y nature;
how it grates upon my feelings. I do not care for that. I can endure as
well as another man. But what I have to hope, and what you have to hope,
Mr Pinch (otherwise a great responsibility rests upon you), is, that
this deception may not alter my ideas of humanity; that it may not
impair my freshness, or contract, if I may use the expression, my
Pinions. I hope it will not; I don't think it will. It may be a comfort
to you, if not now, at some future time, to know that I shall endeavour
not to think the worse of my fellow-creatures in general, for what has
passed between us. Farewell!'

Tom had meant to spare him one little puncturation with a lancet, which
he had it in his power to administer, but he changed his mind on hearing
this, and said:

'I think you left something in the church, sir.'

'Thank you, Mr Pinch,' said Pecksniff. 'I am not aware that I did.'

'This is your double eye-glass, I believe?' said Tom.

'Oh!' cried Pecksniff, with some degree of confusion. 'I am obliged to
you. Put it down, if you please.'

'I found it,' said Tom, slowly--'when I went to bolt the
vestry-window--in the pew.'

So he had. Mr Pecksniff had taken it off when he was bobbing up and
down, lest it should strike against the panelling; and had forgotten it.
Going back to the church with his mind full of having been watched, and
wondering very much from what part, Tom's attention was caught by the
door of the state pew standing open. Looking into it he found the glass.
And thus he knew, and by returning it gave Mr Pecksniff the information
that he knew, where the listener had been; and that instead of
overhearing fragments of the conversation, he must have rejoiced in
every word of it.

'I am glad he's gone,' said Martin, drawing a long breath when Tom had
left the room.

'It IS a relief,' assented Mr Pecksniff. 'It is a great relief. But
having discharged--I hope with tolerable firmness--the duty which I owed
to society, I will now, my dear sir, if you will give me leave, retire
to shed a few tears in the back garden, as an humble individual.'

Tom went upstairs; cleared his shelf of books; packed them up with his
music and an old fiddle in his trunk; got out his clothes (they were not
so many that they made his head ache); put them on the top of his books;
and went into the workroom for his case of instruments. There was a
ragged stool there, with the horsehair all sticking out of the top like
a wig: a very Beas