The Charles Dickens Letters Project

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How to cite:

Individual letter:

Dickens, Charles. To [addressee], [date of letter]. Charles Dickens Letters Project, ed. Leon Litvack, Emily Bell, Lydia Craig and Jeremy Parrott (London: Dickens Fellowship). [URL of individual letter], [date of access].

Database:

Charles Dickens Letters Project, ed. Leon Litvack, Emily Bell, Lydia Craig and Jeremy Parrott (London: Dickens Fellowship), DickensLetters.com.

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Period:

1841-1850

Theme(s):

visual arts

Nicholas Nickleby

Dombey and Son

To THOMAS WEBSTER,1 7 April 1848

MS Stephen Weekes

DEVONSHIRE TERRACE,

Seventh April 1848.

My Dear Sir

If you will kindly let me know in what amount I stand indebted to you,2 I shall be happy to discharge the pecuniary part of my obligation.

I hope to send you, in the course of a week or so, the completed Dombey wherein you will find, at your leisure, that other subject for the companion picture.

Accept my best thanks for the enduring pleasure you have given me, and believe me

Very faithfully Yours

CHARLES DICKENS

T. Webster Esquire

1. Thomas Webster (1800-86), painter, particularly of children. ARA 1840; RA 1846. Exhibited frequently; in the RA exhibition 1847 his painting Instruction was described as ‘a little gem . . . one of the boasts of the year’ (Literary Gazette, 5 June).
2. CD purchased the brimstone and treacle scene from Nicholas Nickleby, which Webster painted as frontispiece for the Cheap edition; see Pilgrim Letters 5, p. 203. The companion picture from Dombey, mentioned in this letter, has not been found.