“Dear me,” said Mr. Pickwick. “Poor lady! gently, Sam, gently’.” “Strange sitivation for one o’ the family’,” observed Sam Weller, hoisting the aunt into a chair. “Now, depitty Sawbones, bring out the wollatilly.”</a></span> Page 513. — Thomas Onwhyn’s twenty-eighth extra illustration for Charles Dickens's “The Pickwick Club” (15 November 1837)

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“Dear me,” said Mr. Pickwick. “Poor lady! gently, Sam, gently’.” “Strange sitivation for one o’ the family’,” observed Sam Weller, hoisting the aunt into a chair. “Now, depitty Sawbones, bring out the wollatilly.”

Thomas Onwhyn [“TO del”]

steel engraving

12 cm high by 10.9 cm wide (4 ½ by 4 ¼ inches), vignetted

Dickens’s The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, Chapter XLVIII, “Relates How Mr. Pickwick, with the Assistance of Samuel Weller, Essayed to Soften the Heart of Mr. Benjamin Allen, and to Mollify the Wrath of Mr. Robert Sawyer,” p. 513.

[Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

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Passage Illustrated: Sawyer and Allen furious at the news of Arabella's marriage

‘Sorry to do anythin’ as may cause an interruption to such wery pleasant proceedin’s, as the king said wen he dissolved the parliament,’ interposed Mr. Weller, who had been peeping through the glass door; ‘but there’s another experiment here, sir. Here’s a wenerable old lady a—lyin’ on the carpet waitin’ for dissection, or galwinism, or some other rewivin’ and scientific inwention.’

‘I forgot,’ exclaimed Mr. Ben Allen. ‘It is my aunt.’

‘I‘Dear me!’ said Mr. Pickwick. ‘Poor lady! Gently Sam, gently.’

‘Strange sitivation for one o’ the family,’ observed Sam Weller, hoisting the aunt into a chair. ‘Now depitty sawbones, bring out the wollatilly!’

The latter observation was addressed to the boy in gray, who, having handed over the fly to the care of the street-keeper, had come back to see what all the noise was about. Between the boy in gray, and Mr. Bob Sawyer, and Mr. Benjamin Allen (who having frightened his aunt into a fainting fit, was affectionately solicitous for her recovery) the old lady was at length restored to consciousness; then Mr. Ben Allen, turning with a puzzled countenance to Mr. Pickwick, asked him what he was about to say, when he had been so alarmingly interrupted. [Chapter XLVIII, “Relates How Mr. Pickwick, with the Assistance of Samuel Weller, Essayed to Soften the Heart of Mr. Benjamin Allen, and to Mollify the Wrath of Mr. Robert Sawyer,” 513]

Commentary: The Dynamic Medical Duo of Allen and Sawyer to the Rescue

Left: Phiz's illustration of the newly-married Winkles' breaking the news to Pickwick, and asking him to intercede with Bob Allen and Winkle, Senior: Mr. Winkle returns under extraordinary circumstances (Chapter XLVII). Right: Phiz's Household Edition woodcut of the same moment: Mr. Pickwick could scarcely believe the evidence of his own senses (1874).

Pickwick has paid to have himself, Sam, and Mrs. Bardle discharged from the Fleet. The place depicted here is not in London or Bath, but the Bristol clinic of Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen. Given their profligate and quixotic natures, readers must have found it difficult to credit that they were physicians and apothecaries! The business has no shortage of clients clamouring for prescriptions to be written and filled, but the lower classes of the port city tend not to pay, and Bob Sawyer has been hoping to marry his friend's sister and thereby gain control of her thousand-pound inheritance. And, of course, for almost his entire life Ben Allen has been looking forward to having Bob Sawyer as his brother-in-law. Now their hopes are dashed as first Ben's aunt and then Pickwick reveal that Arabella has married Nathaniel Winkle, Pickwickian son of a Birmingham industrialist. In characteristic fashion, Bob threatens to challenge Winkle to to a duel, shoot his rival, and thereby make Arabella an eligible widow. However, over a strong alcoholic beverage the pair see reason, and Bob agrees to accompany Pickwick to break the news to Winkle's father in this September 1837 or seventeenth instalment of the serial.

When Pickwick and the medical practitioners have reached an agreement in Bob's private office, the trio return to the shop to find that Bob's aunt has had some sort of fit, for which "Dr." Weller prescribes sal volatile (ammonium carbonate suspended in alcohol, or "smelling salts"). Her coachman holds her from falling (centre) as an agitated Pickwick looks on from the left; behind him is the lad who has been holding the carriage horse. Bob and Ben (in glasses) are about to come to her aid as their office-boy (right) looks on. Particularly effective is Onwhyn's detailing of the medical dispensary: skeletal remains share shelves with medical books and bottles behind the medics, and through the open doorway leading to Bob's office we see many more bottles.

Bibliography

Dickens, Charles. The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Robert Seymour, Robert Buss, and Phiz. London: Chapman and Hall, November 1837. With 32 additional illustrations by Thomas Onwhyn (London: E. Grattan, April-November 1837).

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Thomas Nast. The Household Edition. 16 vols. New York: Harper and Brothers, 1873. Vol. 4.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Hablot Knight Browne ('Phiz'). The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1874. Vol. 6.

_______. Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 2.

Titley, Graham D. C. "Thomas Onwhyn: a Life in Illustration (1811-1886)." Pearl. University of Plymouth (2018-07-12).

Created 29 February 2024