Stories from Dickens — Text and Context

he would go along with anybody with great readiness, when, glancing upwards, he caught sight of Mrs. Mann, who had got behind the beadle’s chair, and was shaking her fist at him with a furious countenance. He took the hint at once, for the fist had been too often impressed upon his body not to be deeply impressed upon his memory.

"Will _she_ go with me?" he inquired.

"No, she can’t," replied Mr. Bumble, "but she’ll come and see you sometimes."

This was no very great consolation to the child. Young as he was, however, he had sense enough to pretend great regret at going away. It was no very difficult matter for the boy to call the tears into his eyes. Hunger and recent ill-usage are great assistants if you want to cry; and Oliver cried very naturally indeed. Mrs. Mann gave him a thousand embraces, and, what Oliver wanted a great deal more, a piece of bread and butter, lest he should seem too hungry when he got to the workhouse. With the slice of bread in his hand, and the little brown-cloth parish cap on his head, the boy was then led away by Mr. Bumble from the wretched home where one kind word or look had never lighted the gloom of his infant years.

Mr. Bumble walked on with long strides, and little Oliver, firmly grasping his gold-laced cuff, trotted beside him; inquiring at the end of every quarter of a mile whether they were "nearly there." To these interrogations Mr. Bumble returned very brief and snappish replies; for was he not a beadle? But at last they were there, and the boy was looking at his new home with interest not unmixed with dread.

Oliver had not been within the walls of the workhouse a quarter of an hour, and had scarcely completed the slice of bread, when Mr. Bumble, who had handed him over to the care of an old woman, returned, and, telling him it was a board night, took him before that august body forthwith.

"Bow to the Board," said Bumble. Oliver brushed away two or three tears that were lingering in his eyes, and seeing no board but the table, fortunately bowed to that.

"What’s your name, boy?" said a gentleman in a high chair.

Oliver was frightened at the sight of so many fat, red-faced gentlemen, and the beadle gave him another tap behind, which made him cry. These two causes made him answer in a very low and hesitating voice; whereupon a gentleman in a white waistcoat said he was a fool,—which was a capital way of raising his spirits and putting him quite at his ease.

"Boy," said the gentleman in the high chair, "listen to me. You know you’re an orphan, I suppose?"

"What’s that, sir?" inquired poor Oliver.

"The boy _is_ a fool—I thought he was," said the gentleman in the white waistcoat.

"Hush!" said the gentleman who had spoken first. "You know you’ve got no father or mother, and that you were brought up by the parish, don’t you?"

"Yes, sir," replied Oliver, weeping bitterly.

"What are you crying for?" inquired the gentleman in the white waistcoat. And, to be sure, it was very extraordinary. What _could_ the boy be crying for?

"I hope you say your prayers every night," said another gentleman, in a gruff voice, "and pray for the people who feed you, and take care of you—like a Christian."

"Yes, sir," stammered the boy. The gentleman who spoke last was unconsciously right. It would have been _very_ like a Christian, and a marvellously good Christian too, if Oliver had prayed for the people who fed and took care of _him_. But he hadn’t, because nobody had taught him.

"Well! You have come here to be educated, and taught a useful trade," said the red-faced gentleman in the high chair.

"So you’ll begin to pick oakum to-morrow morning at six o’clock," added the surly one in the white waistcoat.

For the combination of both these blessings in the one simple process of picking oakum, Oliver bowed low, by the direction of the beadle, and was hurried away to a large ward, where, on a rough hard bed, he sobbed himself to sleep.

Poor Oliver! He little knew, as he fell asleep, that the Board had just reached a sage decision in his and other cases. But they had, and this was it. The members of this Board were very wise men, and when they came to turn their attention to the work-house, they found out at once, what ordinary folks would never have discovered—that the poor people liked it!

"Oho!" said the Board, "we’ll stop all this high living in no time!" So they brought the diet down to the edge of starvation. They contracted with the waterworks to lay on an unlimited supply of water, and with a mill to supply small quantities of oatmeal; and issued three meals of thin gruel a day, and half a roll on Sundays.

For the first six months after Oliver Twist was removed, the system was in full operation. It was rather expensive at first, in consequence of the increase in the undertaker’s bill, and the necessity of taking in the clothes of all the paupers, which fluttered loosely on their wasted, shrunken forms, after a week or two’s gruel. But the number of workhouse inmates got thin as well as the paupers, and the Board were delighted.

The room in which the boys were fed was a large stone hall, with a copper kettle at one end, out of which the master, dressed in an apron for the purpose, and assisted by one or two women, ladled the gruel at meal times. Of this festive composition each boy had one porringer, and no more—except on occasions of great public rejoicing, when he had two ounces and a quarter of bread besides. The bowls never wanted washing. The boys polished them with their spoons till they shone again; and when they had performed this operation (which never took very long, the spoons being nearly as large as the bowls), they would sit staring at the kettle, with eager eyes, as if they could have devoured the very bricks of which it was composed; employing themselves, meanwhile, in sucking their fingers, with the view of catching up any stray splashes of gruel that might have been cast thereon.

Boys have generally excellent appetites. Oliver Twist and his companions suffered the tortures of slow starvation for three months, until at last they got so voracious and wild with hunger that one boy, who was tall for his age and hadn’t been used to that sort of thing (for his father had kept a small cook’s shop), hinted darkly to his companions that unless he had another basin of gruel, he was afraid he might eat the boy who slept next him, who happened to be a weakly youth of tender age. He had a wild hungry eye, and they implicitly believed him. A council was held, and lots were cast to decide who should walk up to the master after supper that evening and ask for more; and it fell to Oliver Twist.

The evening arrived, and the boys took their places. The master, in his cook’s uniform, stationed himself at the kettle; his pauper assistants ranged themselves behind him; the gruel was served out, and a long grace was said over the short rations. The gruel disappeared; the boys whispered to each other, and winked at Oliver, while his next neighbors nudged him. Child as he was, he was desperate with hunger and reckless with misery. He rose from the table and advancing to the master, basin and spoon in hand, said, somewhat alarmed at his own temerity:

"Please, sir, I want some more."

The master was a fat, healthy man, but he turned very pale. He gazed in stupefied astonishment on the small rebel for some seconds, and then clung for support to the copper. The assistants were paralyzed with wonder; the boys with fear.

"What!" said the master at length, in a faint voice.

"Please, sir," replied Oliver, "I want some more."

The master aimed a blow at Oliver’s head with the ladle, pinioned him in his arms, and shrieked aloud for the beadle.

The Board were sitting in solemn conclave, when Mr. Bumble rushed into the room in great excitement, and, addressing the gentleman in the high chair, said:

"Mr. Limbkins, I beg your pardon, sir! Oliver Twist has asked for more!"

There was a general start. Horror was depicted on every countenance.

"For _more_!" said Mr. Limbkins. "Compose yourself, Bumble, and answer me distinctly. Do I understand that he asked for more, after he had eaten the supper allotted by the dietary?"

"He did, sir," replied Bumble.

"That boy will be hung," said the gentleman in the white waistcoat. "I know that boy will be hung."

Nobody disputed this opinion. An animated discussion took place. Oliver was ordered into instant confinement; and a bill was posted on the outside of the gate, offering a reward of five pounds to anybody who would take Oliver Twist off the hands of the parish. In other words, five pounds and Oliver Twist were offered to any man or woman who wanted an apprentice to any trade, business, or calling.

Oliver had a very narrow escape a few days later, as the result of this bill, from a villanous-looking man who wanted a chimney-sweep. But finally he became the apprentice of an undertaker named Sowerberry. His life here was some improvement over the workhouse, but still hard enough. Nevertheless he did get enough to eat, in the shape of broken victuals, and he slept among the coffins in the shop.

Unfortunately there was another apprentice, a great overgrown fellow named Noah Claypole, who delighted to bully Oliver in every way possible. Oliver stood it as long as he could, but Noah mistook his attitude for cowardice and added insults to rough usage. But, one day, Noah spoke ill of the boy’s dead mother.

"What did you say?" asked Oliver quickly.

"A regular right-down bad ’un, she was, Work’us," repeated Noah coolly.

Crimson with fury, Oliver started up, overthrew the chair and table, seized Noah by the throat, shook him, in the violence of his rage, till his teeth chattered in his head, and, collecting his whole force into one heavy blow, felled him to the ground.

A minute ago, the boy had looked the quiet, mild, dejected creature that harsh treatment had made him. But his spirit was roused at last; the cruel insult had set his blood on fire. His breast heaved, and he defied his tormentor with an energy he had never known before.

"He’ll murder me!" blubbered Noah. "Charlotte! missis! Here’s the new boy a-murdering of me! Help! help! Oliver’s gone mad! Char-lotte!"

His cries brought the fat maid-servant running to the scene.

"Oh, you little wretch!" screamed Charlotte, seizing Oliver with her utmost force, which was about equal to that of a strong man in good training. "Oh, you little un-grate-ful, mur-der-ous, hor-rid villain!" And between every syllable Charlotte gave Oliver a blow with all her might, accompanying it with a scream, for the benefit of society.

Charlotte’s fist was by no means a light one; but, lest it should not be effectual in calming Oliver’s wrath, Mrs. Sowerberry plunged into the kitchen, and assisted to hold him with one hand while she scratched his face with the other. In this favorable position of affairs Noah rose from the ground and pommelled him behind.

This was rather too violent exercise to last long. When they were all three wearied out and could tear and beat no longer, they dragged Oliver, struggling and shouting but nothing daunted, into the dust-cellar, and there locked him up. This being done, Mrs. Sowerberry sank into a chair and burst into tears.

"Oh, Charlotte!" she cried; "what a mercy we have not all been murdered in our beds, with such a little villain in the house!"

And when Mr. Sowerberry presently came home, he gave Oliver a whipping on his own account for good measure.

It was not until he was left alone in the silence and stillness of the cellar that Oliver gave way to the feelings which the day’s treatment had awakened. He had listened to their taunts with a look of contempt; he had borne the lash without a cry, for he felt that pride swelling in his heart which would have kept down a shriek to the last, though they had roasted him alive. But now, when there was none to see or hear him, he fell upon his knees on the floor, and, hiding his face in his hands, wept bitter tears.

For a long time Oliver remained motionless in this attitude. The candle was burning low in the socket when he rose to his feet. Having gazed cautiously round him and listened intently, he gently undid the fastenings of the door and looked abroad.

It was a cold, dark night. The stars seemed, to the boy’s eyes, farther from the earth than he had ever seen them before. There was no wind, and the sombre shadows thrown by the trees upon the ground looked sepulchral and death-like, from being so still. He softly re-closed the door. He resolved to run away in the early morning—to go to that great city of London.

With the first ray of light that struggled through the crevices in the shutters, Oliver arose, and again unbarred the door. One timid look around,—one moment’s pause of hesitation,—he had closed it behind him, and was in the open street.

He looked to the right and to the left, uncertain whither to fly. He remembered to have seen the wagons, as they went out, toiling up the hill. He took the same route, and arriving at a footpath across the fields, which he knew led out again into the road, struck into it and walked quickly on.

He was then only ten years old.

*II. OLIVER FALLS FROM BAD TO WORSE*

It was seventy miles to London, and the poor boy made his way thither only with great difficulty. Begging was not allowed in many of the villages, and nearly everybody viewed him with doubt, or else shut the door in his face.

Early on the seventh morning of his flight Oliver limped slowly into the little town of Barnet, near the outskirts of London. The window-shutters were closed, the street was empty, and the boy sank down with bleeding feet and covered with dust upon a door-step.

By degrees the shutters were opened, the window-blinds were drawn up, and people began passing to and fro. Some few stopped to gaze at Oliver for a moment or two, or turned round to stare at him as they hurried by; but none relieved him, or troubled themselves to inquire how he came there. He had no heart to beg, and there he sat.

He had been crouching on the step for some time when he was roused by observing that a boy, who had passed him carelessly some minutes before, had returned, and was now surveying him most earnestly from the opposite side of the way. He took little heed of this at first; but the boy remained in the same attitude of close observation so long that Oliver raised his head and returned his steady look. Upon this the boy crossed over, and, walking close up to Oliver, said:

"Hullo! my covey, what’s the row?"

The boy who addressed this inquiry was about his own age, but one of the queerest-looking fellows Oliver had ever seen. He was a snub-nosed, flat-browed, common-faced boy enough, and as dirty as one would wish to see; but he had about him all the airs and manners of a man. He was short of his age, with rather bow legs, and little, sharp, ugly eyes. He wore a man’s coat, which reached nearly to his heels. He had turned the cuffs back, half-way up his arm, to get his hands out of the sleeves, apparently with the ultimate view of thrusting them into the pockets of his corduroy trousers, for there he kept them. He was altogether as swaggering a young gentleman as ever stood four feet six, or something less, in his shoes.

"Hullo! my covey, what’s the row?" said this strange young gentleman to Oliver.

"I am very hungry and tired," replied Oliver, the tears standing in his eyes as he spoke. "I have walked a long way. I have been walking these seven days."

The boy looked at him narrowly, and asked him some questions. He took Oliver for a vagrant or worse, but led him into a small tavern, and gave him a feast of ham and bread; and Oliver, falling to at his new friend’s bidding, made a long and hearty meal, during the progress of which the strange boy eyed him from time to time with great attention.

"Going to London?" said the strange boy, when Oliver had at length concluded.

The strange boy whistled, and put his arms into his pockets as far as the big coat-sleeves would let them go.

"Do you live in London?" asked Oliver.

"Yes, I do when I’m at home," replied the strange boy. "Want to go along with me? I know an old gen’elman as lives there wot’ll give you lodgings for nothink."

The unexpected offer was too tempting to be resisted, especially when Oliver was told that the old gentleman would doubtless get him a good place without loss of time. This led to a more friendly and confidential chat, in which Oliver learned that his new friend’s name was Jack Dawkins, commonly called "The Artful Dodger."

As Dawkins objected to entering London before nightfall, it was nearly eleven o’clock before he piloted Oliver down some of the worst streets of the city’s worst section. Finally they entered a tumbledown building, and groped their way up a rickety stairway. Then Dawkins threw open the door of a back room and drew Oliver in after him.

The walls and ceiling of the room were perfectly black with age and dirt. There was a deal table before the fire, upon which were a candle stuck in a bottle, some pewter pots, bread and butter. Several rough beds were huddled side by side upon the floor. Seated around the table were four or five boys, none older than the Dodger, smoking long clay pipes and drinking spirits with the air of middle-aged men. But the chief figure was an old shrivelled Jew, whose villanous face was offset by a mass of matted red hair. He was dressed in a greasy flannel gown, and was busily at work frying sausages over a fire.

The boys crowded around Dawkins as he whispered a few words in the ear of the Jew. Then they all turned, as did the Jew, and grinned at Oliver.

"This is him, Fagin," said Jack Dawkins; "my friend Oliver Twist."

The Jew made a low bow to Oliver, took him by the hand, and hoped he should have the honor of his intimate acquaintance. Upon this, the young gentlemen with the pipes came round him, and shook both his hands very hard—especially the one in which he held his little bundle. One young gentleman was very anxious to hang up his cap for him; and another was so obliging as to put his hands in Oliver’s pockets, in order that, as he was very tired, he might not have the trouble of emptying them himself when he went to bed.

"We are very glad to see you, Oliver—very," said the Jew. "Dodger, take off the sausages, and draw a tub near the fire for Oliver."

Oliver ate his share, and the Jew then mixed him a glass of hot gin and water, telling him he must drink it off directly, because another gentleman wanted the tumbler. Oliver did as he was desired. Immediately afterwards, he felt himself gently lifted on to one of the sacks, and then he sank into a deep sleep.

The next morning, Oliver watched the Jew, Dawkins, and Charley Bates, another of the boys, play a curious game. The old man would place a purse and other valuables in his pockets, whereupon the boys would try to slip them out without his knowledge.