I wondered how many other clerks there were up-stairs, and whether they all claimed to have the same detrimental mastery of their fellow-creatures.

I wondered what was the history of all the odd litter about the room, and how it came there.

I wondered whether the two swollen faces were of Mr.Jaggers's family, and, if he were so unfortunate as to have had a pair of such ill-looking relations, why he stuck them on that dusty perch for the blacks and flies to settle on, instead of giving them a place at home.
Of course I had no experience of a London summer day, and my spirits may have been oppressed by the hot exhausted air, and by the dust and grit that lay thick on everything.

But I sat wondering and waiting in Mr.
Jaggers's close room, until I really could not bear the two casts on the shelf above Mr.Jaggers's chair, and got up and went out.
When I told the clerk that I would take a turn in the air while I waited, he advised me to go round the corner and I should come into Smithfield.

So I came into Smithfield; and the shameful place, being all asmear with filth and fat and blood and foam, seemed to stick to me.