Sir John Chester, exercised on the uncomprehending Sim Tappertit and Gabriel Varden. There are also ironic touches in the two heroes, Martin Chuzzlewit and David Copperfield.
The most delightful pictures of those who entertain irony unaware are Mr. Bumble, Mr. Squeers, Mr. Turveydrop, Mrs. Skewton, Mrs. Nickleby, and Mrs. Pardiggle.
Entrenched in wisdom, these philosophers all enunciate profound truths about life.
The beadle discovers the illimitable vistas of human desires, together with the unreasonable expectation of having them gratified. He laments the ingratitude of the pauper who, in antiparochial weather, having been granted bread and cheese, has the audacity to ask for a bit of fuel.[1]
"That's the way with these people, ma'am; give 'em a apron
full of coals today, and they'll come back for another, the day
after tomorrow, as brazen as alabaster."
The pedagogue learns that parental prejudice sometimes
extends to an extravagant pampering of offspring, even
carried so far as an absurd opposition to wholesome discipline.
Summoned to London on some bothering law
business for what was called the neglect of a boy, he explains
to the sympathetic Ralph Nickleby that the lad had
as good grazing as there was to be had.[2]
"When a boy gets weak and ill and don't relish his meals,
we give him a change of diet—turn him out, for an hour or so
every day, into a neighbor's turnip-field, or sometimes, if it's
- [Footnote: "Noble old boy, an't he? * * * generous old buck. Confiding old
boy. Philanthropic old buck. Benevolent old boy! Twenty per cent I engaged to pay him, sir. But we never do business for less, at our shop." Little Dorrit, I, 554.]
