Reading Austen in the 70s

From Margaret Drabble’s introduction to Lady Susan, The Watsons, and Sanditon:

We may tend to think Elizabeth Bennet a sensible girl not to mind getting her skirts muddy, and the Darcy and Bingley women ridiculous for noticing, but eighteenth-century mud was doubtless much more substantial than our own, and long skirts picked it up more, as those who now wear long skirts again will surely have noticed…. The Austen family wore pattens when young, to negotiate the country lanes round Steventon, a practice which seemed as archaic and vulgar to Jane Austen’s nephew, as the wearing of clogs would have seemed to us now, had not a freak of fashion brought them very nosily back again in 1972.

I confess I did wear clogs in the 70’s, though I preferred pants to maxi-skirts. I wonder what cultural trends we could relate to Jane Austen today? Perhaps laptops are today’s writing desks, and instead of daily letter-writing today’s young ladies check Facebook.

“Jane’s Fame” by Claire Harman

Jane's Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World
Claire Harman
Henry Holt and Co.
2010
304 pp.

While I was tidying up the list of books I read in 2011 I noticed that I began the year with a short biography of Jane Austen, read the wonderful A Jane Austen Education in the summer, and finished the year with Jane’s Fame: How Jane Austen Conquered the World. Add to that a re-reading of Persuasion (my favourite) and much munching of popcorn in front of various film adaptations and the enjoyable Lost in Austen spinoff. This all happened without even trying, which just goes to show how ubiquitous Jane Austen has become. Jane’s Fame traces the development of Jane Austen’s popularity, which was by no means a sure thing in the beginning. She was nearly forgotten after her death in 1817, but a biography published by her nephew in 1869 revived interest in her, which prompted the reprinting of her books, and her renown steadily grew from there to today’s all-Austen-all-the-time proportions.

I found it interesting that for a long time the most ardent Janeites were male scholars. No doubt it only seems that way because they had the floor, but in any case her books were certainly not considered to be particularly for women until recently. She was also much-loved by soldiers in World War I, who read and discussed her books in the trenches to escape the hell they were going through. Austen was also prescribed to wounded and shell-shocked soldiers for comfort and solace in their convalescence or their last days.

Claire Harman points out that one of the reasons Austen is so easily appropriated by generation after generation of readers is that her books lack details of time and place that would make it seem dated or foreign to future readers. Apparently she did this quite deliberately and mentions it in her letters. Though some criticized her books for failing to mention the great events of the time, such as the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, in retrospect she made the right choice if she wanted her works to be enduringly accessible. Two centuries later, references to contemporary issues and obsolete facts of life would only get in the way of the stories. Today’s writers might do well to question the conventional wisdom about describing the setting of a novel in vivid detail. People are people, whether they communicate by text message or penny post.

Jane’s Fame is quite a thorough examination of the reception of Austen’s books, and even describes the huge success of the recent film adaptations (including a discussion of the wet shirt), and mentions the most popular Austen blogs and web communities. Nothing is left out, as far as I can tell, though it is understandably UK-centric. If you want to know what people have thought about Jane Austen and her books over the last 200 years, this book will tell you. The tone is scholarly but with enough Austen-like wry humour to make it enjoyable.

After reading this book I realize that I have been remiss in not reading Austen’s unfinished novels, now called Sanditon and The Watsons, as well as the story Lady Susan. I even have a Penguin edition of them sitting on my bookshelf so I have no excuse. I believe that will be my first new book of 2012!

Our Mutual Friend: Inner City School

The school at which young Charley Hexam had first learned from a book—the streets being, for pupils of his degree, the great Preparatory Establishment in which very much that is never unlearned is learned without and before book—was a miserable loft in an unsavoury yard. Its atmosphere was oppressive and disagreeable; it was crowded, noisy, and confusing; half the pupils dropped asleep, or fell into a state of waking stupefaction; the other half kept them in either condition by maintaining a monotonous droning noise, as if they were performing, out of time and tune, on a ruder sort of bagpipe. The teachers, animated solely by good intentions, had no idea of execution, and a lamentable jumble was the upshot of their kind endeavours.

It was a school for all ages, and for both sexes. The latter were kept apart, and the former were partitioned off into square assortments. But, all the place was pervaded by a grimly ludicrous pretence that every pupil was childish and innocent. This pretence, much favoured by the lady-visitors, led to the ghastliest absurdities. Young women old in the vices of the commonest and worst life, were expected to profess themselves enthralled by the good child's book, the Adventures of Little Margery, who resided in the village cottage by the mill; severely reproved and morally squashed the miller, when she was five and he was fifty; divided her porridge with singing birds; denied herself a new nankeen bonnet, on the ground that the turnips did not wear nankeen bonnets, neither did the sheep who ate them; who plaited straw and delivered the dreariest orations to all comers, at all sorts of unseasonable times. So, unwieldy young dredgers and hulking mudlarks were referred to the experiences of Thomas Twopence, who, having resolved not to rob (under circumstances of uncommon atrocity) his particular friend and benefactor, of eighteenpence, presently came into supernatural possession of three and sixpence, and lived a shining light ever afterwards. (Note, that the benefactor came to no good.) Several swaggering sinners had written their own biographies in the same strain; it always appearing from the lessons of those very boastful persons, that you were to do good, not because it WAS good, but because you were to make a good thing of it. Contrariwise, the adult pupils were taught to read (if they could learn) out of the New Testament; and by dint of stumbling over the syllables and keeping their bewildered eyes on the particular syllables coming round to their turn, were as absolutely ignorant of the sublime history, as if they had never seen or heard of it. An exceedingly and confoundingly perplexing jumble of a school, in fact, where black spirits and grey, red spirits and white, jumbled jumbled jumbled jumbled, jumbled every night. And particularly every Sunday night. For then, an inclined plane of unfortunate infants would be handed over to the prosiest and worst of all the teachers with good intentions, whom nobody older would endure. Who, taking his stand on the floor before them as chief executioner, would be attended by a conventional volunteer boy as executioner's assistant. When and where it first became the conventional system that a weary or inattentive infant in a class must have its face smoothed downward with a hot hand, or when and where the conventional volunteer boy first beheld such system in operation, and became inflamed with a sacred zeal to administer it, matters not. It was the function of the chief executioner to hold forth, and it was the function of the acolyte to dart at sleeping infants, yawning infants, restless infants, whimpering infants, and smooth their wretched faces; sometimes with one hand, as if he were anointing them for a whisker; sometimes with both hands, applied after the fashion of blinkers. And so the jumble would be in action in this department for a mortal hour; the exponent drawling on to My Dearert Childerrenerr, let us say, for example, about the beautiful coming to the Sepulchre; and repeating the word Sepulchre (commonly used among infants) five hundred times, and never once hinting what it meant; the conventional boy smoothing away right and left, as an infallible commentary; the whole hot-bed of flushed and exhausted infants exchanging measles, rashes, whooping-cough, fever, and stomach disorders, as if they were assembled in High Market for the purpose.

Even in this temple of good intentions, an exceptionally sharp boy exceptionally determined to learn, could learn something, and, having learned it, could impart it much better than the teachers; as being more knowing than they, and not at the disadvantage in which they stood towards the shrewder pupils. In this way it had come about that Charley Hexam had risen in the jumble, taught in the jumble, and been received from the jumble into a better school.

–Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend

Our Mutual Friend: The 1%

Georgiana had by this time seen a good deal of the house and its frequenters. As there was a certain handsome room with a billiard table in it—on the ground floor, eating out a backyard—which might have been Mr Lammle's office, or library, but was called by neither name, but simply Mr Lammle's room, so it would have been hard for stronger female heads than Georgiana's to determine whether its frequenters were men of pleasure or men of business. Between the room and the men there were strong points of general resemblance. Both were too gaudy, too slangey, too odorous of cigars, and too much given to horseflesh; the latter characteristic being exemplified in the room by its decorations, and in the men by their conversation. High-stepping horses seemed necessary to all Mr Lammle's friends—as necessary as their transaction of business together in a gipsy way at untimely hours of the morning and evening, and in rushes and snatches. There were friends who seemed to be always coming and going across the Channel, on errands about the Bourse, and Greek and Spanish and India and Mexican and par and premium and discount and three quarters and seven eighths. There were other friends who seemed to be always lolling and lounging in and out of the City, on questions of the Bourse, and Greek and Spanish and India and Mexican and par and premium and discount and three quarters and seven eighths. They were all feverish, boastful, and indefinably loose; and they all ate and drank a great deal; and made bets in eating and drinking. They all spoke of sums of money, and only mentioned the sums and left the money to be understood; as 'five and forty thousand Tom,' or 'Two hundred and twenty-two on every individual share in the lot Joe.' They seemed to divide the world into two classes of people; people who were making enormous fortunes, and people who were being enormously ruined. They were always in a hurry, and yet seemed to have nothing tangible to do; except a few of them (these, mostly asthmatic and thick-lipped) who were for ever demonstrating to the rest, with gold pencil-cases which they could hardly hold because of the big rings on their forefingers, how money was to be made. Lastly, they all swore at their grooms, and the grooms were not quite as respectful or complete as other men's grooms; seeming somehow to fall short of the groom point as their masters fell short of the gentleman point.

–Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend

Our Mutual Friend: Mr. Wegg reads to Mr. Boffin

'Hem!' began Wegg, 'This, Mr Boffin and Lady, is the first chapter of the first wollume of the Decline and Fall off—' here he looked hard at the book, and stopped.

'What's the matter, Wegg?'

'Why, it comes into my mind, do you know, sir,' said Wegg with an air of insinuating frankness (having first again looked hard at the book), 'that you made a little mistake this morning, which I had meant to set you right in, only something put it out of my head. I think you said Rooshan Empire, sir?'

'It is Rooshan; ain't it, Wegg?'

'No, sir. Roman. Roman.'

'What's the difference, Wegg?'

'The difference, sir?' Mr Wegg was faltering and in danger of breaking down, when a bright thought flashed upon him. 'The difference, sir? There you place me in a difficulty, Mr Boffin. Suffice it to observe, that the difference is best postponed to some other occasion when Mrs Boffin does not honour us with her company. In Mrs Boffin's presence, sir, we had better drop it.'

Mr Wegg thus came out of his disadvantage with quite a chivalrous air, and not only that, but by dint of repeating with a manly delicacy, 'In Mrs Boffin's presence, sir, we had better drop it!' turned the disadvantage on Boffin, who felt that he had committed himself in a very painful manner.

Then, Mr Wegg, in a dry unflinching way, entered on his task; going straight across country at everything that came before him; taking all the hard words, biographical and geographical; getting rather shaken by Hadrian, Trajan, and the Antonines; stumbling at Polybius (pronounced Polly Beeious, and supposed by Mr Boffin to be a Roman virgin, and by Mrs Boffin to be responsible for that necessity of dropping it); heavily unseated by Titus Antoninus Pius; up again and galloping smoothly with Augustus; finally, getting over the ground well with Commodus: who, under the appellation of Commodious, was held by Mr Boffin to have been quite unworthy of his English origin, and 'not to have acted up to his name' in his government of the Roman people. With the death of this personage, Mr Wegg terminated his first reading; long before which consummation several total eclipses of Mrs Boffin's candle behind her black velvet disc, would have been very alarming, but for being regularly accompanied by a potent smell of burnt pens when her feathers took fire, which acted as a restorative and woke her. Mr Wegg, having read on by rote and attached as few ideas as possible to the text, came out of the encounter fresh; but, Mr Boffin, who had soon laid down his unfinished pipe, and had ever since sat intently staring with his eyes and mind at the confounding enormities of the Romans, was so severely punished that he could hardly wish his literary friend Good-night, and articulate 'Tomorrow.'

'Commodious,' gasped Mr Boffin, staring at the moon, after letting Wegg out at the gate and fastening it: 'Commodious fights in that wild-beast-show, seven hundred and thirty-five times, in one character only! As if that wasn't stunning enough, a hundred lions is turned into the same wild-beast-show all at once! As if that wasn't stunning enough, Commodious, in another character, kills 'em all off in a hundred goes! As if that wasn't stunning enough, Vittle-us (and well named too) eats six millions' worth, English money, in seven months! Wegg takes it easy, but upon-my-soul to a old bird like myself these are scarers. And even now that Commodious is strangled, I don't see a way to our bettering ourselves.' Mr Boffin added as he turned his pensive steps towards the Bower and shook his head, 'I didn't think this morning there was half so many Scarers in Print. But I'm in for it now!'

—Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend

“A Jane Austen Education” by William Deresiewicz

A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me About Love, Friendship, and the Things That Really Matter
William Deresiewicz
Penguin Press
2011-04-28
272 pp.
9781594202889

I knew I was going to like this book when it began with chapter 1 on page 1. No introduction, preface, foreword, not even acknowledgements (they are at the end). William Deresiewicz just gets right down to business, which I very much appreciate. His business, in this case, is to tell the story of how he came to appreciate Jane Austen’s novels while working on his doctoral dissertation. He admits to being prejudiced against her, having been educated to believe modernist literature was the only literature that mattered. However, after reading Austen’s novels carefully and reflecting on his own life, he began to realize that her vision of human social life was not only relevant but sorely needed, as much today as in her time.

The cover art for this book is brilliant because he describes how, by reading Austen’s novels, he learned to put on the behaviour of mature, well-mannered, and socially functional man. Each novel had particular lessons for him, and the parallels with his personal life are quite striking. Perhaps some artistic license has been applied, but the point is that the challenges of modern life bear a striking resemblance to the dramas of Meryton, Hartfield, Bath, and Austen’s other locales.

From Emma he learned that it’s the small details of daily like that hold people and communities together (I posted a related quote here). With some chagrin he recognized himself in Emma, who felt herself to be above the humble concerns of the likes of Miss Bates.

Emma, who had it all, was forever discontented with the world around her—just like me, in my perpetual fog of resentful gloom. Instead it was Miss Bates—scraping by, facing a lonely old age, dependent on everybody else’s good will—who was the happy one. If her speech bubbled and flowed in an endless stream of little matters, that was only because, like Austen herself, she found everything around her so very interesting.

Things went no better for him with Pride and Prejudice. I have never been able to understand why so many readers admire (to put it mildly) Eliza Benet. It never seemed quite right to me, though I could not say why. Deresiewicz puts words to what I only felt instinctively: Elizabeth Benet is wrong for almost the entire book, and it nearly results in disaster for herself and her entire family. It is only through total humiliation that she learns to question herself, which to Deresiewicz amounts to growing up. For him, the lesson of Pride and Prejudice is that growing up requires humiliation, for that is the only way we can learn to temper our feelings and opinions with reason.

Northanger Abbey is not the most entertaining of Austen’s works, for me, but for Deresiewicz it came as a profound revelation. At the time he was struggling with his new role as teacher. The more he tried to cram his brilliant insights into his students, the more they slouched and sighed and stayed silent in class. He then began to look at Northanger Abbey as a story about different kinds of teaching and the effects they have.  Catherine Morland was taught by lurid novels and fashionable friends to view the world in a certain way, and she willingly complied. Then Henry Tilney comes along and tries to lead her to think about things for herself.

…students don’t come to school with open minds, they come with all the concepts they’ve already acquired … and they can’t wait to project them on to everything they read. If you’re in college you go hunting for “symbolism” or “foreshadowing” or “Christ figures.” If you’re in graduate school it’s “constructions of otherness” or “discourses of sexuality” or “the circulation of power.” Either way you end up like Catherine, with a very elaborate theory that bears no relationship to what’s actually going on in front of you. Henry challenged Catherine; my professor challenged his students; Austen challenged all of us. The job of a teacher, I now understood, is neither to affirm your students’ notions or fill them with your own. They job is to free them from both.

Sometimes I regret that I have no formal education in English literature, but a passage like this makes me think that it might actually be an advantage!

Now, about Mansfield Park… I can sense the eyes rolling already, but hold on. Fanny Price has to be Austen’s most disdained heroine, even though she is one of the few who is not in fact a disaster. Everyone around her, except for her cousin Edmund and brother William, are most certainly disasters. Both wealth and poverty have corrupted the people in her life, turning them into selfish beings who see others more as objects than as people. We see this especially at Mansfield Park itself, but it is no less true in Fanny’s own family, where only one brother and sister among many have developed a real sense of affection for her. Her own parents are barely aware of her existence. The Crawfords are even worse, swooping in from the big city and charming everyone with their witty banter, while they desperately try to fill their inner emptiness with intrigue and constant amusement, usually at someone else’s expense.

Deresiewicz saw the same dynamic exactly in the upper class New York clique he had been mysteriously admitted to. He soon learned that he was mainly there as a play thing and if he wanted to stay he had to provide a constant stream of funny stories about his disastrous love life. He was not human to them, no one was; they weren’t even human to themselves. One of them quipped that they are doing well if they haven’t committed suicide by 30, which gives a sense of the inner terrors of these purposeless heirs and heiresses. The author admits being bewitched by the glamour of the high fashion lifestyle, but Austen helped him see it for what it was so he could free himself from it. It also showed him that Fanny, far from being a bland doormat, was in fact the most richly human of them all. She had strong feelings, but had the self-control and dignity not to impose them on others. She could entertain herself, with books and her imagination, while the only entertainment the other young people could come up with was to stage a scandalous play as an excuse to flirt with people they shouldn’t be flirting with. Most importantly, she had a sense of her social duty to others, and made herself useful to everyone around her. This is the antithesis of the likes of the Crawfords, who assumed that everyone else was placed on earth to be of use to them. Though Fanny suffered much abuse and lack of appreciation, she still had infinitely more peace of mind than someone like Tom Bertram, who had all the money and freedom in the world and destroyed himself with it. Austen’s message is simple and timeless: the way of self-will and self-indulgence leads to despair and destruction. Only selflessness and attending to others can bring happiness and the affection of other good people.

Persuasion’s Anne Elliot is another Plain Jane character, taken for granted by everyone, but still making herself useful and helping where she can. For Deresiewicz, Persuasion is as much about finding friends as about finding love. Anne’s family haven’t the slightest interest in her, as she won’t join their game of social climbing, and so she has to look in unconventional places for friendship, namely the navy and her old school friend, the now destitute and disabled Mrs. Smith. People that her father sneers at turn out to be full of warmth and welcome and appreciation for herself rather than for her status. Deresiewicz also points out that Anne makes friends with men, showing that where there is a true meeting of the minds, neither class nor sex is relevant. Mrs. Smith is perhaps the most selfless model of friendship. Had she kept her mouth shut and allowed Anne to marry the rascal Mr. Elliot, she could have benefited greatly from Anne’s generosity. But as a friend she had to tell her the truth about Mr. Elliot. This relates to one of the key lessons that Deresiewicz takes away from Persuasion: being a true friend sometimes means having uncomfortable conversations and even challenging your friends when you think they are on the wrong track. Deresiewicz began to put this into practice by confronting a friend with a drinking problem. Not surprisingly his friend stopped talking to him, but eventually his friend saw the truth of the matter and thanked him for having spoken up. Sometimes being a good friend means disagreeing with your friend, no matter what it costs you.

Austen is often seen as a romantic writer, since her novels tend to end with weddings, but it’s really only Sense and Sensibility that Deresiewicz sees as being principally about love. It contrasts two approaches to love, personified by hyper-romantic Marianne and sensible Elinor. In Austen’s time, as in our own, there was a general belief in the romantic ideal—love at first sight, soul mates, violins and fireworks. However, the folly of this approach is brought home to Marianne in the most humiliating way. She did not take the time to ascertain who this young man really was, and so she was easily deceived. Elinor, on the other hand, when she met Edward Ferrars, proceeded slowly, carefully, and got to know his ideas on all subjects and became acquainted with his true character. To Marianne this seems cold and lifeless, but as Deresiewicz points out, “Elinor’s way … is every bit as intuitive as Marianne’s, and, if anything, takes place at a deeper level.” Elinor does not “fall” in love suddenly (and literally!) as Marianne does, her love grows organically as she learns more about Edward’s fine character. Deresiewicz again: “Austen believed that if a person’s character is good, love increases with simple familiarity.” So Austen is not against love, she is against the false fantasy of romance that is so often mistaken for love.

…making a mature decision, patiently feeling and thinking your way toward mutual respect and regard and esteem, accepting the responsibility of challenging and being challenged, refusing both the comforts of fantasy and the cynicism of calculation—that is the really radical, the really original, the really heroic move. That is the true freedom; that is the way you lift yourself above the bondage of impulse and cliché.

If you are wondering what effect this had on Deresiewicz, it did no less than convert him from confirmed bachelor to the marrying kind. He ends the book with an allusion to another literary Jane by writing, “Reader, I married her.” The irony is that Austen herself never chose marriage, despite having had plenty of admirers and at least one offer. She knew that marriage entailed many duties and many pregnancies, any one of which could kill her. It is a chilling fact that all of her brothers’ wives died in childbirth. She chose to remain single and revelled in her freedom to live and to write. Unfortunately for her and for us, that freedom did not last long and she died of a mysterious disease at only 41 years of age.

Despite the slightly corny ending I greatly enjoyed A Jane Austen Education. It made me see new aspects of all of Austen’s books, which I will dutifully try to unsee the next time I read them. I wouldn’t want to be like Catherine Morland! I will instead try to pay attention to the small details, keep my opinions in check, avoid being charmed by vivacity, look for connections in unexpected places, and, little by little, gradually deepen my knowledge and love for these wonderful books.

“The Warden” by Anthony Trollope

The Warden [ebook] [audiobook]
Anthony Trollope
Oxford University Press, USA
2009-06-01
336 pp.
9780199537785

In former times great objects were attained by great work. When evils were to be reformed, reformers set about their heavy task with grave decorum and laborious argument. An age was occupied in proving a grievance, and philosophical researches were printed in folio pages, which it took a life to write, and an eternity to read. We get on now with a lighter step, and quicker: ridicule is found to be more convincing than argument, imaginary agonies touch more than true sorrows, and monthly novels convince, when learned quartos fail to do so. If the world is to be set right, the work will be done by shilling numbers.

Of all such reformers Mr Sentiment is the most powerful. It is incredible the number of evil practices he has put down: it is to be feared he will soon lack subjects, and that when he has made the working classes comfortable, and got bitter beer put into proper-sized pint bottles, there will be nothing further for him left to do. Mr Sentiment is certainly a very powerful man, and perhaps not the less so that his good poor people are so very good; his hard rich people so very hard; and the genuinely honest so very honest. Namby-pamby in these days is not thrown away if it be introduced in the proper quarters. Divine peeresses are no longer interesting, though possessed of every virtue; but a pattern peasant or an immaculate manufacturing hero may talk as much twaddle as one of Mrs Ratcliffe's heroines, and still be listened to. Perhaps, however, Mr Sentiment's great attraction is in his second-rate characters. If his heroes and heroines walk upon stilts, as heroes and heroines, I fear, ever must, their attendant satellites are as natural as though one met them in the street: they walk and talk like men and women, and live among our friends a rattling, lively life; yes, live, and will live till the names of their calling shall be forgotten in their own, and Buckett and Mrs Gamp will be the only words left to us to signify a detective police officer or a monthly nurse.

This swipe at Dickens in chapter 15 of The Warden was my first serious hint that Mr. Trollope and I were not going to see eye to eye. All seemed well at first: it was discovered that a charitable foundation (a home for retired wool-carders) had increased its value and income dramatically, but the increase had gone to the warden of the establishment, rather than to its occupants, so that he (a clergyman) was living in ease and luxury while they ate soup. An earnest young man took up the cause, and the church establishment naturally opposed him. So far so good. The church obviously had no leg to stand on, so I expected the situation to be rectified, one way or another. I could not have been more wrong. Not only was the situation not rectified, the elderly wool-carders were punished for having the temerity to demand a fair distribution of the income intended for them. Their ingratitude was their downfall, and they ended up with less than they had before and no warden to be their friend.

"Some gentleman will probably take my place here very soon, and I strongly advise you to be prepared to receive him in a kindly spirit and to raise no further question among yourselves as to the amount of his income. Were you to succeed in lessening what he has to receive, you would not increase your own allowance. The surplus would not go to you; your wants are adequately provided for, and your position could hardly be improved."

"God bless your reverence, we knows it," said Spriggs.

"It's all true, your reverence," said Skulpit. "We sees it all now."

"Yes, Mr Harding," said Bunce, opening his mouth for the first time; "I believe they do understand it now, now that they've driven from under the same roof with them such a master as not one of them will ever know again,—now that they're like to be in sore want of a friend."

…

Poor old men! how could they be cordial with their sore consciences and shamed faces? how could they bid God bless him with hearty voices and a true benison, knowing, as they did, that their vile cabal had driven him from his happy home, and sent him in his old age to seek shelter under a strange roof-tree?

As you can see the wool-carders are suitably repentant, not least for losing the extra twopence a day they received from the “open-handed” warden (who got £800 a year). Trollope follows this up with a pathetic diptych in which cupidity pollutes a pensioner’s deathbed and the only loyal inmate attempts to forgive his brethren for their sins:

The poor old bed-ridden creature still kept Mr Harding's hand in his own, and the warden thought that he had met with something like warmth of feeling in the one of all his subjects from whom it was the least likely to be expected; for poor old Bell had nearly outlived all human feelings. "And your reverence," said he, and then he paused, while his old palsied head shook horribly, and his shrivelled cheeks sank lower within his jaws, and his glazy eye gleamed with a momentary light; "and your reverence, shall we get the hundred a year, then?"

How gently did Mr Harding try to extinguish the false hope of money which had been so wretchedly raised to disturb the quiet of the dying man! One other week and his mortal coil would be shuffled off; in one short week would God resume his soul, and set it apart for its irrevocable doom; seven more tedious days and nights of senseless inactivity, and all would be over for poor Bell in this world; and yet, with his last audible words, he was demanding his moneyed rights, and asserting himself to be the proper heir of John Hiram's bounty! Not on him, poor sinner as he was, be the load of such sin!

Mr Harding returned to his parlour, meditating with a sick heart on what he had seen, and Bunce with him. We will not describe the parting of these two good men, for good men they were. It was in vain that the late warden endeavoured to comfort the heart of the old bedesman; poor old Bunce felt that his days of comfort were gone. The hospital had to him been a happy home, but it could be so no longer. He had had honour there, and friendship; he had recognised his master, and been recognised; all his wants, both of soul and body, had been supplied, and he had been a happy man. He wept grievously as he parted from his friend, and the tears of an old man are bitter. "It is all over for me in this world," said he, as he gave the last squeeze to Mr Harding's hand; "I have now to forgive those who have injured me;—and to die."

In the end, the warden leaves without being replaced, and the sinful wool-carders drop off one by one, “with no kind friend to solace their last moments, with no wealthy neighbour to administer comforts and ease the stings of death.” Even their places are not filled by other retired workers, so the rents just accumulate in the bank, benefiting no one. This, we are led to believe, is the natural consequence of trying to upset the natural order of things, that is, the system whereby the poor must be eternally grateful for the crumbs that fall from the tables of the wealthy. To raise workers out of poverty would be anathema, laughable, but to receive great wealth unearned is an honour and a right. Suffice it to say that Trollope was a champion of the status quo, and I am more than glad that it is his kind who were made to reform and repent.

The Warden: Breaking the muslin ranks

The party went off as such parties do. There were fat old ladies, in fine silk dresses, and slim young ladies, in gauzy muslin frocks; old gentlemen stood up with their backs to the empty fire-place, looking by no means so comfortable as they would have done in their own arm-chairs at home; and young gentlemen, rather stiff about the neck, clustered near the door, not as yet sufficiently in courage to attack the muslin frocks, who awaited the battle, drawn up in a semicircular array. The warden endeavoured to induce a charge, but failed signally, not having the tact of a general; his daughter did what she could to comfort the forces under her command, who took in refreshing rations of cake and tea, and patiently looked for the coming engagement: but she herself, Eleanor, had no spirit for the work; the only enemy whose lance she cared to encounter was not there, and she and others were somewhat dull.

[Music begins…]

How comes it that now, when all should be silent, when courtesy, if not taste, should make men listen,—how is it at this moment the black-coated corps leave their retreat and begin skirmishing? One by one they creep forth, and fire off little guns timidly, and without precision. Ah, my men, efforts such as these will take no cities, even though the enemy should be never so open to assault. At length a more deadly artillery is brought to bear; slowly, but with effect, the advance is made; the muslin ranks are broken, and fall into confusion; the formidable array of chairs gives way; the battle is no longer between opposing regiments, but hand to hand, and foot to foot with single combatants, as in the glorious days of old, when fighting was really noble. In corners, and under the shadow of curtains, behind sofas and half hidden by doors, in retiring windows, and sheltered by hanging tapestry, are blows given and returned, fatal, incurable, dealing death.

—Anthony Trollope, The Warden

Chuzzlewit: The third declension always gets to me too

…an ancient scholar read the inscription, which was in Latin; not in English; that would never do. It gave great satisfaction; especially every time there was a good long substantive in the third declension, ablative case, with an adjective to match; at which periods the assembly became very tender, and were much affected.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

Martin Chuzzlewit: It was a dark and stormy night…

The heavy rain beat down the tender branches of vine and jessamine, and trampled on them in its fury; and when the lightning gleamed it showed the tearful leaves shivering and cowering together at the window, and tapping at it urgently, as if beseeching to be sheltered from the dismal night.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

Martin Chuzzlewit: Longing for Liberty

If the bird-fancier had been at home, as he ought to have been, there would have been no great harm in this; but he was out, and his shop was closed. The shutters were down certainly; and in every pane of glass there was at least one tiny bird in a tiny bird-cage, twittering and hopping his little ballet of despair, and knocking his head against the roof; while one unhappy goldfinch who lived outside a red villa with his name on the door, drew the water for his own drinking, and mutely appealed to some good man to drop a farthing's-worth of poison in it.

---

Mr Mould and his men had not exaggerated the grandeur of the arrangements. They were splendid. The four hearse-horses, especially, reared and pranced, and showed their highest action, as if they knew a man was dead, and triumphed in it. 'They break us, drive us, ride us; ill-treat, abuse, and maim us for their pleasure—But they die; Hurrah, they die!'

---

He then learned that the Watertoast Association sympathized with a certain Public Man in Ireland, who held a contest upon certain points with England; and that they did so, because they didn't love England at all—not by any means because they loved Ireland much; being indeed horribly jealous and distrustful of its people always, and only tolerating them because of their working hard, which made them very useful; labour being held in greater indignity in the simple republic than in any other country upon earth. This rendered Martin curious to see what grounds of sympathy the Watertoast Association put forth; nor was he long in suspense, for the General rose to read a letter to the Public Man, which with his own hands he had written.

'Thus,' said the General, 'thus, my friends and fellow-citizens, it runs:

'"SIR—I address you on behalf of the Watertoast Association of United Sympathisers. It is founded, sir, in the great republic of America! and now holds its breath, and swells the blue veins in its forehead nigh to bursting, as it watches, sir, with feverish intensity and sympathetic ardour, your noble efforts in the cause of Freedom."'

At the name of Freedom, and at every repetition of that name, all the Sympathisers roared aloud; cheering with nine times nine, and nine times over.

'"In Freedom's name, sir—holy Freedom—I address you. In Freedom's name, I send herewith a contribution to the funds of your society. In Freedom's name, sir, I advert with indignation and disgust to that accursed animal, with gore-stained whiskers, whose rampant cruelty and fiery lust have ever been a scourge, a torment to the world.…

'"I allude, sir, to the British Lion.

'"Devoted, mind and body, heart and soul, to Freedom, sir—to Freedom, blessed solace to the snail upon the cellar-door, the oyster in his pearly bed, the still mite in his home of cheese, the very winkle of your country in his shelly lair—in her unsullied name, we offer you our sympathy. Oh, sir, in this our cherished and our happy land, her fires burn bright and clear and smokeless; once lighted up in yours, the lion shall be roasted whole.

'"I am, sir, in Freedom's name,

'"Your affectionate friend and faithful Sympathiser,

'"CYRUS CHOKE,

'"General, U.S.M."'

It happened that just as the General began to read this letter, the railroad train arrived, bringing a new mail from England; and a packet had been handed in to the Secretary, which during its perusal and the frequent cheerings in homage to freedom, he had opened. Now, its contents disturbed him very much, and the moment the General sat down, he hurried to his side, and placed in his hand a letter and several printed extracts from English newspapers; to which, in a state of infinite excitement, he called his immediate attention.

The General, being greatly heated by his own composition, was in a fit state to receive any inflammable influence; but he had no sooner possessed himself of the contents of these documents, than a change came over his face, involving such a huge amount of choler and passion, that the noisy concourse were silent in a moment, in very wonder at the sight of him.

'My friends!' cried the General, rising; 'my friends and fellow citizens, we have been mistaken in this man.'

'In what man?' was the cry.

'In this,' panted the General, holding up the letter he had read aloud a few minutes before. 'I find that he has been, and is, the advocate—consistent in it always too—of Nigger emancipation!'

If anything beneath the sky be real, those Sons of Freedom would have pistolled, stabbed—in some way slain—that man by coward hands and murderous violence, if he had stood among them at that time. The most confiding of their own countrymen would not have wagered then—no, nor would they ever peril—one dunghill straw, upon the life of any man in such a strait. They tore the letter, cast the fragments in the air, trod down the pieces as they fell; and yelled, and groaned, and hissed, till they could cry no longer.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

Martin Chuzzlewit: No Satire Please, We’re American

'You are right. So very right, that I believe no satirist could breathe this air. If another Juvenal or Swift could rise up among us to-morrow, he would be hunted down. If you have any knowledge of our literature, and can give me the name of any man, American born and bred, who has anatomized our follies as a people, and not as this or that party; and who has escaped the foulest and most brutal slander, the most inveterate hatred and intolerant pursuit; it will be a strange name in my ears, believe me. In some cases I could name to you, where a native writer has ventured on the most harmless and good-humoured illustrations of our vices or defects, it has been found necessary to announce, that in a second edition the passage has been expunged, or altered, or explained away, or patched into praise.'

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

It seems to me that this is what happens today when anyone, though mainly progressives, it has to be said, suggests some way to improve the country. They are immediately slammed, their allegiance and motives questioned with maximum snark, and that is the end of the discussion. This seems like a new phenomenon, but from what Dickens writes in Martin Chuzzlewit, the polarization we see today is as American as apple pie.

Martin Chuzzlewit: Americans, Dollars, and Books

It was rather barren of interest, to say the truth; and the greater part of it may be summed up in one word. Dollars. All their cares, hopes, joys, affections, virtues, and associations, seemed to be melted down into dollars. Whatever the chance contributions that fell into the slow cauldron of their talk, they made the gruel thick and slab with dollars. Men were weighed by their dollars, measures gauged by their dollars; life was auctioneered, appraised, put up, and knocked down for its dollars. The next respectable thing to dollars was any venture having their attainment for its end. The more of that worthless ballast, honour and fair-dealing, which any man cast overboard from the ship of his Good Name and Good Intent, the more ample stowage-room he had for dollars. Make commerce one huge lie and mighty theft. Deface the banner of the nation for an idle rag; pollute it star by star; and cut out stripe by stripe as from the arm of a degraded soldier. Do anything for dollars! What is a flag to THEM!

One who rides at all hazards of limb and life in the chase of a fox, will prefer to ride recklessly at most times. So it was with these gentlemen. He was the greatest patriot, in their eyes, who brawled the loudest, and who cared the least for decency. He was their champion who, in the brutal fury of his own pursuit, could cast no stigma upon them for the hot knavery of theirs. Thus, Martin learned in the five minutes' straggling talk about the stove, that to carry pistols into legislative assemblies, and swords in sticks, and other such peaceful toys; to seize opponents by the throat, as dogs or rats might do; to bluster, bully, and overbear by personal assailment; were glowing deeds. Not thrusts and stabs at Freedom, striking far deeper into her House of Life than any sultan's scimitar could reach; but rare incense on her altars, having a grateful scent in patriotic nostrils, and curling upward to the seventh heaven of Fame.

Once or twice, when there was a pause, Martin asked such questions as naturally occurred to him, being a stranger, about the national poets, the theatre, literature, and the arts. But the information which these gentlemen were in a condition to give him on such topics, did not extend beyond the effusions of such master-spirits of the time as Colonel Diver, Mr Jefferson Brick, and others; renowned, as it appeared, for excellence in the achievement of a peculiar style of broadside essay called 'a screamer.'

'We are a busy people, sir,' said one of the captains, who was from the West, 'and have no time for reading mere notions. We don't mind 'em if they come to us in newspapers along with almighty strong stuff of another sort, but darn your books.'

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

I wonder if this is the sort of reception that Charles Dickens got when he toured the U.S.? Things really haven’t changed much in the American business community, and I’ve even heard talk of pistols in legislatures recently. As for “screamers,” I think a certain 24-hour “news” channel has that covered. Plus ça change…

Martin Chuzzlewit: The Bookshops

But what were even gold and silver, precious stones and clockwork, to the bookshops, whence a pleasant smell of paper freshly pressed came issuing forth, awakening instant recollections of some new grammar had at school, long time ago, with 'Master Pinch, Grove House Academy,' inscribed in faultless writing on the fly-leaf! That whiff of russia leather, too, and all those rows on rows of volumes neatly ranged within—what happiness did they suggest! And in the window were the spick-and-span new works from London, with the title-pages, and sometimes even the first page of the first chapter, laid wide open; tempting unwary men to begin to read the book, and then, in the impossibility of turning over, to rush blindly in, and buy it! Here too were the dainty frontispiece and trim vignette, pointing like handposts on the outskirts of great cities, to the rich stock of incident beyond; and store of books, with many a grave portrait and time-honoured name, whose matter he knew well, and would have given mines to have, in any form, upon the narrow shelf beside his bed at Mr Pecksniff's. What a heart-breaking shop it was!

There was another; not quite so bad at first, but still a trying shop; where children's books were sold, and where poor Robinson Crusoe stood alone in his might, with dog and hatchet, goat-skin cap and fowling-pieces; calmly surveying Philip Quarn and the host of imitators round him, and calling Mr Pinch to witness that he, of all the crowd, impressed one solitary footprint on the shore of boyish memory, whereof the tread of generations should not stir the lightest grain of sand. And there too were the Persian tales, with flying chests and students of enchanted books shut up for years in caverns; and there too was Abudah, the merchant, with the terrible little old woman hobbling out of the box in his bedroom; and there the mighty talisman, the rare Arabian Nights, with Cassim Baba, divided by four, like the ghost of a dreadful sum, hanging up, all gory, in the robbers' cave. Which matchless wonders, coming fast on Mr Pinch's mind, did so rub up and chafe that wonderful lamp within him, that when he turned his face towards the busy street, a crowd of phantoms waited on his pleasure, and he lived again, with new delight, the happy days before the Pecksniff era.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

Martin Chuzzlewit: You’re Getting Sleepy…

It seems a weary traveller on the road could scarcely do better than to stop at the Blue Dragon Inn for a good night’s rest…

As this fair matron sat beside the fire, she glanced occasionally with all the pride of ownership, about the room; which was a large apartment, such as one may see in country places, with a low roof and a sunken flooring, all downhill from the door, and a descent of two steps on the inside so exquisitely unexpected, that strangers, despite the most elaborate cautioning, usually dived in head first, as into a plunging-bath. It was none of your frivolous and preposterously bright bedrooms, where nobody can close an eye with any kind of propriety or decent regard to the association of ideas; but it was a good, dull, leaden, drowsy place, where every article of furniture reminded you that you came there to sleep, and that you were expected to go to sleep. There was no wakeful reflection of the fire there, as in your modern chambers, which upon the darkest nights have a watchful consciousness of French polish; the old Spanish mahogany winked at it now and then, as a dozing cat or dog might, nothing more. The very size and shape, and hopeless immovability of the bedstead, and wardrobe, and in a minor degree of even the chairs and tables, provoked sleep; they were plainly apoplectic and disposed to snore. There were no staring portraits to remonstrate with you for being lazy; no round-eyed birds upon the curtains, disgustingly wide awake, and insufferably prying. The thick neutral hangings, and the dark blinds, and the heavy heap of bed-clothes, were all designed to hold in sleep, and act as nonconductors to the day and getting up. Even the old stuffed fox upon the top of the wardrobe was devoid of any spark of vigilance, for his glass eye had fallen out, and he slumbered as he stood.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

Martin Chuzzlewit: The Angry Wind

I came across this passage last night, which is quite fitting as we have a wind storm today. March is indeed coming in like a lion.

Out upon the angry wind! how from sighing, it began to bluster round the merry forge, banging at the wicket, and grumbling in the chimney, as if it bullied the jolly bellows for doing anything to order. And what an impotent swaggerer it was too, for all its noise; for if it had any influence on that hoarse companion, it was but to make him roar his cheerful song the louder, and by consequence to make the fire burn the brighter, and the sparks to dance more gayly yet; at length, they whizzed so madly round and round, that it was too much for such a surly wind to bear; so off it flew with a howl giving the old sign before the ale-house door such a cuff as it went, that the Blue Dragon was more rampant than usual ever afterwards, and indeed, before Christmas, reared clean out of its crazy frame.

It was small tyranny for a respectable wind to go wreaking its vengeance on such poor creatures as the fallen leaves, but this wind happening to come up with a great heap of them just after venting its humour on the insulted Dragon, did so disperse and scatter them that they fled away, pell-mell, some here, some there, rolling over each other, whirling round and round upon their thin edges, taking frantic flights into the air, and playing all manner of extraordinary gambols in the extremity of their distress. Nor was this enough for its malicious fury; for not content with driving them abroad, it charged small parties of them and hunted them into the wheel wright's saw-pit, and below the planks and timbers in the yard, and, scattering the sawdust in the air, it looked for them underneath, and when it did meet with any, whew! how it drove them on and followed at their heels!

The scared leaves only flew the faster for all this, and a giddy chase it was; for they got into unfrequented places, where there was no outlet, and where their pursuer kept them eddying round and round at his pleasure; and they crept under the eaves of houses, and clung tightly to the sides of hay-ricks, like bats; and tore in at open chamber windows, and cowered close to hedges; and, in short, went anywhere for safety. But the oddest feat they achieved was, to take advantage of the sudden opening of Mr Pecksniff's front-door, to dash wildly into his passage; whither the wind following close upon them, and finding the back-door open, incontinently blew out the lighted candle held by Miss Pecksniff, and slammed the front-door against Mr Pecksniff who was at that moment entering, with such violence, that in the twinkling of an eye he lay on his back at the bottom of the steps. Being by this time weary of such trifling performances, the boisterous rover hurried away rejoicing, roaring over moor and meadow, hill and flat, until it got out to sea, where it met with other winds similarly disposed, and made a night of it.

—Charles Dickens, Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit

The Pickwick Papers: Shadow and Light

Let us leave our old friend in one of those moments of unmixed happiness, of which, if we seek them, there are ever some, to cheer our transitory existence here. There are dark shadows on the earth, but its lights are stronger in the contrast. Some men, like bats or owls, have better eyes for the darkness than for the light. We, who have no such optical powers, are better pleased to take our last parting look at the visionary companions of many solitary hours, when the brief sunshine of the world is blazing full upon them.

—Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

This is a bit rich coming from Dickens, whose stock in trade consisted mainly of miserable orphans, incarcerated debtors, crooked lawyers, and criminals of all kinds, but it’s a good thought nonetheless.

The Pickwick Papers: Charity

‘What do you think? Is there any chance of their permanent reformation?’

Perker shrugged his shoulders doubtfully, but observing Mr. Pickwick’s anxious and disappointed look, rejoined:

‘Of course there is a chance. I hope it may prove a good one. They are unquestionably penitent now; but then, you know, they have the recollection of very recent suffering fresh upon them. What they may become, when that fades away, is a problem that neither you nor I can solve. However, my dear sir,’ added Perker, laying his hand on Mr. Pickwick’s shoulder, ‘your object is equally honourable, whatever the result is. Whether that species of benevolence which is so very cautious and long-sighted that it is seldom exercised at all, lest its owner should be imposed upon, and so wounded in his self-love, be real charity or a worldly counterfeit, I leave to wiser heads than mine to determine. But if those two fellows were to commit a burglary to-morrow, my opinion of this action would be equally high.’

—Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

The Pickwick Papers: Christmas

And numerous indeed are the hearts to which Christmas brings a brief season of happiness and enjoyment. How many families, whose members have been dispersed and scattered far and wide, in the restless struggles of life, are then reunited, and meet once again in that happy state of companionship and mutual good-will, which is a source of such pure and unalloyed delight, and one so incompatible with the cares and sorrows of the world, that the religious belief of the most civilised nations, and the rude traditions of the roughest savages, alike number it among the first joys of a future condition of existence, provided for the blest and happy! How many old recollections, and how many dormant sympathies, does Christmas time awaken!

We write these words now, many miles distant from the spot at which, year after year, we met on that day, a merry and joyous circle. Many of the hearts that throbbed so gaily then, have ceased to beat; many of the looks that shone so brightly then, have ceased to glow; the hands we grasped have grown cold; the eyes we sought have hid their lustre in the grave; and yet the old house, the room, the merry voices and smiling faces, the jest, the laugh, the most minute and trivial circumstances connected with those happy meetings, crowd upon our mind at each recurrence of the season, as if the last assemblage had been but yesterday! Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home!

—Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

The Pickwick Papers: Very Dull Fellows Indeed

I wonder if the Ghost Hunters have thought of this? (Apologies for the lack of paragraph breaks, that’s how it was originally printed.)

'I knew another man—let me see—forty years ago now—who took an old, damp, rotten set of chambers, in one of the most ancient inns, that had been shut up and empty for years and years before. There were lots of old women's stories about the place, and it certainly was very far from being a cheerful one; but he was poor, and the rooms were cheap, and that would have been quite a sufficient reason for him, if they had been ten times worse than they really were. He was obliged to take some mouldering fixtures that were on the place, and, among the rest, was a great lumbering wooden press for papers, with large glass doors, and a green curtain inside; a pretty useless thing for him, for he had no papers to put in it; and as to his clothes, he carried them about with him, and that wasn't very hard work, either. Well, he had moved in all his furniture—it wasn't quite a truck-full—and had sprinkled it about the room, so as to make the four chairs look as much like a dozen as possible, and was sitting down before the fire at night, drinking the first glass of two gallons of whisky he had ordered on credit, wondering whether it would ever be paid for, and if so, in how many years' time, when his eyes encountered the glass doors of the wooden press. "Ah," says he, "if I hadn't been obliged to take that ugly article at the old broker's valuation, I might have got something comfortable for the money. I'll tell you what it is, old fellow," he said, speaking aloud to the press, having nothing else to speak to, "if it wouldn't cost more to break up your old carcass, than it would ever be worth afterward, I'd have a fire out of you in less than no time." He had hardly spoken the words, when a sound resembling a faint groan, appeared to issue from the interior of the case. It startled him at first, but thinking, on a moment's reflection, that it must be some young fellow in the next chamber, who had been dining out, he put his feet on the fender, and raised the poker to stir the fire. At that moment, the sound was repeated; and one of the glass doors slowly opening, disclosed a pale and emaciated figure in soiled and worn apparel, standing erect in the press. The figure was tall and thin, and the countenance expressive of care and anxiety; but there was something in the hue of the skin, and gaunt and unearthly appearance of the whole form, which no being of this world was ever seen to wear. "Who are you?" said the new tenant, turning very pale; poising the poker in his hand, however, and taking a very decent aim at the countenance of the figure. "Who are you?" "Don't throw that poker at me," replied the form; "if you hurled it with ever so sure an aim, it would pass through me, without resistance, and expend its force on the wood behind. I am a spirit." "And pray, what do you want here?" faltered the tenant. "In this room," replied the apparition, "my worldly ruin was worked, and I and my children beggared. In this press, the papers in a long, long suit, which accumulated for years, were deposited. In this room, when I had died of grief, and long-deferred hope, two wily harpies divided the wealth for which I had contested during a wretched existence, and of which, at last, not one farthing was left for my unhappy descendants. I terrified them from the spot, and since that day have prowled by night—the only period at which I can revisit the earth—about the scenes of my long-protracted misery. This apartment is mine: leave it to me." "If you insist upon making your appearance here," said the tenant, who had had time to collect his presence of mind during this prosy statement of the ghost's, "I shall give up possession with the greatest pleasure; but I should like to ask you one question, if you will allow me." "Say on," said the apparition sternly. "Well," said the tenant, "I don't apply the observation personally to you, because it is equally applicable to most of the ghosts I ever heard of; but it does appear to me somewhat inconsistent, that when you have an opportunity of visiting the fairest spots of earth—for I suppose space is nothing to you—you should always return exactly to the very places where you have been most miserable." "Egad, that's very true; I never thought of that before," said the ghost. "You see, Sir," pursued the tenant, "this is a very uncomfortable room. From the appearance of that press, I should be disposed to say that it is not wholly free from bugs; and I really think you might find much more comfortable quarters: to say nothing of the climate of London, which is extremely disagreeable." "You are very right, Sir," said the ghost politely, "it never struck me till now; I'll try change of air directly"—and, in fact, he began to vanish as he spoke; his legs, indeed, had quite disappeared. "And if, Sir," said the tenant, calling after him, "if you WOULD have the goodness to suggest to the other ladies and gentlemen who are now engaged in haunting old empty houses, that they might be much more comfortable elsewhere, you will confer a very great benefit on society." "I will," replied the ghost; "we must be dull fellows—very dull fellows, indeed; I can't imagine how we can have been so stupid." With these words, the spirit disappeared; and what is rather remarkable,' added the old man, with a shrewd look round the table, 'he never came back again.'

—Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers