The life and writings of Henry Fuseli Volume I Part 21

CHAPTER XI.

Fuseli's prefatory Address to his resumed Lectures.--His second Edition of Pilkington.--He suffers from a nervous fever, and visits Hastings in company with the Biographer.--His Picture of Marcus Curius, and Letter relative to it.--Letter from Mr.

Roscoe.--Canova's Intercourse with Fuseli.--Anecdotes of Fuseli and Harlow.--Letters from Fuseli to the Biographer.--Republication of his Lectures, with additions.--Death of Professor Bonnycastle, and Anecdote concerning him.--Death of Fuseli's friend and patron, Mr.

Coutts.--An agreeable party at Fuseli's house.

On the 26th of February 1810, Fuseli resumed his course of lectures, and prefaced them by the following address:--

"Mr. President, and Gentlemen,

"Sincere as my grat.i.tude and pleasing as my emotions must be on being, by the indulgence of the Academy, appointed to address you again, I should feel myself unworthy of this honour were I not to regret the infirm state of health, the unfortunate cause which occasioned the resignation of the Professor of Painting, and disappointed the expectation you had a right to form from the display of his brilliant talents. Severely, however, as this disappointment may be felt by you, it is a consolation to reflect that we still possess him, and that the Academy may still profit by his advice and practical abilities: but what can I offer to mitigate our grief on the awful decree which s.n.a.t.c.hed from us his predecessor, your late lecturer, my departed friend? In him society has lost one of its best members, our Art one of its firmest supporters, the Academy one of its brightest ornaments, and you a solid, experienced, forcible, and lucid instructor. The innate vigour of his mind supplied every want of education; his persevering energy ruled circ.u.mstances, and made necessity the handmaid of the art; his judgment, at a very early period, discriminated the art itself from those vehicles of which he possessed, in a very high degree, the most splendid; add to these, that insatiable curiosity, which not only stimulated him to examine every system, and to collect every observation on art, but to court all relative knowledge, and whatever, though more distant, might tend to ill.u.s.trate his argument, enforce his proofs, or a.s.sist his researches; and you have an aggregate of qualities, which, if he had been suffered to complete his course, would have enabled him to present you with a more connected series of instructions for your studies than perhaps ever fell to the lot of any other school, and might have conferred on England the honour of having produced the best combined, least prejudiced, if not the most lofty or extensive system of art.

"Such was your teacher:--to expatiate on the artist before his companions, admirers, rivals, and scholars, within these walls, which have so often borne testimony to the splendour and versatility of his powers, would be equally presumption and waste of time: that characteristic truth, that unaffected simplicity and air of life which discriminate his portraits; the decision, the pa.s.sion, the colour, the effects that animate his history; the solidity of his method, his breadth and mellowness of touch, now fresh before us, with his writings, will survive and consecrate to memory the name of OPIE."

Fuseli, this year (1810), gave a second edition of his "Pilkington's Dictionary of the Painters;" to this he added more than three hundred names and characters of artists, chiefly of the Spanish school, enlarged the notes given in the previous edition, corrected some mistakes in dates, and gave in an appendix a few names which had been omitted in the alphabetical order, and also many particulars of the great masters of the Italian school; the last he considered as too prolix for the body of the work.

In the summer of 1813, Fuseli was attacked with a considerable degree of fever on the nerves, attended with great depression of spirits: this he considered a similar disease, but much milder in its effects than that with which he had been afflicted in 1772, at Rome. This indisposition he felt the more, from having enjoyed for the last forty-three years, an uninterrupted state of good health. His medical friends advised change of air, and more particularly for that of the sea-side. He accordingly determined to pa.s.s a month at Hastings, and prevailed upon the writer of this memoir to accompany him thither. The frequenters of this salubrious bathing-place, called by some the _Montpelier_ of England, will hardly recognise, from its present improved state, the description given of it by Fuseli in a letter to a friend; but it was a true picture of the town at that time. "Hastings appears to me to have been constructed by a conspiracy of bone-setters, surgeons, and dissectors, as the most commodious theatre of all possible accidents in contusions, falls, dislocations, sprains, and fractures. The houses of one side of the High-street, _i.e._ the most inhabited part of the town, are built on what they misname a terrace; but, in fact, it is a ma.s.s of stony fragments gathered from the sh.o.r.e, without any other polish than what the wave had left behind; raised four or five feet above the road, unguarded on the edge, and consequently, without the perpetual interference of miracles, fatal to every stranger who approaches them at night, in winter thaws, when spangled with ice, or flooded from the tremendous ridge that beetles o'er the house-tops."

To form an adequate and correct opinion of the extent of Fuseli's talents and information, and a proper notion of his feelings, it was necessary to be an inmate of the same house: from the experience of this and a subsequent opportunity, I can, with truth, a.s.sert, that he was not only a most intellectual, but a pleasant and accommodating companion.

After a month had been spent at this pleasant watering-place, I had the satisfaction of returning to London with him, he being restored to perfect health.

This year (1813) he painted a picture for Mr. Joseph Johnson, of Liverpool, "Marcus Curius preparing his frugal repast." When Mr.

Johnson gave the commission, he said, "I wish the subject to be some mentally heroic action, taken either from the English or Roman History."

When this picture was finished, Fuseli addressed the following letter to his friend:--

"London, Oct. 8, 1813.

"DEAR SIR,

"I have not been unmindful of what you so kindly commissioned me to undertake for you, and the picture which I have painted now only waits your commands. The _subject_, though not English, is congenial with your own mind, and selected from the most virtuous period of Rome. If I remember rightly, you approved of it when we discussed the subjects here; but as you may not perhaps have since had leisure to reconsider it, you will permit me to repeat it as concisely to you as I can, and nearly in the words of Valerius Maximus. 'Marcus Curius, who had repeatedly smitten the Samnites, seated in his rustic chair, preparing his simple meal in a wooden bowl, exhibited to the admiring Legates of the Samnites at once, with the proof of the most rigid frugality, his own superiority.

Commissioned by the state, they spread before him treasure, and humbly solicited his acceptance. With a smile of disdain, scarcely deigning to look at it, Curius replied--Take back these baubles to those who sent you, and tell them that Marcus Curius prefers subduing the rich to being rich himself, and that you found him as impregnable by bribes as irresistible in arms.'

"Such is the subject, my dear Sir, which I have endeavoured to compose and execute for you, as well as my capacity and practice permitted; I wish they had been greater. I remain, with my wife's and my own warmest wishes for your own, dear Mrs. Johnson's, and son's health and happiness, dear Sir,

"Your obliged and sincere friend,

"Henry Fuseli."

"Joseph Johnson, Esq."

Fuseli kept up a constant intercourse with his friends at Liverpool, and particularly with Mr. Roscoe. The correspondence which pa.s.sed between this gentleman and him sometimes had relation to literature, but more frequently to the fine arts; the following is a specimen of the latter:--

"Liverpool, 24th May, 1814.

"MY DEAR FRIEND,

"When my son Robert left us, about ten days since, I sent by him a slight outline of a frieze, under a picture of a Holy Family, by Ghirlandajo, desiring him to give it you, and to enquire whether you agree with me in thinking it likely to be the production of Michelagnolo, who is said to have painted in the pictures of Ghirlandajo, whilst a student with him. Slight as it is, being, in fact, only the copy of a copy, you will be able to form an opinion of it at first sight. The picture is in distemper as well as the frieze, which is executed in chiar' oscuro, in a sort of oblong broken touches, producing on the whole a good effect. The superiority of the style of the frieze to that of the picture is evident, and demonstrates to a certainty that they are the work of different hands.

"I think I also told you, some time since, that I had a picture of Leo X., with the Cardinals de' Medici and Rossi, which I have reason to believe is the copy made by Andrea del Sarto, from that of Raffaelle, and which was first sent to Mantua, afterwards went to Parma, and thence to Capo di Monte, where it is now no longer to be found. Many persons who had seen it there, a.s.sure me this is undoubtedly the same picture. I have had it some years, and having been frequently asked whether I had taken it out of the frame to look for the mark mentioned by Vasari, I determined, a few months since, to examine it, and sending for two or three friends, we took it out, and on the _edge of the pannel_, near the shoulder of the Cardinal de' Medici, found the remains of an inscription, in large letters, which I conjecture to mean, "_Andrea Florentinus Pinxit_,"

with the date, which is so far obliterated as to be wholly illegible. At all events, there undoubtedly has been an inscription on the edge of the pannel, a circ.u.mstance in itself highly favourable to its being the very picture which Vasari has described. This picture is most highly finished, has an indescribable force of colouring, and is in as fine a state of preservation as the day it was painted. Those who have seen the picture of Raffaelle in the Louvre, a.s.sure me that this is in every respect equal to it. I long to have your decision on these two pictures, but hope it will be on the spot.

"I lately got a fine picture by Bernardino Lovini, which confirms in every point the account which Lanzi and you have given of him.

It is a Holy Family, with two attendant pilgrims, saints, small life. I think you will admire it for its simplicity, pathos, and beautiful colouring.

"I have a friend in Liverpool, who is a good chymist, and prepares colours, which I believe to be of a superior quality. His name is Strahan, and his agent for the sale of them in London, is _Mr.

Thos. Clay, No. 18, Ludgate-hill_. I shall esteem it a favour if you will make a trial of them, and if they should be found to answer better than those you are already supplied with, would recommend them to your friends. I believe they are already in some degree known amongst the artists; but Mr. Strahan is very desirous that you should make a trial of them; and I have promised him _all my interest with you_ for the accomplishment of his wishes.

"I hope Robert will have called on you before you receive this: for your kindness and friendship both to him and Richard accept my best thanks, and believe me, my dear friend, unalterably yours,

"W. Roscoe."

Canova visited England in the summer of 1816, and was then very much struck with the pictures, as well as pleased with Fuseli's society. This eminent sculptor remarked, that he not only showed the brilliancy of genius in his conversation, but that he spoke Italian with the purity of a well-educated native of Rome. And on his return, the Academy of St.

Luke, at Rome, at his request, sent a diploma, const.i.tuting Fuseli a member of the first cla.s.s, an honour which was conferred also, by the like recommendation, upon Sir Thomas Lawrence and Mr. Flaxman.

In the year 1817, Fuseli sat, at my request, to Harlow for his portrait, which is on pannel, of a cabinet size. This eminent painter was highly gratified by the compliment, and exerted every faculty to do his best.

Fuseli obliged him and me by giving for this picture twelve sittings of two hours each; and a more perfect resemblance, or characteristic portrait, has seldom been painted. I attended Fuseli at each sitting, and during the progress of this portrait. Harlow commenced and finished his best and most esteemed work, "The trial of Queen Katherine," in which he has introduced many portraits; but more particularly those of the Kemble family; in the performance of this work, he owed many obligations to Fuseli for his critical remarks; for when he first saw the picture (chiefly in dead colouring), he said, "I do not disapprove of the general arrangement of your work, and I see you will give it a powerful effect of light and shadow; but you have here a composition of more than twenty figures, or I should rather say parts of figures; because you have not shewn one leg or foot, which makes it very defective. Now, if you do not know how to draw legs and feet, I will shew you;" and taking up a crayon, drew two on the wainscot of the room.

Harlow profited by these remarks, and the next time we saw the picture, the whole arrangement in the foreground was changed. Fuseli then said, "So far you have done well; but now you have not introduced a back figure, to throw the eye of the spectator into the picture;" and then pointed out by what means he might improve it in this particular.

Accordingly Harlow introduced the two boys who are taking up the cushion; that which shews the back, is altogether due to Fuseli, and is certainly the best drawn figure in the picture. Fuseli afterwards attempted to get him to improve the drawing of the arms of the princ.i.p.al object (Mrs. Siddons), who is represented as Queen Katherine, but without much effect, particularly the left; and after having witnessed many ineffectual attempts of the painter to accomplish this, he desisted, and remarked, "It is pity that you never attended the Antique Academy."

Harlow proved himself, on many occasions, to be among the vainest of men, and generally wished it to be believed that he possessed information to which he was a stranger. On one occasion he said to me, "It is extraordinary that Fuseli, who is so fine a scholar, should suffer engravers to place translations under the plates taken from the cla.s.sical subjects painted by him;" and remarked, "I was educated a scholar, having been at Westminster school, and therefore wish to see the subjects given in the original languages," and then imprudently instanced the print taken from his picture of the death of dipus.

When Fuseli appointed the next sitting, on our way to Harlow's house, I mentioned this conversation to him, and added, I really think he does not understand one word of Greek or Latin, to which he gave his a.s.sent, and remarked, "He has made, I think, an unfortunate choice; for, if I recollect rightly, the Greek pa.s.sage, as well as my translation of it, are scratched in under the mezzotinto. But before we part, I will bring his knowledge to the test." After he had sat the usual time, he asked for a piece of chalk, and wrote in large letters, on the wainscot, the following pa.s.sage:--

"?t?p?se ?? ?e?? ???????, a? d? pa??????

????sa? ?? ????sa?? ?? de ?????ta pat??? pes??sa?, ??a???."[57]

After having done so, he said to Harlow, "Read that," and finding by his hesitation that he did not understand a letter, he resumed, "On our way hither, Knowles told me you had said that I ought not to permit engravers to put translations under the prints taken from me, and that you had instanced the dipus; now that is the Greek quotation whence the subject is taken, and I find you cannot read a letter of it. Let me give you this advice: you are undoubtedly a good portrait painter, and I think in small pictures, such as you are painting of me, stand unrivalled; this is sufficient merit; do not then pretend to be that which you are not, and probably from your avocations never can be--a scholar."

Unfortunately for Harlow, he was very unpopular with the Royal Academicians, and when he offered himself as a candidate for an a.s.sociate of the Academy, there was but one vote in his favour. On the evening of the election, Fuseli was taxed by some of his friends with having given it, and he answered, "It is true, I did,--I voted for the talent, and not for the man." This was not a solitary instance in which Fuseli exercised his judgment as to the fitness of men to fill offices in the Academy; and accordingly voted for them, distinct from any private consideration. On a vacancy happening for the Professorship of Anatomy, Mr. Charles Bell was among the candidates: this gentleman was unknown to Fuseli, except by his works: his vote was requested by one of his best and most intimate of friends (Mr. Coutts) for another person: "I cannot," said he, "oblige you; I know of no man in England who is a better demonstrator than Bell; and for a surgeon, he is a good artist; such a man therefore the Academy wants for their Professor, and, as such, I _must_ vote for him."

The month of September 1817, I pa.s.sed with my relation and friend, Richard Wilson, Esq. of the Cliff-house, at Scarborough; on this occasion, as was always the case when out of London, Fuseli corresponded with me; two of his letters are preserved, and I cannot refrain from giving them to the public, as they shew the kindness of his disposition, and the terms of friendship which subsisted between us. Understanding that my apartments were about to be repainted, he wrote as follows:--

"To any other person an apology might be necessary; to you, whose friendship can neither be heated or cooled by correspondence or silence, I despise offering any: if by remaining mute, I have deprived myself of one source of pleasure, it has reserved to me another, when we meet: your letter made _me_ happy, because you could not have written it, had you not been so _yourself_.

"Hammond has perhaps told you that I went to Luton with him and Roscoe: I spent some happy hours there; and, of course, but few.

Since my return, I have been riding or crawling in a kind of daylight-somnambulism between this place, Brompton, and Putney-hill. Whether I shall continue so to do the remainder of the month, or go to snuff in some sea air, will depend upon my wife's success or disappointment at Cheltenham.

"The chief reason why I send you this scrawl, is to offer you a bed here at your return, on the same floor with myself, and a chamber as pleasant and as well furnished as my own, viz. with demiG.o.ds and beauties. I earnestly request you to accept of it, and not to persist in the foolhardy resolution of sleeping in a newly painted room. If Hammond is obliged to have his house painted, pray oblige me with your compliance, and, in giving me the preference, you will be at home, and your brother can surely not except against it, considering the distance at which he lives. I will not take a refusal.

"I feel my head so stupid, my hand so disobedient, my pen so execrable, my ink such a mudpond, that I ought in mercy to save you the trouble of deciphering more. Adieu, love me as I do you, neither more nor less, and hasten your return.

"Ever, "Henry Fuseli."

"Somerset House, September 12, 1817.

To John Knowles, Esq."