CHAPTER XV

THE STRUGGLE IN THE CRIMEA

The grim struggle of the Crimean War for a time checked Mr. Punch's attacks upon Napoleon III., and turned his attention in another direction. Although the war cloud in the East was assuming portentous dimensions, there were many in England, the Peace Society, the members of the peace-at-any-price party, with Messrs. Bright and Cobden at their head, and most conspicuous of all the Prime Minister, Lord Aberdeen, who deliberately blinded themselves to the possibility of war. It was for the enlightenment of these gentlemen that Mr. Leech designed his cartoon "No Danger," representing a donkey, eloquent in his stolid stupidity, tranquilly braying in front of a loaded cannon. In still another cartoon Lord Aberdeen himself is placidly smoking "The Pipe of Peace" over a brimming barrel of gunpowder. John Bull, however, has already become wide-awake to the danger, for he is nailing the Russian eagle to his barn door, remarking to his French neighbor that _he_ won't worry the Turkies any more. At this time England had begun to watch with growing jealousy the cordial _entente_ between Russia and Austria, for the Emperor Nicholas was strongly suspected of having offered to Austria a slice of his prospective prize, Turkey. This rumor forms the basis of an effective cartoon by Leech, "The Old 'Un and the Young 'Un," in which the Russian and Austrian Emperors are seated at table, genially dividing a bottle of port between them. "Now then, Austria," says Nicholas, "just help me finish the Port(e)." Meanwhile, hostilities between Turkey and Russia had begun, and the latter had already received a serious setback at Oltenitza, an event commemorated by Tenniel in his cartoon of "A Bear with a Sore Head." In spite of his blind optimism, Lord Aberdeen was by this time finding it decidedly difficult to handle the reins of foreign affairs. One of the best satires of the year is by Tenniel, entitled "The Unpopular Act of the Courier of St. Petersburg," depicting Aberdeen performing the dangerous feat of driving a team of vicious horses. The mettlesome leaders, Russia and Turkey, have already taken the bit between their teeth, while Austria, catching the contagion of their viciousness, is plunging dangerously. This cartoon was soon followed by another still more notable, entitled "What It Has Come To," one of those splendid animal pictures in which John Tenniel especially excelled. It shows us the Russian bear, scampering off in the distance, while in the foreground Lord Aberdeen is clinging desperately to the British lion, which has started in mad pursuit, with his mane erect and his tail stiffened like a ramrod; the lion plunges along, dragging behind him the terrified premier, who is gasping out that he can no longer hold him and is forced to "let him go." At the same time Mr. Leech also represented pictorially Lord Aberdeen awakening to the necessity of war in his "Bombardment of Odessa." The cartoon is in two parts, representing respectively the English Premier and the Russian Emperor reading their morning paper. "Bombardment of Odessa," says Aberdeen. "Dear me, this will be very disagreeable to my imperial friend." "Bombardment of Odessa," says Nicholas; "confound it! This will be very annoying to dear old Aberdeen!" In the following November the British victory of Inkerman, won against almost hopeless odds, was witnessed by two members of the Russian imperial family. Leech promptly commemorated this fact in his picture of "The Russian Bear's Licked Cubs, Nicholas and Michael." The cartoon entitled the "Bursting of the Russian Bubble" appeared in _Punch_, October 14, 1854, just after the battle of the Alma had taken place and part of the Russian fleet had been destroyed by the English and French ships at Sebastopol. This cartoon is by the hand of Leech. The Russian Emperor, Nicholas I., had boasted of the "irresistible power" which was to enable him to overthrow the allied forces gathered in the Crimea, and here the artist shows very graphically the shattering of this "irresistible power" and of the "unlimited means." Of all the cartoons which Leech produced there is none which enjoys a more enduring fame than the one entitled "General Février Turned Traitor." Certainly no other in the whole series of Crimean War cartoons appearing in _Punch_ compares with it in power. Yet splendid and effective as it is, there is in it a cruelty worthy of Grandville or Gillray, and when it appeared it caused a shudder to run through all England. The Russian Emperor had boasted in a speech on the subject of the Crimean War that, whatever forces France and England might be able to send to the front, Russia possessed two generals on whom she could always rely, General Janvier and General Février. In other words, Nicholas I. cynically alluded to the hardship of the Russian winter, on which he counted to reduce greatly by death the armies of the Allies in the Crimea. But toward the end of the winter, the Emperor himself died of pulmonary apoplexy, after an attack of influenza. In a flash, Leech seized upon the idea. _General Février had turned traitor._ Under this title, the cartoon was published by _Punch_ in its issue of March 10, 1855. General Février (Death in the uniform of a Russian general) is placing his deadly hand on the breast of Nicholas, and the icy cold of the Russian winter--the ally in whom the Emperor had placed his trust--has recoiled upon himself. The tragic dignity and grim significance of this cartoon made a deep impression upon Ruskin, who regarded it as representing in the art of caricature what Hood's "Song of the Shirt" represents in poetry. "The reception of the last-named woodcut," he says, "was in several respects a curious test of modern feeling ... There are some points to be regretted in the execution of the design, but the thought was a grand one; the memory of the word spoken and of its answer could hardly in any more impressive way have been recorded for the people; and I believe that to all persons accustomed to the earnest forms of art it contained a profound and touching lesson. The notable thing was, however, that it offended persons _not_ in earnest, and was loudly cried out against by the polite journalism of Society. This fate is, I believe, the almost inevitable one of thoroughly genuine work in these days, whether poetry or painting; but what added to the singularity in this case was that coarse heartlessness was even more offended than polite heartlessness."

As was but natural, the Anglo-French alliance against Russia is alluded to in more than one of Mr. Punch's Crimean War cartoons. One of the earliest is a drawing by Tenniel of England and France typified by two fine specimens of Guards of both nations standing back to back in friendly rivalry of height, and Mr. Spielmann records in his "History of Punch" that the cut proved so popular that under its title of "The United Service:" it was reproduced broadcast on many articles of current use and even served as a decoration for the backs of playing cards. Still another cartoon, entitled "The Split Crow in the Crimea," represents England and France as two huntsmen, hard on the track of a wounded and fleeing two-headed bird! "He's hit hard!--follow him up!" exclaimed the huntsmen. In a French reproduction of this cartoon, which is to be found in Armand Dayot's "Le Second Empire," "Crow" is amusingly translated as _couronne_ (crown), and the publishers of _Punch_ are given as "MM. Breadburg, Agnew, et Cie." Another cartoon of the same period is called "Brothers in Arms." It shows a British soldier carrying on his back a wounded French soldier, and a French soldier carrying on his back a wounded Englishman. The two wounded men are clasping hands. There is no better evidence of the utter dearth of French caricature at this period than the fact that M. Dayot, whose indefatigable research has brought together a highly interesting collection of pictorial documents of all classes upon this period of French history, could find nothing in the way of a cartoon in his own country and was forced to borrow from _Punch_ the few that he reproduces.

On the other side the Russian cartoonists were by no means backward in recording the events of the war and holding up the efforts of the Allies to pictorial derision. The Russian point of view has come down to us in a series of excellent prints published in St. Petersburg during the months of the conflict. In this warfare the Russians may be said to have borrowed from their enemies, for this series is essentially French in method and execution. All through this series England and France are shown buffeted about from pillar to post by the Conquering Bear. A description of one of these cartoons will give a fair general idea of the entire series. Sir Charles Napier, at a dinner given in his honor in London just before the departure of the Allied fleet for Kronstadt, has made the foolish boast that he would soon invite his hosts to dine with him in St. Petersburg. Of course the fleet never reached St. Petersburg, and the Russian artist satirically summed up the situation by depicting Sir Charles at the top of the mast, endeavoring by the aid of a large spy-glass to catch a sight of the Czar's capital.

Among the crude American lithographs of this period the Crimean War was not forgotten. A rather rare cartoon, entitled "Turkey, John Bull and M. Frog-Eater in a Bad Fix," is especially interesting as an evidence that American sympathy during the war was in a measure on the Russian side. The Russian General Menshikoff is standing on the heights of Sebastopol looking down smilingly and serenely on the discomfited allies, saying: "How do you do, gentlemen? Very happy to see you. You must be tired. Won't you walk in and take something?" John Bull, seriously wounded, is lying prostrate, bawling out: "Come, come, Turk, no dodging. Hulloa there! Is that the way you stick to your friends? The coat of my stomach is ruined, my wind nearly gone. I won't be able to blow for a month. Pull me out of this at any price! The devil take one party and his dam the other. I am getting sick of this business." By his side is the figure of a Frenchman just hit by a cannon-ball from one of the Russian guns, and crying out: "O! By damn! I not like such treat. I come tousand mile and spend ver much money to take someting from wid you, and you treat me as I vas van Villin! Scoundrel! Robbare!!"

In closing the subject of the Crimean War, it is worth while to call attention to one curious phase of the war as contained in the programme of a theatrical entertainment given by the French soldiers in the trenches of Sebastopol, December 23, 1855. The programme is headed "The Little Comic Review of the Crimea." It contains the announcement of the Tchernaia Theater, which four days later is to present three dramatic pieces. The drawing is by Lucien Salmont.

One final echo of the struggle in the Crimea is found in another of Tenniel's graphic animal pictures, "The British Lion Smells a Rat," which depicts an angry lion sniffing suspiciously at the crack of a door, behind which is being held the conference which followed the fall of Sebastopol. But by far the most famous instance of Tenniel's work is his series of Cawnpore cartoons, the series bearing upon the Indian mutiny of 1857; and one of the finest, if not the very finest, of them all is that entitled "The British Lion's Vengeance on the Bengal Tiger." It represents in the life work of Tenniel what "General Février Turned Traitor" stands for in the life work of John Leech. The subject was suggested to Tenniel by Shirley Brooks. It summed up all the horror and thirst for revenge which animated England when the news came of the treacherous atrocities of the Sepoy rebels. The Cawnpore massacre of women and children ordered by the infamous Nana Sahib had taken place in June, and when this cartoon appeared in _Punch_, August 22, 1857, England had just sent thirty thousand troops to India. In the picture the British lion is springing at the throat of the Bengal tiger, which is standing over the prostrate bodies of a woman and a child. The tiger, fearful of being robbed of its prey, is snarling at the avenging lion. Another of the famous Cawnpore cartoons of Tenniel is descriptive of British vengeance on the Sepoy mutineers. The English troops were simply wild for revenge when the stories came to them of the atrocities which had been perpetrated on English women and children, and their vengeance knew no bounds. The Sepoys were blown from the mouths of the English cannon. It was the custom of the English soldiers to pile up a heap of Sepoys, dead or wounded, pour oil over them, and then set fire to the pile. The Tenniel cartoon, entitled "Justice," published September 12, 1857, shows the figure of Justice with sword and shield cutting down the mutineers, while behind her are the British troops working destruction with their bayonets.

No sooner had the English-French alliance against Russia come to an end than _Punch_ once more began to give expression to his disapproval of Napoleon. A hostile spirit toward Frenchmen was ingrained in the very nature of John Leech, and he vented it freely in such cartoons as his celebrated "Cock-a-doodle-doo!" in which the French cock, clad in the uniform of a colonel, is crowing lustily over the results of a war of which Great Britain had borne the brunt. Or again, in "Some Foreign Produce that Mr. Bull can very well Spare," a cut which includes French conspirators, vile Frenchwomen, organ-grinders (Mr. Leech was abnormally sensitive to street noises), and other objectionable foreign refuse. It is interesting in this connection to note that Leech's hostility to Louis Napoleon was the direct cause of Thackeray's resignation from the staff of _Punch_ in the winter of 1854. In the letter written in the following March, Thackeray explains that he had had some serious differences regarding the editorial policy of _Punch_, and more specifically about the abuse of Louis Napoleon which, he says, "I think and thought was writing unjustly at that time, and dangerously for the welfare and peace of the country:" and he then adds the specific instance which prompted him to sever his connections: "Coming from Edinburgh, I bought a _Punch_ containing a picture of a beggar on horseback, in which the emperor was represented galloping to hell with a sword reeking with blood. As soon as ever I could, after my return, I went to Bouverie Street and gave in my resignation." Thackeray's act had no influence upon the policy of _Punch_. Leech's cartoons grew steadily more incisive in character. One of the most extraordinary is that known as "The French Porcupine." It represents Napoleon III. as a porcupine, bristling with French bayonets in place of quills. One of Napoleon's favorite sayings was "_L'Empire c'est la paix._" But this saying was very often contradicted by events, and the first ten years of his occupation of the French throne showed France embroiled in the Crimean War and the war with Austria. In preparation for the latter conflict a large increase was being made in the French military armament; and Leech seized upon the emperor's dictum only to express his skepticism. The cartoon appeared in March, 1859. As a matter of fact, the idea in this cartoon had previously been used in another called "The Puppet Show," published in June, 1854, depicting the Czar Nicholas in a manner closely similar; yet Mr. Spielmann, who notes this fact, adds that Mr. Leech had probably never seen, or else had forgotten, the earlier caricature. This "French Porcupine" is cited as an instance of Leech's extraordinary speed in executing a cartoon directly upon the wooden block. The regular _Punch_ dinner had that week been held a day late. "Every moment was precious, and Leech proposed the idea for the cartoon, drew it in two hours, and caught his midday train on the following day, speeding away into the country with John Tenniel for their usual Saturday hunt." It was during this same year, 1859, at the close of the war which humbled Austria and forced her to surrender Venetia to Sardinia, that Leech voiced the suspicion that Louis was casting longing eyes upon Italian territory in a cartoon entitled "A Scene from the New Pantomime." Napoleon III, here figures as a clown, a revolver in his hand, a goose labeled Italy protruding from his capacious pocket. He is earnestly assuring Britannia, represented as a stout, elderly woman, eyeing him suspiciously, that his intentions are strictly honorable.