kindly across the table, that I felt quite thankful to her.

'Ah!' said Mr. Peggotty, taking up her curls, and running them over his
hand like water, 'here's another orphan, you see, sir. And here,' said
Mr. Peggotty, giving Ham a backhanded knock in the chest, 'is another of
'em, though he don't look much like it.'

'If I had you for my guardian, Mr. Peggotty,' said I, shaking my head,
'I don't think I should FEEL much like it.'

'Well said, Mas'r Davy bor'!' cried Ham, in an ecstasy. 'Hoorah! Well
said! Nor more you wouldn't! Hor! Hor!'--Here he returned Mr. Peggotty's
back-hander, and little Em'ly got up and kissed Mr. Peggotty. 'And how's
your friend, sir?' said Mr. Peggotty to me.

'Steerforth?' said I.

'That's the name!' cried Mr. Peggotty, turning to Ham. 'I knowed it was
something in our way.'

'You said it was Rudderford,' observed Ham, laughing.

'Well!' retorted Mr. Peggotty. 'And ye steer with a rudder, don't ye? It
ain't fur off. How is he, sir?'

'He was very well indeed when I came away, Mr. Peggotty.'

'There's a friend!' said Mr. Peggotty, stretching out his pipe. 'There's
a friend, if you talk of friends! Why, Lord love my heart alive, if it
ain't a treat to look at him!'

'He is very handsome, is he not?' said I, my heart warming with this
praise.

'Handsome!' cried Mr. Peggotty. 'He stands up to you like--like a--why I
don't know what he don't stand up to you like. He's so bold!'

'Yes! That's just his character,' said I. 'He's as brave as a lion, and
you can't think how frank he is, Mr. Peggotty.'

'And I do suppose, now,' said Mr. Peggotty, looking at me through the
smoke of his pipe, 'that in the way of book-larning he'd take the wind
out of a'most anything.'

'Yes,' said I, delighted; 'he knows everything. He is astonishingly
clever.'

'There's a friend!' murmured Mr. Peggotty, with a grave toss of his
head.

'Nothing seems to cost him any trouble,' said I. 'He knows a task if he
only looks at it. He is the best cricketer you ever saw. He will give
you almost as many men as you like at draughts, and beat you easily.'

Mr. Peggotty gave his head another toss, as much as to say: 'Of course
he will.'

'He is such a speaker,' I pursued, 'that he can win anybody over; and I
don't know what you'd say if you were to hear him sing, Mr. Peggotty.'

Mr. Peggotty gave his head another toss, as much as to say: 'I have no
doubt of it.'

'Then, he's such a generous, fine, noble fello