Title-page [Characters in the Stories] by Harry Furniss — frontispiece for "Christmas Stories" (1910)

Title-page

Harry Furniss

1910

14.3 x 9.1 cm vignetted

Dickens's Christmas Stories, Vol. 16 of The Charles Dickens Library Edition, facing ornamental title-page.

In Dickens's weekly journals Household Words (1851-58) and All the Year Round (1859-1867), the "Conductor" featured annual tributes to the Christmas season in substantial "Extra Christmas" numbers. The majority of these twenty selections are highly varied tales of a convivial, seasonal nature involving endearing characters such as Richard Doubledick, the Boy at Mugby Junction, Mrs. Lirriper, Dr. Marigold, and Cobbs, the Boots at the Holly-Tree Inn. [Commentary continued below.]

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Commentary

These multi-part tales, "framed" by Dickens and then completed by such writers as Elizabeth Gaskell and Wilkie Collins, do not include three lengthier short stories that Dickens wrote under special circumstances for the American market, and without a view to the seasonal number: "Hunted Down" (1859), "Holiday Romance" (1867), and "George Silverman's Explanation" (1868). Characters in thumbnail from all twenty-three pieces in the volume appear in the margins of the title-page.

Some two dozen thumbnails representing characters from some twenty-three pieces (generally of less than volume length) occupy the margins of the title-page of volume 16, Christmas Stories, the last of the regular volumes in Furniss's "Charles Dickens Library Edition" of 1910. The lithograph of the miniature pen-and-ink studies illustrates some works not previously attempted by even the Household Edition illustrators E. A. Abbey and Edward Dalziel. The Ticknor and Fields Diamond Edition volume of 1867 has the customary eight full-page wood-engravings by Sol Eytinge, Jr., but was not likely seen by Furniss, and therefore is not likely to have influenced his choice of subjects. The Chapman and Hall single-volume "Illustrated Library Edition" of the Christmas Stories (1871, rpt. 1893) also contains eight illustrations by various artists, pictures by F. A. Fraser, Harry French, Fred Walker, Edward Dalziel, Charles Green to which Furniss would definitely have had access and which the Oxford Illustrated Dickens elected to use in preference to Edward Dalziel's 1877 Household Edition illustrations.

Modern readers likely have little knowledge of these somewhat unidimensional characters from minor works in the Dickens canon, but nineteenth-century readers would have probably recognized such figures as Cobbs, the boots at the Holly Tree Inn, and the two precocious children, Norah and Master Harry Walmers (bottom centre, from the 1855 Christmas number). The myriad of characters in the margins appear in the various stories, sometimes, as in the case of Uncle Chill and Betsy Snap in "The Poor Relation's Story" (1852), in the very poses that Furniss subsequently uses for his full-page illustrations in the volume. To the left of the poor relation and his miserly uncle in the upper register are the protagonist and antagonist of "No Thoroughfare" (1867), George Vendale and the Machiavellian villain, Jules Obenreizer, wrestling in the Alps ( upper left-hand corner). Other memorable figures, easily recognized by nineteenth-century readers although little known today, are the principals from "The Holly-Tree Inn" (1855), Cobbs, the genial boots at the Yorkshire hostelry, and his charges, Master Harry Walmers and his Gretna Green "bride," Norah (left in the bottom register). The philosophical old man in the lower right resembles the figure in "The Child's Story" (1852). Less obvious are the unemotional Englishman and the orphan Bebelle from "His Boots" from "Somebody's Luggage" (1862), just above the tinker (lower left-hand corner) from "Tom Tiddler's Ground" (1861). From "The Seven Poor Travellers" (1854) come the faithful Ensign Richard Doubledick and his mentor, the redoubtable Major Taunton, on the battlefield of Badajos in the Peninsular campaign (lower right-hand column). Diagonally opposite are the chief characters of "Going into Society" (1858), Magsman and Chops the dwarf, immediately below the wrestling adversaries (left-hand register). What is unclear is whether Furniss intended these thumbnails as a visual overture to the work, recognizable to the general reader, or whether he expected that readers would identify the various characters generally as they encountered them again in the full-page plates and the various stories.

Related Materials

Bibliography

Davis, Paul. Charles Dickens A to Z: The Essential Reference to His Life and Work. New York: Facts On File, 1998.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book Company, 1910. Vol. XVI.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories. Illustrated by Edward Dalziel, Harry French, F. A. Fraser, James Mahoney, Townley Green, and Charles Green. The Oxford Illustrated Dickens. Oxford, New York, and Toronto: Oxford U. P., 1956, rpt. 1989.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories. Illustrated by E. A. Abbey. The Household Edition. 19 vols. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1876. Vol. III.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories from "Household Words" and "All the Year Round". Illustrated by E. G. Dalziel. The Household Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1877. Rpt., 1892. Vol. XXI.

Schlicke, Paul, ed. "Christmas Stories." The Oxford Companion to Dickens. Oxford and New York: Oxford U. P., 1999. Pp. 100-101.

Thomas, Deborah A. Dickens and The Short Story. Philadelphia: U. Pennsylvania Press, 1982.

Created 16 August 2013
Last modified 17 August 2025