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"Oh, yes! Why not?"
"Father," said Joe, presenting Dolly. "You know who this is?" Mr. Willet looked first at her, then at his son, then back again at Dolly, and then made an ineffectual effort to extract a whiff from his pipe, which had gone out long ago.
Harry Furniss
1910
14 cm x 9.3 cm (5 ⅞ by45 ½ inches), vignetted
Dickens's Barnaby Rudge, The Charles Dickens Library Edition (1910), facing VI, 616.
[Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
"Father," said Joe, presenting Dolly. "You know who this is?"
Mr. Willet looked first at her, then at his son, then back again at Dolly, and then made an ineffectual effort to extract a whiff from his pipe, which had gone out long ago.
"Say a word, father, if it’s only 'how d’ye do,'" urged Joe.
"Certainly, Joseph," answered Mr Willet. "Oh yes! Why not?"
"To be sure," said Joe. "Why not?"
"Ah!" replied his father. "Why not?" and with this remark, which he uttered in a low voice as though he were discussing some grave question with himself, he used the little finger — if any of his fingers can be said to have come under that denomination — of his right hand as a tobacco-stopper, and was silent again. [Chapter LVIII, 614]
Furniss's emphasis on the story of Joe Willet and Dolly Varden in the final frames presents a visual reinterpretation of the historical novel set amidst the Riots of 'Eighty as an historical romance. The young soldier, wounded at the Siege of Savannah, George, during the American Revolutionary War returns to London just in time to join forces with Edward Chester. Together they rescue Haredale from the mob and Dolly and Emma from the clutches of Hugh, Sim, and Gashford. This emphasis relegates the other narratives (Barnaby and his mother, Haredale's duel with Sir John Chester, and the romance between Emma Haredale and Edward Chester) to secondary plot-lines.
Phiz's original romantic closure:Dolly Embraces Joe (Ch. LXXVIII).
Dickens, Charles. Barnaby Rudge in Master Humphrey's Clock. Illustrated by Phiz and George Cattermole. 3 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1841; rpt., Bradbury and Evans, 1849.
________. Barnaby Rudge. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. London: Educational Book Company, 1910. VI.
Created 24 July 2020
Last modified 25 December 2020