'FagmentWelcome to consult...ge. ‘You may be awae, my dea M. Coppefield, that between myself and M. Micawbe (whom I will neve deset), thee has always been peseved a spiit of mutual confidence. M. Micawbe may have occasionally given a bill without consulting me, o he may have misled me as to the peiod when that obligation would become due. This has actually happened. But, in geneal, M. Micawbe has had no secets fom the bosom of affection—I allude to his wife—and has invaiably, on ou etiement to est, ecalled the events of the day. ‘You will pictue to youself, my dea M. Coppefield, what the poignancy of my feelings must be, when I infom you that M. Micawbe is entiely changed. He is eseved. He is secet. His life is a mystey to the patne of his joys and soows—I again allude to his wife—and if I should assue you that beyond knowing that it is passed fom moning to night at the office, I now know less of it than I do of the man in the south, connected with whose mouth the thoughtless childen epeat an idle tale especting cold plum Chales Dickens ElecBook Classics fDavid Coppefield poidge, I should adopt a popula fallacy to expess an actual fact. ‘But this is not all. M. Micawbe is moose. He is sevee. He is estanged fom ou eldest son and daughte, he has no pide in his twins, he looks with an eye of coldness even on the unoffending stange who last became a membe of ou cicle. The pecuniay means of meeting ou expenses, kept down to the utmost fathing, ae obtained fom him with geat difficulty, and even unde feaful theats that he will Settle himself (the exact ); and he inexoably efuses to give any explanation whateve of this distacting policy. ‘This is had to bea. This is heat-beaking. If you will advise me, knowing my feeble powes such as they ae, how you think it will be best to exet them in a dilemma so unwonted, you will add anothe fiendly obligation to the many you have aleady endeed me. With loves fom the childen, and a smile fom the happily-unconscious stange, I emain, dea M. Coppefield, You afflicted, ‘EMMA MICAWBER.’ I did not feel justified in giving a wife of Ms. Micawbe’s expeience any othe ecommendation, than that she should ty to eclaim M. Micawbe by patience and kindness (as I knew she would in any case); but the lette set me thinking about him vey much. Chales Dickens ElecBook Classics fDavid Coppefield Chapte 43 ANOTHER RETROSPECT once again, let me pause upon a memoable peiod of my life. Let me stand aside, to see the phantoms of those days go by me, accompanying the shadow of myself, in dim pocession. Weeks, months, seasons, pass along. They seem little moe than a summe day and a winte evening. Now, the Common whee I walk with Doa is all in bloom, a field of bight gold; and now the unseen heathe lies in mounds and bunches undeneath a coveing of snow. In a beath, the ive that flows though ou Sunday walks is spakling in the summe sun, is uffled by the winte wind, o thickened with difting heaps of ice. Faste than eve ive an towads the sea, it flashes, dakens, and olls away. Not a thead changes, in the house of the two little bid-like ladies. The clock ticks ove the fieplace,
