WILL O' THE WISP
This, another periodical of the same class, started on September 12, 1868, but unlike its fellows relied at first solely upon a double-page political cartoon. From the second number these were contributed by J. Proctor until and after April 17, 1869, when other pictures were admitted. With the 31st of July another hand replaces Proctor's vigorous work. The volume for 1870 contains many woodcuts (I use the word advisedly), unintentionally primitive, that should please a certain school to-day. Whether the journal ceased with its fourth volume, or lasted into the seventies, the British Museum catalogue does not record, nor is it worth while to pursue the inquiry further.
THE ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS
To notice this important paper in a paragraph is little better than an insult, and yet between a full monograph (already anticipated partially in Mr. Mason Jackson's The Pictorial Press) and a bare mention there is no middle course. As a rule the drawings are unsigned, and not attributed to the artists in the index.
The Christmas numbers, however, often adopt a different method, and print the draughtsman's name below each engraving, which is almost always a full page. In that for 1865 we find Alfred Hunt, George Thomas, S. Read, and John Gilbert, all regular contributors, well represented. In the Christmas number of 1866 there is Boyd Houghton's Child's Christmas Carol, and other drawings by Corbould, S. Read, J. A. Pasquier, Charles Green, Matt Morgan, and C. H. Bennett.
OTHER ILLUSTRATED WEEKLIES
The Illustrated Times, first issued in October 1855, maintained a long and honourable effort to achieve popularity. A new series was started in 1867, but apparently also failed to gain a footing. The artists included many men mentioned frequently in this volume. The non-topical illustrations occasionally introduced were supplied chiefly by M. E. Edwards, Adelaide and Florence Claxton, Lieut. Seccombe, P. Skelton, and T. Sulman. Yet a search through its pages revealed nothing sufficiently important to notice in detail.
The Illustrated Weekly News and The Penny Illustrated Weekly News are other lost causes, but the Penny Illustrated Paper, which started in 1861, is still a flourishing concern; yet it would be superfluous to give a detailed notice of its work. Pan (date uncertain[5]), a short-lived sixpenny weekly. Its cover was from a design by Jules Chéret. Facsimiles of A Head by Lord Leighton, and Proud Maisie by Frederick Sandys, appeared among its supplements.
THE GRAPHIC
That this admirably conducted illustrated weekly revolutionised English illustration is granted on all sides. Its influence for good or ill was enormous. With its first number, published on December 4, 1869, we find a definite, official date to close the record of the 'sixties'; one by mere chance, chronologically as well as technically, appropriate. Of course the break was not so sudden as this arbitrary limit might suggest. The style which distinguished the Graphic had been gradually prepared before, and if Mr. William Small is credited with the greatest share in its development, such a statement, incomplete as most generalities must needs be, holds a good part of the truth, if not the whole. The work of Mr. Small introduced new qualities into wood-engraving; which, in his hands and those of the best of his followers, grew to be meritorious, and must needs place him with those who legitimately extended the domain of the art of drawing for the engraver. But to discuss the style which succeeded that of the sixties would be to trespass on new ground, and that while the field itself is all too scantily searched. Mr. Ruskin dubbed the new style 'blottesque,' but, as we have seen, he was hardly more enamoured of the manner that immediately preceded it.