Passage Illustrated: Mrs. Ricketts Plays a Domestic Role

While Dalton hastened to overtake his daughter, Mrs. Ricketts had time to descend and shake out all her plumage, — a proceeding of manual dexterity to which Martha mainly contributed; indeed, it was almost artistic in its way, for while feathers were disposed to droop here, and lace taught to fall gracefully there, the fair Zoe assumed the peculiar mood in which she determined on conquest.

“How do I look, Martha?” said she, bridling up, and then smiling.

“Very sweetly, — quite charming,” replied Martha.

“I know that,” said the other, pettishly; “but am I maternal, — am I affectionate?”

“Very maternal, —— most affectionate,” was the answer.

“You're a fool!” said Mrs. Ricketts, contemptuously; but had barely time to restore her features to their original blandness, when Nelly came up. The few words in which her father had announced Mrs. Ricketts spoke of her as one who had known and been kind to Kate, and Nelly wanted no stronger recommendation to her esteem.

The quiet, gentle manner of the young girl, the almost humble simplicity of her dress, at once suggested to Mrs. Ricketts the tone proper for the occasion, and she decided on being natural; which, to say truth, was the most remote thing from nature it is well possible to conceive. [Chapter LVII, "An Act of Settlement," 504]

Commentary

Having made Peter Dalton's acquaintance in the leading restaurant of Baden, Zoe Ricketts determines to make a conquest of Nelly Dalton, the physically challenged, artistic sister who has remained to look after her father. Unfortunately, Peter Dalton's enjoying the high life of the German resort is about to come to a sharp halt as he loses massively at the gambling tables and finds himself enormously in debt to the local money-lender, the extremly shrewd Abel Kraus, who also happens to be the Daltons' new landlord as they have recently quitted their rooms above the toyshop, and have moved to far more magnificent rooms closer to the centre of town, "the Cursaal."

Zoe's intention in seeming "maternal" is to win the confidence of Nelly Dalton, and by extension her father, whom Zoe is sure is receiving the largesse of his princess-designate daughter Kate from her palace in St. Petersburg, Russia. This payment to her father she should be able to maintain indefinitely once she has received an act of settlement and married the fabulously wealthy Prince midchekoff. Having quickly realised Peter Dalton's shallow character, his vanity, and tendency towards self-indulgence, she is reasonably sure that she can manipulate him by charming his daughter Nelly. Zoe manages to impose upon Peter's hospitality by eliciting from the genial Irishman an invitation to stay in his fashionable house.

Bibliography

Browne, John Buchanan. Phiz! Illustrator of Dickens' World. New York: Charles Scribner's, 1978.

Downey, Edmund. Charles Lever: His Life in Letters. 2 vols. London: William Blackwood, 1906.

Fitzpatrick, W. J. The Life of Charles Lever. London: Downey, 1901.

Lester, Valerie Browne. Phiz: The Man Who Drew Dickens. London: Chatto and Windus, 2004.

Lever, Charles. The Daltons, or, Three Roads in Life. Illustrated by "Phiz" (Hablot Knight Browne). London: Chapman and Hall, 1852, rpt. 1859, and 1872. [Two volumes as one, with separate page numbers in the 1859 volume, after I: 362.]

_______. The Daltons and A Day's Ride. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ('Phiz'). Vol VI of Lever's Works. New York: P. F. Collier, 1882. [This large-format American edition reproduces only six of the original forthy-eight Phiz illustrations.]

Lever, Charles James. The Daltons, or, Three Roads in Life. Vol. 2. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32062/32062-h/32062-h.htm

Skinner, Anne Maria. Charles Lever and Ireland. University of Liverpool. PhD dissertation. May 2019.

Stevenson, Lionel. Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. New York: Russell & Russell, 1939, rpt. 1969.

_______. "The Domestic Scene." The English Novel: A Panorama. Cambridge, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin and Riverside, 1960.

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Last modified 24 May 2022