The Rudges' Peaceful Home — forty-third illustration for the novel, Chap. XLV by Hablot Knight Browne (Phiz). 24 July 1841 (Part 24). 3 ⅜ x 4 ½ inches (8.5 cm by 11.7 cm), vignetted, from instalment 67 in Master Humphrey's Clock, Part 67, and published in Dickens's Barnaby Rudge, in the 1849 Bradbury and Evans two-volume edition: 199. Running head: "Master Humphrey's Clock" (198). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Context of the Illustration: The Rudges in Seclusion
Their hut — for it was little more — stood on the outskirts of the town, at a short distance from the highroad, but in a secluded place, where few chance passengers strayed at any season of the year. It had a plot of garden-ground attached, which Barnaby, in fits and starts of working, trimmed, and kept in order. Within doors and without, his mother laboured for their common good; and hail, rain, snow, or sunshine, found no difference in her.
Though so far removed from the scenes of her past life, and with so little thought or hope of ever visiting them again, she seemed to have a strange desire to know what happened in the busy world. Any old newspaper, or scrap of intelligence from London, she caught at with avidity. . . . .
Time had glided on in this way, and nothing had happened to disturb or change their mode of life, when, one summer’s night in June, they were in their little garden, resting from the labours of the day. The widow’s work was yet upon her knee, and strewn upon the ground about her; and Barnaby stood leaning on his spade, gazing at the brightness in the west, and singing softly to himself.
"A brave evening, mother! If we had, chinking in our pockets, but a few specks of that gold which is piled up yonder in the sky, we should be rich for life."
"We are better as we are," returned the widow with a quiet smile. "Let us be contented, and we do not want and need not care to have it, though it lay shining at our feet." [Chapter the Forty-fifth, 194-95]
Relevant Illustration from the Household Edition (1874)
Above: Fred Barnard's revelation as to where the Rudges have been hiding these past five years: A brave evening, mother! If we had, chinking in our pockets, but a fewspecks of that gold which is piled up yonder in the sky, we should be rich for life.
Related Material including Other Illustrated Editions of Barnaby Rudge
- Dickens's Barnaby Rudge (homepage)
- Cattermole and Phiz: The First illustrators: A Team Effort by "The Clock Works" (1841)
- Cattermole's seventeen illustrations (13 Feb.-27 Nov. 1841)
- Felix Octavius Carr Darley's six illustrations (1865 and 1888)
- Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s ten Diamond Edition illustrations (1867)
- Fred Barnard's 46 illustrations for the Household Edition (1874)
- A. H. Buckland's six illustrations for the Collins' Clear-Type Edition (1900)
- Harry Furniss's 28 illustrations for The Charles Dickens Library Edition (1910)
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.]
Bibliography
Dickens, Charles. Barnaby Rudge. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ('Phiz') and George Cattermole. London: Chapman and Hall, 1841; rpt., Bradbury & Evans, 1849.
________. Barnaby Rudge — A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty. Illustrated by Fred Barnard. The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1874. VII.
Hammerton, J. A. "Ch. XIV. Barnaby Rudge." The Dickens Picture-Book. The Charles Dickens Library Edition, illustrated by Harry Furniss. London: Educational Book Co., 1910. 213-55.
Vann, J. Don. "Charles Dickens. Barnaby Rudge in Master Humphrey's Clock, 13 February-27 November 1841." New York: MLA, 1985. 65-66.
Last modified 26 December 2020