her head was painted about this time (1772) and he considered it one
of his best works, observing that no man ever could produce more
than about half a dozen really original works in his life; ‘and this
picture,’ he added, ‘is one of them.’ The picture was exhibited (1773)
and repeated several times; not so much for the sake of profit as for
that of improvement, for _he always advised as a good mode of study,
that a painter should have two pictures in hand of precisely the same
subject and design and should work on them alternately; by which means,
if chance produced a lucky hit, as it often does_, then instead of
working on the same piece, and by that means destroy that beauty which
chance had given, he should go to the other and improve upon that. Then
return again to the first picture, which he might work upon without any
fear of obliterating the excellence which chance had given it, having
transposed it to the other. Thus his desire of excellence enabled him
to combat with every sort of difficulty or labor.
“The compilers’ theory, then, is: after the sketch of _Mrs. Siddons’s_
portrait was laid in, he took up a fresh canvas, made a replica and
worked on both alternately until ‘the lucky hit’ was produced and
that appeared to Sir Joshua in the picture finished and exhibited in
the Royal Academy, 1784. Notwithstanding the glowing eulogiums passed
upon it, a purchaser was not found for it until 1788, when it was sold
to M. de Calonne. Sir Joshua did not record the sale in his ledger,
or note-book, and it only transpired when Skinner and Dyke sold at
their rooms, Spring Gardens, 1795, the English pictures of the Calonne
Collection and specified in the Catalogue that M. de Calonne paid Sir
Joshua 800 guineas for the portrait of Mrs. Siddons in the character of
the Tragic Muse.
“At this time M. Desenfans was Consul-general in Great Britain for the
Kingdom of Poland, a writer of marked ability, a recognized authority
on art, an extensive picture-dealer, employed by the King of Poland
to purchase high-class Old Masters to complete his Collection and who
kept up an acquaintance with Sir Joshua, notwithstanding the trick he
played of selling him, through Cribb, his frame-maker, the copy of a
Claude, specially made by Marchi for the purpose as an original. The
compiler’s surmise is, then, that he knew Sir Joshua had the unfinished
replica on hand, and came to an understanding with him to complete it
in its present form, ‘signed and dated 1789 on the edge of the robe.’
This investigation leads to three inferences; first, that Sir Joshua
would not condescend, for any consideration, to sign and date a copy
of _The Tragic Muse_ made by Score; secondly, that an astute man
of business, such as Desanfans was, would not give £735 for a copy;
thirdly, that The Dulwich picture must now be regarded in the same
light as the Westminster one--both from the hand of Reynolds; but which
was first commenced cannot be ascertained.”
GEORGIANA, DUCHESS OF DEVONSHIRE.
_Sir Joshua Reynolds
(1723–1792)._
_Collection of the late
Mr. Henry E. Huntington._
It is interesting to compare this picture by Sir Joshua with
Gainsborough’s _Duchess of Devonshire_ (see page 373), which is
probably the earlier of the two. This picture, oils on canvas (94 ×
57 inches), was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1776 as No. 233.
The Duchess had not long been married when this picture was painted,
as her marriage took place in 1774. There is something in the pose
that suggests the portrait of _Diana, Lady Crosbie_, which was painted
later. The Duchess is represented full-length facing the left, in the
act of descending a flight of stone steps, her right hand placed on the
balustrade and her left holding her dress very gracefully. The dress
is cream-colored cut low in the neck and fashioned with full sleeves.
The skirt is gracefully cut and abounds in plaits and draperies. A
gauzy scarf is wound around her right arm and floats below. The hair
is dressed very fashionably with a long and round curl pinned tightly
at the back of the neck and reaching the shoulder, and above the braid
which forms a coronal the hair mounts higher and is ornamented by
pearls and grey and red feathers. Vines are growing gracefully around
the balustrade, beyond which and through the near-by trees we see an
open vista of the park with a statue at the left. Presumably this is
_Chatsworth_, the seat of the Duke of Devonshire.
[Illustration:
_Collection of the late Mr. Henry E. Huntington_
GEORGIANA, DUCHESS OF DEVONSHIRE
--_Sir Joshua Reynolds_]
The picture was in the Collection of Earl Spencer, K. G., at Althorp,
Nottinghamshire, before it was taken to California.
THE COTTAGE DOOR.
_Thomas Gainsborough
(1727–1788)._
_Collection of the late
Mr. Henry E. Huntington._
The little group is assembled in front of a thatched cottage, beside
which a gnarled and withered tree rises scarred and seared by the
storms of many years. Overhanging the roof a large tree droops its
feathery Gainsborough foliage and, on the left, half of another
feathery Gainsborough tree is waving in the summer breeze. By this
tree, and farther back as well, a stream is seen falling in a little
cascade beneath a rustic bridge. Luxuriant weeds grow in the foreground
and by the side of the cottage, the door of which is open and beside
which a peasant’s family is grouped. The mother, in yellowish brown
skirt and white bodice, has a suggestion (save for the costume) of the
beautiful ladies that sat to Gainsborough. In her arms is a baby. On
her right, is a little boy, scantily dressed, who is eating something;
in front of her are two children, one holding a bowl and the other
dipping from it with a spoon; a fifth child, with one hand on his head
and the finger of his left hand in his mouth, looks forward shyly;
and the sixth is seated on the ground by his side. “Old pimply-nosed
Rembrandt,” as Gainsborough called him, never lighted a scene more
beautifully, nor more marvellously than this.
The picture, oils on canvas (57 × 46 inches), is one of Gainsborough’s
most mature works and dates from about 1776–1778.
Bought by T. Harvey of Catton, Norfolk, in 1786, it passed to Mr.
Coppin of Norwich in 1807. Then it became the property of Sir John
Leicester, Bart., created Lord de Tabley in 1826; and at the Sale of
the effects of the latter it was bought by Earl Grosvenor, created
Marquess of Westminster in 1831. In 1921 _The Cottage Door_ was
sold by the second Duke of Westminster to Mr. Henry E. Huntington.
“There is no painter of English birth more widely appreciated than
Gainsborough whose art touches every observer, great and simple,
learned and unlearned. As we look at his pictures, said Constable,
we find tears in our eyes and know not what brings them. A thread
of romance runs through the whole of Gainsborough’s career, from
his marriage to a beautiful and well-dowered bride, whose origin is
shrouded in mystery, down to the pathetic termination of the long
years of jealous rivalry with Reynolds. And romance and mystery are
inseparably connected with his pictures--with the portraits of that
_Duchess of Devonshire_, whom tradition has brought us to regard as
typical of English beauty, with that masterpiece at Edinburgh, the
portrait of _Mrs. Graham_, hidden from sight for fifty years on account
of one of the tenderest of love stories; and with the famous _Blue
Boy_, the secret of whose history still remains undiscovered.”[26]
“Old pimply-nosed Rembrandt and myself were both born in a mill,”
Gainsborough used to say, because his father, John Gainsborough, was
a manufacturer of woollens in Sudbury. Thomas was born there in 1727.
At twelve he was said to be a “confirmed painter.” His first portrait
seems to have been a great success. Some one had been stealing pears
from the Gainsborough orchard and one day, when young Thomas was
sketching there he saw a man’s face peering over the fence. Instantly
he made a quick sketch and took it into the house. By means of this
sketch the culprit was identified. Gainsborough then enlarged the
sketch, painted an oil portrait, mounted it on a board, and stuck “Tom
Peartree” up to the delight of all the neighbors and confusion of
strangers. This picture was lent to the Gainsborough Exhibition held at
the Grosvenor Gallery in 1885 and is now in the Elizabethan Mansion in
Christchurch Park, Ipswich.
[Illustration:
_Collection of the late Mr. Henry E. Huntington_
THE COTTAGE DOOR
--_Thomas Gainsborough_]
In 1741 Gainsborough went to London and, after studying under Hubert
Gravelot and Francis Hayman, took a studio in Hatton Garden and tried
to start as a portrait and landscape-painter. A year of failure decided
the young artist to return home. In a short time he married Margaret
Burr (supposed to be a natural daughter of the Duke of Bedford) and
removed to Ipswich. Here he painted chiefly landscapes. About 1760 he
settled in Bath and immediately became the fashion. Fourteen years
later Gainsborough removed to London, where his success continued and
he became the rival of Reynolds. Gainsborough had already in 1768 been
nominated by George III one of the thirty-six Academicians on the
foundation of the Academy and he exhibited almost yearly at the Royal
Academy from 1769 to 1788, when there was a misunderstanding about the
hanging of his pictures. Gainsborough died in 1788, closing one of
the most remarkable careers in art, for this great painter was almost
entirely self-taught. Reynolds called attention to this remarkable fact
in his _Fourteenth Discourse_, in which he cites Gainsborough as
an example of an artist who has arrived “at great fame without the
assistance of an academical education, or any of those preparatory
studies which have so often been recommended.”
Yet his genius was such that he attained the greatest eminence in his
day and his place in art to-day is in the small circle of the very
great ones.
Ruskin did not exaggerate in the least when he wrote: “Gainsborough’s
power of color is capable of taking rank beside that of Rubens; he is
the purest colorist of the English School; with him, in fact, the art
of painting did in great part die and exists not now in Europe. In
management and quality of single and particular tint, in the purely
technical part of painting, Turner is a child to Gainsborough. His
hand is as light as the sweep of a cloud, as swift as the flash of a
sunbeam. He never loses sight of his picture as a whole. In a word
Gainsborough is an immortal painter.”
Gainsborough painted about seven hundred portraits and two hundred
landscapes. Strange as it may seem, he preferred to paint landscapes.
At least he told George III this. And he told his friend Jackson
in a letter “I’m sick of Portraits and wish very much to take my
viol-da-gamba and walk off to some sweet village where I can paint
landskips and enjoy the fag-end of life in quietness and ease.”
This seems strange coming from one of the greatest of all
portrait-painters.
To read the list of Gainsborough’s portraits is to run through the
Social Register of London and Bath. Gainsborough painted “everybody
that was anybody.” The great personalities of the day wanted their
portraits “limned” by both Reynolds and Gainsborough, often adding
Romney and Hoppner as well. The fourteen years that he lived in Bath
Gainsborough’s painting-room was almost as much of a _rendez-vous_
as the Pump Room and his sitters ranged from the most aristocratic
and wealthy, such as Earl Spencer, his wife, and little daughter, the
future Duchess of Devonshire, to statesmen, like Pitt, and actors like
Garrick and Quin. The latter sat three times to Gainsborough. The
following little piece of amusing acting usually took place. Quin,
suffering from gout, would hobble to the painting-room and tapping at
the door would ask “Is Old Grumpus in?” Gainsborough would reply “Come
in”; and, placing a chair for his friend and a stool to rest his foot
upon, would put on a grave, doctorial look and, resting his chin on his
maul-stick, would inquire in the Bath phrase: “Well, how is _toe_?”
Quin evidently was a critic: “Sometimes, Tom Gainsborough,” he
said, “a picture in your rigmarole style appears to my optics the
veriest daub,--then, the devil’s in you, I think you a Van Dyck!” And
Gainsborough would tell Quin that “nothing could equal the devilism of
portrait-painting.”
“Indeed, he told me,” Angelo relates, “at his house in Pall Mall,
that he was sure the perplexities of rendering something like a human
resemblance from human blocks was a trial of patience that would have
tempted holy St. Anthony to cut his own throat with his palette-knife.”
Gainsborough was devoted to music, played several instruments and was
a great friend of the oboe-player in the Queen’s Band, John Christian
Fischer, who married his daughter Margaret; of John Christian Bach,
son of the great John Sebastian Bach; and of Bach’s associate, Charles
Frederick Abel, the celebrated virtuoso on the viol-da-gamba, whose
portrait Gainsborough painted with his instrument by his side, and
which is now in the Huntington Gallery.
Gainsborough’s portrait by Zoffany in the National Portrait Gallery,
London, presents a handsome and rather dashing man of about thirty-five
with classic features and large, fine eyes with penetrating glance and
an intelligent, interior light. Had he not been a painter he might have
easily become a _beau_, or a gallant officer of the Major André type,
or of that impudent young dog, Jack Absolute, who captivated Miss Lydia
Languish in _The Rivals_.
It was the same in London as it had been in Bath. Gainsborough became
the fashion. He barely had time to fill all the orders that came thick
and fast and he enjoyed society and still more his cronies, and, to
judge from numerous anecdotes, was not averse to wild companions; but
for all that he was generous, sympathetic, outgoing, and much beloved
by his friends.
As an instance of his ready wit on one occasion, when he was in court
regarding a picture the councillor tried to embarrass him. “I observe,”
he said, “you lay great stress on a painter’s eye. What do you mean by
that expression!” “A painter’s eye,” replied Gainsborough, without a
moment’s hesitation, “is to him what a lawyer’s tongue is to you!”
Gainsborough was sprightly, humorous, and lively in conversation and
indeed, in society, to use the word of the period, something of a
“rattle.”
Whenever he appeared, either at a morning lounge at Christie’s amidst
the enlightened and polite, or at My Lady’s midnight rout surrounded by
bowing _beaux_ and curtseying belles, his gaiety enlivened every
group. He knew everybody and everybody knew him; he was, however, most
at home with the worthies of the auction-room. For some years Garrick
was frequently his companion at Christie’s, where the amusement caused
by the humor common to both never failed to give an additional zest to
the proceedings. Mr. Christie often declared that “the presence of this
choice pair added fifteen per cent to his commission on a sale.”
And this was a “choice pair,”--Garrick and Gainsborough!
“We know as little about Gainsborough’s tools and methods of painting
as we do of his pigments, but if his daughter’s memory may be trusted,
her father worked with paint so thin and liquid that his palette ran
over unless he kept it on the level. It is generally agreed that he
used very long brushes, and Nollekens Smith who saw him at work, says:
‘I was much surprised to see him sometimes paint portraits with pencils
on sticks full six feet in length and his method of using them was
this: he placed himself and his canvas at a right angle to the sitter,
so that he stood still and touched the features of his pictures exactly
at the same distance at which he viewed the sitter.’ The anonymous
biographer of the _Morning Chronicle_ who knew the painter excuses
his supposed want of finish by saying that he worked with a very long
and broad brush. Another contemporary, John Williams (Pasquin), in a
biographical note declares that Gainsborough always prided himself
upon using longer and broader tools than other men and upon standing
farther away from his canvas when at work. That he always stood to
paint we know from Thicknesse, but it is obvious that all his work
could not have been done with broad tools of hog-hair. Probably he used
camel-hair brushes sometimes, as did Gainsborough Dupont, who inherited
his uncle’s implements and colors and in painting followed his manner
exactly. Dupont left behind him, in addition to a great quantity of
hogtools, ‘twelve bundles of camel’s hair pencils.’ Fulcher says that
when Gainsborough’s sitters left him it was his custom to close the
shutter, in which was a small circular aperture, the only access for
light and by this subdued illumination work on his picture and get rid
of superfluous detail. No authority is given for this statement, but
there can be little doubt that Gainsborough loved to subdue the light
in his painting-room. Williams says that it was sometimes subdued to
such an extent that objects were barely visible.”[27]
And Osias Humphrey, R. A., tells us a little more, drawing from his
memories of Bath,... “Exact resemblances in his portraits was Mr.
Gainsborough’s constant aim, to which he invariably adhered. These
pictures, as well as his landscapes, were frequently wrought by
candle-light and generally with great force and likeness. But his
painting-room--even by day a kind of darkened twilight--had scarcely
any light and I have seen him, whilst his subjects have been sitting to
him when neither they nor the pictures were scarcely discernible.” We
also learn that Gainsborough let in more light when the picture reached
its finishing stages.
THE MALL IN ST. JAMES’S PARK.
_Thomas Gainsborough
(1727–1788)._
_Collection of the late
Mr. Henry Clay Frick._
Horace Walpole characterized this delightful picture as airier than
a Watteau and “all in motion and flutter like a lady’s fan.” It is
one of Gainsborough’s latest works, painted in 1786, and one of his
masterpieces, oils on canvas (57¾ × 47½ inches). The picture was among
those in the painter’s studio at the time of his death. After a few
changes of ownership, it passed into the Collection of George Frost,
an artist and fellow-townsman of Gainsborough, and then to Sir Audley
Dallas Neeld, Bart., Grittleton House, near Chippenham, Wiltshire.
_The Mall_ is a perfect epitome of London society in the Eighteenth
Century--the London of Austin Dobson.
“The Mall from the days of the Stuarts until the closing years of the
Eighteenth Century was the field upon which fashion, and feminine
fashion especially, chose to disport itself. Twice a day social London
donned its best apparel and took a turn under the trees, once at
midday and again, in summer, in its evening clothes after the early
dinner. Here fashion met its friends, exchanged its repartees, made
appointments for evening _rendez-vous_ at Ranelagh or Vauxhall,
ate fruit or bought flowers from Betty’s girl out of St. James’s
Street, or drank syllabubs from the red cow’s milk which was one of
the attractions of the London parks. Nothing in the external aspect of
London more struck the intelligent foreigner than the amenities of the
promenade in the Mall. One of these gentlemen concluded an eloquent
pæan on the beauty of the lady promenaders, by recording with rapture
that of a morning the very ground glistened with the pins which they
had dropped. The Mall, indeed, was the very shrine of flounce and
furbelow until somewhere about 1795, when fashion unaccountably moved
northward to the walk in the Green Park at the back of Arlington
Street, and from there later to Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens.
[Illustration:
_Collection of the Mr. Henry Clay Frick_
THE MALL
--_Thomas Gainsborough_]
“The very spirit of this life is preserved in Gainsborough’s picture,
one of the few canvases in which he represents figures in motion;
singular also among his work is that it contains a score or so of
figures. There is a central group of four ladies with an attendant
cavalier advancing towards the spectator, a pair on the right, two
pairs on the left passing each other, others again seated on the
right. The accidental episodic quality of such a subject is perfectly
conveyed--the transient glance of a passing woman, the turn of the neck
appropriate to that attitude, the ground dotted with an occasional dog.
Technically it represents Gainsborough at his highest, where the solemn
tones of his earlier manner have disappeared, and the very painting
itself seems to echo his delight in the mastery of heightened, luminous
color.”[28]
MARIA WALPOLE, DUCHESS OF GLOUCESTER.
_Thomas Gainsborough
(1727–1788)._
_Collection of
Mr. and Mrs. Charles P. Taft._
The subject of this portrait was famous under three names: her maiden
name of Maria Walpole; as Lady Waldegrave; and as the Duchess of
Gloucester. She was very beautiful (no one could compete with her but
the Gunning sisters); she was very witty and brilliant; and, moreover,
she was noted for her rich qualities of heart and character. Her uncle,
Horace Walpole, was devoted to her.
[Illustration:
_Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Charles P. Taft_
MARIA WALPOLE, DUCHESS OF GLOUCESTER
--_Thomas Gainsborough_]
Maria Walpole began life under a cloud, but this was soon dispelled and
the rest was all sunshine. The Hon. Edward Walpole, second son of Sir
Robert, was her father and her mother was a milliner’s apprentice at
Bath. Maria was baptized July 10, 1738, at St. James’s, Westminster,
and was made legitimate by His Majesty’s warrant. Recognized as a
Walpole, everything was done for her. The old _London Town and
Country Magazine_ gives us this very good idea of her preparation
for life: “Maria’s education was suited to the rank of life in which
she has ever figured; and the advantages she derived from it were
entirely noticed by every man of taste and discernment who was happy
enough to be in her company.”
Horace Walpole brought about her first marriage to the Right Honorable
James, Second Earl of Waldegrave, K. G., in 1759; and he wrote to Sir
Horace Mann:
“I have married, that is, I am marrying my niece, Maria, my brother’s
second daughter, to Lord Waldegrave. What say you? A month ago I
was told he liked her--does he? I jumbled them together and he has
already proposed. For character and credit he is the first match in
England--for beauty I think she is. She has not a fault in her face and
person and the detail is charming. A warm complexion tending to brown,
fine eyes, brown hair, fine teeth, and infinite wit and variety.”
In another letter Sir Horace wrote: “The second daughter of my brother
is beauty itself. Her face, bloom, eyes, hair, teeth, and person all
are perfect. You may imagine how charming she is when her only fault,
if one must find one, is that her face is rather too round. She has a
great deal of wit and vivacity with perfect modesty.”
To George Montagu on May 16, he wrote:
“Well! Maria was married yesterday. Don’t we manage well? The
original day was not once put off; lawyers and milliners were all
ready canonically. It was as sensible a wedding as ever was. There
was neither form nor indecency, both which generally meet on such
occasions. They were married at my brother’s in Pall Mall just before
dinner by Mr. Keppel;[29] the company, my brother, his son, Mrs. Keppel
and Charlotte,[30] Lady Elizabeth Keppel, Lady Betty Waldegrave and
I. We dined there. The Earl and new Countess got into the post-chaise
at eight o’clock and went to Navestock (Lord Waldegrave’s seat near
Brentwood, Essex) alone, where they stay till Saturday night; on Sunday
she is to be presented. Maria was in a white and silver nightgown[31]
with a hat very much pulled over her face; what one could see of it
was handsomer than ever; a cold maiden blush gave her the sweetest
delicacy in the world.”
Maria was a friend of the Countess of Coventry, who had attained fame
as the beautiful Maria Gunning and used to walk with her in the Park
and they must have been a very striking pair, for after the Countess
of Coventry’s death, Lady Waldegrave was considered the handsomest
woman in England. A month after Maria’s marriage Sir Horace noted in a
letter: “My Lady Coventry and my niece Walpole have been mobbed in the
park.”