'He won't be here this three-quarters of an hour or more,' said
the young lady who superintended the domestic arrangements of
the Blue Boar.
'Wery good, my dear,' replied Sam. 'Let me have nine-
penn'oth o' brandy-and-water luke, and the inkstand, will you, miss?'
The brandy-and-water luke, and the inkstand, having been
carried into the little parlour, and the young lady having carefully
flattened down the coals to prevent their blazing, and carried
away the poker to preclude the possibility of the fire being stirred,
without the full privity and concurrence of the Blue Boar being
first had and obtained, Sam Weller sat himself down in a box
near the stove, and pulled out the sheet of gilt-edged letter-paper,
and the hard-nibbed pen. Then looking carefully at the pen to
see that there were no hairs in it, and dusting down the table, so
that there might be no crumbs of bread under the paper, Sam
tucked up the cuffs of his coat, squared his elbows, and composed
himself to write.
To ladies and gentlemen who are not in the habit of devoting
themselves practically to the science of penmanship, writing a
letter is no very easy task; it being always considered necessary
in such cases for the writer to recline his head on his left arm, so
as to place his eyes as nearly as possible on a level with the paper,
and, while glancing sideways at the letters he is constructing, to
form with his tongue imaginary characters to correspond.
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