till found it very rough riding, and was
grievously beset by all the obstacles in his course. Every tooth was a
break-neck fence, and every pimple in the measles a stone wall to him.
He was down in every fit of the hooping-cough, and rolled upon and
crushed by a whole field of small diseases, that came trooping on each
other's heels to prevent his getting up again. Some bird of prey got
into his throat instead of the thrush; and the very chickens turning
ferocious--if they have anything to do with that infant malady to which
they lend their name--worried him like tiger-cats.

The chill of Paul's christening had struck home, perhaps to some
sensitive part of his nature, which could not recover itself in the cold
shade of his father; but he was an unfortunate child from that day. Mrs
Wickam often said she never see a dear so put upon.

Mrs Wickam was a waiter's wife--which would seem equivalent to being any
other man's widow--whose application for an engagement in Mr Dombey's
service had been favourably considered, on account of the apparent
impossibility of her having any followers, or anyone to follow; and who,
from within a day or two of Paul's sharp weaning, had been engaged as
his nurse. Mrs Wickam was a meek woman, of a fair complexion, with her
eyebrows always elevated, and her head always drooping; who was always
ready to pity herself, or to be pitied, or to pity anybody else; and
who had a surprising natural gift of viewing all subjects in an utterly
forlorn and pitiable light, and bringing dreadful precedents to bear
upon them, and deriving the greatest consolation from the exercise of
that talent.

It is hardly necessary to observe, that no touch of this quality ever
reached the magnificent knowledge of Mr Dombey. It would have been
remarkable, indeed, if any had; when no one in the house--not even Mrs
Chick or Miss Tox--dared ever whisper to him that there had, on any one
occasion, been the least reason for uneasiness in reference to little
Paul. He had settled, within himself, that the child must necessarily
pass through a certain routine of minor maladies, and that the sooner
he did so the better. If he could have bought him off, or provided a
substitute, as in the case of an unlucky drawing for the militia, he
would have been glad to do so, on liberal terms. But as this was not
feasible, he merely wondered, in his haughty-manner, now and then, what
Nature meant by it; and comforted himself with the reflec