Читать книгу The Mysteries of London (Vol. 1-4) - George W. M. Reynolds - Страница 121

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MARKHAM was not the man to remain idle now that his circumstances were so desperately reduced. He had a taste for literary pursuits, and he resolved to devote his talents to some advantage. His income was totally insufficient to support his establishment, and yet he knew not how to effect any very great economy in the mode of conducting it. He would not for worlds allow Mr. Monroe and Ellen to leave his house, and again enter upon a struggle with the world. With Whittingham nothing could have induced him to part;—Marian was the only female domestic he kept, and he could not dispense with her services. Holford alone was an incumbrance of which he thought of relieving himself. But before he adopted any measure of economical reform, he summoned the faithful Whittingham to a consultation with him in the library.

When Markham had made the butler acquainted with his altered circumstances, the old man shook his head, and observed—

"Well, Master Richard, all this here ruination—and when I make use of the paragraph ruination, I mean to express the common sentence, flooring—has been brought round about by your over generosity, and good disposition towards others. I can't a-bear, Master Richard, to see you circumlocuted and circumwented in this manner; and now all your property has gone to the canine species—or, wulgarly speaking, to the dogs."