assist my father in the more serious work, such as I, by reason of my
youth, could not yet perform. My spare time was spent largely in taking
instructions to artists or fetching drawings from them. At one moment I
might be at Mont-martre, and at another in the Quartier Latin, calling on
Pelcoq, Anastasi, Janet Lange, Gustave Janet, Pauquet, Thorigny, Gaildrau,
Deroy, Bocourt, Darjou, Lix, Moulin, Fichot, Blanchard, or other artists
who worked for the _Illustrated London News_. Occasionally a sketch was
posted to England, but more frequently I had to despatch some drawing on
wood by rail. Though I have never been anything but an amateurish
draughtsman myself, I certainly developed a critical faculty, and acquired
a knowledge of different artistic methods, during my intercourse with so
many of the _dessinateurs_ of the last years of the Second Empire.

By-and-by more serious duties were allotted to me. The "Paris Fashions"
design then appearing every month in the _Illustrated London News_ was for
a time prepared according to certain dresses which Worth and other famous
costumiers made for empresses, queens, princesses, great ladies, and
theatrical celebrities; and, accompanying Pelcoq or Janet when they went
to sketch those gowns (nowadays one would simply obtain photographs), I
took down from _la premiere_, or sometimes from Worth himself, full
particulars respecting materials and styles, in order that the descriptive
letterpress, which was to accompany the illustration, might be correct.

In this wise I served my apprenticeship to journalism. My father naturally
revised my work. The first article, all my own, which appeared in print
was one on that notorious theatrical institution, the Claque. I sent it to
_Once a Week_, which E. S. Dallas then edited, and knowing that he was
well acquainted with my father, and feeling very diffident respecting the
merits of what I had written, I assumed a _nom de plume_ ("Charles
Ludhurst") for the occasion, Needless to say that I was delighted when