Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/411

 10 S. XL APRIL 24, 1909.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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course of the story. Mr. Philip does this more or less, but his writing is clumsy, and often too concise to be of much use. There is a further point in the arrangement of the book which we regard as a grave deficiency. He gives us the reference to the first chapter only in which the character turns up. If we want to trace Mrs. Gamp through ' Martin Chuzzlewit,' or look for one of her sayings, and not waste tune over the chapters in which she does not appear, we get no help at all. ' The Dickens Dictionary ' of Messrs. G. A. Pierce and W. A. Wheeler at least does this for us.

Mr. Philip is able to include references to the newly collected ' Miscellaneous Papers,' and is strong on vaguely described characters. Thus he notes in his index a wonderful List of Boys, Gentlemen, and Ladies. But he does not always succeed in separating things trivial from things essential.

One other want we should certainly have supplied a series of Dickens's famous dicta with exact references, as the Books of Quotations are inadequate in this respect. Some of our readers will recall how interesting the section of ' Dicta Philosophi ' is in Birkbeck Hill's masterly Index to Boswell's Johnson.

' The Synopses of the Various Works ' and Introduction which precede the main Index we cannot praise. A Summary of ' Pickwick ' which omits the elder Weller, Stiggins, and Messrs. Sawyer and Allen, and refers towards the end to Job Trotter, Arabella Allen, and Mary without any mention of their earlier ap- pearance, is not satisfactory. The Introduction shows enthusiasm for the subject, but lack of critical power. It is excessively verbose.

We now proceed to give some of the results of our scrutiny of the main alphabetical index. Mr. Philip asks for suggestions to improve the ' Dictionary,' and we think that a good " proof- reader " ought to have left less to correct. The titles of the various books are severely abbre- viated throughout. " Adams. Head boy at school. D.C. xvi.," is a typical entry. What school he was head of we are not told, though we recall more than one in the book. Under ' Alfred ' are included various people of that Christian name, which is useful. Under ' Anglo- Bengalee, Disinterested Loan and Life Insurance Society ' we are not told who ran the concern. An entry like ' Beings. Such,' seems to us tolerably absurd, and the quotation which ought to contain it is incomplete. " ' Boz.' Pseudonym of Charles Dickens, Esquire," reads rather oddly. We could do without the " Esquire," and wonder why the explanation of the name, which is certain, is not given. Under ' Christmas. Family Party ' there is no reference to ' Pickwick.' Under " Church.' In which Wemmick and Miss Staffing were married," read Skifflns. Under ' Dodson and Fogg ' and ' Bardell ' the results of the action are not sufficiently explained. The notice of ' Eden ' brings together the ideal and real place without a word of explanation. Under ' Edwards ' the schoolmistress needs correction. The entry " Eugene. A Solicitor, Friend of Mortimer, guest of Veneerings," surprises us. It looks as if Mr. Philip did not realize that Eugene was Eugene Wrayburn, to whom reference under W should be made. Wrayburn was not a solicitor, but a barrister (see ' O.M.F.' chap, vi.) Nothing is said as to the people who used the

" Garden on the Roof " in the same book. Under ' Harmon ' is a confusing repetition of that character's discovery by the Boffins. " Heyling. George's surname," is correct, but oddly phrased. In the note following fact and speculation are unjustifiably mixed. Under ' Inn ' (p. 183) Shepherd's " Shord" and " Shore'" occur within two lines of each other. For ' Moran ' read " Morgan [ap Kerrig]." " Parker, Uncle, Inhabitant of Corner House. O.M.F., v.,' r is an example of inadequate annotation. It should be explained that this uncle is a creation of Mr. Wegg's brain, and no more certainly alive than the Uncle George invoked by Mr. F.'s aunt. " Porkenfcam " is incorrect, and the description of the family as " opposition magisterial party." [to the Nupkinses of Ipswich] seems inadequate without the words we have added in brackets. No notice is given under ' Skiffins ' that the lady married Mr. Wemmick. The suggestions that Squeers recalls Dirk Hatteraick in ' Guy Man- nering,' and Sam Weller, Andrew Fairservice hi ' Roy Roy,' are strange to the literary critic ; indeed, to anybody who knows the four properly, For " Stiggings " read Stiggins. " Strood " is followed by a quotation from ' Pickwick,' con- cerning these " towns," and no hint that it is there mentioned in company with Rochester, Chatham, and Brompton a fact which appears to be essential to ordinary comprehension. Here- is one more entry :

" T. J. B. Original : suggested as the President [of the Society of Ancients of Staple Inn]. James Taylor, but may have been some other."

Here the date 1747, on which Dickens dwells, should come after the initials, and no mention of any book by Dickens or chapter in it is made. The identification of the initials might surely have been established with certainty by a little research.

Mr. Philip hopes some day, we gather, to complete a ' Dickens Encyclopaedia '; if it is to be of real use, he must be more careful thai* he has been over the present volume. A multi- tude of details such as he offers is difficult to control.

Joseph and his Brethren. By Charles Wells, With an Introduction by A. C. Swinburne, and a Note on Rossetti and Charles Wells by T. Watts-Dunton. (Frowde.)

MB. SWINBURNE, the great and generous poet whose loss we are bewailing, contributed an enthusiastic essay in praise of this drama to a reprint issued by Messrs. Chatto & Windus in 1876. We have now not only this article, but " a Note " of well over thirty pages by the sur- viving friend of Rossetti who discovered the- merits of ' Joseph." This Note gives a brilliant transcript of conversation with Rossetti con- cerning the story which Wells took up and its suitability for drama. Oddly enough, it does not seem to have occurred to either of the talkers that Potiphar's wife and Joseph are paralleled by Phaedra and Hippolytus in the play of Euri- pides named after the latter. The two do not r we believe, meet in talk, but the young men have a distinct likeness. Wells has discarded the nurse whom Euripides and Shakespeare both made so striking. We commend to our readers a play that our late editor was ever glad to talk of ; they will find that it contains passages of striking force and beauty.