REV. EDWARD BRADLEY ("CUTHBERT BEDE").
(From a Photograph by A. J. Hancock.)
To the encouragement of Mark Lemon, Cuthbert Bede owed a good deal, in respect to both pen and pencil, and in the warmth of his geniality the sketches for "Verdant Green" were made, and, says the author, more than forty of them were engraved for Punch's pages, to appear a page each week.[58] But circumstances caused Mark Lemon, with Cuthbert Bede's consent, to transfer them to a special Supplement at that time being prepared by Punch's Editor for the "Illustrated London News"—a journal which then enjoyed the co-operation of all the best pens and pencils more closely identified with the Sage of Fleet Street.
Then in 1850 the MS. of "Verdant Green" went the round of the publishers for issue in book-form, and not till after a year's tour was it accepted, and reluctantly enough issued, the publisher vowing that it would not pay its expenses. But within four-and-twenty hours he found out his mistake, and the announcement was made thirty years afterwards, that the sale of the book had amounted to upwards of 170,000 copies—while the author, from first to last, received the splendid sum of £350 for a work which must be reckoned among the great popular successes of the century.
When Douglas Jerrold was at Oxford, in November, 1854, Cuthbert Bede was presented to the sharp-tongued wit, the introducer adding, by way of explanation, "Mr. Verdant Green." "At that time," says Bede, "I was closely shaven, and had a very pale face. Douglas Jerrold looked sharply up at me, with a glitter in his blue eyes, and at once said, 'Mr. Verdant Green? I should have thought it was Mr. Blanco White!'"—though, of course, there was no more real resemblance between Blanco White's face and that of the Rev. Bradley's, than there was between "Mr. Verdant Green" and "Doblado's Letters from Spain." "Among several things that were very agreeable to me in connection with the publication of 'Verdant Green,'" he continues, "was a circumstance that was related to me by an eminent Oxford don, who is now a bishop. He had entered the room of Dr. Pusey, at Christ Church, and saw, as usual, the library table covered with books of divinity and learned tomes; but on the top of these was perched, in pert, cock-sparrow fashion, that shilling railway book that had recently been published, with the spectacled face of the Oxford Freshman on the cover. My friend told me that Dr. Pusey held up the book to him and said, that he had not only read it through, but that he kept it on his table so that he might read bits of it in the pauses of his severer study."
One of Cuthbert Bede's proudest memories was the introduction of the double acrostic. He did not claim to have invented it, for he knew of the monkish acrostics; but for six months he had amused his friends with his revival before he showed them to Mark Lemon. The latter, with a quick eye for novelty, asked Bradley to write a paper on them for the "Illustrated London News," which was then being edited by Dr. Charles Mackay, and the humorist was only too happy to comply with the request. The first of these "double acrostic charades"—the first ever printed—appeared in the paper on August 30, 1856, and at intervals for some months afterwards; indeed, there was a regular column devoted to them, edited by Cuthbert Bede, that drew letters from all parts of the world, literally in thousands, which were forwarded to him in packets by rail. He had to explain their construction, and give examples for practice in the art.
The first was "Charles Dickens—Pickwick Papers"; then followed "London—Thames," "Waterloo—Napoleon," "Scutari Hospital—Miss Nightingale," and then "Lemon—Punch." Here is how the last-named was treated:—
The Letters (5).
| I brighten even the brightest scene | (L am P) |
| I very nearly an ostrich had been | (E m U) |
| I with a hood once pass'd all my days | (M aria N) |
| I am a fop in a play of all plays | (O sri C) |
| To its greatness the city of Bath I did raise | (N as H) |
The Words.
I'm a Mark of judgment, of taste, and wit,
O'er a crowd of pages I rule the roast;
I mix with choice spirits, while choicer ones sit
Around, while I give them full many a toast.
Of my two words, my first is squeez'd into my second,
Although at its head it is commonly reckoned.