Chapter II: Part 2

It is odd to think of Sir Joshua engaged in painting portrait after portrait of these fascinating but frail ladies with the same care, the same thoroughness, and the same wonderful breadth and seriousness as any of the men and women whose names were foremost in the growing culture and dignity of the nation. With Nelly O’Brien we know that he dined, and the only reason to suppose that he was not on easy terms of familiarity with any of them--if it can be called a reason--is the general dignity of his mind and deportment, as evidenced by his relations with Dr. Johnson, the Burney family, and all the great and learned people of his time. The main thing, however, to be considered is that as an artist he made no difference between the virtuous and the frail. That he was paid for painting them need hardly be mentioned, as that has nothing whatever to do with the question. But that he was as much in earnest with these commissions as with any other is a proof of the perfect balance of his mind, which in view of his sometimes over-academical dignity has rather escaped notice.

In 1770, by which time he was President of the Royal Academy and a knight, he was painting a portrait of Polly Kennedy--for the details of whose tragic history I may again refer the readers to Mr. Bleackley’s book--for Sir Charles Bunbury. “Among the rich collection of pictures by Reynolds at Barton,” says Leslie, “is one representing a young and handsome woman, with aquiline features, marked by the tension of anxiety. One hand is raised and holds a handkerchief. The dress is a rich robe of flowered scarlet and silver brocade, worn over an inner vest of bright colours, with a shawl of green and gold round the waist. It looks like the portrait of an actress, but the veiled look of pain does not belong to the stage; it is meant, I believe, to tell a tale of real and prolonged suffering.”

Whether or not Leslie’s conjecture is justified, it is certain that Sir Joshua wrote to Sir Charles Bunbury about the picture in terms which leave no doubt as to the pains he was at in executing the commission:

_Sept. 1770_

DEAR SIR,--I have finished the face very much to my own
satisfaction. It has more grace and dignity than anything I have
ever done, and it is the best coloured. As to the dress, I should
be glad it might be left undetermined till I return from my
fortnight’s tour. When I return I will try different dresses. The
Eastern dresses are very rich, and have one sort of dignity; but
’tis a mock dignity in comparison with the simplicity of the
antique. The impatience I have to finish it will shorten my stay in
the country. I shall set out in an hour’s time.

I am with the greatest respect, Your most obliged servant, J. REYNOLDS.

In the Exhibition of 1784 there appeared the famous _Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse_, of which Sir Joshua painted two if not three originals. One is at Grosvenor House, having been purchased in 1822 by the first Marquis of Westminster for 1760 guineas. (At the sale of Reynolds’s pictures in 1796 it fetched £700.) Another is in the Dulwich Gallery, and a third was given by Sir Joshua to Mr. Harvey, of Langley Park, Stowe, in exchange for a picture of a boar hunt by Snyders, which he admired very much. The Dulwich replica (which, according to Northcote, was painted by one of Reynolds’s assistants) was sold by Reynolds in 1789 to M. Desenfans--whose collection formed the bulk of the pictures now in the Dulwich Gallery--for £735.

In this portrait, for once, we can find a certain reminiscence of Reynolds’s visit to Rome, namely in the resemblance of the attitude to that of Michel Angelo’s _Isaiah_ and the two attendant figures. It is recorded that Mrs. Siddons herself told Mr. Phillips “that it was the production of pure accident: Sir Joshua had begun the head and figure in a different view, but while he was occupied in the preparation of some colour she changed her position to look at a picture hanging on the wall of the room. When he again looked at her and saw the action she had assumed he requested her not to move, and thus arose the beautiful and expressive figure we now see in the picture.” But it is easy to understand that a

1788. National Gallery, London]

slight turn of the head and a complete change of the expression, which would involve no alteration in the general pose, is enough to account for this anecdote. Mrs. Siddons is also reputed to have told a Miss Fanshawe, in whose journal the statement is preserved, that she did not think that Sir Joshua painted the duplicate now at Grosvenor House, but that the original was at Dulwich. This contradicts Northcote, and we may reasonably question Miss Fanshawe’s accuracy. Mrs. Siddons very possibly said a great deal about her picture which listeners were not concerned to take too literally, but we should like to believe her implicitly when she said that Sir Joshua intended to work considerably more on the face, but that on her telling him that she thought it quite perfect he deferred to her judgment, and left it as it was at the last sitting.

A misunderstanding as to the engraving of this picture occasioned a letter from Reynolds which is so characteristic of his thoroughness in anything he undertook, as well as being an enjoyable relief in contrast with some of the rather pedantic passages in his “Discourses” and memoranda, that no excuse is needed for reprinting it in full. Valentine Green, its unfortunate recipient, had asked for permission to engrave the picture, and Reynolds had politely told him that his application “should certainly be remembered.” Mrs. Siddons soon afterwards wrote a note to Reynolds expressing a wish that Howard should engrave it, and Sir Joshua very naturally consented. Green then wrote a long and indignant letter to Reynolds, and here is the reply.

SIR,--You have the pleasure, if it is any pleasure to you, of
reducing me to the most mortifying situation. I must either treat
your accusation with the contempt of silence (which you and your
friends may think pleading guilty) or I must submit to vindicate
myself like a criminal from a charge given in the most imperious
manner; and this charge no less than that of being a liar.

I mentioned in conversation the last time I had the honour of
seeing you at my house that Mrs. Siddons had wrote a note to me
respecting the print. That note, as I expected to be believed, I
never dreamt of showing; and I now blush at being forced to send it
in my own vindication. This I am forced to do as you are pleased to
say in your letter that Mrs. Siddons never did write or even speak
to me in favour of any artist.

1788 or 1789. Wallace Collection, London]

But supposing Mrs. Siddons out of the question, my words (on which
you ground your demand of doing the print as a right, not as a
favour) I do not see can be interpreted as such an absolute
promise; they mean only, in the common acceptation, that you, being
the person who first applied, that circumstance should not be
forgot--that it should turn the scale in your favour, supposing an
equality in other respects.

You say you wait the result of my determination. What sort of
determination can you expect after such a letter? You have been so
good as to give me a piece of advice--for the future to give
unequivocal answers; I shall immediately follow it, and do now, in
the most unequivocal manner, inform you that you shall not do the
print.

With purely historical and subject pictures Sir Joshua may be said to have increased his popularity more than his reputation. Of this class there are comparatively few, for while Malone enumerates one hundred and ten in “a general list of the most considerable,” no less than thirty-five of these are primarily portraits, such as _The Graces adorning a Term of Hymen_, _The Marlborough Family_, &c. &c. And while we acknowledge some of his very finest achievements to be portraits and portrait groups treated in this allegorical manner, when we turn to the “fancy subjects” we find little of which the importance is equal to its sentimental charm.

Nor are the most notable exceptions, as might be expected, those for which he received the largest commissions, namely: _The Infant Hercules_, £1500; _The Nativity_, £1200; _Macbeth_, £1000; _Cardinal Beaufort_, £500; _The Continence of Scipio_, £500; _A Holy Family_, £500; _Count Hugolino_, £400; _A Gipsy Telling Fortunes_, £350; _Tuccia, the Vestal Virgin_, £300.

_The Infant Hercules_ was commenced in January 1786, at a time, that is to say, when he was at the very height of his power. His niece, Miss Palmer, writing to a cousin abroad during this month, says: “My uncle seems more bewitched than ever with his pallet and pencils. He is painting from morning till night, and the truth is that every picture that he does seems better than the former. He is just going to begin a picture for the Empress of Russia, who has sent to desire he will paint her an historical one. The subject is left to his own choice, and at present he is undetermined what to choose.”

The picture is now in St. Petersburg, and we

1789. Dulwich Gallery]

only know it from engravings. Tom Taylor considered it “a confused straggling picture, quite beyond the power of the painter to manage.” But this is scarcely the criticism it deserves, and we prefer the more adulatory notices of his contemporaries. In the Exhibition of 1788--the last but two in which Reynolds was represented--it was hung over the chimney-piece. “It was the first picture which presented itself on entering the room,” says Northcote, “and had the most splendid effect of any picture I ever saw.... It was a large and grand composition, and in respect to beauty, colour, and expression was equal to any picture known in the world. The middle group, which received the principal light, was exquisite in the highest degree.” James Barry was no less enthusiastic over it: “Nothing can exceed the brilliancy of light, the force and vigorous effect ... it possesses all that we look for and are accustomed to admire in Rembrandt, united to beautiful forms and to an elevation of mind to which Rembrandt had no pretensions; the prophetical agitation of Tiresias and Juno, enveloped with clouds, hanging over the scene like a black pestilence, can never be too much admired, and is, indeed, truly sublime.”

_The Nativity_, which he painted in 1779, was purchased by the Duke of Rutland at the then unheard of price of £1200. Unfortunately it perished in a fire at Belvoir Castle, and we only know it from the engraving, and from the rendering of it in glass by Jervas as the central part of the western window of New College, Oxford. But it is doubtful whether the loss is as great as it is deplorable, in view of the opinions expressed by at least two not unfriendly critics. Mason tells us that “the day of opening the Exhibition that year when the picture was in hand approached too hastily upon Sir Joshua, who had resolved that it should then make its public appearance. I saw him at work upon it, even the very day before it was to be sent thither; and it grieved me to see him laying loads of colour and varnish upon it....” Benjamin Haydon when the whole series was exhibited in 1821, allowing that they are unequalled by any series of allegorical designs painted by an English master, and that the _Charity_ in particular is “very lovely,” and “may take its place triumphantly by any Correggio on earth,” is merciless to _The Nativity_. He condemns it for “having emptiness as breadth, plastering for surface, and portrait individuality for general nature.”

The _Macbeth_, which was commenced just a year after _The Infant Hercules_, was a commission from Alderman Boydell--half of which, by-the-by, was paid in advance--as part of the scheme for the Shakespeare Gallery. The _Cardinal Beaufort_ was the same. Neither can be said to have advanced Sir Joshua’s reputation or even his popularity as much as the _Puck_, which was purchased by Boydell for inclusion in the Shakespeare series, although not originally intended for it.

_The Continence of Scipio_ followed the _Hercules_ to Russia. The _Holy Family_, which was commissioned by Macklin for a Bible illustration, has lately been restored and rehung in the National Gallery. It was for long supposed to have suffered beyond repair, but the restorer, if he has not done too much to it, has certainly not done too little, and it now presents an appearance which attracts to it a greater amount of attention from the casual visitor than from the student.

In his minor works of this class, however, there is much more both to charm and to satisfy. If his children have not quite the same spontaneous gaiety of Gainsborough’s, they have many other qualities and distinctions which Gainsborough’s lack. With the _Heads of Angels_ and _The Age of Innocence_ Reynolds is sure of his public in any period.

_The Strawberry Girl_, as Sir Joshua always maintained, was one of the “half-dozen original things” which he declared no man ever exceeded in his life’s work. He repeated the picture several times. Lord Carysfort bought the original from the Exhibition of 1773 for £50, but at the sale of Samuel Rogers’ collection it was bought by the Marquis of Hertford for 2100 guineas.

* * * * *

To realise the full extent of England’s debt to Reynolds one must read his “Discourses” as well as look at his pictures. It is in passages such as the concluding paragraph of his farewell address to the Academy students that we find the real secrets of his success. Speaking of Michel Angelo, he says: “It will not, I hope, be thought presumptuous in me to appear in the train, I cannot say of his imitators, but of his admirers. I have taken another course, one more suited to my abilities and to the taste of the times in which I live. Yet however unequal I feel myself to that attempt, were I now to begin the world

Wallace Collection, London]

again I would tread in the steps of that great master; to kiss the hem of his garment, to catch the slightest of his perfections would be glory and distinction enough for an ambitious man.

“I feel a self-congratulation in knowing myself capable of such sensations as he intended to excite. I reflect, not without vanity, that these discourses bear testimony of my admiration of that truly divine man, and I should desire that the last words which I should pronounce in this Academy and from this place might be the name of--Michel Angelo.”

INDEX

“An Argument in behalf of the Science of a Connoisseur,” 8

Armstrong, Sir Walter, 39

Bleackley’s, Horace, “Ladies Fair and Frail,” 39

British Painting in the Eighteenth Century, 2

Burke, Edmund, 16

Burney Family, 41

Catts’, Jacob, Book of Emblems, 6

Chudleigh, Miss, commissioned to paint, 9

Dilettanti Society, 35

Dulwich Gallery, 44

Elizabeth, Queen, 36

“English Society of the Eighteenth Century in Contemporary Art,” 10

Farington, Joseph, R.A., 20

Fisher, Kitty, 39

Gainsborough, Thomas, 14, 37, 51

Hogarth, William, 2, 11, 39
_Portrait of Bishop of Winchester_, 29

Holbein’s _Duchess of Milan_, 35

Hoppner, 14

Hudson, Thomas, 8, 20

Johnson, Samuel, 17, 41

Keppel, Captain, invites Reynolds to accompany
him to the Mediterranean, 12

Lawrence, Sir Thomas, 14

Lucan, Lord, 39

Malone, Edmund, 16, 21, 47

Marlborough Group, 11

Mason’s “Observations on Sir Joshua Reynolds’ Method of Colouring,” 22

Metastasio, 25

Michel Angelo, 14, 15, 52

Morland, George, 16

Mudge, Rev. Zachariah, 17

Northcote, James, R.A., 9, 31, 45, 49

Pictures by Sir Joshua Reynolds
_A Gipsy telling Fortunes_, 48
_A Holy Family_, 48
_Boy in a Turban_, 20
_Captain Keppel_, 20, 22, 30, 31
_Captain Orme_, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33
_Cardinal Beaufort_, 48, 51
_Charity_, 50
_Continence of Scipio_, 48, 51
_Conversation Piece_, 10
_Count Hugolino_, 48
_Heads of Angels_, 52
_Infant Hercules_, 33, 48, 49, 51
_Kitty Fisher_, 39
_Ladies Sarah Lenox, Susan Strangways, and Charles James Fox_, 34
_Ladies Waldegrave_, 35
_Lady Caroline Russell_, 35
_Lady Elizabeth Keppel_, 34, 35, 36
_Lord Heathfield_, 32
_Lord Holderness_, 22
_Lord Ligonier_, 28, 32, 33
_Lords Huntingdon and Stormont_, 22
_Macbeth_, 48, 51
_Mr. Fane and his Two Guardians_, 32
_Mrs. Bonfoy_, 36
_Mrs. Molesworth_, 37
_Mrs. Siddons as the Tragic Muse_, 43
_Muscipula_, 33
_Nelly O’Brien_, 41
_Pitt (Lord Chatham)_, 39
_Polly Kennedy_, 42
_Puck_, 51
_Sleeping Girl_, 33
_The Age of Innocence_, 52
_The Graces adorning a Term of Hymen_, 47
_The Marlborough Family_, 47
_The Nativity_, 48, 50
_The Strawberry Girl_, 52
_Tuccia, the Vestal Virgin_, 48

Plympton, Birthplace of Reynolds, 5

Reynolds, Sir Joshua, birth of, 5
drawing of Plympton School, 7
early efforts, 5
effects of his studies in Italy, 19
England’s debt to, 52
entries in his pocket-book, 28
introduction to Captain Keppel, 11
lecturing at the Academy, 14
letter to Sir Charles Bunbury, 43
letter to Valentine Green, 46
memoranda of his efforts in Beechey’s Memoir, 24
painting _The Infant Hercules_, 48
portrait of himself, 9
President of the Royal Academy, 42
prices obtained for pictures commissioned, 48
residence in Italy, 12
sent to London, 8
settled at Plymouth, 9
studied under Thomas Hudson, 8
success and continued improvement, 25
three years’ tour, 19
Leslie and Taylor’s Life of, 16

Reynolds, Rev. Samuel, 5

Richardson, Jonathan, 7, 29
“Essay on the whole Art of Criticism as it relates to Painting,” 8
“An argument in behalf of the Science of Connoisseur,” 8

Romney, George, 14, 37, 38

Shakespeare, Quotation from, 32

Siddons, Mrs., story of her portrait by Sir Joshua, 44

Taylor, Tom, 37, 41, 49

Thornhill, Sir James, 2

Veronese, Paul, 35

Walpole, Horace, 8

West, Benjamin, 15

Westmorland, Earl of, Collection, 32

PRINTED AT
THE BALLANTYNE PRESS
LONDON