THE AULA NOVA AND NORMAN STAIRCASE, PART OF THE KING’S SCHOOL, CANTERBURY. ([Page 203].)
The oldest public school in England, dating from the seventh century, and the original of Dr. Strong’s in “David Copperfield.”
HOUSE ON LADY WOOTTON’S GREEN, CANTERBURY. ([Page 203].)
Identified as the private residence of Dr. Strong in “David Copperfield.”
We are assured by Forster that the description here given in “The Lazy Tour” of Doncaster and the races emanated from the pen of Wilkie Collins; I venture, however, to believe that Dickens is more likely to have composed the chapter in question, for not only is it written in his characteristic vein, but we find that when at Doncaster Thomas Idle (i.e., Collins) continued to suffer severely from the accident to his ankle, which practically incapacitated him, and evidently prevented him from witnessing the races. In a letter written at this time Dickens remarks: “I am not going to the course this morning, but have engaged a carriage (open, and pair) for to-morrow and Friday.... We breakfast at half-past eight, and fall to work for H. W. afterwards. Then I go out, and—hem! look for subjects.” The first person singular here is significant, indicating as it does that Collins did not accompany his friend to the scenes so vividly and realistically portrayed in the final chapter of the “Tour.” In respect of the visit to Doncaster, a remarkable incident may be noted. Dickens, who knew nothing (and cared less) about matters relating to the turf, invested in a “c’rect card” containing the names of the horses and jockeys, and, merely for the fun of the thing, wrote down three names for the winners of the three chief races, “and, if you can believe it (he said to Forster) without your hair standing on end, those three races were won, one after another, by those three horses!”[88] It was the St. Leger Day, which brought ill-fortune to many, so that Dickens’s “half-appalling kind of luck” seemed to him especially to be a “wonderful, paralyzing coincidence.” He sincerely believed that if a boy with any good in him, but with a damning propensity to sporting and betting, were taken to the Doncaster Races soon enough, it would cure him, so terrible is the revolting exhibition of rascality and the seamy side of humanity.
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Scotland may justly lay claim to an intimate association with Charles Dickens. With the picturesque streets of Edinburgh he first became familiar in 1834, during his reporting days, when he and his colleague, Thomas Beard, represented the Morning Chronicle at a grand banquet given at the Scottish capital in honour of the then Prime Minister, Earl Grey, the two young reporters going by sea from London to Leith. This fact explains how Dickens secured such an accurate presentment of the old town of Edinburgh as we find in “Pickwick,” in the forty-eighth chapter of which Arthur’s Seat is described as “towering, surly and dark, like some gruff genius, over the ancient city he has watched so long,” while Canongate (as seen by the hero of “The Story of the Bagman’s Uncle”) is represented as consisting of “tall, gaunt, straggling houses, with time-stained fronts, and windows that seemed to have shared the lot of eyes in mortals, and to have grown dim and sunken with age. Six, seven, eight stories high were the houses; story piled above story, as children build with cards, throwing their dark shadows over the roughly-paved road, and making the night darker. A few oil lamps were scattered at long distances, but they only served to mark the dirty entrance to some narrow close, or to show where a common stair communicated, by steep and intricate windings, with the various flats above.” We are told that Tom Smart’s uncle, on reaching the North Bridge connecting the old town with the new, “stopped for a minute to look at the strange irregular clusters of lights piled one above the other, and twinkling afar off so high that they looked like stars, gleaming from the castle walls on the one side and the Calton Hill on the other, as if they illuminated veritable castles in the air.”
The coach-yard (or rather enclosure) in Leith Walk, by which Tom had to pass on the way to his lodging, and where he saw the vision of the old mail-coach with its passengers, actually existed at that spot, and was owned by Mr. Croall, whose family disposed of the carriages and coaches, but subsequently owned all the cabs in the city. Dickens afterwards visited Edinburgh on at least four occasions, staying at the Waterloo Hotel in 1861 and at Kennedy’s in 1868, during his Reading tours, and on the latter occasion he observed: “Improvement is beginning to knock the old town of Edinburgh about here and there; but the Canongate and the most picturesque of the horrible courts and wynds are not to be easily spoiled, or made fit for the poor wretches who people them to live in.”[89] The Scott Monument he could not but regard as a failure, considering that it resembles the spire of a Gothic church taken off and stuck in the ground.
In 1841, on the eve of his departure for the United States, the “Inimitable Boz,” accompanied by his wife, made Scotland his destination for a summer holiday tour in “Rob Roy’s country,” as he termed it. He had thought of Ireland, but altered his mind. The novelist received a magnificent welcome, initiated by a public dinner in Edinburgh, at which Professor Wilson presided. During their brief stay in the Scottish capital Dickens found excellent accommodation at the Royal Hotel, which was consequently besieged, and he was compelled to take refuge in a sequestered apartment at the end of a long passage. His chambers here were “a handsome sitting-room, a spacious bedroom, and large dressing-room adjoining,” with another room at his disposal for writing purposes, while from the windows he obtained a noble view, in which the castle formed a conspicuous object. From Edinburgh he travelled to the Highlands, with intervals of rest, and thoroughly admired the characteristic scenery of the country. Especially was he impressed by the Pass of Glencoe, which he had often longed to see, and which he thought “perfectly terrible.” “The Pass,” he said, “is an awful place. It is shut in on each side by enormous rocks, from which great torrents come rushing down in all directions. In amongst these rocks on one side of the Pass ... there are scores of glens high up, which form such haunts as you might imagine yourself wandering in in the very height and madness of a fever. They will live in my dreams for years.... They really are fearful in their grandeur and amazing solitude.” Indeed, “that awful Glencoe,” as he called it, exercised a kind of fascination over him which proved irresistible, compelling him to revisit the spot the next day, when he found it “absolutely horrific,” for “it had rained all night, and ... through the whole glen, which is ten miles long, torrents were boiling and foaming, and sending up in every direction spray like the smoke of great fires. They were rushing down every hill and mountain side, and tearing like devils across the path, and down into the depths of the rocks.... One great torrent came roaring down with a deafening noise and a rushing of water that was quite appalling.... The sights and sounds were beyond description.” This and other adventures during his journeyings hereabouts were vividly described in letters to Forster, who has printed the major portion of them in his biography, and a very attractive record it is.
Before returning southward, the novelist became the recipient of an invitation to a public dinner at Glasgow; but, yearning for home, he pleaded pressing business connected with “Master Humphrey’s Clock,” then appearing in weekly numbers, promising, however, to return a few months later and accept the honour then. Illness unfortunately prevented the fulfilment of that promise, and six years elapsed (1847) before he made acquaintance with that city, when he performed the ceremony of opening the Glasgow Athenæum, which was followed by a soirée in the City Hall. In 1858 he was recommended by some of the students for election as Lord Rector of Glasgow University, in opposition to his own wish, but received only a few votes.