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CHAPTER X

It is not the author's purpose to treat the names of painters, or indeed those of any other branch of art, especially by themselves. Were any single line to be selected, the peculiarities of its representatives would alone be sufficient to fill a volume. Under the general design of this gossip about genius, the pen is permitted to glide after its own fancy, treating only upon such individuals as readily suggest themselves, and who are illustrative of characteristics already introduced.

Upon beginning the chapter before us, we were thinking of John Opie, the distinguished English painter, born in Cornwall in 1761. When Opie was only ten years of age¹⁷⁹ he saw a person who was somewhat accomplished with the pencil draw a butterfly. The boy watched the process with marked interest, and as soon as the draughtsman had departed, produced upon a shingle a drawing equally good, which he showed to his mother. She, good woman, encouraged him, as Mrs. West did her son on a similar occasion; but the father, being a harsh, rude, low-bred man, was constantly punishing the boy for laziness, and for chalking figures, faces, and animals on every stray bit of board or flat surface at hand. The boy had genius, however; what he required was opportunity. Good fortune sent Dr. Wolcott, better known as "Peter Pindar," that way. He saw the boy's dawning genius, and helped him with suitable material and some useful suggestions. It was not long before the lad got away from home, quietly aided by his good friend Wolcott, and soon earned money enough to clothe himself decently and to make a start in life. He finally married Amelia, daughter of James Alderson, who afterwards became the well-known authoress Amelia Opie. The husband developed into a distinguished artist, whose historical pictures, "The Death of Rizzio" and "Jephthah's Vow," were stepping-stones to his election as President of the Royal Academy. Does not this truthful sketch from life, of a poor wood-sawyer's son, read like romance?

Genius will assert itself; it seems useless to strive against it. The secret suggestions of the soul are true, lead us whither they will. Salvator Rosa was the son of a poor architect who made ineffectual efforts to thwart his son's predilection for art, but all in vain. The young man, finding that he could not hope for any assistance from his father, strove all the harder to earn a livelihood by painting, but nearly starved before he reached his majority. About this time the patrons of art in Rome offered a grand prize for the best painting to be submitted at an exhibition to be held in the Eternal City. The young Neapolitan saw his chance, and painted a picture into which he infused all the glowing spirit of the art which burned within him. If it failed, he resolved that no one should know aught of its authorship. It was forwarded anonymously, and received the recognition of being hung in the most favorable position. That picture took the grand prize, the unknown artist being lauded as above Titian. Nought was to be heard for it but praise. This decided the fate of Rosa. He left his humble home near Naples and settled in Rome, where he secured the friendship and intimacy of the greatest men of the day.

Numerous and grand were the pictures sent forth from Rosa's hand; orders pressed upon him faster than he could fill them, and thus he stepped at once into the highest contemporary fame and fortune.¹⁸⁰ "Salvator possessed real genius," says Ruskin, "but was crushed by misery in his youth." He was not only a painter, but also a poet and a musician; nearly all cultured Italians are the latter. At the grand Carnival of the year 1639 there appeared upon the Corso and in the squares of Rome an actor of fantastic dress, who was marked like all the other revellers on such occasions, but whose name was given as one Formica, of Southern Italy. He attracted both public and private attention by his brilliant wit, his eloquence, and especially by his songs, as he accompanied himself on the lute. He was the hero of the Carnival of that season. By and by the appointed hour arrived when all the revellers unmasked, and lo! the stranger proved to be Salvator Rosa.

Among painters, Rubens is one of the greatest and most familiar names, though Ruskin disparages him by saying that "he is a healthy, worthy, kind-hearted, courtly-phrased animal, without any clearly perceptible traces of a soul, except when he paints children." Rubens became an artist from love of art, and his career was one in which there was far more of sunshine than usually falls to the lot of genius. He throve greatly in a business point of view as well as in art, and became a man of wealth in his native city of Antwerp, where he built a comfortable house and adorned it inside with pencil and brush – the whole, as he estimated it, worth about a thousand pounds sterling. Presently there came to Antwerp the Duke of Buckingham, who coveted the artist's house. A negotiation was opened, and Rubens sold it to the Duke for twelve times what it cost, or say in our currency sixty thousand dollars.

Rubens must have possessed wonderful industry, as we judge by the fact that a hundred of his paintings may be found in the Munich Gallery alone, not to mention those contained in other European collections. Undoubtedly his "Descent from the Cross," now in the Antwerp Cathedral, is his grandest work. Our artist was by no means without his vein of vanity, as evinced by the family picture which he painted, and in which he gives himself due prominence. This picture is placed just above his tomb, back of the altar, in the Church of St. Jacques, at Antwerp. The presumptuousness is increased by the fact that the combined portraits of his first and second wife, his daughter, with his father, grandfather, and himself, are intended to represent a Holy Family, and the painting is typical of that idea. The whole is incongruous and in bad taste. Vandyke, Teniers, and Denis Calvart, the instructor of Guido Reni, were all natives of Antwerp. The city owes its attraction to travellers almost solely to the fact that here are so many masterpieces of painting.

William Hogarth was a great and original genius, who wrote comedies pictorially, satirized vice, and depicted all phases of life more in detail than is possible with the pen. He was early apprenticed to a silversmith; but the natural bent of his genius was too apparent and promising not to be encouraged by the study of art. In the dramatic and satirical departments of design he has never been excelled. It has been objected that his pictures are vulgar; but when we remember the period in which they appeared, and also the fact that they undoubtedly convey useful lessons of morality, we shall find ample excuse if not commendation for the artist. In 1753 he published his "Analysis of Beauty," in which he maintains that a waving line is essential to beauty. Hogarth composed comedies just as much as did Molière. It was a singular characteristic of this able designer and artist that he could not successfully illustrate another's work; he is known utterly to have failed in the attempt, though never in the successful illustration of his own ideas. Hogarth was also a historian, inasmuch as every picture he produced represented the manners and customs of the period. The interior scenes give us the exact style of the furniture and minutest domestic surroundings; while out of doors we have all the various modes of conveyance in use, and a faithful picture of the street architecture. Hogarth died in 1764.

James Spencer, who was a personal friend of Hogarth, began life as a London footman; but the genius of an artist was born in him, and it gradually forced its way to the front. At odd moments he practised drawing and even painting with oils, whenever and wherever he could seize upon a brief chance. It happened that a professional portrait-painter was engaged to make a portrait of the head of the family where Spencer had long acted as footman. When the likeness was finished, he heard his master express some just dissatisfaction at its want of resemblance to the original. Spencer very humbly asked permission of his master to copy the painting and see if he could not get a good likeness. After expressing some astonishment at the request, his master assented. In a much briefer period than the first artist occupied, and without a single sitting on the part of his employer, Spencer astonished the family by producing not only a remarkable likeness, but an entirely satisfactory painting. With such a start the footman became a professional portrait-painter, and accumulated the means ere long to set up a fine London establishment.

In an earlier part of this volume we gave numerous instances of genius being at its best in early youth, when, as Burke says, "the senses are unworn and tender, and the whole frame is awake in every part." Of this early development we know of no more striking instance in art than that of Sir Thomas Lawrence, who at the age of ten years surpassed most of the London portrait-painters both in his certain likenesses and in the general effect of his portraits. He was a remarkable genius, and for a considerable period was the talk of all London.¹⁸¹ Added to his ability as an artist, young Lawrence was remarkably handsome. Prince Hoare saw something so angelic in his face that he desired to paint him in the character of Christ. In about seven minutes Lawrence scarcely ever failed of producing in crayon an excellent likeness of any person present, and in a manner expressive of both grace and freedom. He succeeded Sir Joshua Reynolds, in due time, as first painter to the king, was knighted in 1815, and five years later became President of the Royal Academy.

To realize under what shadows many an artist has lived, worked, and died, yet who is known to us of the highest genius, we have only to recall some familiar names. Correggio was of very humble birth: and though one of the most original of all the brilliant masters of the sixteenth century, he enjoyed little contemporary fame. His works to-day are held at as high a valuation as those of Raphael, Titian, or Murillo.¹⁸² His modesty was characteristic; his pretension, nothing. His pictures speak for him, and exhibit the softness, tenderness, and harmony of his nature. Nearly all his work was done at his native city of Correggio and at Parma; nor is he believed ever to have visited Rome. It was he who, after gazing on one of Raphael's finest productions, exclaimed, "I also am a painter!"

Correggio was chosen by the canons of the cathedral at Parma to paint for them the "Assumption of the Virgin." It was a subject well fitted to his style, and his conception and execution of the painting were beyond criticism. It may be seen, mellowed by age, in the Parma Cathedral to-day. When the work was done, the priests meanly haggled and found fault with it, in order to reduce the price, which had been previously agreed upon. Finally, they only paid the artist half the promised sum, stealing the balance to supply their secret luxuries. To add insult to their meanness, the priests paid the artist the price in copper coin. He could not refuse the money, for his poverty-stricken family awaited his return with it to supply their pressing needs. Correggio took the heavy burden on his shoulders and bore it two leagues and more, under a broiling Italian sun, to reach his home. On arriving there he was completely exhausted, and drank freely of the water his children brought to him; then, disheartened at his ill-fortune and broken down by fatigue, he went sadly to his rude bed, to awake on the following morning in a burning fever and delirious. In two days Correggio was no more.

The development of the genius which slept in the soul of Canova when a lad was brought about by a happy accident. A superb banquet was preparing in the palace of the Falieri family at Venice. The tables were already arranged, when it was discovered that a crowning ornament of some sort was required to complete the general effect of the banqueting board. Canova's grandfather, who brought him up, was a stone-cutter, often hewing out stone ornaments for the architects; and as he lived close at hand, he was hastily consulted by the steward of the Falieris. Canova chanced to go with his grandfather to view the tables, and overheard the consultation. His quick eye and ready genius at once suggested a suitable design for the apex of the principal dishes. "Give me a plate of cold butter," said the boy; and seating himself at a side table he rapidly moulded a lion of proper proportions, and so true to nature in its pose and detail as to astonish all present. It was put in place, and proved to be the most striking ornamental article there. When the guests were seated and discovered it, they exclaimed aloud with admiration, and demanded to see at once the person who could perform such a miracle impromptu. Canova was brought before them, and his boyish person only heightened their wonder. From that hour he had in the head of this opulent family a kind, appreciative, and liberal patron. He was placed under tuition with the best sculptors of Venice and Rome, to study the art of which he finally became a grand master.¹⁸³

The story of Spagnoletto is a romantic one, and not without a vivid moral. Of such humble birth was he, that nothing is said of it by himself or his friends. He suffered the very extreme of poverty; but feeling a deep love for art, and a consciousness within him that he was born to be a painter, he pursued this purpose through besetting difficulties for years. He still felt within him a power of genius superior to all and every disadvantage which he encountered. He was Spanish by birth, but made his way on foot to Rome, where he worked for his daily bread at anything which offered, and for many months was employed as a street porter, but at the same time followed the study of art in his humble way. One day a cardinal passing in his carriage saw in the streets a ragged person painting a board affixed to an ordinary house of Rome. The young man's wretchedness attracted his attention. It was Spagnoletto earning wherewith to purchase a loaf of bread. The cardinal questioned him, took him home to his palace and gave him every luxury he desired, as well as the means to pursue his beloved art. For a brief time all was well, and the art student made great progress; but, alas! the nature which could withstand the frowns of fortune wilted beneath her smiles, and pleasure thoroughly seduced the youth by her tempting wiles. He became a slave to the senses, neglected art entirely, and was fast going to ruin. One night Spagnoletto had a dream; it was the midnight visit of his better angel, and she prevailed. He awoke the next morning determined to leave the cardinal's palace with all its luxuries behind him, to resume his former condition and industry. He worked his way to Naples, and by degrees rose steadily in art until he cast off his rags and was independent. He furnished so perfect a painting of Saint Bartholomew stripped to the muscles, that it became a valued study for anatomists, and from that day his fame was assured. His pictures were eagerly sought for, and to-day they adorn the best European galleries.¹⁸⁴ As Salvator Rosa, the Italian artist, delighted most in depicting wild, rugged mountain scenery and battles, so Spagnoletto, the Spanish painter, was most at home with martyrdoms, executions, and tragic scenes generally. He died at Naples in 1656.

Genius is confined to no line of art, to no special profession; we find its exponents in the legislative hall, in the pulpit, and on the stage. Garrick was undoubtedly one of the greatest geniuses of the English stage; he was not only an actor, but a successful dramatic author. He married a Viennese danseuse, and so far as the world knows was happy in his domestic relations. He was equally at home in tragedy and comedy, possessing in a most marvellous degree the art of imitating the physiognomy of others and the manner of expressing their various emotions. It is said of him that he could imitate anything, bird or beast, both in voice and manner. On the occasion of a grand dinner-party in London, at a certain lord's, Garrick was a guest; in the course of the entertainment he was suddenly missed, and at last was discovered in the garden belonging to the house, where a young negro boy was rolling on the ground convulsed with screams of laughter to see Garrick mimicking a turkey-cock that was strutting about in the enclosure. The actor had his coat-tail stuck out behind, and was in a seeming flutter of feathered rage and pride.¹⁸⁵ Garrick declared that he would cheerfully give a hundred guineas if he could say "Oh!" as Whitfield did. A noble friend wished him to be a candidate for Parliament. "No, my lord," said the actor, sincerely; "I would rather play the part of great men on the stage, than the part of fool in Parliament."¹⁸⁶ He accumulated a large fortune, stated at over a hundred and fifty thousand pounds. He died in 1779, and was buried with such pomp as is awarded only to those who are considered national characters. His ashes rest beside the tomb of Shakespeare in Westminster Abbey.

Moore mentions having seen that excellent comic genius John Liston behind the scenes in a towering rage about some trifle, while he was dressed and "made up" for the part of Rigdum Funidos, – a contrast which must have been as ludicrous as when Washington Irving met Grimaldi in a furious rage behind the curtain, with the regular stage grin painted on his cheeks. Liston began his profession in tragic parts and developed his wonderful comic powers by chance, being suddenly called upon one evening to fill the low comedian's place on account of the illness of the actor cast for the part. He made a hit at once, such as he had not dreamed of, and it was seen by every one that he was naturally a comic actor. On the occasion referred to, by the exercise of his extraordinary facial powers he caused the spectators and actors, until the curtain fell on the closing scene, to roar with laughter, though but very little of the text had been audible to them. True genius loses itself in the character and the subject. Betterton, when he performed Hamlet, by reason of the violent and sudden emotion of amazement and horror at the presence of his father's spectre, absolutely turned as white as his neckcloth, although his natural cast of countenance was very florid, while his whole body seemed affected by an uncontrollable tremor. Had his father's apparition indeed risen before him, he could not have been seized with more real agonies. When a well-known actor of that period, named Booth, first took the part of the ghost, Betterton acted Hamlet; on which occasion his extraordinary look struck Booth with such horror that for a moment he remained silent, having forgotten his part.¹⁸⁷

Samuel Foote, the witty English comedian, was one of the vainest of geniuses. "For loud, obstreperous, broad-faced mirth," said Dr. Johnson, "I know not his equal." Foote sought the stage to earn thereby a living after squandering his fortune at gaming and other vices. When visiting in the country, his vanity led him to boast of his horsemanship, an accomplishment of which he knew little or nothing; and when invited by Lord Mexborough to join the hunt, he could not decently decline. The consequence was that at the first burst he was thrown and broke his leg in two places, so that amputation was necessary. However, he managed to play nearly as well with a cork leg. To some one who made a reflection upon his "game" leg, Foote replied promptly: "Make no allusion to my weakest part. Did I ever attack your head?" Garrick, observing that Foote had placed a plaster bust of him in his entry, remarked, "You are not afraid, I see, to trust me near your gold and bank-notes." "No," retorted the humorist, "you have no hands!" Foote was considered by his contemporaries the greatest master of comic humor after Molière. One day Foote, Garrick, and Dr. Johnson went together to Bedlam, – a hospital in London for the insane. Johnson, who was much affected at the sight of so much human misery, got into a corner by himself to meditate, and in the progress of his mood he threw himself into so many strange attitudes, and drew his face into such odd shapes, that Foote whispered mysteriously to Garrick to ask how they should contrive to get him out!

Of the moral character of Nell Gwynn, who was a favorite London actress and a mistress of Charles II., the less said the better; and yet she was not entirely void of good impulses, for it is well known that she persuaded the king to establish and endow Chelsea Hospital. But of Bracegirdle, the beautiful actress who captivated all hearts, and whom Congreve was thought nearly to worship, not a word reflecting upon her moral character could be truthfully uttered. At a London coffee-house one evening there chanced to be gathered a score or more of her admirers, including the Dukes of Devonshire and Dorset, besides other members of the peerage. Bracegirdle's name had been mentioned; when Lord Halifax said: "You all of you praise the virtue of this lady; why not reward her for not selling it? There are two hundred guineas pour encourager les autres." A thousand guineas were raised on the spot, which the noblemen took to Bracegirdle, going into her presence in a body. As it was a testimony intended in honor of her virtue, she accepted it. No doubt a large portion of this handsome tribute found its way very quickly into the hands of her needy pensioners; for she was no more estimable in her profession than noble in her charities. The best dramatists wrote for her; and two of them, Rowe and Congreve, when they gave her a lover in a play seemed palpably to plead their own passions and to make their individual court to her in fictitious characters.

Having spoken of Nell Gwynn and Bracegirdle, another English actress, Margaret Woffington, comes forcibly to mind; and though we do not propose to treat especially the profession of the drama, the incidental mention of some of its members in this gossip is not out of place. Her father was an Irish bricklayer in Dublin, where Peg Woffington, as she was best known, was a great public favorite long before she came to London to find an equally agreeable home. Her versatility of genius may be judged of from the fact of her personating Lady Macbeth and Sir Harry Wildare with equal excellence. The latter character was a favorite one with Garrick, but he gave up the part altogether after witnessing her excellence in its assumption.¹⁸⁸ She also was distinguished for her benevolence and open-handed charity. The manager of Covent Garden Theatre could always be sure of a full house when he announced her in the character of the gay, dissipated, good-humored rake, Sir Harry Wildare. Margaret built and endowed two almshouses at Teddington, Middlesex, and lies buried in the principal church of the district. In the height of her popularity she declared that she preferred the society of men to that of women; the latter, she said, "talk of nothing but silks and scandal." Her end was singularly dramatic. She was playing the character of Rosalind with more than usual éclat, when she was struck with paralysis, and died soon after in the prime of life.¹⁸⁹

We have spoken of accident as often determining the development and directing the course of genius. Edward Shuter was one of the most popular comedians on the London stage in 1776, but he began life as a pot-boy at a public-house in the neighborhood of Covent Garden. A gentleman came to the house one evening, and after refreshing himself he sent the boy Shuter to call him a hackney-coach. On reaching home he found that he had dropped his pocket-book; and suspecting that he had lost it in the coach, he went the next morning to the tavern to make inquiry. He asked Shuter if he knew the number of the hack. The poor boy could not read or write, and was totally unskilled in numerals; but he knew the signs by which his master scored the quarts and pints of porter that were drunk, and to the gentleman's inquiry as to the number of the coach which the boy had called for him Shuter said it was "two pots and a pint" (771). This was unintelligible to the gentleman, but was explained by the landlord. The coachman was summoned, and the pocket-book recovered. This acuteness of the boy interested the gentleman, and he became his patron, sent him to school, and gave him a start in the line of his choice, which was the theatrical profession. Such is the story in brief of one of the famous London comedians.

How many of our readers remember the one recorded scene when Queen Elizabeth condescended to coquet with Shakespeare? The great bard was performing the part of a king; Elizabeth's box was contiguous to the stage, and she purposely dropped her handkerchief from the box upon the boards, at the very feet of Shakespeare, having a mind thus to try whether her poet would stoop from his high estate of assumed majesty. "Take up our sister's handkerchief," was his prompt and dignified order to one of the actors in his train.

It will doubtless be found interesting to see recorded in juxtaposition the words and the manner of death of some of the great geniuses whom history mentions. When Alonzo Cano, the famous Spanish artist, was dying, the attendant priest presented before him an ivory crucifix; Cano turned away and refused to look at it because the sculpture was so bad, calling for a plain cross, which he embraced, and died. Chaucer breathed his last while composing a ballad. When the priest came whom Alfieri had been prevailed upon to see, he requested him to call the next day. "Death, I trust, will tarry four-and-twenty hours," he said, but died in the interim. Petrarch was found dead in his library, leaning on a book. "I could wish this tragic scene were over," said Quin the actor, "but I hope to go through it with becoming dignity." Pitt, the great statesman, died alone, in a solitary house on Wimbledon Common. Rousseau, when dying, asked to be carried to the window of the apartment overlooking his garden, that he might look his last on Nature.

When Malherbe the lyric poet was dying, he reprimanded his nurse for making use of a solecism in her language, and bade the priest stop his trite, cant talk about heaven, saying, "Your wretched style only makes me out of conceit with it." Bide, the English monk and author, on the night of his death continued to dictate to his amanuensis. He asked his scribe how many chapters yet remained to complete the work, and was told there was one. "Take your pen," he commanded, and went on with the work. By and by the scribe said, "It is finished," just as his master breathed his last. Roscommon, when expiring, quoted from his own translation of the "Dies Iræ." "All my possessions for a moment of time!" were the dying words of Queen Elizabeth. The last words of Cardinal Beaufort were, "What! is there no bribing death?" The last words uttered by Byron were, "I must sleep now." In his last moments Crébillon, who had composed two acts of his tragedy of "Catiline," regretted that he had not been spared to complete it.

Colorden on the day of his death was visited by his friend Barthe, who requested his opinion of the comedy of the "Selfish Man," which he came to read at his bedside. "You may add an excellent trait to the character of your principal personage," said Colorden. "Say that he obliged an old friend, on the eve of his death, to hear him read a five-act comedy!" "Let me die to the sound of delicious music," were the last words of Mirabeau. Herder died writing an ode to the Deity, his pen on the last line. Heller died feeling his own pulse; and when he found it almost gone, turning his eyes to his brother physician, said, "My friend, the artery ceases to beat!" "Tell Collingwood to bring the fleet to anchor," said Nelson, and expired. The last words of Charles I. were uttered on the scaffold, – "I fear not death! Death is not terrible to me!"

Curran's ruling passion was strong in death. Near the close of his earthly hours his physician at his morning call said he "seemed to cough with more difficulty." "That's surprising," said the almost exhausted invalid, "as I have been practising all night." "There is not a drop of blood on my hands," said the expiring Frederick V. of Denmark. "Let not poor Nellie starve" (Nell Gwynn, his mistress), were the last words of Charles II. "I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity, therefore do I die in exile," said Pope Gregory VII. with his expiring breath. Anne Boleyn turned to the executioner on the scaffold, and pointing to her neck, said pathetically, "It is small, very small indeed!" The last words of Maria Theresa were, "I do not sleep; I wish to meet my death awake." Madam Roland exclaimed, "O liberty! liberty! how many crimes are committed in thy name!"

It was in perfect accord with his character when Chancellor Thurlow said at the closing moment of his life, "I'm shot if I don't believe I'm dying!" "World without end, Amen!" said Bunyan as he breathed his last. "Guilty, but recommended to the mercy of the court," whispered Lord Hermand. "For the last time I commit soul, body, and spirit into His hands," said John Knox in dying. "Trust in God," said President Edwards, "and you need not fear." These were his last words. "If I had strength enough to hold a pen," said Willian Hunter, the distinguished anatomist, "I would write how easy and delightful it is to die." The dying words of Louis XIV. were, "I thought that dying had been more difficult." Arthur Murphy the dramatist quoted in his last breath Pope's lines, —

 
"Taught by reason, half by mere decay,
To welcome death and calmly pass away."
 

When asked if he heard the prayers which were offered in his presence, the Duke of Marlborough replied, "Yes, and I join in them." He never spoke again. "O Lord, open the King of England's eyes," said the martyr Tyndale as he died at the stake. When those noble English reformers, Latimer and Ridley, were being burned at the stake, "Be of good cheer, brother," cried Ridley, "for our God will either assuage the fury of this flame or enable us to abide it." Latimer replied: "Be of good comfort, brother, for we shall this day light such a candle in England as by God's grace shall never be put out." Lady Jane Grey's last words upon the scaffold were: "Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit." "Many things are growing plain and clear to me," whispered Schiller, and died with these words on his lips.