Nina came forward at that moment by Sir Luke Fildes; engraver, Swain. Twelfth illustration for Charles Lever's Lord Kilgobbin, 10.3 cm high by 15.7 cm wide (4 by 6 ¼ inches), framed, full-page wood-engraving for Chapter XLIV, "The Head Constable," facing p. 255. Reprinted from the Cornhill Magazine, Part 11 (August 1871), Vol. XXIV, facing p. 238. [Click on the illustration to enlarge it.]
Passage Illustrated: Nina's superciliousness embarrasses Kate
Right: The initial page for the eleventh instalment in Volume XXIV of the Cornhill Magazine (August, 1871), Chapter XLIII, 238.
"It is graver than I suspected," said she thoughtfully.
"And I may lose my place," muttered Curtis, "unless, indeed, you would condescend to say a word for me to Mr. Walpole."
"Willingly, if it were of any use, but I think my cousin, Mademoiselle Kostalergi, would be likelier of success, and here she comes."
Nina came forward at that moment, with that indolent grace of movement with which she swept the greensward of the lawn as though it were the carpet of a saloon. With a brief introduction of Mr. Curtis, her cousin Kate, in a few words, conveyed the embarrassment of his present position, and his hope that a kindly intercession might avert his danger.
"What droll people you must be not to find out that the letters of a Viceroy’s secretary could not be the correspondence of a rebel leader," said Nina superciliously. [Chapter XLIV, "The Head Constable," 255 in volume]
Commentary: A Political Discussion before Breakfast with Captain Harry Curtis
In plain clothes rather than his gorgeous uniform, the Head Constable of King's County, colloquially known as "The Head Peeler" (presumably for Sir Robert Peel, founder of the London Metropolitan Police in 1829), has come to repair a blunder, and save his job. In searching Castle Kilgobbin for any papers left by the "head-centre" Fenian, Daniel Donogan, Captain Harry Curtis had confiscated what turned out to be Cecil Walpole's luggage and papers. As Lever tersely notes, this "indiscretion might cost him his place" (254) since Walpole is the Private Secretary of the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. While he is pleading with Kate Kearney (centre) to intervene with Walpole on his behalf, Nina (equipped with parasol and flower basket by Fildes) enters the garden. Fildes foregrounds the three fashionably dressed figures, throwing the garden background into thinly sketched relief. Nina finds it hard to credit that the local police could have mistaken the secretary's correspondence for Donogan's. But the accounts of the local insurrectionary movement were full of initials, and seemed to reflect a detailed grasp of the political situation that could only be Donogan's. And it turns out that the Fenian leader with a price on his head had once been a man of property in Kilkenny, and had even attended Oxford University in his youth. He gave up all that to purchase firearms for the rebels. Confidentially, Curtis assures the women that he has a viable lead on Donogan's whereabouts as he is booked aboard a clipper ready to sail from Belfast for St. John's, Newfoundland, and thence to Boston, where his American citizenship will protect him.
Scanned images and commentary 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 them, and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin. The Cornhill Magazine. With 18 full-page illustrations and 18 initial-letter vignettes by S. Luke Fildes. Volumes XXII-XXV. October 1870-March 1872.
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin: A Tale of Ireland in Our Own Time. With 18 Illustrations by Sir Luke Fildes, R. A. London: Smith, Elder, 1872, 3 vols; rpt., Chapman and Hall, 1873.
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin. Illustrated by Sir Luke Fildes. Novels and Romances of Charles Lever. Vols. I-III. London: Smith, Elder, 1872, Rpt. London: Chapman & Hall, 1873, in a single volume. Project Gutenberg. Last Updated: 19 August 2010.
Stevenson, Lionel. Chapter XVI, "Exile on the Adriatic, 1867-1872." Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. New York: Russell and Russell, 1939; rpt. 1969. Pp. 277-296.
Sutherland, John A. "Lord Kilgobbin." The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford, Cal.: Stanford U. P., 1989, rpt. 1990, 382.
Created 9 May 2005 Last modified 27 June 2023