"Would I do" by "Phiz" (Illustration for Charles Lever's "Barrington")

Would I do

Phiz (Hablot K. Browne)

1863

Illustration for Charles Lever's Barrington (Chapter 34, p. 278)

Image scan, caption, and commentary by Philip V. Allingham.

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Commentary

The meaning of Phiz's plate is plainer than the text it accompanies, for the artist quite correctly implies that Stapylton is attempting to supplant Conyers as Josephine's suitor, despite the vast differences in age and experience. although Lever indicates that the major's has burnt mahogany by the tropic sun, Phiz has elected to show him as thoroughly white (thereby failing to prepare us for the disclosure that Stapylton is in fact the son of the half-cast Edwardes from George Barrington's letters). In fact, in the letter-press, "Would I do" (278) is asked by Josephine, not the major. She is responding to his wish "for a good colleague just to keep the boat's head straight when one is weary of rowing" (278). How much she has heard of what he has been saying to himself aloud his "projects" neither he nor we are permitted to know.

Last modified August 2002