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'
'
'
'
‘Lovely creetur,’' repeated Sam.
'Tain't in poetry, is it?' interposed his father.
No, no,' replied Sam.
Wery glad to hear it,' said Mr Weller. 'Poetry's unnat'ral; no man ever
talked poetry 'cept a beadle on boxin'-day, or Warren's blackin', or
Rowland's oil, or some of them low fellows; never you let yourself down
to talk poetry, my boy. Begin agin, Sammy.'
Mr Weller resumed his pipe with critical solemnity, and Sam once
more commenced, and read as follows:
'‘Lovely creetur I feel myself a damned - ’' 'That ain't proper,' said Mr
Weller, taking his pipe from his mouth.
'
'
No; it ain't ‘damned,’' observed Sam, holding the letter up to the light,
it's ‘shamed,’ there's a blot there - ’I feel myself ashamed.’'
'Wery good,' said Mr Weller. 'Go on.'
'
‘Feel myself ashamed, and completely cir - ' I forget what this here
word is,' said Sam, scratching his head with the pen, in vain attempts
to remember.
'Why don't you look at it, then?' inquired Mr Weller.
'
‘
So I am a-lookin' at it,' replied Sam, 'but there's another blot. Here's a
c,’ and a ‘i,’ and a ‘d.’'
'
'
'
Circumwented, p'raps,' suggested Mr Weller.
No, it ain't that,' said Sam, '‘circumscribed’; that's it.'
That ain't as good a word as ‘circumwented,’ Sammy,' said Mr Weller
gravely.
'
'
'
'
Think not?' said Sam.
Nothin' like it,' replied his father.
But don't you think it means more?' inquired Sam.
Vell p'raps it's a more tenderer word,' said Mr Weller, after a few
moments' reflection. 'Go on, Sammy.'
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