The Couple Who Coddle Themselves Page #2

"The Couple Who Coddle Themselves" is not a recognized work by Charles Dickens. However, if you're referring to a fictional or hypothetical story inspired by Dickensian themes, it could explore the lives of a couple who indulge in their own comforts and desires, leading to humorous and poignant reflections on self-love and the impact of self-indulgence on their relationship and social interactions. The narrative might resonate with Dickens' typical characterizations and moral lessons, highlighting the balance between self-care and self-absorption. If you meant a different title or author, please clarify!

• Humour
• Short story

								


Supper, coming after dinner, should consist of some gentle provocative;
and therefore the tittivating art is again in requisition, and again—done
honour to by Mr. and Mrs. Merrywinkle, still comforted and abetted by
Mrs. Chopper.  After supper, it is ten to one but the last-named old lady
becomes worse, and is led off to bed with the chronic complaint in full
vigour.  Mr. and Mrs. Merrywinkle, having administered to her a warm
cordial, which is something of the strongest, then repair to their own
room, where Mr. Merrywinkle, with his legs and feet in hot water,
superintends the mulling of some wine which he is to drink at the very
moment he plunges into bed, while Mrs. Merrywinkle, in garments whose
nature is unknown to and unimagined by all but married men, takes four
small pills with a spasmodic look between each, and finally comes to
something hot and fragrant out of another little saucepan, which serves
as her composing-draught for the night.

There is another kind of couple who coddle themselves, and who do so at a
cheaper rate and on more spare diet, because they are niggardly and
parsimonious; for which reason they are kind enough to coddle their
visitors too.  It is unnecessary to describe them, for our readers may
rest assured of the accuracy of these general principles:—that all
couples who coddle themselves are selfish and slothful,—that they charge
upon every wind that blows, every rain that falls, and every vapour that
hangs in the air, the evils which arise from their own imprudence or the
gloom which is engendered in their own tempers,—and that all men and
women, in couples or otherwise, who fall into exclusive habits of
self-indulgence, and forget their natural sympathy and close connexion
with everybody and everything in the world around them, not only neglect
the first duty of life, but, by a happy retributive justice, deprive
themselves of its truest and best enjoyment.
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