{4}

“I own to a very enjoyable pride in making the first editions of my books valuable to their possessors, who found out, before other people, that these writings and drawings were good for something . . . and the two lovely engravings by Messrs. Cuff and Armytage will, I hope, render the old volume more or less classical among collectors.” From this we gather that “the Professor” was of the right kidney.

It is hardly necessary to say that it is not my intention to make this book a devil’s directory to illus­tra­tions which have been suppressed because of indecency, and are referred to in the catalogues of second-hand booksellers, whose cupidity is stronger than their self-respect, as “facetiæ” or “very curious.” Indeed, this book would itself in that case also very properly be put on the index expurgatorius of every decent person. My purpose is to gather together, correct and amplify the floating details concerning a legitimate class of rarities, and to put the collector on his guard, where necessary, against imposition.

By its very nature this treatise cannot be complete, but I have included most of the {5} examples of any importance which, during many years of bibliomania, have come under my observation. To these I have added certain re-engraved or palimpsest plates, which are germane to the subject.

As to these last I find amongst my papers a curious note from the pen of R. H. Cromek, the engraver, who flourished at the end of the eighteenth century.

“One of these vendors,” he writes (publishers of Family Bibles), “lately called to consult me professionally about an engraving he brought with him. It represented Mons. Buffon seated, contemplating various groups of animals surrounding him. He merely wished, he said, to be informed whether, by engaging my services to unclothe the naturalist, and giving him a rather more resolute look, the plate could not, at a trifling expense, be made to do duty for ‘Daniel in the lions’ den’”!

That would be a palimpsest well worth possessing, if ever it were carried into effect. It would be as fascinating an object of contemplation as the Stothard designs for Clarissa Harlowe, {6} which the same authority informs us were later used to il­lus­trate the Scriptures! But the history of the cliché, pure and simple, has yet to be written. Our concern is with higher game than that.

CHAPTER II “THE MARQUIS OF STEYNE”

PERHAPS the most celebrated of sup­pressed book il­lus­tra­tions is the wood-engraved por­trait of the “Marquis of Steyne,” drawn by Thackeray as an illus­tra­tion to Vanity Fair, for which, if we are to believe the state­ment of a well-known book­seller’s cat­a­logue, “libel­lous pro­ceed­ings (sic) were threatened on account of its strik­ing like­ness to a mem­ber of the aris­to­cracy.” With the accuracy of this state­ment I shall deal in due course.

Before, however, proceeding to the con­sid­er­ation of the suppressed illus­tra­tion itself, it will be as well to pause for a moment to consider what antecedent probability there was that Thackeray would pillory a well-known roué of the period in terms that would make the likeness undoubted and undeniable. And in pointing out what the great {8} novelist’s practice was in this respect I would guard myself against the charge of presuming to censure one who is not here to answer for himself, and whose nobility of character was sufficient guarantee of good faith and honourable intention. Let it always be remembered that, if Thackeray flagellated others, he never hesitated to taste the quality of his own whip first. Even in his book illus­tra­tions, as I have pointed out elsewhere, he was as unsparing of his own feelings as he was in his writings. And, in using himself as a whipping-boy for our sins, he probably believed that he was making himself as despicable as a Rousseau. Hence he came to the like treatment of other real personages not with unclean hands.