"You would never guess how I recognized you, sir," said she — staff artist William Newman's twenty-first composite woodblock engraving for Charles Lever's A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance, first published on 17 November 1860 in Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization, Chapter XIX, "Mrs. Keats's Mysterious Communication." 2 ½ by 3 ½ inches (6.9 cm by 8.8 mm), framed, bottom right of page 732. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Passage Illustrated: Mrs. Keats confuses Potts with somebody else
“You would never guess how I recognized you, Sir,” said she.
“Never, madam.” I could have given my oath to this, if required.
“Well,” said she, with a bland smile, “it was from the resemblance to your mother!”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; you are far more like her, than your father, and you are scarcely so tall as he was.”
“Perhaps not, madam.”
“But you have his manner, Sir, the graceful and captivating dignity that distinguished all your house; this would betray you to the eyes of all who have enjoyed the high privilege of knowing your family.” [Chapter XIX, "Mrs. Keats's Mysterious Communication," 733; p. 167 in Chapman and Hall edition]
Commentary: The Nature of Mrs. Martha Keats's Mistake
Mrs. Keats (who is, it turns out, the sister of the British ambassador, Sir Shalley Doubleton) treats Potts here with remarkable deference, especially in light of his rudeness the previous evening. Potts is mystified. She seems to have mistaken him for someone of considerable importance, but who? Potts is convinced that the answer lies in the newspaper she was reading earlier, and does some sleuthing. He comes upon a story that suggests the answer: touring throughout Germany under the assumed identity of a young Englishman is the "the young C. de P." — a French nobleman who bears a strong resemblance to the late duchess, his mother.
Scanned images 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 photographer and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]
Bibliography
Brown, Jane E., and Richard Samuel West. "William Newman (1817—1870): A Victorian Cartoonist in London and New York." American Periodicals, 17, 2: "Periodical Comics and Cartoons." (Ohio State University Press, 2007), 143-183. https://www.jstor.org/stable/20770984.
Lever, Charles. A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance. Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization. Illustrated by William Newman. Vols. IV-V (13 April 1860 through 23 March 1861) in thirty-five weekly parts. Only a dozen of these weekly instalments were illustrated: p. 541 (one), 549 (two), 573, 589, 605, 621, 637, 649, 661, 678, 701, and 714.
_______. A Day's Ride; A Life's Romance. Illustrated by "Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1863, rpt. Routledge, 1882.
_______. A Day's Ride: A Life's Romance. London: Chapman and Hall, 1873.
Lever, Charles James. A Day's Ride; A Life's Romance. http://www.gutenberg.org//files/32692/32692-h/32692-h.htm
Stevenson, Lionel. Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. New York: Russell & Russell, 1939, rpt. 1969.
Sutherland, John. "Charles Lever." The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford, Cal.: Stanford U. P., 1989. Pp. 372-374.
Created 6 June 2022