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Jenny Wren, the Dolls' Dressmaker
Harry Furniss
1910
13.7 cm x 9.2 cm, or 5 ½ by 3 ⅝ inches, vignetted
The Charles Dickens Library Edition, Vol. XV, Book 2, “Birds of a Feather,” Chapter XI, “Some Affairs of the Heart,” facing 353. Our Mutual Friend, p. 355.
[Click on the images to enlarge them.]
Scanned images and text by Philip V. Allingham.
The schoolmaster went his way, brooding and brooding, and a sense of being vanquished in a struggle might have been pieced out of his worried face. Truly, in his breast there lingered a resentful shame to find himself defeated by this passion for Charley Hexam’s sister, though in the very self-same moments he was concentrating himself upon the object of bringing the passion to a successful issue.
He appeared before the dolls’ dressmaker, sitting alone at her work. ‘Oho!’ thought that sharp young personage, ‘it’s you, is it? I know your tricks and your manners, my friend!’
‘Hexam’s sister,’ said Bradley Headstone, ‘is not come home yet?’
‘You are quite a conjuror,’ returned Miss Wren.
‘I will wait, if you please, for I want to speak to her.’
‘Do you?’ returned Miss Wren. ‘Sit down. I hope it’s mutual.’ Bradley glanced distrustfully at the shrewd face again bending over the work, and said, trying to conquer doubt and hesitation:
‘I hope you don’t imply that my visit will be unacceptable to Hexam’s sister?’
‘There! Don’t call her that. I can’t bear you to call her that,’ returned Miss Wren, snapping her fingers in a volley of impatient snaps, ‘for I don’t like Hexam.’
‘Indeed?’
‘No.’ Miss Wren wrinkled her nose, to express dislike. ‘Selfish. Thinks only of himself. The way with all of you.’
‘The way with all of us? Then you don’t like me?’
‘So-so,’ replied Miss Wren, with a shrug and a laugh. ‘Don’t know much about you.’
‘But I was not aware it was the way with all of us,’ said Bradley, returning to the accusation, a little injured. ‘Won’t you say, some of us?’
‘Meaning,’ returned the little creature, ‘every one of you, but you. Hah! Now look this lady in the face. This is Mrs. Truth. The Honourable. Full-dressed.’ [Book Two, “Birds of a Feather”; Chapter XI, “Some Affairs of the Heart,” 355]
Furniss's lithograph for Book Two, "Birds of a Feather," Chapter Eleven, "Some Affairs of the Heart" (facing p. 353) in what was originally the Ninth Part (January 1865) pursues an aspect of the multi-strand plot which, for example, serial illustrator Marcus Stone did not address. However, in the Household Edition (1875), James Mahoney devoted a large-scale composite woodblock engraving to the same scene. A significant departure in the 1910 version, however, is the complete absence of the observer, the schoolmaster — unless we understand that we are seeing Jenny Wren as Bradley Headstone sees her. The interview between the dolls' dressmaker (with the doll, Mrs. Truth, passing judgment on Headstone) and the schoolmaster occurs in Jenny's parlour, which doubles as her workroom. Although all that Mahoney shows of that aspect of the room is the can of glue and the scraps of material under the table, Furniss foregrounds her umbrella, coat, and hat — and an open workbox on the floor, as well as her worktable. Dickens mentions that the little room contains a considerable amount of needle and thread; however, his subject is not the theatrical backdrop and its properties, but the revealing dialogue.
Above: James Mahoney's depiction of the interview between Jenny Wren and Headstone in Book Two, Chapter 11: "Meaning," returned the little creature, "Everyone of you but you." (p. 149, Household Edition, 1875).
Left: Marcus Stone's 30 September 1864 illustration of Jenny Wren and "Mr. Dolls," her drunken father, The Person of the House and the Bad Child. Right: Sol Eytinge, Jr.'s study of the dress-maker and her alcoholic parent: The Person of the House and the Bad Child for Book Two, Chapter II, in the Diamond Edition (1867). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]
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Created 5 August 2025