namely a whole quarter, had been set apart for the Second, the latter
included within it but very little more than half the number of Readings
given in the earlier and more rapid round of the provinces. The Second
Tour, in point of fact--beginning on Monday, the 28th of October, 1861,
at Norwich, and terminating on Thursday, the 30th of January, 1862, at
Chester--comprised within it Forty-Seven, instead of, as on the former
occasion, Eighty-Seven readings altogether. Many of the principal towns
and cities of England, not visited during the more comprehensive sweep
made in 1858, through the three kingdoms, were now reached--the tour,
this time, being restricted within the English boundaries. Lancaster and
Carlisle, for example, Hastings and Canterbury, Ipswich and Colchester,
were severally included in the new programme. Resorts of fashion, like
Torquay and Cheltenham, were no longer overlooked. Preston in the north,
Dover in the south, were each in turn the scene of a Reading. Bury St.
Edmund's, in 1861, was reached on the 30th of October, and on the 25th
of November an excursion was even made to the far-off border town of
Berwick-upon-Tweed. Less hurried and less laborious than the first, this
second tour was completed, as we have said, at Chester, just before the
close of the first month of 1862, namely, on the 30th of January.
Then came the turn once more of London, where a series of Ten Readings
was given in the St. James's Hall, Piccadilly. These ten Readings,
beginning on Thursday, the 13th of March, were distributed over sixteen
weeks, ending on Friday, the 27th of June. Another metropolitan series,
still under Mr. Headland's management, was given as nearly as possible
at the same period of the London season in the following twelvemonth.
The Hanover Square Booms were the scene of these Readings of 1863, which
began on Monday, the 2nd of March, and ended on Saturday, the 13th of
June, numbering in all not ten, as upon the last occasion, but Thirteen.
During the winter of this year, Two notable Readings were given by the
Novelist at the British Embassy, in Paris, their proceeds being devoted
to the British Charitable Fund in that capital. These Readings were so
brilliantly successful, that, by particular desire, they were, a little
time afterwards, supplemented by a Third, which was quite as numerously
attended as either of its predecessors. The audience upon each occasion,
partly English, partly French, comprised among their number many of
the most gifted and distinguished of the Parisians. These three
entertainments were given under the immediate auspices of the Earl
Cowley, then Her Majesty's ambassador to the court of Napoleon III.
A considerable interval now elapsed, extending in fact over nearly three
years altogether, before the author again appeared upon the platform in
his capacity as a Reader, either in London or in the Provinces. During
his last provincial tour, there had been some confusion caused to
the general arrangements by reason of the abrupt but unavoidable
postponement of a whole week's Readings, previously announced as coming
off, three of them at Liverpool, one at Chester, and two at Manchester.
These six readings instead, however, of duly taking place, as originally
arranged, between the 16th and the 21st of December, 1861, had to
be given four weeks later on, between the 13th and the 30th of the
following January. The disarrangement of the programme thus caused arose
simply from the circumstance of the wholly unlooked-for and lamented
death of H. E. H. the Prince Consort. Another confusion in the carefully
prepared plans for one of the London series, again, had been caused by
an unexpected difficulty, at the last moment, in securing the great
Hall in Piccadilly, that having been previously engaged on the required
evenings for a series of musical entertainments. Hence the selection
for that season of the Hanover Square Rooms, which, at any rate for the
West-end public, could not but be preferable to that earliest scene
of the London Readings, St. Martin's Hall, Long Acre. Apart from
every other consideration, however, the Novelist's remembrance of the
confusions and disarrangements which had been incidental to his last
provincial tour, and to the last series of his London Readings, rather
disinclined him to hasten the date of his re-appearance in his character
as a public Reader. As it happened, besides, after the summer of 1863,
nearly two years elapsed, between the May of 1864 and the November
of 1865, during which he was in a manner precluded from seriously
entertaining any such project by the circumstance that the green numbers
of “Our Mutual Friend” were, all that while, in course of publication.
Even when that last of his longer serial stories had been completed, it
is doubtful whether he would have cared to take upon himself anew the
irksome stress and responsibility inseparable from one of those doubly
laborious undertakings--a lengthened series of Readings in London,
coupled with, or rather interwoven with, another extended tour through
the provinces.
As it fortunately happened, however, very soon after the completion
of “Our Mutual Friend,” Charles Dickens had held out to him a double
inducement to undertake once more the duties devolving upon him in his
capacity as a Reader. The toil inseparable from the Readings themselves,
as well as the fatigue resulting inevitably from so much rapid
travelling hither and thither by railway during the period set apart for
their delivery, would still be his. But at the least, according to the
proposition now made to him, the Reader would be relieved from further
care as to the general supervision, and at any rate, from all sense
of responsibility in the revived project as a purely financial or
speculative undertaking. The Messrs. Chappell, of New Bond Street,
a firm skilled in the organizing of public entertainments of various
kinds, chiefly if not exclusively until then, entertainments of a
musical character, offered, in fact, in 1866 to assume to themselves
thenceforth the whole financial responsibility of the Readings in the
Metropolis and throughout the United Kingdom. According to the proposal
originally submitted to the Novelist by the Messrs. Chappell, and at
once frankly accepted by him, a splendid sum was guaranteed to him
in remuneration. Twice afterwards those terms were considerably
increased,--and upon each occasion, it should be added, quite
spontaneously.
Another inducement was held out to the Reader besides that of his being
relieved from all further sense of responsibility in the undertaking as
a merely speculative enterprise. It related to the chance of his finding
himself released also from any further sense of solicitude as to the
conduct of the general business management. The inducement, here,
however, was of course in no way instantly recognizable. Experience
alone could show the fitness for his post of the Messrs. Chappell's
representative. As good fortune would have it, nevertheless, here
precisely was an instance in which Mr. Layard's famous phrase about the
right man in the right place, was directly applicable. As a thoroughly
competent business manager, and as one whose companionship of itself had
a heartening influence in the midst of enormous toil, Mr. Dolby speedily
came to be recognised as the very man for the position, as the very one
who in all essential respects it was most desirable should have been
selected.
A series of Thirty Readings was at once planned under his supervision.
It consisted for the first time of a tour through England and Scotland,
interspersed with Readings every now and then in the Metropolis. The
Reader's course in this way seemed to be erratic, but the whole scheme
was admirably well arranged beforehand, and once entered upon, was
carried out with the precision of clockwork. These thirty Readings,
in 1866, began and ended at St. James's Hall, Piccadilly. The opening
night was that of Tuesday, the 10th of April, the closing night that
of Tuesday, the 12th of June. Between those dates half-a-dozen other
Readings were given from the same central platform in London, the
indefatigable author making his appearance meanwhile alternately in the
principal cities of the United Kingdom. Besides revisiting in this way
(some of these places repeatedly) in the north, Edinburgh and Glasgow
and Aberdeen, in the south and south-west, Clifton and Portsmouth, as
well as Liverpool and Manchester intermediately--Charles Dickens
during the course of this tour read for the first time at Bristol, at
Greenwich, and in the Crystal Palace at Sydenham.
The inauguration of the series of Readings now referred to had a
peculiar interest imparted to it by the circumstance that, on the
evening of Tuesday, the 10th of April, 1866, there was first of all
introduced to public notice the comic patter and pathetic recollections
of the Cheap Jack, Doctor Marigold.
Half a year afterwards a longer series of the Readings began under the
organisation of the Messrs. Chappell, and under the direction of
Mr. Dolby as their business manager. It took place altogether under
precisely similar circumstances as the last, with this only difference
that the handsome terms of remuneration originally guaranteed to
the author were, as already intimated, considerably and voluntarily
increased by the projectors of the enterprise, the pecuniary results of
the first series having been so very largely beyond their expectations.
Fifty Readings instead of thirty were now arranged for--Ireland being
visited as well as the principal towns and cities of England and
Scotland. Six Readings were given at Dublin, and one at Belfast; four
were given at Glasgow, and two at Edinburgh. Bath, for the first time,
had the opportunity of according a public welcome to the great humorist,
some of the drollest scenes in whose earliest masterpiece occur in the
city of Bladud, as every true Pickwickian very well remembers. Then,
also, for the first time, he was welcomed--by old admirers of his in his
capacity as an author, new admirers of his thenceforth in his later
and minor capacity as a Reader--at Swansea and Gloucester, at Stoke and
Blackburn, at Hanley and Warrington. Tuesday, the 15th of January, 1867,
was the inaugural night of the series, when “Barbox, Brothers,” and
“The Boy at Mugby,” were read for the first time at St. James's Hall,
Piccadilly. Monday, the 13th of May, was the date of the last night of
the season, which was brought to a close upon the same platform, the
success of every Reading, without exception, both in London and in the
provinces, having been simply unexampled.
It was shortly after this that the notion was first entertained by the
Novelist of entering upon that Reading Tour in America, which has since
become so widely celebrated. Overtures had been made to him repeatedly
from the opposite shores of the Atlantic, with a view to induce him
to give a course of Readings in the United States. Speculators would
gladly, no doubt, have availed themselves of so golden an opportunity
for turning to account his immense reputation. There were those,
however, at home here, who doubted as to the advisability of the author
entering, under any conceivable circumstances, upon an undertaking
obviously involving in its successful accomplishment an enormous amount
of physical labour and excitement. Added to this, the project was
inseparable in any case--however favourable might be the manner of
its ultimate arrangement--from a profound sense of responsibility all
through the period that would have to be set apart for its realisation.
It was among the more remarkable characteristics of Charles Dickens
that, while he was endowed with a brilliant imagination, and with a
genius in many ways incomparable, he was at the same time gifted with
the clearest and soundest judgment, being, in point of fact, what is
called a thoroughly good man of business. Often as he had shewn this
to be the case during the previous phases of his career, he never
demonstrated the truth of it so undeniably as in the instance of this
proposed Reading Tour in the United States. Determined to understand at
once whether the scheme, commended by some, denounced by others, was in
itself, to begin with, feasable, and after that advisable, he despatched
Mr. Dolby to America for the purpose of surveying the proposed scene of
operations. Immediately on his emissary's return, Dickens drew up a few
pithy sentences, headed by him, “The Case in a Nutshell.” His decision
was what those more immediately about him had for some time anticipated.
He made up his mind to go, and to go quite independently. The Messrs.
Chappell, it should be remarked at once, had no part whatever in
the enterprise. The Author-Reader accepted for himself the sole
responsibility of the undertaking. As a matter of course, he retained
Mr. Dolby as his business manager, despatching him again across the
Atlantic, when everything had been arranged between them, to the end
that all should be in readiness by the time of his own arrival.
Within the brief interval which then elapsed, Between the business
manager's return to, and the Author-Reader's departure for, America,
that well-remembered Farewell Banquet was given to Charles Dickens,
which was not unworthy of signalising his popularity and his reputation.
He himself, upon the occasion, spoke of it as that “proud night,”
recognising clearly enough, as he could hardly fail to do, in the
gathering around him, there in Freemasons' Hall, on the evening of the
2nd of November, 1867, one of the most striking incidents in a career
that had been almost all sunshine, both from within and from without,
from the date of its commencement. It was there, in the midst of what
he himself referred to, at the time, as that “brilliant representative
company,” while acknowledging the presence around him of so many of his
brother artists, “not only in literature, but also in the fine arts,” he
availed himself of the opportunity to relate very briefly the story of
his setting out once more for America. “Since I was there before,” he
said, “a vast, entirely new generation has arisen in the United States.
Since I was there before, most of the best known of my books have
been written and published. The new generation and the books have come
together and have kept together, until at last numbers of those who have
so widely and constantly read me, naturally desiring a little variety
in the relations between us, have expressed a strong wish that I should
read myself. This wish at last conveyed to me, through public channels
and business channels, has gradually become enforced by an immense
accumulation of letters from individuals and associations of
individuals, all expressing in the same hearty, homely, cordial,
unaffected way a kind of personal interest in me; I had almost said a
kind of personal affection for me, which I am sure you will agree with
me, it would be dull insensibility on my part not to prize.” Hence, as
he explained, his setting forth on that day week upon his second visit
to America, with a view among other purposes, according to his own
happy phrase, to use his best endeavours “to lay down a third cable of
intercommunication and alliance between the old world and the new.”
The illustrious chairman who presided over that Farewell Banquet,
Lord Lytton, had previously remarked, speaking in his capacity as a
politician, “I should say that no time could be more happily chosen
for his visit;” adding, “because our American kinsfolk have conceived,
rightly or wrongfully, that they have some cause of complaint against
ourselves, and out of all England we could not have selected an envoy
more calculated to allay irritation and to propitiate good will.” As one
whose cordial genius was, in truth, a bond of sympathy between the two
great kindred nationalities, Charles Dickens indeed went forth in
one sense at that time, it might almost have been said, in a
semi-ambassadorial character, not between the rulers, but between the
peoples. The incident of his visit to America could in no respect be
considered a private event, but, from first to last, was regarded,
and reasonably regarded, as a public and almost as an international
occurrence. “Happy is the man,” said Lord Lytton, on that 2nd of
November, when proposing the toast of the evening in words of eloquence
worthy of himself and of his theme, “Happy is the man who makes clear
his title deeds to the royalty of genius, while he yet lives to enjoy
the gratitude and reverence of those whom he has subjected to his sway.
Though it is by conquest that he achieves his throne, he at least is
a conqueror whom the conquered bless, and the more despotically he
enthralls the dearer he becomes to the hearts of men.” Observing, in
conclusion, as to this portion of his argument, “Seldom, I say, has that
kind of royalty been quietly conceded to any man of genius until his
tomb becomes his throne, and yet there is not one of us now present who
thinks it strange that it is granted without a murmur to the guest whom
we receive to-night.” As if in practical recognition of the prerogative
thus gracefully referred to by his brother-author, a royal saloon
carriage on Friday, the 8th of November, conveyed Charles Dickens from
London to Liverpool. On the following morning he took his departure on
board the _Cuba_ for the United States, arriving at Boston on Tuesday,
the 19th, when the laconic message “Safe and well,” was flashed home by
submarine telegraph.
The Readings projected in America were intended to number up as many as
eighty altogether. They actually numbered up exactly Seventy-Six. They
were inaugurated by the first of the Boston Readings on Monday, the 2nd
of December, 1867. Extending over an interval of less than five months,
they closed in Steinway Hall on Monday, the 20th April, 1868, with the
last of the New York Readings. From beginning to end, the enthusiasm
awakened by these Readings was entirely unparalleled. Simply to ensure
a chance of purchasing the tickets of admission, a queue of applicants
a quarter of a mile long would pass a whole winter's night patiently
waiting in sleet and snow, out in the streets, to be in readiness for
the opening of the office-doors when the sale of tickets should have
commenced. Blankets and in several instances mattresses were brought
with them by some of the more provident of these nocturnal wayfarers,
many of whom of course were notoriously middle-men who simply
speculated, with immense profit to themselves, in selling again at
enormously advanced prices the tickets which were invariably dispensed
by the business manager at the fixed charges originally announced.
As curiously illustrative of the first outburst of this enthusiasm even
before the Novelist's arrival--on the very eve of that arrival, as it
happened--mention may here be made of the simple facts in regard to the
sale of tickets on Monday, the 18th of November. During the whole of
that day, from the first thing in the morning to the last thing at
night, Mr. Dolby sat there at his desk in the Messrs. Ticknor and
Fields' bookstore, literally doing nothing but sell tickets as fast
as he could distribute them and take the money. For thirteen hours
together, without taking bite or sup, without ever once for a passing
moment quitting the office-stool on which he was perched--fortunately
for him behind a strong barricade--he answered the rush of applicants
that steadily pressed one another onwards to the pigeon-hole, each
drifting by exhausted when his claims were satisfied. The indefatigable
manager took in moneys paid down within those thirteen consecutive hours
as many as twelve thousand dollars.
During the five months of his stay in America, four Readings a week were
given by the Novelist to audiences as numerous as the largest building
in each town of a suitable character could by any contrivance be made
to contain. The average number of those present upon each of these
occasions may be reasonably estimated as at the very least 1500
individuals. Remembering that there were altogether seventy-six
Readings, this would show at once that upwards of one hundred thousand
souls (114,000) listened to the voice of the great Author reading, what
they had so often before read themselves, and raising their own voices
in return to greet his ears with their ringing acclamations. At a
moderate estimate, again, just as we have seen that each Reading
represented 1500 as the average number of the audience, that audience
represented, in its turn, in cash, at the lowest computation, nett
proceeds amounting to fully $3000. At Rochester, for example, in the
State of New York, was the smallest house anywhere met with in the whole
course of these American Readings, and even that yielded $2500, the
largest house in the tour, on the other hand, netting as much as $6000
and upwards. Multiplying, therefore, the reasonably-mentioned average of
$3000 by seventy-six, as the aggregate number of the Readings, we arrive
at the astounding result that in this tour of less than five months the
Author-Reader netted altogether the enormous sum of $228,000. Supposing
gold to have been then at par, that lump sum would have represented
in our English currency what if spoken of even in a whisper would,
according to Hood's famous witticism, have represented something like
“the roar of a Forty Thousand Pounder!” Even as it was, then, gold
being at 39 1/2 per cent, premium, with 1/4 per cent, more deducted on
commission--virtually a drop of nearly 40 per cent, altogether!--the
result was the winning of a fortune in what, but for the fatigue
involved in it, might have been regarded as simply a holiday excursion.