No end of No Thoroughfares

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Boston , Christmas Eve, 1867.

My dear Wilkie,--I am obliged to write very hastily, to catch the mail over at New York. The Play is done with great pains and skill, but I fear it is too long. Its fate will have been decided before you get this letter, but I greatly doubt its success.

Your points follow in their order.

1. Whatever is most dramatic in such a complicated thing as the Clock Lock I think the best for the stage, without reference to the nicety of the real mechanism.

2. I would keep Vendale and Marguerite on the stage, and I would end with Obenreizer's exit.

3. Madame D'Or's speaking unquestionably better out. She herself unquestionably better out. I have not the least doubt of it. But, my dear boy, what do you mean by the whole thing being left "at my sole discretion." Is not the play coming out the day after to-morrow ? ? ?

There are no end of No Thoroughfares being offered to Managers here. The play being still in abeyance with Wallack, I have a strong suspicion that he wants to tide over to the 27th, and get a Telegram from London about the first night of the real version. If it should not be a great success, he would then either do a false one, or do none. Accordingly, I have brought him to book for decision on the 26th. Don't you see?

They are doing Cricket, Oliver Twist, and all sorts of versions of me. Under these circumstances they fence when they have to pay.

I will try to catch the next mail.

Ever affectionately, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 158-59.

a good round sum

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Parker House, Boston,

Monday, Second December, 1867.

My dear Wilkie, ---I find that if the Play be left unpublished in England, the right of playing it in America can be secured by assigning the MS. to an American Citizen. That I can do at once by using my publishers here for the purpose. I can make an arrangement with [Lester] Wallack, in New York, to have it produced at his Theatre (where there is the best company), on a sharing agreement after a certain nightly allowance for expenses, and I have arranged to see Wallack next week.

I have made inquiry about Mr. Lawrence Barrett (whose letter to me I enclose), and I find that he has a good reputation as a Star Actor, and that he is a responsible man pecuniarily. Now, I am advised that the best course will be to make an engagement with him to take the play and act in it, and get it up wheresoever he likes in the United States, except in New York City. (The exception, because Wallack and he are not d'accord, and the other good New York Theatres all have their hands full.) As I read his letter his proposal means that we give the play--that he gives his services--and that the receipts of each night's performance be divided between author and actor equally. Will you write to him at once, see him, and bind us both to such an engagement, if he be willing to bind himself to it? We might possibly get a good round sum by such a course. I have advised with one of the most knowing Managers in New York (who came over here this morning to see me)--the Black Crook Manager--and he says: "If you have Wallack for New York, and Barrett for the States generally, you could not do better." Mr. Barrett may have left England before this reaches you. If so, I have taken measures to catch [him] on this side when he comes over. As I read for the first time to-night, I will finish this to-morrow for Wednesday's steamer, which will be my own Cuba returning.

Tuesday, Third December.

A most tremendous success last night. The whole city is perfectly mad about it to-day, and it is quite impossible that prospects could be more brilliant.

Ever, my dear Wilkie,

Your always affectionate C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 155-57.

tolerably stout

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Parker House, Boston, U. S.,

Thursday, Twenty-eighth November, 1867.

My dear Wilkie,---I have received a letter from one Mr. Barrett, an American actor (dated 308 Regent Street, London, W.), proposing for the dramatic version of No Thoroughfare. He says in that letter that he "learns from Mr. Wilkie Collins that I have taken the play to America, intending to arrange for its production there," and offers to come out here with the New Year and play it. As I have not got the play, I am at a loss to know whether this is an intentional or an unintentional mistake.

Now, Dolby is going over to New York this morning, and has it in charge from me to see the most speculative of dramatic men there, and ascertain what terms he will make for the play. I think it far better to deal with a man here than with a man in Regent Street, London. The excitement in New York about the Readings being represented as quite unprecedented, I have little doubt of being able to make a good thing of the Drama, and, if necessary, I will get it up. But what I shall want as soon as I can possibly have them, are:

1. A detailed Scene Plot from Fechter.

2. His notion of the Dresses.

3. A copy of the Play itself. Act by Act, as you do it.

4. Together with any stage Directions that Fechter has in his mind.

Thus armed, I should not be at all surprised if I could get a very handsome addition to our gains. I think it will be worth while for you, on receipt of this, to telegraph to me at the Westminster Hotel, Irving Place, New York City, when you will be able to send me the last of the Play, because I shall then be in a condition to make a contract. Tell Fechter, with my love and regards, that I will write him a note immcdiately after my first Reading here next Monday. (Between ourselves, I have already some 2000 pounds in hand before opening my lips.)

I am yearning already for the Spring and Home, but hope to work out the intervening time with a tolerably stout heart. I am wonderfully well in health, and got over the voyage with the greatest success.

This note is left open for Dolby to add Postscript to. He will know, before closing it, whether or no it is certainly worth while for you to telegraph (in 20 words, containing not more than 100 letters). It will be best for you always to address me about the Play, and always to address whatever you send in connection with it, Westminster Hotel, Irving Place, New York City.

Ever, my dear Wilkie, your affectionate

Charles Dickens.

I will not at present reply to Mr. Barrett at all.

Westminster Hotel. New York,

29 Nov., 1867.

My dear Mr. Collins,--I have only time--to save the Mail--to add a few lines to Mr. Dickens's letter to request you will send out the acting part of the Play as soon as possible, as I am in hopes I may be able to arrange for its production here, possibly at Wallack's; and if you can get models made and sent out of the Scenery, it will also be a great thing to have. I spoke to [Harry] Palmer about the price last evening on my arrival here, and he seems most enthusiastic on the matter.

I have sold to-day the tickets for the first Four Readings in the City, and sold out (8000 tickets in all) in six hours. The enthusiasm with regard to Dickens and all that he does is enormous, and I am in hopes we shall be able to spend the whole of our time in the large cities.

Give my kindest regards to Wills and all London friends, and believe me.

Yours faithfully,

George Dolby

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 152-54.

demon illegibliity

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place,

Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Monday, Twenty-third September, 1867.

My dear Wilkie, ---Like you I am working with snail-like slowness. My American possibility* divides my mind so incongruously with this occupation.

But I think I have a good idea. I send it you with a view to your at odd times Thinking-out of the last Act. When Vendale is at the last pass of the murderous business on the Simplon, he conscientiously says some broken words to Obenreizer to the effect: "If it be possible that you are the man--as I have lately thought--do so and so. Villain and murderer as you are, my trust to my dead friend remains unchanged." This is so brokenly said that Obenreizer supposes it refers to some obscurity in Vendale's birth--not his own--and so goes on to build up Nemesis.

I have already got Vendale haunted by the possibility that Obenreizer is the man.

I will write again by or before Friday. I see a great chance for Act III. out of this leaving of Act II. Don't you .

Ever affec'ly, C. D.

The Demon Illegibility has possession of me.

*[Note: Before Dickens sailed for his second American visit, in November, 1867, with George Dolby as his business agent, he gave Collins some assistance in making a stage version of No Thoroughfare for Fechter. This is the only one of Dickens's works in the dramatization of which he had any hand, except The Tale of Two Cities, the production of which at the Lyceum, under the management of Madame Celeste in 1860, he supervised and superintended. Fechter made a great success in the part of Obenreizer, in London, in the winter of 1867-68, and later in Paris, and in the United States.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 149-50.

avalanche of power

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place.

Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Friday, Twenty-third August, 1867.

My Dear Wilkie, ---I have done the overture, but I don't write to make that feeble report.

I have a general idea which I hope will supply the kind of interest we want. Let us arrange to culminate in a wintry flight and pursuit across the Alps, under lonely circumstances, and against warnings. Let us get into all the horrors and dangers of such an adventure under the most terrific circumstances, either escaping from or trying to overtake (the latter, the latter, I think) some one, on escaping from or overtaking whom the love, prosperity, and Nemesis of the story depend. There we can get Ghostly interest, picturesque interest, breathless interest of time and circumstance, and force the design up to any powerful climax we please. If you will keep this in your mind as I will in mine, urging the story towards it as we go along, we shall get a very Avalanche of power out of it, and thunder it down on the readers' heads.

Ever affec'ly, C. D.

[image of Charles Dickens found at The Victorian Web]

[Dickens and Collins were collaborating on No Thoroughfare, the last of their Christmas Numbers, and one that came out as a play during the same period.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 143-44.

Aspatria

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place,

Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Office, Thirteenth March, 1867.

My dear Wilkie,

y all means let Reade see my letter.

This from a disconsolate Voyager with the Fenians before him. I should as soon have thought of going to Ireland at this time, out of my own head, as of going to read at--what was its name in those geological periods when you sprained your foot?--Aspatria. But Chappell's head thinks differently.

Glad to hear of our friend Regnier [of the Theatre Francais]. As Carlyle would put it: "A deft and shifty little man, brisk and sudden, of a most ingenious carpentering faculty, and not without constructive qualities of a higher than the Beaver sort. Withal an actor, though of a somewhat hard tone. Think pleasantly of him, O ye children of men !''

Ever UnPatrick-iotically, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 140-41.

the railways shake me

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Office, Tuesday, Twelfth February, 1867.

My dear Wilkie,

Coming back here yesterday I found your letter awaiting me.

Owing to my heavy engagements I have not read Charles Reade's last book, but I will take it away with me to-morrow, and do so at once. If the trial should come off in this present month, however, I cannot be a witness; for I go to Scotland to-morrow, and come back for only one night at St. James's Hall before going to Ireland. The public announcements are all made, and heavy expenses are incurred by Chappell, wherefore I must be producible, in common honor. But I hope the action may not be tried so soon. I do not agree with the legal authorities, and I rather doubt Cockburn's allowing such evidence to be given on the ground that the onus probandi lies with the reviewer, and that it is not disproof that is required--but this is beside the question. Say everything that is brotherly in art from me to Reade, and add that I will write to you again after having got through the story.

I am as fresh as can possibly be expected under the work of the Readings. But the railways shake me, as witness my present handwriting. Since the Staplehurst experience I feel them very much.

This day fortnight I shall be at St. James's Hall in the evening, and perhaps we can then have a word together--unless you are in Paris by that time.

Ever affec'ly, C. D.

[Notes: Dickens's Readings in England for a number of years were under the management of the Messrs. Chappell, of Bond Street, London. They paid all of his expenses, and gave him at first 5o pounds a night, later 60, and finally 80, and in two years they paid him 13,000 pounds, besides the 20,000 pounds he made in America. Dickens was a passenger on the train that derailed at Staplehurst, June 9, 1865, with great loss of life; he never fully recovered from the shock to his nerves, and, strangely enough, he died on the 9th of June, five years later. Griffith Gaunt, first published in 1866, excited no little adverse criticism on both sides of the Atlantic--criticism which inspired The Prurient Prude, one of Charles Reade's most characteristic performances. Dickens was not called upon to testify in public concerning his views of the novel, but Reade brought suit for libel against the proprietors of The Round Table, an American publication, and by an intelligent jury of his peers he was awarded pecuniary damages to the amount of six American cents.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 136-38.

if I blinked it

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place,

Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Tuesday, Ninth July, 1866.

My dear Wilkie, ---I have gone through the play [a dramatization of Armadale] very carefully. The plot is extraordinarily got together; its compactness is quite amazing; and the dialogue is very excellent in all the rare essentials of being terse, witty, characteristic, and dramatic.

But insuperable and ineradicable from the whole piece is--Danger. Almost every situation in it is dangerous. I do not think any English audience would accept the Scene in which Miss Gwilt in that Widow's dress renounces Midwinter. And if you got so far, you would never get through the last act in the Sanatorium. You could only carry those situations on a real hard wooden stage, and wrought out (very indifferently) by real live people face to face with other real live people judging them--you could only carry those situations by the help of interest in some innocent person whom they placed inperil, and that person a young woman. There is no one to be interested in here. Let who will play Midwinter, the saving interest cannot be got out of him. There is no relief from the wickedness of the rest; and in exact proportion to the skilful heaping up of it the danger accumulates.

I know as well as you do that this is merely one man's opinion. But I so strongly entertain the opinion that the odds are heavily against an audience's seeing the play out that I should not be your friend if I blinked it. I see the piece before me on the stage. Then I change my point of view, and act Midwinter, and act Miss Gwilt. A perfect terror of the difficult and dangerous ground oppresses me in both positions, and I feel my inability to carry the situations myself as strongly as I feel the inability of any professed actor or actress alive to carry them for me.

In reference to your two questions, I have no doubt whatever as to the first--that the substitution of the Manuscript for the marked printed pages is a decided improvement. As to the second, I think that any advantage to be gained from acting those events instead of narrating them would be more than counterbalanced by lengthening the play. They don't take long to tell, as they stand, and seem quite clear. Again, I think they would be much more difficult to act than to narrate. . . .

I will send the play-book to you to-morrow by the hands of one of the office people. Next week I purpose being at the office on Saturday at 1. At ten minutes past 2 on the said Saturday in next week I purpose coming down here. Can you come with me?

Ever affectionately, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 132-34.

throwing away of points

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

[Wilkie Collins spent the winter of 1863-64 in Italy.]

Gad's Hill Place,

Higham by Rochester, Kent

January 24th. 1864.

My Dear Wilkie,---The Christmas Number [Mrs. Lirriper's Lodgings] has been the greatest success of all; has shot ahead of last year; has sold about two hundred and twenty thousand; and has made the name of Mrs. Lirriper so swiftly and domestically famous as never was. I had a very strong belief in her when I wrote about her, finding that she made a great effect upon me; but she certainly has gone beyond my hope. (Probably you know nothing about her? which is a very unpleasant consideration.) Of the new book [Our Mutual Friend] I have done the first two numbers, and am now beginning the third. It is a combination of drollery with romance which requires a great deal of pains and a perfect throwing away of points that might be amplified; but I hope it is very good. . . . You will have read about poor Thackeray's death--sudden, and yet not sudden, for he had long been alarmingly ill. At the solicitation of Mr. Smith and some of his friends, I have done what I would most gladly have excused myself from doing--if I felt I could-- written a couple of pages about him in what was his own magazine.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 130-31.

yawning chasms abound

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

No. 26 Wellington Street,

Strand, London, W. C,

Thursday, Twenty-fourth September, 1863.

My dear Wilkie,--I hope the abominable gout, having shewn itself in time, will not detain you in this climate long. It is beyond all doubt in my mind that the best thing you can do is to get off.

The Girders* were both got up by 8 o'clock at night. It was ticklish work--nine men gasping, snuffling, heaving, snorting, balancing themselves on bricks, and tumbling over each other. But it really was well done, and with great cheerfulness and spirit, to which three gallons of beer, judiciously thrown in, imparted a festive air.

Nothing has fallen down or b'own up since. Yawning chasms abound, and dust obscures all objects; but we hope to weather it.

I shall be anxious to hear how the gout gets on.

Ever affec'ly, C. D.

P. S.---Two little men, who did nothing, made a show of doing it all, and drank one gallon of the beer.

[* Iron girders at Gad's Hill, which were necessitated by adding another room to the drawing-room of the house]

[The image of Gad's Hill above right, is taken from The Victorian Web-Charles Dickens site.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 129-30.

evaporating for a fortnight

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place. Higham, by Rochester, Kent,

Sunday, Ninth August, 1863.

My dear Wilkie,---Although your account of yourself is not so brilliant as I had hoped you might be able to render by this time, I rejoice to hear from you to any effect. I had divined that you had discovered a yacht and gone on a cruise, and did not wonder at your going as soon as you could. Your plan for the winter is the best you could make, I think. I hope nothing will prevent your coming here, as you propose, for a little while before you depart.

It is extremely hot here--so very hot today that I retired to my bedroom (from which I write) after lunch, and reduced myself to my shirt and drawers. In that elegant costume I achieve the present feat of penmanship. The De la Rues, of Genoa, are coming to England; I expect them here for three days this next week. . . .

I am always thinking of writing a long book, and am never beginning to do it. I have not been anywhere for ever and ever so long, but am thinking of evaporating for a fortnight on the 18th. . . .

All send love. Ever, my dear Wilkie,

Affec'ly yours, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 128-29.

a wet sheet and a flowing sail

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Tuesday Night, October 14th, 1862.

My dear Wilkie,----Frank Beard has been here this evening, of course since I posted my this day's letter to you, and has told me that you are not at all well, and how he has given you something which he hopes and believes will bring you round. It is not to convey this insignificant piece of intelligence, or to tell you how anxious I am that you should come up with a wet sheet and a flowing sail (as we say at sea when we are not sick), that I write. It is simply to say what follows, which I hope may save you some mental uneasiness--for I was stricken ill when I was doing Bleak House, and I shall not easily forget what I suffered under the fear of not being able to come up to time. Dismiss that fear (if you have it) altogether from your mind. Write to me at Paris at any moment, and say you are unequal to your work, and want me, and I will come to London straight, and do your work. I am quite confident that, with your notes, and a few words of explanation, I could take it up at any time and do it. Absurdly unnecessary to say that it would be a makeshift! But I could do it, at a pinch, so like you as that no one should find out the difference. Don't make much of this offer in your mind; it is nothing except to ease it. If you should want help, I am as safe as the bank. The trouble will be nothing to me, and the triumph of over-coming a difficulty great. Think it a Christmas Number, an Idle Apprentice, a Lighthouse, a Frozen Deep. I am as ready as in any of these cases to strike in and hammer the iron out. You won't want me. You will be well (and thankless) in no time. But there I am; and I hope that the knowledge may be a comfort to you. Call me and I come.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 122-23.

invincible determination

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

No. 26, Wellington Street, Strand, London, W. C.,

Saturday, Twentieth September, 1862.

My dear Wilkie,----I have gone through the Second Volume [No Name] at a sitting, and I find it wonderfully fine. It goes on with an ever-rising power and force in it that fills me with admiration. It is as far before and beyond The Woman in White as that was beyond the wretched common level of fiction-writing. There are some touches in the Captain which no one but a born (and cultivated) writer could get near--could draw within hail of. And the originality of Mrs. Wragge, without compromise of her probability, involves a really great achievement. But they are all admirable; Mr. Noel Vanstone and the housekeeper, both in their way as meritorious as the rest; Magdalen wrought out with truth, energy, sentiment, and passion, of the very first water.

I cannot tell you with what a strange dash of pride as well as pleasure I read the great results of your hard work. Because, as you know, I was certain from the Basil days that you were the Writer who would come ahead of all the Field--being the only one who combined invention and power, both humourous and pathetic, with that invincible determination to work, and that profound conviction that nothing of worth is to be done without work, of which triflers and feigners have no conception.

I send the books back, by South Eastern Railway to-day. . . .

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 112-13.

wits at his tongue's end

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Lord Warden Hotel, Dover,

Friday Evening, Twenty-fourth May, 1861.

My dear Wilkie,--I am delighted to receive so good an account of last night,* and have no doubt that it was a thorough success. Now it is over, I may honestly say that I am glad you were (by your friendship) forced into the Innings, for there is no doubt that it is of immense importance to a public man in our way to have his wits at his tongue's end. Sir (as Dr. Johnson would have said), if it be not irrational in man to count his feathered bipeds before they are hatched, we will conjointly astonish them next year. Boswell : Sir, I hardly understand you. Johnson: Sir, you never understand anything. Boswell (in a sprightly manner): Perhaps, sir, I am all the better for it. Johnson (savagely): Sir, I do not know but that you are. There is Lord Carlisle (smiling); he never understands anything, and yet the dog's well enough. Then, sir, there is Forster ; he understands many things, and yet the fellow is fretful. Again, sir, there is Dickens, with a facile way with him--like Davy, sir, like Davy--yet I am told that the man is lying at a hedge ale-house by the sea-shore in Kent, as long as they will trust him. Boswell: But there are no hedges by the sea in Kent, sir. Johnson: And why not, sir? Boswell (at a loss): I don't know, sir, unless--Johnson (thundering): Let us have no unlesses, sir. If your father had never said "unless," he would never have begotten you, sir. Boswell (yielding): Sir, that is very true.

Of course I am dull and penitent here, but it is very beautiful. I can work well, and I walked, by the cliffs, to Folkestone and back to-day, when it was so exquisitely beautiful that, though I was alone, I could not keep silence on the subject. In the fourteen miles I doubt if I met twelve people. They say this house is full, yet I meet nobody, save now and then a languishing youth in a loose, very blue coat, lounging at the door and sucking the round head of a cane, as if he were trying the fit before he had it cut oft from the stem as a pill, and swallowed it.

I hope--begin to hope--that somewhere about the 12th of June will see me out of the book [Great Expectations] I am anxious for some days at Gad's Hill, and settlement of Christmas No. with you. The idea I have will certainly do, I think, and save us a quantity of beating about.

At the end of this next week I will write again. I think we may book Wednesday Week, safely, for the office.

I can hardly see, it is getting so dark.

[Benjamin] Webster is a thorough good fellow. You know how often I have said so. There are better and finer qualities in him than in a host of men.

[*Wilkie Collins making a speech at a special function.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 98-100.

ways of providence

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent,

Thursday, Sixth October, 1859.

My dear Wilkie,-----I do not positively say that the point you put might not have been done in your manner; but I have a very strong conviction that it would have been overdone in that manner--too elaborately trapped, baited, and prepared--in the main anticipated, and its interest wasted. This is quite apart from the peculiarity of the Doctor's [Dr. Manette--A Tale of Two Cities] character, as affected by his imprisonment; which of itself would, to my thinking, render it quite out of the question to put the reader inside of him before the proper time, in respect of matters that were dim to himself through being in a diseased way, morbidly shunned by him. I think the business of art is to lay all that ground carefully, not with the care that conceals itself--to shew, by a backward light, what everything has been working to--but only to suggest, until the fulfilment comes. These are the ways of Providence, of which ways all art is but a little imitation.

"Could it have been done at all, in the way I suggest, to advantage?" is your question. I don't see the way, and I never have seen the way, is my answer. I cannot imagine it that way, without imagining the reader wearied and the expectation Wire-drawn.

I am very glad you liked it so much. It has greatly moved and excited me in the doing, and Heaven knows I have done my best and believed in it.

Ever affect'ly yours, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 95-96.

writeable-in

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent.

Thursday Night, Twenty-fifth August, 1859.

My dear Wilkie,-----This is written on a most intensely hot night, with rain and lightning, and with shoals of little tortoises (only harder in substance) dashing in at the window, and trying in vain to smash themselves on this paper--that was one. He is now beating his eyelids to powder (I am happy to say) on the obdurate black slab of the inkstand.

I am not quite well--can't get quite well; have an instinctive feeling that nothing but sea air and sea water will set me right. I want to come to Broadstairs next Wednesday by the mid-day train and stay till Monday. As I must work every morning, will you ask the Noble Ballard [landlord of the Albion Hotel, Broadstairs] (he will contradict you, but never mind that) if he can reserve a comfortable bedroom and quiet writeable-in sitting-room, for those days, for his ancient friend and patron. Then you two can dine with me one day--I can dine with you another--and evenings similarly arranged. Another tortoise, two earwigs, and a spider. Will you write to me here, after seeing the gallant host of the Albion? Dine with me on the first day, and tell him we dine, or it will break his heart.

What do you mean by not answering my beautiful letter from the office? Love from all.

Ever affectionately, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 93-94.

a desperate calmness

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

No. 16, Wellington Street, North, Strand,
First June (Monday), 1857.

My dear Collins,---In consequence of bedevilments at Gad's Hill, arising from the luggage wandering over the face of the earth, I shall have to pass tomorrow behind a hedge, attired in leaves from my own fig-tree. Will you therefore consider our appointment to stand for next day--Wednesday?

When last heard of the family itself (including the birds and the goldfinch on his perch) had been swept away from the stupefied John by a crowd of Whitsun holiday-makers, and had gone (without tickets) somewhere down into Sussex. A desperate calmness has fallen upon me. I don't care.
Faithfully ever, C. D.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 79.

restraint to the winds

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Tavistock House,

Friday Evening, Twenty-second May, 1857.

My dear Collins,---Hooray ! ! !

From our lofty heights let us look down on the toiling masses with mild complacency--with gentle pity--with dove-eyed benignity. To-morrow I am bound to Forster; on Sunday to solemn Chief Justice's, in remote fastnesses beyond Norwood; on Monday to Geographical Societies dining to cheer on Lady Franklin's Expedition; on Tuesday to Procter's; on Wednesday, sir--on Wednesday--if the mind can devise anything sufficiently in the style of sybarite Rome in the days of its culminating voluptuousness, I am your man.

Shall we appoint to meet at the Household Words office at 1/2 past 5? I have an appointment with Russell [W. H.] at 3 that afternoon, which may, but which I don't think will, detain me a few minutes after my time. In that unlikely case, will you wait for me at the office?

If you can think of any tremendous way of passing the night, in the mean time, do. I don't care what it is. I give (for that night only) restraint to the Winds!

I am very much excited by what you tell me of Mr, F.'s aunt.* I already look upon her as mine. Will you bring her with you?

Wills tells me that he thinks the principles of Story-writing are scarcely understood in this age and Empire

[* A picture by an artist named Gale, of that character in Little Dorrit, and bought by Charles Dickens through Collins.]

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 75-77.

in the nature of a draught

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Tavistock House,

Wednesday, Fourth March, 1857.

My dear Collins,---I cannot tell you what pleasure I had in the receipt of your letter yesterday evening, or how much good it did me in the depression consequent upon an exciting and exhausting day's work. I immediately arose (like the desponding Princes in the Arabian Nights, when the old woman--Procuress evidently, and probably of French extraction--comes to whisper about the Princesses they love) and washed my face and went out; and my face has been shining ever since.

Ellis [proprietor of the Bedford Hotel at Brighton] responds to my letter that rooms shall be ready! There is a train at 12 which appears to me to be the train for the distinguished visitors. If you will call for me in a cab at about 20 minutes past II, my hand will be on the latch of the door.

I have got a book to take down with me of which I have not read a line, but which I have been saving up to get a pull at it in the nature of a draught--The Dead Secret--by a Fellow Student.

Plornish* has broken ground with a Joke which I consider equal to Sydney Smith.

Ever faithfully,

Charles Dickens.

* Charles Dickens' tenth child's nickname.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 73-74.

drinking confusion to Baronetcies

Charles Dickens to W. Wilkie Collins

Ship Hotel, Dover, Thirtieth April, 1856.

My dear Collins, ---Wills* brought me your letter this morning, and I am very much interested in knowing what o'clock it is by the Watch with the brass tail to it. You know I am not in the habit of making professions, but I have so strong an interest in you and so true a regard for you that nothing can come amiss in the way of information as to your well-doing.

How I wish you were well now! For here I am in two of the most charming rooms (a third, a bedroom you could have occupied, close by), overlooking the sea in the gayest way. And here I shall be, for a change, till Saturday. And here we might have been, drinking confusion to Baronetcies, and resolving never to pluck a leaf from the Toady Tree, till this very small world shall have rolled us off! Never mind. All to come---in the fulness of the Arctic Seasons.

I take, as the people say in the comedies of eighty years ago, "hugely" to the idea you have suggested to Wills. But you mustn't do anything until you feel it a pleasure; from which sensation (and the disappearance of the East Wind until next winter) I shall date your coming round the corner with a great velocity.

On Saturday morning I shall be in town about 11, and will come on to Rowland Street about 1. Many thanks for your bulletin academical, which I have despatched straightway to Ary Scheffer, They were all blooming in Paris yesterday morning. I took the Plorn** out in a cabriolet the day before, and his observations on life in general were wonderful.

Ever yours, C. D.

*W. H. Wills, sub-editor of Household Words.

***Edward Bulwer Lytton Dickens "Plorn" (1852-1902), the tenth child of Dickens.

-from the Letters of Charles Dickens to Wilkie Collins edited by Laurence Hutton (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1891) p. 55-57.