Dickens and His Illustrators Part 10

It is a curious fact that several Yorks.h.i.+re schoolmasters actually claimed to be the prototype of Squeers; indeed, a member of the fraternity (probably Shaw himself) declared that he remembered being waited on by two gentlemen, one of whom held him in conversation while the other took his likeness; "and although" (says the author in his preface to the story) "Mr. Squeers has but one eye, and he has two, and the published sketch does not resemble him (whoever he may be) in any other respect, still he and all his friends know at once for whom it is meant, because the character is _so_ like him." I think there can be no doubt that both d.i.c.kens and "Phiz," when delineating Squeers, reproduced too closely the idiosyncrasies of one individual, and that the author's description, as well as the artist's presentment, bore so obvious a likeness to Shaw, that he became the scapegoat for others worse than himself, and suffered accordingly.

PLATE x.x.xII

"THE DOMBEY FAMILY"

_Facsimile_ of the First Study for the Etching by

H. K. BROWNE ("PHIZ")

The "Query" written beneath the Drawing is in the autograph of the Artist. It was addressed to d.i.c.kens, and reads as follows:--"_Qy._ Whether 'twere better to have him standing thus, stiff as a poker, with a kind of side glance at his daughter,--or sitting, as in the other?"

The Etching differs considerably from the Drawing.

_Lent by Mr. J. F. Dexter._

[Ill.u.s.tration]

In some of the etchings may be discovered slight incongruities (as, for example, in the first plate, where Ralph Nickleby's hat is too small for his head), while in others there is a palpable touch of exaggeration. In the ill.u.s.tration, "The Country Manager Rehea.r.s.es a Combat," the artist has omitted to introduce the figure of the landlord who ushered into the managerial presence Nicholas and Smike, and the broad-swords should have been basket-hilted weapons. In the etching, where Nicholas instructs Smike in the art of acting, Nicholas wears the rapier on the wrong side, this oversight doubtless resulting from the non-reversal of the design upon the plate. The "Nickleby" ill.u.s.trations are, as a whole, very successful; in many instances the expressions are capitally rendered, although it is to be regretted that the artist did but scant justice to the physical attractions of Kate Nickleby and Madeline Bray.

There were sixty-three quarto plates etched for the thirty-nine ill.u.s.trations in the story, each plate carrying two designs; some of these were etched three times, while in seven instances the quarto plate was reproduced no less than four times. In none of these duplicated plates will be found such marked variations in detail as may be noted in the _replicas_ of the "Pickwick" designs, so that the collector need only seek for well-printed impressions.[24]

Footnote 24: The "Nickleby" plates were copied by J. Yeager for the first American edition of the story.

All the original drawings for "Nickleby," with one exception, are still in existence; they were disposed of on July 16, 1880, in Robinson & Fisher's auction-rooms, when they realised in the aggregate rather more than a hundred pounds. The missing design is that depicting Nicholas in his capacity as tutor in the Kenwigs family. These drawings are executed in pencil and wash, some being especially valuable by reason of marginal notes in the autograph of the novelist. At the top of the original sketch for "A Sudden Recognition, Unexpected on Both Sides" (kindly lent by Mr. M. H. Spielmann for reproduction), d.i.c.kens has pencilled a note to the artist, a portion of which (that within the brackets) has been cut away: "I don't think that Smike is frightened enough [or that Squeers is] earnest enough, for my purpose,"--a criticism which was apparently not productive of much alteration in the direction indicated, unless effected in the sketch before the subject was etched.

The late Mr. F. W. Cosens, who possessed several preliminary studies of the Kenwigs children, had in his collection a note from d.i.c.kens giving minute instructions to "Phiz" respecting the design for the plate ent.i.tled "Great Excitement of Miss Kenwigs at the Hairdresser's Shop."

The novelist desired his ill.u.s.trator to depict "a hairdresser's shop at night--not a das.h.i.+ng one, but a barber's. Morleena Kenwigs on a tall chair, having her hair dressed by an under-bred attendant, with her hair parted down the middle and frizzed up into curls at the sides. Another customer, who is being shaved, has just turned his head in the direction of Miss Kenwigs, and she and Newman Noggs (who has brought her there, and has been whiling away the time with an old newspaper) recognise, with manifestations of surprise, and Morleena with emotion, Mr.

Lillivick, the collector. Mr. Lillivick's bristly beard expresses great neglect of his person, and he looks very grim and in the utmost despondency."

The original drawing for "Nicholas Starts for Yorks.h.i.+re" presents several important variations from the published plate, the positions of the figures being considerably altered, the most remarkable differences being that Ralph Nickleby and Squeers in the sketch are placed on the side opposite the coach and more in the background, the coachman reading the way-bill is transferred to the spot where Squeers now stands, while there is another coachman looking over his shoulder, who is omitted in the etching; the coachman with the whip (as seen in the plate) was not introduced in the sketch. For the monthly parts "Phiz" designed a pictorial wrapper; on either side of this wood-engraving is a corpulent figure mounted on tall stilts, surmounted by an allegorical scene typifying Justice, with cornucopia, &c., and below is seen the culprit Squeers wading through a river, guided by imps carrying lanterns.

For the two volumes of the Library Edition of "Nicholas Nickleby"

(1858-59) "Phiz" prepared small designs, delicately tinted in water-colours, which were engraved on steel as vignettes for the t.i.tle-pages; the subjects represented are "The Nickleby Family" and "The Mad Gentleman and Mrs. Nickleby," the original drawings realising 14 each at Sotheby's in 1889.

HABLoT K. BROWNE ("PHIZ")

II

"MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK"--A Quaint Advertis.e.m.e.nt--Woodcuts instead of Etchings--"Phiz's" Contributions--Instances of his Exaggerated Grotesqueness--Mr. Frederic Harrison's Comment--A Powerful Design--Ill.u.s.trations in "The Old Curiosity Shop" Criticised--Ruskin's Attack upon the Designs in "Barnaby Rudge"--His Admiration of the Woodcut of "Barnaby and Grip"--"Phiz's" Frontispieces--His Letter to d.i.c.kens--An Amusing Epistle from d.i.c.kens to his Publisher--A "Clock Dinner"--Original Drawing of Master Humphrey and the Deaf Gentleman--Frontispiece for the First Cheap Edition of "Barnaby Rudge"--Vignettes for the Library Edition--New Designs for "Master Humphrey's Clock"--Portraits of Dolly Varden, Little Nell, and Barbara--Sale of Water-Colour Drawings--"MARTIN CHUZZLEWIT"--The Ill.u.s.trations Characterised--How they were Prepared--Slight Errors by "Phiz"--The Original Drawings--Minute Instructions from d.i.c.kens to the Artist--A Humorous Rejoinder--Sale of the "Chuzzlewit" Designs--Vignettes for the Library Edition--"DOMBEY AND SON"--The Plates Etched in Duplicate--Introduction of the Oblong Form of Ill.u.s.tration--Method of Obtaining _Chiaroscuro_--Some Anomalies in the Etchings--Working under Difficulties--d.i.c.kens's Anxiety Respecting the Designs--Studies for Mr. Dombey--A Letter of Instructions--Hints to the Artist--d.i.c.kens Disappointed--The Etching of "Mrs.

Pipchin and Paul"--"Doctor Blimber's Young Gentlemen"--A Remarkable Oversight--Explicit Directions from d.i.c.kens to "Phiz"--Original Drawings for "Dombey and Son"--Slight Variations from the Etchings--"Dombey" Sketches Presented to d.i.c.kens--A Portrait of Little Paul--Pictorial Wrapper--Extra Plates--Criticism by d.i.c.kens--Portraits of Alice and Florence Dombey--Frontispiece for the First Cheap Edition--Vignettes for the Library Edition.

[Sidenote: =Master Humphrey's Clock, 1840-41.=]

Charles d.i.c.kens's next work, ent.i.tled "Master Humphrey's Clock," which comprises "The Old Curiosity Shop" and "Barnaby Rudge," was first issued in weekly instalments, as well as the customary monthly parts, the new venture being thus announced: "Now wound up and going, preparatory to its striking on Sat.u.r.day, the 28th March, Master Humphrey's Clock, Maker's name--'Boz.' The Figures and Hands by George Cattermole, Esq.

and 'Phiz.'" A novel feature of this undertaking was the ill.u.s.trations, which were not etched as. .h.i.therto, but engraved on wood and dropped into the text, the total number of designs being one hundred and ninety-four, including three frontispieces and twenty-four initials. Of these "Phiz"

produced by far the greater proportion, he being responsible for no less than a hundred and fifty-three, including two frontispieces and all the initials; the subjects of many of the latter, by the way, have no connection with the letterpress. Some of the drawings are unsigned, while others have appended to them the artist's initials or monogram, occasionally reversed. At this time "Phiz" was almost as anonymous as "Boz," but when "Master Humphrey's Clock" ultimately appeared in volume form, his ident.i.ty was fully established on the t.i.tle-page as "Hablot Browne." The result of a careful a.n.a.lysis of the ill.u.s.trations discloses the fact that "Phiz" produced sixty-one for "The Old Curiosity Shop" and "Barnaby Rudge" respectively, and seven for the miscellaneous papers relating to "The Clock," exclusive of the initials. The greater number of figure-pieces fell to his pencil, while the architectural subjects were entrusted to his coadjutor, George Cattermole.

PLATE x.x.xIII

"PAUL AND MRS. PIPCHIN"

_Facsimile_ of the Original Sketch for "Dombey and Son" by

H. K. BROWNE ("PHIZ")

A subsequent and more complete Drawing of this subject is included in the d.u.c.h.ess of St. Albans' Collection.

_Lent by Mr. J. F. Dexter._

[Ill.u.s.tration]

In many of the drawings (admirably engraved by S. Williams, Landells, Gray, and Vasey) Browne hardly did himself justice, their exaggerated grotesqueness tending to deprive these little pictorial compositions of much of their artistic value. Observe, for example, the repulsive features of Kit, his mother, and the child in the tenth chapter of "The Old Curiosity Shop," and note how positively diabolical are his representations of Sampson Bra.s.s and his sister, and of d.i.c.k Swiveller.

It is difficult to believe that the terrible-looking creature intended for the Marchioness, in the fifty-seventh and sixty-fifth chapters, would ever have developed into a "good-looking" girl, as she really did, according to the text. It is probably such unpleasing ill.u.s.trations as these which induced Mr. Frederic Harrison in _The Forum_ to condemn, with exceeding severity, the artist's propensity for caricature; "the grins, the grimaces, the contortions, the dwarfs, the idiots, the monstrosities of these wonderful sketches could not be found in human beings constructed on any known anatomy." Other woodcuts are of course excellent, especially those in which Mr. Pickwick and the Wellers are resuscitated. One of the most striking, however, is the weird water-scape showing the corpse of Quilp washed ash.o.r.e--a vista of riparian scenery which, for the sense of desolate breadth and loneliness it suggests, it would be difficult to excel. An ill.u.s.tration deserving special examination is the tailpiece for the chapter immediately following the end of "The Old Curiosity Shop," where the artist has depicted Master Humphrey in his arm-chair, surrounded by Lilliputian figures, among which may be recognised some of the princ.i.p.al actors in the story.

A careful comparison of the ill.u.s.trations with the text of "The Old Curiosity Shop" reveals certain slight inaccuracies on the part of the artist. For example, in the twenty-seventh chapter we read that Quilp leant upon his stick as he beckoned to the boy carrying his trunk, whereas "Phiz" depicts him raising the stick. In the woodcut portraying Kit and his party at Astley's Theatre, the umbrella should be held by Barbara's mother, and not Kit's. Again, in a subsequent chapter, we are told that Sampson Bra.s.s's hat was "grievously crushed," but "Phiz" has represented it with the crown suspended by a single thread,--a striking instance of his tendency to exaggeration. The careful reader will also note (in the seventeenth chapter) that the stilt on the right leg of the "young gentleman" in "Grinder's lot" is at least twelve inches shorter than its fellow, and that Mrs. Jarley's horse (in the twenty-sixth chapter) is considerably out of proportion with its surroundings; the caravan, too, is incorrectly drawn, and Mrs. Jarley with the drum should have been placed upon the platform of the van. The inherent humour of "Phiz" was often _apropos_, an amusing instance being discoverable in the ill.u.s.tration of Miss Monflathers and her young ladies (in the thirty-first chapter), where the inscription on the board above the wall reads, "Take notice--Man traps."

Although the designs in "Barnaby Rudge" are not entirely exempt from the charge of exaggeration, they are, on the whole, more pleasing. The artist seems to have fairly revelled in the scenes depicting the rioters, and, while failing in his conception of Sir John Chester, he successfully realised the more picturesque figures of Barnaby and Maypole Hugh, the latter being admirably limned. Professor Ruskin, however, in his "Ariadne Florentina," denounces these woodcuts in language more caustic even than that of Mr. Frederic Harrison: "Take up," he says, "for an average specimen of modern ill.u.s.trated works, the volume of d.i.c.kens's 'Master Humphrey's Clock' containing 'Barnaby Rudge.'... The cheap popular Art cannot draw for you beauty, sense, or honesty; and for Dolly Varden, or the locksmith, you will look through the vignettes in vain. But every species of distorted folly or vice ...

are pictured for your honourable pleasure on every page, with clumsy caricature, struggling to render its dulness tolerable by insisting on defect." The drawing of Barnaby and the Raven (the final ill.u.s.tration in the second volume) is one of the few the author of this pungent criticism can bring himself to admire. "The raven," he observes, "like all d.i.c.kens's animals, is perfect; and I am the more angry with the rest because I have every now and then to open the book to look for him."

Respecting these woodcuts, it may be pointed out that d.i.c.kens omitted to mention which arm Joe Willet was deprived of "in the defence of the Salwanners." Curiously enough, "Phiz" similarly fails to a.s.sist us in deciding the point, as, in the ill.u.s.trations depicting him after the war, he is seen _minus_ the right arm in four instances, while in another woodcut it is the left which has disappeared.

The frontispieces designed by Browne for the second and third volumes are both elaborate and fanciful. In the first is seen an enormous hour-gla.s.s containing a crowd composed of some of the minor characters in the story, while surrounding it are representations of the more prominent persons. It was originally intended that George Cattermole should execute this drawing, but, being prevented by illness, it fell into the hands of "Phiz," who thereupon wrote to the novelist:--

"_Sunday Morning._

"MY DEAR d.i.c.kENS,--Will you give me some notion of what sort of design you wish for the Frontispiece for second volume of _Clock_? Cattermole being put _hors de combat_--Chapman with a careworn face (if you can picture that) brings me the block at the eleventh hour and requires it finished by Wednesday. Now, as I have two others to complete in the meantime, something nice and _light_ would be best adapted to my _palette_, and prevent an excess of perspiration in the relays of wood-cutters. You shall have the others to criticise on Tuesday.--Yours very truly,

"HABLoT K. BROWNE."

In the frontispiece to the third volume is portrayed an ornamental clock, at the summit of which is seated Master Humphrey, while on either side and at the base are introduced the presentments of Barnaby with his raven and other individuals in the tale. "Phiz" was also responsible for the elaborate design on the wrapper of the weekly numbers.

The following amusing epistle, having reference to the initial letter drawn by "Phiz" for the sixty-fifth chapter, was addressed by d.i.c.kens to a member of his publis.h.i.+ng firm, Edward Chapman, the "precipice" here mentioned being a humorous allusion to the latter's approaching marriage:--

"BROADSTAIRS, _Thursday, 16th September 1841_.

"MY DEAR SIR,--Know for your utter confusion, and to your lasting shame and ignominy, that the initial letter HAS BEEN provided, that it was furnished to the artist at the same time as the subject--and that it is a

D

"--which stands for Double--Demnible--Doubtful--Dangerous--Doleful--Disastrous--Dreadful --Deuced--Dark--Divorce--and Drop--all applicable to the Precipice on which you stand.

"Farewell! If you did but know--and would pause, even at this late period--better an action for breach than--but we buy experience. Excuse my agitation. I scarcely know what I write. To see a fellow-creature--and one who has so long withstood--still if--will _nothing_ warn you?