Caricature and Other Comic Art

n. (Reign of El

th is an open wine-flagon. The eye is a chalice covered by the holy wafer, and the cheek is a paten, or plate used in the communion service. The great volume that forms the shoulders is the mass-book. The front of the bell-tiara is adorned by a mitred wolf devouring a lamb, and by a goose holding a rosary in its bill; the back, by a spectacled as

III. being still the Defender of the Faith, the various articles used in Master Batman's satirical picture were objects of religious veneration throughout Great Britain. They had now become the despised but dreaded rattle-tr

t must have ceased to grow. Nevertheless, those fictions had their beauty and their use. There was a good and pleasing side to that system of fables and ceremonies, which amused, absorbed, and satisfied the people of Europe for a thousand years. If we could concede that the mass of men must remain forever ignorant and very poor, we could also admit that nothing was ever invented by man better calculated to make them thoughtlessly contented with a dismal lot than the Roman Cat

ious observances, changes of costume, and special rites. There was always something going on or coming off. There was not a day in the year nor an hour in the day which had not its ecclesiastical name and character. In our flowery observance of Easter and in our joyous celebration of Christmas we have a faint traditional

eling that they were engaged in enhancing at once the glory of God, the fame of their saint, the credit of their town, and the good of their souls. It was pleasure; it was duty; it was masquerade; it was devotion. Some readers may remember the exaltation of soul with which Albert Dürer, the first of German artists in Luther's age, describes the great procession at Antwerp, in 1520, in honor of what was styled the "Assumption" of the Virgin Mary. One of the pleasing fictions adopted by the old Church was that on the 15th o

dsmiths, painters, masons, embroiderers, statuaries, cabinet-makers, carpenters, sailors, fishermen, butchers, curriers, weavers, bakers, tailors, shoe-makers, and laborers-all marched by in order, at some distance apart, each preceded by its own magnificent cross. These were followed by the merchants, shop-keepers, and their clerks. The "shooters" came next, armed with bows, cross-bows, and firelocks, some on horseback and some on foot. The city guard followed. Then came the magistrates, nobles, and knights, all dressed in their official costume,

lar order, followed by others from the New Testament, such as the Annunciation, the Wise Men of the East riding great camels and other wonderful animals, and the Flight into Egypt, all very skillfully appointed. Then came a great dragon, and St. Margaret with the image of the Virgin at her girdle, exceedingly beautiful; and las

that bright childish pageantry vanished from the sight of the more advanced nations. The reformers discovered that there was no reason to believe that the aged Virgin Mary, on the 15th of August, A.D. 45, was borne miraculously to heaven; and in a single generation many important communities, by using their reason even to that tri

ecome familiar with the Puritan period without feeling that the bondage of the mind to the literal interpretation of some parts of the Old Testament was a bondage as real, though not as degrading nor as hopeless, as that under which it had lived to the papal decrees. You do not make your canary a free bird by merely opening the door of its cage. It has to acquire slowly, with anguish and great fear, the s

lasted more than a century, instead of a few months, and it was during that long period of dread and tribulation that they acquired the passionate abhorrence of the papal system which is betrayed in the pictures and writings of the time. There was a fund of te

feated. (London an

d sorrow for evermore. In 1579 began the long struggle between the New and the Old, which is called the Thirty Years' War. The Prince of Orange was assassinated in 1584, in the midst of those great events which Mr. Motley has made familiar to the reading people of both continents. Every intelligent Protestant in Europe felt that the weapon which slew the prince was aimed at his own heart. The long dread of the Queen of Scots' machinations ended only with her death in 1587. Soon after, the shadow of the coming Spanish Armada crept over Great Britain, which was not dispelled till the men of England defeated and the storm scattered it in 1588. In 1605 Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot struck such terror to

their sanity and serenity in the maddest times. The rapid succession of the plays-an average of nearly two per annum-proves that there was a public for Shakspeare when all the world seemed absorbed in subjects least akin to art and hu

atched with just apprehension the visit of Prince Charles to Spain, and the prospect of a marriage between the heir-apparent and a Spanish princess. At this alarming crisis, 1621, the sheet was composed in England, and sent over to Holland to be engraved and printed, Holland being then, and for a hundred and fifty years after, the printing-house and type-foundry of Northe

Protestants interpreted it, from the time of the Spanish Armada to that of Guy Fawkes-1588 to 1605. It appears to have been designed for circula

, Spayne, arm'd

acefull Land c

waves and fire

lish, frustrate

the Pope in c

ratagem they str

th, by powde

s state ruina

never-slumb'r

ndments of th

t what they did

Lord! for eve

Puritan preacher of Ipswich, of great zeal and celebr

veraunce from ye invincible Navie and

nglish people to the Spanish monarchy. The obsequious lords of the Privy Council summoned Samuel Ward to appear before them. After examining him, they remanded him to the custody of their messenger, whose house was a place of confinement for such prisoners; and there he remained. As there was yet no habeas corpus act known among men, he could only p

e of the sunne," continues the writer, "could more damnifie the earth, to make it barraine and the best things abortive, than did his interposition." We learn also that when the count left England for a visit to his own country, in 1618, "there was an uproare and assault a day or two before his departure from London by the Apprentices, who seemed greedy of such an occasion to vent their own spleenes in doing him or any of his a mischiefe." Another picture exhibits the odious Gondomar giving an account of his conduct in England to the "Spanishe Parliament," in the course of which he attributes the British abhorrence of Spain to such men as "Ward of Ipswich," w

, "Woe to Drunkards," by Sa

g the life-time of Samuel Ward to a town in Massachusetts, which is still thriving. One of his sermons upon drunkenness was illustrated by a picture, of which a copy is given here,[17] designed to sh

me so cruel and so vigilant as to induce men of family and fortune, like Winthrop and his friends, accompanied by a fleet of vessels laden with virtuous and thoughtful families, to cross the ocean and settle in Massachusetts. Boston was founded when Charles I. had been cutting off the ears and slitting the noses of Puritans for five years. All that enchanting shore of New England, with its gleaming beaches, and emerald isles, and jutting capes of granite and wild roses, now so dear to summer visitors-an eternal

erings or misdeeds. One such records the heroic endurance of "the Reverend Peter Smart, mr of Artes, minister of God's word at Durham," who, for pre

ne vaine rites wi

be greate, though

death, afterward lost one of his Eares on the pillorie, had one of his nosthrills slitt clean through, was whipt with a whip of 3 Coardes knotted, had 36 lashes therewith, was fined 1000ll., and kept prisoner in the fleet 12 yeares, where he was most cruelly used a long time, being lodged day and night amongst the most desperately wiked villaines of ye whole prison."

three more ears in the plate before him, the three victims of his cruelty standing about, and two armed bishops at the foot of the table. The dialogue below represents Laud as rejecting with sco

is I doe to mak

e more careful to

ants know, that what I

under heav

devide those whom C

slands, from which they were conveyed to Dartmouth, and thence to London, hailed with acclamations of delight and welcome in every village through which they passed. All the expenses of their long journey were paid for them, and presents of value were thrust upon them as they rode by. Within a few miles of London they were met by such a concourse of vehicles, horsemen, and people that it was with great difficulty they could travel

e here given, urging a union between the Church of England and the Church of Scotland against the foe o

ctorious House of Commons canceled the canons adopted from this work, and fined the clergy who had sat in the Convocation. A caricature quickly appeared, called "Archbishop Laud firing a Cannon," in which the cannon is represented as bur

thou canst not

hop tide thu

incely prelate

once in Limbo

reds where his

eached too oft b

Canons, like a

s; forc'd men to

rdly power 'bov

Lazie Priests

nisters, which

, went downe t

nd heads too th

sters into

avers preacht i

pits; with a

h, hung round

pirit did for t

Cole-holes, were t

these babes o

ost Church-gove

d, and with mos

ir sole inte

inst the Bish

one, what doe yo

Prelates, whi

e, meere Antic

parle, before

rsuivant sli

un like hares b

e 'tad been a

spoke) a word 'ga

are chang'd, men

orse for Cant

th come once to

see him tide

nsels faine he

us together

lace the Levit

ope in one of

unke so deepe

, d'ee think, t

a halter round his neck; and, again, we see him in a bird-cage, with the queen's Catholic confessor, the two being popularly regarded as birds of a feat

will soon de

bleed! and am e

ter with which to wash the extremely sore nose. One broadsheet represents Laud in consultation with his physician, who administers an emetic that causes him to throw off his stomach sever

h bin at church may exercise lawful recreat

n the Sunday, which I caused to be made. B

title is, 'Sunday no Sabbath.' D

or Pocklington made i

staken, a Star-Chamber order made against Mr. Prinne,

oh, here comes up something that makes my very back ak

tongue-tied Doctors, and gave them great Benefices in the Country to preach some twice a year at the least, and in their place to hire

Canons," and finally of his mitre; upon which the doctor says, "Nay, i

that show him asleep, and visited by the ghosts of those whom he had persecuted, each addressing him in turn, as the victims of Richard III. spoke to their destroyer on Bosworth Field. On

poore teare, wh

portraict of

Innovator,

ate; all Times s

hunder-stricken

and: insult not

erances of the time shows that any soul in Engla

h Eagle's Clawes" (P

-thirsty Royalists and blasphemous Anti-Parliamentarians under the Command of that inhumane Prince Rupert, Digby, and the rest, wherein the barbarous Crueltie of our Civill uncivill Warres is briefly discovered." Beneath the portrait of England's wolf are various narratives of his bloody deeds. One picture exhibits the plundering habits of the mercenaries on the side of the king in Ireland. A soldier is represented armed and equipped with the utensils that appertain to good forage: on his head a three-legged pot, hanging from his side a duck, a spit with a

the Scotch Pre

the grinstone, Charl

'tis presbi

enant pretende

of your Trad

, turne the stone

faster than the

our ends did make

s, we will no

dissemblers, I k

es sake, I will

and by their aid place himself upon the throne of England, called forth the caricature annexed, in which an

needs no learn

well enough th

ower and P

ron'd in Engl

ere they seeme

ore obsequiou

rding to Kir

than were Del

few explicit justifications of the execution of Charles

ustice at the

ather, now the

ck Justice" on the late king, and then adopting the heir on condition of his giving t

l soon accomplished the

gious mock we

downfall of t

xt employed in exhibiting the young king fleeing

clesiastics, "Sound-head, Rattle-head, and Round-head." Sound-head, a minister sound in the Puritan faith, hands a Bible to Rattle-head, a personage meant for Laud, half bishop and half Jesuit. On the other

Malignant

on them

d, Round-head

where best

-head are belabored in the thorough-going, root-and-branch manner

Rattle-heads mo

heists or Arm

General" and "Oliver" and "The Protector" were weakly satirized; but as most of the plates in that age were made to serve various purposes, and were frequently altered and redated, it is not certain that any of them were circulated in England during Cromwell's life-time. English d

s and more these

cozen all true-

ur Silver has

e big and mighty th

atire during the rule of the Ironside chief. The only great writer of the Puritan age on the Puritan