er of
anonymous contributions, only a very few of which were ever used, and of
fewer still was the authorship placed upon record. Early in 1843,
however (p. 82, Vol. IV.), Mr. Blackwood, of Edinburgh, sent in one of
the earliest of Scottish witticisms, a conundrum; Joseph O'Leary, a
reporter of the "Morning Herald," is said to have contributed a poem on
"The English Vandal;" and R. B. Peake, who had adapted "A Night with
_Punch_" for W. J. Hammond, began his little series of "_Punch's_
Provincial Intelligence," of which the most notable is a humorous report
of the University Boatrace of the year; and then the elder Hood began
his short but brilliant career.

[Illustration: THOMAS HOOD
_From an Engraving by W. Hole, after the Painting by Lewis._]

Thomas Hood had forgiven and forgotten the annoyance he had felt on
seeing in the first number of _Punch_ a bogus advertisement ascribed to
him under the title of "Lessons in Punmanship," at which he "could only
express his amazement that his name should be paraded with apparent
authority in a paper of the very existence of which he was not aware;"
and within two years he became a fairly constant contributor, after
writing to Dickens, "You will be glad to hear that I have made an
arrangement with Bradbury to contribute to _Punch_, but that is a secret
I cannot keep from you. It will be light occasional work for odd times."
So he began with a sketch re-drawn by H. G. Hine, accompanying a "Police
Report of a Daring Robbery by a Noble Lord"--the first of his stinging
attacks on Lord William Lennox, one of _Punch's_ favourite and, it must
be admitted, legitimate butts. Then followed at different times a score
or more of conundrums in the true Hoodian vein under the title of "Whys
and Whens," fair specimens of which are these: "Why is killing bees
like a confession? Because you unbuzz 'em." "Why is 'yes' the most
ignorant word in the language? Because it doesn't no anything." "What's
the difference between a soldier and a bomb-shell? One goes to wars, the
other goes to peaces." "When is a clock on the stairs dangerous? When it
runs down." A couple of sketches and "A Drop of Gin," an important poem
of seventy-six lines somewhat in the manner of the latter portion of
"Miss Kilmansegg" were followed--enclosed within a comic border!--by his
greatest popular effort, "The Song of the Shirt." This appeared, not in
the "Almanac," but in the "Christmas Number," on p. 261 of the second
volu