Little Dorrit
Page 190The tobacco business round the corner of Horsemonger Lane was carried
out in a rural establishment one story high, which had the benefit of
the air from the yards of Horsemonger Lane jail, and the advantage of a
retired walk under the wall of that pleasant establishment. The business
was of too modest a character to support a life-size Highlander, but it
maintained a little one on a bracket on the door-post, who looked like
a fallen Cherub that had found it necessary to take to a kilt. From the
portal thus decorated, one Sunday after an early dinner of baked viands,
Young John issued forth on his usual Sunday errand; not empty-handed,
but with his offering of cigars. He was neatly attired in a
could carry; a silken waistcoat, bedecked with golden sprigs; a chaste
neckerchief much in vogue at that day, representing a preserve of
lilac pheasants on a buff ground; pantaloons so highly decorated with
side-stripes that each leg was a three-stringed lute; and a hat of
state very high and hard.
When the prudent Mrs Chivery perceived that
in addition to these adornments her John carried a pair of white kid
gloves, and a cane like a little finger-post, surmounted by an ivory
hand marshalling him the way that he should go; and when she saw him, in
Mr Chivery, who was at home at the time, that she thought she knew which
way the wind blew.
The Collegians were entertaining a considerable number of visitors that
Sunday afternoon, and their Father kept his room for the purpose of
receiving presentations. After making the tour of the yard, Little
Dorrit's lover with a hurried heart went up-stairs, and knocked with his
knuckles at the Father's door. 'Come in, come in!' said a gracious voice.
The Father's voice, her
father's, the Marshalsea's father's. He was seated in his black velvet
table, and two chairs arranged. Everything prepared for holding his
Court. 'Ah, Young John! How do you do, how do you do!'
'Pretty well, I thank you, sir. I hope you are the same.' 'Yes, John Chivery; yes. Nothing to complain of.' 'I have taken the liberty, sir, of--'
'Eh?' The Father of the Marshalsea always lifted up his eyebrows at this
point, and became amiably distraught and smilingly absent in mind. '--
A few cigars, sir.' 'Oh!' (For the moment, excessively surprised.) 'Thank you, Young John,
thank you. But really, I am afraid I am too--No? Well then, I will say
no more about it. Put them on the mantelshelf, if you please, Young
John. And sit down, sit down. You are not a stranger, John.'