"Will you? If you don't alter, Mr. Caudle, you'll soon have no house
to be master of. A whole loaf of sugar did I leave in the cupboard,
and now there isn't as much as would fill a teacup. Do you suppose
I'm to find sugar for punch for fifty men? What do you say?

"THERE WASN'T FIFTY?

"That's no matter; the more shame for 'em, sir. I'm sure they drank
enough for fifty. Do you suppose I'm to find sugar for punch for all
the world out of my housekeeping money?"

"YOU DON'T ASK ME?

"Don't you ask me? You do; you know you do: for if I only want a
shilling extra, the house is in a blaze. And yet a whole loaf of
sugar can you throw away upon--No, I WON'T be still; and I WON'T let
you go to sleep. If you'd got to bed at a proper hour last night,
you wouldn't have been so sleepy now. You can sit up half the night
with a pack of people who don't care for you, and your poor wife
can't get in a word!

"And there's that china image that I had when I was married--I
wouldn't have taken any sum of money for it, and you know it--and how
do I find it? With its precious head knocked off! And what was more
mean, more contemptible than all besides, it was put on again, as if
nothing had happened.

"YOU KNEW NOTHING ABOUT IT?