[315], [316]
Uncommercial Traveller, Dickens's, iii. [247]-[253].
Uncommercial Traveller Upside Down, contemplated, iii. [270].
Undercliff (Isle of Wight), Dickens's first impressions of, ii. [426];
depressing effect of climate of, ii. [431]-[433].
Unitarianism adopted by Dickens for a short time, ii. [59].
Upholsterer, visit to an, i. [189];
visit from an, i. [190].
Up the Rhine (Hood's), Dickens on, i. [185].
Utica (U. S.), hotel at, iii. [435].
Vauxhall, the Duke and party at, ii. [470].
Venice, Dickens's impressions of, ii. [163]-[166], iii. [90];
habits of gondoliers at, iii. [90];
theatre at, iii. [91].
Verdeil (M.), ii. [233].
Vernet (Horace), iii. [147] note.
Vernon (Lord), eccentricities of, ii. [270], [271], [298].
Vesuvius, Mount, iii. [83].
Viardot (Madame) in Orphée, iii. [138] note.
Village Coquettes, the story and songs for, written by Dickens, i. [116].
Vote, value of a, in America, iii. [420].
Wales, Prince of, and Dickens, iii. [509].
Wainewright (the murderer), recognized by Macready in Newgate, i. [184] (and see ii. [334] note);
made the subject of a tale in the New York Ledger, iii. [253];
portrait of a girl by, ii. [334] note (and see ii. [468], iii. [279]).
Wales, North, tour in, i. [184].
Ward (Professor) on Dickens, iii. [352], [353] note.
Washington (U. S.), hotel extortion at, i. [345];
climate of, i. [347];
Congress and Senate at, i. [349];
a comical dog at reading at, iii. [425];
readings at, iii. [424], [425].
Wassail-bowl presented to Dickens at Edinburgh, iii. [197].
Waterloo, Battle of, at Vauxhall, ii. [470].
Watson, Mr. (of Rockingham), ii. [231], [264], [479];
death of, iii. [55].
Watson (Sir Thomas), note by, of Dickens's illness in April, 1869, iii. [457]-[459];
readings stopped by, iii. [458];
guarded sanction given to additional readings, iii. [458] (and see [466], [531] note);
Dickens's letter to, iii. [459] note.
Watts's Charity at Rochester, iii. [154] note.
Webster (Daniel), Dickens on, i. [308].
Webster (Mr.), ii. [475].
Webster murder at Cambridge (U. S.), iii. [402], [403]
Well-boring at Gadshill, iii. [209].
Weller (Sam) a pre-eminent achievement in literature, i. [131].
Wellington, Duke of, fine trait of, ii. [264].
Wellington House Academy (Hampstead-road), Dickens a day-scholar at, i. [74]-[84];
described in Household Words, i. [75];
Dickens's schoolfellows at, i. [76]-[84];
Beverley painting scenes at, i. [84];
revisited after five-and-twenty years, i. [76].
Weyer (M. Van de), ii. [477].
Whig jealousies, i. [250] (and see ii. [261]).
Whitechapel workhouse, incident at, iii. [75].
White-conduit-house, reminiscence of, ii. [132].
Whitefriars, a small revolution in, ii. [302].
White (Rev. James), character of, ii. [424]-[426] (and see ii. [426], iii. [126]).
White (Grant) on the character of Carton in the Tale of Two Cities, iii. [359], [360]
Whitehead (Charles), i. [109].
Whitworth (Mr.), ii. [475].
Wieland the clown, death of, iii. [166] note.
Wig experiences, ii. [380].
Wilkie (Sir David), on the genius of Dickens, i. [178];
death of, i. [252].
Willis (N. P.), fanciful description of Dickens by, i. [107] note.
Wills (W. H.), ii. [453], iii. [256], [493]
Wilson (Professor), i. [259];
sketch of, i. [253], [254];
speeches of, i. [255] note, ii. [136].
Wilson (Mr.) the hair-dresser, fancy sketch of, ii. [379]-[383].
Wilton (Marie) as Pippo in the Maid and Magpie, iii. [236], [237] note.
Women, home for fallen, ii. [488] (and see iii. [286]).
Wordsworth, memorable saying of, iii. [381].
Worms, the city of, ii. [223].
Yarmouth first seen by Dickens, ii. [462].
Yates (Edmund), tales by, in All the Year Round, iii. [245];
Dickens's interest in, iii. [495].
Yates (Mr.), acting of, i. [174], ii. [96].
Yesterdays with Authors (Fields'), ii. [42] note.
York, readings at, iii. [231], [454]
Yorkshire, materials gathered in, for Nickleby, i. [172].
Young Gentlemen and Young Couples, sketches written by Dickens for Chapman & Hall, i. [149] note.
Zoological Gardens, feeding the serpents at, iii. [169] note.
Zouaves, Dickens's opinion of the, iii. [143], [144]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] "I shall cut this letter short, for they are playing Masaniello in the drawing-room, and I feel much as I used to do when I was a small child a few miles off, and Somebody (who, I wonder, and which way did She go, when she died) hummed the evening hymn to me, and I cried on the pillow,—either with the remorseful consciousness of having kicked Somebody else, or because still Somebody else had hurt my feelings in the course of the day." From Gadshill, 24 Sept. 1857. "Being here again, or as much here as anywhere in particular."
[2] "The mistress of the establishment holds no place in our memory; but, rampant on one eternal door-mat, in an eternal entry long and narrow, is a puffy pug-dog, with a personal animosity towards us, who triumphs over Time. The bark of that baleful Pug, a certain radiating way he had of snapping at our undefended legs, the ghastly grinning of his moist black muzzle and white teeth, and the insolence of his crisp tail curled like a pastoral crook, all live and flourish. From an otherwise unaccountable association of him with a fiddle, we conclude that he was of French extraction, and his name Fidèle. He belonged to some female, chiefly inhabiting a back parlor, whose life appears to us to have been consumed in sniffing, and in wearing a brown beaver bonnet."—Reprinted Pieces, 287. (In such quotations as are made from his writings, the Charles Dickens Edition will be used.)
[3] "A few weeks' residence at home convinced me, who had till then been an only child in the house of my grandfather, that a quarrel between brothers was a very natural event."—Lockhart's Life, i. [30].
[4] The reader will forgive my quoting from a letter of the date of the 22d April, 1848. "I desire no better for my fame, when my personal dustiness shall be past the control of my love of order, than such a biographer and such a critic." "You know me better," he wrote, resuming the same subject on the 6th of July, 1862, "than any other man does, or ever will." In an entry of my diary during the interval between these years, I find a few words that not only mark the time when I first saw in its connected shape the autobiographical fragment which will form the substance of the second chapter of this biography, but also express his own feeling respecting it when written: "20 January, 1849. The description may make none of the impression on others that the reality made on him. . . . Highly probable that it may never see the light. No wish. Left to J. F. or others." The first number of David Copperfield appeared five months after this date; but though I knew, even before he adapted his fragment of autobiography to the eleventh number, that he had now abandoned the notion of completing it under his own name, the "no wish," or the discretion left me, was never in any way subsequently modified. What follows, from the same entry, refers to the manuscript of the fragment: "No blotting, as when writing fiction; but straight on, as when writing ordinary letter."
[5] The reader will probably think them worth subjoining. Dr. Danson wrote: "April, 1864. Dear Sir, On the recent occasion of the U. C. H. dinner, you would probably have been amused and somewhat surprised to learn that one of those whom you addressed had often accompanied you over that 'field of forty footsteps' to which you so aptly and amusingly alluded. It is now some years since I was accidentally reading a paper written by yourself in the Household Words, when I was first impressed with the idea that the writer described scenes and persons with which I was once familiar, and that he must necessarily be the veritable Charles Dickens of 'our school,'—the school of Jones! I did not then, however, like to intrude myself upon you, for I could hardly hope that you would retain any recollection of myself; indeed, it was only barely possible you should do so, however vividly I might recall you in many scenes of fun and frolic of my school-days. I happened to be present at the dinner of Tuesday last (being interested as an old student in the school of the hospital), and was seated very near you; I was tempted during the evening to introduce myself to you, but feared lest an explanation such as this in a public room might attract attention and be disagreeable to yourself. A man who has attained a position and celebrity such as yours will probably have many early associates and acquaintances claiming his notice. I beg of you to believe that such is not my object, but that having so recently met you I feel myself unable to repress the desire to assure you that no one in the room could appreciate the fame and rank you have so fairly won, or could wish you more sincerely long life and happiness to enjoy them, than, Dear Sir, your old schoolfellow, Henry Danson." To this Dickens replied: "Gadshill Place, Thursday, 5th May, 1864. Dear Sir, I should have assured you before now that the receipt of your letter gave me great pleasure, had I not been too much occupied to have leisure for correspondence. I perfectly recollect your name as that of an old schoolfellow, and distinctly remember your appearance and dress as a boy, and believe you had a brother who was unfortunately drowned in the Serpentine. If you had made yourself personally known to me at the dinner, I should have been well pleased; though in that case I should have lost your modest and manly letter. Faithfully yours, Charles Dickens."
[6] I take other fanciful allusions to the lady from two of his occasional writings. The first from his visit to the city churches (written during the Dombey time, when he had to select a church for the marriage of Florence): "Its drowsy cadence soon lulls the three old women asleep, and the unmarried tradesman sits looking out at window, and the married tradesman sits looking at his wife's bonnet, and the lovers sit looking at one another, so superlatively happy, that I mind when I, turned of eighteen, went with my Angelica to a city church on account of a shower (by this special coincidence that it was in Huggin Lane), and when I said to my Angelica, 'Let the blessed event, Angelica, occur at no altar but this!' and when my Angelica consented that it should occur at no other—which it certainly never did, for it never occurred anywhere. And O, Angelica, what has become of you, this present Sunday morning when I can't attend to the sermon? and, more difficult question than that, what has become of Me as I was when I sat by your side?" The second, from his pleasant paper on birthdays: "I gave a party on the occasion. She was there. It is unnecessary to name Her, more particularly; She was older than I, and had pervaded every chink and crevice of my mind for three or four years. I had held volumes of Imaginary Conversations with her mother on the subject of our union, and I had written letters more in number than Horace Walpole's, to that discreet woman, soliciting her daughter's hand in marriage. I had never had the remotest intention of sending any of those letters; but to write them, and after a few days tear them up, had been a sublime occupation."
[7] To this date belongs a visit paid him at Furnival's Inn in Mr. Macrone's company by the notorious Mr. N. P. Willis, who calls him "a young paragraphist for the Morning Chronicle," and thus sketches his residence and himself: "In the most crowded part of Holborn, within a door or two of the Bull-and-Mouth Inn, we pulled up at the entrance of a large building used for lawyers' chambers. I followed by a long flight of stairs to an upper story, and was ushered into an uncarpeted and bleak-looking room, with a deal table, two or three chairs and a few books, a small boy and Mr. Dickens, for the contents. I was only struck at first with one thing (and I made a memorandum of it that evening as the strongest instance I had seen of English obsequiousness to employers), the degree to which the poor author was overpowered with the honor of his publisher's visit! I remember saying to myself, as I sat down on a rickety chair, 'My good fellow, if you were in America with that fine face and your ready quill, you would have no need to be condescended to by a publisher.' Dickens was dressed very much as he has since described Dick Swiveller, minus the swell look. His hair was cropped close to his head, his clothes scant, though jauntily cut, and, after changing a ragged office-coat for a shabby blue, he stood by the door, collarless and buttoned up, the very personification, I thought, of a close sailer to the wind." I remember, while my friend lived, our laughing heartily at this description, hardly a word of which is true; and I give it now as no unfair specimen of the kind of garbage that since his death also has been served up only too plentifully by some of his own as well as by others of Mr. Willis's countrymen.
[8] Not quoted in detail, on that or any other occasion; though referred to. It was, however, placed in my hands, for use if occasion should arise, when Dickens went to America in 1867. The letter bears date the 7th July, 1849, and was Mr. Chapman's answer to the question Dickens had asked him, whether the account of the origin of Pickwick which he had given in the preface to the cheap edition in 1847 was not strictly correct. "It is so correctly described," was Mr. Chapman's opening remark, "that I can throw but little additional light on it." The name of his hero, I may add, Dickens took from that of a celebrated coach-proprietor of Bath.