Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 5.djvu/493

 11 S. V. MAY 23, 1912.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

405

of pipe made of an old ink-bottle ; and the words that Dickens puts into the mouth of this wretched creature in ' Edwin Drood ' we heard her croon as we leaned over the tattered bed in which she was lying."

It was a pleasant change from London to Gadshill, whither Dickens next took his friends to enjoy the lovely summer weather. When there was no particular excursion afoot, Dickens would take his wonted long walks. Weather made no difference to these, and he would frequently return drenched to the skin. The longest excursion he took with his guests was, to Canterbury, and this was his last visit to the historic city, the streets of which were so familiar to him in his early days. It was a very jolly party that started 'off for the twenty-nine-mile drive ; two post carriages with postilions in red jackets made a gay cavalcade, and as they pulled up at RochesteV a crowd collected. It was known that Dickens was there, and a good deal of fun was made out of a mistake by a man who pointed up at Fields and called out, " That : s Dickens ! " Fields was in great confusion, and Dickens, to complete the deception, handed up to him a small parcel, with the request : " Here you are, Dickens; take charge of this for me."

But the summer was not given wholly to pleasure. In a letter to Forster we find':

" What should you chink of the idea of a story beginning in this way ? Two people, boy and girl, or very young, going apart from one another, pledged to be married after many years at the end of the book the interest to arise out of the tracing of their separate ways, and the impossibility of telling what will be done with that impending fate."

This, Forster says, was laid aside ; but it left a marked trace on the story afterwards designed of Edwin Drood and his betrothed. Writing to Forster on the 6th of August. 1 869, Dickens says :

" I laid aside the fancy I told you of, and have a very curious and new idea for my new story. Not a communicable idea (or the interest of the book would be gone), but a very strong one, though difficult to work."

The story, Forster learnt immediately after- wards, was

"to be that of the murder of a nephew by his uncle, the originality of which was to consist in the review of the murderer's career by himself at the close, when its temptations were to be dwelt upon as if, not he, the culprit, but some other man, were the tempted.

"The last chapters were to be written in the condemned cell, to which his wickedness, all f laborately elicited from him as if told of another, had brought him. Discovery by the murderer of

the utter needlessuess of the murder for its object was to follow hard upon the commission of the deed ; but all discovery of the murder was to be baffled till towards the close, when, by means of a gold ring which had resisted the corrosive effects of the lime into which he had thrown the body, not only the person murdered was to be identified, but the locality of the crime and the man who committed it."

So much was told to Forster before any of the book was written, and I have thought it worth while to include in my notes these details of ' The Mystery ' given by Dickens himself, seeing the labour that, has been since expended by literary men and amateurs ilk trying to solve it. There is evidence that Dickens thought lie would not live to c,om- plete the book himself, for in the agreements- with Frederic Chapman, as well as with my partner Henry Adams and myself ,. there was a clause to the effect that if Dickens should die, or the work not be com- pleted, we should receive suitable com- pensation. I told Chapman I did not like- this, but he replied that " Mr. Dickens insists that the clause should be inserted.'" JOHN COLLINS FRANCIS.

(To be continued.)

REGENT'S PABK CENTENARY. (See ante r p. 107.) The Times quotes from its issu^ of 20 April, 1812, as follows :

" Regent's Park. This ornamental enclosure is proceeding with rapidity. The plantations^ considering the shortness of the time since the work commenced, are in considerable forwardness. The ground extends from Portland Place nearly to the foot of Primrose Hill, and is of a proportionate breadth, spreading westwards nearly to Lisson Green. The grand approach is from Portland Place, which is now extending towards the south,, site of the recently demolished Foley but the new buildings here do not appear

on the

to be constructing with any suitable regard to the elegant uniformity of Portland Place. At the north end of Portland Place a circus is forming,. surrounded by trees, across the centre of which runs the new road. On the north of this circle,, directly opposite Portland Place, a good road, planted on each side, is formed to enter the Park ;. the whole of which is nearly fenced in, and bordered with plantations ; and a coach-drive made round the whole extent. In the enclosed central part, of the Park, and exactly fronting the entrance road, a tolerably spacious avenue is preparing, to be shaded by four rows of forest trees. This passes over the highest ground ia the Park, commanding a view of Hampstead and Highgate, and will certainly form a very pleasant promenade for the inhabitants of Marybone and that vicinity. In the south-western part of the park, a large circus is laid out, and partly planted^ around which a number of houses are intended to- be erected. To the north of this, on the more level ground, the new barracks for the Life Guard*