I lost no time in opening the parcel he had left with me. The
following were its contents:-
MR. PICKWICK'S TALE
A good many years have passed away since old John Podgers lived in
the town of Windsor, where he was born, and where, in course of
time, he came to be comfortably and snugly buried. You may be sure
that in the time of King James the First, Windsor was a very quaint
queer old town, and you may take it upon my authority that John
Podgers was a very quaint queer old fellow; consequently he and
Windsor fitted each other to a nicety, and seldom parted company
even for half a day.
John Podgers was broad, sturdy, Dutch-built, short, and a very hard
eater, as men of his figure often are. Being a hard sleeper
likewise, he divided his time pretty equally between these two
recreations, always falling asleep when he had done eating, and
always taking another turn at the trencher when he had done
sleeping, by which means he grew more corpulent and more drowsy
every day of his life. Indeed it used to be currently reported
that when he sauntered up and down the sunny side of the street
before dinner (as he never failed to do in fair weather), he
enjoyed his soundest nap; but many people held this to be a
fiction, as he had several times been seen to look after fat oxen
on market-days, and had even been heard, by persons of good credit
and reputation, to chuckle at the sight, and say to himself with
great glee, 'Live beef, live beef!' It was upon this evidence that
the wisest people in Windsor (beginning with the local authorities
of course) held that John Podgers was a man of strong, sound sense,
not what is called smart, perhaps, and it might be of a rather lazy
and apoplectic turn, but still a man of solid parts, and one who
meant much more than he cared to show.
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