Chapter XXVIII Gillray’s Caricatures on Social Life — Thomas Rowlandson — His Early Life — He Becomes a Caricaturist — His Style and Works — His Drawings — The Cruikshanks
Gillray was, beyond all others, the great political caricaturist of his age. His works form a complete history of the greater and more important portion of the reign of George III. He appears to have had less taste for general caricature, and his caricatures on social life are less numerous, and with a few exceptions less important, than those which were called forth by political events. The exceptions are chiefly satires on individual characters, which are marked by the same bold style which is displayed in his political attacks. Some of his caricatures on the extravagant costume of the time, and on its more prominent vices, such as the rage for gambling, are also fine, but his social sketches generally are much inferior to his other works.
This, however, was not the case with his contemporary, Thomas Rowlandson, who doubtlessly stands second to Gillray, and may, in some respects, be considered his equal. Rowlandson was born in the Old Jewry in London, the year before that of the birth of Gillray, in the July of 1756. His father was a city merchant, who had the means to give him a good education, but embarking rashly in some unsuccessful speculations, he fell into reduced circumstances, and the son had to depend upon the liberality of a relative. His uncle, Thomas Rowlandson, after whom probably he was named, had married a French lady, a Mademoiselle Chatelier, who was now a widow, residing in Paris, with what would be considered in that capital a handsome fortune, and she appears to have been attached to her English nephew, and supplied him rather freely with money. Young Rowlandson had shown at an early age great talent for drawing, with an especial turn for satire. As a schoolboy, he covered the margins of his books with caricatures upon his master and upon his fellow-scholars, and at the age of sixteen he was admitted a student in the Royal Academy in London, then in its infancy. But he did not profit immediately by this admission, for his aunt invited him to Paris, where he began and followed his studies in art with great success, and was remarked for the skill with which he drew the human body. His studies from nature, while in Paris, are said to have been remarkably fine. Nor did his taste for satirical design fail him, for it was one of his greatest amusements to caricature the numerous individuals, and groups of individuals, who must in that age have presented objects of ridicule to a lively Englishman. During this time his aunt died, leaving him all her property, consisting of about £7,000 in money, and a considerable amount in plate and other objects. The sudden possession of so much money proved a misfortune to young Rowlandson. He appears to have had an early love for gaiety, and he now yielded to all the temptations to vice held out by the French metropolis, and especially to an uncontrollable passion for gambling, through which he soon dissipated his fortune.
Before this, however, had been effected, Rowlandson, after having resided in Paris about two years, returned to London, and continued his studies in the Royal Academy. But he appears for some years to have given himself up entirely to his dissipated habits, and to have worked only at intervals, when he was driven to it by the want of money. We are told by one who was intimate with him, that, when reduced to this condition, he used to exclaim, holding up his pencil, “I have been playing the fool, but here is my resource!” and he would then produce—with extraordinary rapidity—caricatures enough to supply his momentary wants. Most of Rowlandson’s earlier productions were published anonymously, but here and there, among large collections, we meet with a print, which, by companion of the style with that of his earliest known works, we can hardly hesitate in ascribing to him; and from these it would appear that he had begun with political caricature, because, perhaps, at that period of great agitation, it was most called for, and, therefore, most profitable. Three of the earliest of the political caricatures thus ascribed to Rowlandson belong to the year 1784, when he was twenty-eight years of age, and relate to the dissolution of parliament in that year, the result of which was the establishment of William Pitt in power. The first, published on the 11th of March, is entitled “The Champion of the People.” Fox is represented under this title, armed with the sword of Justice and the shield of Truth, combating the many-headed hydra, its mouths respectively breathing forth “Tyranny,” “Assumed Prerogative,” “Despotism,” “Oppression,” “Secret Influence,” “Scotch Politics,” “Duplicity,” and “Corruption.” Some of these heads are already cut off. The Dutchman, Frenchman, and other foreign enemies are seen in the background, dancing round the standard of “Sedition.” Fox is supported by numerous bodies of English and Irishmen, the English shouting, “While he protects us, we will support him.” The Irish, “He gave us a free trade and all we asked; he shall have our firm support.” Natives of India, in allusion to his unsuccessful India Bill, kneel by his side and pray for his success. The second of these caricatures was published on the 26th of March, and is entitled “The State Auction.” Pitt is the auctioneer, and is represented as knocking down with the hammer of “prerogative” all the valuable articles of the constitution. The clerk is his colleague, Henry Dundas, who holds up a weighty lot, entitled, “Lot 1. The Rights of the People.” Pitt calls to him, “Show the lot this way, Harry—a’going, a’going—speak quick, or it’s gone—hold up the lot, ye Dund-ass!” The clerk replies in his Scottish accent, “I can hould it na higher, sir.” The Whig members, under the title of the “chosen representers,” are leaving the auction room in discouragement, with reflections in their mouths, such as, “Adieu to Liberty!” “Despair not!” “Now or never!” While Fox stands firm in the cause, and exclaims—“I am determined to bid with spirit for Lot 1; he shall pay dear for it that outbids me!” Pitt’s Tory supporters are ranged under the auctioneer, and are called the “hereditary virtuosis;” and their leader, who appears to be the lord chancellor, addresses them in the words, “Mind not the nonsensical biddings of those common fellows.” Dundas remarks, “We shall get the supplies by this sale.” The third of these caricatures is dated on the 31st of March, when the elections had commenced, and is entitled, “The Hanoverian Horse and British Lion—a Scene in a new Play, lately acted in Westminster, with distinguished applause. Act 2nd, Scene last.” At the back of the picture stands the vacant throne, with the intimation, “We shall resume our situation here at pleasure, Leo Rex.” In front, the Hanoverian horse, unbridled, and without saddle, neighs “pre-ro-ro-ro-ro-rogative,” and is trampling on the safeguard of the constitution, while it kicks out violently the “faithful commons” (alluding to the recent dissolution of parliament). Pitt, on the back of the horse, cries, “Bravo!—go it again!—I love to ride a mettled steed; send the vagabonds packing!” Fox appears on the other side of the picture, mounted on the British lion, and holding a whip and bridle in his hand. He says to Pitt, “Prithee, Billy, dismount before ye get a fall, and let some abler jockey take your seat;” and the lion observes, indignantly, but with gravity, “If this horse is not tamed, he will soon be absolute king of our forest.”
If these prints are correctly ascribed to Rowlandson, we see him here fairly entered in the lists of political caricature, and siding with Fox and the Whig party. He displays the same boldness in attacking the king and his ministers which was displayed by Gillray—a boldness that probably did much towards preserving the liberties of the country from what was no doubt a resolute attempt to trample upon them, at a time when caricature formed a very powerful weapon. Before this time, however, Rowlandson’s pencil had become practised in those burlesque pictures of social life for which he became afterwards so celebrated. At first he seems to have published his designs under fictitious names, and one now before me, entitled “The Tythe Pig,” bears the early date of 1786, with the name of “Wigstead,” no doubt an assumed one, which is found on some others of his early prints. It represents the country parson, in his own parlour, receiving the tribute of the tithe pig from an interesting looking farmer’s wife. The name of Rowlandson, with the date 1792, is attached to a very clever and humorous etching which is now also before me, entitled “Cold Broth and Calamity,” and representing a party of skaters, who have fallen in a heap upon the ice, which is breaking under their weight. It bears the name of Fores as publisher. From this time, and especially toward the close of the century, Rowlandson’s caricatures on social life became very numerous, and they are so well known that it becomes unnecessary, nor indeed would it be easy, to select a few examples which would illustrate all his characteristic excellencies. In prints published by Fores at the beginning of 1794, the address of the publisher is followed by the words, “where may be had all Rowlandson’s works,” which shows how great was his reputation as a caricaturist at that time. It may be stated briefly that he was distinguished by a remarkable versatility of talent, by a great fecundity of imagination, and by a skill in grouping quite equal to that of Gillray, and with a singular ease in forming his groups of a great number of figures. Among those of his contemporaries who spoke of him with the highest praise were sir Joshua Reynolds and Benjamin West. It has been remarked, too, that no artist ever possessed the power of Rowlandson of expressing so much with so little effort. We trace a great difference in style between Rowlandson’s earlier and his later works; although there is a general identity of character which cannot be mistaken. The figures in the former show a taste for grace and elegance that is rare in his later works, and we find a delicacy of beauty in his females which he appears afterwards to have entirely laid aside. An example of his earlier style in depicting female faces is furnished by the pretty farmer’s wife, in the print of “The Tythe Pig,” just alluded to; and I may quote as another example, an etching published on the 1st of January, 1794, under the title of “English Curiosity; or, the foreigner stared out of countenance.” An individual, in a foreign costume, is seated in the front row of the boxes of a theatre, probably intended for the opera, where he has become the object of curiosity of the whole audience, and all eyes are eagerly directed upon him. The faces of the men are rather coarsely grotesque, but those of the ladies, two of which are given in our cut No. 230, possess a considerable degree of refinement. He appears, however, to have been naturally a man of no real refinement, who easily gave himself up to low and vulgar tastes, and, as his caricature became more exaggerated and coarse, his females became less and less graceful, until his model of female beauty appears to have been represented by something like a fat oyster-woman. Our cut No. 231, taken from a print in the possession of Mr. Fairholt, entitled, “The Trumpet and Bassoon,” presents a good example of Rowlandson’s broad humour, and of his favourite models of the human face. We can almost fancy we hear the different tones of this brace of snorers.
A good example of Rowlandson’s grotesques of the human figure is given in our cut No. 232, taken from a print published on the 1st of January, 1796, under the title of “Anything will do for an Officer.” People complained of the mean appearance of the officers in our armies, who obtained their rank, it was pretended, by favour and purchase rather than by merit; and this caricature is explained by an inscription beneath, which informs us how “Some school-boys, who were playing at soldiers, found one of their number so ill-made, and so much under size, that he would have disfigured the whole body if put into the ranks. ‘What shall we do with him?’ asked one. ‘Do with him?’ says another, ‘why make an officer of him.’” This plate is inscribed with his name, “Rowlandson fecit.”
At this time Rowlandson still continued to work for Fores, but before the end of the century we find him working for Ackermann, of the Strand, who continued to be his friend and employer during the rest of his life, and is said to have helped him generously in many difficulties. In these, indeed, he was continually involved by his dissipation and thoughtlessness. Ackermann not only employed him in etching the drawings of other caricaturists, especially of Bunbury, but in furnishing illustrations to books, such as the several series of Dr. Syntax, the “New Dance of Death,” and others. Rowlandson’s illustrations to editions of the older standard novels, such as “Tom Jones,” are remarkably clever. In transferring the works of other caricaturists to the copper, Rowlandson was in the habit of giving his own style to them to such a degree, that nobody would suspect that they were not his own, if the name of the designer were not attached to them. I have given one example of this in a former chapter, and another very curious one is furnished by a print now before me, entitled “Anglers of 1811,” which bears only the name “H. Bunbury del.,” but which is in every particular a perfect example of the style of Rowlandson. During the latter part of his life Rowlandson amused himself with making an immense number of drawings which were never engraved, but many of which have been preserved and are still found scattered through the portfolios of collectors. These are generally better finished than his etchings, and are all more or less burlesque. Our cut No. 233 is taken from one of these drawings, in the possession of Mr. Fairholt; it represents a party of antiquaries engaged in important excavations. No doubt the figures were intended for well-known archæologists of the day.
Thomas Rowlandson died in poverty, in lodgings in the Adelphi, on the 22nd of April, 1827.
Among the most active caricaturists of the beginning of the present century we must not overlook Isaac Cruikshank, even if it were only because the name has become so celebrated in that of his more talented son. Isaac’s caricatures, too, were equal to those of any of his contemporaries, after Gillray and Rowlandson. One of the earliest examples which I have seen bearing the well-known initials, I. C., was published on the 10th of March, 1794, the year in which George Cruikshank was born, and probably, therefore, when Isaac was quite a young man. It is entitled “A Republican Belle,” and is an evident imitation of Gillray. In another, dated the 1st of November, 1795, Pitt is represented as “The Royal Extinguisher,” putting out the flame of “Sedition.” Isaac Cruikshank published many prints anonymously, and among the numerous caricatures of the latter end of the last century we meet with many which have no name attached to them, but which resemble so exactly his known style, that we can hardly hesitate in ascribing them to him. It will be remarked that in his acknowledged works he caricatures the opposition; but perhaps, like other caricaturists of his time, he worked privately for anybody who would pay him, and was as willing to work against the government as for it, for most of the prints which betray their author only by their style are caricatures on Pitt and his measures. Such is the group given in our cut No. 234, which was published on the 15th of August, 1797, at a time when there were loud complaints against the burthen of taxation. It is entitled “Billy’s Raree-Show; or, John Bull En-lighten’d,” and represents Pitt, in the character of a showman, exhibiting to John Bull, and picking his pocket while his attention is occupied with the show. Pitt, in a true showman’s style, says to his victim, “Now, pray lend your attention to the enchanting prospect before you,—this is the prospect of peace—only observe what a busy scene presents itself—the ports are filled with shipping, the quays loaded with merchandise, riches are flowing in from every quarter—this prospect alone is worth all the money you have got about you.” Accordingly, the showman abstracts the same money from his pocket, while John Bull, unconscious of the theft exclaims with surprise, “Mayhap it may, master showman, but I canna zee ony thing like what you mentions,—I zees nothing but a woide plain, with some mountains and molehills upon’t—as sure as a gun, it must be all behoind one of those!” The flag of the show is inscribed, “Licensed by authority, Billy Hum’s grand exhibition of moving mechanism; or, deception of the senses.”
In a caricature with the initials of I. C., and published on the 20th of June, 1797, Fox is represented as “The Watchman of the State,” ironically, of course, for he is betraying the truth which he had ostentatiously assumed, and absenting himself at the moment when his agents are putting the match to the train they have laid to blow up the constitution. Yet Cruikshank’s caricatures on the Irish union were rather opposed to ministers. One of these, published on the 20th of June, 1800, is full of humour. It is entitled “A Flight across the Herring Pond.” England and Ireland are separated by a rough sea, over which a crowd of Irish “patriots” are flying, allured by the prospect of honours and rewards. On the Irish shore, a few wretched natives, with a baby and a dog, are in an attitude of prayer, expostulating with the fugitives,—“Och, och! do not leave us—consider your old house, it will look like a big wallnut-shell without a kernel.” On the English shore, Pitt is holding open the “Imperial Pouch,” and welcoming them,—“Come on, my little fellows, there’s plenty of room for you all—the budget is not half full.” Inside the “pouch” appears a host of men covered with honours and dignities, one of whom says to the foremost of the Irish candidates for favour, “Very snug and convenient, brother, I allure you.” Behind Pitt, Dundas, seated on a pile of public offices united in his person, calls out to the immigrants, “If you’ve ony consciences at a’, here’s enugh to satisfy ye a’.” A portion of this clever caricature is represented in our cut No. 235.
There is a rare caricature on the subject of the Irish union, which exhibits a little of the style of Isaac Cruikshank, and a copy of which is in the possession of Mr. Fairholt. From this I have taken merely the group which forms our cut No. 236. It is a long print, dated on the 1st of January, 1800, and is entitled “The Triumphal entry of the Union into London.” Pitt, with a paper entitled “Irish Freedom” in his pocket, is carrying off the young lady (Ireland) by force, with her natural accompaniment, a keg of whisky. The lord chancellor of Ireland (lord Clare) sits on the horse and performs the part of fiddler. In advance of this group are a long rabble of radicals, Irishman, &c, while close behind comes Grattan, carried in a sedan-chair, and earnestly appealing to the lady, “Ierne, Ierne! my sweet maid, listen not to him—he’s a false, flattering, gay deceiver.” Still farther in the rear follows St. Patrick, riding on a bull, with a sack of potatoes for his saddle, and playing on the Irish harp. An Irishman expostulates in the following words—“Ah, long life to your holy reverence’s memory, why will you lave your own nate little kingdom, and go to another where they will tink no more of you then they would of an old brogue? Shure, of all the saints in the red-letter calendar, we give you the preference! och hone! och hone!” Another Irishman pulls the bull by the tail, with the lament, “Ah, masther, honey, why will you be after leaving us? What will become of poor Shelagh and all of us, when you are gone?” It is a regular Irish case of abduction.
The last example I shall give of the caricatures of Isaac Cruikshank is the copy of one entitled “The Farthing Rushlight,” which, I need hardly say, is a parody on the subject of a well-known song. The rushlight is the poor old king, George, whom the prince of Wales and his Whig associates, Fox, Sheridan, and others, are labouring in vain to blow out. The latest caricature I possess, bearing the initials of Isaac Cruikshank, was published by Fores, on the 19th of April, 1810, and is entitled, “The Last Grand Ministerial Expedition (on the Street, Piccadilly).” The subject is the riot on the arrest of sir Francis Burdett, and it shows that Cruikshank was at this time caricaturing on the radical side in politics.
Isaac Cruikshank left two sons who became distinguished as caricaturists, George, already mentioned, and Robert. George Cruikshank, who is still amongst us, has raised caricature in art to perhaps the highest degree of excellence it has yet reached. He began as a political caricaturist, in imitation of his father Isaac—in fact the two brothers are understood to have worked jointly with their father before they engraved on their own account. I have in my own possession two of his earliest works of this class, published by Fores, of Piccadilly, and dated respectively the 3rd and the 19th of March, 1815. George was then under twenty-one years of age. The first of these prints is a caricature on the restrictions laid upon the trade in corn, and is entitled “The Blessings of Peace, or, the Curse of the Corn Bill.” A foreign boat has arrived, laden with corn at a low price—one of the foreign traders holds out a sample and says, “Here is de best for 50s.” A group of bloated aristocrats and landholders stand on the shore, with a closed storehouse, filled with corn behind them; the foremost, warning the boat away with his hand, replies to the merchant, “We won’t have it at any price—we are determined to keep up our own to 80s., and if the poor can’t buy at that price, why they must starve. We love money too well to lower our rents again; the income tax is taken off.” One of his companions exclaims, “No, no, we won’t have it at all.” A third adds, “Ay, ay, let ’em starve, and be d— to ’em.” Upon this another of the foreign merchants cries, “By gar, if they will not have it at all, we must throw it overboard!” and a sailor is carrying this alternative into execution by emptying a sack into the sea. Another group stands near the closed storehouse—it consists of a poor Englishman, his wife with an infant in the arms, and two ragged children, a boy and a girl. The father is made to say, “No, no, masters, I’ll not starve; but quit my native country, where the poor are crushed by those they labour to support, and retire to one more hospitable, and where the arts of the rich do not interpose to defeat the providence of God.” The corn bill was passed in the spring of 1815, and was the cause of much popular agitation and rioting. The second of these caricatures, on the same subject, is entitled, “The Scale of Justice reversed,” and represents the rich exulting over the disappearance of the tax on property, while the poor are crushed under the weight of taxes which bore only upon them. These two caricatures present unmistakable traces of the peculiarities of style of George Cruikshank, but not as yet fully developed.
George Cruikshank rose into great celebrity and popularity as a political caricaturist by his illustrations to the pamphlets of William Houe, such as “The Political House that Jack built,” “The Political Showman at Home,” and others upon the trial of queen Caroline; but this sort of work suited the taste of the public at that time, and not that of the artist, which lay in another direction. The ambition of George Cruikshank was to draw what Hogarth called moral comedies, pictures of society carried through a series of acts and scenes, always pointed with some great moral; and it must be confessed that he has, through a long career, succeeded admirably. He possesses more of the true spirit of Hogarth than any other artist since Hogarth’s time, with greater skill in drawing. He possesses, even to a greater degree than Hogarth himself, that admirable talent of filling a picture with an immense number of figures, every one telling a part of the story, without which, however minute, the whole picture would seem to us incomplete. The picture of the “Camp at Vinegar Hill,” and one or two other illustrations to Maxwell’s “History of the Irish Rebellion in 1798,” are equal, if not superior, to anything ever produced by Hogarth or by Callot.
The name of George Cruikshank forms a worthy conclusion to the “History of Caricature and Grotesque.” He is the last representative of the great school of caricaturists formed during the reign of George III. Though there can hardly be said to be a school at the present day, yet our modern artists in this field have been all formed more or less under his influence; and it must not be forgotten that we owe to that influence, and to his example, to a great degree, the cleansing of this branch of art from the objectionable characteristics of which I have on more than one occasion been obliged to speak. May he still live long among the friends who not only admire him for his talents, but love him for his kindly and genial spirit; and none among them love and admire him more sincerely than the author of the present volume.
FINIS
Post Office Orders payable
at Piccadilly Circus.
[December, 1874.
Notes
1 Plin. Hist. Nat., lib. xxxv. c. 8.
2 Panoska Terracotten des Museums Berlin, pl. lxi. p. 154.
3 Given in Panofka, “Antiques du Cabinet Pourtalès,” pl. x.
4 Arnobius (contra Gentes), lib. iv. p. 150. Carmen malum conscribere, quo fama alterius coinquinatur et vita, decemviralibus scitis evadere noluistis impune: ac ne vestras aures convitio aliquis petulantiore pulsaret, de atrocibus formulas constituistis injuriis. Soli dii sunt apud vos superi inhonorati, contemtibiles, viles: in quos jus est vobis datum quæ quisque voluerit dicere turpitudinem, jacere quas libido confinxerit atque excogitaverit formas.
5 Pliny, Hist. Nat., lib. xxxv. c. 40.
6 Pliny, Hist. Nat., lib. xxxv. c. 40.
7 Engraved by Ch. Lenormant et J. de Witt, “Elite des Monuments Céramographiques,” pl. xciv.
8 These intaglios are engraved in the Museum Florentinum of Gorius, vol. ii. pl. 30. On one of them the figures are reversed.
9 It is said to have received its Latin name from this circumstance, persona, a personando. See Aulus Gellius, Noct. Att., lib. v. c. 7.
10 “Simulacrum... quod opponitur faciei ad terrendos parvos.” (Ugutio, ap. Ducange, v. Masca.)
11 See, for allusions to the private employment of these performances, Pliny, Epist. i. 15, and ix. 36.
12 Quintilian says, “Satira quidem tota nostra est.” De Instit. Orator., lib. x. c. 1.
13 ἐπί των καπηλίων. Problem. Aristotelic. Sec. x. 7.
14 On this subject, see my “History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments,” p. 65. The dancing bear appears to have been a favourite performer among the Germans at a very early period.
15 Per totam noctem cantabantur hic nefaria et a cantatoribus saltabatur. Augustini Serm. 311, part v.
16 Noctes pervigiles cum ebrietate, scurrilitate, vel canticis. See the Capitulary in Labbei Concil., vol. v.
17 Ut populi.....saltationibus et turpibus invigilant canticis.
18 The reader is referred, for further information on this subject, to my “History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments,” pp. 33-39.
19 This curious Latin poem was printed by Grimm and Schmeller, in their Lateinische Gedichte des x. und xi. Jh., p. 129.
20 On the character of the nuns among the Anglo-Saxons, and indeed of the inmates of the monastic houses generally, I would refer my readers to the excellent and interesting volume by Mr. John Thrupp, “The Anglo-Saxon Home: a History of the Domestic Institutions and Customs of England from the fifth to the eleventh century.” London, 1862.
21 These will be found in M. Edélestand du Méril’s Poésies Populaires Latines antérieures au douzième siècle, pp. 275, 276.
22 This, and the metrical story next referred to, were printed in the “Altdeutsche Blätter,” edited by Moriz Haupt and Heinrich Hoffmann, vol. i. pp. 390, 392, to whom I communicated them from a manuscript in the University Library at Cambridge.
23 The text of this singular composition, with a full account of the various forms in which it was published, will be found in M. du Méril’s “Poésies Populaires Latines antérieures au douzième siècle,” p. 193.
24 “Formam quandam villosam, hispidam, et hirsutam, adeoque enormiter deformem.” Girald. Camb., Itiner. Camb., lib. i. c. 5.
25 An engraving of this scene, modernised in character, is given in Nichols’s “Leicestershire,” vol. i. plate 43.
26 The Latin text of this and some others of the fables of Odo de Cirington will be found in my “Selection of Latin Stories,” pp. 50-52, 55-58, and 80.
27 See the dissertation by M. Paulin Paris, published in his nice popular modern abridgment of the French romance, published in 1861, under the title “Les Aventures de Maître Renart et d’Ysengrin son compère.” On the debated question of the origin of the Romance, see the learned and able work by Jonckbloet, 8vo., Groningue, 1863.
28 “Insultationes, clamores, sonos, et alios tumultus, in secundis et tertiis quorundam nuptiis, quos charivarium vulgo appellant, propter multa et gravia incommoda, prohibemus sub pœna excommunitationis.”—Ducange, v. Charivarium.
29 Cotgrave’s Dictionarie, v. Charivaris.
30 r. Llewellynn Jewitt, in his excellent publication, the Reliquary, for October, 1862, has given an interesting paper on the encaustic tiles found on this occasion, and on the conventual house to which they belonged.
31 See an interesting little book on this subject by M. Ed. de la Quérière, entitled “Recherches sur les Enseignes des Maisons Particulières,” 8vo., Rouen, 1852, from which both the above examples are taken.
32 See my “Popular Treatises on Science written during the Middle Ages,” p. 107.
33 Alexander Neckam, De Naturis Rerum, lib. ii. c. 129.
34 See Girald. Cambr., Topog. Hiberniæ, dist. ii. cc. 21, 22; and the Itinerary of Wales, lib. ii. c. 11.
35 “Uti me consuesse tragœdi syrmate, histrionis crotalone ad trieterica orgia, aut mimi centunculo.”—Apuleius, Apolog.
36 See before, p. 41 of the present volume.
37 See examples of these illuminations in my “History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments,” pp. 34, 35, 37, 65.
38 People in the middle ages were so fully conscious of the identity of the mediæval jougleur with the Roman mimus, that the Latin writers often use mimus to signify a jougleur, and the one is interpreted by the others in the vocabularies. Thus, in Latin-English vocabularies of the fifteenth century, we have— Hic joculator, Hic mimus, } Anglice jogulour.
39 In a volume entitled “Lateinische Gedichte des x. und xi. Jh.” 8vo. Göttingen, 1838.
40 Many of the Fabliaux have been printed, but the two principal collections, and to which I shall chiefly refer in the text, are those of Barbazan, re-edited and much enlarged by Méon, 4 vols. 8vo., 1808, and of Méon, 2 vols. 8vo., 1823.
41 A collection of these short Latin stories was edited by the author of the present work, in a volume printed for the Percy Society in 1842.
42 In the mediæval Latin, the word goliardia was introduced to express the profession of the goliard, and the verb goliardizare, to signify the practice of it.
43 “Item, præcipimus ut omnes sacerdotes non permittant trutannos et alios vagos scholares, aut goliardos, cantare versus super Sanctus et Angelus Dei in missis,” etc.—Concil. Trevir., an. 1227, ap. Marten. et Durand. Ampliss. Coll., vii. col. 117.
44 “Item, præcipimus quod clerici non sint joculatores, goliardi, seu bufones.”—Stat. Synod. Caduacensis, Ruthenensis, et Tutelensis Eccles. ap. Martene, Thes. Anecd., iv. col. 727.
45 “Clerici... si in goliardia vel histrionatu per annum fuerint.”—Ib. col. 729. In one of the editions of this statute it is added, “after they have been warned three times.”
46 “Clerici ribaldi, maxime qui vulgo dicuntur de famila Goliæ.”—Concil. Sen. ap. Concil., tom. ix. p. 578.
47 See my “Poems of Walter Mapes,” p. 70.
48 The Latin Poems commonly attributed to Walter Mapes, collected and edited by Thomas Wright, Esq., 4to., London, 1841.
49 “Anecdota Literaria; a Collection of Short Poems in English, Latin, and French, illustrative of the Literature and History of England in the Thirteenth Century.” Edited by Thomas Wright, Esq. 8vo., London, 1844.
50 In my edition I have collated no less than sixteen copies which occur among the MSS. in the British Museum, and in the libraries at Oxford and Cambridge, and there are, no doubt, many more.
51 Poems attributed to Walter Mapes, p. 73. The stanzas here quoted, with some others, were afterwards made up into a drinking song, which was rather popular in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
52 “Gedichte des Mittelalters auf König Friedrich I. den Staufar, und aus seiner so wie der nächstfolgenden Zeit,” 4to. Separate copies of this work were printed off and distributed among mediæval scholars.
53 “Carmina Burana. Lateinische und Deutsche Lieder und Gedichte einer Handschrift des XIII. Jahrhunderts aus Benedictbeurn auf der K. Bibliothek zu München.” 8vo. Stuttgart, 1847.
54 “Early Mysteries and other Latin Poems of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries,” edited by Thomas Wright, Esq. 8vo. London, 1838.
55 Introduction, p. xl.
56 “Reliquiæ Antiquæ. Scraps from Ancient Manuscripts, illustrating chiefly Early English Literature and the English Language.” Edited by Thomas Wright, Esq., and J. O. Halliwell, Esq. 2 vols. 8vo. Vol. i., London, 1841; vol. ii., 1843.
57 “Achille Jubinal, Jongleurs et Trouvères.” 8vo., Paris, 1835, p. 34; and “Nouveau Recueil de Contes, Dits, Fabliaux,” &c 8vo., Paris, 1842. Vol. ii. p. 208. In the first instance M. Jubinal has given to this little poem the title Resveries, in the second, Fatrasies.
58 “Songs and Carols, now first printed from a Manuscript of the Fifteenth Century.” Edited by Thomas Wright, Esq. 8vo., London, 1847, p. 2.
59 Both these poems are printed in my “Early Mysteries, and other Latin Poems of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries.” 8vo., London, 1838.
60 “Anecdota Literaria,” p. 49.
61 “Reliquæ Antiquæ,” vol. ii. p. 230.
62 I have published from the original manuscripts the mass of the political poetry composed in England during the middle ages in my three volumes—“The Political Songs of England, from the Reign of John to that of Edward II.” 4to., London, 1839 (issued by the Camden Society); and “Political Poems and Songs relating to English History, composed during the Period from the Accession of Edward III. to that of Richard III.” 8vo., vol i., London, 1859; vol. ii., 1861 (published by the Treasury, under the direction of the Master of the Rolls.)
63 “Receuil de Chants Historiques Français depuis le xii^e. jusqu’au xviii^e. Siècle, par Leroux de Lincy.... Première Série, xii^e., xiii^e., xiv^e, et xv^e., Siècles.” 8vo., Paris, 1841.
64 “A Poem on the Times of Edward III., from a MS. preserved in the Library of St. Peter’s College, Cambridge.” Edited by the Rev. C. Hardwick. 8vo. London, 1849. (One of the publications of the Percy Society.)
65 “The Vision and the Creed of Piers Ploughman;” with Notes and a Glossary by Thomas Wright. 2 vols. 12mo. London, 1842. Second and revised edition, 2 vols. 12mo. London, 1856.
66 “Charlemagne, an Anglo-Norman Poem of the Twelfth Century, now first published, by Francisque Michel,” 12mo., 8vo., London, 1836.
67 “Geschichte der Hofnarren, von Karl Friedrich Flögel,” 8vo. Liegnitz und Leipzig, 1789.
68 The words of this charter, as given by Rigollot, are:—“Joannes, D G., etc. Sciatis nos dedisse et præsenti charta confirmasse Willelmo Picol, follo nostro, Fontem Ossanæ, cum omnibus pertinenciis suis, habendum et tenendum sibi et hæredibus suis, faciendo inde nobis annuatim servitium unius folli quoad vixerit; et post ejus decessum hæredes sui eam tenebunt, et per servitium unius paris calcarium deauratorum nobis annuatim reddendo. Quare volumus et firmiter præcipimus quod prædictius Piculphus et hæredes sui habeant et teneant in perpetuum, bene et in pace, libere et quiete, prædictam terram.”—Rigollot, Monnaies inconnues des Evêques des Innocens, etc., 8vo., Paris, 1837.
69 For the drawings of these interesting carvings from the Cornish churches, I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. J. T. Blight, the author of an extremely pleasing and useful guide to the beauties of a well-known district of Cornwall, entitled “A Week at the Land’s End.”
70 “A festis follorum ubi baculus accipitur omnino abstineatur.... Idem fortius monachis et monialibus prohibemus.”
71 On the subject of all these burlesques and popular feasts and ceremonies, the reader may consult Flögel’s “Geschichte des Grotesk-Komischen,” of which a new and enlarged edition has recently been given by Dr. Friedrich W. Ebeling, 8vo., Leipzig, 1862. Much interesting information on the subject was collected by Du Tilliot, in his “Memoires pour servir à l’Histoire de la Fête des Fous,” 8vo., Lausanne, 1751. See also Rigollot, in the work quoted above, and a popular article on the same subject will be found in my “Archæological Album.”
72 “Monnaies inconnues des Evêques des Innocens, des Fous,” &c., Paris, 1837.
73 This earliest known version is in German verse, and was printed in 1515. An English version, in prose, was printed in 1620, and is reprinted in Thoms’s “Collection of Early Prose Romances.”
74 The title of this English translation is, “Here beginneht a merye Jest of a man that was called Howleglas, and of many marveylous thinges and jestes that he dyd in his lyfe, in Eastlande, and in many other places.” It was printed by Coplande, supposed about 1520. An edition of Eulenspiegel in English, by Mr. Kenneth Mackenzie, has recently been published by Messrs. Trübner & Co., of Paternoster Row.
75 It was reprinted by Von der Hagen, in a little volume entitled “Narrenbuch; herausgegeben durch Friedrich Heinrich von der Hagen.” 12mo., Halle, 1811.
76 I am obliged to pass over this part of the subject very rapidly. For the history of that remarkable book, the “Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles,” I would refer the reader to the preface to my own edition, “Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, publiées d’après le seul manuscrit connu, avec Introduction et Notes, par M. Thomas Wright.” 2 vols, 12mo., Paris, 1858.
77 A neat and useful edition of these two jest-books, with the other most curious books of the same class, published during the Elizabethan period, has recently been published in two volumes, by Mr. W. C. Hazlitt.
78 “Infinitus jam erat numerus qui victum ex Lutheranis libris quæritantes, in speciem bibliopolarum longe lateque per Germaniæ provincias vagabantur.”—Eck., p. 58.
79 Several editions of the writings of Hrotsvitha, texts and translations, have been published of late years both in Germany and in France, of which I may point out the following as most useful and complete—“Théatre de Hrotsvitha, Religieuse Allemande du x^e siècle....par Charles Magnin,” 8vo., Paris, 1845; “Hrotsvithæ Gandeshemensis, virginis et monialis Germanicæ, gente Saxonica ortæ, Comœdias sex, ad fidem codicis Emmeranensis typis expressas edidit.... J. Benedixen,” 16mo., Lubecæ, 1857; “Die Werke der Hrotsvitha: Herausgegeben von Dr. K. A. Barack,” 8vo., Nürnberg, 1858.
80 See p. 191 of the present volume.
81 This singular composition was published with notes by M. de Montaiglon, in a Parisian journal entitled, “L’Amateur de Livres,” in 1849, under the title of “Fragment d’un Dialogue Latin du ix^e siècle entre Terence et un Bouffon.” A few separate copies were printed, of which I possess one.
82 To judge by the number of copies found in manuscripts, especially of the “Geta,” these dramatic poems must have enjoyed considerable popularity. The “Geta” and the “Querulus” were published in a volume entitled, “Vitalis Blesensis Amphitryon et Aulularia Eclogæ. Edidit Fridericus Osannus, Professor Gisensis,” 8vo., Darmstadt, 1836. The “Geta” and the “Babio” are included in my “Early Mysteries, and other Latin Poems of the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries.”
83 “Hilarii Versus et Ludi,” 8vo., Paris, 1835. Edited by M. Champollion Figeac.
84 “Interdum ludi fiunt in ecclesiis theatrales,” &c—Decret Gregorii, lib. iii. tit. i.
85 “Item non permittant sacerdotes ludos theatrales fieri in ecclesia et alios ludos inhonestos.”
86 “Juniores fratres in Heresburg sacram habuere comœdiam de Josepho vendito et exalto, quod vero reliqui ordinis nostri prælati male interpretati sunt.”—Leibn., Script. Brunsv. tom. ii. p. 311.
87 The acts of this synod of Worms are printed in Harzheim, tom. iv. p. 258.
88 The editions of the three principal collections of English mysteries are—1. “The Towneley Mysteries,” 8vo., London, 1836, published by the Surtees Society; 2. “Ludus Coventriæ: a Collection of Mysteries, formerly represented at Coventry on the Feast of Corpus Christi,” edited by James Orchard Halliwell, Esq., 8vo., London, 1841, published by the Shakespeare Society; 3. “The Chester Plays: a Collection of Mysteries founded upon Scriptural Subjects, and formerly represented by the Trades of Chester at Whitsuntide,” edited by Thomas Wright, Esq., 2 vols. 8vo., London, 1843 and 1847, published by the Shakespeare Society.
89 “Hic transit Noe cum familia sua pro navi, quo exeunte, locum interludii subintret statim Lameth, conductus ab adolescente, et dicens,” &c.
90 The most remarkable collection of these early farces, sotties, and moralities yet known, was found accidentally in 1845, and is now in the British Museum. These were all edited in Paris as the first three volumes of a work in ten, entitled “Ancien Théatre François, ou Collection des Ouvrages dramatiques les plus remarquable depuis les Mystères jusqu’à Corneille, publié... par M. Viollet le Duc,” 12mo., Paris, 1854. It is right to state that these three volumes were edited, not by M. Viollet le Duc, but by a scholar better known for his learning in the older French literature, M. Anatole de Montaiglon.
91 This is the date fixed by Meaume, in his excellent work on Callot, entitled “Recherches sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de Jacques Callot,” 2 tom. 8vo., 1860.
92 Meaume appears to be doubtful of the meaning of this word; a friend has pointed out to me the correction. It was the title of a song, so called because the burden was an imitation of the crowing of a cock, the singer mimicking also the action of the bird. When Bacchus, in Redi’s “Bacco in Toscana,” is beginning to feel the exhilarating effects of his critical investigation of the Tuscan wines, he calls upon Ariadne to sing to him “sulla mandola la Cucurucù,” “on the mandola the Cucurucu.” A note fully explains the word as we have stated it—“Canzone cosi detta, perchè in esse si replica molte volte la voce del gallo; e cantandola si fanno atti e moti simili a quegli di esso gallo.”
93 The materials for the history of Della Bella and his works, will be found in a carefully compiled volume, by C. A. Jombert, entitled, “Essai d’un Catalogue de l’Oeuvre d’Etienne de la Bella.” 8vo., Paris, 1772.
94 “Pasquillorum Tomi duo.” Eleutheropoli, MDXLIIII.
95 Pasquil and Pasquin became, during the latter part of the sixteenth and the whole of the seventeenth centuries, a well-known name in French and English literature. In English popular literature he was turned into a jester, and a book was published in 1604 under the title “Pasquil’s Jests; with the Merriments of Mother Bunch. Wittie, pleasant, and delightfull.”
96 The great authority on the history of Macaronic literature is my excellent friend Monsieur Octave Delepierre, and I will simply refer the reader to his two valuable publications, “Macaronéana, ou Mélanges de Littérature Macaronique des differents Peuples de l’Europe,” 8vo., Paris, 1852; and “Macaronéana,” 4to., 1863; the latter printed for the Philobiblon Club.
97 This style differs entirely from the macaronic. It consists merely in using the words of the Latin language with the forms and construction of the vulgar tongue, as illustrated by the directions of the professor who, lecturing in the schools, was interrupted by the entrance of a dog, and shouted out to the doorkeeper, Verte canem ex, meaning thereby that he should “turn the dog out.” It was perhaps from this, or some similar occurrence, that this barbarous Latin gained the name of dog-Latin. The French call it Latin de cuisine.
98 A cheap and convenient edition of the “Cymbalum Mundi,” edited by the Bibliophile Jacob (Paul Lacroix), was published in Paris in 1841. I may here state that similar editions of the principal French satirists of the sixteenth century have been printed during the last twenty-five years.
99 i.e., was drunk.
100 Knightsbridge, as the principal entrance to London from the west, was full of inns.
101 The method of engraving called mezzotinto was very generally adopted in England in the earlier part of the last century for prints and caricatures. It was continued to rather a late period by the publishing house of Carrington Bowles.
102 It was translated into English by Richard Haydocke, under the title of “The Artes of Curious Paintinge, Carvinge, Buildinge,” fol. 1598. This is one of the earliest works on art in the English language.
103 His death is usually placed, but erroneously, in 1732.
104 Sandby etched landscapes on steel, and in aquatinta, the latter by a method peculiarly his own, besides painting in oil and opaque colours. But his fame rests mainly on being the founder of the English school of water-colour painting, since he was the first to show the capability of that material to produce finished pictures, and to lead the way to the perfection in effect and colour to which that branch of art has since attained.
105 In the library of the British Museum there is a collection of John Kay’s works bound in two volumes quarto, with a title and table of contents in manuscript, but whether it is one of a few copies intended for publication, or whether it is merely the collection of some individual, I am not prepared to say. It contains 343 plates, which are stated to be all Kay’s works down to the year 1813, when this collection was made. “The Craft in Danger” is not among them. I have before me a smaller, but a very choice selection, of Kay’s caricatures, the loan of which I owe to the kindness of Mr. John Camden Hotten, of Piccadilly. I am indebted to Mr. Hotten for many courtesies of this description, and especially for the use of a very valuable collection of caricatures of the latter part of the eighteenth century and earlier part of the present, mounted in four large folio volumes, which has been of much use to me.