"Banbury Cakes," and "Banbury Cross," with its favourite juvenile
associations, with the Lady with bells on her toes, having music
wherever she goes, are indissolubly connected with the early years not
only of ourselves but many prior generations. In fact, the Ancient Cross
has been rebuilt since the days, when in Drunken Barnaby's Journal, we
are made familiar with the puritan "who hanged his cat on a Monday for
killing of a mouse on a Sunday." The quaint old town and its people are
rapidly modernizing; but they cling to the old traditions. Both in
pictorial and legendary lore we have some Banburies of another kind
altogether, viz., Banbury Blocks, or in plain English, Engraved Woodcut
Blocks, associated with the Local Chap Books, Toy Books, and other
Histories, for which this quaint old Oxfordshire town is celebrated. The
faithful description of the Blocks illustrating this volume has led to
numerous descriptive digressions, apparently irrelevant to the subject;
it was found however that in tracing out the former history and use of
some of the "Bewick" and other cuts contained in this volume, that the
Literary, Artistic, Historical, Topographical, Typographical, and
Antiquarian Reminiscences connected with the early Printing and
Engraving of Banbury involved that of many other important towns and
counties of Great Britain, and also America. A provincial publisher
about the beginning of the present century would reflect more or less
the modus operandi of each of his contemporaries in abridging or
reproducing verbatim the immortal little chap books issued from the
press of John Newbury's "Toy Book Manufactory," at the Bible and Sun
(a sign lately restored), 65, Saint Paul's Church Yard, near the Bar.
This again leads to the subject as to who wrote these clever little
tomes. In my "Angler's Garland," printed at the Dryden Press, 1870 and
1871, I fully announced my intention of issuing a reprint of the first
edition of "Goody Two Shoes," but the intended volume was published by
the firm at the corner, "Griffith, Farren, Okenden, and Welsh," now in
the direct line of business descent from worthy and industrious John
Newbery: Carman, Harris, Grant and Griffith. Mr. Charles Welsh of the
present firm has taken a warm interest in the Antiquarian and Historical
Associations of the Newbery firm. The premises have been lately rebuilt,
the Sign and Emblems adopted by Newbery restored, and C. Welsh has
reprinted "Goody Two Shoes" in facsimile, since which there has been
added to it a Standard edition of Goldsmith's Works, edited by Mr.
Gibbs. I had the pleasure of making many researches respecting the old
London publisher (Goldsmith's friend), John Newbery, respecting his
Lilliputian Classics, and I have been enabled to introduce several of
the Quarto early editions to the firm, and have had great pleasure in
writing and placing on record numerous facts and data, since utilized in
the very interesting "Life of John Newbery, a last century bookseller."
The connection of Oliver Goldsmith's name is indissolubly associated
with the juvenile classics industriously issued by Newbery. Dr. Johnson
himself edited and prefaced several children's books which I have seen
in the Jupp and Hugo Collections. The weary hours of adversity, through
which "Goldie" passed at Green Arbour Court, top of Break Neck Steps and
Turn Again Lane--I remember them all well, and the Fleet prison walls
too, when I was a boy--and in refuge at Canonbury Tower, near the
village of Islington, these are the places where Goldsmith wrote for
children. Sir Joshua Reynolds tells how, when he called on the poet at
Green Arbour Court, he found the couplet:--
"By sports like these are all their cares beguiled,
The sports of children satisfy the child."
see "The Traveller." He was surrounded by children in this unsavoury
neighbourhood, where he had his humble domicile: a woodcut in Lumburd's
Mirror depicts it very correctly. Bishop Percy, author of the
"Reliques," called on him, and during the interview the oft repeated
incident occurred of a little child of an adjacent neighbour, "Would Mr.
Goldsmith oblige her mother with a chamber pot full of coals!" Truly
these were hours of ill-at-ease. The largest collection of the various
relics of woodcuts used in the chap book literature, "printed for the
Company of Flying Stationers, also Walking Stationers,"--for such is a
portion of the imprint to be found on several of the early Chap Books
printed at Banbury--is to be seen in the Library of the British Museum;
but the richest collection of these celebrated little rarities of Toy
Books is in the venerable Bodleian Library. Among the very interesting
block relics of the past are the pretty cuts to Mrs. Trimmer's "Fabulous
Histories, or The Robins:" these were designed by Thomas Bewick, and
engraved by John Thompson, his pupil, who enriched Whittingham's
celebrated Chiswick Press with his fine and tasteful work. A numerous
series of little fable cuts by the same artist are to be found in this
volume. One of the quaintest sets engraved at an early period by John
Bewick (the Hogarth of Newcastle), are to "The Hermit, or Adventures of
Edward Dorrington," or "Philip Quarll," as it was most popularly known
by that title a century ago. The earliest edition I have seen of Philip
Quarll is as follows: "The Hermit, or the unparalleled sufferings and
surprising adventures of Mr. Philip Quarll, an Englishman who was lately
discovered by Mr. Dorrington, a Bristol merchant, upon an uninhabited
island in the South Sea, where he lived above fifty years without any
human assistance, still continues to reside, and will not come away,"
etc. Westminster: Printed by J. Cluer and A. Campbell, for T. Warner in
Paternoster Row, and B. Creape at The Bible in Jermyn Street, St.
James's, 1727. 8vo, xii pp., map and explanation, 2 pp., and 1 to 26
appendix, with full page copper plate engravings. He was born in St.
Giles', left his master a locksmith, went to sea, married a famous
w----e, listed for a soldier, married three wives, condemned at the Old
Bailey, pardoned by King Charles II., turned merchant, and was
shipwrecked on a desolate island on the coast of Mexico, etc. Other
editions in the British Museum are 1750; 1759 (third); 1780 (twelfth);
1786 (first American edition, from the 6th English edition, Boston,
U.S.A.); 1787 (in French); 1795 (seventeenth); 1807; and also in a
"Storehouse of Stories," edited by Miss C. M. Yonge, 2 vols, 8vo
(Macmillan, 1870-2), Philip Quarll (also Perambulations of a Mouse,
Little Jack, Goody Two Shoes, Blossoms of Morality, Puzzle for a curious
Girl), and others are given. The text is useful to refer to, as the
originals are rare: the woodcuts of several of them are in this volume.
"Philip Quarll," Miss Yonge says, "comes to us with the reputation of
being by Daniel Defoe; but we have never found anything to warrant the
supposition. It must have been written during the period preceding the
first French Revolution." There is also in the Museum an edition printed
in Dutch in 1805.
In 1869, Mr. Wm. Tegg reprinted the Surprising Adventures of Philip
Quarll, entirely re-edited and modernized, with only a frontispiece and
vignette on title as illustrations. The quaint old cuts on next page
probably illustrated an early Newcastle, then York, and finally Banbury,
edition of this oft published work.
_The Blocks designed and engraved by John Bewick, for "The Hermit;
or Philip Quarll,"_ (_circa 1785._)
[Illustrations: iv_1 - iv_6]
Tegg's edition of 356 pages, 12mo, is to be seen in the Reading Room of
the British Museum, and gives the full text and history of these. This
curious book would well bear representing with the original Bewick cuts,
after the manner of the present Newbery firm, who have revived
Butterfly's Ball, Grasshopper's Feast, Goody Two Shoes, Looking Glass
for the Mind, and contemplate others in the immediate future. Tegg in
his reprint of the Book on Philip Quarll, states that he was born in St.
Giles' Parish, London, 1647, voyaged to Brazil, Mexico, and other parts
of America, was left on an island, nourished by a goat, and other
surprising adventures. Edward Dorrington communicates an account (see p.
1 to 94 inclusive) of how the hermit Philip Quarll was discovered, with
his (E. D.'s) return to Bristol from Mexico, Jan. 3, 1724-5; but is
about returning to Peru and Mexico again (p. 94). This is of both
American and Bewick interest. Besides these representatives of this Chap
Book, we are enabled to give in this collection impressions from the
blocks of other editions fortunately rescued from oblivion and
destruction.
[Illustrations: v_1, v_2]
[Illustrations: vi_1, vi_2]
[Illustration: 1_1]