Headnote Vignette
John McLenan
23 July 1859
7 cm high by 4.3 cm wide (3 inches by 1 ¾ inches)
Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities, Book the Second, "The Golden Thread," Chapter XII, "The Fellow of Delicacy."
Harper's Weekly (23 July 1859): 477; this twelfth installment appeared previously in UK on 16 July 1859 in All the Year Round.
Sydney Carton and Lucie Manette in the doctor's house in Soho.
Scanned image and text 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. .]
Passage Illustrated
. . . Sydney’s feet still trod those stones. From being irresolute and purposeless, his feet became animated by an intention, and, in the working out of that intention, they took him to the Doctor’s door.
He was shown up-stairs, and found Lucie at her work, alone. She had never been quite at her ease with him, and received him with some little embarrassment as he seated himself near her table. But, looking up at his face in the interchange of the first few common-places, she observed a change in it.
“I fear you are not well, Mr. Carton!”
“No. But the life I lead, Miss Manette, is not conducive to health. What is to be expected of, or by, such profligates?”
“Is it not — forgive me; I have begun the question on my lips — a pity to live no better life?”
“God knows it is a shame!”
“Then why not change it?”
Looking gently at him again, she was surprised and saddened to see that there were tears in his eyes. There were tears in his voice too, as he answered:
“It is too late for that. I shall never be better than I am. I shall sink lower, and be worse.”
He leaned an elbow on her table, and covered his eyes with his hand. The table trembled in the silence that followed. [Book the Second, "The Golden Thread," Chapter XIII, "The Fellow of No Delicacy," 478]
Other Illustrated Editions (1859-1910)
- Hablot K. Brown or 'Phiz' (16 illustrations, 1859)
- Sol Eytinge, Junior (8 illustrations, 1867)
- Fred Barnard (25 illustrations, 1874)
- A. A. Dixon (12 illustrations, 1905)
- Harry Furniss (32 illustrations, 1912)
Related Materials
- John McLenan's Thirty-One Headnote Vignettes for A Tale of Two Cities in Harper's Weekly (7 May — 3 December 1859)
- McLenan's and Phiz's Illustrations for
A Tale of Two Cities (1859): A Correspondence?
- Images of the French Revolution from Various Editions of A Tale of Two Cities (1859-1910)
- French Revolution
- Victorian Images of the French Revolution
- "A Tale of Two Cities (1859): A Model of the Integration of History and Literature"
Bibliography
Allingham, Philip V. "Charles Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities (1859) Illustrated: A Critical Reassessment of Hablot Knight Browne's Accompanying Plates." Dickens Studies. 33 (2003): 109-158.
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities. Illustrated by John McLenan. Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization, 7 May through 3 December 1859.
Dickens, Charles. A Tale of Two Cities: A story of the French Revolution. Project Gutenberg e-text by Judith Boss, Omaha, Nebraska. Release Date: September 25, 2004 [EBook #98].
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Created 26 November 2007
Last modified 17 November 2025