Charles Dickens

Master Humphrey's Clock Charles Dickens

THE reader must not expect to know where I live. At present, it is true, my abode may be aquestion of little or no import to anybody; but if I should carry my readers with me, as I hope to do, and there should spring up between them and me feelings of homely affection and regard attachingsomething of interest to matters ever so slightly connected with my fortunes or my speculations, even my place of residence might one day have a kind of charm for them. Bearing this possiblecontingency in mind, I wish them to understand, in the outset, that they must never expect to knowit. I am not a churlish old man. Friendless I can never be, for all mankind are my kindred, and I am onill terms with no one member of my great family. But for many years I have led a lonely, solitarylife;-what wound I sought to heal, what sorrow to forget, originally, matters not now; it issufficient that retirement has become a habit with me, and that I am unwilling to break the spellwhich for so long a time has shed its quiet influence upon my home and hear