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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:41:19 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:41:19 -0700 |
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diff --git a/13076-0.txt b/13076-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9db7ae0 --- /dev/null +++ b/13076-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10580 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13076 *** + +THE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN + +by + +W. G. COLLINGWOOD +M.A., F.S.A., Late Professor of Fine Art, University College, Reading + +1911 + + + + + + +PREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION + + +This book in its first form was written nearly twenty years ago with the +intention of contributing a volume to a series of University Extension +Manuals. For that purpose it included a sketch of Ruskin's "Work," with +some attempt to describe the continuous development of his thought. It +had the advantage--and the disadvantage--of being written under his eye; +that is to say, he saw as much of it as his health allowed; and it +received his general approval. + +To explain my venturing upon the subject at all, I may perhaps be +allowed to state that I became his pupil in 1872 (having seen him +earlier), and continued to be in some relation to him--as visitor, +resident assistant, or near neighbour--until his death. + +After his death the biographical part of my book was enlarged at the +expense of the description of his writings; and in revising once more I +have thrown out much relating to his works, chiefly because they are now +accessible as they were not formerly. + +W.G.C. + +CONISTON, May 1911 + + + + +CONTENTS + +BOOK I + +THE BOY POET (1819-1842) + +CHAPTER + I. HIS ANCESTORS + II. THE FATHER OF THE MAN (1819-1825) + III. PERFERVIDUM INGENIUM (1826-1830) + IV. MOUNTAIN-WORSHIP (1830-1835) + V. THE GERM OF "MODERN PAINTERS" (1836) + VI. A LOVE-STORY (1836-1839) + VII. "KATA PHUSIN" (1837-1838) + VIII. SIR ROGER NEWDIGATE'S PRIZE (1837-1839) + IX. "THE BROKEN CHAIN" (1840-1841) + X. THE GRADUATE OF OXFORD (1841-1842) + + +BOOK II + +THE ART CRITIC (1842-1860) + + I. "TURNER AND THE ANCIENTS" (1842-1844) + II. CHRISTIAN ART (1845-1847) + III. "THE SEVEN LAMPS" (1847-1849) + IV. "STONES OF VENICE" (1849-1851) + V. PRE-RAPHAELITISM (1851-1853) + VI. THE EDINBURGH LECTURES (1853-1854) + VII. THE WORKING MEN'S COLLEGE (1854-1855) + VIII. "MODERN PAINTERS" CONTINUED (1855-1856) + IX. "THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART" (1857-1858) + X. "MODERN PAINTERS" CONCLUDED (1858-1860) + + +BOOK III + +HERMIT AND HERETIC (1860-1870) + +CHAPTER + + I. "UNTO THIS LAST" (1860-1861) + II. "MUNERA PULVERIS" (1862) + III. THE LIMESTONE ALPS (1863) + IV. "SESAME AND LILIES" (1864) + V. "ETHICS OF THE DUST" (1865) + VI. "THE CROWN OF WILD OLIVE" (1865-1866) + VII. "TIME AND TIDE" (1867) +VIII. AGATES, AND ABBEVILLE (1868) + IX. "THE QUEEN OF THE AIR" (1869) + X. VERONA AND OXFORD (1869-1870) + + +BOOK IV + +PROFESSOR AND PROPHET (1870-1900) + + I. FIRST OXFORD LECTURES (1870-1871) + II. "FORS" BEGUN (1871-1872) + III. OXFORD TEACHING (1872-1875) + IV. ST. GEORGE AND ST. MARK (1875-1877) + V. "DEUCALION" AND "PROSERPINA" (1877-1879) + VI. THE DIVERSIONS OF BRANTWOOD (1879-1881) + VII. "FORS" RESUMED (1880-1881) +VIII. THE RECALL TO OXFORD (1882-1883) + IX. THE STORM-CLOUD (1884-1888) + X. DATUR HORA QUIETI (1889-1900) + + + + +THE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN + + +BOOK I + + +THE BOY POET (1819-1842) + + + + +THE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN + + +CHAPTER I + +HIS ANCESTORS + + +If origin, if early training and habits of life, if tastes, and +character, and associations, fix a man's nationality, then John Ruskin +must be reckoned a Scotsman. He was born in London, but his family was +from Scotland. He was brought up in England, but the friends and +teachers, the standards and influences of his early life, were chiefly +Scottish. The writers who directed him into the main lines of his +thought and work were Scotsmen--from Sir Walter and Lord Lindsay and +Principal Forbes to the master of his later studies of men and the means +of life, Thomas Carlyle. The religious instinct so conspicuous in him +was a heritage from Scotland; thence the combination of shrewd +common-sense and romantic sentiment; the oscillation between levity and +dignity, from caustic jest to tender earnest; the restlessness, the +fervour, the impetuosity--all these are the tokens of a Scotsman of +parts, and were highly developed in John Ruskin. + +In the days of auld lang syne the Rhynns of Galloway--that +hammer-headed promontory of Scotland which looks towards Belfast +Lough--was the home of two great families, the Agnews and the Adairs. +The Agnews, of Norman race, occupied the northern half, centring about +their island-fortress of Lochnaw, where they became celebrated for a +long line of hereditary sheriffs and baronets who have played no +inconsiderable part in public affairs. The southern half, from +Portpatrick to the Mull of Galloway, was held by the Adairs (or, as +formerly spelt, Edzears) who took their name from Edgar, son of +Dovenald, one of the two Galloway leaders at the Battle of the Standard. +Three hundred years later Robert Edzear--who does not know his +descendant and namesake, Robin Adair?--settled at Gainoch, near the head +of Luce Bay; and for another space of 300 years his children kept the +same estate, in spite of private feud, and civil war, and religious +persecution, of which they had more than their share. + +At the beginning of the eighteenth century, John Adair, the laird of +Little Genoch, was married to Mary Agnew, a near kinswoman of the +celebrated Sir Andrew, colonel of the Scots Fusiliers at Dettingen. The +exact relationship of Mary Agnew to "the bravest man in the British +army" remains undecided, but letters still extant from the Lady Agnew of +the day address her as "Dear Molly," and end, "Your affectionate cousin" +or "kinswoman." Her son Thomas succeeded his father in 1721, and, +retiring with his captaincy, settled on the estate. He married Jean, +daughter of Andrew Ross of Balsarroch and Balkail, a lady noted for her +beauty, her wit, and her Latin scholarship, and a member of a family +which has given many distinguished men to the army and navy. Among them +Admiral Sir John Ross, the Arctic explorer, Sir Hew Dalrymple, and +Field-Marshal Sir Hew Dalrymple Ross, were all her great-nephews, and +her son, Dr. John Adair, was the man in whose arms Wolfe died at the +taking of Quebec; it is he who is shown in Benjamin West's picture +supporting the General. + +Dr. Adair's sister Catherine, the daughter of Thomas Adair and Jean +Ross, married the Rev. James Tweddale, minister of Glenluce from 1758 to +1778, representative of an old Covenanting family, and holder of the +original Covenant, which had been confided to the care of his great-aunt +Catherine by Baillie of Jarviswood on his way to execution in the +"killing time." The document was sold with his library at his death, his +children being then under age, and is now in the Glasgow Museum. One of +these children, Catherine, married a John Ruskin. + +The origin of the name of Ruskin is English, dating from the middle +ages. Soon after the dissolution of Furness Abbey, Richerde Ruskyn and +his family were land-owners at Dalton-in-Furness. One branch, and that +with which we are especially concerned, settled in Edinburgh. + +John Ruskin--our subject's grandfather--when he ran away with Catherine +Tweddale in 1781, was a handsome lad of twenty. His portrait as a child +proves his looks, and he evidently had some charm of character or +promise of power, for the escapade did not lose him the friendship of +the lady's family. Major Ross, her uncle and guardian, remained a good +friend to the young couple. She herself was only sixteen at her +marriage--a bright and animated brunette, as her miniature shows, in +later years ripening to a woman of uncommon strength, with old-fashioned +piety of a robust, practical type, and a spirit which the trials of her +after-life--and they were many--could not subdue. Her husband set up in +the wine trade in Edinburgh. For many years they lived in the Old Town, +then a respectable neighbourhood, among a cultivated and well-bred +society, in which they moved as equals, entertaining, with others, such +a man as Dr. Thomas Brown, the professor of philosophy, a great light in +his own day, and still conspicuous in the constellation of Scotch +metaphysicians. + + + JOHN ADAIR, = MARY, cousin of Sir Andrew Agnew, of Lochnaw, +of Little Genoch. | hereditary Sheriff of Wigtownshire. + | + | + Capt. Thomas Adair, = Jean Ross, of Balsarroch, great-aunt of Sir + of Little Genoch. | John Ross, the Arctic explorer, + | of Sir Hew Dalrymple, and of Sir + | Hew Dalrymple Ross. + | + +-----------------------+============+ + | | | | + Rev. = Isobel Dr. Mrs. Cath. = Rev. John + Andrew McDouall, Adair, Maitland Adair | James Ruskin + Adair, of of grand- | Twaddle, (1732- +Minister Logan Quebec mother | of 1780) + of and of | Glen- | +Whithorn London J.E. | luce | + Maitland | | + of | | + Kenmure | | + Castle | | + | | + +---------+=======+ +==========+--------------+ + | | | | | + Cath. = James Cath. = John Margt. = Capt. Other + Mactaggart | Tweddale, Tweddale| Ruskin Ruskin | Cox issue + (aunt of | of (1765- | of (b. 1756)| of + Sir John | Glen- 181[?]) | Edinburgh | Yarmouth +Joseph Mactaggart, | laggan | (1761- | (1757- +Severn Bart., M.P., | | 1812[?]) | 1789[?]) + of of | | | + Rome Ardwell) | | | + | | | | ++-+ +----+ +----+==+ +====+---+ +| | | | | | | +| George = Cath. | Peter = Jessie J.J. = Margaret Bridget= Mr. +| Agnew, |Tweddale| Richard- | Ruskin Ruskin, | Cox Cox |Richard- +| hered- | | son, | of | (1781- | son +| itary | +----+ of | Billiter | 1871) | of +| Sheriff- | | Bridgend,| Street | | Market +| clerk | Other Perth | and | | Street, +| of | isssue | Denmark | | Croydon +| Wigtown | | Hill | | +| | | (1785- | | +| | | 1864) | | +| | | | | +| | | | | ++-+------+ +-------+------+ +-+-+-+-+-+-+ | +-+++-+-+-+ + | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | +Other Arthur = Joan Other James John John (d. +issue Severn, | Ruskin issue (d. young), Ruskin in + R.I., | Agnew John, of (b. 1819) Australia), + of | Glasgow, William + Hearne | William, M.D., George (of + Hill | (Tunbridge Croydon) + | Wells), Charles + +-+-+++-+ Andrew (d. in (drowned + | | | | | Australia), 1834) + Lily Catherine Margaret + Arthur (d. young), Bridget + Agnew Margaret and + Violet Peter + Herbert (d. young) + Mary + (1815-1849), + Jessie + (1818-1827) + + +Their son, John James Ruskin (born May 10, 1785), was sent to the +famous High School of Edinburgh, under Dr. Adam, the most renowned of +Scottish head-masters, and there he received the sound old-fashioned +classical education. Before he was sixteen, his sister Jessie was +already married at Perth to Peter Richardson, a tanner living at Bridge +End, by the Tay; and so his cousin, Margaret Cox, was sent for to fill +the vacant place. + +She was a daughter of old Mr. Ruskin's sister, who had married a Captain +Cox, sailing from Yarmouth for the herring fishery. He had died in 1789, +or thereabouts, from the results of an accident while riding homewards +to his family after one of his voyages, and his widow maintained herself +in comfort by keeping the old King's Head Inn at Croydon Market-place. +Of her two daughters the younger married another Mr. Richardson, a baker +at Croydon, so that, by an odd coincidence, there were two families of +Richardsons, unconnected with one another except through their +relationship to the Ruskins. + +Margaret, the elder daughter, who came to keep house for her uncle in +Edinburgh, was then nearly twenty years of age. She had been the model +pupil at her Croydon day-school; tall and handsome, pious and practical, +she was just the girl to become the confidante and adviser of her +dark-eyed, active, and romantic young cousin. + +Some time before the beginning of 1807, John James, having finished his +education at the High School, went to London, where a place had been +found for him by his uncle's brother-in-law, Mr. MacTaggart. He was +followed by a kind letter from Dr. Thomas Brown, who advised him to keep +up his Latin, and to study political economy, for the Professor looked +upon him as a young man of unusual promise and power. During some two +years, he worked as a clerk in the house of Sir William Gordon, Murphy +and Co., where he made friends, and laid the foundation of his +prosperity; for along with him at the office there was a Mr. Peter +Domecq, owner of the Spanish vineyards of Macharnudo, learning the +commercial part of his business in London, the headquarters of the +sherry trade. He admired his fellow-clerk's capacity so much as to offer +him the London agency of his family business. Mr. MacTaggart found the +capital in consideration of their taking his relative, Mr. Telford, into +the concern. And so they entered into partnership, about 1809, as +Ruskin, Telford and Domecq: Domecq contributing the sherry, Mr. Henry +Telford the capital, and Ruskin the brains. + +How he came by his business capacity may be understood--and in some +measure, perhaps, how his son came by his flexible and forcible +style--from a letter of Mrs. Catherine Ruskin, written about this time; +in which, moreover, there are a few details of family circumstances and +character, not without interest. John James Ruskin had been protesting +that he was never going to marry, but meant to devote himself to his +mother; she replied: + + + "... But my son an old Batchelor--believe me my beloved Child I + feel the full force and value of that affection that could prompt + to such a plan--dear as your society is to me it would then become + the misery of my existence--could I see my Child so formed for + domestick happiness deprived of every blessing on my account. No my + Dr John I do not know a more unhappy being than an old Batchelor + ... may God preserve my Child from realizing the dreary picture--as + soon as you can keep a Wife you must Marry with all possible + speed--that is as soon as you find a very Amiable woman. She must + be a good daughter and fond of Domestick life--and pious, without + ostentation, for remember no Woman without the fear of God, can + either make a good Wife or a good Mother--freethinking Men are + shocking to nature, but from an Infidel Woman Good Lord deliver us. + I have thought more of it than you have done--for I have two or + three presents carefully [laid] by for her, and I have also been so + foresightly as to purchase two Dutch toys for your Children in case + you might marry before we had free intercourse with that + country.... Who can say what I can say 'here is my Son--a hansome + accomplished young man of three and twenty--he will not Marry that + he may take care of his Mother--here is my Dr Margaret, hansome, + Amiable and good and she would not leave her _Ant_ (I mean Aunt) + for any Man on Earth.' Ah My Dear and valuable children, dear is + your affection to my heart, but I will never make so base a use of + it. I entreat my Dr John that you will not give yourself one + moment's uneasiness about me--I will at all events have £86 a year + for life that your Father cannot deprive me of, and tho' I could + not live very splendidly in a Town on this, yet with a neat little + House and Garden in the country, it would afford all the means of + life in fullness to Meggy myself and our servant. You forget, my Dr + how much a woman can do without in domestick affairs to save + Money--a Woman that has any management at all can live with more + comfort on £50 a year than a Man could do on two hundred. There was + a year of my life that I maintained myself and two children on + twenty pound, the bread too was 1/2 the loave that year: we did not + indeed live very sumptuously nor shall I say our strength improved + much but I did not contract one farthing of debt and that to me + supplyed the want of luxuries. Now my Dr John let me never hear a + fear expressed on my account; there is no fear of me; make yourself + happy and all will be well, and for God sake my beloved Boy take + care of your health, take a good drink of porter to dinner and + supper and a little Wine now and then, and tell me particularly + about yr new Lodgings," etc. + +He returned home to Edinburgh on a visit and arranged a marriage with +his cousin Margaret, if she would wait for him until he was safely +established; and then he set to work at the responsibilities of creating +a new business. It was a severer task than he had anticipated, for his +father's brain and business, as the above letter hints, had both gone +wrong; he left Edinburgh and settled at Bower's Well, Perth, ended +tragically, and left a load of debt behind him, which the son, sensitive +to the family honour, undertook to pay before laying by a penny for +himself. It took nine years of assiduous labour and economy. He worked +the business entirely by himself. The various departments that most men +entrust to others he filled in person. He managed the correspondence, +he travelled for orders, he arranged the importation, he directed the +growers out in Spain, and gradually built up a great business, paid off +his father's creditors, and secured his own competence. + +This was not done without sacrifice of health, which he never recovered, +nor without forming habits of over-anxiety and toilsome minuteness which +lasted his life long. But his business cares were relieved by cultured +tastes. He loved art, painted in water-colours in the old style, and +knew a good picture when he saw it. He loved literature, and read aloud +finely all the old standard authors, though he was not too old-fashioned +to admire "Pickwick" and the "Noctes Ambrosianæ" when they appeared. He +loved the scenery and architecture among which he had travelled in +Scotland and Spain; but he could find interest in almost any place and +any subject; an alert man, in whom practical judgment was joined to a +romantic temperament, strong feelings and opinions to extended +sympathies. His letters, of which there are many preserved, bear witness +to his character, taste, and intellect, curiously anticipating, on some +points, those of his son. His portraits give the idea of an expressive +face, sensitive, refined, every feature a gentleman's. + +So, after those nine years of work and waiting, he went to Perth to +claim his cousin's hand. She was for further delay; but with the +minister's help he persuaded her one evening into a prompt marriage in +the Scotch fashion, drove off with her next morning to Edinburgh, and on +to the home he had prepared in London at 54, Hunter Street, Brunswick +Square (February 27, 1818). + +The heroine of this little drama was no ordinary bride. At Edinburgh she +had found herself, though well brought up for Croydon, inferior to the +society of the Modern Athens. As the affianced of a man of ability, she +felt it her duty to make herself his match in mental culture, as she was +already in her own department of practical matters. Under Dr. Brown's +direction, and stimulated by his notice, she soon became--not a +blue-stocking--but well-read, well-informed above the average. She was +one of those persons who set themselves a very high standard, and +resolve to drag both themselves and their neighbours up to it. But, as +the process is difficult, so it is disappointing. People became rather +shy of Mrs. Ruskin, and she of them, so that her life was solitary and +her household quiet. It was not merely from narrow Puritanism that she +made so few friends; her morality and her piety, strict as they were +within their own lines, permitted her most of the enjoyments and +amusements of life; still less was there any cynicism or misanthropy. +But she devoted herself to her husband and son. She was too proud to +court those above her in worldly rank, and she was not easily approached +except by people fully equal to her in strength of character, of whom +there could never be many. The few who made their way to her friendship +found her a true and valuable friend. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +THE FATHER OF THE MAN (1819-1825) + + +Into this family John Ruskin was born on February 8, 1819, at half-past +seven in the morning. He was baptised on the twentieth by the Rev. Mr. +Boyd. + +The first account of him in writing is in a letter from his mother when +he was six weeks old. She chronicles--not without a touch of +superstition--the breaking of a looking-glass, and continues: "John +grows finely; he is just now on my knees sleeping and looking so +sweetly; I hope I shall not get proud of him." He was a fine healthy +baby, and at four months was "beginning to give more decided proofs that +he knows what he wants, and will have it if crying and passion will get +it." At a year his mother resolves that "this will be cured by a good +whipping when he can understand what it is," and we know that she +carried out her Spartan resolve. + +This, and the story in "Arachne," how she let him touch the tea-kettle; +and the reminiscences in "Præterita" of playthings locked up, and a lone +little boy staring at the water-cart and the pattern on the carpet--all +these give a gloomy impression of his mother, against which we must set +the proofs of affection and kindliness shown in her letters. In these we +can see her anxiously nursing him through childish ailments, taking him +out for his daily walk to Duppas Hill with a captain's biscuit in her +muff, for fear he should be hungry by the way; we hear her teaching him +his first lessons, with astonishment at his wonderful memory, and +glorying with Nurse Anne over his behaviour in church; and all these +things she retails in gossiping letters to her husband, while Mr. +Richard Gray gives two-year-old John "his first lesson on the flute, +both sitting on the drawing-room floor, very deeply engaged." "I am +sure," she says, "there is no other love, no other feeling, like a +mother's towards her first boy when she loves his father;" and her pride +in his looks, and precocity, and docility--"I never met with a child of +his age so sensible to praise or blame"--found a justification in his +passionate devotion to the man who was so dear to them both. + +Though he was born in the thick of London, he was not City-bred. His +first three summers were spent in lodgings in Hampstead or Dulwich, then +"the country." So early as his fourth summer he was taken to Scotland by +sea to stay with his aunt Jessie, Mrs. Richardson of Perth. There he +found cousins to play with, especially one, little Jessie, of nearly his +own age; he found a river with deep swirling pools, that impressed him +more than the sea, and he found the mountains. Coming home in the +autumn, he sat for his full-length portrait to James Northcote, R.A., +and being asked what he would choose for background, he replied, "Blue +hills." + +Northcote had painted Mr. and Mrs. Ruskin, and, as they were fond of +artistic company, remained their friend. A certain friendship too, was +struck up between the old Academician, then in his seventy-seventh year, +the acknowledged cynic and satirist, and the little wise boy who asked +shrewd questions, and could sit still to be painted; who, moreover, had +a face worth painting, not unlike the model from whom Northcote's +master, the great Sir Joshua, had painted his famous cherubs. The +painter asked him to come again, and sit as the hero of a fancy picture, +bought at the Academy by the flattered parents. There is a grove, a +flock of toy sheep, drapery in the grand style, a mahogany Satyr taking +a thorn out of the little pink foot of a conventional nudity--poor +survivals of the Titianesque. But the head is an obvious portrait, and a +happy one; far more like the real boy, so tradition says, than the +generalized chubbiness of the commissioned picture. + +In the next year (1823) they quitted the town for a suburban home. The +spot they chose was in rural Dulwich, on Herne Hill, a long offshoot of +the Surrey downs; low, and yet commanding green fields and scattered +houses in the foreground, with rich undulating country to the south, and +looking across London toward Windsor and Harrow. It is all built up now; +but their house (later No. 28) must have been as secluded as any in a +country village. There were ample gardens front and rear, well stocked +with fruit and flowers--quite an Eden for a little boy, and all the more +that the fruit of it was forbidden. It was here that all his years of +youth were spent. Here, under his parents' roof, he wrote his earlier +works, as far as vol. i. of "Modern Painters." To the adjoining house, +as his own separate home, he returned for a period of his middle life; +and in the old home, handed over to his adopted daughter, he still used +to find his own rooms ready when he cared to visit London. + +So he was brought up almost as a country boy, though near enough to town +to get the benefit of it, and far enough from the more exciting scenes +of landscape nature to find them ever fresh, when summer after summer he +revisited the river scenery of the West or the mountains of the North. +For by a neat arrangement, and one fortunate for his education, the +summer tours were continued yearly. Mr. John James Ruskin still +travelled for the business, then greatly extending. "Strange," he writes +on one occasion, "that Watson [his right-hand man] went this journey +without getting one order, and everyone gives me an order directly." In +return for these services to the firm, Mr. Telford, the capitalist +partner, took the vacant chair at the office, and even lent his carriage +for the journeys. There was room for two, so Mrs. Ruskin accompanied her +husband, whose indifferent health gave her and his friends constant +anxiety during long separations. And the boy could easily be packed in, +sitting on his little portmanteau, and playing horses with his father's +knees; the nurse riding on the dickey behind. + +They started usually after the great family anniversary, the father's +birthday, on May 10, and journeyed by easy stages through the South of +England, working up the west to the north, and then home by the +east-central route, zigzagging from one provincial town to another, +calling at the great country seats, to leave no customer or possible +customer unvisited; and in the intervals of business seeing all the +sights of the places they passed through--colleges and churches, +galleries and parks, ruins, castles, caves, lakes, and mountains--and +seeing them all, not listlessly, but with keen interest, noting +everything, inquiring for local information, looking up books of +reference, setting down the results, as if they had been meaning to +write a guide-book and gazetteer of Great Britain. _They_, I say, did +all this, for as soon as the boy could write, he was only imitating his +father in keeping his little journal of the tours, so that all he +learned stayed by him, and the habit of descriptive writing was formed. + +In 1823 they seem to have travelled only through the south and +south-west; in 1824 they pushed north to the lakes, stayed awhile at +Keswick, and while the father went about his business, the child was +rambling with his nurse on Friar's Crag, among the steep rocks and +gnarled roots, which suggested, even at that age, the feelings expressed +in one of the notable passages in "Modern Painters." Thence they went on +to Scotland, and revisited their relatives at Perth. In 1825 they took a +more extended tour, and spent a few weeks in Paris, partly for the +festivities at the coronation of Charles X., partly for business +conference with Mr. Domecq, who had just been appointed wine-merchant to +the King of Spain. Thence they went to Brussels and the field of +Waterloo, of greater interest than the sights of Paris to six-year-old +John, who often during his boyhood celebrated the battle, and the heroes +of the battle, in verse. + +Before he was quite three he used to climb into a chair and preach. +There is nothing so uncommon in that. Of Robert Browning, his neighbour +and seven-years-older contemporary, the same tale is told. But while the +incident that marks the baby Browning is the aside, _à propos_ of a +whimpering sister, "Pew-opener, remove that child," the baby Ruskin is +seen in his sermon: "People, be dood. If you are dood, Dod will love +you; if you are not dood, Dod will not love you. People, be dood." + +At the age of four he had begun to read and write, refusing to be taught +in the orthodox way--this is so accurately characteristic--by syllabic +spelling and copy-book pothooks. He preferred to find a method out for +himself, and he found out how to read whole words at a time by the look +of them, and to write in vertical characters like book-print, just as +the latest improved theories of education suggest. His first letter may +be quoted as illustrating his own account of his childhood, and as +proving how entirely Scotch was the atmosphere in which he was brought +up. The postmark gives the date March 15, 1823. Mrs. Ruskin premises +that John was scribbling on a paper from which he proceeded to read what +she writes down (I omit certain details about the whip): + + + "MY DEAR PAPA, + + "I love you. I have got new things. Waterloo Bridge--Aunt Bridget + brought me it. John and Aunt helped to put it up, but the pillars + they did not put right, upside down. Instead of a book bring me a + whip, coloured red and black.... To-morrow is Sabbath. Tuesday I go + to Croydon. I am going to take my boats and my ship to Croydon. + I'll sail them on the pond near the burn which the bridge is over. + I will be very glad to see my cousins. I was very happy when I saw + Aunt come from Croydon. I love Mrs. Gray and I love Mr. Gray. I + would like you to come home, and my kiss and my love." + + [First autograph in straggling capitals] + + "JOHN RUSKIN" + +When once he could read, thenceforward his mother gave him regular +morning lessons in Bible-reading and in reciting the Scotch paraphrases +of the Psalms and other verse, which for his good memory was an easy +task. He made rhymes before he could write them, of course. + +At five he was a bookworm, and the books he read fixed him in certain +grooves of thought, or, rather, say they were chosen as favourites from +an especial interest in their subjects--an interest which arose from his +character of mind, and displayed it. But with all this precocity, he was +no milksop or weakling; he was a bright, active lad, full of fun and +pranks, not without companions, though solitary when at home, and kept +precisely, in the hope of guarding him from every danger. He was so +little afraid of animals--a great test of a child's nerves--that about +this time he must needs meddle with their fierce Newfoundland dog, +Lion, which bit him in the mouth, and spoiled his looks. Another time he +showed some address in extricating himself from the water-butt--a common +child-trap. He did not fear ghosts or thunder; instead of that, his +early-developed landscape feeling showed itself in dread of foxglove +dells and dark pools of water, in coiling roots of trees--things that to +the average English fancy have no significance whatever. + +At seven he began to imitate the books he was reading, to write books +himself. He had found out how to _print_, as children do; and it was his +ambition to make real books, with title-pages and illustrations, not +only books, indeed, but sets of volumes, a complete library of his whole +works. But in a letter of March 4, 1829, his mother says to his father: +"If you think of writing John, would you impress on him the propriety of +not beginning too eagerly and becoming careless towards the end of his +_works_, as he calls them? I think in a letter from you it would have +great weight. He is never idle, and he is even uncommonly persevering +for a child of his age; but he often spoils a good beginning by not +taking the trouble to think, and concluding in a hurry." + +The first of these sets was imitated in style from Miss Edgeworth; he +called it, "Harry and Lucy Concluded; or, Early Lessons." Didactic he +was from the beginning. It was to be in four volumes, uniform in red +leather, with proper title, frontispiece, and "copper-plates," "printed +and composed by a little boy, and also drawn." It was begun in 1826, and +continued at intervals until 1829. It was all done laboriously in +imitation of print, and, to complete the illusion, contained a page of +errata. This great work was, of course, never completed, though he +laboured through three volumes; but when he tired of it, he would turn +his book upside down, and begin at the other end with other matters; so +that the red books contain all sorts of notes on his minerals and +travels, reports of sermons, and miscellaneous information, besides +their professed contents; in this respect also being very like his later +works. + +There you have our author ready made, with his ever-fresh interest in +everything, and all-attempting eagerness, out of which the first thing +that crystallizes into any definite shape is the verse-writing. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +PERFERVIDUM INGENIUM (1826-1830) + + +The first dated "poem" was written a month before little John Ruskin +reached the age of seven. It is a tale of a mouse, in seven octosyllabic +couplets, "The Needless Alarm," remarkable only for an unexpected +correctness in rhyme, rhythm, and reason. + +His early verse owes much to the summer tours, which were prolific in +notes; everything was observed and turned into verse. The other +inspiring source was his father--the household deity of both wife and +child, whose chief delight was in his daily return from the city, and in +his reading to them in the drawing-room at Herne Hill. John was packed +into a recess, where he was out of the way and the draught; he was +barricaded by a little table that held his own materials for amusement, +and if he liked to listen to the reading, he had the chance of hearing +good literature, the chance sometimes of hearing passages from Byron and +Christopher North and Cervantes, rather beyond his comprehension, for +his parents were not of the shockable sort: with all their religion and +strict Scotch morality, they could laugh at a broad jest, as +old-fashioned people could. + +So he associated his father and his father's readings with the poetry +of reflection, as he associated the regular summer round with the poetry +of description. As every summer brought its crop of description, so +against the New Year (for, being Scotch, they did not then keep our +Christmas) and against his father's birthday in May he used always to +prepare some little drama or story or "address" of a reflective nature, +beginning with the verses on "Time," written for New Year's Day, 1827. + +That year they were again at Perth, and on their way home some early +morning frost suggested the not ungraceful verses on the icicles at +Glenfarg. By a childish misconception, the little boy seems to have +confused the real valley that interested him so with Scott's ideal +Glendearg, and, partly for this reason, to have found a greater pleasure +in "The Monastery," which he thereupon undertook to paraphrase in verse. +There remain some hundreds of doggerel rhymes; but his affection for +that particular novel survived the fatal facility of his octosyllabics, +and reappears time after time in his later writings. + +Next year, 1828, their tour was stopped at Plymouth by the painful news +of the death of his aunt Jessie, to whom they were on their way. It was +hardly a year since the bright little cousin, Jessie of Perth, had died +of water on the brain. She had been John's especial pet and playfellow, +clever, like him, and precocious; and her death must have come to his +parents as a warning, if they needed it, to keep their own child's brain +from over-pressure. It is evident that they did their best to "keep him +back"; they did not send him to school for fear of the excitement of +competitive study. His mother put him through the Latin grammar herself, +using the old Adam's manual which his father had used at Edinburgh High +School. Even this old grammar became a sort of sacred book to him; and +when at last he went to school, and his English master threw the book +back to him, saying, "that's a Scotch thing," the boy was shocked and +affronted, as which of us would be at a criticism on _our_ first +instrument of torture? He remembered the incident all his life, and +pilloried the want of tact with acerbity in his reminiscences. + +They could keep him from school, but they did not keep him from study. +The year 1828 saw the beginning of another great work, "Eudosia, a Poem +on the Universe"; it was "printed" with even greater neatness and +labour; but this, too, after being toiled at during the winter months, +was dropped in the middle of its second "book." It was not idleness that +made him break off such plans, but just the reverse--a too great +activity of brain. His parents seem to have thought that there was no +harm in this apparently quiet reading and writing. They were extremely +energetic themselves, and hated idleness. They appear to have held a +theory that their little boy was safe so long as he was not obviously +excited; and to have thought that the proper way of giving children +pocket-money was to let them earn it. So they used to pay him for his +literary labours; "Homer" was one shilling a page; "Composition," one +penny for twenty lines; "Mineralogy," one penny an article. + +The death of his aunt Jessie left a large family of boys and one girl to +the care of their widowed father, and the Ruskins felt it their duty to +help. They fetched Mary Richardson away, and brought her up as a sister +to their solitary son. She was not so beloved as Jessie had been, but a +good girl and a nice girl, four years older than John, and able to be a +companion to him in his lessons and travels. There was no sentimentality +about his attachment to her, but a steady fraternal relationship, he, of +course, being the little lord and master; but she was not without +spirit, which enabled her to hold her own, and perseverance, which +sometimes helped her to eclipse, for the moment, his brilliancy. They +learnt together, wrote their journals together, and shared alike with +the scrupulous fairness which Mrs. Ruskin's sensible nature felt called +on to show. And so she remained his sister, and not quite his sister, +until she married, and after a very short married life died. + +Another accession to the family took place in the same year (1828); the +Croydon aunt, too, had died, and left a dear dog, Dash, a brown and +white spaniel, which at first refused to leave her coffin, but was +coaxed away, and found a happy home at Herne Hill, and frequent +celebration in his young master's verses. So the family was now +complete--papa and mamma, Mary and John and Dash. One other figure must +not be forgotten, Nurse Anne, who had come from the Edinburgh home, and +remained always with them, John's nurse and then Mrs. Ruskin's +attendant, as devoted and as censorious as any old-style Scotch servant +in a story-book. + +The year 1829 marked an advance in poetical composition. For his +father's birthday he made a book more elaborate than any, sixteen pages +in a red cover, with a title-page quite like print: "Battle of Waterloo +| a play | in two acts | with other small | Poems dedicated to his +father | by John Ruskin | 1829 Hernhill _(sic)_ Dulwich." + +To this are appended, among other pieces, fair copies of "Skiddaw," and +"Derwentwater." A recast of these, touched up by some older hand, and +printed in _The Spiritual Times_ for February, 1830, may be called his +first appearance in type. + +An illness of his postponed their tour for 1829, until it was too late +for more than a little journey in Kent. He has referred his earliest +sketching to this occasion, but it seems likely that the drawings +attributed to this year were done in 1831. He was, however, busy writing +poetry. At Tunbridge, for example, he wrote that fragment "On Happiness" +which catches so cleverly the tones of Young--a writer whose orthodox +moralizing suited with the creed in which John Ruskin was brought up, +alternating, be it remembered, with "Don Quixote." + +Coming home, he began a new edition of his verses, on a more +pretentious scale than the old red books, in a fine bound volume, +exquisitely "printed," with the poems dated. This new energy seems to +have been roused by the gift from his Croydon cousin Charles, a clerk in +the publishing house of Smith, Elder, and Co., of their annual +"Friendship's Offering." Mrs. Ruskin, in a letter of October 31, 1829, +finds "the poetry very so-so"; but John evidently made the book his +model. + +He was now growing out of his mother's tutorship, and during this autumn +he was put under the care of Dr. Andrews for his Latin. He relates the +introduction in "Præterita," and, more circumstantially, in a letter of +the time, to Mrs. Monro, the mother of his charming Mrs. Richard Gray, +the indulgent neighbour who used to pamper the little gourmand with +delicacies unknown in severe Mrs. Ruskin's dining-room. He says in the +letter--this is at ten years old: "Well, papa, seeing how fond I was of +the doctor, and knowing him to be an excellent Latin scholar, got him +for me as a tutor, and every lesson I get I like him better and better, +for he makes me laugh 'almost, if not quite'--to use one of his own +expressions--the whole time. He is so funny, comparing Neptune's lifting +up the wrecked ships of Æneas with his trident to my lifting up a potato +with a fork, or taking a piece of bread out of a bowl of milk with a +spoon! And as he is always saying [things] of that kind, or relating +some droll anecdote, or explaining the part of Virgil (the book which I +am in) very nicely, I am always delighted when Mondays, Wednesdays, and +Fridays are come." + +Dr. Andrews was no doubt a genial teacher, and had been a scholar of +some distinction in his University of Glasgow; but Mrs. Ruskin thought +him "flighty," as well she might, when, after six months' Greek, he +proposed (in March, 1831) to begin Hebrew with John. It was a great +misfortune for the young genius that he was not more sternly drilled at +the outset, and he suffered for it through many a long year of +struggles with deficient scholarship. + +The Doctor had a large family and pretty daughters. One, who wrote +verses in John's note-book, and sang "Tambourgi," Mrs. Orme, lived until +1892 in Bedford Park; the other lives in Coventry Patmore's "Angel in +the House." When Ruskin, thirty years later, wrote of that +doubtfully-received poem, that it was the "sweetest analysis we possess +of quiet, modern, domestic feeling," few of his readers could have known +all the grounds of his appreciation, or suspected the weight of meaning +in the words. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +MOUNTAIN-WORSHIP (1830-1835) + + +Critics who are least disposed to give Ruskin credit for his artistic +doctrines or economical theories unite in allowing that he taught his +generation to look at Nature, and especially at the sublime in +Nature--at storms and sunrises, and the forests and snows of the Alps. +This mission of mountain-worship was the outcome of a passion beside +which the other interests and occupations of his youth were only toys. +He could take up his mineralogy and his moralizing and lay them down, +but the love of mountain scenery was something beyond his control. We +have seen him leave his heart in the Highlands at three years old; we +have now to follow his passionate pilgrimages to Skiddaw and Snowdon, to +the Jungfrau and Mont Blanc. + +They had planned a great tour through the Lakes and the North two years +before, but were stopped at Plymouth by the news of Mrs. Richardson's +death. At last the plan was carried out. A prose diary was written +alternately by John and Mary, one carrying it on when the other tired, +with rather curious effect of unequally-yoked collaboration. We read how +they "set off from London at seven o'clock on Tuesday morning, the 18th +May," and thenceforward we are spared no detail: the furniture of the +inns; the bills of fare; when they got out of the carriage and walked; +how they lost their luggage; what they thought of colleges and chapels, +music and May races at Oxford, of Shakespeare's tomb, and the +pin-factory at Birmingham; we have a complete guide-book to Blenheim and +Warwick Castle, to Haddon and Chatsworth, and the full itinerary of +Derbyshire. "Matlock Bath," we read, "is a most delightful place"; but +after an enthusiastic description of High Tor, John reacts into bathos +with a minute description of wetting their shoes in a puddle. The cavern +with a Bengal light was fairyland to him, and among the minerals he was +quite at home. + +Then they hurried north to Windermere. Once at Lowwood, the excitement +thickens, with storms and rainbows, mountains and waterfalls, boats on +the lake and coaching on the steep roads. This journey through Lakeland +is described in the galloping anapæsts of the "Iteriad," which was +simply the prose journal versified on his return, one of the few +enterprises of the sort which were really completed. + +To readers who know the country it is interesting as giving a detailed +account in the days when this "nook of English ground" was "secure from +rash assault." One learns that, even then, there were jarring sights at +Bowness Bay and along Derwentwater shore, elements unkind and bills +exorbitant. Coniston especially was dreary with rain, and its inn--the +old Waterhead, now destroyed--extravagantly dear; "_but_," says John, +with his eye for mineral specimens, "it contains several rich +coppermines." An interesting touch is the hero-worship with which they +went reverently to peep at Southey and Wordsworth in church; too humble +to dream of an introduction, and too polite to besiege the poets in +their homes, but independent enough to form their own opinions on the +personality of the heroes. They did not like the look of Wordsworth at +all; Southey they adored. The dominant note of the tour is, however, an +ecstatic delight in the mountain scenery; on Skiddaw and Helvellyn all +the gamut of admiration is lavished. + +On returning home, John began Greek under Dr. Andrews, and was soon +versifying Anacreontics in his notebooks. He began to read Byron for +himself, with what result we shall see before long; but the most +important new departure was the attempt to copy Cruikshank's etchings to +Grimm's fairy tales, his real beginning at art. From this practice he +learnt the value of the pure, clean line that expresses form. It is a +good instance of the authority of these early years over Ruskin's whole +life and teaching that in his "Elements of Drawing" he advised young +artists to begin with Cruikshank, as he began, and that he wrote +appreciatively both of the stories and the etchings so many decades +afterwards in the preface to a reprint by J.C. Hotten. + +His cousin-sister Mary had been sent to a day-school when Mrs. Ruskin's +lessons were superseded by Dr. Andrews, and she had learnt enough +drawing to attempt a view of the hotel at Matlock, a thing which John +could not do. So, now that he too showed some power of neat +draughtsmanship, it was felt that he ought to have her advantages. They +got Mr. Runciman the drawing-master, chosen, it may be, as a relative of +the well-known Edinburgh artist of the same name, to give him lessons, +in the early part of 1831. His teaching was of the kind which preceded +the Hardingesque: it aimed at a bold use of the soft pencil, with a +certain roundness of composition and richness of texture, a conventional +"right way" of drawing anything. This was hardly what John wanted; but, +not to be beaten, he facsimiled the master's freehand in a sort of +engraver's stipple, which his habitual neatness helped him to do in +perfection. Runciman soon put a stop to that, and took pains with a +pupil who took such pains with himself--taught him, at any rate, the +principles of perspective, and remained his only drawing-master for +several years. + +A sample of John Ruskin's early lessons in drawing, described by him in +letters to his father, may be not without interest. On February 20, +1832, he writes: + + + "... You saw the two models that were last sent, before you went + away. Well, I took my paper, and I fixed my points, and I drew my + perspective, and then, as Mr. Runciman told me, I began to invent a + scene. You remember the cottage that we saw as we went to Rhaidyr + Dhu (_sic_), near Maentwrog, where the old woman lived whose + grandson went with us to the fall, so very silently? I thought my + model resembled that; so I drew a tree--such a tree, such an + enormous fellow--and I sketched the waterfall, with its dark rocks, + and its luxuriant wood, and its high mountains; and then I examined + one of Mary's pictures to see how the rocks were done, and another + to see how the woods were done, and another to see how the + mountains were done, and another to see how the cottages were done, + and I patched them all together, and I made such a lovely + scene--oh, I should get such a scold from Mr. Runciman (that is, if + he ever scolded)!" + +After the next lesson he wrote, February 27, 1832: + + + "You know the beautiful model drawing that I gave you an account of + in my last. I showed it to Mr. Runciman. He contemplated it for a + moment in silence, and then, turning, asked me if I had copied. I + told him how I had patched it up; but he said that that was not + copying, and although he was not satisfied with the picture, he + said there was something in it that would make him totally change + the method he had hitherto pursued with me. He then asked Mary for + some gray paper, which was produced; then inquired if I had a + colour-box; I produced the one you gave me, and he then told me he + should begin with a few of the simplest colours, in order to teach + me better the effects of light and shade. He should then proceed + to teach me water-colour painting, but the latter only as a basis + for oil; this last, however, to use his own words, all in due + time.... Oh, if I could paint well before we went to Dover! I + should have such sea-pieces...." + +In March 1834, Runciman was encouraging him in his oil-painting; but a +year later he wrote to his father: + + "I cannot bear to paint in oil, + C. Fielding's tints alone for me! + The other costs me double toil, + And wants some fifty coats to be + Splashed on each spot successively. + Faugh, wie es stinckt! I can't bring out, + With all, a picture fit to see. + My bladders burst; my oils are out-- + And then, what's all the work about?" + +After a few lessons he could rival Mary when they went for their summer +excursion. He set to work at once at Sevenoaks to draw cottages; at +Dover and Battle he attempted castles. It may be that these first +sketches are of the pre-Runciman period; but the Ruskins made the round +of Kent in 1831, and though the drawings are by no means in the master's +style, they show some practice in using the pencil. + +The journey was extended by the old route, conditioned by business as +before, round the South Coast to the West of England, and then into +Wales. There his powers of drawing failed him; moonlight on Snowdon was +too vague a subject for the blacklead point but a hint of it could be +conveyed in rhyme: + + "Folding like an airy vest, + The very clouds had sunk to rest; + Light gilds the rugged mountain's breast, + Calmly as they lay below; + Every hill seemed topped with snow, + As the flowing tide of light + Broke the slumbers of the night." + +Harlech Castle was too sublime for a sketch, but it was painted with +the pen: + + "So mighty, so majestic, and so lone; + And all thy music, now, the ocean's murmuring." + +And the enthusiasm of mountain glory, a sort of ecstacy of +uncontrollable passion, strives for articulate deliverance in the +climbing song, "I love ye, ye eternal hills." + +It was hard to come back to the daily round, the common task, especially +when, in this autumn of 1831, to Dr. Andrews' Latin and Greek, the +French grammar and Euclid were added, under Mr. Rowbotham. And the new +tutor had no funny stories to tell; he was not so engaging a man as the +"dear Doctor," and his memory was not sweet to his wayward pupil. But +the parents had chosen for the work one who was favourably known by his +manuals, and capable of interesting even a budding poet in the +mathematics; for our author tells that at Oxford, and ever after, he +knew his Euclid without the figures, and that he spent all his spare +time in trying to trisect an angle. An old letter from Rowbotham informs +Mr. J.J. Ruskin that an eminent mathematician had seen John's attempt, +and had said that it was the cleverest he knew. In French, too, he +progressed enough to be able to find his way alone in Paris two years +later. And however the saucy boy may have satirized his tutor in the +droll verses on "Bedtime," Mr. Rowbotham always remembered him with +affection, and spoke of him with respect. + +In spite of these tedious tutorships, he managed to scribble +energetically all this winter, writing with amazing rapidity, as his +mother notes: attempts at Waverley novels, which never got beyond the +first chapter, imitations of "Childe Harold" and "Don Juan" and scraps +in the style of everybody in turn. No wonder his mother sent him to bed +at nine punctually, and kept him from school, in vain efforts to quiet +his brain. The lack of companions was made up to him in the friendship +of Richard Fall, son of a neighbour on "the Hill," a boy without +affectation or morbidity of disposition whose complementary character +suited him well. An affectionate comradeship sprang up between the two +lads, and lasted, until in middle life they drifted apart, in no +ill-will, but each going on his own course to his own destiny. + +Some real advance was made this winter (1831-32) with his Shelleyan +"Sonnet to a Cloud" and his imitations of Byron's "Hebrew Melodies," +from which he learnt how to concentrate expression, and to use rich +vowel-sounds and liquid consonants with rolling effect. A deeper and +more serious turn of thought, that gradually usurped the place of the +first boyish effervescence, has been traced by him to the influence of +Byron, in whom, while others saw nothing more than wit and passion, +Ruskin perceived an earnest mind and a sound judgment. + +But the most sincere poem--if sincerity be marked by unstudied phrase +and neglected rhyme--the most genuine "lyrical cry" of this period, is +that song in which our boy-poet poured forth his longing for the "blue +hills" he had loved as a baby, and for those Coniston crags over which, +when he became old and sorely stricken, he was still to see the morning +break. When he wrote these verses he was nearly fourteen, or just past +his birthday. It had been eighteen months since he had been in Wales, +and all the weary while he had seen no mountains; but in his regrets he +goes back a year farther still, to fix upon the Lakeland hills, less +majestic than Snowdon, but more endeared, and he describes his +sensations on approaching the beloved objects in the very terms that +Dante uses for his first sight of Beatrice: + + "I weary for the fountain foaming, + For shady holm and hill; + My mind is on the mountain roaming, + My spirit's voice is still. + + "The crags are lone on Coniston + And Glaramara's dell; + And dreary on the mighty one, + The cloud-enwreathed Sea-fell...." + + "There is a thrill of strange delight + That passes quivering o'er me, + When blue hills rise upon the sight, + Like summer clouds before me." + +Judge, then, of the delight with which he turned over the pages of a new +book, given him this birthday by the kind Mr. Telford, in whose carriage +he had first seen those blue hills--a book in which all his mountain +ideals, and more, were caught and kept enshrined--visions still, and of +mightier peaks and ampler valleys, romantically "tost" and sublimely +"lost," as he had so often written in his favourite rhymes. In the +vignettes to Rogers' "Italy," Turner had touched the chord for which +John Ruskin had been feeling all these years. No wonder that he took +Turner for his leader and master, and fondly tried to copy the wonderful +"Alps at Daybreak" to begin with, and then to imitate this new-found +magic art with his own subjects and finally to come boldly before the +world in passionate defence of a man who had done such great things for +him. + +This mountain-worship was not inherited from his father, who never was +enthusiastic about peaks and clouds and glaciers, though he was +interested in all travelling in a general way. So that it was not +Rogers' "Italy" that sent the family off to the Alps that summer; but, +fortunately for John, his father's eye was caught by the romantic +architecture of Prout's "Sketches in Flanders and Germany," when it came +out in April, 1853, and his mother proposed to make both of them happy +in a tour on the Continent. The business-round was abandoned, but they +could see Mr. Domecq on their way back through Paris, and not wholly +lose the time. + +They waited to keep papa's birthday on May 10, and early next morning +drove off--father and mother, John and Mary, Nurse Anne, and the +courier Salvador. They crossed to Calais, and posted, as people did in +the old times, slowly from point to point; starting betimes, halting at +the roadside inns, where John tried to snatch a sketch, reaching their +destination early enough to investigate the cathedral or the citadel, +monuments of antiquity or achievements of modern civilisation, with +impartial eagerness; and before bedtime John would write up his journal +and work up his sketches just as if he were at home. + +So they went through Flanders and Germany, following Prout's lead by the +castles of the Rhine; but at last, at Schaffhausen one Sunday +evening--"suddenly--behold--beyond!"--they had seen the Alps. +Thenceforward Turner was their guide as they crossed the Splügen, sailed +the Italian lakes, wondered at Milan Cathedral, and the Mediterranean at +Genoa, and then roamed through the Oberland and back to Chamouni. All +this while a great plan shaped itself in the boy's head, no less than to +make a Rogers' "Italy" for himself, just as he tried to make a "Harry +and Lucy" or a "Dictionary of Minerals." On every place they passed he +would write verses and prose sketches, to give respectively the romance +and the reality or ridicule; for he saw the comic side of it all, +keenly; and he would illustrate the series with Turneresque vignettes, +drawn with the finest crowquill pen, to imitate the delicate engravings. +By this he learnt more drawing in two or three years than most amateur +students do in seven. For the first year he had the "Watchtower of +Andernach" and the "Jungfrau from Interlaken" to show, with others of +similar style, and thenceforward alternated between Turner and Prout, +until he settled into something different from either. + +But Turner and Prout were not the only artists he knew; at Paris he +found his way into the Louvre, and got leave from the directors, though +he was under the age required, to copy. The picture he chose was a +Rembrandt. + +Between this foreign tour and the next, his amusement was to draw these +vignettes, and to write the poems suggested by the scenes he had +visited. He had outgrown the evening lessons with Dr. Andrews, and as he +was fifteen, it was time to think more seriously of preparing him for +Oxford, where his name was put down at Christ Church. His father hoped +he would go into the Church, and eventually turn out a combination of a +Byron and a bishop--something like Dean Milman, only better. For this, +college was a necessary preliminary; for college, some little schooling. +So they picked the best day-school in the neighbourhood, that of the +Rev. Thomas Dale (afterwards Dean of Rochester), in Grove Lane, Peckham. +John Ruskin worked there rather less than two years. In 1835 he was +taken from school in consequence of an attack of pleurisy, and lost the +rest of that year from regular studies. + +More interesting to him than school was the British Museum collection of +minerals, where he worked occasionally with his Jamieson's Dictionary. +By this time he had a fair student's collection of his own, and he +increased it by picking up specimens at Matlock, or Clifton, or in the +Alps, wherever he went, for he was not short of pocket-money. He took +the greatest pains over his catalogues, and wrote elaborate accounts of +the various minerals in a shorthand he invented out of Greek letters and +crystal forms. + +Grafted on this mineralogy, and stimulated by the Swiss tour, was a new +interest in physical geology, which his father so far approved as to +give him Saussure's "Voyages dans les Alpes" for his birthday in 1834. +In this book he found the complement of Turner's vignettes, something +like a key to the "reason why" of all the wonderful forms and marvellous +mountain-architecture of the Alps. He soon wrote a short essay on the +subject, and had the pleasure of seeing it in print, in Loudon's +_Magazine of Natural History_ for March, 1834, along with another bit +of his writing, asking for information on the cause of the colour of the +Rhine-water. + +He had already some acquaintance with J.C. Loudon, F.L.S., H.S., etc., +and he was on the staff of that versatile editor not long afterwards, +and took a lion's share of the writing in the _Magazine of +Architecture_. Meanwhile he had been introduced to another editor, and +to the publishers with whom he did business for many a year to come. The +acquaintance was made in a curious, accidental manner. His cousin +Charles Richardson, clerk to Smith, Elder, and Co., had the opportunity +of mentioning the young poet's name to Thomas Pringle, editor of the +"Friendship's Offering" which John had admired and imitated. Mr. Pringle +came out to Herne Hill, and was hospitably entertained as a brother +Scot, as not only an editor, but a poet himself--not _only_ a poet, but +a man of respectability and piety, who had been a missionary in South +Africa. In return for this hospitality he gave a good report of John's +verses, and, after getting him to re-write two of the best passages in +the last tour, carried them off for insertion in his forthcoming number. +He did more: he carried John to see the actual Samuel Rogers, whose +verses had been adorned by the great Turner's vignettes. + +After the pleurisy of April, 1835, his parents took him abroad again, +and he made great preparations to use the opportunity to the utmost. He +would study geology in the field, and took Saussure in his trunk he +would note meteorology: he made a cyanometer--a scale of blue to measure +the depth of tone, the colour whether of Rhine-water or of Alpine skies. +He would sketch. By now he had abandoned the desire to make MS. albums, +after seeing himself in print, and so chose rather to imitate the +imitable, and to follow Prout, this time with careful outlines on the +spot, than to idealize his notes in mimic Turnerism. He kept a prose +journal, chiefly of geology and scenery, as well as a versified +description, written in a metre imitated from "Don Juan," but more +elaborate, and somewhat of a _tour de force_ in rhyming. But that +poetical journal was dropped after he had carried it through France, +across the Jura, and to Chamouni. The drawing crowded it out, and for +the first time he found himself as ready with his pencil as he had been +with his pen. + +His route is marked by the drawings of that year, from Chamouni to the +St. Bernard and Aosta, back to the Oberland and up the St. Gothard; then +back again to Lucerne and round by the Stelvio to Venice and Verona, and +finally through the Tyrol and Germany homewards. The ascent of the St. +Bernard was told in a dramatic sketch of great humour and power of +characterization, and a letter to Richard Fall records the night on the +Rigi, when he saw the splendid sequence of storm, sunset, moonlight, and +daybreak, which forms the subject of one of the most impressive passages +of "Modern Painters." + +It happened that Pringle had a plate of Salzburg which he wanted to +print in order to make up the volume of "Friendship's Offering" for the +next Christmas. He seems to have asked John Ruskin to furnish a copy of +verses for the picture, and at Salzburg, accordingly, a bit of rhymed +description was written and re-written, and sent home to the editor. +Early in December the Ruskins returned, and at Christmas there came to +Herne Hill a gorgeous gilt morocco volume, "To John Ruskin, from the +Publishers." On opening it there were his "Andernach" and "St. Goar," +and his "Salzburg" opposite a beautifully-engraved plate, all hills, +towers, boats, and figures moving picturesquely under the sunset, in +Turner's manner more or less, "Engraved by E. Goodall from a drawing by +W. Purser." It was almost like being Mr. Rogers himself. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE GERM OF "MODERN PAINTERS" (1836) + + +He was now close upon seventeen, and it was time to think seriously of +his future. His father went to Oxford early in the year to consult the +authorities about matriculation. Meantime they sent him to Mr. Dale for +some private lessons, and for the lectures on logic, English literature, +and translation, which were given on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays at +King's College, London. John enjoyed his new circumstances heartily. +From voluminous letters, it is evident that he was in high spirits and +in pleasant company. He was a thorough boy among boys--Matson, +Willoughby, Tom Dale and the rest. He joined in their pranks, and +contributed to their amusement with his ready good-humour and unflagging +drollery. + +Mr. Dale told him there was plenty of time before October, and no fear +about his passing, if he worked hard. He found the work easy, except +epigram-writing, which he thought "excessively stupid and laborious," +but helped himself out, when scholarship failed, with native wit. Some +of his exercises remain, not very brilliant Latinity; some he saucily +evaded, thus: + + "Subject: _Non sapere maximum est malum._ + + "Non sapere est grave; sed, cum dura epigrammata oportet + Scribere, tunc sentis præcipue esse malum." + +In Switzerland and Italy, during the autumn of 1835, he had made a great +many drawings, carefully outlined in pencil or pen on gray paper, and +sparsely touched with body colour, in direct imitation of the Prout +lithographs. Prout's original coloured sketches he had seen, no doubt, +in the exhibition; but he does not seem to have thought of imitating +them, for his work in this kind was all intended to be for illustration +and not for framing. The "Italy" vignettes likewise, with all their +inspiration, suggested to him only pen-etching; he was hardly conscious +that somewhere there existed the tiny, coloured pictures that Turner had +made for the engraver. Still, now that he could draw really well, his +father, who painted in water-colours himself, complied with the demand +for better teaching than Runciman's, went straight to the President of +the Old Water-Colour Society, and engaged him for the usual course of +half a dozen lessons at a guinea a piece. Copley Fielding could draw +mountains as nobody else but Turner could, in water-colour; he had +enough mystery and poetry to interest the younger Ruskin, and enough +resemblance to ordinary views of Nature to please the elder. So they +both went to Newman Street to his painting-room, and John worked through +the course, and a few extra lessons, but, after all, found Fielding's +art was not what he wanted. Some sketches exist, showing the influence +of the spongy style; but his characteristic way of work remained for him +to devise for himself. + +At the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1836 Turner showed the first striking +examples of his later style in "Juliet and her Nurse," "Mercury and +Argus," and "Rome from Mount Aventine." The strange idealism, the +unusualness, the mystery, of these pictures, united with evidence of +intense significance and subtle observation, appealed to young Ruskin as +it appealed to few other spectators. Public opinion regretted this +change in its old favourite, the draughtsman of Oxford colleges, the +painter of shipwrecks and castles. And _Blackwood's Magazine_, which the +Ruskins, as Edinburgh people and admirers of Christopher North, read +with respect, spoke about Turner, in a review of the picture-season, +with that freedom of speech which Scotch reviewers claim as a heritage +from the days of Jeffrey. Young Ruskin at once dashed off an answer. + +The critic had found that Turner was "out of nature"; Ruskin tried to +show that the pictures were full of facts, but treated with poetical +license. The critic pronounced Turner's colour bad, his execution +neglected, and his chiaroscuro childish; in answer to which Ruskin +explained that Turner's reasoned system was to represent light and shade +by the contrast of warm and cold colour, rather than by the opposition +of white and black which other painters used. He denied that his +execution was other than his aims necessitated, and maintained that the +critic had no right to force his cut-and-dried academic rules of +composition on a great genius; at the same time admitting that: + + + "The faults of Turner are numerous, and perhaps more egregious than + those of any other great existing artist; but if he has greater + faults, he has also greater beauties. + + "His imagination is Shakespearian in its mightiness. Had the scene + of 'Juliet and her Nurse' risen up before the mind of a poet, and + been described in 'words that burn,' it had been the admiration of + the world.... Many-coloured mists are floating above the distant + city, but such mists as you might imagine to be ethereal spirits, + souls of the mighty dead breathed out of the tombs of Italy into + the blue of her bright heaven, and wandering in vague and infinite + glory around the earth that they have loved. Instinct with the + beauty of uncertain light, they move and mingle among the pale + stars, and rise up into the brightness of the illimitable heaven, + whose soft, sad blue eye gazes down into the deep waters of the sea + for ever--that sea whose motionless and silent transparency is + beaming with phosphor light, that emanates out of its sapphire + serenity like bright dreams breathed into the spirit of a deep + sleep. And the spires of the glorious city rise indistinctly bright + into those living mists, like pyramids of pale fire from some vast + altar; and amidst the glory of the dream there is, as it were, the + voice of a multitude entering by the eye, arising from the + stillness of the city like the summer wind passing over the leaves + of the forest, when a murmur is heard amidst their multitudes. + + "This, O Maga, is the picture which your critic has pronounced to + be 'like models of different parts of Venice, streaked blue and + white, and thrown into a flour-tub'!" + +Before sending his reply to the editor of _Blackwood_, as had been +intended, it was thought only right that Turner should be consulted. The +MS. was enclosed to his address in London, with a courteous note from +Mr. John James Ruskin, asking his permission to publish. Turner replied, +expressing the scorn he felt for anonymous attacks, and jestingly +hinting that the art-critics of the old Scotch school found their +"meal-tub" in danger from his "flour-tub"; but "he never moved in such +matters," so he sent on the MS. to Mr. Munro of Novar, who had bought +the picture. + +Ten days or so after this episode John Ruskin was matriculated at Oxford +(October 18, 1836). He told the story of his first appearance as a +gownsman in one of his gossiping letters in verse: + + "A night, a day past o'er--the time drew near-- + The morning came--I felt a little queer; + Came to the push; paid some tremendous fees; + Past; and was capped and gowned with marvellous ease. + Then went to the Vice-Chancellor to swear + Not to wear boots, nor cut or comb my hair + Fantastically--to shun all such sins + As playing marbles or frequenting inns; + Always to walk with breeches black or brown on; + When I go out, to put my cap and gown on; + With other regulations of the sort, meant + For the just ordering of my comportment. + Which done, in less time than I can rehearse it, I + Found myself member of the University!" + +In pursuance of his plan for getting the best of everything, his father +had chosen the best college, as far as he knew, that in which social and +scholastic advantages were believed to be found in pre-eminent +combination, and he had chosen what was thought to be the best position +in the college; so that it was as gentleman-commoner of Christ Church +that John Ruskin made his entrance into the academic world. + +After matriculation, the Ruskins made a fortnight's tour to Southampton +and the coast, and returned to Herne Hill. John went back to King's +College, and in December was examined in the subjects of his lectures. +He wrote to his father on Christmas Eve about the examination in English +literature: + + + "The students were numerous, and so were the questions; the room + was hot, the papers long, the pens bad, the ink pale, and the + interrogations difficult. It lasted only three hours. I wrote + answers in very magnificent style to all the questions except three + or four; gave in my paper and heard no more of the matter: _sic + transeunt bore-ia mundi_." + +He went on to mention his "very longitudinal essay," which, since no +other essays are reported in his letters about King's College, must be +the paper published in 1893, in answer to the question. "Does the +perusal of works of fiction act favourably or unfavourably on the moral +character?" + +At his farewell interview with Mr. Dale he was asked, as he writes to +his father, what books he had read, and replied with a pretty long list, +including Quintilian and Grotius. Mr. Dale inquired what "light books" +he was taking to Oxford: "Saussure, Humboldt, and other works on natural +philosophy and geology," he answered. "Then he asked if I ever read any +of the modern fashionable novels; on this point I thought he began to +look positive, so I gave him a negative, with the exception of Bulwer's, +and now and then a laughable one of the Theodore Hook's or Captain +Marryat's." And so, with much excellent advice about exercise and sleep, +and the way to win the Newdigate, he parted from Mr. Dale. + +This Christmas was marked by his first introduction to the scientific +world. Mr. Charlesworth, of the British Museum, invited him to a meeting +of the Geological Society (January 4, 1837), with promise of +introduction to Buckland and Lyell. The meeting, as he wrote, was +"amusing and interesting, and very comfortable for frosty weather, as +Mr. Murchison got warm and Mr. Greenau _(sic)_ witty. The warmth, +however, got the better of the wit." + +The Meteorological Society also claimed his attention, and in this month +he contributed a paper which "Richard [Fall] says will frighten them out +of their meteorological wits, containing six close-written folio pages, +and having, at its conclusion, a sting in its tail, the very agreeable +announcement that it only commences the subject." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +A LOVE-STORY (1836-1839) + + +Early in 1836 the quiet of Herne Hill was fluttered by a long-promised, +long-postponed visit. Mr. Domecq at last brought his four younger +daughters to make the acquaintance of their English friends. The eldest +sister had lately been married to a Count Maison, heir to a peer of +France; for Mr. Domecq, thanks in great measure to his partner's energy +and talents, was prosperous and wealthy, and moved in the enchanted +circles of Parisian society. + +To a romantic schoolboy in a London suburb the apparition was dazzling. +Any of the sisters would have charmed him, but the eldest of the four, +Adèle Clotilde, bewitched him at once with her graceful figure and that +oval face which was so admired in those times. She was fair, +too--another recommendation. He was on the brink of seventeen, at the +ripe moment, and he fell passionately in love with her. She was only +fifteen, and did not understand this adoration, unspoken and unexpressed +except by intensified shyness; for he was a very shy boy in the +drawing-room, though brimming over with life and fun among his +schoolfellows. His mother's ideals of education did not include French +gallantry; he felt at a loss before these Paris-bred, Paris-dressed +young ladies, and encumbered by the very strength of his new-found +passion. + +And yet he possessed advantages, if he had known how to use them. He was +tall and active, light and lithe in gesture, not a clumsy hobbledehoy. +He had the face that caught the eye, in Rome a few years later, of +Keats' Severn, no mean judge, surely, of faces and poet's faces. He was +undeniably clever; he knew all about minerals and mountains; he was +quite an artist, and a printed poet. But these things weigh little with +a girl of fifteen who wants to be amused; and so she only laughed at +John. + +He tried to amuse her, but he tried too seriously. He wrote a story to +read her, "Leoni, a Legend of Italy," for of course she understood +enough English to be read to, no doubt to be wooed in, seeing her mother +was English. The story was of brigands and true lovers, the thing that +was popular in the romantic period. The costumery and mannerisms of the +little romance are out of date now, and seem ridiculous, though Mr. +Pringle and the public were pleased with it then, when it was printed in +"Friendship's Offering." But the girl of fifteen only laughed the more. + +When they left, he had no interest in his tour-book; even the mountains, +for the time, had lost their power, and all his plans of great works +were dropped for a new style of verse--the love-poems of 1836. + +His father, from whom he kept nothing, approved the verses, and did not +disapprove his views on the young lady. Indeed, it is quite plain, from +the correspondence of the two gentlemen, that Mr. Domecq intended his +friend and partner's son to become his own son-in-law. He had the +greatest respect for the Ruskins, and every reason for desiring to link +their fortunes still more closely with those of his own family. But to +Mrs. Ruskin, with her religious feelings, it was intolerable, +unbelievable, that the son whom she had brought up in the nurture and +admonition of the strictest Protestantism should fix his heart on an +alien in race and creed. The wonder is that their relations were not +more strained; there are few young men who would have kept unbroken +allegiance to a mother whose sympathy failed them at such a crisis. + +As the year went on his passion seemed to grow in the absence of the +beloved object. His only plan of winning her was to win his spurs first; +but as what? Clearly his forte, it seemed, was in writing. If he could +be a successful writer of romances, of songs, of plays, surely she would +not refuse him. And so he began another romantic story, "Velasquez, the +Novice," opening with the Monks of St. Bernard, among whom had been, so +the tale ran, a mysterious member, whose papers, when discovered, made +him out the hero of adventures in Venice. He began a play, which was to +be another great work, "Marcolini." He had no playwright's eye for +situations, but the conversation is animated, and the characters finely +drawn, with more discrimination than one would expect from so young an +author. + +This work was interrupted at the end of Act III. by pressing calls to +other studies. But it was not that he had forgotten Adèle. From time to +time he wrote verses to her or about her; and as in 1838 she was sent to +school with her sisters at Newhall, near Chelmsford, to "finish" her in +English, in that August he saw her again. She had lost some of her first +girlish prettiness, but that made no difference. And when the Domecqs +came to Herne Hill at Christmas, he was as deeply in love as ever. But +she still laughed at him. + +His father was fond of her, liked all the sisters, and thought much of +them as girls of fine character, but he liked Adèle best. He seems to +have been fond of his partner, too, worked very hard in his interests, +and behaved very well to his heirs afterwards through many years of +responsible and difficult management of their business. And at this +time, when he went down to the convent school in Essex, as he often did, +he must have had opportunities for seeing how hopeless the case was. Mr. +Domecq recognised it, too, but thought, it seems (they manage these +things differently in France), that any of his daughters would do as +well, and early in 1839 entertained an offer from Baron Duquesne, a rich +and handsome young Frenchman. They kept this from John, fearing he would +break down at the news, so fully did they recognise the importance of +the affair. They even threw other girls in his way. It was not +difficult, for by now he had made some mark in magazine literature, and +was a steady, rising young man, with considerable expectations. But he +could not think of any other girl. + +In February or March, 1839, Mr. Domecq died. The Maisons came to +England, and the marriage was proposed. Adèle stayed at Chelmsford until +September, when he wrote the long poem of "Farewell," dated the eve of +their last meeting and parting. + +At twenty young men do not die of love; but I find that a fortnight +after writing this he was taken seriously ill. During the winter of +1839-40 the negotiations for the marriage in Paris went on. It took +place in March. They kept the news from him as long as they could, for +he was in the schools next Easter term, and Mr. Brown (his college +tutor) had seemed to hope he would get a First, so his mother wrote to +her husband. In May he was pronounced consumptive, and had to give up +Oxford, and all hope of the distinction for which he had laboured, and +with that any plans that might have been entertained for his distinction +in the Church. And his parents' letters of the period put it beyond a +doubt that this first great calamity of his life was the direct +consequence of that unfortunate matchmaking. + +For nearly two years he was dragged about from place to place, and from +doctor to doctor, in search of health. Thanks partly to wise treatment, +more to new faces, and most to a plucky determination to employ himself +usefully with his pen and his pencil, he gradually freed himself from +the spell, and fifty years afterwards could look back upon the story as +a pretty comedy of his youthful days. + + + +CHAPTER VII + +"KATA PHUSIN" (1837-1838) + + +Devoted as she was to her husband, Mrs. Ruskin felt bound to watch over +her son at Oxford. It was his health she was always anxious about; +doctoring was her forte. He had suffered from pleurisy; caught cold +easily; was feared to be weak in the lungs; and nobody but his mother +understood him. So taking Mary Richardson, she went up with him +(January, 1837), and settled in lodgings at Adams' in the High. Her plan +was to make no intrusion on his college life, but to require him to +report himself every day to her. She would not be dull; she could drive +about and see the country, and to that end took her own carriage to +Oxford, the "fly" which had been set up two years before. John had been +rather sarcastic about its genteel appearance. "No one," he said, "would +sit down to draw the form of it." However, she and Mary drove to Oxford, +and reckoned that it would only mean fifteen months' absence from home +altogether, great part of which deserted papa would spend in travelling. + +John went into residence in Peckwater. At first he spent every evening +with his mother and went to bed, as Mr. Dale had told him, at ten. After +a few days Professor Powell asked him to a musical evening; he excused +himself, and explained why. The Professor asked to be introduced, +whereupon says his mother, "I shall return the call, but make no +visiting acquaintances." + +The "early-to-bed" plan was also impracticable. It was not long before +somebody came hammering at his "oak" just as he was getting to sleep, +and next morning he told his mother that he really ought to have a glass +of wine to give. So she sent him a couple of bottles over, and that very +night "Mr. Liddell and Mr. Gaisford" (junior) turned up. "John was glad +he had wine to offer, but they would not take any; they had come to see +sketches. John says Mr. Liddell looked at them with the eye of a judge +and the delight of an artist, and swore they were the best sketches he +had ever seen. John accused him of quizzing, but he answered that he +really thought them excellent." John said that it was the scenes which +made the pictures; Mr. Liddell knew better, and spread the fame of them +over the college. Next morning "Lord Emlyn and Lord Ward called to look +at the sketches," and when the undergraduates had dropped in one after +another, the Dean himself, even the terrible Gaisford, sent for the +portfolio, and returned it with august approval. + +Liddell, afterwards Dean of Christ Church; Newton, afterwards Sir +Charles, of the British Museum; Acland, afterwards Sir Henry, the +Professor of Medicine, thus became John Ruskin's friends: the first +disputing with him on the burning question of Raphael's art, but from +the outset an admirer of "Modern Painters," and always an advocate of +its author; the second differing from him on the claims of Greek +archæology, but nevertheless a close acquaintance through many long +years; and the third for half a century the best of friends and +counsellors. + +The dons of his college he was less likely to attract. Dr. Buckland, the +famous geologist, and still more famous lecturer and talker, took notice +of him and employed him in drawing diagrams for lectures. The Rev. +Walter Brown, his college tutor, afterwards Rector of Wendlebury, won +his good-will and remained his friend. His private tutor, the Rev. +Osborne Gordon, was always regarded with affectionate respect. But the +rest seem to have looked upon him as a somewhat desultory and erratic +young genius, who might or might not turn out well. For their immediate +purpose, the Schools, and Church or State preferment, he seemed hardly +the fittest man. + +The gentlemen-commoners of Christ Church were a puzzle to Mrs. Ruskin; +noblemen of sporting tastes, who rode and betted and drank, and got +their impositions written "by men attached to the University for the +purpose, at 1s.6d. to 2s.6d., so you have only to reckon how much you +will give to avoid chapel." And yet they were very nice fellows. If they +began by riding on John's back round the quad, they did not give him the +cold shoulder--quite the reverse. He was asked everywhere to wine; he +beat them all at chess; and they invaded him at all hours. "It does +little good sporting _his_ oak," wrote his mother, describing how Lord +Desart and Grimston climbed in through his window while he was hard at +work. "They say midshipmen and Oxonians have more lives than a cat, and +they have need of them if they run such risks." + +Once, but once only, he was guilty, as an innocent freshman, of a breach +of the laws of his order. He wrote too good an essay. He tells his +father: + + + "OXFORD, _February_, 1837. + + "Yesterday (Saturday) forenoon the Sub-dean sent for me, took me up + into his study, sat down with me, and read over my essay, pointing + out a few verbal alterations and suggesting improvements; I, of + course, expressed myself highly grateful for his condescension. + Going out, I met Strangeways. 'So you're going to read out to-day, + Ruskin. _Do_ go it at a good rate, my good fellow. Why do you write + such devilish good ones?' Went a little farther and met March. + 'Mind you stand on the top of the desk, Ruskin; gentlemen-commoners + never stand on the steps.' I asked him whether it would look more + dignified to stand head or heels uppermost. He advised heels. Then + met Desart. 'We must have a grand supper after this, Ruskin; + gentlemen-commoners always have a flare-up after reading their + themes.' I told him I supposed he wanted to 'pison my + rum-and-water.'" + +And though they teased him unmercifully, he seems to have given as good +as he got. At a big wine after the event, they asked him whether his +essay cost 2s.6d. or 5s. What he answered is not reported; but they +proceeded to make a bonfire in Peckwater, while he judiciously escaped +to bed. + +So for a home-bred boy, thrown into rather difficult surroundings, his +first appearance at Christ Church was distinctly a success. +"Collections" in March, 1837, went off creditably for him. Hussey, +Kynaston and the Dean said he had taken great pains with his work, and +had been a pattern of regularity; and he ended his first term very well +pleased with his college and with himself. + +In his second term he had the honour of being elected to the Christ +Church Club, a very small and very exclusive society of the best men in +the college: "Simeon, Acland, and Mr. Denison proposed him; Lord Carew +and Broadhurst supported." And he had the opportunity of meeting men of +mark, as the following letter recounts. He writes on April 22, 1837: + + + "My Dearest Father, + + "When I returned from hall yesterday--where a servitor read, or + pretended to read, and Decanus growled at him, 'Speak out!'--I + found a note on my table from Dr. Buckland, requesting the pleasure + of my company to dinner, at six, to meet two celebrated geologists, + Lord Cole and Sir Philip Egerton. I immediately sent a note of + thanks and acceptance, dressed, and was there a minute after the + last stroke of Tom. Alone for five minutes in Dr. B.'s + drawing-room, who soon afterwards came in with Lord Cole, + introduced me, and said that as we were both geologists he did not + hesitate to leave us together while he did what he certainly very + much required--brushed up a little. Lord Cole and I were talking + about some fossils newly arrived from India. He remarked in the + course of conversation that his friend Dr. B.'s room was cleaner + and in better order than he remembered ever to have seen it. There + was not a chair fit to sit upon, all covered with dust, broken + alabaster candlesticks, withered flower-leaves, frogs cut out of + serpentine, broken models of fallen temples, torn papers, old + manuscripts, stuffed reptiles, deal boxes, brown paper, wool, tow + and cotton, and a considerable variety of other articles. In came + Mrs. Buckland, then Sir Philip Egerton and his brother, whom I had + seen at Dr. B.'s lecture, though he is not an undergraduate. I was + talking to him till dinner-time. While we were sitting over our + wine after dinner, in came Dr. Daubeny, one of the most celebrated + geologists of the day--a curious little animal, looking through its + spectacles with an air very _distinguée_--and Mr. Darwin, whom I + had heard read a paper at the Geological Society. He and I got + together, and talked all the evening." + +The long vacation of 1837 was passed in a tour through the North, during +which his advanced knowledge of art was shown in a series of admirable +drawings. Their subjects are chiefly architectural, though a few +mountain drawings are found in his sketch-book for that summer. + +The interest in ancient and picturesque buildings was no new thing, and +it seems to have been the branch of art-study which was chiefly +encouraged by his father. During this tour among Cumberland cottages and +Yorkshire abbeys, a plan was formed for a series of papers on +architecture, perhaps in answer to an invitation from his friend Mr. +Loudon, who had started an architectural magazine. In the summer he +began to write "The Poetry of Architecture; or, The Architecture of the +Nations of Europe considered in its Association with Natural Scenery and +National Character," and the papers were worked off month by month from +Oxford, or wherever he might be, only terminating with the termination +of the magazine in January, 1839. They parade a good deal of classical +learning and travelled experience; readers of the magazine took their +author for some dilettante Don at Oxford. The editor did not wish the +illusion to be dispelled, so John Ruskin had to choose a _nom de +plume_. He called himself "Kata Phusin" ("according to nature"), for he +had begun to read some Aristotle. No phrase would have better expressed +his point of view, that of commonsense extended by experience, and +confirmed by the appeal to matters of fact, rather than to any +authority, or tradition, or committee of taste, or abstract principles. + +While these papers were in process of publication "Kata Phusin" plunged +into his first controversy, as an opponent of "Parsey's Convergence of +Perpendiculars," according to which vertical lines should have a +vanishing point, even though they are assumed to be parallel to the +plane of the picture. + +During this controversy, and just before the summer tour of 1838 to +Scotland, John Ruskin was introduced to Miss Charlotte Withers, a young +lady who was as fond of music as he was of drawing. They discussed their +favourite studies with eagerness, and, to settle the matter, he wrote a +long essay on "The Comparative Advantages of the Studies of Music and +Painting," in which he set painting as a means of recreation and of +education far above music. + +Already at nineteen, then, we see him a writer on art, not full-fledged, +but attracting some notice. Towards the end of 1838 a question arose as +to the best site for the proposed Scott memorial at Edinburgh, and a +writer in the _Architectural Magazine_ quoted "Kata Phusin" as the +authority in such matters, saying that it was obvious, after those +papers of his, that design and site should be simultaneously considered; +on which the editor "begs the favour of 'Kata Phusin' to let our readers +have his opinion on the subject, which we certainly think of +considerable importance." + +So he discussed the question of monuments in general, and of this one in +particular, in a long paper, coming to no very decided opinion, but +preferring, on the whole, a statue group with a colossal Scott on a +rough pedestal, to be placed on Salisbury Crags, "where the range gets +low and broken towards the north at about the height of St. Anthony's +Chapel." His paper did not influence the Edinburgh Committee, but it was +not without effect, as the following extract shows. + + + "BAYSWATER, _November_ 30, 1838. + + "DEAR SIR,--... Your son is certainly the greatest natural genius + that ever it has been my fortune to become acquainted with, and I + cannot but feel proud to think that at some future period, when + both you and I are under the turf, it will be stated in the + literary history of your son's life that the first article of his + which was published was in _London's Magazine of Natural + History._--Yours very sincerely, + + "J.C. LOUDON" + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +SIR ROGER NEWDIGATE'S PRIZE (1837-1839) + + +Of all the prizes which Oxford could bestow, the Newdigate used to be +the most popular. Its fortunate winner was an admitted poet in an age +when poetry was read, and he appeared in his glory at Commemoration, +speaking what the ladies could understand and admire. The honour was +attainable without skill in Greek particles or in logarithms; and yet it +had a real value to an intending preacher, for the successful reciter +might be felt to have put his foot on the pulpit stairs. John Ruskin was +definitely meant for the Church, and he went to Oxford in the avowed +hope of getting the Newdigate, if nothing else. His last talk with Mr. +Dale was chiefly about ways and means to this end; and before he went up +he had begun "The Gipsies" for March, 1837. + +The prize was won that year by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, afterwards Dean +of Westminster. Our candidate and his old schoolfellow, Henry Dart, of +Exeter College, set to work on the next subject, "The Exile of St. +Helena," and after the long vacation read their work to each other, +accepting the hints and corrections of a friendly rivalry. + +Meantime his old nurse Anne (it is trivial, but a touch of nature), +being at Oxford in attendance on the ladies, and keen, as she always +was, for Master John's success, heard from the keeper of the +Reading-room of criticisms on his published verses. She brought the news +to his delighted mother. "He was pleased," she writes, "but says that he +forms his own estimate of his poems, and reviews don't alter it; but +'How my father will be delighted! How he will crow!'" Which historiette +repeated itself many a time in the family annals. + +In Lent term, 1838, he was hard at work on the new poem. He wrote: + + + "I must give an immense time every day to the Newdigate, which I + must have, if study will get it. I have much to revise. You find + many faults, but there are hundreds which have escaped your notice, + and many lines must go out altogether which you and I should wish + to stay in. The thing must be remodelled, and I must finish it + while it has a freshness on it, otherwise it will not be written + well. The old lines are hackneyed in my ears, even as a very soft + Orleans plum, which your Jewess has wiped and re-wiped with the + corner of her apron, till its polish is perfect, and its + temperature elevated." + +In this March he got through his "Smalls." + + + "Nice thing to get over; quite a joke, as everybody says when + they've got through with the feathers on. It's a kind of + emancipation from freshness--a thing unpleasant in an egg, but + dignified in an Oxonian--very. Lowe very kind; Kynaston ditto--nice + fellows--urbane. How they _do_ frighten people! There was one man + all but crying with mere fear. Kynaston had to coax him like a + child. Poor fellow! he had some reason to be afraid; did his logic + shockingly. People always take up logic because they fancy it + doesn't require a good memory, and there is nothing half so + productive of pluck; they _never_ know it. I was very cool when I + got into it; found the degree of excitement agreeable; nibbled the + end of my pen and grinned at Kynaston over the table as if _I_ had + been going to pluck _him_. They always smile when they mean pluck." + +The Newdigate for 1838, for all his care and pains, was won by Dart. He +was, at any rate, beaten by a friend, and with a poem which his own +honourable sympathy and assistance had helped to perfect. + +Another trifling incident lets us get a glimpse of the family life of +our young poet. The Queen's coronation in June, 1838, was a great event +to all the world, and Mr. Ruskin was anxious for his son to see it. Much +correspondence ensued between the parents, arranging everything for him, +as they always did--which of the available tickets should be accepted, +and whether he could stand the fatigue of the long waiting, and so +forth. Mrs. Ruskin did not like the notion of her boy sitting perched on +rickety scaffolding at dizzy altitudes in the Abbey. Mr. Ruskin, +evidently determined to carry his point, went to Westminster, bribed the +carpenters, climbed the structure, and reported all safe to stand a +century, "though," said he, "the gold and scarlet of the decorations +appeared very paltry compared with the Wengern Alp." But he could not +find No. 447, and wrote to the Heralds' Office to know if it was a place +from which a good view could be got. Blue-mantle replied that it was a +very good place, and Lord Brownlow had just taken tickets for his sons +close by. Then there was the great question of dress. He went to Owen's +and ordered a white satin waistcoat with gold sprigs, and a high +dress-coat with bright buttons, and asked his wife to see about white +gloves at Oxford--a Court white neck-cloth or a black satin would do. + +Picture, then, the young Ruskin in those dressy days. A portrait was +once sent to Brantwood of a dandy in a green coat of wonderful cut, +supposed to represent him in his youth, but suggesting Lord Lytton's +"Pelham" rather than the homespun-suited seer of Coniston. "Did you ever +wear a coat like that?" I asked. "I'm not so sure that I didn't," said +he. + +After that, they went to Scotland and the North of England for the +summer, and more fine sketches were made, some of which hang now in his +drawing-room, and compare not unfavourably with the Prouts beside them. +In firmness of line and fulness of insight they are masterly, and mark a +rapid progress, all the more astonishing when it is recollected how +little time could have been spared for practice. The subjects are +chiefly architectural--castles and churches and Gothic details--and one +is not surprised to find him soon concerned with the Oxford Society for +Promoting the Study of Gothic Architecture. "They were all reverends," +says a letter of the time, "and wanted somebody to rouse them." + +Science, too, progressed this year. We read of geological excursions to +Shotover with Lord Carew and Lord Kildare--one carrying the hammer and +another the umbrella--and actual discoveries of saurian remains; and +many a merry meeting at Dr. Buckland's, in which, at intervals of +scientific talk, John romped with the youngsters of the family. After a +while the Dean took the opportunity of a walk through Oxford to the +Clarendon to warn him not to spend too much time on science. It did not +pay in the Schools nor in the Church, and he had too many irons in the +fire. + +Drawing, and science, and the prose essays mentioned in the last +chapter, and poetry, all these were his by-play. Of the poetry, the +Newdigate was but a little part. In "Friendship's Offering" this autumn +he published "Remembrance," one of many poems to Adèle, "Christ Church," +and the "Scythian Grave." In this last he gave free rein to the morbid +imaginations to which his unhappy _affaire de coeur_ and the mental +excitement of the period predisposed him. Harrison, his literary +Mentor, approved these poems, and inserted them in "Friendship's +Offering," along with love-songs and other exercises in verse. One had a +great success and was freely copied--the sincerest flattery--and the +preface to the annual for 1840 publicly thanked the "gifted writer" for +his "valuable aid." + +At the beginning of 1839 he went into new rooms vacated by Mr. Meux, and +set to work finally on "Salsette and Elephanta." He ransacked all +sources of information, coached himself in Eastern scenery and +mythology, threw in the Aristotelian ingredients of terror and pity, and +wound up with an appeal to the orthodoxy of the examiners, of whom Keble +was the chief, by prophesying the prompt extermination of Brahminism +under the teaching of the missionaries. + +This third try won the prize. Keble sent for him, to make the usual +emendations before the great work could be given to the world with the +seal of Oxford upon it. John Ruskin seems to have been somewhat +refractory under Keble's hands, though he would let his fellow-students, +or his father, or Harrison, work their will on his MSS. or proofs; being +always easier to lead than to drive. Somehow he came to terms with the +Professor, and then the Dean, taking an unexpected interest, was at +pains to see that his printed copy was flawless, and to coach him for +the recitation of it at the great day in the Sheldonian (June 12, 1839). + +And now that friends and strangers, publishers in London and professors +in Oxford, concurred in their applause, it surely seemed that he had +found his vocation, and was well on the high-road to fame as a poet. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE BROKEN CHAIN (1840-1841) + + +That 8th of February, 1840, when John Ruskin came of age, it seemed as +though all the gifts of fortune had been poured into his lap. What his +father's wealth and influence could do for him had been supplemented by +a personal charm, which found him friends among the best men of the best +ranks. What his mother's care had done in fortifying his health and +forming his character, native energy had turned to advantage. He had won +a reputation already much wider and more appreciable, as an artist and +student of science, and as a writer of prose and verse, than +undergraduates are entitled to expect; and, for crowning mercy, his head +was not turned. He was reading extremely hard--"in" for his degree +examination next Easter term. His college tutor hoped he would get a +First. From that it was an easy step to Holy Orders, and with his +opportunities preferment was certain. + +On his twenty-first birthday, his father, who had sympathized with his +admiration for Turner enough to buy two pictures--the "Richmond Bridge" +and the "Gosport"--for their Herne Hill drawing-room, now gave him a +picture all to himself for his new rooms in St. Aldate's--the +"Winchelsea," and settled on him a handsome allowance of pocket-money. +The first use he made of his wealth was to buy another Turner. In the +Easter vacation he met Mr. Griffith, the dealer, at the private view of +the old Water-colour Society, and hearing that the "Harlech Castle" was +for sale, he bought it there and then, with the characteristic disregard +for money which has always made the vendors of pictures and books and +minerals find him extremely pleasant to deal with. But as his +love-affair had shown his mother how little he had taken to heart her +chiefest care for him, so this first business transaction was a painful +awakening to his father, the canny Scotch merchant, who had heaped up +riches hoping that his son would gather them. + +This "Harlech Castle" transaction, however, was not altogether unlucky. +It brought him an introduction to the painter, whom he met when he was +next in town, at Mr. Griffith's house. He knew well enough the popular +idea of Turner as a morose and niggardly, inexplicable man. As he had +seen faults in Turner's painting, so he was ready to acknowledge the +faults in his character. But while the rest of the world, with a very +few exceptions, dwelt upon the faults, Ruskin had penetration to discern +the virtues which they hid. Few passages in his autobiography are more +striking than the transcript from his journal of the same evening, +recording his first impression: + + + "'I found in him a somewhat eccentric, keen-mannered, + matter-of-fact, English-minded--gentleman; good-natured evidently, + bad-tempered evidently, hating humbug of all sorts, shrewd, perhaps + a little selfish, highly intellectual, the powers of the mind not + brought out with any delight in their manifestation, or intention + of display, but flashing out occasionally in a word or a look.' + Pretty close that," he adds later, "and full, to be set down at the + first glimpse, and set down the same evening." + +Turner was not a man to make an intimate of, all at once; the +acquaintanceship continued, and it ripened into as close a confidence as +the eccentric painter's habits of life permitted. He seems to have been +more at home with the father than with the son; but even when the young +man took to writing books about him, he did not, as Carlyle is reported +to have done in a parallel case, show his exponent to the door. + +The occasion of John Ruskin's coming to town this time was not a +pleasant one--nothing less than the complete breakdown of his health. It +is true that he was working very hard during this spring; but hard +reading does not of itself kill people, only when it is combined with +real and prolonged mental distress, acting upon a sensitive temperament. +The case was thought serious; reading was stopped, and the patient was +ordered abroad for the winter. + +For that summer there was no hurry to be gone; rest was more needed than +change, at first. Late in September the same family-party crossed the +sea to Calais. How different a voyage for them all from the merry +departures of bygone Maytides! Which way should they turn? Not to Paris, +for _there_ was the cause of all these ills; so they went straight +southwards, through Normandy to the Loire, and saw the châteaux and +churches from Orleans to Tours, famous for their Renaissance +architecture and for the romance of their chivalric history. Amboise +especially made a strong impression upon the languid and unwilling +invalid. It stirred him up to write, in easy verse, the tale of love and +death that his own situation too readily suggested. In "The Broken +Chain" he indulged his gloomy fancy, turning, as it was sure to do, into +a morbid nightmare of mysterious horror, not without reminiscence of +Coleridge's "Christabel." But through it all he preserved, so to speak, +his dramatic incognito; his own disappointment and his own anticipated +death were the motives of the tale, but treated in such a manner as not +to betray his secret, nor even to wound the feelings of the lady who now +was beyond appeal from an honourable lover--taking his punishment like a +man. + +This poem lasted him, for private writing, all through that journey--a +fit emblem of the broken life which it records. A healthier source of +distraction was his drawing, in which he had received a fresh impetus +from the exhibition of David Roberts' sketches in the East. More +delicate than Prout's work, entering into the detail of architectural +form more thoroughly, and yet suggesting chiaroscuro with broad washes +of quiet tone and touches of light, cleverly introduced--"that +marvellous _pop_ of light across the foreground," Harding said of the +picture of the Great Pyramid--these drawings were a mean between the +limited manner of Prout and the inimitable fulness of Turner Ruskin took +up the fine pencil and the broad brush, and, with that blessed habit of +industry which has helped so many a one through times of trial, made +sketch after sketch on the half-imperial board, finished just so far as +his strength and time allowed, as they passed from the Loire to the +mountains of Auvergne; and to the valley of the Rhone, and thence +slowly round the Riviera to Pisa and Florence and Rome. + +He was not in a mood to sympathize readily with the enthusiasms of other +people. They expected him to be delighted with the scenery, the +buildings, the picture-galleries of Italy, and to forget himself in +admiration. He did admire Michelangelo; and he was interested in the +back-streets and slums of the cities. Something piquant was needed to +arouse him; the mild ecstasies of common connoisseurship hardly appeal +to a young man between life and death. He met the friends to whom he had +brought introductions--Mr. Joseph Severn, who had been Keats' companion, +and was afterwards to be the genial Consul at Rome, and the two Messrs. +Richmond, then studying art in the regular professional way; one of them +to become a celebrated portrait-painter, and the father of men of mark. +But his views on art were not theirs; he was already too independent and +outspoken in praise of his own heroes, and too sick in mind and body to +be patient and to learn. + +They had not been a month in Rome before he took the fever. As soon as +he was recovered, they went still farther South, and loitered for a +couple of months in the neighbourhood of Naples, visiting the various +scenes of interest--Sorrento, Amalfi, Salerno. The adventures of this +journey are partly told in letters to Mr. Dale, and in the "Letters +addressed to a College Friend." + +On the way to Naples he had noted and sketched the winter scene at La +Riccia, which he afterwards used for a glowing passage in "Modern +Painters"; and he had ventured into a village of brigands to draw such a +castle as he had once imagined in his "Leoni." From Naples he wrote an +account of a landslip near Giagnano, and sent it home to the Ashmolean +Society. He seemed better; they turned homewards, when suddenly he was +seized with all the old symptoms worse than ever. After another month at +Rome, they travelled slowly northwards from town to town; spent ten +days of May at Venice, and passed through Milan and Turin, and over the +Mont Cenis to Geneva. + +At last he was among the mountains again--the Alps that he loved. It was +not only that the air of the Alps braced him, but the spirit of +mountain-worship stirred him as nothing else could. At last he seemed +himself, after more than a year of intense depression; and he records +that one day, in church at Geneva, he resolved to _do_ something, to +_be_ something useful. That he could make such a resolve was a sign of +returning health; but if, as I find, he had just been reading Carlyle's +lately-published lectures on "Heroes," though he did not then accept +Carlyle's conclusions nor admire his style, might he not, in spite of +his criticism, have been spurred the more into energy by that +enthusiastic gospel of action? + +They travelled home by Basle and Laon; but London in August, and the +premature attempt to be energetic, brought on a recurrence of the +symptoms of consumption, as it was called. He wished to try the +mountain-cure again, and set out with his friend Richard Fall for a tour +in Wales. But his father recalled him to Leamington to try iron and +dieting under Dr. Jephson, who, if he was called a quack, was a sensible +one, and successful in subduing for several years to come the more +serious phases of the disease. The patient was not cured; he suffered +from time to time from his chest, and still more from a weakness of the +spine, which during all the period of his early manhood gave him +trouble, and finished by bending his tall and lithe figure into +something that, were it not for his face, would be deformity. In 1847 he +was again at Leamington under Jephson, in consequence of a relapse into +the consumptive symptoms, after which we hear no more of it. He outgrew +the tendency, as so many do. But nevertheless the alarm had been +justifiable, and the malady had left traces which, in one way and +another, haunted him ever after; for one of the worst effects of +illness is to be marked down as an invalid. + +At Leamington, then, in September, 1841, he was finding a new life under +the doctor's dieting, and new aims in life, which were eventually to +resolder for a while the broken chain. Among the Scotch friends of the +Ruskins there was a family at Perth whose daughter came to visit at +Herne Hill--the Effie Gray whom afterwards he married. She challenged +the melancholy John, engrossed in his drawing and geology, to write a +fairytale, as the least likely task for him to fulfil. Upon which he +produced, at a couple of sittings, "The King of the Golden River," a +pretty medley of Grimm's grotesque and Dickens' kindliness and the true +Ruskinian ecstasy of the Alps. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE GRADUATE OF OXFORD (1841-1842) + + +Ready for work again, and in reasonable health of mind and body, John +Ruskin sat down in his little study at Herne Hill in November, 1841, +with his private tutor, Osborne Gordon. There was eighteen months' +leeway to make up, and the dates of ancient history, the details of +schematized Aristotelianism, soon slip out of mind when one is sketching +in Italy. But he was more serious now about his work, and aware of his +deficiencies. To be useful in the world, is it not necessary first to +understand all possible Greek constructions? So said the voice of +Oxford; but our undergraduate was saved, both now and afterwards, from +this vain ambition. "I think it would hardly be worth your while," said +Gordon. + +He could not now go in for honours, for the lost year had superannuated +him. So in April he went up for a pass. In those times, when a pass-man +showed unusual powers, they could give him an honorary class; not a high +class, because the range of the examination was less than in the +honour-school. This candidate wrote a poor Latin prose, it seems; but +his divinity, philosophy, and mathematics were so good that they gave +him the best they could--an honorary double fourth--upon which he took +his B.A. degree, and could describe himself as "A Graduate of Oxford." + +The continued weakness of his health kept him from taking steps to enter +the Church; and his real interest in art was not crowded out even by the +last studies for his examination. While he was working with Gordon, in +the autumn of 1841, he was also taking lessons from J.D. Harding; and +the famous study of ivy, his first naturalistic sketching, to which we +must revert, must have been done a week or two before going up for his +examination. + +The lessons from Harding were a useful counter-stroke to the excessive +and exaggerated Turnerism in which he had been indulging through his +illness. The drawings of Amboise, the coast of Genoa, and the Glacier +des Bois, though published later, were made before he had exchanged +fancy for fact; and they bear, on the face of them, the obvious marks of +an unhealthy state of mind. Harding, whose robust common-sense and +breezy mannerism endeared him to the British amateur of his generation, +was just the man to correct any morbid tendency. He had religious views +in sympathy with his pupil, and he soon inoculated Ruskin with his +contempt for the minor Dutch school--those bituminous landscapes, so +unlike the sparkling freshness that Harding's own water-colour +illustrated, and those vulgar tavern scenes, painted, he declared, by +sots who disgraced art alike in their works and in their lives. + +Until this epoch, John Ruskin had found much that interested him in the +Dutch and Flemish painters of the seventeenth century. He had classed +them all together as the school of which Rubens, Vandyck and Rembrandt +were the chief masters, and those as names to rank with Raphael and +Michelangelo and Velasquez. He was a humorist, not without boyish +delight in a good Sam-Wellerism, and so could be amused with the +"drolls," until Harding appealed to his religion and morality against +them. He was a chiaroscurist, and not naturally offended by their +violent light and shade, until George Richmond showed him the more +excellent way in colour, the glow of Venice, first hinting it at Rome in +1840, and then proving it in London in the spring of 1842 from Samuel +Rogers' treasures, of which the chief (now in the National Gallery) was +the "Christ appearing to the Magdalen." + +Much as the author of "Modern Painters" owed to these friends and +teachers, and to the advantages of his varied training, he would never +have written his great work without a further inspiration. Harding's +especial forte was his method of drawing trees. He looked at Nature with +an eye which, for his period, was singularly fresh and unprejudiced; he +had a strong feeling for truth of structure as well as for picturesque +effect, and he taught his pupils to observe as well as to draw. But in +his own practice he rested too much on _having observed_; formed a +style, and copied himself if he did not copy the old masters; Hence he +held to rules of composition and conscious graces of arrangement; and +while he taught naturalism in study, he followed it up with teaching +artifice in practice. + +Turner, who was not a drawing-master, lay under no necessity to +formulate his principles and stick to them. On the contrary, his style +developed like a kaleidoscope. He had been in Switzerland and on the +Rhine in 1841, "painting his impressions," making water-colour notes +from memory of effects that had struck him. From one of these, +"Splügen," he had made a finished picture, and now wished to get +commissions for more of the same class. Ruskin was greatly interested in +this series, because they were not landscapes of the ordinary type, +scenes from Nature squeezed into the mould of recognised artistic +composition, nor, on the other hand, mere photographic transcripts; but +dreams, as it were, of the mountains and sunsets, in which Turner's +wealth of detail was suggested, and his knowledge of form expressed, +together with the unity which comes of the faithful record of a single +impression. + +The lesson was soon enforced upon Ruskin's mind by example. One day, +while taking his student's constitutional, he noticed a tree-stem with +ivy upon it, which seemed not ungraceful, and invited a sketch. As he +drew he fell into the spirit of its natural arrangement, and soon +perceived how much finer it was as a piece of design than any +conventional rearrangement would be. Harding had tried to show him how +to generalize foliage; but in this example he saw that not +generalization was needed to get its beauty, but truth. + +At Fontainebleau soon after, in much the same circumstances, a study of +an aspen-tree, idly begun, but carried out with interest and patience, +confirmed the principle. At Geneva, once more in the church where he had +formed such resolutions the year before, the desire came over him with +renewed force; now not only to be definitely employed, but to be +employed in the service of a definite mission, which was, in art, +exactly what Carlyle had preached in every other sphere of life in that +book of "Heroes": the gospel of sincerity. + +The design took shape. At Chamouni he studied plants and rocks and +clouds, not as an artist to make pictures out of them, nor as a +scientist to class them and analyze them; but to learn their aspects and +enter into the spirit of their growth and structure. And though on his +way home through Switzerland and down the Rhine he made a few drawings +in his old style for admiring friends, they were the last of the kind +that he attempted. Thenceforward his path was marked out; he had found a +new vocation. He was not to be a poet--that was too definitely bound up +with the past which he wanted to forget, and with conventionalities +which he wished to shake off; not to be an artist, strugging with the +rest to please a public which he felt himself called upon to teach; not +a man of science, for his botany and geology were to be the means, and +not the ends, of his teaching; but the mission was laid upon him to tell +the world that Art, no less than other spheres of life, had its Heroes; +that the mainspring of their energy was Sincerity, and the burden of +their utterance, Truth. + + + + +BOOK II + +THE ART CRITIC + +(1842-1860) + + + + +CHAPTER I + +"TURNER AND THE ANCIENTS" (1842-1844) + + +The neighbour, or the Oxonian friend, who climbed the steps of the Herne +Hill house and called upon Mrs. Ruskin, in the autumn and winter of +1842, would learn that Mr. John was hard at work in his own study +overhead. Those were its windows, on the second-floor, looking out upon +the front-garden; the big dormer-window above was his bedroom, from +which he had his grand view of lowland, and far horizon, and unconfined +sky, comparatively clear of London smoke. In the study itself, screened +from the road by russet foliage and thick evergreens, great things were +going on. But Mr. John could be interrupted, would come running lightly +downstairs, with both hands out to greet the visitor; would show the +pictures, eagerly demonstrating the beauties of the last new Turners, +"Ehrenbreitstein" and "Lucerne," just acquired, and anticipating the +sunset glories and mountain gloom of the "Goldau" and "Dazio Grande," +which the great artist was "realizing" for him from sketches he had +chosen at Queen Anne Street. He was very busy--but never too busy to see +his friends--writing a book. And, the visitor gone, he would run up to +his room and his writing. + +In the afternoon his careful mother would turn him out for a tramp round +the Norwood lanes; he might look in at the Poussins and Claudes of the +Dulwich Gallery, or, for a longer excursion, go over to Mr. Windus, and +his roomful of Turner drawings, or sit to George Richmond for the +portrait at full length with desk and portfolio, and Mont Blanc in the +background. Dinner over, another hour or two's writing, and early to +bed, after finishing his chapter with a flourish of eloquence, to be +read next morning at breakfast to father and mother and Mary. The vivid +descriptions of scenes yet fresh in their memory, or of pictures they +treasured, the "thoughts" as they used to be called, allusions to +sincere beliefs and cherished hopes, never failed to win the praise that +pleased the young writer most, in happy tears of unrestrained emotion. +These old-fashioned folk had not learnt the trick of _nil admirari._ +Quite honestly they would say, with the German musician, "When I hear +good music, then must I always weep." + +We can look into the little study and see what this writing was that +went on so busily and steadily. It was the long-meditated defence of +Turner, provoked by _Blackwood's Magazine_ six years before, encouraged +by Carlyle's "Heroes," and necessitated by the silence, on this topic, +of the more enlightened leaders of thought in an age of connoisseurship +and cant. + +And as the winter ran out, he was ending his work, happy in the applause +of his little domestic circle, and conscious that he was preaching the +crusade of Sincerity, the cause of justice for the greatest landscape +artist of any age, and justice, at the hands of a heedless public, for +the glorious works of the supreme Artist of the universe. Let our young +painters, he concluded, go humbly to Nature, "rejecting nothing, +selecting nothing, and scorning nothing," in spite of Academic +theorists, and in time we should have a school of landscape worthy of +the inspiration they would find. + +There was his book; the title of it, "Turner and the Ancients." Before +publishing, to get more experienced criticism than that of the +breakfast-table, he submitted it to his friend, W.H. Harrison. The +title, it seemed, was not explicit enough, and after debate they +substituted "Modern Painters: their Superiority in the Art of Landscape +Painting to all the Ancient Masters proved by Examples of the True, the +Beautiful, and the Intellectual, from the Works of Modern Artists, +especially from those of J.M.W. Turner, Esq., R.A." And as the severe +tone of many remarks was felt to be hardly supported by the age and +standing of so young an author, he was content to sign himself "A +Graduate of Oxford." The book was spoken of, but no part of the copy +shown, to John Murray, who said he would prefer something about German +art. It found immediate acceptance with Messrs. Smith and Elder. Young +Ruskin had been doing business for seven years past with that firm; he +was well known to them as one of the most "rising" youths of the time, +and their own literary editor, Mr. Harrison, was his private Mentor, who +revised his proofs and inserted the punctuation, which he usually +indicated only by dashes. His dealings with the publishers were +generally conducted through his father, who made very fair terms for +him, as things went then. + +In May, 1843, "Modern Painters," vol. i., was published, and it was soon +the talk of the art-world. It was meant to be audacious, and naturally +created a storm. The free criticisms of public favourites made an +impression, not because they were put into strong language, for the tone +of the press was stronger then than it is now, as a whole, but because +they were backed up by illustration and argument. It was evident that +the author knew something of his subject, even if he were all wrong in +his conclusions. He could not be neglected, though he might be protested +against, decried, controverted. Artists especially, who do not usually +see their works as others see them, and are not accustomed to think of +themselves and their school as mere dots and spangles in a perspective +of history, could not be entirely content to be classed as Turner's +satellites. And while the book contained something that promised to suit +every kind of reader everyone found something to shock him. Critics were +scandalized at the depreciation of Claude; the religious were outraged +at the comparison of Turner, in a passage omitted from later editions, +to the Angel of the Sun in the Apocalypse. + +But the descriptive passages were such as had never appeared before in +prose; and the obvious usefulness of the analyses of natural form and +effect made many an artist read on, while he shook his head. Some +readily owned their obligation to the new teacher. Holland, for one, +wrote to Harrison that he meant to paint the better for the snubbing he +had got. Of such as reviewed the book adversely in _Blackwood_ and the +_Athenæum_, not one undertook to refute it seriously. They merely +attacked a detail here and there, which the author discussed in two or +three replies, with a patience that showed how confident he was in his +position. + +He had the good word of some of the best judges of literature. "Modern +Painters" lay on Rogers' table; and Tennyson, who a few years before had +beaten young Ruskin out of the field of poetry, was so taken with it +that he wrote to his publisher to borrow it for him, "as he longed very +much to see it," but could not afford to buy it. Sir Henry Taylor wrote +to Aubrey de Vere, the poet, begging him to read: + + + "A book which seems to me to be far more deeply founded in its + criticism of art than any other that I have met with ... written + with great power and eloquence, and a spirit of the most diligent + investigation.... I am told that the author's name is Ruskin, and + that he was considered at college as an odd sort of man who would + never do anything." + +A second edition appeared within 12 months. When the secret of the +"Oxford Graduate" leaked out, as it did very soon, through the proud +father, Mr. John was lionized. During the winter of 1843 he met +celebrities at fashionable dinner-tables; and now that his parents were +established in their grander house on Denmark Hill,[1] they could duly +return the hospitalities of the great world. + +[Footnote 1: To which they removed in October, 1842.] + +It was one very satisfactory result of the success that the father was +more or less converted to Turnerism, and lined his walls with Turner +drawings, which became the great attraction of the house, far outshining +its seven acres of garden and orchard and shrubbery, and the ampler air +of cultured ease. For a gift to his son he bought "The Slave Ship," one +of Turner's latest and most disputed works; and he was all eagerness to +see the next volume in preparation. + +It was intended to carry on the discussion of "Truth," with further +illustrations of mountain-form, trees and skies. And so in May, 1844, +they all went away again, that the artist-author might prepare drawings +for his plates. He was going to begin with the geology and botany of +Chamouni, and work through the Alps, eastward. + +At Chamouni they had the good fortune to meet with Joseph Coutet, a +superannuated guide, whom they engaged to accompany the eager but +inexperienced mountaineer. Coutet was one of those men of natural +ability and kindliness whose friendship is worth more than much +intercourse with worldly celebrities, and for many years afterwards +Ruskin had the advantage of his care--of something more than mere +attendance. At any rate, under such guidance, he could climb where he +pleased, free from the feeling that people at home were anxious about +him. + +He was not unadventurous in his scramblings, but with no ambition to get +to the top of everything. He wanted to observe the aspects of +mountain-form; and his careful outlines, slightly coloured, as his +manner then was, and never aiming at picturesque treatment, record the +structure of the rocks and the state of the snow with more than +photographic accuracy. A photograph often confuses the eye with +unnecessary detail; these drawings seized the leading lines, the +important features, the interesting points. For example, in his +Matterhorn (a drawing of 1849), as Whymper remarks in "Scrambles among +the Alps," there are particulars noted which the mere sketcher neglects, +but the climber finds out, on closer intercourse, to be the essential +facts of the mountain's anatomy. All this is not picture-making, but it +is a valuable contribution and preliminary to criticism. + +From Chamouni this year they went to Simplon, and met J.D. Forbes, the +geologist, whose "viscous theory" of glaciers Ruskin adopted and +defended with warmth later on, and to the Bell' Alp, long before it had +been made a place of popular resort by Professor Tyndall's notice. The +"Panorama of the Simplon from the Bell' Alp" is to be found in the St. +George's (Ruskin) Museum at Sheffield, as a record of his +draughtsmanship in this period. Thence to Zermatt with Osborne Gordon; +Zermatt, too, unknown to the fashionable tourist, and innocent of hotel +luxuries. It is curious that, at first sight, he did not care for the +Matterhorn. It was entirely unlike his ideal of mountains. It was not at +all like Cumberland. But in a very few years he had come to love the +Alps for their own sake, and we find him regretting at Ambleside the +colour and light of Switzerland, the mountain glory which our humbler +scenery cannot match. And yet he came back to it for a home, not +ill-content. + +After another visit to Chamouni, he crossed France to Paris, where +something awaited him that upset all his plans, and turned his energies +into an unexpected channel. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +CHRISTIAN ART (1845-1847) + + +At Paris, on the way heme in 1844, he had spent some days in studying +Titian and Bellini and Perugino. They were not new to him; but now that +he was an art-critic, it behoved him to improve his acquaintance with +the old masters. "To admire the works of Pietro Perugino" was one thing; +but to understand them was another, a thing which was hardly attempted +by "the Landscape Artists of England" to whom the author of "Modern +Painters" had so far dedicated his services. He had been extolling +modernism, and depreciating "the Ancients" because they could not draw +rocks and clouds and trees; and he was fresh from his scientific +sketching in the happy hunting-ground of the modern world. A few days in +the Louvre made him the devotee of ancient art, and taught him to lay +aside his geology for history. + +In one way the development was easy. The patient attempt to copy +mountain-form had made him sensitive to harmony of line; and in the +great composers of Florence and Venice he found a quality of abstract +design which tallied with his experience of what was beautiful in +Nature. Aiguilles and glaciers, drawn as he drew them, and the +figure-subjects of severe Italian draughtsmen, are beautiful by the same +laws of composition, however different the associations they suggest. + +But _he_ had been learning these laws of beauty from Turner and from the +Alps; how did the ancients come by them? This could be found only in a +thorough study of their lives and times, to begin with, to which he +devoted his winter, with Rio and Lord Lindsay and Mrs. Jameson for his +authorities. He found that his foes, Caspar Poussin and Canaletto, and +the Dutch landscapists, were not the real old masters; that there had +been a great age of art before the era of Vandyck and Rubens--even before +Michelangelo and Raphael; and that, towards setting up as a critic of +the present, he must understand the past out of which it had grown. So +he determined to go to Florence and Venice, and to study the religious +painters at first hand. + +Mountain-study and Turner were not to be dropped. For example, to +explain the obvious and notorious licences which Turner took with +topography, it was necessary to see in what these licences consisted. Of +the later Swiss drawings, one of the wildest and most impressive was the +"St. Gothard"; Ruskin wanted to find Turner's point of view, and to see +what alterations he had made. He told Turner so, and the artist, who +knew that his picture had been realized from a very slight sketch, was +naturally rather opposed to this test, as being, from his point of view, +merely a waste of time and trouble. He tried to persuade the Ruskins +that the Swiss Sonderbund war, then going on, made travelling unsafe, +and so forth. But in vain. Mr. John was allowed to go, for the first +time alone, without his parents, taking only a servant, and meeting the +trustworthy Coutet at Geneva. + +With seven months at his own disposal, he did a vast amount of work, +especially in drawing. The studies of mountain-form and Italian design, +in the year before, had given him a greater interest in the "Liber +Studiorum," Turner's early book of Essays in Composition. He found there +that use of the pure line, about which he has since said so much, +together with a thoughtfully devised scheme of light-and-shade in +mezzotint, devoted to the treatment of landscape in the same spirit as +that in which the Italian masters treated figure-subjects in their +pen-and-bistre studies. And just as he had imitated the Rogers vignettes +in his boyhood, now in his youth he tried to emulate the fine abstract +flow and searching expressiveness of the etched line, and the studied +breadth of shade, by using the quill-pen with washes. At first he kept +pretty closely to monochrome. His object was form, and his special +talent was for draughtsmanship rather than for colour. But it was this +winter's study of the "Liber Studiorum" that started him on his own +characteristic course; and while we have no pen-and-wash work of his +before 1845 (except a few experiments after Prout), we find him now +using the pen continually during the "Modern Painters" period. + +On reaching the Lake of Geneva he wrote, or sketched, one of his +best-known pieces of verse, "Mont Blanc Revisited," and a few other +poems followed, the last of the long series which had once been his +chief interest and aim in life. With this lonely journey there came new +and deeper feelings; with his increased literary power, fresh resources +of diction; and he was never so near being a poet as when he gave up +writing verse. Too condensed to be easily understood, too solemn in +their movement to be trippingly read, the lines on "The Arve at Cluse," +on "Mont Blanc," and "The Glacier," should not be passed over as merely +rhetorical. And the reflections on the loungers at Conflans ("Why Stand +ye here all the Day Idle?") are full of the spirit in which he was +gradually approaching the great problems of his life, to pass through +art into the earnest study of human conduct and its final cause. + +He was still deeply religious--more deeply so than before, and found the +echo of his own thoughts in George Herbert, with whom he "communed in +spirit" while he travelled through the Alps. But the forms of outward +religion were losing their hold over him in proportion as his inward +religion became more real and intense. It was only a few days after +writing these lines that he "broke the Sabbath" for the first time in +his life, by climbing a hill after church. That was the first shot fired +in a war, in one of the strangest and saddest wars between conscience +and reason that biography records; strange because the opposing forces +were so nearly matched, and sad because the struggle lasted until their +field of battle was desolated before either won a victory. + +Later on we have to tell how he dwelt in Doubting Castle, and how he +escaped. But the pilgrim had not yet met Giant Despair; and his progress +was very pleasant in that spring of 1845, the year of fine weather, as +he drove round the Riviera, and the cities of Tuscany opened out their +treasures to him. There was Lucca, with San Frediano and the glories of +Romanesque architecture; Fra Bartolommeo's picture of the Madonna with +the Magdalen and St. Catherine of Siena, his initiation into the +significance of early religious painting: and, taking hold of his +imagination, in her marble sleep, more powerfully than any flesh and +blood, the dead lady of St. Martin's Church, Ilaria di Caretto. There +was Pisa, with the Campo Santo and the jewel shrine of Sta. Maria della +Spina, then undestroyed; the excitement of street sketching among a +sympathetic crowd of fraternizing Italians; the Abbé Rosini, Professor +of Fine Arts, whom he made friends with, endured as lecturer, and +persuaded into scaffold-building in the Campo Santo for study of the +frescoes. And there was Florence, with Giotto's campanile and Santa +Maria Novella, where the young Protestant frequented monasteries, made +hay with monks, sketched with his new-found friends Rudolf Durheim of +Berne and Dieudonné the French purist; and spent long days copying +Angelico and annotating Ghirlandajo, fevered with the sun of Italy at +its strongest, and with the rapture of discovery, "which turns the +unaccustomed head like Chianti wine." + +Coutet got him away, at last, to the Alps; worn out and in despondent +reaction after all this excitement. He spent a month at Macugnaga, +reading Shakespeare and trying to draw boulders; drifting gradually back +into strength enough to attack the next piece of work, the study of +Turner sites on the St. Gothard, where he made the drawings afterwards +engraved in "Modern Painters." In August, J.D. Harding was going to +Venice, and arranged for a meeting at Baveno, on the Lago Maggiore. +Gossip had credited him with a share in "Modern Painters"; now the +tables were turned, and Griffith, the picture-dealer, wanted to know if +it was true that John Ruskin had helped Harding with his new book, just +out. They sketched together, Ruskin perhaps emulating his friend's +slap-dash style in the "Sunset" reproduced in his "Poems," and +illustrating his own in the "Water-mill." And so they drove together to +Verona and thence to Venice. + +At Venice they stayed in Danieli's Hotel, on the Riva dei Schiavoni, and +began by studying picturesque canal-life. Mr. Boxall, R.A., and Mrs. +Jameson, the historian of Sacred and Legendary Art, were their +companions. Another old friend, Joseph Severn, had in 1843 gained one of +the prizes at the Westminster Hall Cartoons Competition; and a letter +from Ruskin, referring to the work there, shows how he still pondered on +the subject that had been haunting him in the Alps: + + + "With your hopes for the elevation of English art by means of + fresco I cannot sympathize.... It is not the material nor the space + that can give us thoughts, passions, or power. I see on our Academy + walls nothing but what is ignoble in small pictures, and would be + disgusting in large ones.... It is not the love of fresco that we + want; it is the love of God and His creatures; it is humility, and + charity, and self-denial, and fasting, and prayer; it is a total + change of character. We want more faith and less reasoning, less + strength and more trust. You want neither walls, nor plaster, nor + colours--_ça ne fait rien à l'affaire_; it is Giotto, and + Ghirlandajo, and Angelico that you want, and that you will and must + want until this disgusting nineteenth century has--I can't say + breathed, but steamed its last." + +So early he had taken up and wrapped round him the mantle of Cassandra. + +But he was suddenly to find the sincerity of Ghirlandajo and the +religious significance of Angelico united with the matured power of art. +Without knowing what they were to meet, Harding and he found themselves +one day in the Scuola di S. Rocco, and face to face with Tintoret. + +It was the fashion earlier, and it has been the fashion since, to +undervalue Tintoret. He is not pious enough for the purists, nor +decorative enough for the Pre-Raphaelites. The ruin or the restoration +of almost all his pictures makes it impossible for the ordinary amateur +to judge them; they need reconstruction in the mind's eye, and that is a +dangerous process. Ruskin himself, as he grew older, found more interest +in the playful industry of Carpaccio than in the laborious games, the +stupendous Titan feats of Tintoret. But at this moment, solemnized +before the problems of life, he found these problems hinted in the +mystic symbolism of the School of S. Rocco; with eyes now opened to +pre-Reformation Christianity, he found its completed outcome in +Tintoret's interpretation of the life of Christ and the types of the Old +Testament; fresh from the stormy grandeur of the St. Gothard, he found +the lurid skies and looming giants of the Visitation, or the Baptism, or +the Crucifixion, re-echoing the subjects of Turner as "deep answering to +deep"; and, with Harding of the Broad Brush, he recognised the mastery +of landscape execution in the Flight into Egypt, and the St. Mary in the +Desert. + +He devoted the rest of his time chiefly to cataloguing and copying +Tintoret. The catalogue appeared in "Stones of Venice," which was +suggested by this visit, and begun by some sketches of architectural +detail, and the acquisition of daguerreotypes--a new invention which +delighted him immensely, as it had delighted Turner, with trustworthy +records of detail which sometimes eluded even his industry and accuracy. + +At last his friends were gone; and, left alone, he overworked himself, +as usual, before leaving Venice with crammed portfolios and +closely-written notebooks. At Padua he was stopped by a fever; all +through France he was pursued by what, from his account, appears to have +been some form of diphtheria, averted only, as he believed, in direct +answer to earnest prayer. At last his eventful pilgrimage was ended, and +he was restored to his home and his parents. It was not long before he +was at work again in his new study, looking out upon the quiet meadow +and grazing cows of Denmark Hill, and rapidly throwing into form the +fresh impressions of the summer. He was strongly influenced by the +sermons of Canon Melvill--the same preacher whom Browning in his youth +admired--a good orator and sound analytic expositor, though not a great +or independent thinker. Osborne Gordon had recommended him to read +Hooker, and he caught the tone and style of the "Ecclesiastical Polity" +only too readily, so that much of his work of that winter, the more +philosophical part of vol. ii., was damaged by inversions, and +Elizabethan quaintness as of ruff and train, long epexegetical +sentences, and far-sought pomposity of diction. It was only when he had +waded through the chaos which he set himself to survey, that he could +lay aside his borrowed stilts, and stand on his own feet in the Tintoret +descriptions--rather stiff, yet, from foregone efforts. + +This volume, like the first, was completed in the winter, in one long +spell of hard work, broken only by a visit to Oxford in January as the +guest of Dr. Greswell, Head of Worcester, at a conference for the +promotion of art. Smith and Elder accepted the book on Mr. J.J. Ruskin's +terms (so his wife wrote), for they had already reported it as called +for by the public. The first volume was going into a third edition. + +When his book came out he was away again in Italy, trying to show his +father all that he had seen in the Campo Santo and Giotto's Tower, and +to explain "why it more than startled him." The good man hardly felt the +force of it all at once. And there were little passages of arms and some +heart-quaking and head-shaking, until Mr. Dale, the old schoolmaster, +wrote that he had heard no less a man than Sydney Smith mention the new +book in public, in the presence of "distinguished literary characters," +as a work of "transcendent talent, presenting the most original views, +in the most elegant and powerful language, which would work a complete +revolution in the world of taste." When he returned home it was to find +a respectful welcome. His word on matters of Art was now really worth +something, and before long it was called for. The National Gallery was +comparatively in its infancy. It had been established less than +twenty-five years, and its manager, Mr. Eastlake (afterwards Sir +Charles), had his hands full, what with rascally dealers in forged old +masters, and incompetent picture-cleaners; and an economical Government, +and a public that neither knew its own mind nor trusted his judgment. A +great outcry was set up against him for buying bad works, and spoiling +the best by restoration. Ruskin wrote very temperately to _The Times_, +pointing out that the damage had been slight compared with what was +being done everywhere else, and suggesting that, prevention being better +than cure, the pictures should be put under glass, for then they would +not need the recurring attentions of the restorer. But he blamed the +management for spending large sums on added examples of Guido and +Rubens, while they had no Angelico, no Ghirlandajo, no good Perugino, +only one Bellini, and, in a word, left his new friends, the early +Christian artists, unrepresented. He suggested that pictures might be +picked up for next to nothing in Italy; and he begged that the +collection might be made historical and educational by being fully +representative, and chronologically arranged. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +"THE SEVEN LAMPS" + + +"Have you read an Oxford Graduate's letters on art?" wrote Miss Mitford, +of "Our Village," on January 27, 1847. "The author, Mr. Ruskin, was here +last week, and is certainly the most charming person that I have ever +known." The friendship thus begun lasted until her death. She encouraged +him in his work; she delighted in his success; and, in the grave +reverses which were to befall him, he found her his most faithful +supporter and most sympathetic consoler. In return, "his kindness +cheered her closing days; he sent her every book that would interest and +every delicacy that would strengthen her, attentions which will not +surprise those who have heard of his large and thoughtful +generosity."[2] + +[Footnote 2: "The Friendships of Mary Russell Mitford," edited by the +Rev. A.G. L'Estrange.] + +It was natural that a rising man, so closely connected with Scotland, +should be welcomed by the leaders of the Scottish school of literature. +Sydney Smith, a former Edinburgh professor, had praised the new volume. +John Murray, as it seems from letters of the period, made overtures to +secure the author as a contributor to his Italian guide-books. Lockhart +employed him to write for the _Quarterly Review_. + +Lockhart was a person of great interest for young Ruskin, who worshipped +Scott; and Lockhart's daughter, even without her personal charm, would +have attracted him as the actual grandchild of the great Sir Walter. It +was for her sake, he says, rather than for the honour of writing in the +famous _Quarterly_, that he undertook to review Lord Lindsay's +"Christian Art." + +He was known to be a suitor for Miss Lockhart's hand. His father, in +view of the success he desired, had been in February looking out for a +house in the Lake District; hoping, no doubt, to see him settled there +as a sort of successor to Wordsworth and Christopher North. In March, +John Ruskin betook himself to the Salutation at Ambleside, with his +constant attendant and amanuensis George, for quiet after a tiring +winter in London society, and for his new labour of reviewing. But he +did not find himself so fond of the Lakes as of old. He wrote to his +mother (Sunday, March 28, 1847): + + + "I finished--and sealed up--and addressed--my last bit of work, + last night by ten o'clock--ready to send by to-day's post--so that + my father should receive it with this. I could not at all have done + it had I stayed at home: for even with all the quiet here, I have + had no more time than was necessary. For exercise, I find the + rowing very useful, though it makes me melancholy with thinking of + 1838,--and the lake, when it is quite calm, is wonderfully sad and + quiet:--no bright colours--no snowy peaks. Black water--as still as + death;--lonely, rocky islets--leafless woods,--or worse than + leafless--the brown oak foliage hanging dead upon them; gray + sky;--far-off, wild, dark, dismal moorlands; no sound except the + rustling of the boat among the reeds. + + "_One o'clock._--I have your kind note and my father's, and am very + thankful that you like what I have written, for I did not at all + know myself whether it were good or bad." + +In the early summer he went to Oxford, for a meeting of the British +Association. He said (June 27, 1847): + + + "I am not able to write a full account of all I see, to amuse you, + for I find it necessary to keep as quiet as I can, and I fear it + would only annoy you to be told of all the invitations I refuse, + and all the interesting matters in which I take no part. There is + nothing for it but throwing one's self into the stream, and going + down with one's arms under water, ready to be carried anywhere, or + do anything. My friends are all busy, and tired to death. All the + members of my section, but especially (Edward) Forbes, Sedgwick, + Murchison, and Lord Northampton--and of course Buckland, are as + kind to me as men can be; but I am tormented by the perpetual sense + of my unmitigated ignorance, for I know no more now than I did when + a boy, and I have only one perpetual feeling of being in + everybody's way. The recollections of the place, too, and the being + in my old rooms, make me very miserable. I have not one moment of + profitably spent time to look back to while I was here, and much + useless labour and disappointed hope; and I can neither bear the + excitement of being in the society where the play of mind is + constant, and rolls _over_ me like heavy wheels, nor the pain of + being alone. I get away in the evenings into the hayfields about + Cumnor, and rest; but then my failing sight plagues me. I cannot + look at anything as I used to do, and the evening sky is covered + with swimming strings and eels. My best time is while I am in the + Section room, for though it is hot, and sometimes wearisome, yet I + have nothing to _say_,--little to do,--nothing to look at, and as + much as I like to hear." + +He had to undergo a second disappointment in love; his health broke down +again, and he was sent to Leamington to his former doctor, Jephson, once +more a "consumptive" patient. Dieted into health, he went to Scotland +with a new-found friend, William Macdonald Macdonald of Crossmount. But +he had no taste for sport, and could make little use of his +opportunities for distraction and relaxation. One battue was enough for +him, and the rest of the visit was spent in morbid despondency, digging +thistles, and brooding over the significance of the curse of Eden, so +strangely now interwoven with his own life--"Thorns a also and +Thistles." + +At Bower's Well, Perth, where his grandparents had spent their later +years, and where his parents had been married, lived Mr. George Gray, a +lawyer, and an old acquaintance of the Ruskin family. His daughter +Euphemia used to visit at Denmark Hill. It was for her that, some years +earlier, "The King of the Golden River" had been written. She had grown +up into a perfect Scotch beauty, with every gift of health and spirits +which would compensate--the old folk thought--for his retiring and +morbid nature. They were anxious, now more than ever, to see him +settled. They pressed him, in letters still extant, to propose. We have +seen how he was situated, and can understand how he persuaded himself +that fortune, after all, was about to smile upon him. Her family had +their own reasons for promoting the match, and all united in hastening +on the event. + +In the Notes to Exhibitions added to a new edition of "Modern Painters," +then in the Press, the author mentions a "hurried visit to Scotland in +the spring" of 1848. This was the occasion of his marriage at Perth, on +April 10. The young couple spent rather more than a fortnight on the way +South, among Scotch and English lakes, intending to make a more extended +tour in the summer to the cathedrals and abbeys. + +The pilgrimage began with Salisbury, where a few days' sketching in the +damp and draughts of the cathedral laid the bridegroom low, and brought +the tour to an untimely end. In August, the young people were seen +safely off to Normandy, where they went by easy stages from town to +town, studying the remains of Gothic building. In October they returned +and settled in a house of their own, at 31, Park Street, where during +the winter he wrote "The Seven Lamps of Architecture," and, as a bit of +by-work, a notice of Samuel Prout for the _Art Journal._ + +This was Ruskin's first illustrated volume. The plates were engraved by +himself in soft-ground etching, such as Prout had used, from drawings he +had made in 1846 and 1848. Some are scrappy combinations of various +detail, but others, such as the Byzantine capital, the window in +Giotto's Campanile, the arches from St. Lo in Normandy, from St. Michele +at Lucca, and from the Ca' Foscari at Venice, are effective studies of +the actual look of old buildings, seen as they are shown us in Nature, +with her light and the shade added to all the facts of form, and her own +last touches in the way of weather-softening, and settling-faults, and +tufted, nestling plants. + +Revisiting the Hôtel de la Cloche at Dijon in later years, Ruskin showed +me the room where he had "bitten" the last plate in his wash-hand basin, +as a careless makeshift for the regular etcher's bath. He was not +dissatisfied with his work himself; the public of the day wanted +something more finished. So the second edition appeared with the +subjects elaborately popularized in fashionable engraving. More recently +they have undergone reduction for a cheap issue. But any book lover +knows the value of the original "Seven Lamps" with its San Miniato cover +and autograph plates. + +As to its reception, or at least the anticipation of it. Charlotte +Bronte bears witness in a letter to the publishers. + +"I congratulate you on the approaching publication of Mr. Ruskin's new +work. If 'The Seven Lamps of Architecture' resemble their predecessor, +'Modern Painters,' they will be no lamps at all, but a new +constellation,--seven bright stars, for whose rising the reading world +ought to be anxiously agape." + +The book was announced for his father's birthday, May 10, 1849, and it +appeared while they were among the Alps. The earlier part of this tour +is pretty fully described in "Præterita," II. xi., and "Fors," letter +xc., and so the visit of Richard Fall, the meeting with Sibylla Dowie, +and the death of cousin Mary need not be dwelt on here. From the letters +that passed between father and son we find that Mr. John had been given +a month's leave from July 26 to explore the Higher Alps, with Coutet his +guide and George his valet. The old people stayed at the Hôtel des +Bergues, and thought of little else but their son and his affairs, +looking eagerly from day to day for the last news, both of him and of +his book. + +Mr. Ruskin, senior, writes from Geneva on July 29: + + + "Miss Tweddale says your book _has made a great sensation._" On + August 4: "The _Spectator_, which Smith sets great value on, has an + elaborate favourable notice on 'Seven Lamps,' only ascribing an + _infirmity_ of temper, quoting railroad passage in proof. Anne was + told by American family servant that you were in American Paper, + and got it for us, the _New York Tribune_ of July 13; first article + is your book. They say they are willing to be learners from, rather + than critics of, such a book, etc. The _Daily News_ (some of the + _Punch_ people's paper) has a capital notice. It begins: 'This is a + masked battery of seven pieces, which blaze away to the total + extinction of the small architectural lights we may boast of, etc., + etc.'" On August 5: "I have, at a shameful charge of ten francs, + got August magazine and Dickens, quite a prohibition for parcels + from England. In _British Quarterly_, under æsthetics of Gothic + architecture they take four works, you first.... As a critic they + almost rank you with Goethe and Coleridge, and in style with Jeremy + Taylor." + +The qualified encouragement of these remarks was further qualified with +detailed advice about health; and warnings against the perils of the +way, to which Mr. John used to answer on this wise: + + + "CORMAYEUR, _Sunday afternoon (July_ 29, 1849). + + "MY DEAREST FATHER, + + "(Put the three sheets in order first, 1, 2, 3, then read this, + front and _back_, and then 2, and then 3, front and back.) You and + my mother were doubtless very happy when you saw the day clear up + as you left St. Martin's. Truly it was impossible that any day + could be more perfect towards its close. We reached Nant Bourant at + twelve o'clock, or a little before, and Coutet having given his + sanction to my wish to get on, we started again soon after one--and + reached the top of the Col de Bonhomme about five. You would have + been delighted with that view--it is one upon those lovely seas of + blue mountain, one behind the other, of which one never + tires--this, fortunately, westward--so that all the blue ridges and + ranges above Conflans and Beaufort were dark against the afternoon + sky, though misty with its light; while eastward a range of snowy + crests, of which the most important was the Mont Iseran, caught the + sunlight full upon them. The sun was as warm, and the air as mild, + on the place where the English travellers sank and perished, as in + our garden at Denmark Hill on the summer evenings. There is, + however, no small excuse for a man's losing courage on that pass, + if the weather were foul. I never saw one so literally pathless--so + void of all guide and help from the lie of the ground--so + embarrassing from the distance which one has to wind round mere + brows of craggy precipice without knowing the direction in which + one is moving, while the path is perpetually lost in heaps of + shale or among clusters of crags, even when it is free of snow. + All, however, when I passed was serene, and even beautiful--owing + to the glow which the red rocks had in the sun. We got down to + Chapiu about seven--itself one of the most desolately-placed + villages I ever saw in the Alps. Scotland is in no place that I + have seen, so barren or so lonely. Ever since I passed Shapfells, + when a child, I have had an excessive love for this kind of + desolation, and I enjoyed my little square chalet window and my + chalet supper exceedingly (mutton with garlic)." + +He then confesses that he woke in the night with a sore throat, but +struggled on next day down the Allée Blanche to Cormayeur. + + + "I never saw such a mighty heap of stones and dust. The glacier + itself is quite invisible from the road (and I had no mind for + extra work or scrambling), except just at the bottom, where the ice + appears in one or two places, being exactly of the colour of the + heaps of waste coal at the Newcastle pits, and admirably adapted + therefore to realize one's brightest anticipations of the character + and style of the Allée _Blanche_. + + "The heap of its moraine conceals, for the two miles of its extent, + the entire range of Mont Blanc from the eye. At last you weather + the mighty promontory, cross the torrent which issues from its + base, and find yourself suddenly at the very foot of the vast slope + of torn granite, which from a point not 200 feet lower than the + summit of Mont Blanc, sweeps down into the valley of Cormayeur. + + "I am quite unable to speak with justice--or think with + clearness--of this marvellous view. One is so unused to see a mass + like that of Mont Blanc without any snow that all my ideas and + modes of estimating size were at fault. I only felt overpowered by + it, and that--as with the porch of Rouen Cathedral--look as I + would, I could not _see_ it. I had not mind enough to grasp it or + meet it. I tried in vain to fix some of its main features on my + memory; then set the mules to graze again, and took my sketch-book, + and marked the outlines--but where is the use of marking contours + of a mass of endless--countless--fantastic rock--12,000 feet sheer + above the valley? Besides, one cannot have sharp sore-throat for + twelve hours without its bringing on some slight feverishness; and + the scorching Alpine sun to which we had been exposed without an + instant's cessation from the height of the col till now--i.e., from + half-past ten to three--had not mended the matter; my pulse was now + beginning slightly to quicken and my head slightly to ache--and my + impression of the scene is feverish and somewhat painful; I should + think like yours of the valley of Sixt." + +So he finished his drawing, tramped down the valley after his mule, in +dutiful fear of increasing his cold, and found Cormayeur crowded, only +an attic _au quatrième_ to be had. After trying to doctor himself with +gray pill, kali, and senna, Coutet cured his throat with an alum gargle, +and they went over the Col Ferret. + +The courier Pfister had been sent to meet him at Martigny, and bring +latest news and personal report, on the strength of which several days +passed without letters, but not without a remonstrance from +headquarters. On August 8 he writes from Zermatt: + + + "I have your three letters, with pleasant accounts of critiques, + etc., and painful accounts of your anxieties. I certainly never + thought of putting in a letter at Sion, as I arrived there about + three hours after Fister left me, it being only two stages from + Martigny; and besides, I had enough to do that morning in thinking + what I should want at Zermatt, and was engaged at Sion, while we + changed horses, in buying wax candles and rice. It was unlucky that + I lost post at Visp," etc. + +A few days later he says: + + + "On Friday I had such a day as I have only once or twice had the + like of among the Alps. I got up to a promontory projecting from + the foot of the Matterhorn, and lay on the rocks and drew it at my + ease. I was about three hours at work as quietly as if in my study + at Denmark Hill, though on a peak of barren crag above a glacier, + and at least 9,000 feet above sea. But the Matterhorn, after all, + is not so fine a thing as the aiguille Dru, nor as any one of the + aiguilles of Chamouni: for one thing, it is all of secondary rock + in horizontal beds, quite rotten and shaly; but there are other + causes of difference in impressiveness which I am endeavouring to + analyze, but find considerable embarrassment in doing so. There + seems no sufficient reason why an isolated obelisk, one-fourth + higher than any of them, should not be at least as sublime as they + in their dependent grouping; but it assuredly is not. For this + reason, as well as because I have not found here the near studies + of primitive rock I expected,--for to my great surprise, I find the + whole group of mountains, mighty as they are, except the + inaccessible Monte Rosa, of secondary limestones or slates,--I + should like, if it were possible, to spend a couple of days more on + the Montanvert, and at the bases of the Chamouni aiguilles, + sleeping at the Montanvert." + +And so on, apologetically begging (as other sons beg money) for _time_, +to gather the material of "Modern Painters," volume iv. + +"I hope you will think whether the objects you are after are worth risks +of sore throats or lungs," replied his father, for he had "personified a +perpetual influenza" until they got him to Switzerland, and they were +very anxious; indeed, Pfister's news from Martigny had scared his +mother--not very well herself--into wild plans for recapturing him. +However, Osborne Gordon was going to Chamouni with Mr. Pritchard, and so +they gave him a little longer; and he made the best use of his time: + + + "_Monday evening (August_ 20, 1849). + + "MY DEAREST FATHER, + + "I have to-night a packet of back letters from Viège ... but I have + really hardly time to read them to-night, I had so many notes to + secure when I came from the hills. I walk up every day to the base + of the aiguilles without the slightest sense of fatigue; work there + all day hammering and sketching; and down in the evening. As far as + days by myself can be happy they are so, for I love the place with + all my heart. I have no over-fatigue or labour, and plenty of time. + By-the-by, though in most respects they are incapable of + improvement, I recollect that I thought to-day, as I was breaking + last night's ice away from the rocks of which I wanted a specimen, + with a sharpish wind and small pepper and salt-like sleet beating + in my face, that a hot chop and a glass of sherry, if they were to + be had round the corner, would make the thing more perfect. There + was however nothing to be had round the corner but some Iceland + moss, which belonged to the chamois, and an extra allowance of + north wind." + +This next is scribbled on a tiny scrap of paper: + + + "GLACIER or GREPPOND, _August_ 21. + + "MY DEAREST FATHER, + + "I am sitting on a gray stone in the middle of the glacier, waiting + till the fog goes away. I believe I _may_ wait. I write this line + in my pocket-book to thank my mother for hers which I did not + acknowledge last night. I am glad and sorry that she depends so + much on my letters for her comfort. I am sending them now every day + by the people who go down, for the diligence is stopped. You may + run the chance of missing one or two therefore. I am quite well, + and very comfortable--sitting on Joseph's knapsack laid on the + stone. The fog is about as thick as that of London in + November,--only white; and I see nothing near me but fields of + dampish snow with black stones in it." + +And then: + + + "MONTANVERT, _August_ 22. + + "I cannot say that on the whole the aiguilles have treated me well. + I went up Saturday, Monday and Tuesday to their feet, and never + obtained audience until to-day, and then they retired at twelve + o'clock; but I have got a most valuable memorandum." + +The parental view was put thus: + + + GENEVA, _Monday, August_ 20, 1849. + + "MY DEAREST JOHN, + + "I do not know if you have got all my letters, fully explaining to + you in what way the want of a _single_ letter, on two occasions, + did _so_ much mischief--made such havoc in our peace. I think my + last Thursday's letter entered on it. We are grateful for many + letters--that have come. It was merely the accident of the moment + when first by illness and then by precipices we were most + anxious--being exactly the moment the letters took it into their + heads to be not forthcoming. Not writing so often would only keep + us more in the dark, with little less anxiety. Please say if you + get a letter every day...." + +Space can hardly be afforded for more than samples of this voluminous +correspondence, or interesting quotations might be given about the +"ghost-hunt yesterday and a crystal-hunt to-day," and life at the +Montanvert, until at last (August 28): + + + "I have taken my place in diligence for Thursday, and hope to be + with you in good time. But I quite feel as if I were leaving home + to go on a journey. I shall not be melancholy, however, for I have + really had a good spell of it.... Dearest love to my mother. I + don't intend to write again. + + "Ever, my dearest father, + + "Your most affectionate son, + + "J. RUSKIN." + + + +CHAPTER IV + +"STONES OF VENICE" (1849-1851) + + +A book about Venice had been planned in 1845, during Ruskin's first long +working visit. He had made so many notes and sketches both of +architecture and painting that the material seemed ready to hand; +another visit would fill up the gaps in his information; and two or +three months' hard writing would work the subject off, and set him free +to continue "Modern Painters." So before leaving home in 1849, he had +made up his mind that the next work would be "The Stones of Venice," +which, on the appearance of "The Seven Lamps," was announced by the +publishers as in preparation. + +He left home again early in October; by the end of November he was +settled with his wife at Hôtel Danieli, Venice, for the winter. He +expected to find without much trouble all the information he wanted as +to the dates, styles and history of Venetian buildings; but after +consulting and comparing all the native writers, it appeared that the +questions he asked of them were just the questions they were unprepared +to answer, and that he must go into the whole matter afresh. So he laid +himself out that winter for a thorough examination of St. Mark's and the +Ducal Palace and the other remains--drawing, and measuring, and +comparing their details. + +His father had gone back to England in September out of health, and the +letters from home did not report improvement. His mother, too, was +beginning to fear the loss of her sight; and he could not stay away from +them any longer. In February, 1850, he broke off his work in the middle +of it, and returned to London. The rest of the year he spent in writing +the first volume of "Stones of Venice," and in preparing the +illustrations, together with "Examples of the Architecture of Venice," a +portfolio of large lithographs and engravings in mezzotint and line, to +accompany the work. It was most fortunate for Ruskin that his drawings +could be interpreted by such men as Armytage and Cousen, Cuff and Le +Keux, Boys and Lupton, and not without advantage to them that their +masterpieces should be preserved in his works, and praised as they +deserved in his prefaces. But these plates for "Stones of Venice" were +in advance of the times. The publisher thought them "caviare to the +general," so Mr. J.J. Ruskin told his son; but gave it as his own belief +that "some dealers in Ruskins and Turners in 1890 will get great prices +for what at present will not sell." + +Early in 1850, his father, at his mother's desire, and with the help of +W.H. Harrison, collected and printed his poems, with a number of pieces +that still remained in MS., the author taking no part in this revival of +bygones, which, for the sake of their associations, he was not anxious +to recall--though his father still believed that he _might_ have been a +poet, and _ought_ to have been one. This is the volume of "Poems J.R., +1850," so highly valued by collectors. + +Another resurrection was "The King of the Golden River," which had lain +hidden for the nine years of the Ars Poetica. He allowed it to be +published, with woodcuts by the famous "Dicky" Doyle. The little book +ran through three editions that year. The first issue must have been +torn to rags in the nurseries of the last generation, since copies are +so rare as to have brought ten guineas apiece instead of the six +shillings at which they were advertised in 1850. + +A couple of extracts from letters of 1850 will give some idea of +Ruskin's impressions of London society and the Drawing Room: + + + "MY DEAREST MOTHER, + + "Horrible party last night--stiff--large--dull--fidgety--strange, + --run-against-everybody-know-nobody sort of party. Naval people. + Young lady claims acquaintance with me--I know as much of her as + of Queen Pomare--Talk: get away as soon as I can--ask who she + is--Lady (----);--as wise as I was before. Introduced to a black + man with chin in collar. Black man condescending--I abuse + different things to black man: chiefly the House of Lords. Black + man says he lives in it--asks where I live--don't want to tell + him--obliged--go away and ask who he is--(----); as wise as I was + before. Introduced to a young lady--young lady asks if I like + drawing--so away and ask who she is--Lady(----). Keep away, with + back to wall and look at watch. Get away at last. Very sulky this + morning--hope my father better--dearest love to you both." + + + "PARK STREET, _4 o'clock, (May, 1850)_. + + "MY DEAREST FATHER, + + "We got through gloriously, though at one place there was the most + awkward crush I ever saw in my life--the pit at the Surrey, which I + never saw, may perhaps show the like--nothing else. The floor was + covered with the ruins of ladies' dresses, torn lace and fallen + flowers. But Effie was luckily out of it, and got through + unscathed--and heard people saying 'What a beautiful dress!' just + as she got up to the Queen. It was fatiguing enough but not so + _awkward_ as I expected.... + + "The Queen looked much younger and prettier than I expected--very + like her pictures, even like those which are thought to flatter + most--but I only saw the profile--I could not see the front face as + I knelt to her, at least without an upturning of the eyes which I + thought would be unseemly--and there were but some two or three + seconds allowed for the whole affair.... + + "The Queen gave her hand very graciously: but looked bored; poor + thing, well she might be, with about a quarter of a mile square of + people to bow to. + + "I met two people whom I have not seen for many a day, Kildare and + Scott Murray--had a chat with the former and a word with Murray, + but nothing of interest...." + +As one of the chief literary figures of the day, Ruskin could not avoid +society, and, as he tells in "Præterita," he was rewarded for the +reluctant performance of his duties by meeting with several who became +his lifelong friends. Chief among these he mentions Mr. and Mrs. +Cowper-Temple, afterwards Lord and Lady Mount Temple. The acquaintance +with Samuel Rogers, inauspiciously begun many years before, now ripened +into something like friendship; Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton) and +other men of letters were met at Rogers' breakfasts. A little later a +visit to the Master of Trinity, Whewell, at Cambridge, brought him into +contact with Professer Willis, the authority on Gothic architecture, and +other notabilities of the sister University. There also he met Mr. and +Mrs. Marshall of Leeds (and Coniston); and he pursued his journey to +Lincoln, with Mr. Simpson, whom he had met at Lady Davy's, and to +Farnley for a visit to Mr. F.H. Fawkes, the owner of the celebrated +collection of Turners (April, 1851). + +In London he was acquainted with many of the leading artists and persons +interested in art. Of the "teachers" of the day he was known to men so +diverse as Carlyle--and Maurice, with whom he corresponded in 1815 about +his "Notes on Sheepfolds"--and C.H. Spurgeon, to whom his mother was +devoted. He was as yet neither a hermit, nor a heretic: but mixed freely +with all sorts and conditions, with one exception, for Puseyites and +Romanists were yet as heathen men and publicans to him; and he noted +with interest, while writing his review of Venetian history, that the +strength of Venice was distinctly Anti-Papal, and her virtues Christian +but not Roman. Reflections on this subject were to have formed part of +his great work, but the first volume was taken up with the _à priori_ +development of architectural forms; and the treatment in especial of +Venetian matters had to be indefinitely postponed, until another visit +had given him the opportunity of gathering his material. + +Meanwhile, his wide sympathy had turned his mind toward a subject which +then had received little attention, though since then loudly +discussed--the reunion of (Protestant) Christians. + +He put together his thoughts in a pamphlet on the text "There shall be +one fold and one Shepherd," calling it, in allusion to his architectural +studies, "Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds." He proposed a +compromise, trying to prove that the pretensions to priesthood on the +high Anglican side, and the objections to episcopacy on the +Presbyterian, were alike untenable; and hoped that, when once these +differences--such little things he thought them--were arranged, a united +Church of England might become the nucleus of a world-wide federation of +Protestants, a _civitas Dei_, a New Jerusalem. + +There were many who agreed with his aspirations: he received shoals of +letters from sympathizing readers, most of them praising his aims and +criticising his means. Others objected rather to his manner than to his +matter; the title savoured of levity, and an art-critic writing on +theology was supposed to be wandering out of his province. Tradition +says that the "Notes" were freely bought by Border farmers under a +rather laughable mistake; but surely it was no new thing for a Scotch +reader to find a religious tract under a catching title. There were a +few replies; one by Mr. Dyce, who defended the Anglican view with mild +persiflage and the usual commonplaces. And there the matter ended, for +the public. For Ruskin, it was the beginning of a train of thought +which led him far. He gradually learnt that his error was not in asking +too much, but in asking too little. He wished for a union of +Protestants, forgetting the sheep that are not of _that_ fold, and +little dreaming of the answer he got, after many days, in "Christ's Folk +in the Apennine." + +Meanwhile the first volume of "Stones of Venice" had appeared, March, +1851. Its reception was indirectly described in a pamphlet entitled +"Something on Ruskinism, with a 'Vestibule' in Rhyme, by an Architect" +complaining bitterly of the "ecstasies of rapture" into which the +newspapers had been thrown by the new work: + + "Your book--since reviewers so swear--may be rational, + Still, 'tis certainly not either loyal or national;" + +for it did not join in the chorus of congratulation to Prince Albert and +the British public on the Great Exhibition of 1851, the apotheosis of +trade and machinery. The "Architect" finds also--what may surprise the +modern reader who has not noticed that many an able work has been +thought unreadable on its first appearance--that he cannot understand +the language and ideas: + + "Your style is so soaring--and some it makes sore-- + That plain folks can't make out your strange mystical lore." + +He will allow the author to be quite right, when he finds something to +agree upon; but the moment a sore point is touched, then Ruskin is +"insane." In one respect the "Architect" hit the nail on the head: +"Readers who are not reviewers by profession can hardly fail to perceive +that Ruskinism is violently inimical to _sundry existing interests_." + +The best men, we said, were the first to recognise Ruskin's genius. Let +us throw into the opposite scale an opinion of more weight than the +"Architect's," in a transcript of the original letter from Carlyle. + + + "CHELSEA, _March_ 9, 1851. + + "DEAR RUSKIN, + + "I did not know yesterday till your servant was gone that there was + any note in the parcel; nor at all what a feat you had done! A loan + of the gallant young man's Memoirs was what I expected; and here, + in the most chivalrous style, comes a gift of them. This, I think, + must be in the style _prior_ to the Renaissance! What can I do but + accept your kindness with pleasure and gratitude, though it is far + beyond my deserts? Perhaps the next man I meet will use me as much + below them; and so bring matters straight again! Truly I am much + obliged, and return you many hearty thanks. + + "I was already deep in the 'Stones'; and clearly purpose to hold on + there. A strange, unexpected, and I believe, most true and + excellent _Sermon_ in Stones--as well as the best piece of + schoolmastering in Architectonics; from which I hope to learn much + in a great many ways. The spirit and purport of these critical + studies of yours are a singular sign of the times to me, and a very + gratifying one. Right good speed to you, and victorious arrival on + the farther shore! It is a quite new 'Renaissance,' I believe, we + are getting into just now: either towards new, _wider_ manhood, + high again as the eternal stars; or else into final death, and the + (marsh?) of Gehenna for evermore! A dreadful process, but a needful + and inevitable one; nor do I doubt at all which way the issue will + be, though which of the extant nations are to get included in it, + and which is to be trampled out and abolished in the process, may + be very doubtful. God is great: and sure enough, the changes in the + 'Construction of Sheepfolds' as well as in other things, will + require to be very considerable. + + "We are still labouring under the foul kind of influenza here, I + not far from emancipated, my poor wife still deep in the business, + though I hope past the deepest. Am I to understand that you too are + seized? In a day or two I hope to ascertain that you are well + again. Adieu; here is an interruption, here also is the end of the + paper. + + "With many thanks and regards." + + [Signature cut away.] + +As soon as the first volume of "Stones of Venice" and the "Notes on the +Construction of Sheepfolds" were published, Ruskin took a short Easter +holiday at Matlock, and set to work at a new edition of "Modern +Painters." This was the fifth reprint of the first volume, and the third +of vol. ii. They were carefully and conscientiously revised, and the +Postscript indulged in a little triumph at the changed tone of public +criticism upon Turner. + +But it was too late to have been much service to the great artist +himself. In 1845--after saying good-bye and "Why _will_ you go to +Switzerland? there will be such a _fidge_ about you when you're +gone"--Turner lost his health, and was never himself again. The last +drawings he did for Ruskin (January, 1848), the "Brünig" and the +"Descent from the St. Gothard to Airolo," showed his condition +unmistakably; and the lonely restlessness of the last, disappointing +years were, for all his friends, a melancholy ending to a brilliant +career. Ruskin wrote: + + + "This year (1851) he has no picture on the walls of the Academy; + and the _Times_ of May 3 says: 'We miss those works of + INSPIRATION'!" + + "_We_ miss! Who misses? The populace of England + rolls by to weary itself in the great bazaar of Kensington,[3] + little thinking that a day will come when those veiled vestals and + prancing amazons, and goodly merchandise of precious stones and + gold, will all be forgotten as though they had not been; but that + the light which has faded from the walls of the Academy is one + which a million Koh-i-noors could not rekindle; and that the year + 1851 will, in the far future, be remembered less for what it has + displayed, than for what it has withdrawn." + +[Footnote 3: The Great Exhibition in Hyde Park.] + + + + +CHAPTER V + +PRE-RAPHAELITISM (1851-1853) + + +The _Times_, in May 1851, missed "those works of inspiration," as Ruskin +had at last taught people to call Turner's pictures. But the +acknowledged mouthpiece of public opinion found consolation in +castigating a school of young artists who had "unfortunately become +notorious by addicting themselves to an antiquated style and an affected +simplicity in painting.... We can extend no toleration to a mere servile +imitation of the cramped style, false perspective, and crude colour of +remote antiquity. We want not to see what Fuseli termed drapery 'snapped +instead of folded'; faces bloated into apoplexy, or extenuated into +skeletons; colour borrowed from the jars in a druggist's shop, and +expression forced into caricature.... That morbid infatuation which +sacrifices truth, beauty, and genuine feeling to mere eccentricity +deserves no quarter at the hands of the public." + +Ruskin knew nothing personally of these young innovators, and had not at +first sight wholly approved of the apparently Puseyite tendency of +Rossetti's "Ecce Ancilla Domini," Millais' "Carpenter's Shop," and +Holman Hunt's "Early Christian Missionary," exhibited the year before. +All these months he had been closely kept to his "Sheepfolds" and +"Stones of Venice"; but now he was correcting the proofs of "Modern +Painters," vol. i., as thus: + + + "Chapter the last, section 21: _The duty and after privileges of + all students_.... Go to Nature in all singleness of heart, and walk + with her laboriously and trustingly, having no other thoughts but + how best to penetrate her meaning, and remember her instruction; + rejecting nothing, selecting nothing, and scorning nothing; + believing all things to be right and good, and rejoicing always in + the truth." + +And at Coventry Patmore's request he went to the Academy to look at the +pictures in question. Yes; the faces were ugly: Millais' "Mariana" was a +piece of idolatrous Papistry, and there was a mistake in the +perspective. Collins' "Convent Thoughts"--more Popery; but very +careful--"the tadpole too small for its age"; but what studies of +plants! And there was his own "Alisma Plantago," which he had been +drawing for "Stones of Venice" (vol. i., plate 7) and describing: "The +lines through its body, which are of peculiar beauty, mark the different +expansions of its fibres, and are, I think, exactly the same as those +which would be traced by the currents of a river entering a lake of the +shape of the leaf, at the end where the stalk is, and passing out at its +point." Curvature was one of the special subjects of Ruskin, the one he +found most neglected by ordinary artists. The "Alisma" was a test of +observation and draughtsmanship. He had never seen it so thoroughly or +so well drawn, and heartily wished the study were his. + +Looking again at the other works of the school, he found that the one +mistake in the "Mariana" was the only error in perspective in the whole +series of pictures; which could not be said of any twelve works, +containing architecture, by popular artists in the exhibition; and that, +as studies both of drapery and of every other minor detail, there had +been nothing in art so earnest or so complete as these pictures since +the days of Albert Dürer. + +He went home, and wrote his verdict in a letter to _The Times_ (May 9, +1851). Next day he asked the price of Hunt's "Two Gentlemen of Verona," +and Millais' "Return of the Dove." On the 13th his letter appeared in +_The Times_, and on the 26th he wrote again, pointing out beauties, and +indications of power in conception, and observation of Nature, and +handling, where at first he, like the rest of the public, had been +repelled by the wilful ugliness of the faces. Meanwhile the +Pre-Raphaelites wrote to tell him that they were neither Papists nor +Puseyites. The day after his second letter was published he received an +ill-spelt missive, anonymously abusing them. This was the sort of thing +to interest his love of poetical justice. He made the acquaintance of +several of the Brethren. "Charley" Collins, as his friends +affectionately called him, was the son of a respected R.A., and the +brother of Wilkie Collins; himself afterwards the author of a delightful +book of travel in France, "A Cruise upon Wheels." Millais turned out to +be the most gifted, charming and handsome of young artists. Holman Hunt +was already a Ruskin-reader, and a seeker after truth, serious and +earnest in his religious nature as in his painting. + +The Pre-Raphaelites were not, originally, Ruskin's pupils, nor was their +movement, directly, of his creation. But it was the outcome of a general +tendency which he, more than any man, had helped to set in motion; and +it was the fulfilment, though in a way he had not expected, of his +wishes. + +His attraction to Pre-Raphaelitism was none the less real because it was +sudden, and brought about partly by personal influence. And in +re-arranging his art-theory to take them in, he had before his mind +rather what he hoped they would become than what they were. For a time, +his influence over them was great; their first three years were their +own; their next three years were practically his; and some of them, the +weaker brethren, leaned upon him until they lost the command of their +own powers. No artist can afford to use another man's eyes; still less, +another man's brain and heart. Ruskin, great as an exponent, was in no +sense a master of artists; and if he cheered on the men, who, he +believed, were the best of the time, it did not follow that he should be +saddled with the responsibility of directing them. + +The famous pamphlet on "Pre-Raphaelitism" of August, 1851, showed that +the same motives of Sincerity impelled both the Pre-Raphaelite Brethren +and Turner and, in a degree, men so different as Prout, old Hunt, and +Lewis. All these were opposed to the Academical School who worked by +rule of thumb; and they differed among one another only in differences +of physical power and moral aim. Which was all perfectly true, and much +truer than the cheap criticism which could not see beyond superficial +differences, or the fossil theories of the old school. But +Pre-Raphaelitism was an unstable compound, liable to explode upon the +experimenter, and its component parts to return to their old antithesis +of crude naturalism on the one hand, and affectation of piety or poetry +or antiquarianism, on the other. And _that_ their new champion did not +then foresee. All he knew was that, just when he was sadly leaving the +scene, Turner gone and night coming on, new lights arose. It was really +far more noteworthy that Millais and Rossetti and Hunt were _men of +genius_, than that the "principles" they tried to illustrate were sound, +and that Ruskin divined their power, and generously applauded them. + +Immediately after finishing the pamphlet on "Pre-Raphaelitism," he left +for the Continent with his wife and friends, the Rev. and Mrs. Daniel +Moore; spent a fortnight in his beloved Savoy, with the Pritchards; and +then crossed the Alps with Charles Newton. On the 1st of September he +was at Venice, for a final spell of labour on the palaces and churches. +After spending a week with Rawdon Brown he settled at Casa Wetzler, +Campo Sta. Maria Zobenigo, and during the autumn and winter not only +worked extremely hard at his architecture, but went with his wife into +Austrian and Italian society and saw many distinguished visitors. One of +them, whom he lectured on the shortcomings of the Renaissance, was Dean +Milman. "I am amused at your mode of ciceronizing the Dean of St. +Paul's," wrote his father, who kept up the usual close correspondence, +and made himself useful in looking up books of reference and consulting +authorities like Mr. James Fergusson--for these chapters of easy +eloquence were not written without a world of pains. The engravers and +the business department of the new publications also required his +co-operation, for they were now becoming large ventures. During the +three and a half years preceding the summer of 1851 Ruskin seems to have +spent £1,680 of profits from his books, making by his writings at this +period only about a third of his annual outlay; so that the estimated +cost of these great illustrated volumes, some £1,200, was a matter of +anxiety to his father, who, together with the publisher, deprecated +large plates and technical details, and expressed some impatience to +see results from this visit to Venice. He looked eagerly for every new +chapter or drawing as it was sent home for criticism. Some passages, +such as the description of the Calle San Moise ("Stones of Venice," II. +iv,) were unfavourably received by him. Another time he says, "You have +a very great difficulty now in writing any more, which is to write up to +yourself": or again,--"Smith reports slow sale of 'Stones of Venice' +(vol. I.) and 'Pre-Raphaelitism.' The times are sorely against you. The +Exhibition has impoverished the country, and literature of a saleable +character seems chiefly confined to shilling books in green paper, to be +had at railway stations. Smith will have an account against us." He +always sent adverse press-notices, on the principle that it was good for +John: and every little discouragement or annoyance was discussed in +full. + +The most serious news, threatening complete interruption of the work +rapidly progressing in spite of all, was of Turner's death (December 19, +1851). Old Mr. Ruskin heard of it on the 21st, a "dismal day" to him, +spent in sad contemplation of the pictures his son had taught him to +love. Soon it came out that John Ruskin was one of the executors named +in the will, with a legacy of _£20_ for a mourning ring:--"Nobody can +say you were paid to praise," says his father. It was gossipped that he +was expected to write Turner's biography--"five years' work for you," +says the old man, full of plans for gathering material. But when one +scandal after another reached his ears, he changed his tone, and +suggested dropping personal details, and giving a "Life of his Art," in +the intended third and final volume of "Modern Painters." Something of +the sort was done in the Edinburgh Lectures and at the close of vol. v. +of "Modern Painters": and the official life was left to Walter +Thornbury, with which Mr. Ruskin perhaps did not wish to interfere. But +he collected a mass of then unpublished material about Turner, which +goes far to prove that the kindly view he took of the strange man's +morbid and unhappy life was not without justification. At the time, so +many legal complications developed that Ruskin was advised to resign his +executorship; later on he was able to fulfil its duties as he conceived +them, in arranging Turner's sketches for the National Gallery. + +Others of his old artist-friends were now passing away. Early in January +Mr. J.J. Ruskin called on William Hunt and found him feeble: "I like the +little Elshie," he says, nicknaming him after the Black Dwarf, for Hunt +was somewhat deformed: + + + "He is softened and humanized. There is a gentleness and a greater + _bonhomie_--less reserve. I had sent him 'Pre-Raphaelitism.' He had + marked it very much with pencil. He greatly likes your notice of + people not keeping to their last. So many clever artists, he says, + have been ruined by not acting on your principles. I got a piece of + advice from Hunt,--never to commission a picture. He could not have + done my pigeon so well had he felt he was doing it for anybody." + +The pigeon was a drawing he had just bought; in later years at +Brantwood. + +In February 1852 a dinner-party was given to celebrate in his absence +John Ruskin's thirty-third birthday. + + + "On Monday, 9th, we had Oldfield (Newton was in Wales), Harrison, + George Richmond, Tom, Dr. Grant, and Samuel Prout. The latter I + never saw in such spirits, and he went away much satisfied. + Yesterday at church we were told that he came home very happy, + ascended to his painting-room, and in a quarter of an hour from his + leaving our cheerful house was a corpse, from apoplexy. He never + spoke after the fit came on. He had always wished for a sudden + death." + +Next year, in November, 1853, he tells of a visit paid, by John's +request, to W.H. Deverell, the young Pre-Raphaelite, whom he found "in +squalor and sickness--with his Bible open--and not long to live--while +Howard abuses his picture at Liverpool." + +Early in 1852 Charles Newton was going to Greece on a voyage of +discovery, and wanted John Ruskin to go with him. But the parents would +not hear of his adventuring himself at sea "in those engine-vessels." So +Newton went alone, and "dug up loads of Phoenician antiquities." One +cannot help regretting that Ruskin lost this opportunity of +familiarizing himself with the early Greek art which, twenty years later +he tried to expound. For the time he was well enough employed on the +"Stones of Venice." He tells the story of this ten months' stay in a +letter to his venerable friend Rogers the poet, dated June 23 (1852). + + + "I was out of health and out of heart when I first got here. There + came much painful news from home, and then such a determined course + of bad weather, and every other kind of annoyance, that I never was + in a temper fit to write to anyone: the worst of it was that I lost + all _feeling_ of Venice, and this was the reason both of my not + writing to you and of my thinking of you so often. For whenever I + found myself getting utterly hard and indifferent I used to read + over a little bit of the 'Venice' in the 'Italy' and it put me + always into the right tone of thought again, and for this I cannot + be enough grateful to you. For though I believe that in the summer, + when Venice is indeed lovely, when pomegranate blossoms hang over + every garden-wall, and green sunlight shoots through every wave, + custom will not destroy, or even weaken, the impression conveyed at + first; it is far otherwise in the length and bitterness of the + Venetian winters. Fighting with frosty winds at every turn of the + canals takes away all the old feelings of peace and stillness; the + protracted cold makes the dash of the water on the walls a sound of + simple discomfort, and some wild and dark day in February one + starts to find oneself actually balancing in one's mind the + relative advantages of land and water carriage, comparing the Canal + with Piccadilly, and even hesitating whether for the rest of one's + life one would rather have a gondola within call or a hansom." + +He then goes on to lament the decay of Venice, the idleness and +dissipation of the populace, the lottery gambling; and to forebode the +"destruction of old buildings and erection of new" changing the place +"into a modern town--a bad imitation of Paris." Better than that he +thinks would be utter neglect; St. Mark's Place would again be, what it +was in the early ages, a green field, and the front of the Ducal Palace +and the marble shafts of St. Mark's would be rooted in wild violets and +wreathed with vines: + + + "She will be beautiful again then, and I could almost wish that the + time might come quickly, were it not that so many noble pictures + must be destroyed first.... I love Venetian pictures more and more, + and wonder at them every day with greater wonder; compared with all + other paintings they are so easy, so instinctive, so natural; + everything that the men of other schools did by rule and called + composition, done here by instinct and only called truth. + + "I don't know when I have envied anybody more than I did the other + day the directors and clerks of the Zecca. There they sit at inky + deal desks, counting out rolls of money, and curiously weighing the + irregular and battered coinage of which Venice boasts; and just + over their heads, occupying the place which in a London + countinghouse would be occupied by a commercial almanack, a + glorious Bonifazio--'Solomon and the Queen of Sheba'; and in a less + honourable corner three _old_ directors of the Zecca, very + mercantile-looking men indeed, counting money also, like the living + ones, only a little _more_ living, painted by Tintoret; not to + speak of the scattered Palma Vecchios, and a lovely Benedetto Diana + which no one ever looks at. I wonder when the European mind will + again awake to the great fact that a noble picture was not painted + to be _hung_, but to be _seen_? I only saw these by accident, + having been detained in Venice by soma obliging person who + abstracted some [of his wife's jewels] and brought me thereby into + various relations with the respectable body of people who live at + the wrong end of the Bridge of Sighs--the police, whom, in spite of + traditions of terror, I would very willingly have changed for some + of those their predecessors whom you have honoured by a note in the + 'Italy.' The present police appear to act on exactly contrary + principles; yours found the purse and banished the loser; these + _don't_ find the jewels, and won't let me go away. I am afraid no + punishment is appointed in Venetian law for people who steal + _time_." + +Mr. Ruskin returned to England in July, 1852, and settled next door to +his old home on Herne Hill. He said he could not live any more in Park +Street, with a dead brick wall opposite his windows. And so, under the +roof where he wrote the first volume of "Modern Painters," he finished +"Stones of Venice." These latter volumes give an account of St. Mark's +and the Ducal Palace and other ancient buildings; a complete catalogue +of Tintoret's pictures--the list he had begun in 1845; and a history of +the successive styles of architecture, Byzantine, Gothic, and +Renaissance, interweaving illustrations of the human life and character +that made the art what it was. + +The kernel of the work was the chapter on the Nature of Gothic; in which +he showed, more distinctly than in the "Seven Lamps," and connected with +a wider range of thought, suggested by Pre-Raphaelitism, the doctrine +that art cannot be produced except by artists; that architecture, in so +far as it is an art, does not mean mechanical execution, by +unintelligent workmen, from the vapid working-drawings of an architect's +office; and, just as Socrates postponed the day of justice until +philosophers should be kings and kings philosophers, so Ruskin postponed +the reign of art until workmen should be artists, and artists workmen. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE EDINBURGH LECTURES (1853-1854) + + +By the end of June, 1853, "Stones of Venice" was finished, as well as a +description of Giotto's works at Padua, written for the Arundel Society. +The social duties of the season were over; Ruskin and his wife went +north to spend a well-earned holiday. At Wallington in Northumberland, +staying with Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, he met Dr. John Brown at +Edinburgh, author of "Pet Marjorie" and other well-known works, who +became his lifelong friend. Ruskin invited Millais, by this time an +intimate and heartily-admired friend,[4] to join them at Glenfinlas. +Ruskin devoted himself first to foreground studies, and made careful +drawings of rock-detail; and then, being asked to give a course of +lectures before the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh, he was soon busy +writing once more, and preparing the cartoon-sketches, "diagrams" as he +called them, to illustrate his subjects. Dr. Acland had joined the +party; and he asked Millais to sketch their host as he stood +contemplatively on the rocks with the torrent thundering beside him. The +picture with additional work in the following winter, became the +well-known portrait in the possession of Sir Henry Acland, much the best +likeness of this early period. + +[Footnote 4: "What a beauty of a man he is!" wrote old Mr. Ruskin, "and +high in intellect.... Millais' sketches are 'prodigious'! Millais is the +painter of the age." "Capable, it seems to me, of almost everything, if +his life and strength be spared," said the younger Ruskin to Miss +Mitford.] + +Another portrait was painted--in words--by one of his audience at +Edinburgh on November 1, when he gave the opening lecture of his course, +his first appearance on the platform. The account is extracted from the +_Edinburgh Guardian_ of November 19, 1853: + + + "Before you can see the lecturer, however, you must get into the + hall, and that is not an easy matter, for, long before the doors + are opened, the fortunate holders of season tickets begin to + assemble, so that the crowd not only fills the passage, but + occupies the pavement in front of the entrance and overflows into + the road. At length the doors open, and you are carried through the + passage into the hall, where you take up, of course, the best + available position for seeing and hearing.... After waiting a weary + time ... the door by the side of the platform opens, and a thin + gentleman with light hair, a stiff white cravat, dark overcoat with + velvet collar, walking, too with a slight stoop, goes up to the + desk, and looking round with a self-possessed and somewhat formal + air, proceeds to take off his great-coat, revealing thereby, in + addition to the orthodox white cravat, the most orthodox of white + waistcoats.... 'Dark hair, pale face, and massive marble brow--that + is my ideal of Mr. Ruskin,' said a young lady near us. This proved + to be quite a fancy portrait, as unlike the reality as could well + be imagined, Mr. Ruskin has light sand-coloured hair; his face is + more red than pale; the mouth well-cut, with a good deal of + decision in its curve, though somewhat wanting in sustained dignity + and strength; an aquiline nose; his forehead by no means broad or + massive, but the brows full and well bound together; the eye we + could not see, in consequence of the shadows that fell upon his + countenance from the lights overhead, but we are sure it must be + soft and luminous, and that the poetry and passion we looked for + almost in vain in other features must be concentrated there.[5] + After sitting for a moment or two, and glancing round at the sheets + on the wall as he takes off his gloves, he rises, and leaning + slightly over the desk, with his hands folded across, begins at + once,--'You are proud of your good city of Edinburgh,' etc. + + [Footnote 5: "Mary Russell Mitford found him as a young man 'very + eloquent and distinguished-looking, tall, fair, and slender, with a + gentle playfulness, and a sort of pretty waywardness that was quite + charming.' Sydney Dobell, again, in 1852, discovered an earnestness + pervading every feature, giving power to a face that otherwise + would be merely lovable for its gentleness. And, finally, one who + visited him at Denmark Hill characterized him as emotional and + nervous, with a soft, genial eye, a mouth 'thin and severe,' and a + voice that, though rich and sweet, yet had a tendency to sink into + a plaintive and hopeless tone,"--_Literary World_, May 19, 1893.] + + "And now for the style of the lecture.... Properly speaking, there + were two styles essentially distinct, and not well blended,--a + speaking and a writing style; the former colloquial and spoken + off-hand; the latter rhetorical and carefully read in quite a + different voice,--we had almost said intoned.... He has a + difficulty in sounding the letter 'r'; [and there is a] peculiar + tone in the rising and falling of his voice at measured intervals, + in a way scarcely ever heard except in the public lection of the + service appointed to be read in churches. These are the two things + with which, perhaps you are most surprised,--his dress and manner + of speaking--both of which (the white waistcoat notwithstanding) + are eminently clerical. You naturally expect, in one so + independent, a manner free from conventional restraint, and an + utterance, whatever may be the power of voice, at least expressive + of a strong individuality; and you find instead a Christ Church man + of ten years' standing, who has not yet taken orders; his dress and + manner derived from his college tutor, and his elocution from the + chapel-reader." + +The lectures were a summing up, in popular form, of the chief topics of +Ruskin's thought during the last two years. The first (November 1) +stated, with more decision and warmth than part of his audience +approved, his plea for the Gothic Revival, for the use of Gothic as a +domestic style. The next lecture, given three days later, went on to +contrast the wealth of ornament in mediæval buildings with the poor +survivals of conventionalized patterns which did duty for decoration in +nineteenth-century "Greek" architecture; and he raised a laugh by +comparing a typical stonemason's lion with a real tiger's head, drawn in +the Edinburgh zoological gardens by Mr. Millais. + +The last two lectures, on November 15 and 18, were on Painting; briefly +reviewing the history of landscape and the life and aims of Turner; and +finally, Christian art and Sincerity in imagination, which was now put +forth as the guiding principle of Pre-Raphaelitism. + +Public opinion was violently divided over these lectures; and they were +the cause of much trouble at home. The fact of his lecturing at all +aroused strong opposition from his friends and remonstrances from his +parents. Before the event his mother wrote: "I cannot reconcile myself +to the thought of your bringing yourself personally before the world +till you are somewhat older and stronger." Afterwards, his father, while +apologizing for the word "degrading," is disgusted at his exposing +himself to such an interruption as occurred, and to newspaper comments +and personal references. The notion of an "itinerant lecturer" +scandalizes him. He hears from Harrison and Holding that John is to +lecture even at their very doors--in Camberwell. "I see small bills up," +he writes, "with the lecturers' names; among them Mr. ---- who gets your +old clothes!" And he bids him write to the committee that his parents +object to his fulfilling the engagement. He postponed his lecture--for +ten years; but accepted the Presidency of the Camberwell Institute, +which enabled him to appear at their meetings without offence to any. + +While staying at Edinburgh, Mr. Ruskin met the various celebrities of +modern Athens, some of them at the table of his former fellow-traveller +in Venice, Mrs. Jameson. He then returned home to prepare the lectures +for printing. + +These lectures as published in April, 1854 were fiercely assailed by the +old school; but a more serious blow fell on him before that month was +out. His wife returned to her parents and instituted a suit against him, +to which he made no answer. The marriage was annulled in July. A year +later she married Millais. + +In May (1854) the Pre-Raphaelites again needed his defence. Mr. Holman +Hunt exhibited the "Light of the World" and the "Awakening Conscience." +Ruskin made them the theme of two more letters to _The Times_; +mentioning, by the way, the "spurious imitations of Pre-Raphaelite work" +which were already becoming common. Starting for his summer tour on the +Continent, in the Simmenthal he wrote a pamphlet on the opening of the +Crystal Palace. There had been much rejoicing over the "new style of +architecture" in glass and iron, and its purpose as a palace of art. +Ruskin who had declined, in the last chapter of the "Seven Lamps," to +join in the cry for a new style, was not at all ready to accept this as +any real artistic advance; and took the opportunity to plead again for +the great buildings of the past, which were being destroyed or +neglected, while the British public was glorifying its gigantic +greenhouse. The pamphlet practically suggested the establishment of the +Society for the preservation of ancient buildings, which has since come +into operation. + +This summer of 1854 he projected a study of Swiss history: to tell the +tale of six chief towns--Geneva, Fribourg, Basle, Thun, Baden and +Schaffhausen, to which in 1858 he added Rheinfelden and Bellinzona. He +intended to illustrate the work with pictures of the places described. +He began with his drawing of Thun, a large bird's-eye view of the town +with its river and bridges, roofs and towers, all exquisitely defined +with the pen, and broadly coloured in fluctuating tints that seem to +melt always into the same aerial blue; the blue, high up the picture, +beyond the plain, deepening into distant mountains. + +But his father wanted to see "Modern Painters" completed, and so he +began his third volume at Vevey, with the discussion of the grand style, +in which he at last broke loose from Reynolds, as was inevitable, after +his study of Pre-Raphaelitism, and all the varied experiences of the +last ten years. The lesson of the Tulse Hill ivy had been brought home +to him in many ways: he had found it to be more and more true that +Nature is, after all, the criterion of art, and that the greatest +painters were always those whose aim, so far as they were conscious of +an aim, was to take fact for their starting-point. Idealism, beauty, +imagination, and the rest, though necessary to art, could not, he felt, +be made the object of study; they were the gift of heredity, of +circumstances, of national aspirations and virtues; not to be produced +by the best of rules, or achieved by the best of intentions. + +What his own view of his own work was can be gathered from a letter to +an Edinburgh student, written on August 6, 1854: + + + "I am sure I never said anything to dissuade you from trying to + excel or to do great things. I only wanted you to be sure that your + efforts were made with a substantial basis, so that just in the + moment of push your footing might not give way beneath you; and + also I wanted you to feel that long and steady effort made in a + contented way does more than violent effort made from some strong + motive and under some enthusiastic impulse. And I repeat--for of + this I am perfectly sure--that the best things are only to be done + in this way. It is very difficult thoroughly to understand the + difference between indolence and reserve of strength, between + apathy and severity, between palsy and patience; but there is all + the difference in the world; and nearly as many men are ruined by + inconsiderate exertions as by idleness itself. To do as much as you + can heartily and happily do each day in a well-determined + direction, with a view to far-off results, with present enjoyment + of one's work, is the only proper, the only essentially profitable + way." + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE WORKING MEN'S COLLEGE (1854-1855) + + +Philanthropic instincts, and a growing sense of the necessity for social +reform, had led Ruskin for some years past towards a group of liberal +thinkers with whom he had little otherwise in common. At Venice, in +1852, he had written several articles on education, taxation, and so +forth, with which he intended to plunge into active politics. His +father, like a cautious man of business who knew his son's powers and +thought he knew their limitations, was strongly opposed to this +attempt, and used every argument against it. He appealed to his son's +sensitiveness, and assured him that he would be "flayed" unless he +wrapped himself in the hide of a rhinoceros. He assured him that, +without being on the spot to follow the discussions of politicians, it +was useless to offer them any opinions whatsoever. And he ended by +declaring that it would be the ruin of his business and of his peace of +mind if the name of Ruskin were mixed up with Radical electioneering: +not that he was unwilling to suffer martyrdom for a cause in which he +believed, but he did not believe in the movements afoot--neither the +Tailors' Cooperative Society, in which their friend F.J. Furnivall was +interested, nor in any outcome of Chartism or Chartist principles. And +so for a time the matter dropped. + +In 1854, the Rev. F.D. Maurice founded the Working Men's College. Mr. +Furnivall sent the circulars to John Ruskin; who thereupon wrote to +Maurice, and offered his services. At the opening lecture on October 31, +1854, at St. Martin's Hall, Long Acre, Furnivall distributed to all +comers a reprint of the chapter "On the Nature of Gothic," which we have +already noticed as a statement of the conclusions drawn from the study +of art respecting the conditions under which the life of the workman +should be regulated. Ruskin thus appeared as contributing, so to say, +the manifesto of the movement. + +He took charge from the commencement of the drawing-classes--first at 31 +Red Lion Square, and afterwards at Great Ormond Street; also +super-intending classes taught by Messrs. Jeffery and E. Cooke at the +Working Women's (afterwards the Working Men and Women's) College, Queen +Square. + +In this labour he had two allies; one a friend of Maurice's, Lowes +Dickinson, the well-known artist, whose portrait of Maurice was +mentioned with honour in the "Notes on the Academy"; his portrait of +Kingsley hangs in the hall of the novelist-professor's college at +Cambridge. The other helper was new friend. + +To people who know him only as the elegant theorist of art, sentimental +and egotistic, as they will have it, there must be something strange, +almost irreconcilable, in his devotion, week after week and year after +year, to these night-classes. Still more must it astonish them to find +the mystic author of the "Blessed Damozel," the passionate painter of +the "Venus Verticordia," working by Ruskin's side in this rough +navvy-labour of philanthropy. + +It was early in 1854 that a drawing of D.G. Rossetti was sent to Ruskin +by a friend of the painter's. The critic already knew Millais and Hunt +personally, but not Rossetti. He wrote kindly, signing himself "yours +respectfully," which amused the young painter. He made acquaintance, and +in the appendix to his Edinburgh Lectures placed Rossetti's name with +those of Millais and Hunt, especially praising their imaginative power, +as rivalling that of the greatest of the old masters. + +He did more than this. He agreed to buy, up to a certain sum every year, +any drawings that Rossetti brought him, at their market price; and his +standard of money-value for works of art has never been niggardly. This +sort of help, the encouragement to work, is exactly what makes progress +possible to a young and independent artist; it is better for him than +fortuitous exhibition triumphs--much better than the hack-work which +many have to undertake, to eke out their livelihood. And the mere fact +of being bought by the eminent art-critic was enough to encourage other +patrons. + +"He seems in a mood to make my fortune," said Rossetti in the spring of +1854; and early in 1855 Ruskin wrote: + + + "It seems to me that, of all the painters I know, you on the whole + have the greatest genius; and you appear to me also to be--as far + as I can make out--a very good sort of person, I see that you are + unhappy, and that you can't bring out your genius as you should. + It seems to me then the proper and _necessary_ thing, if I can, to + make you more happy; and that I shall be more really useful in + enabling you to paint properly, and keep your room in order, than + in any other way." + +He did his best to keep that room in order in every sense. Anxious to +promote the painter's marriage with Miss Siddal--"Princess Ida," as +Ruskin called her--he offered a similar arrangement to that which he had +made with Rossetti; and began in 1855 to give her £150 a year in +exchange for drawings up to that value. Rossetti's poems also found a +warm admirer and advocate. In 1856, "The Burden of Nineveh" was +published anonymously in the _Oxford and Cambridge Magazine_; Ruskin +wrote to Rossetti that it was "glorious" and that he wanted to know who +was the author,--perhaps not without a suspicion that he was addressing +the man who could tell. In 1861 he guaranteed, or advanced, the cost of +"The Early Italian Poets," up to £100, with Smith and Elder; and +endeavoured, but unsuccessfully, to induce Thackeray to find a place for +other poems in _The Cornhill Magazine._ + +Mr. W.M. Rossetti, in his book on his brother "as Designer and Writer" +and in his "Family Letters," draws a pleasant picture of the intimacy +between the artist and the critic. "At one time," he says, "I am sure +they even loved one another." But in 1865 Rossetti, never very tolerant +of criticism and patronage, took in bad part his friend's remonstrances +about the details of "Venus Verticordia." Eighteen months later, Ruskin +tried to renew the old acquaintance. Rossetti did not return his call; +and further efforts on Ruskin's part, up to 1870, met with little +response. But the lecture on Rossetti in "The Art of England" shows that +on one side at least "their parting," as Mr. W.M. Rossetti says, "was +not in anger;" and the portrait of 1861, now in the Oxford University +Galleries, will remain as a memorial of the ten years' friendship of the +two famous men. + +At Red Lion Square, during Lent term, 1855, the three teachers worked +together every Thursday evening. With the beginning of the third term, +March 29, the increase of the class made it more convenient to divide +their forces. Rossetti thenceforward taught the figure on another night +of the week; while the elementary and landscape class continued to meet +on Thursdays under Ruskin and Lowes Dickinson. In 1856 the elementary +and landscape class was further divided, Mr. Dickinson taking Tuesday +evenings, and Ruskin continuing the Thursday class, with the help of +William Ward as under-master. Later on, G. Allen, J. Bunney, and W. +Jeffrey were teachers. Burne-Jones, met in 1856 at Rossetti's studio, +was also pressed into the service for a time. + +There were four terms in the Working Men's College year, the only +vacation, except for the fortnight at Christmas, being from the +beginning of August to the end of October. Ruskin did not always attend +throughout the summer term, though sometimes his class came down to him +into the country to sketch. He kept up the work without other +intermission until May, 1858, after which the completion of "Modern +Painters" and many lecture-engagements took him away for a time. In the +spring of 1860 he was back at his old post for a term; but after that he +discontinued regular attendance, and went to the Working Men's College +only at intervals, to give addresses or informal lectures to students +and friends. On such occasions the "drawing-room" or first floor of the +house in which the College was held would be always crowded, with an +audience who heard the lecturer at his best; speaking freely among +friends out of a full treasure-house "things new and old"--accounts of +recent travel, lately-discovered glories of art, and the growing burden +of the prophecy that in those years was beginning to take more definite +shape in his mind. + +As a teacher, Ruskin spared no pains to make the work interesting. He +provided--Mr. E. Cooke informs me that he was the first to +provide--casts from natural leaves and fruit in place of the ordinary +conventional ornament; and he sent a tree to be fixed in a corner of the +class-room for light and shade studies. Mr. W. Ward in the preface to +the volume of letters already quoted says that he used to bring his +minerals and shells, and rare engravings and drawings, to show them. + +"His delightful way of talking about these things afforded us most +valuable lessons. To give an example: he one evening took for his +subject a cap, and with pen and ink showed us how Rembrandt would have +etched, and Albert Dürer engraved it. This at once explained to us the +different ideas and methods of the two masters. On another evening he +would take a subject from Turner's 'Liber Studiorum,' and with a large +sheet of paper and some charcoal, gradually block in the subject, +explaining at the same time the value and effect of the lines and +masses." + +And for sketching from nature he would take his class out into the +country, and wind up with tea and talk. "It was a treat to hear and see +him with his men," writes Dr. Furnivall. + +His object in the work, as he said before the Royal Commission on +National Institutions, was _not to make artists_, but to make the +workmen better men, to develop their powers and feelings,--to educate +them, in short. He always has urged young people intending to study art +as a profession to enter the Academy Schools, as Turner and the +Pre-Raphaelites did, or to take up whatever other serious course of +practical discipline was open to them. But he held very strongly that +everybody could learn drawing, that their eyes could be brightened and +their hands steadied, and that they could be taught to appreciate the +great works of nature and of art, without wanting to make pictures or to +exhibit and sell them. + +It was with this intention that he wrote the "Elements of Drawing" in +1856, supplemented by the "Elements of Perspective" in 1859; the +illustrations for the book were characteristic sketches by the author, +beautifully cut by his pupil, W.H. Hooper, who was one of a band of +engravers and copyists formed by these classes at the Working Men's +College. In spite of the intention not to make artists by his teaching, +Ruskin could not prevent some of his pupils from taking up art as a +profession; and those who did so became, in their way, first-rate men. +George Allen as a mezzotint engraver, Arthur Burgess as a draughtsman +and wood-cutter, John Bunney as a painter of architectural detail, W. +Jeffery as an artistic photographer, E. Cooke as a teacher, William Ward +as a facsimile copyist, have all done work whose value deserves +acknowledgment, all the more because it was not aimed at popular effect, +but at the severe standard of the greater schools. But these men were +only the side issue of the Working Men's College enterprise. Its real +result was in the proof that the labouring classes could be interested +in Art; and that the capacity shown by the Gothic workman had not +entirely died out of the nation, in spite of the interregnum, for a full +century, of manufacture. And the experience led Ruskin forward to wider +views on the nature of the arts, and on the duties of philanthropic +effort and social economy. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +"MODERN PAINTERS" CONTINUED (1855-1856) + + +It was in the year 1855 that Ruskin first published "Notes on the Royal +Academy and other Exhibitions." He had been so often called upon to +write his opinion of Pre-Raphaelite pictures, either privately or to +the newspapers, or to mark his friends' catalogues, that he found at +last less trouble in printing his notes once for all. The new plan was +immediately popular; three editions of the pamphlet were called for +between June 1 and July 1. Next year he repeated the "Notes" and six +editions were sold. + +In spite of a dissentient voice here and there, he was really by that +time recognised as the leading authority upon taste in painting. He was +trusted by a great section of the public, who had not failed to notice +how completely he and his friends were winning the day. The proof of it +was in the fact that they were being imitated on all sides; Ruskinism in +writing and Pre-Raphaelitism in painting were becoming fashionable. + +But at the same time the movement gave rise to the Naturalist-landscape +school, a group of painters who threw overboard the traditions of Turner +and Prout, Constable and Harding, and the rest, just as the +Pre-Raphaelite Brethren threw over the Academical masters. For such men +their study was their picture; they devised tents and huts in wild glens +and upon waste moors, and spent weeks in elaborating their details +directly from nature, instead of painting at home from sketches on the +spot. + +This was the fulfilment of his advice to young artists; and so far as +young artists worked in this way, for purposes of study, he encouraged +them. But he did not fail to point out that this was not all that could +be required of them. Even such a work as Brett's "Val d'Aosta," +marvellous as it was in observation and finish, was only the beginning +of a new era, not its consummation. It was not the painting of detail +that could make a great artist; but the knowledge of it, and the +masterly use of such knowledge. A great landscapist would know the facts +and effects of nature, just as Tintoret knew the form of the human +figure; and he would treat them with the same freedom, as the means of +expressing great ideas, of affording by the imagination noble grounds +for noble emotion, which, as Ruskin had been writing at Vevey in 1854, +was poetry. Meanwhile the public and the critic ought to become familiar +with the aspects of nature, in order to recognise the difference between +the true poetry of painting, and the mere empty sentimentalism which was +only the rant and bombast of landscape art. + +With such feelings as these he wrote the third and fourth volumes of +"Modern Painters," (published respectively January 15 and April 14, +1856). The work was afterwards interrupted only by a recurrence of his +old cough, in the exceptionally cold summer of 1855. He went down to +Tunbridge Wells, where his cousin, William Richardson of Perth, was +practising as a doctor; it was not long before the cough gave way to +treatment, and he was as busy as ever. About October of that year he +wrote to Mrs. Carlyle as follows, in a letter printed by Professor C.E. +Norton, conveniently summing up his year: + + + "Not that I have not been busy--and very busy, too. I have written, + since May, good six hundred pages, had them rewritten, cut up, + corrected, and got fairly ready for press--and am going to press + with the first of them on Gunpowder Plot day, with a great hope of + disturbing the Public Peace in various directions. Also, I have + prepared above thirty drawings for engravers this year, retouched + the engravings (generally the worst part of the business), and + etched some on steel myself. In the course of the six hundred pages + I have had to make various remarks on German Metaphysics, on + Poetry, Political Economy, Cookery, Music, Geology, Dress, + Agriculture, Horticulture, and Navigation,[6] all of which subjects + I have had to 'read up' accordingly, and this takes time. Moreover, + I have had my class of workmen out sketching every week in the + fields during the summer; and have been studying Spanish proverbs + with my father's partner, who came over from Spain to see the + Great Exhibition. I have also designed and drawn a window for the + Museum at Oxford; and have every now and then had to look over a + parcel of five or six new designs for fronts and backs to the said + Museum. + + [Footnote 6: Most of these subjects will be easily recognised in + "Modern Painters," Vols. III. and IV. The "Navigation" refers to + the "Harbours of England."] + + "During my above-mentioned studies of horticulture, I became + dissatisfied with the Linnæan, Jussieuan, and Everybody-elseian + arrangement of plants, and have accordingly arranged a system of my + own; and unbound my botanical book, and rebound it in brighter + green, with all the pages through-other, and backside foremost--so + as to cut off all the old paging numerals; and am now printing my + new arrangement in a legible manner, on interleaved foolscap. I + consider this arrangement one of my great achievements of the year. + My studies of political economy have induced me to think also that + nobody knows anything about that; and I am at present engaged in an + investigation, on independent principles, of the natures of money, + rent, and taxes, in an abstract form, which sometimes keeps me + awake all night. My studies of German metaphysics have also induced + me to think that the Germans don't know anything about _them_; and + to engage in a serious enquiry into the meaning of Bunsen's great + sentence in the beginning of the second volume of the 'Hippolytus,' + about the Finite realization of Infinity; which has given me some + trouble. + + "The course of my studies of Navigation necessitated my going to + Deal to look at the Deal boats; and those of geology to rearrange + all my minerals (and wash a good many, which, I am sorry to say, I + found wanted it). I have also several pupils, far and near, in the + art of illumination; an American young lady to direct in the study + of landscape painting, and a Yorkshire young lady to direct in the + purchase of Turners,--and various little bye things besides. But I + am coming to see you." + +The tone of humorous exaggeration of his discoveries and occupations was +very characteristic. But he was then growing into the habit of leaving +the matter in hand, as he often did afterwards, to follow side issues, +and to take up new studies with a hasty and divided attention; the +result of which was seen in his sub-title for the third volume of +"Modern Painters"--"Of Many Things"; which amused his readers not a +little. But that he still had time for his friends is seen in the +account of a visit to Denmark Hill, written this year by James Smetham. + + + "I walked there through the wintry weather, and got in about dusk. + One or two gossiping details will interest you before I give you + what I care for; and so I will tell you that he has a large house + with a lodge, and a valet and footman and coachman, and grand rooms + glittering with pictures, chiefly Turner's, and that his father and + mother live with him, or he with them.... His father is a fine old + gentleman, who has a lot of bushy gray hair, and eyebrows sticking + up all rough and knowing, with a comfortable way of coming up to + you with his hands in his pockets, and making _you_ comfortable, + and saying, in answer to your remark, that 'John's' prose works are + pretty good. His mother is a ruddy, dignified, richly dressed old + gentlewoman of seventy-five, who knows Chamonix better than + Camberwell; evidently a _good_ old lady, with the 'Christian + Treasury'tossing about on the table. She puts 'John' down, and + holds her own opinions, and flatly contradicts him; and he receives + all her opinions with a soft reverence and gentleness that is + pleasant to witness.... + + "I wish I could reproduce a good impression of 'John' for you, to + give you the notion of his 'perfect gentleness and lowlihood.' He + certainly bursts out with a remark, and in a contradictious way, + but only because he believes it, with no air of dogmatism or + conceit. He is different at home from that which he is in a lecture + before a mixed audience, and there is a spiritual sweetness in the + half-timid expression of his eyes; and in bowing to you, as in + taking wine, with (if I heard aright) 'I drink to thee,' he had a + look that has followed me, a look bordering on tearful. + + "He spent some time in this way. Unhanging a Turner from the wall + of a distant room, he brought it to the table and put it in my + hands; then we talked; then he went up into his study to fetch down + some illustrative print or drawing; in one case, a literal view + which he had travelled fifty miles to make, in order to compare + with the picture. And so he kept on gliding all over the house, + hanging and unhanging, and stopping a few minutes to talk." + +And yet there were many with whom he had to deal who did not look at +things in his light; who took his criticism as personal attack, and +resented it with bitterness. There is a story told (but not by himself) +about one of the "Notes on the Academy," which he was then +publishing--how he wrote to an artist therein mentioned that he +regretted he could not speak more favourably of his picture, but he +hoped it would make no difference in their friendship. The artist +replied (so they say) in these terms: "Dear Ruskin,--Next time I meet +you, I shall knock you down; but I hope it will make no difference in +our friendship." "Damn the fellow! why doesn't he stand up for his +friends?" said another disappointed acquaintance. Perhaps Ruskin, secure +in his "house with a lodge, and a valet and footman and coachman," +hardly realized that a cold word from his pen sometimes meant the +failure of an important Academy picture, and serious loss of +income--that there was bitter truth underlying _Punch's_ complaint of +the Academician: + + "I paints and paints. + Hears no complaints, + And sells before I'm dry; + Till savage Ruskin + Sticks his tusk in, + And nobody will buy." + +Against these incidents should be set such an anecdote as the following, +told by Mr. J.J. Ruskin in a letter of June 3, 1858: + + + "Vokins wished me to name to you that Carrick, when he read your + criticism on 'Weary Life,' came to him with the cheque Vokins had + given, and said your remarks were all right, and that he could not + take the price paid by Vokins the buyer; he would alter the + picture. Vokins took back the money, only agreeing to see the + picture when it was done." + +John Ruskin in reply said he did not see why Carrick should have +returned the cheque. + +A letter from Mrs. Browning describes a visit to Denmark Hill, and +ends,--"I like Mr. Ruskin very much, and so does Robert; very gentle, +yet earnest--refined and truthful. I like him very much. We count him +one among the valuable acquaintances made this year in England." This +has been dated 1855; but Ruskin, writing to Miss Mitford from +Glenfinlas, 17th August, 1853, says, "I had the pleasure this spring, of +being made acquainted with your dear Elizabeth Browning, as well as with +her husband. I was of course prepared to like _her_, but I did not +expect to like _him_ as much as I did. I think he is really a very fine +fellow, and _she_ is the only sensible woman I have yet met with on the +subject of Italian politics. Evidently a noble creature in all things." +In June, 1850, he had met Robert Browning, on the invitation of Coventry +Patmore, and said: "He is the only person whom I have ever heard talk +ration-ally about the Italians, though on the Liberal side." + +In these volumes of "Modern Painters" he had to discuss the Mediæval and +Renaissance spirit in its relation to art, and to illustrate from +Browning's poetry, "unerring in every sentence he writes of the Middle +Ages, always vital and right and profound; so that in the matter of art +there is hardly a principle connected with the mediæval temper that he +has not struck upon in those seemingly careless and too rugged lines of +his." This was written twenty-five years before the Browning Society was +heard of, and at a time when the style of Browning was an offence to +most people. To Ruskin, also, it had been some, thing of a puzzle; and +he wrote to the poet, asking him to explain himself; which the poet +accordingly did. + +That Ruskin was open to conviction and conversion could be shown from +the difference in his tone of thought about poetry before and after this +period; that he was the best of friends with the man who took him to +task for narrowness, may be seen from the following letter, written on +the next Christmas Eve: + + + "MY DEAR MR. RUSKIN, + + "Your note having just arrived, Robert deputes me to write for him + while he dresses to go out on an engagement. It is the evening. All + the hours are wasted, since the morning, through our not being + found at the Rue de Grenelle, but here--and our instinct of + self-preservation or self-satisfaction insists on our not losing a + moment more by our own fault. + + "Thank you, thank you for sending us your book, and also for + writing my husband's name in it. It will be the same thing as if + you had written mine--except for the pleasure, as you say, which is + greater so. How good and kind you are! + + "And not well. That is worst. Surely you would be better if you had + the summer in winter we have here. But I was to write only a + word--Let it say how affectionately we regard you. + + "ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING + + "3, RUE DU COLYSÉE, + + "_Thursday Evening, 24th" (December_, 1855). + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +"THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART" (1857-1858) + + +The humble work of the drawing-classes at Great Ormond Street was +teaching Ruskin even more than he taught his pupils. It was showing him +how far his plans were practicable; how they should be modified; how +they might be improved; and especially what more, beside +drawing-classes, was needed to realize his ideal. He was anxiously +willing to co-operate with every movement, to join hands with any kind +of man, to go anywhere, do anything that might promote the cause he had +at heart. + +Already at the end of 1854 he had given three lectures, his second +course, at the Architectural Museum, specially addressed to workmen in +the decorative trades. His subjects were design and colour, and his +illustrations were chiefly drawn from mediæval illumination, which he +had long been studying. These were informal, quasi-private affairs, +which nevertheless attracted notice owing to the celebrity of the +speaker. It would have been better if his addresses had been carefully +prepared and authentically published; for a chance word here and there +raised replies about matters of detail in which his critics thought they +had gained a technical advantage, adding weight to his father's desire +not to see him "expose himself" in this way. There were no more lectures +until the beginning of 1857. + +On January 23rd, 1857, he spoke before the Architectural Association +upon "The Influence of Imagination in Architecture," repeating and +amplifying what he had said at Edinburgh about the subordinate value of +proportion, and the importance of sculptured ornament based on natural +forms. This of course would involve the creation of a class of +stone-carvers who could be trusted with the execution of such work. Once +grant the value of it, and public demand would encourage the supply, and +the workmen would raise themselves in the effort. + +A louder note was sounded in an address at the St. Martin's School of +Art, Castle Street, Long Acre (April 3rd, 1857), where, speaking after +George Cruikshank, his old friend--practically his first master--and an +enthusiastic philanthropist and temperance advocate, Ruskin gave his +audience a wider view of art than they had known before: "the kind of +painting they most wanted in London was painting cheeks red with +health." This was anticipating the standpoint of the Oxford Lectures, +and showed how the inquiry was beginning to take a much broader aspect. + +Another work in a similar spirit, the North London School of Design, +had been prosperously started by a circle of men under Pre-Raphaelite +influence, and led by Thomas Seddon. He had given up historical and +poetic painting for naturalistic landscape, and had returned from the +East with the most valuable studies completed, only to break down and +die prematurely. His friends, among them Holman Hunt, were collecting +money to buy from the widow his picture of Jerusalem from the Mount of +Olives, to present it to the National Gallery as a memorial of him; and +at a meeting for the purpose, Ruskin spoke warmly of his labours in the +cause of the working classes. + +In the summer of 1857 the Art Treasures Exhibition was held at +Manchester, and Ruskin was invited to lecture. The theme he chose was +"The Political Economy of Art." He had been studying political economy +for some time back, but, as we saw from his letter to Carlyle, he had +found no answer in the ordinary text-books for the questions he tried to +put. He wanted to know what Bentham and Ricardo and Mill, the great +authorities, would advise him as to the best way of employing artists, +of educating workmen, of elevating public taste, of regulating +patronage; but these subjects were not in their programme. And so he put +together his own thoughts into two lectures upon Art considered as +Wealth: first, how to get it; next, how to use it.[7] + +[Footnote 7: July 10 and 13, 1857. He went to Manchester from Oxford, +where he had been staying with the Liddells, writing enthusiastically of +the beauty of their children and the charm of their domestic life.] + +There were very few points in these lectures that were not vigorously +contested at the moment, and conceded in the sequel--in some form or +other. The paternal function of government, the right of the state to +interfere in matters beyond its traditional range, its duty with regard +to education--all this was quite contrary to the prevailing habits of +thought of the time, especially at Manchester, the headquarters of the +_laissez faire_ school; but to Ruskin, who, curiously enough, had just +then been referring sarcastically to German philosophy, knowing it only +at second-hand, and unaware of Hegel's political work--to him this +Platonic conception of the state was the only possible one, as it is to +most people nowadays. In the same way, his practical advice has been +accepted, perhaps unwittingly, by our times. We do now understand the +difference between artistic decoration and machine-made wares; we do now +try to preserve ancient monuments, and to use art as a means of +education. And we are in a fair way, it seems, of lowering the price of +modern pictures, as he bids us, to "not more than £500 for an oil +picture and £100 for a water-colour." + +After a visit to the Trevelyans at Wallington he went with his parents +to Scotland; for his mother, now beginning to grow old, wanted to +revisit the scenes of her youth. They went to the Highlands and as far +north as the Bay of Cromarty, and then returned by way of the Abbeys of +the Lowlands, to look up Turner sites, as he had done in 1845 on the St. +Gothard. From the enjoyment of this holiday he was recalled to London by +a letter from Mr. Wornum saying that he could arrange the Turner +drawings at the National Gallery. + +His first letter on the National Gallery, in 1847, has been noticed. He +had written again to _The Times_ (December 29th, 1852), pressing the +same point--namely, that if the pictures were put under glass no +cleaning nor restoring would be needed; and that the Gallery ought not +to be considered as a grand hall, decorated with pictures, but as a +convenient museum, with a chronological sequence of the best works of +all schools,--every picture hung on the line and accompanied by studies +for it, if procurable, and engravings from it. + +Now--in 1857--question was raised of removing the National Gallery from +Trafalgar Square. The South Kensington Museum was being formed, and the +whole business of arranging the national art treasures was gone into by +a Royal Commission, consisting of Lord Broughton (in the chair), Dean +Milman, Prof. Faraday, Prof. Cockerell, and George Richmond. Ruskin was +examined before them on April 6th, and re-stated the opinions he had +written to _The Times_, adding that he would like to see two National +Galleries--one of popular interest, containing such works as would catch +the public eye and enlist the sympathy of the untaught; and another +containing only the cream of the collections, in pictures, sculpture and +the decorative crafts, arranged for purposes of study. This was +suggested as an ideal; of course, it would involve more outlay, and less +display, than any Parliamentary vote would sanction, or party leader +risk. + +Another question of importance was the disposal of the pictures and +sketches which Turner had left to the nation. Ruskin was one of the +executors under the will; but, on finding that, though Turner's +intention was plain, there were technical informalities which would make +the administration anything but easy, he declined to act. It was not +until 1856 that the litigation was concluded, and Turner's pictures and +sketches were handed to the Trustees of the National Gallery. Ruskin, +whose want of legal knowledge had made his services useless before, now +felt that he could carry out the spirit of Turner's will by offering to +arrange the sketches; which were in such a state of confusion that only +some person with knowledge of the artist's habits of work and subjects +could, so to speak, _edit_ them; and the editor would need no ordinary +skill, patience and judgment, into the bargain. + +Meanwhile, for that winter (1856-7) a preliminary exhibition was held of +Turner's oil-paintings, with a few water-colours, at Marlborough House, +then the headquarters of the Department of Science and Art, soon +afterwards removed to South Kensington. Ruskin wrote a catalogue, with +analysis of Turner's periods of development and characteristics; which +made the collection intelligible and interesting to curious sight-seers. +They showed their appreciation by taking up five editions in rapid +succession. + +Just before lecturing at Manchester, he wrote again on the subject to +_The Times_; and in September his friend R.N. Wornum, Director of the +National Gallery in succession to Eastlake and Uwins, wrote--as we +saw--that he might arrange the sketches as he pleased. He returned from +Scotland, and set to work on October 7th. + +It was strange employment for a man of his powers; almost as removed +from the Epicurean Olympus of "cultured ease" popularly assigned to him, +as night-school teaching and lecturing to workmen. But, beside that it +was the carrying out of Turner's wishes, he always had a certain love +for experimenting in manual toil; and this was work in which his extreme +neatness and deftness of hand was needed, no less than his knowledge and +judgment. During the winter for full six months, he and his two +assistants worked, all day and every day, among the masses of precious +rubbish that had been removed from Queen Anne Street to the National +Gallery. + +Mr. J.J. Ruskin wrote, on February 19 and 21, 1852: + + + "I have just been through Turner's house with Griffith. His labour + is more astonishing than his genius. There are £80,000 of oil + pictures done and undone--Boxes half as big as your Study Table, + filled with Drawings and Sketches. There are Copies of Liber + Studiorum to fill all your Drawers and more, and House Walls of + proof plates in Reams--they may go at 1/-each.... + + "Nothing since Pompeii so impressed me as the interior of Turner's + house; the accumulated dust of 40 years partially cleared off; + Daylight for the first time admitted by opening a window on the + finest productions of art buried for 40 years. The Drawing Room + has, it is reckoned, £25,000 worth of proofs, and sketches, and + Drawings, and Prints. It is amusing to hear Dealers saying there + can be no Liber Studiorums--when I saw neatly packed and well + labelled as many Bundles of Liber Studiorum as would fill your + entire Bookcase, and England and Wales proofs in packed and + labelled Bundles like Reams of paper, as I told you, piled nearly + to Ceiling ... + + "The house must be dry as a Bone--the parcels were apparently quite + uninjured. The very large pictures were spotted, but not much. They + stood leaning against another in the large low Rooms. Some + _finished_ go to Nation, many unfinished _not_: no frames. Two are + given unconditional of Gallery Building--_very fine_: if (and this + is a condition) _placed beside Claude._ The style much like the + laying on in Windmill Lock in Dealer's hands, which, now it is + cleaned, comes out a real Beauty. I believe Turner loved it. The + will desires all to be framed and repaired and put into the best + showing state; as if he could not release his money to do this till + he was dead. The Top of his Gallery is one ruin of Glass and + patches of paper, now only just made weather-proof ... + + "I saw in Turner's Rooms, _Geo. Morlands_ and _Wilsons_ and + _Claudes_ and _portraits_ in various stiles _all by Turner._ He + copied every man, was every man first, and took up his own style, + casting all others away. It seems to me you may keep your money and + revel for ever and for nothing among Turner's Works." + +Among the quantities so recklessly thrown aside for dust, damp, soot, +mice and worms to destroy--some 15,000 Ruskin reckoned at first, 19,000 +later on--there were many fine drawings, which had been used by the +engravers, and vast numbers of interesting and valuable studies in +colour and in pencil. Four hundred of these were extricated from the +chaos, and with infinite pains cleaned, flattened, mounted, dated and +described, and placed in sliding frames in cabinets devised by Ruskin, +or else in swivel frames, to let both sides of the paper be seen. The +first results of the work were shown in an Exhibition at Marlborough +House during the winter, for which he wrote another catalogue. Of the +whole collection he began a more complete account, which was too +elaborate to be finished in that form; but in 1881 he published a +"Catalogue of the Drawings and Sketches of J M.W. Turner, R.A., at +present exhibited in the National Gallery," so that his plan was +practically fulfilled. + +During 1858 Ruskin continued to lecture at various places on subjects +connected with his Manchester addresses--the relation of art to +manufacture, and especially the dependence of all great architectural +design upon sculpture or painting of organic form. The first of the +series was given at the opening of the Architectural Museum at South +Kensington, January 13th, 1858, entitled "The Deteriorative Power of +Conventional Art over Nations;" in which he showed that naturalism, as +opposed to meaningless pattern-making, was always a sign of life. For +example, the strength of the Greek, Florentine and Venetian art arose +out of the search for truth, not, as it is often supposed, out of +striving after an ideal of beauty; and as soon as nature was superseded +by recipe, the greatest schools hastened to their fall. From which he +concluded that modern design should always be founded on natural form, +rather than upon the traditional patterns of the east or of the +mediævals. + +On February 16th he spoke on "The Work of Iron, in Nature, Art and +Policy," at Tunbridge Wells; a subject similar to that of his address to +the St. Martin's School of the year before, but amplified into a plea +for the use of wrought-iron ornament, as in the new Oxford Museum, then +building, and on April 25th he again addressed St. Martin's School. + +The Oxford Museum was an experiment in the true Gothic revival. The +architects, Sir Thomas Deane and Benjamin Woodward, had allowed their +workmen to design parts of the detail, such as capitals and spandrils, +quite in the spirit of Ruskin's teaching, and the work was accordingly +of deep interest to him. So far back as April, 1856, he had given an +address to the men employed at the Museum, whom he met, on Dr. Acland's +invitation, at the Workmen's Reading Rooms. He said that his object was +not to give some labouring men the chance of becoming masters of other +labouring men, and to help the few at the expense of the many, but to +lead them to those sources of pleasure, and power over their own minds +and hands, that more educated people possess. He did not sympathize with +the socialism that had been creeping into vogue since 1848. He thought +existing social arrangements good, and he agreed with his friends, the +Carlyles, who had found that it was only the incapable who could not get +work. But it was the fault of the wealthy and educated that working +people were not better trained; it was not the working-men's fault, at +bottom. The modern architect used his workman as a mere tool; while the +Gothic spirit set him free as an original designer, to gain--not more +wages and higher social rank, but pleasure and instruction, the true +happiness that lies in good work well done. + +To explain the design of the Oxford Museum and to enlist support, he +wrote two letters to Dr. Acland (May 25th, 1858, and January 20th, +1859), which formed part of a small book, reporting its aims and +progress, illustrated with an engraving of one of the workmen's +capitals. Ruskin himself contributed both time and money to the work, +and his assistance was not unrecognised. In 1858 "Honorary Studentships" +(i.e., fellowships) were created at Christ Church by the Commissioners' +ordinances. At the first election held, December 6th, 1858, there were +chosen for the compliment Ruskin, Gladstone, Sir G. Cornewall Lewis, Dr. +(Sir) H.W. Acland, and Sir F.H. Gore Ouseley. At the second, December +15th, 1858, were elected Henry Hallam, the Earl of Stanhope, the Earl of +Elgin, the Marquis of Dalhousie and Viscount Canning. + +Parallel with this movement for educating the "working-class," there was +the scheme for the improvement of middle-class education, which was then +going on at Oxford--the beginning of University Extension--supported by +the Rev. F. Temple (later Archbishop of Canterbury), and Mr. (afterwards +Sir) Thomas Dyke Acland. Ruskin was heartily for them; and in a letter +on the subject, he tried to show how the teaching of Art might be made +to work in with the scheme. He did not think that in this plan, any more +than at the Working Men's College, there need be an attempt to teach +drawing with a view to forming artists; but there were three objects +they might hold in view: the first, to give every student the advantage +of the happiness and knowledge which the study of Art conveys; the next, +to enforce some knowledge of Art amongst those who were likely to become +patrons or critics; and the last, _to leave no Giotto lost among hill +shepherds._ + + + + +CHAPTER X + +"MODERN PAINTERS" CONCLUDED (1838-1860) + + +Oxford and old friends did not monopolise Ruskin's attention: he was +soon seen at Cambridge--on the same platform with Richard Redgrave, +R.A., the representative of Academicism and officialism--at the opening +of the School of Art for workmen on October 29th, 1858. His Inaugural +Address struck a deeper note, a wider chord, than previous essays; it +was the forecast of the last volume of "Modern Painters," and it +sketched the train of thought into which he had been led during his tour +abroad, that summer. + +The battles between faith and criticism, between the historical and the +scientific attitudes, which had been going on in his mind, were taking a +new form. At the outset, we saw, naturalism overpowered respect for +tradition--in the first volume of "Modern Painters;" then the historical +tendency won the day, in the second volume. Since that time, the +critical side had been gathering strength, by his alliance with liberal +movements and by his gradual detachment from associations that held +him to the older order of thought. As in his lonely journey of 1845 +he first took independent ground upon questions of religion and social +life, so in 1858, once more travelling alone, he was led by his +meditations,--freed from the restraining presence of his parents--to +conclusions which he had been all these years evading, yet finding at +last inevitable. + +He went abroad for a third attempt to write and illustrate his History +of Swiss Towns. He spent part of May on the Upper Rhine between Basle +and Schaffhausen, June and half of July on the St. Gothard route and at +Bellinzona. In reflecting over the sources of Swiss character, as +connected with the question of the nature of art and its origin in +morality, he was struck with the fact that all the virtues of the Swiss +did not make them artistic. Compared with most nations they were as +children in painting, music and poetry. And, indeed, they ranked with +the early phases of many great nations--the period of pristine +simplicity "uncorrupted by the arts." + +From Bellinzona he went to Turin on his way to the Vaudois Valleys, +where he meant to compare the Waldensian Protestants with the Swiss. +Accidentally he saw Paul Veronese's "Queen of Sheba" and other Venetian +pictures; and so fell to comparing a period of fully ripened art with +one of artlessness; discovering that the mature art, while it appeared +at the same time with decay in morals, did not spring from that decay, +but was rooted in the virtues of the earlier age. He grasped a clue to +the puzzle, in the generalisation that Art is the product of human +happiness; it is contrary to asceticism; it is the expression of +pleasure. But when the turning point of national progress is once +reached, and art is regarded as the laborious incitement to +pleasure,--no longer the spontaneous blossom and fruit of it,--the +decay sets in for art as for morality. Art, in short, is created _by_ +pleasure, not _for_ pleasure. The standard of thought, the attitude of +mind, of the Waldensians, he now perceived to be quite impossible for +himself. He could not look upon every one outside their fold as heathens +and publicans; he could not believe that the pictures of Paul Veronese +were works of iniquity, nor that the motives of great deeds in earlier +ages were lying superstitions. He took courage to own to himself and +others that it was no longer any use trying to identify his point of +view with that of Protestantism. He saw both Protestants and Roman +Catholics, in the perspective of history, converging into a primitive, +far distant, ideal unity of Christianity, in which he still believed; +but he could take neither side, after this. + +The first statement of the new point of view was, as we said, the +Inaugural Lecture of the Cambridge School of Art. The next important +utterance was at Manchester, February 22nd, 1859, where he spoke on the +"Unity of Art," by which he meant--not the fraternity of handicrafts +with painting, as the term is used nowadays--but that, in whatever +branch of Art, the spirit of Truth or Sincerity is the same. In this +lecture there is a very important passage showing how he had at last got +upon firm ground in the question of art and morality: "_I do_ NOT _say +in the least that in order to be a good painter you must be a good man_; +but I do say that in order to be a good natural painter there must be +strong elements of good in the mind, however warped by other parts of +the character." So emphatic a statement deserves more attention than it +has received from readers and writers who assume to judge Ruskin's views +after a slight acquaintance with his earlier works. He was well aware +himself that his mind had been gradually enlarging, and his thoughts +changing; and he soon saw as great a difference between himself at forty +and at twenty-five, as he had formerly seen between the Boy poet and the +Art critic. He became as anxious to forget his earlier books, as he had +been to forget his verse-writing; and when he came to collect his +"Works," these lectures, under the title of "The Two Paths," were (with +"The Political Economy of Art") the earliest admitted into the library. + +After this Manchester lecture he took a driving tour in +Yorkshire--posting in the old-fashioned way--halting at Bradford for the +lecture on "Modern Manufacture and Design" (March 1st), and ending with +a visit to the school at Winnington, of which more in a later chapter. + +In 1859 the last Academy Notes, for the time being, were published. The +Pre-Raphaelite cause had been fully successful, and the new school of +naturalist landscape was rapidly asserting itself. Old friends were +failing, such as Stanfield, Lewis, and Roberts: but new men were growing +up, among whom Ruskin welcomed G.D. Leslie, F. Goodall, J.C. Hook,--who +had come out of his "Pre-Raphaelite measles" into the healthy naturalism +of "Luff Boy!"--Clarence Whaite, Henry Holiday, and John Brett, who +showed the "Val d'Aosta." Millais' "Vale of Rest" was the picture which +attracted most notice: something of the old rancour against the school +was revived in the _Morning Herald_, which called his works +"impertinences," "contemptible," "indelible disgrace," and so on. It was +the beginning of a transition from the delicacy of the Pre-Raphaelite +Millais to his later style; and as such the preacher of "All great art +is delicate" could not entirely defend it. But the serious strength of +the imagination and the power of the execution he praised with +unexpected warmth. + +He then started on the last tour abroad with his parents. He had been +asked, rather pointedly, by the National Gallery Commission, whether he +had seen the great German museums, and had been obliged to reply that he +had not. Perhaps it occurred to him or to his father that he ought to +see the pictures at Berlin and Dresden and Munich, even though he +heartily disliked the Germans with their art and their language and +everything that belonged to them,--except Holbein and Dürer. By the end +of July the travellers were in North Switzerland; and they spent +September in Savoy, returning home by October 7th. + +Old Mr. Ruskin was now in his seventy-fifth year and his desire was to +see the great work finished before he died. There had been some attempt +to write this last volume of "Modern Painters" in the previous winter, +but it had been put off until after the visit to Germany had completed a +study of the great Venetian painters--especially Titian and Veronese. +Now at last, in the autumn of 1859, he finally set to work on the +writing. + +The assertion of Turner's genius had been necessary in 1843, but Turner +was long since dead; his fame was thoroughly vindicated; his bequest to +the nation dealt with, so far as possible. Early Christian Art was +recognised--almost beyond its claims. The Pre-Raphaelites and +naturalistic landscapists no longer needed the hand which "Modern +Painters" had held out to them by the way. Of the great triad of Venice, +Tintoret had been expounded, Veronese and Titian were now taken up and +treated with tardy, but ample recognition. + +And now, after twenty years of labour, Ruskin had established himself as +the recognised leader of criticism and the exponent of painting and +architecture. He had created a department of literature all his own. He +had enriched the art of England with examples of a new and beautiful +draughtsmanship, and the language with passages of poetic description +and eloquent declamation, quite, in their way, unrivalled. He had built +up a theory of art, so far uncontested; and thrown new light on the +Middle Ages and Renaissance, illustrating, in a way then novel, their +chronicles by their remains. He had beaten down opposition, risen above +detraction, and won the prize of honour--only to realise, as he received +it, that the fight had been but a pastime tournament, after all; and to +hear, through the applause, the enemy's trumpet sounding to battle. For +now, without the camp, there were realities to face; as to Art--"the +best in this kind are but shadows." + + + + +BOOK III + +HERMIT AND HERETIC + +(1860-1870) + + + + +CHAPTER I + +"UNTO THIS LAST" (1860-1861) + + +At forty years of age Ruskin finished "Modern Painters." From that time +art was sometimes his text, rarely his theme. He used it as the +opportunity, the vehicle, so to say, for teachings of wider range and +deeper import; teachings about life as a whole, conclusions in ethics +and economics and religion, to which he sought to lead others, as he was +led, by the way of art. + +During the time when he was preaching his later doctrines, he wished to +suppress the interfering evidences of the earlier. He let his works on +art run out of print, not for the benefit of second-hand booksellers, +but in the hope that he could fix his audience upon the burden of his +prophecy for the time being. But the youthful works were still read; +high prices were paid for them, or they were smuggled in from America. +And when the epoch of "Fors" had passed, he agreed to the reprinting of +all that early material. He called it obsolete and trivial; others find +it interestingly biographical--perhaps even classical. + +This year, then, 1860, the year of the Italian Kingdom, of Garibaldi, +and of the beginning of the American war, marks his turning point, from +the early work, summed up in the old "Selections," to the later work. + +Until he was forty, Mr. Ruskin was a writer on art; after that his art +was secondary to ethics. Until he was forty he was a believer in English +Protestantism; afterwards he could not reconcile current beliefs with +the facts of life as he saw them, and had to reconstruct his creed from +the foundations. Until he was forty he was a philanthropist, working +heartily with others in a definite cause, and hoping for the amendment +of wrongs, without a social upheaval. Even in the beginning of 1860, in +his evidence before the House of Commons Select Committee on Public +Institutions, he was ready with plans for amusing and instructing the +labouring classes, and noting in them a "thirsty desire" for +improvement. But while his readiness to make any personal sacrifice, in +the way of social and philanthropic experiment, and his interest in the +question were increasing, he became less and less sanguine about the +value of such efforts as the Working Men's College, and less and less +ready to co-operate with others in their schemes. He began to see that +no tinkering at social breakages was really worth while; that far more +extensive repairs were needed to make the old ship seaworthy. + +So he set himself, by himself, to sketch the plans for the repairs. +Naturally sociable, and accustomed to the friendly give-and-take of a +wide acquaintance, he withdrew from the busy world into a busier +solitude. During the next few years he lived much alone among the Alps, +or at home, thinking out the problem; sometimes feeling, far more +acutely than was good for clear thought, the burden of the mission that +was laid upon him. In March, 1863, he wrote from his retreat at Mornex +to Norton: + + + "The loneliness is very great, and the peace in which I am at + present is only as if I had buried myself in a tuft of grass on a + battlefield wet with blood--for the cry of the earth about me is in + my ears continually, if I do not lay my head to the very ground." + +And a few months later: + + + "I am still very unwell, and tormented between the longing for rest + and lovely life, and the sense of this terrific call of human crime + for resistance and of human misery for help, though it seems to me + as the voice of a river of blood which can but sweep me down in the + midst of its black clots, helpless." + +Sentences like these, passages here and there in the last volume of +"Modern Painters," and still more, certain passages omitted from that +volume, show that about 1860 something of a cloud had been settling over +him,--a sense of the evil of the world, a horror of great darkness. In +his earlier years, his intense emotion and vivid imagination had enabled +him to read into pictures of Tintoret or Turner, into scenes of nature +and sayings of great books, a meaning or a moral which he so vividly +communicated to the reader as to make it thenceforward part and parcel +of the subject, however it came there to begin with. It is useless to +wonder whether Turner, for instance, consciously meant what Ruskin found +in his works. A great painter does not paint without thought, and such +thought is apt to show itself whether he will or no. But it needs +imaginative sympathy to detect and describe the thought. And when that +sympathy was given to suffering, to widespread misery, to crying wrongs; +joined also with an intense passion for justice, which had already shown +itself in the defence of slighted genius and neglected art; and to the +Celtic temperament of some highstrung seer and trance-prophesying bard; +it was no wonder that Ruskin became like one of the hermits of old, who +retreated from the world to return upon it with stormy messages of +awakening and flashes of truth more impressive, more illuminating than +the logic of schoolmen and the state-craft of the wise. + +And then he began to take up an attitude of antagonism to the world, he +who had been the kindly helper and minister of delightful art. He began +to call upon those who had ears to hear to come out and be separate +from the ease and hypocrisy of Vanity Fair. Its respectabilities, its +orthodoxies, he could no longer abide. Orthodox religion, orthodox +morals and politics, orthodox art and science, alike he rejected; and +was rejected by each of them as a brawler, a babbler, a fanatic, a +heretic. And even when kindly Oxford gave him a quasi-academical +position, it did not bring him, as it brings many a heretic, back to the +fold. + +In this period of storm and stress he stood alone. The old friends of +his youth were one by one passing away, if not from intercourse, still +from full sympathy with him in his new mood. His parents were no longer +the guides and companions they had been; they did not understand the +business he was about. And so he was left to new associates, for he +could not live without some one to love,--that was the nature of the +man, however lonely in his work and wanderings. + +The new friends of this period were, at first, Americans; as the chief +new friends of his latest period (the Alexanders) were American, too. +Charles Eliot Norton, after being introduced to him in London in 1855, +met him again by accident on the Lake of Geneva--the story is prettily +told in "Præterita." Ruskin adds: + + + "Norton saw all my weaknesses, measured all my narrownesses, and, + from the first, took serenely, and as it seemed of necessity, a + kind of paternal authority over me, and a right of guidance.... I + was entirely conscious of his rectorial power, and affectionately + submissive to it, so that he might have done anything with me, but + for the unhappy difference in our innate, and unchangeable, + political faiths." + +So, after all, he stood alone. + +Another friend about this time was Mrs. H. Beecher Stowe, to whom he +wrote on June 18th, 1860, from Geneva: + + + "It takes a great deal, when I am at Geneva, to make me wish myself + anywhere else, and, of all places else, in London; nevertheless, I + very heartily wish at this moment that I were looking out on the + Norwood Hills, and were expecting you and the children to breakfast + to-morrow. + + "I had very serious thoughts, when I received your note, of running + home; but I expected that very day an American friend, Mr. + Stillman, who, I thought, would miss me more here than you in + London, so I stayed. + + "What a dreadful thing it is that people should have to go to + America again, after coming to Europe! It seems to me an inversion + of the order of nature. I think America is a sort of 'United' + States of Probation, out of which all wise people, being once + delivered, and having obtained entrance into this better world, + should never be expected to return (sentence irremediably + ungrammatical), particularly when they have been making themselves + cruelly pleasant to friends here. My friend Norton, whom I met + first on this very blue lake water, had no business to go back to + Boston again, any more than you.... + + "So you have been seeing the Pope and all his Easter performances! + I congratulate you, for I suppose it is something like 'Positively + the last appearance on any stage.' What was the use of thinking + about _him_? You should have had your own thoughts about what was + to come after him. I don't mean that Roman Catholicism will die out + so quickly. It will last pretty nearly as long as Protestantism, + which keeps it up; but I wonder what is to come next. That is the + main question just now for everybody." + +W.J. Stillman had been a correspondent about 1851,--"involved in +mystical speculations, partly growing out of the second volume of +'Modern Painters,'" as he said of himself in an article on "John Ruskin" +in the _Century_ Magazine (January, 1888). With him Ruskin spent July +and August of 1860 at Chamouni. He did but little drawing, and in the +few sketches that remain of that summer there is evidence that his mind +was far away from its old love of mountains and of streamlets. His +lonely walks in the pinewoods of the Arveron were given to meditation on +a great problem which had been set, as it seemed, for him to solve, ever +since he had written that chapter on "The Nature of Gothic." Now at +last, in the solitude of the Alps, he could grapple with the questions +he had raised; and the outcome of the struggle was "Unto this Last." + +The year before, from Thun and Bonneville and Lausanne (August and +September, 1859) he had written letters to E.S. Dallas, suggested by the +strikes in the London building trade. In these he appears to have +sketched the outline of a new conception of social science, which he was +now elaborating with more attempt at system and brevity than he had been +accustomed to use. + +These new papers, painfully thought out and carefully set down in his +room at the Hôtel de l'Union, he used--as long before he read his daily +chapter to the breakfast party at Herne Hill--to read to Stillman: and +he sent them to the _Cornhill Magazine_, started the year before by +Smith and Elder. Ruskin had already contributed to it a paper on "Sir +Joshua and Holbein," a stray chapter from Vol. V., "Modern Painters." +His reputation as a writer and philanthropist, together with the +friendliness of editor and publisher, secured the insertion of the first +three,--from August to October. The editor then wrote to say that they +were so unanimously condemned and disliked, that, with all apologies, he +could only admit one more. The series was brought hastily to a +conclusion in November: and the author, beaten back as he had never been +beaten before, dropped the subject, and "sulked," so he called it, all +the winter. + +It is pleasant to notice that neither Thackeray, the editor nor Smith, +the publisher quarrelled with the author who had laid them open to the +censure of their public,--nor he with them. On December 21st, he wrote +to Thackeray, in answer apparently, to a letter about lecturing for a +charitable purpose: and continued: + + + "The mode in which you direct your charity puts me in mind of a + matter that has lain long on my mind, though I never have had the + time or face to talk to you of it. In somebody's drawing-room, + ages ago, you were speaking accidentally of M. de Marvy.[8] I + expressed my great obligation to him; on which you said that I + could prove my gratitude, if I chose, to his widow,--which choice I + then not accepting, have ever since remembered the circumstance as + one peculiarly likely to add, so far as it went, to the general + impression on your mind of the hollowness of people's sayings and + hardness of their hearts. The fact is, I give what I give almost in + an opposite way to yours. I think there are many people who will + relieve hopeless distress for one who will help at a hopeful pinch; + and when I have the choice I nearly always give where I think the + money will be fruitful rather than merely helpful. I would lecture + for a school when I would _not_ for a distressed author; and would + have helped De Marvy to perfect his invention, but not--unless I + had no other object--his widow after he was gone. In a word, I like + to prop the falling more than to feed the fallen." + +[Footnote 8: Louis Marvy, an engraver, and political refugee after the +French Revolution of 1848. He produced the plates, and Thackeray the +text, of "Landscape Painters of England, in a series of steel +engravings, with short Notices."] + +The winter passed without any great undertaking. G.F. Watts proposed to +add Ruskin's portrait to his gallery of celebrities; but he was in no +mood to sit. Rossetti did, however, sketch him this year. In March he +presented eighty-three Turner drawings to Oxford, and twenty-five to +Cambridge. The address of thanks with the great seal of Oxford +University is dated March 23rd, 1861; the Catalogue of the Cambridge +collection is dated May 28th. + +On April 2nd he addressed the St. George's Mission Working Men's +Institute, and shortly afterwards, though at this time in a much +enfeebled state of health, gave a lecture before "a most brilliant +audience," as the _London Review_ reported, at the Royal Institution +(April 19th, 1861). Carlyle wrote to his brother John: + + + "Friday last I was persuaded--in fact had inwardly compelled myself + as it were--to a lecture of Ruskin's at the Institution, Albemarle + Street, Lecture on Tree Leaves as physiological, pictorial, moral, + symbolical objects. A crammed house, but tolerable even to me in + the gallery. The lecture was thought to 'break down,' and indeed it + quite did '_as a lecture_'; but only did from _embarras de + richesses_--a rare case. Ruskin did blow asunder as by gunpowder + explosions his leaf notions, which were manifold, curious, genial; + and in fact, I do not recollect to have heard in that place any + neatest thing I liked so well as this chaotic one." + +Papers on "Illuminated Manuscripts" (read before the Society of +Antiquaries on June 6th) and on "The Preservation of Ancient Buildings" +(read to the Ecclesiological Society a fortnight later) show that old +interests were not wholly forgotten, even in the stress of new pursuits, +by this man of many-sided activity. + +During May, 1861, he paid a visit to the school girls at Winnington, in +June and July he took a holiday at Boulogne with the fisher folk, in +August he went to Ireland as guest of the Latouches of Harristown, +County Kildare, and in September he returned to the Alps, spending the +rest of the year at Bonneville and Lucerne. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +"MUNERA PULVERIS" (1862) + + +After an autumn among the Alps, hearing that the Turner drawings in the +National Gallery had been mildewed, he ran home to see about them in +January 1862; and was kept until the end of May. He found that his +political economy work was not such a total failure as it had seemed. +Froude, then editor of _Fraser's Magazine_, thought there was something +in it, and would give him another chance. So, by way of a fresh start, +he had his four _Cornhill_ articles published in book form; and almost +simultaneously, in June 1862 the first of the new series appeared. + +The author had then returned to Lucerne with Mr. and Mrs. Burne-Jones, +with whom he crossed the St. Gothard to Milan, where he tried to forget +the harrowing of hell in a close study of Luini, and in copying the "St. +Catherine" now at Oxford. Ruskin has never said so much about Luini as, +perhaps, he intended. A short notice in the "Cestus of Aglaia," and +occasional references scattered up and down his later works, hardly give +the prominence in his writings that the painter held in his thoughts. It +was about this time that he was made an Hon. Member of the Florentine +Academy. + +He re-crossed the Alps, and settled to his work on political economy at +Mornex, where he spent the winter except for a short run home, which +gave him the opportunity of addressing the Working Men's College on +November 29. + +His retreat is described in one of his letters home: + + + "MORNEX, _August_ 31 (1862). + + "MY DEAREST MOTHER, + + "This ought to arrive on the evening before your birthday: it is + not possible to reach you in the morning, not even by telegraph as + I once did from Mont Cenis, for--(may Heaven be devoutly thanked + therefore)--there are yet on Mont Salève neither rails nor + wires.... + + "The place I have got to is at the end of all carriage-roads, and I + am not yet strong enough to get farther, on foot, than a five or + six miles' circle, within which is assuredly no house to my mind. I + cast, at first, somewhat longing eyes on a true Savoyard + château--notable for its lovely garden and orchard--and its + unspoiled, unrestored, arched gateway between two round turrets, + and Gothic-windowed keep. But on examination of the + interior--finding the walls, though six feet thick, rent to the + foundation--and as cold as rocks, and the floors all sodden through + with walnut oil and rotten-apple juice--heaps of the farm stores + having been left to decay in the ci-devant drawing room, I gave up + all medieval ideas, for which the long-legged black pigs who lived + like gentlemen at ease in the passage, and the bats and spiders who + divided between them the corners of the turret-stair, have + reason--if they knew it--to be thankful. + + "The worst of it is that I never had the gift, nor have I now the + energy, to _make_ anything of a place; so that I shall have to put + up with almost anything I can find that is healthily habitable in a + good situation. Meantime, the air here being delicious and the + rooms good enough for use and comfort, I am not troubling myself + much, but trying to put myself into better health and humour; in + which I have already a little succeeded." + +After describing the flowers of the Salève he continues: + + + "My Father would be quite wild at the 'view' from the garden + terrace--but he would be disgusted at the shut in feeling of the + house, which is in fact as much shut in as our old Herne Hill one; + only to get the 'view' I have but to go as far down the garden as + to our old 'mulberry tree.' By the way there's a magnificent + mulberry tree, as big as a common walnut, covered with black and + red fruit on the other side of the road. Coutet and Allen are very + anxious to do all they can now that Crawley is away; and I don't + think I shall manage very badly," etc. + +A little later he took in addition a cottage in which the Empress of +Russia had once stayed: it commanded a finer view than the larger house, +which has since been turned into a hotel (Hôtel et Pension des +Glycines). This place was for some time the hermitage in which he wrote +his political economy. Of his lonely rambles he wrote later on: + + + "If I have a definite point to reach, and common work to do at + it--I take people--anybody--with me; but all my best _mental_ work + is necessarily done alone; whenever I wanted to think, in Savoy, I + used to leave Coutet at home. Constantly I have been alone on the + Glacier des Bois--and far among the loneliest aiguille recesses. I + found the path up the Brezon above Bonneville in a lonely walk one + Sunday; I saw the grandest view of the Alps of Savoy I ever + gained, on the 2nd of January, 1862, alone among the snow wreaths + on the summit of the Salève. You need not fear for me on 'Langdale + Pikes' after that." + +In September the second article appeared in _Fraser._ "Only a genius +like Mr. Ruskin could have produced such hopeless rubbish," says a +newspaper of the period. Far worse than any newspaper criticism was the +condemnation of Denmark Hill. His father, whose eyes had glistened over +early poems and prose eloquence, strongly disapproved of this heretical +economy. It was a bitter thing that his son should become prodigal of a +hardly earned reputation, and be pointed at for a fool. And it was +intensely painful for a son "who had never given his father a pang that +could be avoided," as old Mr. Ruskin had once written, to find his +father, with one foot in the grave, turning against him. In December the +third paper appeared. History repeated itself, and with the fourth paper +the heretic was gagged. A year after, his father died; and these +_Fraser_ articles were laid aside until the end of 1871, when they were +taken up again, and published on New Year's Day 1872, as "Munera +Pulveris." + +From the outset, however, he was not without supporters. Carlyle wrote +on June 30, 1862: + + + "I have read, a month ago, your _First_ in _Fraser_, and ever since + have had a wish to say to it and you, _Euge macte nova virtute._ I + approved in every particular; calm, definite, clear; rising into + the sphere of _Plato_ (our almost best), wh'h in exchange for the + sphere of _Macculloch, Mill and Co._ is a mighty improvement! Since + that, I have seen the little _green_ book, too; reprint of your + _Cornhill_ operations,--about 2/3 of wh'h was read to me (_known_ + only from what the contradict'n of sinners had told me of it);--in + every part of wh'h I find a high and noble sort of truth, not one + doctrine that I can intrinsically dissent from, or count other than + salutary in the extreme, and pressingly needed in Engl'd above + all." + +Erskine of Linlathen wrote to Carlyle, August 7th, 1862: + + + "I am thankful for any unveiling of the so-called science of + political economy, according to which, avowed selfishness is the + Rule of the World. It is indeed most important preaching--to preach + that there is not one God for religion and another God for human + fellowship--and another God for buying and selling--that pestilent + polytheism has been largely and confidently preached in our time, + and blessed are those who can detect its mendacities, and help to + disenchant the brethren of their power...." + +J.A. Froude, then editor of _Fraser_, and to his dying day Mr. Ruskin's +intimate and affectionate friend, wrote to him on October 24 (1862?): + + + "The world talks of the article in its usual way. I was at + Carlyle's last night.... He said that in writing to your father as + to subject he had told him that when Solomon's temple was building + it was credibly reported that at least 10,000 sparrows sitting on + the trees round declared that it was entirely wrong--quite contrary + to received opinion--hopelessly condemned by public opinion, etc. + Nevertheless it got finished and the sparrows flew away and began + to chirp in the same note about something else." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE LIMESTONE ALPS (1863) + + +Our hermit among the Alps of Savoy differed in one respect from his +predecessors. They, for the most part, saw nothing in the rocks and +stones around them except the prison walls of their seclusion; he could +not be within constant sight of the mountains without thinking over the +wonders of their scenery and structure. And it was well for him that it +could be so. The terrible depression of mind which his social and +philanthropic work had brought on, found a relief in the renewal of his +old mountain-worship. After sending off the last of his _Fraser_ papers, +in which, when the verdict had twice gone against him, he tried to show +cause why sentence should not be passed, the strain was at its severest. +He felt, as few others not directly interested felt, the sufferings of +the outcast in English slums and Savoyard hovels; and heard the cry of +the oppressed in Poland and in Italy: and he had been silenced. What +could he do but, as he said in the letters to Norton, "lay his head to +the very ground," and try to forget it all among the stones and the +snows? + +He wandered about geologizing, and spent a while at Talloires on the +Lake of Annecy, where the old Abbey had been turned into an inn, and one +slept in a monk's cell and meditated in the cloister of the monastery, +St. Bernard of Menthon's memory haunting the place, and St. Germain's +cave close by in the rocks above. At the end of May he came back to +England, and was invited to lecture again at the Royal Institution. The +subject he chose was "The Stratified Alps of Savoy." + +At that time many distinguished foreign geologists were working at the +Alps; but little of conclusive importance had been published, except in +papers embedded in Transactions of various societies. Professor Alphonse +Favre's great work did not appear until 1867, and the "Mechanismus der +Gebirgsbildung" of Professor Heim not till 1878; so that for an English +public the subject was a fresh one. To Ruskin it was familiar: he had +been elected a Fellow of the Geological Society in 1840, at the age of +twenty-one; he had worked through Savoy with his Saussure in hand nearly +thirty years before, and, many a time since that, had spent the +intervals of literary business in rambling and climbing with the hammer +and note-book. In the field he had compared Studer's meagre sections, +and consulted the available authorities on physical geology, though he +had never entered upon the more popular sister-science of palaeontology. +He left the determination of strata to specialists: his interest was +fixed on the structure of mountains--the relation of geology to scenery; +a question upon which he had some right to be heard, as knowing more +about scenery than most geologists, and more about geology than most +artists. + +As examples of Savoy mountains this lecture described in detail the +Salève, on which he had been living for two winters, and the Brezon, the +top of which he had tried to buy from the commune of Bonneville--one of +his many plans for settling among the Alps. The commune thought he had +found a gold-mine up there, and raised the price out of all reason. +Other attempts to make a home in the châteaux or chalets of Savoy were +foiled, or abandoned, like his earlier idea to live in Venice. But his +scrambles on the Salève led him to hesitate in accepting the explanation +given by Alphonse Favre of the curious north-west face of steeply +inclined vertical slabs, which he suspected to be created by cleavage, +on the analogy of other Jurassic precipices. The Brezon--_brisant_, +breaking wave--he took as type of the billowy form of limestone Alps in +general, and his analysis of it was serviceable and substantially +correct. + +This lecture was followed in 1864 by desultory correspondence with Mr. +Jukes and others in _The Reader_, in which he merely restated his +conclusions, too slightly to convince. Had he devoted himself to a +thorough examination of the subject--but this is in the region of what +might have been. He was more seriously engaged in other pursuits, of +more immediate importance. Three days after his lecture he was being +examined before the Royal Academy Commission, and after a short summer +visit to various friends in the north of England, he set out again for +the Alps, partly to study the geology of Chamouni and North Switzerland, +partly to continue his drawings of Swiss towns at Baden and Lauffenburg, +with his pupil John Bunney. But even there the burden of his real +mission could not be shaken off, and though again seeking health and a +quiet mind, he could not quite keep silence, but wrote letters to +English newspapers on the depreciation of gold (repeating his theory of +currency), and on the wrongs of Poland and Italy; and he put together +more papers, not then published, in continuation of his "Munera +Pulveris." + +Since about 1850, Carlyle had been gradually becoming more and more +friendly with John Ruskin; and now that this social and economical work +had been taken up, he began to have a real esteem for him, though always +with a patronizing tone, which the younger man's open and confessed +discipleship accepted and encouraged. This letter especially shows both +men in an unaccustomed light: Ruskin, hating tobacco, sends his "master" +cigars; Carlyle, hating cant, replies rather in the tone of the +temperance advocate, taking a little wine for his stomach's sake: + + + "CHELSEA, 22 _Feby_, 1865 + + "DEAR RUSKIN, + + "You have sent me a munificent Box of Cigars; for wh'h what can I + say in ans'r? It makes me both sad and glad. _Ay de mi._ + + "We are such stuff, + Gone with a puff--Then + think, and smoke Tobacco!' + + "The Wife also has had her Flowers; and a letter wh'h has charmed + the female mind. You forgot only the first chapter of + 'Aglaia';--don't forget; and be a good boy for the future. + + "The Geology Book wasn't _Jukes_; I found it again in the + Magazine,--reviewed there: 'Phillips,'[9] is there such a name? It + has ag'n escaped me. I have a notion to come out actually some day + soon; and take a serious Lecture from you on what you really know, + and can give me some intelligible outline of, ab't the + Rocks,--_bones_ of our poor old Mother; wh'h have always been + venerable and strange to me. Next to nothing of rational could I + ever learn of the subject.... + + [Footnote 9: "Jukes,"--Mr. J.B. Jukes, F.R.S., with whom Ruskin had + been discussing in _The Reader_. "Phillips," the Oxford Professor + of Geology, and a friend of Ruskin's.] + + "Yours ever, + + "T. CARLYLE." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +"SESAME AND LILIES" (1864) + + +Wider aims and weaker health had not put an end to Ruskin's connection +with the Working Men's College, though he did not now teach a +drawing-class regularly. He had, as he said, "the satisfaction of +knowing that they had very good masters in Messrs. Lowes Dickinson, +Jeffery and Cave Thomas," and his work was elsewhere. He was to have +lectured there on December 19th, 1863; but he did not reach home until +about Christmas; better than he had been; and ready to give the promised +address on January 30th, 1864. Beside which he used to visit the place +occasionally of an evening to take note of progress, and some of his +pupils were now more directly under his care. + +It was from one of these visits to the College, on February 27th, that +he returned, past midnight, and found his father waiting up for him, to +read some letters he had written. Next morning the old man, close upon +seventy-nine years of age, was struck with his last illness; and died on +March 3rd. He was buried at Shirley Church, near Addington, in Surrey, +not far from Croydon; and the legend on his tomb records: "He was an +entirely honest merchant, and his memory is, to all who keep it, dear +and helpful. His son, whom he loved to the uttermost, and taught to +speak truth, says this of him." + +Mr. John James Ruskin, like many other of our successful merchants, had +been an open-handed patron of art, and a cheerful giver, not only to +needy friends and relatives, but also to various charities. For example, +as a kind of personal tribute to Osborne Gordon, his son's tutor, he +gave £5,000 toward the augmentation of poor Christ-Church livings. His +son's open-handed way with dependants and servants was learned from the +old merchant, who, unlike many hard-working money-makers, was always +ready to give, though he could not bear to lose. In spite of which he +left a considerable fortune behind him,--considerable when it is +understood to be the earnings of his single-handed industry and steady +sagacity in legitimate business, without indulgence in speculation. He +left £120,000 with various other property, to his son. To his wife he +left his house and £37,000, and a void which it seemed at first nothing +could fill. For of late years the son had drifted out of their horizon, +with ideas on religion and the ordering of life so very different from +theirs; and had been much away from home--he sometimes said, selfishly, +but not without the greatest of all excuses, necessity. And so the two +old people had been brought closer than ever together; and she had lived +entirely for her husband. But, as Browning said,--"Put a stick in +anywhere, and she will run up it"--so the brave old lady did not faint +under the blow, and fade away, but transferred her affections and +interests to her son. Before his father's death the difference of +feeling between them, arising out of the heretical economy, had been +healed. Old Mr. Ruskin's will treated his son with all confidence in +spite of his unorthodox views and unbusiness-like ways. And for nearly +eight years longer his mother lived on, to see him pass through his +probation-period into such recognition as an Oxford Professorship +implied, and to find in her last years his later books "becoming more +and more what they always ought to have been" to her. + +At the same time, her failing sight and strength needed a constant +household companion. Her son, though he did not leave home yet awhile +for any long journeys, could not be always with her. Only six weeks +after the funeral he was called away for a time to fulfil a +lecture-engagement at Bradford. Before going he brought his pretty young +Scotch cousin. Miss Joanna Ruskin Agnew, to Denmark Hill for a week's +visit. She recommended herself at once to the old lady, and to Carlyle, +who happened to call, by her frank good-nature and unquenchable spirits; +and her visit lasted seven years, until she was married to Arthur +Severn, son of the Ruskins' old friend, Joseph Severn, British Consul at +Rome. Even then she was not allowed far out of their sight, but settled +in the old house at Herne Hill: "nor virtually," said Ruskin in the last +chapter of "Præterita," "have she and I ever parted since." + +All through that year he remained at home, except for short necessary +visits, and frequent evenings with Carlyle. And when, in December, he +gave those lectures in Manchester which afterwards, as "Sesame and +Lilies," became his most popular work, we can trace his better health of +mind and body in the brighter tone of his thought. We can hear the echo +of Carlyle's talk in the heroic, aristocratic, Stoic ideals, and in the +insistence on the value of books and free public libraries,[10]--Carlyle +being the founder of the London Library. And we may suspect that his +thoughts on women's influence and education had been not a little +directed by those months in the company of "the dear old lady and ditto +young" to whom Carlyle used to send his love. + +[Footnote 10: The first lecture, "Of Kings' Treasuries," was given, +December 6th, 1864, at Rusholme Town Hall, Manchester, in aid of a +library fund for the Rusholme Institute. The second, "Queens' Gardens," +was given December 14th, at the Town Hall, King Street, now the Free +Reference Library, Manchester, in aid of schools for Ancoats.] + +In 1864 a new series of papers on Art was begun, the only published +work upon Art of all these ten years. The papers ran in _The Art +Journal_ from January to July, 1865, and from January to April. 1866, +under the title of "The Cestus of Aglaia," by which was meant the +Girdle, or restraining law, of Beauty, as personified in the wife of +Hephaestus, "the Lord of Labour." Their intention was to suggest, and to +evoke by correspondence, "some laws for present practice of art in our +schools, which may be admitted, if not with absolute, at least with a +sufficient consent, by leading artists." As a first step the author +asked for the elementary rules of drawing. For his own contribution he +showed the value of the "pure line," such as he had used in his own +early drawings. Later on, he had adopted a looser and more picturesque +style of handling the point; and in the "Elements of Drawing" he had +taught his readers to take Rembrandt's etchings as exemplary. But now he +felt that this "evasive" manner, as he called it, had its dangers. And +so these papers attempted to supersede the amateurish object lesson of +the earlier work by stricter rules for a severer style; prematurely, as +it proved, for the chapters came to an end before the promised code was +formulated. The same work was taken up again in "The Laws of Fésole"; +but the use of the pure line, which Ruskin's precepts failed to enforce, +was, in the end, taught to the public by the charming practice of Mr. +Walter Crane and Miss Greenaway. + +A lecture at the Camberwell Working Men's Institute on "Work and Play" +was given on January 24th, 1865; which, as it was printed in "The Crown +of Wild Olive," we will notice further on. Various letters and papers on +political and social economy and other subjects hardly call for separate +notice: with the exception of one very important address to the Royal +Institution of British Architects, given May 15th, "On the Study of +Architecture in our Schools." + + + + +CHAPTER V + +"ETHICS OF THE DUST" (1865) + + +Writing to his father from Manchester about the lecture of February 22, +1859--"The Unity of Art"--Ruskin mentions, among various people of +interest whom he was meeting, such as Sir Elkanah Armitage and Mrs. +Gaskell, how "Miss Bell and four young ladies came from Chester to hear +me, and I promised to pay them a visit on my way home, to their apparent +great contentment." + +The visit was paid on his way back from Yorkshire. He wrote: + + + "WINNINGTON, NORTHWICH, CHESHIRE. + + "12 _March_, 1859. + + "This is such a nice place that I am going to stay till Monday: an + enormous old-fashioned house--full of galleries and up and down + stairs--but with magnificently large rooms where wanted: the + drawing-room is a huge octagon--I suppose at least forty feet + high--like the tower of a castle (hung half way up all round with + large and beautiful Turner and Raphael engravings) and with a + baronial fireplace:--and in the evening, brightly lighted, with the + groups of girls scattered round it, it is a quite beautiful scene + in its way. Their morning chapel, too, is very interesting:--though + only a large room, it is nicely fitted with reading desk and seats + like a college chapel, and two pretty and rich stained-glass + windows--and well-toned organ. They have morning prayers with only + one of the lessons--and without the psalms: but singing the Te Deum + or the other hymn--and other choral parts: and as out of the + thirty-five or forty girls perhaps twenty-five or thirty have + really available voices, well trained and divided, it was + infinitely more beautiful than any ordinary church service--like + the Trinita di Monte Convent service more than anything else, and + must be very good for them, quite different in its effect on their + minds from our wretched penance of college chapel. + + "The house stands in a superb park, full of old trees and sloping + down to the river; with a steep bank of trees on the other side; + just the kind of thing Mrs. Sherwood likes to describe;--and the + girls look all healthy and happy as can be, down to the little + six-years-old ones, who I find know me by the fairy tale as the + others do by my large books:--so I am quite at home. + + "They have my portrait in the library with three others--Maurice, + the Bp. of Oxford, and Archdeacon Hare,--so that I can't but stay + with them over the Sunday." + +The principles of Winnington were advanced; the theology--Bishop +Colenso's daughter was among the pupils; the Bishop of Oxford had +introduced Ruskin to the managers, who were pleased to invite the +celebrated art-critic to visit whenever he travelled that way, whether +to lecture at provincial towns, or to see his friends in the north, as +he often used. And so between March 1859 and May 1868, after which the +school was removed, he was a frequent visitor; and not only he, but +other lions whom the ladies entrapped:--mention has been made in print +(in "The Queen of the Air") of Charles Halle, whom Ruskin met there in +1863, and greatly admired. + + + "I like Mr. and Mrs. Halle so very much," he wrote home, "and am + entirely glad to know so great a musician and evidently so good and + wise a man. He was very happy yesterday evening, and actually sat + down and played quadrilles for us to dance to--which is, in its + way, something like Titian sketching patterns for ball-dresses. But + afterwards he played Home, sweet Home, with three + variations--_quite_ the most wonderful thing I have ever heard in + music. Though I was close to the piano, the motion of the fingers + was entirely invisible--a mere _mist_ of rapidity; the _hands_ + moving slowly and softly, and the variation, in the ear, like a + murmur of a light fountain, far away. It was beautiful too to see + the girls' faces round, the eyes all wet with feeling, and the + little coral mouths fixed into little half open gaps with utter + intensity of astonishment." + +Ruskin could not be idle on his visits; and as he was never so happy as +when he was teaching somebody, he improved the opportunity by +experiments in education permitted there for his sake. Among other +things, he devised singing dances for a select dozen of the girls, with +verses of his own writing; one, a maze to the theme of "Twist ye, twine +ye," based upon the song in "Guy Mannering," but going far beyond the +original motive in its variations weighted with allegoric thought. Deep +as the feeling of this little poem is, there is a nobler chord struck in +the Song of Peace, the battle-cry of the good time coming; in the +faith--who else has found it?--that looks forward to no selfish victory +of narrow aims, but to the full reconciliation of hostile interests and +the blind internecine struggle of this perverse world, in the clearer +light of the millennial morning. + +Ruskin's method of teaching, as illustrated in "Ethics of the Dust," has +been variously pooh-poohed by his critics. It has seemed to some absurd +to mix up Theology, and Crystallography, and Political Economy, and +Mythology, and Moral Philosophy, with the chatter of school-girls and +the romps of the playground. But it should be understood, before reading +this book, which is practically the report of these Wilmington talks, +that it is printed as an illustration of a method. It showed that +play-lessons need not want either depth or accuracy; and that the +requirement was simply capacity on the part of the teacher. + +The following letter from Carlyle was written in acknowledgment of an +early copy of the book, of which the preface is dated Christmas, 1865. + + + "CHELSEA, + + "_20 Decr, 1865._ + + "The 'Ethics of the Dust,' wh'h I devoured with't pause, and intend + to look at ag'n, is a most shining Performance! Not for a long + while have I read anything tenth-part so radiant with talent, + ingenuity, lambent fire (sheet--and _other_ lightnings) of all + commendable kinds! Never was such a lecture on _Crystallography_ + before, had there been nothing else in it,--and there are all + manner of things. In power of _expression_ I pronounce it to be + supreme; never did anybody who had _such_ things to explain explain + them better. And the bit of Egypt'n mythology, the cunning _Dreams_ + ab't Pthah, Neith, etc., apart from their elucidative quality, + wh'h is exquisite, have in them a _poetry_ that might fill any + Tennyson with despair. You are very dramatic too; nothing wanting + in the stage-direct'ns, in the pretty little indicat'ns: a very + pretty stage and _dramatis personæ_ altogeth'r. Such is my first + feeling ab't y'r Book, dear R.--Come soon, and I will tell you all + the _faults_ of it, if I gradually discover a great many. In fact, + _come_ at any rate! + + "Y'rs ever, + + "T. CARLYLE." + +The Real Little Housewives, to whom the book was dedicated, were not +quite delighted--at least, they said they were not--at the portraits +drawn of them, in their pinafores, so to speak, with some little hints +at failings and faults which they recognised through the mask of +_dramatis personæ._ Miss "Kathleen" disclaimed the singing of "Vilikins +and his Dinah," and so on. It is difficult to please everybody. The +public did not care about the book; the publisher hoped Mr. Ruskin would +write no more dialogues: and so it remained, little noticed, for twelve +years. In 1877 it was republished and found to be interesting, and in +1905 the 31st thousand (authorised English edition) had been issued. At +that time, however, Sesame and Lilies had run to 160,000 copies. + +Winnington Hall, the scene of these pastimes, is now, I understand, used +by Messrs. Brunner, Mond & Co. as a commonroom or clubhouse for the +staff in their great scientific industry. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +"THE CROWN OF WILD OLIVE" (1865-1866) + + +Mention has been made of an address to working men at the Camberwell +Institute, January 24th, 1865. This lecture was published in 1866, +together with two others,[11] under the title of "The Crown of Wild +Olive"--that is to say, the reward of human work, a reward "which should +have been of gold, had not Jupiter been so poor," as Aristophanes said. + +[Footnote 11: Republished in 1873, with a fourth lecture added, and a +Preface and notes on the political growth of Prussia, from Carlyle's +"Frederick."] + +True work, he said, meant the production (taking the word production in +a broad sense) of the means of life; every one ought to take some share +in it, according to his powers: some working with the head, some with +the hands; but all acknowledging idleness and slavery to be alike +immoral. And, as to the remuneration, he said, as he had said before in +"Unto this Last," Justice demands that equal energy expended should +bring equal reward. He did not consider it justice to cry out for the +equalization of incomes, for some are sure to be more diligent and +saving than others; some work involves a great preliminary expenditure +of energy in qualifying the worker, as contrasted with unskilled labour. +But he did not allow that the possession of capital entitled a man to +unearned increment; and he thought that, in a community where a truly +civilized morality was highly developed, the general sense of society +would recognise an average standard of work and an average standard of +pay for each class. + +In the next two lectures he spoke of the two great forms of Play, the +great Games of Money-making and War. He had been invited to lecture at +Bradford, in the hope that he would give some useful advice towards the +design of a new Exchange which was to be built; in curious +forgetfulness, it would appear, of his work during the past ten years +and more. Indeed, the picture he drew them of an ideal "Temple to the +Goddess of Getting-on" was as daring a sermon as ever prophet preached. +But when he came to tell them that the employers of labour might be true +captains and kings, the leaders and the helpers of their fellow-men, +and that the function of commerce was not to prey upon society but to +provide for it, there were many of his hearers whose hearts told them +that he was right, and whose lives have shown, in some measure, that he +did not speak in vain. + +Still stranger, to hearers who had not noted the conclusion of his third +volume of "Modern Painters," was his view of war, in the address to the +Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, in December 1865. The common view of +war as destroyer of arts and enemy of morality, the easy acceptance of +the doctrine that peace is an unqualified blessing, the obvious evils of +battle and rapine and the waste of resources and life throughout so many +ages, have blinded less clear-sighted and less widely-experienced +thinkers to another side of the teaching of history, which Ruskin dwelt +upon with unexpected emphasis. + +But modern war, horrible, not from its scale, but from the spirit in +which the upper classes set the lower to fight like gladiators in the +arena, he denounced; and called upon the women of England, with whom, he +said, the real power of life and death lay, to mend it into some +semblance of antique chivalry, or to end it in the name of religion and +humanity. + +In the _New Review_ for March 1892, there appeared a series of "Letters +of John Ruskin to his Secretary," which, as the anonymous contributor +remarked, illustrate "Ruskin the worker, as he acts away from the eyes +of the world; Ruskin the epistolographer, when the eventuality of the +printing-press is not for the moment before him Ruskin the good +Samaritan, ever gentle and open-handed when true need and a good cause +make appeal to his tender heart; Ruskin the employer, considerate, +generous--an ideal master." + +Charles Augustus Howell became known to Ruskin (in 1864 or 1865) through +the circle of the Pre-Raphaelites; and, as the editor of the letters +puts it, "by his talents and assiduity" became the too-trusted friend +and _protégé_ of Ruskin, Rossetti and others of their acquaintance. It +was he who proposed and carried out the exhumation, reluctantly +consented to, of Rossetti's manuscript poems from his wife's grave, in +October, 1869; for which curious service to literature let him have the +thanks of posterity. But he was hardly the man to carry out Ruskin's +secret charities, and long before he had lost Rossetti's confidence[12] +he had ceased to act as Ruskin's secretary. + +[Footnote 12: In the manner described by Mr. W.M. Rossetti at p. 351, +Vol. I., of "D.G. Rossetti, his family letters," to which the reader is +referred.] + +From these letters, however, several interesting traits and incidents +may be gleaned, such as anecdotes about the canary which was anonymously +bought at the Crystal Palace Bird Show (February 1866) for the owner's +benefit: about the shopboy whom Ruskin was going to train as an artist; +and about the kindly proposal to employ the aged and impoverished +Cruikshank upon a new book of fairy tales, and the struggle between +admiration for the man and admission of his loss of power, ending in the +free gift of the hundred pounds promised. + +In April, 1866, after writing the Preface to "The Crown of Wild Olive," +and preparing the book for publication, Ruskin was carried off to the +Continent for a holiday with Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, her niece +Miss Constance Hilliard (Mrs. Churchill), and Miss Agnew (Mrs. Severn), +for a thorough rest and change after three years of unintermitting work +in England. They intended to spend a couple of months in Italy. On the +day of starting, Ruskin called at Cheyne Walk with the usual bouquet for +Mrs. Carlyle, to learn that she had just met with her death, in trying +to save her little dog, the gift of Lady Trevelyan. He rejoined his +friends, and they crossed the Channel gaily, in spite of what they +thought was rather a cloud over him. At Paris they read the news. "Yes," +he said, "I knew. But there was no reason why I should spoil your +pleasure by telling you." + +On his arrival at Dijon he wrote to Carlyle, who in answer after giving +way to his grief--"my life all laid in ruins, and the one light of it as +if gone out,"--continued:--"Come and see me when you get home; come +oftener and see me, and speak _more_ frankly to me (for I am very true +to y'r highest interests and you) while I still remain here. You can do +nothing for me in Italy; except come home improved." + +But before this letter reached Ruskin, he too had been in the presence +of death, and had lost one of his most valued friends. Their journey to +Italy had been undertaken chiefly for the sake of Lady Trevelyan's +health, as the following extracts indicate: + + + "PARIS, _2nd May, 1866_. + + "Lady Trevelyan is much better to-day, but it is not safe to move + her yet--till to-morrow. So I'm going to take the children to look + at Chartres cathedral--we can get three hours there, and be back to + seven o'clock dinner. We drove round by St. Cloud and Sèvres + yesterday; the blossomed trees being glorious by the Seine,--the + children in high spirits. It reminds me always too much of + Turner--every bend of these rivers is haunted by him." + + "DIJON, _Sunday, 6th May, 1866_. + + "Lady Trevelyan is _much_ better, and we hope all to get on to + Neufchatel to-morrow. The weather is quite fine again though not + warm; and yesterday I took the children for a drive up the little + valley which we used to drive through on leaving Dijon for Paris. + There are wooded hills on each side, and we got into a sweet + valley, as full of nightingales as our garden is of thrushes, and + with slopes of broken rocky ground above, covered with the lovely + blue milk-wort, and purple columbines, and geranium, and wild + strawberry-flowers. The children were intensely delighted, and I + took great care that Constance should not run about so as to heat + herself, and we got up a considerable bit of hill quite nicely, and + with greatly increased appetite for tea, and general mischief. They + have such appetites that I generally call them 'my two little + pigs.' There is a delightful French waiting-maid at dinner + here--who says they are both 'charmantes,' but highly approves of + my title for them nevertheless." + + "NEUFCHATEL, _10th May_, 1866. + + "Lady Trevelyan is still too weak to move. We had (the children and + I) a delightful day yesterday at the Pierre à Bot, gathering + vetches and lilies of the valley in the woods, and picnic + afterwards on the lovely mossy grass, in view of all the + Alps--Jungfrau, Eiger, Blumlis Alp, Altels, and the rest, with + intermediate lake and farmsteads and apple-blossom--very heavenly." + +Here, within a few days, Lady Trevelyan died. Throughout her illness she +had been following the progress of the new notes on wild-flowers +(afterwards to be "Proserpina") with keen interest, and Sir Walter lent +the help of botanical science to Ruskin's more poetical and artistic +observations. For the sake of this work, and for the "children," and +with a wise purpose of bearing up under the heavy blow that had fallen, +the two friends continued their journey for a while among the mountains. + +From Thun they went to Interlachen and the Giessbach. Ruskin occupied +himself closely in tracing Studer's sections across the great +lake-furrow of central Switzerland--"something craggy for his mind to +break upon," as Byron said when he was in trouble. At the Giessbach +there was not only geology and divine scenery, enjoyable in lovely +weather, but an interesting figure in the foreground, the widowed +daughter of the hotel landlord, beautiful and consumptive, but brave as +a Swiss girl should be. They all seem to have fallen in love with her, +so to speak the young English girls as much as the impressionable +art-critic: and the new human interest in her Alpine tragedy relieved, +as such interests do, the painfulness of the circumstances through which +they had been passing. Her sister Marie was like an Allegra to this +Penserosa; bright and brilliant in native genius. She played piano-duets +with the young ladies; taught Alpine botany to the savants; guided them +to the secret dells and unknown points of view; and with a sympathy +unexpected in a stranger, beguiled them out of their grief, and won +their admiration and gratitude. Marie of the Giessbach was often +referred to in letters of the time, and for many years after, with +warmly affectionate remembrances. + +A few bits from his letters to his mother, which I have been permitted +to copy, will indicate the impressions of this summer's tour. + + + "HÔTEL DU GIESBACH, _6th June, 1866_, + + "MY DEAREST MOTHER, + + "Can you at all fancy walking out in the morning in a garden full + of lilacs just in rich bloom, and pink hawthorn in masses; and + along a little terrace with lovely pinks coming into cluster of + colour all over the low wall beside it; and a sloping bank of green + sward from it--and below that, the Giesbach! Fancy having a real + Alpine waterfall in one's garden,--seven hundred feet high. You + see, we are just in time for the spring, here, and the strawberries + are ripening on the rocks. Joan and Constance have been just + scrambling about and gathering them for me. Then there's the + blue-green lake below, and Interlaken and the lake of Thun in the + distance. I think I never saw anything so beautiful. Joan will + write to you about the people, whom she has made great friends + with, already." + + "_7th June, 1866_. + + "I cannot tell you how much I am struck with the beauty of this + fall: it is different from everything I have ever seen in torrents. + There are so many places where one gets near it without being wet, + for one thing; for the falls are, mostly, not vertical so as to fly + into mere spray, but over broken rock, which crushes the water into + a kind of sugar-candy-like foam, white as snow, yet glittering; and + composed, not of bubbles, but of broken-up water. Then I had + forgotten that it plunged straight into the lake; I got down to the + lake shore on the other side of it yesterday, and to see it plunge + clear into the blue water, with the lovely mossy rocks for its + flank, and for the lake edge, was an unbelievable kind of thing; it + is all as one would fancy cascades in fairyland. I do not often + endure with patience any cockneyisms or showings off at these + lovely places. But they do one thing here so interesting that I can + forgive it. One of the chief cascades (about midway up the hill) + falls over a projecting rock, so that one can walk under the + torrent as it comes over. It leaps so clear that one is hardly + splashed, except at one place. Well, when it gets dark, they burn, + for five minutes, one of the strongest steady fireworks of a + crimson colour, behind the fall. The red light shines right + through, turning the whole waterfall into a torrent of fire." + + "_11th June, 1866._ + + "We leave, according to our programme, for Interlachen + to-day,--with great regret, for the peace and sweetness of this + place are wonderful and the people are good; and though there is + much drinking and quarrelling among the younger men, there appears + to be neither distressful poverty, nor deliberate crime: so that + there is more of the sense I need, and long for, of fellowship with + human creatures, than in any place I have been at for years. I + believe they don't so much as lock the house-doors at night; and + the faces of the older peasantry are really very beautiful. I have + done a good deal of botany, and find that wild-flower botany is + more or less inexhaustible, but the cultivated flowers are infinite + in their caprice. The forget-me-nots and milkworts are singularly + beautiful here, but there is quite as much variety in English + fields as in these, as long as one does not climb much--and I'm + very lazy, compared to what I used to be," + + "_LAUTERBRUNNEN, 13th June, 1866._ + + "We had a lovely evening here yesterday, and the children enjoyed + and understood it better than anything they have yet seen among the + Alps. Constance was in great glory in a little walk I took her in + the twilight through the upper meadows: the Staubbach seen only as + a grey veil suspended from its rock, and the great Alps pale above + on the dark sky. She condescended nevertheless to gather a great + bunch of the white catchfly,--to make 'pops' with,--her friend + Marie at the Giesbach having shown her how a startling detonation + may be obtained, by skilful management, out of its globular calyx. + + "This morning is not so promising,--one of the provoking ones which + will neither let you stay at home with resignation, nor go anywhere + with pleasure. I'm going to take the children for a little quiet + exploration of the Wengern path, to see how they like it, and if + the weather betters--we may go on. At all events I hope to find an + Alpine rose or two." + +In June, 1866, the Professorship of Poetry at Oxford was vacant; and +Ruskin's friends were anxious to see him take the post. He, however, +felt no especial fitness or inclination for it, and did not stand. Three +years later he was elected to a Professorship that at this time had not +been founded. + +After spending June in the Oberland, he went homewards through Berne, +Vevey and Geneva, to find his private secretary with a bundle of begging +letters, and his friend Carlyle busy with the defence of Governor Eyre. + +In 1865 an insurrection of negroes at Morant Bay, Jamaica, had +threatened to take the most serious shape, when it was stamped out by +the high-handed measures of Mr. Eyre. After the first congratulations +were over another side to the question called for a hearing. The Baptist +missionaries declared that among the negroes who were shot and hanged +_in terrorem_ were peaceable subjects, respectable members of their own +native congregations, for whose character they could vouch; they added +that the gravity of the situation had been exaggerated by private enmity +and jealousy of their work and creed. A strong committee was formed +under Liberal auspices, supported by such men as John Stuart Mill and +Thomas Hughes, the author of "Tom Brown's Schooldays"--men whose motive +was above suspicion--to bring Mr. Eyre to account. + +Carlyle, who admired the strong hand, and had no interest in Baptist +missionaries, accepted Mr. Eyre as the saviour of society in his West +Indian sphere; and there were many, both in Jamaica and at home, who +believed that, but for his prompt action, the white population would +have been massacred with all the horrors of a savage rebellion. Ruskin +had been for many years the ally of the Broad Church and Liberal party. +But he was now coming more and more under the personal influence of +Carlyle; and when it came to the point of choosing sides, declared +himself, in a letter to the _Daily Telegraph_ (December 20th, 1865), a +Conservative and a supporter of order; and joined the Eyre Defence +Committee with a subscription of £100. The prominent part he took, for +example, in the meeting of September, 1866, was no doubt forced upon him +by his desire to save Carlyle, whose recent loss and shaken nerves made +such business especially trying to him. Letters of this period remain, +in which Carlyle begs Ruskin to "be diligent, I bid you!"--and so on, +adding, "I must absolutely _shut up_ in that direction, to save my +sanity." And so it fell to the younger man to work through piles of +pamphlets and newspaper correspondence, to interview politicians and men +of business, and--what was so very foreign to his habits--to take a +leading share in a party agitation. + +But in all this he was true to his Jacobite instincts. He had been +brought up a Tory; and though he had drifted into an alliance with the +Broad Church and philosophical Liberals, he was never one of them. Now +that his father was gone, perhaps he felt a sort of duty to own himself +his father's son; and the failure of liberal philanthropy to realise his +ideals, and of liberal philosophy to rise to his economic standards, +combined with Carlyle to induce him to label himself Conservative. But +his conservatism could not be accepted by the party so called. +Fortunately, he did not need or ask their recognition. He took no +interest in party politics, and never in his life voted at a +Parliamentary election. He only meant to state in the shortest terms +that he stood for loyalty and order. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +"TIME AND TIDE" (1867) + + +The series of letters published as "Time and Tide by Weare and Tyne" +were addressed[13] to Thomas Dixon, a working cork-cutter of Sunderland, +whose portrait by Professor Legros is familiar to visitors at the South +Kensington Museum. He was one of those thoughtful, self-educated working +men in whom, as a class, Ruskin had been taking a deep interest for the +past twelve years, an interest which had purchased him a practical +insight into their various capacities and aims, and the right to speak +without fear or favour. At this time there was an agitation for +Parliamentary reform, and the better representation of the working +classes; and it was on this topic that the letters were begun, though +the writer went on to criticise the various social ideals then popular, +and to propose his own. He had already done something of the sort in +"Unto this Last"; but "Time and Tide" is much more complete, and the +result of seven years' further thought and experience. His "Fors +Clavigera" is a continuation of these letters, but written at a time +when other work and ill health broke in upon his strength. "Time and +Tide" is not only the statement of his social scheme as he saw it in his +central period, but, written as these letters were--at a stroke, so to +speak--condensed in exposition and simple in language, they deserve the +most careful reading by the student of Ruskin. + +[Footnote 13: During February, March and April, 1867, and published in +the _Manchester Examiner_ and _Leeds Mercury_.] + +Before this work was ended, Carlyle had come back from Mentone to +Chelsea, and was begging his friend, in the warmest terms, to come and +see him. Shortly afterward, a passage which Ruskin would not retract +gave offence to Carlyle. But the difference was healed, and later years +reveal the sage of Chelsea as kindly and affectionate as ever. This +friendship between the two greatest writers of their age, between two +men of vigorous individuality, outspoken opinions, and widely different +tastes and sympathies, is a fine episode in the history of both. + +In May, Ruskin was invited to Cambridge to receive the honorary degree +of LL.D., and to deliver the Rede Lecture. The _Cambridge Chronicle_ of +May 24th, 1867, says: "The body of the Senate House was quite filled +with M.A.'s and ladies, principally the latter, whilst there was a large +attendance of undergraduates in the galleries, who gave the lecturer a +most enthusiastic reception." A brief report of the lecture was printed +in the newspaper; but it was not otherwise published, and the manuscript +seems to have been mislaid for thirty years. I take the liberty of +copying the opening sentences as a specimen of that Academical oratory +which Mr. Ruskin then adopted, and used habitually in his earlier +lectures at Oxford. + +The title of the discourse was "The Relation of National Ethics to +National Arts." + + + "In entering on the duty to-day entrusted to me, I should hold it + little respectful to my audience if I disturbed them by expression + of the diffidence which they know that I must feel in first + speaking in this Senate House; diffidence which might well have + prevented me from accepting such duty, but ought not to interfere + with my endeavour simply to fulfil it. Nevertheless, lest the + direction which I have been led to give to my discourse, and the + narrow limits within which I am compelled to confine the treatment + of its subject may seem in anywise inconsistent with the purpose of + the founder of this Lecture--or with the expectations of those by + whose authority I am appointed to deliver it, let me at once say + that I obeyed their command, not thinking myself able to teach any + dogma in the philosophy of the arts, which could be of any new + interest to the members of this University: but only that I might + obtain the sanction of their audience, for the enforcement upon + other minds of the truth, which--after thirty years spent in the + study of art, not dishonestly, however feebly--is manifest to me as + the clearest of all that I have learned, and urged upon me as the + most vital of all I have to declare." + +He then distinguished between true and false art, the true depending +upon sincerity, whether in literature, music or the formative arts: he +reinforced his old doctrine of the dignity of true imagination as the +attribute of healthy and earnest minds; and energetically attacked the +commercial art-world of the day, and the notion that drawing-schools +were to be supported for the sake of the gain they would bring to our +manufacturers. + +In this lecture we see the germ of the ideas, as well as the beginning +of the style, of the Oxford Inaugural course, and the "Eagle's Nest"; +something quite different in type from the style and teaching of the +addresses to working men, or to mixed popular audiences at Edinburgh or +Manchester, or even at the Royal Institution. At this latter place, on +June 4th, Sir Henry Holland in the chair, he lectured on "The Present +State of Modern Art, with reference to advisable arrangement of the +National Gallery," repeating much of what he had said in "Time and Tide" +about the taste for the horrible and absence of true feeling for pure +and dignified art in the theatrical shows of the day, and in the +admiration for Gustave Doré, then a new fashion. Mr. Ruskin could never +endure that the man who had illustrated Balzac's "Contes Drôlatiques" +should be chosen by the religious public of England as the exponent of +their sacred ideals. + +In July after a short visit to Huntly Burn near Abbotsford, he went to +Keswick for a few weeks, from whence he wrote the rhymed letters to his +cousin at home, quoted (with the date wrongly given as 1857) in +"Præterita" to illustrate his "heraldic character" of "Little Pigs" and +to shock exoteric admirers. Like, for example, Rossetti and Carlyle, +Ruskin was fond of playful nicknames and grotesque terms of endearment. +He never stood upon his dignity with intimates; and was ready to allow +the liberties he took, much to the surprise of strangers. + +He reached Keswick by July 4, and spent his time chiefly in walks upon +the hills, staying at the Derwentwater Hotel. He wrote: + + + "Keswick, _19th July, '67, Afternoon, 1/2 past 3_. + + "My dearest Mother, + + "As this is the last post before Sunday I send one more line to say + I've had a delightful forenoon's walk--since 1/2 past ten--by St. + John's Vale, and had pleasant thoughts, and found one of the most + variedly beautiful torrent beds I ever saw in my life; and I feel + that I gain strength, slowly but certainly, every day. The great + good of the place is that I can be content without going on great + excursions which fatigue and do me harm (or else worry me with + problems;)--I am _content_ here with the roadside hedges and + streams; and this contentment is the great thing for health,--and + there is hardly anything to annoy me of absurd or calamitous human + doing; but still this ancient cottage life--very rude and miserable + enough in its torpor--but clean, and calm, not a vile cholera and + plague of bestirred pollution, like back streets in London. There + is also much more real and deep beauty than I expected to find, in + some of the minor pieces of scenery, and in the cloud effects." + + "_July 16_. + + "I have the secret of extracting sadness from all things, instead + of joy, which is no enviable talisman. Forgive me if I ever write + in a way that may pain you. It is best that you should know, when I + write cheerfully, it is no pretended cheerfulness; so when I am + sad--I think it right to confess it." + + "_30th July._ + + "Downes[14] arrived yesterday quite comfortably and in fine + weather. It is not bad this morning, and I hope to take him for a + walk up Saddleback, which, after all, is the finest, to my mind, of + all the Cumberland hills--though that is not saying much; for they + are much lower in effect, in proportion to their real height, than + I had expected. The beauty of the country is in its quiet roadside + bits, and rusticity of cottage life and shepherd labour. Its + mountains are sorrowfully melted away from my old dreams of them." + + [Footnote 14: The gardener at Denmark Hill.] + + Next day he "went straight up the steep front of Saddleback by the + central ridge to the summit. It is the finest thing I've yet seen, + there being several bits of real crag-work, and a fine view at the + top over the great plains of Penrith on one side, and the + Cumberland hills, as a chain, on the other. Fine fresh wind + blowing, and plenty of crows. Do you remember poor papa's favourite + story about the Quaker whom the crows ate on Saddleback? There were + some of the biggest and hoarsest-voiced ones about the cliff that + I've ever had sympathetic croaks from;--and one on the top, or near + it, so big that Downes and Crawley, having Austrian tendencies in + politics, took it for a 'black eagle.' Downes went up capitally, + though I couldn't get him down again, because he _would_ stop to + gather ferns. However, we did it all and came down to Threlkeld--of + the Bridal of Triermain, + + "'The King his way pursued + By lonely Threlkeld's waste and wood,' + + "in good time for me to dress and, for a wonder, go out to dinner + with Acland's friends the Butlers." + + As an episode in this visit to Keswick, ten days were given to the + neighbourhood of Ambleside, "to show Downes Windermere." + + "Waterhead, Windermere, + + "_10th August, 1867, Evening_. + + "I was at Coniston to-day. Our old Waterhead Inn, where I was so + happy playing in the boats, _exists_ no more.--Its place is grown + over with smooth Park grass--the very site of it forgotten! and, a + quarter of a mile down the lake, a vast hotel built in the railroad + station style--making up, I suppose, its fifty or eighty beds, with + coffee-room--smoking-room--and every pestilent and devilish + Yankeeism that money can buy, or speculation plan. + + "The depression, whatever its cause, does not affect my strength. I + walked up a long hill on the road to Coniston to-day (gathering + wild raspberries)--then from this new Inn, two miles to the foot of + Coniston Old Man; up it; down again--(necessarily!)--and back to + dinner, without so much as warming myself--not that there was much + danger of doing that at the top; for a keen west wind was blowing + drifts of cloud by at a great pace, and one was glad of the + shelter of the pile of stones, the largest and _oldest_ I ever saw + on a mountain top. I suppose the whole mountain is named from it. + It is of the shape of a beehive, strongly built, about 15 feet high + (so that I made Downes follow me up it before I would allow he had + been at the top of the Old Man) and covered with lichen and short + moss. Lancaster sands and the Irish sea were very beautiful, and so + also the two lakes of Coniston and Windermere, lying in the vastest + space of sweet cultivated country I have ever looked over,--a great + part of the view from the Rigi being merely over black pine forest, + even on the plains. Well, after dinner, the evening was very + beautiful, and I walked up the long hill on the road back from + Coniston--and kept ahead of the carriage for two miles: I was sadly + vexed when I had to get in: and now--I don't feel as if I had been + walking at all--and shall probably lie awake for an hour or + two--and feeling as if I had not had exercise enough to send me to + sleep." + + + "LANGDALE, _13th August, Evening._ + + "It is perfectly calm to-night, not painfully hot--and the full + moon shining over the mountains, opposite my window, which are the + scene of Wordsworth's 'Excursion.' It was terribly hot in the + earlier day, and I did not leave the house till five o'clock. Then + I went out, and in the heart of Langdale Pikes found the loveliest + rock-scenery, chased with silver waterfalls, that I ever set foot + or heart upon. The Swiss torrent-beds are always more or less + savage, and ruinous, with a terrible sense of overpowering strength + and danger, lulled. But here, the sweet heather and ferns and star + mosses nestled in close to the dashing of the narrow + streams;--while every cranny of crag held its own little placid + lake of amber, trembling with falling drops--but quietly + trembling--not troubled into ridgy wave or foam--the rocks + themselves, _ideal_ rock, as hard as iron--no--not quite that, but + _so_ hard that after breaking some of it, breaking solid white + quartz seemed like smashing brittle loaf sugar, in comparison--and + cloven into the most noble masses; not grotesque, but majestic and + full of harmony with the larger mountain mass of which they formed + a part. Fancy what a place! for a hot afternoon after five, with no + wind--and absolute solitude; no creature--except a lamb or two--to + mix any ruder sound or voice with the plash of the innumerable + streamlets." + +It was during this tour that he looked at a site on the hill above +Bowness-on-Windermere, where Mr. T. Richmond, the owner, proposed +building him a house. He liked the view, but found it too near the +railway station. + +After spending September with his mother at Norwood under the care of +Dr. Powell, he was able to return home, prepare "Time and Tide" for +publication, and write the preface on Dec. 14th. On the 19th the book +was out, and immediately bought up. A month later the second edition was +issued. + + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +AGATES, AND ABBEVILLE (1868) + + +Of less interest to the general reader, though too important a part of +Ruskin's life and work to be passed over without mention, are his +studies in Mineralogy. We have heard of his early interest in spars and +ores; of his juvenile dictionary in forgotten hieroglyphics; and of his +studies in the field and at the British Museum. He had made a splendid +collection, and knew the various museums of Europe as familiarly as he +knew the picture-galleries. In the "Ethics of the Dust" he had chosen +Crystallography as the subject in which to exemplify his method of +education; and in 1867, after finishing the letters to Thomas Dixon, he +took refuge, as before, among the stones, from the stress of more +agitating problems. + +In the lecture on the Savoy Alps in 1863 he had referred to a hint of +Saussure's that the contorted beds of the limestones might possibly be +due to some sort of internal action, resembling on a large scale that +separation into concentric or curved bands which is seen in calcareous +deposits. The contortions of gneiss were similarly analogous, it was +suggested, to those of the various forms of silica. Ruskin did not adopt +the theory, but put it by for examination in contrast with the usual +explanation of these phenomena, as the simple mechanical thrust of the +contracting surface of the earth. + +In 1863 and 1866 he had been among the Nagelflüh of Northern +Switzerland, studying the puddingstones and breccias. He saw that the +difference between these formations, in their structural aspect, and the +hand-specimens in his collection of pisolitic and brecciated minerals +was chiefly a matter of size; and that the resemblances in form were +very close. And so he concluded that if the structure of the minerals +could be fully understood a clue might be found to the very puzzling +question of the origin of mountain structure. + +Hence his attempt to analyze the structure of agates and similar banded +and brecciated minerals, in the series of papers in the _Geological +Magazine_;[15] an attempt which though it was never properly completed, +and fails to come to any general conclusion, is extremely interesting as +an account of beautiful and curious natural forms till then little +noticed by mineralogists. + +[Footnote 15: August and November, 1867, January, April and May, 1868, +December, 1869, and January, 1870, illustrated with very fine mezzotint +plates and woodcuts.] + +A characteristic anecdote of this period is preserved in "Arrows of the +Chace." + +"The _Daily Telegraph_ of January 21st, 1868, contained a leading +article upon the following facts. It appeared that a girl, named Matilda +Griggs, had been nearly murdered by her seducer, who, after stabbing her +in no less than thirteen places, had then left her for dead. She had, +however, still strength enough to crawl into a field close by, and there +swooned. The assistance she met with in this plight was of a rare kind. +Two calves came up to her, and disposing themselves on either side of +her bleeding body, thus kept her warm and partly sheltered from cold +and rain. Temporarily preserved, the girl eventually recovered, and +entered into recognizances, under a sum of forty pounds, to prosecute +her murderous lover. But 'she loved much,' and failing to prosecute, +forfeited her recognizances, and was imprisoned by the Chancellor of the +Exchequer for her debt. 'Pity the poor debtor,' wrote the _Daily +Telegraph_, and in the next day's issue appeared the following letter, +probably not intended for the publication accorded to it. 'Sir,--Except +in 'Gil Blas,' I never read of anything Astræan on the earth so perfect +as the story in your fourth article to-day. I send you a cheque for the +Chancellor. If forty, in legal terms, means four hundred, you must +explain the farther requirements to your impulsive public. + +"'I am, Sir, your faithful servant, 'J. RUSKIN.'" + +The writer of letters like this naturally had a large correspondence, +beside that which a circle of private friends and numberless admirers +and readers elicited. About this time it grew to such a pitch that he +was obliged to print a form excusing him from letter-writing on the +ground of stress of work. And indeed, this year, though he did not +publish his annual volume, as usual, he was fully occupied with frequent +letters to newspapers, several lectures and addresses, a preface to the +reprint of his old friend Cruikshank's "Grimm," and the beginning of a +new botanical work, "Proserpina," in addition to the mineralogy, and a +renewed interest in classical studies. Of the public addresses the most +important was that on "The Mystery of Life and its Arts," delivered in +the theatre of the Royal College of Science, Dublin (May 13th), and +printed in "Sesame and Lilies." + +After this visit to Ireland he spent a few days at Winnington; and late +in August crossed the Channel, for rest and change at Abbeville. For the +past five years he had found too little time for drawing; it was twenty +years since his last sketching of French Gothic, except for a study (now +at Oxford), of the porch at Amiens, in 1856. He took up the old work +where he had left it, after writing the "Seven Lamps," with fresh +interest and more advanced powers of draughtsmanship as shown in the +pencil study of the Place Amiral Courbet, now in the drawing school at +Oxford. + +The following are extracts from the usual budget of home letters; +readers of "Fors" will need no further introduction to their old +acquaintance, the tallow-chandler. + + + "ABBEVILLE, _Friday, 18th Sept._, 1868 + + "You seem to have a most uncomfortable time of it, with the + disturbance of the house. However, I can only leave you to manage + these things as you think best--or feel pleasantest to yourself. I + am saddened by another kind of disorder, France is in everything so + fallen back, so desolate and comfortless, compared to what it was + twenty years ago--the people so much rougher, clumsier, more + uncivil--everything they do, vulgar and base. Remnants of the old + nature come out when they begin to know you. I am drawing at a nice + tallow-chandler's door, and to-day, for the first time had to go + inside for rain. He was very courteous and nice, and warned me + against running against the candle-ends--or bottoms, as they were + piled on the shelves, saying--'You must take care, you see, not to + steal any of my candles'--or 'steal _from_ my candles,' meaning not + to rub them off on my coat. He has a beautiful family of cats--papa + and mamma and two superb kittens--half Angora." + + "_22nd Sept._ + + "I am going to my cats and tallow-chandler.... I was very much + struck by the superiority of manner both in him and in his two + daughters who serve at the counter, to persons of the same class in + England. When the girls have weighed out their candles, or written + down the orders that are sent in, they instantly sit down to their + needlework behind the counter, and are always busy, yet always + quiet; and their father, though of course there may be vulgar + idioms in his language which I do not recognize, has entirely the + manners of a gentleman." + + _30th Sept_. + + "I have the advantage here I had not counted on. I see by the + papers that the weather in England is very stormy and bad. Now, + though it is showery here, and breezy, it has always allowed me at + some time of the day to draw. The air is tender and soft, + invariably--even when blowing with force; and to-day, I have seen + quite the loveliest sunset I ever yet saw,--one at Boulogne in '61 + was richer; but for delicacy and loveliness nothing of past sight + ever came near this." + +Earlier on the same day he had written: + + + "I am well satisfied with the work I am doing, and even with my own + power of doing it, if only I can keep myself from avariciously + trying to do too much, and working hurriedly. But I can do _very_ + little quite _well_, each day: with that however it is my bounden + duty to be content. + + "And now I have a little piece of news for you. Our old Herne Hill + house being now tenantless, and requiring some repairs before I can + get a tenant, I have resolved to keep it for myself, for my rougher + mineral work and mass of collection; keeping only my finest + specimens at Denmark Hill. My first reason for this, is affection + for the old house:--my second, want of room;--my third, the + incompatibility of hammering, washing, and experimenting on stones + with cleanliness in my stores of drawings. And my fourth is the + power I shall have, when I want to do anything very quietly, of + going up the hill and thinking it out in the old garden, where your + greenhouse still stands, and the aviary--without fear of + interruption from callers. + + "It may perhaps amuse you, in hours which otherwise would be + listless, to think over what may be done with the old house. I have + ordered it at once to be put in proper repair by Mr. Snell; but for + the furnishing, I can give no directions at present: it is to be + very simple, at all events, and calculated chiefly for museum work + and for stores of stones and books: and you really must not set + your heart on having it furnished like Buckingham Palace. + + "I have bought to-day, for five pounds, the front of the porch of + the Church of St. James. It was going to be entirely destroyed. It + is worn away, and has little of its old beauty; but as a remnant of + the Gothic of Abbeville--as I happen to be here--and as the church + was dedicated to my father's patron saint (as distinct from mine) + I'm glad to have got it. It is a low arch--with tracery and + niches, which ivy, and the Erba della Madonna, will grow over + beautifully, wherever I rebuild it." + +At Abbeville he had with him as usual his valet Crawley; and as before +he sent for Downes the gardener, to give him a holiday, and to enjoy his +raptures over every new sight. C.E. Norton came on a short visit, and +Ruskin followed him to Paris, where he met the poet Longfellow (October +7). At last on Monday, 19th October, he wrote: + + + "Only a line to-day, for I am getting things together, and am a + little tired, but very well, and glad to come home, though much + mortified at having failed in half my plans, and done nothing + compared to what I expected. But it is better than if I were + displeased with all I _had_ done. It isn't Turner--and it isn't + Correggio--it isn't even Prout--but it isn't bad." + +Returning home, he gave an account of his autumn's work in the lecture +at the Royal Institution, January 29th, 1869, on the "Flamboyant +Architecture of the Valley of the Somme." This lecture was not then +published in full: but part of the original text is printed in the third +chapter of the work we have next to notice, "The Queen of the Air." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +"THE QUEEN OF THE AIR" (1869) + + +In spite of a "classical education" and the influence of Aristotle upon +the immature art-theories of his earlier works, Ruskin was known, in his +younger days, as a Goth, and the enemy of the Greeks. When he began +life, his sense of justice made him take the side of Modern Painters +against classical tradition. Later on, when considering the great +questions of education and the aims of life, he entirely set aside the +common routine of Greek and Latin grammar as the all-in-all of culture. +But this was not because he shared Carlyle's contempt for classical +studies. + +In "Modern Painters," Vol. III., he had followed out the indications of +nature-worship, and tried to analyse in general terms the attitude of +the Greek spirit towards landscape scenery, as betrayed in Homer and +Aristophanes and the poets usually read. Since that time his interest in +Greek literature had been gradually increasing. He had made efforts to +improve his knowledge of the language; and he had spent many days in +sketching and studying the terra-cottas and vases and coins at the +British Museum. He had also taken up some study of Egyptology, through +Champollion, Bunsen and Birch, in the hope of tracing the origin of +Greek decorative art. Comparative mythology, at that time, was a +department of philology, introduced to the English public chiefly by Max +Müller. Under his influence Ruskin entered step by step upon an inquiry +which afterwards became of singular importance in his life and thought. + +In 1865 he had told his hearers at Bradford that Greek Religion was not, +as commonly supposed, the worship of Beauty, but of Wisdom and Power. +They did not, in their great age, worship "Venus," but Apollo and +Athena. And he regarded their mythology as a sincere tradition, +effective in forming a high moral type, and a great school of art. In +the "Ethics of the Dust" he had explained the myth of Athena as parallel +to that of Neith in Egypt; and in his fable of Neith and St. Barbara he +had hinted at a comparison, on equal terms, of Ancient and Mediæval +mythology. He ended by saying that, though he would not have his young +hearers believe "that the Greeks were better than we, and that their +gods were real angels," yet their art and morals were in some respects +greater, and their beliefs were worth respectful and sympathetic study. +The "Queen of the Air" is his contribution to this study. + +On March 9th, 1869, his lecture at University College, London, on "Greek +Myths of Cloud and Storm," began with an attempt to explain in popular +terms how a myth differs from mere fiction on the one hand and from +allegory on the other, being "not conceived didactically, but didactic +in its essence, as all good art is." He showed that Greek poetry dealt +with the series of Nature-myths with which were interwoven ethical +suggestions; that these were connected with Egyptian beliefs, but that +the full force of them was only developed in the central period of Greek +history, and their interpretation was to be read in a sympathetic +analysis of the spirit of men like Pindar and Æschylus. "The great +question," he said, "in reading a story is, always, not what wild hunter +dreamed, or what childish race first dreaded it; but what wise man first +perfectly told, and what strong people first perfectly lived by it. And +the real meaning of any myth is that which it has at the noblest age of +the nation among whom it was current." + +In the next chapter he worked out, as a sequel to his lecture, two +groups of Animal-myths; those connected with birds, and especially the +dove, as type of Spirit, and those connected with the serpent in its +various significances. These two studies were continued, more or less, +in "Love's Meinie" and in the lecture printed in "Deucalion," as the +third group, that of Plant-myths, was carried on in "Proserpina." The +volume contained also extracts from the lecture on the Architecture of +the Valley of the Somme, and two numbers of the "Cestus of Aglaia," and +closed with a paper on The Hercules of Camarina, read to the South +Lambeth Art School on March 15th. This study of a Greek coin had already +formed the subject of an address at the Working Men's College, and +anticipated the second course of Oxford Lectures. For the rest, "The +Queen of the Air" is marked by its statement, more clearly than before +in Ruskin's writing, of the dependence of moral upon physical life, and +of physical upon moral science. He speaks with respect of the work of +Darwin and Tyndall; but as formerly in the Rede Lecture, and afterwards +in the "Eagle's Nest," he claims that natural science should not be +pursued as an end in itself, paramount to all other conclusions and +considerations; but as a department of study subordinate to ethics, with +a view to utility and instruction. + +Before this book was quite ready for publication, and after a sale of +some of his less treasured pictures at Christie's he left home for a +journey to Italy, to revisit the subjects of "Stones of Venice," as in +1868 he had revisited those of the "Seven Lamps." At Vevey, on the way, +he wrote his preface (May 1st). + +By quiet stages he passed the Simplon, writing from Domo d'Ossola, 5th +May, 1869: + + + "I never yet had so beautiful a day for the Simplon as this has + been; though the skin of my face is burning now all over--to keep + me well in mind of its sunshine. I left Brieg at 6 exactly--light + clouds breaking away into perfect calm of blue. Heavy snow on the + col--about a league--with the wreaths in many places higher than + the carriage. Then, white crocus all over the fields, with + Soldanelle and Primula farinosa. I walked about three miles up, and + seven down, with great contentment; the waterfalls being all in + rainbows, and one beyond anything I ever yet saw; for it fell in a + pillar of spray against shadow behind, and became rainbow + altogether. I was just near enough to get the belt broad, and the + down part of the arch: and the whole fall became orange and violet + against deep shade. To-morrow I hope to get news of you all, at + Baveno." + + "BAVENO, _Thursday, 6th May_, 1869. + + "It is wet this morning, and very dismal, for we are in a ghastly + new Inn, the old one being shut up; and there is always a re-action + after a strong excitement like the beauty of the Simplon yesterday, + which leaves one very dull. But it is of no use growling or mewing. + I hope to be at Milan to-morrow--at Verona for Sunday. I have been + reading Dean Swift's life, and 'Gulliver's Travels' again. Putting + the delight in dirt, which is a mere disease, aside, Swift is very + like me, in most things:--in opinions exactly the same." + +At Milan, next day, he went to see the St. Catherine of Luini which he +had copied, and found it wantonly damaged by the carelessness of masons +who put their ladders up against it, just as if it were a bit of common +whitewashed wall. + +On the 8th he reached Verona after seventeen years' absence, and on the +10th he was in Venice. There, looking at the works of the old painters +with a fresh eye, and with feelings and thoughts far different from +those with which he had viewed them as a young man, in 1845, he saw +beauties he had passed over before, in the works of a painter till then +little regarded by connoisseurs, and entirely neglected by the public. +Historians of art like Crowe and Cavalcaselle[16] had indeed examined +Carpaccio's works and investigated his life, along with the lives and +works of many another obscure master: artists like Hook and Burne-Jones +had admired his pictures; Ruskin had mentioned his backgrounds twice or +thrice in "Stones of Venice." But no writer had noticed his +extraordinary interest as an exponent of the mythology of the Middle +Ages, as the illustrator of poetical folk-lore derived from those +antique myths of Greece, and newly presented by the genius of +Christianity. + +[Footnote 16: Their "History of Painting in North Italy," containing a +detailed account of Carpaccio, was published in 1871.] + +This was a discovery for which Ruskin was now ripe, He saw at once that +he had found a treasure-house of things new and old. He fell in love +with St. Ursula as, twenty-four years earlier, he had fallen in love +with the statue of Ilaria at Lucca; and she became, as time after time +he revisited Venice for her sake, a personality, a spiritual presence, a +living ideal, exactly as the Queen of the Air might have been to the +sincere Athenian in the pagan age of faith. The story of her life and +death became an example, the conception of her character, as read in +Carpaccio's picture, became a standard for his own life and action in +many a time of distress and discouragement. The thought of "What would +St. Ursula say?" led him--not always, but far more often than his +correspondents knew--to burn the letter of sharp retort upon stupidity +and impertinence, and to force the wearied brain and overstrung nerves +into patience and a kindly answer. And later on, the playful credence +which he accorded to the myth deepened into a renewed sense of the +possibility of spiritual realities, when he learnt to look, with those +mediæval believers; once more as a little child upon the unfathomable +mysteries of life. + +But this anticipates the story; at the time, he found in Carpaccio the +man who had touched the full chord of his feelings and his thoughts, +just as, in his boyhood, Turner had led him, marvelling, through the +fire and cloud to the mountain-altar; and as, in his youth, Tintoret had +interpreted the storm and stress of a mind awakening to the terrible +realities of the world. It was no caprice of a changeful taste, nor love +of startling paradox, that brought him to "discover Carpaccio;" it was +the logical sequence of his studies, and widening interests, and a view +of art embracing far broader issues than the connoisseurship of "Modern +Painters," or the didacticism of "Seven Lamps," or the historical +research of "Stones of Venice." + +Soon after the "Queen of the Air" was published Carlyle wrote: + + + "Last week I got y'r 'Queen of the Air,' and read it. _Euge, + Ettge._ No such Book have I met with for long years past. The one + soul now in the world who seems to feel as I do on the highest + matters, and speaks _mir aus dem Herzen_, exactly what I wanted to + hear!-As to the natural history of those old myths I remained here + and there a little uncert'n; but as to the meanings you put into + them, never anywhere. All these things I not only 'agree' with, but + w'd use Thor's Hammer, if I had it, to enforce and put in action on + this rotten world. Well done, well done!--and pluck up a heart, and + continue ag'n and ag'n. And don't say 'most g't tho'ts are dressed + _in shrouds_': many, many are the Phoebus Apollo celestial arrows + you still have to shoot into the foul Pythons, and poisonous + abominable Megatheriums and Plesiosaurians that go staggering ab't, + large as cathedrals, in our sunk Epoch ag'n...." + + + +CHAPTER X + +VERONA AND OXFORD (1869-1870) + + +The main object of this journey was, however, not to study mythology, +but to continue the revision of old estimates of architecture, and after +seventeen years to look with a fresh eye at the subjects of "Stones of +Venice." + +The churches and monuments of Verona had been less thoroughly studied +than those of Venice, and now they were threatened with imminent +restoration. On May 25th he wrote:--"It is very strange that I have just +been in time--after 17 years' delay--to get the remainder of what I +wanted from the red tomb of which my old drawing hangs in the +passage"--(the Castelbarco monument). "To-morrow they put up scaffolding +to retouch, and I doubt not, spoil it for evermore." He succeeded in +getting a delay of ten days, to enable him to paint the tomb in its +original state; but before he went home it "had its new white cap on and +looked like a Venetian gentleman in a pantaloon's mask." He brought away +one of the actual stones of the old roof. + +On June 3 he wrote: + + + "I am getting on well with all my own work; and much pleased with + some that Mr. Bunney is doing for me; so that really I expect to + carry off a great deal of Verona.... The only mischief of the + place is its being too rich. Stones, flowers, mountains--all + equally asking one to look at them; a history to every foot of + ground, and a picture on every foot of wall; frescoes fading away + in the neglected streets--like the colours of the dolphin." + +As assistants in this enterprise of recording the monuments of Venice +and Verona, and of recording them more fully and in a more interesting +way than by photography, he took with him Arthur Burgess and John +Bunney, his former pupils. Mr. Burgess was the subject of a memoir by +Ruskin in the _Century Guild Hobby Horse_ (April, 1887), appreciating +his talents and lamenting his loss. Mr. Bunney, who had travelled with +Ruskin in Switzerland in 1863, and had lately lived near Florence, +thenceforward settled in Venice, where he died in 1882, after completing +his great work, the St. Mark's now in the Ruskin Museum at Sheffield. A +memoir of him by Mr. Wedderburn appeared in the catalogue of the Venice +Exhibition, at the Fine Art Society's Gallery in November, 1882. + +At Venice Ruskin had met his old friend Rawdon Brown[17], and Count +Giberto Borromeo, whom he visited at Milan on his way home, with deep +interest in the Luinis and in the authentic bust of St. Carlo; so +closely resembling Ruskin himself. Another noteworthy encounter is +recorded in a letter of May 4th.[18] + +[Footnote 17: Whose book on the English in Italy (from Venetian +documents) was shortly to be published, with funds supplied by Ruskin.] + +[Footnote 18: This date ought to be "June 4th," as Mr. E.T. Cook notices +(Library Edn. XIX., p. liv.).] + +"As I was drawing in the square this morning, in a lovely, quiet, +Italian, light, there came up the poet Longfellow with his little +daughter--a girl of 12, or 13, with _springy_-curled flaxen +hair,--curls, or waves, that wouldn't come out in damp, I mean. They +stayed talking beside me some time. I don't think it was a very vain +thought that came over me, that if a photograph could have been taken of +the beautiful square of Verona, in that soft light, with Longfellow and +his daughter talking to me at my work--some people both in England and +America would have liked copies of it." + +Readers of "Fors" will recognise an incident noted on the 18th of June. + +"Yesterday, it being quite cool, I went for a walk; and as I came down +from a rather quiet hillside, a mile or two out of town, I past a house +where the women were at work spinning the silk off the cocoons. There +was a sort of whirring sound as in an English mill; but at intervals +they sang a long sweet chant, all together, lasting about two +minutes--then pausing a minute and then beginning again. It was good and +tender music, and the multitude of voices prevented any sense of +failure, so that it was very lovely and sweet, and like the things that +I mean to try to bring to pass." + +For he was already meditating on the thoughts that issued in the +proposals of St. George's Guild, and the daily letters of this summer +are full of allusions to a scheme for a great social movement, as well +as to his plans for the control of Alpine torrents and the better +irrigation of their valleys. On the 2nd of June he wrote:--"I see more +and more clearly every day my power of showing how the Alpine torrents +may be--not subdued--but 'educated.' A torrent is just like a human +creature. Left to gain full strength in wantonness and rage, no power +can any more redeem it: but watch the channels of every early impulse, +and fence _them_, and your torrent becomes the gentlest and most +blessing of servants." + +His mother was anxious for him to come home, being persuaded that he was +overworking himself in the continued heat which his letters reported. +But he was loath to leave Italy, in which, he said, his work for the +future lay. He made two more visits to Venice, to draw some of the +sculptured details, now quickly perishing, and to make studies of +Tintoret and Carpaccio. Among other friends who met him there was Mr. +Holman Hunt, with whom he went round his favourite Scuola di San Rocco +(1st July). Two days later he wrote: + + + "You will never believe it; but I have actually been trying to + draw--a baby. _The_ baby which the priest is holding in the little + copy of Tintoret by Edward Jones which my father liked so much, + over the basin stand in his bedroom.[19] All the knowledge I have + gained in these 17 years only makes me more full of awe and wonder + at Tintoret. But it _is_ so sad--so sad;--no one to care for him + but me, and all going so fast to ruin. He has done that infant + Christ in about five minutes--and I worked for two hours in vain, + and could not tell _why_ in vain--the mystery of his touch is so + great." + +[Footnote 19: Mr. and Mrs Burne-Jones had been in Venice in June, 1862; +the artist, then young and comparatively unknown, with a commission to +copy for Ruskin.] + +Final farewell was said to Verona on the 10th August, for the homeward +journey by the St. Gothard, and Giessbach, where he found the young +friend of 1866 now near her end--and Thun, where he met Professor C.E. +Norton. On the way he wrote: + + + "Lugano, _Saturday, 14th August_, 1869. + + "My Dearest Mother, + + "Yesterday--exactly three months from the day on which I entered + Verona to begin work, I made a concluding sketch of the old + Broletto of Como, which I drew first for the 7 lamps[20]--I know + not how many years ago,--and left Italy, for this time--having been + entirely well and strong every day of my quarter of a year's + sojourn there. + + [Footnote 20: "Stones of Venice," Vol. I., plate 5.] + + "This morning, before breakfast, I was sitting for the first time + before Luini's Crucifixion: for all religious-art qualities the + greatest picture south of the Alps--or rather, in Europe. + + "And just after breakfast I got a telegram from my cousin George + announcing that I am Professor of Art--the first--at the University + of Oxford. + + "Which will give me as much power as I can well use--and would have + given pleasure to my poor father--and therefore to me--once.... It + will make no difference in my general plans, about travel, etc. I + shall think quietly of it as I drive up towards St. Gothard to-day. + + "Ever, my dearest mother, ever your loving son, + + "J. Ruskin." + +Six years earlier, while being examined before the Royal Academy +commission, he had been asked: "Has it ever struck you that it would be +advantageous to art if there were at the universities professors of art +who might give lectures and give instruction to young men who might +desire to avail themselves of it, as you have lectures on geology and +botany?" To which he had replied: "Yes, assuredly. The want of interest +on the part of the upper classes in art has been very much at the bottom +of the abuses which have crept into all systems of education connected +with it. If the upper classes could only be interested in it by being +led into it when young, a great improvement might be looked for, +therefore I feel the expediency of such an addition to the education of +our universities." His interest in the first phase of University +Extension, and his gifts of Turners to Oxford and Cambridge, had shown +that he was ready to go out of his way to help in the cause he had +promoted. His former works on art, and reputation as a critic, pointed +to him as the best qualified man in the country for such a post. He had +been asked by his Oxford friends, who were many and influential, to +stand for the Professorship of Poetry, three years earlier. There was no +doubt that the election would be a popular one, and creditable to the +University. On the other hand, Ruskin as Professor would have a certain +sanction for his teaching, he believed; the title and the salary of £358 +a year were hardly an object to him; but the position, as accredited +lecturer and authorised instructor of youth, opened up new vistas of +usefulness, new worlds of work to conquer; and he accepted the +invitation. On August 10th he was elected Slade Professor. + +He returned home by the end of August to prepare himself for his new +duties. During the last period he had been giving, on an average, half +a dozen lectures a year, which amply filled his annual volume. Twelve +lectures were required of the professor. Many another man would have +read his twelve lectures and gone his way; but he was not going to work +in that perfunctory manner. He undertook to revise his whole teaching; +to write for his hearers a completely new series of treatises on art, +beginning with first principles and broad generalisations, and +proceeding to the different departments of sculpture, engraving, +landscape-painting and so on; then taking up the history of art:--an +encyclopædic scheme. He took this Oxford work not as a substitute for +other occupation, exonerating him from further claims upon his energy +and time; nor as a bye-play that could be slurred. He tried to do it +thoroughly, and to do it in addition to the various work already in +hand, under which, as it was, he used to break down, yearly, after each +climax of effort. + +This autumn and winter, with his first and most important course in +preparation, he was still writing letters to the _Daily Telegraph_; +being begged by Carlyle to come--"the sight of your face will be a +comfort," says the poor old man--and undertaking lectures at the Royal +Artillery Institution, Woolwich, and at the Royal Institution, London. +The Woolwich lecture, given on December 14th, was that added to later +editions of the "Crown of Wild Olive," under the title of "The Future of +England." The other, February 4th, 1870, on "Verona and its Rivers," +involved not only a lecture on art and history and contemporary +political economy, but an exhibition of the drawings which he and his +assistants had made during the preceding summer. + +Four days later he opened a new period in his career with his inaugural +Lecture in the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford. + + + + +BOOK IV + +PROFESSOR AND PROPHET (1870-1900) + + + + +CHAPTER I + +FIRST OXFORD LECTURES (1870-1871) + + +On Tuesday, 8th February, 1870, the Slade Professor's lecture-room was +crowded to over-flowing with members of the University, old and young, +and their friends, who flocked to hear, and to see, the author of +"Modern Painters." The place was densely packed long before the time; +the ante-rooms were filled with personal friends, hoping for some corner +to be found them at the eleventh hour; the doors were blocked open, and +besieged outside by a disappointed multitude. + +Professorial lectures are not usually matters of great excitement: it +does not often happen that the accommodation is found inadequate. After +some hasty arrangements Sir Henry Acland pushed his way to the table, +announced that it was impossible for the lecture to be held in that +place, and begged the audience to adjourn to the Sheldonian Theatre. At +last, welcomed by all Oxford, the Slade Professor appeared, to deliver +his inaugural address.[21] + +[Footnote 21: The inaugural course was given Feb. 8, 16, 23; March 3, 9, +16 and 23, 1870.] + +It was not strictly academic, the way he used to come in, with a little +following of familiars and assistants,--exchange recognition with +friends in the audience, arrange the objects he had brought to +show,--fling off his long sleeved Master's gown, and plunge into his +discourse. His manner of delivery had not altered much since the time of +the Edinburgh Lectures. He used to begin by reading, in his curious +intonation, the carefully-written passages of rhetoric, which usually +occupied only about the half of his hour. By-and-by he would break off, +and with quite another air extemporise the liveliest interpolations, +describing his diagrams or specimens, restating his arguments, +re-enforcing his appeal. His voice, till then artificially cadenced, +suddenly became vivacious; his gestures, at first constrained, became +dramatic. He used to act his subject, apparently without premeditated +art, in the liveliest pantomime. He had no power of voice-mimicry, and +none of the ordinary gifts of the actor. A tall and slim figure, not yet +shortened from its five feet ten or eleven by the habitual stoop, which +ten years later brought him down to less than middle height; a stiff, +blue frock-coat; prominent, half-starched wristbands, and tall collars +of the Gladstonian type; and the bright blue stock which every one knows +for his heraldic bearing: no rings or gewgaws, but a long thin gold +chain to his watch:--plain old-English gentleman, neither fashionable +bourgeois nor artistic mountebank. + +But he gave himself over to his subject with such unreserved intensity +of imaginative power, he felt so vividly and spoke so from the heart, +that he became whatever he talked about, never heeding his professorial +dignity, and never doubting the sympathy of his audience. Lecturing on +birds, he strutted like the chough, made himself wings like the swallow; +he was for the moment a cat, when he explained (not "in scorn") that +engraving was the "art of scratch." If it had been an affectation of +theatric display, we "emancipated school-boys," as the Master of +University used to call us, would have seen through it at once, and +scorned him. But it was so evidently the expression of his intense +eagerness for his subject, so palpably true to his purpose, and he so +carried his hearers with him, that one saw in the grotesque of the +performance only the guarantee of sincerity. + +If one wanted more proof of that, there was his face, still +young-looking and beardless; made for expression, and sensitive to every +change of emotion. A long head, with enormous capacity of brain, veiled +by thick wavy hair, not affectedly lengthy but as abundant as ever, and +darkened into a deep brown, without a trace of grey; and short, light +whiskers growing high over his cheeks. A forehead not on the model of +the heroic type, but as if the sculptor had heaped his clay in handfuls +over the eyebrows, and then heaped more. A big nose, aquiline, and broad +at the base, with great thoroughbred nostrils and the "septum" between +them thin and deeply depressed; and there was a turn down at the corners +of the mouth, and a breadth of lower lip, that reminded one of his +Verona griffin, half eagle, half lion; Scotch in original type, and +suggesting a side to his character not all milk and roses. And under +shaggy eyebrows, ever so far behind, the fieriest blue eyes, that +changed with changing expression, from grave to gay, from lively to +severe; that riveted you, magnetised you, seemed to look through you and +read your soul; and indeed, when they lighted on you, you felt you had a +soul of a sort. What they really saw is a mystery. Some who had not +persuaded them to see as others see, maintained that they only saw what +they looked for; others, who had successfully deceived them, that they +saw nothing. No doubt they might be deceived; but I know now that they +often took far shrewder measurements of men--I do not say of women--than +anybody suspected. + +For the Inaugural Course, he was, so to speak, on his best behaviour, +guarding against too hasty expression of individuality. He read careful +orations, stating his maturest views on the general theory of art, in +picked language, suited to the academic position. The little volume is +not discursive or entertaining, like "Modern Painters," and contains no +pictures either with pen or pencil; but it is crammed full of thought, +and of the results of thought. + +The Slade Professor was also expected to organise and superintend the +teaching of drawing; and his first words in the first lecture expressed +the hope that he would be able to introduce some serious study of Art +into the University, which, he thought, would be a step towards +realising some of his ideals of education. He had long felt that mere +talking about Art was a makeshift, and that no real insight could be got +into the subject without actual and practical dealing with it. He found +a South Kensington School in existence at Oxford, with an able master, +Mr. Alexander Macdonald; and though he did not entirely approve of the +methods in use, tried to make the best of the materials to his hand, +accepting but enlarging the scope of the system. The South Kensington +method had been devised for industrial designing, primarily; Ruskin's +desire was to get undergraduates to take up a wider subject, to +familiarise themselves with the technical excellences of the great +masters, to study nature, and the different processes of art,--drawing, +painting and some forms of decorative work, such as, in especial, +goldsmiths' work, out of which the Florentine school had sprung. He did +not wish to train artists, but, as before in the Working Men's College, +to cultivate the habit of mind that looks at nature and life, not +analytically, as science does, but for the sake of external aspect and +expression. By these means he hoped to breed a race of judicious patrons +and critics, the best service any man can render to the cause of art. + +And so he got together a mass of examples in addition to the Turners +which he had already given to the University galleries. He placed in the +school a few pictures by Tintoret, some drawings by Rossetti, Holman +Hunt, and Burne-Jones, and a great number of fine casts and engravings. +He arranged a series of studies by himself and others, as "copies," +fitted, like the Turners in the National Gallery, with sliding frames +in cabinets for convenient reference and removal. After spending most of +his first Lent Term in this work, he went home for a month to prepare a +catalogue, which was published the same year: the school not being +finally opened until October, 1871. During these first visits to Oxford +he was the guest of Sir Henry Acland; on April 29, 1871, Professor +Ruskin, already honorary student of Christ Church, was elected to an +honorary fellowship at Corpus, and enabled to occupy rooms, vacated by +the Rev. Henry Furneaux, who gave up his fellowship on marrying Mr. +Arthur Severn's twin-sister.[22] + +[Footnote 22: His rooms were in Fellows' buildings, No. 2 staircase, +first floor right.] + +After this work well begun, he went abroad for a vacation tour with a +party of friends--as in 1866; Lady Trevelyan's sister, Mrs. Hilliard, to +chaperone the same young ladies, and three servants with them. They +started on April 27th; stayed awhile at Meurice's to see Paris; and at +Geneva, to go up the Salève, twice, in bitter black east wind. Then +across the Simplon to Milan. After a month at Venice and Verona, where +he recurred to his scheme against inundation, then ridiculed by _Punch_, +but afterwards taken up seriously by the Italians, they went to +Florence, and met Professor Norton. In the end of June they turned +homewards, by Pisa and Lucca, Milan and Como, and went to visit their +friend Marie of the Giessbach. + +At the Giessbach they spent a fortnight, enjoying the July weather and +glorious walks, in the middle of which war was suddenly declared between +Germany and France. The summons of their German waiter to join his +regiment brought the news home to them, as such personal examples do, +more than columns of newspaper print; and as hostilities were rapidly +beginning, Ruskin, with the gloomiest forebodings for the beautiful +country he loved, took his party home straight across France, before the +ways should be closed. + +August was a month of feverish suspense to everybody; to no one more +than to Ruskin, who watched the progress of the armies while he worked +day by day at the British Museum preparing lectures for next term. +This was the course on Greek relief-sculpture, published as "Aratra +Pentelici."[23] It was a happy thought to illustrate his subject +from coins, rather than from disputed and mutilated fragments; +and he worked into it his revised theory of the origin of art--not +Schiller's nor Herbert Spencer's, and yet akin to theirs of the +"Spieltrieb,"--involving the notion of doll-play;--man as a child, +re-creating himself, in a double sense; imitating the creation of the +world and really creating a sort of secondary life in his art, to play +with, or to worship. In the last lecture of the series (published +separately) the Professor compared--as the outcome of classic art in +Renaissance times--Michelangelo and Tintoret, greatly to the +disadvantage of Michelangelo. This heresy against a popular creed served +as text for some severe criticism; but as he said in a prefatory note to +the pamphlet, readers "must observe that its business is only to point +out what is to be blamed in Michael Angelo, and that it assumes the fact +of his power to be generally known," and he referred to Mr. Tyrwhitt's +"Lectures on Christian Art" for the opposite side of the question. + +[Footnote 23: Delivered Nov. 24, 26, Dec. 1, 3, 8 and 10, 1870.] + +Meanwhile the war was raging. Ruskin was asked by his friends to raise +his voice against the ravage of France; but he replied that it was +inevitable. At last, in October, he read how Rosa Bonheur and Edouard +Frère had been permitted to pass through the German lines, and next day +came the news of the bombardment of Strasburg, with anticipations of the +destruction of the Cathedral, library, and picture galleries, +foretelling, as it seemed, the more terrible and irreparable ruin of the +treasure-houses of art in Paris. His heart was with the French, and he +broke silence in the bitterness of his spirit, upbraiding their +disorder and showing how the German success was the victory of "one of +the truest monarchies and schools of honour and obedience yet organised +under heaven." He hoped that Germany, now that she had shown her power, +would withdraw, and demand no indemnity. But that was too much to ask. + +Before long Paris itself became the scene of action, and in January 1871 +was besieged and bombarded. So much of Ruskin's work and affection had +been given to French Gothic that he could not endure to think of his +beloved Sainte Chapelle as being actually under fire--to say nothing of +the horror of human suffering in a siege. He joined Cardinal (then +Archbishop) Manning, Professor Huxley, Sir John Lubbock and James +Knowles in forming a "Paris Food Fund," which shortly united with the +Lord Mayor's committee for the general relief of the besieged. The day +after writing on the Sainte Chapelle he attended the meeting of the +Mansion House, and gave a subscription of £50. He followed events +anxiously through the storm of the Commune and its fearful ending, +angered at the fratricide and anarchy which no Mansion House help could +avert or repair. + +It was no time for talking on art, he felt: instead of the full course, +he could only manage three lectures on landscape, and these not so +completely prepared as to make them ready for printing. Before Christmas +he had been once more to Woolwich, where Colonel Brackenbury invited him +to address the cadets at the prize-giving of the Science and Art +Department, December 13, 1870, in which the Rev. W. Kingsley, an old +friend of Ruskin's and of Turner's, was one of the masters. Two of the +lectures of the "Crown of Wild Olive" had been given there, with more +than usual animation, and enthusiastically received by crowded and +distinguished audiences, among whom was Prince Arthur (the Duke of +Connaught), then at the Royal Military Academy. This time it was the +"Story of Arachne," an address on education and aims in life; opening +with reminiscences of his own childhood, and pleasantly telling the +Greek myths of the spider and the ant, with interpretations for the +times. + +In the three lectures on landscape, given January 20, February 9 and 23, +1871, he dwelt on the necessity of human and historic interest in +scenery; and compared Greek "solidity and veracity" with Gothic +"spirituality and mendacity," Greek chiaroscuro and tranquil activity +with Gothic colour and "passionate rest." Botticelli's "Nativity" (now +in the National Gallery) was then being shown at the Old Master's +Exhibition, and Ruskin took it, along with the works of Cima, as a type +of one form of Greek Art. + +In April, 1871, his cousin, Miss Agnew, who had been seven years at +Denmark Hill, was married to Mr. Arthur Severn. Ruskin, who had added to +his other work the additional labour of "Fors Clavigera," went for a +summer's change to Matlock. July opened with cold, dry, dark weather, +dangerous for out-of-door sketching. One morning early--for he was +always an early riser--he took a chill while painting a spray of wild +roses before breakfast (the drawing now in the Oxford Schools). He was +already overworked, and it ended in a severe attack of internal +inflammation, which nearly cost him his life. He was a difficult patient +to deal with. The local practitioner who attended him used to tell how +he refused remedies, and in the height of the disease asked what would +be _worst_ for him. He took it; and to everybody's surprise, +recovered.[24] + +[Footnote 24: Mrs. Arthur Severn, in a note on the proof, says: "It was +a slice of cold roast beef he hungered for, at Matlock (to our horror, +and dear Lady Mount Temple's, who were nursing him): there was none in +the hotel, and it was late at night; and Albert Goodwin went off to get +some, somewhere, or anywhere. All the hotels were closed; but at last, +at an eating-house in Matlock Bath, he discovered some, and came back +triumphant with it, wrapped up in paper; and J.R. enjoyed his late +supper thoroughly; and though we all waited anxiously till the morning +for the result, it had done no harm! And when he was told pepper was bad +for him, he dredged it freely over his food in defiance! It was directly +after our return to Denmark Hill he got Linton's letter offering him +this place (Brantwood). There are, I believe, ten acres of moor +belonging to Brantwood." Mr. Albert Goodwin, R.W.S., the landscape +painter, travelled, about this time, in Italy with Ruskin.] + +During the illness at Matlock his thoughts reverted to the old +"Iteriad" times of forty years before, when he had travelled with his +parents and cousin Mary from that same "New Bath Hotel," where he was +now lying, to the Lakes; and again he wearied for "the heights that look +adown upon the dale. The crags are lone on Coniston." If he could only +lie down there, he said, he should get well again. + +He had not fully recovered before he heard that W.J. Linton, the poet +and wood-engraver, wished to sell a house and land at the very place: +£1,500, and it could be his. Without question asked he bought it at +once; and as it would be impossible to lecture at Oxford so soon after +his illness, he set off, before the middle of September, with his +friends the Hilliards to visit his new possession. They found a +rough-cast country cottage, old, damp, decayed; smoky chimneyed and +rat-riddled; but "five acres of rock and moor and streamlet; and," he +wrote, "I think the finest view I know in Cumberland or Lancashire, with +the sunset visible over the same." + +The spot was not, even then, without its associations: Gerald Massey the +poet, Linton, and his wife Mrs. Lynn Linton the novelist, Dr. G.W. +Kitchin (Dean of Durham) had lived and worked there, and Linton had +adorned it outside with revolutionary mottoes--"God and the people," and +so on. It had been a favourite point of view of Wordsworth's; his "seat" +was pointed out in the grounds. Tennyson had lived for a while close by: +his "seat," too, was on the hill above Lanehead. + +But the cottage needed thorough repair, and that cost more than +rebuilding, not to speak of the additions of later years, which have +ended by making it into a mansion surrounded by a hamlet. And there was +the furnishing; for Denmark Hill, where his mother lived, was still to +be headquarters. Ruskin gave carte-blanche to the London upholsterer +with whom he had been accustomed to deal; and such expensive articles +were sent that when he came down for a month next autumn, he reckoned +that, all included, his country cottage had cost him not less than +£4,000. + +But he was not the man to spend on himself without sharing his wealth +with others. On November 22nd, Convocation accepted a gift from the +Slade Professor of £5,000 to endow a mastership of drawing at Oxford, in +addition to the pictures and "copies" placed in the schools; he had set +up a relative in business with £15,000, which was unfortunately lost; +and at Christmas he gave £7,000, the tithe of his remaining capital, to +the St. George's Fund; of which more hereafter. + +On November 23rd he was elected Lord Rector of St. Andrew's University, +by 86 votes against 79 for Lord Lytton. After the election it was +discovered that, by the Scottish Universities Act of 1858, no one +holding a professorship at a British University was eligible. Professor +Ruskin was disqualified, and gave no address; and Lord Neaves was chosen +in his place. + +Mrs. Ruskin was now ninety years of age; her sight was nearly gone, but +she still retained her powers of mind, and ruled with severe kindliness +her household and her son. Her old servant Anne had died in March. Anne +had nursed John Ruskin as a baby, and had lived with the family ever +since, devoted to them, and ready for any disagreeable task-- + +"So that she was never quite in her glory," "Præterita" says, "unless +some of us were ill. She had also some parallel speciality for _saying_ +disagreeable things, and might be relied upon to give the extremely +darkest view of any subject, before proceeding to ameliorative action +upon it. And she had a very creditable and republican aversion to doing +immediately, or in set terms, as she was bid; so that when my mother and +she got old together, and my mother became very imperative and +particular about having her teacup set on one side of her little round +table, Anne would observantly and punctiliously put it always on the +other: which caused my mother to state to me, every morning after +breakfast, gravely, that if ever a woman in this world was possessed by +the Devil, Anne was that woman." + +But this gloomy Calvinism was tempered with a benevolence quite as +uncommon. It was from his parents that Ruskin learned never to turn off +a servant, and the Denmark Hill household was as easy-going as the +legendary "baronial" retinue of the good old times. A young friend asked +Mrs. Ruskin, in a moment of indiscretion, what such a one of the ancient +maids did--for there were several without apparent occupation about the +house. Mrs. Ruskin drew herself up and said, "She, my dear, puts out the +dessert." + +And yet, in her blindness, she could read character unhesitatingly. That +was, no doubt, why people feared her. When Mr. Secretary Howell, in the +days when he was still the oracle of the Ruskin-Rossetti circle, had +been regaling them with his wonderful tales, after dinner, she would +throw her netting down and say, "How _can you_ two sit there and listen +to such a pack of lies?" She objected strongly, in these later years, to +the theatre; and when sometimes her son would wish to take a party into +town to see the last new piece, her permission had to be asked, and was +not readily granted, unless to Miss Agnew, who was the ambassadress in +such affairs of diplomacy. But while disapproving of some of his worldly +ways, and convinced that she had too much indulged his childhood, the +old lady loved him with all the intensity of the strange fierce lioness +nature, which only one or two had ever had a glimpse of. And when +(December 5th, 1871) she died, trusting to see her husband again--not to +be near him, not to be so high in heaven but content if she might only +_see_ him, she said--her son was left "with a surprising sense of +loneliness." He had loved her truly, obeyed her strictly and tended her +faithfully; and even yet hardly realized how much she had been to him. +He buried her in his father's grave, and wrote upon it, "Here beside my +father's body I have laid my mother's: nor was dearer earth ever +returned to earth, nor purer life recorded in heaven." + + + + +CHAPTER II + +"FORS" BEGUN (1871-1872) + + +On January 1st, 1871, was issued a small pamphlet, headed "Fors +Clavigera," in the form of a letter to the working men and labourers of +England, dated from Denmark Hill, and signed "John Ruskin." It was not +published in the usual way, but sold by the author's engraver, Mr. +George Allen, at Heathfield Cottage, Keston, Kent. It was not +advertised; press-copies were sent to the leading papers; and of course +the author's acquaintance knew of its publication. Strangers, who heard +of this curious proceeding, spread the report that in order to get +Ruskin's latest, you had to travel into the country, with your +sevenpence in your hand, and transact your business among Mr. Allen's +beehives. So you had, if you wanted to see what you were buying; for no +arrangements were made for its sale by the booksellers: sevenpence a +copy, carriage paid, no discount, and no abatement on taking a quantity. + +By such pilgrimages, but more easily through the post, the new work +filtered out, in monthly instalments, to a limited number of buyers. +After three years the price was raised to tenpence. In 1875 the first +thousands of the earlier numbers were sold: "the public has a very long +nose," Mr. Ruskin once said, "and scents out what it wants, sooner or +later." A second edition was issued, bound up into yearly volumes, of +which eight were ultimately completed. Meanwhile the work went on, +something in the style of the old Addison _Spectator_; each part +containing twenty pages, more or less, by Ruskin, with added +contributions from various correspondents. + +The charm of "Fors" is neither in epigram nor in anecdote, but in the +sustained vivacity that runs through the texture of the work; the +reappearance of golden threads of thought, glittering in new figures, +and among new colours; and throughout all the variety of subject a unity +of style unlike the style of his earlier works, where flowery rhetorical +passages are tagged to less interesting chapters, separately studied +sermonettes interposed among the geology, and Johnson, Locke, Hooker, +Carlyle--or whoever happened to be the author he was reading at the +time--frankly imitated. It was always clever, but often artificial; like +the composition of a Renaissance painter who inserts his _bel corpo +ignudo_ to catch the eye. In "Fors," however, the web is of a piece, all +sparkling with the same life; though as it is gradually unwound from the +loom it is hard to judge the design. That can only be done when it is +reviewed as a whole. + +At the time, his mingling of jest and earnest was misunderstood even by +friends. The author learnt too painfully the danger of seeming to trifle +with cherished beliefs. He forswore levity, but soon relapsed into the +old style, out of sheer sincerity: for he was too much in earnest not to +be frankly himself in his utterances, without writing up to, or down to, +any other person's standard. + +Ruskin did not wish to lead a colony or to head a revolution. He had +been pondering for fifteen years the cause of poverty and crime, and the +conviction had grown upon him that modern commercialism was at the root +of it all. But his attacks on commercialism--his analysis of its bad +influence on all sections of society--were too vigorous and +uncompromising for the newspaper editors who received "Fors," and even +for most of his private friends. There were, however, some who saw what +he was aiming at: and let it be remarked that his first encouragement +came from the highest quarters. Just as Sydney Smith, the chief critic +of earlier days, had been the first to praise "Modern Painters," in the +teeth of vulgar opinion, so now Carlyle spoke for "Fors." + +"5, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, _April 30th_, 1871. + +"Dear Ruskin, + +"This 'Fors Clavigera,' Letter 5th, which I have just finished reading, +is incomparable; a quasi-sacred consolation to me, which almost brings +tears into my eyes! Every word of it is as if spoken, not out of my poor +heart only, but out of the eternal skies; words winged with Empyrean +wisdom, piercing as lightning,--and which I really do not remember to +have heard the like of. _Continue_, while you have such utterances in +you, to give them voice. They will find and force entrance into human +hearts, _whatever_ the 'angle of incidence' may be; that is to say, +whether, for the degraded and _in_ human Blockheadism we, so-called +'men,' have mostly now become, you come in upon them at the broadside, +at the top, or even at the bottom. Euge, Euge!--Yours ever, + +"T. Carlyle." + +Others, like Sir Arthur Helps, joined in this encouragement. But the old +struggle with the newspapers began over again. + +They united in considering the whole business insane, though they did +not doubt his sincerity when Ruskin put down his own money, the tenth of +what he had, as he recommended his adherents to do. By the end of the +year he had set aside £7,000 toward establishing a company to be called +of "St. George," as representing at once England and agriculture. Sir +Thomas Dyke Acland and the Right Hon. W. Cowper-Temple (afterwards Lord +Mount Temple), though not pledging themselves to approval of the scheme, +undertook the trusteeship of the fund. A few friends subscribed; in +June, 1872, after a year and a half of "Fors," the first stranger sent +in his contribution, and at the end of three years £236 13s. were +collected, to add to his £7,000, and a few acres of land were given. + +Meanwhile Ruskin practised what he preached. He did not preach +renunciation; he was not a Pessimist any more than an Optimist. +Sometimes he felt he was not doing enough; he knew very well that others +thought so. I remember his saying, in his rooms at Oxford in one of +those years: "Here I am, trying to reform the world, and I suppose I +ought to begin with myself, I am trying to do St. Benedict's work, and I +ought to be a saint. And yet I am living between a Turkey carpet and a +Titian, and drinking as much tea"--taking his second cup--"as I can +_swig_!" + +That was the way he put it to an undergraduate; to a lady friend he +wrote later on, "I'm reading history of early saints, too, for my Amiens +book, and feel that I ought to be scratched, or starved, or boiled, or +something unpleasant; and I don't know if I'm a saint or a sinner in the +least, in mediæval language. How did the saints feel themselves, I +wonder, about their saintship!" + +If he had forsaken all and followed the vocation of St. Francis,--he has +discussed the question candidly in "Fors" for May, 1874--would not his +work have been more effectual, his example more inspiring? Conceivably: +but that was not his mission. His gospel was not one of asceticism; it +called upon no one for any sort of suicide, or even martyrdom. He +required of his followers that they should live their lives to the full +in "Admiration, Hope and Love": and not that they should sacrifice +themselves in fasting and wearing of camels'-hair coats. He wished them +to work, to be honest, and just, in all things immediately attainable. +He asked the tenth of their living--not the widow's two mites; and it +was deeply painful to him to find, sometimes, that they had so +interpreted his teaching: as when he wrote, later, to Miss Beever: + + + "One of my poor 'Companions of St. George' who has sent me, not a + widow's but a parlour-maid's (an old schoolmistress) 'all her + living,' and whom I found last night, dying, slowly and quietly, in + a damp room, just the size of your study (which her landlord won't + mend the roof of), by the light of a single tallow candle,--dying, + I say, _slowly_ of consumption, not yet near the end, but + contemplating it with sorrow, mixed partly with fear lest she + should not have done all she could for her children! The sight of + this and my own shameful comforts, three wax candles and blazing + fire and dry roof, and Susie and Joanie for friends! Oh me, Susie, + what _is_ to become of me in the next world, who have in this life + all my good things!" + +After carrying on "Fors" for some time his attention was drawn by Mr. +W.C. Sillar to the question of "Usury." At first he had seen no crying +sin in Interest. He had held that the "rights of capital" were +visionary, and that the tools should belong to him that can handle them, +in a perfect state of society; but he thought that the existing system +was no worse in this respect than in others, and his expectation of +reform in the plan of investment went hand-in-hand with his hope of a +good time coming in everything else. So he quietly accepted his rents, +as he accepted his Professorship, for example, thinking it his business +to be a good landlord and spend his money generously, just as he thought +it his business to retain the existing South Kensington drawing school, +and the Oxford system of education--not at all his ideal--and to make +the best use of them. + +A lady who was his pupil in drawing, and a believer in his ideals of +philanthropy, Miss Octavia Hill, undertook to help him in 1864 in +efforts to reclaim part--though a very small part--of the lower-class +dwellings of London. Half a dozen houses in Marylebone left by Ruskin's +father, to which he added three more in Paradise Place, as it was +euphemistically named, were the subjects of their experiment. They were +ridiculed at first; but by the noblest endeavour they succeeded, and set +an example which has been followed in many of our towns with great +results. They showed what a wise and kind landlord could do by caring +for tenants, by giving them habitable dwellings, recreation ground and +fixity of tenure, and requiring in return a reasonable and moderate +rent. He got five per cent. for his capital, instead of twelve or more, +which such property generally returns, or at that time returned. + +But when he began to write against rent and interest there were plenty +of critics ready to cite this and other investments as a damning +inconsistency. He was not the man to offer explanations at any time. It +was no defence to say that he took less and did more than other +landlords. And so he was glad to part with the whole to Miss Hill; nor +did he care to spend upon himself the £3,500, which I believe was the +price. It went right and left in gifts; till one day he cheerfully +remarked: + + "It's a' gane awa' + Like snaw aff a wa'." + +"Is there really nothing to show for it?" he was asked. "Nothing," he +said, "except this new silk umbrella." + +He had talked so much of the possibility of carrying on honest and +honourable retail trade, that he felt bound to exemplify his principles. +He took a house No. 19, Paddington Street, with a corner shop, near his +Marylebone property, and set himself up in business as a teaman. Mr. +Arthur Severn painted the sign, in neat blue letters; the window was +decked with fine old china, bought from a Cavaliere near Siena, whose +unique collection had been introduced to notice by Professor Norton; and +Miss Harrie Tovey, an old servant of Denmark Hill, was established +there, like Miss Mattie in "Cranford," or rather like one of the +salaried officials of "Time and Tide," to dispense the unadulterated +leaf to all comers. No advertisements, no self-recommendation, no +catchpenny tricks of trade were allowed; and yet the business went on, +and, I am assured, prospered with legitimate profits. At first, various +kinds of the best tea only were sold; but it seemed to the tenant of the +shop that coffee and sugar ought to be included in the list. This was +not at all in Ruskin's programme, and there were great debates at home +about it. At last he gave way, on the understanding that the shop was to +be responsible for the proper roasting of the coffee according to the +best recipe. After some time Miss Tovey died. And when, in the autumn of +1876, Miss Octavia Hill proposed to take the house and business over and +work it with the rest of the Marylebone property, the offer was +thankfully accepted. + +Another of his principles was cleanliness; "the speedy abolition of all +abolishable filth is the first process of education." He undertook to +keep certain streets, not crossings only, cleaner than the public seemed +to care for, between the British Museum and St. Giles'. He took the +broom himself, for a start, put on his gardener, Downes, as foreman of +the job, and engaged a small staff of helpers. The work began, as he +promised, in a humorous letter to the _Pall Matt Gazette_ upon New +Year's Day, 1872, and he kept his three sweepers at work for eight hours +daily "to show a bit of our London streets kept as clean as the deck of +a ship of the line." + +There were some difficulties, too. One of the staff was an extremely +handsome and lively shoeblack, picked up in St. Giles'. It turned out +that he was not unknown to the world: he had sat to artists--to Mr. +Edward Clifford, to Mr. Severn; and went by the name of "Cheeky." Every +now and then Ruskin "and party" drove round to inspect the works. +Downes could not be everywhere at once: and Cheeky used to be caught at +pitch and toss or marbles in unswept Museum Street. Ruskin rarely, if +ever, dismissed a servant; but street sweeping was not good enough for +Cheeky, and so he enlisted. The army was not good enough, and so he +deserted; and was last seen disappearing into the darkness, after +calling a cab for his old friends one night at the Albert Hall. + +One more escapade of this most unpractical man, as they called him. +Since his fortune was rapidly melting away, he had to look to his works +as an ultimate resource: they eventually became his only means of +livelihood. One might suppose that he would be anxious to put his +publishing business on the most secure and satisfactory footing; to +facilitate sale, and to ensure profit. But he had views. He objected to +advertising; though he thought that in his St. George's Scheme he would +have a yearly Book Gazette drawn up by responsible authorities, +indicating the best works. He distrusted the system of _unacknowledged_ +profits and percentages, though he fully agreed that the retailer should +be paid for his work, and wished, in an ideal state, to see the +shopkeeper a salaried official. He disliked the bad print and paper of +the cheap literature of that day, and knew that people valued more +highly what they did not get so easily. He had changed his mind with +regard to one or two things--religion and glaciers chiefly--about which +he had written at length in earlier works. + +So he withdrew his most popular books--"Modern Painters" and the +rest--from circulation, though he was persuaded by the publisher to +reprint "Modern Painters" and "Stones of Venice" once more--"positively +for the last time," as they said the plates would give no more good +impressions. He had his later writings printed in a rather expensive +style; at first through Smith & Elder, after two years by Messrs. Watson +& Hazell (later Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ltd.), and the method of +publication is illustrated in the history of "Sesame and Lilies," the +first volume of these "collected works." It was issued by Smith & +Elder, May, 1871, at 7s., to the trade only, leaving the retailer to fix +the price to the public. In September, 1872, the work was also supplied +by Mr. George Allen, and the price raised to 9s.6d., (carriage paid) +to trade and public alike, with the idea that an extra shilling, or +nearly ten per cent., might be added by the bookseller for his trouble +in ordering the work. If he did not add the commission, that was his own +affair; though with postage of order and payment, when only one or two +copies at a time were asked for, this did not leave much margin. So it +was doubled, by the simple expedient of doubling the price!--or, to be +accurate, raising it to 18s. (carriage paid) for 20s. over the counter. +It was freely prophesied by business men that this would not do: +however, at the end of fifteen years the _sixth edition_ of this work in +this form was being sold, in spite of the fact that, five years before, +a smaller reprint of the same book had been brought out at 5s., and was +then in its fourth edition of 3,000 copies each. + +Compared with the enormous sale of sensational novels and school books, +this is no great matter; but for a didactic work, offered to the public +without advertisement, and in the face of the almost universal +opposition of the book-selling trade, it means not only that, as an +author, Ruskin had made a secure reputation, but also that he deserved +the curious tribute once paid him by the journal of a big modern shop +(Compton House, Liverpool) as a "great tradesman." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +OXFORD TEACHING (1872-1875) + + +Early in 1872, after bringing out "Munera Pulveris," the essays he had +written ten years before for _Fraser_ on economy; after getting those +street-sweepers to work near the British Museum where he was making +studies of animals and Greek sculpture; and after once more addressing +the Woolwich cadets, this time[25] on the Bird of Calm (the mythology of +the Halcyon), Professor Ruskin went to Oxford to give a course of ten +lectures[26] on the Relation of Natural Science to Art, afterwards +published under the title of "The Eagle's Nest." He wrote to Professor +Norton: + +[Footnote 25: January 13, 1872.] + +[Footnote 26: Feb. 8, 10, 15, 17, 22, 24. 29; March 2, 7, and 9.] + + + "I am, as usual, unusually busy. When I get fairly into my lecture + work at Oxford I always find the lecture would come better some + other way, just before it is given, and so work from hand to mouth. + I am always unhappy, and see no good in saying so. But I am + settling to my work here--recklessly--to do my best with it: + feeling quite sure that it is talking at hazard for what chance + good may come. But I attend regularly in the schools as mere + drawing-master, and the men begin to come in one by one, about + fifteen or twenty already; several worth having as pupils in any + way, being of temper to make good growth of." + +Why was he always unhappy? It was not that Mr. W.B. Scott criticised +"Ruskin's influence" in that March; or that by Easter he had to say +farewell to his old home on Denmark Hill, and settle "for good" at +Brantwood. Nor that he could go abroad again for a long summer in Italy +with Mr. and Mrs. Severn and the Hilliards and Mr. Albert Goodwin. They +started about the middle of April, and on the journey out he wrote, +beside his "Fors" which always went on, a preface to the Rev. R. St. +John Tyrwhitt's "Christian Art and Symbolism." He drew the Apse at Pisa, +half-amused and half-worried by the little ragamuffin who varied the +tedium of watching his work by doing horizontal-bar tricks on the +railings of the Cathedral green. Then to Lucca, where, to show his +friends something of Italian landscape, he took them for rambles through +the olive farms and chestnut woods, among which Miss Hilliard lost her +jewelled cross. Greatly to Ruskin's delight, as a firm believer in +Italian peasant-virtue, it was found and returned without hint of +reward. + +At Rome they visited old Mr. Severn, and then went homeward by way of +Verona, where Ruskin wrote an account of the Cavalli monuments for the +Arundel society, and Venice, where he returned to the study of +Carpaccio. At Rome he had been once more to the Sistine, and found that +on earlier visits the ceiling and the Last Judgment had taken his +attention too exclusively. Now that he could look away from Michelangelo +he become conscious of the claims of Botticelli's frescoes, which +represent, in the Florentine school, somewhat the same kind of interest +that he had found in Carpaccio. He became enamoured of Botticelli's +Zipporah, and resolved to study the master more closely. On reaching +home he had to prepare "The Eagle's Nest" for publication; in the +preface he gave special importance to Botticelli, and amplified it in +lectures on early engraving, that Autumn;[27] in which I remember his +quoting with appreciation the passage on the Venus Anadyomene from +Pater's "Studies in the Renaissance" just published. + +[Footnote 27: "Ariadne Florentina," delivered on Nov. 2, 9, 16, 23, 30, +and Dec. 7, and repeated on the following Thursdays. Ruskin's first +mention of Botticelli was in the course on Landscape, Lent Term, 1871.] + +This sudden enthusiasm about an unknown painter amused the Oxford +public: and it became a standing joke among the profane to ask who was +Ruskin's last great man. It was in answer to that, and in expression of +a truer understanding than most Oxford pupils attained, that Bourdillon +of Worcester wrote on "the Ethereal Ruskin,"--that was Carlyle's name +for him:-- + + "To us this star or that seems bright, + And oft some headlong meteor's flight + Holds for awhile our raptured sight. + + "But he discerns each noble star; + The least is only the most far, + Whose worlds, may be, the mightiest are." + +The critical value of this course however, to a student of art-history, +is impaired by his using as illustrations of Botticelli, and of the +manner of engraving which he took for standard, certain plates which +were erroneously attributed to the artist. "It is strange," he wrote in +despair to Professor Norton, "that I hardly ever get anything stated +without some grave mistake, however true in my main discourse." But in +this case a fate stronger than he had taken him unawares. The +circumstances do not extenuate the error of the Professor, but they +explain the difficulties under which his work was done. The cloud that +rested on his own life was the result of a strange and wholly unexpected +tragedy in another's. + +It was an open secret--his attachment to a lady, who had been his pupil, +and was now generally understood to be his _fiancée_. She was far +younger than he; but at fifty-three he was not an old man; and the +friends who fully knew and understood the affair favoured his intentions +and joined in the hope, and in auguries for the happiness for which he +had been so long waiting. But now that it came to the point the lady +finally decided that it was impossible. He was not at one with her in +religious matters. He could speak lightly of her evangelical creed--it +seemed he scoffed in "Fors" at her faith. She could not be unequally +yoked with an unbeliever. To her, the alternative was plain; the choice +was terrible: yet, having once seen her path, she turned resolutely +away.[28] + +[Footnote 28: In former editions the following sentence was added: +"Three years after, as she lay dying, he begged to see her once more. +She sent to ask whether he could yet say that he loved God better than +he loved her; and when he said 'No,' her door was closed upon him for +ever." The statement was suggested by information from Ruskin in later +days. I must, however, have misrepresented the facts, as the lady's +mother has left it in writing that no such incident occurred.] + +Meanwhile, in the bitterest despair he sought refuge as he had done +before, in his work. He accepted the lesson, though he, too, could not +recant; still he tried to correct his apparent levity in the renewed +seriousness and more earnest tone of "Fors," speaking more plainly and +more simply, but without concession. He wrote on the next Christmas Eve +to an Aberdeen Bible-class teacher: + + + "If you care to give your class a word directly from me, say to + them that they will find it well, throughout life, never to trouble + themselves about what they ought _not_ to do, but about what they + _ought_ to do. The condemnation given from the Judgment + Throne--most solemnly described--is all for the _undones_ and not + for the _dones_. People are perpetually afraid of doing wrong; but + unless they are doing its reverse energetically, they do it all day + long, and the degree does not matter. Make your young hearers + resolve to be honest in their work in this life. Heaven will take + care of them for the other." + +That was all he could say: he did not _know_ there was another life: he +_hoped_ there was: and yet, if he were not a saint or a Christian, was +there any man in the world who was nearer to the kingdom of Heaven than +this stubborn heretic? + +His heretical attitude was singular. He was just as far removed from +adopting the easy antagonism of science to religion as from siding with +religion against science. In a paper singularly interesting--and in his +biography important--on the "Nature and Authority of Miracle," read to +the Metaphysical Society (February 11, 1873), he tried to clear up his +position and to state a qualified belief in the supernatural. + +With that year expired the term for which he had been elected to the +Slade Professorship, and in January 1873 he was re-elected. In his first +three years he had given five courses of lectures designed to introduce +an encyclopædic review and reconstruction of all he had to say upon art. +Beginning with general principles, he had proceeded to their application +in history, by tracing certain phases of Greek sculpture, and by +contrasting the Greek and the Gothic spirit as shown in the treatment of +landscape, from which he went on to the study of early engraving. The +application of his principles to theory was made in the course on +Science and Art ("The Eagle's Nest"). Now, on his re-election, he +proceeded to take up these two sides of his subject, and to illustrate +this view of the right way to apply science to art, by a course on +Birds, in Nature, Art and Mythology, and next year by a study of Alpine +forms. The historical side was continued with lectures on Niccola Pisano +and early Tuscan sculpture, and in 1874 with an important, though +unpublished, course on Florentine Art. + +It is to this cycle of lectures that we must look for that matured +Ruskinian theory of art which his early works do not reach; and which +his writings between 1860 and 1870 do not touch. Though the Oxford +lectures are only a fragment of what he ought to have done, they should +be sufficient to a careful reader; though their expression is sometimes +obscured by diffuse treatment, they contain the root of the matter, +thought out for fifteen years since the close of the more brilliant, but +less profound, period of "Modern Painters." + +The course on Birds[29] was given in the drawing school at the +University Galleries. The room was not large enough for the numbers that +crowded to hear Professor Ruskin, and each of these lectures, like the +previous and the following courses, had to be repeated to a second +audience. Great pains had been given to their preparation--much greater +than the easy utterance and free treatment of his theme led his hearers +to believe. For these lectures and their sequel, published as "Love's +Meinie," he collected an enormous number of skins--to compare the +plumage and wings of different species; for his work was with the +_outside_ aspect and structure of birds, not with their anatomy. He had +models made, as large as swords, of the different quill-feathers, to +experiment on their action and resistance to the air. He got a valuable +series of drawings by H.S. Marks, R.A., and made many careful and +beautiful studies himself of feathers and of birds at the Zoological +Gardens, and the British Museum; and after all, he had to conclude his +work saying, "It has been throughout my trust that if death should write +on these, 'What this man began to build, he was not able to finish,' God +may also write on them, not in anger, but in aid, 'A stronger than he +cometh.'" + +[Footnote 29: March 15, May 2 and 9; repeated March 19, May 5, and 12, +1873.] + +Two of the lectures on birds were repeated at Eton[30] before the boys' +Literary and Scientific Society and their friends; and between this and +1880 Ruskin often went to address the same audience, with the same +interest in young people that had taken him in earlier years to +Woolwich. + +[Footnote 30: May 10 and 17.] + +After a long vacation at Brantwood, the first spent there, he went up to +give his course on Early Tuscan Art ("Val d'Arno")[31]. The lectures +were printed separately and sold at the conclusion and the first numbers +were sent to Carlyle, whose unabated interest in his friend's work was +shown in his letter of Oct. 31st: "_Perge, perge_;--and, as the Irish +say, 'more power to your elbow!' I have yet read this 'Val d'Arno' only +once. Froude snatched it away from me yesterday; and it has then to go +to my brother at Dumfries. After that I shall have it back...." + +[Footnote 31: On Mondays and Thursdays, Oct. 21, 23, 27, 30, Nov. 3, 6, +10, 13, 17, 20; repeated on the Wednesdays and Fridays following.] + +During that summer and autumn Ruskin suffered from nights of +sleeplessness or unnaturally vivid dreams and days of unrest and +feverish energy, alternating with intense fatigue. The eighteen lectures +in less than six weeks, a "combination of prophecy and play-acting," as +Carlyle had called it in his own case, and the unfortunate discussion +with an old-fashioned economist who undertook to demolish Ruskinism +without understanding it, added to the causes of which we are already +aware, brought him to New Year, 1874, in "failing strength, care, and +hope." He sought quiet at the seaside, but found modern hotel-life +intolerable; he went back to town and tried the pantomimes for +distraction,--saw Kate Vaughan in Cinderella, and Violet Cameron in Jack +in the Box, over and over again, and found himself: + + + "Now hopelessly a man of the world!--of that woeful outside one, I + mean. It is now Sunday; half-past eleven in the morning. Everybody + else is gone to church--and I am left alone with the cat, in the + world of sin." + +Thinking himself better, he went to Oxford, and announced a course on +Alpine form; but after a week was obliged to retreat and go home to +Coniston, still hoping to return and give his lectures. But it was no +use. The gloom without deepened the gloom within; and he took the wisest +course in trying Italy, alone this time with his old servant Crawley. + +The greater part of 1874 was spent abroad--first travelling through +Savoy and by the Riviera to Assisi, where he wrote to Miss S. Beever: + + + "The Sacristan gives me my coffee for lunch in his own little cell, + looking out on the olive woods; then he tells me stories of + conversions and miracles, and then perhaps we go into the sacristy + and have a reverent little poke-out of relics. Fancy a great carved + cupboard in a vaulted chamber full of most precious things (the + box which the Holy Virgin's veil used to be kept in, to begin + with), and leave to rummage in it at will! Things that are only + shown twice in the year or so, with fumigation! all the + congregation on their knees--and the sacristan and I having a great + heap of them on the table at once, like a dinner service. I really + looked with great respect on St. Francis's old camel-hair dress." + +Thence he went to visit Colonel and Mrs. Yule at Palermo, deeply +interested in Scylla and Charybdis, Etna and the metopes of Selinus. His +interest in Greek art had been shown, not only in a course of lectures, +but in active support to archæological explorations. He said once, "I +believe heartily in diggings, of all sorts." Meeting General L.P. di +Cesnola and hearing of the wealth of ancient remains in Cyprus then +newly discovered, Mr. Ruskin placed £1,000 at his disposal. General di +Cesnola was able, in April, 1875, to announce that in spite of the +confiscation of half the treasure-trove by the local Government, he had +shipped a cargo of antiquities, including many vases, terra-cottas, and +fragments of sculpture. Whence, precisely, these relics came is now +doubtful. + +The landscape of Theocritus and the remains of ancient glories roused +him to energetic sketching--a sign of returning strength, which +continued when he reached Rome, and enabled him to make a very fine copy +of Botticelli's Zipporah, and other details of the Sistine frescoes. + +Late in October he reached England, just able to give the promised +Lectures on Alpine forms,[32]--I remember his curious attempt to +illustrate the névé-masses by pouring flour on a model;--and a second +course on the Æsthetic and Mathematic schools of Florence;[33] and a +lecture on Botticelli at Eton, of which the Literary and Scientific +Society's minute-book contains the following report: + +[Footnote 32: Oct. 27, 30; Nov. 3 and 6, 1874.] + +[Footnote 33: Nov. 10, 13, 17, 20, 24, 27; Dec. 1 and 4, 1874.] + + + "On Saturday, Dec. 12th (1874), Professor Ruskin lectured before a + crowded, influential and excited audience, which comprised our + noble Society and a hundred and thirty gentlemen and ladies, who + eagerly accepted an invitation to hear Professor Ruskin 'talk' to + us on Botticelli. It is utterly impossible for the unfortunate + secretary of the Society to transmit to writing even an abstract of + this address; and it is some apology for him when beauty of + expression, sweetness of voice, and elegance in imagery defy the + utmost efforts of the pen." + +Just before leaving for Italy he had been told that the Royal Institute +of British Architects intended to present him with their Gold Medal in +acknowledgment of his services to the cause of architecture; and during +his journey official announcement of the award reached him. He dictated +from Assisi (June 12, 1874) a letter to Sir Gilbert Scott, explaining +why he declined the honour intended him. He said in effect that if it +had been offered at a time when he had been writing on architecture it +would have been welcome; but it was not so now that he felt all his +efforts to have been in vain and the profession as a body engaged in +work--such as the "restoration" of ancient buildings--with which he had +no sympathy. It had been represented to him that his refusal to accept a +Royal Medal would be a reflection upon the Royal donor. To which he +replied: + + + "Having entirely loyal feelings towards the Queen, I will trust to + her Majesty's true interpretation of my conduct; but if formal + justification of it be necessary for the public, would plead that + if a Peerage or Knighthood may without disloyalty be refused, + surely much more the minor grace proceeding from the monarch may be + without impropriety declined by any of her Majesty's subjects who + wish to serve her without reward, under the exigency of peculiar + circumstances." + +It was only the term before that Prince Leopold had been at Oxford, a +constant attendant on Ruskin's lectures, and a visitor to his drawing +school. The gentle prince, with his instinct for philanthropy, was not +to be deterred by the utterances of "Fors" from respecting the genius of +the Professor; and the Professor, with his old-world, cavalier loyalty, +readily returned the esteem and affection of his new pupil. A sincere +friendship was formed, lasting until the Prince's death. + +In June, 1875, Princess Alice and her husband, with Prince Arthur and +Prince Leopold, were at Oxford. Ruskin had just made arrangements +completing his gifts to the University galleries and schools. The Royal +party showed great interest in the Professor and his work. The Princess, +the Grand Duke of Hesse, and Prince Leopold acted as witnesses to the +deed of gift, and Prince Arthur and Prince Leopold accepted the +trusteeship. + +With all the Slade Professor's generosity, the Ruskin drawing school, +founded in these fine galleries to which he had so largely contributed, +in a palatial hall handsomely furnished, and hung with Tintoret and +Luini, Burne-Jones and Rossetti, and other rare masters, ancient and +modern; with the most interesting examples to copy--at the most +convenient of desks, we may add--yet in spite of it all, the drawing +school was not a popular institution. When the Professor was personally +teaching, he got some fifteen or twenty--if not to attend, at any rate +to join. But whenever the chief attraction could not be counted on, the +attendance sank to an average of two or three. The cause was simple. An +undergraduate is supposed to spend his morning in lectures, his +afternoon in taking exercise, and his evening in college. There is +simply no time in his scheme for going to a drawing school. If it were +recognised as part of the curriculum, if it counted in any way along +with other studies, or contributed to a "school" akin to that of music, +practical art might become teachable at Oxford; and Professor Ruskin's +gifts and endowments--to say nothing of his hopes and plans--would not +be wholly in vain. + +As he could not make the undergraduates draw, he made them dig. He had +noticed a very bad bit of road on the Hinksey side, and heard that it +was nobody's business to mend it: meanwhile the farmers' carts and +casual pedestrians were bemired. He sent for his gardener Downes, who +had been foreman of the street-sweepers; laid in a stock of picks and +shovels; took lessons in stone-breaking himself, and called on his +friends to spend their recreation times in doing something useful. + +Many of the disciples met at the weekly open breakfasts at the +Professor's rooms in Corpus; and he was glad of a talk to them on other +things beside drawing and digging. Some were attracted chiefly by the +celebrity of the man, or by the curiosity of his humorous discourse; but +there were a few who partly grasped one side or other of his mission and +character. The most brilliant undergraduate of the time, seen at this +breakfast table, but not one of the diggers, was W.H. Mallock, +afterwards widely known as the author of "Is Life Worth Living?" He was +the only man. Professor Ruskin said, who really understood +him--referring to "The New Republic." But while Mallock saw the +reactionary and pessimistic side of his Oxford teacher, there was a +progressist and optimistic side which does not appear in his "Mr. +Herbert." That was discovered by another man whose career, short as it +was, proved even more influential. Arnold Toynbee was one of the +Professor's warmest admirers and ablest pupils: and in his philanthropic +work the teaching of "Unto this Last" and "Fors" was illustrated--not +exclusively--but truly. "No true disciple of mine will ever be a +Ruskinian" (to quote "St. Mark's Rest"); "he will follow, not me, but +the instincts of his own soul, and the guidance of its Creator." + +Like all energetic men, Ruskin was fond of setting other people to work. +One of his plans was to form a little library of standard books +("Bibliotheca Pastorum") suitable for the kind of people who, he hoped, +would join or work under his St. George's Company. The first book he +chose was the "Economist" of Xenophon, which he asked two of his young +friends to translate. To them and their work he would give his +afternoons in the rooms at Corpus, with curious patience in the midst of +pre-occupying labour and severest trial; for just then he was lecturing +at the London Institution on the Alps[34]--reading a paper to the +Metaphysical Society[35]--writing the Academy Notes of 1875, and +"Proserpina," etc.--as well as his regular work at "Fors," and the St. +George's Company was then taking definite form;--and all the while the +lady of his love was dying under the most tragic circumstances, and he +forbidden to approach her. + +[Footnote 34: "The Simple Dynamic Conditions of Glacial Action among the +Alps," March 11, 1875.] + +[Footnote 35: "Social Policy based on Natural Selection," May 11.] + +At the end of May she died. On the 1st of June the Royal party honoured +the Slade Professor with their visit--little knowing how valueless to +him such honours had become. He went north[36] and met his translators +at Brantwood to finish the Xenophon,--and to help dig his harbour and +cut coppice in his wood. He prepared a preface; but the next term was +one of greater pressure, with the twelve lectures on Sir Joshua Reynolds +to deliver. He wrote, after Christmas: + +[Footnote 36: "On a posting tour through Yorkshire". He made three such +tours in 1875--southward in January, northward in June and July, and +southward in September: and another northward in April and May, 1876.] + + + "Now that I have got my head fairly into this Xenophon business, it + has expanded into a new light altogether; and I think it would be + absurd in me to slur over the life in one paragraph. A hundred + things have come into my head as I arrange the dates, and I think I + can make a much better thing of it--with a couple of days' work. My + head would not work in town--merely turned from side to side--never + nodded (except sleepily). I send you the proofs just to show you + I'm at work. I'm going to translate all the story of Delphic answer + before Anabasis: and his speech after the sleepless night." + +Delphic answers--for he was then again brought into contact with +"spiritualism"; and sleepless nights--for the excitement of overwork was +telling upon him--were becoming too frequent in his own experience; and +yet the lectures on Reynolds went off with success.[37] The magic of his +oratory transmuted the scribbled jottings of his MS. into a magnificent +flow of rolling paragraph and rounded argument that thrilled a captious +audience with unwonted emotion, and almost persuaded many a hearer to +accept the gospel of "the Ethereal Ruskin." In spite of a sense of +antagonism to his surroundings, he did useful work which none other +could do in the University. That this was acknowledged was proved by his +re-election, early in 1876: but his third term of three years was a time +of weakened health. Repeated absence from his post and inability to +fulfil his duties made it obviously his wisest course, at the end of +that term, to resign the Slade Professorship. + +[Footnote 37: Nov. 2, 4, 6, 9, 11, 13, 16, 18, 20, 23, 25, and 27; +1875.] + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +ST. GEORGE AND ST. MARK (1875-1877) + + +In the book his Bertha of Canterbury was reading at twilight on the Eve +of St. Mark, Keats might have been describing "Fors." Among its pages, +fascinating with their golden broideries of romance and wit, perplexing +with mystic vials of wrath as well as all the Seven Lamps and Shekinah +of old and new Covenants commingled, there was gradually unfolded the +plan of "St. George's Work." + +The scheme was not easy to apprehend; it was essentially different from +anything then known, though superficially like several bankrupt Utopias. +Ruskin did not want to found a phalanstery, or to imitate Robert Owen +or the Shakers. That would have been practicable--and useless. + +He wanted much more. He aimed at the gradual introduction of higher aims +into ordinary life: it giving true refinement to the lower classes, true +simplicity to the upper. He proposed that idle hands should reclaim +waste lands; that healthy work and country homes should be offered to +townsfolk who would "come out of the gutter." He asked land-owners and +employers to furnish opportunities for such reforms;--which would +involve no elaborate organization nor unelastic rules;--simply the one +thing needful, the refusal of Commercialism. + +As before, he scorned the idea that real good could be done by political +agitation. Any government would work, he said, if it were an efficient +government. No government was efficient unless it saw that every one had +the necessaries of life, for body and soul; and that every one earned +them by some work or other. Capital--that is, the means and material of +labour, should therefore be in the hands of the Government, not in the +hands of individuals: this reform would result easily and necessarily +from the forbidding of loans on interest. Personal property would still +be in private hands; but as it could not be invested and turned into +capital, it would necessarily be restricted to its actual use, and great +accumulation would be valueless. + +This is, of course, a very sketchy statement of the ground-work of +"Fors," but to most readers nowadays as comprehensible as, at the time +of its publication, it was incomprehensible. For when, long after "Fors" +had been written, Ruskin found other writers advocating the same +principles and calling themselves Socialists, he said that he too was a +Socialist. + +But the Socialists of various sects have complicated, and sometimes +confused, their simple fundamental principles with various ways and +means; to which he could not agree. He had his own ways and means. He +had his private ideals of life, which he expounded, along with his main +doctrine. He thought, justifiably, that theory was useless without +practical example; and so he founded St. George's Company (in 1877 +called St. George's Guild) as his illustration. + +The Guild grew out of his call, in 1871, for adherents: and by 1875 +began to take definite form. Its objects were to set the example of a +common capital as opposed to a National debt, and of co-operative labour +as opposed to competitive struggle for life. Each member was required to +do some work for his living--without too strict limits as to the +kind--and to practice certain precepts of religion and morality, broad +enough for general acceptance. He was also required to obey the +authority of the Guild, and to contribute a tithe of his income to a +common fund, for various objects. These objects were--first: to buy land +for the agricultural members to cultivate, paying their rent, not to the +other members, but to the company; not refusing machinery, but +preferring manual labour. Next, to buy mills and factories, to be +likewise owned by the Guild and worked by members--using water power in +preference to steam (steam at first not forbidden)--and making the lives +of the people employed as well spent as might be, with a fair wage, +healthy work, and so forth. The loss on starting was to be made up from +the Guild store, but it was anticipated that the honesty of the goods +turned out would ultimately make such enterprises pay, even in a +commercial world. Then, for the people employed and their families, +there would be places of recreation and instruction, supplied by the +Guild, and intended to give the agricultural labourer or mill-hand, +trained from infancy in Guild schools, some insight into Literature, +Science and Art--and tastes which his easy position would leave him free +to cultivate. + +So far the plan was simple. It was not a _colony_--but merely the +working of existing industries in a certain way. Anticipating further +development of the scheme, Ruskin looked forward to a guild coinage, as +pretty as the Florentines had; a costume as becoming as the Swiss: and +other Platonically devised details, which were not the essentials of the +proposal, and never came into operation. But some of his plans were +actually realised. + +The chief objects of "St. George" come under three heads, as we have +just noticed: agricultural, industrial, and educational. The actual +schools would not be needed until the farms and mills had been so far +established as to secure a permanent attendance. But meanwhile provision +was being made for them, both in literature and in art. The "Bibliotheca +Pastorum," was to be a comprehensive little library--far less than the +100 books of the _Pall Mall Gazette_--and yet bringing before the St. +George's workman standard and serious writing of all times. It was to +include, in separate volumes, the Books of Moses and the Psalms of David +and the Revelation of St. John. Of Greek, the Economist of Xenophon, and +Hesiod, which Ruskin undertook to translate into prose. Of Latin the +first two Georgics and sixth Æneid of Virgil, in Gawain Douglas' +translation. Dante; Chaucer, excluding the "Canterbury Tales"--but +including the "Romance of the Rose"; Gotthelf's "Ulric the Farmer," from +the French version which Ruskin had loved ever since his father used to +read it him on their first tours in Switzerland; and an early English +history by an Oxford friend. Later were published Sir Philip Sidney's +psalter, and Ruskin's own biography of Sir Herbert Edwardes, under the +title of "A Knight's Faith." + +These books were for the home library; reference works were bought to be +deposited in central libraries, along with objects of art and science. +It was not intended to keep the Guild property centralised; but rather +to spread it, as its other work was spread, broad-cast. A number of +books and other objects were bought with the Guild money, and lent or +given to various schools and colleges and institutions where work akin +to the objects of the Guild was being done. But for the time Ruskin +fixed upon Sheffield as the place of his first Guild Museum--being the +home of the typical English industry--central to all parts of England, +near beautiful hill-country, and yet not far from a number of +manufacturing towns in which, if St. George's work went on, supporters +and recruits might be found. + +The people of Sheffield were already, in 1875, building a museum of +their own, and naturally thought that the two might be conveniently +worked together. But that was not at all what Ruskin wished. Not only +was his museum to be primarily the storehouse of the Guild, rather than +one among many means of popular education; but the objects which he +intended to place there were not such as the public expected to see. He +had no interest in a vast accumulation of articles of all kinds. He +wanted to provide for his friends' common treasury a few definitely +valuable and interesting examples--interesting to the sort of people +that he hoped would join the Guild or be bred up in it; and valuable +according to his own standard and experience. + +In September 1875, Ruskin stayed a couple of days at Sheffield to +inspect a cottage at Walkley, in the outskirts of the town, and to make +arrangements for founding the museum--humbly to begin with, but hoping +for speedy increase. He engaged as curator, at a salary of £40 a year +and free lodging on the premises, his former pupil at the Working Men's +College, Henry Swan, who had done occasional work for him in drawing and +engraving. Swan was a Quaker, and a remarkable man in his way; +enthusiastic in his new vocation, and interested in the social questions +which were being discussed in "Fors." Under his care the Museum remained +at Walkley, accumulating material in the tiny and hardly accessible +cottage--being so to speak in embryo, until the way should be clear for +its removal or enlargement, which took place in 1890. + +When Ruskin came back on his posting tour of April 1876, he stayed +again at Sheffield, to meet a few friends of Swan's--Secularists, +Unitarians, and Quakers, who professed Communism. They had an interview +(reported in the Sheffield _Daily Telegraph_, April 28th, 1876), which +brought out rather curiously the points of difference between their +opinions and his. They refused to join the Guild because they would not +promise obedience, and help in its objects. Ruskin, however, was willing +to advance theirs. A few weeks afterwards he invited them to choose a +piece of ground for their Communist experiment. They chose a farm of +over thirteen acres at Abbeydale, which the Guild bought in 1877 at a +cost of £2,287 16s.6d. for their use--the communists agreeing to pay the +money back in instalments, without interest, by the end of seven years: +when the farm should be their own. + +When it was actually in their hands they found that they knew nothing of +farming--and besides, were making money at trades they did not really +care to abandon. They engaged a man to work the farm for them: and then +another. They were told that the land they had chosen was--for farming +purposes--worthless. Their capital ran short; and they tried to make +money by keeping a tea-garden. The original proposer of the scheme wrote +to Ruskin, who sent £100:--the others returned the money. Ruskin +declined to take it back, and began to perceive that the Communists were +trifling. They had made no attempt to found the sort of community they +had talked about; neither their plans nor his were being carried out. So +when the original proposer and a friend of his named Riley approached +Ruskin again, they found little difficulty in persuading him to try them +as managers. The rest, finding themselves turned out by Riley, vainly +demanded "explanations" from Ruskin, who then was drifting into his +first attack of brain fever. So they declined further connection with +the farm; the Guild accepted their resignation, and undertook for the +time nothing more than to get the land into good condition again. + +This was not the only land held by the St. George's Guild. It acquired +the acre of ground on which the Sheffield Museum stood, and a cottage +with a couple of acres near Scarborough. Two acres of rock and moor at +Barmouth had been given by Mrs. Talbot in 1872; and in 1877 Mr. George +Baker, then Mayor of Birmingham, gave twenty acres of woodland at +Bewdley in Worcestershire, to which at one time Mr. Ruskin thought of +moving the museum, before the present building was found for it by the +Sheffield Corporation at Meersbrook Park. On the resignation of the +original Trustees, in 1877, Mr. Q. Talbot and Mr. Baker were offered the +trust: and on the death of Mr. Talbot the trust was accepted by Mr. John +Henry Chamberlain. After he died it was taken by Mr. George Thomson of +Huddersfield, whose woollen mills, transformed into a co-operative +concern, though not directly in connection with the Guild, have given a +widely known example of the working of principles advocated in "Fors." + +In the middle of 1876, Egbert Rydings, the auditor of the accounts +which, in accordance with his principles of "glass pockets," Ruskin +published in "Fors," proposed to start a homespun woollen industry at +Laxey, in the Isle of Man, where the old women who formerly spun with +the wheel had been driven by failure of custom to work in the mines. The +Guild built him a water mill, and in a few years the demand for a pure, +rough, durable cloth, created by this and kindred attempts, justified +the enterprise. Ruskin set the example, and had his own grey clothes +made of Laxey stuffs--whose chief drawback was that they never wore out. +A little later a similar work was done, with even greater success, by +Mr. Albert Fleming, another member of the Guild; who introduced +old-fashioned spinning and hand-loom weaving at Langdale. + +The story of Ruskin's posting tour was told many years afterwards, at +the opening of the new Sheffield museum, by Mr. Arthur Severn, a famous +_raconteur_, whose description of the adventures of their cruise upon +wheels includes so bright a picture of Ruskin, that I must use his words +as they were reported on the occasion in the magazine _Igdrasil_: + + + "... With the Professor, who dislikes railways very much, it was + not a question of travelling by rail. He said, 'I will take you in + a carriage and with horses, and we will drive the whole way from + London to the North of England. And I will not only do that, but I + will do the best in my power to get a postilion to ride, and we + will go quite in the old-fashioned way ...' The Professor went so + far that he actually built a carriage for this drive. It was a + regular posting carriage, with good strong wheels, a place behind + for the luggage, and cunning drawers inside it for all kinds of + things that we might require on the journey. We started off one + fine morning from London--I must say without a postilion--but when + we arrived at the next town, about twenty miles off, having + telegraphed beforehand that we were coming, there was a gorgeous + postilion ready with the fresh horses, and we started off in a + right style, according to the Professor's wishes. + + "After many pleasant days of travelling, we at last arrived at + Sheffield, and I well remember that we created no small sensation + as we clattered up to the old posting inn. I think it was the + King's Head. We stayed a few days, and visited the old Museum at + Walkley; and I remember the look of regret on the Professor's face + when he saw how cramped the space was there for the things he had + to show. However, with his usual kindliness, he did not say much + about it at the time, and he did not complain of the considerable + amount of room it was necessary for the curator and his family to + take up in that place. We stayed about two days looking at the + beautiful country,--and I am glad to say there was a good deal + still left,--and then the Professor gave orders that the carriage + should be got ready to take us on our journey, and that a postilion + should be forthcoming, if possible. I remember leaving the luncheon + table and going outside to see if the necessary arrangements were + complete. Sure enough, there was the carriage at the door, and a + still more gorgeous postilion than any we had had so far on our + journey. His riding breeches were of the tightest and whitest I + ever saw; his horses were an admirable pair, and looked like going. + A very large crowd had assembled outside the inn, to see what + extraordinary kind of mortals could be going to travel in such a + way. + + "I went to the room where the Professor was still at luncheon, and + told him that everything was ready, but that there was a very large + crowd at the door. He seemed rather amused; and I said, 'You know, + Professor, I really don't know what the people expect--whether it + is a bride and bridegroom, or what.' He said, 'Well, Arthur, you + and Joan shall play at being bride and bridegroom inside the + carriage, and I will get on the box.' He got Mrs. Severn on his + arm, and had to hold her pretty tightly as he left the door, + because when she saw the crowd outside she tried to beat a retreat. + At last he got her into the carriage, I was put in afterwards, and + he jumped up on the box. The crowd closed in, and looked at us as + if we were a sort of menagerie. I was much amused when I thought + how little these eager people knew that the real attraction was on + the box; I felt inclined to put my head out of the window, and say, + 'My good people, there is the man you should look at,--not us.' I + did not like to do so; and the Professor gave the word to be off, + the postilion cracked his whip, and we went off in grand style, + amidst the cheers of the crowd...." + +On one of these posting excursions, they came to Hardraw; Mrs. Alfred +Hunt tells the story in her edition of Turner's "Richmondshire"; Mr. +Severn's account is somewhat different. After examining the Fall, Mrs. +Severn and Mr. Ruskin left Mr. Severn to sketch, and went away to Hawes +to order their tea. When they were gone, a man who had been standing by +came up and asked if that were Professor Ruskin. "Yes," said Mr. Severn, +"it was; he is very fond of the Fall, and much puzzled to know why the +edge of the cliff is not worn away by the water, as he expected to find +it after so many years." "Oh," said the other, "there are twelve feet of +masonry up there to protect the rock. I'm a native of the place, and +know all about it." "I wish," said Mr. Severn, absently, as he went on +drawing, "Mr. Ruskin knew that; he would be so interested." And the +stranger ran off. When the sketcher came in to tea he felt there was +something wrong. "You're in for it!" said his wife. "Let us look at his +sketch first," said Mr. Ruskin; and luckily it was a very good one. By +and by it all came out;--how the Yorkshireman had caught the Professor, +and eagerly described the horrible Vandalism, receiving in reply some +very emphatic language. Upon which he took off his hat and bowed low: +"But, sir," he faltered, "the gentleman up there said I was to tell you, +and you would be so interested!" The Professor, suddenly mollified, took +off his hat in turn, and apologised for his reception of the news: +"but," said he, "I shall never care for Hardraw Waterfall again." + +"The Professor," said Mr. Severn, "dislikes railways very much:" and on +his arrival at Brantwood after that posting journey he wrote a preface +to "A Protest against the Extension of Railways in the Lake District," +by Mr. Robert Somervell. Ruskin's dislike of railways has been the text +of a great deal of misrepresentation, and his use of them, at all, has +been often quoted as an inconsistency. As a matter of fact, he never +objected to main lines of railway communication; but he strongly +objected, in common with a vast number of people, to the introduction of +railways into districts whose chief interest is in their scenery; +especially where, as in the English Lake district, the scenery is in +miniature, easily spoiled by embankments and viaducts, and by the rows +of ugly buildings which usually grow up round a station; and where the +beauty of the landscape can only be felt in quiet walks or drives +through it. Many years later, after he had said all he had to say on the +subject again and again, and was on the brink of one of his illnesses, +he wrote in violent language to a correspondent who tried to "draw" him +on the subject of another proposed railway to Ambleside. But his real +opinions were simple enough, and consistent with a practicable scheme of +life. + +In August 1876 he left England for Italy. He travelled alone, +accompanied only by his new servant Baxter, who had lately taken the +place vacated by Crawley, Mr. Ruskin's former valet of twenty years' +service. He crossed the Simplon to Venice, where he was welcomed by an +old friend, Rawdon Brown, and a new friend, Prof. C.H. Moore, of +Harvard. He met two Oxford pupils, Mr. J. Reddie Anderson, whom he set +to work on Carpaccio; and Mr. Whitehead--"So much nicer they all are," he +wrote in a private letter, "than I was at their age;"--also his pupil +Mr. Bunney, at work on copies of pictures and records of architecture, +the legacy of St. Mark to St. George. Two young artists were brought +into his circle, during that winter--both Venetians, and both singularly +interesting men: Giacomo Boni, now a celebrated antiquary, then capo +d'opera of the Ducal Palace, and doing his best to preserve, instead of +"restoring," the ancient sculptures; and Angelo Alessandri, a painter of +more than usual seriousness of aim and sympathy with the fine qualities +of the old masters. + +Ruskin had been engaged on a manual of drawing for his Oxford schools, +which he now meant to complete in two parts: "The Laws of +Fésole"--teaching the principles of Florentine draughtsmanship; and "The +Laws of Rivo Alto"--about Venetian colour. Passages for this second part +were written. But he found himself so deeply interested in the evolution +of Venetian art, and in tracing the spirit of the people as shown by the +mythology illustrated in the pictures and sculptures, that his practical +manual became a sketch of art history, "St. Mark's Rest"--as a sort of +companion to "Mornings in Florence," which he had been working at during +his last visit to Italy. His intention was to supersede "Stones of +Venice" by a smaller book, giving more prominence to the ethical side of +history, which should illustrate Carpaccio as the most important figure +of the transition period, and do away with the exclusive Protestantism +of his earlier work. + +He set himself to this task, with Tintoret's motto--_Sempre si fa il +mare maggiore_, and worked with feverish energy, recording his progress +in letters home. + +"13 _Nov_.--I never was yet, in my life, in such a state of hopeless +confusion of letters, drawings, and work: chiefly because, of course, +when one is old, one's _done_ work seems all to tumble in upon one, and +want rearranging, and everything brings a thousand old as well as new +thoughts. My head seems less capable of accounts every year. I can't +_fix_ my mind on a sum in addition--it goes off, between seven and nine, +into a speculation on the seven deadly sins or the nine muses. My table +is heaped with unanswered letters,--MS. of four or five different books +at six or seven different parts of each,--sketches getting rubbed +out,--others getting smudged in,--parcels from Mr. Brown unopened, +parcels _for_ Mr. Moore unsent; my inkstand in one place,--too probably +upset,--my pen in another; my paper under a pile of books, and my last +carefully written note thrown into the waste-paper basket. + +"3 _Dec_.--I'm having nasty foggy weather just now,--but it's better +than fog in London,--and I'm really resting a little, and trying not to +be so jealous of the flying days. I've a most _cumfy_ room [at the Grand +Hotel]--I've gone out of the very expensive one, and only pay twelve +francs a day; and I've two windows, one with open balcony and the other +covered in with glass. It spoils the look of the window dreadfully, but +gives me a view right away to Lido, and of the whole sunrise. Then the +bed is curtained off from rest of room like that [sketch of window and +room] with fine flourishing white and gold pillars--and the black place +is where one goes out of the room beside the bed. + +"9 _Dec_.--I hope to send home a sketch or two which will show I'm not +quite losing my head yet.... I must show at Oxford some reason for my +staying so long in Venice." + +Beside studies in the Chapel of St. George, he copied Carpaccio's "Dream +of St. Ursula" which was taken down--it had been "skied" at the Academy +until then--and placed in the sculpture gallery; and be laboured to +produce a facsimile. + +"24 _Dec_.--I do think St. Ursula's lips are coming pretty--and her +eyelids--but oh me, her hair. Toni, Mr. Brown's gondolier, says she's +all right--and he's a grave and close looking judge, you know." + +Christmas Day was a crisis in his life. He was attacked by illness; +severe pain, followed by a dreamy state in which the vividly realized +presence of St. Ursula mingled with memories of his dead lady, whose +"spirit" had been shown him a year before by a "medium" met at a country +house. Since then he had watched eagerly for evidences of another life: +and the sense of its conceivability grew upon him, in spite of the +doubts which he had entertained of the immortality of the soul. At last, +after a year's earnest desire for some such assurance, it seemed to come +to him. What others call coincidences, and accidents, and states of mind +flashed, for him, into importance; times and seasons, names and symbols, +took a vivid meaning. His intense despondency changed for a while into a +singular happiness--it seemed a renewed health and strength: and instead +of despair, he rejoiced in the conviction of guarding Providences and +helpful influences. + +Readers of "Fors" had traced for some years back the re-awakening of a +religious tone, now culminating in a pronounced mysticism which they +could not understand, and in a recantation of the sceptical judgments of +his middle period. He found, now, new excellences in the early Christian +painting; he depreciated Turner and Tintoret, and denounced the +frivolous art of the day. He searched the Bible more diligently than +ever for its hidden meanings; and in proportion as he felt its +inspiration, he recoiled from the conclusions of modern science, and +wrapped the prophet's mantle more closely round him, as he denounced +with growing fervour the crimes of our unbelieving age. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +DEUCALION AND PROSERPINA (1877-1879) + + +In the summer of 1875, Ruskin had written: + + + "I begin to ask myself, with somewhat pressing arithmetic, how much + time is likely to be left me, at the age of fifty-six, to complete + the various designs for which, until past fifty, I was merely + collecting material. Of these materials I have now enough by me for + a most interesting (in my own opinion) history of fifteenth century + Florentine Art, in six octavo volumes; an analysis of the Attic art + of the fifth century B.C. in three volumes; an exhaustive history + of northern thirteenth-century art, in ten volumes; a life of Sir + Walter Scott, with analysis of modern epic art, in seven volumes; a + life of Xenophon, with analysis of the general principles of + education, in ten volumes; a commentary on Hesiod, with final + analysis of the principles of Political Economy, in nine volumes; + and a general description of the geology and botany of the Alps, in + twenty-four volumes." + +The estimate of volumes was--perhaps--in jest; but the plans for +harvesting his material were in earnest. + +"Proserpina"--so named from the Flora of the Greeks, the daughter of +Demeter, Mother Earth--grew out of notes already begun in 1866. It was +little like an ordinary botany book;--that was to be expected. It did +not dissect plants; it did not give chemical or histological analysis: +but with bright and curious fancy, with the most ingenious diagrams and +perfect drawings--beautifully engraved by Burgess and Allen--illustrated +the mystery of growth in plants and the tender beauty of their form. +Though this was not science, in strict terms it was a field of work +which no one but Ruskin had cultivated. He was helped by a few +scientific men like Professor Oliver, who saw a value in his line of +thought, and showed a kindly interest in it. + +"Deucalion"--from the mythical creator of human life out of stones--was +begun as a companion work: to be published in parts, as the repertory +of Oxford lectures on Alpine form, and notes on all kinds of kindred +subjects. For instance, before that hasty journey to Sheffield he gave a +lecture at the London Institution on "Precious Stones" (February 17th, +repeated March 28th, 1876. A lecture on a similar subject was given to +the boys of Christ's Hospital on April 15th). This lecture, called "The +Iris of the Earth," stood first in Part III. of "Deucalion": and the +work went on, in studies of the forms of silica, on the lines marked out +ten years before in the papers on Banded and Brecciated Concretions; now +carried forward with much kind help from the Rev. J. Clifton Ward, of +the Geological Survey, and Mr. Henry Willett, F.G.S., of Brighton. + +On the way home over the Simplon in May and June, 1877, travelling first +with Signor Alessandri, and then with Mr. G. Allen, Professor Ruskin +continued his studies of Alpine flowers for "Proserpina." In the autumn +he gave a lecture at Kendal (Oct. 1st, repeated at Eton College Dec. +8th) on "Yewdale and its Streamlets." + +"Yewdale"--reprinted as Part V. of "Deucalion"--took an unusual +importance in his own mind, not only because it was a great success as a +lecture--though some Kendalians complained that there was not enough +"information" in it:--but because it was the first given since that +Christmas at Venice, when a new insight had been granted him, as he +felt, into spiritual things, and a new burden laid on him, to withstand +the rash conclusions of "science falsely so called," and to preach in +their place the presence of God in nature and in man. + +Writing to Miss Beever about his Oxford course of that autumn, "Readings +in Modern Painters," [38] he said, on the 2nd December: + +[Footnote 38: Nov. 6, 8, 10, 13, 15, 17, 20, 22, 24, 27, 29 and Dec. 1, +1877. These lectures were never prepared for publication as a course; +the last lecture was printed in the _Nineteenth Century_ for January, +1878.] + +"I gave yesterday the twelfth and last of my course of lectures this +term, to a room crowded by six hundred people, two-thirds members of the +University, and with its door wedged open by those who could not get in; +this interest of theirs being granted to me, I doubt not, because for +the first time in Oxford I have been able to speak to them boldly of +immortal life. I intended when I began the course only to have read +'Modern Painters' to them; but when I began, some of your favourite +bits[39] interested the men so much, and brought so much larger a +proportion of undergraduates than usual, that I took pains to re-inforce +and press them home; and people say I have never given so useful a +course yet. But it has taken all my time and strength." + +[Footnote 39: Miss Beever had published early in 1875 the extracts from +"Modern Painters," so widely known as "Frondes Agrestes."] + +He wrote again, on Dec. 16th, from Herne Hill: + + + "It is a long while since I've felt so good-for-nothing as I do + this morning. My very wristbands curl up in a dog's-eared and + disconsolate manner; my little room is all a heap of disorder. I've + got a hoarseness and wheezing and sneezing and coughing and + choking. I can't speak and I can't think; I'm miserable in bed and + useless out of it; and it seems to me as if I could never venture + to open a window or go out of a door any more. I have the dimmest + sort of diabolical pleasure in thinking how miserable I shall make + Susie by telling her all this; but in other respects I seem + entirely devoid of all moral sentiments. I have arrived at this + state of things, first by catching cold, and since trying to 'amuse + myself' for three days." + +He goes on to give a list of his amusements--Pickwick, chivalric +romances, the _Daily Telegraph_, Staunton's games of chess, and finally +analysis of the Dock Company's bill of charges on a box from Venice. + +Ten days after he wrote from Oxford, in his whimsical style: + + + "Yesterday I had two lovely services in my own cathedral. You know + the _Cathedral_ of Oxford is the chapel of Christ Church College, + and I have my high seat in the chancel, as an honorary student, + besides being bred there, and so one is ever so proud and ever so + pious all at once, which is ever so nice you know: and my own dean, + that's the Dean of Christ Church, who is as big as any bishop, read + the services, and the psalms and anthems were lovely; and then I + dined with Henry Acland and his family ... but I do wish I could be + at Brantwood too." Next day it was "Cold quite gone." + +But he was not to be quit so easily this time of the results of overwork +and worry. + +He had been passing through the unpleasant experience of a +misunderstanding with one of his most trusted friends and helpers. His +work on behalf of the St. George's Guild had been energetic and sincere: +and he had received the support of a number of strangers, among whom +were people of responsible station and position. But he was surprised to +find that many of his personal friends held aloof. He was still more +surprised to learn, on returning from Venice, full of new hope and +stronger convictions in his mission, that the caution of one upon whom +he had counted as a firm ally had dissuaded an intending adherent from +joining in the work. A man of the world, accustomed to overreach and to +be overreached, would have taken the discovery coolly, and accepted an +explanation. But Ruskin was never a man of the world; and now, much less +than ever. He took it as treason to the great work of which he felt +himself to be the missionary. Throughout the autumn and winter the +discovery rankled, and preyed on his mind. As for the sake of absolute +candour he had published in "Fors" everything that related to the Guild +work,--even his own private affairs and confessions, whatever they +risked,--he felt that this too must out; in order that his supporters +might judge of his conduct and that nothing affecting the enterprise +might be kept back. And so, at Christmas, he sent the correspondence to +his printers. + +Years afterwards, by the intervention of friends, this breach was +healed: but what suffering it cost can be learnt from the sequel. To +Ruskin it was the beginning of the end. His Aberdeen correspondent asked +just then for the usual Christmas message to the Bible class: and +instead of the cheery words of bygone years, received the couplet from +Horace: + + "Inter spem curamque, timores inter et iras, + _Omnem_ crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum." + + + "Amid hope and sorrow, amid fear and wrath, believe + _every_ day that has dawned on thee to be thy last." + +From Oxford, early in January, 1878, he went on a visit to Windsor +Castle, whence he wrote: "I came to see Prince Leopold, who has been a +prisoner to his sofa lately, but I trust he is better; he is very bright +and gentle under severe and almost continual pain." No less gentle, in +spite of the severe justice he was inflicting upon himself even more +than upon his friend, was the author of "Fors," as the letters of the +time to his invalid neighbour in "Hortus Inclusus" show. How ready to +own himself in the wrong,--at that very moment when he was being pointed +at as the most obstinate and egotistic of men--how placable he really +was and open to rebuke, he showed, when, from Windsor, he went to +Hawarden. Nearly three years before he had written roughly of Mr. +Gladstone; as a Conservative, he was not predisposed in favour of the +leader of the party to whom he attributed most of the evils he was +combating. Mr. Gladstone and he had often met, and by no means agreed +together in conversation. But this visit convinced him that he had +misjudged Mr. Gladstone; and he promptly made the fullest apology in the +current number of "Fors," saying that he had written under a complete +misconception of his character. In reprinting the old pages he not only +cancelled the offending passage, but he left the place blank, with a +note in the middle of it, as "a memorial of rash judgment." + +He went slowly northward, seeking rest at Ingleton; whence he wrote, +January 17:--"I've got nothing done all the time I've been away but a +few mathematical figures [crystallography, no doubt, for 'Deucalion,'] +and the less I do the less I find I can do it; and yesterday, for the +first time these twenty years, I hadn't so much as a 'plan' in my head +all day." Arrived at Brantwood, as rest was useless, he tried work. Mr. +Willett had asked him to reprint "The Two Paths," and he got that ready +for press, and wrote a short preface. At Venice, Mr. J.R. Anderson had +been working out for him the myths illustrated by Carpaccio in the +Chapel of S. Giorgio de' Schiavoni; and the book had been waiting for +Ruskin's introduction until he was surprised by the publication of an +almost identical inquiry by M. Clermont-Ganneau. He tried to fulfil his +duty to his pupil by writing the preface immediately; most sorrowfully +feeling the inadequacy of his strength for the tasks he had laid upon +it. He wrote: + + + "My own feeling, now, is that everything which has hitherto + happened to me, and been done by me, whether well or ill, has been + fitting me to take greater fortune more prudently, and to do better + work more thoroughly. And just when I seem to be coming out of + school,--very sorry to have been such a foolish boy, yet having + taken a prize or two, and expecting now to enter upon some more + serious business than cricket,--I am dismissed by the Master I + hoped to serve, with a--'That's all I want of you, sir.'" + +In such times he found relief by reverting to the past. He wrote in the +beginning of February a paper for the _University Magazine_ on "My First +Editor," W.H. Harrison, and forgot himself--almost--in bright +reminiscences of youthful days and early associations. Next, as Mr. +Marcus Huish, who had shown great friendliness and generosity in +providing prints for the Sheffield museum, was now proposing to hold an +Exhibition of Mr. Ruskin's "Turners" at the Fine Art Galleries in New +Bond Street, it was necessary to arrange the exhibits and to prepare the +catalogue. For the next fortnight he struggled on with this labour, and +with his last "Fors"--the last he was to write in the long series of +more than seven years.[40] How little the thousands who read the preface +to his catalogue, with its sad sketch of Turner's fate, and what they +supposed to be its "customary burst of terminal eloquence," understood +that it was indeed the cry of one who had been wounded in the house of +his friends, and was now believing every day that dawned on him to be +his last. He told of Turner's youthful picture of the Coniston Fells and +its invocation to the mists of morning, bidding them "in honour to the +world's great Author, rise,"--and then how Turner's "health, and with it +in great degree his mind, failed suddenly with a snap of some vital +chord," after the sunset splendours of his last, dazzling efforts.... + +[Footnote 40: "Fors" was taken up again, at intervals, later on; but +never with the same purpose and continuity.] + +"Morning breaks, as I write, along those Coniston Fells, and the level +mists, motionless and grey beneath the rose of the moorlands, veil the +lower woods, and the sleeping village, and the long lawns by the +lake-shore. Oh that some one had but told me, in my youth, when all my +heart seemed to be set on these colours and clouds, that appear for a +little while and then vanish away, how little my love of them would +serve me, when the silence of lawn and wood in the dews of morning +should be completed; and all my thoughts should be of those whom, by +neither, I was to meet more!" + +The catalogue was finished, and hurried off to the printers. A week of +agitating suspense at home, and then it could no longer be concealed. +Friends and foes alike were startled and saddened with the news of his +"sudden and dangerous illness,"--some form of inflammation of the +brain--the result of overwork, but still more immediately of the +emotional strain from which he had been suffering. + +On March 4th, the Turner Exhibition opened, and day by day the bulletins +from Brantwood announcing his condition were read by multitudes of +visitors with eager and sorrowful interest. Newspapers all the world +over copied the daily reports: in the Far West of America the same +telegrams were posted, and they say even a more demonstrative sympathy +was shown. Nor was the feeling confined to the English speaking public. +The Oxford Proctor in Convocation of April 24th, when the patient, after +the first burst of the storm was slowly drifting back into calmer +waters, thought it worth while, in the course of his speech, to mention +that in Italy, where he had lately been on an Easter vacation tour, he +had witnessed a widespread anxiety about Ruskin, and prayers put up for +his recovery. + +By May 10th he was so much better that he could complete the catalogue +with some gossip about those Alpine drawings of 1842 which he regarded +as the climax of Turner's work. The first--and best in some ways--of the +series was the Splügen. Without any word to him, the diligence of kind +friends and the help of a wide circle of admirers traced the drawing, +and subscribed its price--1,000 guineas, to which Mr. Agnew generously +added his commission--and it was presented to Mr. Ruskin as a token of +sympathy and respect. He was not insensible to the personal compliment +implied, and by way of some answer he spent the first few days of his +convalescence in arranging and annotating a series of drawings by +himself, and engravings, illustrating the Turners, to add to his show +during the remainder of the season. When they were sent off (early in +June) to Bond Street, he left home with the Severns to complete his +recovery at Malham. + +There was another reason why that spontaneous testimonial was welcome at +the moment, for a curious and unaccustomed ordeal was impending for his +claims as an art critic. On his return from Venice after months of +intercourse with the great Old Masters, he found the Grosvenor Gallery +just opened for the first time, with its memorable exhibition of the +different extra-academical schools. It placed before the public, in +sharp contrast, the final outcome of the Pre-Raphaelitism for which he +had fought many a year before, and samples of the last new fashion from +Paris. The maturer works of Burne-Jones had been practically unseen by +the public, and Ruskin took the opportunity of their exhibition to write +his praise of the youngest of the Old Masters in the current numbers of +"Fors," and afterwards in two papers on the "Three Colours of +Pre-Raphaelitism" (_Nineteenth Century Magazine_, November and December, +1878). But in the same "Fors" he dismissed with half a paragraph of +contempt Mr. Whistler's eccentric sketch of Fireworks at Cremorne. Long +before, in 1863, when he was working with various artists connected with +the Pre-Raphaelite circle, Mr. Whistler had made overtures to the great +critic through Mr. Swinburne the poet; but he had not been taken +seriously. Now he had become the missionary in England of the new French +gospel of "impressionism," which to Ruskin was one of those half-truths +which are ever the worst of heresies. Mr. Whistler appealed to the law. +He brought an action for libel, which was tried on November 25th and +26th before Baron Huddleston, and recovered a farthing damages. Ruskin's +costs--amounting to £386 12s. 4d.--were paid by a public subscription to +which one hundred and twenty persons, including many strangers, +contributed. + +By that time he was fully recovering from his illness, back at Coniston, +after a short visit to Liverpool. It was forbidden to him to attempt any +exciting work. He had given up "Fors" and Oxford lecturing, and was +devoting himself again to quiet studies for "Proserpina" and +"Deucalion." On the first day of the trial the St. George's Guild was +registered as a Company; on the second day he wrote to Miss Beever: + + + "I have entirely resigned all hope of ever thanking you rightly for + bread, sweet odours, roses and pearls, and must just allow myself + to be fed, scented, rose-garlanded and be-pearled, as if I were a + poor little pet dog, or pet pig. But my cold is better, and I _am_ + getting on with this botany; but it is really too important a work + to be pushed for a week or fortnight." + +Early in 1879 his resignation of the Slade Professorship was announced; +followed by what was virtually his election to an honorary doctor's +degree; or, as officially worded--"the Hebdomadal Council resolved on +June 9, 1879, to propose to Convocation to confer the degree of D.C.L. +_honoris causa_ upon John Ruskin, M.A., of Ch. Ch., at the enænia of +that year; but the proposal, though notified in the _Gazette_ of June +10, was not submitted to vote owing to the inability of Mr. Ruskin to be +present at the encænia." The degree was conferred, in his absence, in +1893. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE DIVERSIONS OF BRANTWOOD (1879-1881) + + +Sixty years of one of the busiest lives on record were beginning to tell +upon Ruskin. He would not confess to old age, but his recent illness had +shaken him severely. The next three years were spent chiefly at +Coniston, in comparative retirement; but neither in despair, nor +idleness, nor loneliness. He had always lived a sort of dual life, +solitary in his thoughts, but social in his habits; liking company, +especially of young people; ready, in the intervals of work, to enter +into their employments and amusements, and curiously able to forget his +cares in hours of relaxation. Sometimes, when earnest admirers made the +pilgrimage to their Mecca--"holy Brantwood" as a scoffing poet called +it--they were surprised and even shocked, to find the prophet of "Fors" +at the head of a merry dinner-table, and the Professor of Art among +surroundings which a London or a Boston "æsthete" would have ruled to +be in very poor taste. + +Shall I take you for a visit there,--to Brantwood as it was in those old +times? + +It is a weary way to Coniston, whatever road you choose. The +inconvenience of the railway route was perhaps one reason of Ruskin's +preference for driving on so many occasions. After changing and changing +trains, and stopping at many a roadside station, at last you see, +suddenly, over the wild undulating country, the Coniston Old Man and its +crags, abrupt on the left, and the lake, long and narrow, on the right. +Across the water, tiny in the distance and quite alone amongst forests +and moors, there is Brantwood; and beyond it everything seems +uncultivated, uninhabited, except for one grey farmhouse high on the +fell, where gaps in the ragged larches show how bleak and storm-swept a +spot it is. + +To come out of the station after long travel is to find yourself face to +face with magnificent rocks, and white cottages among the fir-trees. As +you are whirled down through the straggling village, and along the shore +round the head of the lake, the panorama, though not Alpine in +magnitude, is almost Alpine in character. The valley, too, is not yet +built up; it is still the old-fashioned lake country, almost as it was +in the days of the "Iteriad." You drive up and down a narrow, hilly +lane, catching peeps of mountains and sunset, through thick, overhanging +trees; you turn sharp up through a gate under dark firs and larches, and +the carriage stops in what seems in the twilight a sort of court,--a +gravelled space, one side formed by a rough stone wall crowned with +laurels and almost precipitous coppice, the _brant_ (or steep) wood +above, and the rest is Brantwood, with a capital B.[41] + +[Footnote 41: The archway supporting a great pile of new buildings did +not exist in the time when this visit is supposed to be made. Since that +time new stables and greenhouses also have been built; with other +additions somewhat altering the cottage-like house of Ruskin's working +days.] + +You expect that Gothic porch you have read of in "Lectures on +Architecture and Painting," and you are surprised to find a stucco +classic portico in the corner, painted and _grained_, and heaped around +with lucky horseshoes, brightly blackleaded, and mysterious rows of +large blocks of slate and basalt and trap--a complete museum of local +geology, if only you knew it--very unlike an ideal entrance; still more +unlike an ordinary one. While you wait you can see through the glass +door a roomy hall, lit with candles, and hung with large drawings by +Burne-Jones and by the master of the house. His soft hat, and thick +gloves, and chopper, lying on the marble table, show that he has come in +from his afternoon's woodcutting. + +But if you are expected you will hardly have time to look round, for +Brantwood is nothing if not hospitable. The honoured guest--and all +guests are honoured there--after welcome, is ushered up a narrow stair, +which betrays the original cottage, into the "turret room." It had been +"the Professor's" until after his illness, and he papered it with +naturalistic pansies, to his own taste, and built out at one corner a +projecting turret to command the view on all sides, with windows +strongly latticed to resist the storms. There is old-fashioned solid +comfort in the way of furniture; and pictures,--a Dürer engraving, some +Prouts and Turners, a couple of old Venetian heads, and Meissonier's +"Napoleon," over the fireplace--a picture which Ruskin bought for one +thousand guineas, showed for a time at Oxford, and hung up here in a +shabby little frame to be out of the way.[42] + +[Footnote 42: Sold in 1882 for 5,900 guineas.] + +If you are a man, you are told not to dress; if you are a lady, you may +put on your prettiest gown. They dine in the new room, for the old +dining-room was so small that the waitress could not get round the +table. The new room is spacious and lofty compared with the rest of the +house; it has a long window with thick red sandstone mullions--there at +last is a touch of Gothicism--to look down the lake, and a bay window +open on the narrow lawn sloping steeply down to the road in front, and +the view of the Old Man. The walls, painted "duck egg," are hung with +old pictures; the Doge Gritti, a bit saved from the great Titian that +was burnt in the fire at the Ducal Palace in 1574; a couple of +Tintorets; Turner and Reynolds, each painted by himself in youth; +Raphael by a pupil, so it is said; portraits of old Mr. and Mrs. Ruskin, +and little John and his "boo hills." There he sits, no longer little, +opposite: and you can trace the same curve and droop of the eyebrows +prefigured in the young face and preserved in the old, and a certain +family likeness to his handsome young father. + +Since Mr. Ruskin's illness his cousin, Mrs. Arthur Severn, has become +more and more indispensable to him: she sits at the head of the table +and calls him "the coz." An eminent visitor was once put greatly out of +countenance by this apparent irreverence. After obvious embarrassment, +light dawned upon him towards the close of the meal. "Oh!" said he, +"it's 'the coz' you call Mr. Ruskin. I thought you were saying' the +cuss!'" + +There are generally two or three young people staying in the house, +salaried assistants[43] or amateur, occasional helpers; but though there +is a succession of visitors from a distance, there is not very frequent +entertainment of neighbours. + +[Footnote 43: The face most familiar at Brantwood in those times was +"Laurie's." A strange, bright, gifted boy--admirable draughtsman, +ingenious mechanician, marvellous actor; the imaginer of the quaintest +and drollest humours that ever entered the head of man; devoted to boats +and boating, but unselfishly ready to share all labours and contribute +to all diversions; painstaking and perfect in his work, and brilliant in +his wit,--Laurence Hilliard was dearly loved by his friends, and is +still loved by them dearly. He was Ruskin's chief secretary at Brantwood +from Jan., 1876 to 1882, when the death of his father, and ill-health, +led him to resign the post, which was then filled by Miss Sara D. +Anderson. Hilliard continued to live at Coniston, and was just beginning +to succeed as a painter of still life and landscape when he died of +pleurisy on board a friend's yacht in the Aegean, April 11th, 1887, aged +thirty-two.] + +A Brantwood dinner is always ample; there is no asceticism about the +place; nor is there any affectation of "intensity" or of conversational +cleverness. The neat things you meant to say are forgotten--you must be +hardened indeed to say them to Mr. Ruskin's face; but if you were shy, +you soon feel that there was no need for shyness; you have fallen among +friends; and before dessert comes in, with fine old sherry--the pride of +your host, as he explains--you feel that nobody understands you so well, +and that all his books are nothing to himself. + +They don't sit over their wine, and smoking is not allowed. Ruskin goes +off to his study after dinner--it is believed for a nap, for he was at +work early and has been out all the afternoon. In the drawing-room you +see pictures--water-colours by Turner and Hunt, drawings by Prout and +Ruskin, an early Burne-Jones, a sketch in oil by Gainsborough. The +furniture is the old mahogany of Mr. Ruskin's childhood, with rare +things interspersed--like the cloisonné vases on the mantelpiece. + +Soon after nine Ruskin comes in with an armful of things that are going +to the Sheffield museum, and while his cousin makes his tea and salted +toast, he explains his last acquirements in minerals or missals, eager +that you should see the interest of them; or displays the last studies +of Mr. Rooke or Mr. Fairfax Murray, copies from Carpaccio or bits of +Gothic architecture. + +Then, sitting in the chair in which he preached his baby-sermon, he +reads aloud a few chapters of Scott or Miss Edgeworth, or, with +judicious omissions, one of the older novelists; or translates, with +admirable facility, a scene of Scribe or George Sand. When his next +work comes out you will recognise this evening's reading in his +allusions and quotations, perhaps even in the subjects of his writing, +for at this time he is busy on the articles of "Fiction, Fair and Foul." + +After the reading, music; a bit of his own composition, "Old Aegina's +Rock," or "Cockle-hat and Staff"; his cousin's Scotch ballads or Christy +Minstrel songs; and if you can sing a new ditty, fresh from London, now +is your chance. You are surprised to see the Prophet clapping his hands +to "Camptown Races," or the "Hundred Pipers"--chorus given with the +whole strength of the company; but you are in a house of strange +meetings. + +By about half-past ten his day is over; a busy day, that has left him +tired out. You will not easily forget the way he lit his candle--no +lamps allowed, and no gas--and gave a last look lovingly at a pet +picture or two, slanting his candlestick and shading the light with his +hand, before he went slowly upstairs to his own little room, literally +lined with the Turner drawings you have read about in "Modern Painters." + +You may be waked by a knock at the door, and "Are you looking out?" And +pulling up the blind, there is one of our Coniston mornings, with the +whole range of mountains in one quiet glow above the cool mist of the +valley and lake. Going down at length on a voyage of exploration, and +turning in perhaps at the first door, you intrude upon "the Professor" +at work in his study, half sitting, half kneeling at his round table in +the bay window, with the early cup of coffee, and the cat in his crimson +arm-chair. There he has been working since dawn, perhaps, or on dark +mornings by candlelight. And he does not seem to mind the interruption; +after a welcome he asks you to look round while he finishes his +paragraph, and writes away composedly. + +A long, low room, evidently two old cottage-rooms thrown into one; +papered with a pattern specially copied from Marco Marziale's +"Circumcision" in the National Gallery; and hung with Turners. A great +early Turner[44] of the Lake of Geneva is over the fireplace. You are +tempted to make a mental inventory. Polished steel fender, very +unæsthetic; curious shovel--his design, he will stop to remark, and +forged by the village smith. Red mahogany furniture, with startling +shiny emerald leather chair-cushions; red carpet and green curtains. +Most of the room crowded with bookcases and cabinets for minerals. +Scales in a glass case; heaps of mineral specimens; books on the floor; +rolls of diagrams; early Greek pots from Cyprus; a great litter of +things and yet not disorderly nor dusty. "I don't understand," he once +said, "why you ladies are always complaining about the dust; my +bookcases are never dusty!" The truth being that, though he rose early, +the housemaid rose earlier. + +[Footnote 44: Since sold, and replaced by a della Robbia Madonna.] + +Before you have finished your inventory he breaks off work to show you a +drawer or two of minerals, fairy-land in a cupboard; or some of his +missals, King Hakon's Bible, or the original MS. of the Scott he was +reading last night; or, opening a door in a sort of secrétaire, pulls +out of their sliding cases frame after frame of Turners--the Bridge of +Narni, the Falls of Terni, Florence, or Rome, and many more--to hold in +your hand, and take to the light, and look into with a lens--quite a +different thing from seeing pictures in a gallery. + +At breakfast, when you see the post-bag brought in, you understand why +he tries to get his bit of writing done early. The letters and parcels +are piled in the study, and after breakfast, at which, as in old times, +he reads his last-written passages--how much more interesting they will +always look to you in print!--after breakfast he is closeted with an +assistant, and they work through the heap. Private friends, known by +handwriting, he puts aside; most of the morning will go in answering +them. Business he talks over, and gives brief directions. But the bulk +of the correspondence is from strangers in all parts of the +world--admirers' flattery; students' questions; begging-letters for +money, books, influence, advice, autographs, criticism on enclosed MS. +or accompanying picture; remonstrance or abuse from dissatisfied +readers, or people who object to his method of publication, or wish to +convert him to their own religion. And so the heap is gradually cleared, +with the help of the waste-paper basket; the secretary's work cut out, +his own arranged; and by noon a long row of letters and envelopes have +been set out to dry--Mr. Ruskin uses no blotting-paper, and, as he +dislikes the vulgar method of fastening envelopes, the secretary's work +will be to seal them all with red wax, and the seal with the motto +"To-day" cut in the apex of a big specimen of chalcedony. + +If you take, as many do, an interest in the minutiæ of portrait +painting, and think the picture more finished for its details, you may +notice that he writes on the flat table, not on a desk; that he uses a +cork penholder and a fine steel pen, though he is not at all a slave to +his tools, and differs from others rather in the absence of the _sine +quâ non_ from his conditions. He can write anywhere, on anything, with +anything; wants no pen-wiper, no special form of paper, or other "fad." +Much of his work is written in bound notebooks, especially when he _is_ +abroad, to prevent the loss and disorder of multitudinous foolscap. He +generally makes a rough syllabus of his subject, in addition to copious +notes and extracts from authorities, and then writes straight off; not +without a noticeable hesitation and revision, even in his letters. His +rough copy is transcribed by an assistant, and he often does not see it +again until it is in proof.[45] + +[Footnote 45: In later years he sometimes had his copy type-written.] + +Printers' proofs are always a trial, and he is glad to shift the work on +to an assistant's shoulders, such as Mr. Harrison was, who saw all his +early works through the press. But he is extremely particular about +certain matters, such as the choice of type and arrangements of the +page; though his taste does not coincide with that of the leaders of +recent fashions. Mr. Jowett (of Messrs. Hazell, Watson & Viney, Limited) +said in _Hazell's Magazine_ for September; 1892, that Ruskin made the +size of the page a careful study, though he adopted many varieties. The +"Fors" page is different from, and not so symmetrical as that of the +octavo "Works Series," although both are printed on the same sized +paper--medium 8vo. Then there is the "Knight's Faith" and "Ulric," in +both of which the type (pica _modern_--"this delightful type," wrote +Ruskin) and the size of the page are different from any other; yet both +were his choice. The "Ulric" page was imitated from an old edition of +Miss Edgeworth. The first proof he criticised thus: "Don't you think a +quarter inch off this page, as enclosed, would look better? The type is +very nice. How delicious a bit of Miss Edgeworth's is, like this!" "Ida" +was another page of his choice, and greatly approved. His title pages, +too, were arranged with great care; he used to draw them out in pen and +ink, indicating the size and position of the lines and letters. He +objected to ornaments and to anything like blackness and heaviness, but +he was very particular about proportions and spacing, and about the +division of words. + +In the morning everybody is busy. There are drawings and diagrams to be +made, MS. to copy, references to look up, parcels to pack and unpack. +Someone is told off to take you round, and you visit the various rooms +and see the treasures, inspect the outhouse with its workshop for +carpentry, framing and mounting, casting leaves and modelling; one work +or another is sure to be going on; perhaps one of the various sculptors +who have made Ruskin's bust is busy there. Down at the Lodge, a +miniature Brantwood, turret and all, the Severn children live when they +are at Coniston. Then there are the gardens, terraced in the steep, +rocky slope, and some small hot-houses, which Ruskin thinks a +superfluity, except that they provide grapes for sick neighbours. + +Below the gardens a path across a field takes you to the harbour, begun +in play by the Xenophon translators and finished by the village mason, +with its fleet of boats--chief of them the "Jumping Jenny" (called after +Nanty Ewart's boat in "Redgauntlet"), Ruskin's own design and special +private water-carriage. Outside the harbour the sail-boats are moored, +Mr. Severn's _Lily of Brantwood_. Milliard's boat, and his _Snail_, an +unfortunate craft brought from Morecambe Bay with great expectations +that were never realized; though Ruskin always professed to believe in +her, as a _real sea-boat_ (see "Harbours of England") such as he used to +steer with his friend Huret, the Boulogne fisherman, in the days when +he, too, was smitten with sea-fever. + +After luncheon, if letters are done, all hands are piped to the moor. +With billhooks and choppers the party winds up the wood paths, "the +Professor" first, walking slowly, and pointing out to you his pet bits +of rock-cleavage, or ivied trunk, or nest of wild strawberry plants. You +see, perhaps, the ice-house--tunnelled at vast expense into the rock and +filled at more expense with the best ice; opened at last with great +expectations and the most charitable intent--for it was planned to +supply invalids in the neighbourhood with ice, as the, hothouses +supplied them with grapes; and revealing, after all, nothing but a +puddle of dirty water. You see more successful works--the Professor's +little private garden, which he is supposed to cultivate with his own +hands; various little wells and watercourses among the rocks, moss-grown +and fern-embowered; and so you come out on the moor. + +There great works go on. Juniper is being rooted up; boggy patches +drained and cultivated cranberries are being planted, and oats grown; +paths engineered to the best points of view; rocks bared to examine the +geology--though you cannot get the Professor to agree that every inch of +his territory has been glaciated. These diversions have their serious +side, for he is really experimenting on the possibility of reclaiming +waste land; perhaps too sanguine, you think, and not counting the cost. +To which he replies that, as long as there are hands unemployed and +misemployed, a government such as he would see need never be at a loss +for labourers. If corn can be made to grow where juniper grew before, +the benefit is a positive one, the expense only comparative. And so you +take your pick with the rest, and are almost persuaded to become a +companion of St. George. + +Not to tire a new comer, he takes you away after a while to a fine +heathery promontory, where you sit before a most glorious view of lake +and mountains. This, he says, is his "Naboth's vineyard";[46] he would +like to own so fine a point of vantage. But he is happy in his country +retreat, far happier than you thought him; and the secret of his +happiness is that he has sympathy with all around him, and hearty +interest in everything, from the least to the greatest. + +[Footnote 46: Since then become part of the Brantwood estate.] + +Coming down from the moor after the round, when you reach the front door +you must see the performance of the waterfall: everybody must see that. +On the moor a reservoir has been dug and dammed, with ingenious +flood-gates--Ruskin's device, of course--and a channel led down through +the wood to a rustic bridge in the rock. Some one has stayed behind to +let out the water, and down it comes; first a black stream and then a +white one, as it gradually clears; and the rocky wall at the entrance +becomes for ten minutes a cascade. This too has it uses; not only is +there a supply of water in case of fire (the exact utilisation of which +is yet undecided), but it illustrates one of his doctrines about the +simplicity with which works of irrigation could be carried out among the +hills of Italy. + +And so you go in to tea and chess, for he loves a good game of chess +with all his heart. He loves many things, you have found. He is +different from other men you know, by the breadth and vividness of his +sympathies, by power of living as few other men can live, in Admiration, +Hope and Love. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +"FORS" RESUMED (1880-1881) + + +Retirement at Brantwood was only partial. Ruskin's habits of life made +it impossible for him to be idle, much as he acknowledged the need of +thorough rest. He could not be wholly ignorant of the world outside +Coniston; though sometimes for weeks together he tried to ignore it, and +refused to read a newspaper. The time when General Gordon went out to +Khartoum was one of these periods of abstraction, devoted to mediæval +study. Somebody talked one morning at breakfast about the Soudan. "And +who _is_ the Soudan?" he earnestly inquired, connecting the name, as it +seemed, with the Soldan of Babylon, in crusading romance. + +"Don't you know," he wrote to a friend (January 8th, 1880): + + + "That I am entirely with you in this Irish misery, and have been + these thirty years?--only one can't speak plain without distinctly + becoming a leader of Revolution? I know that Revolution _must come_ + in all the world--but I can't act with Dan ton or Robespierre, nor + with the modern French Republican or Italian one. I _could_ with + you and your Irish, but you are only at the beginning of the end. I + have spoken,--and plainly too,--for all who have ears, and hear." + +The author of "Fors" had tried to show that the nineteenth-century +commercialist spirit was not new; that the tyranny of capital was the +old sin of usury over again; and he asked why preachers of religion did +not denounce it--why, for example, the Bishop of Manchester did not, on +simply religious grounds, oppose the teaching of the "Manchester +School," who were the chief supporters of the commercialist economy. Not +until the end of 1879 had Dr. Fraser been aware of the challenge; but at +length he wrote, justifying his attitude. The popular and able bishop +had much to say on the expediency of the commercial system and the error +of taking the Bible literally; but he seemed unaware of the revolution +in economical thought which "Unto this Last" and "Fors" had been +pioneering. + +"I'm not gone to Venice yet," wrote Ruskin to Miss Beever, "but thinking +of it hourly. I'm very nearly done with toasting my bishop; he just +wants another turn or two, and then a little butter." The toasting and +the buttering appeared in the _Contemporary Review_ for February 1880; +and this incident led him to feel that the mission of "Fors" was not +finished. If bishops were still unenlightened, there was yet work to do. +He gave up Venice, and resumed his crusade. + +Brantwood life was occasionally interrupted by short excursions to +London or elsewhere. In the autumn he had heard Professor Huxley on the +evolution of reptiles; and this suggested another treatment of the +subject, from his own artistic and ethical point of view, in a lecture +oddly called "A Caution to Snakes," given at the London Institution, +March 17th, 1880 (repeated March 23rd, and printed in "Deucalion"). He +was not merely an amateur zoologist and F.Z.S., but a devoted lover and +keen observer of animals. It would take long to tell the story of all +his dogs, from the spaniel Dash, commemorated in his earliest poems, and +Wisie, whose sagacity is related in "Præterita," down through the long +line of bulldogs, St. Bernards, and collies, to Bramble, the reigning +favourite; and all the cats who made his study their home, or were +flirted with abroad. To Miss Beever, from Bolton Abbey (January 24th, +1875) he describes the Wharfe in flood, and then continues: "I came home +(to the hotel) to quiet tea, and a black kitten called Sweep, who lapped +half my cream-jugful (and yet I had plenty), sitting on my shoulder." +Grip, the pet rook at Denmark Hill, is mentioned in "My First Editor," +as celebrated in verse by Mr. W.H. Harrison. + +Ruskin had not Thoreau's intimate acquaintance with the details of wild +life, but his attitude towards animals and plants was the same; hating +the science that murders to dissect; resigning his Professorship at +Oxford, finally, because vivisection was introduced into the University; +and supporting the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals with +all his heart. But, as he said at the Annual Meeting in 1877, he +objected to the sentimental fiction and exaggerated statements which +some of its members circulated. "They had endeavoured to prevent cruelty +to animals," he said, "but they had not enough endeavoured to promote +affection for animals. He trusted to the pets of children for their +education, just as much as to their tutors." + +It was to carry out this idea (to anticipate a little) that he founded +the Society of Friends of Living Creatures, which he addressed, May +23rd, 1885, at the club, Bedford Park, in his capacity of--not +president--but "papa." The members, boys and girls from seven to +fifteen, promised not to kill nor hurt any animal for sport, nor tease +creatures; but to make friends of their pets and watch their habits, and +collect facts about natural history. + +I remember, on one of the rambles at Coniston in the early days, how we +found a wounded buzzard--one of the few creatures of the eagle kind that +our English mountains still breed. The rest of us were not very ready to +go near the beak and talons of the fierce-looking, and, as we supposed, +desperate bird. Ruskin quietly took it up in his arms, felt it over to +find the hurt, and carried it, quite unresistingly, out of the way of +dogs and passers-by, to a place where it might die in solitude or +recover in safety. He often told his Oxford hearers that he would rather +they learned to love birds than to shoot them; and his wood and moor +were harbours of refuge for hunted game or "vermin;" and his windows the +rendezvous of the little birds. + +He had not been abroad since the spring of 1877, and in August 1880 felt +able to travel again. He went for a tour among the northern French +cathedrals, staying at old haunts,--Abbeville, Amiens, Beauvais, +Chartres, Rouen,--and then returned with Mr. A. Severn and Mr. Brabazon +to Amiens, where he spent the greater part of October. He was writing a +new book--the "Bible of Amiens"--which was to be to the "Seven Lamps" +what "St. Mark's Rest" was to "Stones of Venice." + +Before he returned, the secretary of the Chesterfield Art School had +written to ask him to address the students. Mr. Ruskin, travelling +without a secretary, and in the flush of new work and thronging ideas, +put the letter aside; he carried his letters about in bundles in his +portmanteau, as he said in his apology, "and looked at them as Ulysses +at the bags of Aeolus." Some wag had the impudence to forge a reply, +which was actually read at the meeting in spite of its obviously +fictitious style and statements: + + + "HARLESDEN(!), LONDON, _Friday_. + + "MY DEAR SIR, + + "Your letter reaches me here. Have just returned [commercial + English, not Ruskin] from Venice [where he had meant to go, but did + not go] where I have ruminated(!) in the pasturages of the home of + art(!); the loveliest and holiest of lovely and holy cities, where + the very stones cry out, eloquent in the elegancies of + iambics" (!!)--and so forth. + +However, it deceived the newspapers, and there was a fine storm, which +Mr. Ruskin rather enjoyed. For though the forgery was clumsy enough, it +embodied some apt plagiarism from a letter to the Mansfield Art School +on a similar occasion. + +Not long before, a forgery of a more serious kind had been committed by +one of the people connected with St. George's Guild, who had put Mr. +Ruskin's name to cheques. The bank authorities were long in tracing the +crime. They even sent a detective to Brantwood to watch one of the +assistants, who never knew--nor will ever know--that he was honoured +with such attentions; and none of his friends for a moment believed him +guilty. He had sometimes imitated Mr. Ruskin's hand; a dangerous jest. +The real culprit was discovered at last, and Mr. Ruskin had to go to +London as a witness for the prosecution. "Being in very weak health," +the _Times_ report said (April 1st, 1879), "he was allowed to give +evidence from the bench." He had told the Sheffield communists that "he +thought so strongly on the subject of the repression of crime that he +dare not give expression to his ideas for fear of being charged with +cruelty"; but no sooner was the prisoner released than he gave the help +needed to start him again in a better career. + +Though he did not feel able to lecture to strangers at Chesterfield, he +visited old friends at Eton, on November 6th, 1880, to give an address +on Amiens. For once he forgot his MS., but the lecture was no less +brilliant and interesting. It was practically the first chapter of his +new work, the "Bible of Amiens,"--itself intended as the first volume of +"Our Fathers have Told us: Sketches of the History of Christendom, for +Boys and Girls who have been held at its Fonts." The distinctly +religious tone of the work was noticed as marking, if not a change, a +strong development of a tendency which had been strengthening for some +time past. + +Early in 1879 the Rev. F.A. Malleson, vicar of Broughton, near Coniston, +had asked him to write, for the Furness Clerical Society's Meetings, a +series of letters on the Lord's Prayer. In them he dwelt upon the need +of living faith in the Fatherhood of God, and childlike obedience to the +commands of old-fashioned religion and morality. He criticised the +English liturgy as compared with mediæval forms of prayer; and pressed +upon his hearers the strongest warnings against evasion, or explaining +away of stern duties and simple faiths. He concluded: + + + "No man more than I has ever loved the place where God's honour + dwells, or yielded truer allegiance to the teaching of His evident + servants. No man at this time grieves more for the damage of the + Church which supposes him her enemy, while she whispers + procrastinating _pax vobiscum_ in answer to the spurious kiss of + those who would fain toll curfew over the last fires of English + faith, and watch the sparrows find nest where she may lay her + young, around the altars of the Lord." + +But if the Anglican Church refused him, the Roman Church was eager to +claim him. His interest in mediævalism seemed to point him out as ripe +for conversion. Cardinal Manning, an old acquaintance, showed him +special attention, and invited him to charming _tête-à-tête_ luncheons. +It was commonly reported that he had gone over, or was going. But two +letters (of a later date) show that he was not to be caught. To a +Glasgow correspondent he wrote in 1887: + + + "I shall be entirely grateful to you if you will take the trouble + to contradict any news gossip of this kind, which may be disturbing + the minds of any of my Scottish friends. I was, am, and can be, + only a Christian Catholic in the wide and eternal sense. I have + been that these five-and-twenty years at least. Heaven keep me from + being less as I grow older! But I am no more likely to become a + Roman Catholic than a Quaker, Evangelical, or Turk." + +To another, next year, he wrote: + + + "I fear you have scarcely read enough of 'Fors' to know the breadth + of my own creed or communion. I gladly take the bread, water, wine, + or meat of the Lord's Supper with members of my own family or + nation who obey Him, and should be equally sure it was His giving, + if I were myself worthy to receive it, whether the intermediate + mortal hand were the Pope's, the Queen's, or a hedge-side gipsy's." + +At Coniston he was on friendly terms with Father Gibson, the Roman +Catholic priest, and gave a window to the chapel, which several of the +Brantwood household attended. But though he did not go to Church, he +contributed largely to the increase of the poorly-endowed curacy, and to +the charities of the parish. The religious society of the neighbourhood +was hardly of a kind to attract him, unless among the religious society +should be included the Thwaite, where lived the survivors of a family +long settled at Coniston--Miss Mary Beever, scientific and political; +and Miss Susanna, who won Mr. Ruskin's admiration and affection by an +interest akin to his own in nature and in poetry, and by her love for +animals, and bright, unfailing wit. Both ladies were examples of +sincerely religious life, "at once sources and loadstones of all good to +the village," as he wrote in the preface to "Hortus Inclusus," the +collection of his letters to them since first acquaintance in the autumn +of 1873. The elder Miss Beever died at an advanced age on the last day +of 1883; Miss Susanna survived until October, 29, 1893. + +In children he took a warm and openly-expressed interest. He used to +visit the school often, and delighted to give them a treat. On January +13th, 1881, he gave a dinner to 315 Coniston youngsters, and the tone of +his address to his young guests is noteworthy as taken in connection +with the drift of his religious tendency during this period. He dwelt on +a verse of the Sunday School hymn they had been singing: "Jesu, here +from sin deliver." "That is what we want," he said; "to be delivered +from our sins. We must look to the Saviour to deliver us from our sin. +It is right we should be punished for the sins which we have done; but +God loves us, and wishes to be kind to us, and to help us, that we may +not wilfully sin." + +At this time he used to take the family prayers himself at Brantwood: +preparing careful notes for a Bible-reading, which sometimes, indeed, +lasted longer than was convenient to the household; and writing collects +for the occasion, still existing in manuscript, and deeply interesting +as the prayers of a man who had passed through so many wildernesses of +thought and doubt, and had returned at last--not to the fold of the +Church, but to the footstool of the Father. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +THE RECALL TO OXFORD (1882-1883) + + +This Brantwood life came to an end with the end of 1881. Early in the +next year he went for change of scene to stay with the Severns at his +old home on Herne Hill. He seemed much better, and ventured to reappear +in public. On March 3rd he went to the National Gallery to sketch +Turner's Python. On the unfinished drawing is written: "Bothered away +from it, and never went again. No light to work by in the next month." +An artist in the Gallery had been taking notes of him for a +surreptitious portrait--an embarrassing form of flattery. + +He wrote: "No--I won't believe any stories about overwork. It's +impossible, when one's in good heart and at really pleasant things. I've +a lot of nice things to do, but the heart fails--after lunch, +particularly!" Heart and head did, however, fail again; and another +attack of brain fever followed. Sir William Gull brought him through, +and won his praise as a doctor and esteem as a friend. Ruskin took it as +a great compliment when Sir William, in acknowledging his fee, wrote +that he should keep the cheque as an autograph. + +By Easter Monday the patient was better again, and plunging into work in +spite of everybody. He wrote: + + + "I was not at all sure, myself, till yesterday, whether I _would_ + go abroad; also I should have told you before. But as you have had + the (sorrowful?) news broken to you--and as I find Sir William Gull + perfectly fixed in his opinion, I obey him, and reserve only some + liberty of choice to myself--respecting, not only climate,--but the + general appearance of the--inhabitants, of the localities, where + for antiquarian or scientific research I may be induced to prolong + my sojourn.--Meantime I send you--to show you I haven't come to + town for nothing, my last bargain in beryls, with a little topaz + besides...." + +But the journey was put off week after week. There was so much to do, +buying diamonds for Sheffield museum, and planning a collection of +models to show the normal forms of crystals, and to illustrate a subject +which he thought many people would find interesting, if they could be +got over its first difficulties. Not only Sheffield was to receive these +gifts and helps: Ruskin had become acquainted with the Rev. J.P. +Faunthorpe, Principal of Whitelands College for Pupil Teachers, and had +given various books and collections to illustrate the artistic side of +education. Now he instituted there the May Queen Festival, in some sort +carrying out his old suggestion in "Time and Tide." Mr. A. Severn +designed a gold cross, and it was presented, with a set of volumes of +Ruskin's works, sumptuously bound, to the May Queen and her maidens. The +pretty festival became a popular feature of the school, "patronised by +royalty," and Ruskin continued his annual gift to Whitelands, and kept +up a similar institution at the High School at Cork. + +At last, in August, he started for the Continent and stayed a while at +Avallon in central France, a district new to him. There he met Mr. Frank +Randal, one of the artists working for St. George's Guild, and explored +the scenery and antiquities of a most interesting neighbourhood. He +drove over the Jura in the old style, revisited Savoy, and after weeks +of bitter _bise_ and dark weather, a splendid sunset cleared the hills. +He wrote to Miss Beever:--"I saw Mont Blanc again to-day, unseen since +1877; and was very thankful. It is a sight that always redeems me to +what I am capable of at my poor little best, and to what loves and +memories are most precious to me." + +At Annecy he was pleased to find the waiter at the Hôtel Verdun +remembered his visit twenty years before;--everywhere he met old +friends, and saw old scenes that he had feared he never would revisit. +After crossing the Cenis and hastening through Turin and Genoa, he +reached Lucca, to be awaited at the Albergo Reale dell' Universo by a +crowd, every one anxious to shake hands with Signor Ruskin. No +wonder!--for instead of allowing himself to be a mere Number-so-and-so +in a hotel, wherever he felt comfortable--and that was everywhere except +at pretentious modern hotels--he made friends with the waiter, chatted +with the landlord, found his way into the kitchen to compliment the +cook, and forgot nobody in the establishment--not only in "tips," but in +a frank and sympathetic address which must have contrasted curiously, in +their minds, with the reserve and indifference of other English +tourists. + +At Florence he met Mr. Henry Roderick Newman, an American artist who had +been at Coniston and was working for the Guild. He introduced Ruskin to +Mrs. and Miss Alexander. In these ladies' home he found his own aims, in +religion, philanthropy, and art, realised in an unexpected way. Miss +Alexander's drawing at first struck him by its sincerity. Not only did +she draw beautifully, but she also wrote a beautiful hand; and it had +been one of his old sayings that missal-writing, rather than +missal-painting, was the admirable thing in mediæval art. The legends +illustrated by her drawings were collected by herself, through an +intimate acquaintance with Italians of all classes, from the nobles to +the peasantry, whom she understood and loved, and by whom she was loved +and understood. By such intercourse she had learned to look beneath the +surface. In religious matters her American common-sense saw through her +neighbours--saw the good in them as well as the weakness--and she was as +friendly, not only in social intercourse, but in spiritual things, with +the worthy village priest as with T.P. Rossetti,[47] the leader of the +Protestant "Brethren," whom she called her pastor. And Ruskin, who had +been driven away from Protestantism by the poor Waldensian at Turin, and +had wandered through many realms of doubt and voyaged through strange +seas of thought, alone, found harbour at last with the disciple of a +modern evangelist, the frequenter of the little meeting-house of outcast +Italian Protestants. + +[Footnote 47: A cousin of the artist, and in his way no less remarkable +a man. A short account of his life is given in "D.G. Rossetti, his +family letters," Vol. I., p. 34. The circumstances of his death are +touchingly related by Miss Alexander in "Christ's Folk; in the +Apennine."] + +One evening before dinner he brought back to the hotel at Florence a +drawing of a lovely girl lying dead in the sunset; and a little +note-book. "I want you to look over this," he said, in the way, but not +quite in the tone, with which the usual MS. "submitted for criticism" +was tossed to a secretary to taste. It was "The True Story of Ida; +written by her Friend." + +An appointment to meet Mr. E.R. Robson, who was making plans for an +intended Sheffield museum, took him back to Lucca, to discuss Romanesque +mouldings and marble facings. Mr. Charles Fairfax Murray also came to +Lucca with drawings commissioned for St. George's Guild. But Ruskin soon +returned to his new friends, and did not leave Florence finally until +he had purchased the wonderful collection of 110 drawings, with +beautifully written text, in which Miss Alexander had enshrined "The +Roadside Songs of Tuscany." + +Returning homewards by the Mont Cenis he stayed a while at Talloires, a +favourite haunt, extremely content to be among romantic scenery, and +able to work steadily at a new edition of his books in a much cheaper +form, of which the first volumes were at this time in hand. He had been +making further studies also, in history and Alpine geology; but at last +the snow drove him away from the mountains. So he handed over the +geology to his assistant, who compiled "The Limestone Alps of Savoy" +(supplementary to "Deucalion") "as he could, not as he would," while +Ruskin wrote out the new ideas suggested by his visit to Cîteaux and St. +Bernard's birthplace. These notes he completed on the journey home, and +gave as a lecture on "Cistercian Architecture" (London Institution, +December 4th, 1882), in place of the previously advertised lecture on +crystallography. + +He seemed now to have quite recovered his health, and to be ready for +re-entry into public life. What was more, he had many new things to say. +The attacks of brain fever had passed over him like passing storms, +leaving a clear sky. + +After his retirement from the Oxford Professorship, a subscription had +been opened for a bust by Sir Edgar Boehm, in memorial of a University +benefactor; and the model (now in the Sheffield Museum) was placed in +the Drawing School pending the collection of the necessary £220. _The +Oxford University Herald_, in its article of June 5th, 1880, no doubt +expressed the general feeling in reciting his benefactions to the +University with becoming appreciation. + +It was natural, therefore, that on recovering his health he should +resume his post. Professor (now Sir) W.B. Richmond, the son of his old +friend Mr. George Richmond, gracefully retired, and the _Oxford +University Gazette_ of January 16th, 1883, announced the re-election. +On March 2nd he wrote that he was "up the Old Man yesterday"; as much as +to say that he defied catechism, now, about his health; and a week later +he gave his first lecture. The _St. James's Budget_ of March 16th gave +an account of it in these terms: + + + "Mr. Ruskin's first lecture at Oxford attracted so large an + audience that, half-an-hour before the time fixed for its delivery, + a greater number of persons were collected about the doors than the + lecture-room could hold. Immediately after the doors were opened + the room was so densely packed that some undergraduates found it + convenient to climb into the windows and on to the cupboards. The + audience was composed almost equally of undergraduates and ladies; + with the exception of the vice-chancellor, heads of houses, + fellows, and tutors were chiefly conspicuous by their absence." + +I omit an abstract of the lecture, which can be read in full in the "Art +of England." The reporter continued: + + + "He had made some discoveries: two lads and two lasses, who[48] ... + could draw in a way to please even him. He used to say that, except + in a pretty graceful way, no woman can draw; he had now almost come + to think that no one else can. (This statement the undergraduates + received with gallant, if undiscriminating, applause.) To many of + his prejudices, Mr. Ruskin said, in the last few years the axe had + been laid. He had positively found an American, a young lady, whose + life and drawing were in every way admirable. (Again great and + generous applause on the part of the undergraduates, stimulated, no + doubt, by the knowledge that there were then in the room two fair + Americans, who have lately graced Oxford by their presence.) At the + end of his lecture Mr. Ruskin committed himself to a somewhat + perilous statement. He had found two young Italian artists in whom + the true spirit of old Italian art had yet lived. No hand like + theirs had been put to paper since Lippi and Leonardo." + +[Footnote 48: Referring to Misses Alexander and Greenaway, and Messrs. +Boni and Alessandri.] + +Three more lectures of the course were given in May, and each repeated +to a second audience. Coming to London, he gave a private lecture on +June 5th to some two hundred hearers at the house of Mrs. W.H. Bishop, +in Kensington, on Miss Kate Greenaway and Miss Alexander. The +_Spectator_ shared his enthusiasm for the pen and ink drawings of Miss +Alexander's "Roadside Songs of Tuscany," and concluded a glowing account +of the lecture by saying: "All Professor Ruskin's friends must be glad +to see how well his Oxford work has agreed with him. He has gifts of +insight and power of reaching the best feelings and highest hopes of our +too indifferent generation which are very rare." + +With much encouragement in his work, he returned to Brantwood for the +summer, and resolved upon another visit to Savoy for more geology, and +another breath of health-giving Alpine air. But he found time only for a +short tour in Scotland before returning to Oxford to complete the series +of lectures on recent English Art. During this term he was prevailed +upon to allow himself to be nominated as a candidate for the Rectorship +of the University of Glasgow. He had been asked to stand in the +Conservative interest in 1880, and he had been worried into a rather +rough reply to the Liberal party, when after some correspondence they +asked him whether he sympathised with Lord Beaconsfield or Mr. +Gladstone. "What, in the devil's name," he exclaimed, "have _you_ to do +with either Mr. D'Israeli or Mr. Gladstone? You are students at the +University, and have no more business with politics than you have with +rat-catching. Had you ever read ten words of mine with understanding, +you would have known that I care no more either for Mr. D'Israeli or Mr. +Gladstone than for two old bagpipes with the drones going by steam, but +that I hate all Liberalism as I do Beelzebub, and that, with Carlyle, I +stand, we two alone now in England, for God and the Queen." After that, +though he might explain[49] that he never under any conditions of +provocation or haste, would have said that he hated Liberalism as he did +_Mammon_, or Belial, or Moloch; that he "chose the milder fiend of Ekron +as the true exponent and patron of Liberty, the God of Flies," still the +matter-of-fact Glaswegians were minded to give the scoffer a wide berth. +He was put up as an independent candidate in the three-cornered duel; +and, as such candidates usually fare, he fared badly. The only wonder is +that three hundred and nineteen students were found to vote for him, +instead of siding, in political orthodoxy, with Mr. Fawcett or the +Marquis of Bute. + +[Footnote 49: Epilogue to "Arrows of the Chace."] + +At last a busy and eventful year came to a close at Coniston, with a +lecture at the village Institute on his old friend Sir Herbert Edwardes +(December 22nd). His interest in the school and the schoolchildren was +unabated, and he was always planning new treats for them, or new helps +to their lessons. He had set one of the assistants to make a large +hollow globe, inside of which one could sit and see the stars as +luminous points pricked through the mimic "vault of heaven," painted +blue and figured with the constellations. By a simple arrangement of +cogs and rollers the globe revolved, the stars rose and set, and the +position of any star at any hour of the year could be roughly fixed. But +the inclement climate of Coniston, and the natural roughness of +children, soon wrecked the new toy. + +About this time he was anxious to get the village children taught music +with more accuracy of tune and time than the ordinary singing-lessons +enforced. He made many experiments with different simple instruments, +and fixed at last upon a set of bells, which he wanted to introduce into +the school. But it was difficult to interfere with the routine of +studies prescribed by the Code. Considering that he scorned "the three +R's," a school after his own heart would have been a very different +place from any that earns the Government grant; and he very strongly +believed that if a village child learnt the rudiments of religion and +morality, sound rules of health and manners, and a habit of using its +eyes and ears in the practice of some good handicraft or art and simple +music, and in natural philosophy, taught by object lessons--then +book-learning would either come of itself, or be passed aside as +unnecessary or superfluous. This was his motive in a well-known incident +which has sometimes puzzled his public. Once, when new buildings were +going on, the mason wanted an advance of money, which Mr. Ruskin gave +him, and then held out the paper for him to sign the receipt. "A great +deal of hesitation and embarrassment ensued, somewhat to Mr. Ruskin's +surprise, as he knows a north-country-man a great deal too well to +expect embarrassment from him. At last the man said, in dialect: 'Ah mun +put ma mark!' He could not write. Mr. Ruskin rose at once, stretched out +both hands to the astonished rustic, with the words: 'I am proud to know +you. Now I understand why you are such an entirely good workman.'" + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE STORM-CLOUD (1884-1888) + + +The sky had been a favourite subject of study with the author of "Modern +Painters." His journals for fifty years past had kept careful account of +the weather, and effects of cloud. He had noticed since 1871 a +prevalence of chilly, dark _bise_, as it would be called in France; but +different in its phenomena from anything of his earlier days. The +"plague wind," so he named it--tremulous, intermittent, blighting grass +and trees--blew from no fixed point of the compass, but always brought +the same dirty sky in place of the healthy rain-cloud of normal summers; +and the very thunder-storms seemed to be altered by its influence into +foul and powerless abortions of tempest. We should now be disposed to +call this simply "the smoke nuisance," but feeling as he did the weight +of human wrong against which it was his mission to prophesy, believing +in a Divine government of the world in all its literalness, he had the +courage to appear before a London audience,[50] like any seer of old, +and to tell them that this eclipse of heaven was--if not a judgment--at +all events a symbol of the moral darkness of a nation that had +"blasphemed the name of God deliberately and openly; and had done +iniquity by proclamation, every man doing as much injustice to his +brother as it was in his power to do." + +[Footnote 50: "The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century," London +Institution, February 4th, 1884; repeated with variations and additions +a week later.] + +In the autumn, at Oxford, he took up his parable again. His lectures on +"The Pleasures of England" he intended as a sketch of the main stream of +history from his own religious standpoint. It was a noble theme, and one +which his breadth of outlook and detailed experience would have fitted +him to handle; but he was already nearing the limit of his vital powers. +He had been suffering from depression throughout the summer, unrelieved +by the energetic work for St. George's Museum, which in other days might +have been a relaxation from more serious thought. He had been editing +Miss Alexander's "Roadside Songs of Tuscany," and recasting earlier +works of his own, incessantly busy; presuming upon the health he had +enjoyed, and taking no hints nor advice from anxious friends, who would +have been glad to have seen the summer spent in change of scene and +holiday-making. + +At Oxford he was watched with concern--restless and excited, too +absorbed in his crusade against the tendencies of the modern scientific +party, too vehement and unguarded in his denunciations of colleagues, +too bitter against the new order of things which, to his horror, was +introducing vivisection in the place of the old-fashioned natural +history he loved, and speculative criticism instead of "religious and +useful learning." + +He was persuaded to cancel his last three attacks on modern life and +thought--"The Pleasures of Truth," of "Sense," and of "Nonsense"--and to +substitute readings from earlier works, hastily arranged and re-written; +and his friends breathed more freely when he left Oxford without another +serious attack of brain-disease. He wrote on December 1st, 1884, to Miss +Beever: + + + "I gave my fourteenth, and last for this year, lecture with vigour + and effect, and am safe and well (D.G.) after such a spell of work + as I never did before." + +To another correspondent, a few days later: + + + "Here are two lovely little songs for you to put tunes to, and sing + to me. You'll have both to be ever so good to me, for I've been + dreadfully bothered and battered here. I've bothered other people a + little, too,--which is some comfort!" + +But in spite of everything, the vote was passed to establish a +physiological laboratory at the museum; to endow vivisection--which to +him meant not only cruelty to animals, but a complete misunderstanding +of the purpose of science, and defiance of the moral law. He resigned +his Professorship, with the sense that all his work had been in vain, +that he was completely out of touch with the age, and that he had best +give up the unequal fight. + +In former times when he had found himself beaten in his struggles with +the world, he had turned to geology for a resource and a relief; but +geology, too, was part of the field of battle now. The memories of his +early youth and the bright days of his boyhood came back to him as the +only antidote to the distress and disappointments of his age, and he +strove to forget everything in "bygones"--"Præterita." + +It was Professor Norton who had suggested that he should write his own +life. He had begun to tell the story, bit by bit, in "Fors." On the +journey of 1882 he made a point of revisiting most of the scenes of +youthful work and travel, to revive his impressions; but the meeting +with Miss Alexander gave him new interests, and his return to Oxford put +the autobiography into the background. + +Now, at last he collected the scattered notes, and completed his first +volume, which brings the account up to the time of his coming of age. It +is not a connected and systematic biography; it omits many points of +interest, especially the steps of his early successes and mental +development; but it is the brightest conceivable picture of himself and +his surroundings--"scenes and thoughts perhaps worthy of memory," as the +title modestly puts it--told with inimitable ease and graphic power. + +We have traced a life which was--even more than might be gathered from +"Præterita"--a battle with adversities from the beginning. Not to +discuss the influences of heredity, there was over-stimulus in +childhood; intense application to work in youth and middle-age, under +conditions of discouragement, both public and private, which would have +been fatal to many another man; and this, too, not merely hard work, but +work of an intense emotional nature, involving--in his view at +least--wide issues of life and death, in which he was another Jacob +wrestling with the angel in the wilderness, another Savonarola imploring +reconciliation between God and man. + +Without a life of singular temperance, without unusual moral principle +and self-command, he would long ago have fallen like other men of genius +of his passionate type. He outlived "consumptive" tendencies in youth; +and the repeated indications of over-strain in later life, up to the +time of his first serious break-down in 1878, had issued in nothing +more than the depression and fatigue with which most busy men are +familiar. He had been accustomed to hear himself called mad--the defence +of Turner was thought by the _dilettanti_ of the time to be possible +only to a lunatic; the author of "Stones of Venice," we saw, was insane +in the eyes of his critic, the architect; it was seriously whispered +when he wrote on Political Economy that Ruskin was out of his mind; and +so on. Every new thing he put forward "made Quintilian stare and gasp," +and _soi-disant_ friends shake their heads, until a still newer +nine-days' wonder appeared from his pen. The break-down of 1878, so +difficult to explain to his public, made it appear that the common +reproach might after all be coming true. The recurrence of a similar +illness in 1881 and 1882 made it still more to be feared. It seemed as +though his life's work was to be invalidated by his age's failure; it +seemed that the stale, shallow reproach might only too easily be +justifiable. + +These attacks of mental disease, which at his recall to Oxford seemed to +have been safely distanced, after his resignation began again at more +and more frequent intervals. Crash after crash of tempest fell upon +him--clearing away for a while only to return with fiercer fury, until +they left him beaten down and helpless at last, to learn that he must +accept the lesson and bow before the storm. Like another prophet who had +been very jealous for the Lord God of Hosts, he was to feel tempest and +earthquake and fire pass over him, before hearing the still small voice +that bade him once more take courage, and live in quietness and in +confidence, for the sake of those whom he had forgotten, when he cried, +"I, even I only, am left." + +From one who has been out in the storm the reader will not expect a cool +recital of its effects. The delirium of brain-fever brings strange +things to pass; and, no doubt, afforded ground for the painful gossip, +of which there has been more than enough--much of it absurdly untrue, +the romancing of ingenious newspaper-correspondents; some of it, the +lie that is half a truth. For in these times there were not wanting +parasites such as always prey upon creatures in disease, as well as weak +admirers who misunderstood their hero's natural character, and entirely +failed to grasp his situation. + +Let such troubles of the past be forgotten: all that I now remember of +many a weary night and day is the vision of a great soul in torment, and +through purgatorial fires the ineffable tenderness of the real man +emerging, with his passionate appeal to justice and baffled desire for +truth. To those who could not follow the wanderings of the wearied brain +it was nothing but a horrible or a grotesque nightmare. Some, in those +trials, learnt as they could not otherwise have learnt to know him, and +to love him as never before. + +There were many periods of health, or comparative health, even in those +years. While convalescent from the illness of 1885 he continued +"Præterita" and "Dilecta," the series of notes and letters illustrating +his life. In connection with early reminiscences, he amused himself by +reproducing his favourite old nursery book, "Dame Wiggins of Lee." He +edited the works of one or two friends, wrote occasionally to +newspapers--notably on books and reading, to the _Pall Mall Gazette_, in +the "Symposium" on the best hundred books. He continued his arrangements +for the Museum, and held an exhibition (June, 1886) of the drawings made +under his direction for the Guild. + +He was already drifting into another illness when he sent the famous +reply to an appeal for help to pay off the debt on a chapel at Richmond. +The letter is often misquoted for the sake of raising a laugh, so that +it is not out of place to reprint it as a specimen of the more vehement +expressions of this period. The reader of his life must surely see, +through the violence of the wording, a perfectly consistent and +reasonable expression of Mr. Ruskin's views:-- + +"BRANTWOOD, CONISTON, LANCASHIRE. + +"_May 19th_, 1886. + +"SIR, + +"I am scornfully amused at your appeal to me, of all people in the world +the precisely least likely to give you a farthing! My first word to all +men and boys who care to hear me is 'Don't get into debt. Starve and go +to heaven--but don't borrow. Try first begging,--I don't mind, if it's +really needful, stealing! But don't buy things you can't pay for!' + +"And of all manner of debtors, pious people building churches they can't +pay for are the most detestable nonsense to me. Can't you preach and +pray behind the hedges--or in a sandpit--or a coal-hole--first? + +"And of all manner of churches thus idiotically built iron churches are +the damnablest to me. + +"And of all the sects of believers in any ruling spirit--Hindoos, Turks, +Feather Idolaters, and Mumbo Jumbo, Log and Fire worshippers, who want +churches, your modern English Evangelical sect is the most absurd, and +entirely objectionable and unendurable to me! All which they might very +easily have found out from my books--any other sort of sect +would!--before bothering me to write it to them. + +"Ever, nevertheless, and in all this saying, your faithful servant, + +"JOHN RUSKIN." + +The recipient of the letter promptly sold it. Only three days later, +Ruskin was writing one of the most striking passages in "Præterita" +(vol. ii., chap. 5)--indeed, one of the daintiest landscape pieces in +all his works, describing the blue Rhone as it flows under the bridges +of Geneva. + +This energetic letter-writing made people stare; but a more serious +result of these periods between strength and helplessness was the +tendency to misunderstanding with old friends. Ruskin had spoiled many +of them, if I may say so, by too uniform forbearance and unselfishness: +and now that he was not always strong enough to be patient, difficulties +ensued which they had not always the tact to avert. "The moment I have +to scold people they say I'm crazy," he said, piteously, one day. And +so, one hardly knows how, he found himself at strife on all sides. +Before he was fully recovered from the attack of 1886 there were +troubles about the Oxford drawing school; and he withdrew most of the +pictures he had there on loan. How little animosity he really felt +against Oxford is shown from the fact that early in the next year +(February, 1887) he was planning with his cousin, Wm. Richardson, to +give £5,000 to the drawing school, as a joint gift in memory of their +two mothers. Mr. Richardson's death, and Ruskin's want of means--for he +had already spent all his capital--put an end to the scheme. But the +remaining loans, including important and valuable drawings by himself, +he did not withdraw, and it is to be hoped they may stay there to show +not only the artist's hand but the friendly heart of the founder and +benefactor. + +In April, 1887, came the news of Laurence Hilliard's death in the +Aegean, with a shock that intensified the tendency to another recurrence +of illness. For months the situation caused great anxiety. In August he +posted with Mrs. A. Severn towards the south, and took up his quarters +at Folkestone, moving soon after to Sandgate, where he remained, with +short visits to town, until the following summer--better, or worse, from +week to week--sometimes writing a little for "Præterita," or preparing +material for the continuation of unfinished books; but bringing on his +malady with each new effort. In June, 1888, he went with Mr. Arthur +Severn to Abbeville, and made his headquarters for nearly a month at the +Tête de Boeuf. Here he was arrested for sketching the fortifications and +examined at the police station, much to his amusement. At Abbeville, +too, he met Mr. Detmar Blow, a young architect, whom he asked to +accompany him to Italy. They stayed awhile at Paris,--drove, as in 1882, +over the Jura, and up to Chamouni, where Ruskin wrote the epilogue to +the reprint of "Modern Painters"; then, by Martigny and the Simplon, +they went to visit Mrs. and Miss Alexander at Bassano; and thence to +Venice. They returned by the St. Gothard, reaching Herne Hill early in +December. + +But this journey did not, as it had been hoped, put him in possession of +his strength like the journey of 1882. Then, he had returned to public +life with new vigour; now, his best hours were hours of feebleness and +depression; and he came home to Brantwood in the last days of the year, +wearied to death, to wait for the end. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +DATUR HORA QUIETI (1889-1900) + + +In the summer of 1889, at Seascale, on the Cumberland coast, Ruskin was +still busy upon "Præterita." He had his task planned out to the finish: +in nine more chapters he meant to conclude his third volume with a +review of the leading memories of his life, down to the year 1875, when +the story was to close. Passages here and there were written, material +collected from old letters and journals, and the contents and titles of +the chapters arranged; but the intervals of strength had become fewer +and shorter, and at last, in spite of all his courage and energy, he was +brought face to face with the fact that his powers were ebbing away, and +that head and hand would do their work no more. + +He could not finish "Præterita"; but he could not leave it without +record of one companionship of his life, which was, it seemed, all that +was left to him of the old times and the old folks at home. And so, +setting aside the plans he had made, he devoted the last chapter, as his +forebodings told him it must be, to his cousin, Mrs. Arthur Severn, and +wrote the story of "Joanna's Care." + +In his bedroom at Seascale, morning after morning, he still worked, or +tried to work, as he had been used to do on journeys farther afield in +brighter days. But now he seemed lost among the papers scattered on his +table; he could not fix his mind upon them, and turned from one subject +to another in despair; and yet patient, and kindly to those with him +whose help he could no longer use, and who dared not show--though he +could not but guess--how heart-breaking it was. + +They put the best face upon it, of course: drove in the afternoons about +the country--to Muncaster Castle, to Calder Abbey, where he tried to +sketch once more; and when the proofs of "Joanna's Care" were finally +revised, to Wastwater. But travelling now was no longer restorative. + +It added not a little to the misfortunes of the time that two of his +best friends in the outside world were disputing over a third. By nobody +was Carlyle's reputation more valued, and yet he acknowledged that +Froude was but telling the truth in the revelations which so surprised +the public; and much as he admired Norton, he deprecated the attack on +Carlyle's literary executor, whose motives he understood and approved. + +In August, after his return to Coniston, the storm-cloud came down upon +him once more. It was only in the summer of 1890 that he was able to get +about. But firmly convinced that his one chance lay in absolute rest and +quiet, he wisely refused any sort of exertion, and was rewarded by a +temporary improvement in health and strength. + +In the meantime he was obliged to hand over to others such parts of his +work as others could do. The St. George's Guild still continued in +existence, though it naturally lost much of its interest, and the whole +of its distinctive mission, when he ceased to be able to direct it. The +Museum had quite outgrown its cottage at Walkley, never intended for +more than temporary premises; and for ten years there had been talk of +new buildings, at first on the spot, then on the Guild's ground at +Bewdley, where, at one time, Ruskin planned a fairy palace in the woods, +with cloistered hostelries for the wandering student. Such schemes were +stopped less by his illness than by want of means. + +Sheffield, however, did not wish to lose the Museum, and offered to +house it if the Guild would present it to the town. That was, of course, +out of the question. But a new offer to take over the collection on +loan, the Guild paying a curator, was another matter, and was thankfully +accepted. The Corporation fulfilled their share of the bargain with +generosity. An admirable site was assigned at Meersbrook Park, in a fine +old hall surrounded with trees, and overlooking a broad view of the town +and country. On April 15th, 1890, the Museum was opened by the Earl of +Carlisle, in presence of the Corporation, the Trustees of the Guild, and +a large assembly of friends and Sheffield townspeople. Since then the +attendance of visitors and students shows that the collection is +appreciated by the public; and it is to be hoped that though nominally a +loan it will remain there in perpetuity, and that it will be maintained +and used with due regard to the intentions of the founder. + +Many other plans had to be modified, as he found himself less able to +work, and was obliged to hand over his business to others. With his +early books he had been dissatisfied, as expressing immature views. "The +Stones of Venice" had been recast into two small volumes, and "St. +Mark's Rest" written in the attempt to supplement and correct it. But +the original book was obviously in demand, and a new edition was brought +out in 1886. + +"Modern Painters" had been also on the condemned list. The aggressive +Protestantism and the geological theories involved in his description of +mountains he condemned as errors; moreover, at the time of the last +edition published by Messrs. Smith & Elder (1873), he had been told +that the plates, which he considered a very important part of the work, +would not stand another impression; and so he destroyed nine of them, in +order that no subsequent edition might be brought out in the original +form. He reprinted vol. ii. in a cheap edition, and began to recast the +rest, with annotations and additions, as "In Montibus Sanctis," and +"Coeli Enarrant", while Miss S. Beever's selections ("Frondes Agrestes") +found a ready sale. But this did not satisfy the public, and there was a +continual cry for a reprint, to which, at last, he yielded. Early in +1889 the "Complete Edition" appeared; with the cancelled plates +reproduced. + +He had always felt it a grievance that the enormous popularity of his +works in America meant an enormous piracy. Towards the end of the +"Fifties," Mr. Wiley of New York had begun to print cheap Ruskins; not, +indeed, illegally, but without proper acknowledgment to the author, and +without any reference to the author's wishes as to form and style of +production. An artist and writer on art, insisting on delicacy and +refinement as the first necessity of draughtsmanship, and himself +sparing no trouble or expense in the illustrations of his own works, was +naturally dissatisfied with the wretched "Artotypes" with which the +American editions caricatured his beautiful plates. Not only that, but +it was a common practice to smuggle these editions, recommended by their +cheapness, into other countries. Mr. Wiley sent, on an average, five +hundred sets of "Modern Painters" to Europe every year, the greater +number to England. His example was followed by other American +publishers, so that in New York alone there came to be half a dozen +houses advertising Ruskin's works, and many more throughout the cities +of the States. Mr. Wiley, the first in the field, proposed to pay up a +royalty upon all the copies he had sold if Ruskin would recognise him as +accredited publisher in America. The offer of so large a sum would have +been tempting, had it not meant that Ruskin must condone what he had for +years denounced, and sanction what he strongly disapproved. The case +would have been different if proposals had been made to reproduce his +books in his own style, under competent supervision. This was done in +1890, when arrangements were made with Messrs. Charles E. Merrill & Co., +of New York, to bring out the "Brantwood" edition of Ruskin, under the +editorship of Professor C.E. Norton. + +Though the sale of Ruskin's books in America had never, until so +recently, brought him any profit, his own business in England, started +in 1871 with the monthly pamphlet of "Fors," and in 1872 with the volume +of "Sesame and Lilies," prospered singularly. Mr. George Allen, who, +while building up an independent connection, still remained the sole +publisher of Mr. Ruskin's works, said that the venture was successful +from its earliest years. It was found that the booksellers were not +indispensable, and that business could be done through the post as well +as over the counter. In spite of occasional difficulties, such as the +bringing out of works in parts, appearing irregularly or stopping +outright at the author's illnesses, there was a steady increase of +profit, rising in the author's later years (according to Mr. Allen) to +an average of £4,000. + +Fortunate it was that this bold attempt succeeded. The £200,000 he +inherited from his parents had gone,--chiefly in gifts and in attempts +to do good. The interest he used to spend on himself; the capital he +gave away until it totally disappeared, except what is represented by +the house he lived in and its contents. The sale of his books was his +only income, and a great part of that went to pensioners to whom in the +days of his wealth he pledged himself, to relatives and friends, +discharged servants, institutions in which he took an interest at one +time or other. But he had sufficient for his wants, and no need to fear +poverty in his old age. + +In this quiet retreat at Brantwood the echoes of the outer world did +not sound very loudly. Ruskin had been too highly praised and too +roundly abused, during fifty years of public life, to care what magazine +critics and journalists said of him. Other men of his standing could +solace themselves, if it be solace, in the consciousness that a grateful +country has recognised their talents or their services. But civic and +academic honours were not likely to be showered on a man who had spent +his life in strenuous opposition to academicism in art and letters, and +in vigorous attacks upon both political parties, and upon the +established order of things. + +And yet Oxford and Cambridge awarded him the highest honours in their +gift. In 1873 the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolours voted him +honorary member, a recognition which gave him great pleasure at the time. +At different dates he was elected to various societies--Geological, +Zoological, Architectural, Horticultural, Historical, Anthropological, +Metaphysical; and to the Athenæum and Alpine Clubs. He was elected Hon. +Member of the Academy of Florence in 1862, of the Academy of Venice, +1877, of the Royal Academies of Antwerp and Brussels in 1892; and was +also an Hon. Member of the American Academy. But he did not seek +distinctions, and he even declined them, as in the case of the medal of +the Royal Institute of British Architects. + +A more striking form of distinction than such titles is the fact that he +was the first writer whose contemporaries, during his lifetime, formed +societies to study his work. The first Ruskin Society was founded in +1879 at Manchester, and was followed by the Societies of London, Glasgow +and Liverpool. In 1887 the Ruskin Reading Guild was formed in Scotland, +with many local branches in England and Ireland, and a journal, +subsequently re-named _Igdrasil_, to promote study of literary and +social subjects in Ruskin, and in writers like Carlyle and Tolstoi +taking a standpoint similar to his. In 1896, Ruskin Societies were +formed at Birmingham and in the Isle of Man. Many classes and clubs for +the study of Ruskin were also in operation throughout America during his +lifetime. + +His eightieth birthday was the signal for an outburst of congratulations +almost greater than even admirers had expected. The post came late and +loaded with flowers and letters, and all day long telegrams arrived from +all parts of the world, until they lay in heaps, unopened for the time +being. A great address had been prepared, with costly illumination on +vellum, and binding by Mr. Cobden Sanderson. + +"Year by year," it said, "in ever widening extent, there is an +increasing trust in your teaching, an increasing desire to realize the +noble ideals you have set before mankind in words which we feel have +brought nearer to our hearts the kingdom of God upon earth. It is our +hope and prayer that the joy and peace you have brought to others may +return in full measure to your own heart filling it with the peace which +comes from the love of God and the knowledge of the love of your +fellow-men." + +Among those who subscribed to these sentiments were various people of +importance, such as Royal Academicians, the Royal Society of Painters in +Watercolours, the Trustees of the British Museum and of the National +Gallery, the St. George's Guild and Ruskin Societies, with many others; +and the address was presented by a deputation who reported that they had +found him looking well "and extremely happy." + +A similar illuminated address from the University of Oxford ran thus: + + + "We venture to send you, as you begin your eighty-first year, these + few words of greeting and good-will, to make you sure that in + Oxford the gratitude and reverence with which men think of you is + ever fresh. You have helped many to find in life more happiness + than they thought it held; and we trust there is happiness in the + latter years of your long life. You have taught many to see the + wealth of beauty in nature and in art, prizing the remembrance of + it; and we trust that the sights you have best loved come back to + your memory with unfading beauty. You have encouraged many to keep + a good heart through dark days, and we trust that the courage of a + constant hope is yours." + +The London Ruskin Society sent a separate address; and to show that if +not a prophet in his own country he was at any rate a valued friend, the +Coniston Parish Council resolved "and carried unanimously," says the +local journal, "with applause," + + + "That the congratulations of this council be offered to Mr. John + Ruskin, on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, together with + the warm thanks which they and all their neighbours feel for the + kindness he has shown, and the many generous acts he has done to + them and theirs during twenty-seven years of residence at Coniston, + where his presence is most truly appreciated, and his name will + always be most gratefully remembered." + +But as the year went on he did not regain his usual summer strength. +Walking out had become a greater weariness to him, and he had to submit +to the humiliation of a bath-chair. To save himself even the labour of +creeping down to his study, he sat usually in the turret-room upstairs, +next to his bed-chamber, but still with the look of health in his face, +and the fire in his eyes quite unconquered. He would listen while Baxter +read the news to him, following public events with interest, or while +Mrs. Severn or Miss Severn read stories, novel after novel; but always +liking old favourities best, and never anything that was unhappy. Some +pet books he would pore over, or drowse over by the hour. The last of +these was one in which he had a double interest, for it was about ships +of war, and it was written by the kinsman of a dear friend. Some of the +artists he had loved and helped had failed him or left him, but +Burne-Jones was always true. One night, going up to bed, the old man +stopped long to look at the photograph from Philip Burne-Jones's +portrait of his father. "That's my dear brother, Ned," he said, nodding +good-bye to the picture as he went. Next night the great artist died, +and of all the many losses of these later years this one was the hardest +to bear. + +So when a little boy lent him "A Fleet in Being" he read and re-read it; +then got a copy for himself, and might have learnt it by heart, so long +he pored over it. But when the little boy or his sisters went to visit +the "Di Pa" (Dear Papa), as he liked children to call their old friend, +he had now scarcely anything to talk about. "He just looked at us, and +smiled," they would report; "and we couldn't think what to say." + +He had his "bright days," when he would hear business discussed, though +a very little of it was wearisome. It was impossible to bring before him +half the wants and wishes of his correspondents, who could not yet +realise his weakness, and besought the notice they fancied so easily +given. Yet in that weakness one could trace no delusions, none of the +mental break-down which was taken for granted. If he gave an opinion it +was clear and sound enough; of course with the old Ruskinian waywardness +of idea which always puzzled his public. But he knew what he was about, +and knew what was going on. He was like the aged Queen Aud in the saga, +who "rose late and went to bed early, and if anyone asked after her +health she answered sharply." + +But all the love and care spent on him could not keep him with us. There +came the Green Yule that makes a fat kirkyard, and in January of 1900 +hardly a house in the neighbourhood was free from the plague of +influenza. In spite of strictest precautions it invaded Brantwood. + +On the 18th of January he was remarkably well, as people often are +before an illness--"fey," as the old Northern folk-lore has it. Towards +evening, when Mrs. Severn went to him for the usual reading--it was Edna +Lyall's "In the Golden Days"--his throat was irritable and he "ached all +over." They put him to bed and sent for Dr. Parsons, his constant +medical attendant, who found his temperature as high as 102°, and +feared the consequences. But the patient, as he always did, refused to +be considered ill, and ate his dinner, and seemed next day to be really +better. There was no great cause for alarm, though naturally some for +anxiety; and in reasonable hopes of amendment, the slight attack was not +made public. + +On Saturday morning, the 20th, all appeared to be going well until about +half-past ten. Suddenly he collapsed and became unconscious. It was the +dreaded failure of heart after influenza. His breathing weakened, and +through the morning and through the afternoon in that historic little +room, lined with his Turners, he lay, falling softly asleep. No efforts +could revive him. There was no struggle; there were no words. The +bitterness of death was spared him. And when it was all over, and those +who had watched through the day turned at last from his bedside, "sunset +and evening star" shone bright above the heavenly lake and the clear-cut +blue of Coniston fells. + +Next morning brought messages of hurried condolence, and the Monday such +a chorus from the press as made all the praises of his lifetime seem +trifling and all its blame forgotten. If only, in his years of struggle +and despair, he had known the place he should win! + +On the Tuesday came a telegram offering a grave in Westminster Abbey, +the highest honour our nation can give to its dead. But his own mind had +long since been made plain on that point, and his wishes had not been +forgotten. "If I die here," he used to say, "bury me at Coniston. I +should have liked, if it happened at Herne Hill, to lie with my father +and mother in Shirley churchyard, as I should have wished, if I died +among the Alps, to be buried in the snow." + +We carried him on Monday night down from his bed-chamber and laid him in +the study. There was a pane of glass let into the coffin-lid, so that +the face might be kept in sight; and there it lay, among lilies of the +valley, and framed in the wreath sent by Mr. Watts, the great painter, a +wreath of the true Greek laurel, the victor's crown, from the tree +growing in his garden, cut only thrice before, for Tennyson and Leighton +and Burne-Jones. It would be too long to tell of all such tokens of +affection and respect that were heaped upon the coffin,--from the wreath +of the Princess Louise down to the tributes of humble dependants,--above +a hundred and twenty-five, we counted; some of them the costliest money +could buy, some valued no less for the feeling they expressed. I am not +sure that the most striking was not the village tailor's, with this on +its label--"There was a man sent from God, and his name was John." + +On the Wednesday we made our sad procession to the church, through storm +and flood. The village was in mourning, and round the churchyard gates +men, women, and children stood in throngs. The coffin was carried in by +eight of those who had been in his employ, and the church filled +noiselessly with neighbours and friends, who after a hymn, and the +Lord's prayer, and a long silence, passed up the aisles for their last +look, and to heap more offerings of wreaths and flowers around the bier. +At dusk tall candles were lit, and so through the winter's night watch +was kept. + +Thursday, the 25th, brought together a great assembly, great for the +remoteness of the place and the inclemency of the weather. The country +folk have a saying "Happy is the dead that the rain rains on;" and the +fells were darkly clouded and the beck roared by, swollen to a torrent. +The church was far too small to hold the congregation, which included +most of his personal friends and the representatives of many public +bodies. A crowd stood outside in the storm while the service went on. + +It began with a hymn written for the occasion by Canon Rawnsley who with +the Vicar of Hawkshead, Brantwood's parish church, read the Psalms. A +hymn, "Comes at times a stillness as of even," was sung by his friend +Miss Wakefield; and the lesson read by Canon Richmond, arrived +officially to represent the Bishop of Carlisle, but to most of us +representing old times and the comradeships of his youth and early +manhood. The Vicar of Coniston and the Rev. Reginald Meister, on behalf +of the Dean of Christ Church, also took part in the service. When the +Dead March sounded the coffin was covered with a pall given by the +Ruskin Linen Industry of Keswick, lined with bright crimson silk, and +embroidered with the motto, "Unto This Last," and with his favourite +wild roses showered over the gray field, just as they fall in the +_Primavera_ of Botticelli. There was no black about his burying, except +what we wore for our own sorrow; it was remembered how he hated black, +so much that he would even have his mother's coffin painted blue; and +among the white and green and violet of the wreaths that filled the +chancel, none was more significant in its sympathy than Mrs. Severn's +great cross of red roses. + +As we carried him down the churchyard path, a drop or two fell from the +boughs, but a gleam of sunshine, the first after many days, shot along +the crags from under the cloud, and the wind paused. Standing there by +the graveside, who could help being thankful that he had found so lovely +a resting-place after so tranquil a falling to sleep? At his feet, +parted only by the fence and the garden, is the village school; and who +does not know how he loved the children of Coniston? At his right hand +are the graves of the Beevers; his last old friend, Miss Susan Beever, +lies next to him. Over the spot hang the thick boughs of a fir-tree--who +does not know what he has written of his favourite mountain-pine? And +behind the church, shut in with its dark yews', rise the crags of +Coniston, those that he wearied for in his boyhood, beneath which he +prayed, in sickness, to lie down and rest. "The crags are lone on +Coniston." + + + + +INDEX + +Abbeville, +Acland, Sir H.W., M.D., +Acland, Sir T.D., +Adairs and Agnews, +Agnew, Miss Joan Ruskin, + _and see_ Severn, Mrs. A. +Alessandri, Angelo, +Alexander, Mrs. and Miss Francesca, +Alice, Princess, +Allen, Mr. George, +"Amiens, The Bible of," +Anderson, Mr. J.R., +Anderson, Miss S.D., +Andrews, Dr. and family, +Animals, Ruskin and, +Anne, Nurse, +"Arachne," +"Aratra Pentelici," +Architects, Royal Institute, +Architectural Association, lecture to, +"Architecture, the Poetry of," +"Architecture, the Seven Lamps of," +"Ariadne Florentina," +Armytage, J.C., +Arthur, Prince, +Assisi, +Avallon, + +Baker, Mr. George, +Baxter, Mr. Peter, +Beever, Miss Mary, + Miss Susanna, 2 +"Bibliotheca Pastorum," +Bishop, Mrs. W.H., +Blow, Mr. Detmar J., +Boehm, Sir Edgar, +Boni, Commendatore G., +Botticelli, +Bourdillon, Mr. F.W., +Boys, T., +Bradford lectures, +Brantwood, +Brown, Dr. John, + Prof. Thomas, + Rawdon, + Rev. Walter, +Browning, Robert and Mrs., +Buckland, Dr., +Bunney, J.W., +Burgess, Arthur, +Burne-Jones, Sir Edward, + +Camberwell lectures, +Cambridge lectures, +Carlyle, Thomas, + Mrs., +Carpaccio, +Carrick and Vokins, +Cesnola, General L.P. di, +"Cestus of Aglaia," +Chamberlain, John Henry, +Chamouni, +Christ's Hospital lecture, +Collins, "Charley," +Coniston, + lecture, +Cooke, Mr. E., +Cousen, J., +Coutet, Joseph, +Cowper-Temple, Mr. and Mrs. (Lord and Lady Mount Temple), +"Crown of Wild Olive," +Croydon, +Cruikshank, George, +Cutt, R.P., +Cyanometer, + +Dale, Rev. T., +Dart, Henry, +Darwin, Charles, +Denmark Hill, +"Deucalion," +Deverell, W.H., +Dickinson, Lowes, +Dixon, Thomas, +Domecq, Adèle, +Peter, +Downes, David, +Dublin lecture, + +"Eagle's Nest," +Edinburgh lectures, +Edwardes, Sir Herbert, +"Elements of Drawing," +"Ethics of the Dust," +Eton lectures, +Eyre, Governor, + +Fall, Richard, +Faunthorpe, Rev. J.P., +Fielding, Copley, +Fleming, Mr. A., +Florence, +Forbes, Principal J.D., +Forgeries of Ruskin, +"Fors Clavigera," +"Friendship's Offering," +Friends of Living Creatures, Society of, +Froude, J.A., +Furnivall, F.J., + +Geneva, +Geology, + _and see_ Deucalion, Minerals +Giessbach, +Gladstone, W.E., +Glasgow Rectorship, +Glenfarg, +Glenfinlas, +Goodwin, Mr. Albert, R.W.S., +Gordon, Rev. Osborne, +Gothic Revival, +Gray, + Euphemia (Effie), + Mr. George, of Perth, + Mr. and Mrs. Richard, +Greenaway, Kate, +Gull, Sir Wm., M.D., + +Halle, Sir Charles, +Harding, J.D., +Hardraw Fall, +Harrison, W.H., +"Harry and Lucy Concluded," +Helps, Sir Arthur, +Herne Hill, +Hill, Miss Octavia, +Hilliard, + Mrs., + Miss, + Laurence Jermyn, +Hooper, W.H., +Howell, Charles Augustus, +Hunt, W. Holman, +Hunt, "Old" William, + +Ilaria di Caretto, + +Jameson, Mrs., +Jeffery, W., +Jephson, Dr., of Leamington, +Jowett, H. (of Hazell, Watson and Viney), + +"Kata Phusin," +Keble, +Kendal lecture, +Keswick, +"King of the Golden River," +King's College, London, +Kingsley, Rev. W., + +Langdale Linen Industry, +"Laws of Fésole," +Le Keux, J.H., +"Leoni," +Leopold, Prince, +Lewis, J.F., R.A., +Liddell, Dean, +Lockhart, J.G., +London Institution lectures, +Longfellow, +"Lord's Prayer, Letters on the," +Loudon's Magazines, +"Love's Meinie," +Lucca, +Luini, +Lupton, Thomas, + +Macdonald, + Mr. Alex., + W.M., of Crossmount, +Mallock, Mr. W.H., +Manchester lectures, +Manning, Cardinal, +"Marcolini," +Marks, H.S., R.A., +Matlock, +Matterhorn, +Maurice, Rev. F.D., +May Queens, +Meissonier's "Napoleon," +Metaphysical Society, +Meteorological Society, +Millais, Sir J.E., +Milman, Dean, +Minerals and Crystals, +Mitford, Miss, +"Modern Painters," +Moore, Prof. C.H., + Rev. Daniel, +Mornex, +"Mornings in Florence," +"Munera Pulveris," +Munro of Novar, +Murray, Mr. C. Fairfax, +Mythology, + +National Gallery, +Newman, Mr. H.R., +Newton, Sir Charles, +Northcote, James, R.A., +Norton, Prof. C.E., + +Oliver, Prof., +Oxford: + Ruskin as under graduate, + as graduate, + as Professor, + his lectures, + his drawing school, + his Hinksey diggings, +Oxford Museum, + +Palermo, +Paris, +Patmore, Coventry, +Pedigree of Ruskin, +Perth, +Photography, Ruskin's early use of, +Pisa, +Plague wind, +Poems, +"Political Economy of Art," +Politics, Ruskin's attitude, +Portraits of Ruskin, by + Northcote, + Richmond, + Rossetti, + Boehm, +Posting-tours, +"Præterita," +Pre-Raphaelitism, +Pringle, Thomas, +"Proserpina," +Prout, Samuel, +Publishing arrangements, + Ruskin's, + "Queen of the Air," + +Queen Victoria, + +Railways, Ruskin's attitude toward, +Randal, Mr. Frank, +Religion, Ruskin's development, +Reynolds, lectures on, +Richardson families, + Charles, + Jessie, + Mary (Mrs. Bolding), + Dr. William, + Mr. William, + _and see_ pedigree, +Richmond, George, R.A., + Sir William B., R.A., +Roberts, David, R.A., +Robson, Mr. E.R., +Rogers, Samuel, +Rome, +Rooke, Mr. T.M., R.W.S., +Rossetti, + D.G., + T.P., +Rowbotham, Mr., +"Royal Academy, Notes on the," +Royal Institution lectures, +Runciman, Mr., +Ruskin family, + John James, + Mrs. (Margaret Cox, John + Ruskin's mother), + +St. Andrews Rectorship, +St. George's Guild, +St. Mark's Rest, +St. Ursula, +Sandgate, +Saussure, +Seascale, +Seddon, Thomas, +"Sesame and Lilies," +Severn, + Mr. Arthur, R.I. + Mrs. Arthur, + _and see_ Agnew, Miss +"Sheepfolds, Notes on the Construction of," +Sheffield communists, + Museum (St. George's now "Ruskin"), +Sillar, W.C., +Smetham, James, +Smith, Elder & Co., +Smith, Sydney, +Socialism, Ruskin's attitude, +Somervell, Mr. R., +South Kensington Museum lecture, +Spurgeon, C.H., +Stanfield, C., R.A., +Stillman, W.J., +"Stones of Venice," +Stowe, Mrs. H.B., +Street-sweeping, +Swan, Henry, +Swiss towns, intended history, +Talbot, Mrs., and Mr. Q., +Talloires, +Taylor, Sir Henry, +Tea-shop, Ruskin's, +Telford, Henry, +Tennyson, +Thackeray, +Thomson, Mr. George, +"Time and Tide," +Tintoret, +Toynbee, Arnold, +Trevelyan, Sir Walter and Lady, +Tunbridge Wells, + lecture at, +Turner, J.M.W., +"Two Paths," +Tyrwhitt, Rev. R, St. J. + +University College, London, + lecture at, +"Unto this last," +"Val d'Arno," +Venice, +Vere, Aubrey de, +Verona, +Waldensians, +Ward, Rev. J. Clifton, + William, +Watts, G.F., R.A., +Wedderburn, Mr. A., K.C., +Whistler, J. McN., +Willett, Henry, F.G.S., +Windus, G., +Winnington school, +Withers, Charlotte, +Woodward, Benjamin, +Woolwich lectures, +Working Men's College, +Wornum, R.N., +Xenophon's "Economist," +"Yewdale and its streamlets," +Yule, Colonel and Mrs., +Zermatt, + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13076 *** |