'What did you take it for, then?' inquired the cabman.

'I didn't take it,' said Mr Pickwick indignantly.

'Would anybody believe,' continued the cab-driver, appealing to the crowd, 'would anybody believe that an informer would go about in a man's cab, not only takin' down his number, but every word he says into the bargain' (a light flashed upon Mr Pickwick - it was the note-book).

'Did he though?' inquired another cabman.

'Yes, he did,' replied Sam; 'and then after aggravating me to assault him, gets three witnesses here to prove it. But I'll give it him, if I get six months for it. Come on!'

The cabman dashed his hat upon the ground, with a reckless disregard of his own private property, and knocked Mr Pickwick's spectacles off, and followed up the attack with a blow on Mr Pickwick's nose, and another on Mr Pickwick's chest, and a third in Mr Snodgrass's eye, and a fourth, by way of variety, in Mr Tupman's waistcoat, and then danced into the road, and then back again to the pavement, and finally knocked the whole temporary supply of breath out of Mr Winkle's body; and all in half a dozen seconds.