A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land
by William R. Hughes · English · Gutenberg #31394 · 679,625 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land
Author: William R. Hughes
Illustrator: Frederic George Kitton
Release date: February 25, 2010 [eBook #31394]
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WEEK'S TRAMP IN DICKENS-LAND ***
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produced from images generously made available by The
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A WEEK'S TRAMP
IN
DICKENS-LAND
[Illustration: The Marshes, Cooling.]
A WEEK'S TRAMP
IN
DICKENS-LAND
TOGETHER WITH
=Personal Reminiscences of the 'Inimitable Boz'=
THEREIN COLLECTED.
BY
WILLIAM R. HUGHES, F.L.S.
_WITH MORE THAN A HUNDRED
ILLUSTRATIONS BY F. G. KITTON
AND OTHER ARTISTS._
LONDON: CHAPMAN & HALL, LIMITED.
BOSTON: ESTES AND LAURIAT.
1891.
RICHARD CLAY & SONS, LIMITED,
LONDON & BUNGAY.
[_All Rights reserved._]
TO
MY WIFE AND DAUGHTERS,
EMILY AND EDITH,
I DEDICATE
THIS RECORD OF "A WEEK'S TRAMP,"
TO REMIND THEM OF
THE MANY PLEASANT READINGS FROM DICKENS
WE HAVE ENJOYED TOGETHER
AT HOME.
PREFACE.
* * * * *
"'I should like to show you a series of eight articles, Sir, that have
appeared in the Eatanswill Gazette. I think I may venture to say that
you would not be long in establishing your opinions on a firm and solid
basis, Sir.'
"'I dare say I should turn very blue long before I got to the end of
them,' responded Bob.
"Mr. Pott looked dubiously at Bob Sawyer for some seconds, and turning
to Mr. Pickwick said:--
"'You have seen the literary articles which have appeared at intervals
in the Eatanswill Gazette in the course of the last three months, and
which have excited such general--I may say such universal--attention and
admiration?'
"'Why,' replied Mr. Pickwick, slightly embarrassed by the question, 'the
fact is, I have been so much engaged in other ways, that I really have
not had an opportunity of perusing them.'
"'You should do so, Sir,' said Pott with a severe countenance.
"'I will,' said Mr. Pickwick.
"'They appeared in the form of a copious review of a work on Chinese
metaphysics, Sir,' said Pott.
"'Oh,' observed Mr. Pickwick--'from your pen I hope?'
"'From the pen of my critic, Sir,' rejoined Pott with dignity.
"'An abstruse subject I should conceive,' said Mr. Pickwick.
"'Very, Sir,' responded Pott, looking intensely sage. 'He _crammed_ for
it, to use a technical but expressive term; he read up for the subject,
at my desire, in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_.'
"'Indeed!' said Mr. Pickwick; 'I was not aware that that valuable work
contained any information respecting Chinese metaphysics.'
"'He read, Sir,' rejoined Mr. Pott, laying his hand on Mr. Pickwick's
knee, and looking round with a smile of intellectual superiority, 'he
read for metaphysics under the letter M, and for China under the letter
C; and combined his information, Sir!'
"Mr. Pott's features assumed so much additional grandeur at the
recollection of the power and research displayed in the learned
effusions in question, that some minutes elapsed before Mr. Pickwick
felt emboldened to renew the conversation."
* * * * *
The above perennial extract from the immortal _Pickwick Papers_ suggests
to some extent the nature of the contents of this Volume. It is the
record of a pilgrimage made by two enthusiastic Dickensians during the
late summer of 1888, together with "combined information,"--not indeed
"crammed" from the ninth edition just completed of the valuable work
above referred to, but gathered mostly from original sources,--respecting
the places visited, the characters alluded to in some of the novels,
personal reminiscences of their Author, appropriate passages from his
works (for which acknowledgments are due to Messrs. Chapman and Hall),
and some little mention of the thoughts developed by the associations of
"Dickens-Land."
Although the pilgrimage only extended to a week, and every spot referred
to (save one) was actually visited during that time, it is but right to
state that on three subsequent occasions the author has gone over the
greater part of the same ground--once in the early winter, when the blue
clematis and the aster had given place to the yellow jasmine and the
chrysanthemum; once in the early spring, when those had been succeeded
by the almond-blossom and the crocus; and again in the following year,
when the beautiful county of Kent was rehabilitated in summer clothing,
thus enabling him to verify observations, to correct possible errors
arising from first impressions, and to gain new experiences.
As our head-quarters were at Rochester, and most of the city and other
parts were taken at odd times, it has not been found practicable to
preserve in consecutive chapters a perfect sequence of the records of
each day's tramp, although they appear in fairly chronological order
throughout the work. "A preliminary tramp in London" will possibly be
dull to those familiar with the great Metropolis, but it may be useful
to foreign tramps in "Dickens-Land."
Availing myself of the privilege adopted by most travellers at home and
abroad, I have made occasional references to the weather. This is
perhaps excusable when it is remembered that the year 1888 was a very
remarkable one in that respect, so much so indeed, that the writer of a
leading article in _The Times_ of January 18th, 1889, in commenting on
Mr. G. J. Symons' report of the British rainfall of the previous year,
remarked that "seldom within living memory had there been a twelve-month
with more unpleasantness in it and less of genial sunshine." We were
specially favoured, however, in getting more "sunshine" than
"unpleasantness," thus adding to the enjoyment of our never-to-be-forgotten
tramp.
Upwards of three years have elapsed since this book was commenced, and
the limited holiday leisure of a hard-working official life has
necessarily prevented its completion for such a lengthened period, that
it has come to be pleasantly referred to by my many Dickensian friends
as the "Dictionary," in allusion to the important work of that nature
contemplated by Dr. Strong, respecting which (says David Copperfield)
"Adams, our head-boy, who had a turn for mathematics, had made a
calculation, I was informed, of the time this Dictionary would take in
completing, on the Doctor's plan, and at the Doctor's rate of going. He
considered that it might be done in one thousand six hundred and
forty-nine years, counting from the Doctor's last, or sixty-second,
birthday."
My hearty and sincere acknowledgments are due to the publishers, Messrs.
Chapman and Hall, not only for the very handsome manner in which they
have allowed my book to be got up as regards print, paper, and execution
(to follow the model of their Victoria Edition of _Pickwick_ is indeed
an honour to me), but especially for their great liberality in the
matter of the Illustrations, which number more than a hundred. These
were selected in conference by Mr. Fred Chapman, Mr. Kitton, and myself,
and include about fifty original drawings by Mr. Kitton, from sketches
specially made by him for this work. Of the remainder, six are from
Forster's _Life of Dickens_, fifteen from Langton's _Childhood and Youth
of Charles Dickens_, seven from _Charles Dickens by Pen and Pencil_, ten
from the Jubilee Edition of _Pickwick_, and five from Rimmer's _About
England with Dickens_. A few interesting fac-similes of handwriting,
etc., have also been introduced. Surely such an eclectic series of
Dickens Illustrations has never before been presented in one volume.
To Messrs. Chapman and Hall, Mr. Robert Langton, F.R.H.S., Messrs. Frank
T. Sabin and John F. Dexter, Messrs. Macmillan and Co., and Messrs.
Chatto and Windus (the proprietors of the above-mentioned works), the
author's acknowledgments are also due, and are hereby tendered. Mr.
Stephen T. Aveling has kindly supplied an illustration of Restoration
House as it appeared in Dickens's time, and Mr. William Ball, J.P.,
generously commissioned a local artist to make a sketch of the Marshes,
which forms the frontispiece to the book, and gives a good idea of the
"long stretches of flat lands" on the Kent and Essex coasts.
To those friends whom we then met for the first time, and from whom we
subsequently received help, the author's most cordial acknowledgments
are due, and are also tendered, for kind information and assistance.
They are a goodly number, and include Mr. A. A. Arnold, Mr. Stephen T.
Aveling, Mr. William Ball, J.P., Mr. James Baird, Mr. Charles Bird,
F.G.S., Major and Mrs. Budden, Mr. W. J. Budden, Mr. R. L. Cobb, Mr. J.
Couchman, The Misses Drage, Mrs. Easedown, Mr. Franklin Homan, Mr. James
Hulkes, J.P., and Mrs. Hulkes, Mr. Apsley Kennette, Mrs. Latter, Mr. J.
Lawrence, Mr. C. D. Levy, Mr. B. Lillie, Mr. J. E. Littlewood, Mr. J. N.
Malleson, Rev. J. J. Marsham, M.A., Mrs. Masters, Mr. Miles, Mr. W.
Millen, Mr. Geo. Payne, F.S.A., Mr. William Pearce, Mr. George Robinson,
Mr. T. B. Rosseter, F.R.M.S., Dr. Sheppard, Mr. Henry Smetham, Dr.
Steele, M.R.C.S., Mr. William Syms, Mrs. Taylor, Miss Taylor, Mr. W. S.
Trood, Major Trousdell, Rev. Robert Whiston, M.A., Mr. W. T. Wildish,
Mr. Humphrey Wood, Mr. C. K. Worsfold, and Mrs. Henry Wright. The late
Mr. Roach Smith, F.S.A., took much interest in my work and gave valuable
assistance. Mr. Luke Fildes, R.A., and Mrs. Lynn Linton generously
contributed very interesting information. The Right Honourable the Earl
of Darnley, Mr. Henry Fielding Dickens, Mr. W. P. Frith, R.A., and Lady
Head, also kindly answered enquiries.
Miss Hogarth has at my request very kindly consented to the publication
of the original letters of the Novelist--about a dozen--now printed for
the first time.
My sincere thanks are due to Mr. E. W. Badger, F.R.H.S., the friend of
many years, for valuable help.
To my old friend and fellow-tramp, Mr. F. G. Kitton, with whose memory
this delightful excursion will ever be pleasantly connected, my warmest
thanks are due for reading proofs and for much kind help in many ways.
"He wos werry good to me, he wos." As Pip wrote to another "Jo," "WOT
LARX" we did have.
Last, but not least, my cordial thanks are due to Mr. Charles Dickens
for much kind information and valuable criticism.
So long as readers continue to be, so long will our great English
trilogy of cognate authors, Shakespeare, Scott, and Dickens, continue to
be read. Indeed as regards Dickens, a writer in _Blackwood_, June, 1871
(and _Blackwood_ was not always a sympathetic critic), said:--"We may
apply to him, without doubt, the surest test to which the maker can be
subject: were all his books swept by some intellectual catastrophe out
of the world, there would still exist in the world some score at least
of people, with all whose ways and sayings we are more intimately
acquainted than with those of our brothers and sisters, who would owe to
him their being. While we live Sam Weller and Dick Swiveller, Mr.
Pecksniff and Mrs. Gamp, the Micawbers and the Squeerses, can never
die. . . . They are more real than we are ourselves, and will outlive
and outlast us, as they have outlived their creator. This is the one
proof of genius which no critic, not the most carping or dissatisfied,
can gainsay."
So long also, the author ventures to think, will pilgrimages continue to
be made to the shrines of Stratford-on-Avon, Abbotsford, and Gad's Hill
Place, and to their vicinities. The modest aim of this Volume is, that
it may add a humble unit in helping to keep _his_ memory green, and that
it may be a useful and acceptable companion to pilgrims, not only of our
own country, but also from that still "Greater Britain," where "All the
Year Round" the name of Charles Dickens is almost a dearer "Household
Word" than it is with us.
WILLIAM R. HUGHES.
WOOD HOUSE, HANDSWORTH WOOD,
near BIRMINGHAM.
_30th September, 1891._
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
PREFACE vii
I. INTRODUCTORY 1
II. A PRELIMINARY TRAMP IN LONDON 7
III. ROCHESTER CITY 51
IV. ROCHESTER CASTLE 98
V. ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL 111
VI. RICHARD WATTS'S CHARITY, ROCHESTER 142
VII. AN AFTERNOON AT GAD'S HILL PLACE 161
VIII. CHARLES DICKENS AND STROOD 211
IX. CHATHAM:--ST. MARY'S CHURCH, ORDNANCE TERRACE,
THE HOUSE ON THE BROOK, THE MITRE HOTEL, AND
FORT PITT. LANDPORT:--PORTSEA, HANTS 251
X. AYLESFORD, TOWN MALLING, AND MAIDSTONE 288
XI. BROADSTAIRS, MARGATE, AND CANTERBURY 317
XII. COOLING, CLIFFE, AND HIGHAM 349
XIII. COBHAM PARK AND HALL, THE LEATHER BOTTLE, SHORNE,
CHALK, AND THE DOVER ROAD 376
XIV. A FINAL TRAMP IN ROCHESTER AND LONDON 405
INDEX 427
LIST
OF
ILLUSTRATIONS
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
PAGE
THE MARSHES, COOLING _Frontispiece_
_F. G. Kitton_ (from a Sketch by _E. L. Meadows_)
HEADPIECE, "HUMOUR" (From two Statuettes of "Mr. Pickwick"
and "Sam Weller" in Crown Derby Ware)
Engraved by _R. Langton_ xvii
THE GOLDEN CROSS _Herbert Railton_ 10
YOUNG DICKENS AT THE BLACKING WAREHOUSE _F. Barnard_ 12
FOUNTAIN COURT, TEMPLE _C. A. Vanderhoof_ 16
STAPLE INN, HOLBORN " " 21
BARNARD'S INN _Herbert Railton_ 23
DICKENS'S HOUSE, FURNIVAL'S INN " " 25
NO. 48, DOUGHTY STREET _J. Grego_ 28
TAVISTOCK HOUSE, TAVISTOCK SQUARE _J. Liddell_ 30
NO. 141, BAYHAM STREET _F. G. Kitton_ 37
NO. 1, DEVONSHIRE TERRACE _D. Maclise, R.A._ 40
FAC-SIMILE OF LETTER, CHARLES DICKENS 43
APOTHEOSIS OF "GRIP" THE RAVEN _D. Maclise, R.A._ 45
"MY MAGNIFICENT ORDER AT THE PUBLIC HOUSE" _Phiz_ 49
BULL INN, ROCHESTER--"GOOD HOUSE, NICE BEDS" _Herbert Railton_ 56
STAIRCASE AT "THE BULL" _F. G. Kitton_ 58
THE "ELEVATED DEN" IN THE BALL-ROOM, "BULL INN" _F. G. Kitton_ 61
OLD ROCHESTER BRIDGE _Herbert Railton_ 68
THE GUILDHALL, ROCHESTER _F. G. Kitton_ 71
THE "MOON-FACED" CLOCK IN HIGH STREET " " 72
IN HIGH STREET, ROCHESTER " " 73
EASTGATE HOUSE, ROCHESTER " " 74
MR. SAPSEA'S HOUSE, ROCHESTER " " 76
MR. SAPSEA'S FATHER (After sketch by _H. Wickham_) 77
RESTORATION HOUSE, ROCHESTER _F. G. Kitton_ 79
OLD ROCHESTER THEATRE, STAR HILL _W. Hull_ 84
THE CASTLE FROM ROCHESTER BRIDGE _F. G. Kitton_ 99
THE KEEP OF ROCHESTER CASTLE _Herbert Railton_ 101
INTERIOR OF ROCHESTER CASTLE _F. G. Kitton_ 105
ROCHESTER CASTLE AND THE MEDWAY " " 109
ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL " " 112
ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL, INTERIOR " " 115
THE CRYPT, ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL _Phiz_ 118
MINOR CANON ROW, ROCHESTER _F. G. Kitton_ 123
COLLEGE GATE (OR "CHERTSEY'S" GATE), ROCHESTER " " 125
PRIOR'S GATE, ROCHESTER " " 126
DEANERY GATE, ROCHESTER " " 128
THE VINES AND RESTORATION HOUSE, ROCHESTER " " 131
RESTORATION HOUSE, AS IT APPEARED IN DICKENS'S TIME
(Engraved from a Drawing by an Amateur) 133
ST. NICHOLAS' BURYING-GROUND _F. G. Kitton_ 136
MEMORIAL BRASS IN ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL 138
THE "SIX POOR TRAVELLERS" _F. G. Kitton_ 143
RICHARD WATTS'S ALMSHOUSES, ROCHESTER " " 149
FAC-SIMILES OF SIGNATURES OF CHARLES DICKENS AND MARK LEMON 151
THE "SIX POOR TRAVELLERS" FROM THE REAR _F. G. Kitton_ 153
A DORMITORY IN THE "SIX POOR TRAVELLERS": GALLERY LEADING
TO THE DORMITORIES _F. G. Kitton_ 154
SATIS HOUSE (From a Photograph) 156
WATTS'S MONUMENT IN ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL _R. Langton_ 157
ROCHESTER FROM STROOD HILL _C. Marshall_ 162
THE "SIR JOHN FALSTAFF" INN, GAD'S HILL _F. G. Kitton_ 164
GAD'S HILL PLACE " " 166
"THE EMPTY CHAIR." GAD'S HILL, NINTH OF JUNE, 1870
_F. G. Kitton_ (from the Drawing by _S. L. Fildes, R.A._) 170
COUNTERFEIT BOOK-BACKS ON STUDY DOOR _R. Langton_ 172
GAD'S HILL PLACE FROM THE REAR _J. Liddell_ 177
"THE GRAVE OF DICK, THE BEST OF BIRDS" _F. G. Kitton_ 178
THE WELL AT GAD'S HILL PLACE " " 181
THE PORCH, GAD'S HILL PLACE _J. Liddell_ 183
THE CEDARS, GAD'S HILL _E. Hull_ 185
VIEW FROM THE ROOF OF DICKENS'S HOUSE, GAD'S HILL _F. G. Kitton_ 189
FAC-SIMILES OF _GAD'S HILL GAZETTE_ AND FINAL NOTICE 199-203
TEMPLE FARM, STROOD _F. G. Kitton_ 213
AT TEMPLE FARM, STROOD " " 214
CRYPT, TEMPLE FARM " " 215
THE "CRISPIN AND CRISPIANUS," STROOD " " 218
OLD QUARRY HOUSE, STROOD " " 236
FRINDSBURY CHURCH " " 239
ROCHESTER FROM STROOD PIER " " 245
ST. MARY'S CHURCH, CHATHAM _W. Dadson_ 256
NO. 11, ORDNANCE TERRACE, CHATHAM _E. Hull_ 259
THE HOUSE ON THE BROOK, CHATHAM " 260
GILES'S SCHOOL, CHATHAM " 261
MITRE INN, CHATHAM " 263
NAVY-PAY OFFICE, CHATHAM " 275
FORT PITT, CHATHAM _Herbert Railton_ 277
BIRTHPLACE OF CHARLES DICKENS, PORTSEA (From a Photograph) 281
ST. MARY'S CHURCH, PORTSEA _R. Langton_ 285
AYLESFORD _F. G. Kitton_ 289
AYLESFORD BRIDGE " " 291
THE HIGH STREET, TOWN MALLING _Herbert Railton_ 293
COB TREE HALL _F. G. Kitton_ 297
CRICKET GROUND, TOWN MALLING " " 302
THE MEDWAY AT MAIDSTONE " " 307
CHILLINGTON MANOR HOUSE, MAIDSTONE " " 310
KIT'S COTY HOUSE " " 312
KIT'S COTY HOUSE AND "BLUE BELL" " " 315
(From the Painting by Gegan)
HOP-PICKING IN KENT _F. G. Kitton_ 319
"BLEAK HOUSE," BROADSTAIRS " " 328
OLD LOOK-OUT HOUSE, BROADSTAIRS " " 332
THE "FALSTAFF," WESTGATE, CANTERBURY " " 335
THE "DANE JOHN" FROM THE CITY WALL, CANTERBURY " " 337
BELL HARRY TOWER, CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL " " 339
SCENE OF THE MARTYRDOM, CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL " " 341
"BITS" OF OLD CANTERBURY _C. A. Vanderhoof_ 342
"THE LITTLE INN," CANTERBURY _F. G. Kitton_ 345
GRAVES OF THE COMPORT FAMILY, COOLING CHURCHYARD " " 353
COOLING CHURCH _C. A. Vanderhoof_ 355
GATEWAY, COOLING CASTLE _F. G. Kitton_ 359
CLIFFE CHURCH " " 361
COBHAM HALL _Herbert Railton_ 381
DICKENS'S CHÂLET, NOW IN COBHAM PARK _J. Liddell_ 384
THE "LEATHER BOTTLE," COBHAM _F. G. Kitton_ 387
THE OLD PARLOUR OF THE "LEATHER BOTTLE" _E. Hull_ 389
COBHAM CHURCH _Herbert Railton_ 390
SHORNE CHURCH _F. G. Kitton_ 392
CURIOUS OLD FIGURE OVER THE PORCH, CHALK CHURCH _F. G. Kitton_ 394
"THERE'S MILESTONES ON THE DOVER ROAD" " " 400
DOORWAY, ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL " " 407
FAC-SIMILES OF CHARLES DICKENS'S HANDWRITING 1837, 1850,
1854, 1870 418-20
THE GRAVE IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY _F. G. Kitton_ 425
TAILPIECE, "PATHOS" (From two Plaques of the "Old Man"
and "Little Nell" in Wedgwood Ware) Engraved by _R. Langton_ xx
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
A WEEK'S TRAMP
IN
DICKENS-LAND.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTORY.
"So wishing you well in the way you go, we now
conclude with the observation, that perhaps you'll
go it."--_Our Mutual Friend._
AMONG the many interesting books that have been published relating to
Charles Dickens since his death, more than twenty years ago (it seems
but yesterday to some of his admirers), there are at least half a dozen
that describe the "country" peopled by the deathless characters created
by his genius.
Probably the pioneer in this class of literature was that comprehensive
work, _Dickens's London, or London in the Works of Charles Dickens_, by
my friend, that thorough Dickensian, Mr. T. Edgar Pemberton, 1876; this
was followed by a very readable volume, _In Kent with Charles Dickens_,
by Thomas Frost, 1880; then came a dainty tome from Boston, U.S.A.,
entitled, _A Pickwickian Pilgrimage_, by John R. G. Hassard, 1881.
Afterwards appeared _The Childhood and Youth of Charles Dickens_, by
Robert Langton, 1883, beautifully illustrated by the late William Hull
of Manchester, the author, and others--a work developed from the
_brochure_ by the same author, _Charles Dickens and Rochester_, 1880,
which has passed through five editions. Next to Forster's _Life of
Dickens_, Mr. Robert Langton's larger work undoubtedly ranks--especially
from the richness of the illustrations--as a very valuable original
contribution to the biography of the great novelist. Another handsome
volume, containing the illustrations to a series of papers in
_Scribner's Monthly_--written by B. E. Martin--entitled _About England
with Dickens_, came from the pen of Mr. Alfred Rimmer, 1883, and
included additional illustrations drawn by the author, C. A. Vanderhoof,
and others. Yet another little _brochure_ recently appeared, called
_London Rambles en zigzag with Charles Dickens_, by Robert Allbut, 1886.
Lastly, there was published in the Christmas Number of _Scribner's
Magazine_, 1887, an article, "In Dickens-Land," by Edward Percy Whipple,
in which this veteran and appreciative critic of the eminent English
writer's works points out that, "In addition to the practical life that
men and women lead, constantly vexed as it is by obstructive facts,
there is an interior life which they _imagine_, in which facts smoothly
give way to sentiments, ideas, and aspirations. Dickens has, in short,
discovered and colonized one of the waste districts of 'Imagination,'
which we may call 'Dickens-Land,' or 'Dickens-Ville,' . . . better known
than such geographical countries as Canada and Australia, . . . and
confirming us in the belief of the _reality_ of a population which has
no _actual_ existence."
It must not be assumed that the above list exhausts the literature on
the subject of "Dickens-Land," many references to which are made in such
high-class works as Augustus J. C. Hare's _Walks in London_, and
Lawrence Hutton's _Literary Landmarks of London_.
Since the above was written, a very interesting and prettily illustrated
article has appeared in the _English Illustrated Magazine_ for October,
1888, entitled "Charles Dickens and Southwark," by Mr. J. Ashby-Sterry,
who is second to none as an enthusiastic admirer and loyal student of
Dickens. There is also a paper in _Longman's Magazine_ for the same
month, by the delightful essayist A. K. H. B., called "That Longest
Day," in which there are several allusions to Dickens and
"Dickens-Land." It, however, lacks the freshness of his earlier
writings. Surely he must have lost his old love for Dickens, or things
must have gone wrong at the Ecclesiastical Conference which took place
at Gravesend on "That Longest Day." Altogether it is pitched in a minor
key.
None of these contributions (with the exception of Mr. Langton's book),
interesting as they are, and indispensable to the collector, attempt in
any way to give personal reminiscences of Charles Dickens from friends
or others, nor do they in any way help to throw light on his everyday
life at home, beyond what was known before.
The circumstances narrated in this work do not concern the imaginary
"Dickens-Land" of Mr. Whipple, but refer to the actual country in which
the imaginary characters played their parts, and to that still more
interesting actual country in which Dickens lived long and loved
most--the county of Kent.
On Friday, 24th August, 1888, two friends met in London--one of them,
the writer of these lines, a Dickens collector of some years'
experience; the other, Mr. F. G. Kitton, author of that sumptuous work,
_Charles Dickens by Pen and Pencil_; both ardent admirers of "the
inimitable 'Boz,'" and lovers of nature and art.
We were a sort of self-constituted roving commission, to carry into
effect a long-projected intention to make a week's tramp in
"Dickens-Land," for purposes of health and recreation; to visit Gad's
Hill, Rochester, Chatham, and neighbouring classical ground; to go over
and verify some of the most important localities rendered famous in the
novels; to identify, if possible, doubtful spots; and to glean, under
whatever circumstances naturally developed in the progress of our tramp,
additions in any form to the many interesting memorials already
published, and still ever growing, relating to the renowned novelist.
The idea of recording our reminiscences was not a primary consideration.
It grew out of our experiences, generating a desire for others to become
acquainted with the results of our enjoyable peregrinations; and the
labour therein involved has been somewhat of the kind described by Lewis
Morris:--
"For this of old is sure,
That change of toil is toil's sufficient cure."
We mixed with representatives of the classes of domestics, labourers,
artizans, traders, professional men, and scientists. Many of those whom
we met were advanced in years,--several were octogenarians,--and there
is no doubt that we have been the means of placing on record here and
there an interesting item from the past generation (mostly told in the
exact words of the narrators) that might otherwise have perished. This
is a special feature of this work, which makes it different from all
the preceding. In every instance we were received with very great
kindness, courtesy, and attention. The replies to our questions were
frank and generous, and in several cases permission was accorded us to
make copies of original documents not hitherto made public.
Considering that almost every inch of ground connected with Dickens has
been so thoroughly explored, we were, on the whole, quite satisfied with
our excursion: "the results were equal to the appliances."
By a coincidence, the month which we selected (August) was Dickens's
favourite month, if we may judge from the opening sentences of the
sixteenth chapter of _Pickwick_:--
"There is no month in the whole year, in which
nature wears a more beautiful appearance than in
the month of August. Spring has many beauties, and
May is a fresh and blooming month, but the charms
of this time of year are enhanced by their
contrast with the winter season. August has no
such advantage. It comes when we remember nothing
but clear skies, green fields, and sweet-smelling
flowers--when the recollection of snow, and ice,
and bleak winds, has faded from our minds as
completely as they have disappeared from the
earth,--and yet what a pleasant time it is.
Orchards and cornfields ring with the hum of
labour; trees bend beneath the thick clusters of
rich fruit which bow their branches to the ground;
and the corn, piled in graceful sheaves, or waving
in every light breath that sweeps above it, as if
it wooed the sickle, tinges the landscape with a
golden hue. A mellow softness appears to hang over
the whole earth; the influence of the season seems
to extend itself to the very wagon, whose slow
motion across the well-reaped field, is
perceptible only to the eye, but strikes with no
harsh sound upon the ear."
By another coincidence, the day which we selected to commence our tramp
was Friday--the day upon which most of the important incidents of
Dickens's life happened, as appears from frequent references in
Forster's _Life_ to the subject.
Provided with a selection of books inseparably connected with the
subject of our tour, including, of course, copies of _Pickwick_, _Great
Expectations_, _Edwin Drood_, _The Uncommercial Traveller_, Bevan's
_Tourist's Guide to Kent_, one or two local Handbooks, one of Bacon's
useful cycling maps, with a sketch map of the geology of the district
(which greatly helped us to understand many of its picturesque effects,
and was kindly furnished by Professor Lapworth, LL.D., F.R.S., of the
Mason College, Birmingham), and with a pocket aneroid barometer, which
every traveller should possess himself with if he wishes to make
convenient arrangements as regards weather, we make a preliminary tramp
in London.
CHAPTER II.
A PRELIMINARY TRAMP IN LONDON.
"We Britons had at that time particularly settled
that it was treasonable to doubt our having and
our being the best of everything: otherwise, while
I was scared by the immensity of London, I think I
might have had some faint doubts whether it was
not rather ugly, crooked, narrow, and
dirty."--_Great Expectations._
SOME sixty or seventy years must have elapsed since Dickens (through the
mouthpiece of Pip, as above) recorded his first impressions of London;
and although he lived in it many years, and in after life he loved to
study its people in every stratum of society and every phase of their
existence, it seems doubtful, apart from these studies, whether he ever
really liked London itself, for in the _Uncommercial Traveller_, on "The
Boiled Beef of New England," in describing London as it existed
subsequently, he contrasts it unfavourably in some respects, not only
with such continental cities as Paris, Bordeaux, Frankfort, Milan,
Geneva, and Rome, but also with such British cities as Edinburgh,
Aberdeen, Exeter, and Liverpool, with such American cities as New York,
Boston, and Philadelphia, and with "a bright little town like Bury St.
Edmunds." Nevertheless, it is indubitable that his writings, beyond
those of any other author, have done wonders to popularize our
knowledge of London,--more particularly the London of the latter half of
the last and the first half of the present century,--and that those
writings have given it a hold on our affections which it might not
otherwise have acquired. In almost all his works we are introduced to a
fresh spot in the Metropolis, perhaps previously known to us, but to
which the fidelity of his descriptions and the reality of the characters
peopling it, certainly give a historical value never before understood
or appreciated. In _The Life of Charles Dickens_, written by his devoted
friend, John Forster, may be found a corroboration of this view:--
"There seemed," says this biographer, "to be not much to add to our
knowledge of London until his books came upon us, but each in this
respect outstripped the other in its marvels. In _Nickleby_, the old
city reappears under every aspect; and whether warmth and light are
playing over what is good and cheerful in it, or the veil is uplifted
from its darker scenes, it is at all times our privilege to see and feel
it as it absolutely is. Its interior hidden life becomes familiar as its
commonest outward forms, and we discover that we hardly knew anything of
the places we supposed that we knew the best."
What Scott did for Edinburgh and the Trossachs, Dickens did for London
and the county of Kent. His fascination for the London streets has been
dwelt on by many an author. Mr. Frank T. Marzials says in his
interesting _Life of Charles Dickens_:--
"London remained the walking-ground of his heart. As he liked best to
walk in London, so he liked best to walk at night. The darkness of the
great city had a strange fascination for him. He never grew tired of
it."
Mr. Sala records that he had been encountered "in the oddest places and
in the most inclement weather: in Ratcliff Highway, on Haverstock Hill,
on Camberwell Green, in Gray's Inn Lane, in the Wandsworth Road, at
Hammersmith Broadway, in Norton Folgate, and at Kensal New Town. A
hansom whirled you by the 'Bell and Horns' at Brompton, and there was
Charles Dickens striding as with seven-leagued boots, seemingly in the
direction of North End, Fulham. The Metropolitan Railway disgorged you
at Lisson Grove, and you met Charles Dickens plodding sturdily towards
the 'Yorkshire Stingo.' He was to be met rapidly skirting the grim brick
wall of the prison in Coldbath Fields, or trudging along the Seven
Sisters' Road at Holloway, or bearing under a steady press of sail
through Highgate Archway, or pursuing the even tenor of his way up the
Vauxhall Bridge Road."
That his feelings were intensely sympathetic with all classes of
humanity there is amply evidenced in the following lines, written so far
back as 1841, which Master Humphrey, "from his clock side in the chimney
corner," speaks in the last page before the opening of _Barnaby
Rudge_:--
"Heart of London, there is a moral in thy every
stroke! as I look on at thy indomitable working,
which neither death, nor press of life, nor grief,
nor gladness out of doors will influence one jot,
I seem to hear a voice within thee which sinks
into my heart, bidding me, as I elbow my way among
the crowd, have some thought for the meanest
wretch that passes, and, being a man, to turn away
with scorn and pride from none that bear the human
shape."
On a sultry day, such as this of Friday, the 24th August, 1888, with the
thermometer at nearly 80 degrees in the shade, one needs some enthusiasm
to undertake a tramp for a few hours over the hot and dusty streets of
London, that we may glance at a few of the memorable spots that we have
visited over and over again before. This preliminary tramp is therefore
necessarily limited to visiting the houses where Dickens lived, from the
year 1836 until he finally left it in 1860, on disposing of Tavistock
House, and took up his residence at Gad's Hill Place. In our way we
shall take a few of the places rendered famous in the novels, but it
would require a "knowledge of London" as "extensive and peculiar" as
that of Mr. Weller, and would occupy a week at least, to exhaust the
interest of all these associations.
[Illustration: The Golden Cross.]
Our temporary quarters are at our favourite "Morley's," in Trafalgar
Square, one of those old-fashioned, comfortable hotels of the last
generation, where the guest is still known as "Mr. H.," and not as
"Number 497." And what is very relevant to our present purpose, Morley's
revives associations of the hotels, or "Inns," as they were more
generally called in Charles Dickens's early days. Strolling from
Morley's eastward along the Strand, to which busy thoroughfare there are
numerous references in the works of Dickens, we pass on our left the
Golden Cross Hotel, a great coaching-house half a century ago, from
whence the Pickwickians and Mr. Jingle started, on the 13th of May,
1827, by the "Commodore" coach for Rochester. "The low archway," against
which Mr. Jingle thus prudently cautioned the passengers,--"Heads!
Heads! Take care of your heads!" with the addition of a very tragic
reference to the head of a family, was removed in 1851, and the hotel
has the same appearance now that it presented after that alteration. The
house was a favourite with David Copperfield, who stayed there with his
friend Steerforth on his arrival "outside the Canterbury coach;" and it
was in one of the public rooms here, approached by "a side entrance to
the stable-yard," that the affecting interview took place with his
humble friend Mr. Peggotty, as touchingly recorded in the fortieth
chapter of _David Copperfield_. The two famous "pudding shops" in the
Strand, so minutely described in connection with David's early days,
have of course long been removed:--
"One was in a court close to St. Martin's
Church--at the back of the Church,--which is now
removed altogether. The pudding at that shop was
made of currants, and was rather a special
pudding, but was dear, two pennyworth not being
larger than a pennyworth of more ordinary pudding.
A good shop for the latter was in the
Strand,--somewhere in that part which has been
rebuilt since. It was a stout pale pudding, heavy
and flabby, and with great flat raisins in it,
stuck in whole at wide distances apart. It came up
hot at about my time every day, and many a day did
I dine off it."
[Illustration: Young Dickens at the Blacking Warehouse.]
Nearly opposite the Golden Cross Hotel is Craven Street, where (says Mr.
Allbut), at No. 39, Mr. Brownlow in _Oliver Twist_ resided after
removing from Pentonville, and where the villain Monks was confronted,
and made a full confession of his guilt.
"Ruminating on the strange mutability of human affairs," after the
manner of Mr. Pickwick, we call to mind, on the same side of the way,
Hungerford Stairs, Market, and Bridge, all well remembered in the days
of our youth, but now swept away to make room for the commodious railway
terminus at Charing Cross. Here poor David Copperfield "served as a
labouring hind," and acquired his grim experience with poverty in
Murdstone and Grinby's (_alias_ Lamert's) Blacking Warehouse. Hungerford
Suspension Bridge many years ago was removed to Clifton, and we never
pass by it on the Great Western line without recalling recollections of
poor David's sorrows.
Next in order comes Buckingham Street, at the end house of which, on the
east side (No. 15), lived Mrs. Crupp, who let apartments to David
Copperfield in happier days. Here he had his "first dissipation," and
entertained Steerforth and his two friends, Mrs. Crupp imposing on him
frightfully as regards the dinner; "the handy young man" and the "young
gal" being equally troublesome as regards the waiting. The description
of "my set of chambers" in _David Copperfield_ seems to point to the
possibility of Dickens having resided here, but there is no evidence to
prove it. At Osborn's Hotel, now the Adelphi, in John Street, Mr. Wardle
and his daughter Emily stayed on their visit to London, after Mr.
Pickwick was released from the Fleet Prison.
Durham Street, a little further to the right, leads to the "dark
arches," which had attractions for David Copperfield, who "was fond of
wandering about the Adelphi, because it was a mysterious place with
those dark arches." He says:--"I see myself emerging one evening from
out of these arches, on a little public-house, close to the river, with
a space before it, where some coal-heavers were dancing." Nearly
opposite is the Adelphi Theatre, notable as having been the stage
whereon most of the dramas founded on Dickens's works were first
produced, from _Nicholas Nickleby_ in 1838, in which Mrs. Keeley, John
Webster, and O. Smith took part, down to 1867, when _No Thoroughfare_
was performed, "the only story," says Mr. Forster, "Dickens himself ever
helped to dramatize," and which was rendered with such fine effect by
Fechter, Benjamin Webster, Mrs. Alfred Mellon, and other important
actors. He certainly assisted in Madame Celeste's production of _A Tale
of Two Cities_, even if he had no actual part in the writing of the
piece.
Mr. Allbut thinks that the residence of Miss La Creevy, the good-natured
miniature painter (whose prototype was Miss Barrow, Dickens's aunt on
his mother's side) in _Nicholas Nickleby_, was probably at No. 111,
Strand. It was "a private door about half-way down that crowded
thoroughfare."
We proceed onwards, passing Wellington Street North, where at No. 16,
the office of the famous _Household Words_ formerly stood; _All the Year
Round_, its successor, conducted by Mr. Charles Dickens, the novelist's
eldest son, now being at No. 26 in the same street.
A little further on, on the same side of the way, and almost facing
Somerset House, at No. 332, was the office of the once celebrated
_Morning Chronicle_, on the staff of which Dickens in early life worked
as a reporter. The _Chronicle_ was a great power in its day, when Mr.
John Black ("Dear old Black!" Dickens calls him, "my first hearty
out-and-out appreciator, . . . with never-forgotten compliments . . .
coming in the broadest of Scotch from the broadest of hearts I ever
knew,") was editor, and Mr. J. Campbell, afterwards Lord Chief-Justice
Campbell, its chief literary critic. The _Chronicle_ died in 1862.
The west corner of Arundel Street (No. 186, Strand, where now stand the
extensive premises of Messrs. W. H. Smith and Son) was formerly the
office of Messrs. Chapman and Hall, the publishers of almost all the
original works of Charles Dickens. After 1850 the firm removed to 193,
Piccadilly, their present house being at 11, Henrietta Street, Covent
Garden. They own the copyright, and publish all Dickens's works; and
they estimate that two million copies of _Pickwick_[1] have been sold in
England alone, exclusive of the almost innumerable popular editions,
from one penny upwards, published by other firms, the copyright of this
work having expired. The penny edition was sold by hundreds of thousands
in the streets of London some years ago.
This statement will probably be surprising to the remarkable class of
readers thus described by that staunch admirer of Dickens, Mr. Andrew
Lang, in "Phiz," one of his charming _Lost Leaders_. He says:--
"It is a singular and gloomy feature in the character of young ladies
and gentlemen of a particular type, that they have ceased to care for
Dickens, as they have ceased to care for Scott. They say they cannot
read Dickens. When Mr. Pickwick's adventures are presented to the modern
maid, she behaves like the Cambridge freshman. 'Euclide viso, cohorruit
et evasit.' When he was shown Euclid he evinced dismay, and sneaked off.
Even so do most young people act when they are expected to read
_Nicholas Nickleby_ and _Martin Chuzzlewit_. They call these
master-pieces 'too gutterly gutter'; they cannot sympathize with this
honest humour and conscious pathos. Consequently the innumerable
references to Sam Weller, and Mrs. Gamp, and Mr. Pecksniff, and Mr.
Winkle, which fill our ephemeral literature, are written for these
persons in an unknown tongue. The number of people who could take a good
pass in Mr. Calverley's _Pickwick_ Examination Paper is said to be
diminishing. Pathetic questions are sometimes put. Are we not too much
cultivated? Can this fastidiousness be anything but a casual passing
phase of taste? Are all people over thirty who cling to their Dickens
and their Scott old fogies? Are we wrong in preferring them to _Bootles'
Baby_, and _The Quick or the Dead_, and the novels of M. Paul Bourget?"
[Illustration: Fountain Court, Temple.]
But this by the way. Turning down Essex Street, we visit the Temple,
celebrated in several of Dickens's novels--_Barnaby Rudge_, _A Tale of
Two Cities_, _Great Expectations_, and _Our Mutual Friend_,--but in none
more graphically than in _Martin Chuzzlewit_, in which is described the
fountain in Fountain Court, where Ruth Pinch goes to meet her lover,
"coming briskly up, with the best little laugh upon her face that ever
played in opposition to the fountain; and beat it all to nothing." And
when John Westlock came at last, "merrily the fountain leaped and
danced, and merrily the smiling dimples twinkled and expanded more and
more, until they broke into a laugh against the basin's rim, and
vanished." As we saw the fountain on the bright August morning of our
tramp, the few shrubs, flowers, and ferns planted round it gave it quite
a rural effect, and we wished long life to the solitary specimen of
eucalyptus, whose glaucous-green leaves and tender shoots seemed
ill-fitted to bear the nipping frosts of our variable climate.
Coming out of the Temple by Middle Temple Lane, we pass on our left
Child's Bank, the "Tellson's Bank" of _A Tale of Two Cities_, "which was
an old-fashioned place even in the year 1780," but was replaced in 1878
by the handsome building suitable to its imposing neighbours, the Law
Courts. Temple Bar, which adjoined the Old Bank, and was one of the
relics of Dickens's London, has passed away, having since been
re-erected on "Theobalds," near Waltham Cross.
"A walk down Fleet Street"--one of Dr. Johnson's enjoyments--leads us to
Whitefriars Street, on the east side of which, at No. 67, is the office
of _The Daily News_, edited by Dickens from 21 Jany. to 9 Feby., 1846,
and for which he wrote the original prospectus, and subsequently, in a
series of letters descriptive of his Italian travel, his delightful
_Pictures from Italy_. St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street is supposed
to have been that immortalized in _The Chimes_.
It was in this street many years before (in the year 1833, when he was
only twenty-one), as recorded in Forster's _Life_, that Dickens
describes himself as dropping his first literary sketch, _Mrs. Joseph
Porter over the Way_, "stealthily one evening at twilight, with fear and
trembling, into a dark letter-box in a dark office up a dark court in
Fleet Street; and he has told his agitation when it appeared in all the
glory of print:--'On which occasion I walked down to Westminster Hall,
and turned into it for half an hour, because my eyes were so dimmed with
joy and pride, that they could not bear the street, and were not fit to
be seen there.'" The "dark court" referred to was no doubt Johnson's
Court, as the printers of the _Monthly Magazine_, Messrs. Baylis and
Leighton, had their offices here. This contribution appeared in the
January number 1834 of this magazine, published by Messrs. Cochrane and
Macrone of 11 Waterloo Place.
Turning up Chancery Lane, also celebrated in many of Charles Dickens's
novels, we leave on our left Bell Yard, where lodged the ruined suitor
in Chancery, poor Gridley, "the man from Shropshire" in _Bleak House_,
but the yard has, through part of it being required for the New Law
Courts and other modern improvements, almost lost its identity.
On our right is Old Serjeant's Inn, which leads into Clifford's Inn,
where the conference took place between John Rokesmith and Mr. Boffin,
when the former, to the latter's amazement, said:--"If you would try me
as your Secretary." The place is thus referred to in the eighth chapter
of _Our Mutual Friend_:--
"Not very well knowing how to get rid of this
applicant, and feeling the more embarrassed
because his manner and appearance claimed a
delicacy in which the worthy Mr. Boffin feared he
himself might be deficient, that gentleman glanced
into the mouldy little plantation or cat preserve,
of Clifford's Inn, as it was that day, in search
of a suggestion. Sparrows were there, dry-rot and
wet-rot were there, but it was not otherwise a
suggestive spot."
Symond's Inn, described as "a little, pale, wall-eyed, woebegone inn,
like a large dust-bin of two compartments and a sifter,"--where Mr.
Vholes had his chambers, and where Ada Clare came to live after her
marriage, there tending lovingly the blighted life of the suitor in
Jarndyce and Jarndyce, poor Richard Carstone,--exists no more. It
formerly stood on the site of Nos. 25, 26, and 27, now handsome suites
of offices.
Lincoln's Inn, a little higher up on the opposite side of the way,
claims our attention, in the Hall of which was formerly the Lord High
Chancellor's Court, wherein the wire-drawn Chancery suit of Jarndyce and
Jarndyce in _Bleak House_ dragged its course wearily along. The offices
of Messrs. Kenge and Carboy, of Old Square, Solicitors in the famous
suit, were visited by Esther Summerson, who says:--"We passed into
sudden quietude, under an old gallery, and drove on through a silent
square, until we came to an old nook in a corner, where there was an
entrance up a steep broad flight of stairs like an entrance to a
church." Mr. Serjeant Snubbin, Mr. Pickwick's counsel in the notorious
cause of Bardell _v._ Pickwick, also had his chambers in this square. We
then enter Lincoln's Inn Fields, and pay a visit to No. 58, on the
furthest or west side near Portsmouth Street. This ancient mansion was
the residence of Dickens's friend and biographer, John Forster, before
he went to live at Palace Gate. It is minutely described in the tenth
chapter of _Bleak House_ as the residence of Mr. Tulkinghorn, "a large
house, formerly a house of state, . . . let off in sets of chambers now;
and in those shrunken fragments of its greatness lawyers lie like
maggots in nuts." The "foreshortened allegory in the person of one
impossible Roman upside down," who afterwards points to the "new
meaning" (_i. e._ the murder of Mr. Tulkinghorn) has, it is to be
regretted, since been whitewashed. On the 30th November, 1844, here
Dickens read _The Chimes_ to a few intimate friends, an event
immortalized by Maclise's pencil, and, as appreciative of the feelings
of the audience, Forster alludes "to the grave attention of Carlyle, the
eager interest of Stanfield and Maclise, the keen look of poor Laman
Blanchard, Fox's rapt solemnity, Jerrold's skyward gaze, and the tears
of Harness and Dyce."
That celebrated tavern called the "Magpie and Stump," referred to in the
twenty-first chapter of _Pickwick_,--where that hero spent an
interesting evening on the invitation of Lowten (Mr. Perker's clerk),
and heard "the old man's tale about the queer client,"--is supposed to
have been "The old George the IVth" in Clare Market, close by. Retracing
our steps through Bishop's Court (where lived Krook the marine-store
dealer, and in whose house lodged poor Miss Flite and Captain Hawdon,
_alias_ Nemo) into Chancery Lane, we arrive at the point from whence we
diverged, and turn into Cursitor Street. Like other places adjacent,
this street has been subjected to "improvements," and it is scarcely
possible to trace "Coavinses," so well known to Mr. Harold Skimpole, or
indeed the place of business and residence of Mr. Snagsby, the
good-natured law stationer, and his jealous "little woman." It will be
remembered that it was here the Reverend Mr. Chadband more than once
"improved a tough subject":--"toe your advantage, toe your profit, toe
your gain, toe your welfare, toe your enrichment,"--and refreshed his
own. Thackeray was partial to this neighbourhood, and Rawdon Crawley had
some painful experiences in Cursitor Street.
[Illustration: Staple Inn, Holborn.]
Bearing round by Southampton Buildings, we reach Staple Inn,--behind the
most ancient part of Holborn,--originally a hostelry of the merchants of
the Wool-staple, who were removed to Westminster by Richard II. in 1378.
At No. 10 in the first court, opposite the pleasant little garden and
picturesque hall, resided the "angular" but kindly Mr. Grewgious,
attended by his "gloomy" clerk, Mr. Bazzard, and on the front of the
house over the door still remains the tablet with the mysterious
initials:--
P.
J. T.
1747.
but our enquiries fail to discover their meaning. Dickens humorously
suggests "Perhaps John Thomas," "Perhaps Joe Tyler," and under hilarious
circumstances, "Pretty Jolly too," and "Possibly jabbered thus!" They
are understood to be the initials of the treasurer of the Inn at the
date above-mentioned. It is interesting to state that the Inn has been
most appropriately restored by the enterprising Prudential Assurance
Company, who have recently purchased it; and on the seat in the centre
of the second Court (facing Holborn), under the plane trees which adorn
it, were resting a few wayfarers, who seemed to enjoy this thoughtful
provision made by the present owners. We can picture in one of the
rooms on the first floor of P. J. T.'s house (very memorable to the
writer of these lines, some brief part of his early life having been
passed there), the conference described in the twentieth chapter of
_Edwin Drood_, between Mr. Grewgious and his charming ward,--so aptly
pourtrayed by Mr. Luke Fildes in his beautiful drawing, "Mr. Grewgious
experiences a new sensation,"--as well as all the other scenes which
took place here.
[Illustration: Barnard's Inn]
Turning into Holborn through the Archway of Staple Inn, and stopping for
a minute to admire the fine effect of the recently restored
fourteenth-century old-timbered houses of the Inn which face that
thoroughfare, a few steps lower down take us to Barnard's Inn, where Pip
in _Great Expectations_ lodged with his friend Herbert Pocket when he
came to London. Dickens calls it, "the dingiest collection of shabby
buildings ever squeezed together in a rank corner as a club for
tom-cats." Simple-minded Joe Gargery, who visited Pip here, persisted
for a time in calling it an "hotel," and after his visit thus recorded
his impressions of the place:--
"The present may be a werry good inn, and I
believe its character do stand i; but I wouldn't
keep a pig in it myself--not in the case that I
wished him to fatten wholesome and to eat with a
meller flavour on him."
A few plane trees--the glory of all squares and open spaces in London,
where they thrive so luxuriantly--give a rural appearance to this
crowded place, while the sparrows tenanting them enjoy the sunbeams
passing through the scanty branches.
Our next halting-place, Furnival's Inn, is one of profound interest to
all pious pilgrims in "Dickens-Land," for there the genius of the young
author was first recognized, not only by the novel-reading world, but
also by his contemporaries in literature. Thackeray generously spoke of
him as "the young man who came and took his place calmly at the head of
the whole tribe, and who has kept it."
[Illustration: Dickens House by Furnival's Inn]
Furnival's Inn in Holborn, which stands midway between Barnard's Inn and
Staple Inn on the opposite side of the way, is famous as having been the
residence of Charles Dickens in his bachelor days, when a reporter for
the _Morning Chronicle_. He removed here from his father's lodgings at
No. 18, Bentinck Street, and had chambers, first the "three pair back"
(rather gloomy rooms) of No. 13 from Christmas 1834 until Christmas
1835, when he removed to the "three pair floor south" (bright little
rooms) of No. 15, the house on the right-hand side of the square having
Ionic ornamentations, which he occupied from 1835 until his removal to
No. 48, Doughty Street, in March 1837. The brass-bound iron rail still
remains, and the sixty stone steps which lead from the ground-floor to
the top of each house are no doubt the same over which the eager feet
of the youthful "Boz" often trod. He was married from Furnival's Inn on
2nd April, 1836, to Catherine, eldest daughter of Mr. George Hogarth,
his old colleague on the _Morning Chronicle_, the wedding taking place
at St. Luke's Church, Chelsea, and doubtless lived here in his early
matrimonial days much in the same way probably as Tommy Traddles did, as
described in _David Copperfield_. Here the _Sketches by Boz_ were
written, and most of the numbers of the immortal _Pickwick Papers_, as
also the lesser works: _Sunday under Three Heads_, _The Strange
Gentleman_, and _The Village Coquettes_. The quietude of this retired
spot in the midst of a busy thoroughfare, and its accessibility to the
_Chronicle_ offices in the Strand, must have been very attractive to the
young author. His eldest son, the present Mr. Charles Dickens, was born
here on the 6th January, 1837.
It was in Furnival's Inn, probably in the year 1836, that Thackeray paid
a visit to Dickens, and thus described the meeting:--
"I can remember, when Mr. Dickens was a very young man, and had
commenced delighting the world with some charming humorous works in
covers which were coloured light green and came out once a month, that
this young man wanted an artist to illustrate his writings; and I
remember walking up to his chambers in Furnival's Inn, with two or three
drawings in my hand, which, strange to say, he did not find suitable."
How wonderfully interesting these "two or three drawings" would be now
if they could be discovered! Of the score or so of "Extra Illustrations"
to _Pickwick_ which have appeared, surely these (if they were such)
which Dickens "did not find suitable," combining as they did the genius
of Dickens and Thackeray, whatever their merits or defects may have
been, would be most highly prized.
John Westlock, in _Martin Chuzzlewit_, had apartments in Furnival's Inn,
and was there visited by Tom Pinch. Wood's Hotel occupies a large
portion of the square, and is mentioned in _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_
as having been the Inn where Mr. Grewgious took rooms for his charming
ward Rosa Bud, from whence he ordered for her refreshment, soon after
her arrival at Staple Inn to escape Jasper's importunities, "a nice
jumble of all meals," to which it is to be feared she did not do
justice, and where "at the hotel door he afterwards confided her to the
Unlimited head chamber-maid."
The Society of Arts have considerately put up on the house No. 15 one of
their neat terra-cotta memorial tablets with the following
inscription:--
CHARLES
DICKENS,
=Novelist=,
Lived here.
B. 1812,
D. 1870.
We proceed along Holborn, and go up Kingsgate Street, where "Poll
Sweedlepipe, Barber and Bird Fancier," lived, "next door but one to the
celebrated mutton-pie shop, and directly opposite the original
cats'-meat warehouse." The immortal Sairey Gamp lodged on the first
floor, where doubtless she helped herself from the "chimley-piece"
whenever she felt "dispoged." Here also the quarrel took place between
that old lady and her friend Betsey Prig anent that mythical personage,
"Mrs. Harris." We pass through Red Lion Square and up Bedford Row, and
after proceeding along Theobald's Road for a short distance, turn up
John Street, which leads into Doughty Street, where, at No. 48, Charles
Dickens lived from 1837 to 1839. The house, situated on the east side of
the street, has twelve rooms, is single-fronted, three-storied, and not
unlike No. 2, Ordnance Terrace, Chatham. A tiny little room on the
ground-floor, with a bolt inside in addition to the usual fastening, is
pointed out as having been the novelist's study. It has an outlook into
a garden, but of late years this has been much reduced in size. A bill
in the front window announces "Apartments to let," and they look very
comfortable. Doughty Street, now a somewhat noisy thoroughfare, must
have been in Charles Dickens's time a quiet, retired spot. A large pair
of iron gates reach across the street, guarded by a gate-keeper in
livery. "It was," says Mr. Marzials in his _Life of Dickens_, "while
living at Doughty Street that he seems, in great measure, to have formed
those habits of work and relaxation which every artist fashions so as to
suit his own special needs and idiosyncrasies. His favourite time for
work was the morning between the hours of breakfast and lunch; . . . he
was essentially a day worker and not a night worker. . . . And for
relaxation and sedative when he had thoroughly worn himself with mental
toil, he would have recourse to the hardest bodily exercise. . . . At
first riding seems to have contented him, . . . but soon walking took
the place of riding, and he became an indefatigable pedestrian. He would
think nothing of a walk of twenty or thirty miles, and that not merely
in the vigorous hey-day of youth, but afterwards to the very last. . . ."
[Illustration: No. 48, Doughty Street, Mecklenburgh Square.
_Dickens's Residence_ 1837-9.]
It was at Doughty Street that he experienced a bereavement which
darkened his life for many years, and to which Forster thus alludes:--
"His wife's next younger sister Mary, who lived with them, and by
sweetness of nature even more than by graces of person had made herself
the ideal of his life, died with a terrible suddenness that for a time
completely bore him down. His grief and suffering were intense, and
affected him . . . through many after years." _Pickwick_ was temporarily
suspended, and he sought change of scene at Hampstead. Forster visited
him there, and to him he opened his heart. He says:--"I left him as much
his friend, and as entirely in his confidence, as if I had known him for
years."
[Illustration: Tavistock House, Tavistock Square.
_Dickens's Residence_ 1851-60.]
Some time afterwards, we find him inviting Forster "to join him at 11
A.M. in a fifteen-mile ride out and ditto in, lunch on the road, with a
six o'clock dinner in Doughty Street."
Charles Dickens's residence in Doughty Street was but of short
duration--from 1837 to 1840 only; but there he completed _Pickwick_, and
wrote _Oliver Twist_, _Memoirs of Grimaldi_, _Sketches of Young
Gentlemen_, _Sketches of Young Couples_, and _The Life and Adventures of
Nicholas Nickleby_. His eldest daughter Mary was born here.
In proper sequence we ought to proceed to Dickens's third London
residence, No. 1, Devonshire Terrace, but it will be more convenient to
take his fourth residence on our way. We therefore retrace our steps
into Theobald's Road, pass through Red Lion and Bloomsbury Squares, and
along Great Russell Street as far as the British Museum, where Dickens
is still remembered as "a reader" (merely remarking that it of course
contains a splendid collection of the original impressions of the
novelist's works, and "Dickensiana," as is evidenced by the
comprehensive Bibliography furnished by Mr. John P. Anderson, one of the
librarians, to Mr. Marzials' _Life of Dickens_), which we leave on our
left, and turn up Montague Street, go along Upper Montague Street,
Woburn Square, Gordon Square, and reach Tavistock Square, at the upper
end of which, on the east side, Gordon Place leads us into a retired
spot cut off as it were from communication with the rest of this quiet
neighbourhood. Three houses adjoin each other--handsome commodious
houses, having stone porticos at entrance--and in the first of these,
Tavistock House, Dickens lived from 1851 until 1860, with intervals at
Gad's Hill Place. This beautiful house, which has eighteen rooms in it,
is now the Jews' College. The drawing-room on the first floor still
contains a dais at one end, and it is said that at a recent public
meeting held here, three hundred and fifty people were accommodated in
it, which serves to show what ample quarters Dickens had to entertain
his friends.
Hans Christian Andersen, who visited Dickens here in 1857, thus
describes this fine mansion:--
"In Tavistock Square stands Tavistock House. This and the strip of
garden in front are shut out from the thoroughfare by an iron railing. A
large garden with a grass-plat and high trees stretches behind the
house, and gives it a countrified look, in the midst of this coal and
gas steaming London. In the passage from street to garden hung pictures
and engravings. Here stood a marble bust of Dickens, so like him, so
youthful and handsome; and over a bedroom door were inserted the
bas-reliefs of Night and Day, after Thorwaldsen. On the first floor was
a rich library, with a fireplace and a writing-table, looking out on the
garden; and here it was that in winter Dickens and his friends acted
plays to the satisfaction of all parties. The kitchen was underground,
and at the top of the house were the bedrooms."
It appears that Andersen was wrong about the plays being acted in the
"rich library," as I am informed by Mr. Charles Dickens that "the stage
was in the school-room at the back of the ground-floor, with a platform
built outside the window for scenic purposes."
With reference to the private theatricals (or "plays," as Andersen calls
them, including _The Frozen Deep_, by Wilkie Collins, in which Dickens,
the author, Mark Lemon, and others performed, and for which in the
matter of the scenery "the priceless help of Stanfield had again been
secured"), on a temporary difficulty arising as to the arrangements,
Dickens applied to Mr. Cooke of Astley's, "who drove up in an open
phaeton drawn by two white ponies with black spots all over them
(evidently stencilled), who came in at the gate with a little jolt and a
rattle exactly as they come into the ring when they draw anything, and
went round and round the centre bed (lilacs and evergreens) of the front
court, apparently looking for the clown. A multitude of boys, who felt
them to be no common ponies, rushed up in a breathless state--twined
themselves like ivy about the railings, and were only deterred from
storming the enclosure by the Inimitable's eye." Mr. Cooke was not,
however, able to render any assistance.
Mrs. Arthur Ryland of The Linthurst, near Bromsgrove, Worcestershire,
who was present at Tavistock House on the occasion of the performance of
_The Frozen Deep_, informs me that when Dickens returned to the
drawing-room after the play was over, the constrained expression of face
which he had assumed in presenting the character of Richard Wardour
remained for some time afterwards, so strongly did he seem to realize
the presentment. The other plays performed were _Tom Thumb_, 1854, and
_The Lighthouse_ and _Fortunus_, 1855.
The following copy of a play-bill--in my collection--of one of these
performances is certainly worth preserving in a permanent form, for the
double reason that it is extremely rare, and contains one of Dickens's
few poetical contributions, _The Song of the Wreck_, which was written
specially for the occasion.
The smallest Theatre in the World!
TAVISTOCK HOUSE.
_Lessee and Manager_ -- -- -- MR. CRUMMLES.
On Tuesday evening, June 19th, 1855, will be presented, at exactly
eight o'clock,
An entirely New and Original
Domestic Melo-drama, in Two Acts, by Mr. Wilkie Collins,
now first performed, called
THE LIGHTHOUSE.
The Scenery painted by Mr. Stanfield, R.A.
Aaron Gurnock, the head Light-keeper MR. CRUMMLES.
Martin Gurnock, his son; the second
Light-keeper MR. WILKIE COLLINS.
Jacob Dale, the third Light-keeper MR. MARK LEMON.
Samuel Furley, a Pilot MR. AUGUSTUS EGG, A.R.A.
The Relief of Light-keepers, by MR. CHARLES DICKENS, JUNIOR,
MR. EDWARD HOGARTH,
MR. ALFRED AINGER, and
MR. WILLIAM WEBSTER.
The Shipwrecked Lady MISS HOGARTH.
Phoebe MISS DICKENS,
Who will sing a new Ballad, the music by Mr. Linley, the words
by Mr. Crummles, entitled
THE SONG OF THE WRECK.
I.
"The wind blew high, the waters raved,
A Ship drove on the land,
A hundred human creatures saved,
Kneeled down upon the sand.
Three-score were drowned, three-score were thrown
Upon the black rocks wild;
And thus among them left alone,
They found one helpless child.
II.
A Seaman rough, to shipwreck bred,
Stood out from all the rest,
And gently laid the lonely head
Upon his honest breast.
And trav'ling o'er the Desert wide,
It was a solemn joy,
To see them, ever side by side,
The sailor and the boy.
III.
In famine, sickness, hunger, thirst,
The two were still but one,
Until the strong man drooped the first,
And felt his labours done.
Then to a trusty friend he spake:
'Across this Desert wide,
O take the poor boy for my sake!'
And kissed the child, and died.
IV.
Toiling along in weary plight,
Through heavy jungle-mire,
These two came later every night
To warm them at the fire,
Until the Captain said one day:
'O seaman good and kind,
To save thyself now come away
And leave the boy behind!'
V.
The child was slumb'ring near the blaze:
'O Captain let him rest
Until it sinks, when GOD'S own ways
Shall teach us what is best!'
They watched the whiten'd ashey heap,
They touched the child in vain,
They did not leave him there asleep,
He never woke again."
Half an hour for Refreshment.
To conclude with
The Guild Amateur Company's Farce, in one act, by Mr. Crummles
and Mr. Mark Lemon;
MR. NIGHTINGALE'S DIARY.
Mr. Nightingale MR. FRANK STONE, A.R.A.
Mr. Gabblewig, of the Middle Temple }
Charley Bit, a Boots }
Mr. Poulter, a Pedestrian and cold }
water drinker } MR. CRUMMLES.
Captain Blower, an invalid }
A Respectable Female }
A Deaf Sexton }
Tip, Mr. Gabblewig's Tiger } MR AUGUSTUS EGG, A.R.A.
Christopher, a Charity Boy }
Slap, Professionally Mr. Flormiville, }
a country actor }
Mr. Tickle, Inventor of the Celebrated }
Compounds } MR. MARK LEMON.
A Virtuous Young Person in the }
confidence of Maria }
Lithers, Landlord of the Water-lily MR. WILKIE COLLINS.
Rosina, Mr. Nightingale's niece MISS KATE DICKENS.
Susan her Maid MISS HOGARTH.
Composer and Director of the music, MR. FRANCESCO BERGER, who
will preside at the pianoforte.
Costume makers, MESSRS. NATHAN of Titchbourne Street, Haymarket.
Perruquier, MR. WILSON, of the Strand.
Machinery and Properties by MR. IRELAND, of the Theatre Royal,
Adelphi.
_Doors open at half-past seven. Carriages may be ordered at a quarter
past eleven._
It was from Tavistock House that Dickens received this startling message
from a confidential servant:--
"The gas-fitter says, sir, that he can't alter the fitting of your gas
in your bedroom without taking up almost the ole of your bedroom floor,
and pulling your room to pieces. He says of course you can have it done
if you wish, and he'll do it for you and make a good job of it, but he
would have to destroy your room first, and go entirely under the
jistes."
The same female, in allusion to Dickens's wardrobe, also said, "Well,
sir, your clothes is all shabby, and your boots is all burst."
[Illustration: No. 141, Bayham Street, Camden Town,
_where the Dickens Family lived in 1823_.]
Among the important works of Charles Dickens which were wholly or partly
written at Tavistock House are:--_Bleak House_, _A Child's History of
England_, _Hard Times_, _Little Dorrit_, _A Tale of Two Cities_, _The
Uncommercial Traveller_, and _Great Expectations_. _All the Year Round_
was also determined upon while he lived here, and the first number was
dated 30th April, 1859.
Tavistock House is the nearest point to Camden Town, interesting as
being the place where, in 1823, at No. 16 (now No. 141) Bayham Street,
the Dickens family resided for a short time[2] on leaving Chatham. There
is an exquisite sketch of the humble little house by Mr. Kitton in his
_Charles Dickens by Pen and Pencil_, and it is spoken of as being "in
one of the then poorest parts of the London suburbs." We therefore
proceed along Gordon Square, and reach Gower Street. At No. 147, Gower
Street, formerly No. 4, Gower Street North, on the west side, was once
the elder Mr. Dickens's establishment. The house, now occupied by Mr.
Müller, an artificial human eye-maker ("human eyes warious," says Mr.
Venus), has six rooms, with kitchens in basement. The rooms are rather
small, each front room having two windows, which in the case of the
first floor reach from floor to ceiling. It seems to be a comfortable
house, but has no garden. There is an old-fashioned brass knocker on the
front door, probably the original one, and there is a dancing academy
next door. (Query, Mr. Turveydrop's?) The family of the novelist, which
had removed from Bayham Street, were at this time (1823) in such
indifferent circumstances that poor Mrs. Dickens had to exert herself
in adding to the finances by trying to teach, and a school was opened
for young children at this house, which was decorated with a brass-plate
on the door, lettered MRS. DICKENS'S ESTABLISHMENT, a faint description
of which occurs in the fourth chapter of _Our Mutual Friend_, and of its
abrupt removal "for the interests of all parties." These facts, and also
that of young Charles Dickens's own efforts to obtain pupils for his
mother, are alluded to in a letter written by Dickens to Forster in
later life:--
"I left, at a great many other doors, a great many circulars calling
attention to the merits of the establishment. Yet nobody ever came to
school, nor do I ever recollect that anybody ever proposed to come, or
that the least preparation was made to receive anybody. But I know that
we got on very badly with the butcher and baker; that very often we had
not too much for dinner; and that at last my father was arrested."
This period, subsequently most graphically described in _David
Copperfield_ as the "blacking bottle period," was the darkest in young
Charles's existence; but happier times and brighter prospects soon came
to drown the recollections of that bitter experience.
[Illustration: No. 1, Devonshire Terrace, Regent's Park.--_Dickens's
Residence_ 1839-50.]
Walking up Euston Road from Gower Street, we see St. Pancras Church (not
the old church of "Saint Pancridge" in the Fields, by the bye, situated
in the St. Pancras Road, where Mr. Jerry Cruncher and two friends went
"fishing" on a memorable night, as recorded in _A Tale of Two Cities_,
when their proceedings, and especially those of his "honoured parent,"
were watched by young Jerry), and proceed westward along the Marylebone
Road, called the New Road in Dickens's time, past Park Crescent,
Regent's Park, and do not stop until we reach No. 1, Devonshire
Terrace. This commodious double-fronted house, in which Dickens resided
from 1839 to 1850, is entered at the side, and the front looks into the
Marylebone Road. Maclise's beautiful sketch of the house (made in 1840),
as given in Forster's _Life_, shows the windows of the lower and first
floor rooms as largely bowed, while over the top flat of one of the
former is a protective iron-work covering, thus allowing the children to
come out of their nursery on the third floor freely to enjoy the air and
watch the passers-by. In the sketch Maclise has characteristically put
in a shuttlecock just over the wall, as though the little ones were
playing in the garden. Forster calls it "a handsome house with a garden
of considerable size, shut out from the New Road by a brick wall, facing
the York Gate into Regent's Park;" and Dickens himself admitted it to be
"a house of great promise (and great premium), undeniable situation, and
excessive splendour." That he loved it well is shown by the passage in a
letter which he addressed to Forster, "in full view of Genoa's perfect
bay," when about to commence _The Chimes_ (1844); he says:--"Never did I
stagger so upon a threshold before. I seem as if I had plucked myself
out of my proper soil when I left Devonshire Terrace, and could take
root no more until I return to it. . . . Did I tell you how many
fountains we have here? No matter. If they played nectar, they wouldn't
please me half so well as the West Middlesex water-works at Devonshire
Terrace."
Mr. Jonathan Clark, who resides here, kindly shows us over the house,
which contains thirteen rooms. The polished mahogany doors in the hall,
and the chaste Italian marble mantel-pieces in the principal rooms, are
said to have been put up by the novelist. On the ground floor, the
smaller room to the eastward of the house, with window facing north and
looking into the pleasant garden where the plane trees and turf are
beautifully green, is pointed out as having been his study.
Mr. Benjamin Lillie, of 70, High Street, Marylebone, plumber and
painter, remembers Mr. Dickens coming to Devonshire Terrace. He did a
good deal of work for him while he lived there, and afterwards, when he
removed to Tavistock House, including the fitting up of the library
shelves and the curious counterfeit book-backs, made to conceal the
backs of the doors. He also removed the furniture to Tavistock House,
and subsequently to Gad's Hill Place. He spoke of the interest which Mr.
Dickens used to take in the work generally, and said he would stand for
hours with his back to the fire looking at the workmen. In the summer
time he used to lie on the lawn with his pocket-handkerchief over his
face, and when thoughts occurred to him, he would go into his study, and
after making notes, would resume his position on the lawn. On the next
page we give an illustration of the courteous and precise manner--not
without a touch of humour--in which he issued his orders.
Here it was that Dickens's favourite ravens were kept, in a stable on
the south side of the garden, one of which died in 1841, it was supposed
from the effects of paint, or owing to "a malicious butcher," who had
been heard to say that he "would do for him." His death is described by
Dickens in a long passage which thus concludes:--
"On the clock striking twelve he appeared slightly
agitated, but he soon recovered, walked twice or
thrice along the coach-house, stopped to bark,
staggered, exclaimed, '_Holloa, old girl!_' (his
favourite expression), and died."
[Illustration:
3 Hanover Terrace
Friday Tenth May, 1861.
Mr. Lillie
Please make the alteration in the two windows in Wellington Street,
agreeably to the estimate you have sent me, and to have the work
completed with all convenient speed. Be so good as to be careful that
the bottom sashes are capable of being easily raised and the top sashes
of being easily let down----
Faithfully yours
Charles Dickens]
In an interesting letter addressed to Mr. Angus Fletcher, recently in
the possession of Mr. Arthur Hailstone of Manchester, Dickens further
describes the event:--"Suspectful of a butcher who had been heard to
threaten, I had the body opened. There were no traces of poison, and it
appeared he died of influenza. He has left considerable property,
chiefly in cheese and halfpence, buried in different parts of the
garden. The new raven (I have a new one, but he is comparatively of weak
intellect) administered to his effects, and turns up something every
day. The last piece of _bijouterie_ was a hammer of considerable size,
supposed to have been stolen from a vindictive carpenter, who had been
heard to speak darkly of vengeance down the mews."
Maclise on hearing the news sent to Forster a letter, and a pen-and-ink
sketch, being the famous "Apotheosis." The second raven died in 1845,
probably from "having indulged the same illicit taste for putty and
paint, which had been fatal to his predecessor." Dickens says:--
"Voracity killed him, as it did Scott's; he died
unexpectedly by the kitchen fire. He kept his eye
to the last upon the meat as it roasted, and
suddenly turned over on his back with a sepulchral
cry of '_Cuckoo!_'"
These ravens were of course the two "great originals" of which Grip in
_Barnaby Rudge_ was the "compound." There was a third raven at Gad's
Hill, but he "gave no evidence of ever cultivating his mind." The
novelist's remarkable partiality for ravens called forth at the time the
preposterous rumour that "Dickens had gone raving (raven) mad."
Here Longfellow visited Dickens in 1841, and thus referred to his
visit:--"I write this from Dickens's study, the focus from which so many
luminous things have radiated. The raven croaks in the garden, and the
ceaseless roar of London fills my ears."
[Illustration: Apotheosis of "Grip" the Raven. Drawn by D. Maclise,
R.A.]
Dickens lived longer at Devonshire Terrace than he did at any other of
his London homes, and a great deal of his best work was done here,
including _Master Humphrey's Clock_ (I. _The Old Curiosity Shop_, II.
_Barnaby Rudge_), _American Notes_, _Martin Chuzzlewit_, _A Christmas
Carol_, _The Cricket on the Hearth_, _Dombey and Son_, _The Haunted
Man_, and _David Copperfield_. _The Battle of Life_ was written at
Geneva in 1846. All these were published from his twenty-eighth to his
thirty-eighth year; and _Household Words_, his famous weekly popular
serial of varied high-class literature, was determined upon here, the
first number being issued on 30th March, 1850.
From Devonshire Terrace we pass along High Street, and turn into
Devonshire Street, which leads into Harley Street, minutely described in
_Little Dorrit_ as the street wherein resided the great financier and
"master-spirit" Mr. Merdle, who entertained "Bar, Bishop, and the
Barnacle family" at the "Patriotic conference" recorded in the same
work, in his noble mansion there, and he subsequently perishes "in the
warm baths, in the neighbouring street"--as one may say--in the
luxuriant style in which he had always lived.
Harley Street leads us into Oxford Street, and a pleasant ride outside
an omnibus--which, as everybody knows, is the best way of seeing
London--takes us to Hyde Park Place, a row of tall stately houses facing
Hyde Park. Here at No. 5, (formerly Mr. Milner Gibson's town residence)
Charles Dickens temporarily resided during the winter months of 1869,
and occasionally until May 1870, during his readings at St. James's
Hall, and while he was engaged on _Edwin Drood_, part of which was
written here; this being illustrative of Dickens's power of
concentrating his thoughts even near the rattle of a public
thoroughfare. In a letter addressed to Mr. James T. Fields from this
house, under date of 14th January, 1870, he says:--"We live here
(opposite the Marble Arch) in a charming house until the 1st of June,
and then return to Gad's. . . . I have a large room here with three fine
windows over-looking the park--unsurpassable for airiness and
cheerfulness."
A similar public conveyance takes us back to Morley's by way of Regent
Street, about the middle of which, on the west side, is New Burlington
Street, containing, at No. 8, the well-known publishing office of
Messrs. Richard Bentley and Son, whose once celebrated magazine,
_Bentley's Miscellany_, Dickens edited for a period of two years and two
months, terminating, 1838, on his resignation of the editorship to Mr.
W. Harrison Ainsworth; and we also pass lower down, at the bottom of
Waterloo Place, that most select of clubs, "The Athenæum," at the corner
of Pall Mall, of which Dickens was elected a member in 1838, and from
which, on the 20th May, 1870, he wrote his last letter to his son, Mr.
Alfred Tennyson Dickens, in Australia; and a tenderly loving letter it
is, indicating the harmonious relations between father and son. It
expresses the hope that the two (Alfred and "Plorn") "may become
proprietors," and "aspire to the first positions in the colony without
casting off the old connection," and thus concludes:--"From Mr. Bear I
had the best accounts of you. I told him that they did not surprise me,
for I had unbounded faith in you. For which take my love and blessing."
Sad to say, a note to this (the last in the series of published letters)
states:--"This letter did not reach Australia until after these two sons
of Charles Dickens had heard, by telegraph, the news of their father's
death."[3]
At Morley's we refresh ourselves with Mr. Sam Weller's idea of a nice
little dinner, consisting of "pair of fowls and a weal cutlet; French
beans, taturs, tart and tidiness;" and then depart for Victoria Station,
to take train by the London, Chatham and Dover Railway to Rochester.
The weather forecast issued by that most valuable institution, the
Meteorological Office (established since Mr. Pickwick's days, in which
doubtless as a scientist and traveller he would have taken great
interest), was verified to the letter, and we had "thunder locally." On
our way down Parliament Street, we pass Inigo Jones's once splendid
Whitehall--now looking very insignificant as compared with its grand
neighbours the Government Offices opposite--remembering Mr. Jingle's
joke about Whitehall, which seems to have been Dickens's first thought
of "King Charles's head":--"Looking at Whitehall, Sir--fine
place--little window--somebody else's head off there, eh, Sir?--he
didn't keep a sharp look out enough either--eh, Sir, eh?"
We also pass "The Red Lion," No. 48, Parliament Street, "at the corner
of the very short street leading into Cannon Row," where David
Copperfield ordered a glass of the very best ale--"The Genuine Stunning
with a good head to it"--at twopence half-penny the glass, but the
landlord hesitated to draw it, and gave him a glass of some which he
suspected was _not_ the "genuine stunning"; and the landlady coming into
the bar returned his money, and gave him a "kiss that was half-admiring
and half-compassionate, but all womanly and good [he says], I'm sure."
[Illustration: "My magnificent order at the Public House" (_vide_
"_David Copperfield_").]
The Horse-Guards' clock is the last noteworthy object, and reminds us
that Mark Tapley noticed the time there, on the occasion of his last
meeting with Mary Graham in St. James's Park, before starting for
America. It also reminds us of Mr. Micawber's maxim, "Procrastination is
the thief of time--collar him;"--a few minutes afterwards we are
comfortably seated in the train, and can defy the storm, which overtakes
us precisely in the manner described in _The Old Curiosity Shop_:--
"It had been gradually getting overcast, and now
the sky was dark and lowering, save where the
glory of the departing sun piled up masses of gold
and burning fire, decaying embers of which gleamed
here and there through the black veil, and shone
redly down upon the earth. The wind began to moan
in hollow murmurs, as the sun went down, carrying
glad day elsewhere; and a train of dull clouds
coming up against it menaced thunder and
lightning. Large drops of rain soon began to fall,
and, as the storm clouds came sailing onward,
others supplied the void they left behind, and
spread over all the sky. Then was heard the low
rumbling of distant thunder, then the lightning
quivered, and then the darkness of an hour seemed
to have gathered in an instant."
We pass Dulwich,--where Mr. Snodgrass and Emily Wardle were married,--a
fact that recalls kindly recollections of Mr. Pickwick and his
retirement there, as recorded in the closing pages of the _Pickwick
Papers_, where he is described as "employing his leisure hours in
arranging the memoranda which he afterwards presented to the secretary
of the once famous club, or in hearing Sam Weller read aloud, with such
remarks as suggested themselves to his mind, which never failed to
afford Mr. Pickwick great amusement." He is subsequently described as
"somewhat infirm now, but he retains all his former juvenility of
spirit, and may still be frequently seen contemplating the pictures in
the Dulwich Gallery, or enjoying a walk about the pleasant neighbourhood
on a fine day."
Although it is but a short distance--under thirty miles--to Rochester,
the journey seems tedious, as the "iron-horse" does not keep pace with
the pleasurable feelings of eager expectation afloat in our minds on
this our first visit to "Dickens-Land"; it is therefore with joyful
steps that we leave the train, and, the storm having passed away, find
ourselves in the cool of the summer evening on the platform of Strood
and Rochester Bridge Station.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] In _The History of Pickwick_, a handsome octavo volume of nearly 400
pages, just published (1891), Mr. Percy Fitzgerald, the author, who is
one of the few surviving friends of Charles Dickens, mentions the
interesting fact that there are 360 characters, 70 episodes, and 22
inns, described in this wonderful book, written when the author was only
twenty-four.
[2] Forster (I. 14) infers that the family removed to London in 1821,
but Mr. Langton considers (_Childhood and Youth of Charles Dickens_,
1883, pp. 62-3), from the fact of the birth of Dickens's brother Alfred
having been registered at Chatham on 3rd April, 1822, and from the
further fact of there being no record of Mr. John Dickens's recall
throughout this year to Somerset House, that the family did not remove
to London until the winter of 1822-3, and I agree with Mr. Langton. Mr.
Kitton in _Charles Dickens by Pen and Pencil_, 1890, also recognizes
this period as the date of the removal of the Dickens family to London.
[3] Mr. Edward Bulwer Lytton Dickens, a son of the great Novelist, is a
member of the New South Wales Parliament, having been elected in March
1889. "He stood as a Protectionist for the representation of Wilcannia,
an extensive pastoral district in the western portion of the colony. His
father, it will be remembered, was an ardent Free Trader, and could not
be prevailed upon to enter the British Parliament on any terms, and
occasionally said some severe things of our Legislative Assembly. His
two sons, Alfred Tennyson and Edward Bulwer Lytton, emigrated to
Australia some years ago, and became successful pastoralists."--_Yorkshire
Daily Post_, March 1889. A subsequent account states that Mr. Edward
Bulwer Lytton Dickens is about to retire, having been, he remarks, "out
of pocket, out of brains, out of health, and out of temper, by the
pursuit of political glory."--_Pall Mall Gazette_, March 1891. I am
since informed that Alfred is not a pastoralist, but in business, and
that Edward has not retired up to date.
CHAPTER III.
ROCHESTER CITY.
"The silent High Street of Rochester is full of
gables, with old beams and timbers carved into
strange faces. It is oddly garnished with a queer
old clock that projects over the pavement out of a
grave red brick building, as if Time carried on
business there, and hung out his sign."--_The
Seven Poor Travellers._
"The town was glad with morning light."--_The Old
Curiosity Shop._
MUDFOG, Our Town, Dullborough, the Market Town, and Cloisterham were the
varied names that Charles Dickens bestowed upon the "ancient city" of
Rochester. Every reader of his works knows how well he loved it in early
youth, and how he returned to it with increased affection during the
years of his ripened wisdom. Among the first pages of the first chapter
of Forster's _Life_ we find references to it:--"That childhood
exaggerates what it sees, too, has he not tenderly told? How he thought
that the Rochester High-street must be at least as wide as Regent Street
which he afterwards discovered to be little better than a lane; how the
public clock in it, supposed to be the finest clock in the world, turned
out to be as moon-faced and weak a clock as a man's eyes ever saw; and
how in its Town Hall, which had appeared to him once so glorious a
structure that he had set it up in his mind as the model from which the
genie of the Lamp built the palace for Aladdin, he had painfully to
recognize a mere mean little heap of bricks, like a chapel gone
demented. Yet, not so painfully either when second thoughts wisely came.
'Ah! who was I, [he says] that I should quarrel with the town for being
changed to me, when I myself had come back, so changed, to it? All my
early readings and early imaginations dated from this place, and I took
them away so full of innocent construction and guileless belief, and I
brought them back so worn and torn, so much the wiser and so much the
worse!'"
It would occupy too much space in this narrative to adequately give even
a brief historical sketch of the City of Rochester, which is twenty-nine
miles from London, situated on the river Medway, and stands on the chalk
on the margin of the London basin; but we think lovers of Dickens will
not object to a recapitulation of a few of the most noteworthy
circumstances which have happened here, and which are not touched upon
in the chapters relating to the Castle and Cathedral.
According to the eminent local antiquary, Mr. Roach Smith, F.S.A., the
name of the city has been thus evolved:--"The ceastre or chester is a
Saxon affix to the Romano-British (DU)RO. The first two letters being
dropped in sound, it became Duro or Dro, and then ROchester, and it was
the Roman station Durobrovis." The ancient Britons called it "Dur-brif,"
and the Saxons "Hrofe-ceastre"--Horf's castle, of which appellation some
people think Rochester is a corruption.
Rochester is a place of great antiquity, and so far back as A.D. 600 it
seems to have been a walled city. Remains of the mediæval Wall exist in
very perfect condition, at the back of the Eagle Inn in High Street, and
in other parts of the city. In 676 Rochester was plundered by Ethelred,
King of Mercia; and in 884 the Danes sailed up the Medway and besieged
it, but were effectually repulsed by King Alfred. About 930, when three
Mints were established there by Athelstan, it had grown to be one of the
principal ports of the kingdom. William the Conqueror gave the town to
his half-brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeux. Fires in 1130 and 1137 nearly
destroyed it.
Not a few royal and distinguished personages have visited Rochester on
various occasions, among others Henry VIII., who came there in 1522,
accompanied by the Emperor Charles V. Queen Elizabeth came in 1573, when
she stayed five days, and attended the Cathedral service on Sunday. She
came again in 1583, with the Duke of Anjou, and showed him her "mighty
ships of war lying at Chatham." King James I. also visited the city in
1604 and 1606. On the latter occasion His Majesty, who was accompanied
by Christian IV., King of Denmark, attended the Cathedral, and
afterwards inspected the Navy. Charles II. paid it a visit just before
the restoration in 1660, and again subsequently. It is believed that on
both occasions he stayed at Restoration House (the "Satis House" of
_Great Expectations_) hereafter referred to. Mr. Richard Head presented
His Majesty with a silver ewer and basin on the occasion of the
restoration. James II. came down to the quiet old city December 19th,
1688, and sojourned with Sir Richard Head for a week at a house (now No.
46 High Street), from whence he ignominiously escaped to France by a
smack moored off Sheerness. Mr. Stephen T. Aveling mentioned to us that
"it is curious that Charles the Second 'came to his own' in Rochester,
and that James the Second 'skedaddled' from the same city."[4] Her
Majesty when Princess Victoria stayed at the Bull Inn in 1836 for a
night with her mother, the Duchess of Kent, on their way from Dover to
London. It was a very tempestuous night, some of the balustrades of
Rochester Bridge having been blown into the river, and the Royal
Princess was advised not to attempt to cross the bridge.
"On the last day of June 1667 (says Mr. W. Brenchley Rye in his pleasant
_Visits to Rochester_), Mr. Samuel Pepys, after examining the defences
at Chatham shortly after the disastrous expedition by the Dutch up the
Medway, walked into Rochester Cathedral, but he had no mind to stay to
the service, . . . 'afterwards strolled into the fields, a fine walk,
and there saw Sir F. Clarke's house (Restoration House), which is a
pretty seat, and into the Cherry Garden, and here met with a young,
plain, silly shopkeeper and his wife, a pretty young woman, and I did
kiss her!'" David Garrick was living at Rochester in 1737, for the
purpose of receiving instruction in mathematics, etc., from Mr. Colson.
In 1742, Hogarth visited the city, in that celebrated peregrination with
his four friends, and played hop-scotch in the courtyard of the
Guildhall. Dr. Johnson came here in 1783, and "returned to London by
water in a common boat, landing at Billingsgate."
The city formerly possessed many ancient charters and privileges
granted to the citizens, but these were superseded by the Municipal
Corporations Act of 1835.
The Guildhall, "marked by a gilt ship aloft,"--"where the mayor and
corporation assemble together in solemn council for the public
weal,"--is "a substantial and very suitable structure of brick,
supported by stone columns in the Doric order," and was erected in 1687.
It has several fine portraits by Sir Godfrey Kneller and other eminent
painters, including those of King William III., Queen Anne, Sir
Cloudesley Shovell, Richard Watts, M.P., and others. The Corporation
also possess many interesting and valuable city regalia, namely, a large
silver-gilt mace (1661), silver loving-cup (1719), silver oar and
silver-gilt ornaments (typical of the Admiralty jurisdiction of the
Corporation) (1748), two small maces of silver (1767), sword (1871--the
Mayor being Constable of the Castle), and chain and badges of gold and
enamel (1875), the last-mentioned commemorating many historical
incidents connected with the city.
Emerging from the railway station of the London, Chatham and Dover
Company at Strood, a drive of a few minutes (over the bridge) brings us
to the first object of our pilgrimage, the "Bull Inn,"--we beg pardon,
the "Royal Victoria and Bull Hotel,"--in High Street, Rochester, which
was visited by Mr. Pickwick, Mr. Tupman, Mr. Snodgrass, Mr. Winkle, and
their newly-made friend, Mr. Jingle, on the 13th May, 1827. Our cabman
is so satisfied with his fare ("only a bob's worth"), that he does not,
as one of his predecessors did, on a very remarkable occasion, "fling
the money on the pavement, and request in figurative terms to be allowed
the pleasure of fighting us for the amount," which circumstance we take
to be an improving sign of the times.
Changed in name, but not in condition, it seems scarcely possible that
we stand under the gateway of the charming old inn that we have known
from our boyhood, when first we read our _Pickwick_, what time the two
green leaves of _Martin Chuzzlewit_ were putting forth monthly, and when
the name of Charles Dickens, although familiar, had not become the
"household word" to us, and to the world, that it is now.
[Illustration: Bull Inn Rochester Good house Nice beds. vide Pickwick.]
We look round for evidence--"Good house, nice beds"--"(vide _Pickwick_)"
appear on the two sign-boards fixed on either side of the entrance-gate.
Only then are we quite sure our driver has not made a mistake and taken
us to "Wright's next door," which every reader of _Pickwick_ knows, on
the authority of Mr. Jingle, "was dear--very dear--half a crown in the
bill if you look at the waiter--charge you more if you dine out at a
friend's than they would if you dined in the coffee-room--rum
fellows--very."
Haunches of venison, saddles of mutton, ribs of beef, York hams, fowls
and ducks, hang over our heads in the capacious covered gateway; cold
viands are seen in a glass cupboard opposite, and silently promise that
some good fare, like that which regaled Mr. Pickwick and his friends, is
still to be found at the Bull. In the distance is seen the large
old-fashioned coach-yard, surrounded by odd buildings, which on market
days (Tuesdays) is crowded with all sorts of vehicles ancient and
modern. On our right is the kitchen, "brilliant with glowing coals and
rows of shining copper lying well open to view."
By the kindness of Mr. Richard Prall, the town-clerk, beds have been
secured for us, and the landlord meets us at the door with a hearty
welcome. We are conducted to our rooms on the second floor looking
front, on reaching which a strange feeling takes possession of us.
Surely we have been here before? Not a bit of it! But the bedrooms are
nevertheless familiar to us; we see it all in a minute--the writer's
apartment is Mr. Tupman's, and his friend's is Mr. Winkle's!
"Winkle's bedroom is inside mine," said Mr. Tupman, after that
delightful dinner of "soles, broiled fowl, and mushrooms," in the
private sitting-room at the Bull, when all the other Pickwickians had,
"after the cosy couple of hours succeeding dinner, more or less
succumbed to the somniferous influence which the wine had exerted over
them," and he and Mr. Jingle alone remained wakeful, and were discussing
the idea of attending the forthcoming ball in the evening.
It is an unexpected and pleasant coincidence that we are located in
these two rooms, and altogether a good omen for our tramp generally.
They are numbered 13 and 19, and the reason why the numbers are not
consecutive is because 19 (Mr. Winkle's room) is also approached by a
back staircase. Mr. Pickwick's room, as befitted his years and his
dignity as G.C.M.P.C., is a larger room, and is number 17. They are all
comfortable chambers, with "nice beds."
[Illustration: Staircase at "The Bull"]
The principal staircase of the Bull, which is almost wide enough to
drive a carriage and four up it, remains exactly as it was in Mr.
Pickwick's days, as described by Dickens and delineated by Seymour. We
could almost fancy we witnessed the memorable scene depicted in the
illustration, where the irascible Dr. Slammer confronts the
imperturbable Jingle. The staircase has on its walls a large number of
pictures and engravings, some curious and valuable, a few of which are
of purely local interest. A series of oil paintings represent the
costumes of all nations. There is a copy of "The Empty Chair," from the
drawing of Mr. Luke Fildes, R.A., and also one of the scarce proof
lithographs of "Dickens as Captain Bobadil," after the painting by C. R.
Leslie, R.A.
Mr. Lawrence informed us that some years ago "The Owl Club" held its
meetings at the Bull--a social club, reminding us strongly of one of the
early papers in _Bentley's Miscellany_, illustrated by George
Cruikshank, entitled the "Harmonious Owls," which has recently been
reprinted in the collection called _Old Miscellany Days_, in which
paper, by the bye, are several names from Dickens.
In one of the cheerful private sitting-rooms, of which there are many,
we find a portrait of Dickens that is new to us. Never have we seen one
that so vividly reproduced the novelist as one of us saw him, and heard
him read, in the Town Hall at Birmingham, on the 10th of May, 1866. It
is a vignette photograph by Watkins, coloured by Mr. J. Hopper, a local
artist, representing the face of the novelist in full, wearing afternoon
dress--black coat, and white shirt-front, with gold studs--the attitude
being perfectly natural and unconstrained, and a pleasant calm upon the
otherwise firm features. The high forehead is surmounted by the
well-remembered single curl of brown hair, the sole survival of those
profuse locks which grace Maclise's beautiful portrait. The bright blue
eyes, with the light reflected on the pupils like diamonds, seem to
follow one in every direction. The lines, of course, are marked, but not
too strongly; and the faint hectic flush which was apparent in later
years--notably when we saw him again in Birmingham in 1869--shows signs
of development. The beard hides the neck, and the white collar is
conspicuous. Altogether it is one of the most successful portraits we
remember to have seen. As witness of its popularity locally, we may
mention that we saw copies of it at Major Budden's at Gad's Hill, at the
Mitre Hotel, Chatham, and at the Leather Bottle Inn, Cobham. We are also
informed that Mr. Henry Irving gave a good sum for a copy, in the spring
of last year. Mr. Lawrence, our host, by good fortune, happening to
possess a duplicate, kindly allows us the opportunity of purchasing it
("portable property" as Mr. Wemmick remarks), as an addition to our
Dickens collection which it adorns. "Beautiful!" "Splendid!" "Dickens to
the life!" are the comments of friends to whom we show it, who
personally knew, or remembered, the original.
Here is the ball-room, entered from the first-floor landing of the
principal staircase, and the card-room adjoining, precisely as it was in
Mr. Pickwick's days:--
"It was a long room with crimson-covered benches,
and wax candles in glass chandeliers. The
musicians were confined in an elevated den, and
quadrilles were being systematically got through
by two or three sets of dancers. Two card-tables
were made up in the adjoining card-room, and two
pair of old ladies, and a corresponding number of
old gentlemen, were executing whist therein."
A very little stretch of the imagination carries us back sixty years,
and, _presto!_ the ball-room stands before us, with the wax candles
lighted, and the room filled with the _élite_ of Chatham and Rochester
society, who, acting on the principle of "that general benevolence which
was one of the leading features of the Pickwickian theory," had given
their support to that "ball for the benefit of a charity," then being
held there, and which was attended by Mr. Tracy Tupman, in his new
dress-coat with the P. C. button and bust of Mr. Pickwick in the centre,
and by Mr. Jingle, in the borrowed garments of the same nature belonging
to Mr. Winkle.
"P. C.," said the stranger.--"Queer set out--old fellow's likeness and
'P. C.'--What does 'P. C.' stand for? 'Peculiar Coat,' eh?" Imagine the
"rising indignation" and impatience of Mr. Tupman, as with "great
importance" he explains the mystic device!
[Illustration: The "Elevated Den" in the Ball Room: ("Bull" Inn)]
Everybody remembers how, declining the usual introduction, the two
entered the ball-room _incog._, as "Gentlemen from London--distinguished
foreigners--anything;" how Mr. Jingle said in reply to Mr. Tupman's
remark, "Wait a minute--fun presently--nobs not come yet--queer
place--Dock-yard people of upper rank don't know Dock-yard people of
lower rank--Dock-yard people of lower rank don't know small
gentry--small gentry don't know tradespeople--Commissioner don't know
anybody."
The "man at the door,"--the local M.C.,--announces the arrivals.
"Sir Thomas Clubber, Lady Clubber, and the Miss Clubbers!"
"Commissioner--head of the yard--great man--remarkably great man,"
whispers the stranger in Mr. Tupman's ear.
"Colonel Bulder, Mrs. Colonel Bulder, and Miss Bulder," are announced.
"Head of the garrison," says Mr. Jingle. "They exchanged snuff-boxes
[how old-fashioned it appears to us who don't take snuff], and looked
very much like a pair of Alexander Selkirks--Monarchs of all they
surveyed."
More arrivals are announced, and dancing begins in earnest; but the most
interesting one to us is Dr. Slammer--"a little fat man, with a ring of
upright black hair round his head, and an extensive bald plain on the
top of it--Dr. Slammer, surgeon to the 97th, who is agreeable to
everybody, especially to the Widow Budger.--'Lots of money--old
girl--pompous doctor--not a bad idea--good fun,' says the stranger.
'I'll dance with her--cut out the doctor--here goes.'" Then comes the
flirtation, the dancing, the negus and biscuits, the coquetting, the
leading of Mrs. Budger to her carriage. The volcano bursts with terrific
energy. . . .
"'You--you're a shuffler, sir,' gasps the furious doctor, 'a poltroon--a
coward--a liar--a--a--will nothing induce you to give me your card,
sir?'" and in the morning comes the challenge to the duel. It all passes
before our delighted mental vision, as we picture the circumstances
recorded in the beloved _Pickwick_ of our youth upwards.
Here also is the bar, just opposite the coffee-room, where the "Tickets
for the Ball" were purchased by Mr. Tupman for himself and Mr. Jingle at
"half a guinea each" (Mr. Jingle having won the toss), and where Dr.
Slammer's friend subsequently made inquiry for "the owner of the coat,
who arrived here, with three gentlemen, yesterday afternoon." We find it
to be a very cosy and comfortable bar-room too, wherein we subsequently
enjoy many a social pipe and pleasant chat with its friendly
frequenters, reminding us of the old tavern-life as described in Dr.
Johnson's days.
The coffee-room of the Bull, in which we take our supper, remains
unaltered since the days of the Pickwickians. It is on the left-hand
side as we enter the hotel from the covered gateway--not very large, but
warm and comfortable, with three windows looking into the High Street.
Many scenes in the novels have taken place in this memorable
apartment--in fact, it is quite historical, from a Dickensian point of
view.
Here it was that the challenge to the duel from Dr. Slammer to Mr.
Winkle was delivered; and, when Mr. Winkle appeared, in response to the
call of the boots, that "a gentleman in the coffee-room" wanted to see
him, and would not detain him a moment, but would take no denial, "an
old woman and a couple of waiters were cleaning the coffee-room, and an
officer in undress uniform was looking out of the window." Here also the
Pickwickians assembled on that eventful morning when the party set out,
three in a chaise and one on horseback, for Dingley Dell, and
encountered such dire mishaps. "Mr. Pickwick had made his preliminary
arrangements, and was looking over the coffee-room blinds at the
passengers in the High Street, when the waiter entered, and announced
that the chaise was ready--an announcement which the vehicle itself
confirmed, by forthwith appearing before the coffee-room blinds
aforesaid." Subsequently, as they prepare to start, "'Wo-o!' cried Mr.
Pickwick, as the tall quadruped evinced a decided inclination to back
into the coffee-room window."
It is highly probable that the descriptions of "the little town of Great
Winglebury," and "the Winglebury Arms," in "The Great Winglebury Duel"
of the _Sketches by Boz_, one of the earliest works of the novelist,
refer to the city of Rochester and the Bull Inn, for they fit in very
well in many respects, although it _is_ stated therein that "the little
town of Great Winglebury is exactly forty-two miles and three-quarters
from Hyde Park Corner."
The Blue Boar mentioned in _Great Expectations_--one of the most
original, touching, and dramatic of Dickens's novels--is indubitably the
Bull Hotel. Although there is an inn in High Street, Rochester, called
the Blue Boar, its description does not at all correspond with the text.
We find several instances like this, where, probably for purposes of
concealment, the real identity of places and persons is masked.
Our first introduction to the Blue Boar is on the occasion of Pip's
being bound apprentice to Joe Gargery, the premium for whom was paid out
of the twenty-five guineas given to Pip by Miss Havisham. Pip's sister
"became so excited by the twenty-five guineas, that nothing would serve
but we must have a dinner out of that windfall at the Blue Boar, and
that Pumblechook must go over in his chaise cart, and bring the Hubbles
and Mr. Wopsle." The dinner is duly disposed of, and although poor Pip
was frequently enjoined to "enjoy himself," he certainly failed to do
so on this occasion. "Among the festivities indulged in rather late in
the evening," says Pip, "Mr. Wopsle gave us _Collins's Ode_, and 'threw
his blood-stain'd sword in thunder down,' with such effect, that a
waiter came in and said 'The Commercials underneath sent up their
compliments, and it wasn't the Tumblers' Arms!'" from which we gather
that the said dinner took place in a private sitting-room (No. 3) over
the commercial room, on the opposite side of the gateway to the
coffee-room.
It will be remembered that on Pip's attaining "the second stage of his
expectations," Pumblechook had grown very obsequious and fawning to
him--pressed him to take refreshment, as who should say, "But, my dear
young friend, you must be hungry, you must be exhausted. Be seated. Here
is a chicken had round from the Boar, here is a tongue had round from
the Boar, here's one or two little things had round from the Boar that I
hope you may not despise. 'But do I,' said Mr. Pumblechook, getting up
again the moment after he had sat down, 'see afore me him as I ever
sported with in his times of happy infancy? And may I--_may_ I--?' This
'May I?' meant might he shake hands? I consented, and he was fervent,
and then sat down again."
Returning to the coffee-room, we discover it was the identical apartment
in which the unexpected and very peculiar meeting took place between Pip
and "the spider," Bentley Drummle, "the sulky and red-looking young man,
of a heavy order of architecture," both "Finches of the Grove," and
rivals for the hand of Estella. Each stands shoulder to shoulder against
the fire-place, and, but for Pip's forbearance, an explosion must have
taken place.
Through the same coffee-room windows, poor Pip looks under the reverses
of his great expectations in consequence of the discovery and subsequent
death of his patron. The "servile Pumblechook," who appears here
uninvited, again changes his manner and conduct, becoming ostentatiously
compassionate and forgiving, as he had been meanly servile in the time
of Pip's new prosperity, thus:--"'Young man, I am sorry to see you
brought low, but what else could be expected! what else could be
expected! . . . This is him . . . as I have rode in my shay-cart; this
is him as I have seen brought up by hand; this is him untoe the sister
of which I was uncle by marriage, as her name was Georgiana M'ria from
her own mother, let him deny it if he can.' . . ."
Dickens takes leave of the Blue Boar, in the last chapter of the work,
in these words:--
"The tidings of my high fortunes having had a
heavy fall, had got down to my native place and
its neighbourhood, before I got there. I found the
Blue Boar in possession of the intelligence, and I
found that it made a great change in the Boar's
demeanour. Whereas the Boar had cultivated my good
opinion with warm assiduity when I was coming into
property, the Boar was exceedingly cool on the
subject now that I was going out of property.
"It was evening when I arrived, much fatigued by
the journey I had so often made so easily. The
Boar could not put me into my usual bedroom, which
was engaged,--probably by some one who had
expectations,--and could only assign me a very
indifferent chamber among the pigeons and
post-chaises up the yard. But, I had as sound a
sleep in that lodging as in the most superior
accommodation the Boar could have given me, and
the quality of my dreams was about the same as in
the best bedroom."
The visitors' book in the coffee-room, at the Bull--we never shall call
it "The Royal Victoria and Bull Hotel"--abounds with complimentary
remarks on the hospitable treatment received by its guests; and there
are several poetical effusions, inspired by the classic nature of
"Dickens-Land." One of these, under date of the 18th September, 1887, is
worth recording:--
"The man who knows his Dickens as he should,
Enjoys a double pleasure in this place;
He loves to walk its ancient streets, and trace
The scenes where Dickens' characters have stood.
He reads _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_
In Jasper's Gatehouse, and, with Tope as guide,
Explores the old cathedral, Durdles' pride;
Descends into the Crypt, and even would
Ascend the Tower by moonlight, thence to see
Fair Cloisterham reposing at his feet,
And passing out, he almost hopes to meet
Crisparkle and the white-haired Datchery.
The gifted writer 'sleeps among our best
And noblest' in our Minster of the West;
Yet still he lives in this, his favourite scene,
Which for all time shall keep his memory green."
[Illustration: Old Rochester Bridge]
We follow Mr. Pickwick's example as regards early rising, and, taking a
turn before breakfast, find ourselves on Rochester Bridge. Nature has
not much changed since the memorable visit of that "truly great man,"
who in the original announcement of _The Pickwick Papers_ is stated with
his companions to have "fearlessly crossed the turbid Medway in an open
boat;" but the march of civilization has effaced the old bridge, and lo!
three bridges stand in the place thereof. The beautiful stone structure
(temp. Edward III.) which Mr. Pickwick leant over, having become
unsuitable, was blown up by the Royal Engineers in 1856, and a handsome
iron bridge erected in its place. The débris was removed by Mr. J. H.
Ball, the contractor, who presented Dickens with one of the balustrades,
others having been utilized to form the coping of the embankment of the
esplanade under the castle walls. The iron bridge was built by Messrs.
Fox and Henderson, the foundations being laid in 1850. The machinery
constituting "the swing-bridge or open ship canal (fifty feet wide) at
the Strood end is very beautiful; the entire weight to be moved is two
hundred tons, yet the bridge is readily swung by two men at a capstan."
So says one of the Guide Books, but as a matter of fact we find that it
is not now used! The other two bridges (useful, but certainly not
ornamental) belong to the respective railway companies which have
systems through Rochester, and absolutely shut out every prospect below
stream. What _would_ Mr. Pickwick say, if his spirit ever visited the
ancient city? Nevertheless, we realize for the first time, with all its
freshness and beauty (although perhaps a little marred by the smoke of
the lime-kilns, and by the "Medway coal trade," in which it will be
remembered Mr. Micawber was temporarily interested, and which "he came
down to see"), the charm of the prospect which Dickens describes, and
which Mr. Pickwick saw, in the opening of the fifth chapter of the
immortal _Posthumous Papers_:--
"Bright and pleasant was the sky, balmy the air,
and beautiful the appearance of every object
around, as Mr. Pickwick leant over the balustrades
of Rochester Bridge, contemplating nature, and
waiting for breakfast. The scene was indeed one,
which might well have charmed a far less
reflective mind, than that to which it was
presented.
"On the left of the spectator lay the ruined wall,
broken in many places, and in some, overhanging
the narrow beach below in rude and heavy masses.
Huge knots of sea-weed hung upon the jagged and
pointed stones, trembling in every breath of wind;
and the green ivy clung mournfully round the dark
and ruined battlements. Behind it rose the ancient
castle, its towers roofless, and its massive walls
crumbling away, but telling us proudly of its old
might and strength, as when, seven hundred years
ago, it rang with the clash of arms, or resounded
with the noise of feasting and revelry. On either
side, the banks of the Medway, covered with
corn-fields and pastures, with here and there a
windmill, or a distant church, stretched away as
far as the eye could see, presenting a rich and
varied landscape, rendered more beautiful by the
changing shadows which passed swiftly across it,
as the thin and half-formed clouds skimmed away in
the light of the morning sun. The river,
reflecting the clear blue of the sky, glistened
and sparkled as it flowed noiselessly on; and the
oars of the fishermen dipped into the water with a
clear and liquid sound, as their heavy but
picturesque boats glided slowly down the stream."
It was over the same old bridge that poor Pip was pursued by that
"unlimited miscreant" Trabb's boy in the days of his "great
expectations." He says:--
"Words cannot state the amount of aggravation and
injury wreaked upon me by Trabb's boy, when,
passing abreast of me, he pulled up his
shirt-collar, twined his side hair, stuck an arm
akimbo, and smirked extravagantly by, wriggling
his elbows and body, and drawling to his
attendants: 'Don't know yah; don't know yah, 'pon
my soul, don't know yah!' The disgrace [continues
Pip] attendant on his immediately afterwards
taking to crowing and pursuing me across the
bridge with crows, as from an exceedingly dejected
fowl who had known me when I was a blacksmith,
culminated the disgrace with which I left the
town, and was, so to speak, ejected by it into the
open country."
There is generally a stiff breeze blowing on the bridge, and the fact
may probably have suggested to the artist the positions of the
characters in the river scene, one of the plates of _Edwin Drood_, where
Mr. Crisparkle is holding his hat on with much tenacity. One other
reference to the bridge occurs in the _Seven Poor Travellers_, where
Richard Doubledick, in the year 1799, "limped over the bridge here with
half a shoe to his dusty foot on his way to Chatham."
After a Pickwickian breakfast in the coffee-room of "broiled ham, eggs,
tea, coffee, and sundries," we take a stroll up the High Street. We do
not know what the feelings of other pilgrims in "Dickens-Land" may have
been on the occasion of a first visit, but we are quite sure that to us
it is a perfect revelation to ramble along this quaint street of "the
ancient city," returning by way of Star Hill through the Vines, all
crowded with associations of Charles Dickens. _Pickwick_, _Great
Expectations_, _Edwin Drood_, and many of the minor works of the eminent
novelist, had never before appeared so clear to us--they acquire new
significance. The air is full of Dickens. At every corner, and almost at
the door of every house, we half expect to be met by one or other of
the characters who will claim acquaintance with us as their friends or
admirers. We are simply delighted, and never tire of repeating our
experience in the pleasant summer days of our week's tramp in
"Dickens-Land."
[Illustration: The Guildhall: Rochester]
[Illustration: The "Moonfaced" Clock in High Street]
[Illustration: In High Street: Rochester]
[Illustration: Eastgate House]
Starting from the Bull, and walking along the somewhat narrow but
picturesque street towards Chatham,--"the streets of Cloisterham city
are little more than one narrow street by which you get into it and get
out of it: the rest being mostly disappointing yards with pumps in them
and no thoroughfare--exception made of the Cathedral close, and a paved
Quaker settlement, in color and general conformation very like a
Quakeress's bonnet, up in a shady corner,"--we pass in succession the
Guildhall, the City Clock, Richard Watts's Charity, the College Gate
(Jasper's Gatehouse), Eastgate House (the Nuns' House), and, nearly
opposite it, the residence of Mr. Sapsea, which, as we ourselves
discover, was also the residence of "Uncle Pumblechook." The latter
buildings are about a quarter of a mile from Rochester Bridge, and are
splendid examples of sixteenth-century architecture, with carved
oaken-timbered fronts and gables and latticed bay-windows. Eastgate
House--the "Nuns' House" of _Edwin Drood_, described as "a venerable
brick edifice, whose present appellation is doubtless derived from the
legend of its conventual uses"--is especially beautiful, and its
"resplendent brass plate on the trim gate" is still so "shining and
staring." The date, 1591, is on one of the inside beams, and the fine
old place abounds with quaint cosy rooms with carved oak mantel-pieces,
and plaster enrichments to the ceilings, as well as mysterious back
staircases and means of exit by secret passages. Charles II. is said to
have been entertained here by Colonel Gibbons, the then owner, when he
visited Chatham and inspected the _Royal George_; but this has been
recently disputed. For many years during this century, the house has
been occupied as a Ladies' School, and the old pianos used for practice
by the pupils are there still, the keys being worn into holes. We wonder
whether Rosa Bud and Helena Landless ever played on them! Looking round,
we half expect to witness the famous courting scene in _Edwin Drood_,
and afterwards "the matronly Tisher to heave in sight, rustling through
the room like the legendary ghost of a dowager in silken skirts, [with
her] 'I trust I disturb no one; but there _was_ a paper-knife--Oh,
thank you, I am sure!'" An excellent local institution, called "The
Rochester Men's Institute," has its home here. The house has been
immortalized by Mr. Luke Fildes in one of the illustrations to _Edwin
Drood_ ("Good-bye, Rosebud, darling!"), where, in the front garden, the
girls are cordially embracing their charming school-fellow, and Miss
Twinkleton looks on approvingly, but perhaps regretfully, at the
possible non-return of some of the young ladies. Mrs. Tisher is saluting
one of the girls. There is a gate opening into the street, with the lamp
over it kept in position by an iron bracket, just as it is now, heaps of
ladies' luggage are scattered about, which the housemaid and the
coachman are removing to the car outside; and one pretty girl stands in
the gateway waving a farewell to the others with her handkerchief.
We feel morally certain that Eastgate House is also the prototype of
Westgate House in the _Pickwick Papers_, although, for the purposes of
the story, it is therein located at Bury St. Edmund's. The wall
surrounding the garden is about seven feet high, and a drop from it into
the garden would be uncommonly suggestive of the scene which took place
between Sam Weller and his master in the sixteenth chapter, on the
occasion of the supposed intended elopement of one of the young ladies
of Miss Tomkins's Establishment--which also had the "name on a brass
plate on a gate"--with Mr. Charles FitzMarshall, _alias_ Mr. Alfred
Jingle. The very tree which Mr. Pickwick "considered a very dangerous
neighbour in a thunderstorm" is there still--a pretty acacia.
[Illustration: Mr. Sapsea's House.]
[Illustration: Mr. Sapsea's Father.]
The house opposite Eastgate House was of course Mr. Sapsea's
dwelling--"Mr. Sapsea's premises are in the High Street over against
the Nuns' House. They are of about the period of the Nuns' House,
irregularly modernized here and there." A carved wooden figure of Mr.
Sapsea's father in his rostrum as an auctioneer, with hammer poised in
hand, and a countenance expressive of "Going--going--gone!" was many
years ago fixed over a house (now the Savings Bank) in St. Margaret's,
Rochester, and was a regular butt for practical jokes by the young
officers of the period, although they never succeeded in their attempts
to pull it down. To us the house appears to be an older building than
Eastgate House, with much carved oak and timber work about it, and in
its prime must have been a most delightful residence. The lower part is
now used as business premises, and from the fact that it contains the
little drawers of a seedsman's shop, it answers very well to the
description of Mr. Pumblechook's "eminently convenient and commodious
premises"--indeed there is not a little in common between the two
characters. "Mr. Pumblechook's premises in the High Street of the market
town [says Pip] were of a peppercorny and farinaceous character, as the
premises of a corn chandler and seedsman should be. It appeared to me
that he must be a very happy man indeed to have so many little drawers
in his shop; and I wondered when I peeped into one or two of the lower
tiers, and saw the tied-up brown paper packets inside, whether the
flower seeds and bulbs ever wanted of a fine day to break out of those
jails, and bloom." Part of these premises is used as a dwelling-house,
and Mr. Apsley Kennette, the courteous assistant town-clerk, to whom we
were indebted for much kind attention, has apartments on the upper
floors of the old mansion, the views from which, looking into the
ancient city, are very pretty. There is a good deal of oak panelling and
plaster enrichment about the interior, restored by Mr. Kennette, who in
the course of his renovations found an interesting wall fresco.
He has had painted most appropriately in gilt letters over the
mantel-piece of his charming old panelled chamber of carved and polished
oak (with its quaint bay-window looking into the street) the pathetic
and sombre lines of Dante Gabriel Rossetti:--
"May not this ancient room thou sitt'st in dwell
In separate living souls for joy or pain;
Nay, all its corners may be painted plain,
Where Heaven shows pictures of some life spent well;
And may be stamped a memory all in vain
Upon the site of lidless eyes in Hell."
[Illustration: Restoration House.]
The beautiful residence in Maidstone Road, formerly Crow Lane, opposite
the Vines, called Restoration House, is the "Satis House" of _Great
Expectations_--"Miss Havisham's up-town." "Everybody for miles round had
heard of Miss Havisham up-town as an immensely rich and grim lady, who
lived in a large and dismal house barricaded against robbers, and who
led a life of seclusion." There is a veritable Satis House as well, on
the opposite side of the Vines alluded to elsewhere. Restoration House,
now occupied by Mr. Stephen T. Aveling, is a picturesque old
Elizabethan structure, partly covered with ivy, having fine oak
staircases, floors, and wainscoted rooms. Charles II. lodged here in
1660, and he subsequently presented to his host, Sir Francis Clarke,
several large tapestries, representing pastoral scenes, which the
present owner kindly allowed us to see. The tapestry is said to have
been made at Mortlake. It was the usual present from royalty in those
days--just as Her present Majesty now gives an Indian shawl to a
favoured subject. Like many houses of its kind, it contains a secret
staircase for escape during times of political trouble.
Mr. Aveling very kindly placed at our disposal the manuscript of an
interesting and "true ghost story" written by him relating to
Restoration House, which is introduced at the end of this chapter.
Many names in Dickens's novels and tales appear to us as old friends,
over the shops and elsewhere in Rochester. Looking through the list of
Mayors of the city from 1654 to 1887, we notice nearly twenty of the
names as having been given by Dickens to his characters, viz. Robinson,
Wade, Brooker, Clarke, Harris, Burgess, Head, Weller, Baily, Gordon,
Parsons, Pordage, Sparks, Simmons, Batten, Saunders, Thomson, Edwards,
and Budden. The name of Jasper also occurs as a tradesman several times
in the city, but we are informed that this is a recent introduction. In
the Cathedral burying-ground occur the names of Fanny Dorr_ett_ and
Richard Pordage. Dartle, we were informed, is an old Rochester name.
The population of the "four towns" of Rochester, Strood, Chatham, and
New Brompton, at the census of 1891, was upwards of 85,000. The
principal industries of Rochester are lime and cement making, "the
Medway coal trade," and boat and barge building.
Rochester is very well off for educational institutions. In addition to
the Board schools, there is the King's (or Cathedral) Grammar School
founded by Henry VIII., a handsome building in the Vines. The tuition
fee commences at £15 per annum for boys under 12, and there is a
reduction made when there are brothers. There are two or three annual
competitive Scholarships tenable for a period of years, and there are
also two Exhibitions of £60 a year to University College, Oxford. There
is also Sir J. Williamson's Mathematical School in the High Street,
founded in 1701, having an income of £1500 a year from endowments, and
the teaching, which has a wide range, includes physical science. The
fees are very small, commencing at about £5 per annum, and there are
foundation Scholarships and "Aveling Scholarships" to the value of £20
per annum.
In addition to the famous Richard Watts's Charity, which is described in
another chapter, the city possesses several other important charities,
viz.:--St. Catherine's Charity on Star Hill, founded by Simon Potyn in
1316, which provides residences for sixteen aged females, with stipends
varying from £24 to £28 each; St. Bartholomew's Hospital in New Road,
which was founded in 1078 by Bishop Gundulph for the benefit of lepers
returning from the Crusades (the present Hospital was erected in 1858,
and is supported by voluntary contributions); Sir John Hawkins's
Hospital for decayed seamen in Chatham, founded in 1592, and provides
for twelve inmates with their wives; and Sir John Hayward's Charity on
the Common, founded in 1651, which provides an asylum for twelve poor
and aged females, parishioners of St. Nicholas.
Not least noteworthy among the numerous objects of interest in the
"ancient city" are the beautiful gardens belonging to several of the
houses in the High Street, particularly those of Mr. Syms and Mr.
Wildish. The fresh green turf, the profusion of flowers, and the rich
growth of foliage and fruit, quite surprise and delight the stranger.
Mr. Stephen T. Aveling's garden is a marvel of beauty to be seen in a
town. "The Cloisterham gardens blush with ripening fruit."
Some of the old-fashioned cries of street hawkers, as "hot rolls,"
"herrings," "watercresses," and the like, similar to those in the London
of Charles Dickens's early days, still survive at Rochester, and are
very noticeable and quaint in the quiet morning.
As illustrative of the many changes which have been brought about by
steam, even in the quiet old city of Rochester, Mr. Syms called
attention to the fact that fifty years ago he could count twenty-eight
windmills on the surrounding heights, but now there are scarcely a dozen
to be seen.
In Rochester we heard frequent mention of "Gavelkind," one of the
ancient customs of Kent, whereby the lands do not descend to the eldest
son alone, but to the whole number of male children equally. Lambarde,
the eminent lawyer and antiquary (born 1536), author of _A Perambulation
of Kent_,[5] says:--"I gather by _Cornelius Tacitus_, and others, that
the ancient Germans, (whose Offspring we be) suffered their lands to
descend, not to their eldest Sonne alone, but to the whole number of
their male Children: and I finde in the 75th Chapter of _Canutus_ Law (a
King of this Realm before the Conquest), that after the death of the
Father, his Heires should divide both his goods, and his lands amongst
them. Now, for as much as all the next of the kinred did this inherit
together, I conjecture, that therefore the land was called, either
_Gavelkyn_ in meaning, _Give all kyn_, because it was given to all the
next in one line of kinred, or _Give all kynd_, that is, to all the male
Children: for _kynd_ in Dutch signifieth yet a male Childe." The learned
historian suggests a second possible origin of this curious custom from
the writ called "Gavelles," to recover "the rent and service arising out
of these lands."
The remarkable custom of "Borough English," whereby the youngest son
inherits the lands, also survives in some parts of the county of Kent.
Mr. Robert Langton has done good service by giving in his delightful
book, _The Childhood and Youth of Charles Dickens_, an illustration by
Mr. W. Hull, of the old Rochester Theatre, which formerly stood at the
foot of Star Hill, and in which Jingle and Dismal Jemmy--"rum
fellow--does the heavy business--no actor--strange man--all sorts of
miseries--dismal Jemmy, we call him on the circuit"--were to play on the
morrow after the duel. It exists no more, for the Conservative
Association has its club-house and rooms on the site of the building.
The theatre is referred to in _Edwin Drood:_--"Even its drooping and
despondent little theatre has its poor strip of garden, receiving the
foul fiend, when he ducks from its stage into the infernal regions,
among scarlet beans or oyster-shells, according to the season of the
year." And again in _The Uncommercial Traveller_, on "Dullborough
Town," when the beginning of the end had appeared:--
[Illustration: Old Rochester Theatre, Star Hill.]
"It was To Let, and hopelessly so, for its old
purposes; and there had been no entertainment
within its walls for a long time, except a
Panorama; and even that had been announced as
'pleasingly instructive,' and I knew too well the
fatal meaning and the leaden import of those
terrible expressions. No, there was no comfort in
the Theatre. It was mysteriously gone, like my own
youth. Unlike my own youth, it might be coming
back some day; but there was little promise of
it."
We did not stay at the Bull during the whole of our visit, comfortable
lodgings in Victoria Street having been secured for us by the courtesy
of Mr. Prall, the landlady of which, from her kindness and consideration
for our comfort, we are pleased to recognize as a veritable "Mrs.
Lirriper."
* * * * *
Among many reminiscences of Charles Dickens obtained at Rochester, the
following are the most noteworthy:--
We had an interesting chat with Mr. Franklin Homan, Auctioneer,
Cabinet-maker, and Upholsterer of High Street, Rochester. Our informant
did a good deal of work for Charles Dickens at Gad's Hill Place, and
remarked "he was one of the nicest customers I ever met in my life--so
thoroughly precise and methodical. If anything had to be done, he knew
exactly what he wanted, and gave his instructions accordingly. He
expected every one who served him to be equally exact and punctual."
The novelist wrote to Mr. Homan from America respecting the furnishing
of two bedrooms, describing in detail how he wished them fitted up--one
was maple, the other white with a red stripe. These rooms are referred
to in another chapter. The curtains separating them from the
dressing-rooms were ordered to be of Indian pattern chintz. When Dickens
came home and saw them complete, he said, "It strikes me as if the room
was about to have its hair cut,--but it's my fault, it must be altered;"
so crimson damask curtains were substituted.
In the little billiard-room near the dining-room was a one-sided couch
standing by the window, which did not seem to please the master of Gad's
Hill Place. He said to Mr. Homan one day, "Whenever I see that couch, it
makes me think the window is squinting." The result was that Mr. Homan
had to make a window-seat instead.
On one occasion, when our informant was waiting in the dining-room for
some orders from Miss Hogarth, he saw Dickens walking in the garden with
a lady, to whom he was telling the story of how as a boy he longed to
live in Gad's Hill Place, and determined to purchase it whenever he had
an opportunity.
Mr. Homan mentioned that the act drop painted by Clarkson Stanfield,
R.A., for _The Lighthouse_ and the scene from _The Frozen Deep_, painted
by the same artist, which adorned the hall at Gad's Hill Place, and
which fetched such enormous sums at the sale, were technically the
property of the purchaser of Tavistock House, but he said, "Perhaps you
would like to have them, Mr. Dickens," and so they continued to be the
property of the novelist.
The valuation for Probate was made by Mr. Homan, and he subsequently
sold for the executors the furniture and other domestic effects at Gad's
Hill Place. The art collection was sold by Messrs. Christie, Manson, and
Woods. There was a very fine cellar of wine, which included some magnums
of port of rare vintage. Mr. Homan purchased a few bottles, and gave one
to a friend, Dr. Tamplin of London, who had been kind to his daughter.
At a dinner-party some time afterwards at the Doctor's, a connoisseur
being present, the magnum in question was placed on the table, the
guests being unaware from whence it came. Reference was made to the
choice quality of the wine. "Yes," said the connoisseur, "it _is_
good--very fine. I never tasted the like before, except once at Gad's
Hill Place."
Mr. Homan recollects seeing among the plate two oak cases which were not
sold, containing the silver figures for dining-table emblematic of
spring, summer, and autumn. These were the presents of a Liverpool
admirer who wished to remain anonymous. The incident is alluded to in
Forster's _Life_, the correspondent being described as "a self-raised
man, attributing his prosperous career to what Dickens's writings had
taught him at its outset of the wisdom of kindness and sympathy for
others, and asking pardon for the liberty he took in hoping that he
might be permitted to offer some acknowledgment of what not only had
cheered and stimulated him through all his life, but had contributed so
much to the success of it." The letter enclosed £500, but Dickens
declined this, intimating to the writer that if he pleased to send him
any small memorial in another form, he would be glad to receive it.
The funeral was conducted by Mr. Homan, who mentioned that Dickens's
instructions in his Will were implicitly followed, as regards privacy
and unostentation. It was an anxious time to him, in consequence of the
changes which were made in the arrangements, the interment being first
suggested to take place at St. Nicholas's Cemetery, then at Shorne, then
at Rochester Cathedral, and finally at Westminster Abbey. The mourners,
together with the remains, travelled early in the morning by South
Eastern Railway from Higham Station to Charing Cross, where a
procession, consisting of three mourning-coaches and a hearse, was
quietly formed. There was neither show nor public demonstration of any
kind. On reaching Westminster Abbey, about half-past nine o'clock, the
procession was met by Dean Stanley in the Cloisters, who performed the
funeral service. A journalist being by accident in the Abbey at the time
of the funeral, Mr. Homan remarked that he became almost frantic when he
heard who had just been buried, at having missed such an opportunity.
Mr. Homan possesses several souvenirs of Gad's Hill Place, presented to
him by the family, including Charles Dickens's walking-stick, and
photographs of the interior and exterior of the house and the châlet.
* * * * *
We were courteously received by the Rev. Robert Whiston, M.A., who
resides at the Old Palace, a beautiful seventeenth-century house,
abounding with oak panelling and carving, on Boley Hill, bequeathed in
1674, by Mr. Richard Head, after the death of his wife, to the then
Bishop of Rochester and his successors, who were "to hold the same so
long as the church was governed by Protestant Bishops." This residence
was sold by permission of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, together
with the mansion at Brinley, in order to help to pay for the new palace
of Danbury in Essex.
Mr. Whiston was a friend of Charles Dickens, and is one of the oldest
inhabitants of Rochester. He was formerly Head-Master of the Cathedral
Grammar, or King's, School of Henry VIII., an office which he resigned
in 1877. Many years previously, Mr. Whiston published _Cathedral Trusts
and their Fulfilment_, which ran through several editions, and was
immediately followed by his dismissal from his mastership, on the ground
that he had published "false, scandalous, and libellous" statements, and
had libelled "the Chapter of Rochester and other Chapters, and also the
Bishop." Much litigation followed--appeals to the Court of Chancery,
the Court of Queen's Bench, and Doctors' Commons, which resulted in his
replacement in office; and then a second dismissal, followed by his
pleading his own cause for five days at Doctors' Commons against eminent
counsel, and after three years of litigation he was fully reinstated in
his office. The result at Rochester, for which Mr. Whiston contended,
was "an increase of £19 for each of the twenty scholars, and of £35 for
each of the four students, a total of £520 a year, and the restoration
of the six bedesmen of the Cathedral, with £14 13_s._ 4_d._ a year each,
who had disappeared since 1810, making altogether £608 a year." Reforms
were effected at other cathedrals, and handsome testimonials--one from
Australia--were presented to Mr. Whiston.
A characteristic paper, entitled "The History of a certain Grammar
School," in No. 72 of _Household Words_, dated 9th August, 1851, gives a
sketch of Mr. Whiston's labours, and of the reforms which he effected.
He is thus referred to:--
"But the Reverend Adolphus Hardhead was not merely a scholar and a
schoolmaster. He had fought his way against disadvantages, had gained a
moderate independence by the fruits of early exertions and constant but
by no means sordid economy; and, while disinterested enough to
undervalue abundance, was too wise not to know the value of money. He
was an undoubted financialist, and never gave a farthing without doing
real good, because he always ascertained the purpose and probable effect
of his charity beforehand. While he cautiously shunned the idle and
undeserving, he would work like a slave, with and for those who would
work for themselves; and he would smooth the way for those who had in
the first instance been their own pioneers, and would help a man who
had once been successful, to attain a yet greater success."
Anthony Trollope, in _The Warden_, also thus refers to this
gentleman:--"The struggles of Mr. Whiston have met with sympathy and
support. Men are beginning to say that these things must be looked
into."
_Punch_ has also immortalized Mr. Whiston, for in the issue of 29th
January, 1853, there is a burlesque account with designs of "A stained
glass window for Rochester Cathedral." The design is divided into
compartments; each containing a representation in the mediæval fashion
of a "Fytte" in "Ye Gestes of Maister Whyston ye Confessour."
Mr. Whiston had dined at Gad's Hill several times, and said that nothing
could be more charming than Dickens's powers as a host. Some years after
his death, by a fortunate circumstance, a large parcel of letters,
written by the novelist, came into the hands of Mr. Whiston, who had the
pleasure of handing them to Miss Hogarth and Miss Dickens, by whom they
were published in the collection of letters of Charles Dickens.
* * * * *
Thomas Millen of Rochester informed us that he knew Charles Dickens. His
(Millen's) father was a hop-farmer, and about the years 1864-5 lived at
Bridgewood House, on the main road from Rochester to Maidstone. One
afternoon in the autumn, Dickens, accompanied by Miss Hogarth and his
daughters, Mary and Kate, drove along the road, and stopped to admire a
pear tree which was covered with ripe fruit. Millen happened to be in
the garden at the time, and while noticing the carriage, Dickens spoke
to him, and referred to the very fine fruit. Millen said, "Will you
have some, sir?" to which Dickens replied, "Thank you, you are very
good, I will." He gave him some pears and some roses. Dickens then said,
"You have not the pleasure of knowing me, and I have not the pleasure of
knowing you. I am Charles Dickens; and when you pass Gad's Hill, I shall
take it as a favour if you will look in and see my place." Millen
replied, "I feel it to be a great honour to speak to you, sir. I have
read most of your works, and I think _David Copperfield_ is the
master-piece. I hope to avail myself of your kind invitation some day."
Dickens laughed, wished Millen "Good-day," and the carriage drove on
towards Maidstone.
"Some little time after," said Millen, "I was going to visit an uncle at
Gravesend, and drove over with a one-horse trap by way of Gad's Hill. As
I came near the place, I saw Mr. Dickens in the road. He said, 'So you
are here,' and I mentioned where I was going. He took me in, and we went
through the tunnel, and by the cedars, to the châlet, which stood in the
shrubbery in front of the house. He showed me his work there--a
manuscript on the table, and also some proofs. They were part of _Our
Mutual Friend_, which was then appearing in monthly numbers; and on that
morning a proof of one of the illustrations had arrived from Mr. Marcus
Stone. It was the one in which 'Miss Wren fixes her idea.' I was then
about sixteen or seventeen, and Dickens said, 'You are setting out in
life; mind _you_ always fix your idea.' He asked me what I was going to
be, and I said a farmer. He said, 'Better be that than an author or
poet;' and after I had had two glasses of wine, he bade me 'good-bye.'"
* * * * *
We were kindly favoured with an interview by the Misses Drage, of No. 1
Minor Canon Row, daughters of the late Rev. W. H. Drage, who was Curate
of St. Mary's Church, Chatham, from 1820 to 1828, and lived during that
time in apartments at No. 3 Ordnance Terrace, next door to the Dickens
family. Afterwards their father was Vicar of St. Margaret's, Rochester,
for many years, and resided in their present home. About the year 1850,
the Vicar, being interested in the daughter of one of his parishioners,
whom he was anxious to get admitted into a public institution in
London--a penitentiary or something of the kind--wrote to Miss (now the
Baroness) Burdett Coutts, who was a patroness or founder, or who
occupied some position of influence in connection therewith. In answer
to the reverend gentleman's application, a letter was received from
Charles Dickens, then residing at Devonshire Terrace, who appeared to be
associated with Miss Burdett Coutts in the management of the
institution, proposing to call at Minor Canon Row on a certain day and
hour. The letter then concluded with these remarkable words:--"I trust
to my childish remembrance for putting your initials correctly."
The letter was properly addressed "The Rev. _W. H._ Drage," and it is
interesting to record this circumstance as showing Dickens's habitual
precision and excellent memory. The future novelist was about eleven
years old when he left Chatham (1823), consequently a period of
twenty-seven years or more must have elapsed since he knew his father's
neighbour as Curate there; yet, notwithstanding the multiplicity and
diversity of his occupations during the interim, his recollection after
this long period was perfectly accurate.
It is scarcely necessary to add that the interview took place (probably
Dickens came down from London specially), and that the Vicar obtained
admission for his _protégée_. The younger Miss Drage, who was in the
room at the time of Dickens's visit, particularly noticed what a
beautiful head the novelist's was, and in her enthusiasm she made a
rough sketch of it while he was talking to her father.
In conversation with the present Mr. Charles Dickens on a subsequent
occasion regarding this circumstance, he informed me that there was an
institution of the kind referred to, "A Home," at Shepherd's Bush, in
which his father took much interest. Forster also says in the _Life_
that this Home "largely and regularly occupied his time for several
years."
* * * * *
We heard from a trustworthy authority, _Y. Z._, at Rochester, some
particulars respecting an interesting custom at Gad's Hill Place. On New
Year's Eve there was always a dinner-party with friends, and a dance,
and games afterwards. Some of the games were called "Buzz," "Crambo,"
"Spanish Merchant," etc. Claret-cup and other refreshments were
introduced later, and at twelve o'clock all the servants came into the
entrance-hall. Charles Dickens then went in, shook hands with them all
round, wished them a Happy New Year ("A happy new year, God bless us
all"), and gave each half-a-sovereign. This custom was maintained for
many years, until a man-servant--who used to travel with
Dickens--disgracefully betrayed his trust,--robbed his master, in
fact,--when it was discontinued, and the name of the man who had thus
disgraced himself was never allowed to be mentioned at Gad's Hill.
The same authority spoke of the long walks that Dickens regularly took
after breakfast--usually six miles,--but he gave these up after the
railway accident at Staplehurst, which, it will be remembered,
occurred, on the "fatal anniversary," the 9th June, 1865. During one of
these walks, he fell in with a man driving a cart loaded with manure,
and had a long chat with him, the sort of thing he frequently did (said
our informant) in order to become acquainted with the brogue and
feelings of the working people. When Dickens went on his way, one of the
man's fellow-labourers said to him, "Do you know that that was Charles
Dickens who spoke to you?" "I don't know who it was," replied the man,
"but he was a d----d good fellow, for he gave me a shilling."
Our informant also referred to a conversation between Dickens and some
of his friends at Gad's Hill, respecting the unhappy marriages of
actors. Twenty such marriages were instanced, and out of these only two
turned out happily. He said that Charles Dickens at home was a quiet,
unassuming man. He remembers on one occasion his saying, in relation to
a war which was then going on, "What must the feelings of a soldier be,
when alone and dying on the battle-field, and leaving his wife and
children far away for ever?"
* * * * *
A TRUE GHOST STORY RELATING TO MISS HAVISHAM'S HOUSE.
"I live in an old red-brick mansion, nearly
covered with ivy--one of those picturesque
dwellings with high-pitched roofs and ornamental
gables, which were scattered broadcast over
England in the days of good Queen Bess. Every
stranger looking at it exclaims, 'That house must
have a history and a ghost!' Many a story has been
told of the ghost which has from time to time been
seen, or said to have been seen, within its walls;
and many a servant has, from fear, refused service
in this so-called haunted house.
"On the 28th May, one thousand six hundred and
sixty, Charles the Second sojourned and slept
here. This being the eve of 'The Restoration,' a
new name was given to the then old house, which
name it has since retained. Charles, having
knighted the owner (Sir Francis Clarke), departed
early the next morning for London.
"There are secret passages _in_ the house, and,
under ground, _from_ the house. From the room in
which the king slept, a secret passage through one
of the lower panels of the wainscot, leads to
various parts of the house. This passage is so
well concealed that I occupied the house some
years before it was discovered. I had occasion to
make a plan of the house, and the inside and
outside not agreeing, disclosed the space occupied
by the unexplored passage. The jackdaws had
forestalled me in my discovery, and had had
undisturbed possession for two centuries, having
got access through a hole under the eaves of the
roof. They had deposited _several bushels_ of
sticks. They had not been the only tenants, as
skeletons and mummies of birds, etc., were also
found.
"I came into possession of this old house in
December 1875, and on the 27th of April, 1876,
slept in it for the first time. At ten o'clock on
that night, my family retired to rest; having some
letters to write, I sat up later. At a quarter to
twelve, I was startled by a loud noise--a sort of
rumbling sound, which appeared to proceed from the
hall. I left my writing and went to the hall, and
found that the noise proceeded from the staircase,
but I could see nothing unusual.
"The staircase is one of those so often described
as being 'wide enough to drive a carriage and pair
up,' with massive oak posts and balustrades. The
walls are covered with tapestry, given to the
house by 'The Merry Monarch,' after his visit. An
oak chest or two, and some high-backed chairs on
the landings, picture to one a suitable habitation
for a ghost. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I had
no belief in ghosts, and commenced an
investigation of this extraordinary noise.
"Could it be rats, or mice, or owls? No; the noise
was ten times louder than could possibly proceed
from these creatures; besides, I knew there were
no rats in the house. The clever builder of the
house had filled all the space between the
ceilings and floors with silver sand, which
rendered it impossible for a rat or mouse to make
passages. To prick a hole in a ceiling is to have
a continuous stream of sand run down, as from an
hour-glass.
"The noise was repeated, but much louder (two
drum-sticks upon a large drum would not have made
more noise), and I was able to localize it, still
I could see nothing. I thought some one had fallen
on the stairs, and I shouted 'Who is there?' A
reply came 'Hush!'--first softly, and then very
loud--too loud for a human voice. As no person was
visible, I was puzzled, and went up-stairs by a
back staircase, and ascertained that none of my
family had left their bedrooms, and that certainly
no trick was being played me.
"The same rumbling, rolling sound was repeated;
and as I stood on the top of the great staircase,
I felt a little uncomfortable, but not frightened.
The noise seemed to proceed from a large carved
oak coffer or chest (as old as the house), which
stood on a landing, about half-way up the stairs.
I approached the chest, and from it appeared to
come again the word 'Hush!' Could it be the wind
whistling through a crack? No; it was far too loud
for any such explanation. I opened the lid of the
chest and found it empty. Again the noise, now
from _under_ the chest. I was just strong enough
to move the chest; I turned it over and slid it
down the stairs on to the next landing. Again the
noise, and again the 'Hush!' which now appeared to
come from the floor where the coffer had stood.
"I felt I would rather have had some one with me
to assist in my investigation, and to join me in
making the acquaintance of the ghost; but,
although my sensations were probably the most
uncomfortable I ever experienced, I was
determined, if possible, to unearth the mystery.
"The light was imperfect, and I went to another
part of the house for a candle to enable me to
examine the floor. In my absence the noise was
repeated louder than ever, and not unlike distant
thunder. On my return, I was saluted with 'Hush!'
which I felt convinced came from a voice
immediately under the floor. By the light of the
candle I examined the dark oak boards, and
discovered what appeared to be a trap door about
two feet six inches square. The floor at some time
had been varnished, and the cracks, or joints of
the trap, had been filled and sealed with the
varnish. I now hoped I had found the habitation of
my troublesome and noisy guest. I procured a
chisel and cut the varnished joint, and found that
there was a trap door, as I supposed. By the aid
of a long screwdriver I was able to move the door,
but at that moment a repetition of the noise,
immediately under me, made me hesitate for a
moment to try and raise it. With feelings better
imagined than described, I raised the lid, and
looked into a dark chasm. All was still, and I
heard the cathedral bell tolling the hour of
midnight. A long African spear was in the corner
near me, and I struck this into the opening. I
tied a string to the candlestick to lower it into
the opening, but at this moment I was startled,
and was for the first time nervous, or I may say,
frightened; but this had better remain for another
chapter.
"So far I have not in the smallest degree
exaggerated or overdrawn any one of the matters I
have recounted. Every word has been written with
the greatest care to truth and accuracy.
"S. T. A."
* * * * *
To cut our ghost story short, without adding another chapter, Mr.
Aveling, on looking into the dark chasm by the meagre light of the
lowered candle, beheld, to his amazement, the reflection of his own face
in the water of a large cistern underneath the staircase, the house
having formerly been supplied from the "large brewery" a short distance
off. The unearthly noise was no doubt caused by air in the pipes,
through which the water rushed when suddenly turned on by the brewers,
who were working late at night. In _Great Expectations_ it is stated
that:--"The brewery buildings had a little lane of communication with
it" [the courtyard of Satis House], "and the wooden gates of that lane
stood open" [at the time of Pip's first visit, when Estella showed him
over the premises], "and all the brewery beyond stood open, away to the
high enclosing wall; and all was empty and disused. The cold wind seemed
to blow colder there, than outside the gate; and it made a shrill noise
in howling in and out at the open sides of the brewery, like the noise
of wind in the rigging of a ship at sea."
FOOTNOTES:
[4] Mr. Aveling subsequently informed me that the vessel in which the
king took his departure continued to be used in the Royal Navy for many
years as a lighter--its name being altered to the "Royal Escape."
Afterwards it was used as a watch-vessel in the Coastguard service at
Chatham, and was eventually broken up at Sheerness Dockyard so recently
as 1876.
[5] "A Perambulation of Kent: Conteining the Description, Hystorie, and
Customes of that Shire. Written in the yeere 1570 by William Lambarde of
Lincoln's Inne Gent."
CHAPTER IV.
ROCHESTER CASTLE.
"I took up my hat, and went out, climbed to the
top of the old Castle, and looked over the windy
hills that slope down to the Medway."--_The Seven
Poor Travellers._
TO the lover of Dickens, both the Castle and Cathedral of Rochester
appeal with almost equal interest. The Castle, however, which stands on
an eminence on the right bank of the river Medway, close to the bridge,
claims prior attention, and a few lines must therefore be devoted to an
epitome of its history in the ante-Pickwickian days.
Tradition says that the first castle was erected by command of Julius
Cæsar, when Cassivelaunus was Governor of Britain, "in order to awe the
Britons." It was called the "Castle of the Medway," or "the Kentishmen's
Castle," and it seems, with other antagonisms, to have awed the
unfortunate Britons pretty effectively, for it lasted until decay and
dissolution came to it and to them, as to all things. It was replaced by
a new castle built by Hrofe (509), which in its turn succumbed to the
ravages of time.
[Illustration: The Castle from Rochester Bridge]
Gundulph, Bishop of Rochester (1077), whose name still survives here and
there in connection with charities and in other ways in the "ancient
city," appears to be entitled to the credit of having commenced to build
the present massive square Tower or Keep, the surviving portion of a
magnificent whole, sometimes called "Gundulph's Tower," "towards which
he was to expend the sum of sixty pounds," and this structure ranks as
one of the most perfect examples of Norman architecture in existence.
Other authorities ascribe the erection to Odo, Bishop of Bayeux and Earl
of Kent, half-brother to William the Conqueror, who is described by
Hasted as "a turbulent and ambitious prelate, who aimed at nothing less
than the popedom." Later, in the reign of William Rufus, it was
accounted "the strongest and most important castle of England." It was
so important that Lambarde, in _A Perambulation of Kent_, says:--"It was
much in the eie of such as were authors of troubles following within
the realme, so that from time to time it had a part almost in every
Tragedie."
Mr. Robert Collins, in his compact and useful _Visitors' Handbook of
Rochester and Neighbourhood_, quoting from another ancient historian,
says that "In 1264, King Henry III. [who in 1251 held a grand tournament
in the Castle] 'commanded that the Shyriffe of Kent do set aboute to
finish and complete the great Tower which Gundulph had left imperfect.'"
About 1463, Edward IV. repaired part of the Castle, after which it was
allowed to fall into decay. The instructions to the "shyriffe" were no
doubt necessary; for although £60 would probably go a great way in the
time of Bishop Gundulph, the modern æsthetic builder would do very
little indeed for that sum, towards the erection of such an impregnable
fortress as Rochester Castle, the walls of which vary from eight to
thirteen feet in thickness, whatever his progenitor may have done in
1077.
The Keep--the last resort of the garrison when all the outworks were
taken--is considered so beautiful that it is selected, under the article
"Castle" in the last edition of the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, as an
illustration of Norman architecture, showing "an embattled parapet often
admitting of chambers and staircases being constructed," and showing
also "embattled turrets carried one story higher than the parapet."
There is also a fine woodcut of the Castle at p. 198 of vol. v. of that
work.
The Keep is seventy feet square and a hundred feet high, built of the
native Kentish ragstone and Caen stone; and the adamantine mortar or
cement used in its construction was made with sand, evidently procured
at the seaside some distance from Rochester, for it contains remains of
cardium, pecten, solen, and other marine shells, which would not be
found in river sand. Mr. Roach Smith suggested that probably the sand
may have been procured from "Cockle-shell Hard," near Sheerness. He
called our attention to the fact that in Norman mortar sand is
predominant, and in Roman mortar lime or chalk.
[Illustration: Rochester Castle]
The roof and the chambers are gone,--the Keep remains as a mere
shell,--and where bishops, kings, and barons came and went, flocks of
the common domestic pigeon, in countless numbers, fly about and make
their home and multiply. One almost regrets the freedom which these
graceful birds possess, although to grudge freedom to a pigeon is like
grudging sunshine to a flower. But though the damage to the walls is
really trifling, as they will stand for centuries to come, still the
litter and mess which the birds naturally make is considerable and
unsightly, and decidedly out of keeping in such a magnificent ruin. The
pigeons exhibit what takes place when a species becomes dominant to the
exclusion of other species, as witness the pest of the rabbits in New
Zealand. With profound respect to his Worship the Mayor and the
Corporation of Rochester, to whom the Castle and grounds now belong, the
writer of these lines, as a naturalist, ventures to suggest that the
Castle should be left to the jackdaws, its natural and doubtless its
original tenants, which, although of higher organization, have been
driven out by superior numbers in the "struggle for existence," and for
whom it is a much more appropriate habitat in keeping with all
traditions; and further, that the said pigeons be forthwith made into
pies for the use and behoof of the deserving poor of the ancient city of
Rochester.
Mention has been made of the fact that the Castle and grounds are the
property of the Corporation of Rochester. They were acquired by purchase
in 1883 from the Earl of Jersey for £8,000, and the occasion was
celebrated by great civic rejoicings.[6] The Corporation are not only to
be congratulated on the wisdom of their purchase ("a thing of beauty is
a joy for ever"), but also on the excellent manner in which the grounds
are maintained--pigeons excepted. The gardens, with closely-cut lawns,
abound with euonymus, laurustinus, bay, and other evergreens, together
with many choice flowers. The single red, or Deptford pink (_Dianthus
Armeria_), grows wild on the walls of the Castle. There is a tasteful
statuette of her Majesty, under a Gothic canopy, near the entrance,
which records her Jubilee in 1887. The inscriptions on three of the four
corners are appropriately chosen from Lord Tennyson's _Carmen
Sæculare_:--
To commemorate the
=Jubilee of Queen Victoria=,
1887.
L. LEVY, MAYOR.
"Fifty years of ever-broadening commerce!"
"Fifty years of ever-brightening science!"
"Fifty years of ever-widening empire!"
There is free admission to the grounds through a handsome modern Norman
gateway, but a trifling charge of a few pence is made for permission to
enter the Keep, which has convenient steps ascending to the top. From
the summit of the Keep, there are magnificent views of the valley of the
river Medway, the adjacent hills, Rochester, Chatham, and the vicinity.
The Cathedral, Jasper's Gatehouse, and Restoration House, are also
noteworthy objects to the lover of Dickens. As Mr. Philips Bevan says,
and as we verified, the views inside at midday, when the sun is
streaming down, are "very peculiar and beautiful."
Dickens's first and last great works are both associated with the
Castle, and it is referred to in several other of his writings. We can
fancy, more than sixty years ago, the eager and enthusiastic
Pickwickians, in company with their newly-made acquaintance, Mr. Alfred
Jingle, seated outside the four-horse coach,--the "Commodore," driven
possibly by "Old Chumley,"--dashing over old Rochester Bridge, to "the
lively notes of the guard's key-bugle," when the sight of the Castle
first broke upon them.
"'Magnificent ruin!' said Mr. Augustus Snodgrass,
with all the poetic fervour that distinguished
him, when they came in sight of the fine old
Castle.
"'What a study for an antiquarian!' were the very
words which fell from Mr. Pickwick's mouth, as he
applied his telescope to his eye.
"'Ah, fine place!' said the stranger, 'glorious
pile--frowning walls--tottering arches--dark
nooks--crumbling staircases--'"
Little did poor Mr. Winkle think that within twenty-four hours _his_
feeling of admiration for Rochester Castle would be turned into
astonishment, for does not the chronicle say that "if the upper tower of
Rochester Castle had suddenly walked from its foundation and stationed
itself opposite the coffee-room window [of the Bull Hotel], Mr. Winkle's
surprise would have been as nothing compared with the perfect
astonishment with which he had heard this address" (referring of course
to the insult to Dr. Slammer, and the challenge in the matter of the
duel).
It was on the occasion of "a visit to the Castle" very soon afterwards
that Mr. Winkle confided in, and sought the good offices of, his friend
Mr. Snodgrass, in the "affair of honour" which was to take place at
"sunset, in a lonely field beyond Fort Pitt." Poor fellow! how eagerly
he tried, under a mask of the most perfect candour, and how miserably
he failed, to arouse the energies of his friend to avert the impending
catastrophe.
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF ROCHESTER CASTLE]
"'Snodgrass,' he said, stopping suddenly, 'do
_not_ let me be baulked in this matter--do _not_
give information to the local authorities--do
_not_ obtain the assistance of several peace
officers to take either me or Doctor Slammer of
the 97th Regiment, at present quartered in Chatham
Barracks, into custody, and thus prevent this
duel;--I say, do _not_.'
"Mr. Snodgrass seized his friend's hand as he
enthusiastically replied, 'Not for worlds!'
"A thrill passed over Mr. Winkle's frame, as the
conviction that he had nothing to hope from his
friend's fears, and that he was destined to become
an animated target, rushed forcibly upon him."
The state of the case having been formally explained to Mr. Snodgrass,
they make arrangements, hire "a case of satisfaction pistols, with the
satisfactory accompaniments of powder, ball, and caps," and "the two
friends returned to their inn." The next ground which they traversed
together to pursue the subject was at Fort Pitt. We will follow them
presently.
In _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_ there is no direct reference to the
Castle itself, but the engraving of it, with the Cathedral in the
background, after the pretty sketch by Mr. Luke Fildes, R.A., will ever
be associated with that beautiful fragment.
Another reference is contained in the preface to _Nicholas Nickleby_,
where Dickens says:--"I cannot call to mind now how I came to hear about
Yorkshire schools when I was a not very robust child, sitting in
by-places near Rochester Castle, with a head full of 'Partridge,'
'Strap,' 'Tom Pipes,' and 'Sancho Panza.'"
A sympathetic notice of the Castle is also contained in the _Seven Poor
Travellers_. It begins:--
"Sooth to say, he [Time] did an active stroke of
work in Rochester in the old days of the Romans,
and the Saxons, and the Normans, and down to the
times of King John, when the rugged Castle--I will
not undertake to say how many hundreds of years
old then--was abandoned to the centuries of
weather which have so defaced the dark apertures
in its walls, that the ruin looks as if the rooks
and daws had picked its eyes out."
And this, the most touching reference of all, occurs in "One Man in a
Dockyard," contributed by Dickens[7] to _Household Words_ in 1851:--
"There was Rochester Castle, to begin with. I
surveyed the massive ruin from the Bridge, and
thought what a brief little practical joke I
seemed to be, in comparison with its solidity,
stature, strength, and length of life. I went
inside; and, standing in the solemn shadow of its
walls, looking up at the blue sky, its only
remaining roof, (to the disturbance of the crows
and jackdaws who garrison the venerable fortress
now,) calculated how much wall of that thickness
I, or any other man, could build in his whole
life,--say from eight years old to eighty,--and
what a ridiculous result would be produced. I
climbed the rugged staircase, stopping now and
then to peep at great holes where the rafters and
floors were once,--bare as toothless gums now,--or
to enjoy glimpses of the Medway through dreary
apertures like sockets without eyes; and, looking
from the Castle ramparts on the Old Cathedral, and
on the crumbling remains of the old Priory, and on
the row of staid old red-brick houses where the
Cathedral dignitaries live, and on the shrunken
fragments of one of the old City gates, and on the
old trees with their high tops below me, felt
quite apologetic to the scene in general for my
own juvenility and insignificance. One of the
river boatmen had told me on the bridge, (as
country folks do tell of such places,) that in the
old times, when those buildings were in progress,
a labourer's wages 'were a penny a day, and enough
too.' Even as a solitary penny was to their whole
cost, it appeared to me, was the utmost strength
and exertion of one man towards the labour of
their erection."
Dickens always took his friends to the Keep of Rochester Castle. He
naturally considered it as one of the sights of the old city. It was
equally attractive to his friends, for a curious adventure is recorded
in Forster's _Life_, in connection with a visit which the poet
Longfellow made there in 1842, and which he recollected a quarter of a
century afterwards, and recounted to Forster during a second visit,
together with a curious experience in the slums of London with Dickens.
The first of these adventures is thus described by Forster:--"One of
them was a day at Rochester, when, met by one of those prohibitions
which are the wonder of visitors and the shame of Englishmen, we
overleapt gates and barriers, and setting at defiance repeated threats
of all the terrors of law, coarsely expressed to us by the custodian of
the place, explored minutely the castle ruins." Happily such a
circumstance could not now take place, for, by the present excellent
regulations of the Corporation of the city of Rochester, every visitor
can explore the Castle and grounds to his heart's content.
On arriving at either railway station, Strood or Rochester Bridge, the
Castle is the first object to claim attention. Our attention is
constantly directed to it during our stay in the pleasant city; it is a
landmark when we are on the tramp; and it is the last object to fade
from our view as we regretfully take our departure.
* * * * *
My fellow-tramp favours me with the following note:--
THE DEDICATION OF ROCHESTER CASTLE TO THE PUBLIC.
"I well remember the day of public rejoicing in the picturesque city of
Rochester, on the occasion of the ceremony of formally presenting the
old Castle and grounds to the inhabitants. I had received instructions
from the manager of the _Graphic_ newspaper to make sketches of the
principal incidents in connection with the day's proceedings, and I
reached my destination just in time to obtain from the authorities some
idea of the nature of those proceedings. With this object in view, I
made my way through the surging crowd to the Guildhall, where, in one of
the Corporation rooms, I found a large assembly of local magnates in
official attire, including the Mayor, who was vainly endeavouring to
properly adjust his sword, an operation in which I had the honour of
assisting, much to his Worship's satisfaction, I hope.
[Illustration: Rochester Castle and the Medway]
"The streets of Rochester were thronged with excited people, and the
houses were gaily decked with flags and bunting. When everything was
ready, an imposing procession was formed, and proceeded to the Castle
grounds, preceded by a military band; on arriving there, an address was
read from the pagoda to an attentive audience, the subsequent
proceedings being enlivened by musical strains.
"It had been announced that, in the evening, the old Keep would be
illuminated by the electric light, and I made a point of being present
to witness the unusual sight. The night was very dark, and the ivy-clad
ruin could barely be distinguished; presently, a burst of music from the
band was immediately followed by a remarkably strong beam of light,
which shot into the darkness with such effect as to fairly startle those
present. Then it rested on the grey walls of the huge pile, bathing in
brightness the massive stones and clinging ivy, the respective colours
of each being vividly apparent. But the most striking feature was yet to
come. The hundreds of pigeons which inhabited the nooks and crannies of
the old Keep, being considerably alarmed by this sudden illumination of
their domain, flew with one accord round and round their ancient
tenement, now in the full blaze of light, now lost in the inky darkness
beyond, and fluttering about in a state of the utmost bewilderment.
Methinks even Mr. Pickwick, had he been present in the flesh, would have
been equally amazed at this remarkable spectacle."
F. G. K.
FOOTNOTES:
[6] Mr. Kitton was, by an interesting coincidence, present at the
ceremony above referred to, and he has kindly given his impressions
thereon, which appear at the end of this chapter.
[7] This was a joint article; the description of the works of the
dockyard being by R. H. Horne, and that of the fortifications and
country around by Charles Dickens.
CHAPTER V.
ROCHESTER CATHEDRAL.
"That same afternoon, the massive grey square
tower of an old Cathedral rises before the sight
of a jaded traveller. The bells are going for
daily Vesper Service, and he must needs attend it,
one would say, from his haste to reach the open
Cathedral door. The choir are getting on their
sullied white robes, in a hurry, when he arrives
among them, gets on his own robe, and falls into
the procession filing in to Service. Then, the
Sacristan locks the iron-barred gates that divide
the Sanctuary from the Chancel, and all of the
procession having scuttled into their places, hide
their faces; and then the intoned words, 'WHEN THE
WICKED MAN--' rise among the groins of arches and
beams of roof, awakening muttered
thunder."--_Edwin Drood._
THE readers of Dickens are first introduced to Rochester Cathedral, in
the early pages of the immortal _Pickwick Papers_, by that audacious
_raconteur_, Mr. Alfred Jingle:--
"Old Cathedral too--earthy smell--pilgrims' feet
worn away the old steps--little Saxon
doors--confessionals like money-takers' boxes at
theatres--queer customers those monks--Popes, and
Lord Treasurers, and all sorts of old fellows,
with great red faces, and broken noses, turning up
every day--buff jerkins
too--matchlocks--sarcophagus--fine place--old
legends too--strange stories: capital."
But it was through the medium of _Edwin Drood_, and under the masked
name of Cloisterham, that all the novel-reading world beyond the
"ancient city" first recognized Rochester Cathedral--and indeed the
ancient city too--as having been elevated to a degree of interest and
importance far beyond that imparted to it by its own venerable history
and ecclesiastical associations, numerous and varied as they are. The
early portion of the story introduces us to Cloisterham in imperishable
language:--
[Illustration: Rochester Cathedral]
"An ancient city Cloisterham, and no meet
dwelling-place for any one with hankerings after
the noisy world. . . . A drowsy city Cloisterham,
whose inhabitants seem to suppose, with an
inconsistency more strange than rare, that all its
changes lie behind it, and that there are no more
to come. . . . In a word, a city of another and a
bygone time is Cloisterham, with its hoarse
cathedral bell, its hoarse rooks hovering about
the cathedral tower, its hoarser and less distinct
rooks in the stalls far beneath. . . ."
The particulars in this chapter mainly relate to _The Mystery of Edwin
Drood_, which Longfellow thought "certainly one of Dickens's most
beautiful works, if not the most beautiful of all," but a few words may
not be inappropriate respecting some of the principal events connected
with the Cathedral. It was founded[8] A.D. 604, by Ethelbert, King of
Kent, and the first bishop of the See (Bishop Justus) was ordained by
Augustine, the Archbishop of the Britons. The See of Rochester is
therefore, with the exception of Canterbury, at once the most ancient
and also the smallest in England.
The Cathedral, as well as the city, suffered from the attacks of
Ethelred, King of Mercia, and in 1075, "when Arnot, a monk of Bec, came
to the See, it was in a most deplorable condition." Bishop Gundulph, who
succeeded him, and by whose efforts the Castle was erected, replaced the
old English church by a Norman one (1080), and made other improvements.
The Cathedral suffered from fire in 1138 and 1179. Its great north
transept was built in 1235, and the great south transept in 1240. In
1423, the parish altar of St. Nicholas, in the nave, was removed to a
new Church for the citizens on the north side of the Cathedral. In 1470,
the great west window was inserted. The Norman west front has a richly
sculptured door of five receding arches, containing figures of the
Saviour and the twelve apostles, and statues of Henry I. and his Queen,
Matilda. There are monuments in the Cathedral to St. William of Perth, a
baker of that town, who was murdered near here by his servant, on his
way to the Holy Land (1201), and was canonized, to Bishop Gundulph,
Bishop John de Sheppey, Bishop de Merton (the founder of Merton College,
Oxford), and to many others.
According to Mr. Phillips Bevan, "the chapter-house is remarkable for
its magnificent Decorated Door (about 1344), of which there is a
fac-simile at the Crystal Palace. The figures represent the Christian
and the Jewish Churches, surrounded by Fathers and Angels. The figure at
the top is the pure soul for whom the angels are supposed to be
praying."
Various alterations and additions have been made from time to time, the
last of which appears to be the central tower, which is terribly mean
and inappropriate, and altogether out of place with the ancient
surroundings. It was built by Cottingham in 1825.
We pass, at various times, several pleasant hours in the Cathedral and
its precincts, admiring the beautiful Norman work, and recalling most
delightful memories of Charles Dickens and his associations therewith.
[Illustration: Rochester Cathedral Interior]
Among the many friends we made at Rochester, was Mr. Syms, the
respected Manager of the Gas Company, and an old resident in the city.
To this gentleman we are indebted for several reminiscences of Dickens
and his works. He fancies that _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_ owed its
origin to the following strange local event that happened many years
ago. A well-to-do person, a bachelor (who lived somewhere near the site
of the present Savings Bank in High St., Rochester, Chatham end), was
the guardian and trustee of a nephew (a minor), who was the inheritor of
a large property. Business, pleasure, or a desire to seek health, took
the nephew to the West Indies, from whence he returned somewhat
unexpectedly. After his return he suddenly disappeared, and was supposed
to have gone another voyage, but no one ever saw or heard of him again,
and the matter was soon forgotten. When, however, certain excavations
were being made for some improvements or additions to the Bank, the
skeleton of a young man was discovered; and local tradition couples the
circumstance with the probability of the murder of the nephew by the
uncle.
Mr. Syms thought that the "Crozier," which is probably a set off to the
"Mitre," the orthodox hotel where Mr. Datchery put up with his
"portmanteau," was probably the city coffee-house, an old hotel of the
coaching days, which stood on the site now occupied by the London County
Bank. "It was a hotel of a most retiring disposition," and "business was
chronically slack at the 'Crozier,'" which probably accounts for its
dissolution. Another suggestion is that the "Crozier" may have been "The
Old Crown," a fifteenth-century house, which was pulled down in 1864. He
could not identify the "Tilted Wagon," the "cool establishment on the
top of a hill."
It is generally admitted that "Mr. Thomas Sapsea, Auctioneer, &c.," was
a compound of two originals well known in Rochester--a Mr. B. and a Mr.
F., who had many of the characteristics of the quondam Mayor of
Cloisterham. Mr. Sapsea's house is the fine old timbered building
opposite Eastgate House, which has been previously alluded to.
The "Travellers' Twopenny" of _Edwin Drood_, where Deputy, _alias_
Winks, lodged, Mr. Syms thought to have been a cheap lodging-house well
known in that locality, which stood at the junction of Frog Alley and
Crow Lane, originally called "The Duck," and subsequently "Kitt's
Lodging-house." But, like less interesting and more important relics of
the past, this has disappeared, to make way for modern improvements. It
had been partly burnt down before. To satisfy ourselves, we go over the
ground, which is near Mr. Franklin Homan's furniture establishment.
We are reminded, in reference to _Edwin Drood_, that the chief tenor
singer never heads the procession of choristers. That place of honour
belongs to the smaller boys of the choir. An enquiry from us, as to what
was the opinion of the townsfolk generally respecting Dickens, elicited
the reply that they thought him at times "rather masterful."
We are most attentively shown over the Cathedral and its surroundings by
Mr. Miles, the venerable verger. This faithful and devoted official, who
began at the bottom of the ladder as a choir boy in the sacred edifice
at the commencement of the present century, is much respected, and has
recently celebrated his golden wedding. Few can therefore be more
closely identified with the growth and development of its current
history. Pleasant and instructive it is to hear him recount the many
celebrated incidents which have marked its progress, and to see the
beautiful memorials of past munificence or affection erected by friends
or relatives, which he lovingly points out. It is in no perfunctory
spirit, or as mere matter of routine, that he performs his office: we
really feel that he takes a deep interest in his task, which makes it a
privilege to walk under his guidance through the historic building, and
into its famous crypt, so especially associated with Jasper and Durdles.
[Illustration: The Crypt, Rochester Cathedral.]
We enter "by a small side door, . . . descend the rugged steps, and are
down in the crypt." It is very spacious, and vaulted with stone. Even by
daylight, here and there, "the heavy pillars which support the roof
engender masses of black shade, but between them there are lanes of
light," and we walk "up and down these lanes," being strangely reminded
of Durdles as we notice fragments of old broken stone ornaments
carefully laid out on boards in several places. Formerly there were
altars to St. Mary and St. Catherine in the crypt or undercroft, but Mr.
Wildish's local guide-book says:--"They seem not to have been much
frequented; consequently these saints were not very profitable to the
priests."
We "go up the winding staircase of the great tower, toilsomely turning
and turning, and lowering [our] heads to avoid the stairs above, or the
rough stone pivot around which they twist." About ninety steps bring us
on to the roof of the Cathedral over the choir, and then, keeping along
a passage by the parapet, we reach the belfry, and from thence go on by
ladder to the bell-chamber, which contains six bells--dark--very--long
ladders--trap-doors--very heavy--almost extinguish us when lowering
them--more ladders from bell-chamber to roof of tower. The parapet of
the tower is very high; we can just see over it when standing on a
narrow ledge near the top-coping of the leaded roof. There are a number
of curious carved heads on the pinnacles of the tower, and the parapet,
to our surprise, appears to be about the same height as the top of the
Castle Keep. A panoramic view of Cloisterham presents itself to our view
(alas! not by moonlight, as in the story), "its ruined habitations and
sanctuaries of the dead at the tower's base; its moss-softened,
red-tiled roofs and red-brick houses of the living, clustered beyond."
We are anxious to go round the triforium, but there is no passage
through the arches; it was closed, we are told, at the time of the
restoration, about fifteen years ago, when the walls of the Cathedral
were pinned for safety. The verger, on being asked, said he did not call
to mind that Dickens ever went round the triforium or ascended the
tower. If this is so, then much of the wonderful description of that
"unaccountable sort of expedition," in the twelfth chapter of _Edwin
Drood_, must have been written from imagination.
As it is Sunday, and as the summer is nearly over, Mr. Miles, with a
feeling akin to that which George Eliot has expressed regarding
imperfect work:--
"but God be praised,
Antonio Stradivari has an eye
That winces at false work and loves the true,"--
apologetically explains that one-half the choir are absent on leave, and
perhaps we shall not have the musical portion of the service conducted
with that degree of efficiency which, as visitors, we may have expected.
Nevertheless we attend the afternoon service; and Mendelssohn's glorious
anthem, "If with all your hearts," appeals to us with enhanced effect,
from the exquisite rendering of it by the gifted pure tenor who takes
the solo, followed by the delicate harmonies of the choir, as the sound
waves carry them upwards through and around the arches, and from the
sublime emotions called into being by the impassioned appeal of the
Hebrew prophet.
We study "the fantastic carvings on the under brackets of the stall
seats," and examine the lectern described as "the big brass eagle
holding the sacred books upon his wings," and in imagination can almost
call up the last scene described in _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_, where
Her Royal Highness, the Princess Puffer, "grins," and "shakes both fists
at the leader of the choir," and "Deputy peeps, sharp-eyed, through the
bars, and stares astounded from the threatener to the threatened."
Upon being interrogated as to whether he knew Charles Dickens, our guide
immediately answers with a smile--"Knew him! yes. He came here very
often, and I knew him very well. The fact is, they want to make me out
to be 'Tope.'" And indeed there appears to be such a relevancy in the
association, that we frequently find ourselves addressing him as "Mr.
Tope," at which he good-humouredly laughs. He further states that
Dickens was frequently in Rochester, and especially so when writing
_Edwin Drood_, and appeared to be studying the Cathedral and its
surroundings very attentively.
The next question we put is:--"Was there ever such a person as Durdles?"
to which he replies, "Of course there was,--a drunken old German
stonemason, about thirty years ago, who was always prowling about the
Cathedral trying to pick up little bits of broken stone ornaments,
carved heads, crockets, finials, and such like, which he carried about
in a cotton handkerchief, and which may have suggested to Dickens the
idea of the 'slouching' Durdles and his inseparable dinner bundle. He
used to work for a certain Squire N----." His earnings mostly went to
"The Fortune of War,"--now called "The Life-Boat,"--the inn where he
lodged.
Mr. Miles does not remember the prototypes of any other "cathedraly"
characters--Crisparkle and the rest--but he quite agrees with the
general opinion previously referred to as to the origin of Mr. Sapsea.
He considers "Deputy" (the imp-like satellite of Durdles and the
"Kinfreederel") to be decidedly a street Arab, the type of which is more
common in London than in Rochester. He thinks that the fact of the rooms
over the gatehouse having once been occupied by an organ-blower of the
Cathedral may have prompted Dicke
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