hand, "has always been my favorite
child."

The blustrous Bounderby crimsoned and
swelled to such an extent on hearing these
words, that he seemed to be, and probably was,
on the brink of a fit. With his very ears a
bright purple shot with crimson, he pent up
his indignation, however, and said:

"You'd like to keep her here for a time?"

"I — I had intended to recommend, my dear
Bounderby, that you should allow Louisa to
remain here on a visit, and be attended by
Sissy (I mean of course Cecilia Jupe), who
understands her, and in whom she trusts."

"I gather from all this, Tom Gradgrind,"
said Bounderby, standing up with his hands
in his pockets, "that you are of opinion that
there's what people call some incompatibility
between Loo Bounderby and myself."

"I fear there is at present a general
incompatibility between Louisa, and — and — and
almost all the relations in which I have placed
her," was her father's sorrowful reply.

"Now, look you here, Tom Gradgrind,"
said Bounderby the flushed, confronting him
with his legs wide apart, his hands deeper in his
pockets, and his hair like a hay field wherein
his windy anger was boisterous. "You have
said your say; I am going to say mine. I am
a Coketown man. I am Josiah Bounderby of
Coketown. I know the bricks of this town, and
I know the works of this town, and I know the
chimneys of this town, and I know the smoke
of this town, and I know the Hands of this
town. I know 'em all pretty well. They're
real. When a man tells me anything about
imaginative qualities, I always tell that man,
whoever he is, that I know what he means.
He means turtle-soup and venison, with a
gold spoon, and that he wants to be set up
with a coach and six. That's what your
daughter wants. Since you are of opinion
that she ought to have what she wants, I
recommend you to provide it for her.
Because, Tom Gradgrind, she will never have it
from me."

"Bounderby," said Mr. Gradgrind, "I
hoped, after my entreaty, you would have
taken a different tone."

"Just wait a bit," retorted Bounderby;
"you have said your say, I believe. I heard
you out; hear me out, if you please. Don't
make yourself a spectacle of unfairness as
well as inconsistency, because, although I am
sorry to see Tom Gradgrind reduced to his
present position, I should be doubly sorry to
see him brought so low as that. Now, there's
an incompatibility of some sort or another, I
am given to understand by you, between your
daughter and me. I'll give you to understand,
in reply to that, that there unquestionably is an
incompatibility of the first magnitude — to be
summed up in this — that your daughter don't
properly know her husband's merits, and is
not impressed with such a sense as would
become her, by George! of the honor of his
alliance. That's plain speaking, I hope."

"Bounderby," urged Mr. Gradgrind, "this
is unreasonable."

"Is it?" said Bounderby. "I am glad to
hear you say so. Because when Tom
Gradgrind, with his new lights, tells me that what
I say is unreasonable, I am convinced at
once it must be devilish sensible. With
your permission I am going on. You know
my origin; and you know that for a good
many years of my life I didn't want a shoeing-
horn, in consequence of not having a shoe.
Yet you may believe or not, as you think
proper, that there are ladies — born ladies —
belonging to families — Families! — who next to
worship the ground I walk on."

He discharged this, like a Rocket, at his
father-in-law's head.

"Whereas your daughter," proceeded
Bounderby, "is far from being a born lady.
That you know, yourself. Not that I care a
pinch of candle-snuff about such things, for
you are very well aware I don't; but that
such is the fact, and you, Tom Gradgrind,
can't change it. Why do I say this?"

"Not, I fear," observed Mr. Gradgrind, in
a low voice, "to spare me."

"Hear me out," said Bounderby, "and
refrain from cutting in till your turn comes
round. I say this, because highly connected
females have been astonished to see the way
in which your daughter has conducted herself,
and to witness her insensibility. They have
wondered how I have suffered it. And I
wonder myself now, and I won't suffer it."

"Bounderby," returned Mr. Gradgrind,
rising, "the less we say to-night the better, I
think."

"On the contrary, Tom Gradgrind, the
more we say to-night, the better, I think.
That is," the consideration checked him, "till
I have said all I mean to say, and then I don't
care how soon we stop. I come to a question
that may shorten the business. What do
you mean by the proposal you made just
now?"

"What do I mean, Bounderby?"

"By your visiting proposition," said
Bounderby, with an inflexible jerk of the hay
field.

"I mean that I hope you may be induced
to arrange, in a friendly manner, for allowing
Louisa a period of repose and reflection here,
which may tend to a gradual alteration for
the better in many respects."

"To a softening down of your ideas of the
incompatibility?" said Bounderby.

"If you put it in those terms."

"What made you think of this?" said
Bounderby.

"I have already said, I fear Louisa has not
been understood. Is it asking too much,
Bounderby, that you, so far her elder, should
aid in trying to set her right? You have
accepted a great charge of her; for better
for worse, for— "

Mr. Bounderby may have been annoyed by
the repetition of his own words to Stephen