Summary — Chapter XIX. I look about me, and make a
Discovery
David sets off on a monthlong journey to Yarmouth, to
the home of Peggotty and her family, to decide what profession to
pursue. He takes his leave of Agnes and Mr. Wickfield, and Doctor
Strong throws a going-away party in David’s honor. At the party,
Annie’s mother reveals that Jack Maldon has sent Doctor Strong a
letter in which he claims that he is ill and likely to return soon
on sick leave. But Annie has received another letter from Jack Maldon
indicating that he wants to return because he misses her.
The next morning, David leaves on the London coach and
tries to appear as manly as possible. Nonetheless, the coachman
asks him to resign his seat of honor to an older man. David spends
the evening at an inn, where the waiter pokes fun at his youthfulness
and the chambermaid gives him a pitiful room. David attends a play,
returns to the inn, and discovers Steerforth in a sitting room.
Steerforth is now attending Oxford but is bored by his studies and
is on his way home to see his mother. David and Steerforth are happily
reunited, and the inn staff immediately treat David with respect.
Summary — Chapter XX. Steerforth’s Home.
Steerforth persuades David to stay a few days with him
at his mother’s house before going to Yarmouth. Steerforth nicknames David
“Daisy,” and the two of them spend the day sightseeing before going
to Steerforth’s home. There, David meets Mrs. Steerforth, Steerforth’s
widowed mother, and Rosa Dartle, Steerforth’s orphaned distant cousin
whom Mrs. Steerforth took in when Miss Dartle’s mother died. Mrs.
Steerforth is an imposing, older, more feminine version of Steerforth,
and she dotes on her son ceaselessly. Miss Dartle has a scar above
her lip from a time when Steerforth, as a child, threw a hammer
at her in anger. Miss Dartle views Steerforth’s and David’s words
and actions with sarcasm, but both young men are drawn to her.
Summary — Chapter XXI. Little Em’ly.
If anyone had told me, then, that all
this was a brilliant game, played for the excitement of the moment
. . . in the thoughtless love of superiority . . . I wonder in what manner
of receiving it my indignation would have found a vent!
(See Important Quotations Explained)
At Steerforth’s, David meets Littimer, Steerforth’s servant,
who frightens David because he is so haughty and respectable. David persuades
Steerforth to accompany him to Yarmouth to see Ham and Mr. Peggotty
again and to meet Peggotty and Little Em’ly. On his way to Peggotty’s,
David stops at Mr. Omer’s shop and sees Mr. Omer and his daughter,
who is now married to her sweetheart. Mr.
Omer tells David that Little Em’ly now works in his shop.
She is a good and diligent worker, but some of the girls in town
say she has earned a reputation for putting on airs and wanting
to be a lady. David decides not to see Little Em’ly until later,
so he continues on to Barkis’s house to find Peggotty.
Peggotty does not recognize David at first, but when she
does, she sobs over him for a long time. Mr. Barkis, ill but glad
to see David, opens his cherished money box and gives Peggotty some
money to prepare dinner for David. Steerforth arrives and entertains
Peggotty and David. In retrospect, the adult David muses that if
anyone had told him that night that Steerforth’s joviality and manners
were all part of a game to him, born from his sense of superiority,
David would have dismissed such an idea as a lie. When Steerforth
and David arrive at Mr. Peggotty’s house, they find everyone, including Mrs.
Gummidge, in a state of high excitement because Little Em’ly has
just announced that she intends to marry Ham. After they leave, David
delights in the good news, but Steerforth becomes momentarily and
inexplicably sullen.
