There was a fine gentle wind, and Mr. Pickwick's hat rolled
sportively before it. The wind puffed, and Mr. Pickwick puffed,
and the hat rolled over and over as merrily as a lively porpoise
in a strong tide: and on it might have rolled, far beyond
Mr. Pickwick's reach, had not its course been providentially
stopped, just as that gentleman was on the point of resigning it
to its fate.
Mr. Pickwick, we say, was completely exhausted, and about to
give up the chase, when the hat was blown with some violence
against the wheel of a carriage, which was drawn up in a line with
half a dozen other vehicles on the spot to which his steps had been
directed. Mr. Pickwick, perceiving his advantage, darted briskly
forward, secured his property, planted it on his head, and paused
to take breath. He had not been stationary half a minute, when
he heard his own name eagerly pronounced by a voice, which he
at once recognised as Mr. Tupman's, and, looking upwards, he
beheld a sight which filled him with surprise and pleasure.
in an open barouche, the horses of which had been taken out,
the better to accommodate it to the crowded place, stood a stout
old gentleman, in a blue coat and bright buttons, corduroy
breeches and top-boots, two young ladies in scarfs and feathers, a
young gentleman apparently enamoured of one of the young
ladies in scarfs and feathers, a lady of doubtful age, probably the
aunt of the aforesaid, and Mr.
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