Part 1 Chapter 2 Murdering The Innocents

THOMAS GRADGRIND, sir. seven for all jeans
A man of realities. A man of facts and calculations. A
man who proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four, and nothing over,
and who is not to be talked into allowing for anything over. Thomas Gradgrind,
sir - peremptorily Thomas - Thomas Gradgrind. With a rule and a pair of scales,
and the multiplication table always in his pocket, sir, ready to weigh and
measure any parcel of human nature, and tell you exactly what it comes to. It is
a mere question of figures, a case of simple arithmetic. You might hope to get
some other nonsensical belief into the head of George seven jeans uk
Gradgrind, or Augustus
Gradgrind, or John Gradgrind, or Joseph Gradgrind (all supposititious,
non-existent persons), but into the head of Thomas Gradgrind - no, sir!

In such terms Mr. Gradgrind always mentally introduced himself, whether to
his private circle of acquaintance, or to the public in general. In such terms,
no doubt, substituting the words 'boys and girls,' for 'sir,' Thomas Gradgrind
now presented Thomas Gradgrind to the little pitchers before him, who were to be
filled so full of facts.

Indeed, as he eagerly sparkled at them from the cellarage before mentioned,
he seemed a kind of cannon loaded to the muzzle with facts, and sevens jeans
prepared to blow
them clean out of the regions of childhood at one discharge. He seemed a
galvanizing apparatus, too, charged with a grim mechanical substitute for the
tender young imaginations that were to be stormed away.

'Girl number twenty,' said Mr. Gradgrind, squarely pointing with his square
forefinger, 'I don't know that girl. Who is that girl?'

'Sissy Jupe, sir,' explained number twenty, blushing, standing up, and
curtseying.

'Sissy is not a name,' said Mr. Gradgrind. 'Don't call yourself Sissy. Call
yourself Cecilia.'

'It's father as calls me Sissy, sir,' returned the young girl in a trembling
voice, and with another curtsey.

'Then he has no business to do it,' said Mr. Gradgrind. 'Tell him he mustn't.
Cecilia Jupe. Let me see. What is your father?'

'He belongs to the horse-riding, if you please, sir.'

Mr. Gradgrind frowned, and waved off the objectionable calling with his
hand.

'We don't want to know anything about that, here. You mustn't tell us about
that, here. Your father breaks horses, don't he?'

'If you please, sir, when they can get any to break, they do break horses in
the ring, sir.'

'You mustn't tell us about the ring, here. Very well, then. Describe your
father as a horsebreaker. He doctors sick horses, I dare say?'

'Oh yes, sir.'

'Very well, then. He is a veterinary all for mankind jeans
surgeon, a farrier, and horsebreaker.
Give me your definition of a horse.'

(Sissy Jupe thrown into the greatest alarm by this demand.)

'Girl number twenty unable to define a horse!' said Mr. Gradgrind, for the
general behoof of all the little pitchers. 'Girl number twenty possessed of no
facts, in reference to one of the commonest of animals! Some boy's definition of
a horse. Bitzer, yours.'