SUBJECTS FOR PICTURES.A LETTER TO EUSEBIUS.

Dear Eusebius,—Your letter of inquiry reached me at Gratian’s, just at the moment we were setting off to pay a visit of a few days to our friend the Curate, who had ensconced himself in happiness and a curacy about an easy day’s ride from his former abode. From that quarter I have no news to tell you, but that the winning affability even of Gratian cannot obtain a smile or look of acknowledgment from Lydia Prateapace. She passes him in scorn. We found the Curate and his bride on his little lawn, before the door of the prettiest of clerical residences. She was reading to him, and that I know will please you; for I have often heard you say that a woman’s reading inspires the best repose of thought, and gives both sweetness and dignity to reflection; that then the true listener is passive under the fascination and sense of all loveliness, and his ideas rise the fairer, as the flowers grow the brighter that bend to the music of the sweet-voiced brook. If every reviewer had such a reader, criticism would fall merciful as the “gentle dew,”—ink would lose its blackness. They rose to greet us with the best of welcomes; and like less happy lovers,

“That day they read no more.”

The house is simply, yet elegantly furnished. To the little library with its well-filled shelves of classical and English literature, female fingers had lent a grace—there were flowers, and the familiarity of work, to humanise the severest author in this living depository of the thoughts of all ages. The spirit of Plato might look through his mesmerised binding and smile. The busts of ancient poets seemed to scent the fragrance, and bow their heads thankful. I could not resist the pleasure of patting our old acquaintance Catullus on the back, as I passed, which Gratian saw, and said—“Ay, ay, that’s the rogue to whom I sacrificed swine.” A few spaces unoccupied by books, were filled with choice prints from pictures by Raffaele. The most appropriate was the “School of Athens,” not the least pleasing that portrait of the “gentle musician.” The Curate saw how much these prints attracted my notice, and said that he would give me a treat on the morrow, as he expected a package of prints all framed and glazed, which a wealthy relative, with whom, however, he added, he was not very well acquainted, had sent him—and he expected us to attend the unpacking. It is a present, he said, to furnish my curacy, but I know nothing of the giver’s taste. I wished at the time, that my friend Eusebius had been present at the unpacking; for I did not augur much of the collection, and I thought the grace of his, that is of your wit, Eusebius, might be wanted either in admiration or apology. For if you happened not to like the picture,

“I’ll warrant you’ll find an excuse for the glass.”

Shall I describe to you our doings and our sayings on this occasion? imagine the case before—us and in the words of another old song,

“It is our opening day.”

Well—it is opened—now, Eusebius, I will not particularise the contents. The giver, it is to be presumed, with the patriotic view of encouraging native art, had confined his choice, and had made his selection, entirely from the works of modern English painters and engravers. And do not imagine that I am here about to indulge in any morose and severe criticism, and say, all were bad. On the contrary, the works showed very great artistic skill of both kinds; indeed, the work of the needle and graver exhibited a miraculous power of translation. That the subjects were such as generally give pleasure, cannot be denied; they are widely purchased, go where you will, in every country town as in the metropolis; the printsellers’ windows scarcely exhibit any other. These prints were therefore according to the general taste,—and therefore the Curate must be expected to be highly gratified withhis present. Perhaps he was—but he certainly looked puzzled; and the first thing he said was, that he did not know what to do with them. “Are they not framed and glazed?” said Gratian: “hang them up, by all means.” “Yes,” said the bride, delightfully ready to assume the conjugal defence, “but where? You would not have me put the horses and dogs in my boudoir; and the other rooms of our nest have already pictures so out of character that these would only be emblems of disagreement; and I am sure you would not wish to see any thing of that nature here—yet.” But let me, Eusebius, take the order of conversation.

Gratian.—There is a queen tamer of all animals, and though I would not like to see the Curate’s wife among the monsters, I doubt not she could always charm away any discordance these pictures might give. And look now at the noble face of that honest and well-educated horse. He would be a gentleman of rank among the houyhuhnms. I love his placid face. He reminds me of my old pet bay Peter, and many a mile has he carried his old master that was so fond of him. I have ridden him over gorse and road many a long day. He lived to be upwards of thirty-three, and enjoyed a good bite and annuity, in a fat paddock, the last seven or eight years of his life.

Aquilius.—Gratian’s benevolence, you see, regulates his tastes: he loves all creatures, but especially the dumb: he speaks to them, and makes eloquent answers for them. You know he has a theory respecting their language.

Curate.—And Gratian is happy therein: I wish I had more taste of this kind, for these things are very beautiful in themselves; they are honest-looking creatures. In that I have been like Berni:

“Piacevangli i cavalliAssai, ma si passava del videre,Che modo non avea da comparalli.”

“Piacevangli i cavalli

Assai, ma si passava del videre,

Che modo non avea da comparalli.”

Lydia.—If they are honest, there are some sly ones too. What say you to this law-suit of Landseer’s? I think I could make a pet of the judge.

Aquilius.—Great as Landseer is, I like this but little. The picture was surprisingly painted, but when you have admired the handiwork, there is an end. The satire is not good: something sketchy may have suited the wit, but the labour bestowed makes it serious: we want the shortness of fable to pass off the “animali parlanti.”

Curate.—Gratian, who ought to order a composition picture of “The Happy Family” all living in concord, knows all the race, in and out of kennel, and should tell us if these dogs are not a little out of due proportion one with the other.

Gratian.—I think they are; but do not imagine I could bear to look upon the “Happy Family,” though the piece were painted by Landseer. I never saw them in a cage but I longed to disenchant them of the terror of their keeper. They all looked as if they could eat each other up if they dared. No, no—no convent and nunnery of heterogeneous natures, that long to quarrel, and would tear each other to pieces but for fear of their superior. I love natural instincts, and am sure the “Happy family” must have been sadly tortured to forget them.

Curate.—I certainly admire these animal portraits, they seem to be very like the creatures; but I really have no gallery-menagerie where I can put them. They appear to me to have been painted to adorn the stable residences of noblemen, gentlemen of the turf and kennel. You smile, Aquilius, but I mean it not to their dispraise, for in such places they might amuse in many an idle hour, and give new zest to the favourite pursuits.

Aquilius.—I only smiled at the thought, that though many such noblemen and gentlemen “go to the dogs,” they would not quite like to see them among the “family portraits,” and was therefore pleased at your appropriating these productions to the stable and the kennel. I am not surprised that you do not know what to do with them. I believe Morland was the first who introduced pigs into a drawing-room; for my own part, I ever thought them better in a sty.

Gratian.—Hold there, I won’t allow any one to rub my pigs’ backsbut myself, and you know I have a brace of Morlands, pigs too, in my dressing-room.

Lydia.—And if the pictures in any degree make you treat your animals more kindly, Morland deserves praise; and, in that case, all such works should be encouraged by the “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.”

Aquilius.—If Gratian is kind of his own nature, his familiarity with all creatures is of another kinship than such as art can bestow. He would have given a litter of straw to Morland himself, had he met him in one of his unfortunate predicaments, and thus have made him happy. But I fear we are not quite safe in thus commending our choice artists, on the score of the humanity they are likely to encourage.

Curate.—Why not? Has not Landseer dedicated to “the Humane Society” the portrait of the noble Retriever; and is that not his “chief mourner,” promoting affection between man and beast?

Gratian.—“O si sic omnia!” I love all field sports, and river sports too; but it is when horse, dog, and man all agree in the pleasure, and the bit of cruelty—for such, I suppose, we must admit it to be—is kept out of sight as much as possible, that we are willing to adopt the Benthamite principle into the sporting code, “the greatest happiness to the greatest number.” Yet I don’t like to refine away feeling in this way, and say, many enjoy, and one poor creature is hunted. I rather put it all upon nature. There is an instinct to hunt and be hunted, and perhaps there is a reciprocal pleasure. I like our good old sporting songs; they dwell upon the health and enjoyment of refreshing animation, the sociality, the good humour (and sometimes with a nice touch of pity too) of sport; they take no pleasure in dwelling upon the hard, the cruel necessity.

Aquilius.—Then are our ballad-makers more tender-hearted than our painters!

Gratian.—And there is need they should be; for some of our painters, and not only ours, but of all countries, have, to my mind, too much indulged in representations of cruelty. I have often wondered how many of the old pictures, your martyrdoms of saints, came to be painted. Who could take pleasure in looking at them?

Curate.—The best were works of high genius, and were painted for religious places; and though cruelty is necessary to the story of martyrdom, it is seldom made the subject—it is the triumph, the angelic choir, and the crown, and the sublime faith,—all combine to make the sublime subject; the mere act then becomes but the accessory; and such pictures, seen in their proper places—the chapels for which they were painted, and with the mind under a religious impression—are of the noblest interest, of most improving contemplation. I have heard such pictures condemned, because they have been seen in uncongenial places, and under antagonistic impressions. They are not for banquet-rooms, nor ball-rooms; nor to be commingled with the low-life subjects of the Dutch school, nor amidst theomnium-gatherumof galleries. The art cannot offer a higher pleasure than the contemplation of these sublime productions of Italian genius, seen when and where they should be exhibited, and alone. I have seen some that make their own sanctity, which seems to spread from them in a divine light, and diffuse itself into the outer obscure, in which all that is unfitting and minute is buried; and the great work of mind has created its own architecture, and filled it with the religious awe under which we gaze and wonder. And are we not the better?

Aquilius.—I fear this age of domestic life is against the reproduction of such works. All that can adorn the home, the house, and not the temple, we make the object of emulous search. Even our churches, if they would be allowed to receive such works, open as they are but an hour or so in the week, could scarcely have influence, and make such creations felt. In Italy, the passer-by has but to draw aside the curtain, and enter, and receive the influence. In such places, the martyrdoms of saints gave conviction of the holiness of faith, the beauty and power of devotion.

Gratian.—True; you will teach me the more to admire old Italian art.I confess, the great power you describe has but seldom come home to my feelings; perhaps they are naturally more congenial with home subjects; and I have been too often disgusted with pictures of horrors. A friend of mine I once found copying a picture of the flaying of a saint. There was a man unconcernedly tearing away his skin; and the raw flesh was portrayed, I dare say, to the life. He told me it was a fine picture. I maintained that it was too natural. It was, in fact, a bad picture, for the subject was cruelty; unconcealed, detestable cruelty, not made the means of exhibiting holy fortitude. There was nothing in it to avert the absolute disgust such a sight must raise. I would as soon live in the shambles, or in a dissecting-room, as have such a picture before my eyes continually. My friend thought only of the painting; the naturalness and the skill that drew it and coloured it to the quick—not to the life. I have seen so many of the Italian pictures of a gloomy cast, that, for my part, I have rather enjoyed the cheerful domestic scenes of life and landscape of the best Flemish masters, and English too.

Curate.—Art has no power of injunction, or the hand of many an artist would be stayed from perilling a profanation. Minds of all grades have been employed in the profession. The Italians have not been exempted from a corruption of taste and of power. Yet, without question, the grandest and the most touching creations of art have been the work of Italian hands, and the conceptions of Italian minds. I fear I am telling but admitted truisms.

Aquilius.—I know not that. I doubt if the pre-eminence will be admitted as established. What works do our collectors mostly purchase—your men of taste, your caterers for our National Gallery, those to whose taste and discernment not only our artists, but the public, are expected to bow? We have heard a great deal of late of encouraging the fine arts. We have had a premier supposed to be supreme in taste. Nay, as if he would cultivate the nation’s taste, show the importance of art, encourage collecting, and teach how to collect, has he not, of late, opened his house almost to the public, and exhibited his collection; and what did it show? doubtless, beautiful specimens of art, but specimens of the great, the sublime, the pathetic? Alas, no! I did not see mention made of a single Italian picture. Now, what would you think of the taste of a man who should profess to collect a library of poets, and should omit Homer, and Æschylus, and Dante, and point with pride to the neatly-bound volumes of the minor poets, and show you nothing higher than the “Pastor Fido,” or the “Gentle Shepherd?”

Lydia.—Or in a musical library should discard Handel?

Gratian.—Well, that is strange, certainly; but if we are becoming more home-comfort-seeking people, is it not right to encourage the production of works for thathome market? I cannot agree to put in the background our more domestic artists—and at least they avoid the fault of choosing disgusting subjects.

Aquilius.—Do they? I am not quite sure of that: we shall see. I suspect they fail more in that respect than you will gladly admit.

Gratian.—Now, what fault can you find with my favourite Landseer? Do you not like to see the faithful, poor dumb creatures ennobled by his pencil, and made, as they ought to be in life, the humble companions of mankind?

Curate.—If humble, not ennobled!

Gratian.—Master Curate, do you not read—“Before honour cometh humility?”

Aquilius.—I agree with you, Gratian. I quite love his pictures: they are wonderfully executed, with surprising truth, and in general his subjects, if not high, are pleasing. Yet I hardly know how to say, in general: there are so many exceptions. I could wish he were a little less cruel.

Lydia.—Cruel! how can that be? his pet dogs, his generous dogs, and horses, and that macaw, and the familiar monkey, and that dear begging dog. The most gentle-minded lady I am acquainted with is working it in tambour—and has been a twelve-month about it!

Gratian.—And has he not a high poetic feeling? Can you object tothe “Sanctuary,” and the “Combat,”—I believe that is the title of the picture—where the stag is waiting for his rival?

Aquilius.—They are most beautiful, they are poetical; there is not an inch of canvass in either that you could say should have a touch more or less. The scenery sympathises with the creatures; it is their wild domain, and they are left to their own instincts. There is no exhibition of man’s craft there, let them enjoy their freedom. Even in the more doubtful “Sanctuary,” we have the assurance that itisa “Sanctuary;” but I see, Gratian, that your memory is giving you a hint of some exception. What think you of the fox—not hunted as you would have him painted, wherein “the field” would be the sport—but just entering the steel trap, where you see the dead rabbit, and think the fox will be overmatched by man’s cruel cunning?

Gratian.—Why, I had rather hunt him in open field, and give him a chance than trap him.

Curate.—Even Reynard might say with Ajax, if man must be his enemy—

“Εν δε φαει και ολεσσον.”

Gratian.—I give up that picture; it is not a pleasing subject.

Lydia.—I am sure you must like his “Bolton Abbey in the Olden Time.”

Aquilius.—What! with its wholesale slaughter of fish, flesh, and fowl, to feed the gross feeders of the convent? I take no pleasure in it: I could take part with the “melancholy Jacques,” and rate “the fat and greasy” ones in good round terms. Who wishes a picture of a larder?

Lydia.—Here is his “Hawking Party;” will not this please you? You at least see the health and joy of the sporting: are not the hawkers delighted?

Aquilius.—So much the worse, for their part in the transaction is quite subordinate—in the background. What is the prominent subject?—the bloody murder of the poor heron. It should have been the accident; it is made the cruel principal: without being squeamishly tender-hearted, I shall never look upon that picture with pleasure. In how different a manner did Wouverman paint his hawking parties! He represented them as scenes in which ladies might participate—the domain, the mansion-gate, the retinue, the grace, the beauty, the cheering exercise, the pleasure of all, even the animals engaged: he does not make the bloody death the subject.

Gratian.—I must confess Wouverman’s was the better choice. You seem prepared with a collection of examples.

Aquilius.—In this I am only taking what is before me; but worse remains for more severe remarks. You have, I see, the “Otter Hunt,”—is it possible that picture can give you any pleasure? What is the sentiment of it?—debasing cruelty. I say debasing, because it puts human nature in the very worst position: the dogs are using their instinct, and are even then defrauded of their game, which the huntsman holds up conspicuously in the picture, (and which is in fact the subject), stuck through with his spear, and writhing in agony. Surely this cannot be

“The dainty dishTo set before the Queen.”

“The dainty dish

To set before the Queen.”

It is said to be in her Majesty’s possession. There is in Lucian a description of a picture of a Centaur and his family, a magnificent group: the father centaur is holding up a lion’s skin to the gaze of his young progeny, to excite them to deeds of courage. If this poor agonised death-writhing otter is to be perpetually before the eyes of our young princes, they will not learn much good from the lesson. For my own part, I look upon the picture with entire disgust, and would on no account have it before my eyes. I know not in what mood I could be to endure it.

Lydia.—I think we really may dispense with the hanging up this picture anywhere. I cannot bear to look at it. It is a picture to teach cruelty. As a test of its impropriety, imagine it placed as an ornament in our Sunday school: we should have the children brought up savages.

Curate.—Thanks, dearest Lydia. I well knew this picture would not be to your taste; we will, at all events, set it aside. Happy are we, that our women of England can be mothers ofheroes, without being inured to the cruelty of bull-fights. A Spanish lady, describing an exhibition of the kind, remarked how glorious was the sight, for there were thirteen horses and one man killed. I suspect Aquilius will not quite approve of the “Deer-Stalking” lately exhibited at the Academy.

Aquilius.—Certainly not; and for the same reason. It puts man in a degrading position; and our sympathy is for the poor creatures who fly terrified, not seeing their skulking enemies; and one poor creature is knocked over in his wild flight. It is admirably painted; the scene all we could wish; but the story is bad—the moral bad. You look at the picture without feeling a common desire with the hunters: you wish them away. You have their object put before you basely: their attitudes are mean. It is not a work, great as it is in art, that ought to give pleasure.

Gratian.—And yet you are not displeased reading Mr Scrope’s “Deer-Stalking?” It is only putting his words on canvass.

Curate.—True; but are they faithfully put? and even so, words and paint are not the same; their power is different. The description of language passes on; you are not allowed to dwell too long on what, if seen embodied, would but shock you, by its being arrested, and made permanent. I remember the description. You at first scarcely know if there is a deer or not; it is only the experienced eye can discover the motion of the ear, or some speck of the creature, at a distance. You enter into the breathless caution of the hunter—his steady and earnest hope; but you see not, or only for a moment, the skulking attitude. The poet—for the prose is poetry—touches with a light and delicate hand that which the less discriminating painter grasps, holds firm, and fixes as his subject.

Aquilius.—A just remark. The sentiment is thus made both cruel and mean.

Gratian.—Come, then, let us have something we can entirely praise, by the hand of this prince of animal painters. You will at least admire his “Peace” and “War,” those two most beautiful and poetical pictures.

Aquilius.—The “Peace”—yes. It is most happy; and perhaps the “War,” if we take the moral rightly. It might be bought by the Peace Society. Every one must acknowledge the great beauty and feeling of these pictures. I confess, however, I seldom look upon battle-pieces with much pleasure. The horrors of war are not for the drawing-room; and where they are painted for public position, they are generally in very bad taste. I do not mean here to allude to the companion to Mr Landseer’s “Peace.”

Gratian.—How seldom you see a battle-piece,—that is, a battle! You have some one or more incidents of a battle; but, as a whole, it is not represented. I have no idea of a battle, on which depends the fate of empires, from the exhibition of a grenadier running his bayonet through a prostrate foe, a few dead men, and a couple of horses, one rearing and one dead. Such are the usual representations of battles.

Aquilius.—Yes—vulgar battles; vulgarising the most important events in history: and yet I do not believe it to be impossible to represent a battle poetically, and more truly, than by such incident as Gratian has described, though the regimentals be most accurately painted—and the gold lace has a great charm for the multitude. And perhaps it was in deference to this common taste, that the chief prize was given to the “Battle of Meeanee” in Westminster Hall.

Lydia.—I rejoice to listen to the criticism. We will not have battle-pieces in our boudoir; Curates and their wives are for peace. I go with the poet—

“Le lance rotte, gli scudi spezzati,L’insigne polverose, e le bandiere,I destrier morti, i corpi arrovesciatiFan spettacolo orribile a vedere!I combattenti insieme mescolati,Senza governo, o ordine di schiere,Veder sossopra andare, or questi, or quelle,A’riguardanti arricciar fa i capelli.”

“Le lance rotte, gli scudi spezzati,

L’insigne polverose, e le bandiere,

I destrier morti, i corpi arrovesciati

Fan spettacolo orribile a vedere!

I combattenti insieme mescolati,

Senza governo, o ordine di schiere,

Veder sossopra andare, or questi, or quelle,

A’riguardanti arricciar fa i capelli.”

Curate.—I take my old part of translator, and thus render it, perhaps Aquilius will think too freely, at least in the conclusion—

Lances and shields of broken chivalry,Banners and ensigns trampled from their gloryDown in the dust—Oh! woe too sad to see,Rider and horse fallen dead in heaps all gory;Leaderless squadrons, one tumultuous seaOf ruin! Death sole hero of the story.And such is war—oh sight the heart to rend,And make our rooted hair to stand on end!

Lances and shields of broken chivalry,

Banners and ensigns trampled from their glory

Down in the dust—Oh! woe too sad to see,

Rider and horse fallen dead in heaps all gory;

Leaderless squadrons, one tumultuous sea

Of ruin! Death sole hero of the story.

And such is war—oh sight the heart to rend,

And make our rooted hair to stand on end!

Aquilius.—Your verse shall not disenchant me of my criticism upon this bad habit of seeing his subject, into which so great a painter has fallen. After what has been said, I shall not surprise you by objecting to his “Van Amburgh and his Beasts,” painted for his Grace the Duke of Wellington—the shrinking, retreating, cowed animals, whom one would wish to see in their wilder or nobler natures. And certainly the painter has made a very poor figure of the tamer: you are angry with the lions and tigers for being afraid of him. He should have been less conspicuous. Poor beasts! within bars, no escape from the hot iron! I had rather see a representation of the tamer within the bars, and the beasts out, longing to get at him. There is a very happy subject for a picture of this kind in the hymn to Aphrodite—where the goddess descends on Ida, and all the savage beasts come fawning about her, when, with a motion of her hand, she dismisses them to pair in the forests. Such noble animals, crouching in obeisance and willing servitude to a divinity, to beauty, and to innocence, make a picture of a finer sentiment. This taming reduces the dignity of the brute, without raising the man.

Curate.—The tamed animals are not honoured in their portraiture; nor is it much consolation that the great duke beholds their quailing. Statius attempted a consoling compliment of this kind, upon the occasion of a much admired beast, “Leo Mansuetus,” being killed by the blow of a flying tigress, in the presence of the emperor. After describing the scene, he adds—

“Magna tamen subiti tecum solatia lethiVicte feres, quod te mœsti, Populusque Patresque,Ceu notus caderes tristi Gladiator arena,Ingemuere mori: magni quod Cæsaris oraInter tot Scythias, Libyeasque, et littore Rheni,Et Pharia de gente feras, quas perdere vile est,Unius amissi tetigit jactura leonis.”

“Magna tamen subiti tecum solatia lethi

Victe feres, quod te mœsti, Populusque Patresque,

Ceu notus caderes tristi Gladiator arena,

Ingemuere mori: magni quod Cæsaris ora

Inter tot Scythias, Libyeasque, et littore Rheni,

Et Pharia de gente feras, quas perdere vile est,

Unius amissi tetigit jactura leonis.”

Aquilius.—We are rivals in rhyme, and you know I freely translate: perhaps you will admit this as a version—

Yet this your consolation, ye poor beasts,Whene’er the duke his guests illustrious feasts,Th’ illustrious guests, as an uncommon treat,Shall see the lions, while they talk and eat.Oft from their plates shall lift their half-filled jaws,To wonder at your whiskers, manes, and, claws,And only wish, the painter to rebuke,To see Van Amburgh killed before the duke.

Yet this your consolation, ye poor beasts,

Whene’er the duke his guests illustrious feasts,

Th’ illustrious guests, as an uncommon treat,

Shall see the lions, while they talk and eat.

Oft from their plates shall lift their half-filled jaws,

To wonder at your whiskers, manes, and, claws,

And only wish, the painter to rebuke,

To see Van Amburgh killed before the duke.

Gratian.—I am umpire: that is not a version, but a perversion.

Aquilius.—Then it the better suits the picture. I must, however, admit that, to criticise at all, there is need to be out of the fascination of the work. It is quite marvellous in power. We are treating of subjects for pictures, and consequently their sentiment—the why they should, or should not please. It is to be regretted that so great an artist should, notalwayswell conceive the poetry of sentiment.

Curate.—We are, not yet really lovers of art, or we should not be so confined in our taste. The excellence of this one painter excludes others from their due praise, and patronage too. Go to our exhibitions, you are surprised at the number of our artists: look at the printsellers’ windows, and you would wonder at their fewness. I cannot remember, at this moment, a print from a work of any modern British painter, of moral importance and dignified sentiment.

Lydia.—There is one of Mr Eastlake’s, his beautiful scriptural subject.

Aquilius.—True; but we have not yet emancipated the nation from their puritan horror of sacred subjects—which are, after all, the greatest and best. We import these from the Germans.

Gratian.—We have been a nation, of country gentlemen—fond of field-sports: and this our national character has had much to do with our taste in art. Hence nothing answers so well as horses and dogs.

Curate.—Yet I am inclined to say “cave canem.” By the bye, why do the old painters, Paul Veronese, for instance, in his celebrated large picture of the marriage feast, introduce great dogs, where they evidently should not be? I havemet lately, somewhere, with the supposition that the bones which the painters calcined to make dryers were the bones thrown under the tables for the dogs, and that such was the practice. But there is passage in “Laurentius Pignorius de servis,” which seems altogether to contradict the notion, and indeed to reprove painters who introduced these large dogs in their pictures; and particularly, it should seem, one who represented Lazarus and the dogs in the same room with Dives. His argument is curious—that the dogs which were admitted upon these occasions were little pet animals, and that it is so shown by the passage in chap.xv. verse 27, ofStMatthew, where they are said to pick up thecrumbs, and that it is shown to have been so by ancient sculpture. He says that this introduction is become such an admitted taste, that whoever would be bold enough to set himself against it would in vain endeavour to correct the bad taste of the painter. It is a curious passage,—I have the book here, and will turn to it: I read it only the other day. Here it is, and I more readily offer it as it speaks sensibly of a disgusting subject, unfit for painting.

“Erant autem et qui pone januam canem pictum haberent, ut apud Petronium Trimalcio. At quid ad hæc pictores nostri qui in triclinio divitis Lazarum delineant? Potestne quidquam ineptius aut cogitari aut fingi? scilicet janitores admisissent hominem scatentem ulceribus, dorso ipsi luituri quidquid oculos nauseabundi domini offendisset. Canes vero immanes illi Villatici et Venatici, num oblectabant cœnantem dominum? Apage! Catelli quidem in delicus tricliniaribus habiti sunt, ut testatur mulier Chananœa apud Mattheum, et indicant sculpturæ antiquorum marmorum: Cæterum. Molossos, et ejus generis reliquos, nemo in convictum, nisi amens aut rusticus recepisset. At quisquis pictorum nostrorum pene omnium pravitatem corrigere voluerit, otium desperaverit omnino: adeo ineruditi sunt, adeo cognitionem omnem antiquitatis turpiter abjecerunt.”

Gratian.—I suppose the little pets admitted to the table were the small Melitan dogs, such as Lucian speaks of in his “Private Tutor.” The Greek philosopher and teacher was requested by the lady of the house in which he was tutor to take charge of her dear little pet, which, being carried in his arms as he was stuffed into the back carriage with the packages and lady’s maids, disgraced the philosopher by watering his beard.

Aquilius.—A kind of King Charles’s breed. I remember a gentleman telling me, many years ago, that he was dining in Rome with Cardinal York, and one of these little creatures was handed round after dinner, upon which occasion the cardinal said, “Take care of him, for he and I are the last of the breed.”

Lydia.—Poor creatures! that is a touching anecdote. It ought to be written under Vandyke’s celebrated picture of the unfortunate Charles and his family, in which the breed are so conspicuous. I think my sweet, Pompey is one of them, notwithstanding the cardinal’s protest, and I shall love the little pet the more for the royal familiarity of his race. I must have his portrait.

Curate.—Or his statue, that he may rival Pompey the Great. Why his picture? has not Landseer painted him to the life in that fine picture where he is all play, with the ribbon about him to show whose pet he is, and the great mastiff lying so quiet, stretched out below him? It is, his very portrait, and when he dies you should get the print, and I have his epitaph for you to write under it.—

In marble statue the Great Pompey lives,Life to the little Pompey Landseer gives.And little Pompey play’d the Roman’s part,And almost won a world—his Lydia’s heart:Then died, to prove that dogs shall have their day,And men no more, whatever parts they play.Great Cæsar at his feet in painted state—Shall little Pompey envy Pompey great.How true the pencil, and no truer pen,Alike the history paints of dogs and men.

In marble statue the Great Pompey lives,

Life to the little Pompey Landseer gives.

And little Pompey play’d the Roman’s part,

And almost won a world—his Lydia’s heart:

Then died, to prove that dogs shall have their day,

And men no more, whatever parts they play.

Great Cæsar at his feet in painted state—

Shall little Pompey envy Pompey great.

How true the pencil, and no truer pen,

Alike the history paints of dogs and men.

Aquilius.—Do you mean to be the general epitaph-maker for your church-yard? Take care you infringe not on the sexton’s privilege.

Gratian.—If we discuss this matter farther, we shall have Aquilius and the Curate diverging into their poetics; so, my dear good lady, I must look at your flower-garden:here now, an arm for an old man; and—have you an orchard?—I can help you there a little. And a word in your ear—depend upon it, wherever there is an orchard there should be a pig or two in it. Come, I must look at your stock; we’ll talk about pictures after tea. See, my friend Curate, I’m off with your wife; not quite so active as a harlequin, but you and Aquilius may follow as pantaloon and clown. So let us keep up the merry farce: no,—entertainment of life, and I don’t care who best plays the fool.

Now, Eusebius, what shall I do? will you have an interlude? Your wit will reply that you have had one already. Will you have music? Yes, I think you said, but your’s is all on one string. Shall it be as a chorus in a Greek play? Why do dogs howl at music? They have an intuitive suspicion of what the strings are made, and think they might as well begin by tolling the bell for themselves, or rehearse the howl! The interlude is over—while we are asking about it, the bell rings, the tea-things are removed—and the prints laid on chairs round the room. We resume the discussion.

Aquilius.—I have been considering what are the most popular subjects as we see them exhibited in the shop windows, and I find that even Landseer has his rival in the popular approbation. Go where you will you see specimens of the style—mawkish sentimentality, Goody Families, Benevolent Visitors, Teaching Children. There is nothing more detestable than these milk-and-water affectations of human kindnesses; all the personages are fools, and as far as their little senses will let them, hypocrites. Whence do these Puritan performances come?—the lamentable thought is, where do they go?—a man cannot paint above himself. A soft artist paints soft things.

Lydia.—Don’t mention the things! I am sure they make hypocrites. I saw one the other day in a cottage; it was of the “Benevolent Visitors”—I am not sure of the title; if any good ladies gave it, it was a vile vanity; if bought as a compliment, it was a worse corruption.

Gratian.—Do you know that we have historical painters for modern saintology, and that a picture was actually painted ofStJoanna Southcote, for the chapel at Newington Butts, in a sky-blue dress, leading the devil with a long chain, like a dancing bear, surrounded by adoring angels? I met with the anecdote in a very amusing book of Mr Duncan’s, the “Literary Conglomerate,” wherein he treats of the subjects of pictures.

Aquilius.—I know it; I only quarrel with him for classing Hogarth with the comic painters. To me, he is the most tragic of all modern, I would almost say of all painters. The tragic power of two of the series of“Marriage á la mode,”is not surpassed in art. The murdered husband, the one: the other, the death of the adulteress. They are too tragic for any position but a public gallery. He was the greatest of moral painters; and the most serious, the gravest of satirists. He is so close to the real tragedies of life, and his moral is so distinct, that he seems to have aimed at teaching rather than pleasing. And perhaps, if the truth were known, it might be that he has in no small degree improved the world in its humanities. He has pictured vice odious in the eyes of the pure, but not so as to quench their pity; and has made it so wonderfully human, that we shudder as we acknowledge the liabilities of our nature. He exhibited strongly that man is the instrument of his own punishment, and that there was no need of painted monsters and demons to persecute him. He showed the scorpion that stings himself to death. He brought the thunder and lightning, the whirlwind, not from the clouds to expend their power on the fair face of the earth, but out of the heart, to drive and crush the criminals with their own tempestuous passions. And is not this tragic power? Is such a man to be classed among the painters of drolls? His pictures would convert into sermons, and would you call the preacher of them a buffoon?

Gratian.—There is, indeed, little drollery in Hogarth: even his wit was a sharp sword, so sharp that the spectator is wounded, and dangerously, before he is aware of it.

Curate.—I could not live comfortably in a room with his prints. Iwould possess them in my library as I would Crabbe’s Tales, but would not have them always before my eye. Nor would I, indeed, some of the finest works of man’s genius—as Raffaele’s “Incendio.” I would have them to refer to, but a home is, or ought to be, too gentle for such disturbance.

Gratian.—There is an anecdote told of Fuseli, that when on a visit to some friend at Birmingham, a lady in a party said to him—“Oh, Mr Fuseli, you should have been here last week, there was such a subject for your pencil, a man was taken up for eating a live cat.”—“Madam,” said the veritable Fuseli, “I paint terrors, not horrors.” For my own part, life has so many terrors, and horrors too, that I should prefer mitigating their effect, by having more constantly before me the agreeabilities—pleasant domestic scenes, soft landscapes, or such gay scenes and figures as my favourite Teniers occasionally painted, or the sunny De Hooge; or why not bring forward some of our pleasant home-scene English painters? Did you not see, and quite love, that little delight of a picture, the hay-making scene in the Vicar of Wakefield, by our own, and who will be the wide world’s own, Mulready? Such scenes ravish me. Did you not long to walk quietly round and look in the vicar’s face, as he and Mrs Primrose sat apart with their backs to you? Mulready, you see, had the sense to leave something to the imagination.

Aquilius.—Yes, pictures of this kind have a very great charm: they are for us in our domestic mood, and that is our general mood—they should gently move our love and pity. But I cannot conceive a greater mistake than to make “familiar life” as it is called, doleful, uncheerful subjects, that are out of the rule of love and pity, very easily run into the class of terror; there is scarcely a between, and if one—it is insipidity.

Gratian.—Now, I shall probably commit an offence against general taste if I confess that, in my eyes, Wilkie is very apt to paint insipid subjects. He seems too often to have been led to a matter of fact, because it had some accessories that would paint rather well, than because the fact was worth telling, either for its moral or its amusement. Some of his pieces, notwithstanding their excellent painting and perfectly graphic power, rather displease me. I never could take any interest in his celebrated “Blind Fiddler.” It may be nature, but there is nothing to touch the feelings in it: had I been present, I should not have given the man a sixpence. And as for the hideous grimace-making boy, I could have laid the stick with pleasure on his back. I don’t think I could ever have kissed the ugly child.

Aquilius.—Wilkie was a man of great observation, great good sense, manifest proof of which his correspondence sets forth; but that necessary virtue of a painter of familiar life, which he possessed in so great a degree, observation, led him oftener to look for character than beauty. Oddity would strike him before regularity. Nor was he a cheerful painter. His “Blind Man’s Buff,” is contrived to be without hilarity, and it is singularly unfortunate in the sharp angles of hips and elbows. His best picture of this kind is certainly the “Chelsea Pensioners”—or “Battle of Waterloo,” very finely painted; but there is an acting joy in it,—it is joy staid in its motion, and bid sit for its portrait. So his “Village Wake” in our national gallery, is not joyous as a whole; the figures are spots, and the mass of the picture is dingy. Pictures, like poems, should not only be fair but touching, “dulcia sunto,” and this is more imperatively essential to domestic scenes. The story should always be worth telling. Painters seem to have taken it into their heads that any thing, which presents a good means for exhibiting light and shade and colour, makes a picture. If an incident or a scene be not worthseeing, it is not worth painting.

Gratian.—That is never more true than when they are figure pieces. Our likings and our antipathies are stronger in all representations of the ways and manners of men, than in all the varieties of other nature. We can bear a low and mean landscape, but degraded humanity seldom is, and never ought to be pleasing.

Curate.—Aristotle determines that brutishness is worse than vice. Viceis a part of our nature, but brutishness unhumanises the whole nature. It is certainly astonishing that painters can take a delight, not having a moral end in the performances, to select the low scenes—the utter degradation of civilisation, and therefore worse than any savage state—as subjects for pictures. How is it that in a drawing-room a connoisseur will look with complacency—more than complacency—upon a painted representation of beastly boors drinking, whose presence, and the whole odour of which scene, in the reality, he would rush from with entire disgust?

Aquilius.—Yet I must, in a great measure, acquit the Dutch and Flemish school of such an accusation. The painters who worked these abominations were really but few,—the majority aim to represent innocent cheerfulness. How often is Teniers delightful in his clear refreshing skies, cheerful as the music to which his happy party are dancing, in the brightness of a day as vigorous as themselves. Cheerfulness, rational repose, and sweetest home affections, often make the subjects of their pictures; and these impart a like pleasantness, a like sympathy, in the mind of the spectator. Having such a variety of these pleasantries and sympathies to choose from, it is astonishing that any artist should select for his canvass a subject unpleasing and even disgusting. I remember, a great many years ago, a picture exhibited, I think at the Academy, which at the time was thought a wonder, and, I believe, sold for a great deal of money. It was “The Sore Leg,” by Heaphy;—there was the drawing off of the plaster, and the horrors of the disease painted to the life, and the pain. Is it possible that, for the mere art of the doing, any human being, unless he were a surgeon, should receive the slightest pleasure from such a picture? It is enough to mention one of the kind; but there have been many.

Lydia.—I dare say, then, you will, with me, disapprove of such a subject as “The Cut Finger.” Surely it is very disagreeable.

Gratian.—Entirely so; but he painted a much worse thing than that. I do not see why any country gentleman should take pleasure in seeing such a “Rent Day,” as this celebrated artist has painted. There is a painful embarrassment, uncomfortable miscalculation, reluctant payments, much more dissatisfaction than joy. I really cannot quite forgive him for making the principal figure hump-backed. This is not the characteristic of toil, labour, and industry. Doubtless the figure is from nature; but he never preferred beauty of form, when character stood by. But there is one of his pictures I consider perfectly brutish—for it is a scene arising out of that brutishness which is the necessary result of artificial and civilised life; which, unless for a moral purpose, it is best to keep out of sight,—at least in all that pertains to the ornament of domestic life. I allude to his picture, “Distraining for Rent.” It is a subject only fit for the contemplation of a bailiff, to keep his heart in its proper case-hardened state, by familiarising him with the miseries of his profession. I have been told that Wilkie did not approve of this subject, but that it was given him as a commission, which he could not well refuse.

Aquilius.—I would have all such subjects prohibited by Act of Parliament. Have a committee of humanity, (we can do nothing now without committees,) and fine the offending artists. Is the man of business, in this weary turmoil of the daily world, to return to his house, after his labour is over, and see upon his walls nothing but scenes of distress, of poverty, of misery, of hard-heartedness—when he should indulge his sight and his mind with every thing that would tend to refresh his worn spirits, avert painful fears, either for himself or others, and should tune himself, by visible objects of rational hilarity, into the full and free harmonies of a vigorous courage, and health of social nature? His eye should not rest upon the miseries of “Distraining for Rent,” Heaphy’s “Sore Legs,” no, nor even “Cut Fingers.” In this wayfaring world of many mishaps, however homely be the inns, let them be clean and cheerful, that we may set out again in an uncertain sky, where we must expect storms, with beautiful thoughts for our companions; that, by encouragementof a confiding reception, become winged angels, with a radiant plumage, brightening all before our path, and seen brightest and most heavenly under a lowering cloud.

Lydia.—Thanks, Aquilius, you are poetical, and therefore most true; so low and mean thoughts—what! are they to accompany us, whether they show themselves in words or in pictures? I fear me, they are bad angels, and are doing their evil mission in our hearts, alas! and in our actions. It has been said, as an encouragement to our charity, that “men have received angels unawares.” It may be said, too, as a warning lest we receive evil, that men may receive demons unawares. Beautiful Una—the lion licked your feet because you were so pure, so good.

Shall I tell it to you, Eusebius? Yes, your eyes will glisten as they read, for dearly do you love happiness. Here the Curate drew his bride, his wife, closer to him, kissed her honest forehead, and rested his cheek upon it for a little space, and with a low voice murmured,—“My beautiful Una.” He then turned to us with a smile, and I think the smallest indication of moisture in his eye, which might have been more but that the bright angel of his thought had cleared it away, and said,—Excuse me; yet, to be honest, excuse is not needed: my two dearest of friends must and do rejoice in the loving truth of my happiness.

Gratian.—No, no, my good friend, don’t make excuse, it would be our shame were it needed. You have given us one subject for a picture, whose interest should set my brushes in motion were I twenty years younger, and might hope to succeed. But this I will say, my memory has a picture gallery of her own, and in it will this little piece have a good place. Now, I like this conversation on art, because you know I have been all my life a dauber of canvass—dauber! even Aquilius, who has so much addicted himself to the art, has praised some of my performances. I have painted many a sign for good-natured landlords, in odd places, where my fishing excursions have led me; and old Hill, honest old Hill, the fisher of Millslade, has a bit of canvass of mine, the remembrance of a day, which I believe he will treasure a little for my sake, and more for its truth, to his last day. I must show the Curate’s wife old Hill. I hit him off well,—am proud of that portrait, and often look at my old companion from my easy chair. I sometimes now dabble with my tube colours, and make a dash at my remembrances of river scenes. Nature and I have been familiar many a long year. I love the breezy hill, and the free large moor, that takes up the winds and tosses them down the grooved sides, to go off in their own communing with the waterfalls. I love, too, the quiet brook, and rivers stealing their way by green meadows, and the elms, that stand like outposts on the banks, keepers of the river. Have we not, in our discussion, too much omitted to speak of landscape,—even including the sea-shores? And in landscape we certainly have painters that please. As a true fisherman and painter-naturalist I could not resist, the other day, purchasing Lewis’s river scenes. How happily—the more happily because his execution is so unstudied, so accidental—does Lewis, with his etching and mezzotint effects, put you into the very heart of river scenery; and then how truly do you trace it upwards and downwards. We have some good landscape painters.

Aquilius.—We have; and of late years they have greatly improved in subjects. They at least now look for what is beautiful. The old dead stump, the dunghill, and horse and cart, the pig and the donkey, are no longer considered to be the requisites for English landscape. One has seen publications called English landscape, which must give foreigners a very miserable idea of our country. Cottage scenery, too, has had its day. The old well is dry—the girl married, it is to be hoped, and the pitcher broken. The lane and gipsies, the cross sticks and the crock, are not dissolving but dissolved views. In time, the turnpike road and ruddled sheep going to the butcher will be thought but ill to represent the pastoral. When the mutton has been eaten up—and I hope the artists get their fair share—I wish they would be satisfied, and know when they have hadenough. The Act of Parliament we spoke of, should exclude creatures with the ruddle on their backs, and butcher-boys, and men in smock-frocks and low hats, and pitchforks. We have had enough of this kind of pastoral; they are not the “gentle shepherds,” that should people the Arcadia within England, or any other. I would have Rosalind and her farm, without the clown. The French and Dresden china shepherds and shepherdesses, as we see them prettily smiling, and garlanding their pet lambs, as something extra parochial, andsui generis, show at least this happiness, that they do not eat their bread by the sweat of their brows. All landscape that reminds you of “the curse of the earth, of the dire necessity of toil, of the beggarly destitution test,” of dingy earths and dirty weather, are, you may be sure, far out of the hearing of Pan’s pipe. He does not adjust his lips to music for the overseer and exciseman, nor rate collectors. Nay, when Pan retires to visit his estate in Arcadia, and Robin Hood reigns, he will have no such ink-horn gentry partake of his venison. The freedom of nature loves not the visible restrictions of law. I would be bold enough to lay it down as a truth, that it is as possible to get poetry out of the earth, as swedes and mangel-wurzel. Let landscape painters look to it, lest they get into bad habits before the act is out, and, of a hard necessity, incur the penalty.

Gratian.—Stay, stay,—where are you running to? Surely if a painter takes abonâ fideview, you would not have him turn the milk-maid out of the field, to bring in Diana and her train.

Aquilius.—Views! oh, I thought we were speaking of Pastoral. That is quite another thing; I am somewhat of Fuseli’s opinion, who said, speaking contemptuously, “I mean those things called Views.”

Curate.—But you will admit, Aquilius, that we have real scenes that are very beautiful, always pleasing to look at, and therefore fit to be painted. Is there not our lake scenery?

Aquilius.—There is; and as our subject is art, I should say such scenery is more valuable for what it suggests, than for what it actually represents in the painter’s mirror. In fact, nature offers with both hands: it requires a nice discretion to tell which hand holds the true treasure. She may purposely show you the ornament to deceive.

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