Written in the middle of the 19th century, the novel shows us a very different world than what we know today. Customs have changed. Geography has changed. Language has changed. Perhaps most significantly cultural references have changed.
An old woman has a pet bird named Gammon. The name means nothing to me, and perhaps not to you. A note tells us the word means nonsense or humbug. (A few weeks ago I did a blog post about odd words meaning nonsense. I missed this one.)
A character is given a glass of negus. What's that? It turns out to be a mixture of hot water, port, sugar and lemons.
"I am in the Downs," a character says. That turns out to be an expression meaning depression.
Reading the novel, one feels the original readers must have much more literate than we are today, for they didn't need footnotes to understand all the many references to Shakespeare, Milton, the Bible and a variety of poets. Did people read more then than they do now? Perhaps, or perhaps they just read different things. In today's world cultural reference are more likely to be movies and popular music or television shows. A few politicians and movie stars may sometimes gain mention in today's novels. If anyone should read these novels two centuries from now, those readers will also certainly need footnotes.
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