[72]Elsewhere in the book the author tells us that the great factories looked like Fairy palaces when illumined at night.
[73]The late Mr. Robert Langton, author of “The Childhood and Youth of Charles Dickens,” states that Dickens, in “Hard Times,” is unsuccessful in his attempt to render the Lancashire dialect—that the utterances put into the mouths of Stephen Blackpool and others in the book “are very far from being correct,” a matter upon which, from his long residence in Manchester, that critic is qualified to speak. Mr. Langton points out that the inscription on the sign of the Pegasus’ Arms, at which inn Sleary’s circus company put up, “Good malt makes good beer,” etc., was taken from an old sign, the Malt Shovel, existing until 1882 at the foot of Cheetham Hill.
[74]See the Manchester Evening Chronicle, January 7, 1904. In this paper were published during 1903-1904 a series of interesting articles on “Dickens and Manchester,” whence some of these details are culled.
[75]“The County of the Cheerybles,” by the Rev. Hume Elliot.
[76]Many of these details are quoted from the Manchester Evening News, October 27, 1903.
[77]“The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.”
[78]“The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.”
[79]“The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.”
[80]“The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.”
[81]“The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices.”