painted his famous portrait of “John Adams at the age of ninety”; and
Browere’s bust will bear comparison with Stuart’s portrait. I must tell
a story connected with the painting of this portrait by Stuart, which,
while a little out of place, especially as we have a chapter devoted to
Gilbert Stuart, comes in better here than there. Stuart had painted a
portrait of John Adams as a younger man. It is the familiar portrait of
the great statesman by that artist. John Quincy Adams was desirous that
Stuart should paint another of his father at the advanced age of ninety,
and applied to the artist for the purpose. But Stuart was too old to go
down to Quincy, and John Adams was too old to come up to Boston.
Finally, Stuart agreed that he would go down to Quincy, for the purpose,
if he were paid half of the price of the picture before he went. To this
John Quincy Adams gladly assented, and Stuart went to Quincy and had the
first sitting. Then John Quincy Adams could not get Stuart to go down
for a second sitting, and, as his father was past ninety, he feared he
might die before the picture was finished. He at last succeeded in
getting Stuart to go down for a second sitting by paying him the balance
of the price of the picture. Then the artist would not go down to finish
it, and the only way John Quincy Adams got him to complete the portrait
was by promising him, if he would make the journey and do the work, he
would pay him the agreed price over again. This is only one of many
illustrations of the character of the greatest portrait-painter this
country has produced, and the peer of any portrait-painter who has ever
lived.
Browere broke his journey from Virginia to Massachusetts by a rest at
the country’s capital, and while there he took a mask of the ruling
President, John Quincy Adams, and one of his young son, Charles Francis
Adams. It was this young man who wrote to Browere as follows:
WASHINGTON CITY, October [28], 1825.
The president requests me to state to Mr. Browere that he will be
able to give him two hours tomorrow morning at seven o’clock at his
(Mr. Browere’s) rooms on Pennsylvania Avenue. He is so much engaged
at present that this is the only time he can conveniently spare for
the purpose of your executing his portrait bust from life.
C. F. ADAMS.
John Quincy Adams, the sixth President of the United States, was born in
Braintree, Massachusetts, July 11, 1767, and died in the Speaker’s room
of the House of Representatives at Washington, February 28, 1848. He has
been called the most cultivated occupant that the Presidential chair has
ever had; but his administration was unimportant, and he
[Illustration: CHARLES FRANCIS ADAMS
Age 18]
personally was the most unpopular man who has yet achieved the high
office. He seems to have anticipated Whistler in the “gentle art of
making enemies.”
Not the least interesting of Browere’s busts is the youthful head of
Charles Francis Adams, made when Mr. Adams had just passed his
eighteenth birthday, he having been born August 18, 1807, in Boston,
where he died November 21, 1886. The services of Mr. Adams to his
country, as minister to England from 1861 to 1868, covering the entire
period of the war between the States, can never be forgotten or
overestimated, and will remain among the foremost triumphs of American
diplomacy.
It is certainly of curious interest to have busts of three generations,
in one family, made by the same hand and within a few days of each
other, as is the case with Browere’s casts of John, John Quincy, and
Charles Francis Adams.
[Illustration]
VII
_Mr. and Mrs. Madison_
“Jimmy” Madison and his wife “Dolly” were prominent characters in social
as well as in public life. He early made a name for himself by his
knowledge of constitutional law, and acquired fame by the practical use
he made of his knowledge, in the creation of the Constitution of the
United States, and in its interpretation in the celebrated letters of
the “Federalist.” With the close of Washington’s administration Madison
determined to retire to private life, but shortly before this he met the
coy North Carolina Quakeress, Dorothea Payn. She was at the time the
young widow of John Todd, to whom she had been married not quite a year,
and Madison made her his wife.
James Madison was born in 1751 and Dorothea Payn in 1772, but the score
and one years’ difference in their ages did
[Illustration: JAMES MADISON
Age 74]
not prevent them from enjoying a married life of two score and two years
of unclouded happiness. Madison died in 1836, and was survived by Mrs.
Madison for thirteen years.
Madison’s temperament, like that of his young bride, was tuned to too
high a pitch to be contented with quietness after the excitement
incident to his earlier career. Therefore his retirement, like stage
farewells, was only temporary, and he became afterward the fourth
President of the United States. As we have seen, it was Madison who
brought Browere to the notice of Jefferson, and Browere was commended to
Madison in the following letter from General Jacob Brown, the land hero
of the war of 1812, and later Commander-in-chief of the Army of the
United States:
WASHINGTON CITY, Oct. 1st, 1825.
_My Dear Sir_:
Mr. Browere waits on you and Mrs. Madison with the expectation of
being permitted to take your portrait busts from the life. As I
have a sincere regard for him as a gentleman and a scholar, and
great confidence in his skill as an artist (he having made two
busts of myself), in the art which he is cultivating, I name him to
you with much pleasure as being worthy of your encouragement and
patronage. I am interested in having Mr. Browere take your
likeness, for I have long been desirous to obtain a perfect one of
you. From what I have seen and heard of Mr. Browere’s efforts to
copy nature, I hope to receive from his hands that desideratum in a
faithful facsimile of my esteemed friend ex-President Madison. Be
pleased to present my most respectful regards to Mrs. Madison, and
believe me always
Your most devoted friend,
JACOB BROWN.
From this introduction Browere seems to have gained the friendship of
Mr. and Mrs. Madison, who took more than an ordinary interest in the
artist and his family. They were on terms of familiar intercourse, and
an infant, born to Mrs. Browere, July 3, 1826, was, by Mrs. Madison’s
permission, named for her. Some years later this child accompanied her
parents on an extended visit to Montpelier.
That Madison was satisfied with the result of Browere’s skill is shown
by the following:
Per request of Mr. Browere, busts of myself and of my wife,
regarded as exact likenesses, have been executed by him in
plaister, being casts made from the moulds formed on our persons,
of which this certificate is given under my hand at Montpelier, 19,
October, 1825.
JAMES MADISON.
[Illustration: “DOLLY” MADISON
Age 53]
Mr. and Mrs. Madison each submitted to Browere’s process a second time,
which is sufficient evidence that the ordeal was not severe and
hazardous. The bust of Madison is very fine in character and expression,
but that of Mrs. Madison is of particular interest, as being the only
woman’s face handed down to us by Browere. Her great beauty has been
heralded by more than one voice and one pen, but not one of the many
portraits that we have of her, from that painted by Gilbert Stuart, aged
about thirty, to the one drawn by Mr. Eastman Johnson, shortly before
her death, sustains the verbal verdict of her admirers; and now the life
mask by Browere would seem to settle the question of her beauty in the
negative.
“Dolly” Madison was in her fifty and third year when Browere made his
mask of her face, and she lived on for a quarter century. She has always
been surrounded by an atmosphere of personal interest, not so much for
what she was as for what she was supposed to be. She doubtless possessed
a charm of manner that made her a most attractive hostess at the White
House during her reign of eight years, in which particular she shares
the laurels with the winsome wife of Mr. Cleveland.
VIII
_Charles Carroll of Carrollton_
The last of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, to be
gathered to his fathers, was the distinguished Marylander, Charles
Carroll of Carrollton, who so signed his name to distinguish himself
from a younger kinsman of the same name, his object being merely
purposes of convenience, and not the patriotic purpose of identifying
himself to the British, as is commonly stated. Charles Carroll was not a
member of the Continental Congress when the Declaration of Independence
was adopted, but took his seat a fortnight afterward, in time to sign
the instrument with the rest of the sitting delegates, when it was
placed before them on August 2, 1776.
Mr. Carroll died November 14, 1832, in his ninety-sixth
[Illustration: CHARLES CARROLL OF CARROLLTON
Age 88]
year, and his last public act was to lay the corner-stone of the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad on July 4, 1828. From the description of his
personal appearance at this time, as given by Hon. John H. B. Latrobe,
it would seem as if it had been written of Browere’s bust, so true is
Browere’s work to the life. Mr. Latrobe says: “In my mind’s eye I see
Mr. Carroll now--a small, attenuated old man, with a prominent nose and
receding chin, [and] small eyes that sparkled when he was interested in
conversation. His head was small and his hair white, rather long and
silky, while his face and forehead were seamed with wrinkles.”
At the present time, when foreign matrimonial alliances of high degree,
with American women, are of almost daily occurrence, it is interesting
to note that among the first American women to marry into the nobility
of England were three granddaughters of the “signer,” Charles Carroll of
Carrollton. They were the children of his daughter, Mrs. Caton, and
became respectively the Marchioness of Wellesley, the Duchess of Leeds,
and Lady Stafford.
Browere, when he presented himself to Mr. Carroll for the purpose of
making his mask, was armed with the following letter from the eminent
scientist, Doctor Samuel Latham Mitchill, which contains the super-added
endorsements of Archibald Robertson, Richard Riker and M. M. Noah:
NEW YORK, July 8, 1825.
_My dear Sir_:
I approve your design of executing a likeness in statuary of the
Honorable Charles Carroll of Carrollton. When you shall present
yourself to him within a few days, I authorize you to employ my
testimony in favor of your skill, having submitted more than once
to your plastic operation. I know that you can perform it
successfully without pain and within a reasonable time. The
likenesses you have made are remarkably exact, so much so that they
may be truly called facsimile imitations of the life. Your gallery
contains so many specimens of correct casts that not only common
observers, but even critical judges bear witness to your industry,
genius and talents. I foresee that your collection of busts already
well advanced and rapidly enlarging, will, if your labors continue,
become a depositary of peculiar and intrinsic value. Without
instituting any invidious comparison between sister arts, the
professional branch under which you address Mr. Carroll, possesses,
in my humble opinion, all the superiority that sculpture exercises
over music and painting.
Yours, with kind feelings and fervent wishes for success,
SAMUEL L. MITCHILL.
IX
_The Nation’s Guest_
_La Fayette_
Gilbert Motier de La Fayette, who had fought side by side with
Washington at Brandywine and at Yorktown, made his third and last visit
to the United States in 1824. Landing at Castle Garden, in New York, on
August 15th of that year, he set sail thirteen months later, on
September 7th, 1825, to return to France, in the frigate _Brandywine_.
He came as the invited guest of the nation, and during his sojourn here
travelled over the whole country, visiting each one of the twenty-four
States and receiving one continuous ovation.
At the request of the Common Council of the city of New York, La Fayette
permitted Browere to make a cast of his head, neck and shoulders on
July 11, 1825. For this purpose La Fayette visited Browere’s workshop,
in the rear of No. 315 Broadway, New York, accompanied by Richard Riker,
Elisha W. King and Henry I. Wyckoff, a committee of the Common Council.
The composition had been applied and had set, and Browere was about
taking it off, when the clock struck, and one of the committee remarked
that the hour for the corporation dinner in honor of La Fayette, and
which he was to attend, had arrived. “_Sacré bleu!_” said La Fayette,
starting up, “Take it off! Take it off!” which caused a piece to fall
out from under one of the eyes. This accident, which necessitated a
second sitting, led to some interesting correspondence.
NEW YORK, Tuesday 12 o’clock,
July 12, 1825.
_Dear General_:
We have just been to see your bust by Mr. Browere and have pleasure
in saying it is vastly superior to any other likeness of General La
Fayette, which as yet has fallen under our inspection. Indeed it is
a faithful resemblance in every part of your features and form,
from the head to the breast, with the exception of a slight defect
about the left eye, caused by a loss of the material of which the
mould was made. This defect or deficiency Mr. Browere assures us,
and we have confidence in his assertion, that he can correct in a
few minutes and without giving you any pain, provided you will
again condescend to his operations, for a limited time. We should
much regret that this slight blemish should not be corrected, which
if not done will cause to us and to the Nation a continued source
of chagrin and disappointment.
Most truly your Friends
RICHARD RIKER
ELISHA W. KING
HENRY I. WYCKOFF.
This letter was followed two days later by the following to Browere:
NEW YORK 14th July 1825.
_Dear Sir_:
Every exertion has been made to get General La Fayette to spend
half an hour with you, so the eye of his portrait bust be
completed, but in vain. He has not had more than four hours each
night to sleep, but has consented that you may take his mask in
Philadelphia. He left New York this morning at eight o’clock and
will be in Philadelphia on Monday next, where he will remain three
days. It you can be present there on Monday or Tuesday at furthest,
you can complete the matter. He has pledged his word. This
arrangement was all that could be effected by
Your friend
ELISHA W. KING.
P. S. Previous to going get a line from the Recorder or Committee.
Upon this letter Browere has endorsed:
NOTE.--The subscribing artist met the General on Monday, in the
Hall of Independence, Philadelphia, and Tuesday morning [July 19,
1825] from seven to eight o’clock was busy in making another
likeness from the face and head of the General. At 4 P.M. of that
day he finished the bust under the eye of the General and his
attendant, and had the satisfaction then of receiving from the
General the assurance that it was the only good bust ever made of
him.
JOHN H. I. BROWERE.
The result of the second trial was a likeness so admirable and of such
remarkable fidelity, that General Jacob Morton, Rembrandt Peale, De Witt
Clinton, S. F. B. Morse, John A. Graham, Thomas Addis Emmet and others,
came forward and enthusiastically bore witness to its being “a perfect
facsimile” of the distinguished Frenchman. The written commendations
[Illustration: THE MARQUIS DE LA FAYETTE
Age 67]
of Peale and Morse are notably interesting as the views of two brother
artists, each of whom had painted a portrait of La Fayette. Rembrandt
Peale, widely known by his composite portrait of Washington, writes:
NEW YORK August 10th 1825.
The singular excellence shown by Mr. Browere in his new method of
executing Portrait busts from the life deserves the applause and
patronage of his countrymen. The bust of La Fayette, which he has
just finished, is an admirable demonstration of his talent in this
department of the Fine Arts. The accuracy with which he has moulded
the entire head, neck and shoulders from the life and his skill in
finishing, render this bust greatly superior to any we have seen.
It is in truth a “faithful and a living likeness.” Of this I may
judge having twice painted the General’s portrait from the life,
once at Paris and recently at Washington.
REMBRANDT PEALE.
Samuel Finley Breese Morse was, at the period of which we write, an
artist of some reputation as a portrait-painter, and he was under
commission, from the corporation of New York, to paint a whole-length
portrait of La Fayette for the City Hall, where it now hangs. Its chief
interest is as a study of costume; for if Browere’s bust is “a perfect
facsimile” of La Fayette’s form and features, true to life, Morse’s
portrait is a caricature. That Morse was destined to greater ends than
painting mediocre portraits, was shown, a decade later, by his invention
of the magnetic electric telegraph, a discovery of such importance that
while millions of human beings know Morse the inventor, not a dozen
perhaps ever heard of Morse the painter. He damns his own portrait of La
Fayette by the following commendation of Browere’s bust:
NEW YORK August 15, 1825.
Being requested by Mr. Browere to give my opinion of his bust or
cast from the person of General La Fayette, I feel no hesitation in
saying it appears to me to be a perfect facsimile of the General’s
face.
SAML. F. B. MORSE.
These are certainly strong words coming from a rival artist and a man of
Mr. Morse’s character.
John A. Graham, who published a volume to prove that Horne Tooke was the
author of the Letters of Junius, was one of the leading lawyers of New
York. His closing words of eulogy upon the bust of La Fayette should
have been, but unfortunately were not, prophetic. He wrote: “I have no
doubt that the name of Browere, in virtue of this bust, will live as
long as the memory of La Fayette shall be beloved and respected in
America.” On the contrary, the name of Browere was wholly and entirely
forgotten and unknown, until brought to light, and publicly proclaimed,
by the present writer, in the fall of 1897. So much for the stability of
man’s reputation!
[Illustration]
X
_De Witt Clinton_
When Samuel Woodworth, the author of the well-known lines to the “Old
Oaken Bucket,” who was a close friend of Browere, entered the artist’s
workshop and caught a glimpse of the bust of De Witt Clinton, he made a
gesture, as of restraint, and pronounced these impromptu lines:
“Stay! the bust that graces yonder shelf claims our regard.
It is the front of Jove himself;
The Majesty of Virtue and of Power,
Before which guilt and meanness only cower.
Who can behold that bust and not exclaim,
Let everlasting honor claim our Clinton’s name!”
[Illustration: DE WITT CLINTON
Age 56]
De Witt Clinton, who was born in 1769 and died in 1828, was the first
recognized practical politician of this country. Apart from his immense
service in pushing to completion the Erie canal, he was essentially a
politician for what politics would yield. Consequently, he was always
looked upon with distrust, and even his high private station was
powerless to overcome this feeling. He posed as a connoisseur of the
fine arts, was at one time President of the American Academy of Arts,
and seems to have had a lofty appreciation of Browere’s work. He wrote:
“I have seen and examined with attention several specimens of busts
executed by Mr. Browere in plaster, and have no hesitation in saying
that their accuracy is equally surprising and gratifying. I feel
pleasure in recommending the fidelity of his likenesses, and the skill
with which they are executed, particularly the portrait bust of General
La Fayette.”
Of Clinton’s own bust the eminent Irish patriot and American advocate,
Thomas Addis Emmet, wrote to Browere:
NEW YORK July 6th 1826.
_Sir_:
If my opinion as to the merits of the portrait busts I have seen of
your workmanship, can be of any advantage to you, it is entirely at
your service. I really think them all entitled to great praise for
fidelity of expression and accuracy of resemblance. Those of
General La Fayette and Governor Clinton are, as far as I can judge,
the most perfect likenesses of the originals that have as yet been
presented to the public.
I am, Dear Sir, your obt Servt
THOMAS ADDIS EMMET.
[Illustration]
XI
_Henry Clay_
Henry Clay, who wore the appellation, conferred upon Pitt, of “the Great
Commoner,” long before it was given to Mr. Gladstone, has left behind
him perhaps the most distinct personality of any of the statesmen of his
era. Where Daniel Webster counted his admirers by hundreds, Henry Clay
was idolized by thousands; the one appealing to the head and the other
to the heart. His strongly marked features are familiar to every one,
from the scores of portraits of him to be found here, there, and
everywhere; while there are, living to-day, a large number of people who
knew Clay in the flesh; so that Browere’s bust of him needs no
perfunctory certificate to assure of its truthfulness. It is certainly
human to a wonderful degree, and there could scarcely be any truer
portraiture than this, wherein we have the very features of the living
man down to the minutest detail.
Clay was of striking physique. He was quite tall, nearly six feet two
inches, rather sparsely built, with a crane-like neck that he endeavored
to conceal by his collar and stock. He had an immense mouth, phenomenal
for size as well as shape, and kindly blue eyes which were electrical
when kindled. Yet he was so magnetic in his power over men that when he
was defeated for the Presidency, thousands of his Whig followers wept as
they heard the news.
Henry Clay was born in Hanover county, Virginia, April 12, 1777, and
died at Washington, June 29, 1852, preceding his compeer Webster to the
grave by only a few months. On reaching his majority, he removed to
Lexington, Kentucky, which became his future home, although he was so
rarely out of public life that he was comparatively little there. Having
chosen the law for his profession, he was admitted to the bar, and
before attaining his thirtieth year, was sent to the Senate of the
United States. He was strenuous in his support of home industries, and
endeavored by legislation to enforce upon legislators the wearing of
homespun cloths. So ardent was he in this, that his course led to a duel
with Humphrey Marshall, in which both were slightly wounded.
At the close of the war of 1812, Clay was one of the commissioners
appointed to negotiate the treaty of peace with
[Illustration: HENRY CLAY
Age 48]
Great Britain, and as such signed the Treaty of Ghent. He was known as
“the great Pacificator,” from his course in the events that led to the
Missouri Compromise and later averted Southern “nullification.” He was
an active and bitter opponent of Andrew Jackson, and supported John
Quincy Adams against him for the Presidency, his reward being the
portfolio of State; but there was no bargain and corruption about this
business as his enemies claimed and which haunted Clay’s political
career throughout the rest of his life. He was an ambitious man, and his
failure to reach the goal of his ambition--the presidential chair--was a
fatal blow.
Clay was undoubtedly one of the greatest orators this country has
produced, and a man with much natural ability, but little study and
cultivation. His name is one to conjure with in old Kentucky, and it is
with a moist eye that personal reminiscences of Clay are related out
there in the blue grass State, even at this day, nearly half a century
after his decease.
[Illustration]
XII
_America’s Master Painter_
_Gilbert Stuart_
One artist, and he easily the first of American painters, did not deny
to Browere and his works the merit that was their due. On the contrary,
he saw the fidelity and great value of these life masks, and gave
practical encouragement to the maker of them by submitting to his
process and by giving a certificate of approval. He did this, not so
much that his living face might be transmitted to posterity, as to test
the truth of the newspaper reports of the suffering and danger
experienced by the venerable and venerated Jefferson, and thus by his
example encourage others to go and do likewise. The result was the
superb head of Gilbert Stuart, herewith reproduced from the original
bust, in the Redwood Library, at Newport, Rhode Island. This noble
action of Stuart must have been as light out of darkness to Browere.
Upon the completion of the mask, from which this bust was made, Stuart
gave to Browere the following emphatic certificate:
BOSTON November 29th 1825.
Mr. Browere, of the city of New York, has this day made a portrait
bust of me from life, with which I am perfectly satisfied and which
I hope will remove any illiberal misrepresentations that may
deprive the nation from possessing like records of more important
men.
G. STUART.
The “illiberal misrepresentations” referred to were of course the
reported inconveniences that Jefferson had suffered; and praise such as
this, from Stuart, is, as approbation from Sir Hubert Stanley, praise
indeed.