In 1913 Henry J. Drane of London published The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. It used FitzGerald’s first and second versions and was illustrated by W.F. Coles, though the artist is not named on the title–page, and he is known only through his signature on the frontispiece and the four illustrations in the body of the book. The book is undated, but its publication was announced in The Bookseller on 14 November 1913 (1). It is Potter #160 & Paas ##1722–6.
The frontispiece (with title–page, bearing an unsigned vignette) is shown in Fig.1a, and the four other illustrations in Figs.1b, 1c, 1d & 1e. All five illustrations relate to FitzGerald’s first version, as their captions indicate, though they do not face their respective quatrains and seem to have been placed so that they were evenly spread through the book, the last two ending up in the text of FitzGerald’s second version. Thus, Fig.1a relates to quatrain 18; Fig.1b to quatrain 7; Fig.1c to quatrain 11; Fig.1d to quatrain 59; and Fig.1e to quatrain 74. As can be seen, the illustrations are mostly literal and not very exciting depictions of their respective quatrains, though Fig.1a has more about it. Firstly the young woman seems to be enthusing about the physical beauty of the roses, but Omar is altogether more thoughtful, presumably about their symbolism. But why is he pouring wine on the roses in front of him? We know from FitzGerald’s Introduction that Omar once prophesied that his tomb would be in a spot where the north wind would scatter rose petals over it, and from quatrains 67 and 68 that Omar wanted his body to be washed in wine “That ev’n my buried Ashes such a snare / Of Perfume shall fling up into the Air &c.” So, is Coles’s illustration related to this? Or is it, perhaps, a nod towards the sentiments of Ernest Dowson’s famous line, “They are not long, the days of wine and roses,” itself an echo of the much earlier carpe diem wine–and–roses odes of Anacreon? Or again, much more likely given the adherence of the other illustrations to their respective quatrains, is the thoughtful Omar simply offering a libation to the “buried Caesar” he is imagining to lie below? Whatever the explanation, this illustration is more interesting than the others.
As regards the vignette on the title–page, this seems to be a generic image of a contemplative Omar, rather than a reference to any particular quatrain – the “thoughtful Soul” of quatrain 4, “Dreaming when Dawn’s Left Hand was in the Sky,” as in quatrain 2, perhaps.
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
Let us now turn to the artist, about whom virtually no information is available either online or in the standard dictionaries of artists and book illustrators.
To identify the artist via online ancestry records one first has to realise that W.F. Coles is the same person as Frederick William Coles. Thus, in the 1900 & 1902 editions of Spennell’s Annual Directory for Stratford–upon–Avon, W.F. Coles, Artist, is listed at the address 22 Scholars Lane, and in the 1901 UK Census Frederick W. Coles, Artist (Painter) lives at that same address. In the 1911 edition of Spennell’s Annual Directory for Stratford–upon–Avon Wm. F. Coles, Artist, is living at 13 West Street, and in the 1911 UK Census Frederick William Coles, Painter (Artist) is living at the same address. Clearly, then, the two are the same, W.F. Coles being the preferred form of his name, as signed in his illustrations, reversing the F.W. initials of his birth name, for he was baptised Frederick William Coles on 7 December 1870 (at Stratford–upon–Avon), his record of baptism revealing that he was the son of William Coles, a cabinet maker, and his wife, Senea.
In the 1881 UK Census, age 10 and named simply as William Coles, he is recorded as living with his parents, his father now listed as a Paper Hanger (age 43), his mother as a Dressmaker (age 43.) He has an older sister, Elizabeth, age 17, also a Dressmaker. Their address is 22 Scholars Lane, Stratford–upon–Avon, already seen above. William Coles Senior died in 1884, and in the 1891 Census the widowed Senea Coles and daughter Elizabeth Coles (both now Dress and Mantle Makers), and with son Frederick W. Coles, now age 20 and an Auctioneer’s Clerk by profession, are all still together at 22 Scholars Lane. The family were still together at this address at the time of the 1901 Census, Frederick W. Coles being by then a 30 years old Artist (Painter), as noted above.
In 1903 our artist married Amy Coaley as a result of which, by the time of the 1911 Census, Frederick William Coles, Painter (Artist), age 40, and his wife Amy, listed as “Servants Registry Office (Proprietress)”, age 34, were living at the aforementioned 13 West Street, Stratford–upon–Avon, with their 6 years old daughter, Doris May Coles.
Frederick William Coles was to live on for only two years after that census. He died of meningitis on 7 April 1913, aged only 42, his death certificate giving his occupation as “Illustrating Draughtsman.” His Rubaiyat, then, was actually published posthumously.
Unfortunately, online newspaper archives have failed to turn up any further information about Coles beyond a brief mention of his marriage in the “Births, Marriages and Deaths” column of The Stratford–upon–Avon Herald on 6 November 1903. Nothing at all emerged to throw any light on his life in Stratford, be it in local affairs, activity in the local art scene, or exhibitions of his work; not even a brief obituary of him which might have given us a clue to his artistic training. All alike remain shrouded in mystery. All we have in addition to the above are the details of the books he illustrated, to which we now turn.
It would appear that Coles illustrated at least fourteen books, all for Henry J. Drane, the publisher of the Coles Rubaiyat. These are listed in the table in Fig.2a, but despite Coles being named on the title–page of twelve of them (he is unnamed only in titles 10 & 14), it has proved surprisingly difficult to build up this list, so there may well be others ‘out there’ waiting to be discovered. It is also worth mentioning at this point that titles 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 & 13 are part of a set of books of fairy tales published by Drane, all bearing the same style of cover. Fig.2b shows three of them (each with its year of publication) by way of example.
Marguerite Russo’s bulky novel In the Coils of the Serpent (1899) appears to be the first publication of Drane’s in which Coles was involved. As the title–page tells us, its frontispiece was “from an original picture by W.F. Coles”. It is shown as Fig.3, and as its caption reveals, it depicts the Carnival at Nice, which features in chapter 10 of the novel. For those readers puzzled by the lack of a serpent in the frontispiece, the ‘serpent’ is a human villain who, by devious and dastardly machinations, seeks the downfall of the family of Sir Arthur Montague. As a reviewer in The Bookseller (6 February 1900) put it, the author “is capable of much better work than this”, adding, “We have struggled laboriously and painfully with the ‘Coils’ only to feel that the labour, both of writer and reader, might have been better employed.” Enough said, then.
His second book for Drane was Gems from Tennyson (1900), subtitled “A Birthday Book for All.” The title–page tells us that the Gems were selected by J.R. Tutin, and that there were “Four Full–page Illustrations from original Pictures by W.F. Coles.” I give two examples here as Fig.4a (“Ring Out, Wild Bells”) and Fig.4b (“The Miller’s Daughter”).
With the third book in the list, Coles’s work for Drane reaches something of a peak: Kate Stanway’s book, The White Prince or the Stolen Roses (1902), subtitled, “A Story of Flowerland.” This allegorical story of the year’s doings in Flowerland as the seasons unfold, involves not only the flowers and trees, each characterised by their traditional symbolism (better known in the early twentieth century than now) (2), but also the assorted fairies, sprites and elves associated with them, plus an assortment of characters from Classical Mythology, notably Hermes (here the White Prince), Athena (here the Queen of the Air), Helios, Aphrodite, Cupid and Pan. The title–page tells us that Coles did “twenty full–page and other illustrations”, the other illustrations being rather neat marginal drawings of various flowers. I give four examples of the full–page illustrations here: Fig.5a (p.22), Fig.5b (p.88), Fig.5c (p.166 – note Athena & Hermes) and Fig.5d (p.194.) This last is my favourite. Stanway was ahead of her time as regards opposing the incursion of towns and cities into the countryside, and its adverse effects on nature. The incursion is blamed on “a hideously ugly demon named ‘Brixanmorta’, who chopped down all the trees, grubbed up all the flowers, filled the ground with foul–smelling pipes, erected houses full of death traps, and finally built a big railway station..." (p.195.)
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
As indicated above, The White Prince or the Stolen Roses was one of a set of fairy stories illustrated by Coles for Drane, and it is a typical member of that set, involving similar illustrations of similar themes. Accordingly I give here only those examples which particularly caught my eye, going forward chronologically.
Wilhelm’s Fortune is the tale of a poor orphan boy who encounters dwarfs (Fig.6a – p.31), becomes a knight and, as is the wont of any self–respecting knight, rescues an imprisoned princess (Fig.6b – p.63). Also in the book is Ardof, the tale of a naughty boy of that name who runs away from school and has various adventures in a forest, where he encounters the hobgoblin called Nobody (Fig.6c – p.105). It has a huge bubble–like head, a wide grotesque mouth, two long wobbly arms and thirteen non-matching feet taken from men, women, children and various animals. In accordance with its name it has no body – it was a “creature without a middle.” Coles’s image, then, is a product of the author’s imagination rather than his own.
Doings in Dogland, subtitled “a Story for all those who love Dogs”. though not a book of conventional fairy tales, has a cover which classes it with those in Fig.2b. As one critic put it, writing in The Morning Leader on 23 May 1906 (p.3), it is a “sort of fairy tale.” It is the story of a boy called Allen who enters Dogland in a dream. Here all the characters are part–dog, part–human, and two of its twelve illustrations will give the flavour of the whole. Fig.7a (the frontispiece) shows Allen at the canine golf course, and Fig.7b shows him as a guest at a doggie wedding. The critic in the above–quoted review in The Morning Leader went on, “The illustrations are creditable, but appear to have been drawn with little knowledge of reproductive methods: they are too flat.” A critic in The Bookseller, though, writing on 9 March 1906 (p.18), thought that “Mr Coles’s illustrations are capital.”
The Granny Growler Stories was described by one reviewer in The Manchester Courier (30 November 1906) as “a curious and clever book for little people”, but cautioned that “the opening story is too gruesome for most tastes, and the element of horror is too prominent throughout for imaginative children.” In other words, it was the sort of thing that many children would delight in, though by today’s standards they are harmless enough. Fig.8a (p.15) relates to that opening story, “The King of the Wolves” and Fig.8b (p.69) to the later tale of “The Water–finder and the Gnomes.”
Motoring through Dreamland is the tale of a little girl who is driven through Dreamland in a car whose chauffeur has yellow eyes and a green moustache. Fig.9a (p.19) and Fig.9b (p.25) are two good examples of Coles’s 20 illustrations for the book. In some ways, the car is the star of the show.
Finally, from The Adventures of the Princess Rosabel, the tale of the kidnapping of the princess by a wicked old witch and her subsequent escape, two good examples are Fig.10a (p.65) and Fig.10b (p.85).
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
Two books which are rather odd–ones–out among the fairy stories in Fig.2a are Reminiscences of Many Lands by A Nomad (the pseudonym of R. Brooks Popham) (3) and The A.B.C. of Diabolo by Dorothy Walthall.
Reminiscences of Many Lands, subtitled, “Being Extracts from the Five Years Journal of a Wanderer,” was published by Drane in December 1905. The many lands include China, Japan, South Africa, India, America and France. Its title–page says “Illustrations by Viola G. Woulfe, Forbes Ashburner, W.F. Coles, and from Original Photographs.” Unfortunately, all but one of the black and white drawings are unsigned, and the only one bearing what looks like a signature is that in Fig.11 (Plate XI), the signature of “W.F. Coles” (?) being just about visible in the top left–hand corner. Its style is very much like some of the ‘action packed’ illustrations Coles did later for the boys’ comic The Vanguard Library, to which we shall return below, but meanwhile, as one critic in The Pall Mall Gazette (2 December 1905, p.9) put it, Reminiscences of Many Lands is told “in artless fashion by a writer with no pretensions to style, and apparently with a somewhat conventional and superficial view of life”, its illustrations being “of no very great artistic value.”
The A.B.C. of Diabolo was one of an extensive series of ABC Handbooks published by Drane, others in the series covering everything from Swimming, Dancing and Gardening, to Bridge, Photography and Palmistry. This particular volume seems to have been published at a time when there was a resurgence of interest in Diabolo, it having an introduction by the cricketer C. B. Fry, who was apparently an enthusiast, though why Coles was roped in to illustrated it is not known – perhaps he, like Fry was an enthusiast, who knows ? Fig.12 shows two of Coles’s illustrations. Note his WFC monogram in both.
As stated above, all of the foregoing books were published by Henry J. Drane. But Drane was London based and Coles lived all his life in Stratford–upon–Avon, so what was the connection between them ? To attempt to address that question let us look at the life of this publisher, about whom little information is generally available.
Born in London on 31 December 1858 he was baptised Henry Joseph Drane on 3 July 1859 at the Church of St. John at Bethnall Green. He was the son of Henry Drane, a shoemaker, and his wife Emma. By the time of the 1861 Census, his father had died, and, aged 2, he was living with his widowed mother (listed as a Mangler), aged 26, and an unnamed 3 weeks old sister at 2 Morpeth Place, South Hackney (she seems not to have survived infancy.) He actually had an older sister, Sophia Amy Drane, born 26 July 1857, baptised 1 January 1858, but at the time of the 1861 Census she was living with an aunt and uncle, presumably to ease the burden on her widowed mother and new–born baby. (Her baptismal record reveals that her mother’s full name was Emma Sarah Drane.)
By the time of the 1871 Census, Emma Drane, now 35, had married William Siggers, age 32, a Porter. Living with them are Henry J. Drane, age 12, Sophia Amy Drane, age 13, their younger brother Willie Drane, age 4 (born after the previous census), and Sophia Emma Siggers, aged 3 months, Henry Drane’s half–sister by his mother’s second marriage. They are living at 15 Brook Street, Bermondsey.
The 1881 Census return is not very legible in parts, annoyingly when it comes to the occupation of the now 22 years old Henry J. Drane. The family is pretty much as it was in the earlier census, but with the addition of four more Siggers children – 3 daughters and 1 son. They were by now living in West Ham (address illegible), the occupation of William Siggers being now listed as City Missionary.
The precise course of events after this is unclear in places because of people sharing the names Drane and Siggers. But in the 1891 Census most of the family of the 1881 Census are still together at 4 East Road, West Ham, but Henry J. Drane and his mother are absent, and it is not clear where they were. An Emma Siggers died in 1888, but this appears not to be his mother, for she features as Emma S. Siggers with her City Missionary husband, living at 7 Compton Street, West Ham in the 1901 Census. (She died in 1904.) Plus, we do know that in 1891 Henry Joseph Drane married Helene Meyer in West Ham. The 1901 Census lists Henry Joseph Drane (age 42, he listed as editor, author (4) and publisher), his wife Helene (age 44, born in Lübeck, Germany), their three sons, Harold Robert Percy (age 7), Douglas Albert Coleman (age 4) and Edward Magnus (age 2), as living at Dalefield House, Palmerston Road, Buckhurst Hill, Essex. In their employ they have a “lady help” named Emilia Marie Oldag (born in Lübeck, Germany), presumably a nurse for the children, and a domestic servant called Elizabeth Grayling.
Helene Drane died in 1906 and in 1907 he married Antonia Minna Marie Johanna Carlotta Muir. She was born Antonia Minna Marie Johanna Carlotta Steinhoff in Osterode, Germany, and had married a merchant, Robert William Muir, in 1873. They had a daughter, Antonia Helene Muir, in 1893. Robert William Muir died in 1898, all of which explains the 1911 census which lists Henry Joseph Drane (age 52 – Editor), Antonia Minna Marie Johanna Carlotta Drane (age 55 – her name so long it had to be split into two lines to fit in the relevant box on the census form), Antonia Helene Muir (age 18, his step–daughter, a student), Harold Robert Percy Drane (age 17, his son, a bank clerk), plus a cook and a housemaid, all living at Dalefield, Buckhurst Hill, Essex (the same address as in the 1901 Census.) His other two sons were boarders at Chigwell School at the time of the Census.
Antonia M. M. J. C. Drane died in 1912.
By the time of the 1921 Census he had moved to Friars Farm in the village of Fordham in Essex, where he was to live until his death. A 62 years old widower, he is listed as Director of Drane’s Publishers Ltd. Living with him are his two sons, Douglas (age 24) and Edward (age 22), both single, and both of whom were demobilised naval officers. Also living in the house were two servants.
Henry Joseph Drane died on 3 December 1932, aged 73. He was buried on 7 December at All Saints Church, Fordham, Essex.
Since the majority of Drane’s publications were undated, it is difficult to be sure when his publishing activities began and when they finished, but it would appear that they ran from about 1887 to 1931, the year before his death. A short notice in The Bookseller on 16 December 1886 (p.3) tells us that:
Mr Henry J. Drane who for some years past has managed the publishing business of Mr James E. Hawkins, 17, Paternoster Row, is shortly giving up that position to commence business as a fine art and general publisher on his own account.
According to The Bookseller, his first publication was F.R. Havergal’s Songs of the Master’s Love in August 1887, and his last was Your Fortune: A Record of what should Befall those Born on any Day in the Year by A Mem Sahib in February 1931.
Unfortunately, nothing has come to light to associate Drane with Stratford–upon–Avon, so how he and Coles encountered each other remains unknown at present.
This was a weekly paper of “ripping yarns” for boys published by Trapps, Holmes & Co. of London between 1907 and 1910. Coles contributed a large number of illustrations to the paper during this period (5), of which the following give a representative cross–section of the story–types illustrated: Fig.13a (issue #31, 30 November 1907); Fig.13b (issue #69, 22 August 1908); Fig.13c (issue # 104, 27 April 1909); and Fig.13d (issue # 111, 15 June 1909). As can be seen, they are typical boys’ comic book illustrations, and fans of Michael Palin’s “Ripping Yarns” will no doubt be as amused as I am.
At the time of writing, I am not aware of Coles working for any other comic–type publication, but I can quite believe that other outlets for his work will emerge in time.
Coles’s Rubaiyat illustrations, though technically neat enough, are not very impressive overall, and, with the possible exception of the frontispiece (Fig.1a), lack imagination. Some of his fairy tale illustrations are technically more impressive (notably Figs.5a, 6a, 8a & 10a), and some are more imaginative (notably Figs.5d, 6c, 7a & 9b), though it has to be said that their imagery seems to derive more from the author’s imagination than the artist’s! I hope that is not overly critical, for whatever I think of them, they are certainly better than I could do!
[The illustrations can be browsed here.]
Note 1: Potter reports “New Editions 1923 and1928.” Roger Paas traced the 1923 edition in The English Catalogue of Books for October of that year, but could not similarly trace Potter’s 1928 edition, and nor have I been able to trace it in The Bookseller for that year.
Note 2: Thus, among the better known flowers and trees, the Forget–me–not, as its name suggests, symbolises True Love, as, more famously does the Rose; the Daisy, by its simplicity, symbolises Innocence; the Palm from ancient times has symbolised Victory; and the Yew, by its association with graveyards, has come to symbolise sorrow. Much less obviously, the Dragonswort and Mandrake symbolise Horror, presumably through their dragonish names; Lilac symbolises Youthful Innocence; and the Snowdrop symbolises Hope. As to why the Buttercup symbolises Ingratitude, Lavender symbolises Distrust, and the Peony symbolises Shame, well, they and many others, remain anyone’s guess. The foregoing and many more examples can be found in the Index of Flowers at the end of The White Prince or the Stolen Roses, but books on the folklore and symbolism of flowers are legion, from at least the mid–nineteenth century.
Note 3: The Bookseller on 12 October 1906 (p.92) names the author as Dr. R. Brooks Popham, though it is not there stated on what authority. However, Brooks Popham wrote, under his real name, a very similar book of nomadic travels, Hither and Thither (W.J. Ham–Smith, London, 1912), the title–page of which states he was the author of Reminiscences in Many Lands, and in the Prefatory Note of which he admits to the nom–de–plume of “A Nomad.” Adèle Crafton Smith is sometimes claimed as the real author of Reminiscences. She certainly used the pseudonym “Nomad” for her novels Owlscroft (1882), A Railway Foundling (1890) and Holly (1891), for example, and it seems to be on the basis of this that library cataloguers have assumed she also wrote Reminiscences. But of course the author of Reminiscences was “A Nomad”, not just “Nomad” (Crafton Smith’s surname on her first marriage, Damon, spelt backwards) – a small but significant difference.
Note 4: The word “author” has been inserted on the census return, the original just reading “editor & publisher.” I am not aware of Drane writing anything under his own name, but of course he may have used a pseudonym, at present unknown.
Note 5: The Vanguard Library and its publisher are very well documented online at: https://www.friardale.co.uk/Vanguard/Vanguard.htm . Of the 46 covers pictured on this site, the illustrations on 20 of them are signed W.F. Coles; 12 are signed by an artist named S. (??) Board, two initials being uncertain (either I E or TC ?); and 14 are unsigned.
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The Drane fairy tale books illustrated by Coles are quite rare, so my thanks are due to many staff at the British Library and the National Library of Scotland for facilitating access to their copies and for answering my queries about them. I must also thank Jos Coumans and Sandra Mason for supplying scans of their copies of the Coles Rubaiyat. My thanks are also due to Joe Howard, Sandra Mason and Roger Paas for their helpful comments on various points.
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