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THE PICKWICK CLUB. 515
" I hope they do," mildly observed Mr. Pickwick, looking round';
- < and," added that gentleman, his colour mounting as he spoke, " I
hope they hear this. Sir, also, — that from what has been stated to me, Sir, I assert that you were by no means justified in attempting to force your sister's inclinations as you did, and that you should rather have endeavoured by your kindness and forbearance to have supplied the place of other nearer relations whom she has never known from a child. As regards my young friend, I must beg to add, that in every point of worldly advantage, he is at least on an equal footing with yourself, if not on a much better one, and that unless I hear this question dis- cussed with becoming temper and moderation, I decline hearing any more said upon the subject."
" I vish to make a wery few remarks in addition to wot has been put forard by the honorable gen'lm'n as has jist given over,'* said Mr. Weller, stepping forth, " vich is this here : a indiwidual in company has called me a feller."
'^ That has nothing whatever to do with the matter, Sam," inter- posed Mr. Pickwick. " Pray hold your tongue."
" I ain't a goin' to say nothin' on that ere pint, Sir," replied Sam,
- but merely this here. P'raps that gen'lm'n may think as there vos
a priory 'tachment, but there vorn't nothin' o' the sort, for the young lady said in the wery beginnin' o' the keepin' company that she couldn't abide him. Nobody's cut him out, and it 'ud ha' been just the wery same for him if the young lady had never seen Mr. Vinkle. That's wot I vished to say. Sir, and I hope I've now made that 'ere gen'lm'n's mind easy."
A short pause followed these consolatory remarks of Mr. Weller, and then Mr. Ben Alien rising from his chair, protested that he would never see Arabella's face again, while Mr. Bob Sawyer, despite Sam's flattering assurance, vowed dreadful vengeance on the happy bridegroom.
But, just when matters were at their height and. threatening to remain so, Mr. Pickwick found a powerful assistant in the old iadv, who, evidently much struck by the mode in which he had advocated her niece's cause, ventured to approach Mr. Benjamin Allen with a few comforting reflections, of which the chief were, that after all, per- haps, it was well it was no worse ; the least said the soonest mended, and upon her word she did not know that it was so very bad after all ; that what was over couldn't be begun, and what couldn't be cured must be endured, with various other assurances of the like novel and strengthening description. To all of which, Mr. Benjamin Allen replied that he meant no disrespect to his aunt or anybody there, but if it were all the same to them, and they would allow him to have his own way, he would rather have the pleasure of hating his sister till death and after it.
At length when this determination had been announced half a hundred times, the old lady suddenly bridling up and looking very majestic, wished to know what she had done that no respect was to be paid to her years or station, and that she should be obliged to beg and pray in that way of her own nephew, whom she remembered about five- and-twenty years before he was born, and whom she had known
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