‘Your sister, my dear Sir,’ said Mr. Pickwick, turning to Benjamin Allen, ‘is in London; well and happy.’
‘Her happiness is no object to me, sir,’ said Benjamin Allen, with a flourish of the hand.
‘Her husband is an object to me, Sir,’ said Bob Sawyer. ‘He shall be an object to me, sir, at twelve paces, and a pretty object I’ll make of him, sir—a mean-spirited scoundrel!’ This, as it stood, was a very pretty denunciation, and magnanimous withal; but Mr. Bob Sawyer rather weakened its effect, by winding up with some general observations concerning the punching of heads and knocking out of eyes, which were commonplace by comparison.
‘Stay, sir,’ said Mr. Pickwick; ‘before you apply those epithets to the gentleman in question, consider, dispassionately, the extent of his fault, and above a
