Part 10
Wilkie died in the year 1841, aged 56 years.
“_LETTER OF INTRODUCTION._”
This picture was suggested by the reception which the artist himself experienced, it is said by Cunningham in his Life of Wilkie, from one of the small wits about town, Caleb Whiteford by name, discoverer of the “cross-readings” in newspapers, and who set up for a judge in art. Some one desirous to do a good turn to Wilkie, when he first came to town, gave him a note to Caleb, who, struck with his very youthful look, inquired how old he was. “Really now,” said the artist, with the hesitation he bestowed on most questions. “Ha!” exclaimed Caleb; “introduce a man to me who knows not how old he is!” and regarded him with that dubious look which is the chief charm of the picture. This was in his mind when he formed the resolution to paint the subject.
_COLLINS’S REMINISCENCES OF WILKIE._
“Wilkie was not quick in perceiving a joke, although he was always anxious to do so, and to recollect humorous stories, of which he was exceedingly fond. As instances, I recollect once when we were staying at Mr. Wells’s, at Redleaf, one morning at breakfast a very small puppy was running about under the table. ‘Dear me,’ said a lady, ‘how this creature teases me!’ I took it up and put it into my breast-pocket. Mr. Wells said, ‘That is a pretty nosegay.’--‘Yes,’ said I, ‘it is a _dog-rose_.’ Wilkie’s attention, sitting opposite, was called to his friend’s pun: but all in vain,--he could not be persuaded to see anything in it. I recollect trying once to explain to him, with the same want of success, Hogarth’s joke in putting the sign of the woman without a head, (‘The Good Woman’) under the window from whence the quarrelsome wife is throwing the dinner into the street.
“Chantrey and Wilkie were dining alone with me, when the former, in his great kindness for Wilkie, ventured, as he said, to take him to task for his constant use of the word ‘_relly_’ (really) when listening to any conversation in which he was interested. ‘Now, for instance,’ said Chantrey, ‘suppose I was giving you an account of any interesting matter, you would constantly say, ‘_Relly!_’ ‘_Relly!_’ exclaimed Wilkie immediately, with a look of the most perfect astonishment.”
_WILKIE’S ARREST AT CALAIS._
When returning from a short Continental tour in 1816, Wilkie became involved in a difficulty at Calais similar to that of Hogarth at the same place, as indicated by our great moral painter in his print of “Oh, the Roast Beef of Old England.” Wilkie, while busily engaged in making a sketch of the gate, was accosted by an officer of police, and taken before the mayor, who told the artist he could not be permitted to make drawings of any of the fortifitions, and courteously dismissed him. The observation was made in England that Wilkie sought his arrest on this occasion, wishing to re-enact the Hogarth incident: but his well-known unobtrusive manners and unaffected modesty completely vindicate him from such an accusation.
The following _naïve_ account of the arrest of Sir David Wilkie is told by him in a letter to his friend and travelling companion, Abraham Raimbach, the celebrated engraver of many of the artist’s pictures:--
“On travelling through France the most singular occurrence was that of my being arrested at Calais, in the act of completing a sketch of the celebrated gate of Hogarth. A young Englishman, who had come from Lille with me, had agreed to remain with me while I was making the drawing; and as I had first obtained leave from the officer of the guard, I expected no sort of interruption. After I had been at work, however, about an hour, with a great crowd about me, a _gendarme_ came to me, and with an imperious tone, said, ‘_Par quelle autorité faites-vous cela, monsieur?_’ I pointed to the officer on guard, and told him that he had given me leave. ‘_Ce n’est rien--c’est défendu, monsieur. Il faut que vous preniez votre livre et m’accompagniez à l’Hôtel de Ville._’ This, of course, I agreed to most willingly, and beckoning my friend to go too, I went along with him, with all the people staring at us. At the Hôtel de Ville we were requested to go to the mayor, and as we were marching along to his house, the _gendarme_ said, ‘_Voila le maire,--arrêtons._’ We stopped till the mayor came up, and learning from us what was the matter, he dismissed the _gendarme_, took us back to his house, and told me, that as there were a number of people there, as in other places, who, on seeing a foreigner making a drawing of a fortified place, would naturally suppose it to be from a hostile intention, and finding it done _en plein jour_, would be apt to blame the magistrates for allowing it; he said it was necessary, therefore, that I should not go on with my drawing, although, from examining it, he was satisfied that I only did it for amusement, and therefore regretted the interruption.”--_Memoirs of Abraham Raimbach, edited by his son, M. T. S. Raimbach, M.A._
_HIS OPINION OF MICHAEL ANGELO AND RAPHAEL._
“The labours of Michael Angelo and Raphael have since been the chief object of my study,--by far the most intellectual. They make other works appear limited, and though high in all that is great, are still an example,--and a noble example too,--of how the accessories of a work may be treated with most advantage. No style can be so pure as to be above learning from them, nor so low and humble as not to gain even in its own way by their contemplation. They have that without which the Venus and the Apollo would lose their value, and with which the mean forms of Ostade and Rembrandt become instructive and sublime,--namely, expression and sentiment. To some of the younger artists here, however, I find they are a stumbling-block; things to be admired but not imitated, and less to be copied than any flat, empty piece of Venetian colouring that comes in their way. The effect of these works upon the unlearned public at large deserves attention. Frescoes, when old, get dull and dry, and cannot be repaired or refreshed like oil; their impression, therefore, upon the common eye is not striking, and many people acknowledge this who, show them a new print from Raphael or Michael Angelo, would be delighted. Vividness is perhaps necessary to make any work generally impressive; and suppose these fresh as they were at first, and as I have seen some recent frescoes, I believe they would be the most beautiful things imaginable,--popular beyond a doubt, as it is on record they were so.”--_Memoirs of Abraham Raimbach._
_WILSON (RICHARD), R.A._
Richard Wilson was born in Montgomeryshire in the year 1713. He excelled as a landscape painter. After practising some time in London, he was enabled, by the assistance of relations, to travel into Italy, where he renewed the study of portrait painting, in which he had made some progress when in London. But the peculiar form and bias of his genius was landscape, as was shown so powerfully later in life by his famous productions, among others, of “Niobe” and the “Villa of Mæcenas.” An incident which happened during his visit to Italy tended to confirm him in his inclination to follow landscape instead of portrait painting. The celebrated French painter, Vernet, happening one day when in Rome to visit Wilson’s painting-room, was so struck with a landscape Wilson had painted that he requested to become the possessor of it, offering in exchange one of his best pictures. The proposal was readily accepted, and Vernet kindly recommended Wilson to the English nobility and gentry then visiting Rome. It is said of Wilson that at times, through his intemperate and irregular habits, he was obliged to pawn his pictures, and was sometimes unable to procure canvas or colours. Fuseli, though generally severe in his criticism of the “map makers,” as he designated the landscape painters of his day, formed what I consider an exaggerated estimate of Wilson’s merits. He says of him: “He is now numbered with the classics of the Art, though little more than the fifth of a century has elapsed since death relieved him from the apathy of cognoscenti, the envy of rivals, and the neglect of a tasteless public; for Wilson, whose works will soon command prices as proud as those of Claude, Poussin, or Elzheimer, resembled the last most in his fate,--lived and died nearer to indigence than ease; and as an asylum for the severest wants incident to age and decay of powers, was reduced to solicit the librarian’s place in the Academy of which he was one of the brightest ornaments.” Wilson died on the 11th of May, 1782, aged 69.
_A SCENE AT CHRISTIE’S._
“Towards the close of Wilson’s life, annoyed and oppressed by the neglect which he experienced, it is well known that he unfortunately had recourse to those means of temporary oblivion of the world to which disappointed genius but too frequently resorts. The natural consequence was, that the works which he then produced were much inferior to those of his former days,--a fact of which, of course, he was not himself conscious. One morning, Mr. Christie, to whom had been entrusted the sale by auction of a fine collection of pictures belonging to a nobleman, having arrived at a _chef-d’œuvre_ of Wilson’s, was expatiating with his usual eloquence on its merits, quite unaware that Wilson himself had just before entered the room. ‘This, gentlemen, is one of Mr. Wilson’s Italian pictures; he cannot paint anything like it now.’ ‘That’s a lie!’ exclaimed the irritated artist, to Mr. Christie’s no small discomposure, and to the great amusement of the company; ‘he can paint infinitely better.’”--_Literary Gazette_, 1824.
[Illustration]
_ZOFFANY (JOHANN), R.A._
Johann Zoffany was born at Frankfort-on-the-Maine in the year 1735. He was by descent a Bohemian, but his father, who followed the profession of an architect, had settled in Germany. When a mere child, having shown considerable ability with the pencil, his father sent him to Italy, where he studied several years. He practised, on his return to Germany, as an historical and portrait painter at Coblentz on the Rhine. He arrived in England but a few years before the foundation of the Royal Academy, and was elected one of its first members in 1768. On his arrival, the extent of his finances hardly amounted to the sum of one hundred pounds. “With this,” he relates, “I commenced maccaroni, bought a suit _à la mode_, a gold watch, and gold-headed cane.” Thus equipped he made the acquaintance of Benjamin Wilson, a portrait painter, then residing in Great Queen Street, Lincoln’s-Inn-Fields. With this artist Zoffany engaged himself as drapery-painter, and remained with him until, tired of the monotony of his employment, he determined to try his fortune by trading on the capital of his talent on his own account. He accordingly took furnished apartments at the upper part of Tottenham Court Road, and began his practice as a _Limner_, by painting the portraits of his landlord and landlady, which, as a standing advertisement, were placed on either side the gate that then opened into the area before the house. Garrick, by chance, passing that way, saw these specimens, admired them, and inquired for the painter. The interview ended in his employing Zoffany to paint himself in small, and hence were produced those admired subjects in which the great actor figured,--“Sir John Brute;” _Abel Drugger_, in Ben Jonson’s “Alchemist;” “The Farmer’s Return,” etc. Sir Joshua Reynolds was so pleased with the painting in which Garrick is represented as _Abel Drugger_, that he purchased it of Zoffany for the sum of one hundred guineas. It is related that the Earl of Carlisle, conversing with Sir Joshua upon the merits of the picture, earnestly urged him to part with it. “Well, my lord,” said he, “what premium will you pay upon my purchase?” “Any sum you will name,” replied the earl. “Then it is yours, my lord, if you will pay me one hundred guineas, and add fifty as a gratuity to Mr. Zoffany.” He consented, and purchased the picture. In 1771, Zoffany painted the royal family on a large canvas, to the number of ten portraits, which has been engraved in mezzotinto by Earlom. He painted likewise two separate portraits of George III. and his Queen, which were also engraved in mezzotinto by Houston. Shortly after this, he paid a second visit to Italy, and taking a recommendation from George III. to the Grand Duke of Tuscany at Florence, he painted an interior view of the Florentine picture gallery. The hopes which he had indulged as to the result of this exertion of his talent were frustrated; for when the Queen was informed that the painter expected to be paid two thousand guineas for his picture, she showed no inclination to receive it. Some years after, the Queen purchased it off him at the greatly reduced sum of six hundred guineas. In 1774, he painted his much-admired picture of the “Life School of the Royal Academy,” in which he introduced two naked models and thirty-six portraits. This painting was also engraved in mezzotinto by Earlom. In 1781, Zoffany went to the East Indies, where he painted three of his best works. One is the “Embassy of Hyderbeck to Calcutta,” who was sent by the Vizier of Oude to Lord Cornwallis. He went with a numerous retinue by Patna to Calcutta. This picture is a rich display of Indian costume, and contains besides about one hundred figures, several elephants and horses. The scene is placed in Patna. The other two pictures are an “Indian Tiger Hunt;” and as a companion to the Embassy, a “Cock Fight,” at which there are many spectators. Zoffany returned to London with a large fortune, and died at Kew, December 16th, 1810.
_THE ROYAL PICTURE._
When Zoffany began the picture of the royal family there were ten children. He made his sketch accordingly, and attending two or three times, went on finishing the figures. Various circumstances prevented him from proceeding,--his Majesty was engaged in business of more consequence; her Majesty was engaged; some of the princesses were engaged, and some of the princesses were unwell. The completion of the picture was consequently delayed, when a messenger came to inform the artist that another prince was born, and must be introduced in the picture; this was not easy, but it was accomplished with some difficulty. All this took up much time, when a second messenger arrived to announce the birth of a princess, and to acquaint him that the illustrious stranger must have a place in the canvas; this was impossible without a new arrangement: one half of the figures were therefore obliterated, in order that the grouping might be closer to make room. To do this was the business of some months, and before it was finished, a letter came from one of the maids of honour, informing the painter that there was another addition to the family, for whom a place must be found. “This,” cried the artist, “is too much; if they cannot sit with more regularity, I cannot paint with more expedition, and must give it up.”
_THE “COCK FIGHT.”_
The ship in which this picture left the Indies was wrecked, and the picture lost. Zoffany fortunately took his passage in another vessel. It is said he heard of the loss of his picture with the philosophy of a Stoic. Having his original sketches by him, he set to work again and made out a second picture with all the grouping, portraits of Hindoos and Gentoos, Rajahs and Nabobs, and finished a fac-simile of the first. It is said Governor Hastings, by whose commission it was originally painted, was never made acquainted with the accident and its repainting.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
Miscellaneous Anecdotes, etc.
[Illustration]
_THE ROYAL ACADEMY, BURLINGTON HOUSE._
THE new rooms of the Royal Academy were erected from the designs, and under the superintendence, of Mr. Sydney Smirke, R.A., and consist of a large oblong block, parallel with Burlington House, and separated from it only by a few feet, but extending on both sides considerably beyond its frontage. The exhibition-rooms are approached by a noble staircase, with paintings by Ricci, which formed part of Burlington House. The galleries are divided into three lines or rows; five each in the north and south rows, and four in the middle. The central room is a domed octagonal sculpture saloon. Occupying the whole space westward of this is the “Great Room,” where the annual dinner takes place. Eastward of the central saloon is a lecture-hall; the remaining space eastward affords a room for water-colour drawings, and the gallery south of that for architectural drawings. All the exhibition-rooms communicate with each other. The dimensions of the apartments are as follows:--
feet. feet. The Picture Gallery at top of stairs 43 by 31 Central Sculpture Saloon, diameter 43 ---- Sculpture Room 43 by 32½ North Picture Galleries, each 40 “ 32½ The Great Room 82 “ 43 Water Colour Room 43 “ 26 Architectural Room 40 “ 31 South Picture Galleries, each 40 “ 31 Hall for Distribution of Prizes, and for Lectures 55 “ 43
The height of the walls in the Great Room to the top of the cornice is 27 ft., the cove occupies 11 ft., making the height to the underside of lantern 38 ft. In the lesser rooms, the height to the top of the cornice is 22 ft., and the cove occupies 9 ft. The lighting is by means of a large central skylight in each gallery, excepting the Sculpture Room, where there is a side light. The walls of the Picture Galleries are of a deep subdued red, down to a dado of black wood and walnut. The choice rested between this and “pheasant egg colour.” The fine art critic of the _Times_, in his article of the 1st of May, 1869, makes the following appropriate remarks on this grand and useful suite of rooms, in which it is to be hoped that the Hanging Committee will for the future be able to display the pictures to the satisfaction of the artists and the public:--“The fears, if they were genuine fears, expressed by some of the Academicians as to the result of removal from Trafalgar Square to Piccadilly can hardly have survived the private view of the Exhibition yesterday. The verdict of the select crowd which filled the stately apartments provided by the architects of the new Academy building for its annual Exhibition was unanimous. No European capital can now boast a more commodious and noble suite of rooms for its yearly display of painting and sculpture than London now possesses.”
[Illustration]
_THE FONTHILL COLLECTION._
William Beckford, Esq., one of the most remarkable men of modern times, was the son of the patriotic Alderman Beckford, who was Lord Mayor in the years 1762 and 1769, and whose noble and courageous remonstrance with George III. is engraved under the monument erected to his memory in Guildhall. Inheriting property amounting to £100,000 per annum, Mr. Beckford was enabled to indulge in the expensive amusement of building. Fonthill Abbey arose like a magic palace at his command, one tower alone employing 460 men, both by day and night, through an entire winter; the torches used by the nocturnal workmen being visible to the astonished traveller at miles distant. This celebrated mansion in a few years cost Mr. Beckford the sum of £273,000. Owing to the rapidity of the work the mortar had not time to consolidate, and a heavy gale of wind brought the great tower to the ground. Merely remarking that he should have been glad to witness the sublime fall of such a mass of materials, he gave orders for the erection of another tower, 276 feet in height; this also fell to the earth in the year 1825. Mr. Beckford was an excellent scholar, and possessed a fine taste in almost every branch of art. He collected, in the fantastic but costly Abbey, one of the finest and most extensive libraries in England; and his galleries of pictures and antiquities were almost unequalled. A Chancery suit,--that blessing to lawyers,--fattened upon his riches for some years, and it ended in the loss of a large West India property; this, added to his other expenses, rendered it necessary to sell the Abbey, with almost all its costly contents. In the year 1822, after Fonthill Abbey had been on view, and catalogues issued by Messrs. Christie and Manson, the day often fixed and as often postponed, it was at length announced as being sold by private contract to Mr. Farquhar, a gentleman who had amassed considerable property in India, for the sum of £340,000, Mr. Beckford only retaining his family pictures and a few books. After the sale, Mr. Beckford resided for some years in Portugal. Not merely a patron of art, he was also an author, and one singularly original in style. His wild and extraordinary tale, entitled “Vathek,” soon formed a portion of our classical literature. This extraordinary man died on the 25th of May, 1844, at the advanced age of 84. In the year 1823, we find the collection again in the market, its new proprietor considering the furniture, etc., wholly unsuited to so splendid a structure; the auctioneer on this occasion being Mr. Phillips, of New Bond Street, who apprised the distinguished company assembled on the first day, that the sale was one of the most important that had ever been offered to the British public. It occupied thirty-seven days, and the amount realized was rather over £80,000.
[Illustration]
_THE STRAWBERRY HILL COLLECTION._