"Servants at The Holly Tree" by Harry Furniss — third illustration for "The Boots," Chapter 2 in <span class="book">The Holly-Tree Inn</span> in "Christmas Stories" (1910)

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Servants at The Holly Tree

Harry Furniss

1910

13.7 x 9 cm vignetted

Dickens's Christmas Stories, Charles Dickens Library Edition, facing XVI, 84.

Most of Dickens's seasonal offerings in the weekly journals Household Words (1851-58) and All the Year Round (1859-1867), appeared in substantial "Extra Christmas" numbers, and The Holly-Tree Inn was no exception, being the multi-part or framed tale for Christmas 1855, the principal collaborator of the novella being the novelist and Dickens protegé Wilkie Collins, who provided the second story, "The Ostler." [Commentary continued below.]

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Passage Illustrated

The way in which the women of that house — without exception — every one of 'em — married and single — took to that boy when they heard the story, Boots considers surprising. It was as much as he could do to keep 'em from dashing into the room and kissing him. They climbed up all sorts of places, at the risk of their lives, to look at him through a pane of glass. They was seven deep at the keyhole. They was out of their minds about him and his bold spirit. [Chapter 2, "The Boots," page 81]

Relevant Household Edition and Illustrated Library Edition Illustrations

Left : E. A. Abbey's "There's Love Lane". Right: Harry French's The Holly Tree [Click on images to enlarge them.]

For this sixth seasonal offering, however, there were also three lesser contributors: William Howitt ("The Landlord"), Adelaide Anne Procter ("The Barmaid"), and Harriet Parr (aka "Holme Lee" — "The Poor Pensioner"). Dickens introduced The Holly-Tree Inn with "The Guest," developed the romantic plot of the runaway children in "The Boots" (the subject of Furniss's three illustrations to accompany the entire novella), and concluded with "The Bill," the seventh and final part in which the middle-class Londoner who is the original narrator learns of his error and returns home to be married instead of emigrating to America. In the latter part of "The Boots," the reader receives a greater sense of the educated, middle class narrator's voice retailing the story that he had from Cobbs.

In this scene Furniss does not depict Cobbs, who is the observer of but not an actor in the scene. Furniss's realisation of the passage in which the inn's female servants — presumably "the women of the house" encompasses both chamber- and barmaids — gather outside Master Harry's door to spy upon him through the glass and the keyhole is far from the static Sixties realism of Harry French in the Illustrated Library Edition of forty years earlier. Furniss's impressionistic rendering of the staircase scene is highly dynamic as each of the attractive young women assumes a different pose around the door.

The scene occurs on the second floor of the rambling, old Yorkshire coaching inn from which the novella takes its name (in Dickens's mind based on The George and New Inn, Gretna Bridge, where the novelist stayed in 1838 while investigating the notorious Yorkshire schools for Nicholas Nickleby — April 1838 through October 1839 — which he epitomised in Squeers' Dotheboys Hall). However, all that we see in Furniss's drawing of the interior of the inn is the landing and stairs, his emphasis being on the comely young women whom he individualises by their poses rather than by their faces, forms, and costumes. A clever touch, however, that implies the servants' longing for romance and their own escape from the quotidien is the bucket and mop displayed prominently, down centre, and the push-broom, left of centre.

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. Il. Harry Furniss. Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book Company, 1910. 2 vols.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories from "Household Words" and "All The Year Round". Il. Fred Walker, F. A. Fraser, Harry French, E. G. Dalziel, J. Mahony [sic], Townley Green, and Charles Green. Centenary Edition. 36 vols. London: Chapman & Hall; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1911.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories. Il. 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., 1956, rpt. 1989.

Dickens, Charles. Christmas Stories. Il. E. A. Abbey. The Household Edition. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1876.

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

Schlicke, Paul, ed. "Christmas Stories." The Oxford Companion to Dickens. Oxford and New York: Oxford U. , 1999. 100-01.

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

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Last modified 3 September 2013