The Letters of Charles Dickens Volume Iii Part 55

1854.

NARRATIVE.

The summer of this year was also spent at Boulogne, M. Beaucourt being again the landlord; but the house, though still on the same "property,"

stood on the top of the hill, above the Moulineaux, and was called the Villa du Camp de Droite.

In the early part of the year Charles d.i.c.kens paid several visits to the English provinces, giving readings from his books at many of the large manufacturing towns, and always for some good and charitable purpose.

He was still at work upon "Hard Times," which was finished during the summer, and was constantly occupied with "Household Words." Many of our letters for this year are to the contributors to this journal. The last is an unusually interesting one. He had for some time past been much charmed with the writings of a certain Miss Berwick, who, he knew, to be a contributor under a feigned name. When at last the lady confided her real name, and he discovered in the young poetess the daughter of his dear friends, Mr.[16] and Mrs. Procter, the "new sensation" caused him intense surprise, and the greatest pleasure and delight. Miss Adelaide Procter was, from this time, a frequent contributor to "Household Words," more especially to the Christmas numbers.

There are really very few letters in this year requiring any explanation from us--many explaining themselves, and many having allusion to incidents in the past year, which have been duly noted by us for 1853.

The portrait mentioned in the letter to Mr. Collins, for which he was sitting to Mr. E. M. Ward, R.A., was to be one of a series of oil sketches of the then celebrated literary men of the day, in their studies. We believe this portrait to be now in the possession of Mrs.

Ward.

In explanation of the letter to Mr. John Saunders on the subject of the production of the latter's play, called "Love's Martyrdom," we will give the dramatist's own words:

"Having printed for private circulation a play ent.i.tled 'Love's Martyrdom,' and for which I desired to obtain the independent judgment of some of our most eminent literary men, before seeking the ordeal of the stage, I sent a copy to Mr. d.i.c.kens, and the letter in question is his acknowledgment.

"He immediately took steps for the introduction of the play to the theatre. At first he arranged with Mr. Phelps, of Sadler's Wells, but subsequently, with that gentleman's consent, removed it to the Haymarket. There it was played with Miss Helen Faucit in the character of Margaret, Miss Swanborough (who shortly after married and left the stage) as Julia, Mr. Barry Sullivan as Franklyn, and Mr.

Howe as Laneham.

"As far as the play itself was concerned, it was received on all sides as a genuine dramatic and poetic success, achieved, however, as an eminent critic came to my box to say, through greater difficulties than he had ever before seen a dramatic work pa.s.s through. The time has not come for me to speak freely of these, but I may point to two of them: the first being the inadequate rehearsals, which caused Mr. d.i.c.kens to tell me on the stage, four or five days only before the first performance, that the play was not then in as good a state as it would have been in at Paris three weeks earlier. The other was the breakdown of the performer of a most important secondary part; a collapse so absolute that he was changed by the management before the second representation of the piece."

This ill-luck of the beginning, pursued the play to its close.

"The Haymarket Theatre was at the time in the very lowest state of prostration, through the Crimean War; the habitual frequenters were lovers of comedy, and enjoyers of farce and burlesque; and there was neither the money nor the faith to call to the theatre by the usual methods, vigorously and discriminatingly pursued, the mult.i.tudes that I believed could have been so called to a better and more romantic cla.s.s of comedy.

"Even under these and other, similarly depressing circ.u.mstances, the nightly receipts were about 60, the expenses being 80; and on the last--an author's--night, there was an excellent and enthusiastic house, yielding, to the best of my recollection, about 140, but certainly between 120 and 140. And with that night--the sixth or seventh--the experiment ended."

[Sidenote: Mr. Walter Savage Landor.]

TAVISTOCK HOUSE, _January 7th, 1854._

MY DEAR LANDOR,

I heartily a.s.sure you that to have your name coupled with anything I have done is an honour and a pleasure to me. I cannot say that I am sorry that you should have thought it necessary to write to me, for it is always delightful to me to see your hand, and to know (though I want no outward and visible sign as an a.s.surance of the fact) that you are ever the same generous, earnest, gallant man.

Catherine and Georgina send their kind loves. So does Walter Landor, who came home from school with high judicial commendation and a prize into the bargain.

Ever, my dear Landor, affectionately yours.

[Sidenote: The Hon. Mrs. Watson.]

TAVISTOCK HOUSE, _Friday, January 13th, 1854._

MY DEAR MRS. WATSON,

On the very day after I sent the Christmas number to Rockingham, I heard of your being at Brighton. I should have sent another there, but that I had a misgiving I might seem to be making too much of it. For, when I thought of the probability of the Rockingham copy going on to Brighton, and pictured to myself the advent of two of those very large envelopes at once at Junction House at breakfast time, a sort of comic modesty overcame me. I was heartily pleased with the Birmingham audience, which was a very fine one. I never saw, nor do I suppose anybody ever did, such an interesting sight as the working people's night. There were two thousand five hundred of them there, and a more delicately observant audience it is impossible to imagine. They lost nothing, misinterpreted nothing, followed everything closely, laughed and cried with most delightful earnestness, and animated me to that extent that I felt as if we were all bodily going up into the clouds together. It is an enormous place for the purpose; but I had considered all that carefully, and I believe made the most distant person hear as well as if I had been reading in my own room. I was a little doubtful before I began on the first night whether it was quite practicable to conceal the requisite effort; but I soon had the satisfaction of finding that it was, and that we were all going on together, in the first page, as easily, to all appearance, as if we had been sitting round the fire.

I am obliged to go out on Monday at five and to dine out; but I will be at home at any time before that hour that you may appoint. You say you are only going to stay one night in town; but if you could stay two, and would dine with us alone on Tuesday, _that_ is the plan that we should all like best. Let me have one word from you by post on Monday morning.

Few things that I saw, when I was away, took my fancy so much as the Electric Telegraph, piercing, like a sunbeam, right through the cruel old heart of the Coliseum at Rome. And on the summit of the Alps, among the eternal ice and snow, there it was still, with its posts sustained against the sweeping mountain winds by cl.u.s.ters of great beams--to say nothing of its being at the bottom of the sea as we crossed the Channel.

With kindest loves,

Ever, my dear Mrs. Watson, Most faithfully yours.

[Sidenote: Miss Mary Boyle.]

TAVISTOCK HOUSE, _Monday, January 16th, 1854._

MY DEAR MARY,

It is all very well to pretend to love me as you do. Ah! If you loved as _I_ love, Mary! But, when my breast is tortured by the perusal of such a letter as yours, Falkland, Falkland, madam, becomes my part in "The Rivals," and I play it with desperate earnestness.

As thus:

FALKLAND (_to Acres_). Then you see her, sir, sometimes?

ACRES. See her! Odds beams and sparkles, yes.

See her acting! Night after night.

FALKLAND (_aside and furious_). Death and the devil! Acting, and I not there! Pray, sir (_with constrained calmness_), what does she act?

ACRES. Odds, monthly nurses and babbies! Sairey Gamp and Betsey Prig, "which, wotever it is, my dear (_mimicking_), I likes it brought reg'lar and draw'd mild!" _That's_ very like her.

FALKLAND. Confusion! Laceration! Perhaps, sir, perhaps she sometimes acts--ha! ha! perhaps she sometimes acts, I say--eh! sir?--a--ha, ha, ha!

a fairy? (_With great bitterness._)

ACRES. Odds, gauzy pinions and spangles, yes!

You should hear her sing as a fairy. You should see her dance as a fairy. Tol de rol lol--la--lol--liddle diddle. (_Sings and dances_). _That's_ very like her.

FALKLAND. Misery! while I, devoted to her image, can scarcely write a line now and then, or pensively read aloud to the people of Birmingham. (_To him._) And they applaud her, no doubt they applaud her, sir. And she--I see her! Curtsies and smiles! And they--curses on them! they laugh and--ha, ha, ha!--and clap their hands--and say it's very good. Do they not say it's very good, sir? Tell me. Do they not?

ACRES. Odds, thunderings and pealings, of course they do! and the third fiddler, little Tweaks, of the county town, goes into fits. Ho, ho, ho, I can't bear it (_mimicking_); take me out! Ha, ha, ha! O what a one she is! She'll be the death of me. Ha, ha, ha, ha! _That's_ very like her!

FALKLAND. d.a.m.nation! Heartless Mary! (_Rushes out._)

Scene opens, and discloses coals of fire, heaped up into form of letters, representing the following inscription:

When the praise thou meetest To thine ear is sweetest, O then REMEMBER JOE!

(_Curtain falls._)