We went back next day to my aunt’s house – not to mine; and when she and I sat alone, as of old, before going to bed, she said: “Trot, do you really wish to know what I have had upon my mind lately?”

“Indeed I do, aunt. If there ever was a time when I felt unwilling that you should have a sorrow or anxiety which I could not share, it is now.”

In this excerpt from David Copperfield, ill-used Betsey Trotwood is not too hardhearted to shed tears for her wayward husband.