Passage Illustrated: O'Leary defies at the Croupier at Rouge et Noir

Round went the ball once more, and once more he lost.

"Look now, divil a lie in it, he makes them go wherever he pleases. I'll take a turn now at the tables; fair play's a jewel — and we'll see how you'll get on."

So saying, he proceeded to insinuate himself into the chair of the croupier, whom he proposed to supersede by no very gentle means. This was of course resisted, and as the loud mirth of the bystanders grew more and more boisterous, the cries of "a la porte, a la porte," from the friends of the bank, rung through the crowd.

"Go it, Pat — go it, Pat," said Guy, over my shoulder, who seemed to take a prodigious interest in the proceedings.

At this unexpected recognition of his nativity, for Mr. O'Leary never suspected he could be discovered by his accent; he looked across the table, and caught my eye at once.

"Oh, I'm safe now! stand by me, Mr. Lorrequer, and we'll clear the room."

So saying, and without any further provocation, he upset the croupier, chair and all, with one sudden jerk upon the floor, and giving a tremendous kick to the casette, sent all the five-franc pieces flying over him; he then jumped upon the table, and brandishing his black-thorn through the ormolu lustre, scattered the wax-lights on all sides, accompanying the exploit by a yell that would have called up all Connemara at midnight, if it had only been heard there; in an instant, the gens d'armes, always sufficiently near to be called in if required, came pouring into the room, and supposing the whole affair had been a preconcerted thing to obtain possession of the money in the bank, commenced capturing different members of the company who appeared, by enjoying the confusion, to be favouring and assisting it. My cousin Guy was one of the first so treated — a proceeding to which he responded by an appeal rather in favour with most Englishmen, and at once knocked down the gen d'arme; this was the signal for a general engagement, and accordingly, before an explanation could possibly be attempted, a most terrific combat ensued. The Frenchmen in the room siding with the gen d'armerie, and making common cause against the English; who, although greatly inferior in number, possessed considerable advantage, from long habit in street-rows and boxing encounters. As for myself, I had the good fortune to be pitted against a very pursy and unwieldy Frenchman, who sacre'd to admiration, but never put in a single blow at me; while, therefore, I amused myself practising what old Cribb called "the one, two," upon his fat carcass. I had abundant time and opportunity to watch all that was doing about me, and truly a more ludicrous affair I never beheld. Imagine about fifteen or sixteen young Englishmen, most of them powerful, athletic fellows, driving an indiscriminate mob of about five times their number before them, who, with courage enough to resist, were yet so totally ignorant of the boxing art, that they retreated, pell-mell, before the battering phalanx of their sturdy opponents — the most ludicrous figure of all being Mr. O'Leary himself, who, standing upon the table, laid about him with a brass lustre that he had unstrung, and did considerable mischief with this novel instrument of warfare, crying out the entire time, "murder every mother's son of them," "give them another taste of Waterloo." Just as he had uttered the last patriotic sentiment, he received a slight admonition from behind, by the point of a gen d'arme's sword, which made him leap from the table with the alacrity of a harlequin, and come plump down among the thickest of the fray. My attention was now directed elsewhere, for above all the din and "tapage" of the encounter I could plainly hear the row-dow-dow of the drums, and the measured tread of troops approaching, and at once guessed that a reinforcement of the gen d'armerie were coming up. [Chapter XXVI, "Paris," 207]

Commentary: O'Leary Causes a Donneybrook in the Casino

In company with his cousin, Guy Lorrequer, Harry, wagering daringly, has just broken the bank at rouge et noir at the Salon des Etrangers, on the Rue Richelieu in Paris. While Guy goes to order their dinner, Harry notices his travelling acquaintance, Mr. Leary, among the votaries of the roulette table. "Mr. O'Leary's external man, as we met him on the Calais road, with its various accompaniments of blouse-cap, spectacles, and tobacco-pipe, were nothing very outre or remarkable" (207), but in this exclusive salon he is decidedly out of place. He is the only player at his table, and is losing badly, announcing his own bet each time in both English and Irish currency, much to the amusement of the sophisticated Parisian spectators. Suspecting that the croupier is cheating him, O'Leary produces a black thorn cudgel, despite the fact that all weapons and even canes are checked at the door. Harry (lower right) is engaged in punching "a very pursy and unwieldy Frenchman." His lack of a worthy opponent affords Harry plenty of opportunity to be an acute observer.

Such a chaotic scene presents obvious challenges to the illustrator, to which Phiz has risen by making the vigorous, portly O'Leary the focal point, swinging his brass lustre as if it were a scourge. The action swirls about him, but includes nothing like fifteen Englishmen and seventy-five Frenchmen. Lorrequer is plainly the young man in the bottom right corner, and Phiz has made the presence of so many gen d'armes obvious by their distinctive large hats and sabres. O'Leary himself does not seem true to Lever's comic stage Irishman. The moment realised is immediately before Lorrequer floors his antagonist, passes behind the curtain, and drops out of the window to the garden below. O'Leary is arrested, whereas, bribing the Concierge in the garden, Harry escapes.

Bibliography

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

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

Lever, Charles. The Confessions of Harry Lorrequer. Illustrated by Phiz [Hablot Knight Browne]. Dublin: William Curry, Jun. London: W. S. Orr, 1839.

Steig, Michael. Chapter Two: "The Beginnings of 'Phiz': Pickwick, Nickleby, and the Emergence from Caricature." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington: Indiana U. P., 1978. Pp. 24-85.

Steig, Michael. Chapter Seven: "Phiz the Illustrator: An Overview and a Summing Up." Dickens and Phiz. Bloomington: Indiana U. P., 1978. Pp. 299-316.

Stevenson, Lionel. Chapter V, "Renegade from Physic, 1839-1841." Dr. Quicksilver: The Life of Charles Lever. London: Chapman and Hall, 1939. Pp. 73-93.

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

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