Читать книгу A Week's Tramp in Dickens-Land - William R. Hughes - Страница 12

The smallest Theatre in the World!

TAVISTOCK HOUSE.

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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.
Phœbe	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."

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Half an hour for Refreshment.

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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 actors
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.

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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."

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.

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."

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."

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."

"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.