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Hello and welcome to Storytime for Grown Ups. I'm Faith Moore and this season we're reading David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. Each episode I'll read a few chapters from the book, pausing from time to time to give brief explanations so it's easier to follow along. It's like an audiobook with built in notes. So brew a pot of tea, find a cozy chair and settle in. It's story time. Hi everyone. Welcome back. I don't know about where you are, but here it is freezing. We are having a real cold snap here. And while it is not at all fun to go outside, which I am going to have to do this afternoon, and I have been dreading it all day. While that is true, I also feel like it makes all the cozy things even more delightful. Like after I'm done talking to you, I'm going to go make myself a cup of tea. And it's going to be the best cup of tea because it's so cold outside. And who doesn't want to have a lovely cup of tea when it's cold outside? Similarly, I am wearing fuzzy socks. I am wearing a fuzzy sweater sweater. And all those things are so great because it's so cold outside. So it's not the best. I'm not a fan of this super, super cold weather, but I am really enjoying the cozy vibes that I get to have in my house and here with you. This always feels like the coziest time. I always say I really hope that wherever you are and whatever you're doing, it feels like a comfy chair. It feels like you have a lovely pot of tea. And I know that that's not necessarily necessarily what you're doing, although some of you do do that and I love it. And sometimes you send me pictures and I love those pictures. Keep them coming. But I know that you might be actually running errands or at the gym or driving down the street. But whatever you're doing and whatever the weather is outside, I hope that here in this virtual space, you are cozy and warm. Because I am. And I'm really happy to be here with you. So thank you for joining me again on Story Time for Grownups Spring. Speaking of tea time and cozy chats and our lovely Victorian mansion, that is this podcast. Just another reminder that you can join me and your fellow listeners at Tea time on Tuesday, January 27th. So that's next Tuesday. It's at 8pm Eastern. And it happens over in our online community, which is called the Drawing Room because it's where we will withdraw after the show to keep our cozy, fun time going. So I hope that you will join us. You have to be a member of the Landed Gentry membership tier in order to participate in tea time. If you are not, either because you're not at all signed up for the drawing room or because you're a house guest, but you'd like to join us so you want to become landed gentry, just scroll into the show notes the description of this episode. There is a link, it's clearly labeled there. Click on it. It's not going to like immediately sign you up or take your money or anything like that, but it will give you more information about the draw room, about tea time, and it will help you to sign up or switch your membership level if you would like to. And so I hope that you will do that. I always really enjoy chatting with you guys. It's an hour. I get to hear from you and talk to you. You also don't have to talk, you can just listen. I know some people do that. They don't feel comfortable speaking up and that's completely fine. So you can just listen or you can join in. We chat about the book, so we'll be talking about the David Copperfield and what we've read so far, but I also answer questions so you can ask me anything. And often we talk about other books that we're reading, other things that are on our minds. It's a really fun time and so I'm really looking forward to chatting with my old friends and I really hope that I get to meet some new friends as well. So please do join us Tuesday, January 27th at 8pm Eastern, in the drawing room for tea time. Another thing I wanted to just quickly address before we get into this, because this is actually a question about the book, but I'm not going to be talking about it in my question and answer session today, which is I've gotten several questions this time which are very valid questions asking how old is David right now? And I remember that when I read this book for the first time, I also was kind of confused because he's a child, but we don't really know how old he is. And you know, he gets older at various points, but how old is he? So I just wanted to say at the start of this episode that at this point in the story, David is about 8 years old. So I did want to answer that because it is helpful, right, to picture him if you know how old he is. And so that is how old he is now and how old he will be at the beginning of chapter five, which is what we're going to be reading today. So just before we do that, this is another long chapter and we have a lot to talk about beforehand. So it's another long episode. So I will not go on and on here. Just please remember all the usual reminders and announcements, and please, please subscribe, tap the five stars, leave a positive review, and tell a friend. Also, check out the merch store and buy some merch so that you can make some new friends by having somebody say, hey, what's story time for grownups? And then you can tell them. So please do check out all of those things. Okay, so before we get into any of the questions, let's just remind ourselves what we read last time. Last time we read chapter four. As I say, today is going to be chapter five. So here, here is the recap. All right, so where we left off, Davey now lives in this new situation with Mr. Murdstone and his mother, which quickly gets worse when Mr. Murdstone's sister, Ms. Murdstone, shows up. So she is this very severe woman who immediately takes over the running of the house and threatens to leave every time Davey's mother tries to assert her own authority. Davey's mother is clearly in total thrall to Mr. Murdstone and likes the idea of being taken care of and helped. So she gives in and allow Ms. Murdstone to just run everything. Davey begins his schooling, and he's constantly forgetting his lessons and being reprimanded because he's so scared of Mr. And Ms. Murdstone that he forgets everything when they're in the room. He's not allowed to play with other boys, and his only solace is in old adventure stories, which he finds in books in an unused room. Eventually, Mr. Murdstone decides that Davey must be flogged in order to help him finally learn his lesson. So he takes him upstairs and he beats him. But before he does, Davey is able to bite his hand really hard. After the beating, Davey feels really bad for biting Mr. Murdstone, and he's placed under house arrest with only Ms. Murdstone for company. After a week or so, Peggy comes to the door to tell him secretly that he's going to be sent to boarding school. She tells him she'll always love him and will write to him and take care of his mother. Davey feels that he loves Peggy in a way that he loves no one else. And. And in the morning, he is sent away to school. Okay, so I'm going to read three comments today. They're all a little bit long, but I'm going to read them in their entirety because I think they're really helpful and they kind of pinpoint a lot of the things that people have been writing in about this time and they'll be really helpful as we try to talk about the chapter so the first one comes from Paula Fernandez. Paula says, wow, what a truly horrifying chapter. I have such admiration for Charles Dickens's skill skill of drawing in the reader, in my case the listener to how mistreated Davy was. In this chapter I'm torn between pity and anger towards Clara. It is a tragedy that out of fear that she is unable to protect her son, she is in the unenviable position of not only dealing with an emotionally controlling and demeaning husband, but also has to deal with her overbearing sister in law. It was painful to see how Davy's love of life and adventure was being methodically attacked by both of the Murdstones. Dickens aptly described them as two snakes waiting to attack a bird. Thank goodness there were a few glimpses of hope and encouragement for Davy when he discovered his father's book collection and Peggy's conversation the night before he left for boarding school. This second one comes from Anne. Anne says this chapter what makes reading these Victorian novels difficult is the absolute stupidity and weakness of some of these women. I really feel no sympathy at all for David's mother. She was already being controlled by her husband and then the sister in law takes the keys away. She has relinquished all her power and has failed to stand up for her child. The strong loving women seem to mostly be the poor second class citizens. least there was some levity when Peggy whispered into the mouth through the keyhole that was funny. Thank you again for reading these books. And this last one comes from Tsivia. She says. I listened to this chapter with growing dread. It seemed that David would never get out of this terrible situation. I am really relieved that he will be going to school. Hopefully there will be some decent people there. Mr. Murdstone is a terrifying character. The way he wormed into David's mother's head and convinced her that she is incapable and that David is an evil child is just crazy. Ms. Murdstone seems like an armored truck or something. She doesn't seem to really have her own opinions either. She doesn't really want to, though she thoroughly enjoys just carrying out her brother's will. I found her hobby of stringing iron beads ominous, almost like she is making armor so she can go battle defenseless children. Okay, So I think these three letters kind of encapsulate the feelings of most of the people who wrote in this time, particularly about Davey's mother. I got a lot of messages this time about the mother. I would say that the majority of you are angry with her. You feel like it's her fault that Davies life has changed for the worse in this way. Her fault, of course, by marrying Mr. Murdstone and bringing him and Ms. Murdstone into house. So she is the one who did this to Davey, and you feel like she ought not to have married this guy in the first place. Or like Anne says in her letter, many of you feel like if she did marry him, once she realized that she had married someone who is controlling and who had taken a dislike to Davey, that she should have stood up to him more. So that's one take. I'm hearing a lot from you guys that you're angry with her. Some of you, though, feel sorry for her, like Paula does in her letter. You feel like she's this young, inexperienced, sort of weak person, and she's being taken advantage of by the man that she married in the hopes that she would be able to provide a father figure for Davey and a better life for all of them. So some of you feel sorry for the mom. Some of you feel both like Paula, sort of torn between pity and frustration and anger. But a lot of you, like Anne, are just angry with her. Okay, but the one thing that we are all agreed on, of course, is that this is really, really bad for Davey. Mr. Murdstone is not the father figure that we want for him. Right. Ms. Murdstone seems to actively enjoy Davey's suffering and the life that he was leading before his trip, when he went to go see Peggy's family at Yarmouth, that life was inarguably better than the life that he is living now in the house with his mother and these Murdstones. So Mr. Murdstone, as we knew right from the beginning, because of his name, Mr. Murdstone, is a bad guy. And his appearance in Davies life is unequivocally bad. There is nothing good about this. But I think this question of the mother and whether or not she's at fault here or whether she's a victim herself or whatever it is, I think that's worth exploring a little bit because I think it kind of gets at the heart of what's happened to Davey at this point and what it all might mean for him going forward. So I think the first thing that is important to point out is that Davy's mother and Mr. Murdstone actually seem to love each other. Both of them. Davy's mother seems to actually love Mr. Murdstone and Mr. Murdstone actually seems to love Davy's mother. See, this reads like a situation where the man comes in and takes advantage of the woman for some reason. Usually it's money, right? We've seen this in books before, even books that we've read on here, although I won't mention which ones because it might be a spoiler. If you haven't read them already. They're all still there. Go back and read them. But anyway, this reads like the sort of situation where the man sees that the woman is in love with him, that she's weak and easily led or whatever, and he wants her money or her social status or something, and so he marries her. But Davey's mother doesn't actually have anything to offer in that sense, really. Mr. Murdstone seems to already be a pretty middle class guy. He seems like he's in the same class that she is. I mean, the mother has like a small income, we're told, from David's father's like life insurance policy basically. But it's not like a fortune or anything. And Mr. Murdstone seems to have enough money in that sense. They're the same status socially. So if Mr. Murdstone wanted to marry into like a huge fortune or something, Davey's mother is not the person to marry. So I really think that we are meant to feel that Mr. Murdstone fell in love with her and that she fell in love with him. Here's something that Davey tells us. This is a quote. It says, he seemed to be very fond of my mother. I'm afraid I liked him none the better for that. And she was very fond of him. Okay, so this is actually a love match. The only problem is that Mr. Murdstone has a totally different view of how to raise children than Davy's mother had before this or than Peggety has or that adult David who is writing this book clearly has. So this is not a situation where the mother married this guy thinking he loved her and it turned out that he was just after her money or her status or whatever and now he's trying to get rid of her annoying kid or something. This is actually a situation where the mother married this guy because they fell in love with each other and the guy is doing what he thinks he's supposed to be doing, which is trying to instill In Davey and Davey's mother, the code that he lives by, which he calls firmness, which essentially means being always in control of yourself and always compliant and obedient to the head of the household, namely him, Mr. Murdstone. Right. And to be honest, this is probably what initially drew the mother to Mr. Murdstone. Because, as we've talked about before, the mother is really pretty ill equipped to run a household and raise a little boy, Right? She's childish and sort of spoilt, and she falls apart at the slightest problem. And she leaves all the practical stuff to Peggy, which is fine, such as it is, but it's not really ideal. So here comes this handsome man. I mean, it's hard for me at least, to remember that Mr. Murdstone is supposed to be handsome because he's so ugly in terms of his character. But we're told that he's handso. So here comes this handsome man who legitimately, as far as we can tell, falls in love with her and courts her and promises to be the head of the household and take care of her and take care of all the practical stuff that she can't wrap her mind around. And he promises to help her raise her son in all of this. I mean, you can see how a person like the mother would fall for a person like this. And the mother. I mean, yes, it's hard for us, okay, with our modern sensibilities. It's hard for us to like her, I think. We look at her and we think, like, grow up already. You've got a child. This child loves you desperately. He needs you desperately. Why are you prancing around in your best dresses and going off to parties and crying about your parasol being old and everything? She is petulant. She is silly. She is spoiled. And she is so, so childish. And we want to kind of shake her or something and say, like, get a grip. But I also think that if you are that sort of person, like, if that's just who you are and you can't get a grip for whatever reason, then you do need someone in your life who. Who will take care of you. Someone who will come in and say, without any doubt or indecision, I am the head of this household. Now, you do what I say, and let's get on with it, right? That would come as a relief, I think. You would want to be controlled, in a sense. You'd want all that stuff to be taken off your plate. So you could just ask for a new parasol when you wanted one and maybe get it Okay. I mean, this little moment where the mother gets upset and Mr. Murdstone comes to comfort her, I think it's sort of their relationship in a nutshell. Here's what it says. He drew her to him, whispered in her ear and kissed her. I knew as well, when I saw my mother's head lean down upon his shoulder and her arm touch his neck, I knew as well that he could mold her pliant nature into any form he chose, as I know now that he did it. Okay, so there's a way in which that is a sort of tender moment. And it speaks again of the fact that they actually do love each other. She loves him because he's going to take control, and he loves her because she's this pretty little childish thing who is enticing, but also who can be kind of molded into the wife that maybe he wants. So they do actually love each other, but in another way, it's an awful moment because it's the moment in which Davy sees that his mother will never come back to him, that she's completely in Mr. Murdstone's thrall, and that whatever he says will. Will go from now on. And what he says is that Davy has been given far too much freedom and far too much leeway, and it's time for him to buckle down and do what Mr. Murdstone wants. And I think one thing that's happening here is that Dickens, through his character of adult David, who is writing this book, Dickens is telling us that he disapproves of this kind of way of raising children, which was a way of raising children. I mean, Mr. Murdstone is awful, okay? Don't get me wrong. He's a bad guy, but he is actually doing what he thinks is right and best here. He believes that this is how you raise a boy, right? You are firm, you are strict, you are resolute. You make him learn his lessons and behave himself, and you make sure he's seen and not heard. And all of this. This is a real parenting philosophy, right, that some parents at the time would have had. And Dickens is telling us that he disapproves of this wholeheartedly, as do we. At least I assume we do. I certainly disapprove of Mr. Murdstone's child rearing practices, right? Because this whole attitude of children should be seen and not heard, and they should perform their lessons and their duties perfectly or be beaten or whatever. What it does is it saps the individuality, the creativity, the sweetness, the innocence. It saps all of that out of a child and makes him like David becomes. It makes him scared and dull and miserable. And in fact, it makes them worse at the lessons and the behavior and everything instead of better. I mean, there's a way in which all of this is social commentary, right? There's a way in which this is Dickens talking to the parents of his time and telling them that this mode of dealing with children is wrong and bad. And he even offers us an alternative. He says, here's a quote. God help me, I might have been improved for my whole life. I might have been made another creature, perhaps for life by a kind word at that season, a word of encouragement and explanation, of pity for my childish ignorance, of welcome home, of reassurance to me that it was home, might have made me dutiful to him in my heart henceforth instead of in my hypocritical outside, and might have made me respect instead of hate him. Okay, so he's suggesting a much more loving method of parenting, something that we would actually agree with now, much more, I think, in the modern day. And he's expressing that the way to make children obedient and loyal and everything is not to be cold and firm and brutal, but to be loving and thoughtful and kind, which, of course, I think we can all agree with. So Mr. Murdstone is awful. Not because he's like some evil villain who comes in with the express purpose of, like, ruining David's life or something, but actually, he's awful because he's doing what many Victorian fathers probably did and trying to raise Davey the way that he himself was raised. In other words, if you asked him, he would tell you that he was trying to raise his wife's child to the best of his ability so that he can grow into an upstanding man, rather than. He wouldn't say he was trying to, like, make him as miserable as possible just for the fun of it or something. But either way, it is bad. And it means that Davy, who, like we talked about before, he's really a very dreamy, romantic, thoughtful, innocent sort of child, probably very much the sort of child, actually, that Dickens was given, that Dickens grew up to be a novelist as opposed to, like, a banker or something. So all of this means that this creative, loving little boy is now forced to live this horribly restricted life with no one to really love and care for him. Because the mother is, as we've discussed, essentially a child, too. And Mr. Merdstone is trying to mold her to his will as well. Again, not because he likes to torture people. But because he believes that this is what the man of the house does, he takes control and he never cedes it. Okay, so when the mother tries to protest that it should be she herself that takes care of the household and not Ms. Murdstone, she is immediately shot down. And because she really is such a child and because she actually really does want to be taken care of and in a way controlled, she doesn't ever fight back. And she lets all of this happen, even though she clearly still loves Davy in her childish way. And she's more like a sister, right? Also powerless and helpless against the murderstone. So more like a sister than a mother. I mean, this little sister scene with the lesson books, it really illustrates that, I think. Here's what it the despairing way in which my mother and I look at each other as I blunder on is truly melancholy. But the greatest effect in these miserable lessons is when my mother, thinking nobody is observing her, tries to give me the cue by the motion of her lips. Okay? It's like your friend at school or something trying to help you by passing you a note or whatever. Alright? So it's not like the person in charge of you who could say to the teacher, no, I don't approve of this method of teaching. So yes, we wish the mother would stand up for herself and for Davy. We wish she would say, no, I don't believe in this method of parenting. I have a different method. And this is my son and I'm going to parent him how I choose. We wish that, but it's never going to happen. It's not who the mother is. So she loves Davy, but she's now Mr. Murdstone's wife. And that spells ruin for David. Right? Which leaves only Peggy. Only Peggy still loves Davey the way that she always has and still believes that he's a good boy and deserving of love and attention and care and all of this. I mean, I don't know about you, but that scene at the keyhole, it's really moving. I think I cried when I was trying to record it and I cried when I listened back to it. It's kind of devastating because here are these two people who love each other so much. Here is this one person who still loves Davey the way that Davey deserves to be loved. But they can't even stand in the same room together. And Davey is going away and Peggy can't come with him and they're both heartbroken and we're heartbroken. I mean, I don't know. I just Love Peggy like what a solid, loyal, trustworthy, good person she is. And David clearly feels the same way. Here's what he says. From that night, there grew up in my breast a feeling for Peggy which I cannot very well define. She did not replace my mother. No one could do that. But she came into a vacancy in my heart which closed upon her. And I felt towards her something I have never felt for any other human being. It was a sort of comical affection, too. And yet, if she had died, I cannot think what I should have done or how I should have acted out the tragedy it would have been to me. Okay, but now Davey has done this unforgivable thing, right? He has bitten Mr. Murdstone. And I think it's really interesting that Mr. Murdstone begins by comparing Davy to a dog. This is part of his whole philosophy about children, right? Here is what it says. This is Mr. Murdstone talking. David, he said, making his lips thin by pressing them together. If I have an obstinate horse or dog to deal with, what do you think I do? I don't know. I beat him. Okay, so he's saying that he treats children the way he treats dogs or animals. He trains them to be submissive and obedient, and if they're not, he beats them. Okay? So eventually, when Mr. Murdstone decides, as some parents did back then decide, when he decides that Davy's blunders in his studies have gone far enough, and he says he's gonna beat him just like he does with a wayward dog, I think it's really interesting that what Davey does in that moment is bite him just like a dog might do. Essentially, in treating Davey like a dog, he has turned him into a dog. It's what adult David told us before. If he'd treated him with kindness and love, Davey would have responded with obedience and in his lessons and love in return. But in treating him like a dog, he made him behave like one. Okay, but of course, Davey is not a dog. He's a boy. And he's still a loving, creative, sweet little boy who has been sustained even in this awful situation by the heroes from his father's books, which is interesting, too, I think he's got this new father who wants to make him submit, but his actual father is. It's like he's sort of watching over him via these books he's left behind. And it's almost like he's saying that had he lived, he. He would have been a loving, kind father who supported his son's creativity and interest in the world. But anyway, Davey is still the boy he is and so he immediately feels terrible, right? Ms. Murdstone, who, as Tivia says, is this jailer type person and who actually does seem to just hate Davey and want him to go away. Ms. Murdstone makes him feel like he's justified in feeling terrible. Mr. Murdstone does too. And Davey's mother, even though she still loves him, feels that what he's done is unacceptable and seems to agree that he should be sent away. And so off he goes to school, right, where we hope things will be better for him. It's hard to imagine them being worse, isn't it? But who knows? I mean, it's a total unknown for Davey and it's a total unknown for us, so. But actually we can find out. Davey can find out by going to school and we can find out by reading more. So let's do that. Let's keep reading. We're going to find out what it's like for Davey at the school. But of course, as always, please Write in it's faith k.moore.com and you click on Contact or you scroll into the show notes and find that same link and write to me. I would love to know what you're thinking, what your questions are. If anything's confusing, please do ask because maybe other people are finding that same thing confusing. And send me all your reactions and thoughts. I love to hear them and it's great for us to be able to talk about them together. So please do that. All right, let's get started with chapter five of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. It's story time. Chapter 5. I am sent away from home. We might have gone about half a mile and my pocket handkerchief was quite wet through when the carrier stopped short looking out to ascertain for what I saw. To my amazement, Peggy burst from a hedge and climb into the cart. She took me in both her arms and squeezed me to her stays, meaning she clasped him to her chest until the pressure on my nose was extremely painful, though I never thought of that till afterwards when I found it very tender. Not a single word did Peggety speak. Releasing one of her arms, she put it down in her pocket to the elbow and brought out some paper bags of cakes which she crammed into my pockets and a purse which she put into my hand. But not one word did she say after another and a final squeeze with both arms she got down from the cart and ran away. And my belief is, and has always been without a solitary button on her gown I picked up one of several that were rolling about and treasured it as a keepsake for a long time. The carrier looked at me as if to inquire if she were coming back. I shook my head and said I thought not. Then come up, said the carrier to the lazy horse who came up accordingly. Having by this time cried as much as I possibly could, I began to think it was no use crying any more, especially as neither Roderick Random nor the captain in the Royal British Navy had ever cried that I could remember in trying situations. The carrier, seeing me in this resolution, proposed that my pocket handkerchief should be spread upon the horse's back to dry. I thanked him and assented, and particularly small it looked, under those circumstances. I now had leisure to examine the purse. It was a stiff leather purse with a snap and had three bright shillings in it which Peggotty had evidently polished up with whitening for my greater delight. But its most precious contents were 2/2 crowns folded together in a bit of paper on which was written in my mother's hand for Davy, with my love. I was so overcome by this that I asked the carrier to be so good as to reach me my pocket handkerchief again, but he said he thought I had better do without it and I thought I really had. So I wiped my eyes on my sleeve and stopped myself for good too, though in consequence of my previous emotions I was still occasionally seized with a stormy sob. After we had jogged on for some little time I asked the carrier if he was going all the way. All the way to where? Inquired the carrier. There, I said. Where's there? Inquired the carrier. Near London, I said. Why, that horse, said the carrier, jerking the rein to point him out, would be deader than pork afore he got over half the ground. Are you only going to Yarmouth, then? I asked. That's about it, said the carrier. And there I shall take you to the stagecoach and the stagecoach that'll take you to wherever it is. Okay. So the stagecoach is the stage coach which is a sort of large horse drawn carriage which operates like a bus so it stops at various locations and it lets people get on and off. As this was a great deal for the carrier, whose name was Mr. Barkis, to say, he being, as I observed, in a former chapter of a phlegmatic temperament and not at all conversational. I offered him a cake as a mark of attention, which he ate at one gulp exactly like an elephant and which made no more impression on his big face than it would have done on an elephant's. Did she make them now? Said Mr. Barkis always leaning forward in his slouching way on the footboard of the cart with an arm on each knee. Peggotty, do you mean, Sir? Ah, said Mr. Barkis. Her, yes. She makes all our pastry and does all our cooking. Do she, though? Said Mr. Barkis. He made up his mouth as if to whistle, but he didn't whistle. He sat looking at the horse's ears as if he saw something new there and sat so for a considerable time. By and by he said, no sweethearts, I believe so he's asking if Peggotty is romantically involved with anyone. Sweetmeats, did you say Mr. Barkis? For I thought he wanted something else to eat and had pointedly alluded to that description of refreshment hearts, said Mr. Barkis. Sweethearts. No person walks with her. With Peggotty. Ah, he said. Her? Oh, no, she never had a sweetheart. Didn't she, though? Said Mr. Barkis. Again he made up his mouth to whistle, and again he didn't whistle, but sat looking at the horse's ears. So she makes, said Mr. Barkis after a long interval of reflection. All the apple parsties and doos, all the cookin', do she? I replied. That such was the fact. Well, I'll tell you what, said Mr. Barkis, p', raps, you might be writin to her. I certainly shall write to her, I rejoined. Ah, he said slowly, turning his eyes towards me. Well, if you was writin to her, p', raps, you'd recollect to say that Barkis was willin', would you? That Barkis is willing, I repeated innocently. Is that all the message? Okay, so Mr. Barkis is saying that he'd like to marry Peggy, if Peggy would like that. But Davey doesn't understand what he means. Yes, he said, considering. Yes, Marcus is willin'. But you will be at BLUNDERSTONE Again tomorrow, Mr. Barkis, I said, faltering a little at the idea of my being far away from it then, and could give your own message so much better. As he repudiated this suggestion, however, with a jerk of his head, and once more confirmed his previous request by saying with profound gravity, barkis is willin'. That's the message. I readily undertook its transmission, meaning he was happy to pass on the message. While I was waiting for the coach in the hotel at Yarmouth that very afternoon, I procured a sheet of paper and an inkstand and wrote a note to Peggy, which ran. My dear Peggy, I have come here safe. Barkis is willing. My love to mama. Yours affectionately. P.S. he says he particularly wants you to know Barkis is willing. When I had taken this commission on myself prospectively Mr. Barkis relapsed into perfect silence and I, feeling quite worn out by all that had happened lately, lay down on a sack in the cart and fell asleep. I slept soundly until we got to Yarmouth, which was so entirely new and strange to me in the inn yard to which we drove, that I at once abandoned a latent hope that I had had of meeting with some of Mr. Peggotty's family there, perhaps even with little Em' Ly herself. The coach was in the yard, shining very much all over, but without any horses to it as yet, and it looked in that state as if nothing was more unlikely than its ever going to London. I was thinking this and wondering what would ultimately become of my box, which Mr. Barkis had put down on the yard pavement by the pole, he having driven up the yard to turn his cart, and also what would ultimately become of me, when a lady looked out of a bow window where some fowls and joints of meat were hanging up, and said, is that the little gentleman from Blunderstone? Yes, ma', am, I said. What name? Inquired the lady. Copperfield, ma', am, I said. That won't do, returned the lady. Nobody's dinner is paid for here in that name, is it? Murdstone, ma', am, I said. If you're Master Murdstone, said the lady, why do you go and give another name first? I explained to the lady how it was, who then rang a bell and called out, william, show the coffee room. Upon which a waiter came running out of a kitchen on the opposite side of the yard to show it, and seemed a good deal surprised when he was only to show it to me. It was a large long room with some large maps in it. I doubt if I could have felt much stranger if the maps had been real foreign countries, and I cast away in the middle of them. I felt it was taking a liberty to sit down with my cap in my hand on the corner of the chair nearest the door, and when the waiter laid a cloth on purpose for me and put a set of castors on it, I think I must have turned red all over with modesty. He brought me some chops and vegetables and took the covers off in such a bouncing manner that I was afraid I must have given him some offence. But he greatly relieved my mind by putting a chair for me at the table and saying very affably, now six foot, come on. I thanked him and took my seat at the board, but found it extremely difficult to handle my knife and fork with anything like dexterity or to avoid splashing myself with the gravy while he was standing opposite, staring so hard and making me blush in the most dreadful manner every time I caught his eye. Okay, so Davey is being treated like a grown up gentleman and it's making him very self conscious. After watching me into the second chop, he said, there's half a pint of ale for you. Will you have it now? I thanked him and said yes. Upon which he poured it out of a jug into a large tumbler and held it up against the light and made it look beautiful. My eye, he said. It seems a good deal. Don't does seem a good deal, I answered with a smile, for it was quite delightful to me to find him so pleasant. He was a twinkling eyed, pimple faced man with his hair standing upright all over his head, and as he stood with one arm akimbo holding up the glass to the light with the other hand, he looked quite friendly. There was a gentleman here yesterday, he said, a stout gentleman by the name of Top Sawyer. Perhaps you know him. No, I said, I don't think in breeches and gaiters. Broad brimmed hat, gray coat, speckled choker, said the waiter. No, I said bashfully, I haven't the pleasure. He came in here, said the waiter, looking at the light through the tumbler, ordered a glass of this ale. Would order it, I told him, not drank it and fell dead. It was too old for him. It oughtn't to be drawn, that's the fact. I was very much shocked to hear of this melancholy accident and said I thought I had better have some water. Why? You see, said the waiter, still looking at the light through the tumbler with one of his eyes shut up. Our people don't like things being ordered and left. It offends em. But I'll drink it if you like. I'm used to it and use is everything. I don't think it'll hurt me if I throw my head back and take it off quick. Shall I? I replied that he would much oblige me by drinking it if he thought he could do it safely, but by no means otherwise. When he did throw his head back and take it off quick, I had horrible fear, I confess, of seeing him meet the fate of the lamented Mr. Top Sawyer and fall lifeless on the carpet. But it didn't hurt him. On the contrary, I thought he seemed the fresher for it. What have we got here? He said, putting a fork into my dish. Not chops. Chops, I said. Lord bless my soul. He exclaimed. I didn't know they were chops. Why, a chop's the very thing to take off the bad effects of that beer. Ain't it, Lucky? So he took a chop by the bone in one hand and a potato in the other and ate away with a very good appetite to my extreme satisfaction. He afterwards took another chop and another potato and after that another chop and another potato. When he had done, he brought me a pudding and having set it before me, seemed to ruminate and to become absent in his mind for some moments. How's the pie? He said, rousing himself. It's a pudding I made answer. Pudding. He exclaimed. Why, bless me. So it is. What? Looking at it nearer, you don't mean to say it's a batter pudding? Yes, it is indeed. Why, a batter pudding, he said, taking up a tablespoon is my favorite pudding. Ain't dat lucky? Come on, little un, let's see who'll get most. The waiter certainly got most. He entreated me more than once to come in and win, but what with his tablespoon to my teaspoon, his dispatch to my dispatch, and his appetite to my appetite, I was left far behind at the first mouthful and had no chance with him. I never saw any one enjoy a pudding so much, I think. And he laughed when it was all gone, as if his enjoyment of it lasted, still finding him so friendly and companionable. It was then that I asked him for the pen and ink and paper to write to Peggotty. He not only brought it immediately, but was good enough to look over me while I wrote the letter. When I had finished it, he asked me where I was going to school, I said near London, which was all I knew. Oh, my eye, he said, looking very low spirited. I am sorry for that. Why? I asked him. O Lord, he said, shaking his head, that's the school where they broke the boy's ribs. Two ribs. A little boy he was. I should say he was. Let me see, how old are you about? I told him. Between 8 and 9. That's just his age, he said. He was 8 years and 6 months old when they broke his first rib, 8 years and 8 months old when they broke his second. Did it for him. I could not disguise from myself or from the waiter that this was an uncomfortable coincidence and inquired how it was done. His answer was not cheering to my spirits, for it consisted of two dismal with whopping meaning by beating the blowing of the coach horn in the yard was a seasonable diversion, which made me get up and hesitatingly inquire in the mingled pride and diffidence of having a purse, which I took out of my pocket if there was anything to pay. There's a sheet of letter paper, he returned. Did you ever buy a sheet of letter paper? I could not remember that I ever had. It's dear, he said, meaning it's expensive on account of the duty. Threepence. That's the way we're taxed in this country. There's nothing else except the waiter. Never mind the ink I lose by that. What should you. What should I. How much ought I towhat would it be right to pay the waiter, if you please? I stammered, blushing. If I hadn't a family and the family hadn't the cowpoc, meaning that they're sick, said the waiter. I wouldn't take a sixpence if I didn't support a aged parent and a lovely sister. Here. The waiter was greedily agitated. I wouldn't ask a farthing. If I had a good place and was treated well here. I should beg acceptance of a trifle instead of taking of it. But I live on broken wittles, meaning victuals, which means food. So he's saying. He hardly has any food to live on, and I sleep on the coals here. The waiter burst into tears. I was very much concerned for his misfortunes and felt that any recognition short of ninepence would be mere brutality and hardness of heart. Therefore I gave him one of my three bright shillings, which he received with much humility and veneration, and spun up with his thumb directly afterwards to try the goodness of it was a little disconcerting to me to find, when I was being helped up behind the coach, that I was supposed to have eaten all the dinner without any assistance. I had discovered this from overhearing the lady in the bow window say to the guard, take care of that child, George, or he'll burst, and from observing that the women servants who were about the place came out to look and giggle at me as a young phenomenon my unfortunate friend. The waiter, who had quite recovered his spirits, did not appear to be disturbed by this, but joined in the general admiration without being at all confused. If I had any doubt of him, I suppose this half awakened it But I am inclined to believe that with the simple confidence of a child and the natural reliance of a child upon superior years, qualities I am very sorry any children should prematurely change for worldly wisdom I had no serious mistrust of him on the whole even then. Okay, so the waiter has completely tricked Davy into giving him his food and his money but he's saying he really didn't know it then because he was still just a child. I felt it rather hard, I must own, to be made without deserving it the subject of jokes between the coachman and guard as to the coach drawing heavy behind on account of my sitting there and as to the greater expediency of my traveling by wagon, the story of my supposed appetite getting wind among the outside passengers they were merry upon it likewise and asked me whether I was going to be paid for at school as two brothers or three and whether I was contracted for or went upon the regular terms with other pleasant questions. But the worst of it was that I knew I should be ashamed to eat anything when an opportunity offered and that after a rather light dinner I should remain hungry all night for I had left my cakes behind at the hotel in my hurry. My apprehensions were realized when we stopped for supper. I couldn't muster courage to take any, though I should have liked it very much, but sat by the fire and said I didn't want anything. This did not save me from more jokes either for a husky voiced gentleman with a rough face who had been eating out of a sandwich box nearly all the way except when he had been drinking out of a bottle, said I was like a boa constrictor who took enough at one meal to last him a long time after which he actually brought a rash out upon himself with boiled beef. We had started From Yarmouth at 3 o' clock in the afternoon and we were due in London about eight next morning. It was midsummer weather and the evening was very pleasant. When we passed through a village I pictured to myself what the insides of the houses were like and what the inhabitants were about and when boys came running after us and got up behind and swung there for a little way I wondered whether their fathers were alive and whether they were happy at home. I had plenty to think of therefore, besides my mind running continually on the kind of place I was going to, which was an awful speculation. Sometimes I remember I resigned myself to thoughts of home and Peggotty and to endeavouring in a confused blind way to recall how I had felt and what sort of boy I used to be before. Before I bit Mr. Murdstonewhich I couldn't satisfy myself about by any means. I seemed to have bitten him in such a remote antiquity. The night was not so pleasant as the evening for it got chilly, and being put between two gentlemen, the rough faced one and another to prevent my tumbling off the coach. I was nearly smothered by their falling asleep and completely blocking me up. They squeezed me so hard sometimes that I could not help crying out to oh, if you please, which they didn't like at all, because it woke them. Opposite me was an elderly lady in a great fur cloak who looked in the dark more like a haystack than a lady. She was wrapped up to such a degree. This lady had a basket with her, and she hadn't known what to do with it for a long time until she found that, on account of my legs being short, it could go underneath me. It cramped and hurt me so that it made me perfectly miserable. But if I moved in the least and made a glass that was in the basket rattle against something else, as it was sure to do, she gave me the cruelest poke with her foot and said, come, don't you fidget. Your bones are young enough, I'm sure. At last the sun rose, and then my companions seemed to sleep easier. The difficulties under which they had laboured all night, and which had found utterance in the most terrific gasps and snorts, are not to be conceived. As the sun got higher, their sleep became lighter, and so they gradually, one by one, awoke. I recollect being very much surprised by the faint everybody made meaning the pretending they all did then, of not having been to sleep at all, and by the uncommon indignation with which everyone repelled the charge. I labor under the same kind of astonishment to this day, having invariably observed that of all human weaknesses, the one to which our common nature is the least disposed to confess, I cannot imagine why is the weakness of having gone to sleep in a coach. What an amazing place London was to me when I saw it in the distance, and how I believed all the adventures of all my favourite heroes to be constantly enacting and re enacting there. And how I vaguely made it out in my own mind to be fuller of wonders and wickedness than all the cities of the earth. I need not stop here to relate. We approached it by degrees and got in due time to the inn in the Whitechapel district for which we were bound. I forget whether it was the Blue Bull or the Blue Boar, but I know it was the Blue Something and that its likeness was painted up on the back of the coach. The guard's eye lighted on me as he was getting down, and he said at the booking office door, is there anybody here for a youngster Booked in the name of Murdstone from Lunderstone, Suffolk, to be left till called for. Nobody answered. Try Copperfields, if you please, sir, said I, looking helplessly down. Is there anybody here for a youngster? Booked in the name of Murdstone from Blunderston, Suffolk, but owning to the name of Copperfield to be left till called for, said the guard. Come. Is there anybody? No, there was nobody. I looked anxiously around, but the inquiry made no impression on any of the bystanders. If I, except a man in gaiters with one eye who suggested that they had better put a brass collar round my neck and dye me up in the stable a ladder was brought and I got down after the lady who was like a haystack, not daring to stir until her basket was removed. The coach was clear of passengers by that time. The luggage was very soon cleared out. The horses had been taken out before the luggage and now the coach itself was wheeled and backed off by some hustlers, meaning people whose job it is to care for the horses in the cart out of the way. Still nobody appeared to claim the dusty youngster from Blunderstone, Suffolk, more solitary than Robinson Crusoe, who had nobody to look at him and see that he was solitary. I went into the booking office and by invitation of the clerk on duty passed behind the counter and sat down on the scale at which they weighed the luggage. Here, as I sat looking at the parcels, packages and books and inhaling the smell of stables ever since associated with that morning, a procession of most tremendous considerations began to march through my mind. Supposing nobody should ever fetch me, how long would they consent to keep me there? Would they keep me long enough to spend seven shillings? Should I sleep at night in one of those wooden bins with the other luggage and wash myself at the pump in the yard in the morning? Or should I be turned out every night and expected to come again to be left till called for when the office opened next day? Supposing there was no mistake in the case and Mr. Murdstone had devised this plan to get rid of me, what should I do? If they allowed me to remain there until my seven shillings were spent? I couldn't hope to remain there when I began to starve. That would obviously be inconvenient and unpleasant to the customers. Besides entailing on the blue, whatever it was, the risk of funeral expenses. If I started off at once and tried to walk back home, how could I ever find my way? How could I ever hope to walk so far? How could I make sure of Anyone but Peggy. Even if I got back, if I found out the nearest proper authorities and offered myself to go for a soldier or a separate sailor, I was such a little fellow that it was most likely they wouldn't take me in. These thoughts and a hundred other such thoughts turned me burning hot and made me giddy with apprehension and dismay. I was in the height of my fever when a man entered and whispered to the clerk, who presently slanted me off the scale and pushed me over to him as if I were weighed, bought, delivered, and paid for. As I went out of the office, hand in hand with this new acquaintance, I stole a look at him. He was a gaunt, sallow young man with hollow cheeks and a chin almost as black as Mr. Murdstone's. But there the likeness ended, for his whiskers were shaved off, and his hair, instead of being glossy, was rusty and dry. He was dressed in a suit of black clothes, which were rather rusty and dry too, and rather short in the sleeves and legs, and he had a white neckerchief on that was not over clean. I did not, and do not suppose that this neckerchief was all the linen he wore, but it was all he showed or gave any hint of. You're the new boy, he said. Yes, sir, I said. I supposed I was. I didn't know. I'm one of the masters at Salem House, he said. I made him a bow and felt very much overawed. I was so ashamed to allude to a commonplace thing like my box to a scholar and a master at Salem House that we had gone some little distance from the yard before I had the hardihood to mention it. We turned back on my humbly insinuating that it might be useful to me hereafter, and he told the clerk that the carrier had instructions to call for it at noon. If you please, sir, I said, when we had accomplished about the same distance as before. Is it far? It's down by Blackheath, he said. Is that far, sir? I diffidently asked. Diffidently means shyly. It's a good step, he said. We shall go by the stagecoach. It's about six miles. I was so faint and tired that the idea of holding out for six miles more was too much for me. I took heart to tell him that I had had nothing all night, meaning he hasn't eaten all night, and that if he would allow me to buy something to eat, I should be very much obliged to him. He appeared surprised at this. I see him stop and look at me. Now and after considering for a few moments said he wanted to call on an old person who lived not far off and that the best way would be for me to buy some bread or whatever I liked best that was wholesome and make my breakfast at her house where we could get some milk. Accordingly, we looked in at a baker's window and after I had made a series of proposals to buy everything that was bilious in the shop and he had rejected them one by one we decided in favour of a nice little loaf of brown bread which cost me threepence. Then at a grocer's shop we bought an egg and a slice of streaky bacon which still left what I thought a good deal of change out of the second of the bright shillings and made me consider London a very cheap place place these provisions laid in. We went on through a great noise and uproar that confused my weary head beyond description and over a bridge which no doubt was London Bridge indeed. I think he told me so. But I was half asleep until we came to the poor person's house which was a part of some almshouses, as I knew by their look, and by an inscription on a stone over the gate which said they were established for 25 poor women. Okay, so they've come to some housing for poor women. The master at Salem House lifted the latch of one of a number of little black doors that were all alike and had each a little diamond paned window on one side and another little diamond paned window above. And we went into the little house of one of these poor old women who was blowing a fire to make a little saucepan boil. On seeing the master enter, the old woman stopped with the bellows on her knee and said something that I thought sounded like my darling, but on seeing me come in too, she got up and, rubbing her hands, made a confused sort of half curtsy. Can you cook this young gentleman's breakfast for him, if you please? Said the master at Salem House. Can I? Said the old woman. Yes. Can I? Sure. How's Mrs. Phippitson today? Said the master, looking at another old woman in a large chair by the fire, who was such a bundle of clothes that I feel grateful to this hour for not having sat upon her by mistake. Ah, she's poorly, said the first old woman. It's one of her bad days. If the fire was to go out through any accident, I verily believe she'd go out too and never come to life again. As they looked at her, I looked at her also, although it Was a warm day. She seemed to think of nothing but the fire. I fancied she was jealous even of the saucepan on it. And I have reason to know that she took its impressment into the service of boiling my egg and broiling my bacon in dudgeon. For I saw her with my own discomfited eyes Shake her fist at me once. When those culinary operations were going on and no one else was looking. The sun streamed in at the little window. But she sat with her own back and the back of the large chair towards it, screening the fire as if she were sedulously keeping it warm, instead of it keeping her warm and watching it in a most distrustful manner. The completion of the preparations for my breakfast by relieving the fire Gave her such extreme joy that she laughed aloud. And a very unmelodious laugh she had, I must say. I sat down to my brown loaf, my egg and my rasher of bacon, and with a basin of milk besides, and made a most delicious meal while I was yet in the full enjoyment of it. The old woman of the house said to the master, have you got your flute with you? Yes, he returned. Have a blow at it, said the old woman coaxingly. Do. The master upon this put his hand underneath the skirts of his coat and brought out his flute in three pieces which he screwed together and began immediately to play. My impression is, after many years of consideration, that there never can have been anybody in the world who played worse. He made the most dismal sounds I have ever heard produced by any means, natural or artificial. I don't know what the tunes were, if there were such things in the performance at all, which I doubt. But the influence of the strain upon me was first to make me think of all my sorrows and until I could hardly keep my tears back. Then to take away my appetite, and lastly to make me so sleepy that I couldn't keep my eyes open. They begin to close again and I begin to nod as the recollection rises fresh upon me once more. The little room with its open corner cupboard and its square backed chairs and its angular little staircase leading to the room above and its three peacock's feathers displayed over the mantelpiece. I remember wondering when I first went in what that peacock would have thought if he had known what his finery was doomed to come to. Fades from before me and I nod and sleep. The flute becomes inaudible. The wheels of the coach are heard instead. And I am on my journey. The coach jolts. I wake with a start and the flute has come back again, and the master at Salem House is sitting with his legs crossed, playing it dolefully, while the old woman of the house looks on, delighted. She fades in her turn, and he fades and all fades. And there is no flute, no master, no Salem House, no David Copperfield, no anything but heavy sleep. I dreamed, I thought, that once, while he was blowing into this dismal flute, the old woman of the house, who had gone nearer and nearer to him in her ecstatic admiration, leaned over the back of his chair and gave him an affectionate squeeze round the neck, which stopped his playing for a moment. I was in the middle state between sleeping and waking, either then or immediately afterwards, for as he resumed, it was a real fact that he had stopped playing. I saw and heard the same old woman Ask Mrs. Phibbotson if it wasn't delicious, meaning the flute, to which Mrs. Ay, ay, yes. And nodded at the fire, to which, I am persuaded, she gave the credit of the whole performance. When I seemed to have been dozing a long while, the master at Salem House unscrewed his flute into the three pieces, put them up as before, and took me away. We found the coach very near at hand and got upon the roof. But I was so dead sleepy that when we stopped on the road to take up somebody else, they put me inside where there were no passengers and where I slept profoundly until I found the coach going at a foot pace up a steep hill among green leaves. Presently it stopped and had come to its destination. A short walk brought us, I mean, the master and me, to Salem House, which was enclosed with a high brick wall and looked very dull. Over a door in this wall was a board with Salem House upon it, and through a grating in this door we were surveyed when we rang the bell by a surly face, which I found on the door being opened. Belonged to a stout man with a bull neck, a wooden leg, overhanging temples, and his hair cut close all round his head. The new boy, said the master. The man with the wooden leg eyed me all over. It didn't take long, for there was not much of me, and locked the gate behind us and took out the key. We were going up to the house among some dark, heavy trees when he called after my conductor. Hello. We looked back and he was standing at the door of a little lodge where he lived with a pair of boots in his hand. Here the cobbler's been, he said, since you've been out, Mr. Mel. And he says he can't. Mend em any more. He says there ain't a bit of the original boot left. And he wonders you expect it. With these words he threw the boots towards Mr. Mel. Who went back a few paces to pick them up and looked at them very disconsolately. I was afraid as we went on together. I observed then for the first time that the boots he had on were a good deal the worse for wear. And that his stocking was just breaking out in one place like a bud. Salem House was a square brick building with wings of a bare and unfurnished appearance all about. It was so very quiet that I said to Mr. Mell, I supposed the boys were out. But he seemed surprised at my not knowing that it was holiday time, that all the boys were at their several homes, that Mr. Creakle, the proprietor, was down by the seaside with Mrs. And Ms. Creakle, and that I was sent in holiday time as a punishment for my misdoing. All of which he explained to me as we went along. I gazed upon the schoolroom into which he took me. As the most forlorn and desolate place I had ever seen. I see it now, a long room with three long rows of desks and six forms, and bristling all round with pegs for hats and slates. Scraps of old copybooks and exercises litter the dirty floor. Some silkworms, houses made of the same materials, are scattered over the desks. Two miserable little white mice left behind by their owner. Are running up and down in a fusty castle made of pasteboard and wireless, looking in all the corners with their red eyes for anything to eat. A bird in a cage very little bigger than himself. Makes a mournful rattle now and then in hopping on his perch 2 inches high, or dropping from it, but neither sings nor chirps. There is a strange, unwholesome smell upon the room. Like mildewed corduroys, sweet apples wanting air, and rotten books. There could not well be more ink splashed about it if it had been roofless from its first construction. And the skies had ra rained, snowed, hailed, and blown ink through the varying seasons of the year. Mr. Mell, having left me while he took his irreparable boots upstairs, I went softly to the upper end of the room, observing all this as I crept along. Suddenly I came upon a pasteboard placard, beautifully written, which was lying on the desk, and bore these. Take care of him. He bites. I got upon the desk immediately apprehensive of at least a great dog beneath. But though I looked all round with anxious eyes, I could see nothing of him. I was still engaged in peering about when Mr. Mel came back and asked me what I did up there. I beg your pardon, sir, says I. If you please, I'm looking for the dog. Dog, he says. What dog? Isn't it a dog, sir? Isn't what a dog? That's to be taken care of, sir, that bites. No, Copperfield, says he gravely. That's not a dog, that's a boy. My instructions are, Copperfield, to put this placard on your back. I am sorry to make such a beginning with you, but I must do it. With that he took me down and tied the placard, which was neatly constructed for the purpose, on my shoulders like a knapsack. And wherever I went afterwards, I had the consolation of carrying it. What I suffered from that placard, nobody can imagine whether it was possible for people to see me or not. I always fancied that somebody was reading it. It was no relief to turn round and find nobody. For wherever my back was, there I imagined somebody always to be. That cruel man with the wooden leg aggravated my sufferings. He was an authority, and if he ever saw me leaning against a tree or a wall or the house, he roared out from his lodge door in a stupendous voice, hello. You, sir. You, Copperfield. Show that badge conspicuous or I'll report you. The playground was a bare gravelled yard open to all the back of the house and the offices. And I knew that the servants read it and the butcher read it and the baker read it. That everybody, in a word, who came backwards and forwards to the house of a morning when I was ordered to walk there, read that I was to be taken care of, for I bit. I recollect that I positively began to have a dread of myself as a kind of wild boy who did bite. There was an old door in this playground on which the boys had a custom of carving their names. It was completely covered with such inscriptions in my dread of the end of vacation and their coming back, I could not read a boy's name without inquiring in what tone and with what emphasis he would read. Take care of him. He bites. There was one boy, a certain J. Steerforth, who cut his name very deep and very often who I conceived, would read it in a rather strong voice and afterwards pull my hair. There was another boy, one Tommy Traddles, who I dreaded would make a game of it and pretend to be dreadfully frightened of me. There was a third, George Dimple, who I fancied would sing it. I have looked a little shrinking creature at that door until the owners of all the names there were five and 40 of them in the school. Then Mr. Mel said, seemed to send me to Coventry by general acclamation and to cry out each in his own way, take care of him. He bites. Okay, so being sent to Coventry means that the children all decide together to completely ignore one child as a kind of child driven punishment. So he's certain that all the boys will come back and send him to Coventry. It was the same with the places at the desks and forms. It was the same with the groves of deserted bedsteads I peeped at on my way to. And when I was in my own bed, I remember dreaming night after night of being with my mother as she used to be, or of going to a party at Mr. Peggotty's, or of travelling outside the stage coach, or of dining again with my unfortunate friend the waiter, and in all these circumstances making people scream and stare by the unhappy disclosure that I had nothing on but my little nightshirt and that placard in the monotony of my life and in my constant apprehension of the reopening of the school. It was such an insupportable affliction. I had long tasks every day to do with Mr. Mell, but I did them, there being no Mr. And Ms. Murdstone here, and got through them without disgrace. Before and after them I walked about, supervised, as I have mentioned, by the man with the wooden leg. How vividly I called to mind the damp about the house. House, the green cracked flagstones in the court, an old leaky water butt, and the discoloured trunks of some of the grim trees which seemed to have dripped more in the rain than other trees and to have blown less in the sun. At one we dined, Mr. Mell and I, at the upper end of a long, bare dining room full of deal tables and smelling of fat. Then we had more tasks until tea, which Mr. Mell drank out of a blue teacup and I out of a tin pot. All day long, and until seven or eight in the evening Mr. Mel, at his own detached desk in the schoolroom, worked hard with pen, ink, ruler, books and writing paper, making out the bills, as I found for last half year, when he had put up his things for the night, he took out his flute and blew at it until I almost thought he would gradually blow his whole being into the large hole at the top of the and ooze away at the keys. I picture my small self in the dimly lighted rooms, sitting with my head upon my hand, listening to the doleful performance of Mr. Mel and Conning tomorrow's lessons. Conning means studying for the next day. I picture myself with my books shut up, still listening to the doleful performance of Mr. Mel and listening through it to what used to be at home and to the blowing of the wind at Yarmouth Flats Flats and feeling very sad and solitary. I picture myself going up to bed among the unused rooms and sitting on my bedside crying for a comfortable word from Peggotty. I picture myself coming downstairs in the morning and looking through a long ghastly gash of a staircase window at the school bell hanging on the top of an outhouse with a weathercock above it, and dreading the time when it shall ring J. Steerforth and the rest to work, which is only second in my foreboding apprehensions to the time when the man with the wooden leg shall unlock the rusty gate to give admission to the awful Mr. Creakle. I cannot think I was a very dangerous character in any of these aspects, but in all of them I carried the same warning on my back. Mr. Mel never said much to me, but he was never harsh to me. I suppose we were company to each other without talking. I forgot to mention that he would talk to himself sometimes and grin and clench his fist and grind his teeth and pull his hair in an unaccountable manner. But he had these peculiarities and at first they frightened me, though I soon got used to them. Thank you so much for listening. I'd love to know what you thought of the chapters. Is there anything you'd like me to clarify? Did something particularly interest you? Please go to my website, faithkmoore.com click on contact and send me your questions and thoughts. Or you can click on the link in the Show Notes to contact me. I'll feature one or two of your entries at the start of the next episode. Speaking of links, don't forget to take a look at the other links in the Show Notes. You can learn more about me, check out our Merch Store, or become a member of the Storytime for Grown Ups online community. Before I go, I'd like to ask a quick favor. This is an independent podcast. It's produced, recorded, and marketed by me, so I need your help. Spread the word about the show by posting about it on social media or texting a link to your friends. Subscribe, tap those five stars and leave a positive review wherever you're listening. If you are able to support the show financially there's a link in the show notes to make a donation. I would really, really appreciate it. Alright everyone, story time is over. To be continued.