soul’s delight, my

   One of the extravagant terms used to his wife by Mr Mantalini, in Charles Dickens’s Nicholas Nickleby. She is also: my heart’s joy; my sense’s idol; my joy; my life and soul; my essential juice of pineapple; my cup of happiness’s sweetener; my existence’s jewel; my sense’s joy; my soul; my gentle, captivating, bewitching and most demnebly chick-a-biddy, amongst other things. Mr Mantalini’s expressions are as false as his name, which was originally Muntle. We are left in no doubt about his hypocrisy, though some of the terms he uses would not sound amiss in the mouths of genuine lovers, such as Romeo and Juliet. They, for example, address one another by such expressions as: dear saint, love, my soul, my love, sweet dear love, sweet. Mantalini lives off his wife’s earnings until she is made bankrupt, whereupon he separates from her.