196 
CLARKSON STANFIELD, R.A. 
[Niilux-e and Art. June, 18G7. 
CLARKSON STANFIELD, R.A. 
I T is sad, perhaps ominous, to close our number with an 
obituary notice ; but the passing- away of so thorough 
a British workman as Clarkson Stanfield demands one from 
every fine-art-professing periodical. This much-loved 
gentleman died on the 18th of May, in his seventy-fourth 
year, full of years and honours, and we may almost say in 
harness, after a long season of merited popularity. He was 
a sea boy, and it were superfluous' to say more of his marine 
works than that they have for more than a quarter of a 
century been the delight of his countrymen and an honour 
to the Academy which, indeed, adopted him some time after 
the million had set their mark of approval upon him. The 
commonalty of the Far East and the New Cut had bestowed 
their s-weet - voiced tributes of joy and thanks upon 
Mr. Stanfield for some years before the dilettanti of the 
British Institution voted him prizes, or the Royal 
Academy annexed him. He was painter to the Coburg 
theatre in 1822, and there illustrated the spectacular pieces 
which made that play-house famous, and the “transpontine 
drama” an institution and a bye-word. The next year he 
painted the scenery for the Drury Lane pantomime, entitled 
“ Harlequin and the Flying Chest.” In 1824 he revelled in 
the sensational scenery demanded by “ Der Freyschutz,” and 
it is in the memory of old playgoers and professionals that 
his “ Wolf's Glen,” a “ set piece ” constructed with all the 
advantages at the disposal of the Drury Lane stage, was 
a remarkable and most successful effort. In 1825 Stanfield 
began a series of dioramas, which formed for many years 
as necessary and popular a feature of the Christmas panto- 
mimes as are the transformation scenes of our own period ; 
and we are disposed to think that the beautiful cloths on 
which the future academician displayed some of his finest 
fancies were far more artistic, if not so terrible, as the 
chemico-engineering triumphs of lime-lighted stage car- 
pentry for which our pits and galleries annually award 
to Messrs. Beverley, Cormack, Slowman, and others their 
much-desired ovations. Even now we remember with plea- 
sure one of these dioramas. It figured the progress from 
her cradle of a man of war, and Stanfield, of course, threw 
himself heartily into the work. We seem as we write to 
hear the deafening shouts of delight as the pictures 
followed each other across the Proscenium. We can 
fancy, too, how Stanfield must have treated Windsor Castle 
and Park in one year ; Alpine passes in another ; the Back- 
woods and Niagara in another ; but facts and memory help us 
when we have to speak of the glories of “ King- Arthur ” 
in 1833, for it was on the occasion of our first visit to a play 
and to the then three-and-sixpenny pit of Drury Lane that 
“ His Majesty’s Servants ” enacted to our delight “ The 
King’s Seal,” “ The King’s Word,” and “ King Arthur.” 
The bill is before us now — a thrice royal programme 
never repeated. About this time he was working for 
the Sutherland family on a noble series of Italian 
scenes which ornament their great house at Trentham. 
He was made an associate of the Royal Academy in 
1832, and member in 1835. His career as a scene 
painter was not, however, terminated by his absorption into 
the Academy ; for we remember well how he assisted the 
Covent Garden manager Maeready in a grand spectacular- 
edition of Henry V., in 1839, with the beautiful works 
“ Before and after Agincourt.” In 1842, his last the- 
atrical triumph was the “ Acis and Galatea,” scenery 
which he painted for the then director of Drury Lane, and 
which truly took the town by storm. Since that period 
Stanfield’s name has been familiar to the thousands who 
have annually flocked round his beautiful canvases on the 
walls of .the Academy. When we mention “ The Battle of 
Ischia,” “The Day after the Wreck,” “French Troops 
crossing the Magra ” — an episode of the first campaign in 
Italy; “The Battle of Roveredo,” “The Abandoned,” 
“ Wind against Tide,” “The Victory towed into Gibraltar- 
after the Battle of Trafalgar,” “ The Siege of St. Sebastian,” 
and“ The Bass Rock,” we name but a few. There is, of 
course, not a collector of any importance in the country 
who has not if possible acquired a Stanfield ; and where the 
Stanfield is, it may always be observed to bo in a place of 
honour. His “ Skirmish off Heligoland ” (No. 199 in the 
present year’s exhibition of the Royal Academy), a picture 
full of atmosphere, and painted with unrivalled delicacy, 
is evidence that the master’s faculty was strong to the last; 
and it is to be hoped that ere long our National Collection 
at Charing Cross will be enriched by some specimens of this 
admirable marine painter, if they be only to range with 
those by the gigantic Turner which already figure there. 
OLLA PODRIDA. 
Work and Play. — If there be an aggravating incident 
in this very trying world, it is assuredly that of being 
mounted on a non-progressive donkey, unarmed with any 
available whip, stick, spur, or other instrument of cruelty! 
and wholly at the mercy of a treacherous conductor, who 
pretends to belabour your beast, and only makes him kick, 
and keeps you behind your party, when you have every 
reason in the world to wish to retain your place in it. Only 
one thing is worse ; a mule which carries you through a 
whole day of weary Alpine climbing, just too far from all 
your friends to exchange more than a scream at intervals. 
If there chance on such an excursion to be ten pleasant 
people of your party,, and one unpleasant one, whom you 
particularly wish neither to follow nor seem to follow, it is 
inevitably that particular, objectionable person whose mule 
your mule will go after, and press past every one else to get 
at, and drag your arm out of its socket if you try to turn it 
back, and finally make you wish that an avalanche would 
fall and bury you and the demon-brute you have got under 
you in the abyss for ever. On horse-back you are a lord 
(or lady) of creation, with the lower animal subject unto 
you. On mule-back, or ass-baclc, you are a bale of goods, 
borne with contumely at the will of the vilest of beasts ; 
not where you please, but where, when, and how it pleases. 
— Hours of Work and Play, by Frances Power Cobbe. 
The Humour of Various Nations. — There are three 
classes of people in society,. — those who radiate spirits, 
those who reflect spirits, and those who absorb spirits. 
The Radiators are few, the Reflectors sufficiently numerous, 
but the Absorbents, alas ! nearly enough to balance them 
both. The height of the thermometer of cheerfulness at 
any social gathering might be predicted beforehand by any 
one who should carefully estimate the numbers of the 
guests to be ranked under these respective classes. Are 
there no Radiators ? Then it is as useless to gather 
Reflectors as to fill a room with mirrors and expect them to 
be bright without the introduction of lamps. Are there 
two or three Radiators ? Then Reflectors may be multiplied 
with advantage, almost ad infinitum ; and even a limited 
number of Absorbents, carefully stowed away in corners, 
will not do much harm ; but this must be managed with 
caution, for even the brightest of Radiators placed at dinner 
between two Absorbents, will often fade away, and merely 
“ twinkle, twinkle,” like a very “ little star ” indeed, for the 
rest of the evening. — Ibid. 
