'A Fine Baritone' — Victor Maurel

Ward's chromolithograph shows Victor Maurel — the French baritone who created Iago in Verdi's Otello (1887) and Falstaff (1893) — in full evening dress: black tailcoat, white waistcoat, bow tie, a boutonnière pinned to his lapel, and a rolled score or programme tucked under one arm. He stands three-quarter length, chin lifted with the self-possession of a man accustomed to commanding opera houses from Milan to New York. The caption 'A fine baritone' is characteristically Vanity Fair in its dry understatement — Maurel was the defining baritone of his generation.