58. A KENTISH FARMYARD
From the Water-colour in the possession of Mr. Arthur R. Moro.
Painted 1900.
Farmyards are out of fashion nowadays, and a Royal Water-Colour Society’s Exhibition, which in the days of Prout and William Hunt probably contained a dozen of them, will now find place for a single example only from the hand of Mr. Wilmot Pilsbury, who alone faithfully records for us the range of straw-thatched buildings sheltering an array of picturesque waggons and obsolete farming implements. But this “stead” is just opposite to the farm in which Mrs. Allingham stays, and it has often attracted her on damp days by its looking like “a blaze of raw sienna.” We can understand the tiled expanse of steep-pitched, moss-covered roof affording her some of that material on which her heart delights, and which she has felt it a duty to hand down to posterity before it gives place to some corrugated iron structure which must, ere long, supplant this old timber-built barn.
What was originally a study has been transformed by her, through the human incidents, into a picture: the milkmaid carrying the laden pail from the byre; the cock on the dunghill, seemingly amazed that his wives are too busily engaged on its contents to admire him; the lily-white ducks waddling to the pool to indulge in a drink, the gusto of which seems to increase in proportion to the questionableness of its quality.
CHAPTER VIII
GARDENS AND ORCHARDS
One is nearer God’s heart in a garden
Than anywhere else on earth.
The practice of painting gardens is almost as modern as that of painting by ladies. The Flemings of the fifteenth century, it is true, introduced in a delightful fashion conventional borders of flowers into some of their pictures, probably because they felt that ornament must be presented from end to end of them, and that in no way could they do this better than by adding the gaiety of flowers to their foregrounds. But all through the later dreary days no one touched the garden, for the conglomeration of flowers in the pieces of the Dutchmen of the seventeenth century cannot be treated as such. Flowers certainly flourished in the gardens of the well-to-do in England in the century between 1750 and 1850, but none of the limners of the drawings of noblemen or of gentlemen’s seats which were produced in such quantities during that period ever condescended to introduce them. Even so late as fifty years ago, if we may judge from the titles, the Royal Academy Exhibition of that date did not contain a single specimen of a flower-garden. The only probable one is a picture entitled “Cottage Roses,” and any remotely connected with the garden appear under such headings as “Early Tulips,” “Geraniums,” “Japonicas and Orchids,” “Will you have this pretty rose, Mamma?” or “The Last Currants of Summer”! Taste only half a century ago was different from ours, and asked for other provender. Thus, the original owner of the catalogue from which these statistics were taken was an energetic amateur critic, who has commended, or otherwise, almost every picture, commendations being signified by crosses and disapproval by noughts. The only work with five crosses is one illustrating the line, “Now stood Eliza on the wood-crown’d height.” On the other hand, Millais’ “Peace Concluded” stands at the head of the bad marks with five, his “Blind Girl” with two, which number is shared with Leighton’s “Triumph of Music.” Holman Hunt’s “Scapegoat,” in addition to four bad marks, is described as “detestable and profane.” These pre-Raphaelites, Millais, Holman Hunt, and their followers, then so little esteemed, may in truth be said to have been the originators of the “garden-drawing cult,” chief amongst their followers being Frederick Walker. To the example of the last-named more especially are due the productions of the numerous artists—good, bad, and indifferent—who have seized upon a delightful subject and almost nauseated the public with their productions. The omission of gardens from the painter’s rôle in later times may in a measure have been due to the gardens themselves, or, to speak more correctly, to those under whose charge they were maintained. The ideal of a garden to the true artist must always have differed from these as to its ordering, even in these very recent days when the edict has gone forth that Nature is to be allowed a hand in the planning.
The gardener, no matter whether the surroundings favour a formal garden or not, insists upon his harmonies or contrasts of brilliant colourings. If he takes these from a manual on gardening he will adopt what is termed a procession of colouring somewhat as follows: strong blues, pale yellow, pink, crimson, strong scarlet, orange, and bright yellow. He is told that his colours are to be placed with careful deliberation and forethought, as a painter employs them in his picture, and not dropped down as he has them on his palette! Alfred Parsons and George Elgood have on occasions grappled with creations such as these, when placed in settings of yew-trimmed hedges, or as surroundings of a central statue, or sundial; but who will say that the results have been as successful as those where formality has been merely a suggestion, and Nature has had her say and her way. Surroundings must, of course, play a prominent part in any garden scheme. However much we may dislike a stiff formality, it is sometimes a necessity. For instance, herbaceous plants, with annuals of mixed colours, would have looked out of place on the lawn in front of Brocket Hall ([Plate 65]), which calls for a mass of plants of uniform colours. The lie of the ground, too, must, as in such a case, be taken into account: there it is a sloping descent facing towards the sun, and so is not easy to keep in a moist condition. Geraniums and calceolarias, which stand such conditions, are therefore almost a necessity.
When this book was proposed to Mrs. Allingham her chief objection was her certainty that no process could reproduce her drawings satisfactorily. Her method of work was, she believed, entirely opposed to mechanical reproduction, for she employed not only every formula used by her fellow water-colourists, but many that others would not venture upon. Amongst those she tabulated was her system of obtaining effects by rubbing, scrubbing, and scratching. But the process was not to be denied, and she was fain to admit that even in these it has been a wonderfully faithful reproducer. Now nowhere are these methods of Mrs. Allingham’s more utilised, and with greater effect, than in her drawings of flower-gardens. The system of painting flowers in masses has undergone great changes of late. The plan adopted a generation or so ago was first to draw and paint the flowers and then the foliage. This method left the flowers isolated objects and the foliage without substantiality. Mrs. Allingham’s method is the reverse of this. Take, for instance, the white clove pinks in the foreground of Mrs. Combe’s drawing of the kitchen-garden at Farringford ([Plate 71]). These are so admirably done that their perfume almost scents the room. They have been simply carved out of a background of walk and grey-green spikes, and left as white paper, all their drawing and modelling being achieved by a dexterous use of the knife and a wetted and rubbed surface. The poppies, roses, columbines, and stocks have all been created in the same way. The advantage is seen at once. There are no badly pencilled outlines, and the blooms blend amongst themselves and grow naturally out of their foliage.
