We may commence our study of his social satires here, in following to some extent the sequence of time, with "A Sketch from Nature"—published by J. R. Smith in January of 1784, and engraved by him in stipple with great beauty and finish. The subject here recalls a very similar scene in Hogarth's "Rake's Progress," for here, as there, a merry company of both sexes is engaged in riotous revel; and the wine and punch flowing freely has got into the heads, and found expression in the behaviour, of the nymphs and their attendant swains. "Money-lenders," "Councillor and Client," and "Bookseller and Author" (all 1784) are excellent character-studies of male figures: the eighteenth century evidently needed the presence of Sir Walter Besant, for the bookseller is fat, prosperous, and overbearing, the author terribly thin, poorly dressed, and looking overworked. In "The Golden Apple or the Modern Paris" (1785) the fair Georgina again appears before us with her rival beauties, the Duchesses of Rutland and Gordon:
"Here Juno Devon, all sublime,
Minerva Gordon's wit and eyes,
Sweet Rutland, Venus in her prime."
The three ladies appear before the Prince of Wales, afterwards George the Fourth—the "Modern Paris" who has the difficult task of awarding the apple. The Prince re-appears in Rowlandson's famous print of "Vauxhall Gardens" (published by J. R. Smith in 1785) with a star upon his breast, where he is paying much attention to Mrs. Robinson—the lovely "Perdita," whose portrait now hangs in the Wallace Collection. The Duchess of Devonshire and her sister, Lady Duncannon, are well in the centre of the picture; Captain Topham takes in the gay scene through his glass; Doctor Johnson, in a supper box, seems deeply engaged upon his meal, though Mrs. Thrale is on his right and "Bozzy" and Goldsmith are of the party. Captain (later Colonel) Topham, the macaroni, man of taste and editor of The World, appears in another plate of 1785—as "Captain Epilogue," and as "Colonel Topham endeavouring to extinguish the Genius of Holman" (the actor); and to the same date belong "Grog on Board" and "Tea on Shore," as well as the print in colour chosen for illustration to this chapter.
["Filial Affection,"] as this is called, depicting a runaway trip to Gretna Green, speaks so fully for itself that it needs no further description from my pen; but I may mention here its companion print (also published by Mr. Hinton on December 15 of 1785), and called "The Reconciliation, or The Return from Scotland," in which the pair of fugitives—whom we have just seen presenting their horse pistols at the parental poursuivant—have now returned, all penitence and submission, and have won their forgiveness. A very curious and somewhat grisly adaptation of "Filial Affection" is reproduced by Messrs. Bell, to illustrate the article upon Rowlandson in their new and valuable edition of Bryan's Dictionary. It is a plate from The Dance of Death, an illustrated volume published by Ackermann in 1815, and resembles the earlier print—save that the figure behind the angry parent is a skeleton rider mounted on a skeleton steed. At this point, in touching these two periods (of 1785 and 1815) we may note how far fresher and more spontaneous is the figure-work in that rich period from 1785 onwards. Rowlandson had gained, perhaps, in what we may call his "Dr. Syntax period," in the treatment of landscape perspective or the massing of crowds, but had become more of the caricaturist, had lost the rich organic beauty which really irradiates some of his earlier prints.
Filial Affection.
By Thomas Rowlandson.
A print in colour from my own collection, published by Fores only sixteen days earlier (November 30, 1785) than "Filial Affection," may help here to illustrate my meaning. "Intrusion on Study" or "The Painter Disturbed," shows a very charming model, attired in nothing but the prettiest of mob caps, posing for some goddess on the canvas of the artist, who turns to wave his palette and brushes—a most effective weapon of defence—in the faces of two unwelcome visitors of his own sex, who have just broken in open-mouthed upon his study. The details of the studio, the expressive faces of the artist and his visitors (especially the second), are in Rowlandson's best mood; but what is more interesting, because more exceptional, is the exquisite feeling of line, as subtle as anything Beardsley has recorded, in the girl's recumbent figure—in the flow of the shoulder into the right arm, and in the sweep of the right hip, and faultless drawing of the right hand—which touches a note of purely plastic beauty entirely beyond the reach of either Hogarth or Gillray.
Joseph Grego says of our artist very justly: "Rowlandson's sense of feminine loveliness, of irresistible graces of face expression and attitude, was unequalled in its way; several of his female portraits have been mistaken for sketches by Gainsborough or Morland, and as such, it is possible, since the caricaturist is so little known in this branch, that many continue to pass current."[[15]] An engraving which came into my own hands, some years ago, of three young girls by Rowlandson, might be an exact illustration of these words, and as the above writer says, be a portrait group by Gainsborough or Hoppner—so refined and yet so masterly was the treatment. I alluded to this print with others, when speaking of Rowlandson as what might be here called a "feminist" in my study of Bartolozzi and his contemporaries, and found illustration there of this peculiarly charming type of his women in "Luxury" (typified, for this artist, by breakfast in bed), "House Breakers," "The Inn Yard on Fire" (where the ladies are making a very impromptu exit), in the lovely model of "The Artist Disturbed," and (for women of fashion) in the series (twelve prints in all) of the "Comforts of Bath."
I mention there, too, that delightful print of "Lady Hamilton at Home," where poor Sir William (whom the caricaturists never neglected) is suffering from an acute attack of gout, while "the lovely Emma, in very classic garb, is watering a flower-pot, and Miss Cornelia Knight, also dressed after the antique, touches the strings of a lyre, and warbles poems of her own composition." In treating, however, of Rowlandson's women, other prints, such as "Tastes Differ," "Opera Boxes," "Harmony," "A Nap in Town," and "In the Country," "Interruption, or Inconvenience of a Lodging House" (published April 1789), and "Damp Sheets" (August 1791), have a strong claim on our notice. Nor must I entirely neglect here Rowlandson's print called ["Preparation for the Academy, or Old Joseph Nollekens and his Venus"] (1800). It is perhaps the Miss Coleman here upon the model-stand who nearly caused a domestic breach between old Nollekens and his jealous spouse—the group on which he is at work being his "Venus Chiding Cupid," which was modelled for Lord Yarborough. The Life of the Sculptor Nollekens, by his pupil John Thomas Smith, contains some amusing contemporary gossip. He describes the sculptor much as we see him in this plate—his figure short, his head big, his shoulders narrow, his body too large. His worthy better half held strong opinions upon the sculptor's models—"abandoned hussies, with whom she had no patience"; and Miss Coleman having ventured to visit the scene of her early labours in a carriage and pair, the wrath of the virtuous Mrs. Nollekens became unbounded. Words indeed (perhaps a rare defect with the good lady) seem to have failed her at this crisis; in a later interview with Joseph they were not wanting.
