"It was at nightfall that I drove into Kalbbratunstadt," etc. — staff artist William Newman's composite woodblock engraving for Charles Lever's A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance, first published on 20 October 1860 in Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization, Chapter XII, "The Duchy of Hesse-Kalbbratonstadt." 2 ⅝ by 3 ½ inches (6.8 cm by 8.8 cm), vignetted, bottom left, page 661. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Passage Illustrated
For the same reason that I have given above, I spare my reader all the circumstances of my journey, my difficulties about carriage, my embarrassments about steamboats and cab fares, which were all of the order that Brown and Jones have experienced, are experiencing, and will continue to experience, till the arrival of that millenary period when we shall all converse in any tongue we please.
It was at nightfall that I drove into Kalbbratonstadt, my postilion announcing my advent at the gates, and all the way to the Platz where the inn stood, by a volley of whip-crackings which might have announced a Grand-Duke or a prima donna. Some casements were hastily opened, as we rumbled along, and the guests of a café issued hurriedly into the street to watch us; but these demonstrations over, I gained the “Schwein” without further notice, and descended. [Chapter XII, "The Duchy of Hesse-Kalbbratonstadt," 662; 117 in the Chapman and Hall edition]
Potts Attempts to Return the Diplomatic Correspondence
Upon departing the Dover railway station in haste for the packet-steamer to Ostende, Potts has inadvertently carried off the Foreign Office's diplomatic pouch belonging to the supercilious attaché and addressed to "Sir Shalley Doubleton, H. M.'s Envoy and Minister at Hesse-Kalbbratonstadt," a backwater diplomatic post in the German states, apparently. When the waiter prepares to take Potts's "luggage" (the single knapsack) to the omnibus for his departure from the hotel, he discovers a second item, a small, white canvas bag of the very sort that Lever must have used to send his manuscript pages from Spezzia to his London publishers, Chapman and Hall. Eager to be away from Ostende and the proximity of the odious Jopplyns (in front of whom he has so thoroughly embarrassed himself), Potts seizes upon this pretext for a Continental adventure in order to deliver the Foreign Office's correspondence.
In Newman's illustration Potts arrives by carriage after nightfall in the North German village. He dreams of being given some sort of preferment or diplomatic post for his service in delivering the diplomatic pouch. he has consulted John Murray's Handbook for Travellers in Northern Germany (from 1836) to ascertain the best route; railway to Cologne, and thence by carriage to the "Schwein," the local inn. Thus, "a volley of whip-cracking which might have announced a grand-duke or prima donna" signals Potts's arrival at the platz. Newman realizes the rapid progress of the speeding carriage, the darkened buildings of the town square, and the whip-cracking which Lever has emphasized in this romantic scene.
Scanned images 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 photographer and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
Brown, Jane E., and Richard Samuel West. "William Newman (1817—1870): A Victorian Cartoonist in London and New York." American Periodicals, 17, 2: "Periodical Comics and Cartoons." (Ohio State University Press, 2007), 143-183. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20770984.
Lever, Charles. A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance. Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization. Illustrated by William Newman. Vols. IV-V (13 April 1860 through 23 March 1861) in thirty-five weekly parts. Only a dozen of these weekly instalments were illustrated: p. 541 (one), 549 (two), 573, 589, 605, 621, 637, 649, 661, 678, 701, and 714.
_______. A Day's Ride; A Life's Romance. Illustrated by "Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1863, rpt. Routledge, 1882.
_______. A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance. London: Chapman and Hall, 1873.
Lever, Charles James. A Day's Ride; A Life's Romance. http://www.gutenberg.org//files/32692/32692-h/32692-h.htm
Stevenson, Lionel. Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. New York: Russell & Russell, 1939, rpt. 1969.
Sutherland, John. "Charles Lever." The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford, Cal.: Stanford U. P., 1989. Pp. 372-374.
Created 25 June 2022