NOTES:
[16] 'I decidedly concur with Malone in the general conclusion that painted moveable scenery was unknown on our early stage; and it is a fortunate circumstance for the poetry of our old plays that it was so: the imagination of the auditor only was appealed to, and we owe to the absence of painted canvas many of the finest descriptive passages in Shakespeare, his contemporaries, and immediate followers. The introduction of scenery gives the date to the commencement of the decline of our dramatic poetry.'—Annals of the Stage, by J. Payne Collier, vol. iii. p. 366.
[17] Mr. Puff in the Critic, giving a specimen of 'the puff direct' in regard to a new play, says: 'As to the scenery, the miraculous powers of Mr. De Loutherbourg are universally acknowledged. In short, we are at a loss which to admire most, the unrivalled genius of the author, the great attention and liberality of the managers, the wonderful abilities of the painter, or the incredible exertions of all the performers.'
[18] 'July 25th, 1798. Went with Geiseveiller to see the picture of the "Siege of Valenciennes" by Loutherbourg. He went to the scene of action accompanied by Gilray, a Scotchman, famous among the lovers of caricature; a man of talents, however, and uncommonly apt at sketching a hasty likeness. One of the merits of the picture is the portraits it contains, English and Austrian. The Duke of York is the principal figure as the supposed conqueror; and the Austrian general, who actually directed the siege, is placed in a group, where, far from attracting attention, he is but just seen. The picture has great merit; the difference of costume, English and Austrian, Hulan, etc., is picturesque. The horse drawing a cart in the foreground has that faulty affected energy of the French school, which too often disgraces the works of Loutherbourg. Another picture by the same artist, as a companion to this, is the victory of Lord Howe on the first of June; both were painted at the expense of Mechel, printseller at Basle, and of V. and R. Green, purposely for prints to be engraved from them. For the pictures they paid £500 each, besides the expenses of Gilray's journeys to Valenciennes, Portsmouth, etc'—Diary of THOMAS HOLCROFT.
THE STORY OF AN ENGRAVER.
he father of John Keyse Sherwin was a hard-working man, living humbly enough at Eastdean, Sussex, earning his subsistence by cutting and shaping wooden bolts for shipbuilders. Up to his seventeenth year the son, born in 1751, helped the father in his labours. A fine, sturdy, well-grown lad, with abundant self-confidence, young Sherwin seems to have acquired, now one knows exactly how, an inclination for art. Shown one day, at the house of a rich employer, a miniature painting of some value, the youth stoutly asserts his conviction that, if provided with proper materials, he can produce a fair imitation of the work before him. Drawing-paper is given him, and a pencil is thrust into a hand that has grown so hard and horny with constant hewing of wood that it scarcely possesses sensitiveness sufficient to grasp and ply the slim little art-implement. The young fellow perseveres, however, and finally produces a tolerable copy of the picture.
Much surprise and interest are excited by this achievement of the woodcutter's son. In Sherwin's days 'the patron' was a part which rich people were rather fond of playing. The fact of having discovered a new artist was in itself a sort of certificate of the discoverer's acumen and taste. If the patronized succeeded, the patron forthwith took high rank as a connoisseur; while on the other hand, if the efforts of the protégé resulted in failure, no great harm accrued to any one; a little money was spent to no purpose: that was all. The mania for patronizing was harmless enough; if based upon some vain glory, there was still a fair leaven of kindliness about it. In the present case, the patron had lighted upon a really clever fellow. Young Sherwin was well worth all the money and pains spent upon him by his first employer and friend, Mr. William Mitford, of the Treasury; and but for some inherent flaw in his moral constitution, would have done his patron and himself unquestionable credit.
The young man was taken from wooden bolt-making, sent up to London, and placed under Bartolozzi, an accomplished and very thriving designer and engraver, who formed one of the original members of the Royal Academy on its institution in 1768. Bartolozzi found his pupil apt. He made, indeed, rapid progress, and about 1772 received the Academy gold medals for drawings of 'Coriolanus taking leave of his family,' and 'Venus soliciting Vulcan to make armour for her son.' From 1774 to 1780 his name is to be found in the catalogues of the Academy as an exhibitor of various drawings, original and copied, in red and black chalks, after the manner his master had rendered popular. Sherwin had proved himself a vigorous, dashing draughtsman, standing high in his preceptor's good opinion, higher still in his own, and surely gaining the applause of the town.
Quitting Bartolozzi, he set up for himself, taking an expensive house in St. James's Street. He there commenced a desultory system of designing, painting, and engraving; doing less engraving than anything else, however. It was his most legitimate occupation, but it was laborious, took time, was not very highly remunerated, and he wanted to make money—as much and as quickly as possible. He had patrons in plenty, eager for his graceful, facile drawings, prepared to pay good prices for them; and the man himself became a favourite in society. He was handsome, ready, good-natured; well pleased to array his shapely person in smart raiment, disport himself in the drawing-rooms of the noble and rich, and add his name to the unprofitable list of fashion's votaries.
He had fallen upon 'dressy' times. A handsome young Prince of Wales was preaching, by example, that costliness of attire was indispensable among gentlemen; and the woodcutter's son set up decidedly for being a gentleman. A record of his costume on one occasion, when he was engaged to dine at his friend Sir Brook Boothby's, has come down to us. A superfine scarlet lapelled coat, with gilt dollar-sized buttons; a profuse lace frill frothing over the top of his white satin, jasmin-sprigged waistcoat; small-clothes of the glossiest black satin, with Bristol diamond buckles; silk stockings, tinged with Scott's liquid-dye blue, and decorated with Devonshire clocks; long ruffles, falling over hands once so worn with rude labour; extravagant buckles covering his instep; and his hair piled up high in front, with three rows of side curls, pomatumed and powdered, and tied into a massive club at the back of his head. Be sure that Mr. Sherwin, thus adorned, presented an imposing aspect; while his morning dress was scarcely less striking. Scarlet and nankeen were the colours chiefly favoured for the spring costume of the exquisites of the period. To the taste of a man of fashion, Mr. Sherwin added an artist's discrimination. He was very difficult to please in regard to shades of colour. It is told of him that he had four scarlet coats made for him before his delicate perception in this respect could be altogether satisfied. He would have the right tone of scarlet, or none at all. 'Fortunately,' observes a critic personally acquainted with the fastidious gentleman, 'he had as many brothers as rejected coats.' And Sherwin was really kind-hearted and generous. There seems to have been no false pride about him. With all his success and prosperity, his airs of fashion and pretentiousness, he was not ashamed of his less fortunate relatives—his wood-cutting father and brothers. He befriended them as long as he was able; tried to lift them up to his own position; brought them up to town, and did what he could to make fine gentlemen of them. His efforts were not attended with much success, however. Possibly the world of fashion found that one member of the Sherwin family was quite as much as it wanted. Besides, by reason of his abilities, the artist had a right to notice and distinction; his relatives were without any such title. They were simple labouring people, much amazed at the luxury and splendour with which they found their kinsman surrounded. A story is told of their dining with the successful artist; when one of the younger lads, without waiting or asking for a spoon, thrusts his fingers into a dish of potatoes to help himself. The father of the family, however, was quick to perceive his son's offence against good manners, and corrected him in a loud whisper: 'Moosn't grabble yer han' 'moong the 'tators here!'
At this time Sherwin was making about twelve hundred pounds a year. With industry he might have doubled that sum. But he was incorrigibly idle; was without rule or system. For one day that he worked he would waste three in sauntering about, calling on his friends, and in all sorts of frivolous pursuits. And then the dissipations of the evening were as so many heavy mortgages upon the labour of the morning. His expenditure was profuse. He gave away money liberally in charity; was especially fond of relieving the distressed widows and orphans of clergymen, observing that the children of a poor curate were more to be pitied than those of a London artist—since the latter generally had some qualification by which they could gain a livelihood. All this had been well enough if Mr. Sherwin had been a man of independent fortune, or had even pursued prudently his own profession. But, his plan of life considered, he had, in truth, no money to give away. His charity was only another form of prodigality, He was a gambler, too. Such money as he gained when he would condescend to work was quickly swept from him at the hazard-table. He was soon deeply in debt; his creditors growing more and more impatient and angry every day.
As an artist, his rapidity and cleverness were remarkable. The late Mr. J.T. Smith, who was for some years keeper of the prints in the British Museum, was in early life a pupil of Sherwin's, and bore testimony to the singular ability of his master. He was ambidexterous. Occupied upon a large engraving, he would often commence a line with his right hand, then, tossing the graver into his left, would meet and finish the line at the other end of the plate with marvellous accuracy. He had great knowledge of the human form, and would sometimes begin a figure at the toe, draw upwards, and complete it at the top of the head in a curiously adroit manner. If he had but worked! Commissions poured in upon him, yet he left them unexecuted. He undertook contracts, yet could seldom be persuaded to execute them. Sometimes when the fit seized him, or when his need of ready money was very urgent, he would apply himself with extraordinary energy, commencing a plate one day, sitting up all night, and producing it finished at breakfast-time the next morning. But this industry was only occasional and accidental. Speedily he relapsed again into slothfulness and self-indulgence.
People of note and fashion at one time thronged Mr. Sherwin's studio. It was his boast, that from five to five-and-twenty of the most beautiful women in London were to be seen every spring morning at his house. For one day he hit upon a notable device, which would probably have made his fortune if he had but given the thing fair play. He had made a drawing of the finding of Moses. No ordinary illustration of a scene from Biblical history, however. Mr. Sherwin did not depend upon merely the intrinsic merits of his design; for Pharaoh's daughter was a portrait of the Princess-Royal of England, and grouped round her were all the most distinguished ladies of the English court—the Duchess of Devonshire, the Duchess of Rutland, Lady Duncannon, Lady Jersey, Mrs. Townley Ward, and others—some fifteen in all. Even tiny Moses was said to be a portrait of some baby of distinction, born conveniently at the time. The picture was a great success. Popular taste had been cunningly measured and fitted. This ingenious interleaving of the Bible and the Peerage found a host of admirers. There were some malcontents, of course: ladies whose claims to be ranked among court beauties had been summarily passed over by the painter; for he has rather an invidious task before him who undertakes to decide who are the fifteen most beautiful of English women of quality. He is certain to make hundreds of enemies if he makes fifteen friends; and he cannot rely for certain upon doing even that much, for, as happened in the present instance, jealousies may spring up among the chosen fifteen. Mr. Sherwin was charged by certain of the ladies portrayed in the picture with partiality and favouritism. One beauty had been shown too prominently in the design, greatly to the prejudice of other beauties, who were unfairly restricted to the background. And why should one lady be displayed so advantageously—in a light so brilliant—while other ladies not less attractive, as they opined, were exhibited in so strangely subdued a way, with ugly shadows marring the lustre of their loveliness? And then why, was indignantly asked, why had the artist arranged the portraits so cruelly? Why was this charming fair one, whose graces were of an irregular pattern—whose nose has a heavenward inclination—who pretends to no strictness of beauty, according to absurd rules laid down in drawing-books—why is she brought into such fatal juxtaposition with this other severe and classical-looking and statuesque lady! To be merely a foil? Much obliged, Mr. Sherwin! The offended belle expressing angry and ironic gratitude sweeps from the painter's studio, gathering her rustling skirts together that they may not be soiled by the least contact with the canvases and plaster casts, and other art-paraphernalia and rubbish about the place.
The picture was without real artistic value, though undoubtedly pretty and graceful. It was a mere acted charade of the 'Finding of Moses,' got up impromptu as it were; the ladies being in ball-room attire, with high powdered heads, strung with pearls and surmounted with feathers; their silken dresses trimmed with laces, and frills, and furbelows; their faces well whitened and rouged, according to the mode of the day. It was more like a plate from a fashion-book than a scene from Scripture history. True, some small attempt at imparting 'local colour' and air of truth to the thing was just discernible. There was an affectation of Orientalism about the background—a line of palm-trees and plenty of pyramids and temples, presumed to be Egyptian, their style of architecture being nondescript otherwise; but these only made the foreground figures appear more utterly preposterous. Still, the picture pleased the town. It was something to see in one group portraits of the prettiest women in the country. There was a great demand for copies of the engraving. And yet it was with difficulty the harebrained artist could be induced to complete the plate, and supply his patrons and subscribers with prints in return for their guineas. The thriftless, flighty fellow seemed to persist in misconceiving his situation, undervaluing his artist abilities; forgetting that but for these he would still have been peg-cutting in the Sussex woods. He would regard himself as a gentleman of independent property, with whom art was simply a pastime—not at all an indispensable means of winning his sustenance. He seemed, indeed, to treat his talent as a sort of obstacle in his path, blamed the world for having made him an artist, and was fond of asserting that, for his own part, he should have preferred the army as a profession!
He was a sort of Twelfth-Night King of Art. For a brief span his success seemed to be without limits. His house was daily besieged by beaux and belles of quality. 'Horses and grooms,' says Miss Hawkins in her Memoirs, 'were cooling before the door; carriages stopped the passage of the street; and the narrow staircase ill sufficed for the number that waited the cautious descent or the laborious ascent of others.' But, of course, this state of things did not last very long. Mr. Sherwin, by his indolence—and indolence in his situation was a sort of insolence—soon put himself out of fashion. Fortune showered her gifts at his feet, but he was too superb a gentleman to stoop and pick them up; so the goddess, wearying of conferring favours that were so ill-appreciated, turned away from him in quest of more reverential votaries. When the footmen of the quality had done with playing fantasias upon his doorknocker, the duns took their turn, and brought less pleasant music out of it.
A troublesome time had the fashionable artist. He had to give all his attention now to the question how his creditors could be evaded. For he preferred evasion to payment. It never seems to have occurred to him that the last was as efficacious a mode of silencing a dun's complaint as keeping out of his way; while it was infinitely preferable to the creditor. But either he had not the money by him at the right moment, or he wanted it for some other purpose—to spend in punch, probably—for he was now devoting himself steadily to the consumption of that deleterious compound. He had become too idle now to work for more than the necessities of the moment—to supply himself with pocket-money sufficient for his immediate requirements. His argument was, that if he could only postpone payment, he was quite justified in postponing work. The main thing was to avoid, put off, and distance his duns. Curious stories are told of his efforts and exploits in this respect. An old engraver, one Roberts, purblind from incessant poring over copper-plates, after repeated calls, finds at last his mercurial debtor at home, and demands the settlement of his little bill for work done. Sherwin is very civil and obliging, promises to settle forthwith the account against him; then, taking base advantage of his creditor's defective vision, he makes good his escape, leaving Roberts confronting the lay-figure of the studio decked for the occasion with its proprietor's coat and wig. Imagine the indignation of the creditor upon the discovery of the imposture! Upon another occasion the artist, splendidly attired—for he is engaged to dine at Sir Brook Boothby's—is prisoned in his room, prevented from stirring forth by the fact that a German tailor, a determined creditor who will take no denial, who will listen to no more excuses, has sat down at the chamber door, to starve the debtor into surrender. Time passes; there is no exit from the house but through the studio, and there is posted the inexorable dun, who has already waited five hours, who will wait five more—fifty more, if need be—but he will see his debtor. And Mr. Sherwin has no money. What is he to do?
Presently the siege is raised. Good-natured Lord Fitzwilliam enters, appreciates the situation, produces his pocket-book, and satisfies the tailor's demand. 'Here, Mr. Sherwin,' says his lordship to the relieved and grateful engraver, 'here is a present for you. Your tailor's receipt for making a fine gentleman!' And Mr. Sherwin is free at last to go to his dinner-party with what appetite he may.
We have another glimpse of the artist—mad with drink, and up all night, alarming the neighbourhood by firing off pistols out of the window to testify his devotion to his patrons of the house of Cavendish, his joy that an heir had been born to the titles and honours of the dukedom of Devonshire—and then he falls, disappears. Invitations no longer come from Sir Brook Boothby and other grand friends; or, if they come, they don't find Mr. Sherwin at home. As long as he can he keeps his creditors at bay; then takes to flight—hides to escape arrest. He binds himself to work for a publisher who harbours and supports him. But it is too late; he cannot work now if he would. He is greatly changed, his constitution has yielded at last to his repeated and reckless attacks upon it. His sight is dim, and his hand is palsied. He has yielded all claim to be accounted an 'exquisite;' the fashions are nothing to him now; he is simply a broken-down, worn-out, prematurely old man. His courage has left him, his gay air of confidence has quite gone; he cannot look his misfortunes in the face; he shrinks from, shivers at, and, in his weakness and despair, exaggerates them wildly; they prey upon him, go near to driving him mad. Pursued and tracked to his publisher's house—or is it merely his fears that mislead him?—he quits his place of refuge, breaks cover, and flies he hardly knows whither. George Steevens, the editor of Shakespeare, wrote on the first October 1790 to a correspondent at Cambridge: 'I am assured that Sherwin the engraver died in extreme poverty at "The Hog in the Pound," an alehouse at the corner of Swallow Street; an example of great talents rendered useless by their possessor.' Miss Hawkins follows this narrative, and the artist's decease is announced in the Gentleman's Magazine of the same year. It is proper to state, however, that Mr. Smith, his pupil, has recorded a less melancholy account of Sherwin's death, which took place, he says, 'at the house of the late Mr. Robert Wilkinson, the printseller in Cornhill, who kindly attended him, afforded him every comfort, and paid respect to his remains, his body having been conveyed to Hampstead and buried in a respectable manner in the churchyard, near the east corner of the front entrance.'
He was barely forty when he died. Prints from his engravings are still highly esteemed by collectors. If his talent was not of the very first class, it was still of too valuable a kind to be flung in the kennel—utterly degraded and wasted.
SIR JOSHUA'S PUPIL.
young apprentice with very little heart in the study of his craft, after the manner of young apprentices, toiling in a watch and clock-maker's shop in the town of Devonport, heard one day the fame of great Sir Joshua's achievements in London sounding through the county—became conscious that the good folks of the shire took pride in the son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds, Master of Plympton Grammar School. Why should not he, the apprentice, become as great, or nearly so, a credit to Devonport, his birthplace, as was Sir Joshua to Plympton, his birthplace? Could one man only have art abilities and ambitions, and make for himself the opportunity to employ and gratify them? So the apprentice asked himself. And he must have been a clever fellow that apprentice! He soon convinced himself—that was easy: but he convinced his family; he convinced several of his townsmen—a more difficult task,—that the best thing they could do with him was to send him up to town to study under his countryman, Sir Joshua, and to become, like him, a great painter. He had his way at last. In his twenty-fifth year he was painting in the studio of Reynolds, living under his roof.
After all, his dearest wishes gratified, perhaps the pupil was little better off. If cleverness, like fever, were contagious, it had been all very well. But the master was but an indifferent master. He could not, or would not, instruct. He was himself somewhat deficient in education—had few rules—only a marvellous love and perception of the beautiful, and an instinctive talent for its reproduction on his canvas. It was as certain as it was innate, but not to be expressed in words, or communicated or reasoned upon in any way. The deeds of genius are things done, as of course, for no why or wherefore, but simply because there is no help for it but to do them. So the pupils painted in the studio of their pseudo-preceptor for a certain number of years, copying his works; or, when sufficiently advanced, perhaps working at his backgrounds, brushing away at draperies, or such conventional fillings in of pictures, and then went their ways to do what they listed, and for the most part to be heard of no more in art chronicles. They had probably been of more use to the painter than he had been to them. Certainly our friend the clockmaker's apprentice was. For when there arose a cry of 'Who wrote Sir Joshua's discourses, if not Burke?' this pupil could give satisfactory evidence in reply. He had heard the great man, his master, walking up and down in the library, as in the intervals of writing, at one and two o'clock in the morning. A few hours later, and he had the results in his hands. He was employed to make a fair copy of the lecturer's rough manuscript for the reading to the public. He had noted Dr. Johnson's handwriting, for he had revised the draft, sometimes altering to a wrong meaning, from his total ignorance of the subject and of art: but never a stroke of Burke's pen was there to be seen. The pupil, it must be said for him, never lost faith in his master. Vandyke, Reynolds, Titian—he deemed these the great triumvirate of portraiture. Comparing them, he would say, that Vandyke's portraits were like pictures, Sir Joshua's like the reflections in a looking-glass, and Titian's like the real people. And he was useful to the great painter in another way, for he sat for one of the children in the Count Ugolino picture (the one in profile with the hand to the face). While posed for this, he was introduced as a pupil of Sir Joshua's to Mr. Edmund Burke, and turned to look at that statesman. 'He is not only an artist, but has a head that would do for Titian to paint,' said Mr. Burke. He served, too, another celebrated man. With Ralph, Sir Joshua's servant, he went to the gallery of Covent Garden Theatre, to support Dr. Goldsmith's new comedy, She Stoops to Conquer, on the first night of its performance. While his friends are trooping to the theatre, the poor author is found sick and shivering with nervousness, wandering up and down the Mall in St. James's Park. He can hardly be induced to witness the production of his own play. Johnson's lusty laugh from the front row of a side box gives the signal to the worthy claque, who applaud to an almost dangerous extent, in their zeal for their friend, because there runs a rumour that Cumberland and Ossian Macpherson and Hugh Kelly are getting up a hiss in the pit.
'How did you like the play?' asked Goldsmith of the young painter, who had been clapping his hands until they ached, in the gallery by the side of good Mr. Ralph.
'I wouldn't presume to be a judge in such a matter,' the art-student answered.
'But did it make you laugh?'
'Oh, exceedingly.'
'That's all I require,' said Goldsmith, and sent him box tickets for the author's benefit night, that he might go and laugh again.
Sir Joshua's pupil was James Northcote, a long-lived man, born at Devonport in 1746, and dying at his London house, in Argyll Place, Regent Street, in 1831. If he had a Titianesque look in his youth, he possessed it still more in his age. Brilliant eyes, deeply set; grand projecting nose; thin, compressed lips; a shrewd, cat-like, penetrating look; fine, high, bald forehead, yellow and polished, though he often hid this with a fantastic green velvet painting cap, and straggling bunches of quite white hair behind his ears. A little, meagre man, not more than five feet high, in a shabby, patched dressing-gown, almost as old as himself, leading a quiet, cold, penurious life. He never married. He had never even been in love. He had never had the time, or he had never had the passion necessary for such pursuits, or he was too deeply devoted to his profession. He was always, brush in hand, perched up on a temporary stage, painting earnestly, fiercely, 'with the inveterate diligence of a little devil stuccoing a mud wall!' cried flaming Mr. Fuseli.
Haydon, with a letter of introduction from Prince Hoare, called upon Northcote. He was shown first into a dirty gallery, then up-stairs into a dirtier painting-room, and then, under a high window, with the light falling full on his bald grey head, stood a diminutive wizened figure in an old blue striped dressing-gown, his spectacles pushed up on his forehead. Looking keenly with his little shining eyes at his visitor, he opened the letter, read it, and with the broadest Devon dialect, said—
'Zo you mayne tu bee a peinter, doo 'ee? What zort of peinter?'
'Historical painter, sir.'
'Heestoricaul peinter! Why, ye'll starve with a bundle of straw under yeer head.'
Presently he read the note again.
'Mr. Hoare zays you're studying anatomy; that's no use—Sir Joshua didn't know it. Why should you want to know what he didn't?'
'But Michael Angelo did, sir.'
'Michael Angelo! what's he tu du here? You must peint portraits here!'
Haydon was roused to opposition.
'But I won't!'
'Won't,' screamed the little man, 'but you must! Your vather isn't a moneyed man, is he?'
'No, sir, but he has a good income, and will maintain me for three years.'
'Will hee? Hee'd better make 'ee mentein yeerzelf.'
'Do you think, sir, that I ought to be a pupil to anybody?'
'No,' said Northcote. 'Who's to teach 'ee here? It'll be throwing your vather's money away.'
'Mr. Opie, sir, says I ought to be.'
'Hee zays zo, does hee? ha, ha, ha, ha! he wants your vather's money.'
He received many visitors in his studio. He was constantly at home, and liked to talk over his work, for he never paused on account of the callers. He never let go his palette even. He went to the door with a 'Gude God!' his favourite exclamation in his west country dialect, 'what, is it you? Come in:' and then climbed his way back to his canvas, asking and answering in his cool, self-possessed way, all about the news of the day. Yet he was violent and angry, and outspoken sometimes, was Sir Joshua's loyal pupil.
'Look at the feeling of Raphael!' said some one to him.
'Bah!' cried the little man. 'Look at Reynolds; he was all feeling! The ancients were baysts in feeling, compared to him.' And again: 'I tell 'ee the King and Queen could not bear the presence of he. Do you think he was overawed by they? Gude God! He was poison to their sight. They felt ill at ease before such a being—they shrunk into themselves, overawed by his intellectual superiority. They inwardly prayed to God that a trap-door might open under the feet of the throne, by which they might escape—his presence was too terrible!'
Certainly he was possessed by no extravagant notions of the divinity of blood-royal.
'What do you know,' he was asked, 'of the Prince of Wales, that he so often speaks of you?'
'Oh, he knows nothing of me, nor I of him—it's only his bragging!' the painter grandly replied.
He could comprehend the idea of distinction of ranks little more than old Mr. Nollekens, who would persist in treating the royal princes quite as common acquaintances, taking them by the button-hole, forgetful altogether of the feuds of the king's family, and asking them how their father did? with an exclamation to the heir-apparent of, 'Ah! we shall never get such another when he's gone!' Though there was little enough veneration for the king in this, as Nollekens proved, when he measured the old monarch, sitting for his bust, from the lip to the forehead, as though he had been measuring a block of marble, and at last fairly stuck the compasses into his Majesty's nose. Even the king, who was not very quick at a joke, could not fail to see the humour of the situation, and laughed immensely.
Modern taste prefers Northcote's portraits to his more pretentious works. The glories of Mr. Alderman Boydell's Shakespeare Gallery have pretty well passed away. However, Northcote's pictures were among the best of the collection. His 'Arthur and Hubert,' and the 'Murder of the Princes in the Tower,' and 'The Interment of the Bodies by torchlight,' were very forcible and dramatic works of art, and possessed more natural attractions than the pictures of many of his competitors. His pupilage with Sir Joshua prevented his falling into the washed leather and warm drab errors of tone that then distinguished the English school of historical painting. In the picture of the Burial of the Princes, Fuseli criticised—
'You shouldn't have made that fellow holding up his hands to receive the bodies. You should have made him digging a hole for them. How awfully grand; with a pickaxe, digging, dump, dump, dump!'
'Yes,' Northcote answered; 'but how am I to paint the sound of dump, dump, dump?'
The Boydell pictures were for a long time very popular, and the engravings of them enjoyed a large sale.
Of course, Northcote despised Hogarth. Abuse of that painter seemed to be one of the duties of the British historical artist of that day. Yet he paid him homage; he painted a series of pictures, Hogarthian in subject, and proved to the satisfaction of everybody, one would think, the absolute superiority of Hogarth. Mr. Northcote's moral subjects, illustrative of vice and virtue, in the progress of two young women, are not to be mentioned in the same breath with the 'Mariage à la Mode.' Not merely were they deficient in expression—they were not equal in point of art-execution, though of course the more modern painter had planned to excel in both these qualities. But Northcote's portraits are really admirable—broad and vigorous—with much of Sir Joshua's charm of colour, if not his charm of manner exactly.
For fifty years he lived in Argyll Place, passing the greatest part of that time in his studio—a small room not more than nine feet by twelve, crowded with the conventional articles of vertu that were then considered to be the indispensable properties of a painter. His maiden sister—'Northcote in petticoats,' she was often called, she was so like him in face, figure, and manner—superintended his frugal household. Its economy was simple enough. The brother and sister were of one opinion. 'Half the world died of over-feeding,' they said. They went into an opposite extreme, and nearly starved themselves. When there was a cry in the land about scarcity of food, they did not heed the panic; they were accustomed to a minimum of sustenance, they could hardly be deprived of that. Fuseli, who sowed his satire broadcast, exclaimed one day: 'What! does Northcote keep a dog? What does he live upon? Why, he must eat his own fleas!' But the painter did not attempt to force his opinions upon others, so the kennel and the kitchen fared better than the parlour. The servants were indulgently treated, permitted to eat as they pleased, and die in their own fashion—of repletion or apoplexy, if it seemed good to them.
If he was cold and callous and cynical to the rest of the world, he was ever good and kind to the pinched elderly lady his sister. By his will he gave directions that everything in his house should remain undisturbed, that there should be no sale of his property in her lifetime. He was counselled by considerate friends to have all his pictures sold immediately after his funeral while his name was fresh in the memory of the public; it was urged that his estate would benefit very much by the adoption of such a course. 'Gude God, no!' the old man would cry; 'I haven't patience with ye! Puir thing! d'ye think she'll not be sufficiently sad when my coffin be borne away, and she be left desolate! Tearing my pictures from the walls, and ransacking every nook and corner, and packing up and carting away what's dearer to her than household gods, and all for filthy lucre's sake! No; let her enjoy the few years that will be spared to her; when she walks about the house let her feel it all her own, such as it be, and nothing missing but her brother. I'd rather my bones were torn from my grave, and scattered to help repair the roads, than that a single thing should be displaced here to give her pain. Ye'll drive me mad!'
One day there was a great crowd in Argyll Place. Not to see the painter, not even to see a royal carriage that had just drawn up at his door, nor a popular prince of the blood who occupied the carriage, but to catch a glimpse of one about whom the town was then quite mad—raving mad: a small good-looking schoolboy, a theatrical homunculus, the Infant Roscius, Master William Henry Betty. Of course rages and panics and manias seem to be very foolish things, contemplated by the cool grey light of the morning after. It seems rather incredible now, that crowds should have assembled round the theatre at one o'clock to see Master Betty play Barbarossa in the evening; that he should have played for twenty-eight nights at Drury Lane, and drawn £17,000 into the treasury of the theatre. He was simply a handsome boy of thirteen with a fine voice, deep for his age, and powerful but monotonous. Surely he was not very intellectual, though he did witch the town so marvellously. 'If they admire me so much, what would they say of Mr. Harley?' quoth the boy, simply. Mr. Harley being the head tragedian of the same strolling company—a large-calved, leather-lunged player, doubtless, who had awed provincial groundlings for many a long year. Yet the boy's performance of Douglas charmed John Home, the author of the tragedy. 'The first time I ever saw the part of Douglas played according to my ideas of the character!' he exclaimed, as he stood in the wings; but he was then seventy years of age. 'The little Apollo off the pedestal!' cried Humphreys, the artist. 'A beautiful effusion of natural sensibility,' said cold Northcote; 'and then that graceful play of the limbs in youth—what an advantage over every one else!' As the child grew, the charm vanished; the crowds that had applauded the boy fled from the man. Byron denounced him warmly. 'His figure is fat, his features flat, his voice unmanageable, his action ungraceful, and, as Diggory says (in the farce of All the World's a Stage), "I defy him to extort that d——d muffin face of his into madness!"' Happy Master Betty! Hapless Mister Betty!
Opie had painted the Infant as the shepherd so well known to nursery prodigies watching on the Grampian Hills the flocks of his father, 'a frugal swain, whose constant care,' etc. etc. His Royal Highness the Duke of Clarence, who was a patron of the stage—or the people on it, or some of them—brought the boy to Northcote, to be represented in a 'Vandyke costume retiring from the altar of Shakespeare,'—rather an unmeaning ceremonial. But the picture was a great success, and the engraving of it published and dedicated to the duke. He was then about forty—a hearty, bluff gentleman, supposed to be free and breezy in his manliness from his service at sea,—kindly and unaffected in manner, had not the slightest knowledge of art, but regarded Northcote as 'an honest, independent, little, old fellow,' seasoning that remark with an oath, after the quarter-deck manner of naval gentlemen of the period.
The prince sat in the studio while the artist drew the Infant. Northcote was not a man to wear a better coat upon his back for all that his back was going to be turned upon royalty. He still wore the ragged, patched dressing-gown he always worked in. The painting of Master Betty was amusing at first, but it seemed, in the end, to be but a prolonged and tedious business to the not artistic looker-on. He must divert himself somehow. Certainly Northcote's appearance was comical. Suddenly the painter felt a twitching at his collar. He turned, frowned angrily, but said nothing. The prince persevered. Presently he touched lightly the painter's rough white locks.
'Mr. Northcote, pray how long do you devote to the duties of the toilet?'
It was very rude of his Royal Highness, but then he was so bored by the sitting.
The little old painter turned round full upon him.
'I never allow any one to take personal liberties with me. You are the first that ever presumed to do so. I beg your Royal Highness to recollect that I am in my own house.'
He spoke warmly, glanced haughtily, then worked at his canvas again. There was silence for some minutes. Quietly the duke opened the door and left the room. The painter took no notice.
But the royal carriage had been sent away. It would not be required until five o'clock. It was not yet four; and it was raining!
The duke returned to the studio.
'Mr. Northcote, it rains. Will you have the kindness to lend me an umbrella?'
Calmly the painter rang the bell.
'Bring your mistress's umbrella.'
Miss Northcote's umbrella was the only silk one in the house. The servant showed the prince down-stairs, and he left the house protected from the shower by Miss Northcote's umbrella.
'You have offended his Royal Highness,' said some one in the room.
'I am the offended party,' the painter answered with dignity.
Next day he was alone in his studio when a visitor was announced.
'Mr. Northcote,' said the duke, entering, 'I return Miss Northcote's umbrella you were so kind as to lend me yesterday.'
The painter bowed, receiving it from the royal hands.
'I have brought it myself, Mr. Northcote,' the duke continued, 'that I might have the opportunity of saying that I yesterday took a liberty which you properly resented. I am angry with myself. I hope you will forgive me, and think no more of it.'
The painter bowed his acceptance of the apology.
'Gude God!' he exclaimed, afterwards telling the story, 'what could I say? He could see what I felt. I could have given my life for him! Such a prince is worthy to be a king!'
More than a quarter of a century passed, and then the Duke of Clarence was the King of England—William the Fourth. The old painter was still living, at work as usual, though weak and bent enough now: but with his brain still active, his tongue still sharp, his eyes still very brilliant in his lined shrunken face. 'A poor creature,' he said of himself, 'perhaps amusing for half an hour or so, or curious to see like a little dried mummy in a museum.' He employed himself in the preparation of a number of illustrations to a book of fables published after his death. He collected prints of animals, and cut them out carefully; then he moved about such as he selected for his purpose on a sheet of plain paper, and, satisfying himself at last as to the composition of the picture, he fixed the figures in their places with paste, filled in backgrounds with touches of his pencil, and then handed the curious work to Mr. Harvey, the engraver, to be copied on wood and engraved. The success of the plan was certainly as remarkable as its eccentricity.
He employed his pen as well as his pencil: contributed papers to the Artist, and published, in 1813, a life of Sir Joshua. A year before his death he produced a Life of Titian, the greater part of which, however, was probably written by his friend and constant companion Hazlitt. About the same time Hazlitt reprinted from the Morning Chronicle his Conversations with Northcote, a work of much interest and value.
He was in his small studio, brush in hand, very tranquil and happy, within two days of his death. It seemed as though he had been forgotten. 'If Providence were to leave me the liberty of choosing my heaven, I should be content to occupy my little painting-room with the continuance of the happiness I have experienced there, even for ever.' He spoke of his works without arrogance. 'Everything one can do falls short of Nature. I am always ready to beg pardon of my sitters after I have done, and to say I hope they'll excuse it. The more one knows of the art, and the better one can do, the less one is satisfied.'
Sir Joshua's pupil—'Of all his pupils I am the only one who ever did anything at all'—died on the 13th July 1831, in the eighty-sixth year of his age.
