loped, thrusting his tongue into his cheek, for the entertainment of the other very tall young man on hire, as the couple turned into the dining-room, Florence and Edith were already there, and sit. ting side by side. Florence would have risen when her father entered, to resign her chair to him; but Edith openly put her hand upon her arm, and Mr. Dombey took an opposite place at the round table. The conversation was almost entirely sustained by Mrs. Skewton. Florence hardly dared to raise her eyes, lest they should reveal the traces of tears; far less dared to speak; and Edith never uttered one word, unless in answer to a question. Verily, Cleopatra worked hard, for the establishment that was so nearly clutched; and verily it should have

been a rich one to reward her!

"And so your preparations are nearly finished at last, my dear Dombey ?" said Cleopatra, when the dessert was put upon the table, and the silver. headed butler had withdrawn. "Even the lawyers' preparations!"

"Yes, madam," replied Mr. Dombey; "the deed of settlement, the professional gentlemen inform mc, is now ready, and as I was mentioning to you, Edith has only to do us the favour to suggest her own time for its execution."

Edith sat, like a handsome statue; as cold, as silent, and as still.

"My dearest love," said Cleopatra, "do you hear what Mr. Dombey says? Ah, my dear Dombey!" aside to that gentleman, "How her absence, as the time approaches, reminds me of the days, when that most agreeable of creatures, her Papa, was in your situation!”

"I have nothing to suggest. It shall be when you please," said Edith, scarcely looking over the table at Mr. Dombey.

"To-morrow?" suggested Mr. Dombey.

64

If you please."

"Or would next day," said Mr. Dombey, "suit your engagements better?"

"I have no engagements. I am always at your disposal. Let it be when you like."

"No engagements, my dear Edith !" remonstrated her mother, when you are in a most terrible state of flurry all day long, and have a thousand and one appointments with all sorts of tradespeople!"

They are of your making," returned Edith, turning on her with a slight contraction of her brow. "You and Mr. Dombey can arrange between you."

“Very true, indeed, my love, and most consider. ate of you!" said Cleopatra. "My darling Florence, you must really come and kiss me once more, if you please, my dear!"

Singular coincidence, that these gushes of interest in Florence hurried Cleopatra away from almost every dialogue in which Edith had a share, however trifling! Florence had certainly never undergone so much embracing, and perhaps had never been, unconsciously, so useful in her life.

So thought Mr. Dombey, when he was left alone at the dining-table, and mused upon his past and future fortunes: finding no uncongeniality in an air of scant and gloomy state that pervaded the room, in colour a dark brown, with black hatchments of pictures blotching the walls, and twentyfour black chairs, with almost as many nails in them as so many coffins, waiting like mutes, upon the threshold of the Turkey carpet; and two exhausted negroes holding up two withered branches of candelabra on the side-board, and a musty smell prevailing as if the ashes of ten thousand dinners were entombed in the sarcophagus below it. The owner of the house lived much abroad; the air of England seldom agreed long with a member of the Feenix family; and the room had gradually put itself into deeper and still deeper mourning for him, until it was become so funereal as to want nothing but a body in it to be quite complete.

No bad representation of the body, for the nonce, in his unbending form, if not in his attitude, Mr. Dombey looked down into the cold depths of the dead sea of mahogany on which the fruit dishes and decanters lay at anchor; as if the subjects of his thoughts were rising towards the surface one by one, and plunging down again. Edith was there in all her majesty of brow and figure; and close to her came Florence, with her timid head turned to him, as it had been, for an instant, when she left the room; and Edith's eyes upon her, and Edith's hand put out protectingly. A little figure in a low arm-chair came springing next into the light, and looked upon him wonderingly, with its bright eyes and its old-young face gleaming as in the flickering of an evening fire. Again came Florence close upon it, and absorbed his whole attention. Whether as a fore-doomed difficulty and disappointment to him; whether as a rival who had crossed him in his way, and might again; whether as his child, of whom, in his successful wooing, he could stoop to think, as claiming, at such a time, to be no more estranged; or whether as a hint to him that the mere appearance of caring for his own blood should be maintained in his new relations; he best knew. Indifferently well, perhaps, at best; for marriage company and marriage altars, and ambitious scenes -still blotted here and there with Florence-always Florence-turned up so fast, and so confusedly, that he rose, and went up stairs to escape them.

It was quite late at night before candles were brought; for at present they made Mrs. Skewton's head ache, she complained; and in the mean time Florence and Mrs. Skewton talked together (Cleopatra being very anxious to keep her close to her. self), or Florence touched the piano softly for Mrs. Skewton's delight; to make no mention of a few occasions in the course of the evening, when that affectionate lady was impelled to solicit another kiss, and which always happened after Edith had said anything. They were not many, however, for Edith sat apart by an open window during the Mr. Dombey was far from quarrelling, in his own whole time (in spite of her mother's fears that she breast, with the manner of his beautiful betrothed. would take cold), and remained there until Mr. He had that good reason for sympathy with haugh- Dombey took leave. He was serenely gracious to tiness and coldness, which is found in a fellow-feel- Florence when he did so; and Florence went to ing. It flattered him to think how these deferred bed in a room within Edith's, so happy and hope. to him, in Edith's case, and seemed to have no willful, that she thought of her late self as if it were apart from his. It flattered him to picture to him- some other poor deserted girl who was to be pitied self, this proud and stately woman doing the hon- for her sorrow; and in her pity, sobbed herself to ours of his house, and chilling his guests after his sleep. own manner. The dignity of Dombey and Son would be heightened and maintained, indeed, in

uch hands.

The week fled fast. There were drives to milliners, dress-makers, jewellers, lawyers, florists, pastry-cooks; and Florence was always of the party.

Florence was to go to the wedding. Florence was to cast off her mourning, and to wear a brilliant dress on the occasion. The milliner's intentions on the subject of this dress-the milliner was a Frenchwoman, and greatly resembled Mrs. Skew. ton-were so chaste and clegant, that Mrs. Skewton bespoke one like it for herself. The milliner said it would become her to admiration, and that all the world would take her for the young lady's sister. The week fled faster. Edith looked at nothing and cared for nothing. Her rich dresses came home, and were tried on, and were loudly commended by Mrs. Skewton and the milliners, and were put away without a word from her. Mrs. Skewton made their plans for every day, and executed them. Sometimes Edith sat in the carriage when they went to make purchases; sometimes, when it was absolutely necessary, she went into the shops. But Mrs. Skewton conducted the whole business, whatever it happened to be; and Edith looked on as uninterested and with as much appa. rent indifference as if she had no concern in it. Florence might perhaps have thought she was haughty and listless, but that she was never so to her. So Florence quenched her wonder in her gratitude whenever it broke out, and soon subdued it. The week fled faster. It had nearly winged its flight away. The last night of the week, the night before the marriage, was come. In the dark room -for Mrs. Skewton's head was no better yet, though she expected to recover permanently to-morrowwere that lady, Edith, and Mr. Dombey. Edith was at her open window looking out into the street; Mr. Dombey and Cleopatra were talking softly on the sofa. It was growing late; and Florence being fatigued, had gone to bed.

"My dear Dombey," said Cleopatra, "you will leave me Florence to-morrow, when you deprive me of my sweetest Edith."

Oh, indeed! it was late, and Mr. Dombey feared he must.

"Is this a fact, or is it all a dream!" lisped Cle. opatra. "Can I believe, my dearest Dombey, that you are coming back to-morrow morning to deprive me of my sweet companion; my own Edith ?"

Mr. Dombey, who was accustomed to take things literally, reminded Mrs. Skewton that they were to meet first at the church,

"The pang," said Mrs. Skewton, "of consigning a child, even to you, my dear Dombey, is one of the most excruciating imaginable; and combined with a naturally delicate constitution, and the extreme stupidity of the pastry-cook who has undertaken the breakfast, is almost too much for my poor strength. But I shall rally, my dear Dombey, in the morning; do not fear for me, or be uneasy on my account: Heaven bless you! My dearest Edith!" she cried archly. "Somebody is going, pet."

Edith, who had turned her head again towards the window, and whose interest in their conversation had ceased, rose up in her place, but made no advance towards him, and said nothing. Mr. Dombey, with a lofty gallantry adapted to his dignity and the occasion, betook his creaking boots towards her, put her hand to his lips, said, "To-morrow morning I shall have the happiness of claiming this hand as Mrs. Dombey's," and bowed himself solemnly out.

Mrs. Skewton rang for candles as soon as the house-door had closed upon him. With the candles appeared her maid, with the juvenile dress that was to delude the world to-morrow. The dress had savage retribution in it, as such dresses ever have, and made her infinitely older and more hideous than her greasy flannel gown. But Mrs. Skewton tried it on with mincing satisfaction; smirked at her cadaverous self in the glass, as she Mr. Dombey said he would, with pleasure. thought of its killing effect upon the Major; and "To have her about me, here, while you are both suffering her maid to take it off again, and to preat Paris, and to think that, at her age, I am assist-pare her for repose, tumbled into ruins like a house ing in the formation of her mind, my dear Dom- of painted cards. bey," said Cleopatra, "will be a perfect balm to me in the extremely shattered state to which I shall be reduced."

Edith turned her head suddenly. Her listless manner was exchanged, in a moment, to one of burning interest, and, unseen in the darkness, she attended closely to their conversation.

Mr. Dombey would be delighted to leave Florence in such admirable guardianship.

"My dear Dombey," returned Cleopatra, "a thousand thanks for your good opinion. I feared you were going, with malice aforethought, as the dreadful lawyers say-those horrid proses!- to condemn me to utter solitude."

"Why do me so great an injustice, my dear madam!" said Mr. Dombey.

"Because my charming Florence tells me so positively she must go home to-morrow," returned Cleopatra, "that I began to be afraid, my dearest Dombey, you were quite a Bashaw."

"I assure you, madam!" said Mr. Dombey, "I have laid no commands on Florence; and if I had, there are no commands like your wish.".

"My dear Dombey," replied Cleopatra, "what a courtier you are! Though I'll not say so, either; for courtiers have no heart, and yours pervades your charming life and character. And are you really going so early, my dear Dombey!"

All this time Edith remained at the dark win. dow looking out into the street. When she and her mother were at last left alone, she moved from it for the first time that evening, and came opposite to her. The yawning, shaking, peevish figure of the mother, with her eyes raised to confront the proud erect form of the daughter, whose glance of fire was bent downward upon her, had a conscious air upon it, that no levity or temper could conceal. "I am tired to death," said she. "You can't be trusted for a moment. You are worse than a child. Child! No child would be half so obsti nate and undutiful."

"Listen to me, mother," returned Edith, passing these words by with a scorn that would not descend to trifle with them. "You must remain alone here until I return."

"Must remain alone here, Edith, until you return!" repeated her mother.

"Or in that name upon which I shall call tomorrow to witness what I do, so falsely, and so shamefully, I swear I will refuse the hand of this man in the church. If I do not, may I fall dead upon the pavement!"

The mother answered with a look of quick alarm, in no degree diminished by the look she met.

"It is enough," said Edith, steadily, "that we are what we are. I will have no youth and truth

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE WEDDING.

Mr. Dombey smiles; but faintly, even for him; for Mr. Dombey feels that he is going to be related to the mother, and that under those circumstances, she is not to be joked about.

"Dombey," says the Major, seeing this, "I give you joy. I congratulate you, Dombey. By the Lord, Sir." says the Major, "you are more to be envied, this day, than any man in England!"

have sometimes mentioned to you is myself; Miss | morning, Sir, that, damme, Dombey, he has half a Dombey is the object of my passion; what are your mind to make a double marriage of it, Sir, and take opinions, Chicken, in this state of things, and what, the mother." on the spot, do you advise?" The so-much-to-beastonished Chicken, in the meanwhile, dips his beak into a tankard of strong beer, in Mr. Toots's kitchen, and pecks up two pounds of beefsteaks. In Princess's Place, Miss Tox is up and doing; for she too, though in sore distress, is resolved to put a shilling in the hands of Mrs. Miff, and see the ceremony which has a cruel fascination for her, from some lonely corner. The quarters of the Wooden Midshipman are all alive; for Captain Cuttle, in his ankle-jacks and with a huge shirt-collar, is seated at his breakfast, listening to Rob the Grinder as he reads the marriage service to him beforehand, under orders, to the end that the Captain may perfectly understand the solemnity he is about to witness for which purpose, the Captain gravely lays injunctions on his chaplain, from time to time, to "put about," or to "overhaul that 'ere article again," or to stick to his own duty, and leave the Amens to him, the Captain: one of which he repeats, whenever a pause is made by Rob the Grinder, with sonorous satisfaction,

Besides all this, and much more, twenty nursery maids in Mr. Dombey's street alone, have promised twenty families of little women, whose instinctive interest in nuptials dates from their cradles, that they shall go and see the marriage. Truly, Mr. Sownds the Beadle has good reason to feel himself in office, as he suns his portly figure on the church steps, waiting for the marriage hour. Truly, Mrs. Miff has cause to pounce on an unlucky dwarf child, with a giant baby, who peeps in at the porch, and drive her forth with indignation!

Cousin Feenix has come over from abroad, expressly to attend the marriage. Cousin Feenix was a man about town, forty years ago: but he is still so juvenile in figure and in manner, and so well got up, that strangers are amazed when they discover latent wrinkles in his lordship's face, and crows' feet in his eyes; and first observe him, not exactly certain when he walks across a room, of going quite straight to where he wants to go. But Cousin Feenix, getting up at half-past seven o'clock or so, is quite another thing from Cousin Feenix got up; and very dim, indeed, he looks, while being shaved at Long's Hotel, in Bond-street.

Mr. Dombey leaves his dressing-room, amidst a general whisking away of the women on the staircase, who disperse in all directions, with a great rustling of skirts, except Mrs. Perch, who, being (but that she always is) in an interesting situation, is not nimble, and is obliged to face him, and is ready to sink with confusion as she curtseys;-may Heaven avert all evil consequences from the house of Perch! Mr. Dombey walks up to the drawing. room, to bide his time. Gorgeous are Mr. Dombey's new blue coat, fawn-coloured pantaloons, and lilac waistcoat; and a whisper goes about the house, that Mr. Dombey's hair is curled.

A double knock announces the arrival of the Major, who is gorgeous too, and wears a whole geranium in his button-hole, and has his hair curled tight and crisp, as well the Native knows.

"Dombey!" says the Major, putting out both hands, "How are you?"

"

Major," says Mr. Dombey, "how are You?" By Jove, Sir," says the Major, "Joey B. is in such case this morning, Sir," and here he hits himself hard upon the breast-"in such case this

Here again, Mr. Dombey's assent is qualified; because he is going to confer a great distinction on a lady; and, no doubt, she is to be envied most.

"As to Edith Granger, Sir," pursues the Major, "there is not a woman in all Europe but mightand would, Sir, you will allow Bagstock to addand would-give her ears, and her ear-rings, too, to be in Edith Granger's place."

"You are good enough to say so, Major," says Mr. Dombey.

"Dombey," returns the Major, "you know it. Let us have no false delicacy. You know it. Do you know it, or do you not, Dombey?" says the Major, almost in a passion.

"Oh, really, Major-"

"Damme, Sir," retorts the Major, "do you know that fact, or do you not? Dombey! Is old Joe your friend? Are we on that footing of unreserved intimacy, Dombey, that may justify a man-a blunt old Joseph B., Sir-in speaking out; or am I to take open order, Dombey, and to keep my distance, and to stand on forms?"

"My dear Major Bagstock," says Mr. Dombey, with a gratified air, "you are quite warm."

"By Gad, Sir," says the Major, “I am warm. Joseph B. does not deny it, Dombey. He is warm. This is an occasion, Sir, that calls forth all the honest sympathies remaining in an old, infernal, battered, used-up, invalided, J. B. carcase. And I tell you what, Dombey-at such a time a man must blurt out what he feels, or put a muzzle on; Joseph Bagstock tells you to your face, Dombey, as he tells his club behind your back, that he never will be muzzled when Paul Dombey is in question. Now, damme, Sir,” concludes the Major, with great firmness, "what do you make of that?"

"

and

Major," says Mr. Dombey, "I assure you that I am really obliged to you. I had no idea of checking your too partial friendship."

"Not too partial, Sir!" exclaims the choleric Major. "Dombey, I deny it!"

"Your friendship I will say then," pursues Mr. Dombey, "on any account. Nor can I forget, Major, on such an occasion as the present, how much I am indebted to it."

"Dombey," says the Major, with appropriate ac tion, "that is the hand of Joseph Bagstock: of plain old Joey B., Sir, if you like that better! That is the hand, of which his Royal Highness the late Duke of York did me the honour to observe, Sir, to his Royal Highness the late Duke of Kent, that it was the hand of Josh.: a rough and tough, and possibly an up-to-snuff old vagabond. Dombey may the present moment be the least unhappy of our lives. God bless you!"

Now, enters Mr. Carker, gorgeous likewise, and smiling like a wedding-guest indeed. He can scarcely let Mr. Dombey's hand go, he is so cou gratulatory; and he shakes the Major's hand so heartily at the same time, that his voice shakes