Chapter XLV

Descriptive Of An Affecting Interview Between Mr Samuel Weller

And A Family Party. Mr Pickwick Makes A Tour Of The

Diminutive World He Inhabits, And Resolves To Mix With It, In

Future, As Little As Possible

A few mornings after his incarceration, Mr Samuel Weller, having

arranged his master's room with all possible care, and seen him

comfortably seated over his books and papers, withdrew to employ

himself for an hour or two to come, as he best could. It was a fine

morning, and it occurred to Sam that a pint of porter in the open air

would lighten his next quarter of an hour or so, as well as any little

amusement in which he could indulge.

Having arrived at this conclusion, he betook himself to the tap. Having

purchased the beer, and obtained, moreover, the day-but-one-before-

yesterday's paper, he repaired to the skittle- ground, and seating

himself on a bench, proceeded to enjoy himself in a very sedate and

methodical manner.

First of all, he took a refreshing draught of the beer, and then he

looked up at a window, and bestowed a platonic wink on a young lady

who was peeling potatoes thereat. Then he opened the paper, and

folded it so as to get the police reports outwards; and this being a

vexatious and difficult thing to do, when there is any wind stirring, he

took another draught of the beer when he had accomplished it. Then,

he read two lines of the paper, and stopped short to look at a couple of

men who were finishing a game at rackets, which, being concluded, he

cried out 'wery good,' in an approving manner, and looked round upon

the spectators, to ascertain whether their sentiments coincided with

his own. This involved the necessity of looking up at the windows also;

and as the young lady was still there, it was an act of common

politeness to wink again, and to drink to her good health in dumb

show, in another draught of the beer, which Sam did; and having

frowned hideously upon a small boy who had noted this latter

proceeding with open eyes, he threw one leg over the other, and,

holding the newspaper in both hands, began to read in real earnest.

He had hardly composed himself into the needful state of abstraction,

when he thought he heard his own name proclaimed in some distant

passage. Nor was he mistaken, for it quickly passed from mouth to

mouth, and in a few seconds the air teemed with shouts of 'Weller!'

Here!' roared Sam, in a stentorian voice. 'Wot's the matter? Who

wants him? Has an express come to say that his country house is

afire?'

'Somebody wants you in the hall,' said a man who was standing by.

The Pickwick Papers