ousehold Words," and
subsequently on "All the Year Round," so that little time was left him
for humorous composition--though he certainly found leisure to issue
"The Family Joe Miller." When he was in Edinburgh he married Robert
Chambers' sister--a lady possessed of true Scottish wit, some of whose
pithy remarks are still remembered, such as "The ladies who agitate for
women's rights are generally men's lefts."

Of the other two writers who aided in the founding of _Punch_--Postans
and George Hodder--there is little to say. The first-named, indeed, has
already been sufficiently dealt with, but it may be added that his last
contribution was his verses--"A Contribution by Cobden"--on the subject
of the removal by Sir Robert Peel of the tax on artificial teeth.
Postans saw his chance, for the Repeal of the Corn Laws was already
being agitated, and the tooth-tax troubled his mouth less than the tax
on bread. His final verse ran--

"Reverse your plan," the Goddess [Commerce] said,
And smiling stood in all her beauty;
"Give me untaxed my daily bread,
And tax my teeth with double duty."

Besides his ambassadorial assistance, and in spite of his presence at
the _Punch_ Club, Hodder was not of much account on the paper, either in
its formation or its literary production. He was, however, related to
_Punch_ by marriage, being the husband of Henning's beautiful daughter,
the niece of Kenny Meadows' wife. His last appearances in its pages were
in 1843, when four contributions (including "_Punch's_ Phrenology") came
from him; and then he resumed his usual work of journalist, became
Thackeray's secretary for a time, and died through the upsetting of a
coach in Richmond Park.

Passing by Leman Rede and G. H. B. Rodwell (composer, playwright, and
ballad writer), neither of whom, so far as I have been able to
ascertain, has left any appreciable trace on _Punch_, we come to the
man to whom, more than to anyone else, the paper owed the enormous
political influence it once enjoyed, and to whom it is indebted for much
of the literary reputation it still retains--Douglas Jerrold.

[Illustration: DOUGLAS JERROLD

(_From the Portrait by Sir D. Macnee, F.R.S.A., in the National Portrait
Gallery._)]

If he was not exactly the wit of his day--for his mind lacked the wider
sympathy, the greater grasp, and gentler refinement of Sydney
Smith's--he was certainly the most brilliant professional humorist of
his generation--"a wit,