In the good old times, legal education and hospitality went hand in hand, and the halls of the different Inns of Court were, for several centuries, a kind of university for the education of advocates, subject to this arrangement. The benchers and readers, being the superiors of each house, occupied, on public occasions of ceremony, the upper end of the hall, which was raised on a daïs, and separated from the rest of the building by a bar. The next in degree were the utter barristers, who, after they had attained a certain standing, were called from the body of the hall to the bar (that is, to the first place outside the bar), for the purpose of taking a principal part in the mootings or exercises of the house; and hence they probably derived the name of utter or outer barristers. The other members of the inn, consisting of students of the law under the degree of utter barristers, took their places nearer to the centre of the hall, and farther from the bar, and, from this manner of distribution, appear to have been called inner barristers. The distinction between utter and inner barristers is, at the present day, wholly abolished; the former being called barristers generally, and the latter falling under the denomination of students; but the phrase "called to the bar" still holds and is recognized throughout the English-speaking world.
The general rule, as to qualification, in all the Inns of Court, is, that a person, in order to entitle himself to be called to the bar, must be twenty-one years of age, have kept twelve terms, and have been for five, or three years, at least, a member of the society. The keeping of terms includes dining a certain number of times in the hall, and hence the pleasantry of eating the way to the bar; the preparatory studies being now private. Of the great business of refection, the engraving herewith shows the most dignified scene – the Benchers' Dinner; the benchers, or "antients," as they were formerly called, being the governors of the inn, at the Temple called the Parliament. The Middle Temple hall surpasses the halls of the other societies in size and splendour. Begun in 1562, and finished about ten years afterward, it is 100 feet long, 40 feet wide, and upwards of 60 feet in height. The roof and panels are finely decorated, and the screen at the lower end is beautifully carved. There are a few good pictures: amongst others, one of Charles I. on horseback, by Vandyke; also portraits of Charles II., Queen Anne, George I., and George II.
Lincoln's Inn was once the property of Henry De Lacy, Earl of Lincoln. It became an Inn of Court in 1310. The New Hall and Library, a handsome structure after the Tudor style, was opened in 1845. The Chapel was built in 1621-23, by Inigo Jones, who laid out the large garden in Lincoln's Inn Fields, close by, in 1620. Lord William Russell was beheaded here in 1683. In Lincoln's Inn are the Chancery and Equity Courts. Lincoln's Inn vied with the Temple in the masques and revels of the time of James I.
Gray's Inn, nearly opposite the north end of Chancery Lane, once belonged to the Lords Gray of Wilton. Most of its buildings – except its hall, with its black oak roof – are of comparatively modern date. In Gray's Inn lived the great Lord Bacon, a tree planted by whom, in the quaint old garden of the Inn, could, in Dickens' time, yet be seen – propped up by iron stays. To-day a diligent search and inquiry does not indicate its whereabouts, which is another manifestation of the rapidity of the age in which we live.
The nine Inns of Chancery allied with the four Inns of Court, the Inner and Middle Temple, Lincoln's Inn and Gray's Inn, are Clifford's Inn, Clement's Inn, Lyons' Inn, New Inn, Furnival's Inn, Thavie's Inn, Sergeant's Inn, Staple Inn, and Barnard's Inn, all of which were standing in Dickens' day, but of which only Staple Inn and Sergeant's Inn have endured, Clement's Inn having only recently (1903) succumbed to the house-breaker.
Staple Inn, in Holborn, "the fayrest inne of Chancerie," is one of the quaintest, quietest, and most interesting corners of mediæval London left to us.
Nathaniel Hawthorne, describing his first wanderings in London, said, "I went astray in Holborn through an arched entrance over which was Staple Inn, and here likewise seemed to be offices; but in a court opening inwards from this, there was a surrounding seclusion of quiet dwelling-houses, with beautiful green shrubbery and grass-plots in the court and a great many sunflowers in full bloom. The windows were open, it was a lovely summer afternoon, and I had a sense that bees were humming in the court." Many more years have passed over the old corner since Hawthorne's visit, but still it retains its ancient charm, and still the visitor is struck by the rapid change from the hurrying stream of Holborn's traffic to this haunt of ancient peace about which Mr. Worsfold writes with pardonable enthusiasm.
With a history traceable backward for many centuries, Staple Inn was at first associated in the middle ages with the dealing in the "staple commodity" of wool, to use Lord Chief Justice Coke's words, but about the fifteenth century the wool merchants gave way to the wearers of woollen "stuff," and their old haunt became one of the Inns of Chancery – the Staple Inn of the lawyers – perpetuating its origin in its insignia, a bale of wool. For many years the connection of the Inn with the Law was little beyond a nominal one, and in 1884 the great change came, and the haunt of merchants, the old educational establishment for lawyers, passed from the hands of "The Principal, Ancients and Juniors of the Honourable Society of Staple Inn," to those of a big insurance society, while the fine old hall became the headquarters of the Institute of Actuaries.
True it is, that perhaps no area of the earth's surface, of say a mile square, has a tithe of the varied literary association of the neighbourhood lying in the immediate vicinity of the Temple, the birthplace of Lamb, the home of Fielding, and the grave of Goldsmith.
Shoe Lane, Fleet Street, is still haunted by the memory of the boy Chatterton, and Will's Coffee House, the resort of wits and literary lights of former days, vies with Royal Palaces as an attraction for those who would worship at the shrines of a bygone age, – a process which has been made the easier of late, now that the paternal Society of Arts has taken upon itself to appropriately mark, by means of a memorial tablet, many of these localities, of which all mention is often omitted from the guide-books. Often the actual houses themselves have disappeared, and it may be questioned if it were not better that in some instances a tablet commemorating a home or haunt of some notability were not omitted. Still if the accompanying inscription is only sufficiently explicit, the act is a worthy one, and truth to tell, a work that is well performed in London.
Suburban London, too, in a way, may well come within the scope of the passion of any lover of material things which have at one time or another been a part and parcel of the lives of great men. And so, coupled with literary associations, we have the more or less imaginary "Bell" at Edmonton to remind us of Cowper, of many houses and scenes identified with Carlyle, at Chelsea; of the poet Thompson, of Gainsborough, and a round score of celebrities who have been closely identified with Richmond, – and yet others as great, reminiscent of Pepys, Addison, Steele, Thackeray and the whole noble band of chroniclers, essayists, and diarists of the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
The "houses of entertainment" – as the Georgian novelist was pleased to refer to inns and taverns – had in Dickens' day not departed greatly from their original status. Referring solely to those coaching and posting-houses situated at a greater or lesser distance from the centre of town, – on the main roads running therefrom, and those city establishments comprehended strictly under the head of taverns, – which were more particularly places of refreshment for mankind of the genus male. These two classes were, and are, quite distinct from the later-day caravanserai known as hotels, and as such performed vastly different functions.
To be sure, all life and movement of the early nineteenth century, and for a couple of hundred years before, had a great deal to do with inns and taverns.
From Chaucer's famous "Tabard," where —
"In Southwark at the Tabard as I lay
Ready to wenden on my pilgrimage,"
to "The Bull," at Rochester, whose courtyard is still as described by Dickens, and the somewhat mythical "Maypole" of "Barnaby Rudge," is a far cry, though it would appear that the kind of cheer and accommodation varies to a much lesser degree than might be supposed. Certainly the demand for brevity and the luxuriousness of the later years of the nineteenth century, and even to some extent during Dickens' time, with the innovation of railway travel, gas-lamps, the telegraph, and what not, was making an entirely new set of conditions and demands.
The old "Tabard" of Chaucer's day is no more, though an antiquary of 1840 has attempted to construct what it may have been out of the "Talbot" of that day, which stood in the ancient High Street of Southwark, just across London Bridge, where, said the annalist Stow, "there were so many fair inns for receipt of travellers," – the rivals of the Boar's Heads and Mermaids of another generation.
Of the actual Dickens' inns, perhaps none is more vividly impressed on the imagination than that of the "Maypole," that fantastic structure of "Barnaby Rudge," the original of which is the "King's Head" at Chigwell on the borders of Epping Forest. It was here that Mr. Willet sat in his accustomed place, "his eyes on the eternal boiler." "Before he had got his ideas into focus, he had stared at the plebeian utensil quite twenty minutes," – all of which indicates the minutiæ and precision of Dickens' observations. This actual copper, vouched for by several documents of attestation, with an old chair which formerly stood in the Chester Room of the "Maypole," is to-day in the possession of Mr. Bransby Williams, of London, an ardent enthusiast of all matters in connection with Dickens and his stories.
Of the Pickwickian Inns, the "White Horse" at Ipswich – "the overgrown tavern" to which Mr. Pickwick journeyed by the London Coach – is something of tangible reality, and doubtless little changed to this day; the same being equally true of "The Leather Bottle" at Cobham. The old "White Hart" in the Borough High Street, the scene of the first meeting of Mr. Pickwick and Weller, was demolished in 1889. Not so the "Magpie and Stump," – that referred to in "Pickwick" as being in the vicinity of the Clare Market, and "closely approximating to the back of the 'New Inn.'" This seems to have been of an imaginary character in nomenclature, at least, though it is like enough that some neighbourhood hostelry – or, as it is further referred to, as being what the ordinary person would call a "low public-house" – was in mind.
The old "Fountain Inn" of the Minories, referred to in "Oliver Twist," and the "little inn" ("The Sun") at Canterbury, where the Micawbers lodged, and the "White Hart" at Hook, – or more probably its predecessor of the same name, – visited by the Pickwickians en route to Rochester, – were realities in every sense of the word, and show once again the blending of truth and fiction which was so remarkable in the novels, and which indicates so strongly the tendency of Dickens to make every possible use of accessories, sights, and scenes, with which, at one time or another, he had been acquainted.
The "Saracen's Head" at Snow Hill, – a real thing in Dickens' day, – where the impetuous Squeers put up during his visits to London, has disappeared. It was pulled down when the Holborn Viaduct was built in 1869, and the existing house of the same name in no way merits the genial regard which is often bestowed upon it, in that it is but an ordinary London "Pub" which does not even occupy the same site as its predecessor.
"The Spaniards," where foregathered the No-Popery rioters, on Hampstead Heath, remains much as of yore; certainly it has not changed to any noticeable degree since Mrs. Bardell, et als., repaired hither in the Hampstead stage for their celebrated tea-party, as recounted in "Pickwick."
The very term Pickwickian Inns inspires rumination and imagination to a high degree. Remembrance is all very well, but there is a sturdy reality about most of the inns of which Dickens wrote. Thus the enthusiast may, if he so wish, in some cases, become a partaker of the same sort of comfort as did Dickens in his own time, or at least, amid the same surroundings; though it is to be feared that New Zealand mutton and Argentine beef have usurped the place in the larder formerly occupied by the "primest Scotch" and the juiciest "Southdown."
It is said there are twenty-five inns mentioned in "Pickwick" alone; the writer has never been able to count up but twenty-two: still the assertion may be correct; he leaves it to the curious to verify. Certainly such well revered names as the "Golden Cross," "The Bull," at Rochester, which, above all other localities drawn in "Pickwick," has the liveliest associations, "The Leather Bottle," "The Magpie and Stump," "The Marquis of Granby," "The Blue Boar," "The White Horse Cellars" in Piccadilly, and "The Great White Horse" at Ipswich are for ever branded upon the memory. The following half-dozen will perhaps be best recalled: "The Old White Hart" in the Borough High Street; "The George and Vulture," Mr. Pickwick's own favourite; "The Golden Cross," reminiscent of Dickens' own personality as well; "The White Horse Cellars," the starting-place of the Ipswich Coach; "Osborne's Hotel" in the Adelphi, still occupied as a rather shabby sort of hostelry, though the name has gone; "Jack Straw's Castle," where "Boz" and his friend Forster so often enjoyed that "shoemaker's holiday;" and lastly, "The Spaniards" at Hampstead. A description of one, as it is to-day, must suffice here.
"The Golden Cross," which stands opposite Charing Cross Railway Station, with its floriated gilt crosses usually brightly burnished, and the entire edifice resplendent in new paint.
There is still, however, something of the air of the conservatism of a former day, if only in the manner of building, which in the present case furthers the suggestion that the ways of the modern architect – striving for new and wonderful constructive methods – were unknown when the walls of this old hostelry were put up.
Its courtyard has disappeared, or rather has been incorporated into a sort of warehouse or stable for a parcels delivery company, and the neighbourhood round about has somewhat changed since the days of "Copperfield" and "Pickwick." The Charing Cross Railway Station has come upon the scene, replacing old Hungerford Market, and palatial hotels have been built where the gardens of Northumberland House once were. St. – Martin's-in-the-Fields is still in its wonted place, but with a change for the worse, in that the platform with its ascending steps has been curtailed during a recent alleged improvement in the roadway in St. Martin's Lane.
The National Gallery remains as of yore, except that it has recently been isolated by pulling down some adjoining structures to the northwest, as a precautionary measure against fire.
The Nelson Monument in Trafalgar Square, then newly arrived, is as it was in the days of Dickens' early life. But there is little suggestion in the hotel or its surroundings of its ever having been a "mouldy sort of an establishment in a close neighbourhood," and it is hard to believe that Copperfield's bedroom "smelt like a hackney-coach and was shut up like a family vault."
DICKENS' LITERARY LIFE
A brief account is here given of Dickens' literary career, which presents chronologically a review of his productions as they appeared.
The first of his literary efforts was the tragedy of "The Sultan of India," written in his precocious school-days at Chatham, when, if we except his Parliamentary journalistic work, nothing else was put forth until "The Dinner at Poplar Walk" was published in the Monthly Magazine (1833). The original "Sketches by Boz" – the first of which bore no signature – also followed in the Monthly Magazine. Other sketches under the same generic title also appeared in the Evening Chronicle, and yet others, under the title of "Scenes and Characters," were published in "Bell's Life in London" and the "Library of Fiction."
In 1836 a number of these fugitive pieces were collected into a volume, the copyright of which was sold to one Macrone for £100, who published them under the first and best known title, "Sketches by Boz." The familiar story of "Pickwick," its early conception and its final publication, is well known. Its first publication (in parts) dated from 1836-37. About this time Dickens had another bad attack of stage-fever, and wrote a farce, "The Strange Gentleman," the libretto of an opera called "The Village Coquettes," and a comedy, "Is She His Wife?" more particularly perhaps for amateur representation, in which he was very fond of taking part. "Oliver Twist," a courageous attack on the Poor Laws and Bumbledom, followed in 1838, though it was not completed until after "Nicholas Nickleby" began to appear in 1839.
At this time was started Master Humphrey's Clock, a sort of miscellany in which it was intended to publish a series of papers written chiefly by Dickens himself after the style of Addison's Spectator of a former day. It was not at first successful, and only upon the commencement therein of the "Old Curiosity Shop" did it take on in any sense.
Master Humphrey's Clock ran down with the completion of the novel, though this story, in company with "Barnaby Rudge," a tale of the riots of '80, was not issued in book form until 1848 and 1849.
The authorship of "Pickwick" was unknown by the great mass of the public until very nearly the completion of the work in serial parts. Much conjecture was raised, and a writer in Bentley's Miscellany published the following lines under the title of:
IMPROMPTU
"Who the Dickens 'Boz' could be
Puzzled many a learned elf,
Till time revealed the mystery,
And 'Boz' appeared as Dickens' self."
The other contributions made by Dickens to this periodical were afterward added to his published works under the title of "Master Humphrey's Clock."
Dickens' first tour to America followed the abandonment of the periodical in 1842. This event called forth the following verses by Tom Hood, entitled:
TO CHARLES DICKENS
On his Proposed Voyage to America, 1842
"Pshaw! away with leaf and berry
And the sober-sided cup!
Bring a Goblet and bright Sherry!
And a bumper fill me up. —
Tho' I had a pledge to shiver,
And the longest ever was, —
Ere his vessel leaves our river,
I will drink a health to 'Boz.'
"Here's success to all his antics,
Since it pleases him to roam,
And to paddle o'er Atlantics,
After such a sale at home
May he shun all rocks whatever,
And the shallow sand that lurks, —
And his passage be as clever
As the best among his works."
With what favour his visit was received in America is too well known to require detailed mention here. His experiences and observations recounted in "American Notes," first published in 1842 upon his return to England, has told these vividly and picturesquely, if not exactly consistently.
As a reader, Dickens stood as preëminently to the fore as when posing as a writer. His phenomenal success on the platform is given in detail in a volume written by George Dolby, who accompanied him and managed his American tour. The mental and physical strain was such that in fifteen years of combined editorial, literary, and reading labours, it left him attenuated and finally curtailed his brilliant work.
What the readings really did accomplish was to increase and firmly assure the permanence of his already wide-spread fame.
"Martin Chuzzlewit" had begun to appear in shilling parts in 1843, and at that time was considered by the novelist to be by far the best work he had yet written. "Dombey and Son" followed, and afterward "David Copperfield," to which Dickens transferred his affections from "Chuzzlewit." This new "child of fancy," as he called it, was so largely autobiographical as to be accepted by many as being a recounting of his own early struggles as a poor boy in London, and his early literary labours. He himself said: "I seemed to be sending a part of myself into the shadowy world."
While "Chuzzlewit" was appearing in serial form, that masterpiece perhaps of all Dickens' shorter stories, "A Christmas Carol," – the first of the "Christmas Stories," – appeared.
This earned for its author the sobriquet, "The Apostle of Christmas."
Its immediate popularity and success was, perhaps, influenced by the following endorsement from Thackeray:
"It seems to me a national benefit, and to every man or woman who reads it a personal kindness."
Others under the same generic title followed: "The Chimes," 1844; "The Cricket on the Hearth," 1845; "The Battle of Life," 1846; and "The Haunted Man," 1848. In January, 1846, Dickens began his short connection with the Daily News. Here his "Pictures from Italy" appeared, he having just returned from a journey thither.
"Dombey and Son," which Dickens had begun at Rosemont, Lausanne, took him from 1846 to 1848 to complete.
In 1850 the idea of Household Words, the periodical with which Dickens' fame is best remembered, took shape. His idea was for a low-priced periodical, to be partly original, and in part selected. "I want to suppose," he wrote, "a certain shadow which may go into any place by starlight, moonlight, sunlight, or candle-light, and be in all homes and all nooks and corners." The general outlines and plans were settled, but there appears to have been no end of difficulty in choosing a suitable name. "The Highway of Life," "The Holly Tree," "The Household Voice," "The Household Guest," and many others were thought of, and finally was hit upon "Household Words," the first number of which appeared on March 30, 1850, with the opening chapters of a serial by Mrs. Gaskell, whose work Dickens greatly admired. In number two appeared Dickens' own pathetic story, "The Child's Dream of a Star." In 1859, as originally conceived, Household Words was discontinued, from no want of success, but as an expediency brought about through disagreement among the various proprietors. Dickens bought the property in, and started afresh under the title of All the Year Round, among whose contributors were Edmund Yates, Percy Fitzgerald, Charles Lever, Wilkie Collins, Charles Reade, and Lord Lytton. This paper in turn came to its finish, and phœnix-like took shape again as Household Words, which in one form or another has endured to the present day, its present editor (1903) being Hall Caine, Jr., a son of the novelist.
Apart from the general circulation, the special Christmas numbers had an enormous sale. In these appeared other of the shorter pieces which have since become famous, – "Mugby Junction," "The Seven Poor Travellers," "The Haunted House," etc.
In the pages of Household Words "The Child's History of England," "The Uncommercial Traveller" (1861), and "Hard Times" (1854) first appeared; while All the Year Round first presented "A Tale of Two Cities" (1859) and "Great Expectations."
"Bleak House" was issued in parts in 1852. "Little Dorrit," originally intended to be called "Nobody's Fault," was published in 1857.
"Our Mutual Friend" dates from 1865 in book form. "Edwin Drood" was left unfinished at the author's death in 1870.
In 1868 "The Uncommercial Traveller" was elaborated for the first issue in All the Year Round, and subsequently again given to the world in revised book form.
Curiously enough, though most of Dickens' works were uncompleted before they began to appear serially, they have been universally considered to show absolutely no lack of continuity, or the least semblance of being in any way disjointed.
Dickens' second visit to America in 1867 was, like its predecessor, a stupendous success. A New York paper stated at this time that: "Of the millions here who treasure every word he has written, there are tens of thousands who would make a large sacrifice to see and hear a man who has made so many happy hours."
Dickens' fame had deservedly attracted a large circle of acquaintances around him, who, in truth, became firmly converted into fast friends.
His literary life and his daily labours had so identified him with the literary London of the day that all reference to literary events of that time must make due allowance of his movements.
The house at 48 Doughty Street still stands, and at the end of 1839 the novelist removed to the "handsome house with a considerable garden" in Devonshire Terrace, near Regent's Park, the subject of a sketch by Maclise which is here given. His holidays during his early and busy years were spent at Broadstairs, Twickenham, and Petersham on the Thames, just above Richmond. Dickens was always a great traveller, and his journeys often took him far afield.
In 1841 he visited Landor at Bath, and in the same year he made an excursion to Scotland and was granted the freedom of the city of Edinburgh. The first visit to America was undertaken in 1842; his Italian travels in 1844; residence in Switzerland 1846; three months in Paris 1847; Switzerland and Italy revisited in 1853. Three summers were spent at Boulogne in 1853, 1854, 1856; residence in Paris 1855-56; America revisited 1867-68.
Such in brief is a review of the physical activities of the author. He did not go to Australia – as he was variously importuned – but enough is given to show that, in spite of his literary associations with old London and its institutions, Charles Dickens was, for a fact, a very cosmopolitan observer.
As for Dickens' daily round of London life, it is best represented by the period of the magazines, Master Humphrey's Clock, Household Words, and All the Year Round, particularly that of the former. In those days he first met with the severe strain which in after life proved, no doubt, to have shortened his days.
Considering his abilities and his early vogue, Dickens made some astonishingly bad blunders in connection with his agreements with publishers; of these his biographer Forster tells in detail.
After the publication of "Martin Chuzzlewit," Dickens expressed dissatisfaction with his publishers, Messrs. Chapman and Hall, which resulted in his making an agreement with Messrs. Bradbury and Evans.
To conserve his intellectual resources, he resolved to again visit Italy, to which country he repaired after a farewell dinner given him at Greenwich, where Turner, the artist, and many other notables attended. He accordingly settled in a suburb of Genoa, where he wrote "The Chimes," and came back to London especially to read it to his friends. Writing from Genoa to Forster in November, 1844, he said:
"… But the party for the night following? I know you have consented to the party. Let me see. Don't have any one this particular night for dinner, but let it be a summons for the special purpose, at half-past six. Carlyle indispensable, and I should like his wife of all things; her judgment would be invaluable. You will ask Mac, and why not his sister? Stanny and Jerrold I should particularly wish; Edwin Landseer, Blanchard … and when I meet you, oh! Heaven, what a week we will have!"
Forster further describes the occasion itself as being —
"Rather memorable … the germ of those readings to larger audiences by which, as much as by his books, the world knew him."
Among those present was Maclise, who, says Forster, "made a note of it" in pencil, which is reproduced herein. "It will tell the reader all he can wish to know, and he will thus see of whom the party consisted."
Of Dickens' entire literary career nothing was more successful than his famous public readings. From that night at Forster's house in Lincoln's Inn Fields (No. 58, still standing, 1903), afterward made use of as Mr. Tulkinghorn's in "Bleak House," and later among other friends, at first in a purely informal and private manner and in a semi-public way for charitable objects, these diversions, so powerful and realistic were they, ultimately grew into an out-and-out recognized business enterprise.
The first series was inaugurated in 1858-59, and absolutely took the country by storm, meeting with the greatest personal affection and respect wherever he went. In Dublin there was almost a riot. People broke the pay-box, and freely offered £5 for a stall. In Belfast he had enormous audiences, being compelled, he said, to turn half the town away. The reading over, the people ran after him to look at him. "Do me the honour," said one, "to shake hands, Misther Dickens, and God bless you, sir; not ounly for the light you've been to me this night, but for the light you've been to me house, sir (and God bless your face!), this many a year." Men cried undisguisedly.
During the second American tour, in 1867, the public went almost mad. In Boston his reception was beyond all expectations; and in New York the speculators assembled the night before the reading in long lines to wait the opening of the doors at nine the next morning for the issue of the tickets. They continued to come all night, and at five o'clock in the morning there were two lines of eight hundred each, whilst at eight there were five thousand. At nine o'clock, each of the two lines reached more than three-quarters of a mile in length, members of the families were relieving each other, waiters from neighbouring restaurants were serving breakfasts in the open December air, and excited applicants for tickets offering five or ten dollars for the mere permission to exchange places with other persons standing nearer the head of the line. Excitement and enthusiasm increased wherever he travelled, and it has been freely observed by all who knew him well that this excitement and strain finally culminated, after he had returned to England and undertaken there another series of readings, in an illness which hastened his death.