CHARLES DICKENS DOMBEY AND SON CHAPTER I Dombey and ...

himself, as if he were possessed by a gruff spirit:
'My name's Jack Bunsby!'
'He was christened John,' cried the delighted Captain Cuttle. 'Hear him!'
'And what I says,' pursued the voice, after some deliberation, 'I stands
to.'
The Captain, with Florence on his arm, nodded at the auditory, and seemed to
say, 'Now he's coming out. This is what I meant when I brought him.'
'Whereby,' proceeded the voice, 'why not? If so, what odds? Can any man say
otherwise? No. Awast then!'
When it had pursued its train of argument to this point, the voice stopped,
and rested. It then proceeded very slowly, thus:
'Do I believe that this here Son and Heir's gone down, my lads? Mayhap. Do I
say so? Which? If a skipper stands out by Sen' George's Channel, making for
the Downs, what's right ahead of him? The Goodwins. He isn't forced to run
upon the Goodwins, but he may. The bearings of this observation lays in the
application on it. That an't no part of my duty. Awast then, keep a bright
look-out for'ard, and good luck to you!'
The voice here went out of the back parlour and into the street, taking the
Commander of the Cautious Clara with it, and accompanying him on board again
with all convenient expedition, where he immediately turned in, and
refreshed his mind with a nap.
The students of the sage's precepts, left to their own application of his
wisdom upon a principle which was the main leg of the Bunsby tripod, as it
is perchance of some other oracular stools--looked upon one another in a
little uncertainty; while Rob the Grinder, who had taken the innocent
freedom of peering in, and listening, through the skylight in the roof, came
softly down from the leads, in a state of very dense confusion. Captain