. Dicken's works . The Christening was firstrepresented.] Mr. Nicodemus Dumps, or, as his acquaintancecalled him, Long Dumps, was a bachelor, six feethigh, and fifty years old; cross, cadaverous, odd,and ill-natured. He was never happy but when hewas miserable ; and always miserable when he hadthe best reason to be happy. The only comfort ofhis existence was to make everybody about himwretched—then he might be truly said to enjoylife. He was afflicted with a situation in the Bankworth five hundred a year, and he rented a firstfloor furnished, at Pentonville, which he originallytook because it
. Dicken's works . The Christening was firstrepresented.] Mr. Nicodemus Dumps, or, as his acquaintancecalled him, Long Dumps, was a bachelor, six feethigh, and fifty years old; cross, cadaverous, odd,and ill-natured. He was never happy but when hewas miserable ; and always miserable when he hadthe best reason to be happy. The only comfort ofhis existence was to make everybody about himwretched—then he might be truly said to enjoylife. He was afflicted with a situation in the Bankworth five hundred a year, and he rented a firstfloor furnished, at Pentonville, which he originallytook because it commanded a dismal prospect of anadjacent churchyard. He was familiar with theface of every tombstone, and the burial serviceseemed to excite his strongest sympathy. Hisfriends said he was surly — he insisted he wasnervous; they thought him a lucky dog, but he pro-tested that he was the most unfortunate man inthe world. Cold as he was, and wretched as he de-clared himself to be, he was not wholly unsusceptible. SKETCHES BY BOZ. 225 of attachments. He revered the memory of Hoyle,as he was himself an admirable and imperturbablewhist-player, and he chuckled with delight at afretful and impatient adversary. He adored KingHerod for his massacre of the innocents ; and if hehated one thing more than another it was a , he could hardly be said to hate anythingin particular, because he disliked everything ingeneral; but perhaps his greatest antipathies werecabs, old women, doors that would not shut, musicalamateurs, and omnibus cads. He subscribed to the Society for the Suppression of Vice, for the pleas-ure of putting a stop to any harmless amusements;and he contributed largely towards the support oftwo itinerant Methodist parsons, in the amiable hopethat if circumstances rendered any people happy inthis world, they might perchance be rendered mis-erable by fears for the next. Mr. Dumps had a nephew who had been marriedabout a year, and who was somewhat of a favoritewit
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