The Miseries of a Portrait -Painter. 387 



It is singular that same kindness of by-standers with regard to the 

 more or less of success with which an artist has represented their 

 friend Miss A., or Mr. B. Unfortunately, it appears inseparable from 

 human nature that each individual should entertain in the privacy of 

 his own breast ideas of self not exactly tallying with those enter- 

 tained by the world. We are apt to think the opinions of our ac- 

 quaintances as regards ourselves any thing but formed in a fair and 

 just spirit ; we rate our qualifications, mind and body, at a somewhat 

 higher value than does the world. In Portrait-painting this feeling 

 is roused into sensitive activity. Sitters look on with an ill-disguised 

 anxiety throughout the progress of the work to see how they appear 

 to others. Painters know well what feeling is in question, and this im- 

 poses on them a line of conduct of considerable risk they must flatter. 

 But here arise a Scylla and Charybdis. If they flatter too much, many 

 are the confidential whisperings among the sitter's acquaintances and 

 behind his back as regards the excess of beauty or intelligence thrown 

 into the picture. " Yes, it is like," they say, " but then it is so flat- 

 tered ; I wonder Miss A. or Mr. B. does not see it ; / should not like 

 to be represented in that way." And then they speak slightingly of 

 the artist to the sitter. If Painters do not flatter enough, the sitter is 

 not excited to admiration by the work ; he coldly approves, and takes 

 the first opportunity of asking some friend or friends confidentially 

 what they think of it. Nine times out of ten the referee traces dis- 

 satisfaction in the tone of the sitter ; or, if he does not see this, he 

 thinks it incumbent on him to pay a compliment ; ad he answers, 

 " The picture is like, but then really it is a (and here comes a sort 

 of friendly hesitation) it is, in fact, too old for you. Besides, I think 

 there is a heavy look about the eyes which you have not got : and 

 indeed, I should say, that altogether it is not so happy a representa- 

 tion as I should have expected." This is enough ; the train is fired ; 

 the sitter's smothered indignation is stirred up; he questions somebody 

 else, telling the new referee what the last said, which is, in truth, 

 calling for a confirmation. His idea is confirmed ; for no visitor can 

 think of telling his host that he, the said host, has over-estimated his 

 personal appearance or his intellectuality of look ; and the conse- 

 quence is, that a week or two afterwards the painter has the pleasure 

 of hearing that all Miss A. or Mr. B.'s friends disapprove of the pic- 

 ture. Many a portrait has come back upon a painter's hands of whose 

 condemnation this is the true history. Sir Thomas Lawrence left 

 between four and five hundred unclaimed pictures behind him, 

 finished and unfinished. A large proportion of these were very pro- 

 bably returned or neglected under the above circumstances. 



We shall here bring our notice of Portrait-painting to a close, more 

 with the view of sparing the patience of the reader than under any 

 inability to extend the catalogue of annoyances. A spirit of impar- 

 tiality, however, requires us to add that it has not been here intended 

 to shield in any degree the real faults and deficiencies of portrait- 

 painters from blame. These faults and deficiencies have only been 

 kept separate from the present subject matter. They may, perhaps, 

 receive a subsequent examination. 



H, F. G. 

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