The Two Viscountesses (January 1858) by Phiz (Hablot K. Browne), thirty-seighth serial illustration for Charles Lever's Davenport Dunn: A Man of Our Time, Part 20 (March 1859), Chapter LXXII, "The Two Viscountesses," facing 630.
Bibliographical Note
This appeared as the thirty-ninth serial illustration for Charles Lever's Davenport Dunn: A Man of Our Time, steel-plate etching; 4 ⅛ by 6 ⅛ inches (10.5 cm high by 15 cm wide), vignetted. The story was serialised by Chapman and Hall in monthly parts, from July 1857 through April 1859. The fortieth and forty-first illustrations in the volume initially appeared in reverse order at the very beginning of the twentieth monthly instalment, which went on sale on 1 March 1859. This number included Chapters LXXI through LXXXIII, and ran from page 609 through 640.
Passage Illustrated: Beecher's Sister-in-Law and Bride Confront One Another
It would not be very easy to say exactly what sort of person Lady Georgina expected in her sister-in-law; indeed, she had pictured her in so many shapes to herself that there was not an incongruity omitted in the composition, and she fancied her bold, daring, timid, awkward, impertinent, and shy alternately, and, in this conflict of anticipation, it was that Lizzy entered. So utterly overcome was Lady Georgina by astonishment, that she actually advanced to meet her in some confusion, and then, taking her hand, led her to a seat on the sofa beside her.
While the ordinary interchange of commonplaces went on, — and nothing could be more ordinary or commonplace than the words of their greeting, — each calmly surveyed the other. What thoughts passed in their minds, what inferences were drawn, and what conclusions formed in this moment, it is not for me to guess. To women alone pertains that marvellous freemasonry that scans character at a glance, and investigates the sincerity of a disposition and the value of a lace flounce with the same practised facility. If Lady Georgina was astonished by the striking beauty of her sister-in-law, she was amazed still more by her manner and her tone. Where could she have learned that graceful repose, — that simplicity, which is the very highest art? Where and how had she caught up that gentle quietude which breathes like a balmy odour over the well-bred world? How had she acquired that subtlety by which wit is made to sparkle and never to startle; and what training had told her how to weave through all she said the flattery of a wish to please? [Chapter LXXII, "The Two Viscountesses," page 630]
Commentary: The Inevitable Meeting
All he way through the Alps and Lombardy, enjoy he scenery as he might, Annesley Beecher (the new Lord Lackington) has been dreading this meeting with his brother's widow — now simply "The Dowager." Lever indicates that the new Viscount "could think of her as nothing but the haughty Viscountess, who had so often pronounced the heaviest censures upon his associates and his mode of living" (622). Now as they meet at the Palazzo Gondi in Rome Beecher learns that she had addressed no less than five letters to him during the latter stages of her husband's illness. Another letter he has missed was sent him from his brother's solicitors in London, Fordyce's, who fear that the claimant to the English estates will succeed, and that all that will now pass to the younger brother will be the Irish estates. He must now go to London to consult his legal team about defending his title.
Her Ladyship, Georgina, superciliously addresses Lizzy, leaving Beecher caught in the middle, exactly as Phiz suggests by the juxtaposition of the figures in his illustration. Shortly Lizzy will learn that her husband will have to go London for several weeks, and that she will spend the duration with the Dowager Lady Lackington at the Palazzo Gondi, rather than at their hotel. Phiz demonstrates by the senior Lady Lackington's haughty demeanour how difficult this protracted stay will be for Lizzy, if, indeed, she acquiesces in the arrangement, rather than shows her mettle as her father's daughter and refuses to be treated as a social inferior of Georgy's establishment.
The verbal duel (iin fact, a contest of wills) occurs in another of those Rococo drawing rooms that Phiz so enjoyed as interior backdrops. Although Lizzy bows to the Dowager Viscountess Lackington in the plate set in Rome's Palazzo Gondi, she is anything but subservient to the elder woman in the accompanying text. Beecher watches his wife's behaviour from behind the door with some apprehension, concerned that the elder Woman of the World will take umbrage at Lizzy's determination, in spite of her youth, to be her own mistress. Phiz has dressed both women not merely in the latest fashion of the mid-50s, but almost identically in order to show how evenly matched the two Viscountesses are going to be in the future contest of wills. To make the confrontation of the sisters-in-law more dramatic, Phiz has depicted them as standing rather than seated on the sofa, and does not have the haughty dowager taking the young Viscountess's hand.
Scanned image by Simon Cooke; colour correction, sizing, caption, and commentary 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.] Click on the image to enlarge it.
Bibliography
Lever, Charles. Davenport Dunn: A Man of Our Day. Illustrated by "Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1859.
Lever, Charles. Davenport Dunn: The Man of The Day. Illustrated by "Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, March 1859 (Part XX).
Last modified 26 April 2019