Mrs Gamp observed it, however, and came to a premature
close in consequence.
'Well, it ain't her, it seems,' said Mrs Prig, coldly; 'who is it then?'
'You have heerd me mention, Betsey,' Mrs Gamp replied, after glancing in
an expressive and marked manner at the tea-pot, 'a person as I took
care on at the time as you and me was pardners off and on, in that there
fever at the Bull?'
'Old Snuffey,' Mrs Prig observed.
Sarah Gamp looked at her with an eye of fire, for she saw in this
mistake of Mrs Prig, another willful and malignant stab at that same
weakness or custom of hers, an ungenerous allusion to which, on the part
of Betsey, had first disturbed their harmony that evening. And she saw
it still more clearly, when, politely but firmly correcting that lady
by the distinct enunciation of the word 'Chuffey,' Mrs Prig received the
correction with a diabolical laugh.
The best among us have their failings, and it must be conceded of Mrs
Prig, that if there were a blemish in the goodness of her disposition,
it was a habit she had of not bestowing all its sharp and acid
properties upon her patients (as a thoroughly amiable woman would have
done), but of keeping a considerable remainder for the service of her
friends.
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