“Mr. Snodgrass, who had only waited for a hearing, at once recounted how he had been placed in his then distressing predicament; how the fear of giving rise to domestic dissensions had alone prompted him to avoid Mr. Wardle on his entrance; and how he merely meant to depart by another door, but, finding it locked, had been compelled to stay against his will.  It was a painful situation to be placed in; but he now regretted it the less, inasmuch as it afforded him an opportunity of acknowledging before their mutual friends that he loved Mr. Wardle’s daughter deeply and sincerely, that he was proud to avow that the feeling was mutual, and that if thousands of miles were placed between them, or oceans rolled their waters, he could never for an instant forget those happy days when first—­et cetera, et cetera.

“Having delivered himself to this effect Mr. Snodgrass bowed again, looked into the crown of his hat, and stepped towards the door.”

But he was stopped on the threshold, and Arabella, having taken up the defence, called on Mr. Wardle to “shake hands with him and order him some dinner.  “A reconciliation took place and Mr. Snodgrass had dinner at a side-table, and when he had finished drew his chair next to Emily, without the smallest opposition on the old gentleman’s part.  The remainder of the evening passed off very happily “and all was smiles and shirt collars.”

During the next few days much perturbation was evinced by the Pickwickians at their leader’s continual absence from the society of his admiring friends, and it being unanimously resolved that he should be called upon to explain himself, Mr. Wardle invited the “full circle” to dinner again at Osborne’s Hotel to give him the opportunity.  After the decanters “had been twice sent round” Mr. Wardle called upon Mr. Pickwick for his explanation.  This was forthcoming in a pathetic speech, very affecting to all present, announcing his unalterable decision of retiring for the rest of his life into the quiet village of Dulwich.  “If I have done but little good,” he said, by way of peroration, “I trust I have done less harm, and that none of my adventures will be other than a source of amusing and pleasant recollection to me in the decline of life.  God bless you all.”

With these words Mr. Pickwick filled and drained a bumper with a trembling hand; and his eyes moistened as his friends rose with one accord and pledged him from their hearts.  So runs the chronicle, and so ended the immortal Pickwick Club, in the precincts of Osborne’s Hotel in the Adelphi, which also became the headquarters of the relatives of Mr. Wardle during their stay in London for the wedding of his daughter.  From here the wedding party set out for Mr. Pickwick’s new abode at Dulwich, from which house the ceremony took place, and where the wedding was celebrated by a happy breakfast party afterwards.

[illustration:  Osborne’s Adelphi Hotel.  From a photograph by T.W.Tyrrell]