'"I have it!" said Bannister. "You must fancy a skin-and-bone hero, a pedantic old prig, in a shovel-hat, with a pony, sketching-stools, and rattletraps, and place him in such scrapes as travellers frequently meet with—hedge alehouses, second and third rate inns, thieves, gibbets, mad bulls, and the like. Come!" he proceeded, warming with the subject, "give us a sheet of paper, and we'll strike out a few hints." The paper was produced, Bannister gave his ideas, Rowlandson adopted them, Combe explained them in a well-written poem; and to this conversation and to the lively invention of Bannister the public is indebted for a highly favoured publication, The Tour of Doctor Syntax.'

It is by no means improbable that Bannister's suggestion had something to do with the eccentric personality of the hero of the Picturesque Tours; but the author of the Memoir of John Bannister assumes too much when he records that the ideas for the adventures of Doctor Syntax were struck out at a sitting and in the easy fashion he has described; it is known that the original designs were furnished at the rate of three a month, and that their invention was spread over the entire period of the publication.

The popularity enjoyed by this Tour was manifested in the number of editions sold; it was further pirated and imitated in various forms. A German edition was published in Berlin in 1822; the poem was translated under the title of Die Reise des Doktor Syntax um das Malerische aufzusuchen. Ein Gedicht frei aus dem Englischen ins Deutsche übertragen. Lithogr. v. F. E. Rademacher. The illustrations were copied in outline on stone, either with a fine point or a pen; the lines are wire-like and give neither fullness nor effect; the pictures are also coloured in a feeble and powerless style, and the whole is a very poor rendering, as far as the artist's work is concerned.

A French edition, freely translated by M. Gandais, appeared in Paris, with twenty-six engravings—rendered with considerable ability by Malapeau (lith. de G. Engelmann)—drawn on stone with care and spirit in lithographic chalk; these illustrations, printed in a warm tint, and coloured by hand, will compare fairly with even Rowlandson's original etchings. We give the title of this edition:—Le Don Quichotte Romantique, ou Voyage du Docteur Syntaxe à la recherche du Pittoresque et du Romantique; Poême en XX chants, traduit librement de l'Anglais par M. Gandais, et orné de 26 gravures par Malapeau. À Paris chez l'auteur, rue du Faubourg Saint Denis 45, et Pélicier libraire, cour du Palais Royal. 1821. The author's advertisement, as written by Combe, is carefully and literally rendered, and the translator has added a slight avertissement of his own, briefly alluding to the reputation enjoyed in England by the original engravings and the descriptive verses which accompany them, and setting forth the circumstances of his own version, &c.

Numerous imitations, less legitimate than the foreign translations alluded to, also appeared in this country, such as The Tour of Doctor Syntax through London; Doctor Syntax in Paris, in Search of the Grotesque; Doctor Prosody; Sentimental Tour through Margate and Hastings by Doctor Comparative, Junr.; and Doctor Syntax's Life of Napoleon, which is possibly due to Combe's pen, and derives a strong additional interest from the illustrations, which are fair examples of George Cruikshank's handiwork. A parody, in verse, entitled The Adventures of Doctor Comicus, by a modern Syntax, was also issued, with coloured imitations of Rowlandson's designs.

The success which had attended the first Tour of Doctor Syntax was so flattering and remunerative that the publisher and his able collaborateurs, the artist and author, projected a second series, entitled Doctor Syntax in Search of Consolation—for the loss of that termagant spouse who figures in the original Tour, and is decently buried, in the first cantos of the new adventures, to give the hero a fitting cause for pursuing his eccentric travels. The renewal of Dr. Syntax's journeys, which appeared in monthly parts, was completed in 1820, when it was republished by Mr. Ackermann, uniform with the first volume; it was less successful than its predecessor, but it ran through several editions.

The plates, which were contributed by Rowlandson, much on his old principle, were as follows:—

A third and final Tour, ending with the hero's funeral, concludes the poem. The last volume, which had appeared, like its predecessors, in monthly parts, was put forth in its collected form in 1821; and, similar to the first and second series, with which it was afterwards re-issued, it received sufficient patronage to carry it through several editions, although neither the Second nor Third Tours were reckoned so successful as the original series.

The Third Tour of Doctor Syntax—in Search of a Wife appeared with the following 'Preface,' from the pen of the veteran Combe, who, for his private reasons, preferred to continue anonymous throughout.