The Abduction — otherwise known as Initial Letter Vignette "T", first page of text for A Holiday Romance in Ticknor-Fields' Our Young Folks, An Illustrated Magazine For Boys and Girls, Vol. IV (p. 1), January 1868. Wood-engraving, 3.7 cm high by 8.9 cm wide (1 ½ by 3 ½ inches), vignetted. Left: The entire page.
Passage Illustrated: Tinkling Waiting to Abduct Nettie Ashford
This beginning-part is not made out of anybody’s head, you know. It’s real. You must believe this beginning-part more than what comes after, else you won’t understand how what comes after came to be written. You must believe it all; but you must believe this most, please. I am the editor of it. Bob Redforth (he’s my cousin, and shaking the table on purpose) wanted to be the editor of it; but I said he shouldn’t because he couldn’t. He has no idea of being an editor.
Nettie Ashford is my bride. We were married in the right-hand closet in the corner of the dancing-school, where first we met, with a ring (a green one) from Wilkingwater’s toy-shop. I owed for it out of my pocket-money. When the rapturous ceremony was over, we all four went up the lane and let off a cannon (brought loaded in Bob Redforth’s waistcoat-pocket) to announce our nuptials. It flew right up when it went off, and turned over. Next day, Lieut.-Col. Robin Redforth was united, with similar ceremonies, to Alice Rainbird. This time the cannon burst with a most terrific explosion, and made a puppy bark.
My peerless bride was, at the period of which we now treat, in captivity at Miss Grimmer’s. [Part One, "Introductory Romance from the Pen of William Tinkling, Esq.," 251]
Commentary: The First of Eytinge's Four Initial Letter Vignettes
Initial vignettes appropriate to the subject-matter of the various stories were a specialty of Our Young Folks — for example, to introduce Mayne Reid's "Among The Ice-Cutters" (Vol. III, No. 1, page 1) the artist has depicted an icicle-like initial "T" surmounting five implements used for boring through lake-ice and cutting it into commercial blocks. Sometimes, however, the initial letter is not so cunningly worked into the vignette — for example, the "W" in the miniature for instalment seven of Cast Away in the Cold (Vol. IV, No. 2, page 65) merely sits in the upper-right corner and has no real connection with the storm raging in the Arctic Ocean below.
The first such vignette for A Holiday Romance shows the sort of detail and energy that one seldom finds even on postage stamps. The initial "T" has been cleverly integrated as part of the tree's branch; it has been playfully en-graved with a bark-like texture, so that the viewer is compelled to study the plate before moving to the text. The branch on which the "T" has been placed, like the fence, the file of school-children, and the movements of the boys, then forces the viewer's eye to the right of the page to begin reading the story.
The corner lamp-post behind which the Colonel has stationed the story's narrator (William Tinkling) is nowhere to be seen. Rather, Tinkling peers from behind a wooden fence (not mentioned by Dickens as a feature of the lane in which the action occurs), ready to sally forth to claim his bride when the Colonel (rushing forward in the middle ground) has felled Miss Drowvey. All this is more or less in accord with the Colonel's plan as outlined in the middle of the second page. What the vignette artist has subtracted is an urban, British lamp-post; what he has added is an American fence and appropriate clothing for the figures. The teacher wears the poke bonnet and dress of a middle-class woman of the 1860s, the boys short, collarless jackets and knickerbocker trousers (Cunnington and Buck, 181). As with the other vignettes in this series, the outcome of the action here is not given away, so that the reader must wait until the bottom of the second page to learn how the gallant rescue turned into a debacle.
Other plates by Eytinge
- Captain Boldheart and a Whale: Initial Letter 'T'
- Princess Alicia: Initial Letter 'T'
- Mrs. Orange and Mrs. Lemon: Initial-Letter Vignette 'T'
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL.]
Bibliography
Allingham, Philip V. "The Original Illustrations for Dickens's A Holiday Romance by John Gilbert, Sol Eytinge, and G. G. White as these appeared in Our Young Folks, An Illustrated Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. IV." Dickensian 92, 1 (Spring 1996): 31-47.
Cunnington, Phillis, and Anne Buck. Children's Costume in England 1300-1900. London: Adams and Charles Black, 1965.
Dickens, Charles. A Holiday Romance in Our Young Folks, An Illustrated Magazine For Boys and Girls, Vol. IV. Boston: Ticknor Fields, January-May, 1868. Rpt. All the Year Round, 1868.
Dickens, Charles. A Holiday Romance and Other Writings for Children. Ed. Gillian Avery. Everyman Dickens. London: J. M. Dent; Vermont: Charles E. Tuttle, 1995.
Kitton, Frederic George. Dickens and His Illustrators: Cruikshank, Seymour, Buss, "Phiz," Cattermole, Leech, Doyle, Stanfield, Maclise, Tenniel, Frank Stone, Landseer, Palmer, Topham, Marcus Stone, and Luke Fildes. Amsterdam: S. Emmering, 1972. Re-print of the London 1899 edition.
Created 2 May 2002
Last modified 2 February 2023