The name of Thomas Ball has acquired celebrity in art since that day, but this statue of Forrest in the character of Coriolanus will always stand as a proud landmark in his sculptured path of fame. It was a true work of love not less than of ambition. For in the long hours of their fellowship in the preparatory studying and sketching and casting the sitter and the artist grew friends. The sculptor took his model and sailed for Florence, there to produce the work he had conceived. And when a year and a half had gone by, the complete result, safely landed in Boston and set up for view in an art-gallery, greeted the eyes of Oakes and gladdened his heart. For it more than met his expectations, it perfectly contented him. He wrote to Mr. Ball, “I am glad the statue came unheralded to our shores, and am content to let the verdict of the public rest on the merits of the work. I congratulate you on an unequivocal and grand success. As a personal likeness of Forrest it is most truthful, and as an illustration of the Shakspearean conception of the Roman Consul it is sublime. For more than forty years I have known this man with an intimacy not common among men. Indeed, our friendship has been more like the devotion of a man to the woman he loves than the relations usually subsisting between men. In all my intercourse with the world I have never known a truer man or one with a nobler nature than Edwin Forrest, whose real worth and greatness will not be acknowledged by the world until he is dead. I rejoice that one of his own countrymen has given to posterity this true and magnificent portrait of him in immortal marble. The eloquence of this marble will outlive the malevolence of all the enemies and of all the critics who have assailed him.”
Forrest was indeed fortunate in the peaceful and time-enduring victory achieved for him by the artist in this sculptured Coriolanus, whose haughty beauty, and right foot insupportably advanced with the planted weight of all imperious Rome, will speak his quality to generations yet unborn. What a melancholy contrast is suggested by the words of Mrs. Siddons after seeing the marble counterfeit of John Philip Kemble: “I cannot help thinking of the statue of my poor brother. It is an absolute libel on his noble person and air. I should like to pound it into dust and scatter it to the winds.”
The Coriolanus is colossal, eight feet and a half in height and weighing six tons. The forms and muscles of the neck, the right side of the chest, the right arm, left forearm, feet, and lower portion of the left leg, are delineated in perfection, the remaining parts being concealed by the folds of the mantle which is drawn around the left shoulder, while the head is slightly turned to the right. The face and head are superbly finished and seem pregnant with vitality. The whole expression is one of massive and imperious strength, adamantine self-sufficingness, reposeful, yet animated and resolute. It represents him at that point in the play where he repels the intercessions of his mother and wife, and says,—
“Let the Volces
Plough Rome and harrow Italy, I’ll never
Be such a gosling to obey instinct, but stand
As if a man were author of himself
And knew no other kin.”
So much pleased was Forrest with the statue, as his lingering gaze studied it and drank in its majestic significance reflected on him from the superb and classic pomp of marble, that he begged the privilege of purchasing it from the subscribers. And so it now stands in the Actors’ Home founded by his will. The enthusiastic and efficient zeal of Oakes in securing this work drew his friend to him with an increased feeling of obligation and of attachment, which he frankly expressed in an eloquent letter of thanks.
Forrest and Oakes had from time to time many pleasing adventures together. A specimen or two may be related. Strolling in a quiet square in Baltimore, they came upon a company of boys who were playing marbles. “My little fellows,” said the tragedian, with his deep voice of music, “will you lend me a marble and let me play with you?” “Oh, yes,” said a barefoot, smiling urchin, and held up a marble in his dirty paw. Forrest took it, sank on one knee, and began his game. In less than half an hour he had won every marble they had, and the discomfited and destitute gang were gazing at him in astonishment. “Don’t you see,” he then said, “how dangerous it is for you to play with a stranger, about whose skill or whose character you are wholly ignorant? Boys, as you grow up and mix in the fight of life it will always be useful to you to know in advance what kind of a fellow he is with whom you are going to deal.” One of the boys, who had been sharply eying him, whispered to another, “I guess he is Mr. Forrest, the play-actor, you know, at the theatre.” The other replied, “Well, I should like to go there and see if he can playact as well as he plays marbles.” “Yes,” said Forrest, “come, all of you. I want you to come. I will do my best to please you.” And he wrote an order of admission for them, gave them back their marbles, and bade them good-morning.