Mr. Pickwick could not resist so tempting an opportunity of studying
human nature. He suffered himself to be led to the table, where, after
having been introduced to the company in due form, he was accommodated
with a seat near the chairman and called for a glass of his favourite
beverage.

A profound silence, quite contrary to Mr. Pickwick's expectation,
succeeded. 'You don't find this sort of thing disagreeable, I hope,
sir?' said his right hand neighbour, a gentleman in a checked shirt and
Mosaic studs, with a cigar in his mouth.

'Not in the least,' replied Mr. Pickwick; 'I like it very much, although
I am no smoker myself.'

'I should be very sorry to say I wasn't,' interposed another gentleman
on the opposite side of the table. 'It's board and lodgings to me, is
smoke.'

Mr. Pickwick glanced at the speaker, and thought that if it were washing
too, it would be all the better.

Here there was another pause. Mr. Pickwick was a stranger, and his
coming had evidently cast a damp upon the party.

'Mr. Grundy's going to oblige the company with a song,' said the
chairman.

'No, he ain't,' said Mr. Grundy.

'Why not?' said the chairman.

'Because he can't,' said Mr. Grundy. 'You had better say he won't,'
replied the chairman.

'Well, then, he won't,' retorted Mr. Grundy. Mr. Grundy's positive
refusal to gratify the company occasioned another silence. 'Won't
anybody enliven us?' said the chairman, despondingly.

'Why don't you enliven us yourself, Mr. Chairman?' said a young man with
a whisker, a squint, and an open shirt collar (dirty), from the bottom
of the table.

'Hear! hear!' said the smoking gentleman, in the Mosaic jewellery.

'Because I only know one song, and I have sung it already, and it's a
fine of "glasses round" to sing the same song twice in a night,' replied
the chairman.

This was an unanswerable reply, and silence prevailed again.

'I have been to-night, gentlemen,' said Mr. Pickwick, hoping to start a
subject which all the company could take a part in discussing, 'I have
been to-night, in a place which you all know very well, doubtless, but
which I have not been in for some years, and know very little of; I
mean Gray's Inn, gentlemen. Curious little nooks in a great place, like
London, these old inns are.'

'By Jove!' said the chairman, whispering across the table to Mr.
Pickwick, 'you have hit upon something that one of us, at least, would
talk upon for ever. You'll draw old Ja