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p. iiiRAMBLES IN
DICKENS’ LAND

BY ROBERT ALLBUT

WITH INTRODUCTION BY
GERALD BRENAN
AND ILLUSTRATIONS BY
HELEN M. JAMES

LONDON
S. T. FREEMANTLE
217 PICCADILLY
1899

p. ivNOTICE

The several Extracts from the Works of Dickens contained in this Manual, are used for the better illustration of the text, by kind permission of Messrs. Chapman & Hall.

Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson and Co.
At the Ballantyne Press

p. vCONTENTS

p. viiLIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

p. ixINTRODUCTION

It is one of the magic legacies left by the great romancers, that the scenes and characters which they described should possess for most of us an air of reality, so convincing as sometimes to put staid history to the blush.  The novelist’s ideals become actual to the popular mind; while commonplace truth hides itself among its dry-as-dust records, until some curious antiquary or insistent pedant drags it forth to make a nine days’ wonder.  We sigh over “Juliet’s Tomb” in spite of the precisians, sup in the inn kitchen at Pennaflor with Gil Blas at our elbow, and shudder through the small hours outside the haunted House of the Black Cat in Quaker Philadelphia.  At Tarascon they show you Tartarin’s oriental garden; and you must hide the irrepressible smile, for Tartarin is painfully real to these good cap-shooters.  The other day an illustrated magazine published pictures of Alexander Selkirk’s birthplace, and labelled them “The Home of Robinson Crusoe.”  The editor who chose that caption was still under the spell of Defoe.  To him, as to the vast majority, Crusoe the imaginary seemed vividly real, while the flesh-and-blood Selkirk was but a name.  And p. xif you have that catholic sympathy which is the true test of the perfect lover of romance, read “David Copperfield” once again, and then, by way of experiment, spend an afternoon in Canterbury.  You will find yourself expecting at one moment to see Mr. Micawber step jauntily out of the Queen’s Head Inn, at another to catch a glimpse of the red-haired Heep slinking along North Lane to his “’umble dwelling.”  You will probably meet a dozen buxom “eldest Miss Larkinses,” and obnoxious butcher-boys—perhaps even a sweet Agnes Wickfield, or a Miss Betsy Trotwood driving in from Dover.  And, above all, you will certainly enjoy yourself, and thank your gods for Charles Dickens.

Mr. Would-be Wiseman may affect to sneer at our pilgrimages to this and other places connected with the imaginary names of fiction; but he must recognise the far-reaching influence for good exercised by symbols and associations over the human mind.  The sight of a loved home after many years—the flutter of one’s country’s flag in foreign lands—these things touch keenly our better nature.  In a like manner is the thoughtful man impressed when he treads a pathway hallowed by the writings of some favourite poet or romancer.  The moral lesson which the author intended to convey, his insight into character or loving eye for Nature’s beauties, and many exquisite passages from his books appeal to us all the more, when we recall them in the very rooms where they were written—p. xiamong the gloomy streets or breezy hills which he has filled with his inventions.  Says Washington Irving in his essay on Stratford: “I could not but reflect on the singular gift of the poet; to be able thus to spread the magic of his mind over the very face of Nature; to give to things and places a charm and character not their own, and to turn this ‘working-day’ world into a perfect fairyland.  He is indeed the true enchanter, whose spell operates, not upon the senses, but upon the imagination and the heart.  Under the wizard influence of Shakespeare I had been walking all day in a complete delusion. . . .  I had been surrounded with fancied beings; with mere airy nothings conjured up by poetic power; yet which, to me, had all the charm of reality.  I had heard Jaques soliloquise beneath his oak; had beheld the fair Rosalind and her companion adventuring through the woodlands; and, above all, had been once more present in spirit with fat Jack Falstaff and his contemporaries, from the august Justice Shallow down to the gentle Master Slender and the sweet Anne Page.  Ten thousand honours and blessings on the bard who has thus gilded the dull realities of life with innocent illusions.”  Wherefore, in spite of the sneers of Master Would-be Wiseman, let us continue to make these pleasant pilgrimages; not alone for our own satisfaction and betterment, but also in memory of those who have opened before us so many delectable lands of fancy, and given us so many agreeable companions of the road.

p. xiiThis volume, then, is the pilgrim’s guide to Dickens’ Land—the loving topography of that fertile and very populous region.  No far away foreign country is Dickens’ Land.  It lies at our doors; we may explore it when we choose, with never a passport to purchase nor a Custom House to fear.  The sojourner in London can scarce look from his windows without beholding scores of its interesting places.  To parody that passage which describes Mr. Pickwick’s outlook into Goswell Street—Dickens’ Land is at our feet; Dickens’ Land is on our right hand as far as the eye can reach; Dickens’ Land extends on our left, and the opposite side of Dickens’ Land is over the way.  Nor do the bounds of this genial territory confine themselves to London alone.  Outlying portions spread north and south, east and west, over England.  There is even, as Sala showed, a Dickens’ quarter in Paris; and we have unexpectedly encountered small colonies of Dickens’ Land across the wide Atlantic.  But the best of it lies close to the great heart of the world—in London, or in the counties thereabout; and if “Rambles in Dickens’ Land” succeeds in guiding its readers with pleasure and profit over this storied ground, it will have faithfully fulfilled its mission.

Trouble has not been spared to make this topography accurate as well as entertaining.  Mr. Weller the younger, with all his “extensive and peculiar” knowledge of London—Mr. Weller the elder and his brothers of the whip, with their p. xiiiknowledge of post-roads and coaching inns, could hardly have identified the various localities more clearly than the compiler has done.  Wherever doubts and disputes arise—as in regard to the site of the “Old Curiosity Shop”—all sides of the case are given, and the reader is asked to sum up the arguments and judge for himself.  In nearly every instance a quotation is offered from the author, by means of which the pilgrim is enabled to refresh his memory and bring his own recollections of the book to bear upon the question of the site.  These quotations will be found to act admirably as aids to memory, and to obviate the necessity of carrying a whole library of Dickens about on one’s rambles.  Take, for example, the excerpts from “David Copperfield” in connection with the visit to Dover.  The facetious answers of the boatmen to David when, sitting ragged and forlorn in the Dover Market Place, he inquires for his aunt’s house, bring back at a single touch the whole sad story of the boy’s tramp from London to the coast.  It does not require much imagination to picture him sitting there “on the step of an empty shop,” with his weary, pinched face and his “dusty sunburnt, half-clothed figure,” while the sea-faring folk (lineal forbears of those who frequent the place to-day) made mock of him with their clumsy japes, until at length happened by the friendly fly-driver, who showed him how to reach the residence of the old lady who “carries a bag—bag with a good deal of room in it—is gruffish, and comes p. xivdown upon you, sharp.”  It is easy, too, with the help of our guide, to follow the shivering child along the cliffs to Miss Trotwood’s—nay, to identify the “very neat little cottage, with cheerful bow-windows,” where that good soul looked after Mr. Dick, and defended her “immaculate grass-plot” against marauding donkeys.  It is this present writer’s privilege to know a charming elderly lady who boasts of Dover as her birthplace, and who, when she has exhausted the other lions of that town, is accustomed to close her remarks with the statement that she “lived for years within a stone’s-throw of Miss Betsy Trotwood’s cottage.”  Occasionally the Superior Person (who, alas, is rarely absent nowadays!) points out with a smile of tolerance that neither Miss Trotwood nor yet her house ever existed save in the novelist’s brain.  Whereupon this charming old lady shakes her finger testily at the transgressor, and exclaims, “It is quite evident that you have never lived in Dover.  Miss Betsy Trotwood a myth, indeed!  Let me tell you that my own mother knew the dear woman well—yes, and that delightful Mr. Dick too; and she remembered seeing Mr. Dickens drive up in a fly from the railway station to visit them.  Of course their names were not ‘Trotwood’ and ‘Dick’ at all; it would never have done for Mr. Dickens to put them in his book under the real names, particularly as Mr. Dick was related to many good families in that part of Kent.  I have even a dim recollection of seeing Miss Trotwood being wheeled about in a bath-chair when p. xvI was a very little girl and she a very old woman.  Myth, indeed!  Why, there are old men in Dover now who were warned off the grass-plot by David Copperfield’s aunt when they were donkey-boys.”  The animation of the speaker shows that she believes everything she says.  Perhaps a lady possessing the characteristics of Miss Betsy did once upon a time inhabit the cottage in Dover.  Perhaps there was a real Mr. Dick.  Otherwise these recollections are but another example of that hypnotism exercised over posterity by the great romancers, to which allusion has already been made.

Again, the many references and the quotations made from several of Dickens’ works, illustrative of the Temple and the Lincoln’s Inn quarter—(pages 2 to 25 in the ensuing “Rambles”)—are certain to be appreciated by the Rambler.  With their assistance he can summon back to his memory the tender love story of Ruth Pinch, and so dream away a happy hour in peaceful Fountain Court; follow in fancy Maypole Hugh and the illustrious Captain Sim Tappertit as they ascended the stairs to Sir John Chester’s chambers in Paper Buildings; stroll thoughtfully along King’s Bench Walk with the spirit of Sidney Carton; and, in the purlieus of Chancery Lane, review the legal abuses of the past—(perhaps even some of those that survive to-day)—reflect upon “Jarndyce and Jarndyce,” or upon the banished sponging-houses of this district, and once p. xvimore admit that Dickens the great novelist was also Dickens the great reformer.

An important feature of “Rambles in Dickens’ Land” will be found in the exhaustive references to Dickens’ own haunts and homes, and the haunts and homes of many of his relatives and friends.  Naturally, these are in numerous cases intimately bound up with the creations of his novels, for Dickens did not “write out of an inkwell,” but looked for inspiration to real life and real scenes.  At Portsmouth our volume guides you to the house where he was born, and to the old church register wherein the christening is entered of—(how strangely the full name sounds!)—“Charles John Huffham Dickens.”  But the same venerable seaport is thronged with memories of Nicholas Nickleby and his player-friends, Miss Snevellicci, the Crummles family, poor Smike and the rest.  It is interesting to remember that an American writer once suggested the possibility that Dickens had obtained Nickleby’s experiences as an actor from personal adventures with a travelling “troupe” during his youth.  This is not impossible, although Forster makes no mention of such an adventure; the early years of Dickens are by no means fully accounted for, and it is certain that the stage had always a great fascination for him.

Back of old Hungerford Stairs, behind what is now Charing Cross Station, you may visit the spot where the two boys—the real and the imaginary—Charles Dickens and David Copperfield p. xviispent so many hours while working for a scant pittance in that “crazy old house with a wharf of its own abutting on the water when the tide was in, and on the mud when it was out, and literally overrun with rats.”  Gadshill, where Dickens lived and died, is on the very borders of historic Rochester, teeming with reminders of “Edwin Drood,” not to say of the genial Pickwick and his companions.  Of Furnival’s Inn where “Pickwick” was written, and where its author spent the first months of his married life, only the site remains; but these “Rambles” will help you to find all, or nearly all, of his other homes, even to that last home of all—the grave in Westminster Abbey, in which he was laid on the 14th of June 1870.  His friends’ houses too, and the scores of spots noteworthy by reason of association with him personally, you will be given an opportunity of visiting if you follow this careful cicerone.  At No. 58 Lincoln’s Inn Fields still stands Forster’s house, where, in 1844, Dickens read “The Chimes” to Carlyle, Douglas Jerrold, Maclise, and others, and which is also utilised in “Bleak House” to supply a model for the dwelling-place of Mr. Tulkinghorn.  The office of Household Words, founded by Dickens, is now part of the Gaiety Theatre.  The old taverns about Hampstead, whither he loved to resort for a friendly flagon “and a red-hot chop,” are much as they were in the novelist’s day, save in one regrettable instance where the proprietor has p. xviiipreferred, in order to cater to an unappreciative class, to disfigure his inn into a mere modern public-house of the conventional type, such that Dickens, who loved the place when it was old-fashioned and comfortable, would utterly disown now.  The ancient “Spaniards,” however, is much the same as it was in the days of the Gordon riots, when the then host of the quaint little tavern saved Lord Mansfield’s country house at Caen Wood by allowing the rioters to devastate his cellars, while he privily sent for the Guards.  The reckless waste of liquor on that occasion is said to have suggested to Dickens the scene in “Barnaby Rudge,” where John Willet watches the sack of his beloved “Maypole” and sees his cellars drained of their best, as he lies bound and helpless in the bar.  That the novelist frequently visited the “Spaniards,” the old records of the house can show; and in “Pickwick” he makes it the scene of a memorable tea-party, attended by Mrs. Bardell, just before those “sharp practitioners,” Dodson and Fogg, caused the injured lady’s arrest.  The “Bull and Bush,” another old Hampstead inn much frequented of Dickens, also exists unharmed by the “renovator.”  And while we are upon the subject of inns known to our author, let us not forget the “Maypole” itself, here shown to be the “King’s Head” at Chigwell.  Dickens was in ecstasies over the “King’s Head” and the surrounding neighbourhood, when a chance visit disclosed to him their p. xixattractions; and the letters which he wrote to his friends at this period are full of Chigwell and its picturesque hostelry.  Little wonder, therefore, that he afterwards made them famous in “Barnaby Rudge.”  The pilgrim will not be disappointed in the “King’s Head” of to-day, if he accepts the good advice offered by the compiler of these “Rambles,” i.e. to take his ideal of the place from Dickens’ own description rather than from the elaborate drawing of Cattermole.  He may perhaps notice that in “Barnaby Rudge” no hint is conveyed of the close proximity of Chigwell church, which is simply across the road.  Doubtless this is a sign of the novelist’s artistic sense.  To have his “Maypole” windows looking directly into the graveyard would have detracted from that air of warmth and conviviality with which he wished to endow his rare old inn.  In most other respects the description exactly fits the “King’s Head” as it must have been in “No Popery” times—as it is with little alteration to-day.  The trim green sward at the rear—once evidently the bowling-green—is a famous resting-place in summer; and in one of the small arbours Dickens is said to have written during his stay here.  The village, although showing signs of the approach of that fell barbarian the Essex builder, is still sufficiently picturesque and old-world to keep one’s illusions alive.  There is a grammar school at Chigwell, the boys of which are learned in neighbouring Dickens’ lore.  If you are p. xxcredulous—as it becomes a pilgrim to be—these grammarians will show you John Willet’s tomb in the churchyard, and Dolly Varden’s path with the real Warren, on the skirts of Hainault Forest, at the farther end of it.  Both in Chigwell and Chigwell Row some village worthies are still to be met with who have conversed with Charles Dickens and the kindred spirits that came hither in his company.  At the “King’s Head,” if Mr. Willet’s successor be agreeable, one may lunch or sup in the Dickens’ Room, also held to have been the chamber in which Mr. Haredale and the elder Chester held their memorable interview.

Some other inns to which Dickens is known to have resorted are: the “Bull” at Rochester, the “Leather Bottle” at Cobham, and the “Great White Horse” at Ipswich—all with Pickwickian associations; the “Old Cheshire Cheese” in Fleet Street, and the “George and Dragon” at Canterbury.  To many minor taverns in London he was also a frequent visitor, for he sought his characters in the market-place rather than in the study.  His signature, with the familiar flourish underneath, is treasured in hotel registers not a few, and it is esteemed a high honour to be permitted to slumber in the “Dickens’ Room.”

To all and each of these places “Rambles in Dickens’ Land” leads the way, if the reader chooses to follow.  A notable advantage of these rambles is the ease with which they may be undertaken.  An ordinary healthy man or woman may set forth p. xxiwithout apprehension in the author’s footsteps from the beginning to the end of any particular journey which he describes, and even the invalid may saunter through a “Ramble” without fatigue.  Conveyances are only needed to bring the pilgrim to the starting-point of the voyage, and in several instances even these aids to locomotion may be dispensed with altogether when the sightseer is one after Dickens’ own heart—a sturdy pedestrian.  By pursuing the routes indicated, there is no reason why a Grand Tour of Dickens’ Land should not be made by easy stages and at slight cost.  Or the pilgrim may pick out some particular trip, when leisure and chance carry him in that direction.  The volume is in truth a serviceable guide-book, leading its clients by the best ways, and even informing them where, when sight-seeing is over, a place may be found for rest, refreshment, and reflection.  And it is happier than most guide-books in that it is never called upon to describe the stupid and uninteresting, which have no existence in Dickens’ Land.

Into Dickens’ Land, therefore, my masters, an you will and when you will!  The high-roads thither are always open, the lanes and by-paths are free for us to tread.  He that found out this rare world has made it fully ours.  Let us visit our inheritance, or revisit it, if that be the better word.  Let us make real the scenes we have read of and dreamt of—peopling them with the folk of Dickens, so that familiar faces shall look upon us p. xxiifrom familiar windows, familiar voices greet us as we pass.  Shall we travel abroad in the fashion of the corresponding committee of the Pickwick Club?  Then here is this book, with a wealth of shrewd information between its covers, ready to be our own particular Samuel Weller—to wear our livery, whether of sadness or of joy—to point out to us the sights and the notabilities, to be garrulous when we look for gossip, and silent when our mood is for silence—to act, in short, as that useful individual whom we all “rayther want,” “somebody to look arter us when we goes out a-wisitin’.”

Where, if you please, shall we “wisit” first?  It is hard to choose, since there is so much to choose from.  We may ramble about London town, where, like Mr. Weller, our guide is “werry much at home.”  If so, we are sure to encounter a host of old cronies.  Perhaps we shall see the great Buzfuz entering court, all in his wig and silk, nodding with lofty condescension to his struggling brother, Mr. T. Traddles, which latter is bringing “Sophy and the girls” to set Gray’s Inn a-blooming.  Or Tom Pinch going towards Fountain Court to meet the waiting Ruth.  Or David Copperfield joyously ushering J. Steerforth into his rooms in the Adelphi.  Or Captain Cuttle steering for the sign of the “Wooden Midshipman,” which he may eventually find (and make a note of) at its new moorings in the Minories.  Or Dick Swiveller, poor soul, loafing to his dingy lodgings.  Or that precious pair, Bob Sawyer and Benjamin Allen, startling p. xxiiithe sullen repose of Lant Street with bacchanalian revelry.

And, if the London Dickens’ Land palls, doth not this most inviting country stretch to all points of the compass?  Northward goes yonder well-appointed coach, whereof the driver has just been escorted from a certain public-house in Portugal Street by a mottle-faced man, in company with two or three other persons of stout and weather-beaten aspect—the driver himself being stouter and more weather-beaten than all.  Let us take the box-seat by his side, and lead him on to talk of “shepherds in wolves’ clothing,” until presently he tools us into Ipswich, pulling up under the sign of that “rapacious animal” the Great White Horse.  In Ipswich we may catch a glimpse of a mulberry-coloured livery slinking by St. Clement’s Church, and guess therefrom that one Alfred Jingle is here at his old game of laying siege to the hearts of susceptible females with money.  Here, too, behind that green gate in Angel Lane, resides the pretty housemaid soon to become Mrs. Sam Weller.  But we must not linger in Ipswich.  Yarmouth lies before us, with its phantom boat-house still upturned on the waste places towards the sea, with Little Em’ly, and the Peggottys, and with Mr. Barkis waiting in the Market Place to jog us out to sleepy “Blunderstone.”

Back again in London, there is another coach-of-fancy prepared to take us into Kent, from the yard of the Golden Cross.  Four gentlemen—one p. xxiva beaming, spectacled person in drab shorts—are outside passengers for Rochester.  And see, here is the ubiquitous Jingle again, clambering to the roof with all his worldly goods wrapped up in a brown paper parcel.  “Heads—heads—take care of your heads,” he cries, as we rumble under the old archway; and then, hey! for hopfields and cherry orchards, for “mouldy old cathedrals” in “Cloisterham” or Canterbury, for jolly Kentish yeomen and bright-eyed maids of Kent. . . .  Who was that wan-faced, coatless urchin we passed just now in a whirl of chalky dust?  His name is Copperfield, and he is on his way to Dover.  And is not that Mr. Wardle driving his laughing women-folk to the review?  And again, yonder on the brown common, by the Punch and Judy show, there is a grey old man, pillowing in his loving arms a little blue-eyed girl.  These, too, we know; and our hearts go out to them, for who of us is there that has not—

“. . . with Nell, in Kentish meadows,
Wandered, and lost his way”?

Of introduction there is no more to be said.  The book itself lies open before you; and at your own sweet will you may ramble with it, high and low, through all the land of Dickens.

G. B.

p. xxvPREFACE

The great majority of English readers—on both sides of the Atlantic—claim personal acquaintance with “Samivel” Weller, Mark Tapley, Oliver Twist, and many more besides: the old companions of our schoolboy days.  We cherish pleasant remembrance of the familiar “green leaves” of Dombey, David Copperfield, and the rest, as they first afforded us their monthly quota of interest and enjoyment; and have always maintained intimate relations with Captain Cuttle, Tom Pinch, Mr. Peggotty, and the more recent dramatis personæ of the works of Dickens.  We sympathise with Florence, Agnes, and Esther as with sisters, and keep corners of our hearts sacred to the memory of Little Nell, Paul Dombey, and the child-wife Dora.

The creations of “bonnie Prince Charlie” have thus become veritable “household words”; part and parcel of our home associations, instinct with personality and life.  We never think of them as the airy nothings of imaginative fiction, but regard them as familiar friends, having “a local habitation and a name” amongst us; with whose cheerful acquaintance we could ill afford to part, and who bear us kindly company on the hot and dusty highway of our daily lives.

Charles Dickens was essentially a Londoner, always having a fond regard for the highways and by-ways of this great Metropolis, and confessedly deriving his inspiration from the varied phases of Town life and Society.  We accordingly find that the main incidents and characters of his novels have here their mise en scène.

In homage to the genius of his favourite Author, the p. xxviwriter of the following pages has endeavoured to localise many of the more familiar associations of the great Novelist with as much exactitude as may be possible; but it must be remembered that London has undergone considerable alteration and reconstruction, during the last fifty years.

Thus far reads the original Preface to this Work, as written thirteen years since; the first (and smaller) edition of which was published in 1886, under the title of Rambles in London with Charles Dickens.  The author now begs to thankfully acknowledge its favourable reception, generously accorded by the Press in particular, and the reading-world in general.

The present arrangement of the book includes some important additions as well as considerable revision, the latter being rendered necessary by the disappearance of many houses and buildings in the course of intervening years, and the steady progress of Metropolitan improvements.  Thus it comes to pass that only the memory of what has been remains, in regard to many of these Dickensian localities and landmarks; and it has been the object of the author (1899) to indicate the former whereabouts of these old places, as heretofore existent.  Especially in the Strand and neighbourhood (Ramble I.), as well as in Chancery Lane and Holborn (Rambles II. and IV.), many alterations have taken place, and another London is springing up around a younger generation, not known to Dickens.  Our Author says (in Martin Chuzzlewit), “Change begets change; nothing propagates so fast”: and the London of to-day, and the activities of our Metropolitan County Council, at the close of this nineteenth century, afford striking testimony to the truth of the aphorism, “The old order changeth, giving place to new.”

The Pall Mall Magazine, July 1896, contains a contribution by Mr. C. Dickens, junr.—“Notes on Some Dickens’ Places and People”—in which he deprecates the endeavours of those inquirers who have attempted any localisation of these places.  “It is true,” says he, “that p. xxviimany of the places described in Charles Dickens’s books were suggested by real localities or buildings, but the more the question comes to be examined, the more clear it is that all that was done with the prototype, was to use it as a painter or a sculptor uses a sketch, and that, under the hand of the writer and in the natural process of evolution, it has grown, in almost every case, into a finished picture, with few, if any, very salient points about it to render its origin unmistakable.”  He also quotes, with emphatic approval, from a review of Mr. P. Fitzgerald’s Bozland, then recently published: “Dickens, like Turner in the sister art of painting—like all real artists indeed—used nature, no doubt, but used it as being his slave and in no wise his master.  He was not content simply to reproduce the places, persons, things that he had seen and known.  He passed them through the crucible of his imagination, fused them, re-combined their elements, changed them into something richer and rarer, gave them forth as products of his art.  Are we not doing him some disservice when we try to reverse the process?”  “With these words I most cordially agree.—Charles Dickens the Younger.”

The author of this book would submit that the attempt to preserve the memory of these localities in association with their original use by “the Master,” does not “reverse the process”; but, rightly considered, may help the reader to a better comprehension of the genius and method of Dickens.  The dictum of the Rev. W. J. Dawson, given a few years since in The Young Woman (referring to a previous edition of this Work), is worth consideration: “The book casts a new light upon Dickens’s methods of work, and shows us how little he left to invention, and how much he owed to exact observation.”  And in this connection there may be quoted the opinion of Sir Walter Besant, who published an appreciative article in The Queen, 9th May 1896, anent these selfsame “Rambles,” which thus concludes: “With this information in your hand, you can go down the Strand and view its streets p. xxviiifrom north to south with increased intelligence and interest.  I am not certain whether peopling a street with creations of the imagination is not more useful—it is certainly more interesting—than with the real figures of the stony-hearted past.”

The writer, therefore, still believes that such a Dickensian Directory as is now prepared will be found a valuable practical guide for those who may desire to visit the haunts and homes of these old friends, whose memory we cannot “willingly let die;” and to recall the many interests connected with them by the way.

Though not professing to be infallible, he begs to assure those whom it may concern that his information—gleaned from many sources—has been collected con amore with carefulness and caution; and he ventures to hope that his book may be of service to many Metropolitan visitors, as indicating (previous to the coming time when the New Zealander shall meditate over the ruins of London) some few pleasant “Rambles in Dickens’ Land.”

R. A.

London, September 20, 1899.

p. 1RAMBLE I
Charing Cross to Lincoln’s Inn Fields

The Golden Cross; Associations with Pickwick and Copperfield—Craven Street; Residence of Mr. Brownlow—Charing Cross Terminus—Hungerford Stairs and Market; Lamert’s Blacking Manufactory; Micawber’s Lodgings; Mr. Dick’s Bedroom—No. 3 Chandos Street; Blacking Warehouse—Bedfordbury; “Tom All-Alone’s”—Buckingham Street; Copperfield’s Chambers—The Adelphi Arches—The Adelphi Hotel; Snodgrass and Emily Wardle—“The Fox-under-the-Hill”; Martin Chuzzlewit and Mark Tapley—The Residence of Miss La Creevy—Offices of Household Words and All the Year Round—Covent Garden Market; Hummums and Tavistock Hotels, associated with “Great Expectations,” etc.—Bow Street—Old Bow Street Police Court; “The Artful Dodger”—Covent Garden Theatre—Broad Court; Mr. Snevellicci—St. Martin’s Hall; Dickens’s First London Readings—Russell Court; Nemo’s Burial Place—Clare Court; Copperfield’s Dining-Rooms—Old Roman Bath; Mrs. Lirriper’s Lodgings—St. Clement Danes—Portsmouth Street; “The Old Curiosity Shop”—The Old George the Fourth; “The Magpie and Stump”—Portugal Street; “The Horse and Groom”; Mr. Tony Weller and his Legal Adviser—Lincoln’s Inn Fields; Mr. John Forster’s House; Residence of Mr. Tulkinghorn.

Starting from Charing Cross Post Office as a convenient centre, and taking an eastward course up the Strand, we immediately reach, on the left-hand (north) side—a few doors from the Post Office—The Golden Cross Hotel.  Sixty years since this p. 2establishment was one of the principal Coaching Houses of the Metropolis.  It was the starting-point of the Rochester Coach, by which, on May 13, 1827, Mr. Pickwick and his friends commenced their travels.  Driving by cab from the vicinity of that gentleman’s residence in Goswell Street, here it was that the pugnacious cabman, having mistaken the purpose of Mr. P.’s note-book, committed assault and battery upon the four Pickwickians, “sparring away like clockwork,” from which unexpected attack they were rescued by the redoubtable Mr. Alfred Jingle.  In those days there was an arched entrance leading from the Strand beneath the front of the hotel to the coach-yard behind.  Hence Mr. Jingle’s warning to his new acquaintances—“Heads, heads; take care of your heads!” which recommendation was followed by the first recorded anecdote as given by that loquacious pretender—

“Terrible place—dangerous work—other day—five children—mother—tall lady, eating sandwiches—forgot the arch—crash—knock—children look round—mother’s head off—sandwich in her hand—no mouth to put it in—head of a family off—shocking—shocking.”

This coach-yard and its entrance existed until the days of Copperfield, who came to The Golden Cross in the nineteenth chapter of his history, having just finished his education at Dr. Strong’s.  He arrived “outside the Canterbury Coach,” and here met Steerforth, his former schoolboy patron, who speedily arranged for his transference from No. 44, “a little loft over a stable,” to No. 72, a comfortable bedroom next his own.  Here, says David, “I fell asleep in blissful condition . . . until the early morning coaches rumbling out of the archway underneath made me dream of thunder and the gods.”  This entrance was abolished in 1851, giving place to a more convenient exterior arrangement and doorway; again remodelled, 1897.

The Golden Cross is again referred to in the Copperfield experience (chapter 40) as the place where David conferred with Mr. Peggotty, one snowy night, after their p. 3unexpected meeting opposite St. Martin’s Church (close at hand on the north, at the corner of St. Martin’s Lane), when Martha listened at the door.

“In those days there was a side entrance” (Duncannon Street, now appropriated by the London and North-Western Railway Company) “nearly opposite to where we stood.  I pointed out the gateway, put my arm through his, and we went across.  Two or three public rooms opened out of the stable-yard; and looking into one of them, and finding it empty, and a good fire burning, I took him in there.”

Opposite the principal entrance of The Golden Cross is Craven Street, leading to the Thames Embankment.  It now mainly consists of private hotels and boarding-houses, at which visitors to London may be conveniently accommodated on reasonable terms.  In the days of Oliver Twist these were, for the most part, private houses; and here was Mr. Brownlow’s Residence—taken after his removal from Pentonville—in which was the back parlour where full confession was extorted from Monks, alias Edward Leeford.  The house, No. 39 (now Barnett’s Private Hotel), centrally situated on the east side, is stated to have been assigned as the residence aforesaid.

On the south side of the Strand we immediately reach the Charing Cross Terminus of the South-Eastern Railway, built on the site of old Hungerford Market.  At No. 30 Hungerford Stairs, at the back of this locality, Charles Dickens, when a lad, did duty at the Blacking Manufactory of a relative, by name James Lamert, at a salary of six or seven shillings a week, as his first employment in life.  It was the last house on the left-hand side of the way, a crazy, tumble-down old place abutting on the river.  Here his work was to cover and label the pots of paste-blacking.  To this episode of his youthful experience he refers in the history of “David Copperfield,” chapter 11, David becoming “a labouring hind” in the service of Messrs. Murdstone and Grinby.  In old Hungerford Market, too, was p. 4The Chandler’s Shop over which Mr. Peggotty slept on the night of his first arrival in London; the bedroom being afterwards appropriated by Mr. Dick.

“There was a low wooden colonnade before the door, which pleased Mr. Dick mightily.  The glory of lodging over this structure would have compensated him for many inconveniences. . . .  He was perfectly charmed with his accommodation.  Mrs. Crupp had indignantly assured him that there wasn’t room to swing a cat there; but, as Mr. Dick justly observed, ‘You know, Trotwood, I don’t want to swing a cat.  I never do swing a cat.  Therefore, what does that signify to me!’”—See “Copperfield,” chapters 32 and 35.

Hungerford is also mentioned in the same book (chapter 57) as the place where, previous to their departure for Australia, the Micawber Family had lodgings “in a little, dirty, tumble-down public-house, which in those days was close to the stairs, and whose protruding wooden rooms overhung the river.”

By a parallel street near at hand (next turning on the left of the Strand—Agar Street) we come into Chandos Street, where are situated the large stores of the Civil Service Supply Association, which, during recent years, have been enlarged, extending westward in Chandos Street.  This extension occupies the former site of No. 3, whilom a chemist’s shop, kept by a Mr. Wellspring.  Here, in the days that are gone, was established a second warehouse of Lamert’s blacking trade, the business being removed in course of time to this address; and here Dickens, with other lads, was often busily employed near the window.  They acquired such dexterity in finishing off the pots, that many persons would stand outside, looking on with interest at the performance.

On the opposite side of Chandos Street is Bedfordbury—a northward thoroughfare leading to New Street, Covent Garden—on the right of which stands a range of five large five-storied blocks known as Peabody’s Buildings.  These afford respectable accommodation for artizans.  This was the locality of Tom All-Alone’s, that wretched rookery of evil repute in p. 5the days of Poor Joe, as described in chapter 16 of “Bleak House.”  But, in these degenerate times, the black, dilapidated streets and tumbling tenements have given place to wholesome dwellings, and the neighbourhood is associated with the name of a great American philanthropist.

Returning to the south side of the Strand, we next come to Buckingham Street (turning on right, by No. 37), at the end house of which, on the right, facing the river, was the top set of chambers in the Adelphi, consisting of

“A little half-blind entry, where you could hardly see anything, a little stone-blind pantry, where you could see nothing at all, a sitting-room and a bedroom.”

Here David Copperfield for some time resided under the housekeeping supervision of Mrs. Crupp, and the residence was afterwards shared by Miss Betsy Trotwood.  At the next turning in the Strand—by No. 64, same side of the way—we arrive at Durham Street, which leads to the no thoroughfare of The Adelphi Arches, about and through which the lad Charles Dickens loved in his leisure time to roam.  David Copperfield says—

“I was fond of wandering about the Adelphi, because it was a mysterious place, with those dark arches.  I see myself emerging one evening from one of these arches, on a little public-house, close to the river, with an open space before it, where some coal-heavers were dancing.”

Of this place more anon.

Continuing our onward journey, we come to Adam Street (right-hand turning by No. 72), looking down which may be seen, at the corner of John Street, The Adelphi Hotel.  This hotel was known in the days of Pickwick as Osborn’s Hotel, Adelphi.  To this establishment, it will be remembered, came Mr. Wardle, visiting London with his daughter Emily, after Mr. Pickwick’s release from the Fleet Prison, also accompanied by his trusty retainer, the fat boy, Joe.  The last plate but one in the book illustrates p. 6the plan adopted by Mary when inducing that intelligent youth to observe a discreet silence as to the visit of Mr. Snodgrass to his young mistress at this hotel; and we may recollect the contretemps which afterwards took place here at dinner-time, involving the detention of the clandestine lover, and resulting in a very satisfactory dénouement.—See “Pickwick,” chapter 54.

Passing the next block onwards, we arrive at the handsome frontage of the Hotel Cecil.  In former days, at western corner of same, close to No. 75, there existed a narrow and precipitous passage which was formerly the approach to the halfpenny boats.  It led to a little public-house, “The Fox-under-the-Hill,” for a long time shut up and in ruinous condition—once situated on the water-side, the site of which is now covered by the west wing of the Hotel Cecil.

This place is spoken of in Mr. Forster’s Biography as being one of our author’s favourite localities, and referred to in “Copperfield,” as before mentioned, in connection with the Adelphi Arches.  This, then, was doubtless the tavern at which Martin Chuzzlewit, junr., was accommodated, on his arrival in London, “in the humbler regions of the Adelphi;” and where he was unexpectedly visited by Mark Tapley, who then and there became his “nat’ral born servant, hired by fate,” and his very faithful friend.—See “Martin Chuzzlewit,” chapter 13.

Farther onwards, on the same side, towards the centre of the Strand, there stood near Savoy Street the house which in all probability was the Residence of Miss La Creevy.  It will be recollected that Ralph Nickleby, visiting his relations at this address in the Strand, is described as stopping

“At a private door, about halfway down that crowded thoroughfare.”

No. 111 was an old-fashioned house in just such a position, with a private door—a somewhat unusual convenience p. 7in the Strand.  A photographer’s case had, for many years, displaced the “large gilt frame screwed upon the street door,” in which Miss La Creevy aforetime displayed her painted miniatures.  The place has been pulled down, together with the adjoining house.  Handsome modern business premises are erected on the double site.—See “Nicholas Nickleby,” chapter 2.

We now cross to the north side of the Strand, and take the next turning on the left, Wellington Street North.  Passing the Lyceum Theatre, we may note, on the opposite side, the offices of the Gaiety Theatre, No. 16.  For many years this was the Office of “Household Words”; this well-known miscellany being started under the conductorship of Charles Dickens, March 30, 1850.

It was afterwards removed to No. 26, higher up, on the same side of the way, at which address the later issue of All the Year Round was published, as conducted by Charles Dickens, the son.

Proceeding a short distance onwards, and turning to the left, we come into the precincts of Covent Garden Market.  At the south corner of Russell Street we may note the position of the old Hummums Hotel, mentioned in “Great Expectations” as the place where Pip slept, in accordance with the warning received from Mr. Wemmick—“Don’t go home.”

The present establishment was erected on the site of the former hotel (as it stood in the days of Mr. Pip’s sojourn), 1892; on completion of the new Flower Market, The Tavistock Hotel, Piazzas, on the north side of the market, was the house at which were held the fortnightly meetings of “The Finches of the Grove,” Herbert Pocket and Mr. Pip being members of the Club known by this appellation in the book above mentioned.  The end and aim of this institution seemed to be “that the members should dine expensively once a fortnight, to quarrel among themselves as much as possible after dinner, and to cause six waiters to get drunk on the stairs.”

p. 8A general description of Covent Garden will be found in “Little Dorrit” (chapter 14), and a graphic reference to “the seamy side” of this locality is contained in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend” (chapter 9, Book 4).

Returning by Russell Street, we soon reach Bow Street, and on the left may observe an open space contiguous to the Foreign Fruit Market.  On this space there stood No. 4, in recent times occupied by Mr. Stinchcombe, costumier.  Some years since this was the situation of Bow Street Police Court, now removed to the handsome new building facing Covent Garden Theatre.  This, therefore, was the place at which the Artful Dodger, when committed for trial by the presiding magistrate, thus reserved his defence:—

“This ain’t the shop for justice; besides which my attorney is a-breakfasting this morning with the Vice-President of the House of Commons; but I shall have something to say elsevere, and so will he, and so will a wery numerous and respectable circle of acquaintances, as’ll make them beaks wish they’d never been born.”—See “Oliver Twist,” chapter 43.

At a short distance onwards, we may note Covent Garden Theatre, selected by David Copperfield as his first place of entertainment in London, after dinner at the Golden Cross Hotel—

“Being then in a pleasant frame of mind . . . I resolved to go to the play.  It was Covent Garden Theatre that I chose; and there, from the back of a centre box, I saw “Julius Cæsar” and the new pantomime.  To have all those noble Romans alive before me, and walking in and out for my entertainment, instead of being the stern taskmasters they had been at school, was a most novel and delightful effect.”

This theatre, as attended by David, was destroyed by fire March 4, 1856, six years after his autobiography was published, and afterwards rebuilt.

Exactly opposite the façade of the theatre is Broad Court, past the new magisterial building above referred to.  This was the location given by Mr. Snevellicci (at Portsmouth), on a convivial occasion, described in p. 9“Nicholas Nickleby” (chapter 30), as his London address:—

“I am not ashamed of myself; Snevellicci is my name.  I’m to be found in Broad Court, Bow Street, when I’m in town.  If I’m not at home, let any man ask for me at the stage-door.”

There is also historical reference to Bow Street in “Barnaby Rudge,” as the place where “another boy was hanged,” after the suppression of the Gordon riots.

Exactly facing the north end of Bow Street, which gives into Long Acre, is a large building, now a stationer’s warehouse, recently used as the Clergy Co-operative Stores.  Thirty-five years since this site was occupied by St. Martin’s Hall, in which Dickens gave his first series of paid readings in London (sixteen nights), under the management of Mr. Arthur Smith, 1858.  The hall was a short time afterwards burnt down, and the Queen’s Theatre was here erected in its stead by Mr. Wigan; which theatre was since converted to the commercial uses of the Clergy as aforesaid.

Proceeding up Long Acre to Drury Lane, we turn to the right, and in five minutes pass the back of Drury Lane Theatre.  The second turning on the same side is Russell Court, a narrow passage leading to Catherine Street.  The entire area between the two streets, for some distance, is cleared for building improvements, so that the indications immediately following refer to the past, and not practically to the present.  These things have been, but are not.

In this court, about halfway on the right, was to be found (until 1897) the entrance to what was once the pauper Burial Ground where Captain Hawdon—known as Nemo in the pages of “Bleak House”—was interred, and where Lady Dedlock was afterwards found dead at the gateway, she having fled from her husband, Sir Leicester, in despair, dreading the exposé threatened by Mr. Tulkinghorn.  It is also associated with Poor Jo, the crossing-sweeper.—See “Bleak House,” chapters 11 and 59.

p. 10“With houses looking on, on every side, save where a reeking little tunnel of a court gives access to the iron gate—with every villainy of life in action close on death, and every poisonous element of death in action close on life—here, they lower our dear brother down a foot or two: here, sow him in corruption, to be raised in incorruption: an avenging ghost at many a sick bedside: a shameful testimony to future ages, how civilisation and barbarism walked this boastful island together.”

This intermural graveyard was attached to the Church of St. Mary-le-Strand, and has been closed for many years.  The enclosure was converted into a recreation ground, and formally opened as such by Lady George Hamilton, May 19, 1886, on behalf of the Metropolitan Public Garden Association.  But the entire locality is changed, the “avenging ghost” has ceased to walk, and the “shameful testimony” has ended.

At a short distance in Drury Lane, towards the Strand, we turn (left) by No. 106, into Clare Court, referred to in Forster’s Biography as follows—(C.D. loq.):—

“Once, I remember tucking my own bread (which I had brought from home in the morning) under my arm, wrapped up in a piece of paper like a book, and going into the best dining-room in Johnson’s a la mode beef-house in Clare Court, Drury Lane, and magnificently ordering a small plate of a la mode beef to eat with it.  What the waiter thought of such a strange little apparition, coming in all alone, I don’t know, but I can see him now, staring at me as I ate my dinner, and bringing up the other waiter to look.  I gave him a halfpenny, and I wish now that he hadn’t taken it.”

This episode of the author’s experience as a poor boy in London was reproduced in “David Copperfield,” chapter 11.  The dining-house mentioned then existed (1824) at No. 13 in the court, in a prominent corner position.  It has been unknown to fame for the last thirty years.

Returning by Drury Court to the Strand, and passing on the south side of the church above mentioned, we turn by No. 162a into Strand Lane, where may be visited, at No. 5, The Old Roman Bath referred to by David Copperfield, who says, “In which I have had many a cold plunge.”  p. 11(See chapter 35.)  The bath itself is lined with white marble, and dates from the sixteenth century.  It is supplied from an old Roman reservoir adjoining, about 2000 years old.

Passing Surrey Street, just beyond, we come (next on the right) to Norfolk Street, in which there may be noted the former whereabouts of Mrs. Lirriper’s Lodgings; and we may here recall the pleasant associations connected with the Christmas numbers of All the Year Round, 1863 and 1864.  The houses in this street are not enumerated beyond forty-five, all told.  The figures 81, as given in the tale referred to, should be reversed; but sad to relate, No. 18—long standing as an old-fashioned boarding-house on the western side, below Howard Street—has disappeared, and certain modern buildings, offices, etc., recently erected, now occupy the old site.  At a short distance farther on, in a central position in the Strand, stands the church of St. Clement Danes.  It is of interest in this connection as the scene of Mrs. Lirriper’s wedding, some forty years previous to the narration of her business experience; and where she still retained “a sitting in a very pleasant pew, with genteel company, and her own hassock, being partial to evening service, not too crowded.”

Retracing our steps, three minutes, to the Church of St. Mary-le-Strand, again leaving the Strand by Newcastle and Houghton Streets, and turning left and right (leaving Clare Market on the left), we shortly arrive at Portsmouth Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields.  At No. 14 will be found (for a short time only) a small old-fashioned house, on the front of which is painted an inscription, “The Old Curiosity Shop, Immortalised by Charles Dickens,” now occupied by Mr. H. Poole, dealer in wastepaper.  This is said to be the house assigned by the novelist for the residence of Little Nell and her grandfather, with whose pathetic history we are all familiar—

“One of those receptacles for old and curious things, which seem to crouch in odd corners of this town, and to hide their musty treasures from the public eye in jealousy and distrust.”

p. 12It cannot, however, be regarded as absolutely certain that this particular house was the author’s intended “local habitation” for one of the best-known and loved of his creations.  The tale itself concludes with a reference to Kit’s uncertainty as to the whereabouts of the place:—

“The old house had long ago been pulled down, and a fine broad road was in its place.  At first he would draw with his stick a square upon the ground to show them where it used to stand.  But he soon became uncertain of the spot, and could only say it was thereabouts, he thought, and that these alterations were confusing.”

[A lady, personally acquainted with the great novelist, has informed the author that she was once taken by Mr. Dickens to No. 10 Green Street (approaching Leicester Square from the east)—at the corner of Green and Castle Streets, behind the National Gallery—the business of curiosity-dealing being then and there carried on.  Mr. Dickens himself localised this house as the home of little Nell, pointing out an inner room—divided from the shop by a glass partition—as her bedroom.  The premises are now rebuilt.]

At a short distance from this locality, and at an opposite angle of the street, there existed (until 1898) one of the old-fashioned taverns of the metropolis.  The house was noteworthy, with its overhanging front resting on rough wooden pillars, and was named Old George IVth.

It is now replaced by a newly-built house of the same name, in modern style of plate glass, mahogany, and glitter.

It is highly probable that the old tavern represented the location and character of “The Magpie and Stump,” the rendezvous of Mr. Lowten (Perker’s clerk) and other choice spirits in the days of Pickwick.  It is described in the Pickwickian history as being near Clare Market, at the back of New Inn, and to this position the “Old George IVth” will correspond.  Joe Miller, of jocular celebrity, was, aforetime, a frequenter of this establishment, when his quips “were wont to set the table in a roar.”  His seat was still shown in the bar of the old house.  Dickens and Thackeray were also well p. 13remembered as visitors to this ancient hostelry.  There is now a “Magpie and Stump” in Fetter Lane, at some distance hence; but it is evident that Dickens transferred the name to a tavern in this neighbourhood.  It will be remembered that here Mr. Pickwick enjoyed an hour’s entertainment, listening to the legends of “those curious old nooks,” the Inns of London, as related by Jack Bamber—see “Pickwick,” chapter 21—also containing a description of the advertisements of the tavern, as then displayed therein.

“In the lower windows, which were decorated with curtains of a saffron hue, dangled two or three printed cards, bearing reference to Devonshire cyder and Dantzic spruce, while a large black board, announcing in white letters to an enlightened public, that there were 500,000 barrels of double stout in the cellars of the establishment, left the mind in a state of not unpleasing doubt and uncertainty as to the precise direction in the bowels of the earth, in which this mighty cavern might be supposed to extend.”

Dick Swiveller would doubtless occasionally patronise this establishment.  He lodged hereabouts “in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane;” but it is difficult to indicate any particular house which Dickens may have selected for his accommodation.

Stretching eastward from this point is Portugal Street, famed in the same book as containing the Old Public House patronised by Mr. Tony Weller and his confrères of the coach-driving persuasion.  This house—opposite the Insolvent Debtors’ Court—existed until a few years since, by name, “The Horse and Groom.”  It and many more besides, have now given place to a range of new offices and buildings in Elizabethan style, on the south side of the street (forming the north boundary of New Court), and the Insolvent Court has been recently appropriated to the uses of the Bankruptcy Court.  It will be remembered that it was here Mr. Samuel Weller got into difficulties, and was hence consigned to the Fleet Prison at the instance of his father; the professional services of the suave Mr. Solomon Pell being retained on that occasion.  Here also a select committee of friends assembled to assist at an oyster lunch and the proving of p. 14Mrs. Weller’s will, when Mr. Pell again conducted the business to the satisfaction of all concerned.—See “Pickwick,” chapters 43 and 55.

Returning through Portsmouth Street, we come into Lincoln’s Inn Fields; and, keeping on its western side—passing Sardinia Street, with its old archway, on the left—we may note Mr. John Forster’s House, No. 58.  At this house resided the friend and biographer of Dickens, and here our author was, of course, a frequent visitor.  On December the 2nd, 1844, Charles Dickens here first read his new Christmas book, “The Chimes,” to a select and critical audience, including Messrs. Forster, Maclise, Douglas Jerrold, Carlyle, Laman Blanchard, Fox, Stanfield, Harness, and Dyce.  The house is itself described in the pages of “Bleak House” (chapter 10) as the

Residence of Mr. Tulkinghorn.

“In a large house, formerly a house of state, lives Mr. Tulkinghorn.  It is let off in sets of chambers now; and in those shrunken fragments of its greatness, lawyers lie, like maggots in nuts.  But its roomy staircases, passages, and antechambers still remain; and even its painted ceiling, where Allegory in Roman helmet and celestial linen sprawls among balustrades and pillars, flowers, clouds, and big-legged boys, and makes the head ache, as would seem to be Allegory’s object always, more or less.”

As in the time spoken of, the house is still in legal possession, being let out as solicitors’ offices; but the old Allegory has disappeared beneath modern whitewash.  Within two minutes’ distance northward, the weary rambler may reach the central thoroughfare of Holborn, where (turning to the left), close at hand, will be found the Holborn Restaurant, at which Sam Weller’s advice on the subject of a “little dinner” (or luncheon) may be worth practical consideration:—

“Pair of fowls and a weal cutlet; French beans, ’taturs, tart, and tidiness.”

Certain it is that everything at this establishment will be found “werry clean and comfortable,” on reasonable terms.

p. 15RAMBLE II
Lincoln’s Inn to the Mansion House

Lincoln’s Inn Hall; “Jarndyce and Jarndyce”—Old Square; Offices of Kenge and Carboy; Chambers of Sergeant Snubbin—Bishop’s Court; Miss Flite’s Lodging at Krook’s Rag and Bottle Warehouse; Nemo; Tony Weevle—The Old Ship Tavern; “The Sol’s Arms”—Coavinses’ Castle—Mr. Snagsby’s Residence, Took’s Court, Cursitor Street—Bell Yard; Lodgings of Neckett and Gridley—Tellson’s Bank, Fleet Street—The Temple; Fountain Court (Ruth Pinch and John Westlock); Garden Court (Pip’s Chambers); Pump Court (Chambers of the elder Martin Chuzzlewit); Paper Buildings (Sir John Chester and Mr. Stryver, K.C.)—Offices of Messrs. Lightwood and Wrayburn—Bradley Headstone’s Look-out—Clifford’s Inn; John Rokesmith and Mr. Boffin—St. Dunstan’s Pump and Maypole Hugh—St. Dunstan’s Church; “The Chimes”—Bradbury and Evans, Bouverie Street—Office of the Daily News—Hanging Sword Alley; Mr. Cruncher’s Rooms,–“Ye old Cheshire Cheese”—Farringdon, formerly Fleet, Market—Fleet Prison; Mr. Pickwick and Sam Weller’s Imprisonment—Belle Sauvage Yard—London Coffee House; Arthur Clennam’s arrival—St. Paul’s Churchyard—Dean’s Court—Doctors’ Commons; Messrs. Spenlow and Jorkins—“Bell Tavern”—Wood Street; Coach Office at which Pip first arrived—The London Stereoscopic Company; “Grip,” the Raven—Bow Church—The Guildhall; Bardell v. Pickwick—Grocers’ Hall Court—The Mansion House; References in “Barnaby Rudge,” “Christmas Carol,” and “Martin Chuzzlewit”—“Dombey and Son.”

The Rambler now crosses Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and, on its eastern side, enters the precincts of Lincoln’s Inn, through an arched gateway, from Serle Street.  Passing the imposing building of the Dining-Hall and Library on the left, with New Square on the right, we shortly arrive at p. 16old Lincoln’s Inn Hall, the Lord High Chancellor’s Court, with its central turret and lantern, bearing the initials of the reigning Treasurer, 1818, where Chancery suits were tried thirty years since.  Here that cause célèbre, Jarndyce and Jarndyce, dragged “its slow length along” through the weary years, involving

“Bills, cross-bills, answers, rejoinders, injunctions, affidavits, issues, references to masters, masters’ reports—mountains of costly nonsense.”

Here, on a seat at the side of the hall, stood little Miss Flite, in her squeezed bonnet, carrying “her documents,” and

“Always expecting some incomprehensible judgment in her favour.”—See “Bleak House,” chapter 1.

The business of Chancery procedure is now transferred to the New Law Courts.  Hard by, on the north, passing through the cloisters of the Chapel of Lincoln’s Inn, we come into the enclosure of Old Square, Lincoln’s Inn, where the Offices of Messrs. Kenge and Carboy were situated.  Esther Summerson says:—

“We passed into sudden quietude, under an old gateway, and drove on through a silent square, until we came to an odd nook in a corner, where there was an entrance up a steep broad flight of stairs, like an entrance to a church.”

The houses in this square have been all rebuilt; but Kenge and Co.’s offices used to flourish in the north-west corner, where still the rising of the ground necessitates an exterior flight of steps.  The chambers of Sergeant Snubbin, counsel for the defence in “Bardell v. Pickwick,” were also located in this square, probably on the opposite side.

Returning to Lincoln’s Inn, we may follow Esther Summerson’s directions, and visit the apartments of Miss Flite—

“Slipping us out of a little side gate, the old lady stopped most unexpectedly in a narrow back street, part of some courts and lanes immediately outside the wall of the inn, and said, ‘This is my lodging.  Pray walk up!’”

p. 17Thus, passing at the back of the Inn, and taking the next turning on the left, we arrive at Bishop’s Court, near at hand, a narrow, dark, and old passage leading to Chancery Lane.  On the left hand, nearest the Inn, was Krook’s Rag and Bottle Warehouse, probably No. 3.  But during recent years, all the old houses of the court have been substituted by modern buildings, offices, and shops; so that the location only remains of the “Lord Chancellor,” and his place of business, yclept by the neighbours the “Court of Chancery.”  The old shop, at one time, possessed the private door and stairway leading to Miss Flite’s lodging.

“She lived at the top of the house, in a pretty large room, from which she had a glimpse of the roof of Lincoln’s Inn Hall.”

Here, too, Captain Hawdon, otherwise Nemo, the law-writer, lived and died in a bare room on the second floor.  A notice may have been observed in the old shop window, “Engrossing and Copying.”  It will be remembered that this room was afterwards occupied by Mr. Tony Weevle, during whose tenancy it was decorated with a choice collection of magnificent portraits, being—

“Copper-plate impressions from that truly national work, the Divinities of Albion, or Galaxy Gallery of British Beauty; representing ladies of title and fashion, in every variety of smirk, that art, combined with capital, is capable of producing.”

Returning to the top of the court, and passing a short distance along Star Yard, we reach, at the corner of Chichester Rents, a modern warehouse (No. 7), recently erected on the site of “The Old Ship Tavern,” now non est, named in the pages of “Bleak House” The Sol’s Arms, it being the house at which the Inquest was held, following the death of Nemo, as described in chapter 11; on which occasion the proffered evidence of Poor Jo was virtuously rejected by the presiding coroner.

“Can’t exactly say; won’t do, you know.  We can’t take that in a Court of Justice, gentlemen.  It’s terrible depravity.  Put the boy aside.”

p. 18The old tavern has given place to the exigencies of modern commerce (1897).  The ghost of Little Swills may still linger in the neighbourhood, but the musical evenings of the past are silent, being now superseded by the prosaics of ordinary business.

The real Sol’s Arms still exists, No. 65 Hampstead Road, N.W., at the corner of Charles Street, once known as Sol’s Row.  Its name was derived from the “Sol’s Society,” whose meetings, held therein, were of a Masonic character.  It has been suggested that Dickens transferred the style and name of this house to the neighbourhood of Chancery Lane, as above.

Coming now into Chancery Lane, we may observe, nearly opposite the old gateway of Lincoln’s Inn, Cursitor Street, a thoroughfare leading eastward from the Lane.  It will be noticed that the houses in this street are comparatively of recent erection, and we may now look in vain for Coavinses’ Castle, which has been swept away by the besom of modern destruction and improvement.  This old sponging-house flourished (in the days of Harold Skimpole) on the left of the street, on the site now occupied by Lincoln’s Inn Chambers, No. 1.

At a short distance in Cursitor Street (No. 9) we come to a turning on the left to Took’s Court, referred to in “Bleak House” as Cook’s Court, in which was Mr. Snagsby’s Residence and Law Stationer’s Shop.  The court is not a long one, and consists mainly of offices connected with the legal profession.  The location of Mr. Snagsby’s shop was at the central corner on the left, the site being now occupied by modern offices and stores.  “The little drawing-room upstairs” is described as commanding

“A view of Cook’s Court at one end (not to mention a squint into Cursitor Street) and of Coavins’s, the Sheriff’s Officer’s, backyard on the other.”

The memorable, but now non-existent room, as prepared p. 19for the reception of the Rev. Mr. Chadband (Chaplain-in-Ordinary to Mrs. Snagsby), who was “endowed with the gift of holding forth for four hours at a stretch.”  On that occasion, it will be remembered that Poor Jo—brought to Cook’s Court by a police constable—was eloquently addressed by the reverend gentleman, but was not greatly edified by his admonitions.

“At this threatening stage of the discourse, Jo, who seems to have been gradually going out of his mind, smears his right arm over his face, and gives a terrible yawn.  Mrs. Snagsby indignantly expresses her belief that he is a limb of the arch-fiend.”

Returning by Chancery Lane, on the left hand, we may note Bream’s Buildings, as being the northern boundary of the former site of Symond’s Inn, which hence extended onward to No. 22.

“A little, pale, wall-eyed, woebegone inn, like a large dust-bin of two compartments and a sifter.  It looks as if Symond were a sparing man in his day, and constructed his inn of old building materials, which took kindly to the dry rot, and to dirt, and all things decaying and dismal, and perpetuated Symond’s memory with congenial shabbiness.”

This inn has ceased to exist for many years past, its position being now occupied by a large printer’s establishment and other offices.  Readers of “Bleak House” will remember that the professional chambers of Mr. Vholes were here situated, and that Richard Carstone and his young wife Ada resided in the next house, in order that Richard might have his legal adviser close at hand.  Here occurred the early death of poor Richard; and we all cherish the remembrance of dear Ada’s wifely devotion, to which Esther Summerson thus refers:—

“The days when I frequented that miserable corner which my dear girl brightened can never fade in my remembrance.  I never see it, and I never wish to see it now; I have been there only once since; but in my memory there is a mournful glory shining on the place, which will shine for ever.”

Leaving Chancery Lane, and turning (right) by Carey Street, we reach p. 20Bell Yard, leading to Fleet Street.  This place has been mentioned by Dickens as containing a “chandler’s shop, left-hand side,” where lodged Gridley, “the man from Shropshire,” and Neckett, the faithful servitor of Coavinses.  The name—Bell Yard—forms the heading of chapter 15, “Bleak House,” which affords information of the Neckett family—Charlie, Tom, and the limp-bonneted baby.  For full details, reference should be made to this very touching and beautifully-written chapter as above.  Great alterations have been made, and are still being made, in this narrow lane, since the erection of the New Law Courts in the immediate vicinity; but some of the older houses still remain on the left-hand side of the way.  Of these, No. 9 is a small, tall, squeezed-looking house, about half-way down the alley, and may be safely assigned (thirty years since) to the tenancy of the good-natured Mrs. Blinder.

Passing through Bell Yard, we reach Fleet Street, at the point where once Temple Bar gave ancient entrance to the City.  Its position is marked by a bronze griffin, surmounting a memorial pedestal beneath.  Exactly on the opposite side of the street is the handsome modern erection of Child’s Bank.  This new building dates from 1878, when the structure of old Temple Bar was removed.  It replaces one of the very old-fashioned houses of London, in which for many years Messrs. Child carried on their important banking business.  This house is spoken of by Dickens, in his “Tale of Two Cities,” as Tellson’s Bank, on the outside of which the mysterious Mr. Cruncher was usually in attendance as “odd-job man, and occasional porter and messenger.”

“Tellson’s Bank, by Temple Bar, was an old-fashioned place even in the year 1780.  It was very small, very dark, very ugly, very incommodious.  Any one of the partners would have disinherited his son on the question of rebuilding Tellson’s.  Thus it had come to pass that Tellson’s was the triumphant perfection of inconvenience.  After bursting open a door of idiotic obstinacy with a weak rattle in its throat, you fell into Tellson’s, down two steps, and came to your senses in a miserable little shop, with two little counters; where the oldest of men made your cheque shake as if the wind rustled it, while p. 21they examined the signature by the dingiest of windows, which were always under a shower-bath of mud from Fleet Street, and which were made the dingier by their own iron bars proper and the shadow of Temple Bar.”

Passing Newton’s (optician) we arrive at the outer Gate of the Temple, by which we enter Middle Temple Lane, following which a short distance and turning to the right, by Middle Temple Hall, we reach Fountain Court.  The fountain standing here, conspicuously in a central position, is associated with the history of Ruth Pinch.  Here it was that Tom and his sister made appointments for meeting—

“Because, of course, when she had to wait a minute or two, it would have been very awkward for her to have had to wait in any but a quiet spot; and that was as quiet a spot, everything considered, as they could choose.”

On further reference to the pages of “Martin Chuzzlewit,” we may recall the auspicious occasion when Ruth was under the special escort of John Westlock—

“Brilliantly the Temple fountain sparkled in the sun, and merrily the idle drops of water danced and danced; and, peeping out in sport among the trees, plunged lightly down to hide themselves, as little Ruth and her companion came towards it.”

See chapter 53.  In Garden Court beyond, Mr. Pip and his friend, Herbert Pocket, had residence.  In “Great Expectations,” he says—

“Our Chambers were in Garden Court, down by the river.  We lived at the top of the last house.”

Here Pip’s patron and benefactor, the convict Magwitch, alias Provis, disclosed himself one memorable night, much to his “dear boy’s” discomfiture; and it will be remembered that temporary accommodation was found for him at

“A lodging-house in Essex Street, the back of which looked into the Temple, and was almost within hail of ‘Pip’s’ windows.”

The houses in this court have been rebuilt, and we may p. 22look in vain for the actual chambers specified.  Returning to Middle Temple Lane, the visitor may walk directly across it to Elm Court, and proceed through the same and a narrow passage beyond, turning to the left, through The Cloisters, which (left again) give into the central location of Pump Court, an oblong old-fashioned court of offices, four storeys high.  Here, in all probability, were situated The Chambers where Tom Pinch was mysteriously installed as librarian to an unknown employer, by the eccentric Mr. Fips.

“He led the way through sundry lanes and courts, into one more quiet and gloomy than the rest; and, singling out a certain house, ascended a common staircase . . . stopping before a door upon an upper storey. . . .  There were two rooms on that floor; and in the first, or outer one, a narrow staircase leading to two more above.”

Here, also, old Martin Chuzzlewit revealed himself to the astonished Tom in his true character, and surprised the virtuous Mr. Pecksniff by a “warm reception,” when “the tables were turned completely upside down.”—See “Chuzzlewit,” chapters 39 and 52.

Proceeding past Lamb Buildings, on the east side of the Cloisters, and by a passage six steps downwards, leading beneath the Inner Temple Dining-Hall, we may note across the road (right) a short range of substantial houses, known as Paper Buildings, facing King’s Bench Walk, where it will be remembered that Sir John Chester had his residential chambers, no doubt selecting a central position—say, at No. 3.  Here at various times Mr. Edward Chester, Hugh, Sim Tappertit, and Gabriel Varden had audience with Sir John; for full particulars of which “overhaul the wollume”—“Barnaby Rudge.”

In this neighbourhood also were situated the chambers of Mr. Stryver, K.C., where Sydney Carton served as “jackal” to that “fellow of delicacy;” as we read in “The Tale of Two Cities,” how Sydney

“Having revived himself by twice pacing the pavements of King’s Bench Walk and Paper Buildings, turned into the Stryver Chambers.”

p. 23Returning to Fleet Street by Lamb Buildings, and passing in front of the Old Temple Church, we come to Goldsmith’s Buildings (right), which overlook the old burial-ground and the tomb of the doctor.  This surely is the “dismal churchyard” referred to in “Our Mutual Friend” as being closely contiguous to the offices of Messrs. Lightwood and Wrayburn.

“Whosoever . . . had looked up at the dismal windows commanding that churchyard, until at the most dismal window of them all, he saw a dismal boy, would in him have beheld . . . the clerk of Mr. Mortimer Lightwood.”

N.B.—Note the last window on the left (second floor), nearest the west wing, lately rebuilt.

Coming again into Fleet Street, by the arched gateway of Inner Temple Lane, the wayfarer may recall the circumstance of Bradley Headstone’s nightly watchings opposite this point for the outgoings of Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, and the many fruitless journeys which were hence commenced, as Eugene enjoyed “the pleasures of the chase” at the expense of his unfortunate rival.

Nearly facing us, on the north side of Fleet Street, is Clifford’s Inn Passage, into whose retirement Mr. Rokesmith, the hero of “Our Mutual Friend,” withdrew from the noise of Fleet Street, with Mr. Boffin, when offering that gentleman his services as secretary.

Close at hand stands St. Dunstan’s Church, near to which the pump was, but is not, from whose refreshing streams “Hugh” (from the Maypole, Chigwell) sobered himself by a drenching on one occasion previous to visiting Sir John Chester at Paper Buildings.  (Vide “Barnaby Rudge,” chapter 40.)  The old pump has been replaced by a drinking-fountain.

Toby Veck surely must have known that pump; for though there is no precise location given by Dickens in “The Chimes” for the church near to which Toby waited for jobs, there is an etching by Stanfield in the original p. 24edition of that book (page 88), which is unmistakably the counterfeit presentment of St. Dunstan’s Tower.

Continuing the route, we pass Bouverie Street (Bradbury and Evans—now Bradbury, Agnew, and Co.—in this street were the publishers of several of the works of Dickens, “The Chimes” included) on the right, next arriving at Whitefriars’ Street on the same side.

At the corner of the street, No. 67, is the public Office of “The Daily News.”  This influential newspaper was started January 21, 1846, under the supervision of Charles Dickens, and in the earlier numbers of the journal were published instalments of his “Pictures from Italy.”  Dickens shortly relinquished the editorship, being succeeded by his friends Jerrold and Forster.  The fact is, Charles never greatly cared for the study of general or party politics; but he always identified himself with “the People—spelt with a large P, who are governed,” rather than “the people—spelt with a small p, who govern.”

A short distance down Whitefriars’ Street is a passage (left) from which, at a right angle riverwards, we may look into Hanging Sword Alley, where Mr. Jeremiah Cruncher, messenger at Tellson’s, had his two apartments.  These “were very decently kept” by his wife, whose “flopping” proclivities gave so much umbrage to Jerry.

On the opposite side of Fleet Street—No. 146—just beyond, we turn (left) into Wine Office Court, and, on the right, we arrive at “Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese.”  In “The Tale of Two Cities,” Book 2, chapter 4, we read that Charles Darnay, being acquitted of the charge of high treason, on his trial at the Old Bailey, was persuaded by the young lawyer, Sydney Carton, to dine in his company thereafter:—

“Drawing his arm through his own, he took him down Ludgate Hill to Fleet Street, and so up a covered way into a tavern.”

This, of course, was the tavern intended; it having been a noted resort with literary and legal men for more than a p. 25century past.  Here Doctor Johnson and Oliver Goldsmith frequently dined together in days gone by, gravely discoursing over their punch afterwards; and, in more recent years, Thackeray, Dickens, Jerrold, Sala, and others have been reckoned among the customary guests of the establishment.  Mr. George Augustus Sala, in a pleasant description of the place, writes as follows:—

“Let it be noted in candour that Law finds its way to the ‘Cheese’ as well as Literature; but the Law is, as a rule, of the non-combatant, and, consequently, harmless order.  Literary men who have been called to the Bar, but do not practise; briefless young barristers, who do not object to mingling with newspaper men; with a sprinkling of retired solicitors (amazing dogs these for old port wine; the landlord has some of the same bin which served as Hippocrene to Judge Blackstone when he wrote his ‘Commentaries’)—these make up the legal element of the ‘Cheese.’”

The journey being resumed through Fleet Street, the visitor attains Ludgate Circus, from which Farringdon Street leads northward on the left.  A short detour along this thoroughfare, facing the handsome bridge of the Holborn Viaduct, will afford a sight of Farringdon Market on the left side.  Its position will recall the description given in “Barnaby Rudge,” in whose days it was known as Fleet Market,

“At that time a long irregular row of wooden sheds and penthouses occupying the centre of what is now called Farringdon Street. . . .  It was indispensable to most public conveniences in those days that they should be public nuisances likewise, and Fleet Market maintained the principle to admiration.”

Here the rioters assembled—as narrated in the book before mentioned—and passed a merry night in the midst of congenial surroundings.  Retracing our steps, we may note, on the east side of Farringdon Street, the site of the old Fleet Prison, on a part of which now stands the Congregational Memorial Hall.  The prison—fifty years since—stretched eastward in the rear as far as the present premises of Messrs. Cassell and Co., Belle Sauvage Yard.  p. 26Its last remaining walls were removed in 1872, when the foundation-stone of the “Memorial Hall” aforesaid was laid.  Here was imprisoned our amiable friend Mr. Pickwick, attended by his faithful Sam, until the time when the costs of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg in re Bardell versus Pickwick were by him fully paid and satisfied.

Proceeding up Ludgate Hill, we may soon note the Belle Sauvage Yard (turning by No. 68, on the left).  The old inn, with its central metropolitan coach-yard, sixty years since occupied this site, where now the extensive printing and publishing offices of Cassell and Co. hold benignant sway.  The place is referred to in an anecdote of Sam Weller’s anent the preparation of his father’s marriage licence, as arranged at Doctors’ Commons, the place being evidently regarded by that respected coachman as his parochial headquarters in London—

“‘What is your name, sir?’ says the lawyer.  ‘Tony Weller,’ says my father.  ‘Parish?’ says the lawyer.  ‘Belle Savage,’ says my father; for he stopped there when he drove up, and he know’d nothing about parishes, he didn’t.”

The plan of the inn-yard is considerably changed from its olden style.  In Mr. Weller’s time it comprised two courts, the outer one being approached from Ludgate Hill by the present entrance, and the Belle Sauvage Inn forming a second quadrangle, with an archway about half-way up from the main entrance.  In this interior court was the coach-yard, surrounded by covered wooden galleries, in accordance with the fashion of the times.

Passing onwards on the same side, past Old Bailey, we arrive at the site of the London Coffee Tavern, No. 46 Ludgate Hill, now occupied by the corner shop of Messrs. Hope Brothers, the well-known outfitters.  The old house was pulled down in 1872.  Here Mr. Arthur Clennam rested awhile on his arrival “from Marseilles by way of Dover, and by Dover coach, ‘the Blue-Eyed Maid,’” one dismal Sunday evening, as narrated in chapter 3 of “Little Dorrit.”  We now soon come to p. 27St. Paul’s Churchyard, facing the dial by which Ralph Nickleby corrected his watch on his way to the London Tavern, no doubt “stepping aside” into No. 1—Dakin’s—“doorway” to do it; and we may probably be disposed to endorse John Browdie’s verdict with reference to St. Paul’s Cathedral itself.  “See there, lass, there be Paul’s Church.  Ecod, he be a soizable one, he be.”  This locality is also mentioned in “Barnaby Rudge” as being in the line of road taken by Lord George Gordon when entering London with his friends en route for his residence in Welbeck Street.  On the right, within a short distance, we come to Dean’s Court, formerly Doctors’ Commons. This place is referred to by Sam Weller as being in

“St. Paul’s Churchyard—low archway on the carriage side, bookseller’s at one corner, hot-el on the other, and two porters in the middle, as touts for licences.”

He further relates to Mr. Pickwick the circumstance of his father’s having been here persuaded to take a marriage licence, directing the lady’s name to be filled in on speculation.

We hear more of Doctors’ Commons in the chronicles of “David Copperfield.”

The Offices of Spenlow and Jorkins were situated in this locality; but the site is now occupied by the Post Office Savings’ Bank in Knightrider Street.  Passing through the Archway and by the Deanery of St. Paul’s (right), we cross Carter Lane, and proceed by a narrow court, Bell Yard, to the street above mentioned.  At the corner of Carter Lane and Bell Yard is the “Bell Tavern,” which it may be interesting to note, as a house where Mr. Dickens frequently rested, making his notes in preparation for David’s “choice of a profession.”  For full particulars the Rambler is referred to chapter 23 of David’s autobiography.

It may also be remembered that the worthy Mr. Boffin (see “Our Mutual Friend”), when instructing his attorney, seemed to be somewhat mixed in his ideas relative to this institution.  In conversation with Mr. Lightwood, he once p. 28referred to the same as a legal personality—“Doctor Scommons!”

This locality has, of late years, altogether changed both its name and aspect.  The old archway has disappeared.  As previously stated, it is now known as Dean’s Court.  In connection with its old associations, there exists The Bishop of London’s Registry and Marriage Licence Office, at the east corner of the court; and there are some Proctors’ offices doing business, as in the days of Copperfield, in the neighbourhood.

On the east side of the Cathedral, the visitor turns into Cheapside, soon arriving, on the left-hand side of the way (No. 122), at Wood Street.  Associated with “Great Expectations,” as containing “Cross Keys Inn” (“The Castle,” No. 25), at which house Mr. Pip arrived when first visiting London, in accordance with instructions received per Mr. Jaggers.

Crossing Cheapside, and onwards by the south side, we reach the well-known establishment of the London Stereoscopic Company, No. 54.  It may be interesting to know that this firm possesses the stuffed original of “Grip,” the Raven, the fortunate bird that received a double passport to fame, Dickens having narrated the particulars of its decease, and Maclise having sketched its apotheosis.  This relic, so intimately associated with the tale of “Barnaby Rudge,” was purchased at the public sale of Mr. Dickens’s effects for £110, and its photographic portrait may be now obtained at this address.

A few steps farther on the same side stands the old Church of St. Mary-le-Bow, whose bells recalled Dick Whittington to fame and fortune.  These same bells are mentioned in the history of “Dombey and Son,” chapter 4, as being within hearing at the offices of that important firm.

Passing on, and crossing to the north side of the thoroughfare, we arrive at King Street (turning by No. 92), at the top of which is The Guildhall.  In the City Court attached thereto, that memorable case for breach of promise of marriage, p. 29“Bardell v. Pickwick,” was contested, on which occasion Mr. Weller, senr., emphatically insisted (from the body of the Court) on Sam’s spelling his name with a “we,” and afterwards much deplored the absence of certain technical defence on Mr. Pickwick’s behalf—“Oh, Sammy, Sammy, vy vorn’t there a alleybi?”  Are not all these and other particulars written in the chronicles of the “Pickwick Papers”?—See chapter 34.

Resuming the promenade of Cheapside (still in the reverse direction of the progress of Lord George Gordon and his escort), we come into the Poultry, at the farther end, passing a turning on the left therefrom, known as Grocers’ Hall Court.  It will be remembered that on one occasion when Mr. Pickwick desired a quiet glass of brandy and water, Sam Weller, whose “knowledge of London was extensive and peculiar,” led the way from the Mansion House, proceeding by the second court on the right, to the last house but one on the same side of the way, where he directed his master to

“Take the box as stands in the first fireplace, ’cos there a’n’t no leg in the middle of the table.”

In pursuance of these explicit instructions, we shall find that this house is now in possession of Mr. Sheppard, gasfitter, but it is recollected that it was, aforetime, a restaurant of the old-fashioned sort.  Mr. Weller, the elder, was here introduced to his son’s patron, and thereupon arranged for Mr. Pickwick’s journey to Ipswich.  At the end of the Poultry we next approach, on the right, The Mansion House, mentioned in “Barnaby Rudge” as the residence of the Mayor of London.  We read of this civic potentate in the pages of “The Christmas Carol,” when, one Christmas Eve,

“The Lord Mayor, in the stronghold of the mighty Mansion House, gave orders to his fifty cooks and butlers to keep Christmas as a Lord Mayor’s household should.”

Mark Tapley also—in America—once made jocose reference p. 30to this location.  When speaking of Queen Victoria, he informed certain members of the Watertoast Association to the following effect:—

“She has lodgings, in virtue of her office, with the Lord Mayor at the Mansion House, but don’t often occupy them, in consequence of the parlour chimney smoking.”

Messrs. Dombey and Son had their offices in the City, within the sound of Bow Bells, and not far from the Mansion House.  Their position was probably in proximity to The Royal Exchange, but the address cannot be definitely indicated.  Here Mr. Carker, the manager, reigned supreme, and schemed for his own aggrandisement, regardless of the prosperity of the house.

The name of the firm is still perpetuated in the City, and the thriving establishment of the well-known merchant tailors—Dombey & Son—will be found at No. 120 Cheapside, at which a large and well-conducted business is carried on.

From this point we may conveniently visit “His Lordship’s Larder” (at three minutes’ distance), Cheapside, where we may advantageously refresh, “rest, and be thankful.”

p. 31RAMBLE III
Charing Cross to Thavies Inn, Holborn Circus

South-Eastern Terminus—Spa Road Station—Jacob’s Island; Sykes’s last Refuge—Butler’s Wharf, formerly Quilp’s Wharf—Quilp’s House, Tower Hill—Trinity House and Garden; Bella Wilfer’s Waiting-place—Southwark Bridge; Little Dorrit’s Promenade—The General Post Office—Falcon Hotel, Falcon Square; John Jasper’s patronage—Little Britain; Office of Mr. Jaggers—Smithfield—Newgate Prison; Pip’s description in “Great Expectations”—The Old Bailey Criminal Court, as per “Tale of Two Cities”—The Saracen’s Head; Associations with Nicholas Nickleby—Clerkenwell Green; Oliver Twist and his Companions—Scene of the Robbery—Line of Route taken by Oliver and “The Artful Dodger” from the Angel to Saffron Hill—Hatton Garden Police Court; Administration of Mr. Fang—Great Saffron Hill and Field Lane—Fagin’s House and the “Three Cripples”—Bleeding Hart Yard; Factory of Doyce and Clennam; the Plornish Family—Ely Place—Thavies Inn; Mrs. Jellyby’s Residence.

From the South-Eastern Terminus at Charing Cross there are frequent trains by which the Rambler can travel to Spa Road Station, Bermondsey (about twenty minutes’ ride), from which point the situation of what was once Jacob’s Island may be conveniently visited.  This place was associated with the adventures of Oliver Twist, being the last refuge to which Sykes, the murderer of Nancy, betook himself on his return to London, and where he met a righteous retribution when attempting his escape.  It is described by Dickens—nearly sixty years since—as being

“Near to that part of the Thames on which the church at Rotherhithe abuts, where the buildings on the banks are dirtiest, and the vessels on the river blackest, with the dust of colliers and the smoke of close-built, low-roofed houses.  In such a neighbourhood, beyond Dockhead, in the borough of Southwark, stands Jacob’s Island, p. 32surrounded by a muddy ditch, six or eight feet deep, and fifteen or twenty wide when the tide is in, once called Mill Pond, but known in the days of this story as Folly Ditch.”

Arriving at Spa Road, the explorer turns left and right by the short routes of West Street South, Fream Street, and Rouel Road, into Jamaica Road (five minutes from station); passing from the opposite side of which, through Parker’s Row to the thoroughfare of Dockhead, he will find himself face to face with a tavern on the north side, named “The Swan and Sugar Loaf.”  A short cut on the right of this house leads immediately to London Street, its northern side forming the south boundary of the old site of Jacob’s Island.  Folly Ditch, flowing from the Thames through Mill Street, took its course through London Street (it has been filled in since 1851); and in these streets wooden bridges crossed to the Island, and “crazy wooden galleries, common to the backs of half-a-dozen houses”—referred to by the novelist—used to “ornament the banks of Folly Ditch.”  To the right we pass into George Row, enclosing Jacob’s Island (east), and may note en passant the blocks of workmen’s dwellings, erected 1883, named “Wolseley’s Buildings,” which occupy the site of the old Island on its eastern side.  From George Row we turn (right) into Jacob Street, north of the Island, by which we come into Mill Street (west); again returning to London Street, and so completing the circumnavigation of this interesting locality.  Some of the old wooden erections still exist in Farthing Alley, Halfpenny Alley, and Edward Street, which intersect the area.  In his preface to the first cheap edition of “Oliver Twist,” the author makes a further reference, as follows:—

“In the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty, it was publicly declared in London by an amazing alderman, that Jacob’s Island did not exist, and never had existed.  Jacob’s Island continues to exist (like an ill-bred place as it is) in the year one thousand eight hundred and sixty-seven, though improved and much changed.”

Starting westward from “The Swan and Sugar Loaf,” we now proceed through Thornton Street, and turn to the p. 33right, by one block in the street beyond, into Queen Street, which leads directly north to the riverside.  At the end of this street is the locality of Quilp’s Wharf and place of business, aforetime described in the pages of “The Old Curiosity Shop”:—

“A small, rat-infested, dreary yard, in which were a little wooden counting-house, burrowing all awry in the dust as if it had fallen from the clouds, and ploughed into the ground; a few fragments of rusty anchors, several large iron rings, some piles of rotten wood, and two or three heaps of old sheet copper—crumpled, cracked, and battered.”

The place has been altogether altered and improved during the last forty years, and is now known as “Butler’s Wharf,” but the original prototype of Quilp is still remembered by some of the older residents of the neighbourhood.

The westward route being continued by the side of the river, we walk through Shad Thames and Pickle Herring Street (underneath an archway) to Vine Street, where is the southern entrance of the Tower Subway, by which we may cross below the river to the other side.  Emerging near the Tower, Quilp’s House, on Tower Hill, is near at hand.  No. 6 Tower Dock, facing the public entrance to the Tower, is said to have comprised the lodging assigned by Dickens for the accommodation of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Quilp and Mrs. Jiniwin.  We may here recall the matrons’ tea-meeting, as described in chapter 4 of “The Old Curiosity Shop,” when Quilp’s conduct as a husband was freely discussed, and much good advice tendered to Mrs. Quilp for the true assertion of her rights and dignity.  Also the notable occasion when, the master of the house being missing and thought to be drowned, Mr. Sampson Brass was in consultation, and the party were unpleasantly surprised, as they were preparing a descriptive advertisement, by the sudden appearance of the Dwarf, as lively and sarcastic as ever.

“A question now arises with regard to his nose.  ‘Flat,’ said Mrs. Jiniwin.  ‘Aquiline!’ cried Quilp, thrusting in his head, and striking p. 34the feature with his fist.  ‘Aquiline, you hag.  Do you see it?  Do you call this flat?  Do you?  Eh?’”

Hard by this locality stands Trinity House, Tower Hill, with its garden in front, and it may be remembered that Mr. Wilfer suggested this neighbourhood as a waiting-place for Bella, on the occasion of their “innocent elopement” to Greenwich, while he should array himself in new garments at her expense, to do honour to the expedition.  We now turn westward by Tower Street, and may save time by taking train at Mark Lane Station for the Mansion House, about ten minutes’ ride.  On arrival at the Mansion House Station we shall find Queen Street close at hand, leading riverwards to Southwark Bridge, referred to in “Little Dorrit” as the Iron Bridge.  This was Amy Dorrit’s favourite promenade, it being quieter than many of the neighbouring thoroughfares; and we may recall the scene when young John Chivery was obliged to take no for an answer, when he attempted the proffer of his hand and heart.

Proceeding onwards through Cannon Street, we turn to the right through St. Paul’s Churchyard, crossing Cheapside to the stately edifice of the General Post Office, St. Martin’s-le-Grand.  This building, in the times of “Nicholas Nickleby,” occasioned honest John Browdie some surprise:—

“Wa-at dost thee tak’ yon place to be, noo, that ’un ower the wa’?  Ye’d never coom near it, gin ye thried for twolve moonths.  It’s na but a Poast-office.  Ho, ho! they need to charge for double latthers.  A Poast-office!  What dost thee think of that?  Ecod, if that’s on’y a Poast-office, loike to see where the Lord Mayor o’ Lunnon lives!”

Aldersgate Street leads northward from St. Martin’s-le-Grand; passing the first block in which, Falcon Street turns on the right (No. 16) towards Falcon Square, a small city piazza, where may be found (No. 8) The Falcon Hotel.  This is the place at which John Jasper sojourned when visiting London.  In “The Mystery of Edwin Drood” we read the following commendation of the house in question:—

p. 35“It is hotel, boarding-house, or lodging-house at its visitor’s option.  It announces itself, in the new Railway advertisers, as a novel enterprise, timidly beginning to spring up.  It bashfully, almost apologetically, gives the traveller to understand that it does not expect him, on the good old constitutional hotel plan, to order a pint of sweet blacking for his drinking, and throw it away; but insinuates that he may have his boots blacked instead of his stomach, and may also have bed, breakfast, attendance, and a porter up all night, for a certain fixed charge.”

Returning to Aldersgate Street, we shall find that the opposite turning, leading to Smithfield, is Little Britain.  In “Great Expectations” we learn that the Offices of Mr. Jaggers, the Old Bailey lawyer, were here situated, in near proximity to Bartholomew Close; but the house cannot be precisely indicated.  Here Mr. Wemmick assisted his Principal in the details of his professional business.  He may be remembered as having a decided preference for “portable property.”

Proceeding onward by Duke Street, the visitor will shortly come into Smithfield, a locality which is considerably changed since the days when Pip first arrived in London.  He says—

“When I told the clerk that I would take a turn in the air while I waited, he advised me to go round the corner and I should come into Smithfield.  So I came into Smithfield; and the shameful place, being all asmear with filth, and fat, and blood, and foam, seemed to stick to me.  So, I rubbed it off with all possible speed by turning into a street where I saw the great black dome of Saint Paul’s bulging at me from behind a grim stone building which a bystander said was Newgate Prison.”

Adopting the same line of route, the Rambler may pass the south front of the Metropolitan Meat Market, turning to the left by St. Bartholomew’s Hospital into Giltspur Street, which leads to Newgate Street, and faces on the opposite corner of Old Bailey Newgate Prison.  In “Great Expectations,” Pip describes his visit to the interior, at the invitation and in the company of Mr. Wemmick:—

p. 36“We passed through the Lodge, where some fetters were hanging up, on the bare walls among the prison rules, into the interior of the jail.  At that time jails were much neglected, and the period of exaggerated reaction consequent on all public wrong-doing—and which is always its longest and heaviest punishment—was still far off.  So, felons were not lodged and fed better than soldiers (to say nothing of paupers), and seldom set fire to their prisons with the excusable object of improving the flavour of their soup.  It was visiting-time when Wemmick took me in, and a potman was going his rounds with beer, and the prisoners behind bars in yards were buying beer and talking to friends; and a frowsy, ugly, disorderly, depressing scene it was.”

Again, it may be remarked that things have much improved since the good old days.  Inter alia, the principles and rules of prison management and discipline have greatly changed for the better.

In the tale of “Barnaby Rudge” is the narrative of the burning of Newgate and the liberation of the prisoners by the rioters (1780), on which occasion it will be remembered that our old friend Gabriel Varden was somewhat roughly handled.  For full particulars, see chapter 64.

Immediately south of Newgate is the adjacent Central Criminal Court of The Old Bailey, the scene of Charles Darnay’s trial in “The Tale of Two Cities.”  At the time there described (1775)—

“The Old Bailey was famous as a kind of deadly Inn yard, from which pale travellers set out continually, in carts and coaches, on a violent passage to the other world, traversing some two miles and a half of public street and road, and shaming few good citizens, if any.  So powerful is use, and so desirable to be good use in the beginning.  It was famous, too, for the pillory, a wise old institution, that inflicted a punishment of which no one could foresee the extent; also for the whipping-post, another dear old institution, very humanising and softening to behold in action; also for extensive transactions in blood-money, another fragment of ancestral wisdom.”

Facing eastward from Newgate Street is the Holborn Viaduct, which has for many years superseded the old ascending and descending road of Holborn Hill.

The Saracen’s Head, the old coaching-house on Snow Hill, with which we have been familiar from the days of p. 37“Nicholas Nickleby,” as the headquarters of Mr. Squeers, has disappeared since 1868, having been pulled down long ago, with many other buildings of this neighbourhood, giving room to the great improvements which have taken place in this part of London.  Hereabouts it stood, on a lower level, not far from St. Sepulchre’s Church—

“Just on that particular part of Snow Hill where omnibus horses going eastward seriously think of falling down on purpose, and horses in hackney cabriolets going westward not unfrequently fall by accident.”

The present Police Station, Snow Hill, stands on part of the site formerly occupied by this old hostelry.

This modern thoroughfare of Snow Hill commences at the first turning on the right, in which has been erected a commodious hotel of the same name (No. 10), where, by the aid of a little refreshment and a slight exercise of imagination, we may recall the departure of Nicholas for Dotheboy’s Hall, Greta Bridge, by the Yorkshire coach, with Mr. Squeers and the pupils; also the later arrival in London of Mr. and Mrs. Browdie, accompanied by the lovely Fanny as bridesmaid, and the first meeting of Nicholas with Frank Cheeryble, newly returned from Continental travel.

Snow Hill leads to the lower level of Farringdon Road, at a point immediately north of the Holborn Viaduct spanning the thoroughfare, in which, turning to the right, we walk onwards to the intersection of Clerkenwell Road (eight minutes’ work).  On the right hand, across the railway, is Clerkenwell Green, referred to in “Oliver Twist” as

“That open square in Clerkenwell which is yet called by some strange perversion of terms The Green.”

It was near this place that little Oliver became enlightened as to the business of Charley Bates and the Artful Dodger.  We read that the boys, traversing a narrow court in this neighbourhood, came out opposite a bookstall, where Mr. Brownlow was reading, abstracted from all other mundane considerations, so affording “a prime plant” for the p. 38operations of these light-fingered gentlemen.  This court leads from the road opposite the Sessions House into Pear Tree Court, giving into the main road at some distance beyond, at which the scene above referred to was enacted.

Walking onwards by the King’s Cross Road we soon come to the point where Exmouth Street joins it from the east, facing the south-east angle of the House of Correction.  Here we strike into the route taken by Oliver Twist when he first came from Barnet to London, under the escort of Mr. John Dawkins.  The text of the story is as follows:—

“They crossed from the ‘Angel’ into St. John’s Road, struck down the small street which terminates at Sadler’s Wells Theatre, through Exmouth Street and Coppice Row, down the little court by the side of the Workhouse, across the classic ground which once bore the name of Hockley-in-the-Hole, thence into Little Saffron Hill, and so into Saffron Hill the Great.”

Following the line thus indicated from Exmouth Street, we come on the south side of the Workhouse, nearly opposite Little Saffron Hill, which leads into Great Saffron Hill as above.  Crossing Clerkenwell Road, and proceeding for a short distance down Great Saffron Hill, we arrive at the cross street of Hatton Wall, in which, past two doors to the left on the south side, will be found—between the Hat and Tun Inn and No. 17 beyond—the entrance of Hatton Yard, a long narrow lane or mews (leading to Kirby Street), occupied by carmen and stabling.  In this eligible position was situated, some fifty years since, “the very notorious Metropolitan Police Court” to which Oliver Twist was taken on the charge of theft; and we may here recall the administration of the presiding magistrate, the notable Mr. Fang, as shown in the examination of the prisoner.

The premises (No. 9, on the left) once formed part and parcel of the police court referred to; but the arrangements of the neighbourhood have been subjected to much alteration during the last half century.  Mr. Forster states that Dickens “had himself a satisfaction in admitting the p. 39identity of Mr. Fang, in ‘Oliver Twist,’ with Mr. Laing of Hatton Garden.”  In a letter (now in possession of Mr. S. R. Goodman, of Brighton) written to Mr. Haines, Reporter, June 3rd, 1838, Dickens writes as follows:—

“In my next number of ‘Oliver Twist’ I must have a magistrate; and, casting about for a magistrate whose harshness and insolence would render him a fit subject to be shown up, I have as a necessary consequence stumbled upon Mr. Laing of Hatton Garden celebrity.  I know the man’s character perfectly well; but as it would be necessary to describe his personal appearance also, I ought to have seen him, which (fortunately or unfortunately as the case may be) I have never done.  In this dilemma it occurred to me that perhaps I might under your auspices be smuggled into the Hatton Garden office for a few moments some morning.  If you can further my object I shall be really very greatly obliged to you.”

“The opportunity was found; the magistrate was brought up before the novelist; and shortly after, on some fresh outbreak of intolerable temper, the Home Secretary found it an easy and popular step to remove Mr. Laing from the Bench.”

Returning to Great Saffron Hill, we may recall its description as given in the days of “Oliver Twist”—

“The street was very narrow and muddy, and the air was impregnated with filthy odours.  The sole places that seemed to prosper amid the general blight of the place were the public-houses, and in them the lowest orders of the Irish were wrangling with might and main.  Covered ways and yards, which here and there diverged from the main street, disclosed little knots of houses where drunken men and women were positively wallowing in filth.”

Field Lane, in the immediate vicinity, was

“Near to that spot on which Snow Hill and Holborn Hill meet . . a narrow dismal alley leading to Saffron Hill.  In its filthy shops are exposed for sale huge bunches of second-hand silk handkerchiefs of all sizes and patterns, for here reside the traders who purchase them from the pickpockets.”

This place has been effaced by the Holborn Valley improvements, and we may now look in vain for the precise locality of the house of Fagin the Jew.  In this p. 40neighbourhood also was situated “The Three Cripples,” a public-house of evil repute patronised by Sykes, Fagin, and Monks.  We may recall the circumstance of Mr. Morris Bolter’s (alias Noah Claypole’s) arrival at this house, when he and Charlotte first came to London, and of his subsequent interview with the wily Jew.

It is pleasant to remark that Saffron Hill has greatly improved in its character since the above-quoted description was correct.  It now affords accommodation for the headquarters of the Central Shoeblacks’ Society (as established under the auspices of the late Earl of Shaftesbury), and about midway in the street where thieves “did once inhabit,” a large Board School is doing good educational service for the elevation of the humbler classes.

Turning from Great Saffron Hill westward by the One Tun public-house, we come into Charles Street, on the south side of which, towards Hatton Garden, is Bleeding Hart Yard (entrance by the Bleeding Hart Tavern, No. 19).  This locality is associated with the tale of “Little Dorrit.”  It will be remembered that here the factory of Messrs. Doyce and Clennam was situated, and here also resided Mr. and Mrs. Plornish, the humble friends of the Dorrit family.  In these degenerate days the place has much altered, and the amiable Mr. Casby would certainly find it more difficult than ever to collect his weekly dues, even by the agency of his energetic assistant, Mr. Pancks.

Passing from this unpretending locality, we come (at No. 8) into Hatton Garden, which leads southward to Holborn Circus.

In Hatton Garden, on the east side, can be observed (No. 20) the old-established warehouse of Messrs. Rowland and Son.  In this connection there may be remembered the mad old gentleman “in small clothes,” who lived next door to the Nicklebys, at Bow.  On the only occasion of his visiting the family indoors, he incidentally referred to “Mrs. Rowland, who, every p. 41morning, bathes in Kalydor for nothing.”—See “Nicholas Nickleby,” chapter 49.

Mr. Waterbrook’s establishment, situated in Ely Place, Holborn, is entitled to passing mention as the place where David and his friend Traddles met each other for the first time after their schoolboy days, on the occasion of a dinner-party, at which also Agnes Wickfield and Uriah Heep attended.  Ely Place is situated on the north side of Holborn Circus, and once comprised the rose garden of the Bishop of Ely, afterwards leased to Sir Christopher Hatton.

On the opposite side of the Circus, and near to St. Andrew’s Church, is situated Thavies Inn, in which Mrs. Jellyby and family resided, in the days when her daughter Caddy acted as amanuensis in re the affairs of Borrioboola-Gha.

It is described in “Bleak House” as being

“A narrow street of high houses like an oblong cistern to hold the fog.”

The house No. 13, on the right, has been indicated as once the disorderly residence of the Jellyby family.  We may recollect it as the place where Esther Summerson and Ada were accommodated for their first night in London, on which occasion little unfortunate Peepy was found with his head between the area railings, and the house generally turned upside down; while Mrs. Jellyby serenely dictated her correspondence in the family sitting-room, altogether oblivious of such minor domestic accidents.

Esther thus narrates her first impressions:—

“Mrs. Jellyby had very good hair, but was too much occupied with her African duties to brush it.  The shawl in which she had been loosely muffled dropped on to her chair, when she advanced towards us; and, as she turned to resume her seat, we could not help noticing that her dress didn’t nearly meet up the back, and that the open space was railed across with a lattice work of staylace—like a summer house. . . .  ‘You find me, my dears,’ said Mrs. Jellyby, ‘as usual, very busy; but that you will excuse.  The African project at present employs my whole time. . . .  We hope by this time next year to have from a hundred p. 42and fifty to two hundred healthy families cultivating coffee and educating the natives of Borrioboola-Gha, on the left bank of the Niger.”—See “Bleak House,” chapter 4.

The Buffet of Messrs. Spiers and Pond will be found a short distance eastward from Holborn Circus, on the right, next the terminus of the London, Chatham, and Dover railway.  A visit to its welcome “contiguity of shade” is confidently recommended to those who may be disposed for necessary rest and refreshment.

p. 43RAMBLE IV
Holborn Circus to Tottenham Court Road

Langdale’s Distillery—Barnard’s Inn; Pip’s Chambers—Furnival’s Inn; Dickens’s and John Westlock’s Apartments—Staple Inn; Mr. Grewgious’s Chambers, P.J.T.; Rooms of Neville Landless and Mr. Tartar; “The Magic Bean-Stalk Country”—Gray’s Inn; Mr. and Mrs. Traddles and “the girls;” Offices of Mr. Perker—The Bull Inn; Scene of Lewsome’s Illness—Kingsgate Street; Poll Sweedlepipe’s Shop; Sairey Gamp’s Apartments—Mrs. Billickin’s Lodgings in Southampton Street; Miss Twinkleton and Rosa Budd—Bloomsbury Square; Lord Mansfield’s Residence—Queen Square—The Children’s Hospital; Johnny’s Will—Foundling Hospital; “No Thoroughfare;” Walter Wilding—“The Boot Tavern”—No. 48 Doughty Street—Tavistock House, Tavistock Square—Mrs. Dickens’s Establishment, No. 4 Gower Street, North; Mrs. Wilfer’s Doorplate—No. 1 Devonshire Terrace—Mr. Merdle’s House, Harley Street—Mr. Dombey’s House—Madame Mantalini’s, Wigmore Street—Wimpole Street; Mr. Boffin’s West-end Residence—Welbeck Street; Lord George Gordon’s Residence—Brook Street, Claridge’s Hotel; Mr. Dorrit’s Return—Devonshire House; Guild of Literature and Art—Hatchett’s Hotel; White Horse Cellars; Mr. Guppy in attendance—193 Piccadilly; Messrs. Chapman and Hall—Golden Square; Ralph Nickleby’s Office—Apartments of the Kenwigs family—The Crown Inn—“Martha’s” Lodgings—Newman Street; Mr. Turveydrop’s Academy—Carlisle House; Doctor Manette and Lucie.

From Holborn Circus the Rambler now proceeds westward by the main thoroughfare of Holborn, passing Fetter Lane on the left, and arrives at (No. 26) the old premises, now partially rebuilt, formerly Langdale’s Distillery.  Half of the same remains (at the moment), but will shortly be superseded by a modern building.  The eastern portion is occupied by Messrs. p. 44Buchanan, whisky merchants, who have recently purchased the premises.  This establishment was sacked (1780) by the Gordon rioters.  Mr. Langdale being a Catholic, was obnoxious to the No-Popery mob; and the stores of liquor at this distillery afforded an additional temptation for the attack.  The terrible scenes enacted on the occasion are powerfully described in “Barnaby Rudge,” chapters 67 and 68—

“At this place a large detachment of soldiery were posted, who fired, now up Fleet Market, now up Holborn, now up Snow Hill—constantly raking the streets in each direction.  At this place too, several large fires were burning, so that all the terrors of that terrible night seemed to be concentrated in one spot.

“Full twenty times, the rioters, headed by one man who wielded an axe in his right hand, and bestrode a brewer’s horse of great size and strength, caparisoned with fetters taken out of Newgate, which clanked and jingled as he went, made an attempt to force a passage at this point, and fire the vintner’s house.  Full twenty times they were repulsed with loss of life, and still came back again; and though the fellow at their head was marked and singled out by all, and was a conspicuous object as the only rioter on horseback, not a man could hit him. . . .

“The vintner’s house, with half-a-dozen others near at hand, was one great, glowing blaze.  All night, no one had essayed to quench the flames, or stop their progress; but now a body of soldiers were actively engaged in pulling down two old wooden houses, which were every moment in danger of taking fire, and which could scarcely fail, if they were left to burn, to extend the conflagration immensely.

“. . .  The gutters of the street, and every crack and fissure in the stones, ran with scorching spirit, which being dammed up by busy hands, overflowed the road and pavement, and formed a great pool, into which the people dropped down dead by dozens.  They lay in heaps all round this fearful pond, husbands and wives, fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, women with children in their arms and babies at their breasts, and drank until they died.  While some stooped with their lips to the brink and never raised their heads again, others sprang up from their fiery draught, and danced, half in a mad triumph, and half in the agony of suffocation, until they fell, and steeped their corpses in the liquor that had killed them. . . .

“On this last night of the great riots—for the last night it was—the wretched victims of a senseless outcry, became themselves the dust and ashes of the flames they had kindled, and strewed the public streets of London.”

p. 45It will be remembered that Mr. Langdale and Mr. Haredale, being in the house that night, were rescued by Edward Chester and Joe Willett, all four finding their way to safety by a back entrance.

“The narrow lane in the rear was quite free of people.  So, when they had crawled through the passage indicated by the vintner (which was a mere shelving-trap for the admission of casks), and had managed with some difficulty to unchain and raise the door at the upper end, they emerged into the street without being observed or interrupted.  Joe still holding Mr. Haredale tight, and Edward taking the same care of the vintner, they hurried through the streets at a rapid pace.”

This door gives into Fetter Lane (No. 79), and still exists for the inspection of the curious.  The old house in Holborn has, for more than a century, replaced the premises so destroyed.  Close at hand (by No. 23) is the entrance to Barnard’s Inn—

“The dingiest collection of shabby buildings ever squeezed together in a rank corner as a club for tom-cats.”

The locality is referred to in these complimentary terms by Mr. Pip (in the pages of “Great Expectations”), who lived here with his friend Herbert Pocket for a short time when he first came to London.  Mr. Joe Gargery’s verdict is worth remembrance:—

“The present may be a wery good inn, and I believe its character do stand i; but I wouldn’t keep a pig in it myself, not in the case that I wished him to fatten wholesome, and to eat with a meller flavour on him.”

Pip further describes as follows:—

“We entered this haven through a wicket-gate, and were disgorged by an introductory passage into a melancholy little square that looked to me like a flat burying-ground.  I thought it had the most dismal trees in it, and the most dismal sparrows, and the most dismal cats, and the most dismal houses (in number half-a-dozen or so), that I had ever seen. . . .  A frowzy mourning of soot and smoke attired this forlorn creation of Barnard, and it had strewed ashes on its head, and was undergoing penance and humiliation as a mere dust-hole.  Thus for my sense of sight; while dry rot, and wet rot, and all the silent p. 46rots that rot in neglected root and cellar—rot of rat, and mouse, and bug, and coaching stables near at hand besides—addressed themselves faintly to my sense of smell, and moaned, ‘Try Barnard’s Mixture.’”

Great alterations are now (1899) being carried out; the old buildings—as above referred to by Mr. Pip—have been demolished, and a new and better arrangement of the locality is in active progress for the improvement of the neighbourhood.

On the opposite side of Holborn are the handsome and extensive offices of The Prudential Assurance Company.  These premises, with their frontage, occupy the site of Furnival’s Inn, which has recently disappeared, having been pulled down to make room for the extension of the Assurance offices above referred to—Sic transit memoria mundi.

Furnival’s Inn was an interesting locality, as associated with the earlier experience of Mr. Dickens himself.  Here the young author resided in 1835, the year previous to the production of the “Pickwick Papers,” the first number of that work being published April 1, 1836.  On the day following that notable date, Mr. Dickens married Miss Catherine Hogarth; and for some time the young couple resided on the third floor apartments at No. 15 Furnival’s Inn—on the right side of the square.  A personal reminiscence of these early days is no doubt intended in chapter 59 of “David Copperfield;” a pleasant description being there given of the residential chambers of Mr. and Mrs. Traddles, as located in Gray’s Inn just beyond.

Mr. John Westlock had his bachelor apartments in this same place at Furnival’s Inn (vide “Martin Chuzzlewit”), and here he received the unexpected visit of Tom Pinch on his first arrival in London.  We may remember the incidents of that cordial welcome, when

“John was constantly running backwards and forwards to and from the closet, bringing out all sorts of things in pots, scooping extraordinary quantities of tea out of the caddy, dropping French rolls into his boots, pouring hot water over the butter, and making a variety of similar mistakes, without disconcerting himself in the least.”

p. 47In the centre of the interior square, standing within the precincts of Furnival’s Inn during the past seventy-five years, and flourishing in recent days—a quiet oasis of retirement and good cheer amidst the bustle and noise of central London—there existed (until 1895) Woods’ Hotel.  This hotel was associated with “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” being the house at which Mr. Grewgious found accommodation for the charming Rosa Budd (on the occasion of her flight from the importunities of Jasper at Cloisterham), including an “unlimited head chambermaid” for her special behoof and benefit.

“Rosa’s room was airy, clean, comfortable, almost gay.  The Unlimited had laid in everything omitted from the very little bag (that is to say, everything she could possibly need), and Rosa tripped down the great many stairs again, to thank her guardian for his thoughtful and affectionate care of her.

“‘Not at all, my dear,’ said Mr. Grewgious, infinitely gratified; ‘it is I who thank you for your charming confidence and for your charming company.  Your breakfast will be provided for you in a neat, compact, and graceful little sitting-room (appropriate to your figure), and I will come to you at ten o’clock in the morning.  I hope you don’t feel very strange indeed, in this strange place.’

“‘Oh no, I feel so safe!’

“‘Yes, you may be sure that the stairs are fire-proof,’ said Mr. Grewgious, ‘and that any outbreak of the devouring element would be perceived and suppressed by the watchmen.’

“‘I did not mean that,’ Rosa replied.  ‘I mean, I feel so safe from him.’

“‘There is a stout gate of iron bars to keep him out,’ said Mr. Grewgious smiling; ‘and Furnival’s is fire-proof, and specially watched and lighted, and I live over the way!’  In the stoutness of his knight-errantry, he seemed to think the last-named protection all-sufficient.  In the same spirit he said to the gate-porter as he went out, ‘If some one staying in the hotel should wish to send across the road to me in the night, a crown will be ready for the messenger.’  In the same spirit, he walked up and down outside the iron gate for the best part of an hour, with some solicitude; occasionally looking in between the bars, as if he had laid a dove in a high roost in a cage of lions, and had it on his mind that she might tumble out.”

The Hotel was originally built 1818–19, and was enlarged as recently as 1884.  Woods was the proprietor for fifty years.

p. 48Crossing to the other side of the street, at a short distance onwards, opposite Gray’s Inn Road, the Rambler reaches (by No. 334 High Holborn) the gateway of Staple Inn; a little nook, composed of two irregular quadrangles behind the most ancient part of Holborn, where certain gabled houses, some centuries of age, still stand looking on the public way.  Staple Inn was the favourite summer promenade of the meditative Mr. Snagsby (see “Bleak House”); and in this Inn Mr. Grewgious occupied a set of chambers.  The house is No. 10, in the inner quadrangle, “presenting in black and white, over its ugly portal, the mysterious inscription, ‘P. J. T., 1747.’  Perhaps John Thomas, or Perhaps Joe Tyler.”  And, under certain social conditions, “for a certainty, P. J. T. was Pretty Jolly Too.”  Neville Landless also had rooms in this locality; the top set in the corner (on the right), overlooking the garden “where a few smoky sparrows twitter in the smoky trees, as though they had called to each other, ‘let us play at country.’”  Close to these lived Mr. Tartar, in “the neatest, the cleanest, and the best-ordered chambers ever seen under the sun, moon, and stars.”  And we may recall the writer’s delicate treatment of this, the blushing “beanstalk country” of dear little Rosa Budd.  For the several associations herewith connected, reference should be made to our author’s last book, “The Mystery of Edwin Drood.”—See concluding paragraphs of chapter 21:—

“Rosa wondered what the girls would say if they could see her crossing the wide street on the sailor’s arm.  And she fancied that the passers-by must think her very little and very helpless, contrasted with the strong figure that could have caught her up and carried her out of any danger, miles and miles without resting.

“She was thinking further, that his far-seeing blue eyes looked as if they had been used to watch danger afar off, and to watch it without flinching, drawing nearer and nearer: when, happening to raise her own eyes, she found that he seemed to be thinking something about them.

“This a little confused Rosebud, and may account for her never afterwards quite knowing how she ascended (with his help) to his garden in the air, and seemed to get into a marvellous country that p. 49came into sudden bloom like the country on the summit of the magic bean-stalk.  May it flourish for ever!”

In this connection, the reader may be interested in chapter 22; the first part of which deals most tenderly and beautifully with “love’s awaking,” in the heart of the innocent heroine.

Recrossing to the other side of High Holborn, past Gray’s Inn Road (on the north), at No. 22, we reach the gateway of Gray’s Inn.  At No. 2 South Square (formerly Holborn Court) we may find the upper chambers formerly occupied by Mr. Traddles and his wife Sophy, whose domestic arrangements included accommodation for “the beauty” and the other Devonshire sisters.  Copperfield says, in the chapter before referred to:—

“If I had beheld a thousand roses blowing in a top set of chambers, in that withered Gray’s Inn, they could not have brightened it half so much.  The idea of those Devonshire girls, among the dry law-stationers, and the attorneys’ offices; and of the tea and toast, and children’s songs, in that grim atmosphere of pounce and parchment, red-tape, dusty wafers, ink-jars, brief and draft paper, law reports, writs, declarations, and bills of costs, seemed almost as pleasantly fanciful as if I had dreamed that the Sultan’s famous family had been admitted on the roll of attorneys, and had brought the talking-bird, the singing-tree, and the Golden water into Gray’s Inn Hall.”

The offices of Mr. Perker, the legal adviser of Mr. Pickwick, were also located in Gray’s Inn.  We read that the “outer door” of these chambers was to be found “after climbing two pairs of steep and dirty stairs;” but no indication is given of their exact situation.

Proceeding westward from Gray’s Inn, and passing the stately, elegant, and commodious First Avenue Hotel, between Warwick Court and Brownlow Street, and a half-a-dozen side streets beyond, we come, on the north side, at No. 92, to the Bull and Anchor Tavern.  This is the house known in the pages of “Martin Chuzzlewit” as “The Bull Inn,” then a more important hostelry than at present.  It will be remembered as the inn at which Mr. Lewsome, during his p. 50illness, was professionally attended by Sairey Gamp and Betsy Prig, “turn and turn about.”

Passing on to the next turning but one, we reach Kingsgate Street, where Poll Sweedlepipes—barber and bird-fancier—once had his business location, “next door but one to the celebrated mutton-pie shop, and directly opposite the original cat’s-meat warehouse.”  At this place the immortal Mrs. Gamp had lodgings on the first floor, where she

“Was easily assailed at night by pebbles, walking-sticks, and fragments of tobacco pipes, all much more efficacious than the street-door knocker, which was so constructed as to wake the street with ease, and even spread alarms of fire in Holborn, without making the smallest impression on the premises to which it was addressed.”

It is recollected in the neighbourhood that, fifty years since, a barber by the name of Patterson (who was also a bird-dealer) lived in this street, at the second house on the left.  The shop has been pulled down, is now absorbed by the corner premises in Holborn, and can be only identified by its position.  Here, then, did Mr. Pecksniff arrive on his doleful mission, in accordance with the recommendation of Mr. Mould, the undertaker, with regard to the death of old Anthony Chuzzlewit; and here did that memorable teapot cause a lasting difference between two friends, as narrated in chapter 49 of “Martin Chuzzlewit.”  “This world-famous personage, Mrs. Gamp, has passed into and become one with the language” whose vernacular she has adorned with her own flowers of speech.  As Mr. Forster remarks, “she will remain among the everlasting triumphs of fiction, a superb masterpiece of English humour.”  “Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale, her infinite variety.”  At the Holborn corner of Kingsgate Street we may remember Mr. Bailey, junior, on the occasion when, at this exact spot, he collided with Poll Sweedlepipes, afterwards going “round and round in circles on the pavement,” the better to exhibit to Poll’s admiring gaze his fashionable livery as Tiger in the service of Mr. Montague Tigg, “rather to the p. 51inconvenience of the passengers generally, who were not in an equal state of spirits with himself.”

The next turning but one, westward, on the right, by the West Central Post Office (No. 126), is Southampton Street, leading to Bloomsbury Square.

Here it will be remembered that lodgings were taken by Mr. Grewgious for Miss Twinkleton and Rosa, of the redoubtable Mrs. Billickin, “the person of the ’ouse,” who, from prudential motives, suppressed her Christian name.

“Mr. Grewgious had his agreement-lines and his earnest-money ready.  ‘I have signed it for the ladies, ma’am,’ he said, ‘and you’ll have the goodness to sign it for yourself, Christian and Surname, there, if you please.’

“‘Mr. Grewgious,’ said Mrs. Billickin in a new burst of candour, ‘no, sir! You must excuse the Christian name.’

“Mr. Grewgious stared at her.

“‘The door-plate is used as a protection,’ said Mrs. Billickin, ‘and acts as such, and go from it I will not.’

“Mr. Grewgious stared at Rosa.

“‘No, Mr. Grewgious, you must excuse me.  So long as this ’ouse is known indefinite as Billickin’s, and so long as it is a doubt with the riff-raff where Billickin may be hidin’, near the street-door or down the airy, and what his weight and size, so long I feel safe.  But commit myself to a solitary female statement, no, Miss!  Nor would you for a moment wish,’ said Mrs. Billickin, with a strong sense of injury, ‘to take that advantage of your sex, if you were not brought to it by inconsiderate example.’

“Rosa reddening as if she had made some most disgraceful attempt to overreach the good lady, besought Mr. Grewgious to rest content with any signature.  And accordingly, in a baronial way, the sign-manual Billickin got appended to the document.”

And we may here recall the incidental passage of arms between the worthy landlady and Miss Twinkleton, Mrs. B. being always in direct antagonism with the schoolmistress, against whom she “openly pitted herself as one whom she fully ascertained to be her natural enemy.”  Witness “the B. enveloped in the shawl of State,” as she remarked to Miss Twinkleton that

“‘A rush from scanty feeding to generous feeding, from what you may call messing to what you may call method, do require a power of p. 52constitution, which is not often found in youth, particular when undermined by boarding-school. . . .  I was put in youth to a very genteel boarding-school, the mistress being no less a lady than yourself, of about your own age, or it may be some years younger, and a poorness of blood flowed from the table, which has run through my life.’

* * * * *

“‘If you refer to the poverty of your circulation,’ began Miss Twinkleton, when again the Billickin neatly stopped her.

“‘I have used no such expressions.’

“‘If you refer, then, to the poorness of your blood—’

“‘Brought upon me,’ stipulated the Billickin, expressly, ‘at a boarding-school—’

“‘Then,’ resumed Miss Twinkleton, ‘all I can say is, that I am bound to believe, on your asseveration, that it is very poor indeed.  I cannot forbear adding, that if that unfortunate circumstance influences your conversation, it is much to be lamented, and it is eminently desirable that your blood were richer.’”

Southampton Street is not a long one, and is now chiefly occupied by solicitors and architects; but there is reason to believe that the Billickins’ residence was, aforetime, to be found at No. 18, which is situated next door but one to an archway.  As Mrs. B. herself candidly pointed out,

“The arching leads to a mews; mewses must exist.”

The mews aforesaid is now superseded by a factory.  Mrs. Billickin has long since relinquished the cares of housekeeping and retired from public life.  The present amiable landlady conducts the business on different principles, and will be at all times disposed to give her patrons satisfaction, whether they be of the scholastic persuasion or otherwise.

Southampton Street leads immediately northward into Bloomsbury Square.  This place is mentioned in “Barnaby Rudge” as the locality in which Lord Mansfield’s residence was situated at the period of the Gordon Riots.  In chapter 66 its destruction by the rioters is thus described:—

“They began to demolish the house with great fury; and setting fire to it in several places, involved in a common ruin the whole of the costly furniture, the plate and jewels, a beautiful gallery of pictures, the rarest collection of manuscripts ever possessed by any one private p. 53person in the world, and, worst of all, because nothing could replace the loss, the great Law Library, on almost every page of which were notes, in the judge’s own hand, of inestimable value; being the results of the study and experience of his whole life.”

The house occupied the site of No. 29, on the east side of the square.  We subsequently read in the same book that two of the rioters—cripples—were hanged in this square, the execution being momentarily delayed, as they were placed facing the house they had assisted to despoil.  Leaving the square at its north-east angle (right) by Bloomsbury Place, the Rambler shortly comes into Southampton Row, turning left, and proceeding for a short distance upwards to Cosmo Place on the right, a short cut which leads directly to the contiguous shades of Queen Square just beyond.  It will be remembered that in this neighbourhood Richard Carstone had furnished apartments at the time when he was pursuing the experimental study of the Law under the auspices of Messrs. Kenge and Carboy (see “Bleak House,” chapter 18).  There is reason to believe that the “quiet old” house intended was No. 28 Devonshire Street, leading from the south-east angle of the square.

Leaving Queen Square by Great Ormond Street (eastward), we immediately arrive, on the north side (No. 50), at The Children’s Hospital, adjacent to the Catholic Church and Convent of St. John.  In 1858, February 9th, a public dinner was arranged, by way of charitable appeal, for funds necessary to carry on and develop the work.  It was happily resolved to invite Charles Dickens to preside on that occasion, and he “threw himself into the service heart and soul.”  His earnest, pathetic, but powerful appeal—“majestic in its own simplicity”—that night added more than £3000 to the treasury, which amount was, two months afterwards, substantially increased by the proceeds of a public reading of his “Christmas Carol.”  It is pleasant to record that this institution has ever since flourished amain, thus fulfilling the prediction of Dickens when, suggesting p. 54that the enterprise could not be possibly maintained unless the Hospital were made better known, he continued as follows:—

“I limit myself to saying—better known, because I will not believe that, in a Christian community of fathers and mothers, and brothers and sisters, it can fail, being better known, to be well and richly endowed.”

We may here recall the scene narrated in chapter 9 of “Our Mutual Friend,” when Johnny makes his will and arranges his affairs, leaving “a kiss for the boofer lady”—

“The family whom God had brought together were not all asleep, but were all quiet.  From bed to bed, a light womanly tread and a pleasant fresh face passed in the silence of the night.  A little head would lift itself into the softened light here and there, to be kissed as the face went by—for these little patients are very loving—and would then submit itself to be composed to rest again. . . .  Over most of the beds, the toys were yet grouped as the children had left them when they last laid themselves down, and in their innocent grotesqueness and incongruity they might have stood for the children’s dreams.”

Proceeding eastward by Great Ormond Street and turning (left) through Lamb’s Conduit Street, to its northern end, we face the entrance of the Foundling Hospital.  This beneficent institution was established by Captain Thomas Coram, about the middle of the last century, and is associated with “No Thoroughfare,” the Christmas number (and last in the series) of “All the Year Round,” 1867.  Visitors attending the morning service of the Foundling Church on Sundays are admitted to the children’s Dining-Hall thereafter, and so may have an opportunity of realising the scene portrayed by Dickens, when the “veiled lady” induced a female attendant to point out Walter Wilding:—

“The bright autumnal sun strikes freshly into the wards; and the heavy-framed windows through which it shines, and the panelled walls on which it shines, are such windows, and such walls as pervade Hogarth’s pictures.  Neat attendants silently glide about the orderly and silent tables, the lookers-on move or stop as the fancy takes them; comments in whispers on face such a number, from such a window, are p. 55not unfrequent—many of the faces are of a character to fix attention.  Some of the visitors from the outside public are accustomed visitors.  They have established a speaking acquaintance with the occupants of particular seats at the table, and halt at those points to say a word or two.”

In “Little Dorrit,” too, reference is made to this institution, in re the adoption of Tattycoram by good Papa and Mamma Meagles.  In the times of Barnaby Rudge, the London streets were not greatly extended northward beyond this (now central) neighbourhood.  We may remember that the headquarters of the “Captain,” Sim Tappertit, Hugh, and Dennis were at The “Boot” Tavern, which is described as

“A lone place of public entertainment, situated in the fields at the back of the Foundling Hospital; a very solitary spot at that period, and quite deserted after dark.  The Tavern stood at some distance from any high road, and was only approachable by a dark and narrow lane.”

Proceeding onwards through Guilford Street, we reach Doughty Street, Mecklenburgh Square, running transversely north and south.  On the east side we may note No. 48 Doughty Street, as the house to which Dickens removed from Furnival’s Inn, in the early spring of 1837, and in which he lived two years and a half, previous to his longer residence at No. 1 Devonshire Terrace.  In it “Oliver Twist” and “Nicholas Nickleby” were written; and here, too, the early friendship, which had been for some time steadily developing between Dickens and Forster, became cemented for life.  His biographer says:—

“Nor had many weeks passed before he addressed to me from Doughty Street, words which it is my sorrowful pride to remember have had literal fulfilment.  ‘I look back with unmingled pleasure to every link which each ensuing week has added to the chain of our attachment.  It shall go hard, I hope, ere anything but death impairs the toughness of a bond now so firmly riveted.’”

The route being retraced to the Foundling Hospital, and thence continued through Guilford Street to Russell p. 56Square, we turn (right) by Woburn Place to Tavistock Square, on the south side of which (Tavistock Villas) is situated Tavistock House.  To this residence Dickens removed (from Devonshire Terrace) in October 1851, retaining its possession for nearly ten years.  During this time “Bleak House” was completed, and “Hard Times,” “Little Dorrit,” and the “Tale of Two Cities” were given to the world.  Tavistock House is now transformed into a Jewish College.  Hans Christian Andersen, visiting his friend in London, gives the following description:—

“In Tavistock Square stands Tavistock House.  This and the strip of garden in front of it are shut out from the thoroughfare by an iron railing.  A large garden, with a grass plat and high trees, stretches behind the house, and gives it a countrified look in the midst of this coal and gas steaming London.  In the passage from street to garden hung pictures and engravings.  Here stood a marble bust of Dickens, so like him, so youthful and handsome; and over a bedroom door were inserted the bas-reliefs of Night and Day, after Thorwaldsen.  On the first floor was a rich library, with a fireplace and a writing-table, looking out on the garden; and here it was that in winter Dickens and his friends acted plays to the satisfaction of all parties.  The kitchen was underground, and at the top of the house were the bedrooms.”

Leaving this locality at the north-west angle, passing Gordon Square, we turn (right) into Gordon Street, and (left) through Gower Place, to Gower Street, on the west side of which—opposite—is the house once bearing a large brass plate on the door, announcing Mrs. Dickens’s Establishment, being the place at which Mrs. Dickens (mother of Charles) endeavoured to set up a school during the difficult times of 1822.  The family lived here for a short time, previous to the Marshalsea imprisonment of Dickens senior; Charles being then a boy ten years of age.  In the first chapter of Forster’s Biography is the following:—

“A house was soon found at number four, Gower Street North; a large brass plate on the door announced Mrs. Dickens’s establishment; p. 57and the result I can give in the exact words of the then small actor in the comedy, whose hopes it had raised so high: ‘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 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.’  . . .  Almost everything by degrees was pawned or sold, little Charles being the principal agent in these sorrowful transactions . . . until at last, even of the furniture of Gower Street, number four, there was nothing left except a few chairs, a kitchen table, and some beds.  Then they encamped, as it were, in the two parlours of the emptied house, and lived there night and day.”

Gower Street has been rearranged since that time (there is now no Gower Street North), and the houses are renumbered.  No. 145, near Gower Street Chapel, and other houses adjoining, are now in the occupation of Messrs. Maple & Co.; and this No. 145 was the house then enumerated as No. 4 Gower Street North.  Mrs. Dickens’s experience, it will be remembered, has been pleasantly referred to in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend;” the stately Mrs. Wilfer therein making a similar experiment, with the same result.  In chapter 4 we read of Rumpty’s return home from business: when

“Something had gone wrong with the house door, for R. Wilfer stopped on the steps, staring at it, and cried ‘Hal-loa?’  ‘Yes,’ said Mrs. Wilfer, ‘the man came himself with a pair of pincers and took it off, and took it away.  He said that as he had no expectation of ever being paid for it, and as he had an order for another Ladies’ School door-plate, it was better (burnished up) for the interests of all parties.’”

On the opposite corner of the street is the Gower Street Station of the Metropolitan Railway, at which train may be taken to Baker Street.  On arrival, we turn to the right, by Marylebone Road, to Devonshire Terrace, consisting of three houses at the northern end of High Street, Marylebone.  No. 1, now occupied by a legal firm, was for twelve years the residence of Charles Dickens (when in town).  It is described by Forster as

p. 58“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.”

To quote the ironical dictum of its future tenant when the choice was made, it was “a house of great promise (and great premium), undeniable situation, and excessive splendour.”  During the period of the author’s residence here several of his best-known books were given to the world—“Master Humphrey’s Clock,” Christmas Books, and “David Copperfield” included.  Proceeding forwards and eastward past Devonshire Place, we may take our way, turning on the right down Harley Street, of which we read in “Little Dorrit” that,

“Like unexceptionable society, the opposing rows of houses in Harley Street were very grim with one another.  Indeed, the mansions and their inhabitants were so much alike in that respect that the people were often to be found drawn up on opposite sides of dinner tables, in the shade of their own loftiness, staring at the other side of the way with the dulness of the houses.  Everybody knows how like the street the two dinner-rows of people who take their stand by the street will be.  The expressionless uniform twenty houses, all to be knocked at and rung at in the same form, all approachable by the same dull steps, all fended off by the same pattern of railing, all with the same impracticable fire-escapes, the same inconvenient fixtures in their heads, and everything, without exception, to be taken at a high valuation—who has not dined with these?”

In this street lived that great financier and swindler Mr. Merdle, who had his residence in one of the handsomest of these handsome houses; but it would be, perhaps, invidious to point out any particular location for the same, Dickens himself having purposely omitted an exact address.  Following the course of Harley Street, we come in due time to Queen Anne Street, running east and west.  Adopting the leftward turning (east), we may find at the next corner—Mansfield Street—on the north side, Mr. Dombey’s House, as described in chapter 3 of “Dombey and Son”—

“Mr. Dombey’s house was a large one, on the shady side of a tall, p. 59dark, dreadfully genteel street in the region between Portland Place and Bryanston Square.  It was a corner house, with great wide areas containing cellars, frowned upon by barred windows, and leered at by crooked-eyed doors leading to dust-bins.  It was a house of dismal state, with a circular back to it, containing a whole suite of drawing-rooms looking upon a gravelled yard.”

It will be observed that the position and character of this mansion exactly correspond to the above description, being in its general style noteworthy and unique.  This, then, was the private establishment and “home department” of the Dombey family, where died the gentle Paul; the lonely house in which the neglected Florence grew to lovely womanhood; what time the second wife—the stately Edith—held temporary sway.

Hence a short distance southward leads to Cavendish Square.  In this neighbourhood we read that Madame Mantalini’s fashionable dressmaking establishment was situated, at which Kate Nickleby was for some few weeks engaged, on the recommendation of her uncle.  The house intended was probably in Wigmore Street, No. 11.  In the days of the Mantalini régime the business was advertised

“To the nobility and gentry by the casual exhibition, near the handsomely-curtained windows, of two or three elegant bonnets of the newest fashion, and some costly garments in the most approved taste.”

By the next turning (right) on the north side we come into Wimpole Street; on the east of which, at the corner of the third block, stands The West End Residence—No. 43—aforetime occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Boffin; which became, later on, the property of Mr. John Harmon and his wife.  It is described as “a corner house, not far from Cavendish Square.”  Near this house Silas Wegg—assuming some knowledge of its affairs—kept his street-stall.  He was accustomed to refer to it as “Our House,” its (imaginary) inmates being Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, and Uncle Parker.

p. 60Returning to Wigmore Street, we arrive by the next block at Welbeck Street, running transversely thereto.  In this street was the London residence of Lord George Gordon, as referred to in the pages of “Barnaby Rudge.”  The house is No. 64, the second from Wigmore Street on the left side.  It is within the recollection of the present landlord that the old balcony—from which Lord George was wont to harangue the public—was many years since superseded by the present continuous railing.

We now come south into the West-end artery of Oxford Street, crossing same to Davies Street, by which we may soon reach Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, running east and west.  On the south-eastern angle of its intersection stands Claridge’s Hotel.  It will be remembered that on Mr. Dorrit’s return from the Continent, after the marriage of his daughter Fanny, “the Courier had not approved of his staying at the house of a friend, and had preferred to take him to an hotel in Brook Street, Grosvenor Square.”  This was doubtless the establishment favoured by the Courier’s preference on that occasion; and where Mr. Merdle paid a state visit to Mr. Dorrit at breakfast-time the next morning; taking him afterwards in his carriage to the City.

Readers of “Dombey and Son” may be reminded that the Feenix Town House was situated in this same Brook Street; but no clue is afforded of its exact whereabouts.  It is described as an aristocratic mansion of a dull and gloomy sort; and was borrowed by the Honourable Mrs. Skewton from a stately relative, on the occasion of her daughter’s marriage.  Here also, in aftertime, the final interview between Florence and Edith took place.

Keeping on through Davies Street across Berkeley Square, we come through Berkeley Street to Piccadilly, in the close vicinity of Devonshire House, a mansion of fashionable and political repute, belonging to the Duke of Devonshire.  Here, on p. 61the 27th of May 1851, in the great drawing-room and library, Dickens and his confrères of “The Guild of Literature and Art” performed, for the first time, Sir Bulwer Lytton’s comedy (written for the occasion) “Not so Bad as We Seem,” in the presence of the Queen, Prince Albert and a brilliant audience.  The Duke not only afforded the necessary accommodation, but (as Mr. Forster writes), in his princely way, discharged all attendant expenses.  Many distinguished authors and artists assisted at this performance, including Douglas Jerrold, Maclise, and John Leech.

Near at hand, on the eastern corner of the next turning down Piccadilly (Dover Street), is Hatchett’s Hotel, adjoining The White Horse Cellars, once a well-known coaching establishment.  On the opposite side of the way stood in days of yore the old “White Horse Cellars,” of which Hazlitt writes:—

“The finest sight in the Metropolis is the setting out of the mail-coaches from Piccadilly.  The horses paw the ground and are impatient to be gone, as if conscious of the precious burden they convey.  There is a peculiar secrecy and despatch, significant and full of meaning, in all the proceedings concerning them.  Even the outside passengers have an erect and supercilious air, as if proof against the accidents of the journey; in fact, it seems indifferent whether they are to encounter the summer’s heat or the winter’s cold, since they are borne through the air on a winged chariot.”

From this well-known Booking Office, Mr. Pickwick and his friends—accompanied by the fierce Dowler and his fascinating wife—started for Bath, one “muggy, damp, and drizzly morning, by the mail coach; on the door of which was displayed, in gilt letters of a goodly size, the magic name of ‘Pickwick’; a circumstance which seems to have occasioned some confusion of ideas in the mind of the faithful Sam, as evidenced by his indignant inquiry—‘An’t nobody to be whopped for takin’ this here liberty?’”

Readers of “Bleak House” will remember this locality as the destination of the Reading Coach; so indicated by Messrs. Kenge and Carboy in their first communication to p. 62Esther Summerson.  Here she was met, one foggy November afternoon, on her arrival in London, by the susceptible Mr. Guppy, and by him conducted to Old Square, Lincoln’s Inn.  The incident was afterwards feelingly referred to by that young gentleman, on the occasion of his offer of heart, hand, and income to Esther:—

“I think you must have seen that I was struck with those charms on the day when I waited at the Whytorseller.  I think you must have remarked that I could not forbear a tribute to those charms when I put up the steps of the ’ackney coach.”

For the full narrative, see “Bleak House,” chapter 9.

The Rambler can now take an eastward course up Piccadilly, and may casually observe, on the left, past Burlington House, The Albany, where Mr. Fledgby had chambers.  The next turning on the same side is Sackville Street, in which it may be recollected that Mr. and Mrs. Lammles resided during the short term of their social prosperity.  Mention of these localities in such connection will be found in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”  Passing onwards on the same side, we arrive at No. 28, St. James’s Hall.  It was at this well-known place of assembly that several of those popular Readings were given by Charles Dickens, which always commanded the attention and sympathetic interest of his audience.  On these occasions he invariably adopted the extreme of fashionable evening attire, being dressed in irreproachable style, with, perhaps, more of shirt-front than waistcoat; and so “got up” as to present a staginess and juvenility of appearance, possibly somewhat out of keeping with his time of life.  Some of his hearers may have desired a more natural and less conventional mode; but they knew that beneath the big shirt and fashionable coat, there throbbed the genial heart of the man they loved, as he read of the sorrows of “Little Emily,” or stood with them in spirit at the bedside of “Paul Dombey.”  On the occasion of his final Reading, given here in March 1870, he tendered his last public farewell to his London audience in the following words:

p. 63“It would be worse than idle, it would be hypocritical and unfeeling, if I were to disguise that I close this episode of my life with feelings of very considerable pain.  For some fifteen years, in this hall and many kindred places, I have had the honour of presenting my own cherished ideas before you for your recognition; and, in closely observing your reception of them, have enjoyed an amount of artistic delight and enjoyment, which perhaps it is given few men to know.  In this task and every other, I have ever undertaken as a faithful servant of the public—always imbued with a sense of duty to them, and always striving to do his best—I have been uniformly cheered by the readiest response, the most generous sympathy and the most stimulating support.  Nevertheless, I have thought it well, at the full flood-tide of your favour, to retire upon those older associations between us, which date from much further back than these; and henceforth to devote myself exclusively to the art that first brought us together.  Ladies and gentlemen, in but two short weeks from this time, I hope that you may enter, in your own homes, on a new series of Readings, at which my assistance will be indispensable; but from these garish lights I vanish now for ever, with one heartfelt, grateful, respectful, and affectionate farewell.”

On the right-hand side of Piccadilly, adjacent to the Prince’s Hall and Institute of Painters, there may be noted, en passant, the premises No. 193, now occupied by the Boys’ Messenger Co.  This, for many years, was the address of Messrs. Chapman and Hall, the publishers of the works of Dickens.  Previous to 1850, the earlier books—“Pickwick” to “Martin Chuzzlewit” inclusive—together with the first issue of their cheaper edition, were published by this well-known house at 186 Strand, the site now occupied by the premises of W. H. Smith and Son.  The firm have, for many years past, removed their offices to No. 11 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden.

Passing on to Piccadilly Circus, and crossing northward from the same, we turn (left) into Sherwood Street, which leads, by a short walk, to Brewer Street, in the neighbourhood of Golden Square.  Continuing by Lower James Street, opposite, we reach the square itself, in which was formerly situated the Office of Ralph Nickleby.  Readers of Dickens will remember that it was a large house, with an attic storey, in which Ralph committed suicide.  The house No. 6, on p. 64the east side, was probably the one assigned by the author as the usurer’s residence.  It is now let off in various suites of offices, professional and otherwise.  The neighbourhood has somewhat changed since the time when the “Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby” was first issued, and the following description, given by Dickens, became public property:—

“It is one of the squares that have been—a quarter of the town that has gone down in the world, and taken to letting lodgings.  Many of its first and second floors are let, furnished, to single gentlemen, and it takes boarders besides.  It is a great resort of foreigners.  The dark-complexioned men who wear large rings and heavy watch-guards, and bushy whiskers, and who congregate under the Opera Colonnade, and about the box-office in the season between four and five in the afternoon, when they give away the orders—all live in Golden Square, or within a street of it.  Two or three violins and a wind instrument from the opera-band reside within its precincts.”

We read in the same book of the whereabouts of Mr. Kenwigs as being in this neighbourhood—

“A bygone, faded, tumble-down street, with two irregular rows of tall meagre houses, which seem to have stared each other out of countenance years ago; the very chimneys appear to have grown dismal and melancholy from having had nothing better to look at than the chimneys over the way.”

There are many streets in the district of Soho, in this vicinity, which will in some respects correspond with the description given; but much alteration has taken place during the last sixty years.  Recollecting that Newman Noggs lodged in the upper part of the same house, it must have been conveniently near Golden Square.  In Carnaby Street (immediately north of the Square) there may be remarked a white-fronted, old-fashioned house (No. 48), which, being in proximity to Ralph Nickleby’s Office, may be assigned as aforetime comprising the apartments of the Kenwigs Family.

At the corner of Beak Street and Upper James Street is still existent “The Crown Inn,” well known to Newman Noggs; though, since his time, it must have undergone p. 65considerable alteration.  In his first letter to Nicholas Nickleby, Newman writes:—

“If you ever want a shelter in London, . . . they know where I live at the sign of the Crown, Golden Square.  It is at the corner of Silver Street” [now Beak Street] “and James Street, with a bar door both ways.”

In this neighbourhood, also, Martha’s Lodgings were situated, in the days of David Copperfield, who says:—

“She laid her hand on my arm, and hurried me on to one of the sombre streets of which there are several in that part, where the houses were once fair dwellings, in the occupation of single families, but have, and had, long degenerated into poor lodgings let off in rooms.”

Such a house may be found in Marshall Street, No. 53, close at hand.  But at this distance of time it is difficult to assign the exact locality intended by Dickens.  We are all familiar with the welcome episode in David’s history when Martha rescued Little Emily, bringing her to these lodgings, and Mr. Peggotty’s dream came true.—See chapter 50.

Proceeding half-way up Marshall Street, we turn (right) through Broad Street, to (left) Poland Street, by which we again attain the main thoroughfare of Oxford Street.  Turning eastward, on the north side, we come at a short distance (by No. 90) to Newman Street, in which was situated Mr. Turveydrop’s Dancing Academy, “established in a sufficiently dingy house, at the corner of an archway” (Newman Passage), with Mr. Turveydrop’s great room built out into a mews at the back.  The house intended is No. 26, on the east side of the street.  Here Caddy Jellyby resided with her husband, Prince Turveydrop, in the upper rooms of the establishment, leaving the better part of the house at the disposal of Mr. Turveydrop, senior; that “perfect model” of parental and social “deportment.”  Returning to Oxford Street and passing onwards on the south side, we shortly arrive at Dean Street, leading southward.

p. 66At a short distance, running east and west, is Carlisle Street, at the further end of which, to the right, is an old house (by name Carlisle House) which stands facing the observer.  It is now occupied by Messrs. Edwards and Roberts, dealers in antique furniture.  Readers of “The Tale of Two Cities” will recollect the lodgings of Doctor Manette and daughter Lucie, as described in the 6th chapter (Book the Second) of the Tale, being situated in a quiet street-corner, not far from Soho Square:—

“A quainter corner than the corner where the Doctor lived was not to be found in London.  There was no way through it, and the front windows of the Doctor’s lodgings commanded a pleasant little vista of street that had a congenial air of retirement on it.  There were few buildings then, north of the Oxford Road, and forest-trees flourished, and wild flowers grew, and the hawthorn blossomed, in the now vanished fields.”

The garden behind the house, referred to in the above-mentioned book, has been converted to the uses of a warehouse, a glass roof having been long ago built over the same.  A paved court now exists at the side for the convenience of foot-passengers, giving egress at the end of Carlisle Street, so that the “wonderful echoes” which once resounded in this “curious corner” are now no longer to be heard.

It may be interesting to note that a thoroughfare leading from No. 119 Charing Cross Road to No. 6 Greek Street, Soho, is now named Manette Street; in remembrance of the worthy Doctor, whose London residence in Carlisle Street, as indicated, was near at hand.

We may return to Oxford Street through Soho Square, conveniently terminating the ramble at Tottenham Court Road, just beyond.  From this central point there is omnibus communication to all parts of London; and a commodious resting-place may be here recommended to those disposed for dinner, at The Horseshoe Restaurant; which stands in a prominent position near at hand, on the east side of the street.

p. 67RAMBLE V
Bank of England to Her Majesty’s Theatre

The Bank; Dombey and Son, Tom Pinch—George and Vulture Inn; Mr. Pickwick’s Hotel—“The Green Dragon,” alias “The Blue Boar,” Leadenhall Market; Tony Weller’s Headquarters—Newman’s Court (alias Freeman’s Court), Cornhill; The Offices of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg—House of Sol Gills, Leadenhall Street; The Wooden Midshipman—St. Mary Axe; Pubsey and Co.—House of Sampson Brass in Bevis Marks—“The Red Lion;”  Mr. Dick Swiveller’s recommendation—Bull Inn, Aldgate; Starting-place of the Ipswich Coach—The Minories—Aldgate Pump; Mr. Toots’s Excursions—Mincing Lane; Messrs. Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles—Boarding House of Mrs. Todgers, King’s Head Court—London Bridge; Meeting-place of Rose Maylie and Nancy—“The White Hart Inn”; its Pickwickian Associations—The Marshalsea Prison; The Dorrit Family—St. George’s Church; Little Dorrit’s Night Refuge and Marriage—Lant Street; Dickens and Bob Sawyer’s Lodging—King’s Bench Prison—Horsemonger Lane Gaol—Mr. Chivery’s Shop—St. George’s Obelisk; “the long-legged young man”—The Surrey Theatre; Fanny Dorrit and Uncle—Bethlehem Hospital; “Uncommercial Traveller”—Astley’s Theatre; visit of the Nubbles Family—Millbank; Poor “Martha”—Church Street, Smith Square; the Dolls’ Dressmaker—Julius Handford—Westminster Abbey—The Red Lion, Parliament Street; the “Genuine Stunning”—The Horse Guards’ Clock—St. James’s Park; Meeting between Martin and Mary—Her Majesty’s Theatre.

Our starting-point is now the Bank of England, Dombey and Son’s

“Magnificent neighbour; with its vaults of gold and silver, ‘all among the dead men, underground.’”

Tom Pinch, diffident of requesting information in London, resolved that, in the event of finding himself near the Bank of England,

p. 68“He would step in, and ask a civil question or two, confiding in the perfect respectability of the concern.”

Adopting the route viâ Lombard Street, we come, on the left (No. 56), to George Yard, traversing which, there will be found, at the corner of Castle Court (No. 3), the George and Vulture Inn, at which Mr. Pickwick resided when in London, subsequent to his removal from Goswell Street; and which has honourable mention in the history of the Pickwickians.

Through Lombard Street, and turning left into Gracechurch Street, we shortly arrive, on the right, at Bull’s Head Passage (turning by the Branch Post Office, No. 82), in which, at No. 4, is the Green Dragon Tavern, in close proximity to Leadenhall Market.  This is, in all probability, the house mentioned in “Pickwick” as “The Blue Boar,” Leadenhall Market, a favourite house of call with the elder Weller, and the place where Sam indited his “Valentine” to Mary, the pretty housemaid, afterwards Mrs. Sam.  But the neighbourhood of the Market has undergone considerable renovation since the old coaching-days, and it is difficult to fix the locale of the tavern with certainty.

Proceeding onwards through Gracechurch Street, we come into the thoroughfare of Cornhill; and at No. 73, on the opposite side, arrive at Newman’s Court.  It will be remembered that in “Pickwick” the offices of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg (Mrs. Bardell’s attorneys) are located in Freeman’s Court, Cornhill.  There is no such place in Cornhill; Freeman’s Court being in Cheapside.  It is evident, therefore, that Dickens, for reasons of his own, emulated the special contributor to the Eatanswill Gazette, and so “combined his information.”  Taking Cornhill to be the locality intended, we shall find Dodson and Fogg’s Office at the furthest end of the Court, No. 4, still associated with legal business, p. 69being in possession of Messrs. Witherby and Co., law stationers.

Passing onwards in Cornhill, past Bishopsgate Street, we come into Leadenhall Street, and may be interested to note, at No. 157 (now an outfitting establishment), the original position of the House of Sol Gills, ships’ instrument maker, at whose door was displayed the figure of

“The Wooden Midshipman; eternally taking observations of the hackney coaches.”

Here our eccentric friend Captain Cuttle remained in charge during the absence of old Sol Gills and his nephew; here Florence, accompanied by the faithful Diogenes, found asylum; and here Walter Gay returned after shipwreck, to make everybody happy and marry the gentle heroine of the story.  (See “Dombey and Son” for information in extenso.)  Until recent years, these premises were in occupation of Messrs. Norie and Wilson, ships’ instrument makers and chart publishers.  They have removed to the Minories, No. 156, where the quaint effigy of the Wooden Midshipman, with his cocked hat and quadrant complete, may now be seen, as bright and brisk as in old days.  “When found, make a note of.”

Farther on, on the same side of Leadenhall Street, we reach St. Mary Axe, turning northward at No. 117, which we notice en passant as the thoroughfare in which Pubsey and Co. had their place of business; “a yellow overhanging plaster-fronted house”—reconstructed, with many others, some years since—at the top of which Riah (the manager) arranged his town garden; where the Dolls’ Dressmaker invited Fascination Fledgby to “come up and be dead.”  All of which is duly set forth in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”  The position of the house cannot now be localised.

Proceeding to the other end of St. Mary Axe, we may turn (right) into Bevis Marks, where there once existed the p. 70House of Mr. Sampson Brass, No. 10, but this and others have long since been rebuilt and re-enumerated.  Here lived that honourable attorney and his sister the fair Sally; aided in their professional duties by a young gentleman of eccentric habits and “prodigious talent of quotation.”  Here the Marchioness lived, or rather starved, in attendance as maid-of-all-work, and first made the acquaintance of Dick Swiveller, her future husband; being by him initiated into the mysteries of cribbage and the peculiarities of purl.  Here lodged the “single gentleman,” who evinced such exceptional interest in the national drama, and so discovered a clue to the retreat of Little Nell and her grandfather.

On the north side of the street there still flourishes the old Red Lion Inn, an establishment patronised in his time by Mr. Richard, and once eulogised by that gentleman on the occasion of his specifying “the contingent advantages” of the neighbourhood.  “There is mild porter in the immediate vicinity.”

For these and the other associations of this spot the tourist is referred to the pages of the “Old Curiosity Shop.”

Following downwards through Bevis Marks and Duke Street beyond, we come into Aldgate, keeping still on the left-hand side of the way to Aldgate High Street, where at a short distance we pass the Station of the Metropolitan Railway.  At No. 24, just ahead, is the Bull Inn Yard, once the City Terminus of Coaches travelling north-east.  From this point Mr. Pickwick started per coach for Ipswich, accompanied by the red-haired Mr. Peter Magnus; Mr. Tony Weller officiating as driver.  On which occasion we read that Mr. Weller’s conversation, “possessing the inestimable charm of blending amusement with instruction,” beguiled “the tediousness of the journey during the greater part of the day.”

Returning westward on the other side of the way, the Rambler may turn, at No. 81, into the Minories; and, at the second house on the right, may observe the figure of p. 71the Wooden Midshipman, previously referred to as removed from its original position in Leadenhall Street.  The route being continued (same side) from the Minories, we can note, as we pass into Fenchurch Street, Aldgate Pump, standing at the top of Leadenhall Street.  There is a reference to this old pump in “Dombey,” as being a stated object of Mr. Toots’s special evening excursions from “The Wooden Midshipman,” when that gentleman desired some temporary relief from the hopeless contemplation of Walter Gay’s happiness.

The tourist will now soon arrive at (No. 42) Mincing Lane, leading to Great Tower Street.  This short street is entirely occupied by wholesale merchants and brokers, and it will be remembered that Messrs. Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles, wholesale druggists, flourished in this locality in the days of the “Golden Dustman.”  The fourth house on the left from Fenchurch Street, next to Dunster Court, has been indicated as the probable whereabouts of the firm.  We may remember that R. Wilfer’s office was on the ground-floor, next the gateway.

Here, then, in this prosaic neighbourhood, John Rokesmith, following Bella Wilfer, came to the warehouse where Little Rumty was sitting at the open window at his tea, and much surprised that gentleman by a declaration of love for his daughter; what time “The Feast of the Three Hobgoblins” was so agreeably celebrated.  This place is also associated with other pleasant episodes connected with the history of the Wilfer family, the details of which are fully furnished in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”

Proceeding through Mincing Lane, we turn to the right through Eastcheap, which leads westward to the top of Fish Street Hill.  The tourist now proceeds southward, passing the Monument on the left.  At a short distance beyond (No. 34) we arrive at King’s Head Court, “a small paved yard,” in which are certain city warehouses and a dairy.  On the south side of the court, now occupied by the warehouses aforesaid, once stood the Commercial Boarding-House of Mrs. Todgers—an old-fashioned abode p. 72even in the days of Mr. Pecksniff—which has long since given place to other commercial considerations.  In the 9th chapter of “Martin Chuzzlewit” full, true, and particular account is given of this establishment as it used to be.  We may here call to remembrance the characters of Bailey junior, Mr. Jinkins, Augustus Moddle, and others in connection with the domestic economy of Mrs. Todgers and the several Pecksniffian associations of the place; notably, the festive occasion of that Sunday’s dinner when Cherry and Merry were first introduced to London society; the moral Mr. Pecksniff thereafter exhibiting alarming symptoms of a chronic complaint.  (See chapter 9.)  And we may indulge in a kindly reminiscence of good-hearted Mrs. Todgers herself, worried with the anxieties of “gravy” and the eccentricities of commercial gentlemen.  “Perhaps the Good Samaritan was lean and lank, and found it hard to live.”  We now come to London Bridge, the scene of Nancy’s interview with Mr. Brownlow and Rose Maylie (see “Oliver Twist”), which took place on the steps near St. Saviour’s Church, on the Surrey side of the river—

“These stairs are a part of the bridge; they consist of three flights.  Just below the end of the second, going down, the stone wall on the left terminates in an ornamental pilaster, facing towards the Thames.”

And it will be remembered that Noah Claypole here ensconced himself as an unseen listener.

As we come to the Surrey side of the Thames, a passing thought may be given to Mrs. Rudge and her son Barnaby, who lived near at hand “in a by-street in Southwark, not far from London Bridge”; and we may recall the incident of Edward Chester being brought hither by Gabriel Varden, having been found wounded by a highwayman on the other side of the river.  But it is altogether impossible to locate the house, the neighbourhood having so entirely changed during the present century.  Onwards by the main thoroughfare of the Borough, we shall find, on the left-hand side of the way (No. 61), the (former) location of “The White Hart,” described in “Pickwick” as

p. 73“An old inn, which has preserved its external features unchanged, and which has escaped alike the rage for public improvement and the encroachments of private speculation.  A great, rambling, queer old place, with galleries and passages and staircases, wide enough and antiquated enough to furnish materials for a hundred ghost stories.”

The old inn has been pulled down some years since; the original gateway only remains, leading to White Hart Yard.  A tavern and luncheon-bar of modern erection now occupy one side of the old coach-yard in which Messrs. Pickwick, Wardle, and Perker made their first acquaintance with Mr. Samuel Weller, on that memorable occasion when Mr. Jingle had eloped from Dingley Dell with Miss Rachael Wardle, and had brought the lady to this establishment.  Farther on, towards the end of the Borough, we arrive at Angel Place, a narrow passage near to St. George’s Church.  It leads into Marshalsea Place, of which Dickens writes as follows in his preface to “Little Dorrit”:—

“Whoever goes into Marshalsea Place, turning out of Angel Court, leading to Bermondsey, will find his feet on the very paving-stones of the extinct Marshalsea jail; will see its narrow yard to the right, and to the left, very little altered if at all, except that the walls were lowered when the place got free; will look upon the rooms in which the debtors lived; and will stand among the crowding ghosts of many miserable years.”

This, then, was The Marshalsea Prison, in which, during Dickens’s youthful days, his father was imprisoned for debt; and the place is intimately associated with the story of Little Dorrit and her family.  We must be all familiar with the Father of the Marshalsea, his brother Frederick, Maggie, and the several others of the dramatis personæ of that charming tale.

St. George’s Church, close at hand, will be remembered in connection with the above, as once affording refuge in its vestry for Little Dorrit, when the sexton accommodated her with a bed formed of the pew-cushions, the book of registers doing service as a pillow.  She was afterwards married to Arthur Clennam in this church.  Full particulars p. 74of the ceremony will be found in the last chapter of the tale.  At a short distance from this point, down Blackman Street, on the right, is (No. 90) Lant Street.  In Forster’s Biography it is narrated that Dickens, when a boy, lodged in this street what time his father was imprisoned in the Marshalsea.  The house stood on part of the site now occupied by the Board School adjoining No. 46—

“A back attic was found for me at the house of an insolvent-court agent, who lived in Lant Street, in the Borough, where Bob Sawyer lodged many years afterwards.  A bed and bedding were sent over for me, and made up on the floor.  The little window had a pleasant prospect of a timber-yard; and when I took possession of my new abode, I thought it was a Paradise.”

This opinion of his boyhood seems to have been somewhat modified fifteen years later, when the “Pickwick Papers” were written, and Mr. Robert Sawyer had taken residence in the locality.  We read—

“There is an air of repose about Lant Street, in the Borough, which sheds a gentle melancholy upon the soul.  A house in Lant Street would not come within the denomination of a first-rate residence, in the strict acceptation of the term; but it is a most desirable spot, nevertheless.  If a man wished to extract himself from the world, to remove himself from within the reach of temptation, to place himself beyond the possibility of any inducement to look out of the window, he should by all means go to Lant Street.”

Walking onwards from “this happy valley” past Suffolk Street, to the westward, turning off Borough Road, we may note on the north corner the site of the old King’s Bench Prison, in which Mr. Micawber was detained—in the top storey but one—pending the settlement of his pecuniary liabilities.  Later on in the Copperfield history, Micawber appointed a meeting for David and Tom Traddles as follows:—

“Among other havens of domestic tranquillity and peace of mind, my feet will naturally tend towards the King’s Bench Prison.  In stating that I shall be (D.V.) on the outside of the south wall of that place of incarceration on civil process, the day after to-morrow, at p. 75seven in the evening, precisely, my object in this epistolary communication is accomplished.”

See chapter 49 for particulars of the subsequent interview.  This “dead wall” of the prison is also mentioned in the same book as the place where young David requested “the long-legged young man”—who had charge of his box for conveyance to the Dover coach-office—to stop for a minute while he (David) tied on the address.  It will be remembered that poor David lost his box and his money on this occasion, when he started for Dover,

“Taking very little more out of the world, towards the retreat of his aunt, Miss Betsy, than he had brought into it on the night when his arrival gave her so much umbrage;”

the total sum of his remaining cash amounting to three half-pence.—See chapter 12.

The first reference of our author to King’s Bench Prison will be found in “Nicholas Nickleby” (chapter 46), on the occasion of the hero’s first visit to Madeline Bray, who resided with her father in one

“Of a row of mean and not over cleanly houses, situated within ‘the rules’ of the King’s Bench Prison; . . . comprising some dozen streets in which debtors who could raise money to pay large fees—from which their creditors did not derive any benefit—were permitted to reside.”

We learn from Allen’s “History of Surrey” that these rules comprehended all St. George’s Fields, one side of Blackman Street, and part of the Borough High Street, forming an area of about three miles in circumference.  They could be purchased by the prisoners at the rate of five guineas for small debts, eight guineas for the first hundred pounds of debt, and about half that sum for every subsequent hundred.

The site of the prison is now occupied by workmen’s model dwellings named “Queen’s Buildings,” divided, north and south, by Scovell’s Road.

At the opposite side (east) of Newington Causeway, which here commences, is Union Road, late Horsemonger p. 76Lane; a short distance down which, on its south side, is “The Public Playground for Children,” formerly the site of Horsemonger Lane Gaol, erected at the back of the Surrey Sessions House.  Here the execution of the Mannings took place, November 13th, 1849, on which occasion Charles Dickens was present.  The same day he sent a notable letter to the Times, directing general attention to the demoralising effect of such public exhibitions; thus setting on foot an agitation which shortly resulted in the adoption of our present private mode of carrying out the last penalty of the law.  After giving a forcible and graphic picture of the night scenes enacted by the disorderly crowd in waiting, the letter was thus continued:—

“When the sun rose brightly—as it did—it gilded thousands upon thousands of upturned faces, so inexpressibly odious in their brutal mirth or callousness, that a man had cause to shrink from himself as fashioned in the image of the devil.  When the two miserable creatures who attracted all this ghastly sight about them, were turned quivering into the air, there was no more emotion, no more pity, no more thought that two immortal souls had gone to judgment, no more restraint in any of the previous obscenities, than if the name of Christ had never been heard in this world, and there was no belief among men but that they perished like the beasts.  I have seen, habitually, some of the worst sources of general contamination and corruption in this country, and I think there are not many phases of London life that could surprise me.  I am solemnly convinced that nothing that ingenuity could devise to be done in this city, in the same compass of time, could work such ruin as one public execution; and I stand astounded and appalled by the wickedness it exhibits.”

Mr. Chivery resided with his family in Horsemonger Lane, in close proximity to the old prison, and kept a tobacconist’s shop for the supply of his Marshalsea customers and the general public of the neighbourhood—

“A rural establishment one storey high, which had the benefit of the air from the yards of Horsemonger Lane Jail, and the advantage of a retired walk under the wall of that pleasant establishment.  The business was of too modest a character to support a life-size Highlander, but it maintained a little one on a bracket on the door-post, p. 77who looked like a fallen cherub that had found it necessary to take to a kilt.”

In the little back-yard of the premises, “Young John”—disappointed in love—was accustomed to sit and meditate; taking cold among the “tuneless groves” of the newly-washed family linen, and composing suitable epitaphs to his own memory, in melancholy anticipation of an early decease.

Proceeding along the Borough Road, we arrive in due course at St. George’s Obelisk, which stands at the meeting-point of six roads.  In the twelfth chapter of “David Copperfield” we read of the Obelisk as the place near to which the “long-legged young man with a very little empty donkey-cart” was standing, whom David engaged to take his box to the Dover coach-office for sixpence.  And we all remember the sad dénouement of that engagement, as previously mentioned.  Near at hand, at the top of Blackfriars Road, stands The Surrey Theatre, at which Fanny Dorrit was engaged as a dancer, while her Uncle Frederick played the clarionet in the orchestra.

Crossing over to the opposite thoroughfare of Lambeth Road, the Rambler will find, at a short distance on the left, the entrance to Bethlehem Hospital, familiarly known as Bedlam.  A reference to this asylum will be found in the pages of “The Uncommercial Traveller,” where our author implies the idea that the sane and insane are, at all events, equal in their dreams—

“Are not all of us outside this Hospital, who dream more or less, in the condition of those inside it, every night of our lives?”

The question may afford us matter for speculation as the route is continued through Lambeth Road, at the end of which we turn to the right, in the direction of the river.  At the angle of the roads, past the Lambeth Police Office, we reach Christchurch, conspicuous for style and position, at p. 78which the Rev. Newman Hall some years since officiated.  We may here recall the criticism given by Dickens with reference to this popular preacher in the book above referred to.  See “Two Views of a Cheap Theatre,” as contained in “The Uncommercial Traveller.”

We now come onwards by Westminster Bridge Road, passing beneath the span of the London and South-Western Railway.  Near Westminster Bridge, on the left, is the old site of Astley’s Theatre (non-existent since 1896).  This establishment had cause to bless itself once a quarter, in days gone by, when Christopher Nubbles, Barbara, and friends patronised the performance.  We may here remember the occasion when Kit knocked a man over the head with his bundle of oranges for “scroudging his parent with unnecessary violence;” also the happy evening that followed, when little Jacob first saw a play and learnt what oysters meant (vide the “Old Curiosity Shop”).  On the site formerly occupied by this favourite place of entertainment, there now stand five handsome houses and shops, Nos. 225 to 233 Westminster Bridge Road.

Past a few doors beyond these, above, on the same side, we reach Lambeth Palace Road, turning by which we may walk (or ride by tramcar) a short distance southward.  Leaving on the right the seven handsome buildings of St. Thomas’s Hospital, we pass—on the left—farther on, Lambeth Episcopal Palace, and cross the Thames by Lambeth Suspension Bridge.

On the Middlesex shore we come into Millbank Street, and bestow a brief thought on Poor “Martha,” following her in imagination as she took her melancholy way southward in this same street, towards the waste riverside locality, “near the great blank prison” of Millbank, long since replaced by Tate’s Gallery.

Here it will be remembered that David Copperfield and his trusty friend Mr. Peggotty saved the despairing girl from a self-sought and miserable death.

p. 79At a few minutes’ distance northward from the bridge, Church Street will be found, leading (left) to Smith Square.  In this street lived The Dolls’ Dressmaker, little Jenny Wren.  The whimsical description of the central church—St. John the Evangelist’s—as given in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend,” may be worth comparison with the original—

“In this region are a certain little street called Church Street, and a certain little blind square called Smith Square, in the centre of which last retreat is a very hideous church, with four towers at the four corners, generally resembling some petrified monster, frightful and gigantic, on its back with its legs in the air.”

The house in which Jenny and her father lived is stated to have been one of the modest little houses which stand at the point where the street gives into Smith Square.  The Rambler will observe four houses answering this description on the north side of Church Street; No. 9 has been indicated as the humble home in question, where “the person of the house” and her “bad boy” resided.  Here, also, Lizzie Hexam lodged for some time after the death of her father, during the days when her uncertain lover, Eugene Wrayburn, was yet a bachelor.

We may now return to the main road and continue the northward route by Abingdon Street, crossing Old Palace Yard.  A passing thought may here be given to Mr. John Harmon, the Julius Handford of “Our Mutual Friend,” who furnished the Police authorities with his address—The Exchequer Coffee House, Palace Yard, Westminster.  Such a house of resort no longer exists in this vicinity.

On the west side the Rambler passes the precincts of Westminster Abbey, beneath whose “high embowed roof” repose the sacred ashes of the illustrious dead.  To this venerable fane—the especial resting-place of English literary genius—we will return after our concluding ramble to the birthplace of our greatest English novelist.

The onward road takes us past the Houses of Parliament, on the right, to Parliament Street, leading to Whitehall and Charing p. 80Cross.  At a short distance up this thoroughfare is Derby Street—the first turning on the right; on the north corner of which there stood—until 1899—an old public-house, “The Red Lion” (No. 48).  This place may be specially noted as the house at which young David Copperfield gave his “magnificent order” for a glass of the “Genuine Stunning,” and where the landlord’s wife gave him back the money and a kiss besides.  This was an actual experience in the boyhood of Dickens, and is referred to in Mr. Forster’s Biography, where the house is indicated as above.  It is now being rebuilt and modernised.

Proceeding by Whitehall, and crossing to the opposite side of the street, we shortly arrive at The Horse Guards, and may take passing observation of the Old Clock—famed for its perfection of time-keeping—by whose warning note Mark Tapley regulated the period of the interview next referred to.  Passing through the arched passage beneath, we now attain the eastern side of St. James’s Park.  This locality will be remembered as the place of meeting between Mary Graham and Martin Chuzzlewit, previous to his departure for America.  As the young lady was escorted by Mark in the early morning from a City hotel, we may be certain that the interview must have taken place on this side of the Park, doubtless near the principal gate of the promenade facing the Horse Guards’ entrance.

Leaving the Park northward, by Spring Gardens, we come into Cockspur Street, shortly leading (left) to Pall Mall.  At the first corner of the latter stands Her Majesty’s Theatre.  At this establishment, as reconstructed during the early years of the century, Mrs. Nickleby attended, by special invitation of Sir Mulberry Hawk, Messrs. Pyke and Pluck assisting on that notable occasion, when, by a prearranged coincidence, Kate and the Wititterlys occupied the adjoining box.—Vide “Nicholas Nickleby,” chapter 27.

This Opera House was burnt down 1789, and rebuilt the following year.  It was remodelled 1818, and again p. 81destroyed by fire, December 6, 1867.  Being a second time rebuilt, it was, for some seasons, closed since 1875.  The present theatre is of recent and splendid erection.

At this central position, from which we may readily take departure for any point in London, the present Ramble will terminate.  To all those needing reparation of tissue, a visit to Epitaux’s Restaurant, near the Haymarket Theatre, will be satisfactory.

p. 82RAMBLE VI
Excursion to Chatham, Rochester, and Gadshill

Emmanuel Church; Mr. Wemmick’s Wedding—Dulwich; Mr. Pickwick’s Retirement—Dulwich Church; Marriage of Snodgrass and Emily Wardle—Cobham—“The Leather Bottle;” Tracy Tupman’s Retreat—Mr. Pickwick’s Discovery—Chatham—Railway Street; Rome Lane Elementary School—The Brook; Residence of the Dickens Family—Clover Lane Academy; Rev. William Giles, Schoolmaster—Fort Pitt; Dr. Slammer’s Duelling-Ground; the Recreation Ground of Chatham—Star Hill; Old Rochester Theatre; Mr. Jingle’s Engagement—Rochester; Eastgate House; The Nuns’ House—Mr. Sapsea’s Residence—Restoration House; Residence of Miss Havisham, “Satis House”—[Joe Gargery’s Forge; Parish of Cooling]—The Monk’s Vineyard—Minor Canon Row—Rochester Cathedral; The Crypts—Durdles—The Cathedral Tower—St. Nicholas Church—The College Gate; John Jasper’s Lodging—Watts’s Charity; “The Seven Poor Travellers”—[Watts’s Almshouses]—Miss Adelaide Procter—The Bull Hotel; the Ball-room—The Crown Hotel; “The Crozier”—The Esplanade—Rochester Bridge; Richard Doubledick—Gadshill Place; Residence of Dickens—Gravesend; Embarkation of Mr. Peggotty and friends—Greenwich Park; “Sketches by Boz”—Church of St. Alphege; Bella Wilfer’s Marriage—Quartermaine’s Ship Tavern; “An Innocent Elopement;” The Rokesmith Wedding Dinner.

Starting from the Holborn Viaduct or Ludgate Hill Station of the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway, we cross the Thames and proceed en route for the Kentish uplands.  At ten minutes’ distance from the London terminus, passing the Elephant and Castle and Walworth Road Stations, we may observe (on the left) the back of Emmanuel Church, as the train slackens speed for Camberwell.  This may be noted as the place where Mr. Wemmick and Miss Skiffins were united in the bonds of matrimony; p. 83so we may here suitably recall the scene narrated in “Great Expectations,” and the informal and unexpected procedure adopted by Mr. W. on that occasion—

“We went towards Camberwell Green, and when we were thereabouts, Wemmick said suddenly, ‘Halloa!  Here’s a church!’  There was nothing very surprising in that; but again I was rather surprised when he said, as if he were animated by a brilliant idea, ‘Let’s go in!’  We went in and looked all round.  In the meantime Wemmick was diving into his coat pockets, and getting something out of paper there.  ‘Halloa!’ said he.  ‘Here’s a couple of pairs of gloves!  Let’s put ’em on!’  As the gloves were white kid gloves, I now began to have my strong suspicions.  They were strengthened into certainty, when I beheld the Aged enter at a side door, escorting a lady.  ‘Halloa!’ said Wemmick.  ‘Here’s Miss Skiffins!  Let’s have a wedding!’ . . .  True to his notion of seeming to do it all without preparation, I heard Wemmick say to himself, as he took something out of his waistcoat pocket before the service began, ‘Halloa!  Here’s a ring!’ . . .  ‘Now, Mr. Pip,’ said Wemmick triumphantly, as we came out, ‘let me ask you whether anybody would suppose this to be a wedding party.’”

The route being continued past Herne Hill Station, the train arrives at Dulwich, which we may recollect en passant as being the locality of Mr. Pickwick’s retirement, before the days of railway locomotion.  The house—a white, comfortable-looking residence—stands (left) near the station, as we approach, corresponding in style and position with its Pickwickian description.  Mr. Tupman, too, may have been met with in olden time, walking in the public promenades or loitering in the Dulwich Picture Gallery—“with a youthful and jaunty air”—still in the enjoyment of single blessedness, and the cynosure of the numerous elderly ladies of the neighbourhood.

Mr. Snodgrass and Emily Wardle, as we all know, were married at Dulwich Church, in this vicinity; the wedding guests—including “the poor relations, who got there somehow”—assembling at Mr. Pickwick’s new house on that interesting occasion; and we may remember the general p. 84verdict then unanimously given as to the elegance, comfort, and suitability of our old friend’s suburban retreat—

“Nothing was to be heard but congratulations and commendations.  Everything was so beautiful!  The lawn in front, the garden behind, the miniature conservatory, the dining-room, the drawing-room, the bedrooms, the smoking-room; and, above all, the study—with its pictures and easy chairs, and odd cabinets and queer tables, and nooks out of number, with a large cheerful window opening upon a pleasant lawn, and commanding a pretty landscape, just dotted here and there with little houses, almost hidden by the trees.”

Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Weller and family—retainers in the Pickwickian establishment—also flourished aforetime in these arcadian groves, in faithful attendance on their illustrious patron.

The journey being resumed, we pass onwards (Crystal Palace on the right side of the railway) viâ Penge and Bromley, and several country towns beyond—a pleasant ride of about an hour’s duration—arriving in due course at Sole Street Station (30 miles from London), about a mile south-west from the village of Cobham.  A pleasant walk of twenty minutes on the high road will lead the wayfarer through Owlet to the pretty parish aforesaid; the rural retreat—famous in the annals of Pickwickian history—selected by Mr. Tracy Tupman for his retirement from the world, after his disappointment at the hands of Miss Rachael Wardle.

“The Leather Bottle Inn”—where he was found at dinner by his anxious friends—is described as “a clean and commodious village ale-house,” and still maintains its favourable repute.  It stands opposite the church at Cobham—

“At Muggleton they procured a conveyance to Rochester.  By the time they reached the last-named place, the violence of their grief had sufficiently abated to admit of their making a very excellent early dinner; and having procured the necessary information relative to the road, the three friends set forward again in the afternoon to walk to Cobham.

“A delightful walk it was; for it was a pleasant afternoon in June, and their way lay through a deep and shady wood, cooled by the light wind which gently rustled the thick foliage, and enlivened by the songs p. 85of the birds that perched upon the boughs.  The ivy and the moss crept in thick clusters over the old trees, and the soft green turf overspread the ground like a silken mat.  They emerged upon an open park, with an ancient hall, displaying the quaint and picturesque architecture of Elizabeth’s time.  Long vistas of stately oaks and elm-trees appeared on every side; large herds of deer were cropping the fresh grass; and occasionally a startled hare scoured along the ground with the speed of the shadows thrown by the light clouds which swept across a sunny landscape like a passing breath of summer.  ‘If this,’ said Mr. Pickwick, looking about him, ‘if this were the place to which all who are troubled with our friend’s complaint came, I fancy their old attachment to this world would very soon return.’

“‘I think so too,’ said Mr. Winkle.

“‘And really,’ added Mr. Pickwick, after half-an-hour’s walking had brought them to the village, ‘really, for a misanthrope’s choice, this is one of the prettiest and most desirable places of residence I ever met with.’

“In this opinion also both Mr. Winkle and Mr. Snodgrass expressed their concurrence; and having been directed to the Leather Bottle, a clean and commodious village ale-house, the three travellers entered, and at once inquired for a gentleman of the name of Tupman.  The three friends entered a long, low-roofed room, furnished with a large number of high-backed leather-cushioned chairs, of fantastic shapes, and embellished with a great variety of old portraits.  At the upper end of the room was a table, with a white cloth upon it, well covered with a roast fowl, bacon, ale, and et ceteras; and at the table sat Mr. Tupman, looking as unlike a man who had taken his leave of the world as possible.”

Resting here awhile, we may recall the “immortal discovery” made by Mr. Pickwick, “which has been the pride and boast of his friends and the envy of every antiquarian in this or any other country”—that famous stone found by the chairman of the Pickwick Club himself; “partially buried in the ground in front of a cottage door,” in this same village of Cobham, on which “the following fragment of an inscription was clearly to be deciphered”:—

p. 86Full particulars are duly recorded in “The Pickwick Papers,” chapter 11.  We may also remember the celebrated controversy in scientific and erudite circles, to which this remarkable stone gave rise; Mr. Pickwick being “elected an honorary member of seventeen native and foreign societies for the discovery.”

The journey being resumed from Sole Street, we travel viâ Strood, ten miles, to the important station of

CHATHAM.

Mr. Pickwick’s description (taken from his note-book sixty years since) is a fairly correct view of the general appearance of Chatham at present:—

“The principal productions of these towns appear to be soldiers, sailors, Jews, chalk, shrimps, officers, and dockyardmen.  The commodities chiefly exposed for sale in the public streets are marine stores, hard-bake, apples, flat-fish, and oysters.  The streets present a lively and animated appearance, occasioned chiefly by the conviviality of the military.”

In this city five years of Dickens’s boyhood were passed.  Mr. Dickens, senior, was appointed in 1816 to a clerkship at the Naval Pay Office, in connection with the Royal Dockyard, and the Dickens family here resided till little Charles was nine years of age.

On arrival at the Chatham Station, we may enter the town on the right from the railway exit (north side of the line), shortly passing under an archway into Railway Street—formerly Rome Lane—in which was once situated the elementary school where the boy first attended, with his sister Fanny.  Revisiting Chatham in after years, Dickens found that it had been pulled down

“Ages before, but out of the distance of the ages, arose, nevertheless, a not dim impression that it had been over a dyer’s shop; that he went up steps to it; that he had frequently grazed his knees in doing so; and that in trying to scrape the mud off a very unsteady little shoe, he generally got his leg over the scraper.”

At the upper end of Railway Street we proceed (right) by the High Street, and at a short distance (left) by Fair p. 87Row to the Brook.  Turning to the left, we shall find, standing immediately beyond the corner, on the west side, the old Residence of the Dickens Family, No. 18, next door to Providence Chapel.  The house is a modest-looking dwelling of three storeys, with white-washed plaster front as in former days, six steps leading up to the front door, and a small garden before and behind.  The chapel previously referred to has been, in more recent years, used for meetings of the Salvation Army, since becoming a clothing factory.  During the residence of the family at Chatham, the minister of this place of worship was a Mr. William Giles, who was also the schoolmaster of Clover Lane Academy.  For the last two years of Charles’s Chatham experience he was placed under the educational supervision of this young Baptist minister, whose influence seems to have been favourable to the development of his pupil’s youthful talents.

Regaining the High Street by Fair Row, and turning to the left for a short distance onwards, we reach, on the right hand of the street, past the Mitre Hotel, Clover Street, on the south side of which (at the corner of Richard Street) the Academy, with its playground behind, may still be seen.  Forster says:—

“Charles had himself a not ungrateful sense in after years, that this first of his masters, in his little-cared-for childhood, had pronounced him to be a boy of capacity; and when, about half-way through the publication of Pickwick, his old teacher sent a silver snuff-box with admiring inscription to ‘the inimitable Boz,’ it reminded him of praise far more precious obtained by him at his first year’s examination in the Clover Lane Academy.”

Coming through Clover Street, and turning (right) into the New Road, we shortly regain the neighbourhood of Chatham Station, on the south side of which a road in the westward direction leads to Fort Pitt, now the Chatham Military Hospital.  Pickwickians will remember that Fort Pitt was indicated by Lieutenant Tappleton, the friend of the choleric Doctor p. 88Slammer, as being in the vicinity of a field where the quarrel between the doctor and Mr. Winkle could be adjusted.  This old field, and the contiguous land surrounding the Fort, now form The Recreation Ground of the City.  Visitors may hence obtain an interesting and comprehensive view of the town and neighbourhood.  We are, doubtless, all familiar with the happy termination of the affair of honour above referred to; the unworthy Jingle being at the bottom of the mischief.  Full particulars of the dilemma may be found in chapter 2 of “The Pickwick Papers.”

Returning to the New Road, the Rambler, passing St. Bartholomew’s Hospital (founded in the eleventh century) on the right, may proceed by Star Hill, in the outskirts of Rochester.  On the south side (left) of the descent there may be noted en passant the new building of the Rochester Conservative Club, which stands on the site of The Old Theatre.  Here the versatile Mr. Jingle and his melancholic friend, “elegantly designated Dismal Jemmy,” were engaged to perform “in the piece that the Officers of the Fifty-second” got up, when Mr. Pickwick commenced his travels, May 1827.

The theatre was demolished December 1884.

Continuing the route, we soon arrive at the central street of the old City of

ROCHESTER.

This place will be interesting to readers of Dickens for its several associations with his books, including “Pickwick,” “Great Expectations,” “The Seven Poor Travellers,” and “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” his latest and uncompleted work.  In chapter 3 of this last-mentioned tale is the following description:—

“An ancient city, Cloisterham, and no meet dwelling-place for any one with hankerings after the noisy world.  A monotonous, silent city, deriving an earthly flavour throughout, from its Cathedral crypt. . . .  A drowsy city, Cloisterham, whose inhabitants seem to suppose, with an inconsistency more strange than rare, that all its changes lie behind p. 89it, and that there are no more to come. . . .  So silent are the streets of Cloisterham (though prone to echo on the smallest provocation), that of a summer day the sunblinds of its shops scarce dare to flap in the south wind; while the sun-browned tramps who pass along and stare, quicken their limp a little that they may the sooner get beyond the confines of its oppressive respectability.  This is a feat not difficult of achievement, seeing that the streets of Cloisterham city are little more than one narrow street by which you get into it, and get out of it; the rest being mostly disappointing yards with pumps in them and no thoroughfare—exception made of the Cathedral-close, and a paved Quaker settlement. . . .  In a word, a city of another and a bygone time is Cloisterham, with its hoarse Cathedral bell, its hoarse rooks hovering about the Cathedral tower, its hoarser and less distinct rooks in the stalls far beneath.  Fragments of old wall, saint’s chapel, chapter-house, convent, and monastery have got incongruously or obstructively built into many of its houses and gardens, much as kindred jumbled notions have become incorporated into many of its citizens’ minds.  All things in it are of the past.”

Entering the busier part of the town by the Eastgate thoroughfare, we may shortly observe, on the right, Eastgate House, now occupied by the City of Rochester Workmen’s Club.  It is a fine old Elizabethan building; a well-preserved specimen of the domestic architecture of the sixteenth century.  The building abuts on the street, with a large courtyard and entrance at the side; and a spacious garden is attached at the back of the house.  For more than fifty years (until about twenty years since) this establishment flourished as a ladies’ boarding-school, and is referred to in the pages of “Edwin Drood” as The Nuns’ House, the seminary conducted by the eminently respectable Miss Twinkleton—

“In the midst of Cloisterham stands the Nuns’ House; a venerable brick edifice, whose present appellation is doubtless derived from the legend of its conventual uses.  On the trim gate enclosing its old courtyard, is a resplendent brass plate flashing forth the legend, ‘Seminary for young Ladies.  Miss Twinkleton.’  The house-front is so old and worn, and the brass plate is so shining and staring, that the general result has reminded imaginative strangers of a battered old beau with a large modern eye-glass stuck in his blind eye.”

On the opposite side of the High Street (Nos. 146 and 147) stands p. 90Mr. Sapsea’s House.  It will be remembered that we are introduced to Mr. Thomas Sapsea, auctioneer and Mayor of Cloisterham, in the 4th chapter of the same book, as being “the purest jackass” in the town; adopting, in his voice and style, the professional mannerism of his superiors—

“Mr. Sapsea ‘dresses at’ the Dean; has been bowed to for the Dean, in mistake; has even been spoken to in the street as My Lord, under the impression that he was the Bishop come down unexpectedly, without his chaplain.  Mr. Sapsea is very proud of this, and of his voice, and of his style.  He has even (in selling landed property) tried the experiment of slightly intoning in his pulpit, to make himself more like what he takes to be the genuine ecclesiastical article.  So, in ending a Sale by Public Auction, Mr. Sapsea finishes off with an air of bestowing a benediction on the assembled brokers, which leaves the real Dean—a modest and worthy gentleman—far behind.”

Much of the humorous element of the tale is connected with this character.  According to local tradition, Mr. S. is supposed to be a combination of two well-known townsmen, formerly resident in Rochester; a councilman who lived at the above address, and an auctioneer, once mayor of the city, over whose door the pulpit spoken of in “Edwin Drood” could have been seen—

“Over the doorway is a wooden effigy, about half life-size, representing Mr. Sapsea’s father, in a curly wig and toga, in the act of selling.  The chastity of the idea, and the natural appearance of the little figure, hammer, and pulpit, have been much admired.”

Both the aforesaid local prototypes have departed this life some time since, and the premises have been occupied by others (equally competent, but less pretentious) of that ilk.

We now turn on the left into Crow Lane; at the further end of which, on the south side, stands Restoration House, another specimen of the Elizabethan style, in the present occupation of Stephen T. Aveling, Esq.  This residence is of interest as being the Satis House of “Great Expectations,” in which Miss Havisham lived.  We may recollect the circumstance of Pip being escorted in Mr. Pumblechook’s chaise-cart to this address, “to play” p. 91for the diversion of Miss Havisham.  Here he first met Estella, who then treated him with extreme contempt, but with whom he fell desperately in love notwithstanding.  Pip says, when speaking of his departure from the house:—

“I set off on the four-mile walk to our forge, pondering, as I went along, on all I had seen, and deeply revolving that I was a common labouring-boy: that my hands were coarse; that my boots were thick; that I had fallen into a despicable habit of calling knaves Jacks; that I was much more ignorant than I had considered myself last night, and generally that I was in a low-lived bad way.”

[Joe Gargery’s Forge and wooden house were in the little village of Cooling, six miles north of Rochester.  The greater part of the parish is marsh-land, extending to the Thames.  Mr. Forster recalls, in his biography, the occasion when he and his friend stood on the spot; Dickens saying that “he meant to make it the scene of the opening of his story—Cooling Castle ruins, and the desolate church lying out among the marshes, seven miles from Gadshill.”  Here it was that Pip met the convict Magwitch—by secret appointment—and supplied him with “wittles” and a file, thus materially influencing his own future fortunes.]

Turning to the left, we reach the Promenade and Recreation Ground, called “The Vines,” an open space of more than three acres, formerly the vinery of the ancient Priory.  It is referred to in “Edwin Drood,” chapter 14, as the Monk’s Vineyard, in which, near a wicket-gate in a corner, Edwin met the old woman from the opium-smoking den in the East end of London, from whom he received warning of a threatened danger.  This is the last occasion that we read of Edwin Drood previous to his mysterious disappearance—

“The woman’s words are in the rising wind, in the angry sky, in the troubled water, in the flickering lights.  There is some solemn echo of them even in the Cathedral chime, which strikes a sudden surprise to his heart as he turns in under the archway of the Gate house.  And so he goes up the postern stair.”

Passing on the right the handsome residence of the p. 92Head Master of the Grammar School, we cross the Vines, and turn on the right hand to Minor Canon Row, a terrace of seven red-brick houses at the north end of St. Margaret Street and on the south side of the Cathedral Close.  This locality bears the appellation, in the before-mentioned book, of Minor Canon Corner, the residence of the Rev. Septimus Crisparkle and his mother, the “china shepherdess.”  In chapter 6 we find the following pleasant reference to the same:—

“Minor Canon Corner was a quiet place in the shadow of the Cathedral, which the cawing of the rooks, the echoing footsteps of rare passers, the sound of the Cathedral bell, or the roll of the Cathedral organ, seemed to render more quiet than absolute silence. . . .  Red-brick walls harmoniously toned down in colour by time, strong-rooted ivy, latticed windows, panelled rooms, big oaken beams in little places, and stone-walled gardens where annual fruit yet ripened upon monkish trees, were the principal surroundings of pretty old Mrs. Crisparkle and the Reverend Septimus as they sat at breakfast.”

Immediately north of this position stands the old Cathedral of Rochester, with its “well-known massive grey square tower,” in which, we may remember, the respected Mr. John Jasper was engaged as Lay Precentor; with the reputation of being devoted to his art, and “having done such wonders with the choir.”  In the interior, on the wall of the south-west transept, is a quaint monument to the memory of Richard Watts, a prominent townsman to whom further reference will be made.  Underneath this is placed a brass memorial-tablet, inscribed—

“Charles Dickens.—Born at Portsmouth, seventh of February 1812.  Died at Gadshill Place, by Rochester, ninth of June 1870.  Buried in Westminster Abbey.  To connect his memory with the scenes in which his earliest and his latest years were passed, and with the associations of Rochester Cathedral and its neighbourhood, which extended over all his life, this tablet, with the sanction of the Dean and Chapter, is placed by his executors.”

The author’s latest suggestive sketch, in association with this ancient fane, may be here suitably recalled:—

p. 93“A brilliant morning shines on the old city.  Its antiquities and ruins are surpassingly beautiful, with the lusty ivy gleaming in the sun, and the rich trees waving in the balmy air.  Changes of glorious light from moving boughs, songs of birds, scents from gardens, woods, and fields—or, rather, from the one great garden of the whole cultivated island in its yielding time—penetrate into the Cathedral, subdue its earthy odour, and preach the Resurrection and the Life.  The cold stone tombs of centuries ago grow warm; and flecks of brightness dart into the sternest marble corners of the building, fluttering there like wings.”

The Crypts below contain the “buried magnates of ancient time and high degree,” with whom Durdles, the stonemason, was on terms of intimate familiarity—

“In the demolition of impedimental fragments of wall, buttress, and pavement he has seen strange sights. . . .  Thus he will say, ‘Durdles come upon the old chap, by striking right into the coffin with his pick.  The old chap gave Durdles a look with his open eyes, as much as to say, Is your name Durdles?  Why, my man, I’ve been waiting for you a Devil of a time!’ And then he turned to powder.  With a two-foot rule always in his pocket, and a mason’s hammer all but always in his hand, Durdles goes continually sounding, and tapping all about and about the Cathedral; and whenever he says to Tope, ‘Tope, here’s another old ’un in here,’ Tope announces it to the Dean as an established discovery.”

It is believed that the prototype of this character was an old German working stonemason, who lived at Rochester many years since.  He employed himself by carving various grotesque figures out of odd fragments of soft stone found in the Cathedral crypt, which he begged for the purpose; and it is recollected that he was accustomed to carry these articles of vertu about the town, tied up in a coloured handkerchief; also that, whenever he succeeded in effecting a sale, he immediately celebrated the transaction by getting very tipsy.  He lodged at a public-house named “The Fortune of War,” now known as “The Lifeboat.”

Chapter 12, headed “A Night with Durdles,” contains a description of the ascent of the Cathedral Tower, to the following effect:—

“They go up the winding staircase . . . among the cobwebs and p. 94the dust.  Twice or thrice they emerge into level low-arched galleries, whence they can look down into the moonlight nave. . .  Anon they turn into narrower and steeper staircases, and the night air begins to blow upon them, and the chirp of some startled jackdaw or frightened rook precedes the heavy beating of wings in a confined space, and the beating down of dust and straws upon their heads.  At last, leaving their light behind a stair—for it blows fresh up here—they look down on Cloisterham, fair to see in the moonlight: its ruined habitations and sanctuaries of the dead, at the tower’s base: its moss-softened red-tiled roofs and red-brick houses of the living, clustered beyond: its river winding down from the mist on the horizon, as though that were its source, and already heaving with a restless knowledge of its approach towards the sea.”

Before leaving the Cathedral precincts, on the north side we soon pass St. Nicholas Church, and may note its pleasant little graveyard—“where daisies blossom on the verdant sod”—lying near the old walls of the Castle and its contiguous gardens.  It is said that this is the spot which Dickens himself would have preferred as his last resting-place.

We now approach the High Street by The College Gate (facing Pump Lane), an old gatehouse with archway, having two exterior doors, standing angle-wise in the street, with a small postern at the back of the gate.  The house, now occupied by the assistant verger, is a gabled wooden structure of two storeys, built over the stone gateway beneath.  Students of Dickens will remember that this was the residence of Mr. Tope, “chief verger and showman” of the Cathedral, with whom lodged Mr. John Jasper, the uncle of Edwin Drood.  It is first referred to in the 2nd chapter of the book: “an old stone gatehouse crossing the Close, with an arched thoroughfare passing beneath it,” decorated by “pendant masses of ivy and creeper covering the building’s front.”  Here Mr. Jasper entertained his nephew and his nephew’s friend; and we also read of Mr. Grewgious climbing “the postern stair.”  On this latter occasion the old lawyer called on Mr. Jasper, visiting Cloisterham in preparation for their formal release as trustees on Edwin’s attaining his majority.

Turning to the right, on the opposite side of the High p. 95Street, we soon reach a stone-fronted edifice, with small windows and three gables, known as The Poor Travellers’ House.  This charity was established 1579, by a local philanthropist, Richard Watts, formerly citizen of Rochester, who rose from a humble position to be Member of Parliament for the City.  He entertained Queen Elizabeth at his mansion (in 1573), a white house situated near the Castle gardens, and called Satis House.  It will be recollected that Dickens transferred this name to Restoration House, situated in Crow Lane.  It is said that the appellation was bestowed on the mansion by the virgin queen herself, in recognition of the “satisfactory” entertainment afforded by her host.  Estella gives another explanation of the title: “It meant, when it was given, that whoever had this house could want nothing else.  They must have been easily satisfied.”

Watts’s Charity, the Travellers’ Rest aforesaid, is associated with the Christmas Number of Household Words (1854), entitled “The Seven Poor Travellers;” in which the inscription over the quaint old door is reproduced as follows:—

RICHARD WATTS, ESQ.,
by his will dated 22 August 1579,
founded this charity
for six poor travellers,
Who not being Rogues, or Proctors
may receive gratis for one night,
Lodging, Entertainment,
and four-pence each.

The entertainment herein specified comprises for each traveller, a supper of half a pound of freshly-cooked meat, one pound of bread, and a half-pint of beer, which is given in addition to the stated fourpence payable in the morning.

[This gentleman’s memory is also perpetuated in the charitable annals of the district by a handsome pile of buildings, in the Elizabethan style, on the Maidstone Road, called Watts’s Almshouses—with pleasure-grounds in p. 96front, affording accommodation for ten men and ten women, who also receive twelve shillings each per week.  The Institution is superintended by a matron and governed by sixteen trustees.]

We are doubtless familiar with the Christmas Eve entertainment here provided by the narrator of “The Seven Poor Travellers,” as above:—

“It was settled that at nine o’clock that night a Turkey and a piece of Roast Beef should smoke upon the board, and that I, faint and unworthy minister for once of Master Richard Watts, should preside as the Christmas-supper host of the six Poor Travellers.”

And we must all have a vivid recollection of the processional order of supply on that festive opportunity:—

After hearty discussion of the orthodox plum-pudding and mince-pies which crowned the feast, the company drew round the fire, and the “brown beauty” of the host—the pitcher, carried first in the procession—was elevated to the table.  It proved to be “a glorious jorum” of hot Wassail, prepared from the chairman’s special and private receipt, the materials of which, “together with their proportions and combinations,” he declines to impart.  Glasses being filled therefrom, the toast of the evening was duly and reverently honoured: “Christmas!  Christmas Eve, my friends; when the Shepherds, who were poor travellers too, in their way, heard the angels sing, ‘On earth peace.  Goodwill toward men!’”

p. 97The pen of the “Inimitable” was never in more genial feather than when inditing this Christmas story, the cheery and sympathetic humour of which is not excelled even by the “Carol” itself.

Another Dickensian association with this Rochester Charity may be quoted in connection with Miss Adelaide Procter.  During ’54 this lady had been a valued contributor to Household Words, under the assumed name of “Berwick,” and some speculation arose in the editorial department as to the real personality of the writer.  The nom de plume being, in course of time, relinquished, and the secret told, Mr. Dickens sent a letter of congratulation and appreciation to the young authoress—dated December 17th, 1854—which thus concluded: “Pray accept the blessing and forgiveness of Richard Watts, though I am afraid you come under both his conditions of exclusion.”

Retracing the High Street route, we again pass the Gate-house of the Cathedral Close, and come, immediately on the left, to the noted Bull Hotel, a commodious establishment of ancient and respectable repute, and the principal posting-house of the town.  This is the celebrated hostelry at which the Pickwickians sojourned on the occasion of their first visit to Rochester, per “Commodore” coach from London.  In the large assembly-room upstairs—“a long room, with crimson-covered benches, and wax candles in glass chandeliers, with the musicians securely confined in an elevated den”—the memorable Ball took place, on the evening of their arrival, which was attended by Mr. Tupman and his seductive friend Jingle; the latter affording some information as to the exclusive character of Rochester society:—

“‘Wait a minute,’ said the stranger, ‘fun presently—nobs not come yet—queer place.  Dockyard people of upper rank don’t know Dockyard people of lower rank.  Dockyard people of lower rank don’t know small gentry—small gentry don’t know tradespeople—Commissioner don’t know anybody.’”

Here Mr. Jingle, on that fateful occasion, gave dire p. 98offence to Doctor Slammer, of the 97th Regiment, by making himself obtrusively agreeable to the rich little widow, Mrs. Budger; and we may remember how the Doctor, with his “hitherto bottled-up indignation effervescing from all parts of his countenance in a perspiration of passion,” insisted on a hostile meeting.

The hotel has a frontage of about 90 feet, with wide pillared gateway, and extensive stabling at the back.  Proceeding past the Guildhall on the right, towards the end of the street, facing Rochester Bridge, we arrive at The Crown Hotel, pleasantly situated at the corner of the Esplanade and High Street, one side of the house facing the Medway; a white-brick edifice lately rebuilt.  It is referred to in chapter 18 of “Edwin Drood” as “The Crozier,” the orthodox hotel at which Mr. Datchery took up his temporary abode, previous to settling in Cloisterham as “a single buffer—an idle dog who lived upon his means.”  Other visitors to Rochester may advantageously imitate Mr. Datchery’s example, the position and conduct of the house being alike excellent.

Round the corner to the left, commences The Esplanade, extending under the castle walls, and along the bank of the river for a considerable distance.  This promenade is mentioned in the 13th chapter of “Edwin Drood,” being the scene of the last interview between Edwin and Rosa, when they mutually agreed to cancel the irksome bond between them—

“They walked on by the river.  They began to speak of their separate plans.  He would quicken his departure from England, and she would remain where she was, at least as long as Helena remained.  The poor dear girls should have their disappointment broken to them gently, and, as the first preliminary, Miss Twinkleton should be confided in by Rosa, even in advance of the reappearance of Mr. Grewgious.  It should be made clear in all quarters that she and Edwin were the best of friends.  There had never been so serene an understanding between them since they were first affianced.”

Leaving Rochester by The Bridge, crossing the Medway, we may bestow a passing thought on Richard Doubledick as he came over the p. 99same, “with half a shoe to his dusty feet,” in the year 1799, limping into the town of Chatham.  (See “The Seven Poor Travellers,” previously mentioned.)

On the north side of the river, the Rambler enters the town of Strood, and may proceed through the same, about two miles on the Gravesend Road, to

GADSHILL PLACE,

the last residence of Charles Dickens.  It is situated on the left-hand side, nearly opposite the Falstaff Inn.  The house was purchased by him on the 14th of March 1856, for £1790; and he afterwards projected and carried out many costly additions and improvements thereto.  On the first-floor landing is displayed an illuminated frame (the work of Mr. Owen Jones), which reads as follows:—

“This House, Gadshill Place, stands on the summit of Shakespeare’s Gadshill, ever memorable for its association with Sir John Falstaff in his noble fancy—‘But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four o’clock, early at Gadshill! there are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses: I have vizards for you all; you have horses for yourselves.’”

On this residence Dickens had fixed his choice in his boyish days.  It had always held a prominent place amid the recollections connected with his childhood.  Forster says that “upon first seeing it as he came from Chatham with his father, and looking up at it with admiration, he had been promised that he might live in it himself, or some such house, when he came to be a man, if he would only work hard enough.”  It is pleasant to record that this ambition was gratified in after life, when the dream of his boyhood was realised.

In the contiguous shrubbery was placed a Swiss Chalet, presented to Dickens by his friend Mr. Fechter, which arrived from Paris in ninety-four pieces, fitting like the joints of a puzzle.  Our author was fond of working in this chalet during the summer months; and in it, much of the material of his latest work was prepared.

p. 100In sad association with Gadshill Place, we must refer to the unexpected Death of Charles Dickens, which occurred here on the 9th of June 1870.  He had been feeling weary and fatigued for some days previous to this date, but had nevertheless continued to work with cheerfulness, writing in the chalet, in preparation of the sixth number of “Edwin Drood.”  On the 8th of June, whilst at dinner, he was suddenly attacked with apoplexy, and never spoke afterwards; and on the evening of the following day—with one rolling tear and one deep sigh—his gentle spirit soared beyond these earthly shadows,

“Into the Land of the Great Departed,
Into the Silent Land.”

An interval being allowed for refreshments at the Falstaff Inn, à discrétion, we may resume the road onwards to the nearest station of Higham—about a mile distant—whence the South-Eastern Railway may be taken for the homeward journey.  At five miles’ distance we reach Gravesend, which is situated at the foot of the hills, extending for some two miles on the south side of the Thames.  This town is the boundary of the port of London, at which many outward and homeward bound vessels on foreign service receive or discharge their passengers and freight.  As we pass this station we may remember that in chapter 57 of “David Copperfield,” Gravesend is referred to as the starting-point of Mr. Peggotty and his niece, emigrating to Australia, and accompanied by Martha, Mrs. Gummidge, and the Micawber family.  The parting with his friends David describes as follows:—

“We went over the side into our boat, and lay at a little distance to see the ship wafted on her course.  It was then calm, radiant sunset.  She lay between us and the red light, and every taper line and spar was visible against the glow.  A sight at once so beautiful, so mournful, and so hopeful, as the glorious ship lying still on the flushed water, with all the life on board her crowded at the bulwarks, and there clustering for a moment, bareheaded and silent, I never saw.  Silent, p. 101only for a moment.  As the sails rose to the wind, and the ship began to move, there broke from all the boats three resounding cheers, which those on board took up and echoed back, and which were echoed and re-echoed . . .  Surrounded by the rosy light . . . they solemnly passed away.”

Continuing the homeward journey by South-Eastern Railway, the Rambler will arrive in due course at the station of Greenwich, eighteen miles from Gravesend.  Here alighting, a short walk eastward, on the south side of the line—through London Street, turning right by end of Church Street—will lead us to the entrance of Greenwich Park.  This well-known place of popular resort was referred to by Dickens in his first contributions to the Evening Chronicle, 1835, which were afterwards collected under the name of “Sketches by Boz.”  The sketch is entitled “Greenwich Fair,” and gives descriptions of the doings in the park at that festival, as holden aforetime in this locality—

“The principal amusement is to drag young ladies up the steep hill which leads to the Observatory, and then drag them down again at the very top of their speed, greatly to the derangement of their curls and bonnet-caps, and much to the edification of lookers-on from below.”

From the Park entrance we may now proceed towards the river by Church Street, on the left hand of which, past London Street, stands the Church of St. Alphege, a handsome edifice in classic style.  The happy wedding of Bella Wilfer and John Rokesmith, otherwise Harmon, here took place, in the presence of a “gruff and glum old pensioner” from the neighbouring hospital, with two wooden legs.  We may also recall the circumstance of Mr. and Mrs. Boffin’s attendance, that worthy couple being hid away near the church organ.

Following the route northward, we may soon reach King William Street, by the river side, in which is situated Quartermaine’s Ship Tavern.  This is the place where the “lovely woman” and her father once dined together on the occasion of their “innocent elopement.”  (See “Our p. 102Mutual Friend,” chapter 8, Book 2.)  It may be also remembered as the hotel at which was celebrated the wedding dinner of Mr. and Mrs. Rokesmith aforesaid, “dear little Pa” being the honoured guest of that blissful opportunity.  We may here also recollect the dignified bearing of the head waiter—The Archbishop of Greenwich—“a solemn gentleman in black clothes and a white cravat, who looked much more like a clergyman than the clergyman, and seemed to have mounted a great deal higher in the church.”

Leaving Greenwich, a short ride of twenty minutes (six miles), following the course of the river, will bring us to the Charing Cross Terminus, in central London.

p. 103RAMBLE VII
Excursion to Canterbury and Dover

Route by London, Chatham and Dover Railway, viâ Sittingbourne and Faversham to Canterbury; The Queen’s Head Inn, “the little hotel” patronised by the Micawbers—By Mercery Lane and Christ Church Gate to Cathedral Close for King’s School, the Establishment at which David Copperfield was educated—Dr. Strong’s House—The Fleur de Lys Hotel; Mr. Dick’s stopping-place at Canterbury—The George and Dragon Inn; the old London Coach Office—Palace Street and Church of St. Alphege; the scene of Dr. Strong’s marriage to Miss Annie Markleham—No. 65 North Lane, the “’umble dwelling” of Uriah Heep, afterwards the residence of the Micawber Family—71 St. Dunstan Street; Mr. Wickfield’s house, and Home of Agnes—Canterbury to Dover—Corner of Church and Castle Streets, Market Place; David’s resting-place—Priory Hill, Stanley Mount; Miss Betsy Trotwood’s Residence—“The King’s Head”; Mr. Lorry, Lucie Manette, and Miss Pross—The Staplehurst Disaster—Postscript to “Our Mutual Friend.”

The excursion proposed in Ramble VI. to Chatham, Rochester, Gadshill, etc. (see page 82), could be advantageously extended to include Canterbury and Dover, for visiting the localities in these towns associated with the history of David Copperfield.

Beyond Chatham the journey is continued on the London, Chatham and Dover Railway, by three minor stations to Sittingbourne, formerly a favourite resting-place for pilgrims (as its name would seem to indicate) en route for Canterbury; but the modern mode of travel only now necessitates a halt of twenty minutes.  Passing Teynsham and Faversham, the train proceeds by the intermediate station of Selling, to the fair old city of

CANTERBURY,

pleasantly situated on the banks of the Stour.  Seat of the p. 104Primate of England, where, as Mr. Micawber writes, “the society may be described as a happy admixture of the agricultural and the clerical.”  A quaint and quiet cathedral town, redolent with fragrant memories of Agnes Wickfield, fairest type of English womanhood—her father, and friends.

Proceeding from the station towards the Cathedral, by Castle Street, we reach the old Roman road of Watling Street (extending from Chester to Dover), at the south corner of which (right), and facing St. Margaret Street, stands the “Queen’s Head Inn.”  This is “the little hotel” patronised by Mr. and Mrs. Micawber on the occasion of their first visit to Canterbury, as related in chapter 17 of “David Copperfield”—“Somebody turns up.”

“It was a little inn where Mr. Micawber put up, and he occupied a little room in it, partitioned off from the commercial room, and strongly flavoured with tobacco smoke.  I think it was over the kitchen, because a warm greasy smell appeared to come up through the chinks in the floor, and there was a flabby perspiration on the walls.  I know it was near the bar, on account of the smell of spirits and jingling of glasses.  Here, recumbent on a small sofa, underneath a picture of a race-horse, with her head close to the fire, and her feet pushing the mustard off the dumb-waiter at the other end of the room, was Mrs. Micawber, to whom Mr. Micawber entered first, saying, ‘My dear, allow me to introduce to you a pupil of Dr. Strong’s.’”

It will be remembered that the amiable lady thus referred to, here confidentially explained to David the reason of their visit to this part of the country—

“‘Mr. Micawber was induced to think, on inquiry, that there might be an opening for a man of his talent in the Medway Coal Trade.  Then, as Mr. Micawber very properly said, the first step to be taken clearly was to come and see the Medway; which we came and saw.  I say ‘we,’ Master Copperfield, ‘for I never will,’ said Mrs. Micawber with emotion, ‘I never will desert Mr. Micawber. . . .  Being so near here, Mr. Micawber was of opinion that it would be rash not to come on and see the Cathedral—firstly, on account of its being so well worth seeing, and our never having seen it; and, secondly, on account of the great probability of something turning up in a cathedral town.’”

We may also recollect the dinner and convivial evening p. 105thereafter, celebrated two days later at this address, when David attended as the honoured guest of the occasion—

“We had a beautiful little dinner.  Quite an elegant dish of fish; the kidney-end of a loin of veal, roasted; fried sausage-meat; a partridge, and a pudding.  There was wine, and there was strong ale; and after dinner Mrs. Micawber made us a bowl of hot punch with her own hands.  Mr. Micawber was uncommonly convivial.  I never saw him such good company.  He made his face shine with the punch, so that it looked as if it had been varnished all over.  He got cheerfully sentimental about the town, and proposed success to it, observing that Mrs. Micawber and himself had been made extremely snug and comfortable there, and that he never should forget the agreeable hours they had passed in Canterbury.”

Later on there is recorded in the Copperfield autobiography (chapter 42) how David, accompanied by his aunt and friends—Messrs. Dick and Traddles—sojourned for the night at this same hotel.  They had arrived at Canterbury by the Dover Mail, as desired by Mr. Micawber, in readiness to assist the next day at the memorable “Explosion” which resulted in the final discomfiture of Uriah Heep, “the Forger and the Cheat”—

“At the hotel where Mr. Micawber had requested us to await him, which we got into, with some trouble, in the middle of the night, I found a letter, importing that he would appear in the morning punctually at half-past nine.  After which, we went shivering at that uncomfortable hour to our respective beds, through various close passages, which smelt as if they had been steeped for ages in a solution of soup and stables.”

Following the course of St. Margaret Street northward, and passing (left) the old Church of St. Margaret—recently restored by Sir Gilbert Scott—we soon arrive at the central main thoroughfare, which here divides the town, extending from St. Dunstan’s Church (west) to the New Dover Road, leaving Canterbury on the east.

Crossing the High Street, and continuing northward through the narrow thoroughfare of Mercery Lane (on the opposite side)—once the resort of the many pilgrims who came aforetime to worship at the shrine of p. 106Thomas-à-Becket—we enter the precincts of the Cathedral by Christ Church Gate (16th century).

Turning to the right within the Close, and passing the secluded residences of several “grave and reverend seigniors,” we may find, on the farther side, King’s School, an educational establishment of good repute and old foundation, pleasantly and quietly situated.  The school is supervised by certain “worthy and approved good masters,” successors to the amiable Doctor Strong and assistants, under whose careful tutorship David Copper-field was educated after his adoption by Miss Betsy Trotwood.  In the commencement of chapter 16 of his autobiography, David thus describes the place:—

“Next morning, after breakfast, I entered on school life again.  I went, accompanied by Mr. Wickfield, to the scene of my future studies—a grave building in a courtyard, with a learned air about it that seemed very well suited to the stray rooks and jackdaws who came down from the Cathedral towers to walk with a clerkly bearing on the grass-plot—and was introduced to my new master, Doctor Strong.”

Doctor Strong’s Private Residence—at which “some of the higher scholars boarded”—is an antiquated house, situated at the corner of Lady’s Green (No. 1), at a short distance eastward.  Here David was a frequent visitor, learning particulars of the Doctor’s history, and becoming intimate with the various personages therewith connected.  Pleasant reminiscences of the doings and sayings of Mrs. Markleham—“the Old Soldier” (so called by the boys “on account of her generalship, and the skill with which she marshalled great forces of relations against the Doctor”)—the tender associations which cluster round the story of Annie, the good doctor’s true-hearted wife; with a casual recollection of the family cousin—Mr. Jack Maldon—(no better than he should be)—may combine to enhance the interest of a visit to this old-fashioned but comfortable home.

Crossing the Lady’s Green towards the gate of the ancient Augustinian Monastery, and proceeding onwards by Monastery Street, we may find at the end and p. 107corner of the street, on the left hand, a noteworthy antique-looking house, partly incorporated with a second gate of the old Monastery, at present the residence of a gentleman of the medical profession.  In bygone time this house was a point of considerable attraction to David during his later school-days at Canterbury, as being the home of “The Eldest Miss Larkins,” his second love.  In chapter 18, as we may remember, is contained a very pleasant piece of natural sketching, entitled “A Retrospect,” comprising, inter alia, the story of his youthful passion.  David says:—

“I worship the eldest Miss Larkins.  The eldest Miss Larkins is not a little girl.  She is a tall, dark, black-eyed, fine figure of a woman.  The eldest Miss Larkins is not a chicken, for the youngest Miss Larkins is not that, and the eldest must be three or four years older.  Perhaps the eldest Miss Larkins may be about thirty.  My passion for her is beyond all bounds. . . .  Everything that belongs to her, or is connected with her, is precious to me.  Mr. Larkins (a gruff old gentleman with a double chin, and one of his eyes immovable in his head) is fraught with interest to me. . . .  I regularly take walks outside Mr. Larkins’s house in the evening, though it cuts me to the heart to see the officers go in, or to hear them up in the drawing-room, where the eldest Miss Larkins plays the harp.  I even walk, on two or three occasions, in a sickly spooney manner, round and round the house after the family are gone to bed, wondering which is the eldest Miss Larkins’s chamber (and pitching, I dare say now, on Mr. Larkins’s instead), wishing that a fire would burst out; that the assembled crowd would stand appalled; that I, dashing through them with a ladder, might rear it against her window, save her in my arms, go back for something she had left behind, and perish in the flames.”

The Drawing-Room here mentioned is situated above the old Monastery Gate, between the two towers which stand on either side.  We may recollect it was here that David, having received an invitation to a private ball given at the Larkins’s, enjoyed his first dance with “his dear divinity;” afterwards being introduced to Mr. Chestle, a hop-grower from the neighbourhood of Ashford, “a friend of the family,” and—alas for David!—the future husband of the eldest Miss Larkins—

“I waltz with the eldest Miss Larkins!  I don’t know where, among whom, or how long.  I only know that I swim about in space with a p. 108blue angel, in a state of blissful delirium. . . .  I am lost in the recollection of this delicious interview, and the waltz, when she comes to me again, with a plain, elderly gentleman, who has been playing whist all night, upon her arm, and says, ‘Oh, here is my bold friend!  Mr. Chestle wants to know you, Mr. Copperfield.’  I feel at once that he is a friend of the family, and am much gratified. . . .  I think I am in a happy dream.  I waltz again with the eldest Miss Larkins.  She says I waltz so well!  I go home in a state of unspeakable bliss, and waltz in imagination, all night long, with my arm round the blue waist of my dear divinity.”

Proceeding westward, we pass along the opposite roadway which faces the house above referred to, by Church Street St. Paul, and Burgate Street, to the Old Cathedral entrance.

As the Rambler returns, again traversing Mercery Lane, there may be noted on the left—No. 14—a respectable Butcher’s Shop, now in the keeping of Mr. Cornes.  It is evident from its position, near Christ Church Gate, that this was the establishment where flourished, in days of yore, that obnoxious “young butcher” who was “the terror of the youth of Canterbury,” and the especial enemy of the pupils at King’s School.  In chapter 18—“A Retrospect”—Copperfield writes as follows:—

“There is a vague belief abroad that the beef suet with which he anoints his hair gives him unnatural strength, and that he is a match for a man.  He is a broad-faced, bull-necked young butcher, with rough red cheeks, an ill-conditioned mind, and an injurious tongue.  His main use of this tongue is to disparage Dr. Strong’s young gentlemen.  He says publicly that if they want anything he’ll give it ’em.  He names individuals among them (myself included) whom he could undertake to settle with one hand, and the other tied behind him.  He waylays the smaller boys to punch their unprotected heads, and calls challenges after me in the open streets.  For these sufficient reasons I resolve to fight the butcher.

“It is a summer evening, down in a green hollow, at the corner of a wall.  I meet the butcher by appointment.  I am attended by a select body of our boys; the butcher by two other butchers, a young publican, and a sweep.  The preliminaries are adjusted, and the butcher and myself stand face to face.  In a moment the butcher lights ten thousand candles out of my left eyebrow.  In another moment I don’t know where the wall is, or where I am, or where anybody is.  I hardly know which is myself and which the butcher; we are always in such a tangle and tussle, knocking about upon the trodden grass.  Sometimes p. 109I see the butcher, bloody but confident; sometimes I see nothing, but sit gasping on my second’s knee; sometimes I go in at the butcher madly, and cut my knuckles open against his face, without appearing to discompose him at all.  At last I awake, very queer about the head, as from a giddy sleep, and see the butcher walking off, congratulated by the two other butchers and the sweep and publican, and putting on his coat as he goes, from which I augur justly that the victory is his.”

But a few years afterwards David—ætat. 17—becomes a better match for his opponent; and we read in the same chapter how—after his youthful disappointment in re “the eldest Miss Larkins”—having received new provocation from the butcher, he goes out to battle a second time, and gloriously defeats him.

Turning again on the right into the main central thoroughfare, we may find, on the south side, the Fleur de Lys Hotel—34 High Street.  A well-appointed and respectable establishment, at which, in the time of Copperfield’s school-days, Mr. Dick was in the habit of stopping every alternate Wednesday, arriving from Dover by the stage-coach on his special fortnightly visits to David.  We read that

“These Wednesdays were the happiest days of Mr. Dick’s life; they were far from being the least happy of mine.  He soon became known to every boy in the school, and though he never took an active part in any game but kite-flying, was as deeply interested in all our sports as any one among us.”

On the opposite (north) side of the road stands the old-fashioned George and Dragon Inn—No. 18 High Street.  In the days of Copperfield, the London and Dover Coach, passing en route through Canterbury, stopped here for change of horses.  At this inn, therefore, was the “Coach Office,” referred to in chapter 17 as being the place of arrival and departure of Mr. Dick, as aforesaid.  This London Coach is also mentioned in the closing paragraph of the same chapter, David being on his way to offer Micawber a soothing word of comfort in reply to a dismal letter just received from that “Beggared Outcast”—

p. 110“Halfway there, I met the London coach with Mr. and Mrs. Micawber up behind; Mr. Micawber, the very picture of tranquil enjoyment, smiling at Mrs. Micawber’s conversation, eating walnuts out of a paper bag, with a bottle sticking out of his breast pocket.  As they did not see me, I thought it best, all things considered, not to see them.  So, with a great weight taken off my mind, I turned into a by-street that was the nearest way to school, and felt, upon the whole, relieved that they were gone, though I still liked them very much, nevertheless.”

Turning on the right (northward) from High Street, by a short intermediate road, the Rambler approaches Palace Street, on the east side of which, near the western end of the Cathedral, stands the Church of St. Alphege.  This edifice was casually referred to by the “Old Soldier,” Mrs. Markleham, as the church where the marriage of her daughter Annie with the worthy Dr. Strong was solemnised.  The reference occurs, by way of interruption on the part of Mrs. M., during a very touching conference between the doctor and his wife, as related in “Copperfield,” chapter 45—“Mr. Dick fulfils my aunt’s predictions.”

Passing onwards through St. Peter’s Street to Westgate Street, crossing the western branch of the river, we come by a turning on the right to North Lane, in which is situated the former Residence of Uriah Heep.  It is a small two-storeyed house with plastered front, on the right side, near the entrance of the lane—No. 65; the “’umble dwelling” to which David was introduced as described in chapter 17 of his history—

“We entered a low, old-fashioned room, walked straight into from the street, and found there Mrs. Heep, who was the dead image of Uriah, only short. . . .  It was a perfectly decent room, half parlour and half kitchen, but not at all a snug room.  The tea things were set upon the table, and the kettle was boiling on the hob.  There was a chest of drawers with an escritoire top, for Uriah to read or write at of an evening; there was Uriah’s blue bag lying down and vomiting papers; there was a company of Uriah’s books commanded by Mr. Tidd; there was a corner cupboard, and there were the usual articles of furniture.  I don’t remember that any individual object had a bare, pinched, spare look, but I do remember that the whole place had.”

p. 111Returning to the main street, we pass the ancient West Gate—a fine specimen of medieval architecture, built between two massive round towers, with battlements and portcullis—and continue westward by St. Dunstan Street.  At a short distance onwards, on the south side of the thoroughfare, nearly facing the approach to the South-Eastern Railway Station, there may be observed—No. 71—an old picturesque timbered house, with three projecting gables and antiquated windows.  This was the Residence of Mr. Wickfield, as described by David, in chapter 15, when he was first taken to Canterbury by Miss Betsy Trotwood—

“At length we stopped before a very old house, bulging out over the road; a house with long low lattice windows bulging out still farther, and beams with carved heads on the ends, bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the narrow pavement below.  It was quite spotless in its cleanliness.  The old-fashioned brass knocker on the low arched door, ornamented with carved garlands of fruit and flowers, twinkled like a star; the two stone steps descending to the door were as white as if they had been covered with fair linen; and all the angles and corners and carvings and mouldings, and quaint little panes of glass, and quainter little windows, though as old as the hills, were as pure as any snow that ever fell upon the hills.”

This house does not answer in every respect to the full description as contained in the book.  The “little round tower that formed one side of the house”—containing Uriah Heep’s circular office—being wanting to complete; but we may readily imagine that this existed, some sixty years’ since, at the western side, in the space now occupied by some gates and a roof of more modern erection.  This residence must certainly be located in the main London road, as David—referring, at the close of chapter 15, as above, to his recent pedestrian journey from the Metropolis to Dover—speaks of his “coming through that old city and passing that very house he lived in, without knowing it.”

[Some friends resident at Canterbury have been disposed to locate Mr. Wickfield’s house at No. 15 Burgate Street, now in occupation of the legal firm of Messrs. p. 112Fielding and Plummer (names, by-the-bye, which are used by Dickens in “The Cricket on the Hearth”); but neither the house nor its position will in any way correspond with Copperfield’s description of the same.]

Here then was the Home of Agnes—that finest delineation of feminine portraiture ever conceived by our author—the central figure of the many pure and beautiful associations which entwine themselves with the chief interests of this most charming tale.  In view of the personal history and character of its heroine, we may well understand Thackeray’s eulogium of his contemporary, as providing for the delectation of his daughters “the pure pages of David Copperfield;” and we can as readily appreciate the preference of Charles Dickens himself, when he says:—

“Of all my books I like this the best.  It will be easily believed that I am a fond parent to every child of my fancy, and that no one can ever love that family as dearly as I love them.  But, like many fond parents, I have, in my heart of hearts, a favourite child, and his name is David Copperfield.”

Leaving Canterbury by the direct line of the London, Chatham And Dover Railway, we are carried onward through a pleasant country towards the south-east coast; the white roads of the district indicating the abundant chalkiness of the soil.  In Copperfield’s 13th chapter, narrating the circumstances of his long tramp to Dover, he says, “From head to foot I was powdered almost as white with chalk and dust as if I had come out of a lime-kiln.”

Passing three minor stations, the train arrives at Dover Priory—about which more anon—whence it proceeds through an intervening tunnel to the town station, at the old port of

DOVER.

The town is of especial interest to readers of “David Copperfield,” as containing on its suburban heights the cottage residence of Miss Trotwood and Mr. Dick.

Proceeding eastward from the station, a short distance p. 113along Commercial Quay; turning left, then right; and walking onwards viâ Snargate, Bench and King Streets, the Rambler may reach the Market Place, centrally situated in the lower part of the town, and may recall the circumstance of poor David resting near at hand, on his arrival—a juvenile stranger in a strange land—after a morning’s fruitless inquiry as to the whereabouts of his aunt.  We read (in chapter 13) as follows:—

“I inquired about my aunt among the boatmen first, and received various answers.  One said she lived in the South Foreland light, and had singed her whiskers by doing so; another, that she was made fast to the great buoy outside the harbour, and could be only visited at half-tide; a third, that she was locked up in Maidstone Jail for child stealing; a fourth, that she was seen to mount a broom in the last high wind and make direct for Calais.  The fly-drivers among whom I inquired were equally jocose and equally disrespectful; and the shopkeepers, not liking my appearance, generally replied without hearing what I had to say, that they had got nothing for me.  I felt more miserable and destitute than I had done at any period of my running away.  My money was all gone, I had nothing left to dispose of; I was hungry, thirsty, and worn out, and seemed as distant from my end as if I had remained in London.”

At the junction of Church Street and Castle Street, both leading to and from the Market Place—at the northeast angle—there may be noted the Street Corner at which David sat down, considering the position of affairs, and where he received the first practical intimation for the proper direction of his search:—

“The morning had worn away in these inquiries, and I was sitting on the step of an empty shop at a street corner, near the Market-place, deliberating upon wandering towards those other places which had been mentioned, when a fly-driver, coming by with his carriage, dropped a horsecloth.  Something good-natured in the man’s face, as I handed it up, encouraged me to ask him if he could tell me where Miss Trotwood lived. . . .  ‘I tell you what,’ said he.  ‘If you go up there,’ pointing with his whip towards the heights, ‘and keep right on till you come to some houses facing the sea, I think you’ll hear of her.’”

Leaving the Market Place from its north-west corner, and p. 114keeping somewhat to the left, the Rambler may ascend by Cannon and Biggin Streets, as indicated by the coachman’s whip, to the heights of Priory Hill, on which elevation, in the neighbourhood of St. Martin’s Priory and the Priory Farm, there may be found several semi-detached residences pleasantly overlooking the “silver streak” and the intervening town below.  Here, in an eligible position, there may be seen Stanley Mount, a villa residence of two storeys, with bow windows and contiguous lawn.  This house now replaces an older one, which aforetime was the cottage at which the worthy Miss Trotwood lived; the miniature lawn in front being the “patch of green” over which that amiable lady asserted private right of way; persistently maintaining it against all comers in general, and the Dover donkey boys in particular—

“The one great outrage of her life, demanding to be constantly avenged, was the passage of a donkey over that immaculate spot.  In whatever occupation she was engaged, however interesting to her the conversation in which she was taking part, a donkey turned the current of her ideas in a moment, and she was upon him straight.  Jugs of water and watering-pots were kept in secret places, ready to be discharged on the offending boys, sticks were laid in ambush behind the door, sallies were made at all hours, and incessant war prevailed.”

Midway between Railway Stations and Quay, there may be noted The King’s Head Hotel, as being the old Coaching House at which the London Mail terminated its journey, and referred to in “The Tale of Two Cities” by the name of “The Royal George.”  Here may be recalled the interview related in chapter 4, which took place at this hotel between Mr. Lorry and Miss Manette, and at which the reader is first introduced to the eccentric Miss Pross—“dressed in some extraordinary tight-fitting fashion”; wearing on “her head a most wonderful bonnet, like a Grenadier measure (and a good measure too) or a great Stilton cheese.”

Returning to London by South-Eastern Rail, the p. 115Rambler will pass, about half-way on the road, the picturesque village of Staplehurst.  Near this station it may be remembered that, on June 9th, 1865, a sad disaster occurred to the train in which Mr. Dickens was a traveller.  The Postscript to “Our Mutual Friend” contains the following reference:—

“Mr. and Mrs. Boffin (in their manuscript dress) were on the South-Eastern Railway with me, in a terribly destructive accident.  When I had done what I could to help others, I climbed back into my carriage—nearly turned over a viaduct, and caught aslant upon the turn—to extricate the worthy couple.  They were very much soiled, but otherwise unhurt. . . .  I remember with devout thankfulness that I can never be much nearer parting company with my readers for ever than I was then, until there shall be written against my life the two words with which I have this day closed this book—The End.”

p. 116RAMBLE VIII
Excursion to Henley-on-Thames

Route by Great Western Railway viâ Maidenhead and Twyford to Henley—The Red Lion Inn, place of accommodation for Mr. Eugene Wrayburn—Marriage of Mr. Wrayburn and Lizzie Hexam—The Anchor Inn, the “little inn” at which Bella Wilfer first visited Lizzie Hexam—Henley Railway Station—The Tow Path, scene of the interview between Lizzie and Eugene—Marsh Mill, at which Lizzie was employed—Neighbourhood where Betty Higden died—Shiplake Churchyard, where Betty was buried—“A cry for help”—West bank of Thames, Henley Bridge and Poplar Point, the neighbourhood where occurred Bradley Headstone’s attack on Eugene Wrayburn—Lizzie’s walk by Marsh Lock to the Eastern Tow Path beyond Henley Bridge—Her rescue of Eugene—Henley viâ Aston and Medmenham to Hurley Lock, “Plashwater Weir Mill” Lock, Rogue Riderhood, Deputy Lockkeeper—Final scene of the Tragedy—Churchyard of Stoke Pogis—Mr. Micawber’s Quotation—The Homeward Journey—John Harmon’s Reflections.

A very delightful country excursion may be made for visiting the neighbourhood of Henley-on-Thames, of especial interest to the readers of “Our Mutual Friend.”

It may be remembered that Lizzie Hexam, desirous of avoiding the attentions of her (then) unworthy lover, Mr. Eugene Wrayburn, left London secretly, with the assistance of Riah—representative of the honourable firm of Messrs. Pubsey and Co.; that, by his recommendation, she obtained a situation at a Paper Mill (then under Jewish management), at some distance from the Metropolis, and remained for a time undisturbed in her country employment; that, thereafter, Eugene Wrayburn obtained her address by bribing the drunken father of “Jenny Wren,” p. 117the dolls’ dressmaker, and so followed Lizzie to her retreat, being in his turn watched and followed by the passionate and jealous schoolmaster, Bradley Headstone, who attempted his life on the river bank; that, near at hand, was the Angler’s Inn, to which Eugene—nearly dead—was carried by the heroic and devoted Lizzie, who saved him from a watery grave, and where “effect was given to the dolls’ dressmaker’s discovery,” one night, some weeks later, by their romantic marriage, while it was yet doubtful whether the bridegroom would survive; that the death of Betty Higden occurred “On the Borders of Oxfordshire,” near the mill at which Lizzie Hexam was engaged, Lizzie herself attending the last moments of the dying woman, and accepting her last request; that in accordance with such request poor Betty was decently interred in a contiguous churchyard, the charges being defrayed by her own hard earnings, specially saved for the purpose; and that, on this occasion, the first meeting of Lizzie and Miss Bella Wilfer took place, when a very interesting and touching interview ensued, which greatly assisted Bella in confirmation of a brave and righteous decision in re money versus love.  Also that, at no great distance from this locality, was situated “Plashwater Weir Mill Lock,” where Rogue Riderhood did duty as deputy lock-keeper, and where, at the last, he and Bradley Headstone were drowned.

These localities are in the neighbourhood of Henley, and may be readily verified by the intelligent Rambler, adopting the excursion by land and water, as subjoined.

Leaving Paddington Terminus of the Great Western Railway, we pass Westbourne Park Junction, and the well-arranged grounds of Kensal Green Cemetery (in which repose the mortal remains of Leigh Hunt, Sidney Smith, John Leech, and Thackeray) on the right, travelling westward by the suburban stations of Acton, Ealing, and Castle Hill, and cross the Wharncliffe Viaduct to Hanwell.

To the left may be seen the handsome building of the Middlesex Lunatic Asylum. We next arrive at p. 118Southall, and afterwards cross the Grand Junction Canal to Hayes and West Drayton.  Our train now passes from Middlesex to Buckinghamshire, and steams onwards in the neighbourhood of Langley Park—seen on the right.  The tower of Langley Church may be observed on the left, rising from the trees, as we speed forward to Slough, where we obtain a distant glimpse of the Royal Castle of Windsor, two miles southward.

Resuming the journey we come, in four miles’ run, to the pleasant village of Taplow, on the borders of the Thames (here dividing the counties of Buckinghamshire and Berkshire), and within easy distance of Burnham Beeches, a favourite picnic resort.  The train now crosses the river, next arriving at Maidenhead, a market town on the Thames.  On the right, observation may be taken of Maidenhead Bridge, a noble erection of thirteen arches.  Thereafter we soon arrive at Twyford Junction, where we change (unless seated in a special through carriage) for Henley, situated four miles northward, and served by a branch line.  The town itself is very pleasantly situated on the Thames, with an old church and handsome bridge, but is of special interest to Dickensian students as containing the Inn at which Mr. Eugene Wrayburn found accommodation on the occasion of his journey in pursuit of Lizzie Hexam.  See “Our Mutual Friend,” book 3, chapter 1, in which Bradley Headstone, returning to Plashwater Weir, is described as reporting the circumstance to the deputy lock-keeper—

“‘Lock ho!  Lock.’  It was a light night, and a barge coming down summoned him (Riderhood) out of a long doze.  In due course he had let the barge through and was alone again, looking to the closing of his gates, when Bradley Headstone appeared before him, standing on the brink of the Lock.  ‘Halloa,’ said Riderhood.  ‘Back a’ready, T’otherest?’  ‘He has put up for the night at an Angler’s Inn,’ was the fatigued and hoarse reply.  ‘He goes on, up the river, at six in the morning.  I have come back for a couple of hours’ rest.’”

The Red Lion Inn thus referred to is situated north of Henley Bridge, on the west bank of the river, and is a p. 119favourite resort for disciples of Izaak Walton and boating men in general.  Here it was that Eugene Wrayburn—after the murderous attack by the schoolmaster—was brought almost lifeless by Lizzie, when rescued by her from the river, as narrated in chapter 6—

“She ran the boat ashore, went into the water, released him from the line, and by main strength lifted him in her arms and laid him in the bottom of the boat.  He had fearful wounds upon him, and she bound them up with her dress torn into strips.  Else, supposing him to be still alive, she foresaw that he must bleed to death before he could be landed at his inn, which was the nearest place for succour. . . .  She rowed hard—rowed desperately, but never wildly—and seldom removed her eyes from him in the bottom of the boat.  She had so laid him there as that she might see his disfigured face; it was so much disfigured that his mother might have covered it, but it was above and beyond disfigurement in her eyes.  The boat touched the edge of inn lawn, sloping gently to the water.  There were lights in the windows, but there chanced to be no one out of doors.  She made the boat fast, and again by main strength took him up, and never laid him down until she laid him down in the house.”

The landing-place and patch of inn lawn, above indicated, may now be verified as belonging to the “Red Lion” at Henley aforesaid.  The lawn is a favourite standpoint for spectators interested in the Henley Royal Regatta, which takes place every year usually about the beginning of July.

The marriage of Eugene and Lizzie took place at this same inn some weeks later, while it was yet uncertain that Eugene would recover; the Rev. Frank Milvey officiating at the bedside, Bella and her husband, Mr. Lightwood, Mrs. Milvey, and Jenny Wren being duly in attendance—

“They all stood round the bed, and Mr. Milvey, opening his book, began the service, so rarely associated with the shadow of death; so inseparable in the mind from a flush of life and gaiety and health and hope and joy.  Bella thought how different from her own sunny little wedding, and wept.  Mrs. Milvey overflowed with pity, and wept too.  The dolls’ dressmaker, with her hands before her face, wept in her golden bower.  Reading in a low, clear voice, and bending over Eugene, who kept his eyes upon him, Mr. Milvey did his office with suitable simplicity.  As the bridegroom could not move his hand, they touched his fingers with the ring, and so put it on the bride.  When p. 120the two plighted their troth, she laid her hand on his, and kept it there.  When the ceremony was done, and all the rest departed from the room, she drew her arm under his head, and laid her own head down on the pillow by his side.  ‘Undraw the curtains, my dear girl,’ said Eugene, after a while, ‘and let us see our wedding-day.’  The sun was rising, and his first rays struck into the room, as she came back and put her lips to his.  ‘I bless the day!’ said Eugene.  ‘I bless the day!’ said Lizzie.”

[The clergyman and friends who assisted on this interesting occasion as above, left London from Waterloo Station.  We may remember that Mrs. Rokesmith, escorted by Mr. Lightwood, came into town by rail from Greenwich.  Thus they would change trains at Waterloo Junction, and adopt the South-Western Route as being the more convenient, travelling to Reading, and driving thence to Henley.  It was at this terminus that Bradley Headstone first heard (from Mr. Milvey) of the intended wedding, and was so seriously upset by the news, that an attack of epilepsy ensued in consequence.  We thus read in chapter 11, book 4, with reference to Bella and her escort:—

“From Greenwich they started directly for London, and in London they waited at a railway station until such time as the Rev. Frank Milvey, and Margaretta, his wife, with whom Mortimer Lightwood had been already in conference, should come and join them. . . .  Then the train rattled among the house-tops, and among the ragged sides of houses, torn down to make way for it, over the swarming streets, and under the fruitful earth, until it shot across the river. . . .  A carriage ride succeeded near the solemn river. . . .  They drew near the chamber where Eugene lay.”

This is certainly descriptive of the South-Western Railway, and is not applicable to the Great Western Route.]

For full particulars the reader is referred to chapter 11, book 4.  On the occasion of Bella Wilfer’s First Visit to Henley, and the introduction of the two girls to each other, as narrated in chapter 9, book 3 (in association with the burial of old Betty Higden), mention is made of “the little inn,” at which Bella’s friends were then accommodated.  This was not the “Red Lion,” but, in all probability, was p. 121The Anchor Inn, a small, but very comfortable hostelry in Friday Street, near the river.  Visitors desiring to combine economy with homeliness, are recommended to follow Miss Wilfer’s lead in this regard, and commit themselves to the hospitable care of the present landlord.

The Railway Station at Henley is referred to in the last-named chapter as being near at hand, when “the Rev. Frank and Mrs. Frank, and Sloppy, and Bella and the Secretary set out to walk to it;” the two last dropping behind, for a little confidential conversation on the road.  We read that

“The railway, at this point knowingly shutting a green eye and opening a red one, they had to run for it.  As Bella could not run easily so wrapped up, the Secretary had to help her.  When she took her opposite place in the carriage corner, the brightness in her face was so charming to behold, that on her exclaiming, ‘What beautiful stars and what a glorious night!’ the Secretary said, ‘Yes,’ but seemed to prefer to see the night and the stars in the light of her lovely little countenance, to looking out of window.”

A short walk of five minutes from the station, southward by the riverside (west bank), will bring the Rambler to The Tow Path, the scene of that memorable interview between Lizzie and Eugene, recorded in chapter 6, book 4, as taking place previous to the catastrophe by which Wrayburn nearly lost his life.  The path leads to Marsh Mill, about half a mile from Henley; a large and important paper mill, now in the occupation of Mr. Wells, situated near the weir, with its long wooden bridge leading to the lock.  This was the mill at which Lizzie Hexam, secretly leaving London, found refuge and occupation, on the recommendation of her old friend Mr. Riah, her worthy employers being a firm of Hebrew nationality.  We first read of this mill in connection with the closing scenes of Betty Higden’s history, as narrated in chapter 8, book 3, and headed “The end of a long journey”—

“There now arose in the darkness a great building full of lighted windows.  Smoke was issuing from a high chimney in the rear of it, and there was the sound of a water-wheel at the side.  Between her p. 122and the building lay a piece of water, in which the lighted windows were reflected, and on its nearest margin was a plantation of trees.  ‘I humbly thank the Power and the Glory,’ said Betty Higden, holding up her withered hands, ‘that I have come to my journey’s end!’”

The Death of Betty here occurred; as, sinking on the ground, and supporting herself against a tree “whence she could see, beyond some intervening trees and branches, the lighted windows,” her strength gave way—

“‘I am safe here,’ was her last benumbed thought.  ‘When I am found dead at the foot of the Cross, it will be by some of my own sort; some of the working people who work among the lights yonder.  I cannot see the lighted windows now, but they are there.  I am thankful for all!’”

We have the satisfaction of reading that the poor woman’s hopes were realised, for Lizzie Hexam returning from the mill, found her lying among the trees as described, and tended her at the last, with helpful and loving hands—

“A look of thankfulness and triumph lights the worn old face.  The eyes, which have been darkly fixed upon the sky, turn with meaning in them towards the compassionate face from which the tears are dropping, and a smile is on the aged lips as they ask, ‘What is your name, my dear?’  ‘My name is Lizzie Hexam.’  ‘I must be sore disfigured.  Are you afraid to kiss me?’  The answer is, the ready pressure of her lips upon the cold but smiling mouth.  ‘Bless ye!  Now lift me, my love.’  Lizzie Hexam very softly raised the weather-stained grey head, and lifted her as high as Heaven.”

The Burial, as detailed in the following chapter, must have taken place in the little churchyard of the contiguous village of Shiplake (about three-quarters of a mile distant), the service being conducted by the Rev. Frank Milvey, and attended by the Secretary and poor Sloppy as mourners.

“A cry for help.”  It may be interesting to indicate the local sequence of events on that memorable Saturday evening, when Bradley Headstone, impelled by wild resentment and furious jealousy, did his best to murder his more favoured rival, as described in chapter 6, book 4, under the above heading.  It will be remembered that, on the evening in question, p. 123Eugene Wrayburn having forced an appointment with Lizzie Hexam, met her on the path by the river, when a very affecting farewell interview ensued.  This interview occurring on the towpath—tolerably secluded at and after twilight—about halfway between Henley and Marsh (see Marcus Stone’s Illustration, “The Parting by the River”), Eugene strolled slowly towards his inn, while Lizzie walked sorrowfully, as a matter of course, in the opposite direction.  We read that, passing Bradley Headstone (disguised as a bargeman)—

“Eugene Wrayburn went the opposite way, with his hands behind him, and his purpose in his thoughts.  He passed the sheep, and passed the gate, and came within hearing of the village sounds, and came to the bridge.  The inn where he stayed, like the village and the mill, was not across the river, but on that side of the stream on which he walked . . . feeling out of humour for noise or company, he crossed the bridge, and sauntered on: looking up at the stars as they seemed one by one to be kindled in the sky, and looking down at the river as the same stars seemed to be kindled deep in the water.  A landing-place overshadowed by a willow, and a pleasant boat lying moored there among some stakes, caught his eye as he passed along.”

Thus it will be seen how Eugene, following the west bank of the Thames to Henley, and thereafter crossing Henley Bridge, pursued the course of his meditations past the landing-place on the opposite side, walking onwards by the towpath thence continued, in the direction of Poplar Point.

The Murderous Attack upon him by Headstone, in the darkening shades of nightfall, must have here occurred, not far from the bridge, and opposite to the town, Wrayburn being thrown into the river by his assailant, and so left for dead.

Lizzie Hexam, endeavouring to regain composure, went towards Marsh, and must have crossed by The Lock Gates to the main road beyond, turning in the direction of Henley.  She thereafter walked slowly onwards in the neighbourhood of the bridge at its eastern side, and thus unconsciously came again near to, and following behind, her lover, on the

p. 124Eastern Tow Path beyond the bridge, as above mentioned.  Hereabouts, hearing “the sound of blows, a faint groan, and a fall into the river,” she ran towards the spot from which the sounds had come—not far distant, on the riverside path, northward from the bridge.  We are all familiar with the story of Lizzie’s heroic rescue of Eugene from the river.  Finding a boat on the north side of Henley Bridge—

“She passed the scene of the struggle—yonder it was—on her left, well over the boat’s stern—she passed on her right the end of the village street (New Street) . . . looking as the boat drove, everywhere, everywhere for the floating face.”

Finding and recovering the body, she rowed “back against the stream,” landing at the lawn of the Red Lion Inn as previously described.

The Rambler may now take a short trip by boat down the river six miles from Henley, for visiting The Lock where Rogue Riderhood acted for a time, as deputy superintendent.

Leaving Henley, we may note, on the left, the mansion of Fawley Court, beyond which, passing Regatta Island, we arrive at Greenlands, in the occupation of the Right Hon. W. H. Smith (not unknown in political and literary circles).  The house is pleasantly situated at the bend of the river.  We next arrive at Hambledon Lock, two miles from Henley; thereafter reaching Aston, as we proceed down the stream to Medmenham, with its picturesque Abbey, founded in the reign of King John, standing on the north bank.  Below Medmenham is Hurley Lock, which is our present destination.  It is contiguous to New Lock Weir, and to the village of Hurley, situated on the right bank of the river.  This is known to readers of “Our Mutual Friend” as Plashwater Weir Mill Lock, at whose gates Riderhood—whilom a “waterside character,” the partner of Gaffer Hexam—officiated as deputy lock-keeper.  We are introduced to him as not very wide-awake in this capacity, in chapter 1, book 4—

p. 125“Plashwater Weir Mill Lock looked tranquil and pretty on an evening in the summer-time.  A soft air stirred the leaves of the fresh green trees, and passed like a smooth shadow over the river, and like a smoother shadow over the yielding grass.  The voice of the falling water, like the voices of the sea and the wind, was an outer memory to a contemplative listener; but not particularly so to Mr. Riderhood, who sat on one of the blunt wooden levers of his lock-gates, dozing.”

To this locality came Bradley Headstone, who, for sinister reasons of his own, cultivated Riderhood’s acquaintance, making The Lock House a convenient place of call, as he pursued Eugene Wrayburn in his quest, full details of which may be found in chapters 1 and 7, book 6.  Here also was enacted the final scene of the tragedy, as narrated in chapter 15, book 4, when Bradley Headstone drowned himself and Riderhood in the Lock—

“Bradley had caught him round the body.  He seemed to be girdled with an iron ring.  They were on the brink of the Lock, about midway between the two sets of gates. . . .  ‘Let go!’ said Riderhood.  ‘Stop!  What are you trying at?  You can’t drown me.  Ain’t I told you that the man as has come through drowning can never be drowned?  I can’t be drowned.’  ‘I can be!’ returned Bradley, in a desperate, clenched voice.  ‘I am resolved to be.  I’ll hold you living, and I’ll hold you dead.  Come down!’  Riderhood went over into the smooth pit, backward, and Bradley Headstone upon him.  When the two were found, lying under the ooze and scum behind one of the rotting gates, Riderhood’s hold had relaxed, probably in falling, and his eyes were staring upward.  But he was girdled still with Bradley’s iron ring, and the rivets of the iron ring held tight.”

By road, Hurley Lock is but four miles distant from Henley; a pedestrian, therefore, could make an easy short cut, as against a rower up the stream; hence the assurance given by the deputy lock-keeper to his impatient visitor (see book 4, chapter 1):—

“‘Ha, ha!  Don’t be afeerd, T’otherest,’ said Riderhood.  ‘The T’other’s got to make way agin the stream, and he takes it easy.  You can soon come up with him.  But wot’s the good of saying that to you!  You know how fur you could have outwalked him betwixt p. 126anywheres about where he lost the tide—say Richmond—and this, if you had had a mind to it.’”

Travelling homeward on the return to London, it may be desirable to break the journey at Slough—eighteen miles from Paddington—whence may be conveniently visited the rustic village and cemetery of Stoke Pogis, about a mile and a half northward from the station.  The latter contains the tomb of the poet Gray, and is the scene of his famous “Elegy in a Country Churchyard.”  It may be remembered that from this well-known poem Mr. Micawber’s Quotation was taken, as an appropriate conclusion to one of his many friendly but grandiloquent epistles, confirming an important appointment.  In “David Copperfield,” at the end of chapter 49, we read of Micawber’s expressed determination to unmask his “foxey” employer, and to crush “to undiscoverable atoms that transcendent and immortal hypocrite and perjurer, Heep”; and we may recall his “most secret and confidential letter,” soon afterwards received by David, as containing the following reference:—

“The duty done, and act of reparation performed, which can alone enable me to contemplate my fellow mortal, I shall be known no more.  I shall simply require to be deposited in that place of universal resort, where

   ‘Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
   The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.’

With the plain Inscription,
Wilkins Micawber.”

So, as the evening shades prevail, “near and nearer drawn” through “the glimmering landscape,” we again approach the lights of London Town, with (it may be hoped) pleasant reminiscences of the foregoing excursions.  Should the Rambler, like Mr. John Harmon on a similar occasion, be accompanied by a friend, who perchance may be “nearer and dearer than all other,” he may appropriately endorse p. 127John Harmon’s reflections as he made the same journey under blissful circumstances (see “Our Mutual Friend,” book 3, end of chapter 9)—

“O, boofer lady, fascinating boofer lady!  If I were but legally executor of Johnny’s will.  If I had but the right to pay your legacy and take your receipt!  Something to this purpose surely mingled with the blast of the train as it cleared the stations, all knowingly shutting up their green eyes and opening their red ones when they prepared to let the boofer lady pass.”

p. 128RAMBLE IX
By Great Eastern Route from London to Yarmouth

Liverpool Street Station—Epping Forest—Buckhurst Hill—Chigwell Village—Chigwell Churchyard; Resting-Place of Barnaby Rudge and his Mother—“Grip” the Raven—The “King’s Head Inn”—“The Maypole”—Mr. Cattermole’s Frontispiece—The Bar—The Landlord, John Willett—Dolly Varden—The Visit of the Varden Family—The Warren; Residence of Mr. Haredale and his Niece—By Main Line to Ipswich—The Great White Horse Hotel in Tavern Street—The Apartment of the Middle-Aged Lady—Mr. Pickwick’s Misadventure—St. Clement’s Church—Job Trotter—The Green Gate, Residence of G. Nupkins, Esq.—Mary the Pretty Housemaid—Sam Weller’s First Love—Ipswich to Great Yarmouth—Mr. Peggotty’s Boat-house—Home of Little Emily—The Two London Coaches—The “Angel Hotel”—David’s Dinner in the Coffee-Room—The Friendly Waiter—The “Star Hotel”—Headquarters of Copperfield and Steerforth—Miss Mowcher’s First Introduction—Unlocalised Sites—Blundeston—Blunderstone Rookery—Early Childhood of Copperfield—Somerleyton Park.

A pleasant drive from London to Chigwell is described in chapter 19 of “Barnaby Rudge,” and may be still taken about twelve miles by road, starting from Whitechapel Church viâ Mile-End and Bow, thence crossing the River Lea, and proceeding, in the county of Essex, by way of Stratford, Leytonstone, Snaresbrook, and Wilcox Green.  But time will be saved by adopting a convenient train, leaving Liverpool Street Station (Great Eastern Railway) for Buckhurst Hill—on the Ongar Branch Line—in the neighbourhood of Epping Forest, a district formerly preserved by the old monarchs of Merrie England for the enjoyment of field sports and the pleasures of the chase.

From this point a country walk (under two miles), turning p. 129eastward, and to the left after crossing the long intervening bridge, will lead in due course to the main road at Chigwell.  Coming into the village we pass, at the corner on the right, Chigwell Church, surrounded by its quiet churchyard.  This locality will be remembered as having afforded a resting-place to Barnaby and his mother after their visit to Mr. Haredale at The Warren (chapter 25).  “In the churchyard they sat down to take their frugal dinner”—Grip, the raven, being one of the party—“walking up and down when he had dined with an air of elderly complacency, which was strongly suggestive of his having his hands under his coat tails, and appearing to read the tombstones with a very critical taste.”  On the other side of the main road, a very little way onward (left), stands the old King’s Head Inn, the original “local habitation,” if not “the name,” of the ancient hostelry so intimately associated with the central and domestic interests of the aforesaid historical novel, and known to us therein as The Maypole, “an old building with more gable ends than a lazy man would care to count on a sunny day; its windows, old diamond pane lattices; its floors sunken and uneven; its ceilings blackened by the hand of time, and heavy with massive beams; with its overhanging storeys, drowsy little panes of glass, and front bulging out and projecting over the pathway.”

This description is appropriate to the house as it stands at present, a fine old specimen of the timbered architecture of bygone centuries; but it may be remarked that The Illustration drawn by Cattermole, which forms the frontispiece in the recent editions of “Barnaby Rudge,” is altogether beside the mark; for the designer has furnished therein, an elaborate and ornate picture of the old inn which does not correspond with fact, but rather remains in evidence of the beauty and exuberance of his artistic imagination.  Here, then, we may recall the visit of Mr. and Mrs. Varden, accompanied by their daughter, the charming Dolly, “the very pink and pattern of good looks, p. 130in a smart little cherry-coloured mantle, with a hood of the same drawn over her head, and, upon the top of that hood, a little straw hat, trimmed with cherry-coloured ribbons, and worn the merest trifle on one side—just enough, in short, to make it the wickedest and most provoking head-dress that ever malicious milliner devised.”

In the same connection The “Bar” of the old “Maypole,” the preparation for dinner, and the kitchen are thus described:—

“All bars are snug places, but the Maypole’s was the very snuggest, cosiest, and completest bar that ever the wit of man devised.  Such amazing bottles in old oaken pigeon-holes; such gleaming tankards dangling from pegs at about the same inclination as thirsty men would hold them to their lips; such sturdy little Dutch kegs ranged in rows on shelves; so many lemons hanging in separate nets, and forming the fragrant grove already mentioned in this chronicle, suggestive, with goodly loaves of snowy sugar stowed away hard by, of punch, idealised beyond all mortal knowledge; such closets, such presses, such drawers full of pipes, such places for putting things away in hollow window seats, all crammed to the throat with eatables, drinkables, or savoury condiments; lastly, and to crown all, as typical of the immense resources of the establishment, and its defiances to all visitors to cut and come again, such a stupendous cheese!

“It is a poor heart that never rejoices—it must have been the poorest, weakest, and most watery heart that ever beat which would not have warmed towards the Maypole bar.  Mrs. Varden’s did directly.  She could no more have reproached John Willet among those household gods, the kegs and bottles, lemons, pipes, and cheese, than she could have stabbed him with his own bright carving-knife.  The order for dinner too—it might have soothed a savage.  ‘A bit of fish,’ said John to the cook, ‘and some lamb chops (breaded, with plenty of ketchup), and a good salad, and a roast spring chicken, with a dish of sausages and mashed potatoes, or something of that sort.’  Something of that sort!  The resources of these inns!  To talk carelessly about dishes which in themselves were a first-rate holiday kind of dinner, suitable to one’s wedding-day, as something of that sort, meaning, if you can’t get a spring chicken, any other trifle in the way of poultry will do—such as a peacock, perhaps!  The kitchen, too, with its great broad cavernous chimney; the kitchen, where nothing in the way of cookery seemed impossible; where you could believe in anything to eat they chose to tell you of.  Mrs. Varden returned from the contemplation of these wonders to the bar again, with a head quite dizzy and bewildered.  Her housekeeping capacity was not large enough to comprehend p. 131them.  She was obliged to go to sleep.  Waking was pain, in the midst of such immensity.”

The Warren, residence of Mr. Haredale and his niece, an old red-brick house, standing in its own grounds, was situated about a mile eastward from the Maypole, and was thence accessible by a path across the fields, from the garden exit of the inn, to its position on the border of Hainault Forest.  (See final paragraph of chapter 19, “Barnaby Rudge.”)  From many suggestions in the book, it occupied, in all probability, the site of Forest House, not a great distance from Chigwell Row; but of this no certainty exists.

Chigwell to Ipswich.  It will be best to return from Buckhurst Hill by rail to Stratford or Liverpool Street, in order to travel by fast main line train, to the good old town of Ipswich, our next destination.  The journey—viâ Chelmsford and Colchester—will occupy about two hours, during which we may recall the memorable occasion of Mr. Pickwick’s excursion per coach from the “Bull Inn,” Whitechapel, to this ancient capital of Suffolk, attended by the faithful Sam, Mr. Weller, senior, driving, and beguiling the tediousness of the way with conversation of considerable interest—“possessing the inestimable charm of blending amusement with instruction.”  Full details will be found on reference to the “Pickwick Papers,” chapter 22, together with the account of Mr. P.’s introduction to his fellow-traveller, Mr. Peter Magnus, “a red-haired man, with an inquisitive nose and blue spectacles.”  On arrival at the station at Ipswich, the wayfarer, crossing by bridge over the Gipping river, may proceed straight onwards through Princes Street (five minutes) to Tavern Street.  Turning to the right, along this thoroughfare, he will soon see the Great White Horse Hotel, on the left side of Tavern Street.  Tramcars from the station pass the hotel; also omnibus meets all trains.  Telegraphic address—Pickwick, Ipswich.  In the chapter before referred to is contained the following description:—

p. 132“In the main street of Ipswich, on the left-hand side of the way, a short distance after you have passed through the open space fronting the Town Hall, stands an inn, known far and wide by the appellation of the Great White Horse, rendered the more conspicuous by a stone statue of some rapacious animal with flowing mane and tail, distinctly resembling an insane cart-horse, which is elevated above the principal door.  The Great White Horse is famous in the neighbourhood in the same degree as a prize ox, or county paper-chronicled turnip, or unwieldy pig—for its enormous size.  Never were such labyrinths of uncarpeted passages, such clusters of mouldy, ill-lighted rooms, such huge numbers of small dens for eating or sleeping in beneath one roof, as are collected together within the four walls of the Great White Horse at Ipswich.”

The Dickensian Rambler will well remember this hotel as the scene of Mr. Pickwick’s “romantic adventure with a middle-aged lady in yellow curl-papers,” related in extenso in the same chapter as above.  Information as to the exact bedroom allotted to Mr. Pickwick on the occasion of his visit to this place is, unfortunately, not afforded by local tradition; but the apartment occupied by “Miss Witherfield,” whose privacy Mr. P. inadvertently, but so unhappily, invaded, is indicated to visitors on the second floor—No. 36, according to recent rearrangement of enumeration, formerly known as No. 6.

Poor Mr. Pickwick, on his escape from his awkward predicament, was unable to find his own room, but was at last rescued from his dilemma by his faithful servitor—

“After groping his way a few paces down the passage, and, to his infinite alarm, stumbling over several pairs of boots in so doing, Mr. Pickwick crouched into a little recess in the wall, to wait for morning as philosophically as he might.

“He was not destined, however, to undergo this additional trial of patience; for he had not been long ensconced in his present concealment when, to his unspeakable horror, a man, bearing a light, appeared at the end of the passage.  His horror was suddenly converted into joy, however, when he recognised the form of his faithful attendant.  It was indeed Mr. Samuel Weller, who after sitting up thus late, in conversation with the Boots, who was sitting up for the mail, was now about to retire to rest.

“‘Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick, suddenly appearing before him, ‘where’s my bedroom?’

p. 133“Mr. Weller stared at his master with the most emphatic surprise; and it was not until the question had been repeated three several times, that he turned round, and led the way to the long-sought apartment.

“‘Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick, as he got into bed.  ‘I have made one of the most extraordinary mistakes to-night that were ever heard of.’

“‘Wery likely, sir,’ said Mr. Weller drily.

“‘But of this I am determined, Sam,’ said Mr. Pickwick, ‘that if I were to stop in this house for six months, I would never trust myself about it alone again.’

“‘That’s the wery prudentest resolution as you could come to, sir,’ replied Mr. Weller.  ‘You rayther want somebody to look arter you, sir, wen your judgment goes out a wisitin’.’”

By way of Upper Brook Street, Tacket Street, and Orwell Place, we come to Fore Street, St. Clement’s (a thoroughfare in which still remain several old houses of the sixteenth century), and soon reach the whereabouts of St. Clement’s Church, towards which, on the morning following the disasters of the night of their arrival, Mr. Samuel Weller bent his steps, and

“endeavoured to dissipate his melancholy by strolling among its ancient precincts.  He had loitered about for some time, when he found himself in a retired spot—a kind of courtyard of venerable appearance—which he discovered had no other outlet than the turning by which he had entered.  He was about retracing his steps, when he was suddenly transfixed to the spot by a sudden appearance; and the mode and manner of this appearance we now proceed to relate.

“Mr. Samuel Weller had been staring up at the old brick houses now and then, in his deep abstraction, bestowing a wink upon some healthy-looking servant girl as she drew up a blind, or threw open a bedroom window, when the green gate at the bottom of the yard opened, and a man having emerged therefrom, closed the green gate very carefully after him, and walked briskly towards the very spot where Mr. Weller was standing.”

This personage proved to be none other than Mr. Job Trotter, whose black hair and mulberry suit were at once recognised by Sam, though their owner did his best to evade detection:—

“As the green gate was closed behind him, and there was no other outlet but the one in front, however, he was not long in perceiving that he must pass Mr. Samuel Weller to get away.  He therefore resumed his brisk pace, and advanced, staring straight before him.  p. 134The most extraordinary thing about the man was, that he was contorting his face into the most fearful and astonishing grimaces that ever were beheld.  Nature’s handiwork never was disguised with such extraordinary artificial carving, as the man had overlaid his countenance with in one moment.”

The Green Gate thus alluded to may yet be seen in a passage or court at the bottom of Angel Lane (leading to Back Street).  It is the last garden gate in the churchyard, a short distance from Church Street.  The same courtyard and gate will be remembered as the official entrance to the Residence of George Nupkins, Esq., the Worshipful Mayor of Ipswich, before whom the Pickwickian party were arraigned, in charge of the redoubtable chief constable of the town.  We read in chapter 25 as follows:—

“Mr. Weller’s anger quickly gave way to curiosity when the procession turned down the identical courtyard in which he had met with the runaway Job Trotter; and curiosity was exchanged for a feeling of the most gleeful astonishment, when the all-important Mr. Grummer, commanding the sedan-bearers to halt, advanced with dignified and portentous steps to the very green gate from which Job Trotter had emerged, and gave a mighty pull at the bell-handle which hung at the side thereof.  The ring was answered by a very smart and pretty-faced servant-girl, who, after holding up her hands in astonishment at the rebellious appearance of the prisoners, and the impassioned language of Mr. Pickwick, summoned Mr. Muzzle.  Mr. Muzzle opened one-half of the carriage gate to admit the sedan, the captured ones, and the specials, and immediately slammed it in the faces of the mob. . . .

“At the foot of a flight of steps, leading to the house door, which was guarded on either side by an American aloe in a green tub, the sedan-chair stopped.  Mr. Pickwick and his friends were conducted into the hall, whence, having been previously announced by Muzzle, and ordered in by Mr. Nupkins, they were ushered into the worshipful presence of that public-spirited officer.”

And we all recollect the resulting exposé of the designs of Mr. Alfred Jingle (alias Captain Fitzmarshall), and the return by Mr. Weller of “Job Trotter’s shuttlecock as heavily as it came.”

It should also be not forgotten that it was at this house Mr. Weller met with his lady-elect, Mary, the Pretty Housemaid (afterwards maid to Mrs. p. 135Winkle), and that here the first passage of first love occurred between them.  For the pleasant narration of the episode, reference should be made to the conclusion of the foregoing chapter:—

“Now, there was nobody in the kitchen but the pretty housemaid; and as Sam’s hat was mislaid, he had to look for it, and the pretty housemaid lighted him.  They had to look all over the place for the hat.  The pretty housemaid, in her anxiety to find it, went down on her knees, and turned over all the things that were heaped together in a little corner by the door.  It was an awkward corner.  You couldn’t get at it without shutting the door first.

“‘Here it is,’ said the pretty housemaid.  ‘This is it, ain’t it?’

“‘Let me look,’ said Sam.

“The pretty housemaid had stood the candle on the floor; as it gave a very dim light, Sam was obliged to go down on his knees before he could see whether it really was his own hat or not.  It was a remarkably small corner, and so—it was nobody’s fault but the man’s who built the house—Sam and the pretty housemaid were necessarily very close together.

“‘Yes, this is it,’ said Sam.  ‘Good-bye!’

“‘Good-bye!’ said the pretty housemaid.

“‘Good-bye!’ said Sam; and as he said it, he dropped the hat that had cost so much trouble in looking for.

“‘How awkward you are,’ said the pretty housemaid.  ‘You’ll lose it again, if you don’t take care.’

“So, just to prevent his losing it again, she put it on for him.

“Whether it was that the pretty housemaid’s face looked prettier still, when it was raised towards Sam’s, or whether it was the accidental consequence of their being so near to each other, is matter of uncertainty to this day; but Sam kissed her.

“‘You don’t mean to say that you did that on purpose,’ said the pretty housemaid, blushing.

“‘No, I didn’t then,’ said Sam; ‘but I will now.’

“So he kissed her again.

“‘Sam!’ said Mr. Pickwick, calling over the banisters.

“‘Coming, sir,’ replied Sam, running upstairs.

“‘How long you have been!’ said Mr. Pickwick.

“‘There was something behind the door, sir, which perwented our getting it open, for ever so long, sir,’ replied Sam.”

Resuming the journey onwards by rail from Ipswich, the route is continued viâ Saxmundham Junction, Halesworth, and Beccles, to the South Town Station at p. 136Great Yarmouth, a well-known and favourite seaside resort, of much interest to the Dickensian Rambler, as being intimately associated with the personal history and experience of David Copperfield.  Visitors are recommended, for reasons hereafter to be seen, to select as their place of sojourn either the “Star Hotel” on the Hall Quay, or the “Angel,” near the market-place.  Any thoroughfare leading eastward from either of these will conduct to the Marine Parade, in full view of the German Ocean.

Towards the southern end of this sea frontage of the town, there may be localised the spot where once stood the Home of Little Emily, “a black barge or some other kind of superannuated boat, high and dry on the ground, with an iron funnel sticking out of it for a chimney.  There was a delightful door cut in the side; it was roofed in, and there were little windows in it.”

The position of this old boat-house, as belonging to Dan’l Peggotty, was at the upper extremity of the South Denes, a flat and grassy expanse—beyond the Wellington Pier and South Battery—in the neighbourhood of the Nelson Column, facing the sea.

In chapter 22 we find a reference to the South Town ferry, crossing the Yare, “to a flat between the river and the sea, Mr. Peggotty’s house being on that waste place, and not a hundred yards out of the track.”

[There is a small wooden erection, more than a mile and a half distant, on the sea-front near Gorleston Pier—between two well-built houses—assuming the name of Peggotty’s Hut; but this is an evident absurdity and misnomer.]

Here, then, we may recall the many interests and incidents connected with the experiences of the Peggotty family, and the sorrowful history of Little Emily, notably the fateful occasion of Steerforth’s First Visit, concerning which David records in chapter 21 of his autobiography, to the following effect:—

“Em’ly, indeed, said little all the evening; but she looked, and listened, and her face got animated, and she was charming.  Steerforth told a story of a dismal shipwreck (which arose out of his talk with Mr. p. 137Peggotty), as if he saw it all before him—and little Em’ly’s eyes were fastened on him all the time, as if she saw it too.  He told us a merry adventure of his own, as a relief to that, with as much gaiety as if the narrative were as fresh to him as it was to us—and little Em’ly laughed until the boat rang with the musical sounds, and we all laughed (Steerforth too), in irresistible sympathy with what was so pleasant and lighthearted.  He got Mr. Peggotty to sing, or rather to roar, ‘When the stormy winds do blow, do blow, do blow;’ and he sang a sailor’s song himself, so pathetically and beautifully, that I could have almost fancied that the real wind creeping sorrowfully round the house, and murmuring low through our unbroken silence, was there to listen.”

Thus commenced the sad story of the poor girl’s fascination and subsequent flight with Steerforth, never more to return to the old home.  In this connection we may recall the graphic and powerful description of the great Storm at Yarmouth, as contained in chapter 55, when Ham met his fate in the gallant attempt to rescue the last survivor of a wrecked and perishing crew, Steerforth himself:—

“They drew him to my very feet—insensible—dead.  He was carried to the nearest house; and, no one preventing me now, I remained near him, busy, while every means of restoration was tried; but he had been beaten to death by the great wave, and his generous heart was stilled for ever.

“As I sat beside the bed, when hope was abandoned and all was done, a fisherman, who had known me when Emily and I were children, and ever since, whispered my name at the door.

“Sir,’ said he, with tears starting to his weather-beaten face, which, with his trembling lips, was ashy pale, ‘will you come over yonder?’

“The old remembrance that had been recalled to me was in his look.  I asked him, terror-stricken, leaning on the arm he held out to support me—

“‘Has a body come ashore?’

“He said, ‘Yes.’

“‘Do I know it?’ I asked then.

“He answered nothing.

“But he led me to the shore.  And on that part of it where she and I had looked for shells, two children—on that part of it where some lighter fragments of the old boat, blown down last night, had been scattered by the wind—among the ruins of the home he had wronged—I saw him lying with his head upon his arm, as I had often seen him lie at school.”

p. 138In the days of Copperfield, Two Coaches ran between Great Yarmouth and London—“The Blue” and “The Royal Mail.”  On the occasion of David’s first journey to his school at Blackheath, he travelled by the former of these, from The Angel Hotel, in the Market Place.  We may here recall his dinner of chops in the coffee-room, at which the “friendly waiter” assisted, helping himself to the lion’s share.

In chapter 5 of his History, David relates the attendant circumstances of this, his second visit to Yarmouth; and how, starting as above from the hotel, his dinner—ordered and paid for in advance—was mainly consumed by proxy, ale included.  We read that the waiter, “a twinkling-eyed, pimple-faced man, with his hair standing upright all over his head,” invited himself to the meal:—

“He took a chop by the bone in one hand, and a potato in the other, and ate away with a very good appetite, to my extreme satisfaction.  He afterwards took another chop, and another potato; and after that another chop and another potato.  When we had done, he brought me a pudding, and having set it before me, seemed to ruminate, and to become absent in his mind for some moments.

“‘How’s the pie?’ he said, rousing himself.

“‘It’s a pudding,’ I made answer.

“‘Pudding!’ he exclaimed.  ‘Why, bless me, so it is!  What!’ looking at it nearer.  ‘You don’t mean to say it’s a batter-pudding?’

“‘Yes, it is indeed.’

“‘Why, a batter-pudding,’ he said, taking up a table-spoon, ‘is my favourite pudding.  Ain’t that lucky?  Come on, little ’un, and let’s see who’ll get most.’

“The waiter certainly got most.  He entreated me more than once to come in and win, but what with his table-spoon to my tea-spoon, his despatch to my despatch, and his appetite to my appetite, I was left far behind at the first mouthful, and had no chance with him.  I never saw any one enjoy a pudding so much, I think; and he laughed, when it was all gone, as if his enjoyment of it lasted still.”

On his return journey from London, we find him coming down by “The Mail,” which stopped at The Star Hotel, on the Hall Quay, where the bedchamber, “The Dolphin,” was assigned for his accommodation.  He and his friend Steerforth, in after visits, p. 139frequently adopted this “Royal Mail” conveyance, making headquarters at the “Star Hotel.”

The “volatile” Miss Mowcher is first introduced to us at this establishment.

In chapter 22 we have the full account of David’s visit to Yarmouth in company with Steerforth.  They “stayed for more than a fortnight in that part of the country,” during which time Littimer, being in attendance one evening at this hotel during dinner, informed them that Miss Mowcher was making one of her professional visits to the town, and desired an opportunity of waiting on his master.  David says:—

“I remained, therefore, in a state of considerable expectation until the cloth had been removed some half-an-hour, and we were sitting over our decanter of wine before the fire, when the door opened, and Littimer, with his habitual serenity quite undisturbed, announced:

“‘Miss Mowcher!’

“I looked at the doorway and saw nothing.  I was still looking at the doorway, thinking that Miss Mowcher was a long while making her appearance, when, to my infinite astonishment, there came waddling round a sofa which stood between me and it, a pursy dwarf, of about forty or forty-five, with a very large head and face, a pair of roguish grey eyes, and such extremely little arms, that, to enable herself to lay a finger archly against her snub nose as she ogled Steerforth, she was obliged to meet the finger half-way, and lay her nose against it.  Her chin, which was what is called a double-chin, was so fat that it entirely swallowed up the strings of her bonnet, bow and all.  Throat she had none; waist she had none; legs she had none, worth mentioning; for though she was more than full-sized down to where her waist would have been, if she had had any, and though she terminated, as human beings generally do, in a pair of feet, she was so short that she stood at a common-sized chair as at a table, resting a bag she carried on the seat.”

Sites Unlocalised.  At this distance of time it is impossible to indicate the locality of “The Willing Mind”—patronised by Mr. Peggotty—the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Barkis, or the establishment of Messrs Omer and Joram.  The last is described as being “in a narrow street,” and should be doubtless looked for in the older part of the town.

p. 140Blundeston, the birthplace of Copperfield, may be visited from Somerleyton Station, on the line between Yarmouth and Lowestoft.  The village, with its round-towered church, is situated about four miles eastward from the railway.  The house indicated in the novel as Blunderstone Rookery stands next the church.  The excursion could include, en route, a visit to Somerleyton Park, open to the public on Wednesdays.

p. 141RAMBLE X
London to Dorking and Portsmouth

Nicholas Nickleby and Smike on their travels—Excursion by Coach, “The Perseverance”—Route to Dorking—Residence of Mr. and Mrs. Tony Weller—The “Marquis of Granby”—The Rev. Mr. Stiggins and his “pertickler vanity”—The downfall of Stiggins—The old Horse-trough—Dorking to Portsmouth—Parentage of Dickens—Registration of Charles John Huffham Dickens—Birthplace of Dickens—The Theatre-Royal—The Old Theatre—Unlocalised Localities—Portsmouth to London—Westminster Abbey—Tomb of Dickens—His Funeral as reported by the Daily News, June 1870—Poetical Tribute—The future Outlook.

In the early days of the present century, Nicholas Nickleby leaving London with Smike, bound for Portsmouth, took the high road viâ Kingston and Godalming (with a view, en passant, of the Devil’s Punch-bowl); walking steadily onward until arrival, on their second day’s march, at a roadside inn—probably in the neighbourhood of Horndean.  Here they met with Mr. Vincent Crummles, of histrionic fame, and ended their more immediate perplexities by an engagement with that gentleman.  There was no railway communication in those times, and coach fare was expensive; but now-a-days we have adopted a cheaper and more speedy means of transit, and may reach Portsmouth from London quickly, by two lines of railroad.

As, in the following excursion, it is proposed to make an intermediate visit en route to the residence (once on a time) of Mr. and Mrs. Tony Weller, a journey by coach is recommended to Dorking, as affording a suitable compliment to Mr. Weller’s memory and profession.  A delightful journey may thus be made by “The Perseverance” coach, which starts every week-day during the season, p. 142from Northumberland Avenue, at 10.45 a.m., and travels four-in-hand, viâ Roehampton, Kingston, Surbiton, Epsom, Leatherhead, Mickleham, and Boxhill, and arrives at Dorking, in time for luncheon at the “White Horse Hotel,” at which the coach stops.

The interest of this country town centres, for Pickwickian readers, in the “Marquis of Granby,” once an inn.  It exists no longer as such, having been long since converted into a grocer’s establishment.  It will be found in the High Street, opposite the Post Office, at the side of Chequers’ Court, which runs between it and the London and County Bank.  The old sign-board, the cosy bar, with its store of choice wines and pine-apple rum (Mr. Stiggins’s “pertickler vanity”), and the horse-trough in which the reverend gentleman was half drowned by the irate Weller, senior, are now among the things that are not; but the old house still remains in situ, altered to the uses of its present occupancy.

In chapter 27 of the Pickwick records we read of Sam’s first pilgrimage to Dorking, on which occasion he paid his filial respects to his mother-in-law, the rather stout lady of comfortable appearance, who conducted the business of the house; and made his acquaintance with the Rev. Mr. Stiggins of saintly memory.  The description of the establishment is given as follows:—

“The ‘Marquis of Granby’ in Mrs. Weller’s time was quite a model of a roadside public-house of the better class—just large enough to be convenient, and small enough to be snug.  On the opposite side of the road was a large sign-board on a high post, representing the head and shoulders of a gentleman with an apoplectic countenance, in a red coat with deep-blue facings, and a touch of the same blue over his three-cornered hat, for a sky.  Over that again were a pair of flags; beneath the last button of his coat were a couple of cannon; and the whole formed an expressive and undoubted likeness of the Marquis of Granby of glorious memory.

“The bar window displayed a choice collection of geranium plants, and a well-dusted row of spirit phials.  The open shutters bore a variety of golden inscriptions, eulogistic of good beds and neat wines; and the choice group of countrymen and hostlers lounging about the stable-door and horse-trough, afforded presumptive proof of the excellent p. 143quality of the ale and spirits which were sold within.  Sam Weller paused, when he dismounted from the coach, to note all these little indications of a thriving business, with the eye of an experienced traveller; and having done so, stepped in at once, highly satisfied with everything he had observed.”

Mr. Stiggins, the clerical friend and spiritual adviser of the worthy hostess, having fully ingratiated himself in her good graces, was in the habit of making himself very much at home at “The Marquis”; greatly appreciating the creature comforts there obtainable, and the good liquors kept in stock.  In point of fact, knowing when he was well off, he lived well—if not wisely—on Mrs. Weller’s hospitable bounty, and made headquarters at this Dorking inn.  On the occasion of Sam’s first visit before referred to—in chapter 27, as above—this estimable character is thus introduced to the notice of Pickwickian students:—

“He was a prim-faced, red-nosed man, with a long, thin countenance, and a semi-rattlesnake sort of eye—rather sharp, but decidedly bad.  He wore very short trousers, and black-cotton stockings, which, like the rest of his apparel, were particularly rusty.  His looks were starched, but his white neckerchief was not, and its long limp ends straggled over his closely-buttoned waistcoat in a very uncouth and unpicturesque fashion.”

“The fire was blazing brightly under the influence of the bellows, and the kettle was singing gaily under the influence of both.  A small tray of tea things was arranged on the table, a plate of hot buttered toast was gently simmering before the fire, and the red-nosed man himself was busily engaged in converting a large slice of bread into the same agreeable edible, through the instrumentality of a long brass toasting-fork.  Beside him stood a glass of reeking hot pine-apple rum and water, with a slice of lemon in it; and every time the red-nosed man stopped to bring the round of toast to his eye, with the view of ascertaining how it got on, he imbibed a drop or two of the hot pine-apple rum and water, and smiled upon the rather stout lady, as she blew the fire.”

The downfall of Stiggins.  The season of his prosperity came to a sad ending after the demise of his patroness; and in chapter 52 we read of his reverse of fortune, and the final congé given to the reverend gentleman by the irate Mr. Weller, senior, who dismissed him from his p. 144household chaplaincy, in a manner more peremptory than pleasant:—

“He walked softly into the bar, and presently returning with the tumbler half full of pine-apple rum, advanced to the kettle which was singing gaily on the hob, mixed his grog, stirred it, sipped it, sat down, and taking a long and hearty pull at the rum and water, stopped for breath.

“The elder Mr. Weller, who still continued to make various strange and uncouth attempts to appear asleep, offered not a single word during these proceedings; but when Stiggins stopped for breath, he darted upon him, and snatching the tumbler from his hand, threw the remainder of the rum and water in his face, and the glass itself into the grate.  Then, seizing the reverend gentleman firmly by the collar, he suddenly fell to kicking him most furiously, accompanying every application of his top-boots to Mr. Stiggins’s person, with sundry violent and incoherent anathemas upon his limbs, eyes, and body.

“‘Sammy,’ said Mr. Weller, ‘put my hat on tight for me.’

“Sam dutifully adjusted the hat with the long hatband more firmly on his father’s head, and the old gentleman, resuming his kicking with greater agility than before, tumbled with Mr. Stiggins through the bar, and through the passage, out at the front door, and so into the street; the kicking continuing the whole way, and increasing in vehemence, rather than diminishing, every time the top-boot was lifted.

“It was a beautiful and exhilarating sight to see the red-nosed man writhing in Mr. Weller’s grasp, and his whole frame quivering with anguish as kick followed kick in rapid succession; it was a still more exciting spectacle to behold Mr. Weller, after a powerful struggle, immersing Mr. Stiggins’s head in a horse-trough full of water, and holding it there until he was half-suffocated.”

The old horse-trough, as depicted by “Phiz” in the original illustrated title-page of the book, has long since given place to local alteration and improvement; but “hereabouts it stood.”

There are many pleasant and humorous associations connected with this old place of country entertainment, as duly set forth in the Pickwick annals; but it should be remembered that many years have passed since their publication (1837), and that men and manners have greatly changed and bettered.  It is satisfactory to reflect that Mr. Stiggins and his brethren have altogether become obsolete p. 145in English middle-class society, and that the protest so embodied sixty years since is no longer necessary.  In these happier days, earnestness and ability have, in the main, superseded laziness and cant.

Dorking to Portsmouth.  The journey being resumed by railway, we travel southward and westward through the pleasant fields and pasture lands of Sussex, viâ Horsham and Chichester, to the old town of Portsmouth, where, in Landport, Portsea, Charles Dickens was born, on Friday, the 7th of February 1812.  He was the second son (in a family of eight, six surviving infancy) of Mr. John Dickens, a clerk in the Navy Pay Office at the Dockyard.  The name of his mother, previous to her marriage, was Elizabeth Barrow.  The baptismal record at Portsea registers him as Charles John Huffham Dickens, but he very seldom used any other signature than the one with which we are all familiar.  On arrival at the Portsmouth town station, we leave the railway, turning to the right, and proceed onwards, in the main thoroughfare of Commercial Road.  Thus we shortly reach, in due course, The Birthplace of Dickens.  The house (No. 387 Commercial Road, Landport) stands about half a mile northward (to the right) from the railway station, with a neat forecourt.  It bears a tablet recording date of the event, as above.

South of the station (leftward), beyond the Town Hall, will be found, on the right, The Theatre Royal; but it should be noted that this is not the establishment referred to in “Nicholas Nickleby.”

That old theatre, at which Nicholas—adopting the professional alias of “Johnson”—made his histrionic début under the managerial auspices of Mr. Vincent Crummles, occupied, some eighty years since, the present site of The Cambridge Barracks, in the High Street, farther onwards.

We read in the same book that the Crummles family resided at the house of one Bulph, a pilot; that Miss Snevellicci had lodgings in Lombard Street, at the house of p. 146a tailor, where also Mr. and Mrs. Lillyvick found temporary accommodation; and that Nicholas and Smike lived in two small rooms, up three pair of stairs, at a tobacconist’s shop, on the Common Hard.  But it is not possible to particularise these places; indeed, it is altogether doubtful whether they had any special assignment in the mind of the author himself.

Leaving Portsmouth, at convenience, by the Brighton and South Coast Railway, we may take the return journey to London in about three hours, arriving at the West End Terminus of the line, Victoria Station.  From this point we may revisit, viâ Victoria Street, about half a mile in distance, Westminster Abbey, containing the Tomb of Dickens, which will be found in the classic shade of the Poets’ Corner.  At the time of his death the Times “took the lead in suggesting that the only fit resting-place for the remains of a man so dear to England was the Abbey, in which most illustrious Englishmen are laid;” and accordingly, on the 14th of June, the funeral took place, with a strict observance of privacy.  In Dean Stanley’s “Westminster Abbey” the following statement is given:—

“Close under the bust of Thackeray lies Charles Dickens, not, it may be, his equal in humour, but more than his equal in his hold on the popular mind, as was shown in the intense and general enthusiasm shown at his grave.  The funeral, according to Dickens’s urgent and express desire in his will, was strictly private.  It took place at an early hour in the summer morning, the grave having been dug in secret the night before; and the vast solitary space of the Abbey was occupied only by the small band of mourners, and the Abbey clergy, who, without any music except the occasional peal of the organ, read the funeral service.  For days the spot was visited by thousands; many were the flowers strewn upon it by unknown hands; many were the tears shed by the poorer visitors.  He rests beside Sheridan, Garrick, and Henderson.”

The plain stone covering the tomb is inscribed

CHARLES DICKENS,

Born February 7th, 1812.    Died June 9th, 1870.

p. 147Report of the Funeral, as published in the Daily News, June 15th, 1870:—“Charles Dickens lies, without one of his injunctions respecting his funeral having been violated, surrounded by poets and men of genius.  Shakespeare’s marble effigy looked yesterday into his open grave; at his feet are Dr. Johnson and David Garrick; his head is by Addison and Handel; while Oliver Goldsmith, Rowe, Southey, Campbell, Thomson, Sheridan, Macaulay, and Thackeray, or their memorials, encircle him; and ‘Poets’ Corner,’ the most familiar spot in the whole Abbey, has thus received an illustrious addition to its peculiar glory. . . .  Dickens’s obsequies were as simple as he desired.  The news that a special train left Rochester at an early hour yesterday morning, and that it carried his remains, was soon telegraphed to London; but every arrangement had been completed beforehand, and there was no one in the Abbey; no one to follow the three simple mourning coaches and the hearse; no one to obtrude upon the mourners.  The waiting-room at Charing Cross Station was set apart for the latter for the quarter of an hour they remained there; the Abbey doors were closed directly they reached it; and even the mourning coaches were not permitted to wait.  A couple of street cabs and a single brougham took the funeral party away when the last solemn rites were over, so that passers-by were unaware that any ceremony was being conducted; and it was not until a good hour after that the south transept began to fill.  There were no cloaks, no weepers, no bands, no scarfs, no feathers, none of the dismal frippery of the undertaker.  We yesterday bade the reader turn to that portion of ‘Great Expectations,’ in which the funeral of Joe Gargery’s wife is described; he will there find full details of the miserable things omitted.  In the same part of the same volume he will find reverent allusion to the time when ‘those noble passages are read which remind humanity how it brought nothing into the world and can take nothing out, and how it fleeth like a shadow, and never continueth long in one stay;’ and will think of the solemn scene in Westminster p. 148Abbey, with the Dean reading our solemn burial service, the organ chiming in, subdued and low, and the vast place empty, save for the little group of heart-stricken people by an open grave; a plain oak coffin, with a brass plate bearing the inscription:—

‘CHARLES DICKENS,

Born February 7th, 1812,

Died June 9th, 1870’;

a coffin strewed with wreaths and flowers by the female mourners; and then dust to dust and ashes to ashes!  Such was the funeral of the great man who has gone.  In coming to the Abbey, in the first coach were the late Mr. Dickens’s children—Mr. Charles Dickens, jun., Mr. Harry Dickens, Miss Dickens, Mrs. Charles Collins.  In the second coach were Mrs. Austin, his sister; Mrs. Charles Dickens, jun.; Miss Hogarth, his sister-in-law; Mr. John Forster.  In the third coach Mr. Frank Beard, his medical attendant; Mr. Charles Collins, his son-in-law; Mr. Dewey, his solicitor; Mr. Wilkie Collins; Mr. Edmund Dickens, his nephew.

“By the orders of the Dean of Westminster, the officials were instructed to keep the grave open until six o’clock last evening, and all who came had the melancholy satisfaction of seeing not only the grave itself, but the polished oak coffin which contained the remains of the lamented deceased.  A raised platform was placed around the grave, and two of the vergers of the Abbey were in attendance to prevent crowding and preserve order, an almost unnecessary precaution, for all who came, comprising persons of various classes, conducted themselves in the most exemplary manner.  In the afternoon, when the fact of the interment became generally known, and that the coffin was to be seen, the crowds arriving at the Abbey became very great, and between twelve and six o’clock many thousands of persons had been present.  Large numbers paid a simple tribute to the memory of the deceased by throwing the flowers p. 149they wore in their coat or dress on to the coffin, until, towards the close of the afternoon, it was completely covered with these simplest offerings of public affection.”

The following Poetical Tribute, in Memoriam, was, at that sad time, contributed to the public Press, and is worthy of remembrance:—

“The Artist sleeps, yet friends are here he gave
   The fair dream-children that his fancy drew;
A phantom crowd still gathers at his grave,
   And in each character he lives anew.

“Soft winds of summer breathe along the fane,
   The honoured sepulchre where Dickens lies;
An Emigravit write we in our pain—
   He is not dead—the artist never dies.

“The statesman wins the mantle of a peer,
   The warrior boasts all titles of renown;
We leave one laurel only on his bier,
   And England’s love is greater than a crown.”

   “S. C.”

So long as the art of printing remains in Society, and the powers of affection, appreciation, and sympathy survive in the hearts of Anglo-Saxons—of the Old World or the New—the name and fame of Charles Dickens will be ever held fresh and green amongst us.  And, through the coming summer-dawn of time—amidst the destined agencies slowly evolving the brighter omens of the future—his genius shall remain co-operant.  For, let us rest assured that “the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns”; that the wheel of time is rolling, surely for an end; and that all worthy labour in the cause of human progress shall become Immortal, as it helps to make the world purer, gentler, and more Christian; and hastens onwards the fulfilment of its nobler destiny.

p. 150APPENDIX

“The Pickwick Papers”; Mrs. Bardell’s House—The Spaniards’ Inn [Wellington Academy].  “Oliver Twist”; Mr. Brownlow’s Residence—Fagin and Bill Sykes.  “Nicholas Nickleby”; The London Tavern—Mrs. Nickleby and Kate in Thames Street—Mortimer Knag’s Library—General Agency Office—Messrs. Cheeryble Brothers—Residence of Mrs. Wititterly.  “Barnaby Rudge”; The Golden Key—Cellar of Mr. Stagg—The Black Lion Tavern.  “Martin Chuzzlewit”; Anthony Chuzzlewit and Son—Montague Tigg, Esq., Pall Mall—Tom Pinch and Ruth at Islington.  “Dombey & Son”; Polly Toodles at Staggs Gardens—Miss Tox and Major Bagstock, Princess Place—Mrs. MacStinger and Captain Cuttle, No. 9 Brig Place.  “David Copperfield”; Mr. Creakle’s Establishment, Salem House—The Micawber family—Residence of Mrs. Steerforth—Doctor and Mrs. Strong—Mr. and Mrs. D. Copperfield—Mr. Traddles’s lodgings.  “Bleak House”; Addresses of Mr. Guppy and his Mother—Apartments of Mr. Jarndyce—Mr. and Mrs. Smallweed, Mount Pleasant—George’s Shooting Gallery—Mr. and Mrs. Bagnet—Harold Skimpole and family.  “Little Dorrit”; The House of Mrs. Clennam—Residence of Mr. Tite Barnacle—The Patriarchal Casby.  “Tale of Two Cities”; Old Church of St. Pancras in the Fields.  “Great Expectations”; Private Residence of Mr. Jaggers—Wemmick’s Castle, Walworth—Mr. Barley, alias old Gruff-and-Glum.  “Our Mutual Friend”; Gaffer Hexam’s House—The Six Jolly Fellowship Porters—Rogue Riderhood and his Daughter—Mr. Twemlow’s Lodgings—The Veneerings and the Podsnaps—Boffin’s Bower.—Mr. R. Wilfer’s Residence—Establishment of Mr. Venus.  “Mystery of Edwin Drood”; The Opium Smokers’ Den.

The various localities referred to in the foregoing Rambles comprise all the more interesting and better-known points which the Reader of Dickens would most naturally desire to visit.  In addition to these, however, there are several places mentioned in the many works p. 151of “The inimitable Boz” which may be enumerated, but cannot for the following reasons be included in such specified routes:—

(1) Neighbourhoods have, in course of years, altogether changed, making it extremely difficult (in many cases impossible) to specify with exactitude the former situation of old houses, which have long become part and parcel of the forgotten past, “lost to sight” and now only “to memory dear.”

(2) The indications given in the various tales have, in some cases, been purposely rendered vague and uncertain; it being the evident aim of the author to avoid precision, and to afford no definite clue to the position of many places named.

(3) Some of the localities specified are situated at a considerable distance from any main line of route, and can be visited only by separate excursion specially undertaken for the purpose.

In the following addendum these uncertain or distant addresses are given under the headings of those books in which they respectively occur; in order that Ramblers, if so disposed, may—in the words of Mr. Peggotty—“fisherate” for themselves.

THE PICKWICK PAPERS.

Mrs. Bardell’s House was located in Goswell Street, certainly in a central position; for we read that, as Mr. Pickwick looked from his chamber-window on the world beneath,

“Goswell Street was at his feet, Goswell Street was on his right hand, as far as the eye could reach, Goswell Street extended on his left, and the opposite side of Goswell Street was over the way.”

The “Spaniards’ Inn” at Hampstead may be remembered as the scene of the tea-party at which Mrs. Bardell and a few select friends enjoyed themselves, previous to her unexpected arrest and removal to the Fleet Prison, at the suit of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg.  There still exists the “Spaniards” at Heath End, Hampstead Heath.

p. 152[Visitors to Hampstead may be disposed to visit the site once occupied by Mr. Jones’s School, called the “Wellington Academy,” at which Dickens received some two years’ technical education; being a little over fourteen years old when he left.  The house is now in possession of the Inland Revenue Office, at the corner of Granby Street, 247 Hampstead Road; part of the premises abutting on the London and North-Western Railway, the formation of which demolished the old schoolroom and playground.]

OLIVER TWIST.

Mr. Brownlow’s Residence, in “a quiet shady street near Pentonville,” cannot he fairly localised.  In the days of “Oliver Twist,” Mr. George Cruikshank, the illustrator of the book, lived at Myddelton Terrace, Pentonville; and possibly Dickens bethought himself of this vicinity in consequence.

Fagin’s House in Whitechapel and the residence of Bill Sykes cannot, with any fairness, be accurately indicated.  The latter is spoken of as being in “one of a maze of mean and dirty streets, which abound in the close and densely populated quarter of Bethnal Green.”

NICHOLAS NICKLEBY.

The London Tavern, at which was held the Meeting in promotion of “The United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company,” once (many years since) occupied the site of the Royal Bank of Scotland, 123 Bishopsgate Street Within, on the left hand entering the street from Cornhill.

Mrs. Nickleby and her daughter Kate lived, per favour of their amiable relative, in Thames Street.  This business thoroughfare has undergone considerable reconstruction since the days of their tenancy, and the particular dwelling intended cannot be identified.  The place is described as a “large, old dingy house, the doors and windows of which were so bespattered with mud that it would have appeared to have been uninhabited for years.”

p. 153Mr. Mortimer Knag kept a small circulating library “in a by-street off Tottenham Court Road,” where also lived his sister, Miss Knag, the presiding genius of Madame Mantalini’s establishment; and we may remember the evening when Mrs. Nickleby and Kate were graciously invited to supper at this abode of literary genius.

The General Agency Office, at which Nicholas Nickleby obtained the address of Mr. Gregsbury, M.P., Manchester Buildings, Westminster (also one of the lost localities of London), and where he first met Madeline Bray, has no specified direction in the book.  There have been few such agencies existent in a central position in London.

Messrs. Cheeryble Brothers had their place of business in a small City square.  “Passing along Threadneedle Street, and through some lanes and passages on the right,” we read that Nicholas was conducted by Mr. Charles Cheeryble to the place in occupation of the firm—

“The City square has no enclosure, save the lamp-post in the middle, and no grass but the weeds which spring up around its base.  It is a quiet, little-frequented, retired spot, favourable to melancholy and contemplation, and appointments of long waiting. . . .  In winter-time the snow will linger there long after it has melted from the busy streets and highways.  The summer’s sun holds it in some respect, and while he darts his cheerful rays sparingly into the square, keeps his fiery heat and glare for noisier and less imposing precincts.  It is so quiet, that you can almost hear the ticking of your own watch, when you stop to cool in its refreshing atmosphere.  There is a distant hum—of coaches, not of insects—but no other sound disturbs the stillness of the square.”

The Residence of Mrs. Wititterly is referred to as having been pleasantly situated in Cadogan Place, Sloane Street—

“Cadogan Place is the one slight bond which joins two extremities; it is the connecting link between the aristocratic pavements of Belgrave Square and the barbarism of Chelsea.  It is in Sloane Street, but not of it.  The people of Cadogan Place look down upon Sloane Street, and think Brompton low.  They affect fashion, too, and wonder where the New Road is.  Not that they claim to be on precisely the same footing as the high folks of Belgrave Square and Grosvenor Place, but that they stand, in reference to them, rather in the light of those illegitimate p. 154children of the great, who are content to boast of their connexions, although their connexions disavow them.”

BARNABY RUDGE.

“The Golden Key”—the house of honest Gabriel Varden, the locksmith—was in Clerkenwell, situated in a quiet street not far from the Charter House—

“A modest building, not very straight, not large, not tall, not bold-faced, with great staring windows, but a shy, blinking house, with a conical roof going up into a peak over its garret window of four small panes of glass, like a cocked hat on the head of an elderly gentleman with one eye.  It was not built of brick, or lofty stone, but of wood and plaster; it was not planned with a dull and wearisome regard to regularity, for no one window matched the other, or seemed to have the slightest reference to anything beside itself.”

This was its description one hundred years ago, and its exact whereabouts cannot now be ascertained.  There are some old plaster-fronted houses, evidently belonging to the last century, still to be found in Albemarle Street, near St. John’s Square, but none of these fairly correspond with the description of “The Golden Key.”

The Cellar of Mr. Stagg was situated in Barbican.  We read that its position was “in one of the narrowest of the narrow streets which diverge from that centre, in a blind court or yard, profoundly dark, unpaved, and reeking with stagnant odours.”

“The Black Lion” Tavern can only be identified as being situated in Whitechapel.  It was a favourite resort of Mr. John Willett, landlord of the “Maypole Inn” at Chigwell, when he came to town; and we may remember it as the scene of Dolly Varden’s satisfactory interview with her lover Joe, after his return from “the Salwanners.”

MARTIN CHUZZLEWIT.

Anthony Chuzzlewit and Son had their place of business near Aldersgate Street.  Their dreary residence was the bridal home of Mercy Pecksniff—married by Jonas Chuzzlewit—and we may recollect her reception at this establishment by the worthy Sairey Gamp.  To this house Jonas p. 155returned after the murder of Montague Tigg, and was here arrested by his relative Chevy Slyme, in the presence of his uncle and Mark Tapley.  Its situation is described as being in

“A very narrow street, somewhere behind the Post Office, where every house was in the brightest summer morning very gloomy; and where light porters watered the pavement, each before his own employer’s premises, in fantastic patterns in the dog-days; and where spruce gentlemen, with their hands in the pockets of symmetrical trousers, were always to be seen in warm weather contemplating their undeniable boots in dusty warehouse doorways, which appeared to be the hardest work they did, except now and then carrying pens behind their ears.”

Montague Tigg, Esq., the Chairman of the Anglo-Bengalee Insurance Company, lived in luxurious chambers in Pall Mall; and we may remember the morning when Jonas Chuzzlewit called at the residence of his chief, and was disagreeably surprised to find his friend in full possession of his secret history—with Mr. Nadgett in attendance.

Tom Pinch and his sister Ruth lodged at “Merry Islington,” “in a singular little old-fashioned house, up a blind street,” where they were accommodated with two small bedrooms and a triangular parlour, the householder being the inscrutable Mr. Nadgett.  In “Martin Chuzzlewit” are contained many pleasant episodes associated with these modest apartments; where, as we all know, little Ruth made her first culinary experiment, and was pleasantly surprised the next morning to find the merry present of a cookery-book awaiting her in the parlour (sent by John Westlock), with the beefsteak pudding leaf turned down and blotted out.

DOMBEY AND SON.

Polly Toodles (otherwise Richards) lived with her husband and her “apple-faced” family, at Stagg’s Gardens, Camden Town, at the time when the London and North-Western Railway was in course of construction—

“As yet the neighbourhood was shy to own the railroad.  One or two bold speculators had projected streets, and one had built a little, p. 156but had stopped among the mud and ashes to consider further of it.  A bran new tavern, redolent of fresh mortar and size, and fronting nothing at all, had taken for its sign the ‘Railway Arms;’ but that might be rash enterprise—and then it hoped to sell drink to the workmen.  So the Excavators’ house of Call had sprung up from a beer-shop, and the old-established Ham and Beef Shop had become the Railway Eating House, with a roast leg of pork daily, through interested motives of a similar immediate and popular description.”

In a later chapter of “Dombey” we read of Stagg’s Gardens having vanished from the earth—

“Where the old rotten summer-houses once had stood, palaces now reared their heads, and granite columns of gigantic girth opened a vista to the railway world beyond.  The miserable waste ground, where the refuse matter had been heaped of yore, was swallowed up and gone, and in its frowzy stead were tiers of warehouses, crammed with rich goods and costly merchandise.  The old bye-streets now swarmed with passengers and vehicles of every kind: the new streets that had stopped disheartened in the mud and waggon-ruts, formed towns within themselves, originating wholesome comforts and conveniences belonging to themselves, and never tried nor thought of until they sprung into existence.”

Miss Lucretia Tox had apartments at Princess Place, an address not included in the London Directory; and Major Bagstock also had chambers in the immediate vicinity, a genteel but somewhat inconvenient neighbourhood.  Miss Tox’s residence is described as

“A dark little house, that had been squeezed at some remote period of English history into a fashionable neighbourhood at the west end of the town, where it stood in the shade, like a poor relation of the great street round the corner, coldly looked down upon by mighty mansions.  It was not exactly in a court, and it was not exactly in a yard, but it was in the dullest of No-Thoroughfares, rendered anxious and haggard by double knocks. . . .  There is a smack of stabling in the air of Princess Place, and Miss Tox’s bedroom (which was at the back) commanded a vista of mews, where hostlers, at whatever sort of work engaged, were continually accompanying themselves with effervescent noises, and where the most domestic and confidential garments of coachmen and their wives and families usually hung like Macbeth’s banners on the outer walls.”

Mrs. MacStinger presided at No. 9 Brig Place, finding accommodation for Captain Cuttle as her first floor lodger, p. 157previous to the time of his hurried and secret removal to the quarters of The Wooden Midshipman.  We read that the house was situated

“On the brink of a little canal near the India Docks, where the air was perfumed with chips, and all other trades were swallowed up in mast, oar, and block making, and boat building.  Then the ground grew marshy and unsettled.  Then there was nothing to be smelt but rum and sugar.  Then Captain Cuttle’s lodgings, at once a first floor and a top storey, in Brig Place, were close before you.”

DAVID COPPERFIELD.

Mr. Creakle’s educational establishment, “Salem House,” was, we are told, “down by Blackheath.”  A large, dull house, standing away from the main road among some dark trees, and surrounded by a high wall.  The character of Mr. Creakle seems to have been drawn from life; being, in fact, a portrait of the proprietor of the “Wellington Academy,” Hampstead Road, previously referred to.  Dr. Danson, an old schoolfellow of Dickens, writing to Mr. Forster, states that this “Mr. Jones was a Welshman, a most ignorant fellow, and a mere tyrant, whose chief employment was to scourge the boys.”  Also, Mr. Forster, speaking of the school, says, “it had supplied some of the lighter traits of Salem House for ‘Copperfield.’”

Mr. Micawber lived in Windsor Terrace, City Road, at the time he first received young David Copperfield as a lodger, and previous to the crisis in his pecuniary affairs which removed him to King’s Bench Prison in the Borough.

We also read, later in the book, of the Micawbers as located in a little street near The Veterinary College, Camden Town, what time Mr. Traddles was their lodger; and we may remember how the astute Mr. Micawber took advantage of the circumstance, by obtaining the friendly signature of his inmate as security, in the matter of two bills “not provided for.”

Mrs. Steerforth resided in “an old brick house at Highgate, on the summit of the hill; a genteel, old-fashioned house, very quiet, and very orderly,” from which position a p. 158comprehensive view was obtainable of “all London lying in the distance like a great vapour, with here and there some lights twinkling through it.”  In connection with this house we may recall the characters of Rosa Dartle and the respectable serving-man Littimer.

Doctor and Mrs. Strong also lived in a cottage at Highgate after their removal from Canterbury; and Mr. and Mrs. David Copperfield resided in the same neighbourhood, with Betsy Trotwood established in a convenient cottage near at hand.

Mr. Traddles, in his bachelor days, had lodgings behind the parapet of a house in Castle Street, Holborn.  This thoroughfare has now changed its name, and is known as Furnival Street.  It may be found on the south side of Holborn, and west of Fetter Lane, leading to Cursitor Street.

BLEAK HOUSE.

Mr. Guppy mentioned his address as 87 Penton Place, Pentonville; but the London Directory does not now include the number specified.  The residence of Mrs. Guppy, his mother, is stated as having been 302 Old Street Road; previous to the time when a house was taken (by mother and son) in Walcot Square, Lambeth, on the south side of the Thames, and Mr. Guppy started on his independent professional career.

Mr. Jarndyce once sojourned in London, “at a cheerful lodging near Oxford Street, over an upholsterer’s shop,” at which also Ada Clare and Esther Summerson were accommodated.

Mr. and Mrs. Smallweed vegetated, with their grandchildren, “in a rather ill-favoured and ill-savoured neighbourhood, though one of its rising grounds bears the name of Mount Pleasant.”  This beatific neighbourhood will be found north of Clerkenwell Road (approached by Laystall Street), in the neighbourhood of the Middlesex House of Correction.

George’s Shooting Gallery is memorable as the place p. 159where Gridley—“the man from Shropshire”—died; where also Poor Jo, clinging to the spars of the Lord’s Prayer, drifted out upon the unknown sea.  It is described as “a great brick building, composed of bare walls, floors, roof-rafters, and skylights; on the front of which was painted ‘George’s Shooting Gallery.’”  Its location is given as being up a court and a long whitewashed passage, in

“That curious region lying about the Haymarket and Leicester Square, which is a centre of attraction to indifferent foreign hotels and indifferent foreigners, racket courts, fighting men, swordsmen, foot-guards, old china, gambling-houses, exhibitions, and a large medley of shabbiness and shrinking out of sight.”

Mr. Bagnet and his “old girl” kept house and home on the Surrey side of the river; but no more precise indication of their whereabouts is given than is contained in the following reference:—

“By Blackfriars’ Bridge, and Blackfriars’ Road, Mr. George sedately marches to a street of little shops lying somewhere in that ganglion of roads from Kent and Surrey, and of streets from the bridges of London, centreing in the far-famed Elephant who has lost his castle.”

The Town House of Sir Leicester and Lady Dedlock was situated in a dull aristocratic street in the western district of London,

“Where the two long rows of houses stare at each other with that severity, that half-a-dozen of its greatest mansions seem to have been slowly stared into stone, rather than originally built in that material.  It is a street of such dismal grandeur, so determined not to condescend to liveliness, that the doors and windows hold a gloomy state of their own in black paint and dust, and the echoing mews behind have a dry and massive appearance, as if they were reserved to stable the stone chargers of noble statues.”

Harold Skimpole and family had their residence in the Polygon, near to the Euston Terminus (on the east side), in the centre of Clarendon Square, Somers Town.  The house is described as being sadly in want of repair—

“Two or three of the area railings were gone; the water-butt was broken; the knocker was loose; the bell-handle had been pulled off a long time, to judge from the rusty state of the wire; and dirty footprints on the steps were the only signs of its being inhabited.”

p. 160LITTLE DORRIT.

The House of Mrs. Clennam was situated not far from the river, in the neighbourhood of Upper Thames Street.  We read that Arthur Clennam, on his arrival in London,

“Crossed by Saint Paul’s and went down, at a long angle, almost to the water’s edge, through some of the crooked and descending streets which lie (and lay more crookedly and closely then) between the river and Cheapside . . . passing silent warehouses and wharves, and here and there a narrow alley leading to the river, where a wretched little bill, ‘Found Drowned,’ was weeping on the wet wall; he came at last to the house he sought.  An old brick house, so dingy as to be all but black, standing by itself within a gateway.”

Mr. Tite Barnacle had his residence in Mews Street, Grosvenor Square—

“It was a hideous little street of dead wall, stables, and dunghills, with lofts over coach-houses inhabited by coachmen’s families, who had a passion for drying clothes, and decorating their window-sills with miniature turnpike-gates.  The principal chimney-sweep of that fashionable quarter lived at the blind end of Mews Street. . . .  Yet there were two or three small airless houses at the entrance end of Mews Street, which went at enormous rents on account of their being abject hangers-on to a fashionable situation; and whenever one of these fearful little coops was to be let (which seldom happened, for they were in great request), the house agent advertised it as a gentlemanly residence in the most aristocratic part of the town, inhabited solely by the élite of the beau monde.”

The Patriarchal Casby, with his daughter—the irrepressible Flora—and Mr. F.’s Aunt,

“Lived in a street in the Gray’s Inn Road, which had set off from that thoroughfare with the intention of running at one heat down into the valley, and up again to the top of Pentonville Hill; but which had run itself out of breath in twenty yards, and had stood still ever since.  There is no such place in that part now; but it remained there for many years, looking with a baulked countenance at the wilderness patched with unfruitful gardens, and pimpled with eruptive summer-houses, that it had meant to run over in no time.”

TALE OF TWO CITIES.

In this Tale we read of the funeral of Cly, the Old Bailey Informer; the interment taking place in the burial-ground attached to the ancient church of p. 161St. Pancras in the Fields.  This edifice still exists in Pancras Road (east side, opposite Goldington Crescent), which leads from King’s Cross, northward, to Kentish Town.  There is a church of the same name to be found in the Euston Road—east of Upper Woburn Place, but this is altogether another and more modern structure than the one above referred to.  A century since, at the time of the funeral described, the name of this locality was literally correct; the church being situated in the outlying fields of the suburban village of Pancras.  We may here recollect the fishing expedition undertaken by Mr. Cruncher and his two companions, on the night following the funeral; when young Jerry quietly followed his “honoured parent,” and assured himself of the nature of his father’s secret avocation.

GREAT EXPECTATIONS.

Mr. Jaggers, the Old Bailey lawyer, had his private residence on the south side of Gerrard Street, Soho, where he lived in solitary state, with his eccentric housekeeper, the mother of Estella: “Rather a stately house of its kind, but dolefully in want of painting, and with dirty windows.”

Wemmick’s Castle at Walworth is altogether a place of the past; Walworth being now one of the most populous and crowded of metropolitan districts.  We read that in Pip’s time

“It appeared to be a collection of black lanes, ditches, and little gardens, and to present the aspect of a rather dull retirement.  Wemmick’s house was a little wooden cottage in the midst of plots of garden, and the top of it was cut out and painted like a battery mounted with guns.”

Mr. Barley, alias Old Gruff-and-Glum, lived at Mill Pond Bank, by Chinks’s Basin and the Old Green Copper Rope-walk.  Pip says the place was anything but easy to find.  Losing himself among shipbuilders’ and shipbreakers’ yards, he continues the description of his search as follows:—

“After several times falling short of my destination, and as often overshooting it, I came unexpectedly round a corner, upon Mill Pond p. 162Bank.  It was a fresh kind of place, all circumstances considered, where the wind from the river had room to turn itself round; and there were two or three trees in it, and there was the stump of a ruined windmill, and there was the Old Green Copper Rope-walk—whose long and narrow vista I could trace in the moonlight, along a series of wooden frames set in the ground, that looked like superannuated haymaking rakes, which had grown old and lost most of their teeth.  Selecting from the few queer houses upon Mill Pond Bank, a house with a wooden front and three storeys of bow-window (not bay-window, which is another thing), I looked at the plate upon the door, and read there Mrs. Whimple . . . the name I wanted.”

OUR MUTUAL FRIEND.

The House of Gaffer Hexam, the humble home of Lizzie Hexam and her brother, was situated somewhere in the district of Limehouse, near the river.  In a description given of the route by which Messrs. Lightwood and Wrayburn approached this locality, we read—

“Down by the Monument, and by the Tower, and by the Docks; down by Ratcliffe, and by Rotherhithe. . . .  In and out among vessels that seemed to have got ashore, and houses that seemed to have got afloat—among bowsprits staring into windows, and windows staring into ships—the wheels rolled on, until they stopped at a dark corner, river-washed and otherwise not washed at all, where the boy alighted and opened the door.”

“The Six Jolly Fellowship Porters” was located in this same vicinity, overlooking the river.  A waterside public-house, kept by Miss Abbey Patterson, who enforced a certain standard of respectability among her numerous clients, and conducted the house with a strict regard to discipline and punctuality—

“Externally, it was a narrow, lop-sided, wooden jumble of corpulent windows heaped one upon another, as you might heap as many toppling oranges, with a crazy wooden verandah impending over the water; indeed, the whole house, inclusive of the complaining flagstaff on the roof, impended over the water, but seemed to have got into the condition of a faint-hearted diver who has paused so long on the brink that he will never go in at all. . . .  The back of the establishment, though the chief entrance, was there so contracted that it merely represented, in its connection with the front, the handle of a flat iron set upright on its broadest end.  This handle stood at the bottom of a wilderness of court and alley; which wilderness pressed so hard and p. 163close upon the ‘Six Jolly Fellowship Porters,’ as to leave the hostelry not an inch of ground beyond its door.”

Rogue Riderhood and his daughter Pleasant traded at Limehouse Hole, in the same district as above, where they kept “a leaving shop” for sailors; advancing small sums of money on the portable property of seafaring customers.  Mr. Riderhood did not stand well in the esteem of the neighbourhood, which “was rather shy in reference to the honour of cultivating” his acquaintance, his daughter being the more respectable and respected member of the firm.

Mr. Twemlow, “an innocent piece of dinner furniture,” often in request in certain West-end circles of society, lodged in Duke Street, St. James’s, “over a livery stable-yard.”

The Location of the Veneering Family is described as “a bran-new house, in a bran-new quarter,” designated by the appellation of “Stucconia;” while their intimate friends The Podsnaps flourished “in a shady angle adjoining Portman Square.”

Boffin’s Bower, the home in which we are first introduced to the Golden Dustman and his wife, was to be found “about a mile and a quarter up Maiden Lane, Battle Bridge,” in the close vicinity of the Mounds of Dust for which Mr. Harman was the contractor.

The Location of Mr. R. Wilfer and family was in the northern district of Holloway, beyond Battle Bridge, divided therefrom by “a tract of suburban Sahara, where tiles and bricks were burnt, bones were boiled, carpets were beat, rubbish was shot, dogs were fought, and dust was heaped by contractors.”

The Establishment of Mr. Venus was in Clerkenwell, among

“The poorer shops of small retail traders in commodities to eat and drink and keep folks warm, and of Italian frame-makers, and of barbers, and of brokers, and of dealers in dogs and singing-birds.  From these, in a narrow and a dirty street devoted to such callings, Mr. Wegg selects one dark shop-window with a tallow candle dimly burning in it, surrounded by a muddle of objects vaguely resembling pieces p. 164of leather and dry stick, but among which nothing is resolvable into anything distinct, save the candle itself in its old tin candlestick, and two preserved frogs fighting a small-sword duel.”

THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD.

In the first chapter of the tale we are introduced to “the meanest and closest of small rooms,” where, “through the ragged window-curtain, the light of early day steals in from a miserable court.”  A man

“Lies dressed, across a large unseemly bed, upon a bedstead that has indeed given way under the weight upon it.  Lying, also dressed, and also across the bed, not longwise, are a Chinaman, a Lascar, and a haggard woman.  The two first are in a sleep or stupor; the last is blowing at a kind of pipe, to kindle it.”

This Opium Smokers’ Den had its location in an eastern district of London, probably the Shadwell neighbourhood of the London Docks, but no precise indication of its whereabouts is given in the tale.  We read of John Jasper starting from his hotel in Falcon Square: “Eastward, and still eastward, through the stale streets, he takes his way, until he reaches his destination—a miserable court, specially miserable among many such.”

THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM

is readily attainable from Charing Cross (or any other) station of the District Metropolitan Railway.  Entrance in Cromwell Road, five minutes’ walk, on the north side, from South Kensington Station.

The Forster Collection—on the first floor—in this museum contains several of the earlier Letters written by Dickens to Forster, and the pen-and-ink sketch by Maclise, representing the “Apotheosis of ‘Grip,’” the celebrated Raven, who departed this life at No. 1 Devonshire Terrace, March 12th, 1841.  There are also here exhibited The Manuscripts of the principal Works of Dickens, together with a Proof Copy of “David Copperfield,” showing the corrections of the Author.  Most of these lie p. 165opened, each at its first page; and it is interesting to observe the careful interlineations and alterations with which the various original copies were amended.  In the case of “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” the sorrowful memento of its final page is exposed to view, as being the last sheet written by the “vanished hand” of our much loved and faithful friend,

p. 167INDEX

Accademy, Turveydrop’s, 65

Adam Street, 5

Adelphi Arches, The, 5

— Hotel, The, 5

Albany, The, 62

Aldgate High Street, 70

— Pump, 71

Almshouses, Watts’s, 95

Apartments of Captain Cuttle, 156

— Major Bagstock, 156

— Miss Tox, 156

— Mrs. Gamp, 50

— Richard Carstone, 52

— The Kenwigses, 64

— Tom Pinch, 155

Apotheosis of “Grip,” 164

Artful Dodger at Court, The, 8

— Dodger at Work, The, 37

Astley’s Theatre, 78

Bagnet, Mr., 159

Bailey, Junior, 50, 72

Bank, Child’s, 20

— of England, 67

— Tellson’s, 20

Bardell v. Pickwick, 29

Bardell’s House, Mrs., 151

Barley, Mr., 161

Barnacle, Mr. Tite, 160

Barnard’s Inn, 45

Barnett’s Hotel, 3

Bedfordbury, 4

Bell Tavern, The, 27

— Yard, 20

Belle Sauvage Yard, 26

Bethlehem Hospital, 77

Bevis Marks, 69 70

Billickin, Mrs., 51

Bishop’s Court, 17

Black Lion, The, 154

Bleeding Hart Yard, 40

Blinder, Mrs., 20

Bloomsbury Square, 52

“Blue Boar,” The, 68

Blunderstone Rookery, 140

Blundeston, 140

Boarding House, Todgers’s, 71

Bob Sawyer’s Lodging, 74

Boffin, House of Mr., 59

Boffin’s Bower, 163

Boot Tavern, 55

Borough, The, 72

Bouverie Street, 24

Bow Street Police Court, 8

Bradbury & Evans, 24

Bradley Headstone, 23

Bream’s Buildings, 19

Broad Court, 8

Brook Street, Grosvenor Sq, 60

Brownlow’s Residence, Mr., 3

Buckhurst Hill, 128

Buckingham Street, 5

Buffet, Spiers and Pond’s, 46

Bull and Anchor Tavern, 49

Bull Inn Yard, The, 76

Burial Ground, Nemo’s, 9

Butler’s Wharf, 33

CANTERBURY

Augustinian Monastery, 106

Burgate Street, 111

Butcher, The obnoxious, 108

Canterbury, City of, 103

Castle Street, 104

Christchurch Gate, 106

Doctor Strong, 106

Faversham, 103

Fleur de Lys Hotel, 109

George and Dragon Inn, 109

Home of Agnes, 111

— Mr. Larkins, 107

King’s School, 106

Lady’s Green, The, 106

p. 168Larkins, The eldest Miss, 107

London Coach Office, 109

London, Chatham & Dover Station 103, 112

Margaret Street, 104, 105

Markleham, Mrs., 110

Mercery Lane, 105, 108

Micawbers, The, 104

Monastery Street, 106

North Lane (No. 65), 110

Palace Street, 110

Queen’s Head Inn, 104

Residence of Dr. Strong, 106

— Mr. Wickfield, 111

— Uriah Heep, 110

St. Alphege, Church of, 110

— Dunstan Street, 111

— Margaret’s Church, 105

Sittingbourne, 103

Teynsham, 103

Watling Street, 104

Carlisle House, 66

Carnaby Street, 64

Carstone’s Apartments, Richard, 53

Casby, Mr., 160

Castle, The, 28

Chadband, Rev. Mr., 19

Chambers of Copperfield, 5

— Mr. Fledgby, 62

— Mr. Grewgious, 48

— Mr. Tartar, 48

— John Westlock, 46

Chandos Street (No. 3), 4

Chapman & Hall, Messrs., 63

Charing Cross Terminus, 3, 31, 102                               

Charles Darnay’s Trial, 36

Chatham, 86

— Clover Lane Academy, 87

— Fort Pitt, 87

— Military Hospital, 87

— Providence Chapel, 87

— Railway Street, 86

— Recreation Ground, 88

— Rome Lane, 86

— The Brook, 87

Cheeryble Bros., Messrs., 153

Chester, Edward, 22

— Sir John, 22, 23

Chevy Slyme, 155

Chichester Rents, 17

Chicksey, Veneering, & Co., 71

Chigwell, 129

— Church, 129

— King’s Head, 129

Children’s Hospital, The, 53

Child’s Bank, 20

Chivery’s Shop, 76

Christchurch, 77

Church, Dulwich, 83

— Emmanuel, 82

— St. Alphege, 101

— St. Dunstan’s, 23

— St. George’s, 73

— St. John the Evangelist’s, 79

— St. Mary-le-Bow, 28

— St. Pancras in the Fields, 161

— Street, 79

Chuzzlewit & Son, 154

Clare Court, 10

Claridge’s Hotel, 60

Clennam’s House, Mrs., 160

Clerkenwell Green, 37

Clifford’s Inn Passage, 23

Cloisterham, 88

Coavinses’ Castle, 17

Cobham, 84

Cook’s Court, 18

Cooling Village, 91

Copperfield’s Chambers, 5

Cornhill, 68

Court of Chancery, 16

Covent Garden Market, 7, 8

— Theatre, 8

Craven Street (No. 39), 3

Creakle’s Establishment, Mr., 157

Crisparkle, Rev. S., 92

Cross Keys Inn, The, 28

Crown Inn, The, 64

Crozier Hotel, The, 98

Curiosity Shop, The Old, 11

Cursitor Street, 17

Daily News Office, 24

Dean’s Court, 27

Dedlock Mansion, The, 159

Devonshire House, 60

— Street, 53

— Terrace, 57

Dickens, Amateur Acting of, 61

— Death of, 100

— Dining-House of, 10

p. 169Dickens at Lamert’s Factory, 3

— Letters of, 164

— Manuscripts of, 164

— Memorial Tablet, 92

— Readings of, 9, 62

— Residences of, 46, 48, 55, 87, 99

— at School, 87

— Tomb of, 146

Dickens’s Establishment, Mrs., 56

Doctor Slammer, 98

Doctors’ Commons, 27

Dodson & Fogg, Messrs , 68

Dolls’ Dressmaker, The, 79

Dombey & Son’s Offices, 30

Dombey’s Residence, Mr., 58, 59

Dorking, 141

— “Marquis of Granby”, 142

— “White Horse,” 142

— Rev. Mr. Stiggins, 143

— ,,    ,,  Downfall of, 144

Doubledick, Richard, 98

Doughty Street (No. 48), 55

DOVER

Copperfield’s Resting Place, 113

Dover Priory, 112-114

Dover, Town of, 112

King’s Head Hotel, 114

Market Place Corner, 113

Miss Manetty and Mr. Lorry, 114

Priory Hill, 114

Residence of Miss Trotwood, 114

Stanley Mount, 114

Staplehurst Disaster, 115

Doyce & Clennam’s Factory, 40

Dulwich Church, 83

Durdles, A night with, 93

Durdles’s Lodgings, 93

Edwin Drood and Rosa, 98

Ely Place, Holborn, 41

Emigration of Peggotty, &c., 100

Emmanuel Church, 82

Escort in London, 120

Establishment of Mr. Waterbrook, 41

Eugene Wrayburn, 23, 123

Exchequer Coffee House, 79

Execution of the Mannings, 76

Fagin’s House, 152

Falcon Hotel, 34

Falstaff Inn, 99

Fang, Mr. J. P., 38, 39

Feast of the Three Hobgoblins, 71

Feenix Town House, 60

Field Lane, 39

Finches of the Grove, The, 7

First Avenue Hotel, 49

— Readings, Dickens’s, 9

Fish Street Hill, 71

Fleet Market, 25

— Prison, 25

Flite, Miss, 16

Folly Ditch, 32

Forest House, Chigwell, 131

Forge, Joe Gargery’s, 90

Forster Collection, The, 164

Forster’s House, Mr., 14

Foundling Hospital, The, 54

Fountain Court, Temple, 21

Fox-under-the-Hill, The, 6

Freeman’s Court, 68

Funeral of Dickens, 147

Furnival’s Inn, 46

Gadshill Place, 99

Gaffer Hexam’s House, 162

Gamp, Mrs., 50

Garden Court, Temple, 21

Gargery’s Forge, Joe, 91

Gate of the Temple, 21

General Agency Office, 153

George and Vulture Inn, The, 68

George the IVth, The Old, 12

George Yard, The, 68

George’s Shooting-Gallery, 158

Giles, Rev. William, 87

Golden Cross Hotel, The, 1

— Key, The, 154

— Square, 63

Goldsmith’s Buildings, 23

Gordon, Lord George, 60

— Riots, The, 36, 44

Goswell Street, 151

Gower Street, 56, 57

Gravesend, 100

Gray’s Inn, 49

p. 170Great Ormond Street, 53

— Yarmouth, 135

— Angel Hotel, 138

— Coaches, 138

— Home of Little Emily, 136

— Star Hotel, 138

— Storm at, 137

Green Dragon Tavern, The, 68

Greenwich Park, 101

Gridley’s Lodgings, 20

Grip, The Raven, 28

— Apotheosis of, 164

Grocers’ Hall Court, 29

Guild of Literature and Art, 61

Guildhall, The, 28

Guppy, Mr., 62, 158

Guppy’s Address, Mr., 158

— Mrs., 158

Hampstead, 151, 152

Hanging Sword Alley, 24

Harley Street, 58

Hatchett’s Hotel, 61

Hatton Yard, 38

Hawdon, Capt., 17

HENLEY

A Cry for Help, 122

Anchor Inn, 121

Aston, 124

Attack by Headstone, 123

Betty Higden, Death of, 122

— Burial of, 122

Death of Riderhood and Headstone, 125

Eastern Tow Path, 124

Eugene Wrayburn, 123

Fawley Court, 124

Greenlands, 124

Harmon’s Reflections, 127

Henley Bridge, 123

Hurley Lock, 125

Kensal Green Cemetery, 117

Lizzie Hexam, 119, 122, 123

Lock House, Hurley, 125

Marriage of Eugene and Lizzie, 119

Marsh Lock, 123

— Mill, 121

Medmenham Abbey, 124

Micawber’s Quotation, 126

Plashwater Weir Mill Lock, 124, 125

Railway Station, Henley, 121

Red Lion Inn, 118

— Lawn, 119

Rescue of Eugene, 119

Rogue Riderhood, 125

Stoke Pogis Churchyard, 126

Tow Path, The, 121

Waterloo Station, 120

Her Majesty’s Theatre, 80

Hexam’s House, 162

Holborn Restaurant, The, 14

— Viaduct, 37

Hope Brothers, Messrs., 26

Horndean, 141

Horse and Groom, The, 13

— Guards, The, 80

Horsemonger Lane Gaol, 76

Horseshoe Restaurant, The, 66

Hospital, Bethlehem, 77

— Children’s, The, 53

— Foundling, The, 54

Hotel, Adelphi, 5

— Barnett’s Private, 3

— Cecil, 5

— Claridge’s, 60

— Falcon, 34

— First Avenue, 49

— Golden Cross, 1

— Hatchett’s, 61

— Hummums, 7

— Tavistock, 7

— Woods’, 47

House of Sampson Brass, 70

— Sol Gills, 69

Household Words Office, 7

Hugh, 23

Hungerford Market, 3

— Stairs, 3

Ipswich, 131

— Residence of Mr. Nupkins, 134

— St. Clement’s Church, 133

— White Horse Hotel, 131

Jacob’s Island, 32

Jaggers, Offices of Mr., 35

— Residence of Mr., 161

Jarndyce, Mr., 158

Jarndyce v. Jarndyce, 16

p. 171Jellyby’s Residence, Mrs., 41

Jenny Wren, 79, 119

Jerry Cruncher’s Apartments, 24

— Cruncher’s Employment, 161

Jingle, Mr., 2, 97, 134

Job Trotter, 133

John Jasper, Apartments of, 94

Johnny’s Will, 54

Julius Handford, Mr., 79

Kenge & Carboy’s Offices, 16

Kenwigs Family, The, 64

King’s Bench Prison, 74, 75

“King’s Head,” Chigwell, 129

King’s Head Court, 71

Kingsgate Street, 50

Knag, Mr. and Miss, 153

Krook’s Warehouse, 17

Laing, Mr. J. P., 39

Lambeth Palace, 78

— Road, 78

Lamert’s Blacking Factory, 3

— Warehouse, 3

Langdale’s Distillery, 39

Lant Street, 74

Leadenhall Street, 69

Leather Bottle Inn, The, 84

Letters of Dickens, 164

Lewsome’s Illness, 49

Lightwood’s Offices, 23

Lincoln’s Inn Chambers, 18

— Fields, 14, 15

— Hall, 16

— Old Square, 16

Lirriper’s Lodgings, 11

Little Britain, 35

London Bridge, 72

— Coffee Tavern, The, 26

— Stereoscopic Company, 28

— Street, 32

— Tavern, The, 152

Lucretia Tox, Miss, 156

Macstinger, Mrs., 156

Magpie and Stump, The, 12

Manette, Doctor, 66

— Street, 66

Mansfield, Lord, 52

— Street, 58

Mansion House, The, 29

Mantalini, Madame, 59

Manuscripts of Dickens, 164

Mark Tapley, 6, 29

Market, Covent Garden, 7, 8

— Farringdon, 25

— Fleet, 25

— Hungerford, 3

Marshall Street, 65

Marshalsea Place, 73

— Prison, 73

Martha’s Lodging, 65

— Suicidal attempt, 78

Martin Chuzzlewit, 6, 21

“Maypole Inn,” The, 129

Memorial Hall, The, 25

Merdle, Mr., 58

Micawber, Mr., 157

Mill Bank Street, 78

— Street, 32

Mincing Lane, 71

Minor Canon Corner, 92

Minories, 70, 71

Monk’s Vineyard, The, 91

Mowcher, Miss, 139

Nadgett, Mr., 155

Nancy and Rose Maylie, 72

Neckett’s Lodging, 20

Nemo’s Burial, 9

— Lodging, 17

Newgate Prison, 35

— Burning of, 36

Newman Noggs, 64

— Street, 65

Newman’s Court, 68

Nickleby’s Office, Ralph, 63

Noah Claypole, 72

Norie & Wilson, Messrs., 69

Nuns’ House, The, 89

Obelisk, St. George’s, 77

Office of Chicksey & Co., 71

— Daily News, The, 24

— Dodson & Fogg, 68

— Dombey & Son, 30

— Jaggers, Mr., 35

— Kenge & Carboy, 16

— Lightwood & Wrayburn, 23

— Perker, Mr., 49

— Pubsey & Co., 69

— Ralph Nickleby, 63

— Spenlow & Jorkins, 27

Old Bailey, The, 36

— Curiosity Shop, The, 11, 12

— Gruff-and-Glum, 161

— Palace Yard, 79

p. 172Old Ship Tavern, The, 17

— Square, Lincoln’s Inn, 16

Olde Cheshire Cheese, Ye, 24

Oliver Twist at Court, 38

— enlightened, 37

— entering London, 38

Opium Smokers’ Den, The, 164

Osborn’s Hotel, 5

“Our House,” 59

Paper Buildings, Temple, 22

Park, St. James’s, 80

Parliament Street, 79

Peabody’s Buildings, 4

Pecksniff’s Downfall, 22

Peggotty, Mr., 100

— House of, 136

Perker’s Offices, 49

Piccadilly, 61, 62

Pickwick’s Discovery, 85

— Imprisonment, 25

— Retirement, 83

— Travels, 2, 61

— Trial, 28

Pip’s Chambers, 21

P. J. T., 48

Plornish’s Home, 40

Podsnaps, The, 8

Poetical Tribute, 149

Police Court, Bow Street, 8

— Hatton Garden, 38

Portsmouth, 145

— Birthplace of Dickens, 145

— Cambridge Barracks, 145

— Street, 11

— Theatre, 145

Portugal Street, 13

Post Office, Charing Cross, 1

— General, 34

Poultry, The, 29

Princess Place, 156

Prison, The Fleet, 25

— King’s Bench, 74, 75

— Marshalsea, 73

Procter, Miss Adelaide, 97

Pubsey & Co., 69

Pump Court, Temple, 22

Quartermaine’s Ship Tavern, 101

Queen Square, 53

Quilp’s House, 33

— Wharf, 33

Railway Street, Chatham, 86

Red Lion, The, 70, 80

Residence of Brownlow, Mr., 3

— Dickens, 46, 48, 55, 87, 99

— Dombey, Mr., 58, 59

— Gordon, Lord G., 60

— Jellyby, Mrs., 41

— La Creevy, Miss, 6

— Lammles, The, 62

— Mansfield, Lord, 52

— Merdle, Mr., 58

— Micawber, Mr., 157

— Nickleby, Mrs., 152

— Pickwick, Mr., 83

— Snagsby, Mr., 18

— Tulkinghorn, Mr., 14

— Veneerings, 163

Restaurant, Epitaux’s, 81

Richard Doubledick, 98

Rochester, 88

— Bridge, 98

— Bull Hotel, 97

— Cathedral, 92

— College Gate, 94

— Crown Hotel, 98

— Crypts, The, 93

— Eastgate House, 89

— Esplanade, 98

— Minor Canon Row, 92

— Restoration Mouse, 90

— St. Nicholas Church, 94

— Sapsea’s House, 90

— Theatre, 88

— The Vines, 99

— Watts’s Charity, 95

Rogue Riderhood, 163

Rokesmith Wedding, The, 101

Roman Bath, 10

Rosa Budd, 47, 48

Rowland & Son, 40

Rudge, Mrs., 72

Rules of King’s Bench, 74, 75

Sackville Street, 62

Saffron Hill, Great, 38, 39

— Little, 38

St. Alphege Church, 101

— Clement Danes, 11

— Dunstan’s Church, 23

— George’s Church, 73

— ,, Obelisk, 77

— James’s Hall, 62

— ,, Park, 80

p. 173St. John the Evangelist’s Church, 79

— Martin’s Hall, 9

— Martin’s-le-Grand, 34

— Mary Axe, 69

— Mary-le-Bow Church, 28

— Pancras in the Fields, 161

— Paul’s Churchyard, 27

Sackville Street, 62

Salem House, 157

Sampson Brass, 70

Sam’s Valentine, 68

Sapsea, Mr., 90

Saracen’s Head, The, 36

Satis House, 90

Sawyer’s Lodging, Bob, 74

Seven Poor Travellers, The, 96

“Six Jolly Fellowship Porters The,” 162

Skimpole Family, The, 159

Slammer, Doctor, 98

Smallweed Family, The, 158

Smithfield, 35

Snagsby’s Residence, 18

Snevellicci, Mr., 8

Snow Hill, 37

Sole Street Station, 84

Sol’s Arms, The, 17, 18

Somerleyton Park, 140

Southampton Street, 51

South Kensington Museum, 164

South Square, 49

Southwark Bridge, 34

Spaniards’ Inn, The, 151

Spa Road Station, 31

Spenlow & Jorkins, 27

Spiers & Pond’s Buffet, Messrs, 42

Stagg’s Cellar, 154

— Gardens, 155

Staple Inn, 48

Steerforth, Mrs., 157

Strong’s House, Dr., 158

Stryver’s Chambers, 22

Surrey Theatre, 77

Swan and Sugar Loaf, The, 32

Sweedlepipes, House of, 50

Swiss Châlet, 99

Sydney Carton, 22, 24

Symond’s Inn, 19

Tattycoram, 55

Tavern, Black Lion, The, 154

Tavern, Boot, The, 55

— Bull and Anchor, The, 49

— Coffee, London, The, 27

— Green Dragon, The, 68

— London, The, 26

— Old George IVth, The, 12

— Old Ship, The, 17

— Quartermaine’s Ship, 101

— “Six Jolly Fellowship Porters”, 162

Tavistock Hotel, The, 7

— House, 56

— Square, 56

Tellson’s Bank, 20

Temple Bar, 20

— Church, 23

— Fountain, 21

— Garden Court, 21

— Gate, 21

— Paper Buildings, 22

— Pump Court, 22

Thames Street, 160

Thavies Inn, 41

Theatre, Astley’s, 78

— Covent Garden, 8

— Her Majesty’s, 80

— Rochester, 88

— Surrey, The, 77

Three Cripples, The, 40

Tigg, Montague, 155

Toby Veck, 23

Todger’s Boarding House, 71

Tom All-Alone’s, 4

Tom Pinch’s Apartments, 155

Toodles, Polly, 155

Took’s Court, 18

Toots’s Excursions, 71

Tox, Miss Lucretia, 156

Traddles, Home of, 49

Traddles’s Lodgings, 158

Travellers, Seven Poor, 95

Trial of Charles Darnay, 36

Trinity House, 34

Tulkinghorn’s Residence, Mr., 14

Tupman’s Retreat, 84

Turveydrop’s Academy, 65

Twemlow, Mr., 163

Twinkleton, Miss, 51

Varden Family, The, 129

Veneering Family, The, 163

Venus, Mr., 163

p. 174Walter Wilding, 54

Warren, The, 131

Waterbrook’s Establishment, 41

Watts, Richard, 95

Wedding of Mr. Snodgrass, 83, 84

Welbeck Street, 60

Weller, Sam, 84, 135

— Tony, 26

Weller’s Rendezvous, 13

Wellington Academy, 152

— Street, Strand, 7

Wemmick’s Castle, 161

— Wedding, 83

Westminster Abbey, 79, 146

White Hart Inn, The, 72

White Horse Cellars, The, 61

Wigmore Street, 59

Wilfer Family, The, 57

  — Residence of, 163

Willet, John, 130

Wimpole Street, 59

Wititterly, Mrs., 153

Wooden Midshipman, The, 69–71

Wood Street, 28

Woods’ Hotel, 47

Yarmouth, 135

Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, 24