BY RANDOLPH CALDECOTT. FROM “BRACEBRIDGE HALL” (MACMILLAN, 1877).
While the magazines I have mentioned were being published, the "Graphic" was started in 1870, taking on its staff most of the foremost artists of the day, Fildes, Holl, Gregory, Houghton, Linton, Herkomer, Pinwell, Green, Woods, S. P. Hall; and about the same date Walter Crane made his far too little known designs for children's books—"King Luckieboy's Party," the "Baby's Opera," the "Baby's Bouquet," and the many others—which have been not half enough appreciated. In a measure, the same may be said of Randolph Caldecott's books for children,—the "House that Jack Built," the "Mad Dog," the "John Gilpin," which, though they contain his cleverest drawings, are usually given secondary rank to his "Bracebridge Hall" and "Old Christmas," of far less artistic importance. Miss Kate Greenaway has been more fortunate: her "Under the Window," and the long series that followed, have set the fashion for children, and have enjoyed a popularity of which they are not by any means unworthy. A trifle mannered and affected, perhaps, her illustrations are full of refined drawing, charming colour, and pleasing sentiment. These artists, in conjunction with Mr. Edmund Evans, gave colour-printing for book illustration a standing in England, while every one of their books is stamped with a decided English character. A Frenchman, too, Ernest Griset, living here, made some notable drawings about this time.
BY E. GRISET. FROM HOOD’S “COMIC ANNUAL” (1878).
When I commenced this book I have no hesitation in admitting that my knowledge of the really great period of English Illustration was of the vaguest possible description.
I knew of "Good Words," "Once a Week," and the "Shilling Magazine," "Dalziel's Bible Gallery," and a few other books, but I had never seen and never even heard of the great mass of work produced during those ten years; even now, I am only slowly beginning to learn about and see something of it.
But a day is coming when the books issued between 1860 and 1870, in this country, will be sought for and treasured up, when the few original drawings that are still in existence will be striven for by collectors, as they struggle for Rembrandt's etchings to-day.
The source from which the English illustrators of 1860 got their inspiration was Adolph Menzel's books; pre-Raphaelites and all came under the influence of this great artist. The change from the style of Harvey, Cruikshank, Kenny Meadows, Leech and S. Read, to Rossetti, Sandys, Houghton, Pinwell, Walker, Millais, was almost as great as from the characterless steel engraving of the beginning of the century to the vital work of Bewick. The first English book to appear after Menzel's work became known, was William Allingham's "The Music Master," 1855, illustrated by Arthur Hughes, Rossetti and Millais; the first book of that period which still lives is Moxon's edition of Tennyson published in 1857, containing Rossetti's drawings for "The Palace of Art" and "Sir Galahad"; Millais' "St. Agnes' Eve," and Holman Hunt's "Lady of Shalott." These drawings and a few others have given to the book a fame, among illustrated volumes, which it has no right or claim to.
BY SIR J. E. MILLAIS, BART. WOOD-ENGRAVING BY DALZIEL.
FROM “GOOD WORDS” (ISBISTER AND CO.).