The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby | Page 4

of
sending him to a Yorkshire school; I was the poor lady's friend,
travelling that way; and if the recipient of the letter could inform me of
a school in his neighbourhood, the writer would be very much obliged.
I went to several places in that part of the country where I understood
the schools to be most plentifully sprinkled, and had no occasion to
deliver a letter until I came to a certain town which shall be nameless.
The person to whom it was addressed, was not at home; but he came
down at night, through the snow, to the inn where I was staying. It was
after dinner; and he needed little persuasion to sit down by the fire in a
warrn corner, and take his share of the wine that was on the table.
I am afraid he is dead now. I recollect he was a jovial, ruddy,
broad-faced man; that we got acquainted directly; and that we talked on

all kinds of subjects, except the school, which he showed a great
anxiety to avoid. "Was there any large school near?" I asked him, in
reference to the letter. "Oh yes," he said; "there was a pratty big 'un."
"Was it a good one?" I asked. "Ey!" he said, "it was as good as
anoother; that was a' a matther of opinion"; and fell to looking at the
fire, staring round the room, and whistling a little. On my reverting to
some other topic that we had been discussing, he recovered
immediately; but, though I tried him again and again, I never
approached the question of the school, even if he were in the middle of
a laugh, without observing that his countenance fell, and that he
became uncomfortable. At last, when we had passed a couple of hours
or so, very agreeably, he suddenly took up his hat, and leaning over the
table and looking me full in the face, said, in a low voice: "Weel,
Misther, we've been vara pleasant toogather, and ar'll spak' my moind
tiv'ee. Dinnot let the weedur send her lattle boy to yan o' our
school-measthers, while there's a harse to hoold in a' Lunnun, or a
gootther to lie asleep in. Ar wouldn't mak' ill words amang my neeburs,
and ar speak tiv'ee quiet loike. But I'm dom'd if ar can gang to bed and
not tellee, for weedur's sak', to keep the lattle boy from a' sike
scoondrels while there's a harse to hoold in a' Lunnun, or a gootther to
lie asleep in!" Repeating these words with great heartiness, and with a
solemnity on his jolly face that made it look twice as large as before, he
shook hands and went away. I never saw him afterwards, but I
sometimes imagine that I descry a faint reflection of him in John
Browdie.
In reference to these gentry, I may here quote a few words from the
original preface to this book.
"It has afforded the Author great amusement and satisfaction, during
the progress of this work, to learn, from country friends and from a
variety of ludicrous statements concerning himself in provincial
newspapers, that more than one Yorkshire schoolmaster lays claim to
being the original of Mr. Squeers. One worthy, he has reason to believe,
has actually consulted authorities learned in the law, as to his having
good grounds on which to rest an action for libel; another, has
meditated a journey to London, for the express purpose of committing

an assault and battery on his traducer; a third, perfectly remembers
being waited on, last January twelve-month, by two gentlemen, one of
whom held him in conversation while the other took his likeness; and,
although Mr. Squeers has but one eye, and he has two, and the
published sketch does not resemble him (whoever he may be) in any
other respect, still he and all his friends and neighbours know at once
for whom it is meant, because--the character is SO like him.
"While the Author cannot but feel the full force of the compliment thus
conveyed to him, he ventures to suggest that these contentions may
arise from the fact, that Mr. Squeers is the representative of a class, and
not of an individual. Where imposture, ignorance, and brutal cupidity,
are the stock in trade of a small body of men, and one is described by
these characteristics, all his fellows will recognise something belonging
to themselves, and each will have a misgiving that the portrait is his
own.
'The Author's object in calling public attention to the system would be
very imperfectly fulfilled, if he did not state now, in his own person,
emphatically and earnestly, that Mr. Squeers and his school are faint
and feeble pictures of an existing reality, purposely subdued and kept
down lest they