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Dombey and Son

by Charles Dickens

CONTENTS

1. Dombey and Son
2. In which Timely Provision is made for an Emergency that
will sometimes arise in the best-regulated Families
3. In which Mr Dombey, as a Man and a Father, is seen at the
Head of the Home-Department
4. In which some more First Appearances are made on the
Stage of these Adventures
5. Paul's Progress and Christening
6. Paul's Second Deprivation
7. A Bird's-eye Glimpse of Miss Tox's Dwelling-place; also
of the State of Miss Tox's Affections
8. Paul's further Progress, Growth, and Character
9. In which the Wooden Midshipman gets into Trouble
10. Containing the Sequel of the Midshipman's Disaster
11. Paul's Introduction to a New Scene
12. Paul's Education
13. Shipping Intelligence and Office Business
14. Paul grows more and more Old-fashioned, and goes Home
for the holidays
15. Amazing Artfulness of Captain Cuttle, and a new Pursuit
for Walter Gay
16. What the Waves were always saying
17. Captain Cuttle does a little Business for the Young people
18. Father and Daughter
19. Walter goes away
20. Mr Dombey goes upon a journey
21. New Faces
22. A Trifle of Management by Mr Carker the Manager
23. Florence solitary, and the Midshipman mysterious
24. The Study of a Loving Heart
25. Strange News of Uncle Sol
26. Shadows of the Past and Future
27. Deeper shadows
28. Alterations
29. The Opening of the Eyes of Mrs Chick
30. The Interval before the Marriage
31. The Wedding
32. The Wooden Midshipman goes to Pieces
33. Contrasts
34. Another Mother and Daughter
35. The Happy Pair
36. Housewarming
37. More Warnings than One
38. Miss Tox improves an Old Acquaintance
39. Further Adventures of Captain Edward Cuttle, Mariner
40. Domestic Relations
41. New Voices in the Waves
42. Confidential and Accidental
43. The Watches of the Night
44. A Separation
45. The Trusty Agent
46. Recognizant and Reflective
47. The Thunderbolt
48. The Flight of Florence
49. The Midshipman makes a Discovery
50. Mr Toots's Complaint
51. Mr Dombey and the World
52. Secret Intelligence
53. More Intelligence
54. The Fugitives
55. Rob the Grinder loses his Place
56. Several People delighted, and the Game Chicken disgusted
57. Another Wedding
58. After a Lapse
59. Retribution
60. Chiefly Matrimonial
61. Relenting
62. Final

CHAPTER 1.

Dombey and Son

Dombey sat in the corner of the darkened room in the great
arm-chair by the bedside, and Son lay tucked up warm in a little
basket bedstead, carefully disposed on a low settee immediately in
front of the fire and close to it, as if his constitution were
analogous to that of a muffin, and it was essential to toast him brown
while he was very new.

Dombey was about eight-and-forty years of age. Son about
eight-and-forty minutes. Dombey was rather bald, rather red, and
though a handsome well-made man, too stern and pompous in appearance,
to be prepossessing. Son was very bald, and very red, and though (of
course) an undeniably fine infant, somewhat crushed and spotty in his
general effect, as yet. On the brow of Dombey, Time and his brother
Care had set some marks, as on a tree that was to come down in good
time - remorseless twins they are for striding through their human
forests, notching as they go - while the countenance of Son was
crossed with a thousand little creases, which the same deceitful Time
would take delight in smoothing out and wearing away with the flat
part of his scythe, as a preparation of the surface for his deeper
operations.

Dombey, exulting in the long-looked-for event, jingled and jingled
the heavy gold watch-chain that depended from below his trim blue
coat, whereof the buttons sparkled phosphorescently in the feeble rays
of the distant fire. Son, with his little fists curled up and
clenched, seemed, in his feeble way, to be squaring at existence for
having come upon him so unexpectedly.