I never could understand how Thackeray in his first serious attempt could have dared to subject himself and Sir Pitt Crawley to the critics of the time. Sir Pitt is a baronet, a man of large property, and in Parliament, to whom Becky Sharp goes as a governess at the end of a delightful visit with her friend Amelia Sedley, on leaving Miss Pinkerton's school. The Sedley carriage takes her to Sir Pitt's door. "When the bell was rung a head appeared between the interstices of the dining-room shutters, and the door was opened by a man in drab breeches and gaiters, with a dirty old coat, a foul old neckcloth lashed round his bristly neck, a shining bald head, a leering red face, a pair of twinkling gray eyes, and a mouth perpetually on the grin. "'This Sir Pitt Crawley's?' says John from the box. "'E'es,' says the man at the door with a nod. "'Hand down these 'ere trunks there,' said John. "'Hand 'em down yourself,' said the porter." But John on the box declines to do this, as he cannot leave his horses. "The bald-headed man, taking his hands out of his breeches' pockets, advanced on this summons, and throwing Miss Sharp's trunk over his shoulder, carried it into the house." Then Becky is shown into the house, and a dismantled dining-room is described, into which she is led by the dirty man with the trunk. Two kitchen chairs, and a round table, and an attenuated old poker and tongs, were, however, gathered round the fireplace, as was a saucepan over a feeble, sputtering fire. There was a bit of cheese and bread and a tin candlestick on the table, and a little black porter in a pint pot. "Had your dinner, I suppose?" This was said by him of the bald head. "It is not too warm for you? Like a drop of beer?" "Where is Sir Pitt Crawley?" said Miss Sharp majestically. "He, he! _I_'m Sir Pitt Crawley. Rek'lect you owe me a pint for bringing down your luggage. He, he! ask Tinker if I ain't." The lady addressed as Mrs. Tinker at this moment made her appearance, with a pipe and a paper of tobacco, for which she had been despatched a minute before Miss Sharp's arrival; and she handed the articles over to Sir Pitt, who had taken his seat by the fire. "Where's the farden?" said he. "I gave you three-halfpence; where's the change, old Tinker?" "There," replied Mrs. Tinker, flinging down the coin. "It's only baronets as cares about farthings."