The vagaries of military uniforms—apart from the intrusions of Prince Albert—call for separate treatment. The new and very skimpy shell-jacket introduced in 1848 evokes imaginary protests alike from stout and lean officers. The short, high-shouldered military cape is guyed in 1851. In 1854 Punch throws himself with great energy into the movement for the abolition of the high stock and the adoption of more rational and comfortable clothing—witness the verses, "Valour under difficulties," depicting the sufferings of a half-strangled militia-man; the caricature of the "New Albert Bonnet"; the cartoon in which Private Jones in a bearskin, black in the face from the strangulation of his stock, is afraid that his head is coming off; the ridiculous frogged tunic with a very low belt; and the comments on the Army Order, issued by Sidney Herbert in 1854, providing white linen covers for helmets and shakos as a protection against the heat. The sufferings endured by soldiers owing to their heavy packs and marching kit are not forgotten. But these abuses, like the story of the bad and rotten boots provided by contractors for the Crimea, do not belong to a chronicle of fashion, but to the scandalous history of commerce. Did history repeat itself in some measure in the Great War?
Rude Boy: "O, look 'ere, Jim!—If 'ere ain't a Lobster bin and out-growed his cloak!"
[28] "Æsthetical" was noticed as early as 1847 in a dig at New Curiosities of Literature, and in 1853 we read of an "æsthetic tea," at which "the atmosphere was one of architecture, painting, stained glass, brasses, heraldry, wood carving, madrigals, chants, motets, mysticism and theology."
THE DRAMA, OPERA, MUSIC, AND THE FINE ARTS
One must not expect to find a detached, impartial, or coldly critical survey of the drama in the pages of Punch. Most of his staff had dabbled in play-writing; Douglas Jerrold was a prolific, accomplished, and, so far as prestige went, a successful dramatist, but he had reaped a singularly meagre reward for his industry and talent. He had fallen out with managers, and his quarrel with Charles Kean was not without its influence on Punch's persistent disparagement of that actor. Yet, when all allowance has been made for these personal motives and the querulous tone which they occasionally inspired, Punch may fairly claim to have rendered valuable service to the British drama in this period. He was sound in essentials: in his whole-hearted devotion to Shakespeare and loyal support of those, like Phelps and Mrs. Warner, who under great difficulties, and with no fashionable patronage, gave good performances of Shakespearean plays at moderate prices; in his unceasing attacks on "Newgate plays," "poison plays," the cult of the criminal whether native or foreign, stage buffoonery, over-reliance on mere upholstery, dramatic clichés, and solecisms in pronunciation.[29] He was also a reformer in his advocacy of improvements for the comfort and convenience of the play-goer, such as the abolition of the rule of evening dress. And, as we have seen, he rebuked mummer-worship, holding that "the players' vanity has been the curse of the modern drama." His continued and pointed remonstrance with the Court for discouraging British plays and British-born players has been already noted. It runs through the first ten years of Punch with little intermission and was largely justified. Punch was able to congratulate Prince Albert on subscribing to the fund raised to purchase Shakespeare's house for the nation in 1847, but in the main his grievance was genuine. Foreign artists and freaks were far too freely patronized and encouraged at Court. The balance has long since been redressed, and another grievance—the dependence of managers on translations and adaptations from French plays as set forth in the following extract—has been largely remedied, though the remedy, so far as the importation of American plays is concerned, is by some critics considered worse than the disease:—
Galignani's Messenger says of the French theatre:—
"There were produced in 1842 at the different theatres of Paris, 191 new pieces."
Punch says of the English theatre:—
"There were produced in 1842 at the different theatres of London about ten new pieces; the rest being hashed, fricasseed, devilled, warmed up, from old stock brought from France or stolen from the manufactory of Bentley and others!"