New Year’s Eve

We close the year with a final flourish from the Twigs, with this delightful illustration by Robert Dudley of their New Year’s Eve dance at Ruddock Hall.

Ruddock Manor is fuller than ever, I think,
There is Goldfinch the banker and little Lord Spink,
Tom Titter is here, and Sir Twitterty Tweet
And that gay Captain Lark (oh, isn’t he sweet?)

From The Twigs, or, Christmas at Ruddock Hall, published in 1890.

Happy New Year to one and all. Thank you for showing an interest in our Victorian children’s book illustrations.

 

 

 

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Twenty Fourth Day of Advent – Christmas Eve

Now wake little people dressed in white,
Old Father Christmas came last night;
He crammed your stocking – and, children, look!
He brought you a coloured picture book.

from Old Father Christmas by Lizzie Mack and Robert Ellice Mack, published in London by Ernest Nister, 1889.

I have been looking forward to posting this picture all the way through Advent. I know it is unashamedly sentimental, but I love the rich red of Father Christmas’ robes, the toys tumbling from his sack, and especially the radiant light spilling from the lantern across the floor. I like the nice touch that Father Christmas is holding the coloured picture book Old Father Christmas, in which he himself appears in this glowing illustration.

 

 

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Twenty Third Day of Advent

This illustration is from The Twigs, or, Christmas at Ruddock Hall illustrated by Robert Dudley, published in London by Castell Brothers, 1890.

Yesterday we mused on why robins are associated with Christmas, which led to the discovery that Victorian postmen were nicknamed Robins. But why is the nation’s favourite bird called a robin in the first place? Well, it hasn’t always been called a robin. 

Learning about this produced a lightbulb moment – I understood why this charming, whimsical book about a family of robins is called The Twigs, or, Christmas at Ruddock Hall. The robin’s earliest recorded name is ruddock, spelt ruddoke in Middle English, which in turn derived from the Old English rudduc. The first part of the word, rudd, means red, and -ock is a suffix which means small, so ruddock means, in effect, small red one. After several hundred years ruddock gradually morphed into redbreast. 

In the early 15th century it became popular to nickname animals and birds with human names, such as Jenny Wren, Tom Tit, Billy and Nanny Goat and so forth, so the name Robin was added to form Robin Redbreast. Why Robin? It’s difficult to be sure of how a certain usage arose. In this case it is perhaps because the name Robin is a familiar, or diminutive, form of the name Robert, thought to derive from the French, with the suffix -in denoting something small. Small Redbreast sums up a robin quite nicely. 

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Twenty Second Day of Advent

Some flowerpot robins from The Bright Surprise for Little Eyes, published in London by the Sunday School Union, 1884.

 

We are so used to associating robins with Christmas that I doubt we ever give much thought as to why this is. As with all such questions there are many answers. However, one thing we do know is that the Victorian postman’s uniform was bright red (up until 1861) and that postmen were nicknamed “Robins” because of their red attire.

Given that, as mentioned in our Thirteenth Day of Advent post, Christmas cards took off in the early 1840s, following the introduction of the Penny Post, it’s easy to see how an association was formed in the popular imagination between postmen “Robins” and Christmas. Add to this that many Victorian illustrators started depicting an actual robin as postman, delivering your Christmas card in its beak, and we can understand how the link was forged. 

 

 

 

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Twenty First Day of Advent

from Oh Dear Oh Look at the Snow by Jack Frost, published by Dean & Son, 1884.
I know we’ve posted a couple of snow scenes from this book by the pseudonymous Jack Frost, depicting children making huge snowballs, but I love this one and can’t bear to leave it out. Why do I love this particular one? They’re all delightful, with their muted, greeny-grey sky, falling snowflakes, capering children and companionable little dog.
 I think it’s the boy on the far left, something about his face. Is it the same boy we saw in the grey check outfit, with the lace collar, in our Eighth Day of Advent post? Maybe. There’s something good natured about him.
And this illustration was made into a Christmas card years ago, when I was working on the Tower Project, and I bought a pack of them. I still have a couple because I can’t part with them. It’s imbued with a certain nostalgia for a very happy time in my career. Another delightful illustration by the mysterious E.B.
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Twentieth Day of Advent

Engaging servants – This important business is usually thought a pleasing excitement by one class of mistresses, who are constantly changing, and who do not know how to appreciate a good servant; or a dreadful trouble and worry by those who are idle or careless.”

From Beeton’s Every-day Cookery and Housekeeping Book by Mrs Beeton, published in London by Ward, Lock & Tyler, 1872.7.371.

Nineteenth Day of Advent

Such a wonderful battle you never did see,
As the battle between little Willie and me.
It was perfectly harmless, I wish you to know,
The balls were all made of the softest of snow!

From ‘Oh Dear Oh Look at the Snow’ by Jack Frost, published by Dean & Son,1884.

Eighteenth Day of Advent

What a surprise! Dazzling streams of light! Fancy a fine tree with a hundred blue, red, white and green candles, and its branches loaded with all manner of fine things!

From ‘The Children’s International Christmas Album’ by the Countess D’Elff, published in London by Asher & Co., 1870.

What remarkably dainty feet this family has! They make a decorous tableau in their finery, a strangely static pose in mid-action.

I’m afraid I have no information about the author/illustrator (are they one and the same?). As my daughter-in-law remarked, you couldn’t possibly have a more Christmassy author than the Countess D’Elff! Is that a real name? Or a pseudonym? I can feel a minor research project coming on …

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Seventeenth Day of Advent

Let bright holly shine and glow
In winter-time of frost and snow;
Let the smooth green leaves entwine
Around our house at Christmas time.

from Holly Berries: with original illustrations by Ida Waugh published in London by Griffith & Farran, 1883.

Here is Ida Waugh again, the American illustrator already discussed in our Ninth Day of Advent post. This beautiful illustration has the same refinement as that picture, with its dainty roundel depicting a little girl dressed in eye-catching dark green, standing in front of soft green vegetation and a muted landscape stretching away behind her. The elegant design of the title words blending into a holly bough, which forms a canopy above the child, is delightful.  Waugh achieves both clarity and warmth in this charming illustration.

 

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Sixteenth Day of Advent

In Canada, North America, and some parts of Russia where the winters are longer and much more severe than in this country, the children amuse themselves by sledging.

from The Seasons – Winter, by A.S., in The Bright Surprise for Little Eyes, published in London by the Sunday School Union, 1884.

This picture is from one book  in a packet of twelve published by the Sunday School Union. Each little book has four pages of rhyming text illustrated by four colour pictures. This particular book is credited to A.S. (they are all by different people) – but who the mysterious A.S. was, and whether they were the author or illustrator, or both, we don’t know.  I understand that the status of cheap, mass produced children’s books was lower than that of other publications of the time, but it is frustrating not to know whose creative work enriched the imagination of so many Victorian children. Granted it is not great art work in most cases – the likes of Phiz (Hablot Knight Browne), one of Dickens’ illustrators, whose magical illustration adorned our Second Day of Advent post, are exceptional artists and deserve their fame and reputation. But there was clearly a considerable pool of artistic talent from which publishers could draw in producing their children’s books, creatives who deserve to be acknowledged for playing their part in bringing colourful, enchanting pictures and lively rhymes and stories, to young children.

 

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