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little brushes, began rubbing and scraping away with both
on the crown of Steerforth’s head in the busiest manner I
ever witnessed, talking all the time.
‘There’s Charley Pyegrave, the duke’s son,’ she said. ‘You
know Charley?’ peeping round into his face.
‘A little,’ said Steerforth.
‘What a man HE is! THERE’S a whisker! As to Charley’s
legs, if they were only a pair (which they ain’t), they’d defy
competition. Would you believe he tried to do without me
- in the Life-Guards, too?’
‘Mad!’ said Steerforth.
‘It looks like it. However, mad or sane, he tried,’ returned
Miss Mowcher. ‘What does he do, but, lo and behold you, he
goes into a perfumer’s shop, and wants to buy a bottle of the
Madagascar Liquid.’
‘Charley does?’ said Steerforth.
‘Charley does. But they haven’t got any of the Madagas-
car Liquid.’
‘What is it? Something to drink?’ asked Steerforth.
‘To drink?’ returned Miss Mowcher, stopping to slap his
cheek. ‘To doctor his own moustachios with, you know.
There was a woman in the shop - elderly female - quite a
Griffin - who had never even heard of it by name. ‘Begging
pardon, sir,’ said the Griffin to Charley, ‘it’s not - not - not
ROUGE, is it?’ ‘Rouge,’ said Charley to the Griffin. ‘What
the unmentionable to ears polite, do you think I want with
rouge?’ ‘No offence, sir,’ said the Griffin; ‘we have it asked
for by so many names, I thought it might be.’ Now that, my
child,’ continued Miss Mowcher, rubbing all the time as
