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Miss Nickleby Introduced to her Uncle's Friends
Phiz (Hablot K. Browne)
Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby
September 1838
Steel engraving
Source: J. A. Hammerton, The Dickens Picture-Book, p. 154.
"Sir Mulberry Hawk," said Ralph. "Otherwise the most knowing card in the pa-ack," said Lord Verisopht. [Ch. 19]
Image scan and text by Philip V. Allingham.
Kate would have entreated a few minutes’ respite, but reflecting that her uncle might consider the payment of the hackney-coach fare a sort of bargain for her punctuality, she suffered him to draw her arm through his, and to lead her away.
Seven or eight gentlemen were standing round the fire when they went in, and, as they were talking very loud, were not aware of their entrance until Mr. Ralph Nickleby, touching one on the coat-sleeve, said in a harsh emphatic voice, as if to attract general attention —
"Lord Frederick Verisopht, my niece, Miss Nickleby."
The group dispersed, as if in great surprise, and the gentleman addressed, turning round, exhibited a suit of clothes of the most superlative cut, a pair of whiskers of similar quality, a moustache, a head of hair, and a young face.
"Eh!" said the gentleman. "What — the — deyvle!"
With which broken ejaculations, he fixed his glass in his eye, and stared at Miss Nickleby in great surprise. [Chapter XIX, "Descriptive of a Dinner at Mr. Ralph Nickleby’s, and of the Manner in which the Company entertained themselves, before Dinner, at Dinner, and after Dinner," ]
These friends at whose dinner Ralph has asked his niece to preside (much to the delight of the class-conscious Mrs. Nickleby) are dissolute young aristocrats. Kate's devious uncle intends to swindle the gullible Verisopht. His rakish companion, the inveterate gambler and womanizer Sir Mulberry Hawk, humiliates Kate by constantly making sexual advances towards her. Ralph intervenes, apparently to protect Kate from the would-be seducer.
Left: Harry Furniss's stylish aristocrat oggles Kate in Sir Mulberry Hawk insults Kate Nickleby (1910). Centre: Fred Barnard's British Household Edition realisation of the same scene: But the young lady making a violent effort to disengage herself, he lost his balance, and measured his length upon the ground (1875). Right: C. S. Reinhart's American Household Edition illustration of Kate's indignation at the aristocrat's licentiousness: This is the first class in English spelling and philosophy, Nickleby (1875).
Dickens, Charles. The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. Illustrated by Phiz (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1839.
_______. The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. Ed. Andrew Lang. Illustrated by 'Phiz' (Hablot Knight Browne). The Gadshill Edition. London: Chapman and Hall, 1897. 2 vols.
Steig, Michael. Chapter 2. "The Beginnings of 'Phiz': Pickwick, Nickleby, and the Emergence from Caricature." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington & London: Indiana U. P., 1978. 24-50.
Thomas, Deborah A. "Chapter 2: Imaginative Overindulgence." Dickens and the Short Story. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982. 7-31.
Vann, J. Don. "The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, twenty parts in nineteen monthly installments, April 1838-October 1839." New York: Modern Language Association, 1985. 63.
Created 11 April 2009 Last modified 20 April 2021