iliar with the
face of every tombstone, and the burial service seemed to excite his
strongest sympathy. His friends said he was surly--he insisted he was
nervous; they thought him a lucky dog, but he protested that he was 'the
most unfortunate man in the world.' Cold as he was, and wretched as he
declared himself to be, he was not wholly unsusceptible of attachments.
He revered the memory of Hoyle, as he was himself an admirable and
imperturbable whist-player, and he chuckled with delight at a fretful and
impatient adversary. He adored King Herod for his massacre of the
innocents; and if he hated one thing more than another, it was a child.
However, he could hardly be said to hate anything in particular, because
he disliked everything in general; but perhaps his greatest antipathies
were cabs, old women, doors that would not shut, musical amateurs, and
omnibus cads. He subscribed to the 'Society for the Suppression of Vice'
for the pleasure of putting a stop to any harmless amusements; and he
contributed largely towards the support of two itinerant methodist
parsons, in the amiable hope that if circumstances rendered any people
happy in this world, they might perchance be rendered miserable by fears
for the next.

Mr. Dumps had a nephew who had been married about a year, and who was
somewhat of a favourite with his uncle, because he was an admirable
subject to exercise his misery-creating powers upon. Mr. Charles
Kitterbell was a small, sharp, spare man, with a very large head, and a
broad, good-humoured countenance. He looked like a faded giant, with the
head and face partially restored; and he had a cast in his eye which
rendered it quite impossible for any one with whom he conversed to know
where he was looking. His eyes appeared fixed on the wall, and he was
staring you out of countenance; in short, there was no catching his eye,
and perhaps it is a merciful dispensation of Providence that such eyes
are not catching. In addition to these characteristics, it may be added
that Mr. Charles Kitterbell was one of the most credulous and
matter-of-fact little personages that ever took _to_ himself a wife, and
_for_ himself a house in Great Russell-street, Bedford-square. (Uncle
Dumps always dropped the 'Bedford-square,' and inserted in lieu thereof
the dreadful words 'Tottenham-court-road.')

'No, but, uncle, 'pon my life you must--you must promise to be
godfather,' said Mr. Kitterbell, as he sat in conversation