 Section 8 of Hard Times by Charles Dickens. Hard Times, Chapter 15, Father and Daughter. Although Mr. Gradgrind did not take after Bluebeard, his room was quite a blue chamber in its abundance of blue books, whatever they could prove, which is usually anything you like, they proved there in an army constantly strengthening by the arrival of new recruits. In that charm department, the most complicated social questions were cast up, got into exact totals and finally settled, if those concerned could only have been brought to know it. As if an astronomical observatory should be made without any windows and the astronomer within should arrange the starry universe solely by pen and ink and paper, so Mr. Gradgrind in his observatory, and there are many like it, had no need to cast an eye upon the teeming myriads of human beings around him, but could settle all their destinies on a slate and wipe out all their tears with one dirty little bit of a sponge. To this observatory then, a stern room with a deadly statistical clock in it which measured every second with a beat like a wrap upon a coffin lid, Louisa repaired on the appointed morning, a window looked towards Coke Town, and when she sat down near her father's table she saw the high chimneys and the long tracks of smoke looming in the heavy distance gloomily. Who I, dear Louisa, said her father, I prepared you last night to give me your serious attention in the conversation we're now going to have together. You've been so well trained and you do, I'm happy to say, so much justice to the education you have received that I have perfect confidence in your good sense. You are not impulsive, you are not romantic, you are accustomed to view everything from the strong, dispassionate ground of reason and calculation. From that ground alone I know you will view and consider what I am going to communicate. He waited as if he would have been glad that she said something, but she said never a word. Louisa, my dear, you are the subject of a proposal of marriage that has been made to me. Again, he waited, and again she answered not one word. This so far surprised him as to induce him gently to repeat, a proposal of marriage, my dear, to which she returned without any visible emotion, whatever. I hear you, Father, I'm attending, I assure you. Well, said Mr. Gradgrine, breaking into a smile after being for a moment at a loss, you are even more dispassionate than I expected, Louisa, or perhaps you are not unprepared for the announcement I have it in my charge to make. I cannot say that, Father, until I hear it, prepared or unprepared. I wish to hear it all from you. I wish to hear you state it to me, Father. Strange to relate, Mr. Gradgrine was not so collected at this moment as his daughter was. He took a paper knife in his hand, turned it over, laid it down, took it up again, and even then had to look along the blade of it considering how to go on. What you say, my dear Louisa, is perfectly reasonable. I have undertaken, then, to let you know that, in short, Mr. Bound-to-Be has informed me that he has long watched your progress with particular interest and pleasure, and has long hoped that the time might ultimately arrive when he should offer you his hand in marriage. That time, at which he has so long, and certainly with great constancy, looked forward, is now come. Mr. Bound-to-Be has made his proposal of marriage to me, and has entreated me to make it known to you, and to express his hope that you will take it into your favorable consideration. Silence between them. The deadly statistical clock very hollow, the distant smoke very black and heavy. Father, said Louisa, do you think I love Mr. Bound-to-Be? Mr. Gradgrine was extremely discomfited by this unexpected question. Oh, well, my child, he returned, I really cannot take upon myself to say. Father, pursued Louisa in exactly the same voices before. Do you ask me to love Mr. Bound-to-Be? My dear Louisa, no, no, I ask nothing. Father, she still pursued. Does Mr. Bound-to-Be ask me to love him? Really, my dear, said Mr. Gradgrine, it is difficult to answer your question. Certainly, my dear, because here was something to demonstrate, and it set him up again. Because the reply depends so materially, Louisa, on the sense in which we use the expression. Now, Mr. Bound-to-Be does not do you the injustice, and does not do himself the injustice of pretending to anything fanciful, fantastic, or, I'm using synonymous terms, sentimental. Mr. Bound-to-Be would have seen you grow up under his eyes to a very little purpose. If he could so far forget what is due to your good sense, not to say to his as to address you from any such ground. Therefore, perhaps, the expression itself, I merely suggest this to you, my dear, may be a little misplaced. What would you advise me to use, and instead, Father, why, my dear Louisa, said Mr. Gradgrine, completely recovered by this time, I would advise you, since you ask me, to consider this question as you have been accustomed to consider every other question, simply as one of tangible fact. The ignorant and the giddy may embarrass such subjects with the relevant fancies and other absurdities that have no existence properly viewed, really no existence, but it is no compliment to you to say that you know better. Now what the facts are in this case? You are, we will say, in round numbers, at twenty years of age. Mr. Bound-to-Be is, we will say, in round numbers, fifty. There is some disparity in your respective years, but in your means and positions there is none. On the contrary, there is a great suitability. When the question rises, is this one disparity sufficient to operate as a bar to such a marriage? In considering this question, it is not unimportant to take into account the statistics of marriage, so far as they have yet been obtained in England and Wales. I find, on reference to the figures, that a large proportion of these marriages are contracted between parties of very unequal ages, and that the elder of these contracting parties is, rather more than three-fourths of these instances, the bridegroom. It is remarkable, as showing the wide prevalence of this law, that among the natives of the British possessions in India, also in a considerable part of China, and among the Colmux in Tartary, the best means of computation yet furnished us by travelers yield similar results. The disparity, I have mentioned therefore, almost ceases to be disparity, and virtually all of it disappears. What do you recommend, Father, as Luisa, her reserve composure not in the lease, affected by these gratifying results, that I should substitute for the term I use just now for the misplaced expression? Luisa, returned her father, it appears to me that nothing can be planer. Confining yourself rigidly to fact, the question of fact you state to yourself is, does Mr. Boundary ask me to marry him? Yes, he does. The sole remaining question then is, shall I marry him? I think nothing can be planer than that. Shall I marry him, repeated Luisa, with great deliberation? Precisely, and it is satisfactory to me as your father, my dear Luisa, to know that you do not come to the consideration of that question with the previous habits of mind and habits of life that belong to many young women. No, Father, she returned. I do not. I leave you to judge for yourselves, said Mr. Gradgrind. I have stated the case, as such cases are usually stated among practical minds. I have stated it as the case of your mother and myself was stated in its time. The rest, my dear Luisa, is for you to decide. From the beginning she had sat looking at him fixedly. As he now leaned back in his chair and bent his deep set eyes upon her in his turn, perhaps he might have seen one wavering moment in her, when she was impelled to throw herself upon his breast and give him the pent-up confidences of her heart. But to see it he must have overleaped at a bound the artificial barriers he had for many years been erecting between himself and all those subtle essences of humanity which will elude the utmost cunning of algebra until the last trumpet ever to be sounded shall blow even algebra to wreck. The barriers were too many and too high for such a leap. With his unbending utilitarian matter-of-fact face he hardened her again and moment shot away into the plumbless depths of the past to mingle with all the lost opportunities that are drowned there. Removing her eyes from him she sat so long looking silently towards the town that he said at length, are you consulting the chimneys of Coke Town Works, Luisa? Well, there seems to be nothing there but languid and monotonous smoke. That when night comes, fire bursts out, Father, she answered turning quickly. Well, of course I know that, Luisa, I do not see the application of that remark. To do him justice he did not at all. She passed it away with a slight motion of her hand and concentrating her attention upon him again said, Father, I have often thought that life is very short. This was so distinctly one of his subjects that he interposed. It is short, no doubt, my dear, still. The average duration of human life is proved to have increased of late years, and the calculations of various life assurance and annuity offices, among other figures which cannot go wrong, have established the fact. I speak of my own life, Father. Oh, indeed, still, said Mr. Gradgrind, I need not point out to you, Luisa, that it is governed by the laws which govern lives in the aggregate. Whilst it lasts, I would wish to do the little I can and the little I am fit for. What does it matter? Mr. Gradgrind seemed rather at a loss to understand the last four words replying. How matter? What matter, my dear? Mr. Bounderby, she went on, in a steady, straight way, without regarding this, asks me to marry him. The question I have to ask myself is, shall I marry him? That is so, Father, is it not? You have told me so, Father, have you not? It is certainly my dear. Let it be so, since Mr. Bounderby likes to take me thus, I am satisfied to accept his proposal. Tell him, Father, as soon as you please, that this was my answer. Repeat it word for word, if you can, because I should wish him to know what I said. Oh, it is quite right, my dear, retorted her, Father, approvingly. To be exact, I will observe your very proper request. Have you any wish in reference to the period of your marriage, my child? None, Father. What does it matter? Mr. Gradgrind had drawn his chair a little nearer to her, and taken her hand. But her repetition of these words seemed to strike with some little discord on his ear. He paused a look at her, and, still holding her hand, said, Louisa, I have not considered it essential to ask you one question, because the possibility implied in it appeared to me to be too remote, but perhaps I ought to do so. You have never entertained in secret any other proposal? Father, she returned almost scornfully. What other proposal can have been made to me? Whom have I seen? Where have I been? What are my heart's experiences? My dear Louisa returned, Mr. Gradgrind, reassured and satisfied. You correct me justly, I merely wish to discharge my duty. What do I know, Father, said Louisa in her quiet manner, of tastes and fantasies, of aspirations and affections, of all that part of my nature in which such light things might have been nourished? What escape have I had from problems that could be demonstrated, and realities that could be grasped? As she said it, she unconsciously closed her hand, as if upon a solid object, and slowly opened it as though she were releasing dust or ash. My dear, assented her, imminently practical parent, quite true, quite true. Why, Father, she pursued. What a strange question to ask me. The baby preference that even I have heard of, as common among children, has never had its innocent resting place in my breast. You have been so careful of me that I never had a child's heart. You have trained me so well that I never dreamed a child's dream. You have dealt so wisely with me, Father, from my cradle to this hour, that I have never had a child's belief or a child's fear. Mr. Gradgrind was quite moved by his success, and by this testimony to it. My dear, Louisa, said he, you abundantly repay my care. Kiss me, my dear girl, so his daughter kissed him. Detaining her in his embrace, he said, I may assure you now, my favorite child, that I am made happy by the sound decision at which you have arrived. Mr. Boundary is a very remarkable man, and what little disparity can be said to exist between you, if any, is more than counterbalanced by the tone your mind has acquired. It has always been my object so to educate you as that you might, well, still in your early youth, be, if I may so express myself, almost any age. Kiss me once more, Louisa. Now let us go and find your mother. Suddenly they went down to the drawing-room, where the esteemed lady with no nonsense about her was recumbent as usual, while Sissy worked beside her. She gave some feeble signs of returning animation when they entered, and presently the faint transparency was presented in a sitting attitude. Mrs. Gradgrind, said her husband, who had waited for the achievement of this feat with some impatience, allow me to present you Mrs. Boundary. Oh, said Mrs. Gradgrind, so you have settled it. Well, I'm sure I hope your health may be good, Louisa, for if your head begins to split as soon as you are married, which was the case with mine, I cannot consider that you are to be envied, though I have no doubt you think you are, as all girls do. However, I give you joy, my dear, and I hope you may now turn all your logical studies to good account. I'm sure I do. I must give you a kiss of congratulation, Louisa, but don't touch my right shoulder, for there's something running down it all day long. And now you see, whimpered Mrs. Gradgrind, adjusting her shawls after the affectionate ceremony. I shall be worrying myself morning, noon, and night to know what I am to call him. Mrs. Gradgrind, said her husband solemnly, what do you mean? Whatever I am to call him, Mr. Gradgrind, when he is married to Louisa, I must call him something. It's impossible, said Mrs. Gradgrind, with a mingled sense of politeness and injury. To be constantly addressing him and never giving him a name, I cannot call him Josiah, for the name is insupportable to me. You yourself wouldn't hear of Joe, you very well know. Am I to call my own son-in-law, Mr.? Not that I believe, unless the time has arrived, when, as an invalid, I am to be trampled upon by my relations, then what am I to call him? Nobody present having any suggestion to offer in the remarkable emergency, Mrs. Gradgrind departed this life for the time being after delivering the following cortisol to her remarks already executed. As to the wedding, all I ask, Louisa, is, and I ask it with a flutter in my chest, what actually extends to the soles of my feet, that it may take place soon, otherwise I know it is one of those subjects I shall never hear the last of. When Mr. Gradgrind had presented Mrs. Boundary, Sissy had suddenly turned her head and looked in wonder, in pity, in sorrow, in doubt, in a multitude of emotions toward Louisa. Louisa had known it and seen it without looking at her. From that moment, she was impassive, proud, and cold, held Sissy at a distance, changed to her altogether. Chapter 16, Husband and Wife Mr. Boundary's first disquietude on hearing of his happiness was occasioned by the necessity of imparting it to Mrs. Sparsit. He could not make up his mind how to do that or what the consequences of the step might be. Whether she would instantly depart bag and baggage to Lady Skadger's, or would possibly refuse to budge from the premises, whether she would be plaintive or abusive, tearful or tearing, whether she would break her heart or break the looking glass, Mr. Boundary could not at all foresee. However, as it must be done, he had no choice but to do so. So, after attempting several letters and failing in them all, he resolved to do it by word of mouth. On his way home on the evening, he set aside for this momentous purpose. He took the precaution of stepping into a chemist's shop and buying a bottle of the very strongest smelling salts. By George, said Mr. Boundary, if she takes it in the fainting way, all had the skin off her nose at all events, but in spite of being thus forearmed, he entered his own house with anything but a courageous air, and appeared before the object of his misgivings like a dog who was conscious of coming direct from the pantry. Good evening, Mr. Boundary. Good evening, ma'am, good evening. He drove his chair and Mrs. Sparsett drew back hers as, who should say, your fireside, sir, I freely admit it. It is for you to occupy it all if you think proper. Oh, don't go to the North Pole, ma'am, said Mr. Boundary. Thank you, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett, and returned, though short of her former position. Mr. Boundary sat looking at her as with the points of a stiff, sharp pair of scissors. She picked out holes from some inscrutable ornamental purpose in a piece of Cambridge, an operation which taken in connection with the bushy eyebrows and the Roman nose suggested with some liveliness the idea of a hawk engaged upon the eyes of a tough little bird. She was so steadfastly occupied that many minutes elapsed before she looked up from her work. When she did so, Mr. Boundary bespoke her attention with a hitch of his head. Mrs. Sparsett, ma'am, said Mr. Boundary, putting his hands in his pockets and assuring himself with his right hand that the cork of the little bottle was ready for use. I have on occasion to say to you that you are not only a lady born and bred, but a devilish sensible woman. Sir, returned the lady, this is indeed not the first time that you have honored me with similar expressions of your good opinion. Mrs. Sparsett, ma'am, said Mr. Boundary, I'm going to astonish you. Yes, sir, returned Mrs. Sparsett interrogatively and in the most tranquil manner possible. She generally wore mittens and she now laid down her work and smooth those mittens. I am going, ma'am, said Mr. Boundary, to marry Tom Gradgrine's daughter. Yes, sir, returned Mrs. Sparsett, I hope you may be happy, Mr. Boundary. Oh, indeed, I hope you may be happy, sir. And she said it with such great condescension as well as with such great compassion for him that Boundary far more disconcerted than if she had thrown her work box at the mirror or swooned on the hearth rug, corked up the smelling salts tight in his pocket and thought, now confound this woman, who could have ever guessed that she would take it in this way? I wish with all my heart, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett in a highly superior manner. Somehow she seemed in a moment to have established a right to pity him ever afterwards, that you may be in all respects very happy. Well, ma'am, returned Boundary with some resentment in his tone, which was clearly lowered, though in spite of himself, I am obliged to you, I hope I shall be. Do you, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett, with great affability, but naturally you do. Of course you do. A very awkward pause on Mr. Boundary's part succeeded Mrs. Sparsett, sedately resumed her work, and occasionally gave a small cough, which sounded like the cough of conscious strength and forbearance. Well, ma'am, resumed Mr. Boundary, under these circumstances, I imagine it would not be agreeable to a character like yours to remain here, though you would be very welcome here. Oh, dear, no, sir, I could on no account think of that. Mrs. Sparsett shook her head still in her highly superior manner, and a little changed the small cough, coughing now as if the spirit of prophecy rose within her, but had better be coughed down. However, ma'am, said Boundary, there are apartments at the bank where a born and bred lady, as keeper of the place, would be rather a catch than otherwise, and if the same terms, I beg your pardon, sir. You were so good as to promise that you would always substitute the phrase annual compliment. Well, ma'am, annual compliment, if the same annual compliment would be acceptable there, why, I see nothing to part us unless you do, sir, returned Mrs. Sparsett. The proposal is like yourself, and if the position I shall assume at the bank is one that I could occupy without descending lower in the social scale, why, of course it is, said Boundary. If it was not, ma'am, you don't suppose that I should offer it to a lady who has moved in the society you have moved in. Not that I care for such society, you know, but you do. Mr. Boundary, you are very considerate. You'll have your own private apartments, and you'll have your coals and your candles and all the rest of it, and you'll have your maid to attend upon you, and you'll have your light porter to protect you, and you'll be what I take the liberty of considering precious comfortable, said Boundary. Sir, rejoined Mrs. Sparsett, say no more, and yielding up my trust here I shall not be freed from the necessity of eating the bread of dependence. She might have said the sweet bread for the delicate article in a savory brown sauce was her favorite supper, and I would rather receive it from your hand than from any other. Therefore, sir, I accept your offer gratefully and with many sincere acknowledgments for past favors, and I hope, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett, concluding in an impressively compassionate manner, I fondly hope that this grad grind may be all you desire and deserve. Nothing moved Mrs. Sparsett from that position anymore. It was in vain for Boundary to bluster or to assert himself in any of his explosive ways. Mrs. Sparsett was resolved to have compassion on him as a victim. She was polite, obliging, cheerful, hopeful. But the more polite, the more obliging, the more cheerful, the more hopeful, the more exemplary altogether she for the forlorners sacrifice and victim he she had that tenderness for his melancholy fate that his great red countenance used to break out into cold prespirations when she looked at him. Meanwhile, the marriage was appointed to be solemnized in eight weeks' time, and Mr. Boundary went every evening to Stone Lodge as an accepted wooer. Love was made on these occasions in the form of bracelets, and on all occasions during the period of betrothal took a manufacturing aspect. Dresses were made, jewelry was made, cakes and gloves were made, settlements were made, and an extensive assortment of facts did appropriate honor to the contract. The business was all fact from first to last. The hours did not go through any of those rosy performances which foolish poets have ascribed to them at such time. Neither did the clocks go any faster or any slower than at other seasons. The deadly statistical recorder in the grad grind observatory knocked every second on the head as it was born and buried it with his accustomed regularity. So the day came, as all other days come to people who will only stick to reason, and when it came, there were married in the church of the florid wooden legs, that popular order of architecture, Josiah bound to be Esquire of Cooktown, to Louisa eldest daughter of Thomas grad grind Esquire of Stone Lodge MP for that burrow. And when they were united in holy matrimony, they went home to breakfast to Stone Lodge aforesaid. There was an improving party assembled on the auspicious occasion, who knew what everything they had to eat and drink was made of, and how it was imported or exported, and in what quantities and at what bottoms, whether native or foreign, and all about it. The bridesmaids down to little Jane grad grind were, in an intellectual point of view, fit helpmates for the calculating boy, and there was no nonsense about any of the company. After breakfast, the bridegroom addressed them in the following terms. Ladies and gentlemen, I am Josiah bound to be of Cooktown. Since you have done my wife and myself the honor of drinking our healths and happiness, I suppose I must acknowledge the same, though as you all know me and know what I am, and what my extraction was, you won't expect a speech from a man who, when he sees a post says, that's a post, and when he sees a pump says, that's a pump, and is not to be got to call a post a pump, or a pump a post, or either of them a toothpick. If you want a speech this morning, my friend and father-in-law, Tom grad grind is a member of parliament, and you know where to get it. I am not your man. However, if I feel a little independent when I look around this table today and reflect how little I thought of marrying Tom grad grind's daughter when I was a ragged street boy who never washed his face unless it was at a pump, and that's not oftener than once a fortnight, I hope I may be excused. So, I hope you like my feeling independent. If you don't, I can't help it. I do feel independent. Now, I have mentioned, and you have mentioned, that I am this day married to Tom grad grind's daughter. I'm very glad to be so. It has long been my wish to be so. I've watched her bringing up, and I believe she is worthy of me. At the same time, not to deceive you, I believe I am worthy of her. So, I thank you on both our parts. For the good will you have shown towards us, and the best wish I can give the unmarried part of the present company is this. I hope every bachelor may find as good a wife as I have found, and I hope every spinster may find as good a husband as my wife has found. Shortly after which oration as they were going on a neptal trip to Lyon, in order that Mr. Bounderby might take the opportunity of seeing how the hands got on in those parts, and whether they too required to be fed with gold spoons, the happy pair departed for the railroad. The bride and passing downstairs, dressed for her journey, found Tom waiting for her, flushed, either with his feeling or the vineyard's part of the breakfast. What a game girl you are to be such a first-rate sister-loo, whispered Tom. She clung to him, as she could have clung to some far better nature that day, and was a little shaken in her reserved composure for the first time. Old Bounderby's quite ready, said Tom. Time's up. Goodbye. I shall be on the lookout for you when you come back. I say, my dear Lou, ain't it uncommonly jolly now? End of section eight of Hard Times. Section nine of Hard Times. This is a Libraryvox recording. All Libraryvox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, not a volunteer, please visit libraryvox.org. Recording by Stuart Bell. Hard Times by Charles Dickens. Book II. Reaping. Chapter I. Effects in the Bank. A Sunny Midsummer Day. There was such a thing sometimes, even in Coke Town. Seen from a distance in such weather, Coke Town lay shrouded in the haze of its own, which appeared impervious to the sun's rays. You only knew the town was there, because you knew there could have been no such sulky blotch upon the prospect without a town. A blur of soot and smoke, now confusedly tending this way, now that way, now aspiring to the vault of heaven, now merkily creeping along the earth, as the wind rose and fell, or changed its quarter, a dense, formless jumble, with sheets of cross-light in it that showed nothing but masses of darkness. Coke Town in the distance was suggestive of itself, though not a brick of it could be seen. The wonder was it was there at all. It had been ruined so often that it was amazing how it had borne so many shocks. Surely there never was such fragile Chinaware as that of which the Millers of Coke Town were made. Handled them never so lightly, and they fell to pieces with such ease that you might suspect them of having been flawed before. They were ruined when they were required to send their laboring children to school. They were ruined when inspectors were appointed to look into their works. They were ruined when such inspectors considered it doubtful whether they were quite justified in chopping people up with their machinery. They were utterly undone when it was hinted that perhaps they need not always make quite so much smoke. Besides Mr Boundby's gold spoon, which was generally received in Coke Town, another prevalent fiction was very popular there. It took the form of a threat. Whenever a Coke Towner felt that he was ill-used, that is to say whenever he was not left entirely alone, and it was proposed to hold him accountable for the consequences of any of his acts, he was sure to come out with the awful menace that he would sooner pitch his property into the Atlantic. This had terrified the Home Secretary within an inch of his life on several occasions. However the Coke Towners were so patriotic after all that they had never pitched their property into the Atlantic yet, but on the contrary had been kind enough to take mighty good care of it. So there it was, in the haze yonder, and it increased and multiplied. The streets were hot and dusty on the summer day, and the sun was so bright that it even shone through the heavy vapor drooping over Coke Town and could not be looked at steadily. Stokers emerged from low underground doorways into factory yards and sat on steps and posts and palings, wiping their swallowy visages and contemplating coals. The whole town seemed to be frying in oil. There was a stifling smell of hot oil everywhere. The steam engine shone with it, the dresses of the hands were soiled with it, the mills throughout their many stories oozed and trickled it. The atmosphere of those fairy palaces was like the breath of the Samoon, and their inhabitants wasting with heat toiled languidly in the desert. But no temperature made the melancholy mad elephants more mad or more sane. The wearer some heads went up and down at the same rate in hot weather and cold, wet weather and dry, fair weather and foul. The measured motion of their shadows on the walls was the substitute Coke Town had to show for the shadows of rustling woods. Well, for the summer hum of insects it could offer all the year round from the dawn of Monday to the night of Saturday the whir of shafts and wheels. Drowsily they were at all through this sunny day, making the passenger more sleepy and more hot as he passed the humming walls of the mills. Sunblines and sprinklings of water a little called the main streets and the shops, but the mills and the courts and alleys baked at a fierce heat. Down upon the river there was black and thick with dye. Some Coke Town boys who were at large, a rare sight there, rode a crazy boat which made a speumas track upon the water as it jogged along, while every dip of nor stood up vile smells. But the sun itself, however beneficent generally, was less kind to Coke Town than hard frost, and rarely looked intently into any of its closer regions without engendering more death than life. So does the eye of heaven itself become an evil eye when incapable or sordid hands are interposed between it and the things it looks upon to bless. Mrs. Sparsit sat in her afternoon apartment at the bank on the shadier side of the frying street. Office hours were over, and at that period of the day in warm weather she usually embellished with her genteel presence a managerial boardroom over the public office. Her own private sitting room was a story higher, at the window of which post of observation she was ready every morning to greet Mr. Boundaby as he came across the road with the sympathizing recognition appropriate to a victim. He had been married now a year and Mrs. Sparsit had never released him from her determined pity a moment. The bank offered no violence to the wholesome monotony of the town. It was another red brick house with black outside shutters, green inside blinds, a black street door up two white steps, a brazen door plate and a brazen door handle full stop. It was a size larger than Mr. Boundaby's house as other houses were from a size to half a dozen sizes smaller. In all other particulars it was strictly according to pattern. Mrs. Sparsit was conscious that by coming in the evening tide among the desks and writing implements she shared a feminine not to say also aristocratic grace upon the office. Seated with her needlework or netting apparatus at the window she had a self-lorditary sense of correcting by her ladylike deportment the rude business aspect of the place. With this impression of her interesting character upon her Mrs. Sparsit considered herself in some sort the bank fairy. The townspeople who in their passing and repassing saw her there regarded her as the bank dragon keeping watch over the treasures of the mine. What those treasures were Mrs. Sparsit knew as little as they did. Gold and silver coin, precious paper, secrets that if divulged would bring vague destruction upon vague persons generally however people whom she disliked were the chief items in her ideal catalog thereof. For the rest she knew that after office hours she reigned supreme over all the office furniture and over a locked up iron room with three locks. Against the door of which strong chamber the light porter laid his head every night on a trackle bed that disappeared at Cochro. Further she was lady paramount over certain vaults in the basement sharply spiked off from communication with the predatory world and over the relics of the current day's work consisting of lots of ink worn out pens fragments of wafers and scraps of paper torn so small that nothing interesting could ever be deciphered on them when Mrs. Sparsit tried. Lastly she was guardian over a little armory of cutlasses and carbines a raid in vengeful order above one of the official chimney pieces and over that respectable tradition never to be separated from a place of business claiming to be wealthy a row of fire buckets. Vessels calculated to be of no physical utility on any occasion but observed to exercise a fine moral influence almost equal to bullion on those beholders. A deaf-serving woman and the light porter completed Mrs. Sparsit's empire. The deaf-serving woman was rumoured to be wealthy and a saying had for years gone about the lower orders of Cochetown that she would be murdered some night when the bank was shut for the sake of her money. It was generally considered indeed that she had been due some time and also have fallen long ago but she had kept her life and her situation with an ill-conditioned tenacity that occasioned much offence and disappointment. Mrs. Sparsit's tea was just set for her on a perlittle table with its tripod of legs and an attitude which she insinuated after office hours into the company of the stern, leather-topped long-bored table that bestowed the middle of the room. The light porter placed the tea tray on it knuckling his forehead as a form of homage. Thank you, Bitsa! said Mrs. Sparsit. Thank you, ma'am! returned the light porter. He was a very light porter indeed, as light is in the days when he blinkingly defined a horse for girl number twenty. All is shut up, Bitsa! said Mrs. Sparsit. All is shut up, ma'am. And what! said Mrs. Sparsit, pouring out her tea, is the news of the day. Anything? Well, ma'am, I can't say I've heard and think particular. Our people are a bad lot, ma'am, but that's no news, unfortunately. What are the restless riches doing now? asked Mrs. Sparsit. Merely going on in the old way, ma'am, uniting and leaguing and engaging to stand by one another. It is much to be regretted, said Mrs. Sparsit, making her nose more Roman and her eyebrows more Coriolanian in the strength of a severity, that the United Masters allow of any such class combinations. Yes, ma'am, said Bitsa. Being united themselves, they ought one and all to set their faces against employing any man who is united with any other man, said Mrs. Sparsit. They have done that, ma'am, returned Bitsa, but it rather fell through, ma'am. I do not pretend to understand these things, said Mrs. Sparsit, with dignity, my lot having been signally classed in a widely different sphere, and Mrs. Sparsit as a paler, being also quite out of the pale of such dissensions. I only know that these people must be conquered, and that it's high time it was done, once for all. Yes, ma'am, returned Bitsa, with a demonstration of great respect for Mrs. Sparsit's orylical authority. You couldn't put it clearer, I'm sure, ma'am. As this was his usual hour for having a little confidential chat with Mrs. Sparsit, and as he had already caught her eye and seen that she was going to ask him something, he made a pretence of arranging the rulers, ink stands, and so forth, while that lady went on with her tea, glancing through the open window down into the street. Has it been a busy day, Bitsa? asked Mrs. Sparsit. Not a very busy day, my lady, about an average day. He now and then slided into my lady, instead of ma'am, as an involuntary acknowledgment of Mrs. Sparsit's personal dignity and claims reverence. The clerks, said Mrs. Sparsit, carefully brushing an imperceptible crumb of bread and butter from her left-hand mitten. A trustworthy, punctual, and industrious, of course? Yes, ma'am, pretty fair, ma'am, with the usual exception. He held the respectable office of General Spie and Informer in the establishment, for which volunteer service he perceived a present at Christmas over and above his weekly wage. He had grown into an extremely clear-headed, cautious, prudent young man who was safe to rise in the world. His mind was so exactly regulated that he had no affections or passions. All his proceedings were the result of the nicest and coldest calculation, and it was not without calls that Mrs. Sparsit habitually observed of him that he was a young man of the steadiest principle she had ever known. Having satisfied himself on his father's death that his mother had a right of settlement in Coke-town, this excellent young economist had asserted that right for her with such a steadfast adherence to the principle of the case that she'd been shut up in the workhouse ever since. It must be admitted that he allowed her half a pound of tea a year, which was weak in him. First, because all gifts have an inevitable tendency to pauperise the recipient. And secondly, because his only reasonable transaction in that commodity would have been to buy it for as little as he could possibly give, and sell it for as much as he could possibly get. It having been clearly ascertained by philosophers that in this is comprised the whole duty of man, not a part of man's duty, but the whole. Pretty fair, ma'am, with the usual exception, ma'am," repeated Bitsa. Ah! said Mrs. Sparsit, shaking her head over the teacup and taking a long gulp. Mr. Thomas, ma'am! I doubt Mr. Thomas very much, ma'am. I don't like his ways at all. Bitsa! said Mrs. Sparsit in a very impressive manner. Do you recollect my having said anything to your respecting names? I beg your pardon, ma'am. It's quite true that you did object to names being used, and they're always best avoided. Pleased to remember that I have a charge here," submissive Sparsit with her air of state. I held a trust here, Bitsa, under Mr. Boundaby. However improbable both Mr. Boundaby and myself might have deemed it years ago that he would ever become my patron, making me an annual compliment, I cannot but regard him in that light. From Mr. Boundaby I have received every acknowledgement of my social station, and every recognition of my family descent that I could possibly expect. More, far more. Therefore to my patron I will be scrupulously true. And I do not consider. I will not consider. I cannot consider. So Mrs. Sparsit, with the most extensive stock on hand of honour and morality, that I should be scrupulously true if I allow names to be mentioned under this roof that are, unfortunately, most unfortunately, no doubt of that, connected with his. Bitsa knuckled his forehead again, and again begged pardon. No, Bitsa, continued Mrs. Sparsit. Say an individual, and I will hear you. Say Mr. Thomas, and you must excuse me. With the usual exception, ma'am, said Bitsa, trying back, of an individual. Ah! Mrs. Sparsit repeated the ejaculation, the shake of the head of her teacup, and the long gulp, as taking up the conversation again at the point where it had been interrupted. An individual, ma'am, said Bitsa, has never been what the altar have been since he first came into the place. He's a dissipated extravagant idler. He's not worth his salt, ma'am. He wouldn't get it, either, if he hadn't a friend in relation at court, ma'am. Ah! said Mrs. Sparsit, with another melancholy shake of her head. I only hope, ma'am, pursued Bitsa, that his friend in relation may not supply him with the means of carrying on. Otherwise, ma'am, we know out of whose pocket that money comes. Ah! sighed Mrs. Sparsit again, with another melancholy shake of her head. He is to be pitted, ma'am. The last party I've eluded to is to be pitted, ma'am, said Bitsa. Yes, Bitsa, said Mrs. Sparsit. I have always pitted the delusion, always. As to an individual, ma'am, said Bitsa, dropping his voice and drawing nearer, he is as improvident as any of the people in this town. And you know what their improvidence is, ma'am. No one could wish to know it better than a lady of your eminence does. They would dwell, returned Mrs. Sparsit, to take example by your Bitsa. Thank you, ma'am. But since you do refer to me, now look at me, ma'am. I've put by a little ma'am already. The gratuity which I receive at Christmas, ma'am, I never touch it. I don't even go the length of my wages, though they're not high, ma'am. Why can't they do as I have done, ma'am? What one person can do, another can do. This, again, was among the fictions of Coketown. Any capitalist there who had made sixty thousand pounds out of sixpence, or its professor wonder why the sixty thousand nearest hands didn't each make sixty thousand pounds out of sixpence, and more or less reproached them every one for not accomplishing the little feat. What idea do you can do? Why didn't you go and do it? As to their wanting recreations, ma'am, said Bitsa, it's stuff and nonsense. I don't want recreations. I never did, and I never show. I don't like them. As to their combining together, there are many of them, I have no doubt, that by watching and informing upon one another, could earn a little trifle now and then, whether in money or goodwill, and improve their livelihood. Then why don't they improve it, ma'am? It's the first consideration of a rational creature, and it's what they pretend to want. Pretend indeed, submissive sparsed. I am sure we are constantly hearing, ma'am, till it becomes quite nauseous concerning their wives and families, said Bitsa. Why look at me, ma'am? I don't want a wife and family. Why should they? Because they're in provident, submissive sparsed. Yes, ma'am, returned Bitsa. That's where it is. If they were more provident and less perverse, ma'am, what would they do? They would say, while my act covers my family, or while my bonnet covers my family as the case might be, ma'am, I have only one to feed, and that's the person I most like to feed. To be sure, assented Mrs. Sparsett, eating muffin. Thank you, ma'am, said Bitsa, knuckling his forehead again, and returned for the favour of Mrs. Sparsett's improving conversation. Would you wish a little more hot water, ma'am, or is there anything else that I could fetch you? Nothing just now, Bitsa. Thank you, ma'am. I shouldn't wish to disturb you at your meals, ma'am, particularly tea, knowing your partiality for it, said Bitsa, craning a little to look over the street from where he stood. But there's a gentleman been looking up here for a minute or so, ma'am, and he has come across as if he was going to knock. Ah, that is his knock, ma'am, no doubt. He stepped to the window, and looking out and drawing in his head again, confirmed himself with a yes, ma'am, would you wish the gentleman to be shown in, ma'am? I don't know who it can be, said Mrs. Sparsett, wiping her mouth and arranging her mittens. A stranger, ma'am, evidently. What a stranger can want at the bank at this time of the evening, unless he comes upon some business for which he is too late. I don't know, said Mrs. Sparsett, but I held a charge in this establishment from Mr. Boundaby, and I will never shrink from it. If to see him is any part of the duty I have accepted, I will see him. Use your own discretion, Bitsa. Here the visitor, all unconscious of Mrs. Sparsett's magnanimous words, repeated his knock so loudly that the light-porter hastened down to open the door, while Mrs. Sparsett took the precaution of concealing her little table with all its appliances upon it, in a cupboard, and then decamped upstairs that she might appear, if needful, with the greater dignity. If you please, ma'am, the gentleman would wish to see you, said Bitsa, with his light eye at Mrs. Sparsett's keyhole. So Mrs. Sparsett, who had improved the interval by touching up her cap, took her classical features downstairs again and entered the boardroom in the manner of a Roman matron going outside the city walls to treat with an invading general. The visitor, having strolled to the window and being then engaged and looking carelessly out, was as unmoved by this impressive entry as man could possibly be. He stood whistling to himself, with all imaginable coolness, with his hat still on, and a certain air of exhaustion upon him, in part arising from excessive summer, and in part from excessive gentility. For it was to be seen with half an eye that he was a thorough gentleman, made to the model of time, weary of everything, and putting no more faith in anything than Lucifer. I believe, sir, quote Mrs. Sparsett, you wish to see me. I beg your pardon, he said, turning and removing his hat. Pray, excuse me. Humph! thought Mrs. Sparsett, as she made a stately bend. Fave and theatre, good-looking, good figure, good teeth, good voice, good breeding, well-dressed, dark hair, bold eyes. All which Mrs. Sparsett observed in her womanly way, like the sultan who put his head in the pail of water, merely in dipping down and coming up again. Pleased to be seated, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett. Thank you. Allow me. He pleased a chair for her, but remained himself carelessly lounging against the table. I left my servant at the railway looking after the luggage, very heavy-drained, vast quantity of it in the van, and strolled on, looking about me. Exceed in the odd place. Will you allow me to ask you if it's always as black as this? In general, much blacker. Returned Mrs. Sparsett in her uncompromising way. Is it possible? Excuse me, you're not a native, I think. Near, sir, returned Mrs. Sparsett. It was once my good or ill fortune, as it may be, before I became a widow, to move in a very different sphere. My husband was a paler. A bigger pardon, really, said the stranger, was Mrs. Sparsett repeated. A paler! A paler family, said the stranger after reflecting a few moments. Mrs. Sparsett signified ascent. The stranger seemed a little more fatigued than before. You must be very much bored here, was the influence he drew from the communication. I am the servant of circumstances, said Mrs. Sparsett, and I have long adapted myself to the governing power of my life. Very philosophical, returned the stranger, and very exemplary and laudable, and it seemed to be scarcely worth his while to finish the sentence, so he played with his watch-chain wearily. May I be permitted to ask, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett, to what I am indebted for the favour of? Assuredly, said the stranger, much obliged you for reminding me, I am the bearer of a letter of introduction to Mr. Bounderby, the banker. Walking through this extraordinarily black town, while they were getting dinner ready at the hotel, I asked a fellow whom I met, one of the working people, who appeared to have been taking a shower bath of something fluffy, which I assumed to be the raw material. Mrs. Sparsett inclined her head. Raw material, where Mr. Bounderby, the banker, might reside. Upon which, misled no doubt by the word banker, he directed me to the bank. In fact, being I presumed that Mr. Bounderby, the banker, does not reside in the edifice in which I have the honour of offering this explanation. No, sir, returned Mrs. Sparsett, he does not. Thank you. I had no intention of delivering my letter at the present moment, nor have I, but strolling on to the bank to kill time, and having the good fortune to observe at the window, towards which he languidly waved his hand, then slightly bowed, a lady of a very superior and agreeable appearance. I considered that I could not do better than take the liberty of asking that lady where Mr. Bounderby the banker does live, which I accordingly venture with all suitable approaches to do. The inattention and indolence of his manner was sufficiently relieved to Mrs. Sparsett's thinking by a certain gallantry at ease, which offered her homage, too. Here he was, for instance, at this moment, all but sitting on the table, and yet lazily bending over her, as if he acknowledged an attraction in her that made her charming in her way. Banks and you are always suspicious and officially must be, said the stranger, whose lightness and smoothness of speech were pleasant likewise, suggesting matter far more sensible and humorous than it ever contained, which was perhaps a shrewd device of the founder of this numerous sect, whose forever may have been that great man. Therefore I may observe that my letter, here it is, is from the member for this place, Gradgrind, whom I have had the pleasure of knowing in London. Mrs. Sparsett recognised the hand, intimated that such confirmation was quite unnecessary, and gave Mr. Bounderby's address with all needful clues and directions in aid. Thousand thanks, said the stranger. Of course you know the banker well. Yes, sir, rejoined Mrs. Sparsett. In my dependent relation towards him I have known him ten years. Quite an eternity. I think he married Gradgrind's daughter? Yes, said Mrs. Sparsett, suddenly compressing her mouth. He had that honour. The lady is quite a philosopher, I am told. Indeed, sir, said Mrs. Sparsett, is she? Excuse my important curiosity, pursued the stranger, fluttering over Mrs. Sparsett's eyebrows with a proprietary air. But you know the family and know the world. I am about to know the family and may have much to do with them. Is the lady so very alarming? Her father gives her such a potentiously hard-headed reputation that I have a burning desire to know. Is she absolutely unapproachable, repellently and stunningly clever? I see it be your meaning, Spyle, you think not. You have poured balm into my anxious soul. As to age now? Forty? Five-and-thirty? Mrs. Sparsett laughed outright. A chit, said she, not twenty when she was married. I give you my honour, Mrs. Paola, returned the stranger, attaching himself from the table, that I never was so astonished in my life. It really did seem to impress him, to the utmost extent of his capacity of being impressed. He looked at his informant for four a quarter of a minute, and appeared to have the surprise in his mind all the time. I assure you, Mrs. Paola, he then said, much exhausted, that the father's manner prepared me for a grim and stony maturity. I have obliged you of all things for correcting such absurd a mistake. Pray excuse my intrusion. Many thanks. Good day! He bowed himself out, and Mrs. Sparsett, hiding in the window curtain, saw him languishing down the street on the shady side of the way, observed of all the town. What do you think of the gentleman, Bizarre? She asked the light porter when he came to take away. Spends a deal of money on his dress, ma'am. It must be admitted, so Mrs. Sparsett, that it is very tasteful. Yes, ma'am, return Bizarre, if that's worth the money. Besides which, ma'am, presumed Bizarre while he was polishing the table, he looks to me as if he gamed. It's a moral to game, so Mrs. Sparsett. It's ridiculous, ma'am, so Bizarre, because the chances are against the players. Whether it was that the heat prevented Mrs. Sparsett from working, or whether it was that her hand was out, she did no work that night. She sat at the window when the sun began to sink behind the smoke. She sat there when the smoke was burning red, when the colour faded from it, when darkness seemed to rise slowly out of the ground and creep upward, upward, up to the house tops, up to the church steeple, up to the summit to the factory chimneys, up to the sky. Without a candle in the room, Mrs. Sparsett sat at the window with her hands before her, not thinking much of the sounds of evening, the whooping of boys, the barking of dogs, the rumbling of wheels, the steps and voices of passengers, the shrill street cries, the cloaks upon the pavement when it was the hour for going by, the shutting up of shop shutters. Not until the light porter announced that her nocturnal sweetbread was ready, did Mrs. Sparsett arouse herself from her reverie, and convey her dense black eyebrows, by that time creased with meditation as if they needed ironing out, upstairs. Oh, you fool! said Mrs. Sparsett when she was alone at her supper. Whom she meant, she did not say. But she could scarcely have meant the sweetbread. End of Section 9. Recording by Stuart Bell, Cambridge, UK, www.stuartbell.co.uk Section 10. Book 2, Chapters 2 and 3 Chapter 2. Mr. James' Hearthouse The Grad Grind Party wanted assistance in cutting the throats of the graces. They went about recruiting, and where could they enlist recruits more hopefully than among the fine gentlemen who having found out everything to be worth nothing were equally ready for anything. Moreover, the healthy spirits who had mounted to this sublime height were attractive to many of the Grad Grind School. They liked fine gentlemen, they pretended they did not, but they did. They became exhausted in imitation of them, and they yawed in their speech like them, and they served out, with an innervated air, the little moldy rations of political economy on which they regaled their disciples. Their never before was seen on earth such a wonderful hybrid race, as was thus produced. Among the fine gentlemen not regularly belonging to the Grad Grind School, there was one of a good family, and a better appearance, with a happy turn of humor, which had told immensely with the House of Commons on the occasion of his entertaining it with his, and the Board of Directors, view of a railway accident, in which the most careful officers ever known, employed by the most liberal managers ever heard of, assisted by the finest mechanical contrivances ever devised, the whole inaction on the best line ever constructed, had killed five people, and wounded thirty-two, by a casualty without which the excellence of the whole system would have been positively incomplete. Among the slain was a cow, and among the scattered articles unowned a widow's cap, and the honorable member had so tickled the house, which has a delicate sense of humor, by putting the cap on the cow that it became impatient of any serious reference to the coroner's inquest, and brought the railway off with cheers and laughter. Now, this gentleman had a younger brother of still better appearance than himself, who had tried life as a cornet of dragoons, and founded a bore, and had afterwards tried it in the train of an English minister abroad, and founded a bore, and had then strode to Jerusalem, and got bored there, and had then gone yachting about the world, and got bored everywhere. To whom this honorable and jocular member fraternally said one day, Gem, there's a good opening among the hard fact fellows, and they want men, I wonder you don't go in for statistics. Gem, rather taken by the novelty of the idea, and very hard up for a change, was as ready to go in for statistics as for anything else, so he went in. He coached himself up with a blue book or two, and his brother put it about among the hard fact fellows, and said, if you want to bring in for any place a handsome dog who can make you a devilish good speech, look after my brother Gem, for he's your man. After a few dashes in the public meeting way, Mr. Gradgrind and a council of political sages approved of Gem, and was resolved to send him down to Coketown, to become known there and in the neighborhood. Hence the letter Gem had last night shown to Mrs. Sparsit, which Mr. Bounderby now held in his hand, superscribed Josiah Bounderby, Esquire, Banker, Coketown, especially to introduce James Harthouse, Esquire, Thomas Gradgrind. Within an hour of the receipt of this dispatch, and Mr. James Harthouse's card, Mr. Bounderby put on his hat and went down to the hotel. There he found Mr. James Harthouse looking out of window in a state of mind so disconsolate that he was already half disposed to go in for something else. My name, sir, said his visitor, is Josiah Bounderby of Coketown. Mr. James Harthouse was very happy indeed, though he scarcely looked so, to have a pleasure he had long expected. Coketown, sir, said Bounderby, obstinately taking a chair, is not the kind of place you have been accustomed to. Therefore, if you will allow me, or whether you will or not, for I am a plain man, I'll tell you something about it before we go any further. Mr. Harthouse would be charmed. Don't be too sure of that, said Mr. Bounderby. I don't promise it. First of all, you see our smoke. That's meat and drink to us. It's the healthiest thing in the world, in all respects, and particularly for the lungs. If you are one of those who want us to consume it, I differ from you. We are not going to wear the bottoms of our boilers out any faster than we wear them out now, for all the humbugging sentiment in Great Britain and Ireland. By way of going in to the fullest extent, Mr. Harthouse rejoined, Mr. Bounderby, I assure you I am entirely and completely of your way of thinking, on conviction. I'm glad to hear it, said Bounderby. Now, you've heard a lot of talk about the work in our mills, no doubt. You have a very good. I'll state the fact of it to you. It's the pleasantest work there is, and it's the lightest work there is, and it's the best paid work there is. More than that, we couldn't improve the mills themselves unless we laid down turkey carpets on the floors, which we're not going to do. Mr. Bounderby perfectly right. Lastly, said Bounderby, as to our hands. There's not a hand in this town, sir. Man, woman, or child, but has one ultimate object in life. That object is to be fed on turtle soup and venison with a gold spoon. Now they're not a going, none of them, ever, to be fed on turtle soup and venison with a gold spoon, and now you know the place. Mr. Harthouse professed himself in the highest degree instructed and refreshed by this condensed epitome of the whole Coke Town question. While you see, replied Mr. Bounderby, it suits my disposition to have a full understanding with a man, particularly with a public man when I make his acquaintance. I have only one thing more to say to you, Mr. Harthouse, before assuring you of the pleasure with which I shall respond to the utmost of my poor ability to my friend Tom Gregrine's letter of introduction. You are a man of family. Don't you deceive yourself by supposing for a moment that I am a man of family. I am a bit of dirty riff-raff and a genuine scrap of tag, rag, and bobtail. If anything could have exalted Jim's interest in Mr. Bounderby, it would have been this very circumstance, or so he told him. So now, said Bounderby, we may shake hands on equal terms. I say equal terms because although I know what I am and the exact depth of the gutter I have lifted myself out of better than any man does, I am as proud as you are. I am just as proud as you are. Having now asserted my independence in a proper manner, I may come to how do you find yourself, and I hope you're pretty well. The better Mr. Harthouse gave him to understand as they shook hands for the salubrious air of Coketown. Mr. Bounderby received the answer with favor. Perhaps you know, said he, or perhaps you don't know, I married Tom Gregrine's daughter. If you have nothing better to do than to walk up town with me, I shall be glad to introduce you to Tom Gregrine's daughter. Mr. Bounderby said, Jim, you anticipate my dearest wishes. They went out without further discourse, and Mr. Bounderby piloted the new acquaintance, who so strongly contrasted with him, to the private red brick dwelling with the black outside shutters, the green inside blinds, and the black street door up the two white steps. In the drawing room of which Manchin there presently entered to them the most remarkable girl Mr. James Harthouse had ever seen. She was so constrained, and yet so careless, so reserved, and yet so watchful, so cold and proud, and yet so sensitively ashamed of her husband's braggart humility, from which she shrunk, as if every example of it were a cut or a blow, that it was quite a new sensation to observe her. In face she was no less remarkable than in manner. Her features were handsome, but their natural play was so locked up that it seemed impossible to guess at their genuine expression. Utterly indifferent, perfectly self-reliant, never at a loss, and yet never at her ease, with her figure in company with them there, and her mind apparently quite alone. It was of no use going in yet a while to comprehend this girl, for she baffled all penetration. From the mistress of the house the visitor glanced to the house itself. There was no mute sign of a woman in the room, no graceful little adornment, no fanciful little device, however trivial, anywhere expressed her influence. Cheerless and comfortless, boastfully and doggedly rich, there the room stared at its present occupants, unsoffened, and unrelieved by the least trace of any womanly occupation. As Mr. Bounderby stood in the midst of his household gods, so those unrelenting divinities occupied their places around Mr. Bounderby, and they were worthy of one another, and well matched. This, sir, said Bounderby, is my wife, Mrs. Bounderby, Tom Gradgrine's eldest daughter, Lou. Mr. James Hardhouse. Mr. Hardhouse, Lou, has joined your father's muster role. If he is not Tom Gradgrine's colleague before long, I believe we shall at least hear of him, in connection with one of our neighbouring towns. You observe, Mr. Hardhouse, that my wife is my junior. I don't know what she saw in me to marry me, but she saw something in me, I suppose, or she wouldn't have married me. She has lots of expensive knowledge, sir, political and otherwise. If you want to cram for anything, I should be troubled to recommend you to a better advisor than Lou Bounderby. To a more agreeable advisor, or one from whom he would be more likely to learn, Mr. Hardhouse could never be recommended. Come, said his host, if you're in the complimentary line, you'll get on here, for you'll meet with no competition. I have never been in the way of learning compliments myself, and I don't profess to understand the art of paying them. In fact, despise them. But your bringing up was different from mine. Mine was a real thing by George. You're a gentleman, and I don't pretend to be one. I am Josiah, Bounderby of Coketown, and that's enough for me. However, though I am not influenced by manners and station, Lou Bounderby may be. She hadn't my advantages, disadvantages, you would call them, but I call them advantages, so you'll not waste your power, I dare say. Mr. Bounderby, said Jim, turning with a smile to Louisa, is a noble animal in a comparatively natural state, quite free from the harness in which a conventional hack, like myself, works. You respect Mr. Bounderby very much, she quietly returned. It is natural that you should. He was disgracefully thrown out for a gentleman who had seen so much of the world, and thought, now, how am I to take this? You are going to devote yourself, as I gather from what Mr. Bounderby has said, to the service of your country. You have made up your mind, said Louisa, still standing before him, where she had first stopped in all the singular contrariety of her self-possession, and her being obviously very ill at ease, to show the nation the way out of all its difficulties. Mrs. Bounderby, he returned, laughing, upon my honor, no, I will make no such pretense to you. I have seen a little, here and there, up and down. I have found it all to be very worthless, as everybody has, and as some confess they have, and some do not, and I am going in for your respected father's opinions, really because I have no choice of opinions, and may as well back them as anything else. Have you none of your own? asked Louisa. I have not so much as the slightest predilection left. I assure you I attach not the least importance to any opinions. The result of the varieties of boredom I have undergone is a conviction, unless conviction is too industrious a word for the lazy sentiment I entertain on the subject, that any set of ideas will do just as much good as any other set, and just as much harm as any other set. There is an English family with a charming Italian motto, What will be will be. It is the only truth going. This vicious assumption of honesty and dishonesty, of ice so dangerous, so deadly, and so common, seemed he observed a little to impress her in his favor. He followed up the advantage by saying in his pleasantest manner, a manner to which she might attach as much or as little meaning as she pleased, the side that can prove anything in a line of units, tens, hundreds, and thousands, Mrs. Boundary, seems to me to afford the most fun, and to give a man the best chance. I am quite as much attached to it as if I believed it. I am quite ready to go in for it to the same extent as if I believed it, and what more could I possibly do if I did believe it? You are a singular politician, said Louisa. Pardon me, I have not even that merit. We are the largest party in the state, I assure you, Mrs. Boundary, if we all fell out of our adopted ranks and were reviewed together. Mr. Boundary, who had been danger of bursting in silence, interposed here with a project for postponing the family dinner till half past six, and taking Mr. James' heart house in the meantime on a round of visits to the voting and interesting notabilities of Coke Town and its vicinity. The round of visits was made, and Mr. James' heart house with a discreet use of his blue coaching came off triumphantly, though with a considerable accession of boredom. In the evening he found the dinner table laid for four, but they sat down only three. It was an appropriate occasion for Mr. Boundary to discuss the flavor of the haphazard of stewed eels he had purchased in the streets at eight years old, and also of the inferior water specially used for laying the dust with which he had washed down that repast. He likewise entertained his guests over the soup and fish with the calculation that he, Boundary, had eaten in his youth at least three horses under the guise of polonies and Savaloys. These recitals gem in a languid manner received with charming every now and then, and they probably would have decided him to go in for Jerusalem again tomorrow, had he been less curious respecting Louisa. Is there nothing, he thought, glancing at her as she sat at the head of the table where her youthful figure, small and slight, but very graceful, looked as pretty as if misplaced, is there nothing that will move that face? Yes, by Jupiter there was something, and here it was in an unexpected shape. Tom appeared. She changed as the door opened and broke into a beaming smile. A beautiful smile. Mr. James Hardhouse might not have thought so much of it, but that he had wondered so long at her impassive face. She put out her hand, a pretty little soft hand, and her fingers closed upon her brothers as if she would have carried them to her lips. I thought the visitor, this welp is the only creature she cares for? So, so. The welp was presented and took his chair. The appellation was not flattering, but not unmerited. When I was your age, young Tom, said Boundary, I was punctual or I got no dinner. When you were my age, resumed Tom, you had an errone balance to get right, and you hadn't to dress afterwards. Never mind that now, said Boundary. Well then, grumbled Tom, don't begin with me. Mrs. Boundary, said Hardhouse, perfectly hearing this understrain as it went on. Your brother's face is quite familiar to me. Can I have seen him abroad or at some public school, perhaps? No, she resumed quite interested. He has never been abroad yet, and was educated here at home. Tom, love, I'm telling Mr. Hardhouse that he never saw you abroad. No such luck, sir, said Tom. There was little enough in him to brighten her face, for he was a sullen young fellow, and ungracious in his manner even to her. So much the greater must have been the solitude of her heart and her need of someone on whom to bestow it. So much the more is this welp the only creature she has ever cared for, thought Mr. James Hardhouse, turning it over and over. So much the more. So much the more. Both in his sister's presence, and after she had left the room, the welp took no pains to hide as contempt for Mr. Boundary whenever he could indulge it without the observation of that independent man by making rife faces or shutting one eye. Without responding to these telegraphic communications, Mr. Hardhouse encouraged him much in the course of the evening, and showed an unusual liking for him. At last, when he rose to return to his hotel, and was a little doubtful whether he knew the way by night, the welp immediately proffered his services as guide, and turned out with him to escort him thither. End of Chapter 2 Chapter 3 The Welp It was very remarkable that a young gentleman who had been brought up under one continuous system of unnatural restraint should be a hypocrite, but it was certainly the case with Tom. It was very strange that a young gentleman who had never been left to his own guidance for five consecutive minutes should be incapable at last of governing himself, but so it was with Tom. It was altogether unaccountable that a young gentleman whose imagination had been strangled in his cradle should be still inconvenienced by its ghost in the form of groveling sensualities, but such a monster, beyond all doubt, was Tom. "'Do you smoke?' asked Mr. James Hardhouse when they came to the hotel. "'I believe you,' said Tom. He could do no less than ask Tom up, and Tom could do no less than go up. What with a cooling drink adapted to the weather, but not so weak as cool, and what with a rarer tobacco than was to be bought in those parts, Tom was soon in a highly free and easy state at his end of the sofa, and more than ever disposed to admire his new friend at the other end. Tom blew his smoke aside after he had been smoking a little while, and took an observation of his friend. "'You don't seem to care about his dress,' thought Tom, and yet how capital he does it. What an easy swell he is.' Mr. James Hardhouse, happening to catch Tom's eye, remarked that he drank nothing, and filled his glass with his own negligent hand. "'Thank you,' said Tom. "'Thank you. Well, Mr. Hardhouse, I hope you have had about a dose of old boundary tonight.' Tom said this with one eye shut up again, and looked over his glass knowingly at his entertainer. "'A very good fellow indeed,' returned Mr. James Hardhouse. "'You think so, don't you?' said Tom, and he shut up his eye again. Mr. James Hardhouse smiled, and rising from his end of the sofa, and lounging with his back against the chimney piece so that he stood before the empty fire grate as he smoked in front of Tom, and looking down at him, observed, "'What a comical brother-in-law you are.' "'What a comical brother-in-law old boundary is, I think you mean,' said Tom. "'You are a piece of caustic, Tom,' retorted Mr. James Hardhouse. "'There was something so very agreeable in being so intimate with such a Westcott, in being called Tom in such an intimate way by such a voice, in being on such off-hand terms so soon with such a pair of whiskers that Tom was uncommonly pleased with himself. "'Oh, I don't care for old boundary,' said he, if you mean that. I have always called old boundary by the same name when I have talked about him, and I have always thought of him in the same way. I'm not going to begin to be polite now about old boundary. It would be rather late in the day.' "'Don't mind me,' returned James, but take care when his wife is by, you know. "'His wife,' said Tom, "'my sister Lou, oh yes,' and he laughed and took a little more of the cooling drink.' James Hardhouse continued to lounge in the same place and attitude, smoking his cigar in his own easy way and looking pleasantly at the welp as if he knew himself to be a kind of agreeable demon who had only to hover over him and he must give up his whole soul if required. It certainly did seem that the welp yielded to this influence. He looked at his companion sneakingly. He looked at him admiringly. He looked at him boldly and put up one leg on the sofa. "'My sister Lou,' said Tom, "'she never cared for old boundary.' "'That's the past tense, Tom,' returned Mr. James Hardhouse, striking the ash from his cigar with his little finger. "'We are in the present tense now.' "'Verb neuter, not to care. Indicative mood, present tense. First person singular, I do not care. Second person singular, thou dost not care. Third person singular, she does not care,' returned Tom. "'Good, very quaint,' said his friend, though you don't mean it.' "'But I do mean it,' cried Tom, "'upon my honor, why, you won't tell me, Mr. Hardhouse, that you really suppose my sister Lou does care for old boundary.' "'My dear fellow,' returned the other, "'what am I bound to suppose when I find two married people living in harmony and happiness?' Tom had by this time got both his legs on the sofa. If his second leg had not been already there when he was called a dear fellow, he would have put it up at that great stage of the conversation. Feeling it necessary to do something, then, he stretched himself out at greater length, and, reclining with the back of his head on the end of the sofa, and smoking with an infinite assumption of negligence, turned his common face, and not too sober eyes, toward the face looking down upon him so carelessly yet so potently. "'You know our governor, Mr. Hardhouse,' said Tom, "'and therefore you needn't be surprised that Lou married old Bounderby. She never had a lover, and the governor proposed old McBounderby, and she took him.' "'Very dutiful, and your interesting sister,' said Mr. James Hardhouse. "'Yes, but she wouldn't have been as dutiful, and it would not have come off as easily,' returned the welp, "'if it hadn't been for me.' The tempter merely lifted his eyebrows, but the welp was obliged to go on. "'I persuaded,' he said, with an edifying air of superiority. "'I was stuck into old Bounderby's bank, where I never wanted to be, and I knew I should get into scrapes there if she put old Bounderby's pipe out, so I told her my wishes, and she came into them. She would do anything for me. It was very game of her, wasn't it? It was charming, Tom. Not that it was altogether so important to her, as it was to me,' continued Tom Cooley, because my liberty and comfort, and perhaps my getting on, depended on it, and she had no other lover. Staying at home was like staying in jail, especially when I was gone. It wasn't as if she gave up another lover for old Bounderby, but still it was a good thing in her. Perfectly delightful, and she gets on so placidly. "'Oh,' returned Tom with a contemptuous patronage. She's a regular girl. The girl can get on anywhere. She has settled down to the life, and she don't mind. It does just as well as another. Besides, though Lou is a girl, she's not a common sort of girl. She can shut herself up within herself, and think, as I have often known her, sit and watch the fire for an hour at a stretch. Aye, aye, as resources of her own,' said Hardhouse, smoking quietly. "'Not so much of that as you may suppose,' returned Tom, for our governor had her crammed with all sorts of dry bones and sawdust. It's his system.' Formed his daughter on his own model, suggested Hardhouse. His daughter, aye, and everybody else. Why, he formed me that way,' said Tom. "'Impossible.' He did, though,' said Tom, shaking his head. "'I mean to say, Mr. Hardhouse, that when I first left home and went to Old Bounderby's, I was flat as a warming pan, and knew no more about life than any oyster does. Come, Tom, I can hardly believe that. A joke's a joke. "'Upon my soul,' said the wellp, "'I am serious. I am indeed.' He smoked with great gravity and dignity for a little while, and then added, in a highly complacent tone, "'Oh, I have picked up a little since. I don't deny that, but I've done it myself. No thanks to the governor.' "'And your intelligent sister?' My intelligent sister is about where she was. She used to complain to me that she had nothing to fall back upon, that girls usually fall back upon, and I don't see how she has to have got over that since, but she don't mind.' He sagaciously added, puffing at his cigar again. Girls can always get on somehow.' Calling at the bank yesterday evening for Mr. Bounderby's address, I found an ancient lady there who seems to entertain great admiration for your sister, observed Mr. James Hardhouse, throwing away the last small remnant of the cigar he had now smoked out. "'Mother Sparsit,' said Tom, "'what? You've seen her already, have you?' His friend nodded. Tom took his cigar out of his mouth to shut up his eye, which had grown rather unmanageable, with the greater expression, and to tap his nose several times with his finger. "'Mother Sparsit's feeling for Lou is more than admiration, I should think,' said Tom. "'Say, affection and devotion.' Mother Sparsit never said her cap at Bounderby when he was a bachelor. "'Oh, no.' These were the last words spoken by the Welp before a giddy drowsiness came upon him, followed by complete oblivion. He was roused from the latter state by an uneasy dream of being stirred up with a boot, and also of a voice saying, "'Come, it's late. Be off.' "'Well,' he said, scrambling from the sofa, "'I must take my leave of you, though. I say yours is very good tobacco, but it's too mild.' "'Yes, it's too mild,' returned his entertainer. "'It's ridiculously mild,' said Tom. "'Where's the door? Good night.' He had another odd dream of being taken by a waiter through a mist, which, after giving him some trouble and difficulty, resolved itself into the main street in which he stood alone. He then walked home pretty easily, though not yet free from an impression of the presence and influence of his new friend, as if he were lounging somewhere in the air in the same negligent attitude, regarding him with the same look. The whelp went home and went to bed. If he had had any sense of what he had done that night, and had been less of a whelp and more of a brother, he might have turned short on the road. Might have gone down to the ill-smelling river that was dyed black. Might have gone to bed in it for good and all, and have curtained his head forever with its filthy waters. mountabank.org