Authorities, it is reported, shake their heads over these performances. "C'est magnifique, mais ce nest pas la gravure," they whisper. Into the matter in dispute, it is perhaps presumptuous for an "atechnic" to adventure himself. But to the outsider it would certainly seem as if the chief ground of complaint is that the new comers do not play the game according to the old rules, and that this (alleged) irregular mode of procedure tends to lessen the status of the engraver as an artist. False or true, this, it may fairly be advanced, has nothing whatever to do with the matter, as far, at least, as the public are concerned. For them the question is, simply and solely--What is the result obtained? The new school, availing themselves largely of the assistance of photography, are able to dispense, in a great measure, with the old tedious method of drawing on the block, and to leave the artist to choose what medium he prefers for his design--be it oil, water-colour, or black and white--concerning themselves only to reproduce its characteristics on the wood. This is, of course, a deviation from the method of Bewick. But would Bewick have adhered to his method in these days?
Even in his last hours he was seeking for new processes. What we want is to get nearest to the artist himself with the least amount of interpretation or intermediation on the part of the engraver. Is engraving on copper to be reproduced, we want a facsimile if possible, and not a rendering into something which is supposed to be the orthodox utterance of wood-engraving. Take, for example, the copy of Schiavonetti's engraving of Blake's Death's Door in "Scribner's Magazine" for June 1880, or the cut from the same source at page 131 of this book. These are faithful line for line transcriptions, as far as wood can give them, of the original copper-plates; and, this being the case, it is not to be wondered at that the public, who, for a few pence can have practical facsimiles of Blake, of Cruikshank, or of Whistler, are loud in their appreciation of the "new American School." Nor are its successes confined to reproduction in facsimile. Those who look at the exquisite illustrations, in the same periodical, to the "Tile Club at Play," to Roe's "Success with Small Fruits," and Harris's "Insects Injurious to Vegetation,"--to say nothing of the selected specimens in the recently issued "Portfolios"--will see that the latest comers can hold their own on all fields with any school that has gone before.{15}({15} Since this paragraph was first written an interesting paper on the illustrations in "Scribner," from the pen of Mr. J. Comyns Carr, has appeared in "L'Art.")
Besides copperplate and wood, there are many processes which have been and are still employed for book-illustrations, although the brief limits of this chapter make any account of them impossible.
Lithography was at one time very popular, and, in books like Roberts's "Holy Land," exceedingly effective. The "Etching Club"issued a number of books circa 1841-52; and most of the work of "Phiz" and Cruikshank was done with the needle. It is probable that, as we have already seen, the impetus given to modern etching by Messrs. Hamerton, Seymour Haden, and Whistler, will lead to a specific revival of etching as a means of book-illustration.
Already beautiful etchings have for some time appeared in "L'Art,"the "Portfolio," and the "Etcher;" and at least one book of poems has been entirely illustrated in this way,--the poems of Mr. W. Bell Scott. For reproducing old engravings, maps, drawings, and the like, it is not too much to say that we shall never get anything much closer than the facsimiles of M. Amand-Durand and the Typographic Etching and Autotype Companies. But further improvements will probably have to be made before these can compete commercially with wood-engraving as practised by the "new American School.""Of ****** many books," 'twais said, "There is no end;" and who thereon The ever-running ink doth shed But probes the words of Solomon:
Wherefore we now, for colophon, From London's city drear and dark, In the year Eighteen Eight-One, Reprint them at the press of Clark.
A. D.