e. Thank you. Well, sir, I was going to tell you--'

'We are quite ready,' interrupted Mould in a low voice.

'Ready, eh?' said the doctor. 'Very good, Mr Pecksniff, I'll take an
opportunity of relating the rest in the coach. It's rather curious.
Ready, eh? No rain, I hope?'

'Quite fair, sir,' returned Mould.

'I was afraid the ground would have been wet,' said the doctor, 'for
my glass fell yesterday. We may congratulate ourselves upon our good
fortune.' But seeing by this time that Mr Jonas and Chuffey were going
out at the door, he put a white pocket-handkerchief to his face as if a
violent burst of grief had suddenly come upon him, and walked down side
by side with Mr Pecksniff.

Mr Mould and his men had not exaggerated the grandeur of the
arrangements. They were splendid. The four hearse-horses, especially,
reared and pranced, and showed their highest action, as if they knew a
man was dead, and triumphed in it. 'They break us, drive us, ride us;
ill-treat, abuse, and maim us for their pleasure--But they die; Hurrah,
they die!'

So through the narrow streets and winding city ways, went Anthony
Chuzzlewit's funeral; Mr Jonas glancing stealthily out of the
coach-window now and then, to observe its effect upon the crowd;
Mr Mould as he walked along, listening with a sober pride to the
exclamations of the bystanders; the doctor whispering his story to Mr
Pecksniff, without appearing to come any nearer the end of it; and
poor old Chuffey sobbing unregarded in a corner. But he had greatly
scandalized Mr Mould at an early stage of the ceremony by carrying his
handkerchief in his hat in a perfectly informal manner, and wiping his
eyes with his knuckles. And as Mr Mould himself had said already, his
behaviour was indecent, and quite unworthy of such an occasion; and he
never ought to have been there.

There he was, however; and in the churchyard there he was, also,
conducting himself in a no less unbecoming manner, and leaning for
support on Tacker, who plainly told him that he was fit for nothing
better than a walking funeral. But Chuffey, Heaven help him! heard no
sound but the echoes, lingering in his own heart, of a voice for ever
silent.

'I loved him,' cried the old man, sinking down upon the grave when all
was done. 'He was very good to me. Oh, my dear old friend and master!'

'Come, come, Mr Chuffey,' said the doctor, 'this won't do; it's a clayey
soil, Mr Chuffey. You mustn't, really.'

'If it had been