gotty's niece and adopted daughter, Emily, a beautiful young woman, betrothed to her cousin Ham, and deliberately sets to work to effect her ruin. In this he is successful; and, on the eve of her intended marriage, she consents to elope with him. They live abroad for some time; but he finally tires of her, and, after insultingly proposing that she should marry his valet, a detestable scoundrel, cruelly deserts her. vi, vii, ix, xix-xxv, xxviii, xxix, xxxi, lv.

Steerforth, Mrs. Mother of James Steerforth; an elderly lady, with a proud carriage and a handsome face, entirely devoted to her son, but estranged from him at last; both of them being imperious and obstinate. xx, xxi, xxiv, xxix, xxxii, xxxvi, xlvi, lvi, lxiv.

Strong, Doctor. Master of a school at Canterbury attended by David Copperfield; a quiet, amiable old gentleman, who has married a young lady many years his junior.

Some of the higher scholars boarded in the doctor's house, and, through them, I learned at second-hand some particulars of the doctor's history, -as how he had not been married twelve months to the beautiful young lady I had seen in the study, whom he had married for love, as she had not a sixpence, and had a world of poor relations (so our fellows said) ready to swarm the doctor out of house and home; also how the doctor's cogitating manner was attributable to his being always engaged in looking out for Greek roots. . . with a view to a new dictionary which he had in contemplation. Adams, our head boy, who had a turn for mathematics, had made a calculation, I was informed, of the time this dictionary would take in completing, on the doctor's plan and at the doctor's rate of going. He considered that it might be done in one thousand six hundred and forty-nine years, counting from the doctor's last or sixty-second birthday. xvi, xvii, xix, xxxvi, xxxix, xlii, xlv, lxii, lxiv.

Strong, Mrs. Annie. The wife of Doctor Strong, and daughter of Mrs. Markleham (the Old Soldier). She is a beautiful woman, much her husband's junior. xvi, xix, xxxvi, xlii, xlv, lxii, lxiv. Tiffey, Mr. An old clerk in the office of Spenlow and Jorkins; a little dry man, wearing a stiff brown wig that looks as if it were made of gingerbread. xxiii, xxvi, xxxiii, xxxv, xxxviii. Tipp. A carman employed in Murdstone and Grinby's warehouse. xi, xii.

Traddles, Thomas. A schoolmate of David Copperfield's at Salem House (Mr. Creakle's school).

Poor Traddles! In a tight sky-blue suit, that made his arms and legs like German sausages or roly-poly puddings, he was the

merriest and most miserable of all the boys. He was always being caned, I think he was caned every day that half-year, except one holiday Monday, when he was only rulered on both hands, and was always going to write to his uncle about it, and never did. After laying his head on the desk for a little while, he would cheer up, somehow, begin to laugh again, and draw skeletons all over his slate before his eyes were dry. I used, at first, to wonder what comfort Traddles found in drawing skeletons, and for some time looked upon him as a sort of hermit, who reminded himself, by those symbols of mortality, that caning could n't last forever. But I believe he only did it because they were easy, and did n't want any features.

He was very honorable, Traddles was, and held it as a solemn duty in the boys to stand by one another. He suffered for this on several occasions, and particularly once, when Steerforth laughed in church, and the beadle thought it was Traddles, and took him out. I see him now, going away in custody, despised by the congregation. He never said who was the real offender, though he smarted for it next day, and was imprisoned so many hours that he came forth with a whole churchyardful of skeletons swarming all over his Latin dictionary. But he had his reward. Steerforth said there was nothing of the sneak in Traddles; and we all felt that to be the highest praise.

In due time Traddles is married, and, getting on by degrees in his profession, at last accumulates a competence, becomes a judge, and is honored and esteemed by all who know him. vi, vii, ix, xxv, xxvii, xxviii, xxxiv, xxxvi, xxxviii, xli, xliii, xliv, xlviii, xlix, li, liv, lvii-lix, lxi, lxii, lxiv.

Trotwood, Miss Betsey. The great-aunt of David Copperfield; an austere, hard-favored, and eccentric, but thoroughly kindhearted woman. ii, xiii-xv, xvii, xix, xxii-xxv, xxxvii-xl, xliii– xlv, xlvii-xlix, li-lv, lvii, lix, lx, lxiv. Trotwood, Husband of Miss Betsey.

A handsome man, younger than Miss Betsey, whom he treats so falsely, ungratefully, and cruelly that she separates from him, and resumes her maiden name. He marries another woman; becomes an adventurer, a gambler, and a cheat; and finally sinks into the lowest depths of degradation. ii, xvii, xxiii, xlvii, lv.

Tungay. Lodge-keeper and tool of Mr. Creakle, at Salem House; a stout man with a bull-neck, a wooden leg, a surly face, overhanging temples, and his hair cut close all round his head. v-vii. Walker, Mick. A boy employed at Murdstone and Grinby's, with three or four others (including David Copperfield), to rinse out bottles, cork and label them, etc. xi, xii.

F

Waterbrook, Mr. Mr. Wickfield's agent in London; a middleaged gentleman with a short throat and a good deal of shirtcollar, who only wants a black nose to be the portrait of a pugdog. xxv.

Waterbrook, Mrs. His wife; a woman who affects to be very genteel; likes to talk about the aristocracy; and maintains that, if she has a weakness, it is "blood." xxv.

Wickfield, Agnes. Daughter and housekeeper of Mr. Wickfield, and friend and counsellor of David Copperfield, whose second wife she becomes after the death of Dora. xv-xix, xxiv, xxxiv, xxxv, xxxix, xlii, xliii, lii-liv, lvii, lviii, lx, lxii-lxiv. Wickfield, Mr. A lawyer at Canterbury, and the agent and friend of Miss Betsey Trotwood. He is nearly ruined by Uriah Heep (at first a clerk in his office, and afterwards his partner), who by adroit management, the falsification of facts, and various malpractices, acquires a complete ascendency over him, and obtains control of all his property; but in the end Uriah's machinations are foiled, and his rascality exposed, by Mr. Micawber, whom he has endeavored to make use of as an instrument to assist in the accomplishment of his dishonest purposes. xv, xvii, xix, xxxv, xxxix, xlii, lii, liv, lx.

William. A waiter in an inn at Yarmouth, who wheedles little David Copperfield out of the greater part of his dinner.

William. Driver of the Canterbury coach. xix.

V.

II

BLEAK HOUSE

OUTLINE

Chapter There was once a notable case in Chancery, the case of I Jarndyce and Jarndyce, which stretched back through the fog beyond the memory of man. It had more than one family involved in its procedure, and counted indeed such mighty personages as Sir Leicester Dedlock and Lady Dedlock, who had come up from Lincolnshire to their town house in London. It was to them that Mr. Tulkinghorn, the rusty Chancery lawyer, was reading in brief some of the latest documents in the case, when Lady Dedlock was overcome with sudden faintness, and the reading was interrupted.

There were two others who were wards in Chancery in this

III case, Ada Clare and Richard Carstone, and Mr. Jarndyce of Bleak House, who was their guardian, had provided a companion for Ada in Esther Summerson, a girl of unknown parentage, who had been under the general charge of Mr. Kenge, called for his felicity of speech Conversation Kenge, of Kenge and Carboy, solicitors, who had much to do with the great case. Esther, since reaching years of discretion, had been a governess in Miss Donny's establishment, and had come thence to the court, where she had been made acquainted with Ada. As she was leaving the court with Ada and Richard, they all three encountered a singular apparition, Miss Flite, who had some dim and very remote connection with the case, so remote that her wits also had retired into some vacant antiquity. The three young people were conducted by Mr. Guppy, a young man from Kenge and Carboy, to the house of Mrs. Jellyby in Thavies' Inn, where they were to pass the night before starting for Bleak House. They found themselves the guests of a singular pair, pronounced by Mr. Quale, an evening caller, as the union of mind and matter, though Mr. Jellyby was no great matter, and Mrs. Jellyby did not mind her children, but devoted herself all the evening to the distant woes of Africa, while Caddy, her eldest daughter, acted sullenly as her amanuensis, and in the depth of the night confided to Esther, while Ada slept, her detestation of the whole business of Borrioboola-Gha. She continued in the same

IV

V

strain the next morning, including Mr. Quale in her animadversions, as she took Esther and Ada as well as Richard to walk before breakfast. On this walk they fell in with Miss Flite, who insisted on their paying her a visit at her rooms. She lived in the upper part of an establishment where Krook, who was sometimes called the Chancellor in derision, kept a sort of junk shop in which bottles, law-books, parchment, and what not were strangely mixed up. He lived alone with his cat, Lady Jane, and entertained the young people with grewsome accounts of persons who had been engaged in the case of Jarndyce and Jarndyce, especially one Tom Jarndyce, so that they came away from him and Miss Flite with a most dismal sense of the misery which seemed to wait on every one who was involved in the suit. But their young minds quickly recovered their wonted cheerfulness, and after breakfast they VI set off for the country, and by nightfall had arrived at Bleak House, where they were received by their guardian, John Jarndyce, an impulsive, warm-hearted man, who when suddenly stirred to indignation, as he readily was, seemed to feel himself attacked by a sharp flaw of east wind. His only companion was an idle dreamer, a fantastic fellow, a mere child in worldly things, named Harold Skimpole, who accepted cheerfully the world of Mr. John Jarndyce's making from which all cares and anxieties were banished for Harold Skimpole. How very childlike and bland he was appeared later in the evening, when Esther was called out of the room to learn that an officer had come to arrest Harold Skimpole for debt, and was dismissed only by Esther and Richard paying the amount out of their own pockets, a proceeding which somehow seemed to put them in the wrong and Skimpole in the right.

VII

The other country house in which Jarndyce and Jarndyce appeared to be interested was Chesney Wold in Lincolnshire, the home of the Dedlocks. In the absence of the family, the only person in authority there was the housekeeper, Mrs. Rouncewell, who for fifty years had been connected with the estate. Her companion was Rosa, a pretty young girl from the village, but just at this time the housekeeper had also for a visitor her grandson, Watt Rouncewell, the son of a well-to-do manufacturer, for Mrs. Rouncewell had two sons, the father of this lad, and a wild vagrant who had gone off as a soldier, carrying his mother's heart with him. It was during Watt's visit that two young men from law offices, Mr. Guppy and a friend, Tony Jobling, being in this part of the country, obtained leave to see Chesney Wold and were shown the picture gallery, where Mr. Guppy, who had never seen Lady Dedlock, was greatly astonished at the recognition of some familiar face in her portrait, as it hung there.