ONE OF THE FAMOUS PLATES IN BLAKE'S BOOK OF JOB. . 214 THE BEGGAR'S OPERA. Engraved by Blake after Hogarth's painting 216 COLORED TITLE OF BLAKE'S "AMERICA A PROPHECY". 220 BOOK-PLATE FROM ONE OF BLAKE'S LAST WORKS 221 A HANSOM CAB 226 ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL, FROM THE BOTTOM OF LUDGATE VISIT OF DR. JOHNSON AND JAMES BOSWELL TO FLORA MAC DONALD 244 A MAGNIFICENT FARCE I A MAGNIFICENT FARCE IN the good old days at the theatre, say a hundred years or so ago, it was not unusual for the main feature of the evening's entertainment to be preceded by a little curtain-raiser; in like manner, the farce to which I am going to ask your attention is to be preceded by a necessarily brief résumé of perhaps the greatest burlesque ever written. I refer to the trial of Mr. Pickwick, the immortal creation of a young and practically unknown man, who for a time masqueraded under the pseudonym of Boz. (Pronounced not as we usually pronounce it, but as if there were an e at the end of it; it was a corruption of Mose.) Mr. Pickwick, who is as English as Falstaff, and I think as great a creation, had inquired his landlady's opinion as to the greater expense involved in keeping two people rather than one, having in mind engaging not himself, but a man, Sam Weller, to look after him, as the phrase goes. Forthwith, the landlady, Mrs. Bardell, assumes that Mr. Pickwick has made her an offer of marriage, flings her arms about his neck, and at his appeal to "consider - if anyone should come,' cries, "Let them come." And come they did: young Master Bardell and Mr. Tupman, Mr. Winkle, and Mr. Snodgrass. The astonishment of all was extreme. His friends did not at the time know him for the amiable gentleman he subsequently became, and regarded his astonishing behavior with some suspicion. How Mrs. Bardell, through that precious pair of legal practitioners,- Messrs. Dodson and Fogg,— brought action against Mr. Pickwick for breach of promise of marriage, with damages laid at £1500; how his friends were made to testify against him; how Sam Weller was promptly ordered to "stand down" when he began to tell how generous it was in those legal gentlemen to take the case "on spec," and to charge nothing at all for costs unless they got them out of Mr. Pickwick, is known even to Macaulay's schoolboy, if there ever was such a prodigy. Had the elder Weller's advice been taken, an "alleybi" would have been provided - a strong “alleybi" has indeed solved many a legal problem; but Mr. Pickwick would not hear of such a thing, and judgment was given for the plaintiff with damages at £750. How Mr. Pickwick, declining to pay, is cast into the Fleet, and how Mrs. Bardell, having given a cognovit, whatever that may be, for the costs, also finds her way into the famous old prison; their meeting, and how, by the payment of all the costs, Mr. Pickwick finally secures the release of the lady and himself and their escape from the legal toils of the two scamps, Dodson and Fogg all this has been written |