The Charles Dickens Letters Project

To ALBERT SMITH,1 [JULY-DECEMBER 1851]

Summary and extract in Cuthbert Bede, “Unpublished Anecdotes of Charles Lamb, Douglas Jerrold and Charles Dickens”, London Sketch- Book, I, iv (April, 1874), pp. 19-22; addressed Albert Smith, undated. Date: mention of the Crystal Palace suggests that this was written during the year of the Great Exhibition and after CD mentions his visit in a letter to Mrs Watson, 11 July 1851.

Excusing himself, on the ground that he had a severe cold, CD described the gathering and preparation for a sneeze, and, in imagery drawn from the Crystal Palace, the laying on of the complete series of waterworks, upper and lower basins, and the grand finale of the accomplished sneeze.2 

• 1. Albert Smith (1816-60; Dictionary of National Biography), author and entertainer: see Pilgrim Letters 4, p. 8n.
• 2. CD likens his sneeze to the great fountain by Osler, Follett & Clarkson, a centrepiece of the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park, May-Sep 51. The 27-foot fountain featured a main water spout, as well as smaller jets lower down, from which water streamed into an upper and lower basin. CD visited the Crystal Palace twice; he specifically recalled the Osler fountain: To Mrs Watson, 11 July, Pilgrim Letters 6, p. 428. CD had a severe cold on 11 July (To Wills, Pilgrim Letters 6, p. 430) and again on 31 Oct (To Watson, Pilgrim Letters 6 , pp. 532-3).