Robert Allbut

“ In a word, a city of another and a bygone time is Cloisterham, with its hoarse Cathedral bell, its hoarse rooks hovering about the Cathedral tower, its hoarser and less distinct rooks in the stalls far beneath. Fragments of old wall, saint’s chapel, chapter-house, convent, and monastery have got incongruously or obstructively built into many of its houses and gardens, much as kindred jumbled notions have become incorporated into many of its citizens’ minds. ”

“ Charles Dickens lies, without one of his injunctions respecting his funeral having been violated, surrounded by poets and men of genius. Shakespeare’s marble effigy looked yesterday into his open grave; at his feet are Dr. Johnson and David Garrick; his head is by Addison and Handel; while Oliver Goldsmith, Rowe, Southey, Campbell, Thomson, Sheridan, Macaulay, and Thackeray, or their memorials, encircle him; and ‘Poets’ Corner,’ the most familiar spot in the whole Abbey, has thus received an illustrious addition to its peculiar glory. ”

“ It is hard to choose, since there is so much to choose from. We may ramble about London town, where, like Mr. Weller, our guide is “werry much at home.” If so, we are sure to encounter a host of old cronies. Perhaps we shall see the great Buzfuz entering court, all in his wig and silk, nodding with lofty condescension to his struggling brother, Mr. T. Traddles, which latter is bringing “Sophy and the girls” to set Gray’s Inn a-blooming. Or Tom Pinch going towards Fountain Court to meet the waiting Ruth. Or David Copperfield joyously ushering J. Steerforth into his rooms in the Adelphi. ”

“ Everybody knows how like the street the two dinner-rows of people who take their stand by the street will be. The expressionless uniform twenty houses, all to be knocked at and rung at in the same form, all approachable by the same dull steps, all fended off by the same pattern of railing, all with the same impracticable fire-escapes, the same inconvenient fixtures in their heads, and everything, without exception, to be taken at a high valuation—who has not dined with these? ”

“ Or the pilgrim may pick out some particular trip, when leisure and chance carry him in that direction. The volume is in truth a serviceable guide-book, leading its clients by the best ways, and even informing them where, when sight-seeing is over, a place may be found for rest, refreshment, and reflection. And it is happier than most guide-books in that it is never called upon to describe the stupid and uninteresting, which have no existence in Dickens’ Land. ”

“ And, above all, you will certainly enjoy yourself, and thank your gods for Charles Dickens.
Mr. Would-be Wiseman may affect to sneer at our pilgrimages to this and other places connected with the imaginary names of fiction; but he must recognise the far-reaching influence for good exercised by symbols and associations over the human mind. The sight of a loved home after many years—the flutter of one’s country’s flag in foreign lands—these things touch keenly our better nature. ”

“ Such a house of resort no longer exists in this vicinity.
On the west side the Rambler passes the precincts of Westminster Abbey, beneath whose “high embowed roof” repose the sacred ashes of the illustrious dead. To this venerable fane—the especial resting-place of English literary genius—we will return after our concluding ramble to the birthplace of our greatest English novelist. ”

“ Doubtless this is a sign of the novelist’s artistic sense. To have his “Maypole” windows looking directly into the graveyard would have detracted from that air of warmth and conviviality with which he wished to endow his rare old inn. In most other respects the description exactly fits the “King’s Head” as it must have been in “No Popery” times—as it is with little alteration to-day. The trim green sward at the rear—once evidently the bowling-green—is a famous resting-place in summer; and in one of the small arbours Dickens is said to have written during his stay here. ”

“ I could not but reflect on the singular gift of the poet; to be able thus to spread the magic of his mind over the very face of Nature; to give to things and places a charm and character not their own, and to turn this ‘working-day’ world into a perfect fairyland. He is indeed the true enchanter, whose spell operates, not upon the senses, but upon the imagination and the heart. ”

“ The gutters of the street, and every crack and fissure in the stones, ran with scorching spirit, which being dammed up by busy hands, overflowed the road and pavement, and formed a great pool, into which the people dropped down dead by dozens. ”

“ It will be easily believed that I am a fond parent to every child of my fancy, and that no one can ever love that family as dearly as I love them. But, like many fond parents, I have, in my heart of hearts, a favourite child, and his name is David Copperfield.”
Leaving Canterbury by the direct line of the London, Chatham And Dover Railway, we are carried onward through a pleasant country towards the south-east coast; the white roads of the district indicating the abundant chalkiness of the soil. ”

“ This and the strip of garden in front of it are shut out from the thoroughfare by an iron railing. A large garden, with a grass plat and high trees, stretches behind the house, and gives it a countrified look in the midst of this coal and gas steaming London. In the passage from street to garden hung pictures and engravings. Here stood a marble bust of Dickens, so like him, so youthful and handsome ”

“ The eyes, which have been darkly fixed upon the sky, turn with meaning in them towards the compassionate face from which the tears are dropping, and a smile is on the aged lips as they ask, ‘What is your name, my dear?’ ‘My name is Lizzie Hexam.’ ‘I must be sore disfigured. ”

“ Into Dickens’ Land, therefore, my masters, an you will and when you will! The high-roads thither are always open, the lanes and by-paths are free for us to tread. He that found out this rare world has made it fully ours. Let us visit our inheritance, or revisit it, if that be the better word. Let us make real the scenes we have read of and dreamt of—peopling them with the folk of Dickens, so that familiar faces shall look upon us p. xxiifrom familiar windows, familiar voices greet us as we pass. Shall we travel abroad in the fashion of the corresponding committee of the Pickwick Club? ”

“ When the two miserable creatures who attracted all this ghastly sight about them, were turned quivering into the air, there was no more emotion, no more pity, no more thought that two immortal souls had gone to judgment, no more restraint in any of the previous obscenities, than if the name of Christ had never been heard in this world, and there was no belief among men but that they perished like the beasts. ”

“ On the first-floor landing is displayed an illuminated frame (the work of Mr. Owen Jones) , which reads as follows:—
“This House, Gadshill Place, stands on the summit of Shakespeare’s Gadshill, ever memorable for its association with Sir John Falstaff in his noble fancy—‘But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four o’clock, early at Gadshill! there are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses: I have vizards for you all; you have horses for yourselves.’”
On this residence Dickens had fixed his choice in his boyish days. ”

“ 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 ”

“ Exactly on the opposite side of the street is the handsome modern erection of Child’s Bank. This new building dates from 1878, when the structure of old Temple Bar was removed. It replaces one of the very old-fashioned houses of London, in which for many years Messrs. Child carried on their important banking business. This house is spoken of by Dickens, in his “Tale of Two Cities,” as Tellson’s Bank, on the outside of which the mysterious Mr. Cruncher was usually in attendance as “odd-job man, and occasional porter and messenger.” ”

“ Indeed, the mansions and their inhabitants were so much alike in that respect that the people were often to be found drawn up on opposite sides of dinner tables, in the shade of their own loftiness, staring at the other side of the way with the dulness of the houses. ”

“ When the sun rose brightly—as it did—it gilded thousands upon thousands of upturned faces, so inexpressibly odious in their brutal mirth or callousness, that a man had cause to shrink from himself as fashioned in the image of the devil. ”

“ Whereupon this charming old lady shakes her finger testily at the transgressor, and exclaims, “It is quite evident that you have never lived in Dover. Miss Betsy Trotwood a myth, indeed! Let me tell you that my own mother knew the dear woman well—yes, and that delightful Mr. Dick too; and she remembered seeing Mr. Dickens drive up in a fly from the railway station to visit them. ”

“ In this task and every other, I have ever undertaken as a faithful servant of the public—always imbued with a sense of duty to them, and always striving to do his best—I have been uniformly cheered by the readiest response, the most generous sympathy and the most stimulating support. ”

“ And, if the London Dickens’ Land palls, doth not this most inviting country stretch to all points of the compass? Northward goes yonder well-appointed coach, whereof the driver has just been escorted from a certain public-house in Portugal Street by a mottle-faced man, in company with two or three other persons of stout and weather-beaten aspect—the driver himself being stouter and more weather-beaten than all. ”

“ The great majority of English readers—on both sides of the Atlantic—claim personal acquaintance with “Samivel” Weller, Mark Tapley, Oliver Twist, and many more besides: the old companions of our schoolboy days. We cherish pleasant remembrance of the familiar “green leaves” of Dombey, David Copperfield, and the rest, as they first afforded us their monthly quota of interest and enjoyment; and have always maintained intimate relations with Captain Cuttle, Tom Pinch, Mr. Peggotty, and the more recent dramatis personæ of the works of Dickens. ”

“ In the twelfth chapter of “David Copperfield” we read of the Obelisk as the place near to which the “long-legged young man with a very little empty donkey-cart” was standing, whom David engaged to take his box to the Dover coach-office for sixpence. And we all remember the sad dénouement of that engagement, as previously mentioned. Near at hand, at the top of Blackfriars Road, stands The Surrey Theatre, at which Fanny Dorrit was engaged as a dancer, while her Uncle Frederick played the clarionet in the orchestra. ”

“ At No. 14 will be found (for a short time only) a small old-fashioned house, on the front of which is painted an inscription, “The Old Curiosity Shop, Immortalised by Charles Dickens,” now occupied by Mr. H. Poole, dealer in wastepaper. This is said to be the house assigned by the novelist for the residence of Little Nell and her grandfather, with whose pathetic history we are all familiar—
“One of those receptacles for old and curious things, which seem to crouch in odd corners of this town, and to hide their musty treasures from the public eye in jealousy and distrust.” ”

“ The novelist’s ideals become actual to the popular mind; while commonplace truth hides itself among its dry-as-dust records, until some curious antiquary or insistent pedant drags it forth to make a nine days’ wonder. We sigh over “Juliet’s Tomb” in spite of the precisians, sup in the inn kitchen at Pennaflor with Gil Blas at our elbow, and shudder through the small hours outside the haunted House of the Black Cat in Quaker Philadelphia. ”

“ In the early days of the present century, Nicholas Nickleby leaving London with Smike, bound for Portsmouth, took the high road viâ Kingston and Godalming (with a view, en passant, of the Devil’s Punch-bowl) ; walking steadily onward until arrival, on their second day’s march, at a roadside inn—probably in the neighbourhood of Horndean. Here they met with Mr. Vincent Crummles, of histrionic fame, and ended their more immediate perplexities by an engagement with that gentleman. There was no railway communication in those times, and coach fare was expensive ”

“ At the time of his death the Times “took the lead in suggesting that the only fit resting-place for the remains of a man so dear to England was the Abbey, in which most illustrious Englishmen are laid;” and accordingly, on the 14th of June, the funeral took place, with a strict observance of privacy. In Dean Stanley’s “Westminster Abbey” the following statement is given:—
“Close under the bust of Thackeray lies Charles Dickens, not, it may be, his equal in humour, but more than his equal in his hold on the popular mind, as was shown in the intense and general enthusiasm shown at his grave. ”

“ Miss Lucretia Tox had apartments at Princess Place, an address not included in the London Directory; and Major Bagstock also had chambers in the immediate vicinity, a genteel but somewhat inconvenient neighbourhood. Miss Tox’s residence is described as
“A dark little house, that had been squeezed at some remote period of English history into a fashionable neighbourhood at the west end of the town, where it stood in the shade, like a poor relation of the great street round the corner, coldly looked down upon by mighty mansions. ”

“ Dickens’s obsequies were as simple as he desired. The news that a special train left Rochester at an early hour yesterday morning, and that it carried his remains, was soon telegraphed to London; but every arrangement had been completed beforehand, and there was no one in the Abbey; no one to follow the three simple mourning coaches and the hearse; no one to obtrude upon the mourners. The waiting-room at Charing Cross Station was set apart for the latter for the quarter of an hour they remained there; the Abbey doors were closed directly they reached it ”

“ But, in these degenerate times, the black, dilapidated streets and tumbling tenements have given place to wholesome dwellings, and the neighbourhood is associated with the name of a great American philanthropist.
Returning to the south side of the Strand, we next come to Buckingham Street (turning on right, by No. 37) , at the end house of which, on the right, facing the river, was the top set of chambers in the Adelphi, consisting of
“A little half-blind entry, where you could hardly see anything, a little stone-blind pantry, where you could see nothing at all, a sitting-room and a bedroom.” ”

“ Conveyances are only needed to bring the pilgrim to the starting-point of the voyage, and in several instances even these aids to locomotion may be dispensed with altogether when the sightseer is one after Dickens’ own heart—a sturdy pedestrian. By pursuing the routes indicated, there is no reason why a Grand Tour of Dickens’ Land should not be made by easy stages and at slight cost. ”