DOMBEY AND SON
THE BEDFORD, BRIGHTON--THE ROYAL, LEAMINGTON--LONG'S HOTEL, BOND
STREET--AND OTHERS
Although a good deal of _Dombey and Son_ is enacted at Brighton, only one
of its famous hotels plays any prominent part in the story, and that is
the Bedford. It is first mentioned during a conversation between Major
Bagstock and Mr. Dombey, when the former asks "Are you remaining here, Mr.
Dombey?" "I generally come down once a week, Major," returned that
gentleman; "I stay at the Bedford." "I shall have the honour of calling at
the Bedford, sir, if you'll permit me," said the Major, and in fulfilment
of his promise he did so.
On another occasion, "Mr. Dombey, bringing down Miss Tox and Mrs. Chick to
see the children, and finding the Major again at Brighton, invited him to
dinner at the Bedford, and complimented Miss Tox highly beforehand on her
neighbour and acquaintance." The Major was considered to possess an
inexhaustible fund of conversation, and showed as great an appetite in
that respect "as in regard of the various dainties on the table, among
which he may be said to have wallowed." After dinner, they had a long
rubber of whist, before they took a late farewell of the Major, who
retired to his own hotel, which, by the way, is not mentioned.
On the following day, when Mr. Dombey, Mrs. Chick and Miss Tox were
sitting at breakfast, Florence came running in to announce in great
excitement the unexpected arrival of Walter and Captain Cuttle, who had
come to ask the favour of a loan of three hundred pounds or so of Mr.
Dombey to liquidate the financial embarrassment of their old friend Sol
Gills. It will be recalled how Captain Cuttle offered as security his
silver watch, the ready money he possessed, his silver teaspoons, and
sugar-tongs; and "piling them up into a heap that they might look as
precious as possible" delivered himself of these words:
"Half a loaf's better than no bread, and the same remark holds good with
crumbs. There's a few. Annuity of one hundred pound prannum also ready to
be made over." The simple and transparent honesty of Captain Cuttle
succeeded in the task he set himself, Mr. Dombey arranging the little
matter for him.
The Bedford can rightly claim the honour of having been the house where
this memorable scene in the story of Captain Cuttle took place. In those
days it was a prominent and fashionable hotel, and remains so to-day.
Dickens frequently stayed at Brighton and very often at the Bedford, where
he wrote a good deal of _The Haunted Man_ and portions of other stories.
The Princess's Arms, spoken of as being "much resorted to by splendid
footmen," which was in Princess's Place, where Miss Tox inhabited a dark
little house, cannot be identified. Indeed, search for Princess's Place in
old directories of Brighton has entirely failed, and it must be assumed
that no such place ever existed there.
At the time Dickens was writing _Dombey and Son_ in 1846, the Royal Hotel
at Leamington, where Mr. Dombey stayed with Major Bagstock, and where
Edith Granger, who became his second wife, visited him with her mother on
one occasion, did not exist, having been demolished about 1841-2 to
make way for railway improvements. But he knew the hotel in its palmy and
aristocratic days, for in 1838 he and his artist friend, Phiz, made a
bachelor excursion in the autumn of that year into the Midlands by coach,
their first halt being Leamington, and the hotel they put up at there was
Copp's Royal Hotel, which stood at the corner of Clemens Street and High
Street. In writing to his wife of his arrival there, he said: "We found a
roaring fire, an elegant dinner, a snug room, and capital beds all ready
for us at Leamington, after a very agreeable (but very cold) ride." From
here they visited Kenilworth, Warwick, and Stratford, and the outcome of
the jaunts is reflected in the story.
[Illustration: THE BEDFORD HOTEL, BRIGHTON
_From an old Engraving_]
[Illustration: THE ROYAL HOTEL, LEAMINGTON
_From a contemporary lithograph_]
Some writers, in referring to the incidents in _Dombey and Son_ associated
with the Royal Hotel, have either assumed that it is still there, or,
having discovered that there is no hotel with that name in the town, have
given the Regent the credit of being the original of Mr. Dombey's Royal
Hotel. Neither is correct. The Royal Hotel of _Dombey and Son_ was the
Royal Hotel of Dickens's visit to Leamington in 1838, and his descriptions
of it in the book must have been made from memory, for in 1846, when he
was writing of it in the novel, the hotel had already been demolished.
Leamington always boasted one peculiarity which it claimed did not belong
to any other watering-place: the "truly select nature and high rank of
respectability of the greater part of its frequenters." For the reception
of such notables several really first-class hotels were provided.
The Regent was the most fashionable for a period, owing to the fact that
it was the resort of Royalty; but Copp's Royal Hotel was a keen rival, and
when in 1828 it was "re-erected on a scale of magnificence almost
unprecedented, displaying a grand front, cased in Roman cement to imitate
stone ... in the style of Grecian architecture," it even outshone the
Regent.
The building was rusticated to the height of the first story and a balcony
on a level with the second floor ran the whole extent of the hotel. Its
appearance is fully described in an old and very rare guide-book, and so
minutely described that it is worth quoting:
"The wings, which are both slightly projected, are embellished with four
fluted pilasters of the Corinthian order, which, springing from the level
of the second floor and terminating at the top of the third, support a
rich entablature extending the whole length of the building. Each wing is
surmounted by four ornamental vases, and, at the extreme height of the
centre, beneath the ornamental scroll, is a tablet containing the name of
the hotel. The principal entrance is in the centre, beneath a portico
projecting ten feet from the building, supported by duplicated pillars of
the Doric order, fluted and surmounted by the Royal Arms, richly carved in
stone. The interior of this building for chasteness of design, richness of
material, and correctness of execution is, we believe, equal to any in the
Kingdom. The entrance hall ... is lighted by a beautiful window of
coloured glass, in the centre of which, on a fawn-coloured mosaic ground,
are the Royal Arms, richly emblazoned, surrounded by an ornamental gold
scroll on a purple ground containing medallions representing the principal
views in the vicinity. The sideboards are supported and adorned by
appropriate Grecian ornaments. On the right of the public dining-room,
upwards of fifty feet by twenty-four feet, the ceiling is supported by
pillars and pilasters of Doric order. A geometrical staircase of
twenty-one steps conducts you to the public drawing-room, of the same
noble dimensions as the dining-room; on the same floor are a number of
private sitting-rooms, papered with rich French paper, of vivid colouring,
representing subjects classical, mythological, etc. The bedrooms are
fitted up with every attention to comfort and convenience.... Detached are
extensive lock-up coach houses, stabling, etc."
This meticulous description of it does not suggest that the Royal Hotel
was one which would have appealed very much to Dickens, but it was the
ideal spot for Major Bagstock and Mr. Dombey, and so we find that eight
years later the novelist makes use of his knowledge of it, and it becomes
the headquarters of his two characters during their visit to the
fashionable watering-place, whilst its rooms furnish the background for a
series of scenes to be found in the pages of _Dombey and Son_.
It will be recalled that Major Bagstock persuaded Mr. Dombey that he
wanted a change, and suggested that he should accompany him to Leamington.
Mr. Dombey consented, became the Major's guest and the two travelled down
by train, making the Royal Hotel their headquarters, "where the rooms and
dinner had been ordered," and where the Major at their first meal "so
oppressed his organs of speech by eating and drinking that when he retired
to bed he had no voice at all, except to cough with, and could only make
himself intelligible to the dark servant by gasping at him. He not only
rose next morning, however, like a giant refreshed, but conducted himself,
at breakfast, like a giant refreshing."
At this meal they arranged their daily habits. The Major was to take the
responsibility of ordering everything to eat and drink; and they were to
have late breakfast together every morning, and a late dinner together
every day. They occupied, no doubt, a suite of the private rooms referred
to above, for there is no reference to the large dining-room, nor would it
have suited the personal and special requirements of the two men and the
friends they brought there.
It will be remembered that, whilst these two friends were taking a
constitutional, they encountered the Major's acquaintances, Mrs. Skewton
and her daughter Edith, and Dombey was formally introduced. On taking
their departure from the fair enchantress, the Major volunteered the fact
that he was "staying at the Royal Hotel with his friend Dombey," and
invited the ladies to join them "one evening when you are good," as he
put it to Mrs. Skewton.
Having met once or twice in the pump-room and elsewhere, and the men
having called upon the ladies, the latter were invited to breakfast at the
Royal Hotel, prior to a drive to Kenilworth and Warwick. In the meantime,
Carker had arrived to transact some business with his master, and in the
evening the three men dined together. At a fitting moment the wine was
consecrated "to a divinity whom Joe is proud to know, and at a distance
humbly and reverently to admire. Edith," went on the Major, "is her name;
angelic Edith!" "Angelic Edith," cried the smiling Carker, "Edith, by all
means," said Mr. Dombey. And thus, in a private dining-room of the Royal
Hotel was pledged the toast of Dombey's future wife--the second Mrs.
Dombey.
The breakfast was punctually prepared next morning, and Dombey, Bagstock
and Carker excitedly awaited the ladies' arrival. A pleasant time ensued
and ultimately all set out on the little trip which proved so momentous a
one for Mr. Dombey. For had he not made an appointment with Edith for the
next day, "for a purpose," as he told Mrs. Skewton? At any rate, the three
men returned to the Royal Hotel in good spirits, the Major being in such
high glee that he cried out, "Damme, sir, old Joe has a mind to propose an
alteration in the name of the hotel, and that it should be called the
Three Jolly Bachelors in honour of ourselves and Carker."
After keeping his appointment with Edith, and having been accepted, Mr.
Dombey and the Major left Leamington, and the Royal Hotel has no further
place in the story.
When Mr. Toots, having come into a portion of his worldly wealth and
furnished his choice set of apartments, determined to apply himself to the
science of life, he engaged the Game Chicken to instruct him in "the
cultivation of those gentle arts which refine and humanise existence." The
Game Chicken, we are informed, was always to be heard of at the bar of the
Black Badger. Towards the end of the book, when Toots and the Chicken part
company, the latter seems to have chosen another house of call. "I'm afore
the public, I'm to be heard on at the bar of the Little Helephant...."
Whether these two taverns existed, or where, history does not relate.
Cousin Feenix, on his arrival from abroad expressly to attend Mr. Dombey's
wedding, stayed at Long's Hotel in Bond Street. No incident of any great
moment takes place within its walls, except that Lord Feenix slept and
was shaved there.
Long's Hotel does not now exist, but was a fashionable and well-known
house in those days when Lord Feenix was a man about town. It stood at the
junction of Clifford Street and Bond Street, and was a square-standing
corner building.
It was frequented by the leading lights of the aristocracy and of the
literary world in its flourishing days, and it is recorded that Byron
lived there for a time. That he and Sir Walter Scott dined there together
on one occasion is an outstanding fact of its history.
From Cousin Feenix's fashionable hotel we turn to a very different kind of
house in the King's Arms, Balls Pond way, where Mr. Perch seemed to be a
well-known figure. Mr. Perch had an air of feverish lassitude about him
that seemed referable to drams, "and which, in fact, might no doubt have
been traced to those numerous discoveries of himself in the bars of
public-houses." The King's Arms was one of these, in whose parlour he met
the man "with milintary frogs," who took "a little obserwation" which he
let drop about Carker and Mrs. Dombey, and worked it up in print "in a
most surprising manner" in the Sunday paper, a journalistic method that
apparently is not an invention of modern times.