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The Church and The World
John Gordon Thomson
Engraver: E. Dalziel
1880
Composite woodblock engraving
Framed, 13.8 cm high by 10.6 cm wide; facing page 61
Charles Dickens, Pictures from Italy, and American Notes. Illustrated by J. Gordon Thomson and A. B. Frost. Chapman and Hall.
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
Although the 1880 P. F. Collier edition indicates that the artist responsible for this illustration is Henry Towneley Green, brother of noted illustrator Charles Green, the anthology of Household Edition illustrations published by Chapman and Hall, Scenes and Characters from the Works of Charles Dickens (1908), ascribes this series of illustrations exclusively to John Gordon Thomson. However, A Sketch at the Carnival (Rome) does not appear in the original Chapman and Hall volume of 1880, and may therefore well be the work of Towneley Green (1836–98), the least significant of the Household Edition illustrators.
I observed the little Frenchman chuckle over the idea that when the Friar saw him in the broad-barred waistcoat, he would mentally exclaim, "Is that my Patron! That distinguished man!" and would be covered with confusion. Ah! never was the Frenchman so deceived. As our friend the Cappuccíno advanced, with folded arms, he looked straight into the visage of the little Frenchman, with a bland, serene, composed abstraction, not to be described. There was not the faintest trace of recognition or amusement on his features; not the smallest consciousness of bread and meat, wine, snuff, or cigars. "C’est lui-même," I heard the little Frenchman say, in some doubt. Oh yes, it was himself. It was not his brother or his nephew, very like him. It was he. He walked in great state: being one of the Superiors of the Order: and looked his part to admiration. There never was anything so perfect of its kind as the contemplative way in which he allowed his placid gaze to rest on us, his late companions, as if he had never seen us in his life and didn’t see us then. The Frenchman, quite humbled, took off his hat at last, but the Friar still passed on, with the same imperturbable serenity; and the broad-barred waistcoat, fading into the crowd, was seen no more. [Chapter 4, "Genoa and its Neighbourhood," pp 53-54]
The narrator of the incident in the harbour at Nice finds the friends a study in contrasts as the loquacious, lively, drunken little Frenchman and the noble Cappuccín friar of Herculean proportion make an odd couple — and the ideal subjects for a realist with a subtle sense of humour. "Although his patronage was such as a mouse might bestow upon a lion, he had a vast opinion of its condescension; and in the warmth of that sentiment, occasionally rose on tiptoe, to slap the Friar on the back" (52) has given the illustrator the governing principle for the picture: a lion befriending a mouse. The petite but chubby Frenchman "would come back, laughing lustily from pure good humour: while the Frenchman wrinkled his small face into ten thousand creases, and said how droll it was, and what a brave boy was that Friar!" (53). Certainly the quarantine, lasting from eleven in the morning until four in the afternoon has given Dickens plenty of opportunity to observe the incongruous friends. Since he lavishes praise on the cleric, the illustrator has made the friar a monumental figure: "he was a gallant, noble figure of a man, even in the Cappuccíno dress, which is the ugliest and most ungainly that can well be" (52).
Above: Thomas Nast's realistic sketch of the religious procession led by the muscular monk, The Procession at Nice. [Click on image to enlarge it.]
Dickens, Charles. Pictures from Italy. Illustrated by Samuel Palmer. London: Chapman and Hall, 1846; rpt., 1850.
Dickens, Charles. American Notes for General Circulation and Pictures from Italy in Works. Illustrated by Marcus Stone. Illustrated Library Edition. London: Chapman and Hall: 1862, rpt. 1874.
Dickens, Charles. Chapter Five, "Genoa and its Neighbourhood." Pictures from Italy, Sketches by Boz, and American Notes. Illustrated by A. B. Frost and Thomas Nast. The Household Edition. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1877. Pp. 10-13.
Dickens, Charles. Pictures from Italy and American Notes. Illustrated by A. B. Frost and Gordon Thomson. London: Chapman and Hall, 1880. Pp. 1-381.
Orestano, Francesca. "Charles Dickens and Italy: The 'New Picturesque'.” Dickens and Italy: Little Dorrit and Pictures from Italy, ed. Michael Hollington and Francesca Orestano. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars, 2009. Pp. 49-67.
Scenes and characters from the works of Charles Dickens; being eight hundred and sixty-six drawings, by Fred Barnard, Hablot Knight Browne (Phiz); J. Mahoney; Charles Green; A. B. Frost; Gordon Thomson; J. McL. Ralston; H. French; E. G. Dalziel; F. A. Fraser, and Sir Luke Fildes; printed from the original woodblocks engraved for "The Household Edition.". New York: Chapman and Hall, 1908. Copy in the Robarts Library, University of Toronto.
Last modified 8 May 2019