.

us.

Verges race, is capitally placed before On the 25th of January, 1743, he The plates will well repay an atten- offered for sale the six paintings of the tive scrutiny. The first pair of pictures" Harlot's Progress," the eight paintings were sold to the Duke of Ancaster for of the “Rake's Progress," and five other seventy-five guineas, and Sir William pictures, the "Strolling Players," and the Heathcote bought the remaining pair Four Times of the Day." The painter, for forty-six. who seldom did anything like other

66

Modern artists have realized, over and over again, more money for a single picture, than Hogarth obtained for the whole. His wit and humour, which were ever ready to flow, had induced him to issue, in addition to the conditions, a strange ticket to this sale, which was no less than "the Battle of the Pictures," an idea probably caught from Swift's "Battle of the Books," which Sir William Temple's essay had given rise to. The card is a satire on the passion for old masters, which was then prevalent. Hundreds of copies of the Bull and Europa, of Apollo and Marsyas, and of St. Andrew on the Cross, are ranked in order; and from these hostile ranks certain pictures advance and charge literally through pictures of Hogarth, which are placed in a row on the ground. All this, although some critics profess to be puzzled at it, seems to us to be merely typical of the injury which a passion for second-rate copies of the old masters was doing the native artist.

The "Strolling Players," a very cele-men, thought it incumbent upon him to brated engraving, representing a com- issue a kind of catalogue or bill, conpany of actors in a barn, dressing for taining strange conditions of sale, and the representation of a comedy, formed the public paid little attention to the the next publication; and the contrast sale at all. The paintings of the two between the dramatis persona, who "Progresses" sold at fourteen guineas, are all of the first order of heathen and twenty-two guineas each picture; deities, the Di majorum gentium, and the Rake's fetching the largest price. their representatives in the barn, is both ludicrous and satirical. Juno is sitting on an old wheelbarrow, which will serve, no doubt, as a triumphal car. Night, dressed in a spangled robe, is mending her stocking; and the Tragic Muse is cutting a cat's tail to draw a little real blood, no doubt for theatrical purposes. On a Grecian altar from which one of the attendants of Pluto has just lifted a pot of beer, is a loaf of bread, and a tobacco-pipe with smoke issuing from it. Apollo and Cupid are endeavouring to reach down a pair of stockings, which are hung upon a cloud to dry, but Cupid's wings are of no avail, and his godship is obliged to have recourse to a ladder; but the most startling is the cup-bearer of Olympus, Ganymede, who is about to cure a raging tooth" by a glass of gin. An excellent critic has well remarked, “that there is positively no end to the drollery. Into the darkest nook the artist has put meaning, and there is instruction or sarcasm in all that he has introduced!"* This wonderful picture was sold to Francis Beckford, Esq. for £27 6s. Od. The gentleman thought the price too much, and the artist returned him the money, and resold the painting to one who had more judgment or more generosity, for the same sum. It must be a source of wonder that with the name and fame which his prints brought him, that Hogarth got paid so little, so very little, for his paintings, but we must recollect that it was the fashion then, and even now until very lately, to declare that he was "no painter;" and the artist supported himself by the sale of his prints. He was soon to find at how little his pictures, now so valuable, were reckoned.

66

*The British Painters, by Allan Cunningham.

Chagrined at the result of his sale, Hogarth returned to his studio to work, and in April, 1743, advertised the series which, perhaps, reflects most honour upon him, and which from being the property of the nation, makes his name the most known. This was the celebrated "Marriage à la mode," which was published by subscription, the plates being engraved by first-rate Parisian artists, with the exception of the heads, which, in order that they might bear the very touch of the painter, were engraved by himself.

Of this work it is difficult to speak in sufficient terms of admiration. The grouping, the drawing, and the acces· sories, are alike excellent, and the tale which they tell is essentially dramatic. A pompous peer, who, by extrava

in the year 1797 for £1381. They came into the National Gallery by the bequest of Mr. Angerstein.

The pride of Hogarth was deeply wounded, nor can we wonder at it, at this neglect. He knew how the foreign singer and dancer were patronised, whilst he was neglected; and he revenged himself by a little bit of legitimate caricature upon these puppets of fashion. Two little figures, dancing and twirling about, exhibit the gracefulness and decency of the favourite amusements of the aristocracy.

46

gance and pride in building and adorning his estate, has impoverished himself, finds it necessary to recruit the income which will devolve upon his son, the viscount Squanderfelt, by marrying him to the daughter of a rich and sordid goldsmith. The bride and father are equally despised by the proud and careless young nobleman, and misery is the result. The bridegroom runs a career of vice and extravagance, and neglects his wife for the company of gamblers and courtezans. The lady, stung by this neglect, listens to the promptings of a designing lawyer, who Another work, which was intended after leading her to those empty and to teach the young, and which has been vicious frivolities of the higher classes, much admired by the staid citizens of which were then so much frequented, London, next appeared by our artist. the faro-table and the masquerade, This was Industry and Idleness," completes his villany by seduction. In wherein two apprentices to the same the very midst of their guilt, the en- master embrace different courses, and raged husband bursts in upon them, exemplify in their different endings the and after a few passes, receives a mortal wisdom and the folly of the choice. thrust from the sword of his wife's The one who is industrious marries his seducer. Nothing can be more striking master's daughter, and becomes Lord or vivid than this scene; the kneeling and horror-stricken wife, the dying man whose knees are giving way with the weakness of death, the open window through which the murderer is escaping, and the terrified valet approaching with the Watch, all tell a tale of guilt and horror which must affect the most hardened. The concluding scene is soon told, the wife dies at the house of her sordid father, who is removing her wedding-ring. She has perished by her own hand, as the empty vial testifies, and at her feet lies the last dying speech and confession of her seducer and her husband's murderer. These prints at once became popular. A drama was founded upon them, and Dr. Shebbeare interwove the scenes in a novel called the "Marriage Act;" every author since that time has, almost without exception, praised and admired them.

Mayor. The other, to use Hogarth's own words, "by giving way to idleness naturally falls into poverty, and ends fatally." The moral lesson was welcomed by the citizens of London, who hung them in the halls of their companies, for a special warning to those who were bound 'prentice. But it seems to us that the moral is imperfect: the race is not always to the strong; not every honest or industrious apprentice can hope to be so rewarded, or even after much hard work realize a competence. In this world the best are often severely tried, and in confining his rewards and punishments to mere mundane means the moralist has failed.

That old Jacobite, Simon Frazer Lord Lovat, who lived in the rudest state of regal barbarity in the Highlands, was rather foolishly betrayed into open rebellion, and expiated his treason upon Tower Hill. Hogarth met him on his way, at St. Albans, and took his likeness. A printseller offered the artist, so popular was the rebel chief, the weight of the plate in gold. The impressions could not be taken off fast enough, although the rolling press worked at them, without intermission. The plate produced, it is said, about twelve pounds a day for several weeks.

Soon after the publication of the prints, Hogarth advertised the original pictures for sale, with a bill almost as quaint as the first. But the sale was to be another failure. Mr. Lane, who purchased them, was the only one present on the day, and these six noble pictures, in frames worth four guineas each, only realised, exclusive of the frames, nineteen pounds six shillings. They are now the property of the na- The war, which had been of some tion, and the nation is justly proud of duration betwixt England and France, them. Colonel Cawthorne, who in- was concluded by a treaty at Aix-laherited them from Mr. Lane, sold them | Chapelle, and Hogarth was amongst

66

66

the "travelling English" who flocked foundation in truth. The print was over there. His visit was not of long inscribed to George II.; but when the duration, for having dared to take a proof was laid before his Majesty, he sketch of the gates of Calais, he was ar- did not quite understand the joke. rested as a spy, and conveyed back to "Does the fellow," said he, mean to England. The artist tried to avenge laugh at my guards? Take his trumhimself for this affront, by a print which pery out of my sight." The picture he termed "The Roast Beef of Old was removed, and the dedicatory inEngland." The print comes, one can scription erased; and Hogarth dediwell see, from the hands of an angry cated his print to the king of Prussia, man. It is very absurd and ridiculous, from whom he received a handsome no doubt, to be ragged and ill fed, but acknowledgment. The original paintas few people would submit to such ing was disposed of by the kind of lotunpleasant fortune if they could help it, lery which at present is known by the the satire upon these weaknesses falls name of the " Art-Union;" every purto the ground. We have now, happily, chaser of a print receiving a ticket. outlived the times when our most bitter Some chances which remained were taunt against a Frenchman was the presented to the Foundling Hospital, meagreness of his diet. Upon this and one of these latter tickets carried vulgar prejudice, Hogarth's print hinges; away the prize. This plan was more it is not worth description. In the beneficial to the painter than his sales: year 1751, he presented to the Found-"a lottery," he observed, "is the only ling Hospital a picture of "The Find- chance a living painter has of being ing of Moses," which is perhaps the paid for his time." "Beer Street," and best of his serious works. This paint- Gin Lane," two works, one of which ing, with others presented by other ar- has, no doubt, great admirers amongst tists to the same Institution, used to be the temperance societies, next appeared. exhibited for the benefit of the Found-Their logic is weaker than their execulings,-a proceeding which gave rise to tion. The imbibers of beer are very the present Royal Acadamy. Hogarth joyous, pleasant people; the gin drinkwas the earliest and amongst the largest ers are no doubt copied from nature, of these who, by their paintings, thus and amongst them, the only being who contributed to so deserving and meri- thrives is the pawnbroker. torious a charity. The next works of tional prints, called "France" and "Engour artist were, "The Four Stages of land" followed; and ridiculed the fear Cruelty," which are revolting in the which was then as now, (and probably extreme; and a ludicrous picture of the ever since the Dauphin landed at DoMarch of the Guards to Finchley." ver, in King John's reign,) very prevaPrince Charles Edward, the darling of lent, namely, of the French invasion. Scottish minstrelsy, and the hope of a Both pictures belong properly to hisgreat portion of the then British nation, toric caricature, and both are in their had began a successful campaign by way overloaded. The French soldier one or two bold strokes, and was ad- in the first print, who has spitted five vancing upon London. The guards of frogs upon his sword, and is roasting the Hanoverian prince, who occupied them at a bivouac fire, was a popular the throne, are advancing to meet him; element in national ridicule, which and the drunken and reeling rout of would now be scouted at Astley's, or the soldiers do not badly represent the lower theatres, whereat highly coloured terror which spread over all parts of the nautical dramas are popular. Some community. In the gossiping pages of scenes called The Cockpit," followed Horace Walpole, we shall find the true this pair of prints, and are broad safeeling of the country concerning this tires upon that cruel sport. The satire advance of the Chevalier, and in the fell harmlessly. Lords and gentlemen, papers of Fielding's Covent Garden as well as blacklegs and butchers, conJournal, we find the fear and alarm tinued to indulge for years after, in the visibly depicted. Hogarth has probably noble sport of "cocking." The next highly caricatured the scene he beheld, series was "The Election," in four but the drunken panic and disorder, the plates. The bribery and corruption of hurried march, the carousing and swag- such a scene had, perhaps, never been gering, and thorough carelessness of placed so prominently before the eyes of discipline, had, without doubt, some the world. To the polling, the lame,

66

Two na

blind, dead, and deaf, are earried up to treatment, and the prints and illustrarecord a vote for one or the other mem tions which accompanied it, were not ber. A doctor by the side of a sick left untouched. Hogarth, who seems man, has him borne along to vote for a to have had like most great men in his favourite client. This incident is a art, a considerable share of vanity, was fact, and is related of Dr. Barrowby. not undisturbed by these attacks; he The patient expired at the hustings. had endeavoured the work of a giant— The fourth scene is the " Chairing of to fix the principles of taste, and he the Member," who resembles in his failed, yet his book has its merits, and person the celebrated Bubb Doddington, it has been highly commended by a raised to the peerage by the title of president of the Royal Academy, Sir Lord Melcombe Regis. He is seated in Benjamin West, whose judgment was a chair, raised aloft by four brawny con- vastly superior to his powers as a stituents. The pictures are full of ex-painter. pression and life, and are finely painted, In 1759, Hogarth, about to discontinue merely to speak of their mechanical painting, determined to enter into comexecution. Foes mingle, however, in petition with a painting said to be by his cortège, but a blow from a flail Correggio. His wife, who was a very prostrates one of his bearers, and is handsome woman, supplied the model, about to overthrow the member. The and the artist produced his " Sigispictures are now in the museum of Sir munda." The picture was painted for John Soane, which he bequeathed to the Sir Robert Grosvenor, but the gentlenation; whilst looking on them, and man refused the picture, when it was remembering recent scenes of bribery completed, and it remained on Hogarth's and riot in our own days, the reader hands. The answer of Sir Robert was, will sigh to think how little we have besides this, unmanly and insulting, for politically improved, since the days age was growing upon Hogarth, and a when Hogarth published the election refusal should not be coupled with insoscenes of the honourable and immacu- lence; he refused the picture because, late member for Guzzledown. David he writes, "the performance is so strikGarrick bought these excellent pictures ing and inimitable, that constantly for £200.

Of these Wilkes and Churchill were the bitterest, and those who made their anger the most felt. Hogarth in a print called the "Times," published in 1762, when he was sixty-five years old, ridiculed the opponents of the Ministry and the friends of Wilkes, as agitators.

having it before one's eyes, would be too The time now came when Hogarth often occasioning melancholy ideas to was to come forward as an author; that arise in one's mind, which a curtain's is to say, for it has been denied that the being drawn before it would not dimibook was written by him, he published nish in the least." The artist gave no a book called the "Analysis of Beauty," answer to the insult, and the picture, a work containing many new notions as we have said, remained on his hands, on his art, and only probably interest- attacked and laughed at by all his ing to artists. The chief point on enemies. which it insists, being in the undulating line, called the line of beauty and grace, and which Hogarth had some time before introduced upon his palette in his own portrait. Of this line, he claims to be the discoverer, and asserts with truth, that nothing beautiful in nature is stiff or angular, the line of Wilkes, although not included in this grace being found in the undulating political caricature, wrote a furious hills, in the shape of the flower, and in North Briton attack (in number 17 of the beauty of man and woman, bird his paper) on "the King's Sergeant and beast. With one or two exceptions, Painter, William Hogarth," in which such as the leaves of the holly, the thistle, he accused him of being a vain, greedy and the various cacti, this is true, but and treacherous hanger-on, of a corrupt some denied the discovery, and asserted court. Hogarth replied with his pencil, that the principle was known to Michael and the print of Wilkes, which we have Angelo. A book from so universal a before described, appeared, and was satirist as Hogarth, was sure to be as- sold by thousands. Wilkes felt now sailed, and assailed it was by writers the sting of the satirist, and Churchill from Wilkes to Walpole. Every part the poet, who appears to have been of the work came in for a share of rough sincerely attached to the demagogue,