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GE, Chapter 05
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What a great chapter. Since GE is one of the "later" Dickens we know that he has refined his style and use of symbolism. His characters are as delightful and unique as his earlier creations but have an added depth and subtly. The plots are tighter and his social conscious as keen. With the weekly publication style the novel is going to move with both speed and precision. All in all, GE is one of his finest novels.The convict again has a central role in this chapter. Kim's observation that the convict protects Pip by claiming he stole the vittles reinforces our earlier observations that while he is certainly an aggressive personality, and did threaten Pip, and does eat like an animal, there still resides in him a decency and sense of fairness. As strange as it may seem in context, Pip's convict is proud to point out that he captured the second convict on the marshes. So far, then, the novel has let the convict's appearance and language speak for him. What we as readers still do not know, and what is key to character understanding, are his intentions and his background.
What we do know is that Dickens has, for a second time, framed this man within the binary framework of good and evil. We read again in this chapter is that on the hunt to find the convicts in the marsh that "[u]nder the low red glare of sunset, the beacon and the gibbet, and the mound of the Battery, and the opposite shore of the river were plain, though all of a watery lead colour."
Beacons suggest light, direction and safety; gibbets darkness, pain and death. The last lines of Chapter five are ominous. As the captured convicts are lead back onto the "black Hulk" which is portrayed as "a wicked Noah's ark" the soldiers' torches are flung into the water, and went out, "as if it were all over with him." Will we see or hear more about Pip's criminal? I believe so. Twice in the first five chapters Dickens has alluded to the concepts of good and evil, symbolized by the beacon and the gibbet. The last sentence of this chapter contains the words "as if." I think that Dickens is at his subtle best here. The convict will be back.
Chapter five furthers the incidence of violence in the novel. The soldiers find Pip's criminal in a struggle with another convict where "blows were being struck" and both men were "bleeding and panting and execrating and struggling." The second criminal tells the soldiers three times that Pip's criminal " tried to murder me." Darkness, mists, torches, eerie lights and lurid surroundings frame this chapter. It is a chapter of atmosphere as much as character. Just as the fog that enveloped London in the beginning of Bleak House pervaded the remainder of that novel, I wonder how much of the introductory chapters of GE will stalk through the remainder of our story.
While I was writing this I thought how it would be easier to call the convict by name then have to say the convict, the other convict, or Pip's convict. This reminded me of Tristram asking what Joe's wife's name is and I decided to search for that and most places just call her Mrs. Joe or Mrs. Gargery, two sites call her "Georgiana Mary". If we were told this I missed it, but perhaps we get to know her name later in the story.
Kim wrote: "While I was writing this I thought how it would be easier to call the convict by name then have to say the convict, the other convict, or Pip's convict. This reminded me of Tristram asking what Joe..."I'm using the term Pip's convict because we don't know his name ... yet. Names do tend to be a bit muddled here, don't they? Mrs Joe. Funny that a woman so domineering would not be clearly distinguished by her own name rather than being referred to as another's property when she is neither faint-hearted or, in any way, Joe's subservient mate. Then we have Joe's fascination with finding the letters "J" and "O" in reading material, and thus believing he has found his name. When Pip stands in the graveyard he must conjure up what his parents and siblings might have looked like based on their names on their tombstones and grave markings.
This leads us to the idea that the novel might well focus on the concept of identity. How do we identify ourselves? What gives us our identity? What factors lead others to assume or to understand our identity? Perhaps a major trope will be to see how the initial identity that one has or projects can be radically different from what the true identity is. Also, of course, is the question if a person can change their identity, and if so, how?
Pip's convict is a conundrum. In chapter one, he says he's got an cohort that he threatens Pip with. But when Pip tells him later that he'd seen the other prisoner, Pip's convict seems surprised and... what? Surprised? Worried? Angry? Now, in chapter five, the two are fighting, and Pip's (I'm tempted to say "our") convict seems to be wanting to capture the other and turn him in, which seems counter-intuitive. So what's going on with these two? Was our convict framed, or an unwitting accomplice? Dickens doesn't do things without a reason, and I'm sure this will all come out as time goes on.
Kim wrote: "Now what I'm wondering is why the sergeant tells them he has already mentioned his reason for being there to Pip when he hadn't really done it?"This reminds me of parents who use poetic license when talking to other adults, who are then, much to their embarrassment, corrected by their children who are listening in. Pip was just savvy - or scared - enough not to correct the sergeant. I didn't read anything more into than that -- just one of those little human foibles that Dickens includes to set the scene in a subtle but powerful way.
Kim wrote: "the blacksmith ...tells Joe that he is sorry to have taken his pie, but Joe tells him he is welcome to it, "so far as it was ever mine" which I suppose means Mrs. Joe never would have let him have it.."I took this as an indication of Joe's being (almost too) good and idealistic -- "imagine all the people sharing all the world" and all of that. Joe goes on to say, "We don't know what you have done, but we wouldn't have you starved to death for it, poor miserable fellow-creatur." Now for all we know, this guy rapes and tortures babies (sorry, but you get my point). I love Joe, but I can't help but wonder if this love-your-neighbor outlook won't come back to bite him at some point, and the nice guy will finish last. Or will karma win the day, and Joe's goodness will land him on top in the end? Wherever he ends up, I have no doubt that Joe will make the best of it, and will always put others first.
Mary Lou wrote: "Kim wrote: "the blacksmith ...tells Joe that he is sorry to have taken his pie, but Joe tells him he is welcome to it, "so far as it was ever mine" which I suppose means Mrs. Joe never would have l..."I thought the same thing when Joe and Pip were saying they hope the convicts weren't found, how did they know the convict didn't rape and torture babies or other horrible stuff.
Here are the illustrations, I hope so anyway, they have been rather hard to copy this time.Chapter 5
Three soldiers, the first carrying a torch, the others with bayonets fixed, are leading the convict away in chains.
Chapter 5
John McLenan
1860
Harper's Weekly 4 (8 December 1860)
Commentary:
The illustrator emphasizes the threat that the convict appeared to pose society by showing the scene in which soldiers with bayonets fixed lead away the recaptured convict. The smoking torch underscores the fact that this is a night scene, an effect to which the general blurriness of all but the first rank of soldiers contributes. Marsh reeds and cattails in the foreground economically establish the setting as the Thames marshes. Shortly Magwitch will exonerate Pip of the theft of the "wittles" from Mrs. Gargery's pantry.
Then Joe began to hammer and clink, hammer and clink
Chapter 5
John McLenan
1860
Harper's Weekly 4 (8 December 1860)
Text Illustrated:
As I watched them while they all stood clustering about the forge, enjoying themselves so much, I thought what terrible good sauce for a dinner my fugitive friend on the marshes was. They had not enjoyed themselves a quarter so much, before the entertainment was brightened with the excitement he furnished. And now, when they were all in lively anticipation of “the two villains” being taken, and when the bellows seemed to roar for the fugitives, the fire to flare for them, the smoke to hurry away in pursuit of them, Joe to hammer and clink for them, and all the murky shadows on the wall to shake at them in menace as the blaze rose and sank, and the red-hot sparks dropped and died, the pale afternoon outside almost seemed in my pitying young fancy to have turned pale on their account, poor wretches.
"The sergeant ran in first"
Chapter 5
F. A. Fraser
1877
An illustration for the Household Edition of Dickens's Great Expectations
Text Illustrated:
"It was a run indeed now, and what Joe called, in the only two words he spoke all the time, “a Winder.” Down banks and up banks, and over gates, and splashing into dikes, and breaking among coarse rushes: no man cared where he went. As we came nearer to the shouting, it became more and more apparent that it was made by more than one voice. Sometimes, it seemed to stop altogether, and then the soldiers stopped. When it broke out again, the soldiers made for it at a greater rate than ever, and we after them. After a while, we had so run it down, that we could hear one voice calling “Murder!” and another voice, “Convicts! Runaways! Guard! This way for the runaway convicts!” Then both voices would seem to be stifled in a struggle, and then would break out again. And when it had come to this, the soldiers ran like deer, and Joe too.
The sergeant ran in first, when we had run the noise quite down, and two of his men ran in close upon him. Their pieces were cocked and levelled when we all ran in.
“Here are both men!” panted the sergeant, struggling at the bottom of a ditch. “Surrender, you two! and confound you for two wild beasts! Come asunder!”
Water was splashing, and mud was flying, and oaths were being sworn, and blows were being struck, when some more men went down into the ditch to help the sergeant, and dragged out, separately, my convict and the other one. Both were bleeding and panting and execrating and struggling; but of course I knew them both directly."
'With you — Hob and Nob,' returned the Sergeant [in the Forge prior to Magwitch's Capture]
Chapter 5
Charles Green
1898
Dickens's Great Expectations, Gadshill Edition
Commentary:
The Annotated Dickens provides the following caption, which is not in the original Gadshill Edition: "He drank to His Majesty's Health" (Ch. 5).
The scene contrasts Pumblechook's toadying to the forces of the Establishment (the soldiers sent out to recapture the escaped convicts) and Joe's doggedly working (right of centre, rear). While blond-haired Joe pays careful attention to the repair of the handcuffs that will be needed once the escapees are apprehended, the Seargeant flatters Pumblechook as a man who "knows what's what" as he consumes the port wine that the seed merchant has brought as a present for Mrs. Joe's Christmas dinner. Pip watches in amazement and apprehension (still mindful of how the tar-water in the brandy was detected) as the the two toast one another, their bodies and raised arms effectively "imprisoning" the figure of Pip. Green has surely chosen this moment because it also implies a criticism of the military leader for drinking on the job.
The sergeant ran in first when he had run the noise quite down
Chapter 5
Felix O. C. Darley
1861
Commentary:
"Whereas other illustrators, such as Marcus Stone, have entirely overlooked the escaped convicts, or have focussed instead on the convict's dramatic encounter with Pip in the churchyard in the early chapters, as is the case with Furniss's illustration Pip's Struggle with the Escaped Convict, with only the benefit of McLenan's illustrations as a reference, Darley has realized the dramatic moment when the party of soldiers comes across the two escapees, wrestling in the mud of the marshes. The tangle of arms, the expressions on the faces, and the composition of the plate generally make it a highly effective realization of a textual moment rarely dealt with by illustrators. In contrast to the central position accorded Pip and his brother-in-law and surrogate parent in the Darley photogravure, note Fraser's emphasis on the wrestling convicts and the absence of Pip as observer in "The sergeant ran in first". Darley's precision in the depiction of the military uniforms suggests that he researched the matter in order to make the illustration convincing historically. The most apt point of comparison for Darley's dynamic handling of the convicts remains, however, John McLenan's serial illustration, the uncaptioned headpiece for the 8 December 1860 issue of Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization."
As always, and forever, thanks for the illustrations Kim.It is interesting to read that Darley probably researched the type of uniforms the soldiers would have been wearing. That is a good touch of historical accuracy. In the top right of the final illustration above we have Joe carrying Pip. Somehow, neither are like I imagined, but that is a matter of imaginative creativity. What is important to me is the fact that Joe is pictured as carrying Pip. We are told later in the text that Joe carried Pip as well. Thus, with the depiction of Joe at the forge given by several illustrators and this last illustration we are meant to interpret Joe as a very strong man. Joe's physical strength will become increasing important as the novel continues.
Kim, I, too, am indebted to you for those interesting illustrations. I wonder whether the one by Darley is meant to be slightly blurry or whether this is just due to the age of the illustration. Anyway, be that as it may, I quite like it for it underscores the foggy, foggy dew that one may expect on the marshes.I think that Pip and Joe may be quite sure that the convict did not commit too heinous a crime, like rape or murder, for if they had, they would probably not have been imprisoned but executed.
Chapter 5 is full of splendid little passages, e.g. the reference to Mr. Pumblechook's "fat sort of laugh", which sums up his character pretty well. Then there is the following observation, which forebodes no good, and is just a linguistic gem:
"the shudder of the dying day in every blade of grass"
Isn't that creepy, and full of meaning? Or the end of the chapter, where we get this about the convict:
"No one seemed surprised to see him, or interested in seeing him, or glad to see him, or sorry to see him or spoke a word" -
you can really sense how hopeless the convict's fate lies before him, and then the chapter ends like this:
"Then, the ends of the torches were flung hissing into the water, and went out, as if it were all over with him."
It's nearly like watching a film.
Tristram wrote: "Kim, I, too, am indebted to you for those interesting illustrations. I wonder whether the one by Darley is meant to be slightly blurry or whether this is just due to the age of the illustration. An..."I have nothing to add, except that this is one of those posts that I read and wish Goodreads came with a "like" button.
I wrote what follows a few days ago, but is probably more apropos here:"Even in the introduction of the convict, while Pip obviously felt great fear and intimidation, I could not help but feel that the convict was "acting" for effect. It certainly worked because it made Pip fearful enough to challenge his sister's rule, however under the radar he tried to be. But even in the beginning, I think there was more hyperbole than actual threat in the convict. By the later chapters, we really begin to see him as a complex person who is not all bad."
That holds even more so now, in my opinion. It is frustrating not to know what crimes the convict committed, but knowing the standards of Victorian "justice", it is more likely to have been something less rather than more wicked. If he were truly a horrible criminal, why wouldn't he have just waited until dark, broken into a cottage or two, and taken what he wanted? Why not just kill Pip and be done with it? If he had committed robbery or something worse, he certainly wouldn't mind stealing food if he was starving. So from the beginning, I think I felt sympathy for the convict.
As for Peter's question about the prison ship--I am assuming it was not rhetorical? Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, England was short of prison space. So it was the custom to park decommissioned Navy hulks out off-shore somewhere and use them for prisons. (Also convenient if it was decided to ship those aboard to "the colonies" somewhere.) The conditions on prison ships were notorious and appalling. Unlike actual prisons, which were at least where the public could see them and the conditions, the hulks were very much "out of sight, out of mind". During the Revolutionary War, the British used ships for prisoners of war, and were infamous for the number of colonials who died on them.
I think perhaps the general public were often on the side of the convict, as they could be transported - or even hanged - for very minor offences indeed, such as stealing fruit from a market stall. So the more major crimes were unlikely. And of course we can see even at this early stage, that there is no love lost between these two convicts, and that "Pip's" convict is very keen to impress on the soldiers that he had captured the other one for them. It makes us wonder why.Is anyone else finding that Pip's sister reminds them of Lady Dedlock's French lady's maid, in Bleak House? That whirlwind of demonic energy!
Lynne wrote: "If he were truly a horrible criminal, why wouldn't he ...."] and
Excellent points re: our convict's actions, Lynne.
Re: the prison ships, I'm re-watching "Turn" which is a drama series about colonial spies in the Revolutionary War, based on real events. A British prison ship plays a significant role, as two characters related to our protagonists are imprisoned there. As Lynne remarked, the conditions are deplorable and one of the characters ends up dying of dysentery. The show is very good. It's on A & E, and there have been 3 seasons (series for those of you in the UK) with the fourth and final season coming out sometime later this year. I should probably warn this international group that this American production does paint many of the loyalists and British soldiers as the bad guys, though some are more sympathetic than others! There's one English captain who is delightfully evil. :-) If you want to see it, the episodes should be watched in order, or you'll be lost.
Mary Lou wrote: "Lynne wrote: "If he were truly a horrible criminal, why wouldn't he ...."] and
Excellent points re: our convict's actions, Lynne.
Re: the prison ships, I'm re-watching "Turn" which is a drama..."
Watching TURN on Netflix and some of the colonials are not such nice guys either. The show makes a good point that there are good guys and bad guys on both sides, though it is hard to argue with the prison ship. In certain situations, whether in Dickens or on TURN, it can be really difficult to choose sides sometimes. My heart goes out to those who try to be neutral and get thumped by both sides.
Kim wrote: "What is a prison ship anway? Does it just sit there with prisoner's living in it? Or is it taking the prisoner's somewhere? ."I believe it just sits there, a used up ship that maybe is even resting on the bottom, a cheap way to house prisoners if the ship is no longer usable as a ship, so it saves having to build a jail, and if the prisoners are chained to balls, it's going to be a challenge to jump into the water and swim or wade to shore, and even when you get there you're in a great marsh.
Kim wrote: "most places just call her Mrs. Joe or Mrs. Gargery, two sites call her "Georgiana Mary"." Georgiana was Pip and Mrs. Joe's mother (also Georgiana wife of the above), but may have been her name also.
I have to admit that the prison ship discussion reminded me of the ship house in David Copperfield.
Mary Lou wrote: "I'm re-watching "Turn" which is a drama..."I get so lost with American history, but think "Revolutionary War" must mean 1775-83, or what we think of as the American War of Independence. I watched the excellent series "John Adams" and was enthralled by this story by David McCullough, which was a new drama for me - I was riveted as I only knew bits of it, trusted it was largely factual, and felt incredibly ashamed about the behaviour of the English. I'm not at all surprised that English people are not depicted particularly sympathetically in "Turn"! I would not expect them to be! The French in "John Adams" came off (probably quite rightly for the time) even worse.
Convicts in Britain were not send to America at the time of Great Expectations though. That stopped in 1776, and after then they were sent to Australia. It's estimated that 140,000 criminals were transported to Australia between 1810 and 1852 (8 years before this was published - it was actually abolished in 1857). It was for life. If a convict ever returned to Britain, they were hanged (by law, until 1834). And the original offences were sometimes quite minor by modern standards.
This must all have been very fresh in the mind of Dickens' readers.
Everyman wrote: "I have to admit that the prison ship discussion reminded me of the ship house in David Copperfield."I'm actually reminded of an earlier Dickens novel, Bleak House where he has the appallingly single-minded Mrs. Jellyby, whom he based on the missionary Caroline Chisholm, founder of the "Family Colonisation Loan Society" involved in the assisted emigation of young families to Australia for a better life. He does seem to be ambivalent about this - judgemental on the one hand (because of her neglect of what he saw as her family duties) and approving the concept on the other.
And only 5 years after Great Expectations began to be first serialised, 2 of Dickens' own sons were encouraged to do this, Alfred in 1865 and Edward ("Plorn") in 1868. Odd that this desirable state was so close in time to the novel he was writing, which is full of dread of an unknown land. He must have been casting his mind back quite a way!
Everyman wrote: "I have to admit that the prison ship discussion reminded me of the ship house in David Copperfield."When I read this Chapter, I had another memory of one of the Dickens novels we read before, namely when Pip spells out his friend's name, and made it JO. But that was probably not any intended cross-reference by Dickens, was it?
Jean wrote: "He does seem to be ambivalent about this - judgemental on the one hand (because of her neglect of what he saw as her family duties) and approving the concept on the other."It was probably not only on account of Mrs. Jellyby's neglect of what he saw as her family duties that Dickens was ambivalent on the subject. Maybe, the 19th century also already knew the species of officious busybodies and do-gooders, a species that is on the increase in Germany and whose representatives often do more harm than good if they do anything at all except posing and vociferating semi-truths and demonstrations of their own good intentions and moral superiority ;-) Mrs. Jellyby and Mrs. Pardiggle seem, to me, to fit well into that category of people.
I agree Tristram, and hadn't thought of that sanctimonious aspect.
OK, phew! The soldiers were not there to arrest Pip for whatever reason. I've been agonizing over that for a week now. :)My favorite line in this chapter:
...and the cattle, their heads turned from the wind and sleet, stared angrily as if they held us responsible for both annoyances...
I wondered in the previous chapters why the convict (Pip's convict, that is) was interested in there being another convict nearby. Now it seems, interestingly, that Pip's convict had so much contempt for the other convict, that he was willing to go back to prison in order to get this other convict recaptured. I wonder if we will find out their relationship to one another.
I was pleasantly surprised that Pip's convict didn't out him, and was even more so surprised that he thanked Joe for eating the pie, although I suppose looking back at the scene when he thanked Pip for bringing him the food in the first place I shouldn't have been surprised at all.
Peter wrote: "the soldiers' torches are flung into the water, and went out, "as if it were all over with him." Will we see or hear more about Pip's criminal? I believe so..... The last sentence of this chapter contains the words "as if." I think that Dickens is at his subtle best here. The convict will be back."Good eye, Peter! I usually miss these subtle pieces, so I appreciate you pointing them out.
Mary Lou wrote: "But when Pip tells him later that he'd seen the other prisoner, Pip's convict seems surprised and... what? Surprised? Worried? Angry? Now, in chapter five, the two are fighting, and Pip's (I'm tempted to say "our") convict seems to be wanting to capture the other and turn him in, which seems counter-intuitive. So what's going on with these two? Was our convict framed, or an unwitting accomplice?"Thank you, Mary Lou. I had forgotten what Pip's convict's response was when Pip told him about the other convict, but it sure wasn't with delight.
Lynne wrote: "Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, England was short of prison space. So it was the custom to park decommissioned Navy hulks out off-shore somewhere and use them for prisons."Thanks for the bit of information, Lynne. I didn't realize that ships were used for prisons.
Linda wrote: "Now it seems, interestingly, that Pip's convict had so much contempt for the other convict, that he was willing to go back to prison in order to get this other convict recaptured."Isn't that an example of what in English is called cutting one's nose to spite one's face? There must be a real good reason behind Pip's convict's line of action - and I am sure we are going to learn about it in the course of the novel ;-) That's the nice thing about Dickens: In his novels there are hardly ever any threads left untied.
Peter wrote: "What a great chapter. Since GE is one of the "later" Dickens we know that he has refined his style and use of symbolism. His characters are as delightful and unique as his earlier creations but hav..."Peter, I definitely agree with your ideas about the symbolism of the beacons and gibbet. Like you say, I think Pip's convict's character conveys the embodies good and evil. I wonder if these are intertwined?
Kate wrote: "Peter wrote: "What a great chapter. Since GE is one of the "later" Dickens we know that he has refined his style and use of symbolism. His characters are as delightful and unique as his earlier cre..."Kate
We will see ... :-)
Dickens's characters are growing more complex in his later novels as can be seen in the beacon-gibbet-dichotomy.
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Books mentioned in this topic
Bleak House (other topics)Great Expectations (other topics)
Great Expectations (other topics)
Bleak House (other topics)
This week we begin with Chapter 5 and I just realized there are no chapter headings. Dickens books usually have chapter headings don't they? I can't remember. Anyway, Pip finds soldiers at the door at the same moment Mrs. Joe finds her pie is gone. The appearance of the soldiers makes her forget about her missing pie, for the time being anyway. One of the questions I have is about the following sentence:
“Excuse me, ladies and gentleman,” said the sergeant, “but as I have mentioned at the door to this smart young shaver,” (which he hadn’t), “I am on a chase in the name of the king, and I want the blacksmith.”
Now what I'm wondering is why the sergeant tells them he has already mentioned his reason for being there to Pip when he hadn't really done it? But now he does tell them - Pip included - that they are in need of a blacksmith to work on a pair of handcuffs that aren't locking properly, they need them fixed as soon as possible because they are seeking two escaped convicts believed to be out on the marshes. As Joe works in the forge the soldiers come into the house and:
"they stood about, as soldiers do; now, with their hands loosely clasped before them; now, resting a knee or a shoulder; now, easing a belt or a pouch; now, opening the door to spit stiffly over their high stocks, out into the yard. "
This next sentence is probably my favorite in this chapter:
"All these things I saw without then knowing that I saw them, for I was in an agony of apprehension. But beginning to perceive that the handcuffs were not for me, and that the military had so far got the better of the pie as to put it in the background, I collected a little more of my scattered wits."
For the next two hours Joe works on the handcuffs and the sergeant spends his time complementing Mrs. Joe and Mr. Pumblechook, the two people in the room who who least deserve any complements. Oh, and drinking Mr. Pumblecook's wine. His gift to Mrs. Joe. Finally, Joe is finished and he, Pip, and Mr. Wopsle go along with the soldiers in search of two escaped convicts. Pip tells us that none of the other villagers join them for:
the weather was cold and threatening, the way dreary, the footing bad, darkness coming on, and the people had good fires in-doors and were keeping the day."
The weather sounds wonderful to me. If I were Pip the last place I would want to be is anywhere near the two convicts, especially "his convict" I would be afraid that the convict would assume I was the one who told the soldiers where he had been hiding. This doesn't seem to occur to Pip however until they are far from town. And they do find the convicts, mostly because the two men are shouting at each other, not a particulary brilliant thing to do if you are attempting to escape from soldiers, or police, or whoever else may be chasing you. But they are shouting and the two convicts are discovered together, fighting furiously with one another in the marsh. Pip's convict makes sure that they know that it is he who "took" the other convict, and the other convict tells them that Pip's convict tried to murder him. Whatever is going on they are now captured. Pip’s convict protects Pip by saying he had stole some "wittles" from the blacksmith and tells Joe that he is sorry to have taken his pie, but Joe tells him he is welcome to it, "so far as it was ever mine" which I suppose means Mrs. Joe never would have let him have it. The convict is now taken away to a prison ship and Pip and Joe see him put into the boat. Pip tells us:
"Cribbed and barred and moored by massive rusty chains, the prison-ship seemed in my young eyes to be ironed like the prisoners. We saw the boat go alongside, and we saw him taken up the side and disappear. Then, the ends of the torches were flung hissing into the water, and went out, as if it were all over with him."
What is a prison ship anway? Does it just sit there with prisoner's living in it? Or is it taking the prisoner's somewhere?
Why do you suppose the convict was in the story in the first place? Will he be back or is this event going to effect Pip's life in some way for the rest of the book? You know, waking up in the middle of the night from a dream about the convict even after he is no longer a child, something like that. Maybe it had a meaning I missed. I'm off to get the illustrations.