by George Moore
CHAPTER XXX.
A PRIVATE VIEW.
IT WAS PRIVATE view day at the Royal Academy. The doors had just been opened, and in another hour or so the elite of Loudon would be there. But for the moment the galleries were quite deserted; not a soul was to be seen but one little old man, who moved silently along the lines of pictures, stopping every now and then to make entries in his pocket-book.
“By Jove!” exclaimed Stanley, “we aren’t the first after all; there goes old Bendish; he must have been waiting outside before the doors were opened.”
“So it is,” said Crossley; “well, it is good of the little beggar to take so much interest in our success; let’s come and speak to him.”
“Take interest in our success,” growled Thompson; “considering he has hundreds of pounds’ worth of our pictures in his possession, all of which he bought for a tenth part of their value.”
“Yes, but he did not know that when he bought them; let’s come and speak to him, anyhow,” replied Harding, interested in the fact that it was principally a silly old man, knowing no more about art than a child, whom fate had selected to keep alive the most important artistic movement of the present century. And the novelist proceeded to explain how the cursed dilettanti, who for the past ten years had done nothing but mumble about the traditions, would, in a week hence, be nodding their heads suggestively, and softly murmuring of a modern art, the outcome of our present civilisation.
“So, Mr. Bendish,” said Thompson, accosting the old man, “you have come to see us; well, this time, I think we are going to have a success.”
“Oh, splendid, Mr. Thompson; I have just been looking at your picture. I wish I had bought it,” replied the old man, in a thin voice.
“Why, surely you don’t want any more of our pictures, do you?” returned Thompson, laughing; “you must have some hundreds.”
“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Bendish, “I think I have a fine collection. I have been very busy sorting them since I heard of your success. You must come and see them, they cover two whole walls of the big room.”
“Very well, I will,” said Thompson, shaking hands with the old man, who immediately continued peering at and taking notes of the different pictures.
“What a strange old beggar he is,” said Crossley; “you know he wouldn’t part with any one of his pictures if you offered him ten times the price he paid for it.”
“Marvellous,” replied Harding; but at this moment they caught sight of Thompson’s picture, and they rushed forward simultaneously.
“By Jove, there’s no doubt,” said the novelist after a pause, during which the whole party gazed in speechless admiration, “there’s no doubt but that we have let the Mediævalists have it this time!”
If letting the Mediævalists have it meant staring them out of countenance, there was no doubt that this at least Thompson had achieved. It was impossible to see anything else in the room but the housemaid and her print dress. The picture represented a pretty but dirty girl whitening the steps of a house. Red geraniums flared in the window, where a large card announced that there were lodgings to let. The girl sat on her heels, with one red hand resting on her bucket, talking to the milkman, who had put down his cans.
Thompson looked at his picture quietly. The hour of dawn was nigh upon him, the hour long desired, the hour long dreamed of, but now that it had come it seemed an ordinary, if not commonplace, event. For what, after all, would it bring him? Had not his victory long been won? What cared he for the praise or blame of the dilettanti? He had to thank them for nothing. In his case they had acted as they have done since art began to be; they had striven to retard the taste of the age, and, having failed, would now, when their praise or blame was valueless, join in the chorus of applause. He knew well enough that to-day they would wag their heads knowingly, forgetful of the fact that they had jeered only a few months ago; forgetful that he had been the same man seven years earlier as he was now. What were their praises to him? He bad worked and laboured, not fur them, but for his own heart’s praise, and for that of the little baud of artists that surrounded him; what were these gilded saloons, subsidised by the state, to him?
It was not there he made his debut, as Harding said afterwards in an article, but in the dusty garrets of Chelsea. It was not the wealthy dilettanti that had found him out and recognised his great talent; it was some dozen or so of poor unknown artists and writers who had fought for him, and forced an unbelieving public to believe, and it was of them, and not of the praises of an uncritical public, that Thompson thought as he looked at his picture. He was not dreaming now of the brilliant drawing-rooms to which he would soon be invited, but of the cold lodging where he had evercome hunger, and, what was worse than hunger, cruel lassitudes and yearnings for rest; where, at the point of his iron will, he had driven himself to his work, scorning respite and comfort. He thought of the past; there it lay before him, concentrated into a few yards of canvas, but of the cost and the worth, who could speak but himself? What could his friends tell of? A few years of perseverance and privation, but only he knew of the terrible drama of abdication, of the life that might have been, of the life he had let lie in the limbo of unborn things, of the love, the dreams, the joys and sentiments that he had ruthlessly torn out of his heart and flung like flowers under the resistless wheels of the chariot of art, that most implacable god, that most terrible of all Juggernauts.
“By Jingo,” said Stanley, “I don’t believe that anyone ever was so much in the open air before; I can’t imagine, Thompson, how you managed to model the hands and arms in that pure cold light.”
“It is the positivism of art,” exclaimed Frazer; “at last we have got an art in concord with the philosophy of our age.”
Stanley and Crossley looked disposed to laugh, and Thompson turned for an explanation, for of positivism of art he had no idea when he painted the picture.
“Yes, quite so,” said Harding; “I know what he means, it is the positivism of art, for it is an art purely material and experimental. Bravo, Frazer! you have given me a title for my article;” and the novelist repeated the phrase which had suggested to him a whole host of ideas.
At this moment they were joined by Holt, the academician. Thompson shook him by the hand warmly.
“We owe it all to you,” said the red-bearded Scotchman, with tears in his voice.
“You owe me nothing,” replied Holt; “if I have gnawed through a few threads of the veil of folly and prejudice, which stifles all artistic aspirations, I have done good work, and am amply recompensed. But you have no idea what a fight I have had for it. They knew that they could not well turn you out; they would probably only have hidden you up there, but when they saw that I was making a stand for the whole school, by Jove, I can’t describe it! Hilton stood by his maidens, and said that he would defend beauty, poetry, and grace, and the rest of it, to the last. However, I was successful, let’s say no more about it. Come, and I’ll show you the rival picture. It is at the other end of the gallery; we’ll see all our own things on the way down.”
Although not apparent to the general public, the walls of the Academy in ‘79 offered the interesting spectacle of a contest between two rival schools of painting, one purely material and experimental, the other wholly ideal and subjective.
The extreme note was struck by Thompson on one side, with his maid-of-all-work; on the other by Mr. Hilton; but on every wall there were pictures which showed, both in execution and sentiment, the influence of either school.
The galleries were now gradually filling. Frazer, Crossley, Stanley and Holt had gone different ways; but Harding, who had an important review article to write, remained with Thompson. They walked up and down together, talking seriously and examining the pictures. At last, stopping before Lewis’s Clytemnæstra, Thompson said:
“Did you ever see anything so piteous? You remember the fellow, he began with us.”
“Yes,” said Harding, “he was one of those creatures who exercise a strange pow
er over all with whom they come in contact, a control that is purely physical, yet acting equally on the most spiritual as on the most gross natures, and leading us independently of our judgment. How can we blame the women for going mad after him, when even we used to sacrifice ourselves, over and over again, to help him?”
“Quite true,” replied Thompson, reflectively; “I took a lot of trouble about him; and, although I knew in my heart he wasn’t worth it, but I’m damned if I could help myself!”
“Marvellous,” said Harding; “and he married the most lovely girl in London. In fact, he succeeded through women; he never had a half-penny worth of talent. But, by Jove! he is just the man I want. I must have some one to hold up to ridicule; let me see, how can I describe his picture?” Then the novelist’s face grew more than ever cynical in its expression as he searched for a scathing criticism. After a pause he said:
“‘To show how utterly outworn is the classical formula, I cannot cite a better example than Mr. Seymour’s picture of Clytemnæstra. Here we have a figure, drawn, I will admit, with tolerable correctness, the modelling is fairly well executed, and the composition is well balanced, and yet it excites as little emotion as a design for a chair in an upholsterer’s catalogue.’ I will then, you know, go on to explain how, in the academies, a pupil is taught that that is right, and that that is wrong, that good painting is this, and bad painting that, and I shall sum up by showing that an emotionless art is the inevitable result of such training.”
“What you say is true enough,” replied Thompson; “but, after all, is he worth attacking? Wouldn’t it be better to say that Mr. Seymour has painted a picture, which, doubtless, all the ladies in Mayfair will declare to be utterly fascinating?”
At that moment, two fashionably dressed women stopped before the picture.
First fashionable lady. “Sweetly pretty, is it not?”
Second fashionable lady. “Charming; what lovely arms she has got.”
First fashionable lady. “Lovely! I believe he did them from his wife.”
Second fashionable lady. “Delightful man is Mr. Seymour. How very handsome he is, and what good manners; ’tis a pity all painters are not like him.”
First fashionable lady. “It is, indeed; how beautifully he paints satin.”
Second fashionable lady. “He always shows such taste in the arrangement of his dresses, and, above all, he doesn’t make one look ugly, and that is the principal thing.”
First fashionable lady. “Of course, what’s the use of having an ugly picture?”
“And it is to be known to such people that we sacrifice our lives,” murmured Harding, as he linked his arm into his friend’s, and walked with him out of their hearing.
The fashionable world had now begun to arrive, and the rooms were already thronged with artists, praising and abusing each others work, and showing their pictures to their friends and relations.
Lady Helen passed through the crowd talking to Sir Thomas Towler, the president; Lewis followed, walking between Lady Marion and Lady Worthing; Lord Worthing had just stopped to speak to Lady Ann Sedgwick. Mrs. Liston, who had left her husband in the first room examining a couple of pictures of ancient Egypt, one of which profoundly interested him, was laughing with Mr. Ripple. He was telling her about “The moderns” and Mediævalists. As he hurried her forward to show her Thompson’s picture, they bowed to Mrs. Campbell Ward. Mrs. Bentham was with Mrs. Thorpe, and Mr. Carver, magnificently dressed in a new pair of white and black plaid trousers, gallantly proposed to take her to Thompson’s picture, an offer which was politely declined.
Everyone talked of the maid-of-all-work. Mr. Swannell, who had lost his seat at the last election, declared that it was a picture of great political significance; it appeared to him to represent the tide of Radicalism which was carrying away the bulwarks of our entire social system. Mrs. Bentham thought it very coarse, but admitted its power. Mrs. French and Mrs. Collins agreed that it was immoral, but refused to give their reasons for thinking it so; it suggested an epigram to Mr. Ripple; and Lady Helen, finding that the general opinion was against the picture, declared herself in its favour; but, on her husband calling their love into question, was induced to modify her opinion. As for the critics, they never ceased talking; they passed through the rooms to and fro between the two pictures, rapidly asking each other what they thought, and discussing the meaning of the phrase, “Positivism of art,” which was now in everybody’s mouth.
Thompson still walked about with Harding, and, as he passed, everyone who knew him pointed him out to their friends.
Lewis was absolutely frantic. He had hoped that the paragraph in Fashion, describing his Clytemnæstra as representing the classical interest, would have attracted some little attention, but it had been entirely passed over, and people seemed to have no eyes or ears for anything but the rival pictures.
As he edged his way through the crowd, throwing civil words to the paragraphists as they passed him, he met Lady Helen and Mrs. Bentham, and they asked him to bring them to see Mr. Hilton’s Hesperia. Biting his lips with vexation, he assented. Thompson’s picture was the most talked about, but Hilton’s was certainly the most praised. All spoke in raptures of its poetry and passion. Mr. Kipple declared that it was the “pain of unassuaged desire,” and, enchanted with his phrase, he went about recklessly repeating it.
The picture was hung at the end of the galleries, just opposite to Thompson’s maid-of-all-work. It represented a band of maiden’s in rose-coloured draperies, pink, white, yellow, and purple, dreaming amid rose-crowned, and sea-begirt rocks. Some sat on high crags, some lay on the low shore, all seemingly overcome by the perfume of the flowers, and the intense glory of the sunset, which flamed around them.
Lady Helen, notwithstanding her general inclination to abuse what other people liked, grew quite enthusiastic, and leaving her husband with Mrs. Bentham, she walked down the galleries, and explained to Mr. Hilton the emotions it suggested to her, and the poem she intended to write immediately she got home.
It was now mid-day, and all who had been able to obtain invitations were within the walls of Burlington House. Grave men with pocket-books edged their way down the lines of pictures, taking notes; now and then they exchanged ideas with their friends, but it was easy to see that they were performing their daily work. Chaperonless young girls, in terra-cotta, or sage-green dresses, with puffed sleeves, passed in great numbers — they criticised the pictures energetically. Occasionally a stylish dress struck a clear gay note here and there, but the fashionable world remained distinct from the artistic; only a few youths who seemed to belong equally to both passed from one to the other. Among these the most remarkable was a tall young man, dressed in a long, dark green frock-coat; his flaxen hair fell on his shoulders; and as he passed he spoke affably of art in general terms. Every now and then was heard the phrase: “Positivism of art.”
Mrs. Bentham and Lewis walked about through the crowd, looking at the pictures. It was the first time he had found himself alone with her since his marriage, and now in this hour of bitter discouragement, her sympathy was the solace he needed. Lady Helen’s impetuous enthusiasm wearied and irritated him. She passed over his faint-heartedness as if it did not exist; but Mrs. Bentham understood him, and he told her of his troubles and sorrows, and she pacified him just as she used to do in the old time. Then they went together to see the Clytemnæstra, and she spoke of it in a tenderer way than Lady Helen had ever done. She condoned its faults, pointed out its merits, reminded him that after all it was only the first day of the exhibition, and that he really did not know what the critics would say of it. Lewis brightened up at her words, and he talked with the gaiety of a convalescent who has been brought out into the sunshine after an illness. He praised her, he thanked her, and he scolded her affectionately, “You never come to see us,” he said. “Us” was an awkward word, but he slid over it, and continued to tell her how lonely he often was, how much he missed her advice.
As they walked
through the rooms, they were stopped from time to time by artists, critics, and friends, who told them what they thought of pictures, and repeated the stray fragments of gossip that were going the round of the galleries. Most of this was idle verbiage, but, nevertheless, one bit of startling news reached Lewis’s ears. It was to the effect that Harding was doing an important article on the Academy. This was quite enough, and Lewis found no difficulty in imagining the terrific shaking he would receive. His first idea was to renew his acquaintance with Harding, ask him to dinner, and persuade him, as best he could, not to be too hard on the Clytemnæstra. But this, on second thoughts, seemed to him a very simple way of proceeding, and it struck him that it would be far more ingenious to introduce Harding to his wife and leave her to speak for him. Full of the idea, he bade Mrs. Bentham good-bye, and looked round for Lady Helen. After some little difficulty he found her talking to a whole group of people under the “Land of Hesperia.” He signed to her that he wanted her, she nodded assent, and, profiting by an occasion that offered itself, said good-bye to the people she was with, and walked up the galleries with her husband.
Lewis explained to her in brief phrases his fears that Harding was going to “slate” his Clytemnæstra, and proposed that he should introduce her to the novelist. She readily consented, and he told her what she was to say.
“You know he is a very clever fellow, and will be able to tell you far more about your verses than I can.”
Lady Helen had read many of Harding’s novels, and she thought at once of the advice he would be able to give her on certain questions of versification that interested her.
“Of course, my dear, I shall be delighted to know him, and you can depend on me to make it all right.”
