CHAPTER XV
AN AESTHETIC COMPANY
On the evening after Miriam's visit to Kenyon's studio, there was anassemblage composed almost entirely of Anglo-Saxons, and chiefly ofAmerican artists, with a sprinkling of their English brethren; and somefew of the tourists who still lingered in Rome, now that Holy Week waspast. Miriam, Hilda, and the sculptor were all three present, and withthem Donatello, whose life was so far turned from fits natural bentthat, like a pet spaniel, he followed his beloved mistress wherever hecould gain admittance.
The place of meeting was in the palatial, but somewhat faded and gloomyapartment of an eminent member of the aesthetic body. It was no moreformal an occasion than one of those weekly receptions, common amongthe foreign residents of Rome, at which pleasant people--or disagreeableones, as the case may be--encounter one another with little ceremony.
If anywise interested in art, a man must be difficult to please whocannot find fit companionship among a crowd of persons, whose ideas andpursuits all tend towards the general purpose of enlarging the world'sstock of beautiful productions.
One of the chief causes that make Rome the favorite residence ofartists--their ideal home which they sigh for in advance, and are soloath to migrate from, after once breathing its enchanted air--is,doubtless, that they there find themselves in force, and are numerousenough to create a congenial atmosphere. In every other clime they areisolated strangers; in this land of art, they are free citizens.
Not that, individually, or in the mass, there appears to be any largestock of mutual affection among the brethren of the chisel and thepencil. On the contrary, it will impress the shrewd observer that thejealousies and petty animosities, which the poets of our day have flungaside, still irritate and gnaw into the hearts of this kindred class ofimaginative men. It is not difficult to suggest reasons why this shouldbe the fact. The public, in whose good graces lie the sculptor's or thepainter's prospects of success, is infinitely smaller than the public towhich literary men make their appeal. It is composed of a very limitedbody of wealthy patrons; and these, as the artist well knows, are butblind judges in matters that require the utmost delicacy of perception.Thus, success in art is apt to become partly an affair of intrigue; andit is almost inevitable that even a gifted artist should look askance athis gifted brother's fame, and be chary of the good word that might helphim to sell still another statue or picture. You seldom hear a painterheap generous praise on anything in his special line of art; a sculptornever has a favorable eye for any marble but his own.
Nevertheless, in spite of all these professional grudges, artists areconscious of a social warmth from each other's presence and contiguity.They shiver at the remembrance of their lonely studios in theunsympathizing cities of their native land. For the sake of suchbrotherhood as they can find, more than for any good that they get fromgalleries, they linger year after year in Italy, while their originalitydies out of them, or is polished away as a barbarism.
The company this evening included several men and women whom the worldhas heard of, and many others, beyond all question, whom it ought toknow. It would be a pleasure to introduce them upon our humble pages,name by name, and had we confidence enough in our own taste--to crowneach well-deserving brow according to its deserts. The opportunityis tempting, but not easily manageable, and far too perilous, both inrespect to those individuals whom we might bring forward, and the fargreater number that must needs be left in the shade. Ink, moreover, isapt to have a corrosive quality, and might chance to raise a blister,instead of any more agreeable titillation, on skins so sensitive asthose of artists. We must therefore forego the delight of illuminatingthis chapter with personal allusions to men whose renown glows richly oncanvas, or gleams in the white moonlight of marble.
Otherwise we might point to an artist who has studied Nature withsuch tender love that she takes him to her intimacy, enabling him toreproduce her in landscapes that seem the reality of a better earth,and yet are but the truth of the very scenes around us, observed by thepainter's insight and interpreted for us by his skill. By his magic,the moon throws her light far out of the picture, and the crimson ofthe summer night absolutely glimmers on the beholder's face. Or we mightindicate a poet-painter, whose song has the vividness of picture, andwhose canvas is peopled with angels, fairies, and water sprites, done tothe ethereal life, because he saw them face to face in his poetic mood.Or we might bow before an artist, who has wrought too sincerely, tooreligiously, with too earnest a feeling, and too delicate a touch, forthe world at once to recognize how much toil and thought are compressedinto the stately brow of Prospero, and Miranda's maiden loveliness; orfrom what a depth within this painter's heart the Angel is leading forthSt. Peter.
Thus it would be easy to go on, perpetrating a score of littleepigrammatical allusions, like the above, all kindly meant, but noneof them quite hitting the mark, and often striking where they were notaimed. It may be allowable to say, however, that American art is muchbetter represented at Rome in the pictorial than in the sculpturesquedepartment. Yet the men of marble appear to have more weight with thepublic than the men of canvas; perhaps on account of the greater densityand solid substance of the material in which they work, and the sortof physical advantage which their labors thus acquire over the illusiveunreality of color. To be a sculptor seems a distinction in itself;whereas a painter is nothing, unless individually eminent.
One sculptor there was, an Englishman, endowed with a beautiful fancy,and possessing at his fingers' ends the capability of doing beautifulthings. He was a quiet, simple, elderly personage, with eyes brown andbright, under a slightly impending brow, and a Grecian profile, such ashe might have cut with his own chisel. He had spent his life, for fortyyears, in making Venuses, Cupids, Bacchuses, and a vast deal of othermarble progeny of dreamwork, or rather frostwork: it was all a vaporyexhalation out of the Grecian mythology, crystallizing on the dullwindow-panes of to-day. Gifted with a more delicate power than any otherman alive, he had foregone to be a Christian reality, and pervertedhimself into a Pagan idealist, whose business or efficacy, in ourpresent world, it would be exceedingly difficult to define. And, lovingand reverencing the pure material in which he wrought, as surely thisadmirable sculptor did, he had nevertheless robbed the marble of itschastity, by giving it an artificial warmth of hue. Thus it became a sinand shame to look at his nude goddesses. They had revealed themselvesto his imagination, no doubt, with all their deity about them; but,bedaubed with buff color, they stood forth to the eyes of the profane inthe guise of naked women. But, whatever criticism may be ventured onhis style, it was good to meet a man so modest and yet imbued with suchthorough and simple conviction of his own right principles and practice,and so quietly satisfied that his kind of antique achievement was allthat sculpture could effect for modern life.
This eminent person's weight and authority among his artistic brethrenwere very evident; for beginning unobtrusively to utter himself ona topic of art, he was soon the centre of a little crowd of youngersculptors. They drank in his wisdom, as if it would serve all thepurposes of original inspiration he, meanwhile, discoursing withgentle calmness, as if there could possibly be no other side, and oftenratifying, as it were, his own conclusions by a mildly emphatic "Yes."
The veteran Sculptor's unsought audience was composed mostly of our owncountrymen. It is fair to say, that they were a body of very dexterousand capable artists, each of whom had probably given the delightedpublic a nude statue, or had won credit for even higher skill by thenice carving of buttonholes, shoe-ties, coat-seams, shirt-bosoms, andother such graceful peculiarities of modern costume. Smart, practicalmen they doubtless were, and some of them far more than this, but stillnot precisely what an uninitiated person looks for in a sculptor. Asculptor, indeed, to meet the demands which our preconceptions make uponhim, should be even more indispensably a poet than those who deal inmeasured verse and rhyme. His material, or instrument, which serveshim in the stead of shifting and transitory language, is a pure, white,undecayin
g substance. It insures immortality to whatever is wrought init, and therefore makes it a religious obligation to commit no ideato its mighty guardianship, save such as may repay the marble forits faithful care, its incorruptible fidelity, by warming it with anethereal life. Under this aspect, marble assumes a sacred character; andno man should dare to touch it unless he feels within himself a certainconsecration and a priesthood, the only evidence of which, for thepublic eye, will be the high treatment of heroic subjects, or thedelicate evolution of spiritual, through material beauty.
No ideas such as the foregoing--no misgivings suggested by themprobably, troubled the self-complacency of most of these cleversculptors. Marble, in their view, had no such sanctity as we imputeto it. It was merely a sort of white limestone from Carrara, cut intoconvenient blocks, and worth, in that state, about two or three dollarsper pound; and it was susceptible of being wrought into certain shapes(by their own mechanical ingenuity, or that of artisans in theiremployment) which would enable them to sell it again at a much higherfigure. Such men, on the strength of some small knack in handling clay,which might have been fitly employed in making wax-work, are bold tocall themselves sculptors. How terrible should be the thought that thenude woman whom the modern artist patches together, bit by bit, from adozen heterogeneous models, meaning nothing by her, shall last as longas the Venus of the Capitol!--that his group of--no matter what, sinceit has no moral or intellectual existence will not physically crumbleany sooner than the immortal agony of the Laocoon!
Yet we love the artists, in every kind; even these, whose merits we arenot quite able to appreciate. Sculptors, painters, crayon sketchers, orwhatever branch of aesthetics they adopted, were certainly pleasanterpeople, as we saw them that evening, than the average whom we meetin ordinary society. They were not wholly confined within the sordidcompass of practical life; they had a pursuit which, if followedfaithfully out, would lead them to the beautiful, and always had atendency thitherward, even if they lingered to gather up golden drossby the wayside. Their actual business (though they talked about it verymuch as other men talk of cotton, politics, flour barrels, and sugar)necessarily illuminated their conversation with something akin to theideal. So, when the guests collected themselves in little groups, hereand there, in the wide saloon, a cheerful and airy gossip began to beheard. The atmosphere ceased to be precisely that of common life; ahint, mellow tinge, such as we see in pictures, mingled itself with thelamplight.
This good effect was assisted by many curious little treasures ofart, which the host had taken care to strew upon his tables. Theywere principally such bits of antiquity as the soil of Rome and itsneighborhood are still rich in; seals, gems, small figures of bronze,mediaeval carvings in ivory; things which had been obtained at littlecost, yet might have borne no inconsiderable value in the museum of avirtuoso.
As interesting as any of these relics was a large portfolio of olddrawings, some of which, in the opinion of their possessor, boreevidence on their faces of the touch of master-hands. Very ragged andill conditioned they mostly were, yellow with time, and tattered withrough usage; and, in their best estate, the designs had been scratchedrudely with pen and ink, on coarse paper, or, if drawn with charcoal ora pencil, were now half rubbed out. You would not anywhere see rougherand homelier things than these. But this hasty rudeness made thesketches only the more valuable; because the artist seemed to havebestirred himself at the pinch of the moment, snatching up whatevermaterial was nearest, so as to seize the first glimpse of an ideathat might vanish in the twinkling of an eye. Thus, by the spell ofa creased, soiled, and discolored scrap of paper, you were enabled tosteal close to an old master, and watch him in the very effervescence ofhis genius.
According to the judgment of several connoisseurs, Raphael's ownhand had communicated its magnetism to one of these sketches; and, ifgenuine, it was evidently his first conception of a favorite Madonna,now hanging in the private apartment of the Grand Duke, at Florence.Another drawing was attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, and appeared to bea somewhat varied design for his picture of Modesty and Vanity, in theSciarra Palace. There were at least half a dozen others, to which theowner assigned as high an origin. It was delightful to believe in theirauthenticity, at all events; for these things make the spectator morevividly sensible of a great painter's power, than the final glowand perfected art of the most consummate picture that may have beenelaborated from them. There is an effluence of divinity in the firstsketch; and there, if anywhere, you find the pure light of inspiration,which the subsequent toil of the artist serves to bring out in strongerlustre, indeed, but likewise adulterates it with what belongs to aninferior mood. The aroma and fragrance of new thoughts were perceptiblein these designs, after three centuries of wear and tear. The charm laypartly in their very imperfection for this is suggestive, and setsthe imagination at work; whereas, the finished picture, if a good one,leaves the spectator nothing to do, and, if bad, confuses, stupefies,disenchants, and disheartens him.
Hilda was greatly interested in this rich portfolio. She lingered solong over one particular sketch, that Miriam asked her what discoveryshe had made.
"Look at it carefully," replied Hilda, putting the sketch into herhands. "If you take pains to disentangle the design from thosepencil-marks that seem to have been scrawled over it, I think you willsee something very curious."
"It is a hopeless affair, I am afraid," said Miriam. "I have neitheryour faith, dear Hilda, nor your perceptive faculty. Fie! what a blurredscrawl it is indeed!"
The drawing had originally been very slight, and had suffered morefrom time and hard usage than almost any other in the collection itappeared, too, that there had been an attempt (perhaps by the very handthat drew it) to obliterate the design. By Hilda's help, however, Miriampretty distinctly made out a winged figure with a drawn sword, and adragon, or a demon, prostrate at his feet.
"I am convinced," said Hilda in a low, reverential tone, "that Guido'sown touches are on that ancient scrap of paper! If so, it must be hisoriginal sketch for the picture of the Archangel Michael setting hisfoot upon the demon, in the Church of the Cappuccini. The compositionand general arrangement of the sketch are the same with those of thepicture; the only difference being, that the demon has a more upturnedface, and scowls vindictively at the Archangel, who turns away his eyesin painful disgust."
"No wonder!" responded Miriam. "The expression suits the daintiness ofMichael's character, as Guido represents him. He never could have lookedthe demon in the face!"
"Miriam!" exclaimed her friend reproachfully, "you grieve me, and youknow it, by pretending to speak contemptuously of the most beautiful andthe divinest figure that mortal painter ever drew."
"Forgive me, Hilda!" said Miriam. "You take these matters morereligiously than I can, for my life. Guido's Archangel is a finepicture, of course, but it never impressed me as it does _you_."
"Well; we will not talk of that," answered Hilda. "What I wanted you tonotice, in this sketch, is the face of the demon. It is entirely unlikethe demon of the finished picture. Guido, you know, always affirmed thatthe resemblance to Cardinal Pamfili was either casual or imaginary. Now,here is the face as he first conceived it."
"And a more energetic demon, altogether, than that of the finishedpicture," said Kenyon, taking the sketch into his hand. "What a spiritis conveyed into the ugliness of this strong, writhing, squirmingdragon, under the Archangel's foot! Neither is the face an impossibleone. Upon my word, I have seen it somewhere, and on the shoulders of aliving man!"
"And so have I," said Hilda. "It was what struck me from the first."
"Donatello, look at this face!" cried Kenyon.
The young Italian, as may be supposed, took little interest in mattersof art, and seldom or never ventured an opinion respecting them. Afterholding the sketch a single instant in his hand, he flung it from himwith a shudder of disgust and repugnance, and a frown that had all thebitterness of hatred.
"I know the face well!" whispered he. "It is Miriam's model!"
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It was acknowledged both by Kenyon and Hilda that they had detected, orfancied, the resemblance which Donatello so strongly affirmed; and itadded not a little to the grotesque and weird character which, halfplayfully, half seriously, they assigned to Miriam's attendant, to thinkof him as personating the demon's part in a picture of more than twocenturies ago. Had Guido, in his effort to imagine the utmost of sinand misery, which his pencil could represent, hit ideally upon just thisface? Or was it an actual portrait of somebody, that haunted the oldmaster, as Miriam was haunted now? Did the ominous shadow follow himthrough all the sunshine of his earlier career, and into the gloom thatgathered about its close? And when Guido died, did the spectre betakehimself to those ancient sepulchres, there awaiting a new victim, tillit was Miriam's ill-hap to encounter him?
"I do not acknowledge the resemblance at all," said Miriam, lookingnarrowly at the sketch; "and, as I have drawn the face twenty times, Ithink you will own that I am the best judge."
A discussion here arose, in reference to Guido's Archangel, and it wasagreed that these four friends should visit the Church of the Cappuccinithe next morning, and critically examine the picture in questionthe similarity between it and the sketch being, at all events, a verycurious circumstance.
It was now a little past ten o'clock, when some of the company, who hadbeen standing in a balcony, declared the moonlight to be resplendent.They proposed a ramble through the streets, taking in their way someof those scenes of ruin which produced their best effects under thesplendor of the Italian moon.