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At the National Gallery on the following morning Wynne fell into conversation with an old man. The old man wore an Inverness cape and a wide-brimmed felt hat, he had shaggy eyebrows, a wispy moustache, and his cheeks were seamed and furrowed with wrinkles. He muttered to himself and seemed in a fine rage. Sometimes he rattled his umbrella and scowled at the passers-by, and sometimes he tossed his head and laughed shortly. Scarcely a soul came nigh him that he did not scrutinize closely and disapprovingly. Before him was Leonardo’s “Virgin of the Rocks,” and by his mutterings and rattles he kept the space before the picture clear of other humanity, as a sheep-dog rings his flock.
As Wynne approached he came under the influence of the old gentleman’s inflamed stare, which, being in no wise alarmed, he returned with interest.
“Keep your eyes for the pictures,” rapped out this peculiar individual.
“So I would,” returned Wynne, “if it were not that you disturbed them.”
“Ha! You’re like all the rest. You’d run from your own bridal altar to see a cab-horse jump the area railings. I know the breed—I know ’em.”
“Concentration is easily dislocated,” said Wynne, choosing his words carefully, “attention is dependent upon circumstance and atmosphere.”
“Good, enough, O most wise Telemachus,” came the answer, with a mixture of agreement and cynicism, “the very reason for my invitation. How the devil shall a man keep his mind on this” (he nodded at the picture) “while this herd is using the Gallery as a shelter from the rain?”
Wynne laughed. An attack on the people always gave him pleasure.
“That’s a fair statement of the case. The sun’ll be out in a minute,” he cocked his eye to the sky-light. “Then we shall have the place to ourselves. Mark my words.”
“They’ve no artistic appreciation,” said Wynne, feeling on safe ground. “A very bovine race, the English.”
“Tommy rot!” said the old gentleman, unexpectedly; “don’t talk drivelling nonsense. Best race in the world, the English, but they won’t let ’emselves go.”
“Well, doesn’t that amount to—”
“No, it don’t. You can’t judge the speed of a racehorse while he is munching oats in a stable.”
“No, sir; but presumably the people should come here to appreciate. They can do their munching at home.”
“Rubbish! English folk are too shy to express appreciation. That’s the trouble with ’em—shyness. National code! They keep away from all matters likely to excite ’em artistically for fear of being startled into expressing their true feelings. Englishmen’s idea of bad form, expression! Damn fine people! Bovine? Not a bit of it!”
Seemingly, to be consistent was not a characteristic of the old gentleman, a circumstance which rendered argument difficult. Wynne fell back on:
“After all, it was you who attacked them first.”
“Know I did. Good reason too. A lot of clattering feet thumping past my Leonardo! Scattering my thoughts. ’Taint right—’taint reverent. If I’d my way I’d allow no one to enter here who hadn’t graduated to a degree in the arts—or respect for the arts. ’Tisn’t decent for people to use as a waiting-room a gallery holding some of the world’s greatest achievements on canvas. It’s degrading and disgraceful. Why aren’t we taught to respect art from infancy, hey? And pay it proper compliments, too. We have to take our hats off in a twopenny tin chapel, and are thought blackguards and infidels if we keep ’em on, but do we ever touch a forelock to a masterpiece in paint, and does any one think any the worse of us however idiotically we behave before it? No! Then I say that we are no better than hooligans and savages, and have no right of contact with the glorious emblems of what a man’s hand and a man’s head can achieve.”
This speech he delivered with enthusiasm and a profusion of gesture. Wynne was properly impressed, and hoped the old gentleman would proceed, which he readily did.
“Good Gad a’mighty!” he ejaculated, pointing a claw-like forefinger at Leonardo’s Virgin. “Whenever I doubt the Scriptures I look at her and the doubt passes. Da Vinci saw her. Saw her, and he painted what he saw—the flesh and the spirit. See the eyelids, they tremble—don’t they? They are never at rest. That’s the woman essence—the mother essence—eyes trembling over the soul of her child. And the hands! Don’t you feel at any second they may move? One might come tomorrow and find them any-other-where. Motion—touch—a quickening sense of protection. Use the place as a shelter against the rain! Damnable! There’s just the same amazing mobility in the expression of La Jaconde—at the Louvre, but with this difference. The Virgin”—he pointed again at the picture—“and Monna Lisa, the woman who saw the world through eyes of understanding which curled her lips to humour. A courtesan some folks say she was—not unlikely—inevitable almost! Takes a courtesan to contrive a measured expression like that. Lord! if a good woman could understand as a courtesan must understand, what a superwoman she would be! Intellect springs from knowledge of the flesh, and is sunk in it too—more often the latter. The revelation of one sex to another is the well-head of all learning. Passion of the soul is the reaction of bodily passion—must be—is. What is it Pater says about Monna Lisa?—‘Represents what, in a thousand years, man had come to desire.’ True too! Even a fool would admit that. There’s a fleeting look in the eyes and the mouth that adjusts itself to every line of thought—gives an answer to every question—a compassion for every sin—an impetus to all betterment. Been to the Louvre? Know the picture?”
“No,” said Wynne, rather ruefully.
“Good Gad a’mighty! then you’ve plenty to learn, and the sooner you start the better. What are you—art student or what?”
“I am going to be a writer.”
“How old?”
“Seventeen and a bit.”
“Then learn to paint first. There are no schools for writers, and painting’ll teach you more than all the libraries in the world. Teach you values—that’s the hinge of all learning in art—values! Relative values. The worth of this as compared with that. Teach you line—the infinite variety of line—the tremendous responsibility of line—the humour—the severity of line. Teach you nature—the goddess from whom all beauty is drawn, and whose lightest touch has more mystery in it than all the creations of man. That’s what you want to do. No good trying to write till you’re nearing thirty—abouts. Learn on canvas how to ink your paper thoughts. Pack your bag and go to Paris.”
“I believe I will,” exclaimed Wynne. “Where—where should I go when I get there?”
“Anywhere—Julian—Calarossi. The Quartier is full of ’em. Make for the Boule Miche, and stop the first boy with a beard. He’ll tell you where to go.”