1854.
A visit to Rogers.--His home.--Geniality in poets.--Talfourd.--Sir
Walter Scott.--Leslie's picture, "The Rape of the Lock."--George
Leslie.--Robert Leslie.--His nautical instincts.--Watkiss Lloyd.--
Landseer.--Harding.--Richard Doyle.
Mr. Leslie took me one afternoon to see old Mr. Rogers, the poet. When
we arrived he was out for a drive, so we quietly examined the works of
art in the house until his return.
The interest of that house was quite peculiar to itself. Even the
arrangement of the furniture had been unaltered for years, and as the
rooms, just as we saw them, had been visited by most people of note
during nearly two generations, they had an interest from association
with famous names that could not be rivalled, at that time, by any other
rooms in London. The dining-room, for example, was exactly in the same
state as when Byron dined there, and would eat nothing but a biscuit.
Leslie said: "I have seen Mrs. Siddons sitting on the corner of that
sofa near the fire, and Walter Scott walk up to her and shake hands."
Leslie mentioned many other celebrities, but none of them were so
interesting to me as the authors of "Waverley" and "Childe Harold."
Many of the material objects about us had a history of their own. A
stand that carried an antique vase had been carved by Chantrey when a
young unknown furniture-carver, and so had the sideboard, as Chantrey
reminded Mr. Rogers long afterwards, when he was received as a guest in
the same room. The fender, chimney-piece, and ceiling had been designed
by Flaxman, the panels of a cabinet had been painted by Stothard.
We went upstairs to see some pictures in Rogers' bedroom, in itself a
very simple, homely place, with the old man's flannels warming before
the fire. The picture in that room which pleased me most was a subject
borrowed from Raphael, by Leslie,--a lady teaching her boy to read,--but
it was treated freely by Leslie from other models. The boy was his son
George (the future Academician) when young; he had already begun to be
good-looking.
As we were examining this picture, Mr. Rogers returned from his drive
and received us in the dining-room. He said, "Mr. Hamerton, I think I've
seen you before," but I said he was mistaken, so he held out his hand
and went on: "Well then, I'm very glad to see you now, especially so
well introduced. Have you been all over the house? You have the honor of
knowing a very distinguished artist. Look at that picture on the
sideboard, of the poor babes in the Tower! Don't you like it? I think it
is beautiful, beautiful. Nobody ought to be able to look at such a
picture without shedding tears. See the light on the heads--oh! it is
beautiful!" Then he began to ramble a little, but soon came back to
realities, and invited Leslie to dine the next day and meet two
distinguished friends. "I'd rather have you by yourself," he added; "you
and I could do very well without the others."
This was the Rogers of 1854,--senile, as was natural at the age of
ninety-one years and eight months, yet still retaining much of the old
Rogers, hospitable, sometimes caustic, sometimes pathetic, and always a
true lover and appreciator of the fine arts. Leslie declared him to be
the only amateur who had knowledge enough to form a good collection
without assistance.
I dined with Leslie the same day, and the talk turned upon the poets.
Leslie said that the virtue of geniality was of great value to a poet,
and that if Byron had possessed the geniality of Goldsmith, he would
have been as great a poet as Shakespeare, but that his misanthropy
spoiled all his views of life. In saying this, Leslie probably
underestimated the literary value of ill-nature. Much of Byron's
intensity and force is due to the energy of malevolence. The success of
Ruskin's earlier writings was due in part to the same cause. In
periodical literature, it was pure _méchanceté_ that first made the
"Saturday Review" successful.
Talking of Talfourd (who had lately died on the bench) Leslie said that
he was a high liver, and that led him to give an account of Sir Walter
Scott's way of life. At dinner he would eat heartily of many dishes and
drink a variety of wines. At dessert he drank port; and last of all a
servant brought him a small wooden bowl full of neat whiskey, which he
drank off. He then either wrote or talked till midnight, and refreshed
himself with a few glasses of porter before going to bed. Leslie did not
mean to imply that Scott was intemperate for a man of a robust
constitution who took a great deal of exercise, but only that, like
Talfourd, he was a high liver. It is remarkable, in connection with the
subject of Scott's own habits, that eating and drinking are so often and
so minutely described in his novels. His heroes and heroines always have
hearty appetites, except when they are laid up with illness.
A few days after our visit to Rogers, I went to see Leslie's picture of
"The Rape of the Lock," and met Robinson, the engraver, on my way. He
told me to expect the finest modern picture I had ever seen. It was
certainly one of the most perfect works of its class. The action and
expression of the sixteen figures were as lively as in a Hogarth, with
more refinement. Leslie was completely in sympathy with Queen Anne's
time, and reproduced it with unfailing zest and knowledge. He had been
very careful about details. The interior at Hampton Court had been
painted on the spot, and all the still life in the picture, even to a
fan, had been studied with equal accuracy. Mrs. Leslie's mother sat
looking at the picture, and making the liveliest comments on the subject
and the actors. She would get up without hesitation to see something
more nearly, and turn round with perfect balance of body to make her
remarks to the company. She appeared to me then to be about sixty, but
the age of her daughter made that impossible. _Her real age was
ninety-three!_ It seemed incredible that she was older than Mr. Rogers.
Her grandchildren were playfully sarcastic at times, to draw her out in
argument.
"We know, grandmamma, that you are a dandy yourself, so no wonder that
you admire the dresses in the picture."
"Yes, yes, I _do_ like people to be dressed as well as possible,--as
well, I mean, as they can really afford. I like them to wear the very
best materials as tastefully as they can." Whilst she was looking at the
picture, Mr. Leslie sat down by her side and read the passage from "The
Rape of the Lock" that his painting illustrated. It was a very
interesting scene--the master with his children about him, and his wife
and her old mother all looking at his last and greatest work, whilst he
was reading Pope's perfect verses so beautifully.
I have scarcely mentioned Leslie's sons yet. George, the future
Academician, was an intimate friend of mine in those days. He was a
clever talker, and he had the advantage--often precious to a taciturn
companion like me--of never allowing the conversation to flag for a
single instant. I think I never knew any one of the male sex, with the
exception of Francis Palgrave, who could keep up such an abundant stream
of talk as George Leslie. This led some of his friends to think that he
would never have any practical success in art, but he afterwards proved
them to be in the wrong. He had a frank, straightforward, boyish nature,
with a fund of humor, and a healthy disposition to be easily pleased.
His philosophy of life, under an appearance of careless gayety, was,
perhaps, in reality deeper than that of my learned friend Mr. Mackay;
for whilst the elderly scholar was laboring painfully and thanklessly to
elucidate the past, the young artist was enjoying the present in his own
way, and looking forward hopefully to the future. The buoyancy of
spirits that George Leslie had in those days is an excellent gift for a
young artist, because it carries him merrily over the difficulties of
his craft. His brother Robert was older and graver. He painted landscape
and marine subjects; but though his pictures have been regularly
accepted at the Academy he has had no popular success. This may be
attributed in great part to his habit of living away from London. Robert
Leslie has all his life had very strong nautical instincts, and very
likely knows more about shipping than any other artist. My belief is
that one reason why he has not been a very successful painter is that
he knows too much about nature, and lives too much in the presence
of nature, which is always overwhelming and discouraging. After
I knew him in London, Robert Leslie indulged his nautical instincts
in sailing and yacht-building, as well as in painting marine pictures.
Aided only by a single workman, he constructed a vessel of thirty-six
tons. With this and other yachts he has made himself familiar with
the southern coasts of England, and has frequently crossed the
Atlantic both on steamers and sailing-vessels. Now that we are both
getting elderly men I heartily regret not to have seen more of Robert
Leslie; but so it is in life,--so it has been particularly in _my_
life,--we are separated by distance from those who might have been our
most intimate and most valued friends. [Footnote: Robert Leslie had a
literary gift, and wrote some clever papers, which have been collected
and published under the title of "A Sea Painter's Log."]
Another friend, gained during my first stay in London, was Mr. Watkiss
Lloyd, who has given up many of the best years of his life to
intellectual pursuits. He has been much devoted to ancient Greek
literature and history, and has studied Greek art with unflagging
interest at the same time, so that he possesses an advantage over most
scholars in knowing both sides of the Hellenic intellect. He has a
manly, frank, and generous nature, with cheerful, open manners. Watkiss
Lloyd is one of several superior men amongst my acquaintances who have
not achieved popularity as authors. The reason in his case may be that
as he has never been obliged to write for money, he has never cared to
study the conditions of success. I told him once, when we were talking
on this subject, that in my opinion it was most necessary to have a
clear and definite idea of the kind of public one is addressing, and
that we ought to write to an especial public, as St. Paul wrote to the
Ephesians. Failure may be caused by having confused ideas about our
public, or by writing only for ourselves, as if our works were destined
to remain in manuscript like a private journal. A man may write what is
clear for himself, when it will require to be read twice or three times
by another. Besides this reason, I am inclined to believe that the
constant study of ancient Greek is not a good preparation for popular
English authorship. The scholar and the successful writer are two
distinct persons. They may be occasionally combined in one by accident,
but if the reader will run over in his mind the names of popular modern
authors, he will find very few distinguished scholars amongst them.
However this may be, Watkiss Lloyd is something better than a popular
author; he is an intellectual man, truly a lover of knowledge and of
wisdom. Without shutting his eyes to the evils that are in the world, he
does not forget the good. On one occasion, after a terrible malady that
had occurred to one dear to him, I said that undeserved diseases seemed
to me clear evidence of imperfection in the universe. He answered, that
as we receive many benefits from the existing order of things that we
have not merited in any way, so we may accept those evils that we have
not merited either. This struck me as a better reason for resignation
than the common assertion that we are wicked enough to deserve the most
frightful inflictions. We do not really believe that our wickedness
deserves cancer or leprosy.
I never wished to push myself into the society of celebrated persons for
the purpose of getting acquainted with them, but I plead guilty to that
degree of curiosity which likes to see them in the flesh. I knew
Landseer by sight, and probably rather astonished him once in a London
street by taking my hat off as if he had been Prince Albert. He used to
pass an evening from time to time at Leslie's house, and I met him
there. He then seemed a very jovial, merry English humorist, with a
natural talent for satire and mimicry; but there was another side to his
nature. If he enjoyed himself heartily when in company, he often
suffered from deep depression when alone. I remember seeing him by
himself when he looked the image of profound melancholy. At that time I
had warmer admiration for his art than I have now, and the general
public looked upon him as the greatest artist in England. No doubt he
was very observant, and had a wonderful memory for animals and their
ways, as well as some invention; he had also unsurpassable technical
skill, of a superficial kind, in painting.
Harding was another very clever artist whom I met at Leslie's. I had
correspondence with him a little as a teacher, and had studied his
works. He had taught many amateurs, including Mr. Ruskin and a clever
friend of mine in the North. I admired his skill, but disliked his
extreme artificiality of style, and the more I went to nature the more
objectionable did it appear to me. The kind of success which is attained
by forcing nature into drawing-masters' set forms never tempted me in
the least. Harding was at one time probably the most successful
drawing-master in England. The word "clever" characterizes him exactly.
He was clever in the art of substituting himself for nature, clever in
the wonderful facility with which he used several graphic arts
technically very different from each other, and clever especially in
that supreme tact of the successful drawing-master by which he makes the
amateur seem to get forward rapidly. He had immense confidence in
himself, and in his own theories and principles.
Another well-known artist whom I met at Leslie's was Richard Doyle. He
had great gifts of wit and invention, with a curiously small fund of
science,--genius without the knowledge that might have given strength to
genius. It is impossible, however, to feel any regret on this account,
for if Doyle's drawings had been thoroughly learned they would have lost
their _naïveté_. He was intelligent enough to make even his lack of
science an element of success, for he turned it into a pretended
simplicity. His own face was mobile and expressive, and it was evident
that he passed quickly from one idea to another without uttering more
than a small percentage of his thoughts.
I remember dancing "Sir Roger de Coverley" when Landseer and Richard
Doyle were of the set. They were both extremely amusing, but with this
difference: that whereas Landseer evidently laid himself out to be funny
in gesture and action, the fun in Doyle's case lay entirely in the play
of his physiognomy. Leslie, too, had a most expressive face--not
handsome (I mean, of course, the elder Leslie; his son George is
handsome), but most interesting, and full of meaning.