CHAPTER X.

ON THE RIVIERA.

The journey to the Riviera and North Italy, which Caldecott was compelled to make for his health, before Christmas 1876, was as usual prolific of work. Writing from Monaco in January, 1877, he says:--

"This is a beautiful place, and for the benefit of you stay-at-home bodies I will describe it--in my way;" and in four original letters published in the _Graphic_ newspaper in March and April, 1877, there appeared about sixty illustrations containing upwards of three hundred figures, different studies of life and character; and these drawings do not represent probably, one half of the sketches made.

No such pictures of Monte Carlo and its neighbourhood had been sent home before; they were the ideal newspaper correspondent's letters--the sketches abounding in humour and accurate detail; the letters accompanying them being written from personal observation.

It would have been strange indeed if these letters had not attracted general attention and amusement in a newspaper; but they did more than this, they revealed an amount of artistic insight, and suggested possibilities in Caldecott's future career as an artist which his health never permitted him to put to the test.

At Monaco and at Monte Carlo, Caldecott found so much that suited his pencil that it is a wonder that he found time for any more serious work. With touches of satire that remind us of Thackeray, and a gaiety all his own, these spontaneous and delightful letters form the best picture of Caldecott that can be given in 1877.

"Round the tables," he writes, "from noon to nearly midnight--seven days a week--the _monde élégant_ congregates, from the Yorkshireman to the Japanese." Then follow sketches of an Englishman in Scotch tweed, and a young man from Japan. Next is a general sketch of the crowd at the round table, the artist's own figure, admirably given, standing back to us, hat in hand. It was a marvellous gathering presented on the printed page, "all intent on gambling--editors of journals, English justices of the peace, venerable matrons and innocent girls, beloved sons who are 'travelling,' artistes, chevaliers of the legion of honour, dames who are not of that legion." "Such costumes and toilettes sweep the polished floor, such delicately-gloved fingers clutch the glittering coins--when they happen to win, and sometimes when they don't--such a clinking of money, as the croupiers mass the rakings."

From the fashionable crowd and the heated atmosphere of the Casino the artist takes us along the cool shores of the Mediterranean, where, in one of the best sketches in these letters, full of air and light, he brings two figures into unexpected contrast. "Walking one afternoon along the Mentone road, we reached a point commanding a fine view of sea, hills, and olive trees. There was a stone seat, and on it an aged round-backed man. On the wall and bench before him were spread out many cards dotted with the results of numerous twirls of the roulette ball. He was studying his chances for the future. As we turned away we met a priest reading in a little book as he passed."

As the landscapes suffered in reproduction in the newspaper, and were the least successful part in these letters, it may be well to mention that some of Caldecott's landscape studies in oils and water colours, on the shores of the Mediterranean, were the best he ever did, attracting much attention at the sale of his works in 1886.

That he did not put a high estimate on his powers as a landscape painter at that time may be gathered from a few words in a private letter declining some commissions.

"The drawings that G. so kindly enquires about are not in my line. I would rather not attempt to paint what I imagine he wants--proper professional water-colour landscape painter's work.

"Please say that my line is to make to smile the lunatic who has shown no sign of mirth for many months (see the _Graphic_ of Saturday last, 6th January, p. 7, right-hand column--I tumbled upon it in the reading room of the Casino), and not to portray the beauties of this southern clime--not but what I would if I could!"

NORTH ITALIAN FOLK.

It was in the same winter, during his journey in North Italy, that Caldecott made twenty-eight illustrations for a book on _North Italian Folk_.[9] Here Caldecott's studies, and his habit of sketching the peasantry wherever he went, served him well. Take the picture of the priest and his faithful servant Caterina; the latter, reproaching her master for bringing home a neighbour, Maddalena, "to eat two _lasagne_ with us!" Caterina is "a gaunt threadbare-looking woman of some five-and-thirty years, and the _prevosto_ is gaunt too, and sallow; the two match well together. Caterina's hair is smooth though scant, and her faded print dress is neat, but the bright yellow kerchief round her shoulders is soiled, and the cunning plaits of her grey hair are not as well ordered as the women's are wont to be on mass days.

"Presently Caterina bustles into the darkened parlour, where sits the _prevosto_ lazily smoking his pipe and reading the country newspaper. He has put aside even the least of his clerical garments now, and lounges at ease in an old coat and slippers, his tonsured head covered by a battered straw hat.

"'Listen to me,' breaks forth the faithful woman, and she is not careful to modulate her voice even to a semblance of secrecy, 'you don't bring another mouth for me to feed here when it is baking day again. _Per Bacco_, no indeed!... It sha'n't happen again, do you hear? And I have the holy wafers to bake besides. For shame of you! Come now to your dinner in the kitchen!' And Caterina, the better for this free expression, hastens to dish up the _minestra_.

"'Poor old priest! What a shrew he has got in his house,' says some pitying reader. Yet he would not part with her for worlds! She is his solace and his right hand, and loves him none the less because of her sharp tongue and uncurbed speech. In many a lone and cheerless home of Italian priest can I call to mind such a woman as this--such a fond and faithful drudge, with harsh ways and a soft heart."

Another picture in _North Italian Folk_ seems to give the character of the peasantry and the scenery exactly. "The sun glitters on the pale sea that is down and away a mile or more beyond the sloping fields and gardens, and the dipping valley. Giovanni pauses to rest his burthen upon the wall just where the way turns to the right again, leaving the mountains and chestnut-clad hills behind it."

Here in the sketch we are made to feel the sunlight and the glare from the sea on the southern slope; every detail of the pathway, to the stones in the old wall, being accurately given.

Never, perhaps, in any book since Washington Irving's _Old Christmas_ and _Bracebridge Hall_ was the illustrator more in touch with the author than in _North Italian Folk_; but for some reason--probably because Caldecott's work and style had become identified with English people and their ways, both abroad and at home--the illustrations made little impression. The completeness of the pictures, and the local colour infused into them by the author, left little to be done; moreover, Caldecott was not on his own ground, and to draw buildings and landscape in black and white, with the finish, and what is technically called the "colour," considered necessary for a book of this kind, was always irksome to him.

Less characteristic, but charming as a drawing, is the group of country girls under the cherry trees, reproduced on the opposite page. It is a picture worth having for its own sake, whether it aid the text or not, and one with which we may fitly leave this volume.

Early in the year 1877 Caldecott made several drawings for an illustrated catalogue of the National Gallery. Amongst the best in the English section were the two sketches from Sir Edwin Landseer's pictures, reproduced here. The grave portrait of an old bloodhound in "Dignity and Impudence," and the animation and movement in the diminutive poodle by his side, are indicated in a few expressive lines. The bright eyes of the two little spaniels of King Charles's breed glitter under his hand in the original pen and ink sketch.

For the foreign section of the book on the National Gallery he made many sketches, notably one of the "Portrait of a Lawyer" by Moroni. Here the touch and method of line are different; quality was more considered, and an attempt made to give something of the effect of the picture.

But neither he, nor those with whom he worked in those days, had mastered the best methods of drawing for mechanical reproduction, as they are understood now; fascinating as it seemed to him, and to many other illustrators also, to learn that the time had come when, by mechanical--or more properly chemical--engraving, the touch of the pen could be printed on the page.

It may be said generally in 1877, that Caldecott disliked drawing for "process," and that after years of experience, and having achieved most successful results by photographic engraving, he remained faithful to the wood engraver. The delicate little drawings in brown ink, which were dispersed in hundreds under the auctioneer's hammer in June, 1886, had nearly all been photographed on to wood blocks.

In June, 1877, Caldecott--staying at Shaldon, Teignmouth, South Devon, for the benefit of his health, chafing under enforced idleness and "debarred by the doctors from all sport," as he says--writes a letter with the following little sketch of "Waiting for a Boat."

"The weather has been unwell for many of the days, and has much interfered with the intellectual occupation of enticing 'dabs' on to hooks let down into the sea by pieces of string and concealed by shreds of mussels.

"On only one occasion have I been engaged in this exciting pursuit--all chases and pursuits are more or less exciting--but this one on that account can hardly be considered 'detrimental' to my health. There were three of us in the boat when I engaged in the sport. We had a large can of fine mussels. We threw out the lines and hauled them in every now and then, for three good hours, being about a mile out to sea. Two whole dabs were the result. I was quite calm as we rowed home.

"I do not boast of this exploit, although the larger dab was at least seven inches long by four and a half wide, and fully 3/8 of an inch thick. Still I glow a little as I recount his measurements."

Many illustrations were made in the autumn of 1877 for the _Graphic_ and other publications which need not be detailed. A painting of one of his favourite hunting scenes was also in progress, in spite of dark days and delicate health.