'An absence of business habits in this family leads, apparently, to a great waste of words before business--when it does come under consideration--is arrived at, at all.' 'I fear it is so indeed,' replied Mrs Nickleby with a sigh.

'Your poor brother--' 'My poor brother, ma'am,' interposed Ralph tartly, 'had no idea what business was--was unacquainted, I verily believe, with the very meaning of the word.' 'I fear he was,' said Mrs Nickleby, with her handkerchief to her eyes.
'If it hadn't been for me, I don't know what would have become of him.' What strange creatures we are! The slight bait so skilfully thrown out by Ralph, on their first interview, was dangling on the hook yet.

At every small deprivation or discomfort which presented itself in the course of the four-and-twenty hours to remind her of her straitened and altered circumstances, peevish visions of her dower of one thousand pounds had arisen before Mrs Nickleby's mind, until, at last, she had come to persuade herself that of all her late husband's creditors she was the worst used and the most to be pitied.

And yet, she had loved him dearly for many years, and had no greater share of selfishness than is the usual lot of mortals.

Such is the irritability of sudden poverty.