Chapter 8 - Page 2

tell you
plainly.'

'My dear,' said Squeers frowning. 'Hem!'

'Oh! nonsense,' rejoined Mrs Squeers. 'If the young man comes to be
a teacher here, let him understand, at once, that we don't want any
foolery about the boys. They have the brimstone and treacle, partly
because if they hadn't something or other in the way of medicine
they'd be always ailing and giving a world of trouble, and partly
because it spoils their appetites and comes cheaper than breakfast
and dinner. So, it does them good and us good at the same time, and
that's fair enough I'm sure.'

Having given this explanation, Mrs Squeers put her head into the
closet and instituted a stricter search after the spoon, in which Mr
Squeers assisted. A few words passed between them while they were
thus engaged, but as their voices were partially stifled by the
cupboard, all that Nicholas could distinguish was, that Mr Squeers
said what Mrs Squeers had said, was injudicious, and that Mrs
Squeers said what Mr Squeers said, was 'stuff.'

A vast deal of searching and rummaging ensued, and it proving
fruitless, Smike was called in, and pushed by Mrs Squeers, and boxed
by Mr Squeers; which course of treatment brightening his intellects,
enabled him to suggest that possibly Mrs Squeers might have the
spoon in her pocket, as indeed turned out to be the case. As Mrs
Squeers had previously protested, however, that she was quite
certain she had not got it, Smike received another box on the ear
for presuming to contradict his mistress, together with a promise of
a sound thrashing if he were not more respectful in future; so that
he took nothing very advantageous by his motion.

'A most invaluable woman, that, Nickleby,' said Squeers when his
consort had hurried away, pushing the drudge before her.

'Indeed, sir!' observed Nicholas.

'I don't know her equal,' said Squeers; 'I do not know her equal.
That woman, Nickleby, is always the same--always the same bustling,
lively, active, saving creetur that you see her now.'

Nicholas sighed involuntarily at the thought of the agreeable
domestic prospect thus opened to him; but Squeers was, fortunately,
too much occupied with his own reflections to perceive it.

'It's my way to say, when I am up in London,' continued Squeers,
'that to them boys she is a mother. But she is more than a mother
to them; ten times more. She does things for them boys, Nickleby,
that I don't believe half the mothers going, would do for their own
sons.'

'I should think they would not, sir,' answered Nicholas.

Now, the fact was, that both Mr and Mrs Squeers viewed the boys in
the light of their proper and natural enemies; or, in other words,
they held and considered that