The "sketches" of HB were a complete innovation upon pictorial satire. The idea of satirizing political subjects and public men without the exaggeration or vulgarity which the caricaturists had more or less inherited from Gillray, was entirely new to the public, and took with them immensely; and herein lies their peculiarity, that whilst the subjects are treated with a distinctly sarcastic humour, there is an absence of anything approaching to exaggeration, and the likenesses of the persons represented are most faithfully preserved. Whilst claiming for himself the character of a pictorial satirist, the artist is all throughout anxious to impress upon you the fact that he repudiates the notion of being considered a caricaturist in the Johnsonian meaning of the word. This _idea_ seems also to have struck Thackeray, who, writing at the time when the sketches were appearing, says of him, "You never hear any laughing at 'H.B.'; his pictures are a great deal too genteel for that,--polite points of wit, which strike one as exceedingly clever and pretty, and cause one to smile in a quiet, gentlemanlike kind of way."[110] Throughout the series of sketches we know but of one instance where the artist suffers any comparison to be established between himself and the political caricaturists who had preceded him, and that is the one entitled _Bombardment Extraordinary_ (having reference to the indictment for libel against the _Morning Journal_, which was shortly followed by the collapse of that paper), which is treated to the full as coarsely as Gillray himself might desire. The fact of this being among the earliest sketches would seem to show that the artist had not then quite made up his mind whether to follow in the footsteps of his great predecessor or not. We think the result must have convinced him that, whilst having distinct merits of his own as a satirist, and indeed as an artist, he was very far behind Gillray; and the rest of the sketches seem to show that their designer had made up his mind that no middle course was possible;--in other words, that he must be HB or nothing.
The faithfulness of the likenesses of the persons who appear in these "sketches" is simply marvellous. Not only has the artist preserved the features of the subjects of his satires, but he has caught their attitude--their manner, almost their tricks and habits,--and the drawings being, as we have said, wholly free from exaggeration, the very men stand before you, often, it is true, in absurd and ridiculous positions. The persons who figure in these lithographs comprise among names of note many whose reputations were too ephemeral to preserve them from oblivion. On the other hand, amongst the various groups we recognise Prince Talleyrand, the Dukes of Cumberland, Gloucester, Wellington, and Sussex, George the Fourth, William the Fourth, Louis Philippe, her present Majesty, Lord Brougham, Colonel Sibthorpe, Count Pozzo di Borgo, Daniel O'Connell, Lord John Russell, Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Hume, Lord Melbourne, Lord Palmerston, Sir Francis Burdett, Mr. Roebuck, Sir James Graham. Persons with no political reputation or connection are occasionally introduced to serve the purposes of the artist: doing duty for him in this manner we find the Rev. Edward Irving; Townsend the "runner," of Bow Street notoriety; George Robins, the auctioneer; Liston, the comedian; and others.