see. It has two faces, and looks into two different streets, with its double gables, and date (1713) inscribed on a tablet outside. It is a yellow, well-worn little building. And you enter through darkened tunnels, as it were, cut through the house, coming into a strange yard of evident antiquity, with a steep, ladder-like flight of stone steps that leads up to a window much like the old Canongate houses. Here, then, it was that Boz put up, and here are preserved traditions and relics of his stay. One of the tales is that, after some exuberant night in the election time, he would get his candle and, having to cross the court, would have it blown out half a dozen times, when he would go back patiently to relight it. They show his chair, and a jug out of which he drank, but one has not much faith in these chairs and jugs; they always seem to be supplied to demand, and must be found to gratify the pilgrims.
One of the examination queries which might have found a place in Mr. Calverley’s paper of questions is this: “When did Mr. Pickwick sit down to make entries in his journal, and spend half an hour in so doing?” At Bath on the night of Mr. Winkle’s race round the Crescent. What was this journal? Or why did he keep it? Or why are so few allusions made to it? Mr. Snodgrass was the appointed historiographer of the party, and his “notes” are often spoken of and appealed to as the basis of the chronicle. But half an hour, as I say, was the time the great man seems to have allotted to his posting up the day’s register: “Mr. Pickwick shut up the book, wiped his pen on the bottom of the inside of his coat-tail, and opened the drawer of the inkstand to put it carefully away.” How particular—how real all this is! This it is that gives the living force to the book, and a persuasion—irresistible almost—that it is all about some living person. I have often wondered how it is that this book of Boz’s has such an astounding power of development, such a fertility in engendering other books, and what is the secret of it. Scott’s astonishing Waverley series, Thackeray’s “Vanity Fair,” Boz’s own “Nicholas Nickleby,” “Oliver Twist,” in fact, not one of the whole series save “the immortal ‘Pickwick’” has produced anything in the way of books or commentaries. I believe it is really owing to this. Boz was a great admirer of Boswell’s equally immortal book. I have
heard him speak of it. He attempted parodies of it even. He knew all the turns, the Johnsonian twists, “Why, sirs,” &c., and used them in his letters. He was permeated with the Johnsonian ether; that detail, that description of trifling things which was in Boswell, attracted him, and he felt it; and the fact remains that Pickwick is written on the principles—no copy—of the great biography, and that Boz applied to a mere fictional story what was related in the account of a living man. And it is really curious that Boswell’s “Life of Johnson” should be the only other book that tempts people to the same rage for commentary, illustrations, and speculations. These are of exactly the same character in both books.
The MS. that Mr. Pickwick so oddly found in the drawer of his inkstand at Mrs. Craddock’s, Royal Crescent, Bath, offered another instance of Boz’s ingenious methods of introducing episodical tales into his narrative. He was often hard put to it to find an occasion: they were highly useful to fill a space when he was pressed for matter. He had the strongest penchant for this sort of thing, and it clung to him through his life. Those in “Pickwick” are exceedingly good, full of spirit and “go,” save one, the “Martha Lobbs” story, which is a poorish thing. So good are the others, they have been taken out and published separately. They were no doubt written for magazines, and were lying by him, but his Bath story—“The True Legend of Prince Bladud”—was written specially. It is quite in the vein of Elia’s Roast Pig story, and very gaily told. He had probably been reading some local guide-book, with the mythical account of Prince Bladud, and this suggested to him his own humorous version. At the close, he sets Mr. Pickwick a-yawning several times, who, when he had arrived at the end of this little manuscript—which certainly could not have been compressed into “a couple of sheets of writing-paper,” but would have covered at least ten pages—replaced it in the drawer, and “then, with a countenance of the utmost weariness, lighted his chamber candle and went upstairs to bed.” And here, by the way, is one of the amusing oversights which give such a piquancy to “Pickwick.” Before he began to read his paper, we are carefully told that Mr. Pickwick “unfolded it, lighted his bedroom candle that it might burn up to the time he had
finished.” It was Mr. C. Kent who pointed this out to him, when Boz seized the volume and humorously made as though he would hurl it at his friend.
Anyone interested in Bath must of necessity be interested in Bristol, to which, as all know, Mr. Winkle fled after the unhappy business in the Circus. He found a coach at the Royal Hotel—which no longer exists—a vehicle which, we are told, went the whole distance “twice a day and more” with a single pair of horses. There he put up at the Bush, where Mr. Pickwick was to follow him presently. The Bush—a genuine Pickwick inn—where Mr. Pickwick first heard the news of the action that was to be brought against him, stood in Corn Street, near to the Guildhall, the most busy street in Bristol; but it was taken down in 1864, and the present Wiltshire Bank erected on the site. Mr. Pickwick broke off his stay at Bath somewhat too abruptly; he left it and all its festivities on this sudden chase after Winkle. But he may have had a reason. Nothing is more wonderful than Boz’s propriety in dealing with his incidents, a propriety that is really instinctive. Everything falls out in the correct, natural way. For instance, Mr. Pickwick having received such a shock at the Bush—the announcement of the Bardell action—was scarcely in heart to resume his jollity and gaieties at Bath. We might naturally expect a resumption of the frolics there. He accordingly returned there; but we are told curtly, “The remainder of the period which Mr. Pickwick had assigned as the duration of his stay at Bath passed over without an occurrence of anything material. Trinity term commenced on the expiration of the first week. Mr. Pickwick and his friends returned to London; and the former gentleman, attended of course by Sam, straightway repaired to his old quarters at the George and Vulture.”
And now in these simple sentences have we not the secret of the great attraction of the book? Who would not suppose that this was a passage from a biography of some one that had lived? How carefully minute and yet how naturally the time is accounted for—“passed over without the occurrence of anything material.” It is impossible to resist this air of vraisemblance.
CHAPTER III. OLD ROCHESTER
I.—Jingle and the Theatre
The little Theatre here must be interesting to us from the fact of Jingle’s having been engaged to play there with the officers of the 52nd Regiment on the night of May 15th, 1827. Jingle was described as “a strolling actor,” and belonged to the “Kent circuit,” that is, to the towns of Canterbury, Rochester, Maidstone, &c. To this circuit also belonged “Dismal Jemmy,” who was “no actor,” yet did the “heavy business.” It does not appear that he, also, was engaged for the officers’ performance. We often wonder whether Jingle did perform on the night in question; or did Dr. Payne and Lieutenant Tappleton tell the story of his behaviour to their brethren: of his passing himself off as a gentleman, his wearing another gentleman’s clothes, and his insults to Dr. Slammer. Tappleton scornfully recommended Mr. Pickwick to be more nice in the selection of his companions. No doubt Jingle was suggested to the officers by the manager: “knew a really smart chap who will just do for the part.” On the whole, I think they must have had his services, as it was too late to get a substitute. Jingle, as we know, was played successfully by Sir Henry Irving in the early ’seventies, tempore Bateman. His extraordinary likeness to the Phiz portrait struck every one, and it was marked, not only in face, but in figure, manner, &c. The adaptation of “Pickwick,” however, was very roughly done by the late James Albery, who merely tacked together the Jingle scenes. Those, where there is much genial comedy, such as the Ball scene at Rochester, were left out. It is likely that the boy, Boz, noticed Dismal Jemmy among the strollers, and possibly may have seen a Jingle himself. But the characters of Jingle and his confederate, Job, were certainly suggested by Robert Macaire and Jacques Strop, which, a little before the appearance of Pickwick, were being played in London—in “L’Auberge des Adrets.”