d him to dine at the Garrick Club
(whither they drove in a hansom, much in the style shown in the sketch),
and Shirley Brooks drank to him as "the future cartoonist of _Punch_."
His first cut--an initial T--appeared on p. 15, Vol. XLVIII, and
thenceforward Mr. Atkinson has been considered on the "outside Staff,"
with but two breaks: the first during an absence in Paris for artistic
instruction, and the second from 1869 to 1876, when an opportunity
occurred to make a "sure fortune" in commerce. The "sure fortune," as
usually befalls, became a pecuniary loss, and the draughtsman gladly
went back to the service of _Punch_ and the other papers and books to
which his pencil (under a different signature) has been devoted. It is
years since Mr. Atkinson, who has latterly worked less for _Punch_ than
in the early days of his connection, was able to do himself full justice
in a half-page drawing; but his "Dumb Crambo" series remain among the
happy things which _Punch_ has published in the direction of punning
sketches. They remind one of those by Hine, Newman, and the rest, in the
old "blackie" days, and are often little masterpieces of comic
ingenuity--as may be seen in "Shooting over an Extensive Moor," where a
man is discharging his weapon over the portly figure of a Moorish
gentleman. Mr. Atkinson, in addition, made some two score literary
contributions to the paper and "Pocket-book"--poems chiefly, and
stories, not counting smaller trifles, between August, 1877, and the
accession of Mr. Burnand to the Editorship. It was, I may add, at the
suggestion of Mr. Burnand that Mr. Atkinson adopted his _nom de crayon_,
just as he suggested Mr. Furniss's "Lika Joko."

[Illustration: CHARLES H. BENNETT.

(_From the Water-Colour Drawing by Himself._)]

One of the brightest and most talented draughtsmen _Punch_ has ever had
was Charles H. Bennett, the forerunner of Mr. Linley Sambourne. He had
graduated in comic draughtsmanship, having been the life and soul of
"Diogenes" (August, 1855), and rendered solid service to the "Comic
Times" (1855), and the "Comic News" (1863 to 1865), by which time his
cipher of an owl, and then of a B in an owl's beak ("B in it" =
Bennett), were known and appreciated. Apart from his _Punch_ work, his
"Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress" was his masterpiece in serious art; while
in the opposite direction his "Shadows" (which procured him for a time
the public nickname of "Shadow Bennett"), as well as his amusing