"Thereupon the doctor and Mr. Winkle shook hands, and then Mr. Winkle and Lieutenant Tappleton (the doctor's second), and then Mr. Winkle and the man with the camp-stool, and finally Mr. Winkle and Mr. Snodgrass: the last-named gentleman in an excess of admiration at the noble conduct of his heroic friend.
"'I think we may adjourn,' said Lieutenant Tappleton.
"'Certainly,' added the doctor."
We ourselves also adjourn, taking with us many pleasant memories of Chatham and Fort Pitt, and of the period relating to "the childhood and youth of Charles Dickens."
* * * * * *
Birthplace of Charles Dickens,
387 Mile End Terrace, Commercial Road, Landport.
No tramp in "Dickens-Land" can possibly be complete without a visit to the birthplace of the great novelist, and on another occasion we therefore devote a day to Portsea, Hants. A fast train from Victoria by the London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway takes us to Portsmouth Town, the nearest station, which is about half a mile from Commercial Road, and a tram-car puts us down at the door. We immediately recognize the house from the picture in Mr. Langton's book, but the first impression is that the illustration scarcely does justice to it. From the picture it appears to us to be a very ordinary house in a row, and to be situated rather low in a crowded and not over respectable neighbourhood. Nothing of the kind. The house, No. 387, Mile End Terrace, Commercial Road, Landport, where the parents of Charles Dickens resided before they removed to another part of Portsea, and subsequently went to live at Chatham, and where the future genius first saw light, was eighty years ago quite in a rural neighbourhood; and in those days must have been considered rather a genteel residence for a family of moderate means in the middle class. Even now, with the pressure which always attends the development of large towns, and their extension on the border-land of green country by the frequent conversion of dwelling-houses into shops, or the intrusion of shops where dwelling-houses are, this residence has escaped and remains unchanged to this day.
There is another point of real importance to notice. Mr. Langton, referring to this house, says:—"The engraving shows the little fore-court or front garden, with the low kitchen window of the house, whence the movements of Charles [who is presumably represented in the engraving by the figure of a boy about two or three years old, with curly locks, dressed in a smart frock, and having a large ball in his right hand], attended by his dear little sister Fanny, could be overlooked."[24] Very pretty indeed, but alas! I am afraid, purely imaginary, considering, as will hereafter appear, that Charles was a baby in arms, aged about four months and sixteen days, when his parents quitted the house in which he was born.