[_Rev. Henry Lansdell, D.D., Blackheath._]
Into the processes by which these massive mounds of hardened salt are
crushed and distributed to the markets, we need not enter; nor need we
name the varieties of salt which are so distributed. We find something
more interesting in turning from California to Central India, where in
Rajputana a tremendous industry in salt is carried on, and where we may
see the same little piles of salt that we have noted in the previous
illustrations.
In the background of the large full-page picture, which we have just
passed, may be seen colossal heaps of salt, and in the foreground scores
of men, women, and children wading in the vat of sluggish brine, from
which, by dint of constant effort, emerge the little cones of white. The
overseers stand by to direct, and the scene is one of tremendous
interest and activity, punctuated by babble of voices. We get a closer
view of these cones in our last illustration, in which we find the
coolies measuring the height of the cones. One thing we miss in these
vistas of barren whiteness--the sight of the labour-saving machinery so
noticeable in our early illustrations. Is it an object-lesson in the
differences between East and West?
_A Peep into "Punch."_
By J. Holt Schooling.
[_The Proprietors of "Punch" have given special permission to reproduce
the accompanying illustrations. This is the first occasion when a
periodical has been enabled to present a selection from Mr. Punch's
famous pages._]
Part II.--1850 to 1854.
Some while ago, in the pantomime "Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves," Ali
Baba's brother, who had found his way into the secret cave, ran about in
a most ludicrous manner eagerly picking from the floor diamonds, rubies,
and emeralds as big as ostrich-eggs: as fast as he picked up another gem
he let one fall from his already loaded arms. I laughed at Ali Baba's
brother, but did not feel sympathetic.
[Illustration: 1.--THIS INITIAL LETTER "L" IS SIR JOHN TENNIEL'S FIRST
"PUNCH" DRAWING; NOVEMBER 30, 1850.]
_Now_, I do not laugh, and I do feel sympathetic with A. B.'s
brother--for in choosing these pictures from _Punch_, one no sooner
picks out a gem, with an "I'll have _you_," than on the turn of a page a
better picture comes, and the other has to be dropped. It goes as much
against my grain to leave such a host of good things hidden in _Punch_
as it went against the covetous desires of Ali Baba's wicked brother to
leave so many fine big gems behind him in the richly-stored cave.
However, Mr. Punch's whole store of riches is, after all, accessible to
anyone whose Open Sesame! is a little cheque, and so one has some
consolation for being able to show here only a very small selection from
Mr. Punch's famous gallery of wit and art which that discerning
connoisseur has been collecting during the last sixty years.
The year 1850 was a notable one for _Punch_, for then John Tenniel
joined the famous band of Punchites. His first contribution is shown in
No. 1, the beautiful initial letter _L_ with the accompanying sketch,
which, although it is nearly fifty years old, and is here in a reduced
size, yet distinctly shows even to the non-expert eye the touch of that
same wonderful hand which in this week's _Punch_ (November 26th, 1898)
drew the cartoon showing Britannia and the United States as two
blue-jackets in jovial comradeship under the sign of the "Two Cross
Flags," with jolly old landlord _Punch_ saying to them, "Fill up, my
hearties! It looks like 'dirty weather' ahead, but you two--John and
Johnathan--will see it through--_together_!"
[Illustration: 2.--JUSTIFIABLE HESITATION. 1850.]
Glancing at Nos. 2 and 3--Leech's sketch in No. 3 is, by the way, a
truthfully graphic reminder to the writer of the first time _he_
[unexpecting] heard and saw a strong Cornish cock-pheasant get up close
at his feet--we come to No. 4, which represents the British Lion (as
taxpayer) looking askance at the Prince of Wales, aged nine, on whose
behalf application had just been made for the purchase of Marlborough
House as a residence for the Prince. The portly man in the picture on
the wall is a former Prince of Wales, the Regent who became George IV.
in 1820, and who is here seen walking by the Pavilion at Brighton, built
in 1784-87 as a residence for this Prince of Wales.
[Illustration: 3.--BY LEECH. 1850.]
No. 5 is very funny, and it is one of the many _Punch_ jokes which are
periodically served up afresh in other periodicals. I have read this
joke somewhere quite lately, although it came out in _Punch_ nearly
fifty years ago.
On this score, does anyone know if the following is a _Punch_ joke? It
was lately told to me as a new joke, but I was afraid to send it to Mr.
Punch:--
Two London street-Arabs. One is eating an apple, the other gazes
enviously, and says, "Gi'e us a bite, Bill." "Sha'n't," says the
apple-eater. "Gi'e us the core, then," entreats the non-apple-eater.
"_There ain't goin' to be no core!_" stolidly replies the other, out of
his stolidly munching jaws.
[Illustration: 4.--THE PRINCE OF WALES AT AGE NINE. BY LEECH, 1850.]
The very clever drawing No. 6 is by Richard Doyle; it was published in
1850, and at the close of that year Doyle left _Punch_ owing to
_Punch's_ vigorous attack on "Popery"--the Popery scare got hold of the
public mind in 1849, and for some while _Punch_ published scathing
cartoons against Roman Catholicism. Doyle being of that faith resigned
his position and a good income through purely conscientious motives.
Although Doyle left in 1850 his work was seen in _Punch_ as lately as
1864, for when he resigned some of his work was then unpublished. This
funny illustration of "A meeting to discuss the principles of Protection
and Free Trade" was an outcome of the intensely bitter feeling between
the partisans of both sides which marked the carrying-on by Lord John
Russell of the system established by Sir Robert Peel in 1846 for
throwing open our market-doors to free trade with foreign nations.
[Illustration: 5.--A CLEAR CASE OF LIBEL. 1851.]
[Illustration: 6.--BY RICHARD DOYLE. 1850.]
No. 7 is one of the minor hits at "Papal Aggression" made by _Punch_
fifty years ago, and it is irresistibly funny.
[Illustration: 7.--THE APPARITION. 1850.]
[Illustration: 8.--THIS IS SIR JOHN TENNIEL'S FIRST CARTOON; FEBRUARY 8,
1851.]
Sir John Tenniel's first cartoon is shown in No. 8. It represents Lord
John Russell as David, backed by Mr. Punch and by John Bull, attacking
Cardinal Wiseman as Goliath, who is at the head of a host of Roman
Catholic archbishops and bishops. A very interesting mention is made by
Mr. Spielmann, in his "History of Punch," of the circumstances which
caused Tenniel to join _Punch_, and to become the greatest cartoonist
the world has produced:--
Had the Pope not "aggressed" by appointing archbishops and bishops
to English sees [This caused all the exaggerated pother and flutter
of 1849.--J. H. S.], and so raised the scare of which Lord John
Russell and Mr. Punch really seem to have been the leaders, Doyle
would not have resigned, and no opening would have been made for
Tenniel.
Sir John, indeed, was by no means enamoured of the prospect of
being a _Punch_ artist, when Mark Lemon [the editor in 1850.--J.
H. S.] made his overtures to him. He was rather indignant than
otherwise, as his line was high art, and his severe drawing above
"fooling." "Do they suppose," he asked a friend, "that there is
anything funny about _me_?" He meant, of course, in his art, for
privately he was well recognised as a humorist; and little did he
know, in the moment of hesitation before he accepted the offer,
that he was struggling against a kindly destiny.
Thus we may say that the "Popish Scare" of fifty years ago was a main
cause of the Tenniel cartoons in the _Punch_ of to-day.
[Illustration: 9.--ILLUSTRATING THE CONNECTION BY ELECTRIC CABLE BETWEEN
ENGLAND AND FRANCE. BY LEECH, 1851.]
The picture in No. 9, "The New Siamese Twins," celebrates the
successful laying of the submarine cable between Dover and Calais,
November 13, 1851: the closing prices of the Paris Bourse were known
within business hours of the same day on the London Stock Exchange. The
use by Leech of the words in the title, "Siamese Twins," refers to the
visit to this country of a Barnum-like natural monstrosity--a pair of
twins whose bodies were joined--a freak that was also the origin of a
toy sold in later years with the same title. In the year 1851 _Punch_
secured another of its most famous artists--Charles Keene--whose first
contribution is shown in No. 10.
[Illustration: 10.--THIS IS CHARLES KEENE'S FIRST "PUNCH" DRAWING;
DECEMBER 20, 1851.]
[Illustration: 11.--BY LEECH. 1851.]
[Illustration: 12.--BY LEECH. 1851.]
[Illustration: 13.--AN INCIDENT OF THE 1851 CENSUS.]
This sketch has little of a joke in it--the shakiness of drawing is
intentional [see the description given in No. 10], and the following
account of this poor little picture, so interesting as the first by
Keene, is given by Mr. G. S. Layard in his "Life and Letters of Charles
Samuel Keene":--
In 1848, Louis Napoleon had been elected to the French Presidency
...; 1849 witnessed the commencement of those violent political
struggles which were the forerunners of internal conspiracies; and
1851 saw this practical anarchy suddenly put a stop to by the
famous, or infamous, _coup d'état_ of December 2nd.
Towards the end of that month a very modest wood-cut, bearing the
legend "Sketch of the Patent Street-sweeping Machines lately
introduced at Paris" appeared on p. 264 of "Mr. Punch's" journal.
It represented a couple of cannon drawn with the waviest of
outlines, and the letter "A" marked upon the ground directly in
their line of fire [see No. 10.--J. H. S.]....
This was the first appearance of Keene's pencil in the pages which
he was destined to adorn with increasing frequency as time went on
for nearly forty years. The sketch is unsigned. Indeed, it was
only at the urgent request of his friend, Mr. Silver, in whose
brain the notion had originated, that the drawing was made, the
artist bluntly expressing his opinion that the joke was a mighty
poor one.
[Illustration: FIRST DESIGN.]
[Illustration: SECOND DESIGN.]
[Illustration: THIRD DESIGN.]
[Illustration: FOURTH DESIGN.]
[Illustration: FIFTH DESIGN.]
[Illustration: SIXTH DESIGN.]
[Illustration: 14.--MR. PUNCH'S "WARDROBE OF OLD COATS." BEING THE SIX
DESIGNS FOR THE FRONT PAGE OF THE WRAPPER OF "PUNCH" WHICH PRECEDED THE
DESIGN NOW IN USE.]
Pictures 11 to 13 bring us to No. 14, which contains small facsimile
reproductions of the six designs on the front of the _Punch_-wrapper,
which preceded the well-known design by Richard Doyle, now used every
week. These little pictures have been made direct from the original
_Punch_-wrappers in my possession, as it was found impossible to get
satisfactory prints in so small a size as these from the much larger
blocks that Messrs. Cassell and Company very kindly lent to me,
impressions from which can be seen by readers who may like to study the
detail of these designs in Mr. Spielmann's "History of Punch," which
contains a full account of them. Incidentally, it is interesting to note
that when these designs were made it would have been impossible to
obtain from them the excellent reduced facsimiles now shown, which, by
the way, have only now been obtained after several attempts--as each of
these pretty little pictures has been reduced from the full size of the
ordinary _Punch_-page.
[Illustration: 15.--BY LEECH. 1852.]
The first design was made in 1841 by A. S. Henning, Mr. Punch's first
cartoonist. In the early years of _Punch_ the design for the wrapper was
changed for each half-yearly volume, and early in 1842 the second design
was adopted: this was drawn by Hablot K. Browne ("Phiz"), who worked for
_Punch_ during 1842-1844, leaving _Punch_ in 1844, because the paper
could not at that time stand the financial strain of the two big guns,
Leech and "Phiz". H. K. Browne went back to Mr. Punch in later years,
and Mr. Spielmann has recorded that this "brave worker, who would not
admit his stroke of paralysis, but called it rheumatism, could still
draw when the pencil was tied to his fingers and answered the swaying of
his body."
The third wrapper is by William Harvey, and was used for Vol. III. of
_Punch_ in the latter part of 1842. The artist "spread consternation in
the office by sending in a charge of twelve guineas" for this third
wrapper--twelve guineas being, by the way, nearly one-half of the total
capital with which _Punch_ was started in 1841.
The fourth wrapper was designed by Sir John Gilbert, whose work for
_Punch_, although greatly intermittent, and small in quantity, was
spread over a longer period than that of any other _Punch_ artist--save
Sir John Tenniel. This wrapper covered the first part of 1843, and it
was used until recent years as the pink cover of _Punch's_ monthly
parts.
The fifth wrapper is by Kenny Meadows--you can just see his signature on
the lower rim of the drum--and it was used in the latter part of 1843.
Then, in January, 1844, Richard Doyle, Mr. Punch's latest recruit, was
employed to design the new wrapper--the sixth of our illustration No.
14. This design was used until January, 1849, and then Doyle made the
alterations which distinguish this sixth wrapper from the one now in use
and which has been used ever since.
[Illustration: 16.--TO TERRIFY THE ENEMY. 1852.]
A little boy's advice to his grandfather is illustrated by Leech in No.
15, and No. 16 suggests an added horror of war. The humorous prospectus
in No. 17 concludes with the words:--
Something turns up every day to justify the most sanguine
expectation that an El Dorado has really been discovered. In the
meantime, the motto of the Company is "Otium Sine Dig." [_Ease
without dignity_]. Applications for Shares to be made immediately
to the above addresses, as a preference will be shown to
respectable people.
By the way, when Mr. Punch wrote this skit about "Gold in England," he
and his public were alike unaware that gold is really in this
country--gold ore worth £15,000 was dug up in 1894 out of this country:
1894 being the most recent year for which I have the official return of
mining.
[Illustration: 17.--MR. PUNCH'S ACCOUNT OF A COMPANY-PROMOTING SWINDLE.
1852.]
No. 18 depicts a moment of half-delightful, half-awe-stricken,
anticipation by the amateur clown, pantaloon, and columbine of the exact
result that will follow the application of the (real) red-hot poker to
the old gentleman's legs.
[Illustration: 18.--BY LEECH. 1853.]
No. 19 is Mr. Punch's tribute to the Duke of Wellington which, a week
later (October 2nd, 1852), was followed by a cartoon by Tenniel
containing in a mournful pose one of Tenniel's splendid British lions
that have intermittently during so many years been a prominent feature
of his cartoons.
[Illustration: 19.--THE OBITUARY NOTICE IN "PUNCH" ON THE DUKE OF
WELLINGTON. SEPTEMBER 25, 1852.]
[Illustration: 20.--THE COMING OF PHOTOGRAPHY [AND OF THE BULL] BY
"CUTHBERT BEDE," 1853.]
No. 20 is by "Cuthbert Bede" [the Reverend Edward Bradley], the author
of "Verdant Green," and this is one of four caricature illustrations of
the then novel art of photography, which Mr. Bradley did for _Punch_ in
the year 1853. We read just now how we are indirectly indebted to a Pope
[Pius IX.] for Sir John Tenniel's cartoons, and in connection with the
Rev. Edward Bradley's picture in No. 20, it may be noted that six
clergymen, at the least, have contributed to Mr. Punch's pages.
[Illustration: 21.--SUGGESTED BY THE MILITARY AND NAVAL REVIEWS HELD BY
THE QUEEN IN 1853.]
[Illustration: 22.--MR. PUNCH'S HIT AT JOHN BRIGHT AND THE PEACE
SOCIETY. 1853.]
No. 21 shows _Punch's_ "Medal for a Peace Assurance Society," a
pictorialization in 1853 of the still true old saying: "To secure peace
be prepared for war." An unhappy necessity, as some people think, but
without doubt the only practical way to assure peace, and, as usual, Mr.
Punch puts the thing in a nutshell with his two mottoes on the medal:
"Attention" and "Ready, aye Ready." Our "attention" and "readiness" of
1853 did not, however, keep us out of the Crimean War, which began in
the spring of 1854, despite the efforts of the Peace Society and of John
Bright, who are caricatured in No. 22. But modern authorities generally
believe that the Crimean War might have been prevented by a more
vigorous policy than that of Lord Aberdeen, whose Administration is
chiefly remembered by what is now thought to have been a gross blunder.
This No. 22 is also interesting as a forerunner of Mr. E. T. Reed's
remarkably witty modern designs, "Ready-made coats (-of-arms); or,
giving 'em fits."
[Illustration: 23.--A SINISTER INVITATION. 1854.]
"I wish the British Lion were dead outright," said John Bright, at
Edinburgh, in 1853, and Mr. Punch's comment on these words was the funny
"Improvement" of the Royal Arms depicted in No. 22.
[Illustration: 24.--A REFERENCE TO THE CRIMEAN WAR. BY LEECH, 1854.]
With a glance of sympathy at the belated traveller in No. 23, we pass to
No. 24, which shows the "Bursting of the Russian Bubble." This was
published in _Punch_, October 14th, 1854, after the Battle of the Alma
had been fought and badly lost by Russia and part of the Russian fleet
sunk at Sebastopol. Leech here shows very graphically the shattering of
the "irresistible power" and of the "unlimited means" which were to have
led the Emperor Nicholas I. of Russia to an easy victory over the
British and French allied forces.
[Illustration: 25.--IN THE EARLY DAYS OF PHOTOGRAPHY; BY "CUTHBERT
BEDE," 1853.]
No. 25 is another of the caricatures of photography in its early days by
"Cuthbert Bede," and very funny it is.
The next picture, No. 26, is one of _Punch's_ classics. It is that
well-known joke illustrating manners in the mining districts in the
early fifties:--
_First Polite Native_: "Who's 'im, Bill?"
_Second ditto_: "A stranger!"
_First ditto_: "'Eave 'arf a brick at 'im."
By the way, speaking of Mr. Punch's jokes which have become classic, the
one which is the best known is the following:--
Worthy of Attention.