M. H. Spielmann

"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's Literature Considered.

"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 to Punch through chance. "My introduction to Punch," 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, a nom de plume that 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?"

A complete contrast to Mr. Bedford became a contributor to Punch a 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 to Punch's pages. Innumerable picture-shows, new books, articles of all kinds, and countless verses of every description on every possible topic, with paragraphs long and short, are, so to speak, the hors d'oeuvres of 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 in Punch.

Reginald Shirley Brooks, the son of Mr. Burnand's brilliant predecessor, was working for Punch in 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 with Punch and 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 in Punch's service. 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 on Punch's Index Expurgatorius until the accession of Mr. Burnand. Punch was 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 "Egos of the Week"—with the startling and satisfactory result that one or two papers, taking the thing au sÉrieux, commented on the fact, and expressed their pleasure that "at last Mr. George Augustus Sala has had the drubbing by Punch he has so long and so richly deserved"!

Mr. Clement Scott, the doyen of the dramatic critics, Civil Servant (like so many of the Punch Staff), 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 for Punch. "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 in Punch I found it quoted in extenso in '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 from Punch."

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:—

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 these Punch poems are republished.

The Parliamentary phase of Punch is 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 Parliament Punch has 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."

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 on Punch, and he 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's Punch work. In the recess he is a constant contributor as Mr. Burnand's deputy in the character of Punch's reviewer—"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 in Punch, 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 another dealt 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 to Punch. 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 up Punch's bevy 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 occasion did 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 of Punch by 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:—

Quaintly humorous ideas are spread among her score of contributions—and tenderness, too; but it is as a humorous versifier of refinement and originality that she has appealed strongly to Punch readers, although, as she herself says, "it seemed very wonderful to be in Punch, which I had venerated from my youth up."

The single contribution of Mr. Brandon Thomas has a rather interesting story. It was a patriotic song of a stirring sort, called "Britannia's Volunteers," composed at a time—in 1885—when patriotism was thick in the air. It was put to music by Mr. Alfred Allen; and two days after it was written, Mr. Thomas was at the house of Mr. Woodall, M.P., and there he sang the song. An old gentleman, who covered his mouth and chin with his hand, sat in the front row, and levelled a piercing look at the singer, listening with intense interest. During the second verse Mr. Thomas, who was much affected by the gazer, sang straight at the aged owner of the wonderful eyes:—

Then the masking hand was removed, and the face of Mr. Gladstone was revealed. The sight of him seemed to stimulate the singer, an enthusiastic Conservative, and as he gave forth the last verse, with singular effect, his eyes so filled with tears that he could hardly see the piano keys:—

When it was finished, Mr. Gladstone applauded vigorously, as though unconscious of the pointed way in which the verse had been sung at him, or respectful perhaps of the sincerity of the singer; and Mr. Burnand, who was present, and had been watching the scene with much amusement, enquired, aside, "Who wrote that?" "I did." "When?" "Two days ago." "Have you sent it anywhere?" "No." "Then let me have it." So with the metre slightly changed it appeared in Punch on May 23rd.

Some of the most delicate and humorous vers de sociÉtÉ of the day have come from Mr. Warham St. Leger, and some of the best have appeared since the end of 1886 in the pages of Punch. "The Lay of the Lost Critic" was the first of his contributions, and it was sent in, not by its author, but by a friend who had read it. So well was it thought of that Mr. St. Leger was invited at once to become a contributor, and accordingly he sent in many poems during the four years that followed, together with odd papers in the form of letters, especially on pseudo-scientific lines. All these poems were collected into a volume entitled "Ballads from Punch" in which perhaps the most striking are that "To my Hairdresser," and the irresistibly comic satire on modern ordnance, in which during a naval battle, after all the fighting has been done by ramming, "the last stern order of the brave" is whispered through the ship: "We're going to fire the guns!!" This desperate course is taken and described—the air grows thick and dark with broken breech, flying tube, and disrupted armour-plate, and when all was over—

Mr. Anstey (Guthrie) was already famous for his little series of successful books, "Vice VersÂ," "The Giant's Robe," "The Tinted Venus," "The Black Poodle," and "A Fallen Idol," when he was invited to contribute to Punch. In each and all of these stories there had been a clear and original idea, worked out with ingenuity and invested with rich and delicate humour. Their author was clearly a man for Punch. So thought Mr. Burnand, and Mr. Anstey shared the opinion. On November 4th, 1885, therefore, appeared his first contribution "Faux et Preterea Nihil." His work was consistently good, and at the end of 1886 he was called to the Table, taking his place and eating his first Dinner in January, 1887.

Mr. Anstey's writings attracted attention from the beginning, and in their reprinted form have been no less successful—the truest test of quality. Among the most delightful of these was the "Model Music Hall Songs"—songs and dramas virginibus puerisque, adapted to the requirements of the members of the London County Council which sought out and found indecency in a marionette's pursuit of a butterfly. The idea opened up to Mr. Anstey a comic vista, which he has developed for our delectation. The songs and dances, with their words and directions, are for the most part screamingly funny, consisting partly in the perfectly realised absurdity and inanity of the performance, and partly in that quality of absolute truthfulness to life which we are forced to realise in the presentation of them. Laughter is often produced by the mere faithfulness of an imitation, whether the thing copied is funny or not. Simple mimicry has the power to make us laugh; and over that power, in all its phases of motive, act, and talk, Mr. Anstey has absolute control. In addition, he has a genius for plot-making and verse-writing, be it original or parody, which in its own line is unsurpassed in modern literature. In his analysis of character and motive he seems to set before us our own weak selves laid bare, until his voces populi become voces animi, the voice of the people speaking unpleasantly like the voice of conscience.

In this comic reproduction of actual experience Mr. Anstey has travelled over the road pointed out by Mr. Burnand in his "Happy Thoughts" and "Out of Town;" but, adding greatly to the scientific truth of it, he seems to have lost something of the geniality and joviality of the form. Mr. Anstey has placed Society on the dissecting-table, and probing with a little less of the sympathy shown by Mr. du Maurier, he carries his observation, consciously or unconsciously, to a much farther and more merciless point. Not that he has no kindly feeling for his subjects; he has—but he reserves it for his good people. Towards his snobs and cads and prigs he is pitiless; he turns his microscope upon them, and with far less mercy than is to be found in a vivisector he lays bare their false hearts, points to their lying tongues, and tears them out without a pang of remorse. It is all in fun, of course; but it is unmistakable. Still, who shall find fault with what is the essence of justice and truth, which mercy only interferes with to weaken?

The burlesques in the "Model Music Hall Songs" are often as good as their originals—just as some of the Rejected Addresses by the Smiths were as good as the genuine poems they parodied; and the representation of them is placed before the reader with more than photographic truth. In "So Shy!" we see the lady "of a mature age and inclined to a comfortable embonpoint," who comes forward and sings—

It is a notable fact that songs of this sort were driven off the better-class music-hall stage about this time, and there is little doubt that Mr. Anstey, to whom Mr. Bernard Partridge afterwards rendered artistic help, took yeoman's share in the campaign. More certain it is that with "Mr. Punch's Young Reciter" he effectively suppressed the drawing-room spouter. No one with a sense of humour who has read that series can now stand up and recite a poem of a sentimental or an heroic nature from the pens of Mr. Clement Scott or Mr. G. R. Sims without genius to back him; and no one who heard it could retain his gravity to the end. "Burglar Bill" melted almost to repentance by the innocent child who asked him to burgle her doll's house, and whose salvation was finally wrought by the gift of the baby's jamtart—killed the Young Reciter by dint of pure ridicule and honest fun. He has made an unsophisticated reciter as impossible as a sympathetic and sentimental audience.

And in "Voces Populi"—the popular dramas in dialogue, in which the conversation accurately and concisely describes the character, temperament, and tastes of the speaker—there is a humorous verbal photography of extraordinary vividness. 'Arry is no longer a symbol and a type, as he is in Mr. Milliken's hands; he is a definite person in one particular position in life and no other, and what he says could not, we feel, possibly have been said in any other way, nor by any other person. And so along the whole gamut of the classes through which Mr. Anstey leads us. The humour is penetrating, and it is difficult to say where the truth ends and the caricature begins. Who can forget the visit to the Tudor Exhibition, when Henry VIII's remarkable hat was on view? "'Arry," says 'Arriet to her escort; "look 'ere; fancy a king goin' about in a thing like that—pink with a green feather! Why, I wouldn't be seen in it myself!" 'Arry, who is clearly farceur, replies with a pretty wit: "Ah, but that was ole 'Enery all over, that was; he wasn't one for show. He liked a quiet, unassumin' style of 'at, he did. 'None o' yer loud pot'ats for Me!' he'd tell the Royal 'atters; 'find me a tile as won't attract people's notice, or you won't want a tile yerselves in another minute!' An' you may take yer oath they served him pretty sharp, too!" And so it is all through; the talk of the people, of everybody in all sorts of positions in life, is recorded in these "Voces," and in all there is the same quality of nature.

In "Travelling Companions," nearly as amusing and quite as observant, we are made to feel that the two heroes detest each other hardly more than Mr. Anstey detests Culcherd, the more unsympathetic and contemptible of the two. They are nearly as despicable as they are funny, and their creator has little pity for them on that account. There is a "plentiful lack of tenderness," but an abundance of humour to excuse it. This quality is not visible in "Mr. Punch's Pocket Ibsen"—a parody so good that we sometimes wonder if the part we are reading is not really from the hand of the Norwegian master. Nothing, surely, could be truer, nothing touched with a lighter hand than "Pill-doctor Herdal"—an achievement attained solely by a profound study of the dramatist. Again, in "The Man from Blankley's" and in "Lyre and Lancet" we have social satires grafted on to a most entertaining plot—a creation in both cases which may be compared with Keene's drawings for observation, and with Goldsmith's and MoliÈre's plays for the happy construction of these comedies of errors. The plots assuredly would have extorted the admiration of Labiche himself, so complicated and ingenious are they. Besides, everything seems so natural, so inevitable, "so much of a lesson," that it is hardly to be wondered at that "The Man from Blankley's" was on more than one occasion actually given out as the text for a sermon delivered from the pulpit.

Another excuse for music-hall treatment of an exquisite sort is afforded by the story of "Under the Rose," which is inimitable. For example:—

The Sisters Sarcenet (on stage): "You men are deceivers
and awfully sly. Oh, you are!"
Male Portion of Audience (as is expected from them):
"No, we aren't!"
The Sisters S. (archly): "Now you know you are!
You come home with the milk; should your poor wife ask why,
'Pressing business, my pet,' you serenely reply,
When you've really been out on the 'Tiddle-y-hi!'
Yes, you have!"
Male Audience (as before): "No, we've not!"
The Sisters S. (with the air of accusing angels): "Why,
you know you have!"

It is sometimes objected that the root of Mr. Anstey's success lies near the surface, and is nothing but the vividness of his dialogues. It is a great deal more; it lies in the truth of his characters, subtly drawn, but irresistible, and, now and again, tenderly pathetic. Thus may you see the optimist and pessimist, and the link between them, in the following scene in the Mall on Drawing-Room Day:—

In the composition of his "Voces" and kindred work, it has been the practice of Mr. Anstey to visit the needful spot, where he would try to seize the salient points and the general tone, the speakers and the scene, trusting to luck for a chance incident, feature, or sentence that might provide a subject. Sometimes he would have to go empty away; but as a rule he would find enough to provide the rough material for a sketch. Sometimes, too, he would combine hints and anecdotes received from his acquaintance with his own experience and invention; on rarer occasions he would happen upon an incident which could be worked up into a sketch very much as it actually occurred, though with strict selection and careful elaboration. On the whole it may be taken that the conversations are mostly what might have happened, but that they never were shorthand reproductions of overheard talk; and the incidents are almost invariably invented. Occasionally something in an exhibition or show would suggest a typical comment, or a casual remark might provide an idea for a character; but a good deal is certainly unconscious reminiscence and fragmentary observation, and the residue pure guess-work.

Of the artistic quality of Mr. Anstey's work there can be no question—neither of its humour, nor of its value as a complete reflection of English, and especially of Cockney, life. Old-fashioned people may and do denounce it as newfangled; but does anyone doubt the sort of welcome that would have been accorded to it by Jerrold and Thackeray and Gilbert À Beckett if they had had the good fortune to have an Anstey in their midst half-a-century ago?

Mr. R. C. Lehmann, grand-nephew of W. H. Wills, one of Punch's early crew, had a good reputation as a Cambridge wit before Mr. Burnand captured him for Punch. In April, 1889, he began to edit "The Granta," the clever "barrel-organ of the Cambridge undergraduates," satirical, brightly humorous, and freshly youthful. On the 14th of the following December there appeared in Punch his first contribution, a dialogue entitled "Among the Amateurs," which has since been reprinted in "The Billsbury Election."

Mr. Lehmann lost no time in devising series of articles, which all Punch readers will remember. Such were "Modern Types" and "Mr. Punch's Prize Novels" (one of the most successful, including parodies of a score of the leading authors of the day), "In the Know," "The Adventures of Picklock Holes," "Letters to Abstractions," "Lord Ormont's Mate and Matey's Aminta," "Manners and Customs," and "Studies in the New Poetry." Within four months of his first contribution Mr. Lehmann was promoted to the Table—an unprecedentedly rapid promotion—and he has ever since been one of the most diligent of contributors. Literary merit apart, Mr. Lehmann's "Conversational Hints for Young Shooters" has probably been received with greater favour throughout the country, on account of its subject and its felicitous treatment, than any of the young author's works. Country readers are essentially sportsmen—in conversation, if not in fact; and nothing in humorous writing delights them more than a clever burlesque on their favourite topic. You may hear the book praised where one of the writer's more ambitious efforts may pass unnoticed; and one of its passages is quoted with unction in many a shooting party. "Johnson, who was placed forward, again stood under a canopy of pheasants, and shot with brilliant success into the gaps.... The only theory which is accepted as explaining the catastrophe is one that imputes a malignant cunning to the birds."

The year that saw Mr. Lehmann's appointment witnessed also the calling of his kinsman, Mr. Barry Pain, one of the chief contributors to "The Granta." His story of "The Hundred Gates," printed in "Cornhill," struck Mr. Burnand as a work of promise; indeed, Mr. Burnand is reported to have found it so funny that he thought he must have written it himself. The annexing of the writer was at once effected. One of his earliest contributions to Punch was the amusing parody of Tennyson's "Throstle," just before Christmas, 1889; and a collection of comic Cambridge definitions in imitation of Euclid followed. Then came a set of short stories called "Storicules," and a series of articles constituting a mock guide to conduct for young ladies. Since 1892 Mr. Pain's work has fallen away, probably only for a time; for Punch has proved well-nigh irresistible to every genuine humorist who is anxious to bring his faculty to bear on the risibility of the English public.

Mr. Henry Pottinger Stephens, one of the wits of the "Sporting Times," the founder of the "Topical Times," and member of the staff of the "Daily Telegraph," was for two or three years on the outside salaried Staff of Punch. Contributing from 1889 to 1891, he wrote a series of "queer tales" as well as some attacks on the then South Western Railway management, under the title of "The Ways of Waterloo." Such dramatic criticisms as were not undertaken by Mr. Burnand or relegated by him to Mr. Arthur À Beckett, and numerous trifles besides, fell to him to do; but on his departure for America the connection was broken, and not afterwards resumed.

Passing by Mr. C. W. Cooke, we find Mr. Charles Geake, member of the Bar and Fellow of Clare College, Cambridge, as the chief recruit of the year 1890. To "The Granta" he had sent a casual contribution, and Mr. R. C. Lehmann, appreciating his talent, proved his esteem by installing Mr. Geake as the Cambridge editor of that paper. From "The Granta" to Punch has become a natural ascent, and on July 12th, 1890, Mr. Geake made his first bow to London readers. Three months later a packet of Punch office envelopes announced that he had been placed on the footing of a regular outside contributor, and that it was now his privilege to send his work straight to the printer's. At first he wrote nothing but verse—society verse, ballades, rondeaux, topical verse, and parodies in verse and prose, and then burlesques of books, such as the capital imitation of "The Tale of Two Telegrams" (a "Dolly Dialogue" in the manner of "Anthony Hope"), p. 97, Vol. CVII., September 1st, 1894, and "The Blue Gardenia" (October 20th, 1894, p. 185), with various skits and topical matter. "Lays of the Currency" are among the chief of Mr. Geake's poetical "series," and "Chronicles of a Rural Parish"—the adventures and misadventures of a rural parishioner who wishes to patronise the Parish Councils Act—his principal effort in comic prose.

The year 1892 brought three new writers: Mr. Gerald F. Campbell, who began by contributing (on April 23rd) poems of sentiment, such as "Town Thoughts from the Country," and three months later "The Cry of the Children" and "Alone in London;" R. F. Murray, the American-born author of "The Scarlet Gown," who, through Mr. Andrew Lang's introduction, sent in a few verses shortly before his death; and Mr. Roberts, who finds his place among the artists.

Mr. George Davies was an important accession of the following year. On only half-a-dozen occasions had he ever been in print, and that in obscure publications, when he composed an "Ethnographical Alphabet," beginning "A is an Afghan." The writer, who is something of a tsiganologue, emboldened by his success, followed up his alphabet, which appeared January 21st, 1893, and within a year had placed to his credit three-score contributions, most of them in verse—rather a remarkable achievement for one heretofore considered a mere bookworm and dryasdust.

Another Cambridge man of originality and ingenuity, mainly in verse, is Mr. Arthur A. Sykes—a "Cantabard," as he himself would admit, peculiarly skilled in "Cambrijingles." He began with "In the Key of Ruthene" on May 6th, 1893, and followed it up with a laughable ode "To a Fashion-Plate Belle." It was accompanied with a comic, though hardly exaggerated, design of the female figure as depicted in ladies' fashion-papers—the drawing being also by Mr. Sykes. Since then many verses by him have appeared, in which quaint conception, sudden turn of thought, and strange achievements in rhyming (as in "The Tour That Never Was," August 19th, 1893) are the chief figures. Then came the promotion embodied in the privilege of sending his contributions direct to the printer before, instead of after, being submitted to the editorial eye; and a good deal of prose work followed, such as the "Scarlet Afternoon," a skit in dialogue suggested by Mr. R. S. Hichens' "Green Carnation."

Light verse from the Rev. Anthony C. Deane began on August 20th, 1892 ("Ad Puellam"), but he was already a master of the art. Two months before his little volume of "Frivolous Verses" had appeared, and so struck Mr. Andrew Lang that he reviewed it in a "Daily News" leading-article, invited the author to go and see him, and suggested his writing for Punch. Mr. Deane had already been a "Granta" poet, and was well known to Mr. Lehmann, who, finding that Mr. Lang had already spoken to Mr. Anstey, gladly added a word of introduction to the Editor. By such means as these, oftener than by promiscuous outside application, is new blood found: the best men do not, as a rule, force forward their own work. Mr. Deane at that time was not twenty-two, nor was he yet ordained. He passed the necessary period at the same theological college—Cuddesdon—that years before had sheltered Mr. Burnand, and went on contributing verses to Punch, to the number (1894) of sixty or seventy; so that the course of his Punch love has run very smooth.

Another literary godson of Mr. Lehmann's, and child of "The Granta," is Mr. Owen Seaman. Through the good offices of the former, Mr. Seaman's "Rhyme of the Kipperling," nearly filling the first page of Punch, was inserted in the number for January 13th, 1894. This imitation of Mr. Rudyard Kipling's "Rhyme of the Three Sealers" was its own recommendation, and since that time Mr. Seaman has been one of the most prolific outside contributors of the year. His series comprise "She-Notes"—a skit on "Keynotes" and "Airs Resumptive"—of which the fourth, "To Julia in Shooting-togs (and a Herrickose Vein)" is an admirable specimen of its class. Art and political criticism in verse and prose are employed to illustrate the writer's facility and classic taste.

To this list, necessarily incomplete, in spite of its length, a few names remain to be added, and an incongruous party they form. Professor Forbes; Mr. J. C. Wilson, mantle manufacturer; and Mr. J. J. Lushington, of the Suffolk Chief Constable's Office, first a soldier and finally an auctioneer (a giant of nearly six feet seven, who would have formed a good fourth to Thackeray, "Jacob Omnium," and Dean Hole)—men of every sort and condition, brought together by the universal brotherhood of humour. Mrs. Frances Collins was a contributor, and her Punch utterance upon Judge Bayley's curious decision at Westminster County Court in January, 1877, as to next-door music that is "intolerable," yet not "actionable" ("Music hath (C)Harms"), is still remembered and quoted. Another lady-wit of the present day is Mr. Lehmann's sister, Lady Campbell, who wrote the women's letters in the series of "Manners and Customs," while her brother took the male side of the correspondence. Mrs. Leverson has been the contributor of numerous clever prose parodies and general articles, the chief of which up to June, 1895, has been "The Scarlet Parasol." Mr. James Payn has also worked for Punch, but very little—only to the extent of placing some little pleasantry at its service, and now and then suggesting a subject for illustration. A set of rhymes by Mr. H. D. Traill, reprinted in his volume entitled "Number Twenty," was his sole contribution, the "Saturday Review" having had a sort of prescriptive right to all his work of this description. It is the greater pity, for even the lightest of his verses have the true ring and, according to some, much of the vigour characteristic of Mr. Rudyard Kipling's work. Mr. Arthur Armitage, too, was for many years a contributor. Being a solicitor in practice, he kept his identity a secret. He was always known to the Editor and Proprietors as "Mr. A. Armstrong," and up to this present publication he never revealed the levity of his youth. His first contribution was "Marriage Customs of the Great Britons," which was inserted in the "Pocket-Book" for 1855. After writing regularly for this offspring of Punch's, Mr. Armitage was, in 1861, specially invited to contribute to the paper itself on topics political, social, and commercial—only a satire on "The Baby of the Papal States" (Louis Napoleon) being rejected, on the ground that, were it inserted, war with France would be inevitable. On Mark Lemon's death Mr. Armitage ceased his connection as an "outside regular," and five years later reprinted a number of his most amusing Punch verses and articles under the title of "Winkleton-on-Sea." Frederick Gale—better known as "The Old Buffer" and as the great cricket authority—wrote a short series for Punch. Then Mr. Walter Sichel, since the beginning of 1892, has contributed some prose and more verse, such as the series of "Men who have taken me in—to dinner," "Lays of Modern Home," "Inns and Outs," as well as "Rhymes out of Season," "The Diary of an Old Joke," and the original "Queer Queries." The late magistrate, Mr. Hosack, too, contributed several sharp police-court sketches; and "Arthur Sketchley" had a capital story to tell, but spoiled it in the telling. Even H. J. Byron, contrary to general belief, tried his hand as a Punch contributor, but he was somewhat dull. He admitted, in fact, that he wanted to keep all his fun for his plays, and so starved his Punch work of its legitimate humour. Mr. Arthur E. Viles's verses on "Temple Bar" (December, 1877) may be mentioned, and Mr. Leopold Godfrey Turner's name must not be omitted. But, of the contributors of trifles, a number must remain anonymous—as, indeed, many do from choice; inevitably so before 1847, when it first became the practice to enter up outsiders' work in their own names. And among these occasional contributors the present writer is proud to range himself.

In looking at the literature of Punch, we become sensible of a change not dissimilar to that which we find to have taken place in its art. There is nowadays no Jerrold, whose fulminating passion and fine frenzy often came dangerously near to "high-falutin'." There is perhaps no versifier at the Table with quite the same fancy or taste as Gilbert Abbott À Beckett, Shirley Brooks, and Percival Leigh. But we have instead a keener observation of the life and customs of the day, an ingenuity and an elegance that go better with the taste and habit of thought of the times. In the old days it was not uncommon in discussing Punch's poetry to urge in apology that—

Nowadays, when comedy and rapier have to a great extent replaced farce and sword, finish is accounted of greater importance than of yore, and grace and daintiness are accepted where simple fun was formerly the aim—an aim, by the way, which was as frequently missed as now. Let the reader who is inclined to be as severe on latter-day Punch as on latter-day everything, take down one of the early volumes, and seek for the side-splitting articles and epigrams, the verse apoplectic with fun, which we are taught to expect there. He will learn that it is not so much that the quality of Punch has changed, despite the great names of the past. He will find that the change is due rather to modern fashion and to modern views than to any deterioration of Punch's. Good things are there now, as then; and now, as then, many of the best writers in the country contribute periodically to its pages. With verse and article, epigram and parody, Punch continues to be a record and a mirror of his times—a comic distorting mirror perhaps, but still a glass of fashion and of history, with fun for its mercury, which, through its literature, pleasantly and agreeably reflects the deeds and the thoughts of the people. What of it, if his verse now and again is only passable? Sometimes it is fine—always acceptable, and rarely below an elevated established standard; anyhow, some years ago, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain's single offering was rejected on its demerits by the "monument of British humour." Perhaps the Editor judged it as Punch's railway-porter judged an old lady's pet in accordance with railway rules: Cats is "dogs," and rabbits is "dogs," and so's parrots; but this 'ere tortis is a hinsect, and there ain't no—need—for it. And the tone of Punch's more serious utterances is now that of the dining-room rather than of the debating society and the vestry room. Mr. Ruskin, among others, deplored Punch's kid gloves and evening-dress, when amiable obituary notices on Baron Bethell—(had he not been Punch's counsel in the old days?)—and the Bishop of Winchester were published. "Alas, Mr. Punch," he wrote, "is it come to this? And is there to be no more knocking down, then? And is your last scene in future to be shaking hands with the devil?"[49] Punch can still hit hard; though "knocking down" is no longer his main delight. His text has become as refined as his art—and that, of course, is the reason that it no longer commands the chief attention of the class that once was led by it. At that time its art alone carried it into circles that abhorred its politics, and it is recorded that Mulready was driven to excuse himself to one of the Staff for not reading the text by the lame confession that he was "no bookworm!"