ould not
be conveyed.

[90] "Etching and Etchers."

[91] Ben Jonson's "The Devil is an Ass."

[92] This was written, of course, before the recent republication,
which lacks the colour and crispness of the early issue.

[93] "British Artists from Hogarth to Turner."

CHAPTER IX.

_GEORGE CRUIKSHANK_ (_Continued_).

_THE SLEEP OF THIRTY YEARS._

The artistic career of George Cruikshank presents probably one of the
most singular problems to be met with in the history of satirical art.
It may be divided into three portions, two of which we have already
considered: the first represents that section wherein we have seen him
described by Lockhart as "one of the most careless creatures alive,"
having "no plan, almost no ambition," doing "just what was suggested or
thrown in his way," "quite contented to dine off the proceeds of a
'George the Fourth' to day, and those of a 'Hone' or a 'Cobbett' to
morrow!" the second may be said to be embraced between the years 1822
and 1848, during which period we find this man without plan, ambition,
or industry (to complete the charge of Lockhart), busily engaged in
building up the reputation which the critic had so confidently and so
truly predicted of him; the third and last section, the strangest surely
of all, shows us this man of genius--in the full enjoyment of an assured
and well-merited reputation, in the midst of his artistic vigour, at the
height of a success altogether unexampled--deliberately throwing away
his opportunities, and consigning himself to a slumber of thirty years,
which might almost justify us in terming him the "Rip Van Winkle" of
British art. The causes of this strange decadence, this singular mental
inactivity, which seem to us to have been hitherto very little or at
best very imperfectly understood, we now propose to consider.

PROFESSOR BATES' THEORY.

Professor Bates, one of the ablest of the essayists who have written on
George Cruikshank since the time when Thackeray penned his famous
article, would have us believe that the causes which led up to his
retirement from active life whilst yet in the enjoyment of his vigorous
intellect, are due partly to the change which has befallen "the
literature of fiction during the last thirty years," but principally to
the fact of his embracing the temperance movement with more zeal than
discretion. As a matter of fact, however, long before this step had been
taken, there had been cau