young feelings. Do you recollect, with all the eagerness of a child's

love, one day pressing upon her acceptance, two small caraway-seed

biscuits and one sweet apple, neatly folded into a circular parcel with

the leaf of a copy-book?'

I do,' replied Bob Sawyer.

She slighted that, I think?' said Ben Allen.

She did,' rejoined Bob. 'She said I had kept the parcel so long in the

pockets of my corduroys, that the apple was unpleasantly warm.'

I remember,' said Mr Allen gloomily. 'Upon which we ate it ourselves,

in alternate bites.'

Bob Sawyer intimated his recollection of the circumstance last alluded

to, by a melancholy frown; and the two friends remained for some time

absorbed, each in his own meditations.

While these observations were being exchanged between Mr Bob

Sawyer and Mr Benjamin Allen; and while the boy in the gray livery,

marvelling at the unwonted prolongation of the dinner, cast an

anxious look, from time to time, towards the glass door, distracted by

inward misgivings regarding the amount of minced veal which would

be ultimately reserved for his individual cravings; there rolled soberly

on through the streets of Bristol, a private fly, painted of a sad green

colour, drawn by a chubby sort of brown horse, and driven by a surly-

looking man with his legs dressed like the legs of a groom, and his

body attired in the coat of a coachman. Such appearances are

common to many vehicles belonging to, and maintained by, old ladies

of economic habits; and in this vehicle sat an old lady who was its

mistress and proprietor.

Martin!' said the old lady, calling to the surly man, out of the front

window.

Well?' said the surly man, touching his hat to the old lady.

Mr Sawyer's,' said the old lady.

I was going there,' said the surly man.

The old lady nodded the satisfaction which this proof of the surly

man's foresight imparted to her feelings; and the surly man giving a

smart lash to the chubby horse, they all repaired to Mr Bob Sawyer's

together.

The Pickwick Papers