Mr. O' Toole & the Umbrella

	Caudle's Curtain Lectures
The Junior Lecturers Series was produced by W. Butcher & Sons, London (1870-1906) under the trade name of Primus. The slides were sold as a set of eight in a cardboard box. The prize of each set was initially about two shillings but at the end of World War I the price had more than doubled. Size of the slides: 8,2 x 8,2 cm (3 1/4" x 3 1/4"). The complete series was divided into three series, A, B and C. Series A was described as 'comic tales and nursery stories, with reading on the slides'. Series B and C had readings printed on paper lecture notes. Longer stories required two or more chapters, always multiples of eight slides. The glasses are fitted with a protective glass and black paper binding tape. The images were either circular or square with rounded corners.		CAUDLES CURTAIN LECTURES is part 607 of the Junior Lecturers Series B (with Printed Readings).

	Mr. Caudle lectured about his club.	Mr Caudle lectured about clothing his children

	Mr Caudle lectured about cold mutton	Mrs Caudle attacked by blackbeetles

	Mr Caudle lectured about beind a skylark	Ms Caudle lectured about his Freemason's apron

	Mr Caudle lectured for giving a punch supper	Lectured about the baby's name


After the book 'Mrs Caudle's Curtain Lectures' by Douglas William JERROLD (1803 - 1857) Douglas William Jerrold (1803-1857) was the son of an actor manager. After some time in the Navy and as an apprentice printer he became a playwright and later a journalist. He was a contemporary and friend of Charles Dickens. As a journalist he worked for Punch magazine in which Mrs Caudle's Curtain Lectures were serialised, to be published in book form in 1846. Job Caudle, the 'hero' of the book is a Victorian shopkeeper whose wife finds she can only talk to him without interruption in bed. Caudle, who outlives his wife, finds he can no longer sleep easily because of his memory of these 'lectures' and resolves to exorcise his wife's memory by recording the lectures, it seems with a view to future publication for the edification of others. Jerrold's humour shines through this insight into Victorian middle class culture.