Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made

by James Dabney McCabe

Powers remained in the Frenchman's employ for seven years, hoping all the while to earn money enough to devote himself entirely to art, which had now become his great ambition. His experience was not a pleasant one. Some of it was so singular, not to say ludicrous, that he shall relate one portion of it in his own language:

"One of the first things I undertook, in company with Herview, was a representation of the infernal regions after Dante's description. Behind a grating I made certain dark grottoes, full of stalactites and stalagmites, with shadowy ghosts and pitchforked figures, all calculated to work on the easily-excited imaginations of a Western audience, as the West then was. I found it very popular and attractive, but occasionally some countryman would suggest to his fellow spectator that a little motion in the figures would add much to the reality of the show. After much reflection I concluded to go in among the figures dressed like the Evil One, in a dark robe, with a death's-head and cross-bones wrought upon it, and with a lobster's claw for a nose. I had bought and fixed up an old electrical machine, and connected it with a wire, so that, from a wand in my hand, I could discharge quite a serious shock upon any body venturing too near the grating. The plan worked admirably, and excited great interest; but I found acting the part of wax-figure two hours every evening in the cold no sinecure, and was put to my wits to devise a figure that could be moved by strings, and which would fill my place. I succeeded so well that it ended in my inventing a whole series of automata, for which the old wax-figures furnished the materials, in part, and which became so popular and so rewarding, that I was kept seven years at the business, my employer promising me, from time to time, an interest in the business, which he quite forgot to fulfill. When, at last, I found out the vanity of my expectations, I left him. He knew I kept no accounts, but he did not know that I reported all the money he gave me to my wife, who did keep our accounts. He tried to cheat me, but I was able to baffle him through her prudence and method. For I had married in this interval, and had a wife and children to support."

Powers was now thirty years old, and had acquired considerable reputation in Cincinnati as an artist. His abilities coming to the notice of Mr. Nicholas Longworth, of that city, that good genius of young men of talent called on him and offered to buy out the museum and establish him in the business. The offer was declined with thanks. Mr. Longworth then proposed to send him to Italy to study his profession, but this, too, being declined, Mr. Longworth urged him to go to Washington and try his fortune with the public men of the country. To this Powers consented, and, aided by his generous friend, he repaired to the national capital in 1835, and spent two years there. During this period he modeled busts of Andrew Jackson, J.Q. Adams, Calhoun, Chief Justice Marshall, Woodbury, Van Buren, and others. Being unable to secure a model of Webster in Washington, the statesman invited him to go with him to Marshfield for that purpose. Powers accepted the invitation, and declares that he looks back upon his sojourn there as one of the most delightful portions of his life.

General Jackson was very kind to him, and won his lasting esteem and gratitude. Upon being asked if he would sit for his bust, the old hero hesitated, and, looking at the artist nervously, asked: "Do you daub any thing over the face? Because," he added, "I recollect poor Mr. Jefferson got nearly smothered when they tried to take his bust. The plaster hardened before they got ready to release him, and they pounded it with mallets till they nearly stunned him, and then almost tore off a piece of his ear in their haste to pull off a sticking fragment of the mold. I should not like that." Powers assured him that such a terrible process would not be necessary, but that he only wished to look at him for an hour a day, sitting in his chair. The General brightened up at once, and cordially told him it would give him pleasure to sit for him. He at once installed the artist in a room in the White House, and gave him a sitting of an hour every morning until the model was done.

Mr. Powers regards the bust of Jackson as one of his best efforts, and the President himself was very much pleased with it. After he had completed his model, Mr. Edward Everett brought Baron Krudener, the Prussian Minister to Washington, to see it. The Baron was a famous art critic, and poor Powers was terribly nervous as he showed him the bust. The Baron examined it closely, and then said to the artist, "You have got the General completely: his head, his face, his courage, his firmness, his identical self; and yet it will not do! You have also got all his wrinkles, all his age and decay. You forget that he is President of the United States and the idol of the people. You should have given him a dignity and elegance he does not possess. You should have employed your art, sir, and not merely your nature." The artist listened in silence, and Mr. Everett stood by without saying a word, "conscious," as he afterward confessed, "of a very poor right to speak on such a subject," after listening to so famous a critic. "I did not dare," says Powers, "in my humility and reverence for these two great men, to say what I wanted to in reply; to tell the Baron that my 'art' consisted in concealing art, and that my 'nature' was the highest art I knew or could conceive of. I was content that the 'truth' of my work had been so fully acknowledged, and the Baron only confirmed my resolution to make truth my only model and guide in all my future undertakings."

One of his sitters in Washington was Senator Preston, of South Carolina, who conceived such an interest in him that he wrote to his brother, General Preston, of Columbia, South Carolina, a gentleman of great wealth, urging him to come to the artist's assistance, and send him to Italy. General Preston at once responded to this appeal, of which Powers was ignorant, and wrote to the artist to draw on him for a thousand dollars, and go to Italy at once, and to draw on him annually for a similar sum for several years. Powers was profoundly touched by this noble offer, and accepted it as frankly as it had been made. He sent his models to Italy, and took his departure for the Old World in 1837. Speaking of Mr. Preston's generosity, he said, two years ago: "I have endeavored to requite his kindness by sending him works of mine, equal in money value to his gifts; but I can never extinguish my great obligations. I fear he don't like me since the war,—for I could not suppress my strong national feelings for any man's friendship,—but I like and honor him; I would do any thing in my power to show him my inextinguishable gratitude."

He reached Florence in advance of his models, and while waiting for them made two busts, one of a professor in Harvard College, and the other of an American lady. A severe domestic affliction, however, which came upon him soon after his arrival in Italy, affected him so greatly that he was not able to return to his work for a long time. Then he applied himself to his busts, which were warmly praised by the artists in Florence and by his countrymen traveling abroad. Thorwaldsen visited him in his studio, and pronounced his bust of Webster the best work of its kind in modern times, and praises from other distinguished artists were equally as warm. Orders came in rapidly from English and Italians, and from Americans in Europe, and the sculptor soon had as much business as he could attend to. He gave his leisure time to work on an ideal figure, which, when completed, was purchased by an English gentleman of wealth. This was "The Greek Slave," the most popular of all his works. Duplicates of it were exhibited in America and at the Crystal Palace in England, and won him praise from all quarters. This single work established his fame as an artist, and brought him orders from all parts of the civilized world. His statue of "Eve," which had preceded "The Greek Slave" by a year, had been pronounced by Thorwaldsen fit to be any man's master-piece, but it had not created such a furore as "The Greek Slave." Subsequently he made an exquisite bust of the Grand Duchess of Tuscany, with which the Grand Duke was so pleased that he called on Powers, and asked him as a favor to himself to apply to him whenever he could do him a service. Powers asked permission to take a cast of the Venus, and this much-coveted boon, which had been denied to other artists for years, was at once granted to him.

Since then his works have been numerous. Among these are "The Fisher Boy," of which three duplicates in marble have been made; "Il Penseroso;" "Proserpine," a bust; "California;" "America," modeled for the Crystal Palace at Sydenham, England; "Washington" and "Calhoun," portrait statues, the former for the State of Louisiana, and the latter for the State of South Carolina; and "Benjamin Franklin" and "Thomas Jefferson," in the Capitol at Washington. His works are all marked by beauty and vigor of conception as well as by exquisite finish. Beautiful as his ideal figures are, he yet excels in his busts and statues of the great men of his native land. His "Jefferson" and "Franklin" are wonderful works, and his "Calhoun" is said to be almost life-like. This last was wrecked on the coast of Long Island on its voyage to America, and remained in the sea for some time, but being well packed was found, when raised, to be only slightly damaged by the water.

Mr. Powers has now resided in Italy for thirty-three years. Motives of economy have controlled his action, for he would gladly return to his own land did he feel justified in doing so. He has thus stated the reasons which have influenced his long residence abroad:

Sculpture is universal. The human form is of no country, and may be studied with equal advantage at home and abroad. The opportunities of studying it abroad are so immeasurably greater than at home, that I do not see how it is possible, without great loss, to neglect them.