Master Humphrey's Clock by Charles Dickens
CHAPTER I - MASTER HUMPHREY, FROM HIS CLOCK-SIDE IN THE CHIMNEY
CORNER
THE reader must not expect to know where I live. At present, it is
true, my abode may be a question of little or no import to anybody;
but if I should carry my readers with me, as I hope to do, and
there should spring up between them and me feelings of homely
affection and regard attaching something of interest to matters
ever so slightly connected with my fortunes or my speculations,
even my place of residence might one day have a kind of charm for
them. Bearing this possible contingency in mind, I wish them to
understand, in the outset, that they must never expect to know it.
I am not a churlish old man. Friendless I can never be, for all
mankind are my kindred, and I am on ill terms with no one member of
my great family. But for many years I have led a lonely, solitary
life; - what wound I sought to heal, what sorrow to forget,
originally, matters not now; it is sufficient that retirement has
become a habit with me, and that I am unwilling to break the spell
which for so long a time has shed its quiet influence upon my home
and heart.
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