Pickwickian Manners and Custom | Page 6

about 6. This we may presume was the mode in old fashioned country houses. Supper came at eleven.
A chaise and four could go at the pace of fifteen miles an hour.
A "1000 horse-power" was Jingle's idea of extravagant speed by steam agency. Now we have got to 4, 5, and 10 thousand horsepower. Gentlemen's "frills" in the daytime are never seen now. Foot gear took the shape of "Hessians'" "halves," "painted tops," "Wellington's" or "Bluchers." There are many other trifles which will evidence these changes. We are told of the "common eighteen-penny French skull cap." Note common--it is exhibited on Mr. Smangle's head--a rather smartish thing with a tassel. Nightcaps, too, they are surely gone by now: though a few old people may wear them, but then boys and young men all did. It also had a tassel. There is the "Frog Hornpipe," whatever dance that was: the "pousette;" while "cold srub," which is not in much vogue now, was the drink of the Bath Footmen. "Botany Bay ease, and New South Wales gentility," refer to the old convict days. This indeed is the most startling transformation of all. For instead of Botany Bay, and its miserable associations, we have the grand flourishing Australia, with its noble cities, Parliaments and the rest. Gone out too, we suppose, the "Oxford-mixture trousers;" "Oxford grey" it was then called.
Then for Sam's "Profeel machine." Mr. Andrew Lang in his notes wonders what this "Profeel machine" was, and fancies it was the silhouette process. This had nothing to do with the "Profeel machine"--which is described in "Little Pedlington," a delightful specimen of Pickwickian humour, and which ought to be better known than it is. "There now," said Daubson, the painter of "the all but breathing Grenadier," (alas! rejected by the Academy). "Then get up and sit down, if you please, mister." "He pointed to a narrow high-backed chair, placed on a platform; by the side of the chair was a machine of curious construction, from which protruded a long wire. 'Heady stiddy, mister.' He then slowly drew the wire over my head and down my nose and chin." Such was the "Profeel machine."
There are many antiquated allusions in Pickwick--which have often exercised the ingenuity of the curious. Sam's "Fanteegs," has been given up in despair--as though there were no solution--yet, Professor Skeat, an eminent authority, has long since furnished it. {34}
"Through the button hole"--a slang term for the mouth, has been well "threshed out"--as it is called. Of "My Prooshian Blue," as his son affectedly styled his parent, Mr. Lang correctly suggests the solution, that the term came of George IV's intention of changing the uniform of the Army to Blue. But this has been said before.
Boz in his Pickwickian names was fond of disguising their sense to the eye, though not to the ear. Thus Lady Snuphanuph, looks a grotesque, but somewhat plausible name--snuff-enough--a further indication of the manners and customs. So with Lord Mutanhed, i.e. "Muttonhead." Mallard, Serjeant Snubbin's Clerk, I have suspected, may have been some Mr. Duck--whom "Boz" had known--in that line.

"A MONUMENTAL PICKWICK."
The fruitfulness of Pickwick, and amazing prolificness, that is one of its marvels. It is regularly "worked on," like Dante or Shakespeare. The Pickwickian Library is really a wonder. It is intelligible how a work like Boswell's "Johnson," full of allusions and names of persons who have lived, spoken, and written, should give rise to explanation and commentaries; but a work of mere imagination, it would be thought, could not furnish such openings. As we have just seen, Pickwick and the other characters are so real, so artfully blended with existing usages, manners, and localities, as to become actual living things.
Mere panegyric of one's favourite is idle. So I lately took a really effective way of proving the surprising fertility of the work and of its power of engendering speculation and illustration. I set about collecting all that has been done, written, and drawn on the subject during these sixty years past, together with all those lighter manifestations of popularity which surely indicate "the form and pressure" of its influence. The result is now before me, and all but fills a small room. When set in proper order and bound, it will fill over thirty great quartos--"huge armfuls" as Elia has it. In short, it is a "Monumental Pickwick."
The basis of The Text is of course, the original edition of 1836. There are specimens of the titles and a few pages of every known edition; the first cheap or popular one; the "Library" edition; the "Charles Dickens" ditto; the Edition de Luxe; the "Victoria": "Jubilee," edited by C. Dickens the younger; editions at a shilling and at sixpence; the edition sold for one penny; the new "Gadshill," edited by Andrew Lang; with the "Roxburghe," edited by F. Kitton,