Chapter V: Preface: 'Tuâ nobis est gratiâ.'--CIC (5)

The list of amateur artists, who enjoyed Rowlandson's friendship, and whose designs received the advantages which his assistance was able to lend them, will not be complete without the name of Collings, well known in the regions of Covent Garden, and some time editor of the _Public Ledger_, who was a lively satirist, both with his pencil and his pen. 'When Boswell's _Tour to the Hebrides_ was ushered forth, it was celebrated by as many crackers and squibs as the _Burning of the Boot_ (Lord Bute). Among other assailants, the impenetrable Bozzy had to expose his front to this lampooner's shafts. A whole series of designs were published by this witty wag, the heroes of which, or rather the knight and the esquire of his drama, were Johnson and Boswell. The knight, it is likely, never saw them; and, as for the squire, his love of notoriety rendered him, if not vain of, at least not vulnerable to, these successive attacks.[15]

'The Laird of Auchinlek, indeed, had a large collection of these satires upon "self and company," as he used facetiously to inscribe them, and boasted at the judge's table that his _History_ would be more copiously illustrated than even the Lord High Chancellor, Clarendon's.'

Caleb Whiteford, another crony of the caricaturist, was an excellent judge of paintings (especially works by the old masters) and was generally known as a fervent admirer of George Moreland's pictures; he was the reputed discoverer of 'cross readings,'[16] and a dabbler in verse. It was he who, as everyone will remember, received such a complimentary notice in the postscript to the mock epitaphs known as Goldsmith's _Retaliation_, that there were not wanting those who contributed to the flattery by suspecting that the additional epitaph was due to Caleb's own pen.

Old Caleb Whiteford, the witty wine-merchant and 'connoisseur in old masters,' knew everyone of any reputation, and was well-received at the various hospitable boards to which allusions have been made in the course of these discursive notes; he was a welcome guest at numerous convivial gatherings of the artistic and literary coteries of the period, whose jovial meetings and good cheer have been suffered to pass into oblivion, unrecorded by the scribes who shared 'the cakes and ale,' in the palmy days of sociable festivities and kindly familiar intercourse.

'Mr. Ephraim Hardcastle, citizen and drysalter,' as he whimsically elected to style himself--in sober fact, W. H. Pyne, the artist to whose literary ventures we have already referred--has on occasions come to the rescue in his _Wine and Walnuts, or after-dinner Chit-Chat_. Here is the report of a conversation concerning Rowlandson, which is supposed to have taken place between Whiteford and the caricaturist's jolly friend Mitchell, culled from the _Chit-Chat_ in question, which was published in 1823.

'Well, Master Caleb Whiteford[17] was on his way up the hill in the Adelphi to his post at the Society of Arts, and who should he stumble upon at the corner of James Street, just turning round from Rowlandson's, but Master Mitchell, the quondam banker of old Hodsoll's house. He had, as usual, been foraging among the multitudinous sketches of that original artist, and held a portfolio under his arm, and as he was preparing to step into his chariot, Caleb accosted him: "Well, worthy sir; what! more choice bits--more graphic whimsies to add to the collection at Enfield, eh? Well, how fares it with our friend Roly?" (a familiar term by which the artist was known to his ancient cronies).

'"Why, yes, Master Caleb Whiteford, I go collecting on, though I begin to think I have enough already, for I have some hundreds of his spirited works; but somehow there is a sort of fascination in these matters, and--heigh--ha--ho--hoo!" (gaping) "I never go up--up--bless the man, why will he live so high? It kills me to climb his stairs"--holding his ponderous sides--"I never go up, Mister Caleb, but I find something new, and am tempted to pull my purse-strings. His invention, his humour, his--his oddity is exhaustless." "Yes," said Whiteford, "Master Roly is never at a loss for a subject, and I should not be surprised if he is taking a bird's-eye view of you and me at this moment, and marking us down for game. But it is not his drawings alone; why, he says he has etched as much copper as would sheathe a first-rate man-of-war; and I should think he is not far from the mark in his assertion.'

'"Yes," replied the banker, "he ought to be rich, for his genius is certainly the most exhaustless, the most--the most--no, Mister Caleb, there is no end to him; he manufactures his humorous ware with such increasing vigour, that I know not what to compare his prolific fancy to, unless it be to the increasing population....

'"Roly has promised to come down. I would have taken the rogue with me, only that he is about some new scheme for his old friend Ackermann, there, and he says he must complete it within an hour. You know Roly's expedition."'

James Heath, also a caricaturist, and a delineator of sporting sketches, was another of Rowlandson's intimates; a Good-Friday jaunt, or an Easter excursion, was for many years indulged by these worthies, who with genial Bannister, the comedian, and their faithful chronicler, Henry Angelo, the fencing-master, annually kept up the practice of proceeding on a jovial expedition at this season, some distance from town, Staines, Windsor, or some similar starting-point, being the rendezvous selected by these congenial spirits.

The list of Rowlandson's friends would be incomplete without the name of George Moreland, who, with all his eccentricities and shortcomings, was another favoured child of fortune, whose inheritance was natural genius; and though the fairy gift was turned to the very worst account, dragged through the mire of dissipation, and sordidly made to supply the means of that social degradation, which lowered the possessor beneath his worst associates, the power remained in the poor shattered wreck, and did not forsake him until, in a state of premature decay, he perished miserably before his easel.

A sketch of Moreland's career is by no means called for in this place. His erratic disposition was not without its whimsical traits; sufficient anecdotes exist of the wayward painter to prove that, beyond his happy qualifications for his art, there was found in his composition a spice of pleasantry that did not always degenerate into buffoonery or horse-play, with occasional flashes of wit and sprightly allusions which, to say the least of them, were remarkably apposite. Perhaps too much stress has been laid upon Moreland's deficiencies, while his more agreeable traits have been somewhat slighted. Putting aside the numerous anecdotal sketches of the painter, we have only to record, in this place at least, that a friendship existed between the subject of this volume and the man to whose sketches those of our caricaturist frequently offer a suggestive resemblance, it being actually difficult to distinguish between the unsigned etchings and drawings of the two artists, in the walk practised by Moreland. The similarity of their talent is more evident perhaps in the larger hunting scenes, and the studies of female heads, tinted in colours, than in any other direction; although, with the pencil or the chalk, their rustic landscapes, from the freedom of their respective handlings, are remarkably alike, both in the choice of subjects and the spirit of the execution.

As we have already noticed, the most characteristic portrait of Moreland, and the one which appears to offer us the most life-like representation of the capricious painter, is due to the skill of Rowlandson. We are informed, in a note which we gather from Angelo, that Moreland, in his various flittings round the metropolis in dread of creditors, when he took sanctuary with any intimate whose residence he happened to remember, gave his colleague the caricaturist the opportunity of exhibiting his friendship by harbouring him in his lodgings under one of these emergencies, which were of tolerably frequent occurrence. 'Rowlandson, the artist, lodged at Mrs. Lay's printshop, a few doors from Carlton House, Pall Mall. One morning when I called upon him, we heard a loud knock at the street door, and looking out of the window, he said, "There's Colonel Thornton----knock again! He may be at this fun three months longer; he is come for his picture, but Moreland, having touched fifty pounds in advance, is never at home to him now. He's in the next room, which he has for painting. You had better go and do the same with him, and drink gin and water; he'll like your company, and make you a drawing for nothing." This was in the middle of the day.'

We are inclined to think that the most memorable of the caricaturist's associates was James Gillray, whose age was within a year of that of Rowlandson; it is a coincidence that two unrivalled geniuses, and in such eccentric walks, should have been both contemporaries, and steady-going friends, never clashing in the course of their respective careers. In this work various allusions will be noticed to the intimacy which subsisted between these remarkably gifted men, each perfectly original in his fashion, and both possessing singular points of resemblance in their characters.

We content ourselves with mentioning that they occasionally entered into friendly alliances, but that, when pitted against each other, they had more regard for friendship than for party warfare, which they utterly despised, except as an opening for the exercise of their skill.

Gillray and Rowlandson were, perhaps, never properly appreciated in their generation, the higher capacities which distinguished both these spoiled pets and wilful sons of Momus, were comparatively slighted, if not completely ignored; all that was vulgar, wayward, and wild in their dispositions was fostered and enlarged upon; their errors, and their occasional lapses into downright coarseness, were, according to the lights of the day, flattered and encouraged as flights of the raciest humour; the crude, careless, and commonplace, received too frequently a hearty and undeserved recognition, which their ambitious efforts failed to inspire; the very productions they scorned were exalted, while, when they felt the magic fire warming their imaginations, the results were misunderstood too commonly.

Their keen intellects, and their satiric sense of the almost constant unfitness of things as they found them, the gnawing of the vanity of vanities, ever present, must have made their temperaments peculiarly sensitive to such slights as the want of discrimination in their admirers which occasionally shocked and continually disheartened them--evils which the want of culture, or consideration on the part of their audience, continually brought in their train.

It is no matter of surprise that the enchantments which they saw before them at the opening of their careers, vanished all too soon, and left them chilled, and inclined to become misanthropes; the very genius, which promised to be a delight to themselves and to mankind, proving a bitter curse.

When the satirists, who felt alike and were sympathetic on most points, met, it seems their intercourse was the reverse of boisterous--in fact, they were rather inclined to be depressed, or, at least, they shrunk within themselves with a more marked contrast to the conduct which should, it was supposed, distinguish notorious pictorial humourists, and became, perhaps, a trifle more retired and undemonstrative than ordinary--possibly to the disappointment of the less-informed _habitués_, who evidently thought they were defrauded of a diversion, and had a right to anticipate, these gentlemen being in a sort graphic jesters by profession, that in private life they would feel themselves impelled to play off a little whimsical jugglery for the entertainment of the company. These professional tricks belonged to the lesser lights, and we warrant that Woodward, Collings, Newton, and the smaller following of the eccentric art, were infinitely more amusing to the taste of their auditors.

It is certain Gillray was grave and self-contained, and Rowlandson, in his degree, participated in his friend's humour, slightly at first, perhaps, as a passing depression, and, later in life, with an intensified and growing grimness, and a gathering gloom, as friends dropped off, and age crept on, and the caricaturist's world was materially altered for him, as his work seemed over.

'For years Gillray occasionally smoked his pipe at _The Bell_, _The Coal-Hole_, or _The Coach and Horses_; and, although the _convives_, whom he met at such dingy rendezvous, knew that he was that Gillray who fabricated those comical cuts, the very moral of Farmer George and Boneyparty, of Billy Pitt and Black Charley, he never sought, like that low coxcomb Moreland, to become king of the company. He neither exacted, nor were they inclined to pay him, any particular homage. In truth, with his associates, neighbouring shopkeepers and master manufacturers, he passed for no greater wit than his neighbours. Rowlandson, his ingenious compeer, and he, sometimes met. They would, perhaps, exchange half-a-dozen questions and answers upon the affairs of copper and aquafortis; swear all the world was one vast masquerade, and then enter into the common chat of the room, smoke their cigars, drink their punch, and sometimes early, sometimes late, shake hands at the door, look up at the stars, say "It is a frosty night," and depart, one for the Adelphi, the other to St. James's Street, each to his bachelor's bed.'[18]

Our friend Angelo, a bright chirpy spirit, who retained his liveliness unimpaired, let us hope, to the last of his long days, not having any pretensions to be a genius, was exempt from the sinister tendencies which too frequently attend its possession. Although, as he confesses in his _Memoirs_, not precisely the 'rose' himself, he had lived near it, and his association with men of an admittedly high type, as far as gifts of fancy and versatile talents were concerned, had taught him to observe the drawbacks not unusually allied to distinguishing attainments; and he records a few sober axioms for the enlightenment of those who have been excluded from his privileges.

'Those who at a distance contemplate characters like these, so professedly eminent for invention, wit, and satirical humour, naturally suppose their society must be universally sought; and that such must, of necessity, be the life and soul of the convivial board. Men, however, who see much and speculate but little, know better. Among the dullest in company could be pointed out those who are "wondrous witty" by themselves; and this not from pride of their superior faculty to please, but from a constitutional shyness or modest desire to avoid notice or applause--or from indolence, or actually from conscious dulness when absent from the study and the desk, when without the pencil and the pen.

'Peter Pindar was witless, even over his bottle, with his most intimate cronies. Anthony Pasquin was sour, and not prone to converse. Churchill was a sulky sot. Butler was lively neither drunk nor sober--a choice companion only when "half gone;" hence, as the witty Duke of Buckingham observed, "he was to be compared to a skittle, little at both ends, but great in the middle!" Burton, who had no less humour than Cervantes, and the learning of a whole university to boot, was neither a cheerful companion, nor endurable to himself. A hundred more could be named, whose aptitude and promptness to discover the ridiculous side of human action, has astonished the grave; and yet, these men who have thus exposed folly to the laughter of mankind, have been themselves the dullest dogs alive. Gillray was always "hipped," and at last sunk into that deplorable state of mental aberration which verifies the couplet, so often quoted, wherein the consanguinity of wit to madness is so eminently proved, to the comfort of those who thank God for their own stupidity.'

Perhaps the most constant friend, and certainly the best adviser, our caricaturist retained to the grave was his principal publisher, Mr. Rudolph Ackermann. We have mentioned this gentleman last among the personal associates of Rowlandson, as his untiring services only ended with the life of the artist.

The name of Rudolph Ackermann, who died March 30, 1834, is worthy of more than a passing mention; he has been cited as one of the first natives of Germany who, by far-sighted and active occupation, accompanied by philanthropic exertions for the benefit of his fellow-creatures, raised the character of his nationality to a high point of esteem in other countries. An account of his energetic and charitable career appeared in the _Didaskalia_, Frankfurt-am-Main, No. 103, April 13, 1864, and was adopted by the writer (W. P.) of an excellent notice upon the well-known publisher, in the pages of _Notes and Queries_, (4th S. iv., August 7 and 14, 1869). The son of a coach-builder, Rudolph Ackermann was born April 20, 1764, at Stolberg, in the Saxon Hartz. We are told 'his sympathies with the misfortunes of others were so warmly excited by the misery seen around him in the famine of 1772-73, that he frequently in later years excused the zeal which he showed on other occasions, by pictures of the distress that he experienced when he, at the age of eight years, was employed for hours daily in distributing food and money.' In 1775 his father removed to Schneeberg. Rudolph received his education in the local school till he was fifteen years old, and showed a decided predilection for literary pursuits; but his father's pecuniary position precluding the choice of a profession to more than one of his sons, he entered the paternal factory. An elder brother, Frederick, instructed Rudolph in the use of the drawing instruments, and he busied himself more willingly in the offices than in the workshops, gaining an acquaintance with details, which proved subsequently as important to his advancement as were his visits to Dresden, the towns of the Rhine, and Hueningen near Basle. He afterwards went to reside in Paris, where he became the friend of Carrossi, the most esteemed designer of equipages of his time, and Rudolph, who proved his best pupil, acquired sufficient knowledge as a practical draughtsman to push his way in the world. From Paris he proceeded to London in pursuit of fortune, and to turn his talents to account: he was delighted to find that, in the metropolis, carriage-building was one of the most successful occupations, and that the exercise of his acquirements would be handsomely rewarded; so for several years, until 1795, he was employed in furnishing the principal coachmakers with designs and models for new and improved carriages. The models of the state coach, built at the cost of nearly 7,000_l._, for the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland in 1790,[19] and that for the Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1791, exhibited his taste and skill. In 1805, the preparation of the car that served as a hearse at the funeral of Lord Nelson was entrusted to him; and during the years 1818-20 the patent for a moveable axle for carriages engaged much of his attention.

It is not, however, in this connection that we have to consider Ackermann, but rather in his relation to the arts as a print-seller and publisher. On his marriage with an English lady, with commendable prudence, he became desirous of establishing a business which would, in case of his own premature decease, prove a suitable provision for his family. He commenced the print trade at 96 Strand, and soon after he secured a large apartment, 65 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 24 feet high, at 101 Strand (erected upon the courtyard of Beaufort House), which had been the drawing academy of William Shipley; it had then passed to Henry Pars, and later passed into the hands of the Radicals, and became notorious as the British Forum, when it was used by John Thelwall for his oratorical lectures. These meetings exceeding the bounds of reasonable political discussion, the Government instituted prosecutions, and the Forum ceased to exist. On the ministerial interference, October 1794, Mr. Ackermann was enabled to secure the lease of the premises, and the room was again used as a school for drawing. In 1796 the entire business was removed to 101 Strand. The drawing academy seems to have flourished; and in 1806 there were three masters engaged for figures, landscape, and architecture, and some eighty pupils were resorting to the school, when the requirements of the founder's business, as a publisher, printseller, and dealer in fancy articles, papers, medallions, and artist's materials, had so increased, that the convenience of this room as a warehouse became of more consideration than the continuance of the school.

During the revolutionary era, and when French emigrants were numerous in this country, Mr. Ackermann was one of the first to find a liberal employment for the refugees; it is said that he had seldom less than fifty nobles, priests, and ladies engaged upon screens, card-racks, flower-stands, and other ornamental work.

His inventive faculties and his disposition to take up with new ideas were marked by many improvements he introduced. At the beginning of the century he was one of the first who arrived at a method of waterproofing paper, leather, woollen stuffs, and felted fabrics, in which he obtained for some time considerable traffic; this branch was conducted in a factory he established at Chelsea for the purpose.

He further contrived an apparatus which was at least ingenious, both in theory and intention. To counteract Napoleon's endeavours, by bridling the newspapers, to keep the French nation in complete ignorance, as was actually the case, of events that were disastrous to him, Mr. Ackermann bethought himself of reviving, for the annoyance of the enemy, the use made by the French in 1794-96 of aërostation in _L'Entreprenant_ and the _Télémaque_; and he contrived a simple mechanism which would, every minute, detach thirty printed placards from a packet of three thousand. Three such parcels were attached to balloons thirty-six inches in diameter, made of gold-beater's skin, and committed to the air in the summer of 1807. The success of the experiment was proved at Woolwich in the presence of a Government commission. With a southerly wind the balloons passed over Salisbury and Exeter, and several of the placards, as a proof of the practical working of the machinery, were returned to London from various parts of the country.

Mr. Ackermann was one of the first inhabitants of London who adopted the use of gas as a means of artificial light to his premises.

The establishment of lithography in England was another example of his patient and persevering expenditure of money and time in the introduction and improvement of a novelty. 'He was not content with translating Alois Senefelder's treatise in 1819, but made a journey to the residence of that inventor, in order to exchange the results of their theory and practice before producing in 1822 a _Complete Course_. The business relations between leading artists and Mr. Ackermann enabled him to induce them to touch the lithographic chalk; so in 1817, through Prout and others, the process became an acceptable, or rather a fashionable mode of multiplying drawings; lithography, for want of such advantages, when introduced into this country by Mr. Andréc, of Offenbach, in its original and rude state, had failed to make its way, and all its subsequent success may be attributed to Mr. Ackermann's personal emulation of the advancement it made in Munich.'

In 1813, upon receiving an authentic account from Count Schönfeld of the misery produced in Germany by Napoleon's wars, particularly in Saxony, culminating in engagements at Leipzig (during the 'five days' October 15-19, 1813), 'Mr. Ackermann temporarily abandoned the oversight of his own multifarious occupations, in order to exert all his strength in procuring aid for the sufferers. With the help of the Duke of Sussex, he formed a committee in Westminster and in the City; the first obtained a Parliamentary grant of 100,000_l._, and the second furnished a larger sum in private contributions. This was the occasion on which the use of Whitehall Chapel was granted for a musical performance in aid of the subscription. For two years, Mr. Ackermann undertook the task of corresponding with the German committees for distributing these sums, examining into the urgency of the appeals for help, and apportioning the fund. The members of "The Westminster Association for the further relief of the sufferers by the war in Germany," were anxious to commemorate their sense of the pains, prudence, and probity Mr. Ackermann had displayed, by presenting him with a testimonial in silver; this costly acknowledgment, together with a vote of thanks proposed to be inscribed on parchment in gold, he had the modesty to decline, begging that all thanks for his services might be comprised in a few autograph lines from the Archbishop of Canterbury.'

In his business relations we are told, 'the discretion which he exercised in choosing his subordinates, and the liberal manner in which he repaid their services, enabled him to produce several books which deserve the notice of all those who know how to appreciate the merit of these illustrated works in colour, relatively to others of similar pretension, both of that time and of the present day.

'A long list might be formed by enumerating the literary, musical, and scientific men of more or less eminence, who appeared as his coadjutors, and who enjoyed his intimacy. Several of them owed to him a helping hand, either in their first efforts or in their declining fortunes. To the end of his days he retained a strongly-marked German pronunciation of the English language, which gave additional flavour to the banters and jests uttered in his fine bass voice; but he wrote in English with great purity on matters of affection and business long before middle life.

'From early in 1813, every Wednesday evening in March and April was given to a reception, half a conversazione and half a family party, in his large room, which then, as at other times, served as an exhibition of English and foreign books, maps, prints, woodcuts, lithographs, drawings, paintings, and other works of art and ornament, besides the leading Continental periodicals. There on those evenings, by annual invitation,[20] amateurs, artists, and authors were sure to find people whom they knew, or wanted to know. Many an introduction grew to an acquaintance; and the value of such evenings to foreigners was often gratefully acknowledged by travellers, who, with any distinction in art or literature, were welcome without any other introduction.

'His active assiduity and his spirited enterprise were suspended by a weakness of sight, commencing from his charitable exertions in 1814, which made his repose at Camberwell, and afterwards at Ivy Lodge in the Fulham Road, first a matter of prudence, and later on of necessity. In the spring of 1830 he experienced an attack of paralysis, and never recovered sufficiently to exert his intelligence in business. He removed for a change of air to Finchley, but a second stroke produced a gradual decline of strength in the honourable old man; and March 30, 1834, saw an end put to the hearty kindness, constant hospitality, and warm beneficence which had been inseparable from his unquestioned integrity. He was interred on April 9 in the family grave, in the burial-ground of St. Clement Danes.'[21]

* * * * *

The little that remains to be recorded of the Caricaturist is best expressed by the kindly writer, a friend of nearly half a century's standing, who contributed an obituary notice of the artist to the _Gentleman's Magazine_ (June 1827).

It is not generally known that, although a considerable proportion of Rowlandson's humorous political and social etchings are in many instances strongly tinctured by an absence of refinement in taste, and are roughly executed--the means simply of tiding over some pressing necessity, or providing funds for further relaxations--his early works were characterised by painstaking and conscientious application; and his studies from the human figure at the Royal Academy were scarcely inferior to the productions of Mortimer, then the most admired and proficient among the Academic professors.

From the versatility of his talent, the fecundity of his imagination, his command of composition, in which he equalled the greatest masters, the grace and elegance with which he could design his groups, added to the almost miraculous despatch with which he supplied his patrons with perfectly original compositions upon every subject, it was a theme of regret at his decease, that he had not sufficiently valued his reputation, to which it has been suspected he was thoroughly indifferent. It was universally admitted in his own days that, had he pursued the course of art steadily, he might have become one of the foremost and most celebrated historical painters of the English school. His style, which was purely his own, was unquestionably original. His bold, fluent, and spiritedly turned outlines were thrown off with easy dexterity, with his famous reed-pen, in a tint composed of vermilion and Indian-ink, the general effect was rapidly washed in, so as to produce an effective _chiaro-oscuro_, and the whole was coloured in tender tints with a most harmonious arrangement of colour.

His manner, though slight in almost every instance, is highly effective; and it is known on indubitable authority that the presidents of the Royal Academy, Sir Joshua Reynolds and Sir Benjamin West, whose manners were most foreign to those of the Caricaturist, individually asserted their conviction that many of his drawings would have done honour to Rubens, or to the most esteemed masters of design of the old schools.

For many years he was too indolent to seek new employment, and his kind friend, and it may be added with justice, his best adviser, Mr. Ackermann, the respected and leading publisher of Rowlandson's period, supplied him with ample subjects for the exercise of his talent. The many works which his pencil illustrated are existing evidence of this, and books containing impressions from Rowlandson's etchings continue to fetch high prices, and are industriously sought after. Many suggestions for plates to enliven new editions of _The Travels of Dr. Syntax_, _The Dance of Death_, _The Dance of Life_, and other well-known productions of the pen of the prolific Coombe, the Defoe of the eighteenth century, will remain esteemed and lasting mementoes of his graphic humour.

It should be repeated that his reputation had never reached its full maturity in the life-time of Mr. Ackermann, his friend, patron, and publisher. The inimitable water-colour drawings of Rowlandson, of which he had a large collection, were justly appreciated by connoisseurs, and his folios have often been viewed with admiration and delight by the many professional artists and amateurs who frequented Mr. Ackermann's conversazioni at his library at the old house in the Strand. No artist of the past or present school, perhaps, ever expressed so much as Rowlandson, with so little effort, or with so evident an appearance of the absence of labour.

The artist's remains were followed to the grave by the two friends of his youth, John Bannister and Henry Angelo, and his constant friend and liberal employer, Rudolph Ackermann.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] The preparation of _The Works of James Gillray, the Caricaturist, with a Story of his Life and Times_ (376 pp. quarto), was in itself no bagatelle; and three working years of steady application were invested in its pages and illustrations.

[2] The Editor, among other special subjects, of a descriptive catalogue of the works of George Cruikshank. 3 volumes quarto. Published by Messrs. Bell and Sons, 1871. (Only 130 copies printed.)

[3] _Vauxhall Gardens_ (503), _An Italian Family_ (462), _The Serpentine River_ (511); _vide_ Catalogue of the Royal Academy (1784), Fourteenth Exhibition.

[4] In the early Exhibition Catalogues, studies in water-colours, where the primitive sepia or Indian ink was supplemented by other tints, are described as STAINED DRAWINGS.

[5] The artist's name frequently occurs upon his plates as his own publisher, and, as might be anticipated, the prints produced under this sponsorship are invariably of his most popular description.

[6] The original sketches of this series were recently bequeathed to the South Kensington Museum, where they are attributed to Bunbury: a contemporary advertisement (1786) announces the designs to the forthcoming _Journal of a Tour in the Hebrides_ to be furnished by Collings and Rowlandson.

[7] A somewhat different version of the origin of this caricature is given in the _Memoirs of John Bannister, Comedian_, by John Adolphus (8vo., 1839): 'His friend and fellow-student Rowlandson was, unhappily, much addicted to games of chance, and Bannister used to remonstrate with him on the subject with amiable but ineffectual perseverance. On one of these occasions John Raffaelle Smith, the engraver, admonished Bannister on the inutility of his efforts. "You may spare your sympathy and advice also," he said; "for that Tom Rowlandson was, is, and ever will be incurable." The artist, in merry revenge, brought out a print called _Hawks and a Pigeon_, in which Smith, endowed for the occasion with a most villanous aspect, the very personation of a sharper and a knave, exhibited conspicuously.

'By way of reprisal, Smith produced a well-known and popular engraving, in which Rowlandson and some others are represented as confederates in fleecing an innocent. Bannister lent his aid in forming the group, and, putting on for the occasion a face from which all appearance of sense was effectually banished, sat for the young dupe. Parsons on seeing the production said: "Why, Jack! you are the last of your fraternity that I should have selected for the model of a flat. Why, when you were a little Cupid in the green-room, Kitty Clive, who was not apt to mince matters, used to say you looked as innocent as a little sucking devil."'

[8] This was written in 1830.

[9] A correspondent to _Notes and Queries_, who signs S. R. (4th Series, IV., September 11, 1869, p. 224), while alluding to this drawing, also mentions having seen a portrait of George III. by Rowlandson, which possessed great art merit; and adds: 'I possess early drawings by him, executed with a fine quill pen, and most tenderly tinted, which are highly refined in style, excellent in drawing, and in elegance and grace may be classed with the productions of Stothard.'

[10] According to the Royal Academy Catalogue, Rowlandson removed from 133 Wardour Street to 50 Poland Street, Pantheon, between 1786 and 1787.

[11] The drawing of the four ruffians is now, we understand, in the possession of Mr. William Bates, B.A., &c., and forms one of an interesting collection of caricatures by Rowlandson held by that admirer of his works. _See Account of Original Drawings in the Appendix._

[12] The main characteristics of this subject belong to _Careless Attention_, 1789: a dashing son of Mars taking the place of the black flunkey.

[13] Mr. Henry G. Bohn, the well-known publisher, informed the writer that at one period he had a collection of drawings by Rowlandson, chiefly fine Continental views, such as the Series in Holland and Flanders, made for the artist's patron Mitchell the banker, numbering nearly a hundred.

[14] Sitting magistrate at Bow Street.

[15] See Boswell (the Elder). _Twenty Caricatures by Collings and Rowlandson in Illustration of Boswell's 'Journal of a Tour in the Hebrides, 1786._'

[16] These cross-readings obtained such celebrity that the inventor was tempted to distribute amongst his friends specimens, which 'he had been at the expense of printing upon small single sheets.' We quote a couple of examples from a slip, which was in the possession of J. T. (_Antiquity_) Smith's family, and, being considered something of a curiosity, is given in the pages of _Nollekens and his Times_.

Sunday night many noble families were alarmed--
By the constable of the watch, who apprehended them at cards.

Wanted, to take care of an elderly gentlewoman--
An active young man, just come from the country.

[17] Caleb Whiteford was Vice-President of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce.

[18] _Somerset House Gazette and Literary Museum_, No. 26. By Ephraim Hardcastle (W. H. Pyne). 1824.

[19] The reader may observe a similar chariot in the Museum at South Kensington; it might readily be mistaken for the one referred to above, and is of the most elaborate character. It is described as 'built for the Lord Chancellor of Ireland (1780), the panels painted by W. Hamilton, R.A.'

[20] According to Mr. Jerdan, the first _missive printed on stone_ (drawings having been printed by this process some while before), was an invitation to one of Ackermann's conversaziones: 'Mr. Ackermann has the honour to inclose a card of invitation to a Literary Meeting at his Library, on Tuesday, the 20th February, at seven o'clock in the evening; and on the same evening in each week, until the 10th day of April inclusive.

[21] _Notes and Queries_, August 1869. See article signed W. P.

1774, 1780-81.

_June 8, 1774._ _A Rotation Office._--A chief magistrate is seated at a table, and three justices, with their hats on, and sticks in their hands, are seated beside him. To the left of the chief is the justice's clerk; and behind the bench is a placard, 'Robbery and Murder. Reward of Justice.'

_June 8, 1774._ _The Village Doctor._ Published by H. Humphrey, Bond Street.--This print appears to have been about the earliest recognised specimen of Rowlandson's handiwork. The plate has a wash of aquatint, all over it, and the etching is free and bold. As an early work it evinces certain carefulness and discrimination, which promised well for the artist's future if he persevered in the same direction. The suggestion of the subject, according to the initials, is due to Henry Wigstead, whose name appears on numerous fine examples of Rowlandson's skill. The village practitioner, outside whose cottage is the sign of a gilt pestle, has evidently been disturbed under false pretences on previous occasions, and now a real client has knocked him up, for the benefit of his professional services, his indignation is bursting forth on the wrong object.

_1780. Scene at Streatham. Bozzy and Piozzi._

BOZZY.

Who, mad'ning with an anecdotic itch,
Hath said that Johnson called his mother, witch?

MADAME PIOZZI.

Who, from Macdonald's rage to save his snout,
Cut twenty lines of defamation out?

The scene of this animated dispute is the Library at the house lately inhabited by the departed Thrale. Mrs. Piozzi (late Mrs. Thrale) and Boswell are in high dudgeon over their respective memoirs of their idol, the defunct Doctor Johnson. In both of their 'Lives' the trifling weaknesses of the great Lexicographer are made ridiculous, under the misguiding impulse of the 'anecdotic itch.' The rival biographers are bouncing and stamping about the study, in a fine rage, ready to pull one another to pieces. The learned lady's second husband, the stout musician, Piozzi, with his violoncello by his side, is seated in an easy chair, regarding the disputants with consternation, while deprecating violence.

Peter Pindar's lines on the subject are appended to the plate; an additional couplet or two are worth borrowing:--

BOZZY.

How could your folly tell, so void of truth,
That miserable story of the youth
Who, in your book, of Dr. Johnson begs,
Most seriously, to know if _cats laid eggs_?

MADAME PIOZZI.

_Who_ told of Mrs. Montague the lie--
So palpable a falsehood? Bozzy, fy!

* * * * *

BOZZY.

_Who_ would have said a word about Sam's wig;
Or told the story of the _peas_ and _pig_?

MADAME PIOZZI.

_Now_ for a _saint_ upon us you would palm him;
First _murder_ the poor man, and then _embalm him_!

BOZZY.

His character so shockingly you handle--
You've sunk your _comet_ to a _farthing candle_.

_March 1780._ _Special Pleading._ Published by A. McKenzie, 101 Berwick Street, Soho.

Lovely Nymph, assuage my anguish,
At your feet behold a swain,
Begs you will not let him languish;
One kind word will ease his pain.

A stout knight (possibly a lineal descendant of Sir John Falstaff) is the _Pleader_; he is lounging on an elegant sofa of the early Georgian period, making inane love to a pretty girl placed by his side, dressed in a picturesque Watteau-like costume, with a quilted petticoat and a quaint mob-cap added; the amorous old trifler's hand is on the slim waist of the beauty; the damsel is standing up in a negligently easy pose, while she is toying with her antiquated admirer and waving his enormous and elaborately curled double-tailed wig in the air. A dog is at her side. The drawing of this picture is unusually graceful and easy, even for Rowlandson; this is most noticeable in respect to the pretty coquette. The etching is spirited and brilliant, and the background and accessories are delicately aquatinted, to bear out the resemblance to a sketch in Indian ink.

_July 18, 1780._ _The School of Eloquence._--The interior of a fashionable debating society of the period; the members are the quality of both sexes. The design was doubtless admirably worked out in the original drawing; but it has suffered at the hands of an unknown etcher. Published by Archibald Robertson, Savile Passage.

_September 1, 1780._ _Italian Affectation._ _Pacchierolti._--The figures of two distinguished foreigners, as imported into this country over a century ago, for the delectation of the _cognoscendi_ and the leaders of high taste. A pair of overdressed Italian artists, extravagantly posturing to one another in some operatic _scena_. A spindle-shanked signor, hat in hand, is pouring out his ardour to an affected and modish _prima donna_ in a love-making situation, outrageously burlesqued.

_September 18, 1780._ _Sir Samuel House._--The full-length portrait of 'Honest Sam House,' famous in his day for his zeal and patriotism, the enthusiastic supporter of Fox, a character familiar to all the electors of Westminster, as an indefatigable canvasser on behalf of the 'Friend of the People;' during the contests for Westminster, Sam kept open house for the friends of the Whig chief, and entertained all the notabilities of the Whig party. Summer and winter, Sam dressed in a clean nankeen jacket and breeches, and brightly polished shoes and buckles; he wore no covering, neither hat nor wig, on a perfectly bald head; his waistcoat was constantly open in all seasons, and he wore remarkably white linen; his legs were generally bare, but when covered, it was always in stockings of the finest silk.

In Rowlandson's spirited portrait old Sam is standing in his sturdy fashion, clean, shaven, and bright, in his eccentric costume, with his shining round poll, a pot with his cipher in one hand, and his pipe in the other. In the rear is shown his public-house, with smokers and customers indicated at the windows. This portrait, which seems to have been deservedly popular, was published with variations. In one impression (printed in sepia), is a barrel inscribed '_No Pope_,' and in another, '_Fox for ever! Huzza!_' The second plate is crossed with very fine stipple, and an old man is introduced in the background with his hand on his bald head.

The prints are signed with the initials T. R. and J. J., and were published by Thomas Rowlandson and J. Jones at 103 Wardour Street. Under some impressions is the inscription, 'The first man who jumped off Westminster Bridge.'

SAM HOUSE.

Not more the great Sam House, with horror, star'd,
By mob affronted to the very beard;
Whose impudence (enough to damn a jail)
Snatch'd from his waving hand his fox's tail,
And stuff'd it, 'midst his thunders of applause,
Full in the centre of Sam's gaping jaws;
That, forcing down his patriotic throat,
Of 'Fox and freedom!' stopp'd the glorious note.

_November 13, 1780._ _Naval Triumph, or Favours Conferred._--Admiral Keppel is riding in triumph through the gates of Greenwich Hospital, mounted on the shoulders of a veteran salt, on crutches, who has lost both an eye and his legs in the service of his country. The Admiral, with his riband and star, is condescending to give a helping hand to another naval commander, who is dancing in merrily by his side.

The shake of the hand with such goodness and grace
Shows who is in favour, and who is in place.
At Greenwich the invalids poor will proclaim
What at present we do not think proper to name.

Poor disabled sailors are limping off on their crutches, disgusted with the results of their sacrifices and the miserable rewards for their services; while a drummer is drubbing in their favoured and well-requited commanders. The composition of this subject is particularly good, and it is worthy of remark that, in the coloured impressions of this print, the tinting is arranged with considerable success; and although, as is the general practice with caricatures, none but the most vivid colours are employed, the arrangement is so good and delicate that the general effect is as harmonious and artistic as in the original drawings by Rowlandson's own hand.

_June 30, 1781._ _The Power of Reflection._ Published by J. Harris, Sweeting's Alley, Cornhill.--This print is executed in mezzotint by J. Jones, whose name appears several times in connection with that of Rowlandson, on the series of plates which we shall particularise in the progress of this work. The contrast is very marked between the Duenna, the lines of whose face have fallen in under the assaults of time, and the demoiselle, in all the pride of youth and attractiveness, aided by the bravery of a fashionable and _piquante_ toilette. _The Power of Reflection_ is probably intended to suggest a pictorial pun. While the maiden is absorbed in the pleasing reflection of her own figure as thrown back in the mirror, her senior, with a ponderous and probably serious volume before her, is employing her thoughts on contemplations of a more philosophical description.

_October 28, 1781._ _E O, or the Fashionable Vowels._--It may be noticed, respecting the earlier works of Rowlandson, that his efforts, soon after he left the Academy, were marked with more care and elaboration than his later etchings; while the effects of his training were still fresh in his mind, he evidently took more pains in the direction of finish, and it is particularly in his management of _chiaro-oscuro_ that we detect the superiority of the artistic productions of his first period; although experience alone could give him that special freedom and facility which render his best-known productions remarkable.

In the early and clear impressions of the _E O Table_, and its surroundings, the artist's skill is even more conspicuous than usual in the spirited grouping; the attitudes and expressions of the several gamblers are distinct with individuality and strongly-marked traits of character. Every variety of emotion--cunning, credulity, confidence, anxiety, stolid indifference, scheming, craft, stupidity, hectoring, exaltation, and despair--we find pictured with an ability which surprises us, contrasting as it does with the indifferent caricatures and the dearth of humorous talent in the years which intervened between the death of Hogarth and the appearance of the more ambitious subjects by Gillray and Rowlandson, works executed while the talents of these masters were at their best, and before they had grown careless of their reputation.

The _E O Table_[22] was republished at various dates: in January 1786 it re-appeared with a new title, as _Private Amusement_, and from time to time it was reissued, the date of publication being altered to suit the several occasions.

_E O Tables._--'In the year 1781 there were swarms of E O Tables in different parts of the town, where a poor man with a shilling only might try his luck. They were open to everybody, till at last the Bow Street police began to interfere.'

An attempt was made, at the commencement of 1731, to suppress some of the most considerable gaming-houses in London and the suburbs, particularly one, behind Gray's Inn Walks. The editor of the _St. James's Evening Post_ observed upon this occasion: 'It may be matter of instruction as well as amusement to present our readers with the following list of officers which are established in the most notorious gaming-houses:--

'A _Commissioner_, always a proprietor, who looks in of a night; the
week's account is audited by him and two others of the proprietors.

'A _Director_, who superintends the room.

'An _Operator_, who deals the cards at a cheating game called _Faro_.

'Two _Croupees_, who watch the cards and gather the money for the
bank.

'Two _Puffs_, who have money given them to decoy others to play.

'A _Clerk_, who is a check upon the _Puffs_, to see that they sink
none of the money given them to play with.

'A _Squib_ is a _Puff_ of a lower rank, who serves at half-salary
while he is learning to deal.

'A _Flasher_, to swear how often the bank has been stripped.

'A _Dunner_, who goes about to recover money lost at play.

'A _Waiter_, to fill out wine, snuff candles, and attend in the
gaming-room.

'An _Attorney_, a Newgate solicitor.

'A _Captain_, who is to fight any gentleman that is peevish for
losing his money.

'An _Usher_, who lights gentlemen up and down stairs, and gives the
word to the porter.

'A _Porter_, who is generally a soldier of the Foot Guards.

'An _Orderly-man_, who walks up and down the outside of the door,
to give notice to the porter and alarm the house at the approach of
constables.

'A _Runner_, who is to get intelligence of the Justices meeting.

'Link-boys, watchmen, chairmen, drawers, or others, who bring the
first intelligence of the Justices' meetings, or of the constables
being out--_half-a-guinea_ reward.

'Common-bail, affidavit-men, ruffians, bravoes, _cum multis aliis_.'

_November 27, 1781._ _Brothers of the Whip._ A. Grant, del.: published by H. Humphrey.--In this engraving a good deal of Rowlandson's manner is traceable, and the etching is at least due to his hand. The subject represents a group of four _brothers of the whip_, whose persons and features are marked with that discrimination for character and faculty for grasping individual peculiarities distinctive of the caricaturist. In the background are figured coach-horses, carriages, saddle-horses, grooms, &c., all depicted in his own marked style.

_November 27, 1781._ _Charity Covereth a Multitude of Sins_, published by H. Humphrey.--A dashing young officer is roving, in pursuit of pleasure, in a dangerous vicinity. With a generous hand he is dropping a gold-piece into the hat of a reduced sailor. Two Savoyards, a man with an organ, and a girl with a hurdygurdy are soliciting the contributions of the charitable.

_December 10, 1781._ _The State Watchman Discovered by the Genius of Great Britain Studying Plans for the Reduction of America_, published by J. Jones.--This subject is engraved within a circle, and, in point of execution, it bears more resemblance to Rowlandson's later style; it is not unlike Gillray's work of the same date.

The somnolent Lord North is fast asleep on his sofa, dreaming, according to the caricaturist, of new theories for the recovery of America.

The figure of _Britannia_, with her staff and cap of Liberty, is well designed; she is crying, 'Am I thus protected?' A miniature figure is introduced, who is endeavouring to arrest the sleeper's attention--'Hallo, neighbour! what, are you asleep?' This officious person is, it is believed, intended to represent '_Sir Grey Parole_.'[23]

_No date._ _Bob Derry, of Newmarket._

_No date._ _Luxury._

FOOTNOTES:

[22] From Malcolm's _Manners and Customs of London during the Eighteenth Century_ (1810). 'Mr. Carlton, Deputy Clerk of the Peace, and Clerk to the Justices of Westminster, stated to a Committee of the House of Commons, in 1782, that E O Tables were very numerous; that one house in the parish of St. Anne, Soho, contained five, and that there were more than three hundred in the above parish of St. James's: those were used every day of the week, and servants enticed to them by cards of direction thrown down the areas.'

[23] Lord North's Administration, which had the onus of conducting the American War, was daily growing weaker and losing popularity; it resigned in March of the year following, and the Rockingham Ministry came into office. The first condition of this more liberal Administration had obtained, through the negotiations of Lord Shelburne, the consent of the King to 'peace with the Americans, and the acknowledgment of their independence.' In a later caricature by Gillray, which appeared on the resignation of Lord North--_Banco to the Knave_, April 12, 1782--the figure of Sir Grey Cooper, one of the Treasury Secretaries, is introduced, exclaiming, 'I want a new master.' On this gentleman's chair is the name '_Sir Grey Parole_,' because, it is understood, he usually sat on the left of Lord North on the Treasury Bench; and when that statesman, who trusted to his memory for the principal points elicited in the debates, had been overcome by the constitutional somnolency which was a favourite subject of ridicule with the satirists, the Secretary aroused his chief, and supplied the deficiency of notes by suggesting the thread of argument, or _parole_, as required.

1782-83.

_February 1783._ _Long Sermons and Long Stories are apt to lull the Senses._ Published by W. Humphrey.

1783. _Amputation._ Republished by S. W. Fores, October 17, 1793.

1783 (?). _The Rhedarium, for the Sale of all sorts of Carriages, by Gregory Gigg._--The auctioneer is in his pulpit, employed in knocking down an assortment of vehicles to a small but sufficiently eccentric-looking audience. A gouty individual, propped on crutches, is making a bid for an antiquated kind of cabriolet, which the groom is trotting up for inspection; around are curricles, travelling carriages, and a general assemblage of the machines on wheels representative of the past.

1783. _The Discovery._--A small political print, a parody on Shakespeare's 'Macbeth.' Lord North, who is the principal agent of the 'Witches' Incantation,' is crying:--

Call Fiends and Spectres from the yawning deep.

BURKE.

(_who is among the witches_).

Cast in your mite, each midnight hag;
Fill the Protector's poisoned Bag.

MOTHER WILSON.

Here's old Nick's nose.

JEFFERY.

Here's Devil's dung.

DUNSTAN.

The wind of Boreas,
Belial's tongue,
A Traitor's heart.

SAM HOUSE.

And Gibbets' blocks.
But hold, ye hags, for here comes Fox.