. But who does not love that
scene with which the novel commences? How could such a girl as Amelia
Osborne have got herself into such society as that in which we see her
at Vauxhall? But we forgive it all because of the telling. And then
there is that crowning absurdity of Sir Pitt Crawley and his
establishment.

I never could understand how Thackeray in his first serious attempt
could have dared to subject himself and Sir Pitt Crawley to the critics
of the time. Sir Pitt is a baronet, a man of large property, and in
Parliament, to whom Becky Sharp goes as a governess at the end of a
delightful visit with her friend Amelia Sedley, on leaving Miss
Pinkerton's school. The Sedley carriage takes her to Sir Pitt's door.
"When the bell was rung a head appeared between the interstices of the
dining-room shutters, and the door was opened by a man in drab breeches
and gaiters, with a dirty old coat, a foul old neckcloth lashed round
his bristly neck, a shining bald head, a leering red face, a pair of
twinkling gray eyes, and a mouth perpetually on the grin.

"'This Sir Pitt Crawley's?' says John from the box.

"'E'es,' says the man at the door with a nod.

"'Hand down these 'ere trunks there,' said John.

"'Hand 'em down yourself,' said the porter." But John on the box
declines to do this, as he cannot leave his horses.

"The bald-headed man, taking his hands out of his breeches' pockets,
advanced on this summons, and throwing Miss Sharp's trunk over his
shoulder, carried it into the house." Then Becky is shown into the
house, and a dismantled dining-room is described, into which she is led
by the dirty man with the trunk.

Two kitchen chairs, and a round table, and an attenuated old
poker and tongs, were, however, gathered round the fireplace,
as was a saucepan over a feeble, sputtering fire. There was a
bit of cheese and bread and a tin candlestick on the table,
and a little black porter in a pint pot.

"Had your dinner, I suppose?" This was said by him of the bald
head. "It is not too warm for you? Like a drop of beer?"

"Where is Sir Pitt Crawley?" said Miss Sharp majestically.

"He, he! _I_'m Sir Pitt Crawley. Rek'lect you owe me a pint
for bringing down your luggage. He, he! ask Tinker if I
ain't."

The lady addressed as Mrs. Tinker at this moment made her
appearance, with a pipe and a paper of tobacco, for which she
had been despatched a m