He shook his fist at me; after which it obviously became my duty, as a member of a gentlemanly and peaceful profession, to leave the room.

The same evening I left the house, and I have never once given the clumsy and expensive footman the trouble of answering the door to me since that time.
I have reason to believe that my exodus from home was, on the whole, favorably viewed by my mother, as tending to remove any possibility of my bad character and conduct interfering with my sister's advancement in life.
By dint of angling with great dexterity and patience, under the direction of both her parents, my handsome sister Annabella had succeeded in catching an eligible husband, in the shape of a wizen, miserly, mahogany-colored man, turned fifty, who had made a fortune in the West Indies.

His name was Batterbury; he had been dried up under a tropical sun, so as to look as if he would keep for ages; he had two subjects of conversation, the yellow-fever and the advantage of walking exercise: and he was barbarian enough to take a violent dislike to me.
He had proved a very delicate fish to hook; and, even when Annabella had caught him, my father and mother had great difficulty in landing him--principally, they were good enough to say, in consequence of my presence on the scene.

Hence the decided advantage of my removal from home.

It is a very pleasant reflection to me, now, to remember how disinterestedly I studied the good of my family in those early days.
Abandoned entirely to my own resources, I naturally returned to the business of caricaturing with renewed ardor.
About this time Thersites Junior really began to make something like a reputation, and to walk abroad habitually with a bank-note comfortably lodged among the other papers in his pocketbook.