[25] It may be mentioned as an interesting fact that no engraved cartoon after Sir John Tenniel has ever failed to find its place in the number for which it was designed. The drawing is a fine example of Keene’s power of endowing his models with the qualities requisite to his design. Not a man of these seventeen financiers suggests a model posing, and yet all, for this was Keene’s invariable custom, were drawn from the life. Not one of them but is balanced as though he were wading in water up to his knees; and yet not one of them, we may be sure, was wading against a stream when, probably unconsciously, he was forced into the service of the artist’s pencil. The pose of one and all is as inevitable as is the expression on the face of each. I would ask all my readers who are seekers after consummate draughtsmanship to give more particular attention to this beautiful drawing than its mere subject would demand, remembering that Keene’s achievements in black-and-white are {135} unsurpassed, and, I am inclined to think, unsurpassable. We will now turn to the consideration of the other suppressed Keene drawing. This, we shall find, owed its rejection not to political but to social considerations. And it is of peculiar interest, not only as showing the scrupulous care taken by the then editor of _Punch_ to avoid the risk of offending the susceptibilities of his readers, but also as an example of the extensive collaboration which existed between Keene and the late Mr. Joseph Crawhall in the supply of “socials” to that paper week by week. Let us pause for a moment, then, to recall the particulars of this remarkable co-operation. Early in the ’seventies, Keene, who was often gravelled for humorous subjects on which to exercise his pencil, was by good fortune introduced to the author of _Border Notes and Mixty-Maxty_, and many other droll books of a like character. This gentleman, always a lover of things quaint, grotesque and jocular, had been for years in the habit of jotting down any telling incident that came in his way, illustrating it at leisure for his {136} own amusement. He was no great artist; but, like Thackeray, his inadequate pencil was so compelled and inspired by the appreciation of his subjects that he was able to set them down pictorially in a manner so naïve and at the same time so intelligent that they are a joy to the beholder. These suggestive drawings, by the time the introduction had taken place, filled several volumes. Keene’s delight, then, may be well imagined when he was given _carte blanche_ to cull the best of the subjects for use in _Punch_. He wrote:— “I can’t tell you how strongly I have felt your rare generosity and unselfishness in letting me browse so freely in your pastures.” And again:— “Many thanks for the loan of the sketch-books. I enjoyed them again and again, with renewed chucklings; but what a mouth-watering larder to lay open to a ravenous joke-seeker!”