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Hugh and his Patron
"Faithful, I dare say!" rejoined his patron, looking at him through his glass.
Harry Furniss
1910
13.5 cm x 7.8 cm (5 ¾ by 3 ¾ inches), vignetted
Dickens's Barnaby Rudge, The Charles Dickens Library Edition (1910), facing VI, 192.
[Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
You see that dog of mine?" said Hugh, abruptly.
"Faithful, I dare say?" rejoined his patron, looking at him through his glass; "and immensely clever? Virtuous and gifted animals, whether man or beast, always are so very hideous."
"Such a dog as that, and one of the same breed, was the only living thing except me that howled that day," said Hugh. ‘Out of the two thousand odd — there was a larger crowd for its being a woman — the dog and I alone had any pity. If he’d have been a man, he’d have been glad to be quit of her, for she had been forced to keep him lean and half-starved; but being a dog, and not having a man’s sense, he was sorry."
"It was dull of the brute, certainly," said Mr. Chester, "and very like a brute."
Hugh made no rejoinder, but whistling to his dog, who sprung up at the sound and came jumping and sporting about him, bade his sympathising friend good night. [Chapter XXIII, 184]
In his version of the meeting between the sharp-witted Mr. Chester and his dull but useful instrument, Maypole Hugh, Furniss reacts to the serial program for the the novel rather than to the Household Edition (1874), which contains no such realisation. Like Phiz, Furniss emphasizes the vast social and intellectual differences between Hugh the ostler and his aristocratic "patron" by contrasting them physically, making Chester slender, sophisticated, and elegant — and Hugh a hairy, unkempt, drunken sot who lives to sate his appetites. The highly civilised Mr. Chester is hardly an admirable character, however, since the suave exterior belies the devious personality. Phiz had presented Chester's reaction to Hugh's physicality and excessive drinking. In contrast, Furniss has focussed on the passage at the close of the chapter in which Hugh expresses his appreciation of his dog's fidelity. Furniss has taken pains to draw the dog as an individual, making his position under Hugh's chair exemplify his attachment to his master. Hugh seems to be promising a similar faithfulness in committing his intelligence services for his patron, but Mr. Chester seems much more interested in his own image in the mirror than in what Hugh is suggesting should be the nature of their relationship.
Above: Phiz's original introduction of the ill-sorted allies: Hugh Calls on his Patron (8 May 1841).
Dickens, Charles. Barnaby Rudge in Master Humphrey's Clock. Illustrated by Phiz and George Cattermole. 3 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1841; rpt., Bradbury and Evans, 1849.
_______. Barnaby Rudge. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book Company, 1910. VI.
Created 24 July 2020
Last modified 15 December 2020