David Copperfield

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What a different Sunday morning from the old Sunday morning at
Yarmouth! In due time I heard the church-bells ringing, as I
plodded on; and I met people who were going to church; and I passed
a church or two where the congregation were inside, and the sound
of singing came out into the sunshine, while the beadle sat and
cooled himself in the shade of the porch, or stood beneath the
yew-tree, with his hand to his forehead, glowering at me going by.
But the peace and rest of the old Sunday morning were on
everything, except me. That was the difference. I felt quite
wicked in my dirt and dust, with my tangled hair. But for the
quiet picture I had conjured up, of my mother in her youth and
beauty, weeping by the fire, and my aunt relenting to her, I hardly
think I should have had the courage to go on until next day. But
it always went before me, and I followed.

I got, that Sunday, through three-and-twenty miles on the straight
road, though not very easily, for I was new to that kind of toil.
I see myself, as evening closes in, coming over the bridge at
Rochester, footsore and tired, and eating bread that I had bought
for supper. One or two little houses, with the notice, 'Lodgings
for Travellers', hanging out, had tempted me; but I was afraid of
spending the few pence I had, and was even more afraid of the
vicious looks of the trampers I had met or overtaken. I sought no
shelter, therefore, but the sky; and toiling into Chatham, - which,
in that night's aspect, is a mere dream of chalk, and drawbridges,
and mastless ships in a muddy river, roofed like Noah's arks, -
crept, at last, upon a sort of grass-grown battery overhanging a
lane, where a sentry was walking to and fro. Here I lay down, near
a cannon; and, happy in the society of the sentry's footsteps,
though he knew no more of my being above him than the boys at Salem
House had known of my lying by the wall, slept soundly until
morning.

Very stiff and sore of foot I was in the morning, and quite dazed
by the beating of drums and marching of troops, which seemed to hem
me in on every side when I went down towards the long narrow
street. Feeling that I could go but a very little way that day, if
I were to reserve any strength for getting to my journey's end, I
resolved to make the sale of my jacket its principal business.
Accordingly, I took the jacket off, that I might learn to do
without it; and carrying it under my arm, began a tour of
inspection of the various slop-shops.

It was a likely place to sell a jacket in; for the dealers in
second-hand clothes were numerous, and were, generally speaking, on
the look-out for customers at their shop doors. But as most of
them had, hanging up among their stock, an officer's coat or two,
epaulettes and all, I was rendered timid by the costly nature of
their dealings, and walked about for a long time without offering
my merchandise to anyone.

This modesty of mine directed my attention to the marine-store
shops, and such shops as Mr. Dolloby's, in preference to the
regular dealers. At last I found one that I thought looked
promising, at the corner of a dirty lane, ending in an enclosure
full of stinging-nettles, against the palings of which some
second-hand sailors' clothes, that seemed to have overflowed the
shop, were fluttering among some cots, and rusty guns, and oilskin
hats, and certain trays full of so many old rusty keys of so many
sizes that they seemed various enough to open all the doors in the
world.

Into this shop, which was low and small, and which was darkened
rather than lighted by a little window, overhung with clothes, and
was descended into by some steps, I went with a palpitating heart;
which was not relieved when an ugly old man, with the lower part of
his face all covered with a stubbly grey beard, rushed out of a
dirty den behind it, and seized me by the hair of my head. He was
a dreadful old man to look at, in a filthy flannel waistcoat, and
smelling terribly of rum. His bedstead, covered with a tumbled and
ragged piece of patchwork, was in the den he had come from, where
another little window showed a prospect of more stinging-nettles,
and a lame donkey.

'Oh, what do you want?' grinned this old man, in a fierce,
monotonous whine. 'Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want? Oh,
my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo, goroo!'

I was so much dismayed by these words, and particularly by the
repetition of the last unknown one, which was a kind of rattle in
his throat, that I could make no answer; hereupon the old man,
still holding me by the hair, repeated:

'Oh, what do you want? Oh, my eyes and limbs, what do you want?
Oh, my lungs and liver, what do you want? Oh, goroo!' - which he
screwed out of himself, with an energy that made his eyes start in
his head.

'I wanted to know,' I said, trembling, 'if you would buy a jacket.'

'Oh, let's see the jacket!' cried the old man. 'Oh, my heart on
fire, show the jacket to us! Oh, my eyes and limbs, bring the
jacket out!'

With that he took his trembling hands, which were like the claws of
a great bird, out of my hair; and put on a pair of spectacles, not
at all ornamental to his inflamed eyes.

'Oh, how much for the jacket?' cried the old man, after examining
it. 'Oh - goroo! - how much for the jacket?'

'Half-a-crown,' I answered, recovering myself.

'Oh, my lungs and liver,' cried the old man, 'no! Oh, my eyes, no!
Oh, my limbs, no! Eighteenpence. Goroo!'

Every time he uttered this ejaculation, his eyes seemed to be in
danger of starting out; and every sentence he spoke, he delivered
in a sort of tune, always exactly the same, and more like a gust of
wind, which begins low, mounts up high, and falls again, than any
other comparison I can find for it.

'Well,' said I, glad to have closed the bargain, 'I'll take
eighteenpence.'

'Oh, my liver!' cried the old man, throwing the jacket on a shelf.
'Get out of the shop! Oh, my lungs, get out of the shop! Oh, my
eyes and limbs - goroo! - don't ask for money; make it an
exchange.' I never was so frightened in my life, before or since;
but I told him humbly that I wanted money, and that nothing else
was of any use to me, but that I would wait for it, as he desired,
outside, and had no wish to hurry him. So I went outside, and sat
down in the shade in a corner. And I sat there so many hours, that
the shade became sunlight, and the sunlight became shade again, and
still I sat there waiting for the money.

There never was such another drunken madman in that line of
business, I hope. That he was well known in the neighbourhood, and
enjoyed the reputation of having sold himself to the devil, I soon
understood from the visits he received from the boys, who
continually came skirmishing about the shop, shouting that legend,
and calling to him to bring out his gold. 'You ain't poor, you
know, Charley, as you pretend. Bring out your gold. Bring out
some of the gold you sold yourself to the devil for. Come! It's
in the lining of the mattress, Charley. Rip it open and let's have
some!' This, and many offers to lend him a knife for the purpose,
exasperated him to such a degree, that the whole day was a
succession of rushes on his part, and flights on the part of the
boys. Sometimes in his rage he would take me for one of them, and
come at me, mouthing as if he were going to tear me in pieces;
then, remembering me, just in time, would dive into the shop, and
lie upon his bed, as I thought from the sound of his voice, yelling
in a frantic way, to his own windy tune, the 'Death of Nelson';
with an Oh! before every line, and innumerable Goroos interspersed.
As if this were not bad enough for me, the boys, connecting me with
the establishment, on account of the patience and perseverance with
which I sat outside, half-dressed, pelted me, and used me very ill
all day.

He made many attempts to induce me to consent to an exchange; at
one time coming out with a fishing-rod, at another with a fiddle,
at another with a cocked hat, at another with a flute. But I
resisted all these overtures, and sat there in desperation; each
time asking him, with tears in my eyes, for my money or my jacket.
At last he began to pay me in halfpence at a time; and was full two
hours getting by easy stages to a shilling.

'Oh, my eyes and limbs!' he then cried, peeping hideously out of
the shop, after a long pause, 'will you go for twopence more?'

'I can't,' I said; 'I shall be starved.'

'Oh, my lungs and liver, will you go for threepence?'

'I would go for nothing, if I could,' I said, 'but I want the money
badly.'

'Oh, go-roo!' (it is really impossible to express how he twisted
this ejaculation out of himself, as he peeped round the door-post
at me, showing nothing but his crafty old head); 'will you go for
fourpence?'

I was so faint and weary that I closed with this offer; and taking
the money out of his claw, not without trembling, went away more
hungry and thirsty than I had ever been, a little before sunset.
But at an expense of threepence I soon refreshed myself completely;
and, being in better spirits then, limped seven miles upon my road.

My bed at night was under another haystack, where I rested
comfortably, after having washed my blistered feet in a stream, and
dressed them as well as I was able, with some cool leaves. When I
took the road again next morning, I found that it lay through a
succession of hop-grounds and orchards. It was sufficiently late
in the year for the orchards to be ruddy with ripe apples; and in
a few places the hop-pickers were already at work. I thought it
all extremely beautiful, and made up my mind to sleep among the
hops that night: imagining some cheerful companionship in the long
perspectives of poles, with the graceful leaves twining round them.

The trampers were worse than ever that day, and inspired me with a
dread that is yet quite fresh in my mind. Some of them were most
ferocious-looking ruffians, who stared at me as I went by; and
stopped, perhaps, and called after me to come back and speak to
them, and when I took to my heels, stoned me. I recollect one
young fellow - a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier -
who had a woman with him, and who faced about and stared at me
thus; and then roared to me in such a tremendous voice to come
back, that I halted and looked round.

'Come here, when you're called,' said the tinker, 'or I'll rip your
young body open.'

I thought it best to go back. As I drew nearer to them, trying to
propitiate the tinker by my looks, I observed that the woman had a
black eye.

'Where are you going?' said the tinker, gripping the bosom of my
shirt with his blackened hand.

'I am going to Dover,' I said.

'Where do you come from?' asked the tinker, giving his hand another
turn in my shirt, to hold me more securely.

'I come from London,' I said.

'What lay are you upon?' asked the tinker. 'Are you a prig?'

'N-no,' I said.

'Ain't you, by G--? If you make a brag of your honesty to me,'
said the tinker, 'I'll knock your brains out.'

With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me, and then
looked at me from head to foot.

'Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you?' said the
tinker. 'If you have, out with it, afore I take it away!'

I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman's
look, and saw her very slightly shake her head, and form 'No!' with
her lips.

'I am very poor,' I said, attempting to smile, 'and have got no
money.'

'Why, what do you mean?' said the tinker, looking so sternly at me,
that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket.

'Sir!' I stammered.

'What do you mean,' said the tinker, 'by wearing my brother's silk
handkerchief! Give it over here!' And he had mine off my neck in
a moment, and tossed it to the woman.

The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this a
joke, and tossed it back to me, nodded once, as slightly as before,
and made the word 'Go!' with her lips. Before I could obey,
however, the tinker seized the handkerchief out of my hand with a
roughness that threw me away like a feather, and putting it loosely
round his own neck, turned upon the woman with an oath, and knocked
her down. I never shall forget seeing her fall backward on the
hard road, and lie there with her bonnet tumbled off, and her hair
all whitened in the dust; nor, when I looked back from a distance,
seeing her sitting on the pathway, which was a bank by the
roadside, wiping the blood from her face with a corner of her
shawl, while he went on ahead.

This adventure frightened me so, that, afterwards, when I saw any
of these people coming, I turned back until I could find a
hiding-place, where I remained until they had gone out of sight;
which happened so often, that I was very seriously delayed. But
under this difficulty, as under all the other difficulties of my
journey, I seemed to be sustained and led on by my fanciful picture
of my mother in her youth, before I came into the world. It always
kept me company. It was there, among the hops, when I lay down to
sleep; it was with me on my waking in the morning; it went before
me all day. I have associated it, ever since, with the sunny
street of Canterbury, dozing as it were in the hot light; and with
the sight of its old houses and gateways, and the stately, grey
Cathedral, with the rooks sailing round the towers. When I came,
at last, upon the bare, wide downs near Dover, it relieved the
solitary aspect of the scene with hope; and not until I reached
that first great aim of my journey, and actually set foot in the
town itself, on the sixth day of my flight, did it desert me. But
then, strange to say, when I stood with my ragged shoes, and my
dusty, sunburnt, half-clothed figure, in the place so long desired,
it seemed to vanish like a dream, and to leave me helpless and
dispirited.

I inquired about my aunt among the boatmen first, and received
various answers. One said she lived in the South Foreland Light,
and had singed her whiskers by doing so; another, that she was made
fast to the great buoy outside the harbour, and could only be
visited at half-tide; a third, that she was locked up in Maidstone
jail for child-stealing; a fourth, that she was seen to mount a
broom in the last high wind, and make direct for Calais. The
fly-drivers, among whom I inquired next, were equally jocose and
equally disrespectful; and the shopkeepers, not liking my
appearance, generally replied, without hearing what I had to say,
that they had got nothing for me. I felt more miserable and
destitute than I had done at any period of my running away. My
money was all gone, I had nothing left to dispose of; I was hungry,
thirsty, and worn out; and seemed as distant from my end as if I
had remained in London.

The morning had worn away in these inquiries, and I was sitting on
the step of an empty shop at a street corner, near the
market-place, deliberating upon wandering towards those other
places which had been mentioned, when a fly-driver, coming by with
his carriage, dropped a horsecloth. Something good-natured in the
man's face, as I handed it up, encouraged me to ask him if he could
tell me where Miss Trotwood lived; though I had asked the question
so often, that it almost died upon my lips.

'Trotwood,' said he. 'Let me see. I know the name, too. Old
lady?'

'Yes,' I said, 'rather.'

'Pretty stiff in the back?' said he, making himself upright.

'Yes,' I said. 'I should think it very likely.'

'Carries a bag?' said he - 'bag with a good deal of room in it - is
gruffish, and comes down upon you, sharp?'

My heart sank within me as I acknowledged the undoubted accuracy of
this description.

'Why then, I tell you what,' said he. 'If you go up there,'
pointing with his whip towards the heights, 'and keep right on till
you come to some houses facing the sea, I think you'll hear of her.
My opinion is she won't stand anything, so here's a penny for you.'

I accepted the gift thankfully, and bought a loaf with it.
Dispatching this refreshment by the way, I went in the direction my
friend had indicated, and walked on a good distance without coming
to the houses he had mentioned. At length I saw some before me;
and approaching them, went into a little shop (it was what we used
to call a general shop, at home), and inquired if they could have
the goodness to tell me where Miss Trotwood lived. I addressed
myself to a man behind the counter, who was weighing some rice for
a young woman; but the latter, taking the inquiry to herself,
turned round quickly.

'My mistress?' she said. 'What do you want with her, boy?'

'I want,' I replied, 'to speak to her, if you please.'

'To beg of her, you mean,' retorted the damsel.

'No,' I said, 'indeed.' But suddenly remembering that in truth I
came for no other purpose, I held my peace in confusion, and felt
my face burn.

MY aunt's handmaid, as I supposed she was from what she had said,
put her rice in a little basket and walked out of the shop; telling
me that I could follow her, if I wanted to know where Miss Trotwood
lived. I needed no second permission; though I was by this time in
such a state of consternation and agitation, that my legs shook
under me. I followed the young woman, and we soon came to a very
neat little cottage with cheerful bow-windows: in front of it, a
small square gravelled court or garden full of flowers, carefully
tended, and smelling deliciously.

'This is Miss Trotwood's,' said the young woman. 'Now you know;
and that's all I have got to say.' With which words she hurried
into the house, as if to shake off the responsibility of my
appearance; and left me standing at the garden-gate, looking
disconsolately over the top of it towards the parlour window, where
a muslin curtain partly undrawn in the middle, a large round green
screen or fan fastened on to the windowsill, a small table, and a
great chair, suggested to me that my aunt might be at that moment
seated in awful state.

My shoes were by this time in a woeful condition. The soles had
shed themselves bit by bit, and the upper leathers had broken and
burst until the very shape and form of shoes had departed from
them. My hat (which had served me for a night-cap, too) was so
crushed and bent, that no old battered handleless saucepan on a
dunghill need have been ashamed to vie with it. My shirt and
trousers, stained with heat, dew, grass, and the Kentish soil on
which I had slept - and torn besides - might have frightened the
birds from my aunt's garden, as I stood at the gate. My hair had
known no comb or brush since I left London. My face, neck, and
hands, from unaccustomed exposure to the air and sun, were burnt to
a berry-brown. From head to foot I was powdered almost as white
with chalk and dust, as if I had come out of a lime-kiln. In this
plight, and with a strong consciousness of it, I waited to
introduce myself to, and make my first impression on, my formidable
aunt.

The unbroken stillness of the parlour window leading me to infer,
after a while, that she was not there, I lifted up my eyes to the
window above it, where I saw a florid, pleasant-looking gentleman,
with a grey head, who shut up one eye in a grotesque manner, nodded
his head at me several times, shook it at me as often, laughed, and
went away.

I had been discomposed enough before; but I was so much the more
discomposed by this unexpected behaviour, that I was on the point
of slinking off, to think how I had best proceed, when there came
out of the house a lady with her handkerchief tied over her cap,
and a pair of gardening gloves on her hands, wearing a gardening
pocket like a toll-man's apron, and carrying a great knife. I knew
her immediately to be Miss Betsey, for she came stalking out of the
house exactly as my poor mother had so often described her stalking
up our garden at Blunderstone Rookery.

'Go away!' said Miss Betsey, shaking her head, and making a distant
chop in the air with her knife. 'Go along! No boys here!'

I watched her, with my heart at my lips, as she marched to a corner
of her garden, and stooped to dig up some little root there. Then,
without a scrap of courage, but with a great deal of desperation,
I went softly in and stood beside her, touching her with my finger.

'If you please, ma'am,' I began.

She started and looked up.

'If you please, aunt.'

'EH?' exclaimed Miss Betsey, in a tone of amazement I have never
heard approached.

'If you please, aunt, I am your nephew.'

'Oh, Lord!' said my aunt. And sat flat down in the garden-path.

'I am David Copperfield, of Blunderstone, in Suffolk - where you
came, on the night when I was born, and saw my dear mama. I have
been very unhappy since she died. I have been slighted, and taught
nothing, and thrown upon myself, and put to work not fit for me.
It made me run away to you. I was robbed at first setting out, and
have walked all the way, and have never slept in a bed since I
began the journey.' Here my self-support gave way all at once; and
with a movement of my hands, intended to show her my ragged state,
and call it to witness that I had suffered something, I broke into
a passion of crying, which I suppose had been pent up within me all
the week.

My aunt, with every sort of expression but wonder discharged from
her countenance, sat on the gravel, staring at me, until I began to
cry; when she got up in a great hurry, collared me, and took me
into the parlour. Her first proceeding there was to unlock a tall
press, bring out several bottles, and pour some of the contents of
each into my mouth. I think they must have been taken out at
random, for I am sure I tasted aniseed water, anchovy sauce, and
salad dressing. When she had administered these restoratives, as
I was still quite hysterical, and unable to control my sobs, she
put me on the sofa, with a shawl under my head, and the
handkerchief from her own head under my feet, lest I should sully
the cover; and then, sitting herself down behind the green fan or
screen I have already mentioned, so that I could not see her face,
ejaculated at intervals, 'Mercy on us!' letting those exclamations
off like minute guns.

After a time she rang the bell. 'Janet,' said my aunt, when her
servant came in. 'Go upstairs, give my compliments to Mr. Dick,
and say I wish to speak to him.'

Janet looked a little surprised to see me lying stiffly on the sofa
(I was afraid to move lest it should be displeasing to my aunt),
but went on her errand. My aunt, with her hands behind her, walked
up and down the room, until the gentleman who had squinted at me
from the upper window came in laughing.

'Mr. Dick,' said my aunt, 'don't be a fool, because nobody can be
more discreet than you can, when you choose. We all know that. So
don't be a fool, whatever you are.'

The gentleman was serious immediately, and looked at me, I thought,
as if he would entreat me to say nothing about the window.

'Mr. Dick,' said my aunt, 'you have heard me mention David
Copperfield? Now don't pretend not to have a memory, because you
and I know better.'

'David Copperfield?' said Mr. Dick, who did not appear to me to
remember much about it. 'David Copperfield? Oh yes, to be sure.
David, certainly.'

'Well,' said my aunt, 'this is his boy - his son. He would be as
like his father as it's possible to be, if he was not so like his
mother, too.'

'His son?' said Mr. Dick. 'David's son? Indeed!'

'Yes,' pursued my aunt, 'and he has done a pretty piece of
business. He has run away. Ah! His sister, Betsey Trotwood,
never would have run away.' My aunt shook her head firmly,
confident in the character and behaviour of the girl who never was
born.

'Oh! you think she wouldn't have run away?' said Mr. Dick.

'Bless and save the man,' exclaimed my aunt, sharply, 'how he
talks! Don't I know she wouldn't? She would have lived with her
god-mother, and we should have been devoted to one another. Where,
in the name of wonder, should his sister, Betsey Trotwood, have run
from, or to?'

'Nowhere,' said Mr. Dick.

'Well then,' returned my aunt, softened by the reply, 'how can you
pretend to be wool-gathering, Dick, when you are as sharp as a
surgeon's lancet? Now, here you see young David Copperfield, and
the question I put to you is, what shall I do with him?'

'What shall you do with him?' said Mr. Dick, feebly, scratching his
head. 'Oh! do with him?'

'Yes,' said my aunt, with a grave look, and her forefinger held up.
'Come! I want some very sound advice.'

'Why, if I was you,' said Mr. Dick, considering, and looking
vacantly at me, 'I should -' The contemplation of me seemed to
inspire him with a sudden idea, and he added, briskly, 'I should
wash him!'

'Janet,' said my aunt, turning round with a quiet triumph, which I
did not then understand, 'Mr. Dick sets us all right. Heat the
bath!'

Although I was deeply interested in this dialogue, I could not help
observing my aunt, Mr. Dick, and Janet, while it was in progress,
and completing a survey I had already been engaged in making of the
room.