Mr. Drake's plan was this. If an artist brought a drawing to him in which there were any signs of individuality, intelligence, or striving after untried effects, his endeavour was to use that drawing, at any rate as an experiment, and to encourage the artist to go on and make others; not to say to the artist, "the public won't stand this, and our clientèle won't know what you mean." But then Mr. Drake was a trained artist and engraver.[22] Nor did Mr. Drake and Mr. Fraser put down their opinions as those of the public. They did not pretend to be infallible, nor did the literary editors; with the consequence, that the American magazines have gained for themselves the largest circulation among respectable publications. In engraving, too, the engraver was asked to reproduce a drawing, not in the conventional manner, but as faithfully as he could, not only rendering the subject of the drawing, but suggesting its quality, the look of the medium in which it was produced. From this sprang the so-called American school of facsimile wood-engraving, which, until the advent of process, was the favourite cockshy of the literary critic who essayed to write upon the subject of art. Now, however, that he believes American engraving is about to disappear in process—though of course there is not the slightest danger of anything of the sort happening—he is uttering premature wails over its disappearance, which is really not coming to pass at all.
In printing, too, experiments were made from the very beginning with inks and paper and press-work. And though stiff glazed paper has been the outcome of these experiments, it is used simply because upon no other sort of paper can such good results be obtained. If some of the people who raise such a wail about this paper would only produce something better, I am sure they would be well rewarded for their pains, because all the great magazines would at once adopt it.
Another reason for the success and advancement of American illustrators is because the publishers of the great magazines, like "The Century," "Harper's," "Scribner's," have had the sense to see that if you want to get good work out of a man you have to pay him for it and encourage him to do it, then reproduce, and print it in a proper fashion. Naturally, the artists have taken a personal pride in the success of the magazines with which they have been connected; in certain cases, greater probably than the proprietors themselves ever realized. They have worked with engravers; they have mastered the mysteries of process and of printing; various engravers and printers have also worked with the artist, and in many cases there has been a truer system of genuine craftsmanship than existed in the everlastingly belauded guilds of the Middle Ages.
BY WALTER SHIRLAW. FROM “THE CENTURY MAGAZINE.”
Within the last few years a new spirit has, to a certain extent, entered into American publishing, and there have cropped up magazines which, apparently, have for their aim the furnishing to their readers of the greatest amount of the cheapest material at the lowest possible price. Syndicate stories and photographic clichés struggle with bad printing, and possibly appeal to the multitude. However, these cheap and nasty journals will probably struggle among themselves to their own discomfiture, without producing lasting effect, unless the conductors of the better class of magazines choose to lower the tone of their own publications.
The illustrated newspaper has become an enormous factor in America. The "Pall Mall" claims to have been the first illustrated daily, and the "Daily Graphic" is the only complete daily illustrated paper yet in existence in England. "Le Quotidien Illustré" has just been started in Paris. The claim of the "Pall Mall" is without foundation, as the London "Daily Graphic" but follows in the footsteps of the New York "Daily Graphic," which took its name from the London weekly; its illustrations were almost altogether reproduced by lithography. The New York "Graphic" was never a great success. Many American daily newspapers print more drawings in a week than the London "Daily Graphic." The chances are that in a very few years the daily will have completely superseded many of the weeklies, and quite a number of the monthly magazines too. It is simply a question of improving the printing press, and this improvement will be made. Anyone who has watched the progress of illustrated journalism during the last ten years can have no doubts upon the subject; and I am almost certain that the very near future will see the advent of daily illustrated magazines of convenient size, which will take the place of the monthly reviews and the ponderous and cumbersome machine we now call a newspaper.
BY HOWARD PYLE. FROM HOLMES’S “ONE HOSS SHAY” (GAY AND BIRD).