Great Expectations
Herbert Pocket
Pip's London friend
The pale young gentleman who once fought Pip at Satis House and becomes his best friend in London.
Herbert is cheerful, honorable and incapable of malice. As a boy, he picks a fight with Pip in the overgrown garden at Satis House and is soundly beaten. He takes it well and the two meet again as young men in London, where he turns out to be Pip's new roommate in Barnard's Inn.
Herbert is generous, humorous and eager to make the best of things, never bothered by Pip's rough start. He gives Pip manners lessons, such as how to use the dinner knife and fork, and nicknames him Handel after a piece of music called The Harmonious Blacksmith. He does not have much money himself, but he is a steady friend.
“We are so harmonious, and you have been a blacksmith! Would you mind if I call you Handel?”
In the story
Contains spoilers.
Herbert tells Pip the story of Miss Havisham's jilting, and Pip learns that Herbert was once brought to the house to be considered for Estella. They both fall into debt in London. Pip quietly arranges, through Wemmick, for Herbert to be given a partnership, and Herbert never finds out who paid for it.
When Magwitch arrives, Herbert swears an oath of secrecy and helps hide him, rows the boat on the Thames and rescues Pip from the limekiln with Startop. Later, Pip joins Herbert's firm in Cairo, and the two become partners.
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