The Charles Dickens Letters Project

To DUDLEY COSTELLO,1 1 NOVEMBER [1845]

MS (note written on inside of envelope), Huntington Library. Address: Dudley Costello Esquire. Date: Ben Jonson’s Every Man in His Humour was performed in 1845 by the Amateurs with Costello and Cattermole.

Saturday | 1st. Novr.2

My Dear Costello.

Pray come to town,3 if you can by any means, for this next rehearsal. I wouldn’t ask you under ordinary circumstances, but Cattermole the Painter4 plays Wellbred5 on a very short notice; and you are so exceedingly important to him in that quarrel Scene.6 Ever Yours

CD

Rehearsal Calls.7

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St. James’s Theatre—Stage Door

Mr. Costello.

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Wednesday 5th. Novr. ¼ before 7

Wednesday 12th. Novr.—Same hour

Attention and punctuality, indispensable, as it is very doubtful indeed, whether the Theatre can be spared on any other occasion

• 1. Dudley Costello (1803-65; Dictionary of National Biography), former Army Officer; foreign correspondent, Morning Herald, 1838; foreign editor, Daily News, 1845.
• 2. Date at the bottom of the note.
• 3. Costello was in Brighton (To Cattermole, 6 Nov 45; Pilgrim Letters 4, p. 428).
• 4. George Cattermole (1800-68; Dictionary of National Biography), painter. Co-illustrator of The Old Curiosity Shop and Barnaby Rudge. See further Pilgrim Letters 1, p.277n.
• 5. The part played by T. J. Thompson at the September performance; he had married Christiana Weller and gone abroad on his honeymoon. Cattermole was recruited for the performances on 15 Nov and 27 Dec.
• 6. Costello played Downright, half-brother to Wellbred: they quarrel in Act III, scene iv.
• 7. CD’s original intention presumably was to send just this sheet to Costello, before he underlined the situation’s urgency by the note inside the envelope.