Mr
Harmon--I make out now, some hints that I've met on that subject in
the newspaper--and I drop you, Bof--fin, as beneath my notice. I ask Mr
Harmon whether he has any idea of the contents of this present paper?'

'It is a will of my late father's, of more recent date than the will
proved by Mr Boffin (address whom again, as you have addressed him
already, and I'll knock you down), leaving the whole of his property
to the Crown,' said John Harmon, with as much indifference as was
compatible with extreme sternness.

'Bight you are!' cried Wegg. 'Then,' screwing the weight of his body
upon his wooden leg, and screwing his wooden head very much on one side,
and screwing up one eye: 'then, I put the question to you, what's this
paper worth?'

'Nothing,' said John Harmon.

Wegg had repeated the word with a sneer, and was entering on some
sarcastic retort, when, to his boundless amazement, he found himself
gripped by the cravat; shaken until his teeth chattered; shoved back,
staggering, into a corner of the room; and pinned there.

'You scoundrel!' said John Harmon, whose seafaring hold was like that of
a vice.

'You're knocking my head against the wall,' urged Silas faintly.

'I mean to knock your head against the wall,' returned John Harmon,
suiting his action to his words, with the heartiest good will; 'and I'd
give a thousand pounds for leave to knock your brains out. Listen, you
scoundrel, and look at that Dutch bottle.'

Sloppy held it up, for his edification.

'That Dutch bottle, scoundrel, contained the latest will of the many
wills made by my unhappy self-tormenting father. That will gives
everything absolutely to my noble benefactor and yours, Mr Boffin,
excluding and reviling me, and my sister (then already dead of a broken
heart), by name. That Dutch bottle was found by my noble benefactor and
yours, after he entered on possession of the estate. That Dutch bottle
distressed him beyond measure, because, though I and my sister were
both no more, it cast a slur upon our memory which he knew we had
done nothing in our miserable youth, to deserve. That Dutch bottle,
therefore, he buried in the Mound belonging to him, and there it lay
while you, you thankless wretch, were prodding and poking--often very
near it, I dare say. His intention was, that it should never see the
light; but he was afraid to destroy it, lest to destroy such a document,
even with his great generous motive, might be an offence at law.