The Life, Letters and Work of Frederic Leighton Volume II Part 23

EDW. STEINLE.

From his birthplace Leighton received the following announcement:--

BOROUGH OF SCARBOROUGH.

At a meeting of the Council of the Borough of Scarborough, in the County of York, held in the Town Hall in the said Borough, on Monday the ninth day of December, 1878,--

Present,-- THE MAYOR (W.C. LAND, Esq.) in the chair,--

It was moved by the Mayor, seconded by Alderman Woodall, and resolved unanimously: "That this Council learns with peculiar satisfaction and pleasure of the election of a native of Scarborough, in the person of SIR FREDERIC LEIGHTON, to the Presidency of the Royal Academy, and respectfully offers to Sir Frederic its warm congratulations, and records its conviction that his great talents as an artist, his attainments as a scholar, and his many striking qualifications, eminently fit him to adorn the high position to which he has been called."

W.C. LAND, Mayor.

Robert Browning wrote:--

19 WARWICK CRESCENT, W., _November 14, 1878_.

DEAR LEIGHTON,--I wish you joy with all my heart, and congratulate us all on your election. There ought to have been no sort of doubt as to the result, but the best of us are misconceived sometimes, though in your case never was a right more incontestable. All I hope is that your new duties will in no way interfere with the practice of your Art. I only venture to write, now, as one who, so many a year ago, saw your beginning with "Cimabue," and from that time to this remained confident what your career would be. But you know all this, and it requires no answer, being rather a spurt of satisfaction at my own original discernment than any a.s.surance which I can fancy you need from,--Yours very truly,

ROBERT BROWNING.

Pen's letter to me, two days since, contained his earnest wishes for what has just happened, and he will be delighted accordingly.

From Matthew Arnold:--

ATHENaeUM CLUB, PALL MALL, S.W., _November 15_.

MY DEAR LEIGHTON,--One line (which you need not answer) to say how delighted I am to see what an excellent choice the Royal Academy has made.

I only hope poor O'Conor may not take advantage of the occasion to plant an ode and a letter.--Ever sincerely yours,

MATTHEW ARNOLD.

From Hubert Herkomer:--

_November 27, 1878._

MY DEAR SIR FREDERIC LEIGHTON,--I am just recovering from an attack of brain fever, and although I am not allowed yet to write, I can no longer wait without dictating a letter to express my own individual pleasure at your being the new President.

Three years ago you wrote me a letter after seeing my "Chelsea Pensioners." Perhaps you little dreamt of the tears of joy that that letter caused in a young painter, who will always feel that he owes you a debt of grat.i.tude; and now he glories in your being the chief of that body which attracts to it all the princ.i.p.al art of the country. All England feels that you, from your new position, will give new life to it. Perhaps you will allow me, when I am sufficiently recovered, to come and see you.

In the meantime believe me to be, with most heartfelt congratulations,--Sincerely yours,

A.H., _pro_ HUBERT HERKOMER.

SIR FREDERIC LEIGHTON, P.R.A.

A friend writes:--

_November 15._

DEAR MR. LEIGHTON,--I have tried to keep silence, telling myself that it cannot matter what I think or feel on the subject (and that it may seem to you a very unnecessary proceeding!); but I _cannot_ resist the temptation to tell you how warmly I rejoice, and how earnestly I congratulate _myself_ and all other hungerers after wholesome beauty of colour and form, and high ideals of greatness and purity, on your acceptance of a position that one may hope will, nay must, influence the Art of this time for good in every sense. One takes a great breath of relief as one thinks of it!

Were I to describe to you the effect your works produce on me, and the feeling of real reverence I have for them, I should appear to exaggerate, and should certainly bore you, so I will say no more! and I am not given to that sort of thing.

My beloved Lady Waterford was much disappointed that you could not come and meet her; I need not say, so were we: it was a great enjoyment to have her, she is like no one else; and I yet hope you may come and meet here some day. Pray do not answer this; of course you are overwhelmed with business, and it would hurt me to have it considered and acknowledged as a complimentary civility! whereas it is nothing but an involuntary overflowing to relieve my mind.

From Lord Coleridge:--

1 SUSs.e.x SQUARE, W., _November 24, 1878_.

MY DEAR LEIGHTON,--Let me add one voice more, small but true, to the great chorus of applause with which your election has been greeted. It might seem left-handed praise to say that your election was the only possible one; but it is very true praise to say it was the only possible one if the highest interests of English Art, and of the Academy itself, were the sole object of the electors.

It would have pleased and touched you to hear old Boxall speak of it. I dined with him alone on Friday, and he was just and generous, as he always is, in his appreciation of you, and looked forward to your reign as likely to be one of high aims and n.o.ble motives. It is a small thing to say, but I venture to agree with him.--Ever sincerely yours,

COLERIDGE.

These are a few among many hundred congratulatory letters Leighton received on his election. One from Mrs. f.a.n.n.y Kemble he answered in the following March, when already he was beset by requests to use his influence to get friends' friends' work hung on the walls of the Academy:--

_March 20, 1879._

DEAR MRS. KEMBLE,--Many thanks for your very amiable words of congratulations on the honour done me by the Royal Academy. The kind sympathy shown towards me by my friends had added very greatly indeed to the pleasure my election gave me. The belief entertained by Miss ---- that the admission of works to an exhibition is a simple matter of personal favour, is shared by all foreigners--and I fear by many English people--and places me at this time of year in much and often painful embarra.s.sment. So robust is this belief, that those who, having applied to me, fail to find their works on our walls ascribe their absence to personal unfriendliness or discourtesy on my part, or, to say the least, to lukewarmness. As a matter of fact each work of art is admitted or rejected by a separate vote of the Council, and that in complete ignorance (except where authorship _saute aux yeux_) of the artist's name. This applies equally to English painters and foreign artists who reside here. In regard, however, to foreigners sending _from abroad_, whilst the vote is taken in the same way, admission is much more difficult. We have so many Anglo-foreign painters who live amongst us that, our Exhibition not being international, we can only admit a very limited number of really prize works. These works are therefore brought before us separately, and a small number of them selected, according to the s.p.a.ce we have to deal with; I myself as a rule dissuade my foreign friends from sending except in cases where their merit is really very great; this may be Miss ---- case; you will best know. I am quite sure, my dear Mrs.

Kemble, that you do not doubt the pleasure it would give me to serve you in the person of your friend, and will not misinterpret these lengthy explanations.

And now I have a favour to ask of you. On Wednesday the 26th, at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, Joe will, I hope, play at my studio, and with him Miss Janotha and Piatti; Henschel will, I hope, sing. Will you give me the great pleasure of seeing you amongst my friends on that occasion?--Believe me always, yours very truly,

FRED LEIGHTON.

On December 10, 1879, Leighton delivered his first address to the students of the Royal Academy--one of the finest of the many fine achievements of Leighton's life. "Purely practical and technical matters" he put aside to look into a wider and deeper question, that of the position of Art in its relation to the world at large in the present and in the past time, in order to gather something of its prospects in the future. If the question why Leighton held indisputably the great position he did were asked me by one who for a first time had heard his name, I should be inclined to answer, "Because he contained within him the combined powers to execute completely the art which he created, and to think out and feel such profound, sympathetic, and wise truths as those to be found in this address."[60]

Among the large number of appreciative letters Leighton received were the following.

Millais wrote:--

2 PALACE GATE, KENSINGTON, _December 11, 1879_.

DEAR LEIGHTON,--I was suffering all yesterday with tooth-ache, otherwise I would have attended the distribution last night. The ceremony is always most interesting to me, awakening as it does many anxious and happy recollections. My object in writing to you is to say I have read your address, which I think so beautiful, true, and _useful_ that I cannot but obey an impulse of congratulating you upon it. For some time past I have been putting down notes on Art which some day may be put into form, and I find we are thinking precisely in the same way. I have used identical words in what I have written to those you delivered yesterday.

The exponents of Art surround it in such a cloud of mystery that it is a real gain when a practical authority is able to say something definite and clear the way.--Yours sincerely,

J.E. MILLAIS.

His poet-friend wrote:--

WOODBERRIE, LOUGHTON, ESs.e.x, _December 11, 1883_.

MY DEAR SIR FREDERIC,--Have any of the mult.i.tude of men who love you ever called you Chrysostom? It seems so natural after reading yesterday's address. Will it be published by itself and obtainable in some handier form than the broadsheet of the _Times_? I want it as part of the education of my daughter, who now, at sixteen, is beginning to take a new interest in whatsoever things are lovely and of good report, and I want it for myself, for in its lovely suggestiveness and exquisite English I could often find refreshment when I wanted (and needed) to "travel in the realms of gold," and forget my own invalided personality under the magic of such guidance.

My wife desires me to say a word of gracious remembrance to you, and I am ever, faithfully yours,