[Victorian Web Home —> Visual Arts —> Illustration —> Phiz (Hablot K. Browne) —> Illustrations of Barnaby Rudge —> Next]
Ornate initial capital "I" (John Willet)
Phiz (Hablot K. Browne)
13 February 1841
2.7 x 2.3 cm. vignetted
Dickens's Barnaby Rudge, The Bradbury & Evans single-volume edition of December 1849, Chapter Thirteen, Vol. III, 1.
[Click on image to enlarge it and mouse over text for links.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
[You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.].
IF Joseph Willet, the denounced and proscribed of ‘prentices, had happened to be at home when his father’s courtly guest presented himself before the Maypole door — that is, if it had not perversely chanced to be one of the half-dozen days in the whole year on which he was at liberty to absent himself for as many hours without question or reproach — he would have contrived, by hook or crook, to dive to the very bottom of Mr Chester’s mystery, and to come at his purpose with as much certainty as though he had been his confidential adviser. In that fortunate case, the lovers would have had quick warning of the ills that threatened them, and the aid of various timely and wise suggestions to boot; for all Joe’s readiness of thought and action, and all his sympathies and good wishes, were enlisted in favour of the young people, and were staunch in devotion to their cause. Whether this disposition arose out of his old prepossessions in favour of the young lady, whose history had surrounded her in his mind, almost from his cradle, with circumstances of unusual interest; or from his attachment towards the young gentleman, into whose confidence he had, through his shrewdness and alacrity, and the rendering of sundry important services as a spy and messenger, almost imperceptibly glided; whether they had their origin in either of these sources, or in the habit natural to youth, or in the constant badgering and worrying of his venerable parent, or in any hidden little love affair of his own which gave him something of a fellow-feeling in the matter, it is needless to inquire—especially as Joe was out of the way, and had no opportunity on that particular occasion of testifying to his sentiments either on one side or the other. [Initial-letter for the third monthly number: Chapter the Thirteenth, Vol. III, 1]
Complementing George Cattermole's architectural design of
The Warren in
Master Humphrey's Clock is the ornamental initial letter "I,"
showing the pipe-smoking publican John Willet, who greets the "courtly guest" (Mr.
Chester) at the portal of the Maypole in the first line of the chapter of the
Dickens, Charles. Barnaby Rudge. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ('Phiz') and George Cattermole. London: Chapman and Hall, 1841; rpt., Bradbury & Evans, 1849.
Vann, J. Don. "Charles Dickens. Barnaby Rudge in Master Humphrey's Clock, 13 February-27 November 1841." New York: MLA, 1985. 65-66.
Created 1 August 2015
Last modified 5 December 2020
