SOME EMINENT VICTORIANS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 13948, 2 January 1909, Page 5 (Supplement)

SOME EMINENT VICTORIANS.

ANECDOTES OF CELEBRITIES. From a rich storehouse of experiences Mr. J. Comyns Carr has produced a book — " Some Eminent Victorians" (Duckworth and Co.)-—which .will be very widely read. Mr. Comyns Can- was on intimate terms with practically all the men celebrated in art and letters during the latter half of the Victorian age. Early in life, Mr. Carr, then a barrister, came into contact with Lord Russell of Killowen when the latter was making his name at the Bar. "Though I had seen and admired him constantly in court,' I had not been introduced to him till I met him one evening in the rooms of Mr. McConnell. Russell was always a keen card-player. ... " There were four of us present that evening, and Russell at once insisted that the tabla should be brought out for a rubber of whist. I nervously explained to him that I knew scarcely anything of the game, but my objection was curtly overborne. "By an unlucky fate, Russell cut me as partner, and the. blunders which 1 had clearly foreseen must occur, endured at first with .some semblance of equanimity,' at last ended in an explosion of rebuke that only made the more inevitable a series of even worse blunders in the game to follow. " By this time Russell had lost all patience, and, to say the truth, so had I. And, with a courage and audacity which I certainly could not have exhibited had I then known him better, I pointed out to him that the fault was his own, that I had. warned him of. my incompetence, and yet, in the face of that, confession, he had forced me to . join in the game, "To my utter amazement he became suddenly gentle and self-controlled, and said: . 'Yes,, yes, you are right. I had forgotten that. I had no business to speak to. you like that.'" . > BOSSETTr. Mr. Carr was also intimate with Dante Gabriel .nossetti. "I remember that one afternoon, as I sat,beside him while he worked, the late M". Virtue Tebbs came .in fresh from an exluuaion of old masters at Burlington House, and; full of enthusiasm for a picture, by Turner,, which he insisted that Rossetti must. speedily go and see. '".What is it called?' asked Rossetti. " 'Girls Surprised While Bathing,' replied Tebbs. • "'Umph!' returned Rossetti. 'Yes, I should think devilish surprised to see what Turner had mad© of them.' "At the simple dinners to which I was at that time hospitably bidden, Rossetti, as he sat at the head of his table, was always amusing to watch. His inability to serve any dish set before him was pathetic in its helplessness. " He would lunge at a joint as though it were a hostile foe, driving it from one end of the dish to the other, till he got it securely cornered .in its well of gravy, and ' then plunge his knife into it with something of deadly ferocity." THE HUMOUR OF BORNE-JOKES. Of another great artist, Sir Edward Bur-he; Jones, he says that he was wont to be lavish of : humorous sketches in letters to his intimate friends, "and I have one or two, supposed to illustrate A projected fresh, departure in his art, wherein, under the impulse of a new resolve, he has to abandon finally all future effort after ideal design, and, conforming to that taste of the-public which he had hitherto failed to satisfy, to embark upon a series of pictures to represent, as he told me, the homes of England. " ' I enclose a sketch,' he writes, ' for my next picture. It is a new departure, but the public must-be humoured. I have fought the fight . of . unpopularity long enough. Tell me what you think,' and accompanying this startling announcement of the fresh direction his art was to take lie enclosed, not a mere sketch, but an elaborately-finished black-and-white drawing of the first of the great series ho had p-ojected, wherein he had evidently intended to present • a typical representative of our great commercial nationa hideous being stretched in stertorous sleep upon a Victorian sofa of abominable design. "On one occasion I remember he told mo he had been to see his doctor, who had questioned him closely as to his habits as a smoker. • " 'How many cigars do you smoke a day?' he had inquired of his patient, to which Burne-Jonos had carelessly replied: "'Oh, I think about six.' "' V*ell,* replied his adviser, 'for the present you had ; better limit yourself to three.' _ -. "And in detailing the incident to me afterwards Burne-Jones added, with a chuckle: " ' You know, my dear Carr, that I never did smoke more than three.'" MILLAIS. Millais, too, was ''among the author's friends. "When the time came for the gathered exhibition of his work in the Grosvenor Gallery, I saw Millais more often and more intimately. ' " Day by day, as Halle and I were engaged in arranging the pictures upon the walls, Millais would come in, with ' his short wooden-pixie in his mouth, and wander round examining the rich record of his own career; sometimes elated to the verge of enthusiasm, and sometimes as frankly confessing his own dissatisfaction with this work or that. Taking me by the arm one day, he drew me round the room, and, pausing before the''Knight Errant,' he said : ■ ' * "' You know, Carr, as I look at these things, there are some of them which seem to say to me, "Millais, you're a. fine painter," and this is one'pointing, as he spoke, to the beautiful picture before — ' and there are others,' lie added, in tones suddenly changing from triumph to dejection, ' that tell me just as plainly, Millais, you're a. vulgar fellow." " There are a number, of good stories about Whistler, who was found by Mr. Carr to be a delightful companion. " I remember meeting, during one of the periods of narrow resources, a foreign painter who at one time had felt himself greatly favoured bv an invitation to Cheyne Walk. " I asked him if he had seen anything of Whistler lately, to which he replied : "'Ah, no; not now so much. He ask me a leetle while ago to breakfast, and I go. My cab fare two chilling, 'art-crown. I arrive, very nice. Gold fish in bowl, ver' pretty. But breakfarst—one egg, cno toast, no more! Ah, no! My cab faro, two shilling, 'arf-crown. For me'no more!" Robert Browning's appreciation of wine, save Mr. Carr, never immoderately indulged', must, • I suppose, have been inherited, " for he used to tell me a story of his father's indignation on the occasion of .his once asking for a glass of water. "'Water, Robert!' exclaimed the elder Browning, in dismay. 'For washing purposes it is, I believe, often employed, and for navigable canals I admit it to be indispensable, but for drinking, Robert, God never intended it.' Among his many stories of Tennyson, Irving, Stevenson, W. E. Henlev, and others,. Mi-.. Carr relates this little incident connected with his friendship with Mr. J. L. Toole. 1 • WITH MR. TOOLE. . On the death of his wife, Mr. Toole asked his friend to drive with him to the funeral. The comedian had already lost his son and daughter,' and was full of grief now that the last link with his domestic life was severed. And yet suddenly " a laughing light came' into those affectionate brown eyes that only a, moment before had been filled with tears. " ' I don't know why it has corn ; into my mind now, Joe,' he said; ' I suppose it ought not to, but I must tell you. I was having dinner once at Dumfries in a company of commercial travellers, and before the'covers were removed the chairman xose and said: " Mr. Macfarlane, as you are nearest the window, perhaps, you will -isk God's blessing on this feast.'" "This little incident may be taken as entirely typical of the man, typical of his absolute ' simplicity, of his total inal— to range his feelings with the ordered decorum which conventional propriety demands. In another moment he was back again .-mid the more painful memories of his life, aid within a few minutes we were on our way to the cemetery."