Murdstone & Grinbys: Time and Space in David Copperfield

Murdstone and Grinbys was at the waterside. It was down in Blackfriars.  Blackfriars is in the southwest corner of London.  It is located on the banks of River Thames.  It was a crazy old house with a wharf of its own, abutting on the water when the tide was in and on the mud when the tide was out.  It was a dirty place, with rats, dirts and smoke.  An important branch of Murdstone and Grinbys dealt with the supply of wines and spirits to packet ships.  To select the good bottles, reject the flawed bottles, rinse and wash the bottles, paste the labels on bottles, fit them with corks, seal them and pack them in casks were done by boys. A look into the history of child labour in this context is appropriate.

Child labour in Victorian England was not the result of Industrial revolution.  Poor children would start work as soon as their parents could find employment for them.  But prior to Industrial Revolution not much work was available.  This changed with Industrial Revolution.  Ample opportunities were risen for child workers in factories and mines.  In villages opportunities were scant.  Bird scaring, sowing crops and driving horses were the rural opportunities. So there was a flow of child labour from villages to towns. 

Here the stepfather finds an employment for his  stepson.  Dickens's own experience is reflected in Murdstone and Grinbys. 

There were three or four boys in the warehouse of Murdstones & Grinbys. On the first day of David's beginning, Mick Walker, the oldest boy was summoned by Mr Quinon to show David his business.  Mick Walker's father was a bargeman, and a participant of Lord Mayor's Show.   Mick wore a ragged apron and a paper cap.  Another boy was Mealy Potatoes who was absent on that day.  His father was a waterman and his sister did imp in pantomime.  Pantomime was theatrical performance of those times and, later we see David going to the show in Convent Garden Theatre after the completion of his education.

David was not at all happy with his new situation.  He compared his new associates with his old school boyfriends, Steerforth and Traddles and he felt that he had fallen into a pit.  David Copperfield was class conscious, but he mixed freely, breaking class limitations - his affection to Peggotty, and his love of little Emily.  But he was not sure of his class.  With the marrige of his mother to Mr Murdstone he became the property of Mr Murdstone.  With the death of his mother he lost everything.

Mr Quinon introduced David to Mr Micawber.  Mr Micawber used to take orders for Murdstone and Grinbys.  Mr Murdstone had written to Mr Micawber to take David as his lodger.  Mr Micawber had been staying at Windsor Terrace, City Road.

At eight o'clock Mr Micawber came to take David to his new lodge.

Micawber decided to take a lodger because of his extreme poverty. Mrs Micawber had two suckling twins; besides there were Master Micawber aged four and Miss Micawber aged three.  In addition to them there was a dark complexioned young woman called Orfling.  Every day creditors came to him from the morning onwards.  Mr Micawber used to hid somewhere. They would shout, and threw abuses at him. Extreme poverty mounted by extreme lavishness.  Mrs Micawber started a Boarding establishment for young ladies. But David never saw there any young lady.  Chanting the glory of her papa and mama was a pastime of Mrs Micawber.  On his way to Murdstone and Grinbys were two pudding shops: one close to St Martins Church and the other at Strands.  There was an old public-house in front of Murdstone and Grinbys. It was called the Lion.  These were some of the places David used to have his food during his stay at Micawber's and his work at Murdstone and Grinbys.  He would also take a look at a vension shop in Fleet Street, or pineapple in the Convent Garden Market; or he would take a stroll to Adelphi.

Here is an episode which has no relation with the body of the story; or without which the story would be intact.  One hot evening David went into the bar of a public-house and said to the landlord:

'What's your very best ale a glass?'

'Twopence-half penny.' said the landlord, 'is the price of Gunine Stunning ale.'

'Then,' said David producing the money, 'just draw me a glass of the Genuine Stunning, with a good head to it.'

The landlord looked at him over the bar, from head to foot, with a strange smile on his face, and instead of drawing the beer, looked round the screen and said something to his wife.  She came out from behind it, with her work in her hand, and joined him in surveying David.  Here they stand, all three.  The landlord in his shirt-sleeves, leaning against the bar window-frame; his wife looking over the little half-door; and David in some confusion looking up at them from outside the partition.  They asked him a good many questions; as what was his name, how old he was, where he lived, how was he employed, and how he came there. David answered them.  They served him with ale, but he suspected that it was not Genuine Stunning; and the landlord's wife, opening the little half-door of the bar, and bending down, gave him his money back, and gave him a kiss, that was half admiring and half compassionate, and all womanly and good.  The woman might have understood that the boy wanted not ale, but love and care.  This is a dramatic moment in the novel; presented by a nameless character. 

David was an intelligent boy.  He never told his peers how he came there, or that Mr Quinon saw him on a different footing.  He always kept a space from other boys. He was called 'little gent' or 'the young Suffolker'.  A man named Gregory and another named Tipp used to call him David, when they were very confidential.

David never disclosed his misery, in his letters to Peggotty.  Mr Micawber's difficulties were an addition to these distress.  In his forlorn state he was quite attached to Mr Micawber and his family.  Mrs Micawber's calculation of ways and means and Mr Micawber's heavy debts were daily incidents. 

Saturday nights and Sunday mornings were special.  Saturday nights David walk home early, with seven shillings in his pocket, thinking of buying such and such things with it.  Mrs Micawber would unbundle her miseries.  It was usual for Mr Micawber to sob violently at the beginning of the Saturday night's conversation and sing Jack's delight at the end of it.  He would come home to supper with a flood of tears, and go home making a calculation of expenses of putting bow-windows to the house.

There developed a friendship between David and Micawbers, inspite of the disparity of their age.  Knowing their poor situation David never accepted their invitation to eat and drink.  One day Mrs Micawber told David that Mr Micawber's difficulties were coming to a crisis, and there was nothing to eat in the house.  David had, in his pocket two or three shillings of his week's money, gave it to Mrs Micawber and begged her to accept it as a loan.  But Mrs Micawber kissed him and put it back in his pocket, and said that she couldn't think of it.  Mrs Micawber told David that he could be of help in another way.  Thus David sold the same evening portable goods in the house, and every morning before going to Murdstone and Grinbys, goods including the books of Mr Micawber.  One of the bookseller David approached was a typical character.  He was tipsy in the night, and got scolded by his wife every morning.  He would be coming out of a turn-up bedstead, with shaking hands, trying to find needful shillings in one or other pockets.  Later David went to pawnbrokers shop on behalf of Mrs Micawber.  After these occasions Mrs Micawber would make a little treat, generally a supper, and there was a peculiar relish for these meals.

At last Mr Micawber's difficulties came to a crisis and he was arrested early one morning and taken to King's Bench Prison in the Borough.

The following Sunday David made a visit to Mr Micawber in King's Bench Prison, and made friends with some of the other imates and had a supper there.

Later all the furniture of the house were sold.  David had no idea how it was arranged.  At last Mrs Micawber resolved to move into prison, where Mr Micawber had secured a room for himself. Later they vacated the building, and the landlord was very much pleased that he got his keys.  For David a little room was hired outside the walls in the neighborhood of King's Bench Prison. It was in Southwark.  Orfling was accommodated in a lodging nearby.  Orfling, also known as Clickett was a maid to Micawbers.  She was a dark complexioned orphan girl brought from St Luke's work-house. [ From her complexion it may be construed that she was a slave girl.  Note that slavery was abolished in British Empire in 1833. Dickens must have been twenty one at that time.

Micawbers were comfortable inside prison than they were outside.  David also was free of their trouble.  Micawbers' relatives and friends helped them in their troubled times.  David used to breakfast with them everyday.  How it worked he didn't know.  Nobody in Murdstone and Grinbys knew of these developments.  Old London Bridge was David's favourite lounging-place, at intervals.  In the evening he used to go back to prison and walk up and down the parade with Mr Micawber, or play casinos with Mrs Micawber or hear reminiscences of her papa and mama.

Mr Micawber had composed a petition to the House of Commons praying an alteration in the law of imprisonment for debt. There was a club in the prison, in which Mr Micawber had a great authority.  He presented the petition before the club, and the club had approved it.  They collected signatures from all imates.  Captain Hopkins and Micawber made it a ceremony, which David attended it after taking half a day's leave of Murdstone and Grinbys.

At this time of life an idea came into his mind that once he would write his experience.

Eventually Mr Micawber's petition won and he was released.  David asked Mrs Micawber what their future plan, while they were on a lambs fry.  Mrs Micawber had told him that her family asked Micawbers to leave London.   David had no idea what the 'family' meant because she had already told him that her mama and papa were no more.

Once out of prison Micawbers were more perplexed.  What to do next?  Mrs Micawber used to say that she would never desert Mr Micawber.  All the ornaments she received from her mama and papa had been lost for less than half the value. Now they were penniless.  They wanted to move to Plymouth.

While returning to his room, and later in his sleepless hours in bed an idea had come to him.  Without Micawbers he would be utterly helpless.  He thought of his life of shame and misery.  He found that it will not change unless he acted.

David had been receiving packets from Miss Murdstone, of his dress with some notes on their future plan; it being his retention in Murdstone and Grinbys. Mr Micawber came to the warehouse and informed Mr Quinon of his decision to move to Plymouth and Mr Quinon arranged David's accommodation with Tipp the carman.  But David had already arrived at a resolution.

David passed his evenings with Micawbers during the remaining days.  On Sunday they invited David to a dinner.  David bought a wooden horse to little Wilkins, and a doll to little Emma. He also bestowed a shillng to Orfling, who was to be disbanded.

'I shall never Mr Copperfield,' said Mrs Micawber, 'revert to the period, when Mr Micawber was in difficulties, without thinking of you.  You have never been a lodger, you have been a friend.'

'My dear Copperfield,' said Mr Micawber, 'my advice is never do tomorrow what you can do today.  Procrastination is the thief of time.  Collar him.'

'My other piece of advice Copperfield,' said Mr Micawber, 'annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen and six, result happiness.  Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure thenty pounds ought and six, result misery.  The blossom is blighted, the leaf is withered, and god of the day does down upon the dreary scene - you are ever floored.  As I am!'

Next morning David met the whole family at the coach office.

'Master Copperfield,' said Mrs Micawber I never could, and I never shall forget all you have done.'

'Copperfield,' said Mr Micawber, 'farewell!  Every happiness and prosperity!  Let my blighted destiny be a warning to you.  If anything turns happy, I shall help you to improve your prospects.'

Mrs Micawber sat at the back of the coach with her children.  David stood in the road looking wistfully at them.  She thought what a little creature David was.  She beckoned to him to climb up, quite a new and motherly expression in her eyes, put her arms round his neck, and gave him a kiss as she might have given to her own boy.  David had barely time to get down before the coach started.  He could hardly see the family, but the handkerciefs they waved.  It was gone in a minute.  Orfling and David stood looking vacantly at each other, in the middle of the road.  She shook hands with David, and said goodbye, going back to St Luke's house.  David went to Murdstone and Grinbys to begin his weary days. But he had already decided to run away - to his aunt, Miss Betsey.

Aunt walked into this story on the day of David's birth.  She was a dread and awful personage.  But there was a little trait in her behaviour which David dwelt on, and it gave him a shadow of encouragement.  David could not forget how his mother had thought that she felt her touch on her pretty little hair with no ungentle hand; and it might have been altogether his mother's fancy, and might have had no foundation, David made a little picture out of it, which softened the whole narrative.  It had been in his mind a long time, and had gradually strengthened his determination. 

But David had no idea where she lived.  So he wrote a long letter to Peggotty whether she knew where Miss Betsey lived, and he also requested her whether she could lend him half Guinea, that he would repay.  Peggoty's letter soon came enclosing half Guinea, and she said that Miss Betsey lived at Dover.  Whether it was at Dover itself or at Hythe, Sandgate or Folkestone she could not say.  At Murdstone and Grinbys, one man said all these places are close together.

When the Saturday night, and all were waiting in the  warehouse to be paid, and Tipp the carman, who always took precedence, went in first to draw his money, David shook Mick Walker by hand; asked him when it came his turn to be paid, to say Mr Quinon that David had gone to move his box to Tipp's, and bidding a last goodnight to Mealy Potatoes, sneaked away.

In his effort to take his box from his old lodging to the coach office he lost his box and his half guinea to the long legged cartman, who threatened him to come to police to get the box and guinea.  He had been running after the donkey cart for a long time and he came to realise that the long legged young man, the carman was defiant, and that there was no use in following him.  Panting and crying David reached in Greenwich; and he remembered that it was on the Dover road.

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