Hogarth: His Life, Art, and Times

More documents

Recommendations

Info

One may suppose that Hogarth turned from the completion of his Moses in 1746/7 to Industry and Idleness. After the unveiling of the Foundling paintings in April, he was approached by Murray to make a painting for Lincoln's Inn. Probably, as soon as he published Industry and Idleness he turned his attention to this project; thus, when he finished Paul before Felix in July 1748 he must have decided that he needed a rest. The outing he planned sounds rather like a prosperous version of the "peregrination" of fifteen years earlier. The signal could have been the armistice that was declared in May (the peace of Aix-la- Chapelle was at length concluded 18 October). He had been to Paris in 1743, just before the outbreak of hostilities, and he apparently had enjoyed himself, coming back with some feeling for the kind of painting being done there, and some sense of the popularity his engravings enjoyed. Then the war prevented both a return visit (he may have intended to carry the Marriage a la Mode paintings over himself) and the employment of some of the engravers he had hired. He may have welcomed the chance to return. Though his first trip left him with good memories of France, he hated French artists in England, and certain aspects of the French style appalled him: their houses, he remarked in an oft-quoted phrase, were "all gilt and beshit." 17 And this second trip, in 1748, coupled with the Seven Years' War, seemed to generate his notorious hatred of things French. Once the preliminaries for peace nego- tiations had been agreed upon and the passage from Dover to Calais was free, Hogarth joined with some of the artists who had previously shared in the Found- ling project (they were also St. Martin's Lane Academy people): Hayman, the sculptor Henry Cheere, Hudson, and the drapery painter (at that time shared by Hudson and Ramsay) Vanhacken. In the words of Vertue, who chronicles the episode, they "resolved and agreed to go to Paris." From Paris the majority traveled north to Flanders and Holland; but Hogarth and Hayman returned to Calais. 18 There Hogarth took out his sketchbook and drew some views of the drawbridge to the Calais gate—the old English tower fortifications. "I was santering about and observing [the people] & the gate which it seems was built by the Eng- lish when the place was in our possession (there is a fair appearance still of the arms of England upon it)." Walpole's account, written the following December, which sounds as though it was had from Hogarth himself, says he was taking a sketch of the drawbridge. Venue's account has both Hogarth and Hayman drawing. Hogarth, according to his own and Walpole's accounts, "was seized and carried to the Governor"—as a spy. "I conceild none of the memorandum I had privately taken and they being found to be only those of a painter for [my] own use it was Judged necessary only to confine me to my lodging till the wind changed for our coming away to England." In Walpole's account "he was forced to prove his vocation by producing several caricatures of the French; particu- 75
76 larly a scene of the shore with an immense piece of beef landing for the Lion d'Argent, the English inn at Calais, and several hungry friars following it. They were much diverted with his drawing, and dismissed him." It sounds as though Walpole talked to Hogarth in his studio as The Gate of Calais was unfolding on the easel, and the story grew in the telling. 19 Nichols got his account from Dr. Ducarel, who had it from the Rev. William Gostling of Canterbury, with whom Hogarth stayed the night after his return to England, and whom he regaled with the story. After being carried before the governor as a spy, and "after a very strict examination," he was "committed a prisoner to Grandsire, his landlord, on his promising that Hogarth should not go out of his house till it was to embark for England." Then Nichols adds: "The same incident, however, has been more circumstantially related by an eminent English Engraver, who was abroad when it happened." This may have been Robert Strange, who was in France between 1748 and '50, or Thomas Major, who was there between 1745 and '48. If it was Major, the story becomes more poignant, for he had himself been seized one night in October 1746 and taken to the Bastille, in reprisal for the French and Irish prisoners taken after Cul- loden, and was only released after the strenuous intercession of Le Bas and Gravelot with the Marquis d'Argenson. 20 This engraver's account, written down (and demonstrably embroidered) by Steevens, comes out as follows: While Hogarth was in France, wherever he went, he was sure to be dis- satisfied with all he saw. If an elegant circumstance, either in furniture, or the ornaments of a room, was pointed out as deserving approbation, his narrow and constant reply was, 'What then? but it is French! Their houses are all gilt and b -------- t.' 21 In the streets he was often clamorously rude. A tattered bag, or a pair of silk stockings, with holes in them, drew a torrent of imprudent language from him. In vain did my informant (who knew that many Scotch and Irish were often within hearing of these reproaches, and would rejoice at least in an opportunity of getting our Painter mobbed) ad- vise him to be more cautious in his public remarks. He laughed at all such admonition, and treated the offerer of it as a pusillanimous wretch, un- worthy of a residence in a free country, making him the butt of his ridicule for several evenings afterwards. This unreasonable pleasantry was at length completely extinguished by what happened while he was drawing the Gate at Calais; for, though the innocence of his design was rendered perfectly apparent on the testimony of other sketches he had about him, which were by no means such as could serve the purpose of an Engineer, he was told by the Commandant, 'that, had not the Peace been actually signed, he should have been obliged to have hung him up immediately on the ramparts.' Two guards were then provided, to convey him on shipboard; nor did they quit him till he was three miles from the shore. They then spun him round
Page 1 and 2: Hogarth: His Life, Art, and Times b
Page 3: 58 probably intended to correct som
Page 6 and 7: voted to the painting of Moses brou
Page 8: Mode. The viewer recognizes one fac
Page 17 and 18: 72 two plates of The Four Times of
Page 19: 74 The division must be explained a
Page 23 and 24: 78 of the print." 23 Unless he had
Page 26 and 27: early years). Hogarth's teacaddy-sh
Page 28 and 29: equipage and was very conscious—a
Page 30 and 31: stipulates that "I do hereby releas
Page 32: of troops marching to defend Englan
Page 36 and 37: painting was late in 1749. It must
Page 38 and 39: oad daylight of Finchley; the inter
Page 40 and 41: for subscribers on 3 January. The a
Page 42 and 43: pation, he was accosted by one who
Page 44 and 45: "new kind of drunkenness . .. which
Page 47 and 48: 102 also publish'd, four Prints on
Page 49: 104
Page 54 and 55: cells to the court house of the Old

Hogarth: His Life, Art, and Times

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?