I am afraid you were disappointed last night at finding no picture by the
Shannon. {93} Mayhap you had asked Mr C[hurchyard] to come and give his
judgment upon it over toasted cheese. But the truth is, the picture has
just been varnished with mastick varnish, which is apt to chill with the
cold at this season of the year: and so I thought it best to keep it by
me till its conveyance should be safer. I hope that on Monday you will
get it. But I must tell you that, besides the reason of the varnish, I
have had a sneaking desire to keep the picture by me, and not to lose it
from my eyes just yet. I am in love with it. I washed it myself very
carefully with only sweet salad oil: perfectly innocuous as you may
imagine: and that, with the new lining, and the varnishing, has at least
made the difference between a dirty and a clean beauty. And now, whoever
it may be painted by, I pronounce it a very beautiful picture: tender,
graceful, full of repose. I sit looking at it in my room and like it
more and more. All this is independent of its paternity. But if I am
asked about that, I should only answer on my own judgment (not a good one
in such a matter, as I have told you) that it is decidedly by
Gainsborough, and in his best way of conception. My argument would be of
the Johnsonian kind: if it is not by G., who the devil is it by? There
are some perhaps feeble touches here and there in the tree in the centre,
though not in those autumnal leaves that shoot into the sky to the right:
but who painted that clump of thick solemn trees to the left of the
picture:--the light of evening rising like a low fire between their
boles? The cattle too in the water, how they stand! The picture must be
an original of somebody's: and if not of Gainsborough's--whose? It is
better painted far than the Market Cart in the National Gallery: but not
better, only equal (in a sketchy way) to the beautiful evening Watering
Place.
Now I have raised your expectations too high. But when you have looked
at the picture some time, you will agree with me. I say all this in
sober honesty, for upon my word, whether it be by Gainsborough or not, it
is a kind of pang to me to part from the picture: I believe I should like
it all the better for its being a little fatherless bastard which I have
picked up in the streets, and made clean and comfortable. Yet, if your
friend tells you it is by G. I shall be glad you should possess it. Any
how, never part with it but to me.
I must tell you my friend Laurence still persists it is not by
Gainsborough: but I have thrown him quite overboard. Oh the comfort of
independent self confidence! Said Laurence also observed that
Gainsborough was the Goldsmith of Painters: which is perhaps true. I
should like to know if he would know an original of Goldsmith, if I read
something to him. He is a nice fellow this Laurence by the way.
Our prospect of going down to Suffolk this year is much on the wane: the
Doctor has desired that Lusia should remain in town. Though I should
like much to see you and others, yet I am on the whole glad that my
sisters should stay here, where they are likely to be better off. I
shall stay with them, as I am of use. I may however run down one day to
give you a look. I wish you would enquire and let me know how Mr. Jenney
{96} is: he was not well when my Father was in Suffolk. Only _don't ask
himself_: he hates that. And now farewell. This is a long letter: but
look at it by way of notice when the picture comes to you. If it does
not come on Monday don't be angry: but it probably will.
BRIGHTON, _Dec_. 29, 1841.