Oliver Twist Capitulo XII

CHAPTER XII

IN WHICH OLIVER IS TAKEN BETTER CARE OF THAN HE EVER WAS

BEFORE.

AND IN WHICH THE NARRATIVE REVERTS TO THE MERRY OLD

GENTLEMAN AND

HIS YOUTHFUL FRIENDS.

The coach rattled away, over nearly the same ground as that which Oliver had traversed

when he first entered London in company with the Dodger; and, turning a different way

when it reached the Angel at Islington, stopped at length before a neat house, in a quiet

shady street near Pentonville. Here, a bed was prepared, without loss of time, in which

Mr. Brownlow saw his young charge carefully and comfortably deposited; and here, he

was tended with a kindness and solicitude that knew no bounds.

But, for many days, Oliver remained insensible to all the goodness of his new friends.

The sun rose and sank, and rose and sank again, and many times after that; and still the

boy lay stretched on his uneasy bed, dwindling away beneath the dry and wasting heat

of fever. The worm does not work more surely on the dead body, than does this slow

creeping fire upon the living frame.

Weak, and thin, and pallid, he awoke at last from what seemed to have been a long and

troubled dream. Feebly raising himself in the bed, with his head resting on his

trembling arm, he looked anxiously around.

'What room is this? Where have I been brought to?' said Oliver.

'This is not the place I went to sleep in.'

He uttered these words in a feeble voice, being very faint and weak; but they were

overheard at once. The curtain at the bed's head was hastily drawn back, and a motherly

old lady, very neatly and precisely dressed, rose as she undrew it, from an arm-chair

close by, in which she had been sitting at needle-work.

'Hush, my dear,' said the old lady softly. 'You must be very quiet, or you will be ill

again; and you have been very bad,--as bad as bad could be, pretty nigh. Lie down

again; there's a dear!' With those words, the old lady very gently placed Oliver's head

upon the pillow; and, smoothing back his hair from his forehead, looked so kindly and

loving in his face, that he could not help placing his little withered hand in hers, and

drawing it round his neck.

'Save us!' said the old lady, with tears in her eyes. 'What a grateful little dear it is.

Pretty creetur! What would his mother feel if she had sat by him as I have, and could

see him now!'

'Perhaps she does see me,' whispered Oliver, folding his hands together; 'perhaps she

has sat by me. I almost feel as if she had.'

'I suppose it was,' replied Oliver, 'because heaven is a long way off; and they are too

happy there, to come down to the bedside of a poor boy. But if she knew I was ill, she

must have pitied me, even there; for she was very ill herself before she died. She can't

know anything about me though,' added Oliver after a moment's silence. 'If she had

seen me hurt, it would have made here sorrowful; and her face has always looked sweet

and happy, when I have dreamed of her.'

The old lady made no reply to this; but wiping her eyes first, and her spectacles, which

lay on the counterpane, afterwards, as if they were part and parcel of those features,

brought some cool stuff for Oliver to drink; and then, patting him on the cheek, told him

he must lie very quiet, or he would be ill again.

So, Oliver kept very still; partly because he was anxious to obey the kind old lady in all

things; and partly, to tell the truth, because he was completely exhausted with what he

had already said. He soon fell into a gentle doze, from which he was awakened by the

light of a candle: which, being brought near the bed, showed him a gentleman with a

very large and loud-ticking gold watch in his hand, who felt his pulse, and said he was a

great deal better.

'You ARE a great deal better, are you not, my dear?' said the gentleman.

'Yes, thank you, sir,' replied Oliver.

'Yes, I know you are,' said the gentleman: 'You're hungry too, an't you?'

'No, sir,' answered Oliver.

'Hem!' said the gentleman. 'No, I know you're not. He is not hungry, Mrs. Bedwin,'

said the gentleman: looking very wise.

The old lady made a respectful inclination of the head, which seemed to say that she

thought the doctor was a very clever man. The doctor appeared much of the same

opinion himself.

'You feel sleepy, don't you, my dear?' said the doctor.

'No, sir,' replied Oliver.

'No,' said the doctor, with a very shrewd and satisfied look.

'You're not sleepy. Nor thirsty. Are you?'

'Yes, sir, rather thirsty,' answered Oliver.

'Just as I expected, Mrs. Bedwin,' said the doctor. 'It's very natural that he should be

thirsty. You may give him a little tea, ma'am, and some dry toast without any butter.

Don't keep him too warm, ma'am; but be careful that you don't let him be too cold; will

you have the goodness?'

The old lady dropped a curtsey. The doctor, after tasting the cool stuff, and expressing

a qualified approval of it, hurried away: his boots creaking in a very important and

wealthy manner as he went downstairs.

Oliver dozed off again, soon after this; when he awoke, it was nearly twelve o'clock.

The old lady tenderly bade him good-night shortly afterwards, and left him in charge of

a fat old woman who had just come: bringing with her, in a little bundle, a small Prayer

Book and a large nightcap. Putting the latter on her head and the former on the table, the

old woman, after telling Oliver that she had come to sit up with him, drew her chair

close to the fire and went off into a series of short naps, chequered at frequent intervals

with sundry tumblings forward, and divers moans and chokings. These, however, had

no worse effect than causing her to rub her nose very hard, and then fall asleep again.

And thus the night crept slowly on. Oliver lay awake for some time, counting the little

circles of light which the reflection of the rushlight-shade threw upon the ceiling; or

tracing with his languid eyes the intricate pattern of the paper on the wall. The darkness

and the deep stillness of the room were very solemn; as they brought into the boy's mind

'That was the fever, my dear,' said the old lady mildly.

the thought that death had been hovering there, for many days and nights, and might yet

fill it with the gloom and dread of his awful presence, he turned his face upon the

pillow, and fervently prayed to Heaven.

Gradually, he fell into that deep tranquil sleep which ease from recent suffering alone

imparts; that calm and peaceful rest which it is pain to wake from. Who, if this were

death, would be roused again to all the struggles and turmoils of life; to all its cares for

the present; its anxieties for the future; more than all, its weary recollections of the past!

It had been bright day, for hours, when Oliver opened his eyes; he felt cheerful and

happy. The crisis of the disease was safely past. He belonged to the world again.

In three days' time he was able to sit in an easy-chair, well propped up with pillows;

and, as he was still too weak to walk, Mrs. Bedwin had him carried downstairs into the

little housekeeper's room, which belonged to her. Having him set, here, by the fire-side,

the good old lady sat herself down too; and, being in a state of considerable delight at

seeing him so much better, forthwith began to cry most violently.

'Never mind me, my dear,' said the old lady; 'I'm only having a regular good cry. There;

it's all over now; and I'm quite comfortable.'

'You're very, very kind to me, ma'am,' said Oliver.

'Well, never you mind that, my dear,' said the old lady; 'that's got nothing to do with

your broth; and it's full time you had it; for the doctor says Mr. Brownlow may come in

to see you this morning; and we must get up our best looks, because the better we look,

the more he'll be pleased.' And with this, the old lady applied herself to warming up, in

a little saucepan, a basin full of broth: strong enough, Oliver thought, to furnish an

ample dinner, when reduced to the regulation strength, for three hundred and fifty

paupers, at the lowest computation.

'Are you fond of pictures, dear?' inquired the old lady, seeing that Oliver had fixed his

eyes, most intently, on a portrait which hung against the wall; just opposite his chair.

'I don't quite know, ma'am,' said Oliver, without taking his eyes from the canvas; 'I have

seen so few that I hardly know. What a beautiful, mild face that lady's is!'

'Ah!' said the old lady, 'painters always make ladies out prettier than they are, or they

wouldn't get any custom, child. The man that invented the machine for taking

likenesses might have known that would never succeed; it's a deal too honest. A deal,'

said the old lady, laughing very heartily at her own acuteness.

'Is--is that a likeness, ma'am?' said Oliver.

'Yes,' said the old lady, looking up for a moment from the broth;

'that's a portrait.'

'Whose, ma'am?' asked Oliver.

'Why, really, my dear, I don't know,' answered the old lady in a good-humoured

manner. 'It's not a likeness of anybody that you or I know, I expect. It seems to strike

your fancy, dear.'

'It is so pretty,' replied Oliver.

'Why, sure you're not afraid of it?' said the old lady: observing in great surprise, the look

of awe with which the child regarded the painting.

'Oh no, no,' returned Oliver quickly; 'but the eyes look so sorrowful; and where I sit,

they seem fixed upon me. It makes my heart beat,' added Oliver in a low voice, 'as if it

was alive, and wanted to speak to me, but couldn't.'

'Lord save us!' exclaimed the old lady, starting; 'don't talk in that way, child. You're

weak and nervous after your illness. Let me wheel your chair round to the other side;

and then you won't see it. There!' said the old lady, suiting the action to the word; 'you

don't see it now, at all events.'

Oliver DID see it in his mind's eye as distinctly as if he had not altered his position; but

he thought it better not to worry the kind old lady; so he smiled gently when she looked

at him; and Mrs. Bedwin, satisfied that he felt more comfortable, salted and broke bits

of toasted bread into the broth, with all the bustle befitting so solemn a preparation.

Oliver got through it with extraordinary expedition. He had scarcely swallowed the last

spoonful, when there came a soft rap at the door. 'Come in,' said the old lady; and in

walked Mr. Brownlow.

Now, the old gentleman came in as brisk as need be; but, he had no sooner raised his

spectacles on his forehead, and thrust his hands behind the skirts of his dressing-gown

to take a good long look at Oliver, than his countenance underwent a very great variety

of odd contortions. Oliver looked very worn and shadowy from sickness, and made an

ineffectual attempt to stand up, out of respect to his benefactor, which terminated in his

sinking back into the chair again; and the fact is, if the truth must be told, that Mr.

Brownlow's heart, being large enough for any six ordinary old gentlemen of humane

disposition, forced a supply of tears into his eyes, by some hydraulic process which we

are not sufficiently philosophical to be in a condition to explain.

'Poor boy, poor boy!' said Mr. Brownlow, clearing his throat. 'I'm rather hoarse this

morning, Mrs. Bedwin. I'm afraid I have caught cold.'

'I hope not, sir,' said Mrs. Bedwin. 'Everything you have had, has been well aired, sir.'

'I don't know, Bedwin. I don't know,' said Mr. Brownlow; 'I rather think I had a damp

napkin at dinner-time yesterday; but never mind that. How do you feel, my dear?'

'Very happy, sir,' replied Oliver. 'And very grateful indeed, sir, for your goodness to

me.'

'Good by,' said Mr. Brownlow, stoutly. 'Have you given him any nourishment, Bedwin?

Any slops, eh?'

'He has just had a basin of beautiful strong broth, sir,' replied Mrs. Bedwin: drawing

herself up slightly, and laying strong emphasis on the last word: to intimate that

between slops, and broth will compounded, there existed no affinity or connection

whatsoever.

'Ugh!' said Mr. Brownlow, with a slight shudder; 'a couple of glasses of port wine

would have done him a great deal more good. Wouldn't they, Tom White, eh?'

'My name is Oliver, sir,' replied the little invalid: with a look of great astonishment.

'Oliver,' said Mr. Brownlow; 'Oliver what? Oliver White, eh?'

'No, sir, Twist, Oliver Twist.'

'Queer name!' said the old gentleman. 'What made you tell the magistrate your name

was White?'

'I never told him so, sir,' returned Oliver in amazement.

This sounded so like a falsehood, that the old gentleman looked somewhat sternly in

Oliver's face. It was impossible to doubt him; there was truth in every one of its thin

and sharpened lineaments.

'Some mistake,' said Mr. Brownlow. But, although his motive for looking steadily at

Oliver no longer existed, the old idea of the resemblance between his features and some

familiar face came upon him so strongly, that he could not withdraw his gaze.

'I hope you are not angry with me, sir?' said Oliver, raising his eyes beseechingly.

'No, no,' replied the old gentleman. 'Why! what's this? Bedwin, look there!'

As he spoke, he pointed hastily to the picture over Oliver's head, and then to the boy's

face. There was its living copy. The eyes, the head, the mouth; every feature was the

same. The expression was, for the instant, so precisely alike, that the minutest line

seemed copied with startling accuracy!

Oliver knew not the cause of this sudden exclamation; for, not being strong enough to

bear the start it gave him, he fainted away. A weakness on his part, which affords the

narrative an opportunity of relieving the reader from suspense, in behalf of the two

young pupils of the Merry Old Gentleman; and of recording--

That when the Dodger, and his accomplished friend Master Bates, joined in the hueand-

cry which was raised at Oliver's heels, in consequence of their executing an illegal

conveyance of Mr. Brownlow's personal property, as has been already described, they

were actuated by a very laudable and becoming regard for themselves; and forasmuch

as the freedom of the subject and the liberty of the individual are among the first and

proudest boasts of a true-hearted Englishman, so, I need hardly beg the reader to

observe, that this action should tend to exalt them in the opinion of all public and

patriotic men, in almost as great a degree as this strong proof of their anxiety for their

own preservation and safety goes to corroborate and confirm the little code of laws

which certain profound and sound-judging philosophers have laid down as the mainsprings

of all Nature's deeds and actions: the said philosophers very wisely reducing the

good lady's proceedings to matters of maxim and theory: and, by a very neat and pretty

compliment to her exalted wisdom and understanding, putting entirely out of sight any

considerations of heart, or generous impulse and feeling. For, these are matters totally

beneath a female who is acknowledged by universal admission to be far above the

numerous little foibles and weaknesses of her sex.

If I wanted any further proof of the strictly philosophical nature of the conduct of these

young gentlemen in their very delicate predicament, I should at once find it in the fact

(also recorded in a foregoing part of this narrative), of their quitting the pursuit, when

the general attention was fixed upon Oliver; and making immediately for their home by

the shortest possible cut. Although I do not mean to assert that it is usually the practice

of renowned and learned sages, to shorten the road to any great conclusion (their course

indeed being rather to lengthen the distance, by various circumlocations and discursive

staggerings, like unto those in which drunken men under the pressure of a too mighty

flow of ideas, are prone to indulge); still, I do mean to say, and do say distinctly, that it

is the invariable practice of many mighty philosophers, in carrying out their theories, to

evince great wisdom and foresight in providing against every possible contingency

which can be supposed at all likely to affect themselves. Thus, to do a great right, you

may do a little wrong; and you may take any means which the end to be attained, will

justify; the amount of the right, or the amount of the wrong, or indeed the distinction

between the two, being left entirely to the philosopher concerned, to be settled and

determined by his clear, comprehensive, and impartial view of his own particular case.

It was not until the two boys had scoured, with great rapidity, through a most intricate

maze of narrow streets and courts, that they ventured to halt beneath a low and dark

archway. Having remained silent here, just long enough to recover breath to speak,

Master Bates uttered an exclamation of amusement and delight; and, bursting into an

uncontrollable fit of laughter, flung himself upon a doorstep, and rolled thereon in a

transport of mirth.

'What's the matter?' inquired the Dodger.

'Ha! ha! ha!' roared Charley Bates.

'Hold your noise,' remonstrated the Dodger, looking cautiously round. 'Do you want to

be grabbed, stupid?'

'I can't help it,' said Charley, 'I can't help it! To see him splitting away at that pace, and

cutting round the corners, and knocking up again' the posts, and starting on again as if

he was made of iron as well as them, and me with the wipe in my pocket, singing out

arter him--oh, my eye!' The vivid imagination of Master Bates presented the scene

before him in too strong colours. As he arrived at this apostrophe, he again rolled upon

the door-step, and laughed louder than before.

'What'll Fagin say?' inquired the Dodger; taking advantage of the next interval of

breathlessness on the part of his friend to propound the question.

'What?' repeated Charley Bates.

'Ah, what?' said the Dodger.

'Why, what should he say?' inquired Charley: stopping rather suddenly in his

merriment; for the Dodger's manner was impressive. 'What should he say?'

Mr. Dawkins whistled for a couple of minutes; then, taking off his hat, scratched his

head, and nodded thrice.

'What do you mean?' said Charley.

'Toor rul lol loo, gammon and spinnage, the frog he wouldn't, and high cockolorum,'

said the Dodger: with a slight sneer on his intellectual countenance.

This was explanatory, but not satisfactory. Master Bates felt it so; and again said, 'What

do you mean?'

The Dodger made no reply; but putting his hat on again, and gathering the skirts of his

long-tailed coat under his arm, thrust his tongue into his cheek, slapped the bridge of his

nose some half-dozen times in a familiar but expressive manner, and turning on his

heel, slunk down the court. Master Bates followed, with a thoughtful countenance.

The noise of footsteps on the creaking stairs, a few minutes after the occurrence of this

conversation, roused the merry old gentleman as he sat over the fire with a saveloy and

a small loaf in his hand; a pocket-knife in his right; and a pewter pot on the trivet.

There was a rascally smile on his white face as he turned round, and looking sharply out

from under his thick red eyebrows, bent his ear towards the door, and listened.

'Why, how's this?' muttered the Jew: changing countenance; 'only two of 'em? Where's

the third? They can't have got into trouble. Hark!'

The footsteps approached nearer; they reached the landing. The door was slowly

opened; and the Dodger and Charley Bates entered, closing it behind them.

Extraordinarios 2a. Vuelta

Comienza la Segunda ronda de Extras  Febrero 27.
Uniformados y con copia del recibo de pago.

Capitulo XI Oliver Twist

CHAPTER XI

TREATS OF MR. FANG THE POLICE MAGISTRATE; AND FURNISHES A

SLIGHT

SPECIMEN OF HIS MODE OF ADMINISTERING JUSTICE

The offence had been committed within the district, and indeed in the immediate

neighborhood of, a very notorious metropolitan police office. The crowd had only the

satisfaction of accompanying Oliver through two or three streets, and down a place

called Mutton Hill, when he was led beneath a low archway, and up a dirty court, into

this dispensary of summary justice, by the back way. It was a small paved yard into

which they turned; and here they encountered a stout man with a bunch of whiskers on

his face, and a bunch of keys in his hand.

'What's the matter now?' said the man carelessly.

'A young fogle-hunter,' replied the man who had Oliver in charge.

'Are you the party that's been robbed, sir?' inquired the man with the keys.

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'Yes, I am,' replied the old gentleman; 'but I am not sure that this boy actually took the

handkerchief. I--I would rather not press the case.'

'Must go before the magistrate now, sir,' replied the man. 'His worship will be

disengaged in half a minute. Now, young gallows!'

This was an invitation for Oliver to enter through a door which he unlocked as he spoke,

and which led into a stone cell. Here he was searched; and nothing being found upon

him, locked up.

This cell was in shape and size something like an area cellar, only not so light. It was

most intolably dirty; for it was Monday morning; and it had been tenanted by six

drunken people, who had been locked up, elsewhere, since Saturday night. But this is

little. In our station-houses, men and women are every night confined on the most

trivial charges--the word is worth noting--in dungeons, compared with which, those in

Newgate, occupied by the most atrocious felons, tried, found guilty, and under sentence

of death, are palaces. Let any one who doubts this, compare the two.

The old gentleman looked almost as rueful as Oliver when the key grated in the lock.

He turned with a sigh to the book, which had been the innocent cause of all this

disturbance.

'There is something in that boy's face,' said the old gentleman to himself as he walked

slowly away, tapping his chin with the cover of the book, in a thoughtful manner;

'something that touches and interests me. CAN he be innocent? He looked like--Bye

the bye,' exclaimed the old gentleman, halting very abruptly, and staring up into the sky,

'Bless my soul!--where have I seen something like that look before?'

After musing for some minutes, the old gentleman walked, with the same meditative

face, into a back anteroom opening from the yard; and there, retiring into a corner,

called up before his mind's eye a vast amphitheatre of faces over which a dusky curtain

had hung for many years. 'No,' said the old gentleman, shaking his head; 'it must be

imagination.

He wandered over them again. He had called them into view, and it was not easy to

replace the shroud that had so long concealed them. There were the faces of friends,

and foes, and of many that had been almost strangers peering intrusively from the

crowd; there were the faces of young and blooming girls that were now old women;

there were faces that the grave had changed and closed upon, but which the mind,

superior to its power, still dressed in their old freshness and beauty, calling back the

lustre of the eyes, the brightness of the smile, the beaming of the soul through its mask

of clay, and whispering of beauty beyond the tomb, changed but to be heightened, and

taken from earth only to be set up as a light, to shed a soft and gentle glow upon the

path to Heaven.

But the old gentleman could recall no one countenance of which Oliver's features bore a

trace. So, he heaved a sigh over the recollections he awakened; and being, happily for

himself, an absent old gentleman, buried them again in the pages of the musty book.

He was roused by a touch on the shoulder, and a request from the man with the keys to

follow him into the office. He closed his book hastily; and was at once ushered into the

imposing presence of the renowned Mr. Fang.

The office was a front parlour, with a panelled wall. Mr. Fang sat behind a bar, at the

upper end; and on one side the door was a sort of wooden pen in which poor little

Oliver was already deposited; trembling very much at the awfulness of the scene.

Mr. Fang was a lean, long-backed, stiff-necked, middle-sized man, with no great

quantity of hair, and what he had, growing on the back and sides of his head. His face

was stern, and much flushed. If he were really not in the habit of drinking rather more

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than was exactly good for him, he might have brought action against his countenance

for libel, and have recovered heavy damages.

The old gentleman bowed respectfully; and advancing to the magistrate's desk, said

suiting the action to the word, 'That is my name and address, sir.' He then withdrew a

pace or two; and, with another polite and gentlemanly inclination of the head, waited to

be questioned.

Now, it so happened that Mr. Fang was at that moment perusing a leading article in a

newspaper of the morning, adverting to some recent decision of his, and commending

him, for the three hundred and fiftieth time, to the special and particular notice of the

Secretary of State for the Home Department. He was out of temper; and he looked up

with an angry scowl.

'Who are you?' said Mr. Fang.

The old gentleman pointed, with some surprise, to his card.

'Officer!' said Mr. Fang, tossing the card contemptuously away with the newspaper.

'Who is this fellow?'

'My name, sir,' said the old gentleman, speaking LIKE a gentleman, 'my name, sir, is

Brownlow. Permit me to inquire the name of the magistrate who offers a gratuitous and

unprovoked insult to a respectable person, under the protection of the bench.' Saying

this, Mr. Brownlow looked around the office as if in search of some person who would

afford him the required information.

'Officer!' said Mr. Fang, throwing the paper on one side, 'what's this fellow charged

with?'

'He's not charged at all, your worship,' replied the officer. 'He appears against this boy,

your worship.'

His worshp knew this perfectly well; but it was a good annoyance, and a safe one.

'Appears against the boy, does he?' said Mr. Fang, surveying Mr.

Brownlow contemptuously from head to foot. 'Swear him!'

'Before I am sworn, I must beg to say one word,' said Mr.

Brownlow; 'and that is, that I really never, without actual

experience, could have believed--'

'Hold your tongue, sir!' said Mr. Fang, peremptorily.

'I will not, sir!' replied the old gentleman.

'Hold your tongue this instant, or I'll have you turned out of the office!' said Mr. Fang.

'You're an insolent impertinent fellow. How dare you bully a magistrate!'

'What!' exclaimed the old gentleman, reddening.

'Swear this person!' said Fang to the clerk. 'I'll not hear another word. Swear him.'

Mr. Brownlow's indignaton was greatly roused; but reflecting perhaps, that he might

only injure the boy by giving vent to it, he suppressed his feelings and submitted to be

sworn at once.

'Now,' said Fang, 'what's the charge against this boy? What have you got to say, sir?'

'I was standing at a bookstall--' Mr. Brownlow began.

'Hold your tongue, sir,' said Mr. Fang. 'Policeman! Where's the policeman? Here,

swear this policeman. Now, policeman, what is this?'

The policeman, with becoming humility, related how he had taken the charge; how he

had searched Oliver, and found nothing on his person; and how that was all he knew

about it.

'Are there any witnesses?' inquired Mr. Fang.

'None, your worship,' replied the policeman.

Mr. Fang sat silent for some minutes, and then, turning round to the prosecutor, said in a

towering passion.

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'Do you mean to state what your complaint against this boy is,

man, or do you not? You have been sworn. Now, if you stand

there, refusing to give evidence, I'll punish you for disrespect

to the bench; I will, by--'

By what, or by whom, nobody knows, for the clerk and jailor coughed very loud, just at

the right moment; and the former dropped a heavy book upon the floor, thus preventing

the word from being heard--accidently, of course.

With many interruptions, and repeated insults, Mr. Brownlow contrived to state his

case; observing that, in the surprise of the moment, he had run after the boy because he

had saw him running away; and expressing his hope that, if the magistrate should

believe him, although not actually the thief, to be connected with the thieves, he would

deal as leniently with him as justice would allow.

'He has been hurt already,' said the old gentleman in conclusion.

'And I fear,' he added, with great energy, looking towards the bar, 'I really fear that he is

ill.'

'Oh! yes, I dare say!' said Mr. Fang, with a sneer. 'Come, none of your tricks here, you

young vagabond; they won't do. What's your name?'

Oliver tried to reply but his tongue failed him. He was deadly pale; and the whole place

seemed turning round and round.

'What's your name, you hardened scoundrel?' demanded Mr. Fang.

'Officer, what's his name?'

This was addressed to a bluff old fellow, in a striped waistcoat, who was standing by the

bar. He bent over Oliver, and repeated the inquiry; but finding him really incapable of

understanding the question; and knowing that his not replying would only infuriate the

magistrate the more, and add to the severity of his sentence; he hazarded a guess.

'He says his name's Tom White, your worship,' said the kind-hearted thief-taker.

'Oh, he won't speak out, won't he?' said Fang. 'Very well, very well. Where does he

live?'

'Where he can, your worship,' replied the officer; again pretending to receive Oliver's

answer.

'Has he any parents?' inquired Mr. Fang.

'He says they died in his infancy, your worship,' replied the officer: hazarding the usual

reply.

At this point of the inquiry, Oliver raised his head; and, looking round with imploring

eyes, murmured a feeble prayer for a draught of water.

'Stuff and nonsense!' said Mr. Fang: 'don't try to make a fool of me.'

'I think he really is ill, your worship,' remonstrated the officer.

'I know better,' said Mr. Fang.

'Take care of him, officer,' said the old gentleman, raising his hands instinctively; 'he'll

fall down.'

'Stand away, officer,' cried Fang; 'let him, if he likes.'

Oliver availed himself of the kind permission, and fell to the floor in a fainting fit. The

men in the office looked at each other, but no one dared to stir.

'I knew he was shamming,' said Fang, as if this were incontestable proof of the fact.

'Let him lie there; he'll soon be tired of that.'

'How do you propose to deal with the case, sir?' inquired the clerk in a low voice.

'Summarily,' replied Mr. Fang. 'He stands committed for three months--hard labour of

course. Clear the office.'

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The door was opened for this purpose, and a couple of men were preparing to carry the

insensible boy to his cell; when an elderly man of decent but poor appearance, clad in

an old suit of black, rushed hastily into the office, and advanced towards the bench.

'Stop, stop! don't take him away! For Heaven's sake stop a moment!' cried the new

comer, breathless with haste.

Although the presiding Genii in such an office as this, exercise a summary and arbitrary

power over the liberties, the good name, the character, almost the lives, of Her Majesty's

subjects, expecially of the poorer class; and although, within such walls, enough

fantastic tricks are daily played to make the angels blind with weeping; they are closed

to the public, save through the medium of the daily press.(Footnote: Or were virtually,

then.) Mr. Fang was consequently not a little indignant to see an unbidden guest enter in

such irreverent disorder.

'What is this? Who is this? Turn this man out. Clear the office!' cried Mr. Fang.

'I WILL speak,' cried the man; 'I will not be turned out. I saw it all. I keep the bookstall.

I demand to be sworn. I will not be put down. Mr. Fang, you must hear me. You

must not refuse, sir.'

The man was right. His manner was determined; and the matter was growing rather too

serious to be hushed up.

'Swear the man,' growled Mr. Fang. with a very ill grace. 'Now, man, what have you got

to say?'

'This,' said the man: 'I saw three boys: two others and the prisoner here: loitering on

the opposite side of the way, when this gentleman was reading. The robbery was

committed by another boy. I saw it done; and I saw that this boy was perfectly amazed

and stupified by it.' Having by this time recovered a little breath, the worthy book-stall

keeper proceeded to relate, in a more coherent manner the exact circumstances of the

robbery.

'Why didn't you come here before?' said Fang, after a pause.

'I hadn't a soul to mind the shop,' replied the man. 'Everybody who could have helped

me, had joined in the pursuit. I could get nobody till five minutes ago; and I've run here

all the way.'

'The prosecutor was reading, was he?' inquired Fang, after another pause.

'Yes,' replied the man. 'The very book he has in his hand.'

'Oh, that book, eh?' said Fang. 'Is it paid for?'

'No, it is not,' replied the man, with a smile.

'Dear me, I forgot all about it!' exclaimed the absent old gentleman, innocently.

'A nice person to prefer a charge against a poor boy!' said Fang, with a comical effort to

look humane. 'I consider, sir, that you have obtained possession of that book, under

very suspicious and disreputable circumstances; and you may think yourself very

fortunate that the owner of the property declines to prosecute. Let this be a lesson to

you, my man, or the law will overtake you yet. The boy is discharged. Clear the

office!'

'D--n me!' cried the old gentleman, bursting out with the rage he

had kept down so long, 'd--n me! I'll--'

'Clear the office!' said the magistrate. 'Officers, do you hear?

Clear the office!'

The mandate was obeyed; and the indignant Mr. Brownlow was conveyed out, with the

book in one hand, and the bamboo cane in the other: in a perfect phrenzy of rage and

defiance. He reached the yard; and his passion vanished in a moment. Little Oliver

Twist lay on his back on the pavement, with his shirt unbuttoned, and his temples

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bathed with water; his face a deadly white; and a cold tremble convulsing his whole

frame.

'Poor boy, poor boy!' said Mr. Brownlow, bending over him. 'Call a coach, somebody,

pray. Directly!'

A coach was obtained, and Oliver having been carefully laid on the seat, the old

gentleman got in and sat himself on the other.

'May I accompany you?' said the book-stall keeper, looking in.

'Bless me, yes, my dear sir,' said Mr. Brownlow quickly. 'I forgot you. Dear, dear! I

have this unhappy book still! Jump in. Poor fellow! There's no time to lose.'

The book-stall keeper got into the coach; and away they drove.

Examenes Extraordinarios

Chavos les comento que para presentar el Examen Extraordinario deben presentarse uniformados y con el talón de pago que ampara el pago el pago del examen con una copia.

Saludos y suerte.

Los examenes comienzan el próximo Lunes chequen horarios y fecha.

Oliver Twist Capitulo X

CHAPTER X

OLIVER BECOMES BETTER ACQUAINTED WITH THE CHARACTERS OF HIS

NEW

ASSOCIATES; AND PURCHASES EXPERIENCE AT A HIGH PRICE. BEING A

SHORT, BUT VERY IMPORTANT CHAPTER, IN THIS HISTORY

For many days, Oliver remained in the Jew's room, picking the marks out of the pockethandkerchief,

(of which a great number were brought home,) and sometimes taking part

in the game already described: which the two boys and the Jew played, regularly, every

morning. At length, he began to languish for fresh air, and took many occasions of

earnestly entreating the old gentleman to allow him to go out to work with his two

companions.

Oliver was rendered the more anxious to be actively employed, by what he had seen of

the stern morality of the old gentleman's character. Whenever the Dodger or Charley

Bates came home at night, empty-handed, he would expatiate with great vehemence on

the misery of idle and lazy habits; and would enforce upon them the necessity of an

active life, by sending them supperless to bed. On one occasion, indeed, he even went

so far as to knock them both down a flight of stairs; but this was carrying out his

virtuous precepts to an unusual extent.

At length, one morning, Oliver obtained the permission he had so eagerly sought. There

had been no handkerchiefs to work upon, for two or three days, and the dinners had

been rather meagre. Perhaps these were reasons for the old gentleman's giving his

assent; but, whether they were or no, he told Oliver he might go, and placed him under

the joint guardianship of Charley Bates, and his friend the Dodger.

The three boys sallied out; the Dodger with his coat-sleeves tucked up, and his hat

cocked, as usual; Master Bates sauntering along with his hands in his pockets; and

Oliver between them, wondering where they were going, and what branch of

manufacture he would be instructed in, first.

The pace at which they went, was such a very lazy, ill-looking saunter, that Oliver soon

began to think his companions were going to deceive the old gentleman, by not going to

work at all. The Dodger had a vicious propensity, too, of pulling the caps from the

heads of small boys and tossing them down areas; while Charley Bates exhibited some

very loose notions concerning the rights of property, by pilfering divers apples and

onions from the stalls at the kennel sides, and thrusting them into pockets which were so

surprisingly capacious, that they seemed to undermine his whole suit of clothes in every

direction. These things looked so bad, that Oliver was on the point of declaring his

intention of seeking his way back, in the best way he could; when his thoughts were

suddenly directed into another channel, by a very mysterious change of behaviour on

the part of the Dodger.

They were just emerging from a narrow court not far from the open square in

Clerkenwell, which is yet called, by some strange perversion of terms, 'The Green':

when the Dodger made a sudden stop; and, laying his finger on his lip, drew his

companions back again, with the greatest caution and circumspection.

'What's the matter?' demanded Oliver.

'Hush!' replied the Dodger. 'Do you see that old cove at the book-stall?'

'The old gentleman over the way?' said Oliver. 'Yes, I see him.'

'He'll do,' said the Doger.

'A prime plant,' observed Master Charley Bates.

Oliver looked from one to the other, with the greatest surprise; but he was not permitted

to make any inquiries; for the two boys walked stealthily across the road, and slunk

close behind the old gentleman towards whom his attention had been directed. Oliver

walked a few paces after them; and, not knowing whether to advance or retire, stood

looking on in silent amazement.

The old gentleman was a very respectable-looking personage, with a powdered head

and gold spectacles. He was dressed in a bottle-green coat with a black velvet collar;

wore white trousers; and carried a smart bamboo cane under his arm. He had taken up a

book from the stall, and there he stood, reading away, as hard as if he were in his elbowchair,

in his own study. It is very possible that he fancied himself there, indeed; for it

was plain, from his abstraction, that he saw not the book-stall, nor the street, nor the

boys, nor, in short, anything but the book itself: which he was reading straight through:

turning over the leaf when he got to the bottom of a page, beginning at the top line of

the next one, and going regularly on, with the greatest interest and eagerness.

What was Oliver's horror and alarm as he stood a few paces off, looking on with his

eyelids as wide open as they would possibly go, to see the Dodger plunge his hand into

the old gentleman's pocket, and draw from thence a handkerchief! To see him hand the

same to Charley Bates; and finally to behold them, both running away round the corner

at full speed!

In an instant the whole mystery of the hankerchiefs, and the watches, and the jewels,

and the Jew, rushed upon the boy's mind.

He stood, for a moment, with the blood so tingling through all his veins from terror, that

he felt as if he were in a burning fire; then, confused and frightened, he took to his

heels; and, not knowing what he did, made off as fast as he could lay his feet to the

ground.

This was all done in a minute's space. In the very instant when Oliver began to run, the

old gentleman, putting his hand to his pocket, and missing his handkerchief, turned

sharp round. Seeing the boy scudding away at such a rapid pace, he very naturally

concluded him to be the depredator; and shouting 'Stop thief!' with all his might, made

off after him, book in hand.

But the old gentleman was not the only person who raised the hue-and-cry. The Dodger

and Master Bates, unwilling to attract public attention by running down the open street,

had merely retured into the very first doorway round the corner. They no sooner heard

the cry, and saw Oliver running, than, guessing exactly how the matter stood, they

issued forth with great promptitude; and, shouting 'Stop thief!' too, joined in the pursuit

like good citizens.

Although Oliver had been brought up by philosophers, he was not theoretically

acquainted with the beautiful axiom that self-preservation is the first law of nature. If

he had been, perhaps he would have been prepared for this. Not being prepared,

however, it alarmed him the more; so away he went like the wind, with the old

gentleman and the two boys roaring and shouting behind him.

'Stop thief! Stop thief!' There is a magic in the sound. The tradesman leaves his

counter, and the car-man his waggon; the butcher throws down his tray; the baker his

basket; the milkman his pail; the errand-boy his parcels; the school-boy his marbles; the

paviour his pickaxe; the child his battledore. Away they run, pell-mell, helter-skelter,

slap-dash: tearing, yelling, screaming, knocking down the passengers as they turn the

corners, rousing up the dogs, and astonishing the fowls: and streets, squares, and courts,

re-echo with the sound.

'Stop thief! Stop thief!' The cry is taken up by a hundred voices, and the crowd

accumulate at every turning. Away they fly, splashing through the mud, and rattling

along the pavements:

up go the windows, out run the people, onward bear the mob, a whole audience desert

Punch in the very thickest of the plot, and, joining the rushing throng, swell the shout,

and lend fresh vigour to the cry, 'Stop thief! Stop thief!'

'Stop thief! Stop thief!' There is a passion FOR HUNTING SOMETHING deeply

implanted in the human breast. One wretched breathless child, panting with exhaustion;

terror in his looks; agaony in his eyes; large drops of perspiration streaming down his

face; strains every nerve to make head upon his pursuers; and as they follow on his

track, and gain upon him every instant, they hail his decreasing strength with joy. 'Stop

thief!' Ay, stop him for God's sake, were it only in mercy!

Stopped at last! A clever blow. He is down upon the pavement; and the crowd eagerly

gather round him: each new comer, jostling and struggling with the others to catch a

glimpse. 'Stand aside!' 'Give him a little air!' 'Nonsense! he don't deserve it.' 'Where's

the gentleman?' 'Here his is, coming down the street.' 'Make room there for the

gentleman!' 'Is this the boy, sir!' 'Yes.'

Oliver lay, covered with mud and dust, and bleeding from the mouth, looking wildly

round upon the heap of faces that surrounded him, when the old gentleman was

officiously dragged and pushed into the circle by the foremost of the pursuers.

'Yes,' said the gentleman, 'I am afraid it is the boy.'

'Afraid!' murmured the crowd. 'That's a good 'un!'

'Poor fellow!' said the gentleman, 'he has hurt himself.'

'_I_ did that, sir,' said a great lubberly fellow, stepping forward; 'and preciously I cut my

knuckle agin' his mouth. I stopped him, sir.'

The follow touched his hat with a grin, expecting something for his pains; but, the old

gentleman, eyeing him with an expression of dislike, look anxiously round, as if he

contemplated running away himself: which it is very possible he might have attempted

to do, and thus have afforded another chase, had not a police officer (who is generally

the last person to arrive in such cases) at that moment made his way through the crowd,

and seized Oliver by the collar.

'Come, get up,' said the man, roughly.

'It wasn't me indeed, sir. Indeed, indeed, it was two other boys,' said Oliver, clasping

his hands passionately, and looking round. 'They are here somewhere.'

'Oh no, they ain't,' said the officer. He meant this to be ironical, but it was true besides;

for the Dodger and Charley Bates had filed off down the first convenient court they

came to.

'Come, get up!'

'Don't hurt him,' said the old gentleman, compassionately.

'Oh no, I won't hurt him,' replied the officer, tearing his jacket half off his back, in proof

thereof. 'Come, I know you; it won't do. Will you stand upon your legs, you young

devil?'

Oliver, who could hardly stand, made a shift to raise himself on his feet, and was at

once lugged along the streets by the jacket-collar, at a rapid pace. The gentleman

walked on with them by the officer's side; and as many of the crowd as could achieve

the feat, got a little ahead, and stared back at Oliver from time to time. The boys

shouted in triumph; and on they went.

Oliver Twist Capítulo IX

CHAPTER IX

CONTAINING FURTHER PARTICULARS CONCERNING THE PLEASANT OLD

GENTLEMAN, AND HIS HOPEFUL PUPILS

It was late next morning when Oliver awoke, from a sound, long sleep. There was no

other person in the room but the old Jew, who was boiling some coffee in a saucepan

for breakfast, and whistling softly to himself as he stirred it round and round, with an

iron spoon. He would stop every now and then to listen when there was the least noise

below: and when he had satistified himself, he would go on whistling and stirring again,

as before.

Although Oliver had roused himself from sleep, he was not thoroughly awake. There is

a drowsy state, between sleeping and waking, when you dream more in five minutes

with your eyes half open, and yourself half conscious of everything that is passing

around you, than you would in five nights with your eyes fast closed, and your senses

wrapt in perfect unconsciousness. At such time, a mortal knows just enough of what his

mind is doing, to form some glimmering conception of its mighty powers, its bounding

from earth and spurning time and space, when freed from the restraint of its corporeal

associate.

Oliver was precisely in this condition. He saw the Jew with his half-closed eyes; heard

his low whistling; and recognised the sound of the spoon grating against the saucepan's

sides: and yet the self-same senses were mentally engaged, at the same time, in busy

action with almost everybody he had ever known.

When the coffee was done, the Jew drew the saucepan to the hob. Standing, then in an

irresolute attitude for a few minutes, as if he did not well know how to employ himself,

he turned round and looked at Oliver, and called him by his name. He did not answer,

and was to all appearances asleep.

After satisfiying himself upon this head, the Jew stepped gently to the door: which he

fastened. He then drew forth: as it seemed to Oliver, from some trap in the floor: a

small box, which he placed carefully on the table. His eyes glistened as he raised the

lid, and looked in. Dragging an old chair to the table, he sat down; and took from it a

magnificent gold watch, sparkling with jewels.

'Aha!' said the Jew, shrugging up his shoulders, and distorting every feature with a

hideous grin. 'Clever dogs! Clever dogs! Staunch to the last! Never told the old

parson where they were. Never poached upon old Fagin! And why should they? It

wouldn't have loosened the knot, or kept the drop up, a minute longer. No, no, no! Fine

fellows! Fine fellows!'

With these, and other muttered reflections of the like nature, the Jew once more

deposited the watch in its place of safety. At least half a dozen more were severally

drawn forth from the same box, and surveyed with equal pleasure; besides rings,

brooches, bracelet, and other articles of jewellery, of such magnificent materials, and

costly workmanship, that Oliver had no idea, even of their names.

Having replaced these trinkets, the Jew took out another: so small that it lay in the palm

of his hand. There seemed to be some very minute inscription on it; for the Jew laid it

flat upon the table, and shading it with his hand, pored over it, long and earnestly. At

length he put it down, as if despairing of success; and, leaning back in his chair,

muttered:

'What a fine thing capital punishment is! Dead men never repent; dead men never bring

awkward stories to light. Ah, it's a fine thing for the trade! Five of 'em strung up in a

row, and none left to play booty, or turn white-livered!'

As the Jew uttered these words, his bright dark eyes, which had been staring vacantly

before him, fell on Oliver's face; the boy's eyes were fixed on his in mute curiousity;

and although the recognition was only for an instant--for the briefest space of time that

can possibly be conceived--it was enough to show the old man that he had been

observed.

He closed the lid of the box with a loud crash; and, laying his hand on a bread knife

which was on the table, started furiously up. He trembled very much though; for, even

in his terror, Oliver could see that the knife quivered in the air.

'What's that?' said the Jew. 'What do you watch me for? Why are you awake? What

have you seen? Speak out, boy! Quick--quick! for your life.

'I wasn't able to sleep any longer, sir,' replied Oliver, meekly.

'I am very sorry if I have disturbed you, sir.'

'You were not awake an hour ago?' said the Jew, scowling fiercely on the boy.

'No! No, indeed!' replied Oliver.

'Are you sure?' cried the Jew: with a still fiercer look than before: and a threatening

attitude.

'Upon my word I was not, sir,' replied Oliver, earnestly. 'I was not, indeed, sir.'

'Tush, tush, my dear!' said the Jew, abruptly resuming his old manner, and playing with

the knife a little, before he laid it down; as if to induce the belief that he had caught it

up, in mere sport. 'Of course I know that, my dear. I only tried to frighten you. You're

a brave boy. Ha! ha! you're a brave boy, Oliver.' The Jew rubbed his hands with a

chuckle, but glanced uneasily at the box, notwithstanding.

'Did you see any of these pretty things, my dear?' said the Jew, laying his hand upon it

after a short pause.

'Yes, sir,' replied Oliver.

'Ah!' said the Jew, turning rather pale. 'They--they're mine, Oliver; my little property.

All I have to live upon, in my old age. The folks call me a miser, my dear. Only a

miser; that's all.'

Oliver thought the old gentleman must be a decided miser to live in such a dirty place,

with so many watches; but, thinking that perhaps his fondness for the Dodger and the

other boys, cost him a good deal of money, he only cast a deferential look at the Jew,

and asked if he might get up.

'Certainly, my dear, certainly,' replied the old gentleman.

'Stay. There's a pitcher of water in the corner by the door.

Bring it here; and I'll give you a basin to wash in, my dear.'

Oliver got up; walked across the room; and stooped for an instant to raise the pitcher.

When he turned his head, the box was gone.

He had scarcely washed himself, and made everything tidy, by emptying the basin out

of the window, agreeably to the Jew's directions, when the Dodger returned:

accompanied by a very sprightly young friend, whom Oliver had seen smoking on the

previous night, and who was now formally introduced to him as Charley Bates. The

four sat down, to breakfast, on the coffee, and some hot rolls and ham which the Dodger

had brought home in the crown of his hat.

'Well,' said the Jew, glancing slyly at Oliver, and addressing himself to the Dodger, 'I

hope you've been at work this morning, my dears?'

'Hard,' replied the Dodger.

'As nails,' added Charley Bates.

'Good boys, good boys!' said the Jew. 'What have you got, Dodger?'

'A couple of pocket-books,' replied that young gentlman.

'Lined?' inquired the Jew, with eagerness.

'Pretty well,' replied the Dodger, producing two pocket-books; one green, and the other

red.

'Not so heavy as they might be,' said the Jew, after looking at the insides carefully; 'but

very neat and nicely made. Ingenious workman, ain't he, Oliver?'

'Very indeed, sir,' said Oliver. At which Mr. Charles Bates laughed uproariously; very

much to the amazement of Oliver, who saw nothing to laugh at, in anything that had

passed.

'And what have you got, my dear?' said Fagin to Charley Bates.

'Wipes,' replied Master Bates; at the same time producing four pocket-handkerchiefs.

'Well,' said the Jew, inspecting them closely; 'they're very good ones, very. You haven't

marked them well, though, Charley; so the marks shall be picked out with a needle, and

we'll teach Oliver how to do it. Shall us, Oliver, eh? Ha! ha! ha!'

'If you please, sir,' said Oliver.

'You'd like to be able to make pocket-handkerchiefs as easy as Charley Bates, wouldn't

you, my dear?' said the Jew.

'Very much, indeed, if you'll teach me, sir,' replied Oliver.

Master Bates saw something so exquisitely ludicrous in this reply, that he burst into

another laugh; which laugh, meeting the coffee he was drinking, and carrying it down

some wrong channel, very nearly terminated in his premature suffocation.

'He is so jolly green!' said Charley when he recovered, as an apology to the company for

his unpolite behaviour.

The Dodger said nothing, but he smoothed Oliver's hair over his eyes, and said he'd

know better, by and by; upon which the old gentleman, observing Oliver's colour

mounting, changed the subject by asking whether there had been much of a crowd at the

execution that morning? This made him wonder more and more; for it was plain from

the replies of the two boys that they had both been there; and Oliver naturally wondered

how they could possibly have found time to be so very industrious.

When the breakfast was cleared away; the merry old gentlman and the two boys played

at a very curious and uncommon game, which was performed in this way. The merry

old gentleman, placing a snuff-box in one pocket of his trousers, a note-case in the

other, and a watch in his waistcoat pocket, with a guard-chain round his neck, and

sticking a mock diamond pin in his shirt: buttoned his coat tight round him, and putting

his spectacle-case and handkerchief in his pockets, trotted up and down the room with a

stick, in imitation of the manner in which old gentlmen walk about the streets any hour

in the day. Sometimes he stopped at the fire-place, and sometimes at the door, making

believe that he was staring with all his might into shop-windows. At such times, he

would look constantly round him, for fear of thieves, and would keep slapping all his

pockets in turn, to see that he hadn't lost anything, in such a very funny and natural

manner, that Oliver laughed till the tears ran down his face. All this time, the two boys

followed him closely about: getting out of his sight, so nimbly, every time he turned

round, that it was impossible to follow their motions. At last, the Dodger trod upon his

toes, or ran upon his boot accidently, while Charley Bates stumbled up against him

behind; and in that one moment they took from him, with the most extraordinary

rapidity, snuff-box, note-case, watch-guard, chain, shirt-pin, pocket-handkerchief, even

the spectacle-case. If the old gentlman felt a hand in any one of his pockets, he cried

out where it was; and then the game began all over again.

When this game had been played a great many times, a couple of young ladies called to

see the young gentleman; one of whom was named Bet, and the other Nancy. They

wore a good deal of hair, not very neatly turned up behind, and were rather untidy about

the shoes and stockings. They were not exactly pretty, perhaps; but they had a great

deal of colour in their faces, and looked quite stout and hearty. Being remarkably free

and agreeable in their manners, Oliver thought them very nice girls indeed. As there is

no doubt they were.

The visitors stopped a long time. Spirits were produced, in consequence of one of the

young ladies complaining of a coldness in her inside; and the conversation took a very

convivial and improving turn. At length, Charley Bates expressed his opinion that it

was time to pad the hoof. This, it occurred to Oliver, must be French for going out; for

directly afterwards, the Dodger, and Charley, and the two young ladies, went away

together, having been kindly furnished by the amiable old Jew with money to spend.

'There, my dear,' said Fagin. 'That's a pleasant life, isn't it?

They have gone out for the day.'

'Have they done work, sir?' inquired Oliver.

'Yes,' said the Jew; 'that is, unless they should unexpectedly come across any, when they

are out; and they won't neglect it, if they do, my dear, depend upon it. Make 'em your

models, my dear.

Make 'em your models,' tapping the fire-shovel on the hearth to add force to his words;

'do everything they bid you, and take their advice in all matters--especially the Dodger's,

my dear. He'll be a great man himself, and will make you one too, if you take pattern

by him.--Is my handkerchief hanging out of my pocket, my dear?' said the Jew, stopping

short.

'Yes, sir,' said Oliver.

'See if you can take it out, without my feeling it; as you saw them do, when we were at

play this morning.'

Oliver held up the bottom of the pocket with one hand, as he had seen the Dodger hold

it, and drew the handkerchief lighty out of it with the other.

'Is it gone?' cried the Jew.

'Here it is, sir,' said Oliver, showing it in his hand.

'You're a clever boy, my dear,' said the playful old gentleman, patting Oliver on the

head approvingly. 'I never saw a sharper lad. Here's a shilling for you. If you go on, in

this way, you'll be the greatest man of the time. And now come here, and I'll show you

how to take the marks out of the handkerchiefs.'

Oliver wondered what picking the old gentleman's pocket in play, had to do with his

chances of being a great man. But, thinking that the Jew, being so much his senior,

must know best, he followed him quietly to the table, and was soon deeply involved in

his new study.

Capitulo VIII Oliver Twist

CHAPTER VIII

OLIVER WALKS TO LONDON. HE ENCOUNTERS ON THE ROAD A STRANGE

SORT

OF YOUNG GENTLEMAN

Oliver reached the stile at which the by-path terminated; and once more gained the highroad.

It was eight o'clock now. Though he was nearly five miles away from the town,

he ran, and hid behind the hedges, by turns, till noon: fearing that he might be pursued

and overtaken. Then he sat down to rest by the side of the milestone, and began to

think, for the first time, where he had better go and try to live.

The stone by which he was seated, bore, in large characters, an intimation that it was

just seventy miles from that spot to London. The name awakened a new train of ideas in

the boy's mind.

London!--that great place!--nobody--not even Mr. Bumble--could ever find him there!

He had often heard the old men in the workhouse, too, say that no lad of spirit need

want in London; and that there were ways of living in that vast city, which those who

had been bred up in country parts had no idea of. It was the very place for a homeless

boy, who must die in the streets unless some one helped him. As these things passed

through his thoughts, he jumped upon his feet, and again walked forward.

He had diminished the distance between himself and London by full four miles more,

before he recollected how much he must undergo ere he could hope to reach his place of

destination. As this consideration forced itself upon him, he slackened his pace a little,

and meditated upon his means of getting there. He had a crust of bread, a coarse shirt,

and two pairs of stockings, in his bundle. He had a penny too--a gift of Sowerberry's

after some funeral in which he had acquitted himself more than ordinarily well--in his

pocket. 'A clean shirt,' thought Oliver, 'is a very comfortable thing; and so are two pairs

of darned stockings; and so is a penny; but they small helps to a sixty-five miles' walk in

winter time.' But Oliver's thoughts, like those of most other people, although they were

extremely ready and active to point out his difficulties, were wholly at a loss to suggest

any feasible mode of surmounting them; so, after a good deal of thinking to no

particular purpose, he changed his little bundle over to the other shoulder, and trudged

on.

Oliver walked twenty miles that day; and all that time tasted nothing but the crust of dry

bread, and a few draughts of water, which he begged at the cottage-doors by the roadside.

When the night came, he turned into a meadow; and, creeping close under a hayrick,

determined to lie there, till morning. He felt frightened at first, for the wind

moaned dismally over the empty fields: and he was cold and hungry, and more alone

than he had ever felt before. Being very tired with his walk, however, he soon fell

asleep and forgot his troubles.

He felt cold and stiff, when he got up next morning, and so hungry that he was obliged

to exchange the penny for a small loaf, in the very first village through which he passed.

He had walked no more than twelve miles, when night closed in again. His feet were

sore, and his legs so weak that they trembled beneath him. Another night passed in the

bleak damp air, made him worse; when he set forward on his journey next morning he

could hardly crawl along.

He waited at the bottom of a steep hill till a stage-coach came up, and then begged of

the outside passengers; but there were very few who took any notice of him: and even

those told him to wait till they got to the top of the hill, and then let them see how far he

could run for a halfpenny. Poor Oliver tried to keep up with the coach a little way, but

was unable to do it, by reason of his fatigue and sore feet. When the outsides saw this,

they put their halfpence back into their pockets again, declaring that he was an idle

young dog, and didn't deserve anything; and the coach rattled away and left only a cloud

of dust behind.

In some villages, large painted boards were fixed up: warning all persons who begged

within the district, that they would be sent to jail. This frightened Oliver very much,

and made him glad to get out of those villages with all possible expedition. In others,

he would stand about the inn-yards, and look mournfully at every one who passed: a

proceeding which generally terminated in the landlady's ordering one of the post-boys

who were lounging about, to drive that strange boy out of the place, for she was sure he

had come to steal something. If he begged at a farmer's house, ten to one but they

threatened to set the dog on him; and when he showed his nose in a shop, they talked

about the beadle--which brought Oliver's heart into his mouth,--very often the only

thing he had there, for many hours together.

In fact, if it had not been for a good-hearted turnpike-man, and a benevolent old lady,

Oliver's troubles would have been shortened by the very same process which had put an

end to his mother's; in other words, he would most assuredly have fallen dead upon the

king's highway. But the turnpike-man gave him a meal of bread and cheese; and the old

lady, who had a shipwrecked grandson wandering barefoot in some distant part of the

earth, took pity upon the poor orphan, and gave him what little she could afford--and

more--with such kind and gently words, and such tears of sympathy and compassion,

that they sank deeper into Oliver's soul, than all the sufferings he had ever undergone.

Early on the seventh morning after he had left his native place, Oliver limped slowly

into the little town of Barnet. The window-shutters were closed; the street was empty;

not a soul had awakened to the business of the day. The sun was rising in all its

splendid beauty; but the light only served to show the boy his own lonesomeness and

desolation, as he sat, with bleeding feet and covered with dust, upon a door-step.

By degrees, the shutters were opened; the window-blinds were drawn up; and people

began passing to and fro. Some few stopped to gaze at Oliver for a moment or two, or

turned round to stare at him as they hurried by; but none relieved him, or troubled

themselves to inquire how he came there. He had no heart to beg. And there he sat.

He had been crouching on the step for some time: wondering at

the great number of public-houses (every other house in Barnet

was a tavern, large or small), gazing listlessly at the coaches

as they passed through, and thinking how strange it seemed that

they could do, with ease, in a few hours, what it had taken him a

whole week of courage and determination beyond his years to

accomplish: when he was roused by observing that a boy, who had

passed him carelessly some minutes before, had returned, and was

now surveying him most earnestly from the opposite side of the

way. He took little heed of this at first; but the boy remained

in the same attitude of close observation so long, that Oliver

raised his head, and returned his steady look. Upon this, the

boy crossed over; and walking close up to Oliver, said

'Hullo, my covey! What's the row?'

The boy who addressed this inquiry to the young wayfarer, was about his own age: but

one of the queerest looking boys that Oliver had even seen. He was a snub-nosed, flatbrowed,

common-faced boy enough; and as dirty a juvenile as one would wish to see;

but he had about him all the airs and manners of a man. He was short of his age: with

rather bow-legs, and little, sharp, ugly eyes. His hat was stuck on the top of his head so

lightly, that it threatened to fall off every moment--and would have done so, very often,

if the wearer had not had a knack of every now and then giving his head a sudden

twitch, which brought it back to its old place again. He wore a man's coat, which

reached nearly to his heels. He had turned the cuffs back, half-way up his arm, to get

his hands out of the sleeves: apparently with the ultimated view of thrusting them into

the pockets of his corduroy trousers; for there he kept them. He was, altogether, as

roystering and swaggering a young gentleman as ever stood four feet six, or something

less, in the bluchers.

'Hullo, my covey! What's the row?' said this strange young gentleman to Oliver.

'I am very hungry and tired,' replied Oliver: the tears standing in his eyes as he spoke.

'I have walked a long way. I have been walking these seven days.'

'Walking for sivin days!' said the young gentleman. 'Oh, I see. Beak's order, eh? But,'

he added, noticing Oliver's look of surprise, 'I suppose you don't know what a beak is,

my flash com-pan-i-on.'

Oliver mildly replied, that he had always heard a bird's mouth described by the term in

question.

'My eyes, how green!' exclaimed the young gentleman. 'Why, a beak's a madgst'rate;

and when you walk by a beak's order, it's not straight forerd, but always agoing up, and

niver a coming down agin. Was you never on the mill?'

'What mill?' inquired Oliver.

'What mill! Why, THE mill--the mill as takes up so little room that it'll work inside a

Stone Jug; and always goes better when the wind's low with people, than when it's high;

acos then they can't get workmen. But come,' said the young gentleman; 'you want

grub, and you shall have it. I'm at low-water-mark myself--only one bob and a magpie;

but, as far as it goes, I'll fork out and stump. Up with you on your pins. There! Now

then!

Morrice!'

Assisting Oliver to rise, the young gentleman took him to an adjacent chandler's shop,

where he purchased a sufficiency of ready-dressed ham and a half-quartern loaf, or, as

he himself expressed it, 'a fourpenny bran!' the ham being kept clean and preserved

from dust, by the ingenious expedient of making a hole in the loaf by pulling out a

portion of the crumb, and stuffing it therein. Taking the bread under his arm, the young

gentlman turned into a small public-house, and led the way to a tap-room in the rear of

the premises. Here, a pot of beer was brought in, by direction of the mysterious youth;

and Oliver, falling to, at his new friend's bidding, made a long and hearty meal, during

the progress of which the strange boy eyed him from time to time with great attention.

'Going to London?' said the strange boy, when Oliver had at length concluded.

'Yes.'

'Got any lodgings?'

'No.'

'Money?'

'No.'

The strange boy whistled; and put his arms into his pockets, as far as the big coatsleeves

would let them go.

'Do you live in London?' inquired Oliver.

'Yes. I do, when I'm at home,' replied the boy. 'I suppose you want some place to sleep

in to-night, don't you?'

'I do, indeed,' answered Oliver. 'I have not slept under a roof since I left the country.'

'Don't fret your eyelids on that score.' said the young gentleman. 'I've got to be in

London to-night; and I know a 'spectable old gentleman as lives there, wot'll give you

lodgings for nothink, and never ask for the change--that is, if any genelman he knows

interduces you. And don't he know me? Oh, no!

Not in the least! By no means. Certainly not!'

The young gentelman smiled, as if to intimate that the latter fragments of discourse

were playfully ironical; and finished the beer as he did so.

This unexpected offer of shelter was too tempting to be resisted; especially as it was

immediately followed up, by the assurance that the old gentleman referred to, would

doubtless provide Oliver with a comfortable place, without loss of time. This led to a

more friendly and confidential dialogue; from which Oliver discovered that his friend's

name was Jack Dawkins, and that he was a peculiar pet and protege of the elderly

gentleman before mentioned.

Mr. Dawkin's appearance did not say a vast deal in favour of the comforts which his

patron's interest obtained for those whom he took under his protection; but, as he had a

rather flightly and dissolute mode of conversing, and furthermore avowed that among

his intimate friends he was better known by the sobriquet of 'The Artful Dodger,' Oliver

concluded that, being of a dissipated and careless turn, the moral precepts of his

benefactor had hitherto been thrown away upon him. Under this impression, he secretly

resolved to cultivate the good opinion of the old gentleman as quickly as possible; and,

if he found the Dodger incorrigible, as he more than half suspected he should, to decline

the honour of his farther acquaintance.

As John Dawkins objected to their entering London before nightfall, it was nearly

eleven o'clock when they reached the turnpike at Islington. They crossed from the

Angel into St. John's Road; struck down the small street which terminates at Sadler's

Wells Theatre; through Exmouth Street and Coppice Row; down the little court by the

side of the workhouse; across the classic ground which once bore the name of Hockleyin-

the-Hole; thence into Little Saffron Hill; and so into Saffron Hill the Great: along

which the Dodger scudded at a rapid pace, directing Oliver to follow close at his heels.

Although Oliver had enough to occupy his attention in keeping sight of his leader, he

could not help bestowing a few hasty glances on either side of the way, as he passed

along. A dirtier or more wretched place he had never seen. The street was very narrow

and muddy, and the air was impregnated with filthy odours.

There were a good many small shops; but the only stock in trade appeared to be heaps

of children, who, even at that time of night, were crawling in and out at the doors, or

screaming from the inside. The sole places that seemed to prosper amid the general

blight of the place, were the public-houses; and in them, the lowest orders of Irish were

wrangling with might and main. Covered ways and yards, which here and there

diverged from the main street, disclosed little knots of houses, where drunken men and

women were positively wallowing in filth; and from several of the door-ways, great illlooking

fellows were cautiously emerging, bound, to all appearance, on no very welldisposed

or harmless errands.

Oliver was just considering whether he hadn't better run away, when they reached the

bottom of the hill. His conductor, catching him by the arm, pushed open the door of a

house near Field Lane; and drawing him into the passage, closed it behind them.

'Now, then!' cried a voice from below, in reply to a whistle from the Dodger.

'Plummy and slam!' was the reply.

This seemed to be some watchword or signal that all was right; for the light of a feeble

candle gleamed on the wall at the remote end of the passage; and a man's face peeped

out, from where a balustrade of the old kitchen staircase had been broken away.

'There's two on you,' said the man, thrusting the candle farther out, and shielding his

eyes with his hand. 'Who's the t'other one?'

'A new pal,' replied Jack Dawkins, pulling Oliver forward.

'Where did he come from?'

'Greenland. Is Fagin upstairs?'

'Yes, he's a sortin' the wipes. Up with you!' The candle was drawn back, and the face

disappeared.

Oliver, groping his way with one hand, and having the other firmly grasped by his

companion, ascended with much difficulty the dark and broken stairs: which his

conductor mounted with an ease and expedition that showed he was well acquainted

with them.

He threw open the door of a back-room, and drew Oliver in after him.

The walls and ceiling of the room were perfectly black with age and dirt. There was a

deal table before the fire: upon which were a candle, stuck in a ginger-beer bottle, two

or three pewter pots, a loaf and butter, and a plate. In a frying-pan, which was on the

fire, and which was secured to the mantelshelf by a string, some sausages were cooking;

and standing over them, with a toasting-fork in his hand, was a very old shrivelled Jew,

whose villainous-looking and repulsive face was obscured by a quantity of matted red

hair. He was dressed in a greasy flannel gown, with his throat bare; and seemed to be

dividing his attention between the frying-pan and the clothes-horse, over which a great

number of silk handkerchiefsl were hanging. Several rough beds made of old sacks,

were huddled side by side on the floor. Seated round the table were four or five boys,

none older than the Dodger, smoking long clay pipes, and drinking spirits with the air of

middle-aged men. These all crowded about their associate as he whispered a few words

to the Jew; and then turned round and grinned at Oliver. So did the Jew himself,

toasting-fork in hand.

'This is him, Fagin,' said Jack Dawkins; 'my friend Oliver Twist.'

The Jew grinned; and, making a low obeisance to Oliver, took him by the hand, and

hoped he should have the honour of his intimate acquaintance. Upon this, the young

gentleman with the pipes came round him, and shook both his hands very hard--

especially the one in which he held his little bundle. One young gentleman was very

anxious to hang up his cap for him; and another was so obliging as to put his hands in

his pockets, in order that, as he was very tired, he might not have the trouble of

emptying them, himself, when he went to bed. These civilities would probably be

extended much farther, but for a liberal exercise of the Jew's toasting-fork on the heads

and shoulders of the affectionate youths who offered them.

'We are very glad to see you, Oliver, very,' said the Jew. 'Dodger, take off the sausages;

and draw a tub near the fire for Oliver. Ah, you're a-staring at the pockethandkerchiefs!

eh, my dear. There are a good many of 'em, ain't there? We've just

looked 'em out, ready for the wash; that's all, Oliver; that's all. Ha! ha! ha!'

The latter part of this speech, was hailed by a boisterous shout from all the hopeful

pupils of the merry old gentleman. In the midst of which they went to supper.

Oliver ate his share, and the Jew then mixed him a glass of hot gin-and-water: telling

him he must drink it off directly, because another gentleman wanted the tumbler.

Oliver did as he was desired. Immediately afterwards he felt himself gently lifted on to

one of the sacks; and then he sunk into a deep sleep.