Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

the other novels of the GRESLEY and SEWELL School, and intended to propagate a ritual and hierarchic churchism; but with this difference, that whereas these latter are only at the verge, Fabiola is wholly inside the pale of the Roman Catholic Church. It is somewhat overcharged, too, with the sentimentality proper to Young Rome; narrating the ecstasies, and even the miracles of its three saintly characters, St. Agnes, St. Sebastian and St. Pancras, with sickening detail. The Lives of the Saints, and the Acts of the Martyrs are quoted, throughout, as quite reliable authority, and the ordinary ceremonies and forms of the Church, along with other antique observances, are a staple material in the progress of events. The story is not remarkable, being the frequently repeated experience of early Christians of high and low rank, converted, and betrayed and martyred, or escaping and living happily. The quiet postulate that Christianity is and always has been Romanism, of course, underlies the whole book. The style is precisely what one would expect from a dignified prelate; rather stiff, and more or less disfigured with classicisms and foreign idioms, such as one might acquire by long habituation to the use of Latin and Greek, and of the continental idioms of Europe; not to speak of technical terms from the ecclesiology of the writer. On the whole, therefore, it is greatly inferior to the controversial works and occasional discourses of the Cardinal, which exhibit not only prodigious variety and accuracy of learning, but rare eloquence.

- Pride and Prejudice, by JANE AUSTEN. With this respectably printed volume, Messrs. Bunce & Brother commence the republication of Miss Austen's standard novels. To the readers of forty years ago any account of her works would be superfluous; but they are known to comparatively few of the younger patrons of circulating libraries and book-stores. Pride and Prejudice is, in respect of style, a conversational novel; in respect of subject, a social novel. It seems to have been intended by the writer to be taken as an exposition of the evils resulting from the faults after which it is named; for the unhappinesses of the story are the consequences of the pride of Darcy and the prejudice of Elizabeth Bennet. But it might, without absurdity,

be maintained that Miss Austen had another purpose at least equal in importance, in her own mind, in its composition; for the book displays the disgusting folly and miserable result of miseducated and misdirected female life very much more fully and forcibly than the nature or operations of either Pride or Prejudice. Mrs. Bennet is a silly old woman, with four daughters; and her whole foolish energies are devoted to the one purpose of marrying them to husbands; who must, at any rate, be wealthy next respectable, then handsome, and good or bad, as luck may have it. Very much the same is the intention of all the other mothers in the book. Such is the expectation of the daughters, who are represented as wise or foolish virgins, more in proportion to the modesty or immodesty of their conduct in their hus band-hunting enterprises, than for any other remarkable qualities. The action of the book is principally carried on by means of conversations, throughout which the individualities of the interlocutors are distinguished and preserved with very considerable skill; and which are quite artistically contrived to hold to each other, throughout the work, the relations usually sustained by adventures or schemes. A very meagre and unskillfully written biographical notice of Miss Austen is prefixed, apparently from some biographical dictionary.

THE FINE ARTS.

HORACE VERNET's Brethren of Joseph, at Goupil & Co.'s Gallery.

Ary Scheffer's "Temptation of Christ," was removed from the Gallery of the Messrs. Goupil, only to make room for a picture of less size but certainly equal merit, by Horace Vernet. "The Brethren of Joseph" has also left us, to adorn the walls of its English purchaser, but a large and important picture by Maclise speedily supplied its place, and renewed, for the third time during the past season, the obligation the public is under to the enterprising gentlemen who compose the firm of Goupil & Co., for the opportunity to study, at leisure, first class works of Art.

There are several things waiting to be said about these Exhibitions of single pictures, and the aid they bring to the forma tion of a correct public taste, but we leave them until another occasion. At present,

a few words about Horace Vernet himself seem in place before speaking of his picture. Here, in brief, is what we have been able to gather concerning him and his history.

The father and grandfather of Horace Vernet were both distinguished painters. The grandfather's name was Claude Joseph Vernet; he painted marine views, principally sea-coasts; a large picture from his hand is in the Gallery of the Boston Athenæum, and two inferior specimens are to be found in the Bryan Gallery in New York-a collection, by the way, which only needs to be exhibited in more easily accessible rooms and at a less charge for admission, to receive a much greater share of public attention than it does at present.

Horace Vernet's father was Antoine Charles Horace Vernet, a painter of repute; his son, born in the Louvre, in 1789, took the last two of his father's long string of names, and at this day plain "Horace Vernet" on a canvas, commands a host of admirers larger than that which follows any other living artist. He early discovered the particular line in which his genius as a painter was to develop itself. Born an artist, he was also born a soldier, and the titles of some of his earliest pictures will show in what direction his nature led him. The Taking of a Redoubt," "Dog of the Regiment," "Battle of Tolosa,"

Barrier of Clichy," "Defense of Paris," -these pictures, painted in 1817, when the artist was twenty-eight years old, have been judged worthy of a place in the Luxembourg Palace-in whose Gallery are hung, as in a place of the highest honor, the works of the best living artists of France.

Horace Vernet began to paint in the days when the tide of popular feeling was turning against David, the great master of the classic school-a school, so-called, because, instead of studying living men and their manners, its scholars spent their lives in making historical pictures whose men and women were modeled from the antique statues and the figures on the Greek vases.

It was, on the whole, a poor school. Its pictures were coldly correct, without life, without vigor, without sentiment; but, fostered by Napoleon, or, at least, made the fashion during his reign, it took a high seat in the world and kept it for a long time unchallenged. To this school Horace

Vernet opposed himself with his characteristic energy. He refused to dress honest soldiers of the nineteenth century in sandals and tunics. He refused to paint them in any dress but their own, or to put shields and spears into their hands instead of good guns and swords. With his keen, mental eyes, he saw through the classic farce, and laughed at those who acted in it. The pictures we have named in a previous paragraph, were the first fruits of his determination. He soon found that the people were on his side, if the Academy and the Artists were against him. In 1822 he wished to make a more decided move, and sent his pictures to the Exhibition at the Louvre. He had made enemies by his opposition, and now he felt their power. His pictures were refused admission. Nothing daunted, but confident in their merit, he took them to his studio and exhibited them to the public there. It was a bold stroke, but a fortunate one. His room became the centre of attraction in Paris; the people were wonderfully drawn to these spirited, natural works. Vernet became at once, and forever, a public favorite.

The French battles in Algeria seem to constitute the great era in Vernet's artistic life. A Gallery at Versailles was set apart for the reception of pictures commemorative of the Algerian War-all of which Vernet was commissioned to paint. This Gallery is called the Constantine Gallery, from the name of the town "Constantine," taken by the French during the war. It contains Vernet's greatest works. There is "The Taking of the Smalah," the largest picture in the world-small praise, if it could not also be said that it is crowded with incident, and that the narrative is told with wonderful clearness, a fertility of invention unparalleled, and a truth to nature, we may almost say, never before attempted.

Although Vernet's great power lies in the painting of battles, yet he by no means confines himself to this field. He paints every variety of subject, but always with an evident leaning toward those in which life is stirring and active. His works have a wonderful reality; his execution leaves nothing to desire in truthfulness, yet there is nothing in it that reminds you of Düsseldorf and its artificial school. Like Scheffer and Couture, Vernet is no colorist. He renders with faithfulness the local color

and texture of every object, but he does not know how to harmonize and tone the whole into an agreeable result. Hence his pictures have a spotty, crude appearancethe eye is not soothed and pleased as in looking at a Rubens or a Titian, but it is shocked and dazzled. Afterward, when the mind busies itself with the story and the characterization of the actors, delight begins. But it must never be forgotten, that a picture wanting in color is deficient in an important and noble attribute.

Vernet works with marvelous rapidity. He rarely uses the model, and then only for an instant; he spends little time in studying dresses, arms or accoutrements-'so retentive is his memory that once having seen he remembers with distinctness, and then, free from all impediment, he impresses himself upon the canvas with such rapidity that he may almost literally be said to think with his brush.

The picture of "The Brethren of Joseph," which our citizens have had so good an opportunity to study. was a fine specimen of Vernet's work. It was painted in Africa in 1853. The story was remarkably told, and the execution could not be surpassed. Like all his pictures, it was unpleasant in color, but it displayed the utmost perfection in drawing. The botany, the anatomy, the rendering of texture in the materials, were all masterly. It was a work we greatly desired to have made a public possession. Not until our people can see such works freely and at will, shall we be able to congratulate ourselves on a public appreciation of Art; and until we have that appreciation we shall be wanting in a great element of civilized society. To provide such works of Art for the contemplation of the people is as clearly a duty of Government as anything can be, and we can but be ashamed that a city like New York, the third city in the world, has to depend for her opportunities of seeing works of Art, on the courtesy of picture dealers, and in the advantages which she offers for the study of pictures and statues, is not only behind Boston and Philadelphia, but also far behind some of the smallest cities of Europe.

Perfect as was "The Brethren of Joseph," in its drawing, and wonderful as it was in the truth of its rendering, and the clearness of its narrative, it wanted the charm of sentiment and purpose. Each of those men

was a wonder--each had a distinct individuality, but it was not only the fact of their being Arabs, and not Hebrews, that made them appear unrelated to the scene. They seemed as if arranged in a tableau vivant, and yet not so, but rather as if some accidental juxtaposition of men in real life had caught the eye of the artist and impressed him with its strange resemblance to the scene acted centuries ago in Palestine by those twelve hard-hearted brethren, and as if he had copied what he saw with literal exactness, making no allowance for the difference between the motives of the two scenes. This want of sentiment-the highest quality in a work of Art, prevented "The Brethren of Joseph" from taking that lofty rank to which, had it been all that we have a right to demand in this respectits admirable execution, the power of its characterization, and the profound knowledge in many departments it displayedwould have unquestionably entitled it.

-The Sacrifice of Noah, by DANIEL MACLISE, R. A., at Goupil & Co.'s Gallery.

This large work by an Irish painter, long resident in England, is undoubtedly a fine specimen of his ability. With great good sense, the Messrs. Goupil have thus far selected their pictures for engraving from the works of those men who are not remarkable for excellence in color. Scheffer, Delaroche, Vernet, and Maclise, are none of them colorists, and their works are well represented by engravings. Of the peculiar excellence of such men as Titian, Paul Veronese, Giorgione, Rubens, and Allston, no idea can be formed by prints: through such a medium we only see the beauty of their forms, the excellence of their arrangements, or the naturalness of their expression.

Mr. Maclise has treated his subject with great simplicity and directness. In color, the picture, like all his works, is wholly unsatisfactory. It is cold, gray and inbarmonious. It is very much worse in this particular than either the "Temptation" or "The Brethren of Joseph." But in drawing, it is excellent, and the story is told with a clearness wholly admirable. The salient points of the narrative are seized with decision, and the canvas, without being crowded, is full of incident.

In the centre stands Noah-an erect, vigorous figure, wanting, perhaps, in hight; his face is lifted earnestly to heaven-his

left hand, clenched, is pressed firmly upon the rude stone altar from whose victim the smoke of sacrifice rises. In his right hand he holds a golden censer. His whole attitude strongly expresses a manly faith and trust in God. He is really the central figure but not the central thought of the picture. The central thought of the picture, admirably interpreted, is the sublimity of faith in God. Without the clear and full expression of this idea, the picture could be nothing but a piece of posture painting, well done, perhaps, but without purpose, and so without real greatness. As it is, in spite of its crudity and want of sufficient study in some portions, it may, without hesitation, be called a sublime work of Art, full of suggestion, and whose deep inner meaning can never be exhausted.

At the right of the picture are grouped the wives of Noah's sons. They are natural, pleasing figures, but are not characterized sufficiently, as the wives of the men who were to found three great empires, each with its peculiar civilization. They are simply three handsome Irish girlsthey might have been made something more. A pretty bit of sentiment is introduced in this portion of the picture. The cnly plant that can be seen, a delicate vine, has sprung up at the feet of these girls, a lamb lies down beside them, and two snow-white doves have come to pick up food close to them. The signification of these incidents is clearly pronounced, while the incidents themselves are skillfully and naturally managed.

At the left of the picture stand the three sons of Noah. SHEM, a youth of fairer skin than his brothers, dressed in the light garb of a shepherd-huntsman, leans eagerly forward, supported by his spear. He carries at his side a knife with a handle of stag's horn and a gourd water-bottle. He is young and beardless. His countenance expresses reverent faith, and intense interest in the ceremony. JAPHET stands next him, an erect and noble figure, clothed in a long mantle which completely covers him. His hair is black and his beard is thick. His attitude and face express, if not indifference to what is going on, at least an intellectual questioning. He is the philosopher-not denying, not asserting, but waiting with quiet dignity for the proof which he demands as the condition of his assent. HAM kneels on one knee

and rests his arms on the other. He is half draped in a mantle-a rich bracelet circles one arm-his beard is slight, his dark-brown hair falls over his forehead. He looks up at the ascending smoke with a countenance earnest in its action, but too sensuous to be fully sympathetic. He exults in life and is thankful for it, but it is with a languid delight. The sweet savor of the sacrifice is to him its greatest charm.

In front of the picture, at the left hand, Noah's wife is seen kneeling. Even if the rest of the work were poor, the sentiment of this figure would redeem it. The attitude is that of one who is saved from peril after long and anxious watching and inward struggle. A different and perhaps grander mode of treatment would have represented her as triumphing in the fulfillment of her belief in God's power, and in the answer to her prayers. But the action chosen by Maclise brings ber nearer to our human sympathies and experience. Her expression is that of tearful thankfulness. She fully joins in the offering of sacrifice, but she is too much prostrated in body and mind to exult. She is looking nowhere -her mind is busied, and absorbed in thought.

The detail of the picture demands a moment's notice. In the background the Ark rests upon Ararat, and the animals are leaving it. The domestic animals remain quietly grouped together, nearest to what is left of mankind. The giraffes, lions, panthers, elephants and camels, take up their march to the East and South; the elks, stags and deer, are on their way to the North-a group of chamois and ibexes stands on a cliff. On the Ark the domestic birds are gathered quietly in one place— the others fly off with multitudinous scream and whirr. This whole arrangement shows careful study and poetic thought. The dead birds and animals in the foreground, with the wonderfully executed silver vase, are almost too well done. They dangerously lure the eye away from the more important statements of the picture, and cause the mind to waver between the contemplation of merely material facts, and those sublime spiritual ideas which underlie and permeate the whole scene.

Both these pictures, "The Brethren of Joseph," and "The Sacrifice of Noah," are to be engraved by Goupil & Co.

MUSIC.

PARIS stops midway in Lenten mortification, puts off sack-cloth and ashes, dons three-pile and motley, and, during the mi carême, dances and sings with the frantic zest of a schoolboy's play during his fifteen minutes noon recess. But New York is more persistent in its abstinence. It was not so of olden time; for those of us who yet write ourselves young remember when all innocent amusements, public or private, were as openly enjoyed, even among our High Church Gothamites, during Lent (excepting Passion Week, perhaps) as in any other part of the year, sacred or secular. With the advent of Gothic church-architecture, however-real Gothic, wrought in stone, which causes note-shaving, porkselling churchwardens to talk of naves and transepts, corbels and finials-the gusty forty days which usher in our only month of Spring have attained a new sacredness in the eyes of the Rev. Cream Cheese, and the flock to whom he dispenses the mild curds and whey of doctrine, and Upperten-dom now goes the entire Lent.

It is for this reason, in part at least, that the serried ranks of seats in the new Opera House, which we absurdly call the Academy of Music, have been in a great measure vacant during the last month, in spite of Steffanone and Vestvali, Brignoli and Badiali. The Committee of Management boldly lifted the concern out of the mire of the Ole Bull-Maretzek "row," and seemed determined to show the public that the affairs of an opera house could be conducted at once quietly and with vigor, generously and with prudence. But as far as regards the pecuniary result of their labors, they were in vain. They piped unto the people, but they would not dance, they sang unto them, but they would not answer.

Steffanone, whom we all remembered with pleasure, whose great, good-natured, lazy way never offends us, even when she sings sluggishly, and who, when she is finally aroused, which usually happens about the finale of the first act, or the beginning of the second, displays a dramatic force and intensity inferior only to Grisi's of all the prima donnas that Fortune and the Collins line of steamers have brought us, this good Steffanone made a bad impression when she first appeared this season. She sang, as one fair auditor said,

"like a drowning woman," while a blondebearded gentleman, who looked as though he had studied, and fought, and drunk, at Heidelberg, thought that her voice sounded as if she were singing in a huge tun. The case was deplorable, and the tender lings of Gotham ran about the house chirping out, that "Steffanone had been living too fast," coaxing their moustache the while, and looking wicked and knowing, as if they, each one of them, could tell who and what was at the bottom of it all; but-though they did not say so they were evidently on their honor, and were discreet. But an evening or two extinguished their pretensions; for Steffanone was again Steffanone the Magnificent,-a little coarse, perhaps, and more sensuous than intellectual in style; but still glorious, in a large, full, sympathetic voice, a fine declamatory vocalization, a striking manner, imperturbable good nature, and unflagging faithfulness. She has lost somewhat of her freshness both of voice and person; but we still see in her potential ministrations to more than one season of operatic pleasure.

The change which has taken place in the taste of our musical public during the last ten years, and the exacting demands for which operatic managers are obliged to cater, are in no respect more decidedly shown than in the manner of Signorina Vestvali's reception by the town. Ten years ago, Vestvali, "solitary and alone," would have filled a theatre. She is quite a phenomenon, this fair Sclave, (she is a Pole, a Varsovienne,) and, in appearance, at least, is the prominent personage upon the stage whenever she appears. Of almost heroic stature for a woman-she is full half a head taller than Grisi-she is, nevertheless, one of the most beautifully formed creatures that the eyes of happy men ever looked upon. Her voice, a contralto, assigns her to more masculine than feminine characters; and not only does she become the dresses which she wears, but she is splendid in them-radiant. In truth, it is impossible to conceive anything more beautiful than the things which Vestvali uses to walk with. Fully conscious of her beauty, too, and never mincing matters when propriety of costume requires its display, she yet seeks no opportunities to reveal it, seeming to be entirely unconscious about the matter, and, when on the stage,

« AnteriorContinuar »