The Boyhood of Great Inventors Part 2

But with Flaxman's work Wedgwood was satisfied, and while he worked hard for him he paid him handsomely. It was not the sort of thing to bring him name and fame, but there was always the need to live to be faced, and he bravely took what offered and was thankful. And by living simply and saving where he could, he managed to keep himself by what he made.

He faced this time of drudgery quietly and patiently, bringing to bear upon its hards.h.i.+ps something of that serene spirit that belonged to him all through life.

He gave to Wedgwood, as far as in him lay, of his best. Models of the four seasons, models of the ancient G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses--those deities whose stories were familiar to him from his childhood, Juno, Jupiter, Minerva, Apollo--models of vases. And besides these, chimney-pieces, plaques, candlesticks, inkstands, anything and everything, for Wedgwood held that a common teapot or a jug might be still a thing of beauty. For the models of the ancient G.o.ds he would get perhaps 10_s._ each, and for a pair of vases as much as 3 3_s._

Some of these were so exquisitely done that Wedgwood said more than once, "It really hurts me to think of parting with these gems."

Long years afterwards, when he had reached the top of the tree, Flaxman used to find endless pleasure in talking of these humble labours.

And all this time he was leading a very quiet life. That strong thirst for knowledge that had always been his, spurred him on to learn all he could. So during the day he worked at casts and models, and in the evenings he sketched or turned to his beloved poets. Either he preferred the old Greek poets' company to that of living friends, or it might be that the slight deformity that was his through life--the high shoulders, the sidling gait--left him shy and sensitive, and in a measure inclined to creep into his sh.e.l.l.

Looking over the huge portfolio of Flaxman's drawings that one can still see to-day, it is easy to discover where he went for most of his subjects. The poets came in for their share, and also history and portraits, but his great delight was to produce scenes from the Bible and the _Pilgrim's Progress_, "The Marys at the Sepulchre," "The Flight into Egypt," "The Angels round the Cradle of Christ."

But although he was getting to be known among men of talent he was still poor and struggling. It is proof enough of this for us to read how at this time he made his busts half life-size and of clay, whereas had he been rich they would surely have been full-size and of marble. About this time he began to talk of what had been with him till now a secret longing. It was to see Rome. The desire had been long growing in his heart. To Rome sculptors and painters flock, for it is the great city of sculpture and painting, and to a sculptor it is as if his education were unfinished, so long as his eyes have not feasted on those beautiful examples of art.

"If I remain here," he said sadly, "I shall be accused of ignorance concerning those n.o.ble works of art which are to the sculptor what learning is to a man of genius."

About this time he took what seemed a foolish step, looking alone to the progress of his art. He married. Sir Joshua, the President of the Royal Academy, who had _not_ given him the gold medal, met him in the street one day and stopped him. "Ha! Flaxman," he said, "I have heard that you have married. I tell you you are ruined for an artist. You cannot now go to Rome to study the great sculptors of antiquity."

Young Flaxman went home downcast. Not to go to Rome! Not to realise his boyhood's golden dreams and his life's ambition!

He told his wife what had happened. She met him with the brave reply, "You will e'en go to Rome and I will accompany you. We must work and economise."

And now for the next five weary years this brave young couple put their shoulders to the wheel. She kept house and he worked--harder than ever--for Wedgwood chiefly--toiling for long hours, but upheld all the time by the thought of the goal to which he was straining.

That journey to Rome!--the very thought of it made all hards.h.i.+p easy.

He turned out much beautiful work for Wedgwood at this time. Groups of children--romping, skipping, playing "blind man's buff."

Nothing that meant making money came amiss to him. He even collected what was known as "watch rates" for the parish of St. Anne's, and might have been seen going about with an ink-bottle in his b.u.t.tonhole.

Often the desires of our heart tarry long in coming to us. This was among the times of hardest work and trial in all Flaxman's life, and he came out of it well. At the end of the five years the needed money was collected!

And now, while the great event of his life was drawing near, his boyhood had left him, and he was entering on the work of the man. Already he had gained some fame in London. The newspapers took notice of his going.

"We understand that Flaxman the sculptor is about to leave his modest mansion in Wardour Street for Rome."

And now a very feast of delight awaited him. With his arrival in Rome, what wonders opened to his view, what grandeur and sublimity in the examples of ancient art! What skill and magnificence and luxuriance he saw in the churches, what wealth of creation on their walls and windows and cupolas, what sculpture, what painting! It was as if an enchanted world had suddenly spread itself out before his eyes.

Gradually it came to be known that Flaxman had arrived, and there gathered about him men of taste and culture--rich men many of them--men of position. But the great sculptor's ways were just the simple ones of old. He was not easily affected by the great of the world. He was always his manly simple self to rich and poor alike. He adopted no more luxurious ways of living with his days of prosperity. He prized money little, just as a something in exchange for which he could get food and clothing, or with which he might help the poor and suffering. The fine character of the boy seemed to have expanded into fuller beauty in the man.

After his stay in Rome he returned to London, his spirit, one could imagine, bathed in a very inspiration from all he had seen and heard. He came back to his native land with a name made, and quietly set about getting a house, a studio, a.s.sistants, workmen, models.

He executed a statue of Lord Mansfield, for which he was paid 2,500.

Prices were indeed altered from the old days, in which he counted himself well paid with ten s.h.i.+llings for the model of a G.o.ddess!

"This little man cuts us all out," said one generous sculptor to another, willing to acknowledge Flaxman's great superiority. Honours now flowed in upon him. He was made an a.s.sociate of the Royal Academy. He was given the Professors.h.i.+p of the Chair of Sculpture. At his first lecture he was enthusiastically cheered. He had climbed to the highest height of his art. It almost seemed as if no honour remained to be bestowed. He was surrounded by fame and applause, but he was in no wise uplifted. So the years went on in the delight of the work he loved.

But, unexpectedly and all unknown to his friends, his life was drawing to a close. In the winter of 1826 he caught a cold, seeming for a time to be slightly, though not seriously, ailing. In the beginning of December he grew much worse, but he would not go to bed.

"When I lie I cannot breathe," he said. So, sitting up to the end, and with scarce a struggle, he pa.s.sed away on the 7th of December.

They buried him quietly in the churchyard of St. Giles-in-the-Fields.

There was no great publicity, no large concourse of people. Just a few friends, a few artists--the greatest--were there, men who in tremulous, hushed voices said to each other they "had lost something greater and dearer than they should see again."

Turning from the ending of his life, we cannot but feel that we are turning from the record of a man who has lived it well.

An enthusiastic admirer has said, "He was a remarkable mixture of simplicity and genius--were you to try any other ingredients you would scarcely form so glorious a creature." And we hardly think he was far wrong.

We can see very clearly the fine simplicity of his nature in his treatment of his workmen. They were to him rather friends than servants.

They in their turn repaid him with a warm and devoted affection, calling him "the best master G.o.d ever made."

To the end, as well in time of difficulty and of toil as in time of triumph, the man retained very much those qualities that had drawn out people's love for him in boyhood, the kindly word from the customer in the shop behind the counter. The world offered him of its best, as it has a way of doing to those who do well for themselves, but it had no power to draw him from his work and the simplicity of his simple home-life. It was only and always to that which is highest and best that he gave of his genius. That n.o.ble mind of his could stoop to nothing less. In churches all over England are to be found beautiful creations of his. In him were at once goodness and genius linked together.

"If ever purity visited this earth," someone has said, "it remained with Flaxman."

SIR HUMPHREY DAVY.

Amid the wild beautiful scenery of Cornwall, where the waters of the Atlantic wash our English sh.o.r.es, was born in the winter of 1778 the greatest chemist England has ever seen. We read in our childish geography books that for being the birthplace of Humphrey Davy the town of Penzance has for long been famous, for the coming into the world of that man whose name is perhaps best known for the invention of the Miners' Safety Lamp, that has lit the darkness of our coal mines and saved hundreds of human lives.

Humphrey was the son of a wood-carver, a man not high up in the world, but we find him free enough from the straits of poverty that have often been the cradle of genius, though, indeed, a cradle out of which genius has had a way of growing to st.u.r.dy stalwart manhood. The child from the outset entered on life with eagerness and enthusiasm, seeming to take a firm, earnest grip, as it were, even from babyhood. It was this same vigour of mind that spurred him on all through--in boyhood and manhood alike--that made him face difficulty with such a brave, dauntless spirit, and overcome obstacles with never a thought of letting them overcome him.

He was quick, energetic, and alert, even as a child. When hardly more than five years old his mother often noticed him with baby fingers rapidly turning the pages of some book as if he were counting their number or glancing at the pictures. To her no small astonishment on questioning him, she found the lisping baby lips could repeat the story.

It was the same through life. Long years after, when he was a great chemist, making wonderful experiments in his laboratory, he had no patience with slowness. He would keep several experiments going at the same time, attending first to one, then to another. If the exact instrument he wanted were not at hand, he would recklessly break or alter another to suit his purpose. His impetuous spirit could never brook delay. With him quickness meant power, and while quick he was also sure.

As a child he specially loved the _Pilgrim's Progress_. The charm of its word-pictures, its characters fired his quick imagination. And history too, especially the history of his own country. These two, it may be, inspired him very early to a love of romance and story, and among the boys at school in Penzance he was not slow to gain the reputation of story-teller. Some were tales of fun, others tales of thrilling wonder and terror, but all flowed easily from the boy's lips and held his listeners enthralled.

When he was no more than eight years old he would take his stand on a cart in the middle of the market-place, his boyish figure drawn to its full height, and there harangue the boys who gathered in little groups to hear the young orator. At school there was nothing in any way remarkable about young Humphrey, except, perhaps, that somewhere hid away within him was the gift of rhyme or the gift of poetry. English and Latin verse alike came easy to him, and by-and-by his schoolfellows found out his facility, and they pressed him into their service to compose valentines and love-letters. But except for this he seemed in these early years to be nothing more than a happy, healthy English boy, full of fun and spirits. He would fish off Penzance Pier for grey mullet, catching more than his companions. He would bait his hooks and wait till a shoal of these difficult fish were swimming about the bait, then by a clever jerk of his tackle entangle and capture them. His love of fis.h.i.+ng remained with him all through life--almost to the end. So strong was it that even as a man he never could conceal his annoyance if unsuccessful, or if he discovered a friend to have caught a larger number than he. So keen and ardent was he that he would dress himself in green that the wily fish might know no difference between him and the green trees and gra.s.sy banks!

In his boyhood we find it difficult to trace any germs of that talent for experimenting and inventing that distinguished him in later life.

He scooped turnips hollow, and lighted up the insides with candles--but what boy has not experimented in the same way? He made squibs, or "thunder-powder," that exploded on a stone with a loud report that delighted his companions. But there is no trace of an unusual bent of mind here--just an example of an ardent, eager English boy, full of life and spirits.

In 1793 he went to school in Truro, not far from Penzance. He was quick, but that was all--a clever boy, not a prodigy. His master, writing long years after, when the boy's name had become a household word in England, said:--

"I did not at that time discover any extraordinary abilities."

It must have been a school of the old sort that Mr. Davy had lighted upon for his son, for the story goes that young Humphrey, at times in sc.r.a.pes like other boys, while punishment hung over him, had these doggrel lines fired off by his master at his head--

"Now, Master Davy, Now, sir, I have 'e, No one shall save 'e; Good Master Davy."

And with the end of the rhyme down came the flat ruler on the open palm of the culprit! School, while it may not have done him a great deal of good, at least did not do him much harm. His own frank, buoyant mind prevented his being twisted into a cut-and-dried shape, or pressed into any special mould. Long years after he gave thanks that in those young days he was left very much to his own bent.

"What I am I have made myself," he said. "I say this without vanity, and in pure simplicity of heart."

So pa.s.sed the long, suns.h.i.+ny days of school-time, and when he was sixteen he left school finally. After that, for one short, blissful year he shot and fished and lived chiefly in the open, surrounded by the beauties of Cornish scenery, for which in after years his heart always kept a tender memory, when the bustle and din of a city, and the whirl of city life, had well-nigh drowned for him Nature's softer tones. He grew then to know familiarly bird and beast, and rock and flower. In after years, when his life was more fully filled than most men's, a chance word or reference would seem to waft him a whiff of the sea off the Cornish sh.o.r.e, and a great longing would seize him for the loved scenes of his childhood. Then, in the midst of his work, he would take a hurried run home. During this year of holiday, which he enjoyed with the whole-heartedness of a careless, happy boy, he collected a number of birds, and stuffed them with his own hands--and with not a little skill.

Almost to the end of life he kept his love of shooting. As in fis.h.i.+ng he tried to efface himself and deceive the wily fish, so in shooting he was strangely beset by fear of an accident, and he would study to make himself as conspicuous as possible in a scarlet hat! Almost at the end, when his strength was failing, it is pathetic enough to find him ask to be driven to the field, that he might still fire a shot.