English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the 19th Century

Chapter IX

The Sleep of Thirty Years.—Causes of George Cruikshank’s Decadence Insufficiently Understood.—Professor Bates’ Theory.—Charles Dickens’s Nervousness (?).—Why Cruikshank was Unfitted to Illustrate his Novels.—The Rejected Illustration to Oliver Twist.—Quarrel with Bentley.—Guy Fawkes Illustrations.—“Ainsworth’s Magazine.”—Progress of the Cruikshank versus Bentley Campaign.—Cruikshank’s Declaration of War.—His Tactics.—“Our Library Table.”—Quarrel with Harrison Ainsworth.—Cruikshank’s Claim to be Originator of Two of his Stories Considered.—A word for Harrison Ainsworth.—Popularity and Success of his Novels.—Charles Lever’s “Arthur O’Leary.”—Cruikshank’s final Leap in the Dark.—Its Fatal Consequences.—Crusade against Drink.—“Worship of Bacchus.”—His Work Falls away.—Thirty Years of Artistic Sterility.—Fairy Stories turned into Temperance Tracts.—Forgotten!

pp. 189-207.