lieved that
she was tutored to excite compassion, and passed on. Florence, too,
called to her aid all the firmness and self-reliance of a character that
her sad experience had prematurely formed and tried: and keeping the end
she had in view steadily before her, steadily pursued it.

It was full two hours later in the afternoon than when she had started
on this strange adventure, when, escaping from the clash and clangour
of a narrow street full of carts and waggons, she peeped into a kind
of wharf or landing-place upon the river-side, where there were a great
many packages, casks, and boxes, strewn about; a large pair of wooden
scales; and a little wooden house on wheels, outside of which, looking
at the neighbouring masts and boats, a stout man stood whistling, with
his pen behind his ear, and his hands in his pockets, as if his day's
work were nearly done.

'Now then! 'said this man, happening to turn round. 'We haven't got
anything for you, little girl. Be off!'

'If you please, is this the City?' asked the trembling daughter of the
Dombeys.

'Ah! It's the City. You know that well enough, I daresay. Be off! We
haven't got anything for you.'

'I don't want anything, thank you,' was the timid answer. 'Except to
know the way to Dombey and Son's.'

The man who had been strolling carelessly towards her, seemed surprised
by this reply, and looking attentively in her face, rejoined:

'Why, what can you want with Dombey and Son's?'

'To know the way there, if you please.'

The man looked at her yet more curiously, and rubbed the back of his
head so hard in his wonderment that he knocked his own hat off.

'Joe!' he called to another man--a labourer--as he picked it up and put
it on again.

'Joe it is!' said Joe.

'Where's that young spark of Dombey's who's been watching the shipment
of them goods?'

'Just gone, by t'other gate,' said Joe.

'Call him back a minute.'

Joe ran up an archway, bawling as he went, and very soon returned
with a blithe-looking boy.

'You're Dombey's jockey, ain't you?' said the first man.

'I'm in Dombey's House, Mr Clark,' returned the boy.

'Look'ye here, then,' said Mr Clark.

Obedient to the indication of Mr Clark's hand, the boy approached
towards Florence, wondering, as well he might, what he had to do with
her. But she, who had heard what passed, and who, besides the relief
of so suddenly considering herself safe at her journey's end, felt
reassured beyond all measur