THE ELDEST SON--SAYING OF WILD FINLAND--THE CRITICAL TIME--VAUNTING
POLLS--ONE THING WANTED--A FATHER'S BLESSING--MIRACLE OF ART--THE POPE'S
HOUSE--THE YOUNG ENTHUSIAST--PICTURES OF ENGLAND--PERSIST AND WRESTLE--OF
THE LITTLE DARK MAN
The eldest son! The regard and affection which my father entertained for
his first-born were natural enough, and appeared to none more so than
myself, who cherished the same feelings towards him. What he was as a
boy the reader already knows, for the reader has seen him as a boy; fain
would I describe him at the time of which I am now speaking, when he had
attained the verge of manhood, but the pen fails me, and I attempt not
the task; and yet it ought to be an easy one, for how frequently does his
form visit my mind's eye in slumber and in wakefulness, in the light of
day and in the night watches; but last night I saw him in his beauty and
his strength; he was about to speak, and my ear was on the stretch, when
at once I awoke, and there was I alone, and the night storm was howling
amidst the branches of the pines which surround my lonely dwelling:
'Listen to the moaning of the pine, at whose root thy hut is
fastened,'--a saying that, of wild Finland, in which there is wisdom; I
listened and thought of life and death. . . . Of all human beings that I
have ever known, that elder brother was the most frank and generous, ay,
and the quickest and readiest, and the best adapted to do a great thing
needful at the critical time, when the delay of a moment would be fatal.
I have known him dash from a steep bank into a stream in his full dress,
and pull out a man who was drowning; yet there were twenty others bathing
in the water, who might have saved him by putting out a hand, without
inconvenience to themselves, which, however, they did not do, but stared
with stupid surprise at the drowning one's struggles. Yes, whilst some
shouted from the bank to those in the water to save the drowning one, and
those in the water did nothing, my brother neither shouted nor stood
still, but dashed from the bank and did the one thing needful, which,
under such circumstances, not one man in a million would have done. Now,
who can wonder that a brave old man should love a son like this, and
prefer him to any other?
'My boy, my own boy, you are the very image of myself, the day I took off
my coat in the park to fight Big Ben,' said my father, on meeting his son
wet and dripping, immediately after his bold feat. And who cannot excuse
the honest pride of the old man--the stout old man?
Ay, old man, that son was worthy of thee, and thou wast worthy of such a
son; a noble specimen wast thou of those strong single-minded Englishmen,
who, without making a parade either of religion or loyalty, feared God
and honoured their king, and were not particularly friendly to the
French, whose vaunting polls they occasionally broke, as at Minden and at
Malplaquet, to the confusion vast of the eternal foes of the English
land. I, who was so little like thee that thou understoodst me not, and
in whom with justice thou didst feel so little pride, had yet perception
enough to see all thy worth, and to feel it an honour to be able to call
myself thy son; and if at some no distant time, when the foreign enemy
ventures to insult our shore, I be permitted to break some vaunting poll,
it will be a triumph to me to think that, if thou hadst lived, thou
wouldst have hailed the deed, and mightest yet discover some distant
resemblance to thyself, the day when thou didst all but vanquish the
mighty Brain.
I have already spoken of my brother's taste for painting, and the
progress he had made in that beautiful art. It is probable that, if
circumstances had not eventually diverted his mind from the pursuit, he
would have attained excellence, and left behind him some enduring
monument of his powers, for he had an imagination to conceive, and that
yet rarer endowment, a hand capable of giving life, body, and reality to
the conceptions of his mind; perhaps he wanted one thing, the want of
which is but too often fatal to the sons of genius, and without which
genius is little more than a splendid toy in the hands of the
possessor--perseverance, dogged perseverance, in his proper calling;
otherwise, though the grave had closed over him, he might still be living
in the admiration of his fellow-creatures. O ye gifted ones, follow your
calling, for, however various your talents may be, ye can have but one
calling capable of leading ye to eminence and renown; follow resolutely
the one straight path before you, it is that of your good angel, let
neither obstacles nor temptations induce ye to leave it; bound along if
you can; if not, on hands and knees follow it, perish in it, if needful;
but ye need not fear that; no one ever yet died in the true path of his
calling before he had attained the pinnacle. Turn into other paths, and
for a momentary advantage or gratification ye have sold your inheritance,
your immortality. Ye will never be heard of after death.
'My father has given me a hundred and fifty pounds,' said my brother to
me one morning, 'and something which is better--his blessing. I am going
to leave you.'
'And where are you going?'
'Where? to the great city; to London, to be sure.'
'I should like to go with you.'
'Pooh,' said my brother, 'what should you do there? But don't be
discouraged, I daresay a time will come when you too will go to London.'
And, sure enough, so it did, and all but too soon.
'And what do you purpose doing there?' I demanded.
'Oh, I go to improve myself in art, to place myself under some master of
high name, at least I hope to do so eventually. I have, however, a plan
in my head, which I should wish first to execute; indeed, I do not think
I can rest till I have done so; every one talks so much about Italy, and
the wondrous artists which it has produced, and the wondrous pictures
which are to be found there; now I wish to see Italy, or rather Rome, the
great city, for I am told that in a certain room there is contained the
grand miracle of art.'
'And what do you call it?'
'The Transfiguration, painted by one Rafael, and it is said to be the
greatest work of the greatest painter whom the world has ever known. I
suppose it is because everybody says so, that I have such a strange
desire to see it. I have already made myself well acquainted with its
locality, and think that I could almost find my way to it blindfold.
When I have crossed the Tiber, which, as you are aware, runs through
Rome, I must presently turn to the right, up a rather shabby street,
which communicates with a large square, the farther end of which is
entirely occupied by the front of an immense church, with a dome, which
ascends almost to the clouds, and this church they call St. Peter's.'
'Ay, ay,' said I, 'I have read about that in Keysler's Travels.'
'Before the church, in the square, are two fountains, one on either side,
casting up water in showers; between them, in the midst, is an obelisk,
brought from Egypt, and covered with mysterious writing; on your right
rises an edifice, not beautiful nor grand, but huge and bulky, where
lives a strange kind of priest whom men call the Pope, a very horrible
old individual, who would fain keep Christ in leading strings, calls the
Virgin Mary the Queen of Heaven, and himself God's Lieutenant-General
upon earth.'
'Ay, ay,' said I, 'I have read of him in Foxe's _Book of Martyrs_.'
'Well, I do not go straight forward up the flight of steps conducting
into the church, but I turn to the right, and, passing under the piazza,
find myself in a court of the huge bulky house; and then ascend various
staircases, and pass along various corridors and galleries, all of which
I could describe to you, though I have never seen them; at last a door is
unlocked, and we enter a room rather high, but not particularly large,
communicating with another room, into which, however, I do not go, though
there are noble things in that second room--immortal things, by immortal
artists; amongst others, a grand piece of Correggio; I do not enter it,
for the grand picture of the world is not there; but I stand still
immediately on entering the first room, and I look straight before me,
neither to the right nor left, though there are noble things both on the
right and left, for immediately before me at the farther end, hanging
against the wall, is a picture which arrests me, and I can see nothing
else, for that picture at the farther end hanging against the wall is the
picture of the world. . . .'
Yes, go thy way, young enthusiast, and, whether to London town or to old
Rome, may success attend thee; yet strange fears assail me and misgivings
on thy account. Thou canst not rest, thou say'st, till thou hast seen
the picture in the chamber at old Rome hanging over against the wall; ay,
and thus thou dost exemplify thy weakness--thy strength too, it may
be--for the one idea, fantastic yet lovely, which now possesses thee,
could only have originated in a genial and fervent brain. Well, go, if
thou must go; yet it perhaps were better for thee to bide in thy native
land, and there, with fear and trembling, with groanings, with straining
eyeballs, toil, drudge, slave, till thou hast made excellence thine own;
thou wilt scarcely acquire it by staring at the picture over against the
door in the high chamber of old Rome. Seekest thou inspiration? thou
needest it not, thou hast it already; and it was never yet found by
crossing the sea. What hast thou to do with old Rome, and thou an
Englishman? 'Did thy blood never glow at the mention of thy native
land?' as an artist merely? Yes, I trow, and with reason, for thy native
land need not grudge old Rome her 'pictures of the world'; she has
pictures of her own, 'pictures of England'; and is it a new thing to toss
up caps and shout--England against the world? Yes, against the world in
all, in all; in science and in arms, in minstrel strain, and not less in
the art 'which enables the hand to deceive the intoxicated soul by means
of pictures.' {153} Seek'st models? to Gainsborough and Hogarth turn,
not names of the world, maybe, but English names--and England against the
world! A living master? why, there he comes! thou hast had him long, he
has long guided thy young hand towards the excellence which is yet far
from thee, but which thou canst attain if thou shouldst persist and
wrestle, even as he has done, 'midst gloom and despondency--ay, and even
contempt; he who now comes up the creaking stair to thy little studio in
the second floor to inspect thy last effort before thou departest, the
little stout man whose face is very dark, and whose eye is vivacious;
that man has attained excellence, destined some day to be acknowledged,
though not till he is cold, and his mortal part returned to its kindred
clay. He has painted, not pictures of the world, but English pictures,
such as Gainsborough himself might have done; beautiful rural pieces,
with trees which might well tempt the wild birds to perch upon them: thou
needest not run to Rome, brother, where lives the old Mariolater, after
pictures of the world, whilst at home there are pictures of England; nor
needest thou even go to London, the big city, in search of a master, for
thou hast one at home in the old East Anglian town who can instruct thee
whilst thou needest instruction: better stay at home, brother, at least
for a season, and toil and strive 'midst groanings and despondency till
thou hast attained excellence even as he has done--the little dark man
with the brown coat and the top-boots, whose name will one day be
considered the chief ornament of the old town, and whose works will at no
distant period rank amongst the proudest pictures of England--and England
against the world!--thy master, my brother, thy, at present, all too
little considered master--Crome.