Chapter 6 - Page 2

short pause: 'it's all very fine, I
dare say; but I can't hear him.'

'Grandma's rather put out now,' said Miss Isabella Wardle, in
a low tone; 'but she'll talk to you presently.'

Mr. Pickwick nodded his readiness to humour the infirmities
of age, and entered into a general conversation with the other
members of the circle.

'Delightful situation this,' said Mr. Pickwick.

'Delightful!' echoed Messrs. Snodgrass, Tupman, and Winkle.

'Well, I think it is,' said Mr. Wardle.

'There ain't a better spot o' ground in all Kent, sir,' said the
hard-headed man with the pippin--face; 'there ain't indeed, sir--
I'm sure there ain't, Sir.' The hard-headed man looked triumphantly
round, as if he had been very much contradicted by somebody,
but had got the better of him at last.

'There ain't a better spot o' ground in all Kent,' said the
hard-headed man again, after a pause.

"Cept Mullins's Meadows,' observed the fat man solemnly.
'Mullins's Meadows!' ejaculated the other, with profound contempt.

'Ah, Mullins's Meadows,' repeated the fat man.

'Reg'lar good land that,' interposed another fat man.

'And so it is, sure-ly,' said a third fat man.

'Everybody knows that,' said the corpulent host.

The hard-headed man looked dubiously round, but finding
himself in a minority, assumed a compassionate air and said no more.
'What are they talking about?' inquired the old lady of one of
her granddaughters, in a very audible voice; for, like many deaf
people, she never seemed to calculate on the possibility of other
persons hearing what she said herself.

'About the land, grandma.'

'What about the land?--Nothing the matter, is there?'

'No, no. Mr. Miller was saying our land was better than
Mullins's Meadows.'

'How should he know anything about it?'inquired the old lady
indignantly. 'Miller's a conceited coxcomb, and you may tell him
I said so.' Saying which, the old lady, quite unconscious that she
had spoken above a whisper, drew herself up, and looked
carving-knives at the hard-headed delinquent.

'Come, come,' said the bustling host, with a natural anxiety to
change the conversation, 'what say you to a rubber, Mr. Pickwick?'

'I should like it of all things,' replied that gentleman; 'but pray
don't make up one on my account.'

'Oh, I assure you, mother's very fond of a rubber,' said Mr.
Wardle; 'ain't you, mother?'

The old lady, who was much less deaf on this subject than on
any other, replied in the affirmative.

'Joe, Joe!' said the gentleman; 'Joe--damn that--oh, here he
is; put out the card--tables.'

The lethargic youth contrived without any additional rousing
to set out two