THE PORTRAIT PAINTERCHAPTER XITHE PORTRAIT PAINTER
THE PORTRAIT PAINTER
TheNewfoundland dog soon found that the smell of my burned clothes and scorched skin was not the same as a broiled bone; and that, in fact, I was not good to eat. But he still continued to hold me in his great, warm, red mouth, because he was used to fetch and carry; and, as he felt no wish to taste me, he thought he would take me, just as I was,to his young mistress, who was not far off. He had merely wandered about Hanover Square to amuse himself, as he knew the neighborhood very well.
The dog ran through the doorway of some private stables into a passage that led into the square; and turning down, first one street, then another, he soon stopped at a door, upon which was written, ‘J. C. Johnson, Portrait Painter.’
The door was shut, but the area gate happened to be open; so down ran the dog into the area, and into the front kitchen, and across that to the stairs, and up the stairs (three flights) till he came to the front room of the second floor, which was ajar, and in he bounced. There sat a little girl and her aunt; and Mr. J. C. Johnson was painting the aunt’s portrait, in a great white turban.
The dog ran at once to the little girl, and laying me at her feet, sprang back a step or two, and began wagging andswishing his tail about, and hanging out a long crimson tongue, and breathing very fast, and waiting to be praised and patted, and called a good dog, for what he had brought.
‘Oh, Nep!’ cried the aunt to the dog, ‘what horrid thing have you brought? Some dirty old bone!’
‘It is an Indian idol, I believe,’ said Mr. Johnson, taking me up from the carpet; ‘an Indian image of ebony, much defaced by time.’
‘I think,’ said the little girl, to whom Mr. Johnson handed me, ‘I think it looks very like a wooden doll, with a burned frock and scorched face.’
‘Well, so it is, I do believe,’ said the aunt.
‘Let me examine the figure once more,’ said the portrait painter, laying down his palette of colors, but keeping his brush in the other hand. ‘Yes, yes, I fancy, madam, your niece is correct. It is not a work of Indian art, nor of Egyptian,nor of Grecian art; it is the work of a London doll-maker.’
I expected he was, of course, about to say, ‘by the celebrated Mr. Sprat,’ but he did not.
‘Oh, you poor London doll!’ said the little girl, ‘what a pity you were not made in India, or somewhere a wonderful way off, then Mr. Johnson would have taken pity on you, and painted you all over.’
Mr. Johnson laughed at this; and then gave such a droll look at the little girl, and such a good-natured look at me. ‘Well,’ said he to her, ‘well, my little dear, leave this black doll with me; and when you come again with your aunt, you shall see what I have done.’
The aunt thanked Mr. Johnson for his pleasant promise, while she was taking off her turban to depart; and away they went, the Newfoundland dog, Nep, leaping downstairs before them, to show the way. They were from Buckinghamshire, and had lodgings only a few streets distant.The aunt was Mrs. Brown, her niece was Mary Hope. Mary Hope’s father was a clerk in the Bank; but she chiefly lived with her aunt in the country, as her father had seven other daughters, and a small salary.
As soon as they were gone, Mr. Johnson told his son to tear off all my burned clothes, scrape me all over with the back of a knife, and then wash me well with soap and water. When this was done, the good-natured artist painted me all over from head to foot. When I was dry, he again painted me all over with a warmer color, like flesh; and when that also was dry, he painted my cheeks, and lips, and eyebrows; and finally he gave me a complete skin of the most delicate varnish. My beautiful hair was entirely burned off; and Mr. Johnson said this was a sad pity, as he did not know how to supply it. But his son told him there was a doll’s wig-shop very near the Temple, where a new head of hair could be got. So thekind Mr. Johnson took the measure of my head; and when he went out for his evening walk, he went to the shop and bought me a most lovely, dark, auburn wig, with long ringlets, and his son glued it on. When all was done, they hung me up in a safe place to dry.
The hanging up to dry immediately reminded me of my infancy in the shop of Mr. Sprat, when I first dangled from the beam and looked round upon all my fellow-creature dolls, who were dangling and staring and smiling on all sides. The recollection was, on the whole, pleasing. I seemed to have lived a long time since that day. How much I had to recollect! There was the doll-shop in Holborn—and little Emmy, who used to read little books in the back room—the Marcett books, the Harriet Myrtle books, the Mary Howitt books, and the delightful story of ‘The Good-natured Bear,’—in short, all the different stories and histories, and voyages, and travels, and fairy tales she had read—andthere was the master of the shop in his brown paper cocked hat—and Thomas Plummy and the cake—and Ellen Plummy, and Twelfth-night in the pastry-cook’s shop—and the different scenes that I had witnessed among the little milliners; and the making of my first frock and trousers under the tent, upon Ellen Plummy’s bed; and my life in Hanover Square, during which I saw so many great places in great London, and had been taught by Lady Flora’s governess to write, and had fallen headlong from a box at the opera into a gentleman’s hat; and where, after having beautiful ball-dresses made, my little lady mamma and I had both caught fire; and, lastly, there was my tumble over the wall into the passage, where the Newfoundland dog had fancied I was a broiled bone, and caught me up in his mouth. Here was a biography to recollect; while, for the second time in my life, I was hanging up for my paint and varnish to dry.