No. I.
The Lady in Milton’s Comus, verse 221.
Was I deceiv’d, or did a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night?
I did not err, there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night,
And casts a gleam over this tufted grove.
No. II. *
A Companion to the preceding picture. The Widow of an Indian Chief watching the arms of her deceased husband.
This picture is founded on a custom which prevails among some of the savage tribes in America, where the widow of an eminent warrior is used to sit the whole day, during the first moon after his death, under a rude kind of trophy, formed by a tree lopped and painted; on which the weapons and martial habiliments of the dead are suspended. She remains in this situation without shelter, and perseveres in her mournful duty at the hazard of her own life from the inclemencies of weather.
No. III. *
William and Margaret. From the celebrated ballad in Pierce’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, vol. 3. xvi.
’Twas at the silent solemn hour
When night and morning meet,
In glided Margaret’s grimly ghost,
And stood at William’s feet.
No. IV. *
View of the Cascade of Turni in Italy.
No. V.
Virgil’s Tomb by moonlight.
No. VI.
The Lake of Nemi. A sunset.
No. VII. *
Julia, the daughter of Augustus, and supposed mistress of Ovid, deploring her exile, by moonlight, in a cavern of the island to which she was banished.
No. VIII. *
The happy meeting of Hero and Leander, after his swimming across the Hellespont in a tranquil night.
No. IX. *
A Companion to the preceding picture. The Storm in which Leander was drowned.
No. X.
A Landscape. Morning.
No. XI.
A Sea Shore. Evening.
No. XII.
Matlock High Tor. Moonlight.
No. XIII.
The Maid of Corinth. From Mr. Hayley’s essay on painting, verse 126, &c.
O, Love! it was thy glory to impart
Its infant being to this magic art;
Inspir’d by thee, the soft Corinthian maid
Her graceful lover’s sleeping form portray’d;
Her boading heart his near departure knew,
Yet long’d to keep his image in her view;
Pleas’d she beheld the steady shadow fall
By the clear lamp upon the even wall;
The line she trac’d with fond precision true,
And drawing, doated on the form she drew.
No. XIV. *
A Companion to the preceding picture. Penelope unravelling her web, by lamp-light. From Pope’s Homer, the second book of the Odyssey, verse 99, &c.
Elusive of the bridal day, she gives
Fond hopes to all, and all with hopes deceives.
Did not the sun thro’ heaven’s wide azure roll’d
For three long years the royal fraud behold,
While she, laborious in delusion, spread
The spacious loom, and mix’d the various thread?
Where, as to life, the wondrous figures rise.
Thus spoke the inventive queen, with artful sighs:
“Tho’ cold in death Ulysses breathes no more,
“Cease yet awhile to urge the bridal hour;
“Cease, till to great Laertes I bequeath
“A talk of grief, his ornaments of death;
“Lest when the Fates his royal ashes claim,
“The Grecian matrons taint my spotless name,
“When he, whom living mighty realms obey’d,
“Shall want in death, a shroud to grace his shade.”
Thus she: at once the generous train complies,
Nor fraud mistrusts in virtue’s fair disguise:
The work she ply’d; but, studious of delay,
By night revers’d the labours of the day;
While thrice the sun his annual journey made,
The conscious lamp the midnight fraud survey’d.
No. XV.
A distant View of Vesuvius from the shore of Posilipo.
No. XVI. *
The Companion, in the gulf of Salerno.
No. XVII. *
A Landscape. Moonlight.
No XVIII.
A View in Dovedale. Morning.
No. XIX.
Ditto, its Companion. Evening.
No. XX.
Portrait of an Artist.
No. XXI. *
Guy de Lusignan in Prison.
No. XXII.
Portraits of three (of Mr. Newton’s) Children.
No. XXIII.
A Wood Scene. Moonlight.
No. XXIV. *
A View of Gibraltar during the destruction of the Spanish Floating Batteries, on the 13th of September, 1782.
It may be proper to inform the spectator, that the painter’s original plan was to execute two pictures, as companions to each other, on this event so glorious to our country. In the first (which is now exhibited) he has endeavoured to represent an extensive view of the scenery combined with the action. In the second (which he hopes to finish hereafter) he proposes to make the action his principal object, and delineate the particulars of it more distinctly.
No. XXV.
Portrait of a Gentleman.
FINIS.
Wright so far forgave the injury he considered the Royal Academy had inflicted upon him, as to contribute to their exhibitions in the years 1788, 1789, 1790, and 1794; though from the correspondence printed in Chapter VI., it will be seen that his paintings were not treated with much consideration.
One characteristic worthy of notice in Wright’s portraiture, is the life-like and liquid look that pervades the eyes; he was also particularly happy in his treatment of the hands of his sitters, which are very different to the misshapen forms that often do duty for hands in paintings by popular artists.
An exhibition, in which his pictures were an important feature, appears to have been held in his native town some two years afterwards, for the Derby Mercury, of October 3, 1787, contains the following advertisement:—
EXHIBITION.
From the numerous and genteel company who have visited this Exhibition, the Inventor will continue the same
FOR ONE WEEK LONGER,
And to the effects already shown will add various others
FROM SOME OF THE
JUSTLY MUCH ADMIRED PAINTINGS OF
MR. WRIGHT, OF DERBY,
The effects of which beggar all description, and for which purpose Mr. Wright has politely sent the Inventor his Paintings.
It is hoped none will miss the present and only opportunity of gratifying their curiosity.
Admittance from Ten in the morning till One, and from Four till Eight in the evening, at Mr. Wood’s, Confectioner, in the Corn Market, at One Shilling ea.
While, however, Wright appears to have had a proper sense of his own merits as a painter, and not to have lost sight of the advantages of keeping them before the public, and though on certain occasions he held out for his price, he was neither conceited nor ungenerous. Of his liberality sufficient proof is afforded by his numerous gifts of valuable pictures to individuals among his private friends, and to persons to whom he thought himself under obligation. In various instances, these gifts were manifestly disinterested; and that they were often, and probably always, conferred in a very pleasing manner, which declined rather than sought the expression of gratitude, the following records will sufficiently vouch.
“Mr. Hayley to Mrs. Hayley.
... “As I love to make you a sharer in every pleasing occurrence of my life, I cannot let a post depart without dispatching to you an account of a circumstance which has given me no little delight. Beridge last night committed a box to my care, declaring it contained something for me, but requesting that I would not open it till he arrived here to-day. After spending an agreeable morning at Hampstead, I met the dear Physician in Cavendish Square; and while I was dressing, he displayed his skill as a carpenter in opening the packing-case. When I came from my dressing-room to the dining-room, he surprised me with an exquisite picture of Virgil’s Tomb, by Wright, putting into my hand a letter from that amiable artist, requesting my acceptance of this poetical scene, and added, that the splendid frame which contained it was the gift of Dr. Beridge.”
The following is part of a letter written on the margin of a pencil and wash sketch of St. Peter’s at Rome, with the Bridge and Tower of St. Angelo, to someone in Derby, in the year 1774, when Wright was at Rome—
“The collour’d drawing I will do for you must be upon a larger scale, and sent by a friend, as I don’t wish to do them as letters, but I presume the enclos’d sort as sketches of observation, or possibly to remove any doubt in regard to particular objects, as I take them as faithfully as I can, and shall do the others also. In the meantime I beg you will make no scruple in mentioning any particular objects that you wish, as I have justly every reason to have the greatest esteem for you, and having experienced your sincerity and friendship, I beg you will mention no more about the prices.”