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Jo taken up by the Constable
Harold Copping
1924
Photographic reproduction of line drawing
12.9 x 11.5 cm (4 ¾ by 4 ½ inches), vignetted
"Poor Jo, The Crossing-Sweeper," p. 85.
[Click on image to enlarge it.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
As time went on Jo's troubles began in earnest. The police turned him away from his crossing, and wheresoever they met him ordered him "to move on."
Once a policeman, angry to find that Jo hadn't moved on, seized him by the arm and dragged him down to Mr. Snagsby's.
"What's the matter, constable?" asked Mr. Snagsby.
"This boy's as obstinate a young gonoph as I know: although repeatedly told to, he won't move on."
"I'm always amoving on," cried Jo. "Oh, my eye, where am I to move to?"
"My instructions don't go to that," the constable answered; "my instructions are that you're to keep moving on. Now the simple question is, sir," turning to Mr. Snagsby, "whether you know him. He says you do."
"Yes, I know him."
"Very well, I leave him here; but mind you keep moving on."
The constable then moved on himself, leaving Jo at Mr. Snagsby's. ["Poor Jo, The Crossing-Sweeper," Character Sketches from Dickens, 81]
Inspired by both the original 1853 and the 1873 Household editions, Harold Copping could have dwelt upon less comic aspects of Joe's pathetic story in Bleak House. But this is a book ostensibly for children, so the illustrator has chosen, for example, this slightly humorous street scene rather than the death of Jo to conclude the short series, despite the fact that the authors actually conclude the chapter in Children's Stories from Dickens with Jo's death in hospital as he tries to learn the Lord's Prayer. Perhaps the deathbed scene would simply have been too lugubrious for childhood reading. In any event, his being turned out of his crossing by the police marks the end of his earning even a meagre livelihood. Thus, Copping's illustration appears against the letterpress describing Jo's death rather than the constable's turning him away from his usual crossing. There is no corresponding scene in the editions illustrated by Phiz, Barnard, Eytinge, and Furniss, and only Barnard depicts Jo's actual death. Copping obliquely identifies Snagsby by inserting his name above the respectable law-stationer's shop window in the background; he thoughtfully studies the grimy urchin, by his gesture betokens puzzlement: whatever are any of us to do about the Jos of western urban society?
Left: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s 1867 Diamond Edition of Joe at work outside Tom-all-Alone's: Jo. Centre: Fred Barnard's forty-fourth Household Edition composite woodblock of the scene outside Tom-all-Alone's with Dr. Alan Woodcourt: Here, against a hoarding of decaying timber, he is brought to bay (1873). Right: Phiz's original serial version of the scene in the fifth number, in which Joe points out where Nemo is buried: Consecrated Ground (July 1852 ).
Left: Fred Barnard's 1873 Household Edition full-page composite woodblock wood-engraving of Joe in a crowd on London Bridge: Frontispiece: Jo. Centre: Harry Furniss's Charles Dickens Library Edition caricatural lithograph of the inquest: Before the Coroner (1910). Right: Furniss's study of Jo places him against no background to suggest, perhaps, his utter alienation: Jo in the Charles Dickens Library Edition.
Bentley, Nicolas, et al. The Dickens Index. Oxford & Troronto: Oxford U. P., 1990.
Dickens, Charles. Bleak House. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ("Phiz"). London: Bradbury and Evans, 1853.
Dickens, Mary Angela [Charles Dickens' grand-daughter]. Dickens' Dream Children. London, Paris New, York: Raphael Tuck & Sons, Ltd., 1924.
Dickens, Mary Angela et al. Children's Stories from Dickens. Introduction by Percy Fitzgerald. Illustrated by Harold Copping. London, Paris New, York: Raphael Tuck & Sons, Ltd., 1893.
Matz, B. W., and Kate Perugini; illustrated by Harold Copping. Character Sketches from Dickens. London: Raphael Tuck, 1924. Copy in the Paterson Library, Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada.
Created 8 October 2023