Great Expectations #261420

To account for the conclusion of the story, as it now stands, where, in a concluding chapter, the heroine, after being mar ried, reclaimed, and widowed, is in a page or two made love to, and re-married to the hero, we must refer to a remon strance from friends, which was more effectual in the case of Dickens, than that which protested against the death of Clarissa Harlowe, in the case of Richardson. Carlyle was among the persons who listened to the reading of advanced sheets Of the story, and on one occasion, at a meeting of friends in Dickens's house, called, in his boisterous, laughing way, for more of that.