H'S_ ARTISTS: 1841.

_Punch's_ Primitive Art--A. S. Henning--Brine--A Strange
Doctrine--John Phillips--W. Newman--Pictorial Puns--H. G.
Hine--John Leech--His Early Life--Friendship with Albert
Smith--Leech Helps _Punch_ up the Social Ladder--His Political
Work--Leech Follows the "Movements"--"Servantgalism"--"The Brook
Green Volunteer"--The Great Beard Movement--Sothern's Indebtedness
to Leech for Lord Dundreary--Crazes and Fancies--Leech's
Types--"Mr. Briggs"--Leech the Hunter--Leech as a Reformer--Leech
as an Artist--His "Legend"-Writing--Friendship with Dickens--His
Prejudices--His Death--And Funeral.

One of the peculiarities of _Punch's_ career is the increasing
preponderance assumed by the artistic section. It is said that when
George Hodder was introduced to a distinguished Royal Academician, he
could find nothing better to say, with which to open the conversation,
than the tremendous sentiment--"Art is a great thing, sir!" _Punch_
gradually but surely realised, too, how great a thing art is, and for
many years past he has sought out artists to recruit his Staff, where
before he looked chiefly for draughtsmen. The statement may seem a
curious one to make, but it is an opinion shared nowadays by some of the
best artists on _Punch_ and off it, that were the drawings sent in
to-day which were contributed by the majority of the original artistic
Staff, not excluding the mighty Leech himself, they would be declined
without thanks, and--according to the somewhat harsh rule that has for
some time prevailed--without return of their contribution. There was a
promiscuous rough-and-ready manner about the drawing of comic cuts in
those early days, when intended for the periodical press, that would
offend the majority of people to-day. There was no photography then to
enable the artist to draw as big as he chose, and then to reproduce the
drawings on to the wood-block in any size he please. There were no
blocks which could be taken into sections and distributed among
half-a-dozen engravers at once for swift and careful cutting. There was
no "process," which permitted of reduction and reproduction of the
finest pen-and-ink work. There was no "drawing from the life" for these
little pictures of "life and character." The joke was the thing, not the
artistic drawing of it. Farce and burlesque had not yet developed into
comedy and comedietta, refined by degrees and beautifully a