Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 by Various

V >> Various >> Blackwood\'s Edinburgh Magazine Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844

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The "Painter of the Olden Time."--"His shop is his element, and he
cannot, with any enjoyment to himself, live out of it.--Dr South." This
is very good. The painter has his back to you, and is at work apparently
on a wall. Little wots he of the world without. He is embodying angels,
and spreading angelic light; himself, slipshod and loosely girdled,
centring the radiance he creates. How differently arrayed are body and
mind! By the title, we presume Mr Cope means to satirize some modern
fops of the profession. Of all Mr Cope's etchings in the volume, we
mostly admire "Love's Enemies." It is from the well-known passage of
Shakspeare, "Ah me! for aught that ever I could read," &c. The
conception is excellent. War, Death, and Sickness are taking off their
prisoner Cupid, chained, from the door of an aged couple willing enough
to part with him, while their poor broken-hearted daughter, with
disheveled hair, hides her face with her hands; and, above her, the hard
father's uplifted crutch is ready to speed the departure. It is lightly
etched, in very good keeping; so that the grouping is clear, and the
moral is perceptible at a glance. His "Rejected Addresses" is of another
cast. Here he is in the common and beggarly world: yet represents he no
common beggar; for, though he be often so named, he is one of rare
accomplishments. "He can write a capital letter, enough to make any of
the 'quality people' cry. The begging-letter people give him a shilling
for a letter. He is now on the tramp." The man was a lawyer, and so
astute that he can so adjust himself and his shadow, that he will hide
in it from your scrutiny any habitual expression of his villany. And
Cope has been most happy in this idea.

"Morning Prayer" is introduced with a few elegant lines, we presume by
Mr Cope himself. They have no name to them. The figure is graceful, the
effect tender; but we confess we have been so satiated with such
subjects in the Annuals, that we do not relish this as perhaps we ought.
From the same cause, we do not dwell upon "The Mother." "The Wanderer--
the beggar and his dog," is good. The impostor beggar was in sunshine,
and which he turned to his purpose: he could cope with the world's broad
glare. This is no impostor; and the atmosphere he breathes is suited to
his fortunes. The rejecting hand, with its shadow of the dry skinny
fingers, is well conceived.

"The Readers," from Boccaccio, is not happy. The figures are not
Italian; nor is the costume of the age of the book. His "Girl and Cupid"
is a little gem, reminding us of Schidoni. We presume these lines are by
the etcher--

"Love, in the virgin breast of beauty lying,
Laughs at the fate for her he doth prepare--
Will swiftly turn her sweetest smiles to sighing,
And flee when she is fixed in despair."

We have seen so many ladies with up-turned eyes, called in the annual
catalogues "Meditation," that we will not interrupt the calm of Mr
Cope's. C.G. Lewis has but one plate, "A Woodland Dell." A quiet spot of
shade and flickering sunshine--a streamlet, and a rural bridge. It is
sweetly etched, true to the character.

Richard Redgrave, in more than one instance in the book, shows that he
has power over the deep and solemn pathetic, as well as over the tender.
His first plate is "The Survivors of the Storm." The story is from
Petronius, as told by Jeremy Taylor. A floating body of one of a
shipwrecked crew lies pillowed on a wave, and is met with by the
survivors in their boat. Solemn and awe-stricken is their expression.
The plate is of a fine tone, befitting death in that awful shape. This
story of Petronius was the subject of a poetical piece, which we
remember to have read in a volume of poems by Thomas Flatman, one of the
"mob of gentlemen" condemned by Pope, who, nevertheless, did not care
about borrowing from him pretty much of his version of the "Animula,
blandula, vagula"--the Emperor Adrian's address to his soul. We remember
the commencement of the piece:--

"After a blustering tedious night,
The winds all hush'd, and the rude tempest o'er,
Rolling far off upon a briny wave,
Compassionate Philander spied
A floating carcass ride,
That seem'd to beg the kindness of a grave.
At near approach he thought he knew the man," &c.

His "Fairy Revels" make a light and elegant plate. A fairy group in a
frame of leaves. He is here both painter and poet.

"Hast thou not seen the summer breeze,
The eddying leaves, and downy feather,
Whirl round a while beneath the trees,
Then bear aloft to heaven together?
With just such motion, gliding light,
These fairies vanish'd from my sight."

Poor unfortunate Dadd! some years ago he exhibited a picture of this
subject, somewhat similarly treated, that was exquisitely ideal.

The "Ellen Orford," from Crabbe's _Borough_, is good in the effect; but
it has not the pathos that usually distinguishes Redgrave. "Rizpah
watching her Sons," is very fine. The night, the glaring torchlight, to
scare away the approaching wolves, and the paler, more distant light in
the sky, with the melancholy mourning Rizpah, are of the best
conception. "The Sick Child" has quite the effect of a Rembrandt plate;
yet it is very tender--a scene fit for the angelic visit, and pure and
devout of thought and purpose is that angel--we do not like the mother.
The best description is from Mr Redgrave's own pen.

"THE SICK CHILD.

"He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy
ways."--PSALM xci.

"In a chamber, faintly crying,
With its mother o'er it sighing,
Lay a baby pale and wan;
Ever turning--restless turning--
Much she dreaded fever burning,
Sickness slow or sickness hasting,
Cough, convulsion, ague wasting.
Bitter tears there fell upon
The pale face of her little son.

"The evening chimes had ceased their ringing,
And the even song was singing
In the old kirk grey with years;
Through the air sweet words came welling--
Words of peace, unto that dwelling;
Hymns they sang, how angels shielded
Those who ne'er to sin had yielded:--
And her pale face lost its fears--
That lonely mother dried her tears.

"In her arms the babe soon slumber'd;
That little son, whose days seem'd number'd,
Smiled upon his mother sleeping.
The Lord indeed had sorely tried her,
But his angel knelt beside her;
Heavenly breezes cool'd the fever
Of her child--He shall not leave her!
And this mother ceased her weeping."

The "Expected Return" is quite in Redgrave's best manner

"Fancy, impatient of all painful thoughts,
Pictured the bliss should welcome his return;
* * * * *
And hope and memory made a mingled joy."--SOUTHEY

This is a lovely figure; a loving and lovable gentle creature! and many
such have we seen by Redgrave's hand. Not Raffaelle himself could more
truly paint the pure mind--that precious jewel, innocence, in its most
lovely casket.

Severn has two plates, which may be called companions; racy and good are
they, and of one vintage. We are not quite satisfied with either face or
figure of the maiden in the "Roman Vintage." Hers is not a face of
feeling; nay, we would almost beg Mr Severn's pardon, and pronounce her
a bit of a fool. The "Neapolitan" is much better. They are executed in a
very bold, broad, free style of etching, and effective. Horsley's
"English Peasant" might be allowed to be a little weatherbeaten; but, at
first sight, we should say that he was not of the temperance society
when the aquafortis was on the table. It is black, from being
overbitten. Yet, after a while, we see through the darkness into the
character. He is an honest fellow, but a little "disguised." His
"Twilight" is very good, yet perhaps is the light a little too sharp and
strong for that hour. The subject is from verses by Redgrave, and good
and quaintlike old gentle rhymes they are. But how comes it that the
figures are both feminine?--that does not accord with the lines.

"Time was no more for them: the sun had gone,
The stars from sunset glow began to peer;
Yet 'neath those stars that pair still linger'd on,
Unconscious of the night, fast drawing near!
His voice to her was daylight, and her smile
A sunny morning breaking o'er his soul:
Such hours of bliss come only once--the while
Long-silent love speaks forth without control,
And of its hopes and fears first telleth out the whole."

"Welsh Gossips."--

"At every word a reputation dies."

For the credit of Wales, we hope Mr Horsley did not sketch these from
nature; yet is there a fearful look of natural acrimony in the one, and
sheer busybodyism in the other. The plate is beautifully etched. His
"Moonlight" is not quite clear enough--there are too many sparkling
lights. The "Shady Seat" is prettily designed; the lady looks rather too
alarmed, and, for the subject, perhaps there is not enough of shadow--
certainly not "enough for two." We at once recognize Stonhouse in the
"Evening effects of Solitude," and his "Neath Abbey." The former he thus
describes:--

"There, woods impervious to the breeze,
Thick phalanx of embodied trees--
Here, stillness, height, and solemn shade
Invite, and contemplation aid."

We are sure that Neath Abbey is from nature, for it has the sooty and
smoked character of that manufacture-ruined ruin. But we must not pass
by his "Dorothea" from Don Quixote. Nothing can be more happily
expressed than the deep shady retirement of the wood; there are nice
gradations of shades, which is the very character of retirement, and
Dorothea is herself in it, not a bright figure in a black mass--and good
is the figure too, but the feet are unfinished.

Mr Creswick is a large contributor, and least fortunate in his first: it
is not the scene so well given in verse by his friend Townsend; for it
is too pretty, too tight. It wants the "lane;" it is the road-side.

"THE WAYSIDE.

"A lane, retired from noisy haunts of men,
Whose ruts the solitary lime cart tracks,
Whose hedge-sides, propp'd by many a mossy stone,
Are checker'd o'er with foxglove's purple bloom,
Or graceful fern, or snakehood's curling sheath,
Or the wild strawberry's crimson peeping through.
There, where it joins the far-outstretching heath,
A lengthen'd nook presents its glassy slope,
A couch with nature's velvet verdure clad,
Trimm'd by the straggling sheep, and ever spread
To rest the weary wanderer on his way.
There, oft the ashes of the camp-fire lie,
Marking the gipsy's chosen place of rest.
Black roots of half-charr'd furze, and capons' bones--
Relic of spoils from distant farmers' coop--
Point to the revels of preceding night.
And fancy pictures forth the swarthy group,
Their dark eyes flashing in the ruddy glare;
While laughter, louder after long constraint,
From every jocund face is pealing round.

His "Summer" is a simple unaffected scene, such as may be met with any
where, if you have but "eyes to see:" and pretty much like it, but
inferior--for if it be not more common in subject, it is in treatment--
is the "Old Farm-House," from that delighting and most natural painter
with her pen, Miss Mitford. Very exquisite in his "Moonlight"--so true,
with all the quivering and blending light of nature, where all things
are at once lucid and in shade--as Virgil happily expresses it, "luce
sub incerta linae." Sweet, too, and in the deep solemn repose of
religious eve, is the "Village Church"--from lines by Rogers. He is not
so happy in his "Smithy;" neither is the scene of interest nor the
effect pleasing. But he makes up for all by his "Outward Bound." The
home is left in the calmest, stillest of days; though the "outward
bound" has sails, they rather wait for, than feel, the wind; there is
the village church still in view, and will yet be an hour and more. The
sky is, though really printers' ink, like many a sooty vapour converted
into light-shedding yet faint clouds--we can see the colour--it is a
grey, in which is gold and ultra-marine. The boat is conveying the
"outward bound" to the vessel; there is the moving and the waiting. It
is poetical. "The Castle" we do not much admire; it is a villa castle,
and on no agreeable river. "Low Water" is quite another thing; it is a
beautiful etching. He thus describes it with his pen--

"The flowing tides that spread the land,
And turn to sea again."

The "River Scene," illustrating lines from Southey, is delicately
touched, and a pleasing scene; yet we feel sure it is not from nature.
Why, we can hardly tell. Is it that there is a bridge, apparently
without a bank on one side to rest upon? "The Terrace," from lines by
Andrew Marvel, is a most fascinating upright plate. It is perfectly
true, giving all the thousand intricacies and shades of such a scene;
and there is grace in the forms, and the figures well suit the whole.
All is gentleness and ease; not a light is too strong, or a shadow too
deep; there is no violence--which too many are apt to express when they
would give powerful effect. His "Fishing Scene on the Coast of Ireland"
is not to our taste, yet is it not without meaning--it is windy and
sunny. "The Oriental Palace" is solemn, with its ancient yew in the
silence of the crescent moon; but the ruin is to fill up, and does no
good.

We have read with pleasure, and extracted, some of Mr Townsend's poetry;
let us now see his etching. "Boyhood:" those who delight in the easy,
every-day, every-hour play of boyhood, will enjoy this plate. A boy is,
with a peacock's feather, tickling a child asleep in the arms of a grave
old lady--so sedate have we seen grimalkin look whilst encouraging her
kitten, lightly and coquettishly, to play with a ball of cotton. "The
Beach" is a well-sketched coast scene, and shows Mr Townsend to have an
eye for nature's scenery, as well as nature's sympathies. Very good is
"The Model"--an artist sketching in the figure of a Lascar. But his best
plate is "Sad Tidings." It is a very sweet figure--youth, elegance,
tenderness, are there--and such an even melancholy light, or rather such
a mournful evenness of light and shade, that, as a whole, it is neither
light nor dark, and should have no other name than melancholy. He had
the judgment and forbearance to hide the face--we know it is lovely, and
that is enough; it is this, in part, which separates "Sad Tidings" from
such subjects as they are usually treated. There are two etchings by
Frederic Tayler--"The Chase" from Somerville, and "The Auld Grey" from
Burns--both are lightly etched and good; but they have not that free and
certain hand which marks Mr Tayler's style in his drawings, where one
wash of the brush hits off his object with great truth. "The Gypsy Boy,"
by Mr Knight, is very masterly in chiaroscuro, and certainly
characteristic of the race. Effect of chiaroscuro seems to be his aim.
It is marked in his "Old Fable" (which always means the newest) of "The
Peasant and the Forest." It is thus given: "A peasant once went into an
old forest of shady oaks, and humbly entreated the same to grant him a
small branch to make a handle for his axe, and thereby enable him to
pursue his labours at home. The forest very graciously acceded to his
request, and the peasant soon formed the required handle; but presently
he began to lay about him in every direction, using the very substance
with which the forest had furnished him out of its own bosom, and in a
short time hewed down its whole growth."

Which are we bound most to admire--John Bell's pen or John Bell's
needle? It is a difficulty. "The Devil's Webbe" is admirable in both.
What a spider-like wretch is he, watching the toils that he has spread!

"This webbe our passions be, and eke the flies
Be we poor mortals: in the centre coyles
Old Nick, a spider grimme, who doth devyse
Ever to catch us in his cunning toyles.
Look at his claws--how long they are, and hooked!
Look at his eyes--and mark how grimme and greedie!
Look at his horrid fangs--how sharp and crooked!
Then keep thy distance so, I this arreede ye,
Oh sillie Flie! an thou wouldst keep thee whole;
For an he catch thee, he will eate thy soul."

And there they are! the winged insect lovers of pleasure, and of gain
and strife--in one word, of sin--entangled in the ladder webb; while
such a monster is in the centre, watching his larder. John Bell is
instinctively a moral weaver. Fine-spun are his philosophical threads;
we stop not to enquire if they will bear the tug of life. He is trying
them, however, on the "tug of war." Pen and needle are set to work
philosophically, methodically, benignly. In this he is but a unit out of
many thousands. His opinions are not singular. Amiable moralist!--
delightful is the dream, sweetly sounding the wisdom; but is it
practicable? John Bell's warfare, "The Assault," is, without a doubt,
"confusion worse confounded;" it is not easy, at a view, to find legs
and arms and heads in their anatomical order. We must trace the human
figure as through its map. Perhaps this is purposely done to resemble a
battle the more truly, where limbs are apt to fly out of their places.
But John Bell thinks--

"The play's the thing
Wherewith to touch the conscience of the king."

So he pours forth from his "Unpublished Play" a choice tirade against
the royal play of human ninepins:--

"And then a battle, too--no doubt it is
A right fine thing; or rather to have been there.
But all things have their price; and this, methinks,
Is rather dear sometimes. Oh! glory's but
The tatter'd banner in a cobwebb'd hall,
Open'd not once a-year--a doubtful tomb,
With half the name effaced. Of all the bones
Have whiten'd battle-fields, how many names
Live in the chronicle? and which were in the right?
One murder hangs a man upon a rope,
A hundred thousand maketh him a god,
And builds him up a temple in the air
Out of men's skulls. A loving mother bears
A thousand pangs to bring into the world
One child; your warrior sends a thousand out,
Then picks his teeth."

JOHN BELL--_Unpublished Play_.

Such was Shakspeare's momentary humour, when he put it into Falstaff's
mouth to ask what honour is "to him that died o' Wednesday." It is a
humour that won't last--'tis against nature--man is more than half
belligerent, and has a "murder" in him (to give it a bad name) "that
will out." Even the peaceable Ephraim took up the handspike, and used it
too, with "friend, keep thee in thy own ship." The "friend" was
hyprocrisy--the use of the handspike, natural; the very elements are at
war, and were made to be so--storms are as necessary as sunshine. But
excellent able John Bell likes sunshine best; and who does not like him
the better for that? And sweet sunshine has he shed around "The good
Mayde"--a sunshine that makes its own magic circle, within which evil
spirits or evil men shall not come. Tempt on, ye wizards--she looketh
upwards, yet think not she will fall or miss her way--the Unseen guideth
her steps. Bell's account of the matter is, however, far better. Let him
publish his quaint poem, all of it; the specimens warrant the request.

"Thus doth the goode Mayde, with a stedfaste eye,
Walke through the troubles vaine, and peryls dire,
That doe beset mayde's path with haytes full slie,
The trappes and gynnes of mischief's cunning syre.
Ne nought to her is riches' golden shower,
Ne gaudy baites of dresse and rich attyre,
Ne lover's talke, ne flatteries' worthless store,
Ne scandal's forked tongue--that ancient liar,
Ne music's magic breath, ne giddy wheel
Of gay lascivious daunce, ne ill-raised mirthe,
Ne promised state doth cause her mind to reel,
Or lure from thoughts of heaven to joys of earthe."

Our poet, a moralist etcher, reverts to the old subject; and we have
"The Progresse of Warre," in a series, as part of a frieze for his
Temple of Peace. This is most clear--for he who runs may read; yet, on a
second view, we doubt that--for we see, what we did not at first see,
writing under each tablet that is by no means intelligible. Having, with
Mr Bell, seen an end of the battle, it is fit time, with Mr Herbert, to
discuss "The Day after the Battle." "Next day did many widows come"--
that verse of _Chevy Chase_ is the subject. The slaughtered knight, the
widow, and the dog, tell the tale, and tell it well too. The widow is
the best figure. We have had enough of battle and all its horrors; let
us turn to tranquillizing nature, where the undisturbed lichen may grow
upon the rocks, and the branches of unpruned trees throw out their
sheltering leafage, and the innocent insects know it is their home; and
even in the seeming silence, if you listen, may you hear the still voice
of a busy creation, a world of a few summer hours--yet seemeth it to
them an eternity of enjoyment. And such a scene we have in the "Woody
Scene," by Thomas Fearnley--poor Fearnley!--and is it not lightly,
elegantly touched with the needle? the scene realized? Or, would you see
a wilder spot, turn to his "Norwegian Scenery," and see the saw-mill, or
whatever the building be, at the very entrance of the deep wood in its
gloom, with the mountain torrent pouring over the rocks. In this
sequestered spot, man has built him a home, and turned to human uses the
rebellious waters, even on the very skirts of the wilderness; and there
he is, for his hours are not all of toil, gloriously angling, for he has
hooked his fish. Poor Fearnley! would he could have remained in this
country! Had he been moderately patronised, he might have added an
honourable name to our dictionary of painters.

And what has become of Webster? We remember well his "Boys let loose
from School." Here he is--and but one plate--"Anticipation"--well named.
The pie is come home, and the boy's eyes open, and his mouth waters. The
story is quaintly told by Townsend thus:--Lights and shadows of boyish
days! how bright and deep they are! The schoolmaster's frown may be
charmed away by the gift of a new top, or a score of marbles. But what
are these in the cotter's life to the stirring vicissitudes of a pie!
----Before its departure for the bakehouse, did he not ponder admiringly
on the delicate tact that mingled the bony scraps with.

'Herbs, and other country messes,
Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses?'

"Since then, _imagination_ has been at play; and, in accordance with its
suggestions, his bib and tucker have been donned, as trusty adjutants to
the formidable wooden spoon. Thus armed, while sister Phillis--the
creative genius of the savoury structure--regards the baker's boy with
her modest glance, young Corydon, with his prophetic anticipation, is
ogling the baker's burden. If his knife be as sharp as his appetite,
'twill want no whetting! We must expect that, in the afternoon, when
anticipation shall have faded through the stages of its fulfilment, if
no longer entranced by the pleasures of Hope, he will solace himself
with those of Memory." And there, sure enough, is the grinning baker's
boy, and the pie admirably baked; and the boy of the bib and tucker, and
the wooden spoon, realizing it through his nostrils, and magnifying it
through his eyes; and there is the neat-handed Phillis, who cares little
for the eating. Feminine and gluttonous seldom come together. "The
little glutton" is ever the male. This was in Webster's own way, and he
has hit it off truly; he has seen it hundreds of times, and knew as well
as Townsend who should have the wooden spoon. We find we have omitted to
notice one plate, and that by Redgrave. We did not expect landscape by
his hand. It is, however, very clever; there is a light over the dark
church-tower which a little offends. Keep down that a little, and you
recognize the true effect of nature. It is a view of Worcester. "A
spot," says Mr Redgrave, "memorable as the scene of that battle
signalized by Oliver Cromwell as the 'crowning mercy;' and whence the
young Charles II. commenced the series of romantic and perilous
adventures which terminated in his safety."

Our work of criticism is at an end; not so our pleasure. We shall look
at this choice volume again and again; and as we have somewhat
arrogantly, and with a conceit of our ability and right so to do, taken
the Etching Club under our especial care, regard, and patronage, we
shall think ourselves at liberty to encourage and to exhort them
whenever we see fit. We therefore do exhort them to go on, to give a
taste for painters' etchings, to improve themselves, too; and let each
make it a rule to himself never to take the trouble to touch a subject
that is not worth doing; nor to tell a story not worth telling, however
such may seem to look pretty or with effect upon copper or paper; by all
means to avoid "annual sentimentalities," and commonplace "acting
charades;" and never to forget that expression is the soul of the art.
For the present, we dismiss them with thanks--like the prudent
physician, who, as Fielding says, always stands by to see nature work,
and contents himself by clapping her on the back, by way of approbation,
when she does well.

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