My parents didn't go in for cartoons or picture books but my father gave this to my mother in the late 50ies and I was fascinated with it from an early age. Many of the cartoons, especially the Victorian ones, made little sense to me but I returned to the book again and again over the years, and as I grew older and acquired more knowledge, I began to understand more and more of the captions.

I know Political Cartoons are not really meant to be funny - although Zapiro always manages - but I can't help feeling sorry for the Victorians, lumbered with Dickens and Leech and others of that ilk: they must have been very hard up indeed for laughs.

A wonderful, wonderful book and a marvellous way of imbibing English history painlessly. ( )

A fine collection of a thousand cartoons from England's long-running humorous weekly, Punch, ranging over a hundred years. This book includes a 16-page color section, all eight pages of Punch's parody of The New Yorker, and Punch's fine cartoons divided into everyday categories. A fine collection, and ample evidence of the differences between British and American jocularity. ( )