Staggering, as if struck by lightning, he lost his balance and tumbled over the parapet. The noose was on his neck. It ran up with his weight, tight as a bowstring. He fell for five-and-thirty feet, and then, after a sudden jerk, and a terrible convulsion of the limbs, swung lifeless against the wall.
[Old Curiosity Shop]
"The Old Curiosity Shop" was begun by Dickens in his new weekly publication called "Master Humphrey's Clock," in 1840, and its early chapters were written in the first person. But its author soon got rid of the impediments that pertained to "Master Humphrey," and "when the story was finished," Dickens wrote, "I caused the few sheets of 'Master Humphrey's Clock,' which had been printed in connection with it, to be cancelled." "The Old Curiosity Shop" won a host of friends for the author; A.C. Swinburne even declared Little Nell equal to any character in fiction. The lonely figure of the child with grotesque and wild, but not impossible, companions, took the hearts of all readers by storm, and the death of Little Nell moved thousands to tears. While the story was appearing, Tom Hood, then unknown to Dickens, wrote an essay "tenderly appreciative" of Little Nell, "and of all her shadowy kith and kin." The immense and deserved popularity of the book is shown by the universal acquaintance with Mrs. Jarley, and the common use of the phrase "Codlin's the friend--not Short."
I.--Little Nell and Her Grandfather
The shop was one of those receptacles for old and curious things which seem to crouch in odd corners of London. There were suits of mail standing like ghosts in armour, rusty weapons of various kinds, tapestry, and strange furniture that might have been designed in dreams.
The haggard aspect of a little old man, with long grey hair, who stood within, was wonderfully suited to the place. Nothing in the whole collection looked older or more worn than he.
Confronting the old man was a young man of dissipated appearance, and high words were taking place.
"I tell you again I want to see my sister," said the younger man. "You can't change the relationship, you know. If you could, you'd have done it long ago. But as I may have to wait some time I'll call in a friend of mine, with your leave."
At this he brought in a companion of even more dissolute appearance than himself.