ar boy!" While I complied, he, not
comprehending a single word, would stand before the fire surveying me
with the air of an Exhibitor, and I would see him, between the fingers
of the hand with which I shaded my face, appealing in dumb show to
the furniture to take notice of my proficiency. The imaginary student
pursued by the misshapen creature he had impiously made, was not more
wretched than I, pursued by the creature who had made me, and recoiling
from him with a stronger repulsion, the more he admired me and the
fonder he was of me.

This is written of, I am sensible, as if it had lasted a year. It lasted
about five days. Expecting Herbert all the time, I dared not go out,
except when I took Provis for an airing after dark. At length, one
evening when dinner was over and I had dropped into a slumber quite
worn out,--for my nights had been agitated and my rest broken by fearful
dreams,--I was roused by the welcome footstep on the staircase. Provis,
who had been asleep too, staggered up at the noise I made, and in an
instant I saw his jackknife shining in his hand.

"Quiet! It's Herbert!" I said; and Herbert came bursting in, with the
airy freshness of six hundred miles of France upon him.

"Handel, my dear fellow, how are you, and again how are you, and again
how are you? I seem to have been gone a twelvemonth! Why, so I must have
been, for you have grown quite thin and pale! Handel, my--Halloa! I beg
your pardon."

He was stopped in his running on and in his shaking hands with me, by
seeing Provis. Provis, regarding him with a fixed attention, was slowly
putting up his jackknife, and groping in another pocket for something
else.

"Herbert, my dear friend," said I, shutting the double doors, while
Herbert stood staring and wondering, "something very strange has
happened. This is--a visitor of mine."

"It's all right, dear boy!" said Provis coming forward, with his little
clasped black book, and then addressing himself to Herbert. "Take it in
your right hand. Lord strike you dead on the spot, if ever you split in
any way sumever! Kiss it!"

"Do so, as he wishes it," I said to Herbert. So, Herbert, looking at
me with a friendly uneasiness and amazement, complied, and Provis
immediately shaking hands with him, said, "Now you're on your oath, you
know. And never believe me on mine, if Pip shan't make a gentleman on
you!"

Chapter XLI

In vain should I attempt to describe the astonishment and disquiet
o