_JOHN LEECH._
John Leech, "born in Bennett Street, Stamford Street, 29th August, 1817,
and baptized (son of John Leech, vintner) 15th November, at Christ
Church, Blackfriars Road." Such is the entry I find in the manuscript
diary of his friend the late Shirley Brooks, now before me, written a
few days after the death of the gifted and lamented artist. The "John
Leech, vintner," his father, here referred to, was at one time
proprietor of the London Coffee House on Ludgate Hill. A late
commentator says he "was an Irishman, a man of fine culture, a profound
Shakespearian scholar, and [presumably by way of apology--as if any such
were needed] a thorough gentleman." Be this as it may, he was not
successful as a landlord, and as a matter of fact depended in a great
measure for his support upon the talents of his remarkably gifted son.
EARLY DAYS.
Leech was only seven years old when his father sent him to the
Charterhouse. His arm had been broken by a fall from a pony, and the
effects of this accident debarred him from taking an active part in the
athletic sports of cricket, hockey, or football; but his nature inclined
him nevertheless to manly exercises, and despite his excellence with the
pencil, which was manifested at a remarkably early age, he is said to
have preferred the lessons of Angelo the fencing, to those of Burgess
the drawing, master. He was not distinguished at school as a classical
scholar, and Latin verses in particular proved so serious a
stumbling-block that he always got a schoolfellow to do them for him.
His famous friend and fellow-pupil, Thackeray, carried an indelible
personal reminiscence of the Charterhouse about him in the shape of a
broken nose, a mark of distinction which was earned in a pugilistic
encounter with another schoolfellow.
A reminiscence of John Leech's schoolboy days will be found in one of
his illustrations to "Once a Week,"[126] which represents a schoolboy
perched in the topmost branches of a tree overlooking the walls of the
Carthusian playground. As the mail coaches bound to the north passed the
Charterhouse walls in the old coaching days, the boys not seeing any
just reason why they should be debarred from the exhilarating spectacle,
notched the trees and drove in spikes at ticklish points, which enabled
them to mount to the upper branches, whence they could watch the coaches
at their leisure. The illustration referred to is labelled, _A Coach
Tree_, but without this explanation the reader would scarcely suspect
(the letterpress being of course silent on the subject) that the
schoolboy represented in the illustration is the artist himself. Leech
always retained a pleasant recollection of his old Carthusian
school-days, and frequently attended the festivities of the
Charterhouse.
His early aptitude for the pencil was developed when he was only three
years of age. One of his early efforts attracted the attention of
Flaxman the sculptor, who advised that he should "not be cramped with
lessons in drawing; let his _genius_," he said, "follow its own bent,
and he will astonish the world." This advice was so far followed, that
we believe we are justified in saying that beyond the ordinary
perfunctory drawing lessons obtained at school, he received no other
artistic education during the rest of his life. His father, the
"profound Shakesperian scholar" and "perfect gentleman," so little
encouraged the bent of the boy's genius, that if he had had his way he
would have driven this square peg into a very round hole. At sixteen
years of age he took his son from the Charterhouse, and shortly
afterwards apprenticed him to an eccentric person at Hoxton, nominally
carrying on the profession of a surgeon, and rejoicing in the name of
Whittle.
[Illustration:
JOHN LEECH. "_Illuminated Magazine._"
THE MAYOR AND CORPORATION OF SWINESTEAD WAIT UPON MR. BAGGES.
_Face p. 278._]
This Whittle proved a perfect study to the young artist, and it is
possible that his connection with this eccentric personage had some
influence in deciding him not to follow a profession for which he had
but little sympathy. Whittle was a man of large frame and muscular
development, so far at least as the upper part of his body was
concerned, but the development extended no farther, his legs being
formed on much more slender proportions. His tastes were decidedly
athletic; he had rings let into the wall for the purpose of practising
gymnastics, and delighted in posing before his amused pupils in the
character of "The Dying Gladiator," "Hercules," and other antique
statues. The few patients he possessed had small chance of professional
attendance when Mr. Whittle was in training for a walking or running
match, or any other amateur athletic engagement. "When," says Shirley
Brooks, "lady patients, taking a walk, are suddenly surrounded by a
hurrying and shouting crowd, in the middle of which, as they escape,
they behold their medical adviser, in quaint attire, rushing to pick up
stones with his mouth, an early termination of the relations between the
healer and his patients is not impossible."[127] A person of this kind
was obviously out of his element in a _learned_ profession, and this
Whittle eventually recognised, and descended to his level by marrying
one of his patients, a widow who kept a neighbouring public. He found
himself more "at home" behind the bar in his shirt sleeves, and with
ready facility adapted himself to circumstances by drawing beer for his
former pupils and patients. Various stories have been told of this
eccentric personage, who is said (with what truth we know not) to have
commenced life as a Quaker, and ended it eventually as a missionary.
"RAWKINS."
Whittle the eccentric was afterwards immortalized by Leech as "Rawkins"
in Albert Smith's "Adventures of Mr. Ledbury," which made their
appearance in "Bentley's Miscellany." We cannot advise those who would
enjoy a hearty laugh to do better than refer to Leech's comical etchings
of _The Return of Hercules from a Fancy Ball_ (on a wet night, without
his latchkey), and the _Last Appearance of Mr. Rawkins in Public_, in
which the _rencontre_ of Mr. Whittle and some of his female patients
already referred to is superbly realized.
When Mr. Whittle and his practice had finally parted company in the
manner we have described, John Leech's indentures were transferred to
Dr. John Cockle, afterwards physician to the Royal Free hospital. During
part of his spasmodic medical course, he went through the mystic
performance at one time known as "walking the hospitals," and at St.
Bartholomew's varied his attendance at the anatomical lectures of Mr.
Stanley--where he met other square pegs intended for round holes, Albert
Smith and Percival Leigh--with sketches of his fellow-pupils and their
medical lecturers. Many of these, the earliest of his sketches, were in
the possession of his friend, the late Mark Lemon. Before his time was
out, Leech luckily resolved to throw his medical studies to the winds,
and to live wholly by the practice of his art.
His first work, published when he was eighteen years of age, was
entitled "Etchings and Sketchings by A. Pen, Esq.," and consisted of
four quarto sheets, containing slightly caricature sketches of oddities
of London life, such as cabmen, policemen, street musicians, and the
like. He next tried his hand at lithography, and produced some political
satires not without ability; but these at best were merely the tentative
efforts of an artist who had not yet discovered the bent of his genius,
in consequence of being compelled to accommodate himself to the standard
of his early patrons--the printsellers. Having drawn his design, Leech
has been known in those early times to spend a weary day in search of a
buyer, by carrying the heavy stone about with him from publisher to
publisher. The style of these tentative efforts may be judged by the
work which first brought him into notice, a poor caricature of
Mulready's envelope in commemoration of the establishment of Sir Rowland
Hill's cheap postage system, a reproduction of which will be found in a
late "Biographical Sketch" by Mr. Kitton.[128] Although the pecuniary
reward of this early effort was small, people began to ask by whom it
was executed; thus it was that his subsequently well-known mark, the
leech-bottle, first came into public notice.
Specimens of these tentative efforts are of course scarce, but
occasionally the reader may fall in with odd numbers of the
"Comicalities," issued some half century ago by the proprietors of
"Bell's Life," in which may be found specimens of his early work among
impressions from the designs on wood of Kenny Meadows, "Phiz," and even
Robert Seymour.[129] Among these early efforts may also be named "The
Boys' Own Series"; "Studies from Nature"; "Amateur Originals"; the "Ups
and Downs of Life, or the Vicissitudes of a Swell"; and other etcetera.
When poor Seymour shot himself in 1836, the artist who was at first
selected to fill his place as illustrator of "Pickwick" was Robert
William Buss, who, failing however to supply the requirements of Charles
Dickens, was (as we shall afterwards see) quickly discarded. Others,
however, had applied to supply the place of the deceased artist, and
among them were Hablot Knight Browne ("Phiz"), W. M. Thackeray, and John
Leech; although the latter failed to secure the appointment, he appears
to us of all others the one best fitted to pictorially interpret the
author's creations. Thackeray was so little conscious of the bent of his
own genius that he seems at this time to have had some thoughts of
following the profession of an artist, but happily failed so completely
that he was induced to follow up his alternative art of authorship, by
which he achieved his fame and reputation. Notwithstanding his failure,
his implicit faith in his own artistic powers remained unshaken to the
end, in which belief he has been followed by one or two writers who
might have known better.
It is not until 1840 that we find Leech had matured the style and manner
which afterwards made him famous; and accordingly, in this year we find
designs which are thoroughly worthy of his reputation. Among these may
be named "The Children of the Mobility," seven lithographs (reproduced
in 1875) dealing with the humorous and pathetic episodes of the London
street arabs; "The Comic Latin Grammar"; "The Comic English Grammar";
and a now exceedingly rare _jeu d'esprit_, bearing the full title of
"The Fiddle-Faddle Fashion Book and Beau Monde a la Francaise, enriched
with numerous highly coloured figures of lady-like gentlemen,"[130] a
most amusing skit upon the absurd fashion books of the period,
containing four coloured plates of gentlemen (more than fifty figures)
in male and female costume, posed in the ridiculous and well-known
simpering style of those periodicals. All these works were produced in
conjunction with Percival Leigh, one of the artist's fellow-students at
St. Bartholomew's, and led directly to his engagement on the pages of
_Punch_, which was started the following year.
Among the rarer works published in 1840, to which John Leech contributed
the benefit of his assistance, may be mentioned a publication, entitled
"The London Magazine, Charivari, and Courier des Dames" (Simpkin,
Marshall & Co.), in which we find some portraits and other work
altogether out of the range of his usual style of illustration. The tone
of this publication was personal in the extreme. Charles Dickens had
produced (among other publications) his "Pickwick Papers," "Oliver
Twist," "Nicholas Nickleby," and at this time was engaged on the most
touching and pathetic of his stories, "The Old Curiosity Shop," which
was, however, so little appreciated by the editor of this scurrilous
publication, that we find him perpetrating the following sorry libel on
the writer and three of his contemporaries: "To cheesemongers and
others! Ready for delivery, at a halfpenny per pound, forty tons of
foundered literature; viz., Mrs. Trollope's 'Unsatis-factory Boy,'[131]
'Master Humphrey's Clock' (refer to the second meaning in 'Johnson's
Dictionary': 'an unsightly crawling thing'!), Captain Marryat's 'Alas,
Poor Jack'! and _Turpis_ Ainsworth's 'Guy _Fox_':--
'An animal cunning, unsavoury, small,
That will dirty your hands if you touch it at all.'"
So little merit had this critical periodical itself, that some rare
etchings by Hablot Knight Browne and Leech to a novel entitled "The
Diurnal Revolutions of David Diddledoff," which appeared in its pages,
failed to keep the dreary serial alive, and a quarrel ensuing between
the proprietors and himself, Browne was dismissed and Leech supplied his
place. Leech's caricature of Mulready's postage envelope, already
mentioned, appears to have led to others, and among them one by "Phiz,"
a circumstance which is referred to in the following attack: "Phiz has
found a lower deep in the lowest depths of meanness. When Leech's
admirable caricature of Mulready's postage envelope was pirated by every
tenth-rate _sketcher_, Phiz steps in to complete the work of injustice,
and advertises his caricature of the same subject at _sixpence_, thus
both borrowing the design and underselling the artist upon whose brains
he is preying as the fly upon the elk's. Well might Leech exclaim, 'Et
tu, Brute!' (and you, you brute!) Leech is a genuine artist, while Phiz
is only a bad engraver." By way of answer to this vulgar abuse, Phiz
almost immediately afterwards produced his admirable illustration of
_Quilp and the Dog_, in No. 18 of "Master Humphrey's Clock."
In the pages of this defunct periodical we find a long and virulent
article on Benjamin D'Israeli, the late Lord Beaconsfield, from which we
have disinterred the following remarkable prophecy. After referring to
his celebrated parliamentary _fiasco_, and his own prophetic words on
that memorable occasion: "You won't hear me now; but the time will come
when you _shall_ hear me!" the writer goes on to say: "That time has
never since arrived. In vain did Benjamin parody Sheridan's celebrated
saying ('It's in me, and by G---- it shall be out of me!'). He renewed
his efforts repeatedly.... But though, in consequence of his (_sic_)
moderating his tone into a semblance of humility, he is sometimes just
listened to, he has never made the slightest impression in the house,
_and we may fairly predict he never will_." The article is illustrated
by a remarkable semi-caricature likeness of the late Lord Beaconsfield,
then in his thirty-second year, which, although unsigned and altogether
different from his well-known style, we can assign to no other hand than
that of John Leech. We found our opinion on the fact that the previous
portrait is by him; that none but his etchings appear in the latter
portion of the book; and because the bird represented following the
footsteps and mimicking the walk of the young statesman, is own brother
to the celebrated Jackdaw of Rheims immortalized by Thomas Ingoldsby. So
remarkable is the likeness, that the shadow of D'Israeli's follower and
that of Saint "Jem Crow" of the Legends are identical.
ARTISTIC POSITION SECURED.
In 1840 some of John Leech's sketches were brought to the notice of the
Rev Thomas Harris Barham, which led to his engagement on the pages of
"Bentley's Miscellany," from which moment his artistic position was
secured. His first illustration was _The Black Mousquetaire_. Barham in
describing the scene, regretted, oddly enough, that he had neither the
pencil of Fuseli or Sir Joshua Reynolds at command, or had himself taken
lessons in drawing:--
"Had I done so, instead
Of the lines you have read,
I'd have given you a sketch should have filled you with dread!
Francois Xavier Auguste squatting up in his bed,
His hands widely spread,
His complexion like lead,
Ev'ry hair that he had standing up on his head,
As when, Agnes des Moulins first catching his view,
Now right and now left, rapid glances he threw,
Then shriek'd with a wild and unearthly halloo,
_Mon Dieu! v'la deux!!_
By the Pope there are two!!!"
Leech continued on the pictorial staff of "Bentley's Miscellany" ten
years; his etchings therein commence with vol. viii. (1840) and
(practically) end with vol. xxv. (1849).[132] Altogether he contributed
to this sterling periodical some one hundred and forty etchings,
illustrating (amongst numerous scattered papers) "The Ingoldsby
Legends" (with Cruikshank); Henry Cockton's "Stanley Thorn"; Charles
Whitehead's "Richard Savage"; Albert Smith's "Adventures of Mr.
Ledbury," "Fortunes of the Scattergood Family," and "The Marchioness of
Brinvilliers"; W. H. Maxwell's "Brian O'Linn," etc., etc.
From the time that he joined the _Punch_ staff, in 1841, the life of
John Leech was one of well-earned prosperity and happiness. His income
at first gradually and then rapidly increased, and he moved from the
attic which he occupied in the vicinity of Tottenham Court Road, into a
house of his own at Notting Hill. Shortly after this he married. Miss
Ann Eaton was one of those English beauties that Leech delighted to
draw; and it is related of him that he first met her walking in London,
and, following her home, noted the house in which she lived, ascertained
her name, procured an introduction, and straightway married her. The
issue of this marriage was two children--a boy and a girl. The
former--John George Warrington Leech, the miniature counterpart of his
father in appearance and dress, and inheriting in a marvellous degree
his talent for drawing--was unfortunately drowned at South Adelaide in
1876.
Leech's hand appears for the first time in the fourth number of _Punch_
(7th August, 1841),[133] to which he contributed the well-known
full-page illustration of _Foreign Affairs_. His first cartoon, _A
Morning Call_, will be found at page 119 of vol. ii., and the reader
will find it worth his while to refer to it for the purpose of comparing
it with the later and better work with which he afterwards enriched the
pages of this famous serial, which mainly through his instrumentality
was steered into the current of prosperity which carried it--after a
time of considerable doubt and perplexity--[134] steadily onwards. One
of _Punch's_ most celebrated contributors has borne testimony to the
value of his services. "Mr. Punch," says Thackeray in reviewing his
friend's contributions in 1854, "has very good reason to smile at the
work and be satisfied with the artist. Mr. Leech, his chief contributor,
and some kindred humourists with pencil and pen, have served Mr. Punch
admirably.... There is no blinking the fact that in Mr. Punch's cabinet
John Leech is the right-hand man."[135] That this was true is proved by
the fact that during his connection with _Punch_, extending over a
period of three and twenty years, he executed no less than three
thousand pictures, of which at least six hundred are cartoons.[136] No
wonder that when he lay dead, Shirley Brooks--another valued
contributor, and afterwards editor of _Punch_--mournfully acknowledged
that the good ship had lost its "mainsail."[137]
THE "ILLUMINATED MAGAZINE."
Most admirable examples of his designs on wood will be found in the
first three volumes of "The Illuminated Magazine," a delightful serial
which appeared in 1843-4, which also contains a series of etchings on
copper of unusual size and brilliancy. Associated with him on the pages
of this periodical, which is now seldom met with, were his friends
Thomas Hood and Mark Lemon, Douglas Jerrold and Laman Blanchard, Albert
Smith and Angus Bethune Reach, Samuel Lover and Kenny Meadows. The world
was young with authors and artists alike in those days; the youngest of
the band were William Hepworth Dixon, then aged twenty-two; John Leech,
twenty-six; and Wilkie Collins, literally not "out of his teens," one of
whose earliest literary productions we find here under the title of "The
Last Stage Coachman," illustrated by Hine. In these volumes appeared
Douglas Jerrold's delightful allegory of the "Chronicles of Clovernook,"
to which the veteran Kenny Meadows contributed some of the most quaint
and original of his sketches.
[Illustration:
JOHN LEECH. "_Illuminated Magazine._"
THE ELECTION.
_Face p. 286._]
John Leech's portrait appears in three of the _Punch_ sketches--two only
of which are due to his own hand; the first in January, 1846, in one
wherein a servant maid is depicted as saying, "If you please, sir,
here's the printer's boy called again;" again, in January, 1847, where
we find him playing the clarionet as one of the orchestra at _Mr.
Punch's Fancy Ball_. Other performers are--Mayhew, cornet; Percival
Leigh, double bass; Gilbert a Beckett, violin; Richard Doyle, clarionet;
Thackeray, piccolo; Tom Taylor, piano; while Mark Lemon, the conductor,
appeals to Jerrold to somewhat moderate his assaults on the drum.
Another hand portrays him seven years later, as armed with a porte
crayon he rides his hobbyhorse at an easel which does duty for a hurdle,
Jerrold is playing skittles, Thackeray holds the bat at a game of
cricket, and Mark Lemon is engaged at rackets.
DOUGLAS JERROLD.
Amongst the early _literary_ contributors to _Punch_ were Mark Lemon,
Horace Mayhew, Gilbert a Beckett, Stirling Coyne, W. H. Wills, H. P.
Grattan, Douglas Jerrold, Percival Leigh, and Dr. Maginn. Albert Smith
joined the staff through the introduction of his friend Leech; Thackeray
was a later acquisition, in 1844. It was scarcely to be expected that
the brilliant and the lesser wits who shed their lustre on the early
volumes of _Punch_, and were brought together at the weekly council
dinners, would invariably agree;--Jerrold and Thackeray, for instance,
entertained a sort of constitutional antipathy to one another, and the
latter, it must not be forgotten, was (in the words of Anthony Trollope)
"still struggling to make good his footing in literature" at the time he
joined the ranks of the _Punch_ parliament. Jerrold could not veil his
contempt for Albert Smith, angrily asking Leech at one of the _Punch_
gatherings, with reference to the former's free and easy method of
addressing his friend, "Leech, how long is it necessary for a man to
know you before he can call you 'Jack'?" When A Beckett announced his
"Comic History of England," in 1846, the strong mind of Jerrold recoiled
in horror from what he deemed a sacrilege. Writing to Charles Dickens in
reference to the announcement, he said, "After all, life has something
serious in it. It cannot be _all_ a Comic History of Humanity. Some men
would, I believe, write the Comic Sermon on the Mount. Think of a Comic
History of England! The drollery of Alfred! the fun of Sir Thomas More
in the Tower! the farce of his daughter begging the dead head, and
clasping it in her coffin, on her bosom! Surely the world will be sick
of this blasphemy!" "The Comic History of England" appeared,
notwithstanding, and was followed afterwards by the "Comic History of
Rome;" and however we may sympathize with the honest indignation of
Jerrold, and condemn the questionable taste of A Beckett, we have at
least to thank the latter for some of the drollest and most original
designs which ever emanated from the pencil of John Leech.
The eccentric and original costumes in which he draped the classical
characters of Rome appear to have been a favourite idea with the artist.
Shirley Brooks relates that he first made his acquaintance at a fancy
ball given at the house of their mutual friend, the late John Parry.
"Leech's costume," says the late editor of _Punch_, "I well remember. It
was something like Charles Mathews, as chorus to Medea. The black
trousers and patent leather boots of decorous life were below; but above
was the classic tunic. Then in addition he wore a fine new hat, round
which, instead of around his head, was the laurel wreath; and the Greek
ideal was brought into further discomfiture by a pair of spectacles and
an exceedingly neat umbrella." This comical idea will be found
ridiculously amplified in his amazing designs to "The Comic History of
Rome."
ALBERT SMITH.
Medical student, novelist, dramatist, humourist, and showman--for some
of us still remember his diorama of "The Overland Route"--the most
fortunate venture of Albert Richard Smith (to give him his full name)
was his ascent of Mont Blanc, which formed the theme of a
well-remembered lecture, in which his perils amid rocky pinnacle,
snow-field, and glacier lost nothing by the graphic mode in which they
were related. This "ascent," by the way, proved a source of profit to
others besides himself; and we should be curious to know the number of
Chamounix guides and hotel-keepers who were enabled through his indirect
means to retire into private life. The memory of Albert Smith is
deservedly cherished by the inhabitants of the distant Savoyard valley,
for he made the ascent of the "Monarch of Mountains" popular among his
countrymen, and thereby sowed the seed of a succession of golden
harvests, of which the primitive but thoroughly wide-awake peasantry
were by no means slow to profit. Dissimilar in many respects, Albert
Smith and John Leech had this bond of sympathy between them, that both
were old friends, and both had nominally studied for the medical
profession; and whilst Leech attained at St. Bartholomew's that
practical knowledge of anatomical drawing which did him such good
service in his artistic career, Albert Smith at Middlesex Hospital and
the _Hotel Dieu_ appears to have picked up that intimate acquaintance
with London and Parisian student life which he displays in the
"Adventures of Mr. Ledbury."
The "New Monthly" for 1844 contains two etchings by Leech to "The Lord
of Thoulouse" and "The Wedding Day," which seem to call for notice,
because they are not to be found in the collected edition of the
"Ingoldsby Legends." In the collected edition he shows us little Jack
Ingoldsby _before_ he entered the fatal cellar, while in the "New
Monthly" we see him lying dead at the feet of the weird buccaneer, who
points with grim irony at the little corpse by way of caveat to those
who would broach his wine. From the "New Monthly" etching George
Cruikshank borrowed the idea for his illustration of the same subject in
the 1864 edition. There is a difference, of course, but the fact will
become ridiculously patent to any one who has an opportunity of
comparing the two designs. This, by the way, is not the only instance in
the '64 edition in which Cruikshank borrowed his idea from John
Leech,[138] which at one time he would have scorned to do, a fact which
affords the strongest possible evidence of the decadence of George's
once unrivalled powers of invention, imagination, and fancy.
Leech it will be remembered obtained a footing on the staff of
"Bentley's Miscellany" at the time when George Cruikshank was leaving
it. Cruikshank, however, was an admirer of the genius of Leech, and when
they laid him in his untimely grave in Kensal Green Cemetery, on the 4th
November, 1864, the veteran artist was among the crowd of distinguished
men who looked sorrowfully on. The influence which George Cruikshank
exercised upon the genius of Leech will be apparent to any one who has
given attention to the early etchings of the latter. This influence will
be particularly discernible in the illustrations to "Richard Savage" and
"The Marchioness of Brinvilliers." Both were men of genius, but Leech's
fancy was of a tamer kind, and little inclined him in the direction of
the supernatural or the terrible. Leech, for instance, never produced
anything which equalled _Fagin in the Condemned Cell_; _The Murder of
Sir Rowland Trenchard_; _Xit Wedded to the Scavenger's Daughter_; _Jack
o' Lantern_; or the reverie of the _Triumph of Cupid_. We shall find but
few diabolicals in his gallery of pictorial subjects, notwithstanding
which there is not a fiend in the whole of Cruikshank's demon ranks who
equals Leech's devil in Thomas Ingoldsby's legend of "The
House-warming."
It may seem invidious to institute a comparison between the two men.
Some, indeed, may hold that a comparison is impossible; but we will
quickly show that such a comparison is not only possible but
unavoidable. George Cruikshank, for instance, might or might not have
illustrated the "Comic Histories" of England and of Rome better than
John Leech; we may fancy, however, his hand on the Surtees' novels, the
odd men, the strange coats, the eccentric women, the podgy "cockhorses,"
the wonderful dogs that would have put in an appearance in the various
sporting scenes and incidents which form the subject of these "horsey"
romances; we should like, for instance, to see what he would have made
of the pretty serving woman who figures in the frontispiece of "Ask
Mamma;" how he would have treated the fair "de Glancey"; how he would
have grouped and dressed his figures at _The Handley Cross Ball_; how he
would have treated poor old Jorrocks when he fell into the shower bath.
But, admirable as are Leech's book illustrations and etchings, it is in
the minor designs which he executed for _Punch_ during the short quarter
of a century allotted to him that we must seek for Leech's _genius_: it
is these little drawings which place him in the front rank of nineteenth
century graphic satirists. They are characterized by genuine humour and
satire, unalloyed with a single trace of ill-humour, exaggeration, or
vulgarity. It was in this direction that the artistic instincts of poor
Robert Seymour inclined him; but his imagination and invincible tendency
to exaggerate, inherited from the caricaturists who preceded him, failed
to bear him beyond the limited sphere of cockney sports and cockney
sportsmen in which his soul delighted. Here, we have the swells and
vulgarians, the flunkies and servants, the old men and maidens, the
soldiers, the parsons, the pretty women of English everyday life, placed
in situations more or less embarrassing, but presenting nevertheless
perfect types of the respective classes thus harmlessly and admirably
satirized. In this lies their chief value, and as years roll on and the
_Punch_ volumes become scarce, this value will necessarily increase.
ABHORRENCE FOR FRENCHMEN.
A shy and unobtrusive member of the society in which he moved, and which
delighted in the enjoyment of his friendship, John Leech was the keenest
of observers, noting and satirizing as no one before his time had
attempted, or indeed had been able to do, the cant and hypocrisy, the
pride and selfishness, the upstart and arrogant exclusiveness, the
insular prejudices and weaknesses, which form a part of our national
character; but doing this, he loved his countrymen and countrywomen for
their finer qualities, and hated the bungling foreigners who presume to
caricature them without the barest knowledge of their subject. This is
the secret of the hearty abhorrence which Leech always testified for
Frenchmen. The ignorance of his countrymen on the subject of English
women has been amusingly ridiculed by one of the most distinguished of
their own writers--Eugene Sue, in his novel of "Mathilde":--"_That_ an
Englishwoman! Nonsense; there is nothing more easy to recognise than an
Englishwoman; you have only to look at her dress; it is simple enough,
in all conscience! A straw bonnet all the year through; a pink spencer;
a Scotch plaid petticoat, and bright green or lemon-coloured boots; you
may see the costume any day in _Les Anglaises pour rire_, at the
_Varietes_. We all know it is a Vaudeville, and it would not be publicly
acted unless it were authentic. I repeat it once more, ever since this
world has been a world, Englishwomen--real genuine Englishwomen--have
never been differently dressed." M. Taine, who devoted himself to the
study of our language and literature, and spent much time amongst us,
has (if I remember rightly) admitted the errors which prevail amongst
his countrymen and women with reference to ourselves; but such observers
as M. Taine and M. Sue are unfortunately rare in France, and many have
essayed to depict us, with as much knowledge of their subject as our Sir
John Maundeville possessed when he sat down to write his absurd but
quaint and amusing "Book of Voiage and Travaile." John Leech resented
this deplorable ignorance on the part of our neighbours; and the _Punch_
volumes are filled with biting sarcasms on French habits, manners, and
sentiments, which were keenly felt, because, unlike the English who
figure at the Varietes or in French caricatures, in the dirty men who
regard with astonishment the English washstand at the exhibition, the
cabs full of hirsute monstrosities, the "Flowers of the French army,"
the grimy Revolutionists of Leicester Square--the hundred and one
Frenchmen who figure in the satires of John Leech, the Parisian
recognises compatriots whose ridiculous lineaments have been too
faithfully reproduced to render identification a matter of doubt or
difficulty.
Leech executed very few illustrations for Dickens; and the amusing
blunder which he perpetrated in "The Battle of Life," in allowing the
lady to elope with the wrong man, and the "horror and agony" of the
author in consequence thereof, have been set forth in Forster's "Life."
The mistake was discovered too late for correction, and remains a
curious proof of the carelessness with which distinguished artists will
sometimes read the manuscript of an author however illustrious.
[Illustration:
JOHN LEECH. "_Illuminated Magazine._"
"I HOPE MR. SMUG, YOU DON'T BEAT YOUR BOYS?"
_Face p. 292._]
The Surtees' novels afford singular evidence of the keenness of John
Leech's critical observation. An ardent lover of sport himself, and a
frequent attendant at the "Pytchley," when he went a day's hunting it
was his custom to single out some fellow disciple of Nimrod that
happened to take his fancy, keeping behind him all day, noting his
attitudes in the saddle, and marking every item of his turn-out, to the
last button and button-hole of his hunting coat. It was in this way that
he obtained the correctness of detail which renders his famous sporting
etchings so wonderfully true to nature. Strange to say, notwithstanding
his knowledge of every detail of the huntsman's dress, even to the
number of buttons on his coat, he himself, with reference to his own
outfit, invariably presented in the hunting field a somewhat incongruous
appearance. Either he would wear the wrong kind of boots, or would
dispense with some detail which on the part of an enthusiast would be
considered an unpardonable omission. Leech, however, was not what is
called a "rough rider," his constitutional nervousness prevented him
indeed from making a prominent figure in the hunting field, and his
friends attributed this want of attention to detail in dress to his
sensitiveness to criticism, and his unwillingness to place himself in
any position which would be likely to incur it.
FOOTNOTES:
[126] Vol. iii., 1860.
[127] Shirley Brooks in the _Illustrated London News_, 19th Nov.,
1864.
[128] George Redway, 12, York Street, Covent Garden.
[129] They include also some (pirated) impressions from the designs
of George Cruikshank, which set that irritable genius, as might have
been expected, in a fume.
[130] Chapman & Hall, 186, Strand, 1st November, 1840.
[131] "Adventures of Michael Armstrong, the Factory Boy."
[132] He subsequently returned to it for a short time only.
[133] The serial commenced 17th July, 1841.
[134] That this was the case, see Mr. Joseph Hatter's "With a Show in
the North;" see also a remarkable letter of Mr. William Tegg in the
_Athenaeum_ of 16th October, 1875.
[135] Thackeray in the _Quarterly_.
[136] I calculate that the minor drawings number about 2,500; if to
these we add 638 cartoons, we get a sum total of over 3,100
illustrations for _Punch_ alone. If we say nearly 1,000 for Mr.
Surtees' sporting novels, without taking into account Leech's other
work, we may form some notion of his untiring industry.
[137] MS. Diary of Shirley Brooks (October 31st, 1864).
[138] Compare, for instance, Leech's _Black Mousquetaire_ in the
original edition with Cruikshank's reproduction of the same subject
in the '64 edition.