"I wonder why it didn't save my mamma!" — ninth illustration by W. L. Sheppard for Dickens's "Dombey and Son" (American Household Edition, 1873)

"I wonder why it didn't save my mamma!" by W. L. Sheppard. Ninth illustration for Dickens's Dombey and Son in the American Household Edition (1873), Chapter VIII, "Paul’s Further Progress, Growth and Character," p. 45. 9.2 x 13.2 cm (3 ⅝ by 5 ¼ inches) framed. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Passage Illustrated: Paul's Heresy: He doubts the value of money

Detail of Fred Barnard's British Household Edition illustration of Paul and His father, sitting side by side before the fire: On a Dark Road. (1877)

On one of these occasions, when they had both been perfectly quiet for a long time, and .Mr Dombey only knew that the child was awake by occasionally glancing at his eye, where the bright fire was sparkling like a jewel, little Paul broke silence thus:

“Papa! what’s money?”

The abrupt question had such immediate reference to the subject of Mr. Dombey’s thoughts, that Mr. Dombey was quite disconcerted.

“What is money, Paul?” he answered. “Money?”

“Yes,” said the child, laying his hands upon the elbows of his little chair, and turning the old face up towards Mr. Dombey’s; “what is money?”

Mr. Dombey was in a difficulty. He would have liked to give him some explanation involving the terms circulating-medium, currency, depreciation of currency, paper, bullion, rates of exchange, value of precious metals in the market, and so forth; but looking down at the little chair, and seeing what a long way down it was, he answered: “Gold, and silver, and copper. Guineas, shillings, half-pence. You know what they are?”

“Oh yes, I know what they are,” said Paul. “I don’t mean that, Papa. I mean what’s money after all?”

Heaven and Earth, how old his face was as he turned it up again towards his father’s!

“What is money after all!” said Mr Dombey, backing his chair a little, that he might the better gaze in sheer amazement at the presumptuous atom that propounded such an inquiry.

“I mean, Papa, what can it do?” returned Paul, folding his arms (they were hardly long enough to fold), and looking at the fire, and up at him, and at the fire, and up at him again.

Mr. Dombey drew his chair back to its former place, and patted him on the head. “You’ll know better by-and-by, my man,” he said. “Money, Paul, can do anything.” He took hold of the little hand, and beat it softly against one of his own, as he said so.

But Paul got his hand free as soon as he could; and rubbing it gently to and fro on the elbow of his chair, as if his wit were in the palm, and he were sharpening it — and looking at the fire again, as though the fire had been his adviser and prompter — repeated, after a short pause:

“Anything, Papa?”

“Yes. Anything — almost,” said Mr Dombey.

“Anything means everything, don’t it, Papa?” asked his son: not observing, or possibly not understanding, the qualification.

“It includes it: yes,” said Mr. Dombey.“Why didn’t money save me my Mama?” returned the child. “It isn’t cruel, is it?”

“Cruel!” said Mr. Dombey, settling his neckcloth, and seeming to resent the idea. “No. A good thing can’t be cruel.”

“If it’s a good thing, and can do anything,” said the little fellow, thoughtfully, as he looked back at the fire, “I wonder why it didn’t save me my Mama.” He didn’t ask the question of his father this time. [Chapter VIII, "Paul’s Further Progress, Growth and Character," pp. 44-45]

Commentary: The Novel's Iconic Scene of the Father and Son before the fire

Working on the novel's illustrations for the American Household Edition in 1877, Sheppard may not have seen the the equivalent illustration by Fred Barnard in the Chapman and Hall edition. However, he would certainly have been aware of Phiz's original fireside illustration for the December 1846 serial instalment, Paul and Mrs. Pipchin. He may even have seen the famous John Leech political cartoon from thirty years earlier which adapted Phiz's illustration for satirical comment: Lord Russell as Paul Dombey (below). However, since it follows immediately after a similar fireside in a previous chapter, Sheppard may well have intended that readers should have the tender scene of Walter Gray, Sol Gillis, and Florence Dombey in mind as the genuine emotion of "Pretty, indeed! I never saw such a face!" sharply contrasts Mr. Dombey's haughty expression and cool aloofness. Another interesting aspect of Dombey's facial expression in Sheppard's realisation of the scene is surprise. The father looks disconcerted when his five-year-old son ponders the value of money since, even though he apparently has so much it, Mr. Dombey was not able to save Paul's mother, Fanny. He holds up his right hand to his neckcloth as an almost defensive response to the boy's suggestion that money is "cruel."

Sheppard suggests the fireside context by the chiaroscuro which plays across both figures as firelight throws the foreground and the fire-screen into intense light and casts deep shadows under the table behind the contemplative child. Although Mr. Dombey is at home, he wears a business suit appropriate to the office, as if he makes no distinction in his life between work and leisure hours. Although Paul in the text asks, 'Why didn't money save me my mamma" (44), Sheppard has removed that telling dative of interest from the caption of the illustration. For Paul, the loss of his mother and the failure of money to forestall that loss is intensely personal.

Relevant Illustrations by Phiz, Barnard, and Furniss for Ch. 8 in Dombey and Son

Left: Phiz's original serial illustration for December 1846, Paul and Mrs. Pipchin. Left of centre: John Leech's 1847 cartoon adapts Phiz's illustration for political comment: Lord Russell as Paul Dombey. Right of centre: Harry Furniss's impressionistic revision of the Phiz scene, Paul Puzzling Mrs. Pipchin (1910). Right: Barnard's untitled vignette for the title-page of the 1877 British Household Edition .

Portrait of Mr. Dombey and Little Paul from Three Editions (1867, 1900, and 1910)

Left: W. H. C. Groome's derivative study of Dombey and his son before the fire: "Papa, what's money?" (1900). Centre: Sol Eytinge, Junior's portrait of the aloof widower and his uncomfortable boy, Dombey and Son in Ch. I. Right: Harry Furniss's frontispiece for the Charles Dickens Library volume, Dombey and Son (1910).

Related Material, including Other Illustrated Editions of Dombey and Son (1846-1924)

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Bibliography

Dickens, Charles. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by W. L. Sheppard. The Household Edition. 18 vols. New York: Harper & Co., 1873.

_______. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by F. O. C. Darley and John Gilbert. The Works of Charles Dickens. The Household Edition. 55 vols. New York: Sheldon and Company, 1862. Vols. 1-4.

__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Sol Eytinge, Jr., and engraved by A. V. S. Anthony. 14 vols. Boston: Ticknor & Fields, 1867. III.

_______. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Fred Barnard [62 composite wood-block engravings]. The Works of Charles Dickens. The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1877. XV.

Dickens, Charles. Dombey and Son. With illustrations by H. K. Browne. The illustrated library Edition. 2 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, c. 1880. Vol. II.

__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Fred Barnard. 61 wood-engravings. The Household Edition. 22 vols. London: Chapman and Hall, 1877. XV.

__________. Dombey and Son> Illustrated by W. H. C. Groome. London and Glasgow, 1900, rpt. 1934. 2 vols. in one.

__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. The Charles Dickens Library Edition. 18 vols. London: Educational Book, 1910. Vol. 9.

__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"). 8 coloured plates. London and Edinburgh: Caxton and Ballantyne, Hanson, 1910.

__________. Dombey and Son. Illustrated by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"). The Clarendon Edition, ed. Alan Horsman. Oxford: Clarendon, 1974.

"Dombey and Son — Sixty-two Illustrations by Fred Barnard." Scenes and Characters from the Works of Charles Dickens, Being Eight Hundred and Sixty-six Drawings by Fred Barnard, Gordon Thomson, Hablot Knight Browne (Phiz), J. McL. Ralston, J. Mahoney, H. French, Charles Green, E. G. Dalziel, A. B. Frost, F. A. Fraser, and Sir Luke Fildes. London: Chapman and Hall, 1907.

Created 20 January 2022