ys than he was.'

'What more did you tell him?' Mr Chuzzlewit inquired.

'Why, sir,' said Mr Tapley, smiling, 'I should have liked to tell him a
deal more, but not being able, sir, I didn't tell it him.'

'You told him all you knew?'

'But it was precious little, sir,' retorted Mr Tapley. 'There was very
little respectin' you that I was able to tell him, sir. I only mentioned
my opinion that Mr Pecksniff would find himself deceived, sir, and
that you would find yourself deceived, and that he would find himself
deceived, sir.'

'In what?' asked Mr Chuzzlewit.

'Meaning him, sir?'

'Meaning both him and me.'

'Well, sir,' said Mr Tapley. 'In your old opinions of each other. As
to him, sir, and his opinions, I know he's a altered man. I know it.
I know'd it long afore he spoke to you t'other day, and I must say it.
Nobody don't know half as much of him as I do. Nobody can't. There
was always a deal of good in him, but a little of it got crusted over,
somehow. I can't say who rolled the paste of that 'ere crust myself,
but--'

'Go on,' said Martin. 'Why do you stop?'

'But it--well! I beg your pardon, but I think it may have been you, sir.
Unintentional I think it may have been you. I don't believe that neither
of you gave the other quite a fair chance. There! Now I've got rid on
it,' said Mr Tapley in a fit of desperation: 'I can't go a-carryin' it
about in my own mind, bustin' myself with it; yesterday was quite long
enough. It's out now. I can't help it. I'm sorry for it. Don't wisit on
him, sir, that's all.'

It was clear that Mark expected to be ordered out immediately, and was
quite prepared to go.

'So you think,' said Martin, 'that his old faults are, in some degree,
of my creation, do you?'

'Well, sir,' retorted Mr Tapley, 'I'm werry sorry, but I can't unsay it.
It's hardly fair of you, sir, to make a ignorant man conwict himself in
this way, but I DO think so. I am as respectful disposed to you, sir, as
a man can be; but I DO think so.'

The light of a faint smile seemed to break through the dull steadiness
of Martin's face, as he looked attentively at him, without replying.

'Yet you are an ignorant man, you say,' he observed after a long pause.

'Werry much so,' Mr Tapley replied.

'And I a learned, well-instructed man, you think?'

'Likewise wery much so,' Mr Tapley answered.

The old man, with his chin resting on his hand, paced the room twice or
thrice before he added:

'You have l