In 1875 H. Allingham supplies most graceful pictures to Miss Angel. Du Maurier is the artist chosen for another Hardy novel, The Hand of Ethelberta. A. Hopkins illustrates Mr. Henley's wonderful achievement, Hospital Outlines, as the poems were called when they appeared in July 1875. From this date to the last number of the shilling series, June 1883, the artists are limited to Small and Du Maurier for the most part, and as this record has already exceeded its limits, no more need be said, except that until the last, the high standard of technical excellence was never abandoned. Although the rare mastery of Millais and the charm of Walker were hardly approached by their successors, yet the magazine was always representative of the best work of those of its contemporaries who devoted themselves to black and white, and not infrequently, as this notice shows, attracted men who have made few, if any other, attempts to draw for publication. It is curious to find that, notwithstanding the evident importance it attached to its pictorial department, no artist's name is ever mentioned in the index or elsewhere. In a graceful and discriminative essay 'S. C.' speaks feelingly and appreciatively of Fred Walker just after his death; but that seems to be the only time when the anonymity imposed on the artists was divulged in the magazine itself. It is but fair to add that the literary contents were never signed, or attributed in the index, except that a few articles bear the now familiar initials, 'L. S.', 'W. E. H.', 'R. L. S.', 'G. A.', and others.
GOOD WORDS
This popular, semi-religious, sixpenny magazine, established in 1860, achieved quickly a circulation that was record-breaking in its time. Edited by Dr. Norman Macleod, it was printed by Thomas Constable, and published (at first) in Edinburgh by Alexander Strahan and Co. Although, viewed in the light of its later issues, one cannot help feeling disappointed with the first volume, yet even there the pictures are distinctly interesting as a forecast, even if they do not call for any detailed notice by reason of their intrinsic merit. They rarely exceed a half page in size, and were engraved none too well by various craftsmen. Indeed, judging from the names of the artists, then as afterwards, given fully in the index of illustrations, it might not be unfair to blame the engravers still more strongly. The very fact that the illustrations are duly ascribed in a separate list is proof that, from the first, the editor recognised their importance. Such honourable recognition of the personality of an illustrator is by no means the rule, even in periodicals that have equal right to be proud of their collaborators. Where the artists' names are recorded it is rare to find them acknowledged so fully and thoroughly as in Good Words. In other magazines they are usually referred to under the title of the article they illustrate and nowhere else; or their name is printed (as in Once a Week) with a bare list of numerals showing the pages containing their pictures; but in Good Words the subject, titles, and artists' names have always been accorded a special index.
G. DU MAURIER
'GOOD WORDS'
1861, p. 579
A TIME TO
DANCE
In the first volume, for 1860, W. Q. Orchardson—not then even an Associate of the Royal Academy—supplies nine drawings, engraved by F. Borders. Admirable in their own way, one cannot but feel that the signature leads one to expect something much more interesting; and, knowing the quality of Mr. Orchardson's later work, it is impossible to avoid throwing the blame on the engraver. Keeley Halswelle contributes six; in these you find (badly drawn or spoilt by the engraver) those water-lilies in blossom, which in after years became a mannerism in his landscape foregrounds. J. W. M'Whirter has four—one a group of Autumn Flowers (p. 664), cut by R. Paterson, that deserves especial notice as a much more elaborate piece of engraving than any other in the volume. Erskine Nicol supplies two genre pieces, the full-page, Mary Macdonell and her friends (p. 216), being, most probably, a thoroughly good sketch, but here again the translator has produced hard scratchy lines that fail to suggest the freer play of pencil or pen, whichever it was that produced the original. Others by 'J. B.,' J. O. Brown, C. A. Doyle, Clarence Dobell, Jas. Drummond, Clark Stanton, Gourlay Steell, and Hughes Taylor, call for no particular comment.
From 1861 the chief full-page illustrations were printed separately on toned paper. A series of animal subjects by 'J. B.,' twelve 'Illustrations of Scripture,' engraved by Dalziel Brothers, were announced in the prospectus as a special feature. Somewhat pre-Raphaelite in handling they are distinctly interesting, but hardly masterly. But the volume will be always memorable for its early work by Frederick Walker and G. Du Maurier. A Time to Dance, by the latter, shows a certain decorative element, which in various ways has influenced his work at different periods, although no one could have deduced from it the future career of its brilliant author as a satirist of society, a draughtsman who imparted into his work, to a degree no English artist has surpassed, and very few equalled, that 'good form' so prized by well-bred people. The drawing unsigned The Blind School (p. 505), attributed to Fred Walker in the index, suggests some clerical error. Like one attributed to Sandys in a later volume, you hesitate before accepting evidence of the compiler of the list of engravings, which the picture itself contradicts flatly. Only a Sweep (p. 609) is signed, and, although by no means a good example, is unquestionably attributed rightly. John Pettie has two designs, Cain's Brand (pp. 376, 422); J. M'Whirter and W. Q. Orchardson, one each; H. H. Armstead, a pre-Raphaelite composition, A Song which none but the Redeemed ever sing, which is amongst the most interesting of the comparatively few illustrations by the Royal Academician, who is better known as a sculptor, as his Music, Poetry, and Painting in the Albert Memorial, the panels beneath Dyce's frescoes at Westminster Palace, and a long series of works shown at the Academy exhibitions suffice to prove. T. Morten, a draughtsman who has missed so far his due share of appreciation, is represented by The Waker, Dreamer, and Sleeper (p. 634), a powerful composition of a group of men praying at night by the side of a breaking dyke. John Pettie has two drawings; and J. D. Watson, six subjects—the first, The Toad, being singularly unlike his later style, and suggesting a closer discipleship with the pre-Raphaelites than he maintained afterwards. Two by Clarence Dobell, and three by T. Graham—one, The Young Mother, a charming arrangement in lines; with others by J. Wolf, Zwecker, W. M'Taggart, J. L. Porter, A. W. Cooper, A. Bushnell, W. Fyfe, W. Linney, and C. H. Bennett, are also included. Altogether the second volume shows marked advance upon the first, although this admirable periodical had not yet reached its high-water mark.
In 1862 we find added to its list of artists, Millais, Keene, Sandys, Whistler, Holman Hunt, E. Burne-Jones, A. Boyd Houghton, Tenniel, S. Solomon, and Lawless, a notable group, even in that year when so many magazines show a marvellous 'galaxy of stars.' To Millais fell the twelve illustrations to Mistress and Maid, by the author of John Halifax, and two others, Olaf (p. 25) and Highland Flora (p. 393). That these maintain fully the reputation of the great illustrator, whose later achievements in oil have in popular estimation eclipsed his importance as a black-and-white artist, goes without saying. If not equal to the superb Parables of the following year, they are worthy of their author. Indeed, no matter when you come across a Millais, it is with a fresh surprise each time that one finds it rarely falls below a singularly high level, and is apt to seem, for the moment, the best he ever did.