The à Becketts of "Punch"; memories of father and sons

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Preface

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^ TOURING the long career of The London Charivari, extending from 1841 till 1902, there ->t^ have been three a Becketts closely associated with Punch. Gilbert Abbott a Beckett, the father of the others, was the chief a Beckett. The pur- , V pose of this work — which I venture to suggest is " a good one — will disclose itself upon perusal. As the subject of my father's connexion with Punch has been recently discussed and may be discussed J again, I have thought it advisable to say my say d about the matter. I have an additional reason for the course I have adopted. My father was the firm and constant companion of Charles Dickens and Thackeray, and everything connected with the lives of the two great novelists of the nineteenth century has its value. I have certainly written nothing in malice, and hope and believe that these

PREFACE

pages are free from anything that can wound or give offence.

For the rest, I am told that reminiscences are very popular. I trust that my recollections of the life of a working j ournalist spent in the pleasantest toil amongst the most delightful of companions may consequently prove attractive and perchance even instructive. As the book has been written in some haste at a time when I have been exceptionally busy, there may be slips of the pen here and there discernible. If there be, these blemishes can be easily removed in the next edition. The date of that interesting issue will depend upon the will — the good will — of that best friend of the Author, the kind, the indulgent and the presentlyappropriately-epitheted person^the gentle reader.

ARTHUR WILLIAM a BECKETT.

Garrick Club, September, 1903.

CHAPTER I Early Days

Reason for such Title. — Gilbert Abbott a Beckett the Magistrate. — Scenes in Court. — From Figaro in London to Punch, or the London Charivari. — Twenty years' service in Bouverie Street. — William a Beckett of Golden Square and The Grange, Hampstead, and his four Sons. — Gilbert a Beckett meets Dickens. — Nicholas Nickleby in Dotheboys Hall. — "In Memoriam Fratris " — The Career of the Censor. — " Bertie Vyse " and " A. Briefless, Junior." — Henry Mayhew and Last. — A Dramatic Interview. — Figaro in London and its rivals. — The Quarrels with Robert Seymour. — Paper Feuds. — Initial Attack upon Charles Kean and the Poet Bunn. — " The King Incog." — Joseph Glossop of the Body Guard and the Royal Coburg Theatre. — Mrs. Gilbert Abbott a Beckett {nie Mary Anne Glossop) writes an opera for the opening of the St. James' Theatre under Braham's management. — " Agnes Sorrell " and its contemporaries. — " The Village Coquettes." — Bonds of Union between Dickens, a Beckett, Henry Mayhew and Jerrold. — End of Figaro. — Commencement of Punch. — The Author claims for his father his proper share in the production of Punch.

CONTENTS

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CHAPTER II Some Nights at Round Tables . . . . 6i

Early Meetings in Bouverie Street. — " Briefless " and " Dunup." — "A. Briefless, Junior." — George Cruikshank. — The Comic Blackstone brought up to date. — The Bouverie Street tradition. — " Loyalty to Punch." — The earliest Contributors. — Percival Leigh. — " Ponny " Mayhew. — Douglas Jerrold. — "Punch's Railway." — The Death of Gilbert Abbott a Beckett.

CHAPTER III The Work of a Boy Editor 102

" The Days of my Youth." — A Dinner with Charles Reade. — Cardinal Manning as Critic. — Offering the Glowworm to York Place. — " Latest Sporting and Ecclesiastical." — An Interview with Mark Lemon. — The Idea of the Tomahawk. — Collecting the Staff. — Financial Arrangements.

Chapter IV

The Effects of my Father's Death. — The Comic Guide to the Royal Academy. — The Difficulties of Unknown Authors. — My First Meeting with the present Editor of Punch. — The Origin of the Glowworm. — Its Career. — A Libel Action. — An Offer to Archbishop Manning. — My Interview with Mark Lemon and what came of it.

CONTENTS

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CHAPTER V A Saturday Journal of Satire : . . . i6i

The First Number of the Tomahawk. — Beales and Walpole. — Drawing the Cartoons. — The Tomahawk Sampled. — Mr. Punch and the Tomahawk working side by side. — Relations between the Staffs of the two Papers. — A Common Policy.

CHAPTER VI My Experience of the '' Punch " Table . . . 183

I join the staff of Punch. — My first Punch Dinner. — Keeping a Diary. — Amateur Theatricals at Colchester. — My Colleagues in Bouverie Street. — Working with Sambourne. — Charles Keene's Pudding. — Edmund Yates. — William Bradbury's Love of Sensational Starts. — The Latest Brand. — Tom Taylor and the Large Cut. — E. J. Milliken. — Death of Tom Taylor. — I am asked to the Interregnum Dinner.

CHAPTER Vn

I am appointed Assistant Editor. — Percival Leigh expresses approval of my conduct in the Chair during the Editor's Absence. — The Punch Staff dine with Mr. Alfred de Rothschild.— Distinguished Guests. — The germ of the John Bull Dinner. — Another huge Punch Dinner. — My Work during the Editor's absence. — The Story of the "Maske of Flowers." — The Dramatic Authors' Society. — Adventures of an Unacted Comedy. — Concerning certain Play Houses.

CONTENTS

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CHAPTER VIII My Father's Friends ...... 252

The Punch Table in the Forties. — Albert Smith Vindicated. — Artemus Ward. — Some Tenants of the Egyptian Hall. — A Visit to Paris. — Swords better than an action for libel. — Breakfast with M. de Blowitz. — The Cohesion of Paris in the days of the Third Empire. .

CHAPTER IX Memories of Bouverie Street and Elsewhere . 272

Change in the Policy of Punch. — Final Reference to a Word with Punch. — The Author as Lecturer. — Sir John Holker helps to settle a Cartoon. — Chat with Lord Leighton^ — A Memory of Mrs. German Reed. — An Interview with Cardinal Manning. — " The Golden Rose " as a Jubilee Gift, — Sir Frank Lockwood and Punch. — The Parnell Commission.— The Policy of the 4 Becketts of Punch.

CHAPTER X Advice Gratis. A Few Words on Parting . . 293

Journalism as a Profession. — A Talk with Sir Walter Besant. — The Duty of an Editor. — The Value of Civility. — Relations between Editor and Staff. — The Corrector, Mr. Pincott. — The News Investigator. — " Over Zeal." — " Log Rolling." — The Benefit of an Agreement. — The Notice Question. — Last Tribute to Gilbert Arthur, the Second 4 Beckett of Punch. ;

Chapter I

I HAVE ventured to use the sub-title " Memories of Father and Sons," as it explains the source of half of my information. Punch was started in 1841, and my father, Gilbert Abbott a Beckett, was one of the httle band of writers who contributed the copy to the initial number.; He died in 1856 before I had entered my teens, but as a child I was a great friend of his. It may appear strange to make such an assertion, but it is a fact. My elder brothers and sister were at school, and although I had plenty of home lessons I was not sent to a boarding school — except once as an experiment for a few weeks — until after his death. I was an extremely delicate child, and I was carried by a nurse until I was six years old. It was in the days before the discovery of perambulators, and I imagine that our dear old family doctor must have ordered gentle exercise. Be this as it may, I used to walk across the park with my father from our house in Kensington to his court at Southwark very frequently. On certain special occasions I was allowed to accompany the magistrate on to the Bench itself, and these were my special delights.

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My father, who was in complete sympathy with his little son, used to make remarks for his delectation. In spite of his adventurous boyhood Gilbert Abbott a Beckett the moment he was appointed a magistrate— when he was in his thirties — ^became in manner the sedatest of the sedate. He frequently smiled but scarcely ever laughed, and used to say the most amusing things with a gravity that emphasized their incongruity. As I write I see before me the little court house with my father seated in front of his official desk on the raised platform of the Bench. On his right sits myself, a little boy with my legs dangling over the floor. My father has before him two females who have crosssummoned one another. It is the case of these ladies that each of them has tried to kill the other.

" She clutched hold of my hair and tore it out by handfulls, your Majesty," cried one of the litigants.

" I see," returned my father, " and I suppose that huge bundle under your arm contains your hair."

" It does, your Majesty."

'' And who are you ? " asked my father, turning to the other party in the case.

" I am a poor lone widow, and she has treated me "

" What was the occupation of your husband ? " interrupted my father.

" He sold rags, your Lordship, and cherries strung on sticks."

" Ah, I see ; a rag and cherry merchant."

And then the case continued, and whenever my father had occasion to refer to the widow she was always surnamed " the widow of the rag and cherry merchant." On one occasion I remember my father was cheered by the cabmen. This was due to a decision that the roadway of a railway station was a public place, and cabmen had a right to ply there for hire without paying toll for admission. But the " Railway Interest/' always a strong body, were determined to have the ruling reversed, and they had their way. I do not know whether the matter was taken up to the Lords, but at any rate the famous decision which had provoked such enthusiasm among the cabmen was not upheld. It has been said that my father had a decided objection to cabmen, and that when my uncle Sir William a Beckett, first Chief Justice of Victoria, came over to England, the initial question my father asked him was, " How much has your cabman asked you ? " As a matter of fact there was no kindlier or more sympathetic man than my father, and he was charitable to a degree. It was his delight to help his poorer brethren, as he called them. I remember once that my father supported with his custom a bootmaker by paying him West End prices for very inferior boots. There were recriminations from the rest of the family.

" Very well," said Gilbert a Beckett, "I will at any rate wear the boots Johnston provides for myself." And he did.

So I cannot credit my father with harshness. In the forties and the fifties the cabmen were very mixed. Some of these fellows were good enough,

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but others were unmitigated brutes. It was their pleasure to take possession of some unfortunate old woman with luggage and then to fleece her to their hearts' content. With these bullies my father was very severe. So it came to pass that I had to take my morning walk with my sire, and during my peregrinations had to hear a good deal about the topics of the day. For my father was anxious to improve my mind ; he used to ask my opinion about everything, and correct it when in his judgment my view was at fault — so much for an explanation.

I shall have to say much about my father, for in my opinion he was the originator of Punch. Mr. Spielmann in his History of Punch has shown that he wrote in the first number and was by far away the most copious contributor, but he has said little about the papers which preceded the leading comic of the day. I shall briefly trace Punch to his predecessor Figaro in London, \Nh\ch. my father founded and wrote. This will be the scheme of this work. If it proves to be a little egotistical I must ask pardon but plead force majeure. From the moment of joining the staff in 1874 to my last dinner in Bouverie Street on June 4, 1902, I abandoned every scheme of my life to Punch. I was called to the Bar and had a fair prospect of success, but Pujich claimed my services and I retired from practice. I had a chance of success as a novelist, for my initial romance was extremely well received by such papers as the AthencBU^n and the Spectator, but Punch claimed my services and I practically abandoned this branch of literature. I wrote some half-dozen plays for the London theatres — none of them failed and they were all well received, but I abandoned writing for the stage for the simple reason ''Pj^wcA" claimed my services and I had no time for attending rehearsals and the rest of it. Lastly my great delight was my connection with the Militia. For four weeks out of the fifty-two I was an officer on duty, a soldier, something more than in name, but Punch claimed my services, and after an attempt to dodge the training by exchanging from one battalion to another I had to give it up. But until June 4, 1902, I did not regret my life devotion to Punch. I was proud of the paper that my father had helped to found, and loyal to its interests to the backbone. For a moment there was a pang, because it looked to be a misspent life. But on reflection I do not regret a moment of my twenty-seven years' service — that twenty-seven years' service that during the last score of it yielded a holiday of not as many weeks. No, for I can look at that service as given to the paper founded by Mark Lemon and Gilbert a Beckett, and contributed to by my father's friends, Thackeray, Leech, Shirley Brooks, Dickey Doyle, Douglas Jerrold, Tom Taylor, Horace Mayhew and last, but not least, my dear old friend, John Tenniel. Of all those I have mentioned only one survives, John Tenniel. John Tenniel retired from Punch a couple of years before my place disappeared from the dear old table. At that table he and I had sat tete d tete concocting the cartoon of

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the week when every other member of the staff was away on a hohday. So I dedicate my hfe's work, such as it has been, to the giants of the Punch table — to the great dead. But mark me well, I do not write as a man with a grievance — let the past look after the past.

My father had three brothers and they were sons of a solicitor. I remember my grandfather as a very dignified old gentleman living at the Grange, Haverstock Hill, devoted to genealogical studies ; it was his pleasure to walk about the cricket field in rear of the Grange and introduce me to every one he met. I was toddling along carr3dng with both my hands his walking stick.

" This young gentleman," he would explain, " is Arthur William a Beckett, third son of my third son, Gilbert Abbott a Beckett, Esquire, Metropolitan Police Magistrate, and nephew of my eldest son. Sir William a Beckett, Chief Justice of Victoria." Then I used to take off my hat (or rather his, for he used to lend me an old wide-awake which came down over my eyes),return it, and go on riding his walking stick as a horse in front of him. He was always very kind to me, was this terrible old gentleman. But he was perhaps feeling remorse, for he quarrelled with all his boys. Three left England for Australia, and one, my father, remained at home. But they were none of them on terms of genuine cordiality with him until they had all succeeded in life. Then they approached the old gentleman and the past was ruled out as forgotten. Of course I knew nothing of these domestic jars at my tender age, but I remember thinking it strange that my grandfather, who was as proud as Lucifer, but not in the least a snob, should be so anxious to emphasize the positions secured by his children. No doubt he was saying in his heart of hearts, " They have risen to this, thank God — in spite of me."

My father, who was born on February 17, 1811, was sent to Westminster School with his three brothers William, Thomas Turner and Arthur Martin. His elder brother and he were great friends and both had literary tastes. My uncles William and Thomas Turner soon left Westminster, one to read for the Bar and the other to prepare for the other branch of the legal profession with a view to his entering the firm created by his father. So Gilbert Abbott a Beckett was left behind for Arthur Martin was not yet old enough to join him. It was then that he made great friends with one of his school-fellows, Henry Mayhew, whose people knew his people " at home." At the time of which I am writing the bullying at Westminster was world-renowned. Forty years later, when my brother Gilbert Arthur a Beckett became a Queen's scholar, subsequently to proceed to Oxford as a student of Christ Church, the "ragging" was sufficiently severe, but in the twenties it was terrible. My father, who was not a strong child — he died before he had completed his forty-fifth year — complained to his parent in Golden Square. My grandfather treated the appeal with contempt. " It would do him good," said the old martinet, who

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prided himself upon the commission he held as Captain of the St. James' company of what now are the Queen's Westminster Volunteers. " It will do him good." Finding he could get no redress my father withdrew himself from Westminster, and never saw his father again on cordial terms until he had become a Metropolitan Police Magistrate.

Left to his resources he determined to make his way in the world, and this was to be done without any appeal to Golden Square. In spite of the bullying, Westminster had turned my father out a good scholar, and he was able to rely upon his knowledge. He applied for and obtained the post of usher, and I have always heard that much of the discipline described in Dotheboys Hall was founded on my father's description of his experiences. Charles Dickens and my father were fast friends, and in Nicholas Nickleby I can trace more than one family likeness. Nicholas himself was my father in his youth, and there is in Ralph Nickleby a suggestion of the stern old man in Golden Square. Not that Mr. Wilham a Beckett was disliked by his neighbours — on the contrary, as my father told me with a smile, " he was greatly respected in the parish," so much so that the ratepayers presented him with a portrait which he subsequently engraved at his own expense. His father being so much respected, a serious thing for Gilbert Abbott a Beckett to do was to produce a paper that would outrage the feelings of Golden Square — so out came Cerberus^ or the Hades Gazette, I am not sure that the second title was not more understandable by the people. The plan of the

i6 paper was that of the Court Circular. A Hst was given of arrivals and those shortly expected. But it never appeared — at the last moment the printer, alarmed at the character of some of the letterpress, went to Golden Square and sought an interview of the Captain. It was accorded, with the result that the type of Cerberus was turned into " pie " and the printers' bill was paid up-to-date. Unconscious of the fate of his paper my father and his eldest brother were watching the fortunes of an agent who, dressed as Mephistopheles, was distributing handbills. Unfortunately a boys' school broke up as he was passing the house dedicated to study, and the urchins surrounded him : the poor man had to fight for his life. My father came to the rescue with a constable ; what was left of Mephistopheles was conducted to the police office and there released at the instigation of his employers. I believe this was the first literary venture of my father's and was undertaken when he was still at Westminster. There were several others, amongst the rest The Literary Beacon and The Censor. In editing the latter he had the help of his brothers Thomas Turner and William. The latter was a poet in a small way. He wrote under the nom de guerre of Spforza, and sometimes turned out decent verses, and on his return from Australia shortly after my father's death he published The Earl's Choice and other poems. From the latter I quote one which referred to my father. It has the condescending tone of the elder brother to the younger, the Chief Justice to the magistrate, but it is neither displeasing nor inaccurate.

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IN MEMORIAM FRATRIS.

He died in prime of manhood, not without

Repute beyond what, he had hoped to gain,

Yet full of cares success could not shut out

From a too anxious heart and chafing brain,

The intellect, whose wit's too ready vein

Won Folly's laugh and Wisdom's kindly smile,

Fretted for loftier office, and the while

The world applauded, he with self disdain

Oft from his work recoiled, for in him lay

Capacity of nobler toil and thought

Than wake the utterance that suits the day;

And 'twas his hope, ere dying, to have wrought

A monument of more enduring fame

Than that which links the '^ Comic" with his name:

The Censor was published for the first time on Saturday, September 6, 1828, when my father was in his nineteenth year. In this initial number appears a notice of Charles Kean. Speaking of Mr. Price, lessee of Drury Lane Theatre, The Censor (three gentlemen rolled into one, as the writers explain in an introductory article) says : ** He commenced the season by introducing to the stage Mr. Kean, junior, a young gentleman who possesses no qualification whatever to fill the station to which he aspired, a fact which Mr. Price must or ought to have found out before he permitted the youth in question to appear upon the boards ; but the wary manager relied on the name of the performer to fill his house, and to effect that object he did not care what disgrace he brought upon the theatre. We shall however waste no more of our valuable space upon this unimportant subject." And here we have the tradition of the paper. Years afterwards in 1841 (the date of the appearance of Punch) it was the tradition to chaff Charles Kean. No doubt the buttons were taken off the foils when Douglas Jerrold quarrelled about '^ Dorothy's Fortune " at the Princess' Theatre. In later years I was introduced to both Charles Kean and his wife and found them both most kindly and delightful gentlefolk. But I never heard my father say a word in praise of the actor, and the last piece he wrote for the stage was a burlesque upon *' The Corsican Brothers," which he called '' Oh ! Gemini, or the " Brothers of Corse." I remember that he, to quote my uncle's lines, " with self-disdain from his work recoiled." He said that burlesques and the Bench should be kept wide apart, and though he wrote to the very last for Punch and The Illustrated London News he had no more to do with the stage door of the theatre. For some time before coming to his decision he had collaborated with his friend Mark Lemon on the understanding that the rehearsals and production should be undertaken by his colleague. To return to the Censor — ^it cost threepence— the price of Punch — and was very smartly written. Here is an extract : ** If you would make others laugh, laugh yourself, there is much in sympathy, and besides, if you utter a good thing without appearing thoroughly to see the wit of it your auditors will very naturally suppose it to be the effect of chance ; and you will lose the credit of it accordingly." On one occasion a schoolfellow of the two brothers, a Mr. Whalley by name, wrote a paragraph called " Triple jeu de mots," which ran as follows : '* At a great public dinner lately one

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of the party had agreeably entertained the company with some comic songs ; and on account of the heat of the apartment proceeded to open the window, when he was unanimously solicited to re-exert his lungs for his friends' amusement, but the singer thereupon expressed his determination " to give himself airs and them none." This feeble joke gave unhmited delight to the two editors. For ever afterwards Mr. \\^alley was known as the author of the " Triple jeu de mots." On December 13, 1828, an editorial banquet was reported. It was described as being of " dazzling and dreamy magnificence," to which had been invited the friends and male contributors to their work. From the emphasis on the " male " it would appear that ladies were also on the staff. After announcing themselves, the editors call attention to the presence of a noble marquis, " whose name we could not learn," " the archbishop," and "the author of the ' Triple jeu de mots.'" The report continues, "The hall in which the dinner took place presented a perfect scene of enchantment, for as the editors had determined to devote the whole of the enormous profits of the publication to this one occasion several ruined noblemen had actually been brought over from the continent incognito for the sole purpose of devising extravagances." The description is very amusing. " From the ceiling depended three chandeliers of real emerald, each supported by a chain of golden circled hair culled from the brows of all the poetesses of England." After the chairman had proposed the toast of the sovereign,

" Crito " rose and '^proposed success to The Censor with 999 times 999, and after the arithmetician engaged for the occasion had calculated the required number of hips the toast was drunk amid the most hearty cheering and plaudits ever heard witliin the island of Great Britain." Then the author of the " Triple jeu de mots" proposed the Editor, and after the response (fully reported) palanquins glided into the banquet room ; *' into these the Editors gracefully threw themselves, in which state they were conveyed to their respective mansions, and in a few minutes the once crowded and illumined hall was dark and desolate." The account is delightful reading and wonderfully clever considering that it was the work of a boy in his teens.

My father was dramatic censor, and wrote on April 4, 1829 : " We enter upon this portion of our work not without regret, conscious that we are addressing our readers (at least through the columns of The Censor) for the last time." Gilbert Abbott a Beckett had no intention of abandoning the field of journalism. By this time his elder brother was studying at Lincoln's Inn, on the road to a call to the Bar, while Thomas Turner (his immediate senior) had settled down to work at Golden Square. The Censor stopped with the sixteenth number, and William a Beckett, the future Chief Justice, gathered together his verse and published A Volume of Poems^ by Sforza^ with the kind assistance of Messrs. Hurst and Chance, of St. Paul's Churchyard. This was in 1828 — sixty 3^ears afterwards Messrs. Hurst and

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Blackett were publishing for me in Great Marlborough Street. And by the way, I may note that my father adopted in The Censor the nom de guerre (I should like to write nom de plume, as it seems more appropriate) of '' Bertie Vyse," a signature I assumed when I wrote my earliest comedy for the Royal Court Theatre, "About Town" some thirty years ago. Moreover, I followed in my father's footsteps, succeeding him in his creation of " Mr. Briefless " as his son, " A. Briefless, Junior." The three young editors of The Censor parted company, but William kept long in touch \\dth his younger brother. When he was a dignified Chief Justice in ^lelbourne he contributed to and, I believe, helped to found, the Melbourne Punch. Through his recommendation my father wrote a London letter for one of the Australian papers — I fancy the Melbourne Argus — and now for nearly a century a Becketts have been doing their best to keep up the prestige of their name on both sides of the world. The eldest son of "Sforza" diedonly the other day. He inherited from his grandfather the love of genealogy^ and was said to be the best amateur herald at the antipodes. \Vhen he left England — it turned out to be for the last time — he spoke of a package he proposed taking with him. " I am going to have it stowed below, since I shan't want it on the voyage." " What is it ? " I asked. " Something to surprise them with over yonder," said he with a laugh : "a hatchment." He actually was making arrangements for his own funeral !

Poor fellow ! W.A.C. he was called (William Arthur Callender) was a good sort. He was eccentric, but a very clever fellow. During the Gavan Duffy Ministry he represented the Government of Victoria in the Upper House.