“That sky-blue suit you used to wear.”

“Lord, to be sure!” cried Traddles, laughing. “Tight in the arms and legs, you know? Dear me! Well! Those were happy times, weren’t they?”

“I think our schoolmaster might have made them happier, without doing any harm to any of us, I acknowledge,” I returned.

“Perhaps he might,” said Traddles. “But dear me, there was a good deal of fun going on. Do you remember the nights in the bedroom? When we used to have the suppers? And when you used to tell the stories? Ha, ha, ha! And do you remember when I got caned for crying about Mr. Mell? Old Creakle! I should like to see him again, too!”

“He was a brute to you, Traddles,” said I, indignantly; for his good-humour made me feel as if I had seen him beaten but yesterday.

“Do you think so?” returned Traddles. “Really? Perhaps he was, rather. But it’s all over, a long while. Old Creakle!”

“You were brought up by an uncle, then?” said I.

“Of course I was!” said Traddles. “The one I was always going to write to. And always didn’t, eh! Ha, ha, ha! Yes, I had an uncle then. He died soon after I left school.”

“Indeed!”

“Yes. He was a retired—what do you call it!—draper—cloth-merchant—and had made me his heir. But he didn’t like me when I grew up.”

“Do you really mean that?” said I. He was so composed, that I fancied he must have some other meaning.

“Oh dear yes, Copperfield! I mean it,” replied Traddles. “It was an unfortunate thing, but he didn’t like me at all. He said I wasn’t at all what he expected, and so he married his housekeeper.”

“And what did you do?” I asked.

“I didn’t do anything in particular,” said Traddles. “I lived with them, waiting to be put out in the world, until his gout unfortunately flew to his stomach—and so he died, and so she married a young man, and so I wasn’t provided for.”

“Did you get nothing, Traddles, after all?”

“Oh dear yes!” said Traddles. “I got fifty pounds. I had never been brought up to any profession, and at first I was at a loss what to do for myself. However, I began, with the assistance of the son of a professional man, who had been to Salem House—Yawler, with his nose on one side. Do you recollect him?”

No. He had not been there with me; all the noses were straight, in my day.

“It don’t matter,” said Traddles. “I began, by means of his assistance, to copy law writings. That didn’t answer very well; and then I began to state cases for them, and make abstracts, and do that sort of work. For I am a plodding kind of fellow, Copperfield, and had learnt the way of doing such things pithily. Well! That put it in my head to enter myself as a law student; and that ran away with all that was left of the fifty pounds. Yawler recommended me to one or two other offices, however—Mr. Waterbrook’s for one—and I got a good many jobs. I was fortunate enough, too, to become acquainted with a person in the publishing way, who was getting up an Encyclopædia, and he set me to work; and, indeed” (glancing at his table), “I am at work for him at this minute. I am not a bad compiler, Copperfield,” said Traddles,