The Project Gutenberg EBook of Kate Greenaway, by Marion Harry Spielmann and George Somes Layard This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license Title: Kate Greenaway Author: Marion Harry Spielmann George Somes Layard Release Date: May 24, 2015 [EBook #49041] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK KATE GREENAWAY *** Produced by Giovanni Fini, Suzanne Shell and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) [i] TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES —Obvious print and punctuation errors were corrected. —In the original book, captions regarding color plates are placed on the page before illustrations; captions have been relocated after pictures. KATE GREENAWAY OFF TO THE VILLAGE. From a large water-colour drawing in the possession of Her Grace the Duchess of Bedford. KATE GREENAWAY BY M. H. SPIELMANN AND G. S. LAYARD [ii] [iii] FROM LADY VICTORIA HERBERT’S BOOK-PLATE LONDON ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK 1905 THIS BOOK A TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF KATE GREENAWAY IS DEDICATED TO JOHN GREENAWAY HER ONLY BROTHER AND LIFE-LONG COMPANION Preface APART from her work, full record of which is made in the following pages, there was in the life of Kate Greenaway one outstanding feature—her friendship with John Ruskin. To this, [iv] [v] [vi] [vii] [viii] [ix] without the permission of the great critic’s legal representatives, no sort of justice could have been done. It is therefore our first duty and pleasure to put on record our great indebtedness to Mrs. Arthur Severn, Mr. Alexander Wedderburn, K.C., and Mr. George Allen, for their liberality in allowing us to make copious extracts from Ruskin’s side of the vigorous correspondence which was carried on between him and Kate Greenaway for so many years; this generous permission is only accompanied by the proviso that, in accordance with the undertaking announced by the editors and publisher of the Library Edition of Ruskin’s complete work, all of his published letters shall ultimately be included in that noble issue. These letters have here been printed with the strictest adherence to Ruskin’s peculiar method of punctuation—long and short dashes in place of commas, semicolons, and the like. From Kate Greenaway’s side of the correspondence abundant drafts have also been made, for they reveal the writer’s character and method of thought better than any independent estimate could do. That no violence has been done to her native modesty is proved by the following letter kindly communicated to us by Mrs. Severn. It was written at the time when the preparation of the ultimate Life of Ruskin was under discussion:— 8th June 1900. 39, Frognal, Hampstead, N.W. My dearest Joanie— ... I feel it is very kind of you to consider my wishes about the letters, as I know of course you could do as you wished about them. In the later letters, I think, there is nothing I should object to any one reading—in the early ones nothing I should mind you reading; but there might be things in some one would feel perhaps better not published.... I have a great many letters of his—one for nearly every day for three years, but they are all of the time of my early letters, before his great illness. Since—he has never written—as you will remember. I should like to have any letters in the Life, if one is written, that were thought desirable. I am not sure the later ones of mine are much in a literary way; but he did say some of the earlier ones ‘ought to exist as long as the most beautiful of my drawings should— because they were also beautiful.’ I tell you this because you know how great was the affection between us that you will not think it conceit. I feel so honoured by it, that I can only feel honoured for my name ever to appear near his. My dearest love to you. Katie. From the facsimile letter given in the following pages, it will be observed that Kate Greenaway later on developed a habit of frequently employing capital letters in unusual places. These, as a mere eccentricity, have been corrected in transcription. Our gratitude—may we say the gratitude of our readers also?—is due to the several ladies and gentlemen who have supplied us with reminiscences, correspondence, and other information duly acknowledged in the text; indeed, with but one or two exceptions, we have been favoured with the most obliging responses. Mrs. Arthur Severn, Lady Maria and the Hon. Gerald Ponsonby, Mrs. Frederick Locker-Lampson, Mr. Austin Dobson, Miss Violet Dickinson, Mr. William Marcus Ward, the Rev. W. J. Loftie, Mr. Edward Jones, Mr. Ernest G. Brown, and the late Mr. Edmund Evans, whose death at the age of seventy-nine occurred as this book was passing through the press, all have shown an interest and have extended a friendly help which cannot be too highly appreciated or too cordially recognised. A word must be said concerning the illustrations. The published works of Kate Greenaway are known, and ought to be found, in every house where children live and are loved. We have therefore confined ourselves, with a few rare and intentional exceptions, to work quite unknown to the public, such as early drawings of the cottage at Rolleston where her career, undreamed of as yet, was being determined, thumb-nail sketches with which she embellished her letters, and more important drawings done for sale to picture-buyers or for presentation to friends. About half a hundred have been reproduced with particular care by the ‘three-colour process,’ for the most part with extraordinary success, the rest by other methods suited to the exigencies of the case. For the use of the originals we are indebted to the kindness of many owners—to Her Grace the Duchess of Bedford, to Mr. Ernest G. Brown, Miss Violet Dickinson, Mr. Alfred Emmott, M.P., Mr. W. Finch, Mr. Campbell S. Holberton, Mr. Charles P. Johnson, Mrs. W. Levy, the Hon. Gerald Ponsonby, Mr. John Riley, Mr. Stuart M. Samuel, M.P., Mrs. Arthur Severn, Mr. Henry Silver, the Hon. Mrs. W. Le Poer Trench, Mr. Harry J. Veitch, Mr. Wm. Marcus Ward, and Mr. Creeser, as well as to Mr. John Greenaway. Other illustrations come from the collections of Miss Evans, Lady Victoria Herbert, Mrs. F. Locker-Lampson, Rev. W. J. Loftie, F.S.A., Lady Pontifex, and Mr. B. Elkin Mocatta. To all of them we express our hearty thanks, and to Messrs. Cassell & Co. our indebtedness for having permitted the publication of the border illustration with Mr. Austin Dobson’s ‘Home Beauty,’ the copyright of which they hold; and to Messrs. M’Caw, Stevenson & Orr, Ltd., of Belfast, similar acknowledgments must be made for [x] [xi] [xii] according their consent in respect of the three famous Christmas cards which appear in colour. Our thanks are also due to Messrs. Frederick Warne & Co. for their courtesy in allowing us to reproduce the illustrations of ‘Bubbles’ and ‘The Bubble’ as well as the end- papers. The last-named are based upon the nursery wallpaper to which, with the artist’s permission, the illustrations of one of her Almanacks were adapted by Mr. David Walker. Messrs. Warne are the present holders of the bulk of Kate Greenaway’s published copyright work as well as of the stock of books which were originally issued by Messrs. G. Routledge & Sons, and from them nearly all the books dealt with in the following pages are still to be obtained. [xiii] Contents CHAPTER I PAGE Introductory 1 CHAPTER II Early Years: Birth—Autobiography of Childhood—First Visit to Rolleston—Love of Flowers—Family Trouble—Evening Parties and Entertainments 8 CHAPTER III Childhood in Rolleston: Early Reading—Adventures in London Streets—A Community of Dolls—Buckingham Palace—Life in Rolleston—Education— Brother and Father 21 CHAPTER IV Student Days and Early Success: Early Promise and Art Classes—South Kensington Prizes—Lady Butler—Dudley Gallery—Rev. W. J. Loftie and Messrs. Marcus Ward—Amateur Theatricals—Toy-Books and Fairy Tales —Progress 41 CHAPTER V 1877-1878 The Triumph of Under the Window: Royal Academy—Mr. and Mrs. Edmund Evans—Mr. Evans’s Colour-printing—John Ruskin on Kate Greenaway —Topo—Randolph Caldecott, and Mr. Walter Crane 55 CHAPTER VI 1879-1880 Christmas Cards and Books—H. Stacy Marks, R.A., John Ruskin, and Frederick Locker-Lampson 73 CHAPTER VII 1881-1882 The Empress Frederick, Mrs. Richmond Ritchie, Ruskin, and Mr. Punch—A Day in a Child’s Life—Little Ann and Mother Goose 98 CHAPTER VIII 1882 (continued) and 1883 The Ruskin and Severn Friendship ripens—At Brantwood—The Art of England—Ruskin’s Advice—Kate Greenaway’s First Almanack—A Greenaway ‘Boom’—Mr. Austin Dobson 109 CHAPTER IX 1884-1885 Language of Flowers—Mavor’s Spelling-Book—Dame Wiggins of Lee—Ruskin Correspondence—His Tuition and Plans for Co-operation—Intimacy with Mrs. Severn and her Children 127 CHAPTER X 1885 and 1886 The Move to Frognal—Ruskin: Letters and Confidences, Praise and Blame, his Illness—Mrs. Allingham 142 CHAPTER XI 1887-1890 Kate Greenaway as a Correspondent—Her Letters to Ruskin—Her Friends— Learning Perspective—Ruskin’s Last Letters—The Pied Piper of Hamelin— Mrs. Allingham, R.W.S.—The Book of Games—Elected to the Royal Institute of Painters in Water-Colours—Paris Exhibition—Death of Mr. John Greenaway, Sr. 163 CHAPTER XII 1891-1895 [xiv] [xv] Kate Greenaway’s First Exhibition—The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby—Almanacks— Contributions to the Columbian Exposition, Chicago—Book-plates—Lady Maria Ponsonby—Works Sold—The Ladies’ Home Journal—Death of Mrs. Greenaway—Lady Mayo—Brantwood again—Kate Greenaway’s Criticism of Modern Art—Marie Bashkirtseff—Friendship with Miss Violet Dickinson —Religious Opinions—Ruskin—Views on Mr. George Meredith, etc. 179 CHAPTER XIII 1896-1897 The Last of the Almanacks—Opinions on Books, Pictures, the New Woman, and Eternal Man—Her Defence of Ruskin 201 CHAPTER XIV 1898-1901 Kate Greenaway’s Third Exhibition—Correspondence with John Ruskin, and Mr. and Mrs. Stuart M. Samuel—Her Views on Art, Religion, and Books—Her Oil-painting—Death of Ruskin—Illness and Death of Kate Greenaway— Posthumous Exhibition—The Kate Greenaway Memorial 224 CHAPTER XV Verse-writing: Kate Greenaway’s Feeling for Poetry—Problem, Tragedy, and Resignation—Charm of her Verses for Children—On Death 257 CHAPTER XVI The Artist: A Review and an Estimate 265 List of Books, etc., illustrated wholly or in part by Kate Greenaway 285 Index. 291 [xvi] [xvii] List of Illustrations IN COLOUR OWNER OF ORIGINAL PAGE 1. Off to the Village Duchess of Bedford Frontispiece 2. Sisters Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 4 3. In the Chappells’ Cottage at Rolleston—The Kitchen John Greenaway, Esq. 10 4. The Kitchen Pump and Old Cheese Press, Rolleston John Greenaway, Esq. 12 5. Winter, 1892 Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 20 6. The Open Door Mrs. Arthur Severn 26 7. The Chappells’ Cottage, Farm, and Croft at Rolleston John Greenaway, Esq. 36 8. Thomas Chappell (‘Dadad’) John Greenaway, Esq. 38 9. Kate Greenaway’s Student- work Nat. Art Library, Victoria and Albert Museum, S. Kensington 42 10. The Elf Ring John Greenaway, Esq. 48 11. The Little Model Mrs. J. St. G. Whitly 58 12. ‘Mary had a Little Lamb’ Mrs. Arthur Severn 62 13. Bubbles:— (1) The Bubble } The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby between pp. 64 and 65 (2) Bubbles 14. Christmas Cards Wm. Marcus Ward, Esq. 74 15. The Little Go-cart Harry J. Veitch, Esq. 80 16. Pink Ribbons Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 88 17. A Calm in a Teacup Mrs. Arthur Severn 94 18. Out for a Walk Ernest G. Brown, Esq. 100 19. ‘Lucy Locket lost her Pocket’ W. Finch, Esq. 104 20. Two Girls going to School John Riley, Esq. 114 21. The Old Farm-house Campbell S. Holberton, Esq. 122 22. The Red Boy Charles P. Johnson, Esq. 130 23. Many Happy Returns of the Day Mrs. Arthur Severn 136 24. The Naughty Little Girl (4 pages) Miss Violet Severn between pp. 140 and 141 25. The Cherry Woman Harry J. Veitch, Esq. 150 26. Taking in the Roses Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 160 27. The Garden Seat Harry J. Veitch, Esq. 166 28. Happy Returns of the Day Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 170 29. Cottages Harry J. Veitch, Esq. 172 30. Portrait of a Lady The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby 180 31. Joan Ponsonby, 1891 The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby 182 32. Brother and Sister Charles P. Johnson, Esq. 188 33. The Bracken Gatherers The Hon. Mrs. W. Le Poer Trench 194 34. A Surrey Cottage Alfred Emmott, Esq., M.P. 198 35. The Pink Sash Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 204 36. The Peacock Girl John Greenaway, Esq. 210 37. Vera Evelyn Samuel Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 212 38. Two Girls in a Garden John Riley, Esq. 216 39. The Dancing of the Felspar Fairies Mrs. Arthur Severn 218 40. A Baby in White Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 222 41. Book-plate of Miss Vera Evelyn Samuel Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 226 42. Kate Greenaway before the Fates Mrs. Arthur Severn 230 43. The Fable of the Girl and her Milk Pail W. Finch, Esq. 236 44. The Muff (unfinished) John Greenaway, Esq. 240 45. The Stick Fire Harry J. Veitch, Esq. 244 46. Two at a Stile Mrs. W. Levy. 246 [xviii] 47. Waiting The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby 250 48. Springtime Henry Silver, Esq. 256 49. Swansdown Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. 260 50. ‘Dead’ John Greenaway, Esq. 264 51. The May Dance Miss Violet Dickinson 272 52. Alfy (unfinished) John Greenaway, Esq. 274 IN BLACK AND WHITE 1. John Greenaway (Father of Kate Greenaway). By Birket Foster, R.W.S. John Greenaway, Esq. 40 2. Kate Greenaway’s Student-work Nat. Art Library, Victoria and Albert Museum, S. Kensington 44 3. Kate Greenaway at the ages of 16 and 21. (From Photographs) ...... 46 4. Pencil Sketches of ‘Tragedy’ The Rev. W. J. Loftie, F.S.A. 50 5. John Greenaway (Brother of Kate Greenaway) John Greenaway, Esq. 52 6. Pencil Sketches The Rev. W. J. Loftie, F.S.A. 66 7. Kate Greenaway, 1880. (From a Photograph by Elliott & Fry) ...... 84 8. Frederick Locker-Lampson Mrs. Frederick Locker- Lampson 86 9. The Twins } Mrs. Frederick Locker- Lampson between pp. 90 and 91 10. Little Dinky 11. Water-colour Drawings on Letters Mrs. Frederick Locker- Lampson 92 12. Water-colour Drawings on Letter Mrs. Frederick Locker- Lampson 96 13. Letter from John Ruskin to Kate Greenaway, 27th Dec. 1882 Mrs. Arthur Severn 111 14. ‘Home-Beauty’ Mrs. Croft 125 15. Kate Greenaway’s Home, 39, Frognal, Hampstead. (From a Photograph) ...... 142 16. Tea Room leading out from the Studio, 39, Frognal, Hampstead. (From a Photograph) ...... 144 17. The Studio, 39, Frognal, Hampstead. (From a Photograph) ...... 146 18. Letter from John Ruskin to Kate Greenaway, 8th Nov. 1886 Mrs. Arthur Severn 157-159 19. ‘Rover.’ (From a Photograph) ...... 164 20. Pencil and Tint Drawing B. Elkin Mocatta, Esq. 174 21. Kate Greenaway in her Studio, 1895. (From a Private Photograph by Mrs. Wm. Miller) ...... 178 22. Mabel Ponsonby The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby 184 23. Eileen Ponsonby The Hon. Gerald Ponsonby 186 24. Sketch on Letter to Miss Violet Dickinson, 8th July 1896 Miss Violet Dickinson 192 25. Sketch on Letter to Miss Violet Dickinson, 10th Dec. 1896 Miss Violet Dickinson 193 26. Sketch on Letter to Miss Violet Dickinson, 19th Jan. 1897 Miss Violet Dickinson 194 27. Letter from Kate Greenaway to John Ruskin (‘Kate Nickleby’) Mrs. Arthur Severn 217 28. Sketch on Letter to Miss Violet Dickinson Miss Violet Dickinson 225 29. ‘Ronald’s Clock’ Mrs. M. H. Spielmann 248 30. Sketch-design for the Plate affixed above the Kate Greenaway Cot in the Gt. Ormond St. Hospital Mrs. Arthur Lasenby Liberty 255 31. Pencil Study from Life M. H. Spielmann, Esq. 276 [xix] [xx] 32. Letter from Kate Greenaway to John Ruskin Mrs. Arthur Severn 278 33. The Picnic John Greenaway, Esq. 280 34. Pen Sketch John Greenaway, Esq. 282 35 to 90. Fifty-six Thumb-nail and other Sketches with Pen and Pencil, throughout the Text, viz.: 26 on Letters to John Ruskin, in the possession of Mrs. Arthur Severn (pp. 1, 8, 18, 21, 23, 116, 152, 162, 163, 165, 179, 197, 199, 202, 207, 222, 232, 233, 237, 239, 241, 243, 247, 277, 283, 284). 5 from Pencil Sketches, in the possession of M. H. Spielmann, Esq. (pp. 5, 55, 123, 131, 245). 5 from the MS. of Kate Greenaway’s Autobiography, in the possession of John Greenaway, Esq. (pp. 26, 30, 33, 35, 40). 5 from Book-plates, etc., in the possession of Mrs. Frederick Locker-Lampson (pp. 20, 54, 72, 88, 97). 4 on Letters to Miss Violet Dickinson, in the possession of Miss Violet Dickinson (pp. 63, 210, 213, 221). 4 Early Rough Sketches for Christmas Cards and Valentines, in the possession of Wm. Marcus Ward, Esq. (pp. 45, 75, 279, 280). 2 from Pencil Sketches, in the possession of Lady Pontifex (pp. 6 and 108). 1 from a Book-plate, in the possession of Lady Victoria Herbert (p. 7). 1 on a Letter to Miss Lily Evans, in the possession of Miss Lily Evans (p. 107). 1 Skit by Randolph Caldecott, in the possession of John Greenaway, Esq. (p. 69). 1 Poem by Austin Dobson, Esq., in the album of Ernest G. Brown, Esq. (p. vii.). 1 Sketch-plan of Kitchen at Rolleston (p. 11). The Illustrations in colour in this volume have been engraved and printed by The Menpes Press. [1] On a Letter to Ruskin. KATE GREENAWAY CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY ABOUT the name of Kate Greenaway there floats a perfume so sweet and fragrant that even at the moment of her death we thought more of the artist we admired than of the friend we had lost. Grateful for the work she had produced, with all its charm and tender cheerfulness, the world has recognised that that work was above all things sincere. And, indeed, as her art was, so were her character and her mind: never was an artist’s self more truly reflected in that which her hand produced. All the sincerity and genuine effort seen in her drawings, all the modesty, humour, and love, all the sense of beauty and of charm, all the daintiness of conception and realisation, the keen intelligence, the understanding of children, the feeling for landscape, with all the purity, simplicity, and grace of mind—all those qualities, in short, which sing to us out of her bright and happy pages—were to be found in the personality of the artist herself. All childhood, all babyhood, held her love: a love that was a little wistful perhaps. Retiring, and even shy, to only a few she gave her friendship—a precious possession. For how many are there who, gifted as she was, have achieved a triumph, have conquered the applause and admiration of two hemispheres, and yet have chosen to withdraw into the shade, caring for no praise but such as she might thankfully accept as a mark of what she was trying to accomplish, never realising (such was her innate modesty) the extent and significance of her success? Here was a fine character, transparently beautiful and simple as her own art, original and graceful as her own genius. Large-hearted and right-minded, Kate Greenaway was gentle in her kindness, lofty and firm in principle, forgiving to the malevolent, and loyal to her friends— a combination of qualities happily not unrivalled among women, but rare indeed when united to attributes of genius. It is true that what Kate Greenaway mainly did was to draw Christmas cards, illustrate a score or two of toy-books, and produce a number of dainty water-colour drawings; and that is the sum of her work. Why, then, is her name a household word in Great and Greater Britain, and even abroad where the mention of some of the greatest artists of England of to- day scarcely calls forth so much as an intelligent glance of recognition? It is because of the universal appeal she made, almost unconsciously, to the universal heart. All who love childhood, even though they may not be blessed with the full measure of her insight and sympathy, all who love the fields and flowers and the brightness of healthy and sunny natures, must feel that Kate Greenaway had a claim on her country’s regard and upon the love of a whole generation. She was the Baby’s Friend, the Children’s Champion, who stood absolutely alone in her relations to the public. Randolph Caldecott laboured to amuse the little ones; Mr. Walter Crane, to entertain them. They aimed at interesting children in their drawings; but Kate Greenaway interested us in the children themselves. She taught us more of the charm of their ways than we had seen before; she showed us their graces, their little foibles, their thousand little prettinesses, the sweet little characteristics and psychology of their tender age, as no one else had done it before. What are Edouard Frère’s little children to hers? What are Fröhlich’s, what are Richter’s? She felt, with Douglas Jerrold, that ‘babes are earthly angels to keep us from the stars,’ and has peopled for us a fairy-world which we recognise nevertheless for our own. She had a hundred imitators (from whom she suffered [2] enough), but which of them is a rival on her own ground? M. Boutet de Monvel was inspired by her; but with all his draughtsman’s talent and astonishing invention and resource, he has not what she has: he has given us the insouciance of childhood, but at what sacrifice of touch; he has given us some of the beauty, but at what surrender of nearly all the lovableness and charm. And not babies and school-girls only, but maidens who are past the ignorance though not the innocence of childhood; not roses only, but all the flowers of the garden; not the fields only, but the fair landscape of the English country-side,—all these things Kate Greenaway has shown us, with winning and delightful quaintness, and has made us all the happier for her own happiness in them; and, showing us all these things, she has made us love them and her drawings the more for the teaching and the loveliness in them, and herself as well for having made them. The children who welcomed her work when it first appeared are grown up now and are looking rather old, and those who bought the picture-books ‘for the little ones’ (as they said) but enjoyed them so much themselves, are mostly wearing spectacles. And all the while Kate Greenaway worked hard, making hundreds, and thousands, of her little pictures, and doing more for the pleasure and happiness of the little folks than most little folks know. So that now when her pencil and her brush are laid aside for ever, and herself has been called away, her life-task being done, it is surely well that we should remember her in affection, and wrap up the memory of her name in a little of the lavender of her love that filled her heart and welled over into her work. One of the charms, as has been said, most striking in the character of ‘K. G.’ (as she was called by her most intimate friends and relatives) was her modesty. A quiet, bright little lady, whose fame had spread all over the world, and whose books were making her rich, and her publisher prosperous and content—there she was, whom everybody wanted to know, yet who preferred to remain quite retired, living with her relatives in the delightful house Mr. Norman Shaw had designed for her—happy when she was told how children loved her work, but unhappy when people who were not her intimate friends wanted to talk to her about it. She was, therefore, so little seen in the world that M. Arsène Alexandre declared his suspicion that Kate Greenaway must really have been an angel who would now and then visit this green earth only to leave a new picture-book for the children, and then fly away again. She has flown away for ever now; but the gift she left behind is more than the gift of a book or of a row of books. She left a pure love of childhood in many hearts that never felt it before, and the lesson of a greater kindness to be done, and a delight in simple and tender joys. And to children her gift was not only this; but she put before them pictures more beautiful in their way and quaint than had ever been seen, and she taught them, too, to look more kindly on their playmates, more wisely on their own little lives, and with better understanding on the beauties of garden and meadow and sky with which Heaven has embellished the world. It was a great deal to do, and she did it well—so well that there is no sadness in her friends’ memory of her; and their gratitude is tinged with pride that her name will be remembered with honour in her country for generations to come. What Kate Greenaway did with her modest pencil was by her example to revolutionise one form of book-illustration—helped by Mr. Edmund Evans, the colour-printer, and his wood-blocks, as will be shown later on. And for a time she dressed the children of two continents. The smart dress with which society decks out its offspring, so little consonant with the idea of a natural and happy childhood, was repellent to Kate Greenaway. So she set about devising frocks and aprons, hats and breeches, funnily neat and prim, in the style of 1800, adding beauty and comfort to natural grace. In the first instance her Christmas cards spread abroad her dainty fancy; then her books, and finally her almanacks over a period of fifteen years, carried her designs into many countries and made converts wherever they were seen. An Englishman visiting Jules Breton, in the painter’s country-house in Normandy, found all the children in Greenaway costumes; for they alone, declared Breton, fitted children and sunshine, and they only were worthy of beautifying the chef-d’œuvres du bon Dieu. [3] [4] SISTERS. ‘Girl with blue sash and basket of roses, with a baby.’ From a water-colour drawing in the possession of Stuart M. Samuel, Esq., M.P. Indeed, Kate Greenaway is known on the Continent of Europe along with the very few English artists whose names are familiar to the foreign public—with those of Millais, Leighton, Burne-Jones, Watts, and Walter Crane—being recognised as the great domestic artist who, though her subjects were infantile, her treatment often elementary, and her little faults clear to the first glance, merited respect for originality of invention and for rare creative quality. It was realised that she was a tête d’école, the head and founder of a school—even though that school was but a Kindergarten—the inventor of a new way of seeing and doing, quite apart from the exquisite qualities of what she did and what she expressed. It is true that her personal identity may have been somewhat vague. An English customer was once in the shop of the chief bookseller of Lyons, who was showing a considerable collection of English picture-books for children. ‘How charming they are!’ he cried; ‘we have nothing like them in France. Ah, say what you like—Walter Crane and Kate Greenaway are true artists—they are two of your greatest men!’ It was explained that Kate Greenaway was a lady. The bookseller looked up curiously. ‘I can affirm it,’ said the visitor; ‘Miss Greenaway is a friend of mine.’ ‘Ah, truly?’ replied the other, politely yet incredulous. Later on the story was duly recounted to Miss Greenaway. ‘That does not surprise me,’ she replied, with a gay little laugh. ‘Only the other day a correspondent who called himself “a foreign admirer” sent me a photograph of myself which he said he had procured, and he asked me to put my autograph to it. It was the portrait of a good-looking young man with a black moustache. And when I explained, he wrote back that he feared I was laughing at him, as Kate is a man’s name—in Holland.’ But if her personality was a ‘mystification’ to the foreigner, there was no doubt about her art. In France, where she was a great favourite, and where her extensive contribution of drawings to the Paris Exhibition of 1889 had raised her vastly in the opinion of those who knew her only by her picture-books, she was cordially appreciated. But she had been appreciated long before that. Nearly twenty years earlier the tribute of M. Ernest Chesneau was so keen and sympathetic in its insight, and so graceful in its recognition, that Mr. Ruskin declared to the Oxford undergraduates that no expressions of his own could vie with the tactful delicacy of the French critic. But in his lecture on ‘The Art of England’ (Fairyland) Ruskin found words to declare for himself that in her drawings ‘you have the radiance and innocence of reinstated infant divinity showered again among the flowers of English meadows.’ And privately he wrote to her: ‘Holbein lives for all time with his grim and ugly [5] “Dance of Death”; a not dissimilar and more beautiful immortality may be in store for you if you worthily apply yourself to produce a “Dance of Life.”’ The touchstone of all art in which there is an element of greatness is the appeal which it makes to the foreigner, to the high and the low alike. Kate Greenaway’s appeal was unerring. Dr. Muther has paid his tribute, on behalf of Germany, to the exquisite fusion of truth and grace in her picture-books, which he declared to be the most beautiful in the world; and, moreover, he does justice to her exquisite feeling for landscape seen in the utmost simplicity—for she was not always drawing children. But when she did, she loved the landscape setting almost, if not quite, as much as the little people whom she sent to play in it. From a Pencil Sketch in the possession of Lady Pontifex. In speaking of Kate Greenaway as a ‘great’ artist, we do not, of course, mean that she was technically accomplished in the sense or degree that a great picture-painter or a sculptor may be. Her figure-drawing was by no means always impeccable; and the fact of the design and composition being generally ‘right’ arose, we imagine, as much from intuition as from the result of scholarly training. And that is the chief thing. As he grows older, even the artist who is primarily technician and purist is apt to ask, ‘What does technical excellence matter so long as the gist of the thing is there? Is not that a finer thing which convinces us from the instinct of the painter than that which satisfies us from his knowledge of it?’ Yet Kate could draw an eye or the outline of a face with unsurpassable skill: firmness and a sense of beauty were among her leading virtues. The painter with whom she had most affinity was perhaps Mr. G. D. Leslie, for her period and treatment are not unlike. Her sense of humour is allied to that of Stacy Marks; and her sentiment to that of Fred Walker. Yet she was wholly personal (as will be shown later on when the details of her art come to be discussed), and full of independence, courage, and fixity of purpose. And just as G. F. Watts in his portraits of men and women invariably sought out the finest and most noble quality in his constant search for beauty in the sitter, not only in features but in character, so did Kate Greenaway in her quiet little drawings show us all that was sweet and pleasant and charming in children’s lives of days gone by in country-side and village, and left out all that was ugly, wrong, or bad. [6] [7]