The baby's head was, as it
were, a test and touchstone for every description of matter,--animal,
vegetable, and mineral. Nothing was in use that day that didn't come, at
some time or other, into close acquaintance with it.
That was a great celebration indeed, with Dot doing the honors in her
wedding-gown, her eyes sparkling with happiness, and the good carrier,
so jovial and so ruddy at the bottom of the table, and all their guests
aiding to make the occasion a memorable and happy one.
There was a dance in the evening, for which Bertha played her liveliest
tune. Inspired by infectious joy, old and young get up and join the
whirling throng. Suddenly Caleb Plummer clutches Tilly Slowboy by both
hands and goes off at score, Miss Slowboy firm in the belief that diving
hotly in among the couples, and effecting any number of concussions with
them, is your only principle of footing it, and ecstatically glad to
abandon herself to the delights of the occasion, so long as she sees joy
written again on the pretty face of her beloved little mistress, and
feels that happiness has been restored to honest John Peerybingle and
his family.
Hark! How the Cricket on the Hearth joins in the music, with its Chirp,
Chirp, Chirp, and how the kettle hums!
AGNES WICKFIELD
[Illustration: AGNES WICKFIELD]
AGNES WICKFIELD
When I became the adopted son of my aunt, Miss Betsy Trotwood, my new
clothes were marked Trotwood Copperfield, instead of the old familiar
David of my childhood; and I began my new life, not only in the new
name, but with everything new about me, and felt for many days like one
in a dream, until I had proved the happy reality to be a fact.
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