Tony Weller

A loquacious coachman, the character never became as popular as his famous son but readers have always enjoyed his quaint humour and his even quainter philosophy.

It cannot be a coincidence that Dickens introduces Tony Weller soon after Mrs Bardell brings a court action against Pickwick for breach of promise.

Tony Weller appears just four times in The Pickwick Papers, with each being in the second half of the novel, in the monthly instalments originally published between March and November 1837.

Yet such was his impact that he quickly became a popular subject for all sorts of merchandise including busts, mugs, and on advertising,[5][6] being a nostalgic reminder of the Regency era in the days before railway.

[3][4] As shown in the extract above, in the novel the Wellers, father and son, speak a form of Cockney English prevalent in London's East End in 1836, pronouncing a "v" where there should be a "w", and "w” where there should be a "v" - "wery" instead of "very" and "avay" instead of "away" - in language that was outdated just 40 years after the novel's publication.

[7] Later in the novel, Tony Weller marries Susan, a large and comfortable woman, who is the landlady of The Marquis of Granby public house in Dorking in Surrey.

She is under the baleful influence of the Reverend Stiggins, the red-nosed, alcoholic and hypocritical Nonconformist minister at the local United Grand Junction, Ebenezer Temperance Association.

[8] Sam Weller says to Pickwick: "This here money," said Sam, with a little hesitation, "he’s anxious to put someveres, vere he knows it’ll be safe, and I’m wery anxious too, for if he keeps it, he’ll go a-lendin’ it to somebody, or inwestin’ property in horses, or droppin’ his pocket-book down an airy, or makin’ a Egyptian mummy of his-self in some vay or another."

"Wery good, Samivel," observed Mr. Weller, in as complacent a manner as if Sam had been passing the highest eulogiums on his prudence and foresight.

With these words, Mr. Weller placed the pocket-book in Mr. Pickwick’s hands, caught up his hat, and ran out of the room with a celerity scarcely to be expected from so corpulent a subject.

[8] After his second unsuccessful attempt at marriage, Tony Weller clearly misses his friends and life as a coachman, and intends to return to that occupation.