top-boots, and not particularly prejudiced that I know of), looking on
as pretty a view out of my study window as you will find in a long day's
English ride. My little place is a grave red brick house (time of George
the First, I suppose), which I have added to and stuck bits upon in all
manner of ways, so that it is as pleasantly irregular, and as violently
opposed to all architectural ideas, as the most hopeful man could
possibly desire. It is on the summit of Gad's Hill. The robbery was
committed before the door, on the man with the treasure, and Falstaff
ran away from the identical spot of ground now covered by the room in
which I write. A little rustic alehouse, called The Sir John Falstaff,
is over the way--has been over the way, ever since, in honour of the
event. Cobham Woods and Park are behind the house; the distant Thames in
front; the Medway, with Rochester, and its old castle and cathedral, on
one side. The whole stupendous property is on the old Dover Road, so
when you come, come by the North Kent Railway (not the South-Eastern) to
Strood or Higham, and I'll drive over to fetch you.
The blessed woods and fields have done me a world of good, and I am
quite myself again. The children are all as happy as children can be. My
eldest daughter, Mary, keeps house, with a state and gravity becoming
that high position; wherein she is assisted by her sister Katie, and by
her aunt Georgina, who is, and always has been, like another sister. Two
big dogs, a bloodhound and a St. Bernard, direct from a convent of that
name, where I think you once were, are their principal attendants in the
green lanes. These latter instantly untie the neckerchiefs of all tramps
and prowlers who approach their presence, so that they wander about
without any escort, and drive big horses in basket-phaetons through
murderous bye-ways, and never come to grief. They are very curious about
your daughters, and send all kinds of loves to them and to Mrs. Cerjat,
in which I heartily join.
You will have read in the papers that the Thames in London is most horrible.
I have to cross Waterloo or London Bridge to get to the railroad when I
come down here, and I can certify that the offensive smells, even in
that short whiff, have been of a most head-and-stomach-distending
nature. Nobody knows what is to be done; at least everybody knows a
plan, and everybody else knows it won't do; in the meantime cartloads of
chloride of lime are shot into the filthy stream, and do something I
hope. You will know, before you get this, that the American telegraph
line has parted again, at which most men are sorry, but very few
surprised. This is all the news, except that there is an Italian Opera
at Drury Lane, price eighteenpence to the pit, where Viardot, by far the
greatest artist of them all, sings, and which is full when the dear
opera can't let a box; and except that the weather has been
exceptionally hot, but is now quite cool. On the top of this hill it has
been cold, actually cold at night, for more than a week past.
I am going over to Rochester to post this letter, and must write another
to Townshend before I go. My dear Cerjat, I have written lightly
enough, because I want you to know that I am becoming cheerful and
hearty. God bless you! I love you, and I know that you love me.
Ever your attached and affectionate.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
WEST HOE, PLYMOUTH, _Thursday, Aug. 5th, 1858._
MY DEAREST GEORGY,
I received your letter this morning with the greatest pleasure, and read
it with the utmost interest in all its domestic details.
We had a most wonderful night at Exeter. It is to be regretted that we
cannot take the place again on our way back. It was a prodigious cram,
and we turned away no end of people. But not only that, I think they
were the finest audience I have ever read to. I don't think I ever read,
in some respects, so well; and I never beheld anything like the personal
affection which they poured out upon me at the end. It was really a very
remarkable sight, and I shall always look back upon it with pleasure.
Last night here was not so bright. There are quarrels of the strangest
kind between the Plymouth people and the Stonehouse people. The room is
at Stonehouse (Tracy says the wrong room; there being a Plymouth room in
this hotel, and he being a Plymouthite). We had a fair house, but not at
all a great one. All the notabilities come this morning to "Little
Dombey," for which we have let one hundred and thirty stalls, which
local admiration of local greatness considers very large. For "Mrs. Gamp
and the Boots," to-night, we have also a very promising let. But the
races are on, and there are two public balls to-night, and the yacht
squadron are all at Cherbourg to boot. Arthur is of opinion that "Two
Sixties" will do very well for us. I doubt the "Two Sixties" myself.
_Mais nous verrons._
The room is a very handsome one, but it is on the top of a windy and
muddy hill, leading (literally) to nowhere; and it looks (except that it
is new and _mortary_) as if the subsidence of the waters after the
Deluge might have left it where it is. I have to go right through the
company to get to the platform. Big doors slam and resound when anybody
comes in; and all the company seem afraid of one another. Nevertheless
they were a sensible audience last night, and much impressed and
pleased.
Tracy is in the room (wandering about, and never finishing a sentence),
and sends all manner of sea-loves to you and the dear girls. I send all
manner of land-loves to you from myself, out of my heart of hearts, and
also to my dear Plorn and the boys.
Arthur sends his kindest love. He knows only two characters. He is
either always corresponding, like a Secretary of State, or he is
transformed into a rout-furniture dealer of Rathbone Place, and drags
forms about with the greatest violence, without his coat.
I have no time to add another word.
Ever, dearest Georgy, your most affectionate.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
LONDON, _Saturday, Aug. 7th, 1858._
MY DEAREST MAMEY,
The closing night at Plymouth was a very great scene, and the morning
there was exceedingly good too. You will be glad to hear that at Clifton
last night, a torrent of five hundred shillings bore Arthur away,
pounded him against the wall, flowed on to the seats over his body,
scratched him, and damaged his best dress suit. All to his unspeakable
joy.
This is a very short letter, but I am going to the Burlington Arcade,
desperately resolved to have all those wonderful instruments put into
operation on my head, with a view to refreshing it.
Kindest love to Georgy and to all.
Ever your affectionate.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
SHREWSBURY, _Thursday, Aug. 12th, 1858._
A wonderful audience last night at Wolverhampton. If such a thing can
be, they were even quicker and more intelligent than the audience I had
in Edinburgh. They were so wonderfully good and were so much on the
alert this morning by nine o'clock for another reading, that we are
going back there at about our Bradford time. I never saw such people.
And the local agent would take no money, and charge no expenses of his
own.
This place looks what Plorn would call "ortily" dull. Local agent
predicts, however, "great satisfaction to Mr. Dickens, and excellent
attendance." I have just been to look at the hall, where everything was
wrong, and where I have left Arthur making a platform for me out of
dining-tables.
If he comes back in time, I am not quite sure but that he is himself
going to write to Gad's Hill. We talk of coming up from Chester _in the
night to-morrow, after the reading_; and of showing our precious selves
at an apparently impossibly early hour in the Gad's Hill breakfast-room
on Saturday morning.
I have not felt the fatigue to any extent worth mentioning; though I
get, every night, into the most violent heats. We are going to dine at
three o'clock (it wants a quarter now) and have not been here two
hours, so I have seen nothing of Clement.
Tell Georgy with my love, that I read in the same room in which we
acted, but at the end opposite to that where our stage was. We are not
at the inn where the amateur company put up, but at The Lion, where the
fair Miss Mitchell was lodged alone. We have the strangest little rooms
(sitting-room and two bed-rooms all together), the ceilings of which I
can touch with my hand. The windows bulge out over the street, as if
they were little stern-windows in a ship. And a door opens out of the
sitting-room on to a little open gallery with plants in it, where one
leans over a queer old rail, and looks all downhill and slant-wise at
the crookedest black and yellow old houses, all manner of shapes except
straight shapes. To get into this room we come through a china closet;
and the man in laying the cloth has actually knocked down, in that
repository, two geraniums and Napoleon Bonaparte.
I think that's all I have to say, except that at the Wolverhampton
theatre they played "Oliver Twist" last night (Mr. Toole the Artful
Dodger), "in consequence of the illustrious author honouring the town
with his presence." We heard that the device succeeded very well, and
that they got a good many people.
John's spirits have been equable and good since we rejoined him. Berry
has always got something the matter with his digestion--seems to me the
male gender of Maria Jolly, and ought to take nothing but Revalenta
Arabica. Bottled ale is not to be got in these parts, and Arthur is
thrown upon draught.
My dearest love to Georgy and to Katey, also to Marguerite. Also to all
the boys and the noble Plorn.
Ever your affectionate Father.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
TAVISTOCK HOUSE, TAVISTOCK SQUARE, LONDON, W.C.,
_Wednesday Morning, Aug. 18th, 1858._
I write this hurried line before starting, to report that my cold is
decidedly better, thank God (though still bad), and that I hope to be
able to stagger through to-night. After dinner yesterday I began to
recover my voice, and I think I sang half the Irish Melodies to myself,
as I walked about to test it. I got home at half-past ten, and
mustard-poulticed and barley-watered myself tremendously.
Love to the dear girls, and to all.
Ever affectionately.
[Sidenote: The same.]
ADELPHI HOTEL, LIVERPOOL, _Friday Night, Aug. 20th, 1858._
I received your welcome and interesting letter to-day, and I write you a
very hurried and bad reply; but it is _after the reading_, and you will
take the will for the deed under these trying circumstances, I know.
We have had a tremendous night; the largest house I have ever had since
I first began--two thousand three hundred people. To-morrow afternoon,
at three, I read again.
My cold has been oppressive, and is not yet gone. I have been very hard
to sleep too, and last night I was all but sleepless. This morning I was
very dull and seedy; but I got a good walk, and picked up again. It has
been blowing all day, and I fear we shall have a sick passage over to
Dublin to-morrow night.
Tell Mamie (with my dear love to her and Katie) that I will write to her
from Dublin--probably on Sunday. Tell her too that the stories she told
me in her letter were not only capital stories in themselves, but
_excellently told_ too.
What Arthur's state has been to-night--he, John, Berry, and Boylett, all
taking money and going mad together--you _cannot_ imagine. They turned
away hundreds, sold all the books, rolled on the ground of my room
knee-deep in checks, and made a perfect pantomime of the whole thing. He
has kept quite well, I am happy to say, and sends a hundred loves.
In great haste and fatigue.
Ever affectionately.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
MORRISON'S HOTEL, DUBLIN, _Monday, Aug. 23rd, 1858._
We had a nasty crossing here. We left Holyhead at one in the morning,
and got here at six. Arthur was incessantly sick the whole way. I was
not sick at all, but was in as healthy a condition otherwise as humanity
need be. We are in a beautiful hotel. Our sitting-room is exactly like
the drawing-room at the Peschiere in all its dimensions. I never saw two
rooms so exactly resembling one another in their proportions. Our
bedrooms too are excellent, and there are baths and all sorts of
comforts.
The Lord Lieutenant is away, and the place looks to me as if its
professional life were away too. Nevertheless, there are numbers of
people in the streets. Somehow, I hardly seem to think we are going to
do enormously here; but I have scarcely any reason for supposing so
(except that a good many houses are shut up); and I _know_ nothing about
it, for Arthur is now gone to the agent and to the room. The men came by
boat direct from Liverpool. They had a rough passage, were all ill, and
did not get here till noon yesterday. Donnybrook Fair, or what remains
of it, is going on, within two or three miles of Dublin. They went out
there yesterday in a jaunting-car, and John described it to us at
dinner-time (with his eyebrows lifted up, and his legs well asunder), as
"Johnny Brooks's Fair;" at which Arthur, who was drinking bitter ale,
nearly laughed himself to death. Berry is always unfortunate, and when I
asked what had happened to Berry on board the steamboat, it appeared
that "an Irish gentleman which was drunk, and fancied himself the
captain, wanted to knock Berry down."
I am surprised by finding this place very much larger than I had
supposed it to be. Its bye-parts are bad enough, but cleaner, too, than
I had supposed them to be, and certainly very much cleaner than the old
town of Edinburgh. The man who drove our jaunting-car yesterday hadn't a
piece in his coat as big as a penny roll, and had had his hat on
(apparently without brushing it) ever since he was grown up. But he was
remarkably intelligent and agreeable, with something to say about
everything. For instance, when I asked him what a certain building was,
he didn't say "courts of law" and nothing else, but: "Av you plase, sir,
it's the foor coorts o' looyers, where Misther O'Connell stood his trial
wunst, ye'll remimber, sir, afore I tell ye of it." When we got into the
Phoenix Park, he looked round him as if it were his own, and said:
"THAT'S a park, sir, av yer plase." I complimented it, and he said:
"Gintlemen tills me as they'r bin, sir, over Europe, and never see a
park aqualling ov it. 'Tis eight mile roond, sir, ten mile and a half
long, and in the month of May the hawthorn trees are as beautiful as
brides with their white jewels on. Yonder's the vice-regal lodge, sir;
in them two corners lives the two sicretirries, wishing I was them, sir.
There's air here, sir, av yer plase! There's scenery here, sir! There's
mountains--thim, sir! Yer coonsider it a park, sir? It is that, sir!"
You should have heard John in my bedroom this morning endeavouring to
imitate a bath-man, who had resented his interference, and had said as
to the shower-bath: "Yer'll not be touching _that_, young man. Divil a
touch yer'll touch o' that insthrument, young man!" It was more
ridiculously unlike the reality than I can express to you, yet he was so
delighted with his powers that he went off in the absurdest little
gingerbeery giggle, backing into my portmanteau all the time.
My dear love to Katie and to Georgy, also to the noble Plorn and all the
boys. I shall write to Katie next, and then to Aunty. My cold, I am
happy to report, is very much better. I lay in the wet all night on
deck, on board the boat, but am not as yet any the worse for it. Arthur
was quite insensible when we got to Dublin, and stared at our luggage
without in the least offering to claim it. He left his kindest love for
all before he went out. I will keep the envelope open until he comes in.
Ever, my dearest Mamie,
Your most affectionate Father.
[Sidenote: Miss Hogarth.]
MORRISON'S HOTEL, DUBLIN, _Wednesday, Aug. 25th, 1858._
I begin my letter to you to-day, though I don't know when I may send it
off. We had a very good house last night, after all, that is to say, a
great rush of shillings and good half-crowns, though the stalls were
comparatively few. For "Little Dombey," this morning, we have an immense
stall let--already more than two hundred--and people are now fighting in
the agent's shop to take more. Through some mistake of our printer's,
the evening reading for this present Wednesday was dropped, in a great
part of the announcements, and the agent opened no plan for it. I have
therefore resolved not to have it at all. Arthur Smith has waylaid me
in all manner of ways, but I remain obdurate. I am frightfully tired,
and really relieved by the prospect of an evening--overjoyed.
They were a highly excitable audience last night, but they certainly did
not comprehend--internally and intellectually comprehend--"The Chimes"
as a London audience do. I am quite sure of it. I very much doubt the
Irish capacity of receiving the pathetic; but of their quickness as to
the humorous there can be no doubt. I shall see how they go along with
Little Paul, in his death, presently.
While I was at breakfast this morning, a general officer was announced
with great state--having a staff at the door--and came in, booted and
plumed, and covered with Crimean decorations. It was Cunninghame, whom
we knew in Genoa--then a captain. He was very hearty indeed, and came to
ask me to dinner. Of course I couldn't go. Olliffe has a brother at
Cork, who has just now (noon) written to me, proposing dinners and
excursions in that neighbourhood which would fill about a week; I being
there a day and a half, and reading three times. The work will be very
severe here, and I begin to feel depressed by it. (By "here," I mean
Ireland generally, please to observe.)
We meant, as I said in a letter to Katie, to go to Queenstown yesterday
and bask on the seashore. But there is always so much to do that we
couldn't manage it after all. We expect a tremendous house to-morrow
night as well as to-day; and Arthur is at the present instant up to his
eyes in business (and seats), and, between his regret at losing
to-night, and his desire to make the room hold twice as many as it
_will_ hold, is half distracted. I have become a wonderful
Irishman--must play an Irish part some day--and his only relaxation is
when I enact "John and the Boots," which I consequently do enact all day
long. The papers are full of remarks upon my white tie, and describe it
as being of enormous size, which is a wonderful delusion, because, as
you very well know, it is a small tie. Generally, I am happy to report,
the Emerald press is in favour of my appearance, and likes my eyes. But
one gentleman comes out with a letter at Cork, wherein he says that
although only forty-six I look like an old man. _He_ is a rum customer,
I think.
The Rutherfords are living here, and wanted me to dine with them, which,
I needn't say, could not be done; all manner of people have called, but
I have seen only two. John has given it up altogether as to rivalry with
the Boots, and did not come into my room this morning at all. Boots
appeared triumphant and alone. He was waiting for me at the hotel-door
last night. "Whaa't sart of a hoose, sur?" he asked me. "Capital." "The
Lard be praised fur the 'onor o' Dooblin!"
Arthur buys bad apples in the streets and brings them home and doesn't
eat them, and then I am obliged to put them in the balcony because they
make the room smell faint. Also he meets countrymen with honeycomb on
their heads, and leads them (by the buttonhole when they have one) to
this gorgeous establishment and requests the bar to buy honeycomb for
his breakfast; then it stands upon the sideboard uncovered and the flies
fall into it. He buys owls, too, and castles, and other horrible
objects, made in bog-oak (that material which is not appreciated at
Gad's Hill); and he is perpetually snipping pieces out of newspapers and
sending them all over the world. While I am reading he conducts the
correspondence, and his great delight is to show me seventeen or
eighteen letters when I come, exhausted, into the retiring-place. Berry
has not got into any particular trouble for forty-eight hours, except
that he is all over boils. I have prescribed the yeast, but
ineffectually. It is indeed a sight to see him and John sitting in
pay-boxes, and surveying Ireland out of pigeon-holes.
_Same Evening before Bed-time._
Everybody was at "Little Dombey" to-day, and although I had some little
difficulty to work them up in consequence of the excessive crowding of
the place, and the difficulty of shaking the people into their seats,
the effect was unmistakable and profound. The crying was universal, and
they were extraordinarily affected. There is no doubt we could stay here
a week with that one reading, and fill the place every night. Hundreds
of people have been there to-night, under the impression that it would
come off again. It was a most decided and complete success.
Arthur has been imploring me to stop here on the Friday after Limerick,
and read "Little Dombey" again. But I have positively said "No." The
work is too hard. It is not like doing it in one easy room, and always
the same room. With a different place every night, and a different
audience with its own peculiarity every night, it is a tremendous
strain. I was sick of it to-day before I began, then got myself into
wonderful train.
Here follows a dialogue (but it requires imitation), which I had
yesterday morning with a little boy of the house--landlord's son, I
suppose--about Plorn's age. I am sitting on the sofa writing, and find
him sitting beside me.
INIMITABLE. Holloa, old chap.
YOUNG IRELAND. Hal-loo!
INIMITABLE (_in his delightful way_). What a
nice old fellow you are. I am very fond of
little boys.
YOUNG IRELAND. Air yer? Ye'r right.
INIMITABLE. What do you learn, old fellow?
YOUNG IRELAND (_very intent on Inimitable, and
always childish, except in his brogue_). I
lairn wureds of three sillibils, and wureds of
two sillibils, and wureds of one sillibil.
INIMITABLE (_gaily_). Get out, you humbug! You
learn only words of one syllable.
YOUNG IRELAND (_laughs heartily_). You may say
that it is mostly wureds of one sillibil.
INIMITABLE. Can you write?
YOUNG IRELAND. Not yet. Things comes by
deegrays.
INIMITABLE. Can you cipher?
YOUNG IRELAND (_very quickly_). Wha'at's that?
INIMITABLE. Can you make figures?
YOUNG IRELAND. I can make a nought, which is
not asy, being roond.
INIMITABLE. I say, old boy, wasn't it you I saw
on Sunday morning in the hall, in a soldier's
cap? You know--in a soldier's cap?
YOUNG IRELAND (_cogitating deeply_). Was it a
very good cap?
INIMITABLE. Yes.
YOUNG IRELAND. Did it fit unkommon?
INIMITABLE. Yes.
YOUNG IRELAND. Dat was me!
There are two stupid old louts at the room, to show people into their
places, whom John calls "them two old Paddies," and of whom he says,
that he "never see nothing like them (snigger) hold idiots" (snigger).
They bow and walk backwards before the grandees, and our men hustle them
while they are doing it.
We walked out last night, with the intention of going to the theatre;
but the Piccolomini establishment (they were doing the "Lucia") looked
so horribly like a very bad jail, and the Queen's looked so
blackguardly, that we came back again, and went to bed. I seem to be
always either in a railway carriage, or reading, or going to bed. I get
so knocked up, whenever I have a minute to remember it, that then I go
to bed as a matter of course.
I send my love to the noble Plorn, and to all the boys. To dear Mamie
and Katie, and to yourself of course, in the first degree. I am looking
forward to the last Irish reading on Thursday, with great impatience.
But when we shall have turned this week, once knocked off Belfast, I
shall see land, and shall (like poor Timber in the days of old) "keep up
a good heart." I get so wonderfully hot every night in my dress clothes,
that they positively won't dry in the short interval they get, and I
have been obliged to write to Doudney's to make me another suit, that I
may have a constant change.
Ever, my dearest Georgy, most affectionately.
[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]
BELFAST, _Saturday, Aug. 28th, 1858._
When I went down to the Rotunda at Dublin on Thursday night, I said to
Arthur, who came rushing at me: "You needn't tell me. I know all about
it." The moment I had come out of the door of the hotel (a mile off), I
had come against the stream of people turned away. I had struggled
against it to the room. There, the crowd in all the lobbies and passages
was so great, that I had a difficulty in getting in. They had broken all
the glass in the pay-boxes. They had offered frantic prices for stalls.
Eleven bank-notes were thrust into that pay-box (Arthur saw them) at one
time, for eleven stalls. Our men were flattened against walls, and
squeezed against beams. Ladies stood all night with their chins against
my platform. Other ladies sat all night upon my steps. You never saw
such a sight. And the reading went tremendously! It is much to be
regretted that we troubled ourselves to go anywhere else in Ireland. We
turned away people enough to make immense houses for a week.