The Emigrants by A. B. Frost (engraved by Edward G. Dalziel), in Charles Dickens's Pictures from Italy and American Notes (1880), Chapter XI, "From Pittsburg to Cincinnati in a Western Steamboat. Cincinnati," facing p. 346. Wood-engraving, 3 ⅞ by 5 ½ inches (9.9 cm high by 13.4 cm wide), framed. Frost takes a more positive view of what awaits his well-dressed, well-organised travellers than Nast in the equivalent scene. Whereas Frost's immigrants focus on the task at hand, unloading their possessions of the shore, Nast's settlers, surrounded by the skeletal remains of the riparian forest, gloomly watch the steamboat's retreat from their landing place.
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Passage Realized: The Emigrants Left on the Shore at Sunset
Frontispiece for Dickens's American Notes by Marcus Stone: The Emigrants (1874): "The Passage Out."
All this I see as I sit in the little stern-gallery mentioned just now. Evening slowly steals upon the landscape and changes it before me, when we stop to set some emigrants ashore.
Five men, as many women, and a little girl. All their worldly goods are a bag, a large chest and an old chair: one, old, high-backed, rush-bottomed chair: a solitary settler in itself. They are rowed ashore in the boat, while the vessel stands a little off awaiting its return, the water being shallow. They are landed at the foot of a high bank, on the summit of which are a few log cabins, attainable only by a long winding path. It is growing dusk; but the sun is very red, and shines in the water and on some of the tree-tops, like fire.
The men get out of the boat first; help out the women; take out the bag, the chest, the chair; bid the rowers ‘good-bye;’ and shove the boat off for them. At the first plash of the oars in the water, the oldest woman of the party sits down in the old chair, close to the water’s edge, without speaking a word. None of the others sit down, though the chest is large enough for many seats. They all stand where they landed, as if stricken into stone; and look after the boat. So they remain, quite still and silent: the old woman and her old chair, in the centre the bag and chest upon the shore, without anybody heeding them all eyes fixed upon the boat. It comes alongside, is made fast, the men jump on board, the engine is put in motion, and we go hoarsely on again. There they stand yet, without the motion of a hand. I can see them through my glass, when, in the distance and increasing darkness, they are mere specks to the eye: lingering there still: the old woman in the old chair, and all the rest about her: not stirring in the least degree. And thus I slowly lose them. [Chapter XI, "From Pittsburg to Cincinnati in a Western Steamboat. Cincinnati," pp. 345-346]
The Equivalent Moment in the American Household Edition (1877)
Above: One of Thomas Nast's few serious interpretations of Dickens's account of his American travels, The Emigrants (1877). [Click on image to enlarge it.]
Related Material
Bibliography
Dickens, Charles. Chapter XI, "From Pittsburg to Cincinnatti in a Western Steamboat. Cincinnatti." American Notes, Sketches by Boz, and Pictures from Italy. Illustrated by A. B. Frost and Thomas Nast. The Household Edition. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1877. Pp. 346-50.
Dickens, Charles. Chapter XI, "From Pittsburg to Cincinnatti in a Western Steamboat. Cincinnatti." American Notes and Pictures from Italy. Illustrated by A. B. Frost and Gordon Thomson. London: Chapman and Hall, 1880. Pp. 341-49.
Last modified 27 March 2019