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tach such an epithet to any person employed and paid in
Salem House, sir.’
Steerforth gave a short laugh.
‘That’s not an answer, sir,’ said Mr. Creakle, ‘to my re-
mark. I expect more than that from you, Steerforth.’
If Mr. Mell looked homely, in my eyes, before the hand-
some boy, it would be quite impossible to say how homely
Mr. Creakle looked. ‘Let him deny it,’ said Steerforth.
‘Deny that he is a beggar, Steerforth?’ cried Mr. Creakle.
‘Why, where does he go a-begging?’
‘If he is not a beggar himself, his near relation’s one,’ said
Steerforth. ‘It’s all the same.’
He glanced at me, and Mr. Mell’s hand gently patted me
upon the shoulder. I looked up with a flush upon my face
and remorse in my heart, but Mr. Mell’s eyes were fixed on
Steerforth. He continued to pat me kindly on the shoulder,
but he looked at him.
‘Since you expect me, Mr. Creakle, to justify myself,’ said
Steerforth, ‘and to say what I mean, - what I have to say is,
that his mother lives on charity in an alms-house.’
Mr. Mell still looked at him, and still patted me kindly
on the shoulder, and said to himself, in a whisper, if I heard
right: ‘Yes, I thought so.’
Mr. Creakle turned to his assistant, with a severe frown
and laboured politeness:
‘Now, you hear what this gentleman says, Mr. Mell. Have
the goodness, if you please, to set him right before the as-
sembled school.’
‘He is right, sir, without correction,’ returned Mr. Mell,

1 0 David Copperfield