Part 8

We are now brought to the conclusion of our most important chapter. Will Cruikshank's humour live? or, rather, may it live? for things live centuries without permission, and the fright of Little Miss Muffet is more remembered than the terror of Melmoth. The answer should be "Yes" from all who acknowledge beauty in the sparkle of evil and of good. No humorist worthy of that forbidden fruit which made thieves of all mankind can refrain from the laughter which is paid for by another. Mark Twain, who has nerves to thrill for martyred Joan of Arc, delights in the epitaph, "Well done, good and faithful servant," pronounced over the frizzled corpse of a negro cook. Lowell, the poet, extracted a pun from the blind eyes of Milton. _Punch_, in 1905, amused us with the boy who supposed that horses were made of cats' meat, and in 1905 Sir Francis Burnand thought that the most humorous pictorial joke published by him in Punch was Phil May's drawing of a fisherman being invited to enter the Dottyville Lunatic Asylum. There is heroism as well as vulgarity in laughter saluting death and patience, hippophagy and cannibalism, ugliness and deprivation. He is a wise man who sees smiling mouths in the rents of ruin and the spaces between the ribs of the skeleton angel. Humour, irresponsible and purposeless, is of eternity, and to me (at least) it is the one masterful human energy in the world to-day. It is against compassion and importance and remorse and horror and blame, but it is not for cruelty, or for indifference to distress. Nothing exists so separate from truth and falsehood and right and wrong. Nothing is more instant in pure appeal to the intellect, no blush is more sincere than that of the person who before company cannot see a joke. Humorists are dear to the critic because they criticise by re-making in the world of idea the things they criticise. Among them Cruikshank is dearer than some, less dear than others. Through the regency and reign of the eldest son of George the Third he, even more than Cobbett, seems to me the historian of genius, by virtue of prodigious merriment in vulgar art. The great miscellany of humour which he poured out revitalises his name whenever it is examined by the family of John Bull. For it is his own humour--the humour of one who had the power to appropriate without disgrace because he was himself an Original.

VII

Our classification of Cruikshank's works has enabled us to see the objective range of his artistic personality. A few words must now be said of the media in which he worked. Of these media the principal was etching.

"O! I've seen Etching!" exclaims Cruikshank in 1859; "it's easy enough, you only rub some black stuff over the copper plate, and then take a[n] etching needle, and scratch away a bit--and then clap on some a-ke-ta-ke (otherwise aquafortis)--and there you are!" "Wash the _steel_," he says in another of his quaint revelations, "with a solution of _copper_ in _Nitro[u]s acid_--to _tarnish_ the _tarnation Bright steel_ before Etching, to save the eyes."

In his 77th year he says: "I am working away as hard as ever at water color drawings and paintings in oil, doing as little Etching as possible as that is very slavish work."

As he had etched about 2700 designs when he made this statement, it is impossible not to sympathise with his recreative change of medium. It must be remembered that, except in dry-point etching, the bite of the acid is trusted to engrave the design of the needle and that, when the stronger lines are obtained "by allowing the acid to act for a longer time" on a particular part or parts of the etched plate, the mechanical work, and work of calculation, imposed upon the etcher is formidable. Until, in the late seventies of the nineteenth century, the invasion of the process-block gave manual freedom to the bookseller's artist, that individual was continually sighing over the complexity of the method by which he paid the tribute of his imagination to Mammon. In the hands of the wood-engraver an artist's unengraved work was apparently always liable to the danger of misrepresentation unless the artist engraved it himself. Even the great John Thompson is not free from the suspicion of having unconsciously assisted "demon printers" in transforming into "little dirty scratches" some designs by Daniel Maclise, whose expressions are preserved in this sentence. Cruikshank who, if we add his woodcuts to his etchings, saw upwards of 4000 designs by him given with laborious indirectness to the world, would have been more than human if he had considered his unskilfulness in the art of producing and employing the colours between black and white as a reason for refraining from painting in oils. In 1853 "he entered as a student at the Royal Academy"; but his industry, in the rôle of a pupil of 60, was, it seems, less than his humility, for "he made very few drawings in the _Antique_," says Mr Charles Landseer, "and never got into the _Life_." Cruikshank, however, had exhibited in the Royal Academy as early as 1830, and in 1848 he dared to paint for the Prince Consort the picture entitled _Disturbing the Congregation_. This picture of a boy in church looking passionately unconscious of the fact that his sacrilegious pegtop is lying on the grave of a knight in full view of the beadle, is an anecdote painted more for God to laugh at than for Christians of the "so-called nineteenth century," but a philosophic sightseer like myself rejoices in it. This picture and _The Fairy Ring_, already praised, reveal Cruikshank's talent sufficiently to prevent one from regretting that he ultimately preferred covering canvases to furrowing plates.

To do him justice he was academically interested in the whole technique of pictorial art as practised in his day. He admitted, for instance, to Charles Hancock, "the sole inventor and producer of blocks by the process known as 'Etching on Glass,'" that if this invention had come earlier before him "it would have altered the whole character" of his drawing, though the designs which he produced by Hancock's process--the first of which was completed in April 1864--include nothing of importance.

We will not further linger over the media of reproduction employed by our artist, but summon a few ideas suggested by the vision we have had of him sitting like a schoolboy in the schoolroom of the Royal Academy.

As a draughtsman he had been professorial in 1817 when he published with S. W. Fores two plates entitled _Striking Effects produced by lines and dots for the assistance of young draftsmen_, wherein he showed, like Hogarth, the amount of pictorial information which an artist can convey by a primitively simple method. He was professorial, too, when in 1865 he attempted to put in perspective a twelve mile giant taking a stride of six miles, on a plate 6 inches long and 3-3/5 inches broad, and informed the publisher of "Popular Romances of the West of England" (1865) that about 1825 he had attempted to put in perspective the Miltonic Satan whose body

"Prone on the flood, extended long and large, Lay floating many a rood."

Cruikshank's greatest enemy was his mannerism which may even delude the pessimist of scant acquaintance with him into the idea that it imperfectly disguises an inability to draw up to the standard of Vere Foster. The Cruikshankian has merely to direct the attention of such a person to the frontispiece executed by Cruikshank for T. J. Pettigrew's "History of Egyptian Mummies" (1834). If a man can draw well in the service of science his mannerism is the accomplishment of an intention.

Ruskin said that Cruikshank's works were "often much spoiled by a curiously mistaken type of face, divided so as to give too much to the mouth and eyes and leave too little for forehead," and yet there is extant a curious MS. note by Cruikshank to the effect that Mr Ruskin's eyes were "in the wrong Place and not set properly in his head," showing that Cruikshank was a student of even a patron's physiognomy and suggesting that, if Ruskin had roamed in Cruikshank's London he would have convicted the artist of a malady of imitativeness. It must be remembered that he repeatedly drew recognisable portraits of his contemporaries; indeed he was so far from being a realist devoted to libel that Mr Layard confides to us that various studies by George Cruikshank of "the great George" would, he thinks, "have resulted in an undue sublimation had completion ever been attained."

Yet the sublimation of the respectable is precisely the rosy view of Cruikshank the man enjoyed by me at the present moment. He is Captain of the 24th Surrey Rifle Volunteers; he is Vice-President of the London Temperance League. He sketches a beautiful palace as a pastime. He is in the same ballroom as Queen Victoria, and Her Majesty bows to him. Withal he is sturdy and declines the Prince Consort's offer for his collection of works by George Cruikshank. In the end St Paul's Cathedral receives him, and the person who knew him most intimately declares on enduring stone that she loved him best.

We are now at the end, and cannot stimulate the muse of our prose to further efforts. She being silent obliges our blunt British voice to speak for itself. Inasmuch as Cruikshank was a mannerist, he is inimitable except by them who take great pains to vex the critical of mankind. Inasmuch as he expressed the beauty of crookedness, as though he found the secret of artistic success in punning on his own name, he offers a model worthy of practical study. His fame as an etcher is too loud to be lost in the silence of Henri Beraldi, who enumerated "Les graveurs du dix-neuvième siècle," in 12 tomes (1885-1892), without mentioning his name. Though C is more employed in the initials of words than any other letter in our alphabet, the name of Cruikshank comes only after "Curious" in its attractiveness for the readers of entries under the letter C in English catalogues of second-hand books. It may be that to etchings in books of Cruikshank's period is ascribed, since the usurpation of the process-block, the factitious value of curios, and that he, Beraldi's Great Omitted, profits thereby. It is a fact that he is "collected" like postage-stamps, though no published work of his has attained the price per copy of the imperforate twopenny Mauritius of 1847. But we have descended to a comparison so unfortunate in its logical consequences that it is well to prophesy the immortality of Cruikshank from other than commercial tokens. Those tokens exist in the undying praises of Dickens, Thackeray, "Christopher North," and Ruskin, in the enormous work of his principal bibliographer George William Reid, and, not least to the spiritual eye, in the permanence of the impression made by a few of his designs on a memory that has forgotten a little of that literary art which is the only atonement offered by its owner to the world for all the irony of his requickened life.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHICAL INDEX

_Numbers referring to illustrations are in larger type. The titles of illustrations are in italics, the titles of books and periodicals in inverted commas. An article or demonstrative adjective in parenthesis in the first line of an entry indicates that the article parenthesised begins the title of the subject of that entry._

Achilles in Hyde Park, 171. _See_ Brazen, Ladies, Making.

Acton, John Adams. _See_ Cruikshank, George.

Adam-tilers. An Adam-tiler is a receiver of stolen goods, a pickpocket, a fence, 103.

"Adventures (The) of Gil Blas of Santillane. Translated from the French of Lesage, by T. Smollett, M.D. To which is prefixed a memoir of the author, by Thomas Roscoe. Illustrated by George Cruikshank [and K. Meadows]" (2 vols., London: Effingham Wilson, 1833; being vols. xvi. and xvii. of "The Novelist's Library, edited by Thomas Roscoe, with illustrations by George Cruikshank"), 199.

"Adventures (The) of Joseph Andrews, by Henry Fielding, Esq., with illustrations by George Cruikshank" (London: James Cochrane & Co., 1832. It is vol. vii. of "The Novelist's Library: edited by Thomas Roscoe, Esq., with illustrations by George Cruikshank"), $189$.

"Adventures (The) of Sir Frizzle Pumpkin; Nights at Mess; and Other Tales. With illustrations by George Cruikshank" (William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh; and T. Cadell, Strand, London, 1836. The author is Rev. James White). 231.

A. E. (George Russell), 161.

_A Going! A Going! The Last Time A Going!!!_ (print pub. 12 April 1821 by G. Humphrey), 25.

Ainsworth, William Harrison, 77, 81. _See_ Ainsworth's, Artist, Guy Fawkes, Jack Sheppard, Miser's, Rookwood, S[ain]t James's, Sir Lionel, Tower, Windsor.

"Ainsworth's Magazine: a Miscellany of Romance, General Literature, and Art. Edited by William Harrison Ainsworth" (illustrations by George Cruikshank appear in the first 6 vols. and the 9th vol. "Guy Fawkes" was reprinted with Cruikshank's etchings in vols. xvi. xvii. in 1849 and 1850. The first 9 vols. were published in London by [successively] Hugh Cunningham, 1842; Cunningham & Mortimer, 1842-1843; John Mortimer, 1843-1845; Henry Colburn, 1845; Chapman & Hall, 1846), 86, $87$, 90, $91$, 93, 137.

Akerman, John Yonge, 125, 126. _See_ Gentleman.

Albert, Prince (the Prince Consort, born 1819, died 1861), 44, 240, 248. _See_ Original.

Albert Memorial, 43.

Alfieri, 72.

Almanack. _See_ Comic Almanack.

Alphabet. 211-212. _See_ Comic Alphabet.

Andersen, Hans Christian, 36.

"Angelo's Picnic; or, Table Talk, including numerous Recollections of Public Characters, who have figured in some part or another of the stage of life for the last fifty years; forming an endless variety of talent, amusement, and interest, calculated to please every person fond of Biographical Sketches and Anecdotes. Written by Himself.... In addition to which are several original literary contributions from the following Distinguished Authors:--Colman, Theodore Hook, Bulwer, Horace Smith, Mrs Radcliffe, Miss Jane Porter, Mrs Hall, Kenny, Peake, Boaden, Hermit in London, &c." (London: John Ebers, 1834), $225$.

"Annals (The) of Gallantry, or the Conjugal Monitor," by A. Moore, LL.D. (3 vols., London: printed for the proprietors by M. Jones, 1814, 1815. First issued in 18 parts), 70-71.

Anti-Slavery. _See_ New.

"Arabian Nights" (the publisher, Mr John Murray, has a record that George Cruikshank was paid £67, 4s. for some illustrations for the "Arabian Nights"), 156.

Arnold, Matthew, 69.

"Arthur O'Leary: His Wanderings and Ponderings in many Lands. Edited by his Friend, Harry Lorrequer, and Illustrated by George Cruikshank. In Three Volumes" (London: Henry Colburn, 1844), 196.

"Artist (The) and the Author. A Statement of Facts, by the Artist, George Cruikshank. Proving that the Distinguished Author, Mr W. Harrison Ainsworth, is 'labouring under a singular delusion' with respect to the origin of 'The Miser's Daughter,' 'The Tower of London,' &c." (London: Bell & Daldy, 1872), 60.

"Art Journal (The)," 184.

"Athenæum (The)," 82.

"Attic Miscellany," 11.

Augustus Frederick, Duke of Sussex (6th son of George III., born 1773, died 1843. George Cruikshank etched facsimiles of five illustrations in a 13th century Hebrew and Chaldee Pentateuch, copies of two illuminations from a 13th century Armenian MS. of the Gospels and an illumination to a Latin Psalter of the 10th century for "Bibliotheca Sussexiana. A descriptive catalogue, accompanied by historical and biographical notices of the manuscripts and printed books contained in the library of His Royal Highness the Duke of Sussex, K.G., D.C.L., &c. &c. &c. &c., in Kensington Palace. By Thomas Joseph Pettigrew, F.R.S., F.A.S., F.L.S., and librarian to H.R.H. the Duke of Sussex" [London: Longman & Co., Paternoster Row; Payne & Foss, Pall Mall, Harding & Co., Pall Mall East; H. Bohn, Henrietta Street; and Smith & Son, Glasgow, 1827]). _See_ Illustrations of Popular.

Bacchus _See_ Worship; Oil Painting.

"Bachelor's (The) Own Book. The Adventures of Mr Lambkin, Gent., in the Pursuit of Pleasure and Amusement, and also in search of Health and Happiness" (designed, etched, and published by George Cruikshank, 1 Aug. 1844), 232-233.

Baker, A. Z., 212.

Ballooning, 40.

"Banbury Chap-Books." _See_ Pearson, Edwin.

"Bands (The) in the Parks. Copy of a letter supposed to have been sent from a High Dignitary of the Church to 'the Right Man in the Right Place,' upon the subject of the military Bands Playing in the Parks on Sundays. Picked up and published by George Cruikshank" (London: W. Tweedie, 1856), 59.

Bank of England, 28.

Bank Restriction Note (Hone is said to have realised over £700 by the sale of this shocker), 28.

Barham, Rev. Richard Harris ("Thomas Ingoldsby"; born 6 Dec. 1788, died 17 June 1845). _See_ Ingoldsby Legends.

Barker, M. H. ("The" and "An" "Old Sailor"), 95. _See_ Greenwich, Old Sailor's Jolly Boat, Topsail-sheet.

Bartholomew Fair, 39.

Basile, Giambattista, 204. _See_ Pentamerone.

Bateman, Lord. _See_ Loving.

Bath. _See_ New Bath.

Bayly, Thomas Haynes (died 22 April 1839), 216.

Beachy Head, 108.

"Beauties (The) of Washington Irving, Esq.... Illustrated with woodcuts, engraved by Thompson; from drawings by George Cruikshank, Esq." (4th ed., London: Thomas Tegg & Son, 1835. G. Cruikshank illustrated "Knickerbocker's New York" [_sic_] with a fine etching entitled _Ten Breeches_, and another entitled _Anthony Van Corlear & Peter Stuyvesant_, pub. in "Illustrations of Popular Works," 1830). _See_ Thompson, John.

"Bee (The) and the Wasp. A Fable--in verse. With designs and etchings, by G. Cruikshank" (London: Charles Tilt, 1832. The text is by Richard Frankum), 148.

Beerbohm, Max, 22.

Belch, W, 12.

Bentley, Richard, publisher (died 10 Sept. 1871 in the 77th year of his age), 86.

Bentley's Miscellany (64 vols., London: Richard Bentley, 1837-1868. George Cruikshank contributed illustrations to the first 14 vols. Charles Dickens edited vols. i.-v., and part of vol. v. William Harrison Ainsworth was the next editor, but started an opposition magazine in 1842), 74 (vol iv., 1838), 133 (The Handsome Clear Starcher), 175 (The Ingoldsby Legends).

Beraldi, Henri, 248, 251.

Berenger, Lt.-Col. Baron De. _See_ Stop.

Bergami, Baron Bartolomo, 26.

"Betting (The) Book. By George Cruikshank" (London: W. & F. G. Cash, 1852), 58.

Blake, William (born 1757, died 12 Aug. 1828). _See_ Three.

Blewitt, Mrs Octavian, 134. _See_ Rose and the Lily.

_Blucher (Old) beating the Corsican Big Drum_ (caricature published by S. W. Fores, 8 April 1814), 20.

"Blue Light (The)," 159.

Boleyn, Anne, 90.

Bolton, engraver, 249.

_Boney Hatching a Bulletin, or Snug Winter Quarters_ (caricature published Dec. 1812 by Walker & Knight), 18.

_Boney's Elb(a)ow Chair_ (caricature published 5 May 1814 by S. Knight), 20.

_Boney's Meditations on the island of St Helena. The Devil addressing the Sun._ (G. H. invt., G. Cruikshank fect. Caricature published by H. Humphrey, Aug. 1815), 133.

_Boney Tir'd of War's alarms_ (caricature published by Walker & Knight, Jan. 1813), 18.

"Bottle (The). In eight plates, designed and etched by George Cruikshank. Dedicated to Joseph Adshead, Esq., of Manchester. London: published for the artist, September 1st, 1847, by David Bogue, 86 Fleet Street; Wiley & Putnam, New York; and J. Sands, Sydney, New South Wales. Price six shillings," 27, 55-57, 69.

Bowring, John. _See_ Minor.

Boz. _See_ Dickens, Charles.

_Brazen (This) Image was erected by the ladies, in honor of Paddy Carey O'Killus, Esq., their Man o' Metal._ (J. P***y invt., G. Cruikshank fect. Caricature published by J. Fairburn, 20 July 1822), 171.

_Breaking Up_ (Holiday scene by George Cruikshank, published 12 Dec. 1826 by S. Knight), 1.

Brighton Pavilion ("the Folly"), 44.

Broadley, A. M., 12. See _Facing_, Reid.

"Brooks _alias_ Read," publisher who employed Percy Cruikshank and who was caricatured insultingly by George Cruikshank, 60.

Brough, Robt. B. _See_ Life of Sir.

Bruton, H. W., 133.

Buck, Adam (portrait painter, born 1759, died 1833. The Duke of York was among his sitters), 26.

Bull, John, 4, 7, 176. See _John Bull_, _John Bull's_, _Johnny Bull_, _Preparing_.

Bunyan, John, 120, 125. See _Christian_, Pilgrim's (2 items).

Burnand, Sir Francis Cowley, (born 29 Nov. 1836; became editor of "Punch" in 1880), 234.

Burns, Robert, 116 (_The Deil cam fiddling thro' the Town_), 172 ("The Jolly Beggars"). _See_ Royal Academy, 1852.

"Bursill's Biographies. No. 1. George Cruikshank. Artist--Humorist--Moralist" (London: John Bursill), 162.

Buzmen. A Buzman is a pickpocket, 103.

Byron, Lord, 183, 195. _See_ Memoirs of the Life.

"Cakes and Ale. By Douglas Jerrold" (2 vols., How & Parsons, 1842), 204 (_The Mayor of Hole-cum-Corner_).

Callot, Jacques (born 1592, died 28 March 1635), 93, 94.

Carbonaro, José Moreno, 199.

Carbonic Acid Gas. See _Good Effects_.

Carey, David, 46, 47.

Caroline of Brunswick, wife of George IV. (born 17 May 1768, married George, Prince of Wales, 8 April 1795, died 7 Aug. 1821. If the belief still linger that Cruikshank was a Caroliniac, see his drawing of _The Radical Ladder_ in "The Loyalist's Magazine," 1821. The preface to this publication remarks on "that Reginal mania, which for a season transported our countrymen"), 25. See _A Going_, Queen's, Royal Rushlight.

Carpenter, 27.

Carroll, Lewis, 32, 183-184, 216, 220, 223.

Cash, William, 57.

Catalani, Angelica, 11.

"Catalogue (A) of a Selection from the Works of George Cruikshank, Extending over a Period of Upwards of Sixty years [from 1799 to 1863,] Now Exhibiting at Exeter Hall. Consisting of Upwards of One Hundred Oil Paintings, Water-Colour Drawings, and Original Sketches; together with over a Thousand Proof Etchings, from his most popular Works, Caricatures, Scrap Books, Son[g] Headings, &c.; and The Worship of Bacchus. Open Daily from Ten till Dusk. Admission One Shilling. London: William Tweedie, 337, Strand, 1863. Price Two-pence" ('This title is copied from that of the 2nd ed. of the catalogue, desirable on account of G. Cruikshank's preface which is dated February, 1863), 1.

"Catholic Miracles; illustrated with seven designs, including a characteristic portrait of Prince Hohenlohe, by George Cruikshank. To which is added a reply to Cobbett's Defence of Catholicism, and his Libel on the Reformation" (London: Knight & Lacey. Dublin: Westley & Tyrrell, 1825), 140.

Cato Street, 3. See _Interior View of Hayloft_.

Cervantes, 183. _See_ History and, Illustrations of Don.

Chamisso, Adelbert von, 125. _See_ Peter.

Charles Gustavus, King of Sweden, 74.

Chesson, Nora (poet), 231.

Chesterton, Gilbert Keith (quoted), 104.

_Children's Lottery Print_ (first published in 1804, by W. Belch, Newington Butts, price 1/2d. Mr G. S. Layard observes that "George did not make his copy from the earliest state of the plate,"), 15.

_Child's Christmas Piece--Daniel in the Lion's Den._ (An etching. Capt. Douglas writes, "the centre is left blank in which the child has to write its Christmas piece"), 11.

_Cholic (The)_ (caricature published by G. Humphrey, 12 Feb. 1819),166.

_Christian passing through the Valley of the Shadow of Death_ (print of which the foundation is unknown. Published by W. Tweedie, 337 Strand. Described on p. 125 from No. 10,043 in The George Cruikshank Collection, South Kensington Museum).