And further, as by a sort of reflex action, another feeling comes uppermost in our minds, apart from the mere amusement and enjoyment of Dickens's works: we mean the actual benefits to humanity which, directly or indirectly, arise out of his writings; and we endorse the noble lines of dedication which his friend, Walter Savage Landor, addressed to him in his Imaginary Conversations of Greeks and Romans (1853):—
"Friends as we are, have long been, and ever shall be, I doubt whether I should have prefaced these pages with your name, were it not to register my judgment that, in breaking up and cultivating the unreclaimed wastes of Humanity, no labours have been so strenuous, so continuous, or half so successful, as yours. While the world admires in you an unlimited knowledge of mankind, deep thought, vivid imagination, and bursts of eloquence from unclouded heights, no less am I delighted when I see you at the school-room you have liberated from cruelty, and at the cottage you have purified from disease."
We have before us—its edges browned by age—a reprint of a letter largely circulated at the time, addressed by Dickens to The Times, dated "Devonshire Terrace, 13th Novr., 1849," in which he describes, in graphic and powerful language, the ribald and disgusting scenes which he witnessed at Horsemonger Lane Gaol on the occasion of the execution of the Mannings. The letter is too long to quote in its entirety, but the following extract will suffice:—"I have seen habitually some of the worst sources of general contamination and corruption in this country, and I think there are not many phases of London life that could surprise me. I am solemnly convinced that nothing that ingenuity could devise to be done in this city in the same compass of time could work such ruin as one public execution, and I stand astounded and appalled by the wickedness it exhibits." The letter contains an urgent appeal to the then Home Secretary, Sir George Grey, "as a solemn duty which he owes to society, and a responsibility which he cannot for ever put away," to originate an immediate legislative change in this respect. Forster says in allusion to the above-mentioned letter:—"There began an active agitation against public executions, which never ceased until the salutary change was effected which has worked so well." Dickens happily lived to see the fruition of his labours, for the Private Execution Act was passed in 1868, and the last public execution took place at Newgate on 26th May of that year. As indicative of the new state of feeling at that time, it may be mentioned that the number of spectators was not large, and they were observed to conduct themselves with unusual decorum.
It is valuable to record this as one of many public reforms which Dickens by his writings and influence certainly helped to accomplish. In his standard work on Popular Government (1885), Sir Henry Sumner Maine says:-"Dickens, who spent his early manhood among the politicians of 1832, trained in Bentham's school, [Bentham, by the bye, being quoted in Edwin Drood,] hardly ever wrote a novel without attacking an abuse. The procedure of the Court of Chancery and of the Ecclesiastical Courts, the delays of the Public Offices, the costliness of divorce, the state of the dwellings of the poor, and the condition of the cheap schools in the North of England, furnished him with what he seemed to consider, in all sincerity, the true moral of a series of fictions."
* * * * * *
We bid a kindly adieu to the "dear old City" where so many genial friends have been made, so many happy hours have been passed, so many pleasant memories have been stored, and for the time leave
"the pensive glory,
That fills the Kentish hills,"
to take our seats in the train for London, with the intention of paying a brief visit to South Kensington, where, in the Forster Collection of the Museum, are treasured the greater portion of the manuscripts which constitute the principal works of Charles Dickens. It will be remembered that the Will of the great novelist contained the following simple but important clause:—"I also give to the said John Forster (whom he previously referred to as 'my dear and trusty friend') such manuscripts of my published works as may be in my possession at the time of my decease;" and that Mr. Forster by his Will bequeathed these priceless treasures to his wife for her life, in trust to pass over to the Nation at her decease. Mrs. Forster, who survives her husband, generously relinquished her life interest, in order to give immediate effect to his wishes; and thus in 1876, soon after Mr. Forster's death, they came into the undisturbed possession of the Nation for ever.
Besides the manuscripts there are numbers of holograph letters, original sketches (including "The Apotheosis of Grip the Raven") by D. Maclise, R.A., and other interesting memorials relating to Charles Dickens. The Handbook to the Dyce and Forster Collections rightly says that:—"This is a gift which will ever have the highest value, and be regarded with the deepest interest by people of every English-speaking nation, as long as the English language exists. Not only our own countrymen, but travellers from every country and colony into which Englishmen have spread, may here examine the original manuscripts of books which have been more widely read than any other uninspired writings throughout the world. Thousands, it cannot be doubted, who have been indebted for many an hour of pleasurable enjoyment when in health, for many an hour of solace when in weariness and pain, to these novels, will be glad to look upon them as each sheet was sent last to the printer, full of innumerable corrections from the hand of Charles Dickens."
The manuscripts are fifteen in number, bound up into large quarto volumes, and comprise:—