Page:The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.djvu/411

333 THE PICKWICK CLUB 333

the necklace, fire-and-twenty beads in all. The sister, who was an industrious g-irl, and seldom treated herself to a bit of finery, cried her eyes out, at the loss of the necklace ; looked high and low for it ; but I needn't say didn't find it. A few days afterwards, the family were at dinner — baked shoulder of mutton, and potatoes under it — the child, who wasn't hungry, was playing about the room, when suddenly there was heard a devil of a noise, like a small hail storm. * Don't do that, my boy,' said the father. ' I ain't a doin' nothing,' said the child. and then the noise began again, worse than ever. ' If you don't mind what I say, my boy,' said the father, * you'll find yourself in bed, in something less than a pig's whisper.' He gave the child a shake to make him obedient, and such a rattling ensued as nobody ever heard before. ' Why, damme, it's in the child I ' said the father, ' he's got the croup in the wrong place !' ' No I haven't, father,' said the child, begin- ning to cry, * it's the necklace ; I swallowed it, father.' — The father caught the child up, and ran with him to the hospital : the beads in the boy's stomach rattling all the way with the jolting ; and the people looking up in the air, and down in the cellars, to see where the unusual sound came from. He's in the hospital now," said Jack Hopkin-s, " and he makes such a devil of a noise when he walks about, that they're obliged to muffle him in a watchman's coat, for fear he should wake I he patients I "
 * Well, don't do it again,' said the father. There was a short silence,

wick, with an emphatic blow on the table.
 * That's the most extraordinary case I ever heard of," said Mr. Pick-

" Oh, that's nothing," said Jack Hopkins ; " is it. Bob ? "

" Certainly not," replied Mr. Bob Sawyer. »

" Very singular things occur in our profession, I can assure you, Sir," said Hopkins.

" So I should be disposed to imagine," replied Mr. Pickwick.

Another knock at the door, announced a large-headed young man in a black wig, who brought with him a scorbutic youth in a long stock. The next comer was a gentleman in a shirt emblazoned with pink anchors, who was closely followed by a pale youth with a plated watch- guard. The arrival of a prim personage in clean linen and cloth boots rendered the party complete. The little table with the green baize cover was wheeled out ; the first instalment of punch was brought in, in a white jug ; and the succeeding three hours were devoted to vingt-un at sixpence a dozen, which was only once interrupted by a slight dis- pute between the scorbutic youth and the gentleman with the pink anchors ; in the course of which, the scorbutic youth intimated a burn- ing desire to pull the nose of the gentleman with the emblems of hope, in reply to which, that individual expressed his decided unwillingness to accept of any " sauce" on gratuitous terms, either from the irascible young gentleman with the scorbutic countenance, or any other person who was ornamented with a head.

When the last " natural " had been declared, and the profit and loss account of fish and sixpences adjusted, to the satisfaction of all parties, Mr. Bob Sawyer rang for supper, and the visiters squeezed themselves .into corners while it was getting ready.