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Mr. Moddle is Led to the Contemplation of his Destiny
Phiz (Hablot K. Browne)
May 1844
Steel-engraving
13.5 cm high by 10.3 cm wide (5 ⅜ high by 3 ⅞ inches), vignetted
Illustration for Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit.
[Click on image to enlarge it and mouse over text for links.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
The original 1844 edition of Dickens's Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit placed Mr. Pecksniff Announces Himself as the Shield of Virtue (the thirty-third monthly illustration of the novel) facing p. 521 in the forty-sixth chapter. The 1867 and 1897 editions added the following descriptive headlines: "Persons about to marry" (1867) and "Cause of Mr. Moddle’s Depression" (1897).
As [Tom and Ruth] were passing through a street in the City, not very far from Mrs Todgers's place of residence, Ruth checked Tom before the window of a large Upholstery and Furniture Warehouse, to call his attention to something very magnificent and ingenious, displayed there to the best advantage, for the admiration and temptation of the public. Tom had hazarded some most erroneous and extravagantly wrong guess in relation to the price of this article, and had joined his sister in laughing heartily at his mistake, when he pressed her arm in his, and pointed to two persons at a little distance, who were looking in at the same window with a deep interest in the chests of drawers and tables.
"Hush!" Tom whispered. "Miss Pecksniff, and the young gentleman to whom she is going to be married."
"Why does he look as if he was going to be buried, Tom?" inquired his little sister.
"Why, he is naturally a dismal young gentleman, I believe," said Tom "but he is very civil and inoffensive."
"I suppose they are furnishing their house," whispered Ruth.
"Yes, I suppose they are," replied Tom. "We had better avoid speaking to them."
They could not very well avoid looking at them, however, especially as some obstruction on the pavement, at a little distance, happened to detain them where they were for a few moments. Miss Pecksniff had quite the air of having taken the unhappy Moddle captive, and brought him up to the contemplation of the furniture like a lamb to the altar. He offered no resistance, but was perfectly resigned and quiet. The melancholy depicted in the turn of his languishing head, and in his dejected attitude, was extreme; and though there was a full-sized four-post bedstead in the window, such a tear stood trembling in his eye as seemed to blot it out.
"Augustus, my love," said Miss Pecksniff, "ask the price of the eight rosewood chairs, and the loo table."
"Perhaps they are ordered already," said Augustus. "Perhaps they are Another's."
"They can make more like them, if they are," rejoined Miss Pecksniff.
"No, no, they can't," said Moddle. "It's impossible!" [Chapter XLVI, "In which Miss Pecksniff makesLove, Mr. Jonas makes Wrath, Mrs. Gamp makes Tea, and Mr. Chuffey makes Business," page 521 in the 1844 edition]
Phiz has depicted the façade of the furniture shop in such detail that one is tempted to believe that he modeled after an actual shop, as George Cruikshank did in Skeches from Boz (1837-39), such as the interior shop scenes in Horatio Sparkins and The Pawnbroker's Shop, and the shop exteriors in Meditations in Monmouth Street. In contrast to Cruikshank, Phiz's interest lies in the relationship among the figures rather than the interior and exterior details of the shop. In Dickens and Phiz Michael Steig explains this very bourgeois property-oriented view of the impending marriage, noting the significance of the figures on the facade:
In Mr. Moddle is led to the contemplation of his destiny, the comic lover is forced to think seriously about his impending marriage, but in the companion plate, Mrs. Gamp makes tea (ch. 46), he is distraught at an accidental encounter with his lost love, Merry. In the first, Phiz's imagination multiplies details which carry a good deal of the burden of comedy, for the figures of Ruth, Tom, Moddle, and Charity are not as important in conveying the meaning as are the setting and its elements. We gradually become aware that the scene is full of disapproving faces: the rug just behind the couple frowns mightily, while the fire screen in the shop grins maliciously. At the top of each doorpost a satyr or devil looks sideways at Cherry and Moddle, holding a finger to his nose. The comical recording angel, who holds a tablet marked "Day by [Day]," may also be looking at the couple, while the shopkeeper, peering out of the store, has a sly grimace on his face. As if all these faces were not enough, at the left of the door is a sign, "Maids/Wives/Widows" (A similar sign including "To those About to Marry" appeared in a comic plate to Godfrey Malvern ("An unexpected Meeting").) implying that for Augustus to make this particular maid a wife will be soon to make her a widow because of his own despondency — something further borne out by the poster of a lion catching a flying leaf (or a bird?), as if Moddle were being brought down in the freedom of his bachelorhood by a predatory creature. Finally, the customary notice, "To Those [about to] Marry," pinned to the poster, may conceivably have elicited the immediate response from readers, "Don't!" although the first appearance of this joke in print is, to my knowledge, in 1845 (Punch; see e-text in Victorian Web.)
Wanting to avoid an awkward meeting on the street, Tom and his sister pretend to be interested in an advertisment, hoping that Augustus Moddle and his fiancée will not notice them. Meanwhile. Charity turns to Augustus and asks him about the merits of the eight rosewood chairs and loo table, which Phiz has not included in the illustration. Thus, Phiz’s illustration leads the viewer to assume that Charity sees both pieces of furniture, whereas the reader encounters the folded, late eighteenth- or early nineteenth-century table inlaid with Japanese motifs used for playing the card game, Loo. Phiz has depicted an oval table suitable for playing cards in the centre of the illustration, probably of highly figured walnut or rosewood. Such a small table could accommodate at most four chairs, but Charity wants eight. Perhaps she expects to host dinner parties or have a large family, both of which prospects which must be well-nigh terrifying for August Moddle.
As Charity smilingly turns to Augustus to ask if he is interested in purchasing the table, the owner of the shop, from behind the ornate curtain rods, studies the couple, presumably assessing when it would be best to step forward to clinch the sale. Such intricate details in this illustration keep the presence of the observer from becoming immediately apparent to the reader, who may also be the subject of the salesman's surveillance. The face on the carpet (right) seems to be studying the shopman apprehensively, but Charity and Augustus seem unaware that they are being appraised even as they study the furnishings.
Above: Fred Barnard's realisation of the later scene in Chapter 46 scene in which Moddle confesses to Tom his determination to avoid marrying Charity at any cost, Mr. Moddle, with a dark look, replied: "The drivers won't do it" (1872), suggesting that he is contemplating making himself as traffic fatality in order to avoid marrying Charity. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Dickens, Charles. The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit. Illustrated by Phiz (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1844.
_____. The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit. Illustrated by Fred Barnard. The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1872. Vol. 2.
_____. The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit. Edited by Andrew Lang. Illustrated by Phiz (Hablot Knight Browne). The Gadshill Edition: 34 volumes. London: Chapman and Hall; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1897. 2 vols.
Lester, Valerie Browne. Phiz: The Man Who Drew Dickens. London: Chatto and Windus, 2004.
Steig, Michael. "From Caricature to Progress: Master Humphrey's Clock and Martin Chuzzlewit." Ch. 3, Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington & London: Indiana U. P., 1978. Pp. 51-85.
_____. "Martin Chuzzlewit's Progress by Dickens and Phiz." Dickens Studies Annual, 2 (1972): 119-149.
Vann, J. Don. "Martin Chuzzlewit, twenty parts in nineteen monthly installments, January 1843 — July 1844." New York: Modern Language Association, 1985. Pp. 66-67.
Modified 30 April 2019
Last updated 15 November 2024