's work which may be found anywhere. It represents a prisoner in a
dungeon lying at the foot of a pillar, which, except in a ghastly carved
work running round it of skulls and cross bones, reminds us somewhat of
Bonneval's pillar at Chillon. The lights and shadows are wonderfully
rendered, and the work is characterized by a softness, a beauty, and a
finish only to be observed in work which took the artist's fancy. This
etching is entitled, _Rougemont's Device to Perplex Auriol_; and
Ainsworth's story which it illustrates--a peculiarly unsatisfactory
one--commenced, I think, in "Ainsworth's Magazine," passed into the "New
Monthly," when its author purchased that periodical in 1845, and
(whether the novelist got himself into an intellectual fix or otherwise
I know not) finished, I believe, eventually nowhere.

Browne indeed finds a place here more by virtue of his book
illustrations than by reason of any just pretensions to be considered a
graphic humourist. His comic powers appear to us more the result of
education and emulation than natural gifts, and the consequence is, that
in attempting to be funny, his work too often degenerates into absolute
exaggeration. His excellencies must be sought for in his serious
illustrations, which fall more within the province of the art critic
than the scope and purpose of a work which treats of graphic satirists
and comic artists of the nineteenth century. Some of his finest
illustrations of a serious character will be found in the pages of the
"Illuminated Magazine"; in Charles Lever's admirable story of "St.
Patrick's Eve"; in the "Fortunes of Colonel Forlogh O'Brien"; in
Augustus Mayhew's "Paved with Gold"; in Ainsworth's "Mervyn Clithero";
and "Revelations of London"; and above all, in Charles Lever's novel of
"Roland Cashel."

Hablot Knight Browne lived to see the decline and fall of that peculiar
and powerful art of book illustration which was introduced by
Cruikshank; was fostered and encouraged by Charles Dickens, Charles
James Lever, their imitators and contemporaries; and died, so to speak,
with these distinguished men. His work in later years, as might
naturally have been expected, shows a woeful decline of power; and when
the suggestors from whom he derived inspiration were no longer at his
back, the poverty of invention which characterized the man when left to
his own devices becomes painfully apparent.

"Phiz" drew in later years for _Judy_ and other comic papers, and