CHAPTER VI.
Constant Attempts at Illustrated News—Increase of Caricatures—The Postman, 1704—Fiery Apparition in the Air, seen in London—Caricature against the Jacobites—The South-Sea Bubble—Eclipse of the Sun, 1724—The Grub Street Journal an Illustrated Paper—The Daily Post—Admiral Vernon’s Attack on Porto Bello—The Penny London Post—Henry Fielding and the Jacobite’s Journal—Owen’s Weekly Chronicle—Lloyd’s Evening Post, and the Trial of Lord Byron for the Murder of Mr. Chaworth—The St. James’s Chronicle—Illustrated Account of a Strange Wild Beast seen in France—The Gentleman’s Journal of Anthony Motteux—The Gentleman’s Magazine of Edward Cave—The London Magazine—The Scot’s Magazine.
In glancing at the early newspapers it is apparent that the idea, in some shape, of illustrating the news of the day was never quite absent from the minds of newspaper conductors. Sometimes it took the form of a rude map of the country where some war was going on, or the plan of some city which was being besieged. In the London Post for July 25, 1701, is a map of the seat of war in Italy, which is reprinted in other numbers, and the Daily Courant, for Sept. 8, 1709, contains a large plan of Mons. In the absence of other means, even printers’ lines were used to represent a plan of some place, or an event of unusual interest. Such an attempt at illustrated news was made in the Dublin Journal for May 14, 1746, where there is a plan, set up in type and printers’ lines, of the battle of Culloden; and in the number for March 28, 1747, there is a similar plan of the trial of Lord Lovat. This is doubly interesting as being Irish. Engraving on copper, though it involved the expense of a double printing, was sometimes resorted to for the purpose of enlivening the pages of the early newspapers, and we have seen that it was also employed in broadsides. There was so much enterprise that even penny papers sometimes introduced engravings into their pages.
About the beginning of the eighteenth century caricatures began to increase in England. Religious animosities and political intrigues, always keen incentives to satire, had opened a wide field to the caricaturist in the years which followed the Revolution. But religious bigotry and party spirit, strong as they were at this period, were exceeded by the social follies which came afterwards. The trial of Dr. Sacheverell occasioned the publication of numerous songs, squibs, and caricatures; but the South-Sea Bubble surpassed it as a fruitful source of lampoons and pictorial satire. The spirit of ridicule was fed by the political intrigues, the follies and the vices of the Georgian era, and reached its highest development in the days of George III. Amongst other early channels for circulation we find caricatures making their appearance in newspapers, and as we proceed I shall give one or two examples from the illustrated journalism of this period.
On March 14, 1704, The Postman, one of the papers that was started on the expiration of the censorship (and which Macaulay says was one of the best conducted and most prosperous), published what was called a Postscript for the purpose of making its readers acquainted with a prodigy seen in Spain in the air so far back as the year 1536. It is illustrated with a woodcut representing two men fighting in the air; and the following account is given of it:—‘The success of the expedition of K. Charles III. being now the subject of all Publick Discourses, the Reader, we hope, will excuse the following Postscript, which must be confest to be of an extraordinary nature, as containing some things hardly to be parallelled. All the states of Christendom being concerned some way or other in this great quarrell, it is not to be wondered at if the discovery of a Prodigy, which seems to foretell the decision of it, has made so much noise at Rome, and that we insert it in this place. The French Faction grew intolerably insolent upon account of the storms which have so long retarded the Portuguese expedition, and represented these cross accidents as a manifest declaration that God did not approve the same; and this way of arguing, though never so rash and impertinent in itself, prevailed over the generality of the people, in a City which is the Centre of superstition. The Partizans of the House of Austria were very much dejected and had little to say, when they happily discovered in the Library of the Vatican a Book printed at Bazil in the year 1557 written by Conradus Lycosthenes, wherein they found an argument to confute all the reasons alledged by their adversaries, and a sure Presage in their opinion of the success of K. Charles III. This made a great noise at Rome, and his Grace the Duke of Shrewsbury sent an account thereof. The Book perhaps is not so scarce as they thought at Rome; and the learned Doctor Hans Sloane having one in his Library, and having been so obliging as to give me leave to transcribe that passage, I present it here to the reader, leaving it to everyone to make his own observations. The Book is thus Intituled: “Prodigiorum Ostentorum Chronicon, &c., per Conradum Lycosthenem, Rubeaquensem. Printed in Folio at Bazil per Henricum Petri 1557,” and amongst the infinite number of Prodigies he relates in his collection, which extends from the beginning of the world to his time, he has the following, page 558 (here follows the description on each side of the woodcut in Latin and English). ‘In a certain place of Spain on the 7th of Feby, 1536, 2 hours after the setting of the sun as Fincelius relates it after others, were seen in the Air, which was rainy and cloudy, two Young Men in Armour, fighting with Swords, one of them having in his left hand a Shield or round Buckler, adorned with an Eagle, with this inscription, I SHALL REIGN, and the other having on a long Target with these words, I HAVE REIGNED. They fought a Duel, and he who had the Eagle on his Buckler beat down his enemy and was conqueror.’ The whole affair refers to the war of the Spanish Succession between the partisans of Louis XIV. and the House of Bourbon, and the House of Austria, and is made to foretell the downfall of the former. As the Bourbons did eventually obtain the Crown of Spain, this interpretation of the supposed prodigy may be referred to the same class as the prophecies of Old Moore’s Almanack. I have copied the engraving, which is the only illustration I have found in The Postman.
| PRODIGY SEEN IN SPAIN. FROM THE ‘POSTMAN,’ 1704. |
We have already noticed that no class of marvels were so attractive to the early news-writers as apparitions in the air. Another example of this is found in a pamphlet, published in 1710, entitled ‘The Age of Wonders: or, A further and particular Description of the remarkable, and Fiery Apparition that was seen in the Air, on Thursday in the Morning, being May the 11th, 1710.’ It is illustrated with a rough woodcut, and has the following description:—
.... ‘As for the strange Appearances which were seen on the 11th of May in the Morning, I suppose there is by this time few that do not give Credit to the same, since so many creditable People in several parts of the Town have apparently testified the same, and are ready still to do it upon enquirey, as in Clare Market, Cheapside, Tower-hill, and other places; it was likewise seen by several Market Folks then upon the Water, who have since agreed in Truth thereof, most of which relate in the following manner:—
‘On Wednesday Night, or rather Thursday Morning last, much about the Hour of two a Clock, several People, who were then abroad, especially the Watchman about Tower Street, Clare Market, Cheapside, and Westminster, plainly and visibly saw this strange Comet, it seem’d a very great Star, at the end of which was a long tail, or streak of Fire, very wonderful and surprizing to behold. It did not continue fix’d, but pass’d along with the Scud, or two black Clouds, being carried by a brisk wind that then blew.
| FIERY APPARITION IN THE AIR, SEEN IN LONDON, 1710. |