1800 (?). Preparation for the Academy, Old Joseph Nollekens and his Venus.—John Thomas Smith, many years Keeper of the prints and drawings in the British Museum, and better known by his works on metropolitan antiquities, to which he furnished etchings, as well as archæological researches, has left us one of the chattiest and most eccentric biographies to be found in the annals of literature—the Life of the Sculptor Nollekens, whose pupil he was. Much as we are indebted to 'Antiquity Smith' for the whimsical anecdotes he has imported into his unequivocally entertaining pair of volumes, which touch freely upon contemporary men and things under their most familiar and every-day aspect, we cannot fail to feel a passing regret that the versatile keeper has forgotten to make any anecdotal mention of his friend Rowlandson, with whom he was on terms of cordiality. The caricaturist had presented, at times, some of his most interesting drawings to 'his old friend John Thomas Smith,' as he has taken care to inscribe on the margins, with his autograph; the best of these is possibly, Drawing from the Life-School at the Royal Academy—a subject upon which both the humourists were well informed, since they had worked there as students, and were more or less acquainted with all the artists of the day, and, moreover, it being impossible to overlook such points, with their keen sense of the eccentric; they had noted—the one with his pencil, and the other with his pen—all the striking peculiarities, personal or professional, of their numerous associates. The latest portrait the present writer has seen of our artist is one drawn with a pen in outline and tinted with Indian ink by the worthy keeper, one day when the caricaturist was visiting the Print Room of the British Museum, Rowlandson being, at that time, well advanced in years. The sketch is that of a large and decisive-looking elderly gentleman, with a bald head, firmly-cut features, and wearing big old-fashioned spectacles; this portrait was taken while the subject was stooping to examine a drawing. Beneath it John Thomas Smith has inscribed the particulars under which he came to draw the portrait of 'his old friend.'
The grave omission with which we have to charge Nollekens' biographer, usually so amazingly fertile in individualistic traits of everyone he knew—and he seems to have been fairly acquainted with, or to have something amusing to impart about, nearly everybody of any note—in respect to the caricaturist, of whom his writings make no sort of mention, is the more to be regretted, since it was probably a sly hint imparted by 'Antiquity Smith' which produced the picture of the gifted old miser at work on one of his cherished subjects—a whimsical study, doubtless founded on a special visit of observation, instituted, with Nollekens' old pupil, for the very purpose. As regards the sculptor's portrait, which is seemingly caricatured, John Thomas Smith comes in as aptly with his description[1] as if the two sittings had taken place simultaneously, and the biographer and artist had worked en collaboration:—'His figure was short, his head big, and it appeared much increased by a large-crowned hat, of which he was very fond. His neck was short, his shoulders narrow, his body too large, particularly in the front lower part; he was bow-legged and hook-nosed; indeed, his leg was somewhat like his nose, which resembled the rudder of an Antwerp packet-boat; his lips were rather thin, but between his brows there was great evidence of study.'
PREPARATIONS FOR THE ACADEMY. OLD JOSEPH NOLLEKENS AND HIS VENUS.
As to 'his Venuses' Mrs. Nollekens invariably continued to express the most derogatory opinions, since she regarded his fair models as 'abandoned huzzies, with whom she had no patience,' regarding her eccentric spouse as quite on their level, for she cherished the extraordinary conviction that after his marriage he ought to have 'dispensed with such people.' While Mrs. Nollekens was unduly mindful of her husband's favourite models, it seems these ladies, under altered circumstances, occasionally amused themselves by reminding the sculptor of their former acquaintance, on which pleasant fact his biographer does not fail to enlarge, in more than one instance:—
'Our sculptor would sometimes amuse himself, on a summer's evening, by standing with his arms behind him at the yard-gate, which opened into Titchfield Street. During one of these indulgences, as a lady was passing, most elegantly dressed, attended by a strapping footman in silver-laced livery, with a tall gilt-headed cane, she nodded to him, and, smiling, asked him if he did not know her. On his reply that he did not recollect her, "What, sir!" exclaimed she, "do you forget Miss Coleman, who brought a letter to you from Charles Townley, to compare limbs with your Venus? Why, I have been with you twenty times in that little room, to stand for your Venus." "Oh! lawk-a-daisy, so you have!" answered Nollekens. "Why, what a fine woman you're grown! Come, walk in, and I'll show you your figure—I have done it in marble." After desiring the man to stop at the gate she went in with him; and upon seeing Mrs. Nollekens at the parlour-window, who was pretending to talk to and feed her sister's bullfinch, but who had been informed by the vigilant Bronze (the eccentric maid-servant of this odd pair) of what had been going on at the gate, she went up to her and said, "Madam, I have to thank——." Mrs. Nollekens then elevated herself on her toes, and, with a lisping palpitation, began to address the lady. "Oh, dear," observed Miss Coleman, "and you don't know me! You have given me many a basin of broth in the depth of winter, when I used to stand for Venus." Mrs. Nollekens, not knowing what to think of Joseph, shook her head at him as she slammed the window, at the same time exclaiming, "Oh, fie! Mr. Nollekens! Fie! fie!" Bronze assured me that when her master went into the front parlour he had a pretty warm reception. "What!" said her mistress, "to know such wretches after you have done with them in your studio!"'
In Rowlandson's picture the sculptor is actually at work on a Venus and Cupid; one of his most successful models.[2]
1800. Rainbow Tavern, in Fleet Street, in 1800.
1800. Remarks on a Tour to North and South Wales in the year 1797, by Henry Wigstead, with plates from Rowlandson, Pugh, Howitt, &c. (Aquatinted by J. Hill.) London: Published by W. Wigstead, 40 Charing Cross. 8vo.—The particulars of the tour undertaken under these auspices are thus briefly set forth by one of the travellers:—