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In Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express, a compartment is booked in the name of Harris, but no one turns up. “I read my Dickens” says Hercule Poirot. “M. Harris, he will not arrive.” If you have ever wondered why, the following passage from Martin Chuzzlewit will enlighten you. Sarah Gamp has called to see Mrs Mould and her husband, the undertaker; and their wheezing servant Tacker has let her in.
Précis

In Charles Dickens’s novel ‘Martin Chuzzlewit’, Sarah Gamp has called on the undertaker Mr Mould and his wife. She has been invited to share her news, and obliges freely, taking care to comment flatteringly on Mrs Mould’s youthful looks, and frequently mentioning conversations with her friend Mrs Harris. Mrs Harris was always full of praise for Sarah Gamp’s wisdom and good nature; but none of those who knew Mrs Gamp had ever met this loyal friend, and most guessed that she was a figment of Mrs Gamp’s imagination.

“Now Mrs Gamp, what’s your news?”

The lady in question was by this time in the doorway, curtseying to Mrs Mould. At the same moment a peculiar fragrance was borne upon the breeze, as if a passing fairy had hiccoughed, and had previously been to a wine-vaults.

Mrs Gamp made no response to Mr Mould, but curtseyed to Mrs Mould again, and held up her hands and eyes, as in a devout thanksgiving that she looked so well. She was neatly, but not gaudily attired, in the weeds she had worn when Mr Pecksniff had the pleasure of making her acquaintance;⁠ and was perhaps the turning of a scale more snuffy.

“There are some happy creeturs,” Mrs Gamp observed, “as time runs back’ards with, and you are one, Mrs Mould; not that he need do nothing except use you in his most owldacious⁠ way for years to come, I’m sure; for young you are and will be. I says to Mrs Harris,” Mrs Gamp continued, “only t’other day; the last Monday evening fortnight as ever dawned upon this Piljian’s Projiss of a mortal wale;⁠ I says to Mrs Harris when she says to me, “Years and our trials, Mrs Gamp, sets marks upon us all.’ — ‘Say not the words, Mrs Harris, if you and me is to be continual friends, for sech is not the case.’

“‘Mrs Mould,’ I says, making so free, I will confess, as use the name,” (she curtseyed here), “‘is one of them that goes agen the obserwation straight; and never, Mrs Harris, whilst I’ve a drop of breath to draw, will I set by, and not stand up, don’t think it.’—‘I ast your pardon, ma’am,’ says Mrs Harris, ‘and I humbly grant your grace; for if ever a woman lived as would see her feller creeturs into fits to serve her friends, well do I know that woman’s name is Sairey Gamp’.”

At this point she was fain to stop for breath;⁠ and advantage may be taken of the circumstance, to state that a fearful mystery surrounded this lady of the name of Harris, whom no one in the circle of Mrs Gamp’s acquaintance had ever seen; neither did any human being know her place of residence, though Mrs Gamp appeared on her own showing to be in constant communication with her. There were conflicting rumours on the subject; but the prevalent opinion was that she was a phantom of Mrs Gamp’s brain — as Messrs. Doe and Roe are fictions of the law⁠ — created for the express purpose of holding visionary dialogues with her on all manner of subjects, and invariably winding up with a compliment to the excellence of her nature.

Footnotes

Footnote

Weeds

Weeds in this context are the sombre clothing worn by a widow. Mr Gamp, Dickens tells us, was “a female functionary, a nurse, and watcher, and performer of nameless offices about the persons of the dead.” By recalling the scene in which Mr Pecksniff, the lawyer, first engaged Mrs Gamp’s services, Dickens is reminding us of what he said at that time: that Mrs Game dressed in mourning clothes for her work, but made sure they were well-worn and faded so that kindly employers would buy her a new suit — which she then exchanged for ready cash at a second-hand clothing store.

Footnote

Owldacious

‘Owldacious’ is not to be found in any dictionary: it is the word ‘audacious’. Though a voluble talker, Mrs Gamp confidently mangles her English.

Footnote

Piljian’s Projiss

This is a reference to John Bunyan’s groundbreaking tale Pilgrim’s Progress, published on February 18th, 1678. Dismissed by critics, it was immensely popular with the public, and is now acknowledged as one of the great works of English literature. Mrs Gamp joins it with the phrase ‘this mortal vale’ as a term for the world and its hardships. This appears to be a blend of two expressions: ‘this mortal coil’, a term for the turmoil of earthly life, from Shakespeare’s Hamlet; and ‘this vale of tears’, drawn from Psalm 84. Mrs Gamp, like other Dickens characters from London, sometimes uses the letter W for the letter V.

Footnote

Fain

The word ‘fain’, considered archaic now, indicates ‘willing, strongly inclined, likely’.

Footnote

John Doe and Richard Roe

At the time, John Doe and Richard Roe were conventional names used in English courtrooms for the plaintiff and defendant, respectively, in what was then termed an ‘action of ejectment’; the modern term is eviction. Other names used in the same context included John-a-Styles and John-a-Nokes. The convention was dropped in England in 1852, but anyone who watches modern US courtroom dramas on TV will be familiar with it.

Author Details

By Charles Dickens 1812-1870
Source
From
Martin Chuzzlewit (1853), by Charles Dickens (1812-1870).

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