The Weird Picture

by John R. Carling

The principal features of the picture (to quote the language of the Standard correspondent) were: "The fallen Cæsar with his toga wrapped partly round him, the statue of Pompey rising above, a tesselated pavement stained with blood, here and there a discarded dagger, columnar architecture in the back-ground: such were the simple elements presented by this chef-d'œuvre."

I fell back a pace or two to contemplate the picture as a whole, and, despite my dislike of the artist, I could not repress a feeling of admiration for the man who had produced such a masterpiece.

Desirous of verifying the Baronet's suspicion that the picture might reveal to me something that would be entirely passed over by others, I proceeded to examine it in detail.

I first directed my attention to the statue of Pompey, and saw that Angelo had given his own regular and haughty features to this figure, which was represented as being crowned with a laurel-wreath, and armed with spear and shield. The centre of this shield was set with the helmeted head of Minerva—a gem of minute painting—and it required no second glance to tell me that the face of the goddess was simply a miniature portrait of Daphne. The Baronet had never made any reference to this fact. How the likeness could have escaped his notice was a marvel to me. Perhaps a lover's eyes were more discerning than his.

From the statue of Pompey I turned my attention to the figure at the base of the pedestal. Angelo had not strictly adhered to the minutiæ of history in this portion of his picture, for he had given a full view of Cæsar's face instead of veiling it in the folds of the toga.

From the space between two lofty columns there slanted a flood of sunshine, painted with a technique so marvellous that the beams seemed actually to quiver on the canvas. In fact, so beautifully was this sunlight managed that I was impelled to touch it with my hand, almost expecting to see it tinged with a golden hue. These rays formed the principal beauty of the picture, suffusing the dead body of Cæsar with a transparent veil of light.

The bald and beardless head of the fallen Dictator became next the object of my study.

Standing close to the canvas, my eyes could detect nothing but a confused daub, but on receding gradually from it the effect was curious, not to say startling. The features of Cæsar, which appeared but dim and vague at first, became gradually clearer and more distinct, till at length each curve and every line of the painted countenance stood out in relief through the cascade of yellow beams. I could quite forgive the little servant-girl for supposing that the eyes of this figure moved, for more than once I was seized with the same impression.

The thought, suggested by the epitaph in the artist's portfolio, that a murdered man might have contributed to the deathlike realism displayed by this face invested it with a weird interest; and I continued to gaze at it as though it were the embalmed head of Orpheus, celebrated in classic legend, whose dead tongue could whisper things past and to come. The filmy, glazed eyes fascinated me with their dreadful stare. The face had a mournful, surprised expression—the very expression, so far as I could imagine (for happily I am no judge of such matters), of a man who, without warning, had been cut off out of the land of the living. It was not, however, the face that meets us in the coins and busts of art-galleries: it seemed to have a much more familiar look. It seemed a face well known to me—one, too, that I had seen but recently.

Minute after minute passed, and still I stood there contemplating the dead face, with the secret consciousness that ere long I should recognise it. A sudden movement on my part to the left, seemingly, as it were, to set the face in a new point of view, caused the light of knowledge to flash into my mind.