Old Friends Part 9

But I can bear my punishment. I loved, I trusted. She to whose hand I aspired, she on whose affections I had based hopes at once of happiness in life and of extended usefulness in the clerical profession, _she_ was less confiding. She summoned to her council a minion of the Law, one Briggs. _His_ estimate of my position and prospects could not possibly tally with that of one whose _hopes_ are not set where the worldling places them. Let him, and such as he, take thought for the morrow and chaffer about settlements. I do not regret the gold to which you so delicately allude. I sorrow only for the bloom that has been brushed from the soaring pinions of a pure and disinterested affection. _Sunt lacrymae rerum_, and the handkerchief in which I bury my face is dank with them.

Nor is this disappointment my only _cross_. The carrion-birds of commerce have marked down the stricken deer from their eyries in Bond Street and Jermyn Street. To know how Solomons has behaved, and the _black_ colours in which Moss (of Wardour Street) has shown himself, is to receive a new light on the character of a People chosen under a very different Dispensation! Detainers flock in, like ravens to a feast. At this moment I have endured the humiliation of meeting a sneering child of this world-Mr. Arthur Pendennis-the emissary of one {151} to whom I gave in other days the sweetest blossom in the garden of my affections-my sister-of one who has, indeed, behaved like a brother-_in law_! My word distrusted, my statements received with a chilling scepticism by this _Nabob_ Newcome, I am urged to make some "composition" with my creditors.

The world is very censorious, the ear of a Bishop is easily won; who knows how those who have _envied_ talents not misused may turn my circ.u.mstances to my disadvantage? You will see that, far from aiding another, I am rather obliged to seek succour myself. But that saying about the sparrows abides with me to my comfort. Could aught be done, think you, with a bill backed by our joint names? On July 12 my pew-rents will come in. I swear to you that they _have not been antic.i.p.ated_. Yours afflictedly,

CHARLES HONEYMAN.

P.S.-Would Jarndyce lend his name to a small bill at three months? You know him well, and I have heard that he is a man of benevolent character, and of substance. But "how hardly shall a rich man"-you remember the text.-C. H.

XIX.

_From Miss Harriet to M. Guy de Maupa.s.sant_.

This note, from one of the English damsels whom M. Guy de Maupa.s.sant dislikes so much, is written in such French as the lady could muster. It explains that recurrent mystery, _why Englishwomen abroad smell of gutta-percha_. The reason is not discreditable to our countrywomen, but if M. de Maupa.s.sant asks, as he often does, why Englishwomen dress like scarecrows when they are on the Continent, Miss Harriet does not provide the answer.

Miss Pinkerton's, Stratford-atte-Bowe, Mars 12.

MONSIEUR,-Vous devez me connaitre, quoique je ne vous connais pas le moins du monde. Il m'est defendu de lire vos romans, je ne sais trop pourquoi; mais j'ai bien lu la notice que M. Henry James a consacree, dans le _Fortnightly Review_, a votre aimable talent. Vous n'aimez pas, a ce qu'il parait, ni 'la sale Angleterre' ni les filles de ce pays immonde. Je figure moi-meme dans vos romans (ou _moa_-meme, car les Anglais, il est convenu, p.r.o.noncent ce p.r.o.nom comme le nom d'un oiseau monstrueux et meme prehistorique de New Zealand)-oui, 'Miss Harriet' se risque a.s.sez souvent dans vos contes a.s.sez risques.

Vous avez pose, Monsieur, le sublime probleme, 'Comment se prennentelles les demoiselles anglaises pour sentir toujours le caoutchouc?' ('_to smell of india-rubber_': traduction Henry James). En premier lieu, Monsieur, elles ne 'smell of india-rubber' quand elles se trouvent chez elles, dans les bouges infectes qu'on appelle les 'stately homes of England.' {154} C'est seulement a l'etranger que nous repandons l'odeur saine et rejouissante de caoutchouc. Et pourquoi? Parce que, Monsieur, Miss Harriet tient a son tub-ou tob-la chose est anglaise; c'est permis pourtant a un galant homme d'en p.r.o.noncer le nom comme il veut, ou comme il peut

Or, quand elle voyage, Miss Harriet trouve, a.s.sez souvent, que le 'tub'

est une inst.i.tution tout-a-fait inconnue a ses hotes. Que fait-elle donc? Elle porte dans sa malle un tub de caoutchouc, 'patent compressible india-rubber tub!' Inutile a dire que ses vetements se trouvent impregnes du "smell of india-rubber." Voici, Monsieur, la solution naturelle, et meme fort louable, d'une question qui est faite pour desesperer les savants de la France!

Vous, Monsieur, qui etes un _styliste_ accompli, veuillez bien me pardonner les torts que je viens de faire a la belle langue francaise.

Dame, on fait ce qu'on peut (comme on dit dans les romans policiers) pour etre intelligible a un ecrivain si celebre, qui ne lit couramment, peut-etre, l'idiome barbare et malsonnant de la sale Angleterre. M. Paul Bourget lui-meme ne lit plus le Grec. _Non omnia possumus omnes_.

Agreez, Monsieur, mes sentiments les plus distingues.

MISS HARRIET.

XX.

_From S. Gandish_, _Esq._, _to the_ '_Newcome Independent_.'

THE ROYAL ACADEMY.

It appears that Mr. Gandish, at a great age-though he was not older than several industrious Academicans-withdrew from the active exercise of his art and employed his learning and experience as Art Critic of the "Newcome Independent." The following critique appears to show traces of declining mental vigour in the veteran Gandish.

OUR great gallery has once more opened her doors, if not to the public, nor even to the fas.h.i.+onable _elite_, at least to the critics. They are a motley throng who lounge on Press Days in the sumptuous halls; ladies, small boys, clergymen are there, and among them but few, perhaps, who have received the training in High Art of your correspondent, and have had their eye, through a lifetime more than commonly prolonged, on the glorious Antique. And what shall we say of the present Academy? In some ways, things have improved a little since my "Boadis.h.i.+a" came back on my hands (1839) at a time when High Art and the Antique would not do in this country: they would not do. As far as the new exhibition shows, they do better now than when the century was younger and "Portrait of the Artist, by S. Gandish"-at thirty-three years of age-was offered in vain to the jealously Papist clique who then controlled the Uffizi. Foreigners are more affable now; they have taken Mr. Poynter's of himself.

To return to the Antique, what the President's "Captive Andromache" must have cost _in models alone_ is difficult to reckon. When times were cheaper, fifty years since, my ancient Britons in "Boadis.h.i.+a" stood me in thirty pounds: the central figures, however, were members of my own family. To give every one his due, "Andromache" is high art-yes, it is high-and the Antique has not been overlooked. About the back-view of the young party at the fountain Mr. Horsley may have something to say. For my part, there seems a want of muscle in vigorous action: where are the _biceps_, where are the thews of Michael Angelo? The President is a touch too quiet for a taste framed in the best schools. As to his colour, where is that nutty brown tone of the flesh? But the designs on the Greek vase are carefully rendered; though I have heard it remarked by a cla.s.sical scholar that these kind of vases were not in use about Homer's time. Still, the intention is good, though the costumes are not what _we_ should have called Ancient Roman when the President was a boy-ay, or earlier.

Then, Mr. Alma-Tadema, he has not turned _his_ back on the glorious Antique. "The Roses of Heliogabalus" are not explained in the catalogue.

As far as I understand, there has been an earthquake at a banquet of this unprincipled monarch. The King himself, and his friends, are safe enough at a kind of high table; though which _is_ Heliogabalus (he being a consumptive-looking character in his coins in the Cla.s.sical Dictionary) your critic has not made out. The earth having opened down below, the heads of some women, and of a man with a beard and his hair done up like a girl, are tossing about in a quant.i.ty of rose-leaves, which had doubtless been strown on the floor, as Martial tells us was the custom, _dum regnat rosa_. So I overheard a very erudite critic remarking. The composition of the piece would be thus accounted for; but I cannot pretend that Mr. Tadema reminds one of either Poussin or Annibale Carracci. However, rumour whispers that a high price has been paid for this curious performance. To my thinking the friends of Heliogabalus are a little flat and leathery in the handling of the flesh. The silver work, and the marble, will please admirers of this eccentric artist; but I can hardly call the whole effect "High." But Mr. Armitage's "Siren"

will console people who remember the old school. This beautiful girl (somewhat careless in her att.i.tude, though she has been sensible enough _not_ to sit down on the damp rock without putting her drapery beneath her) would have been a true gem in one of the old Books of Beauty, such as the Honourable Percy Popjoy and my old friend, Miss Bunnion, used to contribute to in the palmy days of the English school. Mr. Armitage's "Juno," standing in mid-air, with the moon in the neighbourhood, is also an example to youth, and very unlike the way such things are generally done now. Mr. Burne-Jones (who does not exhibit) never did anything like this. Poor Haydon, with whom I have smoked many a pipe, would have acknowledged that Mr. Goodall's "David's Promise to Bathsheba" and "By the Sea of Galilee" prove that his aspirations are nearly fulfilled.

These are extremely large pictures, yet well hung. The figure of Abis.h.a.g is a little too much in the French taste for an old-fas.h.i.+oned painter.

_Ars longa_, _nuda veritas_! I hope (and so will the Liberal readers of the "Newcome Independent") that it is by an accident the catalogue reads-"The Traitor." "Earl Spencer, K.G." "The Moonlighters." (Nos.

220, 221, 225.) Some Tory _wag_ among the Hanging Committee may have taken this juxtaposition for wit: our readers will adopt a different view.

There is a fine dog in Mr. Briton Riviere's "Requiescat," but how did the relations of the dead knight in plate armour acquire the embroidery, at least three centuries later, on which he is laid to his last repose?

This destroys the illusion, but does not diminish the pathos in the att.i.tude of the faithful hound. Mr. Long's large picture appears to exhibit an Oriental girl being tried by a jury of matrons-at least, not having my Diodorus Scriblerus by me, I can arrive at no other conclusion.

From the number of models engaged, this picture must have been designed quite regardless of expense. It is a study of the Antique, but I doubt if Smee would have called it High Art.

Speaking of Smee reminds me of portraits. I miss "Portrait of a Lady,"

"Portrait of a Gentleman;" the names of the sitters are now always given-a concession to the notoriety-hunting proclivities of the present period. Few portraits are more in the style of the palmy days of our school (just after Lawrence) than a study of a lady by Mr. Goodall (687).

On the other hand, young Mr. Richmond goes back to the antiquated manner of Reynolds in one of his representations. I must admit that I hear this work much admired by many; to me it seems old-fas.h.i.+oned and lacking in blandness and affability. Mr Waterhouse has a study of a subject from a poem that Mr. Pendennis, the novelist (whom I knew well), was very fond of when he first came on the town: "The Lady of Shalott." It represents a very delicate invalid, in a boat, under a counterpane. I remember the poem ran (it was by young Mr. Tennyson):-

They crossed themselves, their stars they blest, Knight, minstrel, abbot, squire, and guest.

There lay a parchment on her breast That puzzled more than all the rest The well-fed wits of Camelot: "The web was woven curiously, The charm is broken utterly; Draw near and fear not, this is I The Lady of Shalott."

I admit that the wonder and dismay of the "well-fed wits," if the Lady was like Mr. Waterhouse's picture of her, do not surprise me. But I confess I do not understand modern poetry, nor, perhaps, modern painting.

Where is historical Art? Where is Alfred and the Cake-a subject which, as is well known, I discovered in my researches in history. Where is "Udolpho in the Tower"? or the "Duke of Rothsay the Fourth Day after He was Deprived of his Victuals"? or "King John Signing Magna Charta"? They are gone with the red curtain, the brown tree, the storm in the background. Art is revolutionary, like everything else in these times, when Treason itself, in the form of a h.o.a.ry apostate and reviewer of contemporary fiction, glares from the walls, and is painted by Royal-mark _Royal_!-Academicians! . . .

_From Thomas Potts_, _Esq._, _of the_ '_Newcome Independent_,' _to S.

Gandish_, _Esq._

Newcome, May 3.

MY DEAR SIR,-I am truly sorry to have to interrupt a connection with so old and respected a contributor. But I think you will acknowledge, on reading the proof of your article on the Academy, which I enclose, that the time has arrived when public criticism is no longer your province. I do not so much refer to the old-fas.h.i.+oned tone of your observations on modern art. I know little about it, and care not much more. But you have entirely forgotten, towards the end of the notice, that the "Newcome Independent," as becomes its name, is a journal of Liberty and Progress.

The very proper remarks on Lord Spencer's portrait elsewhere show that you are not unacquainted with our politics; but, at the close (expressing, I fear, your true sentiments), you glide into language which makes me shudder, and which, if printed in the "Independent," would spell ruin. Send it, by all means, to the "Sentinel," if you like. Send your Tory views, I mean. As for your quotation from the "Lady of Shalott," I can find it nowhere in the poem of that name by the author you strangely style "young Mr. Tennyson." {165}

I enclose a cheque for a quarter's salary, and, while always happy to meet you as man with man, must get the notice of the Academy written up in the office from the "Daily Telegraph," "Standard," and "Times."

{166}-Faithfully and with deep regret yours,

THOMAS POTTS.

XXI.

_From Monsieur Lecoq_, _Rue Jerusalem_, _Paris_, _to Inspector Bucket_, _Scotland Yard_.

This correspondence appears to prove that mistakes may be made by the most astute officers of police, and that even so manifest a Briton as Mr.

Pickwick might chance to find himself in the toils of international conspiracy.

(Translated.)