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952 THE LEADER. [Saturday,
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THE COUNTESS GF ST. ALBAN. The Cduntess ...
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PICTURES AND DIRT. Dirt and Pictures Sep...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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School. Experiences. School Experiences ...
years "were fagged at cricket for more than a few minutes . But there were many "who hated cricket , and had no wish to learn , as they did not enjoy games ; their health or hent of mind preventing their taking any interest in it . To these it was hard work indeed to stand behind the wicket , frightened out of their self-possession hy the terrific howling ; to run from place to place , fetching " hard-hit outs . ; " to " long off , ' * often half a mile away , or "long leg , " which it tooka long time for their short ones to reach . Besides , of all perverse and obstinate things , a cricket-ball 5 s the most pigheaded : place yourself where you may , go where you will , it invariably slips through your fingers ; there is a kind , of twist about its progressive motion which defies all your attempts to arrest its onward flight . Many a cricket-hall , instead of rushing into hands ready to receive it , has leaped over my head after pitching on som-e hard sod , and given me a weary mm to the other end of the playground to fetch it . I have heard monitors explain that cricketing was much more healthy than lying by murmuring streams reading foolish , novels ; but we fags did not agree with them : it kept the fags out of mischief , and taught us how to play at manly games ,- they urged ; but we did not wish to he kept out of mischief , and liked playing cricket amongst ourselves . The most unanswerable argument was , that it put a check on the clay pipe , which at one time obtained among the " mauvais sujets" of the school .
There was also racket-fagging , but as it employed but four fags at one time , and was only unendurable from its extreme dullness and idleness , it need hardly be mentioned . The school was essentially a cricket-playing one , and the cricket-fagging was the severe out-door work . Lastly , there was the foot-ball fagging , which the little boys disliked most , and in which masters , mothers , and the public had the greatest interest . Nurses and . doctors must have disliked it most , as it lessened their occupation and their gains , sobeneficial was the influence it exercised on the health of the school . During the autumn halfyear- — -leaf-falling and showery Gctoher , bleak , rainy , foggy November , and clear frosty December—cricket b « mg abandoned , foot-ball was in full vogue .
952 The Leader. [Saturday,
952 THE LEADER . [ Saturday ,
The Countess Gf St. Alban. The Cduntess ...
THE COUNTESS GF ST . ALBAN . The Cduntess of St . Alban . Translated from the German of Hackls 3 nder r by Franz Demmler . ¦ Hodgson , Paternoster-row . IThe translator of this book tells us that Hacklaender in his own country is spoken of as the " German Boz , " and his popularity at home ' *' certainly has equalled , if not surpassed , that of his great English rnodel . " This is said to be the masterpiece of a writer whose long-established and wellearned fame " rests in a great measure on qualities of genius similar -to those by which one of the most popular humourists of England has endeared himself to the reading world . " Looking at the book from this point of -view , we were at a loss to recognise the meaning of the comparison to Dickens , except , perhaps , in some bits of miniature painting . The leaning towards Dumas is rather more apparent .
The romance * the manners , and even the low life , are certainly more of that school than any other . There is in the Countess of St . Alban plenty / of romance , incident , and some humour- ^ a trifle hard , perhaps—but little story . It is rather a succession of scenes than a tale . It is however , more than merely readable , it is interesting , and often amusing . The author' is evidently at home in the " coulisses . " Here is a scene minutely finisled . It is the rehearsal-room of the theatre of a Parisianised small German capital : This apartment waa very long , but rather narrow in proportion , and the floor somewhat inclined , like the stage itself , so that the young artists of fcoth sexes might be enabled even here to overcome the difficulty of dancing back , up hill , aa it were . Along the walls long poles were fastened horizontally , which the ladies took hold of whilst executing with their feet the strangest and most fanciful contortions .
They were a very gay company , and the merrier in the absence of their chief Signor Benetti , who was ia an inner room with the solo-dancers . HeretJhey stood , in the most remarkable costumes , in which curling papers and small caps covering the head prevailed ; tight boddices of coloured or white stuff showed off their thin waists , besides which are to bo mentioned the indispensable silk tricots , ending in old halfwora-out dancing-shoes . Loud laughter and gay conversation prevailed through the room . Here a group of three were . standing together , their toes painfully turned outward , and with their hands on their backs , telling each other remarkable or funny stories ; on another side there were two trying a new pas with a- lanky gentleman of
the corps de ballet ; several others , in a distant corner of the hall , were polking for their own private amusement , and some diminutive beginners , in tlie professional slang of the ballet called " rats , " were trying an exceedingly difficult final group , which somehow or other would never Bucceed . Now one and then the other would not pay any attention—then they tumbled over one another , rolled on the ground , scrambled up again , and tried their luck once more . The whole appearance of the dancing-room , in broad daylight Ivad a sort of threadbare , washed-out look about it ; it was like a ball which lasts until dawn of day , when the dresses and the coiffures of the fair dancers are deranged , and themselves look jaded and worn .
Again , —the rehearsal of a scene in a forthcoming ballet : — " Well then ladies , " said Signor Benetti , " now comes the nceno where you , Mademoiselle Pauline ( this was the name of the fair-haired danseuse" ) , are to execute your pas de deux with the Knight Astolfo . Already , in the adagio , lie tolls you pantomimicaUy that he loves you , and then expresses by dancing , "What are tho charms of the brido -which ia appointed to mo by Fate , in comparison with thine , 0 swoot one ?' His first pirowtte times -with tho -words , ' 0 sweet one ! ' then ho stops , longingly stretching out his arras towards you , and you , frightened by his confession , fly irom him ia dismay . So : one , two-, three , { owe , five , six , sovon , eight—piroaictte : ' oh , sweet one !' fly , Mademoiselle Paulino—that ' s it 1 but you should express the dismay more forcibly ; otherwise it was not bo badj more dismay , if you ploaao ; only consider tho importance of the moment I the catastrophe of tho whole ballot liingoa upon it . Once more—one , two , throe , four , five , six , sovon , eight—pirouette , 'O sweet on-ol' —stretch out your hrrns much more imploringly , sir—much more imploringly 1 Bravo 1
Mademoiselle Paulino , your dismay -was delightful—very good indeod . Lot us go on : in your solo , you answer him that you cannot lovo him , as ho is another ' s ; at tho same time you express your regret at its being so , aa in reality you love him after all ; - — . that ' s it ; now follows your pirouette ; then you oxprcsa by pantomime , * Alas ! Fate severs ua . '—Beautiful , very well done ! Now follows the grand nolo of tho Knight Astolfo ; ho cannot llv « without you , ho will pine away in sorrow and despair ;—very well done , sir ! —In your solo , Mademoiselle Paulino , you rolent , you bocomo more yielding . Excellent !—your relenting ia admirable . —Now bogina tho allogro , tho / km de deux;—yon fly from the knight ; he brings you back—you hold your hands * bashfully before your faco—he takea tho roao from your hair—you snatch it nway from him again . —Bravo 1 Mademoiselle Paulino—Bravo J—you dofend your rono moat divinely I—that ' s it;— 'Knight Astolfo , more pressing , if you plenaa—more proving 1—bomml—bamml — bodomm I—bomm I—bomm I—ho holds ho * fast—aha sinka on hia breast;—n < w a dull roll of kottlo-Ucuma . —Sixth acono , —Enter tho Muck knighta I *'
The translation is too good—mistakenly anglicised down to many of the names . On the whole , this is a good accession to a " Parlour Library , " and if the experiment succeeds , our public may thus rapidly reach a knowledge not only of " The German Boz , " but " the German Thackeray , " " the German Sue , " —to the end of the list of lumbering Teuton imitators in light literature . a
Pictures And Dirt. Dirt And Pictures Sep...
PICTURES AND DIRT . Dirt and Pictures Separated in the Works of the Old Masters . By Henry Merritt . Holyoake and Cols it possible that where beauty is acknowledged paramount , ugliness and dirt should be tolerated ? Yes , even admired , and certainly beloved . Such mere antiquarianism of the Dryasdust type is ah affliction of art very much to be lamented . It is a mortifying thing to hear men like Hazlitt enthusiastic over ' a dark , invisible , very fine old picture , ' and ascribing some merit of the Cartoons of Raphael ' to the decayed and dilapidated state of the pictures
themselves , which are the more majestic for being in ruins ; ' ' that all the petty meretricious part of the art is dead in ihem—the carnal is made spiritual—the corruptible has put on incorruption—and amidst the wreck of calm , and the mouldering of material beauty , nothing is left but a universe of thought or the broad imminent shadows of calm , contemplation or majestic pains . ' Traces of time and 'beautiful obscurities , where doubts and curiosities go hand in hand and eternally exercise the speculations of the learned , * as Mr . Merritt says , " awaken quite as much interest and admiration when discovered on the surfaces of old pictures as when found on : half obliterated coins and battered armour . *'
We treasure a mud-brick from Babylon because of its age , but a wormeaten panel with a few patches of paint left upon it , that once was a picture , retains abundant evidence of its age , but has lost its true interest , and it would be ridiculous to treasureit now . We must beware of affectations in art , for they may lead us to be influenced by the errors of superstition and ignorance . It is for jus to take a clear and pure view of art , to which ' the beautiful' is the A-pxi ' With the old Greeks there-was a superstitious , veneration in placing the genuine old originals of Zeus and Pallas—the ' Simulacra mtesta Deprum 'all rude and dirty as they were—side by side with the sublime creations of Phidias : so at the present day , with the Italians , the most beautiful pictures of Raphael are not chosen as the sbrines of the devoted , but it is some wretched daub of a Madonna scarcely visible ; probably some Byzantine deformity blackened with the smoke of incense and many tapers . Amongst ourselves , there is no escaping from the charge of a taste for ugliness ; all
the monsters of Chinese art and the terrible grotesques of Gothic gurgoyles are positively admired . Quaintness is a beauty . Every kind of old-looking picture that shows some heads with a petergrievous cast of countenance ( saints of course ) , attached to impossible bodies and limbs , is sought after ; and if it happen to possess the legends coming out of the mouth after the style of Gilray * s caricatures , the Value of the work of art is much enhanced . If these things are esteemed only as marking the stages of the art of painting , all very well ; but when they are a choice of the day , they are looked upon with a prejudiced eye in a morbid and artificial taste . With artists , the academies have made them sick of beauty , and * the school' experiences a revulsion in favour of ugliness . If young art progresses much further in search of sentiment and feeling , we shall have a spasmodic school of painting—the heads full of grimace and convulsive sorrow , with a moral in the pattern of the carpet .
We must be faithful to our love of beauty . Whatever is not beautiful must be proportionally disregarded . Time certainly brings very little beauty to pictures , which are not to "be estimated as works of antiquity ; it does infinitely more harm than good , and if there are means of hiding the traces of time , which are in fact decay , they should be adopted in company with every preventive possible- Mr . Merritt jls a practical and conscientious restorer of pictures , not a conceited forger that has neither the eye to detect nor the love to preserve the beauties that linger 'on the panel . Upon cleaning , ho says : — Ia it possible to clean old dirty pictures with beneficial results , and without injury to tho original tints and touches ? " No , " exclaims " A Tory in Art , " in tho Times ; "it ia aa idle to talk of restoring a picture to what it was , as to try and push back tho iron hand of time . Wo must make up our minds to put up with a
certain amount of dirt , and study tho works of departed genius through tho warm haze of time . " Much may we profit by the contemplation of delicate beauties—aa they appear through a dark crust of dirt I Wo may venture tho assertion that tlio old masters would bo tho first to object to the present dingy condition of their productions . The questions hero to bo asked arc , Did tho old painters calculate that thoir pictures would come to need cleaning ? " and tl Did they make any provision to that end ? " Certainl y they did . When oil painting first camo into use , one of itu useful virtues , as noted by tho painters of tho timo , was , that it would wash . Long before Italian pictures were remarkable for correct drawing or harmonious colouring , painters had manifested anxiety for tho future preservation of thoir works . Antonio da Messina , about tho year 1494 , seeing an oil picture of John Van Eyck ' s at Naples ,
and porcoiving that " it might bo washed with water without suffering any injury , ' waa so satisfied of tho advantages of oil painting over tho old method of colouring in distemper , that ho immediately BOt out for Bruges , and there , by presents and services , succeeded in prevailing on John Tan Eyck to divulge his precious secret . It is recorded that tho art of painting in oil thus found ita way into Italy . Any how , there is no want of evidence that tho early Italian painters wore desirous that thoir picturos should bo so painted that they might afterwards bo kept clean and sightly . Wo flnl tho venerable Leonardo da Vinci speculating on a method of painting a picture " tl » ftt will last for over . " This durability waa to bo ensured by a layer of glasa placed ovor tho picture , so as to preserve it from tho action of tho air . W « find vunriahoa of eotno sort in repute as for back as tho year 1410 , after which time they enmo into gcnoiul uso , nnd have continued so to tho present day .
When wo wish to proservo » print with its white margin from dust , we place a glass over it , and there in no doubt that painters , over since tho invention of oil painlii » ff » have boon accustomod to varnish thoir pictured with n view to tho prcaorvation of tho colours . There con be no question of tho long and general nao of varnishes , or of tho ono solo reason for thoir use .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 7, 1854, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_07101854/page/16/
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