In the course of our journey, the conversation turned upon the several
series of the “Clockmaker” I had published, and their relative merits.
Mr. Slick appeared to think they all owed their popularity mainly to the
freshness and originality of character incidental to a new country.
“You are in the wrong pew here, Squire,” said he; “you are, upon my
soul. If you think to sketch the English in a way any one will stop to
look at, you have missed a figur’, that’s all. You can’t do it nohow;
you can’t fix it. There is no contrasts here, no variation of colours,
no light and shade, no nothin’. What sort of a pictur’ would straight
lines of any thing make? Take a parcel of sodjers, officers and all, and
stretch ‘em out in a row, and paint ‘em, and then engrave ‘em, and put
it into one of our annuals, and see how folks would larf, and ask, ‘What
boardin’-school gall did that? Who pulled her up out of standin’ corn,
and sot her up on eend for an artist? they’d say.
“There is nothin’ here to take hold on. It’s so plaguy smooth and high
polished, the hands slip off; you can’t get a grip of it. Now, take Lord
First Chop, who is the most fashionable man in London, dress him in
the last cut coat, best trowsers, French boots, Paris gloves, and
grape-vine-root cane, don’t forget his whiskers, or mous-stache, or
breast-pins, or gold chains, or any thing; and what have you got?--a
tailor’s print-card, and nothin’ else.
“Take a lady, and dress her in a’most a beautiful long habit, man’s hat,
stand-up collar and stock, clap a beautiful little cow-hide whip in her
hand, and mount her on a’most a splendiferous white hoss, with long tail
and flowin’ mane, a rairin’ and a cavortin’ like mad, and a champin’
and a chawin’ of its bit, and makin’ the froth fly from its mouth, a
spatterin’ and white-spottin’ of her beautiful trailin’, skirt like any
thing. And what have you got?--why a print like the posted hand-bills of
a circus.
“Now spit on your fingers, and rub Lord First Chop out of the slate, and
draw an Irish labourer, with his coat off, in his shirt-sleeves, with
his breeches loose and ontied at the knees, his yarn stockings and thick
shoes on; a little dudeen in his mouth, as black as ink and as short as
nothin’; his hat with devilish little rim and no crown to it, and a hod
on his shoulders, filled with bricks, and him lookin’ as if he was a
singin’ away as merry as a cricket:
When I was young and unmarried,
my shoes they were new.
But now I am old and am married,
the water runs troo,’
Do that, and you have got sunthin’ worth lookin’ at, quite
pictures-quee, as Sister Sall used to say. And because why? _You have
got sunthin’ nateral_.
“Well, take the angylyferous dear a horseback, and rub her out, well, I
won’t say that nother, for I’m fond of the little critturs, dressed or
not dressed for company, or any way they like, yes, I like woman-natur’,
I tell _you_. But turn over the slate, and draw on t’other side on’t
an old woman, with a red cloak, and a striped petticoat, and a poor
pinched-up, old, squashed-in bonnet on, bendin’ forrard, with a staff
in her hand, a leadin’ of a donkey that has a pair of yaller willow
saddle-bags on, with coloured vegetables and flowers, and red beet-tops,
a goin’ to market. And what have you got? Why a pictur’ worth lookin’
at, too. Why?--_because it’s natur’_.
“Now, look here, Squire; let Copley, if he was alive, but he ain’t; and
it’s a pity too, for it would have kinder happified the old man, to see
his son in the House of Lords, wouldn’t it? Squire Copley, you know, was
a Boston man; and a credit to our great nation too. P’raps Europe never
has dittoed him since.
“Well, if he was above ground now, alive, and stirrin’, why take him
and fetch him to an upper crust London party; and sais you, ‘Old Tenor,’
sais you, ‘paint all them silver plates, and silver dishes, and silver
coverlids, and what nots; and then paint them lords with their _stars_,
and them ladies’ (Lord if he would paint them with their garters, folks
would buy the pictur, cause that’s nateral) ‘them ladies with their
jewels, and their sarvants with their liveries, as large as life, and
twice as nateral.’
“Well, he’d paint it, if you paid him for it, that’s a fact; for there
is no better bait to fish for us Yankees arter all, than a dollar. That
old boy never turned up his nose at a dollar, except when he thought
he ought to get two. And if he painted it, it wouldn’t be bad, I tell
_you_.
“‘Now,’ sais you, ‘you have done high life, do low life for me, and I
will pay you well. I’ll come down hansum, and do the thing genteel, you
may depend. Then,’ sais you, ‘put in for a back ground that noble, old
Noah-like lookin’ wood, that’s as dark as comingo. Have you done?’ sais
you.
“‘I guess so,’ sais he.
“‘Then put in a brook jist in front of it, runnin’ over stones, and
foamin’ and a bubblin’ up like any thing.’
“‘It’s in,’ sais he.
“‘Then jab two forked sticks in the ground ten feet apart, this side of
the brook,’ sais you, ‘and clap a pole across atween the forks. Is that
down?’ sais you.
“‘Yes,’ sais he.
“‘Then,’ sais you, ‘hang a pot on that horizontal pole, make a clear
little wood fire onderneath; paint two covered carts near it. Let an
old hoss drink at the stream, and two donkeys make a feed off a patch of
thistles. Have-you stuck that in?’
“‘Stop a bit,’ says he, ‘paintin’ an’t quite as fast done as writin’.
Have a little grain of patience, will you? It’s tall paintin’, makin’
the brush walk at that price. Now there you are,’ sais he. ‘What’s
next? But, mind I’ve most filled my canvass; it will cost you a pretty
considerable penny, if you want all them critters in, when I come to
cypher all the pictur up, and sumtotalize the whole of it.’
“‘Oh! cuss the cost!’ sais you. ‘Do you jist obey orders, and break
owners, that’s all you have to do, Old Loyalist.’
“‘Very well,’ sais he, ‘here goes.’
“‘Well, then,’ sais you, ‘paint a party of gipsies there; mind their
different coloured clothes, and different attitudes, and different
occupations. Here a man mendin’ a harness, there a woman pickin’ a
stolen fowl, there a man skinnin’ a rabbit, there a woman with her
petticoat up, a puttin’ of a patch in it. Here two boys a fishin’, and
there a little gall a playin’ with a dog, that’s a racin’ and a yelpin’,
and a barkin’ like mad.’
“‘Well, when he’s done,’ sais you, ‘which pictur do you reckon is the
best now, Squire Copely? speak candid for I want to know, and I ask you
now as a countryman.’
“‘Well’ he’ll jist up and tell you, ‘Mr. Poker,’ sais he, ‘your
fashionable party is the devil, that’s a fact. Man made the town, but
God made the country. Your company is as formal, and as stiff, and as
oninterestin’ as a row of poplars; but your gipsy scene is beautiful,
because it’s nateral. It was me painted old Chatham’s death in the House
of Lords; folks praised it a good deal; but it was no great shakes,
_there was no natur’ in it_. The scene was real, the likenesses was
good, and there was spirit in it, but their damned uniform toggery,
spiled the whole thing--it was artificial, and wanted life and natur.
Now, suppose, such a thing in Congress, or suppose some feller skiverd
the speaker with a bowie knife as happened to Arkansaw, if I was to
paint it, it would be beautiful. Our free and enlightened people is so
different, so characteristic and peculiar, it would give a great field
to a painter. To sketch the different style of man of each state, so
that any citizen would sing right out; Heavens and airth if that don’t
beat all! Why, as I am a livin’ sinner that’s the Hoosier of Indiana, or
the Sucker of Illinois, or the Puke of Missouri, or the Bucky of
Ohio, or the Red Horse of Kentucky, or the Mudhead of Tennesee, or the
Wolverine of Michigan or the Eel of New England, or the Corn Cracker of
Virginia! That’s the thing that gives inspiration. That’s the glass of
talabogus that raises your spirits. There is much of elegance, and more
of comfort in England. It is a great and a good country, Mr. Poker, but
there is no natur in it.’
“It is as true as gospel,” said Mr. Slick, “I’m tellin’ you no lie. It’s
a fact. If you expect to paint them English, as you have the Blue-Noses
and us, you’ll pull your line up without a fish, oftener than you are
a-thinkin’ on; that’s the reason all our folks have failed. ‘Rush’s book
is jist molasses and water, not quite so sweet as ‘lasses, and not quite
so good as water; but a spilin’ of both. And why? His pictur was of
polished life, where there is no natur. Washington Irving’s book is like
a Dutch paintin’, it is good, because it is faithful; the mop has the
right number of yarns, and each yarn has the right number of twists,
(altho’ he mistook the mop of the grandfather, for the mop of the man of
the present day) and the pewter plates are on the kitchen dresser, and
the other little notions are all there. He has done the most that could
be done for them, but the painter desarves more praise than the subject.
“Why is it every man’s sketches of America takes? Do you suppose it is
the sketches? No. Do you reckon it is the interest we create? No. Is it
our grand experiments? No. They don’t care a brass button for us, or our
country, or experiments nother. What is it then? It is because they are
sketches of natur. Natur in every grade and every variety of form; from
the silver plate, and silver fork, to the finger and huntin’ knife. Our
artificials Britishers laugh at; they are bad copies, that’s a fact; I
give them up. Let them laugh, and be darned; but I stick to my natur,
and I stump them to produce the like.
“Oh, Squire, if you ever sketch me, for goodness gracious sake, don’t
sketch me as an Attache to our embassy, with the Legation button, on the
coat, and black Jube Japan in livery. Don’t do that; but paint me in my
old waggon to Nova Scotier, with old Clay before me, you by my side,
a segar in my mouth, and natur all round me. And if that is too
artificial; oh, paint me in the back woods, with my huntin’ coat on, my
leggins, my cap, my belt, and my powder-horn. Paint me with my talkin’
iron in my hand, wipin’ her, chargin’ her, selectin’ the bullet, placin’
it in the greased wad, and rammin’ it down. Then draw a splendid oak
openin’ so as to give a good view, paint a squirrel on the tip top of
the highest branch, of the loftiest tree, place me off at a hundred
yards, drawin’ a bead on him fine, then show the smoke, and young squire
squirrel comin’ tumblin’ down head over heels lumpus’, to see whether
the ground was as hard as dead squirrels said it was. Paint me nateral,
I besech you; for I tell you now, as I told you before, and ever shall
say, there is nothin’ worth havin’ or knowin’, or hearin’, or readin’,
or seein’, or tastin’, or smellin’, or feelin’ and above all and more
than all, nothin’ worth affectionin’ but _Natur_.