PAWKINS. Stop a bit! though I mostly sticks to the easy shaving line, I’ve a mind as can soar to the higher branches. That ’ere head of hair is uncommon well got up, the one with the pearls, I mean. Just allow me to have a look, gov’ner, I’ll be back in a twinkling.
Exit, C., and off, R.
DE W. (L.) Exuberant—unsophisticated creature!
WHITE. Oh, perfectly unsophisticated! I only wish he had not fixed on the only head dress in the room that gives a notion of positive value? No, no, I must not hesitate any longer. Look here, my dear, sir, you are a man of heart—I may say, a noble creature—and it’s one of the specific weaknesses of noble creatures, to fancy everybody else as noble as themselves. Now, suppose this favourite of yours, this Pawkins, were really a little light fingered; suppose the dazzling brilliancy of one of your table spoons caused him to forget the distinction between meum and tuum. Under these painful circumstances, what would you say?
DE W. I should say that you were the most lying humbug I ever clapped eyes on.
WHITE. Heyday! Why?
DE W. Why, didn’t you stand up before the judge and jury, and bellow out your belief in that man’s immaculate virtue. Did you not clap your hand on your heart, and declare that our country might be proud of such a citizen; and St. Giles’s in the Fields proud of such a parishioner? Did not you cause me to blubber aloud, till I was turned ignominiously out of court, as a charity boy is kicked out by a beadle? And am I to understand that all that rhodomontade, followed by that expulsion, was for the sake of a pickpocket? Abominable! Disgusting!
WHITE. But surely, you understand, my dear sir, that when one speaks professionally——
DE W. Sir, no one has business to tell lies, professionally or not; a man should always speak what he thinks. I follow the dictates of my heart, and I always speak what I think; my heart is in my heart, and my heart is in my mouth.