Pickwick Abroad: A Companion to the Pickwick Papers — page 52: what you’re looking at

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44 when the mirth had subsided into little more than a distant tittering; “after all, this is not such a bad place, though.” “J should think not,” cried Mr. Jopling, with. gieat emphasis on the pronoun. “ There’s a billiard-room,—a hazard-table,—a rouge- et-noir table—roulette,—in fine, every kind of lark that a man can wish for, here.” Mr. Jopling’s encomiums upon the New Prison were interrupted by the entrance of two small boys, in blue jackets and clean white aprons, who speedily cleared the table of the glasses, bottles, cigars, de. and thereupon arranged a scanty white cloth, and divers plates, knives, and forks, &c., instead. ‘They then disappeared, and in a few minutes returned with a variety of dishes, which they quietly spread upon the table, to the infinite delight of Mr. Crashem and his company. ~s “Turn out the confounded cat!” exclaimed Mr. Jopling, as that domestic appurtenance to the Café entered the room. But Mr. Lipman considerately interfered in the poor animal’s behalf by verbally consigning it to the hottest regions he could think of: so the party sate down to supper, and the cat retired to snooze beneath a chair in one corner of the room. | Mr. Crashem had caused a most splendid repast to be prepared; and as—for we scorn to deny or withhold one atom of the real truth—Messieurs Lipman and Jopling had made a quiet and economical dinner at three o'clock, p. m., off a couple of baked potatoes and a piece of butter each, they did not fail to do ample justice to the sup- per at which they so unexpectedly and pleasantly found themselves seated. The bottle was circulated freely, and a variety of toasts were proposed and drank with considerable enthusiasm. _ Indeed, to such an extent was the hilarity of the evening carried, that Mr. Pickwick entered into two arguments and made an oration,_-Mr. Boozie only contradicted himself upon his own evidence seventeen times in the course of an hour,--Mr. Crashem cited his own family on ‘three-and-twenty different occasions,— and Messieurs Lipman and Jopling emptied two bottles in drinking wine with Mr. Win- kle, while Mr. Tims amused himself by rolling small pellets of bread.and aiming them at Mr. Pickwick’s nose. i Now it happened that Mr. Tims was a very quarrelsome gentleman when he had | taken a small drop too much: and it’ also happened on the evening of which we are PICKWICK ABROAD. . | writing, that such a quantity of liquor, in | ‘the shape cf wine and spirits, had been circulated and drank, that in Mr. Crashem’s room. there was scarcely a sober person after supper.. Mr. Tims un ortunately ad- vanced some statement, which Mr. Boozie, intending to set himself right in a “con- founded lie” he had just uttered, unhappily contradicted ; and a row was the immediate consequence. Mr. Tims flew at Mr. Boozie—— and Mr. Boozie’s wig flew to the® opposite side of the room: Mr. Lipman at tempted +b enact the part:of mediator, and was imnie- ¥ ¥ a . o %: diately converted into a belligerent by b , a knock on the eye which Mr., Crashen inadvertently gave him: Mr. Jopling pre- pared to assault Mr. Winkle; and Mr. Win- kle crept under the table, while Mr. Pick- wick, thinkmg to restore order by putting Mr. Boozie in possession of his wig, com- menced a most vigorous search after the hairy tegument, and caught hold ef the domestic cat, which a delusion of the optics ee: had represented to his sight as the lost perrugue. The cat, thus unceremoniously disturbed in the midst of her slumbers, flew at Mr. Pickwick and dragged her claws spitefully across his expressive countenance; nor was it before a considerable time had elapsed that the animal could be reduced ‘to pacific measures of any, kind. It were hard and difficult to say how long the warfare might have been waged, had not Mr. Weller suddenly rushed into the room, and speedily compelled the com- batants to desist from their pugilistic strife. “Five minutes more, sir,” said that gen- tleman, addressing his master, so soon as something like order had: been restored, “an’ ve shall all be booked, as the devil ‘said ven he sent for to take Doctor Faustus,” This powerful appeal to the feelings of great men could not for one moment be resisted. Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Winkle, Mr. Boozie, and Mr. Tims accordingly took a certain vague and undefined leave of the prisoners, and accompanied Mr. Weller to a hackney-coach, which that faithful domestic _ had already taken the precaution to fetch, and which speedily deposited the somewhat. intemperate gentlemen at the gate of Meur- ice’s hotel in the Rue de Rivoli, — Go LOOK