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TENNIEL—TENNIS


Chattanooga and Paducah amounted to 755,010 tons, valued at $18,752,180; it consisted chiefly of general merchandise, farm products, forest products and iron ore in the upper section, of general merchandise, cotton, timber products and) grain in the middle section, and of general merchandise, farm products and timber products in the lower section.

During the Civil War Fort Henry was erected by the Confederates on the Tennessee river, in Tennessee just below the Kentucky state line, and on the 6th of February 1862 was captured by Com. A. H. Foote; Fort Donelson on the Cumberland, several miles east, was captured on the 16th by General U. S. Grant, and the two rivers were thus opened for the advance of the Federals far into Confederate territory.

TENNIEL, SIR JOHN (1820–), English humorous and satirical artist—specially identified with Punch—was born in London in 1820. He educated himself for his career, and although he became a probationer, and then a student, of the Royal Academy, he soon left the schools, where at that time there was little teaching. In 1836 he sent his first picture to the exhibition of the Society of British Artists, and in 1845 contributed a 16-ft. cartoon, “An Allegory of Justice,” to the competition, held in that year, of designs for the mural decoration of the new Palace of Westminster. For this he received a £200 premium and a commission to paint a fresco in the Upper Waiting Hall (or “Hall of Poets”) in the House of Lords. In spite of his tendency towards “high art,” he was already known and appreciated as a humorist, and his early companionship with Charles Keene fostered and developed his talent for scholarly caricature. At Christmas time 1850 he was invited by Mark Lemon to fill the position of joint cartoonist (with John Leech) on Punch, from which Richard Doyle, offended by the attitude adopted by the paper towards the Papal see at the time of the so-called “aggression,” had suddenly resigned. On the strength of his remarkable illustrations to Aesop's Fables, in which artistic power, humour of observation, and knowledge of animal life were equally apparent, Tenniel was selected, on Douglas Jerrold's initiative, to fill the breach, and he contributed his first drawing in the initial letter appearing on p. 224, vol. xix. His first “cartoon” was “Lord Jack the Giant Killer”: it showed Lord John Russell, whose letter on the “aggression” had recently been published, valiantly assailing with the sword of truth and liberty Cardinal Wiseman armed with a crozier. In 1852 we find Tenniel's first superb lion, and his first obituary cartoon. Gradually he took over altogether the weekly drawing of the political “big cut,” which John Leech was happy to resign into his hands in order to restrict himself to his pictures of life and character. Leech's work consisted for the most part of farce; Tenniel's was high comedy, and not infrequently tragedy; and the freedom of the humorist heightened the severer beauties of the satirist. When Leech died his friend continued his work alone, and except in 1864, 1868, and 1875–6–7–8, during short spells of illness or holiday, he did not miss a single week. About 2300 cartoons, innumerable minor drawings, double-page cartoons for Punch's Almanac and other special numbers, and 250 designs for Punch's Pocket-books, comprise the sum of Sir John Tenniel's work for the periodical in the service of which he spent the greater portion of his life. When Tenniel retired from the service of Punch in January 1901 he received the honour of a farewell banquet (12th June), at which Mr A. J. Balfour, then leader of the House of Commons, presided, and was supported by distinguished representatives of all that was best in English life. On that occasion Mr Balfour's description of Tenniel as “a great artist and a great gentleman” was applauded by the press of the whole country.

The main quality of Sir John Tenniel's work is accuracy of drawing, precision of touch, grace and dignity of conception, and—so far as such things can be compatible—geniality of satire. Tenniel raised the political cartoon into a classic composition, from which a sense of nobility is rarely absent. The beauty and statuesqueness of his ideal figures recall the influence, perhaps, of Cornelius and Overbeck—that German manner which was characteristic of many of our finer draughtsmen upon wood at the middle of the 19th century. But Tenniel's work is always original, unforced and fresh; and it never suggests, what is the fact, that the artist's work is drawn exclusively from memory, and never from the model. It may be mentioned that Tenniel's wonderful observation has been conducted, and his knowledge accumulated, literally through a single eye, the other having been lost during a fencing bout in his youth. It was in recognition not only of his ability as an artist in black and white, but of his service in infusing good humour and good taste into one phase of political life, that a knighthood was conferred upon him on Mr Gladstone's recommendation in 1893. Without pronounced political opinions of his own, Sir John Tenniel adopted in his work those of his paper, of which the Whig proclivities were to some degree softened by his pencil. The political history not of England only, but to some extent of the world, of half a century appears in Sir John Tenniel's weekly cartoons, which are dignified by a number of types invented by the artist, the classic beauty of which may be looked for in vain in kindred work by any previous cartoonist. (Take, for example, Sir John's famous picture of “Dropping the Pilot,” which appeared in Punch on 20th March 1890, xcviii. 150–51.) Public exhibitions of Sir John Tenniel's work were held in 1895 and in 1900. Sir John Tenniel is also the author of one of the mosaics, “Leonardo da Vinci,” in the South Court in the Victoria and Albert Museum: while his highly stippled water-colour drawings appeared from time to time in the exhibitions of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours, of which society he was elected a member in 1874. As an illustrator on the wood-block he stands very high; his “Lalla Rookh” is perhaps the finest of all his work in point of conception, refinement, power and technical excellence.

Works Illustrated.—(1) Juvenile Verse and Picture Book, (1846); (2) Undine (1846); (3) Aesop's Fables, 100 drawings (1848); (4) Blair's Grave (1858); (5:) Shirley Brooks's The Gordian Knot (1860), and (6) The Silver Cord (1861); (7) Moore's Lalla Rookh, 69 drawings (1861); (8) Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1866); (9) The Mirage of Life, 1867; (10) Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass (1870); and the following in collaboration: (11) Pollok's Course of Time (1857); (12) Poets of the Nineteenth Century (1857); (13) Poe's Works (1857); (14) Home Affections (1858); (15) Cholmondeley Pennell's Puck on Pegasus (1863); (16) The Arabian Nights (1863); (17) English Sacred Poetry (1864); (18) Legends and Lyrics (1865); (19) Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy; (20) Barry Cornwall's Poems, and other books. He also contributed to Once a Week, the Art Union publications, &c.

TENNIS (sometimes called royal tennis, and, in America, court tennis), one of the oldest of ball-games, and one of the most difficult to learn. It is now played in a walled and roofed court, 110 ft. by 38 ft. 8 in., the floor, however, measuring but 96 ft. by 31 ft.8 in., the difference being the width of a roofed corridor, the “penthouse,” which runs along the two end walls and one of the side walls. Across the middle of the court a net is stretched, and the first object of the game is to strike the ball over this with a bat or racquet. The net is 5 ft. high at the ends, 3 ft. 6 in. at the middle, and divides the floor into two equal parts, the “service” side and the “hazard” side. The floor and walls are made cf cement and should be smooth but not polished.

The court is lighted from the roof and sides. The height of the court to the tie-beam is 30 ft., the height of the play-line, above which the ball must not go, 18 ft. at the sides and 23 ft. at the ends. The roof of the penthouse, which is made of wood, slopes downwards towards the court, the lower edge being 7 ft. 1½ in. from the floor, the upper 10 ft. 7 in., the width 7 ft. The illustrations show that each of the walls has its own peculiarities. The “dedans” is an opening in the end wall on the service side, under the penthouse, where provision is made for spectators, who are protected by a net. It is 21 ft. 8 in. in width; the upper edge is 6 ft. 10 in. from the floor, the lower edge 3 ft. 3 in. The opening of the dedans is 4 ft. 6 in. from the main wall, 5 ft. 6 in. from the other side wall. Looking from the dedans (i.e. from the service side), the right-hand or main wall has one peculiarity, the “tambour,” a sloping buttress to form which the wall is built inward, reducing the breadth of that part of the court to 30 ft. 2 in. In the right-hand corner of the hazard side end wall (as viewed from the dedans) is the “grille,” an opening lined with wood, 3 ft. 1 in. square; and on this wall is painted a continuation of the “pass-line.” The left-hand wall, along which runs the pent-house, is not continuous, being broken by a long opening between the floor and the penthouse similar to the dedans, and at the same height from the ground. The low walls under this opening and the dedans are called the “batteries.” There is no wall in front of the “marker's box,” through which the court is entered on either side of the net-post. This long opening in the left-hand wall is divided into “galleries” and “doors,” the latter situated where the entrances to the court used to be in early times. The measurements in order from the dedans are as follows, the numbers of the galleries being counted from the net: Service side—last gallery, 9 ft. 6 in.; second gallery, 9 ft. 6 in.; door, 3 ft. 6 in.; first gallery, 5 ft. 8 in.; marker's box or line-opening, 7 ft. 10 in.; hazard side first gallery, 5 ft. 8 in.; door, 3 ft. 6 in.; second gallery, 9 ft. 6 in.;