Micawber, struggling; 'and I
ne--ver--will--desert Mr. Micawber!'

Mr. Micawber was so deeply affected by this proof of her devotion (as
to me, I was dissolved in tears), that he hung over her in a passionate
manner, imploring her to look up, and to be calm. But the more he asked
Mrs. Micawber to look up, the more she fixed her eyes on nothing;
and the more he asked her to compose herself, the more she wouldn't.
Consequently Mr. Micawber was soon so overcome, that he mingled his
tears with hers and mine; until he begged me to do him the favour of
taking a chair on the staircase, while he got her into bed. I would have
taken my leave for the night, but he would not hear of my doing that
until the strangers' bell should ring. So I sat at the staircase window,
until he came out with another chair and joined me.

'How is Mrs. Micawber now, sir?' I said.

'Very low,' said Mr. Micawber, shaking his head; 'reaction. Ah, this has
been a dreadful day! We stand alone now--everything is gone from us!'

Mr. Micawber pressed my hand, and groaned, and afterwards shed tears.
I was greatly touched, and disappointed too, for I had expected that we
should be quite gay on this happy and long-looked-for occasion. But Mr.
and Mrs. Micawber were so used to their old difficulties, I think, that
they felt quite shipwrecked when they came to consider that they were
released from them. All their elasticity was departed, and I never saw
them half so wretched as on this night; insomuch that when the bell
rang, and Mr. Micawber walked with me to the lodge, and parted from me
there with a blessing, I felt quite afraid to leave him by himself, he
was so profoundly miserable.

But through all the confusion and lowness of spirits in which we had
been, so unexpectedly to me, involved, I plainly discerned that Mr. and
Mrs. Micawber and their family were going away from London, and that a
parting between us was near at hand. It was in my walk home that night,
and in the sleepless hours which followed when I lay in bed, that the
thought first occurred to me--though I don't know how it came into my
head--which afterwards shaped itself into a settled resolution.

I had grown to be so accustomed to the Micawbers, and had been so
intimate with them in their distresses, and was so utterly friendless
without them, that the prospect of being thrown upon some new shift for
a lodging, and going once more among unknown people, was like being that
moment turne