behind the scenes, which nobody saw, and which nobody was meant to see.
Certain big, heavy vehicles, built on the model of the Podsnap plate, took away the heavy articles of guests weighing ever so much; and the less valuable articles got away after their various manners; and the Podsnap plate was put to bed. As Mr. Podsnap stood with his back to the drawing-room fire, pulling up his shirt-collar, like a veritable cock of the walk literally pluming himself in the midst of his possessions, nothing would have astonished him more than an intimation that Miss Podsnap, or any other young person properly born and bred, could not be exactly put away like the plate, brought out like the plate, polished like the plate, counted, weighed, and valued like the plate. That such a young person could possibly have a morbid vacancy in the heart for anything younger than the plate, or less monotonous than the plate; or that such a young person’s thoughts could try to scale the region bounded on the north, south, east, and west, by the plate; was a monstrous imagination which he would on the spot have flourished into space. This perhaps in some sort arose from Mr. Podsnap’s blushing young person being, so to speak, all cheek; whereas there is a possibility that there may be young persons of a rather more complex organization.
If Mr. Podsnap, pulling up his shirt-collar, could only have heard himself called “that fellow” in a certain short dialogue, which passed between Mr. and Mrs. Lammle in their opposite corners of their little carriage, rolling home!
“Sophronia, are you awake?”
“Am I likely to be asleep, sir?”
“Very likely, I should think, after that fellow’s company. Attend to what I am going to say.”