This reminds me of an early caricature of my own. It was drawn on paper with a flaw which the lithographer took for a wart; and in an excess of zeal the lithographer copied it minutely as such. The subject, whom I had drawn from memory, came to ask me for an explanation, saying, "My dear fellow, I may have other blemishes; but really I have not a wart!" I was obliged to explain that the flaw in the paper upon which I drew the original had only shown it in one light.
In the earlier days of Vanity Fair I was very often given subjects refused by Pellegrini. Bowles would say to him, "Now I want you to catch So-and-so," and Pellegrini would reply, "I don't like 'im. Send Ward—'e can run after 'im better." Thus it came about that I was sent off to stalk the undesirable subject because I was younger, and I was obliged of course to comply with the demands of the paper and pursue Pellegrini's uncaricaturable subjects. As an artist, Pellegrini's likes and dislikes were curious. He could find no beauty in a landscape, so he informed me, no matter how well depicted. Whistler's work he adored and Millais' he detested. He was a great personal friend of Whistler's, and, curiously enough, because Pellegrini's work was formerly greatly opposed to Whistler's, he spent a considerable time studying Whistler's method of painting and admiring his work. Pellegrini became so imbued with the great painter and his ideas that he determined to abandon caricature and give his attention to portrait painting. His intention was to outshine Millais, whom he found uncongenial as an artist, and whose work he prophesied would not survive a lifetime's popularity. One of his favourite recreations was to discuss Millais and his success in relation to himself when he had gained fame as a painter. One day, on this subject, after working himself up into his customary excitement, he twisted a piece of paper into a funnel-shaped roll, and said to me:—
"Now Millais' ambitions go in like this"—pointing to the big end, "and become this"—turning up the smaller end. "And mine begin small and go on...." Here he opened his arms as if to embrace the infinite.
J. REDMOND, M.P. 1904.
THE SPEAKER (J. W. LOWTHER, M.P.). 1906.
BONAR LAW, M.P. 1905.
When Pellegrini partially abandoned caricature and took up portraiture he attempted to become a master of painting too soon, and, inspired by Whistler's facility, imagined that it would be easy to overcome very quickly the difficulties of a lifetime. Occasionally, of course, he succeeded legitimately, as in the case of "Gillie"[3] Farquhar; but, generally speaking, if Pellegrini had a sitter who was an admirable subject for caricature, he was unconsciously liable to put what he saw into his portrait. His successes were great; he was undoubtedly—when he had a "sympathetic" subject, a genius in caricature. That pleasure, or sympathy, is one of the main elements in the success of a caricaturist. Just as a subject may offer great temperamental difficulties, so it frequently happens that—for some inexplicable reason—he will at once afford an opening which a practised caricaturist will know immediately how to turn to account. It is this element of chance which lends a charming uncertainty to the caricaturist's art; and it is this element also which explains in many cases the strange success or failure of an impression, the apparent fluctuations of an artist's talent in preserving a likeness or translating a personality into terms of comedy. Thus it often happened that I was fortunate in my own choice of a man, and thus, on the other hand, that when I was sent off in a hurry to seize the peculiarities of a man, I found he required a great deal of study, and so was obliged to leave out the caricature and put as many characteristics in as I could.