it were an absolute point of good breeding that it
should tumble off again soon.
“ When did you come to town , Mr. Gargery ? ”
“Were it yesterday afternoon ? ” said Joe, after coughing
behind his hand, as if he had had time to catch the whooping
cough since he came. " No it were not. Yes it were . Yes.
It were yesterday afternoon " (with an appearance of mingled
wisdom , relief, and strict impartiality ).
“ Have you seen anything of London , yet ? ”
“ Why, yes, Sir," said Joe , “ me and Wopsle went off straightto
look at the Blacking Ware’us . But we didn't find that it come up
to its likeness in the red bills at the shop doors ; which I mean
tersay ,” added Joe, in an explanatory manner, “as it is there
drawd too architectooralooral.”
200 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

I really believe Joe would have prolonged this word (mightily

expressive to my mind of some architecture that I know ) into a
perfect Chorus, but for his attention being providentially
attracted by his hat, which was toppling. Indeed, it demanded
from him , a constant attention , and a quickness of eye and
hand, very like that exacted by wicket-keeping. He made
extraordinary play with it, and showed the greatest skill ; now ,
rushing at it and catching it neatly as it dropped ; now, merely
stopping it midway, beating it up , and humouring it in various
parts of the room and against a good deal of the pattern of the
paper on the wall, before he felt it safe to close with it ; finally
splashing it into the slop -basin , where I took the liberty of
laying hands upon it.
As to his shirt-collar, and his coat -collar, they were perplex
ing to reflect upon - insoluble mysteries both. Why should a
man scrape himself to that extent, before he could consider
himself full dressed ? Why should he suppose it necessary to
be purified by suffering for his holiday clothes ? Then he fell
into such unaccountable fits of meditation, with his fork midway
between his plate and his mouth ; had his eyes attracted in such
strange directions ; was afflicted with such remarkable coughs ;
sat so far from the table, and dropped so much more than he
ate, and pretended that he hadn't dropped it ; that I was heartily
glad when Herbert left us for the City.
I had neither the good sense nor the good feeling to know
that this was all my fault, and that if I had been easier with
Joe, Joe would have been easier with me. I felt impatient of
him and out of temper with him ; in which condition he heaped
coals of fire on my head.
“ Us two being now alone, Sir ,” — began Joe.
* Joe,” I interrupted, pettishly, “ how can you call me, Sir ? ”
Joe looked at me for a single instant with something faintly
like reproach . Utterly preposterous as his cravat was, and as
his collars were, I was conscious of a sort of dignity in the
look.
“ Us two being now alone ,” resumed Joe, " and me having the
intentions and abilities to stay not many minutes more, I will
now conclude - leastways begin — to mention what have led to
my having had the present honour. For was it not,” said Joe ,
with his old air of lucid exposition, “ that my only wish were to
be useful to you, I should not have had the honour of breaking
wittles in the company and abode of gentlemen.”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
201

I was so unwilling to see the look again, that I made no re

monstrance against this tone.
“ Well, Sir ,” pursued Joe, “ this is how it were. I were at the
Bargemen t'other night, Pip ; " whenever he subsided into affec
tion, he called me Pip, and whenever he relapsed into politeners
he called me Sir ; “ when there come up in his shay -cart, Pum
blechook. Which that same identical, ” said Joe, going down a
new track , “ do comb my ' air the wrong way sometimes, awful,
by giving out up and down town as it were him which ever had
your infant companionation and were looked upon as a playfellow
by yourself.”
66
Nonsense. It was you, Joe .”
“ Which I fully believed it were, Pip ," said Joe , slightly
tossing his head , " though it signify little now , Sir. Well, Pip ;
this same identical, which his manners is given to blusterous,
come to me at the Bargemen (wot a pipe and a pint of beer do
give refreshment to the working-man , Sir, and do not over
stimilate ), and his word were, “ Joseph, Miss Havisham she
wish to speak to you.' '
“ Miss Havisham , Joe ?"
“ She wish ,' were Pumblechook's word, ' to speak to you .”'
Joe sat and rolled his eyes at the ceiling.
“ Yes, Joe ? Go on, please ."
• Next day, Sir ,” said Joe, looking at me as if I were a long
way off, “having cleaned myself, I go and I see Miss A. ”
“ Miss A. , Joe ? Miss Havisham ?”
“ Which I say , Sir," replied Joe, with an air of legal for
mality, as if he were making his will, “ Miss A. , or otherways
Havisham . Her expression air then as follering : Mr. Gar
gery. You air in correspondence with Mr. Pip ? Having had
a letter from you, I were able to say " I am .' (When I married
your sister, Sir, I said ‘ I will ;' and when I answered your
friend, Pip , I said, ' I am .') Would you tell him, then ,'
said she, “ that which Estella has come home, and would be glad
to see him .' "
I felt my face fire up as I looked at Joe. I hope one remote
cause of its firing, may have been my consciousness that if I had
known his errand, I should have given him more encouragement.
“ Biddy, ” pursued Joe, “ when I got home and asked her fur to
write the message to you, a little hung back. Biddy says, “ I
know he will be very glad to have it by word of mouth, it is
holiday -time, you want to see him , go !' I have now concluded ,
202 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Sir," said Joe, rising from his chair, “ and, Pip, I wish you ever
well and ever prospering to a greater and a greater heighth.”
“ But you are not going now, Joe ?"
“ Yes I am ,” said Joe.
“ But you are coming back to dinner, Joe ?"
“ No I am not,” said Joe.
Our eyes met, and all the “ Sir ” melted out of that manly
heart as he gave me his hand .
" Pip , dear old chap, life is made of ever so many partings
welded together, as I may say , and one man’s a blacksmith, and
one's a whitesmith, and one's a goldsmith, and one's a copper
smith. Diwisions among such must come, and must be met as
they come. If there's been any fault at all to-day, it's mine .
You and me is not two figures to be together in London ; nor
yet anywheres else but what is private, and beknown, and
understood among friends. It ain't that I am proud, but that I
want to be right, as you shall never see me no more in these
clothes. I'm wrong in these clothes. I'm wrong out of the
forge, the kitchen, or off th ' meshes. You won't find half so
much fault in me if you think of me in my forge dress, with my
hammer in my hand, or even my pipe. You won't find half so
much fault in me if, supposing as you should ever wish to see
me, you come and put your head in at the forge window and see
Joe the blacksmith , there, at the old anvil, in the old burnt
apron , sticking to the old work. I'm awful dull, but I hope
I've beat out something nigh the rights of this at last. Ana so
God bless you, dear old Pip, old chap , God bless you ! "
I had not been mistaken in my fancy that there was a simple
dignity in him . The fashion of his dress could no more come
in its way when he spoke these words, than it could come in its
way in Heaven. He touched me gently on the forehead, and
went out. As soon as I could recover myself sufficiently, I
hurried out after him and looked for him in the neighbouring
streets ; but he was gone.

CHAPTER XXVIII.
It was clear that I must repair to our town next day, and in the
first flow of my repentance it was equally clear that I must stay
at Joe's. But, when I had secured my box-place by to-morrow's
coach and had been down to Mr. Pocket's and back, I was not
by any means convinced on the last point, and began to invent
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
203

reasons and make excuses for putting up at the Blue Buar. I

should be an inconvenience at Joe's ; I was not expected, and
my bed would not be ready ; I should be too far from Miss
Havisham's, and she was exacting and mightn't like it .
other swindlers upon earth are nothing to the self- swindlers,
and with such pretences did I cheat myself. Surely a curious
thing. That I should innocently take a bad half-crown of
somebody else's manufacture, is reasonable enough ; but that I
should knowingly reckon the spurious coin of my own make, as
good money ! An obliging stranger, under pretence of com
pactly folding up my bank -notes for security's sake, abstracts
the notes and gives me nutshells ; but what is his sleight of
hand to mine, when I fold up my own nutshells and pass them
on myself as notes !
Having settled that I must go to the Blue Boar, my mind was
much disturbed by indecision whether or no to take the Aven
ger. It was tempting to think of that expensive Mercenary
publicly airing his boots in the archway of the Blue Boar's
posting -yard : it was almost solemn to imagine him casually
produced in the tailor's shop and confounding the disrespectful
senses of Trabb’s boy. On the other hand, Trabb's boy might
worm himself into his intimacy and tell him things ; or, reck
less and desperate wretch as I knew he could be, might hoot
him in the High -street. My patroness, too, might hear of him ,
and not approve. On the whole, I resolved to leave the Aven
ger behind .
It was the afternoon coach by which I had taken my place,
and, as winter had now come round, I should not arrive at my
destination until two or three hours after dark . Our time of
starting from the Cross Keys was two o'clock. I arrived on the
ground with a quarter of an hour to spare, attended by the
Avenger — if I may connect that expression with one who never
attended on me if he could possibly help it.
At that time it was customary to carry Convicts down to the
> dockyards by stage -coach. As I had often heard of them in the
capacity of outside passengers, and had more than once seen
them on the high road dangling their ironed legs over the
coach roof, I had no cause to be surprised when Herbert, meet
ing me in the yard, came up and told me there were two con
victs going down with me . But I had a reason that was an old
reason now, for constitutionally faltering whenever I heard the
word convict.
204 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ You don't mind them, Handel ?" said Herbert.

- Oh no !"
“ I thought you seemed as if you didn't like them ? ”
“ I can't pretend that I do like them, and I suppose you don't
particularly. But I don't mind them .”
" See ! There they are,” said Herbert, “ coming out of the
Tap. What a degraded and vile sight it is !”
They had been treating their guard, I suppose , for they had
a gaoler with them, and all three came out wiping their mouths
on their hands. The two convicts were handcuffed together,
and had irons on their legs — irons of a pattern that I knew well.
They wore the dress that I likewise knew well. Their keeper
had a brace of pistols, and carried a thick -knobbed bludgeon
under his arm ; but he was on terms of good understanding with
them , and stood , with them beside him , looking on at the put
ting-to of the horses, rather with an air as if the convicts were
an interesting Exhibition not formally open at the moment, and
he the Curator. One was a taller and stouter man than the
other, and appeared as a matter of course , according to the
mysterious ways of the world both convict and free, to have had
allotted to him the smaller suit of clothes. His arms and legs
were like great pincushions of those shapes, and his attire dis
guised him absurdly ; but I knew his half -closed eye at one
glance. There stood the man whom I had seen on the settle at
the Three Jolly Bargemen on a Saturday night, and who had
brought me down with his invisible gun !
It was easy to make sure that as yet he knew me no more
than if he had never seen me in his life. He looked across at
me, and his eye appraised my watch -chain , and then he inci
dentally spat and said something to the other convict, and they
laughed and slued themselves round with a clink of their coup
ling manacle, and looked at something else. The great numbers
on their backs, as if they were street doors ; their coarse mangy ,
ungainly outer surface, as if they were lower animals ; their
ironed legs, apologetically garlanded with pocket-handker
chiefs ; and the way in which all present looked at them and
kept from them ; made them (as Herbert had said) a most dis
agreeable and degraded spectacle.
But this was not the worst of it. It came out that the whole
of the back of the coach had been taken by a family removing
from London, and that there were no places for the two pri
soners but on the seat in front, behind the coachman . Here
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
205

upon, a choleric gentleman, who had taken the fourth place on

that seat, flew into a most violent passion, and said that it was
a breach of contract to mix him up with such villanous com
pany, and that it was poisonous and pernicious and infamous
and shameful, and I don't know what else. At this time the
coach was ready and the coachman impatient, and we were all
preparing to get up, and the prisoners had come over with their
keeper — bringing with them that curious flavour of bread
poultice, baize, rope - yarn, and hearthstone, which attends the
convict presence .
“ Don't take it so much amiss, sir,” pleaded the keeper to the
angry passenger ; “I'll sit next you myself. I'll put 'em on
the outside of the row. They won't interfere with you, sir.
You needn't know they're there.”
“ And don't blame me,” growled the convict I had re
cognized. “ I don't want to go . I am quite ready to stay
behind. As fur as I am concerned any one's welcome to my
2
place."
“ Ormine," said the other, gruffly. “ I wouldn't have incom
moded none of you , if I'd a had my way .” Then, they both
laughed, and began cracking nuts, and spitting the shells about.
-As I really think I should have liked to do myself, if I had
been in their place and so despised .
At length , it was voted that there was no help for the angry
gentleman, and that he must either go in his chance company
or remain behind. So, he got into his place, still making com
plaints, and the keeper got into the place next him , and the
convicts hauled themselves up as well as they could, and the
convict I had recognised sat behind me with his breath on the
hair of my head.
66
Good - by, Handel ! ” Herbert called out as we started. I
thought what a blessed fortune it was, that he had found
another name for me than Pip.
It is impossible to express with what acuteness I felt the
convict's breathing, not only on the back of my head, but all
along my spine. The sensation was like being touched in the
marrow with some pungent and searching acid, and it set my
very teeth on edge. He seemed to have more breathing busi
ness to do than another man , and to make more noise in doing
it ; and I was conscious of growing high -shouldered on one
side, in my shrinking endeavours to fend him off.
The weather was miserably raw , and the two cursed the cold .
206 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

It made us all lethargic before we had gone far, and when we

had left the Half -way House behind, we habitually dozed and
shivered and were silent. I dozed off, myself, in considering
the question whether I ought to restore a couple of pounds
sterling to this creature before losing sight of him , and how it
could best be done. In the act of dipping forward as if I were
going to bathe among the horses, I woke in a fright and took
the question up again ,
But I must have lost it longer than I had thought, since,
although I could recognise nothing in the darkness and the
fitful lights and shadows of our lamps, I traced marsh country
in the cold damp wind that blew at us. Cowering forward for
warmth and to make me a screen against the wind, the convicts
were closer to me than before. The very first words I heard
them interchange as I became conscious, were the words of my
own thought, “ Two One Pound notes."
“ How did he get ' em ? " said the convict I had never seen.
· How should I know ?" returned the other. He had 'em
stowed away somehows. Giv him by friends, I expect. "
“ I wish,” said the other, with a bitter curse upon the cold ,
6 that I had 'em here."
“ Two one pound notes, or friends ? ”
“ Two one pound notes. I'd sell all the friends I ever had,
for one, and think it a blessed good bargain . Well ? So he
says .. ? "
“ So he says,” resumed the convict I had recognised— “ it was
all said and done in half a minute, behind a pile of timber in
the Dockyard — ' You're a going to be discharged ? Yes, I
was. Would I find out that boy that had fed him and kep his
secret, and give him them two one pound notes ? Yes, I would .
And I did .”
“More fool you ,” growled the other. “ I'd have spent 'em on a 1
Man, in wittles and drink . He must have been a green one.
Mean to say he knowed nothing of you ?"
66
Not a ha’porth. Different gangs and different ships. He
was tried again for prison breaking, and got made a Lifer ."
“ And was that --Honour ! -- the only time you worked out, in
this part of the country ? "
“ The only time. ”
“ What might have been your opinion of the place ? "
“ A most beastly place. Mudbank, mist, swamp, and work ;
work, swamp, mist, and mudbank . ”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
207
They both execrated the place in very strong language, and
gradually growled themselves out, and had nothing left to
say.
After overhearing this dialogue, I should assuredly have got
down and been left in the solitude and darkness of the highway,
but for feeling certain that the man had no suspicion of my
identity. Indeed, I was not only so changed in the course of
nature, but so differently dressed and so differently circum
stanced, that it was not at all likely he could have known me
without accidental help. Still, the coincidence of our being
together on the coach, was sufficiently strange to fill me with a
dread that some other coincidence might at any moment connect
me, in his hearing, with my name. For this reason, I resolved
to alight as soon as we touched the town, and put myself out of
his hearing. This device I executed successfully. My little
portmanteau was in the boot under my feet ; I had but to turn
a hinge to get it out ; I threw it down before me, got down after
it, and was left at the first lamp on the first stones of the town
pavement. As to the convicts, they went their way with the
coach, and I knew at what point they would be spirited off to
the river. In my fancy, I saw the boat with its convict crew
waiting for them at the slime- washed stairs,-again heard the
gruff “Give way, you !” like an order to dogs — again saw the
wicked Noah's Ark lying out on the black water .
I could not have said what I was afraid of, for my fear was
altogether undefined and vague, but there was great fear upon
me . As I walked on to the hotel, I felt that a dread , much
exceeding the mere apprehension of a painful or disagreeable
recognition, made me tremble. I am confident that it took no
distinctness of shape, and that it was the revival for a few
minutes of the terror of childhood .
The coffee -room at the Blue Boar was empty, and I had not
only ordered my dinner there, but had sat down to it, before the
waiter knew me . As soon as he had apologised for the remiss
ness of his memory , he asked me if he should send Boots for
Mr. Pumblechook ?
“ No , " said I, “ certainly not."
The waiter (it was he who had brought up the Great Remon
strance from the Commercials, on the day when I was bound )
appeared surprised, and took the earliest opportunity of putting
a dirty old copy of a local newspaper so directly in my way,
that I took it up and read this paragraph :
208 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Our readers will learn , not altogether without interest, in

reference to the recent romantic rise in fortune of a young
artificer in iron of this neighbourhood (what a theme, by the
way , for the magic pen of our as yet not universally acknow
ledged townsman Tooby, the poet of our columns ! ) that the
youth's earliest patron , companion , and friend , was a highly
respected individual not entirely unconnected with the corn and
seed trade, and whose eminently convenient and commodious
business premises are situate within a hundred miles of the
High - street. It is not wholly irrespective of our personal
feelings that we record Him as the Mentor of our young Tele
machus, for it is good to know that our town produced the
founder of the latter's fortunes. Does the thought-contracted
brow of the local Sage or the lustrous eye of local Beauty in
quire whose fortunes ? We believe that Quintin Matsys was
the BLACKSMITH of Antwerp. VERB. SAP .”
I entertain a conviction, based upon large experience, that if
in the days' of my prosperity I had gone to the North Pole, I
should have met somebody there, wandering Esquimaux or
civilised man, who would have told me that Pumblechook was
my earliest patron and the founder of my fortunes.

CHAPTER XXIX .

BETIMEs in the morning I was up and out. It was too early

yet to go to Miss Havisham's, so I loitered into the country on
Miss Havisham's side of town — which was not Joe's side ; I
could go there to -morrow — thinking about my patroness, and
painting brilliant pictures of her plans for me .
She had adopted Estella, she had as good as adopted me, and
it could not fail to be her intention to bring us together. She
reserved it for me to restore the desclate house, admit the sun
shine into the dark rooms, set the clocks a going and the cold
hearths a blazing, tear down the cobwebs, destroy the vermin—
in short, do all the shining deeds of the young Knight of ro
mance, and marry the Princess. I had stopped to look at the
house as I passed ; and its seared red brick walls, blocked
windows, and strong green ivy clasping even the stacks of
chimneys with its twigs and tendons, as if with sinewy old
arms, had made up a rich attractive mystery, of which I was the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
209
hero . Estella was the inspiration of it, and the heart of it, of
course. But, though she had taken such strong possession of
me, though my fancy and my hope were so set upon her, though
her influence on my boyish life and character had been all
powerful, I did not, even that romantic morning, invest her
with any attributes save those she possessed. I mention this in
this place, of a fixed purpose , because it is the clue by which I
am to be followed into my poor labyrinth . According to my
experience, the conventional notion of a lover cannot be always
true. The unqualified truth is, that when I loved Estella with
the love of a man, I loved her simply because I found her irre
sistible. Once for all ; I knew to my sorrow , often and often,
if not always, that I loved her against reason , against promise,
against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all dis
couragement that could be. Once for all ; I loved her none the
less because I knew it, and it had no more influence in restrain
ing me, than if I had devoutly believed her to be human per
fection .
I so shaped out my walk as to arrive at the gate at my old
time. When I had rung at the bell with an unsteady hand, I
turned my back upon the gate, while I tried to get my breath
and keep the beating of my heart moderately quiet. I heard the
side door open, and steps come across the court -yard ; but I
pretended not to hear, even when the gate swung on its rusty
hinges.
Being at last touched on the shoulder, I started and turned .
I started much more naturally then , to find myself confronted
by a man in a sober grey dress. The last man I should have
expected to see in that place of porter at Miss Havisham's door.
“ Orlick !”
Ah, young master, there's more changes than yours. But
come in , come in . It's opposed to my orders to hold the gate
open ."
I entered and he swung it, and locked it, and took the key
out. “Yes ! ” said he, facing round, after doggedly preceding
me a few steps towards the house. “ Here I am !”
“ How did you come here ?"
“ I come here,” he retorted, on my legs. I had my box
brought alongside me in a barrow . "
“ Are you here for good ? ”
" I ain't here for harm , young m er, I suppose .
I was not so sure of that. I had leisure to entertain the
P
210 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

retort in my mind , while he slowly lifted his heavy glance from

the pavement, up my legs and arms, to my face.
5. Then you have left the forge ?” I said .
“ Do this look like a forge ?” replied Orlick , sending his glance
all round him with an air of injury. Now , do it look like it ?"
I asked him how long he had left Gargery's forge ?
“ One day is so like another here , ” he replied, “ that I don't
know without casting it up. However, I come here some time
since you left."
“ I could have told you that, Orlick .”
“ Ah !” said he, dryly. “ But then you've got to be a scholar . "
By this time we had come to the house, where I found his
room to be one just within the side door, with a little window
in it looking on the court-yard . In its small proportions, it
was not unlike the kind of place usually assigned to a gate
porter in Paris. Certain keys were hanging on the wall, to
which he now added the gate key ; and his patchwork -covered
bed was in a little inner division or recess. The whole had a
slovenly confined and sleepy look, like a cage for a human dor
mouse : while he, looming dark and heavy in the shadow of a
corner by the window , looked like the human dormouse for
whom it was fitted up-as indeed he was.
“ I never saw this room before,” I remarked ; "but there used
to be no Porter here."
“ No,” said he ; “ not till it got about that there was no pro
tection on the premises, and it come to be considered dangerous,
with convicts and Tag and Rag and Bobtail going up and down.
And then I was recommended to the place as a man who could
give another man as good as he brought, and I took it. It's
easier than bellowsing and hammering . — That's loaded, that
is.”
My eye had been caught by a gun with a brass -bound stock
over the chimney -piece, and his eye had followed mine .
66
Well ,” said I, not desirous of more conversation, “ shall I
go up to Miss Havisham ?”
“ Burn me, if I know ! ” he retorted , first stretching himself
and then shaking himself ; “ my orders ends here, young master.
I give this here bell a rap with this here hammer, and you go
on along the passage till you meet somebody."
“ I am expected , I believe ?”
“ Burn me twice over, if I can say ! ” said he.
Upon that, I turned down the long passage which I had first
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
211
trodden in my thick boots, and he made his bell sound. At
the end of the passage, while the bell was still reverberating,
1 found Sarah Pocket : who appeared to have now become con
stitutionally green and yellow by reason of me.
“ Oh !” said she. “ You , is it, Mr. Pip ?”
1
It is, Miss Pocket. I am glad to tell you that Mr. Pocket
and family are all well . "
" Are they any wiser ? ” said Sarah, with a dismal shake of the
head ; “ they had better be wiser, than well. Ah, Matthew ,
Matthew ! You know your way , sir ?”
Tolerably , for I had gone up the staircase in the dark, many
a time. I ascended it now, in lighter boots than of yore, and
tapped in my old way at the door of Miss Havisham's room .
“ Pip's rap," I heard her say, immediately ; " come in, Pip ."
She was in her chair near the old table, in the old dress, with
her two hands crossed on her stick, her chin resting on them,
and her eyes on the fire. Sitting near her, with the white
shoe, that had never been worn , in her hand, and her head bent
as she looked at it, was an elegant lady whom I had never
seen.
“ Come in, Pip,” Miss Havisham continued to mutter, without
CG
looking round or up ; come in, Pip, how do you do, Pip ? so
you kiss my hand as if I were a queen , eh ?__ Well ?"
She looked up at me suddenly, only moving her eyes , and
repeated in a grimly playful manner ,
“ Well ? "
“ I heard, Miss Havisham ," said I, rather at a loss, " that you
were so kind as to wish me to come and see you, and I came
directly ."
- Well ? "
The lady whom I had never seen before, lifted up her eyes
and looked archly at me, and then I saw that the eyes were
Estella's eyes. But she was so much changed, was so much
more beautiful, so much more womanly , in all things winning
admiration had made such wonderful advance, that I seemed to
have made none. I fancied, as I looked at her, that I slipped
hopelessly back into the coarse and common boy again. O the
sense of distance and disparity that came upon me, and the
inaccessibility that came about her !
She gave me her hand. I stammered something about the
pleasure I felt in seeing her again, and about my having looked
forward to it for a long, long time.
212 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Do you find her much changed, Pip ?" asked Miss Havisham ,
with her greedy look, and striking her stick upon a chair that
stood between them , as a sign to me to sit down there.
“ When I came in, Miss Havisham , I thought there was
nothing of Estella in the face or figure ; but now it all settles
down so curiously into the old—- "
“What ? You are not going to say into the old Estella ?”
Miss Havisham interrupted. “She was proud and insulting, and
you wanted to go away from her. Don't you remember ? "
I said confusedly that that was long ago, and that I knew
no better then, and the like. Estella smiled with perfect com
posure, and said she had no doubt of my having been quite
right, and of her having been very disagreeable.
" Is he changed ?” Miss Havisham asked her.
06
Very much ,” said Estella, looking at me.
“ Less coarse and common ?” said Miss Havisham , playing
with Estella's hair.
Estella laughed, and looked at the shoe in her hand, and
laughed again, and looked at me, and put the shoe down. She
treated me as a boy still, but she lured me on .
We sat in the dreamy room among the old strange influences
which had so wrought upon me, and I learnt that she had but
just come home from France, and that she was going to London.
Proud and wilful as of old, she had brought those qualities into
such subjection to her beauty that it was impossible and out of
nature — or I thought so — to separate them from her beauty.
Truly it was impossible to dissociate her presence from all those
wretched hankerings after money and gentility that had dis
turbed my boyhood — from all those ill -regulated aspirations that
had first made me ashamed of home and Joe — from all those
visions that had raised her face in the glowing fire, struck it
out of the iron on the anvil, extracted it from the darkness of
night to look in at the wooden window of the forge and flit
away. In a word, it was impossible for me to separate her, in
the past or in the present, from the innermost life of my life.
It was settled that I should stay there all the rest of the day,
and return to the hotel at night, and to London to -morrow .
When we had conversed for a while, Miss Havisham sent us two
out to walk in the neglected garden : on our coming in by-and
by, she said , I should wheel her about a little, as in times of
yore.
So, Estella and I went out into the garden by the gate through
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
213
which I had strayed to my encounter with the pale young gentle
man , now Herbert; I, trembling in spirit and worshipping the
very hem of her dress ; she, quite composed and most decidedly
not worshipping the hem of mine. As we drew near to the
place of encounter, she stopped and said :
“ I must have been a singular little creature to hide and see
that fight that day : but I did, and I enjoyed it very much ."
66 You rewarded me very much .”
“ Did I ?" she replied , in an incidental and forgetful way.
“ I remember I entertained a great objection to your adversary,
because I took it ill that he should be brought here to pester
me with his company."
“ He and I are great friends now . "
Are you
? I think I recollect though , that you read with
his father ?"
“ Yes . ”
I made the admission with reluctance, for it seemed to have
a boyish look, and she already treated me more than enough like
a boy.
“ Since your change of fortune and prospects, you have
changed your companions, ” said Estella.
“ Naturally," said I.
" And necessarily," she added , in a haughty tone ; " what was
fit company for you once, would be quite unfit company for yon
now .”
In my conscience, I doubt very much whether I had any
lingering intention left, of going to see Joe ; but if I had, this
observation put it to flight.
“ You had no idea of your impending good fortune, in those
times?" said Estella , with a slight wave of her hand , signifying
in the fighting times.
“ Not the least.”
The air of completeness and superiority with which she walked
at my side, and the air of youthfulness and submission with
which I walked at hers, made a contrast that I strongly felt.
It would have rankled in me more than it did, if I had not
regarded myself as eliciting it by being so set apart for her and
assigned to her.
The garden was too overgrown and rank for walking in with
ease, and after we had made the round of it twice or thrice, we
came out again into the brewery yard. I showed her to a
nicety where I had seen her walking on the casks, that first old
214 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

day, and she said with a cold and careless look in that direction,
“ Did I ?” I reminded her where she had come out of the house
and given me my meat and drink , and she said, “ I don't re
member . ” “ Not remember that you made me cry?” said I.
“ No," said she, and shook her head and looked about her . I
verily believe that her not remembering and not minding in the
least, made me cry again , inwardly — and that is the sharpest
crying of all.
“ You must know ," said Estella, condescending to me as a
brilliant and beautiful woman might, “ that I have no heart — if
that has anything to do with my memory . "
I got through some jargon to the effect that I took the liberty
of doubting that. That I knew better. That there could be
no such beauty without it.
“ Oh ! I have a heart to be stabbed in or shot in, I have no
doubt,” said Estella, “ and, of course, if it ceased to beat I should
cease to be. But you know what I mean . I have no softness
there, no - sympathy - sentiment-- nonsense.
What was it that was borne in upon my mind when she stood
still and looked attentively at me ? Anything that I had seen
in Miss Havisham ? No. In some of her looks and gestures
there was that tinge of resemblance to Miss Havisham which
may often be noticed to have been acquired by children, from
grown persons with whom they have been much associated and
secluded , and which, when childhood is past, will produce a
remarkable occasional likeness of expression between faces that
are otherwise quite different. And yet I could not trace this to
Miss Havisham . I looked again, and though she was still
looking at me, the suggestion was gone.
What was it ?
“ I am serious,” said Estella, not so much with a frown ( for
her brow was smooth ) as with a darkening of her face ; “if we
are to be thrown much together, you had better believe it at
once. No ! " imperiously stopping me as I opened my lips. " I
have not bestowed my tenderness anywhere. I have never had
any such thing . "
In another moment we were in the brewery so long disused,
and she pointed to the high gallery where I had seen her going
out on that same first day, and told me she remembered to have
been up there, and to have seen me standing scared below. As
my eyes followed her white hand, again the same dim suggestion
that I could not possibly grasp, crossed me . My involuntary start
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 215

occasioned her to lay her hand upon my arm . Instantly the

ghost passed once more and was gone.
What was it ?
“ What is the matter ? ” asked Estella . “ Are you scared
again ?"
“ I should be, if I believed what you said just now ," I replied,
to turn it off.
“ Then you don't ? Very well. It is said, at any rate .
Miss Havisham will soon be expecting you at your old post,
though I think that might be laid aside now , with other old
belongings. Let us make one more round of the garden, and
then go in. Come ! You shall not shed tears for my cruelty
to -day ; you shall be my Page, and give me your shoulder .”
Her handsome dress had trailed upon the ground. She held
it in one hand now, and with the other lightly touched my
shoulder as we walked . We walked round the ruined garden
twice or thrice more, and it was all in bloom for me. If the
green and yellow growth of weed in the chinks of the old wall
had been the most precious flowers that ever blew, it could not
have been more cherished in my remembrance .
There was no discrepancy of years between us, to remove her
far from me ; we were of nearly the same age, though of course
the age told for more in her case than in mine ; but the air of
inaccessibility which her beauty and her manner gave her
tormented me in the midst of my delight, and at the height of
the assurance I felt that our patroness had chosen us for one
another. Wretched boy !
At last we went back into the house, and there I heard, with
surprise, that my guardian had come down to see Miss Havisham
on business, and would come back to dinner. The old wintry
branches of chandeliers in the room where the mouldering table
was spread, had been lighted while we were out, and Miss Havi
sham was in her chair and waiting for me.
It was like pushing the chair itself back into the past, when
2

we began the old slow circuit round about the ashes of the bridal
feast. But, in the funereal room , with that figure of the grave
fallen back in the chair fixing its eyes upon her, Estella looked
more bright and beautiful than before, and I was under stronger
enchantment.
The time so melted away, that our early dinner -hour drew
close at hand, and Estella left us to prepare herself. We had
stopped near the centre of the long table, and Miss Havisham ,
216 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

with one of her withered arms stretched out of the chair, rested
that clenched hand upon the yellow cloth . As Estella looked
back over her shoulder before going out at the door, Miss Havi
sham kissed that hand to her, with a ravenous intensity that was
of its kind quite dreadful.
Then, Estella being gone and we two left alone, she turned to
me and said in a whisper :
“ Is she beautiful, graceful, well- grown ? Do you admire her ? ”
Everybody must who sees her, Miss Havisham .”
She drew an arm round my neck, and drew my head close
down to hers as she sat in the chair . “ Love her, love her, love
her ! How does she use you ? ”
Before I could answer ( if I could have answered so difficult a
question at all ), she repeated, “Love her, love her , love her !
If she favours you, love her. If she wounds you, love her. If
she tears your heart to pieces -and as it gets older and stronger
it will tear deeper - love her, love her, love her !"
Never had I seen such passionate eagerness as was joined to
her utterance of these words. I could feel the muscles of the
thin arm round my neck, swell with the vehemence that
possessed her .
“ Hear me, Pip ! I adopted her to be loved. I bred her and
educated her, to be loved. I developed her into what she is,
that she might be loved. Love her !”
She said the word often enough, and there could be no doubt
that she meant to say it ; but if the often repeated word had been
hate instead of love - despair - revenge - dire deathit could
not have sounded from her lips more like a curse .
“ I'll tell you ,” said she, in the same hurried passionate
whisper, “ what real love is. It is blind devotion ,unquestioning
self -humiliation, utter submission , trust and belief against your
self and against the whole world, giving up your whole heart and
soul to the smiter - as I did !”
When she came to that, and to a wild cry that followed that,
I caught her round the waist. For she rose up in the chair, in
her shroud of a dress, and struck at the air as if she would as
soon have struck herself against the wall and fallen dead .
All this passed in a few seconds. As I drew her down into
her chair, I was conscious of a scent that I knew , and turning,
saw my guardian in the room.
He always carried ( I have not yet mentioned it, I think) a
pocket -handkerchief of rich silk and of imposing proportions,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
217

which was of great value to him in his profession. I have seen

him so terrify a client or a witness by ceremoniously unfolding
this pocket-handkerchief as if he were immediately going to
blow his nose, and then pausing, as if he knew he should not
have time to do it, before such client or witness committed
himself, that the self -committal has followed directly, quite as a
matter of course . When I saw him in the room he had this
expressive pocket-handkerchief in both hands, and was looking
at us. On meeting my eye, he said plainly, by a momentary and
silent pause in that attitude, “ Indeed ? Singular !” and then
put the handkerchief to its right use with wonderful effect.
Miss Havisham had seen him as soon as I, and was ( like
everybody else) afraid of him. She made a strong attempt to
compose herself, and stammered that he was as punctual as
ever .
“ As punctual as ever, ” he repeated, coming up to us. “ (How
do you do, Pip ? Shall I give you a ride, Miss Havisham ?
Once round ?) And so you are here, Pip ? ”
I told him when I had arrived , and how Miss Havisham wished
me to come and see Estella. To which he replied, “ Ah ! Very
fine young lady !” Then he pushed Miss Havisham in her chair
before him , with one of his large hands, and put the other in
his trousers -pocket as if the pocket were full of secrets .
Well, Pip ! How often have you seen Miss Estella before ? ”
said he, when he came to a stop .
" How often ?”
“Ah ! How many times ? Ten thousand times ?"
“Oh ! Certainly not so many."
“ Twice ? "
Jaggers,” interposed Miss Havisham , much to my relief ;
“ leave my Pip alone, and go with him to your dinner.'
He complied, and we groped our way down the dark stairs
together. While we were still on our way to those detached
apartments across the paved yard at the back, he asked me how
often I had seen Miss Havisham eat and drink ; offering me a
breadth of choice, as usual, between a hundred times and
once ,
I considered, and said, “ Never.”
“ And never will, Pip,” he retorted , with a frowning smile .
“ She has never allowed herself to be seen doing either, since
she lived this present life of hers. She wanders about in the
night, and then lays hands on such food as she takes .”
218 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Pray , sir ,” said I, “may I ask you a question ?" .

“ You may ,” said he, “ and I may decline to answer it. Put
your question . "
“ Estella's name. Is it Havisham or—-" I had nothing to
add.
66 Or what ? ” said he.
6 Is it Havisham ?"
66 It is Havisham . ”
This brought us to the dinner-table, where she and Sarah
Pocket awaited us. Mr. Jaggers presided, Estella sat opposite
to him , I faced my green and yellow friend. We dined very
well, and were waited on by a maid servant whom I had never
seen in all my comings and goings, but who, for anything I
know , had been in that mysterious house the whole time . After
dinner a bottle of choice old port was placed before my guardian
(he was evidently well acquainted with the vintage ), and the
two ladies left us .
Anything to equal the determined reticence of Mr. Jaggers
under that roof I never saw elsewhere, even in him. He kept
his very looks to himself, and scarcely directed his eyes to
Estella’s face once during dinner. When she spoke to him ,
he listened, and in due course answered, but never looked at
her, that I could see. On the other hand, she often looked
at him , with interest and curiosity, if not distrust, but his
face never showed the least consciousness. Throughout din
ner he took a dry delight in making Sarah Pocket greener and
yellower, by often referring in conversation with me to my ex
pectations : but here, again , he showed no consciousness, and
even made it appear that he extorted — and even did extort,
though I don't know how -- those references out of my innocent
self.
And when he and I were left alone together, he sat with an
air upon him of general lying by in consequence of information
he possessed, that really was too much for me. He cross
examined his very wine when he had nothing else in hand .
He held it between himself and the candle, tasted the port,
rolled it in his mouth , swallowed it, looked at his glass again
smelt the port, tried it, drank it, filled again , and cross
examined the glass again , until I was as nervous as if I had
known the wine to be telling him something to my disadvan
tage. Three or four times I feebly thought I would start
conversation ; but whenever he saw me going to ask him any
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
219

thing, he looked at me with his glass in his hand, and rolling

hiswine about in his mouth, as if requesting me to take notice
that it was of no use, for he couldn't answer .
I think Miss Pocket was conscious that the sight of me
involved her in the danger of being goaded to madness, and
perhaps tearing off her cap — which was a very hideous one, in
the nature of a muslin mop — and strewing the ground with her
hair — which assuredly had never grown on her head. She did
not appear when we afterwards went up to Miss Havisham's
room , and . we four played at whist. In the interval, Miss
Havisham , in a fantastic way , had put some of the most beau
tiful jewels from her dressing-table into Estella's hair, and
about her bosom and arms ; and I saw even my guardian look
at her from under his thick eyebrows, and raise them a little,
when her loveliness was before him , with those rich flushes of
glitter and colour in it.
Of the manner and extent to which he took our trumps into
custody, and came out with mean little cards at the ends of
hands, before which the glory of our Kings and Queens was
utterly abased, I say nothing ; nor, of the feeling that I had,
respecting his looking upon us personally in the light of three
very obvious and poor riddles that he had found out long ago.
What I suffered from , was the incompatibility between his cold
presence and my feelings towards. Estella . It was not that
I know I could never bear to speak to him about her, that
I knew I could never bear to hear him creak his boots at her,
that I knew I could never bear to see him wash his hands of
her ; it was, that my admiration should be within a foot or two
of him - it was, that my feelings should be in the same place
with him — that, was the agonising circumstance.
We played until nine o'clock , and then it was arranged that
when Estella came to London I should be forewarned of her
coming and should meet her at the coach ; and then I took
leave of her, and touched her and left her.
My guardian lay at the Boar in the next room to mine. Far
into the night, Miss Havisham's words, “ Love her, love her,
love her !" sounded in my ears . I adapted them for my own
repetition, and said to my pillow, “ I love her, I love her, I love
her !” hundreds of times. Then , a burst of gratitude came
upon me, that she should be destined for me, once the black
smith's boy. Then, I thought if she were, as I feared , by no
means rapturously grateful for that destiny yet, when would
220 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

she begin to be interested in me ? When should I awaken

the heart within her, that was mute and sleeping now ?
Ah me ! I thought those were high and great emotions.
But I never thought there was anything low and small in my
keeping away from Joe, because I knew she would be con
temptuous of him. It was but a day gone, and Joe had brought
the tears into my eyes ; they had soon dried, God forgive me !
soon dried .

CHAPTER XXX .

AFTER well considering the matter while I was dressing at the

Blue Boar in the morning, I resolved to tell my guardian that I
doubted Orlick’s being the right sort of man to fill a post of
trust at Miss Havisham's . Why, of course he is not the right
sort of man , Pip," said my guardian, comfortably satisfied
beforehand on the general head, “ because the man who fills the
post of trust never is the right sort of man .” It seemed quite
to put him in spirits, to find that this particular post was not
exceptionally held by the right sort of man , and he listened in
a satisfied manner while I told him what knowledge I had of
Orlick . “ Very good, Pip ,” he observed, when I had concluded ,
“ I'll go round presently ,' and pay our friend off.” Rather
alarmed by this summary action , I was for a little delay, and
even hinted that our friend himself might be difficult to deal
with . “Oh no he won't," said my guardian, making his pocket
handkerchief -point, with perfect confidence ; " I should like to
see him argue the question with me.”
As we were going back together to London by the mid - day
coach, and as I breakfasted under such terrors of Pumblechook
that I could scarcely hold my cup, this gave me an opportunity
of saying that I wanted a walk, and that I would go on along
the London-road while Mr. Jaggers was occupied, if he would
let the coachman know that I would get into my place when
overtaken . I was thus enabled to fly from the Blue Boar
immediately after breakfast. By then making a loop of about
a couple of miles into the open country at the back of Pumble
chook's premises, I got round into the High -street again ,
a little beyond that pitfall, and felt myself in comparative
security.
It was interesting to be in the quiet old town once more, and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 221

it was not disagreeable to be here and there suddenly recog

nised and stared after. One or two of the tradespeople even
darted out of their shops and went a little way down the street
before me, that they might turn , as if they had forgotten some
1 thing, and pass me face to face on which occasions I don't
know whether they or I made the worse pretence ; they of not
doing it, or I of not seeing it. Still my position was a distin
guished one, and I was not at all dissatisfied with it, until Fate
threw me in the way of that unlimited miscreant, Trabb's boy.
Casting my eyes along the street at a certain point of my
progress, I beheld Trabb's boy approaching, lashing himself
with an empty blue bag. Deeming that a serene and uncon
scious contemplation of him would best beseem me, and would
be most likely to quell his evil mind, I advanced with that
expression of countenance, and was rather congratulating my
self on my success , when suddenly the knees of Trabb’s boy
smote together, his hair uprose, his cap fell off, he trembled
violently in every limb, staggered out into the road, and crying
to the populace, “ Hold me ! I'm so frightened ! ” feigned to be
1
in a paroxysm of terror and contrition, occasioned by the dignity
of my appearance. As I passed him , his teeth loudly chattered
in his head, and with every mark of extreme humiliation , he
prostrated himself in the dust.
This was a hard thing to bear, but this was nothing. I had
not advanced another two hundred yards, when , to my inexpres
sible terror, amazement, and indignation, I again beheld Trabb's
boy approaching. He was coming round a narrow corner .
His blue bag was slung over his shoulder, honest industry
beamed in his eyes, a determination to proceed to Trabb's with
cheerful briskness was indicated in his gait. With a shock he
became aware of me, and was severely visited as before ; but
this time his motion was rotatory, and he staggered round and
round me with knees more afflicted, and with uplifted hands
as if beseeching for mercy. His sufferings were hailed with the
greatest joy by a knot of spectators, and I felt utterly confounded .
I had not got as much further down the street as the post
office, when I again beheld Trabb's boy shooting round by a
back way. This time, he was entirely changed . He wore the
blue bag in the manner of my great -coat, and was strutting
along the pavement towards me on the opposite side of the
street, attended by a company of delighted young friends to
whom he from time to time exclaimed, with a wave of his hand ,
222 GREAT EXPECTATIONS ,

“ Don't know yah !” Words cannot state the amount of aggra

vation and injury wreaked upon me by Trabb's boy, when
passing abreast of me, he pulled up his shirt - collar, twined his
side -hair, stuck an arm akimbo, and smirked extravagantly by,
wriggling his elbows and body, and drawling to his attendants
“ Don't know yah, don't know yah, pon my soul don't know
yah !" The disgrace attendant on his immediately afterwards
taking to crowing and pursuing me across the bridge with
crows, as from an exceedingly dejected fowl who had known me
when I was a blacksmith, culminated the disgrace with which
I left the town, and was, so to speak, ejected by it into the open
country.
But unless I had taken the life of Trabb's boy on that
occasion , I really do not even now see what I could have done
save endure. To have struggled with him in the street, or to
have exacted any lower recompense from him than his heart's
best blood, would have been futile and degrading. Moreover,
he was a boy whom no man could hurt ; an invulnerable and
dodging serpent who, when chased into a corner, flew out again
between his captor's legs, scornfully yelping. I wrote, how
ever, to Mr. Trabb by next day's post, to say that Mr. Pip
must decline to deal further with one who could so far forget
what he owed to the best interests of society, as to employ a
boy who excited Loathing in every respectable mind .
The coach, with Mr. Jaggers inside, came up in due time,
and I took my box- seat again, and arrived in London safe — but
not sound, for my heart was gone. As soon as I arrived, I sent
a penitential codfish and barrel of oysters to Job (as reparation
for not having gone myself ), and then went on to Barnard's Inn.
I found Herbert, dining on cold meat, and delighted to
welcome me back . Having despatched The Avenger to the
coffee -house for an addition to the dinner, I felt that I must
open my breast that very evening to my friend and chum. As
confidence was out of the question with The Avenger in the
hall, which could merely be regarded in the light of an ante
chamber to the keyhole, I sent him to the Play. A better
proof of the severity of my bondage to that taskmaster could
scarcely be afforded , than the degrading shifts to which I was
constantly driven to find him employment. So mean is ex
tremity, that I sometimes sent him to Hyde Park - corner to see
what o'clock it was.
Dinner done and we sitting with our feet upon the fender, I
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 223

said to Herbert, “ My dear Herbert, I have something very par

ticular to tell you.”
“My dear Handel ,” he returned , " I shall esteem and respect
your confidence .”
“ It concerns myself, Herbert, ” said I, “and one other person .”
Herbert crossed his feet, looked at the fire with his head on
one side , and having looked at it in vain for some time, looked
at me because I didn't go on.
&C
Herbert ,” said I, laying my hand upon his knee. “ I love
I adore - Estella . ”
Instead of being transfixed, Herbert replied in an easy matter
of-course way, “ Exactly. Well ? ”
“ Well, Herbert ? Is that all you say ? Well ?”
What next, I mean ?” said Herbert. 6. Of course I know
that.”
“ How do you know it ?” said I.
“ How do I know it, Handel ? Why, from you."
I never told you.”
“ Told me ! You have never told me when you have got
your hair cut, but I have had senses to perceive it. You have
always adored her, ever since I have known you. You brought
your adoration and your portmanteau here, together. Told me !
Why, you have always told me all day long. When you told
me your own story, you told me plainly that you began adoring
her the first time you saw her, when you were very young in
deed .”
“ Very well, then ,” said I, to whom this was a new and not
unwelcome light, “ I have never left off adoring her. And she
has come back , a most beautiful and most elegant creature .
And I saw her yesterday. And if I adored her before, I now
doubly adore her."
66
Lucky for you then, Handel, ” said Herbert, “ that you are
picked out for her and allotted to her. Without encroaching
on forbidden ground, we may venture to say that there can be
no doubt between ourselves of that fact. Have you anyidea yet,
of Estella's views on the adoration question ? ”
I shook my head gloomily. “ Oh ! She is thousands of miles
away, from me,” said I.
66
Patience, mydear Handel : time enough, time enough. But
you have something more to say ? ”
“ I am ashamed to say it,” I returned, “ and yet it's no worse
to say it than to think it. You call me a lucky fellow . Of
224 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
course, I am. I was a blacksmith’s boy but yesterday ; I am
what shall I say I am - to -day ?”
“ Say, a good fellow , if you want a phrase ," returned Herbert,
smiling, and clapping his hand on the back of mine : “ a good
fellow , with impetuosity and hesitation, boldness and diffidence,
action and dreaming, curiously mixed in him .”
I stopped for a moment to consider whether there really was
this mixture in my character. On the whole , I by no means
recognised the analysis, but thought it not worth disputing.
" When I ask what I am to call myself to -day, Herbert, ” I
went on , “ I suggest what I have in my thoughts. You say I
am lucky. I know I have done nothing to raise myself in life,
and that Fortune alone has raised me ; that is being very lucky.
And yet, when I think of Estella
( “ And when don't you , you know ! ” Herbert threw in, with
his eyes on the fire ; which I thought kind and sympathetic of
him .)
-Then, my dear Herbert, I cannot tell you how dependent
and uncertain I feel, and how exposed to hundreds of chances .
Avoiding forbidden ground, as you did just now, I may still
say that on the constancy of one person ( naming no person ) all
my.expectations depend. And at the best, how indefinite and
unsatisfactory , only to know so vaguely what they are ! " In
saying this, I relieved my mind of what had always been there,
more or less, though no doubt most since yesterday.
“ Now , Handel ,” Herbert replied, in his gay hopeful way , “ it
seems to me that in the despondency of the tender passion, we
are looking into our gift -horse's mouth with a magnifying glass.
Likewise, it seems to me that, concentrating our attention on
the examination, we altogether overlook one of the best points
of the animal. Didn't you tell me that your guardian, Mr.
Jaggers, told you in the beginning, that you were not endowed
with expectations only ? And even if he had not told you so
though that is a very large If, I grant -- could you believe that
of all men in London , Mr. Jaggers is the man to hold his
present relations towards you unless he were sure of his
ground ? ”
I said I could not deny that this was a strong point. I said
it (people often do so, in such cases) like a rather reluctant
concession to truth and justice ;—as if I wanted to deny it !
“ I should think it was a strong point,” said Herbert, “ and I
should think you would be puzzled to imagine a stronger ; as to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. .225

the rest, you must bide your guardian's time, and he must bide
his client's time. You'll be one-and -twenty before you know
where you are, and then perhaps you'll get some further en
lightenment. At all events, you'll be nearer getting it, for it
must come at last.”
“What a hopeful disposition you have ! ” said I, gratefully ad
miring his cheery ways .
66
I ought to have, ” said Herbert, “ for I have not much else .
I must acknowledge, by -the -by, that the good sense of what I
have just said is not my own , but my father's. The only remark
I ever heard him make on your story, was the final one : The
thing is settled and done, or Mr. Jaggers would not be in it.'
And now before I say anything more about my father, or my
father's son , and repay confidence with confidence, I want to
make myself seriously disagreeable to you for a moment - posi
tively repulsive.”
“ You won't succeed,” said I.
“Oh yes I shall !” said he . “ One, two, three , and now I am
in for it. Handel, my good fellow ;" though he spoke in this
light tone, he was very much in earnest : “ I have been thinking
since we have been talking with our feet on this fender, that
Estella surely cannot be a condition of your inheritance, if she
was never referred to by your guardian . Am I right in so un
derstanding what you have told me, as that he never referred to
her, directly or indirectly, in any way ? Never even hinted, for
instance, that your patron might have views as to your marriage
ultimately ? "
“ Never.”
Now , Handel, I am quite free from the flavour of sour
grapes, upon my soul and honour ! Not being bound to her ,
can you not detach yourself from her ?—I told you I should be
'disagreeable."
I turned my head aside, for, with a rush and a sweep , like
the old marsh winds coming up from the sea, a feeling like that
which had subdued me on the morning when I left the forge,
when the mists were solemnly rising, and when I laid my hand
upon the village finger- post, smote upon my heart again . There
was silence between us for a little while .
“ Yes ; but my dear Handel,” Herbert went on, as if we had
been talking, instead of silent, “ it's having been so strongly
rooted in the breast of a boy whom nature and circumstances
made so romantic, renders it very serious. Think of her bring
Q
226 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

ing - up, and think of Miss Havisham . Think of what she is

herself (now I am repulsive and you abominate me). This may
lead to miserable things.”
“ I know it, Herbert,” said I , with my head still turned away,
" but I can't help it.”
“ You can't detach yourself ?”
“ No. Impossible !"
“ You can't try, Handel ?”
“No. Impossible ! "
“ Well ! ” said Herbert, getting up with a lively shake as if he
had been asleep, and stirring the fire ; now I'll endeavour to
make myself agreeable again !”
So, he went round the room and shook the curtains out, put
the chairs in their places, tidied the books and so forth that were
lying about, looked into the hall, peeped into the letter -box,
shut the door, and came back to his chair by the fire : when he
sat down, nursing his left leg in both arms.
" I was going to say a word or two, Handel, concerning my
father and my father's son . I am afraid it is scarcely necessary
for my father's son to remark that my father's establishment is
not particularly brilliant in its housekeeping."
“ There is always plenty, Herbert,” said I : to say something
encouraging.
“Oh yes! and so the dustman says, I believe, with the
strongest approval, and so does the marine storeshop in the
back street . Gravely, Handel, for the subject is grave enough ,
you know how it is, as well as I do. I suppose there was a time
once , when my father had not given matters up ; but if ever
there was , the time is gone. May I ask you if you have ever
had an opportunity of remarking, down in your part of the
country, that the children of not exactly suitable marriages, are
always most particularly anxious to be married ? ”
This was such a singular question, that I asked him in return ,
" Is it so ?”
“ I don't know , ” said Herbert ; “ that's what I want to
know . Because it is decidedly the case with us . My poor
sister Charlotte who was next me and died before she was
In
fourteen, was a striking example. Little Jane is the same.
her desire to be matrimonially established , you might suppose
her to have passed her short existence in the perpetual contem
plation of domestic bliss. Little Alick in a frock has already
made arrangements for his union with a suitable young por
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 227

son at Kew . And indeed , I think we are all engaged, except

the baby. "
“ Then you are ?” said I.
“ I am ,” said Herbert ; " but it's a secret."
I assured him of my keeping the secret, and begged to be
favoured with further particulars. He had spoken so sensibly
and feelingly of my weakness, that I wanted to know something
about his strength .
May I ask the name ? ” I said .
“ Name of Clara ,” said Herbert,
" Live in London ? ”
“ Yes. Perhaps I ought to mention ," said Herbert, who had
become curiously crestfallen and meek, since we entered on the
interesting theme, " that she is rather below my mother's
nonsensical family notions. Her father had to do with the
victualling of passenger -ships. I think he was a species of
purser.”
5. What is he now ?” said I.
“ He's an invalid now ," replied Herbert.
Living on --- ?"
“ On the first floor,” said Herbert. Which was not at all what
I meant, for I had intended my question to apply to his means.
“ I have never seen him, for he has always kept his room over
head, since I have known Clara. But I have heard him con
stantly. He makes tremendous rows — roars, and pegs at the
floor with some frightful instrument .” In looking at me and
then laughing heartily, Herbert for the time recovered his usual
lively manner .
“ Don't you expect to see him ?” said I.
“ Oh yes, I constantly expect to see him," returned Herbert,
“ because I never hear him, without expecting him to come tum
bling through the ceiling. But I don't know how long the
rafters may hold .”
When he had once more laughed heartily, he became meek
again , and told me that the moment he began to realise Capital,
it was his intention to marry this young lady. He added as a
self - evident proposition, engendering low spirits, “But you can't
marry, you know , while you're looking about you ."
As we contemplated the fire, and as I thought what a difficult
vision to realise this same Capital sometimes was, I put my
hands in my pockets. A folded piece of paper in one of them
attracting my attention, I opened it and found it to be the play
228 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

bill I had received from Joe, relative to the celebrated pro

vincial amateur of Roscian renown . “ And bless my heart, " I
involuntarily added aloud, “ it's to -night !"
This changed the subject in an instant, and made us hur
riedly resolve to go to the play. So, when I had pledged
myself to comfort and abet Herbert in the affair of his heart by
all practicable and impracticable means, and when Herbert had
told me that his affianced already knew me by reputation and
that I should be presented to her, and when we had warmly
shaken hands upon our mutual confidence, we blew out our
candles, made up our fire, locked our door, and issued forth in
quest of Mr. Wopsle and Denmark ,

CHAPTER XXXI,

On our arrival in Denmark, we found the king and queen of

that country elevated in two arm - chairs on a kitchen -table,
holding a Court. The whole of the Danish nobility were in
attendance ; consisting of a nobiť boy in the wash - leather boots
of a gigantic ancestor, a venerable Peer with a dirty face who
seemed to have risen from the people late in life, and the
Danish chivalry with a comb in its hair and a pair of white silk
legs, and presenting on the whole a feminine appearance. My
gifted townsman stood gloomily apart, with folded arms, and I
could have wished that his curls and forehead had been more
probable,
Several curious little circumstances transpired as the action
proceeded. The late king of the country not only appeared to
have been troubled with a cough at the time of his decease, but
to have taken it with him to the tomb, and to have brought it
back . The royal phantom also carried a ghostly manuscript
round its truncheon, to which it had the appearance of occasion
ally referring, and that, too, with an air of anxiety and a ten
dency to lose the place of reference which were suggestive of a
state of mortality. It was this, I conceive, which led to the
Shade's being advised by the gallery to “ turn over ! ”-a recom
mendation which it took extremely ill. It was likewise to be
noted of this majestic spirit that whereas it always appeared
with an air of having been out a long time and walked an im
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 229

mense distance, it perceptibly came from a closely contiguous

wall. This occasioned its terrors to be received derisively .
The Queen of Denmark , a very buxom lady, though no doubt
historically brazen, was considered by the public to have too
much brass about her ; her chin being attached to her diadem
by a broad band of that metal ( as if she had a gorgeous tooth
ache ), her waist being encircled by another, and each of her
arms by another, so that she was openly mentioned as “the
kettledrum .” The noble boy in the ancestral boots, was incon
sistent ; representing himself, as it were in one breath, as an
able seaman, a strolling actor, a gravedigger, a clergyman, and
a person of the utmost importance at a Court fencing -match,
on the authority of whose practised eye and nice discrimina
tion the finest strokes were judged . This gradually led to a
want of toleration for him, and even - on his being detected
in holy orders, and declining to perform the funeral service
—to the general indignation taking the form of nuts. Lastly,
Ophelia was a prey to such slow musical madness, that when ,
in course of time, she had taken off her white muslin scarf,
folded it up, and buried it, a sulky man who had been long
cooling his impatient nose against an iron bar in the front row
of the gallery, growled, “Now the baby's put to bed let's
have supper !” Which, to say the least of it, was out of
keeping
Upon my unfortunate townsman all these incidents accumu
lated with playful effect . Whenever that undecided Prince
had to ask a question or state a doubt, the public helped him
out with it. As for example ; on the question whether 'twas
nobler in the mind to suffer, some roared yes, and some no, and
some inclining to both opinions said “ toss up for it ; " and quite
a Debating Society arose . When he asked what should such
fellows as he do crawling between earth and heaven , he was
encouraged with loud cries of “ Hear, hear ! ” When he appeared
with his stocking disordered ( its disorder expressed , according
to usage, by one very neat fold in the top, which I suppose to
be always got up with a flat iron), a conversation took place in
the gallery respecting the paleness of his leg, and whether it
was occasioned by the turn the ghost had given him. On his
taking the recorders — very like a little black flute that had just
been played in the orchestra and handed out at the door - he
was called upon unanimously for Rule Britannia . When he
recommended the player not to saw the air thus, the sulky man
230 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

said , “ And don't you do it, neither ; you're a deal worse than
him ! " And I grieve to add that peals of laughter greeted Mr.
Wopsle on every one of these occasions.
But his greatest trials were in the churchyard : which had
the appearance of a primeval forest, with a kind of small eccle
siastical wash - house on one side, and a turnpike gate on the
other. Mr. Wopsle in a comprehensive black cloak, being
descried entering at the turnpike, the gravedigger was admo
nished in a friendly way, “ Look out ! Here's the undertaker a
coming, to see how you're a getting on with your work ! " I believe
it is well known in a constitutional country that Mr. Wopsle
could not possibly have returned the skull, after moralising
over it, without dusting his fingers on a white napkin taken
from his breast ; but even that innocent and indispensable
action did not pass without the comment “· Wai-ter !” The
arrival of the body for interment (in an empty black box with
the lid tumbling open ), was the signal for a general joy which
was much enhanced by the discovery, among the bearers, of an
individual obnoxious to identification . The joy attended Mr.
Wopsle through his struggle with Laertes on the brink of the
orchestra and the grave, and slackened no more until he had
tumbled the king off the kitchen -table, and had died by inches
from the ankles upward .
We had made some pale efforts in the beginning to applaud
Mr. Wopsle ; but they were too hopeless to be persisted in .
Therefore we had sat, feeling keenly for him , but laughing,
nevertheless, from ear to ear. I laughed in spite of myself all
the time, the whole thing was so droll ; and yet I had a latent
impression that there was something decidedly fine in Mr.
Wopsle’s elocution — not for old associations' sake, I am afraid ,
but because it was very slow , very dreary, very up -hill and
down - hill, and very unlike any way in which any man in any
natural circumstances of life or death ever expressed himself
about anything. When the tragedy was over, and he had been
called for and hooted , I said to Herbert, “ Let us go at once, or
perhaps we shall meet him .”
We made all the haste we could down stairs, but we were not
quick enough either . Standing at the door was a Jewish man
with an unnatural heavy smear of eyebrow , who caught my eyes
as we advanced, and said, when we came up with him :
“ Mr. Pip and friend ? "
Identity of Mr. Pip and friend confessed.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 231
“Mr. Waldengarver,” said the man , “ would be glad to have
the honour."
“ Waldengarver ? " I repeated - when Herbert murmured in my
ich had ear, “ Probably Wopsle.”
“ Oh ! ” said I. “ Yes. Shall we follow you ?”
on the “ A few steps, please.” When we were in a side alley, he
; being turned and asked , “ How do you think he looked ?-Idressed
admon him . ”
I don't know what he had looked like, except a funeral; with
beliere the addition of a large Danish sun or star hanging round his
Topsle neck by a blue ribbon, that had given him the appearance of
being insured in some extraordinary Fire Office. But I said he
taken had looked very nice.
ensable “When he come to the grave,” said our conductor, “ he
The showed his cloak beautiful. But, judging from the wing, it
I with looked to me that when he see the ghost in the queen's apart
which ment, he might have made more of his stockings.
I modestly assented, and we all fell through a little dirty
swing door, into a sort of hot packing -case immediately behind
it. Here Mr. Wopsle was divesting himself of his Danish
De had garments, and here there was just room for us to look at him
inches over one another's shoulders, by keeping the packing - case door,
or lid, wide open .
CC
lani Gentlemen ," said Mr. Wopsle, “ I am proud to see you.
I hope, Mr. Pip, you will excuse my sending round . I had the
happiness to know you in former times, and the Drama has
ever had a claim which 99 has ever been acknowledged, on the
noble and the affluent.”
Meanwhile, Mr. Waldengarver, in a frightful perspiration,
raid, was trying to get himself out of his princely sables.
and “ Skin the stockings off, Mr. Waldengarver,” said the owner
of that property , or you'll bust 'em. Bust 'em, and you'll bust
nseli five-and -thirty shillings. Shakspeare never was complimented
been > with a finer pair. Keep quiet in your chair now , and leave 'em
to me."
With that, he went upon his knees, and began to flay his
nof victim ; who, on the first stocking coming off, would certainly
18 have fallen over backward with his chair, but for there being no
ves room to fall anyhow .
I had been afraid until then to say a word about the play.
But then, Mr. Waldengarver looked up at us complacently,
and said :
232 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Gentlemen, how did it seem to you , to go, in front ?"

Herbert said from behind (at the same time poking me ),
" capitally. ” So I said “ capitally ."
"How did you like my reading of the character, gentlemen ?"
said Mr. Waldengarver, almost, if not quite, with patronage.
Herbert said from behind (again poking me), “ massive and
concrete.” So I said boldly, as if I had originated it, and must
beg to insist upon it, “ massive and concrete.”
“ I am glad to have your approbation, gentlemen ,” said Mr.
Waldengarver, with an air of dignity, in spite of his being
ground against the wall at the time, and holding on by the seat
of the chair .
“But I'll tell you one thing, Mr. Waldengarver ," said the
man who was on his knees, “in which you're out in your read
ing. Now mind ! I don't care who says contrairy ; I tell you
SO. You're out in your reading of Hamlet when
you get your
legs in profile. The last Hamlet as I dressed, made the same
mistakes in his reading at rehearsal, till I got him to put a
large red wafer on each of his shins, and then at that rehearsal
(which was the last) I went in front, sir, to the back of the pit,
and whenever his reading brought him into profile, I called
out ' I don't see no wafers ! ' And at night his reading was
lovely ."
Mr. Waldengarver smiled at me, as much as to say a
faithful dependent - I overlook his folly ;" and then said aloud,
My view is a little too classic and thoughtful for them here ;
but they will improve, they will improve."
Herbert and I said together, Oh, no doubt they would improve.
“ Did you observe, gentlemen," said Mr. Waldengarver, “ that
there was a man in the gallery who endeavoured to cast derision
on the service - I mean , the representation ? ”
We basely replied that we rather thought we had noticed
such a man . I added, “He was drunk, no doubt.
“ Oh dear no, sir,” said Mr. Wopsle, “ not drunk. His
employer would see to that, sir. His employer would not allow
him to be drunk . ”
“ You know his employer ?” said I.
Mr. Wopsle shut his eyes, and opened them again ; perform
ing both ceremonies very slowly. “ You must have observed,
gentlemen ,” said he, “ an ignorant and a blatant ass, with a
rasping throat and a countenance expressive of low malignity ,
who went through - I will not say sustained — the rôle (if I may
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 233

use a French expression ) of Claudius King of Denmark . That

is his employer, gentlemen. Such is the profession ! ”
Without distinctly knowing whether I should have been more
sorry, for Mr. Wopsle if he had been in despair, I was so sorry
for him as it was, that I took the opportunity of his turning
round to have his braces put on—which jostled us out at the
doorway - to ask Herbert what he thought of having him home
to supper ? Herbert said he thought it would be kind to do
80 ; therefore I invited him, and he went to Barnard's with us ,
wrapped up to the eyes, and we did our best for him, and he sat
until two o'clock in the morning, reviewing his success and
developing his plans. I forget in detail what they were, but I
have a general recollection that he was to begin with reviving
the Drama, and to end with crushing it ; inasmuch as his
decease would leave it utterly bereft and without a chance
or hope.
Miserably I went to bed after all, and miserably thought of
Estella, and miserably dreamed that my expectations were all
cancelled, and that I had to give my hand in marriage to
Herbert's Clara, or play Hamlet to Miss Havisham's Ghost,
before twenty thousand people, without knowing twenty words
of it.

CHAPTER XXXII.

ONE day when I was busy with my books and Mr. Pocket,
I received a note by the post, the mere outside of which threw
me into a great flutter ; for, though I had never seen the hand
writing in which it was addressed, I divined whose hand it was .
It had no set beginning, as Dear Mr. Pip, or Dear Pip, or Dear
Sir, or Dear Anything, but ran thus :
“ I am to come to London the day after tomorrow by the mid -day coach.
I believe it was settled you should meet me ? At all events Miss Havisham
has that impression, and I write in obedience to it. She sends you her
regard .
Yours, ESTELLA.”
If there had been time, I should probably have ordered
several suits of clothes for this occasion ; but as there was not,
I was fain to be content with those I had. My appetite va
nished instantly, and I knew no peace or rest until the day
arrived. Not that its arrival brought me either ; for, then I
was worse than ever, and began haunting the coach -office in
234 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Wood - street, Cheapside, before the coach had left the Blue
Boar in our town. For all that I knew this perfectly well,
I still felt as if it were not safe to let the coach -office be out of
my sight longer than five minutes at a time ; and in this
condition of unreason I had performed the first half -hour of a
watch of four or five hours, when Wemmick ran against me.
" Halloa, Mr. Pip , " said he ; "how do you do ? I should
hardly have thought this was your beat.”
I explained that I was waiting to meet somebody who was
coming up by coach , and I inquired after the Castle and the
Aged .
“Both flourishing, thankye,” said Wemmick, " and particularly
the Aged. He's in wonderful feather. He'll be eighty-two
next birthday. I have a notion of firing eighty -two times, if
the neighbourhood shouldn't complain, and that cannon of mine
should prove equal to the pressure. However, this is not
London talk . Where do you think I am going to ?”
“ To the office ? ” said I, for he was tending in that direction .
““ Next thing to it," returned Wemmick, “ I am going to New
gate. We are in a banker’s- parcel case just at present, and
I have been down the road taking a squint at the scene of
action, and thereupon must have a word or two with our client."
66· Did
your client commit the robbery ?" I asked .
“ Bless your soul and body, no, ” answered Wemmick, very
dryly. “But he is accused of it. So might you or I be.
Either of us might be accused of it, you know.”
“Only neither of us is,” I remarked .
“Yah ! ” said Wemmick, touching me on the breast with his
forefinger ; " you're a deep one, Mr. Pip ! Would you like to
have a look at Newgate ? Have you time to spare ?”
I had so much time to spare, that the proposal came as a
relief, notwithstanding its irreconcilability with my latent desire
to keep my eye on the coach -office. Muttering that I would
make the inquiry whether I had time to walk with him , I went
into the office, and ascertained from the clerk with the nicest
precision and much to the trying of his temper, the earliest
moment at which the coach could be expected — which I knew
beforehand, quite as well as he. I then rejoined Mr. Wem
mick , and affecting to consult my watch and to be surprised by
the information I had received, accepted his offer .
We were at Newgate in a few minutes, and we passed
through the lodge where some fetters were hanging up on the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 235
bare walls among the prison rules, into the interior of the jail.
At that time, jails were much neglected, and the period of
exaggerated reaction consequent on all public wrong-doing
and which is always its heaviest and longest punishment - was
still far off. So, felons were not lodged and fed better than
soldiers ( to say nothing of paupers), and seldom set fire to
their prisons with the excusable object of improving the flavour
of their soup. It was visiting time when Wemmick took me
in ; and a potman was going his rounds with beer ; and the
prisoners, behind bars in yards, were buying beer, and talking
to friends ; and a frouzy, ugly, disorderly, depressing scene
it was .
It struck me that Wemmick walked among the prisoners,
much as a gardener might walk among his plants. This was
first put into my head by his seeing a shoot that had come up
in the night, and saying, " What, Captain Tom ? Are you
there ? Ah, indeed !” and also, “ Is that Black Bill behind the
cistern ? Why I didn't look for you these two months ; how
do you find yourself ?” Equally in his stopping at the bars and
attending to anxious whisperers — always singly - Wemmick with
his post-office in an immovable state, looked at them while in
conference, as if he were taking particular notice of the advance
they had made, since last observed , towards coming out in full
blow at their trial.
He was highly popular, and I found that he took the familiar
department of Mr. Jaggers's business : though something of the
state of Mr. Jaggers hung about him too, forbidding approach
beyond certain limits. His personal recognition of each suc
cessive client was comprised in a nod, and in his settling his hat
a little easier on his head with both hands, and then tightening
the post-office, and putting his hands in his pockets. In one or
two instances, there was a difficulty respecting the raising of
fees, and then Mr. Wemmick, backing as far as possible from
the insufficient money produced, said, “ It's no use, my boy.
2

I'm only a subordinate. I can't take it. Don't go on in that

way with a subordinate. If you are unable to make up your
quantum , my boy, you had better address yourself to a principal;
there are plenty of principals in the profession, you know , and
what is not worth the while of one, may be worth the while of
another ; that's my recommendation to you , speaking as a sub
ordinate. Don't try on useless measures . Why should you ?
Now, who's next ? ”
re
236 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Thus, we walked through Wemmick’s greenhouse, until he

turned to me and said, “ Notice the man I shall shake hands
with .” I should have done so, without the preparation, as he
had shaken hands with no one yet.
Almost as soon as he had spoken, a portly upright man
( whom I can see now, as I write ) in a well-worn olive- coloured
frock - coat, with a peculiar pallor overspreading the red in his
complexion , and eyes that went wandering about when he tried
to fix them , came up to a corner of the bars, and put his hand
to his hat — which had a greasy and fatty surface like cold broth
—with a half -serious and half -jocose military salute.
“ Colonel, to you !" said Wemmick ; “how are you , Colonel ? ”
“ All right, Mr. Wemmick . "
Everything was done that could be done, but the evidence
was too strong for us, Colonel.”
· Yes, it was too strong, sir — but I don't care.”
" No, no," said Wemmick , coolly, "you don't care .' Then ,
turning to me, “ Served His Majesty this man . Was a soldier
in the line and bought his discharge .”
I said , “ Indeed ?" and the man's eyes looked at me, and then
looked over my head, and then looked all round me, and then he
drew his hand across his lips and laughed .
“ I think I shall be out of this on Monday, sir,” he said to
Wemmick .
Perhaps,” returned my friend, “but there's no knowing."
“ I am glad to have the chance of bidding you good-by, Mr.
Wemmick ," said the man , stretching out his hand between two
bars.
“ Thankyo," said Wemmick, shaking hands with him . “ Same
to you, Colonel.”
“If what I had upon me when taken, had been real, Mr. Wem
mick ," said the man unwilling to let his hand go, 66 I should
have asked the favour of your wearing another ring - in acknow
ledgment of your attentions."
“I'll accept the will for the deed , ” said Wemmick . “ By -the
by ; you were quite a pigeon -fancier.” The man looked up at
the sky. “ I am told you had a remarkable breed of tumblers.
Could you commission any friend of yours to bring me a pair,
if you've no further use for 'em ?”
“ It shall be done, sir.”
“ All right,” said Wemmick, they shall be taken care of.
Good afternoon, Colonel. Good -by !" They shook hands again,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 237
and as wewalked awayWemmick said to me, “ A Coiner, a very
good workman. The Recorder's report is made to -day, and he
is sure to be executed on Monday. Still you see, as far as it
goes, a pair of pigeons are portable property, all the same.
With that, he looked back, and nodded at this dead plant, and
then cast his eyes about him in walking out of the yard, as if
he were considering what other pot would go best in its
place.
As we came out of the prison through the lodge, I found
that the great importance of my guardian was appreciated by
the turnkeys, no less than by those whom they held in charge.
“ Well, Mr. Wemmick , " said the turnkey who kept us between
the two studded and spiked lodge gates, and who carefully
locked one before he unlocked the other , “ what's Mr. Jaggers
going to do with that waterside murder ? Is he going to make
it manslaughter, or what's he going to make of it ? "
66
Why don't you ask him ?" returned Wemmick.
" Oh, yes, I dare say !” said the turnkey.
“ Now, that's the way with them here, Mr. Pip , ” remarked
Wemmick, turning to me with his post- office elongated. “ They
don't mind what they ask of me, the subordinate ; but you'll
never catch ' em asking any questions of my principal.”
“ Is this young gentleman one of the 'prentices or articled,
ones of your office ? ” asked the turnkey, with a grin at Mr.
Wemmick's humour.
“ There he goes again, you see ! ” cried Wemmick , “ I told you
80 ! Asks another question of the subordinate before his first
is dry ! Well, supposing Mr. Pip is one of them ? "
“ Why then ," said the turnkey, grinning again, “ he knows
what Mr. Jaggers is.”
“ Yah !" cried Wemmick, suddenly hitting out at the turnkey
in a facetious way, " you're as dumb as one of your own keys
when you have to do with my principal, you know you are.
Let us out, you old fox, or I'll get him to bring an action
2 against you for false imprisonment. "
The turnkey laughed, and gave us good day, and stood laugh
: ing at us over the spikes of the wicket when we descended the
steps into the street.
" Mind you, Mr. Pip," said Wemmick, gravely in my ear, as
he took my arm to be more confidential ; " I don't know that
Mr. Jaggers does a better thing than the way in which he keeps
himself so high. He's always so high. His constant height
238 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

is of a piece with his immense abilities. That Colonel durst no

more take leave of him , than that turnkey durst ask him bis
intentions respecting a case . Then , between his height and
them , he slips in his subordinate — don't you see ?-and so he
has 'em, soul and body. "
I was very much impressed, and not for the first time, by my
guardian's subtlety. To confess the truth , I very heartily
wished, and not for the first time, that I had had some other
guardian of minor abilities.
Mr. Wemmick and I parted at the office in Little Britain
where suppliants for Mr. Jaggers's notice were lingering about
as usual, and I returned to my watch in the street of the coach
office, with some three hours on hand. I consumed the whole
time in thinking how strange it was that I should be encom
passed by all this taint of prison and crime ; that, in my child
hood out on our lonely marshes on a winter evening, I should
have first encountered it ; that, it should have reappeared on
two occasions, starting out like a stain that was faded but not
gone ; that, it should in this new way pervade my fortune and
advancement. While my mind was thus engaged, I thought
of the beautiful young Estella, proud and refined , coming
towards me, and I thought with absolute abhorrence of the con
trast between the jail and her. I wished that Wemmick had not
met me, or that I had not yielded to him and gone with him , so
that, of all days in the year on this day, I might not have had
Newgate in my breath and on my clothes. I beat the prison
dust off my feet as I sauntered to and fro, and I shook it out of
my dress, and I exhaled its air from my lungs. So contaminated
did I feel, remembering who was coming, that the coach came
quickly after all, and I was not yet free from the soiling con
sciousness of Mr. Wemmick’s conservatory, when I saw her
face at the coach window and her hand waving to me.
What was the nameless shadow which again in that one
instant had passed ?

CHAPTER XXXIII.
In her furred travelling -dress, Estella seemed more delicately
beautiful than she had ever seemed yet, even in my eyes. Her
manner was more winning than she had cared to let it be to me
before, and I thought I saw Miss Havisham's influence in the
change.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 239

We stood in the Inn Yard while she pointed out her luggage
to me, and when it was all collected I remembered — having for
gotten everything but herself in the mean while — that I knew
nothing of her destination .
“ I am going to Richmond,” she told me. “Our lesson is, that
there are two Richmonds, one in Surrey and one in Yorkshire,
and that mine is the Surrey Richmond. The distance is ten
miles. I am to have a carriage, and you are to take me. This
is my purse, and you are to pay my charges out of it. Oh, you
must take the purse ! We have no choice, you and I, but to
obey our instructions. We are not free to follow our own
devices, you and I.”
As she looked at me in giving me the purse, I hoped there
was an inner meaning in her words. She said them slightingly,
but not with displeasure.
“ A carriage will have to be sent for, Estella. Will you rest
here a little ? "
“ Yes, I am to rest here a little, and I am to drink some tea,
and you are to take care of me the while .”
She drew her arm through mine, as if it must be done, and I
requested a waiter who had been staring at the coach like a man
who had never seen such a thing in his life, to show us a pri
vate sitting -room . Upon that, he pulled out a napkin, as if it
were a magic clue without which he couldn't find the way up
stairs, and led us to the black hole of the establishment : fitted
up with a diminishing mirror ( quite a superfluous article con
sidering the hole’s proportions ), an anchovy sauce -cruet, and
somebody's pattens. On my objecting to this retreat, he took
us into another room with a dinner- table for thirty, and in the
grate a scorched leaf of a copy -book under a bushel of coal -dust.
Having looked at this extinct conflagration and shaken his head,
he took my order : which , proving to be merely “ Some tea for
the lady,” sent him out of the room in a very low state of
mind .
I was, and I am , sensible that the air of this chamber, in its
strong combination of stable with soup - stock, might have led
one to infer that the coaching department was not doing well,
and that the enterprising proprietor was boiling down the
horses for the refreshment department. Yet the room was all
in all to me, Estella being in it. I thought that with her I
could have been happy there for life . (I was not at all happy
there at the time, observe, and I knew it well.)
240 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Where are you going to, at Richmond ? " I asked Estella .

“ I am going to live ,” said she, “at a great expense, with a
lady there, who has the power — or says she has — of taking me
about, and introducing me, and showing people to me and
showing me to people.”
“ I suppose you will be glad of variety and admiration ?”
“ Yes, I suppose so .”
She answered so carelessly, that I said, “ You speak of your
self as if you were some one else.”
“ Where did you learn how I speak of others ? Come, come, ”
said Estella, smiling delightfully, “ you must not expect me to
go to school to you ; I must talk in my own way . How do you
thrive with Mr. Pocket ?”
“ I live quite pleasantly there ; at least- " It appeared to
me that I was losing a chance .
“ At least ?" repeated Estella .
“ As pleasantly as I could anywhere, away from you ."
“ You silly boy," said Estella, quite composedly, “ how can you
talk such nonsense ? Your friend Mr. Matthew , I believe, is
superior to the rest of his family ?"
- Very superior indeed . He is nobody's enemy.
16 — Don't add but his own,” interposed Estella, “ for I hate
that class of man. But he really is disinterested, and above
small jealousy and spite, I have heard ? ”
“ I am sure I have every reason to say so. "
“ You have not every reason to say so of the rest of his peo
ple,” said Estella, nodding at me with an expression of face that
was at once grave and rallying, " for they beset Miss Havisham
with reports and insinuations to your disadvantage. They
watch you, misrepresent you , write letters about you ( anonymous
sometimes ), and you are the torment and occupation of their
lives. You can scarcely realise to yourself the hatred those
people
66 feel for you .”
They do me no harm , I hope ?"
Instead of answering, Estella burst out laughing. This was
very singular to me, and I looked at her in considerable per
plexity . When she left off - and she had not laughed lan
guidly, but with real enjoyment - I said, in my diffident way
with her :
“ I hope I may suppose that you would not be amused if they
did me any harm ? "
“ No, no, you may be sure of that,” said Estella. “ You may
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 241

be certain that I laugh because they fail. Oh, those people

with Miss Havisham , and the tortures they undergo ! ” She
laughed again, and even now, when she had told me why, her
laughter was very singular to me, for I could not doubt its being
genuine, and yet it seemed too much for the occasion. I
thought there must really be something more here than I knew ;
she saw the thought in my mind, and answered it .
" It is not easy for even you ,” said Estella, “ to know what
satisfaction it gives me to see those people thwarted, or what an
enjoyable sense of the ridiculous have when they are made
ridiculous. For you were not brought up in that strange house
from a mere baby . - I was . You had not your little wits sharp
ened by their intriguing against you, suppressed and defence
less, under the mask of sympathy and pity and what not, that
is soft and soothing. I had . You did not gradually open
your round childish eyes wider and wider to the discovery of
that impostor of a woman who calculates her stores of peace of
mind for when she wakes up in the night. — I did .”
It was no laughing matter with Estella now , nor was she
summoning these remembrances from any shallow place. I
would not have been the cause of that look of hers, for all my
expectations in a heap.
" Two things I can tell you ,” said Estella. First, notwith
standing the proverb, that constant dropping will wear away a
stone, you may set your mind at rest that these people never
willnever would, in a hundred years - impair your ground with
Miss Havisham , in any particular, great or small. Second, I
am beholden to you as the cause of their being so busy and
80 mean in vain , and there is my hand upon it .”
As she gave it me playfully — for her darker mood had been
but momentary — I held it and put it to my lips. “ You ridicu
lous boy,” said Estella, “will you never take warning ? Or do
you kiss myhand in the same spirit in which I once let you kiss
my cheek ? "
“What spirit was that ? ” said I.
“ I must think a moment . A spirit of contempt for the
fawners and plotters .”
If I say yes, may I kiss the cheek again ?”
“ You should have asked before you touched the hand. But,
yes, if you like .”
I leaned down , and her calm face was like a statue's. “ Now ,"
said Estella, gliding away the instant I touched her cheek , “ you
R
242 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

are to take care that I have some tea, and you are to take me to
Richmond . ”
Her reverting to this tone as if our association were forced
upon us and we were mere puppets, gave me pain ; but every
thing in our intercourse did give me pain. Whatever her tone
with me happened to be, I could put no trust in it, and build no
hope on it ; and yet I went on against trust and against hope.
Why repeat it a thousand times ? So it always was.
I rang for the tea, and the waiter, reappearing with his magic
clue, brought in by degrees some fifty adjuncts to that refresh
ment, but of tea not a glimpse. A teaboard , cups and saucers,
plates, knives and forks ( including carvers), spoons (various), salt
cellars, a meek little muffin confined with the utmost precaution
under a strong iron cover, Moses in the bullrushes typified by a
soft bit of butter in a quantity of parsley, a pale loaf with a
powdered head, two proof impressions of the bars of the kitchen
fire- place on triangular bits of bread, and ultimately a fat
family urn : which the waiter staggered in with, expressing in
his countenance burden and suffering. After a prolonged
absence at this stage of the entertainment, he at length came
back with a casket of precious appearance containing twigs.
These I steeped in hot water, and so from the whole of these
appliances extracted one cup of I don't know what, for Estella.
The bill paid, and the waiter remembered, and the ostler
not forgotten , and the chambermaid taken into consideration
in a word, the whole house bribed into a state of contempt and
animosity, and Estella's purse much lightened — we got into
our post-coach and drove away . Turning into Cheapside and
rattling up Newgate -street, we were soon under the walls of
which I was so ashamed .
“ What place is that ?” Estella asked me.
I made a foolish pretence of not at first recognising it, and then
told her. As she looked at it, and drew in her head again , mur
muring “ Wretches ! " I would not have confessed to my visit for
any consideration.
“ Mr. Jaggers,” said I , by way of putting it neatly on some
body else, “ has the reputation of being more in the secrets of
that dismal place than any man in London . ”
“ He is more in the secrets of every place, I think,” said
Estella, in a low voice.
“ You have been accustomed to see him often, I suppose ?"
“ I have been accustomed to see him at uncertain intervals,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 243

ever since I can remember. But I know him no better now ,

than I did before I could speak plainly. What is your own
experience of him ? Do you advance with him ? ”
“ Once habituated to his distrustful manner , ” said I, “ I have
done very well.”
“ Are you intimate ?”
“ I have dined with him at his private house."
“ I fancy, ” said Estella, shrinking, “ that must be a curious
place."
“ It is a curious place .”
I should have been chary of discussing my guardian too
freely even with her ; but I should have gone on with the sub
ject so far as to describe the dinner in Gerrard -street, if we had
not then come into a sudden glare of gas. It seemed, while it
lasted, to be all alight and alive with that inexplicable feeling I
had had before ; and when we were out of it, I was as much
dazed for a few moments as if I had been in Lightning.
So, we fell into other talk, and it was principally about the
way by which we were travelling, and about what parts of
London lay on this side of it, and what on that. The great
city was almost new to her, she told me, for she had never left
Miss Havisham's neighbourhood until she had gone to France,
and she had merely passed through London then in going and
returning. I asked her if my guardian had any charge of her
while she remained here ? To that she emphatically said , “ God
forbid ! ” and no more .
It was impossible for me to avoid seeing that she cared to
attract me ; that she made herself winning ; and would have
won me even if the task had needed pains. Yet this made me
none the happier, for, even if she had not taken that tone of our
being disposed of by others, I should have felt that she held my
heart in her hand because she wilfully chose to do it, and not
because it would have wrung any tenderness in her, to crush it
throw it away.
When we passed through Hammersmith, I showed her where
Mr. Matthew Pocket lived, and said it was no great way
from Richmond, and that I hoped I should see her sometimes.
“ Oh yes, you are to see me ; you are to comewhen you think
proper ; you are to be mentioned to the family ; indeed you are
already mentioned . ”
I inquired was it a large household she was going to be a
member of ?
244 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
“ No ; there are only two ; mother and daughter. The
mother is a lady of some station, though not averse to increasing
her income.”
" I wonder Miss Havisham could part with you again so
soon .'
“ It is a part of Miss Havisham's plans for me, Pip ,” said
Estella, with a sigh, as if she were tired ; “ I am to write to her
constantly and see her regularly, and report how I go on — I and
the jewels — for they are nearly all mine now . ”
It was the first time she had ever called me by my name. Of
course she did so, purposely, and knew that I should treasure it
up.
We came to Richmond all too soon, and our destination there,
was a house by the Green : a staid old house, where hoops and
powder and patches, embroidered coats rolled stockings ruffles
and . swords, had had their court days many a time. Some
ancient trees before the house were still cut into fashions as
formal and unnatural as the hoops and wigs and stiff skirts ; but
their own allotted places in the great procession of the dead
were not far off, and they would soon drop into them and goʻthe
silent way of the rest.
A bell with an old voice - which I dare say in its time had
often said to the house, Here is the green farthingale, Here is the
diamond -hilted sword , Here are the shoes with red heels and the
blue solitaire,-sounded gravely in the moonlight, and two cherry
coloured maids came fluttering out to receive Estella . The door
way soon absorbed her boxes, and she gave me her hand and a
smile, and said good night, and was absorbed likewise. And still
I stood looking at the house, thinking how happy I should be if
I lived there with her, and knowing that I never was happy
with her, but always miserable.
I got into the carriage to be taken back to Hammersmith, and
I got in with a bad heart - ache, and I got out with a worse heart
ache . At our own door, I found little Jane Pocket coming
home from a little party escorted by her little lover ; and I
envied her little lover, in spite of his being subject to Flopson.
Mr. Pocket was out lecturing ; for, he was a most delightful
lecturer on domestic economy, and his treatises on the manage
ment of children and servants were considered the very best
text-books on those themes. But Mrs. Pocket was at home, and
was in a little difficulty, on account of the baby's having been
accommodated with a needle-case to keep him quiet during the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 245
unaccountable absence (with a relative in the Foot Guards) of
Millers. And more needles were missing, than it could be
regarded as quite wholesome for a patient of such tender years
either to apply externally or to take as a tonic,
. Mr. Pocket being justly celebrated for giving most excellent
practical advice, and for having a clear and sound perception of
things and a highly judicious mind , I had some notion in my
heart -ache of begging him to accept my confidence . But
happening to look up at Mrs. Pocket as she sat reading her
book of dignities after prescribing Bed as a sovereign remedy
for baby, I thought - Well — No, Iwouldn't.

CHAPTER XXXIV .

As I had grown accustomed to my expectations, I had insen

sibly begun to notice their effect upon myself and those around
me . Their influence on my own character, I disguised from my
recognition as much as possible, but I knew very well that it
was not all good. I lived in a state of chronic uneasiness
respecting my behaviour to Joe. My conscience was not by any
means comfortable about Biddy. When I woke up in the
night - like Camilla — I used to think, with a weariness on my
spirits, that I should have been happier and better if I had
never seen Miss Havisham's face, and had risen to manhood
content to be partners with Joe in the honest old forge. Many
a time of an evening, when I sat alone looking at the fire, I
thought, after all there was no fire like the forge fire and the
kitchen fire at home.
Yet Estella was so inseparable from all my restlessness and
disquiet of mind, that I really fell into confusion as to the
limits of my own part in its production . That is to say,
supposing I had had no expectations, and yet had had Estella to
think of,I could not make out to my satisfaction that I should
have done much better. Now , concerning the influence of my
position on others, I was in no such difficulty, and so I perceived
though dimly enough perhaps — that it was not beneficial to any
body, and, above all, that it was not beneficial to Herbert. My
lavish habits led his easy nature into expenses that he could not
afford, corrupted the simplicity of his life, and disturbed bispeace
with anxieties and regrets. I was not at all remorseful for
246 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

having unwittingly set those other branches of the Pocket family

to the poor arts they practised : because such littlenesses were
their natural bent, and would have been evoked by anybody
else, if I had left them slumbering. But Herbert's was a very
different case, and it often caused me a twinge to think that I
had done him evil service in crowding his sparely -furnished
chambers with incongruous upholstery work , and placing the
canary - breasted Avenger at his disposal.
So now , as an infallible way of making little ease great ease,
I began to contract a quantity of debt. I could hardly begin
but Herbert must begin too, so he soon followed . At Startop's
suggestion , we put ourselves down for election into a club called
The Finches of the Grove : the object of which institution I
have never divined , if it were not that the members should dine
expensively once a fortnight, to quarrel among themselves as
much as possible after dinner, and to cause six waiters to get
drunk on the stairs. I know that these gratifying social ends
were so invariably accomplished , that Herbert and I understood
nothing else to be referred to in the first standing toast of the
society : which ran " Gentlemen , may the present promotion of
good feeling ever reign predominant among the Finches of the
>>
Grove."
The Finches spent their money foolishly (the Hotel we dined
at was in Covent Garden ), and the first Finch I saw when I had
the honour of joining the Grove, was Bentley Drummle : at that
time floundering about town in a cab of his own, and doing a
great deal of damage to the posts at the street corners. Occa
sionally, he shot himself out of his equipage head - foremost over
the apron ; and I saw him on one occasion deliver himself
at the door of the Grove in this unintentional way — like coals.
But here I anticipate a little, for I was not a Finch, and could
not be, according to the sacred laws of the society, until I came
of age.
In my confidence in my own resources, I would willingly
have taken Herbert's expenses on myself ; but Herbert was
proud, and I could make no such proposal to him . So, he got
into difficulties in every direction , and continued to look about
him . When we gradually fell into keeping late hours and
late company, I noticed that he looked about him with a
desponding eye at breakfast -time; that he began to look about
him more hopefully about mid - day ; that he drooped when he
came in to dinner ; that he seemed to descry Capital in the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 247

distance, rather clearly, after dinner ; that he all but realised

Capital towards midnight; and that about two o'clock in the
morning, he became so deeply despondent again as to talk of
buying a rifle and going to America, with a general purpose of
) compelling buffaloes to make his fortune.
I was usually at Hammersmith about half the week, and
when I was at Hammersmith I haunted Richmond : whereof
separately by -and -by. Herbert would often come to Hammer
smith when I was there, and I think at those seasons his father
would occasionally have some passing perception that the open
ing he was looking for, had not appeared yet. But in the
general tumbling up of the family, his tumbling out in life
somewhere, was a thing to transact itself somehow . In the
mean time Mr. Pocket grew greyer, and tried oftener to lift
himself out of his perplexities by the hair. While Mrs. Pocket
tripped up the family with her footstool, read her book of
dignities, lost her pocket-handkerchief, told us about her grand
papa , and taught the young idea how to shoot, by shooting it
into bed whenever it attracted her notice.
As I am now generalising a period of my life with the object
of clearing my way before me, I can scarcely do so better than by
at once completing the description of our usual manners and
customs at Barnard's Inn .
We spent as much money as we could , and got as little for it
as people could make up their minds to give us. We were always
more or less miserable, and most of our acquaintance were in
the same condition . There was a gay fiction among us that we
were constantly enjoying ourselves, and a skeleton truth that we
never did . To the best of my belief, our case was in the last
aspect a rather common one.
Every morning, with an air ever new, Herbert went into the
City to look about him. I often paid him a visit in the dark
back -room in which he consorted with an ink -jar, a hat-peg, a
+
coal-box, a string -box, an almanack , a desk and stool, and a
ruler ; and I do not remember that I ever saw him do anything
else but look about him . If we all did what we undertake to do,
as faithfully as Herbert did , we might live in a Republic of the
Virtues. He had nothing else to do, poor fellow , except at a
certain hour of every afternoon to “ go to Lloyd's ” -in obser
vance of a ceremony of seeing his principal, I think . He never
did anything else in connexion with Lloyd's that I could find
out, except come back again . When he felt his case unusually
 248 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

serious, and that he positively must find an opening, he would

go on 'Change at a busy time, and walk in and out, in a kind of
gloomy country dance figure, among the assembled magnates.
For," says Herbert to me, coming home to dinner on one of
those special occasions, “ I find the truth to be, Handel, that an
opening won't come to one, but one must go to it--so I have
been .”
If we had been less attached to one another, I think we must
have hated one another regularly every morning. I detested
the chambers beyond expression at that period of repentance, and
could not endure the sight of the Avenger's livery : which had
a more expensive and a less remunerative appearance then, than
at any other time in the four-and -twenty hours. As we got more
and more into debt, breakfast became a hollower and hollower
form , and, being on one occasion at breakfast - time threatened
( by letter ) with legal proceedings, “ not unwholly unconnected , "
as my local paper might put it , “ with jewellery, ” I went so far
as to seize the Avenger by his blue collar and shal him off his
feet - so that he was actually in the air, like a booted Cupid — for
presuming to suppose that we wanted a roll.
At certain times — meaning at uncertain times, for they de
pended on our humour - I would say to Herbert, as if it were a
remarkable discovery :
“ My dear Herbert, we are getting on badly. "
My dear Handel,” Herbert would say to me, in all sincerity,
< if you will believe me, those very words were on my lips, by a
strange coincidence . ”
Then, Herbert , ” I would respond, “ let us look into our
affairs."
We always derived profound satisfaction from making an
appointment for this purpose. I always thought this was busi
ness, this was the way to confront the thing, this was the way
to take the foe by the throat. And I know Herbert thought so
• too.
We ordered something rather special for dinner, with a bottle
of something similarly out of the common way , in order that
our minds might be fortified for the occasion , and we might
come well up to the mark . Dinner over, we produced a bundle
of pens, a copious supply of ink , and a goodly show of writing
and blotting paper . For, there was something very comfortable
in having plenty of stationery.
I would then take a sheet of paper, and write across the top
1
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 249

of it, in a neat hand, the heading, “ Memorandum of Pip's

debts ; ” with Barnard's Inn and the date very carefully
added . Herbert would also take a sheet of paper, and write
across it with similar formalities, “ Memorandum of Herbert's
debts.”
Each of us would then refer to a confused heap of papers at
his side, which had been thrown into drawers, worn into holes
in pockets, half -burnt in lighting candles, stuck for weeks into
the looking -glass, and otherwise damaged . The sound of our
pens going, refreshed us exceedingly , insomuch that I some
times found it difficult to distinguish between this edifying
business proceeding and actually paying the money. In point
of meritorious character, the two things seemed about equal.
When we had written a little while, I would ask Herbert how
he got on ? Herbert probably would have been scratching his
head in a most rueful manner at the sight of his accumulating
figures.
“They are mounting up , Handel,” Herbert would say ; " upon
my life, they are mounting up."
“ Be firm , Herbert, ” I would retort, plying my own pen with
great assiduity. “ Look the thing in the face. Look into you
affairs. Stare them out of countenance."
“ So I would, Handel, only they are staring me out of coun
tenance .”
However, my determined manner would have its effect, and
Herbert would fall to work again . After a time he would give
up once more, on the plea that he had not got Cobbs's bill, or
Lobbs's, or Nobbs's, as the case might be.
" Then, Herbert, estimate ; estimate it in round numbers, and
put it down .”
“ What a fellow of resource you are ! ” my friend would reply,
with admiration , Really your business powers are very re
markable.”
I thought so too. I established with myself, on these occa
sions, the reputation of a first -rate man of business - prompt,
decisive, energetic , clear, cool-headed . When I had got all my
responsibilities down upon my list, I compared each with the
bill, and ticked it off. My self -approval when I ticked an entry
was quite a luxurious sensation . When I had no more ticks to
make, I folded all my bills up uniformly, docketed each on
the back, and tied the whole into a symmetrical bundle. Then
I did the same for Herbert (who modestly said he had not my ,
250 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

administrative genius ), and felt that I had brought his affairs

into a focus for him .
My business habits had one other bright feature, which I
called “ leaving a Margin .” For example ; supposing Herbert's
debts to be one hundred and sixty- four pounds four-and -two
pence, I would say, Leave a margin, and put them down at
two hundred .” Or, supposing my own to be four times as much ,
I would leave a margin, and put them down at seven hundred .
I had the highest opinion of the wisdom of this same Margin ,
but I am bound to acknowledge that on looking back , I deem it
to have been an expensive device. For, we always ran into new
debt immediately, to the full extent of the margin , and some
times, in the sense of freedom and solvency it imparted, got .
pretty far on into another margin.
But there was a calm , a rest, a virtuous hush , consequent on
these examinations of our affairs that gave me, for the time, an
admirable opinion of myself. Soothed by my exertions, my
method , and Herbert's compliments, I would sit with his sym
metrical bundle and my own on the table before me among the
stationery, and feel like a Bank of some sort, rather than a
private individual.
We shut our outer door on these solemn occasions in order
that we might not be interrupted. I had fallen into my serene
state one evening, when we heard a letter dropped through the
slit in the said door, and fall on the ground. 56 It's for you,
Handel,” said Herbert, going out and coming back with it, “and
I hope there is nothing the matter. " This was in allusion to its
heavy black seal and border.
The letter was signed TRABB & Co., and its contents were
simply, that I was an honoured sir, and that they begged to
inform me that Mrs. J. Gargery had departed this life on Mon
day last at twenty minutes past six in the evening, and that my
attendance was requested at the interment on Monday next at
three o'clock in the afternoon .

CHAPTER XXXV .

It was the first time that a grave had opened in my road of life,
and the gap it made in the smooth ground was wonderful. The
figure of my sister in her chair by the kitchen fire, haunted me
night and day. That the place could possibly be, without her,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 251

was something my mind seemed unable to compass ; and

whereas she had seldom or never been in my thoughts of late,
I had now the strangest ideas that she was coming towards me
in the street, or that she would presently knock at the door.
In my rooms too, with which she had never been at all asso
ciated, there was at once the blankness of death and a perpetual
suggestion of the sound of her voice or the turn of her face or
figure, as if she were still alive and had been often there.
Whatever my fortunes might have been , I could scarcely
have recalled my sister with much tenderness. But I suppose
there is a shock of regret which may exist without much tender
ness. Under its influence ( and perhaps to make up for the
want of the softer feeling ) I was seized with a violent indigna
tion against the assailant from whom she had suffered so much ;
and I felt that on sufficient proof I could have revengefully
pursued Orlick, or any one else, to the last extremity.
Having written to Joe, to offer him consolation, and to assure
him that I would come to the funeral, I passed the intermediate
days in the curious state of mind I have glanced at. I went
down early in the morning, and alighted at the Blue Boar in
good time to walk over to the forge.
It was fine summer weather again, and, as I walked along,
the times when I was a little helpless creature, and my sister
did not spare me, vividly returned . But they returned with a
gentle tone upon them that softened even the edge of Tickler.
For now , the very breath of the beans and clover whispered to
my heart that the day must come when it would be well for my
memory that others walking in the sunshine should be softened
as they thought of me.
At last I came within sight of the house, and saw that Trabb
and Co. had put in a funereal execution and taken possession.
Two dismally absurd persons, each ostentatiously exhibiting &
crutch done up in a black bandage — as if that instrument could
possibly communicate any comfort to anybody - were posted at
the front door ; and in one of them I recognised a postboy dis
charged from the Boar for turning a young couple into a sawpit
on their bridal morning, in consequence of intoxication render
ing it necessary for him to ride his horse clasped round the
neck with both arms. All the children of the village, and most
of the women, were admiring these sable warders andthe closed
windows of the house and forge ; and as I came up, one of the
two warders (the postboy) knocked at the door - implying that
252 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

I was far too much exhausted by grief, to have strength remain

ing to knock for myself.
Another sable warder (a carpenter, who had once eaten two
geese for a wager) opened the door, and showed me into the
best parlour. Here, Mr. Trabb had taken unto himself the best
table, and had got all the leaves up , and was holding a kind of
black Bazaar, with the aid of a quantity of black pins. At the
moment of my arrival, he had just finished putting somebody's
hat into black long -clothes, like an African baby ; so he held
out his hand for mine. But I, misled by the action, and con
fused by the occasion, shook hands with him with every testi
mony of warm affection .
Poor dear Joe, entangled in a little black cloak tied in a large
bow under his chin, was seated apart at the upper end of the
room ; where, as chiefmourner, he had evidently been stationed
by Trabb. When I bent down and said to him , “Dear Joe,
how are you ?" he said , “ Pip, old chap, you knowed her when
she were a fine figure of a -” and clasped my hand and said
no more .
Biddy, looking very neat and modest in her black dress, went
quietly here and there, and was very helpful. When I had
spoken to Biddy, as I thought it not a time for talking I went
and sat down near Joe, and there began to wonder in what part
of the house it - she — my sister - was. The air of the parlour
being faint with the smell of sweet cake, I looked about for the
table of refreshments ; it was scarcely visible until one had got
accustomed to the gloom , but there was a cut- up plum -cake
upon it, and there were cut- up oranges, and sandwiches, and
biscuits, and two decanters that I knew very well as ornaments,
but had never seen used in all my life ; one full of port, and
one of sherry. Standing at this table, I became conscious of
the servile Pumblechook in a black cloak and several yards of
hat- band, who was alternately stuffing himself, and making ob
sequious movements to catch my attention. The moment he
succeeded, he came over to me ( breathing sherry and crumbs ),
and said in a subdued voice, “ May I, dear sir ? ” and did , I
then descried Mr. and Mrs. Hubble ; the last-named in a decent
speechless paroxysm in a corner. We were all going to “ follow ,"
and were all in course of being tied up separately (by Trabb )
into ridiculous bundles .
“ Which I meantersay, Pip, ” Joe whispered me, as we were
being what Mr. Trabb called “ formed ” in the parlour, two and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 253

two - and it was dreadfully like a preparation for some grim

kind of dance ; " which I meantersay, sir, as I would in prefer
ence have carried her to the church myself, along with three or
four friendly ones wot come to it with willing larts and arms,
but it were considered wot the neighbours would look down
on such and would be of opinions as it were wanting in re
spect.”
* Pocket- handkerchiefs out, all !” cried Mr. Trabb at this
point, in a depressed business -like voice . “ Pocket- handker
chiefs out ! We are ready ! "
So, we all put our pocket -handkerchiefs to our faces, as if our
noses were bleeding, and filed out two and two ; Joe and I ;
Biddy and Pumblechook ; Mr. and Mrs. Hubble. The remains
of my poor sister had been brought round by the kitchen door,
and, it being a point of Undertaking ceremony that the six
bearers must be stifled and blinded under a horrible black velvet
housing with a white border, the whole looked like a blind
monster with twelve human legs, shuffling and blundering
along, under the guidance of two keepers -- the postboy and his
comrade.
The neighbourhood, however, highly approved of these ar
rangements, and we were much admired as we went through the
village ; the more youthful and vigorous part of the community
making dashes now and then to cut us off, and lying in wait to
intercept us at points of vantage. At such times the more
exuberant among them called out in an excited manner on our
emergence round some corner of expectancy, “ Here they come ! "
“ Here they are !” and we were all but cheered . In this progress
I was much annoyed by the abject Pumblechook, who, being
behind me, persisted all the way as a delicate attention in
arranging my streaming hatband, and smoothing my cloak.
My thoughts were further distracted by the excessive pride of
Mr. and Mrs. Hubble, who were surpassingly conceited and
vainglorious in being members of so distinguished a procession.
And now the range of marshes lay clear before us, with the
sails of the ships on the river growing out of it ; and we went
into the churchyard, close to the graves of my unknown parents,
Philip Pirrip, late of this parish, and Also Georgiana, Wife of
the Above. And there, my sister was laid quietly in the earth
while the larks sang high above it, and the light wind strewed it
with beautiful shadows of clouds and trees.
Of the conduct of the worldly -minded Pumblechook while

1
 LI

254 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

this was doing, I desire to say no more than it was all addressed
to me ; and that even when those noble passages were read
which remind humanity how it brought nothing into the world
and can take nothing out, and how it fleeth like a shadow and
never continueth long in one stay, I heard him cough a reserva
tion of the case of a young gentleman who came unexpectedly
into large property. When we got back , he had the hardihood
to tell me that he wished my sister could have known I had
done her so much honour, and to hint that she would have con
sidered it reasonably purchased at the price of her death. After
that, he drank all the rest of the sherry, and Mr. Hubble drank
the port, and the two talked (which I have since observed to be
customary in such cases) as if they were of quite another race
from the deceased , and were notoriously immortal. Finally, he
went away with Mr. and Mrs. Hubble - to make an evening of
it, I felt sure, and to tell the Jolly Bargemen that he was the
founder of my fortunes and my earliest benefactor.
When they were all gone, and when Trabb and his men - but
not his boy : I looked for him — had crammed their mummery
into bags, and were gone too, the house felt wholesomer . Soon
afterwards, Biddy, Joe, and I, had a cold dinner together ; but
we dined in the best parlour, not in the old kitchen, and Joe
was so exceedingly particular what he did with his knife and
fork and the salt - cellar and what not, that there was great
restraint upon us . But after dinner, when I made him take his
pipe, and when I had loitered with him about the forge, and
when we sat down together on the great block of stone outside
it, we got on better. I noticed that after the funeral Joe
changed his clothes so far as to make a compromise, between
his Sunday dress and working dress : in which the dear fellow
looked natural, and like the Man he was.
He was very much pleased by my asking if I might sleep in
my own little room , and I was pleased too ; for, I felt that I
had done rather a great thing in making the request. When
the shadows of evening were closing in , I took an opportunity
of getting into the garden with Biddy for a little talk .
66
Biddy ,” said I, “ I think you might have written to me
about these sad matters . "
Do you , Mr. Pip ? ” said Biddy. “ I should have written if
J. had thought that.
“ Don't suppose that I mean to be unkind, Biddy, when I say
I consider that you ought to have thought that.”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 255

“ Do you , Mr. Pip ?"

She was so quiet, and had such an orderly, good, and pretty
way with her, that I did not like the thought of making her cry
again . After looking a little at her downcast eyes as she walked
beside me, I gave up that point.
! " I suppose it will be difficult for you to remain here now ,
Biddy dear ? "
“ Oh ! I can't do so, Mr. Pip, ” said Biddy, in a tone of regret
but still of quiet conviction . “ I have been speaking to Mrs.
Hubble, and I am going to her to -morrow . I hope we shall
be able to take some care of Mr. Gargery, together, until he
settles down."
“ How are you going to live, Biddy ? If you want any
mo
“ How am I going to live ? " repeated Biddy, striking in, with
a momentary flush upon her face. “ I'll tell you, Mr. Pip. I
am going to try to get the place of mistress in the new school
nearly finished here. I can be well recommended by all the
neighbours, and I hope I can be industrious and patient, and
teach myself while I teach others. You know , Mr. Pip ,”
pursued Biddy, with a smile, as.she raised her eyes to my face,
“ the new schools are not like the old , but I learnt a good deal
from you after that time, and have had time since then to
improve ."
“ I think 22you would always improve, Biddy, under any cir
cumstances.”
“ Ah ! Except in my bad side of human nature, ” murmured
Biddy.
It was not so much a reproach, as an irresistible thinking
aloud. Well ! I thought I would give up that point too. So,
I walked a little further with Biddy, looking silently at her
downcast eyes.
“ I have not heard the particulars of my sister's death ,
Biddy.”
They are very slight, poor thing. She had been in one of
her bad states — though they had got better of late, rather than
worse — for four days, when she came out of it in the evening,
just at tea-time, and said quite plainly, " Joe.' As she had
never said any word for a long while, I ran and fetched in Mr.
Gargery from the forge. She made signs to me that she wanted
him to sit down close to her, and wanted me to put her arms
round his neck. So I put them round his neck, and she laid
256 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

her head down on his shoulder quite content and satisfied.

And so she presently said ' Joe ' again, and once " Pardon ,'
and once · Pip.' And so she never lifted her head up any
more, and it was just an hour later when we laid it down on her
own bed, because we found she was gone .”
Biddy cried ; the darkening garden, and the lane, and the
stars that were coming out, were blurred in my own sight.
“ Nothing was ever discovered, Biddy ?"
66
Nothing ."
66 Do you know what is become of Orlick?”
" I should think from the colour of his clothes that he is
working in the quarries."
“ Of course you have seen him then ? -Why are you looking
at that dark tree in the lane ? "
“ I saw him there, on the night she died .”
“ That was not the last time either, Biddy ?”
“ No ; I have seen him there, since we have been walking
here. It is of no use, ” said Biddy, laying her hand upon my
arm, as I was for running out, “ you know I would not deceive
you ; he was not there a minute, and he is gone.”
It revived my utmost indignation to find that she was still
pursued by this fellow , and I felt inveterate against him . I
told her so , and told her that I would spend any money or take
any pains to drive him out of that country. By degrees she led
me into more temperate talk, and she told me how Joe loved
me, and how Joe never complained of anything - she didn't say ,
of me ; she had no need ; I knew what she meant — but ever did
his duty in his way of life, with a strong hand, a quiet tongue,
and a gentle heart.
• Indeed, it would be hard to say too much for him ,” said I :
“ and Biddy, we must often speak of these things, for of course
I shall be often down here now. I am not going to leave poor
Joe alone .”
Biddy said never a single word.
“ Biddy, don't you hear me ?"
“ Yes, Mr. Pip .”
“ Not to mention your calling me Mr. Pip — which appears to
me to be in bad taste, Biddy_what do you mean ? "
“ What do I mean ?" asked Biddy, timidly.
“ Biddy," said I, in a virtuously self -asserting manner, “ I
must request to know what you mean by this ?"
“ By this ?” said Biddy.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS 257
“Now, don't echo," I retorted. “ You used not to echo,
Biddy ."
“ Used not ! " said Biddy. “ O Mr. Pip ! Used ! "
Well ! I rather thought I would give up that point too .
After another silent turn in the garden, I fell back on the main
position .
“ Biddy,” said I, “ I made a remark respecting my coming
down here often , to see Joe, which you received with a marked
silence. Have the goodness, Biddy, to tell me why."
“ Are you quite sure, then , that you will come to see him
often ?” asked Biddy, stopping in the narrow garden walk , and
looking at me under the stars with a clear and honest eye.
“ Oh dear me ! " said I, as I found myself compelled to give
up Biddy in despair. “This really is a very bad side of human
nature ! Don't say any more, if you please, Biddy. This
shocks. me very much.”
For which cogent reason I kept Biddy at a distance during
supper, and when I went up to my own old little room , took as
stately a leave of her as I could, in my murmuring soul, deem
) reconcilable with the churchyard and the event of the day.
As often as I was restless in the night, and that was every
quarter of an hour, I reflected what an unkindness, what an
injury, what an injustice, Biddy had done me.
Early in the morning, I was to go. Early in the morning, I
was out, and, looking in, unseen , at one of the wooden windows
of the forge. There I stood, for minutes, looking at Joe,
already at work with a glow of health and strength upon his
face that made it show as if the bright sun of the life in store
for him were shining on it.
66
Good -by, dear Joe !—No, don't wipe it off — for God's sake,
give me your blackened hand ! -I shall be down soon and often . ”
“Never too soon, sir, ” said Joe, “ and never too often , Pip !"
Biddy was waiting for me at the kitchen door, with a mug of
new milk and a crust of bread .. 6* Biddy,” said I, when I gave
her my hand at parting, “ I am not angry, but I am hurt .”
“ No, don't be hurt, ” she pleaded quite pathetically ; “ let
only me be hurt, if I have been ungenerous.”
Once more, the mists were rising as I walked away . If they
disclosed to me, as I suspect they did, that I should not come
back, and that Biddy was quite right, all I can say is they
were quite right too.

T
258 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

CHAPTER XXXVI.
HERBERT and I went on from bad to worse, in the way of
increasing our debts, looking into our affairs, leaving Margins,
and the like exemplary transactions ; and Time went on ,
whether or no, as he has a way of doing ; and I came of age
in fulfilment of Herbert's prediction, that I should do so before
I knew where I was.
Herbert himself had come of age, eight months before me.
As he had nothing else than his majority to come into, the
event did not make a profound sensation in Barnard's Inn.
But we had looked forward to my one -and - twentieth birthday,
with a crowd of speculations and anticipations, for we had both
considered that my guardian could hardly help saying some
thing definite on that occasion.
I had taken care to have it well understood in Little Britain
when my birthday was . On the day before it, I received an
official note from Wemmick , informing me that Mr. Jaggers
would be glad if I would call upon him at five in the afternoon
of the auspicious day. This convinced us that something great
was to happen , and threw me into an unusual flutter when I
repaired to my guardian's office, a model of punctuality.
In the outer office Wemmick offered me his congratulations,
and incidentally rubbed the side of his nose with a folded piece
of tissue -paper that I liked the look of. But he said nothing
respecting it, and motioned me with a nod into my guardian's
room , It was November, and my guardian was standing before
his fire leaning his back against the chimney - piece, with his
hands under his coat - tails.
" Well, Pip,” said he, “ I must call you Mr. Pip to -day.
Congratulations, Mr. Pip ."
We shook hands - he was always a remarkably short shaker
--and I thanked him.
“ Take a chair, Mr. Pip,” said my guardian.
As I sat down, and he preserved his attitude and bent his
brows at his boots, I felt at a disadvantage, which reminded me
of that old time when I had been put upon a tombstone. The
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 259

two ghastly casts on the shelf were not far from him, and their
expression was as if they were making a stupid apoplectic
attempt to attend to the conversation.
“ Now my young friend , " my guardian began, as if I were a
witness in the box, “ I am going to have a word or two with
you . "
“ If you please, sir.”
“ What do you suppose , " said Mr. Jaggers, bending forward to
look at the ground, and then throwing his head back to look at
the ceiling, “ what do you suppose you are living at the rate
of ?”
" At the rate of, sir ? ”
“ At, " repeated Mr. Jaggers, still looking at the ceiling, “the
-rate -of ?” And then looked all round the room, and paused
with his pocket -handkerchief in his hand, half way to his nose.
I had looked into my affairs so often , that I had thoroughly
destroyed any slight notion I might ever have had of their
bearings. Reluctantly, I confessed myself quite unable to
answer the question. This reply seemed agreeable to Mr.
Jaggers, who said, “ I thought so ! ” and blew his nose with an
air of satisfaction .
66
Now, I have asked you a question, my friend," said Mr.
Jaggers. “ Have you anything to ask me ?”
“ Of course it would be a great relief to me to ask you several
questions, sir ; but I remember your prohibition .”
“Ask one,” said Mr. Jaggers.
Is my benefactor to be made known to me to -day ?”
“ No. Ask another . "
“ Is that confidence to be imparted to me soon ?”
“Waive that, a moment,” said Mr. Jaggers, “ and ask another.”
I looked about me, but there appeared to be now no possible
escape from the inquiry, " Have - 1 - anything to receive, sir ?”
On that, Mr. Jaggers said, triumphantly, “ I thought we should
come to it ! ” and called to Wemmick to give him that piece of
paper. Wemmick appeared, handed it in, and disappeared .
“ Now , Mr. Pip ," said Mr. Jaggers, " attend , if you please.
You have been drawing pretty freely here ; your name occurs
pretty often in Wemmick’s cash-book ; but you are in debt, of
course ?"
“ I am afraid I must say yes, sir . "
“ You know you must say yes ; don't you ?” said Mr. Jaggers.
“ Yes, sir. ”
260 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
“ I don't ask you what you owe, because youdon't know ; and
if you did know , you wouldn't tell me ; you would say less.
Yes, yes, my friend ," cried Mr. Jaggers, waving his forefinger to
stop me, as I made a show of protesting : “it's likely enough
that you think you wouldn't, but you would . You'll excuse me,
but I know better than you. Now, take this piece of paper in
your hand. You have got it ? Very good. Now , unfold it and
tell me what it is.”
- TI a bank -note,” said I, “ for five hundred pounds ."
“ That is a bank -note , ” repeated Mr. Jaggers, “ for five hundred
pounds. And a very handsome sum of money too, I think .
You consider it so ?"
“ How could I do otherwise ! "
“ Ah ! But answer the question ,” said Mr. Jaggers.
“ Undoubtedly ."
“ You consider it, undoubtedly, a handsome sum of money .
Now, that handsome sum of money, Pip, is your own. It is a
present to you on this day, in earnest of your expectations.
And at the rate of that handsome sum of money per annum , and
at no higher rate, you are to live until the donor of the whole
appears . That is to say , you will now take your money affairs
entirely into your own hands, and you will draw from Wemmick
one hundred and twenty -five pounds per quarter, until you are
in communication with the fountain -head, and no longer with
the mere agent . As I have told you before, I am the mere
agent . I execute my instructions, and I am paid for doing so .
I think them injudicious, but I am not paid for giving any
opinion on their merits .”
I was beginning to express my gratitude to my benefactor for
the great liberality with which I was treated, when Mr. Jaggers
stopped me. “ I am not paid, Pip ,” said he, coolly, “ to carry
your words to any one ; " and then gathered up his coat-tails, as
he had gathered up the subject, and stood frowning at his boots
as if he suspected them of designs against him .
After a pause, I hinted :
“ There was a question just now, Mr. Jaggers, which you
desired me to waive for a moment. I hope I am doing nothing
wrong in asking it again ?"
66 What is it ? ” said he.
I might have known that he would never help me out ; but it
took me aback to have to shape the question afresh, as if it were
quite new. " Is it likely," I said, after hesitating, “that my
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 261

patron, the fountain -head you have spoken of, Mr. Jaggers, will
soon .” there I delicately stopped.
“ Will soon what ?” asked Mr. Jaggers. “ That's no question
as it stands, you know .”
“ Will soon come to London ,” said I, after casting about for a
precise form of words, “ or summon me anywhere else ? ”
“ Now here,” replied Mr. Jaggers, fixing me for the first time
with his dark deep-set eyes, “ we must revert to the evening
when we first encountered one another in your village. What
did I tell you then , Pip ?"
“ You told me, Mr. Jaggers, that it might be years hence
when that person appeared .”
“ Just so, " said Mr. Jaggers ; “ that's my answer.”
As we looked full at one another, I felt my breath come
quicker in my strong desire to get something out of him . And
as I felt that it came quicker, and as I felt that he saw that it
came quicker, I felt that I had less chance than ever of getting
anything out of him .
“ Do you suppose it will still be years hence, Mr. Jaggers ?"
Mr. Jaggers shook his head - not in negativing the question,
but in altogether negativing the notion that he could anyhow be
got to answer it — and the two horrible casts of the twitched
faces looked , when my eyes strayed up to them , as if they had
come to a crisis in their suspended attention, and were going to
sneeze ,
“ Come !” said Mr. Jaggers, warming the backs of his legs
with the backs of his warmed hands, “ I'll be plain with you, my
friend Pip . That's a question I must not be asked . You'll
understand that, better, when I tell you it's a question that
might compromise me. Come ! I'll go a little further with
you ; I'll say something more .'
He bent down so low to frown at his boots, that he was able
to rub the calves of his legs in the pause he made.
“ When that person discloses," said Mr. Jaggers, straightening
himself, you and that person will settle your own affairs.
When that person discloses, my part in this business will cease
and determine. When that person discloses, it will not be
necessary for me to know anything about it. And that's all I
have got to say."
We looked at one another until I withdrew my eyes, and
looked thoughtfully at the floor. From this last speech I
derived the notion that Miss Havisham , for some reason or no
262 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

reason, had not taken him into her confidence as to her design
ing me for Estella ; that he resented this, and felt a jealousy
about it ; or that he really did object to that scheme, and would
have nothing to do with it. When I raised my eyes again , I
found that he had been shrewdly looking at me all the time, and
was doing so still.
“ If that is all you have to say, sir ,” I remarked, “ there can be
nothing left for me to say."
He nodded assent, and pulled out his thief-dreaded watch,
and asked me where I was going to dine ? I replied at my own
chambers, with Herbert. As a necessary sequence, I asked him
if he would favour us with his company, and he promptly ac
cepted the invitation . But he insisted on walking home with
me, in order that I might make no extra preparation for him ,
and first he had a letter or two to write, and (of course ) had his
hands to wash . So, I said I would go into the outer office and
talk to Wemmick .
The fact was, that when the five hundred pounds had come
into my pocket, a thought had come into my head which had
been often there before ; and it appeared to me that Wemmick
was a good person to advise with , concerning such thought.
He had already locked up his safe, and made preparations for
going home. He had left his desk, brought out his two greasy
office candlesticks and stood them in line with the snuffers on a
slab near the door, ready to be extinguished ; he had raked his
fire low, put his hat and great-coat ready, and was beating him
self all over the chest with his safe-key, as an athletic exercise
after business.
“Mr. Wemmick,” said I, “ I want to ask youropinion. I am
very desirous to serve a friend .”
Wemmick tightened his post office and shook his head, as if
his opinion were dead against any fatal weakness of that sort.
“ This friend ,” I pursued, " is trying to get on in commercial
life, but has no money, and finds it difficult and disheartening
to make a beginning. Now, I want somehow to help him to a
beginning.”
“ With money down ? " said Wemmick, in a tone drier than
any sawdust.
“ With some money down ,” I replied, for an uneasy remem
brance shot across me of that symmetrical bundle of papers at
home ; “ with some money down, and perhaps some anticipation
of my expectations.”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 263

“ Mr. Pip,” said Wemmick, “ I should like just to run over

with you on my fingers, if you please, the names of the various
bridges up as high as Chelsea Reach . Let's see ; there's
London, one ; Southwark, two ; Blackfriars, three ; Waterloo,
four ; Westminster, five ; Vauxhall, six.” He had checked off
7
each bridge in its turn, with the handle of his safe -key on the
palm of his hand. 6. There's as many as six, you see, to choose
from .'
“ I don't understand you , ” said I.
“ Choose your bridge,Mr. Pip ," returned Wemmick , "and take
a walk upon your bridge, and pitch your money into the
Thames over the centre arch of your bridge, and you know the
end of it. Serve a friend with it, and you may know the end of
it too - but it's a less pleasant and profitable end . "
I could have posted a newspaper in his mouth, he made it so
wide after saying this.
“ This is very discouraging ,” said 1.
“ Meant to be so , " said Wemmick .
“ Then is it your opinion ,” I inquired, with some little indig
nation, “ that a man should never
“ —Invest portable property in a friend ?" said Wemmick .
Certainly he should not. Unless he wants to get rid of the
V. friend — and then it becomes a question how much portable pro
perty it may be worth to get rid of him .”
“ And that,” said I, “ is your deliberate opinion, Mr. Wem
mick ?"
66
That, ” he returned . “ is my deliberate opinion in this office . "
“Ah ! " said I, pressing him , for I thought I saw him near a
loophole here ; “ but would that be your opinion at Wal
worth ?”
" Mr. Pip ,” he replied, with gravity, " Walworth is one place,
and this office is another. Much as the Aged is one person ,
and Mr. Jaggers is another. They must not be confounded
together. My Walworth sentiments must be taken at Wal
worth ; uone but my official sentiments can be taken in this
office .”99
· Very well, ” said I, much relieved, o then I shall look you up
at Walworth, you may depend upon it. "
“ Mr. Pip ,” he returned , " you will be welcome there, in a
private and personal capacity .”
We had held this conversation in a low voice, well -knowing
my guardian's ears to be the sharpest of the sharp. As he now
264 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

appeared in his doorway, towelling his hands, Wemmick got on

his great -coat and stood by to snuff out the candles. We all
three went into the street together, and from the door -step
Wemmick turned his way, and Mr. Jaggers and I turned
ours .
I could not help wishing more than once that evening, that
Mr. Jaggers had had an Aged in Gerrard -street, or a Stinger, or
a Something, or a Somebody, to unbend his brows a little. It
was an uncomfortable consideration on a twenty - first birthday,
that coming of age at all seemed hardly worth while in such a
guarded and suspicious world as he made of it. He was a thou
sand times better informed and cleverer than Wemmick , and yet
I would a thousand times rather have had Wemmick to dinner.
And Mr. Jaggers made not me alone intensely melancholy,
because, after he was gone, Herbert said of himself, with his
eyes fixed on the fire, that he thought he must have committed
a felony and forgotten the details of it, he felt so dejected and
guilty.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

DEEMING Sunday the best day for taking Mr. Wemmick's Wal
worth sentiments, I devoted the next ensuing Sunday afternoon
to a pilgrimage to the Castle. On arriving before the battle
ments, I found the Union Jack flying and the drawbridge up ;
but undeterred by this show of defiance and resistance, I rang
at the gate, and was admitted in a most pacific manner by the
Aged.
My son, sir,” said the old man, after securing the drawbridge,
“ rather had it in his mind that you might happen to drop in, and
he left word that he would soon be home from his afternoon's
walk . He is very regular in his walks, is my son . Very regu
lar in everything, is my son .”
I nodded at the old gentleman as Wemmick himself might
have nodded, and we went in and sat down by the fireside.
“ You made acquaintance with my son, sir,” said the old man ,
in his chirping way, while he warmed his hands at the blaze,
“at his office, I expect? ” I nodded . “Hah ! I have heerd that
my son is a wonderful hand at his business, sir ?" I nodded
hard. “ Yes ; so they tell me. His business is the Law ?” I
nodded harder. “ Which makes it more surprising in my son,”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 265

said the old man, " for he was not brought up to the Law , but to
the Wine-Coopering."
Curious to know how the old gentleman stood informed con
cerning the reputation of Mr. Jaggers, I roared that name at
1 him . He threw me into the greatest confusion by laughing
heartily and replying in a very sprightly manner, " No, to be
sure ; you're right.' And to this hour I have not the faintest
notion what he meant, or what joke he thought I had made.
As I could not sit there nodding at him perpetually, without
making some other attempt to interest him, I shouted an inquiry
whether his own calling in life had been “ the Wine -Coopering.”
By dint of straining that term out of myself several times and
tapping the old gentleman on the chest to associate it with him,
I at last succeeded in making my meaning understood .
“ No, " said the old gentleman ; “ the warehousing, the ware
housing. First, over yonder ;" he appeared to mean up tho
chimney, but I believe he intended to refer me to Liverpool ;
“and then in the City of London here. However, having an
infirmity - for I am hard of hearing, sir
I expressed in pantomime the greatest astonishment.
“ _Yes, hard of hearing ; having that infirmity coming upon
me, my son he went into the Law , and he took charge of me,
and he by little and little made out this elegant and beautiful
property. But returning to what you said, you know ," pursued
the old man , again laughing heartily, “ what I say is, No, to be
sure ; you're right."
I was modestly wondering whether my utmost ingenuity
would have enabled me to say anything that would have amused
him half as much as this imaginary pleasantry, when I was
startled by a sudden click in the wall on one side of the chim
ney, and the ghostly tumbling open of a little wooden flap with
“ JOHN " upon it. The old man , following my eyes, cried with
great triumph, “My son's come home !" and we both went out to
the drawbridge.
It was worth any money to see Wemmick waving a salute to
me from the other side of the moat, when we might have shaken
hands across it with the greatest ease . The Aged was so ' de
lighted to work the drawbridge, that I made no offer to assist
him , but stood quiet until Wemmick had come across, and had
presented me to Miss Skiffins : a lady by whom he was accom
panied .
Miss Skiffins was of a wooden appearance, and was, like her
 266 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

escort, in the post - office branch of the service. She might have
been some two or three years younger than Wemmick , and I
judged her to stand possessed of portable property. The cut of
her dress from the waist upward, both before and behind, made
her figure very like a boy's kite ; and I might have pronounced
her gown a little too decidedly orange, and her gloves a little
too intensely green . But she seemed to be a good sort of
fellow , and showed a high regard for the Aged. I was not long
in discovering that she was a frequent visitor at the Castle ; for,
on our going in, and my complimenting Wemmick on his
ingenious contrivance for announcing himself to the Aged, he
begged me to give my attention for a moment to the other side
of the chimney, and disappeared. Presently another click
came, and another little door tumbled open with • Miss Skiffins '
on it ; then Miss Skiffins shut up and John tumbled open ; then
Miss Skiffins and John both tumbled open together, and finally
shut up together. On Wemmick's return from working these
' mechanical appliances, I expressed the great admiration with
which I regarded them , and he said, “ Well, you know , they're
both pleasant and useful to the Aged. And by George, sir, it's
a thing worth mentioning, that of all the people who come to
this gate, the secret of those pulls is only known to the Aged,
Miss Skiffins, and me !"
“And Mr. Wemmick made them ,>>” added Miss Skiffins, “ with
his own hands out of his own head."
While Miss Skiffins was taking off her bonnet ( she retained
her green gloves during the evening as an outward and visible
sign that there was company ), Wemmick invited me to take a
walk with him round the property, and see how the island looked
in winter - time. Thinking that he did this to give me an oppor
tunity of taking his Walworth sentiments, I seized the oppor
tunity as soon as we were out of the Castle.
Having thought of the matter with care, I approached my
subject as if I had never hinted at it before. I informed Wem
mick that I was anxious in behalf of Herbert Pocket, and I told
him how we had first met, and how we had fought. I glanced
at Herbert's home, and at his character, and at his having no
means but such as he was dependent on his father for : those ,
uncertain and unpunctual. I alluded to the advantages I had
derived in my first rawness and ignorance from his society, and
I confessed that I feared I had but ill repaid them , and that he
might have done better without me and my expectations. Keep
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 267

ing Miss Havisham in the background at a great distance, I

still hinted at the possibility of my having competed with him
in his prospects, and at the certainty of his possessing a gene
rous soul, and being far above any mean distrusts, retaliations,
or designs. For all these reasons (I told Wemmick ), and
because he was my young companion and friend, and I had a
great affection for him , I wished my own good fortune to reflect
some rays upon him , and therefore I sought advice from Wem
mick's experience and knowledge of men and affairs, how I
could best try with my resources to help Herbert to some pre
sent income - say of a hundred a year, to keep him in good
hope and heart — and gradually to buy him on to some small
partnership. I begged Wemmick , in conclusion, to understand
that my help must always be rendered without Herbert's know
ledge or suspicion, and that there was no one else in the world
with whom I could advise. I wound up by laying my hand
upon his shoulder, and saying, “ I can't help confiding in you,
though I know it must be troublesome to you ; but that is your
fault ; in having ever brought me here."
Wemmick was silent for a little while, and then said with a
kind of start, “ Well, you know , Mr. Pip, I must tell you one
thing. This is devilish good of you .”
“ Say you'll help me to be good then ," said I.
“ Ecod ," replied Wemmick , shaking his head , " that's not my
trade.”
“ Nor is this your trading - place," said I.
“ You are right,” he returned . “ You hit the nail on the head .
Mr. Pip, I'll put on my considering cap , and I think all you
want to do, may be done by degrees. Skiffins ( that's her
brother) is an accountant and agent. I'll look him up and go
to work for you.”
“ I thank you ten thousand times. "
“ On the contrary ,” said he, “ I thank you, for though we are
strictly in our private and personal capacity, still it may be
mentioned that there are Newgate cobwebs about, and it brushes
them away ."
After a little further conversation to the same effect, we
returned into the Castle where we found Miss Skiffins preparing
tea . The responsible duty of making the toast was delegated
to the Aged, and that excellent old gentleman was so intent
upon it that he seemed to be in some danger of melting his eyes.
It was no nominal meal that we were going to make, but a
268 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

vigorous reality. The Aged prepared such a haystack of but

tered toast, that I could scarcely see him over it as it simmered
on an iron stand hooked on to the top - bar ; while Miss Skiffins
brewed such a jorum of tea , that the pig in the back premises
became strongly excited , and repeatedly expressed his desire to
participate in the entertainment.
The flag had been struck , and the gun had been fired, at the
right moment of time, and I felt as snugly cut off from the rest
of Walworth as if the moat were thirty feet wide by as many
deep. Nothing disturbed the tranquillity of the Castle, but the
occasional tumbling open of John and Miss Skiffins : which
little doors were a prey to some spasmodic infirmity that made
me sympathetically uncomfortable until I got used to it. I in
ferred from the methodical nature of Miss Skiffins's arrange
ments that she made tea there every Sunday night ; and I rather
suspected that a classic brooch she wore, representing the pro
file of an undesirable female with a very straight nose and a very
new moon, was a piece of portable property that had been given
her by Wemmick .
We ate the whole of the toast, and drank tea in proportion,
and it was delightful to see how warm and greasy we all got
after it. The Aged especially , might have passed for some
clean old chief of a savage tribe, just oiled . After a short pause
of repose, Miss Skiffins — in the absence of the little servant
who, it seemed, retired to the bosom of her family on Sunday
afternoons - washed up the tea -things, in a trifling lady -like
amateur manner that compromised none of us. Then , she put
on her gloves again , and we drew round the fire, and Wemmick
said, “ Now Aged Parent, tip us the paper ."
Wemmick explained to me while the Aged got his spectacles
out, that this was according to custom, and that it gave the old
gentleman infinite satisfaction to read the news aloud. " I won't
offer an apology , ” said Wemmick , “for he isn't capable of many
pleasures - are you, Aged P. ?"
“ All right, John, all right, ” returned the old man seeing him
self spoken to.
CG
Only tip him a nod every now and then when he looks off
his paper,” said Wemmick, “ and he'll be as happy as a king.
We are all attention , Aged One."
“ All right, John, all right !" returned the cheerful old man :
so busy and so pleased, that it really was quite charming.
The Aged's reading reminded me of the classes at Mr.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 269

Wopsle's great-aunt's, with the pleasanter peculiarity that it

seemed to come through a keyhole. As he wanted the candles
close to him , and as he was always on the verge of putting
either his head or the newspaper into them , he required as much
watching as a powder-mill. But Wemmick was equally un
tiring and gentle in his vigilance, and the Aged read on , quite
unconscious of his many rescues . Whenever he looked at us,
we all expressed the greatest interest and amazement, and
nodded until he resumed again.
As Wemmick and Miss Skiffins sat side by side, and as I sat
in a shadowy corner, I observed a slow and gradual elongation
of Mr. Wemmick's mouth , powerfully suggestive of his slowly
and gradually stealing his arm round Miss Skiffins's waist. In
course of time I saw his hand appear on the other side of
Miss Skiffins ; but at that moment Miss Skiffins neatly stopped
him with the green glove, unwound his arm again as if it were
an article of dress, and with the greatest deliberation laid it
on the table before her. Miss Skiffins's composure while she
did this was one of the most remarkable sights I have ever seen,
and if I could have thought the act consistent with abstraction
of mind , I should have deemed that Miss Skiffins performed it
mechanically.
By -and - by, I noticed Wemmick's arm beginning to disappear
again, and gradually fading out of view . Shortly afterwards,
his mouth began to widen again . After an interval of suspense
on my part that was quite enthralling and almost painful, I saw
his hand appear on the other side of Miss Skiffins. Instantly,
Miss Skiffins stopped it with the neatness of a placid boxer,
took off that girdle or cestus as before, and laid it on the table .
Taking the table to represent the path of virtue, I am justified
in stating that during the whole time of the Aged's reading,
Wemmick's arm was straying from the path of virtue and being
recalled to it by Miss Skiffins.
At last, the Aged read himself into a light slumber. This
was the time for Wemmick to produce a little kettle, a tray of
glasses, and a black bottle with a porcelain topped cork, repre
senting some clerical dignitary of a rubicund and social aspect.
With the aid of these appliances we all had something warm to
drink : including the Aged, who was soon awake again . Miss
Skiffins mixed, and I observed that she and Wemmick drank out
of one glass. Of course I knew better than to offer to see Miss
Skiffins home, and under the circumstances I thought I had best
270 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

go first : which I did , taking a cordial leave of the Aged, and

having passed a pleasant evening.
Before a week was out, I received a note from Wemmick ,
dated Walworth, stating that he hoped he had made some
advance in that matter appertaining to our private and personal
capacities, and that he would be glad if I could come and see
him again upon it. So, I went out to Walworth again , and yet
again , and yet again, and I saw him by appointment in the City
several times, but never held any communication with him on
the subject in or near Little Britain . The upshot was, that we
found a worthy young merchant or shipping- broker, not long
established in business, who wanted intelligent help, and who
wanted capital, and who in due course of time and receipt
would want a partner. Between him and me, secret articles
were signed of which Herbert was the subject, and I paid him
half of my five hundred pounds down , and engaged for sundry
other payments : some, to fall due at certain dates out of my
income: some, contingent on my coming into my property .
Miss Skiffins's brother conducted the negotiation . Wemmick
pervaded it throughout, but never appeared in it.
The whole business was so cleverly managed, that Herbert
had not the least suspicion of my hand being in it. I never
shall forget the radiant face with which he came home one
afternoon, and told me as a mighty piece of news, of his having
fallen in with one Clarriker (the young merchant's name), and
of Clarriker's having shown an extraordinary inclination towards
him , and of his belief that the opening had come at last. Day
by day as his hopes grew stronger and his face brighter, he
must have thought me a more and more affectionate friend, for
I had the greatest difficulty in restraining my tears of triumph
when I saw him so happy . At length , the thing being done,
and he having that day entered Clarriker's House, and he having
talked to me for a whole evening in a flush of pleasure and suc
cess, I did really cry in good earnest when I went to bed, to
think that my expectations had done some good to somebody.
A great event in my life, the turning point of my life, now
opens on my view . But, before I proceed to narrate it, and
before I pass on to all the changes it involved , I must give one
chapter to Estella . It is not much to give to the theme that
so long filled my heart.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 271

CHAPTER XXXVIII.
If that staid old house near the Green at Richmond should ever
come to be haunted when I am dead , it will be haunted, surely,
by my ghost. O the many, many nights and days through
which the unquiet spirit within me haunted that house when
Estella lived there ! Let my body be where it would , my
spirit was always wandering, wandering, wandering, about that
house .
The lady with whom Estella was placed, Mrs. Brandley by
name, was a widow , with one daughter several years older than
Estella . The mother looked young and the daughter looked
old ; the mother's complexion was pink, and the daughter's was
yellow ; the mother set up for frivolity, and the daughter for
theology. They were in what is called a good position, and
visited , and were visited by, numbers of people. Little, if any,
community of feeling subsisted between them and Estella, but
the understanding was established that they were necessary to
her, and that she was necessary to them . Mrs. Brandley had
been a friend of Miss Havisham's before the time of her seclu
sion .
In Mrs. Brandley's house and out of Mrs. Brandley's house,
I suffered every kind and degree of torture that Estella could
cause me. The nature of my relations with her, which placed
me on terms of familiarity without placing me on terms of
favour, conduced to my distraction . She made use of me to
tease other admirers, and she turned the very familiarity between
herself and me, to the account of putting a constant slight on
my devotion to her . If I had been her secretary, steward, half
brother, poor relation — if I had been a younger brother of her
appointed husband — I could not have seemed to myself, further
from my hopes when I was nearest to her. The privilege of
calling her by her name and hearing her call me by mine,
became under the circumstances an aggravation of my trials ;
and while I think it likely that it almost maddened her other
lovers, I knew too certainly that it almost maddened me.
1 She had admirers without end. No doubt my jealousy made
272 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

an admirer of every one who went near her ; but there were
more than enough of them without that.
I saw her often at Richmond, I heard of her often in town,
and I used often to take her and the Brandley's on the water ;
there were pic -nics, fête days, plays, operas, concerts, parties
all sorts of pleasures, through which I pursued her — and they
were all miseries to me. I never had one hour's happiness in
her society, and yet my mind all round the four -and -twenty
hours was harping on the happiness of having her with unto
death .
Throughout this part of our intercourse — and it lasted, as
will presently be seen, for what I then thought a long time - she
habitually reverted to that tone which expressed that our asso
ciation was forced upon us. There were other times when she
would come to a sudden check in this tone and in all her many
tones, and would seem to pity me.
“Pip, Pip, ” she said one evening, coming to such a check,
when we sat apart at a darkening window of the house in Rich
mond ; “ will you never take warning ? ”
66 Of what ? ”
66 Of me . ”
“ Warning not to be attracted by you, do you mean , Estella ? ”
“ Do I mean ! If you don't know what I mean , you are blind.”
I should have replied that Love was commonly reputed blind ,
but for the reason that I always was restrained — and this was
not the least of my miseries — by a feeling that it was ungenerous
to press myself upon her, when she knew that she could not
choose but obey Miss Havisham. My dread always was, that
this knowledge on her part laid me under a heavy disadvan
tage with her pride, and made me the subject of a rebellious
struggle in her bosom.
“ At any rate,” said I, “ I have no warning given me just now,
for you wrote to me to come to you, this time.”
“ That's true, ” said Estella, with a cold careless smile that
always chilled me.
After looking at the twilight without, for a little while, she 1
went on to say :
66 The time has come round when Miss Havisham wishes to
have me for a day at Satis. You are to take me there , and bring
me back, if you will. She would rather I did not travel alone,
and objects to receiving my maid, for she has a sensitive horror
of being talked of by such people . Can you take me ?"
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 273
Can I take you, Estella ! "
- You can then ? The day after to -morrow , if you please.
You are to pay all charges out of my purse. You hear the con
dition of your going ? ”
“ And must obey ,” said I.
This was all the preparation I received for that visit, or for
others like it : Miss Havisham never wrote to me, nor had I
ever so much as seen her handwriting. We went down on the
next day but one, and we found her in the room where I had
first beheld her, and it is needless to add that there was no
change in Satis House.
She was even more dreadfully fond of Estella than she had
been when I last saw them together ; I repeat the word advi
sedly, for there was something positively dreadful in the energy
of her looks and embraces. She hung upon Estella's beauty,
hung upon her words, hung upon her gestures, and sat mumbling
her own trembling fingers while she looked at her, as though
she were devouring the beautiful creature she had reared.
From Estella she looked at me, with a searching glance that
seemed to pry into my heart and probe its wounds. “ How
does she use you, Pip ; how does she use you ?" she asked me
again, with her witch - like eagerness, even in Estella's hearing.
But, when we sat by her flickering fire at night, she was most
weird ; for then, keeping Estella's hand drawn through her arm
and clutched in her own hand, she extorted from her by dint of
referring back to what Estella had told her in her regular letters,
the names and conditions of the men whom she had fascinated ;
and as Miss Havisham dwelt upon this roll, with the intensity
of a mind mortally hurt and diseased, she sat with her other
hand on her crutch stick, and her chin on that, and her wan
bright eyes glaring at me, a very spectre.
I saw in this, wretched though it made me, and bitter the
sense of dependence even of degradation that it awakened — I
saw in this, that Estella was set to wreak Miss Havisham's
revenge on men , and that she was not to be given to me until
she had gratified it for a term . • I saw in this, a reason for her
being beforehand assigned to me. Sending her out to attract
and torment and do mischief, Miss Havisham sent her with the
malicious assurance that she was beyond the reach of all ad
mirers, and that all who staked upon that cast were secured to
lose. I saw in this, that I, too, was tormented by a perversion
of ingenuity, even while the prize was reserved for me. I saw
T
274 GREAT EXPECTATIONS ,

in this, the reason for my being staved off so long, and the
reason for my late guardian's declining to commit himself to the
formal knowledge of such a scheme. In a word , I saw in this,
Miss Havisham as I had her then and there before my eyes,
and always had had her before my eyes ; and I saw in this, the
distinct shadow of the darkened and unhealthy house in which
her life was hidden from the sun .
The candles that lighted that room of hers were placed in
sconces on the wall. They were high from the ground, and
they burnt with the steady dulness of artificial light in air that is
seldom renewed . As I looked round at them , and at the pale
gloom they made, and at the stopped clock, and at the withered
articles of bridal dress upon the table and the ground, and at
her own awful figure with its ghostly reflection thrown large
by the fire upon the ceiling and the wall, I saw in everything
the construction that my mind had come to, repeated and thrown
back to me. My thoughts passed into the great room across
the landing where the table was spread, and I saw it written as
it were, in the falls of the cobwebs from the centre- piece, in the
crawlings of the spiders on the cloth , in the tracks of the mice as r
they betook their little quickened hearts behind the panels, and
in the gropings and pausings of the beetles on the floor.
It happened on the occasion of this visit that some sharp
words arose between Estella and Miss Havisham . It was the
first time I had ever seen them opposed .
We were seated by the fire, as just now described, and Miss
Havisham still had Estella's arm drawn through her own , and
still clutched Estella's hand in hers, when Estella gradually
began to detach herself. She had shown a proud impatience
more than once before, and had rather endured that fierce affec
tion than accepted or returned it.
“ What !" said Miss Havisham , flashing her eyes upon her,
are you tired of me ?”
“ Only a little tired of myself, ” replied Estella , disengaging
her arm , and moving to the great chimney -piece, where she
stood looking down at the fire.
"Speak the truth, you ingrate !" cried Miss Havisham , pas
sionately striking her stick upon the floor ; “ you are tired of me.”
Estella looked at her with perfect composure, and again
looked down at the fire. Her graceful figure and her beautiful
face expressed a self -possessed indifference to the wild heat of
the other, that was almost cruel.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 275

" You stock and stone !” exclaimed Miss Havisham . 6. You

cold , cold heart !"
“ What ? ” said Estella,preserving her attitude of indifference
as she leaned against the great chimney -piece and only moving
her eyes ; “ do you reproach me for being cold ? You ? ”
“ Are you not ? " was the fierce retort.
“ You should know ," said Estella. 66I am what you have made
me. Take all the praise, take all the blame ; take all the
success, take all the failure ; in short, take me.”
“ O , look at her, look at her ! " cried Miss Havisham , bitterly,
“ Look at her, so hard and thankless, on the hearth where she
was reared ! Where I took her into this wretched breast when
it was first bleeding from its stabs, and where I have lavished
years of tenderness upon ber ! ”
" At least I was no party to the compact,” said Estella , “ for if
I could walk and speak, when it was made, it was as much as I
could do. But what would you have ? You have been very
good to me, and I owe everything to you. What would you
have ?”
“ Love, ” replied the other.
“ You have it. "
“ I have not, ” said Miss Havisham .
“ Mother by adoption , " retorted Estella, never departing form
the easy grace of her attitude, never raising her voice as the
other did, never yielding either to anger or tenderness, “ Mother ..
by adoption, I have said that I owe everything to you. All I
possess is freely yours. All that you have given me, is at your
command to have again. Beyond that, I have nothing. And if
you ask me to give you what you never gave me, my gratitude
and duty cannot do impossibilities.”
“ Did I never give her, love ! " cried Miss Havisham , turning
wildly to me. “ Did I never give her a burning love, inse
parable from jealousy at all times, and from sharp pain , while
she speaks thus to me ! Let her call me mad, let her call me
mad !”
Why should I call you mad,” returned Estella, “ I, of all
people ? Does any one live, who knows what set purposes you
have, half as well as I do ? Does any one live, who knows what
a steady memory you have, half as well as I do ? I who have
sat on this same hearth on the little stool that is even now be
side you there, learning your lessons and looking up into your
face, when your face was strange and frightened me !”
276 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“Soon forgotten ! ” moaned Miss Havisham . 6 Times soon

forgotten !"
" No, not forgotten ," retorted Estella . “ Not forgotten, but
treasured up in my memory. When have you found me false to
your teaching ? When have you found me unmindful of your
lessons ? When have you found me giving admission here," she
touched her bosom with her hand, “to anything that you ex
cluded ? Be just to me.”
“ So proud , so proud !” moaned Miss Havisham , pushing away
her grey hair with both her hands.
“Who taught me to be proud ?” returned Estella. “ Who
praised me when I learnt my lesson ?”
“ So hard, so hard ! ” moaned Miss Havisham , with her former
action.
66
Who taught me to be hard ?" returned Estella . 66 Who
praised me when I learnt my lesson ?"
“ But to be proud and hard to me ! " Miss Havisham quite
shrieked, as she stretched out he arms. “ Estella , Estella,
Estella, to be proud and hard to me ! "
Estella looked at her for a moment with a kind of calm
wonder, but was not otherwise disturbed ; when the moment was
past, she looked down at the fire again .
“ I cannot think , ” said Estella, raising her eyes after a silence
why you should be so unreasonable when I come to see yon
after a separation. I have never forgotten your wrongs and
their causes. I have never been unfaithful to you or your
schooling. I have never shown any weakness that I can charge
myself with .”
“Would it be weakness to return my love ?” exclaimed Miss
Havisham . “ But yes, yes, she would call it so !"
66
I begin to think , ” said Estella, in a musing way, after another
moment of calm wonder, “ that I almost understand how this
comes about. If you had brought up your adopted daughter
wholly in the dark confinement of these rooms, and had never
let her know that there was such a thing as the daylight by
which she has never once seen your face - if you had done that,
and then, for a purpose had wanted her to understand the day
light and know all about it, you would have been disappointed
and angry ? ”
Miss Havisham , with her head in her hands, sat making a low
moaning, and swaying herself on her chair, but gave no answer.
“ Or," said Estella, “ – which is a nearer case-if you had
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 277

taught her, from the dawn of her intelligence, with your utmost
energy and might, that there was such a thing as daylight, but
that it was made to be her enemy and destroyer, and she must
always turn against it, for it had blighted you and would else
blight her ;-if you had done this , and then, for a purpose, had
wanted her to take naturally to the daylight and she could not
do it, you would have been disappointed and angry ? ”
Miss Havisham sat listening (or it seemed so, for I could not
1
see her face ), but still made no answer .
“ So,” said Estella , “ I must be taken as I have been made.
The success is not mine, the failure is not mine, but the two
together make me. "
Miss Havisham had settled down, I hardly knew how, upon
the floor, among the faded bridal relics with which it was strewn .
I took advantage of the moment , I had sought one from the
first — to leave the room, after beseeching Estella's attention to
her, with a movement of my hand. When I left, Estella was
yet standing by the great chimney - piece, just as she had stood
throughout. Miss Havisham’s grey hair was all adrift upon the
ground, among the other bridal wrecks, and was a miserable
sight to see.
It was with a depressed heart that I walked in the starlight
for an hour and more, about the court- yard, and about the
brewery, and about the ruined garden. When I at last took
courage to return to the room, I found Estella sitting at Miss
Havisham's knee, taking up some stitches in one of those old
articles of dress that were dropping to pieces, and of which I
have often been reminded since by the faded tatters of old
banners that I have seen hanging up in cathedrals. Afterwards,
Estella and I played cards, as of yore - only we were skilful
now, and played French games - and so the evening wore away ,
and I went to bed.
I lay in that separate building across the court -yard. It was
the first time I had ever lain down to rest in Satis House, and
sleep refused to come near me. A thousand Miss Havishams
haunted me. She was on this side of my pillow , on that, at the
head of the bed, at the foot, behind the half -opened door of the
dressing -room , in the dressing -room , in the room overhead, in
the room beneath - everywhere. At last, when the night was
slow to creep on towards two o'clock , I felt that I absolutely
could no longer bear the place as a place to lie down in, and
that I must get up . I therefore got up and put on my clothes,
278 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

and went out across the yard into the long stone passago ,
designing to gain the outer court -yard and walk there for the
relief of my mind. But, I was no sooner in the passage than I
extinguished my candle ; for, I saw Miss Havisham going along
it in a ghostly manner , making a low cry . I followed her at a
distance, and saw her go up the staircase . She carried a bare
candle in her hand, which she had probably taken from one of
the sconces in her own room , and was a most unearthly object
by its light. Standing at the bottom of the staircase, I felt the
mildewed air of the feast-chamber, without seeing her open the
door, and I heard her walking there, and so across into her own
room, and so across again into that, never ceasing the low cry .
After a time, I tried in the dark both to get out, and to go back,
but I could do neither until some streaks of day strayed in and
showed me where to lay my hands. During the whole interval,
whenever I went to the bottom of the staircase, I heard her foot
step, saw her candle pass above, and heard her ceaseless low
cry .
Before we left next day, there was no revival of the difference
between her and Estella , nor was it ever revived on any similar
occasion ; and there were four similar occasions, to the best of
my remembrance. Nor, did Miss Havisham's manner towards
Estella in anywise change, except that I believed it to have
something like fear infused among its former characteristics.
It is impossible to turn this leaf of my life, without putting
Bentley Drummle's name upon it ; or I would, very gladly.
On a certain occasion when the Finches were assembled in
force, and when good feeling was being promoted in the usual
manner by nobody's agreeing with anybody else, the presiding
Finch called the Grove to order, forasmuch as Mr. Drummle
had not yet toasted a lady; which, according to the solemn con
stitution of the society , it was the brute's turn to do that day.
I thought I saw him leer in an ugly way at me while the decan
ters were going round, but as there was no love lost between us,
that might easily be. What was my indignant surprise when
he called upon the company to pledge him to “ Estella ” !
6 Estella who ? ” said I.
“Never you mind,” retorted Drummle.
“ Estella of where ? ” said I. “ You are bound to say ofwhere."
Which he was, as a Finch .
“ Of Richmond, gentlemen,” said Drummle, putting me out of
the question, " and a peerless beauty."
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 279

Much he knew about peerless beauties, a mean miserable

idiot ! I whispered Herbert.
“ I know that lady, ” said Herbert, across the table, when the
toast had been honoured.
“ Do you ?” said Drummle.
“ And so do I," I added, with a scarlet face .
“ Do you ?” said Drummle . “ Oh, Lord !”
This was the only retort - except glass or crockery - that the
heavy creature was capable of making ; but, I became as highly
incensed by it as if it had been barbed with wit, and I imme
diately rose in my place and said that I could not but regard it
as being like the honourable Finch’s impudence to come down
to that Grove - we always talked about coming down to tặat
Grove, as a neat Parliamentary turn of expression - down to
that Grove, proposing a lady of whom he knew nothing. Mr.
Drummle upon this, starting up , demanded what I meant by
that ? Whereupon, I made him the extreme reply that I be
lieved he knew where I was to be found.
Whether it was possible in a Christian country to get on
without blood, after this, was a question on which the Finches
were divided . The debate upon it grew so lively, indeed , that
at least six more honourable members told six more, during the
discussion, that they believed they knew where they were to be
found. However, it was decided at last ( the Grove being a
Court of Honour) that if Mr. Drummle would bring never so
slight a certificate from the lady, importing that he had the
honour of her acquaintance, Mr. Pip must express his regret,
as a gentleman and a Finch, for “ having been betrayed into
a warmth which . " Next day was appointed for the production
(lest our honour should take cold from delay ), and next day
Drummle appeared with a polite little avowal in Estella's hand,
that she had had the honour of dancing with him several times.
This left me no course but to regret that I had been “ betrayed into
a warmth which ," and on the whole to repudiate, as untenable,
the idea that I was to be found anywhere. Drummle and I then
sat snorting at one another for an hour, while the Grove engaged
in indiscriminate contradiction, and finally the promotion of good
feeling was declared to have gone ahead at an amazing rate .
I tell this lightly, but it was no light thing to me. For, I
cannot adequately express what pain it gave me to think that
Estella should show any favour to a contemptible, clumsy,
sulky booby, so very far below the average. To the present
 280 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

moment, I believe it to have been referable to some pure fire of

generosity and disinterestedness in my love for her, that I
could not endure the thought of her stooping to that hound .
No doubt I should have been miserable whomsoever she had
favoured ; but a worthier object would have caused me a dif
ferent kind and degree of distress.
It was easy for me to find out, and I did soon find out, that
Drummle had begun to follow her closely, and that she allowed
him to do it. A little while, and he was always in pursuit of
her, and he and I crossed one another every day. He held on ,
in a dull persistent way , and Estella held him on ; now with
.
· encouragement, now with discouragement, now almost flattering
him , now openly despising him , now knowing him very well,
now scarcely remembering who he was.
The Spider, as Mr. Jaggers had called him , was used to lying
in wait, however, and had the patience of his tribe. Added to
that, he had a blockhead confidence in his money and in his
family greatness, which sometimes did him good service -- almost
taking the place of concentration and determined purpose. So,
the Spider, doggedly watching Estella , outwatched many brighter
insects, and would often uncoil himself and drop at the right
nick of time.
At a certain Assembly Ball at Richmond ( there used to be
Assembly Balls at most places then ), where Estella had out
shone all other beauties, this blundering Drummle so hung
about her, and with so much toleration on her part, that I
resolved to speak to her concerning him. I took the next
opportunity : which was when she was waiting for Mrs. Bland
ley to take her home, and was sitting apart among some flowers,
ready to go. I was with her, for I almost always accompanied
them to and from such places.
“ Are you tired, Estella ? ”
Rather, Pip .”
66 You should be."
“Say rather, I should not be ; for I have my letter to Satis
House to write, before I go to sleep.”
“ Recounting to -night's triumph ?” said I. “Surely a very
poor one, Estella ."
“ What do you mean ? I didn't know there had been
any."
66 Estella ," said I, 6. do look at that fellow in the corner
yonder, who is looking over here at us ."
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 281

Why should I look at him ? " returned Estella, with her eyes
on me instead. “ What is there in that fellow in the corner
yonder - to use your words—that I need look at ?"
66
Indeed , that is the very question I want to ask you ,” said I.
« For he has been hovering about you all night."
“Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures," replied Estella, with
a glance towards him , " hover about a lighted candle. Can the
candle help it ?”
“ No," I returned : “ but cannot the Estella help it ?"
" Well !" said she, laughing, after a moment, “ perhaps. Yes .
Anything you like.”
66
* But, Estella, do hear me speak . It makes me wretched that
you should encourage a man so generally despised as Drummle.
You know he is despised ."
6 Well ?” said she.
“ You know he is as ungainly within, as without. A deficient,
ill -tempered, lowering, stupid fellow .”
6 Well ?” said she.
“ You know he has nothing to recommend him but money, and
a ridiculous roll of addle -headed predecessors; now, don't you?”
“ Well ? ” said she again ; and each time she said it, she opened
her lovely eyes the wider .
To overcome the difficulty of getting past that monosyable, I
took it from her, and said, repeating it with emphasis, “Well !
Then, that is why it makes me wretched .”
Now , if I could have believed that she favoured Drummle
with any idea of making me - me - wretched, I should have
been in better heart about it ; but in that habitual way of hers,
she put me so entirely out of the question, that I could believe
nothing of the kind.
“ Pip, " said Estella , casting her glance over the room , " don't
be foolish about its effect on you . It may have its effect on
others, and may be meant to have. It's not worth discussing."
“ Yes it is ,” said I, “because I cannot bear that people should
say , she throws away her gracesand attractions on a mere boor,
the lowest in the crowd .'
“ I can bear it , ” said Estella.
“ Oh ! don't be so proud, Estella , and so inflexible.”
“ Calls me proud and inflexible in this breath !” said Estella,
opening her hands. “And in his last breath reproached me for
stooping to a boor !"
“ There is no doubt you do ,” said I, something hurriedly, " for
282 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

I have seen you give him looks and smiles this very night, such
as you never give to — me.
" Do you want me then , " said Estella, turning suddenly with a
fixed and serious, if not angry , look, “ to deceive and entrap
you ?”
66 Do you deceive and entrap him , Estella ? ”
“ Yes, and many others — all of them but you. Here is Mrs.
Blandley. I'll say no more.”

And now that I have given the one chapter to the theme
that so filled my heart, and so often made it ache and ache
again, I pass on , unhindered , to the event that had impended
over me longer yet ; the event that had begun to be prepared for,
before I knew that the world held Estella, and in the days when
her baby intelligence was receiving its first distortions from Miss
Havisham's wasting hands.
In the Eastern story, the heavy slab that was to fall on the
bed of state in the flush of conquest was slowly wrought out of
the quarry , the tunnel for the rope to hold it in its place was
slowly carried through the leagues of rock, the slab was slowly
raised and fitted in the roof, the rope was rove to it and slowly
taken through the miles of hollow to the great iron ring. All
being made ready with much labour, and the hour come, the
sultan was aroused in the dead of the night, and the sharpened
axe that was to sever the rope from the great iron ring was put
into his hand, and he struck with it, and the rope parted and
rushed away, and the ceiling fell. So, in my case ; all the
work , near and afar, that tended to the end, had been accom
plished ; and in an instant the blow was struck, and the roof of
my stronghold dropped upon me.

CHAPTER XXXIX .

I was three- and -twenty years of age. Not another word had
I heard to enlighten me on the subject of my expectations, and
my twenty -third birthday was a week gone. We had left
Barnard's Inn more than a year, and lived in the Temple. Our
chambers were in Garden -court, down by the river .
Mr. Pocket and I had for some time parted company as to our
original relations, though we continued on the best terms.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 283

Notwithstanding my inability to settle to anything — which

I hope arose out of the restless and incomplete tenure on which
I held my meansI had a taste for reading, and read regularly
so many hours a day. That matter of Herbert's was still pro
gressing, and everything with me was as I have brought it down
to the close of the last preceding chapter.
Business had taken Herbert on a journey to Marseilles. I
was alone, and had a dull sense of being alone. Dispirited and
anxious, long hoping that to -morrow or next week would clear
my way, and long disappointed, I sadly missed the cheerful face
and ready response of my friend .
It was wretched weather ; stormy and wet, stormy and wet ;
mud, mud , mud, deep in all the streets. Day after day, a vast
heavy veil had been driving over London from the East, and it
drove still, as if in the East there were an Eternity of cloud
and wind. So furious had been the gusts, that high buildings
in town had had the lead stripped off their roofs ; and in the
country , trees had been torn up, and sails of windmills carried
away ; and gloomy accounts had come in from the coast, of ship
wreck and death . Violent blasts of rain had accompanied these
rages of wind, and the day just closed as I sat down to read had
been the worst of all.
Alterations have been made in that part of the Temple since
that time, and it has not now so lonely a character as it had
then, nor is it so exposed to the river. We lived at the top of
the last house, and the wind rushing up the river shook the
house that night, like discharges of cannon , or breakings of a
sea. When the rain came with it and dashed against the
windows, I thought, raising my eyes to them as they rocked ,
that I might have fancied myself in a storm -beaten light- house.
Occasionally, the smoke came rolling down the chimney as
though it could not bear to go out into such a night ; and when
I set the doors open and looked down the staircase, the staircase
lamps were blown out; and when I shaded my face with my
hands and looked through the black windows ( opening them
ever so little, was out of the question in the teeth of such wind
and rain ) I saw that the lamps in the court were blown out, and
that the lamps on the bridges and the shore were shuddering,
and that the coal fires in barges on the river were being carried
away before the wind like red - hot splashes in the rain .
I read with my watch upon the table, purposing to close my
book at eleven o'clock . As I shut it, Saint Paul's, and all the
 1
284 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . |

many church - clocks in the City — some leading, some accom

panying, some following — struck that hour. The sound was
curiously flawed by the wind ; and I was listening, and thinking
how the wind assailed and tore it, when I heard a footstep on
the stair.
What nervous folly made me start, and awfully connect it
with the footstep of my dead sister, matters not. It was past
in a moment, and I listened again , and heard the footstep
stumble in coming on. Remembering then, that the staircase
lights were blown out, I took up my reading -lamp and went out
to the stair-head. Whoever was below had stopped on seeing
my lamp, for all was quiet.
66
There is some one down there, is there not ? I called out,"
looking down .
“ Yes ,” said a voice from the darkness beneath .
“ What floor do you want ? ”
“ The top. Mr. Pip . "
“ That is my name. There is nothing the matter ? "
Nothing the matter,” returned the voice. And the man
came on.
I stood with my lamp held out over the stair- rail, and he
came slowly within its light. It was a shaded lamp, to shine
upon a book, and its circle of light was very contracted ; so
that he was in it for a mere instant, and then out of it. In the
instant, I had seen a face that was strange to me, looking up
with an incomprehensible air of being touched and pleased by
the sight of me.
Moving the lamp as the man moved , I made out that he was
substantially dressed , but roughly ; like a voyager by sea. That
he had long iron grey hair. That his age was about sixty.
That he was a muscular man , strong on his legs, and that he
was browned and hardened by exposure to weather. As he
ascended the last stair or two, and the light of my lamp included
us both, I saw, with a stupid kind of amazement, that he was
holding out both his hands to me.
“ Pray what is your business ? ” I asked him.
CG
· My business ?” he repeated, pausing. “Ah ! Yes. I will
explain my business, by your leave ."
“ Do you wish to.come in ?"
· Yes,” he replied ; “ I wish to come in, Master.”
I had asked him the question inhospitably enough, for I re
sented the sort of bright and gratified recognition that still
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 285

shone in his face. I resented it, because it seemed to imply

that he expected me to “respond to it. But, I took him into the
room I had just left, and, having set the lamp on the table,
asked him as civilly as I could to explain himself.
He looked about him with the strangest air — an air of
wondering pleasure, as if he had some part in the things he
admired — and he pulled off a rough outer coat, and his hat.
Then, I saw that his head was furrowed and bald, and that
the long iron grey hair grew only on its sides. But, I saw
nothing that in the least explained him . On the contrary ,
I saw him next moment, once more holding out both his hands
to me .
“What do you mean?” said I, half suspecting him to be
mad .
He stopped in his looking at me, and slowly rubbed his right
hand over his head .' “ It's disappointing to a man ,” he said, in
& coarse broken voice, “ arter having looked for’ard so distant,
and come so fur ; but you're not to blame for that - neither on
us is to blame for that. I'll speak in half a minute. Give me
half a minute, please .”
He sat down on a chair that stood before the fire, and covered
his forehead with his large brown veinous hands. I looked at
him attentively then, and recoiled a little from him ; but I did
not know him .
“There's no one nigh,” said he, looking over his shoulder ;
“ is there ?”
“ Why do you, a stranger coming into my rooms at this time
of the night, ask that question ?” said I.
“ You're a game one,” he returned , shaking his head at me
rith a deliberate affection , at once most unintelligible and most
exasperating ; “ I'm glad you've grow'd up, a game one ! But
don't catch hold of me. You'd be sorry arterwards to have done
it .”
I relinquished the intention he had detected , for I knew him !
Even yet I could not recal a single feature, but I knew him !
If the wind and the rain had driven away the intervening years,
had scattered all the intervening objects, had swept us to the
churchyard where we first stood face to face on such different
levels, I could not have known my convict more distinctly than
I knew him now, as he sat in the chair before the fire. No
need to take a file from his pocket and show it to me ; no need
to take the handkerchief from his neck and twist it round his
286 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

head ; no need to hug himself with both his arms, and take a
shivering turn across the room, looking back at me for recog
nition . I knew him before he gave me one of those aids, though,
a moment before, I had not been conscious of remotely suspect
ing his identity.
He came back to where I stood, and again held out both his
hands. Not knowing what to do — for, in my astonishment I had
lost my self -possession — I reluctantly gave him my hands. He
grasped them heartily, raised them to his lips, kissed them , and
still held them.
“ You acted noble, my boy ,” said he. “ Noble, Pip ! And I
have never forgot it !"
At a change in his manner as if he were even going to em
brace me, I laid a hand upon his breast and put him away .
" Stay !" said I. Keep off ! If you are grateful to me for
what I did when I was a little child , I hope you have shown
your gratitude by mending your way of life . If you have come
here to thank me, it was not necessary . Still, however, you
have found me out, there must be something good in the feeling
that has brought you here, and I will not repulse you ; but
surely you must understand - 1-2 "
My attention was so attracted by the singularity of his fixed
look at me, that the words died away on my tongue.
“ You was a saying," we observed, when he had confronted
one another in silence, “ that surely I must understand . What,
surely must I understand ? ”
“ That I cannot wish to renew that chance intercourse with
you of long ago, under these different circumstances. I am
glad to believe you have repented and recovered yourself. I am
glad to tell you so. I am glad that, thinking I deserve to be
thanked , you have come to thank me. But our ways are dif
ferent ways, none the less. You are wet, and you look weary .
Will you drink something before you go ? ” .
He had replaced his neckerchief loosely, and had stood,
keenly observant of me, biting a long end of it. “ I think , ” he
answered, still with the end at his mouth and still observant of
me, " that I will drink ( I thank you) afore I go."
There was a tray ready on a side -table. I brought it to the
table near the fire, and asked him what he would have ? He
touched one of the bottles without looking at it or speaking, and
I made him some hot rum -and -water . I tried to keep my hand
steady while I did so, but his look at me as he leaned back in
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 287

his chair with the long draggled end of his neckerchief between
his teeth - evidently forgotten — made my hand very difficult to
master. When at last I put the glass to him , I saw with amaze
ment that his eyes were full of tears .
Up to this time I had remained standing, not to disguise that
I wished him gone. But I was softened by the softened aspect
of the man , and felt a touch of reproach. “ I hope ," said I,
hurriedly putting something into a glass for myself, and drawing
a chair to the table, “ that you will not think I spoke harshly to
you just now. I had no intention of doing it, and I am sorry
for it if I did . wish you well, and happy ! "
As I put my glass to my lips, he glanced with surprise at
the end of his neckerchief, dropping from his mouth when he
opened it, and stretched out his hand . I gave him mine, and
then he drank , and drew his sleeve across his eyes and fore
head .
“ How are you living ?” I asked him .
“ I've been a sheep -farmer, stock -breeder, other trades besides,
away in the new world,” said he : " many a thousand mile of
stormy water off from this . ”
“ I hope you have done well ? ”
“I've done wonderful well. There's others went out alonger
me as has done well too, but no man has done nigh as well as
me. I'm famous for it ."
“ I am glad to hear it . ”
“ I hope to hear you say so, my dear boy .”
Without stopping to try to understand those words or the tone
in which they were spoken, I turned off to a point that had just
come into my mind.
“ Have you ever seen a messenger you once sent to me, ” I
inquired , " " since he undertook that trust ?”
“ Never set eyes upon him . I warn't likely to it.”
“ He came faithfully, and he brought me the two one - pound
notes. I was a poor boy then , as you know , and to a poor boy
they were a little fortune. But, like you, I have done well
since, and you must let me pay them back. You can put them
to some other poor boy's use." I took out my purse.
He watched me as I laid my purse upon the table and opened
it, and he watched me as I separated two one- pound notes from
its contents. They were clean and new , and I spread them out
and handed them over to him. Still watching me, he laid them
one upon the other, folded them long -wise, gave them . a twist,
288 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

set fire to them at the lamp, and dropped the ashes into the
tray.
66
May I make so bold ,” he said then, with a smile that was
like a frown, and with a frown that was like a smile, “ as ask you
how you have done well, since you and me was out on them lone
shivering marshes ?”
“ How ? ”
“Ah !"
He emptied his glass, got up , and stood at the side of the
fire, with his heavy brown hand on the mantelshelf. He put a
foot up to the bars, to dry and warm it, and the wet boot began to
steam ; but, he neither looked at it, nor at the fire, but steadily
looked at me. It was only now that I began to tremble.
When my lips had parted, and had shaped some words that
were without sound, I forced myself to tell him ( though I could
not do it distinctly ), that I had been chosen to succeed to some
property.
66
Might a mere warmint ask what property ?” said he.
I faltered, “ I don't know."
Might a mere warmint ask whose property ? " said he.
I faltered again , " I don't know .”
Could I make a guess, I wonder , " said the Convict, “ at your
income since you come of age ! As to the first figure now.
Five ? "
With my heart beating like a heavy hammer of disordered
action, I rose out of my chair, and stood with my hand upon the
back of it, looking wildly at him .
“ Concerning a guardian , " he went on . “ There ought to have
been some guardian or such -like, whiles you was a minor. Some
lawyer, maybe. As to the first letter of that lawyer's name now .
Would it be J ? "
All the truth of my position came flashing on me ; and its
disappointments, dangers, disgraces, consequences of all kinds,
rushed in in such a multitude that I was borne down by them
and had to struggle for every breath I drew . “ Put it,” he
resumed , “ as the employer of that lawyer whose name begun
with a J, and might be Jaggers - put it as he had come over sea
to Portsmouth, and had landed there, and had wanted to come
on to you. • However, you have found me out,' you says just
now. Well ! however did I find you out ? Why, I wrote from
Portsmouth to a person in London, for particulars of your
address. That person's name ? Why, Wemmick .”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 289

I could not have spoken one word, though it had been to

save mylife . I stood, with a hand on the chair-back and a hand
on my breast, where I seemed to be suffocating — I stood so,
looking wildly at him , until I grasped at the chair, when the
room began to surge and turn . He caught me, drew me to the
sofa, put me up against the cushions, and bent on one knee before
me : bringing the face that I now well remembered , and that I
shuddered at, very near to mine.
66
“ Yes, Pip, dear boy, I've made a gentleman on you ! It's
me wot has done it ! I swore that time, sure as ever I earned a
guinea, that guinea should go to you. I swore arterwards, sure
as ever I spec'lated and got rich, you should get rich . I lived
rough, that you should live smooth ; I worked hard that you should
be above work . What odds, dear boy ? Do I tell it fur you
to feel a obligation ? Not a bit. I tell it, fur you to know
as that there hunted dunghill dog wot you kep life in , got
his head so high that he could make a gentleman - and, Pip,
you're him !”
The abhorrence in which I held the man , the dread I had of
him , the repugnance with which I shrank from him , could not
have been exceeded if he had been some terrible beast.
“ Look’ee here, Pip. I'm your second father. You're my
son — more to me nor any son. I've put away money , only for
you to spend. When I was a hired - out shepherd in a solitary
hut, not seeing no faces but faces of sheep till I half forgot wot
men's and women's faces wos like, I see yourn . I drops my
knife many a time in that hut when I was a eating my dinner
or my supper, and I says, ' Here's the boy again, a looking at
me whiles I eats and drinks ! ' I see you there a many times
as plain as ever I see you on them misty marshes. “ Lord strike
me dead ! ' I says each time — and I goes out in the open air to
say it under the open heavens— but wot, if I gets liberty and
money, I'll make that boy a gentleman ! ' And I done it.
Why, look at you, dear boy ! Look at these here lodgings of
yourn, fit for a lord ! A lord ? Ah ! You shall show money
with lords for wagers, and beat 'em ! ”
In his heat and triumph, and in his knowledge that I had
been nearly fainting, he did not remark on my reception of all
this . It was the one grain of relief I had.
“ Look'ee here ! ” he went on, taking my watch out of my
pocket, and turning towards him a ring on my finger, while I
recoiled from his touch as if he had been a snake, “ a gold ’ un
U
290 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

and a beauty : that's a gentleman's, I hope ! A diamond all set

round with rubies ; that's a gentleman's, I hope ! Look at your
linen ; fine and beautiful ! Look at your clothes ; better ain't
to be got ! And your books too ,” turning his eyes round the
room , “ mounting up , on their shelves, by hundreds ! And you
read 'em ; don't you ? I see you'd been a reading of ' em when
I come in. Ha, ha, ha ! You shall read ' em to me, dear boy !
And if they're in foreign languages wot I don't understand, I
shall be just as proud as if I did.”
Again he took both my hands and put them to his lips, while
my blood ran cold within me .
“Don't you mind talking, Pip ,” said he, after again drawing
his sleeve over his eyes and forehead , as the click came in his
throat which I well remembered — and he was all the more
horrible to me that he was so much in earnest ; “ you can't do
better nor keep quiet, dear boy. You ain't looked slowly for
ward to this as have ; you wosn't prepared for this, as I wos.
But didn't you never think it might be me ?”
“ O no, no, no," I returned . “ Never, never !”
Well, you see it wo8 me , and single -handed. Never a soul
in it but my own self and Mr. Jaggers.”
“ Was there no one else ? " I asked .
66
No,” said he, with a glance of surprise : “ who else should
there be ? And, dear boy, how good -looking you have growed !
There's bright eyes somewheres — eh ? Isn't there bright eyes
somewheres, wot you love the thoughts on ?"
O Estella , Estella !
They shall be yourn, dear boy, if money can buy ' em . Not
that a gentleman like you, so well set up as you, can't win ' em
off of his own game ; but money shall back you ! Let me finish
wot I was a telling you , dear boy. From that there hut and
that there hiring -out, I got money left me by my master (which
died, and had been the same as me), and got my liberty and went
for myself. In every single thing I went for, I went for you.
‘ Lord strike'a blight upon it, ' I says, wotever it was I went 1
for, ' if it ain't for him ! It all prospered wonderful. As I
giv' you to understand just now, I'm famous for it. It was the
money left me, and the gains of the first few year wot I sent
home to Mr. Jaggers — all for you — when he first come arter
you , agreeable to my letter."
0, that he had never come ! That he had left me at the forge
-far from contented, yet, by comparison , happy !
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 291

“ And then, dear boy, it was a recompense to me, look’ee here,

to know in secret that I was making a gentleman. The blood
horses of them colonists might fling up the dust over me as I
was walking ; what do I say ? I says to myself, “ I'm making a
better gentleman nor ever you'll be ! When one of ' em says to
another, ' He was a convict, a few years ago, and is a ignorant
common fellow LOW, for all he's lucky ,' what do I say ? I says
to myself, ' If I ain't a gentleman, nor yet ain't got no learning,
I'm the owner of such. All on you owns stock and land ; which
on you owns a brought -up London gentleman ?' This way
kep myself a going. And this way I held steady afore my mind
that I would for certain come one day and see my boy, and make
myself known to him , on his own ground . ”
He said his hand on my shoulder . I shuddered at the
thought that for anything I knew , his hand might be stained
with blood.
“ It warn't easy, Pip, for me to leave them parts, nor yet it
warn't safe. But I held to it, and the harder it was, the stronger
I held , for I was determined, and my mind firm made up . At
last I. done it. Dear boy, I done it !”
I tried to collect my thoughts, but I was stunned . Through
out, I had seemed to myself to attend more to the wind and the
rain than to him ; even now, I could not separate his voice from
those voices, though those were loud and his was silent.
" Where will you put me ?" he asked, presently. “ I must be
put somewheres, dear boy.”
“ To sleep ?" said I.
“ Yes. And to sleep long and sound ,” he answered ; “ for I've
been sea -tossed and sea -washed , months and months.”
“ My friend and companion ," said I, rising from the sofa, “ is
absent
CG ; you must have his room . ”
He won't come back to -morrow ; will he ?”
No,” said I, answering almost mechanically, in spite of my
utmost efforts ; 66 not to -morrow .”
“ Because, look'ee here, dear boy ," he said, dropping his voice ,
and laying a long finger on my breast in an impressive manner ,
“ caution is necessary . "
“ How do you mean ? Caution ?"
By G- , it's Death !"
“ What's death ? ”
}
I was sent for life. It's death to come back . There's been
 R.

292 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

overmuch coming back of late years, and I should of a certainty

be hanged if took ."
Nothing was needed but this ; the wretched man , after loading
me with his wretched gold and silver chains for years, had risked
his life to come to me, and I held it there in my keeping ! If I
had loved him instead of abhorring him ; if I had been attracted
to him by the strongest admiration and affection , instead of
shrinking from him with the strongest repugnance ; it could
have been no worse. On the contrary, it would have been
better, for his preservation would then have naturally and ten
derly addressed my heart.
My first care was to close the shutters, so that no light might
be seen from without, and then to close and make fast the doors.
While I did so, he stood at the table drinking rum and eating
biscuit ; and when I saw him thus engaged, I saw my convict on
the marshes at his meal again . It almost seemed to me as if he
must stoop down presently, to file at his leg.
When I had gone into Herbert's room, and had shut off any
other communication between it and the staircase than through
the room in which our conversation had been held , I asked
him if he would go to bed ? He said yes, but asked me for
some of my “ gentleman's linen to put on in the morning.
I brought it out, and laid it ready for him , and my blood
again ran cold when he again took me by both hands to give
me good night.
I got away from him , without knowing how I did it, and
mended the fire in the room where we had been together, and
sat down by it, afraid to go to bed. For an hour or more, I
remained too stunned to think ; and it was not until I began to
think , that I began fully to know how wrecked I was, and how
the ship in which I had sailed was gone to pieces.
Miss Havisham's intentions towards me, all a mere dream ;
Estella not designed for me ; I only suffered in Satis House as a
convenience, a sting for the greedy relations, a model with a
mechanical heart to practise on when no other practice was at
hand ; those were the first smarts I had. But, sharpest and
deepest pain of all — it was for the convict, guilty of I knew not
what crimes, and liable to be taken out of those rooms where I
sat thinking, and hanged at the Old Bailey door, that I had
deserted Joe.
I would not have gone back to Joe now, I would not have
gone back to Biddy now, for any consideration : simply, I sup
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 293

pose, because my sense of my own worthless conduct to them

was greater than every consideration . No wisdom on earth
could have given me the comfort that I should have derived from
their simplicity and fidelity ; but I could never, never, never,
undo what I had done.
In every rage of wind and rush of rain , I heard pursuers.
Twice, I could have sworn there was a knocking and whispering
at the outer door. With these fears upon me, I began either to
imagine or recal that I had had mysterious warnings of this
man's approach. That, for weeks gone by, I had passed faces in
the streets which I had thought like his. That, these likenesses
had grown more numerous, as he, coming over the sea, had
drawn nearer . That, his wicked spirit had somehow sent these
messengers to mine, and that now on this stormy night he was
as good as his word , and with me.
Crowding up with these reflections came the reflection that I
had seen him with my childish eyes to be a desperately violent
man ; that I had heard that other convict reiterate that he had
tried to murder him ; that I had seen him down in the ditch ,
tearing and fighting like a wild beast. Out of such remem
brances I brought into the light of the fire, a half - formed terror
that it might not be safe to be shut up there with him in the
dead of the wild solitary night. This dilated until it filled the
room, and impelled me to take a candle and go in and look at
my dreadful burden .
He had rolled a handkerchief round his head , and his face
was set and lowering in his sleep. But he was asleep, and
quietly too, though he had a pistol lying on the pillow . Assured
of this, I softly removed the key to the outside of his door, and
turned it on him before I again sat down by the fire. Gradually
I slipped from the chair and lay on the floor. When I awoke
without having parted in my sleep with the perception of my
wretchedness, the clocks of the Eastward churches were striking
five, the candles were wasted out, the fire was dead, and the
wind and rain intensified the thick black darkness .

THIS IS THE END OF THE SECOND STAGE OF PIP'S

EXPECTATIONS .
294 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

CHAPTER XL .

It was fortunate for me that I had to take precautions to insure

(so far as I could ) the safety of my dreaded visitor ; for, this
thought pressing on me when I awoke, held other thoughts in a
confused concourse at a distance .
The impossibility of keeping him concealed in the chambers 1
was self -evident. It could not be done, and the attempt to do
1
it would inevitably engender suspicion. True, I had no Avenger
in my service now, but I was looked after by an inflammatory
1
old female, assisted by an animated rag -bag whom she called
her niece ; and to keep a room secret from them would be to
invite curiosity and exaggeration. They both had weak eyes,
which I had long attributed to their chronically looking in at
keyholes, and they were always at hand when not wanted ; in
deed that was their only reliable quality besides larceny. Not
to get up a mystery with these people, I resolved to announce
in the morning that my uncle had unexpectedly come from the
country .
This course I decided on while I was yet groping about in
the darkness for the means of getting a light. Not stumbling
on the means after all, I was fain to go out to the adjacent
Lodge and get the watchman there to come with his lantern .
Now, in groping my way down the black staircase I fell over
something, and that something was a man crouching in a
corner .
As the man made no answer when I asked him what he did
there, but eluded my touch in silence, I ran to the Lodge and
urged the watchman to come quickly : telling him of the in
cident on the way back . The wind being as fierce as ever, we
did not care to endanger the light in the lantern by rekindling
the extinguished lamps on the staircase, but we examined the
staircase from the bottom to the top and found no one there. It
then occurred to me as possible that the man might have slipped
into my rooms ; so, lighting my candle at the watchman's, and
leaving him standing at the door, I examined them carefully,
7

GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 295

including the room in which my dreaded guest lay asleep. All

was quiet, and assuredly no other man was in those chambers.
It troubled me that there should have been a lurker on the
stairs, on that night of all nights in the year, and I asked the
watchman, on the chance of eliciting some hopeful explanation
as I handed him a dram at the door, whether he had admitted at
his gate any gentleman who had perceptibly been dining out ?
Yes, he said ; at different times of the night, three. One lived
in Fountain Court, and the other two lived in the Lane, and he
had seen them all go home. Again, the only other man who
dwelt in the house of which my chambers formed a part, had
been in the country for some weeks ; and he certainly had not
returned in the night, because we had seen his door with his
seal on it as we came up - stairs.
“The night being so bad, sir , " said the watchman, as he gave
me back my glass, uncommon few have come in at my gate.
Besides them three gentlemen that I have named , I don't call to
mind another since about eleven o'clock, when a stranger asked
for you .”
“My uncle ," I muttered . “ Yes.”
“ You saw him , sir ?”
“ Yes . Oh yes."
“ Likewise the person with him ?”
“ Person with him !" I repeated .
“ I judged the person to be with him ," returned the watch
man , “ The person stopped, when he stopped to make inquiry
of me, and the person took this way when he took this
way."
“ What sort of person ?”
The watchman had not particularly noticed ; he should say a
working person ; to the best of his belief, he had a dust
coloured kind of clothes on, under a dark coat. The watchman
made more light of the matter than I did, and naturally ; not
having my reason for attaching weight to it.
When I had got rid of him, which I thought it well to do
without prolonging explanations, my mind was much troubled
by these two circumstances taken together. Whereas they were
easy of innocent solution apart — as, for instance, some diner- out
or diner-at -home, who had not gone near this watchman's gate,
might have strayed to my staircase and dropped asleep there
andmy nameless visitor might have brought some one with him
to show him the way - still, joined, they had an ugly look to one
296 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

as prone to distrust and fear as the changes of a few hours had

made me .
I lighted my fire, which burnt with a raw pale flare at that
time of the morning, and fell into a doze before it. I seemed to
have been dozing a whole night when the clocks struck six. As
there was full an hour and a half between me and daylight, I
dozed again ; now, waking up uneasily, with prolix conversa
tions about nothing, in my ears ; now, making thunder of the
wind in the chimney ; at length, falling off into a profound sleep
from which the daylight woke me with a start.
All this time I had never been able to consider my own situa
tion , nor could I do so yet. I had not the power to attend to
it. I was greatly dejected and distressed, but in an incoherent
wholesale sort of way. As to forming any plan for the future, I
could as soon have formed an elephant. When I opened the
shutters and looked out at the wet wild morning, all of a leaden
hue ; when I walked from room to room ; when I sat down
again shivering , before the fire, waiting for my laundress to
appear ; I thought how miserable I was, but hardly knew why,
or how long I had been so, or on what day of the week I made
the reflection, or even who I was that made it.
At last, the old woman and the niece came in - the latter with
a head not easily distinguishable from her dusty broom — and
testified surprise at sight of me and the fire. To whom I im
parted how my uncle had come in the night and was then asleep,
and how the breakfast preparations were to be modified accord
ingly. Then, I washed and dressed while they knocked the
furniture about and made a dust ; and so, in a sort of dream or
sleep -waking, I found myself sitting by the fire again , waiting
for Him — to come to breakfast.
By -and -by, his door opened and he came out. I could not
bring myself to bear the sight of him , and I thought he had a
worse look by daylight.
“ I do not even know,” said I, speaking low as he took his seat
at the table, “ by what name to call you. I have given out that
you are my uncle . "
“ That's it, dear boy ! Call me uncle.”
- You assumed some name, I suppose, on board ship ? "
Yes, dear boy. I took the name of Provis. ”
“ Do you mean to keep that name ?”
• Why, yes, dear boy, it's as good as another — unless you'd
like another.”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 297

“ What is your real name ? ” I asked him in a whisper.

66
Magwitch ,” he answered , in the same tone ; " chrisen'd Abel. ”
“ What were you brought up to be ?”
“ A warmint, dear boy .”
He answered quite seriously, and used the word as if it
denoted some profession .
“ When you came into the Temple last night said I,
pausing to wonder whether that could really have been last
night, which seemed so long ago.
“ Yes, dear boy ?"
6. When you came in at the gate and asked the watchman the
way here, had you any one with you ? ”
“ With me ? No, dear boy.”
" But there was some one there ?”
“ I didn't take particular notice, ” he said, dubiously, “ not
knowing the ways of the place. But I think there was a person ,
too, come in alonger me. "
Are you known in London ?"
“ I hope not ! ” said he, giving his neck a jerk with his fore
finger that made me turn hot and sick .
66 Were
you known in London, once ?"
“ Not over and above, dear boy. I was in the provinces
mostly . ”
“ Were you — tried - in London ?”
“Which time ? ” said he, with a sharp look.
- The last time.”
He nodded. “ First knowed Mr. Jaggers that way . Jaggers
was for me. "
It was on my lips to ask him what he was tried for, but he
took up a knife, gave it a flourish, and with the words, “ And
what I done is worked out and paid for ! ” fell to at his break
fast.
He ate in a ravenous way that was very disagreeable, and all
his actions were uncouth, noisy, and greedy. Some of his teeth
? had failed him since I saw him eat on the marshes, and as he
turned his food in his mouth, and turned his head sideways to
bring his strongest fangs to bear upon it, he looked terribly like
a hungry old dog. If I had begun with any appetite, he would
have taken it away, and I should have sat much as I did — re
pelled from him by an insurmountable aversion, and gloomily
looking at the cloth .
" I'm a heavy grubber, dear boy, ” he said , as a polite kind of
298 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

apology when he had made an end of his meal, “ but I always

was. If it had been in my constitution to be a lighter grubber,
I might ha' got into lighter trouble. Similarly, I must have my
smoke. When I was first hired out as shepherd t'other side the
world , it's my belief I should ha' turned into a molloncolly -mad
sheep myself, if I hadn't a had my smoke.”
As he said so, he got up from table, and putting his hand into
the breast of the pea -coat he wore, brought out a short black
pipe, and a handful of loose tobacco of the kind that is called
Negro -head. Having filled his pipe, he put the surplus tobacco
back again, as if his pocket were a drawer. Then, he took a
live coal from the fire with the tongs, and lighted his pipe at it,
and then turned round on the hearth -rug with his back to the
fire, and went through his favourite action of holding out both
his hands for mine.”
“ And this , ” said he, dandling my hands up and down in his,
as he puffed at his pipe ; “ and this is the gentleman what I
made ! The real genuine One ! It does me good fur to look at
you , Pip. All I stip'late, is, to stand by and look at you, dear
boy !"
I released my hands as soon as I could , and found that I was
beginning slowly to settle down to the contemplation of my
condition . What I was chained to, and how heavily, became
intelligible to me, as I heard his hoarse voice, and sat looking
up at his furrowed bald head with its iron grey hair at the sides.
GG
I mustn't see my gentleman a footing in the mire of the
streets ; there mustn't be no mud on his boots. My gentleman
must have horses, Pip ! Horses to ride, and horses to drive,
and horses for his servant to ride and drive as well. Shall
colonists have their horses (and blood ’uns, if you please, good
Lord ! ) and not my London gentleman ? No, no. We'll show
' em another pair of shoes than that, Pip ; won't us ?”
He took out of his pocket a great thick pocket -book, bursting
with papers, and tossed it on the table.
“ There's something worth spending in that there book, dear
boy. It's yourn . All I've got ain't mine; it's yourn. Don't
you be afeerd on it. There's more where that come from . I've
come to the old country fur to see my gentleman spend his
money like a gentleman. That'll be my pleasure. My pleasure
’ull be fur to see him do it. And blast you all !” he wound up ,
looking round the room and snapping his fingers once with a
loud snap, “ blast you every one, from the judge in his wig, to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 299

the colonist a stirring up the dust, I'll show a better gentleman

than the whole kit on you put together !"
“ Stop !” said I, almost in a frenzy of fear and dislike, “ I want
to speak to you. I want to know what is to be done . I want
to know how you are to be kept out of danger, how long you are
going to stay, what projects you have."
“ Look’ee here, Pip ,” said he, laying his
CG hand on my arm in a
suddenly altered and subdued manner ; first of all, look'ee here.
I forgot myself half a minute ago . What I said was low ; that's
what it was ; low. Look’ee here, Pip. Look over it. I ain't a
going to be low ."
“ First," I resumed , half groaning , " what precautions can be
taken against your being recognised and seized ? ”
th
“ No, dear boy ,” he said , in the same tone as before, 66 at
don't go first. Lowness goes first. I ain't took so many year
to make a gentleman , not without knowing what's due to him.
Look’ee here, Pip. >> I was low ; that's what I was ; low. Look
over it, dear boy.”
Some sense of the grimly -ludicrous moved me to a fretful
Heaven's name,
3 laugh, as I replied, “ I have looked over it. In
don't harp upon it !”
“ Yes, but look'ee here,” he persisted. “ Dear boy, I ain't
come so fur, not fur to be low. Now , go on, dear boy. You
99
was a saying
6. How are you to be guarded from the danger you have
incurred ?”
“Well, dear boy, the danger ain't so great. Without I was
informed agen , the danger ain't so much to signify. There's
Jaggers, and there's Wemmick , and there's you. Who else is
there to inform ? ”
“ Is there no chance person who might identify you in the
street ? ” said I.
" Well,” he returned , “there ain't many . Nor yet I don't
intend to advertise myself in the newspapers by the name of
A.M. come back from Botany Bay ; and years have rolled away ,
and who's to gain by it ? Still, look'ee here, Pip. If the
danger had been fifty times as great, I should ha' come to see
you, mind you, just the same. "
“And how long do you remain ?"
“How long ?" said he, taking his black pipe from his mouth ,
and dropping his jaw as he stared at me. “ I'm not a going
back. I've come for good .”
300 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

" Where are you to live? ” said I. “What is to be done with

you ? Where will you be safe ? "
“ Dear boy, " he returned , “ there's disguising wigs can be
bought for money , and there's hair powder, and spectacles, and
black clothes shorts and what not. Others has done it safe
afore, and what others has done afore, others can do agen . As 1
to the where and how of living, dear boy, give me your own
opinions on it.”
“ You take it smoothly now ," said I, “but you were very
serious last night, when you swore it was Death.”
“ And so I swear it is Death ,” said he, putting his pipe back
in his mouth , “ and Death by the rope , in the open street not
fur from this, and it's serious that you should fully understand
it to be so. What then, when that's once done ? Here I am .
To go back now, 'ud be as bad as to stand ground - worse. Be
sides, Pip, I'm here, because I've meant it by you, years and
years. As to what I dare, I'm a old bird now, as has dared all
manner of traps since first he was fledged, and I'm not afeerd to
perch upon a scarecrow . If there's Death hid inside of it, there
is, and let him come out, and I'll face him , and then I'll believe
in him and not afore . And now let me have a look at my
gentleman agen .
Once more, he took me by both hands and surveyed me with
an air of admiring proprietorship : smoking with great com
placency all the while .
It appeared to me that I could do no better than secure him
some quiet lodging hard by, of which he might take possession
when Herbert returned : whom I expected in two or three days.
That the secret must be confided to Herbert as a matter of un
avoidable necessity, even if I could have put the immense relief
I should derive from sharing it with him out of the question,
was plain to me. But it was by no means so plain to Mr. Provis
(I resolved to call him by that name), who reserved his consent
to Herbert's participation until he should have seen him and
formed a favourable judgment of his physiognomy. 66 And
even then, dear boy ,” said he, pulling a greasy little clasped
black Testament out of his pocket, 56 we'll have him on his
oath .”
To state that my terrible patron carried this little black book
about the world solely to swear people on in cases of emergency ,
would be to state what I never quite established — but this I can
say, that I never knew him put it to any other use . The book
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 301

itself had the appearance of having been stolen from some court
of justice, and perhaps his knowledge of its antecedents, com
bined with his own experience in that wise, gave him a reliance
on its powers as a sort of legal spell or charm . On this first
occasion of his producing it, I recalled how he had made me
swear fidelity in the churchyard long ago, and how he had de
scribed himself last night as always swearing to his resolutions
in his solitude.
As he was at present dressed in ù seafaring slop suit, in which
he looked as if he had some parrots and cigars to dispose of, I
Dext discussed with him what dress he should wear. He
cherished an extraordinary belief in the virtues of “shorts
as a disguise, and had in his own mind sketched a dress for
himself that would have made him something between a dean
and a dentist. It was with considerable difficulty that I won
him over to the assumption of a dress more like a prosperous
farmer's ; and we arranged that ne should cut his hair close, and
wear a little powder. Lastly, as he had not yet been seen by
the laundress or her niece, he was to keep himself out of their
view until his change of dress was made.
It would seem a simple matter to decide on these precautions ;
but in my dazed, not to say distracted, state, it took so long,
that I did not get out to further them , until two or three in the
afternoon . He was to remain shut up in the chambers while I
was gone, and was on no account to open the door.
There being to my knowledge a respectable lodging -house in
Essex-street, the back of which looked into the Temple, and was
almost within hail of my windows, I first of all repaired to that
house, and was so fortunate as to secure the second floor for my
uncle, Mr. Provis. I then went from shop to shop, making such
purchases as were necessary to the change in his appearance .
This business transacted , I turned my face, on my own account,
to Little Britain . Mr. Jaggers was at his desk, but, seeing me
enter, got up immediately and stood before his fire.
“ Now , Pip ,” said he, “ be careful .”
“ I will, sir,” I returned. For, coming along, I had thought
well of what I was going to say .
“ Don't commit yourself,” said Mr. Jaggers, 6 and don't com
mit any one . You understand — any one. Don't tell me any
thing : I don't want to know anything ; I am not curious.”
Of course I saw that he knew the man was come.
" I merely want, Mr. Jaggers," said I, “ to assure myself what
302 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

I have been told, is true. I have no hope of its being untrue,

but at least I may verify it."
Mr. Jaggers nodded . “ But did you say told ' or ' in
formed ' ?” he asked me, with his head on one side, and not
looking at me, but looking in a listening way at the floor .
“ Told would seem to imply verbal communication . You can't
have verbal communication with a man in New South Wales,
you know ."
" I will say, informed , Mr. Jaggers."
6 Good . ”
“ I have been informed by a person named Abel Magwitch,
that he is the benefactor so long unknown to me .”
“ That is the man ,” said Mr. Jaggers, “-in New South
Wales .”
“ And only he ?" said I.
“And only he, " said Mr. Jaggers.
“ I am not so unreasonable, sir, as to think you at all respon
sible for my mistakes and wrong conclusions; but I always
supposed it was Miss Havisham ."
“ As you say, Pip," returned Mr. Jaggers, turning his eyes
upon me coolly, and taking a bite at his forefinger, “ I am not at
all responsible for that.
“ And yet it looked so like it, sir,” I pleaded with a downcast
heart.
“ Not a particle of evidence, Pip ,” said Mr. Jaggers, shaking
his head and gathering up his skirts. “ Take nothing on its
looks ; take everything on evidence. There's no better rule ."
“ I have no more to say,” said I, with a sigh, after standing
silent for a little while. “ I have verified my information, and
there's an end ."
“ And Magwitch - in New South Wales — having at last dis
closed himself,” said Mr. Jaggers, “ you will comprehend, Pip,
how rigidly throughout my communication with you, I have
always adhered to the strict line of fact. There has never been
the least departure from the strict line of fact. You are quite
aware of that ? ”
Quite, sir.”
“ I communicated to Magwitch - in New South Wales — when
he first wrote to me — from New South Wales — the caution that
he must not expect me ever to deviate from the strict line of
fact. I also communicated to him another caution . He ap
peared to me to have obscurely hinted in his letter at some
 GREAT EXPEOTATIONS. 303

distant idea of seeing you in England here. I cautioned him

that I must hear no more of that ; that he was not at all likely
to obtain a pardon ; that he was expatriated for the term of
his natural life ; and that his presenting himself in this country
would be an act of felony, rendering him liable to the extreme
penalty of the law . I gave Magwitch that caution," said
Mr. Jaggers looking hard at me ; " I wrote it to New South
Wales. He guided himself by it, no doubt . ”
“ No doubt," said I.
“ I have been informed by Wemmick," pursued Mr. Jaggers,
still looking hard at me, “ that he has received a letter, under
date Portsmouth, from a colonist of the name of Purvis ,
or
“ Or Provis," I suggested.
“ Or Provis — thank you, Pip. Perhaps it is Provis ? Per
haps you know it's Provis ?”
“ Yes, " said I.
“ You know it's Provis. A letter, under date Portsmouth,
from a colonist of the name of Provis, asking for the particulars
of your address, on behalf of Magwitch. Wemmick sent him
the particulars, I understand , by return of post. Probably it is
through Provis that you have received the explanation of Mag
witch — in New South Wales ?"
“ It came through Provis, " I replied.
“ Good day, Pip," said Mr. Jaggers, offering his hand ; " glad
to have seen you. In writing by post to Magwitch - in New
South Wales - or in communicating with him through Provis,
have the goodness to mention that the particulars and vouchers
of our long account shall be sent to you, together with the
balance ; for there is still a balance remaining. Good day,
Pip !"
We shook hands, and he looked hard at me as long as he
could see me. I turned at the door, and he was still looking
hard at me, while the two vile casts on the shelf seemed to be
trying to get their eyelids open , and to force out of their swollen
throats, “ O , what a man he is !”
Wemmick was out, and though he had been at his desk he
could have done nothing for me. I went straight back to the
Temple, where I found the terrible Provis drinking rum -and
water, and smoking negro -head, in safety .
Next day the clothes I had ordered, all came home, and he
put them on . Whatever he put on, became him less it dismally
304 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

seemed to me) than what he had worn before. To my thinking

there was something in him that made it hopeless to attempt to
disguise him . The more I dressed him and the better I dressed
him , the more he looked like the slouching fugitive on the marshes.
This effect on my anxious fancy was partly referable, no doubt, to
his old face and manner growing more familiar to me : but I be
lieve too that he dragged one of his legs as if there were still a
weight of iron on it, and that from head to foot there was
Convict in the very grain of the man .
The influences of his solitary hut -life were upon him besides,
and gave him a savage air that no dress could tame ; added to
these were the influences of his subsequent branded life among
men, and, crowning all, his consciousness that he was dodging
and hiding now. In all his ways of sitting and standing,
and eating and drinking - of brooding about, in a high -shouldered
reluctant style - of taking out his great horn -handled jack -knife
and wiping it on his legs and cutting his food - of lifting light
glasses and cups to his lips, as if they were clumsy pannikins
of chopping a wedge off his bread, and soaking up with it the
last fragments of gravy round and round his plate, as if to make
the most of an allowance, and then drying his finger -ends on it,
and then swallowing it — in these ways and a thousand other
small nameless instances arising every minute in the day, there
was Prisoner, Felon, Bondsman, plain as plain could be.
It had been his own idea to wear that touch of powder, and I
conceded the powder after overcoming the shorts. But I can
compare the effect of it, when on, to nothing but the probable
effect of rouge upon the dead ; so awful was the manner in which
everything in him that it was most desirable to repress, started
through that thin layer of pretence, and seemed to come blazing
out at the crown of his head. It was abandoned as soon as
tried, and he wore his grizzled hair cut short.
Words cannot tell what a sense I had, at the same time, of
the dreadful mystery that he was to me . When he fell asleep of
an evening, with his knotted hands clenching the sides of the
easy -chair, and his bald head tattooed with deep wrinkles falling 1
forward on his breast, I would sit and look at him , wondering
what he had done, and loading him with all the crimes in the
Calendar, until the impulse was powerful on me to start up and
fly from him . Every hour so increased my abhorrence of him,
that I even think I might have yielded to this impulse in the
first agonies of being so haunted, notwithstanding all he had
à
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 305

done for me and the risk he ran , but for the knowledge that
Herbert must soon come back Once, I actually did start out
of bed in the night, and begin to dress myself in my worst
clothes, hurriedly intending to leave him there with everything
else I possessed, and enlist for India, as a private soldier .
I doubt if a ghost could have been more terrible to me, up in
those lonely rooms in the long evenings and long nights, with
the wind and the rain always rushing by. A ghost could not
have been taken and hanged on my account, and the considera
tion that he could be, and the dread that he would be, were no
small addition to my horrors. When he was not asleep, or playing
a complicated kind of Patience with a ragged pack of cards of his
own — a game that I never saw before or since, and in which he
recorded his winnings by sticking his jack -knife into the table
when he was not engaged in either of these pursuits, he would ask
me to read to him— “ Foreign language, dear boy !" While I com
plied, he, not comprehending a single word, would stand before
the fire surveying me with the air of an Exhibitor, and I would
see him , between the fingers of the hand with which I shaded
my face, appealing in dumb show to the furniture to take notice
of my proficiency. The imaginary student pursued by the
misshapen creature he had impiously made, was not more
wretched than I, pursued by the creature who had made me, and
recoiling from him with a stronger repulsion, the more he ad
mired me and the fonder he was of me.
This is written of, I am sensible, as if it had lasted a year.
It lasted about five days. Expecting Herbert all the time, I
dared not go out, except when I took Provis for an airing
after dark . At length, one evening when dinner was over and I
had dropped into a slumber quite worn out — for my nights had
been agitated and my rest broken by fearful dreams-- I was
roused by the welcome footstep on the staircase. Provis, who
had been asleep too, staggered up at the noise I made, and in
an instant I saw his jack -knife shining in his hand .
“Quiet ! It's Herbert ! ” I said ; and Herbert came bursting
in, with the airy freshness of six hundred miles of France upon
him .
66
· Handel, my dear fellow , how are you, and again how are
you, and again how are you ? I seem to have been gone a twelve
month ! Why, so I must have been, for you have grown quite
thin and pale ! Handel, my - Halloa ! I beg your pardon."
He was stopped in his running on and in his shaking hands
X
306 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

with me, by seeing Provis . Provis, regarding him with a fixed

attention, was slowly putting up his jack-knife, and groping in
another pocket for something else.
CG Herbert
, my dear friend,” said I, shutting the double doors,
while Herbert stood staring and wondering, “ something very
strange has happened. This is a visitor of mine ."
“ It's all right, dear boy ! ” said Provis coming forward, with
his little clasped black book, and then addressing himself to
Herbert. “ Take it in your right hand. Lord strike you dead
on the spot, if ever you split in any way suměver . Kiss it !”
“ Do so, as he wishes it,” I said to Herbert. So, Herbert,
looking at me with a friendly uneasiness and amazement, com
plied, and Provis immediately shaking hands with him , said,
“ Now you're on your oath, you know . And never believe me
on mine, if Pip shan't make a gentleman on you ! "

CHAPTER XLI.

In vain should I attempt to describe the astonishment and dis

quiet of Herbert, when he and I and Provis sat down before the
fire, and I recounted the whole of the secret. Enough, that I
saw my own feelings reflected in Herbert's face, and, not least
among them , my repugnance towards the man who had done so
much for me.
What would alone have set a division between that man and
us, if there had been no other dividing circumstance, was his
triumph in my story. Saving his troublesome sense of having
been " low on one occasion since his return - on which point
he began to hold forth to Herbert, the moment my revelation
was finished - he had no perception of the possibility of my
finding any fault with my good fortune. His boast that he had
made me a gentleman, and that he had come to see me support
the character on his ample resources, was made for me quite as
much as for himself. And that it was a highly agreeable boast
to both of us, and that we must both be very proud of it, was a
conclusion quite established in his own mind .
1
Though, look’ee here, Pip’s comrade,” he said to Herbert,
after having discoursed for some time, “ I know very well that
once since I come back — for half a minute - I've been low. I
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 307

said to Pip , I knowed as I had been low. But don't you fret
yourself on that score , I ain't made Pip a gentleman, and Pip
ain't a-going to make you a gentleman, not fur me not to know
what’s due to ye both . Dear boy, and Pip's comrade, you two
> may count upon me always having a gen-teel muzzle on. Muz
zled I have been since that half a minute when I was betrayed
into lowness, muzzled I am at the present time , muzzled I ever
will be. "
Herbert said, “ Certainly , ” but looked as if there were no
specific consolation in this, and remained perplexed and dis
mayed. We were anxious for the time when he would go to his
lodging, and leave us together, but he was evidently jealous of
leaving us together, and sat late . It was midnight before I took
him 'round to Essex Street, and saw him safely in at his own
dark door. When it closed upon him, I experienced the first
moment of relief I had known since the night of his arrival.
Never quite free from an uneasy remembrance of the man on
the stairs, I had always looked about me in taking my guest out
after dark, and in bringing him back ; and I looked about me
now. Difficult as it is in a large city to avoid the suspicion of
being watched , when the mind is conscious of danger in that
regard, I could not persuade myself that any of the people within
sight cared about my movements. The few who were passing,
passed on their several ways, and the street was empty when I
turned back into the Temple. Nobody had come out at the
gate with us, nobody went in at the gate with me . As I crossed
by the fountain, I saw his lighted back windows looking bright
and quiet, and, when I stood for a few moments in the doorway
of the building where I lived , before going up the stairs, Garden
court was as still and lifeless as the staircase was when I as
cended it.
Herbert received me with open arms, and I had never felt be
fore so blessedly, what it is to have a friend. When he had
spoken some sound words of sympathy and encouragement, we
> sat down to consider the question, What was to be done ?
The chair that Provis had occupied still remaining where it
had stood — for he had a barrack way with him of hanging about
one spot, in one unsettled manner , and going through one round
of observances with his pipe and his negro - head and his jack
knife and his pack of cards, and what not, as if it were all put
down for him on a slate -I say, his chair remaining where it
had stood , Herbert unconsciously took it, but next moment
308 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

started out of it, pushed it away , and took another. He had no

occasion to say , after that, that he had conceived an aversion for
my patron, neither had I occasion to confess my own . We in
terchanged that confidence without shaping a syllable.
“ What, ” said I to Herbert, when he was safe in another chair,
" what is to be done ? ”
“ My poor dear Handel, ” he replied, holding his head , “ I am
too stunned to think .”
“ So was I, Herbert, when the blow first fell. Still, somo
thing must be done. He is intent upon various new expenses —
horses, and carriages, and lavish appearances of all kinds. He
must be stopped somehow . "
“ You mean that you can't accept
“ How can I ?” I interposed, as Herbert paused . “ Think of
him ! Look at him ! ”
An involuntary shudder passed over both of us .
“ Yet I am afraid the dreadful truth is, Herbert, that he is
attached to me, strongly attached to me. Was there ever such
a fate !”
“My poor dear Handel," Herbert repeated.
" Then ," said I, " after all, stopping short here, never taking
another penny from him, think what I owe him already ! Then
again : I am heavily in debt - very heavily for me, who have
now no expectations — and I have been bred to no calling, and
I am fit for nothing. "
“ Well, well, well ! ” Herbert remonstrated . - Don't say fit
for nothing . "
“ What am I fit for ? I know only one thing that I am fit
for, and that is, to go for a soldier. And I might have gone ,
my dear Herbert, but for the prospect of taking counsel with
your friendship and affection . ”
Of course I broke down there ; and of course Herbert, be
yond seizing a warm grip of my hand , pretended not to know it.
66
• Anyhow , my dear Handel, ” said he presently, “ soldiering
won't do. If you were to renounce this patronage and these
favours, I suppose you would do so with some faint hope of one
day repaying what you have already had . Not very strong, that
hope, if you went soldiering ! Besides, it's absurd . You would
be infinitely better in Clarriker's house, small as it is. I am
working up towards a partnership, you know.”
Poor fellow ! He little suspected with whose money.
“But there is another question,” said Herbert. “ This is
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 309

determined man , an ignorant who has long had one fixed idea.
More than that, he seems to me (I may misjudge him) to be a
man of a desperate and fierce character . ”
“ I know he is ,” I returned . “ Let me tell you what evidence
I have seen of it .” And I told him what I had not mentioned
in my narrative ; of that encounter with the other convict.
“ See, then, ” said Herbert ; “ think of this ! He comes here
at the peril of his life, for the realisation of his fixed idea. In
the moment of realisation, after all his toil and waiting, you
cut the ground from under his feet, destroy his idea, and make
his gains worthless to him . Do you see nothing that he might
do, under the disappointment ? "
“ I have seen it, Herbert, and dreamed of it, ever since the
fatal night of his arrival. Nothing has been in my thoughts so
distinctly as his putting himself in the way of being taken .”
“ Then you may rely upon it,” said Herbert, “ that there
would be great danger of his doing it . That is his power over
you as long as he remains in England, and that would be his
reckless course if you forsook him .”
) I was so struck by the horror of this idea, which had weighed
upon me from the first, and the working out of which would
make me regard myself, in some sort, as his murderer, that I
could not rest in my chair but began pacing to and fro. I said
to Herbert, meanwhile, that even if Provis were recognised and
taken, in spite of himself, I should be wretched as the cause,
however innocently. Yes ; even though I was so wretched in
having him at large and near me, and even though I would far
rather have worked at the forge all the days of my life than
I would ever have come to this !
But there was no staving off the question, What was to be
done ?
“ The first and the main thing to be done,” said Herbert, “ is
to get him out of England. You will have to go with him , and
then he may be induced to go .”
“ But get him where I will, could I prevent his coming back ?"
“ My good Handel, is it not obvious that with Newgate in the
next street, there must be far greater hazard in your breaking
your mind to him and making him reckless, here, than else
where. If a pretext to get him away could be made out of that
other convict, or out of anything else in his life, now . "
“ There again ! ” said I, stopping before Herbert, with my
open hands held out, as if they contained the desperation of
310 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
the case . “ I know nothing of his life. It has almost made
me mad to sit here of a night and see him before me, so bound
up with my fortunes and misfortunes, and yet so unknown to
me, except as the miserable wretch who terrified me two days
in my childhood !”
Herbert got up, and linked his arm in mine, and we slowly
walked to and fro together, studying the carpet.
CC
Handel,” said Herbert, stopping, “ you feel convinced that
you can take no further benefits from him ; do you ?”
“ Fully . Surely you would, too, if you were in my place ?”
66 And you feel convinced that you must break with him ?”
66
Herbert, can you ask me ?”
5 And you have, and are bound to have, that tenderness for
the life he has risked on your account, that you must save him ,
if possible, from throwing it away . Then you must get him out
of England before you stir a finger to extricate yourself. That
done, extricate yourself, in Heaven's name, and we'll see it out
together, dear old boy."
It was a comfort to shake hands upon it, and walk up and
down again, with only that done.
“ Now, Herbert,” said I, “ with reference to gaining some
knowledge of his history. There is but one way that I know
of. I must ask him point -blank .”
“ Yes. Ask him , ” said Herbert, “ when we sit at breakfast in
the morning .” For, he had said, on taking leave of Herbert,
that he would come to breakfast with us.
With this project formed , we went to bed. I had the wildest
dreams concerning him , and woke unrefreshed ; I woke, too,
to recover the fear which I had lost in the night, of his being
found out as a returned transport. Waking, I never lost that
fear.
He came round at the appointed time, took out his jack - knife,
and sat down to his meal. He was full of plans “ for his gentle
man's coming out strong, and like a gentleman , " and urged me
to begin speedily upon the pocket-book, which he had left in my
possession . He considered the chambers and his own lodging
temporary residences, and advised me to look out at once for
a “ fashionable crib ” near Hyde Park, in which he could have
a shake-down. ” When he had made an end of his breakfast,
and was wiping his knife on his leg, I said to him , without a
word of preface :
“ After you were gone last night, I told my friend of the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 311

struggle that the soldiers found you engaged in on the marshes,

when we came up. You remember ?”
“ Remember !” said he. “ I think so !”
“ We want to know something about that man — and about
you. It is strange to know no more about either, and particu
larly you, than I was able to tell last night. Is not this as
good a time as another for our knowing more ?”
“ Well !” he said, after consideration . “ You're on your oath,
you know, Pip's comrade ?"
66
Assuredly ,” replied Herbert.
“ As to anything I say, you know," he insisted . " The oath
applies to all. ”
“ I understand it to do so."
66 And look'ee here ! Wotever I done, is worked out and
paid for, " he insisted again.
" So be it.”
He took out his black pipe and was going to fill it with negro
head, when, looking at the tangle of tobacco in his hand, he
seemed to think it might perplex the thread of his narrative.
He put it back again, stuck his pipe in a button -hole of his
coat, spread a hand on each knee, and, after turning an angry
eye on the fire for a few silent moments , looked around at us
and said what follows.

CHAPTER XLII.

" Dear boy and Pip's comrade. I am not a going fur to tell
you my life, like a song or a story -book. But to give it you
short and handy, I'll put it at once into a mouthful of English.
In jail and out of jail, in jail and out of jail , in jail and out of
jail. There, you've got it. That's my life pretty much,
down to such times as I got shipped off, arter Pip stood may
friend .
>
“ I've been done everything to, pretty well - except hanged.
I've been locked up, as much as a silver tea - kittle. I've been
carted here and carted there, and put out of this town and put
out of that town, and stuck in the stocks, and whipped and
worried and drove. I've no more notion where was born ,
than you have - if so much. I first become aware of myself,
down in Essex, a thieving turnips for my living. Summun had
312 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
run away from me - a man — a tinker — and he'd took the fire
with him , and left me wery cold.
“ I know'd my name to be Magwitch, chrisen'd Abel. How
did I know it ? Much as I know'd the birds' names in the
hedges to be chaffinch , sparrer, thrush . I might have thought
it was all lies together, only as the birds' names come out true,
I supposed mine did.
“ So fur as I could find, there warn't a soul that see young
Abel Magwitch , with as little on him as in him , but wot caught
fright at him , and either drove him off, or took him up I was
took up, took up , took up , to that extent that I reg'larly grow'd
up took up.
“ This is the way it was, that when I was a ragged little
creetur as much to be pitied as ever I see (not that I looked in
the glass, for there warn’t many insides of furnished houses
known to me), I got the name of being hardened . “ This is a
terrible hardened one,' they says to prison wisitors, picking out
me. May be said to live in jails, this boy .' Then they looked
at me, and I looked at them , and they measured my head, some
on 'em — they had better a measured my stomach — and others on
' em giv me tracts what I couldn't read, and made me speeches
what I couldn't unnerstand. They always went on agen me
about the Devil. But what the devil was I to do ? I must put
something into my stomach , mustn't I ?-Howsomever, I'm a
getting low, and I know what's due. Dear boy and Pip's com
rade, don't you be afeerd of me being low.
“ Tramping, begging, thieving, working sometimes when I
could — though that warn't as often as you may think, till
you put the question whether you would ha ' been over ready
to give me work yourselves — a bit of a poacher, a bit of a
labourer, a bit of a waggoner, a bit of a haymaker, a bit of
a hawker, a bit of most things that don't pay and lead to
trouble, I got to be a man . A deserting soldier in a Tra
veller's Rest, what lay hid up to the chin under a lot of taturs,
learnt me to read ; and a travelling Giant what signed his
name at a penny a time learnt me to write. I warn't locked
up as often now as formerly , but I wore out my good share of
key -metal still,
“ At Epsom races, a matter of over twenty year ago, I got
acquainted wi' a man whose skull I'd crack wi' this poker, like
the claw of a lobster, if I'd got it on this hob. His right name
was Compeyson ; and that's the man , dear boy, what you see me
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 313

a pounding in the ditch, according to what you truly told your

comrade arter I was gone last night.
“ He set up fur a gentleman, this Compeyson, and he'd
been to a public boarding -school and had learning . He was a
smooth one to talk , and was a dab at the ways of gentlefolks.
He was good -looking too . It was the night afore the great
race, when I found him on the heath , in a booth that I know'd
on. Him and some more was a sitting among the tables when
I went in, and the landlord (which had a knowledge of me, and
was a sporting one) called him out, and said , ' I think this is a
man that might suit you ' — meaning I was .
“ Compeyson, he looks at me very noticing, and I look at him .
He has a watch and a chain and a ring and a breast-pin and a
handsome suit of clothes.
“ To judge from appearances, you're out of luck,' says Com
peyson to me.
6. Yes, master, and I've never been in it much. ” (I had come
out of Kingston Jail last on a vagrancy committal. Not but
what it might have been for something else ; but it warn't.)
“ Luck changes,' says Compeyson ; perhaps yours is going
to change.'
“ I says, “ I hope it may be so . There's room .'
6.What can you do ?' says Compeyson .
" " Eat and drink ,' I says ; ' if you'll find the materials.
“ Compeyson laughed, looked at me again very noticing, giv
me five shillings, and appointed me for next night. Same
place.
“ I went to Compeyson next night, same place, and Compey
son took me on to be his man and pardner. And what was
Compeyson's business in which we was to go pardners ? Com
peyson's business was the swindling, handwriting forging, stolen
bank - note passing, and such-like. All sorts of traps as Com
peyson could set with his head , and keep his own legs out of
' and get the profits from and let another man in for, was Com
peyson's business. He'd no more heart than a iron file, he was
as cold as death, and he had the head of the Devil afore men
tioned.
“ There was another in with Compeyson, as was called Arthur
--not as being so chrisen'd , but as a surname. He was in a
Decline, and was a shadow to look at. Him and Compeyson
had been in a bad thing with a rich lady some years afore, and
they'd made a pot of money by it ; but Compeyson betted and
314 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

gamed, and he'd have run through the king's taxes. So, Arthur
was a dying and a dying poor and with the horrors on him , and
Compeyson's wife (which Compeyson kicked mostly ) was a
having pity on him when she could, and Compeyson was a
having pity on nothing and nobody.
" I might a took warning by Arthur, but I didn't ; and I
won't pretend I was partick'ler — for where 'ud be the good on
it, dear boy and comrade ? So I begun wi' Compeyson , and a
poor tool I was in his hands. Arthur lived at the top of Com
peyson's house (over nigh Brentford it was) , and Compeyson
kept a careful account agen him for board and lodging, in case
he should ever get better to work it out. But Arthur soon set
tled the account. The second or third time as ever I see him,
he come a tearing down into Compeyson's parlour late at night,
in only a flannel gown, with his hair all in a sweat, and he says
to Compeyson's wife, Sally, she really is up - stairs alonger me,
now , and I can't get rid of her. She's all in white,' he says,
wi' white flowers in her hair, and she's awful mad, and she's
got a shroud hanging over her arm , and she says she'll put it on
me at five in the morning .' 1
“ Says Compeyson : Why, you fool, don't you know she's got
a living body ? And how should she be up there, without com
ing through the door, or in at the window , and up the
stairs ? '
“ I don't know how she's there ,' says Arthur, shivering dread
ful with the horrors, ' but she's standing in the corner at the
foot of the bed, awful mad. And over where her heart's broke
-you broke it ! —there's drops of blood.'
66
Compeyson spoke hardy, but he was always a coward . " Go
up alonger this drivelling sick man ,' he says to his wife, and
Magwitch, lend her a hand, will you ?' But he never come nigh
himself.
Compeyson's wife and me took him up to bed agen , and he
raved most dreadful. Why look at her ! ' he cries out. . She's
a shaking the shroud at me ! Don't you see her ? Look at her
eyes ! Ain't it awful to see her so mad ? Next, he cries, “ She'll
put it on me, and then I'm done for ! Take it away from her,
take it away !' And then he catched hold of us, and kep on a
talking to her, and answering of her, till I half believed I see
her myself.
“Compeyson's wife, being used to him , give him some liquor
to get the horrors off, and by-and-by he quieted. “ Oh, she's
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 315

gone ! Has her keeper been for her ?' he says. " Yes ,' says
Compeyson's wife. “ Did you tell him to lock and bar her in ?'
· Yes . ' * And to take that ugly thing away from her ?' ' Yes,
yes, all right.” ' You're a good creetur,' he says, don't leave
me, whatever you do, and thank you !
“ He rested pretty quiet till it might want a few minutes of
five, and then he starts up with a scream , and screams out,
* Here she is ! She's got the shroud again. She's unfolding it.
She's coming out of the corner. She's coming to the bed. Hold
me, both on you—one of each side - don't let her touch me with
it. Hah ! She missed me that time. Don't let her throw it
over my shoulders. Don't let her lift me up to get it round me.
She's lifting me up. Keep me down ! ' Then he lifted himself
up hard, and was dead .
Compeyson took it easy as a good riddance for both sides.
Him and me was soon busy, and first he swore me (being ever
artful) on my own book — this here little black book, dear boy,
what I swore your comrade on .
“ Not to go into the things that Compeyson planned, and I
1 done — which ’ud take a week—I'll simply say to you, dear boy,
and Pip's comrade, that that man got me into such nets as m
' ade
me his black slave. I was always in debt to him , always under
his thumb, always a working, always a getting into danger. He
was younger than me, but he'd got craft, and he'd got learning,
and he overmatched me five hundred times told and no mercy .
My Missis as I had the hard time wi'-- Stop though ! I ain't
brought her in-- "
He looked about him in a confused way , as if he had lost his
place in the book of his remembrance ; and he turned his face
to the fire, and spread his hands broader on his knees, and lifted
them off and put them on again .
“ There ain't no need to go into it,” he said, looking round
once more . “ The time wi' Compeyson was aʼmost as hard a
time as ever I had ; that said , all's said . Did I tell you as I
was tried , alone, for misdemeanour, while with Compeyson ?"
?
I answered, No.
“ Well !” he said, “ I was, and got convicted . As to took up
on suspicion, that was twice or three times in the four or five
year that it lasted ; but evidence was wanting. At last, me and
Compeyson was both committed for felony --- on a charge of put
ting stolen notes in circulation—and there was other charges
behind. Compeyson says to me, ' Separate defences, no commu
316 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

nication ,' and that was all. And I was so miserable poor, that
I sold all the clothes I had, except what hung on my back, afore
I could get Jaggers.
“ When we was put in the dock , I noticed first of all what a
gentleman Compeyson looked, wi' his curly hair and his black
clothes and his white pocket -handkercher, and what a common
sort of a wretch I looked . When the prosecution opened and
the evidence was put short, aforehand, I noticed how heavy it
all bore on me, and how light on him . When the evidence was
giv in the box, I noticed how it was always me that had come
for’ard, and could be swore to, how it was always me that the
money had been paid to, how it was always me that had seemed
to work the thing and get the profit. But, when the defence
come on, then I see the plan plainer ; for, says the counsellor
for Compeyson, 'My lord and gentlemen , here you has afore you ,
side by side, two persons as your eyes can separate wide ; one,
the younger, well brought up, who will be spoke to as such ;
one, the elder, ill brought up, who will be spoke to as such ; one,
the younger, seldom if ever seen in these here transactions, and
only suspected ; t'other, the elder, always seen in ' em and always
wi' his guilt brought home. Can you doubt, if there is but one
in it, which is the one, and if there is two in it, which is much
the worst one ?' And such - like. And when it come to character,
warn't it Compeyson as had been to school, and warn't it his
schoolfellows as was in this position and in that, and warn't it
him as had been know'd by witnesses in such clubs and societies,
and nowt to his disadvantage ? And warn't it me as had been
tried afore, and as had been know'd up hill and down dale in
Bridewells and Lock -Ups ? And when it come to speech -mak
ing, warn't it Compeyson as could speak to 'em wi' his face
dropping every now and then into his white pocket-handkercher
-ah ! and wi' verses in his speech, too - and warn't it me as
could only say, ' Gentlemen, this man at my side is a most
precious rascal ' ? And when the verdict come, warn't it Com
peyson as was recommended to mercy on account of good cha
racter and bad company, and giving up all the information he
could agen me, and warn't it me as got never a word but Guilty ?
And when I says to Compeyson, ‘ Once out of this court, I'll
smash that face o' yourn ?' ain't it Compeyson as prays the
Judge to be protected, and gets two turnkeys stood betwixt us ?
And when we're sentenced, ain't it him as gets seven year, and
me fourteen, and ain't it him as the Judge is sorry for, because
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 317

he might a done so well, and ain't it me as the Judge perceives

to be a old offender of wiolent passion, likely to come to worse ?”
He had worked himself into a state of great excitement, but
he checked it, took two or three short breaths, swallowed as
often, and stretching out his hand towards me said, in a reassur
ing manner, “ I ain't a going to be low , dear boy ! "
He had so heated himself that he took out his handkerchief
and wiped his face and head and neck and hands, before he
could go on .
“ I had said to Compeyson that I'd smash that face of his, and
I swore Lord smash mine ! to do it. We was in the same
prison -ship, but I couldn't get at him for long, though I tried .
At last I come behind him and hit him on the cheek to turn
him round and get a smashing one at him, when I was seen and
seized. The black -hole of that ship warn't a strong one, to a
judge of black - holes that could swim and dive. I escaped to the
shore, and I was a hiding among the graves there, envying them
as was in 'em and all over, when I first see my boy !"
He regarded me with a look of affection that made him almost
abhorrent to me again, though I had felt great pity for him .
“ By my boy, I was giv to understand as Compeyson was out
on them marshes too. Upon my soul, I half believe he escaped
in his terror, to get quit of me, not knowing it was me as had
got ashore . I hunted him down . I smashed his face. And
now ,' says I, as the worst thing I can do, caring nothing for
myself, I'll drag you back .' And I'd have swum off, towing him
by the hair, if it had come to that, and I'd a got him aboard
without the soldiers.
“Of course he'd much the best of it to the last -- his character
was so good . He had escaped when he was made half wild by
me and my murderous intentions ; and his punishment was
light. I was put in irons, brought to trial again, and sent for
life. I didn't stop for life, dear boy and Pip's comrade, being here . "
He wiped himself again , as he had done before, and then
slowly took his tangle of tobacco from his pocket, and plucked
his pipe from his button -hole, and slowly filled it, and began to
smoke.
• Is he dead?” I asked , after a silence .
“ Is who dead , dear boy ? ”
“ Compeyson."
“ He hopes I am , if he's alive, you may be sure," with a
fierce look. " I never heerd no more of him ."
318 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Herbert had been writing with his pencil in the cover of a

book. He softly pushed the book over to me, as Provis stood
smoking with his eyes on the fire, and I read in it :
man who
“ Young Havisham's name was Arthur. Compeyson is the man
professed to be Miss Havisham's lover . ”
I shut the book and nodded slightly to Herbert, and put the
book by ; but we neither of us said anything, and both looked
at Provis as he stood smoking by the fire.

CHAPTER XLIII.

Why should I pause to ask how much of my shrinking from

Provis might be traced to Estella ? Why should I loiter on my
road, to compare the state of mind in which I had tried to rid
myself of the stain of the prison before meeting her at the
coach -office, with the state of mind in which I now reflected on
the abyss between Estella in her pride and beauty, and the
returned transport whom I harboured ? The road would be
none the smoother for it, the end would be none the better for
it, he would not be helped, nor I extenuated .
A new fear had been engendered in my mind by his narrative ;
or rather, his narrative had given form and purpose to the fear
that was already there. If Compeyson were alive and should
discover his return , I could hardly doubt the consequence.
That, Compeyson stood in mortal fear of him , neither of the two
could know much better than I ; and that, any such man as that
man had been described to be, would hesitate to release himself
for good from a dreaded enemy by the safe means of becoming
an informer, was scarcely to be imagined.
Never had I breathed , and never would I breathe - or so I
resolved-a- a word of Estella to Provis. But, I said to Herbert
that before I could go abroad, I must see both Estella and Miss
Havisham . This was when we were left alone on the night of
the day when Provis told us his story. I resolved to go out to
Richmond next day, and I went.
On my presenting myself at Mrs. Blandley's, Estella's maid
was called to tell me that Estella had gone into the country.
Where ? To Satis House, as usual. Not as usual, I said, for
she had never yet gone there without me ; when was she coming
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 319
back ? There was an air of reservation in the answer which
increased my perplexity, and the answer was, that her maid be
lieved she was only coming back at all for a little while . I
could make nothing of this, except that it was meant that I
should make nothing of it, and I went home again in complete
discomfiture.
Another night-consultation with Herbert after Provis was
gone home (I always took him home, and always looked well
about me) , led us to the conclusion that nothing should be said
about going abroad until I came back from Miss Havisham’s.
In the mean time, Herbert and I were to consider separately
what it would be best to say ; whether we should devise any
pretence of being afraid that he was under suspicious observa
tion ; or whether I, who had never yet been abroad, should pro
pose an expedition. We both knew that I had but to propose
anything, and he would consent. We agreed that his remaining
many days in his present hazard was not to be thought of.
Next day, I had the meanness to feign that I was under a
binding promise to go down to Joe ; but I was capable of almost
any meanness towards Joe or his name. Provis was to be
strictly careful while I was gone, and Herbert was to take the
charge of him that I had taken . I was to be absent only one
night, and, on my return, the gratification of his impatience for
my starting as a gentleman on a greater scale, was to be begun.
It occurred to me then, and as I afterwards found to Herbert
also, that he might be best got away across the water, on that
pretence —as, to make purchases, or the like.
Having thus cleared the way for my expedition to Miss Havi
sham's, I set off by the early morning coach before it was yet
light, and was out in the open country -road when the day came
creeping on, halting and whimpering and shivering, and wrapped
in patches of cloud and rags of mist, like a beggar. When
we drove up to the Blue Boar after a drizzly ride, whom
should I see come out under the gateway, toothpick in hand, to
look at the coach, but Bentley Drummle !
7
As he pretended not to see me, I pretended not to see him .
It was a very lame pretence on both sides ; the lamer, because
we both went into the coffee- room , where he had just finished
1
his breakfast, and where I had ordered mine. It was poisonous
to me to see him in the town, for I very well knew why he had
come there.
Pretending to read a smeary newspaper long out of date ,
320 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

which had nothing half so legible in its local news, as the

foreign matter of coffee, picklºs, fish sauces, gravy , melted butter,
and wine, with which it was sprinkled all over, as if it had taken
the measles in a highly irregular form , I sat at my table while he
stood before the fire. By degrees it became an enormous injury
to me that he stood before the fire. And I got up, determined
to have my share of it. I had to put my hand behind his legs
for the poker when I went up to the fire- place to stir the fire, but
still pretended not to know him.
6 Is this a cut ? " said Mr. Drummle.
“ Oh ? ” said I, poker in hand ; " it's you, is it ? How do you
do ? I was wondering who it was, who kept the fire off.”
With that I poked tremendously, and having done so,
planted myself side by side with Mr. Drummle, my shoulders
squared and my back to the fire,
“ You have just come down ? ” said Mr. Drummle, edging me a
little away with his shoulder .
“ Yes," said I, edging him a little away with my shoulder.
Beastly place,” said Drummle— “ Your part of the country,
I think ? "
Yes," I assented . “ I am told it's very like your Shrop
shire.”
“ Not in the least like it , ” said Drummle . !
Here Mr. Drummle looked at his boots and I looked at mine,
!
and then Mr. Drummle looked at my boots, and I looked at his.
“ Have you been here long ? ” I asked , determined not to yield
an inch of the fire . Ć

Long enough to be tired of it,” returned Drummle, pre

tending to yawn, but equally determined.
“ Do you stay here long ? ”
6 Can't say,” answered Mr. Drummle . 6 Do you ?”
- Can't say,” said I.
I felt here, through a tingling in my blood, that if Mr.
Drummle's shoulder had claimed another hair's breadth of room ,
I should have jerked him into the window ; equally, that if my
shoulder had urged a similar claim , Mr. Drummle would have 1
jerked me into the nearest box. He whistled a little. So did I.
66
Large tract of marshes about here, I believe i ” said
Drummle.
6 Yes. What of that ? " said I.
Mr. Drummle looked at me, and then at my boots, and then
said, “ Oh !" and laughed.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 321

“ Are you amused , Mr. Drummle ? ”

No,” said he, “ not particularly. I am going out for a ride
in the saddle. I mean to explore those marshes for amusement.
Out -of-the -way villages there , they tell me. Curious little public
houses — and smithies — and that. Waiter ! "
“ Yes, sir .”
“ Is that horse of mine ready ?” .
“ Brought round to the door, sir ."
“ I say. Look here, you sir. The lady won't ride to - day ;
the weather won't do ."
“ Very good, sir ."
“ And I don't dine, because I am going to dine at the lady’s .”
“ Very good, sir."
Then, Drummle glanced at me, with an insolent triumph on
his great-jowled face that cut me to the heart, dull as he was ,
and so exasperated me, that I felt inclined to take him in my
arms (as the robber in the story - book is said to have taken the
old lady ) and seat him on the fire .
One thing was manifest to both of us, and that was, that until
relief came, neither of us could relinquish the fire. There we
stood, well squared up before it, shoulder to shoulder and foot to
foot, with our hands behind us, not budging an inch . The horse
was visible outside in the drizzle at the door, my breakfast was
put on table , Drummle's was cleared away , the waiter invited
me to begin, I nodded, we both stood our ground .
Have you been to the Grove since ? ” said Drummle.
66
No,” said I, “ I had quite enough of the Finches the last
time I was there."
“ Was that when we had a difference of opinion ?"
Yes,” I replied, very shortly.
“ Come, come ! they let you off easily enough ," sneered
Drummle. “ You shouldn't have lost your temper.”
“ Mr. Drummle,” said I, “ you are not competent to give
advice on that subject. When I lose my temper (not that I
admit having done so on that occasion ), I don't throw glasses.”
“ I do,” said Drummle.
After glancing at him once or twice, in an increased state of
smouldering ferocity, I said :
“ Mr. Drummle, I did not seek this conversation, and I don't
think it's an agreeable one.”
“ I am sure it's not ,” said he, suporciliously over his shoulder ;
“ I don't think anything about it.”
Y
322 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ And therefore," I went on , “ with your leave, I will suggest

that we hold no kind of communication in future.”
“ Quite my opinion ," said Drummle, " and what I should have
suggested myself, or done -- more likely - without suggesting.
But don't lose your temper. Haven't you lost enough without
that ? "
• What do you mean , sir ? ”
“ Waiter !” said Drummle, by way of answering me.
The waiter reappeared .
“ Look here, you sir. You quite understand that the young
lady don't ride to -day, and that I dine at the young lady's ?”
Quite so, sir.”
When the waiter had felt my fast -cooling tea-pot with the palm
of his hand, and had looked imploringly at me, and had gone
out, Drummle, careful not to move the shoulder next me, took a
cigar from his pocket and bit the end off, but showed no sign of
stirring. Choking and boiling as I was, I felt that we could
not go a word further, without introducing Estella's name, which
I could not endure to hear him utter ; and therefore I looked
stonily at the opposite wall, as if there were no one present, and
forced myself to silence. How long we might have remained in
this ridiculous position it is impossible to say , but for the
incursion of three thriving farmers — laid on by the waiter, I
think - who came into the coffee - room unbuttoning their great
coats and rubbing their hands, and before whom , as they charged
at the fire, we were obliged to give way .
I saw him through the window, seizing his horse's mane, and
mounting in his blundering brutal manner, and sidling and
backing away . I thought he was gone, when he cameback,
calling for a light for the cigar in his mouth, which he had
forgotten . A man in a dust - coloured dress appeared with what
was wanted - I could not have said from where : whether from
the inn yard, or the street, or where not-and as Drummle leaned
down from the saddle and lighted his cigar and laughed, with a
jerk of his head towards the coffee -room windows, the slouching
shoulders, and ragged hair, of this man whose back was towards
me, reminded me of Orlick .
Too heavily out of sorts to care much at the time whether it
were he or no, or after all to touch the breakfast, I washed the
weather and the journey from my face and hands, and went out
to the memorable old house that it would have been so much the
better for me never to have entered, never to have seen.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 323

CHAPTER XLIV .

In the room where the dressing-table stood, and where the

wax candles burnt on the wall, I found Miss Havisham and
Estella ; Miss Havisham seated on a settee near the fire, and
Estella on a cushion at her feet. Estella was knitting, and Miss
Havisham was looking on. They both raised their eyes as I
went in, and both saw an alteration in me. I derived that, from
the look they interchanged .
“ And what wind,” said Miss Havisham , “blows you here, Pip ?"
Though she looked steadily at me, I saw that she was rather
confused . Estella, pausing for a moment in her knitting with
her eyes upon me, and then going on, I fancied that I read in
the action of her fingers, as plainly as if she had told me in the
dumb alphabet, that she perceived I had discovered my real
benefactor.
“ Miss Havisham , ” said I, “ I went to Richmond yesterday, to
speak to Estella ; and finding that some wind had blown her
here, I followed.”
Miss Havisham motioning to me for the third or fourth time
to sit down, I took the chair by the dressing -table, which I had
often seen her occupy . With all that ruin at my feet and about
me, it seemed a natural place for me, that day .
“ What I had to say to Estella, Miss Havisham , I will say
before you, presently — in a few moments. It will not surprise
you, it will not displease you. I am as unhappy as you can
ever have meant me to be . ”
Miss Havisham continued to look steadily at me . I could
see in the action of Estella's fingers as they worked , that she
attended to what I said : but she did not look up .
“ I have found out who my patron is. It is not a fortunate
discovery, and is not likely ever to enrich me in reputation,
station, fortune, anything. There are reasons why I must say
no more of that. It is not my secret, but another's.”
As I was silent for a while, looking at Estella and considering
how to go on, Miss Havisham repeated , “ It is not your secret ,
but another's. Well ? ”
 324 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ When you first caused me to be brought here, Miss Havi

sham ; when I belonged to the village over yonder, that I wish I
had never left ; I suppose I did really come here, as any other
chance boy might have come — as a kind of servant, to gratify a
want or a whim , and to be paid for it ?”
“Ay, Pip," replied Miss Havisham , steadily nodding her head ;
you did .'
“ And that Mr. Jaggers
“ Mr. Jaggers,” said Miss Havisham , taking me up in a firm
tone, “ had nothing to do with it, and knew nothing of it. His
being my lawyer, and his being the lawyer of your patron is a coin
cidence . He holds the same relation towards numbers of people,
and it might easily arise. Be that as it may, it did arise, and
was not brought about by any one. "
Any one might have seen in her haggard face that there was
no suppression or evasion so far.
“ But when I fell into the mistake I have so long remained in,
at least you led me on ?" said I.
66
Yes,” she returned , again nodding steadily, “ I let you go
on .”
66 Was that kind ? ”
6 Who am I,” cried Miss Havisham , striking her stick upon
the floor and flashing into wrath so suddenly that Estella glanced
up at her in surprise, “ who am I , for God's sake, that I should
be kind !"
It was a weak complaint to have made, and I had not meant to
make it. I told her so , as she sat brooding after this out
burst.
Well, well, well !” she said . " What else ?”
1
** I was liberally paid for my old attendance here,” I said , to
soothe her, “in being apprenticed, and I have asked these ques
tions only for my own information . What follows has another
(and I hope more disinterested ) purpose. In humouring my
mistake, Miss Havisham , you punished - practised on - perhaps
you will supply whatever term expresses your intention, without 1
offence — your self -seeking relations ?”
“ I did . Why, they would have it so ! So would you .
What has been my history, that I should be at the pains of
entreating either them or you not to have it so ! You made
your own snares . I never made them .”
Waiting until she was quiet again -- for this, too, flashed out
of her in a wild and sudden way - I went on .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 325

" I have been thrown among one family of your relations,

Miss Havisham , and have been constantly among them since I
went to London. I know them to have been as honestly under
my delusion as I myself. And I should be false and base if I
did not tell you, whether it is acceptable to you or no, and
whether you are inclined to give credence to it or no, that you
deeply wrong both Mr. Matthew Pocket and his son Herbert, if
you suppose them to be otherwise than generous, upright, open ,
and incapable of anything designing or mean ."
“ They are your friends,” said Miss Havisham .
“ They made themselves my friends,” said I, “ when they sup
posed me to have superseded them ; and when Sarah Pocket, Miss
Georgiana, and Mistress Camilla, were not my friends, I think.”
This contrasting of them with the rest seemed , I was glad to
see, to do them good with her. She looked at me keenly for a
little while, and then said quietly :
“ What do you want for them ?”
Only,” said I, “ that you would not confound them with the
others. They may be of the same blood , but, believe me, they
are not of the same nature.”
Still looking at me keenly, Miss Havisham repeated :
“ What do you want for them ?”
“ I am not so cunning, you see, ” I said, in answer, conscious
that I reddened a little, “ as that I could hide from you, even if
I desired, that I do want something. Miss Havisham , if you
would sparethe money to do my friend Herbert a lasting service
in life, but which from the nature of the case must be done
without his knowledge, I could show you how .”
“ Why must it be done without his knowledge ? ” she asked ,
settling her hands upon her stick , that she might regard me the
more attentively.
Because , ” said I , “ I began the service myself, more than
two years ago, without his knowledge, and I don't want to be
betrayed . Why 1 fail in my ability to finish it, I cannot ex
plain . It is a part of the secret which is another person's and
not mine.”
She gradually withdrew her eyes from me, and turned them
on the fire. After watching it for what appeared in the silence
and by the light of the slowly wasting candles to be a long time ,
she was roused by the collapse of some of the red coals, and
looked towards me again at first, vacantly — then , with a
gradually concentrating attention . All this time, Estella
326 GREAT EXPECTATIONS
knitted on. When Miss Havisham had fixed her attention
on me, she said , speaking as if there had been no lapse in our
dialogue :
" What else ?"
“ Estella," said I, turning to her now , and trying to command
my trembling voice, “ you know I love you. You know that I
have loved you long and dearly .”
She raised her eyes to my face, on being thus addressed , and
her fingers plied their work, and she looked at me with an
unmoved countenance. I saw that Miss Havisham glanced from
me to her, and from her to me.
“ I should have said this sooner, but for my long mistake . It
induced me to hope that Miss Havisham meant us for one
another. While I thought you could not help yourself, as it
were, I refrained from saying it. But I must say it now .
Preserving her unmoved countenance, and with her fingers
still going, Estella shook her head .
“ I know ," said I, in answer to that action ; " I know . I
have no hope that I shall ever call you mine, Estella . I am
ignorant what may become of me very soon, how poor I may be,
or where I may go. Still, I love you. I have loved you ever
since I first saw you in this house ."
Looking at me perfectly unmoved and with her fingers busy,
she shook her head again .
" It would have been cruel in Miss Havisham , horribly cruel ,
to practise on the susceptibility of a poor boy, and to torture
me through all these years with a vain hope and an idle pursuit,
if she had reflected on the gravity of what she did . But I think
she did not. I think that in the endurance of her own trial, she
forgot mine, Estella .”
I saw Miss Havisham put her hand to her heart and hold it
there, as she sat looking by turns at Estella and at me.
“ It seems," said Estella very calmly, “ that there are senti
ments, fancies — I don't know how to call them — which I am not
able to comprehend. When you say you love me, I know what
you mean , as a form of words ; but nothing more . You address
nothing in my breast, you touch nothing there. I don't care for
what you say at all. I have tried to warn you of this ; now ,
have I not ?”
I said in a miserable manner , “ Yes. "
56 Yes. But you would not be warned , for you thought I did
not mean it. Now, did you' not think so ?”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 327

“ I thought and hoped you could not mean it. You, so

young, untried , and beautiful, Estella ! Surely it is not in
Nature.”
“ It is in my nature, " she returned . And then she added,
with a stress upon the words, “ It is in the nature formed within
1 me. I make a great difference between you and all other people
when I say so much. I can do no more.”
“ Is it not true ,” said I , “ that Bentley Drummle is in town
1 here, and pursuing you ? ”
“ It is quite true,” she replied, referring to him with the
indifference of utter contempt .
“ That you encourage him , and ride out with him , and that
de he dines with you this very day ?”
She seemed a little surprised that I should know it, but again
replied, “ Quite true. ”
3 “ You cannot love him , Estella ! ”
Her fingers stopped for the first time, as she retorted rather
1 angrily, " What have I told you ? Do you still think, in spite
of it, that I do not mean what I say ? "
5 “ You would never marry him, Estella ?”
She looked towards Miss Havisham , and considered for a
moment with her work in her hands. Then she said, “ Why not
tell you the truth ? I am going to be married to him . ”
I dropped my face into my hands, but was able to control
myself better than I could have expected, considering what
agony it gave me to hear her say those words. When I raised
my face again , there was such a ghastly look upon Miss Havi
sham’s, that it impressed me, even in my passionate hurry and
grief.
“ Estella, dearest dearest Estella, do not let Miss Havisham
lead you into this fatal step. Put me aside for ever-you have
done so, I well know — but bestow yourself on some worthier
person than Drummle. Miss Havisham gives you to him , as
the greatest slight and injury that could be done to the many
far better men who admire you , and to the few who truly love
you. Among those few , there may be one who loves you even
as dearly, though he has not loved you as long, as I. Take
him , and I can bear it better for your sake !"
My earnestness awoke a wonder in her that seemed as if it
would have been touched with compassion , if she could have
rendered me at all intelligible to her own mind .
“ I am going ,” she said again , in a gentler voice, “ to be mar
328 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

ried to him. The preparations for my marriage are making, and

I shall be married soon. Why do you injuriously introduce the
name of my mother by adoption ? It is my own act. "
“ Your own act, Estella, to fling yourself away upon a brute ?”
“ On whom should I fling myself away ? ” she retorted , with a
smile. “ Should I fling myself away upon the man who would
the soonest feel (if people do feel such things) that I took
nothing to him ? There ! It is done. I shall do well enough,
and so will my husband. As to leading me into what you call
this fatal step, Miss Havisham would have had me wait, and not
marry yet ; but I am tired of the life I have led, which has very
few charms for me, and I am willing enough to change it. Say
no more . We shall never understand each other."
“Such a mean brute, such a stupid brute !" I urged in despair.
“ Don't be afraid of my being a blessing to him , ” said Estella ;
I shall not be that. Come ! Here is my hand . Do we part
on this, you visionary boy -or man ?”
“ O Estella ! ” I answered , as my bitter tears fell fast on her
hand, do what I would to restrain them ; even if I remained in
England and could hold my head up with the rest, how could I
see you Drummle’s wife !"
Nonsense ,” she returned , 66nonsense . This will pass in no
time.”
66· Never, Estella ! "
“ You will get me out of your thoughts in a week .”
“ Out of my thoughts ! You are part of my existence, part of
myself. You have been in every line I have ever read, since
I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you
wounded even then . You have been in every prospect I have
ever seen since — on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the
marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the
wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been
the embodiment of every graceful fancy that my mind has ever
become acquainted with . The stones of which the strongest
London buildings are made, are not more real, or more impos
sible to be displaced by your hands, than your presence and
influence have been to me, there and everywhere, and will be.
Estella , to the last hour of my life, you cannot choose but re
main part of my character, part of the little good in me, part of
the evil. But, in this separation I associate you only with the
good, and I will faithfully hold you to that always, for you must
have done me far more good than harm , let me feel now
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 329

what sharp distress I may. O God bless you , God forgive

you !"
In what ecstacy of unhappiness I got these broken words out
of myself, I don't know . The rhapsody welled up within me ,
like blood from an inward wound, and gushed out. I held her
hand to my lips some lingering moments, and so I left her.
But ever afterwards, I remembered — and soon afterwards with
stronger reason — that while Estella looked at me merely with
incredulous wonder, the spectral figure of Miss Havisham , her
hand still covering her heart, seemed all resolved into a ghastly
stare of pity and remorse .
All done, all gone ! So much was done and gone, that when
I went out at the gate, the light of day seemed of a darker colour
than when I went in. For a while, I hid myself among some
lanes and by -paths, and then struck off to walk all the way to
London. For, I had by that time come to myself so far, as to
eonsider that I could not go back to the inn and see Drummle
there ; that I could not bear to sit upon the coach and be spoken
to ; that I could do nothing half so good for myself as tire
myself out.
It was past midnight when I crossed London Bridge. Pur
suing the narrow intricacies of the streets which at that time
tended westward near the Middlesex shore of the river, my
readiest access to the Temple was close by the river -side,
through Whitefriars . I was not expected till to-morrow, but I
had my keys, and, if Herbert were gone to bed, could get to bed
myself without disturbing him .
As it seldom happenedthat I came in at that Whitefriars gate
after the Temple was closed, and as I was very muddy and
weary, I did not take it ill that the night-porter examined me
withmuch attention as he held the gate a little way open for me
to pass in. To help his memory I mentioned my name.
“ I was not quite sure, sir, but I thought so. Here's a note,
sir. The messenger that brought it, said would you be so good
as read it by my lantern .
Much surprised by the request, I took the note. It was
directed to Philip Pip, Esquire, and on the top of the super
scription were the words, "PLEASE READ THIS , HERE .” I opened
it, the watchman holding up his light, and read inside, in
Wemmick's writing :
- Don'T GO HOME.'
330 GREAT EXPECTATIONS ,

CHAPTER XLV.

TURNING from the Temple gate as soon as I had read the warn
ing, I made the best of my way to Fleet -street, and there got a
late hacķney chariot and drove to the Hummums in Covent
Garden. In those times a bed was always to be got there at
any hour of the night, and the chamberlain , letting me in at his
ready wicket, lighted the candle next in order on his shelf, and
showed me straight into the bedroom next in order on his list.
It was a sort of vault on the ground floor at the back, with a
despotic monster of a four -post bedstead in it, straddling over
the whole place, putting one of his arbitrary legs into the
fire- place and another into the doorway, and squeezing the
wretched little washing -stand in quite a Divinely Righteous
manner .
As I had asked for a night-light, the chamberlain had brought
me in , before he left me, the good old constitutional rush -light
of those virtuous days - an object like the ghost of a walking
cane, which instantly broke its back if it were touched, which
nothing could ever be lighted at, and which was placed in soli
tary confinement at the bottom of a high tin tower, perforated
with round holes that made a staringly wide -awake pattern on
the walls. When I had got into bed, and lay there, footsore,
weary, and wretched, I found that I could no more close my own
eyes than I could close the eyes of this foolish Argus. And
thus, in the gloom and death of the night, we stared at one
another.
What a doleful night ! How anxious, how dismal, how long !
There was an inhospitable smell in the room, of cold soot and
hot dust ; and, as I looked up into the corners of the tester over
my head , I thought what a number of bluebottle flies from the
butchers ', and earwigs from the market, and grubs from the
country, must be holding on up there, lying by for next summer .
This led me to speculate whether any of them ever tumbled
down , and then I fancied that I felt light falls on my face - a
disagreeable turn of thought, suggesting other and more objec
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 331

tionable approaches up my back. When I had lain awake a

little while, those extraordinary voices with which silence teems,
began to make themselves audible. The closet whispered , the
fireplace sighed, the little washing -stand ticked, and one guitar
string played occasionally in the chest of drawers . At about
the same time, the eyes on the wall acquired a new expression ,
and in every one of those staring rounds I saw written, Don't
Go HOME.
Whatever night - fancies and night-noises crowded on me, they
never warded off this Don't GO HOME. It plaited itself into
whatever I thought of, as a bodily pain would have done. Not
long before, I had read in the newspapers, how a gentleman un
known had come to the Hummums in the night, and had gone to
bed, and had destroyed himself, and had been found in the
morning weltering in blood. It came into my head that he
must have occupied this very vault of mine, and I got out of bed
to assure myself that there were no red marks about ; then
opened the door to look out into the passages, and cheer myself
with the companionship of a distant light, near which I knew
the chamberlain to be dozing. But all this time, why I was not
to go home, and what had happened at home, and when I should
go home, and whether Provis was safe at home, were questions
occupying my mind so busily, that one might have supposed
there could be no more room in it for any other theme. Even
when I thought of Estella, and how we had parted that day for
ever, and when I recalled all the circumstances of our parting,
and all her looks and tones, and the action of her fingers while
she knitted - even then I was pursuing, here and there and
everywhere, the caution Don't go home. When at last I dozed,
in sheer exhaustion of mind and body, it became a vast shadowy
verb which I had to conjugate. Imperative mood, present tense :
Do not thou go home, let him not go home, let us not go home,
do not ye or you go home, let not them go home. Then, poten
tially ; I may not and I cannot go home; and I might not,
could not, would not, and should not go home ; until I felt that
I was going distracted , and rolled over on the pillow, and looked
at the staring rounds upon the wall again .
I had left directions that I was to be called at seven ; for it
was plain that I must see Wemmick before seeing any one else,
and equally plain that this was a case in which his Walworth
sentiments, only, could be taken . It was a relief to get out of
the room where the night had been so miserable, and I needed
332 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

no second knocking at the door to startle me from my uneasy

bed.
The Castle battlements arose upon my view at eight o'clock .
The little servant happening to be entering the fortress with two
hot rolls, I passed through the poster and crossed the draw
bridge, in her company , and so came without announcement into
the presence of Wemmick as he was making tea for himself and
the Aged. An open door afforded a perspective view of the
Aged in bed .
“ Halloa, Mr. Pip !” said Wemimick . 6 You did come home,
then ?"
“ Yes," I returned ; " but I didn't go home.”
“ That's all right,” said he, rubbing his hands. “ I left a note
for you at each of the Temple gates, on the chance. Which
gate did you come to ?”
I told him .
“I'll go round to the others in the course of the day and
destroy the notes,” said Wemmick ; “ it's a good rule never to
leave documentary evidence if you can help it, because you don't
know when it may be put in . I'm going to take a liberty
with you. — Would you mind toasting this sausage for the
Aged P. ?"
I said I should be delighted to do it.
“ Then you can go about your work , Mary Anne," said Wem
mick to the little servant ; “ which leaves us to ourselves, don't
you see , Mr. Pip ?” he added , winking, as she disappeared .
I thanked him for his friendship and caution, and our dis
course proceeded in a low tone, while I toasted the Aged's
sausage and he buttered the crumb of the Aged's roll.
“ Now , Mr. Pip, you know , " said Wemmick, " you and I
understand one another. We are in our private and personal
capacities, and we have been engaged in a confidential transaction
before to -day. Official sentiments are one thing. We are
extra official.”
I cordially assented . I was so very nervous, that I had
already lighted the Aged's sausage like a torch, and been
obliged to blow it out.
66
I accidentally heard, yesterday morning ,” said Wemmick ,
6.
· being in a certain place where I once took you — even between
you and me, it's as well not to mention names when avoid
able
6. Much better not,” said I. " I understand you. "
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 333

“ I heard there by chance, yesterday morning ,” said Wem

mick, “ that a certain person not altogether of uncolonial pur
suits, and not unpossessed of portable property — I don't know
who it may really be — we won't name this person
“ Not necessary ,” said I.
“ —had made some little stir in a certain part of the world
where a good many people go, not always in gratification of
their owninclinations, and not quite irrespective of the govern
ment expense
In watching his face, I made quite a firework of the Aged's
sausage, and greatly discomposed both my own attention and
Wemmick's ; for which I apologised.
- by disappearing from such place, and being no more heard
of thereabouts. From which,” said Wemmick, “ conjectures had
been raised and theories formed . I also heard that you at your
chambers in Garden - court, Temple, had been watched, and
might be watched again ."
* By whom ? ” said I.
“ I wouldn't go into that,” said Wemmick, evasively, “ it
might clash with official responsibilities. I heard it, as I have
in my time heard other curious things in the same place. I
don't tell it you on information received. I heard it.”
He took the toasting -fork and sausage from me as he spoke,
and set forth the Aged's breakfast neatly on a little tray. Pre
vious to placing it before him, he went into the Aged's room
with a clean white cloth, and tied the same under the old gen
tleman's chin, and propped him up, and put his nightcap on one
side, and gave him quite a rakish air. Then, he placed his
breakfast before him with great care, and said, “ All right, ain't
you, Aged P.?” To which the cheerful Aged replied 66 All
right, John , my boy, all right !" As there seemed to be a
tacit understanding that the Aged was not in a presentablo
state, and was therefore to be considered invisible, I made a
pretence of being in complete ignorance of these proceedings.
“ This watching of me at my chambers (which I have once
had reason to suspect ), " I said to Wemmick when he came
back, “ is inseparable from the person to whom you have
adverted ; is it ?"
Wemmick looked very serious. “ I couldn't undertake to
say that, of my own knowledge. I mean , I couldn't undertake
to say it was at first. But it either is, or it will be, or it's in
great danger of being ."
334 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

As I saw that he was restrained by fealty to Little Britain

from saying as much as he could, and as I knew with thankful
ness to lim how far out of his way he went to say what he did ,
I could not press him. But I told him , after a little meditation
over the fire, that I would like to ask him a question , subject to
his answering or not answering, as he deemed right, and sure
that his course would be right. He paused in his breakfast, and
crossing his arms, and pinching his shirt-sleeves ( his notion of
in -door comfort was to sit without any coat) , he nodded to me
once , to put my question.
6. You have heard of a man of bad character, whose true name
is Compeyson ?"
He answered with one other nod.
“ Is he living ?"
One other nod.
“ Is he in London ? "
He gave me one other nod, compressed the post-office exceed
ingly, gave me one last nod, and went on with his breakfast.
“ Now ," said Wemmick , " questioning being over ;" which he
emphasised and repeated for my guidance ; “ I come to what I
did, after hearing what I heard . I went to Garden -court to
find you ; not finding you, I went to Clarriker’s to find Mr.
Herbert .”
“ And him you found ?" said I, with great anxiety.
“And him I found . Without mentioning any names or going
into any details, I gave him to understand that if he was aware
of anybody - Tom , Jack, or Richard — being about the chambers,
or about the immediate neighbourhood, he had better get Tom ,
Jack , or Richard, out of the way while you were out of the
way .”
“ He would be greatly puzzled what to do ?”
“ He was puzzled what to do ; not the less, because I gave
him my opinion that it was not safe to try to get Tom, Jack , or
Richard, too far out of the way at present. Mr. Pip, I'll tell
you something. Under existing circumstances there is no place
like a great city when you are once in it. Don't break cover
too soon , Lie close. Wait till things slacken , before you try
the open, even for foreign air.”
I thanked him for his valuable advice, and asked him what
Herbert had done ?
“ Mr. Herbert , ” said Wemmick, " after being all of a heap for
half an hour, struck out a plan. He mentioned to me as a
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 335

secret, that he is courting a young lady who has, as no doubt

you are aware , a bedridden Pa. Which Pa, having been in the
Purser line of life, lies a - bed in a bow - window where he can see
the ships sail up and down the river . You are acquainted with
the young lady, most probably ?"
“ Not personally, ” said I.
The truth was, that she had objected to me as an expensive
companion who did Herbert no good, and that, when Herbert
had first proposed to present me to her, she had received the
proposal with such very moderate warmth, that Herbert had felt
ne himself obliged to confide the state of the case to me, with a
view to the lapse of a little time before I made her acquaintance.
When I had begun to advance Herbert's prospects by stealth , I
had been able to bear this with cheerful philosophy ; he and his
affianced , for their part, had naturally not been very anxious to
introduce a third person into their interviews ; and thus, al
3 though I was assured that I had risen in Clara’s esteem , and
although the young lady and I had long regularly interchanged
e messages and remembrances by Herbert, I had never seen her.
I However, I did not trouble Wemmick with those particulars.
“ The house with the bow -window , " said Wemmick, “ being
by the river -side, down the Pool there between Limehouse and
Greenwich, and being kept, it seems, by a very respectable
widow who has a furnished upper floor to let, Mr. Herbert put it
to me, what did I think of that as a temporary tenement for
Tom , Jack , or Richard ? Now, I thought very well of it, for
three reasons I'll give you. That is to say. Firstly. Firstly. It's
altogether out of all your beats, and is well away from the usual
heap of streets great and small. Secondly. Without going near
it yourself, you could always hear of the safety of Tom, Jack, or
Richard, through Mr. Herbert. Thirdly. After a while and
when it might be prudent, if you should want to slip Tom , Jack,
or Richard, on board a foreign packet-boat, there he is—
ready."
Much comforted by these considerations, I thanked Wemmick
again and again , and begged him to proceed.
Well, sir ! Mr. Herbert threw himself into the business
with a will, and by nine o'clock last night he housed Tom, Jack ,
or Richard — whichever it may be — you and I don't want to know
--quite successfully. At the old lodgings it was understood
that he was summoned to Dover, and in fact he was taken down
the Dover road and cornered out of it . Now, another great
KY

336 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

advantage of all this is, that it was done without you, and when ,
if any one was concerning himself about your movements, you
must be known to be ever so many miles off and quite otherwise
engaged. This diverts suspicion and confuses it ; and for the
same reason I recommended that even if you came back last
night, you should not go home. It brings in more confusion ,
and you want confusion . ”
Wemmick, having finished his breakfast, here looked at his
watch, and began to get his coat on.
“And now, Mr, Pip ,” said he, with his hands still in the
sleeves, “ I have probably done the most I can do ; but if I can
ever do more — from a Walworth point of view , and in a strictly
private and personal capacity - I shall be glad to do it. Here's
the address. There can be no harm in your going here to
night and seeing for yourself that all is well with Tom , Jack , or
Richard, before you go home—which is another reason for your
not going home last night. But after you have gone home,
don't go back here . You are very welcome, I am sure, Mr.
Pip ;" his hands were now out of his sleeves, and I was shaking
them ; " and let me finally impress one important point upon
you .” He laid his hands upon my shoulders, and added in a
solemn whisper : “ Avail yourself of this evening to lay hold of
his portable property. You don't know what may happen to
him . Don't let anything happen to the portable property ."
Quite despairing of making my mind clear to Wemmick
on this point, I forbore to try.
“ Time's up ,” said Wemmick, " and I must be off. If you
had nothing more pressing to do than to keep here till dark,
that's what I should advise. You look very much worried , and
it would do you good to have a perfectly quiet day with the
Aged — bu'll be up presently - and a little bit of — you re
member the pig ?”
“ Of course," said I.
“ Well ; and a little bit of him. That sausage you toasted
was his, and he was in all respects a first - rater. Do try him, if
it is only for old acquaintance sake. Good -by, Aged Parent !"
in a cheery shout .
“ All right, John ; all right, my boy !” piped the old man
from within .
I soon fell asleep before Wemmick’s fire, and the Aged and I
enjoyed one another's society by falling asleep before it more or
less all day. We had loin of pork for dinner, and greens grown
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 337
e2 on the estate, and I nodded at the Aged with a good intention
whenever I failed to do it drowsily. When it was quite dark, I
+
left the Aged preparing the fire for toast ; and I inferred from
the number of teacups, as well as from his glances at the two
little doors in the wall, that Miss Skiffins was expected .

his
CHAPTER XLVI.

221 EIGHT o'clock had struck before I got into the air that was
tly scented , not disagreeably, by the chips and shavings of the long
shore boat -builders, and mast oar and block makers. All that
to water -side region of the upper and lower Pool below Bridge,
07 was unknown ground to me, and when I struck down by the
O river, I found that the spot I wanted was not where I had
ene supposed it to be, and was anything but easy to find. It was
VI. called Mill Pond Bank, Chinks's Basin ; and I had no other
und guide to Chinks's Basin than the Old Green Copper Rope
Walk .
It matters not what stranded ships repairing in dry docks I
Id lost myself among, what old hulls of ships in course of being
to knocked to pieces, what ooze and slime and other dregs of tide,
what yards of ship - builders and ship -breakers, what rusty
anchors blindly biting into the ground though for years off
duty, what mountainous country of accumulated casks and
01 timber, how many rope-walks that were not the Old Green
Copper. After several times falling short of my destination
and as often over
ver-shooting it, I came unexpectedly round a
be corner, upon Mill Pond Bank. It was a fresh kind of place, all
circumstances considered, where the wind from the river had
room to turn itself round ; and there were two or three trees in
it, and there was the stump of a ruined windmill, and there was
the Old Green Copper Rope -Walk - whose long and narrow vista
1
I could trace in the moonlight, along a series of wooden frames
set in the ground, that looked like superannuated baymaking
rakes which had grown old and lost most of their teeth.
Selecting from the few queer houses upon Mill Pond Bank, a
house with a wooden front and three stories of bow - window (not
bay-window, which is another thing ), I looked at the plate
upon the door, and read there, Mrs. Whimple. That being the
name I wanted , I knocked, and an elderly woman of a pleasant
2:
 338 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

and thriving appearance responded. She was immediately

deposed , however, by Herbert, who silently led me into the
parlour and shut the door. It was an odd sensation to see his
very familiar face established quite at home in that very unfa
miliar room and region ; and I found myself looking at him ,
much as I looked at the corner cupboard with the glass and
china, the shells upon the chimney -piece, and the coloured
engravings on the wall, representing the death of Captain Cook ,
à ship -launch, and his Majesty King George the Third in a
state coachman's wig, leather breeches, and top -boots, on the
terrace at Windsor.
“ All is well, Handel,” said Herbert, “and he is quite satis
fied, though eager to see you. My dear girl is with her father ;
and if you'll wait till she comes down, I'll make you known to
her, and then we'll go upstairs . -That's her father.”
I had become aware of an alarming growling overhead , and
had probably expressed the fact in my countenance .
“ I am afraid he is a sad old rascal, ” said Herbert, smiling,
“ but I have never seen him. Don't you smell rum ? He is
always at it.”
6 At rum ? ” said I.
Yes," returned Herbert, " and you may suppose how mild
it makes his gout. He persists, too, in keeping all the pro
visions up -stairs in his room , and serving them out. He keeps
them on shelves over his head, and will weigh them all. His
room must be like a chandler's shop .”
While he thus spoke, the growling noise became a prolonged
roar , and then died away .
“ What else can be the consequence ,” said Herbert, in expla
nation , “ if he will cut the cheese ? A man with the gout in his
right hand — and everywhere else — can't expect to get through a
Double Gloucester without hurting himself.”
He seemed to have hurt himself very much , for he gave
another furious roar .
“ To have Provis for an upper lodger is quite a godsend to
Mrs. Whimple," said Herbert, " for of course people in general
won't stand that noise. A curious place, Handel ; isn't it ?"
1 It was a curious place, indeed ; but remarkably well kept and
clean .
“ Mrs. Whimple, ” said Herbert, when I told him so, “ is the
best of housewives, and I really do not know what my Clara
would do without her motherly help . For, Clara has no mother
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 339

of her own , Handel, and no relation in the world but old Gruff
andgrim .”
Surely that's not his name, Herbert ?”
“ No, no ,” said Herbert, “ that's my name for him. His name
is Mr. Barley. But what a blessing it is for the son of my
father and mother, to love a girl who has no relations, and who
can never bother herself, or anybody else, about her family !”
Herbert had told me on former occasions, and now reminded
me, that he first knew Miss Clara Barley when she was complet
ing her education at an establishment at Hammersmith , and that
on her being recalled home to nurse her father, he and she had
confided their affection to the motherly Mrs. Whimple, by whom
it had been fostered and regulated with equal kindness and dis
cretion ever since. It was understood that nothing of a tender
nature could possibly be confided to old Barley, by reason of his
being totally unequal to the consideration of any subject more
psychological than Gout, Rum , and Purser's stores.
As we were thus conversing in a low tone while Old Barley's
sustained growl vibrated in the beam that crossed the ceiling,
the room door opened , and a very pretty slight dark - eyed girl of
twenty or so, ame in with a basket in her hand : whom Herbert
tenderly relieved of the basket, and presented blushing, as
66 Clara .” She really was a most charming girl, and might
have passed for a captive fairy, whom that truculent Ogre, Old
Barley, had pressed into his service .
“ Look here," said Herbert, showing me the basket, with a
compassionate and tender smile after we had talked a little ;
here's poor Clara's supper, served out every night. Here's her
allowance of bread, and here's her slice of cheese, and here's her
rum --which I drink . This is Mr. Barley's breakfast for to
morrow , served out to be cooked. Two mutton chops, three
potatoes, some split peas, a little flour, two ounces of butter, a
pinch of salt, and all this black pepper. It's stewed up together,
and taken hot, and it's a nice thing for the gout, I should think !"
There was something so natural and winning in Clara's re
signed way of looking at these stores in detail, as Herbert
pointed them out,and something so confiding, loving, and
innocent, in her modest manner of yielding herself to Herbert's
embracing arm -- and something so gentle in her, so much need
ing protection on Mill Pond Bank, by Chinks’s Basin, and the
Old Green Copper Rope -Walk , with Old Barley growling in the
beam --that I would not have undone the engagement between
 S
310 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

her and Herbert, for all the money in the pocket-book I had
never opened.
I was looking at her with pleasure and admiration, when sud
denly the growl swelled into a roar again, and a frightful bump
ing noise was heard above, as if a giant with a wooden leg were
trying to bore it through the ceiling to come at us. Upon this
Clara said to Herbert, “ Papa wants me, darling !" and ran away
“There is an unconscionable old shark for you ! ” said Her
bert. “ What do you suppose he wants now, Handel ? ”
“ I don't know,” said I. Something to drink ? ":
“ That's it ! ” cried Herbert, as if I had made a guess of extra
ordinary merit. “He keeps his grog ready -mixed in a little tub
on the table. Wait a moment, and you'll hear Clara lift him up
to take some. — There he goes !” Another roar, with a pro
longed shake at the end. “ Now ," said Herbert, as it was
succeeded by silence, “he's drinking. Now ," said Herbert, as
the growl resounded in the beam once more, “ he's down again
on his back !”
Clara returned soon afterwards, and Herbert accompanied me
up - stairs to see our charge. As we passed Mr. Barley's door, he
was heard hoarsely muttering within, in a strain that rose and
fell like wind , the following Refrain ; in which I substitute
good wishes for something quite the reverse .
66
Ahoy ! Bless your eyes, here's old Bill Barley. Here's old
Bill Barley, bless your eyes . Here's old Bill Barley on the flat
like a
of his back, by the Lord . Lying on the flat of his back ,
drifting old dead founder, here's your old Bill Barley, bless
your eyes. Ahoy ! Bless you . "
In this strain of consolation , Herbert informed me the invi
sible Barley would commune with himself by the day and night
together ; often while it was light, having, at the same time, one
eye at a telescope which was fitted on his bed for the con
venience of sweeping the river.
In his two cabin rooms at the top of the house, which were
fresh and airy, and in which Mr. Barley was less audible than
below, I found Provis comfortably settled. He expressed no
alarm , and seemed to feel uone that was worth mentioning ; but
it struck me that he was softened - indefinably, for I could not
have said how, and could never afterwards recal how when I
tried ; but certainly.
The opportunity that the day's rest had given me for reflec
tion , had resulted in my fully determining to say nothing to him
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 341

respecting Compeyson. For anything I knew , his animosity

towards the man might otherwise lead to his seeking him out
and rushing on his own destruction . Therefore, when Herbert
and I sat down with him by his fire, I asked him first of all
whether he relied on Wemmick's judgment and sources of infor
mation ?
“ Ay, ay , dear boy ! " he answered, with a grave nod, " Jag
gers knows. "
Then, I have talked with Wemmick ," said I, “and have
come to tell you what caution he gave me and what ad
vice .”
This I did accurately, with the reservation just mentioned ;
and I told him how Wemmick had heard, in Newgate prison
(whether from officers or prisoners I could not say ), that he was
under some suspicion , and that my chambers had been watched ;
how Wemmick had recommended his keeping close for a time,
and my keeping away from him ; and what Wemmick had said
about getting him abroad . I added, that of course, when the
time came, I should go with him , or should follow close upon
him , as might be safest in Wemmick's judgment. What was to
follow that, I did not touch upon ; neither indeed was I at all
clear or comfortable about it in my own mind, now that I saw
him in that softer condition , and in declared peril for my sake.
As to altering my way of living, by enlarging my expenses, I
put it to him whether in our present unsettled and difficult cir
cumstances, it would not be simply ridiculous, if it were no
worse ?
He could not deny this, and indeed was very reasonable
throughout. His coming back was a venture, he said, and he
had always known it to be a venture. He would do nothing to
make it a desperate venture, and he had very little fear of his
safety with such good help.
Herbert, who had been looking at the fire and ponder
ing, here said that something had come into his thoughts
arising out of Wemmick's suggestion, which it might be
worth while to pursue. 6. We are both good watermen ,
Handel, and could take him down the river ourselves when
the right time comes. No boat would then be hired for
the purpose, and no boatmen ; that would save at least a
chance of suspicion, and any chance is worth saving. Never
mind the season ; don't you think it might be a good thing
if you began at once to keep a boat at the Temple stairs,
342 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

and were in the habit of rowing up and down the river ? You
fall into that habit, and then who notices or minds ? Do it
twenty or fifty times, and there is nothing special in your doing
it the twenty - first or fifty -first. "
I liked this scheme, and Provis was quite elated by it. We
agreed that it should be carried into execution, and that Provis
should never recognise us if we came below Bridge and rowed
past Mill Pond Bank. But, we further agreed that he should
pull down the blind in that part of his window which gave upon
the east, whenever he saw us and all was right.
Our conference being now ended, and everything arranged, I
rose to go ; remarking to Herbert that he and I had better not
go home together, and that I would take half an hour's start of
him . “ I don't like to leave you here," I said to Provis,
“ though I cannot doubt your being safer here than near me.
Good-by !"
“ Dear boy,” he answered , clasping my hands, “ I don't know
when we may meet again, and I don't like Good -by. Say Good
Night !”
“Good night ! Herbert will go regularly between us, and
when the time comes you may be certain I shall be ready. Good
night, Good night !"
Wethought it best that he should stay in his own rooms, and
we left him on the landing outside his door, holding a light
over the stair - rail to light us down stairs. Looking back at
him , I thought of the first night of his return when our positions
were reversed , and when I little supposed my heart could
ever be as heavy and anxious 'at parting from him as it was
now.
Old Barley was growling and swearing when we repassed his
door, with no appearance of having ceased or of meaning to
cease . When we got to the foot of the stairs, I asked Herbert
whether he had preserved the name of Provis ? He replied, cer
tainly not, and that the lodger was Mr. Campbell. He also ex
plained that the utmost known of Mr. Campbell there, was, that he
( Herbert) had Mr. Campbell consigned to him , and felt a strong
personal interest in his being well cared for, and living a
secluded life. So, when we went into the parlour where Mrs.
Whimple and Clara were seated at work , I said nothing of my
own interest in Mr. Campbell , but kept it to myself.
When I had taken leave of the pretty gentle dark -eyed girl,
and of the motherly woman who had not outlived her honest.
1
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 343

sympathy with a little affair of true love, I felt as if the Old

Green Copper Rope -Walk had grown quite a different place.
Old Barley might be as old as the hills, and might swear like a
whole field of troopers, but there were redeeming youth and
trust and hope enough in Chinks's Basin to fill it to overflowing.
And then I thought of Estella, and of our parting, and went
home very sadly.
All things were as quiet in the Temple as ever I had seen
them . The windows of the rooms of that side, lately occupied
by Provis, were dark and still, and there was no lounger in
Garden -court. I walked past the fountain twice or thrice before
I descended the steps that were between me and my rooms, but
I was quite alone. Herbert coming to my bedside when he
1 came in - for I went straight to bed, dispirited and fatigued -
made the same report. Opening one of the windows after that,
he looked out into the moonlight, and told me that the pave
ment was as solemnly empty as the pavement of any Cathedral
at that same hour.
Next day, I set myself to get the boat. It was soon done, and
the boat was brought round to the Temple stairs, and lay where
I could reach her within a minute or two. Then, I began to
go out as for training and practice : sometimes alone, sometimes
with Herbert. I was often out in cold, rain , and sleet, but no
body took much note of me after I had been out a few times.
At first, I kept above Blackfriars Bridge ; but as the hours of
the tide changed, I took towards London Bridge. It was Old
London Bridge in those days, and at certain states of the tide
there was a race and a fall of water there which gave it a bad
reputation. But I knew well enough how to “ shoot ” the
bridge after seeing it done, and so began to row about among
the shipping in the Pool, and down to Erith . The first time I
passed Mill Pond Bank, Herbert and I were pulling a pair of
oars ; and, both in going and returning , we saw the blind towards
the east come down. Herbert was rarely there less frequently
than three times in a week, and he never brought me a single
word of intelligence that was at all alarming. Still, I knew that
there was cause for alarm , and I could not get rid of the notion
of being watched. Once received, it is a haunting idea ; how
many undesigning persons I suspected of watching me, it would
be hard to calculate.
In short, I was always full of fears for the rash man who was
in hiding. Herbert had sometimes said to me that he found it
 NR.211

344 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

pleasant to stand at one of our windows after dark, when the

tide was running down, and to think that it was flowing, with
everything it bore , towards Clara. But I thought with dread
that it was flowing towards Magwitch, and that any black mark
on its surface might be his pursuers, going swiftly, silently, and
surely, to take him .

CHAPTER XLVII .

SOME weeks passed without bringing any change. We waited

for Wemmick , and he made no sign. If I had never known
him out of Little Britain , and had never enjoyed the privilege of
being on a familiar footing at the Castle, I might have doubted
him ; not so for a moment, knowing him as I did .
My worldly affairs began to wear a gloomy appearance, and I
was pressed for money by more than one creditor. Even I my
self began to know the want of money ( I mean of ready money
in my own pocket), and to relieve it by converting some easily
spared articles of jewellery into cash . But I had quite deter
mined that it would be a heartless fraud to take more money
from my patron in the existing state of my uncertain thoughts
and plans. Therefore, I had sent him the unopened pocket
book by Herbert, to hold in his own keeping, and I felt a kind of
satisfaction - whether it was a false kind or a true, I hardly
know - in not having profited by his generosity since his reve
lation of himself.
As the time wore on , an impression settled heavily upon me
that Estella was married . Fearful of having it confirmed ,
though it was all but a conviction, I avoided the newspapers,
and begged Herbert (to whom I had confided the circumstances
of our last interview ) never to speak of her to me. Why I
hoarded up this last wretched little rag of the robe of hope that
was rent and given to the winds, how do I know ! Why did
you who read this, commit that not dissimilar inconsistency of
your own , last year, last month, last week ?
It was an unhappy life that I lived, and its one dominant
anxiety, towering over all its other anxieties like a high moun
tain above a range of mountains, never disappeared from my
view. Still, no new cause for fear arose . Let me start from
my bed as I would, with the terror fresh upon me that he was
discovered ; let me sit listening as I would, with dread, for
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 345

Herbert's returning step at night, lest it should be fleeter than

ordinary, and winged with evil news ; for all that, and much
more to like purpose, the round of things went on. Condemned
to inaction and a state of constant restlessness and suspense, I
rowed about in my boat, and waited, waited, waited , as I best
could .
There were states of the tide when , having been down the
river, I could not get back through the eddy -chafed arches and
starlings of old London Bridge ; then , I left my boat at a wharf
near the Custom House , to be brought up afterwards to the
Temple stairs. I was not averse to doing this, as it served to
make me and my boat a commoner incident among the water
side people there. From this slight occasion, sprang two meet
ings that I have now to tell of.
One afternoon, late in the month of February, I came ashore
II at the wharf at dusk . I had pulled down as far as Greenwich
with the ebb tide, and had turned with the tide. It had been a
fine bright day, but had become foggy as the sun dropped, and
I had had to feel my way back among the shipping, pretty care
fully. Both in going and returning, I had seen the signal in his
window , All well.
1
As it was a raw evening and I was cold, I thought I would
comfort myself with dinner at once ; and as I had hours of de
jection and solitude before me if I went home to the Temple, I
thought I would afterwards go to the play. The theatre where
Mr. Wopsle had achieved his questionable triumph , was in
that waterside neighbourhood ( it is nowhere now ), and to that
theatre I resolved to go. I was aware that Mr. Wopsle had not
succeeded in reviving the Drama, but, on the contrary, had
rather partaken of its decline. He had been ominously heard
of, through the playbills, as a faithful Black, in connexion with
a little girl of noble birth, and a monkey. And Herbert had
seen him asa predatory Tartar of comic propensities, with a face
like a red brick , and an outrageous hat all over bells.
I dined at what Herbert and I used to call a Geographical
chop - house - where there were maps of the world in porter -pot
rims on every half-yard of the tablecloths, and charts of gravy
on every one of the knives — to this day there is scarcely a single
chop -house within the Lord Mayor's dominions which is not
Geographical — and wore out the time in dozing over crumbs,
staring at gas, and baking in a hot blast of dinners. By -and -by,
I roused myself and went to the play.
346 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

There, I found a virtuous boatswain in his Majesty's service

-a most excellent man , though I could have wished his trou
sers not quite so tight in some places and not quite so loose in
others —who knocked all the little men's hats over their eyes,
though he was very generous and brave, and who wouldn't hear of
anybody's paying taxes, though he was very patriotic. He had
a bag of money in his pocket, like a pudding in the cloth, and on
that property married a young person in bed -furniture, with
great rejoicings ; the whole population of Portsmouth ( nine in
number at the last Census) turning out on the beach, to rub
their own hands and shake everybody else's, and sing “Fill,
fill !” A certain dark - complexioned Swab, however, who
wouldn't fill, or do anything else that was proposed to him ,
and whose heart was openly stated (by the boatswain ) to be as
black as his figure -head, proposed to two other Swabs to get all
mankind into difficulties ; which was so effectually done ( the
Swab family having considerable political influence ) that it took
half the evening to set things right, and then it was only brought
about through an honest little grocer with a white hat, black
gaiters, and red nose, getting into a clock, with a gridiron, and
listening, and coming out, and knocking everybody down from
behind with the gridiron whom he couldn't confute with what he
had overheard . This led to Mr. Wopsle's (who had never been
heard of before ) coming in with a star and garter on, as a pleni
potentiary of great power direct from the Admiralty, to say
that the Swabs were all to go to prison on the spot, and that he
had brought the boatswain down the Union Jack, as a slight
acknowledgment of his public services. The boatswain , un
manned for the first time, respectfully dried his eyes on the
Jack, and then cheering up and addressing Mr. Wopsle as Your
Honour, solicited permission to take him by the fin . Mr.
Wopsle conceding his fin with a gracious dignity, was imme
diately shoved into a dusty corner while everybody danced a
hornpipe ; and from that corner, surveying the public with a
discontented eye, became aware of me.
The second piece was the last new grand comic Christmas
pantomime, in the first scene of which, it pained me to suspect
that I detected Mr. Wopsle with red worsted legs under a
highly magnified phosphoric countenance and a shock of red
curtain -fringe for his hair, engaged in the manufacture of
thunderbolts in a mine, and displaying great cowardice when
his gigantic master came home ( very hoarse) to dinner. But he
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 347

presently presented himself under worthier circumstances ; for,

the Genius of Youthful Love being in want of assistance — on
account of the parental brutality of an ignorant farmer who
Festa opposed the choice of his daughter's heart, by purposely falling
upon the object in a flour sack, out of the firstfloor window
summoned a sententious Enchanter ; and he, coming up from
Ld on
the antipodes rather unsteadily, after an apparently violent jour
ney, proved to be Mr. Wopsle in a high -crowned hat, with a
ben necromantic work in one volume under his arm . The business
of this enchanter on earth , being principally to be talked at,
FIL sung at, butted at, danced at, and flashed at with fires of various
colours, he had a good deal of time on his hands. And I ob
served with great surprise, that he devoted it to staring in my
direction as if he were lost in amazement.
all There was something so remarkable in the increasing glare of
Mr. Wopsle's eye, and he seemed to be turning so many things
ock over in his mind and to grow so confused, that I could not
make it out. I sat thinking of it, long after he had ascended to
the clouds in a large watch -case, and still I could not make it
nd out. I was still thinking of it when I came out of the theatre
an hour afterwards, and found him waiting for me near the
10 door.
“ How do you do ?” said I, shaking hands with him as we
turned down the street together. “ I saw that you saw
me.”
“ Saw you, Mr. Pip !” he returned . Yes, of course I saw
+ you. But who else was there ?"
" Who else ?”
+ “ It is the strangest thing," said Mr. Wopste, drifting into his
1 lost look again ; "and yet I could swear to him . ”
Becoming alarmed , I entreated Mr. Wopsle to explain his
meaning.
8 “ Whether I should have noticed him at first but for your
8 being there,” said Mr. Wopsle, going on in the same lost way,
• I can't be positive ; yet I think I should.”
$ Involuntarily I looked round me, as I was accustomed to
t look round mewhen I went home ; for, these mysterious words
gave me a chill.
“ Oh ! He can't be in sight,” said Mr. Wopsle. “ He went
out, before I went off, I saw him go. ”
Having the reason that I had, for being suspicious, I even
suspected this poor actor. I mistrusted a design to entrap me
348 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

into some admission . Therefore, I glanced at him as we walked

on together, but said nothing.
“ I had a ridiculous fancy that he must be with you, Mr. Pip ,
till I saw that you were quite unconscious of him , sitting behind
you there, like a ghost."
My former chill crept over me again, but I was resolved not
to speak yet, for it was quite consistent with his words that he
might be set on to induce me to connect these references with
Provis. Of course, I was perfectly sure and safe that Provis had
not been there.
“ I dare say you wonder at me, Mr. Pip ; indeed I see you
do. But it is so very strange ! You'll hardly believe what I
am going to tell you . I could hardly believe it myself, if you
told me .'
“ Indeed ?” said I.
“ No, indeed . Mr. Pip, you remember in old times a certain
Christmas Day, when you were quite a child, and I dined at
Gargery's, and some soldiers came to the door to get a pair of
handcuffs mended ?”
“ I remember it very well.”
“And you remember that there was a chase after two convicts,
and that we joined in it, and that Gargery took you on his back,
and that I took the lead and you kept up with me as well as
you could ? ”
“ I remember it all very well.” Better than he thought
except the last clause.
“ And you remember that we came up with the two in &
ditch , and that there was a scuffle between them , and that one of
them had been severely handled and much mauled about the
face, by the other ?”
“ I see it all before me. ”
“ And that the soldiers lighted torches, and put the two in the
centre, and that we went on to see the last of them , over the
black marshes, with the torchlight shining on their faces
I am particular about that; with the torchlight shining on their
faces, when there was an outer ring of dark night all about us ?'
“ Yes,” said I. 6 I remember all that."
Then, Mr. Pip, one of those two prisoners sat behind you
to -night. I saw him over your shoulder . "
Steady !" I thought. I asked him then, “ Which of the two
do you suppose you saw ? ”
“ The one who had been mauled ,” he answered readily, “and
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 319

I'll swear I saw him ! The more I think of him , the more cer
tain I am of him .”
“ This is very curious !” said I, with the best assumption
I could put on, of its being nothing more to me. “ Very curious
indeed !”
I cannot exaggerate the enhanced disquiet into which this con
versation threw me, or the special and peculiar terror I felt at
Compeyson's having been behind me " like a ghost.” For, if he
had ever been out of my thoughts for a few moments together
since the hiding had begun, it was in those very moments when
he was closest to me ; and to think that I should be so uncon
scious and off my guard after all my care, was as if I had shut
an avenue of a hundred doors to keep him out, and then had
found him at my elbow . I could not doubt either that he was
there, because I was there, and that however slight an appear
ance of danger there might be about us, danger was always near
and active .
I put such questions to Mr. Wopsle as, When did the man
come in ? He could not tell me that ; he saw me, and over my
shoulder he saw the man . It was not until he had seen him for
some time that he began to identify him ; but he had from the
first vaguely associated him with me, and known him as some
how belonging to me in the old village time. How was he
dressed ? Prosperously, but not noticeably otherwise ; he
thought, in black . Was his face at all disfigured ? No, he be
lieved not. I believed not, too, for, although in my brooding
state I had taken no especial notice of the people behind me, I
thought it likely that a face at all disfigured would have attracted
my attntion .
When Mr. Wopsle had imparted to me all that he could recal
or I extract, and when I had treated him to a little appropriate
refreshment after the fatigues of the evening, we parted . It was
between twelve and one o'clock when I reached the Temple,
and the gates were shut. No one was near me when I went in
and went home.
Herbert had come in , and we held a very serious council by
the fire. But there was nothing to be done, saving to communi
cate to Wemmick what I had that night found out, and to re
mind him that we waited for his hint. As I thought that I
might compromise him if I went too often to the Castle,
I made this communication by letter . I wrote it before I
went to bed and went out and posted it ; and again no one
350 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
was near me , Herbert and I agreed that we could do nothing
else but be very cautious. And we were very cautious indeed
-more cautious than before, if that were possible -- and I for
my part never went near Chinks's Basin , except when I rowed
by, and then I only looked at Mill Pond Bank as I looked at
anything else.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

THE second of the two meetings referred to in the last

chapter, occurred about a week after the first. I had again
left my boat at the wharf below Bridge ; the time was an
hour earlier in the afternoon ; and, undecided where to dine,
I had strolled up into Cheapside, and was strolling along it,
surely the most unsettled person in all the busy concourse,
when a large hand was laid upon my shoulder, by some one
overtaking me. It was Mr. Jaggers's hand , and he passed it
through my arm .
“ As we are going in the same direction , Pip, we may walk
together. Where are you bound for ?”
“ For the Temple, I think ," said I.
“ Don't you know ?" said Mr. Jaggers.
“ Well," I returned, glad for once to get the better of
him in cross-examination, “ I do not know , for I have not
made up my mind .”
“ You are going to dine ?" said Mr. Jaggers. " You don't
mind admitting that, Isuppose ?"
" No ," I returned , “ I don't mind admitting that.”
" And are not engaged ?”
“ I don't mind admitting also, that I am not engaged ."
66 Then ,” said Mr. Jaggers, come and dine with me.
I was going to excuse myself, when he added, “ Wemmick's
coming .” So, I changed my excuse into an acceptance — the few
words I had uttered , serving for the beginning of either - and
we went along Cheapside and slanted off to Little Britain , while
the lights were springing up brilliantly in the shop windows,
and the street lamp-lighters, scarcely finding ground enough
to plant their ladders on in the midst of the afternoon's bustle,
were skipping up and down and running in and out, opening
more red eyes in the gathering fog than my rush -light tower
at the Hummums had opened white eyes in the ghostly wall.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 351
M At the office in Little Britain there was the usual letter
writing, hand -washing, candle -snuffing, and safe- locking, that
AIR closed the business of the day. As I stood idle by Mr.
Jaggers's fire, its rising and falling flame made the two casts
on the shelf look as if they were playing a diabolical game at
bo -peep with me ; while the pair of coarse fat office candles
that dimly lighted Mr. Jaggers as he wrote in a corner, were
decorated with dirty winding -sheets, as if in remembrance of
a host of hanged clients.
We went to Gerrard -street, all three together, in a hackney
coach : and as soon as we got there, dinner was served .
Although I should not have thought of making, in that place,
W28 a the most distant reference by so much as a look to Wemmick's
Walworth sentiments, yet I should have had no objection to
catching his eye now and then in a friendly way . But it was
COLLE not to be done. He turned his eyes on Mr. Jaggers whenever
he raised them from the table, and was as dry and distant to
me as if there were twin Wemmicks and this was the wrong
one .
“ Did you send that note of Miss Havisham's to Mr.
Pip, Wemmick ?" Mr. Jaggers asked, soon after we began
dinner.
“ No, sir," returned Wemmick ; " it was going by post,
when you brought Mr. Pip into the office . Here it is.” He
er de
NO handed it to his principal, instead of to me.
“ It's a note of two lines, Pip," said Mr. Jaggers, handing it
on, sent up to me by Miss Havisham , on account of her not
being sure of your address . She tells me that she wants to
see you on a little matter of business you mentioned to her.
You'll go down ?"
· Yes,” said I , casting my eyes over the note, which was
exactly in those terms.
“ When do you think of going down ?"
“ I have an impending engagement ,” said I, glancing at
few
Wemmick , who was putting fish into the post-office, “that
and , renders me rather uncertain of my time. At once, I
lie think.”
18
“ If Mr. Pip has the intention of going at once , ” said
Wemmick to Mr. Jaggers, “he needn't write an answer, you
know ."
Receiving this as an intimation that it was best not to
er
delay, I settled that I would go to -morrow , and said so.
.
352 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Wemmick drank a glass of wine and looked with a grimly

satisfied air at Mr. Jaggers, but not at me.
· So, Pip ! Our friend the Spider, ” said Mr. Jaggers, " has
played his cards. He has won the pool.”
It was as much as I could do to assent.
“ Hah ! He is a promising fellow — in his way — but hemay
not have it all his own way . The stronger will win in the
end , but the stronger has to be found out first. If he should
turn to , and beat her
Surely , " I interrupted, with a burning face and heart,
" you do not seriously think that he is scoundrel enough for
that, Mr. Jaggers ?"
“ I didn't say so , Pip. I am putting a case. If he should
turn to and beat her, he may possibly get the strength on his
side ; if it should be a question of intellect, he certainly will
not. It would be chance work to give an opinion how a fellow
of that sort will turn out in such circumstances, because it's a
toss -up between two results."
May I ask what they are ? ”
“ A fellow like our friend the Spider ," answered Mr. Jaggers,
“ either beats, or cringes. He may cringe and growl, or cringe
and not growl; but he either beats or cringes. Ask Wemmick
his opinion .”
“ Either beats or cringes,” said Wemmick , not at all address
ing himself to me.
• So, here's to Mrs. Bentley Drummle,” said Mr. Jaggers,
taking a decanter of choicer wine from his dumb-waiter, and
filling for each of us and for himself, “and may the question
of supremacy be settled to the lady's satisfaction ! To the
satisfaction of the lady and the gentleman , it never will be .
Now, Molly, Molly, Molly, Molly, how slow you are to
day !”
She was at his elbow when he addressed her, putting a
dishi upon the table . As she withdrew her hands from it, she
fell back a step or two, nervously muttering some excuse.
And a certain action of her fingers as she spoke arrested my
attention.
“ What's the matter ? ” said Mr. Jaggers.
" Nothing. Only the subject we were speaking of,” said I,
was rather painful to me .
The action of her fingers was like the action of knitting.
She stood looking at her master, not understanding whether
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 353
are she was free to go, or whether he had more to say to her and
would call her back if she did go. Her look was very intent.
Surely, I had seen exactly such eyes and such hands, on a
memorable occasion very lately !
He dismissed her, and she glided out of the room . But she
remained before me, as plainly as if she were still there. I
looked at those hands, I looked at those eyes, I looked at that
Le shock flowing hair ; and I compared them with other hands, other
eyes, other hair, that I knew of, and with what those might
ad bear be after twenty years of a brutal husband and a stormy life .
I looked again at those hands and eyes of the housekeeper,
and thought of the inexplicable feeling that had come over me
e sheni when I last walked — not alone—in the ruined garden, and
through the deserted brewery. I thought how the same feel
ing had come back when I saw a face looking at me , and a
hand waving to me from a stage-coach window ; and how it
ise to had come back again and had flashed about me like Lightning,
when I had passed in a carriage - not alone - through a sudden
glare of light in a dark street. I thought how one link of
association had helped that identification in the theatre, and
" CITE how such a link, wanting before, had been riveted for me
now , when I had passed by a chance swift from Estella's
name to the fingers with their knitting action , and the atten
tive eyes. And I felt absolutely certain that this woman was
Estella's mother.
Mr. Jaggers had seen me with Estella, and was not likely
, and to have missed the sentiments I had been at no pains to con
ceal. He nodded when I said the subject was painful to me ,
clapped me on the back, put round the wine again, and went
on with his dinner.
1 be
ce to Only twice more, did the housekeeper reappear, and then
her stay in the room was very short, and Mr. Jaggers was
sharp with her. But her hands were Estella's hands, and her
eyes were Estella's eyes, and if she had reappeared a hundred
, she times I could have been neither more sure nor less sure that
case.
my conviction was the truth .
Emp
It was a dull evening, for Wemmick drew his wine when
it came round, quite as a matter of business — just as he might
have drawn his salary when that came round — and with his
il
eyes on his chief, sat in a state of perpetual readiness for cross
examination. As to the quantity of wine, his post office was
as indifferent and ready as any other post -office for its quantity
2 A
354 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

of letters. From my point of view, he was the wrong twin all

the time, and only externally like the Wemmick of Wal
worth .
We took our leave early , and left together. Even when we
were groping among Mr. Jaggers's stock of boots for our hats,
I felt that the right twin was on his way back ; and we had
not gone half a dozen yards down Gerrard -street in the Wal
worth direction before I found that I was walking arm - in -arm
with the right twin , and that the wrong twin had evaporated
into the evening air.
“ Well ! ” said Wemmick, “ that's over ! He's a wonderful
man , without his living likeness ; but I feel that I have to
screw myself up when I dine with him — and I dine more com
fortably unserewed.”
I felt that this was a good statement of the case , and told
him so .
“ Wouldn't say it to anybody but yourself,” he answered .
“ I know that what is said between you and me, goes no
further.”
I asked him if he had ever seen Miss Havisham's adopted
daughter, Mrs. Bentley Drummle ? He said no. To avoid
being too abrupt , I then spoke of the Aged, and of Miss
Skiffins. He looked rather sly when I mentioned Miss
Skiffins, and stopped in the street to blow his nose, with a roll
of the head and a flourish not quite free from latent boastful
ness.
“ Wemmick ," said I, “ do you remember telling me before
I first went to Mr. Jaggers's private house, to notice that
housekeeper ?"
“ Did I ? ” he replied . “ Ah , I dare say I did. Deuce
take me,” he added sullenly, “ I know I did. I find I am not
quite unscrewed yet. ” 29
" A wild beast tamed , you called her.”
“ And what did you call her ? ”
66 The same. How did Mr. Jaggers tame her, Wem
mick ? ”
- That's his secret. She has been with him many a long
year."
“ I wish you would tell me her story. I feel a particular
interest in being acquainted with it. You know that what is
said between you and me, goes no further .”
“ Well !” Wemmick replied, " I don't know her story — that
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 355

is, I don't know all of it. But what I do know, I'll tell you .
We are in our private and personal capacities, of course."
os Of course.
“ A score or so of years ago , that woman was tried at the
Old Bailey for murder, and was acquitted. She was a very
handsome young woman, and I believe had some gipsy blood
in her. Anyhow , it was hot enough when it was up , as you
may suppose."
“ But she was acquitted .”
“ Mr. Jaggers was for her, ” pursued Wemmick, with a look
full of meaning, “ and worked the case in a way quite asto
Save
nishing. It was a desperate case , and it was comparatively
early days with him then , and he worked it to general admi
ration ; in fact, it may almost be said to have made him. He
worked it himself at the police -office, day after day for many
days, contending against even a committal ; and at the trial
where he couldn't work it himself, sat under counsel, and
every one know - put in all the salt and pepper. The mur
dered person was a woman ; a woman , a good ten years older,
very much larger, and very much stronger. It was a case of
jealousy. They both led tramping lives, and this woman in
Gerrard -street here, had been married very young , over the
broomstick ( as we say ), to a tramping man , and was a perfect
fury in point of jealousy. The murdered woman - more a
fal match for the man, certainly, in point of years — was found
dead in a barn near Hounslow Heath . There had been a vio .
ore lent struggle, perhaps a fight. She was bruised and scratched
and torn , and had been held by the throat at last and choked.
Now, there was no reasonable evidence to implicate any per
ence son but this woman , and, on the improbabilities of her having
DO been able to do it, Mr. Jaggers principally rested his case . You
may be sure ," said Wemmick, touching me on the sleeve,
" that he never dwelt upon the strength of her hands then ,
though he sometimes does now ."
11
I had told Wemmick of his showing us her wrists, that day
of the dinner party.
“ Well, sir ! ” Wemmick went on ; " it happened - happened,
don't you see ? —that this woman was so very artfully dressed
from the time of her apprehension, that she looked much
slighter than she really was ; in particular, her sleeves are
always remembered to have been so skilfully contrived that
her arms had quite a delicate look. She had only a bruise or
356 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

two about her — nothing for a tramp — but the backs of her
hands were lacerated , and the question was, was it with
finger-nails ? Now, Mr. Jaggers showed that she had struggled
through a great lot of brambles which were not as high as her
face ; but which she could not have got through and kept her
hands out of ; and bits of those brambles were actually found
in her skin and put in evidence, as well as the fact that the
brambles in question were found on examination to have been
broken through, and to have little shreds of her dress and
little spots of blood upon them here and there . But the
holdest point he made, was this. It was attempted to be set
up in proof of her jealousy, that she was under strong suspi
cion of having, at about the time of the murder, frantically
destroyed her child by this man - some three years old - to
revenge herself upon him . Mr. Jaggers worked that, in this
6 We
way . say these are not marks of finger -nails, but marks
of brambles , and we show you the brambles . You say they
are marks of finger -nails, and you set up the hypothesis that
she destroyed her child . You must accept all consequences
of that hypothesis. For anything we know , she may have
destroyed her child, and the child in clinging to her may have
scratched her hands. What then ? You are not trying her
for the murder of her child ; why don't you ? As to this case ,
if you will have scratches, we say that, for anything we know ,
you may have accounted for them , assuming for the sake of
argument that you have not invented them ? To sum up ,
sir ,” said Wemmick , " Mr. Jaggers was altogether too many
for the Jury , and they gave in .”
“ Has she been in his service ever since ?"
66
Yes ; but not only that, ” said Wemmick, “ she went into
his service immediately after her acquittal, tamed as she is
now . She has since been taught one thing and another in the
way of her duties, but she was tamed from the beginning."
“ Do you remember the sex of the child ?” '
“ Said to have been a girl.”
“ You have nothing more to say to me to -night ?”
Nothing. I got your letter and destroyed it. Nothing."
We exchanged a cordial Good Night, and I went home,
with new matter for my thoughts, though with no relief from
the old .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 357

CHAPTER XLIX .
Putting Miss Havisham's note in my pocket, that it might
serve as my credentials for so soon reappearing at Satis
House, in case her waywardness should lead her to express any
surprise at seeing me, I went down again by the coach next
day. But, I alighted at the Halfway House, and breakfasted
there, and walked the rest of the distance ; for, I sought to get
into the town quietly by the unfrequented ways, and to leave
it in the same manner .
+
The best light of the day was gone when I passed along the
quiet echoing courts behind the High -street. The nooks of
ruin where the old monks had once had their refectories and
gardens, and where the strong walls were now pressed into
TC
the service of humble sheds and stables, were almost as silent
TE
as the old monks in their graves. The cathedral chimes had
at once a sadder and a more remote sound to me , as I hurried
E on avoiding observation, than they had ever had before ; so,
the swell of the old organ was borne to my ears like funeral
music ; and the rooks, as they hovered about the grey tower
and swung in the bare high trees of the priory -garden, seemed
to call to me that the place was changed, and that 'Estella was
gone out of it for ever.
An elderly woman whom I had seen before as one of the
servants who lived in the supplementary house across the
back court- yard, opened the gate. The lighted candle stood
in the dark passage within , as of old, and I took it up and
ascended the staircase alone. Miss Havisham was not in her
own room, but was in the larger room across the landing.
Looking in at the door, after knocking in vain, I saw her
sitting on the hearth in a ragged chair, close before, and lost
in the contemplation of, the ashy fire.
Doing as I had often done, I went in, and stood, touching
the old chimney-piece , where she could see me when she
1 raised her eyes. There was an air of utter loneliness upon
her, that would have moved me to pity though she had
wilfully done me a deeper injury than I could charge her
358 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

with . As I stood compassionating her , and thinking how in

the progress of time I tuo had come to be a part of the wrecked
fortunes of that house , her eyes rested on me. She stared ,
and said in a low voice , “ Is it real!"
“ It is I , Pip . Mr. Jaggers gave me your note yesterday,
and I have lost no time.”
Thank you.. Thank you .”
As I brought another of the ragged chairs to the hearth and
sat down, I remarked a new expression on her face, as if she
were afraid of me.
“ I want,” she said, “ to pursue that subject you mentioned
to me when you were last here, and to show you that I am
not all stone. But perhaps you can never believe, now, that
there is anything human in my heart ?”
When I said some reassuring words, she stretched out her
tremulous right hand, as though she was going to touch me ;
but she recalled it again before I understood the action , or
knew how to receive it.
“ You said, speaking for your friend , that you could tell me
how to do something useful and good. Something that you
would like done, is it not ?'
66
Something that I would like done very very much.”
• What is it ?"
I began explaining to her that secret history of the
partnership. I had not got far into it, when I judged from
her looks that she was thinking in a discursive way of me,
rather than of what I said. It seemed to be so, for, when
I stopped speaking, many moments passed before she showed
that she was conscious of the fact.
66 Do you break off,” she asked then , with her former air of
being afraid of me, “ because you hate me too much to bear to
speak to me ?"
CG
No, no, " I answered, “ how can you think so, Miss
Havisham ! I stopped because I thought you were not
following what I said.”
“ Perhaps I was not,” she answered , putting a hand to her
head . “ Begin again, and let me look at something else .
Stay ! Now tell me.”
She set her hand upon her stick, in the resolute way that
sometimes was habitual to her, and looked at the fire with
a strong expression of forcing herself to attend. I went on
with my explanation , and told her how I had hoped to com
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 359

plete the transaction out of my means, but how in this I was

disappointed. That part of the subject ( I reminded her ) in
volved matters which could form no part of my explanation,
for they were the weighty secrets of another.
“ So !” said she, assenting with her head, but not looking at
me. “ And how much money is wanting to complete the
purchase ? ”
I was rather afraid of stating it, for it sounded a large sum .
“ Nine hundred pounds."
- If I give you the money for this purpose, will you keep
my secret as you have kept your own ? ”
“ Quite as faithfully ."
" And your mind will be more at rest ?”
6. Much more at rest.”
“ Are you very unhappy now ? "
She asked this question , still without looking at me, but in
an unwonted tone of sympathy. I could not reply at the
moment, for my voice failed me . She put her left arm across
the head of her stick , and softly laid her forehead on it.
“ I am far from happy, Miss Havisham ; but I have other
causes of disquiet than any you know of. They are the secrets
I have mentioned .”
After a little while, she raised her head, and looked at the
fire again .
“ ' Tis noble in you to tell me that you have other causes of
unhappiness. Is it true ? ”
66 Too true.”
“Can I only serve you, Pip, by serving your friend ? Regard
ing that as done, is there nothing I can do for you yourself ? ”
“ Nothing. I thank you for the question . I thank you
even more for the tone of the question. But, there is nothing . "
She presently rose from her seat, and looked about the
blighted room for the means of writing. There were none
there, and she took from her pocket a yellow set of ivory
tablets, mounted in tarnished gold, and wrote upon them with
a pencil in a case of tarnished gold that hung from her neck .
“ You are still on friendly terms with Mr. Jaggers ?"
Quite. I dined with him yesterday .”
“ This is an authority to him to pay you that money, to lay
out at your irresponsible discretion for your friend. I keep no
money here ; but if you would rather Mr. Jaggers knew
nothing of the matter, I will send it to you. "
360 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Thank you, Miss Havisham ; I have not the least ob

jection to receiving it from him . ”
She read me what she had written , and it was direct and
clear, and evidently intended to absolve me from any sus
picion of profiting by the receipt of the money. I took the
tablets from her hand, and it trembled again, and it trembled
more as she took off the chain to which the pencil was attached,
and66 put it in mine. All this she did, without looking at me.
• My name is on the first leaf. If you can ever write under
my name, ' I forgive her,' though ever so long after my
broken heart is dust - pray do it ! "
“ O Miss Havisham , ” said I, “ I can do it now. There have
been sore mistakes ; and my life has been a blind and thank
less one ; and I want forgiveness and direction far too much ,
to be bitter with you .”
She turned her face to me for the first time since she had
averted it, and to my amazement, I may even add to my
terror, dropped on her knees at my feet; with her folded
hands raised to me in the manner in which, when her poor
heart was young and fresh and whole, they must often have
been raised to Heaven from her mother's side.
To see her with her white hair and her worn face, kneeling
at my feet, gave me a shock through all my frame. I en
treated her to rise, and got my arms about her to help her up ;
but she only pressed that hand of mine which was nearest to
her grasp , and hung her head over it and wept. I had never
seen her shed a tear before, and , in the hope that the relief
might do her good, I bent over her without speaking. She
was not kneeling now , but was down upon the ground.
“ O !" she cried, despairingly . “ What have I done ! What
have I done !”
(6
If you mean , Miss Havisham , what have you done to
injure me, let me answer . Very little . I should have loved
her under any circumstances. Is she married ? "
66 Yes.”
It was a needless question , for a new desolation in the
desolate house had told me so.
“ What have I done ! What have I done ! " She wrung
her hands, and crushed her white hair, and returned to this
cry over and over again. " What have I done !"
I knew not how to answer, or how to comfort her. That
she had done a grievous thing in taking an impressionable
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 361
child to mould into the form that her wild resentment, spumed
affection, and wounded pride, found vengeance in , I knew
d full well . But that, in shutting out the light of day , she had
shut out infinitely more ; that, in seclusion , she had secluded
herself from a thousand natural and healing influences ; that,
her mind, brooding solitary, had grown diseased, as all minds
do and must and will that reverse the appointed order of their
Maker ; I knew equally well. And could I look upon her
1 without compassion , seeing her punishment in the ruin she
was, in her profound unfitness for this earth on which she
was placed, in the vanity of sorrow which had become a
master mania, like the vanity of penitence , the vanity of
remorse, the vanity of unworthiness , and other monstrous
vanities that have been curses in this world ?
“ Until you spoke to her the other day, and until I saw in
you a looking -glass that showed me what I once felt myself, I.
did not know what I had done. What have I done ! What
have I done ! " And so again, twenty, fifty times over, What
had she done !
“ Miss Havisham,” I said, when her cry had died away,
" you may dismiss me from your mind and conscience. But
Estella is a different case, and if you can ever undo any scrap
of what you have done amiss in keeping a part of her right
nature away from her, it will be better to do that, than to be
moan the past through a hundred years."
“ Yes, yes, I know it. But, Pip—my Dear !” There was
an earnest womanly compassion for me in her new affection .
“ My Dear ! Believe this : when she first came to me , I
meant to save her from misery like my own . At first I
meant no more . "
“ Well, well !” said I. “ I hope so ."
“ But as she grew , and promised to be very beautiful, I
gradually did worse , and with my praises, and with my
jewels, and with my teachings, and with this figure of myself
always before her, a warning to back and point my lessons, I
stole her heart away and put ice in its place.”
Better , ” I could not help saying, “ to have left her a
natural heart, even to be bruised or broken.”
With that, Miss Havisham looked distractedly at me for a
while, and then burst out again , What had she done !
“ If you knew all my story," she pleaded, " you would
have some compassion for me and a better understanding of me.”
362 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
"Miss Havisham ," I answered , as delicately as I could , " I
believe I may say that I do know your story, and have known
it ever since I first left this neighbourhood. It has inspired
me with great commiseration, and I hope I understand it and
its influences. Does what has passed between us give me any
excuse for asking you a question relative to Estella ? Not as
she is, but as she was when she first came here ?”
She was seated on the ground, with her arms on the ragged
chair, and her head leaning on them. She looked full at me
when I said this, and replied , “ Go on .”
“ Whose child was Estella ?”
She shook her head .
“ You don't know ? ”
She shook her head again .
" But Mr. Jaggers brought her here, or sent her here ? ”
" Brought her here."
6 Will you tell me how that came about ? " ,
She answered in a low whisper and with caution : " I had
been shut up in these rooms a long time (I don't know how
long ; you know what time the clocks keep here) , when I told
him that I wanted a little girl to rear and love, and save from
my fate. I had first seen him when I sent for him to lay this
place waste for me ; having read of him in the newspapers,
before I and the world parted. He told me that he would
look about him for such an orphan child . One night he
brought her here asleep, and I called her Estella .”
Might I ask her age then ?"
“ Two or three. She herself knows nothing, but that she
was left an orphan and I adopted her.”
So convinced I was of that woman's being her mother, that
I wanted no evidence to establish the fact in my mind.
But, to any mind, I thought, the connexion here was clear and
straight.
What more could I hope to do by prolonging the interview ?
I had succeeded on behalf of Herbert, Miss Havisham had told
me all she knew of Estella, I had said and done what I could
to ease her mind . No matter with what other words we
parted ; we parted.
Twilight was closing in when I went down stairs into the
natural air. I called to the woman who had opened the gate
when I entered , that I would not trouble her just yet, but
would walk round the place before leaving. For, I had a
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 363

presentiment that I should never be there again, and I felt

that the dying light was suited to my last view of it.
By the wilderness of casks that I had walked on long ago,
and on which the rain of years had fallen since, rotting them
in many places, and leaving miniature swamps and pools of
water upon those that stood on end , I made my way to the
ruined garden. I went all round it ; round by the corner
where Herbert and I had fought our battle ; round by the
paths where Estella and I had walked . So cold, so lonely, so
dreary all !
Taking the brewery on my way back, I raised the rusty
latch of a little door at the garden end of it, and walked
through . I was going out at the opposite door — not easy to
open now, for the damp wood had started and swelled, and the
hinges were yielding, and the threshold was encumbered with
a growth of fungus — when I turned my head to look back .
A childish association revived with wonderful force in the
moment of the slight action , and I fancied that I saw Miss
Havisham hanging to the beam . So strong was the impres
sion , that I stood under the beam shuddering from head to
foot before I knew it was a fancy_though to be sure I was
there in an instant.
The mournfulness of the place and time, and the great
terror of this illusion , though it was but momentary, caused
me to feel an indescribable awe as I came out between the
open wooden gates where I had once wrung my hair after
Estella had wrung my heart. Passing on into the front court
yard, I hesitated whether to call the woman to let me out at
the locked gate of which she had the key, or first to go up
stairs and assure myself that Miss Havisham was as safe and
well as I had left her. I took the latter course and went up.
I looked into the room where I had left her, and I saw her
seated in the ragged chair upon the bearth close to the fire,
with her back towards me. In the moment when I was with .
drawing my headto go quietly away, I saw a great flaming
light spring up. In the same moment, I saw her running at
me, shrieking, with a whirl of fire blazing all about her, and
soaring at least as many feet above her head as she was high .
I had a double -caped great-coat on , and over my arm an
other thick coat. That I got them off, closed with her, threw
her down, and got them over her ; that I dragged the great
cloth from the table for the same purpose, and with it dragged
364 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
down the heap of rottenness in the midst, and all the ugly
things that sheltered there ; that we were on the ground strug
gling like desperate enemies, and that the closer I covered her,
the more wildly she shrieked and tried to free herself ; that
this occurred I knew through the result, but not through any
thing I felt, or thought, or knew I did . I knew nothing
until I knew that we were on the floor by the great table, and
that patches of tinder yet alight were floating in the smoky
air, which, a moment ago, had been her faded bridal dress.
Then, I looked round and saw the disturbed beetles and
spiders running away over the floor, and the servants coming
in with breathless cries at the door. I still held her forcibly
down with all my strength , like a prisoner who might escape ;
and I doubt if I even knew who she was, or why we had
struggled , or that she had been in flames, or that the flames
were out, until I saw the patches of tinder that had been her
garments, no longer alight but falling in a black shower
around us.
She was insensible, and I was afraid to have het moved, or
even touched . Assistance was sent for and I held her until it
came, as if I unreasonably fancied (I think I did) that if I let
her go, the fire would break out again and consume her.
When I got up, on the surgeon's coming to her with other aid ,
I was astonished to see that both my hands were burnt; for, I
had no knowledge of it through the sense of feeling.
On examination it was pronounced that she had received
serious hurts, but that they of themselves were far from hope
less ; the danger lay mainly in the nervous shock . By the
surgeon's directions, her bed was carried into that room and
laid upon the great table : which happened to be well suited
to the dressing of her injuries. When I saw her again , an
hour afterwards, she lay indeed where I had seen her strike
her stick, and had heard her say she would lie one day.
Though every vestige of her dress was burnt, as they told
me, she still had something of her old ghastly bridal appear
ance ; for, they had covered her to the throat with white
cotton -wool, and as she lay with a white sheet loosely over
lying that, the phantom air of something that had been and
was changed was still upon her.
I found , on questioning the servants, that Estella was in
Paris, and I got a promise from the surgeon that he would
write by the next post. Miss Havisham's family I took upon
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 365

myself; intending to communicate with Mr. Matthew Pocket

only, and leave him todo as he liked about informing the rest.
This I did next day, through Herbert, as soon as I returned
to town .
There was a stage, that evening, when she spoke collectedly
of what had happened, though with a certain terrible vivacity.
Towards midnight she began to wander in her speech , and
after that it gradually set in that she said innumerable times
in a low solemn voice, “ What have I done !” And then ,
“ When she first came, I meant to save her from misery like
mine . ” And then, “ Take the pencil and write under my
name, ' I forgive her !'” She never changed the order of those
three sentences, but she sometimes left out a word in one or
other of them ; never putting in another word , but always
leaving a blank and going on to the next word.
As I could do no service there, and as I had, nearer home,
that pressing reason for anxiety and fear which even her
wanderings could not drive out of my mind, I decided in the
course of the night that I would return by the early morning
coach : walking on a mile or so, and being taken up clear of
the town. At about six o'clock of the morning, therefore, I
leaned over her and touched her lips with mine, just as they
said, not stopping for being touched, “ Take the pencil and
write under my name, ' I forgive her.” ”

CHAPTER L.

My hands had been dressed twice or thrice in the night, and

again in the morning. My left arm was a good deal burned
to the elbow , and, less severely, as high as the shoulder ; it
was very painful, but the flames had set in that direction, and
I felt thankful it was no worse . My right hand was not so
badly burnt but that I could move the fingers. It was ban
daged, of course , but much less inconveniently than my left
hand and arm ; those I carried in a sling ; and I could only
wear my coat like a cloak, loose over my shoulders and fastened
at the neck. My hair had been caught by the fire, but not my
head or face.
When Herbert had been down to Hammersmith and had
seen his father, he came back to me at our chambers, and
 366 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
devoted the day to attending on me. He was the kindest of
nurses, and at stated times took off the bandages, and steeped
them in the cooling liquid that was kept ready, and put them
on again , with a patient tenderness that I was deeply grateful
for.
At first, as I lay quiet on the sofa, I found it painfully diffi
cult, I might say impossible, to get rid of the impression of
the glare of the flames, their hurry and noise, and the fierce
burning smell. If I dozed for a minute, I was awakened by
Miss Havisham's cries, and by her running at me with all that
height of fire above her head. This pain of the mind was
much harder to strive against than any bodily pain I suffered ;
and Herbert, seeing that, did his utmost to hold my attention
engaged.
Neither of us spoke of the boat, but we both thought of it.
That was made apparent by our avoidance of the subject, and
by our agreeing - without agreement — to make my recovery
of the use of my hands, a question of so many hours, not of so
many weeks.
My first question when I saw Herbert had been , of course,
whether all was well down the river ? As he replied in the
affirmative, with perfect confidence and cheerfulness, we did
not resume the subject until the day was wearing away . But
then , as Herbert changed the bandages, more by the light of
the fire than by the outer light, he went back to it sponta
neously.
I sat with Provis last night, Handel, two good hours."
“ Where was Clara ?”
“ Dear little thing ! ” said Herbert. 6. She was upand down
with Gruffandgrim all the evening. He was perpetually
pegging at the floor, the moment she left his sight. I doubt
if he can hold out long though. What with rum and pepper
--and pepper and rum — I should think his pegging mustbe
nearly over.”
“ And then you will be married , Herbert ? "
“ How can I take care of the dear child otherwise ?—Lay
your arm out upon the back of the sofa, my dear boy , and I'll
sit down here, and get the bandage off so gradually that you
shall not know when it comes. I was speaking of Provis. Do
you know , Handel, he improves ?"
“ I said to you I thought he was softened when I last saw
him .”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 367
6 So you did. And so he is. He was very communicative
last night, and told me more of his life. You remember his
breaking off here about some woman that he had had great
trouble with Did I hurt you ?”
I had started, but not under his touch . His words had
given me a start.
“ I had forgotten that, Herbert, but I remember it now you
speak of it. ”
“ Well ! He went into that part of his life, and a dark wild
part it is. Shall I tell you ? Or would it worry you just
now ?”
“Tell me by all means. Every word.”
Herbert bent forward to look at me more nearly, as if my
reply had been rather more hurried or more eager than he
could quite account for . “ Your head is cool ?” he said, touch
ing it.
“ Quite ,” said I. “ Tell me what Provis said, my dear Her
bert.”
“ It seems," said Herbert, “ —there's a bandage off most
charmingly, and now comes the cool one — makes you shrink
at first, my poor dear fellow , don't it ? but it will be comfort
able presently-it seems that the woman was a young woman ,
and a jealous woman , and a revengeful woman ; revengeful,
Handel, to the last degree .”
“ To what last degree ?”
“ Murder . — Does it strike too cold on that sensitive place ?"
" I don't feel it. How did she murder ? Whom did she
murder ?”
“ Why, the deed may not have merited quite so terrible a
name, ” said Herbert, “ but she was tried for it, and Mr. Jag
gers defended her, and the reputation of that defence first
made his name known to Provis . It was another and a
stronger woman who was the victim, and there had been a
struggle — in a barn . Who began it, or how fair it was , or how
unfair, may be doubtful; but how it ended, is certainly not
doubtful, for the victim was found throttled . ”
“ Was the woman brought in guilty ? ”
“ No ; she was acquitted . — My poor Handel , I hurt you !"
“ It is impossible to be gentler, Herbert. Yes ? What
else ? "
“ This acquitted young woman and Provis had a little
child : a little child of whom Provis was exceedingly fond .
368 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

On the evening of the very night when the object of her jea
lousy was strangled as I tell you, the young woman presented
herself before Provis for one moment, and swore that she
would destroy the child (which was in her possession), and he
should never see it again ; then , she vanished . — There's the
worst arm comfortably in the sling once more, and now there
remains but the right hand, which is a far easier job. I can
do it better by this light than by a stronger, for my hand is
steadiest when I don't see the poor blistered patches too dis
tinctly .-- You don't think your breathing is affected, my dear
boy ? You seem to breathe quickly .”
66
Perhaps I do, Herbert. Did the woman keep her oath ?"
“ There comes the darkest part of Provis's life . She
99
did .”
“ That is, he says she did . ”
Why, of course, my dear boy,” returned Herbert, in a tone
of surprise, and again bending forward to get a nearer look at
me. “ He says it all. I have no other information . ”
97
No, to be sure.
“ Now, whether," pursued Herbert, “ he had used the child's
mother ill , or whether he had used the child's mother well ,
Provis doesn't say ; but, she had shared some four or five
years of the wretched life he described to us at this fireside,
and he seems to have felt pity for her, and forbearance towards
her. Therefore, fearing he should be called upon to depose 1
about this destroyed child, and so be the cause of her death ,
he hid himself ( much as he grieved for the child ), kept himself
dark , as he says, out of the way and out of the trial, and was
only vaguely talked of as a certain man called Abel, out of
whom the jealousy arose. After the acquittal she disappeared ,
and thus he lost the child and the child's mother."
“ I want to ask
<"6 A moment, my dear boy , and I have done. That evil
genius, Compeyson, the worst of .scoundrels among many
scoundrels, knowing of his keeping out of the way at that
time, and of his reasons for doing so, of course afterwards held
the knowledge over his head as a means of keeping him poorer,
and working him harder. It was clear last night that this
barbed the point of Provis's animosity."
“ I want to know ," said I , " and particularly, Herbert, whe
ther he told you when this happened ? "
" Particularly ? Let me remember, then , what he said as to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 369
6 a round score o'
that. His expression was, year ago, and
a’most directly after I took up wi' Compeyson .' How old
were you when you came upon him in the little church
yard ?
“ I think in my seventh year .
“ Ay. It had happened some three or four years then, be
said, and you brought into his mind the little girl so tragically
lost, who would have been about your age.”
“ Herbert,” said I, after a short silence, in a hurried way ,
can you see me best by the light of the window , or the
light of the fire ?”
By the firelight," answered Herbert, coming close again.
>
" Look at me.'
“ I do look at you, my dear boy .”
>>
“ Touch me.”
“ I do touch you, my dear boy ."
“You are not afraid that I am in any fever, or that my head
is much disordered by the accident of last night ? ”
“N -no, my dear boy," said Herbert, after taking time to
examine me. “ You are rather excited, but you are quite your
self.”
“ I know I am quite myself. And the man we have in
hiding down the river, is Estella's Father.

CHAPTER LI.
WHAT purpose I had in view when I was hot on tracing out
and proving Estella's parentage, I cannot say. It will pre
sently be seen that the question was not before me in a dis
tinct shape, until it was put before me by a wiser head than
my own .
But, when Herbert and I had held our momentous conver
sation , I was seized with a feverish conviction that I ought to
hunt the matter down — that I ought not to let it rest, but that
I ought to see Mr. Jaggers, and come at the bare truth . I
really do not know whether I felt that I did this for Estella's
sake, or whether I was glad to transfer to the man in whose
preservation I was so much concerned , some rays of the
romantic interest that had so long surrounded me. Perhaps
the latter possibility may be the nearer to the truth .
2 B
 370 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Any way, I could scarcely be withheld from going out to

Gerrard - street that night. Herbert's representations that if I
did, I should probably be laid up and stricken useless, when
our fugitive's safety would depend upon me, alone restrained
my impatience. On the understanding, again and again
reiterated , that come what would, I was to go to Mr. Jaggers
to-morrow , I at length submitted to keep quiet, and to have
my hurts looked after, and to stay at home. Early next
morning we went out together, and at the corner of Giltspur
street by Smithfield , I left Herbert to go hisway into the City,
and took my way to Little Britain .
There were periodical occasions when Mr. Jaggers and
Mr. Wemmick went over the office accounts, and checked
off the vouchers, and put all things straight. On these
occasions Wemmick took his books and papers into Mr.
Jaggers's room, and one of the up-stairs clerks came down
into the outer office . Finding such clerk on Wemmick's
post that morning, knew what was going on ; but I was
not sorry to have Mr. Jaggers and Wemmick together, as
Wemmick would then hear for himself that I said nothing
to compromise him.
My appearance with my arm bandaged and my coat loose
over my shoulders, favoured my object. Although I had sent
Mr. Jaggers a brief account of the accident as soon as I had
arrived in town, yet I had to give him all the details now ;
and the specialty of the occasion caused our talk to be less
dry and hard, and less strictly regulated by the rules of evi
dence, than it had been before. While I described the disaster,
Mr. Jaggers stood , according to his wont, before the fire.
Wemmick leaned back in his chair, staring at me, with his
hands in the pockets of his trousers, and his pen put horizon
tally into the post. The two brutal casts, always inseparable
in my mind from the official proceedings, seemed to be con
gestively considering whether they didn't smell fire at the
present moment.
My narrative finished , and their questions exhausted , I
then produced Miss Havisham's authority to receive the nine
hundred pounds for Herbert. Mr. Jaggers's eyes retired a
little deeper into his head when I handed him the tablets, but
he presently handed them over to Wemmick, with instructions
to draw the cheque for his signature. While that was in
course of being done, I looked on at Wemmick as he wrote ,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 371

and Mr. Jaggers, poising and swaying himself on his well

polished boots, looked on at me. “ I am sorry, Pip , ” said he,
as I put the cheque in my pocket, when he had signed it,
“ that we do nothing for you.
“ Miss Havisham was good enough to ask me, ” I returned ,
“ whether she could do anything for me, and I told her, No. "
17 “Everybody should know his own business , " said Mr.
Jaggers. And I saw Wemmick’s lips form the words " por
table property ."
“ I should not have told her No, if I had been you ," said
421 Mr. Jaggers ; “ but every man ought to know his own business
best. "
“ Every man's business,” said Wemmick , rather reproach
fully towards me, is " portable property .”
As I thought the time was now come for pursuing the
theme I had at heart, I said, turning on Mr. Jaggers :
" I did ask something of Miss Havisham , however , sir. I
asked her to give me some information relative to her adopted
daughter, and she gave me all she possessed .”
“ Did she ?" said Mr. Jaggers, bending forward to look at
his boots and then straightening himself. “ Hah ! I don't
think I should have done so, if I had been Miss Havisham .
But she ought to know her own business best.”
“ I know more of the history of Miss Havisham's adopted
child , than Miss Havisham berself does, sir. I know her
mother.”
Mr. Jaggers looked at me inquiringly, and repeated
“ Mother ?”
“ I have seen her mother within these three days.”
“ Yes ?" said Mr. Jaggers.
“ And so have you, sir. And you have seen her still more
recently.”
“ Yes ?" said Mr. Jaggers.
1 * Perhaps I know more of Estella's history, than even you
do, " said I. “ I know her father, too ."
A certain stop that Mr. Jaggers came to in his manner - he
was too self -possessed to change his manner, but he could not
help its being brought to an indefinably attentive stop
assured me that he did not know who her father was. This
I had strongly suspected from Provis's account as Herbert
had repeated it ) of his having kept himself dark ; which I
pieced on to the fact that he himself was not Mr. Jaggers's
372 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

client until some four years later, and when he could have no
reason for claiming bis identity. But, I could not be sure of
this unconsciousness on Mr. Jaggers's part before, though I
was quite sure of it now .
“ So ! You know the young lady's father , Pip ?" said Mr.
Jaggers.
Yes," I replied, “ and his name is Provis — from New
South Wales.”
Even Mr. Jaggers started when I said those words. It was
the slightest start that could escape a man , the most carefully
repressed and the sooner checked , but he did start, though he
made it a part of the action of taking out his pocket -handker
chief. How Wemmick received the announcement I am
unable to say, for I was afraid to look at him just then , lest
Mr. Jaggers's sharpness should detect that there had been
some communication unknown to him between us.
“ And on what evidence, Pip ?” asked Mr. Jaggers, very
coolly, as he paused with his handkerchief half way to his
nose, “ does Provis make this claim ?"
“ He does not make it,” said I, " and has never made it, and
has no knowledge or belief that his daughter is in existence .'
For once, the powerful pocket- handkerchief failed . My
reply was so unexpected thatMr.Jaggers put the handkerchief
back into his pocket without completing the usual perfor
mance, folded his arms, and looked with stern attention at me,
though with an immovable face.
Then I told him all I knew , and how I knew it ; with the
one reservation that I left him to infer that I knew from Miss
Havisham what I in fact knew from Wemmick. I was very
careful indeed as to that. Nor, did I look towards Wemmick
until I had finished all I had to tell, and had been for some
time silently meeting Mr. Jaggers’s look. When I did at last
turn my eyes in Wemmick’s direction, I found that he had
unposted his pen , and was intent upon the table before him .
“ Hah !" said Mr. Jaggers at last, as he moved towards the
papers on the table. " _What item was it you were at,
Wemmick, when Mr. Pip came in ? ”
But I could not submit to be thrown off in that way, and I
made a passionate , almost an indignant appeal to him to be
more frank and manly with me. I reminded him of the false
hopes into which I had lapsed, the length of time they had
lasted, and the discovery I had made : and I hinted at the
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS, 373

danger that weighed upon my spirits. I represented myself

as being surely worthy of some little confidence from him , in
return for the confidence I had just now imparted. I said that I
did not blame him, or suspect him, or mistrust him, but I wanted
assurance of the truth from him. And if he asked me why I
wanted it and why I thought I had any right to it, I would tell
15 him, little as he cared for such poor dreams, that I had loved
Estella dearly and long, and that, although I had lost her and
must live a bereaved life, whatever concerned her was still
nearer and dearer to me than anything else in the world . And
seeing that Mr. Jaggers stood quite still and silent, and ap
parently quite obdurate, under this appeal, I turned to
Wemmick , and said, “ Wemmick , I know you to be a man
with a gentle heart. I have seen your pleasant home, and
your old father, and all the innocent cheerful playful ways
with which you refresh your business life. And I entreat you
to say a word for me to Mr. Jaggers, and to represent to him
that,all circumstances considered , he ought to be more open
with me !”
I have never seen two men look more oddly at one another
than Mr. Jaggers and Wemmick did after this apostrophe .
1: At first, a misgiving crossed me that Wemmick would be
instantly dismissed from his employment ; but, it melted as I
saw Mr. Jaggers relax into something like a smile, and Wem
mick become bolder.
“ What's all this ?" said Mr. Jaggers. • You with an old
father, and you with pleasant and playful ways ? ”
« Well !" returned Wemmick . “ If I don't bring 'em here,
IES
what does it matter ? ”
“ Pip ,” said Mr. Jaggers, laying his hand upon my arm , and
smiling openly, “ this man must be the most cunning impostor
in all London .
“ Not a bit of it,” returned Wemmick, growing bolder and
7. bolder. “ I think you're another.”
Again they exchanged their former odd looks, each ap
parently still distrustful that the other was taking him in.
“ You with a pleasant home?” said Mr. Jaggers.
“ Since it don't interfere with business," returned Wemmick,
1
“ let it be so. Now, I look at you, sir, I shouldn't wonder if
be
you might be planning and contriving to have a pleasant home of
your own, one of these days, when you're tired of all this work .”
1
Mr. Jaggers nodded his head retrospectively two or three
2
374 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.
times, and actually drew a sigh. “ Pip ,” said he , “ we won't
talk about ' poor dreams ; ' you know more about such things
than I, having much fresher experience of that kind . But
now, about this other matter. I'll put a case to you. Mind !
I admit nothing ."
He waited for me to declare that I quite understood that he
expressly said that he admitted nothing.
Now, Pip ,” said Mr. Jaggers, " put this case . Put the
case that a woman, under such circumstances as you have
mentioned held her child concealed , and was obliged to com
municate the fact to her legal adviser, on his representing to
her that he must know, with an eye to the latitude of his
defence, how the fact stood about that child . Put the case
that at the same time he held a trust to find a child for an
eccentric rich lady to adopt and bring up. "
• I follow you, sir.”
“ Put the case that he lived in an atmosphere of evil, and
that all he saw of children, was, their being generated in
great numbers for certain destruction . Put the case that he
often saw children solemnly tried at a criminal bar, where
they were held up to be seen ; put the case that he habitually
knew of their being imprisoned , whipped, transported, neg
lected, cast out, qualified in all ways for the hangman , and
growing up to be hanged. Put the case that pretty nigh all
the children he saw in his daily business life, he had reason
to look upon as so much spawn, to develop into the fish that
were to come to his net-to be prosecuted, defended, forsworn
made orphans, be -devilled somehow ."
66 I follow you , sir .”
“ Put the case , Pip, that here was one pretty little child out
of the heap who could be saved ; whom the father believed
dead, and dared make no stir about ; as to whom , over the
mother, the legal adviser had this power : ' I know what you
did , and how you did it. You came so and so, you did such
and such things to divert suspicion . I have tracked you
through it all, and I tell it you all. Part with the child,
unless it should be necessary to produce it to clear you, and
then it shall be produced. Give the child into my hands, and
I will do my best to bring you off. If you are saved , your
child will be saved too ; if you are lost your child is still
saved .' Put the case that this was done, and that the woman
was cleared .”
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 375

“ I understand you perfectly ."

" But that I make no admissions ?
“ That you make no admissions.” And Wemmick repeated,
“ No admissions . "
“ Put the case , Pip, that passion and the terror of death
had a little shaken the woman's intellects, and that when she
was set at liberty, she was scared out of the ways of the world
and went to him to be sheltered . Put the case that he took
her in, and that he kept down the old wild violent nature
whenever he saw an inkling of its breaking out, by asserting
his power over her in the old way . Do you comprehend the
imaginary case ?”
Quite. "
“ Put the case that the child grew up , and was married for
money Tbat the mother was still living. That the father
was still living. That the mother and father unknown to one
another, were dwelling within so many miles, furlongs, yards
if you like, of one another. That the secret was still a secret,
except that you had got wind of it. Put that last case to
yourself very carefully."
6. I do.”
“ I ask Wemmick to put it to himself very carefully .”
And Wemmick said , “ I do . "
" For whose sake would you reveal the secret ? For the
father's ? I think he would not be much the better for the
mother. For the mother's ? I think if she had done such a
deed she would be safer where she was. For the daughter's ?
I think it would hardly serve her, to establish her parentage for
the information of her husband, and to drag her back to disgrace,
after an escape of twenty years, pretty secure to last for life.
But, add the case that you had loved her, Pip , and had made
her the subject of those ' poor dreams' which have, at one time
or another, been in the heads of more men than you think
likely, then I tell you that you had better — and would much
sooner when you had thought well of it - chop off that bandaged
left hand of yours with your bandaged right hand , and then
pass the chopper on to Wemmick there, to cut that off, too ."
I looked at Wemmick, whose face was very grave. He
gravely touched his lips with his forefinger. I did the same.
Mr. Jaggers did the same. Now , Wemmick,” said the
latter then, resuming his usual manner, " what item was it
you were at, when Mr. Pip came in ?"!
376 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

Standing by for a little, while they were at work , I observed

that the odd looks they had cast at one another were repeated
several times : with this difference now, that each of them
seemed suspicious, not to say conscious, of having shown
himself in a weak and unprofessional light to the other. For
this reason , I suppose, they were now inflexible with one
another ; Mr. Jaggers being highly dictatorial, and Wemmick
obstinately justifying himself whenever there was the smallest
point in abeyance for a moment. I had never seen them on
such ill terms; for generally they got on very well indeed
together.
But, they were both happily relieved by the opportune
appearance of Mike, the client with the fur cap and the habit
of wiping his nose on his sleeve, whom I had seen on the very
first day of my appearance within those walls. This indivi .
dual, who, either in his own person or in that of some member of
his family, seemed to be always in trouble (which in that
place meant Newgate ), called to announce that his eldest
daughter was taken up on suspicion of shoplifting. As he
imparted this melancholy circumstance to Wemmick, Mr.
Jaggers standing magisterially before the fire and taking no
share in the proceedings, Mike's eye happened to twinkle with
a tear.
“ What are you about ? " demanded Wemmick, with the
utmost indignation. “ What do you come snivelling here for ?”
“ I did't go to do it, Mr. Wemmick .”
" You did ," said Wemmick . “ How dare you ? You're
not in a fit state to come here, if you can't come here without
spluttering like a bad pen. What do you mean by it ?"
" A man can't help his feelings, Mr. Wemmick, " pleaded
Mike.
- His what ?" demanded Wemmick, quite savagely. “ Say
that again ! "
Now , look here , my man , ” said Mr. Jaggers, advancing a
step, and pointing to the door. “ Get out of this office. I'll
have no feelings here. Get out.”
“ It serves you right,” said Wemmick. “ Get out.”
So , the unfortunate Mike very humbly withdrew , and Mr.
Jaggers and Wemmick appeared to have re -established their
good understanding, and went to work again with an air of
refreshment upon them as if they had just had lunch.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 377

CHAPTER LII.
From Little Britain , I went, with my cheque in my pocket,
len 2 to Miss Skiffins's brother, the accountant ; and Miss Skiffins's
brother, the accountant, going straight to Clarriker's and
bringing Clarriker to me , I had the great satisfaction of con
cluding that arrangement. It was the only good thing I had
done, and the only completed thing I had done, since I was
first apprised of my great expectations.
Clarriker informing me on that occasion that the affairs of
the House were steadily progressing, that he would now be
able to establish a small branch -house in the East which
was much wanted for the extension of the business, and
that Herbert in his new partnership capacity would go out and
1: take charge of it, I found that I must have prepared for a
separation from my friend, even though my own affairs had
been more settled . And now indeed I felt as if my last anchor
were loosening its hold , and I should soon be driving with the
winds and waves ,
But, there was recompense in the joy with which Herbert
would come home of a night and tell me of these changes,
IN little imagining that he told me no news, and would sketch
airy pictures of himself conducting Clara Barley to the land
of the Arabian Nights, and of me going out to join them (with
aded & caravan of camels, I believe) , and of our all going up the
Nile and seeing wonders. Without being sanguine as to my
own part in those bright plans, I felt that Herbert's way was
clearing fast, and that old Bill Barley had but to stick to his
pepper and rum , and his daughter would soon be happily pro
vided for.
We had now got into the month of March . My left arm,
though it presented no bad symptoms, took in the natural
T. course so long to heal that I was still unable to get a coat on .
My right arm was tolerably restored ;—disfigured, but fairly
serviceable.
On a Monday morning, when Herbert and I were at break
fast, I received the following letter from Wemmick by the post.
378 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .
“ Walworth . Burn this as soon as read . Early in the week , or say
Wednesday, you might do what you know of, if you felt disposed to try it.
Now burn ."
When I had shown this to Herbert and had put it in the
fire — but not before we had both got it by heart — we con
sidered what to do. For, of course my being disabled could
now be no longer kept out of view .
" I have thought it over, again and again , " said Herbert,
" and I think I know a better course than taking a Thames
waterman . Take Startop. A good fellow , a skilled hand ,
fond of us, and enthusiastic and honourable . ”
I had thought of him, more than once.
“ But how much would you tell him, Herbert ?”
“ It is necessary to tell him very little. Let him suppose it
a mere freak, but a secret one, until the morning comes : then
let him know that there is urgent reason for your getting
Provis aboard and away. You go with him ?”
“ No doubt."
6 Where ?”
It had seemed to me, in the many anxious considerations
I had given the point, almost indifferent what port we made
for - Hamburg, Rotterdam , Antwerp — the place signified
little, so that he was out of England . Any foreign steamer
that fell in our way and would take us up, would do. I had
always proposed to myself to get him well down the river in
the boat : certainly well beyond Gravesend, which was a
critical place for search or inquiry if suspicion were afoot.
As foreign steamers would leave London at about the time of
high -water, our plan would be to get down the river by
a previous ebb-tide, and lie by in some quiet spot until we
could pull off to one . The time when one would be due
where we lay, wherever that might be, could be calculated
pretty nearly , if we made inquiries beforehand.
Herbert assented to all this, and we went out immediately
after breakfast to pursue our investigations. We found that a
steamer for Hamburg was likely to suit our purpose best, and
we directed our thoughts chiefly to that vessel. But we noted
down what other foreign steamers would leave London with
the same tide, and we satisfied ourselves that we knew the
build and colour of each . We then separated for a few hours ;
I, to get at once such passports as were necessary ; Herbert,
to see Startop at his lodgings. We both did what we had to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 379

do without any hindrance, and when we met again at one

o'clock reported it done. I, for my part, was prepared with
passports ; Herbert had seen Startop, and he was more than
!
ready to join.
Those two would pull a pair of oars, we settled, and I would
steer ; our charge would be sitter, and keep quiet ; as speed
was not our object, we should make way enough. We
arranged that Herbert should not come home to dinner before
going to Mill Pond Bank that evening ; that he should not
go there at all, to -morrow evening , Tuesday ; that he should
prepare Provis to come down to some Stairs hard by the
house, on Wednesday, when he saw us approach, and not
sooner ; that all the arrangements with him should be con
cluded that Monday night ; and that he should be communi
cated with no more in any way , until we took him on board .
These precautions well understood by both of us, I went
home.
On opening the outer door of our chambers with my key,
I found a letter in the box, directed to me ; a very dirty
letter, though not ill -written . It had been delivered by hand
(of course since I left home) , and its contents were these :
“ If you are not afraid to come to the old marshes to-night or to -morrow
night at Nine, and to come to the little sluice -house by the limekiln, you had
better come. If you want information regarding your uncle Provis, you
had much better come and tell no one and lose no time. You must come
alone. Bring this with you. ”.
I had had load enough upon my mind before the receipt of
this strange letter. What to do now, I could not tell. And
the worst was , that I must decide quickly, or I should miss
the afternoon coach , which would take me down in time for
to -night. To-morrow night I could not think of going, for it
would be too close upon the time of the flight. And again ,
for anything I knew , the proffered information might have
some important bearing on the flight itself.
If I had had ample time for consideration, I believe I
should still have gone. Having hardly any time for consider
ation - my watch showing me that the coach started within
half an hour - I resolvedto go. I should certainly not have
gone ,but for the reference to my Uncle Provis. That, coming
on Wemmick's letter and the morning's busy preparation ,
turned the scale.
It is so difficult to become clearly possessed of the contents
 per i

380 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

of almost any letter, in a violent hurry, that I had to read this
mysterivus epistle again, twice , before its injunction to me to
be secret got mechanically into my mind. Yielding to it in
the same mechanical kind of way, I left a note in pencil for
Herbert, telling him that as I should be so soon going away, I
knew not for how long, I had decided to hurry down and
back, to ascertain for myself how Miss Havisham was faring.
I had then barely time to get my great-coat, lock up the
chambers, and make for the coach - office by the short by -ways.
If I had taken a hackney -chariot and gone by the streets, I
should have missed my aim ; going as I did, I caughtthe coach
just as it came out of the yard. I was the only inside passen
ger, jolting away knee-deep in straw, when I came to myself.
For, I really had not been myself since the receipt of the
letter ; it had so bewildered me, ensuing on the hurry of the
morning. The morning hurry and flutter had been great, for,
long and anxiously as I had waited for Wemmick , his hint
had come like a surprise at last. And now, I began to won
der at myself for being in the coach, and to doubt whether I
had sufficient reason for being there, and to consider whether
I should get out presently and go back , and to argue against
ever heeding an anonymous communication ; and, in short, to
pass through all those phases of contradiction and indecision
to which I suppose very few hurried people are strangers.
Still, the reference to Provis by name, mastered everything.
I reasoned as I had reasoned already without knowing it - if
that be reasoning — in case any harm should befal him through
my not going, how could I ever forgive myself !
It was dark before we got down, and the journey seemed
long and dreary to me who could see little of it inside, and who
could not go outside in my disabled state . Avoiding the Blue
Boar, I put up at an inn of minor reputation down the town,
and ordered some dinner. While it was preparing, I went to
Satis House and inquired for Miss Havisham ; she was still
very ill, though considered something better.
My inn had once been a part of an ancient ecclesiastical
house , and I dined in a little octagonal common -room , like a
font. As I was not able to cut my dinner, the old landlord
with a shining bald head did it for me. This bringing us into
conversation, he was so good as to entertain me with my own
story - of course with the popular feature that Pumblechook
was my earliest benefactor and the founder of my fortunes.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 381

“ Do you know the young man ?” said I

“ Know him ?” repeated the landlord. " Ever since he
was — no height at all.”
“ Does he ever come back to this neighbourhood ?” ?
“ Ay, he comes back , " said the landlord, “ to his great
friends, now and again , and gives the cold shoulder to the
man that made him .”
“ What man is that ?”
“ Him that I speak of,” said the landlord. 66 Mr. Pumble
chook .”
66
Is he ungrateful to no one else ?”
“ No doubt he would be, if he could , ” returned the land
lord, “ but he can't. And why ? Because Pumblechook
done everything for him . ”
“ Does Pumblechook say so ? ”
“ Say so !" replied the landlord . “ He han't no call to
say so . "
“ But does he say so ?”
“ It would turn a man's blood to white wine winegar to
hear him tell of sir ,” said the landlord .
I thought, “ Yet Joe, dear Joe, you never tell of it. Long
suffering and loving Joe, you never complain . Nor you ,
sweet -tempered Biddy !"
“ Your appetite's been touched like, by your accident,”
said the landlord , glancing at the bandaged arm under my
coat. “ Try a tenderer bit.”
“ No thank you ,” I replied, turning from the table to brood
over the fire. “ I can eat no more . Please take it away .”
I had never been struck at so keenly, for my thanklessness
to Joe, as through the brazen impostor Pumblechook. The
falser he, the truer Joe ; the meaner he, the nobler Joe.
My heart was deeply and most deservedly humbled as I
mused over the fire for an hour or more. The striking of the
clock aroused me, but not from my dejection or remorse, and
I got up and had my coat fastened round my neck, and went
ont. I had previously sought in my pockets for the letter,
that I might refer to it again, but I could not find it, and was
uneasy to think that it must have been dropped in the straw
of the coach. I knew very well, however, that the appointed
place was the little sluice - house by the limekiln on the
marshes, and the hour nine . Towards the marshes I now
went straight, having no time to spare.
382 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

CHAPTER LIII.

It was a dark night, though the full moon rose as I left the
enclosed lands, and passed out upon the marshes. Beyond
their dark line there was a ribbon of clear sky, hardly broad
enough to hold the red large moon . In a few minutes she
had ascended out of that clear field, in among the piled
mountains of cloud.
There was a melancholy wind , and the marshes were very
dismal. A stranger would have found them insupportable,
and even to me they were so oppressive that I hesitated, half
inclined to go back. But, I knew them well, and could have
found my way on a far darker night, and had no excuse for
returning, being there. So , having come there against my
inclination, I went on against it.
The direction that I took, was not that in which my old
home lay, nor that in which we had pursued the convicts.
My back was turned towards the distant Hulks as I walked
on, and, though I could see the old lights away on the spits
of sand, I saw them over my shoulder. I knew the limekiln
as well as I knew the old Battery, but they were miles apart ;
so that if a light had been burning at each point that night,
there would have been a long strip of the blank horizon
between the two bright specks.
At first, I had tu shut some gates after me, and now and
then to stand still while the cattle that were lying in the
banked - up pathway, arose and blundered down among the
grass and reeds. But after a little while, I seemed to have
the whole flats to myself.
It was another half -hour before I drew near to he kiln .
The lime was burning with a sluggish stifling smell, but the
fires were made up and left, and no workmen were visible.
Hard by, was a small stone -quarry. It lay directly in my
way, and had been worked that day, as I saw by the tools
and barrows that were lying about.
Coming up again to the marsh level out of this excavation
--for the rude path lay through it-I saw a light in the old
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 383

sluice -honse . I quickened my pace, and knocked at the door

with my hand. Waiting for some reply, I looked about me,
noticing how the sluice was abandoned and broken, and how
the house -of wood with a tiled roof - would not be proof
against the weather much longer, if it were so even now , and
how the mud and ooze were coated with lime, and how the
choking vapour of the kiln crept in a ghostly way towards
me. Still there was no answer , and I knocked again. No
answer still, and I tried the latch.
It rose under my hand, and the door yielded. Looking in,
I saw a lighted candle on a table, a bench, and a mattress on
a truckle bedstead. As there was a loft above, I called , 66 Is
there any one here ? ” but no voice answered . Then, I
looked at my watch , and, finding that it was past nine, called
again , " Is there any one here ?” There being still no answer,
I went out at the door, irresolute what to do.
It was beginning to rain fast. Seeing nothing save what I
had seen already, I turned back into the house, and stood just
within the shelter of the doorway, looking out into the night.
While I was considering that some one must have been there
lately and must soon be coming back , or the candle would
not be burning, it came into my head to look if the wick
were long. I turned round to do so, and had taken up the
candle in my hand, when it was extinguished by some violent
shock, and the next thing I comprehended, was, that I had
been caught in a strong running noose, thrown over my head
from behind.
“ Now , " said a suppressed voice with an oath , “ I've
got you !"
“ What is this ?" I cried , struggling. “ Who is it ? Help,
help, help !"
Not only were my arms pulled close to my sides, but the
pressure on my bad arm caused me exquisite pain. Some
times, a strong man's hand, sometimes a strong man's breast,
was set against my mouth to deaden my cries, and with a hot
breath always close to me , I struggled ineffectually in the
dark, while I was fastened tight to the wall. * And now , "
said the suppressed voice with another oath , " call out again,
and I'll make short work of you !"
Faint and sick with the pain of my injured arm , bewildered
by the surprise, and yet conscious how easily this threat
could be put in execution, I desisted, and tried to ease my
384 GREAT EXPECTATIONS,

arm were it ever so little. But, it was bound too tight for
that. I felt as if, having been burnt before, it were now
being boiled .
The sudden exclusion of the night and the substitution of
black darkness in its place, warned me that the man had
closed a shutter. After groping about for a little, he found
the flint and steel he wanted, and began to strike a light. I
strained my sight upon the sparks that fell among the tinder,
and upon which he breathed and breathed, match in hand,
but I could only see his lips, and the blue point of the match ;
even those, but fitfully. The tinder was damp -no wonder
there — and one after another the sparks died out.
The man was in no hurry, and struck again with the flint
and steel. As the sparks fell thick and bright about him ,
I could see his hands, and touches of his face, and could make
out that he was seated and bending over the table ; but
nothing more. Presently I saw his blue lips again , breathing
on the tinder, and then a flare of light flashed up, and showed
me Orlick .
Whom I had looked for, I don't know . I had not looked
for him. Seeing him, I felt that I was in a dangerous strait
indeed, and I kept my eyes upon him.
He lighted the candle from the flaring match with great
deliberation , and dropped the match, and trod it out. Then,
he put the candle away from him on the table, so that he
could see me, and sat with his arms folded on the table and
looked at me. I made out that I was fastened to a stout per
pendicular ladder a few inches from the wall—a fixture there
—the means of ascent to the loft above.
“ Now , " said he , when we had surveyed one another for
some time, “ I've got you .”
“ Unbind me. Let me go !"
“ Ah !” he returned , “ I'll let you go. I'll let you go to the
moon , I'll let you go to the stars . All in good time . ” 1
66
Why have you lured me here ?"
“ Don't you know ?” said he, with a deadly look.
Why have you set upon me in the dark ?”
“Because I mean to do it all myself. One keeps a secret
better than two. Oh you enemy, you enemy !”
His enjoyment of the spectacle I furnished , as he sat with
his arms folded on the table, shaking his head at me and
hugging himself, had a maliguity in it that made me tremble.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 385

As I watched him in silence, he put his hand into the corner

at his side, and took up a gun with a brass -bound stock .
66 Do you know this ? ” said he, making as if he would take
aim at me. “ Do you know where you saw it afore ? Speak,
wolf !"
“ Yes," I answered .
“ You cost me that place. You did. Speak ! "
“ What else could I do ?”
“ You did that, and that would be enough , without more .
How dared you come betwixt me and a young woman I
liked ? "
“ When did I ? "
“ When didn't you ? It was you as always give Old Orlick
a bad name to her.”
“ You gave it to yourself ; you gained it for yourself.
I could have done you no harm , if you had done yourself
none."
“ You're a liar . And you'll take any pains, and spend any
money , to drive'me out of this country, will you ? " said he,
repeating my words to Biddy in the last interview I had with
her. Now, I'll tell you a piece of information. It was
ES STI : never so worth your while to get me out of this country, as it
is to -night. Ah ! If it was all your money twenty times
told, to the last brass farden ! ” As he shook his heavy hand
The at me, with his mouth snarling like a tiger's, I felt that it was
hat he true.
Die api “ What are you going to do to me ?”
" I'm a going,” said he , bringing his fist down upon the
ther: table with a heavy blow , and rising as the blow fell, to give
it greater force, “ I'm a going to have your life ! "
er for He leaned forward staring at me, slowly unclenched his
hand and drew it across his mouth as if his mouth watered for
me, and sat down again .
“ You was always in Old Orlick's way since ever you was a
child . You goes out of his way, this present night. He'll
have no more on you. You're dead .”
I felt that I had come to the brink ofmy grave. For a
moment I looked wildly round my trap for any chance of
escape ; but there was none .
“ More than that,” said he, folding his arms on the table
with again, “ I won't have a rag of you, I won't have a bone of you ,
and left on earth . I'll put your body in the kiln-I'd carry two
ble. 2 o
386 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

such to it, on my shoulders - and, let people suppose what

they may of you, they shall never know nothing."
My mind, with inconceivable rapidity, followed out all the
consequences of such a death . Estella's father would believe
I had deserted him, would be taken, would die accusing me ;
even Herbert would doubt me, when he compared the letter I :
had left for him , with the fact that I had called at Miss
Havisham's gate for only a moment ; Joe and Biddy would
never know how sorry I had been that night, none would
ever know what I had suffered , how true I had meant to be,
what an agony I had passed through. The death close before
me was terrible, but far more terrible than death was the
dread of being misremembered after death . And so quick
were my thoughts, that I saw myself despised by unborn
generations - Estella's children, and their children - while the
wretch's words were yet on his lips.
“Now, wolf,” said he, “ afore I kill you like any other beast
-which is wot I mean to do and wot I have tied you up for
-I'll have a good look at you ard a good goad at you . Oh,
you enemy !”
It had passed through my thoughts to cry out for help
again ; though few could know better than I, the solitary
nature of the spot, and the hopelessness of aid . But as he
sat gloating over me, I was supported by a scornful detesta
tion of him that sealed my lips. Above all things, I resolved
that I would not entreat him, and that I would die making
some last poor resistance to him. Softened as my thoughts
of all the rest of men were in that dire extremity ; humbly
beseeching pardon , as I did, of Heaven ; melted at heart, as I
was, by the thought that I had taken no farewell, and never
now could take farewell, of those who were dear to me,
or could explain myself to them , or ask for their compassion
on my miserable errors ; still, if I could have killed him, even
in dying, I would have done it.
He had been drinking, and his eyes were red and blood
shot. Around his neck was slung a tin bottle, as I had often
seen his meat and drink slung about him in other days. He
brought the bottle to his lips, and took a fiery drink from it ;
and I smelt the strong spirits that I saw flash into his face.
“ Wolf !” said he, folding his arms again, “ Old Orlick's a
going to tell you somethink . It was you as did for your shrew
sister.”
 han

GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 387

Again my mind, with its former inconceivable rapidity, had

exhausted the whole subject of the attack upon my sister, her
illness, and her death, before his slow and hesitating speech
had formed those words.
“ It was you, villain , " said I.
' I tell you it was your doing — I tell you it was done
through you ,” he retorted, catching up the gun , and making a
blow with the stock at the vacant air between us. “ I come
upon her from behind, as I come upon you to -night. I giv'
it her ! I left her for dead, and if there had been a lime-kiln
as nigh her as there is now nigh you, she shouldn't have come
to life again . But it warn't Old Orlick as did it ; it was you .
You was favoured, and he was bullied and beat. Old Orlick
5 bullied and beat, eh ? Now you pays for it. You done it ;
now you pays for it.”
He drank again, and became more ferocious. I saw by his
tilting of the bottle that there was no great quantity left in
it. I distinctly understood that he was working himself up
with its contents, to make an end of me. I knew that every
drop it held, was a drop of my life . I knew that when I was
changed into a part of the vapour that had crept towards me
but a little while before, like my own warning ghost, he
would do as he had done in my sister's case-make all haste
to the town , and be seen slouching about there, drinking at
the alo - houses. My rapid mind pursued him to the town ,
made a picture of the street with him in it, and contrasted its
lights and life with the lonely marsh and the white vapour
creeping over it, into which I should have dissolved .
It was not only that I could have summed up years and
years and years while he said a dozen words, but that what
he did say, presented pictures to me, and not mere words.
In the excited and exalted state of my brain, I could not think
of a place without seeing it, or of persons without seeing
them. It is impossible to over - state the vividness of these
images, and yet I was so intent, all the time, upon him him
self — who would not be intent on the tiger crouching to
spring ! — that I knew of the slightest action of his fingers.
When he had drunk this second time, he rose from the
bench on which he sat, and pushed the table aside. Then, he
took up the candle, and shading it with his murderous hand
so as to throw its light on me, stood before me, looking at me
and enjoying the sight.
 --

388 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Wolf, I'll tell you something more. It was Old Orlick as
you tumbled over on your stairs that night."
I saw the staircase with its extinguished lamps. I saw the
shadows of the heavy stair- rails , thrown by the watchman's
lantern on the wall. I saw the rooms that I was never to see
again ; here, a door half open ; there, a door closed ; all the
articles of furniture around.
“ And why was Old Orlick there ? I'll tell you something
more, wolf. You and her have pretty well hunted me out of
this country, so far as getting a easy living in it goes, and I've
took up with new companions, and new masters. Some of 'em
writes my letters when I wants ' em wrote - do you mind ?
writes my letters, wolf ! They writes fifty hands ; they're
not like sneaking you, as writes but one. I've had a firm
mind and a firm will to have your life, since you was down
here at your sister's burying. I han't seen a way to get you
safe, and I've looked arter you to know your ins and outs.
For, says Old Orlick to himself, “ Somehow or another I'll
have him! What ! When I looks for you , I finds your uncle
Provis, eh ? "
Mill Pond Bank, and Chinks's Basin , and the Old Green
Copper Rope -Walk , all so clear and plain ! Provis in his
rooms, the signal whose use was over, pretty Clara , the good
motherly woman, old Bill Barley on his back , all drifting by,
as on the swift stream of my life fast running out to sea !
“ You with a uncle too ! Why, I knowed you at Gargery's
when you was so small a wolf that I could have took your
weazen betwixt this finger and thumb and chucked you away
dead ( as I'd thoughts o' doing, odd times, when I saw you a
loitering among the pollards on a Sunday ), and you hadn't
found no uncles then . No , not you ! But when Old Orlick
come for to hear that your uncle Provis had mostlike wore the
leg -iron wot Old Orlick had picked up, filed asunder, on
these meshes ever so many year ago, and wot he kep by him
till he dropped your sister with it, like a bullock, as he
means to drop you - hey ? -- when he come for to hear that
hey ?--"
In his savage taunting, he flared the candle so close at me,
that I turned my face aside to save it from the flame.
“ Ah !" he cried , laughing, after doing it again, “ the burnt
child dreads the fire ! Old Orlick knowed you was burnt,
Old Orlick knowed you was a smuggling your uncle Provis
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 389

away, Old Orlick’s a match for you and knowed you'd come
to -night! Now I'll tell you something more, wolf, and this
ends it. There's them that's as good a match for your uncle
Provis as Old Orlick has been for you. Let him 'ware
them , when he's lost his nevvy . Let him 'ware them, when
no man can't find a rag of his dear relation's clothes, nor yet a
bone of his body. There's them that can't and that won't
have Magwitch - yes, I know the name ! -alive in the same
land with them , and that's had such sure information of him
when he was alive in another land, as that he couldn't and
shouldn't leave it unbeknown and put them in danger. P'raps
it's them that writes fifty hands, and that's not like sneaking
you as writes but one. ' Ware Compeyson, Magwitch, and the
gallows !"
He flared the candle at me again , smoking my face and hair,
and for an instant blinding me, and turned his powerful back
as he replaced the light on the table. I had thought a prayer,
and had been with Joe and Biddy and Herbert, before he
turned towards me again .
There was a clear space of a few feet between the table and
Green the opposite wall. Within this space, he now slouched back
wards and forwards. His great strength seemed to sit stronger
upon him than ever before, as he did this with his hands
hanging loose and heavy at his sides, and with his eyes scowl
ing at me. I had no grain of hope left. Wild as my inward
FET hurry was, and wonderful the force of the pictures that rushed by
me instead of thoughts, I could yet clearly understand that
unless he had resolved that I was within a few moments
of surely perishing out of all human knowledge, he would
never have told me what he had told.
Of a sudden , he stopped, took the cork out of his bottle, and
tossed it away. Light as it was, I heard it fall like a plummet.
02 He swallowed slowly, tilting up the bottle by little and little ,
and now he looked at me no more. The last few drops of
be liquor he poured into the palm of his hand, and licked up.
Then with a sudden hurry of violence and swearing horribly,
he threw the bottle from him, and stooped ; and I saw in his
ť, hand a stone -hammer with a long heavy handle.
The resolution I had made did not desert me, for, without
uttering one vain word of appeal to him, I shouted out with all
my might, and struggled with all my might. It was only
my head and my legs that I could move, but to that extent 1
390 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

struggled with all the force, until then unknown, that was
within me. In the same instant I heard responsive shouts,
saw ' figures and a gleam of light dash in at the door, heard
voices and tumult, and saw Orlick emerge from a struggle of
men , as if it were tumbling water, clear the table at a leap,
and fly out into the night !
After a blank , I found that I was lying unbound, on the
floor, in the same place, with my head on some one's knee.
My eyes were fixed on the ladder against the wall, when
I came to myself — had opened on it before my mind saw
it - and thus as I recovered consciousness, I knew that I was
in the place where I had lost it.
Too indifferent at first, even to look round and ascertain
who supported me, I was lying looking at the ladder, when
there came between me and it, a face . The face of Trabb's boy !
“ I think he's all right !” said Trabb's boy, in a sober
voice ; “ but ain't he just pale though !"
At these words, the face of him who supported me looked
over into mine, and I saw my supporter to be
“ Herbert ! Great Heaven !"
· Softly,” said Herbert. 'Gently, Handel. Don't be
too eager .
“ And our old comrade, Startop ! ” I cried, as he too bent
over me.
“ Remember what he is going to assist us in ,” said Herbert,
and be calm .”
The allusion made me spring up ; though I dropped again
from the pain in my arm . “ The time has not gone by,
Herbert, has it ? What night is to -night ? How long have I
been here ? " For, I had a strange and strong misgiving that
I had been lying there a long time— a day and a night — two
days and nights - more.
« The time has not gone by. It is still Monday night. ”
66 Thank God !”
“ And you have all to -morrow , Tuesday, to rest in," said
Herbert. C6 But you can't help groaning, my dear Handel.
What hurt have you got ? Can you stand ?"
“ Yes, yes," said I, “ I can walk . I have no hurt but in
this throbbing arm .”
They laid it bare, and did what they could. It was
violently swollen and inflamed , and I could scarcely endure
to have it touched. But, they tore up their handkerchiefs to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 391

make fresh bandages, and carefully replaced it in the sling ,

until we could get to the town and obtain some cooling lotion
to put upon it. In a little while we had shut the door of the
dark and empty sluice-house, and were passing through the
quarry on our way back . Trabb’s boy - Trabb's overgrown
‫ܕ ܕܠ‬ young man now — went before us with a lantern , which was
the light I had seen come in at the door. But, the moon was
a good two hours higher than when I had last seen the sky,
and the night though rainy was much lighter. The white
vapour of the kiln was passing from us as we went by, and,
as I had thought a prayer before, I thought a thanksgiving now.
Entreating Herbert to tell me how he had come to my
sertai
rescue — which at first he had flatly refused to do, but had
insisted on my remaining quiet - I learnt that I had in my
b's bei hurry dropped the letter, open , in our chambers, where he,
Sute: coming home to bring with him Startop whom he had met in
the street on his way to me, found it, very soon after I was
locked gone. Its tone made him uneasy , and the more so because of
the inconsistency between it and the hasty letter I had left
for him . His uneasiness increasing instead of subsiding after
a quarter of an hour's consideration, he set off for the coach
office, with Startop, who volunteered his company, to make
inquiry when the next coach went down . Finding that the
afternoon coach was gone , and finding that his uneasiness
ber grew into positive alarm , as obstacles came in his way , he
resolved to follow in a post -chaise. So, he and Startop
arrived at the Blue Boar, fully expecting there to find me, or
br, tidings of me ; but, finding neither, went on to Miss Havi
ce I sham's, where they lost me . Hereụpon they went back
to the hotel (doubtless at about the time when I was hearing
ТО the popular local version of my own story ), to refresh them
selves and to get some one to guide them out upon the
marshes . Among the loungers under the Boar's archway,
happened to be Trabb's boy_true to his ancient habit of
id happening to be everywhere where he had no business — and
el Trabb's boy had seen me passing from Miss Havisham's in the
direction of my dining -place. Thus, Trabb's boy became
their guide, and with him they went out to the sluice-house :
though by the town way to the marshes, which I had
avoided . Now, as they went along, Herbert reflected, that I
might, after all, have been brought there on some genuine
and serviceable errand tending to Provis's safety , and, be
392 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

thinking himself that in that case interruption might be mis

chievous, left his guide and Startop on the edge of the
quarry , and went on by himself, and stole round the house
two or three times, endeavouring to ascertain whether all
was right within . As he could hear nothing but indistinct
sounds of one deep rough voice ( this was while my mind was
so busy ), he even at last began to doubt whether I was there,
when suddenly I cried out loudly, and he answered the cries,
and rushed in, closely followed by the other two.
When I told Herbert what had passed within the house, he
was for our immediately going before a magistrate in the
town, late at night as it was, and getting out a warrant.
But, I had already considered that such a course , by detain
ing us there, or binding us to come back, might be fatal
to Provis. There was no gainsaying this difficulty, and we
relinquished all thoughts of pursuing Orlick at that tima,
For the present, under the circumstances, we deemed it
prudent to make rather light of the matter to Trabb's boy ;
who I am convinced would have been much affected by
disappointment, if he had known that his intervention saved
me from the limekiln. Not that Trabb's boy was of a
malignant nature, but that he had too much spare vivacity,
and that it was in his constitution to want variety and excite
ment at anybody's expense . When we parted, I presented
him with two guineas (which seemed to meet his views ), and
told him that I was sorry ever to have had an ill opinion of
him ( which made no impression on him at all) .
Wednesday being so close upon us, we determined to go
back to London that night, three in the post-chaise ; the
rather, as we should then be clear away , before the night's
adventure began to be talked of. Herbert got a large bottle
of stuff for my arm , and by dint of having this stuff dropped
over it all the night through, I was just able to bear its pain
on the journey. It was daylight when we reached the
Temple, and I went at once to bed, and lay in bed all day.
My terror, as I lay there, of falling ill and being unfitted
for to -morrow , was so besetting, that I wonder it did not
disable me of itself. It would have done so, pretty surely, in
conjunction with the mental wear and tear I had suffered, but
for the unnatural strain upon me that to -morrow was. So
anxiously looked forward to charged with such consequences,
its results so impenetrably hidden though so near .
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 393

No precaution could have been more obvious than our

refraining from communication with him that day ; yet this
again increased my restlessness. I started at every footstep
and every sound, believing that he was discovered and taken,
and this was the messenger to tell me so. I persuaded
myself that I knew he was taken ; that there was something
more upon my mind than a fear or a presentiment ; that the
he ca
fact had occurred, and I had a mysterious knowledge of it.
As the days wore on and no ill news came, as the day closed
in and darkness fell, my overshadowing dread of being
disabled by illness before to -morrow morning, altogether
mastered me. My burning arm throbbed , and my burning
head throbbed, and I fancied I was beginning to wander.
I counted up to high numbers, to make sure of myself, and
repeated passages that I knew in prose and verse. It hap
pened sometimes that in the mere escape of a fatigued mind,
I dozed for some moments or forgot ; then I would say to
i bor, myself with a start, • Now it has come, and I am turning
delirious !"
saved They kept me very quiet all day, and kept my arm con
of 1 stantly dressed, and gave me cooling drinks. Whenever
I fell asleep, I awoke with the notion I had had in the sluice
Icite house, that a long time had elapsed and the opportunity
ented to save him was gone. About midnight I got out of bed and
, and went to Herbert, with the conviction that I had been asleep
for four-and -twenty hours, and that Wednesday was past.
It was the last self-exhausting effort of my fretfulness , for
o go after that, I slept soundly.
the Wednesday morning was dawning when I looked out of
window . The winking lights upon the bridges were already
pale, the coming sun was like a marsh of fire on the horizon .
ped The river, still dark and mysterious, was spanned by bridges
pain that were turning coldly grey, with here and there at top a
the warm touch from the burning in the sky. As I looked along
the clustered roofs, with church towers and spires shooting
tted into the unusually clear air, the sun rose up, and a veil
201 seemed to be drawn from the river, and millions of sparkles
burst out upon its waters. From me too, a veil seemed to be
but drawn , and I felt strong and well.
So Herbert lay asleep in his bed , and our old fellow -student
es lay asleep on the sofa . I could not dress myself without help,
but I made up the fire which was still burning, and got some
394 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

coffee ready for them . In good time they too started up

strong and well, and we admitted the sharp morning air at
the windows , and looked at the tide that was still flowing
towards us.
“ When it turns at nine o'clock," said Herbert, cheerfully,
" look out for us, and stand ready, you over there at Mill
Pond Bank !"

CHAPTER LIV.

It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and
the wind blows cold : when it is summer in the light, and
winter in the shade . We had our pea - coats with us, and
I took a bag. Of all my worldly possessions I took no more
than the few necessaries that filled the bag. Where I might
go, what I might do, or when I might return , were questions
utterly unknown to 'me; nor did I vex my mind with them ,
for it was wholly set on Provis's safety. I only wondered
for the passing moment, as I stopped at the door and looked
back , under what altered circumstances I should next see
those rooms, if ever.
We loitered down to the Temple stairs, and stood loitering
there, as if we were not quite decided to go upon the water
at all. Of course I had taken care that the boat should be
ready and everything in order. After a little show of in
decision, which there were none to see but the two or three
amphibious creatures belonging to our Temple stairs, we
went on board and cast off ; Herbert in the bow , I steering.
It was then about high -water -- half-past eight.
Our plan was this . The tide , beginning to run down at
nine , and being with us until three, we intended still to
creep on after it had turned , and row against it until dark .
We should then be well in those long reaches below Graves
end, between Kent and Essex, where the river is broad and
solitary, where the water-side inhabitants are very few , and
where lone public -houses are scattered here and there, of
which we could choose one for a resting-place. There, we
ineant to lie by , all night. The steamer for Hamburg, and
the steamer for Rotterdam , would start from London at about
nine on Thursday morning. We should know at what time
to expect them , according to where we were, and would hail
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 395

the first; so that if by any accident we were not tak aboard,

we should have another chance. We knew the distinguish
ing marks of each vessel.
The relief of being at last engaged in the execution of the
purpose, was so great to me that I felt it difficult to realise
the condition in which I had been a few hours before . The
crisp air, the sunlight, the movement on the river, and the
moving river itself — the road that ran with us, seeming to
sympathise with us, animate us, and encourage us on - fresh
ened me with new hope. I felt mortified to be of so little use
in the boat ; but, there were few better oarsmen than my two
friends, and they rowed with a steady stroke that was to last
all day
At that time, the steam -traffic on the Thames was far below
its present extent, and watermen's boats were far more nume
rous . Of barges, sailing colliers, and coasting -traders, there
IN were perhaps as many as now ; but, of steam -ships, great and
small, not a tithe or a twentieth part so many. Early as it
was , there were plenty of scullers going here and there that
morning, and plenty of barges dropping down with the tide ;
the navigation of the river between bridges, in an open boat,
was a much easier and commoner matter in those days than it
is in these ; and we went ahead among many skiffs and wher
I ries, briskly.
e Old London Bridge was soon passed, and old Billingsgate
market with its oyster -boats and Dutchmen , and the White
Tower and Traitors' Gate, and we were in among the tiers of
! shipping. Here, were the Leith , Aberdeen , and Glasgow
steamers, loading and unloading goods, and looking im
mensely high out of the water as we passed alongside ; here,
were colliers by the score and scoro, with the coal -whippers
plunging off stages on deck, as counterweights to measures of
coal swinging up, which were then rattled over the side into
barges ; here, at her moorings was to -morrow's steamer for
Rotterdam , of which we took good notice ; and here to
morrow's for Hamburg , under whose bowsprit we crossed .
And now I, sitting in the stern , could see with a faster beat
ing heart, Mill Pond Bank and Mill Pond stairs.
66
Is he there ?” said Herbert.
" Not yet.”
Right ! He was not to come down till he saw us. Can
you see his signal ?"
396 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

“ Not well from here ; but I think I see it. Now , I see him !
Pull both. Easy, Herbert. Oars !”
We touched the stairs lightly for a single moment, and he
was on board and we were off again. He had a boat- cloak
with him, and a black canvas bag, and he looked as like a
river -pilot as my heart could have wished.
“ Dear boy !" he said, putting his arm on my shoulder, as
he took his seat. “ Faithful dear boy, well done. Thankyo,
thankye ! ”
Again among the tiers of shipping, in and out, avoiding
rusty chain -cables frayed hempen hawsers and bobbing buoys,
sinking for the moment floating broken baskets, scattering
floating chips of wood and shaving, cleaving floating scum of
coal, in and out, under the figure- head of the John of Sunder
land making a speech to the winds (as is done by many
Johns ), and the Betsy of Yarmouth with a firm formality
of bosom and her knobby eyes starting two inches out of her
head ; in and out, hammers going in ship-builders' yards,
saws going at timber, clashing engines going at things un
known, pumps going in leaky ships, capstans going, ships
going out to sea, and unintelligible sea - creatures roaring
curses over the bulwarks at respondent lightermen ; in and
out - out at last upon the clearer river, where the ships' boys
might take their fenders in, no longer fishing in troubled waters
with them over the side, and where the festooned sails might
fly out to the wind.
At the Stairs where we had taken him aboard , and ever
since, I had looked warily for any token of our being suspected.
I had seen none. We certainly had not been , and at that
time as certainly we were not, either attended or followed by
any boat. If we had been waited on by any boat, I should
have run in to shore, and have obliged her to go on, or to
make her purpose evident. But, we held our own, without
any appearance of molestation .
He had his boat -cloak on him , and looked, as I have said , a
naturai part of the scene. It was remarkable (but perhaps
the wretched life he had led, accounted for it), that he
was the least anxious of any of us. He was not indifferent,
for he told me that he hoped to live to see his gentleman one
of the best of gentlemen in a foreign country ; he was not dis
posed to be passivo or resigned, as I understood it ; but he had
no notion of meeting danger half way. When it came upon
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 397

him , he confronted it, but it must come before he troubled

himself.
“ If you knowed, dear boy," he said to me, " what it is to
sit here alonger my dear boy and have my smoke, arter
having been day by day betwixt four walls, you'd envy me.
But you don't know what it is . "
“ I think I know the delights of freedom , " I answered .
, " said he, shaking his head gravely . 6. But you don't
• Ah,”
know it equal to me. You must have been under lock and
key, dear boy, to know it equal to me — but I ain't a going to
Costa be low ."
It occurred to me as inconsistent, that for any mastering
idea, he should have endangered his freedom and even his life .
But I reflected that perhaps freedom without danger was too
much apart from all the habit of his existence to be to him
what it would be to another man . I was not far out, since he
said, after smoking a little :
“ You see , dearboy, when I was over yonder, t'other side
the world, I was always a looking to this side ; and it come
Lite flat to be there, for all I was a growing rich. Everybody
knowed Magwitch, and Magwitch could come, and Magwitch
and could go, and nobody's head would be troubled about him .
They ain't so easy concerning me here, dear boy - wouldn't be,
leastwise, if they knowed where I was.
ght “ If all goes well,” said I , “ you will be perfectly free and
safe again, within a few hours.”
“ Well," he returned , drawing a long breath, " I hope so."
“ And think so ?"
nat He dipped his hand in the water over the boat's gunwale,
bT and said, smiling with that softened air upon him which was
not new to me :
50 “ Ay, I s'pose I think so , dear boy. We'd be puzzled to be
more quiet and easy -going than we are at present. Butit's
a flowing so soft and pleasant through the water, p'raps, as
makes me think it , I was a thinking through my smoke just
then , that we can no more see to the bottom of the next few
9
hours, than we can see to the bottom of this river what I
catches hold of. Nor yet we can't no more hold their tide
than I can hold this. And it's run through my fingers and
gone , you see !” holding up his dripping hand.
“ But for your face , I should think you were a little despon .
dent,” said I.
398 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Not a bit on it, dear boy ! It comes of flowing on só

quiet, and of that there rippling at the boat's head making a
sort of a Sunday tune. Maybe I'm a growing a trifle old
besides."
He put his pipe back in his mouth with an undisturbed
expression of face , and sat as composed and contented as if
we were already out of England. Yet he was as submissive
to a word of advice as if he had been in constant terror, for,
when we ran ashore to get some bottles of beer into the boat,
and he was stepping out, I hinted that I thought he would be
safest where he was, and he said “ Do you , dear boy?" and
quietly sat down again.
The air felt cold upon the river, but it was a bright day,
and the sunshine was very cheering. The tide ran strong , I
took care to lose none of it, and our steady stroke carried us
on thoroughly well. By imperceptible degrees, as the tide
ran out, we lost more and more of the nearer woods- and hills,
and dropped lower and lower between the muddy banks, but
the tide was yet with us when we were off Gravesend. As
our charge was wrapped in his cloak, I purposely passed
within a boat or two's length of the floating Custom House ,
and so out to catch the stream , alongside of two emigrant
ships, and under the bows of a large transport with troops on
the forecastle looking down at us . And soon the tide began
to slacken, and the craft lying at anchor to swing, and pre
sently they had all swung round, and the ships that were
taking advantage of the new tide to get up to the Pool, began
to crowd upon us in a fleet, and we kept under the shore, as
much out of the strength of the tide now as we could, standing
carefully off from low shallows and mud -banks.
Our oarsmen were so fresh , by dint of having occasionally
let her drive with the tide for a minute or two, that a quarter
of an hour's rest proved full as much as they wanted . We
got ashore among some slippery stones while we ate and
drank what we had with us, and looked about. It was like
my own marsh country, flat and monotonous, and with a
dim horizon ; while the winding river turned and turned, and
the great floating buoys upon it turned and turned , and
everything else seemed stranded and still. For, now, the last
of the feet of ships was round the last low point we had
headed ; and the last green barge, straw -laden, with a brown
sail, had followed ; and some ballast-lighters, shaped like a
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 399

child's first rude imitation of a boat, lay low in the mud ; and
a little squat shoal-lighthouse on open piles, stood crippled
in the mud on stilts and crutches ; and slimy stakes stuck out
of the mud, and slimy stones stuck out of the mud, and red
landmarks and tidemarks stuck out of the mud, and an old
67
landing -stage and an old roofless building slipped into the
T2 mud, and all about us was stagnation and mud .
22
We pushed off again, and made what way we could . It
was much harder work now, but Herbert and Startop perse
vered, and rowed, and rowed , and rowed, until the sun went
down . By that time the river had lifted us a little, so that
we could see above the bank. There was the red sun, on the
low level of the shore, in a purple haze, fast deepening into
black ; and there was the solitary flat marsh ; and far away
there were the rising grounds, between which and us there
seemed to be no life, save here and there in the foreground a
melancholy gull.
As the night was fast falling, and as the moon , being past
the full, would not rise early, we held a little council : a short
one, for clearly our course was to lie by at the first lonely
tavern we could find . So, they plied their oars once more,
and I looked out for anything like a house. Thus we held
on , speaking little, for four or five dull miles. It was very
cold, and , a collier coming by us, with her galley -fire smoking
and flaring, looked like a comfortable home. The night was
dark by this time as it would be until morning ; what light
we had, seemed to come more from the river than the sky, as
the oars in their dipping struck at a few reflected stars.
At this dismal time we were evidently all possessed by the
idea that we were followed . As the tide made, it flapped heavily
at irregular intervals against the shore ; and whenever such a
sound came, one or other of us was sure to start and look in
that direction. Here and there, the set of the current had
worn down the bank into a little creek, and we were all sus
picious of such places, and eyed them nervously. Sometimes,
“ What was that ripple ! ” one of us would say in a low voice .
Or another, “ Is that a boat yonder ?" And afterwards, we
would fall into a dead silence, and I would sit impatiently
thinking with what an unusual amount of noise the oar's
worked in the thowels.
At length we descried a light and a roof, and presently
afterwards ran alongside a little causeway made of stones
400 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

that had been picked up hard - by . Leaving the rest in the

boat, I stepped ashore, and found the light to be in the
window of a public- house. It was a dirty place enough, and
I dare say not unknown to smuggling adventurers; but there
was a good fire in the kitchen, and there were eggs and bacon
to eat, and various liquors to drink. Also, there were two
double -bedded rooms— “ such as they were,” the landlord
said. No other company was in the house than the landlord ,
his wife, and a grizzled male creature, the “ Jack ” of the
little causeway , who was as slimy and smeary as if he had
been low -water mark too .
With this assistant, I went down to the boat again , and we
all came ashore, and brought out the oars, and rudder, and
boat-hook , and all else, and hauled her up for the night. We
made a very good meal by the kitchen fire, and then appor
tioned the bedrooms : Herbert and Startop were to occupy
one ; I and our charge the other. We found the air as care
fully excluded from both as if air were fatal to life ; and there
were more dirty clothes and bandboxes under the beds, than
I should have thought the family possessed . But, we con
sidered ourselves well off, notwithstanding, for a more solitary
place we could not have found.
While we were comforting ourselves by the fire after our
moal, the Jack — who was sitting in a corner, and who had a
bloated pair of shoes on, which he had exhibited while we were
Bating our eggs and bacon, as interesting relics that he had
taken a few days ago from the feet of a drowned seaman
washed ashore - asked me if we had seen a four-oared galley
going up with the tide ? When I told him No, he said she
must have gone down then, and yet she “ took up too, ” when
she left there .
They must ha’ thought better on't for some reason or
another, " said the Jack , “and gone down."
“ A four -vared galley, did you say ? ” said I.
“ A four," said the Jack , “ and two sitters .”
“ Did they come ashore here ?"
They put in with a stone two-gallon jar, for some beer.
I'd ha' been glad to pison the beer myself,” said the Jack,
or put some rattling physic in it.”
Why ?"
“ I know why , " said the Jack . He spoke in a slusby voice ,
as if much mud had washed into his throat,
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 401

“ He thinks, " said the landlord : a weakly meditative man

with a pale eye , who seemed to rely greatly on his Jack :
"he thinks they was, what they wasn't .”
“ I knows what I thinks,” observed the Jack.
66 You thinks Custum ' Us, Jack ? " said the landlord .
“ I do," said the Jack.
“ Then you're wrong, Jack . ”
"AM I !”
In the infinite meaning of his reply and his boundless con
fidence in his views, the Jack took one of his bloated shoes off,
looked into it, knocked a few stones out of it on the kitchen
floor, and put it on again. He did this with the air of a Jack
who was so right that he could afford to do anything.
Why, what do you make out that they done with their
buttons then , Jack ?” asked the landlord, vacillating weakly.
“ Done with their buttons ?" returned the Jack. “ Chucked
'em overboard . Swallered 'em. Sowed 'em, to come up
small salad . Done with their buttons !"
“Don't be cheeky, Jack ,” remonstrated the landlord , in
a melancholy and pathetic way .
66
• A Custum ' Us officer knows what to do with his Buttons, ”
said the Jack, repeating the obnoxious word with the greatest
contempt, “ when they comes betwixt him and his own light.
A Four and two sitters don't go hanging and hovering, up
with one tide and down with another, and both with and
against another, without there being Custum 'Us at the
bottom of it .” Saying which he went out in disdain ; and the
landlord, having no one to rely upon, found it impracticable
to pursue the subject.
This dialogue made us all uneasy, and me very uneasy.
The dismal wind was muttering round the house , the tide
was flapping at the shore, and I had a feeling that we were
caged and threatened . A four-oared galley hovering about
in so unusual a way as to attract this notice, was an ugly
circumstance that I could not get rid of. When I had in
duced Provis to go up to bed, I went outside with my two
companions ( Startop by this time knew the state of the case ),
and held another council. Whether we should remain at the
house until near the steamer's time, which would be about
one in the afternoon ; or whether we should put off early in
themorning ; was the question we discussed . On the whole
we deemed it the better course to lie where we were, until
2 D.
402 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

within an hour or so of the steamer's time, and then to get

out in her track , and drift easily with the tide. Having
settled to do this, we returned into the house and went to
bed .
I lay down with the greater part of my clothes on, and
slept well for a few hours. When I awoke, the wind had
risen , and the sign of the house (the Ship) was creaking and
banging about, with noises that startled me. Rising softly ,
for my charge lay fast asleep, I looked out of the window .
It commanded the causeway where we had hauled up our
boat, and, as my eyes adapted themselves to the light of the
clouded moon, I saw two men looking into her. They passed
by under the window , looking at nothing else, and they did
not go down to the landing-place which I could discern to be
empty , but struck across the marsh in the direction of the Nore.
My first impulse was to call up Herbert, and show him the
two men going away. But, reflecting before I got into his
room, which was at the back of the house and adjoined mine,
that he and Startop had had a harder day than 1 , and were
fatigued , I forbore . Going back to my window , I could see
the two men moving over the marsh . In that light, however,
I soon lost them, and feeling very cold, lay down to think of
the matter, and fell asleep again.
We were up early. As we walked to and fro, all four to
gether, before breakfast, I deemed it right to recount what I
had seon. Again our charge was the least anxious of the
party. It was very likely that the men belonged to the
Custom House, he said quietly, and that they had no thought
of us . I tried to persuade myself that it was so — as, indeed ,
it might easily be . However, I proposed that he and I should
walk away together to a distant point we could see, and that
the boat should take us aboard there, or as near there as
might prove feasible, at about noon. This being considered
a good precaution, soon after breakfast he and I set forth,
without saying anything at the tavern .
He smoked his pipe as we went along, and sometimes
stopped to clap me on the shoulder. One would have sup
posed that it was I who was in danger, not he, and that he
was reassuring me. We spoke very little . As we approached
the point, I begged him to remain in a sheltered place, while
I went on to reconnoitre ; for, it was towards it that the men
had passed in the night. He complied, and I went on alone.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 403
There was no boat off the point, nor any boat drawn up any
where near it, nor were there any signs of the men having
embarked there. But, to be sure the tide was high, and there
might have been some footprints under water .
When he looked out from his shelter in the distance , and
saw that I waved my hat to him to come up , he rejoined me ,
and there we waited ; sometimes lying on the bank wrapped
in our coats , and sometimes moving about to warm ourselves :
until we saw our boat coming round . We got aboard easily ,
and rowed out into the track of the steamer. By that time
it wanted but ten minutes of one o'clock, and we began to
look out for her smoke.
But, it was half -past one before we saw her smoke, and soon
afterwards we saw behind it the smoke of another steamer. As
they were coming on at full speed, we got the two bags ready,
and took that opportunity of saying good-by to Herbert and
Startop. We had all shaken hands cordially, and neither
Herbert's eyes nor mine were quite dry , when I saw a four
oared galley shoot out from under the bank but a little way
ahead of us, and row out into the same track.
A stretch of shore had been as yet between us and the
steamer's smoke , by reason of the bend and wind of the river ;
but now she was visible , coming head on. I called to Her
bert and Startop to keep before the tide, that she might see us
lying by for her, and I adjured Provis to sit quite still ,
wrapped in his cloak . He answered cheerily, “ Trust to me,
dear boy, " and sat like a statue. Meantime the galley, which
was skilfully handled , had crossed us , let us come up with
her, and fallen alongside. Leaving just room enough for the
play of the oars, she kept alongside, drifting when we drifted ,
and pulling a stroke or two when we pulled. Of the two
sitters, one held the rudder lines, and looked at us attentively
as did all the rowers ; the other sitter was wrapped up ,
much as Provis was, and seemed to shrink, and whisper some
instruction to the steerer as he looked at us. Not a word was
spoken in either boat.
Startop could make out, after a few minutes, which steamer
was first, and gave me the word “ Hamburg ,” in a low voice
as we sat face to face. She was nearing us very fast, and the
beating of her paddles grew louder and louder. I felt as if
her shadow were absolutely upon us, when the galley hailed
us. I apswered .
401 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ You have a returned Transport there,” said the man who

held the lines. “ That's the man, wrapped in the cloak
His name is Abel Magwitch , otherwise Provis. I apprehend
that man , and call upon him to surrender, and you to assist .”
At the same moment, without giving any audible direction
to his crew, he ran the galley aboard of us. They had pulled
one sudden stroke ahead , had got their oars in, had run
athwart us, and were bolding on to our gunwale. before we
knew what they were doing. This caused great confusion on
board of the steamer, and I heard them calling to us, and
heard the order given to stop the paddles, and heard them
stop , but felt her driving down upon us irresistibly. In the
same moment, I saw the steersman of the galley lay his hand
on his prisoner's shoulder, and saw that both boats were
swinging round with the force of the tide, and saw that all
hands on board the steamer were running forward quite fran
tically. Still in the same moment, I saw the prisoner start
up , lean across his captor, and pull the cloak from the neck
of the shrinking sitter in the galley. Still in the same moment
I saw that the face disclosed, was the face of the other con
vict of long ago. Still in the same moment, I saw the face
tilt backward with a white terror on it that I shall never
forget, and heard a great cry on board the steamer and a loud
splash in the water, and felt the boat sink from under me.
It was but for an instant that I seemed to struggle with a
thousand mill-weirs and a thousand flashes of light; that
instant past, I was taken on board the galley. Herbert was
there, and Startop was there ; but our boat was gone, and
the two convicts were gone.
What with the cries aboard the steamer, and the furious
blowing off of her steam , and her driving on, and our driving
on , I could not at first distinguish sky from water or shore
from shore ; but, the crew of the galley righted her with great
speed, and, pulling certain swift strong strokes ahead, lay
upon their oars, every man looking silently and eagerly at the
water astern . Presently a dark object was seen in it, bearing
towards us on the tide. No man spoke, but the steersman
held up his hand , and all softly backed water, and kept the boat
straight and true before it. As it came nearer , I saw it to be
Magwitch , swimming, but not swimming freely. He was
taken on board, and instantly manacled at the wrists and
ancles.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 405

The galley was kept steady, and the silent eager looker -out
at the water was resumed . But, the Rotterdam steamer now
came up, and apparently not understanding what had happened,
came on at speed . By the time she had been hailed and
stopped, both steamers were drifting away from us, and
we were rising and falling in a troubled wake of water .
The look -out was kept, long after all was still again and the
two steamers were gone ; but, everybody knew that it was
hopeless now.
At length we gave it up, and pulled under the shore
towards the tavern we had lately left, where we were received
with no little surprise. Here, I was able to get some com
forts for Magwitch — Provis no longer - who had received
some very severe injury in the chest and a deep cut in the
head .
He told me that he believed himself to have gone under
the keel of the steamer, and to have been struck on the
head in rising. The injury to his chest ( which rendered his
breathing extremely painful) he thought he had received
against the side of the galley. He added that he did not pre
tend to say what he might or might not have done to Com
peyson , but, that in the moment of his laying his hand on his
cloak to identify him, that villain had staggered up and stag .
gered back , and they had both gone overboard together ;
when the sudden wrenching of him ( Magwitch ) out of our
boat, and the endeavour of his captor to keep him in it, had
capsized us. He told me in a whisper that they had gone
down, fiercely locked in each other's arms, and that there had
been a struggle under water, and that he had disengaged him
self, struck out, and swum away.
I never had any reason to doubt the exact truth of what he
thus told me. The officer who steered the galley gave the
same account of their going overboard .
When I asked this officer's permission to change the
prisonor's wet clothes by purchasing any spare garments I
could get at the public -house, he gave it readily : merely
observing that he must take charge of everything his prisoner
had about him. So the pocket- book which had once been in
my hands, passed into the officer's. He further gave me leave
to accompany the prisoner to London ; but, declined to accord
that grace to my two friends.
The Jack at the Ship was instructed where the drowned
406 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

man had gone down, and undertook to search for the body in
the places where it was likeliest to come ashore. His interest
in its recovery seemed to me to be much heightened when he
heard that it had stockings on . Probably, it took about a dozen
drowned men to fit him out completely ; and that may have
been the reason why the different articles of his dress were in
various stages of decay .
We remained at the public -house until the tide turned, and
then Magwitch was carried down to the galley and put on
board. Herbert and Startop were to get to London by land, as
soon as they could. We had a doleful parting, and when I
took my place by Magwitch's side, I felt that that was my
place henceforth while he lived.
For now, my repugnance to him had all melted away , and
in the hunted wounded shackled creature who held myhand
in his, I only saw a man who had meant to be my benefactor,
and who had felt affectionately, gratefully, and generously,
towards me with great constancy through a series of years .
I only saw in him a much better man than I had been to
Joe.
His breathing became more difficult and painful as the
night drew on, and often he could not repress a groan . I
tried to rest him on the arm I could use, in any easy position ;
but, it was dreadful to think that I could not be sorry at heart 1
for his being badly hurt, since it was unquestionably best that
he should die. That there were still living, people enough
who were able and willing to identify him, I could not doubt.
That he would be leniently treated , I could not hope. He
who had been presented in the worst light at his trial , who
had since broken prison and been tried again, who had re
turned from transportation under a life sentence, and who had
occasioned the death of the man who was the cause of his
arrest.
As we returned towards the setting sun we had yesterday
left behind us, and as the stream of our hopes seemed all
running back, I told him how grieved I was to think he had
come home for my sake.
“ Dear boy , ” he answered, “ I'm quite content to take my
chance . I've seen my boy, and he can be a gentleman with
out me."
No. I had thought about that while we had been there
side by side. No. Apart from any inclinations of my own, I
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 407
understand Wemmick’s hint now . I foresaw that, being con
victed, his possessions would be forfeited to the Crown.
“ Lookee here, dear boy ,” said he. “ It's best as a gentle
man should not be knowed to belong to me now. Only come
to see me as if you come by chance alonger Wemmick . Sit
where I can see you when I am swore to, for the last o' many
times, and I don't ask no more."
“ I will never stir from your side," said I, " when I am
suffered to be near you. Please God, I will be as true to you
as you have been to me !”
I felt his hand tremble as it held mine, and he turned his
face away as he lay in the bottom of the boat, and I heard
that old sound in his throat - softened now, like all the rest of
him. It was a good thing that he had touched this point, for
it put into my mind what I might not otherwise have thought
of until too late : that he need never know how his hopes
of enriching me had perished .

CHAPTER LV .

He was taken to the Police Court next day , and would have
been immediately committed for trial, but that it was neces
sary to send down for an old officer of the prison -ship from
which he had once escaped, to speak to his identity. Nobody
doubted it ; but, Compeyson, who had meant to depose to it,
was tumbling on the tides, dead, and it happened that there
was not at that time any prison officer in London who could
give the required evidence. I had gone direct to Mr. Jaggers
at his private house, on my arrival over-night, to retain his
assistance, and Mr. Jaggers on the prisoner's behalf would
admit nothing. It was the sole resource, for he told me that
the case must be over in five minutes when the witness was
there, and that no power on earth could prevent its going
against us .
I imparted to Mr. Jaggers my design of keeping him in
ignorance of the fate of bis wealth. Mr. Jaggers was querulous
and angry with me for having " let it slip through my fingers,"
and said we must memorialise by -and -by, and try at all events
for some of it. But, he did not conceal from me that although
there might be many cases in which forfeiture would not be
408 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

exacted, there were no circumstances in this case to make it

one of them . I understood that very well. I was not related
to the outlaw , or connected with him by any recognisable
tie ; he had put his hand to no writing or settlement in my
favour before his apprehension, and to do so now would be
idle . I had no claim, and I finally resolved, and ever after
wards abided by the resolution, that my heart should never be
sickened with the hopeless task of attemptiug to establish
one.
There appeared to be reason for supposing that the drowned
informer had hoped for a reward out of this forfeiture, and
had obtained some accurate knowledge of Magwitch’s affairs.
When his body was found, many miles from the scene of his
death, and so horribly disfigured that he was only recognisable
by the contents of his pockets, notes were still legible, folded
in a case he carried . Among these were the name of a bank
ing- house in New South Wales where a sum of money was, and
the designation of certain lands of considerable value. Both
those heads of information were in a list that Magwitch , while
in prison, gave to Mr. Jaggers, of the possessions he supposed
I should inherit. His ignorance, poor fellow , at last served
him ; he never mistrusted but that my inheritance was quite
safe, with Mr. Jaggers's aid .
After three days' delay, during which the crown prose
cution stood over for the production of the witness from the
prison-ship, the witness came, and completed the easy case.
He was committed to take his trial at the next Sessions, which
would come on in a month .
It was at this dark time of my life that Herbert returned
home one evening, a good deal cast down , and said :
“ My dear Handel, I fear I shall soon have to leave you .”
His partner having prepared me for that, I was less sur.
prised than he thought.
“ We shall lose a fine opportunity if I put off going to Cairo,
and I am very much afraid I must go, Handel, when you
most need me.'
“ Herbert, I shall always need you , because I shall always
love you ; but my need is no greater now, than at another
time."
“ You will be so lonely .”
“ I have not leisure to think of that,” said I. " You know
that I am always with him to the full extent of the time
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 409

allowed, and that I should be with him all day long, if I

could. And when I come away from him , you know that
220 my thoughts are with him . "
RY The dreadful condition to which he was brought, was so
appalling to both of us, that we could not refer to it in
plainer words.
be “ My dear fellow ," said Herbert, “ let the near prospect
b of our separation - for, it is very near - be my justification for
troubling you about yourself. Have you thought of your
el future ? "
od No, for I have been afraid to think of any future .”
“ But yours cannot be dismissed ; indeed, my dear dear
· Handel, it must not be dismissed. I wish you would enter on
it now, as far as a few friendly words go, with me.
ed “ I will, ” said I.
k “ In this branch house of ours, Handel, we must have
od a
th I saw that his delicacy was avoiding the right word, so I
Je said , “ A clerk . ”
ed “ A clerk. And I hope it is not at all unlikely that he may
ed expand ( as a clerk of your acquaintance has expanded ) into a
ce partner. Now , Handel in short, my dear boy will you
come to me ?"
There was something charmingly cordial and engaging in
the manner in which after saying “ Now, Handel,” as if it
were the grave beginning of a portentous business exordium ,
he had suddenly given up that tone, stretched out his honest
hand , and spoken like a schoolboy.
“ Clara and I have talked about it again and again ,”
Herbert pursued, “ and the dear little thing begged me only
this evening, with tears in her eyes, to say to you that if you
will live with us when we come together, she will do her
best to make you happy, and to convince her husband's friend
that he is her friend too. We should get on so well,
Handel ["
I thanked her heartily, and I thanked him heartily, I ut
said I could not yet make sure of joining him as he so kindly
offered . Firstly, my mind was too preoccupied to be able to
take in the subject clearly. Secondly - Yes ! Secondly,
there was a vague something lingering in ny thoughts that
will come out very near the end of this slight narrative.
“ But if you thought, Herbert, that you could , without
410 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

doing any injury to your business, leave the question open

for a little while -
“ For any while," cried Herbert. “ Six months, a year !"
“ Not so long as that,” said I. 66 Two or three months at
most.”
Herbert was highly delighted when we shook hands on this
arrangement, and said he could now take courage to tell me
that he believed he must go away at the end of the week.
“ And Clara ?” said I.
“ The dear little thing ,” returned Herbert, “ holds dutifully
to her father as long as he lasts ; but he won't last long.
Mrs. Whimple confides to me that he is certainly going. "
“ Not to say an unfeeling thing ,” said I , “ he cannot do
better than go ."
“ I am afraid that must be admitted ,” said Herbert : " and
then I shall come back for the dear little thing, and the dear
little thing and I will walk quietly into the nearest church .
Remember ! The blessed darling comes of no family , my
dear Handel, and never looked into the red book, and hasn't a
notion about her grandpapa. What a fortune for the son of
my mother !”
On the Saturday in that same week, I took my leave of
Herbert - full of bright hope, but sad and sorry to leave me
-as he sat on one of the seaport mail coaches. I went
into a coffee -house to write a little note to Clara, telling her
he had gone off, sending his love to her over and over again,
and then went to my lonely bome - if it deserved the name,
for it was now no home to me, and I had no home anywhere.
On the stairs I encountered Wemmick, who was coming
down, after an unsuccessful applicativn of his knuckles to my
door. I had not seen him alone, since the disastrous issue of
the attempted flight ; and he had come, in his private and
personal capacity, to say a few words of explanation in refer
ence to that failure.
“ The late Compeyson ,” said Wemmick, “ had by little and
little got at the bottom of half of the regular business now
transacted , and it was from the talk of some of his people in
trouble ( some of his people being always in trouble that I
heard what I did. I kept my ears open, seeming to have
them shut, until I heard that he was absent, and I thought
that would be the best time for making the attempt. I can
only suppose now , that it was a part of his policy, as a very
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 411

clever man , habitually to deceive his own instruments. You

don't blame me, I hope, Mr. Pip ? I am sure I tried to serve
you , with all my heart. "
“ I am as sure of that, Wemmick, as you can be, and
I thank you most earnestly for all your interest and friend
ship .”
" Thank you , thank you very much. It's a bad job,"
said Wemmick , scratching his head, “ and I assure you I
haven't been so cut up for a long time. What I look at, is
the sacrifice of so much portable property. Dear me ! "
“ What I think of, Wemmick, is the poor owner of the
property .”
“ Yes, to be sure ,” said Wemmick . “ Of course there can
be no objection to your being sorry for him , and I'd put down
a five -pound note myself to get him out of it. But what
I look at, is this. The late Compeyson having been before
hand with him in intelligence of his return , and being so
determined to bring him to book, I do not think he could
have been saved . Whereas, the portable property certainly
could have been saved . That's the difference between the
property and the owner , don't you see ? ”
I invited Wemmick to come up-stairs, and refresh himself
with a glass of grog before walking to Walworth. He
accepted the invitation. While he was drinking his moderate
allowance, he said , with nothing to lead up to it, and after
having appeared rather fidgety :
“ What do you think of my meaning to take a holiday on
Monday , Mr. Pip ?"
“ Why, I suppose you have not done such a thing these
twelve months.'
“ These twelve years, more likely ,” said Wemmick . “ Yes.
I'm going to take a holiday. More than that ; I'm going to
take a walk. More than that ; I'm going to ask you to take
99
a walk with me.”
I was about to excuse myself, as being but a bad companion
just then, when Wemmick anticipated me.
“ I know your engagements, " said he , “ and I know you
are out of sorts, Mr. Pip. But if you could oblige me, I
should take it as a kindness . It ain't a long walk, and it's an
early one. Say it might occupy you ( including breakfast on
the walk ) from eight to twelve. Couldn't you stretch a point
and manage it ?"
412 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

He had done so much for me at various times, that this was

very little to do for him. I said I could manage it-would
manage it— and he was so very much pleased by my acqui
escence , that I was pleased too. At his particular request,
I appointed to call for him at the Castle at half -past eight on
Monday morning, and so we parted for the time.
Punctual to my appointment, I rang at the Casile gate
on the Monday morning, and was received by Wemmick bim
self : who struck me as looking tighter than usual, and
having a sleeker hat on . Within , there were two glasses of
rum -and -milk prepared, and two biscuits. The Aged must
have been stirring with the lark, for, glancing into the
perspective of his bedroom , I observed that his bed was
empty.
When we had fortified ourselves with the rum -and -milk
and biscuits, and were going out for the walk with that
training preparation on us, I was considerably surprised
to see Wemmick take up a fishing - rod , and put it over his
shoulder. “Why, we are not going fishing !" said I. " No ,"
returned Wemmick , “ but I like to walk with one.”
“ I thought this odd ; however, I said nothing, and we set
off. We went towards Camberwell Green, and when we
were thereabouts, Wemmick said suddenly ;
6. Halloa ! Here's a church ! "
There was nothing very surprising in that ; but again ,
I was rather surprised, when he said, as if he were animated
by a brilliant idea :
“ Let's go in ! ”
We went in , Wemmick leaving his fishing rod in the porch ,
and looked all round . In the mean time, Wemmick was
diving into his coat-pockets, and getting something out of
paper there.
“ Halloa !” said he. “ Here's a couple of pair of gloves !
Let's put 'em on !”
As the gloves were wbite kid gloves, and as the post-office
was widened to its utmost extent, I now began to have my
strong suspicions. They were strengthened into certainty
when I beheld the Aged enter at a side door, escorting
a lady.
“ Halloa !" said Wemmick . 6. Here's Miss Skiffins! Let's
have a wedding ."
That discreet damsel was attired as usual, except that she
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 413

was now engaged in substituting for her green kid gloves, a

pair of white . The Aged was likewise occupied in preparing
a similar sacrifice for the altar of Hymen . The old gentle
man , however, experienced so much difficulty in getting his
gloves on , that Wemmick found it necessary to put him with
his back against a pillar, and then to get behind the pillar
himself and pull away at them , while I for my part held the
old gentleman round the waist, that he might present an
equal and safe resistance . By dint of this ingenious scheme,
his gloves were got on to perfection .
The clerk and clergyman then appearing, we were ranged
in order at those fatal rails. True to his notion of seeming to
do it all without preparation, I heard Wemmick say to himself
as he took something out of his waistcoat- pocket before the
service began, “ Halloa ! Here's a ring !"
I acted in the capacity of backer, or best-man , to the bride
groom ; while a little limp pew-opener in a soft bonnet like a
baby's, made a feint of being the bosom friend of Miss Skiffins.
The responsibility of giving the lady away, devolved upon
the Aged, which led to the clergyman's being unintentionally
scandalised, and it happened thus. When he said, “Who
giveth this woman to be married to this man ? ” the old
gentleman, not in the least knowing what point of the
ceremony we had arrived at, stood most amiably beaming
at the ten commandments. Upon which, the clergyman said
again , “ Who giveth this woman to be married to this man ?”
The old gentleman being still in a state of most estimable
unconsciousness, the bridegroom cried out in his accustomed
voice, “ Now Aged P. you know ; who giveth ?" To which
the Aged replied with great briskness, before saying that he
gave, 66 All right , John, all right, my boy !" And the
clergyman came to so gloomy a pause upon it, that I had
doubts for the moment whether we should get completely
married that day.
It was completely done, however, and when we were going
out of church, Wemmick took the cover off the font, and put
his white gloves in it, and put the cover on again . Mrs.
Wemmick, more heedful of the future, put her white gloves
in her pocket and assumed her green . Now , Mr. Pip,” said
Wemmick, triumphantly shouldering the fishing -rod as we
came out, “ let me ask you whether anybody would suppose
this to be a wedding party !"
414 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Breakfast had been ordered at a pleasant little tavern, a

mile or so away upon the rising ground beyond the green ;
and there was a bagatelle board in the room, in case we should
desire to unbend our minds after the solemnity. It was
pleasant to observe that Mrs. Wemmick no longer unwound
Wemmick’s arm when it adapted itself to her figure, but sat in
a high-backed chair against the wall, like a violoncello in its
case, and submitted to be embraced as that melodious instru
ment might have done.
We had an excellent breakfast, and when any one declined
anything on table, Wemmick said, “ Provided by contract,
you know ; don't be afraid of it ! " I drank to the new couple,
drank to the Aged, drank to the Castle, saluted the bride at
parting, and made myself as agreeable as I could.
Wemmick came down to the door with me, and I again
shook hands with him, and wished him joy.
“ Thankee !" said Wemmick , rubbing his hands. “ She's
such a manager of fowls you have no idea. You shall have
some eggs, and judge for yourself. I say , Mr. Pip !" calling
me back, and speaking low. “ This is altogether a Walworth
sentiment, please .
“ I understand. Not to be mentioned in Little Britain ,"
said I.
Wemmick nodded. “ After what you let out the other day,
Mr. Jaggers may as well not know of it. He' might think
my brain was softening, or something of the kind . "

CHAPTER LVI.

He lay in prison very ill , during the whole interval between

his committal for trial, and the coming round of the Sessions.
He had broken two ribs, they had wounded one of his lungs,
and he breathed with great pain and difficulty , which in
creased daily. It was a consequence of his hurt that he spoke
80 low as to be scarcely audible ; therefore, he spoke very
little. But, he was ever ready to listen to me, and it became
the first duty of my life to say to him , and read to him , what
I knew he ought to hear.
Being far too ill to remain in the common prison , he was
removed, after the first day or so, into the infirmary. This
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 415
gave me opportunities of being with him that I could not
otherwise have had . And but for bis illness he would have
been put in irons, for he was regarded as a determined prison
breaker, and I know not what else.
Although I saw him every day, it was for only a short
time ; hence, the regularly recurring spaces of our separation
were long enough to record on his face any slight changes that
occurred in his physical state. I do not recollect that I once
saw any change in it for the better ; he wasted, and became
slowly weaker and worse, day by day from the day when the
prison door closed upon him .
The kind of submission or resignation that he showed, was
that of a man who was tired out. I sometimes derived an im
pression , from his manner or from a whispered word or two
which escaped him , that he pondered over the question
whether he might have been a better man under better cir.
cumstances. But, he never justified himself by a hint tend
ing that way, or tried to bend the past out of its eternal
shape.
It happened on two or three occasions in my presence, that
his desperate reputation was alluded to by one or other of the
people in attendance on him. A smile crossed his face
then, and he turned his eyes on me with a trustful look, as if
he were confident that I had seen some small redeeming touch
in him , even so long ago as when I was a little child . As to
all the rest, he was humble and contrite , and I never knew
him complain .
When the Sessions came round , Mr. Jaggers caused an ap
plication to be made for the postponement of his trial until the
following Sessions. It was obviously made with the assurance
that he could not live so long, and was refused . The trial
came on at once , and, when he was put to the bar, he was
seated in a chair . No objection was made to my getting close
to the dock , on the outside of it, and holding the hand that he
stretched forth to me.
The trial was very short and very clear. Such things as
could be said for him , were said-how he had taken to indus
trious habits, and had thriven lawfully and reputably. But,
nothing could unsay the fact that he had returned, and was
there in presence of the Judge and Jury. It was impossible
to try him for that, and do otherwise than find him Guilty.
At that time, it was the custom (as I learnt from my terri
416 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

ble experience of that Sessions) to devote a concluding day to

the passing of Sentences, and to make a finishing effect with
the Sentence of Death. But for the indelible picture that
my remembrance now holds before me, I could scarcely
believe, even as I write these words, that I saw two -and -thirty
men and women put before the Judge to receive that sentence
together. Foremost among the two -and -thirty, was he ;
seated, that he might get breath enough to keep life in
bim.
The whole scene starts out again in the vivid colours of the
moment, down to the drops of April rain on the windows of
the court, glittering in the rays of April sun . Penned in the
dock, as I again stood outside it at the corner with his hand
in mine, were the two-and- thirty men and women ; some de
fiant, some stricken with terror, some sobbing and weeping,
sume covering their faces, some staring gloomily about. There
had been shrieks from among the women convicts, but they had
been stilled , and a hush had succeeded . The sheriffs with their
great chains and nosegays, other civic gewgaws and monsters,
criers, ushers, a great gallery full of people — a large theatrical
audience - looked on, as the two-and -thirty and the Judge
were solemnly confronted. Then, the Judge addressed them .
Among the wretched creatures before him whom he must
single out for special address, was one who almost from his
infancy had been an offender against the laws; who , after
repeated imprisonments and punishments, had been at length
sentenced to exile for a term of years ; and who, under cir
cumstances of great violence and daring, had made his escape
and been re -sentenced to exile for life. That miserable man
would seem for a time to have become convinced of his errors,
when far removed from the scenes of his old offences, and to
have lived a peaceable and honest life. But in a fatal moment,
yielding to those propensities and passions, the indulgence of
which had so long rendered him a scourge to society, he had
quitted his haven of rest and repentance, and had come back
to the country where he was proscribed. Being here presently
denounced , he had for a time succeeded in evading the
officers of Justice, but being at length seized while in the act
of flight, be had resisted them , and had — he best knew
whether by express design , or in the blindness of his hardi
hood - caused the death of his denouncer, to whom his whole
career was known. The appointed punishment for his return
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 417

to the land that had cast him out, being Death, and his case
being this aggravated case, he must prepare himself to Die.
The sun was striking in at the great windows of the court,
through the glittering drops of rain upon the glass, and it
made a broad shaft of light between the two -and -thirty and
the Judge, linking both together, and perhaps reminding some
among the audience , how both were passing on, with absolute
equality, to the greater Judgment that knoweth all things and
cannot err. Rising for a moment, a distinct speck of face in
this way of light, the prisoner said , “ My Lord , I have re
ceived my sentence of Death from the Almighty, but I bow
to yours ," and sat down again. There was some hushing, and
the Judge went on with what he had to say to the rest.
Then , they were all formally doomed , and some of them were
supported out, and some of them sauntered out with a haggard
look of bravery , and a few nodded to the gallery, and two or
three shook hands, and others went out chewing the frag
d
ments of herb they had taken from the sweet herbs lying
EI about. He went last of all, because of having to be helped
Bio from his chair and to go very slowly ; and he held my hand
while all the others were removed, and while the audience
18 got up ( putting their dresses right, as they might at church
or elsewhere and pointed down at this criminal or at that,
and most of all at him and me.
I earnestly hoped and prayed that he might die before the
Recorder's Report was made, but, in the dread of his lingering
1 on, I began that night to write out a petition to the Home
Secretary of State, setting forth my knowledge of him, and
how it was that he had come back for my sake. I wrote it
as fervently and pathetically as I could, and when I had
finished it and sent it in, I wrote out other petitions to such
men in authority as I hoped were the most merciful, and
drew up one to the Crown itself. For several days and nights
after he was sentenced I took no rest except when I fell
asleep in my chair, but was wholly absorbed in these appeals.
And after I had sent them in , I could not keep away from the
places where they were, but felt as if they were more hopeful
and less desperate when I was near them . In this unreason
able restlessness and pain of mind, I would roam the streets
of an evening, wandering by those offices and houses where I
had left the petitions. To the present hour, the weary
western streets of London on a cold dusty spring night, with
2 E
418 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

their ranges of stern shut-up mansions and their long rows of

lamps, are melancholy to me from this association .
The daily visits I could make him were shortened now,
and he was more strictly kept. Seeing, or fancying, that I
was suspected of an intention of carrying poison to him, 1
asked to be searched before I sat down at his bedside , and
told the officer who was always there, that I was willing to
do anything that would assure him of the singleness of my
designs. Nobody was hard with him or with me. There was
duty to be done, and it was done, but not harshly . The
officer always gave me the assurance that he was worse , and
some other sick prisoners in the room , and some other
prisoners who attended on them as sick nurses ( malefactors,
but not incapable of kiudness , God be thanked ! ), always
joined in the same report.
As the days went on , I noticed more and more that he
would lie placidly looking at the white ceiling, with an
absence of light in his face, until some word of mine
brightened it for an instant, and then it would subside again .
Sometimes he was almost, or quite, unable to speak ; then, he
would answer me with slight pressures on my hand, and I
grew to understand his meaning very well.
The number of the days had risen to ten, when saw a
greater change in him than I had seen yet. His eyes were
turned towards the door, and lighted up as I entered.
“ Dear boy ,” he said, as I sat down by his bed : “ I thought
you was late. But I knowed you couldn't be that.”
" It is just the time,” said I. “ I waited for it at the gate ."
“ You always waits at the gate ; don't you, dear boy? ”
“ Yes. Not to lose a moment of the time. "
“ Thank’ee , dear boy, thank’ee. God bless you ! You've
never deserted me , dear boy.
I pressed his hand in silence , for I could not forget that I
had once meant to desert him.
“ And what's the best of all,” he said , “ you've been more
comfortable alonger me, since I was under a dark cloud, than
when the sun shone. That's best of all.”
He lay on his back, breathing with great difficulty. Do
what he would, and love me though he did, the light left his
face ever and again, and a film came over the placid look at
the white ceiling .
“ Are you in much pain to day ?"
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 419

“ I don't complain of none , dear boy."

“ You never do complain.”
He had spoken his last words. He smiled, and I under
stood his touch to mean that he wished to lift my hand, and
lay it on his breast. I laid it there, and he smiled again, and
put both his hands upon it.
The allotted time ran out, while we were thus ; but, looking
round, I found the governor of the prison standing near me,
and he whispered, “ You needn't go yet.” I thanked him
gratefully, and asked, “ Might I speak to him, if he can hear
me ?”
The governor stepped aside, and beckoned the officer away.
The change, though it was made without noise, drew back the
film from the placid look at the white ceiling, and he looked
most affectionately at me.
60
Dear Magwitch , I must tell you, now at last. You under
stand what I say ?"
A gentlo pressure on my hand.
“ You had a child once, whom you loved and lost. ”
A stronger pressure on my hand.
“ She lived and found powerful friends. She is living now.
She is a lady and very beautiful. And I love her !”
With a last faint effort, which would have been powerless
but for my yielding to it and assisting it, he raised my hand
to his lips . Then he gently let it sink upon his breast again ,
with his own hands lying on it. The placid look at the
white ceiling came back, and passed away, and his head
dropped quietly on his breast.
Mindful, then, of what we had read together, I thought of
the two men who went up into the Temple to pray , and I
knew there were no better words that I could say beside his
bed, than “ O Lord, be merciful to him a sinner !"

CHAPTER LVII.

Now that I was left wholly to myself I gave notice of my in

tention to quit the chambers in the Temple as soon as my
tenancy could legally determine, and in the mean while to
underlet them . At once I put bills up in the windows; for,
I was in debt, and had scarcely any money, and began to be
 420 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

seriously alarmed by the state of my affairs. I ought rather

to write that I should have been alarmed if I had had energy
and concentration enough to help me to the clear perception
of any truth beyond the fact that I was falling very ill. The
late stress upon me had enabled me to put off illness, but not
to put it away ; I knew that it was coming on me now , and I
knew very little else , and was even careless as to that.
For a day or two , I lay on the sofa , or on the floor - any
where, according as I happened to sink down - with a heavy
head and aching limbs, and no purpose, and no power. Then
there came, one night which appeared of great duration , and
which teemed with anxiety and horror ; and when in the
morning I tried to sit up in my bed and think of it, I found I
could not do so .
Whether I really had been down in Garden - court in the
dead of the night, groping about for the boat that I supposed
to be there ; whether I had two or three times come to myself
on the staircase with great terror, not knowing how I had got
out of bed ; whether I had found myself lighting the lamp,
possessed by the idea that he was coming up the stairs, and
that the lights were blown out ; whether I had been inex
pressibly harassed by the distracted talking, laughing, and
groaning, of some one, and had half suspected those sounds to
be of my own making ; whether there had been a closed iron
furnace in a dark corner of the room, and a voice had called
out over and over again that Miss Havisham was consuming
within it ; these were things that I tried to settle with myself
and get into some order, as I lay that morning on my bed.
But, the vapour of a limekilu would come between me and
them , disordering them all, and it was through the vapour at
last that I saw two men looking at me.
“ What do you want ? " I asked, starting ; " I don't know
you .” 1
“ Well, sir ," returned one of them , bending down and
touching me on the shoulder, “ this is a matter that you'll
soon arrange, I dare say , but you're arrested . ”
6. What is the debt ? ”
“ Hundred and twenty-three pound, fifteen , six. Jeweller's
account, I think.”
66 What is to be done ?"
“ You had better come to my house," said the man . “ I
keep a very nice house . ”
1
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 421

I made some attempt to get up and dress myself. When I

next attended to them , they were standing a little off from the
bed , looking at me. I still lay there.
“ You see my state,” said I. “ I would come with you if I
could ; but indeed I am quite unable. If you take me from
here, I think I shall die by the way. ”
Perhaps they replied, or argued the point, or tried to
encourage me to believe that I was better than I thought.
Forasmuch as they hang in my memory by only this one
slender thread, I don't know what they did, except that they
forbore to remove me.
That I had a fever and was avoided, that I suffered greatly ,
that I often lost my reason , that the time seemed interminable,
that I confounded impossible existences with my own
identity ; that I was a brick in the house wall, and yet
entreating to be released from the giddy place where the
builders had set me ; that I was a steel beam of a vast engine
clashing and whirling over a gulf, and yet that I implored in
my own person to have the engine stopped, and my part in it
hammered off; that I passed through these phases of disease,
I know of my own remembrance, and did in some sort know
at the time. That I sometimes struggled with real people, in
the belief that they were murderers, and that I would all at
once comprehend that they meant to do me good, and would
then sink exhausted in their arms, and suffer them to lay me
down , I also knew at the time. But, above all, I knew that
there was a constant tendency in all these people -- who, when
I was very ill, would present all kinds of extraordinary trans
formations of the human face, and would be much dilated in
size - above all , I say , I knew that there was an extraordinary
tendenoy in all these people, sooner or later to settle down
into the likeness of Joe.
After I had turned the worst point of my illness, I began
to notice that while all its other features changed, this one
consistent feature did not change. Whoever came about me,
still settled down into Joe . I opened my eyes in the night,
and I saw in the great chair at the bedside, Joe. I opened
my eyes in the day, and, sitting on the window -seat, smoking
his pipe in the shaded open window , still I saw Joe. I asked
for cooling drink, and the dear hand that gave it me was Joe's.
I sank back on my pillow after drinking, and the face that
looked so hopefully and tenderly upon me was the face of Joe.
422 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

At last, one day, I took courage, and said “Is it Joe?”

And the dear old home- voice answered , “ Which it air, old
chap.”
" 0 Joe, you break my heart ! Look angry at mo, Joe.
Strike me , Joe. Tell me of my ingratitude. Don't be so good
to me ! ”
For, Joe had actually laid his head down on the pillow at
my side and put his arm round my neck, in his joy that I
knew him.
" Which dear old Pip, old chap , ” said Joe, “ you and me
was ever friends. And when you're well enough to go out for
a ride - what larks !”
After which, Joe withdrew to the window , and stood with his
back towards me, wiping his eyes. And as my extreme weakness
prevented me from getting up and going to him, I lay there,
penitently whispering, “ O God bless him ! O God bless
this gentle Christian man!"
Joe's eyes were red when I next found him beside me ; but,
I was holding his hand and we both felt happy.
“ How long, dear Joe ? ”
“ Which you meantersay , Pip, how long have your illness
lasted , dear old chap ? "
“ Yes, Joe."
" It's the end of May , Pip. To -morrow is the first of
June,"
“ And have you been here all the time, dear Joe ?”
“ Pretty nigh, old chap. For, as I says to Biddy when the
news of your being ill were brought by letter, which it were
brought by the post, and being formerly single he is now
married though underpaid for a deal of walking and shoe
leather, but wealth were not a object on his part, and marriage
were the great wish of his bart
“ It is so delightful to hear you, Joe ! But I interrupt you
in what you said to Biddy."
“ Which it were,” said Joe, “ that how you might be
amongst strangers, and that how you and me having been ever
friends, a wisit at such a moment might not prove unaccept
abobble. And Biddy, her word were, ' Go to him, without
loss of time.' That,” said Joe, summing up with his judicial
air, were the sword of Biddy. • Go to him ,' Biddy say , ' with
out loss of time. In short, I shouldn't greatly deceive you . "
Joe added, after a little grave reflection , " if I represented to
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 423

you that the word of that young woman were, without a

minute's loss of time. '”
There Joe cut himself short, and informed me that I was to
be talked to in great moderation , and that I was to take a
little nourishment at stated frequent times , whether I felt
inclined for it or not, and that I was to submit myself to
all his orders. So, I kissed his hand, and lay quiet, while
he proceeded to indite a note to Biddy, with my love in
it.
Evidently, Biddy had taught Joe to write. As I lay in bed
looking at him , it made me, in my weak state, cry again with
pleasure to see the pride with which he set about his letter,
My bedstead , divested of its curtains, had been removed, with
me upon it, into the sitting -room , as the airiest and largest, and
the carpet had been taken away , and the room kept always
fresh and wholesome night and day. At my own writing- table,
pushed into a corner and cumbered with little bottles, Joe
now sat down to his great work, first choosing a pen from the
pen -tray as if it were a chest of large tools, and tucking up
his sleeves as if he were going to wield a crowbar or sledge
hammer. It was necessary for Joe to hold on heavily to the
table with his left elbow , and to get his right leg well out
behind him , before he could begin, and when he did begin
he made every down -stroke so slowly that it might have been
six feet long, while at every up -stroke I could hear his pen
spluttering extensively. He had a curious idea that the ink
stand was on the side of him where it was not, and constantly
dipped his pen into space, and seemed quite satisfied with the
result. Occasionally, he was tripped up by some orthographical
stumbling -block, but on the whole he got on very well indeed
and when he had signed his name, and had removed a finishing
blot from the paper to the crown of his head with his two
forefingers, he got up and hovered about the table, trying the
effect of his performance from various points of view as it lay
there, with unbounded satisfaction .
Not to make Joe uneasy by talking too much, even if I
had been able to talk much, I deferred asking him about Miss
Havisham until next day. He shook his head when I then
asked him if she had recovered ?
Is she dead , Joe ? ”!
Why you see , old chap ," said Joe, in a tone of re
monstrance, and by way of getting at it by degrees, “ I
 424 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

wouldn't go so far as to say that, for that's a deal to say ; but

she ain't
“ Living, Joe ?"
• That's nigher where it is ,” said Joe ; " she ain't living."
“ Did she linger long, Joe ? ”
“ Arter you was took ill, pretty much about what you
might call (if you was put to it ) a week , ” said Jov ; still
determined, on my account, to come at everything by degrees.
" Dear J have you heard what becomes of her property ?"
66
Well, old chap ,” said Joe, “ it do appear that she had
settled the most of it, which I meantersay tied it up, on Miss
Estella. But she had wrote out a little coddleshell in her
own hand a day or two afore the accident, leaving a cool four
thousand to Mr. Matthew Pocket. And why, do you suppose,
above all things, Pip , she left that cool four thousand unto
him ? • Because of Pip's account of him the said Matthew .'
I am told by Biddy, that air the writing,” said Joe, repeating
the legal turn as if it did him infinite good, account
of him the said Matthew . And a cool four thousand, Pip !"
. I never discovered from whom Joe derived the conven
tional temperature of the four thousand pounds, but it ap
peared to make the sum of money more to him, and he had a
manifest relish in insisting on its being cool.
This account gave me great joy, as it perfected the only
good thing I had done. I asked Joe whether he had heard if
any of the other relations had any legacies ?
“ Miss Sarah ,” said Joe, “ she have twenty- five pound
perannium fur to buy pills, on account of being bilious. Miss
Georgiana, she have twenty pound down. Mrs. what's
the name of them wild beasts with humps, old chap ?"
“ Camels ? ” said I, wondering why he could possibly want
to know.
Joe nodded . “ Mrs. Camels," by which I presently under
stood he meant Camilla , “ she have five pound fur to buy
rushlights to put her in spirits when she wake up in the
night.”
The accuracy of these recitals was sufficiently obvious to
me, to give me great confidence in Joe's information. “ And
now ,” said Joe, “ you ain't that strong yet, old chap, that
you can take in more nor one additional shovel-full to -day.
Old Orlick he's been a bustin' open a dwelling -ouse .”
6 Whose ?” said I.
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 425
• Not, I grant you, but what his manners is given to
blusterous," said Joe, apologetically ; " still, a Englishman's
ouse is his Castle, and castles must not be busted 'cept when
done in war time. And wotsume'er the failings on his part,
he were a corn and seedsman in his hart.”
“ Is it Pumblechook's house that has been broken into,
then ?”
“ That's it, Pip ,” said Joe ; "and they took his till, and
they took his cash -box, and they drinked his wine, and they
partook of his wittles, and they slapped his face, and they
pulled his nose, and they tied him up to his bedpust, and
they giv' him a dozen, and they stuffed his mouth full of
flowering annuals to prewent his crying out. But he knowed
Orlick , and Orlick's in the county jail.”
By these approaches we arrived at unrestricted conversa
tion. I was slow to gain strength, but I did slowly and
surely become less weak, and Joe stayed with me, and I
fancied I was little Pip again .
For, the tenderness of Joe was so beautifully proportioned
to my need , that I was like a child in his hands. He would
sit and talk to me in the old confidence, and with the old
simplicity, and in the old unassertive protecting way, so that
I would half believe that all my life since the days of the old
kitchen was one of the mental troubles of the fever that was
gone. He did everything for me except the household work ,
for which he had engaged a very decent woman , after paying
off the laundress on his first arrival. " Which I do assure
you , Pip ," he would often say, in explanation of that liberty ;
“ I found her a tapping the spare bed , like a cask of beer.
and drawing off the feathers in a bucket , for sale. Which
she would have tapped your next, and draw'd it off with
you a laying on it, and was then a carrying away the coals
gradiwally in the soup -tureen and wegetable-dishes, and the
wine and spirits in your Wellington boots ."
We looked forward to the day when I should go out for a
ride, as we had once looked forward to the day of my appren
ticeship. And when the day came, and an open carriage was
got into the Lane, Joe wrapped me up, took me in his arms,
carried me down to it, and put me in, as if I were still the
small helpless creature to whom he had so abundantly given
of the wealth of his great nature .
And Joe got in beside me, and we drove away together
426 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

into the country, where the rich summer growth was already
on the trees and on the grass, and sweet summer scents filled
all the air. The day happened to be Sunday , and when I
looked on the loveliness around me, and thought how it had
grown and changed, and how the little wild flowers had been
forming, and the voices of the birds had been strengthening,
by day and by night, under the sun and under the stars,
while poor I lay burning and tossing on my bed, the mere
remembrance of having burned and tossed there, came like a
check upon my peace . But, when I heard the Sunday bells,
and looked around a little more upon the outspread beauty, I
felt that I was not nearly thankful enough - that I was too
weak yet, to be even that — and I laid my head on Joe's
shoulder, as I had laid it long ago when he had taken me
to the Fair or where not, and it was too much for my young
senses .
More composure came to me after a while and we talked as
we used to talk , lying on the grass at the old Battery. There
was no change whatever in Joe . Exactly what he had been
in my eyes then, he was in my eyes still ; just as simply
faithful, just as simply right.
When we got back again and he lifted me out, and carried
me -- s0 easily !-across the court and up the stairs, I thought
of that eventful Christmas Day when he had carried me over
the marshes. We had not yet made any allusion to my
change of fortune, nor did I know how much of my late
history he was acquainted with. I was so doubtful of myself
now , and put so much trust in him, that I could not satisfy
myself whether I ought to refer to it when he did not.
“ Have you heard , Joe ," I asked him that evening, upon
further consideration , as he smoked his pipe at the window,
“who my patron was ?”
“ I heerd,” returned Joe, “ as it were not Miss Havisham ,
old chap ."
“ Did you hear who it was, Joe ? "
“ Well ! I heerd as it were a person what sent the person
what giv' you the bank -notes at the Jolly Bargemen , Pip."
99
“ So it was.”
“ Astonishing ! ” said Joe, in the placidest way.
“ Did you hear that he was dead , Joe ?" I presently asked ,
with increasing diffidence .
“ Which ? Him as sent the bank -notes, Pip ?"
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 427
“ Yes ."
“ I think ,” said Joe, after meditating a long time, and
looking rather evasively at the window-seat, as I did hear
tell that how he were something or another in a general way
in that direction ."
“ Did you hear anything of his circumstances, Joe ?"
“ Not partickler, Pip . "
“ If you would like to hear, Joe— ” I was beginning,
when Joe got up and came to my sofa .
“ Lookee here, old chap ,” said Joe, bending over me.
“ Ever the best of friends ; ain't us, Pip ?”
I was ashamed to answer him.
“ Wery good , then ," said Joe , as if I had answered ; "that's
all right ; that's agreed upon . Then why go into subjects,
old chap, which as betwixt two sech must be for ever on
necessary ? There's subjects enough as betwixt two sech ,
without onnecessary ones . Lord ! To think of your poor
sister and her Rampages ! And don't you remember Tickler ?"
“ I do indeed, Joe .”
“ Lookee here, old chap ,” said Joe. “ I done what I could
to keep you and Tickler in sunders, but my power were not
always fully equal to my inclinations. For when your poor
sister had a mind to drop into you, it were not so much ,” said
Joe , in his favourite argumentative way , “ that she dropped
into me too, if I put myself in opposition to her but that she
dropped into you always heavier for it. I noticed that. It
ain't a grab at a man's whisker, nor yet a shake or two of a
man ( to which your sister was quite welcome), that 'ud put a
man off from getting a little child out of punishment. But
when that little child is dropped into, heavier, for that grab
of whisker or shaking, then that man naterally up and says
to himself, Where is the good as you are a doing ? I grant
6
you I see the 'arm,' says the man , but I don't see the good .
I call upon you, sir, therefore, to pint out the good.' ”
“ The man says ? " I observed, as Joe waited for me to
speak .
“ The man says, " Joe assented . “Is he right, that man ? "
" Dear Joe, he is always right.”
“ Well, old chap , ” said Joe, “then abide by your words.
If he's always right ( which in general he's more likely
wrong ), he's right when he says this Supposing ever you
kep any little matter to yourself, when you was a little child ,
1
 428 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

you kep it mostly because you know'd as J. Gargery's power

to part you and Tickler in sunders, were not fully eqnal to
his inclinations. Theerfore, think no more of it as betwixt
two sech, and do not let us pass remarks upon onnecessary
subjects. Biddy giv ' herself a deal o' trouble with me afore
I left ( for I am most awful dull) , as I should view it in this
light, and, viewing it in this light, as I should ser put it.
Both of which ," said Joe, quite charmed with his logical
arrangement, “ being done, now this to you a true friend,
say . Namely. You mustn't go a over-doing on it, but you
must have your supper and your wine - and -water, and you
must be put betwixt the sheets."
The delicacy with which Joe dismissed this theme, and the
sweet tact and kindness with which Biddy - who with her
wounan's wit had found me out so soon - had prepared him
for it, made a deep impression on my mind. But whether
Joe knew how poor I was , and how my great expectations
had all dissolved, like our own marsh mists before the sun , I
could not understand.
Another thing in Joe that I could not understand when it
first began to develop itself, but which I soon arrived at a
sorrowful comprehension of, was this : As I became stronger
and better, Joe became a little less easy with me. In my
weakness and entire dependence on him , the dear fellow had
fallen into the old tone, and called me by the old names , the
dear “ old Pip, old chap ,” that now were music in my ears .
I too had fallen into the old ways, only happy and thankful
that he let me. But, imperceptibly , though I held by them
fast, Joe's hold upon them began to slacken ; and whereas I
wondered at this, at first, I soon began to understand that the
cause of it was in me, and that the fault of it was all mine .
Ah ! Had I given Joe no reason to doubt my constancy,
and to think that in prosperity I should grow cold to him and
cast him off ? Had I given Joe's innocent heart no cause to
feel instinctively that as I got stronger, his hold upon mé
would be weaker, and that he had better loosen it in time and
let me go , before I plucked myself away ?
It was on the third or fourth occasion of my going out
walking in the Temple Gardens leaning on Joe's arm , that I
saw this change in him very plainly. We had been sitting in
the bright warm sunlight, looking at the river, and I chanced
to say as we got up :
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS . 429

“See, Joe ! I can walk quite strongly. Now, you shall

see me walk back by myself .”
“ Which do not over-do it, Pip ,” said Joe ; “but I shall be
happy fur to see you able, sir.”
The last word grated on me ; but how could I remonstrate !
I walked no further than the gate of the gardens, and then
pretended to be weaker than I was, and asked Joe for his
arm . Joe gave it me , but was thoughtful.
I, for my part, was thoughtful too ; for how best to check
this growing change in Joe, was a great perplexity to my re
morseful thoughts. That I was ashamed to tell him exactly
how I was placed , and what I had come down to, I do not
seek to conceal : but, I hope my reluctance was not quite an
unworthy one. He would want to help me out of his little
savings, I knew , and I knew that he ought not to help me,
and that I must not suffer him to do it.
It was a thoughtful evening with both of us. But, before
we went to bed, I had resolved that I would wait over to
morrow , to-morrow being Sunday, and would begin my new
course with the new week. On Monday morning I would
speak to Joe about this change , I would lay aside this last
vestige of reserve , I would tell him what I had in my thoughts
that Secondly , not yet arrived at) , and why I had not de
cided to go out to Herbert, and then the change would be
conquered for ever. As I cleared, Joe cleared , and it seemed
as though he had sympathetically arrived at a resolution too.
We had a quiet day on the Sunday , and we rode out into
the country, and then walked in the fields.
“ I feel thankful that I have been ill, Joe,” I said .
“ Dear old Pip, old chap, you're a’most come round, sir.”
“ It has been a memorable time for me, Joe.”
“ Likeways for myself, sir ," Joe returned .
“ We have had a time together, Joe, that I can never
forget. There were days once, I know, that I did for a while
forget; but I never shall forget these . ”
Pip ,” said Joe, appearing a little hurried and troubled,
there has been larks. And, dear sir, what have been be
twixt us-have been .”
At night, when I had gone to bed, Joe came into my room ,
as he had done all through my recovery . He asked me if I
felt sure that I was as well as in the morning ?
“ Yes, dear Joe , quite .”
 430 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ And are always a getting stronger, old chap ? "

“ Yes , dear Joe, steadily.”
Joe patted the coverlet on my shoulder with his great good
hand, and said, in what I thought a husky voice, “ Good
night ! "
When I got up in the morning, refreshed and stronger yet,
I was full of my resolution to tell Joe all, without delay. I
would tell him before breakfast. I would dress at once and
go to his room and surprise him ; for, it was the first day I
had been up early. I went to his room , and he was not there .
Not only was he not there, but his box was gone.
I hurried then to the breakfast -table, and on it found a
letter. These were its brief contents .
“ Not wishful to intrude I have departured fir you are well again dear
Pip and will do better without “Jo.
“ P.S. Ever the best of friends,"

Enclosed in the letter, was a receipt for the debt and costs
on which I had been arrested . Down to that moment I had
vainly supposed that my creditor had withdrawn or suspended
proceedings until I should be quite recovered . I had never
dreamed of Joe's having paid the money ; but, Joe had paid
it, and the receipt was in his name.
What remained for me now, but to follow him to the dear
old forge, and there to have out my disclosure to him, and my
penitent remonstrance with him, and there to relieve my mind
and heart of that reserved Secondly, which had begun as a
! vague something lingering in my thoughts, and had formed
into a settled purpose ?
The purpose was, that I would go to Biddy, that I would
show her how humbled and repentant I came back, that I
would tell her how I had lost all I once hoped for, that I
would remind her of our old confidences in my first unhappy
time. Then, I would say to her, “ Biddy, I think you once
liked me very well, when my errant heart, even while it
strayed away from you, was quieter and better with you than
it ever has been since. If you can like me only half as well
once more, if you can take me with all my faults and disap
pointments on my head, if you can receive me like a forgiven
child (and indeed I am as sorry , Biddy, and have as much
need of a hushing voice and a soothing hand ) , I hope I am a
little worthier of you than I was - not much , but a little.
And, Biddy, it shall rest with you to say whether I shall
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 431

work at the forge with Joe, or whether I shall try for any
different occupation down in this country, or whether we shall
go away to a distant place where an opportunity awaits me
which I set aside when it was offered, until I knew your an
swer. And now, dear Biddy, if you can tell me that you will
go through the world with me, you will surely make it a
better world for me, and me a better man for it, and I will try
hard to make it a better world for you."
Such was my purpose . After three days more of recovery,
I went down to the old place, to put it in execution. And
how I sped in it, is all I have left to tell.

CHAPTER LVIII.

The tidings of my high fortunes having had a heavy fall,

had got down to my native place and its neighbourhood,
before I got there. I found the Blue Boar in possession of the
intelligence, and I found that it made a great change in the
Boar's demeanour. Whereas the Boar had cultivated my good
opinion with warm assiduity when I was coming into property,
the Boar was exceedingly cool on the subject now that I was
going out of property .
It was evening when I arrived , much fatigued by the
journey I had so often made so easily. The Boar could not
put me into my usual bedroom , which was engaged ( probably
by some one who had expectations), and could only assign me
a very indifferent chamber among the pigeons and post-chaises
up the yard. But, I had as sound a sleep in that lodging as in
the most superior accommodation the Boar could have given
me, and the quality of my dreams was about the same as in
the best bedroom .
Early in the morning while my breakfast was getting
ready, I strolled round by Satis House. There were printed
bills on the gate and on bits of carpet hanging out of the
windows, announcing a sale by auction of the Household
Furniture and Effects, next week . The House itself was to
be sold as old building materials, and pulled down. Lot 1
was marked in whitewashed knock-knee letters on the brew
house ; Lot 2 on that part of the main building which had
been so long shut up . Other lots were marked off on other
432 GREAT EXPECTATIONS .

parts of the structure, and the ivy had been torn down to
make room for the inscriptions, and much of it trailed low in
the dust and was withered already , Stepping in for a moment
at the open gate and looking around me with the uncomfort
able air of a stranger who had no business there, I saw the
auctioneer's clerk walking on the casks and telling them off for
the information of a catalogue -compiler, pen in hand, who
made a temporary desk of the wheeled chair I had so often
pushed along to the tune of Old Clem.
When I got back to my breakfast in the Boar's coffee -room ,
I found Mr. Pumblechook conversing with the landlord .
Mr. Pumblechook ( not improved in appearance by his late
nocturnal adventure) was waiting for me, nd add ressed me
in the following terms.
Young man , I am sorry to see you brought low. But
what else could be expected ! what else could be expected ! "
As he extended his hand with a magnificently forgiving
air, and as I was broken by illness and unfit to quarrel, I
took it.
William ,” said Mr. Punablechook to the waiter, “ put a
muffin on table. And has it come to this ! Has it come to
this !”
I frowningly sat down to my breakfast. Mr. Pumblechook
stood over me and poured out my tea — before I could touch
the teapot — with the air of a benefactor who was resolved to
be true to the last.
“ William ,” said Mr. Pumblechook, mournfully , “ put the
salt on . In happier times, " addressing me , “ I think you took
sugar ? And did you take milk ? You did. Sugar and milk,
William , bring a wartercress .”
“ Thank you ,” said I, shortly , “ but I don't eat water
cresses .”
“ You don't eat 'em ,” returned Mr. Pumblechook, sighing
and nodding his head several times, as if he might have ex
pected that, and as if abstinence from watercresses were con
sistent with my downfall. “ True. The simple fruits of the
earth. No. You needn't bring any, William , "
I went on with my breakfast, and Mr Pumblechook con
tinued to stand over me , staring fishily and breathing noisily,
as he always did .
“ Little more than skin and bone !” mused Mr. Pumble
chook, aloud . “ And yet when he went away from here ( I

1
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 433
Tu down may say with my blessing), and I spread afore him my humble
iled low
store, like the Bee, he was as plump as a Peach ! ”
This reminded me of the wonderful difference between the
uncomfort servile manner in which he had offered his hand in my new
I saw the prosperity, saying, “ May I ?" and the ostentatious clemency
sell ofa with which he had just now exhibited the same fat five
and, whe fingers.
80 ofter “ Hah !” he went on, handing me the bread -and -butter.
“ And air you a going to Joseph ? ”
e -room. “ In Heaven's name, " said I, firing in spite of myself,
andlord. “ what does it matter to you where I am going ? Leave that
his late teapot alone. ”
=sed me It was the worst course I could have taken , because it gave
Pumblechook the opportunity he wanted .
- Ba: “ Yes, young man ,” said he, releasing the handle of the
cred !" article in question, retiring a step or two from my table, and.
giving speaking for the behoof of the landlord and waiter at the door,
rrel, I " I will leave that teapot alone . You are right, young man .
For once, you are right. I forgit myself when I take such an
put a interest in your breakfast, as to wish your frame, exhausted
me to by the debilitating effects of prodigygality, to be stimilated
by the 'olesome nourishment of your forefathers. And yet,
Chook said Pumblechook, turning to the landlord and waiter, and
couch pointing me out at arm's length, “this is him as I ever sported
ed to with in his days of happy infancy ! Tell me not it cannot be ;
I tell you this is him !”
the A low murmur from the two replied. The waiter appeared
to be particularly affected .
lk. “ This is him ," said Pumblechook , " as I have rode in my
shay -cart. This is him as I have seen brought up by hand .
ra This is him untoe the sister of which I was uncle by marriage,
as her name was Georgiana M’ria from her own mother, let
him deny it if he can ! ”
The waiter seemed convinced that I could not deny it, and
that it gave the case a black look.
CG
Young man ,” said Pumblechook, screwing his head at me
in the old fashion, “ you air a going to Joseph. What does it
matter to me, you ask me, where you air a going ? I say to
you , Sir, you air a going to Joseph.”
The waiter coughed, as if he modestly invited me to get over
that.
66
• Now ," said Pumblechook, and all this with a most ex
2 F
 434 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

asperating air of saying in the cause of virtue what was per

fectly convincing and conclusive, “ I will tell you what to say
to Joseph. Here is Squires of the Boar present, known and
respected in this town, and here is William , which his father's
name was Potkins if I do not deceive myself.”
“ You do not, sir," said William.
“ In their presence,” pursued Pumblechook, “ I will tell
you, young man , what to say to Joseph. Says you, ‘ Joseph
I have this day seen my earliest benefactor and the foundo
of my fortun’s . I will name no names , Joseph, but so
they are pleased to call him up - town, and I have seen that
man .'
1
“ I swear I don't see him here,” said I.
66
Say that likewise," retorted Pumblechook . “Say you said
that, and even Joseph will probably betray surprise."
“ There you quite mistake him," said I. “ I know better .”
66
· Says you ,” Pumblechook went on, “ Joseph, I have seen
that man , and that man bears you no malice and bears me no
malice. He knows your character, Joseph, and is well ac
quainted with your pig -headedness and ignorance ; and he
knows my character, Joseph, and he knows my want of grati
toode . Yes, Joseph,' says you ,” here Pumblechook shook his
head and hand at me, 66 "he knows my total deficiency of com
mon human gratitoode. He knows it, Joseph, as none can .
You do not know it, Joseph, having no call to know it, but that
man do.' ”
Windy donkey as he was, it really amazed me that he could
have the face to talk thus to mine.
• Says you , ‘ Joseph, he gave me a little message, which I
will now repeat. It was, that in my being brought low , he
saw the finger of Providence. He knowed that finger when
he saw it, Joseph, and he saw it plain. It pinted out this
writing, Joseph. Reward of ingratitoode to earliest benefactor, and
founder of fortun's. But that man said that he did not repent of
what he had done, Joseph. Not at all. It was right to do it,
it was kind to do it, it was benevolent to do it, and he would
do it again . ”
" It's a pity,” said I, scornfully, as I finished my interrupted
breakfast, “ that the man did not say what he had done and
would do again ."
Squires of the Boar !” Pumblechook was now addressing
the landlord , “and William ! I have no objections to your
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 435

mentioning, either up - town or down - town, if such should be

your wishes, that it was right to do it, kind to do it, bene
volent to do it, and that I would do it again .”
With those words the Impostor shook them both by the
hand, with an air, and left the house ; leaving me much more
astonished than delighted by the virtues of that same in
definite “ it . ” I was not long after him in leaving the house
too, and when I went down the High -street I saw him
holding forth (no doubt to the same effect) at his shop door to
a select group, who honoured me with very unfavourable
glances as I passed on the opposite side of the way..
But, it was only the pleasanter to turn to Biddy and to Joe,
whose great forbearance shone more brightly than before, if
that could be, contrasted with this brazen pretender. I went
towards them slowly, for my limbs were weak, but with a
sense of increasing relief as I drew nearer to them, and a sense
of leaving arrogance and untruthfulness further and further
behind.
The June weather was delicious. The sky was blue, the
larks were soaring high over the green corn , I thought all that
countryside more beautiful and peaceful by far than I had ever
known it to be yet. Many pleasant pictures of the life that I
would lead there, and of the change for the better that would
come over my character when I had a guiding spirit at my
side whose simple faith and clear home-wisdom I had proved,
beguiled my way. They awakened a tender emotion in me ;
for, my heart was softened by my return , and such a change
had come to pass, that I felt like one who was toiling home
barefoot from distant travel, and whose wanderings had lasted
many years.
The schoolhouse where Biddy was mistress, I had never
seen ; but, the little roundabout lane by which I entered the
village for quietness' sake, took me past it . I was disap
pointed to find that the day was a holiday ; no children
were there , and Biddy's house was closed. Some hopeful
notion of seeing her, busily engaged in her daily duties,
before she saw me, had been in my mind and was de
feated .
But, the forge was a very short distance off, and I went
towards it under the sweet green limes, listening for the clink
of Joe's hammer. Long after I ought to have heard it, and
long after I had fancied I heard it and found it but a fancy,
436 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

all was still. The limes were there, and the white thorns
were there , and the chesnut-trees were there, and their
leaves rustled harmoniously when I stopped to listen ; but,
the clink of Joe's hammer was not in the midsummer
wind .
Almost fearing, without knowing why, to come in view of
the forge, I saw it at last, and saw that it was closed. No
gleam of fire, no glittering shower of ' sparks, no roar of
bellows ; all shut up, and still.
But, the house was not deserted, and the best parlour
seemed to be in use, for there were white curtains fluttering
in its window and the window was open and gay with flowers .
I went softly towards it meaning to peep over the flowers,
when Joe and Biddy stood before me, arm in arm .
At first Biddy gave a cry , as if she thought it was my
apparition, but in another moment she was in my embrace . I
wept to see her, and she wept to see me ; I, because she
looked so fresh and pleasant ; she, because I looked so worn
and white .
“ But dear Biddy, how smart you are ! "
“ Yes, dear Pip ."
“ And Joe, how smart you are ! "
Yes, dear old Pip, old chap."
I looked at both of them , from one to the other, and
then
“ It's my wedding-day,” cried Biddy, in a burst of happi
ness, “ and I am married to Joe !"
* * * * *
They had taken me into the kitchen , and I had laid my
head down on the old deal table. Biddy held one of my
hands to her lips, and Joe's restoring touch was on my
shoulder . “ Which he warn't strong enough, my dear , fur to
be surprised ,” said Joe. And Biddy said , “ I ought to have
thought of it, dear Joe, but I was too happy .” They were both
so overjoyed to see me, so proud to see me, so touched by my
coming to them , so delighted that I should have come by
accident to make their day complete !
My first thought was one of great thankfulness that I had
never breathed this last baffled hope to Joe. How often,
while he was with me in my illness, had it risen to my lips.
How irrevocable would have been his knowledge of it, if he
had remained with me but another hour !
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 437

“Dear Biddy,” said I , “ you have the best husband in the

whole world , and if you could have seen him by my bed you
would have_But no, you couldn't love him better than
you do."
“ No, I couldn't indeed , " said Biddy.
“ And, dear Joe, you have the best wife in the whole world ,
and she will make you as happy as even you deserve to be,
you dear, good, noble Joe !"
Joe looked at me with a quivering lip , and fairly put his
sleeve before his eyes.
“ And Joe and Biddy both, as you have been to church to
day, and are in charity and love with all mankind , receive my
humble thanks for all you have done for me, and all I have so
ill repaid ! And when I say that I am going away within the
hour, for I am soon going abroad , and that I shall never rest
until I have worked for the money with which you have kept
me out of prison , and have sent it to you, don't think , dear Joe
and Biddy , that if I could repay it a thousand times over , I
suppose I could cancel a farthing of the debt I owe you, or
that I would do so if I could !"
They were buth melted by these words, and both entreated
me to say no more .
“ But I must say more . Dear Joe, I hope you will have
children to love, and that some little fellow will sit in this
chimney corner of a winter night, who may remind you of
another little fellow gone out of it for ever. Don't tell him,
Joe, that I was thankless ; don't tell him, Biddy that I was
ungenerous and unjust ; only tell him that I honoured you
both , because you were both so good and true, and that, as your
child, I said it would be natural to him to grow up a much
better man than I did . ”
“ I ain't a going , ” said Joe, from behind his sleeve, “ to tell
him nothink o' that natur, Pip. Nor Biddy ain't. Nor yet
no one ain't."
“ And now , though I know you have already done it in
your own kind hearts, pray tell me, both , that you forgive me !
Pray let me hear you say the words, that I may carry the
sound of them away with me and then I shall be able to
believe that you can trust me, and think better of me, in the
time to come !"
“ O dear old Pip, old chap,” said Joe. " God knows as I
forgive you, if I have anythink to forgive ! "
438 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

“ Amen ! And God knows I do ! ” echoed Biddy.

“ Now let me go up and look at my old little room, and rest
there a few minutes by myself. And then when I have eaten
and drunk with you, go with me as far as the finger-post, dear
Joe and Biddy, before we say good - by !"

I sold all I had , and put aside as much as I could , for a

composition with my creditors — who gave me ample time to
pay them in full - and I went out and joined Herbert. Within
a month , I had quitted England , and within two months I was
clerk to Clarriker and Co., and within four months I assumed
my first undivided responsibility. For, the beam across the
parlour ceiling at Mill Pond Bank, had then ceased to tremble
under old Bill Barley's growls and was at peace, and Herbert
had gone away to marry Clara,and I was left in sole charge
of the Eastern Branch until he brought her back.
Many a year went round, before I was a partner in the
House ; but, I lived happily with Herbert and his wife, and
lived frugally, and paid my debts, and maintained a constant
correspondence with Biddy and Joe . It was not until I
became third in the Firm , that Clarriker betrayed me to
Herbert ; but, he then declared that the secret of Herbert's
partnership had been long enough upon his conscience, and he
must tell it. So, he told it, and Herbert was as much moved
as amazed , and the dear fellow and I were not the worse
friends for the long concealment. I must not leave it to be
supposed that we were ever a great House, or that we made
mints of money . We were not in a grand way of business,
but we had a good name, and worked for our profits, and did
very well. We owed so much to Herbert's ever cheerful
industry and readiness, that I often wondered how I had
conceived that old idea of his inaptitude, until I was one day
enlightened by the reflection , that perhaps the inaptitude had
never been in him at all, but had been in me.

CHAPTER LIX .
For eleven years, I had not seen Joe nor Biddy with my
bodily eyes — though they had both been often before my
fancy in the East — when, upon an evening in December, an
hour or two after dark, I laid my hand softly on the latch of
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 439

the old kitchen door. I touched it so softly that I was not

* heard, and I looked in unseen. There, smoking his pipe in
the old place by the kitchen firelight, as hale and as strong as
ever though a little grey , sat Joe ; and there, fenced into the
corner with Joe's leg, and sitting on my own little stool
looking at the fire, was -- I again !
“ We giv' him the name of Pip for your sake, dear old
chap ," said Joe, delighted when I took another stool by the
child's side (but I did not rumple his hair ), “ and we hoped
he might grow a little bit like you , and we think he do . ”
I thought so too , and I took him out for a walk next
morning, and we talked immensely, understanding one
another to perfection. And I took him down to the
churchyard, and set him on a certain tombstone there, and he
showed me from that elevation which stone was sacred to the
memory of Philip Pirrip, late of this Parish, and Also
Georgiana, Wife of the Above.
Biddy,” said I, when I talked with her after dinner, as
her little girl lay sleeping in her lap, “ you must give Pip to
me, one of these days ; or lend him, at all events."
“ No , no," said Biddy, gently. “ You must marry."
“ So Herbert and Clara say, but I don't think I shall,
Biddy. I have so settled down in their home, that it's not at
all likely . I am already quite an old bachelor."
Biddy looked down at her child , and put its little hand to
her lips , and then put the good matronly hand with which she
had touched it, into mine. There was something in the action
and in the light pressure of Biddy's wedding -ring, that had a
very pretty eloquence in it.
“ Dear Pip ,” said Biddy, "you are sure you don't fret
for her ?”
“ O no - I think not, Biddy.”
“ Tell me as an old, old friend . Have you quite forgotten
her ?”
“ My dear Biddy, I have forgotten nothing in my life that
ever had a foremost place there, and little that ever had any
place there. But that poor dream , as I once used to call it,
has all gone by, Biddy, all gone by !”
Nevertheless, I knew while I said those words, that I
secretly intended to revisit the site of the old house that
evening, alone, for her sake. Yes even so. For Estella's sake.
I had heard of her as leading a most unhappy life, and as
440 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

being separated from her husband who had used her with
great cruelty, and who had become quite renowned as a com
pound of pride, avarice, brutality , and meanness . And I had
heard of the death of her husband , from an accident conse
quent on his ill- treatment of a horse. This release had befallen
her some two years before ; for anything I knew, she was
married again .
The early dinner -hour at Joe's left me abundance of time,
without hurrying my talk with Biddy, to walk over to the old
spot before dark. But, what with loitering on the way, to
look at old objects and to think of old times, the day had
quite declined when I came to the place.
There was no house now, no brewery, no building whatever
left, but the wall of the old garden . The cleared space had
been enclosed with a rough fence, and looking over it, I saw
that some of the old ivy had struck root anew , and was
+ growing green on low quiet mounds of ruin . A gate in the
fence standing ajar, I pushed it open, and went in.
A cold silvery mist had veiled the afternoon , and the moon
was not yet up to scatter it. But, the stars were shining be
yond the mist, and the moon was coming, and the evening
was not dark . I could trace out where every part of the old
house had been, and where the brewery had been, and where
the gates, and where the casks. I had done so, and was
looking along the desolate garden -walk , when I beheld a
solitary figure in it.
The figure showed itself aware of me, as I advanced . It
had been moving towards me, but it stood still. As I drew
nearer, I saw it to be the figure of a woman . As I drew
nearer yet, it was about to turn away, when it stopped, and
let me come up with it. Then, it faltered as if much sur
prised, and uttered my name, and I cried out :
“ Estella !”
“ I am greatly changed . I wonder you know me. "
The freshness of her beauty was indeed gone, but its
indescribable majesty and its indescribable charm remained .
Those attractions in it, I had seen before ; what I had never
seen before, was the saddened softened light of the once proud
eyes ; what I had never felt before, was the friendly touch of
the once insensible hand.
We sat down on a bench that was near , and I said , “ After
so many years, it is strange that we should thus meet again, 3
 GREAT EXPECTATIONS. 441

Estella, here where our first meeting was ! Do you often come
back ?"
92
“ I have never been here since."
“ Nor I.”
The moon began to rise, and I thought of the placid look at
the white ceiling, which had passed away . The moon began
to rise , and I thought of the pressure on my hand when I had
spoken the last words he had heard on earth.
Estella was the next to break the silence that ensued
between us.
“ I have very often hoped and intended to come back, but
have been prevented by many circumstances. Poor, poor old
place ! "
The silvery mist was touched with the first rays of the
moonlight, and the same rays touched the tears that dropped
from her eyes . Not knowing that I saw them , and setting
herself to get the better of them , she said quietly :
“ Were you wondering, as you walked along, how it came
to be left in this condition ?”
“ Yes, Estella . "
“The ground belongs to me. It is the only possession I
have not relinquished . Everything else has gone from me,
little by little, but I have kept this. It was the subject of
the only determined resistance I made in all the wretched
years."
“ Is it to be built on ?"
" At last it is. I came here to take leave of it before its
change. And you ," she said, in a voice of touching interest
to a wanderer, “ you live abroad still ? ”
“ Still . ”
“ And do well, I am sure ? ”
“ I work pretty hard for a sufficient living, and therefore
Yes, I do well.”
“ I have often thought of you ,” said Estella.
“ Have you ? ”
“ Of late, very often . There was a long hard time when I
kept far from me, the remembrance of what I had thrown
away when I was quite ignorant of its worth . But, since my
duty has not been incompatible with the admission of that
remembrance, I have given it a place in my heart.”
“ You have always held your place in my heart , " I an
swered .
2 G
442 GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

And we were silent again until she spoke.

“ I little thought, ” said Estella, “ that I should take leave
of you in taking leave of this spot. I am very glad to
do so .'
“ Glad to part again, Estella ? To me, parting is a painful
thing. To me, the remembrance of our last parting has been
ever mournful and painful.”
“ But you said to me,” returned Estella, very earnestly,
6 God bless you , God forgive you ! And if you could say
that to me then, you will not hesitate to say that to me now
now , when suffering has been stronger than all other teaching,
and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be.
I have been bent and broken , butI hope - into a better
shape. Be as considerate and good to me as you were , and tell
me we are friends. "
“ We are friends,” said I, rising and bending over her, as she
rose from the bench .
“ And will continue friends apart, ” said Estella.
I took her hand in mine, and we went out of the ruined
place ; and, as the morning mists had risen long ago when I
first left the forge, so, the evening mists were rising now , and
in all the broad expanse of tranquil light they showed to me,
I saw no shadow of another parting from her .

THE END .

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET, AND CHARING CRUSS.
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