Dickens of the Mounted: The Astonishing Long-lost Letters of Inspector F. Dickens NWMP 1874–86 ed. by Eric Nicol (review)

HUMANITIES 153 'Michael Macbride' - the sketch Moodie withdrew before publication because of attacks on its anti-Irish bias. I also wish a table of contents for the central section had been added to facilitate comparison between this edition and the other ones we have been using. The CEECT text, however, will clearly become the choice of all readers working in Canadian or women's studies, and of all students interested in autobiography or in the development of realistic fiction. (ELIZABETH WATERSTON) Eric Nicol, editor. Dickens of the Mounted: The Astonishing Long-lost Letters of Inspector F. Dickens NWMP 1874-86 McClelland and Stewart. 294. $24.95 In Dickens of the Mounted, Eric Nicol (author, inter alia, of Like Father, Like Fun) shows his true mettle, returning, as the dust jacket tells us verbally, 'to his first love, history,' and as it photographically shows us, 'enthralled with his discovery in the UBC Library (1988).' And well he might be. Francis Jeffrey Dickens, fifth child and third son of Charles and Catherine Dickens, known in childhood as Chickenstalker and in adulthood as much else, was indeed a member of the Northwest Mounted Police during its turbulent youth, and one can just imagine (that's the word) what a mine (metal unspecified) his letters would be for information about the manners and mores of the later nineteenth century. Only a whiff of the surprising joys can here be given, but let the winds gently blow. Writing to the young female friend, Emily, to whom most of these letters are directed (hers in reply are sadly lost), Dickens thanks 'G-d' (in more relaxed passages he - or his editor - allows the noxious vowel to appear) that only occasionally does he have to instruct recruits in such routines as loading weapons. 'This movement may sound simple, but first I must place the rifle between my knees (numb), butt to the ground (slippery), to hold it while I use my hands (cold as the Ghost of Christmas Present) to load the revolver. The position offers several opportunities for a self-inflicted wound that I cannot even discuss in polite company.' Our views of what was thought appropriate in letters of the 187os to young girls of slender acquaintance must obviously alter in several respects, and we can appreciate the genetic presence of the father not only in the explicit reference but also in the tone of the jokes. For other references to Charles Dickens, see for example page 77, where Francis suddenly sees himself, doling out food to Indians, as the 'orphanage master' to whom Oliver Twist appealed for more, and page 108, where Francis indulges himself in a description such as his father might have written. Dickensians will be quite excited by a passage on page 165 where Francis regrets that he does not have copies of the 'comic sketches' in his father's 'many theatrical pieces.' They will also regret that these letters 154 LETTERS IN CANADA 1989 were not published in their time when they find reference on page 197 to Charles's 'dalliances with actresses,' well known to the family though shameful. In a few places precise scholars will be pleased to find phrases and notions that appear anachronistic only because of our ignorance. For instance, when describing the burial customs of some western tribes, Francis mentions coming across 'strange fruit' hanging from trees, and when congratulatinghimselfon 'memorable' lyrical description, he refers to the foothills as 'wild-rose country.' (Historical lexicographers please take note.) And literary historians will be truly inflamed by the discovery thatHarry Flashman, whose life after Tom Brown's Schooldays was thought to be known only through George MacDonald Fraser's supposedly fictional tales ofhis naughty derring-dos, paida visit to Francis Dickens in 1885. As to prudery, who can forget the ghost of Richard Burton when Francis, admittedly now writing to a man, recounts the conversation concerning the Indian figure of the 'Trickster,' who is 'essentially shapeless, except for having his guts wrapped around the outside o' his body, along with a country mile o' penis topped [sic] by an enormous scrotum.' Emily herself seems to have been epistolarily somewhat liberated as well, for at one point Francis...