The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1891-10-10
GADsHILL. THE HOME OF DICKENS.

them a passion 1t is wee that stimu
lates the Isnguid Southern temperament
GADsHILL, THE HOME OF DICKENS.
All Americans Visit the Place that the
Novelist Loved So Dearly.
London Letter.
Gadshill, the home of the elder Dickens,
has this season been the Mecca CT many
American pilgrims. 1t was and is still a
beautiful home. Dickens loved every
piece of the wood used in building it. 1t
was there he lived the last years of his
life, and there he died. He had enter
tanned iavishly there and was happy in
its possession. The old house had now
passed into the possession of strangers. 1t
cost Dickens about $4,000, and the money
came from the profits OF his American
lecture tour.
The American who visits the home of
the great novelist cannot but wonder that
the Dickens family allowed the property
to pass out of their hands since Dickens
himself loved it so well. But even aside
from its association with the novelist it is
residence that any man might wish to
have for his own.
All of us who have read Forster's "Life
of Dickens" will remember that Dickens
himself has described how from his boy
hood he had longed to own this house. In
one of those inimitable letters that he
used to write to his friends he describes
how as boy he used to daily go out of his
way to pass this house and admire it. That
he should one day own it never occurred
to him in those the days of his poverty
and youth. He relates how one day he
passed the house in company with his
father and how the latter pointed to it and
aid TO the boy:
"If you work real hard you may have a
house like that"
But as the novelist himself said, it
seemed madness to entertain such a
thought. Yet he was the owner of that
very house long years before he died. 1t
has changed but little since the time when
Dickens as boy used to stand and admire
1t for hours at time. 1t is plain, old
fashioned, two-story brick building, with
quaint wooden porch, the whole covered
with vines, making it almost invisible
from the road. The house commands a
fine view of the country around and'o the
river Thames as it winds its crooked way
down TO the sea. Just across the way is
the ruin where Sir John Falstaff laid the
plot to rob the pilgrims who were passing
Gadshill on their way to Canterbury.
The quaint touches that Dickens himself
gave to the interior of the house are still
to be seen, the engraved tablet of which
Forster speaks is still in the hallway, and
reads:
"This house, Gadshill Place, stands on
the summit of Shakespeare's Gadshill,
ever memorable for its association with
Sir John Falstaff in his noble fancy. But,
my lads, my lads, tomorrow morning by
O'Clock, early at Gadshill. There are pill
grims going to Canterbury with rich offer
ings and traders riding to London with
Fat purses. / have wizards for you all, you
have horses for yourselves.
1t was at this spot that Sir John met his
famous men in buckram, and on the stones
about here that he hacked his sword in or
der that he might show it to his comrades
as proof that he had been in the thick of
the FRAY.
The library, too, is much as it was when
Dickens lived in the house. The unique
arrangements made by Dickens himself to
have false shelves wherever there was a
vacant spot with imitation backs of books,
the whole covered by glass, is still to be
seen. The titles on the backs of the imita-
ton books sprang from Dickens own fam
tastlc fancy. Here are some of the titles:
Had Shakespeare's Uncle a Singing
Face 2"-One volume.
Cats Lives. Mime volumes.
History of the Middling Ages."-Six
volumes.
1.-THE Quarrelly Review Four vol
umes.
1.-THE Books of Moses d Sons."-One
volume.
The dining-room looks out upon the
lawn and into the conservatory. 1t was
in this room that Dickens died, and it
remains much as it was thep. The grove
that Dickens called the Wilderness" and
the Swiss chalet that Dickens used to re-
pair to to write when he wanted quiet are
as they were.
Indeed the whole place is still untouched
by the hand of the vandal, and is as elo-
quent of Dickens today as though the
great master of fiction were still living
beneath its roof