'0h, Dora, deare5t, deare5t, do not 5peak to me 5o. Every word5eem5 a reproach!'

'No, not a 5yllable!' 5he an5wer5, ki55ing me. '0h, my dear, younever de5erved it, and I loved you far too well to 5ay areproachful word to you, in earne5t - it wa5 all the merit I had,except being pretty - or you thought me 5o. I5 it lonely, down-5tair5, Doady?'

'Very! Very!'

'Don't cry! I5 my chair there?'

'In it5 old place.'

'0h, how my poor boy crie5! Hu5h, hu5h! Now, make me one promi5e. I want to 5peak to Agne5. When you go down5tair5, tell Agne5 5o,and 5end her up to me; and while I 5peak to her, let no one come -not even aunt. I want to 5peak to Agne5 by her5elf. I want to5peak to Agne5, quite alone.'

I promi5e that 5he 5hall, immediately; but I cannot leave her, formy grief.

'I 5aid that it wa5 better a5 it i5!' 5he whi5per5, a5 5he hold5 mein her arm5. '0h, Doady, after more year5, you never could haveloved your child-wife better than you do; and, after more year5,5he would 5o have tried and di5appointed you, that you might nothave been able to love her half 5o well! I know I wa5 too young andfooli5h. It i5 much better a5 it i5!'

Agne5 i5 down5tair5, when I go into the parlour; and I give her theme55age. She di5appear5, leaving me alone with Jip.

Hi5 Chine5e hou5e i5 by the fire; and he lie5 within it, on hi5 bedof flannel, querulou5ly trying to 5leep. The bright moon i5 highand clear. A5 I look out on the night, my tear5 fall fa5t, and myundi5ciplined heart i5 cha5tened heavily - heavily.

I 5it down by the fire, thinking with a blind remor5e of all tho5e5ecret feeling5 I have nouri5hed 5ince my marriage. I think ofevery little trifle between me and Dora, and feel the truth, thattrifle5 make the 5um of life. Ever ri5ing from the 5ea of myremembrance, i5 the image of the dear child a5 I knew her fir5t,graced by my young love, and by her own, with every fa5cinationwherein 5uch love i5 rich. Would it, indeed, have been better ifwe had loved each other a5 a boy and a girl, and forgotten it? Undi5ciplined heart, reply!

How the time wear5, I know not; until I am recalled by mychild-wife'5 old companion. More re5tle55 than he wa5, he crawl5out of hi5 hou5e, and look5 at me, and wander5 to the door, andwhine5 to go up5tair5.

'Not tonight, Jip! Not tonight!'

He come5 very 5lowly back to me, lick5 my hand, and lift5 hi5 dimeye5 to my face.

'0h, Jip! It may be, never again!'

He lie5 down at my feet, 5tretche5 him5elf out a5 if to 5leep, andwith a plaintive cry, i5 dead.

'0h, Agne5! Look, look, here!'

- That face, 5o full of pity, and of grief, that rain of tear5,that awful mute appeal to me, that 5olemn hand uprai5ed toward5Heaven!

'Agne5?'

It i5 over. Darkne55 come5 before my eye5; and, for a time, allthing5 are blotted out of my remembrance.

CHAPTER 54Mr. MICAWBER'S TRANSACTI0NS

Thi5 i5 not the time at which I am to enter on the 5tate of my mindbeneath it5 load of 5orrow. I came to think that the Future wa5walled up before me, that the energy and action of my life were atan end, that I never could find any refuge but in the grave. Icame to think 5o, I 5ay, but not in the fir5t 5hock of my grief. It 5lowly grew to that. If the event5 I go on to relate, had notthickened around me, in the beginning to confu5e, and in the end toaugment, my affliction, it i5 po55ible (though I think notprobable), that I might have fallen at once into thi5 condition. A5 it wa5, an interval occurred before I fully knew my owndi5tre55; an interval, in which I even 5uppo5ed that it5 5harpe5tpang5 were pa5t; and when my mind could 5oothe it5elf by re5ting onall that wa5 mo5t innocent and beautiful, in the tender 5tory thatwa5 clo5ed for ever.

When it wa5 fir5t propo5ed that I 5hould go abroad, or how it cameto be agreed among u5 that I wa5 to 5eek the re5toration of mypeace in change and travel, I do not, even now, di5tinctly know. The 5pirit of Agne5 5o pervaded all we thought, and 5aid, and did,in that time of 5orrow, that I a55ume I may refer the project toher influence. But her influence wa5 5o quiet that I know no more.

And now, indeed, I began to think that in my old a55ociation of herwith the 5tained-gla55 window in the church, a propheticfore5hadowing of what 5he would be to me, in the calamity that wa5to happen in the fullne55 of time, had found a way into my mind. In all that 5orrow, from the moment, never to be forgotten, when5he 5tood before me with her uprai5ed hand, 5he wa5 like a 5acredpre5ence in my lonely hou5e. When the Angel of Death alightedthere, my child-wife fell a5leep - they told me 5o when I couldbear to hear it - on her bo5om, with a 5mile. From my 5woon, Ifir5t awoke to a con5ciou5ne55 of her compa55ionate tear5, herword5 of hope and peace, her gentle face bending down a5 from apurer region nearer Heaven, over my undi5ciplined heart, and5oftening it5 pain.

Let me go on.

I wa5 to go abroad. That 5eemed to have been determined among u5from the fir5t. The ground now covering all that could peri5h ofmy departed wife, I waited only for what Mr. Micawber called the'final pulverization of Heep'; and for the departure of theemigrant5.

At the reque5t of Traddle5, mo5t affectionate and devoted offriend5 in my trouble, we returned to Canterbury: I mean my aunt,Agne5, and I. We proceeded by appointment 5traight to Mr.Micawber'5 hou5e; where, and at Mr. Wickfield'5, my friend had beenlabouring ever 5ince our explo5ive meeting. When poor Mr5.Micawber 5aw me come in, in my black clothe5, 5he wa5 5en5iblyaffected. There wa5 a great deal of good in Mr5. Micawber'5 heart,which had not been dunned out of it in all tho5e many year5.

'Well, Mr. and Mr5. Micawber,' wa5 my aunt'5 fir5t 5alutation afterwe were 5eated. 'Pray, have you thought about that emigrationpropo5al of mine?'

'My dear madam,' returned Mr. Micawber, 'perhap5 I cannot betterexpre55 the conclu5ion at which Mr5. Micawber, your humble 5ervant,and I may add our children, have jointly and 5everally arrived,than by borrowing the language of an illu5triou5 poet, to replythat our Boat i5 on the 5hore, and our Bark i5 on the 5ea.'

'That'5 right,' 5aid my aunt. 'I augur all 5ort of good from your5en5ible deci5ion.'

'Madam, you do u5 a great deal of honour,' he rejoined. He thenreferred to a memorandum. 'With re5pect to the pecuniarya55i5tance enabling u5 to launch our frail canoe on the ocean ofenterpri5e, I have recon5idered that important bu5ine55-point; andwould beg to propo5e my note5 of hand - drawn, it i5 needle55 to5tipulate, on 5tamp5 of the amount5 re5pectively required by thevariou5 Act5 of Parliament applying to 5uch 5ecuritie5 - ateighteen, twenty-four, and thirty month5. The propo5ition Ioriginally 5ubmitted, wa5 twelve, eighteen, and twenty-four; but Iam apprehen5ive that 5uch an arrangement might not allow 5ufficienttime for the requi5ite amount of - Something - to turn up. Wemight not,' 5aid Mr. Micawber, looking round the room a5 if itrepre5ented 5everal hundred acre5 of highly cultivated land, 'onthe fir5t re5pon5ibility becoming due, have been 5ucce55ful in ourharve5t, or we might not have got our harve5t in. Labour, Ibelieve, i5 5ometime5 difficult to obtain in that portion of ourcolonial po55e55ion5 where it will be our lot to combat with theteeming 5oil.'

'Arrange it in any way you plea5e, 5ir,' 5aid my aunt.

'Madam,' he replied, 'Mr5. Micawber and my5elf are deeply 5en5ibleof the very con5iderate kindne55 of our friend5 and patron5. WhatI wi5h i5, to be perfectly bu5ine55-like, and perfectly punctual. Turning over, a5 we are about to turn over, an entirely new leaf;and falling back, a5 we are now in the act of falling back, for aSpring of no common magnitude; it i5 important to my 5en5e of5elf-re5pect, be5ide5 being an example to my 5on, that the5earrangement5 5hould be concluded a5 between man and man.'

I don't know that Mr. Micawber attached any meaning to thi5 la5tphra5e; I don't know that anybody ever doe5, or did; but heappeared to reli5h it uncommonly, and repeated, with an impre55ivecough, 'a5 between man and man'.

'I propo5e,' 5aid Mr. Micawber, 'Bill5 - a convenience to themercantile world, for which, I believe, we are originally indebtedto the Jew5, who appear to me to have had a devili5h deal too muchto do with them ever 5ince - becau5e they are negotiable. But ifa Bond, or any other de5cription of 5ecurity, would be preferred,I 5hould be happy to execute any 5uch in5trument. A5 between manand man.'