filling up the hole in the dark. The ashes being easily moved by
a skilful hand, the spies took this as a hint to make off in good time.
Accordingly, Mr Venus slipped past Mr Wegg and towed him down. But Mr
Wegg's descent was not accomplished without some personal inconvenience,
for his self-willed leg sticking into the ashes about half way down, and
time pressing, Mr Venus took the liberty of hauling him from his tether
by the collar: which occasioned him to make the rest of the journey on
his back, with his head enveloped in the skirts of his coat, and his
wooden leg coming last, like a drag. So flustered was Mr Wegg by this
mode of travelling, that when he was set on the level ground with his
intellectual developments uppermost, he was quite unconscious of his
bearings, and had not the least idea where his place of residence was
to be found, until Mr Venus shoved him into it. Even then he staggered
round and round, weakly staring about him, until Mr Venus with a hard
brush brushed his senses into him and the dust out of him.

Mr Boffin came down leisurely, for this brushing process had been well
accomplished, and Mr Venus had had time to take his breath, before he
reappeared. That he had the bottle somewhere about him could not be
doubted; where, was not so clear. He wore a large rough coat, buttoned
over, and it might be in any one of half a dozen pockets.

'What's the matter, Wegg?' said Mr Boffin. 'You are as pale as a
candle.'

Mr Wegg replied, with literal exactness, that he felt as if he had had a
turn.

'Bile,' said Mr Boffin, blowing out the light in the lantern, shutting
it up, and stowing it away in the breast of his coat as before. 'Are you
subject to bile, Wegg?'

Mr Wegg again replied, with strict adherence to truth, that he didn't
think he had ever had a similar sensation in his head, to anything like
the same extent.

'Physic yourself to-morrow, Wegg,' said Mr Boffin, 'to be in order
for next night. By-the-by, this neighbourhood is going to have a loss,
Wegg.'

'A loss, sir?'

'Going to lose the Mounds.'

The friendly movers made such an obvious effort not to look at one
another, that they might as well have stared at one another with all
their might.

'Have you parted with them, Mr Boffin?' asked Silas.

'Yes; they're going. Mine's as good as gone already.'

'You mean the little one of the three, with the pole atop, sir.'

'Yes,' said Mr Boffin, rubbing his ear in his old way, with t