all shook together like dry leaves--as I daresay
they may be doing now, for old Hookah was as dull as laudanum. . . . Please
to imagine two small serpents, one beginning on the tail of a white
mouse, and one on the head, and each pulling his own way, and the mouse
very much alive all the time, with the middle of him madly writhing."

[211] There was a situation in the _Frozen Deep_ where Richard Wardour,
played by Dickens, had thus to carry about Frank Aldersley in the person
of Wilkie Collins.

[212] The mention of a performance of Lord Lytton's _Money_ at the
theatre will supply the farce to this tragedy. "I have rarely seen
anything finer than Lord Glossmore, a chorus-singer in bluchers, drab
trowsers, and a brown sack; and Dudley Smooth, in somebody else's wig,
hindside before. Stout also, in anything he could lay hold of. The
waiter at the club had an immense moustache, white trowsers, and a
striped jacket; and he brought everybody who came in, a vinegar-cruet.
The man who read the will began thus: 'I so-and-so, being of unsound
mind but firm in body . . . ' In spite of all this, however, the real
character, humour, wit, and good writing of the comedy, made themselves
apparent; and the applause was loud and repeated, and really seemed
genuine. Its capital things were not lost altogether. It was succeeded
by a Jockey Dance by five ladies, who put their whips in their mouths
and worked imaginary winners up to the float--an immense success."

CHAPTER VII.

WHAT HAPPENED AT THIS TIME.

1857-1858.

Disappointments and Distastes--Compensations of
Art--Misgivings--Restlessness and
Impatience--Reply to a Remonstrance--Visions of
Places to write Books in--Fruitless
Aspirations--What lay behind--Sorrowful
Convictions--No Desire for Immunity from
Blame--Counteracting Influences weakened--Old
Project revived--Disadvantages of Public
Reading--Speech for Children's
Hospital--Unsolved Mysteries--Hospital
described--Appeal for Sick Children--Reasons
for and against Paid Readings--A Proposal from
Mr. Beale--Question of the Plunge--Mr. Arthur
Smith--Change in Home--Unwise Printed
Statement--A "Violated Letter."

AN unsettled feeling greatly in excess of what was usual with Dickens,
more or less observable since his first residence at Boulogne, became at
this time almost habitual, and the satisf