Part 3 (1/2)
NOTES
”Pictor Ignotus” is a reverie characteristic of a monastic painter of the Renaissance who recognizes, in the genius of a youth whose pictures are praised, a gift akin to his own, but which he has never so exercised, spite of the joy such free human expression and recognition of his power would have given him, because he could not bear to submit his art to worldly contact. So he has chosen to sink his name in unknown service to the Church, and to devote his fancy to pure and beautiful but cold and monotonous repet.i.tions of sacred themes. His gentle regret that his own pictures will moulder unvisited is half wonderment that the youth can endure the sullying of his work by secular fame.
67. Travertine: a white limestone, the name being a corruption of <tiburtinus>, from <tibur> , now Tivoli, near Rome, whence this stone comes.
FRA LIPPO LIPPI
1855
1 am poor brother Lippo, by your leave!
You need not clap your torches to my face.
Zooks, what's to blame? you think you see a monk!
What, 'tis past midnight, and you go the rounds, And here you catch me at an alley's end Where sportive ladies leave their doors ajar?
The Carmine's my cloister: hunt it up, Do--harry out, if you must show your zeal, Whatever rat, there, haps on his wrong hole, And nip each softling of a wee white mouse, 10 <weke>, <weke>, that's crept to keep him company!
Aha, you know your betters! Then, you'll take Your hand away that's fiddling on my throat, And please to know me likewise. Who am I?
Why, one, sir, who is lodging with a friend Three streets off--he's a certain . . . how d'ye call?
Master--a . . . Cosimo of the Medici, I' the house that caps the corner. Boh! you were best!
Remember and tell me, the day you're hanged, How you affected such a gullet's-gripe! 20 But you, sir, it concerns you that your knaves Pick up a manner nor discredit you: Zooks, are we pilchards, that they sweep the streets And count fair prize what comes into their net?
He's Judas to a t.i.ttle, that man is!
Just such a face! Why, sir, you make amends.
Lord, I'm not angry! Bid your hangdogs go Drink out this quarter-florin to the health Of the munificent House that harbors me (And many more beside, lads! more beside!) 30 And all's come square again. I'd like his face-- His, elbowing on his comrade in the door With the pike and lantern--for the slave that holds John Baptist's head a-dangle by the hair With one hand (”Look you, now,” as who should say) And his weapon in the other, yet unwiped!
It's not your chance to have a bit of chalk, A wood-coal or the like? or you should see!
Yes, I'm the painter, since you style me so.
What, brother Lippo's doings, up and down, 40 You know them and they take you? like enough!
I saw the proper twinkle in your eye-- 'Tell you, I liked your looks at very first.
Let's sit and set things straight now, hip to haunch.
Here's spring come, and the nights one makes up bands To roam the town and sing out carnival, And I've been three weeks shut within my mew, A-painting for the great man, saints and saints And saints again. I could not paint all night-- Ouf! I leaned out of window for fresh air. 50 There came a hurry of feet and little feet, A sweep of lute-strings, laughs, and whifts of song-- <flower o'=”” the=”” broom,=”” take=”” away=”” love,=”” and=”” our=”” earth=”” is=”” a=””></flower>< p=””>
Flower o' the quince, I let Lisa go, and what good is life since?
Flower o' the thyme>--and so on. Round they went.
Scarce had they turned the corner when a t.i.tter Like the skipping of rabbits by moonlight--three slim shapes, And a face that looked up . . . zooks, sir, flesh and blood, That's all I'm made of! Into shreds it went, 61 Curtain and counterpane and coverlet, All the bed-furniture--a dozen knots, There was a ladder! Down I let myself, Hands and feet, scrambling somehow, and so dropped, And after them. I came up with the fun Hard by Saint Laurence, hail fellow, well met-- <flower o'=”” the=”” rose,=”” if=”” i've=”” been=”” merry,=”” what=”” matter=”” who=”” knows?=””> And so as I was stealing back again 70 To get to bed and have a bit of sleep Ere I rise up to-morrow and go work On Jerome knocking at his poor old breast With his great round stone to subdue the flesh, You snap me of the sudden. Ah, I see!
Though your eye twinkles still, you shake your head-- Mine's shaved--a monk, you say--the sting's in that!
If Master Cosimo announced himself, Mum's the word naturally; but a monk!
Come, what am I a beast for? tell us, now! 80 I was a baby when my mother died And father died and left me in the street.
I starved there. G.o.d knows how, a year or two On fig-skins, melon-parings, rinds and shucks, Refuse and rubbish. One fine frosty day, My stomach being empty as your hat, The wind doubled me up and down I went.
Old Aunt Lapaccia trussed me with one hand, (Its fellow was a stinger as I knew) And so along the wall, over the bridge, 90 By the straight cut to the convent. Six words there, While I stood munching my first bread that month: ”So, boy, you're minded,” quoth the good fat father Wiping his own mouth, 't was refection-time-- ”To quit this very miserable world?
Will you renounce” . . . ”the mouthful of bread?” thought I; By no means! Brief, they made a monk of me; 1 did renounce the world, its pride and greed, Palace, farm, villa, shop and banking-house, Trash, such as these poor devils of Medici 100 Have given their hearts to--all at eight years old.
Well, sir, I found in time, you may be sure, 'T was not for nothing--the good bellyful, The warm serge and the rope that goes all round, And day-long blessed idleness beside!
”Let's see what the urchin's fit for”--that came next, Not overmuch their way, I must confess.
Such a to-do! They tried me with their books: Lord, they'd have taught me Latin in pure waste!
<flower o'=”” the=”” clove,=”” 110=”” all=”” the=”” latin=”” i=”” construe=”” is,=”” ”amo”=”” i=”” love!=””> But, mind you, when a boy starves in the streets Eight years together, as my fortune was, Watching folk's faces to know who will fling The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he desires, And who will curse or kick him for his pains, Which gentleman processional and fine, Holding a candle to the Sacrament, Will wink and let him lift a plate and catch The droppings of the wax to sell again, 120 Or holla for the Eight and have him whipped, How say I?--nay, which dog bites?, which lets drop His bone from the heap of offal in the street-- Why, soul and sense of him grow sharp alike, He learns the look of things, and none the less For admonition from the hunger-pinch.
I had a store of such remarks, be sure, Which, after I found leisure, turned to use.
I drew men's faces on my copy-books, Scrawled them within the antiphonary's marge, 130 Joined legs and arms to the long music-notes, Found eyes and nose and chin for A's and B's, And made a string of pictures of the world Betwixt the ins and outs of verb and noun, On the wall, the bench, the door. The monks looked black.
”Nay,” quoth the Prior, ”turn him out, d' ye say?
In no wise. Lose a crow and catch a lark.
What if at last we get our man of parts, We Carmelites, like those Camaldolese And Preaching Friars, to do our church up fine 140 And put the front on it that ought to be!”
And hereupon he bade me daub away.
Thank you! my head being crammed, the walls a blank, Never was such prompt disemburdening.
First, every sort of monk, the black and white, I drew them, fat and lean : then, folk at church, From good old gossips waiting to confess Their cribs of barrel-droppings, candle-ends-- To the breathless fellow at the altar-foot, Fresh from his murder, safe and sitting there 150 With the little children round him in a row Of admiration, half for his beard and half For that white anger of his victim's son Shaking a fist at him with one fierce arm, Signing himself with the other because of Christ (Whose sad face on the cross sees only this After the pa.s.sion of a thousand years) Till some poor girl, her ap.r.o.n o'er her head, (Which the intense eyes looked through) came at eve On tiptoe, said a word, dropped in a loaf, 160 Her pair of earrings and a bunch of flowers (The brute took growling), prayed, and so was gone, I painted all, then cried ”'T is ask and have; Choose, for more's ready!”--laid the ladder flat, And showed my covered bit of cloister-wall.
The monks closed in a circle and praised loud Till checked, taught what to see and not to see, Being simple bodies--”That's the very man!
Look at the boy who stoops to pat the dog!
That woman's like the Prior's niece who comes 170 To care about his asthma: it's the life!”