This is a somewhat rare instance of the artist selecting for portraiture a house of larger dimensions than a cottage. It is a singular trait, perhaps a womanly trait, that we never find her choice falling upon the country gentleman’s seat, although their formal gardening and parterres of flowers must oftentimes have tempted her. Her selection, in fact, never rises beyond the wayside tenement, which in that before us no doubt once housed a well-to-do yeoman, but was, when Mrs. Allingham limned it, only tenanted in part by a small farmer and in part by a butcher. But it is planned and fashioned on the old English lines to which we have referred, and which in the days when it was built governed those of the dwelling of every well-to-do person.
53. THE DUKE’S COTTAGE
From the Water-colour in the possession of Mr. Maurice Hill.
Painted 1896.
The trend of the trees indicates that this scene is laid where the winds are not only strong, but blow most frequently from one particular quarter. It is, in fact, on the coast of Dorset, at Burton, a little seaside resort of the inhabitants of Bridport, when they want a change from their own water-side town. The English Channel comes up to one side of the buttercup-clad field, and was behind the artist as she sat to paint the carrier’s cottage, a man of some local celebrity, who took the artist to task for not painting his home from a particular point of view, saying, “I’ve had it painted many a time, and theyse always took it from there.” He was a man accustomed to boss the village in a kindly but firm way, never allowing any controversy concerning his charges, which were, however, always reasonable. Hence he had come to be nicknamed “The Duke,” and as such did not understand Mrs. Allingham’s declining at once to recommence her sketch at the spot he indicated.
The Dorsetshire cottages, for the most part, differ altogether from their fellows in Surrey and Sussex, for their walls are made of what would seem to be the flimsiest and clumsiest materials,—dried mud, intermixed with straw to give it consistency, entering mainly into their composition. Many are not far removed from the Irish cabins, of which we see an example in [Plate 78].
54. THE CONDEMNED COTTAGE
From the Water-colour in the possession of the Artist.
Painted 1902.
In speaking of Duke’s Cottage, I dwelt upon the poor materials of which it and its Dorsetshire fellows were made, and this, coupled with Mrs. Allingham presenting a picture of one that is too decayed to live in, may raise a suggestion as to their instability. But such is not the case. The lack of substance in the material is made up by increased thickness, and the cottage before us has stood the wear and tear of several hundred years, and now only lacks a tenant through its insanitary condition. A robin greeted the artist from the topmost of the grass-grown steps, glad no doubt to see some one about the place once more.
55. ON IDE HILL
From the Drawing in the possession of Mr. E. W. Fordham.
Painted 1900.