English Illustration 'The Sixties': 1855-70 / With Numerous Illustrations by Ford Madox Brown: A. Boyd Houghton: Arthur Hughes: Charles Keene: M. J. Lawless: Lord Leighton, P.R.A.: Sir J. E. Millais, P.R.A.: G. Du Maurier: J. W. North, R.A.: G. J. Pinwell: Dante Gabriel Rossetti: W. Small: Frederick Sandys: J. Mcneill Whistler: Frederick Walker, A.R.A.: and Others

by Gleeson White

FUN

This popular humorous penny weekly, which is still running, would be forever memorable as the birthplace of the famous Bab ballads, with W. S. Gilbert's own thumb-nail sketches: yet it would be foolish to rank him as an illustrator, despite the grotesque humour of these inimitable little figures. The periodical, not (I believe) at first under the editorship of Tom Hood, the younger, began in September 21, 1861. The mass of illustrations must be the only excuse for failing to include an orderly summary; yet there is not, and there is certainly no necessity for, an elaborate chronicle of the paper, like Mr. Spielmann's admirable monograph in Punch. But those who are curious to discover the work of less-known men of the sixties will find plenty to reward their search. A clever parody of Millais' pre-Raphaelite manner is given as a tail-piece to the preface of vol. i. A. Boyd Houghton supplied the cartoons for a short period, November 1866 to April 6, 1867. At least those signed A. H. are attributed to him, and the first would almost suffice by itself to decide it, did any doubt exist. Another cartoonist, who signed his work with the device of a hen, is very freely represented. F. Barnard was also cartoonist for a long time—1869 onwards—and J. G. Thomson, for a score of years, did excellent work in the same department. The authorship of many of the drawings scattered through its pages is easily recognised by their style—others, as for instance one on page five of the Almanac for 1866, puzzle the student. It looks like a Paul Gray, but the monogram with which it is signed, although it is indecipherable, is certainly not 'P. G.' W. J. Wiegand, W. Brunton, H. Sanderson, Matt Stretch, Lieut. Seccombe, L. C. Henley, F. S. Walker, and F. W. Lawson (see for instance, Almanac for 1865, p. 11) contributed a great many of the 'socials' to the early volumes.

Then, as now, you find unconscious or deliberate imitations of other artists' mannerisms. A rash observer might attribute drawings here to C. Keene (Almanac for 1865, vi.), and credit Tenniel with the title-page to vol. iv. N.S.

Still, as a field to discover the work of young artists who afterwards become approximately great, Fun is not a very happy hunting-ground. Despite some notable exceptions, its illustrators cannot be placed even upon the average of the period that concerns us; the presence of a half a dozen or so of first-rate men hardly makes a set of the comic paper essential to a representative collection. After renewed intimacy with its pages there is a distinct feeling of disappointment. That its drawings pleased you mightily, and seemed fine stuff at the time, may be true; but it only proves that the enjoyment of a schoolboy cannot be recaptured in after-life if the quality of the drawing be too poor to sustain the weight of old-fashioned dress and jokes whose first sparkle has dimmed beyond restoration.