The examination shows that in his case the personification of failings was as unconscious as the need of which it was the result. His introduction to the public was a chance; his growth from an insignificant beginning into a popular type, a case of the survival of the fittest. A drunken good-for-nothing, blind to his own absurdities and shortcomings, he commenced his career as the hero of a penny dreadful which, unfortunately for its author, had but little success. Whether the latter thought the public at fault or whether his power of invention was limited, it would be difficult to determine; but certain it is that the same hero, under the new name of Ally Sloper, soon tried his fortunes a second time, now, however, not alone but in company with Judy's weekly jesters. The success or failure of one particular comic picture or jest in a weekly paper is not as easily or as soon discovered as that of a book. It was impossible to know if Ally Sloper's second reception was more cordial than his first. But it was thought worth while to give him a third chance, then a fourth, a fifth, a tenth, a twentieth, even a hundredth. No protests being made, he was finally as regularly established on Judy's staff as Arlecchino or Pulcinello was in the Commedia dell' Arte. Though other characters appearing at the same time died a natural death, he gained new life with each number. Though other jests grew old with repetition, his follies never lost their first freshness.

While this continued success presupposes his merit as a comic character in the beginning, it depended mainly upon the fact that he was made a reality rather than an abstraction. He was given a name; his features never varied from week to week. He might have been called anything else with the same results. The name itself, if in a measure appropriate, is of small consequence. Scholars may dispute the origin of the word Arlequin, for example. They may prove its derivation from Achille de Harlay, or from Harle or Herle; but it is more than likely that, as in the case of Ally Sloper, its use as the name of the jester was a mere accident, arising from the desire to secure his definite personality. The features of the modern type, however, were less accidental. They had to a certain extent to correspond to his character. The bald head and abnormally large nose spoke as clearly of dissipated habits as the gin-bottle peeping from the old man's pockets. But no features could have appealed more strongly to the human sense of ridicule. An exaggerated nose has always been a recognized element of the comic, as is proved not only by old Roman gems, Pompeiian frescoes, mediaeval grotesques and modern valentines, but by the part it has played on the stage. Roman mimi and Italian and French masques never tired of wearing it, because people's enjoyment in it never ceased. The Venetian Facanappa, the French Gaultier Garguille, Giangurgolo Pulcincllo, and as many more, made it their one most marked feature. Therefore, with Ally Sloper it was not only an outward sign of an inward infirmity, but a conventional symbol of his comic functions. His costume answered the same double purpose. The old battered hat, the bulging umbrella, the stock tied carelessly behind, the shabby coat with the gin bottle ever in the pocket, expressed his good-for-nothingness, and were ridiculous in themselves. Shabby and disreputable though they were, his clothes did not detract from his reality. They now seem gross caricatures, but so do the finest gowns and bonnets, coats and trousers in old-fashioned plates. Like Arlecchino's and Pulcinello's costumes, originally they were not out of keeping with those of the day. It is easy to fancy just such an old man as the Ally Sloper of the early pictures shuffling along the Commercial Road or the New Cut. Thus figuring again and again with the same name, character, features and clothes, he began to seem less an imaginary than a real person. In the end the chief humour in the story told of him was his personality. As with the imbecile mistakes of Arlecchino, the cowardice of the Capitaine Fracasse, the pedantry of the Dottore, so with his disreputable drunkenness: it would not have been so funny in any one else. People did not weary of the monotony in Ally Sloper's absurd career, because they learned to welcome him as an old friend. Beginning by laughing at the adventures of which he was the hero, they finished by laughing because he was the hero of the adventures. They looked forward to his latest scrape or newest departure with an interest in him personally not unlike that with which devoted Conservatives might follow in their newspaper the political tactics of a Lord Randolph Churchill. And so it came to pass that, as Frenchmen at one time counted no play complete that had not its Pierrot, and as Florentines still hold the presence of Stenterello to be essential to every comedy and tragedy, so Ally Sloper in a few years became as indispensable a figure in Judy as the old lady herself.

It was a strong proof of his increasing hold upon popular favour when the space allowed him in her columns no longer seemed sufficient. But three or four years after his first appearance a series of Sloper books was begun, and his personality was accentuated by making him their editor. Just as Punch, having secured a certain standing, is still accepted as a comic paper, so Ally Sloper, having established his reputation as a humorist, was successful in his literary experiments even when he was a trifle dull. It is but fair to add there is not much to reproach him with on this score. In turning over the back numbers of Judy, of which these books are chiefly republications, the wonder is the jest could be so well sustained. The establishment of Ally Sloper's Half Holiday as a weekly paper in 1884, seventeen years after his creation in Judy, marks an era in his career. His ability to stand alone on his own merits puts him at once on a definite footing as a rival to Punch, Judy, and Fun. He may be said with this event to have achieved his growth, and to have ceased becoming to be the great modern jester or popular type of England.

This positive stage having been reached, he could be given greater license in many ways. His personality was now strong enough to be an attraction in itself, and there was no danger of lessening interest in him by heightening the caricatures. In the Half Holiday the bald head and nose have been exaggerated until they are little more truthful to Nature than the hooked nose and pointed hump of Punch. For a like reason the hat and umbrella and stock have never been modified by fashion; moreover they can be occasionally laid aside. Mr. Punch sometimes wears a silk hat and frock coat like any other gentleman; Stenterello, so long as he keeps his queue, and the lines on his face, and has one front tooth missing, can figure as a modern Florentine. The more strongly caricatured were the features of Ally Sloper, the less dependent was he on his clothes for identification, while it was only more ridiculous to make him appear at appropriate seasons in Highland dress, or Eton collar and jacket, in boating flannels or racing jerseys. Only the gin bottle from the second step or picture has been always with him, on Scotch moors as in Eton cloisters, on the race track as on the Thames. And now also the circumstances in which he was represented had not, as at first, to explain his character; they had only to emphasize his absurdity. This was really the first sign of his development into a typical character. It is the privilege or function of popular types to move with all sorts and conditions of men. Punch is not thought to be more out of place in Parliament than on his little murderous stage. Pulcinello in Naples, and Stenterello in Florence, are at home in whatever society their manager sees fit to put upon his boards. All classes, high or low, are alike to them. Sometimes, indeed, the jesters have varied not only the rank of their associates but their own. Polichinelle, while he continued to be Polichinelle, in his good sense, his ready sally, his irrepressible laugh, could be Turk or magician, mason or Don Quixote. Now he was the lover, now the bridegroom, now the father. Thus each character widened his range of sympathies and multiplied indefinitely the occasions for laughter. Already in the later numbers of Judy, the presence alone of Ally Sloper was considered a joke, and consequently he could go anywhere and everywhere. Now he was on the battlefield during the Franco-Prussian war, umbrella and gin bottle flying in opposite directions as he ran at the first sound of the cannon; now he was in African wilds, a peacock's feather in his old grey hat, hobnobbing with savages. The more incongruous the surroundings the more humorous the jest. In the Half Holiday one week he is at Windsor or Marlborough House, congratulating or dining with princes; another, mingling with the unemployed in Trafalgar Square. To-day he is in the theatre making himself agreeable to ballet dancers ; to-morrow, on his way to church, prayer-book under one arm, his wife on the other. He is actively interested in all the affairs of the day. He observes each season with appropriate celebrations, and is always present at any public event or rejoicing. On Christmas Day he eats his plum pudding, on February 14 he receives his valentines. He drives down to Epsom Downs for the Derby, veil tied about his hat, luncheon in his hampers; he is the prominent figure at Hammersmith during the Oxford and Cambridge race; he is sure to row to Henley for the Regatta; he is the real sight of the Lord Mayor's Show. At the elections he is found in the midst of the riots; at the opening of Parliament he makes his maiden speech. Lord's Cricket Ground, Wimbledon, Margate, see him in turn. In his comprehensive interests he is not unworthy of the initials F.O.M. (i.e., Friend of Man), which, together with M.P., T.O.E., P.B., T.W.M., whatever these may mean, follow his name.

Once a character is acknowledged as a jester, everything appertaining to him is accredited with a humorous value. The clown's whitened face is not his least witticism. And so, just as certain pious folk associate the idea of sanctity with even a thread from a saint's garment, believers in Ally Sloper could and can still see fun in the slightest possession attributed to him. Before he was two years old, the hat and umbrella had become standard jokes, as sacred symbols to his admirers, as Pulcinello's mask, Stenterello's queue, Harlequin's wand, to theirs. Even old broken combs, worn-out tooth brushes, raise a laugh when exhibited as his. This being the case, it is but natural that the members of his household seem beings of infinite jest. That he has a family is a matter of course. It is additional evidence of his reality, another occasion for laughter. Punch's chance of fun would not have been half so great had he not had a wife and baby to murder, and a Toby to run after him. Pantaleone might have been a bore had he not had two pretty daughters to play him false. A few of the Sloper connection are funny in themselves; others, like the old combs and toothbrushes, are only laughable because of their relationship to the chief jester; and still others are not ridiculous at all, but serve to point a contrast and stimulate the public interest by making a plot for the comedy. Ally Sloper's pretty daughter, Tootsie, and her lover, Lord Bob, though less romantic in name and the manner of their wooing, are nothing more than the modern Isabella and Leandro. There are twenty-two of these characters who take their place in the weekly drama of the Half Holiday with the same regularity with which Pantaleone, Arlecchino, Isabella and Leandro walked the boards together. It may at times be wondered why the characters and situations in the Commedia dell'Arte never varied; why one great actor after another became the Pulcinello or Pierrot of the old comedy instead of creating a new role. But people are naturally conservative in these matters, and never tire of favourite characters. No innovation was made because none was wanted. Ally Sloper's family, now it has been established, will probably not diminish, though it may increase in number