Page:The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.djvu/419

341 THE PICKWICK CLUB. PAl

eyes, up a serpentine gravel path leading thereunto. A decidedly inbe- licate young gentleman, in a pair of wings and nothing else, was de- picted as superintending the cooking; a representation of the spire of the church in Langham Place, appeared in the distance; and the' whole formed a " valentine," of which, as a written inscriptino in the window testified, there was a large assortment within, which the shopkeeper pledged himself to dispose of to his countrymen generally, at the reduced rate of one and sixpence each.

" I should ha' forgot it ; I should certainly ha' forgot it ! " said Sara ; and so saying, he at once stepped into the stationer's shop, and request- ed to be served with a sheet of the best gilt-edged letter-paper, and a hard-nibbed pen which could be warranted not to splutter. These articles having been promptly supplied, he walked on direct towards Leadenhall Market at a good round pace, very different from his recent lingering one. Looking round him, he there beheld a sign-board on which the painter's art had delineated something remotely resembling a cerulean elephant with an aquiline nose in lieu of trunk. Rightly con- jecturing that this was the Blue Boar himself, he stepped into the house, and inquired concerning his parent.

" He won't be here this three quarters of an hour or more," said the young lady who superintended the domestic arrangements of the Blue Boar.

" Wery good, my dear," replied Sam. " Let me have nine penn'orth o' brandy and water luke, and the inkstand, will you, miss ? "

The brandy and water luke and the inkstand having been carried into the little parlour, and the young lady having carefully flattened down the coals to prevent their blazing, and carried away the poker to pre- clude the possibility of the fire being stirred, without the full privity and concurrence of the Blue /Boar being first had and obtained, Sam Weller sat himself down in a box near the stove, and pulled out the sheet of gilt-edged letter-paper, and the hard-nibbed pen. Then, looking carefully at the pen to see that there were no hairs in it, and dusting down the table, so that there might be no crumbs of bread under the paper, Sam tucked up the cuffs of his coat, squared his elbows, and composed himself to write.

To ladies and gentlemen who are not in the habit of devoting them- selves practically to the science of penmanship, writing a letter is no very easy task, it being always considered necessary in such cases for Ihe writer to recline his head on his left arm so as to place his eyes as nearly as possible on a level with the paper, and while glancing side^ ways at the letters he is constructing, to form with his tongue ima- ginary characters to correspond. These motions, although unquestion- ably of the greatest assistance to original composition, retard in some degree the progress of the writer, and Sam had unconsciously been a full hour and a half writing words in small text, smearing out wrong letters with his little finger, and putting in new ones which required going over very often to render them visible through the old blots, when he was roused by the opening of the door and the entrance of his irent.

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