Complete Works of Wilkie Collins (2179 page)

I felt my own superiority, as I turned from the humiliating spectacle behind me, and resumed my work with redoubled ardour. I by no means, however, succeeded to my satisfaction — - but what artist ever did? I ask it boldly, and defy contradiction from all the schools in Europe — - what artist ever did succeed to his satisfaction, when he was sketching from Nature in oils? What is the whole process, but toil and vexation of spirit, difficulty and disappointment from beginning to end? For example; you want to take your view from a par- ticular point — - very good ! place yourself at that point; and you are sure to find the sun shining slap — - (l feel strongly on this subject, and must express myself in Anglo-Saxon ) — - I repeat it, therefore, shining slap in your eyes ! Move away; give up; go into the shade; and, in the first place you always find yourself opposite the worst view of the subject you want to paint. Go on, nevertheless; and more trials are in store for you. If there is any moveable object in the scene — - an old cart, let us say — - the owner is sure to want to take it away by the time you have just sketched it in. Then, if the effect of light is sunny when you begin, clouds are certain to change it for you altogether, before you have half done. Then, every insect that can fly is sure to commit suicide on the oily surface of your picture — - every vagrant morsel of dust is caught by it, as if by magnetic attraction — - cattle will come all across a field to gather sociably round you, and poke down your easel. Pshaw ! if it were my business, I could write treatises, volumes, libraries-full of books upon the antagonism of Nature and Art, viewed in this way ! What are critics and writers on painting about? What are Academies and Lecturers about? Why don’t they give us instruc- tions how to act, under emergencies such as those I have hinted at above? Why don’t the “ potent, grave, and reverend signors “ of the brush instruct “ us youth “ how to bear these trials; how to overcome them; how to get gnats, for instance, off a wet picture; or how to paint them into the picture, and make it look like “ fine execution,” if they cannot really be got off? Does the President of the Royal Academy want a good subject for his next address to the students? If he does, I make him a present of the subject of this paragraph; and shall feel honoured by receiving in return a printed copy of his composition,
gratis
, of course, and carriage paid.

Subject to most of the above-mentioned disadvantages of sketching from Nature, I nevertheless continued to paint with unflagging resolu- tion. I added beauties; I corrected errors, until at last I succeeded in persuading myself — - upon very sufficient grounds, as I am still disposed to think — - that I had remedied my first deficiencies, and produced a work of the purest and most correct order of landscape art. At this stage of my proceedings — - when I saw my mimic pine-trees palpably growing in beauty, my glimpses of horizon bathing themselves every minute in a more and more translucent atmosphere, under the application of the creative brush — - I placed my sketch, in a slanting position, against the stem of a neighbouring tree; and retired to examine its effect artistically from a distance. This important action, as everybody knows, or ought to know, is only to be properly accomplished by letting the head fall a
 
little on one side; slightly frowning; partially closing the eyes; and slowly covering one object after another in your picture from sight, with the first two fingers of either hand. I have known some eminent painters who hum, whistle, sigh, or suck their teeth, while in this posi- tion of critical inspection — - physical exertions, all or each of them, which have an excellent effect, especially when any uninitiated spectators hap- pen to be by; but which are to be only considered as purely optional, as slight additional graces, or ornaments, of no vital necessity to the proper process of taking a distant view of a work of art.

I remained for some time absorbed in the remote contemplation of my performance. When I at length returned to it — - oh, fatal interval of easy approval and calm intellectual enjoyment ! — - what did I behold? A catastrophe perhaps unprecedented in the annals of Art — - my sketch from Nature was covered with ants ! I had unconsciously placed it for free exhibition before a nest of those industrious and inquisitive insects — - and there they were insanely struggling upon it, by dozens; sticking in agonies on the tops of my pine-trees; drawing black dots with their dying bodies all over my glimpses of sunny horizon. Strange as it may appear, I neither raved, groaned, invoked curses, nor tore my hair. I felt that this last calamity only added one more link to the intricate chain of failures in which fate had entangled our actions from the begin- ning of the day — - the tour to Bosherville was evidently destined to be a complete and consistent succession of disasters from beginning to end. As I reflected on the subject in this light, a dreary comfort, a gloomy sense of satisfaction became awakened within me; and I calmly set to work to dispose of my spoilt picture thus: — -

After carefully cleaning and putting away my painting materials, I cut up from the ground, with my palette knife, a piece of moss the exact size of my sketch — - which appeared by this time to be, as it were,
peppered
all over with ants. I then mournfully placed my work in the receptacle,or grave, which I had formed for it, and covered it over tight with the piece of moss. No tablet marks the spot — - no epitaph arrests the passing stranger — - the offspring of my genius lies buried in dread secrecy; buried by its bereaved parent in a foreign land ! Sneer not, inartistic reader — - smile not, general public ! You who would lightly say: — - he was a fool for his pains; he had better have thrown his sketch away at once, or wiped it out and kept the mill-board for another time ! — - pause in modest doubt, in reverent silence — - you know not how sacred is the work to the worker — - you cannot feel the sweet and soothing charm of such funeral obsequies as I here describe ! And you, sympathising souls, select and sentimental few who long to drop a tear over the grave of the Bosherville landscape, accept my heart-felt thanks; and comfort your- selves, I beseech you, with the consolatory reflection which, even at this distance of time, still comforts me under my loss: I have firmly imbedded a work of British art in the soil of France; let Revolutions root up that sacred deposit of native English talent, if they can !

Just as the performance of the funeral was over, Mr. Scumble awoke, looking very dreamy and bilious, and complaining of a violent headache. He attributed this, generally to the breakfast, and particularly to the Veuve Duval’s wine, which he took leave to consider the very reverse of “ a genuine article: “ and I think he was right. Here was another disaster ! Even our breakfast was no exception to the general rule of calamity — - innocently seeking to refresh exhausted Nature, we were fated to batten on adulteration, and inherit indigestion for the remainder of the day, Well, well ! — - patience even yet ! Still scornfully enduring the decrees of adverse fate, let us leave the wood and get back to the old church. But what time is it? Past three o’clock; and we are more than half an hour’s walk from the beadle’s cottage, where we ought to have arrived at two ! Art has fatally beguiled one of us, and sleep the other ! Good ! — - this last blow comes not unexpected — - when every- thing else has deceived us, what man with a grain of philosophy can wonder that Time should turn Humbug too?

However, although we happen to be about an hour and a half too late, we will nevertheless leave the wood — - the dark cemetery where my sketch lies interred amid the congenial charms of Nature — - and go to the beadle’s cottage. All human chances and changes are now alike unimportant to us, at St. George Bosherville — - we will revisit the old church, as a matter of form; careless whether its door gives us entrance or not.

By the time we arrive at the cottage, it is four o’clock. We knock, but vainly: nobody is at home; the beadle has either never left his native fields, or has gone back to them after dinner. The beadle’s kittens, three in number, spring out playfully upon us from a small hole in the beadle’s door, and inhospitably fix their teeth and claws in the ends of our trousers: no other living creature appears. We walk back to the church — - it is locked up still; and our last chance of any luck at Bosherville has gone. We peep through an open door in a wall at one side of the building; and behold the deserted garden of what was once a convent. It is a calm, cool, solitary place; with moulder- ing stone buildings running round three sides of it, and a deep well in the midst, overshadowed by olive trees. There is no sunlight, no sound, here; ages seemed to have passed since those cracked pavements and weedy walks have been trodden by human feet; the active world, ever changing, ever going on, all around, seems to have decayed and died on the rotten wooden threshold where we stand. Let us close the door, and depart. We are in no humour now for the mournful associations and the solitary worn-out places of the earth — - we are, for the present, bilious and disappointed men, only fit, if we must moralise upon any subject, to moralise on ourselves.

There is now but one thing more to be done; and that is, to atone for the error we have committed in coming to Bosherville at all, by ascertaining the best means of getting back immediately to Rouen. For this purpose, it is necessary to return to that unprincipled vendor of adulterated wines, the Veuve Duval. Let us once again, therefore, seek the parlour of the “ Piebald Horse.”

Our hostess’s information, when we applied to her, was of a some- what indefinite and discouraging nature. The nearest road from Bosher- ville to Rouen was, she believed, more than four hours’ walk; there were no carriages for hire, in the place; there was a public conveyance which occasionally passed through it in the afternoons, but not on stated days; in fact, the starting of this very independent and irregular vehicle was chiefly determined by the number of passengers who wanted to go by it. If they mustered numerously, the “ conductor “ gave the word to depart — - if not, he waited for a proper accumulation until the next day. “ And suppose you wait now,” said the Veuve Duval, in conclusion, “ and take your chance that our little
diligence
will pass to-day; it may come by in an hour or so; and it is your only chance, that I know of, for riding back to Rouen.”

Although we felt firmly persuaded that this last miserable “ chance “ of all would fail us, like the rest of our chances at St. George Bosher- ville, we took the advice of our hostess as readily, though not quite as confiding1y, as we had taken her wine. We lay down in a sort of indo- lent despair, to watch for the “ little
diligence
“ on a small patch of turf in front of the inn. The Veuve Duval reposed elegantly behind us, in a large arm-chair placed in her doorway — - the Veuve Duval’s flock of poultry congregated about our prostrate forms — - and the Veuve Duval’s small grandson, who had grilled one side of his infant-countenance by innocently falling into the fire, sat down upon my extended legs, and from that respectable position surveyed with lively curiosity the aspect of affairs in general. Afternoon was changing into evening; long shadows of trees behind us fell over the green; the atmosphere was exquisitely mellow and transparent; altogether we formed, with our sur- rounding scenery, what I consider was a charming little pastoral picture. Let some of my esteemed brother-artists who are in want of a good subject, take this. If they can only make the Veuve Duval fat enough, and young master Duval scorched enough on one side of his face, and dirty enough on the other — - if they can but justly delineate the sym- metrical figures and handsome, though somewhat despondent, features of the reclining tourists of Bosherville — - why, then, let them feel assured of painting a picture which will be the glory of the British School, and the coveted object of purchase to the British Patron.

Time passed; but the public conveyance did not. At length, we heard a prodigious noise of rolling-wheels and jingling-bells; and a mighty, over-laden, over-filled
diligence
, thundered by us, as fast as six horses driven at a hand-gallop could draw it. Reckless of the crowded state of this vehicle, outside and in, I hailed it with the English “ Hoi ! “ Mr. Scumble, with more presence of mind, shouted “ Arretez ! “ in his most Parisian accent. Neither appeal produced the smallest effect; the
diligence
flew by furiously, and left us still quietly domesticated among the poultry on the green. When all noise had quite died away, the Veuve Duval oracularly informed us from her arm-chair, that the public conveyance we had just beheld was going from, instead of to, Rouen. No matter ! If that
diligence
had been running straight on to Crim Tartary we should have taken places, if it had stopped, for the sake of getting away from St. George Boshervilie !

What was to be done? it was evening already. Were we to blister our feet by walking all the way back to Rouen? Or, were we to sleep at the “ Piebald Horse,” and suffer from the vermin of the Inn, as we had already suffered from the wine? — - Impossible ! We were still at the crisis of our doubt and despondency, when an idea, an inestimably prac- tical idea, struck me. I advanced to the arm-chair of the Veuve Duval — - I had previously asked her for a carriage: I now lowered my tone and submissively petitioned for a cart.

If carts had been scarce, I was prepared to offer a liberal reward for two wheelbarrows, and two strong men to wheel them. We were, how- ever, spared the ignominy of entering the city of Rouen in wheelbarrows: the Veuve Duval recollected one neighbour who had a cart, and another who had an old mare, which he would be delighted to drive for a pecu- niary consideration. This was very soon agreed on; the cart was pro- cured; the mare was harnessed; the driver smartly cracked his whip — -
 
joyful sights, joyful sounds ! we shall get away from the “ Piebald Horse “ after all !