his friends not
unnaturally counted it as another of Harry's many happy, but usually
impracticable, thoughts. But in this instance Mayhew made his
personality felt, for the character of the paper, instead of partaking
of that acidulated, sardonic satire which was distinctive of Philipon's
journal, on which it was to have been modelled, took its tone from
Mayhew's genial temperament, and from the first became, or aimed at
becoming, a budget of wit, fun, and kindly humour, and of honest
opposition based upon fairness and justice.

As for the Staff of such a paper as he imagined, Mayhew urged that he
could secure the services of Douglas Jerrold, Gilbert a Beckett, Mark
Lemon, Stirling Coyne, and others, in addition to those already engaged;
and then adjournment was proposed to Mark Lemon's rooms in Newcastle
Street, Strand. "The Shakespeare's Head," in Wych Street, had
previously been Lemon's place of business. It was the meeting-place of
the little "quoting, quipping, quaffing" club of fellow-workers in
Bohemia; and Lemon, it was explained, had dabbled both in verse and the
lighter drama, efforts which were "not half bad." Little did the writer
dream that his modest Muse had marked him out for the editorship of the
greatest comic journal the world has seen! To the duties of
tavern-keeper Lemon, who was enamoured of literature and the drama, had
been condemned by a fate more than usually unkind. He had found himself
nearly penniless when Mr. Very, his stepfather, offered him a clerical
position in his brewery in Kentish Town. But the brewery failed, and
with it Lemon's livelihood, and he was only rescued by a jovial
tavern-keeper named Roper, one of his stepfather's customers, and by him
put into charge--disastrously for both--of the Wych Street public-house.
Then he married, having borrowed five pounds to do it with, and by his
wife's advice kept in touch with his literary acquaintance; and by the
acceptance of a five-act comedy by Charles Mathews at Covent
Garden--which was to be played by a cast including the great comedian's
self, Mme. Vestris, and "Old" Farren--he received a hundred pounds down,
and was tided over his difficulties until the starting of _Punch_ gave
him permanent employment.

So to Mark Lemon they went, and a full list was quickly drawn up. Mayhew
undertook to communicate with Douglas Jerrold, who, then better known to
the public as the successful dramatist than as the great satirist, was
staying at