ficing a large income, he seceded from Punch, and Mr. John Tenniel, a clever historical painter, was then called in to assist Mr. John Leech. For some years, the cartoon (the principal full page illustration), has been almost exclusively drawn by Mr. Tenniel. As a book-illustrator of the highest class, Mr. Doyle has increased his reputation since he left Punch (he was the artist of Thackeray's "Newcomes"), and his "Continental Tour of Messrs. Brown and Robinson is so good that the proprietors and readers of Punch must feel, whenever they turn over its leaves, that Mr. Doyle was a great loss.

John Leech, who died in October, 1864, aged fortyseven, was only twenty-four years old, when, on August 7, 1841, a sheet of his designs, entitled "Foreign Affairs," signed John Leech, and with his artist monograph of a leech in a bottle, afterwards so well known, appeared in the fourth of "Punch's Pencillings." From that day to his last, John Leech was a leading draughtsman in Punch. He was the best caricaturist in England, drawing the faces of public characters almost as accurately as Í. B. himself, and with infinitely more spirit. It seems to us, looking over the fifty-two volumes of Punch, which contain so many of his sketches, that he never missed taking and making a likeness, and the result was that the originals of his caricatures were always recognized from Punch the moment they were seen. There was no preserving an incognito, once that a public character was pencilled in Punch. His social sketches (many of them published collectively, as "Pictures of Life and Characters from the Portfolio of Mr. Punch") show how he had elevated burlesque and caricature into the department of art. He illustrated a large number of serial publications, including Beckett's Comic Histories of Rome and England. Perhaps his most popular sketches are those which present scenes in the sporting life of Mr. Briggs, a stout London merchant (said to have been drawn from life), who affected riding, hunting, racing, fishing, deer-stalking, shooting, &c., and invariably came to grief." An excellent rider himself, he knew every point of a horse, and not even Herring could draw that animal more accurately. The Times applied to him, without exaggeration, Dr. Johnson's remark on Garrick, that "his death eclipsed the gaiety of nations." Thackeray, whom he did not long survive, wrote a highly eulogistic article upon him in the Quarterly Review, and Sir Edwin Landseer said, "There is not one of his designs which does

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not deserve framing." In July, 1862, was exhibited in the Egyptian Hall, London, a series of Mr. Leech's sketches in oil, from subjects in Punch. There were sixty-nine of these, and the exhibition greatly increased the artist's popularity. Somebody had contrived by a skilful mechanical process, to expand the Punch sketches on canvas, and, painted over in oil by Mr. Leech himself, had the effect of actual pictures. Thus each became an original work of art. Mr. Leech's position on Punch was supplied by several artists, of whom Mr. George du Maurier has most nearly approached his style.

It

There is no doubt that, during its whole reign, Punch has exercised a great social and political influence. For the most part, it has been rather ultra-liberal in its views, generally supporting the Whigs, and always boldly demonstrative against misrule in foreign countries. threw much ridicule on O'Connell and other Irish leaders, and rendered party justice to Peel while in office, though it warmly praised him after he had lost place but gained power by abolishing the taxes on bread. It sided with the Southern Confederacy during the recent American struggle, and, at various times, its circulation has been prohibited for over-bold speaking against "the authorities" in most of the European kingdoms. Punch has had only a single prosecution against it for libel, and that a small case, in which a second-hand clothes man got a verdict; in this respect, having better fortune than the French journal La Caricature, which Champfleury's "Histoire de la Caricature Moderne" informs us, had fifty-four prosecutions against it in one year. Punch has had few quarrels. One was with Mr. James Silk Buckingham, who founded the British and Foreign Institute (the hunchback substitutes Destitute for the last word in that title), and another with Mr. George Jones, an American actor, who re-appeared in New York, some years ago, décoré with the title of Count Joannes. For a long time, Mr. Alfred Bunn, a well-known theatrical manager, who wrote the librettos for many of Balfe's operas (his songs "married to immortal music" were little better than mere nonsense-verses), was very much ridiculed in Punch, which had a laugh at "the Poet Bunn" week after week. At last, Mr. Bunn retaliated, bringing out a pictorial sheet, almost a fac-simile of Punch in appearance, and filled with all manner of attacks, in every variety of prose and verse, upon Lemon, A Beckett, and Jerrold, as his principal enemies, whom he described as

Thick-head, Sleek-head, and Wrong-head. He gave the personal history of each, describing Lemon in his original trade of selling gin and half-and-half in the publichouse over Covent Garden; reprinting the schedule of his various occupations, residences, and debts, which Mr. à Beckett had filed when getting "whitewashed” in the Court of Insolvent Debtors; and dealing with Jerrold's personal antecedents in an equally free manner. That time, at least, Bunn had the laugh on his side, and Punch never again named him. Mr. Boucicault, the dramatist, described Punch as properly characterized by the four writers who originated it: thus Gilbert à Beckett represented the spirit; Henry Mayhew the sugar; Douglas Jerrold the acid, and Mark Lemon the spoon !

In 1861, when Punch had completed its twentieth year and fortieth volume, its proprietor issued a reprint of the whole, at a somewhat reduced price, prefixing to each volume four pages of political and personal explanations, which were intended to facilitate the understanding, by readers of the present generation, of the subjects which had amused their parents. Of this new edition a large impression was sold.

The rivals of Punch have been numerous. The Squib, began in 1842, lived eight months; Puck; the PuppetShow (in 1848); The Month, which lasted a year; Chat, in 1850-51; Diogenes, one of the best of the imitators, edited by Robert Kemp Philip, and chiefly illustrated by Mr. Watts Phillips, now a dramatist, then a draughtsman and engraver on wood; a second Punchinello, which lasted half a year; Town Talk; and London, a comic weekly, edited by G. A. Sala, seventeen years ago, but a failure. Mephistophiles and The British Lion appeared in 1859, but, though both were undoubtedly clever, success was not their destiny. In 1863, Fun appeared, and is now decidedly established, after much opposition and many changes. Mr. Thomas Hood, only son of him "who sang the Song of the Shirt," has edited the second series since its commencement, with considerable liveliness. He affects the familiar signature of "Tom Hood," which belonged solely to his father. His principal literary assistants have been "Arthur Sketchley," Mr. Burnaud, H. J. Byron, the dramatist. The artists who, more than the authors, made the reputation of Fun, were William Brunton; Paul Gray, a young Irishman who was rapidly approaching the excellence of Mr. Leech; W. McConnell, and Charles Bennett. Of these, the three last

have died-Mr. Bennett only a short time ago, on the staff of Punch.

In 1847, after Albert Smith had ceased to write for Punch, he established a monthly magazine, edited by himself and Angus B. Reach, liberally and ably illustrated by "Phiz," Henry Meadows, Hine, Nicholson, Prough, A. Mayhew, Smythe, "Cham," and others. It was The Man in the Moon, the first number of which appeared in January, 1847. The two volumes for 1848, which closed the publication, were wholly edited by Mr. Reach. In many respects, this was one of the best of the English illustrated comic periodicals.

In 1867 appeared Judy, a Halfpenny Punch, and Banter, all imitations. Of these Judy alone survives, and seems prosperous. Its illustrations, particularly its political cartoons, are superior to those now given in Punch. There also is The Tomahawk, remarkably well written, which gives a single engraving, printed in tints with much effect, and drawn with great spirit; the artist's signature is "Matt Morgan," which may be a pseudonyme. More recent still, also with a single engraving, is Echoes of the Clubs, which has no very decided character, political or satirical, but is illustrated with striking ability.

There has never been, we believe, any attempt in Scotland or Ireland to produce any publication at all resembling Punch. In Liverpool there have been a Tomahawk, a Pan, a Lion, and a Porcupine, all more or less critical on music and the drama. The Porcupine, we understand, survives and flourishes. In Melbourne, Australia, a colonial Punch, well written, smartly illustrated, and largely circulated, has been popular and prosperous for some years.

Illustrated comic literature has not been very successful in the United States. Various attempts have been made- Vanity Fair being the ablest as well as the most persistent. To a future occasion we postpone some account of these attempts, their authors, and the probable causes of their successive failures-causes, we may hint here, which arose rather from the writers than the artists of these publications.

ART. VII.—1. The History of Ancient Astronomy. By M. DELAMBRE. 2 vols., 4to. 1817.

2. Origin and Progress of Astronomy.

F. R. A. S. 1 vol., 8vo. London, 1850.

By JOHN NARRION,

3. Megale Syntaxis; or, The Almagest. By PTOLEMY.

THE origin of the science of astronomy is involved in impenetrable obscurity. We only know that it had an origin, but the time and place of its beginning are unknown. Here, then, the imagination can have loose reins. The human mind has, heretofore, in trying to give a probable account of the origin of the science of the stars, imagined man to be ushered into the world a grown-up, intelligent being, astonished at the beauty of the scene presented by the moon as it moves through the heavens from day to day, changing from the slender crescent to the full round orb, and then as gradually returning again to its original form; or at the scene which the stars and planets present as they move majestically onward in their accustomed rounds.

But such could not have been the course of nature. Man began the world as the child does, naturally ignorant and inexperienced, and so familiar with the scenes of nature before the development of reason, that neither sun, moon, nor stars excited his imagination. His attention was probably never called to the heavenly bodies till necessity drove him to observe them. We shall, then, probably, not be far from the truth if we suppose that man's physical wants, in the first place, impelled him to become an astronomer.

As a suitable introduction to the discoveries and improvements of Hipparchus and Ptolemy, we shall give a brief sketch of the history of astronomy before the time of the former. The wants of agriculture have required in all ages a knowledge of the motions of the sun, so that the seasons can be distinguished and their returns known. The earliest observations made for such purpose. were those of the risings and the settings of the stars, especially those lying along the sun's path. The science of astronomy did not begin, however, till a series of observations had been recorded and compared with one another, and some attempt made to explain the motions and the laws of the heavenly bodies. We know but little of the antiquity of this ancient astronomy; we may judge of its early existence, however, by the astronomical periods which it has