The History of the Nineteenth Century in Caricature Part 2

The dangers which threatened Napoleon at this period were shown by Gillray in one of the most striking of all his cartoons, the "Valley of the Shadow of Death," which was issued September 24, 1808. The valley is the valley of Bunyan's allegory. The Emperor is proceeding timorously down a treacherous path, bounded on either side by the waters of Styx and hemmed in by a circle of flame. From every side horrors are springing up to a.s.sail him. The British lion, raging and furious, is springing at his throat. The Portuguese wolf has broken his chain. King Death, mounted on a mule of "True Royal Spanish Breed," has cleared at a bound the body of the ex-King Joseph, which has been thrown into the "Ditch of Styx." Death is poising his spear with fatal aim, warningly holding up at the same time his hour-gla.s.s with the sand exhausted; flames follow in his course. From the smoke rise the figures of Junot and Dupont, the beaten generals. The papal tiara is descending as a "Roman meteor," charged with lightnings to blast the Corsican. The "Turkish New Moon" is seen rising in blood.

The "Spirit of Charles XII." rises from the flames to avenge the wrongs of Sweden. The "Imperial German Eagle" is emerging from a cloud; the Prussian bird appears as a scarecrow, making desperate efforts to fly and screaming revenge. From the "Lethean Ditch" the "American Rattlesnake" is thrusting forth a poisoned tongue. The "Dutch Frogs" are spitting out their spite; and the Rhenish Confederation is personified as a herd of starved "Rats," ready to feast on the Corsican. The great "Russian Bear," the only ally Napoleon has secured, is shaking his chain and growling--a formidable enemy in the rear.

Gillray's caricature ent.i.tled "John Bull Taking a Luncheon; or, British Cooks Cramming Old Grumble-Gizzard with Bonne Chere," shows the strange-appearing John of the caricature of that day sitting at a table, overwhelmed by the zealous attentions of his cooks, foremost among whom is the hero of the Nile, who is offering him a "Frica.s.see a la Nelson," a large dish of battered French s.h.i.+ps of the line. John is swallowing a frigate at a mouthful. Through the window we see Fox and Sheridan, representative of the Broad Bottom administration, running away in dismay at John Bull's voracity.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Napoleon in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

_From James Gillray's caricature._]

As Gillray retires from the field several other clever artists stand ready to take his place, and chief among them Rowlandson. The latter had a distinct advantage over Gillray in his superior artistic training. He was educated in the French schools, where he gave especial attention to studies from the nude. In the opinion of such capable judges as Reynolds, West, and Lawrence, his gifts might have won him a high place among English artists, if he had not turned, through sheer perversity, to satire and burlesque. Rowlandson's Napoleonic cartoons began in July, 1808. These initial efforts are neither especially characteristic nor especially clever, but they certainly were duly appreciated by the public. Joseph Grego, in his interesting and comprehensive work upon Rowlandson, says of them:

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Spider's Web.

From a German caricature commemorating German success in 1814.]

"It is certain that the caricaturist's travesties of the little Emperor, his burlesques of his great actions and grandiose declarations, his figurative displays of the mean origin of the imperial family, with the cowardice and depravity of its members, won popular applause ... And when disasters began to cloud the career of Napoleon, as army after army melted away, ... the artist bent his skill to interpret the delight of the public. The City competed with the West End in buying every caricature, in loyal contest to prove their national enmity for Bonaparte. In too many cases, the incentive was to gratify the hatred of the Corsican rather than any remarkable merit that could be discovered in the caricatures. Very few of these mock-heroic sallies imprint themselves upon the recollection by sheer force of their own brilliancy, as was the case with Gillray, and frequently with John Tenniel. Rowlandson and Cruikshank are risible, but not inspired."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The Part.i.tion of the Map."

_From the collection of John Leonard Dudley, Jr._]

On July 8 Rowlandson began his series with "The Corsican Tiger at Bay." Napoleon is depicted as a savage tiger, rending four "Royal Greyhounds," quite at his mercy. But a fresh pack appears in the background and prepares for a fierce charge. The Russian bear and Austrian eagle are securely bound with heavy fetters, but the eagle is asking: "Now, Brother Bruin, is it time to break our fetters?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The Chief of the Grand Army in a Sad Plight."

_From a French cartoon of the period._]

"The Beast as Described in the Revelations" followed within two weeks.

The beast, of Corsican origin, is represented with seven heads, and the names of Austria, Naples, Holland, Denmark, Prussia, and Russia are inscribed on their respective crowns. Napoleon's head, severed from the trunk, vomits forth flames. In the distance, cities are blazing, showing the destruction wrought by the beast. Spain is represented as the champion who alone dares to stand against the monster.

"The Political Butcher" bears date September 12 of the same year. In this print the Spanish Don, in the garb of a butcher, is cutting up Bonaparte for the benefit of his neighbors. The body of the late Corsican lies before him and is being cut up with professional zeal.

The Don holds up his enemy's heart and calls upon the other Powers to take their share. The double-headed eagle of Austria is swooping upon Napoleon's head: "I have long wished to strike my talons into that diabolical head-piece"; the British bulldog has been enjoying portions of the joints, and thinks that he would "like to have the picking of that head." The Russian bear is luxuriously licking Napoleon's boots, and remarks, "This licking is giving me a mortal inclination to pick a bone."

The final failure of the Spanish campaign is signalized, September 20, in a cartoon labeled "Napoleon the Little in a Rage with his Great French Eagle." The Emperor, with drawn sword and bristling with rage, threatens the French imperial eagle, larger than himself. The bird's head and one leg are tied up--the result of damage inflicted by the Spaniards. "Confusion and destruction!" thunders Napoleon, "what is this I see? Did I not command you not to return until you had spread your wing of victory over the whole of Spain?" "Aye, it's fine talking," rejoins the bird, "but if you had been there, you would not much have liked it. The Spanish cormorants pursued me in such a manner that they set me molting in a terrible way. I wonder that I have not lost my feathers. Besides, it got so hot I could not bear it any longer."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The Signature Symbol of Abdication."

_From a caricature in color by George Cruikshank._]

In August, 1809, Rowlandson published "The Rising Sun." Bonaparte is surrounded by the Continental powers, and is busy rocking to sleep in a cradle the Russian bear, securely muzzled with French promises.

But the dawn of a new era is breaking: the sun of Spain and Portugal is rising with threatening import. The Emperor is disturbed by the new light: "This rising sun has set me upon thorns." The Prussian eagle is trussed; Denmark is snuffed out. But Austria has once more taken heart: "Tyrant, I defy thee and thy cursed crew!"

The victories of the Peninsular war, and later of the disastrous Russian campaign, called forth an ever-increasing number of cartoons, which showed little mercy or consideration to a fallen foe. A sample of the t.i.tles of this period show the general tendency; he is the "Corsican Bloodhound," the "Carca.s.s-Butcher"; he is a jail-bird doing the "Rogues' March to the Island of Elba." An a.n.a.lysis of a few of the more striking cartoons will serve to close the survey of the Napoleonic period. "Death and Bonaparte" is a grewsome cartoon by Rowlandson, dated January 1, 1814. Napoleon is seated on a drum with his head clasped between his hands, staring into the face of a skeleton Death, who is watching the baffled general, face to face.

Death mockingly parodies Napoleon's att.i.tude. A broken eagle, the imperial standard, lies at his bony feet. In the background the Russian, Prussian, Austrian, and other allied armies are streaming past in unbroken ranks, routing the dismayed legions of France.

"b.l.o.o.d.y Boney, the Corsican Butcher, Left off Trade and Retiring to Scarecrow Island" is the t.i.tle of still another of Rowlandson's characteristic cartoons. In it Napoleon is represented as riding on a rough-coated donkey and wearing a fool's cap in place of a crown. His only provision is a bag of brown bread. His consort is riding on the same beast, which is being unmercifully flogged with a stick labeled "Baton Marechal."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The Oven of the Allies."

_From an anonymous French cartoon._]

Napoleon's escape from Elba was commemorated by Rowlandson in "The Flight of Bonaparte from h.e.l.l Bay." In it the foul fiend is amusing himself by letting his captive loose, to work fresh mischief in the world above. He has mounted the Corsican upon a bubble and sends him careering upward back to earth, while hissing dragons pour forth furious blasts to waft the bubble onward.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The New Robinson Crusoe."

_From a German caricature._]

"h.e.l.l Hounds Rallying around the Idol of France" is the t.i.tle of still another of Rowlandson's designs, which appeared in April, 1815. The head and bust of the Emperor drawn on a colossal scale, a hangman's noose around his throat, is mounted on a vast pyramid of human heads, his decapitated victims. Demons are flying through the air to place upon his brow a crown of blazing pitch, while a ring of other excited fiends, whose features represent Marechal Ney, Lefebre, Davoust and others, with horns, hoofs, and tails, are dancing in triumph around the idol they have replaced. Closely resembling this cartoon of Rowlandson is the German cartoon, which is reproduced in these pages, showing a double-faced Napoleon topping a monument built of skulls.

Rowlandson's "h.e.l.l Hounds Rallying around the Idol of France" was the last English cartoon directed against Napoleon when he was at the head of France. Two months later the Emperor's power was finally broken at Waterloo.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Napoleon caged by the Allies."

_From a French cartoon of the period._]

PART II

_FROM WATERLOO THROUGH THE CRIMEAN WAR_

CHAPTER VII

AFTER THE DOWNFALL

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Rest.i.tution: Or, to Each his Share."

_From a colored stamp of the period._]

With the downfall of Napoleon the Gillray school of caricature came to an abrupt and very natural close. It was a school born of fear and nurtured upon rancor--a school that indulged freely in obscenity and sacrilege, and did not hesitate to stoop to kick the fallen hero, to heap insult and ignominy upon Napoleon in his exile. Only during a great world crisis, a death struggle of nations, could popular opinion have tolerated such wanton disregard for decency. And when the crisis was pa.s.sed it came to an end like some malignant growth, strangled by its own virulence. The truth is that Gillray and Rowlandson led caricature into an _impa.s.se_; they deliberately perverted its true function, which is, to advance an argument with the cogent force of a clever orator, to sum up a political issue in terms so simple that a child may read, and not merely to echo back the blatant rancor of the mob. In the hands of a master of the art it becomes an incisive weapon, like the blade with which the matador gives his _coup-de-grace_. Gillray's conception of its office seems to have been that of the red rag to be flapped tauntingly in the face of John Bull; and John Bull obediently bellowed in response. It would be idle to deny that for the purpose of spurring on public opinion, the Napoleonic cartoons exercised a potent influence. They kept popular excitement at fever heat; they added fuel to the general hatred. But when the crisis was pa.s.sed, when the public pulse was beating normally once more, when virulent attacks upon a helpless exile had ceased to seem amusing, there really remained no material upon which caricature of the Gillray type could exercise its offensive ingenuity. What seemed justifiable license when directed against the arch-enemy of European peace would have been insufferable when applied to British statesmen and to the milder problems of local political issues.

Another and quite practical reason helps to explain the dearth of political caricature in England for a full generation after the battle of Waterloo, and that is the question of expense. A public which freely gave s.h.i.+llings and even pounds to see its hatred of "Little Boney" interpreted with Gillray's vindictive malice hesitated to expend even pennies for a cartoon on the corn laws or the latest ministerial changes. In England, as well as on the Continent, caricature as an effective factor in politics remained in abeyance until the advent of an essentially modern type of periodical, the comic weekly, of which _La Caricature_, the London _Punch_, the _Fliegende Blatter_, and in this country _Puck_ and _Judge_, are the most famous examples. The progress of lithography made such a periodical possible in France as early as 1830, when _La Caricature_ was founded by the famous Philipon; but the oppressive laws of censors.h.i.+p throughout Europe prevented any wide development of this cla.s.s of journalism until after the general political upheaval of 1848.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Adjusting the Balance of Power after Napoleon.]

It would be idle, however, to deny that Gillray exerted a lasting influence upon all future caricature. His license, his vulgarity, his repulsive perversion of the human face and form, have found no disciples in later generations; but his effective a.s.semblage of many figures, the crowded significance of minor details, the dramatic unity of the whole conception which he inherited from Hogarth, have been pa.s.sed on down the line and still continue to influence the leading cartoonists of to-day in England, Germany, and the United States, although to a much less degree in France. Even at the time of Napoleon's downfall the few cartoons which appeared in Paris were far less extreme than their English models, while the German caricaturists, on the contrary, were extremely virulent, notably the Berliner, Schadow, who openly acknowledged his indebtedness to the Englishman by signing himself the Parisian Gillray; and Volz, author of the famous "true portrait of Napoleon"--a portrait in which Napoleon's face, upon closer inspection, is seen made up of a head of inextricably tangled dead bodies, his head surmounted by a bird of prey, his breast a map of Europe overspread by a vast spider web, in which the different national capitals are entangled like so many luckless flies. Had there been more liberty of the press, an interesting school of political cartoonists might have arisen at this time in Germany. But they met with such scanty encouragement that little of real interest is to be gleaned from this source until after the advent of the Berlin _Kladderadatsch_ in 1848, and the _Fliegende Blatter_, but a short time earlier.

[Ill.u.s.tration: John Bull making a new Batch of s.h.i.+ps to send to the Lakes.

This cartoon by William Charles, a Scotchman who was forced to leave Great Britain, and who came to the United States, and wielded his pencil against his renounced country, is in many ways an imitator of Gillray's famous "Tiddy Do, the Great French Gingerbread-Baker, making a new Batch of Kings."

_From the collection of the New York Public Library._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Russia as Mediator between the United States and Great Britain.

_From the collection of the New York Public Library._]