Shoeing-stool

In chapter 9 Charles Dickens's Great Expectations a shoeing-stool refers to a "farrier's stool -- a low, sturdy, wooden bench or seat used by a blacksmith when putting horseshoes on horses.  Joe Gargery is a village blacksmith, whose forge is not for just heavy ironwork, he also functions as a farrier, caring for the local horse's hooves. 

Pip was coming out of fictions he had concocted about Havisham's house -- velvet coaches, massive dogs, eating on gold plates.  The humble utilitarion horse-shoe contrasts his fabricated world of Havisham's house. 

By drawing his shoeing-stool near, Joe physically lowers himself and moves to Pip, manifesting his gentleness to meet Pip on an equal footing.