capacious dumb-waiter a piece of furniture with shelves to hold sauces, silverware, and other items for dinner.
faces out of the Witches' caldron a reference to Act IV, Scene 1 of Shakespeare's Macbeth. Macbeth visits the witches as they stir their caldron, and he demands an explanation of their prophecies about him. They ask if he wants the story from them or from their masters, and he asks to see their masters. The witches promptly work their magic and a number of apparitions arise from the boiling caldron.
in the books of a neighboring upholsterer . . . a boy in boots Pip is in debt to a local interior decorator and furniture dealer. He has also hired a servant.
Provincial Amateur of Roscian renown . . . our National Bard Quintus Roscius Gallus (died 62 BC) was the greatest Roman comic actor of his time, so this reference indicates an actor of the same level of renown. Our National Bard refers to Shakespeare. Essentially, the playbill from the small theater is claiming Wopsle to be a great actor who is performing in a Shakespearean play.
a peck of orange-peel Joe's comment here indicates the audience threw a lot of orange peels, essentially expressing their dislike of the performance.
pettishly peevishly, petulantly, crossly.
bread-poultice, baize, rope-yarn, and hearthstone these references apply to the convicts that rode with Pip to the Hulks. Bread-poultice was bread soaked in hot water, put in cloth, and applied to bruises and swellings. Baize was a cheap, thick wool cloth probably used for prison clothes. Rope-yarn refers to the fact that prisoners were often put to work unraveling old rope. Hearthstone refers to stone broken up to use to whiten doorsteps and hearthstones.
the Mentor of our young Telemachus . . . Quintin Matsys . . . VERB. SAP." The waiter at the Blue Boar, who assumes Pip owes everything to Pumblechook, hands Pip this newspaper article that Pumblechook has run. Telemachus was the young son of Odysseus who was guided during his father's absence by Athene, disguised as an old friend of his father's. Quintin Matsys was a Flemish painter who supposedly began his career as a blacksmith. VERB. SAP. is a Latin abbreviation for verbum satis sapienti, meaning "a hint is enough to the wise." Pumblechook is claiming to be the great mentor and first benefactor of someone and is saying that a good hint is all they need to figure out who the young man is. He provides the hint with the reference to the Flemish painter who was first a blacksmith.
