IMAGINARY CONVERSATIONS
P. Veronese. And you saw this English Painter, who has last arrived among us, Sir Joshua?
Sir J. Reynolds. I did—and, faith, with the more interest that such arrivals become, every day, more rare. But I would rather keep back his tidings from our friends here.
All. Nay—speak—speak!
Rubens. You know, my friend, we have no jealousies here—nor schools.
Rafael. Our noble Michael has forgiven my youthful presumption.
M. Angelo. Not a word of that—I was to blame. Basta! You acted nobly, gracefully, kindly as ever.
Titian. The outline of Rome embraces the colour of Venice; and Titian here, after life, recognizes the might of Michael Angelo, and the saintliness of Rafael.
Rubens. Strange how blind we were on earth!
“A PRETTY PROSPECT!”
Native (to our Landscape Painter, who has come down to sketch). Why, sir, in this ’ere valley that you’re a goin’ to, you may see—ah—three splendid viaducts all at once, and one o’ the largest cloth factories in the West of England!
A. Durer. But the news from England?
M. Angelo. I love your commercial races and their merchant princes. Florence should have been my home. Has England such patrons of art as Soderini—
Rafael. Or as my dear Agostino Chigi? He was a banker, but had the soul of a king. How I loved him! Are there such bankers in England?
Artist. This canvas is going to create a sensation.
Crack!
THE POSSIBILITIES OF A PENNY PISTOL AND A BOX OF CAPS.
TECHNICAL AND PRACTICAL.
Maulstic. Hullo, Jack, what are you after?
Jack. Oh, my foreground didn’t come well, so I’m putting it together a bit.
A. Durer. Or as my worthy burghers of Nüremberg—the friends of Luther and Melancthon—are such the shopkeepers of England?
P. Veronese. Or such traders as my noble Levantine merchants of the Rialto?
How two friends of ours who can’t bear being looked over while they are sketching, circumvented the impertinent curiosity of the vulgar.
Old Streekie, R.A., thought it very hard that he could not run down to the seaside for a week, after the opening of the Academy, without meeting “that pre-Raphaelite fellow Cleevidge loafing about there, the first time he walks out.”
WHERE IGNORANCE IS BLISS.
Miss Jones (loq.). So glad there are no horrid cows in the field this morning.
Reynolds. Hush! friends, one at a time, or I drop my ear-trumpet, as I used to do, when Boswell would put troublesome questions. I fear England hardly boasts such men as you have mentioned. But there is a large subscription to the Art-Union, and bad pictures are greedily bought at small prices; good ones at large prices are few in number, and of that few still fewer are sold.
Rubens. I grieve to hear it. But what of your English sovereign? His Majesty, Charles the First (I was ambassador to his Court, you may remember, from my royal friend, Philip of Spain) would stand by my easel for hours, watching me at work, and discoursing to me of art. Doubtless, your sovereign shows like grace to our brethren of this later time?
A DESIGN FOR AN ALBUM.
The artist who gives up his time to drawing in albums is like a midshipman on half pay—gets “nothing a day and finds himself.”
A. Durer. Nay, you are modest, my Rubens. For the Liebe Deutsche Schule, I must speak for you. Not Charles alone—but the Gonzaga of Mantua, Duke Albert, Philip the Spaniard, and the queenly Medici, gloried in calling you their friend and counsellor.
M. Angelo. They did not honour Art—Art honoured them. How often have I told that hard truth to our Holy Father, fiery old Julius! He cuffed his Chamberlain once, for denying it. But for my own part, I never much affected your kings and great folks.
This is Jack Sparkles, who used to be such a thorough pre-Raphaelite, as we came upon him “at work” the other day—at least he called it so. He said he had come to the conclusion that “painting was, after all, more or less a matter of memory, and that he was studying skies!!”
Rafael. Thy noble nature disdained such shelter as we weaker and more luxurious spirits were fain to take under their escutcheons. And our Leonardo here—Francis, seemed never so great a king as when he picked up thy pencil, oh, my friend, lord not only of thine art, but of all knowledge!
CULTURE FOR THE MILLION; or, SOCIETY AS IT MAY BE.
Ingenuas Didicisse Fideliter Artes, etc., etc.—Nursemaid. The perspective of the Chiaroscuro is divine, Augustus. But, oh! the impasto, is it not a leetle too pizzicato?
Leonardo da Vinci. Is Art so honoured by the great of England?
Sir J. Reynolds. Hum! Oh, His Majesty George the III was pleased to give a charter to the Royal Academy. I have been presented—but, certainly, I don’t remember to have seen him in my painting room at Leicester Square, or to have been asked to take a seat in the Privy Council.
Rafael. But your reigning monarch is a Queen. Woman has ever loved the Beautiful. Surely she much affects you painters.
Sir J. Reynolds. Hum—ha—I am extremely deaf.
P. Veronese (shouting into his trumpet). Does the Queen give due honour to our brethren?
Sir J. Reynolds. I am assured she has had painted already ten portraits of her gracious self, thirty of her Royal consort, twenty of the Royal infants, and fifty of the Royal pets, from paroquet to Brazilian monkey.
M. Angelo. These are your court painters, who so disgrace their calling. But your Artists? How goes it at the palace with them?
Rubens. Seated at the Royal board, doubtless—in places of honour.
L. da Vinci. Where else should sit the architects, engineers, philosophers, poets of the nation—in whom all knowledge is orbed around the Beautiful, and grows to Art?
Sir J. Reynolds. I am not informed that they do sit exactly at the Royal board, but the equerries’ table is excellent—and no doubt——
M. Angelo. Basta! Do not mince words, man—out with it. The painters’ table with the lackeys! Excellent England!
AN ARTIST SCAMP IN THE HIGHLANDS.
Artist (entering). My good woman, if you’ll allow me, I’ll just paint that bedstead of yours.
Cottager (with bob-curtsey). Thank ye, sir, I’ sure it’s very kind of ye—but dinna ye think the wee yin wants it more?
Titian (aside). These islanders! But our pictures which adorn your English galleries, my Bacchus and Ariadne—I painted it for Gonzaga.
M. Angelo. Well remembered, Vicellio. There’s Sebastiano’s picture, too, in your gallery; I painted the Lazarus, my Rafael, to shame thee. Blister my hand for it! How of it?
Rafael. It is a noble work, and I was honoured by such a rivalry.
Rubens. And my Peace and War? I painted it for your Charles, before I opened my negotiation for peace with Spain. Surely it is well cared-for, as a historic record, if not as a picture?
Sir J. Reynolds. Really my trumpet is out of order—I must go.
P. Veronese (pulling him back). Nay, nay, you must tell us of our pictures. Do they stand your fogs and damps? Are they still brightly mellow, defying time and circumstance as such art should do?
INGENIOUS PROTECTION AGAINST MIDGES—A VALUABLE HINT TO SKETCHERS FROM NATURE.
SKETCHING FROM NATURE.
Miss Raphael makes a study for her grand picture, “The Day after the Deluge.”
Sir J. Reynolds. Why, the fact is, my friends—I am sorry to say—but our climate is so very damp, and London so smoky—that they have been cleaned.
All. Cleaned!
Titian. My Bacchus and Ariadne! Oh my tints! Oh my glazings! A picture of mine cleaned!
Rubens. My Peace and War! Cleaned! say flayed rather. I know your cleaners. Oh wasted labour; reputation obscured; thoughtful work rudely scrubbed away!
All. Shame and horror!
First Artist (who has looked in as he was passing). How are you? I say, Stapyton, have you heard what your “Cavalier in a Coal-Hole” went for at Jobinson’s yesterday?
Second Artist. No; how much, my dear fellow; how much?
First Artist. Why, very nearly a pound, I heard!
Omnes (delighted). Hurrah!
M. Angelo. So much for your oil-painting. Nay—excuse me, my Rafael—I sympathize with you; but why not work in fresco? Cheer up, my Titian.
ART AT A CATTLE SHOW.
First Small Boy. I say, Bill, what’s he a doing of?
Second Ditto. Can’t you see he’s a-taking that old gent’s picture, and isn’t it like him?
WHAT AN ARTIST HAS TO PUT UP WITH.
“O! look’ee ’ere, Jane, ’ere’s one of them hacrobats a-goin’ to do the ladder-trick!”
Titian. Alas! my favourite work—my Bacchus! Cleaned! Oh Ghost of Gonzaga! Barbarians!
Leonardo da Vinci. Nay, weep not, my beloved friends and brothers. Is it not all of a piece? Art-Unions, royal lap-dogs, condescensions which are insults, and your great pictures ruined and destroyed. Why should you wish to exist in a country where your works have been impotent to implant the seeds of Art, or aid in their growth and nurture.
Titian. Oimè for Venice.
Rafael. Oh Roma, Roma!
A. Durer. Nay—Nüremberg, also, is a town of burghers, and it is not so with them.
Sir J. Reynolds (aside). I cannot console them. Their indignation is too well grounded. I, too, am a painter, but I alone am ashamed of my country!
Punch, 1847.
Our artist enjoying himself in the Highlands. * * * * “On fine hot days, I have this to carry on my back.”
“On wet days, with my waterproof clothing, I am as comfortable as possible.”—Extract from a Private Letter.
“THE COMPLIMENTS OF THE (SKETCHING) SEASON.”
Papa. There, Henry! If you could do like that, I’d have you taught drawing, my boy!
“FINE ART.”
Rural Connoisseur. He’s a p’intin’ two pictur’s at once, d’yer see? ’Blest if I don’t like that there little ’un as he’s got his thumb through, the best!
“BROTHER BRUSH.”
Ship-Painter. Nice dryin’ weather for our business, ain’t it, sir?
Amateur (disconcerted). Ya-a-s! [Takes a dislike to the place
MAKING THE BEST OF IT.
To artists who have big pictures returned on their hands:—“If you can’t live by them, live under them!”
ONE REASON, CERTAINLY!
First Artist. Who’ll be the next Academician?
Second Artist. Oh, Faddler, my dear fellow, unquestionably!
First Artist (incredulous). Nonsense!
Second Artist. Oh, there’s no doubt about it! A very good fellow, you know, and he’s lived a long time at St. John’s Wood!
ÆSTHETICS.
Fadsby (in agony; he’s a martyr to the decorative art of the nineteenth century). Oh! Mrs. Grabbit—I really must—implore you—to remove those chimney ornam—ugh!—those two—fictile abominations—from this room while I remain he-ar!
[Of all the artis’s, Mrs. Grabbit said, as she’d ever let her apartments to, he was the most partic’lar.
A BROAD HINT.
Stumpy Artist (to friend with a Government appointment and lots of time). Come and see my picture; can’t you come in the daytime early? And look ’ere: do you know a tall, handsome, gentlemanly-looking fellow, with a light beard and moustache, who would sit to me for my Hungarian Chief?
PLEASANT FOR JACK DAUBS, WHO IMAGINES THAT HIS DRAWINGS ARE RATHER TURNERESQUE.
First Art Critic. I do b’lieve he’s a-painting the sky.
Second Ditto. Noa, he ain’t. He’s a-painting them people.
Third Ditto. Noa, he’s a-doing sommut out of his head.
FLATTERING!
First Rustic. ’Str’or’nary way o’ gettin’ yer livin’! Ain’t it, Joe?
Second Ditto. Aye, that ’t be, William. Cripples o’ some sort, most on ’em, you may depend!
OUR ADVENTUROUS ARTIST
Sketching on the Cornish coast, he has taken precautions against slipping over the rocks. Our artist is seen, from below, by the learned German Professor Longbauer, who, after he made the most of it in his Travels, described this incident as an instance of the cruel treatment of their political prisoners by the English Government!
ART AND SCIENCE.
Mahlstyck (who has been at it all day for a week making a pre-Raphaelite study of seashore). I say, some of you fellows in the gunboat yesterday very nearly hit me once or twice!
Jack Tar. Lor, was that you sittin’ here yesterday, sir? Why, you was so still we thought you was a bush or summut—we was practisin’ at you!
AN EYE FOR COLOUR.
1st Art Student. Fine sunset that, Jack, but fancy I’ve seen it before.
2nd Ditto. Of course; decided crib from Turner. Saw it at a glance!
IGNORANCE WAS BLISS.
Waiter. Yes, sir. We had a gentleman here, only last week, as took a sketch of that very ’ill, sir.
Artist (abstractedly). Oh, indeed! Was he an artist?
Waiter (indignantly). Oh, no! sir—a perfect gentleman.
OUR ARTIST
IS NOT IN THE BEST OF TEMPERS. HE HAS BEEN DISTURBED OFTEN BY BARGES, AND BOTHERED BY THE BLUEBOTTLES, AND THEN HE’S ACCOSTED BY WHAT APPEARS TO HIM IN THIS IRRITABLE MOOD TO BE AN
Art-Critic (loq.). The picture looks better a goodish bit off, gov’nour!
Artist (maddened). Con-found—So do you, sir! [Party makes off hastily, “not liking the looks of him.”
SCULPTURE & COMEDY
“Well, there’s one thing: ’e’s well broke!”
THE VENUS OF MILO; or, GIRLS OF TWO DIFFERENT PERIODS.
Chorus. Look at her big foot! Oh, what a waist!—and what a ridiculous little head!—and no chignon! She’s no lady! Oh, what a fright! (Period 1869.)