Sir Edwin Landseer

by Frederic George Stephens

The Common in Winter.

An inscription at the foot of the plate informs us that, at a year old, this magnificent creature was six feet four inches long; and, at the middle of his back, stood two feet seven inches in height. The note in question adds that the animals of this breed are employed by the fraternity of Mont St. Bernard, not only in the rescue of travellers from snowdrifts, in which the latter may have been engulfed, but as beasts of burthen, and that they are capable of carrying a hundredweight of provisions from the town on which the monks rely, to the hospice, a distance of eighteen miles. The drawing was done by Sir Edwin Landseer when he was about thirteen years of age, that is, in the year 1815.

It is really one of the finest drawings of a dog that has ever been produced; we do not think that even the artist at any time surpassed its noble workmanship. In its form are reproduced all the characteristics of such a beast. The head, though expansive and domical in its shape, is small in proportion to that of a Newfoundland dog; the brow is broad and round; the eyes, according to the standard commonly assumed for large dogs, are far from being large, and are very steadfast in their look, without fierceness; the ears are pendulous, placed near to the head, and fleshy in substance. This St. Bernard dog has a great hanging jowl and finely formed nose; which last, as is commonly the case with creatures whose sense of smell is delicate, tapers slightly to the nostrils. The chest is broad and square, but by no means heavy; the forelegs are brawny, yet elegant, with broad and firmly placed feet. The body is comparatively long and rather slender in its contours, the belly is hollow, and the hind legs nervously lean and remarkably muscular. Withal, this beast has a grave and dignified walk which is pleasant to see.

Next, and returning to early examples in the same collection, we have an etching of some sheep, “Southdowns,” which is comparatively unsuccessful. After this comes the “Head of a Ram,” of about half life-size, with doubly voluted horns, pointing downwards. To an artist’s eyes, or those of one who is capable of truly appreciating this superb drawing, the real proof of the draughtsman’s power is to be seen in the foreshortening of the twisted and wreathed horns; the execution of these parts is marvellous for precision and “clearness” of line, for the elaborate involuting of the protuberances, and the manner in which perspective of very delicate and intricate nature has been expressed by the deft craftsmanship.

A Group of Lions in a hollow on a mountain side supplied the subject of the next example in our series of illustrations. Etched by Thomas Landseer is a copy of a retriever lying down, and behind him another dog, whose features recall “Brutus,” the artist’s very old favourite,[18] and the subject of several works by him, to one of which we elsewhere more particularly allude. Next are heads of a pointer and a spaniel, both of great beauty as to the execution—an extraordinarily brilliant production of the engraver. Here we shall place the fore-part of a tiger, crouching and seeking prey. Finally, two admirable prints, the one representing a gaunt French hog, standing munching before its sty, and having an elaborate landscape background. A plate of this was published with a slight modification, and styled “A French Hog, the property of Mr. Bacon, of the Black Boy Inn, near Chelmsford.” By way of fellow appeared “An English Hog.” The French Hog is a ludicrous beast, antithetical to its companion subject, and one of the most uncouth, long-legged, swift-looking, sharp-nosed, flat-sided, hollow-bellied of animals, covered with bristles that recall a porcupine’s quills, which are gathered in lines on his flanks, and project from his limbs like ragged old thatch on a ruined cottage roof. The English Boar looks a mere round barrel of lard mounted on two pairs of wonderfully short legs, with a head stuck on one of its ends, and a tail attached to the upper part of the other.[19]

Almost every place where animals might be seen to advantage was visited by Edwin Landseer during this period, the Tower among them. At this time was observed the incident which furnished a capital subject of “a lion’s and a dog’s friendship,” which is reproduced, with three others, in Thomas Landseer’s book, “Twenty Engravings of Lions, Panthers, &c.” The story is briefly this: a lioness, an orphan of course, had been captured in very early cub-hood and brought on board ship, and was suckled by a bitch, for whom, although she soon surpassed her nurse in size and strength, she ever retained the utmost affection, and some respect. The attached couple being shown in Exeter Change menagerie, attracted much admiration, and were the source of delight to thousands.

The other three works by Edwin Landseer in this collection are “A Combat between a Lion, Tiger, and a Panther, contending for a dead Fawn,” “A Tiger tearing the carcase of an Indian Bullock,” and “The Frontispiece.” Spilsbury, an artist of considerable ability, contributed modifications of designs by Rubens, Rembrandt, Stubbs, and others; there is likewise one by T. Landseer, representing “A Tigress defending her Cubs from a Snake.”

Ere this period of his studies was past, “Master Edwin Landseer” justified so much public interest that his doings were chronicled by his father; and in Elmes’s well-known “Annals of Art” he was referred to as a promising student. Some of his early studies appeared in “The Sporting Magazine,” whence they were, as stated above, collected and republished. Incessantly he drew and painted from nature, without reference to copies; in this was the source of his knowledge of life, truth in design, and mastery of the forms of animals, and of their varied coverings.

The first appearance of the painter, then only thirteen years of age, occurred in 1815, and is thus recorded in the Catalogue of the Royal Academy Exhibition of that year: “Master E. Landseer, H.; 33, Foley Street.”[20] The subjects of the pictures contributed to the annual gatherings of works of art indicate very clearly what had been the youthful painter’s studies. As is not commonly the wont of young artists, “Master Edwin Landseer” did not aspire to a subject. Nothing heroic, pathetic, or dramatic came from his easel at that date, but simply two portraits of animals. They are thus described:—“No. 443. Portrait of a Mule, the property of W. H. Simpson, Esq., of Beleigh Grange, Essex;” and, “No. 584. Portraits of a Pointer Bitch and Puppy.” The latter was painted for the owner of the mule, and both pictures appeared among those early works of Sir Edwin’s which were, as before stated, sold in 1848, after the death of Mr. Simpson. James Ward, being essentially a cattle painter, these examples are important, because they are the first seriously studied pictures by the first English painter who, since Hogarth, had painted a dog with due regard to individuality and character, to say nothing of pathos and dramatic expressiveness, passion, energy, and humour. Hogarth had painted several dogs with admirable skill, e. g., the telling portrait of “Trump” in his own likeness, now in the National Gallery, and there are dogs in “A Rake’s Progress.” John Wooton was the fashionable dog painter of Hogarth’s day, who did many canine portraits, notably that of Horace Walpole’s “Patapan,” as recorded in his master’s letter to Mann, Ap. 25, 1743. Stubbs painted several capital dogs, as accessories to his horses. Both Gainsborough and Romney used dogs in like situations. Nevertheless, it is true that between Snyder’s and Landseer’s days the “friend of man,” as an independent subject of study, was neglected by artists.