AUTHOR'S NOTE ON ILLUSTRATION No. V.
Once more I stand agog before the overweaned self-confidence with which Mr Pahtridhji sets out to depict scenes and episodes requiring the most exhaustive familiarity with West End London habits, if the artist is to escape the risum teneatis of a shocking fiasco!
There is scarcely any habitué of Hyde Park who could not point the finger of scorn at some howling piece of inaccuracy in this soi-disant representation of Mr Bhosh on his cantankerous gifthorse.
The figure of the hero himself is passably correct, though I may hint to Mr P. that no rider in Rotten Row who belongs to the bon ton would wear golden tassels attached to his riding topboots.
But how am I to excuse such a Leviathan lapsus linguæ as the figure of the equestrian mounted upon a cow? It is true that Honble Hampden was so upset at having to pay sheep-money that he rode a cow, but not all his social influence could launch so stagnant a quadruped as a successful competitor with the swifter and more spirited horse, and consequently it has long been disused as the beast of pleasure, even by riders of the funkiest temperaments.
And, as before, Mr Pahtridhji has represented (only with far far less plausibility) a monkey as occupying a prominent situation on the scene of action. I can only conjecture that he is under the impression that ladies in the social position of Princess Jones take horse exercise accompanied by such Simian favourites! Readers, of course, will not hold the writer responsible for these grotesque absurdities, but the pity of it that an ambitious young Native draughtsman should be employed to make a fool of himself in this public manner! I will not insinuate that Misters Publishers are guided by economical motives.
