We have, after one or two unsuccessful attempts, the good fortune to meet with Mr. Stephen Steele, M.R.C.S. and L.S.A., of Bridge House, Esplanade, Strood, who was admitted a member of the medical profession so far back as the year 1831, and has therefore been in practice nearly sixty years. It will be remembered that this experienced surgeon was sent for by Miss Hogarth, to see Dickens in his last illness. He is good enough to go over and describe to us in graphic and sympathetic language the whole of the circumstances attending that sorrowful event. Previously to doing so, he gives us some interesting details of his recollections of Charles Dickens. Dr. Steele had occupied the onerous post of Chairman of the Liberal Association at Rochester for thirty years, and believes that in politics Dickens was a Liberal, for he frequently prefaced his remarks in conversation with him on any subject of passing interest by the expression, "We Liberals, you know—"
As a matter of fact, Dickens discharged his conscience of his political creed in the remarks which followed his address as President of the Birmingham and Midland Institute,[17] delivered 27th September, 1869, when he said—"My political creed is contained in two articles, and has no reference to any party or persons. My faith in the 'people governing' is, on the whole, infinitesimal; my faith in the 'people governed' is, on the whole, illimitable." At a subsequent visit to Birmingham on the 6th January, 1870, when giving out the prizes at the Institute, he further emphasized his political faith in these words:—"When I was here last autumn, I made a short confession of my political faith—or perhaps, I should better say, want of faith. It imported that I have very little confidence in the people who govern us—please to observe 'people' with a small 'p,'—but I have very great confidence in the People whom they govern—please to observe 'People' with a large 'P.'"
A few days after Charles Dickens's first visit, my friend Mr. Howard S. Pearson, Lecturer on English Literature at the Institute, addressed a letter to him on the subject of the remarks at the conclusion of his Presidential Address, and promptly received in reply the following communication, which Mr. Pearson kindly allows me to print, emphasizing his (Dickens's) observations:—
"Gad's Hill Place,
"Higham by Rochester, Kent.
"Wednesday, 6th October, 1869.
"Sir,
"You are perfectly right in your construction of my meaning at Birmingham. If a capital P be put to the word People in its second use in the sentence, and not in its first, I should suppose the passage next to impossible to be mistaken, even if it were read without any reference to the whole spirit of my speech and the whole tenor of my writings.
"Faithfully yours,
"Charles Dickens.
"H. S. Pearson, Esquire."