John Tenniel, although he began to work much earlier, and is still an active contemporary, may be considered as belonging especially to the sixties, wherein he represents the survival of an academic type in sharply accentuated distinction to the pre-Raphaelism of one group or to the romantic naturalism of a still larger section. On page 4 of vol. i. we find his first drawing, a vignette, and page 5 a design, Audun and the White Bear, no less typically 'a Tenniel' in every particular than is the current cartoon in Punch. Those on pages 21, 30, 60, 90, 101, 103, and 170 are all relatively unimportant. The King of Thule (p. 250) is an illustration to Sir Theodore Martin's familiar translation of Goethe's poems. Others are on pp. 285, 435, 446. To vol. ii. he is a less frequent contributor. The designs, pp. 39, 98, 99, and 103 call for no comment. The one on p. 444 (not p. 404 as the index has it), to Tom Taylor's ballad Noménoë, is reprinted in Songs and Ballads of Brittany (Macmillan, 1865). In vol. iii. there is one (p. 52) of small value. On pp. 533, 561, 589, 617, 645, 673, and 701 are pictures to Shirley Brooks's The Silver Cord, showing the artist in his less familiar aspect as an illustrator of fiction. The one on p. 589 is irresistibly like a 'Wonderland' picture, while that on p. 225 (vol. iv.) suggests a Punch cartoon; but, on the whole, they are curiously free from undue mannerism in the types they depict. In vol. iv. are more illustrations to The Silver Cord (pp. 1, 29, 57, 85, 113, 141, 169, 197, 225, 253, 281, 309, 337, 365, 393, 421, 449, 477, 505, 533, 561, 589, 617, 645, 673, and 701), and illustrations to Owen Meredith's poem, Fair Rosamund (pp. 294, 295). In volume v. The Silver Cord is continued with ten more designs (pp. 1, 29, 57, 85, 113, 141, 169, 197, 225, 253), and there is one to Mark Bozzari (p. 659), translated from Müller by Sir Theodore Martin.
In volume vi. Tenniel appears but four times: At Crutchley Prior (p. 267), The Fairies (p. 379), a very delicate fancy, Prince Lulu (p. 490), and Made to Order (p. 575). From the seventh and eighth volumes he is absent, and reappears in the ninth with only one drawing, Clytè (p. 154), and in the tenth (Dec. 1863-June 1864) with one, Bacchus and the Water Thieves (p. 658). Nor does he appear again in this magazine until 1867, with Lord Aythan, the frontispiece to vol. iii. of the New Series. Sir John Tenniel, however, more than any other of the Punch staff, seems never thoroughly at home outside its pages. The very idea of a Tenniel drawing has become a synonym for a political cartoon; so that now you cannot avoid feeling that all his illustrations to poetry, fiction, and fairy-tale must have some satirical motive underlying their apparent purpose.
J. E. MILLAIS
'ONCE A WEEK'
VOL. I. p. 241
GRANDMOTHER'S
APOLOGY
J. E. MILLAIS
'ONCE A WEEK'
VOL. I. p. 316
THE PLAGUE OF
ELLIANT