Initial letter "T" (Bathsheba and Liddy chatting while the mistress sews) (page 129) vertically-mounted, 7.5 cm high by 6.3 cm wide, signed "H. Paterson" in the lower-right corner. Helen Patterson Allingham, second thumbnail vignette illustration for Thomas Hardy's Far From The Madding Crowd Cornhill Magazine (February 1874), Chapters 6 ("The Fair: The Journey: The Fire.") through 8 ("The Malthouse: The Chat: News.") in Vol. 29: pages 129 through 153 (24.5 pages in instalment). The wood-engraver was Joseph Swain (1820-1909). [Click on the image to enlarge it; mouse over links.]
Right: The title-page for Volume 29 of the Cornhill (1874).
Already Allingham has given us four representations of the headstrong Hardy heroine, Bathsheba Everdene, in the first two serialised instalments of the novel: she appears in a total of ten full-page plates plates (for instalments 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, and 12) and four vignettes: this, and the initial-letter thumbnails for instalments 1, 11, and 12. In other words, Hardy's heroine appears in all but ten of the novel's twenty-four illustrations). Liddy, on the other hand, although she serves as Bathsheba's confidante, appears in only two further illustrations, the full-page plates for instalments 3 and 12.
This second vignette is not based on a passage in the February instalment; rather, it illustrates the following passage in Ch. 9, although Allingham shows Bathsheba standing, and Liddy alone on the floor: "In the room from which the conversation proceeded, Bathsheba and her servant-companion, Liddy Smallbury, were to be discovered sitting upon the floor, and sorting a complication of papers, books, bottles, and rubbish spread out thereon — remnants from the household stores of the late occupier" (p. 258).
Because she in her workaday clothes "dusting bottles" (p. 260) as her companion sorts through Farmer Everdene's papers, Bathsheba refuses to step down to converse with the unseen caller, the prosperous and commanding Farmer Boldwood, who is searching for Fanny Robin. Thus, the February vignette seems intended to mark Boldwood's entrance into the narrative, for after his departure Liddy describes his situation; he does not appear in the pictorial narrative until the April plate.
Scanned images and text by Philip V. Allingham. [You may use these images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the images and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy. Volume One: 1840-1892; Volume Three: 1903-1908, ed. Richard Little Purdy and Michael Millgate. Oxford: Clarendon, 1978, 1982.
Hardy, Thomas. Far From the Madding Crowd. With illustrations by Helen Paterson Allingham. The Cornhill Magazine. Vols. XXIX and XXX. Ed. Leslie Stephen. London: Smith, Elder, January through December, 1874. Published in volume on 23 November 1874.
Created 12 December 2001 Last updated 22 October 2022