ness of my nature, the cupidity of my motives, the
poverty of my family, the general moral (or rather immoral) resemblance
between myself and--HEEP. Need I say, that it soon became necessary for
me to solicit from--HEEP--pecuniary advances towards the support of
Mrs. Micawber, and our blighted but rising family? Need I say that this
necessity had been foreseen by--HEEP? That those advances were secured
by I.O.U.'s and other similar acknowledgements, known to the legal
institutions of this country? And that I thus became immeshed in the web
he had spun for my reception?"'

Mr. Micawber's enjoyment of his epistolary powers, in describing this
unfortunate state of things, really seemed to outweigh any pain or
anxiety that the reality could have caused him. He read on:

'"Then it was that--HEEP--began to favour me with just so much of his
confidence, as was necessary to the discharge of his infernal business.
Then it was that I began, if I may so Shakespearianly express myself, to
dwindle, peak, and pine. I found that my services were constantly
called into requisition for the falsification of business, and the
mystification of an individual whom I will designate as Mr. W. That Mr.
W. was imposed upon, kept in ignorance, and deluded, in every possible
way; yet, that all this while, the ruffian--HEEP--was professing
unbounded gratitude to, and unbounded friendship for, that much-abused
gentleman. This was bad enough; but, as the philosophic Dane observes,
with that universal applicability which distinguishes the illustrious
ornament of the Elizabethan Era, worse remains behind!"'

Mr. Micawber was so very much struck by this happy rounding off with a
quotation, that he indulged himself, and us, with a second reading of
the sentence, under pretence of having lost his place.

'"It is not my intention,"' he continued reading on, '"to enter on a
detailed list, within the compass of the present epistle (though it
is ready elsewhere), of the various malpractices of a minor nature,
affecting the individual whom I have denominated Mr. W., to which I
have been a tacitly consenting party. My object, when the contest within
myself between stipend and no stipend, baker and no baker, existence
and non-existence, ceased, was to take advantage of my opportunities
to discover and expose the major malpractices committed, to that
gentleman's grievous wrong and injury, by--HEEP. Stimulated by the
silent monitor within, and by a no less touc