THE PICKWICK CLUB. 559
" Fond ! " replied his father, *< I can't keep her avay from me. If I was locked up in a fire-proof chest vith a patent Brahmin, she'd find means to get at me, Sammy."
- ' Wot a thing it is to be so sought arter!" observed Sam, smiling.
- I don't take no pride out on it, Sammy," replied IMr. Weller,
poking the fire vehemently, *' it's a horrid sitiwation. I'm actiwally drove out o' house and home by it. The breath was scarcely out o' your poor mother-in-law's body, ven vun old "ooman sends me a pot o' jam, and another a pot o' jelly, and another brews a blessed large jug o' camomile-tea, vich she brings in vith her own hands." Mr. Weller paused with an aspect of intense disgust, and, looking round, added in a whisper, " They wos all widders, Sammy, all on 'em, 'cept the camomile-tea vun, as wos a single young lady o' fifty- three."
Sam gave a comical look in reply, and the old gentleman having broken an obstinate lump of coal, with a countenance expressive of as much earnestness and malice as if it had been the head of one of the widows last-mentioned, said —
" In short. Sammy, I feel that I ain't safe anyveres but on the box." '
" How are you safer there than anyveres else ? " interrupted Sam.
- 'Cos a coachman 's a privileged indiwidual," replied INIr. Weller,
looking fixedly at his son. " 'Cos a coachman may do vithout suspi- cion wot other men may not ; 'cos a coachman may be on the very amicablest terms with eighty mile o' females, and yet nobody think that he ever means to marry any vun among 'em. And wot other man can say the same, Sammy ? "
" Veil, there 's somethin' in that," said Sam.
"If your gov'ner had been a coachman," reasoned Mr. Weller, "do you s'pose as that 'ere jury 'ud ever ha' conwicted him, s'posin' it possible as the matter could ha' gone to that ex-tremity . They dustn'c ha' done it."
'^Wy not?" said Sam, rather disparagingly.
" Vy not!" rejoined Mr, Weller; "'cos it 'ud ha* gone agin their consciences. A reg'lar coachman's a sort o' con-nectin' link betvixt singleness and matrimony, and every practicable man knows it."
- ' Wot you mean, they're gen'ral fav'rites, and nobody takes adwan-
tage on 'em, p'raps ?" said Sam.
His father nodded.
" How it ever come to that 'ere pass," resumed the parent Weller, " I can't say ; vy it is that long-stage coachmen possess such insiniwa- tions, and is alvays looked up to — a-dored I may say — by ev'ry young 'ooman in ev'ry town he vurks through, I don't know ; I only know that so it is ; it's a reg'lation of natur — a dispensary, as your poor mother-in-law used to say."
"' A dispensation," said Sam, correcting the old gentleman.
- ' Wery good, Samivel, a dispensation if you like it better," returned
Mr. Weller ; " / call it a dispensary, and it's alvays writ up so, at the places vere they gives you physic for nothin' in your own bottles ; that's all."
With these words Mr. Weller re-filled and re-lighted his pipe, and
