Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (2132 page)

“Upon our arrival, one of our most sincere pleasures was finding two letters from our kind and estimable Kensington correspondent. In both, your accounts of the present Exhibition make me anxiously desire to see it, before the labours of my brethren will have been dispersed. But this I fear, unless the rooms remain open much longer than I can reasonably hope, is almost impossible. We shall, however, lose no time in getting home; this being our last resting-place, with the exception of about a week at Munich. On Monday we propose going through the Tyrol, to Innspruck, and, after staying there two or three days, getting on to Munich; thence to the Rhine; and so to London, by Rotterdam. I return by this route, in preference to going through Switzerland, because the latter journey would require more time than I can now spare, and is a thing to be done without much difficulty, at some future period, even at my time of life; and, moreover, because I want to keep my Italian schemes as distinct as possible, and to have as much time before the next Exhibition as I can, that I may do myself justice. You will think all this contrivance ought to be followed up by the production of something worth looking at: but this is no easy matter; for every place, and indeed everything in Italy, has been so besketched, that little remains, unless the old way of doing things be resorted to, by way of novelty. One thing I am more convinced of every day; namely, that the fine pictures of the schools I am surrounded by are built upon what is called
common nature;
the inhabitants of the streets furnishing the guest-table, and there playing their parts with a dignity to be found only amongst the people. But, if this introduction of the model be too literal, that common look which belongs to modern Continental pictures, and which is certain degradation, is an inevitable consequence.

“So much with respect to figures. In the case of landscape, the same thing, to a much greater extent, is sure to follow. Views, mere views, are detestable. What can be more like Nature than the landscape of Titian? I was yesterday looking at the ‘Peter Martyr,’ at San Giovanni, — I got up to it, on the altar. The painting is truth itself; and yet, how far removed from anything ‘common or unclean!’ (if one might venture on such an expression) — sober, solemn truth, coming from one aware of the real dignity of his pursuit. What a creature he was!

“By the way, we have taken our abode nearly opposite the house in which he painted for many years, and where he died. I hope this very day to finish a sketch I have begun, of the terrace upon which it is said he so frequently walked, looking on the grand canal. Paul Veronese, too, is here in all his glory; and Bonifazio — what great things he has done! Do you recollect the picture, in the
‘Belle Arti,’
of Lazarus and the rich man’s table? What tone, and what real breadth! Then, Paris Bordone — the picture, in the same place, of the ‘Fisherman presenting the Ring to the Doge.’ Tintoretto, too — how can one
speak
of his pictures? the ‘Miracle of S. Marco,’ the ‘ Crucifixion;’ and the many other fine things in the Scuolo di S. Rocco, and in the Church. But I must stop — you cannot answer my questions; but when we meet, as I trust we soon shall, we can talk these matters over and over again. What a lucky wight I have been, to be able to take my pleasure for more than a year and a half, rambling about amongst these glorious scenes, and for twice in my life escaping the responsibilities of an exhibitor! This
ex officio
life, however, must have an end; and then what is to become of me, I know not!

“My paper warns me (for Harriet claims a part of it for your sister) that I must be brief. I must find room, however, to tell you, that we are in daily expectation of hearing that ‘the knot’ has been tied in the case of our excellent friend, Sir William Knighton. His bride, as bride elect, we were introduced to at Rome: she is the daughter of Major Jamieson, and a most excellent and lady-like person. For some time I had observed symptoms in your pupil of slighting his former mistress —
the Art;
and now she, to whom we all thought he was for ever devoted, with her, or rather
his,
colour-box at her back, and her reticule filled with deserted and broken chalks, both black and white, is turned inhumanly out of doors, by him who had sworn, by the ceiling of the Vatican, never to wed another!

“And now, my dear friend, I must break off, trusting to your usual kindness to excuse the haste with which I must conclude. Again thanking you for all your favours, believe me

“Yours, obliged and faithfully,

“WILLIAM COLLINS.”

In his sketches from Nature at Venice, the painter — with the same originality of feeling which marked him in all that related to his Art — abstained from occupying himself with the representation of any of the celebrated views in that city, which had been already appropriated by other pencils. His time was employed, where his attention was attracted, by the fresher pictorial materials, presented in quaint corners of large old buildings, with gloomy strips of water gliding past their thresholds; in curious by-lanes; in unfrequented back canals, with narrow weather-stained bridges over them, and clumsy solitary boats floating drowsily on their waters. Nothing could be more independent, more delightfully easy and undisturbed, than his present process of sketching, as he glided along in his gondola, able to pause wherever he pleased, sheltered from the sun, and out upon the motionless waters with his companions, — where, though he was in the midst of a populous city, no loiterers could overlook him in his tranquil isolation. His sketches at Venice, made under these favourable circumstances, were all clear, sunny, and forcible, in an extraordinary degree. A circumstance attending the production of one of these sketches, exhibited in an interesting light the natural respect of the lower orders of Venetians for all that pertained to the Art. While he was occupied, one morning, in painting a distant building, Mr. Collins’s gondola was kept stationary in the middle of the Grand Canal, on a market day, for more than an hour — a position somewhat akin to that of a man who should draw up a cab across the Strand, at noonday, to paint a portrait of the lion on Northumberland-house. But, though the owners of the little fleet of boats, laden with country produce, (which during the period of the painter’s employment were ascending the canal in a long file,) found themselves delayed on their way, and put to some inconvenience, by being obliged to turn out of their course, as they approached Mr. Collins’s gondola, not one of them, when they perceived his occupation, attempted to vindicate their right to the direct passage, which he was obstructing. Each, without a word of remonstrance, sloped quietly off on either side, and left him in his chosen position perfectly undisturbed.

A useful guide in some of Mr. Collins’s sketching excursions, among the canals of Venice, was a former cook of Lord Byron’s, named Beppo, whom the painter engaged in his “professional” capacity as a compounder of dishes, but who was highly delighted, in his leisure hours, to employ his local knowledge of nooks and corners in Venice for his master’s benefit. Taking an oar in the gondola, the ready cook frequently piloted Mr. Collins through more of the strikingly picturesque back canal scenery of Venice, than even he, with all his industry, was ever able to transcribe to paper. Beppo’s aid on these occasions was always given on one condition — that, when the gondola passed any large hotel, he should be suffered to lay down his oar, and relapse into a plain passenger; because, as a cook well-known in Venice, he could not lower his “profession,” by exposing himself before the servants of the inn, in the act of rowing like a common gondolier!

Having served other Englishmen, besides Lord Byron, (whom he spoke of as a most generous and indulgent master, “though he eat little but biscuits and fruit,”) this Beppo had picked up some ideas of manners and customs in England; one of which was, that all English gentlemen had their names written up over their house doors. Accordingly, he set to work to manufacture a name-plate for his master; which, when completed, he hung up in his absence, at the back gate of his abode, intending it as a surprise to him on his return. On regaining his own door, Mr. Collins, to his astonishment, found two or three idlers gazing up at a black board, nearly three feet long, hung over the entrance, and bearing in large white letters, this impressively simple inscription, “WIMICHIM COLLINS.”

The master’s appreciation of the comic was too genuine to permit him to disturb the servant’s respectable “door-plate.” The delighted Beppo was gravely thanked for his attention to English customs; no attempt was made to improve his notion of the orthography of the word “William;” and the painter remained — to the intense enjoyment of his English friends — placarded to all Venice, as “WIMICHIM COLLINS,” to the last day of his residence there!

Not satisfied with admiring, only, the noble pictures mentioned in his letter to Sir David Wilkie, my father occupied part of his time at Venice, in making copies of groups of figures, and arrangement of colour, in many of the great works that he saw. The fidelity of eye and hand to his original, which had distinguished him in his student days, is exhibited undeteriorated in these studies of his mature age, combined with a spirit and vigour, far beyond what those youthful efforts ever attained. Among the pictures whose peculiar beauties he thus lastingly impressed upon his recollection, Tintoretto’s mighty “Crucifixion,” pre-eminently engaged his attention. Of the noble group at the foot of the cross, and of other figures in this vast and glorious work, he made studies, in which the magical colour and composition of the original were transcribed with remarkable success. The writer of the present work happened to be with him on his first sight of this picture — as indeed he was on most other similar occasions. The day was declining, as they entered the great room in the Scuolo di San Rocco, and beheld the light from without, falling soft and sober, upon the wall along which Tintoretto’s immense composition extended. Thus seen, this sublime illustration of the Divine tragedy of Calvary assumed its grandest and highest aspect: it appeared to strike the painter speechless, as he looked at it. For some time, he and his companion believed themselves to be the only occupants of the room; but a half-suppressed sob, suddenly audible from its lower and darker extremity, informed them that they were not alone. It proceeded from an old man, dressed in the worn rusty cassock of the lower order of Italian country curates, who was standing before the picture, with his wan hands clasped over his breast, the tears rolling down his cheeks, and his eyes fixed immovably on the majestic composition before him. He appeared to be perfectly unconscious that any one was looking at the picture but himself; and Mr. Collins and his companion, on quitting the room, left him in the same position in which they had at first discovered him. It is in such triumphs as these, that painting attains its highest elevation; and, casting its mortal imperfections behind it, communes with universal humanity, in the mother language of that Nature from which it is derived.

After a month’s stay at Venice, fully occupied by the pleasures and employments, of which some instances have been here enumerated, my father’s anxiety to commence his new labours in England urged him at length to close his studies of the great works around him, to resign his sketching excursions on the canals, and to set forth definitively on his return to his native country. On the 26th of June, he quitted Venice; and looked his last at Italy, as, a few days afterwards, he ascended the Tyrolese Alps, on his way to Innspruck.

From this point it is unnecessary to follow Mr. Collins’s progress with any minuteness. When he left Venice, the objects of his journey were achieved — those varied studies of the people, the landscape, and the Art of Italy, which had made the purpose of his departure from England, were now completed. His mind was stored with new ideas, and his hand impatient to embody them, as soon as he quitted Venice. He viewed the rest of the route with the eye of a traveller and a lover of Nature; but he did not study the different features of the countries northward of the Alps, with the strong intellectual purpose, which characterized his days of Italian travel — to illustrate which has been the main object of the present portion of this work. The further progress of his journey will be so managed, therefore, — to use his own words, in his last letter to his friend Wilkie — ”as to keep his Italian schemes as distinct as possible;” little more being related of it, than the bare description of the route he followed; with the single exception of a passing notice of his short sojourn at Munich; which, as a city remarkable for its works of Art, attracted his attention somewhat prominently.

Having passed a few days at Innspruck and Saltzburg, in order to visit the fine mountain scenery of the country around those towns, my father next proceeded to Munich, where he made a stay of ten days. Contrasted with the Italian cities, to which for the last year and a half he had been accustomed, the capital of Bavaria wore a strangely new, neat, and modern aspect. Nothing of the venerable character of antiquity appeared to belong to it, but its works of Art; and in these — in the “Barberini Faun,” and the Egina statues, in the “Glyptothek;” and in the Murillos, Vandyckes, and other old pictures in the “Pinacothek” he found much to remind him agreeably of his pictorial experience in Italy. It was, however, from an expedition to the Royal Palace of Schleisheim, to see there Wilkie’s celebrated picture, “The Reading of a Will,” that he derived his most genuine enjoyment while at Munich. He found his friend’s work (which had been purchased by the King of Bavaria) in perfect preservation, holding its ground triumphantly against the old pictures which surrounded it, by its fine colour and
chiaroscuro,
and its strikingly dramatic developement of subject and character. With what he saw of the modern German works at Munich, Mr. Collins was not particularly impressed. Notwithstanding the inclusiveness of his taste in Art, (so well noticed in Mr. Richmond’s observations on his character, in Rome,) he had little sympathy with the productions of the modern German school, at any time of his life; and that little, his fresh recollections of Titian and Tintoretto tended considerably to lessen, during his stay at Munich.