R. F. SKETCHLEY.R. F. SKETCHLEY.(From a Photograph by Hills and Saunders, Oxford.)
In the same year came Mr. R. F. Sketchley, late Librarian of the Dyce and Forster collection in the South Kensington Museum, who was destined to become one ofPunch'sStaff officers. "I find," he writes, "that I became a contributor toPunchin 1864. At the beginning of 1868 I was honoured with an invitation from Mark Lemon to join the Table. I served also under his successors—Shirley Brooks, Tom Taylor, and Burnand; and finally retired of my ownaccord in 1880. I have seen it stated that in an illness of Shirley Brooks I did some of the 'Essence of Parliament.' If I had been called on to take up the pen of that most brilliant man of letters, I should have been in despair. All I did was to turn the Queen's Speech on the opening of Parliament into verse.
"I was never a prominent member of the Staff, but I am, and always shall be, proud of having been connected withPunch. I wrote both prose and verse—more of the former than the latter—and my contributions ranged in extent from a column down to a single line. My subjects were generally 'topical,' sometimes 'imaginary,' and the verse included a good many parodies." Mr. Sketchley, it should be observed, is one of the few members of the inside Staff—at least, within the last forty years—who have ever resigned their appointments, Richard Doyle, Mr. Henry Silver, and Mr. Harry Furniss being the others. His strong point was prose parody, the best, perhaps, being the quaint quasi-Gulliverian sketch called "A Fortnight in Sparsandria," which he contributed toPunch'sPocket-Book. Sober in judgment and wise in counsel, he was greatly missed when his genial companionship was lost toPunch'sKnights of the Round Table.
ARTEMUS WARD.ARTEMUS WARD.(From a Photograph by S. A. Walker.)
Passing over Mr. W. S. Gilbert's connection with the paper—which is described in the section devoted to artistic contributors—we find another humorist, equally distinguished, who identified himself with the paper the same year, Charles F. Browne, better known as "Artemus Ward." He had arrived in England early in the year, and soon after his arrival he was invited by Mark Lemon to contribute. Ward was at that time in failing health, and, according to his secretary and manager Mr. Kingston, two or three of the papers produced in accordance with the understanding that was entered into were written with painful effort—the reason,no doubt, why so little of his usually rollicking humour is to be found in them. Nowadays many Americans profess to regardPunchwith a sort of scornful amusement, and "Life," with an assumption of lofty disdain, is for ever sneering at it as a survival of the unfittest; and the same line is taken in England by New Journalists and Newer Critics. Not that the New American Journalist was unknown in Ward's day. He had already declared that "Shakespeare wrote good plase, but he wouldn't have succeeded as the Washington correspondent of a New York daily paper. He lacked the reckisit fancy and imagination." Anyhow, he did not live so near to thefin de siècle; nor was he ashamed to own that for years it had been his pet ambition to write for the "London Charivari." Unhappily, its realisation came too late to permit him to do justice to his talent and his humour; and he himself was only too conscious of his sad shortcoming, or, rather, of his failing powers. Only eight papers had come from his hand when it closed in death. In September the first of his papers was published—"Personal Recollections;" the last in November—"A Visit to the British Museum;" they are garrulous and discursive, and a good deal of the humour they contain was repeated from earlier works. That they should have contained any at all, under the circumstances, is the wonder; indeed, one is irresistibly reminded by them of his own humorous reference to one of the burlesque "pictures" illustrative of his "Lecture." "It is by the Old Masters," he said, in his quaint, sad way; "it is the last thing they did before dying. They did this, and then they died."
It is, indeed, curious how many ofPunch'smost valued contributors were working for the paper up to within a few hours, a few minutes, of being called away—Jerrold, ThomasHood, C. H. Bennett, John Leech, Shirley Brooks, and Artemus Ward; and many a time have the public laughed aloud at jokes and pictures wrought when the hand was stiffening in death, when the brain that had imagined them had already ceased to think.
H. SAVILE CLARKEH. SAVILE CLARKE(From a Photograph by the Woodburytype Company.)
H. Savile Clarke, previously a "Fun" contributor, and a disciple of James Hannay, made hisPunchdébut with a set of verses in August, 1867; but he did not follow them up, except in a very small way, until Mr. Burnand's editorship, in 1880, encouraged him to write regularly. This he soon began to do, his main work being Society verse, mostly bearing on medical and scientific subjects, for he was brought up as a doctor. "Songs of the Sciences," "Lyrics in a Library" (verse on books), verse on the minor picture exhibitions, clever trifles like the "Carmen Culinarium" (December, 1891), and the important and strikingly able and successful parody, "Modern Life in London, or Tom and Jerry Back Again," illustrated by Mr. Priestman Atkinson—these formed the staple of hisPunchwork. But he was not enthusiastic about writing for the paper, as the chance of gaining reputation by unsigned contributions was very small. "I feel strongly," he wrote to me years ago, "as many writers do on the paper, as to the inequality of authors and artists. It keeps very good men off it."
"Berkeley Square, 5 p.m." was a poem of five stanzas that formed Frederick Locker-Lampson's sole contribution toPunch; it was published at the same time as Savile Clarke's maiden effort (August, 1867), and was illustrated by Mr. du Maurier. It was Locker-Lampson, it may here be mentioned, who sent in C. S. Calverley's ewe-lamb—a charade—toPunch'spages.
On the 25th of July, 1868, a lady-contributor made her début inPunch'spages. This was Miss M. Betham-Edwards,who was already well known as the authoress of "A Winter with the Swallows," and whose travel "Through Spain to the Sahara," dealing with much the same scene, was then expected from the press. In the earlier part of the year a friend had shown to Mark Lemon a clever skit by the young lady, and the Editor forthwith commissioned her to write a series of papers to be called "Mrs. Punch's Letters to her Daughter"—a sort of belated sequel to Jerrold's "Punch's Letters to his Son." These letters, which ran through six numbers—the last in November 7th of the same year—are contributions of the worldly-wise order, cynical, satirical, and shrewd. Two years later Mark Lemon died, and Miss Betham-Edwards dropped out of the outside Staff position which she was by courtesy supposed to occupy. Certain contributions she sent in were returned; she took the hint, and the connection was severed.
It was about this time that Mr. du Maurier wrote his admirable "Vers Nonsensiques," and proved the literary talent which he afterwards displayed in so striking a manner in his lecture on "Social Satire" and in his novels. But, as has already been pointed out in several other cases, he is not by any means alone in having used both pen and pencil in the paper. Thackeray is the principal example of the twin-talent; but others, in very various degrees, are Cuthbert Bede, Watts Phillips, Thomas Hood (a single cut, and a wonderful one, too), Richard Doyle (a single contribution), John MacGregor, with Sir John Tenniel, and Messrs. Alfred Thompson, Ashby-Sterry, W. S. Gilbert, W. Ralston (one literary effort), J. Priestman Atkinson, J. H. Roberts (one poem), Harry Furniss (a dramatic criticism), and Arthur A. Sykes. As a rule, however, artist and author has kept strictly within his own field, although a bold experiment of a curious kind was once proposed. On that occasion the literary Staff had been complaining, with malicious frankness, that the drawings in a certain issue—(it is not necessary to particularise)—were not up to the mark. They were at once challenged by the artists, who declared that they would strike—thattheywould do the text, and allow the literary men to do the pictures. The idea was seized upon; theresult, they thought, would be screamingly funny. But the Editor would not hear of it; he imagined, not without reason, that the public, who would be called upon (but would probably decline) to pay, would not see the point of the joke. Years after a similar discussion arose; and those who heard it are not likely to forget the mock-philosophic-gastronomic blank verse composed by Mr. Sambourne on the spur of the moment just to illustrate how very easy clever verse-writing really is.
WhilstPunchhas been greatly indebted for much of its humour to Scotsmen, several Irishmen also have contributed not a little to its success. Mr. Alfred Perceval Graves is one of these, although it is long since he wrote for the paper. "I contributed toPunch" he says, "during Shirley Brooks's editorship. Tom Taylor was then secretary to the Local Government Board, and I was private secretary to the Parliamentary Under Secretary for the Home Office, Mr. Winterbotham. Meeting on business, we struck up a friendly acquaintance, and,Punchbeing then a close borough, Taylor smuggled in verses and jokes of mine for a while, till he thought I had established a claim to introduction to Shirley Brooks. My work only went on from 1871 to 1874, as I became so engaged on literary work of a severer kind, and educational work as an Inspector of Schools, that I had not time forPunch; and when I cared to return to it Taylor had gone, and the present Editor was surrounded by fresh men, so I have not resumed my connection with it."
Mr. Graves—the author of the popular "Father O'Flynn," perhaps the best of all his Irish songs—wrote forPunch"The Tea-Table Tragedy," "The Ballad of the Babes in the Wood," and those admirable "Lines of Farewell to the Irish Humorist, Baron Dowse, on leaving the House of Commons"—
"Dick Dowse, Dick Dowse,Is it lavin' the House?"
"Dick Dowse, Dick Dowse,Is it lavin' the House?"
Then there is "On St. Patrick's Day falling on a Sunday," and inPunch'sPocket-Book the lines on "A Frog," and "A Cauliflower"—a parody of "The green, immortal Shamrock." But another merit in Mr. Graves was his coaching of Charles Keene on the subject of his Irish jokes, for which the formerwas greatly responsible in the years of hisPunchconnection.
Nursery jingles newly adapted and applied to the morals and manners of the day are always a favourite vehicle of satire with the public, and have been freely used by professional humorists.Punchoffers many instances of happy examples of the work. The first of a long series of "Nursery Rhymes for the Times" was begun by Mr. Charles Smith Cheltnam on January 9th, 1875, as well as in the Almanac of the same year. The writer forthwith became a busy contributor. About fifty of these rhymes appeared inPunchin quick succession, and there were many other pieces besides. "The Infallible Truth," a comment in verse on the passage at arms which was then (November 13th, 1875) taking place between Lord Redesdale and Dr. Manning on the subject of infallibility, showed thatPunch's"papal aggression" was still rankling in his bosom. Mr. Cheltnam remained a contributor until the death of Tom Taylor, when he transferred his pen to the service of "Fun."
On April 1st, 1872, the Rev. F. D. Maurice died, andPunchcontained a set of verses to his memory, in which the beauty and the strength of his character were set forth with deep sympathy, and not without power or poetical thought. They were from the hand of the Rev. Stainton Moses, of Exeter College, Oxford, for seventeen years an assistant master at the University College School. He was the editor of the leading London organ of Spiritualism. The more ribald of his pupils and acquaintance declared that his spiritualism was of another sort; but there is no doubt that he was very popular with all men, and exercised great influence among the faithful.
ARTHUR À BECKETT.ARTHUR À BECKETT.(From a Photograph by A. Bassano, Limited.)
Eighteen years after the death of Gilbert Abbott à Beckett, his son, Arthur W. à Beckett, restored the family name toPunch'sStaff. He had been nominated to the War Office by Lord Palmerston, but he soon found that he could walk in no other path but that which his father had trodden. Like him, he became an editor at twenty, by assuming for a space the direction, relinquished by Mr. F. C. Burnand,of an evening paper called the "Glow-Worm"—whose light, after Mr. à Beckett left it, steadily refused to burn with the requisite effulgence. Mark Lemon was then approached; but he would have nothing to say to—or, rather, nothing to do with—the sons of his old friend, who thereupon sought elsewhere the encouragement they had hoped for inPunch'sshow. Mr. Arthur à Beckett started a satirico-humorous paper of great ability and promise, the staff including himself and his brother, Matt Morgan, Frederick Clay, and Frank Marshall, with Messrs. Alfred Thompson, Austin, T. G. Bowles, and T. H. Escott—most of them Civil Servants. But in the full tide of its success its financial foundations were weakened by one in the managerial department, and the whole thing came to the ground. After a few years of an active journalistic career he was invited by Tom Taylor, who had succeeded to the command, to contribute toPunch. A curious success attended his opening chapters. His first paper on a "Public Office" (p. 226, Vol. LXVI.), as well as the twelve following—that is to say, his contributions to thirteen consecutive numbers—were all of them quoted in the "Times," though whether or not through Taylor's intermediary did not appear. After the fourth number Mr. à Beckett was put on the salaried Staff, and in August, 1875, was invited to join the Table. Since Mr. Burnand's promotion to the editorship Mr. à Beckett has acted as hislocum tenens, just as Shirley Brooks did to Lemon, and Percival Leigh to Brooks.
Being called to the Bar in 1881, Mr. à Beckett was enabled to revive the humours of his father's "Mr. Briefless," by the filial creation of the happily-named "A. Briefless, Junior." The "Papers from Pump Handle Court" from this self-sufficient, inflated, and utterly hopeless Junior, have been a feature inPunchfor years past, and by them the authorhas—so says an expert—"charmingly illuminated the legal profession by his queer fancy." One of the best papers in the collection is an account of a visit to the studio of a well-known firm of West-End photographers in the character of a legal celebrity, which is wittily called "A Matter in Camera." Up to December, 1894, he had contributed to a thousand and eighty consecutive numbers, his work including many "series," besides the usual topical subject-articles.
Mortimer Collins became an occasional, and by no means a prolific, contributor of verse from the year 1874. The sonnet inPunchon p. 237, Vol. XI. (December, 1846), has been ascribed to him, but there is no ground for the statement (he would then have been only nineteen years of age), nor did he contribute otherwise than from 1874 to 1876. His light lyric touch may be traced in many a poem. In "Where shall we go?" (p. 105, Vol. LXIX., September 11th, 1875) his dainty pen is to be recognised; as in "Lady Psyche's Garden Party," and various other verses of similar style and pleasant flavour. The attack on Mr. Whalley and "Crede Byron" (July 20th, 1875) are his, and the verses on the Burnham Beeches, and, in September, "Causidicus ad Canem." The charming "Sonnets for the Sex" (June 17th, 1876) and, on July 8th, the humorous prose in praise of goose-quill and sealing-wax, entitled "Mr. Oldfangle's Opinion," were full of pleasing turns of thought—little presaging the writer's death three weeks later. When he died,Punchcontained an obituary notice of the writer (p. 57, Vol. LXXI., August 12th, 1876), in which it is said, "He wrote the 'Secret of Long Life,' to teach men to live a century, and himself died at forty-nine." He was in this respect a curious echo of Thomas Walker, who wrote his "Art of Attaining High Health" in his paper "The Original," and did not survive the completion of his task; and the prototype of the Duke of Marlborough, who died while engaged on an essay on the "Art of Living" for the "Nineteenth Century." Had he lived, he would certainly have been promoted to the Staff; and the fact that his funeral was officially attended by Tom Taylor, Percival Leigh, and Mr. Arthur à Beckett, on behalf ofPunch, istestimony of the respect in which his co-operation was held.
The literary post onPunchwhich corresponds with that of Chief Cartoonist has for years past been occupied by Mr. Edwin J. Milliken. The position is an onerous one, and carries great responsibility with it. He who fills it is at once "thePunchPoet"par excellenceand the big drum, so to speak, of the political orchestra. For many years Mr. Milliken has written the letterpress explanatory of the Cartoon, either in verse or prose, as well as the preface to each succeeding volume. To his pen, too, we have owed during the same period those verses which it has been the graceful practice ofPunchto devote to the memory of distinguished men. Remarkable for their tact, dignity, and good-sense—instinct with lofty thought and deep feeling—these poems are often masterpieces of their kind, models of taste and generous sympathy. In particular, those published upon the deaths of Lord Beaconsfield, John Bright, and Lord Tennyson, may be remembered as worthy of the men they were designed to honour, as well as for the felicity with which they set down what was in the heart of the nation, and the eloquence with which its sentiment was expressed.
On January 2nd, 1875, there appeared inPunchsome lines entitled "A Voice from Venus," the planet's transit having at that time just occurred. They were Mr. Milliken's first contribution—a bow drawn at a venture—for he was entirely unknown to anyone connected with the paper. Tom Taylor asked for a guarantee of the originality of the verses—in itself a flattering distrust—and, receiving the necessary assurance, printed them forthwith. From that time forward the young writer contributed with regularity, and for two years was put severely through his paces by the Editor, who, in order to "try his hand," as he said, gave him every sort of work to do. Then came a personal interview of a gratulatory nature, in which Taylor promised to invite Mr. Milliken to the Table as soon as a vacancy occurred. At the end of the second year of probation this promise was fulfilled, and early in 1877 "E. J. M." cut his initials on the board.
E. J. MILLIKEN.E. J. MILLIKEN.(From a Photograph by Messrs. Bassano.)
It is worthy of remark that the successful career of Mr. Milliken is in direct opposition to his training, for he began life, much against his will, as a man of business in a great engineering firm. But literature was his goal, and the appreciation of the editors of a few magazines and journals to some extent satisfied his ambition. In point of fact, Mr. Milliken, in respect to his work, is the most modest and retiring of men; and the only contribution to which his name appeared, for years before or after, was the set of memorial verses to Charles Dickens which were printed in the "Gentleman's Magazine" in 1870.
Without a doubt "The 'Arry Papers" are the most popular and best known of Mr. Milliken's contributions, although "Childe Chappie's Pilgrimage," "The Modern Ars Amandi" (1883), "The Town" (1884), "Fitzdotterel; or, T'other and Which" (a parody of Lord Lytton's "Glenaveril"), 1885; "Untiled; or, the Modern Asmodeus" (1889-90), and "The New Guide to Knowledge," have successively loomed large inPunch'sfirmament. But it is the great creation of 'Arry for which Mr. Milliken is most applauded—and least understood. It is generally supposed that the 'Arry of Mr. Milliken corresponds to the similar character conceived by Charles Keene and Mr. Anstey. But the author means him for a great deal more. 'Arry with him is not so much a personage as a type—as much an impersonal symbol as Mr. Watts's Love, or Death, or other quality, passion, or fate, without individuality and, in spirit at least, without sex.
It is often suggested that Mr. Milliken's 'Arry is the survival—or, at least, the descendant—of the "gent" of Leech and the "snob" of Thackeray and Albert Smith. He is nothing of the sort. The gent and the snob had at least this merit; they aspired, or imagined themselves, to be something more and better than they really were. But 'Arry is a self-declared cad, without either hope or desire, or even thought,of redemption. Self-sufficient, brazen, and unblushing in his irrepressible vulgarity, blatant and unashamed, he is distinguished by a sort of good-humour that is as rampant and as offensive as his swaggering selfishness, his arrogant familiarity and effrontery, and his sensuous sentiment. He is a mean-souled and cynical camp-follower of the army of King Demos, every day expanding, every day more objectionable in his insolent assurance. Originally designed as an illustration of the 'Arryism of the rougher classes, then promoted to be characteristic of the low sort of shop-lad and still lower kind of mechanic "with views" of a clear-cut kind within the narrow limits of his materialistic philosophy, he has developed into a type of character—almost, indeed, into a type of humanity. And as 'Arryism is rife in every walk of society, so 'Arry's experiences have become more informed, but not for that reason more cultivated or more refined. And therein lies the one inevitably weak point of Mr. Milliken's invention. Like Frankenstein, he seems to have created a Monster, who has outgrown the purpose he was originally intended to serve. For when he finds himself considering the 'Arryism of the "upper classes," he is bound, by his otherwise admirable convention, to retain the Cockney slang of which he is such a master, even though the speaker is supposed to have advanced so far in his views and knowledge of life as to be able to discuss matters of art, science, and literature. For, be it observed, a bank-'oliday at the Welsh 'Arp, "wich is down 'Endon wy," is no longer a spree for him, however uproarious the "shindy," and however ready his "gal" may be to sit on his knee and "change 'ats" to the accompaniment of cornet and concertina. He travels—on the cheap, of course—but still he travels, and discusses Venus of Milo, and 'Igh Art, and the philosophic questions of the "dy," and resolves all his meditations into the "motter" that "Socierty's all right." Without soul, without ideality, without aspiration, save of the baser sort, he represents no good quality nor redeeming virtue but physical health—the promise, it may at least be hoped, of a posterity that in the future, perchance, may justify his existence.He is the raw, the offensively raw, material from which respectable and useful descendants may eventually be made. At present Mr. Milliken shows the 'Arryism that is permeating and fouling all classes, almost to the highest; but there the convention fails—only because itisa convention—for 'Arry is made to fill the part which has more recently, and perhaps with greater fitness, been accorded to the Bounder.[46]
But, apart from the satirical creation, 'Arry is a most amusing personage—his forms of speech, the quaint turns of his vulgar thought, being in themselves irresistibly laughable—their grossness merged in their genuine humour, and in the art so well concealed. 'Arry alone has stamped Mr. Milliken as a satirical humorist of the front rank, and has gone far towards making the public forget his other phase—the graceful and sympathetic poet. The philologists, too, proclaim their debt of gratitude to the author as the most complete collector of modern English slang, with suitable context and situation. Dr. Murray's great "New English Dictionary" accepts 'Arry as a name "used humorously for: A low-bredfellow (who drops hish's) of lively temper and manners," and quotes "'Arry on 'Orseback" inPunch'sAlmanac for 1874 as his début in print. And, finally, Herr C. Stoffel, of Nijmegen, has published a philological volume on the "'Arry Letters" inPunch, from 1883 to 1889, examining the cant words with the utmost elaboration, gravity, and knowledge, and producing one of the most valuable treatises on the subject that have hitherto been published.
GILBERT À BECKETT'GILBERT À BECKETT'(From a Photograph by Messrs. Bassano.)
In addition to the work already indicated, Mr. Milliken (as shown in the chapter on cartoons) devotes a great deal of attention to the devising of Mr. Punch's "big cuts," both for Sir John Tenniel and Mr. Linley Sambourne. The Almanac double-page cartoons, too—usually very elaborate designs—have been planned by him for a good many years, as well as most of Mr. Sambourne's fanciful calendars and "months" in the Almanacs. It will thus be seen that—with all his work in prose and verse, from a paragraph to a preface, and from a series to an epigram—Mr. Milliken is Writer-of-all-work and "General Utility" in the best sense; and a more loyal and devoted servantPunchhas never had.
Alfred Thompson's work, which began in 1876, is considered with that ofPunch'sartists. Then came Gilbert Arthur à Beckett, who after a short spell of regular work was summoned to the Table. His first contribution had, in fact, been published by Mark Lemon, but immediately afterwards that Editor treated him just as he had treated his brother; and not for some years did he receive the call. Tom Taylor it was who, attracted by the quality of the work which the brothers were doing elsewhere, sent the coveted invitation.[47]In 1879—five yearsafter his brother Arthur—Gilbert à Beckett joined the salaried Staff, and three years later he was appointed to the Table. He had a very quaint humour and a wonderfully quick and startling sense of the incongruous. He was sadly hampered by his affliction, but he was an accomplished, high-principled, sensitive fellow, of whom one of his companions declared that "he was the purest-minded man I ever knew." Under more favourable conditions of health he would probably have made a greater mark; but as it was, he did good work. He was a happy parodist, and a very neat and smart versifier—at the age of fifteen he had gained the prize for English verse at Westminster, which was open to the whole school—and in the wildly absurd yet laughable vein of his bogus advertisements (of which he did many under the head of "How we Advertise Now"—a continuation of Jerrold's early idea) none of hisPunchbrethren could touch him. He was, perhaps, best known to the world as part author of the famous political burlesque of "The Happy Land;" less, perhaps, as part author of "The White Pilgrim;" and least of all as a musical composer, as it was under the pseudonym of "Vivian Bligh" that he put forth his songs and his music for the "German Reeds' Entertainment." But his work onPunchwas always relished, and, considering his sad physical afflictions, he held his own on the Staff. He contributed both prose and verse, smart and apt of their kind. He wrote—in part, at least—the admirable parody of a boy's sensational shocker (p. 119, Vol. LXXXII., March 11th, 1882). With the exception of this and the comical "Advertisements" he did very few "series," but his contributions were always varied and excellent in their way, and himself appreciated as a useful and clever man. Perhaps his chief claim to recollection was his suggestion, as explained elsewhere, of the famous cartoon of "Dropping the Pilot." The Dinners were his greatest pleasure, and he attended them with regularity, although the paralysis of the legs—the result of falling down the stairway of Gower Street Station—from which he suffered (in common with his uncle Sir William à Beckett, and with one of theMayhew brothers as well) rendered his locomotion and the mounting of Mr. Punch's stairway a matter of painful exertion. Although he did useful work forPunch, he never became a known popular favourite; yet when he died—on October 15th, 1891—a chorus of unanimous regret arose in the press, for he was one of those few men who count none but friends among their wide circle of acquaintance.
"Punch's" Family Trees."Punch's" Family Trees.(Note.—The names of the workers forPunchare printed in capitals.)View larger image
Mr. Horace Frank Lester, late of Oxford University, afterwards barrister-at-law, author and journalist of the first rank, but at that time unknown toPunch, first appeared on January 5th, 1878, with a slashing satire on busybody amateur statesmen which greatly tickled Tom Taylor's fancy. But his first real hit was in September, 1880, with a form of contribution then comparatively new. It was a "Diary of the Premier at Sea," when Mr. Gladstone was on board theGrantully Castle, and, so far from "husbanding his energies," as his doctor directed, was supposed to receive deputations, make speeches, convert the man-at-the-wheel from Toryism, and try to cut down the mainmast with his axe. Then followed political diaries, parodies (such as "'The Entire History of Our Own Times' by Jestin Machearty," and innumerable poems), comic Latin verse, "Journal of a Rolling Stone," "Advice Gratis," "Queer Queries," legal skits, and so on. An amusing incident occurred in respect to one of the "Advice Gratis" series. Mr. Lester had spoken of a mythical book called "Etiquette for the Million: or, How to Behave Like a Gentleman on Nothing a Year,published at this Office." A corporal stationed at Galway Barracks wrote and asked for the price of it, "as I am extremely anxious to have the book referred to." Mr. Burnand's reply was simply, "Sold."
"Robert"—Mr. Deputy Bedford—Mr. Ashby-Sterry—Reginald Shirley Brooks—Mr. George Augustus Sala—Mr. Clement Scott—The "Times" Approves—Mr. H. W. Lucy—"Toby, M.P."—Martin Tapper and Edmund Yates—Mr. George Grossmith—Mr. Weedon Grossmith—Mr. Andrew Lang's "Confessions of a Duffer"—Miss May Kendall—Miss Burnand—Lady Humorists—Mr. Brandon Thomas and Mr. Gladstone—Mr. Warham St. Leger—Mr. Anstey—"Modern Music-hall Songs"—"Voces Populi"—Mr. R. C. Lehmann—Mr. Barry Pain—Mr. H. P. Stephens—Mr. Charles Geake—Mr. Gerald Campbell—R. F. Murray—Mr. George Davis—Mr. Arthur A. Sykes—Rev. Anthony C. Deane—Mr. Owen Seaman—Lady Campbell—Mr. James Payn—Mr. H. D. Traill—Mr. A. Armitage—Mr. Hosack—Arthur Sketchley—Henry J. Byron—Punch'sLiterature Considered.
"Robert"—Mr. Deputy Bedford—Mr. Ashby-Sterry—Reginald Shirley Brooks—Mr. George Augustus Sala—Mr. Clement Scott—The "Times" Approves—Mr. H. W. Lucy—"Toby, M.P."—Martin Tapper and Edmund Yates—Mr. George Grossmith—Mr. Weedon Grossmith—Mr. Andrew Lang's "Confessions of a Duffer"—Miss May Kendall—Miss Burnand—Lady Humorists—Mr. Brandon Thomas and Mr. Gladstone—Mr. Warham St. Leger—Mr. Anstey—"Modern Music-hall Songs"—"Voces Populi"—Mr. R. C. Lehmann—Mr. Barry Pain—Mr. H. P. Stephens—Mr. Charles Geake—Mr. Gerald Campbell—R. F. Murray—Mr. George Davis—Mr. Arthur A. Sykes—Rev. Anthony C. Deane—Mr. Owen Seaman—Lady Campbell—Mr. James Payn—Mr. H. D. Traill—Mr. A. Armitage—Mr. Hosack—Arthur Sketchley—Henry J. Byron—Punch'sLiterature Considered.
JOHN T. BEDFORD.JOHN T. BEDFORD.(From a Photograph by E. J. Stoneham.)
"Robert, the City waiter" made his low-comedy bow in 1880. "Robert's" literary father is Mr. Deputy John T. Bedford, whose opportunities for studying the ways of the City waiter have necessarily been many and excellent. The result of his keen observation was introduced toPunchthrough chance. "My introduction toPunch," Mr. Bedford informs me, "arose from the quite accidental circumstance that Mr. Burnand and myself were introduced at the same time, by Mr. F. Gordon, on the directorship of the 'Grand Hotel' at Charing Cross; and very shortly afterwards ... on the appointment of Mr. Burnand as Mr. Tom Taylor's successor, I ventured to congratulate him, when he said to me, 'If any fun is to be found in the City, I shall expect you to bring it to me.' I replied that I had sometimes thought that there was some to be got out of a City waiter, as waiters were not quite so deaf as was generally considered. I tried my hand, and my first attempt was very kindly received; it was printed on p. 64,Vol. LXXIX. (August 14th, 1880), under the title of 'Notes from the Diary of a City Waiter.' ... There is no truth in the statement that Robert was based upon a certain waiter. He is certainly imaginary"—a statement which disposes of the assertion that the famous old "Cock Tavern" is famous nowadays for the original of "Robert" in the person of its head-waiter. Since 1880 Mr. Deputy Bedford is to be credited with more than two hundred contributions, of which, however, only a proportion belong to the "Robert" series. "You will find some of them," writes Mr. Bedford, "signed J. Litgué, anom de plumethat puzzled Mr. Burnand himself, until I revealed the secret that it was French for 'Bed-ford'; and he, with his excellent knowledge of French, was thoroughly sold." "Robert" has been republished in book form, and has attained an extraordinary circulation, though some of Mr. Bedford's critics have declared that the chief attraction has been the admirable illustrations by Charles Keene with which the little book is embellished. For severe critics there are; one of whom, in order to prove that "Robert" was not a humorous creation at all, took the curious course of translating one of his articles into good, well-spelt English, and then triumphantly asking—"Where is the humour now?"
J. ASHBY-STERRY.J. ASHBY-STERRY.(From a Photograph by Samuel A. Walker.)
A complete contrast to Mr. Bedford became a contributor toPuncha fortnight after him—Mr. J. Ashby-Sterry. Twenty-nine years had passed since his boyish drawings had been accepted; and during the interval he had relinquished the pencil for the pen, had become a well-known journalist, and the author of sundry volumes of light literature. He was one of the first to be summoned by the new Editor, and he responded nobly to the call. Since August 28th, 1880, he has contributed as largely as any outsider toPunch'spages. Innumerable picture-shows, new books, articles of all kinds, and countless verses of every descriptionon every possible topic, with paragraphs long and short, are, so to speak, thehors d'œuvresof his contribution. Many series of poems and papers are his, of which the best-known is that of the "Lays of a Lazy Minstrel" (begun August 28th, 1880), with their riverside idylls and love-carols; but to his hand also are to be credited "Simple Stories for Little Gentlefolk," "Holiday Haunts, by Jingle Junior on the Jaunt," "Club Carols," "Uncle Bulger's Moral Tales," "Songs of the Streets," "Rambling Rondeaux," and "Paper-knife Poems." But it is his fluent, melodious, and unpretentious verse that has made him popular inPunch.
Reginald Shirley Brooks, the son of Mr. Burnand's brilliant predecessor, was working forPunchin 1880, and the following year he was called to the Table, and remained there without much distinction until 1884. He wrote some smart papers, but his groove was not that of the sober and respectable Fleet Street Sage. He preferred wilder spirits, and he accordingly retired, taking with him the sympathy of his companions. He died soon after.
After the escapade of Mr. George Augustus Sala in respect to Alfred Bunn's quarrel withPunchand the resultant "Word with Punch" of half a century ago (which was illustrated by Mr. Sala's lively pencil, as is explained in another chapter), none would ever have thought that his pen would have been driven inPunch'sservice. Lemon had declared him a "graceless young whelp," and nothing that Mr. Sala ever cared to do had tended to change that opinion. Shirley Brooks and Tom Taylor carried on the sentiment as a sort of dynastic vendetta, and Mr. Sala's name was kept onPunch'sIndex Expurgatorius until the accession of Mr. Burnand.Punchwas then no longer the close borough, and the new Editor sought talent where he could find it. He invited Mr. Sala to contribute, and the invitation has been responded to whenever anything "Punchy" has occurred to the writer—as in the rhymed travesty of Tennyson's opening verses of "The Princess." It is an amusing fact that on one occasion Mr. Sala contributed a skit on himself—felicitously entitled "Egosof the Week"—with the startling and satisfactory result that one or two papers, taking thethingau sérieux, commented on the fact, and expressed their pleasure that "at last Mr. George Augustus Sala has had the drubbing byPunchhe has so long and so richly deserved"!
Mr. Clement Scott, thedoyenof the dramatic critics, Civil Servant (like so many of thePunchStaff), member of the clever band that nurtured "Fun" into life, and brother-in-law of Mr. du Maurier, also had to wait till Mr. Burnand was Editor before he was given the opportunity to write forPunch. "It struck him," writes Mr. Scott, "that he might mingle among the essentially comic pages an occasional poem that might ventilate some grievance in a pathetic manner or describe some heroic subject in the ballad style.... The first subject Burnand sent me was the overworked and underpaid clerks in London. It took my fancy, and in three hours after I received his letter I sent him 'The Cry of the Clerk!' To my intense surprise, the morning after it appeared inPunchI found it quotedin extensoin 'The Times'—an unusual honour. I believe Dr. Chinery the instant he read the poem clipped it out with his own scissors and said, 'I don't know if this has ever been done before, but we must quote the poem to-morrow morning.' The sub-editor was aghast, but the poem was printed as fromPunch."
These verses, indeed, struck people's consciences, as Thomas Hood had struck them years ago with "The Song of the Shirt." It brought into relief the enforced "respectability" of the men who earn but a few shillings a week, and yet are supposed to be "above charity."
It was the last verse that most struck home:—
"Why did I marry? In mercy's name, in the form of my brother was I not born?Are wife and child to be given to him, and love to be taken from me with scorn?It is not for them that I plead, for theirs are the only voices that break my sorrow,That lighten my pathway, make me pause 'twixt the sad to-day and grim to-morrow.The Sun and the Sea are not given to me, nor joys like yours as you flit togetherAway to the woods and the downs, and across the endless acres of purple heather.But I've love, thank Heaven! and mercy, too; 'tis for justice only I bid you harkTo the tale of a penniless man like me—to the wounded cry of a London Clerk!"
"Why did I marry? In mercy's name, in the form of my brother was I not born?Are wife and child to be given to him, and love to be taken from me with scorn?It is not for them that I plead, for theirs are the only voices that break my sorrow,That lighten my pathway, make me pause 'twixt the sad to-day and grim to-morrow.The Sun and the Sea are not given to me, nor joys like yours as you flit togetherAway to the woods and the downs, and across the endless acres of purple heather.But I've love, thank Heaven! and mercy, too; 'tis for justice only I bid you harkTo the tale of a penniless man like me—to the wounded cry of a London Clerk!"
Then he took the part of the shop-girls who are never allowed to sit down ("Weary Womankind"); of the London children who cry for fresh air ("The Children's Cry"), and described as well many a deed of daring by sea and land, in which sailors, soldiers, engine-drivers, policemen, life-boatmen, and coastguardsmen were concerned. In his little volume of "Lays and Lyrics" nearly a score of thesePunchpoems are republished.
The Parliamentary phase ofPunchis the one which has remained constant from the beginning of the paper. All else has been subject to change—the quality of its satire, the character of its literature, the intention of its art, and the class of its humour. But in his attendance upon ParliamentPunchhas been persistently assiduous and consistently frank, neither awed by its majesty nor sickened by its follies. Parliament has always been regarded in his pages in the spirit of benevolent patronage and control, which, though unquestionably pedagogic, has always been just and sympathetic in tone. It was in order to continue the chain forged by Shirley Brooks and Tom Taylor in their "Essence of Parliament," without the dropping of a link, that Mr. Burnand's first Staff appointment was made with a view to filling the place that had been left vacant by Tom Taylor's death. His attention, like that of many others, had long been attracted to the brilliant weekly articles in the "Observer," entitled "From the Cross Benches"—papers that dealt with the week's Parliamentary proceedings with singular cleverness, humour, and originality—and at the proper moment he sought out the author of them, Mr. Henry W. Lucy, of the "Daily News."
H. W. LUCY.H. W. LUCY.(From a Photograph by Walery, Limited.)
Mr. Lucy had already graduated as the Pepys of Parliament; for he had been known in gallery and lobby of the House for the past ten years, and was acting as chief of the Parliamentary Staff for his paper. He was, therefore, considered particularly well-fitted for the new post onPunch, andhe readily accepted the invitation. His first contribution was a sort of prospectus of Toby's Diary, which was published on January 8th, 1881. Thenceforward Mr. Lucy became known as "Toby, M.P.;" and when a puzzled Member of Parliament, familiar with his face, would occasionally ask him in the Lobby, "By the way, where are you member for?" he would answer "Barks" and pass on. It is not uncommon to find unregenerate members taking to themselves the credit of the witticisms which Toby puts into their mouths; so that there is perhaps excuse for the biographer of Lord Sherbrooke (Robert Lowe), who attributed to his subject the capital exclamation with which Mr. Lucy endowed him. When he saw a deaf member get his ear-trumpet into position in order to listen to a tedious orator, he remarked (according to Toby): "What a pity it is to see a man thus wasting his natural advantages!" And Lowe has had the credit of it ever since.
No one in the House knows its members so well as Mr. Lucy; no one out of it is so well acquainted with its procedure; and when for a short time he reluctantly filled the editorial chair of the "Daily News," he was unhappy till he got back to Toby's "kennel" in the gallery of the House of Commons.
But the Essence of Parliament as distilled by "Toby" is by no means the only, hardly even the most voluminous of Mr. Lucy'sPunchwork. In the recess he is a constant contributor as Mr. Burnand's deputy in the character ofPunch'sreviewer—"The Baron de Book-Worms," through whose personality "My Baronite" appears from time to time; while among his serial articles have been "The Letter-bag of Toby, M.P.," and the set of Interviews with Celebrities at Home, parodies of the "World's" articles, which delighted none so much as Edmund Yates himself.[48]Mr. Lucy joined the Table on his return from Japan in 1884.
But it is as "Toby" that he has gained most of his popularity. He showed the way about the House of Commons to Mr. Harry Furniss; and, up to the withdrawal of the latter, his "Diary" was always illustrated by that artist. Later on Mr. Edward J. Reed took the place Mr. Furniss resigned, and the pair continue to set before the world their humorous versions—perversions, it would be hardly fair to say—of Parliamentary proceedings. Mr. Lucy's touch is light and original, imparting an appearance of interest and entertainment to the dullest debate, and of verisimilitude to the most doubtful statements. Yet the "Diary" is not without its value as a record, while it remains an amusing commentary upon the work of the Session, and an entirely inoffensive caricature of the men and speeches with whom it deals.
In 1884, when the entertainer's platform was offering inducements superior to those of the stage, Mr. George Grossmith began a series of sketches inPunch, entitled "Very Trying," the fourth article of which contained a skit of Mr. Flowers, the Police Magistrate at Bow Street, under the heading of "The Good-humoured Magistrate," and anotherdealt with Mr. Vaughan. Then came his funny musical sketches, with a few bars of absurd music sprinkled here and there in imitation of the London concert books. A few songs he also contributed to the paper, "The Duke of Seven Dials" becoming "popular even unto Hackney." Then, in collaboration with his brother, Mr. Weedon Grossmith, he produced "The Diary of a Nobody." It was a domestic record of considerable length, which dealt in an extremely earnest way with Mr. Samuel Porter, who lived in a small villa in Holloway, and had trouble with his drains, and was sometimes late at the office, with similar circumstances of striking interest and concern, which seemed to him to call for public notice. The "Diary" was afterwards republished in book form.
The light and dainty touch of Mr. Andrew Lang has not been denied toPunch. A number of trifles in verse appeared in 1883 and the two following years, the most important of them being a sonnet to Colonel Burnaby—the one contribution, it may be said, that the author has thought well to republish. Some years later he produced the laughable series "The Confessions of a Duffer"—papers so humorous that it is difficult to accept Mr. Lang's disclaimer that "a comic paper is a thing in which I have no freedom to write."
Besides Mr. W. Ralston, with his single contribution of "K.G.—Q.E.D." (November 22nd, 1884), Miss May Kendall was the chief comer of the year 1885. This lady helps to make upPunch'sbevy of lady literary contributors—Miss Betham-Edwards, Mrs. Frances Collins, Lady Campbell, Miss Burnand (an occasional reviewer, or "Baronitess"), Miss Hollingshead, and Mrs. Leverson, being the others. She is one of the few lady humorists of any consequence in her day. Women, as a rule, are humorists neither born nor made. Often enough they are wits, more frequently satirists. They can make, we are told, but they cannot take, a joke; at any rate, they are usually out of their element in the comic arena. Moreover, as butts for the caricaturist they are unsatisfactory, for in proportion as his efforts are successful, his sense of chivalry is outraged; and we have seen how Keene and others recoiled from the idea. Only on one occasiondid Mr. Furniss make the attempt, and that indirectly and in a sense unintentionally—and the circumstance brought a miniature storm about his ears. No woman has ever yet been a caricaturist, in spite of the fact that her femininity befits her pre-eminently for the part. That she has desisted is a mercy for which man may be devoutly thankful. At the present time the rule here laid down as to lady humorists is proved by an exception in the person of Miss Murphy, a lady, it is said, of much beauty, who worked her way up from a subordinate position to the editorship of "The Melbourne Punch," a really comic production; but the unequal battle that would follow any extensive imitation of her example is altogether too painful to contemplate.
Miss Kendall's first poems, which were introduced to the notice ofPunchby Mr. Andrew Lang in sincere admiration of their cleverness, were "The Lay of the Ancient Trilobite," and "Ballad of the Ichthyosaurus," which were printed in the numbers for January 24th and February 14th, 1885. It is Miss Kendall's peculiar talent that she is able to extract delicate humour out of the most unpromising subjects, and even in these lays, which together constituted her maiden effort, the characteristic is clearly shown. One verse may serve as an example; it is from the poem which shows how the Ichthyosaurus aspires to a higher life, and how the all-absorbent Ether remains in triumph after we have played out our little parts to their puny end:—