Page:Nicholas Nickleby.djvu/415

Rh of any family with which I have the honour to be connected; at the same time, Mrs. Kenwigs's is——I should say," said Mr. Kenwigs, abruptly, and raising his voice as he spoke, "that my children might come into a matter of a hundred pound a-piece, perhaps. Perhaps more, but certainly that."

"And a very pretty little fortune," said the married lady.

"There are some relations of Mrs. Kenwigs's," said Mr. Kenwigs, taking a pinch of snuff from the doctor's box, and then sneezing very hard, for he wasn't used to it, "that might leave their hundred pound a-piece to ten people, and yet not go begging when they had done it."

"Ah! I know who you mean," observed the married lady, nodding her head.

"I made mention of no names, and I wish to make mention of no names," said Mr. Kenwigs, with a portentous look. "Many of my friends have met a relation of Mrs. Kenwigs's in this very room, as would do honour to any company; that's all."

"I've met him," said the married lady, with a glance towards Doctor Lumbey.

"It's naterally very gratifying to my feelings as a father, to see such a man as that, a kissing and taking notice of my children," pursued Mr. Kenwigs. "It's naterally very gratifying to my feelings as a man, to know that man. It will be naterally very gratifying to my feelings as a husband, to make that man acquainted with this ewent."

Having delivered his sentiments in this form of words, Mr. Kenwigs arranged his second daughter's flaxen tail, and bade her be a good girl and mind what her sister, Morleena, said.

"That girl grows more like her mother every day," said Mr. Lumbey, suddenly stricken with an enthusiastic admiration of Morleena.

"There!" rejoined the married lady. "What I always say—what I always did say. She's the very picter of her." And having thus directed the general attention to the young lady in question, the married lady embraced the opportunity of taking another sip of the brandy-and-water—and a pretty long sip too.

"Yes I there is a likeness," said Mr. Kenwigs, after some reflection. "But such a woman as Mrs. Kenwigs was, afore she was married! Good gracious, such a woman!"

Mr. Lumbey shook his head with great solemnity, as though to imply that he supposed she must have been rather a dazzler.

"Talk of fairies!" cried Mr. Kenwigs. "I never see anybody so light to be alive—never. Such manners too; so playful, and yet so sewerely proper! As for her figure! It isn't generally known," said Mr. Kenwigs, dropping his voice; "but her figure was such at that time, that the sign of the Britannia over in the Holloway road, was painted from it!" "But only see what it is now," urged the married lady. "Does she look like the mother of six?"

"Quite ridiculous," cried the doctor.

"She looks a deal more like her own daughter," said the married lady.