I had helped myself surreptitiously to pocket-money at school, by selling my caricatures, and I was obliged to repeat the process at home! At the time of which I write, the Art of Caricature was just approaching the close of its colored and most extravagant stage of development.

The subtlety and truth to Nature required for the pursuit of it now, had hardly begun to be thought of then.

Sheer farce and coarse burlesque, with plenty of color for the money, still made up the sum of what the public of those days wanted.

I was first assured of my capacity for the production of these requisites, by a medical friend of the ripe critical age of nineteen.

He knew a print-publisher, and enthusiastically showed him a portfolio full of my sketches, taking care at my request not to mention my name.