Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (2140 page)

During the next few days of my father’s stay at Lerwick, excursions among the crags, hills, and valleys of Shetland followed each other in rapid succession, and were productive of two more illustrations to “The Pirate.” One depicted the moonlight scene on the beach between “Brenda” and “Mordaunt,” in a rocky sea-coast landscape of remarkable grandeur. The other embodied the departure of “Triptolemus Yellowley” and his party, on ponies, for “Burgh Westra.” In this scene was introduced, with great effect, one of the quaint Shetland corn-mills, so correctly described by Scott as “no larger than a pig-stye,” and pourtrayed by Mr. Collins with perfect fidelity in all its diminutive proportions. Indeed, throughout his illustrations for Mr. Cadell’s publication, he preserved the same minute and conscientious fidelity to local peculiarities; a process by no means easy in the rough climate of Shetland, which often made careful sketching in the open air a considerable trial of patience and skill. Most of the painter’s studies in his northern sojourn were produced under unpropitious skies; and he and his party would frequently have formed no bad subject for a picture in themselves, when they halted on a bleak hill-side: Mr. Collins, with one knee on the ground, steadying himself against the wind; his companion holding a tattered umbrella over him, to keep the rain off his sketch-book; the guide standing by, staring at his occupation in astonishment; and the ponies browsing near their riders, on the faded grass, with mane and tail ever and anon floating out like streamers on the gusty breezes that swept past them. Obstacles of weather, however, wrought no bad influence on my father’s studies; he preserved his patience and composure through them all, and finished his sketches determinately, in spite of Shetland showers and northern gales.

After a seven days’ stay at Lerwick, Mr. Collins, finding that he had seen the principal points of view on the mainland of Shetland, and knowing that he had completed his sketches for the number of illustrations to “The Pirate” required by Mr. Cadell, determined to take advantage of the first weekly departure of the
Wick
steamer, after his arrival, and to set forth upon his homeward voyage. A few hours before he took leave of the scenes that had so much delighted him, he wrote as follows, — reviewing the past events of his journey, and partly intimating the route by which he intended to effect his return:

“To MRS. COLLINS.

“Lerwick, Shetland, July 2nd, 1842.

“I received most joyfully and thankfully your note of Monday last, by yesterday’s boat; and when you consider that we had not heard from home for a fortnight before, you will not be surprized that I should have become anxious. The last letter we received reached us at Thurso, which we left at nine o’clock in the evening, driven by Henry Otter, in his tandem, and arriving at Wick at half-past twelve, P.M. We stayed nearly a week with our friend, and spent every evening but one with Mrs. Slater, the widow of Captain Slater; a handsome, agreeable woman, — interesting in her manners and conversation. We started on Saturday for Shetland, and arrived early on Sunday morning; since which time we have had many pleasant adventures, some of which Willie has recorded in his letter for your amusement. Our course is now, thank Heaven, southward, and is to commence this afternoon. When we reach Wick, which we trust will be to-morrow, we hope to find one or two letters at the post-office. We then propose having another evening with Otter, on our way to Inverness, at a village where he is surveying, and then to be taken up by the mail.

“Tell Mr. Richardson, with my regards, that I am mending, I trust, very fast; that I am able, without fatigue, to take great exercise; and that my heart is very quiet.

“I cannot bear to think how great a distance I am from you — it seems months since I left home. I am quite pleased to find it is your intention to stay at Oxford-terrace till our return: however, should you require country air before that, do not wait for me,

“Ever yours,

“WILLIAM COLLINS.”

The journey homeward — commenced, as above indicated — was continued from Inverness, through the fine scenery of the Caledonian Canal, to Glasgow; and thence, southward, by Liverpool. On his return to London, my father, as usual, resumed his old occupation of preparing for the next Exhibition. His labours on his pictures, alternating with one or two short visits to friends in the country, employed his time closely for the rest of the year. His correspondence this autumn, chiefly addressed to his family during his absence from home, is of too brief and private a nature to be generally interesting. The subjoined letter, however, to Mr. E. V. Rippingille, merits insertion, as a continuation of those opinions on the decoration of the Houses of Parliament, some of the first of which have been laid before the reader already, in the painter’s communication on that subject to Mr. Eastlake:

“To E. V. RlPPINGILLE, ESQ.

“85, Oxford-terrace, 26th October, 1842.

“My dear Sir, — I send you the pamphlet on Fresco, which I regret has been so long delayed. You will find in this, and in the Report, almost all that can be said on the subject of the decoration of the new Houses of Parliament. For myself, I have very great fears that in this age of
bustle,
the poetry of our Art will be stifled altogether.

“The usual cry for novelty, by the time the mechanical power of painting in Fresco has been acquired, will be raised for ‘the good old way’ — but will the call be responded to? Encouragement will do much in the way of
fostering
genius, but neither money nor patronage, of any kind; no, nor even that mighty engine the Press, can
produce
genius — which, unless it first be given, can never exist at all. The most that these giant powers can do, alone, is to foster a race of tradesmen in painting —
’Decorators’
— how I hate the word!

“Sincerely hoping, however, that I may be mistaken, and that the country which has produced such men as Hogarth, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Wilson, Flaxman, Lawrence, Chantrey, Hilton, Stothard and Wilkie, may not be bullied, by our own countrymen, out of its just claims to be considered a school of Art,

“I remain, (in great haste,)

“Very faithfully yours,

“WILLIAM COLLINS.”

“P.S. I return the “Pilgrimage,”* with many thanks, for the great treat the reading it has twice afforded me. Would it be possible to get a copy of it? How delightful it is to find that the consummation of this world’s goods has not, in the smallest degree, deadened the author’s yearnings after those better things, which belong, thank God, to man if he will.”

* A poem entitled, “A Pilgrimage to Jerusalem,” by the Earl of Ellesmere

As the year 1843 opened, serious variations of health, seldom hitherto observed in Mr. Collins’s naturally robust constitution, already presented, to those most interested in watching his physical condition, but too plain a testimony to the slow yet sure progress within him, of the malady which his medical attendant had pronounced to be a disease of the heart. These evidences of impaired strength — significant, though as yet comparatively slight — wrought however, no saddening influence on the painter’s spirits. He still derided the idea that his loss of health proceeded from other than ordinary causes; still retained the cheerfulness and gaiety, which always made him “the life of the party,” wherever he went; and still pursued, with no loss of success or cessation of assiduity, his indefatigable labours in the Art. As the month of April approached, five pictures by his hand were ready for the Royal Academy; two of them, separately exhibiting, in bold contrast, the relative peculiarities of an English and Italian coast scene; and a third, displaying the concluding, and, in many respects, the finest example of his capacity, as a painter of Scripture subjects.

The following were Mr. Collins’s works for 1843, in the Royal Academy: — ”The Virgin and Child” (now in the possession of his family;) “The World, or the Cloister?” (purchased by Mr. Colls; by whom it was sold to Mr. Wass;) “A Windy Day — Sussex,” (sold to Mr. Hippesley;) “A Sultry Day — Naples” (purchased by Mr. Colls; afterwards sold to Mr. George Oddie;) and “A Girl of Sorrento Spinning,” (sold to the Rev. S. W. Russell.)

Fully conscious that in painting the Virgin and Child he was attempting perhaps the most arduous of all Scripture subjects, Mr. Collins felt, that to attain real excellence in his work, it was necessary to depend entirely upon his own resources, avoiding all imitation of the peculiarities of any particular schools. Resigning, therefore, any idea of seeking models for his subject from the great pictures that he admired, but felt to be inimitable, — from the unapproachable perfection of the Madonnas of Raphael downwards, — he resolved to follow his own intention of personifying the tenderer and more maternal emotions in the adoration of the Virgin for her Divine offspring, exactly as his own deep feeling and vivid conception of the subject should direct him. Proceeding throughout his undertaking on such principles as these, he produced a picture which, whatever may be the opinions on its particular qualities, must be acknowledged to possess the first great merit of being an original work. The Virgin, in his composition, is placed at the entrance of a cavern, with her back towards the dim, solemn, twilight landscape that forms the distance of the picture. The infant Saviour is sleeping on her lap, suffused in the soft radiance of a beam of celestial light, which descends on him from a dark lustrous sky, and typifies the “youngest-teemed star — with handmaid-lamp attending,” of Milton. The face of the divine Mother is bent down in solemn contemplation on the diviner Son. An ineffable tenderness, serenity, and peace, is expressed in her features, — in the tranquil simplicity of her attitude, — in the solemn, almost melancholy, stillness and repose of her whole figure. Depth of colour, and grandeur of light and shade, pervade the picture; a mournful, mysterious, evening atmosphere lingers over the landscape scenery, which thus assumes a solemn aspect, finely harmonising with the profound sentiment of the figures of the Virgin and Child. The following passage, in Milton’s “Nativity Hymn,” was appended as the motto to this work:

— “But, see, the Virgin blest
Hath laid her babe to rest!
* * * *
Heaven’s youngest-teemed star,
Hath yoked her polish’d car;
Her sleeping Lord, with handmaid-lamp attending!”

The painter’s second picture, “The World, or the Cloister,” takes its title from the subject the three figures in it are supposed to be discussing. They are assembled under the cloister of a convent, which discloses the church through one arch, and a strip of mountain landscape through part of another. One of the party is a beautiful girl, clothed in light brilliant attire, whose melancholy expression denotes that her experience of “the world,” short as it is, has already been tinged with disappointment. Taking advantage of the effect produced on her mind by some recent slight, from which she is still suffering, the abbess of the convent (seated opposite) is exhorting her, with earnest gesticulation, to “forsake the pomps and vanities of this wicked world,” and seek consolation in the “cloister.” By the side of the abbess is one of the youngest of the nuns, who is regarding the disappointed, pensive girl, (still undecided to choose the world or the cloister,) with an expression of deep, affectionate interest. The face of this youthful “sister” is treated with exquisite purity and grace; her calm and melancholy beauty contrasts as impressively as her sober robe, with the softer attractions and gay habiliments of the object of the abbess’s exhortations. Every part of the picture is painted with extreme clearness and delicacy, and it has the great merit of telling its story with perfect intelligibility. It was engraved in the “National Tableaux,” (edited by Mrs. Alaric Watts) and was there made the subject of a graceful and pleasing story, by Mr. G. P. R. James.

“A Windy Day,” the first English sea-piece produced by the painter since 1836, abundantly proved, like “The Welsh Guides “ of the year before, that his capacity for attracting the public in his early branch of the Art had remained unimpaired since the period when he had first originated it. Every object in this picture is eloquent of a fresh gale blowing over the Sussex coast. The varied, moving clouds, — the light gray sea, — the wreath of smoke from a distant cottage, streaming low from the chimney, — the fisherman holding on his cap, with his legs planted firm and wide on the ground, — the girl buying his fish, with her bonnet blown back, her shawl floating out on the air, and her balance hardly preserved against the wind, — the boy by her side, with bent knees and hands in pockets, shivering as the gale rushes past him, — the dog, with his ears and tail wafted from their customary position — all concur to produce a composition exhilarating, buoyant, thoroughly windy. The picture is painted throughout with great purity of tone and fidelity to nature, and offers a most effective contrast to its companion, “The Sultry Day.” Here everything is hot and still. The rays of the noonday sun pour down upon the Mediterranean, which wears the deep green hue always cast upon its waters by excessive heat. The island of Capri in the distance is hardly visible through the quivering white mist over the horizon. In the foreground is a fisherman’s boat, under the shade of which a man is sleeping. His wife is near him, taking her siesta, with her head laid in an old basket, as a defence against the sun: even the dog at their feet is too lazy to open more than one eye, as he feels the light, which is gliding round the boat, touching the tip of his nose. The only one of the party awake is a little girl, who is mischievously attempting to tickle her father as he sleeps. This picture is as redolent of intense Italian heat as “The Windy Day” of a brisk English breeze. It is painted with great force and boldness, and with a happy absence of any violence, or exaggeration of colour.