1817: AGED FORTY-TWO
HE SELLS FIFTY WATER-COLOURS TO MR. FAWKES OF FARNLEY HALL
The 'Rhine Tour' Sketch-Book of 1817 suggests that Turner was in the
mood to be careful about his material necessities, one can hardly call
them comforts. Written inside the covers are the words:--
'Boots, Pouch, Fever Medicine, Bark, Pencils, Colours,' followed by,
'_Vier ist myn Simmer_--Where is my chamber?' On a later page I find
the following list:--
'3 Shirts, 1 Night ditto, A Razor, a Ferrell for Umbrella, a Pair of
Stockings, a waistcoat, 1/2 dozen of Pencils, 6 Cravats, 1 large ditto,
1 Box of Colours'--and then, on the next leaf, the inevitable 'Study of
a Sky.'
On a page of the 'Dort' Sketch-Book is this note of a 'thing seen' that
he may have thought of painting:--
'Float of Timber--1000 feet long at least, lashed into two pieces and
guided by the cross piece of timber which hauls either part of the
float or buoy in two lines--and drawn by 3 Horses down the Canal.'
During this three weeks' tour in the Rhine district Turner produced no
fewer than fifty drawings at the rate of about three a day. He first,
says Mr. Rawlinson, stained the paper a uniform bluish-grey, which,
although itself sombre in tone, effectively shows up the body-colour
work, and must have effected an immense economy of time as compared
with ordinary transparent colour. Returning to England he took the roll
of drawings straight to Farnley Hall, and Mr. Fawkes bought them for
five hundred pounds. For a long time they remained in a portfolio, but
a few years ago some of them were sold at Christie's. Mr. Rawlinson
possesses one of them, the delicate and romantic 'Goarhausen and Katz
Castle.'
Other drawings of this period are the rich and forceful 'Bonneville,
Savoy' in the Salting collection at the British Museum, a majestic
water-colour; that vision of yellow foliage, blue water, and
outstretched yellowy-blue country, 'The Lake of Nemi,' and the more
academic 'Turin from the Church of the Superga,' the foreground with
its artless groups not very attractive, but the distant glimpse of the
snow mountains, and the white fleecy clouds seen against the blue sky,
as lovely as Turner could make them,' and that is saying much.
Probably in this year he began the glorious illustrations to Dr.
Whitaker's _History of Richmondshire_, which contains some of his
finest water-colours. The first plate was published in 1819, the
last in 1822. Turner was paid twenty-five guineas a drawing, and
the magnificent enterprise cost the publishers, Messrs Longman, ten
thousand pounds. 'The Crook of the Lune' is one of the finest of the
series. 'You can find at least twenty different walks in it--yet all
this wealth of exquisite detail is perfectly subordinated to the
unity and harmony of the composition as a whole.' Another of the
Richmondshire drawings is the 'Hornby Castle' in the Victoria and
Albert Museum, which, through constant exposure to light, is a wreck of
its former beauty.
His chief Royal Academy picture of 1817 was 'The Decline of the
Carthaginian Empire.' It has disappeared from the National Gallery,
loaned, I suppose, to some provincial museum, where a Turner, even a
bad Turner, is a Turner. I will quote from the catalogue of 1817 its
full title, and tag of verse by Turner, and say no more about 'The
Decline of the Carthaginian Empire.'
'EXHIBITION XLIX 1817
'J. M. W. Turner, R.A. Professor of Perspective, Sandycombe Lodge,
Twickenham, and Queen Anne Street West.
'The Decline of the Carthaginian Empire. Rome, being determined on the
overthrow of her hated rival, demanded from her such terms as might
either force her into war, or ruin her by compliance; the enervated
Carthaginians, in their anxiety for peace, consented to give up even
their arms and their children.
"At Hope's delusive smile,
The Chieftain's safety and the mother's pride,
Were to the insidious conqueror's grasp resign'd;
While o'er the western wave th' ensanguined sun,
In gathering haze, a stormy signal spread,
And set portentous."'
Behold a mystery! The eyes that saw and the hand that produced the
simple splendour of 'Richmond Castle,' and the spacious beauty of 'The
Crook of the Lune' could also see in fancy and produce in reality 'The
Decline of the Carthaginian Empire.'