The History of "Punch" Part 4

[Ill.u.s.tration: PERCIVAL LEIGH'S MONOGRAM.]

Here you have the portraits of the four editors--that of Mark Lemon painted by Fred Chester, son of his life-long friend George Chester, and the likenesses of s.h.i.+rley Brooks, Tom Taylor, and Mr. Burnand in photography. The portraits of the Staff, taken by Ba.s.sano in 1891 at Mr.

William Agnew's request, to the number of fourteen or fifteen, hang separately in their dark frames. The original of one of Tenniel's Almanac designs; a masterly drawing, two feet long, by Keene, bought by the late Mr. Bradbury at a sale--the (unused) cartoon of Disraeli leading the princ.i.p.al financiers of the day in hats and frock-coats across the Red Sea ("Come along, it's getting shallower"); the original of Leech's celebrated "Mr. Punch's Fancy Ball," and a series of the enlarged coloured prints of his hunting sketches; a caricature of Mr.

Furniss by Mr. Sambourne, made in Paris; another of Mr. Sambourne by Mr.

Furniss; and a third of Mr. Sambourne by himself; a caricature in pen-and-ink and colour of the _Punch_ Staff marching along in Paris, by Mr. Furniss; a black-and-white sketch by the same artist of the same distinguished company in the train on the return journey; and another souvenir of the Paris trip by Mr. du Maurier, including the portraits of himself, Mr. Burnand, Mr. Arthur a Beckett, and Mr. W. Bradbury. The trophy-frame of specimen proofs of some of the finest of Swain's cuts of the artistic Staff's best work, gathered together for show in one of the great exhibitions, has been removed to make room for photographs of Gilbert a Beckett, "Ponny" (Horace) Mayhew, Charles Keene, Tom Taylor, Percival Leigh, Charles H. Bennett, R. F. Sketchley, John Henry Agnew, Thomas Agnew and William Bradbury, Mr. Fred Evans and Sir William Agnew; while photographic groups of the Staff and a fine autotype of Thackeray complete the wall decoration of one of the most interesting apartments in London City.

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOHN LEECH'S INITIALS AND CYPHER.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: W. M. THACKERAY'S MONOGRAM]

And in the corner, on the locker farthest from the street, besides a little _papier-mache_ figure of a j.a.panese Punch--sent by an admirer in the Land of the Rising Sun--and a group charmingly modelled from Sir John Tenniel's beautiful cartoon of "Peace and the New Year," stands the statue of the Great Hunchback himself, which in a fit of enthusiasm a young German sculptor, named Adolph Fleischmann, wrought and presented to the object of his admiration. It is a work of no little grotesqueness and ingenuity (well modelled and coloured, and fitted with springs that permit of the working of arms and eyes and head), which, endowed with a white favour, has played its part in the decoration of the publis.h.i.+ng office on the occasion of certain royal weddings and public rejoicing, and during the blocking of Fleet Street has been utilised in the direction of comic self-advertis.e.m.e.nt.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HORACE MAYHEW'S INITIALS.]

Then there is a real "Royal Patent" appropriately framed, "hereby appointing Master Punch unto the Place and Quality of Joke Maker Extraordinary to her Majesty," duly signed and sealed by the Lord Chamberlain, and countersigned "J. A. N. D. Martin." It is undoubtedly a genuine certificate--up to a point; but how it was obtained, and how _Punch's_ name came to be filled in, remains to this day a mystery. Such is the room, with its pleasant decoration of red and black and gold, with its large windows and its sunlight gaselier; but, take it for all in all, it is about as unlike Mr. Sambourne's cla.s.sic representation of the Roman atrium in his Jubilee drawing as well could be imagined.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TOM TAYLOR'S INITIALS.]

And the Table itself--_the_ Table--the famous board of which we all have heard, yet none, or but very few of us, have seen--I myself amongst the fortunate few! As a piece of furniture this hospitable, but rather primitive, piece of joinery is not of much account, the top being of plain deal (_pace_ Thackeray's "_Mahogany_ Tree"), oblong in shape, with rounded ends. But its a.s.sociations render it a treasure among treasures, a rich and priceless gem. For at this Table nearly every man upon the Staff has, from the day it was made, sat and carved his initials upon it with a penknife, when officially elevated to _Punch's_ peerage. As each has died, his successor has taken his place--just as the Inst.i.tut de France creates Immortals to fill the chairs made vacant by death--and he has cut his initials or his mark close by those of the men who occupied the place before him. There they are, staring at you from the Table like so many abecedarian skeletons at the feast; and if you take a furtive and hasty peep from the doorway and lift the green protective cloth you catch sight nearest you of a "D. M." in close company with a beautifully-cut "W. M. T." and a monogrammatic leech inside a bottle flanked by a J. and an L.; and you gaze with deep interest on the handiwork of them and of the rest, many of whom have carved their names, as on that Table, deep into England's roll of fame; and of others, too, who, with less of genius but equal zeal and effort, have a strong claim on the grat.i.tude and the recollection of a kindly and laughter-loving people.[7]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIR JOHN TENNIEL'S MONOGRAM.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: s.h.i.+RLEY BROOKS' MONOGRAM.]

For more than forty years, then, this Table has week by week, with few exceptions, been surrounded by the Staff of the day; and the chair, the self-same old-fas.h.i.+oned wooden editorial armchair, has been filled by the reigning Editor. "With few exceptions," I said; for Bouverie Street has not invariably been the hatching-place of the Cartoon, nor have its walls resounded with absolute regularity to the laughter and the jests of the merry-makers. During the summer the Dinner has been, now and again, and still is, held at Greenwich, at Richmond, Maidenhead, or elsewhere--Hampton Court and Dulwich rather frequently of old, as well as once at Harrow, and sometimes at Purfleet, Windsor, and Rosherville.

Sometimes, when occasion has demanded--in the "dead season," maybe, when the attendance at the Table has dwindled, though for no sustained period (it is even on record that the "Dinner" has consisted of a _tete-a-tete_ between Sir John Tenniel and Mr. Arthur a Beckett)--not more than three or four consecutive weeks, certainly--the "Suss.e.x," or more often the old "Bedford Hotel," or latterly the "First Avenue," has been the scene of the feast; while "special dinners" (and they have been many) have been held in special places. And not invariably has the weekly repast been a "dinner" at all, be it observed; for on certain rare occasions, when some important Parliamentary matter has intervened, a luncheon has been held instead. Once, in September, 1845, it was postponed from the Sat.u.r.day night at the intercession of Charles d.i.c.kens, so that a new play by Macready might be produced with the full advantage of the _Punch_ men's presence. And the Dinner was once more made a movable feast, and was held on the Tuesday instead of the Wednesday, on the occasion of the production of Mr. Burnand's and Sir Arthur Sullivan's opera of "The Chieftain" in December, 1894.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WILLIAM BRADBURY'S INITIALS.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: F. M. EVANS' INITIALS. (Unfinished)]

In the "Bedford Hotel"--beloved of Thackeray, for in it he wrote much of "Henry Esmond," and stayed there when his house was in the painters'

hands--the room occupied was that known as the "Dryden." Here the Staff would make no attempt at self-repression; and I have been told how the idle and the curious would congregate outside upon the pavement and listen to the voices of the wits within, and wait to gape at them as they pa.s.sed in and out.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HENRY SILVER'S INITIALS.]

The places at Table once occupied by the members of the Staff are nowadays regarded as theirs by right. But in earlier days the places were often shuffled, as at a game of "general post." Proof of it may be had from the following plans of the Table between 1855 and 1865--perhaps the most interesting years in the history of _Punch_, as demonstrating the transitional stage, when the ancient order of things was rapidly developing into the modern as we know them to-day. In 1855, then, the disposition was as follows:--

WILLIAM BRADBURY*

DOUGLAS JERROLD JOHN LEECH TOM TAYLOR W. M. THACKERAY GILBERT a BECKETT s.h.i.+RLEY BROOKS HORACE MAYHEW MARK LEMON PERCIVAL LEIGH JOHN TENNIEL F. M. EVANS*

--only two artists and a half (Thackeray being a commixture of writer and draughtsman) to seven writers and a half!

Five years later--in 1860--the places had changed, partly through death, partly through rearrangement:--

WILLIAM BRADBURY*

W. M. THACKERAY (when he came) JOHN LEECH TOM TAYLOR HENRY SILVER HORACE MAYHEW CHARLES KEENE s.h.i.+RLEY BROOKS JOHN TENNIEL PERCIVAL LEIGH MARK LEMON F. M. EVANS*

Here the artistic element is seen to be a.s.serting itself to some extent, the proportion between artist and writer being further readjusted after the lapse of another five years: for in 1865 the const.i.tution of the table became--

F. M. EVANS*

TOM TAYLOR G. DU MAURIER W. H. BRADBURY* HENRY SILVER (his father seldom came now) HORACE MAYHEW CHARLES H. BENNETT CHARLES KEENE F. M. EVANS, JR.[9]

F. C. BURNAND s.h.i.+RLEY BROOKs PERCIVAL LEIGH JOHN TENNIEL MARK LEMON

--the editor for the first time taking his proper place at the table, although, it is true, it was only at the foot.

To-day the number of the staff has been increased, and the right proportion struck between the pen and the pencil--the editor, too, presiding.

MR. F. C. BURNAND SIR JOHN TENNIEL MR. F. ANSTEY MR. LINLEY SAMBOURNE MR. HENRY LUCY MR. ARTHUR a BECKETT MR. E. T. REED MR. R. C. LEHMANN MR. BERNARD PARTRIDGE MR. HARRY FURNISS (until Feb. 1894) MR. PHIL MAY MR. DU MAURIER MR. E. J. MILLIKEN SIR WILLIAM AGNEW (sometimes) MR. LAWRENCE BRADBURY or MR. PHILIP AGNEW

=* Proprietors=

In the decade or so following the death of Douglas Jerrold--roughly corresponding with the period within which the arrangements varied as i have shown--six new appointments were made to the table. These were: Mr.

Henry Silver, In August, 1857; Charles Keene, February, 1860 (after a nine years' probationers.h.i.+p); Mr. F. C. Burnand, June, 1863; Mr. G. Du Maurier, November, 1864; Charles H. Bennett, February, 1865 (though ill-health prevented him from taking his place until the following June); and Mr. R. F. Sketchley (till 1894 of the South Kensington Museum), January, 1868. The present Staff, I may add, since Mr. du Maurier's accession, have taken their places at the Table in the following order: Mr. Linley Sambourne, Mr. Arthur a Beckett, Mr. E. J.

Milliken, Gilbert a Beckett, Mr. Reginald s.h.i.+rley Brooks (until 1884), Mr. Henry Lucy, Mr. F. Anstey, Mr. R. C. Lehmann, Mr. E. T. Reed, Mr.

Bernard Partridge, and in February, 1895, Mr. Phil May. As Mr. Punch approached man's estate, and arrived at years of artistic discretion, he cultivated a pretty taste in epicurism; until to-day, if report be true, the Dinners (prepared and sent in by Spiers and Pond), the Ayala, and the cigars, are all worthy of the palates of the men whose wit it is theirs to stimulate and nourish. To summon the Staff to these feasts of reason it was in later years the practice to issue printed notices, which after 1870 were superseded by invitation cards drawn by Mr. du Maurier--the design representing Mr. Punch ringing his bell, while the faithful fly hurriedly to respond to the behest. But owing to the number of portraits it contained of old friends now departed, and the painful recollections it consequently aroused, its later use has been discontinued.

[Ill.u.s.tration: F. C. BURNAND'S INITIALS.

_(1) On joining the Table, and (2) on appointment as Editor._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: GEORGE DU MAURIER'S MONOGRAM.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: LINLEY SAMBOURNE'S MONOGRAM.]

But when our Democritus boasted fewer years, there was not so much ceremony in his banquet, neither was there so much state; nor was the friends.h.i.+p less keen or the intimacy less enjoyable in Leigh's humbler days of "off-n-off." A wonderful company--a brilliant company; with flas.h.i.+ng wit and dazzling sallies, with many "a skirmish of wit between them." From more, the quieter flow of genial humour. And among the rest, the listeners; men--some of them--who prefer to attend than to talk, even to the point of reserve and almost of taciturnity. Such men were John Leech, Richard Doyle, and Charles Keene--whose silence, however, masked subtle minds that were teeming with droll ideas, and as appreciative of humour as the sprightliest. What jokes have been made, what stories told that never have found their way into print! What chaff, what squibs, what caricatures--which it surpa.s.ses the wit of a Halsbury or a MacNeill to imagine or condone!

Of what the _Punch_ Dinner was at the time when Thackeray was still of the band, an idea may be formed from the following extract from Mr.

Silver's Diary, with which I have been favoured by the writer, who for several years sat at it by right. He calls it--

"A NIGHT AT THE ROUND TABLE."

SCENE: _Mr. Punch's Banquet Hall at No. 11, Bouverie Street._

TIME: _Wednesday, March 2nd_, 1859, _six o'clock p.m._

F. M. EVANS W. M. THACKERAY JOHN LEECH HORACE MAYHEW TOM TAYLOR s.h.i.+RLEY BROOKS HENRY SILVER PERCIVAL LEIGH JOHN TENNIEL MARK LEMON

'Turbot and haunch of venison--what a good dinner!' says Tenniel, reading _menu_. Tantalising to Tom Taylor, who has to dine elsewhere; and Thackeray leaves early, to go to an 'episcopal tea-fight,' as he tells us--a jump 'from lively to severe,' to Fulham Palace from the _Punch_ Table.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 40, Bouverie Street, E.C. July 15th 1871

The pleasure of your company is requested on Wednesday next, the 10th just at half-past Six sharp.

An answer, if unable to come, will oblige.

_PUNCH_ DINNER INVITATION CARD. DRAWN BY G. DU MAURIER.