In this description of Coketown on the morning of Stephen’s departure, Dickens uses alliteration:
Domestic fires were not yet lighted, and the high chimneys had the sky to themselves. Puffing out their poisonous volumes, they would not be long in hiding it [...], some of the many windows were golden, which showed the Coketown people a sun eternally in eclipse, through a medium of smoked glass.
The alliteration adds a quality of musicality and lyricism to this otherwise unremarkable morning in Coketown. This aligns with the perspective of Stephen himself, who is looking at the city for the last time.
The tone of the scene is mournful and elegiac, as Stephen unwillingly leaves his home and Rachael behind to begin what he believes is a new life. The alliteration in the passage makes the reader more aware of the images within (the “eternal eclipse” of the sun, the “high chimneys,” the “poisonous volumes” of smoke), which weigh heavily on Stephen as he departs. The writing forces the reader to linger on these visual details, as the eye might linger on a landscape.
At this moment in the narrative, Stephen is certainly lingering, taking in the city for a final time before leaving it. Likewise, the alliteration in this paragraph draws attention to the language within the passage, and slows the process of reading, so that the audience is forced to take leave of Coketown at the same pace that Stephen does.
