Tom Taylor is beside him--Horace ("Ponny")
Mayhew lies helpless in his box; while next to him Gilbert a Beckett is
prone upon his face, leaving his barrister's wig upon the "block-head."
Jerrold, as a wasp, is gazing ruefully at the baton which has dropped
from Punch's feeble hands; and Mark Lemon, dressed as a pot-boy, is
straining himself in the foreground to reach his pewter-pot. Around
float many of _Punch's_ butts, political and social. Wellington on the
left and Brougham on the right play cup-and-ball with him. Louis
Philippe has him on a toasting-fork, and Lord John Russell hangs him on
a gallows-tree. Palmerston, Prince de Joinville, Jullien, Sibthorpe,
Moses the tailor, Buckingham, and many more besides, are to be
recognised. It was inscribed "No. 1,--(to be continued if necessary)"--a
contingency, however, that did not arise.

It is usually considered that Bunn engaged a clever writer to write his
text for him; but it is quite likely that he wrote the whole work
himself, simply submitting it to the "editing" of some more experienced
journalist, probably Albert Smith. Much of the manner is his own, and,
as Mr. Joseph Knight agrees,[24] it "has many marks of Bunn's style, and
is in part incontestably his."

His "Word" is directed at _Punch's_ "three Puppets--Wronghead (Mr.
Douglas Jerrold), Sleekhead (Mr. Gilbert a Beckett), and Thickhead (Mr.
Mark Lemon)--formidable names, Punch! and, as being three to one,
formidable odds!" He refers to his friends having warned him not to
rebel against Punch's attacks, as he is

a public character!! Pray, Punch, are not these, your puppets,
public characters? Have they not acted in public, laboured for the
public, catered for the public? Has not Douglas Jerrold been hissed
off the stage by the public? Have not a Beckett's writings! been
acted, and damned, in public? and as to Mark Lemon, there can be no
doubt of _his_ being a public character, for he some time since
kept a _public_-house!!! All ceremony therefore is at an end
between us.... There may be other misdemeanours of which they have
from time to time thought me guilty; but the grand one of all is,
that I have taken the liberty of attempting to write poetry, and
have produced on the stage my own works in preference to theirs....
Did you ever see them act, Punch? Did you ever see Douglas Jerrold
in his own piece, entitled "The Painter of Ghent"? If not,