“Keep that barrow back now,” cried Wardle, when it had been hoisted over a stile into another field, and Mr. Pickwick had been deposited in it once more.

“All right, sir,” replied Mr. Weller, pausing.

“Now, Winkle,” said the old gentleman, “follow me softly, and don’t be too late this time.”

“Never fear,” said Mr. Winkle. “Are they pointing?”

“No, no; not now. Quietly now, quietly.” On they crept, and very quietly they would have advanced, if Mr. Winkle, in the performance of some very intricate evolutions with his gun, had not accidentally fired, at the most critical moment, over the boy’s head, exactly in the very spot where the tall man’s brain would have been, had he been there instead.