John Leech; his life and work (Volume 2) online

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA

LOS ANGELES















\




JOHN LEECH

jis pfc jinb SEork



JOHN LEECH



is |Cife ant) SStork



BY



WILLIAM POWELL FRITH, R.A.




WITH PORTRAIT AND NUMEROUS ILLUSTRATIONS



IN TWO VOLUMES
VOL. II.



SECOND EDITION



LONDON
RICHARD BENTLEY AND SON

publishers in (Drbinarg to ^jcr Jfctjestg the
1891

[All rights reserved]



/



CONTENTS OF VOL. II.



CHAPTER PAGE

I. " PUNCH " . . . . .1

II. CARTOONS . . . . . 15

in. THE LAWYER'S STORY . . . -35

IV. LOVE OF FIELD SPORTS . . . .40

V. INVENTORS AND ILLUSTRATORS . . -54

VI. "INGOLDSBY LEGENDS " . . . -59

VII. DICKENS AND THACKERAY ON LEECH . . 66

VIII. DEAN HOLE . . . . . . 80

IX. TYPES . . . . . .89

X. LEECH AND HIS PREDECESSORS . . .96

XI. KENNY MEADOWS . . . . .103

XII. "COMIC HISTORY OF ROME" . . . Io6

XIII. PERSONAL ANECDOTES . . . I 1 3

XIV. PERSONAL ANECDOTES CONTINUED . . . IIQ
XV. SPORTING NOVELS . . . . . 130

XVI. THE "BON GAULTIER BALLADS " . . . 137

XVII. SPORTING NOVELS CONTINUED . . -152

XVIII. MICHAEL HALLIDAY AND LEECH . . .163



2066483



CONTENTS



CHAPTER 1'AGE

XIX, THOMAS HOOD AND LEECH .... 182

XX. DR. JOHN BROWN AND LEECH . . 2l8

XXI. AUTOGRAPH-HUNTERS AND OTHERS . . . 22Q

xxii. ARTISTS' LIVES . . . . . 239

XXIII. LEECH EXHIBITION ..... 247

XXIV. MILLAIS AND LEECH ..... 275
XXV. MR H. O. NETHER COTE AND JOHN LEECH . -283



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS



PAGE



THE MARCHIONESS GOING TO EXECUTION . Frontispiece

THE DRUNKEN POST-BOY . . . . .11

" THEY MAY BE OFFICERS, BUT THEY ARE NOT GENTLE-
MEN" . . . . . . 13

JACK ARMSTRONG . . . . . 17

THE JEW AND SKELETON TAILORS . . .29

"I'LL THIN YOUR TOP !" . . . . -37

" GIVE HER HER HEAD, JACK " . . . .42

" OH, IF THIS IS ONE OF THE PLACES CHARLEY SPOKE OF,

I SHALL GO BACK !" . . . . -44

JACK JOHNSON ATTEMPTS TO RESCUE DERVAL . To face p. 57
THE MAID AND THE HEAD OF GENGULPHTJS . . 62

ELOPEMENT OF ROMAN YOUTH WITH SABINE LADIES . 109
ROME SAVED FROM THE GAULS BY GEESE . .Ill

LITTLE JOHN AND RED FRIAR .... 140

LITTLE JOHN AND THE POPISH BULL . .142

GEORGE OF GORBALS . . 149

THE LOVER'S FRIEND AND THE LOVER . . -150



viii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

AFTER AIMING FOR A QUARTER OF AN HOUR, MR. B.

FIRES BOTH HIS BARRELS, AND MISSES ! . J 73

WHAT WIDE REVERSES OF FATE ARE THERE ! .188

MlSS KlLMANSEGG . . . . . . IQI

THE FOREIGN COUNT . . . . 197

THE WEDDING "WILT THOU HAVE THIS WOMAN?" . 202
LOVE AT THE BOARD . . . . .204

HE BROUGHT STRANGE GENTLEMEN HOME TO DlNE . 208
THE TORN WILL . . . . . .212

BEDTIME . . . . . . .216

"HE BLOWS HIS OWN NOSE !" .... 228

THE SEAL .....".. 235

A CYPRESS BRANCH FOR THE TOMB OF JOHN LEECH . 301



JOHN LEECH:

HIS LIFE AND WORK



CHAPTER I.

"PUNCH."

\ IN the year 1841 I exhibited a picture at the
Suffolk Street Gallery, and I recollect accidentally
overhearing fragments of a conversation between
a certain Joe Allen and a brother member of
the Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street.
Allen's picture happened to hang near mine, and we
were both "touching up" our productions. Joe Allen
was the funny man of the society, and, though he
startled me a little, he did not surprise me by a loud
and really good imitation of the peculiar squeak of
Punch.

" Look out, my boy," he said to his friend, " for
the first number. We " (I suppose he was a member
of the first staff) "shall take the town by storm.

VOL. II. 1 8

3
I



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS



I'AGE

AFTER AIMING FOR A QUARTER OF AN HOUR, MR. B.

FIRES BOTH HIS BARRELS, AND MISSES ! < . 173

WHAT WIDE REVERSES OF FATE ARE THERE ! .188

MlSS KlLMANSEGG . . . . . . 1 91

THE FOREIGN COUNT . . . . . 197

THE WEDDING " WILT THOU HAVE THIS WOMAN ?" . 202
LOVE AT THE BOARD . . . . .204

HE BROUGHT STRANGE GENTLEMEN HOME TO DlNE . 208
THE TORN WILL . . . . . .212

BEDTIME ....... 216

"HE BLOWS HIS OWN NOSE !" .... 228

THE SEAL .....".. 235

A CYPRESS BRANCH FOR THE TOMB OF JOHN LEECH . 301



JOHN LEECH:

HIS LIFE AND WORK



CHAPTER I.

"PUNCH."

\ IN the year 1841 I exhibited a picture at the
Suffolk Street Gallery, and I recollect accidentally
overhearing fragments of a conversation between
a certain Joe Allen and a brother member of
the Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street.
Allen's picture happened to hang near mine, and we
were both "touching up" our productions. Joe Allen
was the funny man of the society, and, though he
startled me a little, he did not surprise me by a loud
and really good imitation of the peculiar squeak of
Punch.

" Look out, my boy," he said to his friend, " for
the first number. We " (I suppose he was a member
of the first staff) "shall take the town by storm.

VOL. II. 1 8

3 "
I



2 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

There is no mistake about it. We have so-and-so "
naming some well-known men " for writers ;
Hine, Kenny Meadows, young Leech, and a lot
more first-rate illustrators," etc.

Whether Allen's friend took his advice and bought
the first number of Punch, which appeared in the
following July, I know not ; but I bought a copy,
and remember my disappointment at finding
Leech conspicuous by his absence from the pages.
In the hope of finding him in the second issue, I
went to the shop where I had bought the first. The
shopman met my request for the second number
of Punch, as well as I can recollect, in the following
words :

''What paper, sir? Oh, Pzmch ! Yes, I took a
few of the first ; but it's no go. You see, they billed
it about a good deal " (how well I recollect that
expression!), "so -I wanted to see what it was like.
It won't do ; it's no go."

I have been told that, like most newspapers,
Punch had some difficulty in keeping upon his legs
in his first efforts to move ; but as those elegant
members, so exquisitely drawn by Tenniel, have
supported the famous hunchback for nearly half a
century, there is no need for his friends' anxiety
as to his future movements.



"PUNCH" 3

Though Leech had engaged himself to the then
proprietors of Punch as one of the illustrators of the
paper, it seems strange that his first contribution did
not appear till the 7th of August, and in the fourth
number, and stranger still that its appearance should
have damaged the paper. Under the heading of
" Foreign Affairs," the artist represents groups of
foreigners such as may be seen any day in the
neighbourhood of Leicester Square. The reader is
told in a footnote that the plate does not represent
foreign gentlemen, an unnecessary intimation to any-
one who knows a foreign gentleman.

It is said that this engraving sent down the circu-
lation of Pimch to an alarming point. I confess my
inability to understand this, and would rather
attribute the decadence to some other cause, contem-
porary with the production of " Foreign Affairs."
The drawing is somewhat hard upon the foreign
frequenters of the purlieus of Leicester Square, and
would only have been more acceptable to John Bull
on that account. By Leech's non-appearance in
Punch for many months after " Foreign Affairs "
was published, one is driven to the conclusion that
the managers had little faith in him as an attraction.
The second volume contains very few of Leech's
designs, while it bristles with inferior work.



4 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

My own admiration for Leech's genius, so con-
stantly roused by his works, with which I was
familiar, created a great desire for his acquaintance ;
but being perfectly unknown at that time as an
artist, and knowing none of Leech's friends, I began
to despair of the realization of my wishes, when
accident helped me.

A Scottish painter a Highlander and fierce
Jacobite named Me Ian, who was also an actor
and friend of Macready, to whose theatrical com-
pany he was attached, lived with his wife, an accom-
plished artist, somewhere in the neighbourhood of
Gordon Square. Calling one morning to see Mrs.
Me Ian, I found her in her studio, not, as usual, hard
at work at her own easel, but superintending the
labours of a pupil, who was hard at work at another ;
and the pupil, a tall, slim, and remarkably handsome
young man, was John Leech.

I made some remark about the different method
in which he was employed to that with which he
was familiar. I forget what he was copying some
still life, I think.

" I like painting much better than what I have to
grind at day after day, if I could only do it," said
Leech ; " but it's so confoundedly difficult, you
know, and requires such a lot of patience."



LEECH AS A PAINTER



I fancy I thought his efforts in oil-painting on that
occasion very promising ; but the exigencies of his
position quite prevented the unceasing devotion to
the study of painting which is required before any
success can be assured.

Leech was once heard to say that he would rather
be the painter of a really good picture than the pro-
ducer of any number of the " kind of things " he did.
I, for one, am very thankful that he never did pro-
duce a good picture, for he would have been tempted
to repeat the success, to the loss of numbers of de-
lightful sketches.

Mrs. Me I an appeared to think that Leech would
soon cease to draw for Punch ; indeed, she doubted,
as did many others, that Punch would long succeed
in attracting the public ; and I joined her in the
hope rather hypocritically, I fear that her young
friend would persevere in mastering the difficulty of
the technicalities of oil-painting, and thus place him-
self amongst the best painters of the country. Leech
had taken many lessons from Mrs. Me I an, and that
lady seemed convinced that he had but to persevere
and the difficulties would fall before him, as, to use
her own figure, the walls of Jericho fell before the
sound of the trumpet. Ah, perseverance ! " there's
the rub."



6 JOHN LEECH : HIS LIFE AND WORK

From the time of my introduction to Leech I
became gradually very intimate with him, and the
more I knew of his nature, the more I became con-
vinced that he totally lacked the disposition for con-
tinuous, steady, mechanical industry necessary for
success in painting. He constantly ridiculed the
care spent on the details in pictures ; finish, in his
opinion, was so much waste of time. " When you
can see what a man intends to convey in his picture,
you have got all he wants, and all you ought to wish
for ; all elaboration of an idea after the idea is com-
prehensible is so much waste of time " this was his
constant cry, a little contradicted by the fact that he
as constantly tried to paint his ideas, but in a fitful
and perfunctory manner.

I can imagine the enthusiasm that was lighted up
in Leech upon his first sight of one of our annual
exhibitions. After a visit to one of them he was
known to have gone home, and getting out easel,
canvas, and colours, he would set to work in a fury
of enthusiasm, which evaporated at the encounter of
the first technical difficulty. He used to take
pleasure in watching my own attempts at painting,
and I remember on one occasion, when I was
finishing a rather elaborate piece of work, he
said :



LEECH AS A PAINTER



" Ah, my Frith, I wasn't created to do that sort
of thing ! I should never have patience for it."

He was right, and, happily for the world, he
became convinced that, even if he had the power to
fully "carry out" as we call it one of his drawings
into a completed oil picture, the time required would
have deprived us of immortal sketches ; and though
he undoubtedly "left off where difficulties begin "
as I once heard a painter, who was exasperated at
Leech's sneers at his manipulation, say to him
he has left behind him work which will continue
to delight succeeding generations so long as wit,
humour, character and beauty are appreciated that
is to say, so long as human nature endures.

I feel I ought to apologize for what I am about to
tell, because it has nothing to do with my hero beyond
the fact of its occurrence having taken place on the
memorable morning when I first had the happiness
of meeting him.

I have said that Mclan was a Scotchman, a High
lander of the clan Mclan, and a worshipper of
Charles Stuart, whose usual cognomen, the Pre-
tender, I should have been sorry to have used in
the presence of my Jacobite friend. As Leech left
the room to go to his " grind," as he called his wood-
work, Mclan entered, and we were discussing Leech's



8 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

prospects when Mclan's servant an old, hard-
featured Scotchwoman hurried into the room, and,
in an awe-stricken voice, said :

" Sir sir, here's the Preences !"

The words were scarcely out of her mouth, when
two gentlemen entered tall, rather distinguished,
but melancholy, looking young men. No sooner did
Mclan and his wife catch sight of them, than, without
a word, they both dropped upon their knees, and
while the lady kissed the hands of one of the gentle-
men, her husband paid a similar attention to the
hands of the other. I was holding my hat, and I
remember I dropped it in my astonishment, for I
was not aware that I was in the presence of the last
of the Stuarts; or that these two young men claimed
to be the great-grandsons of the hero of Culloden,
and amongst a large section of Scotchmen, and not
a few Englishmen, had their claim allowed. Anyone
curious about this delusion can read for himself how
it was dispelled, but the men themselves implicitly
believed in their royal descent. They are both dead
now. I once saw one of them again at a garden-
party at Chelsea Hospital, where his likeness to the
Stuarts was the talk of the company. It was certainly
striking.

It is a melancholy task to me to try to recall the



SUBJECTS SUGGESTED



social scenes in which Leech so often figured sad
indeed to think how few of his friends, more inti-
mate with him than I, now remain amongst us !
Though Leech very seldom illustrated any ideas but
his own, I can recall an example or two to the con-
trary ; and still oftener have I seen, by the sparkle
of his eye, that something occurring in conversation
had suggested a "cut."

I think it was Dickens who said that a big
cock-pheasant rising in covert under one's nose was
like a firework let off in that locality. Elsewhere
we have Leech's rendering of the idea.

When cards, or some other way of getting rid
of time after dinner, had been proposed, I have
heard Leech say :

"Oh, bother cards ! Let us have conversation."

And talk it was, often good talk ; but Leech was
more a listener than a partaker. Not that he could
not talk, and admirably ; but he was always on the
watch for subjects which he hoped something in
conversation might suggest.

Leech's mental condition was certainly deeply
tinged with the sadness so common to men who
possess wit and humour to a high degree. He
sang well, but his songs were all of a melancholy
character, and very difficult to get from him. In-



io JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

deed, the only one I can remember, and that but
partially, was something about " King Death," with
allusions to a beverage called "coal-black wine,"
which that potentate was supposed to drink. As I
write I can see the dear fellow's melancholy face,
with his eyes cast up to the ceiling, where Dickens
said the song was written in ghostly characters
which none but Leech could read.

I may give another example rare, no doubt of
Leech's having used a suggested subject. Many
years ago my brother-in-law, long since dead, took
a party of friends to the Derby. They drove, or,
rather, were driven, down to Epsom, the usual post-
boy being recommended as a careful, steady driver
a character very desirable, considering the crowded
state of the road, more especially on the return
journey. The post-boy quite realized all that was
said of him as the party went to the course, but
when the time came for departure he was found,
after considerable searching, to be as nearly dead-
drunk as possible. What was to be done ? The
man could scarcely stand ; his driving was, of course,
out of the question.

"Well," said my brother-in-law to his friends, " if
you will trust yourselves to me, I will ride and drive
you back ;" and, after tying the post-boy on to the



12 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

carriage, where he soon fell fast asleep, my brother
mounted and drove his party safely home.

This I thought a good subject for Leech, and
I suggested it to him. He smiled faintly, and said
not a word. Very nearly a year after I had told
him of the incident, as I was walking with him one
day, he said :

"By the way, Frith, are you going to use the
subject you mentioned to me of the drunken post-
boy and your brother-in-law ?"

" I ? No," said I ; "it's more in your way than
mine."

" Then I'll do it next week."

He was as good as his word.

Nothing could be less like my brother-in-law than
the delightful "swell" who is driving home some
charming women, who are, however, left to our
imagination ; and as to the post-boy, the artist has
awoke him to some purpose. What could surpass
that drunken smile ?

Long, long ago there might have been seen on
the sands at Ramsgate two stuffed figures, the size
of life, intended to represent soldiers ; for they were
bedecked with the red coat, cap, and trousers of the
ordinary private. The clothes were simply stuffed
out into something resembling human forms, but the



14 JOHN LEECH : HIS LIFE AND WORK

effect, as may be supposed, was ludicrous in the
extreme. They were the work of a professor of
archery, who supplied his customers with bows and
arrows, with which the archer showed how seldom
he could hit the target made by the two soldiers.
Leech and I watched the shooting for some time,
till the little sketch-book was produced, and Leech
made a rapid drawing of the two soldiers, afterwards
to figure in an inimitable cut in Pimch.

A young lady is seen bathing with her aunt, whose
attention she is directing to the two stuffed figures.
The aunt is short-sighted, and the girl is wickedly
pretending that the figures are live officers, watching
the bathers. The aunt says, " They may be officers,
but they are not gentlemen," etc.

I am sure that Leech never used a model, in the
sense that the model is commonly used by artists,
for the thousands of human beings made immortal
by his genius; but that he made numberless sketches
for backgrounds, detail of dresses, landscapes, fore-
grounds, and bits of character caught from uncon-
scious sitters, there can be no doubt. How
wonderful was the memory, how sensitive the
mental organization, that could retain and reproduce
every variety of type, every variety of beauty and
character !



[ '5]



CHAPTER II.

CARTOONS.

As I fancy I am one of the few of Leech's friends
who have figured personally in Punch, I may be
excused for the egotism of the following :

About the year 1852 I began the first of a series
of pictures from modern life, then quite a novelty in
the hands of anyone who could paint tolerably. When
the picture which was called " Many Happy Returns
of the Day " (a birthday subject, in which the health
of the little heroine of the day is being drunk)
was finished, Leech came to see it, and expressed
his satisfaction on finding an artist who could leave
what he called " mouldy costumes " for the habits
and manners of every-day life. As he was speaking,
two of my brother artists, whose practice was on
different lines to mine, called, and saw my picture
for the first time. They both looked attentively at
it, and the longer they looked judging from their



1 6 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

faces the less they liked it. I shall not forget
Leech's expression when I gave him a sort of ques-
tioning look as to the correctness of his judgment.

"Well, what do you think of the picture?' said
Leech to one of the painters.

" Well, really I don't know what to think," was
the reply.

It never occurred to me that the incident was one
likely to serve my friend for a drawing ; lively was
my surprise, and great was my pleasure, therefore,
when I saw myself " immortalized for ever," as my
old master used to say, in the pages of Punch.

In this drawing may be seen a striking proof of
the avoidance of personality which always distin-
guished Leech. I cannot see my own back, but I
have been assured by those who have had that
privilege that there is a dashing, not to say aristo-
cratic, character about Jack Armstrong to which I
have no claim. While Messrs. Potter and Feeble
are quite curiously unlike the persons they are sup-
posed to represent neither of my high art friends
wore beards yet the attitudes of the men were
exactly reproduced ; while the background, with
armour, oak-cabinet, etc., for which no sketch was
taken, was a perfectly correct representation of my
old painting-room.




VOL. II.



1 8 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

In one of my autumnal holidays Leech stayed a
few days with me. He had not been well ; picking
up "a thousand stones in a thousand hours," to
which he likened his unceasing work, had begun to
tell upon him ; and in reply to my warning, that, for
his own sake, to say nothing of the interests of
Punch, he should husband his strength for, I added,
"If anything happened to you, who are ' the back-
bone of Piinch' what would become of the paper ?"-
I can see his smile as I hear him say, " Don't talk
such rubbish ! backbone of Punch, indeed ! Why,
bless your heart! there isn't a fellow at work upon the
paper that doesn't think that of himself, and with
about as much right and reason as I should. Pimch
would get on well enough without me, or any of
those who think themselves of such importance."

Among the many admirable qualities that adorned
the character of John Leech his modesty was re-
markable ; he thought little or nothing of his own
work. " Talk of drawing, my dear fellow," he once
said to me, "what is my drawing compared to
Tenniel's ? Look at the way that chap can draw a
boot ; why, I couldn't do it to save my life."

Though Leech in his modesty chose to ignore the
fact, it was no less a fact that for nearly a quarter
of a century he was the leading spirit of Piinch.



LEECH'S IMPECUNIOSITY 19

"Think," said Thackeray, "what a number of
Punch would be without a drawing by Leech in
it!"

In addition to the wonderful political cartoons,
Leech contributed more than three thousand illus-
trations of life and manners to the paper; and it is
said I know not how truly that he received from
first to last more than ,40,000 for his contributions
to Punch alone. If he did, what did he do with the
money ? That he was in no way extravagant I
know, and that he was frequently in dire straits after
his connection with Punch I also know. Let my
reader imagine what pecuniary trouble must have
been to this man, whose mind was racked by the
constantly recurring demands for intellectual work
such as Leech supplied week after week, and often
day after day! Did he lend or give away his hardly-
earned money ? Did he accept bills for so-called
friends, and find that he had to meet them ? Leech
was one of the most open-hearted and generous of
men, an easy victim to a plausible tale of real or
fictitious distress. I suppose we shall never know
why a man who made so large an income, who had
not a large family to absorb much of it, and who
never lived expensively, should have died compara-
tively poor. Let me leave these painful considera-



20 JOHN LEECH: HIS LIFE AND WORK

tions and "pursue the triumph and partake the
gale " of the artist's glorious career.

Between Cruikshank and Leech there existed
little sympathy and less intimacy. The extravagant
caricature that pervades so much of Cruikshank's
work, and from which Leech was entirely free,
blinded him a little to the great merit of Cruik-
shank's serious work. I was very intimate with
" Immortal George," as he was familiarly called, and
I was much surprised by the coolness with which he
received my enthusiastic praise of Leech.

" Yes, yes," said George, " very clever. The new
school, you see. Public always taken with novelty."

For the larger part of fifty-seven years Cruik-
shank told me he had been in the habit of drinking
wine and spirits, often a great deal too much of
both ; but from his fifty-seventh birthday to his
seventy-fifth, when he lectured me for taking a
single glass of sherry, he had devoted himself to
strict teetotalism, the interests of which he advocated
by tongue, brush, and etching-needle.

Unlike Leech, Cruikshank was a painter, and the
last years of his life were spent in painting a huge
picture, or, rather, a series of pictures upon one