The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sir Edwin Landseer, by Frederick G. Stephens 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: Sir Edwin Landseer Author: Frederick G. Stephens Release Date: July 24, 2018 [EBook #57574] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR EDWIN LANDSEER *** Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images available at The Internet Archive) 1. Contents. 2. List of Illustrations (In certain versions of this etext [in certain browsers] clicking on the image will bring up a larger version.) 3. Chronology of Edwin Henry Landseer 4. Chronological List of Pictures by Sir Edwin Landseer, Mentioned in this Volume. 5. Index of Names. (etext transcriber's note) ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHIES OF THE GREAT ARTISTS. /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ SIR EDWIN HENRY LANDSEER. /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHIES OF THE GREAT ARTISTS. The following volumes, each illustrated with from 14 to 20 Engravings, are now ready, price 3s. 6d. LEONARDO DA VINCI. By Dr. J. Paul Richter. MICHELANGELO. By Charles Clement. RAPHAEL. From J. D. Passavant. By N. D’Anvers. TITIAN. By Richard Ford Heath, M.A., Oxford. TINTORETTO. By W. Roscoe Osler. From researches at Venice. HOLBEIN. From Dr. A. Woltmann. By Joseph Cundall. THE LITTLE MASTERS OF GERMANY.[1] By W. B. Scott. REMBRANDT. From Charles Vosmaer. By J. W. Mollett. RUBENS, By C. W. Kett, M.A., Oxford. VAN DYCK and HALS. By Percy R. Head, Lincoln Coll., Oxford. FIGURE PAINTERS OF HOLLAND. By Lord Ronald Gower, F.S.A. VERNET and DELAROCHE. By J. Ruutz Rees. HOGARTH. By Austin Dobson. REYNOLDS. By F. S. Pulling, M.A., Oxford. TURNER. By W. Cosmo Monkhouse. LANDSEER. By Frederick G. Stephens. The following volumes are in preparation:— FRA ANGELICO. By Catherine M. Phillimore. FRA BARTOLOMMEO. By Leader Scott. VELAZQUEZ. By Edwin Stowe, M.A., Oxford. GAINSBOROUGH. By G. M. Brock Arnold, M.A., Oxford. ALBRECHT DÜRER. By R. F. Heath, M.A. GIOTTO. By Harry Quilter, M.A., Trinity College, Cambridge. [Image unavailable.] Deerhound’s Heads. “The whole world without Art would be one great wilderness.” ———— SIR EDWIN LANDSEER By FREDERICK G. STEPHENS, {i} {ii} {iii} AUTHOR OF “MEMORIALS OF MULREADY,” ETC. LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON, CROWN BUILDINGS, FLEET STREET. 1880. (All rights reserved.) TO HENRY WALLIS, PAINTER, THE THANK-OFFERING OF AN OLD FRIEND. PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. The text of a former work on the early productions of Sir Edwin Landseer has been, for the second time, revised and extended by the author; and the subject has been continued to the death of the artist. The biographer’s aim is achieved if he has successfully shown the course of the artist’s studies, and their result in success of an extraordinary kind. June, 1880. [Image unavailable.] CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE Origin of the Landseer family—Parentage of Edwin Henry Landseer—Thomas Landseer 1 CHAPTER II. Early life—Landseer’s first studio—Etchings—First picture at the Royal Academy—Haydon’s studio 16 CHAPTER III. A fully-developed painter—Early paintings—British Institution—The Cat’s Paw 39 CHAPTER IV. At St. John’s Wood—Chevy Chase—Chief’s Return from Deer-stalking—Made Royal Academician (1830)—Lassie herding sheep 58 CHAPTER V. Suspense—Highland Shepherd Dog—Bolton Abbey—Drover’s departure—Shepherd’s Chief Mourner—Dignity and Impudence—Otters and Salmon—The Sanctuary 72 CHAPTER VI. {iv} {v} {vi} {vii} {viii} Windsor Castle in the present time—Not caught yet—The Otter speared—Shoeing—The random shot—Dialogue at Waterloo —Landseer knighted 87 CHAPTER VII. Sir Edwin Landseer—The Monarch of the Glen—Midsummer Night’s Dream—Maid and Magpie—The Flood in the Highlands 94 CHAPTER VIII. Man proposes, God disposes—The Connoisseurs—The Swannery invaded—Closing Years—Death of Landseer 105 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. From Etchings by Edwin Landseer and C. G. Lewis. PAGE 1. Dogs worrying a Frog. Etched by Edwin Landseer (1822), xii 2. Low Life. ” ” ” (1822), 7 3. A Shepherd’s Dog. ” ” ” (1824), 13 4. The Beggars. ” ” ” (1824), 19 5. Donkeys on a Common. ” ” ” (1824), 25 6. Four Irish Greyhounds. ” ” ” (1825),Front. 7. Eagle and Red Deer. ” ” ” (1825), 31 8. The Rabbit Warren. ” ” ” (1826), 37 9. Return from Deer-Stalking. ” ” ” (1826), 43 The Mothers. Drawn by Edwin Landseer in 1837. 10. Highland Nurse. Etched by C. G. Lewis (1847) 49 11. Mare and Foal. ” ” ” (1847), 55 12. Dog and Pups. ” ” ” (1847), 61 13. Cow and Calf. ” ” ” (1847), 69 14. Donkey and Foal. ” ” ” (1847), 77 15. Goat and Kids. ” ” ” (1847), 85 16. Sow and Pigs. ” ” ” (1847), 93 17. Sheep and Lambs. ” ” ” (1847), 101 The head and tail pieces are from Etchings by Edwin Landseer for the Game Card at Woburn Abbey (1825). CHRONOLOGY OF EDWIN HENRY LANDSEER. PAGE 1802 Born at 83, Queen Anne Street East 16 1812 Studied at Hampstead 17 1815 Exhibited pictures at Royal Academy 28 Attended Haydon’s Studio 32 1818 Exhibited “Fighting Dogs” 42 1822 Received a premium of £150 from the Directors of the British Institution51 1824 First visit to the Highlands 55 1825 Took the house in St. John’s Wood 58 1826 Made Associate of the Royal Academy 60 1830 Made Royal Academician 62 1850 Knighted 93 1859 Received the Commission for the Lions for the Nelson Monument 108 1860 Exhibited “Flood in the Highlands” 100 1866 The “Lions” were placed in Trafalgar Square 108 1869 The Swannery invaded 108 1873 Died October 1st 112 Buried in St. Paul’s, October 11th 112 {x} {xi} {xii} [Image unavailable.] DOGS WORRYING A FROG (1822). [Image unavailable.] SIR EDWIN LANDSEER. CHAPTER I. ORIGIN AND PARENTAGE. So much of the family history of this artist as it is needful to repeat, or the reader will care to learn, may be briefly told: it begins with his grandfather, who was a jeweller settled in London, where, in 1761,[2] his father, John Landseer, was born. The senior was on intimate terms with Peter, father of the lawyer and politician, Sir Samuel Romilly. Peter Romilly was descended from a distinguished French family, the first of whom known in this country settled near London after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and acquired a fortune as a wax-bleacher. This Peter was a jeweller of note and wealth, established in Frith Street, Soho, and it is probable that common interest in a craft which is so closely allied to art had much to do with directing the minds of John, and consequently those of his family, to design. It is certain that in the early life of Sir Samuel Romilly he gave considerable attention to painting and its sister studies— architecture, and anatomy as applied to the arts. His biographer tells us that the future lawyer attended the lectures delivered on these subjects by Dr. William Hunter and James Barry at the Royal Academy, and doubtless those which, as we shall presently see, John Landseer, his friend—for the affection of the fathers was continued with the sons—pronounced with noteworthy effect at the Royal Institution. These discourses of John Landseer’s, as printed and published at a later date, and entitled “Lectures on the Art of Engraving,” 1807, still supply the body of one of the best text-books in our language on the principles and practice of that art. How John Landseer became an engraver may not be difficult to understand when we recollect that the art which he fortunately illustrated, was, for modern use at least, first exercised if not invented by a jeweller and goldsmith, and that most of the early European artists in gold and jewellery not only worked in their proper crafts, but, for the service of the printing-press, incised silver and copper plates with the graver and needle. From Holbein to Stothard, before and since their days, some of the greatest artists have applied their genius to the designing of jewellery. Hogarth engraved on household plate before he etched or cut copper to immortal uses. As etchers, or autographic artists on metal, both John Landseer and his son Edwin distinguished themselves. Conversely, the best etchers have been and are painters, from Dürer, and Rembrandt, and Van Dyck, to MM. Rajon and Palmer of our own day. The etchings of our chief subject are among his least known yet most admirable works; Thomas, Edwin’s senior, another son of John Landseer, was one of the most eminent engravers of this age. Observing the ability of his son John, Landseer the jeweller obtained for him the assistance of William Byrne, one of the best instructors of that period, who, with Hearne, had been engaged in the production of “The Antiquities of Great Britain,” and singly, in preparing many topographical works, such as “Views of the Lakes of Cumberland,” and “Italian Scenery.” Sea-pieces by Vernet, landscapes by Both and Claude Lorrain, Turner’s contributions to “Britannia Depicta,” and a fine “View of Niagara,” by Wilson, occupied this venerable artist, who was one of the ablest in his profession, and a pupil of Aliamet and Wille, as Hearne, his partner in “The Antiquities,” had been a pupil of William Woollett.[3] William Byrne was one of those stout “out-siders” of the Royal Academy who, with Woollett, Schiavonetti, Sharp, Hall, and Strange, refused to place their names as candidates for the half-honours of the Associateship to that body so long as the upper grade of Academicianship in full was denied to members of their profession. Some of the more eminent English engravers, among whose names that of Mr. John Pye is distinct, held themselves aloof from the Academical body on this as well as on other accounts. This exclusion of engravers from their full professional honours had, as we shall see, great effect on the career of John Landseer, and the law by which it was produced has only within the last ten years been modified by the admission without reserve of Mr. S. Cousins to the Academicianship, after he, with Mr. Doo, had passed through the anomalous grade of Academician-Engravers, which seemed to {1} {2} {3} {4} have been instituted in order to draw the line sharply between members of their profession and those other artists who practised painting, sculpture and architecture. This line was drawn with such emphasis that Bartolozzi was elected, not as an engraver, but as a painter, he having painted a picture in order to evade the law of the Academy. Byrne, like his pupil, John Landseer, was earnest in charitable works for his fellow-artists; thus, we find his name as one of the Directors of the Society of Engravers for the benefit of poor professors of the art, their widows and orphans. John Landseer was one of the founder-members of the Artists’ Fund, and associated therein with the Schiavonettis, Raimbach, and Heath, to whom as painters, Mulready, Mr. Linnell, and others of good standing were joined. Mr. John Pye was among the most active members of this society, its ablest expositor, and practically its founder. No artist among Englishmen, not even Turner, Stothard, Wilkie, nor Hogarth himself, owed so much of his popular honours to engraving as Edwin Landseer; in Mr. Thomas Landseer’s hands, and by the hands of other skilful engravers, the pictures of the distinguished animal-painter obtained a popularity which would otherwise be impossible; and it may be said, with but little strain on the terms, that the engravers have repaid his son for the devotion of John Landseer to their art. Not only was the popularity of Sir Edwin immensely extended by engravings, but the greater part of his fortune accrued by means of copyrights and the sale of prints. Having got over the early difficulties of his profession, the first works of John Landseer were vignettes after De Loutherbourg’s landscapes; intended, says the author of an excellent article in “The Literary Gazette,” to which we are indebted for some of the facts of this biography of the engraver, for the “Bible” of Macklin, the once “great” publisher. These plates were produced in the heat of the contest between Alderman Boydell and Macklin, who struggled which should employ the ablest artists to paint for their respective ventures in engraving. The “Shakespeare” of the former enthusiastic speculator is the best known of these publications. To him, indirectly, we owe the establishment of the now defunct British Institution, and all the knowledge of ancient and modern art which it diffused during more than sixty years. One of Boydell’s efforts to establish his large venture secured the aid of Sir Joshua Reynolds, who was considered not only the ablest portrait-painter of that day, but acceptable to the public as a producer of historical and fancy subjects. As to the last, it is not too much to state that the cost was thrown away. It would have been better for Reynolds’s reputation if he had restricted himself to that mode of art in which he was a master. It is said that a bank-note for fifty pounds slipped in the hand of Sir Joshua had much to do in dispelling the apathy with which he was supposed to regard the schemes of Boydell. This statement may be believed by those who choose to do so, not by us. Nevertheless, Reynolds did paint pictures for Boydell, and among these was the famous “Puck,” which is noteworthy for producing the enormous sum of 980 guineas when sold, with the Rogers Collection, to Earl Fitzwilliam; Rogers bought it at Boydell’s sale for 215l. 5s. It is now at Wentworth House, and very much faded. Boydell gave Reynolds 100 guineas for this painting, of which—when exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1789, about the time John Landseer was working from De Loutherbourg’s vignettes—Walpole wrote that it was “an ugly little imp, with some character, sitting on a mushroom as big as a millstone.” Reynolds likewise painted for Boydell “The Death of Cardinal Beaufort,” of which there is a version in the Dulwich Gallery. For the former of these the Earl of Egremont gave, at the publisher’s sale, 530l. 8s.; Boydell paid Reynolds 500 guineas for it, June 22, 1789. The well-known painting of “The Witches meeting Macbeth” is noted in Reynolds’s ledger as “not yet begun,” although, June 1786, the President received 500 guineas for it. These were the three pictures produced by Reynolds for Boydell’s “Shakespeare;” their painting is closely connected with our story. In publishing large and boldly-illustrated works Boydell’s rival was Macklin, who, as he contemplated a “Bible” of even greater pretensions than those of his antagonist’s “Shakespeare,” needed the countenance of the President of the Royal Academy as much as his aldermanic antagonist.[4] Of Reynolds Macklin bought “Tuccia, the Vestal Virgin,” an illustration of Gregory’s “Ode to Meditation,” for which he paid, says Northcote, 300 guineas, though Reynolds’s ledger refers to the receipt of 200 guineas only; Macklin bought for 500 guineas “The Holy Family,” which is now in the National Gallery; and, for a still larger sum,—which it would be difficult to ascertain, as the entry in Reynolds’s ledger confuses it with the prices of various works, in all more than two thousand pounds—a painting which is sometimes called “Macklin’s Family Picture,” or “The Cottagers,” otherwise “The Gleaners,” and represents an Arcadian scene, such as Macklin would have rejoiced to realize as it might appear before the door of a cottage, with the publisher, his wife, and their daughter seated in domestic happiness, with Miss Potts,[5] a dear and beautiful friend of theirs, [Image unavailable.] Low Life. {5} {6} standing with a sheaf of corn on her head; the last-named figure claims the greatest interest from all who admire the works of the Landseers; because, in a short time after the damsel sat to Sir Joshua in this charming guise, she was married to John, the young engraver, and thus became the mother of Thomas, Charles, Edwin Henry, and four daughters of his name.[6] It is understood that John Landseer and Miss Potts were first acquainted in the house of Macklin, and it is believed that the marriage was, in more than a single sense, an artistic one. Bartolozzi engraved, in 1794, the portrait of a Miss Emily Pott, after Reynolds, as “Thais.” This was not the lady now in question. The introduction of these lovers to each other occurred, we believe, through the employment of John Landseer by Macklin to execute plates for his “Bible.” In these works, several of the best engravers of that time were associated with him; among them Bromley, Heath, and Skelton. Not long after this, that is, in 1792, we find John Landseer exhibiting at the Royal Academy, the only year, we believe, ere he became an Associate of that body, in which he vouchsafed to do so. His contribution was “View from the Hermit’s Hole, Isle of Wight” (No. 541), and his address was given at 83, Queen Anne Street East.[7] A few years later he was occupied in the production of plates from drawings by Turner and Ibbetson, styled “Views in the Isle of Wight,” a series which came to an early end. John Landseer’s share of this work was confined to “Orchard Bay,” “Shanklin Bay,” and “Freshwater Bay.” He engraved “High Torr,” after Turner, for Whitaker’s “History of Richmondshire,” a very fine specimen of his skill; this book was published by Longmans in 1823; and, for “The Picturesque Tour in Italy,” he executed “The Cascade of Terni,” which is one of Turner’s best pictures. These were, we believe, all Landseer’s transcripts from the works of the great master of English landscape art. His largest series of plates was styled “Twenty Views of the South of Scotland,” and made after drawings by James Moore: another group of engravings was executed from drawings of animals by the Dutch masters, Rubens, Snyders, Rembrandt, and others; these plates show not only his remarkable skill, but the current of his mind towards animal subjects, such as his sons, Thomas and Edwin Henry, have pre-eminently illustrated. In addition to the above we have “A Series of Engravings illustrating those important events recorded in the Sacred Scriptures,” “which have been selected from Raphael, &c., with critical notices,” 1833; and six plates to “Vates, or the Philosophy of Madness,” 1840. Having disposed of our materials about the professional and family lineage of the Landseers, it will be desirable, before entering upon the chief subject of this text, to draw together all it is needful to state of his very remarkable parent, the engraver and engravers’ champion. We shall do so without regard to the chronological parallelism of their lives; a course of treatment which admits simplicity of arrangement. The births of three able sons are important facts in the history of any man who might be so honoured in parentage. Thomas, the eldest son, was born, we believe, in 1796; Charles, the second son, Aug. 2, 1799; Sir Edwin Henry, in 1802; March 7th was the date given on his coffin-plate, but there are doubts about this matter, even among the Landseer family. Including the daughters, the names of this family ran thus in the order of their births:—Jane, who married Mr. Charles Christmas, and died at the birth of her first child; Thomas, Charles, Anna Maria, Edwin, Jessica, i.e. the present Miss Landseer, and Emma, now Mrs. Mackenzie. The last two survive. According to the original constitution of the Academy, engravers had no place in it. Thus they were denied the privilege of considering themselves artists at all. This absurdity was not much reduced when, in the third year of its existence, the body decided on admitting six “Associate Engravers” as a distinct and inferior class.[8] As we have thus noted, the position of engravers in the honour-bestowing body of their profession had been anomalous, and beneath the pretences, as well as the merits and reputations, of many distinguished men, who, while not unwilling to join the academical association, declined to do so on conditions which at once marked their alleged inferiority to the professors of other branches of art, and placed them in a lower grade than the painters, sculptors, and architects with whom, nevertheless, they claimed to be equal. They complained especially, that, in addition to the above-given sources of discontent, a law of the Academy restricted them from more than one of the privileges and advantages of the exhibitions:—1st, of that law which declared that “each Associate-Engraver shall have the liberty [an unfortunate form of expression] of exhibiting two prints, either compositions of his own, or engravings from other masters.” Thus, while other members were entitled to contribute eight pictures, sculptures, or what not, without limitation as to the size of each example, the engravers might exhibit not more than two, which, by the very conditions under which they were produced, must be small. 2ndly, the engravers objected to the concluding section of the same law, which ran thus: “and these shall be the only prints admitted to the Royal Exhibition.” By these measures the engravers were affected, and their art depreciated. This state of things has been mended now, and engravers are admitted to the full academical honours. The history of the earliest phases of the contest, and a statement of the case are in Mr. John Pye’s “Patronage of British Art,” where the exertions of John Landseer and others are described. It is strange that although this measure of justice has been vouchsafed, the lots of honour fell to two of the staunchest “outsiders” who refused to become candidates for the Associateship until the standing of their profession was recognized: while John Landseer remained an Associate for nearly fifty years, and died without further distinction in 1852, but five years before the election of Mr. Cousins. Mr. Doo’s election occurred the next year after that of Mr. Cousins. The latter became an Associate thirty years later than John Landseer; the former was an Associate but one year, being elected A.R.A. in 1856, and R.A. in 1857. Mr. Cousins resigned his R.A.ship, and became a Retired Royal Academician in 1879. The first to accept honour was John Landseer. It was with the intention of putting the true position of the engraver’s art and its professors before the world, and of doing so in the most effectual fashion, that John Landseer, in 1806, delivered lectures on engraving to large audiences at the Royal Institution, and thus laid out those broad and high views of art for which he has been justly honoured. He defined engraving as a species of sculpture performed by incision, and, by defending that view with spirit and skill, became the champion of his profession. Mr. H. Crabb Robinson described John Landseer’s lecturing on “The Philosophy of Art,” at a later occasion, December 5, 1813, at the Surrey Institution. “He is animated in his style,” said Mr. Robinson, “but his animation is produced by indulgence in sarcasms and in emphatic diction. He pronounces his words in italics, and by colouring strongly he produces an effect easily.”[9] In the year in which the lectures on engraving were delivered, John Landseer was elected A.-E.R.A., under protest, as it were, from himself, that he received the distinction with a view to more effective action in favour of his fellow-sufferers. In furtherance of this object he, with very little effect, presented a memorial to the Academicians, and, as he said, experienced from Sir Martin Archer Shee and others “a very great deal of illiberality, and was finally repulsed in a most ungracious way.”[10] After this, says the author of a biography of John Landseer,[11] the {7} {8} {9} {10} {11} disappointment preyed upon his mind so deeply that he turned his attention from the practice of his profession to the study of archæology. This statement requires a considerable quantity of salt. No doubt this failure of so many hopes and efforts embittered his memory for a long time. It is said, though, as Mr. Pye told us, it would be difficult to verify the assertion, that an Associate- Engravership in the total number of six, which became vacant on the death of John Brown, in 1801, remained vacant because no outsider offered himself until Landseer’s election in 1806. There were only five such members of the Academy during the interval in question, and Val. Green, Collyer, James Heath, Anker Smith, and James Fittler were tenants of the five posts. The intensity of professional feeling on the subject may be surmised from this fact. There is this much to be said about John Landseer’s alleged neglect of his own profession for the studies of an archæologist: he published “Observations on the Engraved Gems brought from Babylon to England by Abraham Lockett, Esq., considered with reference to Scripture History;” but this was not done until 1817, or ten years after the memorializing of the Royal Academy. The object of this work was to show that Babylonian cylinders, the “gems” in question, were not used as talismans or amulets, but as signets of monarchs or princes—a conclusion which is not far from the now accepted truth. He next issued “Sabæan Researches,” 1823, a work founded on remains brought from “Babylon,” by the above-named traveller, comprising letters on antiquities, and lectures delivered at the Royal Institution. These works have been superseded by later ones, and more scientific studies than were to be expected from an author who had been bred to another profession. He likewise published a discursive “Description of Fifty of the Earliest Pictures in the National Gallery,” 1834. He produced twenty plates by way of contribution to the “Antiquities of Dacca” (begun in 1816), a work which was never completed; this imperfectness likewise marked that book on the National Gallery which bears “End of Vol. I.” by way of “Finis,” to a tome which has no successor. He issued “The Review of Publications of Art,” 1808, a periodical of trenchant quality, but brief career; and he promoted a second periodical styled “The Probe,” 1837, which seemed—for it ran to not more than half-a-dozen numbers—designed to oppose the then recently-established “Art-Union” journal. The chief task of his later years was engraving his son Edwin’s famous picture of “The Dogs of St. Bernard,” on which he wrote a small explanatory pamphlet styled “Some Account of the Dogs and the Pass of St. Bernard.” In 1826 he was appointed one of the “Engravers to his Majesty.” Later, he exhibited at the Royal Academy some studies in water-colours from so-called Druidical Temples. He died on the 29th of February, 1852, aged eighty-three. It is a curious fact that on his death, and the vacancy caused in the Academy by that event, Leslie proposed that the disabilities of engravers should be removed. The chief work of John Landseer was the bringing-up of his sons; in this he was thoroughly successful, and worthy of more [Image unavailable.] The Highland Shepherd’s Dog. honour than is given to one who struggled valiantly towards an unselfish end. This process of education must have been common to all the objects of attention and affection. As to the eldest son, but for his admirable skill with the burin, feeling for animal character, and pathetic treatment of his brother’s pictures, we should have known comparatively little about Sir Edwin or his works. The thousands who go to exhibitions, public galleries, and private collections, are few compared with those who day by day study the learned prints for which we are indebted to the skilful hand of Mr. Thomas Landseer. This engraver, trained as a draughtsman and anatomist under the advice of Haydon, and to work on copper under his father, generally exercised his craft in mezzotint, combining with this mode a considerable proportion of etching, because that process is better adapted to the subjects he affected than the more severe mode of line-engraving. He executed, nevertheless, plates in the “line manner.” To him was attributed a cartoon named “Samson forgives Delilah,” No. 34, in the exhibition of such works at Westminster Hall, in 1843. His first work in copper was a “Study of the Head of a Sibyl,” after Haydon, 1816. He engraved a considerable series of early designs by his brother Edwin in “The Sporting Magazine,” 1823-6, which, including original works of his own in the same periodical, were afterwards collected in a folio volume, and published separately as “Annals of Sporting.” “The Sportsman’s Annual,” 1836, owed much to the brothers Edwin and Thomas; “Twenty Engravings of Lions, Panthers, &c.,” 4º., 1823, was likewise so composed, and comprises many excellent specimens of the united arts of the authors. “Stories about Dogs,” 16º., 1864, and “Stories illustrative of Instinct of Animals,” 16º., 1864, are amusing books for juvenile students, and happily illustrated in their way. Probably his most important work, not a production of his brother’s, is the fine mezzotint of Mdlle. Rosa Bonheur’s “Horse Fair.” This, with the series of etchings of monkeys styled “Monkeyana, or Men in Miniature,” which he designed, drew, and etched throughout, secured the reputation of Thomas Landseer, both as an original {12} {13} {14} humourist and a translator of the works of others. He was elected an “Associate-Engraver of the New Class” in the Royal Academy in 1867, after he had been before the public during more than fifty years. In 1873 he became an “Associate-Engraver.” In 1876 he was merged with the “A.R.A’s.,” and this distinction was abolished. This artist died on the 20th of January, 1880. He published “Characteristic Sketches of Animals,” “Drawn from the life and engraved by T. L.,” 1832, Ten Etchings, illustrative of “The Devil’s Walk,” 1831, “Flowers of Anecdote,” with etchings, 1829, and in 1871, “Life and Letters of William Bewick,” a most readable and excellent book, that is full of anecdotes and experiences. Most of the original sketches in pencil for “Monkeyana” are in the British Museum. As the life of Mr. Charles Landseer does not come within the scope of our purpose in this text, it will be needless to say more about his career than that he became an exhibitor at the Royal Academy in 1828. Before this he travelled in the suite of Lord Stuart de Rothesay in Portugal and to Rio de Janeiro, where he made a large number of studies and sketches, which have been described with admiration. He was elected A.R.A. in 1837; R.A. in 1845; Keeper in 1851. This office Mr. C. Landseer, having held it for an unusually long period, resigned in 1871; he died July 22, 1879, leaving an ample fortune, which somewhat unexpectedly, it is said, accrued to him as the residuary legatee of his brother Sir Edwin. Mr. C. Landseer was a large donor to the artists’ benevolent societies; 10,000l. fell to the Royal Academy for the “Landseer Scholarships,” as appointed and awarded by the President and Council. Miss Landseer (Mrs. C. Christmas) exhibited occasionally at the Royal Academy and British Institution. The name of H. and Henry Landseer frequently appears in the like manner; this gentleman was a brother of John Landseer, a frequent contributor to the Exhibitions, especially to that of the Society of British Artists. Edwin Henry Landseer bore the second name, in honour of his uncle. At one period it was, at least occasionally, his practice to use all three of these names. He made a sketch of Count D’Orsay’s horse, and signed it “E. H. L.,” and, in reply to a question why he did this, said that his second name was Henry, but, as his father had said one name was enough, he had given up using it; (see the Catalogue of the Royal Academy Winter Exhibition, 1874, p. 30.) Miss Jessie Landseer is a painter of considerable ability, and an engraver, who etched some of her brother Edwin’s works. She is now, 1880, the sole bearer of the name of Landseer in the family. Mrs. Mackenzie, her sister, to whom I am much indebted for materials used in this text, practised art with characteristic success. At the British Institution Exhibitions of 1821, 1822, and 1823, Miss Landseer, Mr. E. Landseer, and Mr. H. Landseer appeared together. [Image unavailable.] CHAPTER II. A.D. 1802 TO A.D. 1817. EDWIN HENRY LANDSEER—EARLY DRAWINGS—PICTURES OF DOGS—HAYDON’S STUDIO—MR. RUSKIN’S CRITICISM. Edwin Henry Landseer was, as stated above, born in 1802—the year before another animal painter of modern note, Mr. T. S. Cooper—and that event happened at his father’s house, No. 83,[12] Queen Anne Street East (not Turner’s Queen Anne Street), and consequently at his death he was in his seventy-second year. For the greater part of this long period he retained far more health and activity than are commonly vouchsafed to those who pass the allotted term of human life. How that life was spent, what are the pictures he produced, and under what circumstances they were executed, I have now, to the best of my means, to inquire and detail. The best living authority avers that our subject was by no means diligent at school, in fact, he was “always running away from his teachers, and always drawing.” His artistic education was begun by his father at a very early age, but not before natural ability had made itself evident in sketching and drawing. Training of the best sort was soon afforded by the judicious care of John Landseer, who directed his son’s practice, after the mode of the greatest masters, to Nature, so that “as soon as he could hold a pencil with some steadiness,” says Mr. R. N. Wornum, the biographer of Landseer in the “English Cyclopædia,” the boy was sent or accompanied into the fields to draw from sheep, goats, and donkeys; and especially did he find space for this mode of study on Hampstead Heath, where the creatures grazed or stood as nearly in a state of nature as civilization permits to any of their kind in England; and certainly in that condition of their existence which is familiar to us. The following account, obligingly furnished to me by the late Miss Meteyard, at once confirms and illustrates this early history:— “In 1849—1850 the Howitts resided in Avenue Road, St. John’s Wood, and the father of Edwin Landseer no great way off. William Howitt and Mr. John Landseer being well acquainted, and often meeting in their walks, would go and return together; sometimes one way, sometimes another, but generally in the direction of Hampstead. One evening, in passing along the Finchley Road towards Child’s Hill, Mr. Landseer stayed by a stile of ancient look, and said to his friend, ‘These two fields were Edwin’s first studio. Many a time have I lifted him over this very stile. I then lived in Foley Street, and nearly all the way between Marylebone and Hampstead was open fields. It was a favourite walk with my boys; and one day when I had accompanied them, Edwin stopped by this stile to admire some sheep and cows which were quietly grazing. At his request I lifted him over, and finding a scrap of {15} {16} {17} paper and a pencil in my pocket I made him sketch a cow. He was very young indeed then—not more than six or seven years old. After this we came on several occasions, and as he grew older this was one of his favourite spots for sketching. He would start off alone, or with John (Thomas?) or Charles, and remain till I fetched him in the afternoon. I would then criticize his work, and make him correct defects before we left the spot. Sometimes he would sketch in one field, sometimes in the other; but generally in the one beyond the old oak we see there, as it was more pleasant and sunny.’ “Those acquainted with Hampstead and its environs will know these two fields at once. They lie nearly opposite what is now the Finchley Road Station of the North London Railway, and open out into West End Lane, a little below Frognal and the parish church. The old oak is still standing, though in withered decrepitude.[13] Indeed, till almost recent years, this was a region of oak-trees, and the whole neighbourhood was picturesque in the extreme. But much of this beauty is now effaced. “Belonging to Sir John Maryon Wilson, Lord of the Manor of Hampstead, and abutting the corner of West End Lane, these fields will, at no late date, be covered with ‘villas’ and other buildings. But the fact that the site was Edwin Landseer’s first studio may be preserved by in some manner naming it after the illustrious painter. “This interesting fact was told me by Mr. Howitt whilst walking through these fields about twenty years ago. “Eliza Meteyard.” The representation of animals in that mode of life in which the creatures existed, is that practice which, being best understood by the common world, would best sustain the objects of an artist who had to do with so many beasts which were but semi-barbarous, and not in a state of natural fierceness and wildness. The reader who wishes to see what was the merit of studies thus pursued, is referred to the South Kensington Museum, British Art Collection, where a series of nine drawings, executed at a very early period of his life by Edwin Landseer, and duly marked with the dates of their production, will not alone evoke admiration for the nature-given ability of the draughtsman, but testify, that with such ability to back the practice his father devised, the son was fortunate in receiving that father’s counsel. Further, the observer will note how zealously the boy-pupil bent his mind to the task with all the pleasantness [Image unavailable.] The Beggar. which attends the exercise of natural powers. This is enforced by Miss Meteyard’s communication. Be it remembered that even such natural ability as that of Landseer was not trained without strenuous and long-continued labours.[14] The same course was pursued by him in painting, and he never, during this early stage, drew without nature; not, probably, carrying the principle of study in this fashion to the virtuous excess of William Henry Hunt, his contemporary, of whom it is said that he would not draw a pin without a model; a saying which implies the devotion of the man to truth, rather than that he refused to avail himself of his own experience. That the one would not paint a pin without a model is as true as that the other painted dogs best because he relied on nature from the first, and succeeded most in painting them while he relied most on nature. The drawings and sketches which are referred to were reserved by John Landseer from a much larger number of his son’s productions, and by means of notes in that father’s hand—notes written in affectionate pride, indicating that some of them were made when the boy was but five years old—declare the progress and precocity of their subject; so that we see how in the fifth year of his age Landseer drew well, and thoroughly studied animal character and humour.[15] Landseer’s precocity exceeded that of Lucas van Leyden, one of the great artists whose early skill has made them wonderful, and added interest to their after-glory. Lucas van Leyden etched designs of his own when he was but nine years of age. When he was fourteen appeared his famous print of Mahomet killing Sergius the Monk. When Van Leyden was twelve he painted “St. Hubert,” thereby beating Edwin Landseer in pictorial progress, if not in precocity of draughtsmanship. To have been so nearly neck-and-neck in early development with such a magnificent genius as that of Lucas van Leyden, and to have maintained that remarkable position through a long life, was a singular fortune. Van Leyden, however, died at thirty-nine years of age. Sir Edwin’s years attained to nearly double that period. At the sale of Mr. M. W. Simpson’s pictures, in 1848 (Mr. Simpson was an early friend and patron of Landseer’s), a considerable number of the artist’s youthful productions were disposed of, many of which were, we believe, painted at about this period of his career. Of those probably executed a little later, but which for convenience sake we may as well refer to here, if it were but to declare how these pictures have risen in value, the following were examples:—“A Scotch Terrier with a Rat in his mouth,” sold for, although not more than four inches by five inches, sixty-eight guineas, and would now, twenty-five years later, produce treble that sum. This work has been engraved, we believe, by Mr. T. Landseer. “Waiting for Orders,” a full length portrait of Mr. Simpson’s {18} {19} {20} coachman, sold for thirty-two guineas. This was not that portrait of a deer-hound which is now called “Waiting,” and was engraved by J. C. Webb. “The Paddock,” an old chestnut horse, and a white Scotch terrier near it, with a distant view of Windsor Castle, sold for one hundred guineas. If this could happen twenty-five years ago, with regard to unexhibited pictures of comparatively small account, what could be expected now, although the artist was most prolific, and not, like Mulready, accustomed to confine his labours to a few canvases or panels? For this question of the comparative prices of old and later pictures by Landseer we shall enable the reader to form an answer for himself ere our task is complete. Among the minor works of the painter, none have so much interest as examples of the etchings which were produced when he was little more than an infant. The inherent ability of the man’s mind is more distinctly and decidedly marked in these comparatively unimportant works than in those which received the benefit of years of study and of craft, and were produced when his natural powers had been consummated by practice upon a score of pictures, being the fruits of an intelligence developed to the utmost in that way which these very etchings, more than any other means, declare to be proper, apt and natural to it. Edwin Landseer continued the practice of etching, and made the results of these labours proportionately as valuable and meritorious as his pictures. It is not, however, to the products of his perfected skill that we now address our remarks, so much as to the works of his infancy, boyhood, and youth. As some of these juvenile productions are very rare, and consequently little studied, although much admired in artistic circles, our readers will not be sorry to have an account of a collection of them, including works duly annotated with the age, of the artist at the time they were executed.[16] The first etching on our list is said to be also that which was produced before all others by “Master E. Landseer,” and to have been wrought five years ere he appeared in the Royal Academy display as an “Honorary Exhibitor;” doubtless the youngest of his class before or since that date. It was done in his eighth year, and one plate comprises several subjects, thus:—1. The Head of an Ass; which, by the way, is not thoroughly understood, if one may so write of the production of so capable an artist; for the head is not well articulated with the neck, or complete in drawing as to placing the eyes on a level with each other. Yet it is full of truth in the rendering of texture and expression, as the beast bites sideways at the large-leaved herbage; his ears are standing well above his head, and one eye is turned towards us in a very asinine fashion, steadfastly watching, while the other is directed downwards as the animal’s wrenching nibble goes on. 2. Is the Head of a Shorthorned Sheep, with the exact expression of nature in its ever mobile and quivering lips; the eye is that of the timid creature, yet seems to meditate. The foreshortening of the horns is astonishing as the workmanship of a child-draughtsman. 3. Is the Head of a Sheep in the act of browsing; this calls for no remark, except that of general admiration for its excellent drawing. 4. Is the Head, on a larger scale than the others, of a long-tusked, deep-snouted Boar, while dozing in the sun. Besides these, and probably of even earlier origin, is a not very well-drawn Head of a Sheep in full-face; here the eyes are a little out of drawing. On this account, although the defect may be due to the greater difficulty of the subject when so placed, we are inclined to believe this etching to be more remote in execution than the above-described examples, which are, as the productions of a boy of eight years of age, so far wonderful that they are really better drawn and more truly expressive than the work of most adult artists. On the same plate with the sheep’s head in front view is (1) a Donkey, at full length, so to say, i.e., standing on all fours, and biting at his leg— a capital study, full of action and spirit; (2) a Donkey and her Foal. On another plate are the heads of a lion and tiger (see the last note), in which the differing characters of the beasts are given with marvellous craft, that would honour a much older artist than the producer. The drawing of the tiger’s whiskers—always difficult things to manage—is admirable in its rendering of foreshortened curves. Then comes a drawing of a young bull, wrought by Edwin Landseer at nine years of age, and etched by his by no means very distant senior brother Thomas; this brute’s walk, the peculiar shouldering, lounging way of his kind, rolling from shoulder to shoulder, is here in perfection; the bull whisks his tail lightly from side to side. Next is another specimen, but on a larger scale than those which are above described. It exhibits an extraordinarily finely drawn bull, the foreshortening and handling of whose form is perfect; his expression is that of a rigid conventionalist—for bulls are not unlike men in these matters of temperament—a thoroughly old-fashioned John Bull. Behind this is a foreshortened view of a horse reclining, and, in the distance of the field, which supplies a landscape-background to the composition, is a goat. The work of the young artist’s tenth year shows great progress to have been made, for he wrought the whole design, and entirely etched the next plate, which represents two groups of cattle placed one above the other on the paper, which is disposed, as artists say, upright-fashion, and of about the size and proportion of a large octavo book. In the lower section is the representation of a ponderous beast, couched at ease, yet with all his strength drawn together by the attitude of resting with his limbs beneath his bulky body; he has downward-pointing horns. He is a surly “oldish” bull, who breathes the breath of content in summer, but with possibilities of fury in his irritable moodiness; not a stupid bull, although terrible when exasperated; he is evidently apt to lose his temper on slight occasions. Behind this surly monster stands an intensely stupid brute, one who is evidently given up to all sorts of self-indulgences, and who in every possible fashion spoils himself; his countenance is absolutely besotted; he has a hog-like air, and his very tail hangs heavily straight down from his back; with these is grouped a maternal cow, who is large, if not like Byron’s “Dudu,” “languishing and lazy.” Executed in the same year of the draughtsman’s life we have another group, drawn on the same plate with the above-named studies of animals. This is a bovine family. Maternity itself appears in the shape of a stumpy-footed cow; fatherhood, in the portly figure of a bull whose knit brows and self-satisfied look about his chaps, his broad bowed neck and vast chest, are honoured by imitation in the little bull-calf which reclines before its parents, ruminating, if not meditating, and “the picture of his father.” Produced at about the same period as the last is an admirable etching of a cow and bull-calf. The former, by the leanness of her haunches and flanks, shows the stress of the debt of milk she is paying to the latter, or to the more exacting pail: on her back a ridge of spines is distinct; large aspiring promontories of bone crop up in the rearward regions of the milky mother, not unlike, in their ruggedness and the slopes which form their sides, the steep forms of granite mountains as they are thrust through sedimentary deposits of a later date. At her feet lies the blunt-nosed bull-calf of her heart. Next, in the same collection, and said to be of still earlier origin, comes a much larger production, etched by Mr. Thomas Landseer from a drawing by his brother, our subject. This noble plate represents an Alpine mastiff of the great St. Bernard breed, which had been in the second decade of this century imported to this country by a gentleman of Liverpool.[17] {21} {22} {23} {24} [Image unavailable.] The Common in Winter. An inscription at the foot of the plate informs us that, at a year old, this magnificent creature was six feet four inches long; and, at the middle of his back, stood two feet seven inches in height. The note in question adds that the animals of this breed are employed by the fraternity of Mont St. Bernard, not only in the rescue of travellers from snowdrifts, in which the latter may have been engulfed, but as beasts of burthen, and that they are capable of carrying a hundredweight of provisions from the town on which the monks rely, to the hospice, a distance of eighteen miles. The drawing was done by Sir Edwin Landseer when he was about thirteen years of age, that is, in the year 1815. It is really one of the finest drawings of a dog that has ever been produced; we do not think that even the artist at any time surpassed its noble workmanship. In its form are reproduced all the characteristics of such a beast. The head, though expansive and domical in its shape, is small in proportion to that of a Newf...