The Sun.
London, England, 1864-10-31 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 31, 1864.

g:PURNI EUItE, CARPETS, BEDDING, and
FLOORCLOTII, CARRIAGE-FREE to any house in
the kingdom, regardless of amount or distance. First. class
goods at second-class prices. Terms peculiarly liberal to
Clergymen and Gentlemen. An immense stock to select
from, displayed in Showrcoms occupying en acre of ground.
Every article warranted.
CLERGYMEN and GENTLEMEN ABOUT TO FUR-
NISH are respectfully informed that Messrs. Cobbett and
Co. are publishing- an entirely New Edition of their un-
equalled HOUSE FURNISHING GUIDE, illustrated byllo
.dm, -able engravings of every description of Furniture and
A:cc:steads, with prices attached. A copy sent gi atls and
post-free on application. This costly work also contains
complete estimates for furnishing on the following revised
_ _ _

A Six-roomed Parsonsge
Au Eight-roomed ditto
A Ten-rolmed ditto
A Twelve-roomed ditto

Together with a Price List of purified Bedding-, sad a mass
of valuable inforivationto all requiring househ 31d furniture,
'arpets, or bedding. References kindly permitted to Clergy-
men and gentlemen in or near Great Malvern, Southampton,
Chichester, Bury, Ely, Preston, Grimsby, Ityde, Plymouth,
Wells, Oxford. Brighton, Gainsborongh, Margate. Kidder-
minster, Wellington. Croydon. Cambridge, Staines, Dorking,
St. A.:ban's, Worcester, Ipswich, Peterborough, St. David's,
Wrexham, and above 500 other places in all parts of Great
Brits —.
COBBETT and CO., General House Furnishers, Deptford-
bridge, London. S.E.

R 30,000 —This Amount to be advanced
• by a private gentleman in sums of
£5O and upwards, to Noblemen, Gentlemen, Beira to Entailed
Estates, Officers on full-pay, &c., with secrecy and despatch,
on their notes of hand ; also on Reversions, Legacies, and
Life Interests, at 5 per cent.—Apply, by letter only, to L. G.,
7, Jermyn-street, St. James's, S. W.

HAIR-CURLING FLUID, 248, High Holborn,
London.—ALEX. ROSS'S CURLING FLUID curls
Ladies' or Gentlemen's hair immediately it is app.ied. Sold
at 3s. 6d.; sent free for 54 stamps. Ross's Toilet Magazine,
Is. 6d., or 20 stamps.

GREY HAIR.-248, High Holborn, London.—
ALEX. ROSS'S charges for Dyeing the hair perma-
nently— Ladies' Hair from 7s. 6d. ; Gentlemen's from ss.
The Dye is sold at 3s. 6d ,or sent free for 54 stamps. It is
most easy of tre.

HAIR DESTROYER —248, High Holborn,
London.—ALEX. ROSS'S DEPILATORY removes,
without effect to the sion, superfluous hair from the face,
neck, and arms. Is. tid.; sent the same day as ordered by post
for 51 stamps.

SPANISH FLY is the acting ingredient in
ALEX. ROSS'S CANTHARIDES 0 IL, which Fpeedily
produces whiskers and thickens hair. 3s. 6d.; sent free for 54
stumps.—ALES. ROSS, 218, High Holborn, London. Essay
)n Hair, Id.

PIMPLE REMOVER.--All diseases of the skin
are improved by one dose of ALEX. ROSS'S VEGE-
TABLE SKIN PILL. They remove redness, sallowness
tte 2s. 9d.; by post for 40 st tmps.—ALEX. ROSS, 248, High
llolborn, Lonaon.

ALEX. ROSS'S FACE POWDER, ls.; sent for
14 stamps ; Eye Colour, 3s. fd., or 54 stamps. Skin
tonic produces a transcendent complexion, 45., or t*.o stamps.
Bloom of Roses, 3s. 6d., or 51 stamps —ALEX. ROSS, 218,
High Holborn, London.

BUSINESSES.-Mr. ANDREW HIND'S
NOVEMBER LIST,
Containing 500 Businesses, Premises, Partnerships, &e.,
Gratis.
Letters, enclose stamp.—Particulars entered free.
OFFICES—CORNER OF LITTLE CARTER-LANE, ST. PAUL'S.

CAPITAL INVESTMENT, nearly eqoal to
F ItEEIIOLD.—M r. ANDREW HIND has for disposal
a PUBLIC-HOUSE, with Tlouse and Shop adjoining, near
Southampton, produ-ing £75 per annum ; t nants paying all
taxes ; value ot property in the neighbourhood rapidly in-
creasing; hid for a term ot 999 years at a ground-rent of
£10; lowest price £Boo. Further particuttrs and cards to
view, at the Estate Agency Offices, corner of Little Carter-
lane, St. Paul's.

MEET H. -IMPROVED MECHANICAL
DENTIS TRY.—Professional abilities and great artistic
skill have been most successfully combined In the proluction
of ARTIFICIAL TEETH, upon a new principle. The real
value or the perfection of the art of Dentistry will be experi-
enced by all wishing' to avail themselves of professional
assistance by c:nsulting Mr. AL BERT, 34, Great Russell-
st•eet, Bloomsbury. whose experience has enabled him to
effect such admirable, convenient contrivances by artificial
means, and which are so perfectly efficient.

THE BENEFACTOR OF THE SKIN.—
MOLLARD'S perfumed Toilet Sulphur Soap and
Cream, highly patronised by the faculty, nobility, and gentry.
Nothinz equals the properties and qualities of the Soap No.
I for ordinary toilet purposes, and of A os. 2 to 5 in all oases
of cutaneous affections or rheumatism.
Perfumed toilet cream, cold cream, and pomatsm for the
hair,
Barege cream for sulphur baths, without any disagreeable
odour.
All these preparations may be had at the central depot,
221 A, Regent-street, London, W. ; and at Messrs. Newbery
and Sons, Barclay and Sons. Edwards, Keating, Sanger and
Son, Jozeaunetti, and all chemists. Pamphlets and test:-
mon'als tree on a plication.
Agent for Edinbirgh—Mr. John M'Kay, chemist, 119,
George-street.

ROYAL FREE HOSPITAL, Gray's-inn-road,
in the immediate vicinity of the Great Northern Rail-
way Terminus, King's-cross.
Patron—Her Most Gracious Majesty the QUEEN.

Vice-Patron—His Royal llighness the Prince of WALE
President—His Grace the Duke of BUCCLEUCIL K.G.
Treasurer—Edward Mastcrman, Esq. _

- - -
The numerous and urgent appeals of the si:k poor for ad-
mission compel the Committee to entreat the bounty of the
affluent and humane, as the medical officers are daily obliged
t) treat as out-patients many distressing cases which, with
more adequate funds, they would gladly admit into the wards.
The premises of the Hospital are capable of containing 500
beds.
The Hospital is not endowed, but is wholly dependent on
voluntary contributions and legacies, which are received by
the Treasurer, Edward Mas rerman, Esq., Nicholas-lane; also
by Messrs. Coutts and Co.; Drummond and Co. ; Herries and
Co. ; Ransom and Co. ; Prescott, Grote, and Co. ; Smith,
Payne, and Co. ; Giyn and Co. ; Jones Loyd and Co. ; Barclay
and Co. ; Denison and Co. ; ,lliams, Deacon, and Co.;
Overend, Gurney, and Co. ; Nisbet and Co., Berners-street ;
Masterman and Co. ; I. Barned and Co., Liverpool ; and at
the Hospital. from 10 till 5.
STANFORD S. SMITH Secretary.

DEATH OF MR. JOHN LEECH.

Suddenly there is a great blank among ns, and
the shadow of a great darkness, One of our dearest
and most delightful companions, one whom not only
we, but also all whose eyes will rest upon these

columns, must think of as in some sort a cherished
companion, is taken from us, John Leech, known
to the puKc es one of the most kindly and the
moat graceful humonris's that ever lived, known to
his friends for a peculiar gentleness and refinement

of character that at first sight seemed as it were in

opposition to the robustnese of his judgment, and
therefore took many people by surprise, died on

Saturday evening at 7 o'clock. The death of Garrick
was said to have eclipsed the gaiety of nations, and
the death of Mr Leech will touch many more hearts
both of this and other nations, than Garrick ever
reached. Although he looked strong, he had been
long a suffererer, and complained of sleeplessness;
his incessant brainwork induced a peculiar irrita-
bility with which meat persons have a terdency to
jest rather than to sympathise. He was much
effected by noise, and was literally driven from his
house in Brunswick-coiner° by street music. He
hoped to get peace at Kensington, especially as he
shut them out by the device of double windows;
but he had no peace, and in addition to the torment
of the organs he came to be afflicted at early dawn
by the hammer of some small mechanic. His friends
' • •
madeslig_hc.of it , trie_djo jest with him. " You
may laugh," he would say, "but I assure you it
will kill me." He was so unwell that during this
last summer he was obliged to go abroad, and he
was forbidden to indulge in his favourite exer-
cise of riding on horseback. He came back
better in the autumn, but still he was strangely
susceptible to noise, and only than a fortnight ago
he spoke with more than his usual earnestness,
with something even of passionate entreaty
in his tones about the suffering which
the street organs gave him, and about the
smallness of the sympathy which he received from
people who have to work their brains in a mere
routine. At last his sufferings have come to an end,
and if any of his friends were inclined to treat them
as imaginary they will now be convinced. It is
not a year since he stood in tears by the grave of
his schoolfellow, Thackeray, and now his friends
will follow him, too, to his long home. They were
schoolfellows together, they were fellow-workers
together in Punch; both had something even of
womanly gentleness intermingled with the strength
of their characters; and both were in their styles
of working classical.

Although Mr Leech lived to be 47 years of age,
the record of his life is short and simple. He was
born in London in 1817, and was educated at the
Charterhouse. He left school to study medicine,
and had made considerable progress in that direc-

tioa before he discovered what was to be his true
path in life. His first sketch in Punch, entitled
"Foreign Affairs," appeared in the first week of
August, 1841, and thenceforward the history of his
lite is to be seen week by week in the pages of that
popular periodical. No doubt, he was otherwise
engaged also. He illustrated almanacs and novels,
books of travel and poems. A Christmas time with-
out two dozen sketches by Leech, full of the most
graceful and delicate humour, would be a strange
Christmas indeed, a Christmas which might as well
be without holly and mistletoe, dancing and good
cheer. He always took great pains as Christmas
drew nigh, and year by year seemed to surpass
himself in delicacies of touch, and in the charm of
his humour. But it was through the weekly pages
o' Punch, far more than through the yearly almanac,
that Mr Leech was best known to the public; and
his life is there reflected. He goes to France and
draws aFrench scene, to Scotlitnd auddraws a Scotch
one. Then his experieno.,, of our litooial
pictures of balls, dinner parties, mess-rooms, bache-
lors' chambers, Rotten-row, gardens, parks, streets,
watering places, shooting parties, hunting fields,
boating, fishing, and we know act what else,
make up such a history of his time as to the future
historian will be invaluable. The fashion of the
day, the passion of the hour is reflected on his page
as in a photograph. And while we have thus in his
sketches a curiously complete history of certain
phases of this Victorian era, we have also in them a
picture and a chronicle of the artist's own life,
Anyone, without knowing Mr Leech personally,
can detect in these sketches the work of a keen-
sighted, hearty sort of man, healthy and broad in
his sympathies, full of fun, but still more charmed
with grace, and sensitive to beauty, fond of chil-
dren, fond of dwelling on all youthful beauty, fond
of beautiful dogs and horses, but above all things
of truth and nature.

We have said that he was classical in his style of
working. One cannot well speak of the ridiculous
in itself as classical ; and much of Mr Leech's work
concerned the ridiculous. But in him the sense of
the grotesque and the love of satire was never
allowed to interfere with, much less to over-ride, his
attraction to whatever was beautiful and true. There
never was a caricaturist who was so little of a ca•
ricaturist ; who would gi ite the truth of nature on
so many different sides, and seemed at the same
time to have so quick an eye for whatever is lovely
in nature. Ile drew with equal ease a fine lady and
a crossing-sweeper—and on the same page he would
bewitch the reader of Punch with the loveliest of

little maidens, and provoke him with the vnlgarest
of upstarts. And h 3 was always seeing and drawing
something new. Suddenly we should be astonished
with some sea-piece in which the billows were ren-
dered with wonderful skill. Or we had some monn-

tain scenery, or a glade in a wood, or ploughed
fields, or standing corn. He never stood still.
When we wondered what should come next, we
had some rare sky, some curious effect of light. And
all this display of scenery was the mere background
to views in which men, and women, and children
were the chief objects of interest. All seemed to
flow from his pencil so easily that people scarcely
enough understood how hard he worked. He
must have worked very hard to produce so
much variety in constant succession week
after week for more than 20 years. He died,
too, in harness, working to the last, and
working, indeed, beyond his strength. With cha-
racteristic generosity he made unusual exertions in
aid of his relatives, and his labours were latterly
more severe than they need have been if he had had
only to think of himself and his household. These
anxieties and exertions have at length struck him
down—and who is there to fill his place ? A good,
great man, of fine and rare genius, has gone from
among us,and we shall not know how much he was to
us until we discover by his loss that nature does not

often produce such artists as John Leech. One of
our greatest artists, Sir Edwin Landseer, has said
that there is scarcely a sketch of Mr. Leech's which
is not worthy to be framed by itself and hung on

our walls. Other artists are equally strong in his
praise. No man envied him. The public at large
think more of the human interest that belongs to
his drawings and the amusement which may be de-
rived from them. But, over and above all this, they
have qualities which, notwithstanding the lowli-
ness of the material employed, will hereafter confer
on Mr. Leech's sketches a very high renown as
works of art.

To these few observations we append the follow-
ing letter, which will have a sad interest at the
present moment. When Mr. Bass proposed to bring
a bill into Parliament relating to street music he
received a number of letters from various persons
who wished him success. He published these
letters, and among them wo find the following. We
will only add that, though Mr. Leech suffered
much, his life was not supposed to be in immediate
danger. He went out to consult Dr. Quain on
Friday, and there was a child's party in his home
at the time of his death :
" Punch Office, 85, Fleet-street, 231 May, 1861.

" venture upon what might possibly be consi•
dered an impertinence, were not the subject of my note o 1
public interest.
4' I am so greatly interested iu the success of your mea•

sure for the regulation of street music that I am desirous of
strengthening your hands by putting you in possession of
some facts within my knowledge. I formerly lived in Gor-
don-street, Gordon-square, but was compelled to quit Lon-
don to escape the distressing consequences of street music,
although Gordon_street was comparatively a quiet locality.
A dear friend of mine, and one to whom the public has been
indebted for 20 years for weekly supplies of innocent amuse-
ment, and whose name will find a place in the future history
of Art, has not been se fortunate. He lived in Brunswick.
square, and remained there until the nervous system Wad
so seriously affected by the continual disturbance to which
he was subjected while at work that he was compelled to
abandon a most desirable home and seek a retreat at Ken-
sington. After expending considerable sums to make his
present residence convenient for his art work—placing
double windows to the front of his house, &c., he is again
driven from his home by the continual visitation of street
bands and organ grinders. The effect upon his health pro-
duced—on my honour, by the causes I have named—is so
serious that ha is forbidden to take horse exercise, or indulge
in fast walking, as a palpitation of the heart has been pro-
duced—a form of angina pectoris, I believe—and his friends
are most anxiously concerned for his safety. He is ordered
to Homburg, and I know that the expatriation will entail a
loss of nearly £5O a week upon him just at present. lam
sure I need not withhold from you the name of this poor 1
gentleman—it is Mr John Leech.

" If those gentlemen who !augh at complaints such as this
letter contains were to know what are the natural penalties
of constant brain work, they would not encourage or defend
such unnecessary inflictions as street music entails upon
some of the benefactors of their age. Such men are the
last to interfere with the enjoyments of their poorer fel-
low-labourers, but they claim to be allowed to pursue their
calling in peace, and to have the comfort of their. homes
secured to them, All they ask is to have the semi, thnk=
nity from the annoyances of street mnsic as the resit of the
community have from dustmen's bells, post-horns, and other
unnecessary disturbance. The objection to street noises is
not a matter of taste. It involves the progress of hornet
labour and the avoidance of great mental affliction.
"Apologising for the liberty I have taken,
" Believe me, yours faithfully,
"iM. T, Bass, Esq., M.P." " MARK LEMON.