, that Thackeray paid
a visit to Dickens, and thus described the meeting:--

"I can remember, when Mr. Dickens was a very young man, and had
commenced delighting the world with some charming humorous works in
covers which were coloured light green and came out once a month, that
this young man wanted an artist to illustrate his writings; and I
remember walking up to his chambers in Furnival's Inn, with two or three
drawings in my hand, which, strange to say, he did not find suitable."

How wonderfully interesting these "two or three drawings" would be now
if they could be discovered! Of the score or so of "Extra Illustrations"
to _Pickwick_ which have appeared, surely these (if they were such)
which Dickens "did not find suitable," combining as they did the genius
of Dickens and Thackeray, whatever their merits or defects may have
been, would be most highly prized.

John Westlock, in _Martin Chuzzlewit_, had apartments in Furnival's Inn,
and was there visited by Tom Pinch. Wood's Hotel occupies a large
portion of the square, and is mentioned in _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_
as having been the Inn where Mr. Grewgious took rooms for his charming
ward Rosa Bud, from whence he ordered for her refreshment, soon after
her arrival at Staple Inn to escape Jasper's importunities, "a nice
jumble of all meals," to which it is to be feared she did not do
justice, and where "at the hotel door he afterwards confided her to the
Unlimited head chamber-maid."

The Society of Arts have considerately put up on the house No. 15 one of
their neat terra-cotta memorial tablets with the following
inscription:--

CHARLES
DICKENS,
=Novelist=,
Lived here.
B. 1812,
D. 1870.

We proceed along Holborn, and go up Kingsgate Street, where "Poll
Sweedlepipe, Barber and Bird Fancier," lived, "next door but one to the
celebrated mutton-pie shop, and directly opposite the original
cats'-meat warehouse." The immortal Sairey Gamp lodged on the first
floor, where doubtless she helped herself from the "chimley-piece"
whenever she felt "dispoged." Here also the quarrel took place between
that old lady and her friend Betsey Prig anent that mythical personage,
"Mrs. Harris." We pass through Red Lion Square and up Bedford Row, and
after proceeding along Theobald's Road for a short distance, turn up
John Street, which leads into Doughty Street, where, at No. 48, Charles
Dickens lived from 1837 to