ain old newspapers.

One other quotation from the same Preface may serve to introduce a fact
that my readers may think curious.

"To turn to a more pleasant subject, it may be right to say, that
there ARE two characters in this book which are drawn from life. It is
remarkable that what we call the world, which is so very credulous in
what professes to be true, is most incredulous in what professes to be
imaginary; and that, while, every day in real life, it will allow in one
man no blemishes, and in another no virtues, it will seldom admit a
very strongly-marked character, either good or bad, in a fictitious
narrative, to be within the limits of probability. But those who take an
interest in this tale, will be glad to learn that the BROTHERS CHEERYBLE
live; that their liberal charity, their singleness of heart, their
noble nature, and their unbounded benevolence, are no creations of the
Author's brain; but are prompting every day (and oftenest by stealth)
some munificent and generous deed in that town of which they are the
pride and honour."

If I were to attempt to sum up the thousands of letters, from all sorts
of people in all sorts of latitudes and climates, which this unlucky
paragraph brought down upon me, I should get into an arithmetical
difficulty from which I could not easily extricate myself. Suffice it
to say, that I believe the applications for loans, gifts, and offices
of profit that I have been requested to forward to the originals of the
BROTHERS CHEERYBLE (with whom I never interchanged any communication
in my life) would have exhausted the combined patronage of all the Lord
Chancellors since the accession of the House of Brunswick, and would
have broken the Rest of the Bank of England.

The Brothers are now dead.

There is only one other point, on which I would desire to offer a
remark. If Nicholas be not always found to be blameless or agreeable, he
is not always intended to appear so. He is a young man of an impetuous
temper and of little or no experience; and I saw no reason why such a
hero should be lifted out of nature.

CHAPTER 1

Introduces all the Rest

There once lived, in a sequestered part of the county of Devonshire, one
Mr Godfrey Nickleby: a worthy gentleman, who, taking it into his head
rather late in life that he must get married, and not being young enough
or rich enough to aspire to the hand of a lady of fortune, had wedded an
old flame out of mere attachment, who