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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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I passed that off, and brought Mr. Dick on the carpet. 'You see,' said Mr. Dick, wistfully, 'if I could exert myself, Mr. Traddles - if I could beat a drum-or blow anything!' Poor fellow! I have little doubt he would have preferred such an employment in his heart to all others. Traddles, who would not have smiled for the world, replied composedly: 'But you are a very good penman, sir. You told me so, Copperfield?' 'Excellent!' said I. And indeed he was. He wrote with extraordinary neatness. 'Don't you think,' said Traddles, 'you could copy writings, sir, if I got them for you?' Mr. Dick looked doubtfully at me. 'Eh, Trotwood?' I shook my head. Mr. Dick shook his, and sighed. 'Tell him about the Memorial,' said Mr. Dick. I explained to Traddles that there was a difficulty in keeping King Charles the First out of Mr. Dick's manuscripts; Mr. Dick in the meanwhile looking very deferentially and seriously at Traddles, and sucking his thumb. 'But these writings, you know, that I speak of, are already drawn up and finished,' said Traddles after a little consideration. 'Mr. Dick has nothing to do with them. Wouldn't that make a difference, Copperfield? At all events, wouldn't it be well to try?' This gave us new hope. Traddles and I laying our heads together apart, while Mr. Dick anxiously watched us from his chair, we concocted a scheme in virtue of which we got him to work next day, with triumphant success. On a table by the window in Buckingham Street, we set out the work Traddles procured for him - which was to make, I forget how many copies of a legal document about some right of way - and on another table we spread the last unfinished original of the great Memorial. Our instructions to Mr. Dick were that he should copy exactly what he had before him, without the least departure from the original; and that when he felt it necessary to make the slightest allusion to King Charles the First, he should fly to the Memorial. We |
