The Project Gutenberg eBook, Doctor Marigold, by Charles Dickens

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Title: Doctor Marigold

Author: Charles Dickens

Release Date: April 3, 2005 [eBook #1415]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOCTOR MARIGOLD***

Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall "Christmas Stories" edition by
David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk

DOCTOR MARIGOLD

I am a Cheap Jack, and my own father's name was Willum Marigold. It was
in his lifetime supposed by some that his name was William, but my own
father always consistently said, No, it was Willum. On which point I
content myself with looking at the argument this way: If a man is not
allowed to know his own name in a free country, how much is he allowed to
know in a land of slavery? As to looking at the argument through the
medium of the Register, Willum Marigold come into the world before
Registers come up much,--and went out of it too. They wouldn't have been
greatly in his line neither, if they had chanced to come up before him.

I was born on the Queen's highway, but it was the King's at that time. A
doctor was fetched to my own mother by my own father, when it took place
on a common; and in consequence of his being a very kind gentleman, and
accepting no fee but a tea-tray, I was named Doctor, out of gratitude and
compliment to him. There you have me. Doctor Marigold.

I am at present a middle-aged man of a broadish build, in cords,
leggings, and a sleeved waistcoat the strings of which is always gone
behind. Repair them how you will, they go like fiddle-strings. You have
been to the theatre, and you have seen one of the wiolin-players screw up
his wiolin, after listening to it as if it had been whispering the secret
to him that it feared it was out of order, and then you have heard it
snap. That's as exactly similar to my waistcoat as a waistcoat and a
wiolin can be like one another.

I am partial to a white hat, and I like a shawl round my neck wore loose
and easy. Sitting down is my favourite posture. If I have a taste in
point of personal jewelry, it is mother-of-pearl buttons. There you have
me agai