Just before this lucky stroke, another not less fortunate as a succes d'estime, if nothing more, was "Punch's Valentines"—at that time considered a most remarkable production; for there were no fewer than twelve half-page engravings within its full-page borders—a generous amount that puzzled the public far more than ten times as much and as good would do to-day. Kenny Meadows, "Phiz,"[6] Leech, Crowquill, Henning, and Newman, contributed each two "valentines," which were addressed to various sorts and conditions of people, accompanied by verses of considerable humour and more than average merit. Thus, to the lawyer—whom "Phiz" has represented as a mixture, in equal parts, of Squeers, Brass, and Quilp—the lines begin in a manner not unworthy of Hood himself:—
"Lend me your ears, thou man of law,
While I my declaration draw,
Your heart in fee surrender;
As plaintiff I my suit prefer,
'Twould be uncivil to demur,
Then let your plea be—tender."
The invocation which follows, to a gorgeous footman, by some love-smitten serving-maid, ends—
"But now fare thee well!—with your ultimate breath,
When you answer the door to the knocking of Death,
On your conscience, believe me, 'twill terribly dwell,
If now you refuse to attend to the belle!"
In August, 1850, in the extra number called "Punch's Holidays," that was done for the outskirts of London which eight years before had been done for the watering-places. It was illustrated by Leech and Doyle, and, it may be added, the Hampton Court section was written by Thackeray. Then when the great Shakespeare Tercentenary was being celebrated, with singularly little éclat so far as the Shakespeare Committee itself was concerned, Punch produced his "Tercentenary Number." It was in all respects admirable, and Tenniel's double-page cartoon was a striking success—as might have been expected from a Staff so remarkably well versed in Shakespeare. In that cartoon the poet's triumphal car, drawn by twin Pegasi and driven by Mr. Punch, is followed by a motley procession, in which Mark Lemon, in the character of John Bull, appears adapted as Prospero (one of the best of the many portraits of the editor that have appeared in the paper), while a typically malignant organ-grinder is Caliban, and all the leading statesmen and sovereigns are represented in Shakespearian character appropriate to the circumstances; the "Standard" and "Morning Herald," two of Punch's pet aversions and journalistic butts, bringing up the rear as the Witches in "Macbeth," Mesdames Gamp and Harris. The illustrators of this exceptionally happy number were—besides Sir John Tenniel—Charles Keene, Mr. du Maurier, and Mr. Fairfield.
Then came the unwieldy "Records of the Great Exhibition, extracted from Punch" on October 4th, 1851. Punch had made a dead-set against the exhibition in Hyde Park (until his friend Paxton was appointed its architect, subsequently earning £20,000 by the work), and, according to Mr. Justin McCarthy, "was hardly ever weary of making fun of it ... and nothing short of complete success could save it from falling under a mountain of ridicule. The Prince did not despair, however, and the project went on." And when it was a fait accompli, Punch, good man of business that he was, at once put it to the best possible advantage, by issuing his enormous "extra" of nine previously-published cartoons by Tenniel and Leech, and many other cuts besides—the whole, in point of its double-folio size, more suitable for street display than library reading. The price was sixpence, and with all the special matter it contained it was one of the cheapest productions ever issued from that office.
With the special Paris Exhibition number, produced in celebration of the Exhibition of 1889, the list of extra numbers issued by Punch for general circulation comes to a close. Nearly the whole of the Staff, including the proprietors, travelled to Paris together—how luxuriously, Mr. Furniss's drawing of their dining-saloon gives a good notion; it contains (with Sir John Tenniel and Mr. Lucy) portraits of all who were present. Charles Keene had stayed at home; he felt unequal to the jaunt, and was, in fact, sickening for the mortal illness which soon had him in its grip. The "Paris Sketches" in the number that bear his signature were—like the "war correspondence from the front" concocted in Fleet Street—quietly drawn at home down at Chelsea. One thing primarily the number showed: that Punch's national prejudices have mellowed with time, and that a Frenchman may be accepted as a cultivated gentleman and a genial companion—a very different being to him whom Leech habitually drew as a flabby-faced refugee in Leicester Square, "with estaminet clearly written across his features," while Thackeray applauded the conception in his most righteous hatred and contempt for all things vile.
Two other special means has Punch adopted with the view of pleasing his constituents and confounding his enemies, exclusive of the mock Mulready envelope known as the "Anti-Graham Envelope" and the "Wafers," which are elsewhere referred to. The first of these was the music occasionally printed in his pages from the hand of his own particular maestro, Tully, the well-known member of the Punch Club, whose musical setting of "The Queen's Speech, as it is to be sung by the Lord Chancellor," appeared in 1843; the polka, at the time when that dance was a novel and a national craze, dedicated to the well-known dancing-master, Baron Nathan; "Punch's Mazurka," in Vol. VIII. (1845); and one or two other pieces besides. The other was a coloured picture representing a "plate"—a satire on the poor and inartistic "coloured plates" then being issued by S. C. Hall's "Art Union." It was a clever lithographic copy of an ordinary "willow pattern" plate; a homely piece of crockery, broken and riveted, beneath which is inscribed: "To the Subscribers to the Art Union this beautiful plate (from the original in the possession of the Artist) is presented, as the finest specimen of British Art, by Punch." It was designed by Horace Mayhew; but the edition was extremely limited—not a hundred copies, it is understood—on account of the expense, which it was thought was not justified by the excellence or the likely popularity of the joke.
Such have been some of Punch's efforts outside the usual routine, and the result has been the continual popularisation of the paper. Volume after volume, too, in various forms, has been republished, culminating in the "Victorian Era," "Pictures from Punch," and "Sir John Tenniel's Cartoons;" and each one has but served to attract the favourable notice of the public to the ordinary issue. So Punch has developed his power and his resources. To him one might almost apply what a Welshman said of his friend: "I knew him when he wass a ferry poor man—quite a poor man walking about in the village; and now he drives in his carriage and twice!"