Chapter IV: Part 4

In 1764 Mr. Reynolds had the merit of being the first promoter of that club, which, having long existed without a name, became at last distinguished by the appellation of the _Literary Club_. Upon the foundation of the Royal Academy of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, he was appointed president; and his acknowledged excellence in his profession made the appointment acceptable to all the lovers of art. To add to the dignity of this new institution, his majesty conferred on the president the honor of knighthood; and Sir Joshua delivered his first discourse at the opening of the Academy, on January 2, 1769. The merit of that discourse has been universally admitted among painters; but it contains some directions, respecting the proper mode of prosecuting their studies, to which every student of every art would do well to pay attention. "I would chiefly recommend (says he) that an implicit obedience to the _rules of art_, as established by the practice of the great masters, should be exacted from the young students. That those models, which have passed through the approbation of ages, should be considered by them as perfect and infallible guides, as subjects for their imitation, not their criticism. I am confident that this is the only efficacious method of making a progress in the arts; and that he who sets out with doubting will find life finished before he becomes master of the rudiments. For it may be laid down as a maxim, that he who begins by presuming on his own sense, has ended his studies as soon as he has commenced them. Every opportunity, therefore, should be taken to discountenance that false and vulgar opinion, that rules are the fetters of genius. They are fetters only to men of no genius; as that armor, which upon the strong becomes an ornament and a defence, upon the weak and misshapen turns into a load, and cripples the body which it was made to protect."

Each succeeding year, on the distribution of the prizes, Sir Joshua delivered to the students a discourse of equal merit with this; and perhaps we do not hazard too much when we say, that from the whole collected, the lovers of belles-lettres and the fine arts will acquire juster notions of what is meant by taste in general, and better rules for acquiring a correct taste, than from the multitude of those volumes which have been professedly written on the subject.

In the autumn of 1785 he went to Brussels, where he expended about £1,000 on the purchase of paintings which, having been taken from the different monasteries and religious houses in Flanders and Germany, were then exposed to sale by the command of the Emperor Joseph. Gainsborough and he had engaged to paint each other's portrait; and the canvas for both being actually stretched, Sir Joshua gave one sitting to his distinguished rival; but to the regret of every admirer of the art, the unexpected death of the latter prevented all further progress.

In 1790 he was anxiously desirous to procure the vacant professorship of perspective in the academy for Mr. Bonomi, an Italian architect; but that artist not having been yet elected an associate, was, of course, no academician, and it became necessary to raise him to those positions, in order to qualify him for being a professor. Mr. Gilpin being his competitor for the associateship, the numbers on the ballot proved equal, when the president, on his casting vote, decided the election in favor of his friend, who was thereby advanced so far toward the professorship. Soon after this, an academic seat being vacant, Sir Joshua exerted all his influence to obtain it for Mr. Bonomi; but finding himself out-voted by a majority of two to one, he quitted the chair with great dissatisfaction, and next day sent to the secretary of the academy a formal resignation of the office, which for twenty-one years he had filled with honor to himself and to his country. His indignation, however, subsiding, he suffered himself to be prevailed upon to return to the chair, which, within a year and a half, he was again desirous to quit for a better reason.

Finding a disease of languor, occasioned by an enlargement of the liver, to which he had for some time been subject, increase, and daily expecting a total loss of sight, he wrote a letter to the academy, intimating his intention to resign the office of president on account of bodily infirmities, which disabled him from executing the duties of it to his own satisfaction. The academy received this intelligence with the respectful concern due to the talents and virtues of their president, and either then did enter, or designed to enter, into a resolution honorable to all parties, namely, that a deputation from the whole body of the academy should wait upon him, and inform him of their wish, that the authority and privileges of the office of president might be his during his life, declaring their willingness to permit the performance of any of its duties which might be irksome to him by a deputy.

From this period Sir Joshua never painted more. The last effort of his pencil was the portrait of the honorable Charles James Fox, which was executed in his best style, and shows that his fancy, his imagination, and his other great powers in the art which he professed, remained unabated to the end of his life. When the last touches were given to this picture,

"The hand of Reynolds fell, to rise no more."

On Thursday, February 23, 1792, the world was deprived of this amiable man and excellent artist, at the age of sixty-eight years; a man than whom no one, according to Johnson, had passed through life with more observations of men and manners. The following character of him is said to be the production of Mr. Burke:

"His illness was long, but borne with a mild and cheerful fortitude, without the least mixture of anything irritable or querulous, agreeably to the placid and even tenor of his whole life. He had, from the beginning of his malady, a distinct view of his dissolution, which he contemplated with that entire composure which nothing but the innocence, integrity, and usefulness of his life, and an unaffected submission to the will of Providence, could bestow. In this situation he had every consolation from family tenderness, which his tenderness to his family had always merited.

"Sir Joshua Reynolds was, on very many accounts, one of the most memorable men of his time; he was the first Englishman who added the praise of the elegant arts to the other glories of his country. In taste, in grace, in facility, in happy invention, and in richness and harmony of coloring, he was equal to the great masters of the renowned ages. In portrait he went beyond them; for he communicated to that branch of the art in which English artists are the most engaged, a variety, a fancy, and a dignity derived from the higher branches, which even those who professed them in a superior manner did not always preserve when they delineated individual nature. His portraits reminded the spectator of the invention of history and the amenity of landscape. In painting portraits he appears not to be raised upon that platform, but to descend to it from a higher sphere. His paintings illustrate his lessons, and his lessons seem to be derived from his paintings.

"He possessed the theory as perfectly as the practice of his art. To be such a painter, he was a profound and penetrating philosopher.

"In full happiness of foreign and domestic fame, admired by the expert in art, and by the learned in science, courted by the great, caressed by sovereign powers, and celebrated by distinguished poets, his native humility, modesty, and candor never forsook him, even on surprise or provocation; nor was the least degree of arrogance or assumption visible to the most scrutinizing eye in any part of his conduct or discourse.

"His talents of every kind--powerful from nature, and not meanly cultivated in letters--his social virtues in all the relations and all the habitudes of life, rendered him the centre of a very great and unparalleled variety of agreeable societies, which will be dissipated by his death. He had too much merit not to excite some jealousy, too much innocence to provoke any enmity. The loss of no man of his time can be felt with more sincere, general, and unmixed sorrow."

BENJAMIN WEST

By MARTHA J. LAMB[5]

[Footnote 5: Reprinted by permission, from the Magazine of
American History.]

(1738-1820)

In the wilds of the new world, a century and a half ago, there was, apparently, no spot less likely to produce a famous painter than the Quaker province of Pennsylvania. And yet, when George Washington was only six years old there was born, in the little town of Springfield, Chester County, a boy whose interesting and remarkable career from infancy to old age has provided one of the most instructive lessons for students in art that America affords.

Perhaps Benjamin West's aptitude for picture-making in his infancy, while he was learning to walk and to talk, did not exceed that of hosts of other children, in like circumstances, in every generation since his time. But many curious things were remembered and told of this baby's performances after he had developed a decided talent for reproducing the beautiful objects that captivated his eye. It was in the summer of 1745, a few months before he was seven years old that his married sister came home for a visit, bringing with her an infant daughter. The next morning after her arrival, little Benjamin was left to keep the flies off the sleeping baby, while his mother and sister went to the garden for flowers. The baby smiled in its sleep, and the boy was captivated. He must catch that smile and keep it. He found some paper on the table, scrambled for a pen, and with red and black ink made a hasty but striking picture of the little beauty. He heard his mother returning, and conscious of having been in mischief, tried to conceal his production; but she detected and captured it, and regarded it long and lovingly, exclaiming as her daughter entered, "He has really made a likeness of little Sally!" She then caught up the boy in her arms, and kissed instead of chiding him, and he--looking up encouraged--told her he could make the flowers, too, if she would permit. The awakening of genius in Benjamin West has been distinctly traced to this incident, as the time when he first discovered that he could imitate the forms of such objects as pleased his sense of sight. And the incident itself has been aptly styled "the birth of fine arts in the New World."

The Quaker boy, in course of years, left the wilderness of America to become the president of the Royal Academy in London. His irreproachable character not less than his excellence as an artist, gave him commanding position among his contemporaries. From first to last he was distinguished for his indefatigable industry. The number of his pictures has been estimated, by a writer in _Blackwood's Magazine_, at three thousand; and Dunlap says that a gallery capable of holding them would be four hundred feet long, fifty feet wide, and forty feet high--or a wall a quarter of a mile long.

The parents of Benjamin West were sincere and self-respecting, and in the language of the times, well-to-do. His mother's grandfather was the intimate and confidential friend of William Penn. The family of his father claimed direct descent from the Black Prince and Lord Delaware, of the time of King Edward III. Colonel James West was the friend and companion in arms of John Hampden. When Benjamin West was at work upon his great picture of the "Institution of the Garter," the King of England was delighted when the Duke of Buckingham assured him that West had an ancestral right to a place among the warriors and knights of his own painting. The Quaker associates of the parents of the artist, the patriarchs of Pennsylvania, regarded their asylum in America as the place for affectionate intercourse--free from all the military predilections and political jealousies of Europe. The result was a state of society more contented, peaceful, and pleasing than the world had ever before exhibited. At the time of the birth of Benjamin West the interior settlements in Pennsylvania had attained considerable wealth, and unlimited hospitality formed a part of the regular economy of the principal families. Those who resided near the highways were in the habit, after supper and the religious exercises of the evening, of making a large fire in the hallway, and spreading a table with refreshments for such travellers as might pass in the night, who were expected to step in and help themselves. This was conspicuously the case in Springfield. Other acts of liberality were performed by this community, to an extent that would have beggared the munificence of the old world. Poverty was not known in this region. But whether families traced their lineage to ancient and noble sources, or otherwise, their pride was so tempered with the meekness of their faith, that it lent a singular dignity to their benevolence.

The Indians mingled freely with the people, and when they paid their annual visits to the plantations, raised their wigwams in the fields and orchards without asking permission, and were never molested. Shortly after Benjamin West's first efforts with pen and ink, a party of red men reached and encamped in Springfield. The boy-artist showed them his sketches of birds and flowers, which seemed to amuse them greatly. They at once proceeded to teach him how to prepare the red and yellow colors with which they decorated their ornaments. To these Mrs. West added blue, by contributing a piece of indigo. Thus the boy had three prismatic colors for his use. What could be more picturesque than the scene where the untutored Indian gave the future artist his first lesson in mixing paints! These wild men also taught him archery, that he might shoot birds for models if he wanted their bright plumage to copy.

The neighbors were attracted by the boy's drawings, and finally a relative, Mr. Pennington, a prominent merchant of Philadelphia, came to pay the family a visit. He thought the boy's crude pictures were wonderful, as he was then only entering his eighth year. When he went home he immediately sent the little fellow a box of paints, with six engravings by Grevling. John Gait, who wrote from the artist's own statements, describes the effect of this gift upon the boy. In going to bed he placed the box so near his couch, that he could hug and caress it every time he wakened. Next morning he rose early, and taking his paints and canvas to the garret, began to work. He went to breakfast, and then stole back to his post under the roof, forgetting all about school. When dinnertime came he presented himself at table, as usual, but said nothing of his occupation. He had been absent from school some days before the master called on his parents to inquire what had become of him. This led to the discovery of his secret painting, for his mother proceeded to the garret and found the truant. She was, however, so astonished with the creation upon his canvas, that she took him in her arms and kissed him with transports of affection. He had made a composition of his own out of two of the engravings--which he had colored from his ideas of the proper tints to be used--and so perfect did the picture appear to Mrs. West that, although half the canvas remained to be covered, she would not suffer the child to add another touch with his brush. Sixty-seven years afterward, Mr. Gait saw this production in the exact state in which it was left, and Mr. West himself acknowledged that in subsequent efforts he had never been able to excel some of the touches of invention in this first picture.

The first instruction in art which the artist received was from Mr. William Williams, a painter in Philadelphia. Young West's first attempt at portraiture was at Lancaster, where he painted "The Death of Socrates" for William Henry, a gunsmith. He was not yet sixteen, but other paintings followed which possessed so much genuine merit, that they have been preserved as treasures. One of these is in possession of General Meredith Reed, of Paris, France, a descendant of the signer. West returned to his home in Springfield, in 1754, to discuss the question of his future vocation. He had an inclination for military life, and volunteered as a recruit in the old French war; but military attractions vanished among the hardships involved, and in 1756, when eighteen years old, he established himself in Philadelphia as a portrait-painter, his price being "five guineas a head." Two years later he went to New York, where he passed eleven months, and was liberally employed by the merchants and others. He painted the portrait of Bishop Provoost, those of Gerardus Duyekinck and his wife--full length--one of Mrs. Samuel Breese, and many others, which are in the families of descendants, and characteristic examples of his early work.

In 1760 an opportunity offered for him to visit Rome, Italy. He carried letters to Cardinal Albani and other celebrities, and as he was very handsome and intelligent, and came from a far-away land about which hung the perpetual charm of tradition and romance, he soon became the lion of the day among the imaginative Italians. It was a novelty then for an American to appear in the Eternal City, and the very morning after his arrival a curious party followed his steps to observe his pursuit of art. He remained in Italy until 1763, and while there he painted, among others, his pictures of "Cimon and Iphigenia," and "Angelica and Medora." His portrait of Lord Grantham excited much interest, and that nobleman's introduction facilitated his visit to London, which proved so prolific in results. There was no great living historical painter in England just then; and at first there was no sale for West's pictures, as it was unfashionable to buy any but "old masters." But the young artist was undaunted, and presently attracted attention in high places. His picture of "Agrippina Landing with the Ashes of Germanicus," painted for Dr. Drummond, Archbishop of York, secured him the favor of George III., and the commission from his majesty to paint the "Departure of Regulus from Rome." His untiring industry and gentlemanly habits were conspicuous, and may be regarded as among the great secrets of his continual advance and public recognition. His "Parting of Hector and Andromache," and "Return of the Prodigal Son," were among his notable productions of this period. His "Death of General Wolfe" has been, says Tuckerman, "truly declared to have created an era in English art, by the successful example it initiated of the abandonment of classic costume--a reform advocated by Reynolds, who glories in the popular innovation." His characters were clad in the dress of their time. Reynolds said to the Archbishop of York: "I foresee that this picture will not only become one of the most popular, but will occasion a revolution in art." It was purchased by Lord Grosvenor. Among the long list of paintings executed by order of the king were "The Death of Chevalier Bayard;" "Edward III. Embracing his Son on the Field of Battle at Cressy;" "The Installation of the Order of the Garter;" "The Black Prince Receiving the King of France and his Son Prisoners at Poictiers," and "Queen Philippa Interceding with Edward for the Burgesses of Calais." West was one of the founders, in 1768, of the Royal Academy, and succeeded Sir Joshua Reynolds as president of the institution in 1792, which post he held almost uninterruptedly until 1815.

In the year 1780 he proposed a series of pictures on the progress of revealed religion, of which there were thirty-six subjects in all, but he never executed but twenty-eight of these, owing to the mental trouble which befell the king. He then commenced a new series of important works, of which "Christ Healing the Sick" was purchased by an institution in Great Britain for £3,000, and was subsequently copied for the Pennsylvania Hospital. "Penn's Treaty with the Indians" was painted for Granville Penn, the scene representing the founding of Pennsylvania. West wrote to one of his family that he had taken the liberty of introducing in this painting the likeness of his father and his brother Thomas. "That is the likeness of our brother," he says, "standing immediately behind Penn, leaning on his cane. I need not point out the picture of our father, as I believe you will find it in the print from memory." Tuckerman says that the work which, in the opinion of many critics, best illustrates the skill of West in composition, drawing, expression, and dramatic effect, is his "Death on the Pale Horse." His "Cupid," owned in Philadelphia, is one of his most effective pictures as to color.

The full-length portrait of West, by Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A., represents the great artist in his character as president of the Royal Academy, delivering a lecture on "coloring" to the students. Under his right hand may be noticed, standing on an easel, a copy of Raphael's cartoon of the "Death of Ananias." The picture of West's face has been considered a perfect likeness, but the figure somewhat too large and too tall in its effects. A copy of this portrait was made by Charles R. Leslie; and Washington Allston also painted a portrait of the artist. There exists, it is said, a portrait of West from his own hand, taken apparently at about the age of forty, three-quarter length, in Quaker costume.

THORWALDSEN

By HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN

(1770-1844)

It was in Copenhagen, on November 19, 1770, that a carver of figures for ships' heads, by name Gottskalk Thorwaldsen, was presented by his wife, Karen Grönlund, the daughter of a clergyman in Jutland, with a son, who at his baptism received the name of Bertel, or Albert.

The father had come from Iceland, and lived in poor circumstances. They dwelt in _Lille Grönnegade_ (Little Green Street), not far from the Academy of Arts. The moon has often peeped into their poor room; she has told us about it in "A Picture-book without Pictures":

"The father and mother slept, but their little son did not sleep; where the flowered cotton bed-curtains moved I saw the child peep out. I thought at first that he looked at the Bornholm clock, for it was finely painted with red and green, and there was a cuckoo on the top; it had heavy leaden weights, and the pendulum with its shining brass plate went to and fro with a 'tick! tick!' But it was not that he looked at; no, it was his mother's spinning-wheel, which stood directly under the clock; this was the dearest piece of furniture in the whole house for the boy; but he dared not touch it, for if he did, he got a rap over the fingers. While his mother spun, he would sit for hours together looking at the buzzing spindle and the revolving wheel, and then he had his own thoughts. Oh! if he only durst spin that wheel! His father and mother slept; he looked at them, he looked at the wheel, and then by degrees a little naked foot was stuck out of bed, and then another naked foot, then there came two small legs, and, with a jump, he stood on the floor. He turned round once more, to see if his parents slept; yes, they did, and so he went softly, quite softly, only in his little shirt, up to the wheel, and began to spin. The cord flew off, and the wheel then ran much quicker. His mother awoke at the same moment; the curtains moved; she looked out and thought of the brownie, or another little spectral being. 'Have mercy on us!' said she, and in her fear she struck her husband in the side; he opened his eyes, rubbed them with his hands, and looked at the busy little fellow. 'It is Bertel, woman,' said he."

What the moon relates we see here as the first picture in Thorwaldsen's life's gallery; for it is a reflection of the reality. Thorwaldsen has himself, when in familiar conversation at Nysöe, told the author almost word for word what he, in his "Picture-book," lets the moon say. It was one of his earliest remembrances, how he, in his little short shirt, sat in the moonlight and spun his mother's wheel, while she, dear soul, took him for a little spectre.

A few years ago there still lived an old ship-carpenter, who remembered the little, light-haired, blue-eyed boy, that came to his father in the carving-house at the dock-yard; he was to learn his father's trade; and as the latter felt how bad it was not to be able to draw, the boy, then eleven years of age, was sent to the drawing-school at the Academy of Arts, where he made rapid progress. Two years afterward, Bertel, or Albert, as we shall in future call him, was of great assistance to his father; nay, he even improved his work.

See the hovering ships on the wharves! The Dannebrog waves, the workmen sit in circle under the shade at their frugal breakfasts; but foremost stands the principal figure in this picture: it is a boy who cuts with a bold hand the lifelike features in the wooden image for the beak-head of the vessel. It is the ship's guardian spirit, and, as the first image from the hand of Albert Thorwaldsen, it shall wander out into the wide world. The eternally swelling sea should baptize it with its waters, and hang its wreaths of wet plants around it.

Our next picture advances a step forward. Unobserved among the other boys, he has now frequented the Academy's school for six years already, where, always taciturn and silent, he stood by his drawing-board. His answer was "yes" or "no," a nod or a shake of the head; but mildness shone from his features, and good-nature was in every expression. The picture shows us Albert as a candidate for confirmation. He is now seventeen years of age--not a very young age to ratify his baptismal compact; his place at the dean's house is the last among the poor boys, for his knowledge is not sufficient to place him higher. There had just at that time been an account in the newspapers, that the pupil Thorwaldsen had gained the Academy's smaller medal for a bas-relief representing a "Cupid Reposing." "Is it your brother that has gained the medal?" inquired the dean. "It is myself," said Albert, and the clergyman looked kindly on him, placed him first among all the boys, and from that time always called him Monsieur Thorwaldsen. Oh! how deeply did that "Monsieur" then sound in his mind! As he has often said since, it sounded far more powerfully than any title that kings could give him; he never afterward forgot it.

In a small house in Aabeuraa--the street where Holberg lets his poor poets dwell--lived Albert Thorwaldsen with his parents, and divided his time between the study of art and assisting his father. The Academy's lesser gold was then the prize to be obtained for sculpture. Our artist was now twenty years of age; his friends knew his abilities better than himself, and they compelled him to enter on the task. The subject proposed was, "Heliodorus Driven out of the Temple."

We are now in Charlottenburg; but the little chamber in which Thorwaldsen lately sat to make his sketch is empty, and he, chased by the demons of fear and distrust, hastens down the narrow back-stairs with the intention not to return. Nothing is accidental in the life of a great genius; an apparent insignificance is a God's guiding finger. Thorwaldsen was to complete his task. Who is it that stops him on the dark stairs? One of the professors just comes that way, speaks to him, questions, admonishes him. He returns, and in four hours the sketch is finished, and the gold medal won. This was on August 15, 1791.

Count Ditlew de Reventlow, minister of state, saw the young artist's work, and became his protector; he placed his own name at the head of a subscription that enabled Thorwaldsen to devote his time to the study of his art. Two years afterward the large gold medal was to be contended for at the Academy, the successful candidate thereby gaining the right to a travelling _stipendium_. Thorwaldsen was again the first; but before he entered on his travels, it was deemed necessary to extend that knowledge which an indifferent education at school had left him in want of. He read, studied, and the Academy gave him its support; acknowledgment smiled on him, a greater and more spiritual sphere lay open to him.

A portrait figure stands now before us; it is that of a Dane, the learned and severe Zoega, to whom the young artist is specially recommended, but who only sees in him a common talent; whose words are only those of censure, and whose eye sees only a servile imitation of the antique in his works. Strictly honest in his judgment, according to his own ideas, is this man, who should be Thorwaldsen's guide.

We let three years glide away after the arrival of Thorwaldsen, and ask Zoega what he now says of Albert, or, as the Italians call him, Alberto, and the severe man shakes his head and says: "There is much to blame, little to be satisfied with, and diligent he is not!" Yet he was diligent in a high degree; but genius is foreign to a foreign mind. "The snow had just then thawed from my eyes," he has himself often repeated. The drawings of the Danish painter Carstens formed one of those spiritual books that shed its holy baptism over that growing genius. The little _atelier_ looked like a battle-field, for roundabout were broken statues. Genius formed them often in the midnight hours; despondency over their faults broke them in the day.

The three years, for which he had received a _stipendium_, were as if they had flown away, and as yet he had produced nothing. The time for his return drew nigh. One work, however, he must complete, that it might not with justice be said in Denmark, "Thorwaldsen has quite wasted his time in Rome." Doubting his genius just when it embraced him most affectionately; not expecting a victory, while he already stood on its open road, he modelled "Jason who has Gained the Golden Fleece." It was this that Thorwaldsen would have gained in the kingdom of arts, and which he now thought he must resign. The figure stood there in clay, many eyes looked carelessly on it, and--he broke it to pieces!

It was in April, 1801, that his return home was fixed, in company with Zoega. It was put off until the autumn. During this time "Jason" occupied all his thoughts. A new, a larger figure of the hero was formed, an immortal work; but it had not then been announced to the world, nor understood by it. "Here is something more than common!" was said by many. Even the man to whom all paid homage, the illustrious Canova, started, and exclaimed: "Quest' opera di quel giovane Danese è fatta in uno stilo nuovo, e grandioso!" Zoega smiled. "It is bravely done!" said he. The Danish songstress, Frederikke Brunn, was then in Rome and sang enthusiastically about Thorwaldsen's "Jason." She assisted the artist, so that he was enabled to get this figure cast in plaster; for he himself had no more money than was just sufficient for his expenses home.

The last glass of wine had been already drunk as a farewell, the boxes packed, and the _vetturino's_ carriage was before the door at daybreak; the boxes were fastened behind. Then came a fellow-traveller--the sculptor, Hagemann, who was returning to his native city, Berlin. His passport was not ready. Their departure must be put off until the next day; and Thorwaldsen promised, although the _vetturino_ complained and abused him, to remain so long. He stayed--stayed to win an immortal name on earth, and cast a lustre over Denmark.

Though forty years resident in Rome, rich and independent, he lived and worked with the thought of once returning home to Denmark, there to rest himself; unaccustomed to the great comforts of other rich artists in Rome, he lived a bachelor's life. Was his heart, then, no longer open to love since his first departure from Copenhagen? A thousand beautiful Cupids in marble will tell us how warmly that heart beat. Love belongs to life's mysteries.

We know that Thorwaldsen left a daughter in Rome, whose birth he acknowledged; we also know that more than one female of quality would willingly have given her hand to the great artist. The year before his first return to Denmark he lay ill at Naples, and was nursed by an English lady who felt the most ardent affection for him; and, from that feeling of gratitude which was awakened in him, he immediately consented to their union. When he had recovered and afterward returned to Rome, this promise preyed on his mind, he felt that he was not now formed to be a husband, acknowledged that gratitude was not love, and that they were not suited for each other; after a long combat with himself, he wrote and informed her of his determination. Thorwaldsen was never married.

The following trait is as characteristic of his heart as of his whole personality. One day, while in Rome, there came a poor countryman to him, an artisan, who had long been ill. He came to say farewell, and to thank him for the money that he and others of his countrymen had subscribed together, with which he was to reach home.

"But you will not walk the whole way?" said Thorwaldsen.

"I am obliged to do so," replied the man.

"But you are still too weak to walk--you cannot bear the fatigue, nor must you do it!" said he.

The man assured him of the necessity of doing so.

Thorwaldsen went and opened a drawer, took out a handful of _scudi_ and gave them to him, saying, "See, now you will ride the whole way!"

The man thanked him, but assured him that his gift would not be more than sufficient to carry him to Florence.

"Well!" said Thorwaldsen, clapping him on the shoulder, as he went a second time to the drawer and took out another handful. The man was grateful in the highest degree, and was going. "Now you can ride the whole way home and be comfortable on the way," said he, as he followed the man to the door.

"I am very glad," said the man. "God bless you for it! but to ride the whole way requires a little capital."

"Well, then, tell me how great that must be," he asked, and looked earnestly at him. The man in a modest manner named the requisite sum, and Thorwaldsen went a third time to the drawer, counted out the sum, accompanied him to the door, pressed his hand, and repeated, "But now you will ride, for you have not strength to walk!"

Our artist did not belong to the class of great talkers; it was only in a small circle that he could be brought to say anything, but then it was always with humor and gayety. A few energetic exclamations of his are preserved. A well-known sculptor, expressing himself one day with much self-feeling, entered into a dispute with Thorwaldsen, and set his own works over the latter's. "You may bind my hands behind me," said Thorwaldsen, "and I will bite the marble out with my teeth better than you can carve it."

Thorwaldsen possessed specimens in plaster of all his works; these, together with the rich marble statues and bas-reliefs which he had collected of his own accord, without orders, and the number of paintings that he every year bought of young artists, formed a treasure that he wished to have in his proper home, Copenhagen. Therefore, when the Danish government sent vessels of war to the Mediterranean, in order to fetch the works that were ready for the palace or the churches, he always sent a number of his own things with them. Denmark was to inherit these treasures of art; and, in order to see them collected in a place worthy of them, a zeal was awakened in the nation to build a museum for their reception. A committee of his Danish admirers and friends sent out a requisition to the people, that everyone might give their mite; many a poor servant-girl and many a peasant gave theirs, so that a good sum was soon collected. Frederick VI. gave ground for the building, and the erection thereof was committed to the architect, Bindesbol.

Thorwaldsen, in 1838, had attained universal fame. The frigate Rota was dispatched to bring a cargo of his works to Copenhagen, and he was to arrive at the same time, perhaps to remain in Denmark. Close to Presto Bay, surrounded by wood-grown banks, lies Nysöe, the principal seat of the barony of Stampenborg, a place which, through Thorwaldsen, has become remarkable in Denmark. The open strand, the beautiful beech woods, even the little town seen through the orchards, at some few hundred paces from the mansion, make the place worthy of a visit on account of its truly Danish scenery. Here Thorwaldsen found his best home in Denmark; here he seemed to increase his fame, and here a series of his last beautiful bas-reliefs were produced.

Baron Stampe was one of nature's noblest-minded men; his hospitality and his lady's daughterly affection for Thorwaldsen opened a home for him here, a comfortable and good one. A great energetic power in the baroness incited his activity; she attended him with a daughter's care, elicited from him every little wish, and executed it. Directly after his first visit to Nysöe, a short tour to Moen's chalk cliffs was arranged, and during the few days that were passed there, a little _atelier_ was erected in the garden at Nysöe, close to the canal which half encircles the principal building; here, and in a corner room of the mansion, on the first floor facing the sea, most of Thorwaldsen's works, during the last years of his life, were executed: "Christ Bearing the Cross," "The Entry into Jerusalem," "Rebecca at the Well," his own portrait-statue, Oehlenschlæger's and Holberg's busts, etc. Baroness Stampe was in faithful attendance on him, lent him a helping hand, and read aloud for him from Holberg. Driving abroad, weekly concerts, and in the evenings his fondest play, "The Lottery," were what most easily excited him, and on these occasions he would say many amusing things. He has represented the Stampe family in two bas-reliefs: in the one, representing the mother, the two daughters, and the youngest son, is the artist himself; the other exhibits the father and the two eldest sons.

All circles sought to attract Thorwaldsen; he was at every great festival, in every great society, and every evening in the theatre by the side of Oehlenschlæger. His greatness was allied to a mildness, a straightforwardness, that in the highest degree fascinated the stranger who approached him for the first time. His _atelier_ in Copenhagen was visited daily; he therefore felt himself more comfortable and undisturbed at Nysöe. Baron Stampe and his family accompanied him to Italy in 1841, when he again visited that country. The whole journey, which was by way of Berlin, Dresden, Frankfort, the Rhine towns, and Munich, was a continued triumphal procession. The winter was passed in Rome, and the Danes there had a home in which they found a welcome.

The following year Thorwaldsen was again in Denmark, and at his favorite place, Nysöe. On Christmas eve he here formed his beautiful bas-relief, "Christmas Joys in Heaven," which Oehlenschlæger consecrated with a poem. The last birthday of his life was celebrated here; the performance of one of Holberg's vaudevilles was arranged, and strangers invited; yet the morning of that day was the homeliest, when only the family and the author of this memoir, who had written a merry song for the occasion, which was still wet on the paper, placed themselves outside the artist's door, each with a pair of tongs, a gong, or a bottle on which they rubbed a cork, as an accompaniment, and sung the song as a morning greeting. Thorwaldsen, in his morning gown, opened the door, laughing; he twirled his black Raphael's cap, took a pair of tongs himself, and accompanied us, while he danced round and joined the others in the loud "hurra!"

A charming bas-relief, "The Genius of Poetry," was just completed; it was the same that Thorwaldsen, on the last day of his life, bequeathed to Oehlenschlæger, and said, "It may serve as a medal for you."

On Sunday, March 24, 1844, a small party of friends were assembled at the residence of Baron Stampe, in Copenhagen. Thorwaldsen was there and was unusually lively, told stories, and spoke of a journey that he intended to make to Italy in the course of the summer. Cahn's tragedy of "Griseldis" was to be performed for the first time that evening at the theatre. Tragedy was not his favorite subject, but comedy, and particularly the comedies of Holberg; but it was something new that he was to see, and it had become a sort of habit with him to pass the evening in the theatre. About six o'clock, therefore, he went to the theatre alone. The overture had begun; on entering he shook hands with a few of his friends, took his usual seat, stood up again to allow one to pass him, sat down again, bent his head, and was no more! The music continued. Those nearest to him thought he was only in a swoon, and he was borne out; but he was numbered with the dead.

The mournful intelligence of his death soon spread through the country and through all lands; funeral dirges were sung and funeral festivals were arranged in Berlin and Rome; in the Danish theatre, whence his soul took its flight to God there was a festival; the place where he sat was decorated with crape and laurel wreaths, and a poem by Heiberg was recited, in which his greatness and his death were alluded to.

The day before Thorwaldsen's death the interior of his tomb was finished, for it was his wish that his remains might rest in the centre of the court-yard of the museum; it was then walled round, and he begged that there might be a marble edge around it, and a few rose-trees and flowers planted on it as his monument. The whole building, with the rich treasures which he presented to his fatherland, will be his monument; his works are to be placed in the rooms of the square building that surrounds the open court-yard, and which, both internally and externally, are painted in the Pompeian style. His arrival in the roads of Copenhagen and landing at the custom-house form the subjects depicted in the compartments under the windows of one side of the museum. Through centuries to come will nations wander to Denmark; not allured by our charming green islands, with their fresh beech-woods alone--no, but to see these works and this tomb.

There is, however, one place more that the stranger will visit, the little spot at Nysöe where his _atelier_ stands, and where the tree bends its branches over the canal to the solitary swan which he fed. The name of Thorwaldsen will be remembered in England by his statues of Jason and Byron; in Switzerland, by his "recumbent lion;" in Roeskilde, by his figure of Christian the Fourth. It will live in every breast in which a love of art is enkindled.

JEAN-FRANÇOIS MILLET[6]

[Footnote 6: Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.]

By CLARENCE COOK

(1814-1875)

We read that on one occasion, when a picture by some Dutch artist, representing peasants at their sports, was shown to Louis XIV., he angrily exclaimed, "Take away those vermin!" Such subjects had never been chosen by French artists, nor indeed had they been seen anywhere in Europe before the Dutch artists began to paint them in the seventeenth century. The Italian painters of the early and the later Renaissance, working almost exclusively for the churches, or for the palaces of pleasure-loving princes, did not consider the peasant or the laboring man, by himself, a proper subject for his art. If he were introduced at any time into picture or bas-relief, it was only as a necessary actor in some religious story, such as "The Adoration of the Shepherds," or in the representations of the months or the seasons, as in the Fountain of the Public Square at Perugia, where we see the peasant engaged in the labors of the farm or vineyard: cutting the wheat, gathering in the grapes, and treading out the wine, and, in the later season, dressing the hog he has been killing; for in those less sophisticated times, Art, no more than Poetry, despised the ruder side of rustic life.

The German artists of the sixteenth century introduced peasants and peasant-life into their designs whenever the subject admitted. Albert Dürer was especially given to this, and it often gives a particular savor, sometimes a half-humorous expression, to his treatment of even religious subjects; as where, in his design, "The Repose in Egypt," he shows Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus, making a water-trough out of a huge log, and a bevy of cherub-urchins about him gathering up the chips. Mary, meanwhile, as the peasant mother, sits by, spinning and rocking the cradle of the Holy Child with her foot.

But these examples only serve to make clearer the fact that in the earlier times there was no place found in art for the representation of the laboring man, whether in the field or in the shop, except as an illustration of some allegorical or religious theme. Nor in the Dutch pictures that Louis XIV. despised, and that our own time finds so valuable for their artistic qualities, was there anything outside of their beauty or richness of tone or color to redeem their coarseness and vulgarity. There was no poetry in the treatment, nor any sympathy with anything higher than the grossest guzzling, fighting, and horseplay. The great monarch, who, according to his lights, was a man of delicacy and refinement, was certainly right in contemning such subjects, and it is perhaps to his credit that he did not care enough for "Art for Art's sake" to excuse the brutality of the theme for the sake of the beauty of the painting.

The next appearance of the peasant in art was of a very different sort, and represented a very different state of social feeling from the "peasants" of the Dutch painters. In the Salon of 1850 there appeared a picture called "The Sower" and representing a young peasant sowing grain. There was nothing in the subject to connect it particularly with any religious symbolism--not even with the Parable of the Sower who went forth to sow; nor with any series of personifications of the months. This was a simple peasant of the Norman coast, in his red blouse and blue trousers, his legs wrapped in straw, and his weather-beaten hat, full of holes. He marches with the rhythmic step made necessary by his task, over the downs that top the high cliffs, followed by a cloud of crows that pounce upon the grain as he sows it. At first sight there would seem to be nothing in this picture to call for particular notice; but the public, the artists, the critics, were with one accord strongly drawn to it. Something in the picture appealed to feelings deeper than mere curiosity, and an interest was excited such as did not naturally belong to a picture of a man sowing a field of grain. The secret was this: that a man born and bred in the midst of laboring people, struggling with the hard necessities of life--himself a laborer, and one who knew by experience all the lights and shades of the laborer's life--had painted this picture out of his own deep sympathy with his fellows, and to please himself by reproducing the most significant and poetical act in the life of the farmer.

The painter of this picture, the first man of our time to give the laborer in the fields and on the farm a place in art, and to set people to thinking about him, as a man, not merely as an illustration of some sacred text, or an image in a book of allegories, was Jean-François Millet, known as the peasant painter of peasants.

He was born at Gruchy, a small hamlet on the coast of Normandy, where his family, well known in the region for several generations, lived by the labor of their hands, cultivating their fields and exercising the simple virtues of that pastoral life, without ambition and without desire for change. This content was a part of the religion of the country and must not be looked upon as arguing a low state of intelligence or of manners. Of their neighbors we have no account, but the Millet household contained many of the elements that go to sustain the intellectual no less than the spiritual life. If there was plain living, there was high thinking; there were books and of the best, and more than one member of the circle valued learning for its own sake. Millet owed much to his grandmother, a woman of great strength of character and of a deeply religious nature. As his godmother she gave him his name, calling him Jean, after his father, and François, after Saint Francis of Assisi. As is usual in Catholic countries, the boy was called after the name of his patron saint, and in the case of Millet, Saint Francis, the ardent lover of nature, the friend of the birds and of all the animate creation, was well chosen as the guardian of one who was to prove himself, all his life, the passionate lover of nature.

The boyhood of Millet was passed at home. He had no schooling except some small instruction in Latin from the village priest and from a neighboring curate, but he made good use of what he learned. He worked on the farm with his father and his men, ploughing, harrowing, sowing, reaping, mowing, winnowing--in a word, sharing actively and contentedly in all the work that belongs to the farmer's life. And in the long winter evenings or in the few hours of rest that the day afforded, he would hungrily devour the books that were at hand--the "Lives of the Saints," the "Confessions of Saint Augustine," the "Life of Saint Jerome," and especially his letters, which he read and re-read all his life. These and the philosophers of Port Royal, with Bossuet, and Fénelon, with the Bible and Virgil, were his mental food. Virgil and the Bible he read always in the Latin; he was so familiar with them both that, when a man, his biographer, Sensier, says he never met a more eloquent translator of these two books. When the time came, therefore, for Millet to go up to Paris, he was not, as has been said by some writer, an ignorant peasant, but a well-taught man who had read much and digested what he had read, and knew good books from bad. The needs of his narrow life absorbed him so seriously that the seeds of art that lay hid in his nature found a way to the light with difficulty. But his master-passion was soon to assert itself, and, as in all such cases, in an unexpected manner.