JOHN LEECH
His Life and Work
[Illustration: _The Marchioness going to execution._]
JOHN LEECH
His Life and Work
BY
WILLIAM POWELL FRITH, R.A.
[Illustration]
_WITH PORTRAIT AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS_
IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II.
LONDON
RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON
Publishers in Ordinary to Her Majesty the Queen
1891
[_All rights reserved_]
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. "PUNCH" 1
II. CARTOONS 15
III. THE LAWYER'S STORY 35
IV. LOVE OF FIELD SPORTS 40
V. INVENTORS AND ILLUSTRATORS 54
VI. "INGOLDSBY LEGENDS" 59
VII. DICKENS AND THACKERAY ON LEECH 66
VIII. DEAN HOLE 80
IX. TYPES 89
X. LEECH AND HIS PREDECESSORS 96
XI. KENNY MEADOWS 103
XII. "COMIC HISTORY OF ROME" 106
XIII. PERSONAL ANECDOTES 113
XIV. PERSONAL ANECDOTES--CONTINUED 119
XV. SPORTING NOVELS 130
XVI. THE "BON GAULTIER BALLADS" 137
XVII. SPORTING NOVELS--CONTINUED 152
XVIII. MICHAEL HALLIDAY AND LEECH 163
XIX. THOMAS HOOD AND LEECH 182
XX. DR. JOHN BROWN AND LEECH 218
XXI. AUTOGRAPH-HUNTERS AND OTHERS 229
XXII. ARTISTS' LIVES 239
XXIII. LEECH EXHIBITION 247
XXIV. MILLAIS AND LEECH 275
XXV. MR. H. O. NETHERCOTE AND JOHN LEECH 283
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
THE MARCHIONESS GOING TO EXECUTION _Frontispiece_
THE DRUNKEN POST-BOY 11
"THEY MAY BE OFFICERS, BUT THEY ARE NOT GENTLEMEN" 13
JACK ARMSTRONG 17
THE JEW AND SKELETON TAILORS 29
"I'LL THIN YOUR TOP!" 37
"GIVE HER HER HEAD, JACK" 42
"OH, IF THIS IS ONE OF THE PLACES CHARLEY SPOKE OF,
I SHALL GO BACK!" 44
JACK JOHNSON ATTEMPTS TO RESCUE DERVAL _To face p. 57_
THE MAID AND THE HEAD OF GENGULPHUS 62
ELOPEMENT OF ROMAN YOUTH WITH SABINE LADIES 109
ROME SAVED FROM THE GAULS BY GEESE 111
LITTLE JOHN AND RED FRIAR 140
LITTLE JOHN AND THE POPISH BULL 142
GEORGE OF GORBALS 149
THE LOVER'S FRIEND AND THE LOVER 150
AFTER AIMING FOR A QUARTER OF AN HOUR, MR. B.
FIRES BOTH HIS BARRELS, AND MISSES! 173
WHAT WIDE REVERSES OF FATE ARE THERE! 188
MISS KILMANSEGG 191
THE FOREIGN COUNT 197
THE WEDDING--"WILT THOU HAVE THIS WOMAN?" 202
LOVE AT THE BOARD 204
HE BROUGHT STRANGE GENTLEMEN HOME TO DINE 208
THE TORN WILL 212
BEDTIME 216
"HE BLOWS HIS OWN NOSE!" 228
THE SEAL 235
A CYPRESS BRANCH FOR THE TOMB OF JOHN LEECH 301
JOHN LEECH:
_HIS LIFE AND WORK_
CHAPTER I.
"PUNCH."
In the year 1841 I exhibited a picture at the Suffolk Street Gallery,
and I recollect accidentally overhearing fragments of a conversation
between a certain Joe Allen and a brother member of the Society of
British Artists in Suffolk Street. Allen's picture happened to hang near
mine, and we were both "touching up" our productions. Joe Allen was the
funny man of the society, and, though he startled me a little, he did
not surprise me by a loud and really good imitation of the peculiar
squeak of Punch.
"Look out, my boy," he said to his friend, "for the first number. We" (I
suppose he was a member of the first staff) "shall take the town by
storm. There is no mistake about it. We have so-and-so"--naming some
well-known men--"for writers; Hine, Kenny Meadows, young Leech, and a
lot more first-rate illustrators," etc.
Whether Allen's friend took his advice and bought the first number of
_Punch_, which appeared in the following July, I know not; but I bought
a copy, and remember my disappointment at finding Leech conspicuous by
his absence from the pages. In the hope of finding him in the second
issue, I went to the shop where I had bought the first. The shopman met
my request for the second number of _Punch_, as well as I can recollect,
in the following words:
"What paper, sir? Oh, _Punch_! Yes, I took a few of the first; but it's
no go. You see, they billed it about a good deal" (how well I recollect
that expression!), "so I wanted to see what it was like. It won't do;
it's no go."
I have been told that, like most newspapers, _Punch_ had some difficulty
in keeping upon his legs in his first efforts to move; but as those
elegant members, so exquisitely drawn by Tenniel, have supported the
famous hunchback for nearly half a century, there is no need for his
friends' anxiety as to his future movements.
Though Leech had engaged himself to the then proprietors of _Punch_ as
one of the illustrators of the paper, it seems strange that his first
contribution did not appear till the 7th of August, and in the fourth
number, and stranger still that its appearance should have damaged the
paper. Under the heading of "Foreign Affairs," the artist represents
groups of foreigners such as may be seen any day in the neighbourhood of
Leicester Square. The reader is told in a footnote that the plate does
not represent foreign _gentlemen_, an unnecessary intimation to anyone
who knows a foreign gentleman.
It is said that this engraving sent down the circulation of _Punch_ to
an alarming point. I confess my inability to understand this, and would
rather attribute the decadence to some other cause, contemporary with
the production of "Foreign Affairs." The drawing is somewhat hard upon
the foreign frequenters of the purlieus of Leicester Square, and would
only have been more acceptable to John Bull on that account. By Leech's
non-appearance in _Punch_ for many months after "Foreign Affairs" was
published, one is driven to the conclusion that the managers had little
faith in him as an attraction. The second volume contains very few of
Leech's designs, while it bristles with inferior work.
My own admiration for Leech's genius, so constantly roused by his works,
with which I was familiar, created a great desire for his acquaintance;
but being perfectly unknown at that time as an artist, and knowing none
of Leech's friends, I began to despair of the realization of my wishes,
when accident helped me.
A Scottish painter--a Highlander and fierce Jacobite--named McIan, who
was also an actor and friend of Macready, to whose theatrical company he
was attached, lived with his wife, an accomplished artist, somewhere in
the neighbourhood of Gordon Square. Calling one morning to see Mrs.
McIan, I found her in her studio, not, as usual, hard at work at her own
easel, but superintending the labours of a pupil, who was hard at work
at another; and the pupil, a tall, slim, and remarkably handsome young
man, was John Leech.
I made some remark about the different method in which he was employed
to that with which he was familiar. I forget what he was copying--some
still life, I think.
"I like painting much better than what I have to grind at day after day,
if I could only do it," said Leech; "but it's so confoundedly difficult,
you know, and requires such a lot of patience."
I fancy I thought his efforts in oil-painting on that occasion very
promising; but the exigencies of his position quite prevented the
unceasing devotion to the study of painting which is required before any
success can be assured.
Leech was once heard to say that he would rather be the painter of a
really good picture than the producer of any number of the "kind of
things" he did. I, for one, am very thankful that he never did produce a
good picture, for he would have been tempted to repeat the success, to
the loss of numbers of delightful sketches.
Mrs. McIan appeared to think that Leech would soon cease to draw for
_Punch_; indeed, she doubted, as did many others, that _Punch_ would
long succeed in attracting the public; and I joined her in the
hope--rather hypocritically, I fear--that her young friend would
persevere in mastering the difficulty of the technicalities of
oil-painting, and thus place himself amongst the best painters of the
country. Leech had taken many lessons from Mrs. McIan, and that lady
seemed convinced that he had but to persevere and the difficulties would
fall before him, as, to use her own figure, the walls of Jericho fell
before the sound of the trumpet. Ah, perseverance! "there's the rub."
From the time of my introduction to Leech I became gradually very
intimate with him, and the more I knew of his nature, the more I became
convinced that he totally lacked the disposition for continuous, steady,
mechanical industry necessary for success in painting. He constantly
ridiculed the care spent on the details in pictures; finish, in his
opinion, was so much waste of time. "When you can see what a man intends
to convey in his picture, you have got all he wants, and all you ought
to wish for; all elaboration of an idea after the idea is comprehensible
is so much waste of time"--this was his constant cry, a little
contradicted by the fact that he as constantly tried to paint his ideas,
but in a fitful and perfunctory manner.
I can imagine the enthusiasm that was lighted up in Leech upon his first
sight of one of our annual exhibitions. After a visit to one of them he
was known to have gone home, and getting out easel, canvas, and colours,
he would set to work in a fury of enthusiasm, which evaporated at the
encounter of the first technical difficulty. He used to take pleasure in
watching my own attempts at painting, and I remember on one occasion,
when I was finishing a rather elaborate piece of work, he said:
"Ah, my Frith, I wasn't created to do that sort of thing! I should never
have patience for it."
He was right, and, happily for the world, he became convinced that, even
if he had the power to fully "carry out"--as we call it--one of his
drawings into a completed oil picture, the time required would have
deprived us of immortal sketches; and though he undoubtedly "left off
where difficulties begin"--as I once heard a painter, who was
exasperated at Leech's sneers at his manipulation, say to him--he has
left behind him work which will continue to delight succeeding
generations so long as wit, humour, character and beauty are
appreciated--that is to say, so long as human nature endures.
I feel I ought to apologize for what I am about to tell, because it has
nothing to do with my hero beyond the fact of its occurrence having
taken place on the memorable morning when I first had the happiness of
meeting him.
I have said that McIan was a Scotchman, a Highlander of the clan McIan,
and a worshipper of Charles Stuart, whose usual cognomen, the Pretender,
I should have been sorry to have used in the presence of my Jacobite
friend. As Leech left the room to go to his "grind," as he called his
woodwork, McIan entered, and we were discussing Leech's prospects when
McIan's servant--an old, hard-featured Scotchwoman--hurried into the
room, and, in an awe-stricken voice, said:
"Sir--sir, here's the Preences!"
The words were scarcely out of her mouth, when two gentlemen
entered--tall, rather distinguished but melancholy, looking young men.
No sooner did McIan and his wife catch sight of them, than, without a
word, they both dropped upon their knees, and while the lady kissed the
hands of one of the gentlemen, her husband paid a similar attention to
the hands of the other. I was holding my hat, and I remember I dropped
it in my astonishment, for I was not aware that I was in the presence of
the last of the Stuarts; or that these two young men claimed to be the
great-grandsons of the hero of Culloden, and amongst a large section of
Scotchmen, and not a few Englishmen, had their claim allowed. Anyone
curious about this delusion can read for himself how it was dispelled,
but the men themselves implicitly believed in their royal descent. They
are both dead now. I once saw one of them again at a garden-party at
Chelsea Hospital, where his likeness to the Stuarts was the talk of the
company. It was certainly striking.
It is a melancholy task to me to try to recall the social scenes in
which Leech so often figured--sad indeed to think how few of his
friends, more intimate with him than I, now remain amongst us! Though
Leech very seldom illustrated any ideas but his own, I can recall an
example or two to the contrary; and still oftener have I seen, by the
sparkle of his eye, that something occurring in conversation had
suggested a "cut."
I think it was Dickens who said that a big cock-pheasant rising in
covert under one's nose was like a firework let off in that locality.
Elsewhere we have Leech's rendering of the idea.
When cards, or some other way of getting rid of time after dinner, had
been proposed, I have heard Leech say:
"Oh, bother cards! Let us have conversation."
And talk it was, often good talk; but Leech was more a listener than a
partaker. Not that he could not talk, and admirably; but he was always
on the watch for subjects which he hoped something in conversation might
suggest.
Leech's mental condition was certainly deeply tinged with the sadness so
common to men who possess wit and humour to a high degree. He sang well,
but his songs were all of a melancholy character, and very difficult to
get from him. Indeed, the only one I can remember, and that but
partially, was something about "King Death," with allusions to a
beverage called "coal-black wine," which that potentate was supposed to
drink. As I write I can see the dear fellow's melancholy face, with his
eyes cast up to the ceiling, where Dickens said the song was written in
ghostly characters which none but Leech could read.
I may give another example--rare, no doubt--of Leech's having used a
suggested subject. Many years ago my brother-in-law, long since dead,
took a party of friends to the Derby. They drove, or, rather, were
driven, down to Epsom, the usual post-boy being recommended as a
careful, steady driver--a character very desirable, considering the
crowded state of the road, more especially on the return journey. The
post-boy quite realized all that was said of him as the party went to
the course, but when the time came for departure he was found, after
considerable searching, to be as nearly dead-drunk as possible. What was
to be done? The man could scarcely stand; his driving was, of course,
out of the question.
[Illustration]
"Well," said my brother-in-law to his friends, "if you will trust
yourselves to me, I will ride and drive you back;" and, after tying the
post-boy on to the carriage, where he soon fell fast asleep, my
brother mounted and drove his party safely home.
This I thought a good subject for Leech, and I suggested it to him. He
smiled faintly, and said not a word. Very nearly a year after I had told
him of the incident, as I was walking with him one day, he said:
"By the way, Frith, are you going to use the subject you mentioned to me
of the drunken post-boy and your brother-in-law?"
"I? No," said I; "it's more in your way than mine."
"Then I'll do it next week."
He was as good as his word.
Nothing could be less like my brother-in-law than the delightful "swell"
who is driving home some charming women, who are, however, left to our
imagination; and as to the post-boy, the artist has awoke him to some
purpose. What could surpass that drunken smile?
[Illustration]
Long, long ago there might have been seen on the sands at Ramsgate two
stuffed figures, the size of life, intended to represent soldiers; for
they were bedecked with the red coat, cap, and trousers of the ordinary
private. The clothes were simply stuffed out into something resembling
human forms, but the effect, as may be supposed, was ludicrous in the
extreme. They were the work of a professor of archery, who supplied his
customers with bows and arrows, with which the archer showed how seldom
he could hit the target made by the two soldiers. Leech and I watched
the shooting for some time, till the little sketch-book was produced,
and Leech made a rapid drawing of the two soldiers, afterwards to figure
in an inimitable cut in _Punch_.
A young lady is seen bathing with her aunt, whose attention she is
directing to the two stuffed figures. The aunt is short-sighted, and the
girl is wickedly pretending that the figures are live officers, watching
the bathers. The aunt says, "They may be officers, but they are not
gentlemen," etc.
I am sure that Leech never used a model, in the sense that the model is
commonly used by artists, for the thousands of human beings made
immortal by his genius; but that he made numberless sketches for
backgrounds, detail of dresses, landscapes, foregrounds, and bits of
character caught from unconscious sitters, there can be no doubt. How
wonderful was the memory, how sensitive the mental organization, that
could retain and reproduce every variety of type, every variety of
beauty and character!