PORTRAITS IN PRIVATE COLLECTIONS
The names of Reynolds, Gainsborough, Raeburn, Romney, and Hoppner are
universally known, and many of their pictures, not always the best
examples, are familiar; yet how few Britons have any idea of the
chronological life-work of these masters. Their pictures in our public
galleries are chance acquisitions, sometimes representative, often mere
byways of their achievement.
Romney was an unequal painter. A classification of his achievement in
order of merit would begin with the score or so of masterpieces, and
dwindle downwards through his good, fair, poor, and bad pictures.
There is no other word but bad for such productions as "The Shipwreck"
and "The Infant Shakespeare surrounded by the Passions"; and if bad be
an unfair description of "Newton Displaying the Prism," it is certainly
a poor picture, although better than "Milton Dictating 'Paradise
Lost.'" I have only seen a photograph of "Newton Displaying the
Prism," but Redgrave, who examined the picture in the early sixties,
describes it as poor in drawing, dirty and hot in colouring, and weak
and common-place in treatment.
Romney stands or falls by his portraits and portrait groups, by the
score or so of masterpieces that he painted better than he knew. These
are the true "great art," the presentment through the eyes of
temperament and training of the thing seen, that he was always striving
to escape from in his pursuit of a false "great art," which he
struggled to approach through the portals of literature guided by other
eyes and other brains.
The inequality of Romney was shown at the 1907 Old Masters' Exhibition
at Burlington House. In the six contributions from his brush, or
ascribed to him, there was one superb example, the second Mrs. Lee
Acton; one good example, the first Mrs. Lee Acton, and one bad example,
the hard and discordant sketch of Edward Wortley Montagu. The muddy
portrait of a "Lady in a White Dress," and the dull and common painting
of the Rev. Thomas Carwardine, although not as bad as the Edward
Montagu, were indeed poor Romneys. One only had to turn from the "Lady
in a White Dress" to the Raeburn, "Mrs. Anderson of Inchyra," to
realise the difference between journeyman-work and inspiration, between
a muddy amalgam of paint, and quality and vivacity.
But the second Mrs. Lee Acton! Ah! there was Romney at his loveliest,
easy in mind, seeing the completed design from the inception, unworried
by any literary groping after arrangement on the lines of "great art,"
instantly inspired by the beauty of this second wife of Nathaniel Lee
Acton of Livermere Park and Bramford, Sussex, when she rustled into his
vision one day in 1791. This Dryad, masquerading in the pretty clothes
of a mortal, lurks in a glade; her dainty feet rest near a pool of blue
water; her white dress, the simple gown that no doubt Romney persuaded
her to wear, golden in the sun, which is setting behind the distant
hills and flushing the trees to warmth. Her complexion has the
peach-like porcelain quality in which Romney, at his best, rivalled
Gainsborough; and as for her fair powdered hair, I think the secret of
its touch-and-go, intimate rendering is now lost. There is hardly any
colour in the picture, and yet it is all colour. Time, no doubt, has
co-ordinated the glow that enwraps and illuminates this sophisticated
Dryad, whose folded hands and arch simper seem to announce that her
momentary condescension has given the painter immortality.
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PLATE VII.--MISS BENEDETTA RAMUS.
(From the picture in the possession of the Hon. W. F. D. Smith)
The younger of the beautiful Ramus girls, who afterwards became Lady
Day. Miss Benedetta of the lovely eyes, that languish and sparkle as
if pleading against oblivion, rests her hands upon a book in reverie.
This beautiful girl and her sister were also painted by Gainsborough.
That lovely work was most unfortunately destroyed by fire.
[Illustration: PLATE VII.--MISS BENEDETTA RAMUS.]
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Recalling the pleasure that a beautiful Romney such as this gives, and
eager to pass on my delight to my friends, I imagine a room hung with
reproductions of fine Romneys, where the twentieth century could burn a
little incense to the eighteenth-century master. But there must be two
rooms, for Lady Hamilton must have a compartment to herself, as in this
little book.
The Romneys in the first room would include a reproduction of this
"Mrs. Lee Acton" from the collection of Lord de Saumarez; "Mrs. Mark
Currie," "The Parson's Daughter," and the "Lady with a Child" from the
National Gallery, with "Mrs. Robinson" from the Wallace Collection.
Beside them I would place those adorable girls, Miss Ramus and Miss
Benedetta Ramus, who were also painted together by Gainsborough in the
picture known as "The Sisters." That lovely work was, alas! burnt in
the fire at Waddesdon. I remember a poem by Mr. Andrew Lang in
Longmans' Magazine on one of these sisters. A verse ran--
"Mysterious Benedetta! Who
That Reynolds or that Romney drew
Was ever half so fair as you
Or is so well forgot?
Those eyes of melancholy brown,
Those woven locks, a shadowy crown,
Must surely have bewitched the town;
Yet you're remembered not."
Forgotten? Remembered not? Living and very near seemed the sisters
when I made an expedition to Henley-on-Thames, and was allowed to see
Romney's portraits of Miss Ramus and Miss Benedetta in the hall of
Greenlands, Mr. W. F. D. Smith's country house. These half-figure
portraits have not the frolic daintiness of the "Mrs. Lee Acton," or
the "Mrs. Mark Currie." They antedated those sparkling full-lengths by
nearly fifteen years. Compared with them Miss Ramus and Miss Benedetta
are almost prim. If Romney had wished to make them the centre of a
sumptuous decorative scheme, the artist in him knew that such was not
the way to treat those dark and dainty gentlewomen. Nowhere, I think,
are there better examples of his simplicity of design and handling, his
frank statement, without a fleck of personal cleverness or pride, than
these sisters who smile on either side of the doorway that issues from
the hall at Greenlands. Miss Benedetta of the lovely eyes, that
languish and sparkle as if pleading against oblivion, lost in reverie,
rests her hands upon a book. The binding of the volume is light brown,
the table dark brown; there is a rosy flush in her cheeks and down the
tips of her slim fingers; in the grey band, looped with pearls, that
binds her hair there is a glint of green; otherwise, the portrait has
little colour save in the break of blue sky that surges across the
background. I suppose every one compares and makes a choice between
the two sisters. The appeal of Benedetta is swiftest, yet when I look
at Miss Ramus I know that I should not like to be obliged to choose.
The bow of her red lips may be a thought too precise, but how vibrant
she is in spite of her composure! how keen and quick the look of that
high-bred face! No; I should not like to have to choose between the
merry languishing Benedetta and the merry alert Miss Ramus, in her pink
dress, with the flaming green gauze veil, and the gleams of gold in
hair and gown.
Another beautiful girl, "Miss Vernon as Hebe," now in Warwick House,
would have an honoured place in my roomful of fine Romney productions.
Well may this charming goddess claim to restore beauty and youth to
those who have lost them. Abundant brown hair crowns the pure,
untroubled brow; she glides forward, bearing the wine cup, and looking
upwards as she advances. As in the Miss Ramus, candour and nobility
have here taken the place of the Romney prettiness.
Perhaps it is the curling powdered hair, perhaps the pout of disdain on
the lips or the flicker of contempt in the eyes, that gives to "Lady
Altamount" (Lady Sligo) the air and very essence of an
eighteenth-century aristocrat. This proud and fragile beauty found in
Romney, son of a cabinet-maker, the man who could perfectly interpret
her exquisiteness.
Does the large white hat, tied with blue ribbons beneath her chin, that
"Miss Cumberland" wears, suit the lady? I think so, and so thought
Romney, when this dark-eyed daughter of his friend Richard Cumberland
decked herself one day in an old-fashioned hat to amuse her family.
Romney happened to call, saw the charm of the decoration, and saw his
picture.
When I come upon a portrait of a fragile blonde by Romney, I feel that
he is at his best with fair women; when I see one of his bold beauties,
such as "Lady Morshead," the tangle of her profuse brown hair
contrasted with the simple folds of her muslin fichu, I feel that he is
at his best with dark women. This "Lady Morshead," doing nothing, but
looking charming; bright-eyed "Mrs. Raikes," playing on a spinet; the
dark Cholmeley girls; bewitching Sarah with the ringlets; and the more
dignified Catherine--they were painted on Romney's best days.
A few of his "Mother and Child" groups must also have place on the
walls of my imaginary room--the "Mrs. Russell," in a green dress at
Swallowfield Park, holding the sash of her small child, who is standing
upon a table, back to the spectator, regarding its chubby face in a
circular mirror--a happy design this, most natural and winning; the
"Mrs. Canning," seated beneath a tree and clasping her infant to her
bosom, but quite conscious that her portrait is being painted; and the
"Mrs. Carwardine," in a high white cap, who is consoling her baby and
ignoring the painter--a charming and restful group.
Also the boy "Lord Henry Petty," at Landsdowne House, a quaint figure
in his blue tail-coat and amber-coloured trousers, standing in an
affected attitude, with his fingers marking the passage in a book,
which he pretends to have been reading. The boy is posing. Romney did
not always succeed in suggesting the simplicity of childhood. Even in
the famous group of the "Children of the Earl of Gower," now in the
possession of the Duke of Sutherland, delightful as it is, one is
conscious that the actions of the children are not spontaneous.
Clasping each other's hands, the lively creatures dance round in a
ring, their sandalled feet tripping to a measure played by Lady Anne
upon a tambourine held in the "grand manner" above her left shoulder.
This group has been called Romney's masterpiece. The murmur of
pleasure that rises to the lips at the first sight of the "Clavering
Children" is checked by the feeling that the small boy must eternally
and wearily hold his right arm outstretched on a level with his head.
So Romney has fixed him, holding high aloft the leash that confines the
two spaniels. Otherwise, the group is delightful. The little girl
fondles a puppy, her brother's left arm clasps her waist, and the
children, conscious that they are being watched, trip forward through
the landscape. In another of the large groups, "The Countess of
Warwick and her Children," there is something very taking in the small
old-fashioned figure of the boy with the hoop, and in the intimate
movement of the girl, who is whispering to her listening mother.
The group of "The Horsley Children," so simply painted and so sure, was
designed on one of Romney's happy days. George and Charlotte stand on
the steps of a garden terrace beneath a tree, in white dresses with
blue sashes. In her right hand the girl holds poppies; in her left a
corn-flower.
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PLATE VIII.--MISS RAMUS. (From the picture in the possession of the
Hon. W. F. D. Smith.)
Connoisseurs in beauty have long disputed as to which is the lovelier
of the two Ramus girls painted by Romney. The bow of Miss Ramus' lips
may be a thought too precise, but how vibrant she is in spite of her
composure I how keen and quick the look of her high-bred face! It
would be hard to make a choice between Miss Ramus and Miss Benedetto.
[Illustration: PLATE VIII.--MISS RAMUS.]
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Two portraits of men I should include in my collection of significant
Romneys--the "Warren Hastings," with its watchful dignity, and the
inward smile that flickers on the calm, purposeful face of John Wesley.
From the following extract, printed in _Wesley's Journal_, January 5,
1789, I judge that he, like Thurlow, belonged to the Romney faction:
"Mr. Romney is a painter indeed. He struck off an exact likeness at
once, and did more in an hour than Sir Joshua did in ten."
No one ever accused Romney of a lack of quickness. He could always
begin; he could not always continue to the end.