Chapter XXIV: Introduction (1)

We have no great collection of Portrait Busts in England. The British Museum contains 20 antique portrait busts; those of Homer, Pericles, Diogenes, and Julius Cæsar have a good claim to authenticity. There are, also, in the Museum, some valuable antique Portrait Statues. The English portraits, in Sculpture, in the Crystal Palace have been collected, as time permitted, from old busts and statues, and from the studios of living and deceased sculptors. Attached to the lives of our English worthies given in the following pages, will be found, wherever practicable, the names of the respective artists.

With the English Contingent, the muster of our illustrious army for the present closes. Five hundred busts and statues constitute the vigorous germ of a collection which it is hoped eventually to render by its extent worthy of the magnificent structure in which it is housed, and of the subject which it is intended to vivify, viz.:--The history of the great men of all nations who have, by thought and deed, advanced human civilization, and stamped their impress, whether for good or evil, upon the world through which they have passed.

* * * * *

(_The English Portraits commence immediately behind the Farnese
Hercules at the north-west angle of the Great Transept and Nave._)

ARTISTS AND MUSICIANS.

388. INIGO JONES. _Architect._

[Born in London, 1572. Died 1651. Aged 79.]

Inigo Jones served his apprenticeship to a joiner: but his talent for landscape-drawing obtained for him the favour of the Earl of Pembroke, in whose company he visited France, Flanders, Germany, and Italy. At Venice he was inspired with a taste for architecture, and following the art with ardour and success obtained the office of first architect to the King of Denmark. The king took Jones to England in 1606, and introduced him to James I. His employment at the English Court as scenic decorator is well known. The attachment of Inigo Jones, who was a Roman Catholic, to the cause of Charles I., caused him great loss and suffering during the civil wars, and he died, shortly after the sacrifice of his master, worn out with grief and trouble. The style of architecture introduced into England by this famous master, was founded on the Venetian school, and more particularly on that branch of it exercised by Andrea Palladio. It is distinguished by excellent proportions, and by a masculine and noble character, which, whilst it does not condescend to borrow too much from ornament, yet makes just use of its charm. The Banquetting House at Whitehall, the only completed portion of the magnificent palace designed by Jones, is his _chef-d’œuvre_, and bears comparison with any work of the Italian style in Europe. He practised the best and purest style of Italian architecture ever known in England.

389. SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN. _Architect and Mathematician._

[Born in Wiltshire, 1632. Died at Hampton Court, 1723. Aged 91.]

We think of Wren as the first of British architects; but he was something more. As a mathematician, he was in his day second only to Newton; and in general scientific knowledge, he had no superior. Educated at Westminster. At thirteen, had already invented a new astronomical instrument. At fourteen, entered Wadham College, Oxford;--and, young as he was, formed one of the original members of a club established for philosophical discussions and experiments; a club out of which sprang the Royal Society. When twenty-five, Professor of Astronomy at Gresham College, London. At the Restoration, Savilian Professor of Astronomy at Oxford; his skill as an architect having been meanwhile shown in the Sheldon Theatre at Oxford. The popular fame of Wren rests on St. Paul’s Cathedral, which he began to rebuild nine years after the great fire, taking thirty-five years to complete his magnificent labour. Before, and during this lengthened period, he built other edifices, and applied his vigorous and subtle mind to the most abstruse branches of science. His mechanical discoveries are numerous. He invented an instrument for ascertaining the amount of rain falling in each year; he rendered the taking of astronomical observations more easy and exact; he was the originator of the attempt to introduce fluids into the veins of animals; and there is every reason to believe that to him, and not to Prince Rupert, we owe the art of mezzotint engraving. Amongst his architectural buildings are Trinity College Library, Cambridge, the new part of Hampton Court Palace, Chelsea Hospital, a wing of Greenwich Hospital, and the palace at Winchester. St. Paul’s, probably suggested by St. Peter’s at Rome, although not of equal dimensions with its supposed prototype, is a far nobler work of art, excelling it in plan, in composition externally, in variety of effect internally, and in scientific construction. Bow Church, Cheapside, St. Stephen’s, Walbrook, and most of the other churches, in the City of London--where he chiefly worked--with their exquisite and varied steeples, are the work of Wren, whose ecclesiastical edifices greatly surpass in beauty all his other buildings. In his time the Greek style had not been made known, and though with the Roman acquainted only through books, and the Renaissance buildings of Paris, his work in it is critically correct. His native genius is stamped upon his buildings, and he is ever to be admired, if not always imitated. Supplanted by Court intrigue in 1718, he spent his old age as quietly as intrigue would let him at Hampton Court, absorbed, and finding compensation, in his scientific studies, and visiting London occasionally to see how the repairs at Westminster Abbey were going on.

390. DAVID GARRICK. _Player and Dramatist._

[Born at Hereford, 1716. Died at Hampton, 1779. Aged 63.]

The pupil of Dr. Johnson, with whom he went to London from Lichfield, in search of a profession. He adopted the stage, and after playing for some time at Ipswich under the assumed name of Lyddel, made his first appearance in London, in 1741, in the theatre of Goodman’s-fields. He was twenty-five years old--the part was Richard III.--the success triumphant. According to tradition, the sole imperfect reporter to posterity of the triumphs achieved on the scenic boards, Garrick was a rare master of his art; equally impressive in tragedy and comedy. Sir Joshua Reynolds painted him smiling at Comedy, looking sadly at Tragedy,--and claimed by both. He raised immeasurably the character of the actor’s profession in this country, and purified the stage. His acting was founded upon a delicate and thorough perception of Truth and Nature. To him is due the great merit of restoring Shakspeare to the boards, and of annihilating the false taste created by the dramatists of a later period. His last appearance on the stage was in 1776. He was small in stature, but well built; his eyes were dark, and full of fire. He had marvellous power of transfusing the workings of the soul into the face, and all the passions were at his bidding. He was very vain, and not without other weaknesses; but else a generous and worthy man. His private life reflected additional lustre on his genius, and as citizen and artist he earned the honourable grave which he found in Westminster Abbey. Garrick was also a writer for the stage. His comedies and farces are lively and agreeable, and some of his epigrams have wit and fancy. Johnson and he maintained their friendship to the last. The great lexicographer affected contempt for the profession of his pupil; but he hugged “Davy,” nevertheless, in the folds of his capacious heart, and was justly proud of his achievements and renown.

391. HENRY FUSELI or FUESSLI. _Painter._

[Born 1745. Died 1825. Aged 80.]

An artist of undoubted genius and originality, but very eccentric both as painter and as man. Born at Zurich, where he cultivated learning with great ardour, especially the literature of England; at the same time took delight in copying the works of Michael Angelo and Raffaelle. Came to England in 1763, and showed his paintings to Sir Joshua Reynolds, who praised the work and recommended to the young aspirant the usual pilgrimage to Rome. Obeying the command he remained for eight years in the city of Art, and then came back to England where he worked his way to honour. In 1790, he was Royal Academician; in 1799, Professor of Painting; in 1804, Keeper of the Royal Academy. Fuseli was a good scholar, endowed with a potent and wild imagination, and an excellent anatomist; but he suffered his imagination to lead him into extravagance, and his anatomy protruded itself in his pictures. He painted, in 1798, a series of forty-seven pictures illustrative of Milton. They reveal grand conception and daring power, but tremble occasionally on the verge of the grotesque. No later artist has ventured to follow him in his flights, but his profound interpretations of the true spirit of poetry may be contemplated by all men with advantage.

[From the marble, by E. H. Baily, R.A. Executed for Sir Thomas
Lawrence, 1824.]

392. JAMES NORTHCOTE. _Painter._

[Born at Plymouth, 1746. Died 1831. Aged 85.]

The son of a watchmaker, and intended for his father’s business; but, at an early age, he transferred his affections from the parental shop to the more genial region of art. In 1771, he attracted the notice of Reynolds, under whose eye he studied for a time, and in 1777, set out for Italy. In 1783, first exhibited at the Royal Academy. In 1787, elected Royal Academician. The subjects of Northcote are chiefly historical, but he is not remarkable for power, or originality of conception. Although he displayed considerable skill in composition and colouring, as well as some vigour of expression, his ability in art was by no means equal to his enthusiasm and his application. Northcote was also a writer on art, and the author of a Life of Reynolds. At the age of eighty-four he published a Life of Titian. He was penurious and eccentric, and not a favourite with his brother Academicians.

[By E. H. Baily, R.A., 1821.]

392A. JAMES NORTHCOTE. _Painter._

[Modelled from the life, and executed in marble, by Joseph Bonomi.
Presented by J. S. Scoles, Esq.]

393. JOHN RAPHAEL SMITH. _Engraver._

[Born about 1750. Died in 1811.]

A distinguished draughtsman in crayons, and a mezzotint engraver. The friend of Chantrey the sculptor, when that admired artist was serving his time at Sheffield, in the shop of Mr. Ramsay, carver and gilder. It is related that the sight of Mr. Smith’s drawings, together with his conversation, first rendered Chantrey impatient of his servitude in the carver’s workshop, and induced him to purchase his release, which he obtained two years before his indentures had expired, for the sum of fifty pounds. This bust of John Raphael Smith, by Chantrey, was the first that brought the young sculptor into note. It was exhibited in the Royal Academy when Chantrey was 24 years old, and, during the disposition of the works for exhibition, attracted the attention of Nollekens, who exclaimed, “This is a splendid work. Let the man be known. Remove one of my busts and put this in its place.”

[The subject of this bust was afflicted with deafness, and the
expression of the infirmity is cleverly given in the face.]

394. JOHN FLAXMAN. _Sculptor._

[Born at York, 1755. Died 1826. Aged 71.]

Beyond all compare the greatest artist England has produced, and in all respects one of her worthiest sons. His life constitutes one of the landmarks set up in a nation for the guidance of the ambitious, and the encouragement of the desponding. His father was a moulder of plaster casts: in whose humble shop the boy received his earliest inspiration. Feeble, and crippled, and thrown upon himself, he read such books as he could obtain, and made drawings from the classic models that surrounded him. This was his education, for there was no money at home to purchase a better. At ten, the self-taught boy could read Latin, and had picked up much varied information. A shop filled with plaster casts will be visited occasionally by men of taste and feeling. One such man saw, and was struck by the genius of John Flaxman. His name was Mathew, and by him the child, who could read Latin, was made acquainted with the beauties of the Iliad and Odyssey. At fifteen, admitted a student of the Royal Academy, and competed successfully for the silver medal. What was to be done next?--the father without means, and the youth old enough to earn his own bread! The young sculptor entered the service of the Messrs. Wedgwood, and devoted some dozen years of his life to the improvement of their porcelain manufacture. His genius stamped upon the products of the potteries a character of beauty and classic elegance rivalling the productions of any country. The forms were admired in his own day; they are now more highly esteemed than ever. At the age of twenty-seven Flaxman married Anne Denman. His marriage, his friends declared, would ruin him as an artist. Friends are apt to look upon the shadowy side of one’s happiness. In this case they were mistaken. Anne Denman had the finest qualities of heart; she possessed also exquisite taste, and a cultivated mind. She appreciated the genius of her husband, and was an enthusiast for his works. She accompanied him to Italy, where he nourished his talents by the study of the masterpieces of antiquity. At Rome he executed his illustrations of Homer, Hesiod, Æschylus, and Dante. For the first-named he received fifteen shillings for each drawing, and was satisfied. He was elected member of the Academies of Florence and Carrara, and after seven years’ absence came back to England. His reputation bad preceded him, and he soon justified his fame by his noble monument of Lord Mansfield, in Westminster Abbey. The works of Flaxman, whether of the pencil or the chisel, may take rank with the productions of any age or country. They are distinguished by simplicity, dignity, sublimity, grace, and true poetic feeling. If any modern sculptor may take rank with the ancients, Flaxman’s place will be second to none. His productions are scattered over the globe; we meet them in India, the two Americas, and in Italy, as well as nearer home. He is better appreciated everywhere than in England. But we are beginning to know his value. His worth as a man was equal to his greatness as an artist. All who knew him speak of his modesty, his gentleness, his single-heartedness. After the death of his wife in 1820, whom he tenderly loved, he lived in comparative retirement.

[By E. H. Baily, R.A. From the marble executed for Sir Thomas
Lawrence, 1824.]

395. THOMAS STOTHARD. _Painter._

[Born 1755. Died 1834. Aged 79.]

Apprenticed at an early age to a pattern draughtsman. Subsequently, and for many years, he furnished the illustrations to “The Novelist’s Magazine.” Became the reigning prince of illustrators, and for fifty years continued to adorn the pages, not only of contemporary literature, but of our poets from Chaucer all down to Rogers. His most famous productions are the illustrations to “The Pilgrim’s Progress,” to “Robinson Crusoe,” to “Rogers’s Italy,” the Procession of the Flitch of Bacon, the Pilgrimage to Canterbury, and the Wellington Shield. He made many designs for sculptors; amongst others, that for Chantrey’s “Sleeping Children,” in Lichfield cathedral. At one time or another he attempted every branch of the limner’s art. He had great powers of imagination, moulded and directed by unflagging industry and the severest application. His genius is peculiarly English. He studied deeply the works of Raffaelle and Durer, but was no slavish imitator of these, or of any other men. The grace that clings to his works is essentially the expression of his own mind. Let us see his productions how, or when, or where we may, his spirit is detected at once, and we say, “This is Stothard.” His female figures, not always strictly correct in drawing, are exquisitely graceful. His life passed evenly in the performance of labour in which he delighted. He was a good man, and his works are his annals.

[From the marble executed by E. H. Baily, R.A., in. 1825, for Sir
Thomas Lawrence.]

396. SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE. _Painter._

[Born at Bristol, 1769. Died 1830. Aged 61.]

Of humble origin; the father of Sir Thomas being the landlord of the “Black Bear,” at Devizes, in Wiltshire. At an early age evinced great delight in drawing, and a talent for the recitation of poetry. Received his first instruction at Bath from Mr. Hoare, the painter in crayons; and when thirteen years old, gained from the Society of Arts the great silver palette and five guineas, for a copy, in crayons, of the “Transfiguration.” When eighteen, he exhibited seven female portraits at Somerset House. In 1791, chosen Associate of the Royal Academy. In 1815, knighted; and in 1820, upon the death of West, elected President of the Royal Academy. The first portrait painter of his time, and in other respects an accomplished man. His numerous works are representations of the most notable and wealthiest people of his day, by whom he was courted, honoured, and richly rewarded. His colouring was clear and brilliant, and his design most graceful; but vigour and truthfulness of character are not always remarked in his productions. Lawrence had little or no education,--he was removed from school when only eight years old,--but he must have picked up much on his road. One of our great actors has acknowledged his large debt of gratitude to Lawrence for instruction, advice, and intellectual training.

[By E. H. Baily, R.A. Taken the year after Sir Thomas Lawrence’s
death.]

397. CHARLES KEMBLE. _Player._

[Born at Brecknock, 1775. Still living.]

The living chief of a family remarkable for dramatic genius. Since the time of Garrick, until very recently, the English stage has not been without its Kemble, as one of its brightest ornaments. Mrs. Siddons and John Kemble, were the sister and brother of Charles. As the representative of Falconbridge, Mercutio, Benedick, Cassio, and similar characters, Charles Kemble has been without an equal in our time. He first appeared at Sheffield, as Orlando, in “As You Like it,” in 1792. His first appearance in London was at Drury Lane Theatre (1794), in the character of Malcolm, in “Macbeth.” He retired from the stage in 1836, but subsequently returned to the boards for a short time, in 1840, in order to play a few of his best parts before her present Majesty. He played for the last time, April 10, 1840, in the character of Hamlet.

[By Dantan, 1842.]

398. FRANCIS CHANTREY. _Sculptor._

[Born at Norton, near Sheffield, 1781. Died in London, 1841. Aged 60.]

The first portrait sculptor of his day, but not equally famous for works of imagination, the very few compositions of this kind that proceeded from his chisel having been suggested to him by other more poetic minds. Chantrey did not command astonishment, but compelled admiration by the simplicity, beauty, and truth, that were stamped on all his productions. His portraits are faithful, characteristic, and most artistic representations; idealizing the individual; and in this branch of his art he undoubtedly outstripped all rivals. His success was very great. He began life as a carver’s apprentice, and was a journeyman carver in London, where he helped with his own hand to furnish the dining-room of Mr. Rogers, the poet--a room in which many times, in after life, he sat, one of the most welcome and sociable of the guests there assembled. Wealth and honour came to him earned by labour and perseverance; and the fruits of his industry, amounting to £90,000, he bequeathed to the Royal Academy, for the purchase of “works of fine art of the highest merit in painting and sculpture,” such works “being executed within the shores of Great Britain.” The bequest was worthy of a man whose mind, whose works, whose habits, all bore the strong impress of the nation in which he was born, and of the people from whose heart he had sprung.

[By his pupil, F. W. Smith.]

398A. FRANCIS CHANTREY. _Sculptor._

[Medallion by Heffernan.]

399. WILLIAM MULREADY. _Painter._

[Born at Ennis, in Ireland, 1786. Still living.]

An honoured name in British art, and undoubtedly the head of the charming and peculiar style which he adopted, after having employed his genius on larger and more striking subjects. He has risen from obscurity by the force of genius, and given to the world works which will not readily perish. When fourteen years old admitted a student at the Royal Academy. Elected Royal Academician in 1816. His works reveal great delicacy and purity of mind. He is a consummate draughtsman and colourist; and in the refined beauty and finish of his pictures, is not surpassed by any of his contemporaries. Amongst his best works may be reckoned those in the Vernon Gallery and in the collection of Mr. Sheepshanks.

[By Christopher Moore. 1830.]

400. JOHN GIBSON. _Sculptor._

[Born at Conway, N. Wales, 1790. Still living.]

Like Chantrey, apprenticed to a wood-carver, and, like him also, a cabinet-maker at this starting-point of his career. At the age of eighteen, he exhibited a wax model of “Time,” which procured him employment with a sculptor in Liverpool. Making the acquaintance of Lord Castlereagh, he was furnished by that nobleman with an introduction to Canova, and he accordingly set out for Rome in 1820. In Rome he still resides. He has wrought with his chisel for the noble and wealthy of his own country, and for the patrons of art in the land which he has chosen for his residence. Ludwig of Bavaria--the eager and munificent patron of art--has been amongst the serviceable friends of the gifted Welshman. For grace, beauty, and finished execution, John Gibson has never been surpassed in this country. Flaxman is the first of British artists; but as a sculptor, chisel in hand, Gibson is hardly second even to him.

[From the marble by Theed.]

400A. JOHN GIBSON. _Sculptor._

[This bust is by Macdonald of Rome.]

401. WILLIAM CHARLES MACREADY. _Player._

[Born 1793. Still living.]

The son of William Macready, who was author, actor, and manager. Educated at Rugby. Made his first appearance on the stage as Romeo, at Birmingham, and his debût in London, in 1816, as Orestes, in the “Distressed Mother.” He continued in London a leading tragic actor, until he finally retired from the stage in 1851. Mr. Macready’s style of acting was of the romantic, rather than of the classic order; his “Virginius” a more masterly performance than “Hamlet,” his “Rob Roy” far more picturesque and striking than “Richard III.” In the representation of Shakspeare’s characters this popular actor was not, generally speaking, equal to the most celebrated of his contemporaries. His conceptions were not the conceptions formed by the intellectual portion of his auditory in the tranquillity of the study. It was, however, impossible to witness a more admirable execution of a wrong conception, than that which Mr. Macready was able to render. In private life he has done honour to his profession; and he has left no actor behind him. superior to himself.

[By W. Behnes.]

402. GEORGE CRUIKSHANK. _Caricaturist._

[Born in London, 1794. Still living.]

Like Tom Hood, George Cruikshank is something more than a humourist: or, to speak more correctly, like all great humourists, both he and Hood possess and reveal a deep perception and appreciation of the serious and the pathetic in Nature and Art. The labours of Cruikshank, which commenced at a very early period of his life, have been incessant and remarkable. His admirable illustrations have adorned books of all kinds, from the political “House that Jack built,” to the moral “Bottle.” At no period has he drawn a line which--however cutting may have been the satire employed--has not had for its object the benefit, as well as the amusement of his fellow-men. His latest works--attacking the most degrading of our national vices,--command our gratitude and respect. George is popular amongst his associates. His face is an index to his mind. There is nothing anomalous about him and his doings. His appearance, his illustrations, his speeches are all alike,--all picturesque, artistic, full of fun, feeling, geniality, and quaintness. His seriousness is grotesque, and his drollery is profound. He is the prince of living caricaturists, and one of the best of men.

[By W. Behnes.]

403. ROBERT VERNON. _Patron of Art._

[Born 1774. Died in London, 1849. Aged 75.]

A benefactor to his country, who amassed a fortune in business, and expended his wealth in the formation of a gallery of pictures by British artists. Whilst living, he proved himself the benefactor of struggling genius. Dying, he bequeathed his works of art to the nation. His pictures are now collected at Marlborough House, where they form “The Vernon Gallery.”

[By W. Behnes.]

404. FANNY BUTLER. _Actress._

[Still living.]

The daughter of Charles Kemble: and a popular actress of her day. She made her first appearance at Covent Garden Theatre, October 5, 1829, in the character of Juliet; and the sensation she then created rescued the theatre from the difficulties into which it had fallen. She married Mr. Butler, an American, and is the authoress of one or two well-written tragedies and other works.

[By Dantan, of Paris.]

405. ADELAIDE SARTORIS. _Vocalist._

[Still living.]

Second daughter of Charles Kemble: highly distinguished as a vocalist of the Italian school; she made her first appearance at Covent Garden Theatre, in Norma, Nov. 2, 1841, and sang and acted with great success at the same theatre in 1841 and 1842; but at the end of 1842 she retired from her profession into private life.

[By Dantan, of Paris.]

405*. GRACE DARLING. _Lighthouse-keeper’s Daughter._

[Born at Bamborough, Northumberland, 1815. Died 1842. Aged 27.]

“ONE whose very name bespeaks
Favour divine, exalting human love;
Whom, since her birth on bleak Northumbria’s coast,
Known unto few, but prized as far as known,
A single act endears to high and low,
Through the whole land.”--WORDSWORTH.

Grace was the seventh child of a humble man who had charge of a lighthouse on one of the Farne Islands, off the coast of Northumberland. In the month of September, 1888, the “Forfarshire” steamer, of 300 tons, having on board sixty-three souls, during a terrible storm and dense fog, struck on a rock within a mile of the light-house. It was deep night. The ship snapped in half. Nearly all the creatures on board were swallowed by the chafing sea; and when morning broke, all that remained of the “Forfarshire” and its people, were nine of the passengers clinging to the windlass in the forepart of the vessel. It was a fearful morning, the fog still prevailing--the sea hardly less boisterous. Through the mist, however, the sad spectacle could be witnessed from the mainland, and a reward was offered to any boat’s crew that would venture to the rescue. It was offered in vain. But the despairing castaways were visible also from the lighthouse, where none was rich enough to offer reward of any kind, for the sole inhabitants were husband, wife, and daughter. It was the last watch before extinguishing the light at sunrise, and Grace was keeping it. She intreated her father to go to sea, and he consenting, the girl shared his boat, and the pair in dread and awe put off. Why speak of danger? Why detail the miracle? The risk was incalculable. The chances of recovery, nay, of self-preservation, were infinitesimal. But God strengthened the woman’s arm, as he had visited her heart, and, after painful labour, the rescue was effected. The delivered nine were taken to the lighthouse, and there kindly treated by the heroic girl and her aged parents. The spirit of the nation was stirred by the act. Money enough to provide for her as long as she should live, and gifts innumerable, were brought to her sea-girt rock; but she would not leave the light-house. Why should she? What place so fitting to hold this queen? She held her modest Court there until her early death. One who visited her speaks of her genuine simplicity, her quiet manner, her perfect goodness. In 1841, symptoms of consumption--the poisonous seed sown, it may be, on that drear morning--revealed themselves. In a few months she died, quietly, happily, religiously. Shortly before her death, she received a farewell visit from one of her own sex, who came in humble attire, to bid her God speed on her last illimitable journey. The good sister was the Duchess of Northumberland, and her coronet will shine the brighter for all time, because of that affectionate and womanly leave-taking. Joan of Arc has her monument. Let Grace of Northumbria have none. Her deed is registered--

“in the rolls of Heaven, where it will live
A theme for angels when they celebrate
The high-souled virtues which forgetful earth
Has witnessed.”

[Medallion by David Dunbar. Modelled from the marble bust in the
possession of the Bishop of Durham. The original model was taken. from
the life at the Longstone lighthouse, soon after the incident above
recorded, and three years before the death of Grace.]

405.** WILLIAM DARLING. _Lighthouse-Keeper._

[Born 1783. Still living.]

The father of Grace Darling. He succeeded his own father as keeper of the Coal-light on the Brownsman, the outermost of the Farne islands, on the coast of Northumberland. In 1826, he was transferred to the lighthouse on the Longstone, another of the same group of islands. Solitary, cut off for weeks from communication with the mainland, this humble man has passed his days in self-improvement. He is intelligent, quiet, and well-conducted. His children have received a good education for their position in life, the father being the sole instructor--and one daughter at least has not thrown discredit upon her bringing up.

[By David Dunbar.]

POETS AND DRAMATISTS.

406. GEOFFREY CHAUCER. _The Father of English Poetry._

[Born in London, 1328. Died there, 1400. Aged 72.]

Notwithstanding the gulf of years, the poetical sire of Shakspeare. He to whom, in an age which we call dark, the full sun of poetry shone. He whose lineaments and gesture, transmitted by a contemporary pencil, are here before us. He whose eye, though downcast, reads the world around him, as it sounds the interior of Man: whose grave look of thought hides the soul of mirth. What phase of our various life seems strange to him? To this he is at home in experience; to that in imagination. With what Homeric power has he not described the tournament where kings fight in the lists at Athens! What mediæval romance in the loves of Palamon and Arcite! What an oriental colour and grace in the Squier’s half-told tale of the Tartar Cambuscan! You read tale after tale, and wonder which of the diversified strains was indeed the most native to the heart of the poet. One critic will tell you--the broad coarse mirth--Never believe it! See with what lingering and tender fondness he brings out the sorrowful story of the pure, innocent, and falsely accused Custance, abandoned to the wild, drifting sea. How patiently he tells the trials of the patient Griseldis--how sternly the self-doom of those two impious challengers of death. To Chaucer was given an insight of which nothing eludes the scrutiny, a sympathy of which nothing lies beyond the embrace. And in what spring-like vigour and bloom of life that vanished world rises again before us! What truth! and what spirit! Under his quill the speech of England first rose into the full form and force of a language. Look up at him! He seems to be scanning thought and word, both. Mine host of the Tabard singling him out amongst the pilgrims, for the teller of the next tale, says of him: “He seemeth elvish by his countenance.”--Does he?

[For an account of this statue by Marshall, see No. 53, Handbook of
Modern Sculpture. There is an interesting contemporary portrait of
Chaucer in the British Museum, bearing date 1400, from which the idea
of this statue is borrowed.]

407. WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. _Poet._

[Born at Stratford-on-Avon, 1564. Died there, 1616. Aged 52.]

William Shakspeare stands at the head of those whose intellectual domain is the spirit of man. This is the master character of his mind, to which poetry is in him an accidental direction. His insight into man is his title to universal interest. He is the chief painter of humanity that the world has seen, combining, at once, perfect intimate knowledge of human nature, and perfect creative power of representation. The drama had suddenly awakened in his country, and he obeyed the instinct of his time, the poetic bent of which was created for him, as he for it. There were with him, before him, and immediately after him, great poets, with whom the dramatic elements existed in high native strength and beauty; but in him alone are those elements mastered, so as to produce entire works of art, complete in power, and in consistent, though not regular, form. Sharing the intuition of Aristotle, which makes the action in the play the root out of which the characters and all else grow, he directs the stream of events as connectedly as it flows in the human world; and, as in the world, so in his inspired writing--agents appear born for their work, as the work to do seems to offer itself to the agents. All beauties of language, all flights of poetry, all particular scenes and speeches, powerful and impressive as they may be, are merely subordinate. No character, how exquisitely or elaborately soever conceived and finished, is drawn for itself; but one and all are relative to the scope of the play and to one another. He seems to have undertaken a great task, and to be seriously and solely intent upon advancing to its fulfilment. No form of human life is foreign to him; the most heroic and the humblest, the most illustrious and the most obscure, of all times, in all places, are in presence before him. He seizes the spirit of time, place, and theme. Natural, preternatural, light, weighty, laughter, tears, terror, are all alike to him---all under his mastery, and flung forth with free power. Grace and gigantic strength, are spirits equally at his bidding. The learned and the unlearned are both attracted by his spell. The ignorant feel the fascination, the erudite have never exhausted the study. His country, with her innumerable titles to renown, ranks amongst the highest his great name. With school instruction of the most ordinary kind, by universal and unerring observation, by profound and intense meditation of men, with the creative power of the highest imagination, he gave out, spontaneously, works of that kind whose study makes men learned: and they are so viewed and studied by all civilized nations, every day more and more, at home and abroad. In him England competes for the crown of poetical glory with all other nations of old or modern fame. She has had other great poets, but they all, besides their own natural offerings, have brought poetry from other lands and languages, into their own. In him alone she feels, that what she displays SHE has produced. Little is known of the life of William Shakspeare.

[From the well-known monumental bust in the church at
Stratford-on-Avon, where Shakspeare lies buried. It was executed by an
artist named Gerard Johnson, very soon after the death of Shakspeare,
and erected between 1616 and 1620. The original is in common
limestone, and was painted to resemble life. The eyes were a light
hazel, the hair and beard auburn: the doublet was scarlet, and the
loose gown black. It was repainted precisely in the same manner in
1749. But in 1793, Malone officiously had it whitewashed, as it now
exists. There is a great resemblance between this face from the
Stratford monument and the portrait published in the first folio of
Shakspeare’s works, by the actors, in 1623. No. 407A is from a very
remarkable terracotta bust, in the possession of Professor Owen, of
the College of Surgeons. It was discovered in pulling down the old
Duke’s Theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, where it was placed over one
of the stage-doors, the bust of Ben Jonson (accidentally destroyed by
the workmen) occupying a corresponding place over the other door.
Shakspeare having been rescued by the timely interposition of Mr.
Clift, Professor Owen’s father-in-law, the bust became that
gentleman’s property, and by him it was given to its present owner.
There are two types of the Shakspeare portrait: the “round-faced,” as
seen in the monument of Stratford-on-Avon, and the “oval-faced” of
Cornelius Jansen. Roubilliac’s bust, and that in the possession of
Professor Owen, are after Jansen. No. 407B is the bust by Roubilliac.
The statues by Roubilliac and John Bell (see Handbook of Modern
Sculpture, Nos. 56 and 9) are conventional, and represent the two
types.]

407A.}
} WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. _Poet._
407B.}

408. JOHN MILTON. _Poet._

[Born in London, 1608. Died there, 1674. Aged 66.]

The son of a scrivener. In his earliest years he became enamoured of the Muses, wrote exquisite poetry, travelled in Italy, returned hastily on the outbreak of the Civil war, and identified himself with the Republican party. Later in life, and as blindness was deepening upon him, he was appointed by Cromwell Latin Secretary to the Council of State. Retiring from politics on the death of the Protector, he would, under the Restoration, have suffered as a regicide, had not Sir William Davenant, to his great honour, interposed his own favour with the Court. So rescued, Milton withdrew into obscurity and poverty, unnoticed and forgotten. In his solitude and blindness he composed “Paradise Lost,” which he dictated chiefly to his eldest daughter. The poem was sold to a bookseller for ten pounds, and was not very popular during the lifetime of the poet. At one time he took pupils. He was three times married, was devoutly religious, austere in his morals, and simple in his ways of life. He is the great epic poet of England, distinguished by the strength and sublimity of his genius, and hardly less for sensibility to the graceful and beautiful. Laboriously learned, with an admiration as intelligent as devoted, of the great writings preserved from Greek and Roman antiquity, he, more than any other of our poets, has modelled his works on the type of his illustrious predecessors. He has, of all English poets, carried art in his writings to the highest pitch, but neither art nor imitation has tamed the wing of his muse, or impaired his praise of originality. He knew the greatness of his powers, viewing them as a gift to be used to the honour of the Giver; and his one paramount work, the “Paradise Lost,” having for its “great argument,” as he himself says, “to justify the ways of God to men,” must be regarded as his oblation, brought and laid on the Altar. He founded and formed English heroic blank verse,--a measure which, under his hand, rivals in richness and variety the music of his classical masters; and which alone could, by its majestic flow and inexhaustible powers of expression, have sustained the weight and amplitude of his subject. He loved and honoured Shakspeare.

409. ALEXANDER POPE. _Poet._

[Born in London, 1688. Died at Twickenham, 1744. Aged 56.]

Alexander Pope, the son of a linendraper, and a Roman Catholic, was his own instructor. He was sent home from school in his twelfth year for lampooning his tutor, and from that time he gave his teachers no further trouble. Already, as a boy, a happy versifier--twice happy, for an indulgent father smiled on his dawning skill--he was, in his maturer day, and for the remainder of his own century, the leading star in the sky of our English poetry. He received at the hands of his master, Dryden, the rhymed ten-syllable couplet. This couplet was not first by Dryden used harmoniously, forcibly, eloquently--for Hall in his Satires had done this--but by Dryden it was first raised into the reigning measure of English song. He sustained in it a free flow and bold sweep, suitable to his genius. Pope rather chained the movement, stamping even on his verse the peculiarity of his fine intellectual powers. When we search for Pope’s characteristic amongst poets, we find that he had reasoning--which is the earnest,--and wit--which is the sporting--of the logical faculty, both intimately blending themselves with the poetic vein. It was, accordingly, to a bright and sharp intellectual action that he fitted the couplet, apt by its nature for the service. Uniting to a lively, quick and keen intellect, so much of poetic passion as, in fact, secured the dedication of a life, he produced works which, by their mastery, must command admiration whilst the language is read, although in them, the deliberate skill predominates over the passionate expression. Viewed from the highest point, he was imitative, not original. His spirit active and perceptive in the study of his greater and less predecessors, not self-infused into the contemplation of Man and Nature. What is most felt as a fire in his verse is the ardency of writing, the zeal of an artist enamoured of his task: or he accepts and translates the passion of others, which, not having its home in its own bosom, does not receive justice there. Our grandfathers and our grandmothers knew by heart the “Essay on Man,” the “Essay on Criticism,” the “Moral Essays,” the “Characters of Women” (sparkling with wit and malice, but adding nothing to the observation and true ideal delineation of woman), and the “Rape of the Lock,” in which the playfulness, lying in the verse, exquisitely comes out, and a graceful half-ironical fancy amuses and captivates, but no steeping imagination subdues or transforms to its likeness. He introduces us again to Ariel, whom we have known before, but how different his Ariel and Shakspeare’s. Pope brought intellective precision into poetry, which should feed on the indefinite and the vague, and should flower out into the softened and the flowing. Hence, often when he is the most admirable, he is the most artificial.

410. OLIVER GOLDSMITH. _Poet and Man of Letters._

[Born in Ireland, 1728. Died in London, 1774. Aged 45.]

Poor dear Oliver! What shall we say of him, with his kindly benevolence, his manly independence, his honest feeling, his childish vanity, his naughty extravagance, his irregularities, his blunders, his idleness, his industry, his zeal for the improvement and advancement of the whole world, and his improvident neglect of himself. Goldsmith had fits of genius:--moments of an inspiration, or a possession, that appeared to produce in him powers, not ordinarily there. In the conduct of life he seemed born to be the world’s victim: he lay under the world. His gifted pen in his hand, he rose above it. The tender sensibility that indites his verse agrees too well to his story. The playful humour, and the sharp, never rough, never malignant, satire, take by surprise. He then had the laughers on his side--too often, unfortunately, against him. His poems of “The Traveller” and “The Deserted Village” are a species by themselves, or each a species. The vein of reflexion, of personal feeling, and of poetical viewing, with native simplicity of expression and musical sweetness, is common to the two. The dirge of the deserted hamlet sowed the seed of “The Pleasures of Memory;” and the wandering poet, feeding his verse from his travels, was repeated in “Childe Harold.” Goldsmith’s “Retaliation,” written upon his friends of the St. James’s Coffee House, in requital of the epitaphs they had provided for himself, is the most brilliant and masterly summing up of characters in pointed words and streaming verse that the language possesses. The “Vicar of Wakefield” is the smiled-at, honoured, and loved inmate of every English home.

[By W. Behnes.]

410*. ROBERT BURNS. _Poet._

[Born in Alloway, Ayrshire, 1759. Died at Dumfries, 1796. Aged 37.]

The ploughman-poet of Scotland; in whom the labour of the limbs appeared to invigorate the intelligence, and the bleak air of poverty to cherish the blossoms of genius. Shakspeare rose from the bosom of the people to delineate kings and queens. Burns, born some steps lower, dwelt, even in his verse, to the last, amongst his own order. That is his dignity and his glory. The life of the Scottish peasant as it remains represented by his pencil, and in his person, seizes the imagination and the sympathies of the educated world. He has drawn the heart of the high towards the low. He has raised the low to their just esteem in the opinion of the high. But besides this moral aspect, he has gained, as a poet, immeasurably, by rooting his foot to the fields which he furrowed. The conflict, so maintained in our thoughts between his social position and his endowments and aspirations, sheds a continual illumination of wonder upon his writings. But more! His happiest subjects and strains draw life and meaning from the soil of which they are the self-sown flowers. Not merely that solitary agricultural Idyl, with its homely-pathetic and homely-picturesque--“The Cotter’s Saturday Night,”--but the fanciful tenderness of his lament over the Daisy and the Mouse;--but the wild and reckless daring of imagination in that cordial rencounter with the dread foe Death--that blending of the humorous, the supernaturally grotesque and the terrific in Tam O’Shanter--of the rustic, the gracious, the solemn, even the sublime--in the Vision of Coila--these most characteristic feats of poetical skill and genius--which stand apart, defying competition and claiming rank for the name of Burns, amongst the illustrious on Parnassus--all are made possible by originating from and by reflecting his native condition. His songs are tender, passionate, musical; chaunting his own or imaginary rustic loves. The torrent of his spirit, that, pouring along the channels of thought and song, became an elate and exalting enthusiasm, hurried him on the paths of common life into excesses, dilapidating the humble home and the proud householder. He first published his poems--now in every peasant’s cottage throughout Scotland--in his 27th year, and his fame was instantaneous. Later in life, the favour and patronage of the Scottish nobility and gentry were able to confer upon him a place in the Excise, of no less than £70 a-year: in the discharge of which distinguished public function, and in the enjoyment of which splendid public remuneration--then his only certain support--the one-laurelled modern singer of the time-honoured Scottish tongue sank, from his darkening noon, into the grave.

[This Bust is by David Dunbar.]

411. SAMUEL ROGERS. _Poet._

[Born at Newington Green, near London, 1762. Still living.]

A classic inheritance from the entombed past. The living poet who carried his first production with a trembling hand to Dr. Johnson’s house in Bolt Court, Fleet Street, and could not find heart to wait for an answer to his summons when he had knocked at the door; who listened with delight and instruction to the lectures of Sir Joshua Reynolds; and who still remembers and relates how, when his father took him to see Garrick act, he himself punished his boyish impatience by closing his eyes for a moment, as the great actor was coming on to the stage. It is nearly seventy years since Samuel Rogers published his first poem, and he was then a man. He is the Addison of verse. Grace, elegance, delicacy, softness, are the characteristics of his poetry. He does not astonish by power, nor thrill by burning passion; but he soothes, gratifies, and charms all who are susceptible of consolation and pleasure from polished and complete works of art. His taste is refined and classical, and all his works have the finish which such taste will require of the artist possessing it. The rhythm of his poetry partakes of the character of the sentiment: all is chaste, smooth, refined, and clear. The descriptions in “Italy” of Italian life and scenery are very beautiful, and his reflections are at all times pure and elevating. For so long a life, Mr. Rogers has written very little; but his works are gems, and have been heightened and improved by labour until scrupulous thought can do for them nothing more. All poets since the century began have acknowledged Rogers for a master; and his conscientiousness, purity, and refinement, fit him for a teacher. He has outlived not only his illustrious contemporaries, but the great poets who were unborn when he had reached his prime. The patriarch, in his long protracted nightfall, still gladdens his memory with the visions of the past, looking with placid hope towards his all but present future.

[By W. Behnes.]

412. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. _Poet._

[Born at Cockermouth, 1770. Died at Rydal Mount, 1850. Aged 80.]

The most original of the poetical thinkers whom his day gave to his country. Her verse, notwithstanding one or two better voices uplifted, had too long and too patiently worn the character of an imitative literature. He undertook the championship of a conflict, which was to reseat legitimate powers on the throne. Born and bred in the northern, mountain region of England, his first study of men was amongst the simple-minded, vigorous, independent, and intelligent peasantry of the dales. The earth, which his young feet explored, lay embosoming its lakes, rearing crag and steep, as though yet freshly robed in loveliness, or charged with power, by the Creator’s hand. His instinct already drew him, even unconsciously, to gather, in _that_ contemplation of Man and of Nature, and not in books, the materials of his appointed Art. Solitary, self-communing, self-sufficing, he soon stood in presence with an educated world, the prophet of a new poetical revelation. He found, at the first encounter, a prophet’s reward--belief in the few: from the multitude, mockery and persecution. He lived long enough to be understood; to see health and strength of his infusing reanimate the too languid veins of our English poesy. An extreme trust in the worth inhering in every phase of humanity may have sometimes descended too low, in the choice of the theme; an excessive zeal of simplicity may occasionally have stripped the style a little too bare. But his writings remain distinguished, amongst the lays of his own just elapsed age, as the most soothing and instructive to the heart of the reader; and for the generations of poets, rising and to rise, the most warning and oracular. His strains have been remarkably various in length and weight, in manner and style. As a portrayer of human nature, he ranks amongst those who have the most deeply and critically explored the workings of our mysterious heart and intellectual being. His especial vocation amongst poets was, in his own view, the disclosure of the affinities which attract, by feeling, the human soul to the natural world: It supplying intellectual forms, and We, passion--an intercourse, blending, if it may be so said, two lives into one. He entered upon his work of reforming our poetical spirit, in two volumes of Lyrical Ballads and Other Poems, in the years 1798 and 1807. His life was one long day of brooding calm--his sunset, lucid and serene.

[Presented to the Crystal Palace by the sculptor, F. Thrupp, and
modelled by him from a cast after death by Chantrey.]

413. SIR WALTER SCOTT. _Poet and Novelist._

[Born in Edinburgh, 1771. Died at Abbotsford, 1832. Aged 61.]

The great magician of the north, under whose fascinating spell millions in all lands have been entranced and strengthened. His boyish eye fed on the wild scenes of his native land, and on the mouldering wrecks--here and there sadly gracing those scenes--of her former sterner, yet greater day. His boyish heart was cradled in the music of her old wild songs, then living, and in the rough and bold traditions of her strange and romantic Past. The joy and the passion which were life to the boy, became power to the man. With a wondrous dominion suddenly begun, yet prolonged whilst he lived, he swayed and swept back the spirits of his generation on a torrent of delight and desire, into forgotten times, alien to our manner of thinking and of being. But the poet finds one heart of Man under all the shapes of human existence: one universal spirit of human life. Transported by the poet, we find ourselves everywhere with our kind. Reanimated by him, the worn-out and the antiquated rise new-born and of our time. And Scott, in verse or in prose, was a poet. The electric telegraph of the press carried his writings, as they left his desk, over the globe. The excellent French historian, Augustin Thierry, says that the romances of Scott, by their vivid and vital representations of the past, have reformed the style and study of history on the continent, urging and guiding the historian, instead of chronicling dry facts, to throw himself with a thirsty inspiration into the bosom of the mighty departed time. A Scottish traveller in Spanish California told, that a Spanish monk had there shown him his copy of “Ivanhoe,” and said “Next after my Bible.” We remember with pain that Scott, to whom the world stands so largely indebted for some of its purest delights, fell into trouble and difficulty, and snapped his brain in his noble and manly struggle for escape. The spot of Scotland which the toil of his genius had won him, for rooting his family on, when torn from both him and them by a blast of ill-fortune, was redeemed to them by the reverent affection of his country---made theirs by a public act which tied even every “book of his curious learning” to its place on his shelves, in perpetuity. There his favourite daughter’s daughter and her children now prolong, if not his illustrious name, his honoured line.

[By F. Chantrey.]

414. ROBERT SOUTHEY. _Poet Laureate._

[Born at Bristol, 1774. Died at Keswick, in Cumberland, 1843. Aged
69.]