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like a play, and you come in. Theer! the murder’s out!’ said
Mr. Peggotty - ‘You come in! It took place this here present
hour; and here’s the man that’ll marry her, the minute she’s
out of her time.’
Ham staggered, as well he might, under the blow Mr.
Peggotty dealt him in his unbounded joy, as a mark of
confidence and friendship; but feeling called upon to say
something to us, he said, with much faltering and great dif-
ficulty:
‘She warn’t no higher than you was, Mas’r Davy - when
you first come - when I thought what she’d grow up to be.
I see her grown up - gent’lmen - like a flower. I’d lay down
my life for her - Mas’r Davy - Oh! most content and cheer-
ful! She’s more to me - gent’lmen - than - she’s all to me that
ever I can want, and more than ever I - than ever I could
say. I - I love her true. There ain’t a gent’lman in all the
land - nor yet sailing upon all the sea - that can love his lady
more than I love her, though there’s many a common man
- would say better - what he meant.’
I thought it affecting to see such a sturdy fellow as Ham
was now, trembling in the strength of what he felt for the
pretty little creature who had won his heart. I thought the
simple confidence reposed in us by Mr. Peggotty and by
himself, was, in itself, affecting. I was affected by the sto-
ry altogether. How far my emotions were influenced by the
recollections of my childhood, I don’t know. Whether I had
come there with any lingering fancy that I was still to love
little Em’ly, I don’t know. I know that I was filled with plea-
sure by all this; but, at first, with an indescribably sensitive
