Chirrup in company, there is a certain complacent twinkle in it,
accompanied, perhaps, by a half-expressed toss of the head, which
as clearly indicates what has been passing in his mind as if he had
put it into words, and shouted it out through a speaking-trumpet.
Moreover, Mr. Chirrup has a particularly mild and bird-like manner
of calling Mrs. Chirrup 'my dear;' and--for he is of a jocose turn-
-of cutting little witticisms upon her, and making her the subject
of various harmless pleasantries, which nobody enjoys more
thoroughly than Mrs. Chirrup herself. Mr. Chirrup, too, now and
then affects to deplore his bachelor-days, and to bemoan (with a
marvellously contented and smirking face) the loss of his freedom,
and the sorrow of his heart at having been taken captive by Mrs.
Chirrup--all of which circumstances combine to show the secret
triumph and satisfaction of Mr. Chirrup's soul.
We have already had occasion to observe that Mrs. Chirrup is an
incomparable housewife. In all the arts of domestic arrangement
and management, in all the mysteries of confectionery-making,
pickling, and preserving, never was such a thorough adept as that
nice little body. She is, besides, a cunning worker in muslin and
fine linen, and a special hand at marketing to the very best
advantage. But if there be one branch of housekeeping in which she
excels to an utterly unparalleled and unprecedented extent, it is
in the important one of carving.
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