The History of "Punch" Part 9

And the ladies! The coal-scuttle bonnet and the incipient crinoline of 1845; the growing crinolines of 1851, larger in 1860, largest of all in 1864; the hair in bands or side-curls of 1852, and in nets in 1862; the bonnets worn almost off the head in 1853, more so in 1854, until Leech drew a picture of two ladies walking out, with footmen carrying their headgear behind them; the "spoon-shaped bonnet" of 1860--"the latest Parisian folly," which the street-boys mistake for "a dustman's 'at;"

the archery of 1862, the pork-pie hat, the croquet, the tennis, the golf--every sport, every habit and custom, every change of dress, down to the minutest detail--all is recorded with faithfulness and humour, first by Leech's pencil, and then, in chief measure, by Mr. du Maurier's.

It is curious in turning over _Punch's_ volumes to see how on occasion he could use his power of prophecy with an accuracy that spoke well for the common-sense, sometimes even the statesmanship, to be found among the Staff. "There is but one Punch, and he is his own prophet." It is rather as a social reformer than as a politician that he has exerted his gift, though an example of the latter cla.s.s of foresight may be pointed to in the cartoon of Sir John Tenniel of April 7th, 1860. This was ent.i.tled "A Glimpse of the Future: A Probable and Large Importation of Foreign Rags," in which King Bomba of Naples, the Emperor Louis Napoleon, and the Pope were shown landing on British sh.o.r.es in very sorry plight. And in due time England was to see--at least, as far as the two monarchs were concerned--the realisation of the oracular couplet combined:--

"The time will come when discontent Will overthrow your Government."

Then the number of inventions and innovations forestalled by _Punch's_ pen are many. In December, 1848, much is made of a proposed "opera telakouphanon"--a forecast of the telephone, phonograph, and theatrophone combined:--

"It would be in the power of Mr. Lumley," says _Punch_, "during the aproaching holiday time to bring home the Opera to every lady's drawing-room in London. Let him cause to be constructed at the back of Her Majesty's Theatre an apparatus on the principle of the Ear of DIONYSIUS.... Next, having obtained an Act of Parliament for the purpose, let him lay down after the manner of pipes a number of Telakouphona connected--the reader will excuse the apparent vulgarism--with this ear, and extended to the dwellings of all such as may be willing to pay for the accommodation. In this way our domestic establishments might be served with the liquid notes of JENNY LIND as easily as they are with soft water, and could be supplied with music as readily as they can with gas. Then at a _soiree_ or evening party, if a desire were expressed for a little music, we should only have to turn on the _Sonnambula_ or the _Puritani_, as the case might be," etc.

--a thirty years' prophecy. The following year he represented a lady listening to music by telegraph; and the kinetoscope is only now waiting to fulfil Mr. du Maurier's forecast of many years ago. If Mr. Edison has not yet done quite all that Mr. Punch foretold, is not that rather Mr.

Edison's than _Punch's_ fault?

In an unhappy moment in 1847 _Punch_ proposed the use of umbrellas and house-fronts for advertising purposes, and the hint was promptly taken.

In the previous year he foretold the use of the Thames Tunnel as a railway conduit; and his sketch of a zebra harnessed to a carriage in the streets of London was realised forty years later. The great "Missing Word Compet.i.tion" of 1892 was forestalled by _Punch_ by four-and-thirty years (p. 53, Vol. x.x.xV., August 7th, 1858). Leech's "Mistress of the Hounds," too--how fantastic the idea was thought in those days, and laughed at accordingly!--has since become a hard, astraddle, uncompromising fact; and the lady's safety riding-skirt, that attached itself to the saddle when the lady lost her seat, antic.i.p.ated by thirty years the patent for a similar contrivance taken out in 1884. Indeed, _Punch's_ picture of November, 1854, was put in as evidence before Mr.

Justice Wright in April, 1893, when an action between two sartorial artists turned upon the point of anteriority, and the picture won the case.

Common-sense, and shrewdness of observation and judgment, which are at the root of amateur prophecy, brought as much honour to _Punch_ as ever Old Moore obtained through one of his lucky flukes. In December, 1893, the Prince of Wales opened the Hugh Myddleton Board School, the finest in London, which had been erected on the site of the old Clerkenwell prison; and on the invitation card to the ceremony appeared a reproduction of the _Punch_ picture of May, 1847, which accompanied an altercation between "School and Prison, who've lately risen As opposition teachers." This was published nearly a quarter of a century before Mr. Forster's Education Act, and concludes with the prophecy curiously fulfilled in the case of this particular inst.i.tution. To this picture, in which the county gaol, untenanted, looks scowlingly at the crowded school, the Prince feelingly referred when he spoke of the scepticism with which the statement was regarded, that the inst.i.tution of "free" schools would shut the prisons up. But a volume might be filled with instances of the occasions on which _Punch_ has seen with his eyes, and thought with the front of his brain--how his demands for necessary innovations (such, for example, as fever carriages in 1861) were quickly acted upon, and how his serious mood has enforced the respect which mere geniality might have failed to secure.

He is not, of course, ent.i.tled to invariable congratulation for his att.i.tude towards art; but he has suffered as well as acted ill. When he derided the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and joined in the storm of ridicule that swirled round the heads of Rossetti and his devoted and courageous friends, he doubtless acted within his _role_; but he utterly failed to see below the surface of the apparent affectation of the artists, and all he had to say of Sir John Millais' "Vale of Rest," in the lines descriptive of the year 1859, was

"Year Mr. Millais came out with those terrible nuns in the graveyard."

In the following year, however, Mr. Eastlake, afterwards of the National Gallery, made his mark in the paper as "Jack Easel," and a more intelligent view of art prevailed.

But neither has Art, as personified by the Royal Academy, recognised _Punch_, save by a couple of seats at the annual banquet. It is true that several of its members have drawn for it--Sir Frederic Leighton, Sir John Millais, Sir John Gilbert, Mr. Briton Riviere, Mr. Stacey Marks, Mr. G. A. Storey, and Fred Walker. But _Punch's_ art has gone unnoticed, otherwise than by a square yard or two of wall s.p.a.ce in the Black-and-White room at the annual exhibition. While the Academy has canonised many members whose names half a century later are forgotten, or are remembered only to be called up with a smile or a shrug, it has persistently ignored those who have employed the pencil instead of the brush, or have used ink instead of misusing paint. But it is unnecessary to pursue the subject farther; that the names of Keene, Leech, and Tenniel are not on the roll of the Academy is surely far more to the discredit of the inst.i.tution than of the artists themselves, who presumably, from the Academic point of view, are "no artists." As Mr. du Maurier has pointed out, _Punch's_ artists will have their revenge: "If the ill.u.s.trator confine himself to his own particular branch, he must not hope for any very high place in the hierarchy of art. The great prizes are not for him! No doubt it will be all the same a hundred years hence--but for this: if he has done his work well, he has faithfully represented the life of his time, he has perpetuated what he has seen with his own bodily eyes; and for that reason alone his unpretending little sketches may, perhaps, have more interest for those who come across them in another hundred years than many an ambitious historical or cla.s.sical canvas that has cost its painter infinite labour, imagination, and research, and won for him in his own time the highest rewards in money, fame, and Academical distinction. For genius alone can keep such fancy-work as this alive, and the so-called genius of to-day may be the scapegoat of to-morrow."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DRAUGHTSMAN'S REVENGE.

(_Drawn by George du Maurier._)]

_Punch_ was born, so to speak, upon the stage, between the four canvas walls of his own and Judy's show. His heart and soul were with and of the drama, and plays have rained from the prolific pens of his literary Staff. Many of his contributors acted in public--a few professionally, most of them as amateurs--and more than one has linked his life with a lady who had trodden the stage or concert platform. From the first he proclaimed that Music and the Drama were to be amongst the most prominent features of the work; and to that declaration he has ever since faithfully adhered. As a record of the London stage, the pages of _Punch_ are fairly complete; as a dramatist he has, through the members of his Staff, been prolific, and on the whole highly successful; as an actor he has at least enjoyed himself; and just as Falstaff was the cause of wit in others, he has unwittingly served the pirates of the stage, and to better purpose, too, than they deserved.

With "readings," lectures, and "entertainments," the members of _Punch's_ Staff have often come strikingly before the public; so much so, indeed, that they have stepped from their studies and studios on to the platform as by a natural transition. Albert Smith's "Overland Mail"

and "The Ascent of Mont Blanc," with the extraordinary success that attended them, doubtless set the fashion to the band of men who were always, in one sense at least, before the public. Thackeray's "Four Georges" and the "English Humorists" raised the standard of quality at once; and to that standard more than one of his contemporaries and successors has aimed at attaining, even though they never hoped to succeed. Every Editor of _Punch_--except perhaps Stirling Coyne--delivered such lectures in his day. Henry Mayhew took for his subject that of which he had a complete mastery, "London Labour and London Poor." Mark Lemon, whose knowledge of the metropolis was probably even more extensive and peculiar than Sam Weller's own, lectured on it in "About London," and gave recitals of "Falstaff" with a certain measure of success. Shirley Brooks spoke, as he was so well qualified to do, on "The Houses of Parliament;" and discourses were similarly delivered by Tom Taylor. Mr. Burnand's bright "Happy Thoughts" readings could be forgotten by none that heard them. James Hannay, laying humour aside, lectured on the more serious aspects of literature; and Cuthbert Bede talked of the literary and artistic friends of his Verdant Green career. Mr. Harry Furniss, with his delightful entertainments on "Portraiture" and "The Humours of Parliament," achieved a success undreamed of by the earlier _Punch_ reciters; and Mr. du Maurier in his "Social Pictorial Satire" touched a literary and critical height that charmed every audience by its humour, its delicacy, and its admirable taste.

The theatrical stars of half a century march through _Punch's_ pages in long procession, and matters of high theatrical politics engage the attention from year to year. _Punch's_ interest in theatricals is hardly surprising when it is remembered how closely identified with the drama have been many members of the Staff. Douglas Jerrold was a successful playwright before ever _Punch_ was heard of, and as the author of "Black-Eyed Susan" and "Time Works Wonders" he made his name popular with many who had hardly heard of his connection with "the great comic."

It has been computed that the _Punch_ writers, from first to last, have contributed no fewer than five hundred plays to the stage; and it may be mentioned as a curious fact that to "German Reed's" each successive Editor of _Punch_ has contributed an "Entertainment." The Staff has on several occasions been seen upon the boards; and on countless occasions _Punch_ has figured there, usually against his will. It but sufficed for _Punch_ to make a hit for hungry provincial actors, either of stock companies or on tour, to pounce upon it and work it up into a play or an entertainment. Jerrold's brother-in-law, W. J. Hammond, who was at one time manager of the Strand Theatre, travelled with what must be considered the authorised show, thus described:

"A new Entertainment, called a

NIGHT

with

PUNCH!

Founded on the Series of Celebrated Papers of that highly humorous Periodical, from the pens of the acknowledged best Comic Writers of the day. Adapted and Arranged by R. B. Peake, Esq. As performed by Mr. W. J.

Hammond Forty-two successive nights at the New Strand Theatre.... After which, a Monopolylogue ent.i.tled the

LAST MAN;

or,

PUNCH OUT OF TOWN"

--with five characters, all performed by Hammond, the whole reaching its climax when _Punch_, in _propria persona_, appeared and sang an "Epilogue Song."

But it was Mrs. Caudle, of course, that offered a bait too tempting to be resisted. There was Mrs. Keeley's authorised "Mrs. Caudle" in town; but simultaneously Mrs. Caudles cropped up in every town in the country.

One of these was enacted by Mr. Warren, and his playbill of the Theatre Royal, Gravesend, dated August 7th, 1845, is before me as I write. "The REAL MRS. CAUDLE," he a.s.serts, "having received an enthusiastic welcome from a Gravesend audience, and being p.r.o.nounced far superior to any of the _counterfeit Representatives_, will have the honour of repeating her Curtain Lecture this and to-morrow evenings." "Mrs. Caudle at Gravesend"

was, in fact, a "Comic Sketch" by C. Z. Barnett; and the programme decorated with a common engraving in impudent imitation of Leech's immortal cut, contained all the _dramatis personae_ of Jerrold's little domestic drama, including "Mrs. Caudle (the Original from _Punch's_ Papers), Mr. WARREN."

Six years later Mr. Briggs himself was lifted from _Punch_ on to the stage (amongst others) of the Royal Marylebone Theatre, which then a.s.siduously cultivated the equestrian drama. On November 14th, 1851, for the benefit of a lady called MRS. MORETON BROOKES, there was played a "new grand dramatic equestrian spectacle, ent.i.tled the MAID OF SARAGOSSA; OR, THE DUMB SPY AND STEED OF ARRAGON--realising Sir David Wilkie's Celebrated Picture." As the Arragon Steed remained on the premises when the curtain fell on the first piece, it was obviously a pity to waste him; so, after he had finished realising Wilkie's picture, and had rested awhile, he stepped out of romance into high comedy, or, as the playbill simply put it--"After which will be presented from Sketches furnished from PUNCH'S Domicile, Fleet Street, a New, Grand, Locomotive, Pedestrian, Equestrian, Go-ahead Extravaganza, ent.i.tled

=MR. BRIGGS=!

Or, HOUSE KEEPING _versus_ HORSE KEEPING"--

in which Mr. Briggs was played by Mr. Crowther, and Mrs. Briggs by the fair _beneficiaire_.

The first dramatic effort of _Punch_, in his individual quality and personality as a jester, was the pantomime of "King John, or Harlequin and Magna Charta." _Punch_ had at that time become so popular, and was so generally regarded as the incarnation of all that was witty, that a commission was given for a pantomime that was to surpa.s.s for wit and humour any pantomime that had ever been written or thought of before.

"They have given out," said Alfred Bunn in his vituperative "Word with Punch," "in distinct terms that none but themselves can write a pantomime, and modestly ent.i.tled the one they _did_ write '_Punch's_ Pantomime' ... which they laboured so l.u.s.tily, but so vainly, to puff into notoriety." It was written in 1842, by Lemon, Jerrold, and Henry Mayhew; but when it was read by the first-named to the Covent Garden Company, by whom it was produced, it was found to contain a great deal of wit, but very little fun. It was extensively amended in response to the representations of the pantomimists, and W. H. Payne managed to make a good deal of his part. The wit, however, militated greatly against the "go" and success of the piece, the prestige of its writers did not help it, and the experiment of a "_Punch's_ Pantomime" was accordingly not repeated.

The cordial sympathy that has bound together so many of _Punch's_ Staff in life has more than once taken the form of kindly charity in death or misfortune. To the performance given on behalf of the unhappy Angus Reach reference is made where the man and his work are considered. For Leigh Hunt--although he was not of the band--a theatrical performance was also given, and realised a large sum, and the benefit in aid of Charles H. Bennett's widow and children was even more successful. That interesting event is described later; but for the sake of history it may be well to reproduce the programme here:--

AMATEUR PERFORMANCE AT THE THEATRE ROYAL, MANCHESTER,

(kindly placed at the disposal of the committee by John Knowles, Esq.,)

MONDAY EVENING, JULY 29, 1867.

To commence with an entirely new and original Triumviretta, in one act and ten tableaux (being a lyrical version of Mr. Maddison Morton's celebrated farce of "Box and c.o.x"), by Mr. F. C. BURNAND, ent.i.tled--

c.o.x AND BOX; OR, THE LONG-LOST BROTHERS.

The Lodging, including the Little Second-floor Back Room, has been furnished with

ORIGINAL MUSIC by Mr. ARTHUR SULLIVAN.

John c.o.x, a Journeyman Hatter Mr. QUINTIN James Box, a Journeyman Printer Mr. G. DU MAURIER.

Bouncer, late of the Hampshire Yeomanry, with military reminiscences Mr. ARTHUR BLUNT.