It is impossible to conceive the disgust which this avowal
awakened in the bosoms of the hearers. Loud cries of 'Shame,'
mingled with groans and hisses, prevailed for a quarter of an hour.
Mr. Whiffers then added that he feared a portion of this
outrage might be traced to his own forbearing and accommodating
disposition. He had a distinct recollection of having once
consented to eat salt butter, and he had, moreover, on an occasion
of sudden sickness in the house, so far forgotten himself as to
carry a coal-scuttle up to the second floor. He trusted he had not
lowered himself in the good opinion of his friends by this frank
confession of his faults; and he hoped the promptness with which
he had resented the last unmanly outrage on his feelings, to
which he had referred, would reinstate him in their good opinion,
if he had.
Mr. Whiffers's address was responded to, with a shout of
admiration, and the health of the interesting martyr was drunk
in a most enthusiastic manner; for this, the martyr returned
thanks, and proposed their visitor, Mr. Weller--a gentleman
whom he had not the pleasure of an intimate acquaintance with,
but who was the friend of Mr.
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