Part 11

“No doubt greater accuracy in detail, correct eye for form, knowledge of anatomy to make the figure plastic, and intense feeling to give power to convey to others the idea of emotions; but when it comes to _exciting emotions_ the landscape artist has a field bountiful with opportunity for spiritual insight and significance--as a matter of fact, figures themselves need not be ignored, but made accessory.”

“The world and his wife don’t value landscapes as highly as you do,” remarked Paul, cogitating. “Who ever sees all that in a landscape?--why, the average man wouldn’t like it if he did see it.” This somewhat nettled the Doctor.

“The average man! that pretentious individual who always thinks of himself as Lord of Creation--let him keep on thinking of his physique and physical comforts. I enjoy good landscapes for the very reason that they lift one above all that; they respond to something better, and that settles it for me. I enjoy having inspiring landscapes always where I can see them; there are precious few faces of which I can say the same thing.” Then he added, as if mindful of one in particular: “Some faces never respond; I take to the woods to get rid of ’em, as I often leave a portrait for a landscape.”

The Doctor was getting roused. Paul detected it and concluded to laugh the matter off.

“Why not take your piano with you, Doctor--to the woods?”

“I would if I could. Gottschalk did; and others to-day, like him in that respect, do seek fresh thoughts and sounds direct from Nature. Saint-Saëns does; he told me so during some talks we had when out in far east Ceylon; and he is the most notable living expert in different forms of musical composition, ranging from complicated rhythmic conceits to serious harmonies well nigh sublime. As to Edvard Grieg, I caught him in the very act, entranced by Nature’s strange moods and melodies amid the waterfalls of his beloved Norway. And Beethoven! ah! there is the real test! Beethoven’s most profound utterances are but the unadulterated deep sounds and chords from Nature, both felt and heard when others thought him deaf. His experience was in the woods of Austria, and if we do not hear now, elsewhere, when he yet speaks, we do not really comprehend Beethoven, how he transmuted into another form that which exists in Nature. Blessed be his name! for he did it that we, too, might hear. And we call that Art.”

“Well, there’s one advantage about a piano in the woods,” teased Paul.

“What’s that?”

“You’ll be more comfortable, and possibly less moist than the other fellow.”

“What other fellow?”

“The one who sat on a wet cloud pecking at a harp--ask Widow Bedot.”

Evidently Paul was trying to escape a serious discussion. Fortunately for both, Adele came to the rescue. She perceived that men of such different temperaments could seldom see anything from the same point of view unless it was the result of a similar or simultaneous experience, and that with Paul the personality of the artist should go far to promote a thorough appreciation of his work.

“It strikes me,” said Adele, “neither of you knows all that may be said on that subject.”

“H’m!” ejaculated the Doctor, looking out of the corner of his eye.

“Or else you’re not thinking about the same thing.”

“Give it up,” laughed Paul. “I was with the Widow on that cloud.”

“Then, isn’t it just possible, a wee bit possible, that a landscape artist himself, Mr. Le Roy, for instance, should know more about such things than either of us?”

“All right; we’ll visit him,” said the Doctor; “take a run over to Capri for the sake of our--artistic health.”

“You mean your credit as a critic,” thought Adele.

* * * * *

The venerable artist, nearly seventy years of age, gave them a cordial welcome, his sharp eyes sparkling behind his old-fashioned spectacles; a man of medium height, with evidently no thought to throw away on mere matter of dress. His light-colored soft hat covered a mass of touzled hair, with a few streaks of gray; his beard was sparse on the cheeks and luxuriant on the chin.

The Doctor looked with interest at his thin hands and his hectic cheeks; then noticed his forcible action as he walked and talked. Outward signs of a highly nervous, impulsive temperament were very pronounced.

“He looks more like an impractical, enthusiastic mystic than ever,” pondered the Doctor; “even more so than when I met him years ago--no doubt Italy suits him as he ages in spiritual discernment. He certainly can give very powerful impressions when he paints, and to all sorts and conditions of men; how remarkable, yet quite reasonable, that a man so frail as he should produce such effects of power. I suppose it is the intensity of his visions which makes him great. I wonder how Paul the practical will size him up?”

The artist was talking to Paul about fresh air and the delightful life at Capri.

“Then you paint in the open?” asked Paul.

“Well, yes, and no. Of course, one must go out, but not necessarily far--all is near at hand. The _paysage intime_, as it was called at Barbizon, is here, too, as we also found it in Florida. There’s a sort of unity in nature, and in it we live and move and have our being. It is a vast thing, that unity, but it is close to us also. The landscape picture may convey a comprehensive impression very large, out of proportion to its actual subject. Art, you know, is but part of the universal-plan, and like both science and religion, must drop into its appropriate place.”

Paul seemed interested, also somewhat amused. “Fresh air certainly does surround everything, and no doubt there is a universal-plan in nature; but why mix up art, fresh air and the universal-plan in that way?” Paul wondered how a fellow who could paint such practical pictures, so true to life, should talk so vaguely. “He’s a high-flyer. I like his fresh air and his pictures better than his queer sentiments.”

Now, what Doctor Wise especially desired to learn was, not what other people thought of Mr. Le Roy, but how he himself satisfied his own keen, analytical sense. How Le Roy worked, not in mere allegorical figure, but, going directly to nature, discovered and conveyed something worth portraying. For it was well known in art circles that Le Roy had slowly gathered together his own theories as to nature and what nature could give him, and of the Immortality of Art. The conversation, therefore, took that turn.

“Every artist,” said Le Roy, “has his own feeling, and if he develops it, may be a great artist in his way; yet, the other schools, the men with other methods and ideas, may not recognize the merit in his work.”

“Can this matter of feeling be explained in words?” asked Adele.

“I think so, having made a thorough and complete theory of it. I am now seventy years of age, and the whole study of my life has been to find out what it is that is in myself--what is this thing we call Life--and how does it operate. The idea has become clearer and clearer; and as we see that the Creator never makes any two things alike, nor any two men alike, therefore every man has a different impression of what he sees, and that impression constitutes feeling, so every man has a different feeling.”

The Doctor’s face lighted up as he eagerly drank in these words. Here was the “unlimited,” the very thing he had heard so much about--the unlimited with a vengeance. He knew that varied mentality and temperament among musicians who were artists often produced discord, but here was a successful artist of ripest maturity who insisted that no two artists were ever alike--all received different impressions, all had different feelings. Evidently everything or anything might be expected from an artist. “Hurrah for the typical artistic capacity and temperament; feelings of endless variety and scope, hence unlimited.” Such was the Doctor’s interpretation--the way it impressed him.

Le Roy continued:

“As to sitting at the feet of nature for inspiration, that came to my mind in the beginning of my career. I went instinctively to her, and drawn by a sympathetic feeling, I put something on canvas. It was not always a correct portrayal of the scene, but only something more or less like what I had in mind. Other artists and certain Philistines would see it and exclaim, “Yes! there is a certain charm about it. Did you paint it outside?--because if you did, you could not have seen this, that and the other.”

“Of course I could not deny it, and thought I ought to improve my method. Being young, I then took it for granted that we saw physically, and with the physical eye only. What I had to learn was that a true artist has two sets of eyes: the one physical, the other spiritual.”

Adele began to be uneasy lest the Doctor should at once claim three pairs of eyes, physical, mental, and spiritual, one of his own theories about such things, so she appealed to the artist as quickly as possible.

“What did you do about it, Mr. Le Roy?”

“At first I tried to paint what I thought I saw, calling memory to supply the missing details.”

“And the result?”

“The picture had no charm whatever; there was nothing beautiful about it. I asked myself why it is that when I try to do my duty and paint faithfully I achieve so little, but when I care little for so-called faithful duty and accuracy I get something more or less admirable.”

“Oh!” exclaimed the Doctor, “I presume the first pair of eyes is always imitative, that is to say, photographic, and copies; the second, artistic or spiritual--but how about the third pair, the intermediate?”

“Whose?” asked Le Roy.

“The highly intellectual critic’s, self-constituted.”

“Oh, the critic! He always sees more than I do,” laughed Le Roy. “Let him pass; what I wish to tell you is this:

“Little by little I began to find out that my feeling was governed by a principle, and I needed to find out the law under which it would act--the law of the unit, that is, of impression; although I did not then understand it as such.”

Paul thought this a rather big undertaking, to discover any law which would apply to all feelings, no two alike. Le Roy continued:

“Landscape is a constant repetition of the same thing under different forms and in a different feeling. When we go outdoors our minds are underloaded in some, overloaded in others--we don’t know where to go to work. We can only achieve something if we have an ambition so powerful as to forget ourselves and grasp whatever nature may give from any source; that is to say, one must be up in the science of his art. To be able to draw what you feel, you must first of all be able to draw what you see. There can be no true color without true form. In other words, to create an impression you must have both knowledge and technique to do so.”

This statement pleased the Doctor immensely, a clear recognition of the great philosophic truth that in the nature of things science and art are both essential under the law of impression in order to produce the best work. Now, what could the artist say about the higher spiritual element?

The reply came: “If a man could be as God when he is painting outside (perfection, thought the Doctor), then it would be easy enough; but, as he cannot, he must fall back on science. It is not possible for us to establish a measuring point in art--not in a broad, general sense. Even the early masters of the Renaissance were not always perfect in technique; they sought sympathy, not applause; and their results will always remain pre-eminent and authoritative in the domain of impression.” Le Roy seemed strong in his convictions about this, and followed up his thoughts with a still more comprehensive statement: “The worst of it is that all thinkers are apt to become dogmatic, and every dogma fails because it does not give us the other side.”

“Then it restricts the truth to one point of view?” inquired the Doctor.

“Yes--and the same applies to all things, to religion as well as to art. A man who thinks must find a third element besides the science of his art for his standpoint of reason. There is a Trinity operative in regard to this.”

All the party now strained every nerve to catch the words as they fell from the great artist’s lips.

“At one time I took up the science of geometry because I considered it the only abstract truth; the diversion of the arc of consciousness, and so on. No one can conceive the mental struggles and torments I endured before I could master the whole thing. I knew the principle was true, but in practice it seemed contradictory. I had constantly to violate my principles to get in my feeling.”

“Purely intellectual effort,” thought the Doctor, “must ever fail, in the very nature of things.” Le Roy continued:

“I used this mathematical mode of thought as my third, together with natural science and the art, to form the stable tripod-standpoint of reason. I found it enabled me to keep the understanding under perfect control, except----”

“Except when?” interrupted the Doctor, nervously. “Was not pure mathematics always invariably sufficient to attain stability and confidence?”

“Except when I overworked myself, then I was mentally tired, _my spirit not satisfied_--I got wobbly, like any one else.”

“Now what do you do?” asked Adele, in thorough sympathy, her lovely black eyes, full of intelligence, meeting those of the venerable philosopher in art.

“What do I do, my child? What do I do?”

“Therein lies the secret of my life.”

XXII

THE SECRET OF A LIFE

All waited reverently until the venerable artist was ready to explain. They watched him take off his spectacles and polish them, so that his physical sight might aid his mental vision, and his spiritual insight assert its potency. He stepped across his studio toward one of his superb paintings--a landscape in which a wealth of rich coloring streamed forth from behind dark, luxuriant foliage. At first sight “the related masses of color rather than the linear extensions” was what appealed to the beholder, as if, as a work of art, it was not intended to instruct or edify, but to awaken an emotion. Le Roy stood with one hand held forth toward the picture; his other, as the Doctor noticed, rested naturally, unostentatiously, upon a sacred volume lying upon a table at his left, as if he wished to feel in physical touch with that book while he spoke.

“You ask me what I do in the final resort--what I do when both science and art grow weak and unstable.

“I retire to be alone, take only certain books with me, and write, applying the principles I have already experienced as true in art to the purest of all forms of reasoning, theology--religious truths scientifically stated. Speaking of and with God in nature is the saving, the salvation of my art. The impressions I then receive are what you see in my pictures and ask me to explain. That is the feeling you recognize and the sentiment you appreciate. You see and appreciate precisely in accordance with your own experience in personal religion, no more, no less. You are part of the truth in unity just as I am; we all have the soul for the beautiful, the beautiful soul within us. One Father breathed into each man when he became a living soul in beauty of mind and spirit. In a way, I worship through my paintings.

“I know I have always had this power; all of us, when at our best, know we have it in some degree, creative or responsive--but I did not always understand the principles which govern it. Science now assures me it is the truth. The unit law of impression, you now see, demands the three in one, Science, Art, and Communion with the Holy Spirit of Truth, God in nature.

“People ask me why I keep on painting, old as I am, and I answer: Simply because of a constraining force from beyond me, from without, something which lifts me higher and higher toward finding the very best forms of truthful expression. Of course this development must depend in a measure on physical strength and individual endowment. I am obliged to watch myself that I do not overwork, and when I grow weary of painting then I open the Book--the Source of Wisdom. This gives me the only point of view, except the artistic, which interests me--in fact, art and religion are very closely connected.”

Le Roy ceased speaking and stood thoughtfully before his wonderful picture--verily his masterpiece, in that it rose to a height of spiritual suggestion he had not before attained, and by means the best he knew. His eyes were fixed upon it, and he seemed to become oblivious to his surroundings.

Adele drew near, the Doctor and Paul close behind her; the grouping itself was suggestive. The artist-philosopher, mystic and artistic; the inquisitive Doctor, sincere and at times metaphysical; the practical Paul, true and observing; and Adele, an idealist--all dominated by a landscape utterly devoid of figures.

A pure landscape. The beholder stood upon a moderate elevation, a grove of trees on his left, the branches covering the upper part of the canvas. Looking forward, a valley; a village nestled below, telling of happy homes and playgrounds, and near by the parish church, where the belfry chimes could almost be heard. Through openings in the grove and in the broader expanse were cultivated fields, and faintly outlined was a winding stream meandering off toward the horizon; the course of the stream broken by woodlands and far distant bluffs, the bluffs lessening to a point in mid-distance, where the stream for a time was concealed behind the foliage on its banks. As observed by the physical eye trained to seek many lines and complicated perspective it was truly a very simple, modern subject, embodying little more than elementary drawing. But what had this great artist seen by spiritual insight dominating his art? What impression had the Spirit that is Holy, the Creator with whom he had spoken when alone, revealed to him? What had “the candle of the Lord,” within himself, illumined?

An early morning, the atmosphere clear and transparent, with fleecy clouds pure and chaste, late draperies of the flying night, so delicately refined in form and shade, with light and shadow, that with the birth of a new day the resurrection from the dawn became brilliant with color. Every cloud and celestial vista, every hillside, undulation, meadow, stream, stone, branch, leaf and leaflet gave its own responsive reflection of the Brightness of the Coming. Each diversified form was alive with the inspiration caught and expressed by tints and hues in the harmony of colors. So brilliant were some of the combinations nature had called for, that the artistic sense demanded that they should be partly hidden behind the darker foliage. A vision of this world as it is, yet looking towards something more beautiful, heavenward. Earth idealized by the artist’s dream, to a reality too lavish for the credulity of ordinary experience. None, unless with the artist (he had seen with the eyes of the Spirit as well as of Science and of Art), would have credited the glorious impression so simple a landscape could give; therefore the sombre contrast had been introduced. The artistic sense had controlled the flight of imagination, and deeper shadows told each beholder to look within and complete the scenes from his own experience. Let us approach more closely, and go with the artist nearer to the inner recesses of the heart of nature.

Among the shadows what had the Spirit suggested? “The place whereon thou standest is Holy Ground.”

The beholders are upon an elevation, and close at hand in the subdued light a group of trees, modestly conspicuous among others in the grove. Vines encircle and climb their trunks, and blossoms glorify the branches on either side. The central vine is more luxuriant than the others, and its flowers, tinged with a roseate glow, much akin to flesh tints in nature.

The vine and its branches are waving in the wind; they take graceful forms and scatter blossoms at the beholders’ feet. To every lover of nature and weary one who seeks repose it is a vision of beauty and rest now, and a promise of rest to come.

The artist seemed especially fond of this feature in his work; his eyes repeatedly reverted from the glorious coloring he had given to the sky and the heavens above, to this notable detail in shadow.

“May I ask what flower you intend to suggest?” said Adele.

“A passion vine. It climbs aloft among the ordinary forest trees; some life-plants grow at its feet; the Rose of Sharon is in bloom among the shrubs, and I leave to your imagination the lilies-of-the-valley in the grass beneath. One of my impressions when alone was, that a cross might have once stood in such a place in the years gone by, when the mount was bare and bleak; since then nature has shown her constant kindness, for she abhors the void of bleakness and barrenness in such a place, and has covered the mount with lovely foliage. But the vision, the sight and the site of the cross remain; you may find the suggestion here--it upholds the vine and the branches, and the flowers are cradled in its arms.

“The cross is conceived as in bloom; and to me all the beauty is greatly enhanced by one precious significance--the same light in nature which so brilliantly illumines the celestial cloud vistas also gives the roseate tint to the flowers upon the cross.”

* * * * *

“That is ‘a creation’--by the artist,” meditated Adele.

“Through nature, looking upward,” remarked Paul, pensive.

“The crucifixion itself is marvellously beautiful,” said the Doctor, “when portrayed in landscape without a figure upon the scene. How great is genius in art, if it is endowed with a gift for spiritual impressions.”

Adele put her arm in Paul’s as they walked along, pondering over what they had seen. “The Cross in bloom, illumined by the Light of the World. The Divine in Art has both sought and spoken the Word.” She thought of how the artist had searched the Book of Wisdom; and she recalled what had long since been written therein about such Words spoken in nature and in history: “They are they which testify of Me.”

XXIII

OLYMPUS--COURT FESTIVITIES

Sailing down the Adriatic, the Ionian Isles finally rose above the bosom of the sea; before them lay modern Greece, with its landscape and atmosphere still populated with the legendary divinities of ancient times. Mrs. Cultus adjusted her eye-glasses to catch first glimpse of Olympus, evidently under the impression that the Mountain of the Gods towered over Greece much as Fuji Yama does over Japan. She found it did, but not precisely as she had anticipated.

As to Adele and Paul, they were becoming more susceptible to impressions subtle, if not mystical, than ever before. Being in the region of the old-time divinities the influence of those deities at the Court of Olympus, whose especial duty was to direct love affairs, began to be felt. So potent was this influence that the lovers became intensely absorbed in watching for Aphrodite, lest she might rise from the sea at any turn of the tide. They had heard how, in modern times, she often arose at other points than Cyprus.

As the vessel proceeded southward, a new Olympus was constantly discovered and pointed out. This was great sport to Miss Winchester; such an accommodating guide-book mountain she had not before encountered.

“How many mountain resorts does our present Zeus keep up?” asked she of the Captain, a jolly sailor.

“Oh, wherever you see storm clouds around the highlands, there’s some fun going on.”

“Any court festivities, any Apollo bands or musical sands to entertain Court circles?”

“Apollo is not popular at this season--since rag-time came in, the lyrique and doggerel have gone out--the old accompaniment was too sleepy.”

“But I must hear Orpheus on a lute, or Pan give a toot.”

“Orpheus played last at a ball game,” said the Captain.

“Too dulcet?”

“Not enough wood wind and brassy; the boys said too lugubrious. They came to play ball, not to shed tears.”

“And poor Orpheus?”