He entered, and Nina arose as he came forward by Sir Luke Fildes; engraver, Swain. Fifth illustration for Charles Lever's Lord Kilgobbin: A Tale of Ireland in Our Time, facing p. 84. Reprinted from the January 1871 number of the Cornhill Magazine, Vol. XXIII, facing p. 1. 10.5 cm by 16 cm (4 by 6 ¼ inches), framed. Fourth serial illustration, Part 4, Chapter XIII, "The Sick Room," facing p. 1. [Click on the illustration to enlarge it.]
Passage Illustrated: Breakfast Interrupted
Right: The initial page for the fourth instalment in Volume XXIII of the Cornhill Magazine (January, 1871), page 1.
"Ten o’clock! — nearly half-past ten!" said Lockwood, rising from his chair. "I must go and have some breakfast. I meant to have been down in time to-day, and breakfasted with the old fellow and his daughter; for coming late brings me to a tête-à-tête with the Greek damsel, and it isn’t jolly, I assure you."
"Don’t you speak?"
"Never a word? She’s generally reading a newspaper when I go in. She lays it down; but after remarking that she fears I’ll find the coffee cold, she goes on with her breakfast, kisses her Maltese terrier, asks him a few questions about his health, and whether he would like to be in a warmer climate, and then sails away."
"And how she walks!"
"Is she bored here?"
"She says not."
"She can scarcely like these people; they're not the sort of thing she has ever been used to."
"She tells me she likes them: they certainly like her."
"Well," said Lockwood, with a sigh, "she’s the most beautiful woman, certainly, I’ve ever seen; and, at this moment, I’d rather eat a crust with a glass of beer under a hedge than I’d go down and sit at breakfast with her."
"I’ll be shot if I’ll not tell her that speech the first day I’m down again."
"So you may, for by that time I shall have seen her for the last time." And with this he strolled out of the room and down the stairs towards the breakfast-parlour.
As he stood at the door he heard the sound of voices laughing and talking pleasantly. He entered, and Nina arose as he came forward, and said, "Let me present my cousin — Mr. Richard Kearney, Major Lockwood; his friend, Mr. Atlee." [Chapter XIII, "The Sick Room," pp. 84-85]
Commentary: The Two Sets of Travellers Meet
Serendipitously, Cecil Whalpole had been visiting the Castle at Nina's invitation when "The Boys," a mob of Fenians from the neighbourhood, had demanded firearms of the chatelaine, Kate Kearney. Rather than accede to their demands, she had fired upon them when they stormed to main entrance. Because his friend and fellow member of the Viceregal staff at Dublin Castle had been wounded in the fray, his travelling companion, Major Henry Lockwood, had come over from the Goat Inn at Moate to support him. Now the two sets of young men cross paths, as it were, in Kilgobbin Castle at breakfast as Atlee and his roommate, Dick Kearney, have arrived to see that Kate has survived the encounter mentally and psychologically after being praised in the Dublin newspapers as an Irish Joan of Arc.
As a social realist of the Sixties, Fildes fills the breakfast-parlour with plenty of convincing realia: a diminutive teapot and cups, a toast-rack, and eggs on the small table, a clock and candle-sticks on the mantelpiece, chairs, and fireplace. None of these items (except the hard-boiled egg) actually appear in Lever's narrative, but their presence enhances the verisimilitude of the illustration — these mundane details make the whole, rather coincidental scene credible. We readily distinguish Nina from Kate by her blonde hair, and Joe from Dick by the former's moustache.
Scanned images, captions, and commentary by Philip V. Allingham. [You may use these images without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose, as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned them, and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin. The Cornhill Magazine. With 18 full-page illustrations and 18 initial-letter vignettes by S. Luke Fildes. Volumes XXII-XXV. October 1870-March 1872.
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin: A Tale of Ireland in Our Own Time. With 18 Illustrations by Sir Luke Fildes, R. A. London: Smith, Elder, 1872, 3 vols; rpt., Chapman and Hall, 1873.
Lever, Charles. Lord Kilgobbin. Illustrated by Sir Luke Fildes. Novels and Romances of Charles Lever. Vols. I-III. In three volumes. London: Smith, Elder, 1872, Rpt. London: Chapman & Hall, 1873. Project Gutenberg. Last Updated: 19 August 2010.
Stevenson, Lionel. Chapter XVI, "Exile on the Adriatic, 1867-1872." Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. New York: Russell and Russell, 1939; rpt. 1969. Pp. 277-296.
Sutherland, John A. "Lord Kilgobbin." The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford, Cal.: Stanford U. P., 1989, rpt. 1990, 382.
Created 24 October 2007 Updated 19 June 2023