Chapter II: Part 2

Still confining ourselves to the pre-Victorian period, although the works in question were popular several decades later, we find "Sandford and Merton" (first published in 1783, and constantly reprinted), "The Swiss Family Robinson," the beginning of "Peter Parley's Annals," and a vast number of other books with the same pseudonym appended, and a host of didactic works, a large number of which contained pictures of animals and other natural objects, more or less well drawn. But the pictures in these are not of any great consequence, merely reflecting the average taste of the day, and very seldom designed from a child's point of view.

This very inadequate sketch of the books before 1837 is not curtailed for want of material, but because, despite the enormous amount, very few show attempts to please the child; to warn, to exhort, or to educate are their chief aims. Occasionally a Bewick or an artist of real power is met with, but the bulk is not only dull, but of small artistic value. That the artist's name is rarely given must not be taken as a sign that only inept draughtsmen were employed, for in works of real importance up to and even beyond this date we often find his share ignored. After a time the engraver claims to be considered, and by degrees the designer is also recognised; yet for the most part illustration was looked upon merely as "jam" to conceal the pill. The old Puritan conception of art as vanity had something to do with this, no doubt; for adults often demand that their children shall obey a sterner rule of life than that which they accept themselves.

Before passing on, it is as well to summarise this preamble and to discover how far children's books had improved when her Majesty came to the throne. The old woodcut, rough and ill-drawn, had been succeeded by the masterpieces of Bewick, and the respectable if dull achievements of his followers. In the better class of books were excellent designs by artists of some repute fairly well engraved. Colouring by hand, in a primitive fashion, was applied to these prints and to impressions from copperplates. A certain prettiness was the highest aim of most of the latter, and very few were designed only to amuse a child. It seems as if all concerned were bent on unbending themselves, careful to offer grains of truth to young minds with an occasional terrible falsity of their attitude; indeed, its satire and profound analysis make it superfluous to reopen the subject. As one might expect, the literature, "genteel" and dull, naturally desired pictures in the same key. The art of even the better class of children's books was satisfied if it succeeded in being "genteel," or, as Miss Limpenny would say, "cumeelfo." Its ideal reached no higher, and sometimes stopped very far below that modest standard. This is the best (with the few exceptions already noted) one can say of pre-Victorian illustration for children.

If there is one opinion deeply rooted in the minds of the comparatively few Britons who care for art, it is a distrust of "The Cole Gang of South Kensington;" and yet if there be one fact which confronts any student of the present revival of the applied arts, it is that sooner or later you come to its first experiments inspired or actually undertaken by Sir Henry Cole. Under the pseudonym of "Felix Summerley" we find that the originator of a hundred revivals of the applied arts, projected and issued a series of children's books which even to-day are decidedly worth praise. It is the fashion to trace everything to Mr. William Morris, but in illustrations for children as in a hundred others "Felix Summerley" was setting the ball rolling when Morris and the members of the famous firm were schoolboys.

To quote from his own words: "During this period (_i.e._, about 1844), my young children becoming numerous, their wants induced me to publish a rather long series of books, which constituted 'Summerley's Home Treasury,' and I had the great pleasure of obtaining the welcome assistance of some of the first artists of the time in illustrating them--Mulready, R.A., Cope, R.A., Horsley, R.A., Redgrave, R.A., Webster, R.A., Linnell and his three sons, John, James, and William, H. J. Townsend, and others.... The preparation of these books gave me practical knowledge in the technicalities of the arts of type-printing, lithography, copper and steel-plate engraving and printing, and bookbinding in all its varieties in metal, wood, leather, &c."

Copies of the books in question appear to be very rare. It is doubtful if the omnivorous British Museum has swallowed a complete set; certainly at the Art Library of South Kensington Museum, where, if anywhere, we might expect to find Sir Henry Cole completely represented, many gaps occur.

How far Mr. Joseph Cundall, the publisher, should be awarded a share of the credit for the enterprise is not apparent, but his publications and writings, together with the books issued later by Cundall and Addey, are all marked with the new spirit, which so far as one can discover was working in many minds at this time, and manifested itself most conspicuously through the Pre-Raphaelites and their allies. This all took place, it must be remembered, long before 1851. We forget often that if that exhibition has any important place in the art history of Great Britain, it does but prove that much preliminary work had been already accomplished. You cannot exhibit what does not exist; you cannot even call into being "exhibition specimens" at a few months notice, if something of the same sort, worked for ordinary commerce, has not already been in progress for years previously.

Almost every book referred to has been examined anew for the purposes of this article. As a whole they might fail to impress a critic not peculiarly interested in the matter. But if he tries to project himself to the period that produced them, and realises fully the enormous importance of first efforts, he will not estimate grudgingly their intrinsic value, but be inclined to credit them with the good things they never dreamed of, as well as those they tried to realise and often failed to achieve. Here, without any prejudice for or against the South Kensington movement, it is but common justice to record Sir Henry Cole's share in the improvement of children's books; and later on his efforts on behalf of process engraving must also not be forgotten.

To return to the books in question, some extracts from the original prospectus, which speaks of them as "purposed to cultivate the Affections, Fancy, Imagination, and Taste of Children," are worth quotation:

"The character of most children's books published during the last quarter of a century, is fairly typified in the name of Peter Parley, which the writers of some hundreds of them have assumed. The books themselves have been addressed after a narrow fashion, almost entirely to the cultivation of the understanding of children. The many tales sung or said from time to time immemorial, which appealed to the other, and certainly not less important elements of a little child's mind, its fancy, imagination, sympathies, affections, are almost all gone out of memory, and are scarcely to be obtained. 'Little Red Riding Hood,' and other fairy tales hallowed to children's use, are now turned into ribaldry as satires for men; as for the creation of a new fairy tale or touching ballad, such a thing is unheard of. That the influence of all this is hurtful to children, the conductor of this series firmly believes. He has practical experience of it every day in his own family, and he doubts not that there are many others who entertain the same opinions as himself. He purposes at least to give some evidence of his belief, and to produce a series of works, the character of which may be briefly described as anti-Peter Parleyism.

"Some will be new works, some new combinations of old materials, and some reprints carefully cleared of impurities, without deterioration to the points of the story. All will be illustrated, but not after the usual fashion of children's books, in which it seems to be assumed that the lowest kind of art is good enough to give first impressions to a child. In the present series, though the statement may perhaps excite a smile, the illustrations will be selected from the works of Raffaelle, Titian, Hans Holbein, and other old masters. Some of the best modern artists have kindly promised their aid in creating a taste for beauty in little children." Did space permit, a selection from the reviews of the chief literary papers that welcomed the new venture would be instructive. There we should find that even the most cautious critic, always "hedging" and playing for safety, felt compelled to accord a certain amount of praise to the new enterprise.

It is true that "Felix Summerley" created only one type of the modern book. Possibly the "stories turned into satires" to which he alludes are the entirely amusing volumes by F. H. Bayley, the author of "A New Tale of a Tub." As it happened that these volumes were my delight as a small boy, possibly I am unduly fond of them; but it seems to me that their humour--_a la_ Ingoldsby, it is true--and their exuberantly comic drawings, reveal the first glimpses of lighter literature addressed specially to children, that long after found its masterpieces in the "Crane" and "Greenaway" and "Caldecott" Toy Books, in "Alice in Wonderland," and in a dozen other treasured volumes, which are now classics. The chief claim for the Home Treasury series to be considered as the advance guard of our present sumptuous volumes, rests not so much upon the quality of their designs or the brightness of their literature. Their chief importance is that in each of them we find for the first time that the externals of a child's book are most carefully considered. Its type is well chosen, the proportions of its page are evidently studied, its binding, even its end-papers, show that some one person was doing his best to attain perfection. It is this conscious effort, whatever it actually realised, which distinguishes the result from all before.

It is evident that the series--the Home Treasury--took itself seriously. Its purpose was Art with a capital A--a discovery, be it noted, of this period. Sir Henry Cole, in a footnote to the very page whence the quotation above was extracted, discusses the first use of "Art" as an adjective denoting the _Fine_ Arts.

Here it is more than ever difficult to keep to the thread of this discourse. All that South Kensington did and failed to do, the aesthetic movement of the eighties, the new gospel of artistic salvation by Liberty fabrics and De Morgan tiles, the erratic changes of fashion in taste, the collapse of Gothic architecture, the triumph of Queen Anne, and the Arts and Crafts movement of the nineties--in short, all the story of Art in the last fifty years, from the new Law Courts to the Tate Gallery, from Felix Summerley to a Hollyer photograph, from the introduction of glyptography to the pictures in the _Daily Chronicle_, demand notice. But the door must be shut on the turbulent throng, and only children's books allowed to pass through.

The publications by "Felix Summerley," according to the list in "Fifty Years of Public Work," by Sir Henry Cole, K.C.B. (Bell, 1884), include: "Holbein's Bible Events," eight pictures, coloured by Mr. Linnell's sons, 4_s._ 6_d._; "Raffaelle's Bible Events," six pictures from the Loggia, drawn on stone by Mr. Linnell's children and coloured by them, 5_s._ 6_d._; "Albert Duerer's Bible Events," six pictures from Duerer's "Small Passion," coloured by the brothers Linnell; "Traditional Nursery Songs," containing eight pictures; "The Beggars coming to Town," by C. W. Cope, R.A.; "By, O my Baby!" by R. Redgrave, R.A.; "Mother Hubbard," by T. Webster, R.A.; "1, 2, 3, 4, 5," "Sleepy Head," "Up in a Basket," "Cat asleep by the Fire," by John Linnell, 4_s._ 6_d._, coloured; "The Ballad of Sir Hornbook," by Thos. Love Peacock, with eight pictures by H. Corbould, coloured, 4_s._ 6_d._ (A book with the same title, also described as a "grammatico-allegorical ballad," was published by N. Haites in 1818.) "Chevy Chase," with music and four pictures by Frederick Tayler, President of the Water-Colour Society, coloured, 4_s._ 6_d._; "Puck's Reports to Oberon"; Four new Faery Tales: "The Sisters," "Golden Locks," "Grumble and Cherry," "Arts and Arms," by C. A. Cole, with six pictures by J. H. Townsend, R. Redgrave, R.A., J. C. Horsley, R.A., C. W. Cope, R.A., and F. Tayler; "Little Red Riding Hood," with four pictures by Thos. Webster, coloured, 3_s._ 6_d._; "Beauty and the Beast," with four pictures by J. C. Horsley, R.A., coloured, 3_s._ 6_d._; "Jack and the Bean Stalk," with four pictures by C. W. Cope, R.A., coloured, 3_s._ 6_d._; "Cinderella," with four pictures by E. H. Wehnert, coloured, 3_s._ 6_d._; "Jack the Giant Killer," with four pictures by C. W. Cope, coloured, 3_s._ 6_d._; "The Home Treasury Primer," printed in colours, with drawing on zinc, by W. Mulready, R.A.; "Alphabets of Quadrupeds," selected from the works of Paul Potter, Karl du Jardin, Teniers, Stoop, Rembrandt, &c., and drawn from nature; "The Pleasant History of Reynard the Fox," with forty of the fifty-seven etchings made by Everdingen in 1752, coloured, 31_s._ 6_d._; "A Century of Fables," with pictures by the old masters.

To this list should be added--if it is not by "Felix Summerley," it is evidently conceived by the same spirit and published also by Cundall--"Gammer Gurton's Garland," by Ambrose Merton, with illustrations by T. Webster and others. This was also issued as a series of sixpenny books, of which Mr. Elkin Mathews owns a nearly complete set, in their original covers of gold and coloured paper.

BY WALTER CRANE (OSGOOD, MCILVAINE AND CO. 1892)]

It would be very easy to over-estimate the intrinsic merit of these books, but when you consider them as pioneers it would be hard to over-rate the importance of the new departure. To enlist the talent of the most popular artists of the period, and produce volumes printed in the best style of the Chiswick Press, with bindings and end-papers specially designed, and the whole "get up" of the book carefully considered, was certainly a bold innovation in the early forties. That it failed to be a profitable venture one may deduce from the fact that the "Felix Summerley" series did not run to many volumes, and that the firm who published them, after several changes, seems to have expired, or more possibly was incorporated with some other venture. The books themselves are forgotten by most booksellers to-day, as I have discovered from many fruitless demands for copies.

The little square pamphlets by F. H. Bayley, to which allusion has already been made, include "Blue Beard;" "Robinson Crusoe," and "Red Riding Hood," all published about 1845-6.

Whether "The Sleeping Beauty," then announced as in preparation, was published, I do not know. Their rhyming chronicle in the style of the "Ingoldsby Legends" is neatly turned, and the topical allusions, although out of date now, are not sufficiently frequent to make it unintelligible. The pictures (possibly by Alfred Crowquill) are conceived in a spirit of burlesque, and are full of ingenious conceits and no little grim vigour. The design of Robinson Crusoe roosting in a tree--

And so he climbs up a very tall tree,
And fixes himself to his comfort and glee,
Hung up from the end of a branch by his breech,
Quite out of all mischievous quadrupeds' reach.
A position not perfectly easy 't is true,
But yet at the same time consoling and new--

reproduced on p. 13, shows the wilder humour of the illustrations. Another of Blue Beard, and one of the wolf suffering from undigested grandmother, are also given. They need no comment, except to note that in the originals, printed on a coloured tint with the high lights left white, the ferocity of Blue Beard is greatly heightened. The wolf, "as he lay there brimful of grandmother and guilt," is one of the best of the smaller pictures in the text.

Other noteworthy books which appeared about this date are Mrs. Felix Summerley's "Mother's Primer," illustrated by W. M[ulready?], Longmans, 1843; "Little Princess," by Mrs. John Slater, 1843, with six charming lithographs by J. C. Horsley, R.A. (one of which is reproduced on p. 11); the "Honey Stew," of the Countess Bertha Jeremiah How, 1846, with coloured plates by Harrison Weir; "Early Days of English Princes," with capital illustrations by John Franklin; and a series of Pleasant Books for Young Children, 6_d._ plain and 1_s._ coloured, published by Cundall and Addey.

In 1846 appeared a translation of De La Motte Fouque's romances, "Undine" being illustrated by John Tenniel, jun., and the following volumes by J. Franklin, H. C. Selous, and other artists. The Tenniel designs, as the frontispiece reproduced on p. 20 shows clearly, are interesting both in themselves and as the earliest published work of the famous _Punch_ cartoonist. The strong German influence they show is also apparent in nearly all the decorations. "The Juvenile Verse and Picture Book" (1848), also contains designs by Tenniel, and others by W. B. Scott and Sir John Gilbert. The ideal they established is maintained more or less closely for a long period. "Songs for Children" (W. S. Orr, 1850); "Young England's Little Library" (1851); Mrs. S. C. Hall's "Number One," with pictures by John Absolon (1854); "Stories about Dogs," with "plates by Thomas Landseer" (Bogue, _c._ 1850); "The Three Bears," illustrated by Absolon and Harrison Weir (Addey and Co., no date); "Nursery Poetry" (Bell and Daldy, 1859), may be noted as typical examples of this period.

In "Granny's Story Box" (Piper, Stephenson, and Spence, about 1855), a most delicious collection of fairy tales illustrated by J. Knight, we find the author in his preface protesting against the opinion of a supposititious old lady who "thought all fairy tales were abolished years ago by Peter Parley and the _Penny Magazine_." These fanciful stories deserve to be republished, for they are not old-fashioned, even if their pictures are.

To what date certain delightfully printed little volumes, issued by Tabart and Co., 157 Bond Street, may be ascribed I know not--probably some years before the time we are considering, but they must not be overlooked. The title of one, "Mince Pies for Christmas," suggests that it is not very far before, for the legend of Christmas festivities had not long been revived for popular use.

"The Little Lychetts," by the author of "John Halifax," illustrated by Henry Warren, President of the New Society of Painters in Water-Colours (now the R.I.) is remarkable for the extremely uncomely type of children it depicts; yet that its charm is still vivid, despite its "severe" illustrations, you have but to lend it to a child to be convinced quickly.

"Jack's Holiday," by Albert Smith (undated), suggests a new field of research which might lead us astray, as Smith's humour is more often addressed primarily to adults. Indeed, the effort to make this chronicle even representative, much less exhaustive, breaks down in the fifties, when so much good yet not very exhilarating material is to be found in every publisher's list. John Leech in "The Silver Swan" of Mdme. de Chatelaine; Charles Keene in "The Adventures of Dick Bolero" (Darton, no date), and "Robinson Crusoe" (drawn upon for illustration here), and others of the _Punch_ artists, should find their works duly catalogued even in this hasty sketch; but space compels scant justice to many artists of the period, yet if the most popular are left unnoticed such omission will more easily right itself to any reader interested in the subject.

Many show influences of the Gothic revival which was then in the air, but only those which have some idea of book decoration as opposed to inserted pictures. For a certain "formal" ornamentation of the page was in fashion in the "forties" and "fifties," even as it is to-day.

To the artists named as representative of this period one must not forget to add Mr. Birket Foster, who devoted many of his felicitous studies of English pastoral life to the adornment of children's books. But speaking broadly of the period from the Queen's Accession to 1865, except that the subjects are of a sort supposed to appeal to young minds, their conception differs in no way from the work of the same artists in ordinary literature. The vignettes of scenery have childish instead of grown-up figures in the foregrounds; the historical or legendary figures are as seriously depicted in the one class of books as in the other. Humour is conspicuous by its absence--or, to be more accurate, the humour is more often in the accompanying anecdote than in the picture. Probably if the authorship of hundreds of the illustrations of "Peter Parley's Annuals" and other books of this period could be traced, artists as famous as Charles Keene might be found to have contributed. But, owing to the mediocre wood-engraving employed, or to the poor printing, the pictures are singularly unattractive. As a rule, they are unsigned and appear to be often mere pot-boilers--some no doubt intentionally disowned by the designer--others the work of 'prentice hands who afterwards became famous. Above all they are, essentially, illustrations to children's books only because they chanced to be printed therein, and have sometimes done duty in "grown-up" books first. Hence, whatever their artistic merits, they do not appeal to a student of our present subject. They are accidentally present in books for children, but essentially they belong to ordinary illustrations.

Indeed, speaking generally, the time between "Felix Summerley" and _Walter Crane_, which saw two Great Exhibitions and witnessed many advances in popular illustration, was too much occupied with catering for adults to be specially interested in juveniles. Hence, notwithstanding the names of "illustrious illustrators" to be found on their title-pages, no great injustice will be done if we leave this period and pass on to that which succeeded it. For the Great Exhibition fostered the idea that a smattering of knowledge of a thousand and one subjects was good. Hence the chastened gaiety of its mildly technical science, its popular manuals by Dr. Dionysius Lardner, and its return in another form to the earlier ideal that amusement should be combined with instruction. All sorts of attempts were initiated to make Astronomy palatable to babies, Botany an amusing game for children, Conchology a parlour pastime, and so on through the alphabet of sciences down to Zoology, which is never out of favour with little ones, even if its pictures be accompanied by a dull encylopaedia of fact.

Therefore, except so far as the work of certain illustrators, hereafter noticed, touches this period, we may leave it; not because it is unworthy of most serious attention, for in Sir John Gilbert, Birket Foster, Harrison Weir, and the rest, we have men to reckon with whenever a chronicle of English illustration is in question, but only because they did not often feel disposed to make their work merely amusing. In saying this it is not suggested that they should have tried to be always humorous or archaic, still less to bring down their talent to the supposed level of a child; but only to record the fact that they did not. For instance, Sir John Gilbert's spirited compositions to a "Boy's Book of Ballads" (Bell and Daldy) as you see them mixed with other of the master's work in the reference scrap-books of the publishers, do not at once separate themselves from the rest as "juvenile" pictures.

Nor as we approach the year 1855 (of the "Music Master"), and 1857 (when the famous edition of Tennyson's Poems began a series of superbly illustrated books), do we find any immediate change in the illustration of children's books. The solitary example of Sir Edward Burne-Jones's efforts in this direction, in the frontispiece and title-page to Maclaren's "The Fairy Family" (Longmans, 1857), does not affect this statement. But soon after, as the school of Walker and Pinwell became popular, there is a change in books of all sorts, and Millais and Arthur Hughes, two of the three illustrators of the notable "Music Master," come into our list of children's artists. At this point the attempt to weave a chronicle of children's books somewhat in the date of their publication must give way to a desultory notice of the most prominent illustrators. For we have come to the beginning of to-day rather than the end of yesterday, and can regard the "sixties" onwards as part of the present.

It is true that the Millais of the wonderful designs to "The Parables" more often drew pictures of children than of children's pet themes, but all the same they are entirely lovable, and appeal equally to children of all ages. But his work in this field is scanty; nearly all will be found in "Little Songs for me to Sing" (Cassell), or in "Lilliput Levee" (1867), and these latter had appeared previously in _Good Words_. Of Arthur Hughes's work we will speak later.

Another artist whose work bulks large in our subject--Arthur Boyd Houghton--soon appears in sight, and whether he depicted babies at play as in "Home Thoughts and Home Scenes," a book of thirty-five pictures of little people, or imagined the scenes of stories dear to them in "The Arabian Nights," or books like "Ernie Elton" or "The Boy Pilgrims," written especially for them, in each he succeeded in winning their hearts, as every one must admit who chanced in childhood to possess his work. So much has been printed lately of the artist and his work, that here a bare reference will suffice.

Arthur Hughes, whose work belongs to many of the periods touched upon in this rambling chronicle, may be called _the_ children's "black-and-white" artist of the "sixties" (taking the date broadly as comprising the earlier "seventies" also), even as Walter Crane is their "limner in colours." His work is evidently conceived with the serious make-believe that is the very essence of a child's imagination. He seems to put down on paper the very spirit of fancy. Whether as an artist he is fully entitled to the rank some of his admirers (of whom I am one) would claim, is a question not worth raising here--the future will settle that for us. But as a children's illustrator he is surely illustrator-in-chief to the Queen of the Fairies, and to a whole generation of readers of "Tom Brown's Schooldays" also. His contributions to "Good Words for the Young" would alone entitle him to high eminence. In addition to these, which include many stories perhaps better known in book form, such as: "The Boy in Grey" (H. Kingsley), George Macdonald's "At the Back of the North Wind," "The Princess and the Goblin," "Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood," "Gutta-Percha Willie" (these four were published by Strahan, and now may be obtained in reprints issued by Messrs. Blackie), and "Lilliput Lectures" (a book of essays for children by Matthew Browne), we find him as sole illustrator of Christina Rossetti's "Sing Song," "Five Days' Entertainment at Wentworth Grange," "Dealings with the Fairies," by George Macdonald (a very scarce volume nowadays), and the chief contributor to the first illustrated edition of "Tom Brown's Schooldays." In Novello's "National Nursery Rhymes" are also several of his designs.

This list, which occupies so small a space, represents several hundred designs, all treated in a manner which is decorative (although it eschews the Duerer line), but marked by strong "colour." Indeed, Mr. Hughes's technique is all his own, and if hard pressed one might own that in certain respects it is not impeccable. But if his textures are not sufficiently differentiated, or even if his drawing appears careless at times--both charges not to be admitted without vigorous protest--granting the opponent's view for the moment, it would be impossible to find the same peculiar tenderness and naive fancy in the work of any other artist. His invention seems inexhaustible and his composition singularly fertile: he can create "bogeys" as well as "fairies."

It is true that his children are related to the sexless idealised race of Sir Edward Burne-Jones's heroes and heroines; they are purged of earthy taint, and idealised perhaps a shade too far. They adopt attitudes graceful if not realistic, they have always a grave serenity of expression; and yet withal they endear themselves in a way wholly their own. It is strange that a period which has bestowed so much appreciation on the work of the artists of "the sixties" has seen no knight-errant with "Arthur Hughes" inscribed on his banner--no exhibition of his black-and-white work, no craze in auction-rooms for first editions of books he illustrated. He has, however, a steady if limited band of very faithful devotees, and perhaps--so inconsistent are we all--they love his work all the better because the blast of popularity has not trumpeted its merits to all and sundry.

Three artists, often coupled together--Walter Crane, Randolph Caldecott, and Kate Greenaway--have really little in common, except that they all designed books for children which were published about the same period. For Walter Crane is the serious apostle of art for the nursery, who strove to beautify its ideal, to decorate its legends with a real knowledge of architecture and costume, and to "mount" the fairy stories with a certain archaeological splendour, as Sir Henry Irving has set himself to mount Shakespearean drama. Caldecott was a fine literary artist, who was able to express himself with rare facility in pictures in place of words, so that his comments upon a simple text reveal endless subtleties of thought. Indeed, he continued to make a fairly logical sequence of incidents out of the famous nonsense paragraph invented to confound mnemonics by its absolute irrelevancy. Miss Greenaway's charm lies in the fact that she first recognised quaintness in what had been considered merely "old fashion," and continued to infuse it with a glamour that made it appear picturesque. Had she dressed her figures in contemporary costume most probably her work would have taken its place with the average, and never obtained more than common popularity.

(BLACKIE AND SON)]

But Mr. Walter Crane is almost unique in his profound sympathy with the fantasies he imagines. There is no trace of make-believe in his designs. On the contrary, he makes the old legends become vital, not because of the personalities he bestows on his heroes and fairy princesses--his people move often in a rapt ecstasy--but because the adjuncts of his _mise-en-scenes_ are realised intimately. His prince is much more the typical hero than any particular person; his fair ladies might exchange places, and few would notice the difference; but when it comes to the environment, the real incidents of the story, then no one has more fully grasped both the dramatic force and the local colour. If his people are not peculiarly alive, they are in harmony with the re-edified cities and woods that sprang up under his pencil. He does not bestow the hoary touch of antiquity on his mediaeval buildings; they are all new and comely, in better taste probably than the actual buildings, but not more idealised than are his people. He is the true artist of fairyland, because he recognises its practical possibilities, and yet does not lose the glamour which was never on sea or land. No artist could give more cultured notions of fairyland. In his work the vulgar glories of a pantomime are replaced by well-conceived splendour; the tawdry adjuncts of a throne-room, as represented in a theatre, are ignored. Temples and palaces of the early Renaissance, filled with graceful--perhaps a shade too suave--figures, embody all the charm of the impossible country, with none of the sordid drawbacks that are common to real life. In modern dress, as in his pictures to many of Mrs. Molesworth's stories, there is a certain unlikeness to life as we know it, which does not detract from the effect of the design; but while this is perhaps distracting in stories of contemporary life, it is a very real advantage in those of folk-lore, which have no actual date, and are therefore unafraid of anachronisms of any kind. The spirit of his work is, as it should be, intensely serious, yet the conceits which are showered upon it exactly harmonise with the mood of most of the stories that have attracted his pencil. Grimm's "Household Stories," as he pictured them, are a lasting joy. The "Bluebeard" and "Jack and the Beanstalk" toy books, the "Princess Belle Etoile," and a dozen others are nursery classics, and classics also of the other nursery where children of a larger growth take their pleasure.

Without a shade of disrespect towards all the other artists represented in this special number, had it been devoted solely to Mr. Walter Crane's designs, it would have been as interesting in every respect. There is probably not a single illustrator here mentioned who would not endorse such a statement. For as a maker of children's books, no one ever attempted the task he fulfilled so gaily, and no one since has beaten him on his own ground. Even Mr. Howard Pyle, his most worthy rival, has given us no wealth of colour-prints. So that the famous toy books still retain their well-merited position as the most delightful books for the nursery and the studio, equally beloved by babies and artists.

Although a complete iconography of Mr. Walter Crane's work has not yet been made, the following list of such of his children's books as I have been able to trace may be worth printing for the benefit of those who have not access to the British Museum; where, by the way, many are not included in that section of its catalogue devoted to "Crane, Walter."

The famous series of toy books by Walter Crane include: "The Railroad A B C," "The Farmyard A B C," "Sing a Song of Sixpence," "The Waddling Frog," "The Old Courtier," "Multiplication in Verse," "Chattering Jack," "How Jessie was Lost," "Grammar in Rhyme," "Annie and Jack in London," "One, Two, Buckle my Shoe," "The Fairy Ship," "Adventures of Puffy," "This Little Pig went to Market," "King Luckieboy's Party," "Noah's Ark Alphabet," "My Mother," "The Forty Thieves," "The Three Bears," "Cinderella," "Valentine and Orson," "Puss in Boots," "Old Mother Hubbard," "The Absurd A B C," "Little Red Riding Hood," "Jack and the Beanstalk," "Blue Beard," "Baby's Own Alphabet," "The Sleeping Beauty." All these were published at sixpence. A larger series at one shilling includes: "The Frog Prince," "Goody Two Shoes," "Beauty and the Beast," "Alphabet of Old Friends," "The Yellow Dwarf," "Aladdin," "The Hind in the Wood," and "Princess Belle Etoile." All these were published from 1873 onwards by Routledge, and printed in colours by Edmund Evans.

A small quarto series Routledge published at five shillings includes: "The Baby's Opera," "The Baby's Bouquet," "The Baby's Own AEsop." Another and larger quarto, "Flora's Feast" (1889), and "Queen Summer" (1891), were both published by Cassells, who issued also "Legends for Lionel" (1887). "Pan Pipes," an oblong folio with music was issued by Routledge. Messrs. Marcus Ward produced "Slate and Pencilvania," "Pothooks and Perseverance," "Romance of the Three Rs," "Little Queen Anne" (1885-6), Hawthorne's "A Wonder Book," first published in America, is a quarto volume with elaborate designs in colour; and "The Golden Primer" (1884), two vols., by Professor Meiklejohn (Blackwood) is, like all the above, in colour.

Of a series of stories by Mrs. Molesworth the following volumes are illustrated by Mr. Crane:--"A Christmas Posy" (1888), "Carrots" (1876), "A Christmas Child" (1886), "Christmas-tree Land" (1884), "The Cuckoo Clock" (1877), "Four Winds Farm" (1887), "Grandmother Dear" (1878), "Herr Baby" (1881), "Little Miss Peggy" (1887), "The Rectory Children" (1889), "Rosy" (1882), "The Tapestry Room" (1879), "Tell me a Story," "Two Little Waifs," "Us" (1885), and "Children of the Castle" (1890). Earlier in date are "Stories from Memel" (1864), "Stories of Old," "Children's Sayings" (1861), two series, "Poor Match" (1861), "The Merry Heart," with eight coloured plates (Cassell); "King Gab's Story Bag" (Cassell), "Magic of Kindness" (1869), "Queen of the Tournament," "History of Poor Match," "Our Uncle's Old Home" (1872), "Sunny Days" (1871), "The Turtle Dove's Nest" (1890). Later come "The Necklace of Princess Fiorimonde" (1880), the famous edition of Grimm's "Household Stories" (1882), both published by Macmillan, and C. C. Harrison's "Folk and Fairy Tales" (1885), "The Happy Prince" (Nutt, 1888). Of these the "Grimm" and "Fiorimonde" are perhaps two of the most important illustrated books noted in these pages.

Randolph Caldecott founded a school that still retains fresh hold of the British public. But with all respect to his most loyal disciple, Mr. Hugh Thomson, one doubts if any successor has equalled the master in the peculiar subtlety of his pictured comment upon the bare text. You have but to turn to any of his toy books to see that at times each word, almost each syllable, inspired its own picture; and that the artist not only conceived the scene which the text called into being, but each successive step before and after the reported incident itself. In "The House that Jack Built," "This is the Rat that Ate the Malt" supplies a subject for five pictures. First the owner carrying in the malt, next the rat driven away by the man, then the rat peeping up into the deserted room, next the rat studying a placard upside down inscribed "four measures of malt," and finally, the gorged animal sitting upon an empty measure. So "This is the Cat that Killed the Rat" is expanded into five pictures. The dog has four, the cat three, and the rest of the story is amplified with its secondary incidents duly sought and depicted. This literary expression is possibly the most marked characteristic of a facile and able draughtsman. He studied his subject as no one else ever studied it--he must have played with it, dreamed of it, worried it night and day, until he knew it ten times better than its author. Then he portrayed it simply and with irresistible vigour, with a fine economy of line and colour; when colour is added, it is mainly as a gay convention, and not closely imitative of nature. The sixteen toy books which bear his name are too well known to make a list of their titles necessary. A few other children's books--"What the Blackbird Said" (Routledge, 1881), "Jackanapes," "Lob-lie-by-the-Fire," "Daddy Darwin's Dovecot," all by Mrs. Ewing (S.P.C.K.), "Baron Bruno" (Macmillan), "Some of AEsop's Fables" (Macmillan), and one or two others, are of secondary importance from our point of view here.

It is no overt dispraise to say of Miss Kate Greenaway that few artists made so great a reputation in so small a field. Inspired by the children's books of 1820 (as a reference to a design, "Paths of Learning," reproduced on p. 9 will show), and with a curious naivety that was even more unconcerned in its dramatic effect than were the "missal marge" pictures of the illuminators, by her simple presentation of the childishness of childhood she won all hearts. Her little people are the _beau-ideal_ of nursery propriety--clean, good-tempered, happy small gentlefolk. For, though they assume peasants' garb, they never betray boorish manners. Their very abandon is only that of nice little people in play-hours, and in their wildest play the penalties that await torn knickerbockers or soiled frocks are not absent from their minds. Whether they really interested children as they delighted their elders is a moot point. The verdict of many modern children is unanimous in praise, and possibly because they represented the ideal every properly educated child is supposed to cherish. The slight taint of priggishness which occasionally is there did not reveal itself to a child's eye. Miss Greenaway's art, however, is not one to analyse but to enjoy. That she is a most careful and painstaking worker is a fact, but one that would not in itself suffice to arouse one's praise. The absence of effort which makes her work look happy and without effort is not its least charm. Her gay yet "cultured" colour, her appreciation of green chairs and formal gardens, all came at the right time. The houses by a Norman Shaw found a Morris and a Liberty ready with furniture and fabrics, and all sorts of manufacturers devoting themselves to the production of pleasant objects, to fill them; and for its drawing-room tables Miss Greenaway produced books that were in the same key. But as the architecture and the fittings, at their best, proved to be no passing whim, but the germ of a style, so her illustration is not a trifling sport, but a very real, if small, item in the history of the evolution of picture-books. Good taste is the prominent feature of her work, and good taste, if out of fashion for a time, always returns, and is treasured by future generations, no matter whether it be in accord with the expression of the hour or distinctly archaic. Time is a very stringent critic, and much that passed as tolerably good taste when it fell in with the fashion, looks hopelessly vulgar when the tide of popularity has retreated. Miss Greenaway's work appears as refined ten years after its "boom," as it did when it was at the flood. That in itself is perhaps an evidence of its lasting power; for ten or a dozen years impart a certain shabby and worn aspect that has no flavour of the antique as a saving virtue to atone for its shortcomings.

It seems almost superfluous to give a list of the principal books by Miss Kate Greenaway, yet for the convenience of collectors the names of the most noteworthy volumes may be set down. Those with coloured plates are: "A, Apple Pie" (1886), "Alphabet" (1885), "Almanacs" (from 1882 yearly), "Birthday Book" (1880), "Book of Games" (1889), "A Day in a Child's Life" (1885), "King Pepito" (1889), "Language of Flowers" (1884), "Little Ann" (1883), "Marigold Garden" (1885), "Mavor's Spelling Book" (1885), "Mother Goose" (1886), "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" (1889), "Painting Books" (1879 and 1885), "Queen Victoria's Jubilee Garland" (1887), "Queen of the Pirate Isle" (1886), "Under the Window" (1879). Others with black-and-white illustrations include "Child of the Parsonage" (1874), "Fairy Gifts" (1875), "Seven Birthdays" (1876), "Starlight Stories" (1877), "Topo" (1878), "Dame Wiggins of Lee" (Allen, 1885), "Stories from the Eddas" (1883).

Many designs, some in colour, are to be found in volumes of _Little Folks_, _Little Wideawake_, _Every Girl's Magazine_, _Girl's Own Paper_, and elsewhere.

The art of Miss Greenaway is part of the legend of the aesthetic craze, and while its storks and sunflowers have faded, and some of its eccentricities are forgotten, the quaint little pictures on Christmas cards, in toy books, and elsewhere, are safely installed as items of the art product of the century. Indeed, many a popular Royal Academy picture is likely to be forgotten before the illustrations from her hand. _Bric-a-brac_ they were, but more than that, for they gave infinite pleasure to thousands of children of all ages, and if they do not rise up and call her blessed, they retain a very warm memory of one who gave them so much innocent pleasure.

Sir John Tenniel's illustrations, beginning as they do with "Undine" (1845), already mentioned, include others in volumes for young people that need not be quoted. But with his designs for "Alice in Wonderland" (Macmillan, 1866), and "Through the Looking Glass" (1872), we touch _the_ two most notable children's books of the century. To say less would be inadequate and to say more needless. For every one knows the incomparable inventions which "Lewis Carroll" imagined and Sir John Tenniel depicted. They are veritable classics, of which, as it is too late to praise them, no more need be said.

Certain coloured picture books by J. E. Rogers were greeted with extravagant eulogy at the time they appeared "in the seventies." "Worthy to be hung at the Academy beside the best pictures of Millais or Sandys," one fatuous critic observed. Looking over their pages again, it seems strange that their very weak drawing and crude colour could have satisfied people familiar with Mr. Walter Crane's masterly work in a not dissimiliar style. "Ridicula Rediviva" and "Mores Ridiculi" (both Macmillan), were illustrations of nursery rhymes. To "The Fairy Book" (1870), a selection of old stories re-told by the author of "John Halifax," Mr. Rogers contributed many full pages in colour, and also to Mr. F. C. Burnand's "Present Pastimes of Merrie England" (1872). They are interesting as documents, but not as art; for their lack of academic knowledge is not counterbalanced by peculiar "feeling" or ingenious conceit. They are merely attempts to do again what Mr. H. S. Marks had done better previously. It seems ungrateful to condemn books that but for renewed acquaintance might have kept the glamour of the past; and yet, realising how much feeble effort has been praised since it was "only for children," it is impossible to keep silence when the truth is so evident.

Alfred Crowquill most probably contributed all the pictures to "Robinson Crusoe," "Blue Beard," and "Red Riding Hood" told in rhyme by F. W. N. Bayley, which have been noticed among his books of the "forties." One of the full pages, which appear to be lithographs, is clearly signed. He also illustrated the adventures of "Master Tyll Owlglass," an edition of "Baron Munchausen," "Picture Fables," "The Careless Chicken," "Funny Leaves for the Younger Branches," "Laugh and Grow Thin," and a host of other volumes. Yet the pictures in these, amusing as they are in their way, do not seem likely to attract an audience again at any future time.

E. V. B., initials which stand for the Hon. Mrs. Boyle, are found on many volumes of the past twenty-five years which have enjoyed a special reputation. Certainly her drawings, if at times showing much of the amateur, have also a curious "quality," which accounts for the very high praise they have won from critics of some standing. "The Story without an End," "Child's Play" (1858), "The New Child's Play," "The Magic Valley," "Andersen Fairy Tales" (Low, 1882), "Beauty and the Beast" (a quarto with colour-prints by Leighton Bros.), are the most important. Looking at them dispassionately now, there is yet a trace of some of the charm that provoked applause a little more than they deserve.

In British art this curious fascination exerted by the amateur is always confronting us. The work of E. V. B. has great qualities, yet any pupil of a board school would draw better. Nevertheless it pleases more than academic technique of high merit that lacks just that one quality which, for want of a better word, we call "culture." In the designs by Louisa, Marchioness of Waterford, one encounters genius with absolutely faltering technique; and many who know how rare is the slightest touch of genius, forgive the equally important mastery of material which must accompany it to produce work of lasting value.

Mr. H. S. Marks designed two nursery books for Messrs. Routledge, and contributed to many others, including J. W. Elliott's "National Nursery Rhymes" (Novello), whence our illustration has been taken. Two series of picture books containing mediaeval figures with gold background, by J. Moyr Smith, if somewhat lacking in the qualities which appeal to children, may have played a good part in educating them to admire conventional flat treatment, with a decorative purpose that was unusual in the "seventies," when most of them appeared.

In later years, Miss Alice Havers in "The White Swans," and "Cape Town Dicky" (Hildesheimer), and many lady artists of less conspicuous ability, have done a quantity of graceful and elaborate pictures _of_ children rather than _for_ children. The art of this later period shows better drawing, better colour, better composition than had been the popular average before; but it generally lacks humour, and a certain vivacity of expression which children appreciate.

In the "sixties" and "seventies" were many illustrators of children's books who left no great mark except on the memories of those who were young enough at the time to enjoy their work thoroughly, if not very critically. Among these may be placed William Brunton, who illustrated several of the Right Hon. G. Knatchbull-Hugessen's fairy stories, "Tales at Tea Time" for instance, and was frequent among the illustrators of Hood's Annuals. Charles H. Ross (at one time editor of _Judy_) and creator of "Ally Sloper," the British Punchinello, produced at least one memorable book for children. "Queens and Kings and other Things," a folio volume printed in gold and colour, with nonsense rhymes and pictures, almost as funny as those of Edward Lear himself. "The Boy Crusoe," and many other books of somewhat ephemeral character are his, and Routledge's "Every Boy's Magazine" contains many of his designs. Just as these pages are being corrected the news of his death is announced.

Others, like George Du Maurier, so rarely touched the subject that they can hardly be regarded as wholly belonging to our theme. Yet "Misunderstood," by Florence Montgomery (1879), illustrated by Du Maurier, is too popular to leave unnoticed. Mr. A. W. Bayes, who has deservedly won fame in other fields, illustrated "Andersen's Tales" (Warne, 1865), probably his earliest work, as a contemporary review speaks of the admirable designs "by an artist whose name is new to us."

It is a matter for surprise and regret that Mr. Howard Pyle's illustrated books are not as well known in England as they deserve to be. And this is the more vexing when you find that any one with artistic sympathy is completely converted to be a staunch admirer of Mr. Pyle's work by a sight of "The Wonder Clock," a portly quarto, published by Harper Brothers in 1894. It seems to be the only book conceived in purely Duereresque line, which can be placed in rivalry with Mr. Walter Crane's illustrated "Grimm," and wise people will be only too delighted to admire both without attempting to compare them. Mr. Pyle is evidently influenced by Duerer--with a strong trace of Rossetti--but he carries both influences easily, and betrays a strong personality throughout all the designs. The "Merry Adventures of Robin Hood" and "Otto of the Silver Hand" are two others of about the same period, and the delightful volume collected from _Harper's Young People_ for the most part, entitled "Pepper and Salt," may be placed with them. All the illustrations to these are in pure line, and have the appearance of being drawn not greatly in excess of the reproduced size. Of all these books Mr. Howard Pyle is author as well as illustrator.

Of late he has changed his manner in line, showing at times, especially in "Twilight Land" (Osgood, McIlvaine, 1896), the influence of Vierge, but even in that book the frontispiece and many other designs keep to his earlier manner.

In "The Garden behind the Moon" (issued in London by Messrs. Lawrence and Bullen) the chief drawings are entirely in wash, and yet are singularly decorative in their effect. The "Story of Jack Bannister's Fortunes" shows the artist's "colonial" style, "Men of Iron," "A Modern Aladdin," Oliver Wendell Holmes' "One-Horse Shay," are other fairly recent volumes. His illustrations have not been confined to his own stories as "In the Valley," by Harold Frederic, "Stops of Various Quills" (poems by W. D. Howells), go to prove.

It is strange that Mr. Heywood Sumner, who, as his notable "Fitzroy Pictures" would alone suffice to prove, is peculiarly well equipped for the illustration of children's books, has done but few, and of these none are in colour. "Cinderella" (1882), rhymes by H. S. Leigh, set to music by J. Farmer, contains very pleasant decoration by Mr. Sumner. Next comes "Sintram" (1883), a notable edition of De la Motte Fouque's romance, followed by "Undine" (in 1885). With a book on the "Parables," by A.L.O.E., published about 1884; "The Besom Maker" (1880), a volume of country ditties with the old music, and "Jacob and the Raven," with thirty-nine illustrations (Allen, 1896), the best example of his later manner, and a book which all admirers of the more severe order of "decorative illustration" will do well to preserve, the list is complete. Whether a certain austerity of line has made publishers timid, or whether the artist has declined commissions, the fact remains that the literature of the nursery has not yet had its full share from Mr. Heywood Sumner. Luckily, if its shelves are the less full, its walls are gayer by the many Fitzroy pictures he has made so effectively, which readers of THE STUDIO have seen reproduced from time to time in these pages.