We steamed up the river, with every step of its banks replete with history, every step having been painted on canvas or commemorated in song from time immemorial, and not only still retains its charms, but has even added to them.
“O veil of bliss! O softly swelling hills,
Heavens! What a goodly prospect spreads around,
Of hills and dales, and woods and lawns.”
We got off at the pier of Kew Gardens, where thousands land for a visit each day to this beautiful spot. No one can afford to miss this place, even if you are not entertained by the Duchess while there. There’s not such a park anywhere. What splendid trees it has! The horse-chestnut, a rich mass from its base—whose branches rest on the ground, as those of so many trees do here—to its highest dome. Hawthorns, and a variety that sweep its turf, which is an emerald green, and so deep that you walk with a grateful sense of drawing life from its wonderful depths. On this beautiful turf the boys are playing cricket in great numbers, and the children are getting as intimate with this sweet-smelling earth as their nurses will allow. The beauty of the green is heightened by the masses of color from flowers in a state of perfection; the whole effect is one of luxury and solidity that we encounter nowhere else, and it was with regret that we harkened to the evening call, which was musical in its way, to quit the garden.
The Thames is beautiful here. While waiting for the boat, which was delayed by low tide, we entered a little cottage (which gave notice of hospitality), and looked out over the beautiful green of a churchyard, where one of England’s greatest painters, Gainsborough, lies in repose. He is still in the minds and hearts of not only his own people, but is appreciated by our American millionaire, Pierpont Morgan, to the extent of $150,000, the sum expended for the lost gem—the “Duchess of Devonshire.” Truly, these people are surrounded by history, tradition, and romance five or six centuries old.
CHAPTER XII
THE National Gallery on Trafalgar Square, without taking Ruskin’s word for it, is the most important collection of paintings in Europe. The most expensive purchases are the “Blenheim Raphael,” “Blenheim Van Dyke,” the “Pisani,” “Veronese,” the two “Correggios,” and “Lord Radnor’s” three. They are splendid specimens of the greatest of the English old masters and so many of their successors; whilst the large collection of Turner’s is unrivalled and incomparable. In order to insure the high level of the National Gallery in point of quality, an act was passed in 1883 authorizing the sale of unsuitable works, thinning out the gallery in favor of provincial collections. The result of this wise weeding is that, though there are many galleries in which there are more pictures to be seen, there are none in which they are more really worth seeing. There is another way in which pictures interest the spectator in after ages: a painter inevitably shows us something of himself in his work. He shows us something of his age—of its costumes, its manner of life, and, if a portrait painter, the characters and physiognomy of its men and women. It is necessary to study them in historic order, as we find painting has in each school been a progressive one. I first studied the early Flemish pictures, which are a striking contrast to the Italian pictures. There is no feeling or beauty in them. What is it, then, that gives these pictures their worth, and causes their painters to be included among the greatest masters of the world? Look at the most famous Van Dyke; the longer you look the more you will see its absolute fidelity to nature in dress and detail, especially in portraiture. Here the men and women of the time are set down precisely as they lived. They were the first to discover the mixing of oil with colors, and made oil painting much more popular. Their pictures have an imperishable firmness, with exquisite delicacy.
The French painters were poorly represented here; especially did it seem so after viewing their wonderful exhibit at the Exposition. The Paris school is the chief centre of art teaching in the world; and is marked for its excessive realism and gross sensuality. This reminds me of one of their pictures exhibited at the Exposition—so shockingly realistic it should be barred from any exhibit; no place else would it be allowed to hang. Of course, the French are ideal painters as well; Claude Poussin and Greuze are striking contrasts.