Travels in South Kensington
by Moncure Daniel Conway · English · Gutenberg #42571 · 434,585 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Travels in South Kensington
Author: Moncure Daniel Conway
Release date: April 22, 2013 [eBook #42571]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRAVELS IN SOUTH KENSINGTON ***
[Illustration: THE STATUE OF HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE CONSORT.
_J. H. FOLEY_, Sculptor.]
TRAVELS
IN
SOUTH KENSINGTON
WITH
Notes on Decorative Art and Architecture
in England
BY
MONCURE DANIEL CONWAY
AUTHOR OF
“THE SACRED ANTHOLOGY,” “THE WANDERING JEW,” “THOMAS CARLYLE,” ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED_
LONDON
TRÜBNER & CO., LUDGATE HILL
1882
[_All rights reserved_]
Ballantyne Press
BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO.
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM
DECORATIVE ART AND ARCHITECTURE IN ENGLAND
BEDFORD PARK
CONTENTS.
PAGE
THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM 19
DECORATIVE ART AND ARCHITECTURE IN ENGLAND 115
BEDFORD PARK 215
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
The Statue of His Royal Highness the
Prince Consort _Frontispiece_
South Kensington Museum 21
Sir Henry Cole, K.C.B. 36
South Kensington Museum--Ground
Plan 39
Diagram showing Glitter Points in a
Picture-gallery 40
Sir Philip Cunliffe Owen, Director of
South Kensington Museum 42
North Court, North-west Corner, Showing
Casts of the Biga (or Two-horse
Chariot), from the Original in Marble
at the Vatican, and of the Pulpit
by Giovani Pisano, formerly in the
Cathedral at Pisa 44
South Court, Showing the Prince Consort’s
Gallery 45
Chinese Potters at Work--Window in
the Ceramic Gallery 47
Italian Majolica (Urbino). Sixteenth
Century 51
Lamp from an Arabian Mosque. Fourteenth
Century 53
Palissy, the Potter--Window in the Ceramic
Gallery 54
Sèvres Porcelain Vase. Modern 55
Henri Deux Candlestick 56
Henri Deux Salt-cellar 58
Michael Angelo’s Eros 62
Marble Cantoria. By Baccio D’Agnolo 65
Tabernacle. Andrea Ferrucci 66
Altar-piece--the Virgin with the Infant
Saviour.--Enamelled Terra-cotta, or
Della Robbia, in High Relief. By
Andrea Della Robbia 67
Hercules, the Duke of Ferrara 70
Ashantee Relics 72
The Cellini Sardonyx Ewer, Mounted in
Enamelled Gold, and Set with Gems--Italian.
Sixteenth Century 73
Châsse, or Reliquary--Limoges Enamelled.
Thirteenth Century 75
Pastoral Staves--Ivory and Enamel.
Fourteenth Century 82
Elkington’s Mark 85
Franchi and Son’s Mark 85
Modern Persian Ewer (Copper-coated,
with White Metal) 94
Old Persian Earthenware (Water-bottle) 95
Persian Kaliān 96
Ancient Persian Incense-burner (Pierced
and Chased Brass) 97
Modern Persian Incense-burner (Brass) 98
Andrea Gritti, Doge of Venice--Italian.
Ascribed to Vittore Camelo. Sixteenth
Century 99
Tazza--Algerian Onyx and Enamel.
Modern French 100
Salt-cellar--Silver Gilt; Italian. Fifteenth
Century 100
Ivory Tankard--Augsburg. Seventeenth
Century 101
Finest Raised Venetian Point Lace--Floral
Design. Italian. Seventeenth
Century 104
Nettle in its Natural State 109
Nettle in Geometrical Proportions 109
Plan of Top of Henri Deux Salt-cellar 111
Assize Court, Manchester 122
Minton Tile 124
Kidderminster Carpet--Fern Design 127
Minton Tiles for Mantel 129
Albert Memorial, Hyde Park 131
Albert Memorial. Europe 133
Albert Memorial--East Front. Painters 134
Albert Memorial--Continuation of East
Front. Painters 136
Albert Memorial--South Front. Poets
and Musicians 138
Albert Memorial--Continuation of South
Front. Musicians 140
Spandrel Picture 147
Owen Jones 153
Ebony Serving-table, Mr. Lehmann’s
House 162
Top of Serving-table, Mr. Lehmann’s
House 164
Pot Designed by Miss Lévin 167
William Morris 185
Moulding over Dado 186
Chippendale Mahogany Moulding, Belmont
House 187
Drawing-room of Bellevue House 188
Library in Bellevue House 191
Drawing-room in Townsend House 194
A Grate of One Hundred Years Ago 198
Grate made for Baron Rothschild 199
Boyd’s Grate 200
L. Alma Tadema.--[From a Bust by J.
Dalou] 207
Candelabra, Townsend House 209
View from a Balcony 217
Dining-room in Tower House 222
Queen Anne’s Gardens 224
Co-operative Stores and Tabard Inn 225
Tower House and Lawn-tennis Grounds 226
Reading and Billiard Room, Club-house 227
A Fancy-dress party at the Club 229
An Artist’s Studio 233
[Illustration]
PROLEGOMENA.
Homely and Comely were sisters. Their parents were in humble
circumstances, and depended mainly on the care and economy of these
two daughters--their entire family. They were persons of some social
position, and it had constituted a problem how they might preserve
some relation to the community and at the same time maintain comfort
at home: Youth required the former, Age needed the latter. It was
settled in a way which this historian cannot commend: the arrangement
was that one of the girls should attend to the external, the other to
the internal affairs of the family. So soon as this was resolved, there
was no difficulty in determining which of the girls should go out and
which stay at home. There was about Comely a certain ease and address,
as well as personal attractiveness, which seemed to make society her
natural sphere; while the shyness and plainness of Homely made the
task of remaining at home congenial. Homely was content with homespun
clothes in order that Comely might wear silk. Whenever there was a ball
or a festival, Comely was sure to come, and Homely stayed at home.
Gradually, however, this distribution of parts appeared not to have
the happiest results. Comely grew so fond of the gay world that her
home became distasteful; she demanded, too, more and more of the family
resources for her fashionable attire, and the concession deprived the
house of everything but the barest utensils. On the other hand, Homely
had stayed withindoors so much that she became slovenly, and, as she
had to wear her homespun till it was threadbare, in order that her
sister might keep up with the fashions, she became unlovely to look
upon. Comely came at length to despise her sister. Homely became a
peevish drudge. The family by degrees became unhappy, without being
very clear as to the cause of their troubles.
One night Comely came home from a ball in unusual agitation. Her sister
was aroused to hear the confidence that a lover of rank, handsome and
charming, had discovered his interest in Comely. Any differences the
sisters may have had were quite forgotten in the renewal of their
natural sympathy caused by this incident.
The next morning a messenger arrived to announce that his master, Lord
Deeplooke, was on his way to visit Comely and the family in their
own home, and would arrive in an hour. Here was a sensation! The
two sisters set themselves to work--even Comely using her hands for
once--to make the chief room of the house neat. But Comely looked on
the blank walls with dismay, and said, “Surely there used to be some
pictures.” “Yes,” replied Homely, “but you are wearing the last of them
now.” Comely blushed--and the blush was becoming--at this; but the
sisters gathered some beautiful flowers and decorated the room as well
as they could. When this was attended to Comely was about to repair to
her room to decorate herself, and called her sister to do the same;
but Homely declared she already had on her very best gown. Comely was
shocked at this, and entreated her sister to conceal herself during the
nobleman’s visit. This Homely was quite willing to do.
When Lord Deeplooke arrived, Comely met him in the finest array she had
next to the ball-dress. She introduced him to her venerable parents;
but a shade of anxiety passed over her face when she observed his
lordship presently looking around as if he expected some one else. She
then remembered that the messenger had announced that he was coming to
visit not her alone but the family, and that on the evening before,
at the ball, she had casually mentioned her sister. With a quick wit
Comely anticipated the inquiry she knew would be made and left the
room, remarking, as she did so, “I pray your lordship to excuse
me while I seek my sister.” Another moment and the two girls were
hurriedly investing Homely in Comely’s second-best dress.
It was a novel experience for Homely to be dressed in a pretty gown; it
was equally novel for her to be introduced to a gentleman, much less a
lord; and the two novelties together had an almost transforming effect
upon her. Home-work and early hours had kept her in perfect health; her
manners had no chance to be other than simple; and as no experiences of
fashionable life had made her _blasé_, her face was suffused with an
exquisite color, and her eye bright with delight, when she entered the
room and was introduced to his lordship.
The reader must not be kept in suspense for another instant. It was not
Comely but Homely that Lord Deeplooke ultimately married. Homely having
discovered the secret that lay in a becoming dress, chiefly from its
effect on the feeling of the wearer, stoutly refused to be slovenly any
more; and all her serviceable virtues, thus set in a fit frame, were
found to have touched her countenance into unconventional beauty. On
the other hand, Comely, though at first jealous and angry, gradually
appreciated the lesson she had been taught. She did not, indeed, forget
the magical effect wrought on her sister by a beautiful dress; but she
pondered deeply the qualities fostered at home which she had supposed
incongruous with such raiment, but now saw particularly harmonious with
it; and thenceforth, even before Homely was married, Comely devoted
herself to household work. Need I say that in this Comely was far more
successful than her sister had been? All the beauty she had seen in the
gay world, an occasional visit to which she still enjoyed, now became
available. Pictures reappeared on the walls, which her sister had
supposed were just as useful without them. Touches of color, a ribbon
on the curtain which had hitherto been tied with a string, a hundred
refinements which required only a cultured taste, gradually transformed
the house, just as Comely’s dress had transformed Homely. For these
improvements Comely had been glad to part with her mere finery, though
she never forgot that a slovenly mistress makes a slatternly home.
Comely subsequently married an artist, who, beginning life as a
sign-painter, was made a knight for the best example of domestic
decoration exhibited at the Great Exposition of 18--, a model which,
he frankly confessed, was suggested by the house in which he found his
bride.
* * * * *
There are, indeed, few words in our language of more peculiar, or even
pathetic, import than the word “homely.” It has gradually come to bear
the significance of coarseness or even ugliness, as if these were quite
appropriate to the home. It is, indeed, fortunate that the home can
supply affection for things and persons not very presentable; but it is
none the less true that the word has gradually come to represent the
impression that beauty is for outside show, and that anything will do
for home purposes.
Decoration (_decus_) means the bestowal of honor. Beauty followed
honor. Because man honored his deity, grand temples and cathedrals
arose and altars blazed with gems; and because he honored the prince
and the noble, palaces were decked with splendor. All this time the
home remained homely, for religion denied its sanctity and aristocracy
despised it as the dwelling-place of a serf. The wealthy called their
residences palaces, châteaux, castles, villas, seats, anything but
“homes.” The “Home” came to mean some common asylum of the poor.
But at last two mighty forces invaded Europe--Democracy and Heresy.
Sternly they forbade man longer to spend his strength and his honor
on allied Tyranny and Superstition. Then the Arts declined, because
the convictions which had inspired them were shaken. Several of the
grandest cathedrals were struck by a sort of paralysis and could never
get finished, and palaces had to continue their grandeur on terra-cotta
and tinsel.
And now the cunning workman, having struck work upon shrines and
thrones, began to think of his own mind, so long left vacant that
temples might be adorned, of his wife and child, so long stinted
that palaces might be luxurious. The first expression of this new
reflection was not outward: it was in the decoration of men’s minds
with furniture of another kind--with science, poetry, and literature.
Enamored of these deeper pleasures, man almost despised and hated the
outward arts which symbolized his long thraldom. And perhaps it was
necessary that the ancient splendors which invested a departed era
should fade, and that man should retire as into an ugly shell to mature
the pearl of an inner life. The old artists, artisans, potters--the
Bellinis, Angelos, Palissys, Della Robbias--reappeared in Rousseau,
Milton, Bunyan--artists of an invisible beauty, disowning Art while
frescoing the mind with ideals.
For a time the work of imagination went on in humble dwellings
amidst Puritan plainness. But finally, even in the beginning of this
generation, it began to be asked in England whether the mind and
heart thus formed might not be honored with a fit environment of
beauty. To this end London established its great School of Design and
Decoration. Thereto have gravitated the fragments of a Past that has
crumbled--images, altars, shrines, decorations lavished by genius on
ideals ere they hardened to idols; imperial services, jewels, sceptres,
wrought before kings became survivals and phantasms. It is England,
land of beautiful homes, reviving the art of decoration for the Age
of Humanity. She will no longer have the home to be homely. Her call
has gone round the world, and temples and palaces deliver up their
treasures that they may gather in London, there to teach the millions
how they may beautify the latter-day temple, which is the Home, and
refine the latter-day king, which is Man.
* * * * *
It is said that the Londoner may be known, in any part of the world
where he may die, if his lungs are examined--they being of a sooty
color. So much of his great metropolis he is doomed to carry with him
wherever he may journey. London itself must forever bear, through
and through, the effect of its fogs and its climate. Rain was its
architect and Smoke its decorator. But let no one hastily conclude
that their work has been all unlovely. John Ruskin has pointed it out
as a characteristic of the greatest English artist, Turner, that
there was nothing so ugly about England but he could bring beauty out
of it; but that fine artist, Necessity, worked long before Turner
in transmuting apparent disadvantages to advantages. “It is,” said
Charles Kingsley, “the hard gray English climate which has made hard
gray Englishmen.” There is as little _terra-cotta_ on the Englishman’s
house as on his character. It has been determined for him by Rain and
Fog that he shall seek his pleasures by the fireside instead of in
public gardens and fêtes. What beauty he can afford must be of the
interior. Without, gray dirty brick and wall; within, every comfort and
refinement: such are the decree of his superficially dismal decorators.
Of course the wealthy Londoners have always fought against their hard
climatic environment, and against the ever-encroaching ugliness which
is the attendant shadow of millions massed together in the struggle
for existence on a small island. There are still a few mansions, only
a little way from the present centre of London, which attest the fine
taste which its wealthy citizens have always tried to cultivate in
the direction of architectural beauty. About two hundred and fifty
years ago Northumberland House was described as “in the village of
Charing.” That is now Charing Cross, the heart of the metropolis; a
street runs over the site of Northumberland House. Where once was
Charing hermitage is now a huge hotel and railway station. About two
hundred years ago, when the Earl of Burlington was building Burlington
House on Piccadilly, about half a mile west of Charing Cross, he was
asked why he was building so far away in the country, and replied, “I
am resolved to have no house beyond me.” The earl’s resolution was
not kept. He lived to find himself amidst a noisy thoroughfare, and
now one may travel five miles to the westward of his old country-seat
without leaving the avenue of brick and mortar which passes its door.
This migration of dwellings to ever-extending suburbs is, indeed,
traced in much grander buildings than the tasteful old mansions which
are being swallowed up because of their uneconomical occupancy of
space: so much general stateliness is secured by the vast increase and
diffusion of wealth; but the rarity with which the unique beauties of
the older mansions are imitated, and the utter absence of any attempt
at individuality in even the wealthiest new quarters--such as Belgrave
Square--would seem to indicate that the Londoners have finally adopted
it as a creed that external architecture and gardens must no longer be
sought for by individuals, but possessed by all in communal forms, as
public edifices, squares, and parks. It is now usual, in the new parts
of London, for the grandest mansions of a terrace to own a large garden
in common, to which each has entrance by a back gate, and to whose
maintenance and ornamentation each family contributes a small sum per
annum.
In its journey of eighteen centuries, from being that small
trading-village mentioned by Tacitus--“not yet dignified with the
name of colony”--to its present dimensions, covering 125 square
miles, London has been formed by forces of use, by world-historical
movements--powers not to be criticised. But we may admire in some of
the characteristics of its mighty growth some of that beauty which
ever works at the heart of the hardest utility. For example, in its
expansion London is said to have swallowed up and built over more
than three hundred villages; but in every case the village-green has
been spared, and these are now represented by those beautiful and
embowered squares which everywhere adorn the metropolis, constitute
with the seven large parks its lungs, and make it the healthiest city
of the world in proportion to its population. Though the ancient
houses built by the wealthy were beautiful, and, wherever remaining,
bring such large prices that one wonders why they should not be
imitated, yet the homes of the lower classes in old times were far
uglier than now. Especially were they made dismal by that barbarous
“tax on light,” whose monuments may frequently be observed in windows
walled up to avoid the window-tax. The poor had to live in houses
illuminated from one or two windows, until the clever gentlemen of
the Exchequer perceived the costliness of this means of revenue. As
the Swiss mountaineers have come to admire goitres, unless belied by
rumor, and as the city man, from having to put up with “high” game, has
gradually come to prefer it, so the London builders for a long time
placed few windows in houses, and seem to have thought the effect solid
and “English,” as contrasted with the light and airy style of French
houses. The newest streets of London show, however, that light on this
subject has dawned upon the English architectural mind, through that
into the homes of the people, to such an extent that the tax is now
upon darkness. It is now accepted as a principle that as Smoke has had
its way with the outside of the London habitation, hereafter the first
decorator of the interior is to be--Light.
* * * * *
In these fragmentary first pages of a fragmentary work, it has been
the author’s aim to outline certain general ideas and historical
facts, which may illustrate their own illustrations as written in
the following pages. It will be best seen, when approached from the
historical side, what may be regarded as a necessary factor in English
art or architecture, and what may be considered as experiment. This
is the more important for the American, who is, in an especial sense,
“heir of all the ages,” while not limited to the grooves prescribed by
any. It is in America that we are to have the great Art of Arts--that
whose task is to utilize the Arts of other lands and ages as pigments,
to be combined into new proportions for unprecedented effects, and
to invest fairer ideals. For America the author has written these
contributions toward a knowledge of what has been done, and is being
done, in England; but he would prefer now to burn his work rather
than have it aid the retrogressive notion that Art in America is to
copy the ornamentation or duplicate the work of other countries, much
less of other ages. These things can mean for the artists and people
of the United States nothing more than culture; and culture means not
a mere eclectic importation of select facts and truths, but their
recombination, in obedience to a new vital principle related to a
further idea and wider purpose.
THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM.
[Illustration: SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM.]
THE SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM.
“Come,” said my friend, Professor Omnium, one clear morning, “let us
take an excursion round the world!” My friend is a German, and he has
such a calm familiarity with the unconditioned and the impossible, that
a suggestion which, coming from another, would appear astounding, from
him appears normal. This time, however, I look through his spectacles
to see if his eyes have not a merry twinkle: they are quite serene.
Visions of the Parisian play entitled _Round the World in Eighty Days_,
thoughts of Puck and excursion tickets, rise before me, and I gravely
pronounce the word “Impossible!”
“But,” says the professor, “Kant declares that it is too bold for any
man, in the present state of our knowledge, to pronounce that word.”
“My dear friend,” said I, “it is among my dreams one day to visit
India, China, Japan, California; but at present you might as well ask
me to go with you to the moon.”
“You misunderstand,” replies Professor Omnium: “I do not propose to
leave London. We can never go round the world, except in a small
limited way, if we leave London. How much does an excursionist in India
see of that country? Only a few cities, a few ruins, and the outside
of some old temples, and he only sees a little of them. I stayed in
Rome three days once--all the time I had there--trying to get a glimpse
of some antiquarian treasures in the Bocca della Verita Church: first
day, the church was closed to all outsiders by regulation; second day,
the building was occupied by a pious crowd, and services were going
on from daybreak to midnight; third day was so dark and rainy that I
couldn’t see anything. On my way back I met an archæologist who had
been in Nuremberg a week trying to scrutinize an old shrine; he had
seen many priests, but only caught glimpses through railings of the
shrine (St. Sebald’s, which exists in full-sized fac-simile at South
Kensington), and the net result of his journey was represented in
fifty photographs, just a little inferior to my own collection of the
same--bought in Regent Street. I tell you, sir, there are few greater
humbugs than this travelling about to see Objects (with a big O) of
Interest. It’s expensive. Somebody says most travellers carry ruins to
ruins, but the purses they carry away are the worst ruins of all. A man
may well travel to see the world of men and women; but so far as art
and antiquity are concerned, he who goes away from London shall have
the experience of the boy in the fable, who dreamed about the beautiful
blue hills on the horizon until he left his own flinty hill-side and
journeyed to them; he found them flintier than his own, and, looking
back, saw his own hill to be bluest after all.”
“Ah, then,” I put in--when Omnium is talking it is well to put in when
one can--“you begin by asking me to go round the world, and end with
sneering at all my dreams of India and Japan--”
“Not a bit of it,” cried the professor; “but ten thousand people and
a dozen governments have been at infinite pains and expense to bring
the cream of the East and of the West to your own doors: you turn your
back, and pine for the skim-milk. Yesterday I was talking with Dr.
Downingrue, an amiable and learned gentleman, who has been an official
in the India House here for twenty years, and was lately given furlough
for a year. That year he passed in Turkey and Persia. He told me that
he wished to see a certain sacred book, written in ancient Zend,
curiously illustrated with the most ancient pictures in the world, one
of them possibly a portrait of the great Zoroaster himself. It was,
he had heard, kept in the archives of the city of Bam Buzel, and he
went a journey of three days and nights in a wagon to see and examine
its text. Fancy his disgust at finding only an entry that the volume
in question had been removed by order of the Shah in 1855, and that
the Keeper of the Archives knew nothing whatever of its whereabouts. I
took Downingrue by the hand, led him up one flight of stairs, and took
down the old Zend book from its shelf there in Downing Street, where
it had remained quietly, twenty feet over his head, while he worked
twenty years for freedom to go searching for it in Persia! Now I heard
you talking a few evenings ago about your hopes of one day seeing
Shiraz and Mecca, the Topes in India, and the great Daiboots Buddha in
Japan. I have called this morning to say, firstly, Don’t! secondly,
Come, go round the world with me here in London! There is in the South
Kensington Museum as noble a Buddha as that at Daiboots, which hundreds
of thousands of pilgrims have journeyed for weeks to see: you have
only to walk fifteen minutes to see it--not a copy either, but the
huge bronze itself. You may travel through Mexico, Peru, and Chili for
ten years, and in all that time never see one-hundredth part of the
vestiges of their primitive life and history which you shall see in the
British Museum. Greece?--and be captured by brigands. Professor Newton
has Greece under lock and key, from Diana’s Temple to the private
accounts of Pericles. Assyria?--you go, and find that the human heart
of it has migrated; you come back, and George Smith reconstructs it for
you--”
There was no sign that Omnium was ever coming to an end: the only
way of stopping him is surrender; and it was not long before we were
making our pilgrimage through Stone Age and Bronze Age, as recovered
by the ages of Iron and Gold, and still more by the ages of Art and
Science. The professor held a very positive theory that to travel round
the world profitably you must first travel up to it, assimilating
its past ages. Two recent stories had taken a strong hold on his
imagination: one was about a learned historian of his own Germany,
who had resolved that it was essential to the complete culture of
his little son that the child should begin where the world began,
believe implicitly in its fetiches, follow them till they changed to
anthropomorphic gods and goddesses, these again till the Christian
wand transformed them to fairies and demons, and so on. By this means
the historian meant that his boy should bear in his individual periods
of life corresponding periods in the growth of the race, and sum up
at last the long column in a total of rational philosophy; but the
boy is now growing old, and at last accounts had got only as far as
Roman Catholicism, and there--stuck! The other story which haunted
Omnium’s mind came from California, and was to the effect that upon
the head of a woman in mesmeric sleep there was laid the fossil tooth
of a mammoth, whereupon she at once gave as graphic a description of
the world the extinct animal had inhabited when alive as could have
been given by any paleontologist. “Both good stories, eh?” said the
professor, with a hearty laugh; “almost as good as Pilpay’s fables:
both of them fictitious notions ending in fantasies; but both, so
to speak, prophetic types of what real science with real materials
enables us to do to-day. We can, indeed, ‘interview’ the mammoth, as
you Americans say; we can hang his portrait on our walls along with
our other ancestors; and we can assimilate the education of the human
race, not by beginning with being assimilated by its embryonic ages,
risking failure to pick through the egg-shell at last, but by bringing
to bear the lens of imagination, polished by science, and carrying so a
cultured human vision through all the buried City of Forms.”
Since the few mornings when I had the pleasure of rambling with my
German friend in the museums of London, and listening to his raptures,
I have passed a great deal of time in those institutions, and with a
growing sense that his enthusiasm was not misplaced. Indeed, so far
as the museum at South Kensington is concerned--to which the present
paper is especially devoted--to study it with care, and then stand in
it intelligently, must, one would say, convey to any man a sense of his
own eternity. Vista upon vista! The eye never reaches the farthest end
in the past from which humanity has toiled upward, its steps traced
in fair victories over chaos, nor does it alight on any historic
epoch not related to itself: the artist, artisan, scholar, each finds
himself gathering out of the dust of ages successive chapters of his
own spiritual biography. And even as he so lives the Past from which he
came over again, he finds, at the converging point of these manifold
lines of development, wings for his imagination, by which he passes
on the aerial track of tendency, stretching his hours to ages, living
already in the Golden Year. There is no other institution in which an
hour seems at once so brief and so long. A few other European museums
may surpass this in other specialties than its own; though, when the
natural history collections of the British Museum are transferred to
their magnificent abode at South Kensington, one will find at the door
of this museum a collection of that kind not inferior to the best with
which Agassiz and others have enriched the Swiss establishments; but
no other has so well classified and so well lighted an equal variety
and number of departments, and objects representing that which is its
own specialty--Man, as expressed in the works that embody his heart and
genius.
The museum has been in existence about twenty-five years (1882). Its
buildings and contents have cost the nation about one million pounds:
an auction on the premises to-day could not bring less than twenty
millions. Such a disproportion between outlay and outcome has led some
to regard South Kensington as a peculiarly fortunate institution; but
there has been no luck in its history. Success, as Friar Bacon reminds
us, is a flower that implies a soil of many virtues. If magnificent
collections and invaluable separate donations have steadily streamed
to this museum, so that its buildings are unceasingly expanding for
their reception, it is because the law of such things is to seek such
protection and fulfil such uses as individuals can rarely provide for
them. I remarked once to a gentleman, who did as much as any other
to establish this museum, that I had heard with pleasure of various
American gentlemen inquiring about it, and considering whether such an
institution might not exist in their own country, and he said: “Let
them plant the thing and it can’t help growing, and most likely beyond
their powers--as it has been almost beyond ours--to keep up with it.
What is wanted first of all is one or two good brains, with the means
of erecting a good building on a piece of ground considerably larger
than is required for that building. The good brains will be sure to
recognize the fact that we have been doing a large part of their work
for them at South Kensington. It is no longer a matter of opinion or
of discussion how a building shall be constructed for the purpose of
exhibiting pictures and other articles. The laws of it are as fixed as
the multiplication table. Where there have been secured substantial,
luminous galleries for exhibition, in a fire-proof building, and these
are known to be carefully guarded by night and day, there can be no
need to wait long for treasures to flow into it. Above all, let your
men take care of the interior, and not set out with wasting their
strength and money on external grandeur and decoration. The inward
built up rightly, the outward will be added in due season.”
There is no presumption in the high claims of the curators and
architects of the South Kensington Museum for the principle and method
of their building. For it must be borne in mind that every difficulty
that could conceivably present itself had to be solved by them in its
extreme form: they had to deal with the gloomiest and dampest climate
and the smokiest city in the world, and, _a fortiori_, they have solved
every difficulty that can arise under less dismal skies. Nevertheless,
this museum need not rest upon the claims made in its behalf by any
authority. No statement can be so instructive and impressive as its own
history, so far as that history exists; for, great as is the success
it has attained, there is no one aspect of it which, if examined, does
not reveal that it is rapidly growing to a larger future. I applied to
a man who sells photographs of such edifices for pictures of the main
buildings. He had none. “What, no photograph of the South Kensington
Museum!” I exclaimed, with some impatience. “Why, sir,” replied the
man, mildly, “you see, the museum doesn’t stand still long enough to
be photographed.” And so, indeed, it seems; and this constant addition
of new buildings, and of new decorations on those already erected, is
the physiognomical expression of the rapid growth and expansion of the
new intellectual and æsthetic epoch which called the institution into
existence, and is through it gradually climbing to results which no man
can foresee.
From a valuable paper on local archæological museums, contributed to
the _Building News_, June 11th, 1875, I gather some of the following
facts relating to the origin of the chief English museums. In the
middle of the seventeenth century there was formed at Lambeth, in
London, the first place that could be described as a museum. It was
called “Tradescant’s Ark.” It consisted of objects of natural history
collected in Barbary and other states by Tradescant, sometime gardener
to Queen Elizabeth. This valuable collection was bequeathed, in 1662,
by the younger Tradescant to Elias Ashmole, who gave it to Oxford in
1667, and it was the basis of the now valuable Ashmolean Museum of that
place. Sir Robert Bruce Cotton, after graduation in 1585, associated
with the antiquaries of his day, Joscelin, Lambard, Camden, and Noel,
and collected rare books and antiquities, which became the nucleus
of the British Museum. Sir Hans Sloane died one hundred and twenty
years ago, and by will offered his collection of MSS. and artistic
and natural curiosities (for which he had paid £50,000) to the nation
for £20,000. In 1753 the Harleian collection was purchased. When a
place in which to deposit these treasures was sought, Buckingham
House (now Buckingham Palace) was offered for £30,000; but an offer
by Lord Halifax of Montague House (built by Hooke, the mathematician)
for £10,000 was accepted, and so the museum stands at Bloomsbury.
The public was first “admitted to view” (the phrase is still used at
the museum) the collections in 1759. George II. presented the old
Royal Library, founded by Henry VII., containing monastic spoils. The
Lansdowne MSS. were bought in 1807 for £4925; the Burney collection,
eleven years later, for £13,500; and in 1820 Sir J. Banks bequeathed
his library of natural history. At the time of the foundation of the
British Archaeological Association in 1844 there were outside of London
but three museums, namely, at Oxford, York, and Salisbury. Now nearly
every large town has its museum in which to treasure the monumental
relics and natural curiosities of its neighborhood. York has the
sarcophagi, tessellated pavements, and altars of _Eboracum_, Salisbury
the spoils of _Uriconium_, Colchester the remains of _Camulodunum_,
Bath those of _Aquae Solis_, and Cirencester those of _Corinium_. The
Brown Museum at Liverpool is rich in Anglo-Saxon remains, and the
important collection described by Wylie in his _Fairford Graves_ is in
the Ashmolean at Oxford. The Brown Museum derives its name from Sir W.
Brown, who not only added to it a large building, but his collection
(which cost him £50,000) of consular diptychs, Etruscan jewelry,
Limoges enamels, Wedgwood pottery, and important Roman and Saxon
antiquities. The Scarborough Museum has interesting British relics,
among them a tree coffin of great rarity. The Exeter Museum has a good
set of Celtic pottery, and bronze implements found in Devon. Wisbech
possesses superb examples of mediaeval art and important Egyptian
antiquities. In the Torquay Museum may be found the vast collection of
flint implements found in the famous Kent’s Cavern through the industry
of Mr. Pengelly, the geologist, along with remains of extinct animals
discovered beside them. The Halifax Museum, in which Professor Tyndall
passed his early scientific apprenticeship, is rich in the curiosities
of the coal measures, and has important Egyptian as well as Roman
remains. There are many other museums in the country--indeed, hardly
any important town is without one; but I must not fail to mention a
very interesting one at Canterbury. It contains Roman tessellated
pavements; a large number of ancient terra-cotta forms, presented by
the late Viscount Strangford, who brought them from the Greek isles,
Egypt, and Asia Minor; two extremely interesting Runic stones found
near Sandwich; and many such interesting antiquities as the “Curfew
Bell” and “Couvre Feu;” and some very odd ones--for instance, the
severed hand of Sir John Heydon, who was killed by Sir Robert Mansfield
in a duel, anno 1600.
In a graphic article published some years ago Sir Henry Cole described
(what it is almost impossible for the Londoner of to-day to realize)
the condition of this metropolis at the beginning of the century.
The only institution which then existed for preserving any object of
art or science was the British Museum, which was founded in 1753, in
which year a sum of £300,000 was raised by lottery to purchase certain
collections--as that of Sir Hans Sloane, and the Cotton MSS.--over the
drawing of which lottery (100,000 tickets at three pounds each), at
Guildhall, the Lord Chancellor, the Speaker of the House of Commons,
and the Archbishop of Canterbury presided! But this sole institution
excited the very smallest interest in the country, and so late as
forty years ago Croker jeered in Parliament at Bloomsbury as a _terra
incognita_, and Carlyle’s brilliant friend and pupil, Charles Buller,
wrote an article describing a voyage of exploration he had made to
that region, with some account of the curious manners and customs of
the inhabitants. “About a hundred visitors a day on an average,” says
Sir Henry Cole (there are now as many visitors to the British Museum
per hour), “in parties of five persons only, were admitted to gape
at the unlabelled ‘rarities and curiosities’ deposited in Montague
House. The state of things outside the British Museum was analogous.
Westminster Abbey was closed except for divine service, and to show a
closet of wax-work. Admittance to the public monuments in St. Paul’s
and other churches was irksome to obtain, and costly: even the Tower
of London could not be seen for less than six shillings. The private
picture-galleries were most difficult of access, and, for those not
belonging to the upper ten thousand, it might be a work of years to get
a sight of the Grosvenor and Stafford collections. No national gallery
existed, and Lord Liverpool’s government refused to accept the pictures
now at Dulwich, offered by Sir Francis Bourgeois, even on condition
of merely housing them. The National Portrait Gallery, the South
Kensington Museum, and the Geological Museum were not even conceived.
Kew Gardens were shabby and neglected, and possessed no museum. Hampton
Court Palace was shown, by a fee to the house-keeper, one day in the
week. No public schools of art or science existed in the metropolis or
the seats of manufacture. The Royal Academy had its annual exhibition
on the first and second floors of Somerset House, in rooms now used by
the Registrar-general, whose functions then had no existence. It was
only at the British Institution or at Christie’s auction-rooms that
a youthful artist like Mulready could chance to see the work of an
old master, as he has often told us. Dr. Birkbeck had not founded the
present Mechanics’ Institute in Southampton Buildings, and the first
stone of the London University, in Gower Street, was not laid. Not
a penny of the public taxes was devoted to national education. Hard
drinking was as much a qualification for membership of the Dilettanti
Society as the nominal one of a tour in Italy. Men’s minds were more
anxiously engaged with bread riots and corn laws, Thistlewood’s
conspiracy and Peterloo massacres, Catholic emancipation and rotten
boroughs, than with the arts and sciences, for the advancement of
which, in truth, there was hardly any liking, thought, or opportunity.”
This being the condition of London, the state of things in other parts
of the United Kingdom may easily be inferred. There are now fifteen
important public museums and art galleries in or near London. The
ancient buildings of interest are shown without fees. More than a
million people visited a single one of these museums last year. There
are seven large schools for art training in London alone, and 151 in
the whole country, with 30,239 pupils. The number of pupils at South
Kensington Art School for the scholastic year ending July, 1880, was
824. These numbers refer exclusively to those who mean to devote their
lives to art. The official report for 1881 gives 4758 as the number
of elementary schools in which art is taught, 768,661 as the number
of children instructed, the total amount of the grants in aid of them
being £43,203 in the same year.
Public interest in the treasures of art and science in London--whose
extent was unknown to any one--first manifested itself in 1835, when
Parliament caused an inquiry to be made into the state of the British
Museum; a second committee inquired in 1847, a third in 1859. The
result of these inquiries was a series of ponderous Blue-books, which
few ever saw, but which that few studied very carefully. It finally
burst upon the country that the British Museum and its collections
had, up to 1860, cost three millions of pounds, and that it was “in
hopeless confusion, valuable collections wholly hidden from the public,
and great portions of others in danger of being destroyed by damp and
neglect.” The commissioners of 1859 who made this report also pointed
out the cause of the evils they recognized. The museum was in the hands
of forty-seven trustees, each of whom seemed to think that there were
plenty to manage the affair without his concerning himself individually
in the matter. Never was costlier broth so near being spoiled by
multiplicity of cooks, when Panizzi, by a sort of _coup d’état_,
brought a strong executive control to bear upon it. It is a singular
fact that even now the British government does not formally adopt the
British Museum. The vote for supplies of its ways and means is given
each year on a motion made by a member sitting on the opposition
benches. During Mr. Gladstone’s administration it was made by the Right
Hon. S. Walpole, a trustee of the museum; when Lord Beaconsfield was
in power it was made by the Right Hon. Robert Lowe, also a trustee.
The money is supplied grudgingly. There can hardly be found elsewhere
men of such eminence in their own departments as Professor Newton,
Reginald Stuart Poole, and Story-Maskelyne (the mineralogist); there
can be found none who have done such enormous work in bringing order
out of chaos in the British Museum; yet they receive salaries of six
hundred and fifty pounds each for labors that deserve a thousand. The
condition of this museum has much improved of late. The vast growth
of its collections had crowded its literary and scientific employés
into miserable unventilated cells, and their murmurings of years have
until now been unheeded. When the first victim, the Talmudic scholar,
Emanuel Deutsch, was dying, he said, “Perhaps when I am gone they will
do something.” This was the hope of the thirty-eight scholars buried
alive in the printed-book department. He died, and nothing was done.
Then fell the second victim, Mr. Warren, head of the transcribing
department. This caused a panic. The readers of the reading-room, many
of whom suffer from the now medically recognized “Museum headache,”
took the matter up. The trustees visited the room where the two
scholars had perished, and condemned it. But several rooms only a
little better were still used, and another able assistant, an eminent
author, barely saved his life by resigning a post he had held in the
museum for over twenty years. The principal librarian, Bond, and
keeper of printed books, Bullen, have done much to improve the state
of things: but there is still a great want of private rooms for the
assistant librarians, who generally have to sit in draughty galleries,
where no open fires are to be got at. That this huge building should
have become absurdly inadequate for its contents and its original
purpose indicates the vast progress of English science in recent
years. The keepers of antiquities felt themselves bound to declare
that there were valuable Egyptian, Assyrian, and Greek monuments and
inscriptions, in the crypts and corners of the museum, quite as useless
for scientific purposes as if they had remained buried in the lands
where they were exhumed. Much relief, both to the assistants and to the
scholars who have had to dig like Schliemann for some of the museum’s
treasures, will follow the removal of the vast zoological collections
to South Kensington. The final result will be that the British Museum
will be specialized, and become the treasury of the national archives
and the national library.
As for the matter of payment, it certainly constitutes the gravest
problem besetting institutions of this character. The best work done
for literature, art, and science (so far as they are connected with the
state) is done on small salaries, a thousand pounds being considered
a vast sum for great men. Even such men as Tyndall and Lockyer get
less than that by their official positions. But these gentlemen all
feel the danger that might arise if such work became so well paid as
to allure the incompetent, and its offices become objects of political
intrigue. At present no country is better served in such matters than
England, such men as those mentioned being content with small salaries
because of the ample means of research afforded them. And indeed it
would appear enough to prevent the offices for scientific and other
work of an intellectual character being sought for gain, if some clever
statesman would invent a way of paying the additional sums needed
“in kind,” but in some kind, also, not transmutable into values for
other than the learned. It must be admitted that thus far no English
minister has appreciated the necessity that scholars should have
salaries sufficiently large to raise them above anxiety, and to render
unnecessary the too frequent frittering away of invaluable time and
power in a multiplicity of extraneous and lucrative employments.
The redemption of the British Museum, so far as it has proceeded, as
well as the establishment of nearly every institution of importance to
art or science in the country, was largely due to the instruction by
example represented in the South Kensington Museum. This institution,
it is important to remember, did not grow out of any desire to heap
curiosities together or to make any popular display; it grew out of a
desire for industrial art culture, and the germ of it was the School of
Design which opened in a room of Somerset House, June 1st, 1837. This
poor little school is now a thing to make fun of. It took over a month
for it to obtain the eight pupils with which it began. The first act
of its regulators seems to have been a rule that “drawing the human
figure shall _not_ be taught to the students.” Haydon insisted that
there could be no training without the human figure. The government did
not want artists, but men who could draw such patterns as should render
it no longer necessary for English manufacturers to go to Lyons and
Paris for such. Etty and Wilkie sat in the council beside silk-weavers
and portly warehousemen. Fine-art students were actually excluded--this
mainly because of the cry that the government would otherwise be
taking bread out of the mouths of private teachers--and the School
of Design in 1842 consisted of 178 pattern-drawers. Schools of a
similar character were gradually established in some of the provincial
manufacturing cities. And there had been about ten years of this sort
of thing when the great Exhibition of 1851-52 took place.
Queen Victoria has described the May day when the Palace of Glass was
opened in Hyde Park as the happiest of her life. She had witnessed one
of those noble victories which leave no tears behind but such as may
welcome glad tidings of good-will, and she had seen her hero wearing
the only crown he coveted--that of success in a great achievement for
European civilization. It is sad indeed that only as a widow does she
live to realize the latest results of that day on her country.
The great Exhibition may be termed, so far as English art is concerned,
the great revolution. Such a display of “florid and gorgeous tinsel,”
to use Redgrave’s description, was never seen, unless in the realms
of King Coffee. The articles from the Continent were glittering and
showy enough, but those of Great Britain outglittered all, exciting
the laughter of cultivated foreigners to such an extent that English
gentlemen were scandalized and abashed without knowing precisely what
was the matter. The Prince Consort, who was especially ashamed at the
general disgust manifested for this tawdry English work, had brought
with him from his careful training in Germany and at Brussels one
excellent habit--that of deferring to the judgment of accomplished men
in matters relating to their own specialties. When he found himself,
as Chief Commissioner of the great Exhibition, the hero of a great
aesthetic failure and of a great financial success--blushing for the
fame of the country which had bestowed its highest honor upon him, and
at the same time contemplating a net surplus of £170,000--the idea took
possession of him that the least the money could do would be to begin
the task of raising English work from the abyss of ugliness which had
been so admirably disclosed; and that idea led him to consult artists
of ability and men of taste, and to mediate between them and her
Majesty’s complacent ministers, whom he managed to rouse into a happy
state of bewilderment, which resulted in action.
The Prince Consort was, during his brief life, a fortunate man in
many respects, but in nothing was he so fortunate as when, inspired
by the best artistic minds in England, he induced the Queen to set
apart some rooms at Marlborough House (now the residence of the Prince
of Wales) for an industrial art collection and for art training, and
when he persuaded her ministers to devote £5000 to the same purpose.
He has thus made the great head-quarters of British art in some sense
his monument. In 1852 the small collection of the School of Design
in Somerset House was removed to Marlborough House, and the Board of
Trade confided to Owen Jones, R. Redgrave, and Lyon Playfair the work
of reorganizing the whole art training of the country. The collection
transferred from Somerset House was trifling enough, but now there were
added a number of articles that had been purchased from the Exhibition,
and a still more remarkable collection, which has a curious history.
After the French Revolution, when the infuriated people were prepared
to destroy not only the _noblesse_, but the works associated with them,
fine cabinets and beautiful china vanished out of Paris. At this time
George IV.’s French cook gathered up a superb collection of old Sèvres
china. This had long been distributed through the English palaces, and
was even used for ordinary table service; it was now, by the Queen’s
order, removed from the various palaces to Marlborough House, where it
was at once recognized as the finest existing collection of a class of
articles which was already exciting that competition among collectors
which at present amounts to a mania. But the Queen’s best loan was
her example. Ministers took up the matter with unwonted courage. Mr.
Henley, of the Board of Trade, secured the Bandiuell pottery, Mr.
Gladstone the Gherardini models, and the precedent was set which has
since added the Bernal, Soulages, Soltikoff, Pourtalès, and other
collections--one of the most curious being that of the Rev. Dr. Bock,
a collection of mediaeval religious vestments. There is a myth still
current that in one or two cases the secret agent of the British Museum
had been bidding for some treasure against the secret agent of South
Kensington; but it has no foundation. Once upon a time the British
Museum and the Tower of London found themselves bidding against each
other for a piece of old armor; but no similar accident could have
occurred under the keen eye of Sir Henry Cole, who from first to last
has been felt in the progress of this museum. Sir Henry developed a
power of getting money for the museum, from the stingiest chancellors,
unknown in the history of the English exchequer. He, with Mr. Richard
Redgrave, explored Italy, and brought back many valuable treasures of
early art.
[Illustration: SIR HENRY COLE, K.C.B.]
In 1854 the first report of the newly-established Department of Science
and Art was laid before Parliament. It was a Blue-book of 642 pages--so
much being required for those interests of the country to which the
Board of Trade had, in 1836, devoted the half of one page. This report
and those which followed bore witness that a new enthusiasm had arisen
in England for recovering its lost arts; but they increasingly proved
also that the collections evoked from their hiding-places were already
overflowing Marlborough House. In one sense this overflowing was of
signal advantage, for it enabled the department to send a collection of
four hundred beautiful specimens as a circulating museum through the
provincial cities and towns--a plan which has been maintained by the
museum, and also by the National Gallery of Fine Arts, with excellent
results. The commissioners had not at that time, so far as their
reports show, any notion of localizing the various schools of science
and art at South Kensington. Indeed, no such expression as “South
Kensington” had existed until 1856, when Earl Granville so christened
the “Brompton Boilers,” which the government had empowered Mr. Cole to
prepare for the transfer of the Marlborough House collection (voting
£10,000 for the purpose), and which, with their three boiler-shaped
tops, still stand as the seed-shell of the museum. It was little
supposed then that the “Mr. Huxley” whom the report of 1856 speaks of
as employed to collect specimens on the coast would ever be seated
as he is now in a palatial science school at Kensington. There must,
however, have been some very far-seeing eyes looking at things in those
days, for the commissioners of the great Exhibition of 1851 persuaded
the government to add to the Exhibition surplus of £170,000 enough
to make £300,000, and to invest the sum in the vast Kensington Gore
estate. This estate comprised between twenty-five and thirty acres of
land, twelve of which belong to the museum, and has become the site of
a great metropolis of science and art. The museum was opened on June
22d, 1857, by the Queen, accompanied by the Prince Consort and the Heir
Apparent.
The removal of the collections of Marlborough House to South
Kensington, and the establishment of the new movement in a centre of
its own, with room to grow, was speedily followed by a grand event,
namely, the donation by Mr. Sheepshanks of his superb collection of
pictures to the nation. Mr. Sheepshanks supplies to gentlemen who wish
to benefit the public about as good an example as they can find in
modern annals. For many years he had welcomed artists to study and copy
in the gallery opening from his dining-room, which so many of them
now remember as an oasis in the wilderness which surrounded them in
the last generation. But the owner of this gallery had observed that
the Philistines of Parliament were still very strong: they had once
refused to accept even a valuable collection of pictures (as already
stated) from unwillingness to house them; and although they had got
beyond that, and thankfully accepted the Vernon Gallery, he saw that
the arrangements for giving shelter to this gallery were made very
slowly. The National Gallery had a large portion of its Turner and its
Vernon bequests housed at South Kensington, and a much larger portion
of them hid away in its crypt, for twenty-five years, awaiting the
hour when England should find out the magnificent works of which it
is the heir, by seeing them on the new walls completed in 1876. Mr.
Sheepshanks resolved to see his gallery--which was worth even then
a hundred thousand pounds--attended to while he was yet alive. He
offered his pictures to the country on the following conditions: that a
suitable building should be erected at Kensington (which would remove
them from the dust and smoke of the city); that they should never be
sold; must be open to art students, and at times to the public; and
that the public, especially the working-classes, should be permitted to
view the same on Sunday afternoons. The government assented to all of
these conditions except the last, and Mr. Sheepshanks was reluctantly
compelled to add to that provision the words, “it being, however,
understood that the exhibition of the collection on Sundays is not to
be considered one of the conditions of my gift.”
Having thus summed up the history of the museum, it remains for me to
consider its three aspects: (1) as to architecture and decoration; (2)
its collections of objects; (3) its educational or art training method
and character.
The accompanying map will show the series of buildings at South
Kensington. There exists to the west of Exhibition Road a park of
about ten acres, holding at the north the Royal Albert Hall, at the
south the Museum of Natural History, and between these, on either side,
the long line of arcade buildings containing the National Portrait
Gallery, the Indian section, Naval Museum, Patent Office, the Museum
of Scientific Apparatus, and, in addition, spacious halls for the
display of machinery during exhibitions, for horticultural shows, and
Mr. Frank Buckland’s methods of pisciculture. Such a collection of
museums, answering the varied needs of science and art, cannot be found
elsewhere--even within the limits of a nation. The gardens adjoining
this series of buildings are beautifully adorned with statues and
fountains, and will remain in the future, as they have been in the
past, a favorite promenade, entered from Albert Hall and its extended
galleries, in summer always bright with flowers, with music, and gay
companies.
[Illustration: SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM--GROUND PLAN.]
[Illustration: DIAGRAM SHOWING GLITTER POINTS IN A PICTURE-GALLERY.]
The building containing the courts was designed by the late Captain
Fowke, of the Royal Engineers, and, I believe, there is no other
building in this country more adapted to its purpose. The task assigned
Captain Fowke was to build a picture-gallery eighty-seven feet long by
fifty wide, with two floors, the upper to be lighted from above, and
the lower open to the light from side to side, and to make the whole as
near fire-proof as possible. The building is thirty-four feet above the
ground-line to the eaves, and fifty to the ridge, and consists of seven
equal bays, twelve feet in length and of the width of the building. The
upper floor contains four separate rooms, two of forty-six by twenty
feet, the others of thirty-five by twenty feet, lighted entirely from
the roof, and giving a wall space of 4340 square feet available for
hanging pictures. The lower floor is thrown into two unequal rooms of
forty-six by forty-four feet and thirty-five by forty-four feet, each
having a row of piers along the centre, the play of light from side to
side being thus nearly unimpeded. Thus the upper floor has no windows,
but as much wall space as possible, while the lower has no walls, but
piers, as is demanded for the exhibition of objects in cases. The roof
is double glazed, and the rule of lighting is that the height and width
of the gallery should be the same, and the skylight half of the same.
This renders it always easy for the spectator to avoid the glitter
point on a picture, as may be seen by the accompanying diagram. The
glitter point, altering with the position of the beholder, is at B,
nine feet from the floor, when the beholder is at E_{2}, or five feet
from the wall; and the glitter descends to C, seven feet from the
floor, when the beholder advances to E_{3}. But if the spectator can
recede to fifteen feet, the wall has no glitter up to thirteen feet.
The skylight at South Kensington is brought as near as is consistent
with avoiding glitter, and is twenty feet nine and a half inches from
the floor. Just below the skylight run horizontal gas-pipes, with
fish-tail burners projecting on two-inch brass elbows, and the light at
night is as nearly as possible the same as in the day. When the gas was
first put in this building there occurred an interesting controversy
concerning the effect of gas on pictures, which elicited a valuable
statement, jointly signed by Faraday, Hofmann, Tyndall, Redgrave, and
Fowke, who had been appointed as a commission of inquiry, to the effect
that coal-gas is innocuous as an illuminator of any pictures, if kept
at a sufficient distance above them to avoid bringing into contact with
the pictures the sulphuric acid caused by its combustion (22½ grains
per 100 cubic feet of London gas).
In the large courts electric lamps are now used with much success.
It is wonderful to note the beauty of porcelain and all objects of
delicate decoration under the new light; it brings out the minute
traceries better than daylight.
Security from fire here has been made as nearly absolute as possible,
and Sir Philip Cunliffe Owen believes it impossible by any device to
fire the museum; yet the water arrangements and vigilance at South
Kensington are as complete as if the building were built of the
ordinary materials. As a matter of fact, the choice of materials was
made after long and patient scientific experiments. The main material
is the best gray stock brick, with ornamental work of certain blue,
red, and cream-colored bricks peculiar to some English counties. Some
iron it was, of course, necessary to use for joists and girders, but in
every case this iron has been isolated by being surrounded with a thick
fire-proof concrete. The floor is of Minton tiles imbedded in Roman
cement. The double roof is Mansard, and covered with a French tile
(_tuile courtois_), selected at the Paris Exhibition of 1855.
[Illustration: SIR PHILIP CUNLIFFE OWEN, DIRECTOR OF SOUTH KENSINGTON
MUSEUM.]
The picture-gallery described above, made to hold the Sheepshanks
collection, has had additions made behind it, in accordance with the
original plan, of three large rooms, which contain various collections
of pictures, and near the back entrance to these is the gallery of
Raphael’s cartoons. All this series of picture-galleries constitutes
an upper floor of a wing to two vast double show-rooms. One of these
is a large square apartment, in which large numbers of marble and
other antique monuments are displayed. The other, connected with
it, is architecturally divided by slender pillars--between which,
as an avenue, are show-cases, above and below--into two noble rooms
with splendid arched ceilings. The first-named of these rooms (that
which is without division, and single-roofed) has not yet received
its wall decorations, which are to be a distemper half-way up, and
above, a frieze of frescoes large as Raphael’s cartoons. The other
show-room--with the double-arched ceiling--furnishes, as may be
imagined, fine opportunities for wall decoration, as also for the
ornamentation of floor and ceilings. The decoration here has not been
completed, but it has gone far enough for the scheme to be judged by
its effect.
And it is just here that a careful criticism is necessary. While the
purely architectural work merits all the praise that can be claimed
for it, securing an admirable play of light, making each division
add its light to the other, and reducing the space occupied by
pillars and other accessories to a minimum, the decorations are but
measurably successful. The faults are due, I think, to the intention
that the ornaments themselves should present some of the features of
a collection of styles. The result proves that it would be better if
the varied styles were exhibited in a court set apart for the purpose.
The floor, for example, is rich in its varieties of tiles, there being
some five or six of different designs and shades. It is true that the
great central floors are made of tiles of uniform design and color, and
that these--a deep brick red, with small green spots at the corners of
each tile--are grave and good; but all around, where we pass through
arch or door, there is a deep fringe of brilliant tiles, which are
reflected into the glass cases nearest them, to the injury of the
objects shown; and in the series of “cloisters,” as the spaces beneath
the picture-gallery may be called, there are further experiments in
floor tiles which militate against the effect of the articles exhibited
in them. The ceilings in these cloisters, or side spaces, have been
covered with Oriental decorations by the late Owen Jones; they are
Indian, Persian, moresque, and of the greatest beauty, each coffer in
the ceiling and each archway presenting a new design, and yet all in
harmony: these being too far above the show-cases to affect any objects
in them, are rightly placed; but the floor, as the necessary background
to many objects in the rooms--many of which depend on delicate shades
of color for their effect--will eventually, I suspect, have to be
reconstructed, and made entirely of the grave hue which has happily
been already adopted for the greater part of it. Ascending a little
above the floor, it must be said also that there is too much brilliancy
about the lower arches and their spandrels--too much white and gold. It
is not only that this does not give a sufficiently subdued background
for the bright glass or chased metals in the upper parts of the cases
(on the ground-floor), but they are by no means the best supports
for the grand series of life-sized figures in mosaic, on deep gold
surfaces, which make the magnificent frieze of the upper wall.
[Illustration: NORTH COURT, NORTH-WEST CORNER, SHOWING CASTS OF THE
BIGA (OR TWO-HORSE CHARIOT), FROM THE ORIGINAL IN MARBLE AT THE
VATICAN, AND OF THE PULPIT BY GIOVANI PISANO, FORMERLY IN THE CATHEDRAL
AT PISA.]
[Illustration: SOUTH COURT, SHOWING THE PRINCE CONSORT’S GALLERY.]
It is these superb figures, representing the great artists of the past,
which constitute the most salient feature of decoration in the museum.
In this case (as in so many others in the museum) the scheme--due
to the late Mr. Godfrey Sykes--of combining the purposes of general
decoration with subjects of special interest in a museum, has been
most fortunate: the general effect is noble, the figures interesting
as portraits and as representations of costume, the varieties of
mosaic in which they are produced being of value for comparison.
There are thirty-six flat alcoves--eighteen on each side--and the
figures in them are those of the chief artists in ornamentation, with
the names of their designers beneath: Phidias (by Poynter); Apelles
(Poynter); Nicola Pisano (Leighton); Cimabue (Leighton); Torel, the
English goldsmith, d. 1300 (Burchett); William of Wykeham, bishop and
architect of Winchester Cathedral, d. 1404 (Burchett); Fra Angelico
(Cope); Ghiberti (Wehnert); Donatello (Redgrave); Gozzoli, one of whose
Florentine frescoes, containing his own portrait, is in the museum, d.
1478 (E. Armitage); Luca della Robbia, specimens of whose terra-cotta
work in the museum show him to have been a man of genius, d. 1481
(Moody); Mantegna (Pickersgill); Giorgione (Prinsep); Giacomo da Ulma,
friar at Bologna and painter on glass, d. 1517 (Westlake); Leonardo da
Vinci (J. Tenniel); Raphael (G. Sykes); Torrigiano (Yeames); A. Dürer
(Thomas); P. Vischer (W. B. Scott); Holbein (Yeames); Giorgio, painter
in majolica, d. 1552 (Hart); Michael Angelo (Sykes); Primaticcio, the
Italian who made the decorations at Fontainebleau, d. 1570 (O’Neil);
Jean Goujon, to whom is attributed the old carving in the Louvre,
d. 1572 (Bowler); Titian (Watts); Palissy (Townroe); François du
Quesnoy, Flemish ivory carver, d. 1546 (Ward); Inigo Jones (Morgan);
Grinling Gibbons (Watson); Wren (Crowe); Hogarth (Crowe); Sir J.
Reynolds (Phillips); Mulready (Barwell). The only very modern artist
in this list is Mulready, and he is certainly unfortunate, looking
as if Mr. Punch’s most cynical artist had been employed to depict
him. The late Mr. Owen Jones has been well represented in a mosaic
set in the wall near a staircase leading from the Oriental Court
decorated by him. Mulready is the only bit of really ugly work in the
series, although, of course, the merits of the others are unequal.
The artists have evidently given careful archæological study to the
costumes of each period, and in some cases--as Prinsep’s Giorgione,
Scott’s Vischer, and Pickersgill’s Mantegna--the work is such as the
grand old workers around need not be ashamed of. Of great interest,
too, are the varieties of material of which the mosaics are composed,
concerning which I can only say here that the Italian glass appears to
me incomparably superior to the experiments in English ceramic wares.
The shape of this double room, it will be borne in mind, implies four
large lunettes, one, that is, at each end of the two large roof-spans.
One of these has been already filled by Sir Frederick Leighton, P.R.A.,
with an admirable allegorical painting representing the “Arts of War.”
Here we see workmen forging every variety of armor, shields, weapons,
and women buckling them on to knights, as is written in fabliaux of the
Round Table. Sir Frederick has put his most graceful drawing and purest
colors into this fine work. There is also in the gallery a design for
a companion picture of the “Arts of Peace,” wherein the ladies are
engaged in the pleasanter work of adorning themselves, and utilizing
mirrors, while the men are toiling to provide the sinews for the
gentler siege in which their own hearts are liable to capture. These
works are scholarly, almost hypercritically exact in archæological
details, and when the second is completed the court will be greatly
improved.
[Illustration: CHINESE POTTERS AT WORK.--WINDOW IN THE CERAMIC GALLERY.]
To Mr. F. W. Moody, one of the most energetic and accomplished teachers
at the museum, the institution is indebted for many instructive
experiments and designs in the way of decoration. No one should fail
to observe the very remarkable exterior wall decoration covering one
entire side of the new School of Science, which is a most complete
revival of the _sgraffito_ work of the fifteenth century. This
experiment by Mr. Moody of the high Renaissance in Italy has been
placed on a wall of the building not visible from the streets, but
only from the windows of the museum. It is analogous to the _niello_,
which was graven in silver and the lines filled in with carbon, making
a black picture on a white ground. (There is a good account of this
ornamentation, said to be the origin of all engraving for printed work,
in W. B. Scott’s _Half-hour Lectures_.) Mr. Moody’s experiment is made
by filling in the hollows of the cement, presenting a multiplicity of
scrolls, symbols, allegorical figures--Natura, Scientia, etc.--and
portraits of scientific men. The stairway from which this vast
work--covering the wall for four or five stories--can best be seen is
another interesting experiment of Mr. Moody’s. As befits a stairway
leading to the Ceramic Gallery, its ornaments are made of Minton
porcelain. The steps and facings of the steps are a kind of mosaic
made of hexagon pellets painted; the walls are panelled with white
porcelain; and their effect under the light falling through large
figured windows, toned rather than colored, is very good indeed.
Entering now the Ceramic Gallery, we find its contents illustrated by
a very ingeniously devised series of window etchings (as they may be
called), which are probably unique in the history of work on glass.
The windows on one side of this room, fifteen in number, each double,
were intrusted to Mr. William B. Scott, who as an archaeologist in
art has few superiors. Mr. Scott designed no fewer than forty-eight
large pictures, representing the history of ceramic art from the most
ancient Chinese, Egyptian, Indian, and Persian down to Wedgwood; and
these he has placed in the fifteen windows, where, unhappily, they are
little observed, being without mention, much less description, in any
work except that now before the reader. They are for the most part in
black and white, colors being introduced only once or twice, and then
but slightly. The first and second windows are devoted to the Chinese,
their work being, if not the earliest, the most ancient in porcelain,
and that which has most influenced the European art. Here is shown
their whole method, from the preparation of the clay, the half-naked
natives bringing the kaolin from caves in panniers, others steeping
it in water, refining it in large mortars, and kneading it on tables.
The potter is seen before his rude wheel, and forming the vessel by
hand-pressure. And after this we trace his work to the furnace, and on
to its place in the shop. This work implies the most patient study of
original Chinese models. One window represents characteristic Chinese
ornamentation--such as the royal dragon and the bird of paradise, and
a bazar at Pekin. The third window represents early Egyptian art. The
upper part shows the casting of brick by packing in boxes, and then
turning it out, all under the whip of the taskmaster, the work and
the whip being but little different to-day from what they were in the
ancient days whose relics have been so diligently studied by Mr. Scott
on the papyri of the British Museum. Beneath, a skilled workman is
painting a large Canopus: he is on his knees, with his feet doubled
behind him. One page, so to speak, of this window represents Assyrian
art by a triumphal procession, in which immense vases are carried on
ox trucks, and smaller ones on the heads of prisoners--a design based
upon discoveries in Nineveh which show the great importance that people
ascribed to earthenware. The fourth window is Greek and Etruscan. The
Greek legend of the origin of painting--the daughter of the potter of
Sicyon tracing on the wall the shadow of her lover on his leaving her
for a journey--is exquisitely done. Next we see the girl applying her
plan to her father’s vases. We have also depicted with learning the
honorary uses of pottery among the Greeks, the vases given as prizes
in public games, or as votive offerings for the dead, by which custom
the finest examples we have were transmitted; and, finally, there is
the genius of Death holding in her hand the cinerary urn. The fifth
window is Hispano-Moresque. The earliest ware in Europe after the
Samian of which we have any examples was that made by the Moors, who
brought the art of making it from east of the Mediterranean. This was
the famous “lustre-ware” which was supplied from Spain, which is now
so eagerly sought by collectors, both on account of its beauty and as
the origin of the Italian majolica. Specimens of this kind of pottery
have been found by Layard at Nineveh and at Ephesus. There appears
to be little doubt that it is of Persian origin. It must have been
always very difficult to make; in the modern manufacture about fifty
per cent. of the pieces come out of the furnace dull and worthless.
The fine specimens seem to the workmen happy accidents rather than the
steady results of any normal process upon which they can depend. The
first design in this window of Mr. Scott’s represents the master-potter
amidst his swarthy workmen watching the hour-glass beside the fire.
This wonderful lustre was the result of some utilization of smoke in
modifying the copper glaze, and was probably discovered by accident,
as so many fine effects in the ceramic art have been. This beautiful
ware has lately attracted especial attention in England because of
the experiments which Mr. De Morgan, son of the late mathematician
of University College, is making. He has tried nearly every kind of
smoke influence upon copper and silver pigments, in contact with glaze
and his success has been remarkable. These lustre-wares are still, I
believe, made in some parts of Spain in a small way; also at Gubbio, in
Italy; but the furnace of Mr. De Morgan at Chelsea is the most active
and successful in bringing out such wares in all their varieties.
[Illustration: ITALIAN MAJOLICA (URBINO). SIXTEENTH CENTURY.]
[Illustration: LAMP FROM AN ARABIAN MOSQUE--FOURTEENTH CENTURY.]
It adds greatly to the charm of these windows that they are as a frame
around the objects whose history they tell. Fine examples of the
“lustre-ware” from the earliest ages are in this gallery. And we have
only to turn round from admiring another part of this fifth window,
showing the building of the Alhambra, and its wonderful vase, to see
the finest copy of that unparalleled piece of lustre-ware. The vase
is four feet five and a half inches high, by eight feet two and a
half inches in circumference; it is decorated with two antelopes, and
foliations covering the body of the vase, intermingled with which are
African characters whose sense is “Felicity and Fortune,” “Permanent
Prosperity;” and the colors are brown and blue on a yellow ground,
the lustre being of a mother-of-pearl tint. From rich specimens of
ancient Italian majolica we in turn refer to the sixth window, which
shows us the embryonic and later phases of this beautiful art. The
Italians imitated the Hispano-Moresque lustre as well as they could,
but not being able to attain it exactly, they secured new tints of
their own, especially a very fine ruby lustre. Afterward they painted
their wares without trying to get lustres, to obtain which was perhaps
a work too slow and precarious to be profitable. The vast development
of ceramic art in Italy has required three windows--sixth, seventh, and
eighth--for its representation. First we have bird’s-eye views of the
localities with which it was chiefly associated: Urbino, the seat of
the finest ware made in the time of Raphael, wherein is portrayed their
process of softening and refining the clay by putting it in square pits
in the ground; Duranto, with its method of grinding the clay in a sort
of water-mill; Gubbio, with its own ingenious processes. Then we have
other Italian methods--foot-mill, hand-mill, horse-mill. An artist
is seen in his studio, receiving as sitters ladies whose portraits he
paints on plates that are to be their marriage gifts--a design taken
from a plate in the gallery painted by Maestro Giorgio--while other
details have been taken from a MS. by Piccolpasso, also preserved
in the museum. And, finally, we have a representation of Luca della
Robbia, of the fifteenth century, who used earthenware medallions,
admirably modelled and fired with white glaze, which were fixed on the
outside of buildings, and may be seen to-day on the Foundling Hospital
and several churches at Florence. The very word “majolica” (Majorca)
shows that the Italians found their art where the Moors left it. But
if they could not equal the moresque lustres, they certainly developed
and enriched their designs. Such decorations as that encircling the
figure of St. George on the Urbino plate (see engraving) may be called
“arabesque,” but they are equally Italian. It is curious to compare
such arabesques with the ornament on a piece of real Arabian work,
such as the accompanying ancient lamp. (This lamp, singularly enough,
is of a form represented in very early Italian bronze carvings of
sacred subjects.) Window ninth is devoted to Dutch tiles and pots and
Flanders-ware, which were once imported in such vast quantities to this
country: here they may be traced from their manufacture in Holland
to their sale in the Thames docks. Window tenth relates the curious
story of the Dresden-ware. Here it was that the famous material of
the best porcelain (kaolin), which was so long the secret of China,
was discovered by a happy accident--Böttcher, the alchemist, having
taken a notion to analyze the white dust which his barber had used to
powder his wig in a year of dear flour. The two men are represented,
and also the château of Meissen, where the first Dresden porcelain
was secretly made. Window eleventh tells the story of Palissy, who,
instructing himself, ruined his family: one leaf of the window shows
him feeding his furnace with his broken furniture, while his wife with
her babe stands beseechingly by; the other shows his triumph, as he
builds and decorates the grottoes in the Tuilleries garden. The story
recalls that of Benvenuto Cellini, who, having been seized with a fever
while casting his Perseus and Medusa, heard that his work was ruined.
Leaping from his bed, he found the furnace burst, but he saw the metal
was partly fused; he cast in two hundred pieces of his table-service,
and the mould was filled. The great work was saved, and so was the
artist; he ate a hearty meal with his workman, slept soundly, and was
himself again. Window twelfth is devoted to Sèvres, where porcelain
was carried to its highest perfection. The famous “Rose du Barry” and
“Bleu du Roi” are represented--and here exquisite colors are used--by
Louis XV. and Madame Du Barry exchanging vases of those colors. The old
manufactory is pictured, and some of its finest designs, in the lower
panes of the window. Near by is the beautiful specimen of Sèvres which
France contributed to the first International Exhibition in London. In
window thirteenth we are introduced to English wares, at present the
most excellent in the world. The processes described are--preparing
the clay, making different colored clays, stamping tiles, filling
color into moulds, “throwing,” “turning,” applying printed patterns.
It takes two of the double windows to display this, which brings us to
the fifteenth and last, in which there are four designs of the greatest
historical interest: Dr. Doddridge’s mother teaching her child Bible
history from the tiles in the fireplace; Dr. Samuel Johnson trying
experiments; figures of Josiah Wedgwood and Bentley, his partner;
Flaxman and Stothard, the painter. The two artists last named both
worked in decorating earthenware for Wedgwood. Flaxman was underpaid by
Wedgwood for the numerous models he supplied--models still used by the
firm. The poor artist has made the fortunes of three generations of his
employer’s family, whose present representatives are so liberal that
one must suppose their ancestor to have hardly realized the value of
the artist’s work until it was too late to reward him.
[Illustration: PALISSY, THE POTTER--WINDOW IN THE CERAMIC GALLERY.]
[Illustration: SÈVRES PORCELAIN VASE.--MODERN.]
[Illustration: HENRI DEUX CANDLESTICK.]
The visitor to the Ceramic Gallery in this museum will be apt to admit
that there were never windows that shed more light than these of the
kind required by a student. He will see lustres on the lustre-wares
beyond what mere sunlight can give, and the huge dragons, deer, and
horned birds on the Moresque-Spanish dishes will link the culture of
1882 with the barbaric mediæval mythology. He will, indeed, find at
every step that he is really exploring in this gallery of pots and
dishes strata marked all over with the vestiges of human and ethnical
development. Nothing can be more complete than the arrangement of the
gallery. Not only is it chronological, but beneath each particular
specimen a card tells when and where it was made, and the price paid
for it by the museum. If it has gone off with the floating collection,
the card reports that also. One may learn what changes have occurred
in the prices of such wares by finding Sèvres vases, for instance,
marked at £100 or £200, of a like character with those six for which
Lord Dudley recently paid £17,500. These are articles which, when first
collected, incited the first cabinet minister who inspected them to
ask, “What’s the use of all this trash?” There is a single candlestick
in this room now worth all the “trash” in that noble lord’s mansion. It
is a specimen of that famous “Henri Deux ware” of which only fifty-five
pieces exist, so far as is known. This elegant ware has been such a
puzzle to antiquarians that no fewer than thirteen different works
have been written about it. It was finally ascertained by M. Riocreux,
of the Imperial Ceramic Museum at Sèvres, that the pottery was made
at Oiron, in France; that two artists made it in the earlier part of
the sixteenth century for Henry II. and his queen, whose initials or
monograms are on several of the pieces; and the artists were François
Cherpentier and Jean Bernard. Cherpentier, the chief maker, had been
an architect, and when he set about working in earthen-ware he was
fond of moulding it in little monumental shapes, and filling in the
hollows with different colors. The candlestick has a pale yellow
ground, with arabesques, etc., in reddish-brown. The base is circular,
with projecting brackets, on which stand three boys holding shields
inscribed with the arms and cipher of Henri Deux. Above are three
terminal figures of satyrs. This work (which it is to be hoped will
some day be called by the artist’s name instead of the king’s) is less
than a foot high; it cost £750, and is one of the cheapest purchases
ever made. Seven of the fifty-five specimens of this ware are in the
collection of Sir Anthony de Rothschild, two in that of Baron Lionel
de Rothschild, two in that of Baron Gustave de Rothschild, three in
that of Baron Alphonse de Rothschild, while the Louvre has the same
number as the South Kensington Museum--five. Three very beautiful
specimens (candlestick, ewer, and large salt-cellar) were found some
years ago, very carefully wrapped in a blanket, placed in a wicker
clothes-basket, under a bed in a garret of Narford Hall. Our engraving
(p. 56) represents the candlestick so found. The pieces were no doubt
collected by Sir Andrew Fountaine in France, in the last century, and,
put away perhaps by some provident house-keeper, now turn up as a more
valuable bequest to the old connoisseur’s descendants than he could
have imagined, but which is rightly appreciated by the present owner
of the pieces, Mr. Andrew Fountaine. The other specimens of this Henri
Deux ware in this gallery are two tazzas, a plateau, and a wonderful
salt-cellar, of which last the skill of a pupil at South Kensington
enables me to give the linear design.
[Illustration: HENRI DEUX SALT-CELLAR.]
But it must not be supposed that this is merely an antiquarian
collection: the best work now going on all over the world is
represented, and one may see by the superb examples of modern
Berlin work and of Minton that England and Germany are engaged in a
competition for excellence which bids fair to distance anything done
in the past. What admirable work Minton can do may be estimated by the
embossed and tinted tiles surrounding the ten columns which support
the roof of this gallery. They reproduce the finest colors of the
Celadon porcelain of Sèvres. Around each column are letters forming
the names of the ten greatest potters--Vitalis (whose name was found
on a red vase of Samian-ware discovered in London in 1845), Giorgio
Andreoli, Luca della Robbia, Veit Hirschvogel of Nuremberg (1441-1525),
Xanto of Urbino (1547), Palissy (1510-89), François Cherpentier (maker
of the Henri Deux ware, otherwise called faïence d’Oiron), Böttcher
(1681-1719), Wedgwood (1730-95), and last, not least, Pousa, with
whom began the list of wondrous accidents with which the history and
traditions of pottery abound. Pousa is said to have been a workman in
the imperial porcelain factory of China. On one occasion the emperor
had ordered some great work, and Pousa tried long to produce it--in
vain. Finally, driven to despair, he plunged into the furnace. His
self-immolation caused such an effect upon the ware in the furnace
that it came out the most beautiful piece of porcelain ever known.
Pousa is now the patron saint of porcelain-workers in China, and is
kept near them in a little corpulent figure (porcelain), which is
familiar to many parts of the world where its story and sanctity are
unknown. The South Kensington Museum has carried out in its own case
this tradition of happy accidents, having been remarkable for its
good-luck. Some instances of it are in the Ceramic Gallery. Some years
ago a terrible explosion of gas occurred in the house of the famous art
collector and dealer, Mr. Gambart, at St. John’s Wood, by which the
house-maid was killed. M. Alma Tadema was a guest in the house, and
he had the presence of mind to open a window when he first perceived
that gas was escaping, by which means the disaster was mainly limited
to the dining-room. In this room were two large cabinets filled with
splendid specimens of Flemish “graybeards,” beakers, and similar wares,
and some of the best were smashed. As the fragments were about to be
cleared away, a friend of Mr. Gambart’s, who was also connected with
this museum, brought him an offer from the institution of £800 (as I
have heard; at any rate, a sum that was generous) for the collection,
broken and unbroken, and it was gratefully accepted. The skilled
workmen at the museum have put the bits together with such adroitness
that it requires a practised eye to distinguish the wares that
suffered. The magnificent reproduction of the Alhambra Vase by Baron
Davillier, elsewhere described, was exhibited at the Paris Exposition
of 1867, and an agent of the museum found it “going a-begging;” he
purchased it for far less than its actual value. And, indeed, I might
instance a vast number of similar cases not only in this particular
gallery--which we must now leave--but throughout the museum. The truth
is, the South Kensington Museum has shown that the present is the great
opportunity of museums, while it has done much to turn that tide on
whose flood it floated to fortune, by awakening nations to the value
of their treasures. The Oriental world, and, indeed, some portions
of Southern Europe, have hitherto been unconscious of the value of
their monuments, because only culture can prevent familiarity breeding
contempt. Miss Frances Power Cobbe once expressed in my hearing the
shock she received when, on first arriving at Old Alexandria, in Egypt,
she found her luggage set down on an ancient monument resembling
those treasured in the British Museum. How much the South Kensington
Museum has reaped from the indifference to objects whose value is not
intrinsic, and which for that reason are unique and inestimable, may
appear incidentally as I proceed to describe some of them, adding what
particulars I have been able to learn concerning their acquisition.
The little sixpenny guide-book sold at the door is necessarily
provisional; the historical and descriptive volume which such an
institution requires must remain a desideratum so long as the museum
itself is changing and growing daily before our eyes. But the materials
for that work exist; specialists have studied well the various
departments; there exist nearly twenty large Blue-books recording the
origin and growth of the museum; and when all these are sifted and
their connected story told--enriched, as we may hope it will be, from
the memories of those men who have founded and conducted the work to
its present condition--the history so told will be in itself a sort
of literary museum, replete with curiosities, picturesque incidents,
and romance. In this scattered condition of the facts I have had to
depend mainly on information given by the gentlemen just referred to,
and what scraps I could pick up in old newspaper files and Blue-books.
This it has appeared to me right to mention here, in explanation of any
slightness and unsatisfactoriness that may be found in the details, or
of the motley way in which they are put together.
If the history of this museum of civilization would record strange
instances of popular neglect for great works of art, it must at the
same time show that works of genius, in whatever perishable material
embodied, have a strange vitality. The Milonian Venus, twice buried
in the earth that she might not be harmed by the wrath of her Mars,
has had experiences hardly more significant than those through which
the sacred forms designed by Raphael--preserved by aid alike of king
and regicide, by aid, too, of the neglect which left them hidden for a
hundred years in lumber-rooms--have become the glorious inheritance of
South Kensington.
The seven cartoons--what would not now be paid for the three that are
lost![A]--were designed and drawn by the great artist and his scholars
at the request of Pope Leo X. (1513) as copies for tapestry, and the
tapestries made from them are now in the Vatican. They were made at
Arras, and the cartoons--so called because drawn on card-board--were
thrown into the warehouse there. Here they remained neglected until
they were seen by Rubens, who advised Charles I. to purchase them
for a tapestry establishment at Mortlake, near London. On the death
of the king, Oliver Cromwell paid £300 for them, intending that the
tapestry-works should be continued. On the fall of Cromwell they
were confiscated, and, for a second time, were thrust away into a
lumber-room, this time at Whitehall. Fortunately the designs were on
strips of paper twelve feet long, which could roll up, and so they
were able to survive such usage. The next time they attracted notice
was in the reign of William III., by whose order Sir Christopher Wren
prepared a room for them at Hampton Court. They were then carefully
lined with cloth. They were never removed again until placed in the
gallery prepared for them here, with the sometimes criticised and
certainly remarkable inscription beneath each, “Lent by the Queen.” The
last individual who clearly owned them was Oliver Cromwell, who paid
what was supposed a large sum (£300) for works which no amount could
purchase from the Protector’s true heir--the English Nation.
[Illustration: MICHAEL ANGELO’S EROS.]
The museum is especially rich in old Italian glass. Some of these
wine-glasses are nearly as light in weight as ordinary letter-paper,
and the iridescence is most wonderful. One of the oldest forms has on
it red Indian girls, dressed like Italian ballet-dancers of a very
early period. There is reason to believe that this piece of glass was
made soon after the discovery of America, when the enthusiasm about
the region which the great Genoese had discovered filled all Italy.
It is very plain that no portraits of the squaws could have reached
the countrymen of Columbus when these dancers were designed. Mr. G. W.
Cooke, Academician and landscape-painter, had in early life a studio
in Venice, and he had a way of picking up bits of old glass in the
shops, the keepers of which were often willing, for a few soldi, to
part with things now worth (in some cases literally) their weight in
gold. Afterward he had, I believe, a studio in Agerola, and there also
found beautiful Italian glass. He collected in this way enough to fill
three or four large cases. After they were collected a considerable
quantity of ancient Spanish glass was obtained, and the fact was
made apparent that the latter was in some cases an imitation of the
former--the reverse being probably the case with the majolica, in which
Italy would seem to have imitated the Hispano-Moresque “lustre-wares.”
It is possible that a transfer of art-initiative from Spain to Italy
may have been one of the first bad results of the banishment of the
Moors, whose exquisite works are now models for our finest architects.
With reference to the hypothesis that the theatrical squaws are to be
referred to the interest that followed the discovery of America, I may
mention that there are several curious instances in the museum where
dates have been approximately fixed by the treatment of subjects. One
notable example is a Japanese dish, on which is a rude but reverent
representation of the baptism of Christ. Although certainty cannot
be reached yet in the matter, it is possible that this dish was made
before the extermination of Christianity from Japan (1641). However,
it is known that before the discovery of kaolin in Europe the English
and Dutch used to send over to China designs to be put on wares that
were ordered. There are various pieces of china which are marked with
English coats of arms, and a clergyman in Somersetshire has three
pieces marked with scenes of the Passion. But I believe there is no
instance where any such work is known to be Japanese, and, indeed, the
latter had not formerly any great reputation in England.
There are eight magnificent Japanese bronzes in the museum, of which
one is a figure of the beatified Buddha. It is impossible to gaze upon
this grand figure (about fifteen feet high), seated with crossed legs,
and open hands lying one in the other, without being impressed by a
certain majesty in the ideal it represents, as well as astonished
at the largeness of the undertaking which has produced a bronze of
such size. The figure is seated, as it were, on the ground, and the
round, infantine fulness and health of the face and the closed eyes
render it probable that it was meant to represent the supreme moment
when Sakya Muni attained, through humility and meditation, that sacred
Buddhahood (enlightenment) which he had vainly sought by practising
the severe asceticisms which the Brahmins enjoined upon him. “He met a
certain Brahmin,” says the Siamese version, “named Sotiya, and from him
accepted eight handfuls of long grass. The Master spread the grass on
the ground to the east of the Bo-tree, and sat thereon, and the grass
became a jewelled throne. The Lord, with well-steadied mind, turned
his whole thought to attain through purity and love the exaltation
of knowledge. And around him gathered the angels of many worlds
with fragrant offerings, and the strains of their celestial concert
resounded in the most distant universe.”
It is interesting to observe the strong impression made upon the casual
visitors by this face so sweetly serene, so free from the lines which
care and ambition trace upon the European face. I heard a little girl
of thirteen years say, after her silent gaze, “How I would like to
climb up and sit in his lap! Perhaps I would get some of his goodness.”
How many little ones of the East have felt the same as they looked upon
this face of perfect holiness!
The history of some of the other bronzes is as follows: An English
sea-captain saw three large bells, each seven or eight feet high, about
to be taken on a Japanese ship for ballast. He saw that they were of
antique and curious design, and was told that they had belonged to
a temple that had been destroyed. The Japanese seamen gladly parted
with them for a small sum, and told him of similar things near by.
These, which were two bronze vessels something like huge candlesticks,
each four and a half feet high--probably meant to support large masts
for flags--he found lying amidst rubbish of old metal. These noble
bronzes are elegantly modelled with dragon ornaments, and indicate a
development of skill in this direction which has never been equalled in
Europe. Besides these there are two large incense-burners eight feet
high, and wonderfully wrought with beautiful decorative and symbolical
forms.
[Illustration: MARBLE CANTORIA. BY BACCIO D’AGNOLO.]
But the indifference of the Japanese to their ancient relics is
paralleled by that which prevailed in the cathedral at Bois-le-Duc,
Holland, a few years ago, and led to the transfer to this museum of
one of the finest specimens of the French Renaissance that now exist.
In the rage for repairs the authorities of the cathedral pulled
down this, its magnificent rood-loft--which is marked 1623, and
consists of the finest colored marbles and many perfectly sculptured
statues--and substituted for it a conventional Gothic structure. This
great rood-loft--it covers one whole wall, sixty feet in width, and is
from thirty to forty feet high--was actually carted out in pieces as
rubbish, and lay in a corner of the cathedral yard, when some English
tourist, attracted by the beauty of one of the statues, made a small
offer for it, and finally purchased the entire structure for a few
pounds. Finding some difficulty in carrying it off, the tourist wrote
to the directors of the museum about it, and was overjoyed when they
agreed to purchase it for a thousand pounds. The museum was no less
happy in securing for a tithe of its value this unique and admirable
work, which is without damage of any kind, and stands in the New Court
just as it did in the cathedral which was unable to appreciate its
finest treasure. When the Queen of Holland recently visited the Museum,
she was not a little disgusted when she came to this rood-loft and
heard its history.
[Illustration: TABERNACLE. ANDREA FERRUCCI.]
[Illustration: ALTAR-PIECE--THE VIRGIN WITH THE INFANT
SAVIOUR.--ENAMELLED TERRA-COTTA, OR DELLA ROBBIA, IN HIGH RELIEF.--BY
ANDREA DELLA ROBBIA.]
Most of the “finds” by which the collection of ecclesiastical
architecture has been enriched have been made in Italy. One of the most
valuable of these is a Florentine “Cantoria,” which has been affixed
to the wall over the lower door-way of the North Court, and thus
supplying promenaders in the corridor above with a little balcony from
which the contents of the great room below may be best seen. This
singing-gallery was the work of Baccio d’Agnolo, and was set up in the
Church of Santa Maria Novella, in Florence, about the year 1500.
In the neighborhood of the same city, namely, at Fiesole, the Church of
San Girolamo was found willing, for small sums, to despoil itself of
two fine examples of its own great artist (1490), Andrea di Fiesole,
otherwise Ferrucci, and two works of the artist, not without honor
save in his own country--an altar-piece and a tabernacle--grace an
arcade of this museum. But the most precious possessions of this
character are the specimens of Della Robbia ware, of which this museum
has more than fifty examples. There were two men who gave this ware
its name--Luca and Andrea, uncle and nephew--and their work is almost
equally excellent. One of the pieces is a large terra-cotta medallion,
eleven feet in diameter, bearing the arms and emblems of King René of
Anjou, which was fixed in an exterior wall near Florence about fifty
years before America was discovered, and, after undergoing the weather
of over four centuries, its colors are as brilliant and its finest
mouldings as clear as if it had been made this year. An altar-piece,
probably by Andrea della Robbia, representing the Adoration of the
Magi, is certainly one of the finest works of art, pictorially as
well as in modelling, that have come to us from the era in which he
lived. There are some twenty figures in relief, and each face has
its own physiognomical distinctiveness, each head its phrenological
peculiarities, all as carefully portrayed as if Lavater and Spurzheim
had watched over the work. A figure of the Virgin and Child, with an
arched border of fruit and flowers, presents us with an expression
which could only be conveyed fully if the matchless colors could be
transferred to my page, but which entitles it to be classed among those
great Madonnas of art history which have influenced civilization.
[Illustration: HERCULES, THE DUKE OF FERRARA.]
The most conspicuous object in the North Court is the reproduction by
Mr. Franchi of a pulpit erected in the cathedral at Pisa by Giovanni
Pisano in 1302-11. A fire occurred in the cathedral in 1596 by which
this great work was damaged, and the panels--carvings in relief of
Scripture subjects--were deposited in the crypt; other parts of the
pulpit were removed to the arcades of the Campo Santo, and some others
incorporated in the new pulpit of the cathedral. Some ten years ago Mr.
Franchi, of whose wonderful skill the museum contains many evidences,
obtained from the cathedral authorities permission to take casts of
all these scattered parts of Pisano’s greatest work, and having done
so, he put them together; and now, more than two centuries and a half
after the structure vanished from Pisa, it has been set up at South
Kensington. The reproduction has been so perfect--even to the toning
of the marble (as it seems to be) by age--that no one could imagine it
to be a reproduction. And it was certainly worthy of all this care.
The supports of the circular tribune are groups of statues--Fortitude,
holding a lion by the tail, head downward; Prudence, with compass and
cornucopia; Justice, with scales; Charity, nursing twins; Temperantia,
who, oddly enough, is quite nude and in the Medicean attitude; and the
Evangelists. The statues, two-thirds the size of life, are grouped
around eight columns, which they nearly conceal. At the top of these
the tribune is enclosed by seven large panels, in which are finely
carved the Nativity, the Adoration of the Wise Men, the Presentation
in the Temple, the Massacre of the Innocents, the Betrayal, the
Crucifixion, the Resurrection. This noble work justifies the ancient
fame of Pisa as the home of sculpture.
The museum is particularly rich in Michael Angelos, considering that it
has had to glean after the Glyptothek of Munich, the Vatican, and the
Louvre. It possesses the beautiful Eros (see page 62) executed in the
great sculptor’s twenty-fourth year (1497), also his statuette of St.
Sebastian, unfinished, and showing the last touches of his chisel--as,
without the intervening appliances of modern sculpture, he carved his
idea directly on the marble. There is a female bust ascribed to him,
and another work in which he participated, which is quite unique: this
is a case of small models in wax and terra-cotta, of which twelve are
by Michael Angelo. This case was for a long time in the Gherardini
family, and was purchased by a Parliamentary grant in 1854 for the sum
of £2110. One of these little models is that of the slave. Buonarotti’s
two slaves or prisoners, the originals of which are in the Louvre,
are here in good copies, the one exhibiting the physical suffering of
the fettered man, the other the mental anguish of bondage. There are
also admirable casts of other works by the same artist, the finest
being the colossal figure of David, which stands in the new Tribune at
Florence. This copy was presented to the museum by the late Grand-Duke
of Tuscany, and is one of the many excellent fruits which have been
gathered from the international league which European princes have
entered into for the purpose of exchanging works of this character,
and reciprocally aiding in the work of enriching the museums which
constitute so important a feature of modern civilization. It is a happy
characteristic of this museum that one meets in it very few objects
whose interest or beauty is marred by association with war. The spoils
are few, the tokens of friendship with foreign nations innumerable.
Some pieces of work in gold brought back from Abyssinia and from the
kingdom of Ashantee--the latter close to the famous umbrella of King
Koffee--were exhibited, and a few of them remain here to show by their
exquisite chasing that blows aimed at so-called savages are likely to
fall upon the springing germs of civilization. The poorly designed but
wonderfully chased and jewelled symbols of Theodore excited general
admiration. The bird that was perched on the top of King Koffee’s
state chair is also of fine workmanship. It is rude in design, truly;
but it is hardly ruder than the gold dove, the ampulla which holds
the oil used at English coronations; and perhaps, like the latter, it
purposely imitated a primitive and consecrated form. These African
trophies are unpleasantly suggestive of the worst phase of British
policy, or impolicy; but they are slight incidents in a museum which
will forever be considered the ripest fruit of the long Victorian and
victorious era of Peace.
[Illustration: ASHANTEE RELICS.]
[Illustration: THE CELLINI SARDONYX EWER, MOUNTED IN ENAMELLED GOLD,
AND SET WITH GEMS--ITALIAN. SIXTEENTH CENTURY.]
It is quite impossible for me to invite my reader to an exploration
of the loan collections. Some of the ancient jewellery and gold work
which has been, or is, shown here is not only intrinsically priceless
and beautiful, but also historical, _e.g._, the Mexican sun-opal; the
largest known aqua-marine, set as a sword-hilt, formerly belonging
to the King of Naples (Joachim Murat); a cat’s-eye (largest known),
formerly belonging to King Candy; a piece of amber in which is a small
fish--all of which have been loaned by Beresford Hope, M.P. But the
great treasure belonging to this gentleman, and long exhibited here,
was the famous Cellini ewer. Previous to the great Revolution, it was
part of the crown-jewels of France, and Mr. Hope has recently sold it
to a collector in that country. This matchless work is ten and a half
inches in height; the body is formed of two convex pieces of carved
sardonyx, with a similar piece for pedestal; the handle and spout are
of gold, covered with masks and figures richly enamelled, and set with
rubies and diamonds. In place of this fragment of old French royalty,
which the explosion sent flying and the Republic has lured back, is
the brilliant gold missal case of Henrietta Maria. Some of the most
beautiful specimens of ancient _repoussé_ gold work and enamels were,
until recently, in a case made up chiefly from the collection of Mr.
Gladstone, whose fondness for things of this kind, though rather
indiscriminate, has done something to popularize the taste for them. In
a recent Christmas satire, “The Fijiad,” the Prime Minister has been
portrayed rather cleverly in his right environment:
“Great Homer’s bust upon the table stood--
Homer much talked of, little understood;
Around the bust were ranged, with curious care,
Gems of old Dresden or of Chelsea ware,
Cracked teapots, marvels of ceramic art,
Choice Faïence and Palissy set apart;
For great Gladisseus, warrior of renown,
For plates and pottery ransacked the town.
Made dowagers and virtuosi stare,
Collectors, jealous, tear their scanty hair.”
When the Gladstone collection was brought to the hammer, it did not
require many hours for the same cases to be refilled with objects quite
as beautiful from the large accumulation which the museum always has on
hand or obtainable in excess of its present room for their exhibition.
It is rather droll, however, to find one of Mr. Gladstone’s specimens
of sacred art replaced by a wonderful racing prize, a silver cup three
feet high, representing the “Birth of the Horse.” The winged steed
is rampant on top, while the gods and goddesses of Olympus gather
around it in homage. It is modern English work, and would do for an
allegorical representation of the august divinities of Parliament
adjourning to honor the American winged winner of the Derby in 1881.
[Illustration: CHÂSSE, OR RELIQUARY--LIMOGES ENAMEL. THIRTEENTH
CENTURY.]
One of the most important loan exhibitions ever opened at the museum
was completed at the end of May, 1881. It consists of Spanish and
Portuguese ornamental art. On my way to visit this exhibition I read
in a daily paper the invitation extended by the present King of Spain
to the Jews of Russia to take refuge from their persecutions in the
Peninsula from which they were so cruelly expelled three hundred
and eighty-nine years ago. The first object which met my eye in the
exhibition was traced with the spirit which led to that inhuman decree.
It is a large altar-piece, or retable, painted in distemper on panel,
in seventeen Gothic compartments, the subjects being from the legend
of St. George. It is of wood, twenty-two feet in height, sixteen feet
in width, and is from a destroyed church in Valencia. One of the three
centre compartments represents James I. of Aragon rescued by St. George
in battle against the Moors. At the bottom there are ten compartments
painted with subjects from the life of Christ. In these pictures the
figures and faces of the Jews have been carefully mutilated. Jesus and
his disciples remain to prove how beautifully the artist had done his
work; the hacked and scratched figures around them remain to attest
that in the fifteenth century, to which the work belongs, fanaticism
was strong enough in Spain to invade the altar and destroy the most
beautiful works by which Art was seeking to soften human ferocity.
In one of the panels Jesus, with a face of utmost benignity, is
represented receiving the kiss of Judas on his left cheek, and at the
same time extending his right hand to touch the ear of Malchus. This
servant of Caiaphas would seem, from so much of him as is left, to be
in a half-kneeling posture. Peter, with angry face, holds over Malchus
his short sword. One may see here the spirit of fanaticism making its
choice between the gentle healer of wounds and the fierce inflicter
of them. Upon this stony hatred the Inquisition built its church. The
knife which hewed and hacked the Jewish figures of these once beautiful
panels was presently mutilating the Spanish Jews themselves. In 1492
the greatness and littleness of Spain culminated together: by the
nobility of Isabella, Columbus was enabled to discover America; by the
meanness of Ferdinand, the Jews and the Moors were driven out of Spain
with every circumstance of inhumanity.
And now King Alfonso wants them back. There was once an Alfonso who
thought he could have suggested a better world than this, if the
Creator had consulted him; the present Alfonso will not be censured for
thinking he could have created a better Spain than was fashioned by the
Inquisitors. One need only look around upon this wonderful collection
of Spanish objects of art to see that it was Spain’s self as much as
Jews or Moors that the sword of fanaticism mutilated and disfigured.
Here is the splendid _débris_ of arts which Moorish genius and Jewish
wealth combined to render possible. From the time of their expulsion
Spanish art suffered a progressive decline. Dark and symbolical seems
the purple velvet banner of the “Holy Office” sent here by Madrid,
where it used to be carried in procession to every _auto-da-fé_. On it
embroidered angels hold the instruments of Christ’s suffering, which
Inquisitors turned upon humanity, and the inscription is, “Clamaus
voce magna emissit spiritum.” The color of this strange banner is that
of blood grown darker with time. It came from the side of crucified
humanity. But it was Spain that breathed out its spirit, now loudly
recalled.
Of the Moresque porcelain I have already spoken in pages of this work
written before the Loan Exhibition was opened. Suffice it to say that
there are here the best specimens of that lustre-ware in existence.
“During the sixteenth century,” says Senor Riaño, “the Spaniards
did nothing but imitate what was done in other countries.”[B] In
the seventeenth century, when a Spanish pictorial art was born with
Velasquez, Murillo, and Zurbaran, it was reflected in some of the
wood-carvings, notably in those of Alonso Cano. The most artistic piece
of such work at South Kensington is a statue of St. Francis of Assisi
by that artist; it is carved in walnut, and exquisitely painted. Lady
Charlotte Schreiber has loaned a remarkable circular jewel, sixteenth
century, of which there is a legend. When Charles V. was visiting the
northern towns of his paternal duchy, a Frisian gentleman, Governor of
Harlingen, named Humalda, warned him against embarking on the Zuyder
Zee with some troops he was despatching to the opposite shore. The
emperor reluctantly yielded; the tempest Humalda predicted arose, and
every man was lost. Charles said to Humalda, “Thou art my Star of the
Sea” (_sternsee_); and afterward had this jewel made for the Frisian,
who thenceforth assumed the name Sternsee, borne by his descendants.
The jewel represents Charles V. standing on a star-spangled orb, rocked
by the Devil from below, and at the sides figures of Death and War. The
inscription around it is, “Carolus V. Sternsee. In te Domine speravi.”
Many of the inscriptions found upon Spanish ornamental works were
in Cufic characters even after the banishment of the Moors. The
workmen seemed to realize the value of letters which made beautiful
fringes while they conveyed meanings. But it is only in ancient
Hispano-Moresque carvings that the Cufic inscriptions are found in
their perfection. An ivory casket, eleventh century, is covered with
deeply-cut figures of conventional birds and animals, and around the
margin of the lid is a Cufic inscription saying, “In the name of God.
The blessing of God, happiness, prosperity, good-fortune, perfect
health and peace of mind, perpetual pleasures and delight to the owner
of this casket.” Another ivory box has round its dome-shaped cover, “I
display the fairest of sights. Beauty has cast upon me a robe bright
with gems. Behold in me a vessel for musk, for camphor, and ambergris.”
On the opposite side of the hall, facing the altar-picture of the
disfigured Jews, is a great reredos from the high altar of the
cathedral of Ciudad Rodrigo. It was painted about twelve years before
the discovery of America, it is believed, by Fernando Gallegos,
greatest Spanish painter of that century, and three assistants. This
picture also has traces of disfigurement which have their story to
tell. It is owned by Mr. J. C. Robinson, to whose explorations of Spain
and enthusiasm for antiquarian art this fine exhibition is mainly due.
Mr. Robinson’s account of this picture shows that its injuries came by
English guns, in 1811, during the Peninsular War. The cathedral stands
near the fortress of Ciudad Rodrigo, and the English shot traversed it
from end to end. The grand reredos was so injured that a new one was
erected. Twenty-nine of the panels, though in some cases perforated,
were preserved separately in a corridor of the chapter-house. In 1879
they were sold to a local dealer, who forwarded them to Madrid, whence
they were brought to this country. In some of the panels the faces
and costumes are Moorish. It is still a magnificent work, and must
originally have been over fifty feet high, by twenty-five in width.
Its panels, beginning with Chaos and the Creation of Eve, pass at once
to the life and Passion of Christ. It is likely that this monument of
so many eras, thus curiously brought to the country which marred it,
will not be followed by many similar treasures. The Spaniards have
lately learned the value of such things. The Spanish collection made
at South Kensington by Mr. Robinson, for a long time superintendent of
the art-collections, chiefly led to the formation of the Archæological
Museum at Madrid. When Mr. Robinson began his visits to Spain (about
1862) things were in a fair condition for foreign collectors. “At the
period in question,” he says, “railways had scarcely yet made their
appearance in the Peninsula, photography was almost unknown, and
the country was not overrun by the professional dealers, native and
foreign, who have since ransacked every nook and corner of the land.
On the other hand, in these comparatively early days of the collecting
furore, facilities for the discovery and purchase of specimens were
few, and the work of acquisition slow and difficult. A few brokers
and silversmiths alone occupied themselves casually in the commerce
of antiquities in Madrid, Lisbon, and one or two other of the chief
cities. Neglect and destruction were still the rule. Ancient things,
once out of use, if their materials had any intrinsic value, were
forthwith demolished and utilized. The fine enamelled jewels of the
sixteenth century were often broken up for the stones and the gold.
The most admirable works in silver were currently consigned to the
smelting-pot; the splendid iron ‘rejas’ were converted into mules’
and asses’ shoes; and the gorgeous carved and gilded wood-work of
dismantled churches and convents burnt for the sake of the bullion
to be derived from the rich gilding on its surface.” This is now
all changed, and the Peninsula boasts its band of dealers as well
organized as any in Europe; nor is it behindhand in their shadows--the
fabricators of fraudulent specimens of the kinds most in request.
The visitor to South Kensington should bear in mind that there may
be Loan Exhibitions in some of the adjacent buildings of a highly
important character. As I write there is a collection on exhibition
which will well repay a visitor for the exploration required to reach
it, for it has had to find rooms on the west side of the Gardens: this
is the anthropological collection gathered by General Pitt Rivers,
who, before he became heir of the late Lord Rivers, had made the
name of Lane Fox so noble in the scientific world that one almost
regrets that his good-fortune, in which all rejoice, involved a change
of name. In this collection the evolution of savage and barbarian
weapons, ornaments, utensils, and the like may be studied. General
Pitt Rivers has arranged boomerangs in series, so that the completest
form may be traced back to the first slightly curved stick found to
carry some increase of force. The development of a shield from a mere
stick grasped in the hand, next with a protection for the hand, may
be traced. There is a series of paddles upon which may be followed a
human form, degraded from one surface to another, until a grotesque
conventional figure appears on the last without a trace of human
semblance. The ornamental marks on the bodies of pots are found in
some instances to have been suggested by the net-work print left by
their corded holders. These are but a few instances of the way in which
objects are made by a man of science to tell their own history. Among
the articles which have received the attention of General Pitt Rivers
are the caps worn by the women of Brittany, and a few supplementary
cases of these have been added to his wonderful collection. An
examination of these caps--which are considered of so much importance
that a woman is not allowed to enter church without one, nor with one
of a pattern belonging to another parish--shows good reason for the
supposition that their sanctity is derived from their having been all
developed from the head-dress of the nun. Such is the opinion that
General Pitt Rivers expressed when he conducted me through his rooms.
He showed me that each cap has parts which correspond to parts of the
normal cap of the nun. These parts have grown small in some cases; in
others they are pinned up; but in the latter case they are let down on
important occasions--funerals and weddings--and the wearers are then
all nun-like.
These little French things, however, are hardly to be included in this
great collection--perhaps the most important private collection of
objects illustrative of anthropology in the world. Nor is there any
book more useful to the student of anthropology than the illustrated
and explanatory catalogue of 1847 of these objects prepared by General
Pitt Rivers, and published by the Science and Art Department.[C]
[Illustration: PASTORAL STAVES--IVORY AND ENAMEL. FOURTEENTH CENTURY.]
Various public men sent their treasures to the museum in its earlier
days, when they were more needed than now; but it has been found
necessary to select fastidiously from the too numerous articles
offered every year as loans. Many families owning valuable collections
find it difficult to keep them in perfect safety, and more begin to
realize that such articles should not be of private advantage. Some
collections, originally received as loans, it is pretty certain will
never be removed; and I am assured by the director that the museum has
been notified of being remembered in many wills. This gentleman, Sir
Philip Cunliffe Owen, and his predecessor, Sir Henry Cole, said to me,
in conversation about the prospect of building museums in the American
cities, that they had no doubt such institutions, if good and safe
buildings were erected, would there as well as here find themselves
centres of gravitation for the art treasures and curiosities owned by
the community around them. This museum, though hardly out of its teens,
has received seven great collections, worth collectively more than two
million dollars; thirteen bequests, worth over half a million dollars;
and a large number of donations whose aggregate money value is very
great, though not yet estimated. Among the more important donations
sixteen have been from the Queen, nineteen from the late Prince
Consort, three from Napoleon III. (very valuable too--Raphael’s “Holy
Family,” in Gobelin tapestry; four pieces of Beauvais tapestry, and a
collection of 4854 engravings from the Louvre), three from the Emperor
of Russia, and thirty Egyptian musical instruments from the Khedive.
Thirty-one donations, including, of course, a much larger number of
objects, have been received from twenty-eight governments. In this list
Japan (two), Würtemberg (two), and the United States (three) are the
only governments which appear more than once; but I am sorry to say the
presents of the American Republic are limited to department reports,
the last being one from the War Department on gunshot wounds. Twenty
European museums have sent valuable gifts to this youngest member of
their family. Among private individuals, other than the donors of
collections, Sir Henry Cole, K.C.B., father of the museum, and his
family, are represented by twenty-eight valuable gifts--gifts, however,
which are little compared with the enthusiasm and intelligence they
lavished on the institution they saw planted as a seed, and may now
from their windows behold grown to its present large proportions.
Among the numerous gifts and bequests which the museum has received
during the past twenty years the following are the most important:
In 1857. By John Sheepshanks, Esq., 233 oil paintings, 289
water-color paintings, etchings, and other drawings. (Gift.) Mr.
Sheepshanks died in 1863.
In 1860 and in 1873. By Mrs. Elizabeth Ellison, 100 water-color
drawings. (Acting in the spirit of the intention of her late
husband, Richard Ellison, Esq., of Sudbrook House, Lincolnshire.)
For the purpose of forming a National Collection of Watercolor
Drawings. (Gift.)
In 1864. By Rev. R. Brooke, 396 objects, consisting of textiles,
watches, rings, etc., and 718 volumes of books. (Gift.)
In 1867. By Mrs. Wollaston, 270 drawings of mosaics. (Gift.)
In 1867. By W. Minshull Bigg, Esq., 3 works in marble by Lough:
“Puck,” “The Melancholy Jaques,” “Titania.” (Bequest.)
In 1867 and 1868. By Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke, Bart., M.P.,
297 volumes, 862 pamphlets, and 155 prints illustrating the Great
Exhibition, 1851. (Gift.) Died in 1869.
In 1868. By Mrs. Louisa Plumley, 43 enamel paintings by Essex,
Bone, etc. (Bequest.)
In 1868. By Professor Ella, 329 volumes of music, printed and in
MS.; 6 busts, 1 oil painting (a portrait of Rossini). From the
Library of the Musical Union Institute. (Gift.)
In 1868. By Rev. Chauncy Hare Townshend, 211 objects, chiefly
jewels, 189 oil paintings, 174 water-color paintings, 4218 Swiss
coins, 831 volumes, 390 drawings, 1815 prints. (Bequest.)
In 1869. By Rev. Alexander Dyce, 80 pictures, 63 miniatures, 802
drawings. 1511 prints, 74 rings, 27 art objects, 13,596 books.
(Bequest.)
In 1870. By William Gibbs, Esq., Roman and Anglo-Saxon ornaments
and other antiquities, chiefly found in Kent. (Bequest.)
In 1870. By Alfred Davis, Esq., a collection of coral. (Bequest.)
In 1870. By John Meeson Parsons, Esq., a collection of 92 oil and
47 water-color paintings. (Bequest.)
In 1871. By C. T. Maud, Esq., 6 oil paintings of the English
School. (Gift.)
In 1871. By W. S. Louch, Esq., 2 oil paintings, 2 water-colors,
etc. (Bequest.)
In 1871. By W. Smith, Esq., 86 early English water-color drawings.
(Gift.)
In 1872. By Thomas Millard, Esq., 197 gold and silver coins,
chiefly English. (Bequest.)
In 1872. By Mr. Tatlock, 15 drawings and paintings by De Wint, and
by Hilton. (Gift.)
In 1872. By Lady Walmsley, 13 oil paintings. (Gift.)
In 1873. By C. T. Maud. Esq., 11 water-color-drawings. (Gift.)
In 1874. By Alexander Barker, Esq., Venetian furniture of a
boudoir. (Bequest.)
In 1875. By Assimon, Delavigne, et Cie, a collection of French
lace. (Gift.)
In 1875. By Mrs. A. Nadporojsky, a collection of Russian lace.
(Gift.)
In 1876. By John Forster, Esq., 48 oil paintings, 74 frames of
water-color paintings and drawings, collections of drawings,
sketches, and engravings; collection of manuscripts and
autographs, library of printed and illustrated books.
In 1876. By Sir M. Digby and Lady Wyatt, 148 fans. (Gift.)
In 1876. By William Smith, Esq., 136 water-color drawings, and
also 700 volumes.
In 1882. By John Jones, Esq., pictures and virtu amounting to
£240,000. (Bequest.)
For the purpose of industrial and art education, the museum has
found the perfect casts and reproductions that can now be made not
inferior in value to original works. In this respect the international
convention, to which reference has already been made, has been of
immense advantage. As one of the signs of better times, to be set
against standing armies, the agreement deserves insertion in any
account of this museum. It was entered into during the Paris Exposition
of 1867, and in the following year communicated by the Prince of Wales
to the Lord President of the Council:
CONVENTION FOR PROMOTING UNIVERSAL REPRODUCTIONS OF WORKS OF
ART FOR THE BENEFIT OF MUSEUMS OF ALL COUNTRIES.
Throughout the world every country possesses fine historical
monuments of art of its own, which can easily be reproduced by
casts, electrotypes, photographs, and other processes, without the
slightest damage to the originals.
(_a_). The knowledge of such monuments is necessary to the
progress of art, and the reproductions of them would be of a high
value to all museums for public instruction.
(_b_). The commencement of a system of reproducing works of art
has been made by the South Kensington Museum, and illustrations
of it are now exhibited in the British section of the Paris
Exhibition, where may be seen specimens of French, Italian,
Spanish, Portuguese, German, Swiss, Russian, Hindoo, Celtic, and
English art.
(_c_). The following outline of operations is suggested:
I. Each country to form its own commission, according to its own
views, for obtaining such reproductions as it may desire for its
own museums.
II. The commissions of each country to correspond with one
another, and send information of what reproductions each causes to
be made, so that every country, if disposed, may take advantage of
the labors of other countries at a moderate cost.
III. Each country to arrange for making exchanges for objects
which it desires.
IV. In order to promote the formation of the proposed commissions
in each country, and facilitate the making of reproductions, the
undersigned members of the reigning families throughout Europe,
meeting at the Paris Exhibition of 1867, have signified their
approval of the plan, and their desire to promote the realization
of it.
The following Princes have already signed this convention:
Great Britain and Ireland { Albert Edward, Prince of Wales.
{ Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh.
Prussia Frederick William, Crown Prince of Prussia.
Hesse Louis, Prince of Hesse.
Saxony Albert, Prince Royal of Saxony.
France Prince Napoleon (Jerome).
Belgium Philippe, Comte de Flandre.
Russia The Czarowitz.
” Nicolas, Duc de Leuchtenberg.
Sweden and Norway Oscar, Prince of Sweden and Norway.
Italy Humbert, Prince Royal of Italy.
” Amadeus, Duke of Aosta.
Austria { Charles Louis, Archduke of Austria.
{ Rainer, Archduke of Austria.
Denmark Frederick, Crown Prince of Denmark.
PARIS, 1867.
[Illustration: ELKINGTON’S MARK.]
[Illustration: FRANCHI AND SON’S MARK.]
Cincinnati is already sharing these reproductions; and the signers of
the above document would gladly have the Governors of the American
States which possess museums add to it their names, and transatlantic
museums avail themselves of its advantages. These advantages are
very great, as, after one cast has been made, the cost of the rest
amounts to little more than that of material and transportation. This
kind of work is now done in such perfection that it were easy for an
untrained eye to doubt which is original and which reproduction. The
firms officially connected with the Science and Art Department always
use marks which have a money value in Europe. For three or four pounds
any museum or private collector may obtain perfect copies of ancient
shields, salt-cellars, tankards, tazzas, fire-dogs, knockers, whether
chased or _repoussé_. Old specimens of this kind are rare and costly.
A beautiful pair of bronze fire-dogs --pedestals surrounded by Cupids,
and supporting respectively Venus and Adonis--made in Venice about
1570, are rather costly, the work being intricate and the figures four
feet high; but Franchi’s copper-bronze copies at £30 are nearly as good
as the originals, which were considered cheap at the £300 paid by the
museum. A wonderful old Italian bronze knocker (1560), fourteen and
a half inches in height and thirteen inches wide, which cost £80, is
reproduced by the same firm for £4.
It is, however, the large casts of Oriental objects and ancient German
shrines that will probably be of paramount interest to an American.
It is here shown that the most notable and interesting objects in the
world can be copied with the utmost exactness, and in their actual
size, and brought within reach of the people of any country. Even
Trajan’s Column is here; and, though in this case it has had to be
set up in two columns instead of one, many others have confirmed my
experience of the impossibility in tracing out at Rome the figures
which cover it so satisfactorily as they can be made out at South
Kensington.
The 17th of May, 1880, is an historic day in the annals of the museum.
On that day was thrown open to the public its Indian section. A small
collection of Indian curiosities has long been wandering from one place
to another in London, and had finally been shelved at the very top of
the India Office. So, at any rate, it was stated, and most persons
were willing to accept the statement on faith by the time they reached
the third story of that edifice. However, the collection steadily
increased up there, and it was at length removed to some rooms at South
Kensington. But there it attracted little attention from the public,
though much from scholars, and it was publicly announced that it would
be closed because it did not pay expenses. The authorities ultimately
followed better counsels: they gave it up to the Direction of the South
Kensington Museum. The Queen loaned it the magnificent collection of
Oriental armor from Windsor Castle; Indian treasures hitherto dispersed
through the other courts of the museum were gathered together in the
new section; Dr. Leitner’s collection of Græco-Buddhist sculptures was
added; the walls adorned with Carpenter’s water-colors illustrative of
Indian scenery and life; and lo! London awaked one morning to find that
it had a new and splendid institution, which the Queen and her family
had visited the day before with “the greatest satisfaction.”
It is indeed a noble section; and if any one has read about India,
is at all interested in its pantheon, its mythology, or its relation
to the evolution of humanity, he may pass many fruitful days or even
weeks in these wonderful rooms. There is no university in the world
where one can learn so much about India, especially if he should
study these objects in connection with Fergusson’s _History of Indian
and Eastern Architecture_. Immediately on entering, one passes those
strange remains brought by Dr. Leitner from Peshawar, which exhibit the
influence of Greek art upon India at the time when Buddhism was there
in its zenith of power. Next we pass beneath the model of the great
Sanchi Tope Gate. The Buddhist Tope is a sort of mound or barrow, only
built of earth and stone with great care; it is shaped like a regular
dome, surrounded by a double railing, and is reached through four
large gates of the finest and most elaborate carvings. This hill-like
dome, wherever found, appears to have no other use than to contain
some tiny relic--one of Buddha’s hairs, say, or his toe-nail. In the
_Mahawanso_, the Buddhist history of Ceylon, it is said: “The chief of
the Devos, Sumano, supplicated of the deity worthy of offerings for an
offering. The Vanquisher, passing his hand over his head, bestowed on
him a handful of his pure blue locks from the growing hair of his head.
Receiving and depositing it in a superb golden casket, on the spot
where the divine teacher had stood, he enshrined the lock in an emerald
dagoba, and bowed down in worship.” The thorax-bone of Buddha is a
great relic; but most sacred of all is his left canine tooth, whose
shrine probably originated the famous Car of Juggernaut. Among the
treasures in this section is a drum-shaped reliquary of pure gold; it
is about three inches high by two in diameter, and panelled with saints
in relief. It was found in one of these huge topes; inside it were
wrappings within wrappings, and last of all some hardly distinguishable
speck representing an unknown saint.
The model of the great gate is probably the largest achievement of the
copying art ever known. In 1869 the party set out with twenty-eight
tons of materials, chiefly plaster-of-Paris; these were drawn by
bullocks one hundred and eighty miles; and in a year’s time three
full-sized casts of the magnificent structure were completed without
a flaw--which is marvellous, considering the extremely fine and
complicated character of the carvings. This structure, erected in the
first century of our era, is thirty-three feet in height. There are two
high pillars--every inch of whose surfaces is covered with symbolical
carvings--supporting capitals made of elephant-heads--the elephant
being the animal in whose shape Buddha descended for his incarnation.
Above the elephants three cross-beams are stretched, upholding
pinnacles bearing the phallic Trisul, the Wheel, the Lion. There are
winged lions that remind us of Assyrian influence; there are sieges
and wars (no doubt about the relics); scenes relating to the princely
and amorous years of Siddharta, but nothing of his asceticism or his
lowliness; everywhere symbolical forms, especially the serpent, which
is always intertwined with the emblems of early Buddhism, indicating
that his first converts were the serpent-worshippers called Nagas. The
intricacy and fineness of all this work, constituting, as Fergusson has
said, the “picture Bible of Buddhism,” are indescribable.
Throughout this Indian section there are large photographs
of the temples and palaces representing the eras of Indian
architecture--Buddhist, Dravidian, Jain, Moslem--and near many of
them actual specimens or casts of their ornamentation. Some of these
specimens of sculptured ornamentation fill one with amazement at the
degree of art-culture they imply, and by their refined beauty. Here the
capital of a pillar is fringed round with small elephant-heads; there
a pedestal is adorned with mounted horsemen in relief, so regularly
dispersed that at first they might hardly be noticed. There are some
architraves from Rajpootna, of the eleventh century, made up of gods,
goddesses, and symbolic forms, the tracery of which is so refined and
the execution so delicate that it would be impossible to find any
European work of like antiquity to equal it. These arts are still
kept up. There are some screens from Mirzapore and from Agra, made of
perforated sandstone or marble, which are meant for ventilation and
also to admit a little light: they are so delicate, and the figures so
fine-edged, as to induce one to touch them and make sure they are not
made of paper or wax.
Dr. Birdwood has prepared in two small volumes a fair hand-book of
this section, which, however, contains no direct references to the
objects. Useful as it is, a student will find that it is too apt to
take the conventional view of things, as, for example, when it speaks
of Hindoos throwing themselves beneath the Car of Juggernaut--an error
which Dr. Hunter exploded long ago. There is no doubt that the real
way to understand these objects, and to derive high benefit from this
unique collection, is to study them in connection with Dr. Fergusson’s
great work on Eastern architecture--certainly one of the greatest
archæological and descriptive books ever written.
The throne of Akbar was set in the air at the convergence of bridges,
so that no man might approach him without being inspected from the
surrounding windows, and any arms he might have about him observed.
Before removal to the new section it stood in all its grandeur, but
it has been considered sufficient to preserve the central column and
the large capital which supported the famous throne. It is wonderful,
indeed, that it should be left to this age and to England to appreciate
the romance of the East, and to revise, correct, and estimate the
traditions of the Oriental world concerning its own monarchs. Akbar,
for instance, bears the reputation in the East of having been an
archtyrant and a blasphemer, and the care he took in preparing this
curious building, with his throne suspended, as it were, in mid-air
for safety, is regarded as confirming the Oriental view. But the fact
is now known that the hostility excited by Akbar was through his
liberality in entering upon a comparative study of all religions,
arousing thereby the enmity of all their priesthoods. From being a
saint, to whom the people brought their sick that his breath might heal
them, the Emperor became in popular regard a demon. He instituted at
Delhi (<small>A.D.</small> 1542-1605) discussions on every Thursday
evening, to which he invited the most learned representatives of all
religions, allowing each his statement with strict impartiality; he had
as many as he could of the sacred books of each religion translated
for his library, though neither his threats nor bribes could extort
from the Brahmans their Vedas, which now are open to every English
reader through the labors of Max Müller. He tried in turns worshipping
Vishnu, Allah, the Sun, and Christ. Badáoní writes that “when the
strong embankment of our clear [Mussulman] law and our excellent faith
had once been broken through, his Majesty grew colder and colder.” This
sad result (in the view of Badáoní) being proved by the fact that “not
a trace of Mussulman feeling was left in his heart,” and “there grew
gradually, as the outline on a stone, the conviction in his heart that
there were sensible men of all religions.”
He had three wives representing these religious--Mehal (Hindoo), Roumi
(Moslem), Miriam (Christian). A great deal of Akbar’s toleration and
independence may be ascribed to the influence of his favorite sultana,
Mehal. She was a faithful, wise, and educated lady, who always held
the Emperor to his high standard. There is a miniature of her in this
museum, showing her in a rich gauze, or dress, diaphanous above the
waist; she is not burdened with jewels, as was the case with some of
her wealthy subjects, but wears the ornaments of a lowly and quiet
spirit.
There is also here a picture of the superb tomb, the Taje, at Agra. It
is the most beautiful monument in the world; even that of the Prince
Consort, in Hyde Park, is poor beside it. It is to be remembered,
however, that, according to the imperial custom of that period and
region, such tombs were built while those for whom they were intended
were yet living. They were by no means what Western people would
imagine to be tombs, but beautiful pleasure-domes of purest marbles.
During the lives of their builders they were wont to invite their
friends to gay feasts in them, and this continued until the pretty
palace received the dead bodies of those who had enjoyed them, and were
so turned into monuments.
It is not always that these ancient monuments, as in Akbar’s case,
survive to remind the world of to-day what forerunners some of its
characteristic tendencies had in early times and unsuspected places.
Indeed, it might surprise some of the magnificent princes of the East
in the far past if they could now visit London and observe the kind
of interest their monuments excite. Here, for example, is an exact
and full-sized copy of that ancient iron pillar of Delhi which some
think gave the province its name. It was set up in the fourth century,
and is twenty-two feet above ground. All manner of superstitions have
grown around it. The Hindoos have a belief that it rests upon the head
of the king-serpent Vásaki, near the earth’s centre; that the founder
of a great dynasty was told by an oracle that if he planted it there
his kingdom would never be shaken so long as it should stand; that
one of his successors, doubting this legend, dug it up, and found the
bottom stained with the serpent’s blood; and that in consequence the
dynasty passed away before Mussulman and then English conquerors.
For ages this pillar has been kept polished by the vast numbers who
climbed or tried to climb it every year, success in this feat being
deemed a proof of high pedigree. But during fifteen centuries there
were two rather obvious things which the Hindoos appear never to have
attempted--one was to really dig about the bottom of this pillar, the
other to translate an old Sanscrit inscription on it. Both of these
have recently been done by Englishmen. The bottom was found to reach
only twenty inches beneath the surface of the earth, there resting on
a gridiron of iron bars. The inscription testifies that it was set
up by a prince unknown in other Hindoo annals. This prince, Dháva by
name, would appear to have been the most extraordinary being that
the sun ever shone upon, or, rather, that ever shone upon the sun. A
clause of the inscription runs: “By him who obtained with his own arm
an undivided sovereignty on the earth for a long period, who united
in himself the qualities of the sun and the moon, who had beauty of
countenance like the full moon--by this same Rajah Dháva, having bowed
his head to the feet of Vishnu, and fixed his mind on him, was this
very lofty arm of the adored Vishnu [the pillar] caused to be erected.”
There was probably a figure of Garuda on it originally, which the
Mohammedans would have removed; but the real object of the pillar,
Mr. Fergusson thinks, was to celebrate the defeat of the Balhikas
(<small>A.D.</small> 364 or 371). “It is,” says Fergusson, “to say the
least of it, a curious coincidence that, eight centuries afterward, men
from that same Bactrian country should have erected a Jaya Stambha ten
times as tall as this one, in the same court-yard, to celebrate their
victory over the descendants of those Hindoos who so long before had
expelled their ancestors from the country.” The chief present value of
the monument of this magnificent individual is the light it enables
such archæologists of metals as Day, Percy, Murray, and Mallet to cast
on the early use of iron. It is pure malleable iron, without alloy;
and though since it was forged it has been exposed to the weather, it
is unrusted, and the capital and inscription are as clear as when it
was set up fourteen centuries ago. Mr. Day has shown the remarkable
interest of this pillar in that respect, though I believe that the
iron sickle found beneath the feet of a Sphinx, and now in the British
Museum, brings us nearer to Tubal-cain by a thousand years, being
assigned to <small>B.C.</small> 600.
The Indian section has sundry “trophies,” among which the “Tippoo
Tiger” is conspicuous. As it is just possible that some transatlantic
readers may be so benighted as not to know what the “Tippoo Tiger”
is, I will explain that it is a musical instrument contrived for the
delectation of Tippoo Sahib. It is a large-sized tiger, under whose
claws lies a prostrate Englishman, dressed pretty much in the fashion
of a London City merchant of East India Company times. When this
emblematic organ is played the music that issues consists of blended
tiger-growls and human groans. This instrument was made for Tippoo
Sultan by a fellow-citizen of the tiger’s victim! It brought much
satisfaction to the royal breast of Tippoo, and still more perhaps to
the boys who used to be taken to see and hear it when it was a show in
Leadenhall Street. Not far from it is also a beautiful cannon which
belonged to Tippoo Sahib; it was captured at Mysore, and presented
to the Queen. Instead of the cross with which the godly guns of
Christendom are decorated, this one is adorned with the sun and moon;
but it has also a lion, to remind Britannia where her own emblem may
have originated. Tippoo Sahib’s throne was supported by massive gold
tiger-heads, admirably wrought, one of which is also in the Windsor
collection. He would seem to have been fond of animals.
There is in the Oriental fire-arms a notable resemblance to the old
arquebus. It looks as if when the Orientals received gunpowder from
the West they received also the cross-bows with which it was first
connected; and, while that shape has been completely modified here, it
has been retained in the East. The powder-horns and other accoutrements
also have a curious resemblance to the mediæval shape of such things in
Europe.
Prominence is given to another “trophy,” the throne of Runjeet Singh,
whom the English overthrew. It is a large throne, wrought of pure gold,
and too softly cushioned to have ever fulfilled the much-needed duties
of that Eastern throne whose velvet seat turned to rough flint whenever
any subject of him who sat on it was suffering an injustice.
There are a good many things in this Indian section which one meets
with surprise. For example, here is a tablet of marble which belonged
to the Parsees of Bombay, but is decorated with Assyrian figures; also,
there is a panel brought from the Audience Hall of the Great Mogul, on
which is fashioned in marbles of various colors a fair copy of Orpheus
charming the beasts with his violin, as it was found frescoed in the
Catacombs. It is surmised that Austin de Bordeaux, who worked for a
time at Delhi, copied it from Raphael’s picture, and made Orpheus
a portrait of himself. But it is not so easy to explain the close
resemblance between the ancient pottery of Gour and the Delia Robbia
ware.
The collection of jade in this section is superb; it cannot be worth
much less than fifty thousand pounds. The splendid jewellery, the rich
stuffs, the models of Hindoos of all castes, the conventionalized
figures of the deities, the pottery of all times and places in India
here collected, make this new section one of unique interest, and one
which cannot fail to prove of importance to the industrial arts as well
as to Oriental studies.
[Illustration: MODERN PERSIAN EWER (COPPER-COATED, WITH WHITE METAL).]
South Kensington Museum contains a noble collection of Persian
articles, ancient and modern, made for it in that country by Major
E. Murdoch Smith, of the Royal Engineers. I say ancient and modern;
but where an art has had a continuous evolution it would be perhaps
more philosophical to pronounce its last results the oldest, and its
“modern” period that in which it was newest. In no other part of
this museum have I seen works which reminded me so much of that long
conspiracy between man and nature by which wild-briers have turned
to roses. It seemed to me there might be written on the walls this
beautiful page of the “Rose Garden” of Sâdi: “I have heard that in the
land of the East they are forty years in making a china cup: they make
a hundred a day at Bagdad, and consequently you see the meanness of
the price. A chicken, as soon as it comes out of the egg, seeks its
food; but an infant hath not reason and discrimination. That which
was something all at once never arrives at much perfection; and the
other by degrees surpasses all things in power and excellence. Glass
is everywhere, and therefore of no value; the ruby is obtained with
difficulty, and on that account is precious. Affairs are accomplished
through patience: the hasty man faileth in his undertakings.”
It was probably under the inspiration of these very words of Sâdi that
Bagdad in the end vindicated itself. “The powerful Abbaside Caliphs
of Bagdad,” says Major Murdoch Smith, “no doubt summoned to their
court men of science and learning from all the countries under their
sway--Persia furnishing them with architects and other artists. Skilled
Persian workmen were no doubt employed in large numbers in decorating
the mosques and palaces in the Arab capital, situated as it was on
the very frontier of their own country. Thence, we believe, arose the
so-called Arabian or arabesque style of ornament, afterward so widely
spread, and now so well known. The peculiar pendent ornamentation of
vaults and niches, of which the Alhambra is so typical an example,
is identical in style with that used throughout Persia down to the
present day.” If this theory be true--and really these works appear to
sanction it--the Arabs derived their arts from Persia, as the Romans
did from the Greeks, and consequently the Moors imported a Persian art
into Spain. The Shah of Persia, in wishing to carry back with him Owen
Jones’s reproductions of the Alhambra at the Crystal Palace, had good
reason for his selection.
[Illustration: OLD PERSIAN EARTHENWARE (WATER-BOTTLE).]
It is difficult to tell the age of most of this Persian work, and I
think the enterprising collector of these specimens is not always happy
in his estimates. Thus there is a beautiful vase (No. 1224) which
Major Smith thinks over 500 years old, on the ground that it bears an
inscription in Pehlevi; but that is no more evidence than would be a
Latin epitaph in Westminster Abbey that the monument was erected during
the Roman occupation of Britain. The collection shows that Persian art
is by no means in such a state of decay as many have supposed. This
is especially true of the exquisite damascene work still executed
at Ispahan. “The true damascene,” says our collector, “is made of a
particular kind of iron. After the object is forged it is placed for
six or eight days in the furnace of a hot bath, where the greatest
attention has to be paid to the even heating of the article. The bath
is heated with the dried dung of cows and other animals, which gives
a steady and not very intense heat, and is supposed to contain the
salts necessary for the formation of true damascene. When the article
is taken out of the furnace it is left at the temper it has therein
acquired. It is then finished and polished. To bring out the grain a
certain mineral (of which a specimen may be seen in the museum) is
then applied in the following manner: about three parts of the mineral
are dissolved in ten of water, over a slow fire, in an earthenware or
leaden vessel. The object is then slightly heated, and a little of the
liquid applied with a cotton wad, after which it is washed in cold
water. If the damascene does not appear sufficiently the operation is
repeated. The object must be thoroughly cleaned and polished before the
mineral is applied.”
[Illustration: PERSIAN KALIĀN.]
It is very doubtful if Corsinet, the French artist who carried the art
of damascening to such an extent in the time of Henry IV., has left
any such beautiful work as this now being wrought by artists whose
names are unknown in Europe. The three kinds of ornamentation known
as “damascening” are elegantly represented--the delicately lustred
and watered blade, the light etching on polished steel, and the rich
inlaying of steel with gold and silver. One of the most beautiful
pieces of work is a kaliān or hookah (for smoking tobacco) of brass
open-work, with turquoise and other ornamentation. In the head of this
great and solemn pipe the tobacco is placed, slightly moistened, under
pieces of live charcoal, which are prevented from falling off by the
movable top of the bottle containing the water, into which the end of
the stem descends. The tobacco smoked is the mild Tombaku, produced
near Shiraz, which really is the best “Turkish,” though Turkey never
produced a leaf of it. If any one will gaze on this Persian hookah he
will see why it is imposing enough to warrant such religious treatment
as its Indian counterpart, the hubble-bubble, has received at the hands
of an eloquent Vedantist preacher of my acquaintance (Chintamon). The
hubble-bubble is generally made of a cocoa-nut shell, with a receptacle
for water, through which the smoke passes before being inhaled. In
Chintamon’s parable the stem represents the body; passions are the
tobacco; the bowl is mind; understanding is the plug which prevents
the tobacco-passions from blocking up the stem-body; knowledge is the
fire which separates passion--the pure from the impure; the evil is
reduced to ashes, and vanishes in the vapor of folly; while through
the purifying water of reflection, and the mouth-piece of mental
satisfaction, man draws the desirable aroma of content, and hears a
bubbling noise which suggests the still small voice of Reason.
[Illustration: ANCIENT PERSIAN INCENSE-BURNER (PIERCED AND CHASED
BRASS).]
Among the many exquisite books, manuscripts, and paintings--the latter
being oftenest upon the covers of the finest books--there is one
of surpassing beauty. It is a copy of the works of Sâdi, a modern
manuscript with six illuminated pages forming the head-pieces of the
six books, all the pages being bordered in gold and colors. The covers
have been painted by the artist Nadjaf, who lived about fifty years
ago, on the outside with certain battles between some shahs, sultans,
and their like; but on the inside of one cover is a picture of the poet
Hafiz surrounded by his friends; on the inside of the other cover is
a picture of Sâdi conversing with his pupils. What grace, what honor,
was in the heart of him who drew these pictures! Amidst such tints
Sâdi might be saying to his pupils one of the passages that are here
written: “I saw a peacock’s feather in the leaves of the Koran. I said,
‘I consider this an honor much greater than your quality deserves.’ He
replied, ‘Be silent; for whosoever has beauty, wherever he puts his
foot doth not every one receive him with respect?’ A little beauty is
preferable to great wealth.”
[Illustration: MODERN PERSIAN INCENSE-BURNER (BRASS).]
I hear of some prosaic young Englishmen who are wandering about the
banks of the Euphrates to try and find the locality of Eden. I venture
to affirm that with the Kaliān, plenty of Tombaku, Sâdi’s Gulistan,
and this rose-garden manuscript, I can get nearer Eden reclining on yon
English grass than those young gentlemen seeking it so far away. Yet it
is pleasant, in a melancholy way, to see the never-failing fascination
which the Oriental world has for these Northern races. The hardest,
least imaginative Englishman will feel some sweeter pulsation about
his heart when he sees one of Holman Hunt’s pictures of Palestine, or
hears the solemn roll of Oriental poetry.
“A pine-tree’s standing lonely
In the North, on a mountain’s brow,
Nodding with whitest cover,
Wrapped up by the ice and snow.
“He’s dreaming of a palm-tree,
Which, far in the Morning Land,
Lonely and silent sorrows
‘Mid burning rocks and sand.”[D]
But here my rambles through these unlimited fields must draw to a
close. One must, amidst such numberless treasures gathered from the
great streams of Time, more especially remember Sydney Smith’s advice,
based on the post-diluvial brevity of human life, that writers should
“think of Noah, and be brief.” It is with a certain distress that I
feel compelled to pass by the great galleries of pictures, including
some of the finest Turners, Wilkies, and Gainsboroughs, and a large
number of historic paintings. The Forster bequest, with its charming
souvenirs of famous actors, actresses, and authors, in the shape of
portraits, character-sketches, and autographs--among the latter the
MSS. of most of the works of Dickens--were of itself the sufficient
theme for a treatise.
[Illustration: ANDREA GRITTI, DOGE OF VENICE--ITALIAN. ASCRIBED TO
VITTORE CAMELO. SIXTEENTH CENTURY.]
[Illustration: TAZZA--ALGERIAN ONYX AND ENAMEL. MODERN FRENCH.]
[Illustration: SALT-CELLAR--SILVER GILT; ITALIAN. FIFTEENTH CENTURY.]
No collection in the museum is more deserving of attention than that
of the musical instruments, which show the entire evolution of the
art, from the first savage bark drum and the pipe that Pan might have
played to his flocks, up to the last grand piano; but for twelve
shillings the reader may procure Mr. Carl Engel’s admirable _résumé_
of this department. Since it was written an interesting series of
instruments has been added (Indian section), and it is to be hoped
that these will be included in a new edition of Herr Engel’s work. The
Indian instruments have not changed in many centuries, some not for two
thousand years; their harp (chang) is identical with one represented
in the Nineveh sculptures. Unfortunately there is no catalogue to
the museum; but there may be had full works on the ancient ivories
(one guinea), textile fabrics (one and a half guineas), majolica (two
guineas), furniture and woodwork (one guinea). There are small shilling
“Handbooks,” giving succinct histories of the arts of working in gold
and silver, bronze, pottery, etc., with general reference to objects in
the museum, which are useful and interesting. There also exists a full
catalogue of books on art (two guineas); and I may mention that at the
present moment it is possible to collect in London an admirable art
library for a moderate sum--an advantage that will soon disappear. The
present art library in the museum is the only one possessing anything
like completeness in Europe; it contains 45,000 volumes. This is quite
distinct from the educational library, which has an equal number of
volumes.
[Illustration: IVORY TANKARD--AUGSBURG. SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.]
But we must not part from South Kensington without considering how
fares therein the aim and purpose out of which it grew, namely, culture
and training in every variety of art. It will at once be recognized
that the art schools, enjoying such an unparalleled environment as to
examples, carried on also in rooms of vast extent, perfectly lighted,
heated, ventilated, and furnished, must be judged by a higher standard
than other institutions of the kind in Europe or in America. And,
retrospectively, the schools must be conceded to have done wonders.
For one thing, it may be claimed that it found the art education of
the nation at zero and raised it enormously. By wisely using its power
to send floating through the provincial cities a loan exhibition,
and by a judicious distribution of the annual fund (now about £2500)
granted it by Parliament to aid institutions of a like character,
which are willing also to aid themselves, the Commission has been the
means of establishing throughout the kingdom schools devoted to art,
and in forming classes in colleges to teach art, to an extent which
has increased by 150 per cent. the number of those who study art
to prosecute it for itself, or to apply it to make their work more
artistic. Between the years 1855-‘77, 27,000 objects of art and 24,000
paintings were circulated by the museum through the United Kingdom.
In the various provincial towns and cities where they have been left
for several months at a time, these works have been visited by over
6,000,000 of persons and copied by many students, the cost to the
Science and Art Department being over £100,000. In order to tempt
Schools of Art to acquire permanent objects for museums of their own,
the Department offers a grant in aid of fifty per cent. on the cost
of such objects. Parliament is continually inquiring into the means
of increasing the utility of the collections in this direction. South
Kensington has already awakened a higher taste throughout the nation,
and especially in London. The number of visitors has increasingly
exceeded a million each year; and should the museum be opened on Sunday
afternoons--a step which can hardly fail to be taken ere long--this
number must be vastly increased. These crowds, however, never make the
rooms seem crowded; their decorum is equal to that which is preserved
in the best drawing-rooms; there have been only two cases in the
history of the museum where persons have been ejected (the fault being
tipsiness); and no article of value has ever been missed. In strolling
through the building with George Boughton we concluded to follow some
very rough-looking youths and observe what objects attracted their
attention. We were surprised to find them passing by King Koffee’s
umbrella and trinkets to devote all their time to the statues of
Michael Angelo. I have repeatedly observed similar phenomena in the
picture-galleries--the roughest people crowding around the best works
of art.
The way in which all this has told upon the work of the country has
been jealously watched, and also fairly recognized by foreign critics.
The first gold medal awarded on the Continent for art education,
awarded to South Kensington, was not given by any favor, and it
was won by a great deal of hard work. In the introduction to the
seven-volume report presented to the French Government in 1862, M.
Chevallier says: “Rivals are springing up, and the pre-eminence of
France may receive a shock if we do not take care. The upward movement
is visible, above all, among the English. The whole world has been
struck with the progress they have made since the last Exhibition in
designs for stuffs, in the distribution of colors, also in carving and
sculpture, and generally in articles of furniture.” M. Rupet urged the
establishment of a museum in Paris similar to that at South Kensington,
saying: “It is impossible to ignore the fact that a serious struggle
awaits France from this quarter.” The report from Lyons--whose School
of Design was, to a large extent, the model copied by England--says:
“With Great Britain we shall have some day to settle accounts, for she
has made great progress in art since the Exhibition of 1851.” These
statements are much more true now than when they were written. In the
direction to which they refer--that of decorative art--South Kensington
has certainly taken a leading position in Europe. The evidences of
this are appearing daily. For example, the firm of Messrs. Corbière &
Sons, which was established in London about twenty-eight years ago as
an importing house for French patterns and goods, has now been almost
changed into an exporting house, sending to France patterns and designs
for goods which it obtains from South Kensington. Even this is hardly
so grateful to the English as a report lately made by a large Glasgow
firm, that it has for some years been obtaining from this museum, at
the annual cost of a few hundred pounds, designs such as it had been
for many years previously securing from Paris and Lyons at a cost of
£2000 per annum.
[Illustration: FINEST RAISED VENETIAN POINT LACE--FLORAL DESIGN.
ITALIAN. SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.]
Lyons, indeed, after teaching England its art of war, has itself lost
it. Neither Paris or London will use their newest patterns, one of
which, I understand, represents huntsmen and hounds in full chase
after a stag, careering all over a drawing-room carpet! In Paris, and
even more in England, taste has for some years been tending to demand
richness in substance, vagueness in pattern, quietness in color, for
all stuffs used in rooms. It is greatly to be regretted that the
great manufacturers of textile fabrics declined to participate in
the Centennial Exhibition, having concluded that their goods would
have too much protection in one sense, and not enough in others. It
would have excited astonishment in America to see what transformation
has been wrought in carpets and curtains, and it would be at once
recognized that the old fabrics, with their fixed scrolls, their
glare and glitter, have become barbarous. Messrs. Ward, of Halifax,
recently rolled out for me on a floor side by side the old patterns
and the new, and it was to the eye like passing from poppies to
passion-flowers. “Those blazing ones,” said Mr. Ward, “have gone out of
fashion in this country since the new schools of design began, and we
never sell a yard of them here; we made them for America until the last
tariff, and now the manufacture has ceased altogether.” The new curtain
stuffs have always an unobtrusive, almost a dead, ground of saffron,
or olive, or green, and on it flowing conventional leaves with some
heraldic form--as daisy, pomegranate, etc.--to supply spots of color;
and the carpets are of much the same character, with somewhat larger
forms.
These exquisite designs are universally recognized as results of
South Kensington. But there is one point where the results are less
satisfactory. The best designs, which include the human figure, have
still to be obtained from the Continent; and these being of especial
importance in pottery, the great porcelain factories say that their
needs cannot yet be met by English art schools. The truth is, there was
long an opposition in controlling quarters to permitting studies of the
female nude at South Kensington at all, though now the female students
have that privilege. In the male school the male nude is studied; but
still the students--those who mean to devote themselves to fine, as
distinguished from decorative, art--have to unite and employ female
models in rooms outside the school. It is as difficult to see what
benefit is secured by modesty, in thus placing a necessary study beyond
the regulation of the masters, who might preserve decorum, as it is
to find any advantage to religion gained by shutting the door to the
pictorial gospels of Raphael on Sunday and keeping open the door of the
gin-shop. Both the piety and the prudery are anomalous. The Zoological
and the Botanical Gardens, in London, the Dublin Museum, Hampton Court,
and Kew Gardens are all open on Sunday, while the museums and galleries
of the metropolis are closed: the Royal Academy has nude models of both
sexes, under the same Government which prohibits the like at South
Kensington. The queerest anomaly, however, existed until lately in the
Slade School of Art, at University College, where the vexed question
was settled by permitting the male pupils to have female models, and
the female pupils to have male models! This restriction of the ladies
to (nearly) nude models of the other sex was made in the interest of
propriety, as the masters felt disinclined to enter and instruct them
in the presence of a female model.
The former restrictions at South Kensington as to models fell heavily
upon the female pupils. The young female artists were not permitted
to see so much of their model as they would be required to reveal of
their own persons at one of her Majesty’s drawing-rooms. The late
head-master, Mr. Burchett, himself an able figure painter, knew well,
as all experienced figure painters in Europe know, that female models
are far oftener secured from vice by their occupation than exposed to
it, and that life schools are not inconsistent with decorum, under
proper management; and he (Mr. Burchett) made efforts, one of which
was to have the model encased in flesh tights, to secure for his
pupils the advantages so freely offered in Continental schools. But
his contrivances were stopped by threats of Parliamentary questions.
His successor has, however, secured to the female pupils the advantage
of the nude model of their own sex and male model with caleçon; and,
if he can now secure like privileges for the males, South Kensington
may some day be able to point to as high results in the direction of
the fine as in the ornamental arts. Until then young men of genius
will continue to prefer schools which are without such restrictions.
It can only be ascribed to the consummate care with which studies of
the antique are conducted, and to the full supply of the finest casts
offered by the museum, that decorative art itself at South Kensington
has suffered so little from the limitations referred to; for it is
certain that the human figure is the key to all other forms in nature.
It is certain, also, that the female form is the very flower of all
natural beauty--“the sum of every creature’s best,” as Shakspeare says
of Perdita--and no arrangements for art training can be considered
complete which do not include accessibility to such studies of the same
as are required, by those who have given evidence of their fitness to
interpret the sacred secrets of nature.
Beyond this there is no special deduction to be made from the method
of training at South Kensington, which as a school is steadily
improving. The following official memorandum of its regulations (with
which is given the names of its faculty) will show the large scope of
instruction included:
DIRECTOR-GENERAL FOR ART, AND PRINCIPAL,
THOMAS ARMSTRONG.
_Head-Master_, J. SPARKES.
_Mechanical and Architectural Drawing_, H. B. HAGREEN.
_Geometry and Perspective_, E. S. BURCHETT.
_Painting, Free-hand Drawing of Ornament, etc., the Figure and
Anatomy, and Ornamental Design_, J. SPARKES, C. P.
SLOCOMBE, T. CLACK, F. M. MILLER.
_Modelling_, M. LANTERI.
_Etching_, A. LEGROS.
FEMALE CLASSES.
_Lady Superintendent_, MISS TRULOCK.
_Female Teachers_, MRS. S. E. CASABIANCA and MISS
CHANNON.
_Occasional Lecturers_: DR. ZERFFI, Historic Ornament;
E. BELLAMY, Anatomy; F. W. MOODY, the Figure, as
applied to Decoration.
1. The courses of instruction pursued in the School have for their
object the systematic training of teachers, male and female,
in the practice of Art and in the knowledge of its scientific
principles, with the view of qualifying them to impart to others
a careful Art education, and to develop its application to
the common uses of life, and to the requirements of Trade and
Manufactures. Special courses are arranged in order to qualify
School-masters of Elementary and other Schools to teach Elementary
Drawing as a part of general education concurrently with writing.
2. The instruction comprehends the following subjects: Free-hand,
Architectural, and Mechanical Drawing; Practical Geometry
and Perspective; Painting in Oil, Tempera, and Water-colors;
Modelling, Moulding, and Casting. The Classes for Drawing,
Painting, and Modelling include Architectural and other Ornament,
Flowers, Objects of still-life, etc., the Figure from the Antique
and the Life, and the study of Anatomy as applicable to Art.
3. The Annual Sessions, each lasting five mouths, commence on
the 1st of March and the 1st of October, and end on the last day
of July and the last day of February, respectively. Students can
join the School at any time, the tickets running from date to
date. The months of August and September, one week at Christmas,
and one week at Easter or Whitsuntide, are Vacations. The classes
meet every day _except Saturday_. Hours of Study: Day, 10 to 3;
Evening, 7 to 9.
4. In connection with the Training School, and open to the public,
separate classes are established for male and female students; the
studies comprising Drawing, Painting, and Modelling, as applied to
Ornament, the Figure, Landscape, and still-life.
FEES.
For classes studying for five whole days, including evenings: £5
for five months.
For three whole days, including evenings: £4 for five months.
For the half-day--morning, 10 to 1; or afternoon, 1 to 3: £4 for
five months.
To all these classes there is an entrance fee of 10_s._
_Evening Classes_: Male School: £2 per session.
Artisan Class: 10_s._ per session; 3_s._ per month.
Female School: £1 per session, three evenings a week.
No students can be admitted to these classes until they
have passed an examination in Free-hand Drawing of the 2d
Grade. Examinations of candidates will be held weekly, at the
commencement of each session, and at frequent intervals throughout
the year.
5. Students cannot join the School for a shorter term than _five_
months, but the students who have already paid fees for five
months may remain until the end of the scholastic year on payment
of a proportional fee for each month unexpired up to the 31st of
July in each year.
6. Classes for School-masters, School-mistresses, and
Pupil-teachers of Elementary Schools meet on two evenings in each
week. Fee 5_s_. for the session. Teachers in private schools or
families may attend the day classes on payment of a fee of £1 per
month.
7. The morning classes for Practical Geometry and Perspective are
open to all students, but they may be attended independently of
the general course on payment of a fee of £2 per session for those
classes.
8. Students properly qualified have full access to the collections
of the Museum and Library, either for consultation or copying, as
well as to all the School Lectures of the Department.
9. A register of the students’ attendance is kept, and may be
consulted by parents and guardians.
Nothing can exceed the care and devotion with which the great work of
South Kensington is carried on by both teachers and pupils. In walking
through the rooms with the head-master I could only marvel at the
indications unintentionally furnished by the pupils, from moment to
moment, of his intimate knowledge of their work and their progress,
however remote from such details he might be officially. In his room
he keeps all the works sent in by the pupils in competition for the
many valuable prizes offered by the school at each stage of progress,
and these are preserved in large albums, each marked with the young
artist’s name, so that by looking through it we trace the unfolding
in this or that direction of a human mind, from the first crude
geometrical drawing to mastery of the finer strokes of form and color.
The pupil applying for admission is not simply put in at one end of a
machine-like system to be turned out at the other, but a specimen of
his or her work is demanded, and a place assigned in accordance with it.
[Illustration: NETTLE IN ITS NATURAL STATE.]
[Illustration: NETTLE IN GEOMETRICAL PROPORTIONS.]
It was morally impressive to witness the large numbers of women who
have here found a field for the cultivation of their powers. In one
room--that of geometrical proportions--the students of both sexes
are taught together, and no doubt the co-educational system will
gradually creep from this to other classes, as it has to some extent
done in University College and other institutions. But the museum is
able to supply both schools with any quantity of models and aids. The
young female artists have excited the admiration of their teachers and
examiners by the remarkable perfection to which they carry ornamental
designs, especially such as may be derived from flowers, fruits, and
leaves. In one part of the museum there is a series of grottoes, filled
with all manner of ferns and other plants, which serve the double
purpose of adorning the room, from which they are seen through large
glass doors, and of supplying subjects for the study of decorative
foliation. They who see the beautiful combinations of these plants made
in the training schools will discover that their previous acquaintance
with some very common things has been very limited. In this study of
the geometrical capacities of plants for decorative purposes the
female pupils seem to excel. The exquisite art of one of them, Miss
Louisa Poole, enables me to present an example of this kind of work,
for which she recently received a gold medal. The subject of this very
clever piece of combination is the common nettle; and, even without the
beautiful colors with which Miss Poole’s original work was rendered,
these outlines she has drawn for me will perhaps enable the reader
to understand the kind of work by which this school has relieved
England of its former dependence on Paris and Lyons. It is but just,
however, to state that Miss Poole’s work, when exhibited, on occasion
of a distribution of prizes by the Duke of Richmond, was surrounded
by a score of similar sketches which had brought their designers
well-merited prizes. No one could examine them without perceiving that
the young artists have learned the main secret of ornamental art--that
nature is but an alphabet, which it is the task of the artist to
combine into words and sentences that shall convey human purpose and
thought.
Some of the best work done at South Kensington is the copying of rare
and beautiful specimens of ancient majolica and other wares. The
Rothschilds and other collectors gladly lend their choicest possessions
for this purpose, and the copies are of high value to this and other
museums. It is wonderful to observe with what refinement of taste and
with what sympathy some of the pupils enter into the subtle secrets
of the old masters of decorative work. The illustration of the Henri
Deux salt-cellar was made for me by Mr. William Broad, while a pupil
at South Kensington, from a work sent in by him to the Examiners. The
reproduction of Cherpentier’s rich and delicate colors in this young
artist’s original work was exceedingly fine. His design of the top of
the salt-cellar is given on the following page.
[Illustration: PLAN OF TOP OF HENRI DEUX SALT-CELLAR.]
It is quite certain that a peculiar excellence has been given to
the work of this institution by the atmosphere of general culture
surrounding it. Each pupil works amidst the splendors of ancient art,
amidst the shades of the great, and each lives in the presence of men
who to-day best represent the accumulated knowledge of the world. The
spirit tells more than the letter of instruction. Moreover, no art is
here studied in isolation: each is studied along with literature and
science; and, what is of great importance to thoroughness, all the arts
are studied in connection with their own history. Through the literary
works of such archæologists as William B. Scott, the ever-careful
teaching of Thomas Armstrong and Mr. Sparkes, and the practical labors
of such experts as Mr. Moody and Mr. Bowler, the pupil may study, by
theory and experiment, the evolution by which his task has come to
him, when and how great successes were attained, and so inherit the
vital spirit which of old quickened the flowers of beauty by which he
or she is at every moment surrounded. The pupil will realize here the
immortality of good work. He will see that an old blacksmith, ordered
to make iron grilles for Hampton Court garden, put such heart and soul
into his work that his four pieces must now be brought hither as a
monument of which Thor might be proud. Never was more beauty wrought in
iron than this by Huntington Shaw, of Nottingham, anno 1695. Under his
hand rose, shamrock, and thistle have grown on the metal so tenderly
that it would seem a breath might stir them, while from the Irish harp
in the centre one might almost listen for Æolian strains. But that
was done in a day when to work for a king was felt to be working for
God. And all through this museum shines the great fact that the best
work was never done merely for money, but for the altar, for love and
loyalty. It is a Museum of Civilization, where each work is a heart.
There sat a man doing his very best to advance the whole world; there
marched a brave invader of Chaos and Disorder; a reason worked through
him like that which turns a bit of mud into a lily. It is a supreme
joy to trace these footprints of the universal Reason. A flute-key
that wins one more soft note from the air; a pot flushed with some
more intimate touch of the sunlight; an ornament which detaches a pure
form from its perishable body--such things as these exhibit somewhat
finer than themselves, namely, man elect still to carry on the ancient
art which adorned the earth with grass and violet, and framed the
star-gemmed sky and the spotted snake. The student shall also learn
here the solidarity of genius. In distant regions of the world these
men worked at their several tasks, sundered by land and sea, but here
they are seen to have been members of one sacred guild, like that
described of old: “They helped every one his neighbor; and every one
said to his brother, Be of good courage. So the carpenter encouraged
the goldsmith, and he that smootheth with the hammer him that smote
the anvil, saying, It is ready for the soldering: and he fastened it
with nails, that it should not be moved.” From manifold regions of
the world, through ages linked each to each by natural piety, their
works have come here to unite in one mystical symphony of excellence.
By the spirit that worked through them they are made members one of
another. Some little time ago the Professor of Political Economy at
Oxford formed a class of youths of both sexes, and said to them one
day: “There are two great distinctions between man and the lower
animals; one of them is the root of labor, the other is the root of
civilization. What are they?” The first was soon explained; the root of
labor is that the animal has only to seek his food to find it prepared
for him, and his clothing is made for him by nature, whereas man must
cook and modify his food, and make his clothing. The second puzzled all
in the class except one young maid, who said: “The root of civilization
is progressive desire. Give an animal all that satisfies its present
want--good shelter and food enough--it will never be restless, nor show
a further want; but satisfy man in any moment, he will want something
better the next. This craving for the better and the best leads on
to civilization.” But it is the combination of these various lines
of improvement which finally creates a civilization. Savages improve
on their own roads, but the Kaffir never borrows for his own hut any
advantage belonging to the hut of the Zulu, not more than the bee
borrows for its cell a hint from the bird’s nest. The savage has the
root but not the flower of civilization. But then each civilization in
turn is to a great extent special; the human race has a wider life,
into which all separate streams of blood are poured, and all arts
blend. By a higher law of evolution man’s moral and intellectual powers
are selected from the isolated tribes and nations through which they
have for ages been distributed. In this our museum men are taken as
varied pigments to make the study of Man.
“Man, one harmonious soul of many a soul,
Whose nature is its own divine control,
Where all things flow to all....
Man, oh, not men! A chain of linked thought,
Of love and might, to be divided not.”
Of all countries America is that to which mankind must look for the
fulfilment of those aspirations which are the creative force, carving
on the world the ideals of poetry and art. Each fine work will reflect
the culture of the race. Emerson has reminded us that for the best
achievement we must have instead of the Working-man the Man working,
and it were a pity if the great man’s countrymen should not realize
that whole work must be done by the whole man. In walking through the
school at South Kensington once, I met a young lady who had passed
several years in the schools at Philadelphia and the Cooper Institute,
but had never found what she required for her training until she
came here. The picture on her easel proved her to be an accomplished
artist, and her experience appears to me worth mentioning. The school
at Philadelphia, she said, was the best she had known anything of in
the United States, but when she was there it lacked trained teachers.
The teachers were artists in all but the art of teaching. She believed,
however, that the Philadelphia school, if associated with a good
collection, would turn out well. But of the Cooper Institute she was
not so hopeful. It was rather too philanthropic to be a good school of
art. The great aim was to qualify the pupils--girls particularly--to
make money. The pupils are urged on to the paying work rather than to
that which is excellent. It must be understood that these criticisms
are here detached from this lady’s pleasant plaudits to things in
America other than its schools of design, her experience of which was
that one with a high standard had no means of attaining it, while the
other, with more resources, had a low standard and aim. This lady’s
experience has been several times confirmed by American artists with
whom I have walked through the South Kensington Museum. One of the most
eminent of them said: “What a revolution it would cause in American art
to have some such museum as this in each large city! It would in each
case draw around it an art community, and send out widening waves of
taste and love of beauty through the country.”
These expressions, however, were used ten years ago, and it may be
hoped that to those now in the American institutions mentioned that
may appear a dim past. Within that period my own visits to the chief
schools of high art in New York have convinced me that their teaching
is of the highest character, while the resources for culture of
decorative art are slight.
If there be among the readers hereof one of those sensitive patriots
who resent the idea of borrowing any ideas or methods from the Old
World more modern than the Decalogue, I would submit even to him
whether it be not less humiliating to import European experience than
to export American brains. It is no dishonor for America to claim her
inheritance from the past; it is no degradation to recognize what
has been done as done, and not needing to be done over again; but it
may well be pondered by the patriotic whether the Coming Artist will
go abroad, or whether he shall find in his own country the resources
essential to his culture and his finest fruit.
DECORATIVE ART AND ARCHITECTURE IN ENGLAND.
[Illustration]
DECORATIVE ART AND ARCHITECTURE IN ENGLAND.
Michael Angelo was once commissioned to lead in the destruction of the
beautiful villas around Florence. He of all men! The expelled Medici,
now of papal dignity, were menacing the city. The first thought of the
great artist was to save the Campanile, and he covered that noble work
of Giotto with protecting wool-sacks. But the suburban villas must
not stand to give aid to the enemy, and at word of command he started
out, and for once the track of the great artist was indicated in the
destruction instead of in the creation of beautiful things. But he came
upon one house whose wall was covered with a beautiful fresco, and
he had not the heart to destroy it; the soul of the artist held back
the hand of the patriot, and in the field of desolation one mansion
remained standing alone--saved by the protecting genius of Beauty.
It is but one incident in the long history of the career of Use and
Beauty through the world, hand in hand, undivorceable. All our science
is engaged in spelling out their story. Every spot of color on bird
or insect it finds to be the trace of a utility. What weary struggles
carried on through ages to mimic blossom and leaf, and so hide from
pursuing foes! The same force works on when the art of man enters the
arena for new creation. The thin and feeble blossom of the brier passes
through all the phases of culture until it becomes the full rose of
the horticulturist, like unto some little maiden’s face for size and
lustre, all by merest mercenary influence. Our fairest flowers have
migrated from East to West, cherished and preserved for highest use as
oracles and symbols of successive goddesses and saints, transplanted
from temple courts to flourish under the holier chrism of convent
gardens. Despite his proverb, man has painted the lily and adorned the
rose, until we may almost say with the Persian Nizámi, “Every flower
growing in the many-colored garden of the earth is a drop of blood
from the heart
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