Of the internal economy of Dotheboys Hall
A RIDE of two hundred and odd miles in severe weather, is one of the best
softeners of a hard bed that ingenuity can devise. Perhaps it is even a
sweetener of dreams, for those which hovered over the rough couch of Nicholas,
and whispered their airy nothings in his ear, were of an agreeable and happy
kind. He was making his fortune very fast indeed, when the faint glimmer of an
expiring candle shone before his eyes, and a voice he had no difficulty in
recognising as part and parcel of Mr Squeers, admonished him that it was time to
rise.
`Past seven, Nickleby,' said Mr Squeers.
`Has morning come already?' asked Nicholas, sitting up in bed.
`Ah! that has it,' replied Squeers, `and ready iced too. Now, Nickleby, come;
tumble up, will you?'
Nicholas needed no further admonition, but `tumbled up' at once, and
proceeded to dress himself by the light of the taper, which Mr Squeers carried
in his hand.
`Here's a pretty go,' said that gentleman; `the pump's froze.'
`Indeed!' said Nicholas, not much interested in the intelligence.
`Yes,' replied Squeers. `You can't wash yourself this morning.'
`Not wash myself!' exclaimed Nicholas.
`No, not a bit of it,' rejoined Squeers tartly. `So you must be content with
giving yourself a dry polish till we break the ice in the well, and can get a
bucketful out for the boys. Don't stand staring at me, but do look sharp, will
you?'
Offering no further observation, Nicholas huddled on his clothes. Squeers,
meanwhile, opened the shutters and blew the candle out; when the voice of his
amiable consort was heard in the passage, demanding admittance.
`Come in, my love,' said Squeers.
Mrs Squeers came in, still habited in the primitive night-jacket which had
displayed the symmetry of her figure on the previous night, and further
ornamented with a beaver bonnet of some antiquity, which she wore, with much
ease and lightness, on the top of the nightcap before mentioned.
`Drat the things,' said the lady, opening the cupboard; `I can't find the
school spoon anywhere.'
`Never mind it, my dear,' observed Squeers in a soothing manner; `it's of no
consequence.'
`No consequence, why how you talk!' retorted Mrs Squeers sharply; `isn't it
brimstone morning?'
`I forgot, my dear,' rejoined Squeers; `yes, it certainly is. We purify the
boys' bloods now and then, Nickleby.'
`Purify fiddlesticks,' ends,' said his lady. `Don't think, young man, that we
go to the expense of flower of brimstone and molasses, just to purify them;
because if you think we carry on the business in that way, you'll find yourself
mistaken, and so I tell you plainly.'
`My dear,' said Squeers frowning. `Hem!'
`Oh! nonsense,' rejoined Mrs Squeers. `If the young man comes to be a teacher
here, let him understand, at once, that we don't want any foolery about the
boys. They have the brimstone and treacle, partly because if they hadn't
something or other in the way of medicine they'd be always ailing and giving a
world of trouble, and partly because it spoils their appetites and comes cheaper
than breakfast and dinner. So, it does them good and us good at the same time,
and that's fair enough I'm sure.'
Having given this explanation, Mrs Squeers put her head into the closet and
instituted a stricter search after the spoon, in which Mr Squeers assisted. A
few words passed between them while they were thus engaged, but as their voices
were partially stifled by the cupboard, all that Nicholas could distinguish was,
that Mr Squeers said what Mrs Squeers had said, was injudicious, and that Mrs
Squeers said what Mr Squeers said, was `stuff.'
A vast deal of searching and rummaging ensued, and it proving fruitless,
Smike was called in, and pushed by Mrs Squeers, and boxed by Mr Squeers; which
course of treatment brightening his intellects, enabled him to suggest that
possibly Mrs Squeers might have the spoon in her pocket, as indeed turned out to
be the case. As Mrs Squeers had previously protested, however, that she was
quite certain she had not got it, Smike received another box on the ear for
presuming to contradict his mistress, together with a promise of a sound
thrashing if he were not more respectful in future; so that he took nothing very
advantageous by his motion.
`A most invaluable woman, that, Nickleby,' said Squeers when his consort had
hurried away, pushing the drudge before her.
`Indeed, sir!' observed Nicholas.
`I don't know her equal,' said Squeers; `I do not know her equal. That woman,
Nickleby, is always the same--always the same bustling, lively, active, saving
creetur that you see her now.'
Nicholas sighed involuntarily at the thought of the agreeable domestic
prospect thus opened to him; but Squeers was, fortunately, too much occupied
with his own reflections to perceive it.
`It's my way to say, when I am up in London,' continued Squeers, `that to
them boys she is a mother. But she is more than a mother to them; ten times
more. She does things for them boys, Nickleby, that I don't believe half the
mothers going, would do for their own sons.'
`I should think they would not, sir,' answered Nicholas.
Now, the fact was, that both Mr and Mrs Squeers viewed the boys in the light
of their proper and natural enemies; or, in other words, they held and
considered that their business and profession was to get as much from every boy
as could by possibility be screwed out of him. On this point they were both
agreed, and behaved in unison accordingly. The only difference between them was,
that Mrs Squeers waged war against the enemy openly and fearlessly, and that
Squeers covered his rascality, even at home, with a spice of his habitual
deceit; as if he really had a notion of someday or other being able to take
himself in, and persuade his own mind that he was a very good fellow.
`But come,' said Squeers, interrupting the progress of some thoughts to this
effect in the mind of his usher, `let's go to the schoolroom; and lend me a hand
with my school-coat, will you?'
Nicholas assisted his master to put on an old fustian shooting-jacket, which
he took down from a peg in the passage; and Squeers, arming himself with his
cane, led the way across a yard, to a door in the rear of the house.
`There,' said the schoolmaster as they stepped in together; `this is our
shop, Nickleby!'
It was such a crowded scene, and there were so many objects to attract
attention, that, at first, Nicholas stared about him, really without seeing
anything at all. By degrees, however, the place resolved itself into a bare and
dirty room, with a couple of windows, whereof a tenth part might be of glass,
the remainder being stopped up with old copy-books and paper. There were a
couple of long old rickety desks, cut and notched, and inked, and damaged, in
every possible way; two or three forms; a detached desk for Squeers; and another
for his assistant. The ceiling was supported, like that of a barn, by
cross-beams and rafters; and the walls were so stained and discoloured, that it
was impossible to tell whether they had ever been touched with paint or
whitewash.
But the pupils--the young noblemen! How the last faint traces of hope, the
remotest glimmering of any good to be derived from his efforts in this den,
faded from the mind of Nicholas as he looked in dismay around! Pale and haggard
faces, lank and bony figures, children with the countenances of old men,
deformities with irons upon their limbs, boys of stunted growth, and others
whose long meagre legs would hardly bear their stooping bodies, all crowded on
the view together; there were the bleared eye, the hare-lip, the crooked foot,
and every ugliness or distortion that told of unnatural aversion conceived by
parents for their offspring, or of young lives which, from the earliest dawn of
infancy, had been one horrible endurance of cruelty and neglect. There were
little faces which should have been handsome, darkened with the scowl of sullen,
dogged suffering; there was childhood with the light of its eye quenched, its
beauty gone, and its helplessness alone remaining; there were vicious-faced
boys, brooding, with leaden eyes, like malefactors in a gaol; and there were
young creatures on whom the sins of their frail parents had descended, weeping
even for the mercenary nurses they had known, and lonesome even in their
loneliness. With every kindly sympathy and affection blasted in its birth, with
every young and healthy feeling flogged and starved down, with every revengeful
passion that can fester in swollen hearts, eating its evil way to their core in
silence, what an incipient Hell was breeding here!
And yet this scene, painful as it was, had its grotesque features, which, in
a less interested observer than Nicholas, might have provoked a smile. Mrs
Squeers stood at one of the desks, presiding over an immense basin of brimstone
and treacle, of which delicious compound she administered a large instalment to
each boy in succession: using for the purpose a common wooden spoon, which might
have been originally manufactured for some gigantic top, and which widened every
young gentleman's mouth considerably: they being all obliged, under heavy
corporal penalties, to take in the whole of the bowl at a gasp. In another
corner, huddled together for companionship, were the little boys who had arrived
on the preceding night, three of them in very large leather breeches, and two in
old trousers, a something tighter fit than drawers are usually worn; at no great
distance from these was seated the juvenile son and heir of Mr Squeers--a
striking likeness of his father--kicking, with great vigour, under the hands of
Smike, who was fitting upon him a pair of new boots that bore a most suspicious
resemblance to those which the least of the little boys had worn on the journey
down--as the little boy himself seemed to think, for he was regarding the
appropriation with a look of most rueful amazement. Besides these, there was a
long row of boys waiting, with countenances of no pleasant anticipation, to be
treacled; and another file, who had just escaped from the infliction, making a
variety of wry mouths indicative of anything but satisfaction. The whole were
attired in such motley, ill-assorted, extraordinary garments, as would have been
irresistibly ridiculous, but for the foul appearance of dirt, disorder, and
disease, with which they were associated.
`Now,' said Squeers, giving the desk a great rap with his cane, which made
half the little boys nearly jump out of their boots, `is that physicking over?'
`Just over,' said Mrs Squeers, choking the last boy in her hurry, and tapping
the crown of his head with the wooden spoon to restore him. `Here, you Smike;
take away now. Look sharp!'
Smike shuffled out with the basin, and Mrs Squeers having called up a little
boy with a curly head, and wiped her hands upon it, hurried out after him into a
species of wash-house, where there was a small fire and a large kettle, together
with a number of little wooden bowls which were arranged upon a board.
Into these bowls, Mrs Squeers, assisted by the hungry servant, poured a brown
composition, which looked like diluted pincushions without the covers, and was
called porridge. A minute wedge of brown bread was inserted in each bowl, and
when they had eaten their porridge by means of the bread, the boys ate the bread
itself, and had finished their breakfast; whereupon Mr Squeers said, in a solemn
voice, `For what we have received, may the Lord make us truly thankful!'--and
went away to his own.
Nicholas distended his stomach with a bowl of porridge, for much the same
reason which induces some savages to swallow earth--lest they should be
inconveniently hungry when there is nothing to eat. Having further disposed of a
slice of bread and butter, allotted to him in virtue of his office, he sat
himself down, to wait for school-time.
He could not but observe how silent and sad the boys all seemed to be. There
was none of the noise and clamour of a schoolroom; none of its boisterous play,
or hearty mirth. The children sat crouching and shivering together, and seemed
to lack the spirit to move about. The only pupil who evinced the slightest
tendency towards locomotion or playfulness was Master Squeers, and as his chief
amusement was to tread upon the other boys' toes in his new boots, his flow of
spirits was rather disagreeable than otherwise.
After some half-hour's delay, Mr Squeers reappeared, and the boys took their
places and their books, of which latter commodity the average might be about one
to eight learners. A few minutes having elapsed, during which Mr Squeers looked
very profound, as if he had a perfect apprehension of what was inside all the
books, and could say every word of their contents by heart if he only chose to
take the trouble, that gentleman called up the first class.
Obedient to this summons there ranged themselves in front of the
schoolmaster's desk, half-a-dozen scarecrows, out at knees and elbows, one of
whom placed a torn and filthy book beneath his learned eye.
`This is the first class in English spelling and philosophy, Nickleby,' said
Squeers, beckoning Nicholas to stand beside him. `We'll get up a Latin one, and
hand that over to you. Now, then, where's the first boy?'
`Please, sir, he's cleaning the back-parlour window,' said the temporary head
of the philosophical class.
`So he is, to be sure,' rejoined Squeers. `We go upon the practical mode of
teaching, Nickleby; the regular education system. C-l-e-a-n, clean, verb active,
to make bright, to scour. W-i-n, win, d-e-r, der, winder, a casement. When the
boy knows this out of book, he goes and does it. It's just the same principle as
the use of the globes. Where's the second boy?'
`Please, sir, he's weeding the garden,' replied a small voice.
`To be sure,' said Squeers, by no means disconcerted. `So he is. B-o-t, bot,
t-i-n, tin, bottin, n-e-y, ney, bottinney, noun substantive, a knowledge of
plants. When he has learned that bottinney means a knowledge of plants, he goes
and knows 'em. That's our system, Nickleby: what do you think of it?'
`It's very useful one, at any rate,' answered Nicholas.
`I believe you,' rejoined Squeers, not remarking the emphasis of his usher.
`Third boy, what's horse?'
`A beast, sir,' replied the boy.
`So it is,' said Squeers. `Ain't it, Nickleby?'
`I believe there is no doubt of that, sir,' answered Nicholas.
`Of course there isn't,' said Squeers. `A horse is a quadruped, and
quadruped's Latin for beast, as everybody that's gone through the grammar knows,
or else where's the use of having grammars at all?'
`Where, indeed!' said Nicholas abstractedly.
`As you're perfect in that,' resumed Squeers, turning to the boy, `go and
look after my horse, and rub him down well, or I'll rub you down. The rest of
the class go and draw water up, till somebody tells you to leave off, for it's
washing-day tomorrow, and they want the coppers filled.'
So saying, he dismissed the first class to their experiments in practical
philosophy, and eyed Nicholas with a look, half cunning and half doubtful, as if
he were not altogether certain what he might think of him by this time.
`That's the way we do it, Nickleby,' he said, after a pause.
Nicholas shrugged his shoulders in a manner that was scarcely perceptible,
and said he saw it was.
`And a very good way it is, too,' said Squeers. `Now, just take them fourteen
little boys and hear them some reading, because, you know, you must begin to be
useful. Idling about here won't do.'
Mr Squeers said this, as if it had suddenly occurred to him, either that he
must not say too much to his assistant, or that his assistant did not say enough
to him in praise of the establishment. The children were arranged in a
semicircle round the new master, and he was soon listening to their dull,
drawling, hesitating recital of those stories of engrossing interest which are
to be found in the more antiquated spelling-books.
In this exciting occupation, the morning lagged heavily on. At one o'clock,
the boys, having previously had their appetites thoroughly taken away by
stir-about and potatoes, sat down in the kitchen to some hard salt beef, of
which Nicholas was graciously permitted to take his portion to his own solitary
desk, to eat it there in peace. After this, there was another hour of crouching
in the schoolroom and shivering with cold, and then school began again.
It was Mr Squeer's custom to call the boys together, and make a sort of
report, after every half-yearly visit to the metropolis, regarding the relations
and friends he had seen, the news he had heard, the letters he had brought down,
the bills which had been paid, the accounts which had been left unpaid, and so
forth. This solemn proceeding always took place in the afternoon of the day
succeeding his return; perhaps, because the boys acquired strength of mind from
the suspense of the morning, or, possibly, because Mr Squeers himself acquired
greater sternness and inflexibility from certain warm potations in which he was
wont to indulge after his early dinner. Be this as it may, the boys were
recalled from house-window, garden, stable, and cow-yard, and the school were
assembled in full conclave, when Mr Squeers, with a small bundle of papers in
his hand, and Mrs S. following with a pair of canes, entered the room and
proclaimed silence.
`Let any boy speak a word without leave,' said Mr Squeers mildly, `and I'll
take the skin off his back.'
This special proclamation had the desired effect, and a deathlike silence
immediately prevailed, in the midst of which Mr Squeers went on to say:
`Boys, I've been to London, and have returned to my family and you, as strong
and well as ever.'
According to half-yearly custom, the boys gave three feeble cheers at this
refreshing intelligence. Such cheers! Sights of extra strength with the chill
on.
`I have seen the parents of some boys,' continued Squeers, turning over his
papers, `and they're so glad to hear how their sons are getting on, that there's
no prospect at all of their going away, which of course is a very pleasant thing
to reflect upon, for all parties.'
Two or three hands went to two or three eyes when Squeers said this, but the
greater part of the young gentlemen having no particular parents to speak of,
were wholly uninterested in the thing one way or other.
`I have had diappointments to contend against,' said Squeers, looking very
grim; `Bolder's father was two pound ten short. Where is Bolder?'
`Here he is, please sir,' rejoined twenty officious voices. Boys are very
like men to be sure.
`Come here, Bolder,' said Squeers.
An unhealthy-looking boy, with warts all over his hands, stepped from his
place to the master's desk, and raised his eyes imploringly to Squeers's face;
his own, quite white from the rapid beating of his heart.
`Bolder,' said Squeers, speaking very slowly, for he was considering, as the
saying goes, where to have him. `Bolder, if you father thinks that because--why,
what's this, sir?'
As Squeers spoke, he caught up the boy's hand by the cuff of his jacket, and
surveyed it with an edifying aspect of horror and disgust.
`What do you call this, sir?' demanded the schoolmaster, administering a cut
with the cane to expedite the reply.
`I can't help it, indeed, sir,' rejoined the boy, crying. `They will come;
it's the dirty work I think, sir--at least I don't know what it is, sir, but
it's not my fault.'
`Bolder,' said Squeers, tucking up his wristbands, and moistening the palm of
his right hand to get a good grip of the cane, `you're an incorrigible young
scoundrel, and as the last thrashing did you no good, we must see what another
will do towards beating it out of you.'
With this, and wholly disregarding a piteous cry for mercy, Mr Squeers fell
upon the boy and caned him soundly: not leaving off, indeed, until his arm was
tired out.
`There,' said Squeers, when he had quite done; `rub away as hard as you like,
you won't rub that off in a hurry. Oh! you won't hold that noise, won't you? Put
him out, Smike.'
The drudge knew better from long experience, than to hesitate about obeying,
so he bundled the victim out by a side-door, and Mr Squeers perched himself
again on his own stool, supported by Mrs Squeers, who occupied another at his
side.
`Now let us see,' said Squeers. `A letter for Cobbey. Stand up, Cobbey.'
Another boy stood up, and eyed the letter very hard while Squeers made a
mental abstract of the same.
`Oh!' said Squeers: `Cobbey's grandmother is dead, and his uncle John has
took to drinking, which is all the news his sister sends, except eighteenpence,
which will just pay for that broken square of glass. Mrs Squeers, my dear, will
you take the money?'
The worthy lady pocketed the eighteenpence with a most business-like air, and
Squeers passed on to the next boy, as coolly as possible.
`Graymarsh,' said Squeers, `he's the next. Stand up, Graymarsh.'
Another boy stood up, and the schoolmaster looked over the letter as before.
`Graymarsh's maternal aunt,' said Squeers, when he had possessed himself of
the contents, `is very glad to hear he's so well and happy, and sends her
respectful compliments to Mrs Squeers, and thinks she must be an angel. She
likewise thinks Mr Squeers is too good for this world; but hopes he may long be
spared to carry on the business. Would have sent the two pair of stockings as
desired, but is short of money, so forwards a tract instead, and hopes Graymarsh
will put his trust in Providence. Hopes, above all, that he will study in
everything to please Mr and Mrs Squeers, and look upon them as his only friends;
and that he will love Master Squeers; and not object to sleeping five in a bed,
which no Christian should. Ah!' said Squeers, folding it up, `a delightful
letter. Very affecting indeed.'
It was affecting in one sense, for Graymarsh's maternal aunt was strongly
supposed, by her more intimate friends, to be no other than his maternal parent;
Squeers, however, without alluding to this part of the story (which would have
sounded immoral before boys), proceeded with the business by calling out
`Mobbs,' whereupon another boy rose, and Graymarsh resumed his seat.
`Mobbs's mother-in-law,' said Squeers, `took to her bed on hearing that he
wouldn't eat fat, and has been very ill ever since. She wishes to know, by an
early post, where he expects to go to, if he quarrels with his vittles; and with
what feelings he could turn up his nose at the cow's-liver broth, after his good
master had asked a blessing on it. This was told her in the London
newspapers--not by Mr Squeers, for he is too kind and too good to set anybody
against anybody--and it has vexed her so much, Mobbs can't think. She is sorry
to find he is discontented, which is sinful and horrid, and hopes Mr Squeers
will flog him into a happier state of mind; with which view, she has also
stopped his halfpenny a week pocket-money, and given a double-bladed knife with
a corkscrew in it to the Missionaries, which she had bought on purpose for him.'
`A sulky state of feeling,' said Squeers, after a terrible pause, during
which he had moistened the palm of his right hand again, `won't do. Cheerfulness
and contentment must be kept up. Mobbs, come to me!'
Mobbs moved slowly towards the desk, rubbing his eyes in anticipation of good
cause for doing so; and he soon afterwards retired by the side-door, with as
good cause as a boy need have.
Mr Squeers then proceeded to open a miscellaneous collection of letters; some
enclosing money, which Mrs Squeers `took care of;' and others referring to small
articles of apparel, as caps and so forth, all of which the same lady stated to
be too large, or too small, and calculated for nobody but young Squeers, who
would appear indeed to have had most accommodating limbs, since everything that
came into the school fitted him to a nicety. His head, in particular, must have
been singularly elastic, for hats and caps of all dimensions were alike to him.
This business dispatched, a few slovenly lessons were performed, and Squeers
retired to his fireside, leaving Nicholas to take care of the boys in the
schoolroom, which was very cold, and where a meal of bread and cheese was served
out shortly after dark.
There was a small stove at that corner of the room which was nearest to the
master's desk, and by it Nicholas sat down, so depressed and selfdegraded by the
consciousness of his position, that if death could have come upon him at that
time, he would have been almost happy to meet it. The cruelty of which he had
been an unwilling witness, the coarse and ruffianly behaviour of Squeers even in
his best moods, the filthy place, the sights and sounds about him, all
contributed to this state of feeling; but when he recollected that, being there
as an assistant, he actually seemed--no matter what unhappy train of
circumstances had brought him to that pass--to be the aider and abettor of a
system which filled him with honest disgust and indignation, he loathed himself,
and felt, for the moment, as though the mere consciousness of his present
situation must, through all time to come, prevent his raising his head again.
But, for the present, his resolve was taken, and the resolution he had formed
on the preceding night remained undisturbed. He had written to his mother and
sister, announcing the safe conclusion of his journey, and saying as little
about Dotheboys Hall, and saying that little as cheerfully, as he possibly
could. He hoped that by remaining where he was, he might do some good, even
there; at all events, others depended too much on his uncle's favour, to admit
of his awakening his wrath just then.
One reflection disturbed him far more than any selfish considerations arising
out of his own position. This was the probable destination of his sister Kate.
His uncle had deceived him, and might he not consign her to some miserable place
where her youth and beauty would prove a far greater curse than ugliness and
decrepitude? To a caged man, bound hand and foot, this was a terrible idea--but
no, he thought, his mother was by; there was the portrait-painter, too--simple
enough, but still living in the world, and of it. He was willing to believe that
Ralph Nickleby had conceived a personal dislike to himself. Having pretty good
reason, by this time, to reciprocate it, he had no great difficulty in arriving
at this conclusion, and tried to persuade himself that the feeling extended no
farther than between them.
As he was absorbed in these meditations, he all at once encountered the
upturned face of Smike, who was on his knees before the stove, picking a few
stray cinders from the hearth and planting them on the fire. He had paused to
steal a look at Nicholas, and when he saw that he was observed, shrunk back, as
if expecting a blow.
`You need not fear me,' said Nicholas kindly. `Are you cold?'
`N-n-o.'
`You are shivering.'
`I am not cold,' replied Smike quickly. `I am used to it.'
There was such an obvious fear of giving offence in his manner, and he was
such a timid, broken-spirited creature, that Nicholas could not help exclaiming,
`Poor fellow!'
If he had struck the drudge, he would have slunk away without a word. But,
now, he burst into tears.
`Oh dear, oh dear!' he cried, covering his face with his cracked and horny
hands. `My heart will break. It will, it will.'
`Hush!' said Nicholas, laying his hand upon his shoulder. `Be a man; you are
nearly one by years, God help you.'
`By years!' cried Smike. `Oh dear, dear, how many of them! How many of them
since I was a little child, younger than any that are here now! Where are they
all!'
`Whom do you speak of?' inquired Nicholas, wishing to rouse the poor
half-witted creature to reason. `Tell me.'
`My friends,' he replied, `myself--my--oh! what sufferings mine have been!'
`There is always hope,' said Nicholas; he knew not what to say.
`No,' rejoined the other, `no; none for me. Do you remember the boy that died
here?'
`I was not here, you know,' said Nicholas gently; `but what of him?'
`Why,' replied the youth, drawing closer to his questioner's side, `I was
with him at night, and when it was all silent he cried no more for friends he
wished to come and sit with him, but began to see faces round his bed that came
from home; he said they smiled, and talked to him; and he died at last lifting
his head to kiss them. Do you hear?'
`Yes, yes,' rejoined Nicholas.
`What faces will smile on me when I die!' cried his companion, shivering.
`Who will talk to me in those long nights! They cannot come from home; they
would frighten me, if they did, for I don't know what it is, and shouldn't know
them. Pain and fear, pain and fear for me, alive or dead. No hope, no hope!'
The bell rang to bed: and the boy, subsiding at the sound into his usual
listless state, crept away as if anxious to avoid notice. It was with a heavy
heart that Nicholas soon afterwards--no, not retired; there was no retirement
there--followed--to his dirty and crowded dormitory.
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