but - hum - proud. Always proud. It has become a - hum - not
infrequent custom for my - ha - personal admirers - personal admirers solely -
to be pleased to express their desire to acknowledge my semi-official position
here, by offering - ha - little tributes, which usually take the form of - ha -
Testimonials - pecuniary Testimonials. In the acceptance of those - ha -
voluntary recognitions of my humble endeavours to - hum - to uphold a Tone here
- a Tone - I beg it to be understood that I do not consider myself compromised.
Ha. Not compromised. Ha. Not a beggar. No; I repudiate the title! At the same
time far be it from me to - hum - to put upon the fine feelings by which my
partial friends are actuated, the slight of scrupling to admit that those
offerings are - hum - highly acceptable. On the contrary, they are most
acceptable. In my child's name, if not in my own, I make the admission in the
fullest manner, at the same time reserving - ha - shall I say my personal
dignity? Ladies and gentlemen, God bless you all!«
    By this time, the exceeding mortification undergone by the Bosom had
occasioned the withdrawal of the greater part of the company into other rooms.
The few who had lingered thus long followed the rest, and Little Dorrit and her
father were left to the servants and themselves. Dearest and most precious to
her, he would come with her now, would he not? He replied to her fervid
entreaties, that he would never be able to get up the narrow stairs without Bob,
where was Bob, would nobody fetch Bob? Under pretence of looking for Bob, she
got him out against the stream of gay company now pouring in for the evening
assembly, and got him into a coach that had just set down its load, and got him
home.
    The broad stairs of his Roman palace were contracted in his failing sight to
the narrow stairs of his London prison; and he would suffer no one but her to
touch him, his brother excepted. They got him up to his room without help, and
laid him down on his bed. And from that hour his poor maimed spirit, only
remembering the place where it had broken its wings, cancelled the dream through
which it had since groped, and knew of nothing beyond the Marshalsea. When he
heard footsteps in the street, he took them for the old weary tread in the
yards. When the hour came for locking up, he supposed all strangers to be
excluded