But the instinctive recognition of such a truth by the Major, and his plain avowal of it, were very able.

It was a confirmation to Mr Dombey, if he had required any, of his not being mistaken in the Major.

It was an assurance to him that his power extended beyond his own immediate sphere; and that the Major, as an officer and a gentleman, had a no less becoming sense of it, than the beadle of the Royal Exchange.
And if it were ever consolatory to know this, or the like of this, it was consolatory then, when the impotence of his will, the instability of his hopes, the feebleness of wealth, had been so direfully impressed upon him.

What could it do, his boy had asked him.

Sometimes, thinking of the baby question, he could hardly forbear inquiring, himself, what could it do indeed: what had it done?
But these were lonely thoughts, bred late at night in the sullen despondency and gloom of his retirement, and pride easily found its reassurance in many testimonies to the truth, as unimpeachable and precious as the Major's.