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Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney
Harry Furniss
lithograph from pen-and-ink
1910
14.2 x 9.5 cm, vignetted
Sixteenth illustration for The Adventures of Oliver Twist in the Charles Dickens Library Edition (1910), facing III, 168.
[Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
Whatever were Mr. Bumble's intentions, however (and no doubt they were of the best): it unfortunately happened, as has been twice before remarked, that the table was a round one; consequently Mr. Bumble, moving his chair by little and little, soon began to diminish the distance between himself and the matron; and, continuing to travel round the outer edge of the circle, brought his chair, in time, close to that in which the matron was seated.
Indeed, the two chairs touched; and when they did so, Mr. Bumble stopped.
Now, if the matron had moved her chair to the right, she would have been scorched by the fire; and if to the left, she must have fallen into Mr. Bumble’s arms; so (being a discreet matron, and no doubt foreseeing these consequences at a glance) she remained where she was, and handed Mr. Bumble another cup of tea. [Chapter 23, "Which contains the substance of a pleasant conversation between Mr. Bumble and a lady; and shews that even a beadle may be susceptible on some points," 172]
Mr. Bumble brought his chair, in time, close to that in which the matron was seated. Indeed, the two chairs touched; and when they did so, Mr. Bumble stopped. [172]
George Cruikshank, the novel’s original illustrator, several times portrayed the self-important bully Mr. Bumble, the parish beadle who acts as the agent for the trustees of the workhouse in which Oliver's mother dies at the beginning of the novel. The parallel study to Furniss's here is Cruikshank's Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney taking tea (see below). These images are consistent with Dickens's conviction that Mrs. Corney and Mr. Bumble are irresponsible public servants who exploit positions of trust for personal gain. For Dickens poetic justice is ultimately served when he places the couple as inmates into the workhouse they had once administered. They are justly punished for attempting to suppress the truth of Oliver's birth by secreting the locket that belonged to his mother.
Furniss depicts the couple in the manner of caricature, satirizing their complacency, their love of comfort, and their lack of concern for anyone but themselves. As in the text, in the Furniss illustration tea is poured, Bumble expresses his devotion and amorousness with eye and gesture, and a family of cats play at their feet. On the sideboard (upper left) are the two bottles of wine that Bumble has expropriated from the stock ordered for the workhouse infirmary, a detail that reveals Furniss's appreciation of Dickens's pointed criticism of these self-serving "parochial officers" (169). Furniss exploits the possibilities of illustration by placing it in the midst of the text describing Mr. Bumble's visit to the widow, leaving the reader to anticipate Bumble's popping the question by its caption (see above), the climax of which is "Mr. Bumble stopped."
Although Cruikshank took obvious delight in depicting the budding romance of the parish beadle and the workhouse matron (a match made in the bureaucracy of the Poor Law, if not in Heaven), having already depicted the self-satisfied humbug in Oliver Escapes Being BoundApprentice to the Sweep (Part 2, March 1837), he now shows Bumble in love — or as much in love with somebody else as an acquisitive character such as the parish beadle can be. With an eye for the grotesque developed in his former career as a political cartoonist in the Regency, Cruikshank found the notion of the courtship of Mrs. Corney by the arrogant, ridiculous Bumble irresistible, a scene which he echoed subsequently in the adolescent romance of the infatuated housemaid Charlotte and the greedy undertaker's apprentice Noah Claypole, Mr. Claypole as he appeared when his master was out (Part 12, March 1838), in which the fatuous Bumble has a minor role, indignantly peering in at the window.
Cruikshank in both instances undercuts the romance by the leering, smirking faces of the would-be lovers. We note in the Cruikshank version of the tea-drinking scene at Mrs. Corney's the effective detailism of the furnishings and theatrical properties, including a teakettle singing on the hob. Emulating Cruikshank's handling of the scenes, Furniss revisits both of these unlikely romance interludes, undoubtedly enjoying the opportunity to show the exploiters in love. Hat and rod, symbols of his office and public persona put aside temporarily (down left), Bumble, who reveals a side of his personality not seen before, becomes utterly ridiculous in Furniss's illustration. Taking a slightly different approach in his 1886 representation of Bumble, F.W. Pailthorpe presents his motivation as strictly avaricious and not in the least amorous when he does a jog as he inspects Mrs. Corney's possessions while she is out of room.
The flirtatiousness of both Mrs. Corney and Charlotte is particularly delightful in these illustrations. The couple actually become charming under Charles Pears' sentimentalizing pencil, and almost serious players in Oliver's drama in James Mahoney's rendition of the same scene. Caricaturist Kyd, however, views Bumble with a probing, satirical eye, perhaps as Dickens would have us view the pompous, calculating, hypocritical embodiment of the most callous aspects of the 1834 New Poor Law.
Left: Cruikshank's Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney taking tea. Centre: Sol Eytinge, Junior's Mrs. Corney and Mr. Bumble. Right: Charles Pears' more naturalistic treatment of the same scene, Mr. Bumble and Mrs. Corney taking tea (1912).
Above: Mahoney's Mahoney's Household Edition illustration "Don't sigh, Mrs. Corney". (1871).
Left: J. Clayton Clarke's 1890 full-length portrait of the beadle Mr. Bumble (1890). Centre: Kyd's Player's Cigarette Card no. 3, Mr. Bumble (1910). Right: F. W. Pailthorpe's Inexplicable conduct of Mr. Bumble when Mrs. Corney left the room (1886).
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Created 9 February 2015
Last modified 29 February 2020