as they were scornfully called), the National Gallery, Mud-Salad Market,
Leicester Square, the Wellington Statue on the Wellington Arch, the
Great Exhibition, John Bell's Guards' Memorial in Waterloo Place, and
the British Museum Catalogue--all of which, so far as they represented
Londoners' grievances, have ere now been reformed.

FOOTNOTES:

[18] _Mangez bien_, Jenkinsonian French for "fare well."

[19] Jenkinsonian French for "thread-bare subject."

[20] On the occasion of _Punch's_ Jubilee, July, 1891, the "Times"
remarked; 'May we be excused for noting the fact that he [Punch] has
generally, in regard to public affairs, taken his cue from the "Times"?'

[21] "Fortnightly Review," December, 1886.

[22] His publisher.

[23] Edmund Yates believed that Bunn was Thackeray's model also for Mr.
Dolphin, the manager, in "Pendennis."

[24] "Dictionary of National Biography."

CHAPTER X.

_PUNCH_ ON THE WAR-PATH: COUNTER-ATTACK.

Satire and Libel--Mrs. Ramsbotham Assaulted--Attacks of "The Man in
the Moon" and "The Puppet-Show"--H. S. Leigh's Banter--Malicious
Wit--Mr. Pincott--_Punch's_ Purity gives Offence--His Slips of
Fact--Quotation--And Dialect are Resented--His Drunkards not
Appreciated by the U.K.A.--"_Punch_ is not as good as it was!"

Above the head of every editor the law of libel hangs like the sword of
Damocles. It is at all times difficult for a newspaper of any sort to
avoid the infringement of its provisions, vigilant though the editor may
be. But in the case of a confessedly "satirical" journal the danger is
enormously increased, for the margin between "fair comment" and flat
libel shrinks strangely when the _raison d'etre_ of the criticism is
pungency, and the object laughter.

That _Punch_ has steered clear of giving serious offence, save on
occasions extremely few, must be counted to him for righteousness. It is
true that, as a Lord Chancellor once declared, "_Punch_ is a chartered
libertine." But for him to have won his "charter" at all proves him at
least to have been worthy of it, the tolerance and indulgence of the
nation having been in themselves a temptation. It is not so much that he
has not hit hard; it is rather that he has hit straight. Indeed, as we
have seen, he has struck hastily in many directions; but, save in his
years of indiscretion, he has scarcely ever been guilty of anything
approaching scurrility. At a time when the "Satirist" was fli