We now come to consider the prime artistic treasure in Penicuik
House, the largest and finest of the three Raeburns that hang in
the dining-room, that admirable group of Sir John Clerk, the fifth
Baronet, and his wife Rosemary (so she signed her name) Dacre. It is
an oblong picture, showing the two life-sized figures almost to the
knees, and turned towards our right. Nearly one-half of the picture,
that to the left, is occupied with a landscape of undulating country,
diversified by darker passages afforded by tree-masses, with flashes
of light playing over the grass in points where it is quickened by
the radiance of the setting sun, and with still sharper flashings
which mark the course of the “classic Esk.” To our extreme right an
elm-tree raises its great forked stem, and throws out a slenderer
branch, bearing embrowned leafage. This is carried over the upper edge
of the picture, across nearly its whole extent, repeating, by its mass
of dark against the sky, the arm of the male figure standing beneath,
which is extended, dark against the distant expanse of dimly-lighted
landscape background. The sky, against which the heads of the figures
are set, is filled with the soft mellow light of a sunset after rain,
struggling with films of fluctuating misty clouds,—a sky in the
treatment of which Raeburn has used a portrait-painter’s licence,
making it lower in tone than would have been the case in such a natural
effect. The figure furthest to our right is that of the lady, clad in
white muslin, a dress utterly without ornament, but “adorned the most”
in the absolute simplicity of its soft overlapping folds, delicate and
full of subtlest gradation as a pile of faintly yellow rose-leaves. The
waist is girt with a ribbon of a more definite yellow, though this too
is subdued, taking grey tones in shadow. The light comes from behind
the figures, and the edges of the dress, catching its brightness, are
the highest tones of the picture. The lady’s face is one of mature
comeliness and dignity, the hair brown and slightly powdered, the light
touching and outlining sharply the rounded contours of cheek and chin,
and the edge of the throat, which rises from the masses of pure soft
muslin—itself still purer and more delicate in tone and texture. Her
left hand hangs down by her side, fingering a little among the folds
of the dress and compressing its filmy fabric; and her right hand
rests on her companion’s left shoulder, its hand, an admirable piece
of draughtsmanship and foreshortening, hanging over, loose from the
wrist, which is circled by a sharply struck band of black ribbon. The
Baronet stands by her side, with his left arm—on whose shoulder the
lady’s hand rests—circling her waist, and his right relieved against
the background as it stretches across the canvas, pointing, over the
river, to the mansion of Penicuik,—which is manifestly visible to the
pair in the distance, though unseen to the spectator of the picture. He
wears a soft felt hat, broad-brimmed, low-crowned, and Quaker-like in
fashion, with an oval metal clasp set in front in its band. His coat
is low-toned greyish yellow in its lights, and low-toned olive green
in shadow, the vest and breeches showing a lighter tone of the same;
and a white cravat and ruffles appear at throat and wrists. His face
is a well-conditioned face of middle life, small-mouthed, with cheeks
plumply rounded, and a nose delicately aquiline. He stands, quietly
expectant, looking into the lady’s face, which is gazing right onward
into the background.
There is in this group none of the strong, positive, insufficiently
gradated colour, which is sometimes rather distressing in Raeburn’s
work. It is far quieter and more delicate than is altogether usual in
his art, full of tenderness and subtlety; the faces exquisitely lit
by reflected light, their half-shadows softly luminous and delicate
exceedingly, never sinking with a crash into blackness and opacity. The
artist has seldom produced a finer or more artistic group, has seldom
given us a more fascinating portrayal of well-born manhood and of
female loveliness.
It is not at all in originality of general conception that the
greatness of Raeburn’s portraiture usually lies, in the novel groupings
of its figures, or in any suggestion of story in their combinations.
Some other painters have contrived to throw a hint of narrative into
works which, in first and main aim, were mere likenesses; but Raeburn
was a portraitist in the strictest and most exclusive sense; and he
simply adopted the accepted poses of the figure that were current in
the Scottish portraiture of his day, though to these his original
genius gave a finer grace, catching from Nature an added ease. But
in the grouping of this picture, and in its lighting—so abnormal in
arrangement—we certainly have as definite a departure as could well
be imagined, from the stock traditions that have guided the art of
portraiture from time immemorial; and some other reason than a purely
technical one is suggested by the marked originality of the work,
in both conception and treatment. Was this strange and most unusual
distribution of light in the picture a mere artistic experiment in
chiaroscuro? Did the painter devote half of his canvas to an extended
landscape vista, merely in honour of the Baronet’s ancestral acres; and
was that pose of regardant countenance and interlacing arms selected
only because it made for a graceful flow of changeful line? Hardly was
all this the case, one fancies.
May it not, then, be conceivable that when the portrait had been
commissioned, and while its details and way of treatment were being
discussed by the pair—painter and baronet—as they sat together, in
quiet after-dinner hour over their wine, in this very room where the
completed picture now holds its place,—is it not just conceivable that
Sir John, in some such time of genial heart-expansion, as he poised
his glass to catch the last warm gleam of summer evening light that
streamed across the darkening woods,—that the childless man, beginning
now to verge gently towards age, may have been stirred by ancient
memories, and have told the artist of some bygone scene to which these
ancestral woods were once the witness? Is it a walk of plighted lovers
that the painter hints at on his canvas, and has the bride just caught
first sight of her future home? Or, can the scene be one tenderer
still? The middle-aged lover looks—calmly, earnestly expectant,
waiting for an answer that will not come from the lady’s lips, that
will certainly not be given by their _words_—at the noble face of the
mature and stately beauty by his side, into her dear grey eyes that
never meet his, but gaze right on into the distance—into the future
is it? Has the painter then meant to show us one of those strenuous,
delicately-poised moments that come in mortal lives, when “words are
mere mistake,” when
“A lip’s mere tremble,
Looks half hesitation, cheeks just change of colour,”
at once crystallise intensest emotion and afford its fullest
expression, and sign and seal a human soul with final impress of
success or failure? Is—in briefest English—the man waiting for the
sign that will make him accepted or rejected lover?
This portrait, the chief treasure of Penicuik House, would surely
possess enough of interest from the power of its artistry, and the
romantic associations with which our fancy may possibly invest it; but
its interest is deepened, and it gathers a yet more intimate charm when
we have heard the beautiful old-world story connected with the lady’s
birth.
Of this curious episode there are varying versions extant, which
are given and fully discussed by Ellen K. Goodwin, in a pamphlet
(Kendal, 1886) reprinted from the “Transactions of the Cumberland
and Westmoreland Antiquarian and Archæological Society.” There is a
puzzling difference between the date of 15th November 1745, given by
Lady Clerk as the day of her birth, and that of 3d November which
appears in the register of Kirkliston parish as the day of her baptism;
but this discrepancy—we may suggest—would be lessened to within a
single day, if her Ladyship has calculated according to New Style,
introduced in Scotland in 1600, and the register has estimated by
Old Style, current in England till 1752; while the presence of the
Highlanders at Carlisle at the time would be accounted for if they
crossed the border on “the 7th or 8th of November,” New Style.
The following is the interesting version of the story, communicated by
Lady Clerk herself to the Editor of “Blackwood’s Magazine”:—
“... The incident occurred November 15th, 1745. My father, Mr.
Dacre, then an officer of His Majesty’s Militia, was a prisoner
in the Castle of Carlisle, at that time in the hands of Prince
Charles. My mother (a daughter of Sir George le Fleming, Bart.,
Bishop of Carlisle) was living at Rose Castle, six miles from
Carlisle, when she was delivered of me. She had given orders
that I should immediately be privately baptized by the Bishop’s
chaplain (his Lordship not being at home) by name of Rosemary
Dacre. At that moment a company of Highlanders approached
headed by a Captain Macdonald, who having heard there was much
plate and valuables in the Castle came to plunder it. Upon the
approach of the Highlanders, an old grey-headed servant ran out
and entreated Captain Macdonald not to proceed, as any noise or
alarm might cause the death of both lady and child. The Captain
enquired where the lady had been confined. ‘Within this house,’
the servant answered. Captain Macdonald stopped. The servant
added, ‘They are just going to christen the infant.’ Macdonald,
taking off his cockade, said, ‘Let her be christened with this
cockade in her cap, it will be her protection now and after if
any of our stragglers should come this way: we will wait the
ceremony in silence,’ which they accordingly did, and they went
into the coachyard, and were regaled with beef, cheese, and
ale, then went off without the smallest disturbance. My white
cockade was safely preserved and shown me from time to time,
always reminding me to respect the Scotch, and Highlanders in
particular. I think I have obeyed the injunction by spending my
life in Scotland, and also by hoping to die there.