“I am my own engineer, and my own carpenter, and my own plumber, and my own gardener, and my own Jack of all Trades,” said Wemmick, in acknowledging my compliments. “Well; it’s a good thing, you know. It brushes the Newgate cobwebs away.”
– Charles Dickens
Great Expectations, Chapter 25. Pip visits Wemmick’s cottage at Walworth, which he calls “The Castle” and has modeled in the style of a small castle. Proud to show it off to Pip, he boasts of doing all the construction work himself. The metaphor of brushing the Newgate cobwebs away means that the cottage is his sanctuary after a tough day at the courts and Newgate Prison. Wemmick is the hard-working legal clerk who looks after Jaggers’s business affairs.