reddening, “that I will hear no disrespectful word of that young

lady from any lips; and that if I knew any manwhich I hope I do

notwhose taste was so coarse, and whose temper was so

overbearing, that he could not restrain himself from speaking

disrespectfully of that young lady at this desk, not even Tellson’s

should prevent my giving him a piece of my mind.”

The necessity of being angry in a suppressed tone had put Mr.

Stryver’s blood-vessels into a dangerous state when it was his turn

to be angry; Mr. Lorry’s veins, methodical as their courses could

usually be, were in no better state now it was his turn.

“That is what I mean to tell you, sir,” said Mr. Lorry. “Pray let

there be no mistake about it.”

Mr. Stryver sucked the end of a ruler for a little while, and then

stood hitting a tune out of his teeth with it, which probably gave

him the toothache. He broke the awkward silence by saying:

“This is something new to me. Mr. Lorry. You deliberately

advise me not to go up to Soho and offer myselfmyself, Stryver

of the King’s Bench bar?”

“Do you ask me for my advice, Mr. Stryver?”

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

“Yes, I do.”

“Very good. Then I give it, and you have repeated it correctly.”

“And all I can say of it is,” laughed Stryver with a vexed laugh,

“that thisha, ha!beats everything past, present, and to come