illing you must get change I haven't got it.'

'Well, Sam,' said Mr. Pickwick, 'I suppose they are getting the
HABEAS-CORPUS ready?'

'Yes,' said Sam, 'and I vish they'd bring out the have-his-carcase.
It's wery unpleasant keepin' us vaitin' here. I'd ha' got half a dozen
have-his-carcases ready, pack'd up and all, by this time.'

What sort of cumbrous and unmanageable machine, Sam Weller imagined a
habeas-corpus to be, does not appear; for Perker, at that moment, walked
up and took Mr. Pickwick away.

The usual forms having been gone through, the body of Samuel Pickwick
was soon afterwards confided to the custody of the tipstaff, to be by
him taken to the warden of the Fleet Prison, and there detained until
the amount of the damages and costs in the action of Bardell against
Pickwick was fully paid and satisfied.

'And that,' said Mr. Pickwick, laughing, 'will be a very long time. Sam,
call another hackney-coach. Perker, my dear friend, good-bye.'

'I shall go with you, and see you safe there,' said Perker.

'Indeed,' replied Mr. Pickwick, 'I would rather go without any other
attendant than Sam. As soon as I get settled, I will write and let you
know, and I shall expect you immediately. Until then, good-bye.'

As Mr. Pickwick said this, he got into the coach which had by this time
arrived, followed by the tipstaff. Sam having stationed himself on the
box, it rolled away.

'A most extraordinary man that!' said Perker, as he stopped to pull on
his gloves.

'What a bankrupt he'd make, Sir,' observed Mr. Lowten, who was standing
near. 'How he would bother the commissioners! He'd set 'em at defiance
if they talked of committing him, Sir.'

The attorney did not appear very much delighted with his clerk's
professional estimate of Mr. Pickwick's character, for he walked away
without deigning any reply.

The hackney-coach jolted along Fleet Street, as hackney-coaches usually
do. The horses 'went better', the driver said, when they had anything
before them (they must have gone at a most extraordinary pace when
there was nothing), and so the vehicle kept behind a cart; when the cart
stopped, it stopped; and when the cart went on again, it did the same.
Mr. Pickwick sat opposite the tipstaff; and the tipstaff sat with his
hat between his knees, whistling a tune, and looking out of the coach
window.

Time performs wonders. By the powerful old gentleman's aid, even a
hackney-coach gets over half a mile of ground. The