ContentsCHAPTER XV.

THACKERAY IN HIS STUDY.THACKERAY IN HIS STUDY.(From Portion of a Painting by F. M. Ward, R.A., in the Possession of Richard Hurst, Esq.)

Yet, though he resigned, he would still from time to time attend the Dinners, at which he was always made welcome by the publishers and his late colleagues. When, during this period, he was pleading for assistance for the family of one ofthe Staff who had passed away, he took pleasure in admitting that—"It is through my connection withPunchthat I owe the good chances that have lately befallen me, and have had so many kind offers of help in my own days of trouble that I would thankfully aid a friend whom death has called away." So, although he was no longer to be identified with the paper, Thackeray—"the great Thackeray" he had become—was bound to it and to several members of the Staff by ties of intimate affection, and his sudden death came with stunning force upon them all. To Leech it was as his own death-knell; and when he, Mark Lemon, Shirley Brooks, Tom Taylor, Horace Mayhew, "Jacob Omnium," and John Tenniel stood round his grave, they felt, I have been told, as if the glory ofPunchhad been irremediably dimmed. No verses ever penned byPunch'spoets to the memory of one of their dead brethren ever breathed more love or more beauty of thought than those in which Thackeray was mourned, and defended against the charge of cynicism—" ... a brave, true, honest gentleman, whom no pen but his own could depict as those who knew him could desire":—

"He was a cynic: By his life all wroughtOf generous acts, mild words, and gentle ways;His heart wide open to all kindly thought,His hand so quick to give, his tongue to praise."And if his acts, affections, works, and waysStamp not upon the man the cynic's sneer,From life to death, oh, public, turn your gaze—The last scene of a cynical career!"Those uninvited crowds, this hush that lies,Unbroken, till the solemn words of prayerFrom many hundred reverent voices riseInto the sunny stillness of the air."These tears, in eyes but little used to tears,Those sobs, from manly lips, hard set and grim,Of friends, to whom his life lay bare for years,Of strangers, who but knew his books, not him."

"He was a cynic: By his life all wroughtOf generous acts, mild words, and gentle ways;His heart wide open to all kindly thought,His hand so quick to give, his tongue to praise.

"And if his acts, affections, works, and waysStamp not upon the man the cynic's sneer,From life to death, oh, public, turn your gaze—The last scene of a cynical career!

"Those uninvited crowds, this hush that lies,Unbroken, till the solemn words of prayerFrom many hundred reverent voices riseInto the sunny stillness of the air.

"These tears, in eyes but little used to tears,Those sobs, from manly lips, hard set and grim,Of friends, to whom his life lay bare for years,Of strangers, who but knew his books, not him."

Horace Mayhew—"The Wicked Old Marquis"—A Birthday Ode—R. B. Peake—Thomas Hood—"The Song of the Shirt"—Its Origin—Its Effect in the Country—Its Authorship Claimed by Others—Translated throughout Europe—A Missing Verse—Hood Compared with Jerrold—"Reflections on New Year's Day"—Dr. E. V. Kenealy—J. W. Ferguson—Charles Lever—Laman Blanchard—Tom Taylor—Passed over by Shirley Brooks—Taylor's Critics—Mr. Coventry Patmore—"Jacob Omnium"—Tennysonv. Bulwer Lytton—Horace Smith—"Rob Roy" Macgregor—Mr. Henry Silver—Introduces Charles Keene—His Literary Work—Service to Leech—Retirement—Mr. Sutherland Edwards—Charles Dickens andPunch—Sothern Earns his Dinner—Reconciliation of Dickens and Mark Lemon—J. L. Hannay—Cuthbert Bede.

HORACE MAYHEW.HORACE MAYHEW.(From a Photograph by Bassano.)

Punchhad been running about eight months when, in Wills's words, "a handsome young student returned from Germany and was heartily welcomed by his brother, Mr. Henry Mayhew, and then by the rest of the fraternity." This was at the particularPunchmeeting at which Mr. Hamerton was present. Horace Mayhew's diploma joke consisted, I believe, of "Questions addressées au grand concours aux élèves d'Anglais, du Collége St. Badaud dans le Département de la Haute Cockaigne" (Vol. III. p. 89). Regular occupation was forthwith found for him as sub-editor, his duties being to collect the cuts from the artists, to act as medium of communication between the writers and draughtsmen, and to assist Mark Lemon in making-up the paper; and for these services he received one pound a week. Soon, however, it was found that the editor could very well perform all such duties for himself, and the post of "pony" was abolished. Horace—or "Ponny," as he was invariably nicknamed—became one of the accepted writers. He was most prolific as a suggestor, and never failed of point and pith in his own numerous little paragraphs. As a proposer he had much of the talent of his brother, but little of his genius. "The Life and Adventures of Miss Robinson Crusoe," written by Douglas Jerrold, was "Ponny's" suggestion; but he carried out his conceptions entirely in such papers as his extremely amusing "Model Men," "Model Women," and "Model Couples;" and his "Change for a Shilling" and "Letters left at a Pastrycook's" are still remembered.

"Ponny" had not a seat "in the Cabinet" until January 11th, 1845, before which time he had no separate existence as a contributor, all his "copy" being entered indiscriminately to the Editor. For a long while his average contribution was thirty-one columns in each volume; but his main value lay in the short articles and paragraphs of a playful and whimsical character. Thus, when the "Birmingham Advertiser" declared with grovelling snobbishness that "in these days it is quite refreshing to pronounce the name of the Duke of Newcastle," "Ponny" suggested that during the summer months "the name of his Grace should be written up in every public thoroughfare." He was, in fact, in the words of an old friend, "bright, good-natured, and lively, not very clever, but always letting off little jokes;" "a social butterfly," adds Mr. Sala, "who never fulfilled the promise of his youth."

He was a strikingly good-looking man, and was justifiably proud of Thackeray's greeting as they met at Evans's—"Ah, here comes Colonel Newcome!" "From his aristocratic mien and premature baldness," says Vizetelly, "Wiltshire Austin christened him 'the wicked old Marquis.' The keeping of late hours was Ponny Mayhew's bane. For a quarter of a century—save an annual fortnight devoted to recruiting himself at Scarborough or elsewhere—he scorned to seek repose before the milkman started on his rounds, and during the greater portion of the year never thought of rising until the sun had set, when he would emerge from his Bond Street rooms as spruce and gay as a lark." He had been engaged to a daughter of Douglas Jerrold (whose other daughter, it will be remembered, was the wife of HenryMayhew), but on the ground that "one Mayhew is enough in the family," Jerrold would not hear of it, and the young people remained faithful to each other to the end. Living first with Joseph Swain, the engraver, he afterwards took up his residence for a time with the Lemons at King's Road, Chelsea.

"Ponny's" portrait, it has often been said, may be seen in the White Knight in "Alice in Wonderland;" but "the resemblance," says Sir John Tenniel, "was purely accidental, a mere unintentional caricature, which hisfriends, of course, were only too delighted to make the most of. P. M. was certainly handsome, whereas the White Knight can scarcely be considered a type of 'manly beauty.'" He was a great favourite with the Staff, by reason of his many charming qualities. What they thought of him may be in a measure deduced from one or two of the verses borrowed from Shirley Brooks's Birthday Ode, here reproduced from Mr. Hatton's "True Story" in "London Society":—

"Is he perfect? Why, no, that is hardly the case;If he were, thePunchTable would not be his place;You all have your faults—I confess one or two—And we love him the better for having a few."He never did murder, like—never mind whom,Nor poisoned relations, like—some in this room;Nor deceived the young ladies, like—men whom I see,Nor even intrigued with a gosling, like—me."No; black are our bosoms, and red are our hands,But a model of virtue our Ponniboy stands;And his basest detractors can only say this,That he's fond of the cup, and the card, and the kiss."A warm-hearted fellow—a faithful ally,Our Bloater's[42]Vice-Regent o'erPunch'sgone by;He's as true to the flag of the White Friars stillAs when he did service with Jerrold and Gil."Here's his health in a bumper! "Old" Ponny—a fib;What's fifty? A baby. Bring tucker and bib.Add twenty; then ask us again, little boy,And till then may your life be all pleasure and joy!"

"Is he perfect? Why, no, that is hardly the case;If he were, thePunchTable would not be his place;You all have your faults—I confess one or two—And we love him the better for having a few.

"He never did murder, like—never mind whom,Nor poisoned relations, like—some in this room;Nor deceived the young ladies, like—men whom I see,Nor even intrigued with a gosling, like—me.

"No; black are our bosoms, and red are our hands,But a model of virtue our Ponniboy stands;And his basest detractors can only say this,That he's fond of the cup, and the card, and the kiss.

"A warm-hearted fellow—a faithful ally,Our Bloater's[42]Vice-Regent o'erPunch'sgone by;He's as true to the flag of the White Friars stillAs when he did service with Jerrold and Gil.

"Here's his health in a bumper! "Old" Ponny—a fib;What's fifty? A baby. Bring tucker and bib.Add twenty; then ask us again, little boy,And till then may your life be all pleasure and joy!"

"Ponny" Mayhew, who did not actually write anything for some years before his end, died in May, 1872; and on p. 191 of the sixty-second volume a graceful obituary notice pays tribute to his long and faithful service and his gentle good-nature.

By this timePunch'sestablished reputation brought a great number of anonymous contributions, only a very few of which were ever used, and of fewer still was the authorship placed upon record. Early in 1843, however (p. 82, Vol. IV.), Mr. Blackwood, of Edinburgh, sent in one of the earliest of Scottish witticisms, a conundrum; Joseph O'Leary, a reporter of the "Morning Herald," is said to have contributed a poem on "The English Vandal;" and R. B. Peake, who had adapted "A Night withPunch" for W. J. Hammond, began his little series of "Punch'sProvincial Intelligence," of which the most notable is a humorous report of the University Boatrace of the year; and then the elder Hood began his short but brilliant career.

THOMAS HOODTHOMAS HOODFrom an Engraving by W. Hole,after the Painting by Lewis.

Thomas Hood had forgiven and forgotten the annoyance he had felt on seeing in the first number ofPuncha bogus advertisement ascribed to him under the title of "Lessons in Punmanship," at which he "could only express his amazement that his name should be paraded with apparent authority in a paper of the very existence of which he was not aware;" and within two years he became a fairly constant contributor, after writing to Dickens, "You will be glad to hear that I have made an arrangement with Bradbury to contribute toPunch, but that is a secret I cannot keep from you. It will be light occasional work for odd times." So he began with a sketch re-drawn by H. G. Hine, accompanying a "Police Report of a Daring Robbery by a Noble Lord"—the first of his stinging attacks on Lord William Lennox, one ofPunch'sfavourite and, it must be admitted, legitimate butts. Then followed at different times a score or more of conundrums in the true Hoodian vein under the title of "Whys and Whens," fair specimens of which arethese: "Why is killing bees like a confession? Because you unbuzz 'em." "Why is 'yes' the most ignorant word in the language? Because it doesn't no anything." "What's the difference between a soldier and a bomb-shell? One goes to wars, the other goes to peaces." "When is a clock on the stairs dangerous? When it runs down." A couple of sketches and "A Drop of Gin," an important poem of seventy-six lines somewhat in the manner of the latter portion of "Miss Kilmansegg" were followed—enclosed within a comic border!—by his greatest popular effort, "The Song of the Shirt." This appeared, not in the "Almanac," but in the "Christmas Number," on p. 261 of the second volume for 1843.

The particular incident by which this immortal poem was suggested was one which had called forth a powerful leading-article in the "Times." It was the "terrible fact" that a woman named Bidell, with a squalid, half-starved infant at the breast, was "charged at the Lambeth police-court with pawning her master's goods, for which she had to give £2 security. Her husband had died by an accident, and had left her with two children to support, and she obtained by her needle for the maintenance of herself and family what her master called the 'good living' ofseven shillings a week."

Punchwas at once aglow with red-hot indignation, and in an article entitled "Famine and Fashion!" proposed an advertisement such as this for the firm that employed her—

"Holland coatsfrom two-and-three are shownBy Hunger's haggard fingers neatly sewn.Embroidered tunicsfor your infant made,—The eyes are sightless now that worked the braid;Rich vests of velvetat this mart appear,Each one bedimm'd by some poor widow's tear;Andriding habitsformed for maid or wife,All cheap—aye, ladies, cheap as pauper-life.Formourning suitsthis is the fitting mart,For every garment help'd to break a heart."

The subject touched Hood more powerfully perhaps than others, for his nature was essentially grave and sympathetic.As he himself had said, it was only for his livelihood that he was a lively Hood—although he was always brimming over with comicalities; and he never felt more deeply the dignity of his profession and his own force and weight than when he was engaged on serious work. So Hood conjured up his "Song of the Shirt," moved by the revelations of poor seamstresses who received, as it appeared, five farthings a shirt, out of which sum they had to find their own needles! Mark Lemon told Mr. Joseph Hatton that Hood had "accompanied the poem with a few lines in which he expressed the fear that it was hardly suitable forPunch, and leaving it between his discretion and the waste-paper basket." It had, said Hood, already been rejected by three papers, and he was sick of the sight of it. Mark Lemon brought the poem up at the Table, where the majority of the Staff protested against its inclusion in a comic paper. But Lemon was determined; and, after all, was it not for a Christmas number that he destined it—a number in which something serious, pathetic, with a note of pity and love, was surely not out of place?

The effect on its publication was tremendous. The poem went through the land like wild-fire. Nearly every paper quoted it, headed by the "Times;" it was the talk of the hour, the talk of the country. It went straight to John Bull's kind,bourgeois, sympathetic heart, just as Carlyle declared that Ruskin's truths had "pierced like arrows" into his. The authorship, too, was vigorously canvassed with intense interest. Dickens, with that keen insight and critical faculty which had enabled him almost alone among literary experts to detect the sex of George Eliot, then an unknown writer (though doubtless he was helped in the case I now speak of by Hood's letter to him just quoted), was one of the few who at once named the writer of the verses. And it was well for Hood that he had proof positive of the authorship, for one of the most curious things connected with the poem was the number of persons who had the incomprehensible audacity to claim it. One young gentleman was mentioned by name, either by his friends or himself, and I find a letter in a volume of newspaper cuttings to this effect: "I have just read, to mygreat surprise, the announcement in your paper that Mr. Hood wrote 'The Song of the Shirt,' becauseI know positivelythat what I before stated to you is the fact." So hard pressed, indeed, was Hood, that he wrote a private letter in February, 1845, in the following terms:—

"As I have publicly acknowledged the authorship of the 'Song of the Shirt,' I can have no objection to satisfy you privately on the subject. My old friends Bradbury and Evans, the proprietors ofPunch, could show you the document conclusive on the subject. But I trust my authority will be sufficient, especially as it comes froma man on his death-bed."

Had these literary vultures had their way, Hood would have been brazened out of his verses altogether.

Punchshared handsomely in the glory of the poet, and its circulationtripledon the strength of it. And Mrs. Hood, poor soul, triumphed in her prophecy; for had she not said, and maintained in spite of each successive rejection from foolish editors—"Now mind, Hood, mark my words; this will tell wonderfully! It is one of the best things you ever did!"

And so this song, which, in spite of its defects, still thrills you as you read, achieved such a popularity that for sudden and enthusiastic applause its reception has rarely been equalled. It was soon translated into every language of Europe—(Hood used to laugh as he wondered how they would render "Seam and gusset and band," into Dutch); it was printed and sold as catchpennies, printed on cotton pocket-handkerchiefs, it was illustrated and parodied in a thousand ways; and the greatest triumph of all, which brought tears of joy to Hood's eyes, before a week was out a poor beggar-woman came singing it down the street, the words set to a simple air of her own. The greatest delight of Hood—"the darling of the English heart," as he was called, who was literally dying when he wrote the song, and so fulfilled the sole condition which Jerrold said was all that was needed to make him famous—was the conviction that the interest which the nation was taking in his lines would turn to the real advantage of those in whose cause he pleaded. He felt that he had touched not only the nation'sheart but the nation's conscience, and he deeply appreciated Kenny Meadows' and Leech's efforts in the same direction, such as are to be seen in the cartoons of "Pin Money, Needle Money," and many more besides.

Speaking of the "Song of the Shirt," which brought letters toPunchfrom every part of the globe, Mr. Ruskin declares it the most impressive example of the most perfect manifestation of the temper of the caricaturist, the highest development of which is to be found in Hood's poetry; and he compares it to Leech's "General Février turned Traitor." There certainly can be no doubt that its force is amazingly assisted by its plainness and simplicity of language.

It is a curious fact that one verse of the poem was not printed by Mark Lemon, although it appeared in the original manuscript; nor is it included in the reprinted "Works." I imagine that its omission was simply a matter of make-up, as it would be hard to compress the poem into the space allotted to it, without using a much smaller type than was usual inPunch; and an odd number of verses is a serious matter for a sub-editor to wrestle with when he has to arrange a poem into double columns of a given depth. The missing verse, which, to do Mark Lemon justice, is the one most easily spared, runs as follows:—

"Seam, and gusset, and band,Band, and gusset, and seam,Work, work, work,Like an Engine that works by Steam!A mere machine of iron and wood,That toils for Mammon's sake,Without a brain to ponder and craze,Or a heart to feel—and break!"

In the same number that contained the "Song of the Shirt" was another impressive poem by Hood, "The Pauper's Christmas Carol," in seven stanzas; but it was entirely overshadowed and eclipsed by its fellow-song, so that it lay, as it has done for the most part since, almost unknown, unhonoured, and unsung. Yet it was as ringing and true as any of Jerrold'smost stirring efforts in his championship of the poor. But the two friends were essentially different in their treatment and methods. Hood's satire was never personal, as Jerrold's was; and, unlike Jerrold, Hood would never tolerate the idea, much less practise it, of placing "a wide moral gulf between Rich and Poor, with Hate on one side and Fear on the other." He sought to help the poor by awakening the love and sympathy of Society, and for that reason he selected his epitaph in reference to his poem, for he would never have chosen this as technically his finest work. He was altogether out of harmony with Jerrold's policy of stinging the rich into charity and justice by biting satire and illogical sarcasm, warm-hearted and well-meant though it was.

At this time Hood was fast approaching his end; and he wrote forPunchon his death-bed. Though still young, he was becoming more and more afflicted with physical ailments. Amongst other troubles, he was getting stone deaf, he said; but consoled himself with the reflection that his friend Charles Landseer wastwo stone deafer. And all the while his rollicking fun, and quaintly sudden turn of word and idea were transporting his readers, as he somewhere says, "from Dull-age to Grin-age." His humour was effervescent, continuous, and effortless—not like Jerrold's wit, intermittent flashes called up at need—but overflowing in a rich stream of joke, pun, hit, crank, and quip, covering a field far wider than Jerrold's, and more genial.

The next contribution was his poem "The Drama," apropos of the State trials in Ireland, and the Fair Maid of Perth, with allusion to the Fighting Smith in either case—a poem of 108 lines. Then followed "Reflections on New Year's Day" (January 6th, 1844), from which a couple of specimen verses may well be quoted:—

"Yes, yes, it's very true and very clear!By way of compliment and common chat,It's very well to wish me a New Year;But wish me a New Hat."Oh, yes, 'tis very pleasant, though I'm poor,To hear the steeple make that merry din;Except I wish one bell were at the doorTo ring new trowsers in."

"Yes, yes, it's very true and very clear!By way of compliment and common chat,It's very well to wish me a New Year;But wish me a New Hat.

"Oh, yes, 'tis very pleasant, though I'm poor,To hear the steeple make that merry din;Except I wish one bell were at the doorTo ring new trowsers in."

After a column on "The Awful State of Ireland" Hood was, on the 3rd of March, 1844, editorially reckoned on the Staff. But the decree of Fate was against him, and he only contributed two more pieces altogether.Punch, as he acknowledged, was the one bright meteor that had flashed across his milk-and-watery way in his latter years, and gave him, together with Sir Robert Peel's tactful and charming bestowal of a pension, his last delight. But already death, he said, had thrown open wide its door to him, and he was "so near to it that he could almost hear the hinges creak." And when he died, there were engraved upon his tombstone, at his own desire, the simple words, "He Sang the Song of the Shirt."

The first arrival of 1844 was Dr. Edward Vaughan Kenealy, who, many years after, acted for and defended the historic "Claimant," the self-confessed Orton,aliasCastro,alias"Sir Roger Tichborne," with so much violent ability, lost his balance and came to utter grief. In his youth one of his scholarly relaxations was to translate English verse of various sorts into various languages—Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, Hindustani, and the like, for he was a remarkable linguist. His uniquePunchcontribution was the rendering of "The King of the Cannibal Islands" into Greek, and very good Greek too. Thejeu d'espritis to be found on p. 79, Volume VI., as well as in his volume of verse dedicated to Lord Chief Justice Cockburn, whom he was destined afterwards to waste his life in vilifying, while shattering his own career in his savage and ineffective assaults.

In the following month T. J. Serle struck up an ephemeral connection. He had been Macready's secretary, and acting manager of Drury Lane, and had written "The Shadow on the Wall," and other successful plays; and Jerrold's eldest son was named Thomas Serle, after him. His first paper was"A Fine Lady," on the 10th of March; but after one further contribution, two months later, he appeared no more. About the same time there was printed "The Magnitia," by Frank Moir (May 3rd, No. 199).

J. W. Ferguson was a far more important and more useful contributor, whose work was full of talent, whose versification was clever and pointed, and whose topical "Punch'sFairy Tales" (with obtrusively obvious morals) are models of their kind. His "Little Frenchman's First Lesson" (May 18th, 1844) purports to be a translation of a French poem with which patriots are supposed to implant hatred of England in the minds and hearts of their children the refrain being "Car ce sont là des perfides Albionnais!"—and the "Second Lesson," which replies to a French attack, were important efforts. His "Lays of the Amphitheatre (Royal), by T. B. Macaulay," "Cyinon and Iphigeneia," and similar contributions justified his inclusion in the Staff (April, 1845); but after the autumn of 1846, by which time he was represented by a score of columns, he disappeared fromPunch'sscene.

A letter from Charles Lever (6th June, 1844), under the title of "A Familiar Epistle," and over the signature "Archy Delany," for a moment brought that distinguished novelist into contact with Thackeray—a circumstance that was not forgotten by either writer, when the latter paid his rather stiff Dublin visit some time afterwards to the "Harry Rollicker" whom he so brilliantly parodied in his "Prize Novelists." Then Mr. W. P. Bull, of Nuneaton, sent in half a column of mock-heroic verse—"A Soliloquy"—which purported to be the commencement of a scene from an unpublished drama entitled "The Chemist," a contribution of which Lemon thought very highly. No further items, however, came from that quarter.

Three recruits appeared with the month of October. A writer named Jackson forwarded a couple of pieces ("Irish Intelligence" and "The Polka Pest"—the latter well describing the craze with which the new dance inoculated the whole country); and then Laman Blanchard, Jerrold's life-longfriend and fellow-worker from the beginning, made a début that was almost coincident with his death. His "Royal Civic Function" showed what a hand had been lost toPunch; but it was his delightful "New Year's Ode: To the Winner of the St. Nisbett—Season, 1844," that was the best of his rare contributions. It was at once an elegy of Mrs. Nisbett, and a prayer and prophecy that she might again be seen on the boards. The last verse runs:—

"Who weds a mere beauty, dooms dozens to grieve;Who marries an heiress, leaves hundreds undone;Who bears off an actress (she never took leave),Deprives a whole city of rational fun.But farewell the glances and nods of St. Nisbett;We list for her short ringing laughter in vain,And yet—bereaved London!—What think you ofthisbet?A hundred to one we shall see her again!"

The prophecy was only partly fulfilled; Mrs. Nisbett was certainly seen again upon the stage, but Blanchard was not there to enjoy the sight. He died within the same year, to the passionate grief of Douglas Jerrold.

TOM TAYLOR.TOM TAYLOR.(From a Photograph by Bassano.)

The last and most important accession of the year was Tom Taylor, for six-and-thirty years a Staff officer ofPunch, and for the last six of them commander-in-chief. He was twenty-seven years old when he sent in his first two contributions—"Punchto Messieurs les Rédacteurs of the French Press" and "Startling and most Important Intelligence" (October 19th, 1844). According to John Timbs, "Landells in one of his artistic visits to Cambridge met with Mr. T. Taylor, who, having completed his University studies, came to London to embark in the profession of letters, his first contribution being to Douglas Jerrold's 'Illuminated Magazine,'" just at the time when Landells ceased his connection. Bristed,in his record of English University life, foretold of "Travis," generally accepted as a literary portrait of Taylor, "perhaps he will be a nominal barrister and an actual writer forPunchand the magazines. Perhaps he will go quite mad and write a tragedy:" a capital example of a prophecy after the event, so far as it goes—for "Five Years" was published in 1851.

Tom Taylor prided himself on the classic verve of his prose and verse, and undoubtedly assisted in maintainingPunch'sliterary standard. His work for the paper went on increasing—from six columns in Vol. VII., to forty-two in Vol. XIII.—and soon won him his seat at the Table. For a long while, however, he did not shine as a cartoon-suggestor, the first being "Peel's Farewell" (July 14th, 1849), and the second in the following May, the extremely happy burlesque on the picture in the National Gallery—"Leeds Mercury instructing Young England." As time went on and he became known as a writer of taste and versatility, as a dramatist and adaptor of plays, French and English; art critic of the "Times;" artist biographer; and Civil Servant (he attained to the secretaryship of the Local Government Board), the weight of his increasing responsibility and influence seemed to get into what should have been his humorous work. To counteract it, Thackeray, up to the time of his resignation, struggled to maintain the spirit of jollity and the lightness of touch which had formerly beenPunch'strue note. But in 1874, when Shirley Brooks died, Tom Taylor, who had been identified with the paper ten years before Brooks had joined it, was promoted, as by right of service, to the supreme command.

JOHN LEECH, TOM TAYLOR, AND PART OF HORACE MAYHEW.JOHN LEECH, TOM TAYLOR, AND PART OF HORACE MAYHEW.(Drawn by R. Doyle.)

It cannot be said that his editorship was a success. His fun was too scholarly and well-ordered, too veiled, deliberate, and ponderous; and under himPunchtouched its lowest point of popularity.

"In humour slow, though sharp and keen his mind;His hand was heavy, though his heart was kind."

His popularity among the outsiders was great, as I have learnt from many of his old contributors; for he loved to extend his hospitality to young men at his house, Lavender Sweep, at Wandsworth, and to send kindly notes of encouragement and promises of future help. Nevertheless, he was ever the butt of rival publications. In one of them a cartoon, entitled "An Editor Abroad," was published, showing Mr. Burnand and Mr. du Maurier helping him and hisPunchShow out of the mud in which he had stuck; in another he was represented as "The Trumpet Blower;" while in an article in "The Mask" (April, 1868), before he had assumed his sway, Mr. Punch is supposed to point to "Mark Lemon's Triumphal Car" and, referring to Taylor, to say: "He is our seraph.... His adaptations, I assure you, are delightful. You must be well up in Michel Levy'srépertoireto find him out. He is so very artful."

A peculiar feature of Tom Taylor's editorship was the hieroglyphical character of his handwriting. His missives of instructions to artists and writers came as a terror to the receivers, who could make little of them. "Mr. Tom Taylor's letters," Mr. Swain informs me, "were often very difficult to decipher. His writing was peculiar, and he would also continue the letter if necessary in any odd corner that was vacant. I remember his writing some instructions to an artist one day in this fashion, while I stood at his table, and, while blotting it, saying, 'You can send it off, but I don't think he'll be able to make it out.'" To this experience may be added my own—that I have been the first to decipher one of these notes addressed to an unattached artist, now understood for the first time, nearly twenty years after it was written. To the compositors he was a perpetual tribulation;and it is doubtful if he could not have given points to Horace Greeley. That his son helped him, towards the end, in a secretarial sort of way, was no doubt a saving mercy.

His was one of the busiest literary and journalistic careers of the day; and when he died he left a void—great, it is true, yet in one respect easily enough filled. But it was little to his friends that his humour was not of the brightest and lightest, for his heart was of the warmest, as Mr. George Meredith set forth in the October number of the "Cornhill Magazine," to which he contributed a noble tribute—"To a Friend Recently Lost, T. T."—a sonnet beginning:—

"When I remember, Friend, whom lost I callBecause a man beloved is taken hence,The tender humour and the fire of senseIn your good eyes: how full of heart for all;And chiefly for the weaker by the wall,You bore that light of sane benevolence:"

ThePunchmen, themselves, in a whole-page obituary (July 24th, 1880), bore graceful testimony to his personal worth. "That he is not with us," they said, "is hard to imagine.... A cultivated man of letters, an admirable scholar, he was as free from pedantry as he was incapable of idleness. From first to last he was, in the highest and best sense, 'Thorough.' ... Quick to detect and appreciate talent, he was ready in every way and on all occasions to hold out a helping hand to a beginner." Thus feelingly they spoke of "the dear friend" they had lost. For in his death they forgot the little annoyances they had suffered from the tampering with their lines and spoiling their points, of which they had sometimes had occasion to complain; with other drawbacks belonging to an essentially fidgety nature. It may safely be said, that if he left a hard task to his successor to work up the reputation ofPunchas a comic paper, he did not at least render it difficult for him to make his mark by comparison.

No new humorist appeared in the volumes for 1845, although a poet of eminence found expression on a singleoccasion. To one Kelly is to be credited some humorous verses on "Dunsinane;" to J. Rigby, an Irish Song; to Leech, his Harlequinade verses (which do not aspire even to the dignity of a "trifle" or doggerel); to Watts Phillips, a few articles of little importance; and to J. King, the verses in which an "Exiled Londoner" (p. 147, Vol. IX.) apostrophises his beloved Babylon. The one contribution of importance was that of Mr. Coventry Patmore.

This was written in hot indignation of generous youth (he was but twenty-two years old) at the French atrocity in Algiers, when, during the campaign, General Pelissier filled with straw the mouth of the caves of Dahra, wherein the opposing Arabs, with their women and children, had taken refuge, and set fire to the mass. This foul act of the future Duke of Malakoff caused a thrill of horror to pass through Europe, and the gentle author of "The Angel in the House" was moved by the scandal to the composition of his eight-stanza poem, of which Douglas Jerrold procured the insertion on the 16th of August (p. 73, Vol. IX.):—

"Rush the sparks in rapid fountainsUp abroad into the sky!From the bases of the mountainsLeap the fork'd flames mountain-high!The flames, like devils thirsting,Lick the wind, where crackling sparsWage hellish warfare, worstingAll the still, astonished stars!Ply the furnace, fling the faggots!Lo, the flames writhe, rush, and tearAnd a thousand writhe like maggotsIn among them—Vive la guerre!"

The poem follows the details of the massacre, sickening but for the power the lines display. It continues:

"And now, to crown our glory,Get we trophies, to displayAs vouchers for our story,And mementoes of this day!Once more, then, to the grottoes!Gather each one all he can—Blister'd blade with Arab mottoes,Spear-head, bloody yataghan.Give room now to the ravenAnd the dog, who scent rich fare;And let these words be gravenOn the rock-side—Vive la guerre!"

It was Mr. Patmore's sole contribution, his Muse never again being startled into any other poetical demonstration of the sort inPunch'spages. The following year he became assistant-librarian at the British Museum.

"Jacob Omnium's" first appearance, curiously enough, was with a short article which, in the reprinted works of Thackeray, has been ascribed to the novelist. This was "A Plea for Plush" (July 20th, 1846), appropriately signed "Φιλοφλυνκης," dealing, it is true, with Jeames's nether garments on a hot day, but still with no internal evidence of style to warrant its ascription to the "Fat Contributor." Henceforward his other few papers were entered to him in his own name of Matthew J. Higgins. He was a great friend of thePunchStaff, particularly of Thackeray and Leech. Of him the former had written in the "Ballad of Policeman X"—

"His name is Jacob Homnium, Exquire;And ifI'd committed crimes,Good Lord! I wouldn't ave that mannAttack me in theTimes!—--"

while Leech took his part against Lord John Russell on the occasion of Higgins's "Story of the Mhow Court Martial." He was shown as a tall, self-possessed gentleman, saying to the little fellow, who is sparring up to him—"Pooh, go and hit one of your own size." Higgins's height, indeed, was greater than that of either Thackeray or his friend Dean Hole—six feet eight; and when the three friends walked abroad, the sensation among the passers-by was considerable. On Thackeray and Dean Hole measuring heights once in the house of a common friend, it was found that they werepractically equal. "Ah, yes," exclaimed the Dean; "the cases are about the same, but one contains a poor dancing-master's fiddle, and the other a Stradivarius."

Punch'ssensation of the year was the fierce revenge taken by Tennyson in its pages on Bulwer Lytton. Bulwer, as is explained elsewhere, had been set up byPunchas one of its pet butts from the very beginning; and when Tennyson's sledge-hammer onslaught was brought to them, so it is said, by a distinguished man of letters—a particular friend of both parties—they rejoiced exceedingly. Tennyson's broadside had not been unprovoked. Years before, in 1830, he had published, through Effingham Wilson, "Poems, chiefly Lyrical," which contained the poem "To a Darling Room," afterwards suppressed. Seizing on this, Lytton had re-echoed in his "New Timon: A Romance of London," the strictures which Christopher North has so severely, though good-naturedly, passed upon it in "Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine" for May, 1832, and furthermore taunted the Laureate with the pension of £200 which had just been conferred upon him. The attack was just the sort to extort a violent reply.

"Not mine, not mine (O, muse forbid!) the boonOf borrowed notes, the mock-bird's modish tune,The jingling medley of purloined conceitsOut-babying Wordsworth, and out-glittering Keats,Where all the airs of patchwork pastoral chimeTo drown the ears in Tennysonian rhyme.

"Let school-miss Alfred vent her chaste delightOn darling rooms, so warm and bright;[43]Chant 'I am weary' in infectious strain,And 'catch the blue-fly singing on the pane;'Though praised by critics and adored by Blues,Though Peel with pudding plumb the puling muse;Though Theban taste the Saxon purse controls,And pensions Tennyson while starves a Knowles."

Punch(p. 64, Vol. X.) had rushed in to the rescue with the clever retort:—

"The New Timon" and Alfred Tennyson's Pension.

"You've seen a lordly mastiff's port,Bearing in calm, contemptuous sortThe snarls of some o'erpetted pupWho grudges him his 'bit and sup:'So stands the bard of Locksley Hall,While puny darts around him fall,Tipp'd with whatTimontakes for venom;He is the mastiff,Timthe Blenheim."

But Tennyson's was not by any means "the lordly mastiff's port." He was stung by the contemptuous reference to the pension, and proved the truth of Johnson's aphorism—

"Of all the griefs that harass the distrest,Sure the most bitter is the scornful jest"—

and he straightway wrote the ten verses that appeared under the title of "The New Timon, and the Poets" (p. 103, Vol. X.), signing them "Alcibiades":—

"We know him, out ofShakespeare'sart,And those fine curses which he spoke;The oldTimon, with his noble heart,That, strongly loathing, greatly broke.So died the Old: here comes the New.Regard him: a familiar face:Ithoughtwe knew him: What, it's you,The padded man that wears the stays—

Back to Index Next