Theodore Watts-Dunton Part 20

'WE ARE WHAT SUNS AND WINDS AND WATERS MAKE US.'

Landor.

Sea, wind, and sun, with light and sound and breath The spirit of man fulfilling-these create That joy wherewith man's life grown pa.s.sionate Gains heart to hear and sense to read and faith To know the secret word our Mother saith In silence, and to see, though doubt wax great, Death as the shadow cast by life on fate, Pa.s.sing, whose shade we call the shadow of death.

Brother, to whom our Mother, as to me, Is dearer than all dreams of days undone, This song I give you of the sovereign three That are, as life and sleep and death are, one: A song the sea-wind gave me from the sea, Where nought of man's endures before the sun.

1882 was a memorable year in the life of Mr. Watts-Dunton. The two most important volumes of poetry published in that year were dedicated to him.

Rossetti's 'Ballads and Sonnets,' the book which contains the chief work of his life, bore the following inscription:-

TO THEODORE WATTS THE FRIEND WHOM MY VERSE WON FOR ME, THESE FEW MORE PAGES ARE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.

A few weeks later Mr. Swinburne's 'Tristram of Lyonesse,' the volume which contains what I regard as his ripest and richest poetry, was thus inscribed:-

TO MY BEST FRIEND THEODORE WATTS I DEDICATE IN THIS BOOK THE BEST I HAVE TO GIVE HIM.

Spring speaks again, and all our woods are stirred, And all our wide glad wastes aflower around, That twice have made keen April's clarion sound Since here we first together saw and heard Spring's light reverberate and reiterate word Shine forth and speak in season. Life stands crowned Here with the best one thing it ever found, As of my soul's best birthdays dawns the third.

There is a friend that as the wise man saith Cleaves closer than a brother: nor to me Hath time not shown, through days like waves at strife This truth more sure than all things else but death, This pearl most perfect found in all the sea That washes toward your feet these waifs of life.

THE PINES, _April_, 1882.

But the finest of all these words of affection are perhaps those opening the dedicatory epistle prefixed to the magnificent Collected Edition of Mr. Swinburne's poems issued by Messrs. Chatto and Windus in 1904:-

'To my best and dearest friend I dedicate the first collected edition of my poems, and to him I address what I have to say on the occasion.'

Once also Mr. Watts-Dunton dedicated verses of his own to Mr. Swinburne, to wit, in 1897, when he published that impa.s.sioned lyric in praise of a n.o.bler and larger Imperialism, the 'Jubilee Greeting at Spithead to the Men of Greater Britain':-

"TO OUR GREAT CONTEMPORARY WRITER OF PATRIOTIC POETRY, ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.

You and I are old enough to remember the time when, in the world of letters at least, patriotism was not so fashionable as it is now-when, indeed, love of England suggested Philistinism rather than 'sweetness and light.' Other people, such as Frenchmen, Italians, Irishmen, Hungarians, Poles, might give voice to a pa.s.sionate love of the land of their birth, but not Englishmen. It was very curious, as I thought then, and as I think now. And at that period love of the Colonies was, if possible, even more out of fashion than was love of England; and this temper was not confined to the 'cultured' cla.s.s.

It pervaded society and had an immense influence upon politics. On one side the Manchester school, religiously hoping that if the Colonies could be insulted so effectually that they must needs (unless they abandoned all self-respect) 'set up for themselves,' the same enormous spurt would be given to British trade which occurred after the birth of the United States, bade the Colonies 'cut the painter.' On the other hand the old Tories and Whigs, with a few n.o.ble exceptions, having never really abandoned the old traditions respecting the unimportance of all matters outside the parochial circle of European diplomacy, scarcely knew where the Colonies were situated on the map.

There was, however, in these islands one person who saw as clearly then as all see now the infinite importance of the expansion of England to the true progress of mankind-the Great Lady whose praises in this regard I have presumed to sing in the opening stanza of these verses.

I may be wrong, but I, who am, as you know, no courtier, believe from the bottom of my heart that without the influence of the Queen this expansion would have been seriously delayed. Directly and indirectly her influence must needs be enormous, and, as regards this matter, it has always been exercised-energetically and even eagerly exercised-in one way. This being my view, I have for years been urging more than one friend clothed with an authority such as I do not possess to bring the subject prominently before the people of England at a time when England's expansion is a phrase in everybody's mouth. I have not succeeded. Let this be my apology for undertaking the task myself and for inscribing to you, as well as to the men of Greater Britain, these lines."

[Picture: Summer at 'The Pines'-II]

I feel that it is a great privilege to be able to present to my readers beautiful photogravures and photographs of interiors and pictures and works of art at 'The Pines.' Many of the pictures and other works of art at 'The Pines' are mementoes of a most interesting kind.

Among these is the superb portrait of Madox Brown, at this moment hanging in the Bradford Exhibition. Madox Brown painted it for the owner. An interesting story is connected with it. One day, not long after Mr.

Watts-Dunton had become intimate with Madox Brown, the artist told him he specially wanted his boy Nolly to read to him a story that he had been writing, and asked him to meet the boy at dinner.

'Nolly been writing a story!' exclaimed Mr. Watts-Dunton.

'I understand your smile,' said Madox Brown; 'but you will find it better than you think.'

At this time Oliver Madox Brown seemed a loose-limbed hobbledehoy, young enough to be at school. After dinner Oliver began to read the opening chapters of the story in a not very impressive way, and Mr. Watts-Dunton suggested that he should take it home and read it at his leisure. This was agreed to. Pressure of affairs prevented him from taking it up for some time. At last he did take it up, but he had scarcely read a dozen pages when he was called away, and he asked a member of his family to gather up the pages from the sofa and put them into an escritoire. On his return home at a very late hour he found the lady intently reading the ma.n.u.script, and she declared that she could not go to bed till she had finished it.

On the next day Mr. Watts-Dunton again took up the ma.n.u.script, and was held spellbound by it. It was a story of pa.s.sion, of intense love, and intense hate, told with a crude power that was irresistible.

Mr. Watts-Dunton knew Smith Williams (the reader of Smith, Elder & Co.), whose name is a.s.sociated with 'Jane Eyre.' He showed it to Williams, who was greatly struck by it, but pointed out that it terminated in a violent scene which the novel-reading public of that time would not like, and asked for a concluding scene less daring. The ending was modified, and the story, when it appeared, attracted very great attention. Madox Brown was so grateful to Mr. Watts-Dunton for his services in the matter that he insisted on expressing his grat.i.tude in some tangible form. Miss Lucy Madox Brown (afterwards Mrs. W. M. Rossetti) was consulted, and at once suggested a portrait of the painter, painted by himself. This was done, and the result was the masterpiece which has been so often exhibited.

From that moment Oliver Madox Brown took his place in the literary world of his time. The mention of Oliver Madox Brown will remind the older generation of his friendship with Philip Bourke Marston, the blind poet, one of the most pathetic chapters in literary annals.

[Picture: 'Picture for a Story.' (Face and Instrument designed by D. G.

Rossetti, background by Dunn.)]

Although Rossetti never fulfilled his intention of ill.u.s.trating what he called 'Watts's magnificent star sonnet,' he began what would have been a superb picture ill.u.s.trating Mr. Watts-Dunton's sonnet, 'The Spirit of the Rainbow.' He finished a large charcoal drawing of it, which is thus described by Mr. William Sharp in his book, 'Dante Gabriel Rossetti: a Record and a Study':-

"It represents a female figure standing in a gauzy circle composed of a rainbow, and on the frame is written the following sonnet (the poem in question by Mr. Watts-Dunton):

THE WOOD-HAUNTER'S DREAM

The wild things loved me, but a wood-sprite said: 'Though meads are sweet when flowers at morn uncurl, And woods are sweet with nightingale and merle, Where are the dreams that flush'd thy childish bed?

The Spirit of the Rainbow thou would'st wed!'

I rose, I found her-found a rain-drenched girl Whose eyes of azure and limbs like roseate pearl Coloured the rain above her golden head.

But when I stood by that sweet vision's side I saw no more the Rainbow's lovely stains; To her by whom the glowing heavens were dyed The sun showed naught but dripping woods and plains: 'G.o.d gives the world the Rainbow, her the rains,'

The wood-sprite laugh'd, 'Our seeker finds a bride!'

Rossetti meant to have completed the design with the 'woods and plains'

seen in perspective through the arch; and the composition has an additional and special interest because it is the artist's only successful attempt at the wholly nude-the 'Spirit' being extremely graceful in poise and outline.

I am able to give a reproduction of another of Rossetti's beautiful studies which has never been published, but which has been very much talked about. Many who have seen it at 'The Pines' agree with the late Lord de Tabley that Rossetti in this crayon created the loveliest of all his female faces. It is thus described by Mr. William Sharp: "The drawing, which, for the sake of a name, I will call 'Forced Music,'

represents a nude half-figure of a girl playing on a mediaeval stringed instrument elaborately ornamented. The face is of a type unlike that of any other of the artist's subjects, and extraordinarily beautiful."

I should explain that the background and the ragged garb of the girl in the version of the picture here reproduced, are by Dunn. These two exquisite drawings were made from the same girl, who never sat for any other pictures. Her face has been described as being unlike that of any other of Rossetti's models and yet combining the charm of them all.

I am strictly prohibited by the subject of this study from giving any personal description of him. For my part I do not sympathize with this extreme sensitiveness and dislike to having one's personal characteristics described in print. What is there so dreadful or so sacred in mere print? The feeling upon this subject is a reminiscence, I think, of archaic times, when between conversation and printed matter there was 'a great gulf fixed.' Both Mr. Watts-Dunton and his friend Mr.

Swinburne must be aware that as soon as they have left any gathering of friends or strangers, remarks-delicate enough, no doubt-are made about them, as they are made about every other person who is talked about in ever so small a degree. Not so very long ago I remained in a room after Mr. Watts-Dunton had left it. Straightway there were the freest remarks about him, not in the least unkind, but free. Some did not expect to see so dark a man; some expected to see him much darker than they found him to be; some recalled the fact that Miss Corkran, in her reminiscences, described his dark-brown eyes as 'green'-through a printer's error, no doubt. Some then began to contrast his appearance with that of his absent friend, Mr. Swinburne-and so on, and so on. Now, what is the difference between being thus discussed in print and in conversation?

Merely that the printed report reaches a wider-a little wider-audience.

That is all. I do not think it is an unfair evasion of his prohibition to reproduce one of the verbal snap-shots of him that have appeared in the papers. Some energetic gentleman-possibly some one living in the neighbourhood-took the following 'Kodak' of him. It appeared in 'M.A.P.'

and it is really as good a thumb-nail portrait of him as could be painted. In years to come, when he and I and the 'Kodaker' are dead, it may be found more interesting, perhaps, than anything I have written about him:-

"Every, or nearly every, morning, as the first glimmer of dawn lightens the sky, there appears on Wimbledon Common a man, whose skin has been tanned by sun and wind to the rich brown of the gypsies he loves so well; his forehead is round, and fairly high; his brown eyes and the brow above them give his expression a piercing appearance.

For the rest, his voice is firm and resonant, and his brown hair and thick moustache are partially shot with grey. But he looks not a day over forty-five. Generally he carries a book. Often, however, he turns from it to watch the birds and the rabbits. For-it will be news to lie-abeds of the district-Wimbledon Common is lively with rabbits, revelling in the freshness of the dawn, rabbits which ere the rush for the morning train begins, will all have vanished until the moon rises again. To him, morning, although he has seen more sunrises than most men, still makes an ever fresh and glorious pageant. This usually solitary figure is that of Mr. Theodore Watts-Dunton, and to his habit of early rising the famous poet, novelist, and critic ascribes his remarkable health and vigour."

The holidays of the two poets have not been confined to their visits to the sea-side. One place of retreat used to be the residence of the late Benjamin Jowett, at Balliol, when the men were down, or one of his country places, such as Boar's Hill.

I have frequently heard Mr. Swinburne and Mr. Watts-Dunton talk about the famous Master of Balliol. I have heard Mr. Swinburne recall the great admiration which Jowett used to express for Mr. Watts-Dunton's intellectual powers and various accomplishments. There was no one, I have heard Mr. Swinburne say, whom Jowett held in greater esteem. That air of the college don, which has been described by certain of Jowett's friends, left the Master entirely when he was talking to Mr.

Watts-Dunton.