he looked at her, she had again cast down her eyes!

'What,' he repeated presently, 'would Mr. Bounderby say?' All the
way to Stone Lodge, as with grave indignation he led the two
delinquents home, he repeated at intervals 'What would Mr.
Bounderby say?' - as if Mr. Bounderby had been Mrs. Grundy.



CHAPTER IV - MR. BOUNDERBY



NOT being Mrs. Grundy, who was Mr. Bounderby?

Why, Mr. Bounderby was as near being Mr. Gradgrind's bosom friend,
as a man perfectly devoid of sentiment can approach that spiritual
relationship towards another man perfectly devoid of sentiment. So
near was Mr. Bounderby - or, if the reader should prefer it, so far
off.

He was a rich man: banker, merchant, manufacturer, and what not.
A big, loud man, with a stare, and a metallic laugh. A man made
out of a coarse material, which seemed to have been stretched to
make so much of him. A man with a great puffed head and forehead,
swelled veins in his temples, and such a strained skin to his face
that it seemed to hold his eyes open, and lift his eyebrows up. A
man with a pervading appearance on him of being inflated like a
balloon, and ready to start. A man who could never sufficiently
vaunt himself a self-made man. A man who was always proclaiming,