Hogarth's Works, with life and anecdotal descriptions of his pictures. Volume 2 (of 3)

by John Ireland; John Nichols

FIVE GROUPS OF HEADS.

THE LAUGHING AUDIENCE.

"Let him laugh now, who never laugh'd before;

And he who always laugh'd, laugh now the more."

THE LAUGHING AUDIENCE.

From the first print that Hogarth engraved to the last that he published, I do not think there is one in which character is more displayed than in this very spirited little etching. It is much superior to the more delicate engravings from his designs by other artists, and I prefer it to those that were still higher finished by his own burin.

The prim coxcomb with an enormous bag, whose favours, like those of Hercules between Virtue and Vice, are contended for by two rival orange girls, gives an admirable idea of the dress of the day; when, if we may judge from this print, our grave forefathers, defying nature and despising convenience, had a much higher rank in the temple of Folly than was then attained by their ladies. It must be acknowledged that since that period the softer sex have asserted their natural rights; and, snatching the wreath of fashion from the brow of presuming man, have tortured it into such forms—that were it possible, which certes it is not, to disguise a beauteous face!—But to the high behest of fashion all must bow.

Governed by this idol, our beau has a cuff that for a modern fop would furnish fronts for a waistcoat, and a family fire-screen might be made of his enormous bag. His bare and shrivelled neck has a close resemblance to that of a half-starved greyhound; and his face, figure, and air, form a fine contrast to the easy and degagée assurance of the grisette whom he addresses.

The opposite figure, nearly as grotesque, though not quite so formal as its companion, presses its left hand upon its breast,[173] in the style of protestation, and eagerly contemplating the superabundant charms of a beauty of Rubens' school, presents her with a pinch of comfort.[174] Every muscle, every line of his countenance, is acted upon by affectation and grimace, and his queue bears some resemblance to an ear-trumpet.

The total inattention of these three polite persons to the business of the stage, which at this moment almost convulses the children of Nature who are seated in the pit, is highly descriptive of that refined apathy which characterizes our people of fashion, and raises them above those mean passions that agitate the groundlings.

One gentleman, indeed,[175] is as affectedly unaffected as a man of the first world. By his saturnine cast of face and contracted brow, he is evidently a profound critic, and much too wise to laugh. He must indisputably be a very great genius; for, like Voltaire's Poccocurante, nothing can please him; and while those around open every avenue of their minds to mirth, and are willing to be delighted, though they do not well know why, he analyzes the drama by the laws of Aristotle, and finding those laws are violated, determines that the author ought to be hissed instead of being applauded. This it is to be so excellent a judge; this it is which gives a critic that exalted gratification which can never be attained by the illiterate: the supreme power of pointing out faults where others discern nothing but beauties, and preserving a rigid inflexibility of muscle while the sides of the vulgar herd are shaking with laughter. These merry mortals, thinking with Plato that it is no proof of a good stomach to nauseate every aliment presented them, do not inquire too nicely into causes; but, giving full scope to their risibility, display a set of features more highly ludicrous than I ever saw in any other print. It is to be regretted that the artist has not given us some clue by which we might have known what was the play which so much delighted his audience: I should conjecture that it was either one of Shakspeare's comedies, or a modern tragedy. Sentimental comedy was not the fashion of that day.

The three sedate musicians in the orchestra, totally engrossed by minims and crotchets, are an admirable contrast to the company in the pit.

THE LECTURE.

DATUR VACUUM.

"No wonder that science, and learning profound,

In Oxford and Cambridge so greatly abound,

When so many take thither a little each day,

And we see very few who bring any away."

THE LECTURE.

I was once told by a fellow of a college that he would never purchase Hogarth's works, because Hogarth had in this print ridiculed one of the Universities. I endeavoured to defend the artist, by suggesting that this was not intended as a picture of what Oxford is now, but of what it was in days long past: that it was that kind of general satire with which no one should be offended, etc. etc. His reply was too memorable to be forgotten: "Sir, the Theatre, the Bench, the College of Physicians, and the Foot Guards, are fair objects of satire; but those venerable characters who have devoted their whole lives to feeding the lamp of learning with hallowed oil, are too sacred to be the sport of an uneducated painter. Their unremitting industry embraced the whole circle of the sciences, and in their logical disputations they displayed an acuteness that their followers must contemplate with astonishment. The present state of Oxford it is not necessary for me to analyze, as you contend that the satire is not directed against that."

In answer to this observation, which was uttered with becoming gravity, a gentleman present remarked as follows: "For some of the ancient customs of this seminary of learning I have much respect; but as to their dry treatises on logic, immaterial dissertations on materiality, and abstruse investigations of useless subjects, they are mere literary legerdemain. Their disputations being usually built on an undefinable chimera, are solved by a paradox. Instead of exercising their power of reason, they exert their powers of sophistry, and divide and subdivide every subject with such casuistical minuteness, that those who are not convinced are almost invariably confounded. This custom, it must be granted, is not quite so prevalent as it once was: a general spirit of reform is rapidly diffusing itself; and though I have heard cold-blooded declaimers assert that these shades of science are become the retreats of ignorance and the haunts of dissipation, I consider them as the great schools of urbanity, and favourite seats of the belles lettres. By the belles lettres I mean history, biography, and poetry; that all these are universally cultivated, I can exemplify by the manner in which a highly accomplished young man, who is considered as a model by his fellow-collegians, divides his hours.

"At breakfast I found him studying the marvellous and eventful history of Baron Munchausen; a work whose periods are equally free from the long-winded obscurity of Tacitus, and the asthmatic terseness of Sallust. While his hair was dressing, he enlarged his imagination and improved his morals by studying Doctor what's his name's Abridgment of Chesterfield's Principles of Politeness. To furnish himself with biographical information, and add to his stock of useful anecdote, he studied the Lives of the Highwaymen; in which he found many opportunities of exercising his genius and judgment in drawing parallels between the virtues and exploits of these modern worthies, and those dignified and almost deified ancient heroes whose deeds are recorded in Plutarch and Nepos.

"With poetical studies he is furnished by the English operas, which, added to the prologues, epilogues, and odes of the day, afford him higher entertainment than he could find in Homer or Virgil: he has not stored his memory with many epigrams, but of puns has a plentiful stock, and in conundra is a wholesale dealer. At the same college I know a most striking contrast, whose reading"—— But as his opponent would hear no more, my advocate dropped the subject; and I will follow his example.

It seems probable that when the artist engraved this print he had only a general reference to an university lecture; the words datur vacuum were an after-thought. I have seen prints without the inscription, and in some of the early impressions it is written with a pen.

The scene is laid at Oxford, and the person reading, universally admitted to be a Mr. Fisher of Jesus College, registrat of the university, with whose consent this portrait was taken, and who lived until the 18th of March 1761. That he should wish to have such a face handed down to posterity in such company is rather extraordinary; for all the band, except one man, have been steeped in the stream of stupidity. This gentleman has the profile of penetration; a projecting forehead, a Roman nose, thin lips, and a long pointed chin. His eye is bent on vacancy: it is evidently directed to the moon-faced idiot that crowns the pyramid, at whose round head, contrasted by a cornered cap, he with difficulty supresses a laugh. Three fellows on the right hand of this fat, contented "first-born transmitter of a foolish face," have most degraded characters, and are much fitter for the stable than the college. If they ever read, it must be in Bracken's Farriery, or The Country Gentleman's Recreation. Two square-capped students a little beneath the top, one of whom is holding converse with an adjoining profile, and the other lifting up his eyebrows and staring without sight, have the same misfortune that attended our first James—their tongues are rather too large. A figure in the left-hand corner has shut his eyes to think; and having, in his attempt to separate a syllogism, placed the forefinger of his right hand upon his forehead, has fallen asleep. The professor, a little above the book, endeavours by a projection of his under lip to assume importance; such characters are not uncommon: they are more solicitous to look wise than to be so. Of Mr. Fisher it is not necessary to say much: he sat for his portrait for the express purpose of having it inserted in the "Lecture!"—We want no other testimony of his talents. To the whole tribe I bid a long and last adieu.

"Ye dull deluders, truth's destructive foes,

Cold sons of fiction, clad in stupid prose;

Ye treacherous leaders, who, yourselves in doubt,

Light up false fires, and send us far about;

Still may the spider round your pages spin,

Subtle and slow, her emblematic gin!

Buried in dust, and lost in silence dwell,

Most potent, grave, and reverend friends—farewell!"

REHEARSAL OF THE ORATORIO OF JUDITH.

"O cara, cara! silence all that train;

Joy to great chaos! let division reign."

THE ORCHESTRA.

The oratorio of Judith was written by Esquire William Huggins,[176] honoured by the music of William de Fesch, aided by new painted scenery and magnifique decoration, and in the year 1733 brought upon the stage. As De Fesch[177] was a German and a genius, we may fairly presume it was well set; and there was at that time, as at this, a sort of musical mania, that paid much greater attention to sounds than to sense. Notwithstanding all these points in her favour, when the Jewish heroine had made her theatrical début, and so effectually smote Holofernes,

"As to sever

His head from his great trunk for ever, and for ever,"

the audience compelled her to make her exit. To set aside this partial and unjust decree, Mr. Huggins appealed to the public, and printed[178] his oratorio. Though it was adorned with a frontispiece designed by Hogarth and engraved by Vandergucht, the world could not be compelled to read, and the unhappy writer had no other resource than the consolatory reflection, that his work was superlatively excellent, but unluckily printed in a tasteless age:[179] a comfortable and solacing self-consciousness, which hath, I verily believe, prevented many a great genius from becoming his own executioner.

To paint a sound is impossible; but as far as art can go towards it, Mr. Hogarth has gone in this print. The tenor, treble, and bass of these ear-piercing choristers are so decisively discriminated, that we all but hear them.

The principal figure, whose head, hands, and feet are in equal agitation, has very properly tied on his spectacles; it would have been prudent to have tied on his periwig also, for by the energy of his action he has shaken it from his head, and, absorbed in an eager attention to true time, is totally unconscious of his loss.

A gentleman—pardon me, I meant a singer—in a bag-wig, immediately beneath his uplifted hand, I suspect to be of foreign growth. It has the engaging air of an importation from Italy.

The little figure in the sinister corner is, it seems, intended for a Mr. Tothall, a woollen-draper, who lived in Tavistock Court, and was Hogarth's intimate friend.

The name of the performer on his right hand,

"Whose growling bass

Would drown the clarion of the braying ass,"

I cannot learn; nor do I think that this group were meant for particular portraits, but a general representation of the violent distortions into which these crotchet-mongers draw their features on such solemn occasions.

Even the head of the bass viol has air and character: by the band under the chin, it gives some idea of a professor,[180] or what is I think called a Mus. D.

The words now singing, "The world shall bow to the Assyrian throne," are extracted from Mr. Huggins' oratorio; the etching is in a most masterly style, and was originally given as a subscription-ticket to "The Modern Midnight Conversation."

I have seen a small political print on Sir Robert Walpole's administration, entitled, Excise, a new Ballad Opera, of which this was unquestionably the basis. Beneath it is the following learned and poetical motto:

"Experto crede Roberto."

"Mind how each hireling songster tunes his throat,

And the vile knight beats time to every note:

So Nero sung while Rome was all in flames,

But time shall brand with infamy their names."

ET PLURIMA MORTIS IMAGO.

THE COMPANY OF UNDERTAKERS,

THE COMPANY OF UNDERTAKERS.

"Beareth sable, an urinal proper, between twelve quack heads of the second, and twelve cane heads OR, consultant. On a chief[181] nebulæ,[182] ermine, one complete doctor[183] issuant checkie, sustaining in his right hand a baton of the second. On his dexter and sinister side, two demi-doctors, issuant of the second, and two cane heads issuant of the third: the first having one eye couchant, towards the dexter side of the escutcheon; the second faced per pale proper, and gules guardant, with this motto, 'Et plurima mortis imago.'"

It has been said of the ancients, that they began by attempting to make physic a science, and failed; of the moderns, that they began by attempting to make it a trade, and succeeded. This company are moderns to a man; and if we may judge of their capacities by their countenances, are indeed a most sapient society. Their practice is very extensive, and they go about taking guineas,

"Far as the weekly bills can reach around,

From Kent Street end, to fam'd St. Giles's pound."

Many of them are unquestionably portraits;[184] but as these grave and sage descendants of Galen are long since gone to that place where they before sent their patients, I am unable to ascertain any of them, except the three who are for distinction placed in the chief or most honourable part of the escutcheon. Those whom, from their exalted situation, we may naturally conclude the most distinguished and sagacious leeches of their day, have marks too obtrusive to be mistaken. He towards the dexter side of the escutcheon is determined by an eye in the head of his cane to be the all-accomplished Chevalier Taylor,[185] in whose marvellous and surprising history, written by his own hand, and published in 1761, is recorded such events relative to himself and others[186] as have excited more astonishment than that incomparable romance, Don Belianis of Greece, the Arabian Nights, or Sir John Mandeville his Travels.

The centre figure, arrayed in a harlequin jacket, with a bone, or what the painter denominates a baton, in the right hand, is generally considered designed for Mrs. Mapp, a masculine woman, daughter to one Wallin, a bone-setter at Hindon, in Wiltshire. This female Thalestris, incompatible as it may seem with her sex, adopted her father's profession, travelled about the country, calling herself crazy Sally; and like another Hercules, did wonders by strength of arm! An old gentleman, who knew this lady, assures me, that notwithstanding all the unkind things which her medical brethren said of her ignorance, etc., she was entitled to an equal portion of professional praise with many of those who decried her; for not more than nineteen out of twenty of her patients died under her hands.

The Grub Street Journal, and some other papers of that day, are crowded with paragraphs[189] relative to her cures and her consequence.

On the sinister side is Doctor Ward, generally called Spot Ward, from his left cheek being marked with a claret colour. This gentleman was of a respectable family,[191] and though not highly educated, had talents very superior to either of his coadjutors.

For the chief, this must suffice; as for the twelve quack heads and twelve cane heads OR, consultant, united with the cross-bones at the corners, they have a most mortuary appearance, and do indeed convey a general image of death.

In the time of Lucian, a philosopher was distinguished by three things: his avarice, his impudence, and his beard. In the time of Hogarth, medicine was a mystery,[192] and there were three things which distinguished the physician: his gravity, his cane head, and his periwig. With these leading requisites, this venerable party are most amply gifted. To specify every character is not necessary; but the upper figure on the dexter side, with a wig like a weeping willow, should not be overlooked. His lemon-like aspect must curdle the blood of all his patients. In the countenances of his brethren there is no want of acids; but however sour each individual was in his day—

"A doctor of renown,

To none but such as rust in health unknown,

And save or slay, this privilege they claim,

Or death, or life, the bright reward's the same."[193]

Ward, Taylor, and Mapp were considered as a proper trio by other persons besides Hogarth: some lines beginning as follows, were written about the latter end of 1736:—

"In this bright age three wonder-workers rise,

Whose operations puzzle all the wise;

To lame and blind, by dint of manual slight,

Mapp gives the use of limbs, and Taylor sight.

But greater Ward," etc.

GROUP OF HEADS

INTENDED TO DISPLAY THE DIFFERENCE BETWIXT CHARACTER AND CARICATURE.

For a further explanation of this difference, see the Preface to Joseph Andrews.[194]

CHARACTERSCARICATVRAS

"In Lairesse; still more in Poussin; and most of all in Raphael; simplicity, greatness of conception, tranquillity, superiority, sublimity the most exalted! Raphael can never be enough studied, although he only exercised his mind on the rarest forms, the grandest traits of countenance.

"In Hogarth, alas, how little of the noble, how little of beauteous expression, is to be found in this, I had almost said, false prophet of beauty! But what an immense treasure of features, of meanness in excess, vulgarity the most disgusting, humour the most irresistible, and vice the most unmanly!"—Lavater's Essays on Physiognomy.

In this rhapsody there is some truth; but the philosopher of Zurich should have recollected that Hogarth could not be expected to attain what he never attempted. Sublimity exalted, simplicity angelic, and the ideal grandeur of superior beings, he left to those who delineated subjects which demanded such characters; and contented himself with representing Nature, not as it ought to be, but as he found it. That he had little reverence for the dreams of those who portrayed imaginary beings, I have had occasion to remark; but that he respected their waking thoughts is evinced in this print, where the heads of three figures from Raphael's Cartoons are introduced under the article character, in opposition to the fantastic caricatures of Cavalier Chezze, Annibal Characi,[195] and Leonard da Vinci: the last of whom, I am very sorry to see so classed; for to his anatomical knowledge the late Dr. Hunter gave the strongest testimony, by declaring his intention to publish a volume illustrated by the designs of this artist, as anatomical studies.

I have often seen three engravings from the same picture, by an Italian, an English, and a French artist, which, with a tolerable correctness of outline, have in their general characters a dissimilarity that is astonishing. Each engraver gives his national air. The three heads from Raphael, at the bottom of this print, are etched by Hogarth, and sufficiently marked to determine the master from whence they are copied; but their grandeur, elevation, and simplicity is totally evaporated.

With angels, apostles, and saints, he was not happy. In the group placed above them he has been more successful. Hogarth was less of a mannerist than almost any other artist; for though there are above a hundred profiles, I discover no copy from another painter; no repetition of his own works: they are all delineated from nature, and the most careless observer must discover many resemblances: to the physiognomist, they are an inexhaustible study.

This print was given as a subscription-ticket to the six plates of "Marriage à la Mode."