Death and Mr. Pickwick (22 page)

Attendants carried scales into the centre of the pit. ‘Fifty-two pounds!' said the master of ceremonies, for the first dog. ‘Fifty-two and
one-half
pounds!' he said for the second dog.

Upon the removal of the scales, both owners knelt beside their dogs. It was then that a change overcame the previously cool-demeanoured man. His face creased, so showing his teeth, and a focused hatred entered his eyes. A spectator looking at this man would see much the same had he looked at the dog. Opposite, the man from Bond Street said words of encouragement to his dog and kissed its head.

The master of ceremonies stood at the circumference of the pit. He held his hands in the air.

‘Wait … wait …
go
!' The hands chopped down.

But for the presence of fur, teeth, blood and life, the turbulence and flurry in the sawdust ring could have suggested two pieces of screwed-up paper, wrapping around each other, gusted by crosswinds from the crowd's shouts.

There was not to be the excitement and suspense of an evenly matched contest. Within a minute of the go, the white dog sank its teeth into the throat of the Bond Street dog and pulled back, ripping open the neck. The owner of the upper dog instantly lost his savagery and assumed his previous coolness, for the job was done, while the Bond Street owner held his head in his hands in despair. The dogs were separated by attendants wearing gauntlets, and the injured beast carried out of the pit. His owner received a commiserating hand on the shoulder from the master of ceremonies. Egan and the Cruikshanks were close enough to hear the master say: ‘I am so sorry.'

‘A shame it's that dog,' said Egan.

‘Had to be sad for someone,' said George Cruikshank.

‘I wish it had gone on longer,' said his brother. ‘I feel cheated.'

‘Shall I get one of the attendants to do the necessary?' said the master of ceremonies.

‘I have to do it myself,' the owner replied.

There was a shot heard shortly afterwards, before the next contest.

*   *   *

After the dogpit, the Cruikshanks and Egan moved on to the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane and entered half an hour into the performance. Within twenty minutes, George Cruikshank turned to Robert Cruikshank, and mimed an exaggerated yawn. Egan nodded in agreement. They rose and left. In the lobby were elegantly dressed prostitutes.

‘Ladies or daffy, lads?' said Egan.

‘Daffy,' said George Cruikshank. His wink to one of the women indicated there would be another night.

‘To the sluicery, my boys,' said Egan. They headed for the nearest gin shop.

*   *   *

‘Aunt, that's your ninth,' said the proprietor of the gin shop to a florid woman in a black bonnet. Commercial interest had to be balanced against the risk of damage to the shop's stock, should it be necessary to eject the customer.

‘Don't call me aunt. The babe's had at least one of those nine,' she said, indicating a miserable-looking girl whose eyes were at the level of the counter. ‘Don't you worry, dear, the man will give us more jackey.' She eyed up Egan who, along with the Cruikshanks, had just entered the shop. ‘I know you, don't I?'

‘Do you?' said Egan.

‘I bet you
do
,' said Robert Cruikshank with a smirk.

‘She is changed so much,' said Egan, when the woman was distracted by the arrival of the ninth glass, ‘as to count as a different woman.'

As they drank, a nightwatchman came coughing into the shop, truncheon tucked under his arm. He paid for his flask to be filled, and as it was placed under the tap Egan whispered to the Cruikshanks: ‘When you see a charley, what goes through your mind?'

‘That some men are born to be other men's jokes,' said George Cruikshank.

The watchman's cough was now so severe he gripped the counter for support.

‘Their horrible coughs and their weak little lamps take away all possibility of respect,' said Egan.

‘It may be shameful to say it,' said Robert Cruikshank, ‘but I admit I cannot see a charley standing in his box without thinking: I want to do him some mischief.'

Egan whispered: ‘Up for mischief tonight?'

‘Ridiculous they may be, but they
do
have truncheons,' he replied.

‘But if one were bold and quick,' said Egan.

‘And if the charley were taken by surprise,' added George Cruikshank.

‘I'm game.' Egan downed his gin.

‘I'm game,' said George Cruikshank as he finished his own.

‘All right, I'm game too,' said Robert Cruikshank, and he swallowed like his friends. Yet, even as he put his glass down, he said, ‘Now who's she?' looking towards a pretty woman in a green bonnet who stood outside the shop.

‘She's an out-and-outer, isn't she?' said George Cruikshank. ‘Why don't we put down a deposit on her, and ask her to meet us after we've had our fun?'

‘There'll be others,' said Egan. ‘Let's find a charley.'

*   *   *

They all moved forward stealthily, following the course of the moonlit railings, Egan in front. The nightwatchman's box stood ahead, at the corner of the street.

‘As mice?' said George Cruikshank.

‘As ghosts,' said Robert Cruikshank.

‘You do it, George,' said Egan.

‘Robert wanted the mischief,' he replied.

‘
You
do it, Egan,' whispered Robert. ‘You started the talk about the charleys.'

Egan looked round, as though no longer sure the idea was a good one, and he approached the nightwatchman's box with utmost caution. He hesitated when a few feet away, but suddenly both Cruikshanks pushed him towards the box. Egan stumbled and hit the wooden side, the box rocked, and the man within cried out. All three assailants now joined together to complete the action.

Egan's hand struck the watchman in the middle of the chest, so he was pushed back into his own box – the box was then lifted, scooping the watchman up, and also turned in one swift gesture, with the result that the watchman fell forward, and lay imprisoned with his face upon the pavement. The trio cheered their mischief, then they ran away down the street, laughing. Shortly afterwards, in a lamplit alcove of a public house, they toasted each other on the success of the operation.

‘There's something I've been meaning to bring up for a while,' said Egan. ‘There will never be a better moment to mention it than now, after what we did to the charley. We have fun, don't we?'

‘We certainly do,' said Robert Cruikshank, raising his glass.

‘Has it ever struck you,' said Egan, looking across the table, first at one Cruikshank and then the other, ‘that people might find it amusing to hear about our antics?'

‘I tell a few friends, and they laugh,' said George Cruikshank. ‘I can't believe you keep your mouth shut, Egan.'

‘I mean,' said Egan, ‘that we might publish all the things we get up to.'

‘
Publish
?' said George.

‘Turn them into words and pictures, me doing the words, you two doing the pictures.'

‘I think the law would have something to say if we published
some
of the things we have done,' said George.

‘And if not the law,' said Robert, ‘I think we might lose a friend or two.'

‘I am not so unfurnished in the upper storey as to suggest that we make a
confession
,' said Egan. ‘But suppose we had words and pictures about three characters – characters who have more than a dash of ourselves in them.'

‘Interesting,' said George. ‘Tell me more.'

‘Imagine two cousins, one from the city, one from the country. The city man knows what's o'clock – his cousin is a Johnny Raw. The city cousin shows the country cousin all that London has to offer. All the
fun
there is of living here. The people to meet. The things to do. What to see. They are joined by a third man – I have in mind an Oxford scholar, who is always up for a lark and a song.'

‘And these three do everything we do,' said George.

‘You have got it,' said Egan.

‘Do you think this would sell?' said Robert.

‘I think it would. People would like to see all sides of life in London. What if they could see the city in the safety of their own homes? No pickpockets, no violence, no dirt. So yes, they would buy.'

‘The whole of London?' said George.

‘A one-mile radius of Piccadilly forms a complete cyclopedia of the world,' said Egan. ‘The world that matters, at least. Life, gentlemen, life. People want to see it.'

 

*

I HAVE NOTED ALREADY THE SENSATION
of
Dr Syntax
, and the associated memorabilia which Mr Inbelicate collected. There are also, in this house, items concerning the phenomenon that was
Life in London
, by which the even greater success of that publication may be gauged. Just as there is a Dr Syntax papier-mâché snuffbox in the library, next to the family Bible, so on a coffee table is a red and black japanned snuffbox depicting a whist-playing scene from a stage adaptation of
Life in London
, in which a Negro servant in livery brings drinks to the card table. Stuffed in drawers around this house, I have found threadbare handkerchiefs and broken handheld fans showing scenes from
Life in London
by the brothers Cruikshank.

Just like Ackermann before – who had judged that the public would love to read about the illustrated exploits of a travelling pedant – so Egan's instincts had been exactly right regarding the appeal of the illustrated exploits of three men travelling across London in search of ‘fun'.

Ten theatres in London put on adaptations of
Life in London –
simultaneously. At the Adelphi, the seats were sold out so many weeks in advance that the exasperated man at the box office had to drawl, time and time again: ‘Do not ask for today, sir. Make it easy for both of us. Ask for next month.' The price of a seat with a good view, on the night of a performance, purchased from a man in the Cider Cellars who had connections, was
five guineas
, and that was probably if he liked your face. It was not much cheaper for a seat with a restricted view. And the cheers from the audience at those ten theatres as the charley was knocked over in his box! They were the loudest cheers for a dramatic production that anyone could recall.

Indeed, one of Mr Inbelicate's favourite items of memorabilia was a toy theatre version of
Life in London
which, as he demonstrated to me once on the kitchen table, allowed children, by means of cardboard characters on wires, to enjoy the pleasures of knocking down a nightwatchman's box in miniature. He said as he staged the attack that his father had spent ages going around dealers in antique toys trying to find a
Life in London
toy theatre in good condition, and when he found one, it was Mr Inbelicate's Christmas present one year when he was a small boy, and he loved it then and still loved it. He had previously said virtually nothing about his past to me, and I seized the opportunity to ask him about his father and his family. He merely moved on, dodging the question, and said that it was not surprising that there were many copycat attacks on nightwatchmen – one of which, as we have seen, was attempted by the young Grimaldi, and the charley's retaliation probably led to the clown's madness.

But let me eschew ‘fun' and be serious. I ask readers to bear with me, I shall be brief.

It is notable that, as with
Dr Syntax
,
Life in London
did not appear all at once. It was issued in twelve monthly parts, with illustrations, and a set of these parts is in the library here. Were you to bind them, they could admittedly look like an illustrated book. But the three pictures sewn into the front of each part were so loosely connected to the words that for the first nine numbers the wrappers had an ‘Explanation of the Plates', and words and pictures were not always even about the same subject. But in that ninth part, a notice appeared, which I shall give now: ‘To Subscribers, In future, the only opportunity of giving the explanation of the plates will be in the body of the work.'

Such a terse, dull statement. Yet, how significant, those twenty-two words! Here was the
true
linking of pictures and text! With those few words,
Life in London
become an illustrated work of fiction in parts – moreover, not in poetry like
Syntax
, but in prose, using the slang of the streets. It was an historic turning point.

Mr Inbelicate told me that, in his mind's eye – which was sometimes so vivid one could almost believe he was really there – he would see Robert Seymour caught up in the fever for
Life in London
, reviving his boyhood memories of
Dr Syntax
, and that he and Wonk would attend the theatrical adaptations
,
pushing their way through leaflet distributors from the Methodist Chapels and the Religious Tract Society, who thrust their reading matter into Seymour's face, urging him to ‘Turn away! Seek Christ!' But in so doing, demonstrated the truth that, the more that people were told that
Life in London
was immoral, the more they wanted to see it.

Mr Inbelicate also showed me a Seymour drawing of a performance of
Life in London
at Covent Garden, in later years, for the phenomenon lingered for some time. There was Seymour's portrayal of the Oxford scholar who liked a lark, the bespectacled Bob Logic, being arrested for debt in his well-appointed chambers in the Albany, his arm seized by a bailiff.

One part of
Life in London
took the trio of characters to the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition, and that is a very good place to rejoin Robert Seymour. Because, following all his hard work, the painting on a theme of Tasso was exhibited, two years after Joseph Severn's
Una in the Cave of Despair
received the same honour.