AUTOGRAPH-HUNTERS AND OTHERS.
No doubt all painters, poets, literary men, Churchmen—in short, all men who have attained to more or less celebrity—become the prey of the autograph-hunter, either in the form of a boy at school, a young lady whose life is made continuous sunshine by the contemplation of your pictures or the study of your delightful poems, or an elderly gentleman who has watched your career with intense interest from its beginning. Each of these applicants, strange to say, avers that he or she will be made happier by the possession of your name on a card or a piece of paper which is enclosed for your signature, and in addition to your "valued name," if you happen to be an artist, "if you will add a slight sketch," the gratitude of the hunter will know no bounds. I have been guilty on one or two occasions of complying with a desire that seems to verge upon the unreasonable; but my folly is as nothing compared to that of Edwin Landseer, who was a frequent and willing victim to such imposition. On one of the many occasions when I had the happiness of receiving Landseer at my house, the conversation turned upon the autograph-hunter, whose habits were strongly anathematized by some of us; the great painter defended the craze as harmless, easily gratified, and complimentary to the objects of it.
"Only this morning," said he, "I had an application from someone at Birmingham for my name, and for a sketch of a dog's head added to it; well, I complied with both desires."
I confess to my surprise when I heard this, and I was amused on hearing artists who were present exclaim loudly against such a proceeding, as creating a precedent that they would be expected to follow. Harmless, however, is the autograph pest in comparison with the really terrible album, which bids unblushingly for work that may consume many hours of the time of the painter or the poet. Here, again, Landseer was a great sinner; many a splendidly bound album lies at this moment on gilded tables in stately English mansions, the homes of our "old nobility," with delightful drawings of sporting scenes by that cunning hand; and there are instances, I am sorry to say, of the possessors being unable to resist the sums offered for the purchase of their treasures so cheaply acquired.
As I am speaking of Edwin Landseer, I seize the opportunity of expressing my great regret that my friend Mr. Sidney Cooper, R.A., in his recently published memoirs, should have created an impression in the public mind that Landseer was a drunkard. From my intimate knowledge of Landseer, I can aver that nothing could be further from the fact. I have dined in his company scores of times, and I have met him in all kinds of society, and under conditions which would have made the propensity, if it possessed him, irresistible; and never in a single instance did I, or anyone else, see Landseer even excited by drink. This was the habit of the man until about a year and a half before his death, when the brain disorder began which afterwards destroyed him. I cannot disguise from myself that if Mr. Cooper had questioned the physicians who attended Landseer in his last illness, he would have been told that a craving for drink of every kind is one of the peculiarities of the disease which every sufferer from it is quite unable to resist. I know that great care was taken to keep stimulants from the illustrious patient; but that he may have secretly possessed himself of wine or spirits on certain occasions, and in that way given a colour to the report of his drunken habits, is probable enough; but I venture to think a brother-artist—even if the charge of habitual intoxication could have been proved against this great painter—should have been mournfully silent; how much more careful, then, should he have been, if he desired—perhaps as a warning—to proclaim this terrible failing, to ascertain whether he had truthful ground to go upon.
I do not in the least apologize for the above, though it is "far wide" of the purpose of this chapter; but I feel that my complaint against albums is a little ungracious and ungrateful in the face of the admirable page of sketches with which my publisher has supplied me. (See note at the end of this chapter.)
Mr. Richard Bentley was the possessor of an autograph-book and album combined; but he did not solicit the aid of strangers to fill it, thereby creating a wide difference between himself and the ordinary album nuisance. "My father," says Mr. George Bentley, "started an autograph-book, and got Cruikshank, Leech, and some others to give a sketch, or, if not an artist, an autograph. Leech did one in colour. It was so superior to anything in the volume that I cut it out and framed it, and so see it every day in my life."
The idea is to reproduce some of the characters he was so fond of sketching, and some he had actually given; for instance, the girl in bed is, I think, from the scene where a man gets up at night to fire at some cats. The wife suddenly awakes, and finds him looking out of window, gun in hand, and imagines thieves. The voyez vous
is delicious, and the old gentleman with "Now, it's my opinion," etc., I am pretty sure is taken from a sketch in some work he had illustrated.
So far Mr. George Bentley, who shows that his father, who was the liberal employer of Leech, Dickens, Cruikshank, and so many others, had a raison d'être for his requests in favour of his album.
I supplement Mr. Bentley's remarks on this delightful page by calling my readers' special attention to that charming little boy and his dreadful old grandmother—"Will Charley come and live with his gran-ma?" Study well that little boy's face, beautiful as an angel's, as he looks wondering at the hideous old woman—will he live with her? not, I think, if he can help it. See, also, the lovely little group of the ill-assorted couple—old husband and young wife. More terrible the lady's fate there than Charley's with his "Gran-ma."
I have now to notice another album belonging to no less a person than the late Duke of Devonshire. Leech made the Duke's acquaintance while staying with Millais at the Peacock, Baslow, a place within easy distance of Chatsworth; where, by the way, Millais painted the perfect likeness of Leech which, by his kindness, is allowed to enrich this volume, and where, by Sir Joseph Paxton, I think, Leech was introduced to the Duke, and entertained with much kindness at Chatsworth. How the album was introduced to Leech, and whether the Duke asked for a sketch or the artist volunteered it, I have no evidence to offer; but that a design was made and repeated, the following letters from the Duke sufficiently prove:
"August 6, 1851.
"Dear Sir,
"I am so much charmed with your device that I must have a seal engraved from it. Perhaps you would have the kindness to renew the sketch for me on a smaller scale, as I am unwilling to extract the leaf made valuable by you from the book. The stone should not be larger than this, which, I fear, makes my request hardly possible.
"Most sincerely yours,
"Devonshire."
The Seal.
The reduced scale proved no obstacle, and the success was gracefully acknowledged as follows:
"London, April 14, 1852.
"Dear Sir,
"In these critical days of the Crystal Palace, let me request your acceptance of the seal for which you gave me the idea.
"And that you may not have any feeling as to depriving me of it, I must tell you that I have another.
"Believe me,
"Most sincerely yours,
"Devonshire."
But what was the subject of the drawing? In a courteous reply to my inquiry, I find from the present Duke that he has no such drawing in any of his books, and he knows nothing of the seal. In a postscript to one of Leech's letters to his friend Adams, however, I find the following mention of it:
"Look at the seal on this envelope. I told you, I think, some time ago about my making a little sketch for the Duke of Devonshire, and how kind he was about it, saying he must have a seal made of it. Well, he called here himself, and left me a most handsome and valuable seal the other day, of which, I confess, I am proud to send you an impression. As you say of some of your people, 'It's very nice to be treated so, isn't it?' The design of the seal is a spade turning up the Crystal Palace, in allusion to Paxton being a gardener.
"Ever yours, my dear Charley,
"John Leech.
"31, Notting Hill Terrace,
"April 20, 1852."
Though the present Duke of Devonshire knows nothing of the seal, or the drawing from which it was made, I am happy to say that I am able to present to my readers an impression from it, through the kindness of Leech's son-in-law, Mr. Gillett, to whom I applied in my perplexity.
Everybody may not know that Sir Joseph Paxton, the Duke of Devonshire's gardener, was the architect of the glass house of 1851, afterwards christened the Crystal Palace, which—greatly enlarged—now flourishes at Sydenham. I conclude this chapter with an extract from Notes and Queries, evidently written by a friend of Leech. The writer, under date November, 1864, says:
"Leech's success was owing to his almost daily practice of jotting in his note-book every remarkable physiognomy or incident that struck him in his rambles. Such, at any rate, was his practice at the commencement of his too brief career. On one occasion he and I were riding to town together in an omnibus, when an elderly gentleman in a very peculiar dress, and with very marked features, stepped into the vehicle, and sat down immediately in front of us. We were the only inside passengers. For whom or for what he took, or probably mistook, us, I know not; but he stared so hard, and made such wry faces at us, that I could hardly refrain from laughter. My discomfiture was almost completed when Leech suddenly exclaimed, 'By the way, did Prendergast ever show you that extraordinary account that has been recently forwarded to him?' and, showing me his note-book, added, 'Just run your eye up that column, and tell me what you can make of it.' Instead of a column, the features of the old gentleman were reflected upon the page with life-like fidelity. On another occasion I saw him strike off with promptitude and skill the scene of a quarrel between some dirty little urchins in a suburban village."
Note.—To my great regret, I find that the material in which Mr. Bentley's drawing was executed made its reproduction impossible.