Pip Pirrip

“ He had only taken a few steps when his course was arrested by the sound of a crash and a dull thud behind him. He whirled round again to see what had happened. Pip was no longer balanced on the bar, but lay on the floor beneath, a motionless heap of arms and legs and striped pyjamas. ”

“ That jealous little person, finding one day that Pip had suddenly deserted her, and was at that moment actually sharing his morning bun with his fiancée in the boot-room, incontinently burst in upon the lovers, and after a brief but decisive interview despatched her rival howling from the room, remaining herself to share the bun with the newly restored Pip, who, to be quite frank, had been finding the rôle of a Romeo, however passive, rather exacting. ”

“ A mite of a girl trying to take the clothes down. She cannot reach high enough; she stamps her little foot and cries. A boy comes and takes them down for her.
"Thank you, boy!" she says prettily.
"Say Pippin!" says the boy.
"Pip-pin!" cries the child in a clear, high little voice.
Pippin runs his fingers through his close-curling hair with a puzzled look.
"Now—now—" he said; "when was that? 'Twas after the first things I've forgot, and before the second. Pretty little gal! What was her name now? Polly? No! Dolly? No! Well, anyhow, I guess I'll have my sister like that little gal. ”

“ Miss Innes glanced in Pip's direction.
"So it is. I can recognise him," she answered, with an air of gratified surprise. "Will you take me to have some strawberries now, please?"
The couple departed, leaving Pip still hove-to on the horizon.
"Rum things, women," mused the captain. "This girl's quite out of the common. I thought at first she must be keen on Pip, or something; but she doesn't seem even to know him. Not often you get a woman taking a purely sporting interest in a man like that!" ”

“ That was exactly what Elsie had meant, and she knew in her heart now that she had been wrong: Pip was not that sort. Still, she was young and independent. Pip was young and tactless. An older and more experienced girl would have seen that Pip's warning was well worth listening to. An older and more experienced man would have delivered it in a different way. Neither of them being possessed of these advantages, the net result of Pip's impromptu effort was to invest Cullyngham with a halo of romantic mystery in the eyes of Elsie, who, after all, was only nineteen, and a daughter of Eve at that. ”

“ Brought up in a circle almost exclusively male,—Pipette was too completely subservient to himself to have any direct influence on the moulding of his character,—Pip regarded women in general much as the poor Indian regards the sun, moon, and other heavenly bodies,—as things not to be understood or approached, but merely to be worshipped. ”

“ A man can no more take a wicket than he can take a city unless he gives his mind to it, and it must be confessed that up to the luncheon interval Pip had been wool-gathering. His interview with Cullyngham, his rather brief night's rest, and his tiff with Elsie had kept his wits wandering. Now, braced by the knowledge that Cullyngham was speeding on his way south, that Elsie was sitting safely on the pavilion lawn, and that—most blessed of rest cures!—there was work, hard work, before him, Pip rolled up his sleeves, set his field, and bowled. ”

“ The world-weary Blane surveyed his friend with something approaching consternation.
"A bad case!" he remarked, shaking his head. "Her face? My boy, faces are the most deceptive things in the world."
"Hers isn't," maintained Pip. "She is most sincere. You have only to look her in the eyes to see what is going on inside."
He stopped suddenly. He realised that he was growing too communicative.
"Eyes? That's just it. A girl makes eyes at you, Pip, and you crumple up. ”

“ Pip ate enough salt beef and damper to half kill him, drank more tea than he had ever disposed of at one sitting in all his fourteen years, swung himself into his saddle in close imitation of the oldest stockman, and thought if he only could have a black, evil-looking pipe like Tettawonga and the rest of the men his happiness would be complete and his manhood attained. ”

“ We are going to fill them with soap and water after prep, and put a notice beside them telling him not to stick on so much of it. I'm writing it now. How many e's are there in beastly?"
"Dunno," replied Pip shortly.
"Will you come and help?"
"No. He looks rather a decent chap. He's only been here a week; he may not know about white boots."
[Pg 109] "Ought to, then," snapped the bloodthirsty Mumford. "Other people find things out all right."
"Not all," grunted Pip. "How about stamps?" ”

“ Wemmick was the first one Pip met in London, and the clerk took him to the rooms where Mr. Jaggers had arranged for Pip to live, with the son of a gentleman who was to be his teacher. This gentleman was a Mr. Pocket, a relative (as Pip discovered) of Miss Havisham, which fact made him all the more certain that she was his unknown friend. Mr. Pocket's son was named Herbert, and the minute he and Pip first saw each other they burst out laughing. ”

“ Marsh, it appeared, in a fit of laughable absent-mindedness, had filled the last place in the list with the name of Pip, instead of that of one Elliot, who had occupied that position in the previous round.
"Rum mistake to make," said Mumford, with obvious sincerity.
"Very," said Pip shortly.
"Rather a jest," continued the imaginative Mumford, "if he didn't notice it, and you turned out on the day with the rest of the Eleven instead of Elliott!" ”

“ And the men? Maybe they were youthful and conventional,—each would probably have cut his own father dead in the street if he had met him wearing a made-up tie,—but Pip knew that they were for the most part clean-run, straight-going people like himself, good fellows, "white" men all. With one exception. And suddenly Pip realised that the exception was sitting on the other side of Elsie.
Cullyngham was smiling and talking. He [Pg 194] always was smiling. He smiled when he made a century. He smiled when he made a blob. He smiled when a rising ball hit him on the knuckles. ”

“ Pip and Elsie, on the other hand, did not "combine" well. Elsie, who (strictly between ourselves) fancied her golf not a little, insisted on dictating the line of action to be followed on each occasion, and more than once told Pip what club to use. Pip, though relatively her inferior, declined at first to be trampled upon by a female, even a high-spirited goddess with fair hair and a swing like an archangel. But few men in Pip's condition argue the point long: after a brief struggle [Pg 315] to assert the predominance of man he subsided completely, and, as he thought, rather diplomatically. ”

“ The [Pg 221] place was deserted, for the butler and, indeed, most of the establishment were down at the cricket-ground. Pip went rather heavily upstairs and packed his portmanteau, which he presently brought down to the hall door. After that he went to the library and wrote a brief letter.
"Now to find some one to leave this with," he said to himself. "The maids can't all be out. After that I'll go to the stables. Hallo! That sounded like a voice. There it is again! A sort of shriek! It comes from the conservatory. My God! ”

“ It would be a grand chance, Pip. Most men are so unenterprising. Those at the top never want to see what things are like below, and those below are so afraid of staying there forever that their eyes are constantly turned upwards and they miss a lot. I'd give something to be a vagabond for a year or two."
"What fearful sentiments for a respectable house-master!" said Pipette severely; but Pip's eyes glowed.
"However," continued Hanbury more soberly, [Pg 240] "Pip can't afford to waste time observing life in a purely academic way down in the basement. He must start getting upstairs at once." ”

“ The sea had jeeringly kept his finite body up, but drowned the infinite of his soul. Not drowned entirely, though. Rather carried down alive to wondrous depths, where strange shapes of the unwarped primal world glided to and fro before his passive eyes; and the miser-merman, Wisdom, revealed his hoarded heaps; and among the joyous, heartless, ever-juvenile eternities, Pip saw the multitudinous, God-omnipresent, coral insects, that out of the firmament of waters heaved the colossal orbs. He saw God’s foot upon the treadle of the loom, and spoke it; and therefore his shipmates called him mad. ”

“ Pip thought he could make his table pay if he had some flowers to set it off. But that was not all; he was envious of others’ success. The fair had been characterized by the usual amount of “human nature” displayed on such occasions, and Pip now exhibited his peculiarities. For ten cents he bought a few white flowers at a hot-house, and then thought he would get ahead of the boys and be at the barn at an early hour, making sure for himself any possible customers. ”

“ Pip saw before him a girl of about sixteen. She had extremely fair hair, a clear skin, not unbecomingly freckled, and eyes which had a habit of changing from blue to grey in different lights. Girls of sixteen are not always graceful,—like their male prototypes they frequently run to knees and elbows,—but this girl appeared to be free from such defects. ”

“ The Gresley Works contained seven hundred men, and it was not likely, Pip thought, that young Gresley, who, though he was seen frequently about the shops, spent most of his time in the drawing-office, would recognise even his most admired friend amid a horde of grimy mechanics.
But for all that they met, as they were bound to do. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. Pip's reliability and general smartness soon raised him from the ruck of his mates, and presently his increasing responsibilities began to bring him in contact with those in authority. ”

“ What a deal of spoiling nevertheless, a nature that is really good at the bottom of it will stand without permanent damage, is nicely shown in Pip; and the way he reconciles his determination to act very shabbily to his early friends, with a conceited notion that he is setting them a moral example, is part of the shading of a character drawn with extraordinary skill. ”

“ Now, Pip was only a member of the Fifth, and occupied but a sedimentary position in that. Consequently the Committee heaved a resigned if dissatisfied sigh when Uncle Bill, after taking the chair, announced with real regret that Wilmot—this, you may possibly remember, was Pip's name—was not eligible for the post of Captain.
"Lucky thing Link got his remove this term," whispered Fagg to Jarvis, "or he'd have been barred too."
"Dry up," said Jarvis, with a warning nudge; "Uncle Bill has got something on his chest." ”

“ He's a rabbit, [Pg 133] and the next four are rabbits, too. That leaves you and me. By rights you ought to be the man to keep the house on its legs. But you seem rather inclined to—to leave it to me. See?"
Linklater glared.
"It's a large order for one monitor," continued Pip, "but I'm going to do it, my son."
Pip finished a rather ornate pattern on the mantelpiece, laid down the poker, and continued talking, looking straight into the fire.
"What sort of state do you think the house will be in by the end of the term if it's to be run by Kelly, Hicks, and—you in your present state? Rotten! ”

“ The car slowed down to a stop. Miss Lottingar stepped out, and was received by her enraptured lover, regardless of Pip's presence, with a smacking salute that fairly drowned the [Pg 278] noise of the engine. After that the happy couple entered the tonneau, and Pip, with eyes rigidly turned to the front, heard little and saw nothing of them throughout the drive home.
As the Principal Boy had confidently predicted, the Right Honourable the Earl of Cartavon arrived at Broadoak Manor at lunch-time next day. The inmates of that venerable pile were ready for him. ”

“ Should he? Could he? Yes—no—yes! He raised his bat uncertainly, and made a half-hearted pull at the ball. It struck his bat somewhere on the splice,—the curl in the air had deceived one more victim,—flew up into the air, and, when it descended, found Pip waiting for it with a pair of hands that would at that moment have gripped a red-hot cannonball.
So the innings ended for forty-nine, and the Hivites won by seventy-one runs. In two overs Pip had taken eight wickets (doing the hat-trick incidentally) for no runs. Verily, in a house-match all things are possible. ”

“ But she handled her light clubs with a suppleness and dexterity usually [Pg 314] given only to a schoolboy of fourteen, and the length of her drive was amazing. She was always graceful, always cool, and, as Pip once noted to himself, "never got either hot or hairy."
After their first meeting at Raven's cottage Pip and Elsie saw each other constantly. They played a round of golf every day, usually between tea and dinner, the hour when the ardent male golfer relaxes from his noonday strenuousness and turns to thoughts of mixed foursomes. Usually Pip and Elsie played Mr. ”

“ "Why didn't you ever go to school, Joe, when you were as little as me?"
"Well, Pip," said Joe, taking up the poker, and settling himself to his usual occupation when he was thoughtful, of slowly raking the fire between the lower bars: "I'll tell you. My father, Pip, he were given to drink, and when he were overtook with drink, he hammered away at my mother most onmerciful. It were a'most the only hammering he did, indeed, 'xcepting at myself. ”

“ "They tell me, sir, that Stubb did once desert poor little Pip, whose drowned bones now show white, for all the blackness of his living skin. But I will never desert ye, sir, as Stubb did him. ”