credit for some portion
of this bold attempt (which had so nearly proved successful) to carry
off Smike; but on more mature consideration, he was inclined to
think that the full merit of it rested with Mr Squeers. Determined to
ascertain, if he could, through John Browdie, how the case really stood,
he betook himself to his daily occupation: meditating, as he went, on
a great variety of schemes for the punishment of the Yorkshire
schoolmaster, all of which had their foundation in the strictest
principles of retributive justice, and had but the one drawback of being
wholly impracticable.

'A fine morning, Mr Linkinwater!' said Nicholas, entering the office.

'Ah!' replied Tim, 'talk of the country, indeed! What do you think of
this, now, for a day--a London day--eh?'

'It's a little clearer out of town,' said Nicholas.

'Clearer!' echoed Tim Linkinwater. 'You should see it from my bedroom
window.'

'You should see it from MINE,' replied Nicholas, with a smile.

'Pooh! pooh!' said Tim Linkinwater, 'don't tell me. Country!' (Bow was
quite a rustic place to Tim.) 'Nonsense! What can you get in the country
but new-laid eggs and flowers? I can buy new-laid eggs in Leadenhall
Market, any morning before breakfast; and as to flowers, it's worth a
run upstairs to smell my mignonette, or to see the double wallflower in
the back-attic window, at No. 6, in the court.'

'There is a double wallflower at No. 6, in the court, is there?' said
Nicholas.

'Yes, is there!' replied Tim, 'and planted in a cracked jug, without a
spout. There were hyacinths there, this last spring, blossoming, in--but
you'll laugh at that, of course.'

'At what?'

'At their blossoming in old blacking-bottles,' said Tim.

'Not I, indeed,' returned Nicholas.

Tim looked wistfully at him, for a moment, as if he were encouraged
by the tone of this reply to be more communicative on the subject; and
sticking behind his ear, a pen that he had been making, and shutting up
his knife with a smart click, said,

'They belong to a sickly bedridden hump-backed boy, and seem to be the
only pleasure, Mr Nickleby, of his sad existence. How many years is it,'
said Tim, pondering, 'since I first noticed him, quite a little child,
dragging himself about on a pair of tiny crutches? Well! Well! Not many;
but though they would appear nothing, if I thought of other things, they
seem a long, long time, when I think of him. It is a sad thing,' said
Tim, breaking off, 't