IN THE ART SCHOOLS
After tarrying in Brussels, doing the galleries thoroughly, we went to
Dover. I had been anything but in love with the exuberant Rubenses
gathered together in one surfeited room, but imbibed enthusiastic
stimulus from some of the moderns. I write: “Oh! that I had time to tell
of my admiration of Ambroise Thomas’ ‘Judas Iscariot,’ of Charles
Verlat’s wonderful ‘Siege of Jerusalem by Godfrey of Bouillon,’ with its
strikingly terrible incidents, given with wonderful vividness, so free
from coarseness; of Tshaggeny’s ‘Malle Poste,’ with its capital horses.
There was not much study to be done in the time, but enthusiasm to be
caught, and I caught it.”
At Dover I find myself saying: “Still at my drawing of the soldiers
working at the new fort on the cliff, just outside the castle, which
forms the background of the scene. I am sending it to the _Illustrated
London News_.” Then, a few days later: “Woe is me! my drawing is
returned with the usual apologies. Well, never mind, the world will hear
of me yet.” And there, above my “diminished head,” right over No. 2,
Sydney Villas, our temporary resting-place, stood that very castle,
biding its time when it should receive me as its official _châtelaine_,
and all through that art which I was so bent on.
At Brompton I said “good-bye” to a year to me very bright and full of
adventure; a year rich in changes, full of varied scenes and emotions.
I say: “Enter, 1866, bearing for me happy promise for my future, for
to-day I had the interview with Mr. Burchett, the Headmaster of the
South Kensington School of Art, and everything proved satisfactory and
sunny. First, Papa and I trotted off to Mr. Burchett’s office and saw
him, a bearded, velvet-skull-capped and cold-searching-eyed man. After a
little talk, we galloped off home, packed the drawings and the oil,
then, Mamma with us, we returned, and came into The Presence once more.
The office being at the end of the passage of the male schools, I could
see, and envy, the students going about. So the drawings were
scrutinised by _that Eye_, and I must say I never expected things to go
so well. Of course, this austere, rigid master is not one to say much,
but, on the contrary, to dwell upon the shortcomings and weaknesses; to
have no pity. He looked longer at my soldiers at work at Dover Castle
and some hands that I had done yesterday, saying they showed much
feeling. He said he did not know whether I only wished to make my
studies superficial, but strongly advised me to become an artist. I
scarcely needed such advice, I think, but it was very gratifying. I told
him I wished for severe study, and that I did _not_ wish to begin at the
wrong end. We were a long time talking, and he was very kind, and told
me off to the Life School after preliminary work in the Antique. I join
to-morrow. I now really feel as though fairly launched. Ah! they shall
hear of me some day. But, believe me, my ambition is of the right sort.
“_January 2nd._--A very pleasant day for me. At ten marched off, with
board, paper, chalk, etc., etc., to the schools, and signed my name and
went through all the rest of the formalities, and was put to do a huge
eye in chalk. I felt very raw indeed, never having drawn from a cast
before. Everything was strange to me. I worked away until twenty minutes
to two, when I sped home to have my lunch. Five hours’ work would be too
long were I not to break the time by this charming spin home and back in
the open air, which makes me set to work again with redoubled energy and
spirits sky-high. A man comes round at a certain time to the rooms to
see by the thermometer whether the temperature is according to rule,
which is a very excellent precaution; 65° seems to be the fixed degree.
Of course, I did not make any friends to-day; besides, we sit far apart,
on our own hooks, and not on forms. Much twining about of arms and
_darling-ing_, etc., went on, however, but we all seem to work here so
much more in earnest than over those dreary scrolls in the Elementary.
One girl in our room was a capital hit, short hair brushed back from a
clever forehead and a double eyeglass on an out-thrust nose. Then there
is a dear little pale girl, with a pretty head and large eyes, who is
struggling with that tremendous ‘Fighting Gladiator.’ She and he make a
charming _motif_ for a sketch. But I am too intent on my work to notice
much. The skeleton behind me seems, with outstretched arm, to encourage
me in my work, and smiles (we won’t say _grins_) upon me, whilst behind
him--it?--the _écorché_ man seems to be digging his grave, for he is in
the attitude of using a spade. But enough for to-day. I was very much
excited all day afterwards. And no wonder, seeing that my prayer for a
beginning of my real study has now been granted and that I am at length
on the high road. Oh, joy, joy!
“_January 15th._--Did very well at the schools. Upon my word, I am
getting on very smoothly. I peeped into the Life room for the first time
whilst work was going on, and beheld a splendid halberdier standing
above the girls’ heads and looking very uncomfortable. He had a steel
headpiece and his hands were crossed upon the hilt of his sword in
front, and his face, excessively picturesque with its grizzly moustache,
was a tantalising sight for me!
“_January 16th._--Oh, how I am getting on! I can’t bear to look at my
old things. Was much encouraged by Mr. Burchett, who talked to me a good
deal, the mistress standing deferentially and smilingly by. He said,
‘Ah! you seem to get over your difficulties very well,’ and said with
what immense satisfaction I shall look back upon this work I’m doing.
Altogether it was very encouraging, and he said this last thing of mine
was excellent. He remarked that my early education in those matters had
been neglected, but I console myself with the thought that I have not
wasted my time so utterly, for all the travel I have had all my life has
put crowds of ideas into my head, and now I am learning how to bring
those ideas to good account.
“_January 24th._--I shall soon have done the big head and shall soon
reach a full-length statue, and I shall go in for anatomy rather than
give so much time to this shading which the students waste so much time
over. I don’t believe in carrying it so far. The little pale girl I
like, on the completion of her gladiator, has been promoted to the Life
class. A girl made friends with me, a big grenadier of a girl, who says
she wants to know ‘all about the joints and muscles’ and seems a
‘thoroughgoer’ like myself.”
This is how I write of dear Miss Vyvyan, a fine, rosy specimen of a
well-bred English girl, who became one of my dearest fellow
students--and drew well. In writing of me after I had come out in the
art world, she records this meeting in words all the more deserving of
remembrance for being those of a voice that is still. Of my other
fellow-students the Diary will have more to say, left to its own
diction.
“_February 13th._--It is very pleasant at the schools--oh, charming! In
coming home at the end of my work I fell in with Mr. Lane, my friend in
the truest sense of the word. He was coming over to us. His first
inquiry was about me and my work. He was very much disappointed that I
was not in the Life class, fully expecting that I should be there,
seeing how highly Mr. Burchett twice spoke of my drawings to Mr. Lane,
and that I was quite ready for the Life. But, of course, Mr. B. is
desirous of putting me as much through the regular course as possible.
Mr. Lane shares Millais’ opinion that ‘the antique is all very well, but
that there is nothing like the living model, and that they are too fond
of black and white at the Museum.’ I was enrolled as a member of the
Sketching Club this morning, and have only a week to do ‘On the Watch’
in, the title they have given us to illustrate. _Only_ a week, Mimi?
That’s an age to do a sketch in! Ah! yes, my dear, but I shall have five
hours in the schools every day except Saturdays. I have chosen for
subject a freebooter in a morion and cloak upon a bony horse, watching
the plain below him as night comes on, with his blunderbus ready
cocked. Wind is blowing, and makes the horse’s mane and tail to stream
out.”
There follow pages and pages describing the daily doings at the schools:
the commotion amongst girls at the drawings I used to bring to show them
of battle scenes; the Sketching Club competitions, and all the work and
the play of an art school. At last I was promoted to the Life class.
“_March 19th._--Oh, joyous day! oh, white! oh, snowy Monday! or should I
say _golden_ Monday? I entered the Life this joyous morn, and, what’s
more, acquitted myself there not only to my satisfaction (for how could
I be satisfied if the masters weren’t?), but to Mr. Denby’s and the oil
master’s _par excellence_, Mr. Collinson’s. I own I was rather
diffident, feeling such a greenhorn in that room, but I may joyfully say
‘So far, so good,’ and do my very best of bests, and I can’t fail to
progress. How willingly I would write down all the pleasant incidents
that occur every day, and those, above all, of to-day, which make this
delightful student life I am leading so bright and happy and amusing.
However, I shall write down all that my spare moments will allow me.
Little ‘Pale Face’ took me in hand and got me a nice position quite near
the sitter, as I am only to do his head. There was a good deal of
struggling as the number of girls increased, and late comers tried
amicably to badger me out of my good position. We waited more than half
an hour for the sitter, and beguiled the time as we are wont. Three
semi-circles surround the sitter and his platform. The inner and smaller
circle is for us who do his head only, and is formed by desks and low
chairs; the next is formed by small fixed easels, and the outer one by
the loose-easel brigade, so there are lots of us at work. At length the
martyr issued from the curtained closet where Messrs. Burchett, Denby
and Collinson had been helping the unhappy victim to make a lobster of
his upper self with heavy plates of armour. He became sadly modern below
the waist, for his nether part was not wanted. To see Mr. Denby pinning
on the man’s refractory Puritan starched collar was rich. The model is a
small man, perfectly clean shaven with a most picturesque face; quite a
study. Very finely-chiselled mouth, with thin lips and well-marked chin
and jaw. The poor fellow was dreadfully nervous. He was posed standing,
morion on head, with a book in one hand, the other raised as though he
were discoursing to some fellow soldiers--may-be Covenanters--in a camp.
I never saw a man in such agony as he evinced, his nervousness seeming
at times to overpower him, and the weight of the armour and of the huge
morion (too big for him) told upon him in a painfully evident manner. He
was, consequently, allowed frequent rests, when down his trembling arm
would clatter and the instrument of torture on his heated forehead come
down with a great thump on the table. Mr. Denby was much pleased with my
drawing in, and Mr. Collinson commended my carefulness. This pleases me
more than anything else, for I know that carefulness is the most
essential quality in a student.
“_March 27th._--Mr. Burchett showed me how to proceed with the finishing
of the face. He liked the way I had done the morion, which astonished
me, as I had done it all unaided. I am now a friend of more girls than I
can individualise, and they seem all to like me. ‘Little Pale Face’ is
very charming with me indeed. One girl told me a dream she had had of
me, and Mrs. C., wife of the _Athenæum_ art critic, clapped me on the
back very cordially.”
I give these extracts just to launch the Memoirs into that student life
which was of such importance to me. Till the Easter vacation I did all I
could to retrieve what I considered a good deal of leeway in my art
training. There were Sketching Club competitions of intense effort on my
part, and how joyful I felt at such events as my illustrations to
Thackeray’s “Newcomes” coming through marked “Best” by the judges.
“_May 9th._--_Veni_, _vidi_, _vici_! My re-entry into the schools after
the vacation has been a triumphal one, for my ‘Newcomes’ have been
returned ‘The Best.’ The girls were so glad to see me back. I have
chosen, as there is not to be a model till next Monday week, a beautiful
headpiece of elaborate design on whose surface the red drapery near it
is reflected. Some time after lunch Mrs. C. came running to me from the
Antique triumphantly waving a bunch of lilac above her head and crying
out that my ‘Newcomes’ had won! I jumped up, overjoyed, and went to see
the sketches, around which a crowd of students was buzzing. Mr. Denby,
who couldn’t help knowing whose the ‘Best’ were, gave me a nod of
approbation. I was very happy. Returning to Fulham, I told the glad
tidings to Papa, Mamma, Grandpapa and Grandmamma as they each came in.
So this has been a charming day indeed.”
Page after page, closely written, describes the student life, than which
there cannot be a happier one for a boy or girl; thorough searchings
through the Royal Academy rooms for everything I could find for
instruction, admiration and criticism. I joined a class in Bolsover
Street for the study of the “undraped” female model, and worked very
hard there on alternate days. This necessitated long omnibus rides to
that dismal locality, but I always managed to post myself near the
omnibus door, so as to study the horses in motion in the crowded streets
from that coign of vantage. I also joined a painting class in Conduit
Street, but that venture was not a success. I went in about the same
time for very thorough artistic anatomy at the schools. I gave sketches
to nearly all my fellow students--fights round standards, cavalry
charges, thundering guns. I wonder where they are all now! I had always
had a great liking for the representation of movement, but at the same
time a deep well of melancholy existed in my nature, and caused me to
draw from its depths some very sad subjects for my sketches and plans
for future pictures. How strange it seems that I should have been so
impregnated, if I may use the word, with the warrior spirit in art,
seeing that we had had no soldiers in either my father’s or mother’s
family! My father had a deep admiration for the great captains of war,
but my mother detested war, though respecting deeply the heroism of the
soldier. Though she and I had much in common, yet, as regards the
military idea, we were somewhat far asunder; my dear and devoted mother
wished to see me lean towards other phases of art as well, especially
the religious phase, and my Italian studies in days to come very much
inclined me to sacred subjects. But as time went on circumstances
conducted me to the _genre militaire_, and there I have remained, as
regards my principal oil paintings, with few exceptions. My own reading
of war--that mysteriously inevitable recurrence throughout the
sorrowful history of our world--is that it calls forth the noblest and
the basest impulses of human nature. The painter should be careful to
keep himself at a distance, lest the ignoble and vile details under his
eyes should blind him irretrievably to the noble things that rise
beyond. To see the mountain tops we must not approach the base, where
the foot-hills mask the summits. Wellington’s answer to enthusiastic
artists and writers seeking information concerning the details of his
crowning victory was full of meaning: “The best thing you can do for the
Battle of Waterloo is to leave it alone.” He had passed along the
dreadful foot-hills which blocked his vision of the Alps.
I worked hard at the schools and in the country throughout 1867, and,
with many ups and downs, progressed in the Life class. My fellow
students were a great delight to me, so enthusiastically did they watch
my progress and foretell great things for me. We formed a little club of
four or five students--kindred spirits--for mutual help and all sorts of
good deeds, the badge being a red cross and the motto “Thorough.” I
remember a money-box into which we were, by the rules, to drop what
coins we could spare for the Poor. We were to read a chapter of the New
Testament every day, and a chapter of Thomas à Kempis, and all our works
were to be signed with the red cross and the club monogram. Seeing this
little sign in the corner of “The Roll Call” over my name set one of
those absurd stories circulating in the Press with which the public was
amused in 1874, namely, that I had been a Red Cross nurse in the Crimea.
As a counterpoise to this more “copy” was obtained for the papers by
paragraphs representing me as an infant prodigy, which I thank my stars
I was _not_!
One day in this year 1867 I had, with great trepidation, asked Mr.
Burchett to accept two pen and ink illustrations I had made to Morris’s
poem, “Riding together.” Great commotion amongst the students. Some
preferred the drawing for the gay and happy first verse:
Our spears stood bright and thick together,
Straight out the banners streamed behind,
As we galloped on in the sunny weather,
With our faces turned towards the wind.
and others the tragic sequel:
They bound my blood-stained hands together,
They bound his corpse to nod by my side,
Then on we rode in the bright March weather,
With clash of cymbal did we ride.
The Diary says: “Mr. Burchett, surrounded by my dear fellow red crosses,
Va., B., and Vy., talked about the drawings in a way which pleased me
very much. When he was gone, Va. and B. disappeared and soon reappeared,
Va. with a crown of leaves to crown me with and B. with a comb and some
paper on which to play ‘See the Conquering Hero comes’ whilst Va. and
Vy. should carry me along the great corridor in a dandy chair. They had
great trouble to crown me, and then to get me to mount. It was a most
uncomfortable triumphal progress, Vy. being nearly six foot and Va.
rather short. They just put me down in time, for, had we gone an inch
further on, we should have confronted Miss Truelock,[3] who swooped
round the corner. I cannot describe the homage these three pay me, Va.’s
in particular--Vy.’s is measured, and not humble like Va.’s or
radiantly enthusiastic like B.’s. I am glad that I stand proof against
all this, but it is hard to do so, as I know it is so thoroughly
sincere, and that they say even more out of my hearing than to my face.”
The Sultan Abdul Aziz and the Khedive Ismail paid a visit to London that
year. We were in the midst of the festivities; and such church-bell
ringing, fireworks, musical uproar, especially at the Crystal Palace,
where the “Hallelujah,” “Moses in Egypt,” and other Biblical choruses
vied with the cheering of the crowds in expressions of exultation,
seldom had London known. This fills pages and pages of the Diary. As we
looked on from Willis and Sotheran’s shop window, out of which all the
books had been cleared for us, in Trafalgar Square, at the arrival of
the “Father of the Faithful,” it seemed a strange thing for the bells of
our churches to be pealing forth their joyous welcome. But how vain all
these political doings appear as time goes by! What sort of reception
would we give the present Sultan I wonder? We have even _abolished_
Khedives. Much more reasonable and sane was the mob’s welcome to the
Belgian volunteers, who were also England’s guests that year. We English
were very courteous to the Belgians. Papa took us to the great Belgian
ball, where we appeared wearing red, black, and yellow sashes. He
offered to hold a Belgian officer’s sword for him while he (the Belgian)
waltzed me round the hall. A silver medal was struck to commemorate this
visit, and every Belgian was presented with this decoration. On it were
engraved the words “_Vive La Belge_.” No one could tell who the lady
was.
This year saw my meek beginning in the showing of an oil picture
(“Horses in Sunshine”) at the Women Artists’ Exhibition, and then
followed a water colour, “Bavarian Artillery going into Action,” at the
Dudley Gallery--that delightful gallery which is now no more and which
_The Times_ designated the “nursery of young reputations.” I continued
exhibiting water colours and black-and-whites for some years there. I
had the rare sensation of walking on air when my father, meeting me on
parting with Tom Taylor, the critic of _The Times_, told me the latter
had just come from the Dudley’s press view and seen my “Bavarian
Artillery” on its walls. I had begun!
In the latter part of this year’s work at South Kensington Mr. Burchett
stirred us up by giving us “time” and “memory” drawing to do from the
antique, and many things which required quickness, imagination and
concentration, all of which suited me well. Charcoal studies on tinted
paper delighted me. I was always at home in such things. We often had
“time” drawings to do on very rough paper, using charcoal with the hog’s
hair paint brush. What a good change from the dawdling chalk work
formerly in vogue when I joined. I had by this time painted my way in
oils through many models, male and female, with all the ups and downs
recorded elaborately, the encouragements and depressions, and the happy,
though slow, progress in the management of the brush. I had won a medal
for two life-size female heads in oils, and through all the ups and
downs the devotion of my dear “Red Cross” fellow students never
fluctuated.
The year 1868 saw me steadily working away at the Schools and doing a
great many drawings for sketching clubs and various competitions during
this period, till we were off once more to Italy in October. On March
19th of that year I wrote in the Diary: “Ruskin has invited himself to
tea here on Monday!!!” Then: “Memorable Monday. On thee I was introduced
to Ruskin! Punctually at six came the great man. If I had been disposed
to be nervous with him, his cold formal bow and closing of the eyes, his
somewhat supercilious under-lip and sensitive nostrils would not have
put me at my ease. But, fortunately, I felt quite normal--unlike Mamma
and Alice, the latter of whom had reason for quaking, seeing that one of
her young poems, sent him by a friend, had been scanned by that eye and
pondered by that greatest of living minds.
“He sat talking a little, not commonplaces at all; on the contrary, he
immediately began on great topics, Mamma and he coinciding all through,
particularly on the subject of modern ugliness, railways, factory
chimneys, backs of English houses, sash windows, etc., etc. Then he
directed his talk to me, and we sat talking together about art, of
course, and I showed him two life studies, which he expressed himself as
exceedingly pleased with in a very emphatic manner. But here we went
down to tea. After tea I showed him my imaginative drawings, which he
criticised a good deal. He said there was no reason why I should not
become a great artist (!), that I was ‘destined to do great things.’ But
he remarked, after this too kindly beginning, that it was evident I had
not studied enough from nature in those drawings, the light and shade
being incorrect and the relations of tones, etc., etc. He told me to
beware of sensational subjects, as yet, _à propos_ of the Lancelot and
Guinevere drawing; that such were dangerous, leading me to think I had
quite succeeded by virtue of the strength of my subject and to overlook
the consideration of minor points. He said, ‘Do fewer of these things,
but what you do _do right_ and never mind the subject.’ I did not like
that; my great idea is that an artist should choose a worthy subject and
concentrate his attention on the chief point. But Ruskin is a lover of
landscape art and loves to see every blade of grass in a foreground
lovingly dwelt upon. I cannot write down all he said as he and I leant
over the piano where my drawings were. But it was with my artillery
water colour, ‘The Crest of the Hill,’ that he was most pleased. He
knelt down before it where it hung low down and held a candle before it
the better to see it, and exclaimed ‘Wonderful!’ two or three times, and
said it had ‘immense power.’ Thank you, Dudley Gallery, for not hanging
it where Ruskin would never have seen it!
“He listened to Mamma’s playing and Alice’s singing of Mamma’s ‘Ave
Maria’ with perfectly absorbed attention, and seemed to enjoy the lovely
sounds. He had many kind things to say to Alice about her poem, saying
that he knew she was forced to write it; but was she always obliged to
write so sadly? Then he spied out Mamma’s pictures, and insisted on
seeing lots of her water colours, which I know he must have enjoyed more
than my imaginative things, seeing with what humble lovingness Mamma
paints her landscapes. In fact, we showed him our paces all the evening.
Papa says he (P.) was like the circus man, standing in the middle with
the long whip, touching us up as we were trotted out before the great
man. He seems, by the by, to have a great contempt for the modern French
school, as I expected.”
Daily records follow of steady work, much more to the purpose than in
the humdrum old days. Mr. Burchett continued the new system with
increasing energy. He seemed to have taken it up in our Life class with
real pleasure latterly. In July the session ended, and I was not to
re-enter the schools till after my Italian art training had brought me a
long way forward.