The Shadow in the Little Parlour
Phiz (Hablot K. Browne)
13.3 cm by 10.8 cm
Dickens's Dombey and Son, Chapter 49; facing 307 in the second volume of the Illustrated Library Edition (1880)
Image scan and text by Philip V. Allingham.
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Passage Illustrated: Walter and Captain Cuttle surprise Florence
"Don’t be took aback! A minute more, my lady lass! with a good heart! — aboard that ship, they went a long voyage, right away across the chart (for there warn’t no touching nowhere), and on that voyage the seaman as was picked up with him died. But he was spared, and —"
The Captain, without knowing what he did, had cut a slice of bread from the loaf, and put it on his hook (which was his usual toasting-fork), on which he now held it to the fire; looking behind Florence with great emotion in his face, and suffering the bread to blaze and burn like fuel.
"Was spared," repeated Florence, "and — ?"
"And come home in that ship," said the Captain, still looking in the same direction, "and — don’t be frightened, pretty — and landed; and one morning come cautiously to his own door to take a obserwation, knowing that his friends would think him drownded, when he sheered off at the unexpected —"
"At the unexpected barking of a dog?" cried Florence, quickly.
"Yes," roared the Captain. "Steady, darling! courage! Don’t look round yet. See there! upon the wall!"
There was the shadow of a man upon the wall close to her. She started up, looked round, and with a piercing cry, saw Walter Gay behind her! [Chapter XLIX, "The Midshipman makes a Discovery," Vol. II: 306-7]
Pertinent Scenes from the Household and Charles Dickens Library Editions (1877 and 1910)
Left: Fred Barnard's scene in the Household Edition for this chapter focuses on Florence's relationship with Captain Cuttle: When he had filled his pipe in an absolute reverie of satisfaction, Florence lighted it for him (1877). Right: Harry Furniss's somewhat theatrical version of the reunion scene in the same chapter: Captain Cuttle and Walter's Return (1910).
Related Material, including Other Illustrated Editions of Dombey and Son
- Dombey and Son (homepage)
- Felix Octavius Carr Darley's Captain Cuttle . . . too his own [watch] down from the mantel-shelf for Volume 4 of Dombey and Son, Wholesale Retail & for Exportation, 1862
- Fred Barnard's 61 Illustrations for Dombey and Son, 1877
- Groome's illustrations of the Collins Pocket Edition of Dombey and Son (1900, rpt. 1934)
- Kyd's five Player's Cigarette Cards for Dombey and Son, 1910
- Harry Furniss's twenty-nine illustrations for Dombey and Son, Wholesale Retail & for Exportation (1910)
Bibliography
Dickens, Charles. Dombey and Son. With illustrations by H. K. Browne. The illustrated library Edition. 2 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, c. 1880. Vol. II.
__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"). 8 coloured plates. London and Edinburgh: Caxton and Ballantyne, Hanson, 1910.
__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"). The Clarendon Edition, ed. Alan Horsman. Oxford: Clarendon, 1974.
__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Sol Eytinge, Jr., and engraved by A. V. S. Anthony. 14 vols. Boston: Ticknor & Fields, 1867. III.
__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Fred Barnard. 61 wood-engravings. The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1877. XV.
_________. Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son: Wholesale, Retail, and for Exportation. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. London: Educational Book Company, 1910. IX.
Hammerton, J. A. "Chapter 16: Dombey and Son."The Dickens Picture-Book. The Charles Dickens Library Edition.Illustrated by Harry Furniss. 18 vols. London: Educational Book Co., 1910. Vol. 17, 294-337.
Kitton, Frederic George. Dickens and His Illustrators: Cruikshank, Seymour, Buss, "Phiz," Cattermole, Leech, Doyle, Stanfield, Maclise, Tenniel, Frank Stone, Landseer, Palmer, Topham, Marcus Stone, and Luke Fildes. Amsterdam: S. Emmering, 1972. Re-print of the London (1899) edition.
Lester, Valerie Browne. Ch. 12, "Work, Work, Work." Phiz: The Man Who Drew Dickens. London: Chatto and Windus, 2004, pp. 128-160.
Steig, Michael. Chapter 4. "Dombey and Son: Iconography of Social and Sexual Satire." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington & London: Indiana U. P., 1978. 86-112.
Vann, J. Don. Chapter 4."Dombey and Son, twenty parts in nineteen monthly installments, October 1846-April 1848." Victorian Novels in Serial. New York: Modern Language Association, 1985. 67-68.
Created 8 August 2015
Last modified 14 January 2021