NOTES:
[23] In 1861 was published The Life of J.M.W. Turner, R.A., founded on letters and papers furnished by his friends and Fellow Academicians; by Walter Thornbury. In a more recent work, Haunted London (1865), Mr. Thornbury has himself passed judgment upon his Life of Turner, pronouncing it to be 'a careless book, but still containing much curious, authentic, and original anecdote.'
[24] It may be noted, however, that in 'The Georgian Era' (1834) occurs the following passage:—'Some have gone the length of saying that in marine views Turner has wrested the palm from all competitors; but with this, few, surely, will agree who have seen the sea pieces of Powell, an artist who, though but recently deceased, has had no biographer to commemorate his poverty or his genius.' The works of Powell, however admirable, are not likely now to be preferred to Turner's. 'The Georgian Era' is not a work of much repute.
[25] 'What can I say of the Napoleon of Mr. Turner? called (with frightful satire) "The Exile and the Rock Limpet." He stands in the midst of a scarlet tornado looking at least forty feet high. "Ah!" says the mysterious poet from whom Mr. Turner loves to quote—
"Ah! thy tent-formed shell is like The soldier's nightly bivouac, alone Amidst a sea of blood....... ......but you can join your comrades!"
FALLACIES OF HOPE.
'These remarkable lines entirely explain the meaning of the picture; another piece is described by lines from the same poem, in a metre more regular—
"The midnight torch gleamed o'er the steamer's side, And merit's corse was yielded to the tide."
(This was the burial of Wilkie at sea: now in the National Gallery.)
'When the pictures are re-hung, as sometimes I believe is the case, it might, perhaps, be as well to turn these upside down and see how they would look then. The Campo Santo of Venice, when examined closely, is scarcely less mysterious; at a little distance, however, it is a most brilliant, airy, and beautiful picture. O for the old days before Mr. Turner had lighted on "The Fallacies" and could see like other people!'—An Exhibition Gossip, by Michael Angelo Titmarsh, Ainsworth's Magazine,1843.
[26] The Almanack of the Month, 1846—in which see also a comical drawing, by Mr. Richard Doyle, of 'Turner painting one of his pictures,' and the accompanying letterpress:—'Considerable discussion has arisen as to the mode in which Turner goes to work to paint his pictures. Some think he mixes a few colours on his canvas instead of on his palette, and sends the result to be exhibited. Another ingenious theory is that he puts a canvas in a sort of pillory, and pelts it with eggs and other missiles, when appending to the mess some outrageous title, he has it hung in a good position at the Academy. Our own idea is, that he chooses four or five good places in which he hangs up some regularly framed squares of blank canvas; a day or so before the opening of the Exhibition, we believe he goes down to the Academy with a quantity of colours and a nine pound brush, with which he dabs away for a few minutes, and his work is finished,' etc. etc.
[27] In a letter to Phillips he adds, 'No one knew the value of this treatment better than Turner.'
