At a garden party at Lord Leven's, in Roehampton Lane, I saw Professor Owen or "Old Bones" (as he was irreverently nicknamed), and, struck with his antediluvian incongruity amidst the beautiful surroundings of the garden, and the children there, I resolved to caricature him. Impressing his strange and whimsical face upon my memory, I returned home and at once conveyed my impressions to paper. I "caught" him in his best clothes, with the tall white hat, which made a contrast to his florid face; it is hardly one's idea of a garden party "get up" as will be seen by the boots. I suppose some eccentricity must be forgiven in the light of his genius, for "Old Bones" was a man, and a scientist, of prodigious activity. There was no end to his works--especially their titles, of which, for instance, "On the Archetype and Homologies of the Vertebrate Animals," is a fair example; while "Memoir on a Gigantic Sloth," has possibilities. He belonged to innumerable societies, geological, zoological, chirurgical, and so forth; and he was, as _Vanity Fair_ described him, "a simple-minded creature, although a bit of a dandy." [Illustration: 1903 SIR WILLIAM CROOKES.] [Illustration: 1904. SIR OLIVER LODGE.] [Illustration: SIR WILLIAM HUGGINS. 1903.] [Illustration: PROFESSOR OWEN. 1873 _"My first" in "Vanity Fair_".] A little before this, Mr. Gibson Bowles, then editor of _Vanity Fair_, had become dissatisfied with the artists who were working for him in the absence of Pellegrini, and, owing to a disagreement, was looking for a new cartoonist. Millais, remembering my ambitions in that direction (for when I saw the first numbers of _Vanity Fair_ I was greatly taken with Pellegrini's caricatures, and, having a book of drawings of a similar character, had thought that if only I could get one drawing in _Vanity Fair_ I should die happy), called to see my book of caricatures. This book contained drawings made at various times, from my early youth up to that period; and when Millais saw the sketch of "Old Bones," he was very taken with it. "I like so much this one of Professor Owen," he said. "It's just the sort of thing that Bowles would delight in. Re-draw it the same size as the cartoons in _Vanity Fair_ and I'll take it to him." I called with the cartoon, which was accepted--but was unsigned. I had invented a rather amusing signature in the form of a fool's bauble, but this did not meet with Mr. Bowles' approval. After a little discussion he handed me a Johnson's dictionary, in order that I might search there for some appropriate pseudonym. The dictionary fell open in my hand in a most portentous manner at the "S's," and my eye fell with the same promptitude on the word SPY. "How's that?" I said. "The verb to spy, to observe secretly, or to discover at a distance or in concealment."