Chapter 19

He was a skilful artist, working with an eye to Sir Joshua's manner, and following him oftentimes into error, as well as into truth and beauty. Ridiculing the loose touches of Lawrence, he was frequently as faulty, without ever reaching the real fascination of his rival's style. He had not the Lawrence sense of expression and charm; he could not give to his heads the vivacity and flutter, the brilliance and witchery, of Sir Thomas's portraits. They both took up Reynolds's theory about it being 'a vulgar error to make things too like themselves,' as though it were a merit to paint untruthfully. And painting people of fashion, they had to paint--especially in their earlier days--strange fashions; and an extravagant, and fantastic, and meretricious air clings as a consequence to many of their pictures; for the Prince of Wales had then a grand head of hair (his own hair), which he delighted to pomatum, and powder, and frizzle; and, of course, the gentlemen of the day followed the mode; and then the folds and folds of white muslin that swathed the chins and necks of the sitters; and the coats, with fanciful collars and lapels; and the waistcoats, many-topped and many-hued, winding about in tortuous lines. It is not to be much marvelled at that such items of costume as 'Cumberland corsets,' 'Petersham trousers,' 'Brummel cravats,' 'Osbaldistone ties,' and 'Exquisite crops,' should be only sketchily rendered in paint. Of course, Mr. Opie, who affected thorough John Bullism in art, who laid on his pigments steadily with a trowel, and produced portraits of ladies like washerwomen, and gentlemen liking Wapping publicans--of course, unsentimental, unfashionable Mr. Opie denounced the degeneracy of his competitor's style. 'Lawrence makes coxcombs of his sitters, and they make a coxcomb of him.' Still 'the quality' flocked to the studios of Messrs. Hoppner and Lawrence, and the rival easels were long adorned with the most fashionable faces of the day.

VII.

For twenty years Lawrence reigned alone. After the final defeat of Napoleon, the artist was commissioned by the Regent to attend the congress of sovereigns at Aix-la-Chapelle, and produce portraits of the principal persons engaged in the great war. These European portraits--twenty-four in number--now decorate the Waterloo Hall at Windsor. In 1815 he was knighted by the Regent; in addition he was admitted to the Academy of St. Luke in Rome, and became in 1817 a member of the American Academy of the Fine Arts, an honour he repaid by painting and presenting to the Academy a portrait of their countryman Benjamin West. The Academies of Venice, Florence, Turin, and Vienna subsequently added his name to their roll of members, while, through the personal interposition of King Christian Frederick, he was presented with the diploma of the Academy of Denmark. He was nominated a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in France, George IV. giving him permission to wear the cross of the order. Charles X. further presented the painter with a grand French clock nearly two feet high, and a dessert service of Sèvres porcelain, which Sir Thomas bequeathed to the Royal Academy. From the Emperor of Russia he received a superb diamond ring of great value; from the King of Prussia a ring with his Majesty's initials, F.R., in diamonds. He also received splendid gifts from the foreign ministers assembled at Aix-la-Chapelle, and from the Archduchess Charles and Princess Metternich at Vienna; from the Pope a ring and a colosseum in mosaic with his Holiness's arms over the centre of the frame; from the Cardinal Gonsalvi, besides other presents, a gold watch, chain, and seals of intaglios, and many beautiful bon-bon boxes of valuable stones set in gold; gold snuff-boxes, etc.; a breakfast set of porcelain from the Dauphin in 1825, with magnificent casts and valuable engravings from Canova at Rome. Was ever painter so fêted and glorified! And then he had been, on the death of West, in 1820, elected to the presidentship of the Academy. 'Well, well,' said Fuseli, who growled at everything and everybody, but was yet a friend to Lawrence, 'since they _must_ have a face-painter to reign over them, let them take Lawrence; he can at least paint eyes!' In 1829, he exhibited eight portraits; but his health was beginning to decline. He died on the 7th June 1830. He had been painting on the previous day another portrait of George IV. in his coronation-dress.

'Are you not tired of those eternal robes? asked some one.

'No,' answered the painter; 'I always find variety in them--the pictures are alike in outline, never in detail. You would find the last the best.'

In the night he was taken alarmingly ill. He was bled, and then seemed better; but the bandage slipped--he fell from his chair into the arms of his valet, Jean Duts, a Swiss.

'This is fainting,' said the valet, in alarm.

'No, Jean, my good fellow,' Sir Thomas Lawrence politely corrected him, 'it is dying.' And he breathed his last.

VIII.

The obsequies of the departed President were of an imposing kind. His remains were removed from his house in Russell Square to Somerset House. There the body was received by the Council and officers of the Academy, and deposited in the model-room, which was hung with black cloth and lighted with wax candles in silver sconces. At the head of the coffin was raised a large hatchment of the armorial bearings of the deceased; and the pall over the coffin bore escutcheons of his arms, wrought in silk. The members of the Council and the family having retired, the body lay in state--the old servant of the President watching through the night the remains of his master.

The body was interred in St. Paul's Cathedral, in the 'Painters' Corner' of the south crypt, near the coffins of the former Presidents, Reynolds and West. The Earl of Aberdeen, Earl Gower, Sir Robert Peel, Lord Dover, Sir George Murray, the Right Honourable J.W. Croker, Mr. Hart Davis, and Earl Clanwilliam were pall-bearers. Etty, who followed with the other academicians, writes: 'Since the days of Nelson there has not been so marked a funeral. The only fine day we have had for a long time was _that_ day. When the melancholy pageant had entered the great western door, and was half way up the body of the church, the solemn sound of the organ and the anthem swelled on the ear, and vibrated to every heart. It was deeply touching.... The organ echoed through the aisles. The sinking sun shed his parting beams through the west window--and we left him alone. Hail, and farewell!'

The produce of the sale by auction of his collection of art works and treasures, etc., was between fifteen and sixteen thousand pounds. The estate of the dead man was only just equal to the demands upon it, however. His popularity ought to have brought him wealth, but, strange to say, he was always embarrassed. Yet he did not gamble, was never dissipated, never viciously extravagant; but he kept no accounts, was prodigal in kindness to his brother-artists, and in responding to the many appeals to his charity. Perhaps, too, he rather affected an aristocratic indifference to money. He spent much time in gratuitous drawing and painting for presents to his friends. It is probable that his death was hastened by his incessant work, to meet the demands made upon him for money. Washington Irving saw him a few days before his death, and relates that 'he seemed uneasy and restless, his eyes were wandering, he was as pale as marble, the stamp of death seemed on him. He told me he felt ill, but he wished to bear himself up.' In one of his letters the painter wrote: 'I am chained to the oar, but painting was never less inviting to me--business never more oppressive to me than at this moment.' Still he could play his courtier part in society, and was always graceful and winning. Haydon, who never loved a portrait-painter much, yet says of Lawrence, that he was 'amiable, kind, generous, and forgiving.' Further on he adds: 'He had smiled so often and so long, that at last his smile had the appearance of being set in enamel.' But then, Mr. Haydon prided himself on his coarseness, defiance, and hatred of conventionality, deeming these fitting attributes of the high artist.

It is only as a portrait-painter that Sir Thomas can now be esteemed; and, as a portrait-painter, his reputation has much declined of late years. His drawing was often very incorrect, and his execution slovenly. His colour was hectic and gaudy; and in composition he possessed little skill. He was a master of expression, however. His heads are wonderfully animated, and he invested his sitters with an air of high life peculiar to himself. Conscious and a little affected they might be, but certainly, through his art, they proclaimed themselves people of quality and distinction. His attempts in another line of art were few and not successful. His 'Homer reciting his Poems' was chiefly remarkable for its resemblance to Mr. Westall's manner, and for containing a well-drawn figure of Jackson the pugilist. Of his 'Satan calling up the Legions,' Anthony Pasquin cruelly wrote, that 'it conveyed an idea of a mad German sugar-baker dancing naked in a conflagration of his own treacle.' Over an attempt at a Prospero and Miranda, he subsequently painted on the same canvas a portrait of Kemble as Rolla.

And was he a male coquette? 'No,' answers a lady --and it is a question that requires a lady's answer--'he had no plan of conquest.... But it cannot be too strongly stated that his manners were likely to mislead without his intending it. He could not write a common answer to a dinner invitation without its assuming the tone of a _billet-doux_. The very commonest conversation was held in that soft low whisper, and with that tone of deference and interest which are so unusual, and so calculated to please. I am myself persuaded that he never intentionally gave pain.'

Perhaps he was not capable of very deep feeling, and liked to test the effects of his fine eyes. He wooed the two daughters of Mrs. Siddons, never being quite clear in his own mind which he really loved. He tired of the one and was dismissed by the other, or so rumour told the story; however, his friendly relations with the family do not appear to have ceased. One of the sisters died. 'From the day of her death to that of his own,' writes a biographer, 'he wore mourning, and always used black sealing-wax. Uncontrollable fits of melancholy came over him, and he mentioned not her name but to his most confidential friend, and then always with tenderness and respect.' It would have been more desirable, perhaps, that he should have exhibited a little more feeling during the lifetime of the lady; but perhaps marriage was not in the programme of Hoppner's courtly rival, of the painter 'that began where Reynolds left off,' as the sinking Sir Joshua is reported to have declared of him, rather too flatteringly.

IX.

Haydon notes in his diary, under date 25th May 1832, 'I passed Lawrence's house (Russell Square). Nothing could be more melancholy or desolate. I knocked, and was shown in. The passages were dusty; the paper torn; the parlours dark; the painting-room, where so much beauty had once glittered, forlorn; and the whole appearance desolate and wretched--the very plate on the door green with mildew.

'I went into the parlour, which used to be instinct with life; "Poor Sir Thomas; always in trouble," said the woman who had the care of the house, "always something to worrit him." I saw his bed-room--small --only a little bed--the mark of it was against the wall. Close to his bed-room was an immense room (where was carried on his manufactory of draperies, etc.), divided, yet open over the partitions. It must have been five or six small rooms turned into one large workshop. Here his assistants worked. His painting-room was a large back drawing-room; his show-room a large front one. He occupied a parlour and a bed-room; all the rest of the house was turned to business. Any one would think that people of fashion would visit from remembrance the house where they had spent so many happy hours. Not they. They shun a disagreeable sensation. They have no feeling--no poetry. It is shocking. It is dirty!'

Bitter Mr. Haydon. Perhaps it was not that he loved Lawrence more, but that he loved his patrons less. For the people of fashion who were caring so little about the dead Lawrence, cared not at all for the living Haydon.

THE PUPIL OF SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE.

In St. James's Street, London, on the 10th June 1787, was born George Henry Harlow. His father, an East India merchant for a time Resident at Canton, had been dead about four months. The widowed mother, only twenty-seven, and of remarkable personal attractions, was fortunately left with an ample dower. Mourning her husband, she devoted herself to her children--five very young girls and the new-born son. Perhaps it was not unnatural that to the youngest child, born under such circumstances--the only boy--the largest share of her maternal affection and solicitude should be given.

He was first placed at the classical school of Dr. Barrow in Soho Square, then under the tuition of Dr. Roy in Burlington Street; for some time he was at Westminster. In after-life, in boastful moments, he was pleased to speak grandly of his classical attainments; of these, however, he could never adduce any notable evidence. It is probable that he was at no time a very eager student; he had tastes and ambitions not compatible with school-learning, and an over-indulgent mother was little likely to rebuke his want of application, or to desire that her darling's attention should be fixed upon his books in too earnest a manner. Certainly before he was sixteen he had left school, and even then he had devoted much of his time to other than scholastic pursuits.

He was a smart, clever boy, with a lively taste for art, a constant visitor at the picture-galleries, already able to ply his pencil to some purpose; yet bent, perhaps, upon acquiring the manner and the trick of others rather than of arriving at a method of his own by a hard study of nature. He almost preferred a painted to a real human being--a picture landscape to a view from a hill-top. He was satisfied that things should come to him filtered through the canvases of his predecessors--content to see with their eyes. He was apt to think painting was little higher than legerdemain, was a conjurer's feat to be detected by constantly watching the performer, was a secret that he might be told by others or might discover for himself by examining their works: not a science open under certain conditions to all who will take the trouble to learn. These were not very noble nor very healthy opinions to entertain upon the subject; but at least at the foundation of them was a certain fondness for art, and there was without doubt promise in the performances of the young man. Of this Mrs. Harlow was speedily satisfied, and the friends she consulted confirmed her opinion. It was determined that he should enter the studio of a painter. Not much care was exercised in the selection of a preceptor. A Dutch artist, named Henry De Cort, had settled in London; he produced landscapes of a formal, artificial pattern--compositions in which Italian palaces and waterfalls and ruins appeared prominently, formal in colour, neat in finish, the animals and figures being added to the pictures by other Dutchmen. There was rather a rage at one time for Italian landscape seen through a Dutch medium: a fashion in favour of which there is little to be said. It was not a very good school in which to place George Henry Harlow. De Cort was pretentious and conceited--worse, he was dull. The student loved art, but he could not fancy such a professor as De Cort. He began to feel that he could learn nothing from such a master--that he was, indeed, wasting his time. He quitted De Cort, and entered the studio of Mr. Drummond, A.R.A. He applied himself assiduously, 'with an ardour from which even amusements could not seduce him,' says a biographer. For, alas! young Mr. Harlow was becoming as noted for his love of pleasure as for his love of his profession. He remained a year with Mr. Drummond, and then commenced to sigh for a change.

There is a story that the beautiful Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire interested herself in the studies of the young man, and that owing to her influence and interposition he was admitted into the studio of Sir Thomas Lawrence in Greek Street. Another account has it that Mr. Harlow and his mother visited the various painters with the view of selecting one with whom the student would be content to remain until his period of pupilage was at an end, and that he himself finally selected Sir Thomas Lawrence. A premium of one hundred guineas was paid. For this sum the student was to have free access to his master's house 'at nine o'clock in the morning, with leave to copy his pictures till four o'clock in the afternoon, but was to receive no instruction of any kind.' It was supposed, apparently, that the example of Sir Thomas was instruction enough. But it is possible that Lawrence, while, with his innumerable engagements, he was unable to bestow much time upon a pupil, was also, like Sir Joshua, unable to communicate art instruction. He knew very little of rules, he was little imbued with academic prescriptions, he painted rather from an instinctive love of beauty and from a purely natural quickness in observing expression. Harlow might have said of Lawrence as Northcote said of Reynolds: 'I learnt nothing from him while I was with him.' Though it seems hard to say that a student could be long in the studio of either master and benefit in no way.

The friends of the late Mr. Harlow were greatly distressed that his son should follow the unprofitable business of the Fine Arts. They hastened to rescue him from ruin, as they believed. They offered him a writership in India. He declined their assistance. 'I care not for riches,' he said; 'give me fame and glory!' They could not comprehend an ambition so absurd; they thought the young man out of his senses, and left him accordingly. They were even angry with their friend's son that he would not permit them to tear him from the profession of his choice.

Harlow was excitable, impulsive, enthusiastic. He was well acquainted with his own ability; indeed he was inclined to set almost too high a value upon it. He could bear no restraint. If Lawrence had attempted to impart instruction to him, he would probably have resisted it with all his might; he was ill at ease under even the semblance of pupilage; he declined to recognise his own inferiority; he was angry with the position he occupied in the studio of Sir Thomas. It would seem to have been difficult to quarrel with one who was always so courtier-like in manner, so gentle and _suave_ and forbearing as was Lawrence. But it is possible these very characteristics were matters of offence to Harlow. He could not give credit for ability to a man who was so calm and elegant and placid amidst all the entrancements of his profession. He thought a great painter should gesticulate more, should sacrifice the gentlemanly to the eccentric as _he_ did, should be feverish and frothy and unconventional and absurd as _he_ was. And then he possessed a quick mimetic talent. He had soon acquired great part of Lawrence's manner. People are always prone to think themselves equal to those they can imitate, and he was far ahead of all the other young gentlemen who entered the studio; indeed it may be said that no one has ever approached more closely to the peculiar style and character of Lawrence's art than his pupil Harlow. The master admitted this himself--if not in words, at least in conduct. He employed Harlow upon his portraits, to paint replicas, and even to prepare in dead colours the originals. Of course the painting of backgrounds and accessories was the customary occupation of the pupils.

For eighteen months Harlow remained in the studio of Sir Thomas. A portrait had been painted of Mrs. Angerstein. In this Lawrence had introduced a Newfoundland dog, so skilfully represented as to excite the warmest admiration. Harlow, perhaps, had had a share in the painting of this dog, and he loudly claimed credit for it. He is said even to have intruded himself upon the Angerstein family, and to have represented to them how greatly the success of the picture was due to his exertions. Of course this conduct on the part of a pupil amounted to flat mutiny. Sir Thomas informed of it, sought out his pupil, and said to him: 'You must leave my house immediately. The animal you claim is among the best things _I_ ever painted. Of course you have no need of further instruction from me.' Harlow withdrew abruptly. In a day or two afterwards he was heard of, living magnificently, at the Queen's Head, a small roadside inn on the left hand as you leave Epsom for Ashstead. When the host approached with the reckoning, it was found that the painter was without the means of liquidating it. It was agreed that the account should be paid by his executing a new sign-board. He painted both sides: on one a full-face view of Queen Charlotte, a dashing caricature of Sir Thomas's manner; on the other a back view of the Queen's head, as though she were looking into the sign-board, while underneath was inscribed 'T.L., Greek Street, Soho.' Sir Thomas, informed of this eccentric proceeding, said to Harlow:--

'I have seen your additional act of perfidy at Epsom, and if you were not a scoundrel I would kick you from one end of the street to the other.'

'There is some privilege in being a scoundrel, then,' answers the pupil, 'for the street is very long.'

So we read of the quarrel of Lawrence and Harlow, one of those stories so easy to relate and so difficult to disprove. But there are incoherencies about it. The portrait of Mrs. Angerstein was exhibited at the Royal Academy in the year 1800, some years before Harlow had become a pupil of Lawrence's. The speech about the kicking is a very unlikely one to have proceeded from Lawrence, while it is still more unlikely that Harlow would have received it so quietly. Had such language passed between them it is hardly possible they could have been on the footing of anything like friendship afterwards, yet we find Lawrence assisting Harlow in his picture of the Kemble family in quite an intimate way. Certainly there was a quarrel, and Harlow quitted Sir Thomas. A living writer says, in reference to the sign-board story:--

'I remember to have seen it as early as 1815. Some twenty years after, missing this peculiar sign from the suspensory iron (where a written board had been substituted), I made inquiry at the inn as to the fate of Harlow's Queen's Head, but could not learn anything of its whereabouts.'

It is not probable that Lawrence was disposed to condemn this more severely, than as one of those artistic freaks which clever caricaturing students are every day indulging in.