At all events, he besought George to go through with it before the orders came, which everybody expected, for the departure of the regiment from England on foreign service.
Bent upon these hymeneal projects, and with the applause and consent of Mrs.Sedley, who did not care to break the matter personally to her husband, Mr.Dobbin went to seek John Sedley at his house of call in the City, the Tapioca Coffee-house, where, since his own offices were shut up, and fate had overtaken him, the poor broken-down old gentleman used to betake himself daily, and write letters and receive them, and tie them up into mysterious bundles, several of which he carried in the flaps of his coat.

I don't know anything more dismal than that business and bustle and mystery of a ruined man: those letters from the wealthy which he shows you: those worn greasy documents promising support and offering condolence which he places wistfully before you, and on which he builds his hopes of restoration and future fortune.

My beloved reader has no doubt in the course of his experience been waylaid by many such a luckless companion.

He takes you into the corner; he has his bundle of papers out of his gaping coat pocket; and the tape off, and the string in his mouth, and the favourite letters selected and laid before you; and who does not know the sad eager half-crazy look which he fixes on you with his hopeless eyes?
Changed into a man of this sort, Dobbin found the once florid, jovial, and prosperous John Sedley.

His coat, that used to be so glossy and trim, was white at the seams, and the buttons showed the copper.