Part 14 (2/2)
This picture makes one start and shudder; such must have been its intention, and such is its success.
Among sculptures, the most conspicuous was one called the Last Hour of Napoleon--a figure in an invalid's chair, with drooping head and worn countenance, the map of the globe lying spread upon his pa.s.sive knees.
Every trait already says, ”This _was_ Napoleon,” the man of modern times who longest survived himself, who was dead and could not expire. Wreaths of immortelles always lay at the foot of this statue. It is the work of an Italian artist, and the only sculpture in the whole exhibition which I can recall as easily and deservedly remembered.
Our American part in the art-exhibition was not great. William Hunt's pictures were badly placed, and not grouped, as they should have been, to give an adequate idea of the variety of his merits. Bierstadt's Rocky Mountains looked thin in coloring, and showed a want of design. Church's Niagara was effective. Johnston's Old Kentucky Home was excellent in its kind, and characteristic. Kensett had a good landscape. But America has still more to learn than to teach in the way of high art. Success among us is too cheap and easy. Art-critics are wordy and ignorant, praising from caprice rather than from conscience. It would be most important for us to form at least one gallery of art in which American artists might study something better than themselves. The presence of twenty first-rate pictures in one of our great cities would save a great deal of going abroad, and help to form a sincere and intelligent standard of aesthetic judgment. Such pictures should, of course, be constantly open to the public, as no private collection can well be. We should have a t.i.tian, a Rubens, an Andrea, a Paul Veronese, and so on. But these pictures should be of historical authenticity. The most responsible artists of the country should be empowered to negotiate for them, and the money might be afforded from the heavy gains of late years with far more honor and profit than the superfluous splendors with which the fortunate of this period bedizen their houses and their persons.
Among American sculptures I may mention a pleasing medallion or two by Miss Foley. Miss Hosmer's Faun is a near relative in descent from the Barberini Faun, and, however good in execution, has little originality of conception. And these things I say, Beloved, in the bosom of our American family, because I think they ought to be said, and not out of pride or fancied superiority.
I am ashamed to say that I have already told the little I am able to tell of the Exposition as seen by daylight--the little, at least, that every one else has not told. But I visited the enclosure once in the evening, when only the cafes were open. Among these I sought a beer-shop characterized as the Bavarian brewery, and sought it long and with trouble; for the long, winding paths showed us, one after the other, many agglomerations of light, which were obviously places of public entertainment, and in each of which we expected to find our Bavarian brewery, famous for the musical performances of certain gypsies much spoken of in Parisian circles. In the pursuit of this we entered half a dozen buildings, in each of which some characteristic entertainment was proceeding. Coming finally to the object of our search, we found it a plain room with small tables, half filled with visitors. Opposite the entrance was a small orchestral stage, on which were seated the wild musicians whom we sought. A franc each person was the entrance fee, and we were scarcely seated before a functionary authoritatively invited us to command some refreshment, in a tone which was itself the order of the day. In obedience, one ordered beer, another _gloria_, a third cigars--all at extortionate prices. But then the music was given for nothing, and must be paid for somehow. And it proved worth paying for.
At first the body of sound seemed overpowering, for there was no pianissimo, and not one of the regular orchestral effects. A weird-looking leader in high boots stood and fiddled, holding his violin now on a level with his eyes, now with his nose, now with his stomach, writhing and swaying with excitement, his excitable troupe following the ups and downs of his movement like a track of gaunt hounds das.h.i.+ng after a spectre. The cafe gradually filled, and orders were asked and given.
But little disturbance did these give either to the band or its hearers.
They played various wild airs and symphonies (not technical ones), being partially advised therein by an elegant male personage who sat leaning his head upon his jewelled hand, absorbed in attention. These melodies were obviously compositions of the most eccentric and accidental sort.
Not thus do great or small harmonists mate their tones and arch their pa.s.sages. But there was a vivacity and a pa.s.sion in all that these men did which made every bar seem full of electric fire; and these must be, I thought, traditional vestiges of another time, when music was not yet an art, but only nature. Here Dwight's Journal has no power. Beethoven or Handel may do as he likes; these do as they please, also. This is the heathendom of art, in which feeling is all, authority nothing; in which rules are only suspected, not created. After an hour or more of this entertainment, we left it, not unwillingly, being a little weary of its labyrinthine character and unmoderated ecstasy. Yet we left it much impressed with the musical material presented in it. Our civilized orchestras have no such enthusiasts as that nervous leader, with his leaping violin and restraining high boots. And this, with the lights and shadows, and broken music of the outside walks, is all that I saw of evening at the Exposition.
PICTURES IN ANTWERP.
As you cannot, with rare exceptions, see Raphael out of Italy, so, I should almost say, you cannot see Rubens and Vandyck out of Belgium.
This is especially true of the former; for one does, I confess, see marvellous portraits of Vandyck's in Genoa and in other places. But one judges a painter best by seeing a group of his best works, which show his sphere of thought with some completeness. A single sentence suffices to show the great poet; but no one will a.s.sume that a sentence will give you to know as much of him as a poem or volume. So the detached sentences of the two great Flemish painters, easily met with in European galleries, bear genuine evidence of the master's hand; but the collections of Antwerp and Bruges show us the master himself. Intending no disrespect to Florence, Munich, or the Medicean series at the Louvre, I must say that I had no just measure of the dignity of Rubens as a man and as an artist, until I stood before his two great pictures in the Cathedral of Antwerp. One of these represents the Elevation of the Cross. Mathematically it offends one--the cross, the princ.i.p.al object in the picture, being seen diagonally, in an uneasy and awkward posture. On the other hand, the face of the Christ corresponds fully to the heroism of the moment; it expresses the human horror and agony, but, triumphing over all, the steadfastness of resolve and faith. It is a transfiguration--the spiritual glory holding its own above all circ.u.mstances of pain and infamy. A sort of beautiful surprise is in the eyes--the first deadly pang of an organism unused to suffer. It is a face that lifts one above the weakness and meanness of ordinary human life. This soul, one sees, had the true talisman, the true treasure. If we earn what he did, we can afford to let all else go. The Descent from the Cross is better known than its fellow-picture. It had not to me the wonderful interest of the living face of Christ in the supreme moment of his great life; for I shall always consider that the Christ represented in the Elevation is a true Christ, not a mere fancy figure or dramatic ghost. The Descent is, however, more grand and satisfactory in its grouping, and the contrast between the agony of the friendly faces that surround the chief figure and the dead peace of his expression and att.i.tude is profound and pathetic. The head and body fall heavily upon the arms of those who support it, and who seem to bear an inward weight far transcending the outward one. The pale face of the Virgin is stricken and compressed with sorrow. Each of the pictures is the centre of a triptych, the two smaller paintings representing subjects in harmony with the chief groups. On the right of the Descent we have Mary making her historical visit to the house of Elisabeth; on the left, the presentation of the infant Christ in the temple. On the right of the Elevation is a group of those daughters of Jerusalem to whom Christ said, ”Weep not for me.” The subject on the left is less significant.
With these pictures deserves to rank the Flagellation of Christ, by the same artist, in the Church of St. Paul. The resplendent fairness of the body, the cruel reality of the bleeding which follows the scourge, and the expression of genuine but n.o.ble suffering, seize upon the very quick of sympathy, weakened by mythicism and sentimentalism. This fair body, sensitive as yours or mine, endured bitter and agonizing blows. This great heart was content to endure them as the penalty of bequeathing to mankind its priceless secret.
The churches of Antwerp are rich in architecture, paintings, and marbles. In the latter the Church of St. Jacques excels, the high altar and side chapels being adorned with twisted columns of white marble, and with various sculptures. The Musee contains many pictures of great reputation and merit. Among these are a miniature painting of the Descent from the Cross, by Rubens himself, closely, but not wholly, corresponding with his great picture; the Education of the Virgin, and the Vierge au Perroquet, both by Rubens, in his most brilliant style.
Another composition represents St. Theresa imploring the Savior to release from purgatory the soul of a benefactor of her order. Rubens is said to have given to this benefactor the features of Vandyck, and to one of the angels releasing him those of his young wife, Helena Forman; while the face of an old man still in suffering represents his own.
This gallery contains three Vandycks of first-cla.s.s merit, each of which will detain the attention of lovers of art. The one that first meets your eye is a Pieta, in which the body of Christ is stretched horizontally, his head lying on the lap of his mother. The strongest point of the picture is the Virgin's sorrow, expressed in her pallid face, eyes worn with weeping, and outstretched hands. The second is a small crucifix, very harmonious and expressive. The third is a life-size picture of the crucifixion, with a very individual tone of color. The Virgin, at the foot of the cross, has great truth and dignity, but is rather a modern figure for the subject. But the pride of the whole collection is a unique triptych by Quintin Matsys, his greatest work, and one without which the extent of his power can never be realized. The central picture represents a dead Christ, surrounded by the men and women who ministered to him, preparing him for sepulture. The right hand of the Christ lies half open, with a wonderful expression of acquiescence. The faces of those who surround him are full of intense interest and tenderness; the Virgin's countenance expresses heart-break.
The whole picture disposes you to weep, not from sentimentalism, but from real sympathy. Of the side pieces, one represents the wicked women with the head of John the Baptist, the other the martyrdom of Ste.
Barbe. Add to these some of the best Teniers, Ostades, Ruysdaels, and Vanderweldes, with many excellent works of second-cla.s.s merit, and you will understand, as well as words can tell you, what treasures lie within the Musee of Antwerp.
Copy is exhausted, say the printers. Perhaps patience gave out first. My MS. is at end--not handsomely rounded off, nor even shortened by a surgical amputation, but broken at some point in which facts left no room for words. Observation became absorbing, and description was adjourned, as it now proves, forever. The few sentences which I shall add to what is already written will merely apologize for my sudden disappearance, lest the clown's ”Here we are” should find a comic _pendant_ in my ”Here we are not.”
I have only to say that I have endeavored in good faith to set down this simple and hurried record of a journey crowded with interests and pleasures. I was afraid to receive so freely of these without attempting to give what I could in return, under the advantages and disadvantages of immediate transcription. In sketches executed upon the spot, one hopes that the vividness of the impression under which one labors may atone for the want of finish and of elaboration. If read at all, these notes may be called to account for many insufficiencies. Some pages may appear careless, some sentences Quixotic. I am still inclined to think that with more leisure and deliberation I should not have done the work as well. I should, perhaps, like Tintoretto, have occupied acres and acres of attention with superfluous delineation, putting, as he did, my own portrait in the corner. Rejoice, therefore, good reader, in my limitations. They are your enfranchis.e.m.e.nt.
Touching Quixotism, I will plead guilty to the sounding of various parleys before some stately buildings and unshaken fortresses. ”Who is this that blows so sharp a summons?” may the inmates ask. I may answer, ”One who believes in the twelve legions of angels that wait upon the endeavors of faithful souls.” Should they further threaten or deride, I will borrow Elizabeth Browning's sweet refrain,--
”I am no trumpet, but a reed,”--
and trust not to become a broken one.
Conscious of my many shortcomings, and asking attention only for the message I have tried to bring, I ask also for that charity which recognizes that good will is the best part of action, and good faith the first condition of knowledge.
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