Before proceeding further the writer desires to enter a plea pro domo sua. He, like others, has his weak spot, and the present may be the only opportunity he will ever have of setting forth certain facts concerning his family, which, in spite of considerable association with English journalism and literature, has frequently been described—chiefly in connection with Zola and his writings—as Greek, Hungarian, Polish, Italian, or Jewish. That the Vizetellys are of Italian origin is indisputable, but one may well inquire how long it takes to make a family English? Some are accepted as such after a few years. Surely, then, four centuries ought to suffice.
The forerunners of Henry Vizetelly came from Venice[3] to England in the spacious days of Queen Elizabeth; and until the end of the seventeenth century were concerned in the manufacture of glass. One of them became connected with some works established at Lambeth in or about 1673 by George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham. The first sheets of blown glass for mirrors and coach-windows made in Great Britain came from those works, which Evelyn visited, as mentioned in his "Diary" But in the early part of the eighteenth century the Vizetellys became printers, and the family papers describe them as of "the parish of St. Bride's in the city of London." The Vizetelly, or Vizzetelli, of Elizabethan days having been called James (Jacopo), it became until recent years the family rule that the eldest son of the eldest son should bear that Christian name.
Another name, given to daughters, was the Biblical one of Mehetabel, a survival, perhaps, of some family Puritanism in Commonwealth days. But if there were a Puritan, there was certainly no Jewish strain in the family, the men of which in the eighteenth century married girls with good old English names, some of them London born and others coming from counties as far away as Cheshire. Thus, although the Vizetellys seem to have never forgotten their origin and to have cultivated friendship with sundry notable Italians who settled in England, it is certain that, as generation followed generation, English blood predominated in their veins.
The status of the eighteenth-century Vizetellys as printers is difficult to determine. They were apparently in fair circumstances, but the writer knows of no eighteenth-century book bearing their imprint. He believes they were associated in business with others whose names alone appeared. The first found actually trading in his own name was James Henry Vizetelly,[4] born in 1790, and son of James Vizetelly, "printer, of St. Bride's parish and of Duke Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields." James Henry's eldest son, James Thomas George, was apprenticed to him as a printer; and his second son, Henry Richard, after acquiring a knowledge of the same trade, was placed first with Bonner and afterwards with Orrin Smith, two noted wood-engravers. He proved one of the latter's best pupils, and ultimately joined his brother James in the printing and engraving firm known as Vizetelly Brothers.
While thus engaged, Henry Vizetelly[5] was approached by Mr. Herbert Ingram, a former news-agent of Nottingham, on the subject of founding an illustrated newspaper. The outcome (1842) was "The Illustrated London News," the first journal of its kind in any country. Vizetelly afterwards quarrelled with Ingram, and, in 1843, in conjunction with Mr. Andrew Spottiswoode, started an opposition paper, "The Pictorial Times," to which some notable men, including Douglas Jerrold and Thackeray, contributed. As, however, the printing and engraving business which he carried on with his brother was becoming a large one, Vizetelly eventually severed his connection with journalism for some years, and either with his brother, or later on his own account, produced a large number of illustrated books, which from typographical and other technical standpoints were often among the best of their time. He was also (this may interest American readers) the first to introduce Poe's "Tales" and—through C. H. Clarke—Mrs. Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin," to the English public, and, having virtually discovered Birket Foster, he also did much to popularise Longfellow in England. Perhaps his best work as a wood-engraver was that done for the edition of "Evangeline," illustrated with Foster's designs.
Vizetelly also took a prominent part in the agitation for the repeal of the taxes on knowledge, such as the newspaper stamp and the paper duty, being honorary secretary to the society for the removal of the latter impost; and in 1855, conjointly with David Bogue, the publisher of most of the books he printed, he started "The Illustrated Times," on the staff of which, as had been the case with "The Pictorial Times," there were again many notable writers and artists.[6] This newspaper ran a very successful course for some years, but about 1860 Vizetelly—after losing a large sum over another venture, "The Welcome Guest"—sold his share in the proprietorship to Ingram of "The Illustrated London News." Ultimately, in 1865, he entered into an agreement to represent the last-named journal on the continent of Europe, with headquarters in Paris, to which city he removed with his family. He saw virtually all there was to be seen there during the last years of the Empire, the subsequent siege by the Germans, and, later, the Commune. He afterwards acted for "The Illustrated London News" as a "special" in different parts of Europe, and became British wine juror at various international exhibitions, for he had made a particular study of wines in the regions where they were produced, and wrote on them at length both in "The Pall Mall Gazette" and in a series of popular volumes. Other subjects also attracted his pen; the best of his numerous literary efforts being probably a work on the famous Diamond Necklace scandal, and another on Berlin as it was when Bismarck had constituted the new German Empire.
Such, then, was the man who in 1880 joined the ranks of the London publishers. He was at that time sixty years old but still full of energy, and he gave great personal attention to his business, though, as already mentioned, he had the assistance of two sons. He had been twice married, and of a numerous family four sons and a daughter were then living. The sons whom he had with him were the younger ones, Arthur and Frank Vizetelly;[7] their elder brothers, then abroad, being Edward[8] and Ernest, the present writer, who for convenience proposes to refer to himself by his Christian name throughout this particular narrative.
One of the first ventures of the new business, a series of sketches of English society, entitled "The Social Zoo," and published in parts, was badly launched and dropped before completion, but some sections of it, by E. C. Grenville-Murray, attracted great attention and sold widely on being reissued in volume form. Sala's "Paris Herself Again" and other books were also very successful, but when Vizetelly—who by reason of his long residence in Paris took great interest in French literature—produced a series of cheap translations of works of high repute in France—novels and tales by Daudet, Theuriet, About, Malot, Cherbuliez, George Sand, Mérimée, and others—there was little or no demand for them, though a large amount of money was spent in advertisements. Indeed it soon appeared that if French fiction was to be offered to English readers at all it must at least be sensational; and Vizetelly therefore started a cheap series of Gaboriau's detective stories, which found a large and immediate market. The business gradually expanded, and before long, in addition to miscellaneous works by Sala, Grenville-Murray, and others, the firm took up English fiction in a new form.