these, as well as the "Militia Meeting" and "The Deserter," while "A
Visit to the Camp" and "A Camp Scene" belong to the same class of
subject. The characterisation of "Recruits" is excellent, from the smart
young officer to the rustic awkwardness of the two recruits, and the
more dangerous self-approval of the third; behind we see a chawbacon
grinning at the scene, beneath the portentous sign of "The Old Fortune,"
with its painting of a wooden-legged and armless veteran. "A Visit to
the Camp" gives just such a scene--save that the characters are in
eighteenth-century costume--as might be witnessed even to-day, when
parents, aunts and cousins visit their young hopeful amid the martial
surroundings of his volunteer camp; and here, too, may be mentioned a
series of single figures in military costume--a "Life-guardsman," "Light
Infantryman," "Light-horseman" and a "Foot-soldier." These were all
published by Macklin. The foot-soldier's uniform appears in "Recruits";
the handsome uniform of the Light-horseman, with its plumed helmet and
high boots, in "A Visit to the Camp," and again in "The Deserter."
While Bunbury was thus occupied with his military career his wife, whom
he had left in lodgings in Pall Mall, gave him their second son, to whom
Sir Joshua Reynolds stood godfather. Is it too much to suggest that
this latter is the artist caricatured in that delightful "Family Piece,"
of which I also hope to give an illustration; and which may have been
suggested to our artist by the scene in his friend Oliver Goldsmith's
masterpiece, "The Vicar of Wakefield"?
To the next period of Bunbury's life--when war's alarms were over and
the camp at Coxheath broken up--belong many of his best prints of
English country life. He was living now in Suffolk, and his print of the
"Country Club" is said to have depicted to the life an institution of
that nature in quiet old Bury St. Edmunds; while "Conversazione" and the
"Sulky Club" display the social efforts of the period, and his famous
"Barber's Shop," which Knight engraved in 1783, comes into this part of
his career.
=_By H. W. Bunbury_ THE FAMILY PIECE=
To his visits to the West of England and North Wales about this time we
owe some charming sketches--the two "Wynnstay Theatre Tickets," for
instance, dating from some visit to Sir Watkin Williams Wynn when
theatricals were in the air at Wynnstay, and that lovely print of "The
Modern Graces," drawn, it is said, from the three beautiful Misses
Shakespere during the stay of our artist at Aston; while those two
prints of "Peasants from the Vale of Llangollen" hint at some pleasant
ramble in the Welsh hills. Bunbury excelled, in fact, in a class of
subject which does not strictly fall within our notice, since we are
treating him here as a caricaturist, but which must by no means be
neglected by those who appreciate his work.
These are what may be characterised as fancy sketches, which are often,
in his hand, singularly graceful and charming in treatment and
conception. "The Song," "The Dance," and "Morning Employments" may be
mentioned especially among these, all these three having been entrusted
to the graver of the famous Bartolozzi. Indeed, in writing of
Bartolozzi,[7] I found it impossible to leave Bunbury out of my subject,
and said of this artist: "He supplied the engraver with some charming
drawings, mostly of English girls in simple country dress--such as the
'Sophia and Olivia,' drawn for Goldsmith's 'Vicar of Wakefield,' where
one of the girls touches a guitar and the other holds a roll of music;
or, again, that very lovely print, a copy of which is in the Victoria
and Albert collection, where three young girls dance hand in hand to
the strain which a country lad seated near them is piping. 'The Song,'"
I added, "a pendant to this, is no less charming."
"Love and Honour" is another of Bartolozzi's prints from Bunbury,
representing a Light-Cavalry soldier taking leave of a pretty country
girl, and bearing the legend:
"Hark! the drum commands
Honour! I attend thee!
Love, I kiss thy hands!"
"Lucy of Leinster" and "Bothwell's Lament," it may be noted, are by the
same engraver. Apart from its own beauty the engraving of "The Dance" is
of especial interest, since the three figures dancing are said to be
taken from those famous beauties of the time, the Misses Gunning; and in
his "Love and Hope," "Love and Jealousy," and a "Tale of Love," which
Bartolozzi's pupil, J. K. Sherwin, engraved for him, he follows with
success the same class of subject. It is the sentimental charm, which
streams from the fair Angelica Kauffman's pencil and kept busy the best
engravers of the time, notably Bartolozzi, Ryland, Sherwin, and Tomkins,
which here attracts the soldier and caricaturist, who was also the
devoted lover and husband; and in these prints, though the initiative
and conception is certainly our artist's, it is difficult to know how
much we may not owe to the practised hand of such an engraver as
Francesco Bartolozzi.
But certainly this side of art was treated by Henry Bunbury freely, and
with marked success, and the list would be a long one if we were to
attempt to chronicle all. "Edwin and Ethelinda," "Black-eyed Susan,"
"Auld Robin Gray" (a charming colour-print, also engraved by
Bartolozzi), "Adelaide in the Garden" (by the same engraver), the
charming "Songstress," "Charlotte and Werther's meeting," "Margaret's
Tomb," "The Girl of Snowdon," "The Girl of Modena," "Marianna,"
"Cicely," and that sweet "Country Maid" engraved by J. R. Smith in 1782,
and whose legend tells us:
"No care but Love can discompose her breast,
Love of all cares the sweetest and the best."
His illustrations to Macklin's Shakespeare come nearer to our subject
proper, and here we have the whole Falstaff episode very fully and very
humourously illustrated; while Launce and his dog, whom he "would have
to behave as a dog at all things," may be compared in our artist's
treatment of canine life with his "Black George," the Suffolk
gamekeeper.
Was it, we may here ask, in returning to the story of our artist's life,
that fatal quality, the artistic temperament, or was it his charming
social qualities, his frequent visits to great houses and corresponding
expenses, which had brought Henry Bunbury at this time into financial
difficulties?
His military connection, which had led to his appointment as A.D.C. to
the Duke of York, was too important to be neglected even under these
conditions.
Hence it is that in 1788 we find the Bunburys settled in London at
Whitehall. Our artist was now, from his Court position and his own
tastes, thrown into the midst of London social life; and this new life
in all its features begins to reproduce itself in his caricatures. "Hyde
Park," "The Coffee House Patriots," "The Chop House," "Richmond Hill,"
"Bethnal Green," and the large print of a "Fete at Carlton House" (at
which no doubt he was present in attendance on the Duke), belong to this
period of his life.
Bath he no doubt knew well already from his visits to the West of
England, where it was at this time the great rendezvous for fashionable
society; he must have himself moved in this society, and enjoyed the
study of its follies and foibles, its airs and graces, which the
dramatists of the time love to reproduce. For here certainly it was that
he gained his inspiration for the "Long Minuet," as danced at Bath, with
its line of stately dancers and its classical inscription--
"Longa Tysonum minuit
Quid velit et possit rerum concordia discors."
This is one of Bunbury's most famous prints; and justly so, for nothing
could be truer to life, especially to eighteenth-century life, and
probably to Bath of the period, than these bowing and pirouetting
figures.
In his "Lumps of Pudding" we have the same theme, but treated with a
coarser note; and yet some of the figures are excellent--notably the
stout gentleman in the corner, who has removed his wig to mop his heated
brow--the enthusiast near him who is "setting" before a dame with a
three-decker and its anchor in her hair, and the group of four who are
next the lady dancing with her pet dog. The "Long Minuet" and this last
belong to that class of caricatures in which the figures form a
continued story--a line of humour which the Germans have developed in
_Fliegende Blaetter_, which Caran d'Ache has used with success in France,
and which _Pick-Me-Up_, when it was under the able direction of Mr.
Leslie Willson, scored many a good point with.
=_By H. W. Bunbury_ A FASHIONABLE SALUTATION=
To this class, too, belongs Bunbury's famous "Propagation of a Lie,"
published in 1787. Male figures only appear in this wonderful series;
though (alas!) many of us have learnt from experience that the fair sex,
with all its charm, is not always averse to "_broder_" the simple truth,
especially when a prospect of scandal is concerned. Bath, we may feel
sure, would have offered in those days every facility of this nature, if
required; and it may be fairly assumed that the _mise-en-scene_ for this
print was the same as that of the "Long Minuet." From "Dear me! You
don't say so!" we proceed through the stages of "Heigh ho!" "O fye!"
"Indeed!" "There now!" to that lively dandy who exclaims "Ha! Ha!" and
that irascible old gentleman who is shaking his fist at him with the
reply, "God's zounds! hold your tongue!" To the same line of social
satire belong the "Front, side, and back view of a modern Gentleman,"
"Sunday Evening," "Morning, or the Man of Taste," and "Evening, or the
Man of Feeling" (engraved by J. R. Smith in 1781), and a "Fashionable
Salute," called "Salutation Tavern," of which I give a plate from the
print in my own collection. The same engraver, J. R. Smith, produced
Bunbury's sketch of "Lord Derby on Horseback," following the coach of
the lovely Miss Farren,[8] which has the motto:
"When I followed a lass that was froward and shy."
But the "lass" in question became less shy later, and complied to his
request to become Countess of Derby.
=LORD DERBY=
"Patience in a Punt," one of our artist's best-known prints, was
engraved by Rowlandson, and has acquired a good deal of his
characteristic drawing in the process; and I may mention briefly here
some prints dealing with Cambridge life--"The Hope of the Family,"
"Admission at the University," and "Pot Fair, Cambridge" (dated 1777),
as well as a series of very interesting original etchings by our artist
in the British Museum collection. Professor Colvin tells me that a
recently acquired collection there of Italian prints included several by
Bunbury; and among these may have been "John Jehu--L'Inghilterra," 1772,
and "The Dog-Barber--La Francia," 1772 (a theme which we have noted in
his print of the "Pont Neuf"), as they by their titles seem to be
evidently intended for the Italian market. By far the most interesting,
in one way, of these etchings by our artist--which date from the
beginning of his career and are often very weak in drawing--is one which
shows two boys, or men, one of whom is riding a pig; and which belongs
to the time when Bunbury was a boy at Westminster School, being thus, as
I believe, his earliest existing caricature. The British Museum is, in
fact, very rich in Bunbury's prints; and his series there of the
"Arabian Nights" (in colour, engraved by Ryder) may be noted here (the
print of "Morgiana's Dance" being especially charming), ere we turn
back to our artist's life story. In 1797 the Bunburys had taken a small
house at Oatlands, near Weybridge, to be near the Duke and Duchess of
York, who were then residing at Oatlands Park; and it was here that in
1798 Henry Bunbury had a terrible blow, in the loss of his wife at the
early age of forty-five years. The beautiful face and figure of
Catherine Horneck had often appeared in our artist's fancy subjects;
their life together seems to have been a very happy one, and we may
believe that he never entirely recovered from this loss, for the next
thirteen years of his life after her decease were spent by him in
comparative retirement. He left Oatlands, and probably also, then or
later, his official post at Court, and came to live in the Lake Country,
where he had Robert Southey as his friend; it was at Keswick that he
died, in 1811, and lies buried there far away from the grave of his wife
in Weybridge Church.
His prints form a link in our knowledge of eighteenth-century social
life in England which we could ill afford to lose. Not always very
strong in drawing, his humour is genuine, wholesome, spontaneous; his
sense of beauty, in subjects outside of pure caricature, often very
fascinating and refined; while in both classes of subject he remains
happily free from that coarseness which disfigures to some extent the
great caricaturists whom I shall treat of in my next two chapters. A
charming personality--all his work seems to tell us--and a lovable man;
English to the core, in the best sense, fond of his home, fond of
outdoor life, fond of his joke, but a joke whose laughter has no
bitterness or malice, and leaves no bad taste behind.
="LUMPS OF DELIGHT" BY H. W. BUNBURY=
="LUMPS OF PUDDING" BY H. W. BUNBURY=
IV
THE COMEDY OF POLITICS
In treating here of English eighteenth-century caricature, I find that
the conditions of space at my command in this work compel me, in order
to do my subject any justice at all, to focus my reader's interest on
certain central figures, who typify, each in themselves, one side or
other of their art; and to pass by more slightly some of the lesser men,
whose interest is either divided or secondary.
Such a towering personality in caricature as James Gillray comes
necessarily into the first of these categories; such draughtsmen as
Woodward or Sayer into the second.
Woodward comes near to Bunbury in style and subject, and like him seems
to have preferred social satire, though occasionally--as in his "General
Complaint," of 1796--he touches political topics of the time. Sayer,
belonging to the period of Gillray, is, like him, essentially a
political caricaturist. James Sayer was the son of a merchant captain,
and had been put to the profession of attorney: but caricature attracted
him more than law, and, having gained the notice and interest of the
younger Pitt, he attached himself to his service with such industry and
success that Charles James Fox is said to have remarked that Sayers'
caricatures had cost him more votes than all the speeches in the House
of Commons.
In fact, just as certain modern English politicians,--Lord Palmerston in
earlier days, and, in later, Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Joseph
Chamberlain--seem to have been singled out (a compliment this to the
public interest in their personality) as especial targets for the
caricaturist's shaft, so Fox was throughout the object of Sayer's
constant devotion. His first effort was directed against the Rockingham
Ministry of 1782; but far happier was his "Paradise Lost," published on
the fall of that Administration, which shows the once happy pair, Fox
and Burke, turned away from their previous Paradise, the Treasury, over
whose gate appears the menacing head of Lord Shelburne--who succeeded
them at the head of the Cabinet, Pitt being Chancellor of the
Exchequer--with others of his Ministerial colleagues above ...
... "the gate
With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms.
Some natural tears they dropt, but wiped them soon;
The world was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide."
James Gillray made his entry into English political caricature almost at
the same date as Sayer--namely in 1782--with his caricatures on the
subject of Rodney's naval victory. His father was of Scotch descent, and
having been wounded as a soldier at the battle of Fontenoy--where he
lost his arm--he became in later life an out-pensioner of Chelsea
Hospital; so that it was in Chelsea that James, his son, was born. Like
William Hogarth he too was put in his early years to letter engraving;
but, becoming tired of this rather dull employment, he ran away and
joined a company of strolling players, sharing in the hardships and
adventures of their roving life, perhaps taking part in such scenes as
Hogarth had depicted in his famous print, where the company have
successfully "stormed" their barn and are getting ready--dressing-rooms
being at a discount--for the next performance.
But Gillray's bent towards the plastic arts must have been too strong to
let him remain long in the theatre: when he returned to London he became
a student of the Royal Academy, and seems to have worked hard at
improving his drawing. He also studied under the engraver Bartolozzi;
and the result of his training begins to show itself in his engravings
of "The Deserted Village" and "The Village Train," published in 1784 to
illustrate Goldsmith's poem, and in his imitations of drawings by
Lavinia, Countess Spencer. But, though successful as an engraver, and
even as a painter, it was as a caricaturist that he was destined to win
his lasting fame. Here his individuality came at once to the front;
though even when a professional caricaturist he continued the practice
of engraving and painting, as his portraits of William Pitt and numerous
engravings bear witness.
The political history of England was then approaching a most dramatic
epoch, and this--even apart from Gillray's marvellous natural aptitude
in this direction--might well have tempted him to choose politics as his
special subject. The French and American wars had scarcely yet left
men's memories; a King was on the throne who had joined to no great
political sagacity or insight a stubborn determination to govern; and
the clash of political issues, the struggle of the two great traditional
English parties, was intensified and rendered more brilliant by the
figures of famous statesmen or orators--such as Pitt, Fox, Burke, and
Sheridan, and, but in a lesser degree, Thurlow and Shelburne.
But yet further, before this very generation the tremendous and (as we
shall see it to have been) world-absorbing spectacle of the French
Revolution was to unrol itself, touching every individual in his most
intimate interests and convictions, awaking everywhere feelings of
passionate enthusiasm, or of corresponding hatred; and then, gradually,
out of that sea of blood which we know in history as the Terror, the
sinister form of Buonaparte, General, Consul, Dictator, Emperor, came to
detach itself, to blot out all lesser figures, to become a menace to the
world. All this had passed before the eyes of Gillray and his
fellow-countrymen. He saw the thundercloud arise that was to darken the
horizon. He saw the energy and genius of Pitt create one Coalition
after another, only to find them melt away before the victorious armies
of France. He saw at length--and his trumpet-call at that crisis gave no
uncertain sound--England stand alone, and find in herself the forces
that were to bring her safely through the storm.
We have noted already Sayers' caricature of the triumph of the Shelburne
Ministry in 1782; a print which had been followed by his still more
clever satire--called "Carlo Khan's Triumphant Entry into Leadenhall
Street"--on Fox's India Bill of 1783. In that same year Shelburne's
Ministry had been overthrown, and Fox and Burke came back into office
with Lord North. Against these statesmen, whether in or out of office,
Gillray's pencil became largely employed, though he was never a hired
caricaturist or kept in fee like Sayer, and all sides of politics
(including the Court and even the King himself) felt the edge of his
satire; while Lord Thurlow, the great Lord Chancellor, was in no way
neglected. Thus we find a "New Way to pay the National Debt" (1786),
"Ancient Music" (1787), "Monstrous Craws" (1787), "Frying Sprats" (1791)
and "Anti-Saccharites, or John Bull and his Family leaving off the use
of Sugar" (1792), are all directed against the reigning House, and
allude frequently to the parsimonious habits of George III. and his
Queen. The story goes that this monarch, having remarked of Gillray's
drawings, "I don't understand these caricatures," the artist drew him
("A Connoisseur Examining a Cooper," 1792) studying minutely with a
glass the miniature of Oliver Cromwell, remarking at the time: "I wonder
if the Royal Connoisseur will understand this?"
But if the economy of the King was a subject for his satire, the
opposite qualities in the Prince of Wales met with as little mercy. "The
Voluptuary under the Horrors of Digestion" (1792) gives a very clever
treatment of this latter theme; and in a "Morning after Marriage, or a
Scene upon the Continent," we seem to find the same distinguished
person, with a lady who may be the charming Mrs. Fitzherbert.
About this period, too, Lord Thurlow, in a "Westminster Hunt" (1788) and
"Market Day" (also 1788, where the motto, "Every man his price," seems
aimed at the fat kine of the House of Commons), is not forgotten; while
in "Dido Forsaken," where the Queen of France stands deserted and
desperate on her own shores, and Fox and his friends in a row-boat are
steering for Dover Castle with the remark, "I never saw her in my life!"
("No! never in his life, damme!" adds Fox at the rudder), we seem to be
already getting drawn into the maeelstrom of the French Revolution.
Perhaps to the average student the period of Gillray's work which we are
here approaching will be of most interest, because a fairly exact
knowledge of English party politics is necessary to follow with
enjoyment his earlier prints on home affairs. Gillray had treated a
French subject with success in his amusing "Landing of Sir John Bull and
his Family at Boulogne-sur-Mer," which recalls Bunbury to our thought
both in its humour and treatment. This latter artist had thoroughly
appreciated James Gillray's genius, and said of his great contemporary
that "he was a living folio, every page of which abounded with wit."
Following the order of time, which is perhaps our safest guide, "The
Bengal Levee" is a large print, full of clever portraits, "made on the
spot by an Amateur"; and "The Dagger Scene, or the Plot discovered," is
a political print which must not be omitted. But now we find ourselves
suddenly launched into the midst of the French Revolution in "French
Liberty and British Slavery" (showing a starving Jacobin praising his
own Government, and a fat John Bull at dinner abusing his); and
"Sansculottes feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty," this latter a
most inimitably clever print, whose centre is formed by John Bull, with
Fox and a sympathiser administering the Bread of Liberty on the dagger's
point, while Germany, Holland, and Italy are at the corners.[9] Gillray
had already, as we see here, taken a strongly anti-French attitude,
which he never altered, and which, no doubt, faithfully reflected the
mass of English public opinion, horrified at the excesses with which
Paris had in those days sullied the pure name of Liberty. I say
advisedly the mass, for Charles James Fox next appears in "Dumourier
dining in State at St. James's" (1793), serving up to the French General
the head of Pitt upon a dish, with the British crown thrown in as an
_entremet_. A very striking print of the same year shows the heroic
"Charlotte Corday upon her Trial" (July 17, 1793), and a figure very
like Gillray's usual rendering of Talleyrand, with two other judges,
upon the bench beneath the cap of Liberty. "The Blessings of Peace and
the Curses of War," with its inscription--"Such Britain was, such
Flanders, Spain and Holland now is (_sic_); from such a sad reverse, O
Gracious God, preserve our country!"--is an eloquent, if slightly
ungrammatical, appeal (Jan. 17, 1795) to his fellow-countrymen, an
appeal to which our artist must have been stirred by the horrible
carnage and misery which the French armies were then inflicting upon the
continent of Europe; while "John Bull ground down" (June 1, 1795) shows
the guineas being extracted from that long-suffering person, despite his
cries of "Murder"; and in "Blind-man's Buff, or Too Many for John Bull"
(June 12, 1795) he is being handed over, with Pitt's assistance, to the
kicks and plunder of the Powers of Europe.