The Letters of Charles Dickens Volume I Part 17

Dear Sir, very faithfully yours.

FOOTNOTES:

[53] The "Medical Aspects of Death, and the Medical Aspects of the Human Mind."

[54] The injurious effects of the manufacture of lucifer matches on the employed.

1853.

[Sidenote: Mr. W. H. Wills.]

1, JUNCTION PARADE, BRIGHTON, _Thursday night, 4th March, 1853._

MY DEAR WILLS,

I am sorry, but Brutus sacrifices unborn children of his own as well as those of other people. "The Sorrows of Childhood," long in type, and long a mere mysterious name, must come out. The paper really is, like the celebrated amba.s.sadorial appointment, "too bad."

"A Doctor of Morals," _impossible of insertion as it stands_. A mere puff, with all the difficult facts of the question blinked, and many statements utterly at variance with what I am known to have written. It is exactly because the great bulk of offences in a great number of places are committed by professed thieves, that it will not do to have pet prisoning advocated without grave remonstrance and great care. That cla.s.s of prisoner is not to be reformed. We must begin at the beginning and prevent, by stringent correction and supervision of wicked parents, that cla.s.s of prisoner from being regularly supplied as if he were a human necessity.

Do they teach trades in workhouses and try to fit _their_ people (the worst part of them) for society? Come with me to Tothill Fields Bridewell, and I will show you what a workhouse girl is. Or look to my "Walk in a Workhouse" (in "H. W.") and to the glance at the youths I saw in one place positively kept like wolves.

Mr. ---- thinks prisons could be made nearly self-supporting. Have you any idea of the difficulty that is found in disposing of Prison-work, or does he think that the Treadmills didn't grind the air because the State or the Magistracy objected to the compet.i.tion of prison-labour with free-labour, but because the work _could not be got_?

I never can have any kind of prison-discipline disquisition in "H. W."

that does not start with the first great principle I have laid down, and that does not protest against Prisons being considered _per se_.

Whatever chance is given to a man in a prison must be given to a man in a refuge for distress.

The article in itself is very good, but it must have these points in it, otherwise I am not only compromising opinions I am known to hold, but the journal itself is blowing hot and cold, and playing fast and loose in a ridiculous way.

"Starting a Paper in India" is very droll to us. But it is full of references that the public don't understand, and don't in the least care for. Bourgeois, brevier, minion, and nonpareil, long primer, turn-ups, dunning advertis.e.m.e.nts, and reprints, back forme, imposing-stone, and locking-up, are all quite out of their way, and a sort of slang that they have no interest in.

Let me see a revise when you have got it together, and if you can strengthen it--do. I mention all the objections that occur to me as I go on, not because you can obviate them (except in the case of the prison-paper), but because if I make a point of doing so always you will feel and judge the more readily both for yourself and me too when I take an Italian flight.

YOU: How are the eyes getting on?

ME: I have been at work all day.

Ever faithfully.

[Sidenote: The same.]

BOULOGNE, _Sunday, 7th August, 1853._

MY DEAR WILLS,

Can't possibly write autographs until I have written "Bleak House." My work has been very hard since I have been here; and when I throw down my pen of a day, I throw down myself, and can take up neither article.

The "C. P." is very well done, but I cannot make up my mind to lend my blow to the great Forge-bellows of puffery at work. I so heartily desire to have nothing to do with it, that I wish you would cancel this article altogether, and subst.i.tute something else. As to the guide-books, I think they are a sufficiently flatulent botheration in themselves, without being discussed. A lurking desire is always upon me to put Mr.

----'s speech on Accidents to the public, as chairman of the Brighton Railway, against his pretensions as a chairman of public instructors and guardians. And I don't know but that I may come to it at some odd time.

This strengthens me in my wish to avoid the bellows.

How two men can have gone, one after the other, to the Camp, and have written nothing about it, pa.s.ses my comprehension. I have been in great doubt about the end of ----. I wish you would suggest to him from me, when you see him, how wrong it is. Surely he cannot be insensible to the fact that military preparations in England at this time mean Defence.

Woman, says ----, means Home, love, children, Mother. Does he not find any protection for these things in a wise and moderate means of Defence; and is not the union between these things and those means one of the most natural, significant, and plain in the world?

I wish you would send friend Barnard here a set of "Household Words," in a paid parcel (on the other side is an inscription to be neatly pasted into vol. i. before sending), with a post-letter beforehand from yourself, saying that I had begged you to forward the books, feeling so much obliged to him for his uniform attention and politeness. Also that you will not fail to continue his set, as successive volumes appear.

ASPECTS OF NATURE.

We have had a tremendous sea here. Steam-packet in the harbour frantic, and das.h.i.+ng her brains out against the stone walls.

Ever faithfully.

[Sidenote: Rev. James White.]

BOULOGNE, _September 30th, 1853._

MY DEAR WHITE,

As you wickedly failed in your truth to the writer of books you adore, I write something that I hoped to have said, and meant to have said, in the confidence of the Pavilion among the trees.

Will you write another story for the Christmas No.? It will be exactly (I mean the Xmas No.) on the same plan as the last.

I shall be at the office from Monday to Thursday, and shall hope to receive a cheery "Yes," in reply.

Loves from all to all, and my particular love to Mrs. White.

Ever cordially yours.

[Sidenote: Mrs. Charles d.i.c.kens.]

HOTEL DE LONDRES, CHAMOUNIX, _Thursday Night, 20th October, 1853._

MY DEAREST KATE,

We[55] came here last night after a very long journey over very bad roads, from Geneva, and leave here (for Montigny, by the Tete Noire) at 6 to-morrow morning. Next morning early we mean to try the Simplon.

After breakfast to-day we ascended to the Mer de Glace--wonderfully different at this time of the year from when we saw it--a great portion of the ascent being covered with snow, and the climbing very difficult.

Regardless of my mule, I walked up and walked down again, to the great admiration of the guides, who p.r.o.nounced me "an Intrepid." The little house at the top being closed for the winter, and Edward having forgotten to carry any brandy, we had nothing to drink at the top--which was a considerable disappointment to the Inimitable, who was streaming with perspiration from head to foot. But we made a fire in the snow with some sticks, and after a not too comfortable rest came down again. It took a long time--from 10 to 3.

The appearance of Chamounix at this time of year is very remarkable. The travellers are over for the season, the inns are generally shut up, all the people who can afford it are moving off to Geneva, the snow is low on the mountains, and the general desolation and grandeur extraordinarily fine. I wanted to pa.s.s by the Col de Balme, but the snow lies too deep upon it.

You would have been quite delighted if you could have seen the warmth of our old Lausanne friends, and the heartiness with which they crowded down on a fearfully bad morning to see us off. We pa.s.sed the night at the Ecu de Geneve, in the rooms once our old rooms--at that time (the day before yesterday) occupied by the Queen of the French (ex- I mean) and Prince Joinville and his family.