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PEN-DRAWING :AND
P EN DR AU G HTSM EN
BY-. lOSEPH^PENNELL

l\/

''-J

3o5

CORNELL

UNIVERSITY

LIBRARY

THE

BROWN-PENNELL

COLLECTION

GIFT OF
RALPH M. BROWN, '01

IN MEMORY

OF HIS MOTHER

ANNA MELIUS BROWN

1941

DATE DUE

jjAYZl^^e^gl^

PRIMTCD IK U S.>

Cornell University Library
NC905 .P41

++ 2

Pen drawing and pen draughtsmen, their w

3 1924 030 667 582

olin Overs

^,^5^ V^3^

PEN DRAWING

AND PEN DRAUGHTSMEN

PEN DRAWING AND
PEN DRAUGHTSMEN

THEIR WORK AND THEIR ME

THODS A STUDY OF THE

ART TODAY WITH TECH

NICAL SUGGESTIONS

BY JOSEPH PENNELL

LONDON & NEW YORK MACMILLAN & CO

MDCCCLXXXIX

. .^O

P .- ,' -f--^

JOSEPH PENNELL

1S89

A7-I70-

•^^ >/

A. W. DRAKE

W. LEWIS ERASER

CHARLES PARSONS

RICHMOND SEELEY

FOUR MEN WHO SHOULD BE
HONOURED FOR THEIR EN-
COURAGEMENT OF PEN DRAW-
ING AND PEN DRAUGHTSMEN
IN AMERICA AND ENGLAND

DEDICATE THIS BOOK

PREFA CE

pOPULAR ilhistration is the product of the nineteentJi centtiry. It has never
been treated seriously, and to-day it covers such a wide field and is so many-
sided that it is impossible to discuss more than one of its phases at a time. The best
illustrators are as conscientious in their profession as the best painters or sculptors.
But zuith the enormous grozuth of and demand for, illustration, drauglitsmen
liave appeared ivho care nothing at all for their art, whose only desire apparently
is to produce more than any one else, and who threaten, oiuing to tlie cheapness and
rapidity wit/i which they work and the avidity with zuhic/i certain publishers seize
upon the results, to drag illustration doion to their owii low level. I have
endeavoured to show what a hio-h standard the best illustration reaches, and to
give, for puif OSes of study, the most notable examples from all over tJie world.

I am afraid my book may not appeal very strongly to the book-love^', since
in it I have transgressed many of the established lazus of book-making, and
tJiought more of facing the text with tJie appropriate illustration than of the size
and shape of the page. In some cases the actual appearance of the drawing as
book decoration is very unpleasant to me. But it zuas a case of sacrificing either
practical examples for study, or else here and there the decoration of a page. If
the book is to have any value, it must be of use to the student ; therefore, in certain
places I have not kept to traditional forms. I object as much as any one to the
meaningless and senseless dotting of pictures over the margin and their eccentric
arrangement on t lie page, and I think it will be realised that necessity, and not
eccentricity, has occasioned any placing of tJie cuts in oilier than the true decora-
tive form.

PREFACE

It IS also because the book is intended primarily for the student that I publish
tmtch work tJiat has been seen before, gathered from every available sotirce and
piLt together, I Iiope it ivill be found, not in a Iiapliazard mamier, but as carefully
as I could. Many artists have been consulted in the selection; to many otJiers
it will probably be a surprise to see their drawings here ; I think there are very
few zvJiom, from ignorance of their work, I have omitted. I Iiave not included
examples of very original men like Majiet and Jean B/iraud,for, tJiough I admire
tlieir zaork as the supreme expression of individuality and originality, it is only
of value from the man who produces it, and t lie copy by tlie student is worse than
worthless. And for the same reason examples of many well-known comic
draughtsmen will not be found ; their reputation is based on tJieir wit and
liumour which cannot be imitated, ivhile the student can leai'n notliing from tJieir
technique. I trust tlie critic may not be obliged to point out that I have foigotten
any ivell-known pen draughtsmen or important pen drawings published during
tlie last half century, within zvhich time pen drawing has taken rank as a separate
art. If I have unwittingly overlooked any one, I shall be only too glad, if I am
allozved the chance, to insert or describe his work on a future occasion. Tlie
spelling of some of the names of lesser known artists may be questioned, while
there is at least one man zvhose nationality may be wrongly given. But when
artists themselves spell their names in three or four fashions, I cannot be expected
to knozu which is right ; I have tried to use the most common form. And when
they are continually changing their nationality, one cannot tell to what country
they really belong.

Where old reproductions have been used it has not been for cheapness, but
because these reproductions were the best made at the time the drazvino-s were
published, and because if I had commissioned — and Ulessrs. Macmillan were
willing to order — drazoings from artists of established reputation, it is extremely
doubtful, even for this purpose, if they would have surpassed the best work they
had already done, and my object has been to sliozo their best zvork. While in the
making of the book I have had the interest and enthusiasm, generosity and
encouragement of the leading publishers zvitli very feio exceptions, these fezo to
my great surprise have come altogether from France, and I have no hesitation
in saying that they have prevented my including cither any zoork of certain artists
or that which I specially desired.

Many critics and literary men have allozaed themselves to be carried away

PREFACE ix

in praise of drawings whicli artists cannot respect, and have even devoted volumes
to the zL'ork of men and women whose names are not in the folloiving pages.
But 7ny book is technical, and unless a draiuing possesses technique I care not
a jot or a tittle for its ifitellectical, social, or spiritual qualities. Without
technical merit such zvork is useless for study. I have made no endeavour to
estimate the value of the drawing of the artists represented, nor to claim for
them any place among the immortals. I believe much of the zvork will live and
will be known as long as there is any real love for art. But since all the greatest
men here represented, with one or two exceptions, are living and working to-day,
it IS impossible to form any estimate of the place they will occupy in the future,
nor is it my business to do so.

In the preparation of the book, instead of having, as in most cases, authorities
to consult and acknowledgment to make for information gained from tlicm, I can
only say that there are no authorities on my subject, this indeed being one of my
reasons for writing. No works of importance, so far as I have been able to
discover, have been written upon pen drazuing since the introduction of process
which has made it into a separate and distinct art. However, I have deep
acknowledgments to make to artists, — the real but usually unconsulted and ignored
authorities, — to publishers, and, above all, to my wife.

This book, which is the outcome of Mr. Richmond Seeleys offer to publish
a small Iiandbook on pen drawing, zvould never have appeared in its present form,
had not Mrs. Pennell devoted much time to the writing from my dictation of
the text. She has managed all the correspondence in connection with it, and
relieved me of the drudgery of the work. Without her aid and encouragement,
the almost insurmountable difficulties, altogether unforeseen but encountered at
every step, could not Jiave been overcome.

I must next thank Messrs. Macmillan, especially Mr. Frederick Macmillan,
for their generosity in allowing the illustrations to be so complete, for their
permission to use or reproduce drazoings which have appeared in their publications,
and for their willingness to reject process block after process block, the most
imperfect of whicJi perhaps not half a dozen people in the zoorld would have
criticised.

The Century Company, my friends and patrons — for publishers to-day are
the o-reatest art patrons who ever lived, — Jiave freely lent me all the drazoings
I wanted from their unrivalled collection. In this matter I am particularly

PREFACE

indebted to Mr. Charles F. Chichester, t/ie assistant treasurer, and Messrs.
A. jr. DraJce and W. Lewis Fraser, the art editors.

Mr. David Douglas of Edinburgh lias lent me tlie plate by Amand-
Durand after Mr. George Reid. Messrs. George Routlcdge and Sons have
also contributed the blocks after Randolph Caldecott engraved by Mr. Edmund
Evans. Messrs. Harper have given me permission to use t/ie two drawings
by Messrs. Abbey and Parsons from She Stoops to Conquer ; and Mr. Charles
Parsons, the late head of their Art Department, ivas good enough to select drawings
and have electros under his supennsion made from them in Neiu York. Messrs.
Carrcre and Hastings undertook the printing of an edition of Blum's draivnig
from their book on the Ponce de Leon Hotel ; zvhile Messrs. Cassell, Charles
Scribners Sons of New York, Bradbury, Agneza and Co., and R. See ley
and Co., have furnished me with editions and plates and blocks from tJieir
different publications. As to the great mass of French, German, Ltalian, and
Spanish work, zaith the exception of original drazvings, it zuas obtained through
the Electrotype Agency, the proprietor of zvhich, Mr. D. T. N'ops, has on
several occasions gone to much trouble in obtaining certain electros, as well as
in other matters.

But after all there would be no illnstraled publications zvere it not for
artists and engravers, and from them I have received directly more sympatJiy
and substantial assistance than I ever could have expected. It is useless to specify
the many interesting letters I have received from all quarters of the world. But
when in several cases these letters have been accompanied by original drazvings
as freely given as they have been gratefully accepted, I hardly know hozu duly
to acknozaledo'c the kindness. On commissioning^ Martin Rico to make a drazvino-,
he gave me zaith it another quite as important — the one zvhich begins the chapter
on his zvork — simply, as he put it, as a petit soLu-enir. Casanova, reftsing to
make a drazuing at any price, sent instead zvhat he called a little sketch ; it
appears as a fullfage photogravure. I must also specially acknozvledge my
indebtedness to jMessrs. Alpred Parsons, E. A. Abbey, ]]lro-nian, JJ^. L. JJ\llie,
George Reid, David Murray, Mackmurdo and Home. Harry Furniss, Linley
Sambourne, and the artists of Pick- Me- Up; zvJiile I must at least refer to
the kindly aid and interest of Adolf JMenzel, Vierge, Dantan, Mine. Lemaire,
Messrs. W. AL Rossetti, Elozoard Lflc, Charles Kecne, and /. G. Lego-e, the
latter having attended to many difficult business details for me in Paris. But

PREFACE xi

the list IS endless. I have already tried to thank each individually ; I am glad
to be able to again thank all collectively.

Messrs. Dalziel with the greatest possible generosity — a generosity which
can only be appreciated when 1 say that these draiuings were lent solely for the
purpose of endeavouring to surpass their own ivoodcuts, in which I have succeeded
— fu7-nished me with the original draioings by Sir Frederick Leighton, iMessrs.
F. M. Brown and Poynter, which were published in their Bible Gallery.
Messrs. Dalziel and Swain have not only given me much invaluable information
about the greatest period of English illustration with which they were so
intimately associated, but Mr. Szoain has also furnished me with the photographic
negative from which the Sandys plate was made. As to the photo-engravers
who have been particularly successful in the reproduction of drawings, I have
sought to give them due credit where their zvork appears.

I have not space to mention all the collectors I have bothered, all the
collections I have waded through, but I must at least alloiv myself the pleasure
of again thanking Mr. J. P. Heseltine for lending me the draioing by Frederick
Walker, Mr. Edmund Gosse for his book plate by Mr. Abbey, and Mr. Hall
for the drawing by the same artist from She Stoops to Conquer. The
authorities of the British and Sojith Kensington Museums will probably re-
member me as one who has given them an immense amount of muscular' exercise
in the mere carting of bound magazines ; the fact that they not only never
rebelled, save on one occasion in the British Museum, but were willing to aid
7ne by other than physical means, calls for my very best thanks.

I must also explain that when I say that American printing is the best,
I refer especially to magazine zvork — that is the rapid printing of large editions.
BtU this would not be true in speaking of the printing of a book like this.
Messrs. Clark have taken the greatest possible pains with it, and have been
completely successful. I do not believe it could have been better printed anywhere.

Westminster, August 1889.

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
INTRODUCTION ....
PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

Titian ....

Some Comparative Heads : Old and
Rembrandt
PEN DRAWING OF TO-DAY-
SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK .
Mariano Fortuny
Daniel Vierge
G. Favretto
J. F. Raffaelli
A. Montalti
Antonio Faeres .
Louis Galice and Ferrand Fau
Martin Rico

E. Tito ....
A. Casanova y Estorach
GERMAN WORK
Adolf Menzel

W. Dietz ....
H. Schlittgen

Robert Haug and Hermann Luders
Ludwig Marold .
A. Oberlander

New

PAGE

xvii

25
35
40

44
45
46
48
51
52
57
58
61
69
73
74

79
So

XIV

CONTENTS

Albert Richter and other Artists in " Universum

A. Stucki . . ■ ■ ■

Waldemar Frederick ....
PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE

Leon Lhermitte . . ■ •

Edouard Detaille . . . •

Madeleine Lemaire ....

E. Dantan .....

P. G. Jeanniot .....

Louis Leloir . . . . ■

Maxime Lalanne ....

Ulysse Butin .....

Drawings of Sculpture

H. Scott .....

Mars ......

A. LANgoN .....

A. Lalauze .....

M. DE Wylie .....

Caran D'Ache .....
PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND .

Introduction .....

Frederick Sandys ....

Ford Madox Brown ....

E. J. Poynter .....

Sir Frederick Leighton

William Small .....

W. L. WVLLIE .....

T. Blake Wirgman ....

Frederick Walker ....

George du Maurier ....

Charles Keene ....

LiNLEY SAMBOURNE ....

Harry Furniss ....

George Reid .....
Walter Crane .....
Randolph Caldecott ....
Maurice Griffenhagen
Hugh Thomson, Herbert Railton
Leslie Willson and J. Raven Hill .
Alfred Parsons ....

PAGE
82

100

103

109

1 10

1 12

114

121
124
125
126
128

147
150

153

157
158

159
160
162
165
167

i68
173
174
176
179
182
184
187
190

CONTENTS

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA .

Edwin A. Abbey ....

C. S. Reinhart ....

Reginald B. Birch

H. F. Farny ....

Howard Pyle ....

Arthur B. Frost, Frederick Remington, E. W. Kemble

Alice Barber ....

Arthur B. Frost — Caricatures

Robert Blum ....

Alfred Brennan

Frederick Lungren . .

Harry Fenn ....

Kenyon Cox ....

Wyatt Eaton ....
A FEW WORDS ON PEN DRAWING ELSEWHERE
ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING .
PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION
MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING .
TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR PEN DRAWING
REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS
HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING .
INDEX ......

I'AGE

201

204

207
208

2 10
215
217
21S
220
224
"•2 7
228
231

239
249

273
281
289
301
311

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PACK

1. Titian. Landscape. Process block ; unsigned. From the Gazette des Beaux-Arts^ vol.

XXV. 1882, p. 239 ....... . . 14

2. Maxime Lalanne. La Porte St.-Antoitte, K\-as^.iirAa.Tci. Process block ; unsigned. From Zrt

Hotlande a Vol d'Oiseait par. H. Havard, Ouantin, p. 237 . . . .15

3. Albert DuRER. Study for a figure. Process block ; unsigned. From Life of Diirer by C.

Ephrussi, Quantin, p. 177 . . . . . . . .16

4. Vandyke. Head of a child. Process block ; unsigned. Yxovci Aijtoine Vandyke ; Sa Vie et

son CEiivre, par Jules Guififrey, Quantin, p. 59 . . . . . .17

5. D. G. ROSSETTI. Study of a head. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From the English Illus-

trated Magazine, 1884, p. 38 . . . . . . . . 19

6. Louis Desmoulins. Portrait of Georges Ohnet. Process block ; unsigned. From La Vie

Moderne, vol. vi. 1884, p. 354 . . . . . . . .19

7. Louis Galice. Portrait of Mme. Madrazo. Process block ; unsigned. From La Vie

Moderne, vol. vii. 1885, p. 57 . . . . . . . .20

8. Louis Desmoulins. Portrait of M. Jundt. Process block ; unsigned. Yxom La Vie Moderne,

vol. vi. 1884, p. 324 ......... 20

9. Vandyke. Head of Snyders. Process block ; unsigned. Yxova Ajitoine Vandyke, <t\z.,'^. T ^ 2 1

10. Rembrandt. Head of an old man. Process block; unsigned. From Gazette des Beaux-

Arts, vol. xxxii. 1885, p. 498, seq. ....... 22

11. Rembrandt. Landscape. Process block ; unsigned. From the same . . .22

12. Rembrandt. The Unfaithful Servant. Process block; unsigned. From L'Art, vol. xix.

1879, p. 126 . . . . . . . . . .23

13. Mariano FortuNY. A man reading. Process block ; unsigned. From Z'^rz", vol. xxv. 188 I,

p. 141 . ■ . . • . ■ • ■ • -37

14. Daniel Vierge. Drawing made for Pablo de Segovie, par Francisco de Ouevedo, Leon

Bonhoure, p. i. Process block by Gillot ...... 40

1 5. Daniel Vierge. Don Quixote. Photogravure by Dujardin. From Portfolio, Nov.

1888 .......... to face 40

16. Daniel Vierge. Drawing made for Pablo de Segovie, p. 40. Process block by Gillot . 42

17. Daniel Vierge. Drawing made for Pablo de Segovie, p. 148. Process block by Gillot (?) 43

1 8. G. Favretto. Study. Process block ; unsigned. From Gazette des Beaux-Arts, vol. xxx.

1884, p. 89 .......... 44

XVIU

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

19. J. F. RAFFAitLLI. Homme du Peuplc. Process block ; unsigned. From Gazette des Beaux-

Arts, vol. xxix. 1884, p. 337 ..■••■••

20. A. MONTALTi. Pen drawing on lined paper. Tl Tirit), T\. Process block by Fratelli

Treves of Milan. From Cera una Volta, by Luigi Capuana, Fratelli Treves . . 47

21. A. Fabres. a Roman peasant. Process block; unsigned. From VArt, vol. xxiii. 1880,

facing p. 22 . . . • ■ • ■ • • .49

22. Louis Galice. Sketch. Process block by Michelet. From Zrt Vie Moderne, \o\. \\. 1884,

p. 611 . . . . . . • ■ ■ • -51

23. Ferrand Fau. Figures. Process block by Michelet. From La Vie lifoderne, vol. vii.

1885, p. 262 . . . . . . . • • -51

24. Martin Rico. A corner of St. Mark's, drawn for this book. Process block by Waterlow

and Sons, Limited .....•••• 5^

25. Martin Rico. Study, Venice, drawn for this book. Photogravure; unsigned . to face 52

26. Martin Rico. A Venetian canal. Process block ; unsigned. From La Ihestracion

Espauola y Americana, vol. xxiii. 1879, p. 292 . . . . . -54

27. Martin Rico. Reminiscence of Seville. Process block ; unsigned. From La Ilustracion

Espailola y Americana, vol. xxiii. 1879, p. 292 ....•• 55

28. E. Tito. Piazetta di Santa Marta. Process block ; unsigned. From Z'^r/, vol. xxxv. 1883,

p. 218 . . . . . . . . . • .57

29. A. Casanova v Estorach. Study. Process block by Yves et Barret. From LArt, vol. vi.

1876, p. 217 .......... 58

30. A. Casanova y Estorach. Study of a head, drawn for this book. Photogravure ;

unsigned ......... to face 58

31. A. Casanova y Estorach. Two monks. Process block by Gillot. From LAj-t, vol. xviii.

1879, p. 31 • • • . . • • • • -59

32. A. Menzel. Portrait of Blucher. From Germania j drawing loaned by the Berlin Museum.

Photogravure by the Berlin Photographic Co., by permission of the Keeper of the Gallery

and A. Menzel ......... to face 69

33. A. Menzel. Sentinel on duty. Process block from a pen drawing on stone; unsigned.

From Uniforms of t/ie Army of Frederick the Great, published in Les Maitres Modernes,
Menzel, p. 8 . . . . . . . . . .70

34. A, Menzel. Drum-major. See above, p. 9 . . . . . .71

35. A. Menzel. Studies of costume. See above, p. 10 . . . . .72

36. W. DiETZ. Revellers. Process block ; unsigned. From Kunst fiir Alle . . -73

37. H. Schlittgen. Head of officer. Process block ; unsigned. From Ein Erster tmd ein

Letzter Bal, by Hacklander, Carl Krabbe, p. 2 . . . . . .74

38. H. Schlittgen. At Trouville. Process block ; imsigned. From Trouville, by F. W.

Hacklander, Carl Krabbe, p. 25 . . . . . . . -75

39. Robert Haug. Saluting an officer. Process block ; unsigned. From Ein Scldoss in den

Arde7inen, by F. W. Hacklander, Carl Krabbe, p. 93 . . . . -77

40. Hermann Luders. A review. Process block by Angerer and Goschl. From Ein

Soldatenleben, etc., by H. Luders, Deutsche Verlags Anstalt, p. 167 . . .78

41. LUDWIG Marold. Sketch, three girls. Process block; unsigned. From Zwisclien Zwei

Regen, by F. W. Hacklander, Carl Krabbe, p. 49 . . . . -79

42. A. Oberlander. The Doctor. Woodcut by Roth. From Oberliinder's collection of

sketches . . . . . . . . _ .Si

43. Albert Richter. Three small drawings from Universum. Process blocks ; unsigned . 82 83

44. A. Stucki. a cup. Process block by Meisenbach. From Das Dciitche Zimmer, G. Hirth 84
45 Waldemar Frederick. Idyl. Photo-lithograph, from a pen and wash drawing; unsigned.

From Universum ........ to face 86

46. Leon Lhermitte. The Ragpickers' Street, Paris. Photogravure by Amand-Durand. A

process block from the same drawing was published in Hamerton's Paris . to face 96

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

47. Edouard Detaille. Figure from DAlcrte. Process block by Yves and Barret. From

L'Art, vol. xiv. 1878, p. 33 .

48. Madeleine Lemaire. La Marchande de Violettes. Process block ; unsigned. From the

Ccita.\ogue of the Soch'ii' d'A(^uare/^isies Frangais, 1888 .

49. E. Dantan. Corner of a studio. Process block by Yves and Barret. From L'Art, vo

xxii. 1880, facing p. 166 ........

50. P. G. Jeanniot. Kiosque at night. Process block ; unsigned. From Z« Vie Moderne,

vol. V. 1883, p. 2

51. P. G. Jeanniot. Soldiers drilling. Process block; unsigned. From Za Vie Modenie, wo\

V. 1883, p. 284 .........

52. P. G. Jeanniot. Study of furniture. Process block by Rose. From La Vie Moderne, vol

iv. 1882, p. 61 .

53. Louis Leloir. Study of a figure. Process block; unsigned. From VArt, vol. xxv,

1881, p. 365 ■

54. Maxime Lalanne. Zutphen. Process block ; unsigned. From Havard's j^/Zaw^/f?, p. 88

55. Maxime Lalanne. Kampen, Eglise St. Nicholas. Process block; unsigned. From

Havard's Hollande, Quantin, p. 112 .

56. Maxime Lalanne. Roermond Vue du Marche. Process block; unsigned. See above,

p. 17 .

57. UlysSE Butin. Au cabaret. Process block by Yves and Barret. From L'Art, vol. xiii

1878, facing p. 54 .

58. L£on Gaucherel. Sarpedon. Process block by Yves and Barret. From L'Art, vol. x

1877, p. 104 .

59. St. Elme Gautier. La Genie des Arts. Process block by Yves and Barret. Yxom L'Art,

vol. X. 1877, p. loi ........

60. Marie Weber. Tetes d'Anges. Process block; unsigned. From L'Art, vol. xxviii. 188:

p. 35 .

61. Ringel D'Illzach. Head of De Lesseps. Drawing in crayon and ink on lined pape

Process block; unsigned. From L'Art, vol. xxxviii. 1885, p. 8 .

62. H. Scott. Clock tower of Chantilly. Process block ; unsigned. From La Vie Moderne.

vol. V. 1883, p. 402 ........

63. H. Scott. Pierrefonds. Process block; unsigned. From La Vie Moderne, vol. vi. 1884

p. 148 .

64. Mars. Pierrot blanc et Pierrette noir. Process block ; unsigned. From La Vie Moderne.

vol. v. 1883, p. 136 .

65. A. LaN(JON. Cats. Process blocks; unsigned. From La Vie Moderne,' yo\. ii. 1881, p,

523 ......... .

66. A. L.alauze or Louis Leloir. Study of a figure in pen and pencil. Process block by

Yves and Barret. From L'Art, vol. xxxvi. 1884, p. 62 .

67. M. DE Wylie. Twilight. Process block ; unsigned. From La Vie Moderne, vol. v

1883, p. 309 . . . .

68. Caran D'Ache. All Pesage. Process block by Krakow, on which colour wash is to be

applied. From Les Courses dans L'Antiquite, Plon, Nourrit, and Cie, p. 28

69. Frederick Sandys. Amor Mundi. Photogravure ; unsigned. From a negative, owned

by Mr. J. Swain, made from the original drawing on the wood. The woodcut from this
drawing was published in the 5/«'///;zf yJ/ag'a^zVz^ for 1865. . . . to face

70. Ford M.ADOX Brown. Elijah and the widow's son. Process block by A. and C. Dawson.

From the original drawing owned by Messrs. Dalziel. From this drawing a woodcut, made
by them, was published in their Bible Gallery ......

71. E. J. Poynter. Daniel's prayer. Process block; Walker and Boutall. See above

72. Sir Frederick Leighton. Samson. Photogravure; unsigned. See above . to face

73. William Small. Studies. Process blocks by Waterlow and Sons, and unsigned. From

original unpublished drawings loaned me by Mr. T. Blake Wirgman

XIX

PAGE

97
99

105

107

109
1 10

1 10

1 1 1

113
114

115

117
119
121

123

124
125
127
129
132

150

152
155
157

iSS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

i6o

i6i

165
167

74. W. L. Wyllie. Black Diamonds. Drawing from his picture of the same name, with brush

and pen. Process blocl< ; unsigned. From the original drawing. Reproductions of this
drawing have also been pubhshed in catalogues and Cassell's Afaffl^/Vz^ <?/-4r^ . -15?

75. T. Blake Wirgman. Sketch of Reynolds' portrait of Mrs. Smeaton. Process block ;

unsigned. From original unpublished drawing, loaned me by the artist .

76. T. Blake Wirgman. H. H. Armstead at work. Process block ; unsigned. From original

drawing, by permission of the Century Co., loaned me by the artist. This drawing m
smaller size was cut on wood in the Century Magazine, as an illustration to Some English
Sculptors, 1882.

77. Frederick Walker. The Vagrants. Photogravure ; unsigned. From the original un-

published drawing loaned by Mr. J. P. Heseltine . . • • • to face 162

78. George Du Maurier. Right of Translation. Woodcut by J. Swain. From Pimch

for 7th Jan. 1865 ..■•■••■•

79. Charles Keene. "Little Chickmouse," etc. Woodcut by J. Swain. From Punch for

24th Sept. 1864 ....•■•••■

80. LiNLEY Sambourne. A water baby. Process block by A. and C. Dawson and woodcut

by J. Swain. From Water Babies, -p. 109. Macmillan and Co. . . • .168

81. LiNLEY Sambourne. A lobster. Woodcut by J. Swain. See above, p. 162 . . 169

82. LiNLEY Sambourne. Tail-piece. See above, p. 235 . . . • • 169

83. LiNLEY Sambourne. Worth Cultivating. Process block by A. and C. Dawson, from the

original drawing. A woodcut of the same drawing was published in Punch, 24th Dec.

1887 ......•■•■■ 170

84. Harry Furniss. Education's Frankenstein. Woodcut by J. Swain. From Punch's

Almanac hi 1884 . . . . ■ • • • .172

85. Harry Furniss. Portraits. Woodcut; unsigned, and process block by Waterlow and

Sons. YromXkiit English Illustrated Magazine, 1884, pp. 12 and 13 ■ • ■ I73

86. George Reid. Portrait of the Author, from Johnnie Gibb. Photogravure by Amand-

Durand, the plate loaned by David Douglas of Edinburgh. . . . to face 174

87. Walter Crane. Process block ; unsigned. From the original drawing . . .177

88. Randolph Caldecott. Cat waiting for a mouse. Woodcut by Edmund Evans. From

R. C.'s. House that Jack Built. Routledge and Sons . . . . .179

89. Randolph Caldecott. The Mad Dog. From The Mad Dog. Woodcut by Edmund

Evans. Routledge and Sons . . . . . . . .180

90. Randolph Caldecott. The Stag. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From R. C.'s yEsop's

Failles. Macmillan and Co. . . . . . . . .180

91. Randolph Caldecott. The Fox. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From ALsofs Fables.

Macmillan and Co. . . . . . . . . .181

92. Randolph Caldecott. The Lamb. See above . . . . . .181

93. Randolph Caldecott. Some Round Hats. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From the

English Illustrated Magazine, 1886, p. 415 . . . . . . 181

94. Maurice Griffenhagen. Evening on a house boat. Process block by A. and C.

Dawson. From original drawing loaned me by Messrs. Dalziel . . . .183

95. Hugh Thomson. A hunting morning. Process block by Waterlow and Sons. From the

English Illustrated Magazine, 1889 . . . . . . .184

96. Herbert Railton. The Judge's houses at East Grinstead. Process block by Waterlow

and Sons (?) From the Englisli Illustrated Magazitie, 18S8, p. 434 . . .185

97. Leslie Willson. Evening fete. Process block by J. Swain. From Pick-Me-Up for 30th

March 1889 . . . . . . . . . .187

98. L. Raven Hill. Visions of the future. Process block by J. Swain. From Pick-Me-Up

for 1 6th March 1S89 . . . . . . . . .189

99. Alfred Parsons. Marston Sicca. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From the English

Illustrated Magazine, 1885, p. 275 . . . . . . , 190

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xxi

PAGE

lOO. Alfred Parsons. Initial Letter. Woodcut by E. Schladitz. From the English Illus-
trated Maga::ine, 1884, p. 478 . . . . . . .190

loi. Alfred Parsons. Field thistle. Woodcut by J. D. Cooper. From the English Illiis-

tratcd Maga:iine, 1884, p. 169 . . . . . . . .190

102. Alfred Parsons. An old garden. Process block ; unsigned. Yxoxn Harper's CJwistmas

A limber^ 1887. . , . . , . . . .191

103. Alfred Parsons. Title-page to She Stoops to Conquer. Photogravure by Amand-Durand.

From original drawing, by permission of Messrs. Harper Brothers. Drawing loaned by

Mr. Parsons ......... to face 192

104. Edwin A. Abbey. Book plate. Process block by A. and C. Dawson. From original

drawing loaned by Mr. Edmund Gosse ....... 202

105. Edwin A. Abbey. 'Q'C2i\mVL'g^ixo\-\\ She Stoops to Conquer. Photogravure by Amand-Durand.

From original drawing, by permission of Messrs. Harper Brothers, loaned by Mr. Hall

to face 202

106. Charles S. Reinhart. Drawing from Tlieir Pilgrimage. Process block by Franklin

Electro Co. Yrom. Harper^ s Monthly, 1886 ...... 204

107. Reginald Birch. Two di'a.wm'g^ irom Little Lord Fauntleroy. Process blocks ; unsigned 205

108. H. F. Farny. An Indian chief Process block by A. and C. Dawson. From original

drawing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in smaller size in the
Century Magazi?ie . . . . . . . . .206

109. Howard Pyle. Drawing from the Wonder Clock. Process block by Moss Engraving Co. 208

110. Arthur B. Frost. A discussion. Process block by Louis Chefdeville. From original

drawing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in smaller size in the Century
Magazine . . . . . . . . .211

111. Frederick Remington. A question of brands. Process block by Louis Chefdeville.

From original drawing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in smaller size

i n the Century Magazine . . . . . . . .212

112. E. W. Kemble. Boiling sugar cane. Process block by Louis Chefdeville. From original

drawing loaned by the Centuiy Co. of New York. Published in smaller size in the Century
Magazitie . . . . . . . . . .213

113. Alice B.arber. A music lesson. Process block by Moss Engraving Co. From Harper's

Young People, 188S . . . . . . . . .215

114. A. B. Frost. Our Cat Eats Rat Poison. Process block; unsigned. From Harper's

Monthly, 1881 . . . . . . . . .216

115. Robert Blum. Portrait of Joe Jefferson. Photogravure ; unsigned. From original drawing

loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published as a woodcut much smaller in
Scrihner's Monthly . . . . . . . .to face 2 1 8

116. Alfred Brennan. Illustration for story. Process block ; unsigned. From drawing loaned

by the Century Co. of New York. Published in much smaller size in St. Nicholas . 221

1 1 7. Alfred Brennan. Stairway at Chantilly. Process block by C. L. Wright Gravure Co.

From Harpet^s Monthly, 1887. . . . . .223

1 1 8. Frederick LUNGREN. Illustration for story. Process block ; unsigned. From original draw-
ing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in much smaller size in St. Nicholas 225

119. Harry Fenn. Hallway of his house. Process block; unsigned. From the Magazine

of Art . . ■ ■ . . . . ■ . .227

120. Kenyon Cox. Figure from photograph. Process block by Louis Chefdeville. From

original drawing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in much smaller size

in the Century Magazine ■ . . . , . . .229

121. Wyatt Eaton. Drawing of relief Process block by the C. L. Wright Gravure Co. From

the Century Magazine, January 1889 . . . . . . .231

122. Robert Blum. Alcazar. Photo-lithograph done under the superintendence of Gilliss

Brothers and Tournure. Y-com Florida, the American Riviera . . . to face 246

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

124.

[26.
C27.

[28.

[29.

130.
31-
32.

133-

134.
135-
136.

137-
rsS.

139-

140.

141.

142.
143.

144.

145.

146.
147.

149.
[50.
rsi.
[52.
153-

Albert Durer. Angels carrying the Crown. Process block ; unsigned. From Life of

Diirer by Ephrussi, Ouantin, p. 194 .

Albert Durer. St. George and the Dragon. See above, p. 203
Alfred Parsons. The Hawk. Decoration for Si. Guido by Richard Jefiferies. Woodcut

by J. D. Cooper. From the English Illustrated Magazine, 1885, p. 186
Alfred Parsons. The Swallow. See above, p. 181 .
Hugh Thomson. Title : A Morning in London. Process block by Waterlow and Sons

YxovLi\\ift English Illustrated Magazine, \'&?,1,T^. Z^i ■ ■ ■ ■

Louis Davis. Tail-piece. Process block by Waterlow and Sons. Used as head-piece in

t\i& E?iglish Illustrated Magazine, 1887, p. 245 .
Heywood Sumner. Head-piece. Woodcut; unsigned. See above, 1884, p. 390
A. C. Morrow. Tail-piece. See above, 1886, p. 498 . . . ■

Heywood Sumner. Head-piece. See above, 1885, p. 718

Henry Ryland. Tail-piece. Process block ; unsigned. See above, 1888, p. 629
Henry Ryland. Head-piece. Process block by Waterlow and Sons. See above, 18

p. 210 .
Heywood Sumner. Tail-piece. Process block ; unsigned. See above, 1887, p. 373
Louis Davis. Head-piece. Process block ; unsigned. See above, 1888, p. 524.
E. Grasset. Head-piece, landscape. Process block ; unsigned. From Baschet's illustrated

Salon Catalogues ........

E. Grasset. Introductory head-piece. Process block by Gillot. See above

F. Bracquemond. Tail-piece. Process block ; unsigned. Yrora Gazette des Beaux-Arts.
voL xxix. 1884, p. 420, etc. .......

Heywood Sumner. We have no Souls, etc. Process block by Waterlow and Sons. From
\\i& English Illustrated Magazine, 1887, p. 298 ......

Alfred Parsons. Title : Shakespeare's Country. Woodcut by J. J. Cocking. From
\h^ English Illustrated Magazine, 1885, p. 271.

Herbert P. Horne. Diana. Process block by Walker and Boutall. From the Century
G\x\\A Hobby-Horse, 1888

Herbert P. Horne. Initial F. Process block by Walker and Boutall. From the
Century Guild Hobby-Horse .......

H. L. Bridwell. Initial M. Process block by Louis Chefdeville. From original drawing
loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in smaller size in the Century
Magazine .........

E. Unger. Head-piece. Woodcut ; unsigned. From Universum

H. L. Bridwell. Initial S. Process block by Louis Chefdeville. From original draw-
ing loaned by the Century Co. of New York. Published in smaller size in the Century
Magazine .........

Haeert-Dys. Initial A. Process block by Pettit. From the Alphabet of Habert-Dys

F. Bracquemond. Initial D. Process block ; unsigned. From Gazette des Beaux-Arts.
vol. xxix. 1884, p. 420 .........

E. Unger. Tail-piece. Woodcut ; unsigned. From Universum

Habert-Dys. Tail-piece. Process block; unsigned. From VArt, vol. xxxvi. 1884

p. 195 ■
P. Renouard. Cock fight. Process blocks ; unsigned. From La Vie Modernc, vol. iii

1882, p. 84s .

Walter Crane. Page of decorative lettering. Process block by Waterlow and Sons

7 torn ih& English Illustrated Magazine, 1885, p. 628
Walter Crane. Head and tail-pieces. Process blocks by Walker and Boutall. From

drawings designed for Messrs. R. and R. Clark .....
Habert-Dys. Head-piece. Process block by Pettit. From L'Art, vol. xxxvi. 1884

P- 194 •

251
251

252
253

254

254
255
255
256
256

257

257
258

259
260

260

261

262

263

264

264
265

265
266

266
267

267

268

269

270

271

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xxiii

PAGE

154. Herbert P. HoRNE. Tail-piece. Process block by Walker and Boutall. From the Century

G\xM Hobby-Horse . . . . . . . ■ .271

155. A. Edelfeldt. Study of a head. Woodcut by Charles Baude .... 296

156. Albert Durer. Big Horse. Woodcut by R. Paterson. From the English Illustrated

Magazine^ 1885, p. 20 . . . . . . . . • 298

157. Albert Durer. Big Horse. Photogravure by A. and C. Dawson. From print in

British Museum ......... to face 298

158. Albert Durer. Big Horse. Process block by A. and C. Dawson. From print in

British Museum .......... 299

Note. — Many of the plates and blocks being unsigned, I am unfortunately unable in certain cases to give the en-
gravers who reproduced them credit for their work. There are also a few illustrations to which the date of publication
is not appended. This is due to the fact that either original drawings were sent me by artists or publishers without date
or title, or else examples were selected from unsigned and undated collections of proofs.

ERRATA

Pages 30 and ^2, for "Illustradon," ax\A page ^S,, for '■^ Ilhistrazion" read

" llustracion.'"
Page 1^0, for " Armand Durand " read " Amand-Durand."

143, /^r "Leslie Wilson" read "Leslie Willson."

154, /&^ "Ford Maddox Brown" read "Ford Madox Brown."

\Z-],for "J. Raven Hill" read " L. Raven Hill."

200, for " Thurlstrop " read " Thulstup."

245, /(^r " British Artists " read " British Architects."

277, y^r " Tabor " ;ra(/ " Taber. "

2Z0, for "Windsor and Newton" read " Winsor and Newton."

295, /w " Beaude " read " Baude."

PEN DRAWING & PEN DRAUGHTSMEN

INTRODUCTION

I "HERE are three reasons why I wish to write of pen drawing
-L at the present time. The first is because I believe that, just
as none but the physician is allowed to speak with authority on
medicine, none but the scientist on science, so only the man who
has made and carefully studied pen drawings should have the
right to speak authoritatively of them. Only the writing on art by
one who has technical knowledge of it is of practical value, and
I think this explains why it is, that of the many books on art written
of late years, so few are of real use to the artist. Such volumes as
Lalanne's Treatise on Etching, Mr. Hamerton's Etching and Etchers,
and some parts of Ruskin's Elements of Drawing, are indeed the
exceptions.

This leads me to my second reason for writing : the very un-
satisfactory manner in which pen drawing has hitherto been treated.
The principal critics of the day hold their own estimation of con-
temporary and earlier art in all its many branches to be the only
right one, and abuse every other as vitally at fault ; while it is the
tendency of many modern writers to so enlarge upon the divine mission,
the intellectual value, the historical importance of art in the past, as to
belittle contemporary art, and to altogether ignore technique, which is
as great to-day as in any former time. Without the nearest possible
individual approach to technical perfection, according to the standard

2 PEN DRAWING

of the age in which it is produced, art work cannot be of value
as a whole, although in parts it may be instructive.

If often this belittling of contemporary art is to be expected, it is
unwarranted when extended to pen drawing, which, as a distinct art,
belongs only to the last few years. This fact has been so completely
overlooked that in treatises accepted as authorities, pen drawing
in its modern development has not received the attention it deserves.
This is true even of Mr. Hamerton's chapter on the subject, though it
must be remembered that The Graphic Arts was published in 1882,
before pen drawing had developed to any extent in England ; and,
knowing how careful and painstaking Mr. Hamerton is in all his
work, I think it probable that this chapter was written at a much
earlier date. Looking in The Graphic Arts, I find that not one
of the pen drawings is reproduced by any intaglio process of photo-
engraving, and it is the development of photo-engraving, side by
side with pen drawing, that has brought the latter to its present
perfection.

Of course the pen drawings or sketches of Albert Diirer, of
Da Vinci and Raphael, of Michael Angelo and Titian, in fact of
every old master, and above all of Rembrandt, are unquestionably
instructive and interesting and curious. Of the drawings of several
of these men I shall speak further on. As a rule, however,
they are but memoranda, the adjuncts of another art. To-day pen
drawing is not only an art in itself, but one which, as well as
painting in oils, requires its own technical perfection. It may
be objected that the old masters often made elaborate pen drawings.
So they did ; just as Rossetti elaborated with his pen or pencil
until one wishes he had put the same time and infinite amount of
work that went to his illustrations of Tennyson, and copies of
his pictures, for example, into his beautiful pastels. True, in the
end he succeeded in getting what he wanted, but he was no
technician ; like the old masters, he did not in the modern sense
know how to make a pen drawing. I should except some of his
slight early sketches, and notably a fine head of his mother.

With a certain class of writers on art I am not here concerned,
since to them eloquent writing is of more importance than honest
criticism, and their ignorance of the technique of any art is only
equalled by their ability to write on it. There have been men,

INTRODUCTION 3

however, who have sought to treat pen and ink drawing technically,
and the third reason for my writing is that some of these writers,
who call themselves pen draughtsmen, have evidently the very smallest
knowledge of their subject. One such manual states on cover and
title-page that pen and ink drawing is commonly called etching,
showing at once to what manner of audience it is addressed,
viz. people who draw with pen and ink on antimacassars and
call it etching, and who are continually asking what is the difference
between a pen drawing and an etching anyway.^ If Mr. Hamerton
and Mr. Ruskin have not been able to show this elementary difference,
it would be not only presumptuous, but a great waste of paper on my
part to quote their words. However, for the benefit of such people,
to whom it probably will be information, I may say that pen
drawing is, was, and ever shall be, drawing with a pen, and nothing
else. As to etching, it is a method of engraving on a metal plate
with which I am not here concerned.

Neither do I propose to make this a treatise on drawing. For
one must not only know something of art, but all that one can find
out for one's self about drawing, before good work can be done with
the pen. Strange as it may seem to the crowds who are actually
flooding the world with pen drawings, the same qualities go to make
a good pen drawing which Mr. Hamerton rightly says are indispens-
able to the production of a good etching. The only advantage is, that
instead of having a treacherous material to work with, you have the
simplest possible. This being so, only proves the great difficulty of
really drawing well with the pen.

When one sees pen and ink copies of woodcuts, of oil paintings,
of anything and everything, all worked out with an awful and reverent,
but utterly misplaced and wasted fidelity, one best realises that pen
drawing, like etching, is one of the most facile, least understood, and
most abused of the arts.

I do not believe with one of the few men who have already
written of pen drawing that he or any one else can, in a book, " teach
drawing in Indian ink, upon principles so easy and progressive that

1 The Master of the Architectural School of calls a perspective etched in brown ink. Other

the Royal Academy also falls into this careless architects are continually talking of a drawing

mistake. On page 47, paragraph 143, of his being etched when they mean it is drawn in pen

Architectural Drawing, writing of pen drawings, and ink.
he illustrates his matter by reference to what he

4 PEN DRAWING

individuals may attain this pleasing amusement without the aid of a
master" ; or indeed, unless the student has great ability, with his aid.
But I am not without hope that the pen drawings published here will
show many, who are pleased to call themselves pen draughtsmen, that
they are without the faintest idea of the aims, objects, and limitations
of the art; as well as bring to the notice of amateurs, collectors,
critics and print-sellers, a healthy, vigorous, flourishing art which is
being developed and improved in all its branches, and owes nothing
whatever to their fostering care or encouragement.

For examples, I have selected the best work, so far as I have
been able to find it, of all schools, and not merely of one narrow
French, English, Italian, German, Spanish, or American method, the
merits or shortcomings of which one would be unable to point out
without using this comparative plan.

Mr. Hamerton calls pen drawing a " simple process," and some
people may unwisely suppose that a simple process implies an easy
and trifling form of art. To the incipient artist encouraged by the
financial success of pen drawing hacks, I would only say : unless you
feel that pen drawing is something to be reverenced, something to be
studied, something to be loved, something to be wondered at, that you
are the motive power behind the pen, and that you must put all your
individuality and character into your work, you will never become a
pen draughtsman. And you should be prouder to illustrate the greatest
magazines of the world, thus appealing to millions of readers, than to
have your drawings buried in the portfolios of a few hundred collectors.
For I believe that, in these days, artists, who show their work to the
people through the press, are doing as did the masters of other days,
who spoke to the people through the church.

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

OF pen drawing in the past I shall say but little, for the
simple reason that there is little to be said. No artist
would study the old masters, with a very few exceptions, notably
among the old Dutchmen, for the technical qualities of pen
drawing. As painters now look to Titian and Velasquez, Rem-
brandt and Franz Hals, so men in future times will look back
to some of the pen draughtsmen of to-day as not only the early,
but the great masters of the art. It is not necessary to do more
than to point out the scope and aim of pen drawing as it existed
among the great artists of other days, in order to emphasise its
far wider scope and higher aims among the men of the present.
A knowledge of its immaturity in the past helps one to the appre-
ciation of its development in our own time.

It must be understood, however, that if the pen drawing of the
old masters was undeveloped in comparison with the work of to-day,
it was simply because with them there was no call for it as an art
apart. It was quite perfect for the purpose they wished it to serve.
Since in engravings on wood and steel all the pen quality of a
drawing is lost, when they wanted to reproduce their work auto-
graphically, they etched. What Mr. Hamerton says generally of pen
drawings, is really applicable only to theirs: they were "sketches of
projects and intentions." They are to be studied, of course, for their

8 PEN DRAWING

composition and arrangement, suggestion of light and shade, and
rendering of the figure, of Avhich I have no intention to speak, since
in these matters pen drawing is subject to the same laws as any other
art ; but for pure technique these pen memoranda, as a rule, have
little to teach the modern draughtsman.

That the old masters made great use of the pen is well enough
known. One cannot go to any of the galleries of the world without
seeing many of their pen drawings, which are interesting in their
relation to the pictures of which they were the germs, and as records
of strong impressions and ideas vigorously and simply put down.
And here let me insist again that, while one may make notes and
sketches as they did, and study their marvellous facility and vigour
in so sketching, such sketches are not, as many modern art critics
and artists consider them, pen drawings. This is proved at once by
the very different methods used by these same masters in their
etchings, to which the pen drawings of to-day are equivalent. But
their pen sketches, or rather memoranda, really were for them very
much what instantaneous photographs are for the modern artist —
suggestions and notes of action and movement. By all means these
old sketches should be studied. But it is the veriest affectation
nowadays to imitate them.

If the artists of to-day were not possessed of such external aids
as photography, they would probably excel all old masters in sketch-
ing — always excepting Rembrandt, though Whistler in his etchings
of architecture is quite the equal of Rembrandt. The modern artist
has many aids and adjuncts which the old men knew nothing about,
and which make the work of to-day much more true and accurate and
scientific than that of any other time. But because of his dependence
on these aids, the modern artist has lost much of the old facility in
sketching. What I say applies even to colour. And if a man with
the gifts of Titian were to come to-day, he would surpass Titian
himself, just as Corot surpasses all the old landscapists.

Michael Angelo, Da Vinci, and Raphael often made the first
sketches for their pictures with pen and ink : sketches full of character,
which have lately been made better known by Braun's autotypes and
numberless photographs. Botticelli's delicate and refined illustrations
for the Divina Commedia, though drawn in with sympathetic silver
point, were gone over with pen and ink.

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST 9

Landscapes by Titian, with little villages or houses in the middle
distance, have a delightful suggestion of picturesqueness ; but it is
curious to compare these with modern pen and ink landscapes by Rico
or Vierge, for example. Titian's, the honest critic must admit, suffer
when comparison of their technical points is made. A drawing of a
Turk by Giovanni Bellini in the British Museum can, for beauty of
modelling with a pen and delicacy of handling combined with sim-
plicity, be advantageously studied by the pen draughtsmen of to-day.
It shows what the old men might have done with a pen.

There are pen studies of horses and carriages by Velasquez, very
simply and strongly suggested. But it is unnecessary to go through
the list of all the masters whose drawings have been preserved. It is
endless, and, differing as the drawings do in character, they are nearly
all alike in being mere notes or records of facts; or if, as rarely
happens, carried out, they are, save in few more than the cases I have
mentioned, valueless for study of technique. There are ideas enough
to be learned from them, and sometimes the best and strongest work
of the artist is to be found in his pen drawings.

The pen draughtsman will study to best advantage such old work
as Holbein's Dance of Death, and beautiful designs for metal work,
many of the originals of which may be found in the British Museum ;
Albert Diirer's and Israel von Meckenen's engravings ; Rembrandt's
etchings ; the lovely Renaissance decorative head and tail pieces.
Durer, having no perfect process by which to reproduce his work,
wisely put little delicacy of line into his wonderful drawings for the
wood-cutter, and delicacy is all that is lacking to make them in
technique equal to the drawings of to-day. That he could draw
delicately is shown by his etchings, every one of which is worthy of
reverent study. That he did not, only proves that he understood
the limitations of wood-cutting. This want, however, added to a
certain archaic decorative feeling that pervades all his engraved
work, makes it affectation for an artist to-day to model his style
on that of Dtirer.

But, on the other hand, nothing could be nearer perfection for an
artist of a northern countiy to study than Rembrandt's drawings and
etchings of out-of-door subjects, especially his little views of towns.
Even Mr. Ruskin gives this advice in his Elements of Drawing.
Rembrandt's etchings have so many of the same qualities as pen

lo PEN DRAWING

drawings that, I feel certain, had he lived in our age, he would not
have etched so much, but would have made innumerable pen draw-
ings, for the same reason the best pen draughtsman of to-day, who
could etch if he chose, once gave me. Why, when he could have his
drawings reproduced perfectly, should he use a nasty, dirty process,
which is successful more by good luck than good management ? You
can see by reproductions in the Gazette des Beaux-Arts how well
Rembrandt's simpler etchings, as well as Vandyke's, are rendered by
process blocks from clean wiped prints. Many of Rembrandt's etch-
ings come veiy Avell without any wiping.^ Collectors now appreciate
old etchings for their rarity, but when they were made, they were
appreciated because of their perfect reproduction of the master's work.
There were then no fancy prices attached to Rembrandt's etchings, or,
in his time, to Meryon's either for that matter. They were sold for a
few pence, as are our best illustrated magazines.

There is a little of the modern feeling and go in some
of Tiepolo's drawings. Claude's landscape sketching in pen and
ink is also marked by more of the modern spirit. Mr. Hamerton,
indeed, thinks that with him modern pen work began. Both these
artists used washes of bistre or sepia in their pen drawings. But to
this I see no reason to make objection. I am no purist in art,
and therefore no advocate for "pure pen drawing." I think it
more important to give a desired effect, no matter how, than to
limit the means by which it is to be obtained.

The development from Claude and Tiepolo, through Paul Huet
and others, onwards to our time, could be easily traced. Doubtless
many pages could be filled were I to follow this growth in detail,
and the average art critic would have ample opportunity to discover
my omissions and praise my discoveries. But I do not think it
worth while, since it is in its maturity, rather than in its making,
that pen drawing is most interesting. And besides, as I have
said, the introduction of photo-engraving had so much to do with its
development that there seems to be but one step from the old
" sketches of projects and intentions " to the modern comparatively
perfect work.

The history of the development of pen drawing and the history

^ For reproductions of Rembrandt's etchings par Emilc Michel, Paris; Librairie de L'Arf,
by process, see Les Artistes C'dcbres ; Rembratidt, iSS6; and DaJieiiu, Leipzic, Sept. iSSS, scq.

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST n

of the development of photo-engraving are two distinct subjects,
neither of which do I propose to treat. Mr. H. Trueman Wood in
his Modern MetJwds of Illustrating Books devotes a chapter to
mechanical processes, in which he gives the bare dates and facts
about photo - engraving. I think it more than likely that the
processes he mentions were used in France and America before
they were ever attempted in this country, though Mr. Fraser of the
Century says the first really successful process was Woodbury's
in England. However, the first successful reproductions which
appeared in any English magazine, I have found in Once a Week, and
they were taken from French periodicals.

There are, on the other hand, innumerable histories and
biographies of the great and lesser masters of all times from Giotto
to the man who died yesterday, all of whom have helped to develop
pen drawing. But until about the year 1880 pen drawing did
not begin to flourish as an art in itself. Before this no artist,
except as an experiment, would have his work reproduced by these,
then, only partially developed processes. The drawings of the old
masters, when reproduced at all, were drawn on wood and then
cut all to pieces, and this method was continued until a very
few years ago, when photography was made use of to transfer
the image of natural objects on to the wood. Thence it was
only a step to photograph the pen or other drawing on to the
block, the original work remaining untouched. The last step of
all is the photographing of the pen or other drawing — with pen
drawings alone I am of course here concerned — on to a sensitised
block, gelatine film or zinc plate, or other substance, from which a
mechanical or process engraving is made. It is this development of
process which has made pen drawing into a distinct art, equal in
importance to etching.

Throughout this volume I use the word process to express the
reproduction of a drawing. It is the word used by artists, and there-
fore the right one.

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST 13

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

ILLUSTRATIONS

TITIAN

T SHOW this drawing by Titian, and with it a Httle sketch in Holland by
-*- Maxime Lalanne, for the purpose of comparison. I am quite aware that it
will be thought absurd on my part to compare the study for a great picture,
which this may have been, — I confess I do not know for what picture it was a
study, if indeed it was ever used, for I cannot recall any of Titian's pictures in
which the composition recurs, — with an apparently slight and trivial drawing by
Lalanne. I know it will at once be said that the hand of a greater man and a
larger and broader mind is shown in a pen drawing which, like Titian's, can
give a rocky foreground with a great tree, a middle distance with a town and
woods, a lake stretching away to a mountainous horizon, and above all, a fine
cloud effect. I would be the first to admit this, if the drawing by Titian
expressed, with the same simplicity and meaning of line, a result as artistic as
that of the drawing by Lalanne. But this is certainly not the case.

Before analysing Titian's drawing, I must do that which will seem gratuitous.
I must make an apology for it by saying that I do not believe Titian ever in-
tended it to be shown. And because Titian was one of the greatest, if not the
o-reatest Italian painter who ever lived, there is absolutely no reason why we
should bow down and worship everything that came from his hand. Though
the composition is suggestive and may have been of great value to the artist,
the actual lines are useless for study. They are careless and trivial from one
end of the drawing to the other. To come down to details, the idea of the
tree trunk which comes out towards us is very well given, although there is
in it absolutely no feeling for line. But it grows out of a meaningless blot at
the bottom and disappears at the top in meaningless scrawls which common
sense tells us are meant for foliage. Compare it for a moment with the young

PEN DRAWING

tree by Lalanne ; ^ note how gracefully the growth of the tree is indicated,
and the way in which Lalanne shows the direction of the prevalent wind in
Holland, which causes the tree to bend and its branches to grow on the side
away from it. Then in Titian's drawing it is impossible to tell where the
rocky foreground ends and the water of the lake begins, even though the lake
lies far below. Everything is obscure. In Lalanne's this is shown in the
clearest manner with about one-third the number of lines Titian has used. In
the Titian there are blots in the water, and you cannot make out the construc-

tion ot the boat. In the Lalanne this is plain enough ; you can even see the
different colours in which his boat is painted. Look at the careful and yet
slight indication of the roadway leading back to the towered gate. But can
any one tell me what the cross-hatched, scrawled-in hill on the right of Titian's
is composed of? Titian's middle distance of a town, woods, and a house under
the trees on the opposite side of the lake have the handling of a small child,
while the perspective is all out. In Lalanne's, note how every line has a
purpose, how beautifully the shadows are given on the houses, how the little

1 La Porte Saint-Antoine, Amsterdam. La Hollande d Vol d'Oiscau, Henry Havard Decaux and
Quantin, Paris. '

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

blots all have a meaning, while Titian's are due to pure carelessness. There
is quite as much suggestion in Lalanne's pure white paper sky, as in Titian's
laboured clouds. I know that any critic can see these things. But the point
I wish to emphasise is that students are bidden, and do study drawings like
this of Titian's ; because he was a great master of painting, he is supposed to
be a great master of everything ; but Lalanne, who was an equally great master
as a pen draughtsman, is ignored because he is a modern and rarely painted.
And I want to insist in the strongest manner that this, and all other drawings
of Titian's I have ever seen — and I have gone through almost all the great
galleries, — are simply of no value whatever for the study of technique. I
repeat what I have already said that neither pen drawing nor landscape
painting was then developed, or had even become an independent and separate
art of any great importance. I do not for a moment assert that Titian could
not have made a fine pen drawing. I only say that, judging from his drawings
which we possess, he did not.

Note. — For other Lalannes, see Illustrations to Chapter on French Pen Drawing.

PEN DRAWING

SOME COMPARATIVE HEADS
OLD AND NEW

In showing these heads I have thought it best to compare the old work with

the new, even though I am thus grouping together two or three different

countries, in order to

explain more easily the

difference between

ancient and modern

methods.

Commencing with
Dlirer ; we all know what
he could do with a pen
from his designs and
decorations, so refined
as to be models for use
to-day, and from his
woodcuts, for whether
he drew these with a
pen, pencil, or brush is
of very little importance
since the results resem-
ble pen drawings on the
block. But when we
come upon a drawing
like this, of which he
must have been proud
or he would never have
signed it, we find at
once, exquisite though
the drawing is and fine as is every line in it, that Durer had not a knowledge
of the wealth and depth of colour which can be obtained with a pen. By
comparing it with the drawing by Rossetti this becomes apparent, even though
the Rossetti has lost very much in the woodcut. The lines in the Diirer are

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

of course far finer than those in the Rossetti, but the latter suggests far more

colour and is much more
freely handled than the
earlier drawing of Durer.
Neither of these drawings
was intended for reproduc-
tion, and the Diirer no
more resembles his etch-
ings than the Rossetti re-
sembles his designs which
were put on the block.

That a man like Van-
dyke, for example, could
draw with a pen is shown
most conclusively by the
accompanying head of a
child, though, of course,
in his day such a drawing
could never have been re-
produced ; but to-day it
could be, as indeed it has
been perfectly. Even the
chalk work in it comes

admirably. However, the head of Mme. Madrazo by Galice, though not to

be compared with it in knowledge of form

or in beauty of line, in some ways shows

plainly the advances we have made techni-
cally. While all of Vandyke's shadows are

made, or at any rate have been reproduced

in nearly pure black, Galice's, being drawn

with a fine pen, give variety to the whole,

and allow him to concentrate his blacks

where he wants. Vandyke has scattered his

blacks all over. Nevertheless his drawing

is but another proof that the old men could

have drawn with a pen had there been any

necessity for it.

I have had a process made from Vandyke's

etching of the head of Snyders and it is upon

his etchings that Vandyke's reputation as a

black-and-white man rests. I have placed with it two heads by Louis Des-

moulins from La Vie Moderne, which I think any one must admit are quite

>"V

PEN DRAWING

equal to Vandyke's work, and yet utterly different. The smaller drawing is as

full of character and the model-
ling as well given as in the
Vandyke ; in the larger one
the feeling- of flesh is far more
completely carried out than in
the Vandyke, while the hair,
moustache, and imperial, some-
what similar in both, are vastly
better rendered by Desmou-
lins. Here is a man who, I
venture to say, is almost un-
known, and yet in black and
white he has surpassed Van-
dyke with his world-wide re-
putation. However, Vandyke
has had but a handful of fol-
lowers ; Desmoulins, whether
the fact is known to newspaper

editors or not, is the man who com-
menced the drawing of portraits in
pen and ink for illustrated journalism.
Vandyke gave to a few of his friends
a most interesting gallery of his con-
temporaries ; Desmoulins has given /
the whole world a most artistic render-
ing of many great and little French-
men, and has influenced a vast army of
pen draughtsmen of whom he still
remains the master.

These drawings also demonstrate
another fact : we moderns have ad-
vanced very little, if at all, in merely
getting a likeness. But we have made
great strides in technical execution in
the drawing of portraits. If any one

PEN DRAWING IN THE PAST

will dispassionately compare the manner in which Vandyke has dotted and
stippled the light side of the face of Snyders, and lined the shadows without
reference to the modelling, with the very simple yet suggestive line of Des-
moulins, he will find that Desmoulins has carried his subject further and
rendered the head more completely with an expenditure of probably half the
time and labour. The actual time and labour given to a drawing is of course
of no importance. But if one can show a good result produced simply, it cannot
but be an advantage.

As I have said elsewhere I should like to give the beautiful Bellini — the
drawing of a Turk — which is in the British Museum. But the delicate lines
are so faded it would have been impossible to render them adequately. It
has more of the spirit of a modern pen drawing than any old pen work I
have seen.

REMBRANDT

Rembrandt, great in every way, shows his knowledge of the limitation of every
art by his admirable and right work in it. The etching of the old man's
head here given is a perfect study for a pen sketch. It is as free as it can be,
and yet every line is put in carefully. The most positive proof that Rembrandt
would have been a pen draughtsman had he lived to-day is the fact that this
head reproduces charmingly by process. Compare it with the head of the master
in the Unfaithful Servant, the full-page pen drawing, and note that though every
line in the latter is put down with a purpose, and there is in it none of the
wild scrawling so visible in Titian, it is without the delicacy and refinement
shown in the two etchings. It is only a note to be used in a picture or
an etching, and I am sure is not a work upon which Rembrandt would have
wished to base his reputation.

As I have said of other men, Rembrandt knew perfectly the limitations of
pen drawing in his day and he respected them. When he wanted the quality
which now is to be had in pen drawing, he etched, and in his simple etchings,
which are not dependent on dry point, he obtained this quality, though of course
they possessed a certain softness which no process has yet been able to give.
No man among the ancients is greater than Rembrandt as an etcher, but
Whistler in his etchings of Old London is even greater than Rembrandt.
Therefore, if you wish a simple style good for all times, you will find it in many
of these landscape and figure subjects of Rembrandt's. But for work of to-day
— and Rembrandt gave the things that were about him — the student would
learn more from the work of Whistler.

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 27

PEN DRAWING OF TO-DAY

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK

T3EN drawing as an art in itself belongs to the nineteenth
-*- century, especially to the last quarter. Mr. Hamerton, who
in his Graphic Arts gives a brief sketch of its history, says :
" Fortuny, the Spanish painter, introduced a new kind of pen
drawing which has been followed by Casanova and others of the
same school, and which has had some influence outside of it, as
well as upon the practice of etching."

But when he wrote, though but six years ago, the real signifi-
cance of this new kind of pen drawing had not been brought
to the notice of even so keen an observer. For the truth is, in
Fortuny's day pen drawing was revolutionised ; he, Madrazo, Rico
and Vierge in Spain, Menzel and Dietz in Germany, Lalanne
and De Neuville in France, with the new method of photo-
engraving to help them, may be said to have made it the art
it now is. You have but to place a drawing of Fortuny's or
Menzel's by one of Michael Angelo's or Raphael's to realise how
completely modern pen draughtsmen have broken away from the
old limitations, and shown that the pen can be used for something
more than the mere sketching of projects and intentions. As
Mr. Hamerton says, pen drawing is a painter's process, and nearly all

28 PEN DRAWING

these artists were or are great painters as well as great pen
draughtsmen.

Fortuny's chief innovation in methods was, as Mr. Hamerton also
points out, the use of short broken lines. He adds that Fortuny
preferred them probably because he wanted to get variety, and
because he saw nothing in nature "that could be fairly interpreted by
a long line." But a far more likely reason is that he found
with short lines he could model and break up the mechanical
look often given by long conventional lines — though all lines are
conventional. Fortuny's drawings are full of the most delicate
modelling ; his figures, instead of being simply and strongly
suggested as in the pen sketches of the old masters, are as carefully
worked in as if with a brush, and their strength is increased
rather than lessened by this care. Mr. Hamerton asserts that the
apparently " coarsest pen drawings are usually the work of great
artists ; the delicate and highly-finished are usually the work of
amateurs, or else of workmen who are paid to imitate engravings
for the purpose of photographic reproduction." True as this was
in a certain sense, it shows that Mr. Hamerton did not foresee
the development of photo-engraving, and it is misleading, since
nothing could be more delicate and less suggestive of engraving
than the drawings of Fortuny. They are moreover full of the
most wonderful brilliancy. It was in Africa that his eyes were
opened to the strong effects of light and shade under a hot sun,
and the desire to reproduce these effects had much to do with his
breaking away from academical traditions to originate and develop
new methods.

One cannot study too long, too carefully, or too lovingly, the
unfortunately few examples of his work which Fortuny has left
to us. These are to be found scattered in the, illustrated papers of
France and Spain, for which he occasionally worked. Poor as were
at first many of the reproductions, mostly woodcuts, they stood out
from the other work, just as one of his pictures will when by chance
it makes its way into an exhibition. His drawings may also be
found reproduced in some of the lately published lives of the artist,
notably in that by Davillier, his great friend. Here and there
in other of Davillier's books are a few of Fortuny's drawings of
bronzes and of Spanish and Moorish trappings. The woodcut

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK " • 29

reproductions, however, are not to be studied, for fine as a few are,
notably Leveille's of tlie portrait of M. D'Epinay in the fashion
of Goya's time, the feeling of pen and ink work is in them cut out
to a great extent. It is best to see direct reproductions or the
photogravures that have been made. It may be asked. How is one
to know the difference between woodcuts and process reproductions ?
This IS difficult to explain. In the former there are little dots and
engraved lines which can, after some practice, be detected, at times
only through the magnifying glass ; while the fine grey lines made
with a pen are nearly always much harder and broader. ^ Fortuny
lived a little too soon for the processes by which his followers have
profited. Otherwise there would doubtless have been a still greater
number of beautiful pen drawings as well as fine reproductions from
them. As it is, many of the process reproductions give his drawings
a rough and hard look, which the photogravure reproductions in
Davillier's Life prove most conclusively to have been the fault of
the undeveloped process.

I have spoken as if Fortuny was the leader of the new movement

in Spain. There is very little doubt that he was ; but he gave his

time almost entirely to painting, and though his few drawings prove

him to have been a master, he did not devote himself to the

development of pen drawing to the same extent as did some of the

other men who worked with and around him. However, Fortuny

is known to the whole world as a pen draughtsman, but, owing to

the persistent way in which black and white Avork has been ignored

by critics and artistic associations, especially in England and America

— notwithstanding the fact that it is the only healthy art developed

in the nineteenth century, — the names of the men who have made

illustration what it now is, and whose work is studied by intelligent

illustrators the world over, are absolutely unknown even to the

many who are flooding the world with pen drawings. And yet, men

who have studied Rico, Fortuny, and Vierge, are thought to be

masters, and their work is praised as being original, when originality

is the last merit they would claim for it.

As a landscape pen draughtsman, there is not and has not been

^ This difference can easily be seen by com- in the explanatory chapter, " Some Comparative
paring the drawing by Rossetti, which is a wood- Heads : Old and New."
cut, with the other heads done by process, given

30 PEN DRAWING

in any country or time a greater man than Martin Rico. Tliough
it may be information to many, Rico, co-worker with Fortuny,
is living to-day, still producing those beautiful pen drawings of
the canals of Venice and the palaces of Spain which are the admiration
of all who know them. He is almost faultless as a draughtsman,
and can on white paper with pen and ink catch the sunlight of a
Venetian day and the glitter and transparency of a moving, shimmer-
ing canal. He understands the true limitations of his art and never
goes beyond them ; he knows just where to put a blot of colour
and where to leave it out. With his wonderful facility, he can do
what seems an impossibility : fill a piece of white paper with modelling,
and make a brilliant black with six grey lines. Everything he
touches glitters and shines with sunlight, and there is not one
superfluous stroke in his drawing ; neither is a necessary line omitted.
How true he is only those can realise who have reverently studied
him in the countries alone adapted to glowing, glittering, out-of-door
pen work — that is in Spain, Italy and Southern France, Africa and
the East. Abortive attempts to follow this great master are almost
daily made by people ignorant of his work, of the scope of pen
drawing, and the reasons for a brilliancy that does not exist north
of Southern France and Italy. It is perfectly true that on a summer
day some of the little white-washed villages of England and many
towns in the United States, especially in the south, are not without
the brilliancy best reproduced by the methods of Rico. But how
much better it is for the English artist, in a country where these
effects are the exception and not the rule, to strike out in a new
direction for himself, as has been done, for example, by Alfred
Parsons and George Reid, two of the very few British landscape
pen draughtsmen of originality. Rico's work is very difficult to
find. Many of his original drawings are never reproduced, but
are bought up immediately by collectors to be given an honourable
place in their galleries. I have seen a number in New York. A
few have been reproduced in L Art, La Illustraciou Espanola y
Americana, and La Vie Moderne.

In fact, the work of these Spaniards must be more difficult to
find than I imagined. Although I believe that all real pen draughts-
men know it, an article in Harpers Magazine, for March 1888,
absolutely failed to mention the work of either Casanova, the best-

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 31

known Spaniard after Fortuny and Madrazo, or of Vierge, while
the writer only refers to some artists who have studied under Rico.
This is merely an ordinary example of the utter worthlessness of
inartistic art writing-.

I think one of the Spaniards who should be ranked with Fortuny
and Rico, and indeed above them, as a pen draughtsman and
illustrator, is Vierge, a man who has all the draughtsmanship of
Fortuny and Menzel, the colour and brilliancy of Rico, the grace
and beauty of Abbey, the eccentricity and daring of Blum, Brennan,
and Lungren ; in a word, a man who, in the few short years of
his working life, has proved himself the greatest illustrator who
ever lived. I rank Vierge thus above Fortuny and Rico because
he has devoted himself more entirely to black and white work.

He flashed out upon the artistic world in a few drawings in
La Vie Moderne, Le Monde Illustv^, the Spanish papers, and The
Century (then Scribners Monthly) ; in many books, some compara-
tively commonplace, but one, the most brilliantly illustrated work
ever published, which illness, however, prevented him from finishing.
Before the illustrations for Pablo de Sdgovie were all made, his right
side and right hand were paralysed, and he lost the power of speech.
But when a man is as great as Vierge, his career is only checked,
not stopped by a misfortune that would have killed another less
strong. A few months after this attack, we find him learning to
draw by painting with his left hand — and painting with a cleverness
unknown outside of this group of Spaniards. Even the French
were so struck with this astonishing marvel, as they called it, that
in the papers of that time are to be found drawings of Vierge
sitting out of doors, beginning to paint with his left hand. Now
he is slowly regaining the use of the right, but still works with

the left.

Viero-e seems to have learnt everything and to have mastered
that cleverness, or the knowledge of how to use one's ability, which
is indispensable to good pen drawing, an art only for so-called

clever men men who are interested in their work and who, to

attain their ends, are ready, if necessary, to use other than con-
ventional methods, or to get other than commonplace results by
ordinary means. If the pen draughtsman who thinks he has dis-
covered some new method looks in that wonderful book, the

32 PEN DRAWING

history of Pablo de Sc^govie, he finds that Vierge discovered it long
before him, and can give him a few new hints into the bargain.
You cannot examine the smallest drawing in his masterpiece of
illustration without seeing how much study prepared the way for
its brilliancy and grace.

Such an influence did this book have upon French pen drawing,
that after its publication an entire school of pen draughtsmen
following Vierge appeared, and their work was more clever than
that of any other draughtsmen, though it did not equal the drawing
of their master. Among these men are Ferrand Fau, L. Galice,
V. Poirson, and F. Lunel. Their drawings can be seen in the
early numbers of La Vie Moderne}- a complete file of which is to
be found in the South Kensington Museum. At the present time,
however, this paper is artistically worthless.

Daniel Vierge must not be confounded with his very talented
but less brilliant brother, who signed his name S. Urrabieta, while
Vierge always omits the Urrabieta and simply signs himself D.
Vierge. His brother died recently.

In' the Fortuny group, for originality Casanova must be given
a very high place — indeed, one almost equal to that of Fortuny
himself. I have not seen any large photogravures, or even any very
good reproductions of his drawings. They could hardly be engraved
on wood, and in the more or less rough and almost cruel reproductions
for the Salon Catalogue and in French illustrated papers they
necessarily lose enormously. The best are in L!Arf. But even
in the poorest reproductions can be seen the exquisite modelling
of a monk's head or a woman's hand, the wonderful sparkle of a tiny
jewel. His delicate grey lines would be lost in any ordinary attempt
at a woodcut.

In the list of the Spanish-Italian school of figure draughtsmen,
Madrazo, Fabres, and a host of others, hold a high rank. But to
describe their work in detail would be endless repetition. There
is nothing to do but to study it for one's self. To-day the Spanish
and Italian illustrated papers are full of the work of imitators of the
greater men who revolutionised the whole art of France and Italy- —
work with which the pages of these papers glitter and sparkle and
glow, though it is Avithout the originality of Fortuny, Casanova, and
Viergfe.

^ Also see Les Premieres, the French theatrical journal, Paris Illiistrl^ etc.

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 33

To speak of an Italian school separately would be impossible,
since all alike these children of the sunlight, as they might be called,
spend their winters in Paris, Rome, or Madrid, in the life schools
or domg nothing, while in summer they lind their work out of doors
in Spain, Southern France, Italy, or Africa. Senzanni, whose
decorative compositions are most charming and graceful, Paolocci,
Chessa, Scoppetta, Fabbi, all have a style and character which is
well worth study, although it has been founded on that of the great
Spaniards. Men like Ximenez, Michetti, Tito, Favretto, Raffaelli,
Gomar, Montalti, whether born in Italy, Spain, or France, as artists
can hardly be said to have any nationality. The sun is their god,
and Fortuny and Rico are his prophets. Another reason for not
speaking separately of Italian pen drawing is, that the greater number
of Italian papers and books are so badly printed that the principal
pen draughtsmen strive to get their work into French publications,
which are not only better made, but appeal to a much larger
audience.

The work of the Spanish school may still be a problem to critics
who, though they admit its brilliancy, think it all wrong and
stupefying because of its contradiction to their preconceived notions
of art, it never seeming to occur to them that perhaps their notions,
and not the methods criticised, are at fault. But all artists with
technical knowledge and broad opinions have recognised new masters
in these innovators whose influence has continued steadily to increase.

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 35

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK

ILLUSTRATIONS
MARIANO FORTUNY

' I ^HE full name of Fortuny is Jose- Maria- Bernardo, but as he dispensed
-*- with the greater part of it, we may as well follow his example. He was
born in 1838 at Reus, a little town in the province of Tarragona, where he
lived until the age of fourteen years, attending the village school. Then his
grandfather proposed that they should start out to seek their fortunes, and
they footed it to Barcelona. I make these bare statements about Fortuny's
early life — statements which are usually the backbone of all art books — simply
because I wish to show, first that Fortuny was born years after Menzel, and
secondly, that, though this would seem as if from the beginning he had been
influenced by Menzel, as were all northern artists, he most probably knew
nothing about the great German's work until he went to Rome in 1857.

But there, when studying in the Academy, in the course of the ordinary
academical training he most likely, as his biographer Yriarte, who knew him
well, says, came under the influence of the followers of Overbeck. I have not
the slightest doubt that these Germans possessed examples of Menzel, if indeed
at the German embassy or some of the Roman libraries was not to be found a
complete set of his already published drawings, which certainly must have been
makino- a profound sensation among the students of that time. Fortuny, not
having yet worked out a style of his own, doubtlessly was equally influenced by
the drawings of Menzel, the like of which had never been seen before. The
chances are, drawings by Fortuny showing this influence might somewhere be
found. But just then, war breaking out between Spain and Morocco, Fortuny
went off with a Royal Commission to paint on the spot.

It was here in Morocco his eyes were opened to the wonderful effects of
lio-ht and shade— effects which Menzel had never seen, and had therefore never
tried to render. Just as Menzel, influenced by all the old men who, as far back
as Bellini, as I have shown, had produced occasional pen drawings which were

36 PEN DRAWING

wonderfully fine, was the first man to take up pen drawing and seriously work
at it to express his ideas — why I do not know unless because of an innate love
of the medium ; so Fortuny, when he got to Africa and back again into Spain,
discovered that here was a method by which he could give not only modelling
with Menzel, but the brilliancy of sunlight as well. Though, as I have said,
he lived too soon for the processes which have enabled his followers to improve
on his methods, at the same time we owe all the brilliant work of the modern
Spanish school to him.

Fine as is the drawing which I show, I cannot help thinking that the
drawings done by Fabres and Blum, which also are in this book, made years
afterwards for process and with a full knowledge of the means to be employed
and the results to be obtained, are of more value to the student ; because there
is in this drawing of Fortuny's the freedom of a master which in the student
would merely lead to carelessness, while the background and the floor are
worked over so much that, without a vast amount of intelligent hand-work, no
process block could reproduce the lines. Knowing some of Fortuny's original
work, I fancy that in this block a great many of his delicate greys have been
lost. Had he lived later I have no doubt he would have somewhat modified
his style, as Vierge has done, to meet the requirements of process. Just as in the
Blum plate one can see the texture of the coat with its gold lace and silk lining,
the shine of the silken breeches and stockings and the polish of the shoes, so
one can study these same indications of texture in the Fortuny block. But
when you come to the face you find that it is almost impossible to follow the
lines, they having been made probably with grey ink, the back of a quill pen, or
anything to be had, without thought of reproduction. The effect is right, but
one cannot altogether commend the means by which it has been obtained ; in
fact the drawing was done for study and not for reproduction. But if this is all
we have, we ought to be only too thankful for a drawing which has had so much
influence on pen work.

I have explained elsewhere why I have not given a photogravure from
Fortuny's work. To me, this block shows it as well as could any other re-
production. There are photogravures in Davillier's Life, but they are scarcely
important enough to use again. Among the other well-known reproductions
are the engraving by Leveille, which does not show the work at all ; a very
good process block in the Magazine of Art, and other blocks in L Art and
La Vie Moderne, and in Davillier's books. Beyond these I know of very few
published examples of Fortuny's work. I have no doubt he made hundreds of
drawings, but they would probably be found in the portfolios of his friends.

Finally, what I say is not merely my opinion but that of the men who have
devoted their lives to pen drawing. Only the other day I saw in the artistic
end of a journal a statement to the effect that the opinions of artists are of no
value, and that only the thoughts of the critics are worth preservation. How-

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 39

ever, the opinions of Vasari, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and Lalanne, have had some
influence on the development of art-work. Just as Sir Joshua Reynolds was
opinionated enough to believe that the men of the future would look upon the
art of his day as he looked to the art of the Red Indians or the Byzantines, so
pen draughtsmen believe that these same men of the future will look to the
pen work of Menzel and Fortuny, as we look to the paintings of Giotto and
Cimabue.

1 ■'■ ', \

-^i

DANIEL VIERGE

As Menzel is responsible for the development of pen drawing in Germany and
England, so is Vierge for the present style and the great advance in technique
of draughtsmen in France, Italy, Spain, and America. I know that Vierge
falls apparently under Sir Joshua Reynolds' condemnation of superficial clever-
ness. But when a man draws with Vierge's knowledge and adds to it his skill
in handling, his work is something vastly more than clever, although every line
might seem to deserve this condemnation. Because Vierge is followed by a
number of men in France, Italy, Spain, and America, who, if they lack a certain
amount of his inventive cleverness, have added to it much that is original of
their own, — although I admit they would never have worked after his manner
had he not led the way, — a certain number of critics, and artists too, jump to
the conclusion that anybody can do this sort of work. Yet the fact remains
that the number of these clever men has not increased, nor have any other
draughtsmen been able to .supersede them. They in their turn have had their
imitators, men without the slightest knowledge of the means used by Vierge to
obtain his effects, but no one, even among Vierge's immediate followers, has yet
succeeded in surpassing him.

Vierge doubtless owed much to Fortuny. The greater part of his work,
and certainly the most characteristic, is clone with pen and ink, and, like Fortuny,
he uses the pen to fill his drawings with delicate modelling. But however much
he learned from his great countryman, he brought to his work a strength, a

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK 41

delicacy, and a character that were all his own. From the beginning there was
no mistaking it for that of any other draughtsman. Not that it is in the least
mannered ; In looking over the pages of Pablo de St^govic one is struck with the
entirely different methods used in the many drawings. With this cleverness of
technique one finds the most perfect modelling in the tiniest figures and faces,
the most artistic rendering of architecture, the most graceful suggestions of
landscape ; and the assured touch of the master stamps each and every drawing
with individuality.

To get the refinement given in the beautiful little cuts from Pablo de
Sdgovie, it is necessary to make one's drawings very large and yet at the same
time to work with the greatest amount of delicacy. For instance, the photo-
gravure is made from a drawing nineteen by twelve inches. The consequence
is that in the shadows, which are seemingly put in with such wonderfully
delicate lines, though these were delicately drawn, as the drawing was so large
the refinement was produced with no special difficulty. There is next to no
cross-hatching except in Vierge's later work done since his illness, of which
the photogravure is an example, and therefore his drawings can be reduced
to almost any extent without the lines filling up. Still, in the volume of Pablo
de S(fgovie, the blocks were almost too small to do full justice to his work, as
any one can see by comparing them with the larger reproductions here given
and with the plate. Then, again, when he wishes to get a rich colour, he
uses a positive black, in the reproduction of which there is apparently no
change, although it is a perfectly well-known fact that the whites of any re-
production grow whiter and the blacks blacker as the size decreases. Another
quality to be noted in his work is the amount of colour suggested without the
use of it. In the plate there is no pure black at all.

There is really very little to be said about Vierge's drawings, except to
advise the student to study them in the most thorough manner, and to remind
him that their cleverness and apparent freedom is the result of years of the
hardest study, and, in each drawing, of days and sometimes weeks of the most
careful work. After all I have said, it is almost useless for me to repeat that
the effects of light and shade in Vierge's work, being intended for Spanish or
southern subjects, are of course utterly out of keeping in drawings made in
England. But the cleverness, the skill, is never out of keeping, and the nearer
it can be approached, the better for the pen draughtsman and the art of pen
drawing.

I know quite well that the most slovenly attempts to imitate Vierge are
constantly made and daily applauded ; but if you have any real feeling and love
for the art, you will, in studying his work, seek, not to make a direct imitation,
but to introduce his beauty of drawing and brilliancy of handling into your own,
remembering always that such drawings are not knocked off in a morning.

G. FAVRETTO

This is only a simple study from
one of Favretto's pictures, I think.
I use it here to show how much
colour can be suggested with very
little work. Any one can see that
the figures stand in front of a bright,
sunlit, glittering wall, and yet there
is no work in it at all. The plant,
which tells so well against this wall,
the bright colours of the flowers,
and the still more brilliant tints of
the kerchief about the girl's neck,
are all rendered charmingly, to any
one who can feel them, in this little
pen study. To me it is just as
much Favretto's work as one of his
Venetian paintings. The only thing
to be regretted is that we shall
never have any more of it. Favretto
died but a little more than a year

J. F. RAFFAELLI

This is an excellent example of a simple direct, straightforward drawing of a
head. The greater part of it, I should say, was drawn with a quill. The bony
formation of the head is remarkably well rendered, and yet, as it should be, in
the simplest manner possible. Notice how Raffaelli has drawn the tassel by a
flat mass, and still made it look round, and kept its proper relation and form.
Notice too how the stubby beard and the lines of the face are drawn to show
the growth of the beard and the direction of this growth, and to express the
construction of the face ; and only one set of lines is used. Raffaelli's work is
very like Herkomer's. Indeed it is much more like German work than Italian.

46 PEN DRAWING

A. MONTALTI

This is a drawing from Cera una Volta, a book of Italian fairy tales published
by the Fratelli Treves of Milan in 1885. The whole book is a proof of the
possibilities of pen work on grained paper, of which I speak in the Chapter on
Materials. There is no possible comparison to be made between Montalti's
drawing and the head of De Lesseps by Ringel.^ That is a pure exercise in
the rendering of a low relief; this is an example of artistic decoration applied to
book illustration. Not only does it illustrate a passage in the story, but it is
given with the greatest amount of decorative feeling, and in a style which goes
to prove that there is no reason why we should be dependent on the decorative
methods of other times. Conventional forms, of course, are the property of the
whole world. It may be argued that there is no meaning in this decoration.
Neither to me — and I am sure I speak for all artists who have any honesty
in their opinions — is there meaning in nearly all decoration except that of
pleasure in the beauty of the design itself. We may be told in Smith's
Classical Dictionary, or in any of those useful cribs much affected by the
intellectual artist, that such and such mysterious swirls and scrawls mean life
and immortality, but we are not impressed by this hidden meaning ; we only
look to see if the line is gracefully drawn.

Montalti's decorations at the side and top of his drawing are graceful.
They may have been derived from old iron-work or from his inner conscious-
ness — I do not care from which. The result is pleasing and restful. The white
circle behind the girl may be a swirl of life or the bull's eye of a target ; but
it really is a proof that Montalti is an illustrator who knows the requirements of
his art. He has used this white circle for his mass of light which draws
attention to the figure of the girl ; the figure of the piping shepherd is his great
black, and the positive black and white really neutralise each other. It also
may be said that the half-decorative, half-realistic daisies at the bottom of the
drawing are out of place : nothing is out of place in art if the result is good,
and it is nobody's business but the student's how it is obtained. This state-
ment, of course, seems to necessitate the abolition of art critics. But all I can
say is that those who criticise art without ever having studied it, have more
assurance than it has entered into the brain of any but an art critic to conceive.

The drawing was made on the Fratelli Treves tinted paper, on which I
have worked, but at that time it was not so good as the Papier Gillot. The
original paper can be seen in places where the mechanically -ruled horizontal
lines are visible. The positive blacks in the decoration, for example, were
probably put in with a pen first, as well as in the figure and the flowers, which

1 See French Illustrations.

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK

probably were done with both pen and brush. Having gotten in his darks,
Montalti scraped with an eraser or pen-knife the Hght round the shepherd, and
thus made a hghter tone by means of cross-hatching, bringing out a perpen-
dicular line in the white. He then obtained his high lights by scraping with

much more force, and removing all the tint from the paper, as in the circle and
in the white blots of the decoration. In some places he very probably used
Chinese white, because you will often find in working on this paper that after
scraping it, if you again attempt pen work, you will be sure to get blots. The
drawing cannot be reduced very much in size, while to obtain any but mechanical
results is difficult.

48 PEN DRAWING

ANTONIO FABRES

This is not only a masterpiece of feeling for pen work, but a remarkable
example of reproduction. Published in L' Art a few years ago, and drawn in
1879 in Rome, of course under the influence of Fortuny, this drawing not only
surpasses anything Fortuny himself did, but has exerted an enormous influence
on pen drawing. I have no hesitation in saying that Fortuny never made a
drawing which can approach it for technique, although any one comparing it
with the Man Reading on another page will see a great similarity. Fortuny
has just as carefully studied the man's embroidered coat as Fabres has the
peasant's breeches. But Fabres' rendering of the texture of the coat, the vest,
and the trousers of the peasant, reproduces much more perfectly than Fortuny's
work, and this is the point to be noted. Again, Fabres' head is better than the
Fortuny, and he has boldly drawn the hands which Fortuny shirks. To me,
at least, his rendering of the whole is more successful than Fortuny's. But
Fortuny, being the original man, is responsible for Fabres, just as Fabres is
for half the French and American illustration of to-day.

How is this drawing done? The greater part of it, including the most
delicate modelling of the head and hands and legs — in fact everything, but part
of the hat and coat and a little of the hair, is drawn with a pen. The coat and
all the hair may have been drawn by a pen by dragging it in various directions,
allowing all the ink to run into a blot, and then lifting some of it off with the
finger or with blotting paper. The hat most likely was drawn with a brush or
with an inked thumb, the background with both, in a manner I have elsewhere
described. On these flat tints, the rouletted effect, that is the effect of wash,
has been produced by a roulette in the hands of a photo-engraver who is an
artist. But this example is the most successful result I know of a very
unreliable experiment on the part of the draughtsman. With any but a most
skilful artistic workman, the result is certain failure. I am very sorry that the
photo-engraver's name is not on the print. I should be glad to give him full
credit for his surprising success. The printing of such a drawing is extremely
difficult. Do not imagine that the apparently wildly-scrawled background is
composed of nothing but wild scrawls. It is indication and suggestion, every
bit of which is put down with a purpose. Notice how the background grows
out of the deep shadows of the coat, and how the wash and pen work are com-
bined in the shadows between the legs ; how the wash work in places is reinforced
by pen work, as on the left side near the coat sleeve, and how wonderfully the
effect has been reproduced. There are other drawings by Fabres in L'Art}
notably a photogravure of a Moor with a gun over his shoulders. But I do
not think any of them compare with this.

1 Also see Illiistyazion Artistica.

LOUIS GALICE AND FERRAND FAU

These charming little drawings give a good idea of the work of two followers
of Vierge. The drawing in both is excellent, but it is easy to see that the
artists, who would probably be the first to admit it, are inspired by their great
master Vierge. The work of men of this school can be seen any week in Paris
Illustrd, Les Premieres, Le Monde Ilbistrd ; in fact, they are the pen draughts-
men of France to-day. But I have given so much space to the master that it
would be only repetition, beautiful as is their work, to dwell upon the followers.

PEN DRAWING

MARTIN RICO

Owing to the in-
terest which Rico
has taken in this
book I am able
to pubHsh, not only
two of his well-
__- , known drawing-s, but

,J'-" Y two new ones which
H|t/ he has made expressly
for me. These are the
photogravure and the
corner of St. Mark's.
The other two, originally
published in La Illustra-
cion Espafiola y Americana,
have been known to me for
years, and I have reproduced
them here because I consider
them two of the best pen draw-
ina:s Rico ever made.

The great beauty of Rico's

work is the grace of his line, and

the brilliancy and strength of light

and shade which he obtains with

comparatively little work. Not only

is there not a superfluous stroke in

his drawing, but each line is used,

either singly, to express or, together

with others, to enforce certain effects

he wishes to give. In bright sunlight,

the characteristic of Italy and Spain, all

' : his drawmgs and pamtnigs are made. In

^5~^? / the photogravure, the fact of sunshine is

not more evident than the actual position

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK S3

of the sun directly behind the spectator, shown by the direction of every line
which goes to make up a shadow. Notice how he has concentrated his only
pure black in the two open windows near the centre of the drawing ; and yet,
he has relieved this black by bits of pure white, in one window by the flowers
trained across it, in the other by the charmingly-placed patches of sunlight just
behind the half-closed shutter and on the rich decorations which he has indicated
and which we know so well on many Venetian windows. Notice too the light,
giving such value to the darks on both sides of it, which shows through the
crack between the window-frame and the shutter ; see how the light and shade
are managed on the little shrine and on the wall and window under it, and the
way in which the light on one wall is carried into the shadow on the other by
the arrangement of the foliage. Everything is toned up from these two blacks ;
there is not another pure black of importance in any part of the drawing. The
effect is thus concentrated and your eye attracted, as he meant it should be, to
the very centre of the composition. You should also study the manner in which
he works out to the edges of the drawing, leading you into it by the most delicate
and graceful lines. His architecture is only hinted and suggested, but so
thoroughly does he know his Venice that an architect could work from his
suggestions, while for an artist they are simply perfect of their kind ; the capitals,
the decorated mouldings running around the buildings, the under side of the
cornice, the little shrine, the balcony with its pots and vines and awning, are all
well indicated. Bits of these things in nature were of course as dark as his two
windows, but he knows, and every one who wishes to make a good drawing
should learn, that force must be reserved for one particular point and blacks
must not be scattered, if an effective whole is to be produced.

Rico's knowledge of the necessity of concentration is specially notable in
the drawing of the Canal with a gondola, in which the inside of the felze, or
cover of the gondola, is the only pure black ; but it is so skilfully managed with
little touches of white, suggestions of the carving, the window on the opposite
side and the lamp, that you do not see it is a pure black, for your eye is carried
at once to the keynote to the whole picture — the large door which is really not
so black as the gondola, but, because there are here no opposing whites, it
seems, as Rico intended, much blacker.

In all his drawings Rico invariably breaks his long straight lines, in each,
however, in a different manner. The long mouldings in the photogravure are
broken by shadows and by foliage ; in the corner of St. Mark's, pigeons not
only add grace, but take away from the monotony which would otherwise, un-
avoidably, be too prominent in this part of the drawing, and even the water-spout
helps to serve the same purpose. In the Canal, the gondolas, sandolas, and
other boats carry out the straight lines and break them at the same time, while
the suggestion of foliage and the balustrade are done as no one ever did them
before Rico ; in the Reminiscence of Seville, the carved balcony, beautiful in

■r-UV

ir^

56 PEN DRAWING

itself, would become monotonous were it not relieved by the drapery thrown
over it, by the keynote of black supplied in the head of the leaning figure, and
by the stone pine farther along. Note how thoroughly the effect of a glittering
hot wall is given by the shadow of one drain-pipe, and how rightly the grille
with the flower-pots leads into the drawing.

The amount of expression Rico gets in his rendering of reflections in water,
always drawn in a very simple manner, is wonderful. There is absolutely no
black in them, except where, as in the Canal, I think it is the result of bad
reproduction. And yet the suggestion of the effect of a Venetian Canal is right.
Here is a point I wish to note : these drawings are not intended to be pictures
or records of transient effects ; they are line drawings made in brilliant sunshine.
Do not try to imitate them in countries where the effects they give do not exist.

As to the reproduction, in the photogravure it is as good as I can get it and
gives an excellent idea of the drawing. There is a certain rottenness about
some of the lines which is not in the original, but their relative value is almost
right. The lines which appear very fine are really so, and were drawn either
with a very fine pen or the back of the pen Rico was using. The drawing is
scarcely reduced. It was made in bluish-black ink on white smooth Whatman
paper, and, as far as I can see, with very little pencil work, though, as I have
already explained, I have seen Rico making very elaborate pencil drawings.
He is a master of this sort of work and can do what he wishes ; but for the
student it would be very foolish to attempt such a drawing without preliminary
pencil work — even with it, he can hardly hope for such results. However, I
know of no better models than these four, but it must be remembered that the
photogravure is somewhat hard all over and rotten, and that in the process
blocks many of the blacks come from the filling up in the printing and the fact
that the lines will not stand alone ; a momentary comparison between the blocks
and the photogravure will show how much thicker the lines in the former have
become in every part.

To realise the great development of pen drawing it is only necessary to
place the drawings of Rico by the side of Braun's reproductions of Canaletto's
pen work. Rico's are as much in advance of Canaletto's as his were of the
drawings of every one of his predecessors. Both artists are true ; but Rico
shows how much more we have learned to express by pen drawing.

The drawing of the corner of St. Mark's has been very well reproduced by
Waterlow and Sons. It was a difficult piece of work, but they have succeeded
in keeping the character of the original.

E. TITO

Tito is one of Rico's cleverest pupils. He has the power of seeing things for
himself, and though he works in Venice, where Rico draws and paints, he
chooses different subjects, and his figures are drawn much larger and made
more important than Rico's. Looking at this drawing, though one sees at once
whence its inspiration is derived, it is also evident that, though he works out
his drawings in the manner of his master, his subjects are all his own.

njB

A. CASANOVA Y ESTORACH

Casanova is one of those men who seem to be always amusing themselves with
their drawings and experimenting, making a dainty suggestion in one place or
elaborately working out a figure in another, jotting down notes or trying a pen
in the most fascinating manner on the margin of the paper, and always wander-
ing about over the drawing just for pleasure. But if the student should
endeavour to imitate this freedom and to wander in this way before he has gone
through the necessary training, his results will probably not be so satisfactory
to himself or to the public. For Casanova has told me it takes a long time to
make a drawing like the plate, and I can well believe it.

This plate is the first large one I have ever seen in which Casanova's
work has been worthily rendered. The large process of the monks is from
one of his pictures, and the smaller is apparently made for his own enjoyment.
One can say really very little about the way such work is done, but I should
imagine it was taken up and worked on, a little here and a little there, just
when Casanova was in the humour, part of it done with a fine pen, part with
a quill, part with his fingers ; in fact it is doubtlessly all experimenting, but
the experimenting of a man who is almost certain of the results he will obtain.

I do not publish his drawings so much as examples of pen work to be
studied, since it would be almost impossible even to copy him, but rather to
show the command over the pen of one of the most accomplished of the modern

SPANISH AND ITALIAN WORK

school of Spaniards— men who have something to say and who say it in a fashion
ot their own.

Casanova is not an illustrator but a painter who cares very little about the

reproduction of his drawings. He knows that no process save photogravure is
yet able to render them, for the fineness of his lines and the greyness of his ink
make it impossible at the present time to reproduce his work and print it with
type. But it is the work of just such experimenters which advances the

6o PEN DRAWING

technique of the art and its reproduction. Had it not been for Menzel we
probably never should have had good fac-simile woodcutting. Vierge no doubt
has done more than any one else to develop process. Casanova is one after
whom woodcutters and process -workers struggle in vain, but this struggle in
the end will perfect woodcutting and process, until we have reproductions which
will be as good as photogravures and yet may be printed with type. The art
workmen who look ahead are those who are really of service in the world, the
workmen, that is, who understand the methods of the past and can make use of
their valuable qualities, but who at the same time can look to the future and
make improvements.

GERMAN WORK

GERMAN WORK 63

GERMAN WORK

T N Germany the greatest pen draughtsman is Adolf Menzel,
-'- who, in point of age at least, takes precedence of almost all
the modern men. Like Fortuny and Rico, he cut himself loose
from academical methods and traditions, and like them he had his
eyes opened to see in what a valley of dry bones he had been
walking by going straight to nature, though, at the same time, he
may be said to be a direct descendant of Holbein and Chodowiecki.
I do not pretend to know exactly who or what originated the great
movement in pen drawing, but there is little doubt that if, just
before the introduction of photo-engraving, men in the south of
Europe were influenced by Fortuny, artists in the north were by
Menzel. Not only German pen draughtsmen, but some of the
most brilliant Americans, Englishmen, and Frenchmen owe much
to the study of his work.

A very old man — he was born in 1815 — Menzel still lives. His
most famous illustrations are in the Life and Works of Frederick the
Great, Germania, and La Critche Cass^e. The drawings for the Life,
made on the wood, were given to the best Parisian engravers, but
Menzel himself was far from being satisfied with the results, for the
reason that these engravers reproduced everything in a mannered
fashion, giving theirs and not the artist's idea of the original work.
This utter subjection of the artist to a mechanical and inartistic

64 PEN DRAWING

engraver is what ruined the work of many clever young Englishmen
of a few years ago. The preposterous idea of getting the engraver's
and not the artist's lines, although it must have been disheartening
to the latter, had at least the good effect of developing wood-
cutting, and photographic reproduction, all over the world.

Menzel was so discouraged by the results obtained by the French
engravers that the greater number of his drawings were afterwards
given to Germans, who were artists enough to know that they were
nothing more than machines gifted with human intelligence and
artistic sensibility, and that they should devote the whole of their
skill, under the artist's direction, to the absolute subjection of them-
selves, in order that they might perfectly reproduce his work. Even
the best results of this perfect subjection, as exemplified in America
by men like Cole, Whitney, Collins, Gamm, and Jungling, in fac-
simile line-work, do not equal those of a photographic process
when assisted by an engraver of less ability, but still a clever man.
Moreover the saving of time by these mechanical processes is
enormous. Among the engravers who worked for Menzel on the
Life of Frederick the Great were Bentworth, Unzelmann, and Albert
Vogel. Menzel's efforts to have his own work and not the engraver's
given, produced not only a resurrection but a revolution in the art
of woodcutting in Germany, and this revolution has spread where-
ever fac-simile woodcutting is used. However, the use of wood-
cutting in this way, though marvellous in the results produced, will
soon become a lost art ; but, unlike most lost arts, one we can
very well dispense with. With the present art of wood-engraving,
that is the translation of tone into line as practised by the really
great wood-engravers of to-day in Germany, France, and America,
I am not concerned. All that I wish to state is, that when we
have a process which will give automatically in a few hours exactly
the same result the workman obtains after weeks of toilsome and
thankless drudgery, there is no reason why we should not use it. I
think I am quite right in saying with every artist, excepting probably
the reproductive and therefore the more or less mechanical and com-
mercial etcher, that I look forward to the days when wood and all
other engravings will again hold the place they held in the time of
Dtirer, and all drawings that are not suited to them will be repro-
duced by some mechanical process. Nobody has felt this more than

GERMAN WORK 65

Menzel, for his first attempt to do without the wood-engraver is shown
in his drawing on stone for the lithographer, either to be directly
reproduced, or, later, by photo-lithography. Many French critics have
said that the German wood-engravers reproduced his work perfectly.
But any one who has had drawings reproduced by wood-engraving
knows that it is absolutely impossible for the best wood-engraver to
preserve all the feeling of the original drawing, while of course the
drawing itself is all cut to pieces, if made on the block.

In his Frederick the Great, Menzel, as all real artists do in their
work, really developed his talent and genius. He began a student,
he ended a master. No illustrator ever had a greater opportunity.
In the Works of Frederick the Great there are over two hundred
illustrations by Menzel, engraved by Unzelmann, Hermann Miiller,
Albert and Otto Vogel, and this work in thirty volumes was published
by the Academy of Sciences of Berlin at the command of Frederick
William IV. Nearly all the illustrations had to be made of a certain
size, rarely more than twelve centimetres, and they were principally
head and tail pieces. But into these Menzel has put some of the
greatest black and white art of the century. For example, each one
of his little portraits, so full of character, is taken from an original
picture, or the most authentic source. We hear a great deal about
painters going to the Holy Land and the East to get the background
for a more or less unimportant picture, and how their paint-boxes and
canvases go wrong. But who hears of the hundreds and thousands of
studies made for his Frederick tJie Great by Menzel, or for that matter
of the thousands of miles travelled, and the difficulties overcome by
the artists of the principal illustrated magazines of the day ? Their
object is the result which they get, and not the belauding of
themselves.

Almost every one who has had royalty for a patron has enjoyed
great liberality in some ways, but in others has had to endure almost
as great disadvantages. For many years Menzel's work was lost in
the thirty volumes of the official edition. This work, to which the
artist gave six years of his life, and which he filled with his imagina-
tion and knowledge, remained almost unknown to the world at large.
Fortunately the Museum at Berlin at length issued a special edition
of Menzel's drawings. Now his work is almost as well known in
France as in Germany, not long ago an exhibition of it having been

66 PEN DRAWING

held in Paris. Master of his art, he recognises the fact that Germany
is not the country for brilliancy of effects, and he aims above all at
perfection of modelling and the expression of detail.

Dietz, to say nothing of a whole school of followers, is another
of the marvellous German draughtsmen. Within the last three or
four years, since the introduction of photo-engraving — and here and
elsewhere under this term I of course include photo-lithography — and
what is known as the Meisenbach process of reproducing wash draw-
ings, an entire change has been effected, notably in the pages of
Flicgende Blatter, and in the small illustrated books either published
in Munich by the proprietors of that journal, or else illustrated by the
artists who work for it. These men, some of whom are not Germans,
but Austrians and Hungarians, after studying probably in the Munich
Academy, started on the lines laid down by Menzel and Dietz, and
have already proved the possibilities of pen drawing in rendering the
last fashion in gowns, and the pictorial quality that lies hidden in a
dress coat and a pair of patent leather pumps. Their work shows the
development of a nineteenth century school, whose only point in
common with those of other ages is good drawing. There is in it no
affectation, or imitation, or endeavours to reproduce bygone methods ;
but it is a healthy growth brought about by men who feel and know
that the work of to-day can, in its own way, equal that of any other
time, and it is their aim to show this in a style of their own. Such
books as Hacklander's Troiiville, Ein Erster inid eiii Letzter Ball,
Familien Concert, In der Ai'dennen, In Danien coupe, Ziuischen
Ziuei Regen, are, in their turn, like the work of Menzel and Fortuny,
influencing the whole world of pen draughtsmen.

I consider the first of these younger men to be H. Schlittgen, an
artist whose improvement and march onward is simply marvellous.
I have now before me drawings made by him in 1884, 1885, and 1886,
and there is no comparison between those of 1886 and those of 1884.
Instead of improving backward, like so many illustrators, he is going
forward with every book. For the pictorial quality of German life in
the nineteenth century, one has only to look for his drawings every
week in Flicgende Blatter. His work is simple, direct, and right to
the point, and everything is drawn with a feeling for its artistic eftect.
Not a line is wasted. In Hacklander's Huinoristische, there is on
page 5 the study of an advocate, which rivals in simplicity, directness.

GERMAN WORK ^^7

and expression, anything Randolph Caldecott ever did, and the draw-
ing is infinitely better. The drawing on page 9 of a girl is almost
perfection in its rendering in blacks and whites of a modern dress, and
no one has ever done anything as full of character as his pompous
German officers. For expression and colour, combined with the least
amount of work, nothing can be found to surpass the drawing on page
19 of Trouville of the interior of a railroad carriage.

H. Albrecht's work is almost as good as that of Schlittgen, but
he does not use his blacks and whites with the same strength and
vigour. This can also be said of F. Bergen, who, to my mind, puts
rather too much work in his drawings. One of the most independent
of these Germans, a man who works much more like a Frenchman or
an Italian, is Ludwig Marold.

Hermann Liiders and Robert Haug do for the German soldier
of to-day that which Menzel did for the soldier of Frederick the Great's
time, and they have an advantage which Menzel did not enjoy — direct
reproduction. Their work is quite equal to and much more varied
than anything of De Neuville's and Detaille's.

Though Germans are traditionally supposed to be somewhat
stolid and phlegmatic, there is no doubt that they are the funniest of
comic draughtsmen. When the art of a nation is so expressive that
one has only to see to understand it, it becomes a universal language.
Oberlander's and Busch's drawings at a glance can be understood
by the civilised, and, for that matter, probably by the uncivilised
world. Like much of Randolph Caldecott's work, there is nothing
in Busch's to study for technique. The greater part of it is as
slight as the funny and charming sketches Caldecott put in his
letters to his friends. Indeed, Busch's work is a perpetual letter
to the whole world, which one who runs may read. You cannot
look at it without bursting into roars of laughter. The books
which appeal to me as much as anything Busch has done, though
he has made thousands of drawings, are Max and Movits, in which
there is a colour wash over the pen drawing and Fiffs der Affe.
Oberlander's work, on the contrary, is careful and serious. I only
know it in wood blocks, but many of these, like the famous Bad
Pen and the Doctor, are equal to Menzel at his best. Oberlander
and Busch are only two among a hundred comic draughtsmen.
Whoever cares for the work of these artists should study not only

68 PEN DRAWING

FHegeiide Blatter, but their little books which are continually being
published.

Englishmen, and especially Americans, congratulate themselves
continually on the cleverness of their pen draughtsmen and illustrators.
But, as a matter of fact, no cheap book has ever been published in
America, or illustrated by English or American artists, that can be
compared with the German publications I have just mentioned. The
sooner therefore we get to know the work of German pen draughts-
men, carefully studying it and applying it to our own country, or the
country where we may happen to be, — though this admission may
be very damaging to our own good opinion of our work, — the
nearer will our magazines come to being, what we are pleased to
think them, the best illustrated publications in the world. It may
be interesting to know that some of those wonderfully illustrated
books are published and sold for sixpence, while the most expensive
cost the enormous sum of a shilling.

^9/iy^^€^f^>;yy.^^y .ri^-^/fft^'^i-H'y'- ■ -' -^

GERMAN WORK 69

GERMAN WORK
ILLUSTRATIONS

ADOLF MENZEL

T HAVE made every endeavour to obtain a new drawing from Menzel, but
-*• I regret to say my efforts have only resulted in, to me, an interesting corre-
spondence which shows, that in the short working time still remaining to him, he
feels that unfinished work already planned must be completed in preference to the
undertaking of new schemes. But the Berlin Photographic Company were good
enough to obtain permission for me to reproduce by photogravure the drawing
of Blucher from the Gennania, the original of which was not, with so much of
Menzel's work, cut to pieces on the block, but is now in the National Gallery at
Berlin. It has never been reproduced, so far as I know, except by a woodcut.
Fortunately, however, it is a remarkably good example of his style, for even
though Menzel did revolutionise illustration and bring again to life fac-simile
woodcutting, like all other masters who have devoted themselves to developing
any branch of art, he has suffered for those who have followed him in every part
of the world. I do not know of but one other photogravure ever made from his
pen drawings, and I have seen very few process blocks from them. Charles
Keene has shown me two or three lithographs, which he owns and which are
apparently viemi cards and programmes done by Menzel for his friends, and one
or two small very clever little drawings, all of which have been reproduced by
photo-engraving. I do not know, nor does he, where they were published. An
almost parallel case is that of Meissonier, who also devoted many years to
illustration, and yet in the numberless books he has illustrated I have only been
able to find one photogravure from a pen drawing. But Meissonier has given
up illustration, while Menzel has been and always will be primarily an illustrator.
Menzel's pen work began, I believe, with his drawings on stone for the
lithographer, and though much of his early work on the stone is absolutely of no
value to the student, there is at least one book illustrated with drawings made in
this way with a pen and afterwards coloured, I think by hand, which every

PEN DRAWING

student should know : this is his Uniforms of the Army of Frederick the
Great, produced while he was occupied on the History and the Life and Worfis
of Frederick, and Germania. The drawings, three of which I have here given,

are simply studies of costume — indeed, one might
say, nothing more than fashion plates which show
the cut of the clothes of Frederick's army, but
such fashion plates as had never before been done
in this world. Instead of the ordinary stupid dis-
play of mere costume without the slightest artistic
feeling for the subject, every drawing is a portrait
of a model, and every one of these models is, not
a lay figure to hang clothes on, but a live man.
The drawing of the sentinel shows the cut of the
front of his coat perfectly, and what more could
you want ? the make of his gun, the way he carries
his accoutrements, and yet, though but a fashion
plate, note that he is not stupidly standing just to
show his coat, but is plainly a sentinel on duty,
yawning with the bored expression a man in his
position would probably have. This or another
model can be seen in two or more positions simply
to show the back or the side of the same uniform,
but always the primary idea is character, expres-
sion, action, and not the mere stupid rendering of
a coat. Contrast this bored sentinel with the
conceited self-satisfied swaggering drummer who,
in the original drawing on the stone, will be
found talking to two or three of his companions.
I should like to have published a complete plate
of these uniforms, but the drawings are so laro-e
each figure nearly as tall as
the text of this book, that the
whole drawing could not have
been put on the page without
ruinous reduction. Techni-
cally, I cannot entirely com-
^ mendeither of these drawings,

because the very strong and decided blacks which one finds all over them,^ in
the knee of the sentinel, in his coat and his hat, and in the boots of the
drummer, were put in to take a colour wash in the book, where they do not
tell so strongly as they do here. But nevertheless, much of Menzel's work
does show this impatience with the greying of tones, and a desire to use

A'/ /

>^'

4^^tn>

GERMAN WORK

pure black to get his effect at once and be done with it. This can be seen
in the photogravure of Blucher. The head is massive and grand, but the
coat is put in carelessly. If I were merely
criticising the drawings from the standpoint
of the critic I would have no right to object
to certain technical details in such master-
pieces, since the effect is all right. But
this slapdash manner of blotting — not the
clever blotting of the Spaniards and Italians
— cannot be commended for the student.
With him it would only be carelessness ;
with a master like Menzel, it is an impa-
tience with details which he knows he can
render if he wants to. For a proof of this,
look at the coat of the full-dress uniform of
Frederick. The gold lace is worked out
as carefully as a mechanical draughtsman
would draw the parts of a machine, or a
naturalist study the wings of a fly. Note
how he has given the set of the coat, the
hang of the folds, expressed the colour and
sheen of the silk, although the actual colour
was put on over it, and do not attempt
to say he could not draw detail when he
wanted. Why, everything is even mea-
sured, and this is only a bit of one of the
enormous pages ; on the same page there
are details of hats and swords and of canes,
even down to a measured drawing of the
weaving of a sash. But if Menzel were
doing these things to-day, I cannot help
thinking he would get a better result, for
two reasons : these were drawn on the
stone with lithographic ink which is, first,
a tedious and slow process, and secondly, ^ .
it is almost impossible to print lines as
finely as they were drawn, because, as any
one who has tried it knows, lithographic
ink blots easily, or if it does not blot, the result is much thicker and harder
and blacker on white paper than the original drawing on the beautifully-toned
stone. I really wish to show them as models of expression and good drawing
rather than of technique. Personally, I prefer the delicate refinement of Abbey

PEN DRAWING

in this sort of work to the brute strength of Menzel. Both men can draw
details ; but Abbey seems to love them ; Menzel, though he never slights or
draws them badly, apparently hates to be obliged to do them. But it must
be remembered that when these drawings were made, Menzel stood absolutely
alone in the world as an illustrator. I am sure, however, that future generations
will look back to him as the Michael Angelo of illustration. It is all very well
to say he was influenced by Chodowiecki, whom I believe he acknowledges to
be his master, but Menzel is as much greater than Chodowiecki as Reynolds
was greater than Hudson. And as I have said in the Chapter on Fortuny, the
sensation his drawings made when they first appeared was so great, I believe
they were what sent Fortuny straight, not to copying them as a weaker man
would have done, but to nature.

In conclusion, I do not want it to be thought that Menzel did not as a rule
draw details. When working for the woodcutter he used the most marvellous
refinement of detail ; when working for himself, as the illustrator of to-day
works, he was bold and free as these drawings show. No one has ever
approached the exquisite delicacy of the little head and tail-pieces in the Works
of Frederick. I have not used them because they are all woodcuts.

— ^

W. DIETZ

I SUPPOSE this is by the well-known Dietz of Munich. In the title of the

drawing given in Kitnst fiir Aile, where it was published, the name was printed

Diez. In English publications it is usually spelt with a T. It is scarcely

probable there could have been two men of the same name, both working at the

same time, and in the same place. The late Munich professor, I know, made any

number of illustrations for Fliegende Blatter, and I believe this to be one of his

drawings. But the design is of great value, and this is really the important point.

It shows how well he was able to carry out the feeling of the old Dutchmen with

a handling all his own, though it suggests both Menzel and Vierge. Still I

cannot help saying that the barrels in the foreground, the drawing of the grass, and

the toned side of the house, might have been much better rendered with no greater

work. But the group of little figures is, I find, in power and completeness of

expression equal to anything in the book. And it is this power of expression,

combined with care in the selection of each line, which marks the modern

German style of drawing, several excellent examples of which I have been

fortunate enough to secure. This thought for line, which interests and fascinates

all artists, distinguishes the work of these Germans from the equally simple but

utterly careless and thoughtless engraved line of men like Leech and his English

followers.

H. SCHLITTGEN

ScHLiTTGEN IS the best known of all the German draughtsmen, and these two
drawings are fair examples of his style. To the simplicity of character sketch-
ing of Haug and Liiders is added the use of pure strong colour, as in the dress
of the girl in the foreground of the large drawing. There is very little to say,
except that his work is very clever and has influenced the pen draughtsmen of
the world. The most superficial glance at it will show where many illustrators
of to-day have got their style. Notice the charming grouping of the figures,
and the action and movement which pervades the whole drawing and which is
given in very few lines. Notice, too, the thoughtful placing of the little blacks
and whites, their arrangement against each other so as to tell with the utmost
effect. Everything in Schlittgen is studied and thought out in the most
careful manner.

The large drawing is from Tronvilk ; the smaller one, which shows most
perfectly what might be called his serious caricature, is from Ein Erster 7ind ein
Letzter Ball, and is a wonderful rendering of that wonderful creation, the
German officer.

All the Hacklander books, from which these are taken, should be seen
and studied ; the price of each is a shilling, and they can be obtained at
Triibner's in London.

GERMAN WORK

ROBERT HAUG AND HERMANN LUDERS

None of the German publications and books, with the exception of Fliegende
Blatter and the Httle volumes, I have mentioned, illustrated by the artists of
that paper, have a very wide circulation among English-speaking people.

- \//.- '"-''-

While nearly every German city of any importance possesses an art academy,
one at least having a world-wide reputation, it is rather strange that a greater
number of really good pen drawings are not seen. Though probably there are
innumerable Germans who do very good work with a pen, the fact remains that
but very few seem to care to, or do, get their work published. I do not know
if in Germany there exists a prejudice against the employment of a new man,
as I regret to say there does in certain quarters in England. However that
may be, only the work of the men here represented is seen to any great extent,
and, interesting as it would be to discover work done by the artist for study or
practice, it is the object of this book to show the work of men well known
as illustrators.

As I have said, Hermann Liiders and Robert Haug are two most notable
followers of Menzel, and in the two small drawings here given — all their draw-
ings I know are small — can be seen most clearly their style of work, which is
very similar, and which consists of the greatest expression of character given in

PEN DRAWING

the fewest possible lines. Contrast the light clapper officer in Luders's drawing
of a review, in Ein Soldateuleben, with the heavy files which are passing.
Although the drawing is almost in outline, you can see the different quality of
the cloth in the officer's and in the privates' uniforms, and every soldier's face
has a character of its own, although it may be given in only two lines. Notice
the curve shown in the feet of the advancing file — the curve which is always
seen in any column of marching men. To me, at least, the portraits of the
Emperor, the Crown Prince, and Von Moltke, are quite as complete and
satisfactory as any elaborate work in oil, and this small drawing contains as
much character and as much feeling for the artistic quality of line as any etching
that was ever produced. I know, of course, there would be more refinement in
the etched line, but these two drawings in their way are perfect.

The drawing by Haug of the cavalry passing is from Ein Sckloss m den
Ardennen, and of it, especially of his drawing of horses, exactly the same things
may be said as of Luders's work. Both of these books — and it may here be
noted that Ein Soldateuleben is written as well as illustrated by Hermann
Liiders — should be known and studied, as well as Vierge's Pablo de Sdgovie and
Abbey's and Parsons's Old Songs, by all who wish for style and care for the best
results in pen drawing. These drawings were reproduced in Vienna.

LUDWIG MAROLD

Marold's work possesses more of the cleverness of half a dozen Italians, though
it is not an imitation of any one of them, than that of any other German I know.
The drawing in the hands of the three girls is very careless ; but the simplicity
of the work combined with the stronsf bits of colour and the character in the
faces makes a whole which is very pleasing and interesting, and which certainly
has a style of its own.

8o PEN DRAWING

A. OBERLANDER

Oberlander is always called a caricaturist, and he is a caricaturist in the true
sense of the word, for he shows in his drawings the humorous side of his sub-
ject without aggressive exaggeration, and in a manner which interests artists as
well as people who have no knowledge of art. The caricaturist who merely
puts a little head, a big nose, or long legs to a figure, without drawing it in a
good technical style, and expects people to laugh at it, although he may appeal
to a vast inartistic public for a moment, because this abomination somewhat
suggests a notoriety or celebrity, cannot permanently attract those who really
care for art work. Can anything be more wearisome than to go through either
one of the histories of caricature or a file of the political comic papers ? You
turn over page after page only to find the stupid portrayal of forgotten men and
unremembered and trivial events. Without the legend accompanying them
they are unintelligible, and nearly always the events which led to the publication
of the picture are forgotten and all interest in the subject has ceased. The man
who puts down such trivialities and the public who appreciate them are not
much above the schoolboy who scrawls the effigy of his schoolmaster on a back
fence. I do not mean to say for a moment that all caricatures should be as
elaborate as this example of Oberlander's work. He and many another man
can tell a story in half a dozen artistically disposed lines. But a caricaturist who
can work out a drawing, and yet keep in it the comic and amusing element,
possesses a power given to few.

I care not for a minute if this is a portrait of a doctor in Berlin or Munich,
or only of a model. The subject is of absolutely no importance, but the way in
which it is worked out is of the greatest value to artists. I am very sorry that
the drawing has been engraved on wood ; though it has been very well cut by
Roth, in all of the darker parts the pen drawing quality is lost in the woodcut
line. But as the drawing was most likely made on the block — at least I have
never been able to find out anything about the original — this was all I could give.
However, what remains of it, to my mind, reaches the high-water mark of
caricature.

Any number of Oberlander's drawings can be found in the German papers,
from which they are often taken by the periodicals of the whole world, as they
can be understood by every one without a story to explain them.

PEN DRAWING

ALBERT RICHTER

OTHER ARTISTS IN "UNIVERSUM

While Fliegende Blatter and its artists — among whom I probably ought to have
mentioned Hengel, who tells his stories all over the page, and Stubbe — are
known everywhere, magazines like Universum, Kunst fiir Alle, Felz ziim Meer,
DaJieim, have little, if any, circulation in English-speaking
countries. And moreover, it is only occasionally, for a year
or six months at a time, that these magazines rise to the level
of originality. It has been less
a surprise to find my own work
in some of them than to dis-
cover good original drawings.
For though they borrow from
all sources, they rarely keep up
a hig;h standard in work done
specially for them. I have al-
ready referred to the series of
reproductions by Angerer and
Goschl after Rembrandt in
— Daheini, where they made an
oasis in a desert of common-
placeness ; in half a ton of Felz
zum Meer, there is hardly a
;'■ notable drawing done by a
German in pen and ink ; but in Universum, at
times straight away for a year, one will find a
number of good drawings, and then the maga-
zine will degenerate, only to be revived again.
All through it, however, there is good decora-
tive work by E. linger, two of whose very
characteristic designs I have included in the Chapter on Decoration. There
is Scheyner who draws like Haug, and Mandlick who works like Schlittgen.

^?\:^

GERMAN WORK

But I think the most original of all the men who have illustrated this magazine
is Albert Richter, who draws landscape and interiors, and three of whose draw-
ings are given. The expression of detail in the ■ ' / ;
carving over the open doorway and in the corner

of the room is very well rendered, while the bit . . ' . ■

of a German town is extremely characteristic, the
German feeling being well kept. The drawings
are very slight, but despite this slightness there
is evident a great desire to show with the simplest
means the most picturesque aspects of very com-
monplace subjects. In fact they possess the true
illustrative quality.

The only other drawings worth notice, except
the single Vierge-like drawing by Dietz, the helio-
type by Waldemar Frederick, and those of the
other men I mention when describing it on another
page, are by the military painter Lang in Kunst
filr Alle, from whom very likely Haug, Luders,
and Scheyner got their ideas, but he is not an
illustrator and they are.

J^\i^^\j^t!^

GERMAN WORK 85

A. STUCKI

There is nothing more difficult to draw with a pen than low relief or
decoration, and while Jacquemart, with his books made rare by limited editions,
illustrated with etchings and therefore only for collectors and amateurs, gained a
great reputation for himself, this man who can draw just as well and with as
much feeling for light and shade and colour and the play of reflections on
polished surfaces, in which lay Jacquemart's great strength, is unknown because,
though he treats the same objects in the same manner, he draws them with a
pen. The sole difference is that he works for the people, and Jacquemart,
though himself an artistic man, catered to the collector who is usually unable to
appreciate his work technically. The chasing and the roundness and the
metallic feeling of this cup or chalice could not be better rendered by any other
medium. Lately, notably in the Century and Harper s, there have been
published drawings by Will H. Drake which approach, but I do not think
equal, this. Drake's work is more artistically put together ; his backgrounds
have some relation to the objects drawn, this is meaningless. But I do not find
that the subjects themselves are as well treated by Drake and the other
Americans, that is in feeling for surface and material.

86 PEN DRAWING

WALDEMAR FREDERICK

Universum contains one sort of work which has not been used to very great
extent by any other popular magazine. For a year or two it gave a heHotype
or photo-print as a frontispiece to each number. The architectural papers have
almost always employed some form of this method of reproduction, and it can
also be seen in the Universal Review. It is very cheap but exceedingly effective,
and there is no reason why it should not be more extensively adopted. Among
the men whose drawings have been published in this way are Waldemar
Frederick, K. Richfelt, and Hugo Kaufman. The pen drawings in which there
is a wash come very well by this process, though they cannot be printed with
the text. This, of course, is the objection to it. It gives the character of the
artist's work comparatively perfectly and is usually printed in two or more
colours. The results are not as accurate as those obtained by photogravure, but
for the reproduction of wash It is superior to a relief block. The drawings are
merely photographed on to a lithographic stone or gelatine film, and printed in a
lithographic press. The process is well enough known all over the world with
more variety in name than in method. For it is indifferently called heliogravure,
heliotype, photo- tint, ink photo, and it is not infrequently palmed off as
photogravure. The process is altogether different, a photogravure, as the name
implies, being printed from an engraved plate, the heliotype from the surface, as
a lithograph.

Waldemar Frederick's drawing of the figure is excellent, and thoroughly
German in character, and the reproduction is good, though it seems to me that
much must have been lost in the shadows. Of this I cannot be sure, as I have
not seen the original drawing. But the prints themselves even in an edition as
small as this vary very much, and the want of accuracy in printing is enough
to prevent the success of any process as a method for popular illustration.

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE

CRITICS have spoken of French drawings as tricky. I am
not c^uite sure what this may mean, but I am certain that in
French, as in Spanish drawing, dull mechanical work was done
away with, and clever handling took its place. At the same
time that the great Spaniards were beginning to be famous,
Detaille and De Neuville appeared in France. They studied
under Meissonier. A reference to this artist's pen drawings, even
though they are engraved on wood, will show that his method
of working with a pen was careful, reverent, and accurate. But
as he does not illustrate any more, and as I have never seen but
one of his drawings reproduced by photo-engraving, there is no more
reason why I should speak of him than that I should go back
to Vernet, and then to Claude and Nicholas Poussin — in fact to
the beginning of French art. As I have said, it is with the pen
drawing of to-day, and of no other time, that I am here concerned.

Even before De Neuville and Detaille and Meissonier, Paul
Huet had already given signs of the coming change. But his
drawings were not known until after his death, when they were
looked upon as revelations. Rousseau, when he took a pen, was
too careless, or I suppose some would say too old-masterish, to
care about line, but he managed his blacks effectively in his wood
interiors. Millet, too, worked with a pen, especially a quill, not

go PEN DRAWING

exactly as the old men did, but still with simplicity, making a
few lines tell a whole story. Dore, of course, produced hundreds
and probably thousands of pen drawings ; but I suppose it is now
almost universally admitted that his facility killed his art, as it
eventually killed himself. Not only this, but the greater part of
his work, was done for the engraver.

Looking at great men like Menzel and Vierge, one is struck
by the fact that their original work is expressed by pen drawing.
With the majority of Frenchmen, pen drawing has been the
means of giving the public an artistic rendering of their pictures
in black and white. It has also been used in this way in England,
but, as a rule, in anything but an artistic manner. De Neuville
and Detaille and hundreds of others drew in pen and ink with
the adjunct of wash, not that the pen was to them of any special
importance ; it simply happened to be the medium that was the
fashion. Their sketches were really a working-out of the old
projects' and intentions' scheme. With the introduction of photo-
engraving, the publication of L'Art and the Salon Catalogues,
and the coming of the Spaniards of whom I have spoken, the
revolution began in France. Of course the Frenchmen were ready
for this artistic change in their work, and only adapted their style
to the new requirements.

In De Neuville's well-known drawings of war subjects, as
in Menzel's work, there is the most careful modelling, obtained
by simple and direct means, and the utmost refinement. Mr.
Hamerton devotes much space to justly praising his Coups de
Ftisil, published by Charpentier, but to praise De Neuville and
to omit Detaille is to slight an artist who is no less brilliant
as a pen draughtsman. To write of these two men and to omit
Jeanniot would be an inexcusable oversight.

In my estimation Jeanniot is the leading French pen draughts-
man. He has of course painted, but he is more of a pen draughts-
man than a painter, and therefore should be here ranked above
these two better- known men who, owing to the magnificent series
of photogravure reproductions of their paintings published by Goupil,
have acquired a wide-spread popularity. Jeanniot has devoted
himself almost exclusively to illustrating the magazines, and showino-
the French life of to-day. I hardly know where or when he beo-an

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE 91

to draw, but the first numbers of La Vie Moderne are filled
with examples of his work. Exactly the same can be said of
Adrien Marie and Renouard, who are known in England through
the Graphic. Indeed, the Graphic, as it admits, is at the present
moment very much dependent on the drawings of these men. Of
late most of the work of Renouard, however, is in chalk. Mars
also has done much for English papers, with his rendering of
life on the sea-shore, and his charming children.

At one time, in almost every number of La Vie Moderne,
was to be seen work which, though the artists' names might be
unknown to us outside of France, was clever and marked with
originality. The same can be said of an innumerable host in
Paris Illustrd, Le Petit Journal pour Rire, La Vie Parisienne,
L Illustration, Le Monde Illustrd, Revue Illustrde, Le Conrrier
Francais ; or if you look any week in books which bear the little
card Vient de Parattre, you will probably find in their pages some
exquisite little gem by a man you never heard of before. Almost
every French pen draughtsman has made the books and papers of
the day — whether big or little, comic or serious, important or
frivolous — beautiful and worthy of study. The early volumes of
La Vie Moderne and L!Art are the best masters that any pen
draughtsman could have.

It would really be much easier to name the French artists
who cannot draw with a pen than those who can. However, among
the better known draughtsmen I might mention Duez, whose brilliant
sketches transfer scenes from the theatre to the pages of the theatrical
papers ; Jean Beraud, who makes wonderful interiors with effects of
light and shade ; Maurice Leloir, who has given us a new Sterne ;
Auguste Lan^on, whose drawings of animals have an enormous
amount of strength and vigour, and who, I believe, has been
called the "Cat Raphael"; Lucien Gautier, who can make a bronze
statuette or a marble group with the sunlight glowing on it and
its soft reflected shadows, real for us in LArt ; Bracquemond,
the etcher, whose head and tail -pieces are charming, while his
little sketches are as Avonderful as Japanese work ; Ringel, the
modeller, who seems able to do anything, and whose drawings after
his own placques are the most clever that have ever been made ;
H. Scott, who is a delightful architectural draughtsman ; E. Adan,

92 PEN DRAWING

who renders his own pictures charmingly; Rochegrosse ; Mme.
Lemaire ; Edmond Yon ; Robida, who is very popular both as a
caricaturist and an artistic traveller; Brunet-Debaines, who was
one of the first to show Englishmen what pen drawing for process-
reproduction should be; Habert-Dys, who draws an initial or the
border of a page with most effective brilliancy by means of almost
pure blacks and whites ; graceful swallows flit about chimney-pot
initials, Japanese dolls tumble all around the text, perfect oriental
feeling pervades his head and tail pieces, and all his work is
suffused with his own personality.

There is one Frenchman who stands apart from all these men,
and who is the landscape pen draughtsman of France. This is
Maxime Lalanne, who has recently died full of honours, if not of
years. Without his beautiful drawings Havard's HoUande would
be veritably dead as the cities of the Zuyder Zee. His bird's-eye
views have made them live again. For quick, bright, strong, incisive
work, for getting at the essence of a thing with sharp, short, brilliant
strokes, perhaps no one can equal him. The only possible drawback
to his work is that there is too much Lalanne in it. He knew, if
anything, too well what he was going to do. He can hardly be
called mannered, because a mannered man usually cares nothing
for nature with its variety and subtlety, while Lalanne really did
care and makes you feel that he cared. I may perhaps best explain
what I mean by saying that Rico in his work seems to ask, " Is this
the way a tree or a bit of water ought to look ? I think it is ; " while
Lalanne in his is more positive : "This is the way the tree or bit of
water looks; I know it," he seems to say. He is almost too sure of
himself.

In speaking of French pen drawing one cannot help noticing
that a few years ago it was the fashion in Paris to draw with the
pen — a fashion, as I have said, started by the Spaniards, then living
there. The work of the French artists, although not so clever as
that of the Spaniards, was almost all good, simple, and careful. But
at the same time the leading attraction of the French magazines
and journals was the fact that week after week Vierge, his brother
or his followers, or other Spaniards, contributed, as they still continue
to do, the most striking drawings. But since the introduction of
the Guillaume and Meisenbach processes much of this work has

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE 93

been given up, and only those artists who care for line and the
quality to be gotten with a pen still produce pen drawings. What
has given that which is known as French art its reputation with
art students and art lovers, is the fact that it is not French art
at all, but the art of the whole world ; for there is not the slightest
doubt that the work of the greatest artists of the day is to be seen
at one time or another in Paris, which has therefore become the
art metropolis. The Salon is really the broadest and most varied
exhibition in the world, and far less French than the Royal Academy
is English.

Almost every French pen draughtsman to whom I have referred
is a well-known painter. If you take up to-day a Salon Catalogue,^
you find it full of charming pen drawing reproductions, pictures in
themselves. Of these I have given several as examples. Indeed,
the list of the greatest pen draughtsmen is, as I said of the Spaniards,
the list of the great painters. The fashion of illustrating catalogues
commenced, I believe, in France, and grew and developed there under
the care of H Art and the publishers of the Salon Catalogue until
its influence has made itself felt, even in England, though here very
little of the French feeling has been retained. The French work
is done for the sake of the drawing; the English catalogue is but
an inartistic reading book for the artless. There have been some
exceptions. Some good drawings have been made for English
catalogues, just as of late years the Salon Catalogues have been given
over to less able draughtsmen, for this reason ; at the present moment
many of the best known artists are having their paintings reproduced
by a mechanical tone process. In some ways this is unfortunate
for pen drawing ; in others it is fortunate, since it helps to confine
pen drawing to its proper sphere, which is not the reproduction
of tone, but of line only. The publication of LArt and these
catalogues not only created a school of French pen draughtsmen,
whose sole work it Avas to reproduce other men's art, but, so
powerful was its influence, that it produced a few English artists,
who for a time did very fine work of the same kind, but of them

1 I want to make an exception of the Catalogue ruins them. The Catalogue for i88S is not very

for 1887, which is very bad. Some of the much better. The most artistic cheap French

drawings may have been good, but over them Catalogue published, as far as I know, is that of

has been put a grey tone which gives them a the Societe d'Aquarellistes.
uniform cheap look, and, in nearly every case.

94 PEN DRAWING

I shall speak in the English Chapter. It is owing to the same
influence that the finest catalogues ever issued have been published in
America, and that in that country catalogue-making and advertising
have become a fine art.

If the healthy black and white art, which is the art of the
nineteenth century, is put into advertisements, catalogues, the daily
and weekly papers, journals and magazines, and the people really
appreciate, understand, and care for it, as they do in France, Germany,
and America, I believe it is doing just as much good as pictures
buried away in churches, which they look and wonder at through
the eyes of a guide-book or of a religious art teacher, and the beauties
of which seeing, they do not perceive, and the meaning of which
hearing, they do not understand.

PEX DRAWING IN FRANCE 95

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE
ILLUSTRATIONS

LEON LHERMITTE

T N every branch of art work at which I have ever known him to try his hand,
-*- Lhermitte seems equally at home. His pictures are always among the
most distinguished in the SaloH ; his water-colours are always to be included
with the successes at the exhibitions of the Socidtd des Aqiiarellistes Fra?icais ;
his pastels surprise every one who sees them ; his charcoal drawings are worked
out with a massive and big completeness which proves that this medium can
be used for something more than the pretty finicky work to which it is de-
voted on the one hand, or to the making of slight studies or rapid sketches for
which it is so often employed on the other ; his etchings of interiors of churches
and his west front of the Cathedral of Rouen are known all over the world ; and
I have now, through the kindness of Messrs. Seeley, the opportunity of properly
showing one of his pen drawings.

Although not almost exclusively, like Abbey, an illustrator, or unable, like
Menzel, to express himself equally well in colour, he is quite as much at home
in the many books and papers he has decorated as they are. There is an
entire absence of all cleverness in his work — I mean in the sense in which that
of the Spaniards is clever — yet a straightforward way of rendering every subject
he attempts makes his drawings most interesting, and he certainly possesses a
very strong and marked individuality. Although he does not confine himself
by any means to the life of the peasant, as Millet did, all his work which I have
seen treats some one or other phase of French life, and is done with the greatest
possible endeavour to show the truth about his subject without affectation or
exaggeration. The drawing I have reproduced gives one of the old streets in
Paris. It is made with blue ink, evidently with an ordinary pen on a piece of
very poor white drawing paper, and is handled in exactly the same way as are
his etchings. He has endeavoured to show the mass of objects, which fill one
of these old rag-pickers' streets in the heart of Paris, without giving undue

96 PEN DRAWING

prominence to any one part, or without any apparent brilliancy of execution.
But if the drawing- is looked into, it will be realised that every object in it keeps
its proper place, while he has suggested not only light and shade by very
simple means, but colour as well. He works in his important figures in the
foreground, or the objects he wishes to emphasise, by using a broader pen or
by greater pressure just as an etcher would ; and at the same time he allows
portions of them to sink into other parts of the drawing just as they do in
nature. I do not want any one to think I publish it altogether as an example
of style, because many of the lines are put in with an effect of carelessness, and
it is only when one examines them carefully that one sees they are right. The
modelling, which at first is almost hidden, will also be found. But I cannot
help pointing out that a drawing, like Abbey's, in which every line is carefully
thought about is far better for study. If the student fears that he is becoming
too careful with each line — which is really an impossibility — he can easily allow
himself greater freedom. But apparently this drawing of Lhermitte's could not
be done much more freely. And yet, on looking into it closely, it can be seen
that a pencil drawing was originally made under the freest part of the ink
work ; it is really only by having a solid groundwork that one can indicate and
express the various parts which go to make up a whole as interesting as this.
Then of course there is another reason for not working so freely as Lhermltte
does here : no process but photogravure would reproduce this work accurately.
The original reproduction In Mr. Hamerton's Paris gave no idea whatever of
the drawing.

There is one quality to be noted, however, in such work. It Is unmistak-
ably clone out of doors and from nature, with probably little thought about line,
and therefore has none of the cut and dried sort of freedom that can easily be
distinguished from the genuine thing. Notice how all the forms of the stones
and the stains on the wall are given on the left-hand side, and so freely, and yet
so carefully, you know they must be facts recorded from nature. Notice how
the whites in the men's shirts and baskets tell, not too strongly but just right,
and how Lhermltte has indicated the grey misty distance in the old high narrow
street. Of course the windows and the doors on the riofht mieht have been
drawn much more carefully, and the lamp-post which sticks out at the side is
very bad. But throughout the whole drawing there Is a good honest endeavour
to represent a street he has seen, though the way in which this was to be done
was of minor importance. With Parsons or with Blum or with Rico, the hand-
ling is of no less importance than the subject. These men give as much thouoht
to the reproduction as to any special quality in the drawing. A man like Lher-
mltte evidently does not, but he knows what he wants to express, and, as I have
said in several other places, it is only by working after drawings like his that
photo-engraving advances at all.

EDOUARD DETAILLE

Nothing has been more of a surprise to me in preparing this book than to find
how comparatively few pure pen drawings have been made by two men so well
known for black and white work as De Neuville and Detaille. I have not
forgotten that I have said in another place I myself care little whether a draw-
ing is pure pen work or not, and I have shown other drawings where wash is
used with the pen work. But, as I have also said, nothing but a pure pen
drawing can be reproduced with so little labour and without hand work. These

98 PEN DRAWING

two men studied under Meissonier before the coming of process, and they drew
on the wood ; therefore, though their work was well reproduced, it made very
little difference whether there was a wash in it or not. During the last decade,
in which their reputation has been made, and De Neuville unfortunately has
died, though they have done a vast amount of work for reproduction — in fact,
almost all their work was intended for this purpose, — it has been for reproduction
by photogravure, either in colour or in black and white, from their paintings and
not from their line drawings.

There are, of course, a great number of sketches in pen and ink, more or
less slight and always interesting, to be had from them like this sketch and
the series for the Coiips de Fusil, which have a great deal of wash in them,
and which I do not think were a great success, or else I should have shown
one or two here. The accompanying drawing by Detaille is a sketch of the
principal figure in the picture called L'Alerte, and though it was exhibited, as
are hundreds of his and De Neuville's drawings, it is nothing more than a sketch
of projects and intentions, but far better than any old man could have done it.
The drawing itself is good, and the action and movement of the man and horse
are very well expressed. But it is filled with careless blots and smudges. It
is the sketch of a master, primarily done for his own use, though he is willing
to show it. A glance at the work of Jeanniot or Haug and Luders will show
that Detaille's drawing is a work for study, theirs are works for exhibition.
Having studied the methods of fifteen or twenty years ago, and having met
with success in other ways, he has never paid the necessary attention to the
essentially modern illustrative methods. From his standpoint there is no reason
why he should. He paints for reproduction, and in the reproductions published
by Goupil, from the cheapest to the most expensive, he does appeal to the
people. No one to-day knows more about painting for reproduction than
Detaille. He is one of the men who have given up pen drawing because their
wash drawings can be reproduced equally well. In his great work, L'Arm^e
Frangaise, there are scarcely any pen drawings at all.

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE

MADELEINE LEMAIRE

I AM not yet sure whether I should have
selected this charming figure of a flower-
girl, or one of Madame Lemaire's studies
of flowers, which she renders with more
colour and less work than even Alfred
Parsons, though I cannot think she gives
as much attention to the delicacy of each
individual form and the expression of its
growth. But there is no doubt whatever
to her right to a place as a figure draughts-
woman. There is no one livinsf who can
approach her for refinement of drawing
and rendering of colour in a simple un-
affected manner. Louis Leloir was cer-
tainly her equal, but I know of no one
else. I think she is even superior to
Abbey in the suggestion of colour in
a single figure. But then Abbey can
carry out a drawing more completely,
making a picture - illustration, while
Madame Lemaire's designs are only
notes of her pictures, but notes of a
most artistic sort. The principal quali-
ties to be studied in her work are the
simplicity of line and the grace of
handling.

E. DANTAN

This drawing shows a consummate mastery of technique in a man who has
given the world very little pen drawing — at least very little that I have been
able to find. Of course in the original picture the greatest cleverness was
manifested in the scheme of light, the posing of the figures, and the arrangement
of the different parts. But to suggest this cleverness in pen and ink without
over elaboration is quite as wonderful. The reserving of blacks here, as in all
other good drawings, will be noted. But the great feature is the rendering of
the greys, and especially the flesh tints of the model in the foreground. You
feel instinctively the difference between the relief on which the sculptor is
working, the litde coloured figure, the model herself, and the cloth which carries
the light from the relief down her arms on to the box where she is sitting. All
of this is produced by the most simple means, and yet the different surfaces are
perfectly suggested. It cannot be said there is any great cleverness in the
handling ; the drawing itself in places might be much better. The model's
hands and one of the sculptor's are probably not up to those in the picture.
But this drawing should be studied mainly for its suggestion of colour, and for
the very careful and, at the same time, very artistic manner in which Yves and
Barret have engraved it. The skilful use of cross-hatching has contributed in
many places to the successful rendering of the character of the different surfaces.
And yet in some of the most difficult passages, notably in the model herself,
there is none of this hand work ; the whole effect is entirely due to the artist.
But right alongside the model, look at the delicate way in which Dantan's name
is engraved. It might be remarked that this is too trivial to notice ; but it is
such apparent trivialities that make the difference between good and bad work.

The outlines of the figure on the relief are somewhat rough and hard. I
think they should have been cut down and thus softened. The hardness is
probably due to a defect in the block. As it is, the outlines catch one's eye
unpleasantly. As to the rendering of the canvasses in high light above the
relief, the placques and reliefs on the wall which runs at right angles to it, at the
left hand of the drawing, I think the surfaces and the colour and texture
suggested are worked out, though unobtrusively, as well as the principal motive
in the picture. But every part of this drawing is worthy of the most careful and
thorough study.

Dantan assures me that the drawing is his own work, and, as I have said,
it is simply wonderful that a man who has shown so little pen work should get
such perfect results. I have no doubt that he is responsible in a great measure
for the careful engraving, and therefore it is almost presumptuous of me to offer
any criticism upon it. This drawing is but another proof of what I have
asserted : if an artist can reproduce his own picture in pen and ink artistically,
he produces not only a valuable record but a new work of art. It is to this
drawing, as much as to the picture itself, that Dantan owes his fame.^

1 For work of this class Emile Adan's Ferryman's Dauglitcr and Autumn should be seen.

p. G. JEANNIOT

The reason I have not given
a photogravure to Jeanniot,
whom I have called the lead-
ing French pen draughtsman,
is because his work comes
perfectly well by process. He
has a style and character of
his own, and by the simplest
means he obtains the most
artistic results. Take this
little drawing of the boule-
vards at night with a kiosque ; the effect of the light which comes from it, the
light of the shop windows, and their reflections on the wet asphalt, are given
as well as if the drawing was made in wash. There is no over elaboration and
unnecessary work. The tones are suggested in a remarkable manner. Of
course they are all wrong, but they give the right effect. In fact, the little
drawing which heads this page should be carefully studied.

Then take the drawing of the soldiers drilling. Randolph Caldecott never
did a better dog than the one standing in the foreground looking at the officer,
and the recruit close by is simply the thing itself. Look at the character in
the awkward squad, in all the spectators, in the officers. The houses in the
background, however, are careless. They might have been suggested much
more artistically with very little more work. But the figures are altogether
delightful in their suggestion of character, and every line shows careful thought.

What could be more stupid and monotonous to draw than the mass of
furniture in the third example. I think the background might with advantage
have had less work in it ; Brennan would have rendered every one of the details
much more cleverly. But Jeanniot has made an interesting picture as a whole,
breaking up one really inartistic line by another, and with the most unpromising
details producing the best results. It is in artistically rendering furniture,
bric-a-brac, and even old shoes, that men like Jacquemart have made their
reputation as etchers. The same effects can be rendered quite as well in pen
and ink, and stupid trade catalogues could be made interesting and worthy
of preservation instead of being, as they are now, only fit to be thrown away

104 PEN DRAWING

as a nuisance. Business men are beginning to understand that there is
something in artistic advertising ; but it will take them some time to learn to
pay for an artistically drawn advertisement. I have been told that a large piano
manufacturer in America has produced just such a catalogue, but I have not
seen it. With this drawing, those continually appearing in the Century and
Harper s by Brennan, Drake, and Du Mond, and with the etchings and pen
drawings by Jacquemart in his various books, there is no difficulty in finding
good studies by good men.

Jeanniot has illustrated an almost endless succession of books and papers,
La Vie Moderne, La Revue Illustrde, etc. etc. The book b}^ which his work
has been made most widely known is, of course, the Dentu edition of Tartarin
de Tarascon, which contains a vast number of pen drawings.

■Vv^

LOUIS LELOIR

This Leloir must not be confounded with Maurice Leloir, the illustrator of
Sterne. The drawing here shown is a most refined rendering of character.
The face has been drawn so well for reproduction that the printed result is more
successful than any work I know of. And yet this is one of the very few
drawings of Louis Leloir's that I have seen. Of course it is nothing more
perhaps than a sketch for a picture, but when a man can make such a sketch he
is a great master of pen drawing. The face and hands cannot be too thoroughly
and carefully studied.

I lO

PEN DRAWING

MAXIME LALANNE

To my mind, at least, Lalanne was one of the most exquisite and refined
illustrators of architecture who ever lived. His ability to express a great

building, a vast town, or a
•— ,r-,_ delicate little landscape, has

-^ — - - -v^^?ir never been equalled, I think,

_^ ■ by anybody but Whistler.

To a certain extent he was
mannered ; so was Rem-
brandt ; Whistler is the only
man I know of who is not.
The three little drawings
which I have given show
Lalanne's style very well. I
do not know what was the size of the originals ; in Havard's HoUande the
illustrations are reproduced in many different
sizes, but I think the small ones like those
I give are the most successful. The student
will find the book extremely useful.

Lalanne probably acquired his refinement
of handling in the production of his innumer-
able delicate etchings. It is scarcely neces-
sary to analyse his drawings here, as I have
considered one of them in an earlier chapter,
and all are characterised by the same sim-
plicity and refinement of expression, the same directness of execution. There is
in them great knowledge of architecture, but this knowledge is not aggressive.
The Portfolio contained many examples of Lalanne's work, among others
sketches in Rouen and illustrations for Mr. Hamerton's Paris. His etchino-
of Richmond and the Thames, which appeared in the Portfolio, is the
most exquisite example ot his work I have seen in any English periodical.
Nearly the same results could be obtained with pen and ink.

However, the books which Lalanne illustrated are numberless. He did a
great deal for Ouantin, I believe. His work can be found in back numbers of

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE

1 1 1

L Art and nearly all the French magazines and periodicals, for he was a most
prolific draughtsman. But perhaps the best, certainly the most complete,
example of his work is Havard's Hollande. He was a very successful teacher,
but because of the class of people who patronised him — principally royalties of
more or less importance — this part of his life was wasted.

112 PEN DRAWING

ULYSSE BUTIN

It may be wondered why I give so much space to a drawing which is apparently
crude and very hlce the projects and intentions of the old men. I give it simply
to show the difference. The old work either is in pure outline, or if modelling
is attempted, it is done in the most conventional manner. Here you have no
outline, but, on the contrary, a masterly sketch in which the suggestion of model-
ling and the feeling for light and shade are remarkable for strength and
character. Notice how the fio;ure of the sfirl is suo-o;ested under her dress, and
the simple yet excellent rendering of her hair, and the difference between her
face and that of the man sleeping beside her. Of course this is rough work if
you like, and the reproduction is probably about the size of the original drawing.
But though the work is put in strongly and boldly, it is not done carelessly, and
it is most interesting to see the way in which a man like Butin works. Note,
too, that none of the lines are done with unnecessary coarseness in hopes that
they will reduce into the proper relations with other light ones, but all are
drawn apparently with a big quill pen. As I have said, I show this drawing
more to mark the contrast between modern sketching of projects and intentions
and old work of the same sort. It was published in L' Art.

"T^Ttfss ^JumiT,

DRAWINGS OF SCULPTURE

In looking over the catalogues of different art exhibitions, which are perhaps the
only places where are to be found pen drawings of sculpture with any pretence
to artistic rendering, one is struck by one of two facts. Either the sculptors
have not made the drawings themselves, or else they have produced slight and
trivial renderings of their own often very beautitul work. The chief cause for

ii6 PEN DRAWING

this is that many sculptors out of France, singular as it may seem, cannot
draw ; that is, they cannot make a drawing of any artistic value. Of course in
Paris this is not so often the case. A man who has gone through the Beaux-
Arts is almost always able to draw. But in other countries it is the exception
when the sculptor can. And again, it is extremely difficult to give with a pen,
either with simple lines or complicated drawing, the real feeling of marble, terra-
cotta, or bronze.

The consequence is that the majority of French sculptors, when they wish
an artistic rendering in pen and ink of their work, not infrequently employ one of
the three draughtsmen whose work I have here given to do it for them. Let
us take the large drawing by St. Elme Gautier, after the high relief by Mercie,
over one of the doorways of the Louvre. Mercie is a painter as well as a
sculptor, Jiis painting often being seen in the Salon, and he realises the difficulty
of giving with pen and ink the effect of a newly-modelled relief which has none
of the marks of time, or the interesting smudges and breaks and fractures which
save the artist much work and lend charm to the results. But from new work
you have to draw sharply and cleanly, depending upon nothing but your ability
to draw correctly, taking the utmost care with every line, and yet avoiding that
liny mechanical look which j^ou will find at once in your drawing unless you are
very skilful. One cannot call this drawing of Gautier's very artistic, but it is a
clean, sharp rendering of the subject, and as such is a good study.

Contrast it for a moment with these heads of angels by Marie Weber. She
has got all the modelling and the effect of the surfaces and the rendering of
light and shade without a single outline, though Gautier's work is almost
altogether outline. But a drawing like this could not be made unless the
draughtsman was quite Gautier's equal. Notice how, though she indicates the
lights and shades and the darks in the mouths, she has concentrated her blacks
on the base on which the heads stand. And yet you will find little blacks all
over the drawing, which is one of the most delightfully artistic renderings of
sculpture I have ever seen. Other of Marie Weber's drawings are to be found
in UArt, but none that are as fine as this one.

Half-way between Gautier's and Marie Weber's work comes this drawing
of Teucer by L. Gaucherel, which is an excellent combination of their two
methods — of Gautier's firm bold outline in the light part of the figure, and of
Weber's delicate modelling in the shadows. The effect has been obtained
without a single pure black, just as, of course, there was no black in the figure
itself.

Lastly, the head of De Lesseps by Ringel is an example of the work of a
man who can model as well as he can draw, and draw as well as he can etch.
Not only have his series of medallions of contemporary Frenchmen been most
original in their conception and true in their execution, but the drawings are in
no way inferior, and made a profound sensation a few years ago upon their

1'=="

I20 PEN DRAWING

publication in L Art. They are drawn on the Papier Gillot, and the cross-
hatch, the double tone which increases the light, can be seen all over the side
of the face, while the pure whites are obtained in the manner I have described
in another chapter. It is, of course, quite possible that some of my critics will
remark that this is not a pen drawing at all. I am quite well aware of this.
There may not be a single pen line in it, though I think there is pen work in
the hair. The darks are put in with a crayon. But as I wish to give an
example of pen work on this tinted paper, even though it consists of only a few
lines, and as this is one of the finest examples to be had, I think it best to give
it, since I am sure it will be useful to students. By means of this tinted paper
one can get nearer to the effect of a relief or an entire figure than can be done
in any other way, except by wood -engraving, or by direct process from the
relief or statue itself without the intervention of any engraver.

Among Americans, Blum, Wyatt Eaton, Kenyon Cox, and Brennan, by a
process of his own, which I believe did not turn out very successfully, have
made some interesting drawings of sculpture which may be seen in the Century.
But by process or wood-blocks from the statue or relief itself a more telling
result may be had, because sculpture depends not on lines but on surfaces, and
by translation into line it loses enormously.

H. SCOTiT

I DO not know if this artist
is a Frenchman. But he
lives in France, and his
work always appears in
French periodicals. I pre-
sume, therefore, he is one
of the many Frenchmen of
English or foreign parent-
age, among whom one at "
once recalls men, at any-
rate with English names,
like Alfred Stevens, Albert
Lynch, and many another.
However, nowadays the
only artists living in a
foreign country, who think
it worth while to maintain
and even assert their na-
tionality, are Americans,
owing to the duty of
thirty-three per cent with
which a beneficent g-overn-
ment has seen fit to tax the works of art of all who are not fortunate enough
to be citizens of my great and glorious country.

Scott has devoted himself to the picturesque rendering of architecture. He
is not a master by any means, but he has done more of this work than any one
else in France. Looking at his drawing, I should say most undoubtedly he was
educated as an architect. In the headpiece, at Chantilly, the drawing of the flat
mansard roof is absolutely expressionless and without character. It is im-
possible to tell whether it is of slate, shingle, or stone ; I suppose it is slate, the
material of which all French roofs are built. But there is no reason why a man
should make a long series of parallel lines when a few, drawn with discretion,
would have shown the material much more plainly. The drawing, or at least
the reproduction, contains a great number of blacks, thus scattering his effects ;
but its chief merit is its expression of details which are very well rendered.

The large drawing is of course far more of a picture. The scraggy grape

122 PEN DRAWING

vine in the foreground is atrocious and meaningless. But the Hght is excellently
carried up the long street leading to the chateau ; the chateau itself is very well
drawn, though there is but little light and shade in it, and some careless cross
hatching on the towers. The masses of trees are very wire-worky. Taken
altogether, however, as an impressive representation of a vast building
dominating a small town, the effect is extremely well given. He has shown
everything, from the sally-port to the tops of the towers, from the great mansard-
roofed mairie standing among trees on the left to the little working-men's
cottages on the right, with great intelligence. The roofs in all his buildings,
save in the mansard of the mairie — and it might be better — neither represent
light or shade nor their materials. A simple reference to the Rico or Blum
drawing will show what I mean. The long straggling lines on the left of the
cJiateau, though they lead into the wood and hillside beyond, are confusing.
But with the exception of these details, and especially of the foliage, the
mechanical treatment of which is to be avoided, I think the drawing an
excellent model for study. It is not given with the cleverness of Rico's work,
an intelligent cleverness which very few draughtsmen may hope to attain. But
this style is one that can be acquired and is very well adapted to northern
countries, as there is no attempt to render the brilliant glittering sunshine of
the south.

MARS

Mars is evidently — I may use the term correctly in this case — a nom de pliune.
But here I care little for the draughtsman's personality, or sex either for that
matter. I am not even sure if Mars is a man or a woman. But I am sure that
as a caricaturist, rendering his drawings with an artistic feeling far beyond any
mere artless or slovenly caricaturing, as an illustrator of fashion magazines,
as a delineator of French liig life, or as one who produces charming children's
books, Mars stands alone, and his work is recognisable anywhere. But there
is frequently so much carelessness and so much caricature in his drawings,
which are intended to be serious, that it is really difficult to find a good example
of his work, though it appears every week in the French papers.

However, a drawing like this of Pierrot blanc et Pierrette noir shows
the character of one side of his work — the only side I find worth consider-
ing seriously — as well as it could be shown. There is nothing remarkable
about the drawing ; it is most probably all cliic ; but it is filled with graceful
lines, and is specially characteristic as an example of his delightful use of pure
blacks and whites. It may look as if it were very simple to silhouette a figure
in either pure black or white, but it is really very difficult to do it and still give
any effect of roundness. It is this which Mars can do so well. Of course
several of the Germans — Schlittgen and Marold — and Birch in America also
draw in this way, but no one does it with the grace and charm of Mars. On
one side it is only a step from his drawing to the German silhouette work, and
on the other to the pure outline work of Caran d'Ache. Exactly the same
criticism could be applied to Boutet de Monvel's drawings of children. But
I do not think they are quite so simple or clever, and they are nearly always
printed with a wash of colour, as indeed are many of Mars'.

A. LANgON

Lancon has often been called the Cat- Raphael. His drawing of cats was no
doubt masterly. But in his pen drawings there is very little or no attempt to
render the texture oi the fur ; it is the modelling, the pose, the expression
he has been trying for, and to me the work, especially the side view of a cat,
looks as if it were drawn from a bronze of Barye's. This may have been the
case. But what I wish to call special attention to is the fact that these drawings
are made with the double-line pen of which I have spoken, and you will see all
through them the three lines made at one stroke. Of this I speak at length in
the Chapter on Materials. The two drawings are a practical example of the
working of the double-line pen, and as such are here given rather than as
examples of technique.

a^j:'

126 PEN DRAWING

A. LALAUZE

I PUBLISH this little sketch of Lalauze to show that the clumsy lines without
feeling or character, used so much by many English and American illustrators,
can be avoided, and graceful sympathetic lines substituted for them. This want
of grace of line tells greatly in pen drawing. The excuse for the liny line work
of many illustrators is that it reproduces better, but I am sure Lalauze's and
Louis Leloir's drawings prove the contrary. Even Maurice Leloir's Sterne
drawings are to me unpleasantly liny ; the lines are aggressive all through them.
In this connection I must insist that only too often English and American
photo -engravers are but mechanical middlemen, who in many cases do not
pretend to do their own work, while, in others, they are so utterly ignorant
of art they make no pretence to artistic reproduction. When the reproduction
becomes in the least difficult, they assure you that it is quite impossible. The
desire to produce really artistic work they do not understand. But I hope this
book may serve to show most conclusively what may be done with process.

There is a considerable amount of chalk work in Lalauze's drawing. As I
have not seen the original I cannot say whether the pen work was done over the
chalk, the chalk being used for an outline sketch ; but I think it more probable
the chalk was worked in with the pen to remove the liny effect and to
strengthen the pen-work.

Lalauze's etchings, especially his refined little illustrations in numberless
books, are perfectly well known.

Note. — I have lately seen this drawing also attributed to Louis Leloir.

128 PEN DRAWING

M. DE WYLIE

The Wylie here represented I know nothing about, except that he has an
EngHsh name and is mentioned in the Salon Catalogue as M. de WyHe.

His drawing of twilight is one of the most complete renderings in pen and
ink of tone-work I have ever seen. Pen and ink, of course I maintain, is, like
etching, the shorthand of art. But when a man can work out a drawing of this
kind, and give the most difficult effect of twilight even with elaboration, there is no
reason why he should not do so. This, however, is the only successful example
of complete tonality in pen and ink that I know. The wire-work sky is very
bad, and though the artist has given the right effect in it, the work is aggressive ;
the means and not the result first strike your eye, and this in any case is wrong.
But the masses of the trees and the distance could not be given better in any
other medium. There is an enormous amount of work in the rich foreground,
and in some of the deep shadows under the trees ; the solid masses of black are
disposed with the greatest knowledge, and, unlike the sky, this part of the
drawing does not show the means employed, and the lines are not aggressive.
Had the sky been made twice as low in tone and the block hand-worked, it
would have been better as a whole. But there is very little, if any, hand-work
in the block.

The drawing is a wonderful example of the rendering of colour by black
and white, and an especially good study of tree masses. It was published in
La Vie Moderne. Some of Felix Buhot's drawings from pictures in L' Art
approach, but I do not know any that equal it.

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE 131

CARAN D'ACHE

Caran D'Ache, whose real name is Emmanuel Poirie, is to-day the most ap-
preciated living caricaturist. His work contains all the essentials of caricature.
His drawings amuse the whole world. No one but a blind man would refuse to
laugh at them. They are composed of the simplest possible lines and these are
arranged by a masterly technician. It is true the drawings are commonly
printed with a flat colour wash, or else in silhouette, but he does not depend on
this wash to hide imperfections of drawing. And in addition to its other
qualities nearly all his work possesses that local colour, that quality of ridiculing
notorieties to which the English caricaturist makes everything else subordinate,
with the result that in English, or in fact Anglo-Saxon caricature, unless you
happen to know the person or the subject caricatured, you can scarcely ever
appreciate the humour. Take this drawing Att Pesage; I do not know who these
judges, or weighers-in, or whatever they may be called in horsey terms, are,
but I have no doubt, knowing as much of Caran D'Ache's work as I do, that
each one is a portrait of some Parisian notoriety from Longchamps. For Caran
D'Ache first came into public notice through the shadow pictures of the Chat
Noir, every one of which had a double meaning of the strongest kind. These
were silhouettes, and it is strange that silhouette work so well adapted to pen
drawing has been used so little. Since then he has continued to produce either
these silhouettes or caricatures in black or white or colour in the pages of Figaro,
U Illustration, and La Revue Illustrde, and he is now devoting himself more or
less to illustrating books, among which are the CoviMie du Jour, Com^die de
Notre Temps, and Les Courses dans L'Antiqjiitif, from which this drawing is
taken. The whole idea is perfectly absurd ; the combination of the Parisians
of to-day going to Les Courses and the Elgin marbles running a race is simply
side-splitting, especially when it is worked out technically so well. There is no
doubt that we outsiders miss half the point, but nobody can fail to roar while
admirino- the cleverness of Station de Centanres de la Compagnie Gdnifrale ; the
LJe2U'e2tx Pere, Heurese Mere ; II y a du tirage ; Mile. Pli^-ynd ; Dcje^mer dii
Favori ; F Arrivde, which is a masterpiece ; La Mere des Grace lies, with all the
little Gracchi in Cab, No. 1482 ; the arrangement of the De Lesseps family of
which he never tires ; and Le Mail du Prince Apollo, where Apollo drives a
four-in-hand, while the President Carnot, as Jupiter with the thunderbolts under

PEN DRAWING IN FRANCE i33

his arm, is trying to control the Char de L'Etat. The book is filled with this
absurd combination of Greek art and modern French life, but it must be seen to
be appreciated. It is published by Plon, Nourrit, and Co., who have been good
enough to furnish me with the pen drawing — that is, the key-block over which
the colour wash is placed.

I must refer every one to the Figaro Illustrd tor Christmas 1888. This
holiday number contained what I think is Caran D'Ache's greatest work, com-
ment on fait un chef-d'ceuvre. But the publishers would not permit its being
reproduced. I have endeavoured to obtain one of the series of drawings which
have made Caran d'Ache's reputation, but this has been impossible — I mean
one of the series like the Frost drawings, a style introduced, or at least popu-
larised, by Oberlander. The omission, too, of work in this manner by Job
Willette, Courboin, or a whole army of comic illustrators, may be noted ; but
I cannot help thinking that their reputation is owing more to their wit, their
vulgarity, or their personality, than to the technical qualities of their drawings.

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 137

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

T N all the countries of which I have spoken, and in America
-^ too, the introduction of photo-engraving proved of the greatest
advantage to the artist. It enabled him to work without considering
a wood-engraver, who would have to pick out with the utmost
difficulty and care, work which the artist did freely and sometimes
in as many minutes as the engraver would require hours or even
days to reproduce. But the pen drawings made by a brilliant
band of young men for Once a Week, Cornhill, Good Words, the
Sunday Magazine, and others — between about 1859 ^^^ 1865,
degenerating towards 1875 — and for many books, especially the
illustrated edition of Tennyson's Poetns, the Arabian Nights, etc.,
were the best ever made in England. Nearly all, however, were
drawn on the block and consequently lost. That the proprietors
of Once a Week looked forward to the introduction of photo-
engraving, and probably endeavoured to foster it, is shown by the
numerous examples of mechanical processes which they published.

But in England, until French and American magazines proved
the artistic value, and not merely the pecuniary advantage, of pen
drawing for process reproduction, comparatively little attention was
paid to it by draughtsmen. Even yet, but few publishers have
discovered anything beyond the cheapness of the invention. There
have been, of course, notable exceptions. The Portfolio, for which
Brunet-Debaines and Lalanne did some of their best work years

138 PEN DRAWING

ago, has always, more or less, for its small cuts used photographic
methods of reproduction, and usually pen drawings have been made
for this purpose. The Magazine of Art has also begun to publish
them within the last four or five years. But most of the English
process reproductions have been until lately of inferior quality.
The competition of the photo-engraver was directed towards cheap-
ness rather than excellence ; and artists could feel little satisfaction
in the results of drawings reproduced in this way. For example.
Punch preferred — and still prefers — wood -engravings, which cut so
much out of the drawings, to process blocks, which ruined them
altogether. But within the last few years several fairly good repro-
ductive processes have been brought out here, and one photo-engraver,
Mr. Chefdeville, a Frenchman, is doing work which can scarcely
be surpassed anywhere. Many drawings are, however, still sent
to Paris for reproduction ; while, as a rule, English block printing
does not begin to compare with French or American, and without
good press work you cannot have good results.

It is unfortunate that in England few leading artists now draw
with a pen. I have been repeatedly given to understand that this is
because it is the tendency of the English school to think more of
colour than of line ; and so pen drawing seems with the many to be
thought of no account except for a rapid unimportant sketch. If
anything has to be done in a hurry, " Oh, make a pen sketch," is
suggested. Naturally, this manner of regarding it has not been con-
ducive to the progress of the art in England. There are probably still
many English artists who agree with Mr. Hamerton in his belief that
"one very great educational advantage of the photographic process is
that the public, which formerly looked upon real sketches with in-
difference or contempt, as ill-drawn or unfinished things unworthy of
its attention, is now much better able to understand the short-hand of
drawing, and consequently is better prepared to set a just value on the
pen sketches of the great masters." But it would be no great comfort
or satisfaction to men of to-day to believe that drawings, on which
they spend their lives, have no other merit than that of assisting the
public to appreciate work, not so well done technically, by artists four
or five hundred years ago,^— that pen drawings, the real masterpieces

1 Of course, in saying this, I except Diirerand where, work which I appreciate as much as any
the other old men whose work I refer to else- done to-day.

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 139

of Fortuny, Rico, and Menzel, are only helps to the understanding of
the sketches of old masters. Work done in an old-masterly way by
Sir Frederick Leighton, which can be seen in the South Kensington
Museum on the original blocks, is quite as good technically as that of
any old master. But in the so-called fac-simile woodcuts from these
blocks the work is so cut to pieces that many are almost worthless
for study.

When I speak of drawings made on the block, I cannot help
touching on another subject with which I have nothing to do in this
book, namely, drawing on wood with a pen or hard pencil for cutting.
With the starting of the publication of Once a IVeek, about the year
1859, as I have said, the editors or publishers of that paper succeeded
in drawing around them the most original draughtsmen who probably
ever lived in England. On the cover of each number it was announced
that its illustrators were Leech, Tenniel, Millais, H. K. Browne, C.
Keene, Wolf, and others. The word others on this title-page hides
the names of Fred Walker, G. J. Pinwell, A. Boyd Houghton, Luke
Fildes, Henry Woods, H. S. Marks, Cecil Lawson, J. Mahoney, E.
Griset, J. M. Lawless, Paul Gray, C. H. Bennett, Poynter, Holman
Hunt, F. Madox Brown, Du Maurier, W. Small, and F. Sandys.^
No paper, probably not even the Vie Moderne, ever had a more
brilliant staff. Most of these artists, seeing their Avash drawings
utterly ruined by wood and steel engravers, — all the character being
cut out of them, and the drawings themselves lost in the process,
— drew on the wood blocks with pen or pencil, thus compelling the
wood-engraver to follow their lines. Even with this method, so
much was still cut out of the drawing, it is usually impossible to
tell whether it was made with pen, pencil, or chalk. Therefore,
while the drawings of the men of the Vie Moderne exist to-day,
as well as their comparatively perfect reproductions in the pages of
the paper, in Once a Week we have neither the drawings nor their
fac-simile reproductions, but a translation according to the wood-
engraver. The loss of British black and white work between the
years 1850, and I should say about 1875, can never be replaced.
Nor can it be too deeply deplored. I suppose what is left is
better than nothing, but it certainly is not the original work.

The least known but perhaps the best pen draughtsman in Great

■^ For fuller description of this work see explanatory chapter on these men.

140 PEN DRAWING

Britain to-day is George Reid of Edinburgh. He can, in a pen
drawing, give the whole character of northern landscape, so different
in every way from that of the country of the great southern pen
draughtsmen, while his portraits contain all the subtlety and refine-
ment of a most elaborate etching by Rajon ; in fact, he seems to think
Rajon and Armand Durand the only men who can interpret him.
He not only understands the use of a pen, but apparently fears that
no process except photogravure or etching can reproduce his beautiful
and reverent work, a fear which at the present day I do not share
with him. Abbey's drawings are quite as delicate, if not so much
elaborated, and are well reproduced in Harpers, though their absolute
fineness is lost. It must not, however, be thought for a moment that
I mean to say any process for printing with type is equal to photo-
gravure, which gives all the richness and delicacy of the drawing,
together with a softness and fulness of colour, not possessed by it.
It is to be regretted that Reid does not, by using process methods
and coming out in some of the larger magazines, take the place which
so justly belongs to him as one of the foremost pen draughtsmen
of the day.

An artist who easily stands at the head of his profession, as a
landscape pen draughtsman, in England is Alfred Parsons. He can
draw decorative designs of flowers with all the grace and beauty with
which Grinling Gibbons could carve them, and no higher praise can
be given. He will, with pen and ink, make a rosebud which one cares
to keep far more than a painting of the same subject by any other
Englishman ; he will show a little valley farm down by the reeds in
the river, a group of trees on a hillside, or a wind-swept moor ; and of
late he has begun to draw figures ; while much of his work is so inter-
woven with Abbey's that at times you cannot tell one from the other.
Though Parsons' work is imitated even to his signature, there is no
one in England who can be named with him.

It is curious to note the inability of English artists to translate
their own work into pen and ink, or to do anything outside the sphere
of some one art. The surest proof of this assertion is that a few
years ago, when English art was adequately represented in LArt,
instead of the artists, as in the case of many distinguished French
painters, making their own drawings, and thus giving their own ideas
and adding the value of originality to the reproduction of their

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 141

painting, they allowed a clever young Scotchman, Robert W.
Macbeth, to do the work for them. He did it very well, and by
this practice has made himself the best reproductive etcher in
England.

How little good pen drawing there is in this country is
shown in looking over Henry Blackburn's catalogues, in which it
is the exception to find, from one end to the other, a pen sketch
one would wish to preserve. It may be said that English painters
do not care to give more than the merest rough notes of their
pictures. But the truth is, to produce a pen drawing requires great
technical skill only to be obtained after careful study and continuous
practice. In England, and in the course of time the same thing will
happen in America, a successful draughtsman as soon as he finds
he can make, if not a greater reputation, certainly much more money
by painting, gives up his drawing as if he were ashamed of it. The
difference in this respect between the English artist and a Frenchman
like Detaille needs no comment. Not only is the French artist
willing to produce black and white work, but glad to do so. The
same can be said of Menzel with his thousands of drawings, while
Alfred Parsons and George Reid are exceptions in Great Britain.

Among the few breaks in the monotony of the long years of
Mr. Blackburn's catalogues are the drawings by E. J. Gregory,
one or two by Boughton, Colin Hunter, Herkomer, Charles Green,
Sir J. D. Linton, Cecil Lawson, and some charming heads by Frank
Holl. But the only drawings which really merit mention, as works
of art in themselves, are those by T. Blake Wirgman, done after
his own pictures. He has really cared, and he alone, and the
result is his drawings stand out as by far the best that have been
contributed to Mr. Blackburn's catalogues.

Hubert Herkomer is one of the very few men who have ever
illustrated their catalogues with drawings which have a value of
their own. His sketches of heads are full of character, strongly
and simply put in, while his studies in the Bavarian Highlands,
though greatly elaborated and almost too large for reproduction, are
very successful.

Fred Walker made many pen drawings, but unfortunately
scarcely any survive to be studied technically, having been drawn
mostly on the block for the wood-engravers, like the work of so many

142 PEN DRAWING

of the other artists of Once a Week. One very charming example
of his drawing can be seen on the wood at South Kensington
Another, probably the best he ever did, which has not, so far as I
know, been reproduced before, is in this book. He died before the
days of successful process reproduction.

Some of Wyllie's drawings, notably those of the " Toil, Glitter
and Grime of the Thames," published a few years ago in the
Magazine of Art, are models for the drawing of boats and the
suggestion of light and the movement of water. If Whistler would
only give us some pen drawings like his etchings of thirty years
ago, he would show himself to be as a pen draughtsman what he
was then as an etcher of old houses — the greatest who ever lived.
A process block from one of his first series of London etchings
would be a perfect study for a pen drawing.

Walter Crane's beautiful decorative draAving, his book covers,
his designs, his initials, his head and tail pieces, in pen and ink,
entitle him to be ranked as the first English decorative draughts-
man of the day ; while Selwyn Image's work is quite as striking
and original.

Although Du Maurier is probably the best known of the so-
called comic draughtsmen, his genius to-day lies rather in his
wit and humour and satire than in the technical excellence of his
drawing. In the Court and Society Review for November 23, 1888
he calls himself a pictorial satirist, and this describes him perfectly.
There is much for which we must thank the creator of Mrs. Ponsonby
de Tomkyns, but at the same time it would be best for the student
not to imitate his technique, since Du Maurier to-day, in his desire
to express his ideas, seems to care little how he does it. He appeals
far less to the art student than to the lover of satire. His drawinQ^s
are a sort of sermon which happens to be drawn, instead of written
with a pen. Every one, however, should study his work in Once
a PVeek of nearly thirty years ago. I can easily understand the
appreciative enthusiasm with Avhich it was greeted by the critics
of the last generation. It then contained all and a great deal more
than is claimed for it to-day.

Harry Furniss is an extremely clever man ; his drawings are
full of character and style, and frequently his slightest sketches are
the most interesting. His best work, I think, is found in his large

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 143

drawings of the Essence of Parliament and in his small ones of
the different members. Linley Sambourne's drawings also are
intensely clever, but so near being mechanical that it would be
impossible for any one to study from them without becoming wholly
so. In his work, however, as in that of many another original man,
the result is simply wonderful. Charles Keene's work in Punch is
unfortunately nearly always engraved on wood and, before I had
seen his original drawings, had he not written and told me that most
of them were made with a pen, I never should have imagined it.
The originals are among the best character drawings ever made in
England. It is to be regretted that so much is lost in the cutting.
Thirty years ago one could tell much more easily how his drawings
were made ; to-day it is absolutely impossible, a fact which is not
very flattering to the art of woodcutting at the present time,
as exemplified in the work of the engravers for Pitnch. Therefore,
excellent as are Keene's drawings, it is useless for the student to
study the reproductions in Punch, which give no idea of the original
work.

As a matter of fact, some of the younger artists of Jtidy are the
men on English comic papers who give most thought to style and
technique. The drawings of Leslie Wilson and Maurice Griffen-
hagen, who started out by working as much like Schlittgen as they
could, are probably, technically, the best of all. Griffenhagen has
since developed a style of his own which is very charming. The
work of Partridge and Forestier of the London News is also full of
character. Caton Woodville has made numerous pen drawings,
but for the student I would suggest, rather than his work, that of
Germans like Haug and Frenchmen like Jeanniot.

Cruikshank, Leech, and Phiz are responsible for the style, or
rather want of style, of too many English draughtsmen. They had
genius, but most of their followers have nothing but their weaknesses
and imperfections of technique. The latter forget that the drawings
of the artists they imitate were rarely done with the pen, and that if
they were, it was only to be reproduced by engraving or etching on
wood or steel, mostly by other men, and hence that the qualities of
the pen work were cut out. It is a delight to turn from the English
so-called comic papers to Fliegende Blatter, La Vie Parisiejine, or the
American Life, in which not only is there wit and humour, but a

144 PEN DRAWING

feeling for art not always to be found in English journals of the
same class.

In the case of Sir John Gilbert, who has done much good work,
freedom is the result of study. The same freedom, however, indulged
in by a student would lead to meaningless blots and wild scrawlings,
though all of Sir John Gilbert's blots and lines are put down with
a purpose. A far better man to study would be Mulready, some of
whose drawings are marvellous in their old-masterish feeling. A
collection of them is to be seen at South Kensington. However, were
Mulready and Wilkie living to-day, I believe they would utterly
change their style. The attempt at so-called freedom, which on the
part of the student is nothing but carelessness, is often sure to be his
ruin. Look at the apparent freedom of a man like Forestier and then
try to imitate it. Far better would it be for the student to follow
the painstaking, careful lines of Tenniel in such work as Alice in
IVonderland, for, though these drawings may have been made in line
with a hard lead-pencil, and the student will probably not keep for
long to Tenniel's methods, he will at least learn from them that
pen drawing is not the easy slip-shod art he is pleased to think it.

The late Randolph Caldecott, separated from his humour and
observation, shows very little technically to study. Unless a man has
the genius to make in half a dozen lines a drawing like that of the mad
dog or the cat waiting for a mouse, in which case he would be another
Randolph Caldecott, it would be useless for him to study these draw-
ings. Caldecott had enough genius to make him superior to technique.
One can pardon his faults and ask for more of his delightful work
because of his humour. I have recently seen drawings of dogs, cats,
and children by Ernold Mason, which, technically, are far superior
to anything Randolph Caldecott ever did.

It is just this pardoning that has such a bad influence on art, and
has made men, who really technically never studied their profession,
its leaders. The trouble is that because artists have good ideas, the
fact that they cannot express them technically is overlooked. No
ideas can be expressed in a really artistic manner without technique,
which is nothing more than the grammar of art.

Hugh Thomson, a very young man, who draws figure subjects ;
Herbert Railton, who is very clever and draws architecture ; and
Gordon Browne, whose Fairy Tales were excellent, and who seems

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 14S

to have the facility of Dorc, are three men who have devoted them-
selves almost exclusively to pen drawing. But one cannot help
being conscious that it is the demand for photographic draughts-
men, rather than the real feeling for line, which has sent them to
pen drawing. Hugh Thomson's best work is his decoration, some
of which is very effective. Herbert Railton, having been educated
as an architect, has probably better knowledge of architectural con-
struction than any other draughtsman. But one finds in his drawing,
as in all architectural sketching, a confusion between architectural
and artistic lines. His drawings have not the effect of being made
from nature, though they may be, while his architectural training
asserts itself everywhere. This is less Railton's fault than that
of the English system of architectural drawing.

G. P. Jacomb-Hood has made some notable drawings for In
his Name, and beautiful decorative head and tail pieces for Mr.
Lang's translation of A ncassin and Nicolette. Frederick Barnard
also has done some very clever pen drawings, but he seems to have
preferred, until lately, when he has come out strongly in Harper s,
other mediums for his black and white work.

Finally, in summing up, I think that the examples in this book
will show most conclusively that, with the exception of Parsons, Reid,
Walter Crane, Griffenhagen, Forestier, Partridge, and Charles Keene
to-day, the artists of the Continent and of America have paid more
attention to, and have been more successful in, pen drawing for
process reproduction than artists in England.

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND i47

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND
ILLUSTRATIONS

INTRODUCTION

TI^OR the publication of pen drawings made some thirty years ago, I feel
-*- that an explanation is needed. While pen drawing, owing to photography,
has advanced in all other countries, there is no doubt that in England its
greatest period was just before photographic reproduction was invented. Very
good work was being done all over the world at the same time. Meissonier,
for example, was illustrating in France. But not only has he given up illustra-
tion, but his methods have been improved upon by the men who have followed
him. In Germany, though Menzel still retains his position as an illustrator,
he has always worked in a style well adapted to reproduction. In Italy and
Spain at this period, no one was doing pen work of any special importance.
But the Englishmen who illustrated Once a Week, The Cornhill, Good Words,
the SiLiiday and Shilling Magazines, and the early numbers of The Graphic
and Punch, have had, even in these days of development both in woodcutting
and in process, no worthy successors working for English periodicals. The
consequence is that I am obliged to show drawings by these men or else to
ignore the best period of English work.

In some cases I have found that the original drawings were preserved or
photographed through the interest the engravers took in their work, and also
because, realising the uncertainties of woodcutting, they feared the drawing
might be spoiled and no record of it left. The case of the Dalziel Bible is
different. Messrs. Dalziel commissioned all of the rising young artists to
produce a series of drawings. But the work turned in was difficult to do full
justice to on the wood block ; Messrs. Cassell about the same time brought out
their Dore Bible, and it was almost impossible for any one to rival Dore's
popularity and productiveness. The consequence was that Messrs. Dalziel,
looking ahead and seeing that photography would be used to transfer drawings
to the block for cutting, finished a certain number and put the others aside for

148 PEN DRAWING

twenty years, and their Bible Gallery did not appear until iSSo, when the
drawings were photographed on to the block and cut, the original work thus
remaining untouched. And now, nine years later, I have the admission from
Messrs. Dalziel that they themselves consider the process reproductions I now
publish from these drawings much more satisfactory than their own woodcuts.
This, in connection with the fact that Mr. W. J. Linton is devoting the ripest
years of his life to reproducing the masterpieces ot wood -engraving, not by
new woodcuts, but by process plates, is the strongest proof that I, at any rate,
desire, not that woodcutting is a failure, but that it is a waste of time, labour,
and skill, provided the drawing is made with as much attention to the require-
ments of process as the old men devoted to the requirements of wood-cutting,
for a skilled craftsman to compete with a mechanical yet accurate invention.

Among the men whose work I have not shown, but whom I should like to
have had represented is, to begin with, Rossetti. When I said in the Introduc-
tion that I wished Rossetti had not elaborated with pen or pencil in his drawings,
I referred more especially to the dravv^ings from his paintings which have been
photographed and published in rather large size. For technically these do not
compare for a minute with his illustrations of Tennyson, particularly those in the
Palace of Art, drawn on the block and cut to pieces. Mr. William Michael
Rossetti kindly offered to lend me a set of negatives which were rather generally
thought to have been made from the drawings on the wood before they were
cut, as in the case of the Sandys drawing. But the slightest examination of the
photographs shows them to have been made merely from preparatory studies
before the drawings were put on the wood, and their publication would be most
unfair to Rossetti. Nor would it be fair to show as an example of his work
the illustrations in the Princes Progress and the frontispiece to the Early
Italian Poets, which give no idea of its exquisite refinement. The only
drawing I know of which may have been made for engraving is the portrait
of his wife, which was never cut, and can be seen at South Kensington. There-
fore I have not shown any Rossettis, except the one small cut in "Some
Comparative Heads." He can hardly be considered an illustrator, thouo-h he
did make so marvellous a success in the Tennyson. But even in it, there is
but one drawing — the first illustration to the Palace of Art engraved by Messrs.
Dalziel — really worthy of the extravagant praise lavished upon it ; and as I
have a beautiful Sandys, which is the work of an illustrator and technically
even better, and as it is impossible to obtain anything but the wood block of
the Rossetti, I have not considered it worth while to put it here. Moreover it
would be the greatest waste of time to draw in such a manner and on such a
scale in these days of process. That Rossetti and Dalziel did produce their
result calls for all praise ; a repetition of it would be laborious and misplaced
affectation.

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND i49

The work of other men in the pages of the magazines I have referred to
was engraved by Messrs. Swain and Dalziel, I doubt not with the greatest
possible fideUty for hne, but the actual quality of the line, that is the quality
given by pencil, brush, or pen, is in nearly every case lost. Therefore, though
these magazines and Tlie Cornliill and Good Words collections of proofs should
be seen and known by all students, it is really useless to publish any of the
blocks as examples of pen drawing. But as cuts, the series of Parables by Sir
J. E. Millais, especially the Good Samaritan, published in Good M'ords, April
1863, and the Lost Piece of Silver, in September of the same year, are enough
to make any man's reputation. One of these men who, to my mind, is much
less well known than he deserves to be, is J. Mahoney, whose drawings in the
Sunday Magazine for November i, 1867, and March i, 1868, are, even as wood-
cuts, equal to anything Alfred Parsons has ever done, and Parsons is the only
man who can for a minute be compared with him ; the engravings by Whymper
from Mahoney's drawings in Scrambles among the High Alps should also be
seen. Of the rest, there are J. D. Watson with his great delicacy; Fred
Walker's Adventitres of Philip and Denis Dnval in The Cornhill ; Gordon
Thomson ; J. W. M'Ralston's illustrations to Mrs. Craik's novels ; Sir Frederick
Leighton's Romola ; T. Morten, who was good yet sketchy; R. Barnes, Saul
Solomon; Basil Bradley; A. Murch ; while the work of Pinwell, Sir James
D. Linton, and the later men is to be found in the early volumes of The
Graphic. Dickens was a magnificent field for Charles Green, Fred Barnard,
and others.

It would be most interesting to publish examples of all this work; but as
it was not done for process, even if the original drawings could have been
obtained, in many cases they could not have been rendered satisfactorily by
photo-engraving, not through any fault of the process but because the artists
worked without knowledge of it, while the reproductions of the cuts themselves
would only prove the possibilities of process for reproducing woodcuts, and
nothing about the drawings. Therefore, interesting as it would be, and difficult
as it is for me to resist showing them, to do so is not within the limits of this
book.

150 PEN DRAWING

FREDERICK SANDYS

I HAVE been told that it must not be supposed Frederick Sandys revived
illustration in the manner of the Germans of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries,
but that this revival, on the contrary, was due to the Pre-Raphaelites, and more
especially to Saul Solomon, all of whom were themselves influenced by Menzel.
But however this may be, there is no doubt that Sandys surpassed in technique
all the artists of the best period of English draughtsmanship. His designs may
not have possessed from their subjects that elevation of ideas which was so
markedly the characteristic of the Germans, and which was the outcome of the
spirit of their age. But there is no question that technically many parts of this
drawing are quite equal to Durer's work ; while the modelling of the faces, the
legs of the man, and the gown of the woman are drawn in a manner absolutely
unknown to Diirer. There is a feeling- of colour throuo-hout which Dlirer
never attempted on the wood, because he knew it could not be retained in the
cutting.

I admit that the photogravure in certain particulars is not as satisfactory as
the woodcut of the same drawing by Swain, because it was made from an old
negative taken from the drawing on the block. It shows the colour of the
block, which Sandys never intended, and, owing to this or to the ink not
having been uniformly black or having run, the lines are blurred to a certain
extent. The negative too has faded, and many of the lines of the under-
growth about the middle of the right side of the drawing were apparently
confused in the drawing, though they were corrected when cut. But I publish
the plate because, with all these imperfections, I am not afraid to have it
compared with the wood block in the Shilling Magazine for 1S65. The wood
block shows the drawing in the manner in which Sandys and Swain wished it
to appear ; the plate shows it exactly as it was drawn on the block. Had the
drawing been made on a piece of white paper, and could I have obtained
that white paper, the result would have been perfect, because no one has ever
drawn better for process than Sandys. I do not say that it would have been
an improvement on the woodcut, but it would have been reproduced autographi-
cally with infinitely less labour, and would have given Sandys' actual lines
without the intervention of another hand.

Lmvtttf 1

WMnm

FORD MADOX BROWN

If this is Pre-Raphaelite work it is excellent. It is carried out with the careful
reverence for line which is so characteristic, not of the men before Raphael's
time, but of the Germans of Durer's age, though without slavish imitation of
any one. Not only is every detail, save the very funny chicken in the fore-
ground, well drawn, but the feeling for the various substances and the differing
texture of the garments is well given. Contrast the heavy robe of the Prophet
with the lighter stuff of the widow's cloak and the grave clothes of the boy ; note
the difference, although the tone is very nearly the same, between the Prophet's
robe, the steps, the shadow, and the widow's gown, and the delightful difference
of handling in each. Every part is worked out with the feeling not only for
light and shade, but for line. In fact, one can see that Madox Brown took the
greatest interest in the making of this drawing, in rendering a subject of the
past with the technical knowledge of the present — the true and right spirit in
which all art work should be produced.

Though for my own purpose I should prefer the cleverness of a man like
Fabres, a cleverness which is amazing and which in a southern subject I would
unquestionably follow, to the student I would recommend this drawing quite as
highly as the one by Fabres. However, I must say that I do not think the
effects of strong light, which exist in the East, have been rendered by Madox
Brown so truly as by Fabres in Italy. This probably comes from the fact that
Fabres worked from nature, Madox Brown in the studio. But the delicate
suggestion of bits of light telling against the dark on the steps, the wooden
stand relieved against the stairs, the relief of the heads against the white walls,
and the delightful way in which the shadow of the little bird flying to its brick
nest is studied, make the drawing equal to the work of Rico or any of the
Spaniards and Italians ; though it is not so realistic, it is worked out far more
thoroughly than any of their drawings, and in it the peculiarly English artistic
idea of telling a whole story is expressed, not in an aggressive, but in the right
spirit. Notice how the light from the lamp in the little upper chamber is
carried down the light side of the post to which the rope that serves as banister
is attached, down the rope itself, on by the widow's gown into the most carefully-
studied interior of the living room. The contrast between the delicate face of
the child, the severe head of the Prophet, and the agonised expression of the
widow is completely rendered. In fact the subject could not be treated in a
more satisfactory manner in any other medium.

By publishing these three illustrations from Dalziel's Bible, I hope I may
show, not only my appreciation of them, but that the methods of thirty years
ago were sometimes adapted to the requirements of to-day. There are certain
details of line which will not reproduce, but I believe Madox Brown would
have changed them had he known what was wanted.

E. J. POYNTER

This drawing of Daniel's Prayer for Dalziel's Bible is one of the three blocks
made from the original drawings which I have been able to show. The drawmg
differs from Sir Frederick Leighton's and that of Ford Madox Brown in being
carried out in the most complete manner all over, and in resembling m the
handling a clean wiped print from an etched plate. Had I made a copper plate
from this drawing and printed it with retroussage, I do not believe that any one
could have told it from an etching. The drawing of Daniel and the figure m
the background are excellent, and the careful way in which the detail has been
all worked out is something remarkable. The result is extremely good ; it is
indeed by far better than any pen drawing made before Menzel's time, for of
course to Menzel this style of drawing is entirely due, and Mr. Dalziel has told
me he bought copies of Menzel's drawings and gave them to the artists who
were then at work on his Bible. But, though this drawing of Poynter's is a
wonderful example of careful honest work, I cannot conscientiously say that
its style is a good one for a student to follow. The same effect could have been
produced in wash with one-tenth the time and labour.

But as I have elsewhere said, this was the commencement of the reaction
against translative wood-engraving. These lines of course had to be followed
by the engraver, and when it is remembered for a moment that the engraver
had to cut the whites out between these lines, some estimation of the difficulty
of the task can be formed. And when it is considered that the process block
from the original drawing from which this impression is printed was made
automatically, I think it shows most conclusively what strides mechanical
reproduction is making. As to the reproduction itself, the lines nearly all over
have thickened appreciably, and in some places they have filled up, because the
drawing was made on yellowish-toned paper and in parts in a very grey ink,
and having been made nineteen years ago, it has also probably faded to a
certain extent. I think a French, and I am quite sure an American process
block from the same drawing would have given these grey lines, which in a few
places have been entirely omitted, and in other places have thickened perceptibly
or become rotten. But the principal thing I want to show is that it is possible
to reproduce a drawing like this simply and easily by process, giving the
character and feeling of the work, which this block certainly does ; while the
engraving of it on wood, line for line, is an almost impossible task with really
no better results. For, as I have shown, in the woodcut you do not have the
lines but the effect produced by cutting round them ; in the process block you
have the lines themselves reproduced just as they were drawn.

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PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND IS7

SIR FREDERICK LEIGHTON

It may be a surprise to many to find Sir Frederick Leighton included among
pen draughtsmen, and I have no doubt I shall be told that this is not a pen but
a brush drawing. But when a man makes a drawing as notable, — technically so
remarkable, — conveying such an idea of strength and size and power, and show-
ing conclusively what may be done with a brush used as a pen, it ought to be
known. I publish it as an example, not of style for reproduction, but of the
successful use of means which one would not think were fitted to the desired
end. The whole effect could have been rendered, not with the point of a half-
dry brush as it has been, but by splatter work and a pen. I would not re-
commend any one to attempt to imitate it, because, except by photogravure,
it cannot be autographically reproduced ; and though the forms and modelling
have here been obtained, they could have been much more easily rendered
with a wash.

Though the effect of the drawing has been reproduced almost perfectly, the
lines in the hand to the right and in the leg have thickened appreciably, and it
has darkened all over. The photogravure, however, is much better than the
woodcut, which may be seen in Dalziel's Bible Gallery. The woodcut was a
failure ; the photogravure is an undoubted success.

WILLIAM SMALL

I PUBLISH these four draw-
ings as examples of good
careful sketchinij of the figure
in pen and ink, not by any
means an easy performance.
They have not been very
well reproduced, but owing
to the greyness of the ink,
it has proved impossible for
the photo -engravers to ob-
tain the true value of the
lines. I publish them also
because Small's work, so far
as I know, is always cut on
wood, and I thought these
little figures would be an in-
teresting contrast to his best
known drawing, and also to
the work of Butin and of the
old men.

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

159

W. L WYLLIE

When one considers the extreme picturesqueness of river life, especially of life
on a river like the Thames, it is very remarkable that pen draughtsmen have
not turned it to more profitable account. On the Thames, however, the reason
for this neglect may be because Wyllie has made it so completely his own.
This drawing done largely, freely, and boldly, mainly with a quill pen, shows,
not only his command of the pen, but his knowledge of the construction of
boats, the movement and swing of the water and the effect of sunlight shining
through the bright but misty and smoky atmosphere of the river. The quill
and brush have both been used. Where the roulette work is seen, it indicates
his greyish brush-marks.

T. BLAKE WIRGMAN

I SHOW two drawings by Blake Wirgman which differ both in style and subject,
but are alike in their mastery of method. The portrait of Mrs. Smeaton after
Reynolds, though apparently knocked off, is full of knowing suggestion of the
modelling and colour of the original. In the other, of Mr. Armstead, he has
expressed himself by line. Dantan in his drawing of a similar subject shows
colour, Wirgman uses almost pure line, by which, however, he gets the modelling
and suggestion of colour and indicates the surfaces. He makes the fewest lines
tell with the greatest effect. This drawing and others of English sculptors,
engraved on wood and much reduced, appeared in the Century some few
years ago.

,62 PEN DRAWING

FREDERICK WALKER

Walker is considered by tlie older men of to-day to be one of the greatest
illustrators who ever lived. His subjects were always interesting, his sentiment
popular, and his drawing exceedingly graceful. But owing to the fact that he
worked before process, as well as to the methods employed by English wood-
cutters, he was limited in certain ways in using the pen. For this very reason
the results he did obtain are the more surprising.

The sentiment in his pictures is very charming, but in this drawing, as in so
many others, it is neither true nor real. The colour and line and composition
are most admirable, but in his time such a drawing could not be reproduced, and
even to-day it cannot be well reproduced except by photogravure. This plate
is the first fairly successful reproduction which has been made from the drawing,
one on which Fred Walker, I think, would have liked to base his reputation ;
at any rate it was done in exactly the way he liked to work. At the time it was
made, however, it was absolutely impossible to do anything with it. The
consequence was it had to be redrawn in a much more open and much more
mechanical manner for engraving, and the result can be seen in one of the early
numbers o{ L'Ari.

The English engraver of Fred Walker's time seems to have endeavoured
to compel him and Pinwell and Keene and Du Maurier and their fellow-
draughtsmen, even when they were at the height of their success, to draw lines
which he, the engraver, could cut in the easiest manner. The consequence
is that it is impossible to tell whether many of the drawings were done with a
pen, a pencil, or a brush. I know it will at once be said that most of them were
not done with a pen at all but with a brush, that is with the sensitive point of a
very fine brush such as the Japanese use. They were also worked on with a
lead-pencil and a pen, but in the engraved result, in the majority of cases, you
cannot tell which line was made with a pen, which with a brush, which with a
pencil ; and I say that such a subjection of the artist to the engraver is utterly
wrong. It is not that the wood-engraver could not cut almost every line
that Fred Walker ever drew, but the fact is that he did not engrave it so as to
show the actual means used to produce it. Wood -engraving can do almost
everything, and even this drawing of Fred Walker's could be engraved on wood.
But when we have a mechanical process like photogravure which will produce,

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND 163

in as many hours as the wood-engraver would have to take days, an equally
artistic and true result, there is no reason why we should not use it. This is
one of the cases where science has rightly come to the aid of art. It is all
very well for certain artists, who are not illustrators, to say that another man
can render your work better than a machine ; in a line drawing, in which you
do not want any one's ideas or feelings but your own, no man can equal, though
he may very materially aid, an accurate machine in its reproduction.

Though the idea, the composition, and the lines in the drawings of the men
of Fred Walker's day are all most charming, and though the artists themselves
considered the engraved results on the wood obtained from them most admirable,
any one who will take the trouble to compare these engravings with the fac-
simile engravings, or rather woodcuts, after Menzel, or with the work of some
of the American engravers like Whitney and Cole, or Frenchmen like Baude,
or Englishmen like Paterson, will see they are not admirable at all, but give,
instead of the actual quality of the artist's line, that which it was easiest tO'
reproduce. The engravers may deny this, but the comparison I suggest will
prove at once the truth of what I say. Though no one can think more highly
than I do of the endless number of varied effects which Fred Walker obtained,
I cannot help feeling to-day that many of these are utterly unsulted to pen
work, that they could have been gotten with far more ease with a brush, and
that the reason Fred Walker drew with a pen was not from any particular
love of line but to make for, or give to, the engraver lines to follow. One
method some of his fellow-draughtsmen very frequently used was to make the
foreground, or the part they wished accentuated, with a pen or brush in line
which the engraver followed, while the background, in which of course they
only wanted flat tints, was done with wash which the engraver could cut as he
chose. The advantage of working in this way was that, if they made a mistake
on the wood, they simply went over it with wash on which they worked with
Chinese white, and the engraver made what he wished out of it. A good
example of their manner of working can be seen by looking over the reproduc-
tions from the Graphic, published in the Universal Review for September 1888 ;
though I do not wish it to be thought that I can commend anything which has
yet appeared in this Review as good original drawing, reproduction, or printing.
But in the number I mention these drawings, very much reduced, are all brought
together and are therefore more accessible than in the Graphic.

There is another matter to which attention can be most easily called here.
In studying the handling in the clothes of the figures in almost any of these
drawings, especially those by Fildes, William Small, Pinwell, Houghton, and to
a certain extent Herkomer and Macbeth, you find that exactly the same line is
used by all, and that this same line appears in Du Maurier's drawings to-day.
Either these men became mannered in an exceedingly short space of time,
or else the engravers compelled them to draw in this abominable, mechanical.

i64 PEN DRAWING

cross-hatched manner. Of course this same touch can be found in Ditrer
and the old men. But it is not a fine quahty in their drawings. It is the
expression of a mechanical difficulty which they could not surmount and which it
is foolish for us to follow, imitate, or commend to-day. And so also I believe
the growth of this cross-hatch work, twenty or thirty years ago, which has been
mistaken to be a good style by so many draughtsmen, was not at all the fault of
the draughtsmen but of the wood-engravers. And the reason for the position
which Fred Walker holds among these men is, not so much because his draw-
ings were better than theirs, for I do not think they were, but because he was
more independent and refused to draw in this mechanical manner, although even
in his work you sometimes see it cropping up wherever the engraver could put
it. It is really the independence of his style, and not the excellence of the style
itself, which has given Fred Walker the place he holds — and this is the surest
proof that if one wants to succeed in illustration, one has simply got to do some-
thing for one's self.

GEORGE DU MAURIER

When I first saw the engravings after the drawings signed Du Maurier made
twenty or thirty years ago for Once a Week and Punch, I understood at once
the sensation their appearance created among artists and critics. This worl<;,
really unknown to us of the younger generation, is as original as any ever pro-
duced. This drawing was published in 1865, and I only chose it because it was
one of the first which specially appealed to me when studying his work in Pzmch.
I might have shown a hundred others just as delightful, but all different and
now unrecognisable as the work of Du Maurier. And yet with these drawings,
at times published in the same number or even on the opposite page, we find
the Du Maurier of to-day who, I must confess, from an artistic standpoint, I am
utterly unable to understand. In saying this, I refer to his use of a mechanical
cross-hatch to express almost all sorts of surfaces and of one type of face, and
to his conventional and mannered drawing of landscape. But it seems to me
that in the beginning his mannerisms must have been imposed upon him by the
engravers, though now they are to be found in all his drawings. Du Maurier
did not commence as a comic draughtsman. There is no comic element, no

1 66 PEN DRAWING

humour in his early drawings, for that matter, nor in many of his later ones.
But every artist would wonder at his technique, his expression, and the clever-
ness he put into the very inartistic dresses of the last generation. No effect
seems to have been impossible to him. He has tried in his early drawings to
render daylight and nightlight, and even to work in all sorts of styles. There
is one set of drawings in Punch in which you find Du Maurier burlesquing the
Pre-Raphaelite movement so seriously as to be almost Pre-Raphaelite himself.
In the early days of Punch he was pre-eminently a technician. He cared
hardly at all for the story he was telling, but he cared infinitely for the way in
which he told it. He possessed what Mr. Kenyon Cox calls the executive
talent ; and this talent, the talent of the technician, is, as he says, in its highest
forms as rare as any other. Du Maurier possessed this technical power of
showing the beauty in the most commonplace and really uninteresting subjects.
It is almost impossible to analyse it. One has simply got to feel it for one's
self in the delightful way in which the absolutely uninteresting folds of the
woman's gown are worked out, in the suggestion of modelling in the man's
trousers, and in the study of light and shade on the polished leather of the
lounge.

His work of to-day can be reproduced perfectly by process without the
least trouble, and I should imagine, from the look of the woodcuts in Punch, that
the old work — a drawing like this, for example — would have come equally well,
in fact much more truly than in the woodcut.

CHARLES KEENE

There are very few men in this world about whose work every one has a good
word to say. But Charles Keene is and deserves to be one of the few. The
technique of his drawing is always excellent, his subjects interesting or amusing,
and he has always striven to improve on his own methods. There is no draughts-
man in England who has reached such a high standard, maintained it, and
continually tried to improve it. I am not even certain whether this is a pen
drawing, for the pen quality has been entirely cut out of it. But I have seen so
many exactly like it done with a pen that I think it probably is. At any rate it
is an example of very good line-work, of the study of character in the two figures,
the modelling of the ground, and the suggestion of distant landscape. There is
absolutely no reason why I should have selected this particular drawing. Those
which have appeared in Ptmch during the last few weeks are equally good, if
not better ; and indeed the last thirty years of Punch are a record of Keene's
efforts to produce the best character sketching in the best possible manner. His
methods are those of extreme simplicity and directness of work, thought in
composition, attention to modelling, and care in arrangement. Owing to the
fact that he uses grey ink, always drawing for the engraver, washes here and
there, and introduces pencil work, no process save photogravure will give a
better result than the woodcuts by Mr. Swain. Photo-engraving would of course
reproduce his work, but it would not be any more true than the woodcut.

LINLEY SAMBOURNE

When I speak in the English Chapter
of Sambourne's worlv being almost
mechanical, I do not wish to say any-
thing that Sambourne or any one else
could object to, for I admire his draw-
ings very much. But the peculiarity
of his style is that the actual technique
seems to be founded on mechanical
drawing, that is on the sharp, clean
cut lines of engineering or architectural
work. As his drawings are always
more or less conventional, and seldom,

Engra\'ed by Swain.

process block of the water baby compared

Process Block by Dawson.

if ever, wholly realistic, this is per-
fectly allowable ; and that he should
get such remarkable results using
such peculiar handling is all the more
notable. On looking over his original
drawinofs I find that a certain amount
of this mechanical look is gotten by
the engraver; for example, the angular
lines surrounding eyes and mouths are
enormously intensified, and while of
course these lines do exist in the
drawings themselves you do not feel
them as you do in the reproductions.
Sambourne, working almost always
for and with Mr. Swain, knows the
result he is o-oinfj to obtain, but one
of his drawings engraved by some
one else would probably not have
this excessive Sambourne look, which
is the only thing I can call it. The
with the woodcut shows this at

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

169

once, though the actual changes in detail — in the reeds and the water, for
example — were put in by Sambourne on the wood before it was cut ; but the
hardness in the dragon-fly's wings and the very wooden lines in the woodcut

are due to the engraver. The actual loss in the quality of the line is visible
all over ; I can feel it everywhere. That the process block is really not vastly
superior to the woodcut in the pen quality is not owing to a defect in the
process, but entirely to the fact that the ink used in the original drawing was
weak and pale. Sambourne knew this perfectly well, for he offered to go over
the lines. But the comparison could not then have been made with fairness
to Mr. Swain. As it is, I find the process block the more pleasing of the two
reproductions.

Of Sambourne's composition, which is always good, the lower drawing on
this page from the IVater Babies is an excellent example, while it also shows his

ability to express himself in a small space. His drawing of the lobster and the
small boy looking at it, from the same book, is a characteristic example of
another phase of his work — that is

his combination of human fip-ures and

170

PEN DRAWING

animal forms, often very grotesque. This large lobster drawing was done in
such poor ink it would not have come by process. Though Sambourne uses
but one female type, there is much grace and beauty in it combined with fine
decorative feeling. The pages of Punch are filled with such drawings. The
tail-piece is a characteristic example. It would be almost useless for the student
to copy his work because, owing to this conventional treatment, he would only
obtain an exceedingly weak Sambourne.

His drawings, to use an illustrator's phrase, are sure to make a hole in the
page. His effects are almost always novel and catch your eye and interest you,
even though the subject is very local. This is as it should be, for if a drawing
is done in an interesting manner the subject is of minor importance. But it is
for the pleasing fantastic medley which he produces in an impossible book like
the Water Babies, or in his social and political allegories in Punch, filled with
good drawing, that Sambourne's work interests the whole world, whether the
local subject is understood or not.

Wfp!^^

-/Vayz^ ^^^^^^m^

ILihvsrkI'!

HARRY FURNISS

Of all the artists of Punch, the only one

who habitually attempts caricature is Harry

Furniss. But in his larafe drawinafs, called

for some unknown reason cartoons, there is

shown, especially in the one he has sent me

to represent his work, the absolute want of

all the qualities which I have noted in those

of Oberlander, Frost, and Caran D'Ache.

For you must be an Englishman to appre-
ciate it, and you must have been on the spot

and thoroughly in the swing at the time the

drawing was made to understand it, while the

work of the German, American, and French

caricaturists does not altogether depend upon f-j/T*-

time or nationality. Even the most delight- ^""-^

ful drawing which I know Furniss ever to have pro-
duced, the burlesque of Pears' Soap, was unintelligible
to any one who had not seen the advertisement. This
drawing of Education's Frankenstein, interesting as
it is, will really explain what I mean. It is not done
for all the world, but for a small section of the British
public. In Furniss' smaller drawings, two of which I
also show, and in his Parliamentary sketches, there is
much more cleverness of handling, while there is no
doubt that they give the character of their subjects.
They look as if models had been used for them, but
they also depend in almost every case, no matter how
well they are drawn, on something exceedingly local.
The consequence is that although one appreciates
Furniss' great talent, at the same time unless one is
thoroughly in with his public one cannot see the point

of his drawings, which in themselves are not sufficiently amusing to make one

laugh.

The large drawing could not be satisfactorily reproduced by process, neither

could the small ones. Furniss was working in each case for the wood-engraver

and therefore did not consider the quality of his ink and paper. I have tried

process with the lower figure on this page, but the woodcuts are better because

the ink was not good. Furniss does at times work for process, and then shows

that he understands its limitations.

174 PEN DRAWING

GEORGE REID

George Reid's pen work contains all the subtleties and refinements of a
most delicate etching. He is one of those exceptional draughtsmen who can
combine breadth with delicacy, who can elaborate a drawing on a piece of paper
scarcely larger than this plate, — for Reid's drawings are mostly done the same
size as their reproductions, — and yet obtain valuable results without niggling.
The great feature of his work is its wonderful delicacy, its suggestion of colour.
Look how the collar tells white simply by means of the fine lines which surround
it, for it is no lighter than other parts of the drawing. Of all the men whose
work I have shown Reid is the only one who succeeds in obtaining such delicate
effects and yet makes his drawings the size he wishes to have them printed.
However, the enormous difficulty of doing so must be apparent to every one, and
Reid rarely makes any more pen drawings. Those he has already given to the
world, however, are sufficient to secure his reputation as a pen draughtsman.

He tells me that he makes a pencil drawing from nature, then from this
works out an elaborate study in pen and ink of the proposed size of its reproduc-
tion. This of course accounts for his remarkable certainty in his drawings. I
cannot conscientiously advise any one to follow his methods, however, because
they are too difficult. But if you can draw in his manner and succeed as he
does, there is absolutely no reason why you should not. He seems to have no
trouble in getting his figures and landscapes just the way he wants them, for he
draws landscapes as well as portraits, and with them has illustrated three or four
books. It is true that some of Parsons' work is very little reduced, but Parsons
does not strive for Reid's very delicate lines, many of which could not be re-
produced perfectly except by photogravure ; though with a little more breadth
of drawing and strength of line, I believe Reid could obtain exactly the same
effect more easily by reduction. Du Maurier's drawings also are very nearly
the same size as their reproductions. But then, in comparison with Reid's
drawings, there is no fine work in them. As I have mentioned elsewhere, the
photo-engraver tells you your work must be reduced to get fineness ; Reid's and
Parsons' work is the most positive refutation of such statements. But if with
process and reduction one can obtain these effects I see no objections to doing
so. Certainly it is sensible to take advantage of every means at one's disposal.
Turn to the Blum drawing for example ; it was not very much larger than the

HelioSravure et imp , A, Durand _Paris

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND i75

plate given in this book, but it was made for a very much greater reduction.
In it there is nothing Hke the elaborate work which Reid has put in his drawing,
and yet the result is just as good. The only characteristic feature of Reid's
drawing is that he gets almost the etched line ; but very nearly the same line
will be found in Blum's work.

The truth is that, although you must do your work with good technical
style and distinction, if you wish it to have any value — and I believe all the work
shown here has this distinction — you may use any style or combination of styles.
What you want is to get a good result by good means ; so long as you do get
this result it makes little difference what your methods are, provided they are
good.

176 PEN DRAWING

WALTER CRANE

Walter Crane has furnished me with this design as a characteristic example of
his illustrative work. His manner of working is to make with lead-pencil or
chalk a more or less elaborate study of his subject, with a great and very proper
idea of its decorative motive, on a piece of paper of the proposed size of the
final drawing. He then makes a tracing from this and works it out in pen and
ink. The drawing was scarcely larger than the reproduction. There is nothing
gained by reducing his work ; in fact I think the nearer the original size it is
reproduced the better it comes.

The feeling of long sweeping lines and the suggestion of modelling in the
drawing are very fine. But when we look at the lines of which the drawing is
composed, and we compare them with the work of men whom Crane considers
to be the ideal draughtsmen, we find that, in his reverence for them, he seeks to
perpetuate even the defects and imperfections which, had they been able, they
would have been the first to overcome. These defects were really due to the
undeveloped stage of engraving and printing, when there were endless mechani-
cal difficulties which the woodcutter and the printer could not surmount. But
in the preservation of the defects of these early draughtsmen Crane seems to be
quite as faithful as in his admiration of their perfections. Again, when we
compare his cross-hatching and shadow lines with the work either of the early
Italians or of Durer for example, we find that he does not work with the care
for each individual line which characterised all their autographic drawing, that
is, their etched work or their work engraved on steel, which, and not the wood-
cutting, is equivalent to the pen drawing of to-day. This can be most clearly
seen in the woman's face or the shading of the man's back. The general effect
is quite right, but the student who followed the lines would most certainly come
to grief. Crane's decorative feeling is also very fine and he gives good colour
effect.

He has repeatedly told me and seems to think that process cannot
reproduce his work, though he finds this reproduction satisfactory. Nothing
could really be easier to reproduce by process than his drawings were
it not that he uses a very poor ink, sometimes for his shadows, getting
in the result, notably in the shadows on the armour which express the

2 A

178 PEN DRAWING

modelling of the man's back, instead of the grey he wants, a black line, the true
quality of which can only be obtained by the most minute, laborious, and careful
hand-work, either in process or woodcutting, though this work could be avoided
if he were to adopt either the line of Diirer or the style of the pen draughtsmen
of to-day. For example, Howard Pyle's work shows admirably what I mean.
As it is. Crane's drawings cannot be reproduced without this elaborate and, I
cannot help thinking, useless expenditure of time on the part of the wood-
engraver or the photo-engraver.-'

1 For other work by Walter Crane, see Chapter on Decoration,

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

179

RANDOLPH CALDECOTT

I THINK there is probably no one who has been so unjustly treated, by having
been given a place to which he had no claim, as Randolph Caldecott. I believe
I am right in saying he wished to succeed as a painter, a sculptor, and perhaps
as a serious illustrator. As a modeller he was a success. Some of his beautiful
little low reliefs are not half so well known as they deserve to be. As a painter
he was a complete failure. As a serious illustrator, he either servilely copied
the men working about him, or else, as in many of his horses and other subjects,
borrowed from Menzel without approaching him. His so-called character
sketching in Italy and America was either characterless or caricature, and even
the best of this work in Breton Folk is technically of no value to the student.
But there is a side to his drawing which, though it has been almost altogether
ignored, is really the only side to be considered by the student. This is his
power of showing expression and action by a few lines, often by a single line
of his brush used as a pen. There
is no one in England who has ever

equalled him in this respect, and I
very much doubt if any one anywhere
ever surpassed him. I do not see
how it would be possible to give with
fewer lines the intense expression of-
the cat stealthily approaching the
mouse. But curiously enough, al-
though there are several other cats
in The House that Jack Built, there
is not one which comes near it, unless
perhaps I except the cat worried by
the dog on page 15, in which, how-
ever, the dog is characterless, while the intense expression which characterises
the cat I give is wanting in all the others.

Again, has anybody ever given such a delightful absurdity as this of the
dog who, to gain some private ends, went mad and bit the man ? It is the
concentration of action and expression. Could anything be finer than the two
dots for eyes which glitter with madness, or the aimless expression of the fore

i8o

PEN DRAWING

>. ^

paws and the undecided pose of the whole body ? You have not an idea in
which direction the dog will spring, but you are very sure you ought to get

out of the way. The coloured plate on the
opposite page is very good, but what could be
more inane than the absolutely vacant expres-
sion of the young man in the background ? The
whole arrangement is excellent, but there is no
reason why, when a man tries to elaborate a
drawing, he should put in the houses in so
careless and slovenly a manner. The big dog
too, on page 14, sitting among broken pots and
plates is good, but Caldecott simply could not
work out a foreground. When a man draws
plants and flowers and grass, I at once compare
him with Alfred Parsons ; if he cannot give
^ them so well as Parsons, it is useless for the
"^^^ student to turn to his work.

These drawings of course were done with a brush used as a pen, in sepia
or some other liquid colour, a method which, as far as I can see, was merely a
fad. Unless the printing is in brown, as in the picture-books and ALsop's Fables,
it is impossible to give any idea of the work. It cannot be reproduced in its
proper value, and absolutely the only object in using this brown ink to-day
would be to make work for engravers and colour-printers like Messrs. Cooper
and Edmund Evans. The latter has reproduced, as far as I know, all the
colour-work of Caldecott, with whom his name has come to be very closely
associated. The work of Caran D'Ache is done with a pen in black ink, and
the flat colour washes, which he like Caldecott uses, are lithographed or pro-
cessed. The work is far simpler and the colours seem to keep in their right
places with a great deal more ease.

It would be almost impossible to give a better idea of bounding free motion
than in this stag from the ^sop, with
the whole of Scotland stretching away
behind him, though probably the lines
in the shadow were better in the orio;inal
drawing. Then look at the happy fox
after he has fooled the stork, and the
innocent young lamb, probably just be- •■ —
fore he entered on his discussion with
the wolf Take this Iamb especially ;
technically I cannot conceive of anything "--

more innocent and childlike ; it would be simply absurd to attempt to copy such
a drawing, and yet everything you want is in it. It shows Caldecott's marvellous

\''A"-1^

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

i8i

power in expressing a whole story in a few lines, technically worthless, in his
hands perfect. But the minute he went beyond this expression in pure outline,
only to be surpassed by the cleverness of handling of Caran D'Ache, he began to

^f^

fall off. Note the action and go of these Three Round Hats. The first figure
and horse are good, the boy on a pony is indifferent, the third man and horse and
the landscape are absolutely bad ; for when he began to elaborate, Caldecott was
not able to express with many lines what he could indicate with one. If a man
can express so much in one line as he did, he is really great ; no one can follow
him. If you have the same ability, you can do the same thing ; if you have not,
your imitation is sure to be artless and valueless. I know it will be said that
there are cases in which Caldecott drew figures and elaborated landscape well ;
perhaps there are, but they are the very rare exceptions, and even in these
exceptions his work cannot be compared with that of a man like Charles Keene,
for example. What I want to show is every man's best work, and what I have
shown is, I think, Caldecott's.

'K-

1 82 PEN DRAWING

MAURICE GRIFFENHAGEN

Griffenhagen's work ranks to-day, in my estimation, with that produced by
Du Maurier twenty-five years ago, though it has not the same variety. Each
of his drawings is made with the understanding of the possibilities of pen
drawing which characterised Du Manner's work and so justly made his reputa-
tion. Although Grifienhagen started in the manner of Schlittgen and the other
Germans, he has developed a style and character of his own. The features of
his work are his refinement and delicacy of line, and his suggestion of modelling,
surfaces, and texture by single lines. He uses scarcely any cross-hatching, and
therefore his drawings come well by process.

Jfiiiliu,' t

HUGH THOMSON, HERBERT RAILTON

Hugh Thomson began, to a certain extent, by studying tlie imperfections of
Caldecott. His horses were Caldecott's horses, his figures were caricatures of
Caldecott's caricatures ; and until lately he has always drawn the same horse and
the same man. But I am able to show one of his most recent drawings in
which he has got rid of a vast amount of these mannerisms, and has commenced
to work in a style of his own. This drawing is as full of go and movement as
anything in the book ; he has probably taken his ideas from Remington, who,
however, is a far better man to study for the purpose than Caldecott ; but these
ideas he has expressed entirely in his own way. If he continues to improve at
this rate, there is no doubt that he will produce something far better than he has
ever done. The grass in the foreground is over elaborated without being
expressive, and the faces have very little character, though still much caricature ;

PEN DRAWING IN ENGLAND

i8s

but this can be overlooked because there are so many good quahties in the draw-
ing, which is unquestionably the best of his I have yet seen.

I put Herbert Railton with Hugh Thomson because they have done so
much worls; together, especially in the English Ilhistrated Magazine. It is true

Railton has his figures drawn by John Jellicoe, and I cannot but think it an
enormous mistake for him, or any one else, to depend upon others in this
manner. The first time one sees Railton's work, one is struck with its bright-
ness, cleverness, and go. Looking at this drawing alone, one is charmed by the
clever way in which he draws a plain wall, indicates a bulging old roof, and
throws in a bit of sky, and although it is at once seen that he has paid no atten-

2 B

1 86 PEN DRAWING

tion to the light and shade or tone of the drawing, one is interested in studying
the way he works. But when one takes up drawings of Westminster Abbey, of
all the post-roads of England, of the towns of Normandy, and of the walls of
Nuremberg, and sees exactly the same touch ; when one finds that all his
windows open in the same manner and all his trees grow in the same fashion,
one must regret that a man of his cleverness and ability either never draws
directly from nature, or, if he does, seems to care so little for what is about him.
His mannerisms give his drawings, at first very pretty, an endless monotony.
He is apt to elaborate patches of meaningless shadow in the midst of his lights,
to fill his reflections in water with spotty blacks, and to kill what might be fine
effects by scattering these blacks all over the drawing. But it is because he has
such great ability that one cannot help criticising him, as one would not criticise
a man less strong. The best reproductions of Railton's drawings, all of which,
however, come very well by process, are the photogravures in a late edition of
Lamb's Essays, in which they are reduced so much that his mannerisms are
lost sight of and the results are very pleasing. It is to be regretted that the
publishers call these etchings, in the endeavour to give them a commercial
fictitious value. That the critic calls them etchings is not surprising ; it would
be surprising if he were able to distinguish between a photogravure and an
etching.

LESLIE WILLSON AND
J. RAVEN HILL

Whenever a man endeavours in any
way to produce something out of the
common, he is deserving of praise. Both Leslie Willson and Raven Hill,
seeking inspiration on the Continent, have infused some life and go and
technique into English comic drawings, and have shown, in their publication
Pick-Me-Up, that there is no necessity to overload a paper with politics in
order to obtain comedy. The example by Willson proves that he has
broadened, at least in this drawing, and cleared himself of the charge I
made against him of only working after Schlittgen ; save in the figure ot
the near woman there is little German feeling in it, while it has a large
amount of character of its own, though one can see he has studied, as every
draughtsman who wishes to get breadth and character into his drawing should,
the methods of the best men on the Continent. I find suggestions of Myrbach
and Mars, Rossi and Rochegrosse.

In the drawing by Raven Hill, clever as it is, for he has utilised the
methods of Jean Beraud and Ludwig Marold, I do not find any English
character at all. The flower-girls are characterless, and the hansom and

1 88 PEN DRAWING

lamp -post, which should give at once the stamp of London, are excessively
careless. But the execution is brilliant and the concentration of blacks ex-
tremely good. I also want to call attention in this block to the dotted
tint which may be seen in the overskirt of the girl to the left, on the
ribbons of the girl in the foreground, and in the extreme background ; it
is very useful often to fill up unpleasant white spaces and to give the effect
of a wash. The artist has either made a wash on his drawing or indicated
that a wash should come within the boundaries of this dotted space ; the
photo-engraver places a dotted film over his negative or on the drawing and
photographs the whole ; the solid lines show through it, and the dots are
also photographed on to the zinc plate or gelatine film from which the en-
graving is made. This has been greatly used by Courboin, Mars, and
Adrien Marie in France ; while drawing on dotted films or placing differ-
ently arranged dotted or lined films over the drawing was patented by Ben
Day in America. But this method, unless very skilfully and cleverly employed
as in Raven Hill's drawing, is apt to look mechanical, and I do not think it
compares to the tinted ruled paper. However, it is needless to say that
Vierge succeeded in using it without mechanical results.

There are several other Englishmen on Pick-Me-Up, among whom is
Edgar W. Wilson, some of whose suggestive backgrounds, worked out in
a Japanese decorative manner, are very pleasing and full of colour. The
editor is also obtaining the work of such foreigners as Willette, Lunel, and
Caran D'Ache, and by this method of procedure and his desire for the draw-
ings of outsiders, I hope his paper may have the success it deserves.

ALFRED PARSONS

Alfred Parsons is a man who has transgressed almost every law of pen
drawing. There is no shorthand about his work, there is no suggestion in
line ; but he has with a pen succeeded where every one else has failed. His
pen work has the richness and fulness of colour and the delicacy of execution
of an etching, combined with the most artistic elaboration that could be obtained
with a colour medium. When a man can successfully carry pen drawing to
this perfection of completeness, there is no
reason why he should not, provided the
result is, as with Parsons, artistic. With
other men, however, it is usually laboured
and over-worked.

|HE manner in which he has arrived

at this complete mastery of pen

drawing is simply by regarding it
as no less serious a medium than any other,
by studying the light and shade in his subject
as in the drawing at Long Marston, by seek-
ing for tone and colour where other men
only strive for line. Note the drawing of the
distant trees, the curves of each leaf in the
foreground plants in all the drawings, and
the individuality which he puts into the stem
and leaf and blossom of every plant he draws.
His drawings of plant forms are also full of
decorative feeling. He is a perfect com-
bination of decorator and illustrator ; if he gives you an eighteenth-century

From Harper 9 Magazine

^opjTigiit Ub b\ Harper & Brother

192 PEN DRAWING

initial, you may be sure it has been obtained from the best authority, just
as you know, if you are a botanist, that his flowers are right. But work
Hke Parsons' can only be produced by the most careful study from nature,
and in no other fashion. As a general rule, I consider Rico's methods much
better, and in a certain sense they are more difficult to follow, because Rico
has the mind of a great analyst, and the analytical faculty is probably rarer
than that of selection and complete rendering. But Parsons possesses this
latter quality, as well as that of decoration, to a greater degree than any other
man living, and the possession of such ability gives him a place apart. As
to the drawings themselves, they are made on smooth Whatman paper with
inks more or less diluted with water. Their great feature is not the clever-
ness with which they are done, but the truth with which every thing is drawn,
and the marvellous manner in which difficulties hitherto considered insurmount-
able by pen draughtsmen have been conquered.

The photogravure from She Stoops to Conquer, reproduced by Amand-
Durand, is the best example of decorative realism that I could possibly show.
The shield and the lettering might be the work of a decorator of Goldsmith's
day. But no one has ever made such exquisite studies of roses as those which
surround and build up this most original title. The flowers grow and stretch
across the design with all that feeling for curves and direction which the old
men rendered by a single line. Parsons' work contains these lines, but they
are hidden among the flowers, and each spray and each flower and each leaf is
worked out in a manner unknown before our time.

llcinjo''^ <"^ '"'f"'' '■" 'J"a ''^

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA

2 C

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA i95

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA

T F Spain and Germany were the homes of pen drawing, then
-*- certainly America is its adopted country. There the art has
been developed altogether within the last ten years, more especially
within the last seven. At one time American artists imitated the
good English pen drawing of some thirty years ago, much of which,
as I have said, was executed for the wood-engraver, and was there-
fore only known to them in the form of woodcuts. But they ceased
to do so as soon as they saw the work of the Continent, which they
could study in fac- simile reproduction. The principal American
illustrators of the day unquestionably owe much to their study and
appreciation of continental draughtsmen. Whom they took as
models depended much on where they studied. Many adopted,
as have Americans studying any branch of art, what seemed best
to them in each of the different schools. Hence, though like
Englishmen we have no national art school comparable with the
Ecole des Beaux-Arts, nor the standard which such a school
supplies, Americans have on the other hand, what Englishmen
have not, and, whether rightly or wrongly, do not seek to cultivate,
an eclectic appreciation of good art whenever we see it, no matter
where it comes from. Any one, who has been at all out of England,
knows how really little good modern art of any foreign school
is to be seen in this country.

196 PEN DRAWING

One American has taken Menzel as his model; another Dietz
and the artists of Fliegende Blatter ; a whole school now worships
Fortuny, Vierge, Rico, Casanova, and the other Spaniards, reverently
but with judgment at the same time ; while there are some artists
who follow Detaille and De Neuville, intelligently adopting French
methods to their own needs. These men have in turn many
imitators who, however, are without knowledge of all the underlying
principles of pen drawing. The principal credit for this development
must be ascribed to the intelligent support which Mr. A. W. Drake,
the art editor of the Century, then Scribners Monthly, was the first
to give to the group of young men who, about this time, returned
from a course of several years' study in Munich with the idea of
revolutionising art in America — then a not very wonderful thing to
do — by converting it to the school of Munich, especially to the
school of Dietz. Among the Munich men were William M. Chase,
who made some strong figure studies, Walter Shirlaw, who gave
some of the most artistic renderings of commonplace things ever
produced in America, Frederick Dielman and Henry Muhrman.
A little later Reginald Birch returned, and though he was heralded
by less blowing of trumpets, he has sustained and improved the reputa-
tion he made with his first drawings. The last book he has illustrated.
Little Lord Faiintleroy, is probably the best thing he has ever done.
Every number of St. Nicholas is made more interesting by his
work. The infection quickly spread to what was then Harper's
brilliant shop, working in, or for which were such artists as Edwin
A. Abbey, Charles S. Reinhart, Howard Pyle, A. B. Frost. The
entire revolution was not altogether due to the Munich students.
But certainly they, together with the Centennial Exhibition, showed
to a vast number of Americans, among others to those artists who
had never been abroad, what foreign standards of technique really
were.

About the same time, or a little later, between 1877 and 1879,
Alfred Brennan and Robert Blum began to be known. They com-
menced to study in Cincinnati to a certain extent under Frank
Duveneck and H. F. Farny. The latter is in many ways one of the
most original, if erratic, of American artists. He had then already
produced some very good pen drawings published in the Art Review,
and he has added to his reputation by his brilliant drawings of

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA i97

Indians published in the Century and Harper s, and by his illustra-
tions for school books, of which he has made something artistic.
From Cincinnati, Blum and Brennan went to Philadelphia where,
like many another student, they received everything but encourage-
ment to continue in the way they had marked out for themselves.
But they found a friend in Stephen J. Ferris, w^ho then, though
he did not own originals, had photogravures or reproductions of
almost all the drawings of Fortuny, Rico, and Boldini ; and through
these he introduced them and his son, Gerome Ferris, as he later
did me — and for this I can never be thankful enough to him —
to an entirely new world. Ferris, Peter and Thomas Moran, J. D.
Smillie, and several others, by reproducing the pen drawings and
the pictures of the greatest men of the Continent for the art books
issued by Gebbie and Barrie, probably did as much to make known
the work of European pen draughtsmen to Americans as any one
else. However, even in the present state of international copyright,
it is not likely that any of these books will be seen in Europe.

Ferris was one of the first artists to practise etching on glass,
as it was miscalled — that is, drawing on a sheet of glass coated
with collodion, which had been exposed in a camera at a white
wall and so turned a dark grey or brown colour, and then varnished ;
then on this plate a drawing was made with an etching needle, a
pen or any sharp point, and the result was either reproduced by
photo-lithography or printed in a photographic printing-press. It
was work like this, done about ten or fifteen years ago, which had
an enormous influence in developing photo-engraving. Mrs. Elinor
Greatorex, in her illustrations of old New York, I believe used the
same process. Another man who made many experiments in other
ways was B. Day. Brennan, too, continually made discoveries in
process work, in which he was aided by the Century s Art Depart-
ment. But without the assistance of Mr. De Vinne, the printer of
the Century — a man who has devoted his life to artistic printing
and succeeded in it — comparatively little advance would have been
made. A glance at the magazines of 1876 will prove this.

In New York, Blum and Brennan found instant recognition, and
a place for their work both in a sort of memorial to Fortuny and in
the Centtiry, then Scribners. Here they were joined by F. Lungren
and Kenyon Cox. From that day to this their work has contributed

198 PEN DRAWING

to maintain the high position which the Century and St. Nicholas
hold among illustrated magazines. Much has been said about their
originality. But their real originality consists in their intelligent
adaptation of the methods of Fortuny, Rico, and Vierge, of the artists
of Fliegende Blatter, and of the draughtsmen of Japan, and in their
production, under all these many and opposing influences, of vigorous
and charming pictures of their own. Brennan most certainly was
and is the master of this school of American pen draughtsmen.

In 1878, I think, Abbey, who was then illustrating Herrick's
Poems, came to England, and a knowledge of the country and things
he had long cared for started him on a brilliant career, and has carried
him forward until he is now the greatest English speaking illustrator
the Avorld has ever seen. For grace and refinement he ranks second
to no one. In England of the eighteenth century he is as much at
home as Austin Dobson. He can reconstruct its old rooms and
village streets and fill them anew with beauty and life. In his old
furniture and bits of glass and silver ware he rivals in fidelity and
execution De Neuville and Jacquemart. And all of his work is in a
style that delights the purist. It is simple, honest, and straight-
forward. So also is the drawing of Reinhart, who, about the same
time as Abbey, came abroad again — he having studied before in
Germany — and, finding his chance in illustrating a trip to Spain,
began an equally brilliant career. His work is always devoted to
the things of modern life. He puts Mr. Howells' characters on
paper with just that last touch of realism which an illustrator can
give better than the author ; while he has only finished telling the
world what he thinks about American sea-shore resorts and the
people who go to them. His drawings of France and England,
done boldly, directly, and vigorously, are life itself. Nothing better
than the work of these two men could be found for Enelishmen
and Americans to study. One cannot but wish that Abbey too
would give us a little more of what is happening about him,
instead of occupying himself almost altogether with the people and
things of other days. His editions of She Stoops to Conquer and
Herrick's Poems have never been approached in modern times.

Howard Pyle has given in his pen drawings the quaintness
of American life in the colonial period, and, in Robin Hood, some
beautiful ideas of a country he does not know. His Pepper and Salt

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 199

and other children's books are as beautiful in their old and quaint
simplicity.

Harry Fenn has illustrated many books and magazines. He
works apparently with equal facility in all sorts of mediums. If he
would concentrate his power on something that he made distinctly
his own, as he did with wash in Picturesque America, he would hold
a very high place as a pen draughtsman. There is no one probably
who has such perfect command of his materials, and who, though
often doing work which cannot be interesting to him, is always sure
of getting striking and, very often, novel and artistic results. His
drawings of interiors are models of arrangement and knowledge of
details, and very clever as a whole. His work, as well as its re-
production, has vastly improved since he made the illustrations for
Picturesgtie America.

A. B. Frost and W. A. Rogers, who can be either funny
or serious to good purpose, have produced some of the funniest
drawings, which rival those of Fliegende Blatter in their technical
work and humour — though very different ; and, like them, are good
because they are understandable in all languages, and need no label
to explain them. Of caricatures, pure and simple, are to be mentioned
those of Thomas Nast and M. A. Wolf, which, however, have no
technical pretensions. The same can be said of those of Mat Morgan
and a host of other caricaturists. J. D. Mitchell, S. W. Van Schaick,
W. H. Hyde, C. J. Taylor, are other comic pen draughtsmen who
really are clever. But to mention them all would be to make a
catalogue. Among the older men, of course, we have Darley's litho-
graphed outline illustrations to Washington Irving, which I suppose
were done with a lithographic pen on stone ; but, of course, he started
and formed his ideas and settled his style long before the time of
process. Among the painters is Mr. Wyatt Eaton, who produced
the noble head of Lincoln, engraved by Cole, in the Century, and
the drawings after Olin Warner, also published in the Century;
while another man who h^s done a great deal of portrait work in
the style of, though not equal to, Desmoulins, is Jacques Reitch.

The only men of any note who have appeared in the last two or
three years are E. W. Kemble, whose delineations of old darkies and
the wild west are very life-like, but often very careless; Frederick
Remington, whose drawings of horses in action are wonderfully

200 PEN DRAWING

spirited ; and F. Childe Hassam, whose work has certainly a character
of its own.

Miss Jessie M'Dermott and Miss Alice Barber both draw well,
but have not illustrated other work, or done work of their own to
sufficient extent, to be given the place they would otherwise hold.
The same may be said of many other men and women — Thurlstrop,
Graham, Zogbaum, Redwood, for example. But the great bulk of
their work is not done in pen and ink, and they do not seem to care
for it more than for other mediums. The drawings of the artists I
have mentioned will live long after the present generation.

So much of Alfred Parsons' work is published in America that
one has come to think of him as an American. But of his pen
drawings I have already spoken. Frank L. Kirkpatrick makes
excellent pen drawings, but painting almost altogether, one sees
comparatively little pen work from him. And this is also to be said
of F. S. Church, Avho is strikingly original in his treatment of birds
and animals. L. S. Ipsen, — who, among other things, has recently
published some charming decorations, though the figures are not
good, for Mrs. Browning's Poems, — George Wharton Edwards,
and H. L. Bridwell, have given a decorative character to many of
the books and magazines of America, which places them second only
to men like Habert-Dys. W. H. Drake and Otto Bacher render
arms and armour and many unpicturesque subjects in an original
manner ; while Hughson Hawley, F. Du Mond, and Camille Piton
have devoted themselves to architecture.

In looking at pen drawing, or rather all illustrative work in
America, outside of the Harper, Century, and Scribner publications,
Life and Wide Awake, the process work in Puck, and a few of the
art periodicals, it seems as if the art editors of the various illustrated
papers were trying to see which one could fill his magazine or weekly
with the worst and cheapest drawings. One cannot but fear that
unless there is another reaction like that which followed the Cen-
tennial Exhibition, art in America will fall to a lower level than it
has ever held before.

PEiSr DRAWING IN AMERICA 201

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA
ILLUSTRATIONS

EDWIN A. ABBEY

nr^HE fact that I have devoted more space to certain Spaniards, Frenchmen,
-^ and Germans, and less to some of the equally well-known and important
Englishmen and Am,ericans, deserves, I think, a word of explanation. Too
many of Menzel's drawings could not be shown, nor could I give too many of
Abbey's. But while it is the duty of every illustrator and every one who cares
for illustration to see all the work which Abbey produces — and it can be seen
in the pages of Harper s Monthly — and while every pen draughtsman should
own the charming Herrick, the monumental She Stoops to Conq7ier, and the
lovely Old Songs, which have been reproduced by the best modern mechanical
and wood engravers and printed in the most careful manner, it is scarcely
possible for any one to obtain the original editions of Menzel's work, and in
many cases reproductions from these original editions or new editions have
never been published. Of the Uniforms of the A7'my of Frederick the Great
I know of only one easily accessible copy in England ; this one is in the British
Museum, but very likely there may be a few more. The case of Rico and
Vierge is almost parallel ; it is even more difficult to find the drawings of
many of the principal Spaniards than those of Menzel.

Abbey began in the wood-engraving office of Van Ingen and Snyder in
Philadelphia, and, like so many other illustrators, he learned the mechanical
part of his work in the daytime and studied art at night, to a certain extent
under Isaac L. Williams and in the Academy of Fine Arts. But he soon
went to New York and entered the office of Messrs. Harper and Brothers,
where he continued for several years, producing much work in many different
mediums for all of Messrs. Harpers' periodicals. Though his early work was
wanting in the grace and refinement which has now placed him in a position
without a rival among English-speaking draughtsmen, it was always remarkable
for its quiet humour and its suggestiveness, while his marvellous mastery of

2 D

202

PEN DRAWING

technique was quickly attained. Although he has gained a knowledge of
composition, a largeness of feeling, and a completeness of expression with his
years of practice, some of the drawings in the Herrick are equal in many ways
to his later work. As a whole, however, his last book, the Old Songs, is
infinitely finer than anything he has yet done. His drawings have become so
refined that no engraving can reproduce every line in them. He has selected
the two girls on the sofa from She Stoops to Conquer, and it is interesting to

compare this reproduction, which is probably better than any made from his
work, with the block in the magazine and the plate in his book ; I think It will
at once be seen that it contains more of the feeling of his drawing than either of
the others.

While the superficial qualities of Abbey's work can be imitated by any one,
his rendering of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which he has recon-
structed so wonderfully, will never be approached on the lines he is following.
His present position as an illustrator has been attained and maintained simply
by treating illustration, as it should be treated, as seriously as any other branch
of art. He is remarkable not so much for academic correctness — as is Menzel,

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 203

for example — but rather for his truth, the beauty of his line and his power of
expression. No illustrator has realised more beautiful women or finer swagger-
mg gallants, and no one has placed them in more appropriate surroundings.
He makes the figures real for us because all the backgrounds and accessories
are taken directly from nature.

Any one can see for one's self how drawing like this is produced ; a more
or less rough pencil-sketch is made on a sheet of very thin smooth paper
mounted on pasteboard, something like London board, and the completed
subject, which he has in his mind before he touches the drawing, gradually
grows out of the models he has before him, and nature to which he always
refers ; and this is the only way in which great illustration can be and should
be produced. The book plate, the drawing for which Mr. Gosse was good
enough to lend me, is one of those numberless designs Abbey is for ever
making for his friends ; other examples of these charming suggestive conceits
may be found in the frontispiece of Mr. Ashby-Sterry's Lazy Minstrel, Mr.
Austin Dobson's Sign of the Lyre, Miss Strettell's Spanish and Ltalian
Folk-Songs, in many other books and catalogues of his friends' pictures. In
the book plate for Mr. Gosse, the greys all over the drawing are utterly lost;
no process or engraver could render them. But no matter how much is lost,
a vast amount of beauty remains. It has already been very well engraved by
Mr. J. D. Cooper, but the result is not better than, if as good as, Messrs.
Dawson's photo-engraving. I suppose that one might criticise the drawing
for the utter want of the old conventional decorative feeling, but when so much
that is new and good can be found in it, I think one ought rather to rejoice
for what we have obtained and not mourn over what has not been given.

Note. — After a rather careful examination of the country in the world, men who are seeking to carry

drawings and engravings in the Paris Exhibition out his method of brilliant drawing carefully and

of this year (1889), I cannot help being conscious seriously executed. And really on the same plane

of the fact that I have not given Abbey the place with him must be placed Alfred Parsons and Rein-

which he really deserves. Menzel is the founder hart.

of modern illustration; Fortuny, Rico, and Vierge American pen drawing, this Exhibition conclusively

have been its most powerful apostles, and among proves, is the best, and American process reproduc-

the cleverest men their influence will never grow tion is the most sympathetic, and American printing

less. But while Menzel's methods are obsolete, the most careful, and it is this harmonious co-opera-

and Vierge's style can only be attempted by the tion which has enabled Abbey to become not only,

most brilliant, any one can see that a new school is as I have written, the greatest English-speaking

arising, and this is the school of Abbey, who has illustrator, but the greatest living illustrator,
at the present moment followers in every illustrating

From Harper's Maprazine.

Copyri-;bt, 1886, by Harper & Brothers

C. S. REINHART

It would be a mere waste of time on my part to try to praise or even to criticise
Reinhart at his best. He has been influenced both by Germans and French-
men, with whom he has studied and among whom he has hved for years. His
drawings are notable for their simplicity, directness and freedom, often for their
grace, and always for their character and expression. There is probably no
one else who, with such simple means, could so well show the three American
mothers in this drawing. He has concentrated his attention on the faces, but
he has not been slovenly in the costumes, while his grouping is extremely
pleasing. It is unnecessary to give more examples of a man whose work is
so characteristic and well known, and should be studied by all who wish to
produce good as well as realistic renderings of the life of to-day. His drawings
for the last twenty years have been seen in Harper s, where he has shown his
ability to work in all sorts of mediums. It is only of late he has in his black
and white drawings used a pen to any great extent.

^i^#^/^^

REGINALD B. BIRCH

Birch is one of those men who have studied abroad, and taken what they
have learned to America. Not only does he know how to draw well, but he
is familiar with the life of two continents. His drawings in the beginning
were Americanised Schlittgens, but, while he is quite as clever as Schlittgen,
he possesses, I think, more grace, combined with wider knowledge of character.
In the concentration of blacks, the drawing of little Lord Fauntleroy carried off
to bed might suggest Vierge, but the footman, the two housemaids, and the
merest indication of the housekeeper's cap and one eye are thoroughly English,
though the little lord himself is completely American. The other drawing is
equally full of character, and the handling in these, as in all his work, shows
the greatest amount of expression obtained with the simplest and most direct
means. He scarcely ever uses models in his final work, but makes his drawings
from studies, tracing these on to Bristol board which he thus keeps thoroughly
clean ; consequently his work reproduces perfectly well.

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 207

H. F. FARNY

Farny's drawing is an example of wliat is Isinown among illustrators as splatter
work, which I have described in the Chapter on Technical Suggestions. But
it deserves a place far more because of its suggestion of colour and the strong
character of the face ; there is a figure, too, wrapped up in the blanket. The
decorative manner in which the shield and bow are put in and balance each
other is good, and in fact the whole drawing is very well put together. But, as
I said before, I wish to call special attention to the way in which the splatter
tint is managed. The figure, apparently, was drawn and then covered, prob-
ably with a piece of paper to protect it, and the splattering done all over it.
Everything outside the frame of the background was then painted with Chinese
white and the drawing continued on this ground when dry. The difference
in the quality of the lines made on the two grounds can easily be seen in
the reproduction, in which the Messrs. Dawson have been very successful in
keeping this difference. But in their process they do not seem able to get very
fine single lines, such as those in the lower part of the blanket which are rotten,
though there is no rottenness in the drawing. The feeling of the drawing,
however, has been very well retained.

From Pyle'a " Wondiir t'lock."

HOWARD PYLE

A COMPARISON between this drawing, Walter Crane's, and the plate after Diirer
will best show whether pen drawing has advanced. When I can print along
with text a drawing by Howard Pyle, which contains many qualities Diirer
could not have obtained save in an etching, and then never could have printed
with type, it shows decided progress, not only in technique, but in the printing

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 209

of an autographic reproduction of a pen drawing with type without the aid of a
woodcutter, a process which of course was unknown to Durer, but of which, had
he known it, I have not the shghtest doubt he would have availed himself to
the fullest extent.

The most superficial comparison of Pyle's composition and handling with
DLirer's will show what a careful student the nineteenth-century American is of
the sixteenth-century German. I admit, with certain American critics whom I
respect, that in some qualities it is very hard to tell where Durer ends and
Howard Pyle begins. In his Otto of the Silver Hand, for example, there are
compositions which are almost entirely suggested by Durer. But who has not
made use of the suggestions of other men ? That Pyle should do this in telling
and illustrating a mediaeval tale, merely proves his ability to saturate himself
with the spirit of the age in which the scenes are laid, and to give his work
the colour and character of the biggest man of that age. The entire figure
of Time, in the drawing I show from the Wonder Clock, is Dlireresque. But
the figure of the small boy piping, although the lines of shadow are drawn in the
manner of the old Germans, is not German at all but nineteenth -century
American, and this is true of the tree in blossom and the stony foreground.
They are better than anything in Dtirer, for the simple reason that we know
more about landscape than the Germans of his time. This way of adapting the
methods of an earlier generation to our own requirements is exactly what the
old men did, and it is only by so doing art advances. Pyle has preserved all
that was good in their work, and yet kept pace with modern technical and
mechanical developments. I know his drawing is a frank imitation, while
Walter Crane's is not, but I do not see where the latter has improved upon the
old work. Every line in Pyle's drawing is as careful as any to be found in
Durer's, and this cannot always be said of Crane's. I have published two
almost similar drawings and compared them, because unless one is able to see
together drawings by two men who work for the same end by almost the same
means, it is impossible to judge of their relative positions.

Among the books by Howard Pyle which every student should know, are
Robin Hood, Pepper and Salt, Otto of the Silver Hand, and the Wonder Clock.
Many of the drawings are wanting to a certain extent in local colour, a want
only due to the fact that Pyle has, as far as I am aware, never visited Europe.
But in technique they are far superior to anything that has been done in
America, and, I hope It will not be too presumptuous for me to say, therefore
to any modern work of this sort. They are carried out with a thoroughness
and completeness which give them originality, even though they preserve all
the feeling of the old work. They are almost equal as decoration to Abbey's
and Parsons' realistic revivals, and would be quite equal to them did Pyle
know Europe as well.

2 E

210 PEN DRAWING

ARTHUR B. FROST, FREDERICK REMINGTON,

E. W. KEMBLE

I GROUP these three men together, for not only is there great similarity in their
methods of work, but they seem to me the most distinctly American illustrators
we have. On the one hand, their work does not possess much of that intense
brilliancy and cleverness which is so characteristic of the Spaniards ; nor, on the
other hand, has it any of the slovenliness which characterises so much English
work of exactly the same sort.

In the three drawings you see that models have been used for all the
figures, though Remington's has the photographic look which marks all his
work. But, as I have said elsewhere, there is no reason why a man should not
use photographs, if from them he can get good results.

The style of Frost's work is, I fancy, that which the men of Fred Walker's
time would have used, had they been transported to an American town and
taken enough interest in it to make a drawing of a subject like that of Frost's.
Of course there is an exaggeration in all the figures ; they are not so real as
Remington's, but then Frost's indication of the men's clothes is much more true
and carefully studied than Remington's, while Kemble, to a great extent, has
ignored all details and only attempts the large mass and long folds of the
women's simple garments. But in none of them is there any of that everlasting
machine-made cross-hatch.

Each of these drawings gives to an American a characteristic rendering of
country life : Frost's of the middle states or the northern part of the southern,
Kemble's of the extreme south and Remington's of the far west. All will
probably fall under the English critic's ban because they are not pretty or
beautiful ; but they are more than this, they are real, and genuine realism was
the one quality lacking in the brilliant Englishmen of thirty years ago. In
Frost's drawings I do not think there is a line which could be omitted or any-
thing that could be changed to its advantage. In all three, the reserving of
blacks is well managed. In Remington's there is a certain scrawl of meaning-
less lines over the grass which is found in nearly all his work ; the drawino-
is not so well thought out as Frost's, and it has a mechanical look which is
much more evident in this reproduction than ordinarily, because his drawino-s

2 14 PEN DRAWING

are usually reduced to a much smaller size. The intelligent critic will of course
ask what has become of the cow's other horn. My only answer is that I am
sure I do not know. For a man with such a thorough knowledge of animal
anatomy this omission is rather curious. His drawing of the men's hands is
not as careful as Frost's or Kemble's.

Kemble's drawing contains more of his good qualities and less of his faults
than almost any which I have seen. There is a very striking difference in
the rendering of the old Congo woman with her brilliant shiny jet-black face —
though in the drawing of it, by the way, there is not a bit of black — and the tall
statuesque mulatto who stands in front of her ; the action of this figure is re-
markably fine. Rendering of types is Kemble's strong point, and his weak one
is carelessness in detail, a carelessness which at its worst is positively aggressive
The mass of wire-work to the left of the figures is thoroughly bad. It is in-
tended for bushes or grass, but, as line-work, is meaningless. The dress of the
old woman is also careless when compared with the delightful drawing in the
other woman's gown. The sugar-pans and the brick oven are also careless, and
the smoke is really childish. I criticise Kemble because he is such a remarkably
clever draughtsman, and yet there would be no use for students to copy im-
perfections which with him are but the result of carelessness. With far less
work he could in these details get a far better effect. Compare the tree trunk
in Frost's drawing with the bushes in Kemble's and what 1 mean will at once
be seen.

These drawings have been reproduced by Louis Chefdeville, and, like all
his reproductions, are in advance of the work of any other reproductive engraver
in England. He has not only reproduced the drawings excellently, but he has
kept the quality of the line which each man uses. The reason of this is not
difficult to find. Mr. Chefdeville is an artist and reproduces drawings in an
artistic manner — that is, he seeks to reproduce the character of the draughts-
man's work. His rendering of separate lines is infinitely better than that of
any other English photo-engraver.

I ^J^H.J J J. I .J

From Harper's Yoans People.

CopjTight, 1833. by Ilarper & BroUicn.

ALICE BARBER

Miss Barber's work is a good example of careful honest drawing without clever-
ness of handling. She knows how to construct her figures, and she puts them
together very well. There is a good colour scheme in her work, and the whole
drawing is simple and direct. The only thing to criticise is a cross-hatching in
the floor which might be omitted. The figure of the girl against the light thin
curtain is specially well drawn. Every one knows how difficult it is to give light
clean work with a pen, and in doing this Miss Barber has been very successful.
She carries her work out more thoroughly, with a real feeling for line and without
over-elaboration, than any woman I know of.

From Harper's Magazine.— Copy nght, 1881, by Hnrpev ^ Brothers.

From Harjier'a Magazine.— Copyright, 163 1, by Harper & Broa

From Harper's Mntrazlne.- Copyright, 1681, by Harper & Brotbeva.

From Harper's Mapaziue.— Copyright, 1S81, by Harper & Brothers.

rrora Harpt-r s Magaz nc— Coijr t,lit, Ubl, bj ll.irjir i^. LfuUl.

From liar]iLT"9 Magazine.— Copyrlglit, ISSl, by Harper & Brothers.

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 217

ARTHUR B. FROST

CARICATURES

These are not models of technique — Caran D' Ache's simple outline is very
much better — but the style is good enough for the purpose. They are examples
of comic drawings which appeal to the whole world without any label to explain
them. The only title ever tagged on to them was Oitr Cat Eats Rat Poison,
which to any one with the slightest sense of humour or drawing is all-sufficient.

2 F

2i8 PEN DRAWING

ROBERT BLUM

For giving a full-page photogravure to a comparatively unknown illustrator —
for, I reiterate it, all illustration is unknown or ignored — and omitting to give a
photogravure to Fortuny, I suppose I shall be criticised. But I have very good
reasons for doing so. There are several drawings in existence by Fortun)' which
have been reproduced either by woodcuts or photo -engravings, or which as
photogravures are unimportant. I have been unable to obtain any originals.
However, I should have managed to show one here, if it had not been that the
Century Company loaned me the drawing of Joe Jefferson as Bob Acres by
Robert Blum. From an historical point of view, it would have been more
interesting to make a photogravure from one of the Fortunys. For the student
the Blum is of much more value, for this reason. As I have said, Fortuny
lived a little too soon for the process work by which many of his followers have
profited. Among them all, there has been no more careful and at the same time
more brilliant student of his work than Blum. And this drawing was done for
reproduction, while Fortuny's were not. It therefore possesses many qualities
of value to the draughtsman which are absent from the more original work
of his master. As I have also said, in almost all Fortuny's work there are
smudges and blots, and though these are artistically right, they cannot be
depended upon in any process -reproduction. The Fabres drawing, however,
is a most successful exception. Everything in this drawing of Blum's will
come as nearly right as photo-engraving and printing can make it. The photo-
gravure is a little too hard all over. It would be impossible to render the
face more delicately than Blum has. Notice how he gets the colour of the
hair darker than the face by means of the fine lines under the modelling of
it, and how he gets the tone of the face down lower than the cravat and shirt
front ; and how well the legs are expressed, and every line goes to show the
form that is inside the breeches. I cannot help feeling that the boots are
somewhat too black, but this black is used to emphasise and bring out the
delicate lights all the way from his feet to the under side of his hat. This
is a contradiction to my advice not to use too many blacks ; but at the same
time it is a proof of my assertion that a man who is a master of his art can do
what he chooses. The lines which surround the drawing and which in most
men's hands would be a meaningless affectation of Fortuny's searching for his

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA 219

forms and modelling, although they are with Blum to a certain extent an
affectation, -^and I doubt if he would use them to-day, — serve to bring the drawing
out of the paper and to connect the black of the coat with the white of the paper
without producing a hard crude line around it. Take these apparently careless
lines away and you will at once discover that the drawing becomes hard and
loses much in refinement. And just here I want to express another opinion.
This drawing may have been made from Joe Jefferson on the stage, or studied
in the studio, or done from a photograph. The fact that one cannot tell how it
was done is a proof of its excellence. If a man is compelled to work from a
photograph — and there are very few who can without the fact being known at
once, for it is much more difficult to make a picture out of a photograph than
one from nature — it is nobody's business how the work is done, nor would the
use of a photograph detract from the artistic value of the drawing.

Under this head come some of Blum's drawings for Carrere and Hastings'
descriptive pamphlet on the Ponce de Leon Hotel in St. Augustine, Florida, the
most artistic piece of architectural drawing and hotel advertising combined I have
ever seen. It is a book which should be in the hand of every architectural
draughtsman. The drawings, having been made in the southern states of
America, are rightly based on the work of Rico. There is not an architectural
draughtsman in the world who could equal, or even come anywhere near them.
Blum has given all the architectural details with the utmost fidelity, and to
them he has added an artistic rendering while he has avoided all stupid
results by means of his delicate play of light and shade. Interest has been
added by carefully-drawn figures, and the trees and flowers are put in wi,th a
knowledge of their form in nature and not evolved from the imagination of the
architectural "J" square brain. i

220

PEN DRAWING

ALFRED BRENNAN

Brennan's work is unconventional and often startling. Much of it, of course,
is but an imitation of the Fortuny manner. His skill is shown in his con-
centration of blacks, and in this drawing in his rendering of the Chinese
weapons, about which he probably knows nothing except what he has learnt
from museums ; he here impresses us with the idea of a completely toned
drawing, though it is not a toned drawing at all ; he breaks up great spaces
of light or dark by either pure black or pure white — ^in fact every line and
touch is a triumph of technical skill combined with a thorough command of his
materials and resources.

The original was a huge drawing — a. drawing which took as much thought
and time in execution and as much knowledge of composition as would be
required to make a water-colour or oil of the same size, and there is scarcely a
painter who has the technical ability to produce such a masterpiece. Because
this man chooses to illustrate, his work, which the critic does not understand, is
dismissed with a line. Had he made a painting of the same subject with the
same amount of work in it, he would have been known all over the world. As
it is, he is only an illustrator, but for pure cleverness there is no one who has
ever surpassed him.

In the drawing of a stairway, which is a study in beautiful line, the lines
have all the character, the meaning, and the value of the best etched line Whistler
ever did. What could be better as a model for the architectural student than
this ? — if indeed the student could ever learn to work like Brennan. The draw-
ing is full of interest, vitality, and distinction. There is nothing stupid and
nothing photographic, and yet it was made from a photograph.

Brennan's decorative work is also filled with his individuality and character,
and though, to me, much of it is absolutely incomprehensible, it is always striking
and often beautiful ; it is taken from any motive which he may happen to find
around him, but instead of making a mere copy, he adapts this motive to his
own wishes and requirements. He has illustrated several children's books and
nursery rhymes, and these, when at their best, are, like his other work, techni-
cally unapproachable. Of course I know if it had not been for the influence of
Fortuny, Casanova and Vierge, and the Japanese, there might not have been a

PEN DRAWING IN AMERICA

223

living who hl'a "«! ,;: ™ °'; f ''^ °™- '^''-^ - P-b-bl/„o „„f
possrbilities of proofs w,h*t' "' f «q--me„.s and limitations and

u I piuLCbb. With the thoroughness of thp A-T.vi^i^ a

he has studied the subject in a workshop. ^^" ''■"^^'"^""'

From flarper's Magazine.

CopyriVht, 18S:, by Harp.r .«; Brothers.

224 PEN DRAWING

FREDERICK LUNGREN

LuNGREN is the third of the quartette of Americans of whom I have spoken,
and though with them he was at first very much under the influence of Fortuny,
Vierge, and Rico, and though his work now has many of their quahties, he has
added to it, not only by his study abroad in Paris, but by uniting to the brilhancy
of these Spaniards and of Frenchmen hke Jean B^raud some of the methods of
Germans Hke Schlittgen. The consequence is that while his work is in many
ways suggestive of that of many men, it is at the same time his own.

What is to be specially noted in Lungren's work is the great power of
expression conveyed with very few and simple lines, as well as the striking use
of solid blacks, and the beauty of every line he uses. For example, in the
accompanying drawing he expresses a great field with no work at all, excepting
in exactly the right place, that is in the foreground, where he shows the growth
of the grass and the weeds just where it would be seen, and the modelling of the
ground which is given just in the right place to connect the two figures together
in a good but not obtrusive manner. Notice too the use of pure blacks in the
stockings and shoes of both children and in the sash and ribbons of one, and
how carefully the folds of the drapery are rendered ; the faces of the little girls,
though perhaps not very interesting, are pretty and pleasing. The house among
the trees is put in so that every line tells, while the distant wood has been drawn
with chalk or crayon. The drawing itself was on smooth paper, but, as I have
explained, lithographic chalk not only comes by process, but holds fairly well on
this paper, which, though almost smooth, has a slight grain in the surface.

This drawing was merely an illustration for a child's story in 5/. Nicholas,
and yet it is worth more study and attention — and if anything but an illustration
would receive more — than a vast mass of the pictures painted every year.

2 G

HARRY FENN

It is always possible to render architecture picturesquely, even though it may
be the latest American device in Queen Anne or a city shop front, if one only
knows how, and Harry Fenn does. He not merely makes every line tell
something, but he uses a different line for each substance. Notice how he
gets the effect of the stairway with one line, the light wood of the hall with
another, and how well the old chair and chest, drawn with still another, tell
against it. The rug and the hangings are quite differently handled, while the
fire-place in the dining-room beyond is in line and splatter work, the rest of the
room in outline, which again varies the treatment. There is not such brilliant
and strong colour in this drawing as in many of Fenn's, but it is an excellent
example of picturesque working-out of a new, and therefore somewhat stiff in-
terior, and, above all, of the use of line to express, not only surfaces, but the
construction of a building in the best and simplest manner. Any number of
Fenn's drawings can be seen in the American periodicals, especially in the
Century. This one, however, was published in the Magazine of Art.

228 PEN DRAWING

KENYON COX

Kenyon Cox, I believe, commenced his illustrative vi^ork with Blum, Brennan,
and Lungren. But on going to France he gave up the methods which they
thought to be the only right ones, that is those of intense brilliancy and clever-
ness, and has devoted himself to an entirely different manner of working.

Here he shows an excellent way of taking the photographic look out
of a photograph, only retaining those features which give the character of the
subject and suppressing all others. Thus the pose of the figure is indicated
with freedom and grace, and the colour and texture of the clothes are well
expressed, while the African type is self-evident. There is no obtrusive
cleverness, nor indeed any cleverness of handling at all, in the drawing, but
there is a very successful and serious attempt to render a type, a pose, and a
costume, and the work can be thoroughly commended as good, serious, and
honest, as well as for its non-photographic rendering of a photograph.

WYATT EATON

Not only is this a good example of directness and freedom of line, with scarcely
any cross-hatching and certainly no mechanical work, of beauty of modelling and
suggestion of various surfaces, and of a man's individuality in his drawing, but it
is a marvellous example of mechanical reproduction, probably the best in the
book. It was engraved by the C. L. Wright Gravure Company of New York.
Their aim is not, as I have found with too many other mechanical engravers, to
succumb before the slightest difficulty, but, to use their own words, "to reach
the acme of perfection in reproducing drawings," and, "to give an absolute
fac-simile of the artist's work." It is only by such endeavours that blocks like
this can be produced, that photo-engraving can advance at all.

A FEW WORDS ON PEN DRAWING

ELSEWHERE

2 H

A FEW WORDS ON PEN DRAWING ELSEWHERE 235

A FEW WORDS ON PEN DRAWING

ELSEWHERE

THERE are probably good pen draughtsmen in Belgium,
Holland, Austria, and Russia. But the best known artists
of all these countries almost invariably leave their native land to
live in Venice with Van Haanen, or in Paris with Jan Van
Beers, Munkacsky, and Chelmonsky, or in London with Alma
Tadema. One feels as if even a country like Austria, where the
only large comparative exhibition of black and white illustrative
work has ever been held, — most of its examples as shown in the
Catalogue, however, were very commonplace, — is out of artistic
touch with the rest of Europe. The trouble is the illustrated
books and papers — the exhibition rooms of pen drawing — of these
countries do not circulate all over the world, as do those of
France, Germany, England, and the United States. Niccolo Masic,
a Hungarian I think, and Repine, a Russian, are men whose pen
work stands out in any illustrated catalogue. In Masic's there is
a suggestion of Vierge. In referring to nearly all illustrated cata-
logues I also find that the same pictures, which have been the
admiration of the Salon, travel around with their accompanying
reproductions, from one art centre to another.

It would be impossible to write of pen drawing in Europe

2 36 PEN DRAWING

and America without acknowledging the debt which all artists,
who have thought and worked and striven in their art, owe to the
Japanese. All know and try to reverently study the sketch-books,
the drawings on silk, in fact all the decorative work of Japanese
artists which is so freely and beautifully rendered by the pen, or
rather by the brush. Whether these drawings are right according
to instantaneous photography is of small importance ; they are the
most beautiful, the most decorative, the most careful studies of
birds and flowers, fish and animals, ever made. I do not even
pretend to know the styles, nor would it be worth while to give a
catalogue of the names of Japanese artists. But I do know that
one can learn more about art, decoration, and beauty from a Japanese
sketch-book, which can be bought at Batsford's, High Holborn,
for half-a-crown, or at John Wanamaker's, Philadelphia, for fifty
cents, than is often to be learned from a whole season of modern
European picture-galleries. In making this assertion I am sure
I should have the support of men like Habert-Dys, Felix R^*gamey,
Alfred Brennan, Frederick Lungren, Abbey, and Parsons, as well
as that of the commissioners, appointed by the Japanese Government,
who have just said, in their report, that there is very little to learn
in European art to-day.

But unless one can assimilate Japanese methods to one's own
requirements, in the manner of Brennan and Habert-Dys, — that
is, unless one can engraft Japanese methods on European subjects,
— it is better simply to study their drawings as an old master's
pen work might be studied. Otherwise the result would be a
medley, neither Japanese nor European, with about the value of a
tea-chest made in Birmingham.

I have no intention, however, of attempting a detailed account
or analysis of Japanese pen drawing, for so different is it from
European work that it would require a volume apart, and several very
able books on Japanese art are to be had.

After examining carefully the wonderful collection of Japanese
drawings shown in the Burlington Fine Arts Club in the spring of
1888, I cannot help thinking that it might be better for western
artists to give up drawing with a pen and take to the brush — that
is, I mean, the brush used by the Chinese and Japanese. We
should get better effects of certain kinds with a brush than we can

A FEW WORDS ON PEN DRAWING ELSEWHERE 237

with a pen. In their making and reproduction of pen drawings, the
Japanese are hundreds of years ahead of us in other ways. Their
ink is better than any we have, their wood-engravers are far more
sympathetic, reverent, and careful than even the fac-simile men of
America, and their printing is excellent.^

^ I sec no reason to alter what I have said very large and complete. But it did not show
after seeing the Paris Exhibition. The display me that any other but the countries I have men-
of printed books, drawings, and engravings was tioned possesses a great and original illustrator.

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING 241

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING

A RCHITECTURAL drawing to-day is not artistic. Of course
^^^- architects would explain that it is not intended to be so ;
but I maintain that in one of its branches it should be, and it
is of this only that I have any right to speak. I am not an
architect, and therefore I am not qualified to criticise technical
architectural drawing.

But, on referring to Mr. R. Phene Spiers's book on the subject,
which has just appeared, I find he says that the term architectural
drawing " is intended to include every kind of drawing which
may have to be executed by an architect at any period of his career,
whether for the purposes of elementary study, professional practice,
or recreation." As such a variety covers all sorts of artistic and
mechanical work, I feel myself as free to speak of the artistic side as
Mr. Spiers himself.

Architectural draughtsmen have opportunities of making artistic
drawings, but they seldom take advantage of them. Nor is this, as
is sometimes supposed, because exactness prevents their seeing
the picturesque, or rather the artistic side of architectural drawing.
The truth is they are often much less exact than artists, for the
simple reason that they know too much. They understand so well
how a building should be, that they do not see it as it is. As a
very striking example of what I say, I would refer the reader to the

2 I

242 PEN DRAWING

American ArcJiitect for 23d July 1887, in which the results of
a competition v/ere published. A photograph of an old house in
Normandy had been given as a subject, and of the dozen or more
drawings made from it by as many draughtsmen, none had the
slightest pretensions to architectural exactness or artistic truth, or
more especially to technical knowledge of pen drawing, save those
drawn by Harry Fenn and J. D. Woodward, the only artists
represented. I have before me at this moment a drawing by a
Royal Academician of a recently erected public building, in which
he has been careful to omit certain prominent and very artistic
details of his own, in order to insert the stone jointing which,
if actually true, would make each stone as big as an Egyptian
monolith.

The drawings to which I refer were not working drawings
intended for architects only, but were meant to be shown to the
general public. If it be said they were done to the best of the
ability of the architectural draughtsmen this is but a proof of my
assertion that architects to-day are not artistic draughtsmen. Of
course I am not here concerned with working drawings, details,
and perspectives for the architect's own use, which are technical
architectural drawings and not drawings of architecture — a difference
pointed out by the late Mr. E. W. Godwin. But there is no reason
why the drawings architects make for the public or for their clients
should not be artistic. Mr. Spiers says the public, as a rule, fail
"to estimate correctly from a drawing of any description the pro-
portion, mass, or scale of a building." He then says, farther on,
that in competition for an exhibition, however, the object is "to set
off the drawing in an attractive manner ^ (The italics are his.)
" The finish of the drawing and the method by which this is attained,
whether in pen and ink or tinting in monochrome or colours, is
consequently of some importance." He again says, "A study of
an important building, in which colour forms the chief element of
its beauty, as in one of the Venetian palaces, St. Mark's at Venice,
Giotto's tower at Florence, or a portion of the interior of the church
at Assisi, may claim long expenditure of time, because these subjects
are worth it, and art as well as nature (or the effect produced by age)
have contributed to their beauty." On the whole, Mr. Spiers's book
only shows that he does appreciate the fact, though he is loath, as is

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING 243

almost every architect, to acknowledge it, that architectural drawing
must be artistic if it is to have any value. He also quotes Mr.
Ware, who says that architectural drawing lies between mechanical
and artistic draughtsmanship ; therefore unless a student has studied
both mechanical and artistic draughtsmanship, as he does in the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, — Mr. Ware's school, — I
should very much like to know how he is to tell when he is either
mechanical or artistic. That the architectural student commonly
knows nothing about artistic drawing — in London at any rate —
Mr. Spiers himself admits, since he says that probably not more
than one per cent of the articled pupils here avail themselves of
the opportunity of attending the schools of art.

In looking into the three divisions of architectural drawing
as defined by an architect, Mr. Maurice B. Adams, ^ it is clear that
but one — that which includes working plans and details — is ex-
clusively technical. These are not for exhibition or publication
any more than are the anatomical studies of the painter. Detail
drawings and elevations are the anatomical drawings of architecture.
But it is quite different with drawings prepared for clients or
exhibition, in which what is needed is picturesque and graphic
perspective, as well as exactness. That even to architects they
do not answer the purpose of working drawings is easily to be
seen, since the draughtsman, to make them intelligible architecturally,
has to supplement them with a frieze of plans and elevations.
And certainly clients and public would take more interest and
pleasure in them if the perspective drawings were picturesque as
well as conventionally correct. But if the architectural draughtsman
is to attain this picturesqueness, if he is to be concerned with his
sky-lines and "the general massing of parts for effect," he must
have knowledge of something beyond the mere construction of
elevations. He must do as he is made to do in the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, for example : study decoration, perspective,
the point of view, outline, interiors, etc. ; quite as important, if
an artistic result is to be attained, as a knowledge of the resisting
power of wood or metal which any engineer understands ten times
as much about as any architect. He must be not simply an

■^ Lecture on Architectural Drawing delivered before the Royal Institute of British Architects,
and published in the Transactions of that Society.

244 PEN DRAWING

architect but an artist as well, and if artists cannot be made,
neither can architects. Mr. Adams seems to realise the increasing
tendency to forget this fact. He says, " It seems to me more than ever
desirable in this essentially commercial age of push and steam, to
take particular care lest we allow the science of building to crush out
the higher and nobler spirit which constitutes the life and character of
our Art." Mr. Walter Millard in a paper read before the Archi-
tectural Association was even more emphatic on the subject. " Every
day," he declared, "it seems to be more generally understood, that
the first thing necessary for good architecture is that the architects
must be artists. Good designs are not to be produced by accident
any more than good pictures or good sculpture, but by men endowed
with artistic ability, who have taken all care to cultivate it to the
utmost."

But it is not merely for the benefit of clients and public that
architects should aim to become artistic draughtsmen. If they
are unable to draw — that is, see artistically — they cannot build art-
istically, and here again I may quote Mr. Adams. " If," he says,
" drawing for the architect is only at best a means to an end,
we must, if we aim at good architecture, have correspondingly
able and sympathetic draughtsmanship." Mr. Burges also urged
the artistic training of architects. He even went so far as to say^
"no amount of architectural drawing would make a man an artist
or an architect, unless he knows the human figure. When the
Institute draws for itself instead of going to past ages, we may
have an architecture." Mr. Millard advocates the "habit of
sketching " in the student or draughtsman of architecture, because it
" must tend to bring out whatever artistic ability he may happen to
be endowed with, to accustom his eye to appreciate delicacies of form,
subtlety of proportion, and beauty of composition, and all those
niceties that go to make just the difference between the work of an
artist and a ' cobbler ' ; thereby to set him thinking and rouse his
imagination ; and in a word, to at once furnish him with ideas, and
give him skill and readiness in expressing them."

Of the architects of to-day Mr. Ernest George, who has a
world-wide reputation among architects as a draughtsman, builds
houses which have the most character of their own. This was

^ Paper on Architectural Drawing, published in Transactions of the R. I. B. A. for 1S60-61.

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING 245

also the case with Mr. Richardson in America. That details can
be drawn artistically, as well as accurately, thus interesting not
only architects but artists also, is shown by the careful, beautiful
drawing of a capital by Mr. Spiers, published in the Transactions
of the Royal Institute of British Artists, and by the wonderful
detail drawing of the porch of St. Paul's by Mr. Schultz. And
though these are merely technical drawings for the benefit of
architects, they are filled with the feeling for art, and real love
for the artistic possibilities, and beauty of the subject drawn. But
to call the slovenly notes by Mr. Street,^ which may have been
useful to himself, an admirable example of a useful drawing, or
the checker-board windows of Mr. Norman Shaw's perspectives
fine, makes one admire the half-trained, but very ambitious, efforts
of a man like Mr. Beresford Pite, to cut himself loose from such
very careless masters.

For the last hundred years or more, English and American
architects have been trained apart, without coming within artistic
influence, with the result shown in the buildings which line the
streets of American and English cities. The trouble is that
architects must be business men first, social swells next, and then
engineers, sanitary authorities, builders and surveyors, — if they
happen to have a slight knowledge of art, it will not do them any
harm. Architecture in our times is too much of a business, too
little of an art. Like the law, it has become a good opening for
impecunious younger sons. As Mr. Millard says, if architecture
is "nothing less than the entire profession of building-surveying,
with a knowledge of the quality and market value of all kinds
of material and labour sufficient for an enterprising contractor ;
a grasp of physical science, constructive formulae, and methods

1 Mr. Street is responsible for the greater part unfortunately they have given him the reputation
of the present slovenliness of architectural drawing of being master of a subject — drawing and sketch-
in England. He not only drew very carelessly, ing — of which he was not even a proficient pupil,
though probably well enough to suit his own ends, The worst of it is, that drawings which he prob-
but he was one of those men who insist that an ably would be ashamed to show, were he alive,
architect must do everything for himself, even are published in architectural journals as models
down to the most trifling and mechanical details. for students, with the result that in the last
Instead of getting artists to draw his perspectives, few years, architectural drawing has greatly
he always drew them himself They may, even degenerated.
if not artistic, have answered his purpose, but

246 PEN DRAWING

of calculation so essential to an engineer ; acquaintance with
authorities, and skill in expounding the mysteries of easements
and arbitrations, compensations and contracts, and cases of ' ancient
lights,' such that a lawyer might envy ; as well as a general capacity
for conducting affairs of all management of property, insurance
agency, or advertising ; in fact so many and such varied accomplish-
ments, — the wonder is, what room there can be left for architecture
proper."

In looking over years of architectural Avork, I do not see any
drawings which, artistically, can equal those made by professional
illustrators who have absolutely no pretensions to architectural
science. The consequence is, I can only recommend to the student
of architectural pen drawing the work of these illustrators. Some
architects, especially in America, — M'Kim, Meade and White,
Carrere and Hastings, for example, — have their perspectives drawn
by artists, and an art which in the hands of its own craftsmen
is perfectly stupid, by artistic draughtsmen has been made attractive
to the public, as well as to architects themselves. Notable
examples of this are the illustrations for Mrs. Van Renssalaer's
series on American Architecture in the Century, and M. Camille
Piton's drawings in Harper s ; and all or nearly all these drawings
were made by painters or draughtsmen ; Avhile there are many
French illustrators, such as Lucien Gautier and H. Scott, whose
work is equally good. If this were done more frequently, and
such drawings were hung at the Royal Academy, there would
be less complaint that the public does not appreciate architectural
drawing. The public does not care for technical drawings, which,
though good from an architectural standpoint, are utterly unin-
telligible to all but architects, any more than it would prefer
an anatomical study to a portrait. One cannot be expected to
admire in a drawing trees which look like masses of wire work
or wooden toy trees ; or the graceful lines of a beautiful building,
when drawn as if from a balloon or the bottom of a well. Neither
can one enjoy drawings set up with all the crudities and imper-
fections of the draughtsmanship of three or four hundred 3'ears
ago; or drawings perfectly artless in execution, in which all the
laws of light and shade are ignored, even though the buildino-s
represented may look brand-new, and have all the jointing of their

ARCHITECTURAL PEN DRAWING 247

Stone-work carefully drawn out. In the Architectural Gallery of
the Royal Academy of 1887 I only remember two or three drawings
which appealed to me : one water-colour by Mr. Lessore, and pencil
and wash drawings by Mr. Arnold B. Mitchell. The pen drawings
were utterly uninteresting and inartistic, and yet when you came
to look at them, you saw that artistic results could have been
had in all, without in the least detracting from their architectural
value. I must again repeat that I speak in this chapter only
of drawings published and exhibited to the public, or made for
clients, and which need not necessarily be subject to conventional
architectural laws.

Architects should give up showing the public inartistic repre-
sentations of what may have been artistic originals, and instead,
have their buildings photographed, confining themselves to their
often very beautiful working drawings for practical purposes ; or
better still, secure the aid of an artistically trained draughtsman ;
or, best of all, arrange their system of architectural education so
that the coming generation of architects will know some little about
art, and not become mere business men with no artistic appreciation
of the profession of architecture. But, as I have said, I cannot
mention a single architectural draughtsman of to-day whose work
I would recommend to students who wish to make artistic pen
drawings of architecture. In this connection architects will probably
note the omission of several well-known names. I probably know
the work of these men as well as architects themselves. But
artistically it does not compare with that of the illustrators upon
whose style theirs is modelled.

Even at meetings of architects, drawings by artists are shown
as models of what the drawing of architecture should be. I cannot
but differ, however, from architects who uphold Turner as a model,
simply because Mr, Ruskin has said that he "leads to rightness."
This cannot be believed by any one who has studied Turner's
work, and the buildings which he drew or painted. I can think
of no worse architectural work for artists or architects to study
than that of Turner. He cared to show places and buildings, not
as they really are, but as it pleased him that they should look.
Rightness was nothing to him. He was never half so accurate as
Mr. Ruskin himself.

248 PEN DRAWING

Finally, in its greatest days, architecture was an art practised
by painters and sculptors ; so it must be to be an art at all. To
think that any one can make an architectural drawing, to say
nothing of building a house of any artistic value, without being
an artist, is absurd. One cannot produce art work until after years
of patient study, and in order to secure artistic results, one has got
to know what good drawing is, and then be able to do it.

Probably architects will suppose that I intend setting up as
a rival to Lord Grimthorpe. But the reason I write as I do is
because I have such a great respect for artistic architecture. When
one sees around one all traces of old London, or rather of old
England, disappearing under the puny hands of knighted and titled
jerry builders, drain constructors and sanitary engineers ; when the
old churches of the city rise up from their beauty, scraped, white-
washed, and re-arranged according to the ideas of these decorators,
house-painters, and upholsterers, one can do nothing but utter
what of course will be an unavailing protest against the unchecked
sway of the building trade, into which architecture in this country
is degenerating.

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK
DECORATION

2 K

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

251

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK
DECORATION

"P ECENTLY certain artists have sought
-*-^ to separate the conventional decoration
of books from their pictorial illustration, and
to treat each as a distinct art. Though, in a
measure, the illustrator has become divorced
from the decorator, there is no real reason
for this separation. In the greatest age of

book decoration, I believe the decorator and illustrator worked together, and

were in the best examples one and the

same man. No one would ever deny that

Durer or Holbein, Mantegna or Bellini, or

whoever illustrated many of the beautiful

books from the Aldine press, was not both

decorator and illustrator ; if the work was

not actually done by the same hand, it was

the product of the same mind. No one

but a master of anatomy, of figure drawing,

could have produced the figures which are

interwoven in the decoration of almost all

these works. I refer, not to the pictures

inserted in the text, in the initial letters

or in the margins, but to the conventional

decorative figures themselves. Neither do

252

PEN DRAWING

( N

I mean to say that Dlirer did all the work with
his own hand ; I would as soon assert that he
drew and cut all his wood blocks, but he invented
it, sketched it and touched it up. And as with
Dtirer, so with the other great book decorators
m the past.

But while I have no intention of separating
the illustrator and the decorator, since I believe
no such separation should be recognised, there Is
a distinction between drawings which, while they
ornament the text, are specially intended for its
elucidation, and those which, though they may
illustrate the text, are intended primarily to orna-
ment the page according to conventional rules.
Of these latter I propose to speak here. Of the
drawings reproduced in other chapters, there is
not one which would not be a decoration in any
book ; many I now give are illustrative ; and yet
a certain difference in motives and in treatment,
even when conventional laws are set aside, is
apparent.

The old MSS., the missals, and early printed
books were treated very much as are modern
illustrated publications. The MSS. were made
rich with ornament, sometimes confined to a very
elaborate initial letter, sometimes extending^ down
the margins, and they also contained many pictures
wholly realistic in treatment, either placed in the
page very much as are the cuts in our magazines,
or else so interwoven with the ornament as to
be almost inseparable from it. And so it was
with the early printed books. At times the text
was enclosed in a border of graceful spirals or
purely conventional forms ; at others it enclosed

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

253

a picture ; often picture and ornament were not to be
separated. These MSS. and books, therefore, are a mine
to the modern illustrator, but it is a mine which I do not
intend to work. In the first place, those in which the
most beautiful examples occur were either printed in
colour, or afterwards coloured by hand, and were not
meant to be seen in black and white ; consequently when
one does reproduce them in black and white, the effect
is frequently extremely poor. Such use of old decora-
tion which has no mechanical relation to modern printing,
instead of being praiseworthy, really calls for all the con-
demnation which I have lately heard devoted to what is
known in this country as American work — that is, work
in which the artist, the engraver, and the printer have
striven together, as they did of old, to produce beautiful
and appropriate results, such as are to be seen in the
books of Abbey and Parsons and of Howard Pyle.
Modern work of this kind, however, is really no more
American than it is French or German ; look, for example,
at Leloir's Sentimental Jotirney or Manon Lescant, or at
Poirson's Vicar of Wakefield, from which I regret to say
I have been unable to show examples, not finding it pos-
sible to obtain the necessary permission from the pub-
lishers. This old work was mainly conventional or sym-
bolical ; to-day we have found that realistic drawings
decorate a page as well as geometrical forms, and that
a flower by Alfred Parsons or a vase by Jules Jacquemart
is quite as decorative as the illustrations in any old missal,
and infinitely superior to the realistic decoration which the
old rnen themselves used.

v^M'ii

'ilW

Mornine in LONDON.

A second reason for not giving examples of old book decoration is
that, even when not coloured, it was drawn on the wood and seldom
engraved by the artist himself, and therefore, to a certain extent, was
not autographic. Of course drawing on the wood in the time of Durer
and Holbein, especially when intended for the decoration of the text,
was more or less conventional, as a reference to the etched work of the
same men will show. The artist, when working for the engraver, could,
by drawing less freely, do much to help him to obtain accurate results
and to lighten his labour. As we are often reminded, artists and crafts-
men then worked together. Books were produced entirely by art
workmen in a workshop, a beautiful example of which remains to-day
in the Plantin Museum at Antwerp, with its type -founding rooms, its
artists' designing rooms and designs, its printing presses, and its
"hutches" for tame authors and artists and proof-readers; it was the
house, the home, and the workshop of the publisher. But save that
publishers and authors and artists do not live on the premises, the same

IgCfcj^ ^

^E^ff

tfN>?

^^^^^

ii^^^II

"^y^

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

255

state of affairs, carried out in a much broader manner than even Plantin
would have thought possible, will be found in many of the great publish-
mg houses to-day. However, because we see the business details and the
shoppy working of such firms, and because they have produced results
undreamed of by Durer or Plantin, only the beautiful side of whose
work survives, we younger men are told by unsuccessful engravers,
visionary dreamers, incompetent middlemen, or mediocre illustrators,
that we must go back to the time of Durer, that we must give up our
improved printing presses, our process work, our overlays, and our art
for the people, made by the people and enjoyed by the people, and
return to the work which was made only for the few and given to the
few — to the fine illustrated volumes intended rather as curiosities for
presentation to popes and kings and nobles, than books which the
people, or even artists, should ever see. If this is to be, why should
we stop with the Renaissance, with the decorative work of Rome, with
those mummy cases of Egypt which show how much more the Greeks
knew about painting than Giotto, or why should we look at the beauty
of Greek art at all ? Why, the reasoning of these people would carry
us back to painting ourselves blue and drawing with a burnt stick on
the walls of a cave.

The great difference between the conditions ot early and modern
book-making is too often lost sight of, and yet, without understanding
it, it is impossible to justly value the great development accomplished in

illustration and decoration within the last few years. The old illustrators
attempted the same scheme of illustration as that which is carried out
to-day ; they would have used the same realism had it been possible
— or the same idealism, whichever you choose to call it, for I suppose
it is universally admitted that between idealism and realism of the
highest kind there is no difference ; — they arranged their pages in the
same manner, a manner which is praised in their work and condemned
in ours ; but they had not the same technical knowledge or the same
mechanical facilities. To begin with, the methods of the printers of
the fifteenth century could not be applied to the large editions of to-day.
The old books, which either were carefully chained in one place or were
the rare possessions of the great of the earth, could be decorated to any
extent ; their size was not an important consideration. But if the books
of to-day — intended for wide circulation — were equally decorated, with
every page of text enclosed in a border as in books of the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries, they would be so swollen as to be almost entirely
unmanageable. This is a fact regretted by a select few, though even if
the old methods could be applied to modern editions, they would not
equal those now adopted. We are told much about Caxton and Dtirer,
Holbein and Plantin. But were these men living to-day, instead of
looking back to Gutenberg and MS. illuminators who were their pre-
decessors, they would use steam presses and avail themselves of every
appliance of mechanics, science and art, as they did in their own day, thus

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

257

placing themselves far in advance of their time and their contemporaries.
The draughtsman to-day who is most in sympathy with Diirer is he who
adapts his work to the methods of Theodore de Vinne in New York or
the Guillaume Freres in Paris. It is owing to the progressive men who
have not spent their time lamenting the past and mourning present
degeneracy, but have always sought to advance, that the world has de-
veloped at all. To have the inventions and improvements of to-day called
bad because they were . mechanical impossibilities three hundred years
ago is rubbish ; and it is on such rubbish that modern art is nourished.

For a time, especially about the beginning of this century, it seemed
as if the art of book decoration was dormant. There was, it is true,
what was accepted as decoration, but it was really desecration. Old
books were borrowed from unreservedly and their designs used without
the least sense of fitness or proportion. A publisher would not have
hesitated to embellish a cook-book with head and tail pieces from the
Divine Comedy. He employed decorators — really desecrators — to
scrawl all over the inside and outside of his book covers, and to spread
themselves unrestrainedly on the pages in the most obnoxious manner.
This sort of thing came to a crisis in the Books of Beauty. The
consequence was that many draughtsmen in disgust gave up all attempt
at decoration. But within the last few years a new impetus has been
given to the decoration of books, — using the term to express the dis-

2 L

258

PEN DRAWING

tinction I have pointed out, — and it is to this modern woric that I will
pay most attention, since it alone, having been done for reproduction by
process, comes within my present scope.

The principal conventional motives were very early evolved in
every country ; we have, as a rule, endeavoured to make little or no
advance upon them, and they are still accepted as standards only admis-
sible of slight changes. This, however, is far from meaning that all
that is possible to-day is to copy what has already been done. No
matter how conventional the treatment or what the motive, the decora-
tion should have some relation not only to the size and shape of the
page, but to the subject of the text. If we surround our pages with
designs of the sixteenth century — as some draughtsmen still do and
would have all others do — which have no relation to the text, it is
not decoration but senseless display. Durer's designs for the Missal
of Maximilian might be appropriate to a nineteenth -century prayer-
book, but there must be a great lack of ideas on the part of the
nineteenth -century illustrator who cannot work into sixteenth -century
forms nineteenth-century feeling. It is always wise to go to Durer, to
Meckenen, to Mantegna, or to any of the illustrators of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries for motives, but to literally copy their designs
and to print them on a modern page reveals an absolute sterility of
invention or a conservative servility which is disgusting. The accom-
panying cuts of the two little angels carrying the crown and St. George
and the Dragon show how admirably some of Durer's work would be
adapted to many of our needs ; but on looking through Howard Pyle's
Otto of the Silver Hand, one finds the little tail -pieces there have
much the same motives and are carried out in much the same spirit,
and yet are altogether original in subject, while they are reproduced
mechanically with an ease which would have surprised DUrer. There
is probably no draughtsman as successful as Howard Pyle in working
in the manner of the sixteenth-century artists, always, however, adding
something distinctly his own. His mediseval tales have given him aood
reason to adhere to the old models. The book I have just mentioned

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

259

would not have been so appropriately-
illustrated with designs less conven-
tional in treatment and more modern
in feeling ; the full pages, though re-
produced by process, look like old wood blocks ; the head and tail
pieces at a glance might be mistaken for Diirer's. But that Pyle
knows how utterly out of place these designs would be in books
relating to other periods is proved by the very different methods he
employs for other subjects. His Pepper and Salt gives an excellent
idea of the great extent of his knowledge and his perfect under-
standing of the limitations and possibilities of the decoration of a page.
An equally good example of the perfect use of old methods en-
grafted on modern work is to be found in the cover — too large to be
reproduced here — of any number of the Miinchejier Kalender. In it
again all the old feeling is preserved, and yet we find the proper
adaptation to modern requirements in the coat of arms, the eagle,
and the emblems of the printer by whom it is issued. But still, I
cannot help saying that from my standpoint at any rate, such schemes
of decoration as those by Grasset are even more appropriate. In
his work we have, in the first place, the old decorative line in the
borders, in the centre are the charming little suggestions of a picture
carried out exactly in the way the old men would have done it, realistic
figures and landscape being given in a shape which accords with, and
decorates and illustrates the page at the same time. A realistic picture
can be just as decorative as any number of conventional lines. The
illustrations of the earlier illustrators seem more conventional to us^
simply because technical conditions allowed them less freedom than
is now possible. I say and I maintain that there is no earthly reason,
save narrow, conservative, hide -bound tradition or inability to draw,

i6o

PEN DRAAVING

which prevents the modern man from producing
decoration of this sort. The designs are not only
well drawn, but are perfectly appropriate in their
places, and they prove Grasset's power to pro-
duce decoration which has some relation to the nineteenth century as well
as to the Catalogue of the Paris Salon which he was illustrating ; just as
the decorative illustrations of sixteenth-century artists had some relation
to their time. The mixing up of conventionalism and realism in decoration
is to be found in almost any old book.

But because, if I may so express it, realism prevails in the decorative
work of Alfred Parsons, though he is able to draw flowers as no one else
ever drew them, and to fill his page with the mingling of decoration and
realism that Durer never dreamt of, though his every line is as beautiful as
Diirer's, are we not to use it, not to study it ? As far as I can see, the
only reason why it should be considered not altogether right is because it
is produced to-day, and because there is no one else in the world who
can do anything like it. It is interesting to compare the photogravure
after Parsons in the English Chapter with the designs by Walter Crane
worked out in such a different spirit. The organic lines in the latter are
very beautiful, but the Parsons' plate, and also the heading In SJiakcspcares

Coitntry, show there is
of decorative drawing
think a great deal better
to books pubHshed to-
Crane's work are two
made, not for any
Messrs. Clark, that is
Fine as all are, they
tion of two, absolutely
can see, to the work of
er or the publisher, and
itself to any one. On
Echoes of Hellas, he
his splendid ideas of
design is appropriate,
out that he seems to
dern life and feeling to
referring only to his
notable examples in

ler and newer way
which I, for my part,
and more appropriate
day. The examples of
of a series of designs
special books, but for
for trade purposes,
have, with the excep-
no relation, as far as I
the printer, the engrav-
a design should explain
the other hand, in his
has really carried out
decoration, while the
I simply want to point
object to applying mo-
decoration. I am here
pen drawing. The only
which he has succeeded
old cover oiSt. Nicholas
But even in them there is a con-

in doing this are the
and the cover of the Chants of Laboti,r.
ventionality for which I do not admit the necessity. I do not consider
that conventional or geometrical lines are more decorative than any
others ; and this. Parsons' work proves, as also does that of men like
Caran D'Ache and Rochegrosse and Mars, who work the life of to-day
into their initials and decorations instead of trying to copy old conven-
tionality. Look at the swallow by Habert-Dys, or the tail-pieces by Unger.

A C H number of the English Illustrated Magazine
has always contained reproductions of old work and
new designs which were appropriate to, and specially designed for,
the articles they decorated. Among them I cannot help mentioning —
though they are not drawn in pen and ink — several by A. C. Morrow
for articles on different industries ; these were most decorative and most
appropriate, and I only regret they were not done in pen and ink, so that
I might use them. Caldecott and Herbert Railton and Hugh Thomson,
the two latter in their Coaching Ways and Coaching Days, have produced
head and tail pieces which were most appropriate, as well as good in
design. But the best decorative work in the Eno;lish Illustrated is to
be seen in many drawings by Alfred Parsons, Heywood Sumner, and
Henry Ryland. To my mind Heywood Sumner's illustrations to his
article on Undine are the most beautiful decorations it has yet published.
And if all of his drawings are worked out in a more quaint than decora-
tive style, they often convey the ideas of the life, character, and feeling
of the time and country he was illustrating or decorating, though some-
times, notably in The Besom-Maker, he seems to have striven only
to perpetuate the imperfections and crudities.

A set of men in England who have persistently set themselves up
solely as conventional decorators are the artists of the Century Guild,
and three of their designs they have kindly loaned me. Selwyn Image,
Arthur Mackmurdo, and Herbert Home are the best known of these
men who, to me in an incomprehensible manner, refuse to make use of
any of the adjuncts with which science has in our time furnished the
book-maker. The full page drawing of Diana is so remarkably well
done that one sees, if it were not that Herbert Home refuses to make

ili'^varkerii

264

PEN DRAWING

himself comprehensible to the ordinary mortal, he might easily do much more
good in the world and fill a far wider sphere than the narrow niche in which
he deliberately places himself It would be difficult to explain in what way

art is served by using bad paper ; and from the stand-
point of printing illustrations, the paper of the Hobby-
Horse is thoroughly bad, handmade papers of all sorts
being unsuitable for the printing of pen drawings, or any
illustrations printed from blocks, in fact. The initial by
Home is of equal value with that by Bridwell given
farther on, but it is no better. The tailpiece also is
extremely good, that is, the spaces are well kept. It
may have some hidden meaning ; to me, however, its only meaning is the
beauty of line. Nor do I understand the printing of the Hobby-Horse page ;
it is very good as a mass, but very bad for practical purposes, that is, for
reading. In many of the decorative designs, notably the cover by Selwyn
Image, I fail to grasp the significance or to discover any relation to any age ;
and certainly, if Dlirer was right, the Hobby-Horse men are all wrong. I
prefer to believe that a man like Albert Dtirer, whose work was understood
by the people of his age, or Parsons, whose work is understood by those of
to-day, really does more good than one whose designs can only be made
intelligible by a continual reference to the history of symbolism.

Those who have strong faith in the degeneracy of modern art often contend
that we cannot make purely decorative initials equal to those of the men of the
sixteenth century. That the initials of the old men were very beautiful and
very decorative no one would be foolish enough to deny.

^^/■\ ORE OVER, that in the original draw-
ings there was far more refinement
than could be given in the woodcuts,
we know from the little blocks with
the drawings on them, for one reason
'^ or another left uncut, and now to be
seen in the Plantin Museum. In
delicacy of execution this work is
very much akin to modern pen draw-
ing, and would be reviled, was its
)-) existence known to them, by those
who now can find praise only for
_ the really excessively bad reproduc-
Ol/I tions of that early period. Indeed,
there is no better proof of the fact
that, before the days of process, much of the draughtsman's work was lost in
the cutting than a comparison between these drawings on the block and the

printed initials of the same date, while the realistic treatment in the original
drawing also shows that much of the old conventionalism was due to the
limitations of the woodcutter. But that the designing of initials is not a
lost art is demonstrated by reference to the initials by Bridwell, designed for
and published in the Century Magazine, two of which the Century Company
have allowed me to reproduce, as well as those by the Century Guild artists
to which I have just referred. They are quite equal to any initials ever
designed. The actual drawing in Bridwell's lines might in places be some-
what firmer, but it must be admitted that some of Diirer's work of this kind
is about as slovenly as possible. Take Bridwell's letter S, for an initial to
decorate an article on nature, or more especially on a pine wood, could anything

be more appropriate 1 And it is ut-
terly and entirely different in motive
from the other ; one is classic, while
the other shows the free motive of
the Japanese.

I have not published any Japanese
designs because they are not appro-
priate to a European work, not having
been designed for it. But it is quite as
admissible to use Japanese as classical
motives, if we can adapt them to our
purpose. Neither have I given any
of the Europeanised Japanese of Felix
Regamey who, of course, did so much
to introduce this style to western
illustrators. His work to me is always purely that of a European who attempts
to be Japanese, and not the engrafting of European ideas on Japanese motives.

2 M

266 J PEN DRAWING

MONG all the men who have used Japanese sugges-
tions, there is not one who has yet succeeded better
than Habert-Dys. I confess I do not
like the circular form of this design,
because it is impossible to properly
build it into the type, and though I
grant, from this point of view, it is
imperfect, it contains so many beauti-
ful lines and so many good qualities
that I do not hesitate to use it. An-
other method of work adopted by
Habert-Dys is his decorative treat-
ment of birds. He most probably got
his idea from Giacomelli, but he has
improved on it and has added the
Japanese feeling to the whole com-
position, which has been copied all
over the world. F. S. Church too has
worked out this idea, but I do not
think really as well as Habert-Dys. The little drawings of a cock fight by
Renouard are as Japanese as they can be, but yet no Jap would have drawn
them exactly like this. They are as French as they are Japanese.

IRECT copying is, I insist, always bad,
but in the initial and the tail-piece by

Bracquemond there is most skilful com-
bination of German and Japanese, while'
the whole result is French.

Not only the time but a country's
national characteristics can be perfectly
easily e.xpressed in book decoration.
The two designs by E. Unger are as
German as they possibly can be. A
good deal of the tree drawing is bad
and careless, though much of this may
be due to the woodcutting, for it was
drawn on wood. But the spaces are
well filled, there is absolutely no mistaking the Munich model who has posed for
the figure. The same can be said of the drawing by Walter Crane for the
Chants of Labour, to which I have already called attention, where the work-
man is most characteristically an Englishman, and where the whole space is
better filled than in the example of lingers work, and the design is a great
deal more aispropriate, for Unger's was made to be used as a head-piece in

PEN DRAWING FOR BOOK DECORATION

267

Universwn very much in the same manner as Walter Crane's designs were
drawn for Messrs. Clark.

I have said nothing as yet about decorative lettering. The pages of MSS.
and early printed books are often
held up as models, but effective as
they are from a decorative stand-
point, they are only too frequently
extremely difficult to read, and, what-
ever books may have been to their
owners in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries, they to-day are intended
above all to be read. Those who
believe decoration must be primarily
useful, cannot but admit that a le-
gible page is of far more value than a beautiful page which is unreadable. The
MSS. are often, simply in their lettering, far more beautiful than any printed
books. But the men who are held up to-day as masters of book decoration
were only too ready to sacrifice this beauty in order to make use of the
invention of printing, and by it to save time and labour. The profession of
the scribe was doomed from the moment the first printed book was published.
Just as the illustrators after Gutenberg recognised the folly of having the

'^,''V

268

PEN DRAWING

text, which accompanied their drawings, cut on wood instead of being set up
in type, so it would be useless for the illustrator of the modern magazine to

, seek to return to the methods of the first

,rj^^ printers. There is not much doubt that a
Wi,W book with all the lettering reproduced from
the MSS. would be much more trying for
readers than a book with all the text set up
in type. However, for an occasional page
or for a title page, the artists' lettering in-
stead of the ordinary type is very charming.
Walter Crane works, probably to a greater extent than any one else, in this
manner. But I do not altogether like his lettering ; it is nearly always the
same, it is not easy to read, and I do not think it is well spaced. Compare
the sameness of his or Heywood Sumner's lettering with the infinite variety
used by Alfred Parsons, or Howard Pyle,
or Alfred Brennan. The latter vary their
letterinsf to suit their text, and this Walter
Crane and Heywood Sumner never do.
Nor do they even draw it carefully.
Though they believe type and decoration
to be of equal importance they slight the
lettering.

Many examples of good conventional
decorative work I cannot give, simply
because it was designed for pages of a certain size and shape, and therefore
would not be seen here in its proper relations, and justice could not be done
to it. I can, however, refer the student to almost all American artists or
other draughtsmen who contribute to American magazines. Reginald Birch

has done much work which is filled with the feeling of
the German Renaissance, in him developed by study in
Munich. Ludwig S. Ipsen has brought his knowledge
of Celtic art to the decoration of American books, where,
however, one feels it to be a foreign element. Roger
Riordan's designs for stained glass oua^ht to be men-
tioned in this connection, for, reproduced in black and
white, they become beautiful page decorations. George
Wharton Edwards' decorative pen work is frequently
very good, though it is not always very original. It
would be an unpardonable omission to leave out Elihu
Vedder, the greatest American decorator, in some ways
the greatest decorator of modern times, if I were concerned with all forms of
book decoration. But I am only treating of pen work, and Vedder seldom

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works with a pen, nor is his brush work carried out with the pen
feeling. In France the late Paul Baudry did some very fine book
decoration, but, as far as I know, his life was not devoted to this
work, of which he has left comparatively few examples. Much the
same can be said of Luc Ollivier Merson, whose drawings from his
paintings are very decorative in feeling. In Germany there is an
endless number of draughtsmen who use the work of Dtirer to a
greater or less degree, copying it without the least attempt to adapt
it to the special subjects they are illustrating. But I cannot attempt
to give a complete list of the decorators for the simjole reason that all
illustrators are decorators.

Decoration is appropriateness, and it really makes no difference
whether it is realistic or conventional, so long as it improves the
appearance of the page. But at the same time I consider the modern
thoroughly developed realistic work in its best form superior to that
of the old men, because it shows most plainly the advances we have
made in knowledge and technique. However, I cannot conceive how
any liberal-minded person can fail to appreciate the fine qualities
contained in the two drawings of birds by Habert-Dys and Herbert

Home, one done with all the feeling of the nineteenth century, the other, good as it is,
but a copy of the sixteenth. Both are equally decorative.

Nowhere for a moment will such a statement be questioned, except in this country.
But here, within the last thirty years, people have been continuously taught to believe
that book decoration, like all other art work, to be artistic must have a spiritual, moral,
social, political, literary, or sixteenth -century value, while beauty of line and perfection
of execution have been subordinated to these qualities ; as a result the many pay no
attention to the real artistic merits or defects of a drawing, but simply consider it from
an entirely inartistic standpoint. The excuse is the elevation of the masses and the
reformation of the classes. Art will never accomplish either of these desirable ends,
its only function being to give pleasure, but this pleasure will be obtained from good
work produced in any fashion. If the work is equally well, or, as usually happens,
better done in a modern style, it will give more pleasure to a greater number, simply
because it will be far more widely understood.

MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING

2 N

MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING 275

MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING

A S I have said before, the making of a pen drawing is the
-^^- simplest process possible. Only four things are absolutely
necessary — that is besides the rather indispensable qualification,
ability. First, a piece of white paper; second, a hard lead-pencil,
with its adjuncts, a very sharp knife and a rubber ; third, a pen ;
and fourth, a bottle of ink.

First, as to the paper : the photo-engraver will tell you that the
only paper to be used is hard white Bristol board, which undoubtedly
is excellent, and can be worked on more freely with less practice than
any other paper. When I say with less practice, I mean you must
have just about the same amount of preparation as a great violinist
has before he ever appears in public. The comparison is not out of
place, for there are not more great pen draughtsmen to-day than there
are great violinists. But Bristol board is at times very cumbersome
to take about with one ; when it is more than two sheets in thickness
it will not roll without breaking. Though I know every photo-
engraver will declare that my advice will "drive him mad," I can
recommend several other kinds of paper on which good results can
be had. As to whose Bristol board you use, it is of no particular
importance. Goodall's is excellent, but as good is made by Pierre
and Sons, and other firms. I have heard that Reeves' mounting
board is also good. You must only be careful to get a board which

276 PEN DRAWING

is uniformly hard, and has been well dried, and through the surface
of which the pen will not cut as it does sometimes on badly made
boards. With good Bristol board, a good pen and great practice, you
ought to be able to draw as freely in any direction as with a needle
on an etching plate. But you cannot do this after six weeks' or even
six months' work. The chances are you will never be able to. It
is interesting to know that Vierge uses Bristol board. You can see
the trade mark, Bristol A. L., in a garter, a very well-known mark,
shining through a drawing on page 73 of Pablo de Sdgovie, a book
which no one who cares about pen drawing should fail to possess.

Probably the next easiest paper to draw on with a pen is London
board, which I believe is Whatman paper pressed into sheets. It is
usually very good, but you must be very careful to get it from a
reliable dealer, or you will be sure to find soft places. I have always
had mine from Newman in Soho Square and have found it excellent.
However, any thin smooth paper, mounted and pressed, is extremely
good, and if you go to Roberson and Co., Long Acre, they will mount
and press it for you better than any one I know of.

The next paper I might mention is one against which I know
photo-engravers will and do exclaim, that is good, hard, smooth writing-
paper without any lines or water marks. Why they object I do not
know, as either they or the artist, after the drawing has been made,
can with a little care mount the paper, thus making it as solid as
Bristol board. The results are certainly equal to those to be obtained
on Bristol board. I have made many drawings on this paper. More-
over, a great convenience is that in making a tracing from an original
sketch in which you may wish to preserve its fresh feeling, you can
fasten a sheet of thin hard correspondence paper over your original
sketch, and the paper being so thin, you can see the drawing right
through and work on the top of it. Lalanne and many others used
paper of this kind.

Another paper is good hard Whatman paper with a slight grain.
The photo-engraver will object to this too, but in the reproduction
the result is a broken line, which, in the case of old houses, gives a
richness to be had in no other way. This is a point on which most
writers on art would give very explicit and elaborate directions. But
all I shall say is, if you use Whatman paper, get whatever kind or
quality suits you best. It is all very hard to work on at first, because

MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING 277

the pen catches in the interstices of the grain, splutters and drags over
the paper, and often runs into it, malcing a great blot very difficult to
erase. I find Newman's art tablets, which consist of Whatman paper
pasted on both sides of a stiff board, excellent. You can work on
both sides and then split the tablet down the middle. It may be well
to note that to remove blots, or to tone down lines that are too hard,
a very useful instrument is a razor ; though there is a French eraser
with a curved blade, made for working on Papier Gillot, which is still
better. The simplest plan, however, is to paste a piece of paper over
the blot, and to join the lines at the edges.

White crayon papers are used most cleverly by Frenchmen, like
Ulysse Butin and Lhermitte, and by Americans, especially by Tabor
and Lungren ; while Reinhart works on Bristol board in the same
way. Part of the drawing, which is usually large and bold, is put in
with ordinary lithographic crayon, or crayon coiitd, some of the blacks
often with a brush, and the delicate work with a pen. The grain, or
crayon, leaves ridges, which of course reproduce white. No attempt
must be made to use stumps, or to get an even tone by filling up
these accidental whites. The result is like a charcoal drawing with
pen work on it.

There are various sorts of grained paper, the most popular being
that with a horizontal line, which may be taken for the middle tone,
as on a grey toned paper ; on scratching this with a sharp knife either
before or after you have drawn on it, a vertical line in white appears
under, doubling the lightness of the light tone ; this may be again
scratched into pure white. There are three difficulties in using this
paper. One is that the effect of these accurately drawn lines in the
paper is always more or less mechanical ; another, that the drawing
cannot be reduced in size very much without blurring and indistinct-
ness ; and the third is that there is a great tendency to blots. This
paper has been most successfully managed by Vierge, some of whose
drawings made on it, and reproduced in Le Monde Ilhistrd, are, like
all his other work, the wonder and despair of every artist. Adrien
Marie and Montalti have also used it very cleverly, and on it Adolf
Ringel can perfectly reproduce his own bronzes. I have tried enough
just to know how difficult and unsatisfactory the paper is. It is to
be had from almost all the French photo-engraving houses in Paris,
and from the colour shop at the foot of Regent Street. There are

278 PEN DRAWING

numerous varieties ; some have dots, some lines, and some chalky-
surfaces on which you draw, or try to draw, and then lighten your
drawing by scratching through it. You can also wash with colour
and scratch through it. Sandham in America uses this paper to
a very great extent. Personally I do not care for drawings made
on it, with the exception of those of Vierge, who seems to have
succeeded perfectly with it as wath everything else he puts his hand
to. Some of the drawings in Pablo de Si^govie seem to have been
made on paper of this kind, though the white lines may have
been cut through by the engraver, but of this I shall speak later.
However, such draughtsmen as Rico and Abbey use ordinary w^hite
paper.

Of the second necessary, a hard lead-pencil, all I shall say is that
you will want it, as well as a rubber ; why, I shall explain farther on.

With the pen as with the paper, it is a case of finding out what
suits you, and then using it. But I do not think the photo-engraver
will object to any sort of pen. Half a dozen different kinds are often
useful in the same drawing. The most useful all-round pen I know
of is Gillott's Lithographic Crow Quill, No. 659, which, when once
you have mastered it, can be used with the utmost freedom for any-
thing, from the boldest to the most delicate line. It is almost like a
living thing ; it springs and responds to every impulse of your hand,
and is vastly more pleasant than the dull heavy etching needle.
There are many other crow quill pens, but they are all cheap, and,
my experience is, very nasty. A J pen is very useful at times. In
fact any pen you like is serviceable, and what you ought to use. An
ordinary sharp school pen is as good as anything you can have. A
quill pen works beautifully on Whatman paper in any direction, no
matter how you hold it, and you can almost wash with the back of it,
using it as a brush. Vierge, who has used everything, and men who
have made pen and ink copies of Corot's pictures in order to get
something of their softness, have used a double lined pen, but of
this I have had no practical experience. Sometimes a quill pen will
wear so that you can make this double line with it. The author of the
Excellency of the Pen and Pencil, published in 1668, recommends
" pens made of a raven's quill, which will strike a more neat stroke
than the common quill," but for the truth of this I cannot answer. I
have endeavoured to use various sorts of stylographic and fountain

MATERIALS FOR PEN DRAWING 279

pens, which theoretically are perfect. But I have found that, unless
charged with a very watery writing fluid which is sold with them, but
would not answer for reproductive pen drawing, they are practically
useless. It is a pity that makers cannot produce a fountain pen which
an artist could use.

Only lately, in trying to find out what ink a certain pen draughts-
man used, I was told it was a profound secret. And yet by the aid of
a photo-engraver and the careful analysis of a corner of one of his
drawings, in fifteen minutes there was no great difficulty in discovering
that it was Winsor and Newton's liquid lamp black, which is sold at
sixpence or a shilling a bottle. Of such stuff are made most of the
secrets of art. To know what good ink is, and then to get it, means
ease in drawing and success in reproduction. I suppose in this
regard I am in the same condition as all other pen draughtsmen, each
of whom thinks he has the best ink. I might as well give at once
the name of the ink I use, and which of course I believe cannot be
equalled. It is Higgins's American Drawing Ink, not to be bought
at present in England. But it can be had by sending to G. S. Wool-
man, 116 Fulton Street, New York. The price for which an artist
can get it from any dealer in artists' materials in America is twenty-
five cents, or a shilling a bottle. Woolman, however, will charge, or
endeavour to, about sixpence a bottle more, and the expressage from
New York to London, which makes it cost about a guinea a dozen.
It is therefore not cheap, but it is well worth the price. There is no
ink equal to it for half a dozen reasons. First, it is put in a sensible
flat bottle almost impossible to upset. It has a cork with a quill
running through it which forms a handle, and thus keeps your
fingers clean, prevents the cork from dropping into the bottle, keeps
the ink off anything on which you may lay the cork, so beautifully
is it balanced, while there is a pen-wiper attached. I know of no
other ink for artists which is put up in so sensible a manner. Every
one who draws knows how much ink usually goes on one's clothes
and surroundings. As the quill in the cork reaches to the very
bottom of the bottle, every time you pull it out, you stir the ink, so
that there is no necessity to shake up the bottle, and the ink over
yourself, as so frequently happens. Another advantage is that the
bottle is filled with ink, and not with dirty water and a solid sediment
which settles at the bottom, if it is left alone for half an hour. This

280 PEN DRAWING

ink is just as good at the last drop as when you open the bottle. I
never knew but one photo-engraver to complain of it. It is jet black
without shine, flows freely, and never clogs the pen. In short, from
the time you open the bottle until you have put all its contents on
paper, you have no reason to find fault with it. It is made in two
qualities, water proof and not water proof.

Encre de Chine Liqiiide is very good, but I do not think it equals
Higgins's ink. Liquid lamp black is a dead black and has no shine,
and therefore reproduces well. Windsor and Newton's, Newman's,^
and in fact all made artists' inks I have tried, have this fault : the ink
sinks to the bottom of the bottle, leaving a dirty grey liquid. The
makers will tell you that an advantage of their ink is that it will
wash ; but what the artist wants primarily is to make, not a wash, but
a black and white pen and ink drawing. Of course, theoretically, India
ink is excellent. But it not only shines, which is unsuitable for
photo-engraving, but it is very tedious to grind it down for yourself,
and almost impossible to keep it a uniform black. Almost all the
preparations I know of are abominable. Brown inks are very pretty
to look at, but of course are utterly worthless for reproduction, because
the delicate brown tone is all lost, and your drawing is nearly always
printed in black, not in brown.

I do not think there is any other recommendation to be made,
except to insist on the fact that good materials must be used if good
results are Avanted. But enough materials to make several pen
drawings can be had for half a crown.

1 Mr. Mills of Newman's has been, at my suggestion, making many experiments. Their ink
is now very much better.

TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR
PEN DRAWING

2 O

TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR PEN DRAWING 283

TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR
PEN DRAWING

IV /TOST writers on any branch of art begin by laying down
■^^-^ definite laws for working. Mr. Hamerton in his Etching
and Etchers says that the great value in an etching depends upon
the etcher's own individuality in his method of work. He then
goes on to give, in the most clear and lucid manner, directions
for making an etching. I have faithfully followed Mr. Hamerton's
suggestions, and I know into what quagmires they have led me ;
not from any fault of his, but simply because his methods were not
suited to my needs. I therefore know by experience that a man
must work in his own way ; that what is good for one is simply
artistic death for another.

One of the truest old artistic saws is that art can be learned but
not taught. Therefore I do not intend to give infallible laws or
directions on the subject of pen drawing, I only wish to make
suggestions which are the result of a considerable amount of ex-
perience. But the study of good work is really of more practical
value to the student than suggestions, and to show a series of
examples of the best is the reason for the publication of this book.

Theoretically, it is very easy to take a piece of white paper, a

284 PEN DRAWING

pen, and any kind of ink, and draw away. This is really what the
old men did, not minding blots or anything else, so long as they
suggested the idea at which they aimed, and very charming are
many of the sketches they produced in this manner. But now, pen
and ink drawing is another thing.

I might start by saying, though it sounds as if I were trying to
make a bull, that the best way to make a pen drawing is to make a
pencil drawing. Whoever can make a good pen drawing without a
preliminary pencil sketch of more or less importance, may set himself
up for a genius, and be congratulated on his ability to avoid much
drudgery. For convenience sake it will be better to suppose that
my readers are not geniuses, and after all I shall only be ranking
them temporarily with men like Fortuny and Rico. I know a study
by Fortuny of a man draped, in which may be seen under the
drawing, not only the nude figure, but the anatomy as well, drawn
in pencil which has never been rubbed out. I have seen Rico on
the canals of Venice making a pencil drawing more elaborate than
the work which was to succeed it. In Z.'^r/, vol. i., 1884, p. 63,
there is an unfinished pen drawing by Louis Leloir, which is the
strongest proof of what I say on this subject. One side is worked
out with pen, the other is in the preliminary pencil. The pencil has
all the care and reverence of a hard-working but brilliant student,
and the pen, the freedom of an accomplished master, who knows he
has a good foundation and goes ahead. Ruskin tells the student
to make outlines with a hard pencil, and also that a drawing should
be, not only free but right. Other men, Blum and Brennan, I have
been told, never make a preliminary pencil sketch. It is to be
hoped the reader is, but to be feared he is not, as clever as they
are.

The best way is to make a careful sketch with a hard, an H,
or HH lead -pencil on the sheet of paper on which you intend to
make your pen drawing, in which case, in order to save the surface
of the paper, only outline your shadows. In fact, make the sketch
in outline as much as possible, as it must be rubbed out afterwards,
and much rubbing will spoil the surface and grey the ink. Or make
the drawing just as you want it on another sheet of paper, and then
transfer it by means of black transferring paper, or else, as I sug-
gested, use thin correspondence paper. When this is done, go to

TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR PEN DRAWING 285

work with your pen. It would be well to study from masters of
pen drawing, but you must remember, if you study from repro-
ductions, to choose only masterpieces, and that these, unless they
are the same size, do not look like the original drawings, and
even if they are the same size, much delicacy, refinement, and grey-
ness of line have been lost. In this book several of the most
important drawings are reproduced by photogravure exactly the size
they were made, and can therefore be followed line for line. As
a rule, however, the drawings are very much reduced, and you are
consequently not looking at the drawing as it was made, but at the
reproduction the artist wanted you to see. Therefore it must be
borne in mind that the artist made his drawing, not necessarily crude,
but with the lines farther apart than you see them, because, if these
drawings have to be reduced very much, the spaces between the
lines are so diminished that, unless the printing is very careful, as
in the best American magazines and books, you have, instead of
the delicate grey drawing you expected, a dirty black mass, owing
to the ink filling up the spaces between the lines and to the lines
themselves running together.

I hope it will be understood that this is not a manual for
beginners, and that I am not concerned with such questions as,
" How do you draw trees?" or, " How do you make bricks?" You
go to nature and draw them as faithfully as you would if you were
drawing with a pencil or painting in oils. As to light and shade,
colour and tone, pen drawing is subject to the same laws as crayon
drawing, pencil drawing, and etching. There is, therefore, no necessity
for my going into detail on the subject.

You must remember that if you want a sharp line, your work
must be perfectly black, and must stand out clean and alone on the
paper. If you want to get a grey, you will not succeed by putting
water in the ink, but by making the lines light — I mean fine and
separate. This is the general rule to follow. Of course a master
will grey his lines, and run them together, and make a tender grey
where the student would make but a muddle, and in fact do all sorts
of things that I might say should not be done. You will also find
that if you put one solitary line in the sky to mark the outline of a
cloud, it will come out in the reproduction three times as strong as you
intended it to, for the simple reason that though four or five light grey

286 PEN DRAWING

lines may stand up together, one will not, and will have to be thickened
in the type-metal by the photo-engraver. Of course in a photogravure
you can get the lines as fine as you choose to make them. In
drawing your foreground, do not make it too coarse under the
impression that it will be brought by reproduction into proper
relations with the delicate distance. It probably will always remain
coarse. Though there are few things to be remembered in connection
with pen drawing, these few that I have mentioned, such as keeping
the lines apart, not getting too many blacks, are of the utmost
importance. But these are things which must be remembered in
any sort of drawing, if you want a good result.

The size of pen drawings for reproduction is a matter of experi-
ence and personal liking. It is not, as the photo-engraver insists,
necessary to make the drawing one-third or one-half as wide again
as the block is to be. Of course if your drawing is to fill exactly a
certain space, you will have to shape it to fit in. But in most
magazines or books the space is made to suit the drawing, and
all the art editor need do is to reduce the longest side of the
drawing to fit his page, and the type will come in around it. As
to size, for example I believe in many cases Mr. Parsons' drawings
are exactly the same, or very slightly larger than their reproductions,
a contradiction — also proven in this book — to the photo-engraver's
oft-repeated statement that drawings must be reduced in order to
get fine work. On the other hand, I have frequently seen drawings
by Brennan which filled a sheet of Whatman imperial paper, and
were reduced — and beautifully— to five inches the longest way. But
for general advice, it would probably be wisest for the draughtsman
to make his drawing twice the width of the intended reproduction.

There are many devices adopted by every clever pen draughtsman,
which to the purist are very shocking. As, for example, in putting
on in two minutes a flat tone with a brush, which will afterwards
be rouletted by the photo-engraver. It is really a question of getting
what is wanted in five minutes or in five hours. Often, too, one
finds that the distance comes entirely too strong, and will have to
be toned down by a skilful engraver. Frequently the engravings
of French drawings will be cut all over in this way, and are thus
given a soft grey misty effect, often very beautiful. Nearly all the
better pen drawings in Harpers and the Centitry are hand-worked,

TECHNICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR PEN DRAWING 287

as it is called, by skilful engravers. All fine work must be cut
at the edges if you do not want it to look hard and rough.

The thumb is a very useful auxiliary in pen drawing. By
inking your thumb, and pressing it on the paper, you can often get
a strong rich effect, the lines on the skin being marked on the paper,
and reproducing beautifully.

In Fortuny's work are to be found dear delightfully- smeared
dirty blotches, a trial to the purist, but a joy to the artist, since their
value and expression are always just right.

A foreground, old walls of houses, can be richly varied very
beautifully by taking a tooth brush, dipping it in ink, and then
running a match stick under it, and splattering the necessary parts
of the drawing, stopping the others out with paper. The most
charming effects are to be had in this way. But any one who goes
into pen drawing, will learn all these and more devices in a very short
time if he has any facility for it. But he Avill also learn that pen
drawing is an art which requires as much skill and experience on
the part of the artist as etching does, and though less treacherous,
and much more simple in its actual mechanical operation, is also
much less dependent on accidental effects than etching. But the
great thing to remember is, not to try to draw everything under the
sun with a pen, but only those things which by simplification lend
themselves easily and naturally to it. I have already said, you must
know how to draw before you can make a pen drawing, and after
you have learned to draw, you must be able to arrange the most
simple lines in the most artistic manner, or else you will never be a
great pen draughtsman. It is just this want of artistic feeling for
line that makes a man, who may be a great painter, say " O scribble
it down anyway," with a bad drawing as the result. While if you
take a pen drawing by a great master you will find that, though it
may look as if it was scribbled down hurriedly and hastily, it is done
with the greatest care.

I hope none of my readers would be so foolish as to follow the
calmly-given advice of Mr. H. R. Robertson, to copy woodcuts or
steel engravings of any subjects except those done with the pen, and
never then if you can help it. As Mr. Hamerton says: "There is a
wide distinction in every art between possibility and prudence. A
delicate line engraving may be so closely imitated with a fine pen that

288 PEN DRAWING

few people, at a little distance, would at the first glance detect the
difference ; but no artist who knew the value of his time would waste
it in such foolish toil." The only sensible course, if you must copy,
is to copy pen drawings of the greatest pen draughtsmen, if you can
see the originals ; if you can only see their reproductions, to
remember that these have been reduced. For a man to say that
pen drawings are obtained in two distinct methods, one by a few
lines drawn slowly, the other by many lines drawn rapidly, and then
to cite Rembrandt as a man to be studied for the second method, is
to suppose that everybody is an embryo Rembrandt. Had photo-
engraving been invented when Mr. Ruskin wrote his Elements of
Drawiitg, he never would have made the mistake of advising the
draughtsman to cover quickly a space of paper with lines, without
troubling himself as to how they are made, and then to place other
sets of lines on top of them. Certainly the man who can with one
set of lines get the exact grey, which according to Mr. Ruskin is to
be produced with many sets, will be not only doing a much more
artistic piece of work, but saving much time. The consequence
is, if one wishes to get a grey he should cover his paper with
straightish lines, troubling himself infinitely to draw them very
carefully.

As a matter of fact, what you want to do is to take the French
advice and, no matter how good a draughtsman you may be, go
slowly at first in order that you may go fast in the end.

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS

2 P

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS 291

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS

TDEN drawings may be reproduced in two radically different
-^ ways. First, by what is commonly known among artists as
photo-engraving or process, for printing with the type in book,
magazine, or newspaper ; and secondly, by photogravure on a
copper or other plate, for printing like a steel plate or etching.
These two processes may be subdivided, the first into innumerable
methods, and the second into a dozen or more. In the first, the
object is to make a relief block, as I have said, for printing with
type ; and in the second, to produce an engraved plate for printing
separately. Examples of both are given throughout the book.

In the photo-engraving, the drawing is photographed and then
directly etched into a zinc plate, or, after numerous processes, finds
itself on a gelatine or some other film, the film in relief with the
drawing sunken in it. From this film a casting is made, from which
electros may be taken in relief just exactly like type. The production
of this result would be neither clear nor interesting to any but a
photo-engraver or a photographer. It would require a whole book to
be explained, as it has been, and very well, in Modern Methods of
Book Ilhistration.

Photogravures are similarly produced by photographing the
drawing on to a copper plate, which is then bitten more or less in the
same manner as an etching, and worked up afterwards with a graver,

292 PEN DRAWING

or by building up a plate in a bath on a gelatinous film. The result
resembles an etching closely.

Reproduction is a purely mechanical process, but so important
as to be destined almost entirely to supersede all but the best wood-
engraving, and all other sorts of reproductive art. In it no human
intelligence comes between the drawing and the result to any great
degree, although intelligent aid can always be given. For example,
it is almost impossible for a wood-engraver to cut the delicate grey
lines of many a pen drawing. It is equally impossible for the photo-
engraver to reproduce them mechanically. But their intelligent
co-operation, added to the accuracy of the process, will give the desired
effect. I mean the fine line which the wood-engraver cannot cut by
himself, and which is so fine that if reproduced accurately it will
scarcely stand on the process block, can be cut down to the required
fineness on the relief block by the wood-engraver, or by the photo-
engraver, if he is artist enough to do it.

Mr. Hamerton sets forth the great economy of process reproduc-
tions as one of their chief advantages. "It so happens," he writes,
" that nothing we can draw reproduces quite so perfectly as a clear
black ink line on perfectly smooth white paper, and in consequence of
this the art of drawing with the pen has suddenly become the princi-
pal means of disseminating artistic ideas when economy is an object."
But it is very doubtful whether a cheap photo-engraving is really
much cheaper than a cheap woodcut. The latter will look better, as
it is almost impossible to print a cheap process block. Publishers
should reject all but the best reproductions by photographic processes.
Otherwise they only lead to carelessness and the ruin of the artist's
drawing.

Of course it would do the pen draughtsman no harm, but rather
an enormous amount of good, to not only study with the photo-
engraver before he sets himself up as a draughtsman, but also when-
ever his work is being reproduced. No explanation will supply the
criticisms which an intelligent photo-engraver will make on a novice's
drawings, that is criticising them with a view to their reproduction.
Unless men to-day are willing to come out of their luxurious studios —
as some of the best do — and go down to the dirty shop of the photo-
engraver and try experiments, or intelligently consult with him, we
shall never have really artistic workmen and thoroughly good results.

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS 293

There are certain processes by which results resembling pen
drawings are produced. Prepared surfaces of paraffin, or other
materials from which a cast can be made, are laid on plates of
blackened brass or other metal, and you draw with a sharp point
through the film of paraffin, and a cast is taken from the drawing so
made. The result is very like a sharp pen drawing. But there are
two great difficulties to be surmounted ; one is that reduction is
impossible, and the drawing must therefore be the size of the desired
print, and the other is that the mechanical process is much harder to
learn than drawing with a pen, and entirely different. The technical
difficulties are really so great as to be scarcely worth the trouble of
overcoming. They have been mastered, however, with some very
good results by Herkomer and Dawson, the inventor. Randolph
Caldecott also tried this process ; and the late Kent Thomas did
some extraordinary things with it. I believe it is excellent for
the drawing of maps.

Since the introduction of photo-lithography, it has not been
necessary for an artist who is a draughtsman to become a skilled
lithographer in order to have his line drawings reproduced on stone.
For though he should understand the process, there is no more reason
why he should give his time to it than that he should reproduce his
own drawings by photo-engraving. Intelligent supervision of repro-
duction is one thing ; unintelligent waste of time over mechanical
details is quite another. The drawing of the Ponce de Leon Hotel
by Blum, and the example of Waldemar Frederick in the German
Chapter, have been reproduced by some form of lithographic process.

The real advantage of mechanical reproduction can be easily
explained. Unless the artist draws expressly with the thought of
the woodcutting of every single line he is making, no wood-engraver
can follow him. It will be said that the draughtsmen on wood
of Diirer's time did this ; but it really is not likely that they
often did. So tedious, so difficult, and so laborious is this manner
of working that, not only is it an exploded theory that Diirer cut
his own blocks, but I believe he scarcely ever even drew on the
wood. It is more probable that he made the studies which we
possess to-day, that these studies were traced or enlarged or re-
duced on to the block by his pupils, or by the woodcutter himself,
that the design was then touched up by Durer and cut by the

294 PEN DRAWING

engraver. It is impossible otherwise that he could have produced
such an amount of work. I say this as a practical illustrator,
knowing perfectly well the time which must have been given to
one of these drawings. Besides, this was the course the old men
always adopted in their other art work ; they had a shop full of clever
young students, whose hands and brains they used whenever they
could. If Diirer, the typical illustrator at any rate of the Middle
Ages, drew every line for the woodcutter with a handling utterly
different from that which we see in all his etchings, the lesser
men who surrounded and followed him and would have been in-
fluenced by him, did nothing of the sort. They made their draw-
ings on the block with the greatest care, in inks of different degrees
of blackness, and with beautifully arranged lines, and the wood-
engraver cut the blocks without the slightest feeling for the artist's
work. It might very reasonably be asked why did I not then use
more of the old drawings? Because, made on the wood-blocks,
they were cut all to pieces, the engravers not following the artist's
lines, but engraving lines which were easy to cut, ignoring all but
the main ideas of the design, and being, I maintain, incapable,
slovenly, or slipshod, and not to be compared for a minute to the
engravers who have been developed since the time of Menzel.
When they did follow the original lines, it was only because the
artist drew expressly for them, as did the English draughtsmen of
thirty years ago. Everything I say can be proven by a reference
to the spoiled wood-blocks, the only evidence we have, but all we
need, in the Plantin Museum. These drawings were made on the
block in exactly the same way as the draughtsman works on paper
to-day. But I have not used them for two reasons : they could not
be reproduced without infinite labour, since they are spoiled blocks,
and, having been made three hundred years ago, are faded ; and,
moreover, they are no better than work done to-day.

It may be objected that I have elsewhere stated one must draw
specially for reproduction. But the requirements in this case are
even at the present moment the simplest, and may be done away
with in the future ; nothing is necessary but a reasonably clean line,
good ink and white paper. The reason that a certain number of
examples throughout the book are cut on wood is not that process
was unable to reproduce them, but either that the engravings were

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS 295

made before the time of process or that the artists were too indifferent
as to the quality of their ink or paper. There is not a single wood-
cut in the book from which a process block could not be made so
cleverly that it would be impossible to tell, were they placed side by
side, which was the original block and which the process. The
photo-engraving, however, is really superior to the wood-engraving
for this reason : there are not a dozen engravers who can equal the
best process. The work of J. D. Cooper, Paterson, and Swain I
have shown; that of Whitney, Cole, and Collins can be seen in
almost any number of the Century. Cole's marvellous reproduction
of the head of Lincoln after a drawing by Wyatt Eaton in the
Scribner collection of proofs from that magazine, now the Century,
should be mentioned in this connection ; and I now give a woodcut
by the Frenchman, Charles Beaude. These men, and probably a
few others, are the only engravers who can equal process. Some of
Cooper's work is as good as any process. Cole's Lincoln gives
Wyatt Eaton's drawing because it was drawn for him. But the
portrait by Wyatt Eaton reproduced by process in the American
Chapter is far more freely drawn, and there is no wood-engraving
about it. The cut by Beaude after Edelfeldt is most remarkable.
Any woodcutter can show the actual lines, this being the easiest
thing possible to do, so long as there is not too much fine cross-
hatching in the drawing. But few can give the pen quality of the
line, which is extremely difficult. The men to whom I have referred
can. So, too, could some of Menzel's engravers and some of the
English engravers of thirty years ago, though none ever surpassed
the work of Beaude. But the minute even Beaude comes to the
elaborate cross-hatching, the delicate greys, or the pencil marks in
the drawing, he meets an insurmountable barrier. I say most un-
hesitatingly that marvellous as is his woodcut, I much prefer to it
the process blocks after Louis Leloir and Lalauze in the French
Chapter.

But suppose that none of this cross-hatching, these delicate greys
or pencil marks existed in the drawing, and that the wood-engraver
could cut a perfect facsimile in line and in feeling ; it is a crying
shame to put an artist of such consummate ability to doing the work
a machine can accomplish equally well in as many hours as he would
take days. There is no more false subjection of art to mechanism

296

PEN DRAWING

in the adoption of process than there was in the substitution of
movable types for block types, in the development of woodcutting in
the time of Durer, in the resurrection made by Bewick, in the famous
white line loved by Mr. Linton, in the use of the steam press, or
in any other development. Why, if we had not made use of these
improvements and hundreds of others, we would not even have been

apes and winkles ! The minute that any real and true improvement
is introduced and shown to be an improvement, we are blind and
fools not to adopt it. It is not its cheapness which gives value to
process ; neither is it the inability of woodcutting to obtain the
same results — a great engraver almost can ; but it is the fact that
unless this great artist wishes to display his power, it is useless to
compel a wood-engraver — a vastly different person from a woodcutter
— to toil and slave for a result in which a machine so often surpasses

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS 297

him. In a word, this book is merely an exhibition of the best
possible pen drawings I could obtain and the best possible mechani-
cal reproductions of them. It is a plea for pen drawing and an
exposition of process.

These three prints of Dtlrer's Big Horse will show the difference
in the three methods of reproducing the same engraving better than
any amount of written explanation. The first example is a woodcut
by Paterson. A careful comparison of it with the photo-engraving
by the Dawsons, entirely a mechanical reproduction, on the following
page, will make clear the points wherein the photo-engraving fails
and the wood-engraver has succeeded. But the failures of the
mechanical photo-engraving have been less than those of the skilled
craftsman, and the results obtained by photography are truer than
those obtained by the wood-engraver; the block mechanically re-
produced under the supervision of Alfred Dawson, without any
hand-work on it at all, has much more of the feeling of Diirer's
work than Paterson's engraving. The reason for this is simple.
The lines are directly and automatically reproduced by photography,
while each one has to be re-made by the wood-engraver. The photo-
engraver has reproduced the actual lines of Diirer ; the wood-engraver
has had to cut around and produce new ones for himself, which
never can be perfectly done. The Dawsons' block contains no more
lines than Paterson's engraving, — in fact it does not contain as many,
for Paterson has added some that do not exist in the original, and
patched up certain imperfections in the original plate, giving in
consequence a certain wooden feeling to his block and not the look
of metal lines, but this the Dawsons have reproduced in their block,
which therefore comes nearer to the original engraving. Of course
the photogravure is still truer to the original because it contains the
tone, of ink and colour of time found on the print in the British
Museum, and shows that fulness of colour which no wood or process
engraving has yet been able to obtain. These differences between
the woodcut and the process block can only be appreciated by
students, though they should be by collectors. To feel them, a
long study of the cuts will be necessary, and an examination of the
blocks and a comparison with the original is the only way in
which they can be appreciated. The reproduction of a line engrav-
ing by woodcutting is one of the most difficult operations possible ;

2 Q

298

PEN DRAWING

the reproduction of a line engraving by photo-engraving is really
absurdly easy.

As to the photogravure also made by the Dawsons, it is not
nearly so much better than their photo-engraved block as it should

be. It ought to be a perfect facsimile, but though it is probably as
good as anything that could be done in England, it does not compare
with the plate of the same subject by Amand-Durand, which, owing
to an unfortunate business complication, I could not use. To have
properly shown the absolute difference between these forms of re-

REPRODUCTION OF PEN DRAWINGS

299

production and the original, as well as the manner in which they

vary from it, I should have given prints from the Durer plate.

This being impossible, I have tried to point out how they differ

from each other. But even though I have explained that both of

the plates by the Dawsons are mechanically reproduced, as in fact
are all the photogravures in the book, I have no doubt that many
people will speak of them as etchings and call the process blocks
woodcuts. This wilful ignorance on the part of critics and the
public would do no special harm, if it were not that certain publishers

300 PEN DRAWING

are taking advantage of it at the present time to palm off mechani-
cally reproduced plates as etchings, attaching a fictitious value to
them, thus perpetrating a fraud. A careful study of the different
quality of line and the different points in which the three plates
fail and succeed, is the only way in which one can distinguish
between an etching and a photogravure, a process block and a
woodcut.

In all my references to old work, I have used the name of Diirer,
but I do not mean to imply that Diirer was the only illustrator in
the past. I could have proved what I wished as well by reference
to other artists or engravers on steel or wood or copper — to the work
of Lucas Van Leyden, Mantegna, Martin Schongaur, Lucas Cranach,
Hans Holbein, the Venetians, Botticelli, or even Claude. But just
as Adolf Menzel in Germany is the embodiment of modern pen
drawing, in fact of modern illustration, so is Albert Diirer of illustra-
tion in the past. The motives of other days have been given up ;
the motives of to-day have replaced them. Which are the greater
and which the lesser, I have no intention of discussing. As to
technique, of far more importance, it is now infinitely better, and I
do not hesitate to maintain that if Diirer were alive to-day, he would
do twice as good work as he ever did. For Diirer had to draw
directly for the engraver, and then he was not sure of getting the
results he wanted ; the modern illustrator draws for himself.

Neither have I given another example of that oft trotted out
Egyptian brick stamp, nor turned up as a trump the everlasting
playing card, nor quarrelled over the original Saint Christopher.
Indeed, I have purposely omitted all this old work, and begun
where the usual authority leaves off. For I hold that if writers
would only pay some slight attention to what is going on around
them, and stop disputing over the unknowable and undiscoverable
in the past, they would at least collect data which would serve as a
basis for historians of art in the future. Pen drawing or illustration,
the art of to-day, has so far been quite as much ignored as wood-
engraving was in its early stages of development. The illustrators of
the Middle Ages worked for the people ; so do the illustrators of
to-day.

HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING

HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING 303

HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING

I HAVE tried to show what pen drawing is, and in conclusion I
should like to state my great hopes, and greater fears, for the
future of the art. I have already pointed out that pen drawing is
supposed to be despised by almost everybody but a few artists and
art editors, some of the latter having given it recognition simply
because of its cheapness for reproduction. I hope therefore to see
an art, which is looked down upon to-day by the same people who
despised etching until Mr. Hamerton opened their eyes to its true
value, put in its proper place — that is, in equal rank with etching.

A good etching is only a successful pen drawing after all.
The qualities of softness, richness, and mistiness can be given by a
master of pen drawing, and reproduced in photogravure so cleverly,
as to deceive the most accomplished art critic. Smudges, accidental
foul biting, and a thousand other things that go to make the value
of the state of an etching by Whistler, Haden, or Mdryon, can be
obtained in ten minutes by a clever man with an old tooth brush and
a rough skinned thumb, while the drawing, the only autographic
and valuable part of the production, is exactly the same, and the
tone, the softness, and effect of any unwiped plate can be produced by
a good printer for a few pence extra. It is really for blemishes and
defects, accidental or intentional on the part of the very thoughtful
artist, that the collector prizes its rare first state. The value

304 PEN DRAWING

attached to the print from an etched plate is fictitious ; the value
of a pen drawing is real. The pen drawing is the artist's work ;
the etching is only a print from it, often not satisfactory to the artist,
for though he sees just what he wants on the copper-plate, neither
he nor the printer can get it from the plate to the paper. With the
etching, as with the pen drawing, there is only one person who can
own the original. A print from a photogravure of a pen drawing
is really of as much value as the print from an etching. The only
difference is that in nine cases out of ten the etching is a failure,
the photogravure a success. The collector may own the single pen
drawing, but he hardly ever troubles himself to buy the original copper-
plate which is owned by the dealer, and which — and not the print
from it — is the real equivalent to the pen drawing.^ But so ignorant
are some amateurs and collectors that they pay high prices for artists'
proofs of photogravures and autotypes, which cannot even boast of
rarity, and are only better than prints inasmuch as an early pull of
any plate is of course sharper and clearer, and therefore better
than a later one. I have heard the intelligent collector persuaded
into paying £20 for an etching which was quite without artistic
merit, and which in a few years will sell for 20s. ; while,
for a guinea or so more, he had a gorgeous frame thrown in,
which, he was assured, he only got at that price because all the
other subscribers were having exactly the same thing !

To value a work of art only for its rarity is a feeling with
which I have no sympathy. But it is strange that collectors
should not see that an original drawing which they can own and
preserve, and which need not be duplicated if they do not wish it,
is of more value according to their own standard than a print,
which five hundred or fifty thousand other people can own, and
over which they have no control. They are in fact influenced
by dealers who publish almost all the etchings, and are not willing
to encourage the work which would bring them comparatively small
profit.

In a recent conversation with a dealer, he admitted my facts to be

^ Of course the pecuniary value of a work of no one else can duplicate it is, as Mr. Will H.

art is, like that of other things, determined by Low says, " essentially vulgar, and when exercised

the law of supply and demand ; but apart from in the domain of art excessively so." But then

this, the mere ambition to own a thing because Mr. Low is an artist and not a collector.

HOPES AND FEARS FOR TEN DRAWING 305.

perfectly true, but in the next breath he said he would fight against
them so long as he continued in the print business. For the simple
reason that he could purchase an etched plate for the same amount of
money he would have to pay for a good pen drawing ; that if the
plate proved popular, he could sell thousands of proofs from it, some
of which, containing cabalistic and inartistic scrawls, would bring
ten times more than others which only contained the artist's signa-
ture, while these would sell for twice as much as the ordinary plain
prints ; the plain prints themselves being probably quite as good as
the first pulls from the plate, because the artist now steels his plate
the moment it is finished. Exactly the same result could be obtained
by the dealer buying a pen drawing, having a photogravure made
from it and selling the prints. I know that this result is to be had
with absolute certainty, while every etching ordered by a dealer is
an uncertain speculation. Still, if dealers would go to the leading
pen draughtsmen of the day, they would be as sure to get good
drawings as they are now certain of getting bad etchings from
artless etchers. All that is needed is a little exploiting, but dealers
will never do this for themselves. For all business — and etching
is no longer an art, but only a business and a trade — is conducted
on the most short-sighted principles — principles w^hich are rapidly
running etching into the ground. But until nothing more can be
made from etchings, though the market is flooded with them, dealers
will refuse to turn their attention to anything else. I know, as I
have said, that if pen drawing can be made to seem worth the
financial attention of dealers, the result will be, mainly, more money
in their pockets. But still, with so many good pen draughtsmen
now at work, it may show the public that there is at the present
moment a healthy, flourishing art. However, somebody must compel
the dealers to take up pen drawing, if it is to be taken up by them at
all, for they will never do so of themselves.

The objection most art editors find to pen drawing is, that it is
not understood by the masses. I have made many pen drawings, not
only in the house, but among the people, and I have heard from
them more expressions of pleasure in a pen drawling, both while it
was being made and after it was finished, than I have ever heard
given to a pencil or a wash drawing. The reason is easy to explain.
In pen drawing the details, the windows of houses, the delicacy

2 R

3o6 PEN DRAWING

of trees or the study of a figure, half an inch high, are all worked
out carefully, lovingly, and artistically, while in wash drawings these
details may be only suggested, and to the average mortal artistic
suggestion is absolutely meaningless.

That children like pen drawings needs no proof. The success
of Randolph Caldecott's,^ Kate Greenaway's, Adrien Marie's, and
Reginald Birch's drawings, — whether they have a slight wash of
colour or not is of no consequence, — answers all arguments to the
contrary. Of course, as the educated child grows up, its innate
ideas of art are so quickly suppressed that in the end bad drawings
are not infrequently preferred to good. It is only wonderful that
any one cares in the least for drawing.

That some people do, however, is proved by the popularity of
magazines like the Century and Harper s, and of illustrated weeklies
like Le Monde Illiistre, and Fliegende Blatter. As far as I know,
the utterly inartistic and pseudo-comic papers, which are usually
illustrated by pen drawings, have the largest circulation of any
illustrated English periodicals — Ally Slopers Half-Holiday, for
example, though I ought to add that, technically, the late Mr.
Baxter's rendering of Ally Sloper was excessively clever.

Newspapers which really appeal to the masses, and in which
there is never mention of the word art, are beginning to use pen
drawings, some of which are not bad, though the majority are
atrocious. A few of the portraits and little sketches that have
appeared in the Pall Mall Gazette are good, but frequently they
have been remarkable only for their artlessness. But it is in
newspapers that my greatest hopes and fears for the future of pen
drawing lie. I hope that some great inventor like Walter or Hoe -
may turn his attention — as I believe he will — to artistic news-
paper printing. If he does he will kill every magazine. For
just as literary men are only too willing to work for the

1 Some people say children do not appreciate more to obtain the best results from artists'
Randolph Caldecott's work. But any one who drawings than any one else, and whose work
was a child when his books began to come out, comes nearer satisfying artists than that of any
as I was, or who knows anything about children, other printer — he said he had been making
need not be told that such a statement is not experiments continuously for the last few years,
true. in order that when there is a demand for good

2 In fact, in a recent conversation with Mr. De illustrated newspapers he will be able to print
Vinne of New York — the man who has done them.

HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING 307

newspapers, so would the pen draughtsman be, if he could get
his work well printed. And this would merely mean bringing art
to the people, where we are told it was in Italy some hundreds of
years ago. For just as the people are said to have gone to church
to see their art, so many now seek for everything, art included,
in the newspapers. But I fear that when this comes to pass, the
second state of art will be worse than the first, unless the newspaper
office is revolutionised and an art editor introduced. For the news
editor would very likely accept whatever came to hand.

Not only can an illustrated newspaper be printed daily, but
more than one is published to-day. The New York Daily Graphic
and the Paris Charivari are examples. The last time I saw the
New York Graphic, however, it was still suffering under the dis-
advantage of not having any good men to work for it. Instead of
employing good artists, it was content with cheap-looking work,
just as the average newspaper, instead of getting a staff of men whose
writing would give literary value to its columns, employs people
whose special aim seems to be to write stupidly and to enlarge upon
the power of journalism — i.e. of themselves. That their power
is great, owing to the ignorance of the public, is unfortunately
unquestionable. And for this reason, Avith the general use of
drawings in papers, they would be able to bring art down to the
same level to which they too frequently debase literature. In the
illustrated daily of the future, the plan that will have to be pursued
is this : all sorts of illustrated news must be reproduced by the
Meisenbach or other process from photographs ; slight sketches could
be made by clever men in three or four hours, and reproduced
in time to appear in the next, or possibly the same, day's paper ;
more important work must be delayed several days or a week,
but still the daily would be much ahead of the weeklies with its news.

My greatest fear is only that such a paper would be an instant
and phenomenal success, and that its managers would make their
fortunes and then, like those of other papers started by a brilliant
set of young artists, engravers, and journalists, become merely stock-
holders, pocket the profits, and allow the paper to fall to a lower level
than that of the publications it was going to improve. It is just this,
one fears for pen drawing in every direction. The difficulty of
keeping to a very high standard is shown in LArt, which has very

3o8 PEN DRAWING

noticeably gone down during the last few years. The only con-
solation is that pen drawing eventually ruins the people who use
it by abusing it. Our Continent, an American publication, which
started with the most brilliant prospects, was wrecked exactly from
this cause; it began to publish nothing but poor pen drawings
and quickly came to grief. Papers which do continue to improve
week by week and month by month are the Century, Harpers,
Fliegende Blatter. Unless there is an art editor w^ho can draw to
himself a clever staff of artists and keep them, an illustrated paper
can neither go on, nor maintain the position it has reached.

There is an enormous demand for pen drawing growing daily,
and though the supply apparently equals it, pen drawing as an
art is not advancing. There are a few artists who really care
for it in itself, and endeavour with each new drawing to make
something of value, but outside of the larger magazines in which
their work usually appears, they apparently make no impression
on the majority of pen draughtsmen who are filling books and
papers with artless drawings. Any one who will look back,
especially through the European magazines and the Century, will
see that some of the very best pen drawings were made between
1879 and 1883, before this vast army of scribblers had sprung
up and found that their wretched work was of value to people as
ignorant as themselves. Just as architects are wanted to restore
or ruin whatever little beauty is left in the world, so this ever-
increasing army of pen draughtsmen, one might think, is wanted
to lower the standard of pen drawing and turn it farther and
farther away from its legitimate end.

Because so many pen drawings are now made, it has been
said that for artists who work in pen and ink " their only chance
of relative immortality is a reputation won in some other department
of art." A sufficient answer to this assertion is to be had in the
drawings of four men — to mention no more,- — Fortuny, Rico, Menzel,
and Vierge, which will be known so long as there is any love
for art. It might as well be said that because thousands of artless
pictures are painted and exhibited every year, a good painter, in
order to be remembered, must make his reputation as a sculptor or an
architect.

Though it seems as if Mr. Hamerton and Mr. Haden have

HOPES AND FEARS FOR PEN DRAWING 309

shown people the beauty and true province of etching, only to
make the fortune of print dealers and to set on pinnacles men who
transgress every law governing etching as a fine art, yet at the same
time, etchers like Whistler, Haden, and Buhot occasionally produce
plates which prove the beauty and province of the art have not been
entirely forgotten. In like manner there is a strong saving remnant
among pen draughtsmen, and upon it hopes for the future of pen
drawing can safely rest. But if good pen drawing is to be confined
to these few men, and elsewhere to be used as a medium for
disseminating the cheapest and worst art, the outlook is dark enough.
Whether the few will leaven the whole is doubtful. But they certainly
will never be swallowed up entirely, and their work, like all good art,
will live.

INDEX

Abbey, Edwin A., x, xi, 31, 71, 72, 78, 95, 96,
99, 140, 196, 198, 201, 202, 203, 209, 236,
253, 278.

Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, 201.

Adams, Maurice B., 243, 244.

Adan, E., 91, 100.

Adventures of Philip, Fred Walker's illustrations
for, 149.

jEsop's Fables, Caldecott's illustrations for, 180.

Albrecht, H., 67.

Aldine press, 251.

Alice i?i Wondei'land, Tenniel's illustrations for,
144.

Ally Sloper's Half-Holiday, 306.

Alma Tadema, L., 235.

Amand-Durand, x, 140, 192, 298.

America?! Architect and Bidldiiig NeiL'S, the, 242.

Angerer and Goschl, 82.

Arabian Nights, the, illustrated, 137.

Architectural Association, 244.

Armstead, H. H., Wirgman's drawing of, 160.

Art criticism, worthlessness of inartistic, 31.

Art critics, praise given by, viii, ix ; teaching of,
I ; indifference to black and white of, 29 ; on
the Spanish school, 33 ; importance attached to
thoughts of, 36 ; abolition of, 46 ; on French
art, 89; on etching and photogravure, 186;
English, 210.

Art patrons, publishers as, ix; royalty as, 65, ill.
Art Review, the, 196.

Aucassin and Nicolette, Jacomb - Hood's illustra-
tions for Lang's translation of, 145.

Backer, Otto H., 200.
Barber, Alice, Miss, 200, 215.

Barnard, Fred, 145, 149.

Barnes, R., 149.

Barye, A. L., 125.

Baude, Charles, 163, 295.

Baudry, Paul, 270.

Baxter, W. G., 306.

Beaux-Arts, Ecole des, 116, 195.

Bellini, Giovanni, 9, 21, 35, 251.

Bennett, C. H., 139.

Bentworth, 64.

Beraud, Jean, viii, 91, 187, 224.

Bergen, F., 67.

Berlin Photographic Co., 69.

Besom -Maker, The, illustrated by Heywood
Sumner, 262.

Bewick, T., 296.

Bible, Dore, the, 147.

Bible Gallery, Dalziel's, xi, 147, 148, 153, 154,
157-

Birch, Reginald, 124, 196, 205, 268, 306.

Blackburn, Henry, his catalogues, 141.

Bliicher, Menzel's drawing of, 69, 71.

Blum, Robert, x, 31, 36, 96, 120, 122, 174, 175,

196, 197, 218, 219, 228, 284, 293.
Boldini, J., 197.
Books of Beauty, 257.
Botticelli, 8, 300.
Boughton, G. H., 141.
Bracquemond, Fehx, 91, 266.
Bradbury, Agnew, and Co., x.
Bradley, Basil, 149.
Braun's autotypes, 8, 56.
Brennan, Alfred, 31, 103, 104, 120, 196, 197,

198, 220, 223, 228, 236, 268, 284, 286.
Breton-Folk, Caldecott's illustrations for, 179.

312

INDEX

Bridwell, H. L., 200, 264, 265.

Brown, Ford IMadox, xi, 139, 153, 154.

Browne, Gordon, 144.

Browne, H. K., 139.

Browning", Mrs., Poems, Ipsen's illustrations for,

200.
Brunet - Debaines, A., 92, 137.
Buhot, Felix, 128, 309.
Surges, W., 244.
Busch, W., 67.
Butin, Ulysse, 112, 158, 277.

Caldecott, Randolph, x, 67, 103, 144, 179,

180, 181, 184, 262, 293, 306.
Canaletto, 56.
Caran D'Ache (Emmanuel PoiriiJ), 124, 131, 133,

173, 180, 181, 188, 217,261.
Caricaturists, 80, 131, 173, 199, 217.
Carrere and Hastings, x, 219, 246.
Casanova y Estorach, A., x, 27, 30, 32, 58, 59,

60, 196, 220.
Cassell and Co. (Limited), x, 147.
Caxton, 256.

Centennial Exhibition (Philadelphia, 1876), influ-
ence on American artists, 196, 200.
Century hx^ Department, 197.
Century Company, the, ix, 218, 265.
Century Guild, artists of, 262, 265 ; Hobby-Horse,

264.
Century Magazine, 11, 31, 85, 104, 120, 160, 196,

197,198,199,227,246,265,286, 295, 306,308.
Ccnticry publications, 200.

C^cra una Volta, Montalti's illustrations for, 46.
Chants of Labour, cover by Crane, 261, 266.
Chase, William M., 196.
Cliat Noir, shadow pictures of, 131.
Chefdeville, Louis, 138, 214.
Chelmonsky, J., 235.
Chessa, 33.

Chichester, Charles F., x.
Chodowiecki, D. N., 63, 72.
Church, F. S., 200, 266.
Cimabue, 39.
Clark, R. and R., excellence of printing of, xi ;

Crane's designs for, 261, 267.
Classical Dictionary, Smith's, 46.
Claude, 10, 89, 300.
Coaehing ]Vays and Coacliing Days, Railton and

Thomson's illustrations for, 262.
Cole, T., 64, 163, 199, 295.
Collins, R. C, 64, 295.
Comic draughtsmen, viii. 67, 80, 131, 142, 165,

166, 199, 217.
Cooper, J. D., iSo, 203, 295.
Cornliill, The, 137, 147, 149; collection of proofs,

140.

Corot, 8, 278.

Coups de Fusil, De Neuville's illustrations for, 90,

98.
Courboin, E., 133, 188.
Court and Society Review, 142.
Cox, Kenyon, 120, 166, 197, 228.
Craik, Mrs., M'Ralston's illustrations for novels

by, 149.
Cranach, Lucas, 300.
Crane, Walter, 142, 145, 176, 17S, 208, 209,

260, 261, 266, 267, 268.
Cruikshank, George, 143.

Da Vinci, 2, 8.

Dahieim, 10, 82.

Daily Graphiic, New Yorh:, 307.

Dalziel Brothers, xi, 147, 148, 149, 153, 154, 157.

Dance of Deatli, Holbein's, 9.

Dantan, E., x, 100, 160.

Darley, F. O. C, 199.

Davillier, Baron, Life of Fortuity, 28, 29, 36.

Dawson, A. and C, 203, 207, 293, 297, 298,

299-
Day, B., 188, 197.

D'Epinay, M., Fortuny's portrait of, 29.
De Lesseps, Ringel's drawing of head of, 46, 116.
De Monvel, Boutet, 124.

De Neuville, A., 27, 67, 89, 90, 97, 98, 196, 198.
De Vinne, T. L., 197, 257, 306.
De Wylie, M., 128.

Denis Duval, Fred Walker's illustrations for, 149.
Desmoulins, Louis, 19, 20, 21, 199.
Detaille, E., 67, 89, 90, 97, 98, 141, 196.
Dickens, Charles, illustrations for his books, 149.
Diclman, F., 196.

Dietz, W. (Diez), 27, 66, 73, 83, 196.
Divine Comedy, Botticelli's illustrations for, 8 ; 257.
Dobson, Austin, 198, 203.
Dore, G., 90, 145, 147.
Douglas, David, x.
Drake, A. W., x, 196.
Drake, Will H., 85, 104, 200.
Du Maurier, G., 139, 142, 162, 163, 165, 166,

174, 182.
Du Mond, F. B., 104, 200.
Duez, E., 91.
Diirer, Albert, 2, 9, 16, 19, 64, 138, 150, 153,

164, 176, 178, 208, 209, 251, 252, 254, 255,

256, 257, 258, 259, 260, 264, 265, 270, 293,

294, 296, 297, 299, 300.
Duveneck, F., 196.

Farly L TALLIN PoETs, frontispiece by Rossetti for,

148.
Eaton, Wyatt, 120, 199, 231, 295.
Felloes of Hellas, Crane's illustrations for, 261.

INDEX

313

Edelfeldt, A., 295.

Edwards, G. W., 200, 268.

Ein Erster wid em Letzter Ball, 66 ; Schlittgen's
illustrations for, 74.

Ein Schloss in den Ardmnen, 66 ; Liiders' illus-
trations for, 7S.

Ein Soldatetileben, by Liiders, 78.

English Illustrated Magazine, the, 185, 262.

Etching, difference between pen drawing and. 3 ;
old masters', 8; Durer's, 9 ; Vandyke's, 19,
20, 21; why appreciated by collectors, 10 ;
Rembrandt's, 10, 22; Whistler's, 22, 142;
influence of pen drawing on, 27 ; Jacquemart's,
85, 104; Lhermitte's, 95; Lalanne's, no;
Lalauze's, 126; photogravure miscalled, 1S6,
299, 300; drawing on glass miscalled, 197 ;
Hamerton's directions for, 283 ; pen drawing
compared with, 303, 304, 305 ; financial value
of> 305 ; conditions of the art to-day, 309.

Evans, Edmund, x, 180.

Fabbi, 33.

Fabres, A., 32, 36, 48, 153, 218.

Eainilien Concert, 66.

Farny, H. F., 196, 207.

Fau, Ferrand, 32, 51.

Favretto, G., 33, 44.

Feh zum Meer, 82.

Fenn, Harry, 199, 227, 242.

Ferris, Gerome, 197.

Ferris, Stephen J., 197.

Fiffs der Affe, illustrated by Busch, 67.

Figaro, 131.

Figaro Illicstre, 133.

Fildes, Luke, 139, 163.

Fliegendc Blatter, 66, 68, 73, t;, 82, 143, 196,
198, 199, 306, 308; artists of, 82, 196, 198.

Forestier, A., 143, 144, 145.

Fortuny, M., 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 35, -:,e,
39, 40, 48, 63, 66, 72, 139, 196, 197, 198,
203, 21S, 220, 224, 284, 287, 308.

Fraser, W. Lewis, .\, 11.

Frederick, Waldemar, 83, 86, 293.

Frederick the Great, Life aiid IVorks of, illus-
trated by Menzel, 63, 64, 65, 70, 72 ; Uniforms
of the Army of, illustrated by Menzel, 70, 201.

Frost, A. B., 133, 173, 196, 199, 210, 214, 217.

Furniss, Harry, .x, 142, 173.

Galice, Louis, 19, 32, 51.
Gamm, A., 64.
Gaucherel, L., 116.
Gautier, Lucien, 91, 246.
Gautier, St. Elme, 116.
Gazette des Beaux- Arts, 10.
Gebbie and Barrie, 197.

George, Ernest, 244.

Germania, illustrated by Menzel, 63, 69, 70.

Giacomelli, J., 266.

Gibbons, Grinling", 140.

Gilbert, John, Sir, 144.

Giotto, II, 39, 242, 255.

Godwin, E. W., 242.

Gomar, 33.

Good Words, 137, 147, 149; collection of proofs,

149.
Gosse, Edmund, xi, 203.
Goupil and Co., 90, 98.
Graham, C, 200.
Graphic, The, 91, 147, 149, 163.
Grasset, 259, 260.

Gray, Paul, 139. ' •

Greatore.K, Elinor, Mrs., 197.
Green, Charles, 141, 149.
Greenaway, Kate, Miss, 306.
Gregory, E. J. 141.
Griffenhagen, M., 143, 145, 182.
Grimthorpe, Lord, 248.
Griset, E., 139.
Guillaume Freres, 257.
Gutenberg, 256, 267.

Habert-Dys, J. A., 92, 200, 236, 261, 266, 270.
Hacklander, Trouville, etc., 66 ; Humoristische,

66 ; books, 74.
Haden, F. Seymour, 303, 308, 309.
Hall, J. F., xi.
Hals, Franz, 7.
Hamerton, P. G., 3, 4, 7, 1°, 28, 90, 138, 287,

292, 303, 308; Etching and Etchers, I, 283 ;

Graphic Arts, 2, 27 ; Paris, 96, no.
Harper and Brothers, x.
Harpe>^s Alonthly, 30, 85, 104, 140, 145, 197,

201, 204, 246, 286, 306, 308; office, 196,

201 ; publications, 200, 201.
Hassam, F. Childe, 200.
Haug, R., 67, 74, TJ, 78, 82, 83, 98, 143-
Havard, H., La Hollande a Vol d'Oiseau, Lalanne's

illustrations for, 14, 92, no, in.
Hawley, Hughson, 200.
Heliogravure, or heliotype, 86.
Heliotype, in Ujiiverstim, 83, 86.
Hengel, O., 82.

Herkomer, Hubert, 45, 141, 163, 293.
Herrick, Poems, Abbey's illustrations for, 198,

201, 202.
Heseltine, J. P. xi.
Hill, L. Raven, 187, 188.
Hoe, R., 306.

Holbein, 9, 63, 251, 254, 256, 300.
HoU, Frank, 141.
Home, Herbert P., x, 262, 264, 270, 271.

2 S

3'i4

INDEX

Houghton, A. Boyd, 139, 163.

House that Jack Built, The, Caldecott's illustra-
tions for, 179.

Howells, W. D., Reinhart's illustrations for his
books, 198.

Hudson, T., 72.

Huet, Paul, 10, 89.

Hunt, W. Holman, 139.

Hunter, Colin, 141.

Hyde, W. H., 199.

Illustrated London News, 143.

Image, Selwyn, 142, 262, 264.

In his Name, Jacomb-Hood's illustrations for, 145.

In Damen Coupe, illustrated, 66.

Ink, 279, 280 ; used by Rico, 56 ; lithographic,
71; brown, 180, 280; Higgins' American draw-
ing, 279 ; Winsor and Newton's lamp black,
279, 280; Encre de Chine Liquide, Newman's,
Winsor and Newton's, India, etc., 280.

Institute of Technology, the Massachusetts, 243.

Ipsen, L. S., 200, 268.

Irving, Washington, Darley's illustrations for his
books, 199.

Jacomb-Hood, p. G., 145.

Jacquemart, J., 85, 103, 104, 198, 253.

Japanese art, influence of, 220; debt of American
and European artist to, 236 ; motives and de-
signs of, 265, 266.

Jeanniot, P. G., 90, 98, 103, 104, 143.

Jefferson, Joe, Blum's drawing of, 218, 219.

Jellicoe, John, 185.

Job, 133.

Journalism, Desmoulins' influence on illustrated,
20 ; power of illustrated, 307.

Judy, artists of, 143.

Junghng, J. F., 64.

Keene, Charles, x, 69, 139, 143, 145, 162, 167,

181.
Kemble, E. W., 199, 210, 214.
Kirkpatrick, Frank L., 200.
Kunst fitr Alle, 73, 82, 83.

L'ArmAe Franqaise, Detaille's illustrations for, 98.
L'Art, 30, 32, 36, 48, 90, 91, 93, III, 112, 116,

120, 128, 140, 162, 284, 307.
L Illustration, 91, 131.
La Comidie de Notre Temps, illustrated by Caran

D'Ache, 131.
La Comedie du Jour, illustrated by Caran D'Ache,

131-
La Cruche Casse'e, illustrated by Menzel, 63.
La Ilustracion Artistica, 48.

La Ilustraeioti Espaiiola y Americana, 30, 52.

La Revue Illustree, 91,1 04, 131.

La Vie Moderne, 19, 30, 31, 32, 36, 91, 104, 128,

139.

La Vie Parisienne, 91, 143.

Lalanne, Maxime, i, 13, 14, 15, 27, 39, 92, no,
137, 276 ; Treatise on Etching, i.

Lalauze, A., 126, 295.

Lamb's Essays, Railton's illustrations for, 186.

Langon, Auguste, 91, 125.

Lang (German painter), S3.

Lawless, J. M., 139.

Lawson, Cecil, 139, 141.

Lazy Minstrel, J. Ashby-Sterry's, Abbey's draw-
ing for, 203.

Le Charivari, 307.

Le Cout rier Franqais, 9 1 .

Le Monde Illustre, 31, 51, 91, 277, 306.

Le Petit Jour7ial pour Rire, 91.

Leech, J., 73, 139, 143.

Legge, J. G., x.

Leighton, Frederick, Sir, xi, 139, 149, 154, 157.

Leloir, Louis, 99, 109, 126, 284, 295.

Leloir, Maurice, 91, 109, 126, 253.

Lemaire, Madeleine, Mme., x, 92, 99.

Les Artistes Celebres, Rembrandt, 10.

Les Courses dans VAntiqidtc, illustrated by Caran
D'Ache, 131.

Les Premieres, 32,51.

Lessore, J., 247.

Leveille, A., 29, 36.

Lhermitte, Leon, 95, 96, 277.

Librairie de L'Art, 10.

Life, New York, 143, 200.

Lincoln, W. Eaton's drawing of head of, 199, 295.

Linton, J. D., Sir, 141, 149.

Linton, W. J., 148, 296.

Lithography, Menzel's drawing for, 65, 69, 71 ;
change affected by introduction of photo-, 66,
293 ; Darley's outline drawings reproduced by,
199.

Little Lord Fauntleroy, Birch's illustrations for,
196, 205.

Low, Will H., 304.

Ltiders, Hermann, 67, 74, 77, 78, 83, 98.

Lunel, F., 32, 188.

Lungren, Frederick, 31, 197, 224, 228, 236, 277.

Lynch, Albert, 121.

M'Dermott, Jessie, Miss, 200.

M'Kim, Meade, and White, 246.

M 'Ralston, J. W., 149.

Macbeth, R. W., 141, 163.

Mackmurdo, A. H., x, 262.

Macmillan and Co., viii, ix.

Madrazo, Mme., Galice's drawing of, 19.

INDEX

315

Madrazo, R., 27, 31, 32.

Magazine of Art, 36, 138, 142, 227.

Mahoney, J., 139, 149.

Mandlick, 82.

Manet, Edouard, viii.

Maiion LescMif, Leloir's illustrations for, 253.

Mantegna, 251, 258, 300.

Marie, Adrien, 91, 188, 277, 306.

Marks, H. S., 139.

Marold, Ludwig, 67, 79, 124, 187.

Mars, 91, 124, 187, 18S, 261.

Masic, Niccolo, 235.

Mason, Ernold, 144.

Mar und Moritz, Busch's illustrations for, 67.

Meckenen, Israel von, 9, 258.

Meissonier, J. L. E., 69, 89, 98, 147.

Menzel, Adolf, x, 27, 31, 35, 36, 39, 40, 60, 63,

64, 65, 66, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 77, 90, 95,
139, 141, 147, 150, 154, 163, 179, 196, 201,
202, 203, 294, 295, 300, 308.
Mercid, M. J. E., 116.
Merson, Luc Ollivier, 270.
Meryon, C, 10, 303.
Michael Angelo, 2, 8, 27, 72.
Michel, Emile, Rembrandt by, i o.
Michetti, 33.

Millais, John E., Sir, 139, 149.
Millard, Walter, 244, 245.
Millet, Jean Francois, 89, 95
Missal of Maximilian, 258.
Mitchell, A. B., 247.
Mitchell, J. D., 199.
Montalti, A., 33, 46, 47, 277.
Moran, Peter, 197.
Moran, Thomas, 197.
Morgan, Mat, 199.
Morrow, A. C, 262.
Morten, T. 149.
Muhrman, Henry, 196.
Miiller, Hermann, 65.
Mulready, W., 144.
Miinchencr Kalender, 259.
Munkacsky, M. de., 235.
Murch, A., 149.
Murray, David, x.
Museum, Berlin, edition of Menzel's drawings issued

by, 65 ; Menzel's drawing of BRicher in, 69.
Museum, British, xi ; old prints in, 9, 21, 297;

Uniforms of the Army of Frederick the Great

in, 201.
Museum, Plantin, 254, 264, 294.
Museum, South Kensington, xi ; illustrated papers

in, 32 ; original blocks in, 139, 142 ; Mulready's

drawings in, 144 ; Rossetti's drawing of his wife

in, 148.
Myrbach, 187.

Nast, Thomas, 199.

Nops, D. T., Electrotype Agency, x.

Oberlander, a., 67, 80, 133, 173.

Old masters, pen drawings by, 7-2 3 ; sketches of
projects and intentions, 7 ; comparison between
their etchings and pen drawings, 8; com-
parison of Butin's methods with those of, 112 ;
relation of modern to pen drawing of, 138,
139 ; contrast of Small's pen drawing with that
of, 158.

Old Songs, Parsons' and Abbey's illustrations for,
78, 201, 202.

Once a Week, 11, 137, 139, 142, 147, 165.

Otto of the Silver Hand, Pyle's illustrations for,
209, 258.

Our Continent, 308.

Overbeck, J. F., 35.

Pablo Dii Segovie, illustrated by Vierge, 31, 32,
41, 7S, 276, 278.

Pall Mall Gazette, 306.

Paolocci, 33.

Paper, Papier Gillot, 46, 120, 277 ; grained,
46, 277, 278 ; Whatman, 56, 192, 276,
277, 278, 286 ; London board, 203, 276 ;
Bristol board, 205, 275, 276, 277 ; Pierre and
Sons', and Goodall's Bristol board, 275 ;
Reeves' mounting board, 275 ; crayon, 277 ;
Roberson and Co.'s, 276 ; Newman's London
board and art tablets, 276, 277.

Parables, Sir J. E. Millais' illustrations for, 149.

Paris Exhibition, drawings and engravings at
(1889), 203, 237.

Paris Illustre, 32, 51, 91.

Parsons, Alfred, x, 30, 78, 96, 99, 140, 141, 145,
149, 174, 180, 190, 192, 200, 203, 209, 236,
253, 260, 261, 262, 264, 268, 286.

Parsons, Charles, x.

Partridge, B., 143, 145.

Paterson, R., 163, 295, 297.

Pen drawing, no authorities on, ix, i ; modern
development of, 2, 10, ii ; H. R. Robertson
on, 3 ; difference between etching and, 3 ; aims
of, 4 ; in the past, 7-23 ; Spanish and Italian,
27-60; a painter's process, 27; Fortuny's in-
novation in, 28 ; ignored by critics, 29 ; an art
for clever men, 31 ; German, 63-86; Menzel's
influence on, 63; French, 89-133; original
work expressed in, 90 ; a fashion in Paris, 92 ;
used in illustrating catalogues, 93 ; of sculpture,
114, 116, 120; example of tonality in, 128;
English, 137-192; in Once a Week, 139; best
period in England of, 147 ; American, 195-231 ;
in other European countries, 235 ; Japanese,
236, 237 ; architectural, 241 - 248 ; for book

3i6

INDEX

decoration, 251-271 ; materials for, 275-280;
technical suggestions for, 28 3-2 88 ; things to be
remembered in, 286 ; size of, 286 ; devices in,
2S6, 287 ; proper subjects for, 287 ; models for,
288; reproduction of, 291-300; art of to-day,
300 ; hopes and fears for, 303 ; etching com-
pared with, 303, 304, 305 ; financial value of,
305 ; objections made to, 305, 306 ; for news-
papers, 306, 307, 308 ; demand for, 308 ;
future of, 308, 309.

Pen and Pencil, Excellency of, 3, 278.

Pennell, Mrs. E. R., ix.

Pens, used by Raffaelli, 45 ; used by Casanova,
58; used by Butin, 112; double line, 125,
278; brush used as, 157, 162, 180; used by
Wyllie, 159; Gillott's lithographic crow-quill.
No. 659, J., and quiU, 278 ; stylographic and
fountain, 278, 279.

Pepper and Salt, Pyle's illustrations for, 198, 209.

Phiz, 143.

Photo-engravers, of Fabres' drawing, 48 ; Ameri-
can, 126; English, 126, 138; size of drawing
suggested by, 174, 2S6 ; their methods to
give effect of wash, 18S; Chefdeville, 214;
paper recommended by, 275, 276 ; value of
criticism by, 292 ; co-operation with wood-
engraver, 292.

Photo-engraving, influence on pen drawing of, 2,
27, 66, 90; history of, 11 ; aids to develop-
ment of, 60, 96, 197; Menzel's work repro-
duced by, 69; of Dantan's drawing, 100;
advantage to the artist of, 137 ; Dawson's, 203,
207; drawings made for, 218; best example
of, 231 ; inks suitable for, 280; object and
methods of, 291 ; economy of, 292 ; superiority
to wood-engraving of, 293, 294, 295 ; compared
with woodcutting and photogravure, 297, 29S,
299, 300.

Photo-lithography. See Lithography.

Photo-print, or heliotype, 86.

Photography, aid to artists of, 8 ; applied to repro-
duction of pen drawings, 11, 64, 138, 147;
artistic use of, 210, 219, 220, 228; use to
architects of, 247.

Photogravure, reproductions of Fortuny's drawing
by, 29 ; of- Vierge's drawing, 41 ; of Fabres'
drawing, 48 ; of Rico's drawing, 52, 53, 56 ;
of Casanova's drawing, 58, 59, 60 ; of Menzel's
drawing, 69, 7 1 ; difference between heliotype
and, 86 ; of Detaille's and De Neuville's work,
90, 98 ; of Lhermitte's drawing, 95, 96 ; advan-
tages of, 140, 162, 163 ; of Sandys' drawing com-
pared with woodcut, 150; of Sir F. Leighton's
drawing compared with woodcut, 157; of Fred
Walker's drawing, 162 ; of Reid's drawing,
174; miscalled etching, 186; of Parsons' draw-

ing, 192, 260; of Abbey's drawing, 202; of
Blum's drawing, 218; important drawings
reproduced by, 285 ; object of, 291 ; how made,
291, 292 ; compared with photo-engraving and
woodcutting, 297, 298, 299, 300; real and
fictitious value of, 304, 305.

Pkk-Me-Up, artists of, x, 187, 188.

Picturesque America, Fenn's illustrations for, 199.

Pinwell, G, J., 139, I49, 162, 163.

Pite, A. B. Beresford, 245.

Piton, Camille, 200, 246.

Plantin, 255, 256.

Plon, Nourrit, and Co., 133.

Poirson, V., 32, 253.

Ponce de Leon Hotel, descriptive pamphlet of, x,
219.

Portfolio, Tlie, no, 137.

Poussin, Nicholas, 89.

Poynter, E. J., xi, 139, 154.

Pre-Raphaelites, the, 150.

Pre-Raphaelite movement, Du Manner's burlesque
of, 166.

Pre-Raphaelite work, 153.

Prince's Progress, The, Rossetti's illustrations for,
148.

Printing, American, xi ; R. and R. Clark's, xi ; of
process blocks, 56 ; comparison of French and
American to English block, 138 ; De Vinne's,
197 ; progress in, 208, 209, 218 ; of old work,
253 ; early and modern, 256, 257 ; of Hobby-
Horse, 264 ; of photo-engraving and photo-
gravure, 291 ; of illustrated newspapers, 306.

Process, reproduction of "\'andyke's and Rem-
brandt's etchings by, 10; influence on pen
drawing of, 1 1 ; meaning of, i i ; advantages
of, 29, 64, 137, 168, 169; value of drawings
made for, 36 ; printing of, 56 ; Vierge's in-
fluence on, 60 ; iNIeisenbach, 66, 92, 307 ;
Guillaume, 92 ; paintings reproduced by, 93 ;
Jeanniot's work adapted to, 103 ; possibilities
of, 126, 154; English, 138; English draughts-
men who have worked for, 145 ; reproduction
of old woodcuts, 148, 149 ; compared to wood-
cuts, 168, 169; Furniss' work for, 173 ; Bren-
nan's knowledge of, 223 ; economy of, 292 ;
processes resembling pen drawing, 293 ; re-
quirements of, 294, 295 ; true value of, 296,
297 ; for newspapers, 307.

Puck, 200.

Punch, 138, 143, 147, 165, 166, 167, 170, 173.

Pyle, Howard, x, 17S, 196, 198, 20S, 209, 253,
25S, 259, 268.

OUANTIN, 14, no.

RAFF.-\iiLLI, J. F., 33, 45.

Railton, Herbert, 144, 145, 184, 185, 186, 262.

INDEX

317

Rajon, Paul, 140.

Raphael, 2, 8, 27, 153.

Redwood, A. C, 200.

Regamey, Felix, 236, 265.

Reid, George, x, 30, 140, 141, 145, 174^ 175.

Reinhart, C. S., 196, 198, 203, 204, 277.

Reitch, J., 199.

Rembrandt, 2, 7, 8, 9, 10, 22, 82, no, 288.

Remington, Frederick, 184, 199, 210, 214.

Renouard, Paul, 91, 266.

Ri^pine, 235.

Reynolds, Joshua, Sir, 39, 40, 72, 160.

Richardson, 245.

Richfelt, K., 86.

Richter, Albert, 82, 83.

Rico, Martin, x, 9, 27, 29, 30, 31, 33, 52, 53, 56,
57, 63, 92, 96, 122, 139, 153, 192, 196, 197,
198, 201, 203, 219, 224, 278, 284, 308.
Ringel d'lllzach, 46, 91, 116, 277.

Riordan, Roger, 268.

Robertson, H. R., Pen Drawing hy, 2, 287.

Robida, A., 92.

Robin Hood, Pyle's illustrations for, ig8, 209.

Rochegrosse, G., 92, 187, 261.

Rogers, W. A., 199.

Romola, Sir F. Leighton's illustrations for, 149.

Rossetti, D. G., 2, 16, 19, 29, 148.

Rossetti, W. M., x, 148.

Rossi, 187.

Roth, 80.

Rousseau, J., 89.

Routledge, George, and Sons, x.

Royal Academy, 93, 246, 247 ; Architectural

School of, 3.
Royal Institute of British Architects, Transactions

of, 243, 244, 245.
Ruskin, John, 3, 247, 284 ; Elements of Drawing,

I, 9, 288.
Ryland, Henry, 262.

St. Nicholas, 196, 198, 224, 261.

Salon, 93, 95, 116, 235.

Salon Catalogue, 32, 90, 93, 128, 260.

Sambourne, Linley, x, 143, 168, 169, 170.

Sandham, H., 278.

Sandys, F., xi, 139, 148, 150.

Scheyner, 82, 83.

Schlittgen, H., 66, 67, 74, 82, 124, 143, 182,

187, 205, 224.
Schongaur, Martin, 300.
Schultz, R. W., 245.
Scoppetta, 33.

Scott, H., 91, 121, 122, 246.
Scrambles among the High Alps, Mahoney's illus-
trations for, 149.
Scribner's, Charles, Sons, x; Monthly {Century),

31, 196, 197 ; publications, 200; collection of
proofs, 295.
Seeley and Co., ix, x, 95.
Senzanni, 33.
Shaw, Norman, 245.
She Stoops to Conquer, Abbey's and Parsons'

illustrations for, x, xi, 192, 198, 201, 202.
Shilling Magazine, 147, 150.
Shirlaw, Walter, 196.

Sign of the Lyre, Abbey's illustrations for, 203.
Small, William, 139, 158, 163.
Smeaton, Mrs., Wirgman's drawing of portrait of,

160.
Smillie, J. D., 197.
Snyders, Vandyke's head of, 19, 21.
Socicte d' Aquarellistes Fran^ais, Catalogue of, 93 ;

exhibition of, 95.
Solomon, Saul, 149, 150.
Spanish a?id Italian Folk-Songs, Miss Strettell's,

Abbey's illustrations for, 203.
Spiers, R. Phene, 245 ; Architectural Dra'wi7ig, 3,

241, 242, 243.
Sterne, Leloir's illustrations for his books, 91, 109,

126 ; Sentimental Journey, Leloir's illustrations

for, 253.
Stevens, Alfred, 121.
Street, G. E., 245.
StLibbe, 82.
Stucki, A., 85.

Sumner, Heywood, 262, 268.
Sunday Magazine, 137, 147, 149.
Swain, Joseph, xi, 149, 150, 167, 168, 169, 295.

Taeer, W., 277.

Tartarin de Tarascon, Jeanniot's illustrations for,
104.

Taylor, C. J., 199.

Technique, value of, ix ; importance of, i ; in
drawing of portraits, 20 ; influence of Vierge on,
40 ; Fabres, 48 ; advanced by experimenters,
60 ; its absence from Caldecott's and Busch's
work, 67 ; Menzel's, 69, 71 ; Dantan's mastery
of, 100; Du Maurier's, 142, 166; of English
draughtsmen, 143, 144 ; of Sandys' compared
with Diirer's, 150 ; Sambourne's, 168 ; Abbey's
command of, 20l, 202 ; progress in, 208, 209 ;
Brennan's, 220 ; suggestions for, 283-28S ; to-
day, 300.

Tenniel, J., 139, 144.

Tennyson, Poems of, Rossetti's illustrations for, 2,
137, 148; Palace of Art, 148.

Thomas, R. Kent, 293.

Thomson, Gordon, 149.

Thomson, Hugh, 144, 145, 184, 185, 262.

Thulstup, T. de, 200.

Tiepolo, 10.

3i8

INDEX

Titian, 2, 7, 8, 9, 13, 14, 15, 22.

Tito, E., 33, 57.

Treves, Fratelli, 46.

Trouville, Schlittgen's illustrations for, 66, 67, 74.

Triibner and Co., 74.

Turner, J. M. W., 247.

Unger, E., 82, 261, 266.
Universal Review, 86, 163.
Unive7-sutn, S2, 86, 267.
Unzelmann, F., 64, 65.
Urrabieta, S. (Vierge), 32.

Van Beers, J., 235.

Van Haanen, C, 235.

Van Ingen and Snyder, 201.

Van Leyden, Lucas, 300.

Van Renssalaer, M. G., Mrs., 246.

Van Schaick, S. W., 199.

Vandyke, 10, 19, 20, 21.

Vasari, 39.

Vedder, Elihu, 268.

Velasquez, 7, 9.

Vernet, Horace, 89.

Viear of Wakefield, Poirson's illustrations for, 253.

Vierge, Daniel, x, 9, 27, 29, 31, 32, 36, 40, 41,
51, 60, Tl, 78, 83, 90, 92, 188, 196, 198, 201,
203, 205, 220, 224, 235, 276, 277, 27S, 308.

Vogel, Albert, 64, 65.

Vogel, Otto, 65.

Walker, Fred, xi, 139, 141, 149, 162, 163, 164,

210.
Walker and Boutall, 154.
Walter, John, 306.
Ware, W. R., 243.
Warner, Olin L., 199.
Water Babies, Sambourne's illustrations for, 169,

170.
Waterlow and Sons, Limited, 56.
Watson, J. D., 149.
Weber, Marie, 1 16.

Whistler, J. M'N., 8, 22, no, 142, 220, 303, 309.
Whitney, J. H. E., 64, 163, 295.
Whymper, Edward, 149.
Wide Awake, 200.
Wilkie, D., Sir, 144.
Willette, A., 133, 18S.
Williams, Isaac L., 201.
Willson, Leslie, 143, 187.
Wilson, EdL'ar W.. 188.

Wirgman, T. Blake, x, 141, 160.
Wolf, M. A., 139, 199.

Wonder Clock, the, Pyle's illustrations for, 209.
Wood, H. Trueman, Methods of Illustrating Books
by, I I, 291.

Woodbury process, i i.

Woodcuts, DUrer's, 16; of Fortuny's drawings,
28, 29 ; difference between process and, 29,
169 ; of Menzel's work, 69, 72 ; in Once a
Week, 139; of Sir F. Leighton's drawings,
139; in Dalziel's Bible Gallery, 148; in Eng-
lish magazines before process, 149 ; of Sandys'
drawing compared with photogravure, 150; com-
pared with process blocks, 154 ; of Keene's draw-
ings, 167 ; of Furniss' drawings, 173 ; draughts-
man's work lost in early, 264 ; Paterson's, of
Durer's Big Horse, 297 ; compared with photo-
engraving and photogravure, 297, 298, 299,
300.

Woodcutters, difificulties and limitations of early,
176, 265, 295 ; of Diirer's work, 293, 294.

Woodcutting, Menzel's influence on facsimile, 60,
69 ; development and future of, 64 ; in greatest
period of English pen drawing, 147, 148, 149 ;
compared with process and mechanical repro-
duction, 14S, 168, 169; in Durer's time, 293.

Wood-engravers, of Menzel's work, 63, 64, 65,
295 ; labour of, 137 ; Fred Walker's drawing
for, 141, 142 ; oi Bunch, 143 ; of Fred Walker's
time, 162, 163, 164, 295 ; of Japan, 237 ; con-
ventionality of work drawn for, 254, 293 ; co-
operation of photo-engraver with, 292.

Wood-engraving, definition of present art, 64 ; in
Bunch, 138, 164, 165 ; reproduced by process,
148 ; commencement of reaction against trans-
lative, 154; compared with photo -engraving,
162, 163, 295.

Woods, Henry, 139.

Woodville, R. Caton, 143.

Woodward, J. D., 242.

Wright, C. L., Gravure Company, 231.

Wyllie, W. L., x., 142, 159.

XlMENEZ, 33.

Yon, Edmond, 92.

Yriarte, C, Life of Fortuny, 35.

Yves and Barret, lOO.

ZOGBAUM, R. F., 200.
Zwischen Zwei Rccen, 66.

PriiUcdhy R. & R. Clark, Ediid'in-^h.

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