Nov. 7, 1884.] 



♦ KNOWLEDGE 



387 



to make to the account. What he haa learned may be of 

 use to him, but he cannot yet see his way to profiting by it. 

 "'I thiuk a moderate stroke,' he concludes, 'is all I am 

 justified in scoring up,' so suits the action to the word, 

 closes the cupboard, and goes to bed." 



It is very difl'erent with the events of the following 

 morning. Observe the contrast between Datchery's feel- 

 ings in the two cases. We have just seen that he sighed 

 at the jioverty of the score in the evening, yet with some 

 doubt whether he mvjhl not be justified La attaching import- 

 ance to what he had discovered. After the morning's 

 experience, we are told in the very last words Dickens ever 

 wrote that, before sitting down to his breakfast, Datchery 

 " opened liis corner cupboard, took his bit of chalk from its 

 shelf, added one thick line to the score, extending from the 

 top of the cupboard door to the bottom ; and then fell to 

 with an appetite." No sigh now at the poverty of the score, 

 no moderate stroke added thereto, but a thick stroke from 

 top to bottom of the cujiboard door. Surely a statement 

 inviting our most careful attention to the events which have 

 led to Datchery's satisfaction. 



Let us see, then, what happened that morning : — 

 Mr. Datchery attends the morning service at the 

 Cathedral, and from a stall glances about him for " Her 

 Royal Highness the Princess Puffer." The service is well 

 advanced before he " has made her out in the shade." She 

 is behind a pillar, carefully withdrawn from the Choir- 

 master's view, but regards him with the closest attention." 

 All unconscious of her presence, he chants and sings. She 

 grins when lie is most mv.sicaVy ferrid, and — i/es, Mr. 

 Datchery sees Iter do it .' — shakes her fist at him behind the 

 pillars friendly shelter." Mr. Datchery looks again to 

 convince himself. Yes, again. She hugs herself in her 

 lean arms, and then shakes both fsls at the leader of the 

 choir. And at that moment, outside the grated door of 

 the choir . . . Deputy peeps, sharp-eyed through the bars, 

 and stares astonished from the threatener to the threatened." 

 Mr. Datchery has learned that the old woman knows Jasper 

 for a hypocrite, and for some reason hates him (even 

 more intensely than " good Mrs. Brown hated Mr. Carker"); 

 and observe how carefully Dickens shows 1st, that 

 Datchery learns this for the first time, and 2ndly, that 

 it is news also and strange news to the Deputy. If 

 Deputy had not stared astonished (as Datchery noted) at 

 the old woman's demonstrations, he might have doubted, 

 as Datchery might, whether Deputy had not told her how 

 Jarsper had ill-treated him, and so excited her sympathies 

 on his behalf ; but we see that Datchery recognises in her 

 an entirely independent knowledge alike of Jasper's evil 

 nature and of some at least of his evil deeds. What the 

 extent of her knowledge may be, he now inquires : — 



" Well, mistress," he says, " you have seen Mm ? " 



" I've seen him, deary; I've see him ! " 



" And you know him ? " 



"Enow him ! Better fak than all the Reverend Paesoxs put 



TOGETHER KNOW HIM." 



Here is ihe end. So much learned about the opium- 

 eater's knowledge, Datchery's doubts and anxieties of over- 

 night are replaced by satisfaction and good hope of success 

 in his scheme for the punishment of Jasper. 



It is clear that Datchery's plans depend on such informa- 

 tion as he now sees that the old opium woman can obtain 

 for him. Overnight he had no reason to suppose that she 

 knew more of Jasper than that he was a slave to opium. 

 Now he sees that in some waj', doubtless through the effects 

 of that drug, she has learned much about Jasper, and knows 

 him to be the villain he is. From her, then, he may now 

 hope to learn what he wants, — how far Jasper's attack was 

 premeditated, what was the precise nature of his plot in all 



its details, and precisely in what way Jasper's punishmen 

 may be made most terrible. 



It remains only that we consider what was the course 

 thus indicated as that along which the main plot of the 

 story was to have run. What was the particular punish- 

 ment which Edwin Drood and iMr. Grewgious were 

 preparing to inflict upon the hypocritical villain, who, 

 pretending love for Edwin, had endeavoured not merely to 

 kill him but to destroy all trace of him. 



But first let it be noticed what a favourite idea with 

 Dickens was the thought of a watch kept on a villain or a 

 hypocrite by one whom he despised as powerless to injure 

 him. Even in this specific form, the idea appears at least a 

 round dozen of times in Dickens's novels, while the general 

 idea of an unsuspected patient watch may be identified 

 about twice as often. In " Bamaby Piudge " we have the 

 murderer Rudge watched for years by the brother of the 

 murdered man (on whom suspicion of the murder had been 

 cast). In " Nicholas Nickleby " Ralph is watched to the 

 last and all his plans foiled by the de.*pised Brooker. In 

 " Martin Chiizzlewit " the favourite idea appears in two 

 important parts of the plot, — we see Jonas Chuzzlewit the 

 murderer tracked to his doom by Nadgett whom he regards 

 as little better than an idiot, and Pecksniff the hypo- 

 crite watched by old Martin whom he supposes to be 

 decrepit and a dotard. Dombey is watched by the con 

 temned Carker, Carker is tracked to the death by the 

 despised Dombey. Blandois-Rigaud is hunted down by 

 Cavaletto, Mademoiselle Hortense watched night and day 

 by Mrs. Buckle, and Magwitch by his hated fellow-convict 

 Compeyson. The " Tale of Two Cities " turns wholly on 

 a patient watch maintained by despised folk on the de- 

 scendants of those who had oppressed them. In " Our 

 Mutual Friend " a man supposed to be dead watches the 

 actions of more than one wrongdoer ; in " Hunted Down" 

 a murderous hypocrite is patiently watched to the death 

 by one whom he supposes to be dying ; in " A Trial for 

 Murder,' a murderer is watched by the spirit of the 

 murdered man ; and in " No Thoroughfare '' the murderer 

 (as he himself supposes) is confronted at the end by his 

 supposed victim. 



We need not wonder if it shall appear that the denoue- 

 ment of Edwin Drood was to turn on the watch kept on a 

 murderer by a man supposed to be dead and not merely 

 buried but destroyed in his tomb. The culminating horror 

 of " a dead man rising from the tomb to confront him on 

 which Dickens dwells in the last scene of .Jonas Chuzzle- 

 wit's villany, was to be actually wrought into the plot of 

 "Edwin Drood." 



{To he continued.) 



H.M.S. AGAMEMNON. 



THIS vessel, which is an armoured citadel turret ship 

 of the Inflexible type, has recently been ordered to 

 proceed to the Mediterranean. She has been hurriedly 

 prepared for sea service after being nearly nine years in 

 process of construction and undergoing alterations and 

 modifications of various kinds. Her estimated cost has 

 been enormously exceeded, and we recommend any member 

 of Parliament, who wishes to learn something really worth 

 knowing of how money is spent upon our ships of war, 

 to move for a return of the estimated and actual costs of 

 all the ships recently added to the Navy, with the cost 

 also of alterations and additions made to the vessels now 

 in progress. This information would show how much of 

 the present wasteful expenditure is caused. The Aga- 

 memnon is one of those vessels which has enormously ex- 



