580 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1960 



from West Point late in January of that year, they were almost 

 certainly painted in 1839. One ("Sawing Wood'') must have been 

 a genre piece; the other four were landscapes. In October 1841, the 

 Apollo Gallery had one of his paintings for sale ("View on the Hud- 

 son, near West Point"). Eastman's first period, devoted ahnost en- 

 tirely to landscape, may be said to close at this point. 



Possibly among the paintings just mentioned were two pictures 

 found in St. Louis a decade later. An account contributed to the 

 Missouri Kepublican (May 2, 1848) described them as — 



full of the beauties of this accomplished artist; they form so many studies of 

 foliage, and rock; so completely and laboriously, and with so much taste has 

 nature been followed in her teachings. The views are of the falls opposite West 

 Point, a bit of exquisite wood and water scenery scarcely to be equalled in the 

 country, and known in times of yore, as the bath, and favorite resort, of Fanny 

 Kemble * * • 



The pictures are of that form of landscape, in which nearly all the canvas Is 

 taken up by the foreground, leaving only a glimpse of the sky, and giving but 

 little chance for the careless and idle mode of painting which is so common when 

 masses of foliage or rock are introduced. If not painted on the spot, (and we 

 suppose they were, from their apparent accuracy,) they are at least the tran- 

 script of drawings so correct, that the botanic names of nearly every tree Intro- 

 duced, from the painting of the bark, and leaves, and branches, could be easily 

 indicated ; the rocks possess a form that indicates to you their exact geological 

 relations • ♦ * The figures of females bathing in one piece, and the solitary 

 heron, a shy and distant bird, in the other, determine and mark the seclusion 

 and privacy of the scene ; and the cool tone through the pictures, with the dis- 

 position of shades and shadows, indicate the full noon of a sultry day overhead, 

 but no sunbeams have reached the seclusion of this wooded recess ♦ • * 



The • * • two landscapes, painted some years since, are in the style of color- 

 ing common in England from the time of Gainsborough to that of Turner ♦ • ♦ 



None of the paintings shown during these years at the National 

 Academy of Design and the Apollo Gallery can be positively identified 

 with extant work. However, we must certainly include among them 

 the very pleasing oil "View of the Highlands, from West Point" 

 (pi. 1), owned by Dr. and Mrs. Hermann Warner Williams, Jr. 

 Several watercolors illustrate other views that took the painter's 

 eye : "Constitution Island and Foundry from West Point, N. Y.," in 

 the collection of the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and "View from Fort 

 Clinton, West Point" belonging to Dr. and Mrs. Williams. 



During his long tenure at the Academy Eastman was twice pro- 

 moted — to lieutenant on November 14, 1836, and to captain on Novem- 

 ber 12, 1839. In 1835 he married 17-year-old Mary Henderson, 

 daughter of Dr. Thomas Henderson, army surgeon from Virginia. 



II. ON THE FRONTIER, 1840-50 



For the next 10 years Eastman sketched and painted in many parts 

 of the United States and became interested in studying and recording 



