Chapter VIII: Preface (8)

One day there was a great crowd in Argyll Place. Not to see the painter, not even to see a royal carriage that had just drawn up at his door, nor a popular prince of the blood who occupied the carriage, but to catch a glimpse of one about whom the town was then quite mad--raving mad: a small good-looking schoolboy, a theatrical homunculus, the Infant Roscius, Master William Henry Betty. Of course rages and panics and manias seem to be very foolish things, contemplated by the cool grey light of the morning after. It seems rather incredible now, that crowds should have assembled round the theatre at one o'clock to see Master Betty play Barbarossa in the evening; that he should have played for twenty-eight nights at Drury Lane, and drawn £17,000 into the treasury of the theatre. He was simply a handsome boy of thirteen with a fine voice, deep for his age, and powerful but monotonous. Surely he was not very intellectual, though he did witch the town so marvellously. 'If they admire me so much, what would they say of Mr. Harley?' quoth the boy, simply. Mr. Harley being the head tragedian of the same strolling company--a large-calved, leather-lunged player, doubtless, who had awed provincial groundlings for many a long year. Yet the boy's performance of Douglas charmed John Home, the author of the tragedy. 'The first time I ever saw the part of Douglas played according to my ideas of the character!' he exclaimed, as he stood in the wings; but he was then seventy years of age. 'The little Apollo off the pedestal!' cried Humphreys, the artist. 'A beautiful effusion of natural sensibility,' said cold Northcote; 'and then that graceful play of the limbs in youth--what an advantage over every one else!' As the child grew, the charm vanished; the crowds that had applauded the boy fled from the man. Byron denounced him warmly. 'His figure is fat, his features flat, his voice unmanageable, his action ungraceful, and, as Diggory says (in the farce of _All the World's a Stage_), "I defy him to extort that d----d muffin face of his into madness!"' Happy Master Betty! Hapless _Mister_ Betty!

Opie had painted the Infant as the shepherd so well known to nursery prodigies watching on the Grampian Hills the flocks of his father, 'a frugal swain, whose constant care,' etc. etc. His Royal Highness the Duke of Clarence, who was a patron of the stage--or the people on it, or some of them--brought the boy to Northcote, to be represented in a 'Vandyke costume retiring from the altar of Shakespeare,'--rather an unmeaning ceremonial. But the picture was a great success, and the engraving of it published and dedicated to the duke. He was then about forty--a hearty, bluff gentleman, supposed to be free and breezy in his manliness from his service at sea,--kindly and unaffected in manner, had not the slightest knowledge of art, but regarded Northcote as 'an honest, independent, little, old fellow,' seasoning that remark with an oath, after the quarter-deck manner of naval gentlemen of the period.

The prince sat in the studio while the artist drew the Infant. Northcote was not a man to wear a better coat upon his back for all that his back was going to be turned upon royalty. He still wore the ragged, patched dressing-gown he always worked in. The painting of Master Betty was amusing at first, but it seemed, in the end, to be but a prolonged and tedious business to the not artistic looker-on. He must divert himself somehow. Certainly Northcote's appearance was comical. Suddenly the painter felt a twitching at his collar. He turned, frowned angrily, but said nothing. The prince persevered. Presently he touched lightly the painter's rough white locks.

'Mr. Northcote, pray how long do you devote to the duties of the toilet?'

It was very rude of his Royal Highness, but then he was _so_ bored by the sitting.

The little old painter turned round full upon him.

'I never allow any one to take personal liberties with me. You are the first that ever presumed to do so. I beg your Royal Highness to recollect that I am in my own house.'

He spoke warmly, glanced haughtily, then worked at his canvas again. There was silence for some minutes. Quietly the duke opened the door and left the room. The painter took no notice.

But the royal carriage had been sent away. It would not be required until five o'clock. It was not yet four; and it was raining!

The duke returned to the studio.

'Mr. Northcote, it rains. Will you have the kindness to lend me an umbrella?'

Calmly the painter rang the bell.

'Bring your mistress's umbrella.'

Miss Northcote's umbrella was the only silk one in the house. The servant showed the prince down-stairs, and he left the house protected from the shower by Miss Northcote's umbrella.

'You have offended his Royal Highness,' said some one in the room.

'_I_ am the offended party,' the painter answered with dignity.

Next day he was alone in his studio when a visitor was announced.

'Mr. Northcote,' said the duke, entering, 'I return Miss Northcote's umbrella you were so kind as to lend me yesterday.'

The painter bowed, receiving it from the royal hands.

'I have brought it myself, Mr. Northcote,' the duke continued, 'that I might have the opportunity of saying that I yesterday took a liberty which you properly resented. I am angry with myself. I hope you will forgive me, and think no more of it.'

The painter bowed his acceptance of the apology.

'Gude God!' he exclaimed, afterwards telling the story, 'what could I say? He could see what I felt. I could have given my life for him! Such a prince is worthy to be a king!'

More than a quarter of a century passed, and then the Duke of Clarence was the King of England--William the Fourth. The old painter was still living, at work as usual, though weak and bent enough now: but with his brain still active, his tongue still sharp, his eyes still very brilliant in his lined shrunken face. 'A poor creature,' he said of himself, 'perhaps amusing for half an hour or so, or curious to see like a little dried mummy in a museum.' He employed himself in the preparation of a number of illustrations to a book of fables published after his death. He collected prints of animals, and cut them out carefully; then he moved about such as he selected for his purpose on a sheet of plain paper, and, satisfying himself at last as to the composition of the picture, he fixed the figures in their places with paste, filled in backgrounds with touches of his pencil, and then handed the curious work to Mr. Harvey, the engraver, to be copied on wood and engraved. The success of the plan was certainly as remarkable as its eccentricity.

He employed his pen as well as his pencil: contributed papers to the _Artist_, and published, in 1813, a life of Sir Joshua. A year before his death he produced a _Life of Titian_, the greater part of which, however, was probably written by his friend and constant companion Hazlitt. About the same time Hazlitt reprinted from the _Morning Chronicle_ his _Conversations with Northcote_, a work of much interest and value.

He was in his small studio, brush in hand, very tranquil and happy, within two days of his death. It seemed as though he had been forgotten. 'If Providence were to leave me the liberty of choosing my heaven, I should be content to occupy my little painting-room with the continuance of the happiness I have experienced there, even for ever.' He spoke of his works without arrogance. 'Everything one can do falls short of Nature. I am always ready to beg pardon of my sitters after I have done, and to say I hope they'll excuse it. The more one knows of the art, and the better one can do, the less one is satisfied.'

Sir Joshua's pupil--'Of all his pupils I am the only one who ever did anything at all'--died on the 13th July 1831, in the eighty-sixth year of his age.

HOPPNER AND LAWRENCE.