r one of the most probable events in
the world.

'Drag him away! Take him out of my reach!' said Martin; 'or I can't help
it. The strong restraint I have put upon my hands has been enough to
palsy them. I am not master of myself while he is within their range.
Drag him away!'

Seeing that he still did not rise, Mr Tapley, without any compromise
about it, actually did drag him away, and stick him up on the floor,
with his back against the opposite wall.

'Hear me, rascal!' said Mr Chuzzlewit. 'I have summoned you here to
witness your own work. I have summoned you here to witness it, because
I know it will be gall and wormwood to you! I have summoned you here to
witness it, because I know the sight of everybody here must be a dagger
in your mean, false heart! What! do you know me as I am, at last!'

Mr Pecksniff had cause to stare at him, for the triumph in his face and
speech and figure was a sight to stare at.

'Look there!' said the old man, pointing at him, and appealing to the
rest. 'Look there! And then--come hither, my dear Martin--look here!
here! here!' At every repetition of the word he pressed his grandson
closer to his breast.

'The passion I felt, Martin, when I dared not do this,' he said, 'was
in the blow I struck just now. Why did we ever part! How could we ever
part! How could you ever fly from me to him!'

Martin was about to answer, but he stopped him, and went on.

'The fault was mine no less than yours. Mark has told me so today, and
I have known it long; though not so long as I might have done. Mary, my
love, come here.'

As she trembled and was very pale, he sat her in his own chair, and
stood beside it with her hand in his; and Martin standing by him.

'The curse of our house,' said the old man, looking kindly down upon
her, 'has been the love of self; has ever been the love of self. How
often have I said so, when I never knew that I had wrought it upon
others.'

He drew one hand through Martin's arm, and standing so, between them,
proceeded thus:

'You all know how I bred this orphan up, to tend me. None of you can
know by what degrees I have come to regard her as a daughter; for
she has won upon me, by her self-forgetfulness, her tenderness, her
patience, all the goodness of her nature, when Heaven is her witness
that I took but little pains to draw it forth. It blossomed without
cultivation, and it ripened without heat. I cannot find it in my heart
to say that I am sorry for it n