The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 230: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

MR. SAMUEL EMANUEL 203 His wife was a perfect giantess, with large coarse features, an enormously stout shape, and an air of brazen effrontery which she seldom took the trouble to subdue. There was a certain showiness about her, — a sort of Flemish mare kind of handsomeness, which to some little extent was striking, and Mr. Emanuel considered her one of the finest specimens of the female sex. For this uxoriousness he was rather to be honoured than otherwise, and therefore we record it as no imputation to his detriment. In respect to the establishment itself, we need only ob- serve that it was splendidly fitted up, that the shop-windows were of the largest-sized plate glass, that the lamps were almost endlessly multiplied, and that as the show-rooms “were crammed with goods, so the various shopmen were well-nigh countless in each particular department. But truth compels us to add that the garments which Mr. Samuel Emanuel had for sale were very much like himself, — dashing and fine, but intrinsically mean and trumpery. Indeed, the cheapest of his articles would prove the dearest bargain that a purchaser could possibly possess himself of; they were very much after the same description as Peter Pindar’s razors, which were made to sell, and not to cut, for Mr. Emanuel’s garments were made for disposal, and not for wear. To this establishment was it that, at about eleven in the fore- noon of the day after the twins’ removal to their new lodging, Christina bent her way, in-company with her brother. He however remained outside while she entered, but just within the door she stopped short, under the influence of a sudden timidity which seized upon her. At the same moment she heard voices speaking, but those who were thus engaged in conversation were concealed from her view, as she was hidden from theirs, by an array of gaudy dressing-gowns for gentlemen, hung upon frames so contrived as to show off the particular fit and appearance of the several garments. Christina could not for the life of her move another step for- ward at the instant; she was overwhelmed with bashfulness; there was a sickening sensation at her heart, for she felt as if she were there under almost mendicant circumstances. It was no wonder that the delicate sensibilities of the young girl were thus poignantly touched by the new position to which Mr. Preston’s plight had reduced her, and tears starting into her eyes, she was compelled to linger where she was in ECORNICLOOKS (C(O)