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Passage Illustrated: A Tall Tale from an Exotic Land, Egypt

"Was it an ostrich?" said Tom.

"No; nor an oyster either, Mr. Conolly," said the old fellow, who thought the question was meant to quiz him.

"'T was an ibis, Martin," cried Daly, — "an ibis."

"The devil a doubt of it, — that's the name. A crayture with legs as long as Mr. Beecham O'Reilly's, and a way of going — half-flying, half-walking — almost impossible to catch; and they hunt him on dromedaries. Dick liked the notion well, and as he was a favorite on board, he got lave for three days to go on shore and have his fun; though the captain said, at parting, 'It's not many dromedaries you'll see, Dick, for the Pasha has them all up the country at this time.' This was true enough; sorra a bit of a camel or dromedary could be seen for miles round. But however it was, the consul kept his word, and had one for Dick the next morning, — a great strapping baste, all covered with trappings of one kind or other; elegant shawls and little hearthrugs all over him.

"The others were mounted on mules or asses, any way they could, and away they went to look after the goose — the 'ibis,' I mean. Well, to be short with it, they came up with one on the bank of the river, and soon gave chase; he was a fine strong fellow, and well able to run. I wish you heard Dick tell this part of it; never was there such sport in the world, blazing away all together as fast as they could prime and load, at one time at the goose, more times at each other; the mules kicking, the asses braying, and Dick cantering about on his dromedary, upsetting every one near him, and shouting like mad. At last he pinned the goose up in a narrow corner among some old walls, and Dick thought he'd have the brush; but sorra step the dromedary would stir; he spurred and kicked, and beat away with a stick as hard as he could, but it was all no good, — it was the carpets maybe, that saved him; for there he stood fast, just for all the world as if he was made of stone.

"Dick pulled out a pistol and fired a shot in his ear, but all to no use; he minded it no more than before. 'Bad luck to you for a baste,' says Dick, 'what ails you at all — are you going to die on me? Get along now.' The divil receave the step I'll go till I get some spirits and wather!' says the dromedary, 'for I'm clean smothered with them b———y blankets;' and with them same words the head of the baste fell off, and Dick saw the consul's own man wiping the perspiration off his face, and blowing like a porpoise. 'How the divil the hind legs bears it I can't think,' says he; 'for I'm nigh dead, though I had a taste of fresh air.'

"The murther was out, gentlemen, for ye see the consul couldn't get a raal dromedary, and was obliged to make one out of a Christian and a black fellow he had for a cook, and sure enough in the beginning of the day Dick says he went like a clipper; 'twas doubling after the goose destroyed him." [Chapter V, "An After-dinner Story," pp. 34-35]

Commentary: A Humorous After-dinner Anecdote about Hunting for an Extinct Bird

We are now in the opening chapter of the novel's second monthly number. The stand-in for the Knight of Gwynne as Master of Ceremonies at the fox-hunters' dinner at the Abbey, Bagenal Daly, tries to put their English visitor, Captain Forester, at ease by encouraging the company to recount amusing anecdotes. The one alluded to in the Phiz illustration, provided by old Farmer Martin, is prompted by a remark about the pointless introduction of English horses into Ireland (a metaphor for the Act of Union):

"You forget, sir," said the young gentleman referred to, "that I was on an English-bred mare, and she doesn't understand these fences."

"Faith, she wasn't worse off, in that respect, than the man on her back," said old Conolly, with a hearty chuckle. "If to look before you leap be wisdom, you ought to be the shrewdest fellow in the country."

"Beecham, I believe, keeps a good place in Northamptonshire," said his father, half proudly.

"Another argument in favor of the Union, I suppose," whispered a guest in Conolly's ear. [34]

The picture, occurring at the head of the February 1846 serial instalment, will have already puzzled the book's original readers because the "dromedary" or camel is strictly a Vaudeville beast propped up by two men. "However could the gullible Irish sailor, Dick French, possibly believe he was riding an actual dromedary?" the purchaser of the serial instalment must have wondered. Phiz focuses on the very moment when Dick is suddenly disabused of the notion, and sees one of the British consul's servants and his Black cook: Dick looks down, shocked. At least Phiz has provided a reasonable facsimile of a dromedary, and has sketched in the actual ibis hunt to the left, with the speedy bird looking more like an ostrich, with much longer legs than the long-billed wading-bird that can actually fly. The species actually went extinct in Egypt, where the interpolated tale is set, just about the time that Lever wrote this episode about the young Irish sailor on leave from a British frigate or man-of-war (suggesting, of course, that Ireland is already functioning as a full member of the United Kingdom). As Lever mentions, the other hunters, pursuing the gigantic bird, are "mounted on mules or asses." Phiz gives us a sense of immediacy, of being in the moment, by the smoke emanating from the barrel of Dick's pistol.

Bibliography

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

Lester, Valerie Browne Lester. Chapter 11: "'Give Me Back the Freshness of the Morning!'" Phiz! The Man Who Drew Dickens. London: Chatto and Windus, 2004. Pp. 108-127.

Lever, Charles. The Knight of Gwynne; A Tale of the Time of the Union. London: Chapman and Hall, serialised January 1846 through July 1847.

Lever, Charles. The Knight of Gwynne. Illustrated by Phiz [Hablột Knight Browne]. Novels and Romances of Charles Lever. Vol. I and II. In two volumes. Project Gutenberg. Last Updated: 28 February 2018.

Steig, Michael. Chapter Four: "Dombey and Son: Iconography of Social and Sexual Satire." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington: Indiana U. P., 1978. Pp. 86-112.

Stevenson, Lionel. Chapter IX, "Nomadic Patriarch, 1845-1847." Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. London: Chapman and Hall, 1939. Pp. 146-164.

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

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