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The Summer House
Phiz
June 1844 (eighteenth) instalment
Steel-engraving
12.3 cm by 10 cm (4 ¾ by 3 ⅞ inches), vignetted.
Charles Lever's Tom Burke of "Ours", Chapter LXXXI, "A Forest Path" (June 1844), facing p. 176 in vol. 2 of the 1844 edition, and 224 in vol. 2 of the 1869 edition.
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“Let me look on him!” said the vivandière, as she stooped down and took from the hearth a piece of lighted wood — “let me see this man, and learn the features of one who can be so craven of spirit, so poor of heart, as to fly the field, while thousands are flocking towards it.”
Burning with shame and indignation, I arose, just as she approached me. The pine-branch threw its red gleam over her bright uniform, and then upon her face. “Minette! Minette!” I exclaimed. But with a wild shriek she let fall the burning wood, and fell senseless to the ground. [Chapter LXXII, "A Chance Meeting," 176 in the 1844 edition, vol. 2; pp. 223-224 in the 1869 edition, vol. 2]
This illustration is a continuation of The Foraging Party in Chapter LXXII, "A Chance Meeting" in the June 1844 instalment. Tom has asked an officer in charge of the Fourth Cuirassiers of the Guard, Milhaud's brigade, to assist him with the ailing priest, Père Arsène, who has accompanied him on his walk from Weimar. Returning to the village, Tom is glad to receive the offer of accommodation in the summer-house of the Trauben, the local inn. After ministering to the priest and getting him settled on a couch, Tom falls asleep. He awakes to discover Minette, the uniformed vivandière, talking to the old man. Appalled that one so young should be abandoning the army, she demands to examine the face of the sleeper. She suddenly learns that Tom, the man whom she secretly loves as she has just confessed to the priest, has been the priest's companion from the Creutz Mountains to Westphalia.
Thus, in Phiz's realisation of this dual moment of recognition, Minette holds aloft a pine-branch torch to reveal the face of the priest's walking companion as he has arisen from the floor, where he has been asleep on a large dragoon cloak. Although Lever does not mention it, the helmet on the table probably belongs to the corporal who has loaned them the room for the night. The fire flares up, illuminating the room and the priest's face, right. We cannot judge Tom's expression, but Minette by her gesture and attitude seems shocked and surprised. Recovered from her faint, she darts from the summer-house into the garden, and Tom bounds after her. When he sees her riding beside a veteran on a waggon, we realise that the corporal who gave up his room was in fact Pioche.
Buchanan-Brown, John. Phiz! Illustrator of Dickens' World. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1978.
Lester, Valerie Browne Lester. Chapter 11: "'Give Me Back the Freshness of the Morning!'" Phiz! The Man Who Drew Dickens. London: Chatto and Windus, 2004. Pp. 108-127.
Lever, Charles. Tom Burke of "Ours." Dublin: William Curry, Jun., 1844. Illustrated by H. K. Browne. London: Chapman and Hall, 1869. Serialised February 1843 through September 1844. 2 vols.
Lever, Charles. Tom Burke of "Ours." Illustrated by Phiz [Hablột Knight Browne]. Vol. I and II. In two volumes. Project Gutenberg. Last Updated: 24 February 2021.
Steig, Michael. Chapter Four: "Dombey and Son: Iconography of Social and Sexual Satire." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington: Indiana U. P., 1978. Pp. 86-112.
Stevenson, Lionel. Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. London: Chapman and Hall, 1939.
_______. "The Domestic Scene." The English Novel: A Panorama. Cambridge, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin and Riverside, 1960.
Created 22 November 2023