Since Mr. Jaggers is modeled upon a notoriously
unscrupulous lawyer who was also rude and abrupt for whom Dickens once worked, it seems
likely that Wemmick, who is an excellent judge of character, perceives the dark side of
Jaggers. However, Wemmick woodenly maintains his business-like personality which he
reserves for the office. Nonetheless, that Mr. Jaggers feels no affection or kindliness
towards his clients is evinced in the contrast between the mourning rings and gifts that
Wemmick has been given by those condemned and the two death masks that Jaggers keeps on
a shelf in his greasy-walled office. Instead, as in apparent in Chapter 20 in which
Jaggers pushes past supplicants and abruptly dismisses them, he is cold, perceiving them
only as simply clients. When Wemmick says that Jaggers is as deep as Austrialia,
pointing to the map, he implies that his employer is aloof
and inscrutable.
At the end of the chapter, after having
shown Pip the other clerks, who appear as seedy and dishelved as the criminals
themselves, Wemmick asks Pip if he has been to the house of Jaggers. When Pip replies
in the negative, Wemmick urges him to observe the housekeeper, "a wild beast tamed";
this is an observation, he adds,"...that won't lower your opinion of Mr. Jaggers
powers."
Later, as Pip observes Mr. Jaggers in the
courtroom, he understands the implications of Wemmick use of the word
"professional" and "powerful" for Jaggers as
well as his innuendos about Jaggers: The lawyer is unceremonious, to say the least.
His curt remarks to the witnesses intimidate them as well as disturbing the officials of
the court. Pip states that "thieves and thief-takers hung in dread rapture on his every
word." Even the judge is unnerved by Jagger's insinuations that he is not
representative of English justice as his legs shake under the
table.
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