k to be but poor and humble stars for glittering on the rustic
objects among which I had passed my life.

"Saturday night," said I, when we sat at our supper of bread and cheese
and beer. "Five more days, and then the day before the day! They'll soon
go."

"Yes, Pip," observed Joe, whose voice sounded hollow in his beer-mug.
"They'll soon go."

"Soon, soon go," said Biddy.

"I have been thinking, Joe, that when I go down town on Monday, and
order my new clothes, I shall tell the tailor that I'll come and put
them on there, or that I'll have them sent to Mr. Pumblechook's. It
would be very disagreeable to be stared at by all the people here."

"Mr. and Mrs. Hubble might like to see you in your new gen-teel figure
too, Pip," said Joe, industriously cutting his bread, with his cheese on
it, in the palm of his left hand, and glancing at my untasted supper
as if he thought of the time when we used to compare slices. "So might
Wopsle. And the Jolly Bargemen might take it as a compliment."

"That's just what I don't want, Joe. They would make such a business of
it,--such a coarse and common business,--that I couldn't bear myself."

"Ah, that indeed, Pip!" said Joe. "If you couldn't abear yourself--"

Biddy asked me here, as she sat holding my sister's plate, "Have you
thought about when you'll show yourself to Mr. Gargery, and your sister
and me? You will show yourself to us; won't you?"

"Biddy," I returned with some resentment, "you are so exceedingly quick
that it's difficult to keep up with you."

("She always were quick," observed Joe.)

"If you had waited another moment, Biddy, you would have heard me say
that I shall bring my clothes here in a bundle one evening,--most likely
on the evening before I go away."

Biddy said no more. Handsomely forgiving her, I soon exchanged an
affectionate good night with her and Joe, and went up to bed. When I got
into my little room, I sat down and took a long look at it, as a mean
little room that I should soon be parted from and raised above, for
ever. It was furnished with fresh young remembrances too, and even at
the same moment I fell into much the same confused division of mind
between it and the better rooms to which I was going, as I had been in
so often between the forge and Miss Havisham's, and Biddy and Estella.

The sun had been shining brightly all day on the roof of my attic, and
the room was warm. As I put the window open and stood looking out, I saw
Joe co