id, in a deep and impressive tone:

"Oliver!"

"Come, you let me out!" replied Oliver, from the inside.

"Do you know this here voice, Oliver?" said Mr. Bumble.

"Yes," replied Oliver.

"Ain't you afraid of it, sir? Ain't you a-trembling while I speak, sir?"
said Mr. Bumble.

"No!" replied Oliver, boldly.

An answer so different from the one he had expected to hear, and was in
the habit of receiving, staggered Mr. Bumble not a little.

"Oh, you know, Mr. Bumble, he must be mad," said Mrs. Sowerberry. "No
boy in half his senses could venture to speak so to you."

"It's not madness, ma'am," replied Mr. Bumble, after a few moments of
deep meditation. "It's meat."

"What?" exclaimed Mrs. Sowerberry.

"Meat, ma'am, meat," replied Bumble, with stern emphasis. "You've
overfed him, ma'am."

"Dear, dear!" ejaculated Mrs. Sowerberry, piously raising her eyes to
the kitchen ceiling; "this comes of being liberal!"

The liberality of Mrs. Sowerberry to Oliver had consisted in a bestowal
upon him of all the dirty odds and ends which nobody else would eat.

"Ah!" said Mr. Bumble, when the lady brought her eyes down to earth
again; "the only thing that can be done now, that I know of, is to leave
him in the cellar for a day or so, till he's a little starved down; and
then to take him out, and keep him on gruel all through his
apprenticeship. He comes of a bad family. Excitable natures, Mrs.
Sowerberry! Both the nurse and doctor said that that mother of his made
her way here, against difficulties and pain that would have killed any
well-disposed woman, weeks before."

At this point of Mr. Bumble's discourse, Oliver, just hearing enough to
know that some new allusion was being made to his mother, recommenced
kicking, with a violence that rendered every other sound inaudible.
Sowerberry returned at this moment. Oliver's offense having been
explained to him, with such exaggerations as the ladies thought best
calculated to rouse his ire, he unlocked the cellar-door in a twinkling,
and dragged his rebellious apprentice out by the collar.

Oliver's clothes had been torn in the beating he had received; his face
was bruised and scratched; and his hair scattered over his forehead. The
angry flush had not disappeared, however; and when he was pulled out of
his prison, he scowled boldly on Noah, and looked quite undismayed.

"Now, you are a nice young fellow, ain't you?" said Sowerberry, giving
Oliver a shake and a box on the