said the traveller, rising and holding the door open, as
the gentleman crossed the room towards it with his arm drawn through his
daughter's. 'Good repose! To the pleasure of seeing you once more! To
to-morrow!'

As he kissed his hand, with his best manner and his daintiest smile,
the young lady drew a little nearer to her father, and passed him with a
dread of touching him.

'Humph!' said the insinuating traveller, whose manner shrunk, and whose
voice dropped when he was left alone. 'If they all go to bed, why I must
go. They are in a devil of a hurry. One would think the night would be
long enough, in this freezing silence and solitude, if one went to bed
two hours hence.'

Throwing back his head in emptying his glass, he cast his eyes upon the
travellers' book, which lay on the piano, open, with pens and ink beside
it, as if the night's names had been registered when he was absent.
Taking it in his hand, he read these entries.

William Dorrit, Esquire
Frederick Dorrit, Esquire
Edward Dorrit, Esquire
Miss Dorrit
Miss Amy Dorrit
Mrs General
and Suite.
From France to Italy.

Mr and Mrs Henry Gowan.
From France to Italy.

To which he added, in a small complicated hand, ending with a long lean
flourish, not unlike a lasso thrown at all the rest of the names:

Blandois. Paris.
From France to Italy.

And then, with his nose coming down over his moustache and his moustache
going up and under his nose, repaired to his allotted cell.

CHAPTER 2. Mrs General

It is indispensable to present the accomplished lady who was of
sufficient importance in the suite of the Dorrit Family to have a line
to herself in the Travellers' Book.

Mrs General was the daughter of a clerical dignitary in a cathedral
town, where she had led the fashion until she was as near forty-five as
a single lady can be. A stiff commissariat officer of sixty, famous as a
martinet, had then become enamoured of the gravity with which she drove
the proprieties four-in-hand through the cathedral town society, and
had solicited to be taken beside her on the box of the cool coach of
ceremony to which that team was harnessed. His proposal of marriage
being accepted by the lady, the commissary took his seat behind
the proprieties with great decorum, and Mrs General drove until the
commissary died. In the course of their united journey, they ran over
several people who came