The chance of securing as many of these characteristic designs as was in our power directed the selection of books which came into our possession in consequence of the sale of Thackeray's library; it was found they were richer in these clever pencillings than had been anticipated.
An impulse thus given, the excitement of increasing the little gathering was carried further; many volumes which had been dispersed were traced, or were offered spontaneously when the fact of the collection became known. From books wherein, pencil in hand, passages had been noted with sprightly little vignettes, not unlike the telling etchings which the author of 'Vanity Fair' caused to be inserted in his own published works, we became desirous of following the evidence of this faculty through other channels; seeing we held the Alpha, as it were, inserted in the Charterhouse School books, and the later pencillings, which might enliven any work of the hour indifferently, as it excited the imagination, grotesque or artist-like, as the case might be, of the original reader, whether the book happened to be a modest magazine in paper or an édition de luxe in morocco.
A demand created, the supply, though of necessity limited, was for a time forthcoming. The energy, which fosters a mania for collecting, was aided by one of those unlooked-for chances which sustain such pursuits, and, from such congenial sources as the early companions of the author, sufficient material came into our possession to enable us to trace Thackeray's graphic ambition throughout his career with an approach to consistency, following his efforts in this direction through his school days, in boyish diversions, and among early favourites of fiction; as an undergraduate of Cambridge; on trips to Paris; as a student at Weimar and about Germany; through magazines, to Paris, studying in the Louvre; to Rome, dwelling among artists; through his contributions to 'Fraser's,' and that costly abortive newspaper speculation the 'Constitutional;' through the slashing Bohemian days, to the period of 'Vanity Fair;' through successes, repeated and sustained—Lectures and Essays; through travels at home and abroad—to America, from Cornhill to Grand Cairo, to Scotland, to Ireland, 'Up the Rhine,' Switzerland, Italy, Belgium, Holland, and wherever Roundabout 'sketches by the way' might present themselves.
The study which had attracted an individual, elicited the sympathy of a larger circle. The many who preserve mementos similar to those dispersed through 'Thackerayana' enlarged on the general interest of the materials, and especially upon the gratification which that part of the public representing Thackeray's admirers would discover in such original memorials of our eminent novelist; and which, from the nature of his gifts, and the almost unique propensity for their exercise, would be impossible in the case of almost any other man of kindred genius.
Selections from the sketches were accordingly produced in facsimile, only such subjects being used as, from their relation to the context, derived sufficient coherence to be generally appreciable.
The writer is aware that many such memorials exist, some of them unquestionably of greater worth in themselves than several that are found in the present gathering; but it is not probable, either from their private nature, the circumstances of their ownership, or from the fact that, in their isolated condition, they do not illustrate any particular stage of their author's progress, that the public will ever become familiar with them.
'Thackerayana' is issued with a sense of imperfections; many more finished or pretentious drawings might have been offered, but the illustrations have been culled with a sense of their fitness to the subject in view. It is the intention to present Thackeray in the aspect his ambition preferred—as a sketcher; his pencil and pen bequeath us matter to follow his career; we recognise that delightful gift, a facility for making rapid little pictures on the inspiration of the moment; it is an endless source of pleasure to the person who may exercise this faculty, and treasures up the most abundant and life-like reminiscences for the delectation of others. It will be understood as no implied disparagement of more laboured masterpieces if we observe that the composition of historical works, the conception and execution of chefs-d'œuvre, are grave, lengthy, and systematic operations, not to be lightly intruded on; they involve much time and preparation, many essays, failures, alterations, corrections, much grouping of accessories, posing of models, and setting of lay-figures; they become oppressive after a time, and demand a strain of absorption to accomplish, and an effort of mind to appreciate, which are not to be daily exerted; long intervals are required to recruit after such labours; but the bright, ready croquis of the instant, if not profound, embalms the life that is passing and incessant; the incident too fleeting to be preserved on the canvas, or in a more ambitious walk of the art, lives in the little sketch-book; it is grateful to the hand which jots it down, and has the agreeable result of being able to extend that pleasure to all who may glance therein. If it was one of Thackeray's few fanciful griefs that he was not destined for a painter of the grand order, it doubtless consoled him to find that the happier gift of embodying that abstract creation—an idea—in a few strokes of the pencil was his beyond all question; and this graceful faculty he was accustomed to exercise so industriously, that myriads of examples survive of the originality of his invention as an artist, in addition to the brilliant fancy and sterling truth to be found in his works as an author.
