So far Kate had been going through the usual experiences of the free-lance who with pen or pencil in hand sets forth to win recognition from the public. Public taste is the hardest thing in the world to gauge by those who would be original according to their talents, and harder still is it to arrest attention, save by gasconades of which she certainly was wholly incapable. Hitherto she had been the servant eager to please the whim of her master, but the time was coming when she would call the tune and the public would delight to dance to it.

Kate Greenaway was now in her thirty-third year, and, though fairly prosperous, could scarcely consider herself successful. Commissions were certainly coming in faster and faster, and in 1877, when she took her studio to College Place, Liverpool Road, Islington, her earnings had nearly reached £300; but she had not yet made any great individual mark. She appeared in the Royal Academy Exhibition and sold her picture ‘Musing’ for twenty guineas. She was a recognised contributor to the Dudley Gallery, and was pretty sure of buyers there. She was getting more or less regular employment on the Illustrated London News. She had been asked by Mr. W. L. Thomas of the newly established Graphic to provide him with a running pictorial full-page story after the manner of Caldecott, and had succeeded in satisfying his fastidious taste, though the first sketch-plan which she sent seemed to him lacking in humour. ‘They strike me,’ he wrote, ‘as being a little solemn in tone.’ But this defect was soon rectified, and the result was so greatly admired that it led to many further commissions from the artist-editor.

These were gratifying and encouraging results, but in Kate’s opinion they were but the prizes of the successful artist-hack. Her name had not yet passed into the mouth of the town. Though she had drawn many charming pictures, she had not yet drawn the public.

What was true of the public was true of the publishers. Though Messrs. Marcus Ward of Belfast had seen the possibilities that lay in her designs for valentines, Christmas cards, and the like, and had achieved a real success by their publication, Kate was but yet only the power behind the throne. She was the hidden mainspring of a clock with the maker’s name upon the dial. Now all this was to be changed by a business arrangement, almost amounting to a partnership, in which she was to take her full share of the credit as well as of the spoil.

The story will be best told in the words of the man who so boldly backed his opinion as to print a first edition of 20,000 copies of a six-shilling book written and illustrated by a young lady who could hardly yet be said to have commanded anything like wide public approval. This was Mr. Edmund Evans.

Mr. Edmund Evans was primarily a colour-printer; his wood-engraving department was subsidiary. For the purposes of his business he owned a good many machines; he had three houses full of them in the City, and he was sometimes puzzled to find work to keep them going, to do which is at the root of commercial economy and success in his business. He printed most of the ‘yellow-backs’ of the time, covers for books as well as for small magazines of a semi-religious character, working-men’s magazines, and so forth, all with much colour-work in them. Mr. Evans also executed much high-class work of the kind, such as Doyle’s Chronicles of England, which had done much to make his reputation. Therefore, to fill up the spare time during which his machines would otherwise be idle, he began publishing the toy-books of Mr. Walter Crane, then those of Randolph Caldecott, and finally he turned his attention to Miss Kate Greenaway.

It should be recorded to the credit of Mr. Evans that he excelled all others in the skill with which he produced his colour-effects with a small number of printings. Mr. John Greenaway, himself an expert in the preparation of blocks for colour-printing, as well as an artist of much intelligence, used to declare that no other firm in London could come near the result that Edmund Evans would get with as few, say, as three colour-blocks, so wonderful was his ingenuity, so great his artistic taste, and so accurate his eye.

Mr. Evans informs us:

After I had engraved the blocks and colour-blocks, I printed the first edition of 20,000 copies, and was ridiculed by the publishers for risking such a large edition of a six-shilling book; but the edition sold before I could reprint another edition; in the meantime copies were sold at a premium. Reprinting kept on till 70,000 was reached.[14]

I volunteered to give K. G. one-third of the profit of this book. It was published in the autumn of 1879. We decided to publish The Birthday Book for Children in 1880. Miss Greenaway considered that she should have half the profits of all books we might do together in future, and that I should return to her the original drawings after I had paid her for them and reproduced them. To both these terms I willingly agreed.[15] ... Then came the Birthday Book, Mother Goose, and part of A Day in a Child’s Life, in 1881; Little Ann, 1883; the Language of Flowers, Kate Greenaway’s Painting-Book, and Mavor’s Spelling-Book, 1884-85; Marigold Garden and A Apple Pie, 1886; The Queen of The Pirate Isle and The Pied Piper of Hamelin, 1887; The Book of Games, 1888; King Pepito, 1889. Besides the above and a certain number of smaller issues, minor works, and detached designs, the artist was responsible for an Almanack from 1883 to 1897, with the sole exception of the year 1896.

The books named above are those which we did together.

There is a little story my daughter Lily tells of her tenderness towards animals. She was walking one day and came upon a stream with a rat sitting on a stone. Lily wished to startle it, and was about to throw a stone in the water, but K. G. exclaimed—‘Oh, don’t, Lily, perhaps it’s ill!’ We all loved her.

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This interesting account of what is one of the most important events in Kate’s life may be supplemented by the following charming sketch taken from an article written by Mrs. Edmund Evans at the request of the editor of the Girl’s Own Paper, shortly after her death. It was published on December 26, 1901, together with a photograph of the artist taken by Miss Lily Evans and four pen-and-ink drawings done by Kate Greenaway for the Evans children. Miss Lily Evans was Mr. Evans’s second daughter and a special favourite with Kate Greenaway, who dedicated Mother Goose to ‘Lily and Eddie’ (Kate Greenaway’s nephew), ‘the two children she loved most in the world.’

Kate Greenaway (wrote Mrs. Evans) had a very interesting personality, and was extremely fond of the country and of flowers, and could draw them beautifully, and always liked those best of a more simple form—not orchids nor begonias; she loved daffodils and roses, and few things gave her more pleasure than a copse yellow with primroses. Her favourite time of year was when apple trees were in blossom; she especially liked them when they were in the garden of a picturesque farm or cottage. One such cottage at Hambledon, Surrey, she particularly admired, where a green door had faded to a peacock blue. She liked only blue and white skies; stormy effects gave her no pleasure.... ‘The sincerest form of flattery’ (imitation) annoyed her, and did her reputation harm, as her many imitators went beyond, in fact out-Kate-Greenawayed Kate Greenaway in their caricatures, and many people did not know one from the other. She herself was waiting in a bookseller’s shop at Hastings, and a lady came in and asked for Kate Greenaway’s books. The shopman spread a handful out before her. The lady asked, ‘Are those all by Kate Greenaway?’ The man assured her they were. Kate Greenaway was near enough to see that not one was her work.

She had a very affectionate nature, very tender-hearted—seeing even an insect in pain wounded her. She could not tolerate flies caught in traps, or see a beetle or a spider killed. Seeing a mouse in a trap tempted her to set it free; in fact, the ‘cruelty of nature’ in the animal world quite troubled her. (She could not understand it or reconcile it with the goodness of God.[16]) Dogs and cats recognised this quality by showing their devotion and imposing on her good-nature. She would never even scold them. This was simply kindness—not indicating a weak nature. She was a decidedly strong-minded woman.

Of Kate Greenaway’s letters Mrs. Evans writes:—

I am sorry now I did not keep her letters. They were often very interesting and unlike ordinary people’s, but when I had a great many it did not seem worth while, and I never do keep letters. As you know, she was so unassuming and homely, and liked our unostentatious way of living so much, it was difficult to realise she was a celebrated person.

Here, however, is one which has escaped destruction:—

Of Under the Window, which was published at the end of 1878, it is no exaggeration to say that it was epoch-making; its popularity was such that Kate tasted the bitter-sweet experience—shared in our own time by Frederick Sandys in respect of his great skit on Millais’s ‘Sir Isumbras at the Ford,’ and by Mr. Brandon Thomas in respect of Charley’s Aunt—of finding her work coolly appropriated by others. One—a lady of Twickenham—calmly gave herself out as the artist-author, explaining that she had preferred to issue her work under an assumed name. To enter into an elaborate description of the book would be superfluous, for it still holds its place in every properly constituted children’s library, and should be constantly taken out for renewed inspection. So, too, would it be superfluous to make extensive quotations from the eulogiums of the reviewers. We may content ourselves with the following prophecy from the Saturday Review, which seems now to be within measure of its fulfilment. ‘In time,’ the writer says, ‘the hands of children will wear away, and their pencils and paint-brushes deface Miss Kate Greenaway’s beautiful, fantastic, and dainty work Under the Window. Probably some wise collector will lay up a little stock for future use while the impressions are in their first freshness. His treasure will come to be as valuable as that parcel of unbound and uncut Elzevirs which Mottley found in Hungary, and which, after filling the hearts of bibliophiles with joy for years, was burned by the Commune.’

There are, however, one or two facts connected with the book which demand attention. In the first place, it must be borne in mind that from this moment Kate Greenaway’s name became a household word, not only in Great Britain, but in a vast number of homes on the continents of Europe and America. In the second place, that now for the first time she was not hampered in her published work by adapting her fancy to the literary ideas of other people, but was inspired by subjects which came red-hot from the furnace of her own imagination.

This is a matter of no little importance. It is clear that the ideal illustrator of a literary idea, if only the technical skill is not wanting, is the person to whose mind that idea first presents itself. In the mind of any other the conception is but a second-hand affair, and but the reflection, more or less accurate, of the original, conveyed on to the mental retina of the artist through the somewhat opaque medium of language. The writer alone knows exactly what he means and what he wants. His pencil may be unskilled, but it is nerved by the original thought. ‘I wish to goodness I could put it upon paper myself,’ said Barham to Bentley, writing about an illustration for the Mousquetaire, even while Cruikshank and Leech were at his service. It is because Thackeray had the double gift that his drawings, although so weak in execution, yet so evidently imbued with the living literary inspiration, so greatly commend themselves to those who look for genuine sincerity of inspiration, and not only for beauty of composition and execution. That is why the world revelled in du Maurier’s Peter Ibbetson and Trilby, and why Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience is one of the completest and most harmonious books in existence.

What Blake did, Kate Greenaway was now enabled to do, in her own fashion, in Under the Window. She was expressing her own literary thoughts and at the same time treating them pictorially.

One word about her verses, of which more will be said later on. Alone they would probably not have attracted much serious attention, and doubtless would have met with criticism. For there are in them faults of scansion, rhythm, and rhyme which it is easy enough to reprobate. But their sincerity, gaiety, and feeling appealed to such unimpeachable judges as Frederick Locker and Mr. Austin Dobson, the latter of whom declares, ‘She was very deficient in technique, but she had the root of the matter in her.’ During the last months of her life she found much pleasure in composing many more of those charming little verses, of which examples will be found in a later portion of this book.

Here is an amusing sample from Under the Window, written for children:

Five little sisters walking in a row;
Now, isn’t that the best way for little girls to go?
Each had a round hat, each had a muff,
And each had a new pelisse of soft green stuff.

Five little marigolds standing in a row;
Now, isn’t that the best way for marigolds to grow?
Each with a green stalk, and all the five had got
A bright yellow flower, and a new red pot.

It must not be supposed that Kate had any illusions about her literary gifts, or that she placed her own productions on a par with those of others whose work she illustrated. But she preferred her liberty and found her pencil better inspired by her own pen than by the pens of others with whom she was called upon to collaborate. Other verses were obviously cleverer and daintier than hers, but her own simple thoughts were more in harmony with her delightful little pictures.

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It was not only the critics but the public who acclaimed her, for she had got at the secret of the beauty and charm of childhood, and the appeal was universal. As Mr. Lionel Robinson wrote:—i63

The moment selected for striking this note was well chosen. Abroad and at home the claims of children were asserting themselves more loudly than ever. German and French artists had alike proved unequal to the task, notwithstanding the temporary popularity of L. FrÖhlich, of Ludwig Richter, and, in a high degree, of Edouard FrÈre and others. Clever as many of these showed themselves, they failed to render the more transient graces of little children, whilst they were, with the exception of FrÈre, apparently indifferent to the bright surroundings and beauties of nature with which Miss Greenaway heightened the charm of her work. It is this absolute harmony between the figures and the landscape which makes her work so complete. Mr. Ruskin devoted one of his lectures at Oxford to the place occupied by Miss Greenaway in modern art, and bestowed upon her praise without stint. ‘Observe,’ said he, ‘that what this impressionable person does draw she draws as like as she can. It is true that the combination or composition of things is not what you see every day. You can’t every day, for instance, see a baby thrown into a basket of roses; but when she has once pleasantly invented that arrangement for you, baby is as like baby and rose as like rose as she can possibly draw them. And the beauty of them is in being like, they are blissful just in the degree that they are natural; the fairyland that she creates for you is not beyond the sky nor beneath the sea, but near you, even at your doors. She does but show you how to see it, and how to cherish.’

When the original drawings for Under the Window were exhibited at the Fine Art Society two years later, the critics vied with one another in their applause. Ruskin in particular exhausted the splendour of his vocabulary in his praise of their unaffected beauty, their sweetness and naÏvetÉ, their delicacy of sentiment, subtlety of humour, and the exquisiteness of technique, and what he added to the artist privately has already been quoted here. Furthermore Mr. Austin Dobson wrote that ‘since Stothard, no one has given us such a clear-eyed, soft-faced, happy-hearted childhood; or so poetically “apprehended” the coy reticences, the simplicities, and the small solemnities of little people. Added to this, the old-world costume in which she usually elects to clothe her characters lends an arch piquancy of contrast to their innocent rites and ceremonies. Her taste in tinting, too, is very sweet and spring-like; and there is a fresh, pure fragrance about all her pictures as of new-gathered nosegays.’

Wherefore it is evident that the success was as deserved as it was instantaneous. Nor was it due only to the fortunate moment chosen for launching the book. There was at least one other felicitous circumstance: Miss Greenaway was exceptionally fortunate in her interpreter, who had brought colour-printing by means of wood blocks to a pitch of excellence never before attempted. A description, therefore, of the process is of exceptional interest. The following account of the method is taken from notes supplied by Mr. Edmund Evans himself.

In the first place, a photograph is taken and printed on the whitened surface of the wood from the original drawing in line. This is engraved as faithfully as possible, no notice being taken at this stage of colour. From the engraving thus made ‘transfers,’ ‘sets off,’ or ‘proofs’ are pulled in dark brown or black ink. These, laid face downwards on the blocks prepared for the colour printing, which equal in number the colours to be used, are passed through the press. By this means the wet ink is transferred and set-off on to the blocks, and a number of facsimiles of the original drawing are ready for the engraver, who prepares for his work by painting-in, on each, that part of the tinting which is to be printed from that particular block. On one he paints in all the red that is to be used and engraves so much on that block, on the next all the blue that is to be used and engraves so much on that block, and so on until all the colours are represented, some of them overlapping or superimposed where they have to cross and modify other colours. Then the engraver sets to work with his engraving until he has prepared a separate block for each colour. In theory of course a proof printed from each block should exactly reproduce the blue, red, and other colours used in the original picture, but, ‘alas,’ as Mr. Evans says, ‘the eye, brain, and hand of the engraver are not up to the eye, brain, and hand of the painter,’ so that the print suffers by comparison. No doubt the coloured inks can be ground and mixed as surely as by the painter on his palette, but the mechanical print must ever come short of the nerve-driven original. When all the proofs taken from the several blocks are pronounced satisfactory, a print is taken from the key block. Upon that is superimposed a print from the other blocks charged each with its properly coloured ink, the greatest care being taken to get the ‘register’ correct—that is to say, that each block is printed accurately in its place upon the paper with relation to those which have gone before. From this it will be seen how important it is that the colours used should be as few as possible so as to keep within bounds the cost of engraving and to simplify the difficulties of printing. Of course, had Kate Greenaway worked in the twentieth century, the conditions would have been altogether different. Now coloured wood-engravings have been almost wholly superseded by the ‘Three-Colour Process,’ which owes its rise to the possibilities which have been found to lie in the use of filtering screens, bichromate of potash, and metal plates—possibilities of which full advantage has been taken in this volume.

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