“Wretched creature, what do you want here?” said the gentleman, who it is needless to say was Mr. Snodgrass. To this the fat boy, considerably terrified, briefly responded, “Missis.” — Thomas Onwhyn's thirty-first extra illustration for Charles Dickens's "The Pickwick Club" (30 November 1837)

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“Wretched creature, what do you want here?” said the gentleman, who it is needless to say was Mr. Snodgrass. . . .

Thomas Onwhyn [“TO del”]

steel engraving

12.8 cm high by 11.8 cm wide (5 by 4 ½ inches), vignetted

Charles Dickens's The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, Chapter LIV, “Containing the Particulars relative to the Double Knock, and other Matters; among which certain Interesting Disclosures relative to Mr. Snodgrass and a Young Lady are by no means irrelevant to this History,” facing 570.

[Click on the image to enlarge it.]

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 it, and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Passage Illustrated: Augustus Snodgrass put out by the arrival of Wardle’s Page

Now, whether the shake had jumbled the fat boy’s faculties together, instead of arranging them in proper order, or had roused such a quantity of new ideas within him as to render him oblivious of ordinary forms and ceremonies, or (which is also possible) had proved unsuccessful in preventing his falling asleep as he ascended the stairs, it is an undoubted fact that he walked into the sitting-room without previously knocking at the door; and so beheld a gentleman with his arms clasping his young mistress’s waist, sitting very lovingly by her side on a sofa, while Arabella and her pretty handmaid feigned to be absorbed in looking out of a window at the other end of the room. At the sight of this phenomenon, the fat boy uttered an interjection, the ladies a scream, and the gentleman an oath, almost simultaneously.

‘Wretched creature, what do you want here?’ said the gentleman, who it is needless to say was Mr. Snodgrass.

To this the fat boy, considerably terrified, briefly responded, ‘Missis.’

‘What do you want me for,’ inquired Emily, turning her head aside, ‘you stupid creature?’

‘Master and Mr. Pickwick is a-going to dine here at five,’ replied the fat boy.

‘Leave the room!’ said Mr. Snodgrass, glaring upon the bewildered youth.

‘No, no, no,’ added Emily hastily. ‘Bella, dear, advise me.’

Upon this, Emily and Mr. Snodgrass, and Arabella and Mary, crowded into a corner, and conversed earnestly in whispers for some minutes, during which the fat boy dozed.

‘Joe,’ said Arabella, at length, looking round with a most bewitching smile, ‘how do you do, Joe?’

‘Joe,’ said Emily, ‘you’re a very good boy; I won’t forget you, Joe.’

‘Joe,’ said Mr. Snodgrass, advancing to the astonished youth, and seizing his hand, ‘I didn’t know you before. There’s five shillings for you, Joe!” [Chapter LIV, “Containing the Particulars relative to the Double Knock, and other Matters; among which certain Interesting Disclosures relative to Mr. Snodgrass and a Young Lady are by no means irrelevant to this History,” 570]

Some Necessary Background: Meanwhile, at the Adelphi Hotel in Chapter LIV

Chapter LIII ends with a terrible knocking at the door of Perker's law office — the knocker proves to be none other than Wardle's page, "a wonderfully fat boy" to the eyes of Mr. Lowten, Perker's clerk who has answered the door. His knocking announces the arrival in London of Wardle himself, who is in his carriage below. He and his daughter have responded to Arabella's news of her having married Winkle by coming up to London — Emily has announced her intention to marry Snodgrass, with whom she has been conducting a clandestine romantic correspondence since Christmas. Wardle now invites Pickwick back to his rooms at Osborne's Adelphi Hotel in the Strand to discuss the marital issue with Emily Wardle, who is attended by the newly-wed Arabella Winkle.

At the George and Vulture Inn where Mrs. Winkle is putting up, Pickwick and Wardle learn that she has already gone to see Emily at the Adelphi. With some business to transact, Wardle and Pickwick agree to meet back at the Adelphi at 5:00 PM for dinner, and send Joe in the carriage to let the girls know.

Thus, the scene that Onwhyn has chosen to depict is set in the Wardles' rooms at Osborne's Hotel, in the Adelphi, built in an imposing neoclassical style in 1777. Taking the liberty of entering the sitting-room of the suite without knocking, Joe is startled to find that the girls (unchaperoned) have a male visitor, Augustus Snodgrass, who in fact is seated on the sofa, holding Emily in his arms. No wonder, then, that he is disconcerted to have been caught in this situation by Wardle's page, who announces that his master and Pickwick are due back at 5:00 PM. The trio switch tactics suddenly, deciding to bribe Joe rather than intimidate him.

Commentary: The Fat Boy's Final Appearance

“Wretched creature, what do you want here?” said the gentleman, who it is needless to say was Mr. Snodgrass. To this the fat boy, considerably terrified, briefly responded, “Missis.” Page 570.

By a series of coincidences Wardle and his page, Joe the Fat Boy, are in London with his daughter Emily. We and Pickwick now learn that Emily Wardle has agreed to marry to Mr. Snodgrass after a six-month correspondence and thoughts about running away with him. In the spirit of reconciliation which dominates the novel's conclusion (even to the point of Pickwick's arranging the liberation of Jingle and Trotter from the Fleet), Wardle, arriving just after the moment depicted, accepts Snodgrass as his son-in-law. The meeting depicted occurs in the sitting room of the London hotel where the Wardles are staying, and is the ideal setting for the resolution of various romantic issues. As Snodgrass protests Joe's presence and casts a protective arm around Emily, her friend Arabella Allen, now a married woman and at least potentially a chaperone, looks on. After a quick huddle, the girls and the bachelor attempt to bribe him into silence with his employer. Shortly, as captured in the Phiz illustration for this ultimate instalment, Mary and The Fat Boy, Joe expresses an obvious attraction for the maid, Mary, such amorousness being a feature of his peculiar medical problem, Kleine Levin Syndrome.

Scenes with The Fat Boy in Other Editions (1837-1910)

Left: Phiz's original engraving for the conclusion of the serial novel, Mary and The Fat Boy (November 1837). Centre: Phiz's Household Edition woodcut reworks his original 1837 steel engraving as "I say, how nice you look!" (1874). Right: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s Diamond Edition Vol. 1 illustration Right: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s Diamond Edition Vol. 1 illustration The Fat Boy (1867) makes Joe a grossly overweight child. [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Left: Phiz's original engraving for the conclusion of the serial novel, The Fat Boy Awake Again (substituted in November 1837 for Chapter VIII). Centre: Thomas Nast's American Household Edition woodcut reworks Phiz's 1837 steel engraving as "Will you have some of this?" said the Fat Boy (1873). Right: Harry Furniss's version of the scene between Mary and the suddenly amorous Joe, Mary and the Fat Boy (1910). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]

Bibliography

Dickens, Charles. The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Robert Seymour, Robert Buss, and Phiz. London: Chapman and Hall, November 1837. With 32 additional illustrations by Thomas Onwhyn (London: E. Grattan, April-November 1837).

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Thomas Nast. The Household Edition. 16 vols. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1873. Vol. 4.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ('Phiz'). The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1874. Vol. 6.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 2.

Titley, Graham D. C. "Thomas Onwhyn: a Life in Illustration (1811-1886)." Pearl. University of Plymouth (2018-07-12).

Created 29 February 2024