CHAPTER XVII.

Through the depth and darkness of the summer night, you can hear Mrs

Laurie’s quiet breathing as she lies asleep. With a pain at her heart

she lay down, and when she wakes she will feel it, or ever she is aware

that she has awaked; but still she sleeps: blessing on the kind oblivion

which lays all these troubles for a time to rest.

But what is this white figure erecting itself from the pillow, sitting

motionless and silent in the night? It is tears that keep these gentle

eyelids apart—tears that banish from them the sleep of youth. Still,

that she may not wake the sleeper by her side, scarcely daring to move

her hand to wipe away this heavy dew which blinds her eyes. Menie

Laurie, Menie Laurie, can this sad watcher be you?

And Menie’s soul is vexing itself with plans and schemes, and Menie’s

heart is rising up to God in broken snatches of prayer, constantly

interrupted, and merging into the bewilderment of her thoughts. Startled

once for all out of the early calm, the serene untroubled youthful life

which lies behind her in the past, Menie feels the change very hard and

sore as she realises it; from doing nought for her own comfort—from the

loving sweet dependence upon others, to which her child’s heart has been

accustomed—suddenly, without pause or preparation, to learn that all

must depend upon herself—to have the ghost of strife and discord, where

such full harmony was wont to be—to feel the two great loves of her

nature—the loves which heretofore, in her own innocent and unsuspicious

apprehension, have but strengthened and deepened each the other, set

forth in antagonism, love against love, and her own heart the

battle-ground. Shrinking and failing one moment, longing vainly to flee

away—away anywhere into the utmost desolation, if only it were out of

this conflict,—the next resolving, with such strong throbs and beatings

of her heart, to take up her burden cordially, to be ever awake and

alert, to subdue this giant difficulty with the force of her own strong

love and ceaseless tenderness—praying now for escape, then for

endurance, and anon breaking into silent tears over all. Alas for Menie

Laurie in her unaccustomed solitude! and Menie thinks, like every other

Menie, that she could have borne anything but this.

But by-and-by, in spite of tears and trouble, the natural rest steals

upon Menie—steals upon her unawares, though she feels, in the sadness of

her heart, as if she could never rest again; throws back her drooping

head upon her pillow, folds her arms meekly on her breast, closes her

eyelids over the unshed tear; and thus it is that the dawn finds her

out, like a flower overcharged and drooping with its weight of evening

dew, but wrapt in sleep as deep and dreamless and unbroken as if her

youth had never known a tear.

The sun is full in the room when Menie wakes, and Mrs Laurie has but a

moment since closed the door softly behind her, that the sleeper might

not be disturbed. Even this tender precaution, when she finds it out,

chills Menie to the heart; for heretofore her mother’s voice has roused

her, and even her mother’s impatience of her lingering would be joy to

her to-day; but Mrs Laurie is not impatient. Mrs Laurie thinks it

better, for all the sun’s unceasing proclamation that night and sleep

are past, to let the young heart refresh itself a little longer, to

leave the young form at rest.

Ay, Menie Laurie, kneel down by your bedside—kneel down and pray; it is

not often that your supplications testify themselves in outward

attitude. Now there is a murmur of an audible voice speaking words to

which no mortal ear has any right to listen; and your downcast face is

buried in your hands, and your tears plead with your prayers. For you

never thought but to be happy, Menie, and the gentle youthful nature

longs and yearns for happiness, and with the strength of a rebel fights

against the pain foreseen—poor heart!

“Eh, Jenny! you’re no keeping ill-will?” said a doleful voice upon the

lawn below; very distinct, through the open window, it quickened Menie’s

morning toilette considerably, and drew her forward, with a wondering

face, to make sure. “I’m sure it’s no in me to be unfriends with

onybody; and after ane coming a’ this gate for naething but to ask a

civil question, how you a’ was. I’m saying, Jenny? you’re no needing to

haud ony correspondence with me except ye like; it’s the mistress and

Miss Menie I’m wanting to see.”

“Am I to let in a’ the gaun-about vagabones that want to see the

mistress and Miss Menie?” said Jenny’s gruff voice in reply. “I trow no;

and how ye can have the face to look at Jenny after your last errand

till her, I canna tell; ye’ll be for undertaking my service ance mair?

but ye may just as weel take my word ance for a’—the mistress canna bide

ye ony mair than me.”

“Eh, woman, Jenny, ye’re a thrawn creature!” said Nelly Panton. “I’m

sure I never did ye an ill turn a’ my days. But ye needna even the like

of your service to me; I’m gaun to live with our Johnnie, and keep his

house, and Johnnie’s company are grander folk than the mistress; but I’m

no forgetting auld friends, so I came to ask for Miss Menie because I

aye likit her, and because she’s a young lass like mysel; and I’ll gang

and speak to that ither servant-woman if you’ll no tell Miss Menie I’m

here.”

Jenny’s fury—for very furious was Jenny’s suppressed fuff at the

presumptuous notion of equality or friendship between Menie Laurie and

Nelly Panton—was checked by this threat; and fearful lest the dignity of

her young mistress should be injured in the eyes of the household by the

new-comer’s pretensions, Jenny, who had held this colloquy out of doors,

turned hastily round and pattered away by the back entrance to open the

door for the visitor, muttering repeated adjurations. “My patience!” and

Jenny’s patience had indeed much reason to be called to her aid.

Menie’s curiosity was a little roused—her mind, withdrawn from herself,

lightened somewhat of its load, and she hastened down stairs less

unwillingly than she would have done without this interruption. Jenny

stood by the drawing-room door holding it open; and Jenny’s sturdy

little form vibrated, every inch of it, with anger and indignation. “Ane

to speak to you, Miss Menie!—ane used with grand society, and owre high

for the like of me. Ye’ll have to speak to her yoursel.”

And Menie suddenly found herself thrust into the room, while Jenny, with

an audible snort and fuff, remained in possession of the door.

Nelly Panton had too newly entered on her dignities to be able to

restrain the ancient curtsey of her humility. Yes, undoubtedly, it was

Nelly Panton—with the same faded gown, the same doleful shawl, the same

wrapped-up and gloomy figure. Against the well-lighted, well-pictured

wall of Miss Annie Laurie’s drawing-room she stood in dingy

individuality dropping her curtsey, while Menie, much surprised and

silent, stood before her waiting to be addressed.

“Can nane of ye speak?” said the impatient Jenny, from the door. “Miss

Menie, are ye no gaun to ask what is her business here? A fule micht

ha’e kent this was nae place to come back to, after her last errand to

Burnside; and when she kens I canna bide her, and the mistress canna

bide her, to come and set up for a friendship with you!”

“She’s just as cankered as she aye was, Miss Menie,” said Nelly Panton,

compassionately, shaking her head. “It shows an ill disposition, indeed,

when folk canna keep at peace with me, as many a time I’ve telt my

mother. But ye see, Miss Menie, I couldna just bide on in Kirklands when

ye were a’ away, so I just took my fit in my hand, and came on to London

to see after Johnnie with my ain een. He needs somebody to keep him

gaun, and set him richt, puir callant; and he’s in a grand way for

himsel, and should be attended to—so I think I’ll just stay on, Miss

Menie; and the first thing I did was to come and ask for you.”

“You are very kind, Nelly,” said Menie Laurie; but Menie paused with a

suppressed laugh when she saw Jenny’s clenched hand shaken at her from

the door.

“And ye’ll maybe think I’m no just in condition to set up for friends

with the like of you,” said Nelly, glancing down upon her dress; “but I

only came in to London the day before yesterday, and I’ve naething yet

but my travelling things. I’m hearing that little Juley Home of

Braecroft’s coming too; and between you and me, Miss Menie, no to let it

gang ony farther, I think it was real richt and prudent of you to show

us the first example, and draw us a’ up to London to take care of thae

lads.”

“What do you mean, Nelly?” exclaimed Menie, somewhat angrily.

“Ye may weel say what does she mean,” said Jenny, making a sudden inroad

from the door. “Do you hear, ye evil speaker!—the mistress is out, and

there’s naebody to take care of this puir bairn but me; whatever malice

and venom ye have to say, out wi’t, and I’ll tell the young lady what

kind of character ye are when a’s dune.”

“I wadna keep such a meddling body in my house—no, if she did the wark

twice as weel,” retorted Nelly, with calm superiority; “and I’ve nae

call to speak my mind afore Jenny, and her aye misca’in’ me; but it’s

nae secret of mine. I was just gaun to say, that for a’ our Johnnie’s a

very decent lad, and minds upon his friends, I never saw ane, gentle or

simple, sae awfu’ muckle tooken up about himsel as Randy Home. He’s

anither lad altogether to what he used to be; and it’s no to be thocht

but what he’s wanting a grand wife like a’ the rest. Now, ye’ll just

see.”

Menie Laurie put down Jenny’s passionate disclaimer by a motion of her

hand. “If this was what you came to tell me, Nelly, I fear I shall

scarcely be grateful for your visit. Do you know that it is an

impertinence to say this to me? Whisht, Jenny, that is enough; and I

came here to look after no one. Whatever you may have thought before,

you will believe this now, since I say it. Jenny will see that you are

comfortable while you stay out here; but I think, Nelly, you have said

enough to me this morning, and I to you—Jenny, whisht.”

“I’ll no whisht,” cried Jenny, at last, freed by Menie’s pause. “Eh, ye

evil spirit! will ye tell me what cause of ill-will ye ever could have

against this innocent bairn? I’m no gaun to whisht, Miss Menie—to think

of her coming up here ance errand to put out her malice on you! My

patience! how ony mortal can thole the sicht o’ her, I dinna ken.”

“I can forgive ye, Jenny,” said the meek Nelly Panton, “for a’ your

passions, and your glooms, and your ill words—I’m thankful to say I can

forgive ye; but, eh, sirs, this is a weary world;—wherever I gang, at

hame, or away frae hame, I’m aye miskent—naebody has the heart to take a

guid turn frae me—though, I’m sure, I aye mean a’thing for the best, and

it was richt Miss Menie should ken. I thocht I would just come up this

far to give ye an advice, Miss Menie, when we were our lanes; and I’m no

gaun to blaze up into a fuff like Jenny because it’s ill ta’en. I’m just

as guid friends as ever. The next time I come I’ll come with our

Johnnie, so I bid you a very good morning, Miss Menie Laurie, and mony

thanks for your kind welcome. Jenny, fare-ye-well.”

Menie sat down in the window when the dark figure of her unwelcome

visitor was gone. The sun came in upon her gaily—the genial August

sun—and the leaves without fluttered in a happy wind and a maze of

morning sounds, broken with shriller shouts of children, and rings of

silvery laughter floated up and floated round her, of themselves an

atmosphere fresh and sweet; but Menie bowed her face between her hands,

and looked out with wistful eyes into the future, where so many fears

and wonders had come to dwell; and vigilant and stern the meagre

yew-tree looked in upon her, like an unkindly fate.

NATIONAL GALLERY.

REPORT OF COMMISSION.

The publication of the evidence given before the Select Committee on the

National Gallery, enables us to return to the subject of our article of

December with a more complete knowledge of the facts than we could

gather from the unfinished Report and the extracts of evidence, which

the press of the day supplied. The whole Blue Book is a valuable

document: it contains a very clear index by which references to all

details, as well of fact as of opinion, can be readily made, rendering

the alarming bulk of the materials very manageable. We can now see what

each witness actually said, so that none need complain of partial or

mutilated extracts; every passage may be taken with its context. We

shall take occasion thereby to correct some portions of evidence, upon

which we commented in our former paper, having been misled by the

versions in the newspaper reports, from which we took them. To correct a

misstatement should be our first task. We were certainly much surprised

to find it stated that Sir Charles Eastlake had made such a declaration

as this, that he would not hesitate to clean a picture, and “to _strip

off the whole of its glazings_.” We thought it at the time so improbable

that we could not believe such to have been his meaning; and accordingly

said, that Sir Charles must have meant coats of varnish, for that we

knew him to be too experienced a master of his profession to mean the

glazings. We have, since the publication, carefully examined his

evidence, and not only do not see the words attributed to him, but

collect from his answers to the queries put to him, a general aversion

to “cleaning,” and that, in most instances, he opposed subjecting

pictures to it, as a dangerous process.

It might, however, be supposed that artists would agree as to the

meaning of terms of art. Those on the Commission unacquainted with the

processes of painting, must have been very much surprised and perplexed

by the very different meanings given to technical terms, and that not by

one or two, or by artists of little note, but by nearly all, including

the most celebrated. The confusion caused by this non-agreement among

the artists, with regard to the terms of their art, the contradictions,

and explanations, occupy a very large portion of the Blue Book. Nor does

it appear that the Commissioners are able to come to any clear

conclusion upon the matter. They labour hard, it is true, and put their

questions in every shape, to learn what seems to be simple enough—in

fact, whether any paint, put on a picture by the original painter, in a

thin transparent manner, has been removed by the cleaning process; but

the examined force their examiners into a labyrinth of words, of various

and tortuous uses, in which there is all bewilderment, and no

master-clue is given them by which they might escape into unobscured

ground. Thus, we see in the index the word “glazings” requires four

heads of examination—1. Explanation of the process; its susceptibility

to injury by cleaning. 2. How far it was used by the ancient masters. 3.

Proofs of glazings having been extensively used. 4. Removal by cleaning

of the glazings from certain pictures in the Gallery. There is, at

least, one certain conclusion to be drawn—that there was, and is, such a

thing as glazing. That is generally agreed upon—in fact, is only doubted

by the keeper, Mr Uwins, R.A.; and his denial, causing so much

astonishment, has raised a storm of contradictory opinions, which have

obfuscated the whole artistic atmosphere. The public attention had been

drawn to a supposed injury, said to have been inflicted on some of the

finest pictures in the National Gallery. The attack, through letters in

the _Times_, on the trustees, keeper, cleaners, and general system, was

so vigorous that the Commission of Enquiry became absolutely necessary,

in order either to allay the public alarm or to provide security for the

future. The result has been certainly to justify and confirm the alarm,

and to offer certain propositions for the better providing for the

safety and progressive improvement of our National Gallery. The system,

which includes the whole management of the Gallery, is condemned, in

unhesitating terms of compliment to those who _made_ the system, and who

ought to have made a better, or to have refused position in one so bad.

Yet we really think it is straining a point of grace to dignify the

general mismanagement with the title of “system” at all, for no regular

system seems ever to have been pursued from the beginning. As we showed

in our former article, (and not from our own surmise, but from the

evidence of a parliamentary report), our several Governments were never

in earnest with regard to the Fine Arts; and a National Gallery having,

by a kind of accident, been forced upon them, they chose trustees as to

an honorary office in which there was nothing to do, selected for their

title and rank rather than for their taste, knowledge, or ability. The

consequences have been sad indeed, and exhibit a catalogue of sins of

commission and omission. A National Gallery was founded thirty years

ago; what is the great production of these thirty years of peace? It is

the old fable of the mountain’s labour. The evidence as to losses

sustained by omission to purchase is quite vexatious; there is a long

list, to which every one acquainted with the picture world may make

additions. We have often and often expressed our astonishment, when we

have seen pictures on sale, wanted in the Gallery, and not purchased. To

say nothing of the greater schools, the Italian, less understood by

collectors of pictures, and for which there is as yet unhappily no

sufficient public taste—How many pictures of value, of the schools for

which a taste is professed, have been allowed to pass away, and many of

them sent out of the country? We allude to pictures of which there could

be no doubt, either as to their condition or originality. For instance,

how miserably poor is our gallery in the works of the younger

Vanderveldt, who may be almost classed as an English painter; yet the

country had an opportunity of making a purchase of that exceedingly fine

one sold from the collection of Sir Bethel Codrington. How poor are we

in the works of Ruysdael, of Hobbima—painters so highly estimated by

private collectors. We are not giving a preference to these schools; we

only show, that what entirely falls within the taste of all collectors

among us the nation disregards. An indifference has been proved. Did not

a member of the Government declare, in his place in Parliament, that it

was preferable that pictures should rather be in private collections

than in a public gallery?

We cannot subscribe to the censure passed on our Prime-Minister, Lord

Aberdeen, by a writer in the _Morning Post_, that he consented to the

purchase of two pictures which he never saw. Surely he was justified in

his reliance upon the recommendation of the Trustees, especially as he

was well aware of the difficulty of obtaining their consent to make any

purchases. But the inadequacy of the system is thus admitted. _Question_

5289.—“Your Lordship has probably become aware that a want of definite

and well-subdivided responsibility is the main defect of the institution

as it exists at present?”—“Yes, I think that where the trustees are

numerous, and their attendance is not compulsory, there is great

uncertainty; different persons attend on different days, and come with

different views and different projects.” But further on we have the real

cause of the difficulty exposed, the incompetency of the judges. _Q._

5319.—“Your Lordship is aware that opportunities have occurred for the

purchase of pictures which belonged to Mr Solly, Mr Conyngham, Mr Younge

Otley, and various other gentlemen; and some persons regret that we have

not availed ourselves of those opportunities. I presume your Lordship

conceives it might be desirable that authority should be given to a

limited body of trustees to give a positive recommendation in such cases

to the Chancellor of the Exchequer?”—“Yes, I think that would be very

useful; but at the same time, on all these subjects, people differ very

much among those who are generally supposed to understand matters of art

exceedingly well—I have never found two agree. In the case of pictures

not enjoying public notoriety and celebrity, you are always liable to

that: one man will think that he has found something that is invaluable,

while others will think that it is good for little or nothing. You are

always liable to a difference of opinion, and the selection must be left

to those who are admitted to be the best judges. I do not expect to see

a tribunal in which there will not often be a great difference of

opinion on matters of art.” Although his Lordship is aware that there is

in France, and Prussia, and other countries, “one supreme head, not an

artist, but a nobleman or gentleman of high attainments in those

matters, in whom the country has confidence,” he is also aware of the

hornet’s nest that free discussion is: in answer to question 5314, “Yes,

I believe so—a sort of minister; but in a country where there is the

same freedom of discussion that there is here, I should not envy the

person occupying such a position.” It would indeed be a responsibility

requiring a strong and firm mind. And “public confidence” is a variable

thing, as his Lordship may at the present moment shrewdly suspect; yet

we doubt not there would be many candidates for, or at least many having

sufficient confidence in themselves to accept, such a position. Such

might be found amongst the competent and incompetent. It is not

improbable that Mr Morris Moore, fully assured of his own taste and

knowledge, would accept it; or if Sidney Smith were living, he would be

likely to add that to the catalogue of undertakings to which Lord John

Russell would think himself fully equal, even though there would be a

chance of being flayed alive by public discussion and averted public

confidence. There are men who desperately love to give judgment _ex

cathedra_, whether it be about a Titian or a nation’s safety, and would

hardly be restrained though the fate of Sisanes were threatened them,

and they were to encounter the chance of being flayed, and their skins

made cushions for their successors in the same seat, to remind them of

the consequences of an ill judgment. Still we advocate the one supreme

head—a minister of the fine arts—and would have him choose his council;

nor should we be so unreasonable as to expect even such a one to be a

competent judge in all departments. Few, indeed, are so gifted. Sir

Robert Peel, who appears from the beginning to have taken great interest

in the Gallery, would scarcely have been a competent authority with

regard to Italian art; for, if we mistake not, in the public exhibition

of his pictures, a few years ago, there were none of any of the Italian

schools. We know no man whose general judgment we should so much rely

upon as Sir Charles Eastlake, for he is accomplished, not only as a

painter, but as a scholar of artistic research, and full of knowledge;

but we learn from himself, in his evidence before this Commission, that

when he was appointed to the keepership by Sir Robert Peel, he accepted

the office on the condition that he was only to be consulted on, and

responsible for, the purchase of Italian pictures. A minister of fine

arts should certainly be well acquainted with the finest works of art,

and they are undoubtedly of the Italian schools—a real knowledge of

these, to a great extent, implies a Catholic taste. The possessor of

such knowledge is not likely to be blind to the merits of other schools,

though his preference for the higher may have limited his search, and in

some measure lowered his zeal as a collector. He would, of course, have

subordinate officials, who would, for final judgment, refer to him; and

we should in no case fear his decision if he were versed in the

fundamental principles of art discoverable in the great schools of

Italy. There should be purveyors everywhere. But we have seen enough in

the pages of the Report to show that such employed purveyors should not

be selected from picture-dealers. Any one attached to the Gallery in

this capacity should be a sworn agent, bound to renounce all

picture-dealing as a trade, and not to accept anything whatever in the

shape of commission. We see no reason why he should ever have been in

the trade at all, quite sure that there are many gentlemen out of it

perfectly qualified to undertake the important duty.

The main object of the Commission being to discover if the charges of

injury, from cleaning certain pictures, have any foundation, it may be

thought somewhat strange that they scarcely come to a conclusion upon

the matter, which, if they had been inclined to trust to their

perception, would not have been a difficult task. They tell us that “the

preponderance of testimony is to the effect, that the appearance of the

pictures has been _rendered less agreeable by the operation of cleaning_

(the draught of Report says deteriorated)—in some of them, in regard to

their general aspect, by removal of the mellow tone which they

previously exhibited; in others, from special blemishes, which have

become apparent, and which in a former state of the pictures were not

perceptible.” In another place we are told, “the weight of evidence

varies considerably in respect of the effect produced upon each of the

nine pictures which have been lately subjected to the process of

cleaning.” We should have thought the _weight_ of evidence had been the

_preponderance_; the weighing down testimony, the turning the scale for

or against a varying weight, as a conclusion of evidence appears rather

unintelligible. There never was so great a weight of evidence as the

Blue Book itself. Did the Commissioners—admitting that, from the

examination of artists, amateurs, and picture-dealers, the only result

was “great contrariety of judgment and irreconcilable differences of

taste”—go to the pictures and examine for themselves? They did so. They

went “in company with several witnesses, and in some instances they had

also the advantage of engravings and painted sketches of the pictures,

so that the witness could point out in detail the precise grounds upon

which his conclusions were founded.” We did expect, when we came upon

this passage in the Report, that we should learn what the Commissioners

themselves thought after this inspection, especially as they had

immediately stated that the object of the inspection was, “_in order

that every facility_ might be afforded for _the elucidation of these

conflicting_ opinions.” But, no. They avoid throwing any opinion into

the scale; so that there is no positive decision; and at this

interesting point they suddenly turn aside, make, as it were, a ring, to

enjoy the stand-up fight of the conflicting opinions of Mr Morris Moore

and Mr Uwins the keeper, as some relief to the discrepancies among

themselves. We do not doubt that they did form a judgment in their own

minds, and can readily guess it. They are cautious, and avoid

pronouncing it. Indeed, the Commissioners seem to have been a little

vexed with Mr Morris Moore, and look unpleasantly upon him as a chief

accuser who had put into their hands a very disagreeable work, which

they do not at all sit easy under. They show their vexation in the

Report, p. xi., where, in commenting upon the contradictory evidence of

Mr Morris Moore and Mr Uwins, they embody in the Report the opinion of

Mr Uwins, who characterises the evidence of Mr M. Moore as “displaying a

mass of ignorance and want of intelligence.” And immediately, as if to

set aside the evidence of both, we presume by the context as prejudiced,

they say—“Your Committee wish to direct attention to the _unprejudiced_

[the italics are ours] opinions of many eminent artists and amateurs.”

So when Mr Morris Moore justly complains of insult from the unreproved

words used by Mr Farrer, “If the imputation came from a person who I

thought would be believed, I should take it up,” the Commissioners,

after clearing the room to consider the charge of Mr Moore, that he had

been insulted, came to the strange conclusion, not that Mr Farrer’s

words were no insult, but that “Mr Moore had himself frequently used

language towards others which might reasonably give offence.” Now this

is not fair. Offence may be given reasonably, and therefore admissibly;

but when it is of a nature to impugn the veracity generally, not as to

any particular fact, of a person under examination, as one not to be

believed, he has a right to demand protection; and if it be not given,

their right of examination ceases. There is a great difference between

what may be in the nature of the evidence offensive and what is

insulting. If Mr Moore had been equally guilty with Mr Farrer, the

Commissioners should, when so guilty, have reproved it; whereas they

make this their omission an excuse for not doing plain justice now.

Doubtless Mr M. Moore has given great offence by his evidence, but that

does not justify Mr Farrer in offering an insult which is not evidence;

nor are the Commissioners justified in their comment that Mr Moore had

given offence, without marking still more strongly the insult offered by

Mr Farrer, still unreproved. We are not acquainted with Mr Moore, nor do

we in any way take up his “_animosities_,” if he has any; but we think

towards him the Commissioners did not act quite fairly, nor consistently

with the dignity of their position.

We may not unaptly look upon their visit to the National Gallery as an

inquest on the bodies of certain old masters—say Claude, Titian,

Velasquez—for the charge had been made of positive murder. The decision

required—Were they dead, killed, murdered, or still alive and

well-looking? A physician once told us an anecdote in point. He, with

another physician, had been some time in attendance upon a patient. (We

believe the man was a baker). One day they went up-stairs as usual,

looked a moment or two at the poor man, then at each other

significantly, and walked out of the room. On the stairs they met the

wife, and tenderly informed her that she was a widow; and as a widow she

properly conducted herself, and saw the physicians depart. It so

happened that our friend, some weeks after, turning the corner of a

street, came suddenly against the baker—“What! aren’t you dead?” “No,”

said the man, “I recovered as soon as you left me.” A little farther on

he met the widow that should have been. Perhaps she had less reason to

be thankful than her recovered husband. She raised a tumult against the

physician, vociferating, “Pretty fellows you must be—much you must know

of your business, not to know whether a man be living or dead.” From

this, he said, he determined henceforth, on most occasions, to use only

dumb show, or ambiguous expressions. The Commissioners seem to have been

of this way of thinking. They cannot altogether acquit the irresponsible

responsibles—are unwilling to condemn; they adopt, therefore, a figure

not unknown in oratory, a mystification under the ambiguity of a varying

weight of evidence.[4]

We are, however, now in a position to hear the witnesses speak for

themselves. Such a mass of contradictions it will be difficult to find

elsewhere among professors of any other art or science. In the multitude

of counsellors there may be wisdom, but it is not the less hard to

extract it; and certainly one part of the wisdom is sometimes to conceal

it.

As “glazing” has been shown to be a fertile source of discrepancies of

opinion, and the whole question of the cleaning process so much depends

upon its existence or non-existence in certain works, and upon its

peculiar liability to injury, it may not be unimportant to examine the

testimonies concerning it.

What is the definition of glazing? Sir Charles Eastlake makes it to be,

“The passing a dark transparent colour over a lighter colour.” He also

draws a distinction between the Italian and Flemish glazing. “The

Italian practice is glazing over a solid, light preparation; the Flemish

is passing transparent colours over a light ground.” Mr Charteris doubts

the propriety of the definition; Sir Charles explains, “I would say

that, if a dark transparent colour be passed too thickly, even over a

white ground, so as to exclude the light entirely, it becomes opaque; on

the other hand, if an opaque colour be passed so thinly over a light

ground as to show the light through, it partakes of the nature of

glazing. There are pictures by Rubens, in which some of the tints are

produced in that way, with opaque colour in a diaphanous state. I was

about to state, when you called my attention to the meaning you attach

to glazing, that the system of passing a thin opaque colour over its

ground is called, in English technical phraseology, ‘scumbling;’ and the

passing a strictly transparent colour over its ground is called

‘glazing.’” It may appear very bold in us to question this definition of

the President of the Academy; yet we are inclined to do so, because we

think our artists have not agreed to adopt it, and because it leaves a

common mode of painting without any technical term; but if scumbling may

be allowed to express the thin, yet somewhat dry, rubbing in of opaque

colour, we may well leave glazing to the conception of it adopted by the

Italians, which strikes Sir Charles Eastlake as remarkable. “Now, it is

remarkable that the Italians have but one word for both operations—the

term _velare_ (to veil) comprehends both glazing and scumbling.” Nor do

we see any sufficient reason for confining glazing to dark over light.

We cannot but think it was the practice of the Italian schools, at least

some of them, to paint glazingly light over dark. Did not Correggio,

especially in his backgrounds, paint out the light, the white ground—if

he used always light grounds—with deep greys, not of a uniform tone, and

afterwards go over them, sometimes with dark transparent colour, and

sometimes semi-transparent, and so on lighter? The practice of Rembrandt

seems to want technical terms, if Sir Charles’s definition is to be an

authority. That eminent painter of mysterious effect, of “palpable

obscure,” certainly often painted glazingly semi-opaque lighter over

dark, as well as dark over light. It may be a question of practical art,

if it be not as desirable that dark under-painting should come out, or

slightly appear through a lighter, as that light should come up through

the dark. We never can be brought to believe that a white ground,

showing through dark glazings, will imitate all the depths of nature. It

was perhaps too much the practice of the Flemish schools, but they were

not schools from which we should learn the power of sentiment in

colouring. It was an expeditious practice, but it led to a conventional

colouring, sacrificing the truth of shadows, with the object (if

attained) of setting off, and giving body to the lights. We the rather

dwell upon this, because we believe that the Flemish system, and

particularly that of Rubens, has had an injurious influence upon modern

art. Rubens was a painter of great power, and dared an extravagance of

conventionality, which, in weaker hands, becomes a conspicuous fault.

Hence a thin, flashy, and flimsy style of painting, unnatural, because

unsubstantial;—we say unsubstantial; for, however illuminated, or

covered with transparency of light or of shadow, nature is ever

substantial. The Italian practice is, therefore, greatly to be

preferred.

It is well known that our Gainsborough said, that with black or blue,

and asphaltum, he would make a pit as deep as the Inferno; but it was a

mistake: with such dark transparency, especially over a light ground, he

would make no pit at all, but a hole scarcely the depth of his

mall-stick; his arm could reach to the end of it, as against a wall. In

the greatest depths of nature, there is a depth of dark below, not of

light, over which there is atmosphere. It is this depth that should come

up, not light. We are not unaware that any semi-opaque glazing over a

darker colour has a tendency to coldness, but it may not be the worse on

that account, as the painter has the choice of making his under-darks as

warm as he pleases, and his semi-opaque glazing warm too. This, cool, in

its various degrees over warm, was the method adopted by both the

Poussins: they painted on red ground, and that generally not light, but

of deep tone; as it was also pretty much the case with the Bolognese

school. Gaspar Poussin, by this method, gave great effect to his cool

greens in masses of wood, the red ground imperceptibly giving an under

warmth, the general masses being laid in with a body of colour, but

semi-transparent, as if chalk, or some transparent body, had been

embodied with the colour. In his pictures, cool greys, more or less

mixed with ochres, tell with great truth over the red ground. We hope

the condemnation passed by the President of the Academy upon this method

may not be quite merited. Indeed, the beauty of most of that great, we

should say greatest, of landscape-painter’s works, which are yet

uninjured by the cleaner, would contradict so strong an assertion, as

that they are sure to perish from the cause ascribed; for, as they have

survived at least two hundred years, Gaspar Poussin having been born in

1600, (and, it may be worth observing, Claude in the same year), we may

fairly presume that the work of time on white lead has already done its

worst; and we would almost doubt the effect ascribed to time, when we

look at the perfect pictures of the master, which appear as if fresh

from the easel, and certainly the white not too transparent. Sir Charles

is explaining why he objected to the cleaning certain pictures. “The

general reason I have given; but if you were to ask me about those

pictures, I should say of the two, Canaletti and the Poussin, that it is

extremely injudicious to clean pictures of that kind, because time, even

without any assistance from picture-cleaners, is sure to destroy such

pictures in the end; they are painted on a dark ground, and every

painter knows, that when white lead is thinly spread over a dark colour,

it becomes more or less transparent in time: white lead has a tendency

to grow transparent. If you were to paint a chess-board with a thin coat

of white lead, so as effectually to conceal the black squares, and not

suffer it to be touched, in a certain time, longer or shorter, according

to the thinness of the paint, the black squares would again become

apparent. The white lead has a tendency to grow transparent, and the

consequence is, that, when a picture is painted on a dark ground, time

does it harm rather than good.” We would, with some hesitation—for we

pay great deference to the opinions of Sir C. Eastlake—suggest another

cause for this appearance of the chess-board—the tendency of oil to

become a varnish, and therefore itself more transparent; and we are

inclined to think that, had the experiment been tried with any other

colour, ochres, or Naples yellow, the effect would have been the same.

Nay, what would be a still better test—had the whole board been covered

with black, the white squares, we believe, though concealed for a time,

would have appeared through. We also hope and trust that this effect of

time on the oil is on the whole rather beneficial than otherwise, and

that it is not continuous beyond a certain point. It is almost

incredible that either the oil or the white lead, laid on canvass two or

three hundred years ago, is now, at the present, and will be in future,

to a day of destruction, changing their properties. Then, with regard to

Gaspar Poussin, if such were really the case, the lights would be the

first to disappear; but, on the contrary, Mr Brown, who cleaned the Dido

and Æneas about thirty years ago, a very dark picture, gives another

kind of evidence. _Q._ 1128.—“Did you observe in that picture that a

very considerable part of the discolouring and blackness arose from

internal causes, from an internal alteration in the colours?”—“In some

instances; but the general effect of the picture was very much lowered

by the heterogeneous mass of oil that was upon it, and the very dark

parts did not, of course, come out, as you would imagine they would,

from the removal of that: the lighter parts were very brilliant, indeed,

but it was always a dark picture.” _Q._ 1130.—“Is there not something

peculiar in the ground on which Gaspar and Nicholas Poussin painted

their pictures, which rendered them liable to decomposition and

discolourment?”—“I think not so much the ground, as the colour which

they would put upon the ground, because the ground that you see in those

masters, where they have used it to assist them in painting the picture,

is an universal colour: in some parts of the picture, the ground is more

or less painted on, but all the light parts of Gaspar Poussin’s pictures

are very tender.” The differences of opinion with respect to glazing are

chiefly among the artists. Picture-cleaners and picture-dealers are in

better agreement. Even the artists who differ, perhaps differ more on

account of the definition not being very clear, and established in the

artists’ vocabulary, than as to the fact. But the evidence of the

present keeper, Mr Uwins, is certainly very extraordinary on this, as on

every point upon which his examination entered. We showed, in our last

paper, how he was present and absent at the cleanings at the same times;

how he gave evidence as to the methods adopted by the cleaners in his

presence, which the cleaners themselves very flatly contradicted; how he

astonished Lord Monteagle by assertions which his lordship denied; how

he protested he did not advise, yet did advise; and now we find, with

regard to this question of glazing, having contradicted nearly every one

else, he turns round, for lack of others, to contradict himself. His

first answers about glazing were most plain and unhesitating. Being

asked if the Venetian painters did not use glazing, and that, in

consequence, their pictures are liable to injury in cleaning, he says,

“That is a question that can never be settled, because nobody can prove

that they did use glazings.” _Q._ 116.—“Is it your opinion that they

did, or that they did not?”—“I believe that the best painters of every

school used very little, indeed, if any at all, of what is called

glazing. I think it quite a modern quackery, that has nothing to do with

the noble works of remote ages in art.” _Q._ 117.—“You consider the

theory, as to the Venetian painters having used very delicate glazings

in finishing off their pictures, is fallacious?”—“I do not admit those

glazings, as they are called; I believe that they sought for freshness

and pureness of colour, and depended on their knowledge of colour for

the harmony of their picture, and not on putting on what the Romans call

‘la velatura Inglese;’ they wished to obtain the vigour and freshness of

nature, or their pictures would not have lasted as they have.” _Q._

118.—“Will you explain to the Committee why the Romans (I presume you

mean the Romans of the present day) call that particular process by the

name of ‘la velatura Inglese?’”—“Because the English painters only adopt

it.” _Q._ 119.—“The English painters of the modern school?”—“It is only

those who adopt it; that is why it is especially called ‘la velatura

Inglese.’” This is very childish, to attempt to disprove the practice of

the old Roman, or other masters, by the supposed—for it is only

supposed—or assumed criticism of modern Romans, who can be no authority

upon the practice of modern art in this country. Having found, however,

that “velare” and “velatura” are old, not new terms of art, in another

examination Mr Uwins comes to his explanation, which is as extraordinary

as his first assertion. He contradicts himself, by admitting, that all

good painters did use glazings, and even asserts that he never denied

it, only in a particular sense. It is in vain that the Committee tell

him, they asked not the question in any particular sense; he slips out

of the hands of the examiner with wonderful lubricity. It is the hardest

thing to bring his comprehension to any sense whatever of the questions

put to him; and as to the unfortunate “velatura,” he has examined the

dictionary of the Academy of Bologna, and, although he has admitted its

meaning by the thing, as in practice they all glazed, yet, not to be

vanquished, even by his extracts from his dictionary, he pertinaciously

says, “I believe that both these extracts relate to the preparation of

the canvass.”

We fear the reader may be weary of this discussion on glazing, but we

must beg him to go a little further with us on the subject; it is

important, for if there were no glazings, both during the process and

final, no damage may have been done, in respect to them, for there could

be none to remove—a state of the case which some would fain establish,

if possible. The Committee take a great deal of trouble to get the

clearest evidence upon the point. We perfectly agree with Mr Morris

Moore in his evidence in this matter, and utterly repudiate the idea

that the mellow, warm, lucid tones of the old masters have been in any

degree given by time. He very appositely quotes the sensible Hogarth,

“Time cannot give a picture more union and harmony than has been in the

power of a skilful master, with all his rules of art, to do.” Mr Morris

Moore denies it, with the examples of Claude and Titian, and quotes

amply old authorities. We have immediately referred to Leonardo da

Vinci’s treatise on painting in general, a very puzzling book; but we

find a passage which shows that not only tone might be given by glazing,

but colours changed by it—that is, one colour over another, making a

third. He says, “A transparent colour being laid on another colour of a

different kind forms a third, partaking of each of the two simples that

compose it.” Mr Dyce, R.A., comes to the rescue of the Paul Veronese,

one of the recently cleaned pictures, showing from the authority of

Boschini, a satirical writer on art, of the seventeenth century, that

Paul Veronese did not glaze his draperies. The conclusion would of

course be, that in that respect the picture could not have been injured,

or that it is not the work of Paul Veronese. But surely the passage from

Boschini proves too much; for it asserts with regard to drapery an

impossibility, or at best a very unlikely thing, unless glazing be taken

into the account. For though Boschini is made to say, that Paul Veronese

never glazed his drapery, he is made also to say that “he was accustomed

to paint the shadows of drapery with lake, not only of red draperies,

but also of yellow, green, and even blue, thus producing an

indescribably harmonious effect.” But he had also said, that the painter

“put in the local tints of draperies first, painting the blue draperies

for the most part in water-colour.” It is, in the first place, most

unlikely that he left these draperies in water-colour only; it is more

probable that this first painting was entirely gone over, or his lake in

shadows would hardly have suited all the colours. We happen to have in

our possession a Venetian picture, which shows this Venetian practice of

lake, under blue drapery. It is a Palma; the subject, The Dead Christ,

The Virgin Mother, Mary Magdalene, and other figures. The foot of Mary

the Mother rests on a stone, on which is written Jacobus Palma. He was

the pupil of Titian, and is said to have finished a picture left

unfinished by Titian. The lake is very visible under the blue, which was

evidently put over it; and being rubbed off here and there, the red is

very conspicuous. We mention this, merely to show that so far Boschini

was right, and that the practice was not confined to Paul Veronese. And

is there not presumption in any one, whether painter or not—and Boschini

was no painter, or a poor one—to assert positively, that a master who

lived a generation before him did not use this or that process of

painting, having a choice of all, and skill to use them. Boschini’s

aversion was the abuse of varnishes; and it is curious that, among the

condemned recipes is the _olio d’abezzo_, for which there are other

authorities besides Armenini, and it is mentioned in the Marciana

Manuscript, supposed to have been the varnish of Correggio. Boschini is

speaking of _foreigners_, “forestiere,” not Venetians:—

“O de che strazze se fa cavedal

D’ogio d’avezzo, mastice e sandraca,

E trementina (per no dir triaca)

Robe che illusterave ogni stival.”

—MARCO BOSCHINI, _Vinisto Quinto_.

Mr Dyce is unfortunate upon one occasion in rejecting the evidence of

Armenini, “because he describes the practice of another school,” “his

own school, the school of Ferrara.” Upon this Mr Morris Moore is

somewhat sharp upon him, and quotes Armenini himself, to show that he

does not confine himself to any school, but speaks from the “practice

and example of the most excellent artists that have existed,” and that

he was of Faenza, not Ferrara.

Mrs Merrifield, in her valuable work on the ancient practice of

painting, the result of a Government Commission, expresses great

confidence in the information she received from a learned and skilful

Milanese painter and cleaner, Signor A. He had particularly studied the

works of Titian, and describes his practice. If his account be correct,

Titian certainly glazed over his lights as well as darks; and, like Paul

Veronese, by the account of Boschini, he painted the shadows of blue

drapery with lake. “He (Titian) then painted the lights with

flesh-colour, and laid by the picture to dry. After five or six months

he glazed the flesh with _terra rossa_, and let it dry. He then painted

in the shades transparently (that is without any white in the shadows),

using a great deal of asphaltum[5] with them.” “He also said, that in a

blue drapery he painted the shades with lake, and then laid on the

lights (with white); that these colours were laid on with great body,

and, when dry, he took a large brush and spread the biadetto over the

whole.” This biadetto was used by Paul Veronese; we suppose it was a

blue from copper, and, owing to its liability to turn green, used

without oil. Now, if such was the practice of Titian, it was most likely

in some degree the practice also of Paul Veronese, who, though younger,

was contemporary with Titian. We somewhat enlarge upon this question

here, because, by the evidence given, doubts were thrown upon the

originality of the “Consecration of St Nicolas,” or to prove that no

glazings had been removed.

We shall not pursue this subject further, concluding that, whatever

practice is in use now by various artists was known by the ancient

masters, and some things more, which are either lost or uncertainly

recovered. No one has paid greater attention to this subject, or applied

to it more research and discrimination, than Sir Charles Eastlake. We

still look for more valuable and decisive information from him,

especially with respect to the Italian schools.

We are certainly surprised at the opinions given by artists of eminence

as to the condition of the Claude, “The Queen of Sheba;” that Mr

Stansfield should confirm his opinion of its being uninjured “from the

extremities of the trees next the sky, and the foliage generally,”

because those very parts have appeared to our eyes so feeble, so washy,

as if at some time or other painted on by another hand than Claude’s: we

say the same also, somewhat fearlessly, of the edges of the trees in the

small upright Claude. The outlining, too, of the cloud in the Queen of

Sheba is of the same feeble handling; and the upper and lower tones of

the sky are quite out of agreement. Mr Stansfield and others think time

will restore the lost tone and harmony: we cannot comprehend this

judgment. If time can give that peculiar warm glow of Claude, we should

see that time had done this kind or unkind office on the works of other

painters, as cold as that picture is now. There were many who avoided

this glow, as unsuited to their subjects; we do not see that time has in

this respect converted any of them into Claudes. There is Claude’s

imitator, Swannevelt, without the glow; but take Ruysdael, who painted

upon an opposite principle—we never see that glow thrown over his

pictures. His fresh blue and white skies are still free from that yellow

toning of time’s fingers. It comes to this—either Claude painted his

peculiar glow, or time did for him. If Time did it for him, Time must

have been constrained by his office and nature to do the same thing for

others. He did not do so for others, or Claude’s would not be a glow

peculiar to him—_ergo_, Claude did the work, and not time. But time is

also supposed to do this ameliorating work very speedily. Mr Stansfield

thinks “we all must allow that the Cuyp has recovered its tone.” Will it

be allowed? There is, and was after the cleaning of that picture in

1844, a pink colouring in the sky, which put the whole picture out of

harmony, which, if painted by Cuyp, to be like his other works, could

only have been an under-tone, and by him gone over with another, which

must have been at some time or other removed.

How could so skilful a marine painter as Mr Stansfield look accurately

at the water from the foreground to the distance in the Claude and think

it uninjured? The very forms of the waves, in the second and third

distances, are interrupted and faint. An argument has been brought,

that, if the sky had been injured, the ropes would have suffered.

Besides that it is merely assumed that they have not suffered, that

argument is fallacious. We have the authority of a very experienced

picture-cleaner, and one well acquainted with pictures and all

processes, which tends to a contrary proof. De Burtin, in his treatise

on picture-cleaning, says: “A point of the utmost importance, and which

never must be lost sight of, is this, that among the glazings there will

be found some which, although very transparent and delicate, it is

nevertheless very difficult to injure, because they have been laid on

the colour when fresh, and have become thoroughly incorporated and

united therewith; and, on the contrary, there will be found others, and

sometimes not so transparent and delicate, but which will yet be injured

very readily, because they stand separate from, and do not adhere to the

colour beneath them, that having been almost dry ere they were put on.”

Now, supposing that Claude’s glow were—we say not that it was—an

after-glaze, the ropes may have been put in on the wet sky. Does any one

think that Claude’s skies were painted at one painting, or even two?

Mr Stansfield had used the words “raw and disagreeable;” but being asked

if he thought that picture raw and disagreeable when it left Claude’s

easel? replies, No. We must in justice say, that he somewhat modifies

the expression. “Perhaps I have used a wrong term in saying ‘raw’ and

‘disagreeable,’ for we all paint for time to have some effect upon our

pictures.” Notwithstanding Mr Stansfield’s great experience, we more

than doubt this fallacy as to time. We know it to be, and to have been,

a favourite maxim of many painters of the English school, that time will

remedy rawness, and make their works in mellowness what those of the

ancient masters were. We utterly disbelieve it, and for the following

reasons: It is out of character with the mind of genius purposely to

leave a work incomplete. The idea of perfection being in the mind, the

hand cannot resist the operation. Then, has time had that effect upon

more modern works? We appeal for evidence to the Vernon Gallery. Are the

pictures there better than when they were fresh from the easel? Not one,

we verily believe, and _know_ some to be much worse. This was a notion

of Constable’s and his followers, and it has infected the minds of too

many. He painted as if he would frost his pictures with white—has time

finished them to his conceived perfection? Those who trust to time must,

we fear, also trust to the picture-cleaner and picture-toner, against

whom there is, rather inconsistently, a considerable outcry. This is a

point not requiring a test of long ages. Mr Stansfield himself thinks

“The Queen of Sheba” will recover its tone in six months, and that from

1846 to the present time the satisfactory change has taken place in the

pictures cleaned.

With regard to Claude’s general yellow tone, there remains yet a

question to be asked—Did he take it from nature, or did he add it with a

view of improving nature? Quite aware that the question will shock the

Naturalists, we still venture it. In the first place, be it observed—and

we have noticed it elsewhere in the pages of this Magazine—nature will

bear great liberties with regard to colour, without losing her

characteristics. Colour may be said, in this sense, to be the poetical

language of nature. It is astonishing that any can doubt whether or not

this view of nature was taken by the Ancient Masters. It is

unfashionable now. To apply this to Claude: In Sir David Brewster’s

evidence, we find mention made of “Claude glasses,” some of which he

produced. He considered that, looking through these, the tone would be

much restored to the eye. “I conceive,” he says, “this (the yellow tone)

is proved by the glasses, which I have produced, having got the name of

Claude Lorraine glasses from their giving that general tone to nature

that characterises all his pictures.” This leads to a slight discussion

on the subject of the glasses. Mr B. Wall asks Sir David, “Are you not

aware that, about forty-five years ago, those Claude Lorraine glasses

were introduced and sold, three, or four, or five together, and they

were very much used by tourists who used to see the English Lakes?—were

they not of different colours—blue, pink, green, and almost every

shade?” “No such name was given to such glasses as you refer to in your

question.” Mr B. Wall: “I venture to differ from your high authority,

and to think that the glass which you call a Claude Lorraine glass is

not the only glass that went by that name; and therefore that the

inference which you have drawn, that the yellow one was the proper one

to use when you looked at Claude’s pictures, was not correct.” Mr

Stirling asks if there is not another thing called a Claude Lorraine

glass, “a piece of coloured glass which is used to reduce the landscape,

and reflect it like the surface of a mirror?” Sir David says, he never

saw it done with coloured glass. The difference between the glass spoken

of by Sir David, and that by Mr B. Wall, does not seem very

important,—it being that one admits other colours more freely than the

other. Mr Wall is not, however, quite correct in limiting the invention

to forty-five years ago. We have one in our possession which we know to

have been in existence very near a century, and it has always been

called a Claude glass. I believe it has been in use, as was the black

glass, in the days of the Old Masters. The effect on the natural

landscape is curious, and worth recording. The yellow glass is very

extraordinary: it wondrously heightens the lights, so that a sky, for

instance, in which scarcely an illuminated cloud is seen, looked at

through this glass, exhibits great variety of parts. Shadows are

deepened, and light strengthened; real colours not lost, but as it were

covered with a glaze. We have always been of opinion that Rembrandt used

it, his pictures are so like nature seen through that medium. It mostly

reduces the blue, making it greenish. There was a little picture of

Rembrandt exhibited some years ago at the Institution in Pall-Mall,

which presented exactly the effect we speak of. It was a most simple

subject—a hilly ground, on the undulating summit of which, on one side,

was a village church among trees, on the other a few scattered houses,

all dark, against the sky; from the division of the hill, a road very

indistinct came down to the foreground, which, to the right, melted off

into a dark brook, going into deep shade, where it was lost. The sky was

exceedingly luminous—a cloud rising over the village, such as would

“drop fatness,” and the whole tone of that greenish-grey, with

rich-toned illuminations, which the Claude glass constantly presents to

the eye. In a paper of this Magazine of 1847, in which we had occasion

to speak of colour, and the habit of the Old Masters in deviating from

the common, obvious colouring of nature, we alluded to this Claude

Lorraine glass. “This may be exemplified by a dark mirror—and, better

still, by a Claude glass, as it is called, by which we look at nature

through coloured glasses. We do not the less recognise nature—nay, it is

impossible not to be charmed with the difference, and yet not for a

moment question the truth. We are not here discussing the propriety of

using such glasses—it may be right, or it may be wrong, according to the

purpose the painter may have. We only mean to assert, that nature will

bear the changes and not offend any sense. The absolute naturalness,

then, of the colours of nature, in its strictest and most limited sense,

local and aërial, is not so necessary as that the eye cannot be

gratified without it. And it follows, that agreeability of colour does

not depend upon this strict naturalness.”

We learn from Mrs Merrifield, that Signor A. showed her a black mirror,

which had belonged to Bamboccio (Peter Van Laer). “This mirror was

bequeathed by Bamboccio to Gaspar Poussin; by the latter to some other

painter, until it ultimately came into the hands of Signor A.” It is

admitted by Mr Seguier himself, as by other witnesses, that Claude

painted thinly, semi-opaque over dark, but this is called “scumbling.”

It is, however, in fact, if done with a free hot dry brush, a glaze, and

he may have thus toned his pictures. That tone once removed, as in the

case of the Sheba, we believe irrecoverable but by such a master-hand as

put it on, and possessed of the same pure medium. We fancy we discover

in the working that a great deal of the detail of his pictures was

painted in this method. To expect that time only will restore that fine

glow is worthy the philosopher of Laputa, and his resolution to extract

sunbeams from cucumbers. Poor Claude! Professors of the art of painting

are far worse off than professors of literature, whose tormentors are

but the printer’s devil and the compositor. The poor painter has an

endless generation of tormentors. The “Quidlibet audendi” is not his

motto; his genius will never be half so daring as the hands of his

scrubbers. Let him sit at his easel, and, in his enthusiasm, throw

sunshine from his brush, and dream fondly that it will be eternal; a

host of cleaners are looking over his shoulder, or lurking in secret, to

catch the treasure, and smudge his dream and his work out for ever. And

when they have visibly, too visibly, done their worst, old Time, that

used to be represented as the “Edax rerum,” the general destroyer, is

introduced as a newly-dubbed professor of the art of cleaning and

restoring by dirt.

We do not, however, wish to speak disrespectfully of picture-cleaners,

or picture-varnishers, or picture-dealers. There are many very skilful

and very useful, and, of dealers, honourable and liberal. Nor do we say

this without knowledge; yet habit creates boldness, and removes caution.

Like the medical profession, cleanership, it is to be feared, must kill

before it has learned to cure. But the professors sometimes forget the

wholesome rule, “Fiat experimentum in corpore vili.” Even the wise Sir

David Brewster confesses to having dabbled in destruction. There is not

a man of note in it but must have killed his man; and few are so happy

as the wonderful Mr Lance, to make a new one so well that none can tell

the difference. Indeed, Mr Lance’s magic brush did a great deal more. A

cleaner had wiped out of existence whole members—man and horse;

sometimes had left half a horse, and scarcely half a man, and sometimes

had ironed them all out together. Mr Lance brought all to life again,

without having ever seen one of them; and all so like, that their most

familiar acquaintances had never missed them, nor known they had ever

been defunct. Yet was his modesty equal to his skill. He never boasted

of his performance. Man and horse were revivified, and remounted, and

caracoled with the utmost grace and precision before himself and the

public, with unbounded applause; and the wonderful restorer was

contented to sit quietly in a corner, as if unconscious of his own

creations, and deaf to the loudest blast of Fame’s trumpet. If we have

wearied our readers with too long discussions upon technicalities, we

can now make amends by retiring behind the scenes, first introducing Mr

Lance himself, who will be as amusing to others as he has been to us.

But there is a prologue to every play; we would not usher in so

celebrated a performer without one.

Every one acquainted with the National Gallery knows the Velasquez

“Boar-hunt.” It was always a celebrated picture, and henceforth will be

more celebrated than ever. In the very Index of the Report it occupies

more than a whole page. The famous Erymanthian boar never gave half the

sport, though it required a Hercules to kill him. But there is a

difference: he was killed, and frightened people after he was dead; this

boar was killed, and brought to life again, and pleased every one ever

after. It had been hunted in many countries, and would have been hunted

in many more, had it not received its Apotheosis from the hand of Sir

Robert Peel, and found a place in the galaxy of the National Gallery.

This picture was presented to Lord Cowley by the Court of Spain; and

from him came into the hands of Mr Farrer, a dealer in pictures. By him

it was sent to Holland, having been refused by our Gallery, and offered

to the king, who rejected it. On its return from Holland, Mr Farrer left

it in its case, in his front shop, with the direction on it to his

Majesty the King of Holland—no direction to Mr Farrer appearing. Mr B.

Wall, one of the Commissioners, sees the case, and asks what it

contains; is told the Velasquez: has the “impression,” but is not quite

certain, that Mr Farrer told him it was going to the King of Holland. Mr

B. Wall upon this goes to Sir Robert Peel, and both fear the picture may

be lost; and, with the sanction and at the desire of Sir R. Peel, it was

purchased for the Gallery. Now, Mr B. Wall was not the only person who

saw the case in Mr Farrer’s shop. Mr Morris Moore was one, and, as he

says, there were many others. He names two—Mr Coningham and Mr Chambers

Hall—to all of whom Mr Farrer, according to the evidence of Mr Morris

Moore, told the same tale—namely, “that the Trustees were but just in

time to save it from exportation to the King of Holland.” This Mr Farrer

stoutly denies, and Mr Morris Moore offers to take his oath to the fact.

In the denial, Mr Farrer states, that he may have said he was going to

send it _abroad_, for that he intended to offer it in Paris; but, after

a while, speaks rather uncertainly, not knowing exactly where abroad he

should have sent it; but it is possible he may have intended again to

send it to Holland, under a kind of conviction that the King of Holland

would, after all, have it. Then he asserts that the visit from, and

conversation with, Mr Morris Moore upon the subject were before, not

after, the picture had gone to Holland. Mr Moore, on the other hand, is

positive it was after it had returned, because it was then secured for

the National Gallery, and Mr Farrer admits it was not so secured till

after its return from Holland. This is, as far as we can make it, a

plain statement, in abstract, from the evidence. The Commissioners leave

these “discrepancies” where they found them; so do we. It is a common

saying that truth lies somewhere between two contradictory statements.

Wherever it may appear to lie, there appears but little space, on any

intermediate ground, upon which it could, by any possibility, stand

upright. This little history has seen the picture lodged in the Gallery.

We must beg the reader to imagine it not as yet to have been located,

that he may learn a little of its antecedents. Lord Cowley had placed

the picture in the hands of Mr Thane to keep, where it remained some

years. But Mr Lance shall tell the tale. “After a considerable time, Mr

Thane, as I heard afterwards, had been commissioned to clean the

picture, and reline it. A colourman was employed to reline the picture,

a most skilful man, and, in relining it, I understand, he blistered it

with hot irons.... When the picture was returned to Mr Thane in this

condition, it naturally distressed him very much; he was a very

conscientious man, and he became very deeply distressed about it: he saw

the picture passing over his bed in procession. After a certain time, he

thought it got worse, and that the figure of it was more attenuated; and

at length he fancied he saw a skeleton. In fact, the poor man’s mind was

very much injured. It was then proposed that he should employ some

painter to restore the picture; and three persons were selected for that

purpose. Sir David Wilkie, Sir Edwin Landseer, and myself, were

mentioned; but it was supposed that neither Sir David Wilkie nor Sir

Edwin Landseer would give their time to it, and that probably I might;

and, therefore, the picture was placed with me, with a representation

that, if I did not do something to it, serious consequences would follow

to the cleaner. I undertook it, though I was very much employed at the

time; and, to be as short as possible, I painted on this picture. I

generally paint very rapidly, and I painted on that occasion as

industriously as I could, and was engaged for six weeks upon it. When it

was completed, Lord Cowley saw it, never having been aware of the

misfortune that had happened to the picture. It was then in Mr Thane’s

possession, and remained with him some time afterwards. From that time I

saw no more of the picture until it was exhibited in the British Gallery

some time afterwards, where it was a very popular picture, and was very

much thought of. Since then, I have heard it was sold to the nation; and

twice I have seen it in the National Gallery. I saw it only about a week

ago, and I then thought it was not in the same condition (indeed, I am

certain it is not) as when it was exhibited in the British Gallery

formerly, after I had done it.” This is sufficient evidence that the

picture has been damaged in cleaning. Let us pursue the story through

question and answer.

“_Q._ 5124. What was the state of the picture when it came into your

hands? There were portions of the picture entirely gone.—_Q._ 5125. What

portions? Whole groups of figures, and there was a portion of the

foreground entirely gone also.—_Q._ 5126. Do you mean that celebrated

group which is so often copied—the man in a red coat? That is original.

I think that any man, with any knowledge of art, will see at once that

that is original; and I am only surprised that it has not been seen that

other parts are original also.—_Q._ 5127. Which portions of these groups

did you chiefly restore? You are very near the mark when you speak of

the red coat; it is the group on the right hand; the outlines were

entirely gone.—_Q._ 5128. Do you mean to say, that the whole of the

paint was removed from that part of the picture? Entirely.—_Q._ 5129.

Was the canvass laid bare? Entirely.—_Q._ 5130. What guide had you in

repainting those groups? Not any.—_Q._ 5131. Did you paint groups that

you yourself imagined and designed? Yes.—_Q._ 5132. Did Lord Cowley not

distinguish any difference in the groups? Not any.—_Q._ 5133. What was

the extent of paint wanting on that group which you say you repainted on

the right—was it a portion as large as a sheet of note-paper? Larger,

considerably; the figures themselves are larger than that.—_Q._ 5134.

Was it as large as a sheet of foolscap? About that size, I should

imagine.—_Q._ 5135. There was a piece of the original paint wanting as

large as that? Yes, in the foreground.—_Q._ 5136. It was totally

wanting, and the canvass to that extent laid bare—is that so? Yes.—_Q._

5137. And on that bare canvass you painted the groups of figures we see

now? Exactly.—_Q._ 5138. Will you have the goodness to describe to the

committee any other portions of the picture where the paint was in a

similar or in an analogous state? The whole of the centre of the picture

was destroyed, with slight indications here and there of men; there were

some men without horses, and some horses without men.—_Q._ 5139. That is

in the arena? Yes.—_Q._ 5140. You are speaking of the figures on

horseback? Yes: some riders had no horses, and some horses had no

riders.”

We must curtail the evidence for want of space. It appears that his

brush, taking the number of square feet, went over a great deal more

than half. He is sorry to say it is now gone back to “Velasquez

mutilated.” But are there not infallible judges to discover all this

repainting? “I may mention that, many years ago, when the picture was at

the British Gallery, I was invited by a member of the Academy to go and

look at it; and I went there; Mr Seguier and Mr Barnard (who was also a

picture-cleaner) were present. They said, ‘I know what you have come

for; you have come to see the magnificent Velasquez.’ I said, ‘Well, I

have;’ and, with the greatest simplicity in the world, I said it gave me

a notion that some part had been much repaired and painted upon: upon

which Mr Barnard, the keeper of the British Institution, said

immediately, ‘No, you are wrong there; we never had a picture so free

from repair in our lives.’ I did not think it at all desirable to make

any statement,” &c. He hopes there is no engraving of the picture, for

the group in the foreground, entirely his, would be detected

immediately.

So much for Mr Lance’s doings with this celebrated Boar-hunt, which,

whatever part of it may be by Mr Lance, we are very glad to see in our

National Gallery, and should have been more glad if they had abstained

from cleaning it. But Mr Lance has further amusement for us. That

account is the serious play in which he was principal actor. We shall

see him again in the entertainment. It has a very excellent

title—“Diogenes in search of an Honest Man.” The part of Diogenes, Mr

Lance; the point being, the vain search for a time, but discovered at

last—in whom? In a negro. This was Mr Diogenes Lance’s satirical

discovery. There are countries where the scene must not be exhibited. He

shall tell the story. “_Q._ 5230. Have you ever restored any other

picture in the ordinary course of your professional practice? During the

time I was engaged upon that picture at Mr Thane’s, he had a picture

belonging to the Archbishop of York, to which rather an amusing thing

occurred.—_Q._ 5231. What was the subject of it? It was a picture of

Diogenes in search of an Honest Man, by Rembrandt; a portion of it was

much injured. Mr Thane said to me, ‘I wish you would help me out in this

difficulty.’ He did not paint himself.—_Q._ 5232. Which Archbishop was

it? The Archbishop of York. I said, ‘What am I to do? tell me what you

want.’ He said, ‘There’s a deficiency here—what is it?’ I said, ‘It

appears to me very much as if a cow’s head had been there.’ He said, ‘It

cannot be a cow’s head; for how could a cow stand there?’ I said, ‘That

is very true; there is no room for her legs.’ I fancied first one thing,

then another: at one time, I fancied it was a tree that was wanting; and

at length I said, ‘Well, I will tell you what will do—if you will let me

put in a black man grinning, that will do very well, and rather help out

the subject.’ He said, ‘Could you put in a black man?’ I said, ‘Yes, in

a very short time;’ and in about half an hour I painted in a black man’s

head, which was said very much to have improved the picture. Shortly

afterwards Mr Harcourt came in, and seeing the picture, he said, ‘Dear

me, Mr Thane, how beautifully they have got out this picture! my father

will be delighted. We never saw this black man before.’ And that is the

extent of my picture-repairing.” Mr Lance is a man of humour. When Mr

Harcourt came to examine the picture, did what his namesake Launce in

the play said occur to the painter? This is “the blackest news that ever

thou heard’st.” But no; both Lances were discreet in their humour, and

the one thought like the other—“Thou shalt never get a secret from me

but by a parable.” The idea of a black man grinning at the folly of

Diogenes, in looking for an honest man among the whites, was a most

original piece of humour, worthy the concentrated geniuses of all the

Launces that ever were.

All the world knew Mr Lance’s powers as a painter of still life; he has

now doubly established his fame, and notwithstanding that his modesty

would look shy upon his performances on the Velasquez “The Boar-hunt,”

as nobody else has been startled by them, we sincerely hope they will be

allowed to remain—that is, as much of them as the cleaners have spared.

We hope, also, that no experimentalists in nostrums will be allowed to

reiterate the attempt of the fable, and try to “wash his blackamore

white.” Let this be the picture’s motto—“Hic niger est, hunc

tu——caveto.”

It is to be feared that picture-cleaning has become a necessary evil, as

patients who have been long under the hands of empirics must needs have

recourse to regular practitioners to preserve even a sickly life.

Empirical nostrums must be got out of the constitution, for by a habit

of maintenance, however advantageous they may appear at first, they are

sure to side with the disease, and kill the patient. There is the first

Mr Seguier’s boiled oil, that terrible black dose—must that be allowed

to remain? Then comes the question, by what desperate remedies is it to

be eradicated? There is the Gaspar Poussin landscape near the injured

Claude “Queen of Sheba,” the “Abraham and Isaac:” we remember it a very

beautiful clear picture. It is now all obscured; there are large brown

patches in the once lucid sky. As so large a proportion of the pictures

in the Gallery are suffering under this oil-disease, and seem to

petition for a ticket to the hospital, we offer a suggestion made by De

Burtin, that experienced and cautious cleaner, who speaks with utter

abhorrence of the oiling system. He says that he tried every secret of

his art without success; “continuing always my experiments, however,

though with little hope, I have at length had the happiness to find in

the application of this same oil itself the means of so softening the

old oil, that I have afterwards, with spirit of wine, removed both the

oils, new and old together, without at all injuring the picture.

Although this plan has succeeded equally well with four pictures on

which I had occasion to employ it, yet I must not be understood to hold

it out as infallible until, from the number of the cases in which it is

tried, and the uniformity of its success, it shall earn for itself that

title; but, persuaded that the want of other known means will induce

connoisseurs to make trial of this one, I feel desirous to put them in

possession of all the information that I myself have in regard to it. My

four pictures, all painted on panel, were evidently covered with an oil

which gave them an aspect alike sad and monotonous, and which seemed to

be of many years’ duration. I gave them a coat of linseed oil during the

warmest days of summer, renewing once, and even twice a-day, the places

on which it seemed to be absorbed. On the twelfth day the oil on one of

the pictures was become so softened that it clung to my finger. I then

employed good spirit of wine, without any other admixture whatever, to

remove all the oil which I had put upon the picture; and the pleasure I

experienced was only equalled by my surprise, when I saw the vivacity of

the colours restored under my hands as the spirit of wine removed the

old oil along with the new. After a few days’ interval, the other three

pictures gave me renewed occasion for congratulation by the same

results, and with equal success.”

De Burtin has at least the great merit of having no concealments in his

practice. And here the Commissioners have done well in recommending that

no varnishes be used, the ingredients of which are kept secret. Mr

Farrer thinks he is the only person in this country using gum damas. He

is mistaken—we have used it many years, and agree with him that it is

far less liable to chill than mastic. The recommendation, also, that,

before cleaning a picture, an able chemist should be applied to, is a

proper precaution, which would, of course, include varnishing. That

pictures may not be subject to secret varnishes, the only one we would

have kept secret is that mentioned by Mr Niewenhuys, the

experimentalising in which brought the indignation of the court of

Lilliput on the unfortunate Gulliver. Picture-scourers have been

hitherto a ruthless race—with their corrosives they take the life’s

blood out of the flesh of works, like true Vampires, and appropriately

enough talk of _vamping_ them up. Few are as conscientious as Mr Thane,

to be persecuted with the “processions” of the skeletons they make.

There is an amusing story illustrated by Cruikshank. A lover, anxious

for the safety of his sick mistress, goes about seeking physicians; he

is gifted, for the occasion, to see over the doors of the faculty the

ghosts of the patients they had killed. It is within doors we would have

the picture possessor go. The outer shop of the cleaner is

enchanting—perhaps it may exhibit a face half of which is cleaned, and

half dirty, that, according to Mr Ford’s notion of looking better and

worse, customers may take their choice of the dingy or the clean. The

connoisseur and collector need have some “Diable Boiteux” to take them

unseen into the interior laboratories where the ghosts and skeletons lie

concealed, while the Medea’s pot is on the fire, whose boiling is to

transfer new flesh to the dry bones, that they may be produceable again,

as they often are, novelties of a frightful vigour and unnatural

sprightliness, to be reduced to an after-sobriety under a regimen of

boiled oil and asphaltum. Even Mr Lance’s work, which was believed to be

original, has been obscured and otherwise damaged. Salvator Rosa’s

“Mercury and the Woodman,” is as if it had been dipped in “the sooty

Acheron.” There is little pleasure in looking at pictures in such a

state. Altogether, then, to leave pictures “black, dirty, and in a

filthy state,” a condition which Mr Stansfield[6] properly abominates,

is to mislead the public, whom to instruct is one great object of a

National Gallery. But who is to restore the gem-like lustre when once

removed? There should be a cleaning, or rather a preservation committee.

Philosophers say, that diamonds are but charcoal; none have, however,

succeeded in converting the carbon into diamonds; but it may be possible

to convert the diamonds of art into charcoal, or into something worse,

“black, dingy, and filthy.”

We scarcely know where to stop with so large a volume as this Report,

with its evidence before us. The questions, with their answers, amount

to the astonishing number of 10,410! We necessarily leave much matter

untouched, very much interesting matter—We would gladly enlarge upon

some of the suggestions thrown out in our article on this subject of

December, but adequate space in this Magazine may not be allowed. Yet we

will refer to one suggestion, because it is now the very time that

public attention should be directed to it; we mean the appointment of

Professorships of the Fine Arts at our Universities of Oxford and

Cambridge. Lord Palmerston’s letter to the Chancellor of Cambridge shows

that great changes are in contemplation. Such professorships would be a

graceful offering to the universities, who may have been a little

suspicious of the movement of a commission; and we feel sure, that

nothing could be more promotive of the fine arts, the real taste of the

country, or more beneficial, as leading the educated to pursuits of a

high and noble nature. We will not attempt to discuss the “Removal of

the Gallery.” The Blue Book affords details, and plans of site. The

appendix is full of valuable information; but it contains matter upon

which we feel some alarm. We know there is a scheme, under peculiar

favour, to make our National Gallery a Chronological Almanac of Art,

than which nothing can be more worthless or more beyond the objects for

which we should have a National Gallery at all. What we should collect

is a large subject, which we may feel disposed to consider more at large

in a future article.

The public will now inquire, what is to be the result of this

pains-taking Commission? We are aware that the Chairman repudiates the

Report. It is one to which he does not give his assent. We know not the

particulars in which he differs from the Report as agreed upon. We could

have wished, for the sake of the arts, that there had been no

difference.

Of this there can be no doubt, that the system, if such it may be

called, is most unsatisfactory. If we would have a National Gallery at

all, the public have a right to demand that it shall be one befitting

the dignity of the country and the objects proposed by such an

establishment, none of which, it is manifest from the entire evidence,

can be realised unless the trust be thoroughly revised. Evils to be

avoided are now laid bare to sight. If it be true,

“They say best men are moulded out of faults,”

there are faults enough to mould them out of. May we not, then,

entertain a hope that we shall have a National Gallery?

A GLANCE AT TURKISH HISTORY.

Had history recorded the increase and decrease in the numbers of mankind

with the attention it has bestowed in chronicling the names of the

worthless dynasties which have devoured the wealth of nations, and

annihilated the accumulations of national industry, the history of the

Turks would occupy a prominent place in the annals of the human race. No

other people has made such extensive conquests. They subdued China

before the Moguls, and they formed a considerable part of the armies of

Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, which subdued Russia and ravaged Syria. Even

at the present day, though fallen from their ancient power, they are

spread over a considerable portion of Europe and Asia, from the Adriatic

and the Danube to the lake Baikal and the sources of the Lena. Their

original seats are supposed to lie round the Altaï mountains. The

Turkish nations of the present day, besides the descendants of the

Seljouks, the Turkomans, and the Othomans, who dwell in the sultan’s

dominions, are the Usbeks, the Ugours, the Kirgises, the Baskirs, the

tribe called Nogay Tartars, and the so-called Tartars of Astrakan and

Kasan. The real Tartars, or Moguls, are a different people, and the

Kalmuks on the Volga are of Tartar, not Turkish race.

The only modern European nations which pretend to be mentioned in

Scripture, are the Turks and Russians. Historical antiquaries tell us

that Togarmah is used for Turk; and they affirm, that the Targhitaos of

Herodotus, whom the Scythians called the founder of their nation, and

the son of Jupiter, is identical with the Togarmah of Moses and

Ezekiel.[7]

The Russians can boast of much more precise notice in Scripture than

their enemies the Turks. Though their name is omitted in our

translation, it occurs in the Septuagint three times, and under the

peculiar ethnic denomination in which it reappears in the Byzantine

historians. The word is Ῥὼς, and on this name Gibbon remarks, “Among the

Greeks this national appellation has a singular form as an undeclinable

word;” but he does not mention that it is found in the Septuagint. The

second and third verses of the thirty-eighth chapter of Ezekiel,

according to the Greek text, read thus: “Son of man, set thy face

against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of the Russians

(ἄρχοντα Ῥὼς), Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him, and say,

Thus saith the Lord God, I am against thee, O chief prince of the

Russians, Meshech and Tubal.” And again, in the first verse of the

thirty-ninth chapter: “Therefore, son of man, prophesy against Gog, and

say, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the

chief prince of the Russians, Meshech and Tubal.”

The Russians are said also to be noticed in the Koran, though not with

the same distinctness, under the name of Al Rass. In the chapter Al

Forkan, which is the twenty-fifth of Sale’s translation, it is said, “We

have prepared for the unjust a painful torment. Remember Ad and Tamud,

and those who dwelt at Al Rass.” In the chapter called the letter Kaf,

which is the fiftieth of Sale’s translation, we also find: “The people

of Noah, and those who dwelt at Al Rass, and Thamud, and Ad, and

Pharaoh, accused the prophets of injustice.”

The earliest authorities, however, who furnish us with an account of the

Turkish nation as it now exists, with the distinct nationality and

language preserved to the present day, are the Byzantine historians,

Menander and Theophylactus Simocalta. The latter historian gives a very

interesting account of the condition of the Turks in the sixth century

of our era. They were then the sovereigns of a great city called Tavgas;

they were the most valiant and populous of nations; they lived under the

protection of just laws, and carried on an extensive commerce. Tavgas is

supposed to be the name of a Chinese city, which was then one of the

seats of the Turkish government, for there is no doubt that somewhat

before this period the Turks had conquered a considerable part of the

north of China. Indeed, traces of the language of these early conquerors

are still preserved, which are identical with the Turkish spoken to-day

at Constantinople, for time has effected less change in the Turkish than

in any other European language. Collateral evidence concerning the power

of the Turks in central Asia during the latter part of the fifth, and

early part of the sixth centuries, is afforded by the history of the

life and travels of Hiouen-thsang, recently translated by Monsieur

Julien, whether that work be really the composition of a Chinese

contemporary, or only a Chinese compilation from earlier Arabic

authorities.[8] It is certain that about the commencement of the sixth

century the Turks ruled all central Asia, as far south as the

Hindookoosh, including the ancient Sogdiana and Bactria.

The first political intercourse between the Turks and a European state

occurred towards the middle of the sixth century. The great khan of the

Turks sent an embassy to Justinian I., to persuade the Roman empire to

refuse an asylum to the Avars. The dominions then ruled by the great

khan formed the first of the three great Turkish empires which have

exercised an important influence on the social condition of the

Christian nations, both in Europe and Asia. The second of these empires

was that of the Seljouk Turks, which caused the crusades, and ruined the

Byzantine empire. And the third was that of the Othoman Turks, which

destroyed the Greek empire, and has long been the master, patron, or

tyrant, of the patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem, Antioch, and

Alexandria.

The first Turkish empire took its rise from the oppression of the Avars,

who were the dominant people in Asia, and who are supposed to have been

a mixed race of Mogul and Turkish origin. The oppression of the Avars

was submitted to as long as the body of the Turkish people was confined

by its circumstances to an agricultural and pastoral life. The

population being dispersed in small communities, which lived without

much intercommunication, was composed of as many isolated tribes as

there are springs in the plains they inhabitated; and these tribes were

as incapable of acquiring common motives of action as the population of

the islands in the eastern seas. But the scene changed in the fifth

century. The Turks who dwelt on Mount Altaï grew rich by mining

operations and manufactures. They became the principal traders in iron

and steel, and the manufacturers and merchants of the arms and armour

required in the Avar empire. But the government soon endeavoured to

appropriate the wealth which it saw was created by the industry of its

subjects to administrative purposes. Taxation was increased, and

monopolies were established, to enable the court of the Avar emperor to

display the power of centralisation. Governmental pageantry, court

spectacles, and military pomp, consumed the wealth of the people in the

unknown capital of this vanished empire; while the Turkish people, now

inspired by common feelings, called for an administration that would dig

wells, and construct cisterns and caravanserais in the desert. The Turks

were now united by the lessons which their trade had disseminated

through every province. With improved intercourse they had gained a more

enlarged experience, and acquired national feelings. They at last rose

in rebellion; and before the middle of the sixth century, the first

great Turkish empire was founded by Toumen the blacksmith, the ancestor

of Genghis Khan, and Timor the lame. This empire extended from the

Caspian sea to the ocean. The great Khan of the Turks, Askel, who sent

an embassy to the Roman emperor Justinian I., is supposed to have been

the son of Toumen.

In the year 568 another embassy arrived at Constantinople from the great

Khan Dizaboulos, with a letter for Justin II., written in the Scythian

character, which, whatever it was, was not unknown to the learned

interpreters of the Roman foreign office. One great object of Turkish

diplomacy had been to get possession of the whole of the silk trade with

Europe, but the Turkish ambassadors had been astonished to find that

Justinian had already succeeded in introducing the culture of the

silk-worm in the Roman empire, and that the imperial court was rich in

native silk, manufactured in Asia Minor and the islands. The ambassadors

of Dizaboulos, however, concluded the first formal treaty between the

Turks and the emperors of Constantinople; the bond of union between the

courts of Mount Altaï and Byzantium was hostility to Persia, and very

profound and enlightened views concerning the maintenance of the balance

of power in the East, while the tie which then connected the interests

of the Turks with those of the Romans and Greeks was commerce.

The long wars between the Persian and Roman empires, and the arbitrary

measures of the Persians, had stopped all commercial communications

between India and Europe through the Persian dominions. The countries on

the shores of the Mediterranean had in consequence been compelled to

draw their supplies of Indian and Chinese produce, and the productions

of the Spice islands, of which there was then an immense consumption, by

way of the Red Sea. This trade, even as early as the time of Pliny, was

so extensive as to excite the wonder of that aristocratic Roman. In the

sixth century it had greatly increased, and both Arabia and Ethiopia

were in a most prosperous condition, from the great profits it poured

into those countries. In the year 523 the king of Ethiopia was able to

collect a fleet of thirteen hundred ships in the Red Sea, and to obtain

abundant supplies for a large army on the coast of Arabia, where a

single ship and a company of infantry would find it difficult to procure

provisions for a week. After the reign of Justinian this commerce

rapidly declined. The increase of piracy on the coast near the entrance

of the Persian gulf, and the wars of the Ethiopian kings in Arabia, were

simultaneous with the poverty, depopulation, and destruction of capital

in Africa and Italy, caused by the Vandal and Gothic wars of Justinian.

At this crisis, when Alexandria and Rome were rapidly declining, the

security which the extent of the Turkish empire and the policy of the

great Khan afforded to merchants, turned a great portion of the Eastern

trade towards Constantinople. The Indian traders began to prefer the

caravan journey through the deserts of central Asia, to the tedious and

dangerous navigation of the Red Sea. By sea they could no longer venture

to visit the intermediate ports from fear of pirates, while on the land

journey they could carry on a profitable trade in slaves, and in

exchanging the precious metals, at many stations on their way. The great

importance of the slave trade at this time in central Asia is proved by

the circumstance that the emperor Tiberius II., A.D. 578–582, formed a

corps of fifteen thousand mamlouks, composed entirely of purchased

slaves, imported into the Roman empire by the traders engaged in the

Indian or the fur trade. Had the supply continued, and had the

successors of Tiberius II. pursued the same policy, the Roman empire

would in all probability have been overthrown by Turkish mamlouks, as

that of the caliphs of Bagdat was by following a similar military system

at a later period.

The first Turkish empire was not of long duration. The Khazar kingdom,

whose relations with the Roman and Persian empires in the hour of their

decline give it an important place in history, arose in its western

fragments, and inherited a considerable portion of its power and

commercial influence. But the Khazars, though called Turks by the

Byzantine historians, Nicephorus the patriarch and Theophanes, are

supposed by modern scholars to have been a people of mixed race.

There are several points connected with the history of the rise and fall

of the first Turkish empire which are interesting, as marking an era in

the progress of civilisation. At no previous period in the history of

mankind were greater changes made in the commercial, political, and

religious ideas of mankind. Religion was then closely connected with

political organisation. Christianity was identified with the Roman

government; the religion of Zoroaster with Persian domination. The fact

that both Christianity and the religion of Zoroaster were declining in

the sixth century is unquestionable. Historians have not clearly

explained the causes of a revolution so degrading to human nature. In

Arabia, in central Asia, and in Spain, an extensive conversion to

Judaism heralded the extraordinary rapidity with which the lizard-eaters

of Arabia, led by the followers of Mahomet, exterminated the religion of

Zoroaster, and converted the majority of the inhabitants of Syria,

Palestine, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Africa to Mohammedanism. It is

evident that an internal canker in the social condition of the

Christians in the Roman empire, and of the inhabitants of Persia,

prepared the way for the desolation of many of the richest provinces of

the ancient world.