_PUNCH'S_ EARLY PROGRESS AND VICISSITUDES.
Reception of _Punch_--Early Struggles--Financial Help Invoked--The
First Almanac--Its Enormous Success--Transfer of _Punch_ to
Bradbury and Evans--Terms of Settlement--The New Firm--_Punch's_
Special Efforts--Succession of Covers--"Valentines," "Holidays,"
"Records of the Great Exhibition," and "At the Paris Exhibition."
The public reception of the first number of _Punch_ was varied in
character. Mr. Watts, R.A., once told me that the paper was regarded
with but little encouragement by the occupants of an omnibus in which he
was riding, one gentleman, after looking gravely through its pages,
tossing it aside with the remark, "One of those ephemeral things they
bring out; won't last a fortnight!" Dr. Thompson, Master of Trinity,
informed Professor Herkomer that he, too, was riding in an omnibus on
the famous 17th of July, when he bought a copy from a paper-boy, and
began to look at it with curiosity. When he chuckled at the quaint wit
of the thing, "Do you find it amusing, sir?" asked a lady, who was
observing him narrowly. "Oh, yes." "I'm so glad," she replied; "my
husband has been appointed editor; he gets twenty pounds a week!" One
may well wonder who was this sanguine and trustful lady. Mr. Frith
describes how, having overheard Joe Allen tell a friend, in the gallery
of the Society of British Artists, to "look out for our first number; we
shall take the town by storm!" he duly looked out, but was disappointed
at finding nothing in it by Leech; and how when he went to a shop for
the second number, to see if his idol had drawn anything for it, the
newsman replied, "'What paper, sir? Oh, _Punch_! Yes, I took a few of
the first number; 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.'"
The reception by the press was more encouraging--that is to say, by the
provincial press, for the London papers took mighty little notice of the
newcomer. The "Morning Advertiser," it is true, quaintly declared in
praise of the "exquisite woodcuts, serious and comic," that they were
"executed in the first style of art, at a price so low that we really
blush to name it;" while the "Sunday Times" and a number of provincial
papers of some slight account in their day professed astonishment at the
absence of grossness, partisanship, profanity, indelicacy, and malice
from its pages. "It is the first comic we ever saw," said the "Somerset
County Gazette," "which was not vulgar. It will provoke many a hearty
laugh, but never call a blush to the most delicate cheek." They vied
with each other in their vocabulary of praise; and as to _Punch's_ quips
and sallies, his puns, his propriety, his "pencillings," and his
cuts--they simply defied description; you just cracked your sides with
laughter at the jokes, and that was all about it.
Yet, notwithstanding all this praise, the paper did not prosper; but
whether it was that the price did not suit the public, although the
"Advertiser" really blushed to name it, or that _Punch_ had not yet
educated his Party, cannot be decided. The support of the public did not
lift it above a circulation of from five to six thousand, and on the
appearance of the fifth number Jerrold muttered with a snort, "I wonder
if there will ever be a tenth!" Everything that could be done to command
attention, with the limited funds at disposal, was done. No sooner was
Lord Melbourne's Administration defeated and discredited (for the
Premier was angrily denounced for hanging on to office), than _Punch_
displayed a huge placard across the front of his offices inscribed, "Why
is _Punch_ like the late Government? Because it is JUST OUT!!" And no
device of the sort, or other artifice that could be suggested to the
resourceful minds in _Punch's_ cabinet, was left untried. Things were
against _Punch_. It was not only that the public was neglectful,
unappreciative. There was prejudice to live down; there were stamp duty,
advertisement duty, and paper duty to stand up to; and there were no
Smiths or Willings, or other great distributing agencies, to assist.
While Bryant was playing his uphill game, _Punch_, written by educated
men, was doing his best not only to attract politicians and lovers of
humour and satire, but to enlist also the support of scholars, to whom
at that time no comic paper had avowedly appealed; and it is doubtless
due to the assumption that his readers, like his writers, were gentlemen
of education, that he quickly gained the reputation of being entitled to
a place in the library and drawing-room, diffusing, so to speak, an
odour of culture even in those early days of his first democratic
fervour. We had a German "Punchlied," Greek Anakreontics, and plenty of
Latin--not merely Leigh's mock-classic verses, but efforts of a higher
humour and a purer kind, such, among many more, as the "Petronius," and
the clever interlinear burlesque translations of Horace which came from
the pen of H. A. Kennedy. Then "Answers to Correspondents" were
maintained for a while inside the wrapper, which were witty enough to
justify their existence. But it was felt that something more was wanted
to make the paper "move;" and the first "Almanac" was decided upon.
The circulation meanwhile had not risen above six thousand, and ten
thousand were required to make the paper pay. Stationer and contributors
had all been paid, and "stock" was now valued at £250. That there was a
constant demand for these back numbers (on September 27th, 1841, for
example, £1 3s. 4-1/2d.-worth were sold "over the counter"), was held to
prove that the work was worth pushing; but it seemed that for want of
capital it would go the way of many another promising concern. The
difficulties into which _Punch_ had fallen soon got noised abroad, and
offers of assistance, not by any means disinterested, were not wanting
to remind the stragglers of their position. Helping hands were certainly
put out, but only that money might be dropped in. Then Last declined to
go on. He had neither the patience nor the speculative courage of the
Northumbrian engraver, and money had, not without great difficulty and
delay, been found to pay him for his share--which had hitherto been a
share only of loss. The firm of Bradbury and Evans had been looked to as
a _deus ex machinâ_ to take over the printing, and lift _Punch_ out of
the quagmire by acquiring Last's share and interest for £150. The offer
was entertained, and an agreement drafted on September 25th, when, on
the very same day, Bradbury and Evans wrote to withdraw, on the ground
that they found the proposed acquisition "would involve them in the
probable loss of one of their _most valuable_ connections." Landells,
who always regarded this action--without any definite grounds that I can
discover--as a diplomatic move to involve him and his friends still
more, so that more advantageous salvage terms might be made, hurriedly
cast about for other succour, and alighted on one William Wood, printer,
who lent money, but whose agreement as a whole was not executed, as it
was considered "either usurious or exorbitant" by their solicitors, who
characteristically concluded their bill thus:--"Afterwards attending at
the office in Wellington Street to see as to making the tender, and to
advise you on the sufficiency thereof, but you were not there;
afterwards attending at Mr. H. Mayhew's lodging, but he was out;
afterwards attending at Mr. Lemon's, and he was out; and we were given
to understand you had all gone to Gravesend"--showing the one touch of
nature which made all _Punch_-men kin.
In due course Landells acquired Last's share, and the printing was
executed successively by Mr. Mitchell and by Mills, Jowett, and Mills,
until it slid by a sort of natural gravitation into the hands of
Bradbury and Evans. Landells had endeavoured to interest his friends in
the paper, but soon discovered the fatal truth that one's closest
friends are never so close as when it is a question of money.
Then came the Almanac, upon which were based many hopes that were
destined to be more than realised. It has hitherto been considered as
the work of Dr. Maginn, at that time, as at many others, an unwilling
sojourner in a debtor's prison. But H. P. Grattan has since claimed the
distinction of being, like the doctor, an inmate of the retreat known as
Her Majesty's Fleet, where he was visited by Henry Mayhew. Mayhew, he
said, lived surreptitiously with him for a week, and during that time,
without any assistance from Dr. Maginn, they brought the whole work to a
brilliant termination. Thirty-five jokes a day to each man's credit for
seven consecutive days in the melancholy privacy of a prison cell is
certainly a very remarkable feat--hardly less so than the alleged fact
that Mayhew, who proposed the Almanac, as he proposed so many other good
things for _Punch_, should have gone to the incarcerated Grattan for
sole assistance, when he and his co-editors had so many capable
colleagues at large. The claim does not deserve full credence,
especially in face of Landells' declaration that "everyone engaged on it
worked so admirably together, and it was done so well, that the town was
taken by surprise, and the circulation went up in that one week from
6,000 to 90,000--an increase, I believe, unprecedented in the annals of
publishing." The Almanac became at once the talk of the day; everybody
had read it, and a contemporary critic declared that its cuts "would
elicit laughter from toothache, and render gout oblivious of his toe."
Now, although Bradbury and Evans had hesitated to become proprietors,
they had had no objection to act as printers and publishers, and when
the editors approached them they lent a ready ear. "It was Uncle Mark,"
said "Pater" Evans at the "Gentleman's Magazine" dinner in 1868, "who
was the chief conspirator when they brought _Punch_ to Whitefriars; it
was his eloquence alone that induced us to buy _Punch_. Jerrold did not
say much, but he supported his friend, you may be sure. They talked us
over very easily." They bought the editors' share for £200, which they
advanced on the security of the whole. Into the circumstances of the
subsequent squabbles between Landells and the firm it is not needful to
enter. He bitterly complained that he could obtain neither statements of
accounts nor satisfactory arrangement, while the firm withheld their
favourable consideration of the agreements his solicitors sent them to
sign. The negotiations proceeded wearily from April, 1842, to December
24th, with rising wrath on the part of the good-hearted, impatient
Northumbrian, who could neither understand nor brook the repeated
delays, and fairly boiled over with indignation, suspicion, and wrath.
In despair, so Landells recorded, that his lawyers could get no
satisfaction, and yet "not willing to put the whole thing into
Chancery," he blurted out that he should buy back Bradbury and Evans'
share or they acquire his. As cool business men they promptly asked his
price. He named £450, ultimately reducing it to £400, and further to
£350, on the understanding, he says, that he should continue to act as
engraver; and great were his anger and humiliation when he found after
the second week of the new _régime_ that the engraving was taken from
him. But it is only fair to say that in his lawyer's instructions there
is evidence that Bradbury and Evans persistently declined to give up
their freedom in the matter of the engraving. The transfer then took
place.[5] On December 23rd, 1842, the firm was already speaking with
some authority; the voice was the voice of the printers, but the tone
was the tone of proprietors. And that was the passing of _Punch_.
Earlier in the year Landells had made an effort to save the paper by
persuading those who worked for it to take shares. With a few he was
successful; others were less speculative, so the writer was informed by
the late H. G. Hine. "Landells," he said, "asked me to take a share in
the paper, but, not being a business man, I declined. When the paper
changed hands, Bradbury and Evans bought it for so small an increase on
the actual losses and debts, that each man, when the profits were
divided, received two-and-sixpence each." Not long after Landells ceased
his connection with _Punch_, Douglas Jerrold met Vizetelly, and
acquainted him with the turn of the tide. "_Punch_ is getting on all
right now," he said; and added, in his saturnine way, "It began to do so
immediately we threw that engraving Jonah overboard!" Yet Jerrold was
glad enough to take advantage of the engraving Jonah's influence the
following year, when Landells, with Herbert Ingram, N. Cooke, T.
Roberts, W. Little, and R. Palmer started the "Illuminated Magazine,"
and installed him as editor at a handsome salary.
The following page from Landells' rather rough-and-ready accounts will
give some idea of how financial matters stood between the parties at the
time of the transfer:--
B. & E. CASH RECD. | B. & E. CASH PAID.
|
£ s. d. | £ s. d.
|
Accts. 1,278 6 9 |Cash paid to Artists,
Editors, Artists, paid 507 4 6 | Editors, etc. 507 4 6
----------- |B. & E. for printing 605 10 6
771 2 3 |
B. & E. acct. 605 10 6 |
----------- |
Balance in hand £165 11 9 |
------------------------------------+----------------------------------
E. LANDELLS. | LEMON, COYNE, AND MAYHEW.
|
£ s. d. | £ s. d.
|
To Engravings 315 4 0 |To Editing 400 0 0
Cash 25 0 0 |1/2 debt 100 0 0
Paid contributions at | ---------
£6. 0. 0 per week 120 0 0 | 300 0 0
--------- |
460 4 0 | 400 0 0
1/2 debt 100 0 0 | 100 0 0
--------- | ---------
360 4 0 | 300 0 0
--------- | 120 0 0
Cash received 57 0 0 | ---------
--------- | 180 0 0
£303 4 0 | 25 0 0
| ---------
| £155 0 0
[_Note._--The schedule of documents and legal papers connected with
the matters here dealt with, now in possession of Messrs. Bradbury,
Agnew and Co., Ltd. (which confirm the particulars derived from
Landells' papers) are:--
1. The original Agreement between the original founders of _Punch_
already enumerated. This is dated July 14th, 1841--only three days
before the appearance of the paper. It is printed at length as
Appendix 1 to this volume.
2. Agreement between Bradbury and Evans and "Punchites," whereby in
consideration of a loan of £150 the printing of the paper is
assured to the firm. This is dated Oct., 1841, the signatories
being E. Landells, Mark Lemon, Henry Mayhew, and Stirling Coyne,
with W. H. Wills and G. Windsor as witnesses.
3. The assignment to Landells of _Punch_ and the stock-in-trade by
Lemon, Mayhew, and Stirling Coyne. Dated December 6th, 1841.
4. Assignment to Bradbury and Evans by Landells of his two-thirds
share of _Punch_. Dated, July 25th, 1842.
5. Assignment of his remaining one-third to Bradbury and Evans by
Landells, in consideration of £100 cash and their acceptance for
£250 due Jan. 31st, 1843, their mortgage on this share to be
cancelled. This deed is dated Dec. 29th, 1842, and is in the terms
of Landells' letter of agreement of the previous 24th.]
The new proprietors, when they acquired their interest in _Punch_, were
not then distinguished publishers such as they soon became; they were
essentially printers, and had few connections to assist them in making
it into a paying property. They had, however, W. S. Orr & Co. (the
London agents of Chambers, of Edinburgh), who had fallen into financial
difficulties, and looked to Bradbury and Evans to help them out; and
through their organisation _Punch_ was taken up by the trade "on sale or
return." To work up the sale of a threepenny publication was at that
time a formidable task; but Orr certainly accomplished it, and for a
time _Punch_ undoubtedly owed more to his efforts than to Jerrold's pen
or Leech's pencil. The head of the firm, in both senses, was William
Bradbury, the keenest man of business that ever trod the flags of Fleet
Street, and the founder of a dynastic line nearly as long and eminent as
that of John Murray himself. His portrait may be seen in _Punch_ more
than once--for example, in Tenniel's drawing of the Staff at play at the
beginning of Vol. XXVII, 1854, where his tall, imposing figure contrasts
with that of his partner, Frederick Mullett ("Pater") Evans, who appears
with shining spectacles, beaming countenance, and convex waistcoat.
Jolly old "Pater," who died in 1870, was the model of Leech's
_pater-familias_; and it is remembered to his credit that he never
resented the liberty taken with him by Thackeray in "The Kickleburys on
the Rhine." It has always been the graceful and feeling practice of
_Punch_, ever since the death of Dr. Maginn, to whom a kindly obituary
was devoted in 1842, to do honour in his pages to each of his
lieutenants as they drop out of the ranks, recognising misfortune and
death--both "devil's inventions," as Ruskin calls them--as toll-gates on
the path of life, with sorrow as the tax; so that these more solemn
articles and mortuary elegies seem to mark the way, like milestones set
by loving hands. To Evans one of these was raised, and we read in it
that "they who inscribe these lines to his memory will never lament a
more kind, more genial, or more loyal friend."
[Illustration: F. M. EVANS. WILLIAM H. BRADBURY.
WILLIAM BRADBURY. F. M. ("PATER") EVANS.
(_From Photographs by A. Bassano Limited._)]
The next head of the firm was William Hardwick Bradbury, who had been at
school with Mr. Justice Romer, the husband of Mark Lemon's daughter; and
the house then became Bradbury, Evans & Co. He married the daughter of
Mr. Thomas Agnew; and when, in 1872, Mr. F. M. Evans (the son of
"Pater") left the firm, after having attended the Dinner for five years
as the son of his father, and sat for another seven years at the tail of
the Table by right of proprietorship, the business was reinforced by the
inclusion of the house of Agnew. It then became Bradbury, Agnew & Co.,
and it has been thought that Sir William Agnew's personality has tended
to colour _Punch_ up to a certain point with just a shade of his own
Liberal political opinions. Messrs. W. H. Bradbury, William Agnew,
Thomas Agnew, and John Henry Agnew were then the members of the firm,
which a few years since was converted into a limited company; and on the
death of the first-named, Mr. W. Lawrence Bradbury took his father's
place as managing head of the house, with Mr. Philip Agnew as colleague:
young men, surely, to succeed to the direction of a house which had been
the publisher of Thackeray and Dickens, founders of "The Field," "The
Army and Navy Gazette," printers of the "Family Herald" and "London
Journal," of the "Daily News," the "English Encyclopedia," and other
huge undertakings. With the advent of the younger generation came some
of those technical alterations and improvements which have brought the
production of _Punch_ abreast of the times; but the older traditions, in
particular that great institution of the _Punch_ Dinner, have been
reverently and lovingly retained in all their admirable features.
[Illustration: THOMAS AGNEW. JOHN HENRY AGNEW.
SIR WILLIAM AGNEW, BART. PHILIP L. AGNEW. W. LAWRENCE BRADBURY.
(_From Photographs by A. Bassano, Limited._)]
It is not surprising that after the striking success of the experiment
the Almanac became a permanent annual institution. Into so important a
publication did it develop, commercially speaking, that a special
"Almanac Dinner" has up to recent years always been considered
necessary, at which its chief contents are arranged, just as at the
ordinary weekly Dinner. Hine, Kenny Meadows, and others assisted in the
production of the first two or three Almanacs; but after that, and for
many years, practically the whole of the illustrative work usually fell
on the broad and entirely competent shoulders of John Leech, especially
after Doyle's secession. From time to time experiments have been made in
the direction of novelty. Thus in 1848, in consequence of the great
popularity of the issue, a luxurious edition was prepared, at the price
of five shillings for the coloured and half that sum for the uncoloured
copies, wherein, it was claimed, "full effect is given to the artists'
designs." It was certainly an imposing affair, with meadows of margin,
and printed on one side only of the thick paper; and it now commands a
price in the bookshops of five or six times its original cost.
Humour for private as well as for public consumption has always been a
rule in the _Punch_ circle; and in 1865, a year in which influenza colds
were extremely prevalent, this pleasing faculty was given full scope.
Most of the Staff that Christmas were afflicted with severe colds; so
with amiable consideration the copies of the Almanac provided for them
and for some of the chief contributors were printed upon linen--lest
their supply of handkerchiefs should run short. They were charming and
cheerful in appearance, being handsomely bound and stitched with red,
and presented unusual advantages in the way of utility and
entertainment. Of recent years the Almanacs have had admirably drawn
wrappers, specially designed. In 1882 Mr. Burnand tested the powers of
our humorous painters outside, in addition to _Punch's_ own Staff,
including Mr. Stacy Marks, R.A., Mr. G. A. Storey, A.R.A., and Sir John
Gilbert, R.A.; but the result was an argument in favour of Staff-work
over outside contribution. Among other experiments, colour was tried
with a view to rendering further homage to Sir John Tenniel's cartoon,
by printing it on a tinted background, in the manner of Matt Morgan's
famous designs in the "Tomahawk." But the idea, which originated with
the late Mr. Bradbury, did not answer expectations, and the attempt was
abandoned.
The success that immediately attended the Almanac naturally attracted
the attention of the pirates, and hatched the brood of spurious and
coarse imitations given forth by such notorious printers and publishers
as Goode, Lloyd, and Lyle. But _Punch_ had a short legal way with him
that soon scared them off, and the merry Hunchback is now left supreme
in his own sphere. He not only, as the "Times" said, "commences the
winter season for us with the 'Almanac,' but he continues the tradition
of Charles Dickens by retaining for Christmastide much of the fine
hearty old flavour which the great novelist imparted to it--that jovial,
tender, charitable, roast-goose spirit that exhales from it, the Spirits
of Christmas Present and Christmas Past." "Christmas without the
Christmas number of _Punch_," exclaimed the "Saturday Review" not long
ago, "would be a Christmas without plum-pudding, mince-pies, turkey, and
children's parties--it would not be Christmas at all!"
Another result of the constant search for freshness was the changing of
the design on the cover of each consecutive volume. Any change from that
of Henning could only be a change for the better, so a second
application was made to Hablôt Knight Browne ("Phiz") for his
collaboration. Well satisfied by this time with the tone of the paper,
he gladly responded. The result was a refined and artistic page, crowded
with figures, rather graceful and quaint than funny; and although, to
Leech's horror, a barrel-organ figured in it, it served its purpose
admirably.
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ SECOND WRAPPER, DESIGNED BY "PHIZ." JANUARY,
1842.]
[Illustration: PROPOSED WRAPPER FOR THIRD VOLUME. SKETCH BY H. G. HINE.
NOT ADOPTED.]
For the next volume a sketch was made by H. G. Hine, based on a slighter
one by Landells. It was not used, however, as intended, but adapted as
the index-heading; and William Harvey, the Shakespearian illustrator,
was requested to undertake a design to replace it. This, though yet
more graceful than Browne's, was less suitable than ever. Babes like
_amorini_ toying with Punch's cap and _bâton_, bells and mask, were very
pretty and charming, but a good deal too much in the style of Rubens or
Stothard; and what was thought more unsuitable still was the price. Mr.
Birket Foster has borne witness to the consternation in the office when
the charge of twelve guineas was sent in with the design--nearly half
the total capital with which Landells a year before had begun the
concern!
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ THIRD WRAPPER, DESIGNED BY WILLIAM HARVEY.
JULY, 1842.]
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ FOURTH WRAPPER. DESIGNED BY SIR JOHN GILBERT.
JANUARY, 1843.]
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ FIFTH WRAPPER, DESIGNED BY KENNY MEADOWS. JULY,
1843.]
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ SIXTH WRAPPER, DESIGNED BY RICHARD DOYLE. FIRST
DESIGN. JANUARY, 1844.]
Six months later Sir John Gilbert--then a youth doing great things for
the "Illustrated London News"--was commissioned to draw another front
page. This was subsequently used until recent years as the pink cover
of _Punch's_ monthly parts. A cover was produced by Kenny Meadows, and
then for January, 1844, Richard Doyle, the latest recruit, whose merit
had been quickly gauged, was employed to execute the new one. This
wrapper was far more in accord with the true spirit of _Punch_. More
sportive and rollicking, and with less attempt at grace, it threw over
the style of the "Newcastle School"--of which Landells was a
member--and gave the general idea of the latest of all covers. This was
not executed until January, 1849, when several changes of detail were
made, including the substitution of the smug lion's head for that of
Judy in the canvas--the whole so successful that it may safely be
predicted that it will never be superseded.
[Illustration: _PUNCH'S_ SIXTH AND LAST WRAPPER, DESIGNED BY RICHARD
DOYLE. SECOND DESIGN. JANUARY, 1849.]
Such are the covers--comprising what Mr. W. Bradbury used to call "our
wardrobe of old coats"--which, though interesting enough in themselves,
certainly included nothing to equal the last design, by which Doyle's
name is best known throughout the artistic world.
Guided by the success of the first Almanac, the conductors decided to
work the same oracle by publishing "extra numbers" at every promising
opportunity. "Mr. Mayhew, Mr. Jerrold, and I," says Landells, "happened
to spend a few days in the summer at Herne Bay, and there '_Punch's_
Visit to the Watering Places' was projected. These articles gave _Punch_
another great lift. Messrs. Mayhew, Mark Lemon, Douglas Jerrold, and I,
did Herne Bay, Margate, Broadstairs, and Ramsgate, and I never enjoyed
myself more than on this, to me, memorable occasion. Albert Smith did
Brighton. _Punch_ thenceforth became an established favourite with the
public, and the weekly circulation averaged over 30,000."
Just before this lucky stroke, another not less fortunate as a _succes
d'estime_, if nothing more, was "_Punch's_ Valentines"--at that time
considered a most remarkable production; for there were no fewer than
twelve half-page engravings within its full-page borders--a generous
amount that puzzled the public far more than ten times as much and as
good would do to-day. Kenny Meadows, "Phiz,"[6] Leech, Crowquill,
Henning, and Newman, contributed each two "valentines," which were
addressed to various sorts and conditions of people, accompanied by
verses of considerable humour and more than average merit. Thus, to the
lawyer--whom "Phiz" has represented as a mixture, in equal parts, of
Squeers, Brass, and Quilp--the lines begin in a manner not unworthy of
Hood himself:--
"Lend me your ears, thou man of law,
While I my declaration draw,
Your heart in fee surrender;
As plaintiff I my suit prefer,
'Twould be uncivil to demur,
Then let your plea be--tender."
The invocation which follows, to a gorgeous footman, by some
love-smitten serving-maid, ends--
"But now fare thee well!--with your ultimate breath,
When you answer the door to the knocking of Death,
On your conscience, believe me, 'twill terribly dwell,
If now you refuse to attend to the _belle_!"
In August, 1850, in the extra number called "_Punch's_ Holidays," that
was done for the outskirts of London which eight years before had been
done for the watering-places. It was illustrated by Leech and Doyle,
and, it may be added, the Hampton Court section was written by
Thackeray. Then when the great Shakespeare Tercentenary was being
celebrated, with singularly little _éclat_ so far as the Shakespeare
Committee itself was concerned, _Punch_ produced his "Tercentenary
Number." It was in all respects admirable, and Tenniel's double-page
cartoon was a striking success--as might have been expected from a Staff
so remarkably well versed in Shakespeare. In that cartoon the poet's
triumphal car, drawn by twin Pegasi and driven by Mr. Punch, is followed
by a motley procession, in which Mark Lemon, in the character of John
Bull, appears adapted as Prospero (one of the best of the many portraits
of the editor that have appeared in the paper), while a typically
malignant organ-grinder is Caliban, and all the leading statesmen and
sovereigns are represented in Shakespearian character appropriate to the
circumstances; the "Standard" and "Morning Herald," two of _Punch's_ pet
aversions and journalistic butts, bringing up the rear as the Witches in
"Macbeth," Mesdames Gamp and Harris. The illustrators of this
exceptionally happy number were--besides Sir John Tenniel--Charles
Keene, Mr. du Maurier, and Mr. Fairfield.
Then came the unwieldy "Records of the Great Exhibition, extracted from
_Punch_" on October 4th, 1851. _Punch_ had made a dead-set against the
exhibition in Hyde Park (until his friend Paxton was appointed its
architect, subsequently earning £20,000 by the work), and, according to
Mr. Justin McCarthy, "was hardly ever weary of making fun of it ... and
nothing short of complete success could save it from falling under a
mountain of ridicule. The Prince did not despair, however, and the
project went on." And when it was a _fait accompli_, _Punch_, good man
of business that he was, at once put it to the best possible advantage,
by issuing his enormous "extra" of nine previously-published cartoons by
Tenniel and Leech, and many other cuts besides--the whole, in point of
its double-folio size, more suitable for street display than library
reading. The price was sixpence, and with all the special matter it
contained it was one of the cheapest productions ever issued from that
office.
With the special Paris Exhibition number, produced in celebration of the
Exhibition of 1889, the list of extra numbers issued by _Punch_ for
general circulation comes to a close. Nearly the whole of the Staff,
including the proprietors, travelled to Paris together--how luxuriously,
Mr. Furniss's drawing of their dining-saloon gives a good notion; it
contains (with Sir John Tenniel and Mr. Lucy) portraits of all who were
present. Charles Keene had stayed at home; he felt unequal to the jaunt,
and was, in fact, sickening for the mortal illness which soon had him in
its grip. The "Paris Sketches" in the number that bear his signature
were--like the "war correspondence from the front" concocted in Fleet
Street--quietly drawn at home down at Chelsea. One thing primarily the
number showed: that _Punch's_ national prejudices have mellowed with
time, and that a Frenchman may be accepted as a cultivated gentleman and
a genial companion--a very different being to him whom Leech habitually
drew as a flabby-faced refugee in Leicester Square, "with _estaminet_
clearly written across his features," while Thackeray applauded the
conception in his most righteous hatred and contempt for all things
vile.
Two other special means has _Punch_ adopted with the view of pleasing
his constituents and confounding his enemies, exclusive of the mock
Mulready envelope known as the "Anti-Graham Envelope" and the "Wafers,"
which are elsewhere referred to. The first of these was the music
occasionally printed in his pages from the hand of his own particular
maestro, Tully, the well-known member of the _Punch_ Club, whose musical
setting of "The Queen's Speech, as it is to be sung by the Lord
Chancellor," appeared in 1843; the polka, at the time when that dance
was a novel and a national craze, dedicated to the well-known
dancing-master, Baron Nathan; "_Punch's_ Mazurka," in Vol. VIII. (1845);
and one or two other pieces besides. The other was a coloured picture
representing a "plate"--a satire on the poor and inartistic "coloured
plates" then being issued by S. C. Hall's "Art Union." It was a clever
lithographic copy of an ordinary "willow pattern" plate; a homely piece
of crockery, broken and riveted, beneath which is inscribed: "To the
Subscribers to the Art Union this beautiful plate (from the original in
the possession of the Artist) is presented, as the finest specimen of
British Art, by _Punch_." It was designed by Horace Mayhew; but the
edition was extremely limited--not a hundred copies, it is
understood--on account of the expense, which it was thought was not
justified by the excellence or the likely popularity of the joke.
Such have been some of _Punch's_ efforts outside the usual routine, and
the result has been the continual popularisation of the paper. Volume
after volume, too, in various forms, has been republished, culminating
in the "Victorian Era," "Pictures from _Punch_," and "Sir John Tenniel's
Cartoons;" and each one has but served to attract the favourable notice
of the public to the ordinary issue. So _Punch_ has developed his power
and his resources. To him one might almost apply what a Welshman said of
his friend: "I knew him when he wass a ferry poor man--quite a poor man
walking about in the village; and now he drives in his carriage and
twice!"
FOOTNOTES:
[5] When the purchase was completed, a curious making-up of accounts
proceeded between the parties as to the wood-blocks which were to
accompany the paper. These accounts, referring to the titles of the
engravings, read curiously enough. Here is a specimen:--
No. 22. £12 10 6
Deduct Collared Beef 4 6
--- ---
£12 6 0
No. 25.
Brown's wrapper (_i.e._ Frontispiece
drawn by "Phiz"--Hablôt
K. Browne) 15 12 6 12 12 0
Deduct 2 7 0
--- ---
13 5 6
No. 32.
_Deduct._ £ s. d. _Add._ £ s. d.
Bald Head 0 8 0 Concert-piece 0 5 0
Great Sale in Beer 0 4 0 Collared Beef 0 4 6
Highwayman 0 5 0 All round my hat 0 10 0
Leg of Mutton 0 5 0 Tall Lady 0 8 0
Turning over a Page 0 3 0 Adder-up 0 5 0 14 18 0
Betrayed 0 5 0
Letter P 0 15 0
--- ---
£2 7 0
These cuts were for the most part drawn by Brine, Hine, and Newman.
[6] It is a curious fact that the biographer of Hablôt K. Browne is
altogether silent on his _Punch_ work, although it lasted with intervals
over a quarter of a century. The particulars of this work are referred
to further on, when _Punch's_ artists are passed in review.